George Wagner, in the Year 1527

George Wagner, of Emmerich, was arrested at Munich, in Bavaria, on account of four articles of the faith. First, that the priest cannot forgive sins. Second, that he does not believe that a man can bring God down from heaven. Third, that he does not believe that God or Christ is bodily in the bread which the priest has upon the altar; but that it is the bread of the Lord. Fourth, that he did not hold the belief that water baptism had any saving power. Since he would not renounce these articles, he was most severely tormented, so that the prince felt great compassion for him, and came to him in the prison himself, and earnestly urged him to do so, promising that he would call him his friend all his life long. In the same way the prince's tutor also earnestly urged him to recant, and likewise made him many promises. At last his wife and child were brought before him in prison, in order to move him in this way to recant. But he was not to be moved in this way either; for he said that though his wife and child were so dear to him that the prince could not buy them with all his dominion, yet he would not forsake his God and Lord on their account. Many priests and others also came to him, to persuade him; but he was steadfast and immovable in what God had given him to know. So he was finally sentenced to the fire and to death.

Having been delivered into the hands of the executioner, and led into the middle of the city, he said: "Today I will confess my God before all the world." He had such joy in Christ Jesus that his face did not pale, nor did his eyes show fear; but he went smiling to the fire, where the executioner bound him on the ladder, and tied a little bag of powder to his neck, at which he said: "Let it be done in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost;" and having smilingly said farewell to a Christian who was there, he was thrust into the fire by the executioner, and happily offered up his spirit, on the eighth day of February, in the year 1527. The sheriff, however, surnamed Eisenreich von Landsberg, while returning home from the place of execution, traveling on horseback, intending to arrest others of the brothers, died suddenly in the night, and was found dead in his bed in the morning, having thus been removed through the wrath of God.

NOTE. It is known that Balthasar Pacimontanus opposed infant baptism, and was therefore burned at Vienna, in the year 1527. See the second part of Jacob Mehrning's History of Baptism, page 777, from Bellarm., volume 3, book 1, de Bapt., chapter 8. [n572-1]