Luther, not content with encouraging his prince, desired also to frighten his adversaries. It was with this intent that he wrote at that time an address to the members of the clergy assembled at Augsburg. A crowd of thoughts, like lansquenets armed cap-a-pié, "rushed in to fatigue and bewilder him;"[394] and in fact there is no want of barbed words in the discourse he addresses to the bishops. "In short," said he to them in conclusion, "we know and you know that we have the Word of God, and that you have it not. O Pope! if I live I shall be a pestilence to thee; and if I die, I shall be thy death!"[395] [394] Ut plurimos Lansknecktos, prorsus vi repellere cogar, qui insalutati non cessant obstrepere.--(L. Epp. iv. p. 10.) [395] Pestis eram vivus, moriens ero mors tua, Papa.--(L. Opp. xx. p. 164.) Thus was Luther present at Augsburg, although invisible; and he effected more by his words and by his prayers than Agricola, Brenz, or Melancthon. These were the days of travail for the Gospel truth. It was about to appear in the world with a might that was destined to eclipse all that had been done since the time of St. Paul; but Luther only announced and manifested the things that God was effecting: he did not execute them himself. He was, as regards the events of the Church, what Socrates was to philosophy: "I imitate my mother (she was a midwife)," this philosopher was in the habit of saying; "she does not travail herself, but she aids others." Luther--and he never ceased repeating it--has created nothing; but he has brought to light the precious seed, hidden for ages in the bosom of the Church. The man of God is not he who seeks to form his age according to his own peculiar ideas, but he who, distinctly perceiving God's truth, such as it is found in his Word, and as it is hidden in his Church, brings it to his contemporaries with courage and decision. [Sidenote: HUMAN HOPES FAIL.]