S44 LUTHER'S CORRESPONDENCE AND Let afi^
turn to the writings of the ancient Fathers, either to defend themselves or to attack Luther. . . .
282. MELANCHTHON TO JOHN HESS. Corpus Reforntatorum, i. 208. Wittenberg, August i (1520).
Hail, sweetest Hess ! You will learn from the letters of Luther and Schleupner how others bear your perpetual silence ... I believe you must have received Luther's answer and mine to your last letters which you sent by the priest . . .
I know no news. Thank God Martin is yet alive; and do you pray that he may live long, for he is the one champion of divinity. A few days ago Cardinal Riario* wrote our illustrious Elector Frederic urging him with prayers and threats to bind Luther. The elector answered craftily; you know the Ulysses of persuasion. . . .
283. LUTHER TO SPALATIN.
Greeting. I have not written for some time, waiting for the agitation which friends have put you in to die down. I am not pleased with Amsdorf's excessive affection for the other side. The students never suffered what the citizens did, but they don't care for that, thinking only of their own inconveniences. But enough .of them. All speak of my abuse, but none of them is right. It is nothing to me if my authoriO declines. If every scolding is abuse, none has sinned mo^ than the prophets. But in our time we are unaccustomed t^ hear truth distasteful to us. ^
Hatred is vexing Leipsic, which in the person of Alveld :^ acting a tragedy. Even if my trumpet-blast* will meet th approval of none, yet it must meet my approval, as a neces^ sary attack on the tyranny of the Roman Antichrist whc^ destroys the souls of the whole world. It is very sharp an<^ vehement, so that I hope it will make even those languid little ' evil-speakers gasp. I will not answer Alveld,* but he will be
»C/. Smith, 74f.
This name was applied by Lang to Luther's Address to the German NobiHty, Smith, p. 86. SWho had recently published a Tract on Communion; cf. Lcmmens, 52.
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