Pine Needles Part 26

"But I mean, there--in Germany."

"It is so still in Germany," said Meredith. "But then was just the beginning of the Reformation, Maggie. Luther was preaching, and the world was in a stir generally."

"'One day there comes to Pastor Grunhagen a sort of artisan fellow, who asked for a bit of bread. It was in winter time, and the poor man was quite benumbed with cold. Pastor Grunhagen took pity on him, had him served with food and drink, and made him sit down in the _Flett_ (that is, the open hall of the house with its low fireplace) that he might also warm his cold limbs. After the man had eaten, not forgetting to pray either, he stretched his legs comfortably down by the warm hearth, and then drew a small MS. book out of his pocket, in which he began to read with eager and devout attention. Grunhagen wondered that the man could read, and more especially that he could read writing. Now, indeed, an artisan would take it ill if anybody were surprised to find him able to read. But the fact that all of us, even the poorest and the smallest, can read now, is just one of the blessings of the Reformation, under which the first schools for the people were established. In those days only scholars and priests could read, and the laity, even the n.o.bles, knew nothing about it. So Grunhagen steps up curiously to the remarkable artisan who knows so much as to read, and asks him, "Pray what have you there?" For all answer, the man hands him the book. Grunhagen takes it and reads and reads, and the more he reads the more eagerly and attentively he devours what he finds there. It was a copy of Luther's smaller catechism. Like a lightning flash darts through his soul the thought, "What stands in this book is THE TRUTH." He asks his guest now where he has come from? The answer is, "From Wittenberg; I have heard Luther preach there, and I brought away this catechism with me."

"'Why he had a written copy of the catechism, and not a printed one, I cannot tell you; perhaps he had not been able to buy a printed copy, and had been at the pains of writing it out; but that is not said in the chronicle. And now, while I am speaking of the catechism, I will show you also that I am a scholar. Therefore know that Luther printed his smaller catechism in the year of grace 1529; because in the two years previous he had been travelling about all through Saxony, examining the churches; and had found that the pastors were so stupid that they did not know even the princ.i.p.al things. Therefore, and surely with the a.s.sistance of the Holy Spirit, he wrote the small catechism, which I hold to be the best of all human books. Before that, however, he had already written some similar works; for example, a short exposition on the ten commandments, the Creed, and the Paternoster; from which, on account of its remarkable quality, I will quote a little. So in it Luther says--"The first commandment is trangressed by every one who in his difficulties turns to sorcery, the black art of the devil's allies; every one who makes that use of letters, signs, words, herbs, charms and the like; whoever uses divining-rods, treasure-conjurings, clairvoyance, and the like; whoever orders his work and his life according to lucky days, sky tokens, and the sayings of soothsayers. The third commandment is trangressed by those who eat, drink, play, dance, and carry on unholy doings; by those who in indolence sleep away the time of divine service, or miss it, or spend it in pleasure drives or walks, or in useless chatter; by whoever works or does business without special need; by whoever does not pray, does not think on Christ's sufferings, does not repent of his sins and long for mercy; and who, therefore, only in outward things, as dressing, eating, and posture-taking, keeps the day holy."

"'I have brought forward this proof of learning only to show you that good people are not quite so simple as perhaps they look; and now I will go on with my story.

"'Grunhagen was so delighted with the dear catechism that he says to the workman, "Friend, you must stay with me long enough to let me make a copy of your MS., for you won't get the book again before I have done that." The friend was very willing to have it so; and now they made an honest exchange one with the other. For the pastor ministered to the poor, starved and frozen body of the artisan, and the artisan ministered to the poor, starved and frozen soul of the pastor. Day by day his accounts grew more and more fiery and spirited about Luther's powerful preaching, about the many thousands who were streaming to Wittenberg to hear the man of G.o.d, about the German Bible which Luther had translated, about the glorious songs of praise which the Lutherans sung, about the pure Sacrament in both kinds; that is, that in Wittenberg both the bread and the wine were given to the communicants, and not the bread merely, as is done by the Papists against the Lord's commandment. He told how, amidst all the rage of his foes, Luther was so joyful and brave, that on one occasion he said to the electoral prince of Saxony, who he saw had become anxious, "I do not ask your princely grace to protect me, for I am under much higher protection, which will take good care of what concerns me." Grunhagen's whole soul was moved by these narrations.

"'After a good many days he let the workman go, laden with gifts, and with tears in his eyes dismissed him; for through him he had learned to know the truth. And now he goes to study. Soon the little catechism is fixed in his heart and his head; and now he procures Luther's other works, and first of all the New Testament. And then he can conceal it from himself no longer, that the Word of G.o.d and the sacrament are basely falsified in the Romish Church, and that he himself, without knowing it, has been all this while misleading the people; he who in his office as pastor should have been a servant of G.o.d. This thought burns into his inmost soul, so that he almost falls into despondency. But soon he finds grace through faith in the dear blood of Jesus Christ. And now in him also that word goes into fulfilment--"I believe, therefore have I spoken." He begins to preach the pure Word of G.o.d, in demonstration of the Spirit and of power; he begins to give to communicants the whole, entire supper, the emblems of Christ's body and blood; and he teaches the children the catechism. And how could he fail of fruit. The parish of Hermannsburg stirs with life, the whole region is waked up, and thousands come to hear G.o.d's Word. Oh, that must have been a blessed time, when the Holy Ghost breathed thus upon the dry bones, and the Light shined in the darkness. But then, too, the Cross could not fail; for on the baptism of the Spirit follows always the baptism of fire; and David in the very psalm quoted above says, "I believed, therefore have I spoken. _I was greatly afflicted._"

"'There was at that time in Hermannsburg a warden--that is, a steward and judge in one person--who was called Andreas Ludwig von Feuershutz (from whom the neighbouring property still keeps the name of Feuershutzenbostel), a rash, determined man, and very zealous for the old Popish Church. Writing in those days did not amount to much; the warden's scribes were his soldiers. So he went to the pastor, and without any circ.u.mlocution forbade him to preach the Lutheran heresy, adding, "If you don't stop it, I'll shut the door before your nose."

When Grunhagen rejected this demand as an improper one, and told him to attend to his office, but leave the church to the pastor, the warden grew wrathful, and called Grunhagen a renegade heretic; and the next Sunday he actually did set his soldiers to keep the church doors and closed the entrance to pastor and congregation both. The thousands who followed their pastor were not unwilling to use violence against the doer of violence; but Grunhagen prevented that, and tried to hold divine service in his house, and, when that also was interfered with, in the houses of the peasants. But wherever they might be, the warden would come with his soldiers and break up the service.

"'And this went on for many a week, and yet so great was the power of Grunhagen's good influence over the believers, that no act of violence was attempted against their tyrants. At last one day the following peasants, Hans von Hiester, Michel Behrens, and Albrecht Lutterloh of Lutterloh, Karsten Lange of Ollendorf, and the great Meyer from Weesen, came to Grunhagen and told him they knew a spot in the heath, still and solitary and remote, which neither highroad nor footpath came near; the warden could not easily find it out: "Let us go there on Sundays and hear G.o.d's Word from your mouth!" And so it was arranged. Quietly one tells it to another, and no one betrays it. The next Sunday, while it is still night, the house doors everywhere open, the indwellers come out one by one, and travel in mist and darkness, by distant paths, through moor, heather, and thicket, hither to Tiefenthal. Grunhagen is there, and with him is his clerk, Gottlob, a believer, converted by his pastor's means; and he carries the sweet burden of the church service. O my beloved! here stood Grunhagen; here were your fathers who renounced false idols and worshipped their Saviour according to the pure Word and ordinance He has given; their songs of praise echoed here, here they bent the knee; for a long while your fathers' house of G.o.d was here under the blue heaven; here were the new-born children baptized in the name of the triune G.o.d, and the grown men and women were fed with the bread and wine which mean the body and blood of the Lord, and so received new strength to mount up with wings of eagles. In this place your fathers grew to a strength of faith which would waver no more. But more trials were coming upon them. The warden was struck by the sudden quietness; he had expected that new attempts would be made to get into the church. He guessed that something was going on, and could not find out what it was. So he set his soldiers on to serve as sleuth-hounds, and they scented the game so well that they discovered the whole. Then one Sunday morning he got up early and watched with bitter rage to see how the people came out of all the houses, men, women, young men and girls, old men and children, all quiet and yet so joyous, dressed in their Sunday clothes, and hastening to Tiefenthal. Stealthily he followed after them, and at their place of refuge heard them preach and sing and pray. Suddenly he heard his own name spoken; it gave him a great shock; he heard the pastor praying for his conversion and the congregation saying Amen. Then a great surging and conflict of feelings arose in his brazen heart. But the time was not yet come. He dashed down the tears that would come into his eyes, and let his supposed duty get the victory. Resolved to suppress the hated heresy that had almost made him soft, but too weak to do it with the force at his command, he made known the affair to the justiciary of Zelle and asked for help. The Zelle justiciary, nothing loath, next Sunday dispatched two hundred of his soldiers, who lay hid in the wood till the congregation had a.s.sembled. Then they broke forth, surrounded our fathers, just as they were gathered around their beloved pastor for the holding of divine service, fell first of all upon Grunhagen himself and the crowd which pressed round him, laid hold of him and dragged him off, and a hundred others with him, to Zelle, with brutal ill-treatment. There the captives were obliged to pa.s.s three days and three nights in the courtyard of the official's house, in snow and ice (it was in November), and it was only with difficulty that they could get a bit of bread to eat. Then they were thrown into prison; and there for a long time our fathers had to share the bonds and imprisonment of G.o.d's faithful servant; but no threats, no contumely, no distress could move them to apostasy, from the faith they had confessed.

"'How long they lay there I do not know. At last, when the Dukes came back from Augsburg, the hour of their freedom struck; they were let go, and returned to their homes shedding thankful tears; the church was again opened to them too, and the heroic Grunhagen preached the gospel to his people anew with fresh power. Then also struck the warden's hour of grace; he grew tender, and was overcome by the might of the blessed gospel; and whereas he had formerly been a zealot for the mistaken service of G.o.d, now he became one of the strongest friends of the pure Lutheran doctrine in all the community. Out of grat.i.tude the parish gave to its beloved watcher for souls this Tiefenthal with the wooded hill here, to be for all time the property of the parsonage, which it still is to the present day. My beloved, we have come here to-day for pleasure; are we to come here again perhaps some day in distress? You answer possibly, "No, that is not to be apprehended; our times are too humane." Yes! they are humane towards all that is _human_; _i.e._, towards banqueting and drinking, dissolute living and deceit. But that our times are not too humane towards what is _G.o.dly_, is testified by the persecutions directed against the Lutherans in Baden and Na.s.sau, where various Lutheran preachers have had to pay fine after fine, and lie in the common prison, because they preach and baptize and observe the communion in the Lutheran manner, and whereto the preaching must often be held in mountains and clefts of the rocks to be had in peace.

And besides, the kingdom of Antichrist is advancing with constantly quicker and more decided steps. Even now it everywhere rains words of abuse upon the saints, the praying people, the hypocrites, the enthusiasts, the mad folk, and by whatever other names beside they may call them. And who knows how soon the time may come when the word will again be true,--"They will put you out of their synagogues," and "whosoever killeth you will think that he doeth G.o.d service." I could if I would read you letters that have come from many cities and villages, filled with such threatenings and cursings and coa.r.s.e words against me that they would fill you with astonishment. Therefore ask yourselves again seriously the question, would you also be ready to give money and blood, body and life, for the Lord Jesus and for your faith? would you also be ready to suffer bonds and imprisonment for the Lord's sake? If it be so that you could not or would not do that, then you are not worthy to bear the name of Jesus Christ; for whoever hateth not father and mother, wife and child, farm and farm stock, and his own life also, for Jesus's sake, he is not worthy of me, the Lord says. To confess Christ in peace and in pleasant times, that is easy enough; but to do it through distress and death, to stand fast in the baptism of fire, that is another thing. Christians of nowadays are accustomed to easy living; how would the cup of suffering taste to them? They are drowned in delicate and luxurious habits; how would they bear privation? They have corrupted themselves in cowardice and indolence; how should they be strong and brave under persecution? And listen to me now, you who are gathered here together in such numbers; what do you think? If the soldiers all of a sudden came upon you, to run you through, or to carry you off somewhere where there are no feather beds, would you stand it?

would you cheerfully give yourselves up to be dragged off? Or would you make long legs, keep a whole skin, and deny your Saviour? O G.o.d! grant that all of us may be able to cry with the Apostle Paul, "I count all things but loss that I may win Christ." "I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor princ.i.p.alities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor height, nor depth, shall be able to separate me from the love of G.o.d, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord!"

Let us now sing with the sound of the trumpets our Luther's hero song--

"Ein' feste Burg ist unser Gott."'"

"What does that mean?" said Maggie.

"It means, 'The Lord is my strength and my fortress;' or, more literally, Maggie, 'Our G.o.d is a sure stronghold.'"

"'When this hymn had been sung, it was time for our noonday meal. So after we had prayed the prayer before eating, the people arranged themselves everywhere, in larger and smaller groups, on the green gra.s.s or the brown heather, and with giving of thanks enjoyed the food they had brought along with them. Those who had nothing took gladly the spare bits of those who had too much. And all were filled; and beer, and water, and even sugar-water, were on hand too to quench the burning thirst. I had myself a further particular pleasure. A few of our festival companions had brought with them some mighty pieces of honeycake as a gift for me. That suited me exactly, and I had it packed in with other things in my basket of provisions. Now you should have seen the glee when I called the children to me and snapped off the sweet bits for them. There came even a pretty good number of larger people, who wanted to be children too, and have their bite after the children had had enough. When we had eaten we had the prayer of thanks, and then the beautiful song,

"Now let us thank G.o.d and praise Him," &c."

"'A blast of the trumpets proclaimed the renewal of divine service; and again the people arranged themselves in their former places and order for a new and last refreshing of their spirits.'"

CHAPTER XV.

"Is that all?" said Maggie.

"All of that story," Meredith answered.

There was a long silence. On hill and rock and river there was a stillness and peace as if nowhere in the world could blood ever have flowed, or wrangling been heard, or men been cruel one to another. So soft and warm the sunlight brooded, and the dry leaves hung still on the trees and not a breath moved them, and the liquid lap of the water against the rocks far down below just came to the ear with a murmur of content. There was nothing else to hear; and the silence was so exquisite that it laid a sort of spell on everybody's tongue, while the mild sunlight on the warm, hazy hills seemed to find out everybody's very heart and spread itself there. A spell of stillness and a spell of peace. All the party were hushed for a good while; and what broke the charm at last was a long-drawn breath of little Maggie, which came from somewhere much deeper then she knew. Mr. Murray looked up at her and smiled.

"What is it, Maggie?"

"I don't know, Uncle Eden. I think something makes me feel bad."

"Feel bad!" echoed Esther.

"I don't mean feel _bad_ exactly--I can't explain it."

"I suppose she has been thinking, as I have been," said Meredith, "that it does not seem as if this day and my story could both belong to the same world."

"Ah!" said Mr. Murray, "this is a little bit of G.o.d's part, and the other is a little bit of man's part in the world; that is all."

"But, Uncle Eden, in those dreadful times it don't seem as if there could ever have been pleasant days."

"I fancy there were. Don't you think the people of Hermannsburg must have enjoyed Tiefenthal, sometimes in the early starlight dawn and sometimes in the fresh sunrise?"

"Uncle Eden, I should always have been afraid the soldiers were coming."

"On the other hand, those people always knew that G.o.d was there. And there is a wonderful sweetness in living in His hands."

"But yet, Uncle Eden, He did let the soldiers come."

"_He_ did not go away, Maggie."

"No; but those must have been dreadful times."

"Well, yes. They were no doubt hard times. And yet, Maggie, it remains true--'When _He_ giveth quietness, then who can make trouble?' Think of Paul and Silas, beaten and bleeding, stiff and sore, stretched uncomfortably in the wooden framework which left them no power to rest themselves or change their position; in the noisome inner dungeon of a Roman prison, and yet singing for gladness. People cannot sing when they are faint-hearted, Maggie. The Lord keeps His promises."

"I wonder how many people would stand Pastor Harms's test?" Meredith remarked.

"They are not obliged to stand it," Flora rejoined. "There are no persecutions now; not here, at any rate. People are not called upon to be martyrs."

"Do you think the terms of service have changed?" said Mr. Murray looking at her.

"Why, sir, we are _not_ called upon to be martyrs."

"No, but are you not called to have the same spirit the martyrs had?"

"How can we?"

"What is the martyr spirit?"

"I don't know," said Flora. "I suppose it is a wonderful power of bearing pain, which is given people at such times."

"Given to everybody?" said Meredith.

"Of course, not given to everybody."

"To whom, then?"

"Why, to Christians."