On April 26 Münzer advanced to Mühlhausen, the 'arch-devil, 'as Luther called him, but as he described himself, the 'champion of the Lord.' He came with four hundred followers, and was joined by large masses of the peasants. His 'only fear,' as he said in his summons to the miners of Mansfeld, 'was that the foolish men would fall into the snare of a delusive peace.' He promised them a better result. 'Wherever there are only three among you who trust in God and seek nothing but His honour and glory, you need not fear a hundred thousand.... Forward now!' he cried; 'to work! to work! It is time that the villains were chased away like dogs.... To work! relent not if Esau gives you fair words. Give no heed to the wailings of the ungodly; they will beg, weep, and entreat you for pity, like children. Show them no mercy, as God commanded Moses (Deut. vii.) and has declared the same to us.... To work! while the fire is hot; let not the blood cool upon your swords.... To work! while it is day. God is with you; follow Him!' Of Luther he spoke in terms of peculiar hatred and contempt. In a letter which he addressed to 'Brother Albert of Mansfeld,' with the object of converting the Count, he alluded to him in expressions of the coarsest possible abuse. In Thuringia, in the Harz, and elsewhere, numbers of convents, and even castles, were reduced to ashes. The princes were everywhere unprepared with the necessary troops, while the insurgents in Thuringia and Saxony counted more than 30,000 men. The former, therefore, endeavoured to strengthen themselves by coalition. Duke John, at Weimar, prepared himself for the worst: his brother, the Elector Frederick, was lying seriously ill at his Castle at Lochau (now Annaburg) in the district of Torgau. At this crisis Luther, having left Eisleben, appeared in person among the excited population. He preached at Stolberg, Nordhausen, and Wallhausen. In his subsequent writings he could bear witness of himself, how he had been himself among the peasants, and how, more than once, he had imperilled life and limb. On May 3 we find him at Weimar; and a few days afterwards in the county of Mansfeld. Here he wrote to his friend, the councillor Rühel of Mansfeld, advising him not to persuade Count Albert to be 'lenient in this affair'--that is, against the insurgents; for the civil power must assert its rights and duties, however God might rule the issue. 'Be firm,' he entreats Rühel, 'that his Grace may go boldly on his way. Leave the matter to God, and fulfil His commands to wield the sword as long as strength endures. Our consciences are clear, even if we are doomed to be defeated.... It is but a short time, and the righteous Judge will come.'