From the Diet of Worms to the Augsburg Confession - James Aitken Wylie

cardinal doctrines of revelation–the ruin of man,
and the redemption in Christ. "He who believes on
the Savior," he remarked, "is freed from sin."
Thus he returned with them to his first startingpoint,
salvation by free grace in opposition to
salvation by human merit, and in doing so he
reminded them of what it was that had emancipated
them from the bondage of penances, absolutions,
and so many rites enslaving to the conscience, and
had brought them into liberty and peace. Coming
next to the consideration of the abuse of that liberty
into which they were at that moment in some
danger of falling, he said faith was not enough, it
became them also to have charity. Faith would
enable each freely to advance in knowledge,
according to the gift of the Spirit and his own
capacity; charity would knit them together, and
harmonize their individual progress with their
corporate unity. He willingly acknowledged the
advance they had made in his absence; nay, some
of them there were who excelled himself in the
knowledge of Divine things; but it was the duty of
the strong to bear with the weak. Were there those
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