Martin Luther

An angel is a spiritual creature created by God without a body for the service of Christendom and the church.

— Martin Luther

When I am angry I can pray well and preach well.

— Martin Luther

Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree.

— Martin Luther

No one need think that the world can be ruled without blood. The civil sword shall and must be red and bloody.

— Martin Luther

The multitude of books is a great evil. There is no limit to this fever for writing.

— Martin Luther

The fewer the words, the better the prayer.

— Martin Luther

Christian life consists of faith and charity.

— Martin Luther

Christians are rare people on earth.

— Martin Luther

Where God builds a church the devil builds a chapel.

— Martin Luther

The Devil beget darkness; darkness beget ignorance; ignorance beget error and his brethren; error beget free-will and presumption; free-will beget works; works beget forgetfulness of God; forgetfulness beget transgression; transgression beget superstition; superstition beget satisfaction; satisfaction beget the mass-offering; the mass-offering beget the priest; the priest beget unbelief; unbelief beget hypocrisy; hypocrisy beget traffic in offerings for gain; traffic in offerings for gain beget Purgatory; Purgatory beget the annual solemn vigils; the annual vigils beget church-livings; church-livings beget avarice; avarice beget swelling superfluity; swelling superfluity beget fulness; fulness beget rage; rage beget license; license beget empire and domination; domination beget pomp; pomp beget ambition; ambition beget simony; simony beget the pope and his brethren, about the time of the Babylonish captivity.

— Martin Luther

Here I stand; I can do no other. God help me. Amen!

— Martin Luther

Every man must do two things alone; he must do his own believing and his own dying.

— Martin Luther

The devil is God's ape!

— Martin Luther

To be a Christian without prayer is no more possible than to be alive without breathing.

— Martin Luther

I am afraid that the schools will prove the very gates of hell, unless they diligently labor in explaining the Holy Scriptures and engraving them in the heart of the youth.

— Martin Luther

An earthly kingdom cannot exist without inequality of persons. Some must be free, some serfs, some rulers, some subjects.

— Martin Luther

Our Lord has written the promise of resurrection, not in books alone, but in every leaf in springtime.

— Martin Luther

Faith must trample under foot all reason, sense, and understanding.

— Martin Luther

You should not believe your conscience and your feelings more than the word which the Lord who receives sinners preaches to you.

— Martin Luther

Reason is the enemy of faith.

— Martin Luther

Faith is a living, daring confidence in God's grace, so sure and certain that a man could stake his life on it a thousand times.

— Martin Luther

Be a sinner and sin strongly, but more strongly have faith and rejoice in Christ.

— Martin Luther

Who loves not women, wine and song remains a fool his whole life long.

— Martin Luther

Forgiveness is God's command.

— Martin Luther

Mankind has a free will; but it is free to milk cows and to build houses, nothing more.

— Martin Luther

To gather with God's people in united adoration of the Father is as necessary to the Christian life as prayer.

— Martin Luther

The God of this world is riches, pleasure and pride.

— Martin Luther

The hair is the richest ornament of women.

— Martin Luther

I am more afraid of my own heart than the Pope and all his cardinals. I have within me the great Pope, Self.

— Martin Luther

My heart, which is so full to overflowing, has often been solaced and refreshed by music when sick and weary.

— Martin Luther

I shall never be a heretic; I may err in dispute, but I do not wish to decide anything finally; on the other hand, I am not bound by the opinions of men.

— Martin Luther

In our sad condition our only consolation is the expectancy of another life. Here below all is incomprehensible.

— Martin Luther

The human heart is like a ship on a stormy sea driven about by winds blowing from all four corners of heaven.

— Martin Luther

I cannot and will not recant anything, for to go against conscience is neither right nor safe. Here I stand, I can do no other, so help me God. Amen.

— Martin Luther

You should point to the whole man Jesus and say, That is God.

— Martin Luther

Justice is a temporary thing that must at last come to an end; but the conscience is eternal and will never die.

— Martin Luther

If I am not allowed to laugh in heaven, I don't want to go there.

— Martin Luther

There is no more lovely, friendly, and charming relationship, communion, or company than a good marriage.

— Martin Luther

Let the wife make the husband glad to come home, and let him make her sorry to see him leave.

— Martin Luther

If he have faith, the believer cannot be restrained. He betrays himself. He breaks out. He confesses and teaches this gospel to the people at the risk of life itself.

— Martin Luther

The Lord commonly gives riches to foolish people, to whom he gives nothing else.

— Martin Luther

I have no pleasure in any man who despises music. It is no invention of ours: it is a gift of God. I place it next to theology. Satan hates music: he knows how it drives the evil spirit out of us.

— Martin Luther

Next to theology I give music the highest place of honor.

— Martin Luther

Christians are to be taught that the pope would and should wish to give of his own money, even though he had to sell the basilica of St. Peter, to many of those from whom certain hawkers of indulgences cajole money.

— Martin Luther

All who call on God in true faith, earnestly from the heart, will certainly be heard, and will receive what they have asked and desired.

— Martin Luther

Some plague the people with too long sermons; for the faculty of listening is a tender thing, and soon becomes weary and satiated.

— Martin Luther

People must have righteous principles in the first, and then they will not fail to perform virtuous actions.

— Martin Luther

How soon not now, becomes never.

— Martin Luther

Reason is a whore, the greatest enemy that faith has.

— Martin Luther

Anyone who can be proved to be a seditious person is an outlaw before God and the emperor; and whoever is the first to put him to death does right and well. Therefore let everyone who can, smite, slay and stab, secretly or openly, remembering that nothing can be more poisonous, hurtful, or devilish than a rebel.

— Martin Luther

So our Lord God commonly gave riches to those gross asses to whom he vouchsafed nothing else.

— Martin Luther

A good servant is a real godsend, but truly this is a rare bird in the land.

— Martin Luther

Teaching is of more importance than urging.

— Martin Luther

Who has skill in the art of music is of good temperament and fitted for all things.

— Martin Luther

Superstition, idolatry and hypocrisy have ample wages, but the truth goes begging.

— Martin Luther

Peace if possible, but truth at any rate.

— Martin Luther

Cannons and fire-arms are cruel and damnable machines; I believe them to have been the direct suggestion of the Devil. If Adam had seen in a vision the horrible instruments his children were to invent, he would have died of grief.

— Martin Luther

There is no wisdom save in truth. Truth is everlasting, but our ideas about truth are changeable. Only a little of the first fruits of wisdom, only a few fragments of the boundless heights, breadths and depths of truth, have I been able to gather.

— Martin Luther

Everything done in the world is done by hope.

— Martin Luther

I would advise no one to send his child where the Holy Scriptures are not supreme. Every institution that does not unceasingly pursue the study of Gods word becomes corrupt. Because of this we can see what kind of people they become in the universities and what they are like now. Nobody is to blame for this except the pope, the bishops, and the prelates, who are all charged with training young people. The universities only ought to turn out men who are experts in the Holy Scriptures, men who can become bishops and priests, and stand in the front line against heretics, the devil, and all the world. But where do you find that? I greatly fear that the universities, unless they teach the Holy Scriptures diligently and impress them on the young students, are wide gates to hell.

— Martin Luther

I do not deny that medicine is a gift of God, nor do I refuse to acknowledge science in the skill of many physicians; but, take the best of them, how far are they from perfection? . . . I have no objection to the doctors acting upon certain theories, but, at the same time, they must not expect us to be the slaves of their fancies.

— Martin Luther

Reason in no way contributes to faith. Nay, in that children are destitute of reason, they are all the more fit and proper recipients of baptism. For reason is the greatest enemy that faith has. . . . If God can communicate the Holy Ghost to grown persons, he can, a fortiori, communicate it to young children. Faith comes of the Word of God, when this is heard; little children hear that Word when they receive baptism, and therewith they receive also faith.

— Martin Luther