Will Hamilton remain at Marburg? Shall he not see Luther, Melanchthon, and the other doctors of the Reformation? It has been generally supposed that he did go to Wittenberg; but there is no evidence of this, either in the University registers or in Luther’s or Melanchthon’s letters. This tradition, therefore, appears to us to be unfounded. As Hamilton had, however, formed the intention of visiting Luther when he left Scotland, what motive led him to relinquish his design? It was this. Early in July, at the very time when the young Scotchman might have gone to Wittenberg, a report was spread abroad that Luther had suddenly fallen ill. On July 7 he had lost the use of his senses, his body lay motionless, the heart scarcely beating, while his wife and his weeping friends stood round the bed, on which he was stretched as if dead. He came to himself, however, and, persuaded that he was at the point of death,[46] he resigned himself entirely to the hand of God and prayed with much fervency. At the same time the report ran in Germany that the plague was raging at Wittenberg. When Luther had recovered a little strength, he wrote to Spalatin:--‘May the Lord have pity on me and not forsake _his_ sinner!’[47] Soon after, he had fresh attacks. ‘Ah,’ said he to his friends, ‘people fancy, because joy usually brightens my countenance, that I walk on roses, but God knows how rugged life is for me!’ One day, when Jonas had come to take supper with him, Luther, feeling ill during the meal, suddenly rose, and after taking a few steps fell in a fainting fit. ‘Water, water,’ cried he, ‘or I die.’ As he lay on the bed, he lifted up his eyes and said: ‘O my beloved Lord, thou art master of life and of death, do as it pleaseth thee. Only remember that it is thou who didst bid me undertake this work, and that it is for thy truth, for thy Word, that I have fought.’ On the following day, at six o’clock in the evening, as Jonas again stood by the bedside of his friend, he heard him calling on the Lord, sometimes in German, sometimes in Latin. The thought that he had not done enough, nor suffered enough for his Saviour, distressed him. ‘Ah,’ said he, ‘I have not been judged worthy to shed my blood for the love of Christ, as several of my brethren have done.’ Presently a thought consoled him: ‘St. John the Evangelist also,’ said he, ‘had not that honor--he who nevertheless wrote a book (Apocalypse) against the papacy, far more severe than any that I could ever write.’[48] After that he had his little John brought to him, and looking at the mother of the boy, he said, ‘You have nothing; but God will provide for you.’ [Sidenote: THE PLAGUE AT WITTENBERG.]