Luther did not desert us. His speech of two hours distinguished itself by its respectful, wise, and honest tone; submissive to whatsoever could lawfully claim submission, not submissive to any more than that. His writings, he said, were partly his own, partly derived from the Word of God. As to what was his own, human infirmity entered into it; unguarded anger, blindness, many things, doubtless, which it were a blessing for him could he abolish altogether. But as to what stood on sound truth and the Word of God, he could not recant it. How could he? “Confute me,” he concluded, “by proofs of Scripture, or else by plain, just arguments. I can not recant otherwise; for it is neither safe nor prudent to do aught against conscience. Here stand I; I can do no other. God assist me!” It is, as we say, the greatest moment in the modern history of men. English Puritanism, England and its Parliaments, Americas, and the vast work done in these two centuries; French Revolution, Europe and its work everywhere at present--the germ of it all lay there. Had Luther in that moment done other, it had all been otherwise! The European world was asking him: Am I to sink ever lower into falsehood, stagnant putrescence, loathsome, accursed death; or, with what paroxysm, to cast the falsehoods out of me, and be cured and live? Great wars, contentions, and disunion followed out of this Reformation, which last down to our day, and are yet far from ended. Great talk and crimination has been made about these. They are lamentable, undeniable; but, after all, what has Luther or his cause to do with them? It seems strange reasoning to charge the Reformation with all this. When Hercules turned the purifying river into King Augeas’s stables, I have no doubt the confusion that resulted was considerable all around, but I think it was not Hercules’s blame; it was some other’s blame! The Reformation might bring what results it liked when it came, but the Reformation simply could not help coming.