of the gospel.^561 He called upon the magistrates to "stab, kill, and strangle" them like mad dogs.
He who dies in defence of the government dies a blessed death, and is a true martyr before God.
A pious Christian should rather suffer a hundred deaths than yield a hair of the demands of the
peasants.^562
So fierce were Luther’s words, that he had to defend himself in a public letter to the
chancellor of Mansfeld (June or July, 1525). He did not, however, retract his position. "My little
book," he said, "shall stand, though the whole world should stumble at it." He repeated the most
offensive passages, even in stronger language, and declared that it was useless to reason with rebels,
except by the fist and the sword.^563
Cruel as this conduct appears to every friend of the poor peasants, it would he unjust to
regard it as an accommodation, and to derive it from selfish considerations. It was his sincere
conviction of duty to the magistrate in temporal matters, and to the cause of the Reformation which
was threatened with destruction.
Defeat of the Rebellion.
The advice of the Reformer was only too well executed by the exasperated princes, both
Protestant and Roman Catholic, who now made common cause against the common foe. The
peasants, badly armed, poorly led, and divided among themselves, were utterly defeated by the
troops of the Landgrave Philip of Hesse, Duke Henry of Brunswick, the Elector Jolin, and the
Dukes George and John of Saxony. In the decisive battle at Frankenhausen, May 25, 1525, five
thousand slain lay on the field and in the streets; three hundred were beheaded before the court-house.
Münzer fled, but was taken prisoner, tortured, and executed. The peasants in South Germany, in
the Alsace and Lorraine, met with the same defeat by the imperial troops and the forces of the
electors of the Palatinate and Treves, and by treachery. In the castle of Zabern, in the Alsace (May
17), eighteen thousand peasants fell. In the Tyrol and Salzburg, the rebellion lasted longest, and
was put down in part by arbitration.
The number of victims of war far exceeded a hundred thousand.^564 The surviving rebels
were beheaded or mutilated. Their widows and orphans were left destitute. Over a thousand castles
and convents lay in ashes, hundreds of villages were burnt to the ground, the cattle killed, agricultural
implements destroyed, and whole districts turned into a wilderness. "Never," said Luther, after the
end of the war, "has the aspect of Germany been more deplorable than now."^565
(^561) Kurzum, eitel Teufelswerk treiben sie, und insonderheit ists der Erzteufel, der zu Mühlhausen regiert [Münzer],und nichts denn
Raub, Mord, Blutvergiessen anricht, wie denn Christus von ihm sagt, Joh. 8:44, dass er sei ein Mörder von Anbeginn."Erl. ed., XXIV.
288.
(^562) "Darum, lieben Herren, löset hie, rettet hie, erbarmet euch der armen Leute [i.e., not the peasants, but the poor people deluded by
them]; steche, schlage, würge hie wer da kann. Bleibst du darüber todt: wohl dir, seliglicheren Tod kannst du nimmermehr überkommen.
Denn du stirbst im Gehorsam göttlichs Worts und Befehls, Rom. 13:1." ... "So bitte ich nun, fliche von den Bauern wer da kann, als vom
Teufel selbst."Ibid., xxiv. 294. In his explanatory tract, p. 307, this passage is repeated more strongly."Der halsstarrigen, verstockten,
verblendeten Bauern erbarme sich nur niemand, sondern haue, steche, würge, schlage drein, als unter die tollen Hunde, wer da kann
und wie er kann. Und das alles, auf dass man sich derjenigen erbarme, die durch solche Bauern verderbt, verjagt und verführt werden,
dass man Fried und Sicherheit erhalte."
(^563) Ibid., 298, 303, 307. See preceding note.
(^564) Bishop Georg of Speier estimated the number of the killed at a hundred and fifty thousand. This does not include those who were
made prisoners, beheaded, and hanged, or dreadfully mutilated. A hangman in the district of Würzburg boasted that he had executed by
the sword three hundred and fifty in one month. Margrave George of Brandenburg had to remind his brother Casimir, that, unless he
spared some peasants, they would have nothing to live on. Janssen, II. 563.
(^565) Letter of Aug. 16, 1525, to Brismann (in De Wette, III. 22): "Rusticorum res quievit ubique, caesis ad centum millia, tot orphanis
factis, reliquis vero in vita sic spoliatis, ut Germaniae facies miserior nunquam fuerit. Ita saeviunt victores, ut impleant suas iniquitates."