Читать книгу Sketches of Imposture, Deception, and Credulity онлайн

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Among the most mischievous of the pretenders to prophetical inspiration may be reckoned Thomas Muncer, and his companions, Storck, Stubner, Cellarius, Thomas, and several others, contemporaries of Luther, from whom sprang the sect of the Anabaptists. Eighty-four of them assumed the character of twelve apostles and seventy-two disciples. “They state wonderful things respecting themselves,” says Melancthon, in a letter to the Elector of Saxony; “namely, that they are sent to instruct mankind by the clear voice of God; that they verily hold converse with God, see future things, and, in short, are altogether prophetical and apostolical men.” Muncer was, of them all, the one who possessed the highest portion of talents and eloquence, and chiefly by his exertions a spirit of insurrection was excited among the peasantry. Expelled from Saxony, he found a retreat at Alstadt, in Thuringia, where the people listened to his revelations, gave him the chief authority in the place, and proceeded to establish that community of goods which was one of his doctrines. The war of the peasants had by this time broken out, but Muncer hesitated to place himself at their head. The exhortations of Pfeifer, another impostor, of a more daring spirit, and who pretended to have seen visions predictive of success, at length induced him to take the field. His force was, however, speedily attacked, near Frankhuysen, by the army of the allied princes, and, in spite of the courage and eloquence which he displayed, it was utterly defeated. Muncer escaped for the moment, but speedily fell into the hands of his enemies, and, after having been twice tortured, was beheaded. The same fate befell Pfeifer and some of his associates. Of the unfortunate peasants, who had been driven to arms by oppression, still more than by fanaticism, several thousands perished.