130 



THEODORE ROBERTS, ESQ., ON 



the moral force wliich the church exercised on tliis occasion was 

 entirely salutary. But we can hardly say the same of the world- 

 famous scene of Henry IV. of the restored western Eoman 

 Empire in January, 1077, standing in the snow in the thin linen 

 dress of a penitent outside the castle of Canossa and there fasting, 

 waiting humbly for the absolution of the arrogant priest within, 

 the Pope Gregory YII., better known as Hildebrand, which was 

 necessary for his continuance in the empire. Well might 

 Bismarck in his contest with the Pope of his day protest that 

 " Germany will not again go to Canossa." 



Alas, we have not long to trace the Pioman church's history 

 before we fmd her using the veneration which she had inspired 

 for the basest of purposes. In the words of our Lord's parable 

 " The servant who should have given the household meat in due 

 season began to beat his fellow sei'vants." Therefore, in our next 

 scene we shall find conscience standing up against all the might 

 of the Eoman hierarchy in league with the temporal power. 



V. 



For my fifth scene I take you to Ihe famous Diet of ^Yorms 

 ill the year 1521, when Maitin Luther a])peared before all the 

 princes of Germany presided over by the young emperor Charles 

 the Fifth. History records that there had been no assemblage so 

 numerous and brilliant since the days of Charlemagne, seven 

 centuries before. The emperor himself had gathered up the 

 crowns of more kingdoms than had ever yet been united on a 

 single head. He was king of all the various kingdoms that now 

 make up Spain, and he also ruled over the greater part of Italy 

 and the whole of our present Belgium and Holland. In the New 

 World the valuable ^Yest Indian Islands, Mexico, Central 

 America, Peru, a s well as the Philippines, were his, while his 

 brother, also present, ruled over Hungary, Bohemia and the 

 adjacent lands; so that with the exception of France and England, 

 who, however, both sent ambassadors to the Diet, practically the 

 whole civilized world was represented at Worms. 



Even to go to Worms at all required great courage on the 

 part of Luther, when he remembered the fate of John Huss, who 

 went to Constance a century earlier relying on the safe conduct of 

 Charles' predecessor Sigismund, which he violated and allowed 

 Huss to be burned; but Luther's reply to his friends who would 

 have dissuaded him is well known : ' ' Though there were as many 

 devils in Worms as the tiles on the housetops," still he would 

 enter it. 



On his way he passed through Erfurt where as a monk 

 he had first learned the truth of the Gospel. The sermon which 

 he preached there on his journey to Worms has come down to us, 

 and perhaps I maj^ quote a passage from it in order to show 

 exactly what was the tmth for which Luther was standing. 



