sincere men, who have a bad conscience, were afraid of them- selves and sought to anticipate me with this book and snatcji the glory in advance, a^id thus injure my reputation, as is usual with men of this spirit. But since Carlstadt is going to come out against me, and this book, with its mixture of lies and truth, is published anonymously, it must be over- come and swallowed up by patience, lest I should seem to be seeking glory or revenge, and lest, in writing about our own affairs, we fall into mere contention, and the chief cause of the* controversy be lost sight of. The writing of such books teaches nothing and does no good; its only purpose is to win glory and to work on the common herd, which is quite character- istic of Carlstadt. I should like nothing better than to pre- pare such a book, but in the end Christ will judge His own cause. I, too, must bear with my Absalom.* Farewell.
Martin Luther.
640. DUKE GEORGE OF SAXONY TO ERASMUS. Gcss, i, 753. Leipsic (between October 3 and 8),* 1524.
Kind greetings, learned Erasmus. We have received your letter,* with the book On the Free Will, and since you await our criticism of it, we cannot but confess that it pleases us greatly, and we do not doubt that it will be a permanent con- tribution to the glory and the good of th^ Church. But what kind of fruit it will bear among our opponents we cannot yet be sure, for we fear that they will have hardened their ears and will not listen to the voice of the snake-charmer; they say, too, that they have answered it perfectly already. But the cause is safe, because the discussion of this matter does not depend upon them. But in order that you may know that our criticism is sincere, we are sending you with this a copy of this Luther's book On Monastic Vows, He has written this unspeakable book in German also, and it is wonderful how many souls he has caused to stumble and driven out of the monasteries into the brothels. We are sending it to you in order that some help may be given to these people and
^Cf. II Samuel xviii. A suggestion of lingering personal regard for Carlstadt ' Between these dates George is known to have been in Leipsic, where the letter was written. C/. Gess, /. c. n. x.
- Supra, no. 634.
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