Then Luther determined to marry.  For two years Catherine von Bora had lived in the house of Reichenbach, the city clerk, afterward mayor of Wittenberg.  A healthy, good looking girl, she was, like many others, the abandoned daughter of a family of the country gentry of Meissen.  Twice Luther had tried to find her a husband, as in fatherly care he had done for several of her companions.  Finally Catherine declared that she would marry no one but Luther himself, or his friend Amsdorf.  Luther was surprised, but he reached a decision quickly.  Accompanied by Lucas Kranach, he asked for her hand and married her on the spot.  Then he invited his friends to the wedding feast, asked at Court for the venison which the Prince was accustomed to present to his professors when they married, and received the table wine as a present from the city of Wittenberg.  How things stood in Luther’s soul at that time we should be glad to know.  His whole being was under the highest tension.  The savage vigor of his nature struck out in all directions.  He was deeply shocked at the misery which arose about him from burned villages and murdered men.  If he had been a fanatic in his ideas, he would probably have perished now in despair; but above the stormy restlessness which could be perceived in him up to his marriage, there shone now, like a clear light, the conviction that he was the guardian of divine right among the Germans, and that to protect civil order and morality, he must lead public opinion, not follow it.  However violent his utterances are in particular cases, he appears just at this time preeminently conservative, and more self-possessed than ever.  He also believed, it is true, that he was not destined to live much longer, and often and with longing awaited his martyrdom.  He entered wedlock, perfectly at peace with himself on this point, for he had fully convinced himself of the necessity and the scriptural sanction of the married state.  In recent years he had urged all his acquaintances to marry—­finally even his old adversary, the Archbishop of Mainz.  He himself gave two reasons for his decision.  For many years he had deprived his father of his son; and it would be like an atonement if he should leave to old Hans a grandson in case of his own death.  There was also some defiance in it.  His adversaries were saying in triumph that Luther was humiliated, and since all the world now took offense at him, he proposed to give them still greater offense in his good cause.  He was of vigorous nature, but there was no trace of coarse sensuality in him, and we may assume that the best reason, which he confessed to no friend, was, after all, the decisive one:  Gossip had known for a long time more than he did, but now he also knew that Catherine was dear to him.  “I am no passionate lover, but I am fond of her,” he wrote to one of his closest friends.