On March 28, 1519, Luther addressed a letter to him, as "our glory and hope," acknowledging his indebtedness and begging for support.

Erasmus answered in a friendly way, at the same time sending a message encouraging the Elector Frederic to defend his innocent subject.
Dreading nothing so much as a violent catastrophe, the humanist labored for the next two years to find a peaceful solution for the threatening problem.

Seeing that Luther's two chief errors were that he "had attacked the crown of the pope and the bellies of the monks," Erasmus pressed upon men in power the plan of allowing the points in dispute to be settled by an impartial tribunal, and of imposing silence on both parties.

At the same time he begged Luther to do nothing {105} violent and urged that his enemies be not allowed to take extreme measures against him.

But after the publication of the pamphlets of 1520 and of the bull condemning the heretic, this position became untenable.
Erasmus had so far compromised himself in the eyes of the inquisitors that he fled from Louvain in the autumn of 1521, and settled in Basle.
He was strongly urged by both parties to come out on one side or the other, and he was openly taunted by Ulrich von Hutten, a hot Lutheran, for cowardice in not doing so.