new weapons of reason and truth from conquering to
conquer, until all the strongholds of sin and Satan shall be subdued,
and laid triumphantly at the foot of His throne whose right it is
to reign."

Thus far Luther has appeared as a theologian, a philosopher, a man of
ideas, a man of study and reflection, whom the Catholic Church distrusts
and fears, as she always has distrusted genius and manly independence;
but he is henceforth to appear as a reformer, a warrior, to carry out
his idea, and also to defend himself against the wrath he has provoked;
impelled step by step to still bolder aggressions, until he attacks
those venerable institutions which he once respected,--all the frauds
and inventions of Mediaeval despotism, all the machinery by which Europe
had been governed for one thousand years; yea, the very throne of the
Pope himself, whom he defies, whom he insults, and against whom he urges
Christendom to rebel. As a combatant, a warrior, a reformer, his person
and character somewhat change. He is coarser, he is more
sensual-looking, he drinks more beer, he tells more stories, he uses
harder names; he becomes arrogant, dogmatic; he dictates and commands;
he quarrels with his friends; he is imperious; he fears nobody, and is
scornful of old usages; he marries a nun; he feels that he is a great
leader and general, and wields new powers; he is an executive and
administrative man, for which his courage and insight and will and
Herculean physical strength wonderfully fit him,--the man for the times,
the man to head a new movement, the forces of an age of protest and
rebellion and conquest.

How can I compress into a few sentences the demolitions and
destructions which this indignant and irritated reformer now makes in
Germany, where he is protected by the Elector from Papal vengeance?
Before the reconstruction, the old rubbish must be cleared away, and
Augean stables must be cleansed. He is now at issue with the whole
Catholic regime, and the whole Catholic world abuse him. They call him a
glutton, a wine-bibber, an adulterer, a scoffer, an atheist, an imp of
Satan; and he calls the Pope the scarlet mother of abominations,
Antichrist, Babylon. That age is prodigal in offensive epithets; kings
and prelates and doctors alike use hard words. They are like angry
children and women and pugilists; their vocabulary of abuse is amusing
and inexhaustible. See how prodigal Shakspeare and Ben Jonson are in the
language of vitup