Luther now issued his _Catechisms_, which proved a great and glorious aid to the true Gospel. Henceforth the children were to be bred up in the pure faith. Matthesius says: "If Luther in his lifetime had achieved no other work but that of bringing his two Catechisms into use, the whole world could not sufficiently thank and repay him." A quarrel between the emperor and the pope also contributed to the progress of the Reformation. A Diet at Spire in 1526 had interposed a check to the persecuting spirit of the Romanists, and granted toleration to those of Luther's mind in all the states where his doctrines were approved. The respite lasted for three years, until Charles and Clement composed their difference and united to wreak their wrath upon Luther and his adherents. FOOTNOTES: [16] The death of Adrian VI., on the 14th of September, 1523, was a subject of general rejoicing in Rome. There was a crown of flowers hung to the door of his physician, with a card appended which read, "_To the savior of his country_." PROTESTANTS AND WAR. A second Diet at Spire, in 1529, revoked the former act of toleration, and demanded of all the princes and estates an unconditional surrender to the pope's decrees. This called forth the heroic _Protest_ of those who stood with Luther. They refused to submit, claiming that in matters of divine service and the soul's salvation conscience and God must be obeyed rather than earthly powers. It was from this that the name of _Protestants_ originated--a name which half the world now honors and accepts. The signers of this Protest also pledged to each other their mutual support in defending their position. Zwingli urged them to make war upon the emperor. He himself afterward took the sword, and perished by it. Calvin, Cranmer, Knox, and even the Puritan Fathers as far as they had power and occasion, resorted to physical force and the civil arm to punish the rejecters of their creed. Luther repudiated all such coercion. The sword was at his command, but he opposed its use for any purposes of religion. All the weight of his great influence was given to prevent his friends from mixing external force with what should ever have its seat only in the calm conviction of the soul. He thus practically anticipated Roger Williams and William Penn and the most lauded results of modern freedom--not from constraint of circumstances and personal interests, but from his own clear insight into Gospel principles. Bloody religious wars came after he was dead, the prospect of which filled his soul with horror, and to which he could hardly give consent even in case of direst necessity for self-defence; but it is a transcendent fact that while he lived they were held in abeyance, most of all by his prayers and endeavors. He fought, indeed, as few men ever fought, but the only sword he wielded was "the sword of the Spirit, which is the Word of God." THE CONFESSION OF AUGSBURG.