The Great Controversy The Great Controversy | Page 169

The elector of Saxony and the princes most friendly to Luther had left
Worms soon after his departure, and the emperor’s decree received the
sanction of the Diet. Now the Romanists were jubilant. They considered
the fate of the Reformation sealed.
God had provided a way of escape for His servant in this hour of
peril. A vigilant eye had followed Luther’s movements, and a true
and noble heart had resolved upon his rescue. It was plain that Rome
would be satisfied with nothing short of his death; only by concealment
could he be preserved from the jaws of the lion. God gave wisdom to
Frederick of Saxony to devise a plan for the Reformer’s preservation.
With the co-operation of true friends the elector’s purpose was carried
out, and Luther was effectually hidden from friends and foes. Upon
his homeward journey he was seized, separated from his attendants,
and hurriedly conveyed through the forest to the castle of Wartburg, an
isolated mountain fortress. Both his seizure and his concealment were so
involved in mystery that even Frederick himself for a long time knew not
whither he had been conducted. This ignorance was not without design;
so long as the elector knew nothing of Luther’s whereabouts, he could
reveal nothing. He satisfied himself that the Reformer was safe, and with
this knowledge he was content.
Spring, summer, and autumn passed, and winter came, and Luther
still remained a prisoner. Aleander and his partisans exulted as the light
of the gospel seemed about to be extinguished. But instead of this, the
Reformer was filling his lamp from the storehouse of truth; and its light
was to shine forth with brighter radiance.
In the friendly security of the Wartburg, Luther for a time rejoiced
in his release from the heat and turmoil of battle. But he could not long
find satisfaction in quiet and repose. Accustomed to a life of activity and
stern conflict, he could ill endure to remain inactive. In those solitary
days the condition of the church rose up before him, and

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