Of Princes and Potentates DCCXX.
Potentates and princes, nowadays, when they take in hand an enterprise, do not pray before they begin, but set to work calculating: three time three makes nine, twice seven are fourteen—so and so will do so and so—in this manner will the business surely take effect—but our Lord God says unto them: For whom, then, do ye hold me? for a cypher? Do I sit here above in vain, and to no purpose? You shall know, that I will twist your accounts about finely, and make the mall false reckonings.
Pilate was a more honest and just man than any papist prince of the empire. I could name many of these, who are in no degree comparable with Pilate; for he kept strictly to the Roman laws. He would not that the innocent should be executed and slain without hearing, and he availed himself of all just means whereby to release Christ; but when they threatened him with the emperor's disfavor, he was dazzled, and forsook the imperial laws, thinking, it is but the loss of one man, who is both poor and condemned; no man takes his part; what hurt can I receive by his death? Better it is that one man die, than that the whole nation be against me.
Dr. Mathesius and Pomer debated this question, why Pilate scourged Christ, and asked:
What is truth? The former argued that Pilate did i out of compassion; but the other, that it was done out of tyranny and contempt. Whereupon Luther said: Pilate scourged Christ out of compassion, to the end he might still thereby, the insatiable wrath and raging of the Jews.
And in that he said to Christ: What is truth: he meant: Why wilt thou dispute concerning truth in these wicked times? Truth is here of no value. Thou must think of some other plan; adopt some lawyer's quiddity, and then, perchance, thou mayest be released.
Philip Melancthon and myself have justly deserved at God's hands, as much riches in this world as any one cardinal possesses; for we have done more in his business than a hundred cardinals. But God says unto us: Be contented that ye have me. When we have him, then have we also the purse; for although we had the purse and had not God, so had we nothing.
God said to Ezekiel: "Thou son of man, Nebuchadnezzar caused his army to serve a great service against Tyre, yet he had no wages; what shall I give him? I will give the land of Egypt to Nebuchadnezzar, that shall be his wages." So plays God with great kingdoms, taking them from one, and giving them to another.
At the imperial diet, at Augsburg, certain princes there spoke in praise of the riches and advantages of their respective principalities. The prince elector of Saxony said: He had, in Of Princes and Potentates his country, store of silver mines, which brought him great revenues. The prince elector palatine extolled his vineyards on the Rhine. When it became the turn of Eberhard, prince of Wirtemberg, he said: "I am, indeed, but a poor prince, and not to be compared with either of you; yet, nevertheless, I have also in my country a rich and precious jewel; namely, that if at any time I should ride astray in my country, and were left all alone in the fields, yet I could safely and securely sleep in the bosom of any one of my subjects, who all, for my service, are ready to venture body, goods, and blood." And, indeed, his people esteemed him as a pater patrice. When the other two princes heard this, they confessed that, in truth, his was the most rich and precious jewel.
I invited to dinner, at my house at Wittenberg, prince Ernest of Luneburg, and prince William of Mecklenburg, who much complained of the immeasurable swilling and drinking kind of life at courts; and yet they will all be good Christians. I said: The potentates and princes ought to look into this. Then prince Ernest said: Ah! sir, we that are princes do even so ourselves, otherwise `twould have gone down long since; confessing that the intemperance of princes caused the intemperance of the people. And truly, when the abbot throws the dice, the whole convent will play. The example of governors greatly influences the subjects.
Some one asked, whether Sir Thomas More was executed for the Gospel's sake or no?
I answered: No, in no wise; he was a cruel tyrant; he was the king's chief counsellor; a very learned and wise man, doubtless, but he shed the blood of many innocent Christians that confessed the Gospel; he tormented them with strange instruments, like a hangman; first, he personally examined them under a green tree, and then cruelly tortured them in prison.
At last, he opposed the edict of the king and kingdom. He was disobedient, and was punished.
We have this advantage; no council has condemned us for heretics; the laws of the empire define a heretic to be one who obstinately maintains errors, which we have never done, but have shown and produced witnesses out of God's Word, and the Holy Scriptures; we willingly hear the opinions of others, but we will not endure the pope to be judge; we make him a party.
The emperor Maximilian in his campaigns was very superstitious. In times of danger, he would make a vow to offer up as sacrifice what first met him. One of his captains had taken captive a very fair virgin of an ancient family in Germany, and of the protestant religion, whom he loved exceedingly; but he was forced by the emperor to kill her with his own hands.