THE threatened storm burst at length in some places. At Antwerp the truth had been received, and was preached. But the evangelical monks were obliged to flee. Henry Voes, John Esch, and Lambert Thorn were discovered and thrown into prison. Lambert Thorn was appalled at death, and begged time to consider what he would do; Voes and Esch faithfully confessed Christ. They were delivered to the secular arm, as it was called, and then to the executioner. They were bound to the stake. The confessor drew near and said, "Once more we ask you if you will receive the Christian faith?" "We believe in the christian church," said they, "but not in your church." Half an hour was allowed to elapse: it was hoped that the sight of the stake and the fagots would have appalled these young men. But no, they resolved to die for the name of Jesus Christ, and began to sing psalms. The fire was lit, and thus died, rejoicing, the first martyrs of the gospel in the time of Luther. Satan was again outwitted. He thought to stay the current of truth by stopping the voices of some; whereas it was the means of spreading it the more. Men saw that there was something real in such faith, and the confidence of the martyrs stirred up the failing courage of others. "Wherever Aleandro lights a pile," remarked Erasmus, "there it seems as if he now sowed heretics.”
Luther was much moved. He thanked God for the courage of the martyrs. "I am bound with you in your bonds," said he; "your dungeons and your burnings my soul takes part in. All of us are with you in spirit; and the Lord is above it all.”
Luther wrote a hymn on the occasion of their death, and soon that hymn was sung throughout the land. We give a translation: —
Flung to the heedless winds,
Or on the waters cast,
Their ashes shall be watched,
And gathered at the last.
And from that scattered dust,
Around us and abroad,
Shall spring a plenteous seed
Of witnesses for God.
Jesus hath now received
Their latest living breath—
Yet vain is Satan's boast
Of victory in their death.
Still—still though dead, they speak,
And, trumpet-tongued, proclaim
To many a wakening land,
The one availing name.
Persecution was further stayed for the time by the death of Pope Adrian. He was so "good" in the sense of being strictly moral that the Romans were overjoyed at his death, and suspended a crown of flowers at his physician's door, with the writing, "To the savior of his country." The pope had been too strict with those who desired to do as they pleased, so that they praised his physician for not saving his life! Such was Rome.
Julio de Medici was the next pope. He was a very different sort of man from Adrian. There was no hope now of Rome reforming itself: he thought only of what would enrich himself. He despatched Cardinal Campeggio to Germany.
The Diet again met at Nuremberg in January 1525. The Emperor was incensed against the Elector Frederick, and determined to crush him. It was resolved that the executive powers of the empire should all be changed. This was a blow at Frederick. Filled with grief, he left the Diet.
Campeggio demanded of the Diet that the edict of Worms should be enforced against the Reformers. "And pray," asked some, "what has become of the memorial of grievances presented to the pope by Germany?" Campeggio said three different memorials had reached Rome, and they did not know which was the official one.
The Diet agreed to carry out the edict of Worms but added to it these words, "as far as possible," which left it free for some not to do it at all.
Moreover the Diet again pressed the necessity of calling a General secular Council, and at length in spite of Rome settled that this council should meet in November in Spire, "to regulate all questions of religion," and the states were to request their divines to prepare the various subjects to be discussed at that meeting.
The pope was much incensed, and he and Campeggio sought to sow discord among the German princes. If they would not be at peace with Rome, they should not be at peace among themselves. Campeggio called a meeting at Ratisbon of those he thought staunch for Rome, and sought to unite them together to form a league in her favor. They met, and resolved to do all they could to crush the Reformation. They proceeded at once to act.
At Vienna there was a citizen named Gaspard Tauber, who had written against the papacy. He was now seized, and ordered to retract. Whether he promised to do so, or whether they misunderstood him, is doubtful, but when he was summoned publicly to retract, he declared he would sooner die than deny the gospel. He was beheaded and afterward burnt.
Another, at Buda in Hungary, a bookseller, was a believer in the Lord Jesus Christ, and had distributed the New Testament and the writings of Luther. They bound the good man to a stake, and piled his books about him, and set them on fire. He died rejoicing.
At other places great and fearful persecution was carried on. Some were imprisoned, and some were hanged; and some of the preachers had their tongues nailed to posts, so that they might tear themselves away, deprived of the power to preach.
The case of Henry Zuphten is sad to relate. He had escaped from Antwerp and went to preach at Bremen, at a place called Mehldorf in the Dittmarches. The pastor at first tried to stop his preaching; but here he failed. He took his vengeance thereon. He caused the bells to be rung at night-fall and assembled the peasants, about five hundred. Then, to give them courage and stifle conscience, he tapped three butts of beer. When all were elated he led them on to where the good man slept. He was dragged out of his bed, and, undressed as he was, hurried through the streets in the frost and ice. They reached the heath, where they gathered the fagots and applied the light. But the wood would not burn, and for two long hours he stood there exposed to their fury. At length the wood was alight and they threw him on the pile, but he rolled off, when one with a club struck him dead. They then put him on the wood and he was consumed. Thus was killed this faithful man. His crime was preaching the gospel; and they who put him to death did it in the name of religion! It could not have been the religion of Jesus Christ.