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

hung so heavily above his friends in Augsburg, and
heard far beneath the mutterings of imperial wrath;
but neither could the one darken the sunshine of his
peace, nor the other shake his confidence in that
throne to which, in faith and prayer, his eyes were
continually uplifted. His letters at this time show a
singular elevation of faith, and a corresponding
assurance of victory. To take an instance, "I
beheld," says he, writing to his friends, "thick
clouds hanging above us like a vast sea; I could
neither perceive ground on which they reposed, nor
cords by which they were suspended; and yet they
did not fall upon us, but saluted us rapidly and
passeel away." Emperors and armies, and all the
array of earthly power, what are they? black
vapors, which seem charged with tempest and
destruction, but, just as they are about to burst, they
are driven away by the breath of the Almighty, as
clouds are driven before the wind. But fully to
realize this we must mount to Luther's elevation.
We must stand where we have the cloud beneath,
not above us.
Meanwhile in the Diet promises had been tried
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