Grace and peace in Christ Jesus our Lord. My beloved Spalatin has showed me your letter to him, and surely I have read it with joy, my dear Brenz, seeing the grace of God through Christ His Son, which dwells in you who faithfully keep and purely teach the Word of God in the midst of that wicked and perverse nation.^ Blessed be God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ Who permits me amidst the many ills by which I am surrounded, to see some brethren who are the true and legitimate seed of Israel; except for them there are nothing but furious and raging monsters everywhere. We have been cherishing Carlstadt in our bosom with all kindness in the hope that he might return to the true way; but the miserable man is more hardened every day, though cowardice compels him to be silent. He still holds fast even to his Touto* though it is repudiated even by his own friends. So great is God's wrath if one once assails His Word. I pray Christ to keep you and your brethren with us in His own purity and simplicity until the day of His glory. Amen.
Your Spalatin has got this letter out of me (though I was quite willing to write it) in order that I might make your acquaintance, if only by writing letters, for by the grace of God we are already of one spirit and one mind. Do you and you^; brethren pray that Christ may make this joy full and permanent in us. Bugenhagen sends you greetings. He is my only companion, since all the rest have fled because of the plague. Commend us, and especially me, a miserable sinner, to your church, for Satan has been let loose upon me and is trying in secret to take Christ from me, now that he sees that he can take nothing from me publicly, as regards the profession of the Word. I wonder what sort of man Zwingli is. He is ignorant of grammar and logic, to say nothing of the other arts, and yet he ventures to boast of victories. That kind of glory hastens quickly to confusion. Farewell to you, my dearest joy and my crown in Christ our Master and Lord, and to all the brethren.
Very sincerely your brother, Martin Luther.
- A reference to the prevalence of Zwinglian views In South Germany.
- I.e., his intcrpreUtion of the Words of Institution of the Lord's Supper,
supra, no. 728.
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