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Eck was an able man, and an old friend of Luther's, and the argument between him and the reformer was especially vehement. In 1518 the latter was joined by Melancthon, who became one of his dearest and most trusted friends.
But the doctrine of the Trinity was as vital and important in the eyes of the divines of the fourth century as that of Justification by Faith was to the Germans when they assembled in the great hall of the Electoral palace of Leipsic to hear Luther and Dr. Eck advocate their separate sides.
The earlier and stricter Romanists take the ground that the Synod did intend to forbid an appeal to the Hebrew and Greek Scriptures, and to make the Vulgate the ultimate authority. The language of the council seems to favor this interpretation." We might add, the practise of Romanists, too. At the debate in Leipzig Eck contended that the Latin Vulgate was inspired by the Holy Ghost.
In this pause, as the Baron glared for his victim, a song, so softly sung that it sounded remote, but of which every syllable was clearly rounded, swelled into his ears, and froze him in his angry posture. 'The blood of the barons shall turn to ice, And their castle fall to wreck, When a true lover dips in the water thrice, That runs round Werner's Eck.
The latter, after manifold negotiations with the bishops, after a final weighing of the different views of the governments themselves, resolved, in March of the year 1526, to accept the offer of Eck, to whom the general-vicar Faber had joined himself, and assemble a religious conference at Baden, in the middle of October.
Petersburg, Eck met the daughter of one of the members of the Imperial Orchestra, and began a flirtation, which she took so seriously that her father gave him the alternative of matrimony or Siberia. After some hesitation he chose matrimony.
It rivalled in importance and dignity the Council of Nice, when the great Constantine presided, to settle the Trinitarian controversy. The combatants were as great as Athanasius and Arius, as vehement, as earnest, though not so fierce. Doctor Eck was superior to Luther in reputation, in dialectical skill, in scholastic learning. He was the pride of the universities.
Melancthon even said in a letter after the disputation, 'Most of us must admire Eck for his manifold and distinguished intellectual gifts. Later on he calls him, 'Eckeckeck, the daws'-voice. At any rate Eck displayed a rare power and endurance in those Leipzig days, and understood above all how to pursue with cleverness the real object he had in view in his contest with Luther.
He sought to keep on friendly and useful relations with other circles than those of Scholastic theology, such as with learned Humanists, and a short time before, with Luther himself and his colleague Carlstadt, to whom he had been introduced through a jurist of Nuremberg named Scheuerl. Luther, after the publication of his theses, had written a friendly letter to Eck.
At two o'clock the disputation between Eck and Carlstadt began. They were placed opposite each other in pulpits. A host of theologians and learned laymen had flocked together to the scene. From Wittenberg had come the Pomeranian Duke Barnim, then Rector of the University. Prince George of Anhalt, then a young Leipzig student, and afterwards a friend of Luther, was there.
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