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Luther quitted the Wartburg March 1, 1522, after having previously paid a secret visit to Wittenberg between December 3 and 11. He now made his appearance at the birthplace of the Evangel in order to recommence his vigorous and incisive sermons, which had become imperatively necessary for his cause.

The action of Carlstadt, even more than that of the “Prophets of the Kingdom of God,” who had come over from Zwickau, called for his presence in order that he might resist their attacks. In his absence the Mass had already been forcibly abolished, sermons had been preached against confession and infant baptism, and the destruction of the images had commenced. Like Luther himself, those who incited the people to these proceedings, appealed on the one hand to the plain testimony of Holy Scripture as the source of their inspiration, and on the other to direct illumination from above.

Infant baptism, argued the Zwickauers, was not taught in Holy Scripture, but was opposed to the actual words of the Saviour: “He that believes and is baptised.” The “prophets” met, however, with little encouragement. Carlstadt had not yet taken their side either in this matter or in their pseudo-mysticism.

Against the Elector, Carlstadt, however, appealed expressly, as Luther had done, to his duty of proclaiming the understanding of the Bible which he had been granted.

“Woe to me,” he cried with the Apostle St. Paul, “if I do not preach” (1 Cor. ix. 16). He declared that the diversions arose merely from the fact that all did not follow Holy Scripture; but he, at least, obeyed it and death itself would not shift him from this firm foundation; he would remain “firmly grounded on the Word of God.” In demanding the removal of the images he cried: “God’s voice says briefly and clearly in Scripture: ‘Thou shalt not adore them nor serve them’; and hence it is useless to argue: ‘I do not worship the images, I do not honour them for their own sake, but on account of the Saints whom they represent.’ ”

Carlstadt, it is true, also suggested that it was for “the supreme secular power to decree and effect the removal of the abuse.”[239] When occasion arose he also advised “proceeding without causing a tumult and without giving the foes cause for calumny.” That was his advice,[240] but most of those who thought as he did were little disposed to wait until the authorities, or the “priests of Baal themselves, removed their vessels and idols.”

The first step towards liturgical change in Wittenberg was, however, taken by Melanchthon when, September 29, 1521, he and his pupils received the Sacrament in the Parish Church, the words of institution being spoken aloud and the cup being passed to the laity, because Christ had so ordained it. A few days later the Augustinians, particularly Gabriel Zwilling, commenced active steps against the Mass as a sacrifice, ceasing to say it any longer. Melanchthon and the Augustinians knew that in this they had Luther’s sympathy. As those who agreed with Luther followed Melanchthon’s example concerning the Mass and the Supper, and ceased to take any part in the Catholic Mass, introducing preachers of their own instead, a new order of Divine worship was soon the result. “Alongside of the congregation with the old Popish rites rose the new evangelical community.”[241] But here Carlstadt stepped forward and gave a new turn to events; he was determined not to see the followers of the Gospel left in a corner, and without delay he set about altering the principal service at Wittenberg, which was still celebrated in accordance with Catholic usage, so as to bring it into agreement with the “institution of Christ.” This new service was first celebrated at Christmas, 1521. Those portions which express the sacrificial character of the Mass were omitted, and a new Communion service introduced instead, the laity partaking of the chalice and the words of institution being spoken aloud. Confession was not required of the communicants. The novelty and the ease of receiving communion attracted crowds to the new ritual, which was first held in All Saints’ Church, then in the parish church, and was subsequently introduced by his followers, such as Zwilling, for instance, in the neighbouring parishes.

Great disorders occurred at the very first service of this sort.

Many communicated after eating and drinking freely. In January, 1522, a noisy rabble forced its way into the church at Wittenberg, destroyed all altars, and the statues of the saints, and cast them, together with the clergy, into the street.

The Elector and his Councillors, for instance Hieronymus Schurf, were very angry with the business and with the “pseudo-prophets,” i.e. Carlstadt and his followers; the Zwickauers, who, as a matter of fact constituted an even greater source of danger, held back on this occasion.

Melanchthon, then at Wittenberg, inclined to the belief that the Zwickauers were possessed by a higher spirit, but it was, he thought, for Luther to determine the nature of this spirit. The prophets, on the other hand, argued that Luther was certainly right in most he said and did, though not always, and that another, having a higher spirit, would take his place.

The purer and more profound view of the Evangel upon which they secretly prided themselves was a consequence of their eminently reasonable opposition to Luther’s altogether outward doctrine of justification and the state of grace. To them the idea of a purely mechanical covering over of our sinfulness by the imputation of Christ’s merits, seemed totally inadequate. They wanted to be in a more living communion with Christ, and having once seceded from the Church, they arrived by the path of pseudo-mysticism at the delusion of a direct intercourse with the other world; thereby, however, they brought a danger on the field, viz. religious radicalism and political revolution. “It seems to me a very suspicious circumstance,” so Luther writes of the Zwickau prophets, “that they should boast of speaking face to face with the Divine Majesty.”[242]

Luther, after his period of study at the Wartburg, had at once to define and prove his position, particularly as he disapproved of much of the doctrines of Carlstadt’s party, as well as of his over-hasty action. Without delay, he mounted the pulpit at Wittenberg and staked all the powers of his personality and eloquence against the movement; he was unwilling that the whole work of the Evangel which had begun should end in chaos. In a course of eight sermons he traced back the disorders to “a misapprehension of Christian freedom.” It grieved him deeply, he declared, that, without his order, so much was being altered instead of proceeding cautiously and allowing the faith to mature first. “Follow me,” he cried, “I have never yet failed; I was the first whom God set to work on this plan; I cannot escape from God, but must remain so long as it pleases my Lord God; I was also the first to whom God gave the revelation to preach and proclaim this His Word to you. I am also well assured that you have the pure Word of God.”[243]

What he says is, however, rather spoilt by a dangerous admission. “Should there be anyone who has something better to offer and to whom more has been revealed than to me, I am ready to submit to him my sense and reason and not to force my opinion upon him, but to obey him.”[244] He, of course, felt that he could convict the so-called “fanatics” of error, and was sure beforehand that his professed readiness to submit to others would not endanger his position. His whole cause depended on the maintenance of outward order and his own authority at Wittenberg; he knew, moreover, that he was backed by the Elector.

His success against his adversaries, who, to tell the truth, were no match for him, was complete. Wittenberg was saved from the danger of open adherence to “fanaticism,” though the movement was still to give Luther much trouble secretly at Wittenberg and more openly elsewhere, particularly as Carlstadt, in his disappointment, came more and more after 1522 to make common cause with the Zwickauers.[245]

The success of his efforts against the fanatics secured for Luther the favour of his Ruler and his protection against the consequences of his outlawry by the Empire. Luther was thus enabled to carry on his work as professor and preacher at Wittenberg in defiance of the Emperor and the Empire; from thence, till the very end of his life, he was able, unmolested, to spread abroad, with the help of the Press, his ideas of ecclesiastical revolution.

In view of the movement just described, and of others of a like nature, he published towards the close of his Patmos sojourn the work entitled “A True Admonition to all Spirits to Avoid Riot and Revolt.”[246] This, however, did not prevent him shortly after from furthering the idea of the use of force with all his habitual incautious violence in the tract “Against the Falsely-called Spiritual Estate of the Pope and the Bishops” (1522),[247] in which, in language the effect of which upon the masses it was impossible to gauge, he incites the people to overthrow the existing Church government.

“Better were it,” he cries in the latter work, “that all bishops were put to death, and all foundations and convents rooted out, than that one soul should suffer. What then must we say when all souls are lost for the sake of vain mummery and idols? Of what use are they but to live in pleasure on the sweat and toil of others and to hinder the Word of God?” A revolt against such tyrants could not, he says, be wicked; its cause would not be the Word of God, but their own obstinate disobedience and rebellion against God. “What better do they deserve than to be stamped out by a great revolt? Such a thing, should it occur, would only give cause for laughter, as the Divine Wisdom says, Proverbs i. 25–26: ‘You have despised all my counsel and have neglected my reprehensions. I also will laugh in your destruction.’ ”[248]

Expressing similar sentiments, the so-called “Bull of Reformation,” comprised in the last-mentioned tract, has it that “all who assist in any way, or venture life or limb, goods or honour in the enterprise of destroying bishoprics and exterminating episcopal rule, are dear children of God and true Christians. … On the other hand all who hold with the rule of the bishops … are the devil’s own servants.”[249] Such is the teaching of “Ecclesiastes, by the Grace of God,” as Luther calls himself here and frequently elsewhere. They must listen to him; the bishops, for the sake of their idol the Pope, abused, condemned and consigned to the flames him and his noble cause, refusing either to listen to or to answer him, but now he will, so he says, “put on his horns and risk his head for his master,” in defiance of the “idolatrous, licentious, shameless, accursed seducers and wolves.”

As a demolisher Luther proved himself great and strong. Was he an equally good builder?

The decisive question of how to proceed to the construction of a new ecclesiastical system seems to have been scarcely considered at all by Luther, either at the Wartburg, or even for some time after his return. His mind was full of one idea, viz. how best to fight the Church of Antichrist. He had no real conception of the Church which might have assisted him in an attempt to plan out a new system; his notion of the Church was altogether too dim and indefinite to serve as the basis of a new organisation. Even to-day Protestant theologians and historians are unable to tell us with any sort of unanimity how his ideas of the Church are to be understood; this holds good of him throughout life, but most of all during the earliest days of Protestantism, when the first attempts were made to consolidate it.

One of the most recent explorers in the field of the history of theology in those years, H. Hermelink, concludes a paper on the subject with the words: “Let us hope that we Protestant theologians may gradually reach some agreement concerning Luther’s idea of the Church and concerning the Reformer’s plans for the reorganisation of the Church.”[250]

K. Rieker, K. Sohm, W. Köhler, Karl Müller, P. Drews, Fr. Loofs and many others who have recently devoted themselves to these studies which have aroused so much interest in our day, all differ more or less from each other in their views on the subject.

The fact must not be forgotten that the Apocalyptic tendency of Luther’s mind at that time prevented his dwelling on matters of practical organisation. The reign of Antichrist at Rome seemed to him to portend the end of the world. Apocalyptic influences oppressed him, particularly in the years 1522 and 1523, and we find their traces at intervals even afterwards, for instance, in the years following 1527 and just before his death;[251] in each case they were due to outward and interior “trials.” In the first crisis, at the commencement of the third decade of the sixteenth century, his false eschatology, based on an erroneous understanding of the Bible, led him, for instance, to anticipate the coming of the Last Day in 1524, in consequence of a remarkable conjunction of the planets which was confidently expected to bring about a deluge. His sermon on the 2nd Sunday in Advent fixes the year 1524 as the latest on which this event could occur.[252]

In his work “To the Nobility on the Improving of the Christian State,” Luther still took it for granted that the Emperor, Princes and influential laity would forcibly rescue Christendom from the state of corruption in which it was sunk, and that after Christendom had accepted the evangel, the pre-existing order of things would continue very much as before under a reformed episcopate; should the bishops refuse to come over to the Gospel, plenty “idle parsons” would be found to take their place. As a matter of fact, he had no clear idea in his mind regarding the future shaping of affairs.

At the Diet of Worms it became evident that his fantastic dreams were not to be realised, for the Empire, instead of welcoming him, proclaimed him an outlaw. Luther, accordingly, trusting to his mystical ideas, now persuaded himself that his cause and the reorganisation of Christendom would be undertaken by Christ alone.

In the Wartburg Luther received the fullest and most definite assurance that the temporal powers who were opposed to him at Worms would submit themselves in these latter days to the Word which he preached, and that the weakening of the Church’s authority which had been begun had not proceeded nearly far enough. It was revealed to him that his work was yet at its beginning and that there yet remained to be established new communities of Christians sharing his views. Hence we find him writing to Frederick, his Elector, on March 7, 1522: “The spiritual tyranny has been weakened, to do which has been the sole aim of my writings; now I perceive that God wills to carry it still further as He did with Jerusalem and its twofold government. I have recently learnt that not only the spiritual but also the temporal power must give way to the Evangel, willingly or unwillingly; this is plainly shown in all the Bible narratives.”[253] With the Bible in his hand he seeks to prove, from the passages relating to the end of the world, and the reign of Antichrist, that, before the end of all, Christ will overthrow the anti-Christian powers by the “breath of His mouth.”

“It is the mouth of Christ which must do this.” “Now may I and everyone who speaks the word of Christ freely boast that his mouth is the mouth of Christ.” “Another man, one whom the Papists cannot see, is driving the wheel, and therefore they attribute it all to us, but they shall yet be convinced of it.”[254]

Meanwhile some practical action was necessary, for, as yet, the Evangelicals formed only small groups and unorganised congregations which might at any time drift apart, whilst elsewhere they were scattered among the masses, almost unnoticed and utterly powerless. The mere attacking of Popery was not sufficient to consolidate them. The “meetings” of those who had been touched by the “Word,” Gospel-preaching and a new liturgy, did not suffice. The further growth and permanent organisation of the congregations Luther hoped to see effected by the help of the authorities, by the Town-councillors, who were to play so great a part later, and, better still, by the Princes whom he expected to win over to the new teaching as he had already done in the case of Frederick, the Elector of Saxony. It is true he would have preferred the setting up of churches to have been the work of the newly converted Faithful, i.e. to have taken place from below upwards. Those who had been converted by the Gospel, “the troubled consciences” as he calls them, who were united in faith and charity, were ever to form the nucleus around which he would fain have seen everywhere the congregations growing, without the intervention of the worldly power. The force of circumstances, however, even from the commencement, compelled him to fall back on the authorities.

In short, the ideas he advanced concerning organisation were, not only various, but frequently contradictory. His favourite idea, to which we shall return later, of a community of perfect Christians was utterly incapable of realisation. “To maintain within the Congregation a more select company forming a corporation apart was hardly feasible in the long run.”[255] At the back of his various plans was always the persuasion that the power of the Gospel would in the end do its own work and reveal the right way for the building up of a new organisation, just as of its own power it had shattered the edifice of Antichrist. Instead of searching for the link connecting his discordant utterances, as Protestant[256] theologians have been at pains to do, it will be more practical and more in accordance with history to present them here in disconnected groups. For any lack of clearness which may be the result Luther must be held responsible.

In one and the same work, shortly after his visit to Wittenberg from the Wartburg, the destruction of the Papacy is depicted first as the result of the action of the governments (who accordingly are bound to provide a new, even if only temporary, organisation), then as taking place through no human agency and without a single blow being struck.[257] In writing thus, he was the plaything of those “states of excitement” which constitute a marked feature of his “religious psychology.”[258] Luther was then aware of the threatening movement at Wittenberg and elsewhere, and attempted to stem it with the assurance that the kingdom of Antichrist was already crumbling to pieces; he does not, however, omit to point to the governments as the real agents of which Christ was to make use to achieve the victory: “Hearken to the government; so long as it does not interfere and give the command, keep your hands, your mouth and your heart quiet and say and do nothing. But if you are in a position to move the authorities to intervene and to give the order, you may do so.”[259]

It would seem from all this as though he expected the help necessary for the change of faith to come solely from those in authority, an opinion which he had expressed in his pamphlet to the nobility, the Princes and the gentry; the secular power after making its “submission” to the Evangel was to do all that was required in the interests of the Evangel; it was its duty to see that uniformity prevailed in the “true worship” throughout its dominions, to watch over the public services and exclude false worship. But whether the “Kingdom of God was to be introduced by the Princes, or to rise up spontaneously from the Christian Congregation, he does not clearly state.”[260] From 1522 to 1525 he frequently speaks as though it were to proceed solely from the congregation, which by reason of the common priesthood of its members was possessed of the necessary qualifications.

In any case, we may gather the following regarding Church organisation: no outward government, no power or legislative authority exists in the Church itself; on earth there is but one outward authority, viz. the secular; the Church lives only by the Word of God and supports and governs itself by this alone.

If legislation and external authority were called for in the Church, then this would have to be borrowed from the State, or, as Rudolf Sohm expresses it: “If legislation and judicial authority were needed in the Church of Christ, then, according to Luther’s principles, the government of the Church would have to be set up by the ruler of the land.” For, according to Luther, the authority of the Church is intended merely to foster piety,[261] and a spiritual governing authority would result in compulsion and simply make people “impious.” “The ecclesiastical authority to rule of the parson, i.e. his teaching office, is not a legal power.” In his treatise on canon law, Sohm is one of the principal supporters of this principle.[262] To judge from the praise bestowed upon him by Hermelink, he had “penetrated deeply into Luther’s thought,” and “on the whole saw things in a right light,” although he was possibly too fond of simplifying them in the interests of a system.[263] It is perfectly true that in Sohm and other Protestant Canonists, the contradictions in Luther’s opinions are left in the background; Luther’s views of the formation of congregations having their own rights and their own authority, which appear side by side with his other schemes, receive, as a rule, little attention.

In any case, Luther at that time made use of “every artifice to prove that it was the right of each individual Christian to judge of the preaching of the Gospel and of the avoiding of false prophets.”[264]

In those early days Luther was so full of the ideal of the congregation that, in order to support it, he even appeals to the natural law. In order to save souls every congregation, government or individual has by nature the right to make every effort to drive away the wolves, i.e. the clergy of Antichrist; no apathy can be permitted where it is a question of eternal salvation; the alleged rights and the handed-down possessions of the foes, on which they base their corruptive influence, must not be spared: “We must not fall upon and seize the temporal possessions of others, above all not of our superiors—except where it is a question of doctrine and the salvation of souls; but if the Gospel is not preached, the spiritual authorities have no right to the revenues.”[265] “According to Luther,” says Hermelink, “the authorities of Altenburg had a perfect right to drive away the Provost and his people from Altenburg as ravening wolves”; they were only to wait “a little” to see whether the monks would hold their tongues or perhaps even preach the pure Gospel. When thereupon Luther cries: “Their authority is at an end, abrogated by God Himself, if it be in conflict with the Gospel,”[266] Hermelink admits the presence of a certain “antagonism between the right of each individual Christian and the common law of society.”

Luther, however, generally prefers to give expression to other less violent thoughts anent the building up of the congregations to be formed from the Church of Antichrist.

The holy Brotherhood of the Spirit, he says in his idealistic way, was to arise, knowing no constraint but only charity, and having a ministry (“ministerium”), but no “power.”[267] “The freedom of the Spirit which must reign, makes things which are merely corporal and earthly, indifferent and not necessary.” “All things are indifferent and free (‘omnia sunt indifferentia et libera’).” “Paul demands the preservation of unity, but this is unity of the spirit, not of place, of persons, of things or of bodies.”[268] We here again note the advent of that mysticism which had formerly dragged him down to the depths of a passive indifference. How these pseudo-mystical ideas were to further the building up of the new ecclesiastical system it is hard to understand.

The Brotherhood, however, is not intended to introduce an altogether new ecclesiastical system. We are simply “Christians,” the true Christians, members of the Churches which have always existed, but purified from a thousand years of deformation. “To create sects is stupid and useless”;[269] according to Luther, it is not even necessary for the task of uniting under the Christian name, before the end of the world, all the faithful and the pious consciences elected from the Kingdom of Antichrist.

At that time he wished all his followers to be known simply as “Christians”; and in the first days of the Protestant Churches he very frequently makes use of this term.[270] Even at a later date he was loath to hear them called after himself, in spite of his practical action to the contrary, because they “share with the rest the common teaching of Christ.”[271] The term “Evangelicals” does not appear to have been much in use in Luther’s immediate surroundings.[272] As “Christians” and “Evangelicals” they had not left the “Church,” indeed, Luther always insists on the fact that it was they who really constituted and represented the “Church.” According to the Augsburg Confession in 1530 they belonged to the Catholic Church; they wished to define their position rather as that of a party within the Church, fighting for its existence, a party which accepted the Church’s recognised articles of belief, sheltered itself under the testimony of recognised Catholic authorities, and which had merely introduced certain innovations for the removal of the abuses which had crept in.[273]

Although, according to Luther, the inward organisation of the Brotherhood referred to above was a matter of indifference, and the approaching end of the world admonished him to suffer and wait to see what Christ willed to do with it, yet we read in other passages of his writings that it is necessary to work and to make great efforts to provide every city with a bishop or elder to preach the Gospel; “every Christian” is bound to help towards this end, both by personal exertion and with his goods, and more particularly the secular power, the authorities, whose duty it is to protect the pious. Those who are now already parsons may, indeed must, at once “withdraw from their obedience, seeing that they promised obedience to the devil and not to God.”[274]

This is certainly “something more than passive suffering and waiting for the end.”[275]

The apostasy of the clergy, which had begun, made the question of definite, external organisation a pressing one, for the new preachers and the clergy who were coming over had, after all, to be responsible to someone and had also to be maintained; it was also necessary that they and their followers should receive external recognition for their Churches and extricate themselves from the numerous ties which united so closely the spiritual with the secular in Catholic life. The appointment of pastors and the representation of the faithful by them was one of the factors which called for further organisation of the Churches: another factor, as we may notice in the case of Wittenberg, was the manner of celebrating the Supper. It was, as a matter of fact, the trouble at Wittenberg under Carlstadt which impelled Luther to take into serious consideration the establishment of an independent ecclesiastical organisation in that town, and which called for a definite system of appointing the Lutheran pastors even elsewhere, so as to prevent Carlstadt’s followers from getting the upper hand throughout the country.

After Luther had set aside Carlstadt’s innovations at Wittenberg, with the approval of the Elector who had forbidden them, he appointed the celebration of the Supper for those of the new faith at Wittenberg on the lines previously followed by Melanchthon; the communion became the principal part of the ceremony, the offertory was omitted and the words of consecration were spoken aloud either with or without certain of the prayers of the Mass. Thus the abuses introduced by Carlstadt were, in his opinion, removed, and the swarms of worldly minded and fanatical nominal Christians, “Christian in name but almost heathen at heart,” were no longer brought in contact with the true Evangelicals; the employment of force towards those weak in the faith, whose convictions Luther did not consider ripe for the purely congregational ritual of Carlstadt, was also put an end to. All the external forms which had been introduced, and to which, Luther feared, the people would have clung in an unevangelical fashion as had formerly been the case in Popery, were removed.

In order more particularly to avoid any compromising abuse of the Sacrament of the Altar, Luther sought to establish a Christian congregation in which confession should exist, though not as a compulsory practice, and in which a certain supervision was exercised.

In order to proceed cautiously and in accordance with the Elector’s ideas, he refrained from directing the bestowal of the chalice in the order of Divine Service drawn up for the use of his followers; at any rate, this was the case at Easter, 1522, though in the autumn of that same year the chalice was again in general use.[276] In spite of this, up to 1523, a special form of communion with the cup was in use for true Evangelical believers, who were subject to a special form of supervision. This arrangement agreed with Luther’s idea of an “Assembly of true Christians,” on which he was to enlarge in 1523 in his Maundy-Thursday sermon (see below). The special communion was, it is true, speedily abandoned, but the idea of the select Assembly ever remained dear to him.[277]

The other factor which called even more urgently for internal organisation was the appointment of pastors.

The induction of new pastors could not well take place independently of the authorities, indeed, it imperatively demanded their co-operation. At Wittenberg the later alteration in the liturgy and the final prohibition of the Mass, after it had been insisted on by Luther, was carried out by a threatening mob with the connivance of the Government.[278] Yet, in spite of the impossibility of dispensing with the secular power, until 1525, Luther was for various reasons more inclined to the Congregational ideal, which was less subject to Government interference.

This congregational ideal tended to promote his plan of an “Assembly of true Christians.”

In the newly erected congregations the “true believers,” according to what Luther repeatedly says, formed the nucleus. It is to these that he appeals in his instructions in 1523 (“iis qui credunt, hæc scribimus”); “those whose hearts God has touched are to meet together,” so he says, in order to choose a “bishop,” i.e. “a minister or pastor.” Even though the congregation numbers only half a dozen, yet they will draw after them others “who have not yet received the Word”; the half a dozen, though but a handful and perhaps not distinguished by piety, so long as they do not live as obstinate and open sinners, are the real representatives of the true Church at their home. They must also rest assured, that if in their choice they have prayed to God for enlightenment, they “will be moved, and not act of themselves (‘vos agi in hac causa, non agere’).” “That Christ acts through them is quite certain (‘plane certum’).”[279] “Hence even a small minority of the truly pious among the congregation possess not only the right but also the duty to act; for to stand by and let things take their course is contrary to the faith.”[280] The election derives its “true validity solely from the half-dozen.”[281] Of any election by the remaining members of the congregation or of any action of the magistracy Luther says nothing whatever; he is speaking only to those within the body of the congregation whose hearts God has touched.

The above thoughts find their first expression in the writing “De instituendis ministris ecclesiæ,” which Luther sent to the Utraquists or Calixtines of Prague.[282]

The Utraquists of Bohemia acknowledged the Primacy of the Holy See and obeyed the Catholic Hierarchy, though certain Lutheran tendencies prevailed amongst them, which, however, had been grossly exaggerated by Cahera, who informed Luther of the fact; Cahera even represented the greater part of the Council of Prague as predisposed in Luther’s favour, which was certainly not true. In instructing the burghers, and more particularly the Council of Prague, how to proceed in founding congregations of their own by means of elections, Luther was also thinking of Germany, and above all of Saxony. This explains why, without delay, he had the Latin writing published also in German.

To the people of Prague he wrote that those whose hearts God had touched were to assemble in the city for the election. They were first to remind themselves in prayer that the Lord had promised that where two or three were gathered together in His name, there He would be in the midst of them; then they were to select capable persons for the clerical state and the ministry of the Word, who were then to officiate in the name of all; these were then to lay their hands on the best amongst them (“potiores inter vos”), thus confirming them, after which they might be presented to “the people and the Church or congregation as bishops, servants or pastors, Amen.” “It all depends on your making the venture in the Lord, then the Lord will be with you.” In the congregations scattered throughout the land the faithful were to proceed in like manner, firing others by their example; if they were few in number, there was all the more reason why they should make the venture. But as all was to be done spontaneously and under the influence of the Spirit of God, such Councils as were favourably disposed were not to exercise any constraint. He, too, for his own part, merely gave “advice and exhortation.”[283] Where a large number of congregations had appointed their “ministers” in this way, then these latter might, if they so desired, meet to elect Superintendents who would make the visitation of their Churches, “until Bohemia finally returns to the legitimate and evangelical Archiepiscopate.”

At about that same time, in a writing intended for the congregation at Leisnig, Luther expressed his views on the congregational Churches to be established by the people. The confusion of his mind is no less apparent in this work; under the influence of his idealism he fails to perceive the endless practical difficulties inherent in his scheme, and above all the impossibility of establishing any real congregation when every member had a right to criticise the preacher and to interpret Scripture according to his own mind.[284]

He here assumes that the liberty to preach the Word, and likewise the right of judging doctrines, is part of the common priesthood of Christians. Whoever preaches publicly can only do this “as the deputy and minister of the others,” i.e. of the whole body.[285] The congregation must see that no one seduces them with the doctrines of men, and therefore no one may be a preacher except by their choice. Where there is no bishop to provide for them, who holds Christian and evangelical views, they are themselves to give the call to the right preacher; but if they catch him erring in his doctrine, then anyone may get up and correct him, so long as “all done is done decently and in order.”[286] For St. Paul says concerning those who speak during Divine Worship [St. Paul is really alluding to the charismata of the early Christians], “If anything be revealed to another sitting, let the first hold his peace” (1 Cor. xiv. 30). “Indeed, a Christian has such authority that he might well rise up and teach uncalled even in the midst of the Christians. … For this reason, that necessity knows no law.” Therefore to preserve the purity of the evangelical teaching, “every man may come forward, stand up and teach, to the best of his ability.”[287]

The experience with the fanatics which speedily followed was calculated to dispel such platonic ideas. Luther does not appear to have asked himself on which side the “Christian congregation” and the Church was to be sought when dissensions, doctrinal or other, at that period inevitable, should have riven the fold in twain. The “Christian congregation” he teaches—merely restating the difficulty—“is most surely to be recognised where the pure Gospel is preached. … From the Gospel we may tell where Christ stands with His army.”[288]

How bold the edifice was which he had planned in the evangelical Churches is plain from other statements contained in the writing addressed to the Leisnig Assembly.

The president was indeed to preside, but all the members were to rule. “Whoever is chosen for the office of preacher is thereby raised to the most exalted office in Christendom; he is then authorised to baptise, to say Mass and to hold the cure of souls.”[289] Yet he is subject both to the community and to every member of it. “In the world the masters command what they please and their servants obey. But amongst you, Christ says, it shall not be so; amongst Christians each one is judge of the other, and in his turn subject to the rest.”[290]

He might say what he pleased against the abuses of the old Church, such systematic disorder never prevailed within her as that each one should teach as he pleased and even correct the preacher publicly, or that the Demos should be acknowledged as supreme. It is in vain that, in the writing above referred to, he mocks at this city set on a hill, with her firmly established hierarchy, saying: “Bishops and Councils determine and settle what they please, but where we have God’s Word on our side it is for us to decide what is right or wrong and not for them, and they shall yield to us and obey our word.”[291] We may well explain the saying “to obey our word” by Luther’s own eloquent paraphrase: “Pay no heed to the commandments of men, law, tradition, custom, usage and so forth, whether established by Pope or Emperor, Prince or Bishop, whether observed by half the world or by the whole, whether in force for one year or for a thousand!” “Obey our word!” For we declare that we have the “Word of God on our side.”[292]

The new congregations will, in spite of their own and every member’s freedom to teach, agree with Luther, so he assures them with the most astounding confidence, because “his mouth is the mouth of Christ,” and because he knows that his word is not his, but Christ’s. We must emphasise the fact, that here we have the key to many of the strange trains of thought already met with in Luther, and also a proof of the endurance of his unpractical ultra-spiritualism.

Luther, in fact, declares that he had “not merely received his teaching from heaven, but on behalf of one who had more power in his little finger than a thousand popes, kings, princes and doctors.”[293] Before receiving his enlightenment he had had to learn what was meant by being “born of God, dying often and surviving the pains of hell.”[294] Whoever differed from him, as the fanatics did, had not been through such an experience. “Wouldst thou know where, when and how we are vouchsafed the divine communications? When that which is written takes place: ‘As a lion, so hath He broken all my bones’ (Isa. xxxviii. 13). … God’s Majesty cannot speak in confidence with the old man without previously slaying. … The dreams and visions of the saints are dreadful.”[295] Such was the mysticism of the Wartburg.