ore the Diet at Worms, what
would have been the result? Though he knew that his life was in danger,
if he appeared, yet he also knew that the cause he had espoused would
have suffered, provided he evaded a public test of his doctrines. The
Papists having been taught by experience that the public debates with
Luther proved injurious to their party, they avoided them as much as
they could and employed various stratagems to destroy him and his cause.
Luther says: 'The court of Rome most horribly fears, and shamefully
flees from, a Christian council.' Had this principle been uniformly
followed in the days of Luther that it is sinful to dispute on points of
doctrine, the errors of the Papish Church could have been impregnable;
and those who bear the name of Christian might perhaps yet groan under
papal superstition and tyranny. . . . Thousands have joined churches
with whose peculiar doctrines they are not acquainted, and even do not
know whether their government is republican, aristocratical, or
monarchical. They are satisfied with what they hear from their
ministers, without even examining their creeds or forms of government.
Such being ignorant, they are already prepared for a state of slavery.
They who so easily submit to an ecclesiastical slavery may also by
degrees, by the same means, be led to sacrifice their civil liberty. How
is it possible that people can with any degree of safety be in
connection with such ministers as are publicly impeached with erroneous
doctrines, and yet are not willing to be brought to light? Ought not
every person conclude: If such ministers believed that they had nothing
but the truth on their side, they would freely embrace every opportunity
of coming to the light, so that they might show that their works are
wrought in God, and refute their opponents' calumnies? That a public
debate would create animosity is no reason that it should be omitted.
Would it offend real Christians? By no means. It indeed might offend
false teachers and their votaries, who for the want of argument would
substitute the ebullitions of their anger. But what Christian can
imagine that no error should be exposed, lest the persons who are guilty
might be offended?" (38 ff.)

104. Arguments Continued.--David Henkel furthermore showed from Phil.
2, 15; 1 Pet. 2, 9; 1 Pet. 3, 15. 16, that it is the duty of Christians
to shine as lights in the world, to instruct the ignorant, to give an
answer to every man who asks them