In his confusion of mind Luther does not perceive to what his proviso “so long as” amounts. It was practically the same as committing the decision concerning what was good for salvation to the hands of every man, however ignorant or incapable of sound judgment. Luther’s real criterion remained, however, his own opinion. “If anyone teaches another Gospel,” he says in this very sermon,[874] “contrary to that which we have proclaimed to you, let him be anathema” (cp. Gal. i. 8). The reason why people will not listen to him is, as he here tells them, because, by means of the filth of his arch-knaves and liars, “the devil in the world misleads and fools all.” Luther was convinced that he was the “last trump,” which was to herald in the destruction, not only of Satan and the Papacy, but also of the world itself. “We are weak and but indifferent trumpeters, but, to the assembly of the heavenly spirits, ours is a mighty call.” “They will obey us and our trump, and the end of the world will follow. Amen.”[875] Meanwhile, however, he notes with many misgivings the manifestations of the evil one. He even intended to collect in book form the instances of such awe-inspiring portents (“_satanæ portenta_”) and to have them printed. For this purpose he begged Jonas to send him once more a detailed account of the case of a certain Frau Rauchhaupt, which would have come under this category; he tells his friend that the object of his new book is to “startle” the people who lull themselves in such a state of false security that not only do they scorn the wholesome marvels of the Gospel with which we are daily overwhelmed, but actually make light of the real “furies of furies” of the wickedness of the world; they must read such marvellous stories, for “they are too prone to believe neither in the goodness of God nor in the wickedness of the devil, and too set on becoming, as indeed they are already, just bellies and nothing more.”[876]—Thus, when Lauterbach told him of three suicides who had ended their lives with the halter, he at once insisted that it was really Satan who had strung them up while making them to think that it was they themselves who committed the crime. “The Prince of this world is everywhere at work.” “God, in permitting such crimes, is causing the wrath of heaven to play over the world like summer lightning, that ungrateful men, who fling the Gospel to the winds, may see what is in store for them.” “Such happenings must be brought to the people’s knowledge so that they may learn to fear God.”[877] Happily the book that was to have contained these tales of horror never saw the light; the author’s days were numbered. The outward signs, whether in the heavens or on the earth, “whereby Satan seeks to deceive,” were now scrutinised by Luther more superstitiously than ever.