A friend and follower of Luther and Melanchthon--Martin Butzer by name--went still farther. According to this "reforming" worthy a subject was to obey his lord in everything. This was all that concerned him. It was not for him to consider whether what was enjoined was, or was not, contrary to the will of God. That was a matter for his feudal superior and God to settle between them. Referring to the doctrines of the revolutionary sects, Butzer urges the authorities to extirpate all those professing a false religion. Such men, he says, deserve a heavier punishment than thieves, robbers, and murderers. Even their wives and innocent children and cattle should be destroyed (_ap. Janssen_, vol. i. p. 595). Luther himself quotes, in a sermon on "Genesis," the instances of Abraham and Abimelech and other Old Testament worthies, as justifying slavery and the treatment of a slave as a beast of burden. "Sheep, cattle, men-servants and maid-servants, they were all possessions," says Luther, "to be sold as it pleased them like other beasts. It were even a good thing were it still so. For else no man may compel nor tame the servile folk" (_Saemmtliche Werke_, vol. xv. p. 276). In other discourses he enforces the same doctrine, observing that if the world is to last for any time, and is to be kept going, it will be necessary to restore the patriarchal condition. Capito, the Strassburg preacher, in a letter to a colleague, writes lamenting that the pamphlets and discourses of Luther had contributed not a little to give edge to the bloodthirsty vengeance of the princes and nobles after the insurrection. The total number of the peasants and their allies who fell either in fighting or at the hands of the executioners is estimated by Anselm in his _Berner Chronik_ at 130,000. It was certainly not less than 100,000. For months after the executioner was active in many of the affected districts. Spalatin says: "Of hanging and beheading there is no end." Another writer has it: "It was all so that even a stone had been moved to pity, for the chastisement and vengeance of the conquering lords was great." The executions within the jurisdiction of the Swabian League alone are stated at 10,000. Truchsess's provost boasted of having hanged or beheaded 1,200 with his own hand. More than 50,000 fugitives were recorded. These, according to a Swabian League order, were all outlawed in such wise that any one who found them might slay them without fear of consequences.