to have ever claimed, that the indulgences not
only released the purchasers from the necessity of penance, but absolved
them from all the consequences of sin in this world or the next.

We shall not go into the details of the venalities charged against
Tetzel, whose field of labor was in Saxony, but they seem to have been
sufficient to cause a strong feeling of dissatisfaction, which at length
found a voice in Martin Luther, who preached vigorously against Tetzel
and his methods and wrote to the princes and bishops begging them to
refuse this irreligious dealer in indulgences a passage through their
dominions.

The near approach of Tetzel to Wittenberg roused Luther to more decided
action. He now wrote out ninety-five propositions in which he set forth
in the strongest language his reasons for opposing and his view of the
pernicious effects of Tetzel's doctrine of indulgences. These he nailed
to the door of the Castle church of Wittenberg. The effect produced by
them was extraordinary. The news of the protest spread with the greatest
rapidity and within a fortnight copies of it had been distributed
throughout Germany. Within five or six weeks it was being read over a
great part of Europe. On all sides it aroused a deep public interest and
excitement and became the great sensation of the day.

We cannot go into the details of what followed. Luther's propositions
were like a thunderbolt flung into the mind of Germany. Everywhere deep
thought was aroused and a host of those who had been displeased with
Tetzel's methods sustained him in his act. Other papers from his pen
followed in which his revolt from the Church of Rome grew wider and
deeper. His energetic assault aroused a number of opponents and an
active controversy ensued; ending in Luther's being cited to appear
before Cajetan, the pope's legate, at Augsburg. From this meeting no
definite result came. After a heated argument Cajetan ended the
controversy with the following words:

"I can dispute no longer with this beast; it has two wicked eyes and
marvellous thoughts in its head."

Luther's view of the matter was much less complimentary. He said of the
legate,--

"He knows no more about the Word than a donkey knows of harp-playing."

In the next year, 1519, a discussion took place at Leipzig, between
Luther on the one hand, aided by his friends Melanchthon and Carlstadt,
and a zealous and talented ecclesiastic, Dr. Eck, on the other. Eck was
a vigorous deba