careful as he came along to ascertain the state of public opinion. To his great astonishment he observed, at every place where he stopped, that the majority of the inhabitants were friendly to the Reformation,[5] and spoke of Luther with enthusiasm. For one person favourable to the pope, there were three favourable to the Reformer.[6] Luther has preserved an anecdote of the journey—"What think you of the see (seat) of Rome?" frequently asked the legate at the mistresses of the inns and their maidservants. One day, one of these poor women, with great simplicity, replied—"How can we know what kind of seats you have at Rome, and whether they are of wood or stone?"[7]

The mere rumour of the new legate's arrival filled the Elector's court, the university, the town of Wittemberg, and all Saxony, with suspicion and distrust. "Thank God," wrote Melancthon, in alarm,[8] "Martin still breathes." It was confidently stated that the Roman chamberlain had received orders to possess himself of Luther's person, by force or fraud; and the doctor was advised, on all hands, to be on his guard against the stratagems of Miltitz. "His object in coming," said they, "is to seize you and give you up to the pope. Persons worthy of credit have seen the briefs of which he is the bearer." "I await the will of God," replied Luther.[9]

In fact, Miltitz brought letters addressed to the Elector and his counsellors, to the bishops and to the burgomaster of Wittemberg. He was also provided with seventy apostolic briefs. Should the flattery and the favours of Rome attain their object, and Frederick deliver Luther into her hands, these seventy briefs were to serve as a kind of passports. He was to produce and post up one of them in each of the towns through which he had to pass, and hoped he might thus succeed in dragging his prisoner, without opposition, all the way to Rome.[10]

The pope seemed to have taken every precaution. The electoral court knew not well what course to take. Violence would have been resisted, but the difficulty was to oppose the chief of Christianity, when speaking with so much mildness, and apparently with so much reason. Would it not be the best plan, it was said, to place Luther somewhere in concealment until the storm was over?... An unexpected event relieved Luther, the Elector, and the Reformation, from this difficult situation. The aspect of affairs suddenly changed.

On the 12th of January, 1519, Maximilian, the Emperor of Germany, died, and Frederick of Saxony, agreeably to the Germanic constitution, became regent of the empire. From this time the Elector feared not the schemes of nuncios, while new interests began to engross the court of Rome—interests which, obliging her to be chary of giving offence to Frederick, arrested the blow which Miltitz and De Vio were undoubtedly meditating.

The pope earnestly desired to prevent Charles of Austria, already King of Naples, from ascending the imperial throne. A neighbouring king appeared to him more formidable than a German monk; and in his anxiety to secure the Elector, who might be of essential service to him in the matter, he resolved to give some respite to the monk that he might be the better able to oppose the king. Both, however, advanced in spite of him.

In addition to the change thus produced in Leo, there was another circumstance which tended to avert the storm impending over the Reformation. The death of the emperor was immediately followed by political commotions. In the south of the empire the Swabian confederation sought to punish Ulric of Wurtemberg, for his infidelity to it, while in the south, the Bishop of Hildesheim proceeded, sword in hand, to invade the bishopric of Minden, and the territories of the Duke of Brunswick. How could men in power, amid such disturbances, attach any importance to a dispute relating to the remission of sins? But, above all, the reputation for wisdom enjoyed by the Elector, now regent of the empire, and the protection which he gave to the new teachers, were made subservient by Providence to the progress of the Reformation. "The tempest," says Luther, "intermitted its fury, and papal excommunication began to fall into contempt. The gospel, under the shade of the Elector's regency, spread far and wide, and in this way great damage was sustained by the papacy."[11]

Moreover, the severest prohibitions were naturally mitigated during an interregnum. In every thing there was more freedom and greater facility of action. Liberty which began to shed its rays on the infant Reformation, rapidly developed the still tender plant, and any one might have been able to predict how favourable political freedom would prove to the progress of evangelical Christianity.

Miltitz, having arrived in Saxony before the death of Maximilian, lost no time in visiting his old friend Spalatin; but no sooner did he begin his complaint against Luther than the chaplain made an attack upon Tezel, acquainting the nuncio with the lies and blasphemies of the vender of indulgences, and assuring him that all Germany blamed the Dominican for the division which was rending the Church.

Miltitz was taken by surprise. Instead of accuser he had become the accused. Turning all his wrath upon Tezel, he summoned him to appear at Altenburg and give an account of his conduct.

The Dominican, as great a coward as a bully, and afraid of the people whom he had provoked by his impostures, had ceased his peregrinations over town and country, and was living in retirement in the college of St. Paul. He grew pale on receiving the letter of Miltitz. Even Rome is abandoning, threatening, and condemning him—is insisting on dragging him from the only asylum in which he feels himself in safety, and exposing him to the fury of his enemies.... Tezel refused to obey the nuncio's summons. "Assuredly," wrote he to Miltitz, on the 31st of December, 1518, "I would not regard the fatigues of the journey if I could leave Leipsic without endangering my life; but the Augustin, Martin Luther, has so stirred up men in power, and incensed them against me that I am not in safety any where. A great number of Luther's partizans have conspired my death, and therefore I cannot possibly come to you."[12] There was a striking contrast between the two men, the one of whom was then living in the college of St. Paul at Leipsic, and the other in the cloister of the Augustins at Wittemberg. In presence of danger the servant of God displayed intrepid