The purer and more profound view of the Evangel upon which they secretly prided themselves was a consequence of their eminently reasonable opposition to Luther’s altogether outward doctrine of justification and the state of grace. To them the idea of a purely mechanical covering over of our sinfulness by the imputation of Christ’s merits, seemed totally inadequate. They wanted to be in a more living communion with Christ, and having once seceded from the Church, they arrived by the path of pseudo-mysticism at the delusion of a direct intercourse with the other world; thereby, however, they brought a danger on the field, viz. religious radicalism and political revolution. “It seems to me a very suspicious circumstance,” so Luther writes of the Zwickau prophets, “that they should boast of speaking face to face with the Divine Majesty.”[242] Luther, after his period of study at the Wartburg, had at once to define and prove his position, particularly as he disapproved of much of the doctrines of Carlstadt’s party, as well as of his over-hasty action. Without delay, he mounted the pulpit at Wittenberg and staked all the powers of his personality and eloquence against the movement; he was unwilling that the whole work of the Evangel which had begun should end in chaos. In a course of eight sermons he traced back the disorders to “a misapprehension of Christian freedom.” It grieved him deeply, he declared, that, without his order, so much was being altered instead of proceeding cautiously and allowing the faith to mature first. “Follow me,” he cried, “I have never yet failed; I was the first whom God set to work on this plan; I cannot escape from God, but must remain so long as it pleases my Lord God; I was also the first to whom God gave the revelation to preach and proclaim this His Word to you. I am also well assured that you have the pure Word of God.”[243] What he says is, however, rather spoilt by a dangerous admission. “Should there be anyone who has something better to offer and to whom more has been revealed than to me, I am ready to submit to him my sense and reason and not to force my opinion upon him, but to obey him.”[244] He, of course, felt that he could convict the so-called “fanatics” of error, and was sure beforehand that his professed readiness to submit to others would not endanger his position. His whole cause depended on the maintenance of outward order and his own authority at Wittenberg; he knew, moreover, that he was backed by the Elector. His success against his adversaries, who, to tell the truth, were no match for him, was complete. Wittenberg was saved from the danger of open adherence to “fanaticism,” though the movement was still to give Luther much trouble secretly at Wittenberg and more openly elsewhere, particularly as Carlstadt, in his disappointment, came more and more after 1522 to make common cause with the Zwickauers.[245] * * * * *