Page:Luther's correspondence and other contemporary letters 1521-1530.djvu/446

 letter, enclosing the Dirge for Diirer.^ Thus you have an- ticipated me, and written me before I answered your first letter, which I had certainly not expected. I had put it where I could see it, so that I would be sure to answer it by the first available messenger. It is indeed a pious duty to grieve over Dtirer, who was a most excellent man; but it was also right for you to call him happy, as one whom, well-prepared and by a blessed death, Christ has taken out of these times that are so turbulent and likely to become even more turbulent, so that he, who was worthy to see only the best things, might not be compelled to look upon the worst. May he rest in peace with his fathers. Amen. . ..

. . . There is no news here to send to your market-place, for Nuremberg is almost the very eyes and ears of Germany, seeing and hearing everything, much of which never reaches us. Greet your dear hind and her dear little fawns. The Lord's blessing upon you. We bless you in the name of the Lord.

Mart. Lutherus.

7^. LUTHER TO WENZEL LINK AT NUREMBERG. Enders, vi, 263. (WrrrENBERG), May 12, 1526.

Grace and peace. I congratulate you, my dear Wenzel, on the birth of your second daughter, and on the new love and joy that has come into your heart. May Christ bless you and make you happy and keep you all well.

From other places I am getting many letters about the Ana- baptists, but here, thank God ! there is peace. Carlstadt is still what he was, or, rather, he is more stubborn than ever, but he is compelled to keep silence. I think you have seen my Antifanaticum* and the theses on the second marriage of bishops.* The constancy which the Anabaptists show when dying I think to be like that which Augustine relates of the Donatists, and Josephus of the Jews at the destruction of Jerusalem. There is no doubt that many of these cases are only the raging of Satan, especially when they die blaspheming

^Epicedion in funere Atberti Dureri, a copy of which Hess sent also to I<ang April 20. Durer died April 6.


 * Antischwermerum, i.e., the Von Abendmahi ChrisH Bekenntms.


 * Weimar, xxri, 51 off.

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