Speaking of the end of the world he often says, that the fall of the Papacy involves it. “Assuredly,” he says, the end will shortly follow on account of the manifest wickedness of the Pope and the Papists. According to him, the Bible itself teaches that, “after the downfall of the Pope and the deliverance of the poor, no one on earth would ever again be a tyrant and inspire fear.” “This would not be possible,” so Luther thinks, “were the world to go on after the fall of the Pope, for the world cannot exist without tyrants. And thus the Prophet agrees with the Apostle, viz. that Christ, when He comes, will upset the Holy Roman Chair. God grant it may happen speedily. Amen!”[900] In his fantastic interpretation of the Monk-Calf he declares in a similar way, that the near end of the world is certain in view of the abominations of the sinking Papacy and its monkish system, which last is symbolised in the wonderful calf: “My wish and hope are that it may mean the Last Day, since many signs have so far coincided, and the whole world is as it were in an uproar,”[901] the source of the whole to-do being his triumphant contest with Antichrist. In the same way his conviction of the magnitude and success of his mission against the foe of Christ gives the key to his curious reading of Daniel and the Epistle to the Thessalonians with regard to the time of Antichrist’s advent and the end of the world, which we find set forth quite seriously in his reply to Catharinus.[902] In short, “Antichrist will be revealed whatever the world may do; after this Christ must come with His Judgment Day.”[903] When the Papacy, instead of collapsing, began to gather strength and even proceeded to summon a Council, Luther did not cease foretelling its fall; he predicts the end of the world in terms even stronger than before, though the reason he assigns for his forebodings is more and more the “contempt shown for the Word,” i.e. for his teaching and exhortations. Disgust, disappointment and the gloomy outlook for the future of his work are now his chief grounds for expecting the end of all and for ardently hoping that the Day will soon dawn.... It is the self-seeking and vice so prevalent in his own fold which wrings from him the exclamation: “It must soon come to a head,”[904] for things cannot long go on thus.