their hearts, and hath put down princes from their thrones" (Luke 1:51, 52) and as St. Peter writes,
"Deus superbis resistit" (1 Pet. 5:5). The proud and haughty, whether he be pope, emperor, king,
prince, nobleman, citizen, or peasant, will be humbled, and come to a bitter end. The chapter of
Naumburg elected a bishop who would have been bound by obedience to the pope to persecute the
gospel, "to worship the devil," and to let the pope, the archbishop of Mainz, and their courtiers rule
and ruin at pleasure. The papists have been playing this game for more than twenty years. It is high
time to stop it. He who rules in heaven and also here in our hearts turns the wise into fools, and
"taketh the wise in their craftiness" (1 Cor. 3:19).
This is the spirit and language of this apologetic Tract. It was followed by a still fiercer
attack upon popery as an invention of the Devil" (1545).
Amsdorf was forced upon the chapter and the people by the Elector, but lost his bishopric
in the Smalcaldian War (1547), took a leading and ultra-Lutheran part in the bitter theological
controversies which followed, and died at Eisenach, 1565, in his eighty-second year. His ephemeral
episcopate was, of course, a mere superintendency.
Several of Luther’s friends and pupils were appointed superintendents; as Lauterbach at
Pirna (d. 1569); Heidenreich, or Heiderich, at Torgau (d. 1572), who with Mathesius, Dietrich,
Weller, and others, preserved his "table spice" (condimenta mensae), as they called his familiar
conversations.
The appointment of these superintendents was in the hands of the prince as summus episcopus
over his territory. The congregations had not even the power of electing their own pastors.^713
In the cities the magistrate assumed the episcopal power, and appointed the superintendents.
The further development of the episcopal, territorial, and collegial system in the Lutheran
Church lies beyond our limits.
§ 87. Relation of Church and State.
In January, 1523, Luther published a remarkable book on the civil magistrate, dedicated to
Prince John, in which he proved from Rom. 13:1 and 1 Pet. 2:13 the duty to obey the civil magistrate,
and from Acts 5:29 the duty to obey God more than man.^714 On the ground of Christ’s word, Matt.
22:21, which contains the wisest answer to an embarrassing question, he drew a sharp distinction
between the secular and spiritual power, and reproved the pope and bishops for meddling with
secular affairs, and the princes and nobles for meddling with spiritual matters. It sounds almost like
a prophetic anticipation of the American separation of church and state when he says: —
"God has ordained two governments among the children of Adam, the reign of God
under Christ, and the reign of the world under the civil magistrate, each with its own laws
and rights. The laws of the reign of the world extend no further than body and goods and
the external affairs on earth. But over the soul God can and will allow no one to rule but(^713) "Die Gemeinde," says Friedberg, l.c., p. 61, "tritt bei dieser Organisation ganz zurück. Sie ist der ’Pöbel,’ der unter der Zucht des
Wortes und der Polizei des Kirchenregimentes steht ... Eine Mitwirkung an der Handhabung der Kirchenzucht findet sich nur in den
Kirchenordnungen, wo reformirte Einflüsse bemerkbar sind."
(^714) Von weltlicher Obrigkeit, wie weit man ihr Gehorsam schuldig sei. Erl. ed. XXII. 59-105.