PH.OTESTANT THEORY OF PERSECUTION 161
His vie\v of the authority of Scripture and his theory of justification both precluded him from appreciating freedom. "Christian freedom," he said, "consists in the belief that we require no works to attain piety and salvation." 1 Thus he became the inventor of the theory of passive obedience, according to \vhich no motives or provocation can justify a revolt; and the party against \vhom the revolt is directed, whatever its guilt may be, is to be preferred to the party revolting, however just its cause. 2 In 1530 he therefore declared that the German princes had no right to resist the Emperor in defence of their religion. " It \vas the duty of a Christian," he said, "to suffer wrong, and no breach of oath or of duty could deprive the Emperor of his right to the unconditional obedience of his subjects." S Even the empire seemed to him a despotism, from his scriptural belief that it was a continuation of the last of the four monarchies. 4 He preferred submission, in the hope of seeing a future Protestant Emperor, to a resistance which might have dismembered the empire if it had succeeded, and in which failure would have been fatal to the Protestants; and he was ahvays afraid to draw the logical consequences of his theory of the duty of Protestants towards Catholic sovereigns. In consequence of this fact, Ranke affirms that the great reformer was also one of the greatest conserva- tives that ever lived; and his biographer, J ürgens, makes the more discriminating remark that history knows of no man who was at once so great an insurgent and so great
1 " Das ist die christliche Freiheit, der einige Glaube, der da macht, nicht dass wir müssig gehen oder übel thun mögen, sondern dass wir keines Werks bedür- fen, die Frömmigkeit und Seligkeit zu erlangen" (Sermon von der Freihe'it). A Protestant historian, who quotes this passage, goes on to say: " On the other hand, the body must be brought under discipline by every means, in order that it may obey and not burden the inner man, Outward servitude, therefore, assists the progress towards internal freedom" (Bensen, Geschichte des Bauern- kriegs, 269,) 2 r-Verke, x. 4 1 3. 8 II According to Scripture, it is by no means proper that one who would be a Christian should set himself against his superiors, whether by God's permission they act justly or unjustly. But a Christian must suffer violence and wrong. es ecially .from his superiors. , , , As the emperor continues emperor. and pnnces prmces. though they transgress all God's commandments, yea, even if they be, heathen, so they do even when they do not observe their oath and duty. , , , Sm does not suspend authority and allegiance" (De Wette, iii, 560). 4 Ranke, Reformatioll, iii, 18 3, M
