“He is not a Christian, but a Turk, and an enemy of Christ, who does not desire afflictions.” “Our theologians and popes are in fact enemies of the cross of Christ ... for no one hates pain and trouble more than the popes and the lawyers [i.e. those who insist upon laws and observances]. No one is more greedy than they for riches, comfort, idleness, honour and pomp.” “They honour the relics of the Holy Cross and yet abhor and fly from what they dislike.” “We consider Christ our helper and our support in time of trouble, but whoever does not suffer gladly, cheats Him of these titles; to such a one God even is no longer the Creator because he will not return to the nothingness from which God created all. Whoever will not suffer God in weakness, foolishness and punishment, for him God is not powerful, not wise, not merciful.”[620] “The cross puts to death everything that is in us. Nature, it is true, desires to make itself and everything alive, but God in His love takes care, by the infliction of crosses and suffering, that even spiritual gifts shall not taste too sweet to the righteous; he must not throw himself upon them in a natural, godless impetuosity in order to enjoy them, even though they be attractive and tempt him to savour them ... he may not even love God on account of His grace and His gifts, but only for His own sake, otherwise this would be a forbidden [!] indulgence in the grace received, and he would insult the Father even more than he did before [i.e. when as yet unrighteous!]. In the Commentary on Romans Luther refuses to recognise any love save that which springs from the most perfect motive. He stigmatises the love which arises from the joy in the benefits bestowed by a gracious God,—and which the orthodox mystics allowed,—as presumption, and as an enjoyment of the creature rather than of the Creator, and goes so far as to say that if a man were to remain in this love “he would be lost eternally.”[621]