On the Restraint of the First Electors of Saxony in Adopting and Establishing Luther's Doctrine, Volume 2

XII

While, therefore, I attribute ABSTINENCE to the Elector Princes of Saxony, who first undertook and established the doctrine of Luther, I enter into this line of thought and opinion: to free them from the nefarious crime of the accursed hunger for gold, and, as they tempered themselves from what belonged to others, I deny that they crossed over to the family of Luther with the intention of converting sacred fortunes to their own use. So that this may be less brought into doubt, in the next dissertation I will compare certain general arguments, which will be able to remove and ward off, in a universal sense, that which is imputed to them as a vice. Then I shall look to closer matters, and in the remaining commentaries, pursuing the begun enterprise, I will set forth one by one the abstinence of FREDERICK THE WISE, the abstinence of JOHN THE STEADFAST, and the abstinence of JOHN FREDERICK. And as for FREDERICK, besides other reasons which will look to this, I will prove it primarily from his difficult delay in fostering and defending Luther on account of the imminent dangers, while at the same time I shall show that in his lands there was no bishopric at that time which could have been turned to profane uses. Afterward, I shall come to the brother and successor of Frederick, JOHN THE STEADFAST, whom I shall confirm—with equal integrity—held the purer religion, from the testimony of many, especially the Great Man himself [Luther], and I shall make it clear that if anything was committed, it should be attributed not so much to the Prince as to his crafty administrators. Finally, I shall turn my mind to the son of John, JOHN FREDERICK, whose singular and almost incredible abstinence will be proven by his early age, in which—with Luther as a witness—he bore with difficulty the robberies, as they are called, of the monasteries; it will be proven by the letters given to his spouse; it will be proven, finally, by that testimony, which is above all exception, by which he preferred to endure captivity and other evils rather than the deceits of the book. Meanwhile, summoned to help with their own vote, not without great...