On two successive days he joined hunting parties, but his heart was with the few hares and partridges which were driven into the net by the troop of men and dogs. "Innocent creatures! The papists persecute in the same way!" To save the life of a little hare he had wrapped him in the sleeve of his coat. The dogs came and crushed the animal's bones within the protecting coat. "Thus Satan rages against the souls that I seek to save." Luther had reason for protecting himself and his friends from Satan. He had rejected all the authority of the Church; now he stood terribly alone; nothing was left to him but his last resort--the Scriptures. The ancient Church had represented Christianity in continual development. The faith had been kept in a fluid state by a living tradition which ran parallel with the Scriptures, by the Councils, by the Papal decrees; and they had adapted themselves, like a facile stream, to the sharp corners of national character, to the urgent needs of each age. It is true that this noble idea of a perpetually living organism had not been preserved in its original purity. The best part of its life had vanished; empty cocoons were being preserved. The old democratic church had been transformed into the irresponsible sovereignty of a few, had been stained with all the vices of an unconscientious aristocracy, and was already in striking opposition to reason and popular feeling. What Luther, however, could put in its place--the word of the Scriptures--although it gave freedom from a hopeless mass of soulless excrescences, threatened on the other hand new dangers.
What was the Bible? Between the earliest and latest writings of the sacred book lay perhaps two thousand years. Even the New Testament was not written by Christ himself, not even entirely by those who had received the sacred doctrine from his lips. It was compiled after his death. Portions of it might have been transmitted inexactly. Everything was written in a foreign tongue, which it was difficult for the Germans to understand. Even the keenest penetration was in danger of interpreting falsely unless the grace of God enlightened the interpreter as it had the apostles. The ancient Church had settled the matter summarily; in it the sacrament of holy orders gave such enlightenment. Indeed, the Holy Father even laid claim to divine authority to decide arbitrarily what should be right, even when his will was contrary to the Scriptures. The reformer had nothing but his feeble human knowledge, and prayer.