88 Readings in European History to us or at least let us know where he may be captured. In the meanwhile you shall keep him closely imprisoned until you receive notice from us what further to do, according to the direction of the laws. And for such holy and pious work we will indemnify you for your trouble and expense. 28. In like manner you shall proceed against his friends, adherents, patrons, maintainers, abettors, sympathizers, emu- lators, and followers. And the property of these, whether personal or real, you shall, in virtue of the sacred ordinances and of our imperial ban and over-ban, treat in this way; namely, you shall attack and overthrow its possessors and wrest their property from them and transfer it to your own custody and uses ; and no one shall hinder or impede these measures, unless the owner shall abandon his unrighteous way and secure papal absolution. No one to 29. Consequently we command you, each and all, under print, sell, t h e penalities already prescribed, that henceforth no one Luther's shall dare to buy, sell, read, preserve, copy, print, or cause writings. to be copied or printed, any books of the aforesaid Martin Luther, condemned by our holy father the pope as afore- said, or any other writings in German or Latin hitherto composed by him, since they are foul, harmful, suspected, and published by a notorious and stiffnecked heretic. Nei- ther shall any dare to approve his opinions, nor to proclaim, defend, or assert them, in any other way that human inge- nuity can invent, notwithstanding he may have put some good in them to deceive the simple man. • •*••••••••• 38. And in order that all this may be done and credit given to this document, we have sealed it with our imperial seal, which has been affixed in our imperial city of Worms, on the eighth day of May, after the birth of Christ 1521, in the second year of our reign over the Roman Empire, and over our other lands the sixth. 1 By our lord the emperor's own command. 1 The German version of the edict is given by Walch, Luthers Werke, Vol. XV, columns 2264 sqq. There are two Latin versions, seem- ingly independent translations from the German, and both attributed to
