The Reformation gained a still more important victory. A prince, whose conversion to the Gospel was destined to exert the greatest influence, even in our days, began about this time to turn aside from Rome. One day about the end of June, shortly after Melancthon's return to Wittemberg, Albert, margrave of Brandenburg and grand-master of the Teutonic order, entered Luther's chamber. This chief of the military monks of Germany, who then possessed Prussia, had gone to the Diet of Nuremberg to invoke the aid of the empire against Poland. He returned in the deepest distress. On the one hand, the preaching of Osiander and the reading of the Bible had convinced him that his monastic profession was contrary to the Word of God; and on the other the fall of the national government in Germany had deprived him of all hope of obtaining the succour he had gone to solicit. What can he do then?......The Saxon councillor Von Planitz, with whom he had quitted Nuremberg, advised him to see the reformer. "What do you think of the regulations of my order?" said the restless and agitated prince. Luther felt no hesitation: he saw that a line of conduct in conformity with the Gospel was the only thing that could save Prussia. "Invoke the aid of God," said he to the grand-master; "throw off the senseless and confused rules of your order; put an end to that abominable principality, a veritable hermaphrodite, which is neither religious nor secular;[367] relinquish that false chastity, and seek the true one; take a wife, and instead of that nameless monster, found a legitimate sovereignty."[368] These words placed distinctly before the mind of the grand-master a state of things that he had as yet conceived but vaguely. A smile lit up his features; but he had too much prudence to declare himself; he remained silent.[369] Melancthon, who was present, spoke to the same effect as Luther, and the prince returned to his states, leaving the reformers under the conviction that the seed they had sown in his heart would one day bear fruit. [367] Ut loco illius abominabilis principatus, qui hermaphrodita quidem. L. Epp. ii. 527. [368] Ut contempta ista stulta confusaque regula, uxorem duceret. Ibid. [369] Ille tum arrisit, sed nihil respondit. Ibid. Thus Charles V. and the pope had opposed the national assembly at Spires for fear the Word of God should gain over all who might be present; but the Word of God cannot be bound; they refused to let it be heard in one of the halls of a town in the Lower Palatinate; it avenged itself by spreading over all the provinces; it stirred the hearts of the people, enlightened the princes, and manifested in every part of the empire that Divine power which neither bulls nor edicts can ever take away. CHAPTER IX. Reforms--All Saints Church--Fall of the Mass--Learning--Christian Schools--Learning extended to the Laity--The Arts--Moral Religion--Esthetical Religion--Music--Poetry--Painting.