And now a word about the chastity of Rome, particularly that peculiar brand which was inaugurated by Gregory VII for the Roman clergy and the religious of both sexes, and riveted upon them by the Council of Trent- the chastity of the celibate state. That the unnatural principle had never worked out toward true chastity, that the robbery which it has perpetrated on men and women had to be compensated for by connivance at, and open permission of, concubinage, is a matter of current knowledge. Luther's advice to priests and bishops who had opened their hearts to him on the state of their chastity to marry their cooks, even if they had to do it secretly; rather than maintain the other relation to them, was a good man's effort to meet a grave difficulty as best he could. This advice is now used to show that Luther was ready to approve any kind of cohabitation. The very opposite is true: it was because he did not approve of any kind of sexual intercourse, but because he desired to obtain some kind of a legal character for that relation, that he gave the advice to which we have referred. Before the assembled representatives of the Church and of the German nation the following statements were read in Article XXIII of the Augsburg Confession: "There has been common complaint concerning the examples of priests who were not chaste. For that reason, also, Pope Pius is reported to have said that there were certain reasons why marriage was taken away from priests, but that there were far weightier ones why it ought to be given back; for so Platina writes. Since, therefore, our priests were desirous to avoid these open scandals, they married wives, and taught that it was lawful for them to contract matrimony. First, because Paul says (1 Cor. 7, 2): 'To avoid fornication, let every man have his own wife.' Also (9): 'It is better to marry than to burn.' Secondly, Christ says (Matt. 19, 11): 'All men cannot receive this saying,' where He teaches that not all men are fit to lead a single life; for God created man for procreation (Gen. 1, 23). Nor is it in man's power, without a singular gift and work of God, to alter this creation. Therefore, those that are not fit to lead a single life ought to contract matrimony. For no man's law, no vow, can annul the commandment and ordinance of God. For these reasons the priests teach that it is lawful for them to marry wives. It is also evident that in the ancient Church priests were married men. For Paul says (1 Tim. 3, 2) that a bishop should be the husband of one wife. And in Germany, four hundred years ago for the first time, the priests were violently compelled to lead a single life, who indeed offered such resistance that the Archbishop of Mayence, when about to publish the Pope's decree concerning this matter, was almost killed in the tumult raised by the enraged priests. And so harsh was the dealing in the matter that not only were marriages forbidden for the time to come, but also existing