Page:Luther's correspondence and other contemporary letters 1521-1530.djvu/508

 we might be glad to be out of it and yet be unable to get out. Any such disaster would be intolerable and we would ten times rather be dead than have it on our consciences that our Gospel had become, through any fault of ours, the cause of bloodshed or of harm. It is our lot to be the sufferers, and, as the prophet says,* to be "counted as sheep for the slaughter," and not to avenge ourselves or defend ourselves, but give place to the wrath of God.*

That this course puts your Grace in danger, does no harm. Our Lord Christ is strong enough and can readily find ways and means to keep this danger from injuring your Grace. He can destroy the thoughts of the ungodly princes." For it is our opinion that this undertaking of the Emperor's is only a threat of Satan's which will be powerless and will contribute in the end to the downfall of pur opponents; though, to be sure, Qirist takes ways — and it is right and proper — to test us and see whether we take His Word seriously, whether we hold it to be sure and certain truth, or not. If we really wish to be Christians and have eternal life yonder, we can have no better way than the way our Lord Himself had and all the saints, nay, the way He still has. Christ must always bear the Cross; the world will not bear it, but lays it upon Him, and we Christians, too, must bear it so that it may never be empty. Your Grace has borne it well heretofore, both in the time of the great uprising * and in the face of great trials — envy, hatred and the many evil wiles of friend and foe. God has always helped your Grace and given your Grace courage, and has not left your Grace comfortless, either in body or in soul, but has graciously revealed and broken up and put to shame all the wiles and snares of the devil, and He will not make it hard for us in the future if we believe and pray. We know for certain that our cause is not our own but God's Himself, and the manifest help that He has given us has proved it. That is our comfort and our confidence, and because of it He has shown Himself a true Father, and has taken up and de- fended His own cause in such wise that we must confess it would have been beyond our ability and power, and we


 * Psalm xUv, xx. 'Ptalm xxxiii, lo.

'Romans xu» 19. «The Peasants' War.

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