Granted the presence of this inspiration he regards as permissible what otherwise would not be so. In a note sent to the Elector of Saxony at the time of the Diet of Augsburg regarding the question whether it was allowed to offer armed resistance to the Emperor, we find this idea expressed in remarkable words. Till then Luther had looked upon resistance as forbidden. The predicament of his cause, now endangered by the warlike threats of the Emperor, led him to think of resistance. He writes: If the Elector wishes to take up arms “he must do so under the influence of a singular spirit and faith (‘_vocante aliquo singulari spiritu et fide_’). Otherwise he must yield to superior force and suffer death together with the other Christians of his faith.”[260] It is plain that there would have been but little difficulty in finding the peculiar mystical inspiration required; no less plain is it, that, once this back door had been opened “inspiration” would soon usurp the place of conscience and justify steps, that, in themselves, were of a questionable character. _Conscience in the Religious Question of the Day_ The new method of dealing with conscience is more closely connected with Luther’s new method of inducing faith than might at first sight appear. The individualism he proclaimed in matters of faith embodied the principle, that “each one must, in his own way, lay hold on religious experience and thus attain religious conviction.”[261] Luther often says, in his idealistic way, that only thus is it possible to arrive at the supreme goal, viz. to feel one’s faith within as a kind of inspiration; our aim must ever be to feel it “surely and immutably” in our conscience and in all the powers of our soul.[262] Everything must depend on this experience, the more so as to him faith means something very different from what it means to Catholics; it is, he says, “no taking it all for true”; “for that would not be Christian faith but more an opinion than faith”; on the contrary, each one must believe that “he is one of those on whom such grace and mercy is bestowed.”[263] Now, such a faith, no matter how profound and immutable the feeling be, cannot be reached except at the cost of a certain violence to conscience; such coercion is, in fact, essential owing to the nature of this faith in personal salvation.