The tractates of 1520, to which that on "The Papacy at Rome" belongs, like most of Luther's writings, were drawn forth from him in large part defensively, under provocation from the other side, or by the exigencies of the occasion. His correspondence[3] during the first half of 1520 reveals them as a result (with fresh causes arising) of the stir at Leipzig. Said Luther (February, 1520), "You cannot make a pen out of a sword: the Word of God is a sword. I was unwilling to be forced to come forward in public; and the more unwilling I am, the more I am drawn into the contest." Widely and eagerly read, these piquant publications made Luther the awakener, the developer, and as Harnack declares, the spiritual center of the reformatory thought that was now rising to a crisis. Fortunate it was, that the infancy of modern and the birth of Luther were contemporary, and that Luther turned to the printing press to such an extent in that critical period, that in the single year under discussion the number of printed German works was doubled. Our little book of June 26, 1520, is the earliest of his writings to present a full outline of his teaching on the nature of the Christian Church. Driven by an antagonist, to whom his work is a reply, to write[4] in German for the laity, Luther gives them a clear and fundamental insight into this burning subject. His teachings "which he had just one year before maintained at the Leipzig Disputation are here unfolded, following to their logical conclusions and clearly presented."[5] This flying counter-attack against the "famous Romanist at Leipzig" thus becomes, in the judgment of Köstlin,[6] "one of the most important of his general doctrinal treatise of that period." Luther's reply was written in short order during the last two weeks in May.[7] It came about in this wise: Eck at the Disputation had driven Luther to declare that belief in the divine supremacy of Rome was not necessary to salvation. Following this, in fall, a Franciscan friar, Augustine von Avleld, had risen to attack Luther and glorify the papacy, having received an appointment from Adolph, the Bishop of Merseburg (who had posted the inhibition on the Leipzig churches against the Disputation,[8] to write against the Reformer. Alveld's work, justifying the divine right of the Apostolic Chair, to all learned men, appeared early in May,[9] in the Latin language, in a first edition full of errors, followed quickly by a second edition.[10] Alveld attempted to cut Luther to pieces with "seven swords," of which the first was recta ratio; the second, canonica scriptura; the third, vera scientia (gained through the Church teachers and scholastics); the fourth, pietas sacra; the fifth, sanus intellectus; the sixth, simplex et pudica sapientia; the seventh, pura et integra scientia.