f that Latin dress which
would have facilitated an English translation. It is well known,
moreover, that Luther formed a most humble estimate of his own
writings, and was uniformly reluctant to collect his works in
volumes, or bestow upon them any editorial care. He seemed perfectly
willing to have them sink to oblivion, and could not be persuaded by
the most urgent representations to do anything which might rescue
them from such a fate. Besides, it is to be noted that a perusal of
this volume especially would soon satisfy the reader, that after the
accession of Queen Elizabeth to the throne, it stood little chance of
securing the necessary approval or _imprimatur_ of an English bishop.

Yet the work is one of no little historical as well as antiquarian
interest. It has done its part in one of the greatest intellectual
and religious conflicts of the world. It is the sword that a giant
wielded, and that has done execution on a broad field. In the great
armory of the Reformation-writings, scarcely another deserves a more
conspicuous place. It presents those views of the relative spheres of
Divine and human authority which became prevalent wherever the cause
of Reform advanced. It unmasked popular errors, rebuked
ecclesiastical corruption, and vindicated most effectively the simple
doctrines of faith. Here, moreover, we see Luther clad in the armor
with which he boldly challenged the Papacy to a lifelong combat. The
man is before us, girded for the battle, and we see the weapons upon
which he relies. If one of those cannon balls with which English
valor won the battle of Cressy,--the first in which the efficiency of
the new invention was tested,--could be picked up there now, and it
could be ascertained that it did service in that famous battle, it
would be an object of no small interest, at least to the antiquary;
but in regard to this treatise of Luther, we know full well that Rome
felt its visitation as something more terrible than a bombshell
exploding beneath the dome of St. Peter's. Under the authority of
Peter himself it demolished the very foundations of the throne upon
which his pretended successors were seated, and gave a most effective
impulse to the onward movement of reform.

Nor is this all. It is still capable of doing effective service.
After all the rust and tarnish of three centuries, these words of
Luther are remarkably fresh, and seem almost like a living utterance
of to-day. Their critical value is n