History of the Reformation in the Sixteenth Century Volume III Part 20

CHAPTER IV.

Persecution--Exertions of Duke George--The Convent at Antwerp--Miltenberg--The Three Monks of Antwerp--The Scaffold--The Martyrs of Brussels.

[Sidenote: PERSECUTION.]

The torrent of fire poured forth by the humble and meek Adrian kindled a conflagration; and its flickering flames communicated an immense agitation to the whole of Christendom. The persecution, which had been for some time relaxed, broke out afresh. Luther trembled for Germany, and endeavoured to appease the storm. "If the princes," said he, "oppose the truth, the result will be a confusion that will destroy princes and magistrates, priests and people. I fear to see all Germany erelong deluged with blood.[298] Let us rise up as a wall and preserve our people from the wrath of our G.o.d. Nations are not such now as they have hitherto been.[299] The sword of civil war is impending over the heads of our kings. They are resolved to destroy Luther; but Luther is resolved to save them. Christ lives and reigns; and I shall live and reign with him."[300]

[298] Ut videar mihi videre Germaniam in sanguine natare. L. Epp. ii.

156.

[299] Cogitent populos non esse tales medo, quales hactenus fuerunt.

Ibid. 157.

[300] Christus meus vivit et regnat, et ego vivam et regnabe. Ibid.

158.

These words produced no effect; Rome was hastening onward to scaffolds and to bloodshed. The Reformation, like Jesus Christ, did not come to bring peace, but a sword. Persecution was necessary in G.o.d's purposes.

As certain objects are hardened in the fire, to protect them from the influence of the atmosphere, so the fiery trial was intended to protect the evangelical truth from the influence of the world. But the fire did still more than this: it served, as in the primitive times of Christianity, to kindle in men's hearts a universal enthusiasm for a cause so furiously persecuted. When man begins to know the truth, he feels a holy indignation against injustice and violence. A heaven-descended instinct impels him to the side of the oppressed; and at the same time the faith of the martyrs exalts, wins, and leads him to that doctrine which imparts such courage and tranquillity.

[Sidenote: DUKE GEORGE'S EXERTIONS.]

Duke George took the lead in the persecution. But it was a little thing to carry it on in his own states only; he desired, above all, that it should devastate electoral Saxony, that focus of heresy, and spared no labour to move the Elector Frederick and Duke John.

"Merchants from Saxony," he wrote to them from Nuremberg, "relate strange things about that country, and such as are opposed to the honour of G.o.d and of the saints: they take the sacrament of the Lord's Supper with their hands!......The bread and wine are consecrated _in the language of the people_; Christ's blood is put into common vessels; and at Eulenburg, a man to insult the priest entered the church riding on an a.s.s!......Accordingly, what is the consequence?

The mines with which G.o.d had enriched Saxony have failed since the innovating sermons of Luther. Would to G.o.d that those who boast of having uplifted the Gospel in the electorate had rather carried it to Constantinople. Luther's strain is sweet and pleasing, but there is a poisoned tail, that stings like that of the scorpion. Let us now prepare for the conflict! Let us imprison these apostate monks and impious priests; and that too without delay, for our hair is turning gray as well as our beards, and shows us that we have but short time left for action."[301]

[301] Wie ihre Bart und Haare ausweisen. Seckend. p. 482.

Thus wrote Duke George to the elector. The latter replied firmly but mildly, that any one who committed a crime in his states would meet with due punishment; but that for what concerned the conscience, such things must be left to G.o.d.[302]

[302] Musse man solche Dinge Gott uberla.s.sen. Ibid. p. 485.

[Sidenote: THE ANTWERP CONVENT.]

George, unable to persuade Frederick, hastened to persecute the followers of the work he detested. He imprisoned the monks and priests who followed Luther; he recalled the students belonging to his states from the universities which the Reformation had reached; and ordered that all the copies of the New Testament in the vulgar tongue should be given up to the magistrates. The same measures were enforced in Austria, Wurtemberg, and the duchy of Brunswick.

But it was in the Low Countries, under the immediate authority of Charles V., that the persecution broke out with greatest violence. The Augustine convent at Antwerp was filled with monks who had welcomed the truths of the Gospel. Many of the brethren had pa.s.sed some time at Wittemberg, and since 1519, salvation by grace had been preached in their church with great energy. The prior, James Probst, a man of ardent temperament, and Melchior Mirisch, who was remarkable, on the other hand, for his ability and prudence, were arrested and taken to Brussels about the close of the year 1521. They were brought before Aleander, Glapio, and several other prelates. Taken by surprise, confounded, and alarmed, Probst retracted. Melchior Mirisch found means to pacify his judges; he escaped both from recantation and condemnation.

These persecutions did not alarm the monks who remained in the convent at Antwerp. They continued to preach the Gospel with power. The people crowded to hear them, and the church of the Augustines in that city was found too small, as had been the case with the one at Wittemberg.

In October 1522, the storm that was muttering over their heads burst forth; the convent was closed, and the monks thrown into prison and condemned to death.[303] A few of them managed to escape. Some women, forgetting the timidity of their s.e.x, dragged one of them (Henry Zuphten) from the hands of the executioners.[304] Three young monks, Henry Voes, John Esch, and Lambert Thorn, escaped for a time the search of the inquisitors. All the sacred vessels of the convent were sold; the gates were barricaded; the holy sacrament was removed, as if from a polluted spot; Margaret, the governor of the Low Countries, solemnly received it into the church of the Holy Virgin;[305] orders were given that not one stone should be left upon another of that heretical monastery; and many citizens and women who had joyfully listened to the Gospel were thrown into prison.[306]

[303] Zum Tode verurtheilet. Seck. p. 548.

[304] Quomodo mulieres vi Henric.u.m liberarint. L. Epp. ii. 265.

[305] Susceptum honorifice a domina Margareta. L. Epp. ii. 265.

[306] Cives aliquos, et mulieres vexatae et punitae. Ibid.

Luther was filled with sorrow on hearing this news. "The cause that we defend," said he, "is no longer a mere game; it will have blood, it calls for our lives."[307]

[307] Et vitam exiget et sanguinem. Ibid. 181.

[Sidenote: MIRISCH AND PROBST.]

Mirisch and Probst were to meet with very different fates. The prudent Mirisch soon became the docile instrument of Rome, and the agent of the imperial decrees against the partisans of the Reformation.[308]

Probst, on the contrary, having escaped from the hands of the inquisitors, wept over his backsliding; he retracted his retractation, and boldly preached at Bruges in Flanders the doctrines he had abjured. Being again arrested and thrown into prison at Brussels, his death seemed inevitable.[309] A Franciscan took pity on him, and a.s.sisted his escape; and Probst, "preserved by a miracle of G.o.d," says Luther, reached Wittemberg, where his twofold deliverance filled the hearts of the friends to the Reformation with joy.[310]

[308] Est executor Caesaris contra nostros. Ibid. 207.

[309] Domo captum, exustum credimus. Ibid. 214.

[310] Jacobus, Dei miraculo liberatus, qui nunc agit n.o.bisc.u.m. L. Epp.

ii. 182. This letter, placed in M. de Wette's collection, under the date of April 14, must be posterior to the month of June; since on the 26th of June Luther writes that Probst has been taken a second time and is going to be burnt. We cannot admit that Probst visited Wittemberg between his two imprisonments, for Luther would not have said of a Christian, who had saved his life by a recantation, that he had been delivered by a miracle of G.o.d. Perhaps we should read in the date of the letter _in die S. Turiafi_, instead of _in die S.

Tiburtii_, which would bring it down to the 13th of July,--a far more probable date in my opinion.

[Sidenote: MILTENBERG.]

On all sides the Roman priests were under arms. The city of Miltenberg on the Maine, which belonged to the Archbishop of Mentz, was one of the German towns that had received the Word of G.o.d with the greatest eagerness. The inhabitants were much attached to their pastor John Draco, one of the most enlightened men of his times. He was compelled to leave the city; but the Roman ecclesiastics were frightened, and withdrew at the same time, fearing the vengeance of the people. One evangelical deacon alone remained to comfort their hearts. At the same time troops from Mentz marched into the city: they spread through the streets, uttering blasphemies, brandishing their swords, and giving themselves up to debauchery.[311]

[311] So sie doch schandlicher leben denn Huren und Buben. L. Epp. ii.

482.

Some evangelical Christians fell beneath their blows;[312] others were seized and thrown into dungeons; the Romish rites were restored; the reading of the Bible was prohibited; and the inhabitants were forbidden to speak of the Gospel, even in the most private meetings.

On the entrance of the troops, the deacon had taken refuge in the house of a poor widow. He was denounced to their commanders, who sent a soldier to apprehend him. The humble deacon, hearing the hasty steps of the soldier who sought his life, quietly waited for him, and just as the door of the chamber was opened abruptly, he went forward meekly, and cordially embracing him, said: "I welcome thee, brother; here I am; plunge thy sword into my bosom."[313] The fierce soldier, in astonishment, let his sword fall from his hands, and protected the pious evangelist from any further harm.

[312] Schlug etliche Todt. Seck. p. 604.

[313] Sey gegrusst, mein Bruder. Scultet. Ann. i. 173.

[Sidenote: THE THREE MONKS OF ANTWERP.]

Meantime, the inquisitors of the Low Countries, thirsting for blood, scoured the country, searching everywhere for the young Augustines who had escaped from the Antwerp persecution. Esch, Voes, and Lambert were at last discovered, put in chains, and led to Brussels. Egmonda.n.u.s, Hochstraten, and several other inquisitors, summoned them into their presence. "Do you retract your a.s.sertion," asked Hochstraten, "that the priest has not the power to forgive sins, and that it belongs to G.o.d alone?" He then proceeded to enumerate other evangelical doctrines which they were called upon to abjure. "No! we will retract nothing,"

exclaimed Esch and Voes firmly; "we will not deny the Word of G.o.d; we will rather die for the faith."

THE INQUISITOR.--"Confess that you have been seduced by Luther."

THE YOUNG AUGUSTINES.--"As the apostles were seduced by Jesus Christ."

THE INQUISITORS.--"We declare you to be heretics, worthy of being burnt alive, and we give you over to the secular arm."

Lambert kept silence; the prospect of death terrified him; distress and doubt tormented his soul. "I beg four days," said he with a stifled voice. He was led back to prison. As soon as this delay had expired, Esch and Voes were solemnly deprived of their sacerdotal character, and given over to the council of the governor of the Low Countries. The council delivered them, fettered, to the executioner.

Hochstraten and three other inquisitors accompanied them to the stake.[314]

[314] Facta est haec res Bruxellae in publico foro. L. Epp. ii. 361.

When they came near the scaffold, the youthful martyrs looked at it calmly; their firmness, their piety, their age,[315] drew tears even from the inquisitors. When they were bound, the confessors approached them: "Once more we ask you if you will receive the christian faith."