and fall into the serious error of giving me too much credit, as if I were absorbed in God’s cause.
This high opinion of yours confounds and racks me, when I see myself insensible, hardened, sunk
in idleness, alas! seldom in prayer, and not venting one groan over God’s Church. My unsubdued
flesh burns me with devouring fire. In short, I who ought to be eaten up with the spirit, am devoured
by the flesh, by luxury, indolence, idleness, somnolence. Is it that God has turned away from me,
because you no longer pray for me? You must take my place; you, richer in God’s gifts, and more
acceptable in his sight. Here, a week has passed away since I put pen to paper, since I have prayed
or studied, either vexed by fleshly cares, or by other temptations. If things do not improve, I will
go to Erfurt without concealment; there you will see me, or I you, for I must consult physicians or
surgeons. Perhaps the Lord troubles me so much in order to draw me from this wilderness before
the public."^415
Notwithstanding his complaints of illness and depression, and assaults from the evil spirit,
he took the liveliest interest in the events of the day, and was anxious to descend to the arena of
conflict. He kept writing letters, books, and pamphlets, and sent them into the world. His literary
activity during those few months is truly astounding, and contrasts strangely with his repeated
lament that he had to sit idle at Patmos, and would rather be burned in the service of God than
stagnate there.
He had few books in the Wartburg. He studied the Greek and Hebrew Scriptures very
diligently;^416 he depended for news on the letters of his friends at Wittenberg; and for his writings,
on the resources of his genius.
He continued his great Latin commentary on the Psalms, dwelling most carefully on Psalm
22 with reference to the crucifixion, and wrote special expositions of Psalms 68 and 37. He completed
his book on the Magnificat of the Holy Virgin, in which he still expresses his full belief in her
sinlessness, even her immaculate conception. He attacked auricular confession, which was now
used as a potent power against the reading of Protestant books, and dedicated the tract to Sickingen
(June 1). He resumed his sermons on the Gospels and Epistles of the church year (Kirchenpostille),
which were afterwards finished by friends, and became one of the most popular books of devotion
in Germany. He declared it once the best book he ever wrote, one which even the Papists liked.^417
He replied in Latin to Latomus, a Louvain theologian. He attacked in Latin and German the doctrine
of the mass, which is the very heart of Roman Catholic worship, and monastic vows, the foundation
of the monastic system. He dedicated the book against vows to his father who had objected to his
becoming a monk.
He also dealt an effectual blow at Cardinal Albrecht of Mainz, who had exposed in Halle
a collection of nearly nine thousand wondrous relies (including the manna in the wilderness, the
burning bush of Moses, and jars from the wedding at Cana) to the view of pilgrims, with the promise
of a "surpassing" indulgence for attendance and a charitable contribution to the Collegiate Church.
Luther disregarded the fact that his own pious Elector had arranged a similar exhibition in Wittenberg
only a few years before, and prepared a fierce protest against the "Idol of Indulgences" (October,
1521). Spalatin and the Elector protested against the publication, but he wrote to Spalatin: "I will
not put up with it. I will rather lose you and the prince himself, and every living being. If I have
(^415) De Wette, II. 21 sq.
(^416) "Bibliam Graecam et Hebraicam lego." To Spalatin, May 14 (De Wette, II. 6).
(^417) See Preface to the St. Louis ed. of Walch, XI. (1882), p. 1 sqq., and Köstlin, I. 486-489.