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No. 2.]

A Monthly Magazine for Sunday Reading.

Sunday Talk.

NOVEMBER, 1883.

All Literary Correspondence to be addressed to the Editor, 253 Argyle Street, Glasgow.

Books, Magazines, and Periodicals should be sent in by the 12th of the preceding month, otherwise they may be left over till the following number.

Business Communications to be addressed to the Publishers, Messrs. GILLESPIE Brothers, 253 Argyle Street, Glasgow.

I

PLAS

The Personal Life of Martin Luther.

PART I.

DESIRE in the following pages to tell the main incidents in the life of the great German Reformer. I have endeavoured to do so as far as possible in his own words. 1 have made copious use of Principal Tulloch's graphic sketch of Luther, in his Leaders of the Reformation; and also of Mr. J. A. Froude's recent able articles in the Contemporary Review; and have not hesitated to employ the language of both these writers, when it seemed to add directness and picturesqueness to the narrative.

On the 10th of November, 1483, 400 years ago, on the eve of the saint after whom, the day following his birth, he received his name, Martin Luther was born at Eisleben, where his parents-his father a miner, his mother a peasant-had gone to attend a fair. His education began at the Latin School, at Mansfield, where the family lived; and the discipline both of the school and of the home life seems to have been somewhat severe, though we have a pretty picture of the father carrying his little boy in his arms to and from school. Subsequently he went to the school of the Franciscans, at Magdeburg, and then at Eisenach, where, singing one day on the streets for bread, as was the custom at that time in Germany, he attracted the attention of a lady of the name of Cotta, who became his warm friend and comfortably housed him during his further school days. At the age of eighteen he entered the University of Erfurt as a law-student, and four years later took his degree of Doctor of Philosophy. His legal studies influenced his future thought, but during his college days other influences were at work,

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which were not only to change the current of his own but of the world's history. A dangerous illness, the death of a dear friend, the discovery that there were more gospels and epistles than those given in the lectionaries of the Church, an interested perusal of the Bible, all helped to strengthen the resolution to which he felt himself impelled. "His mode of carrying it out was characteristic. One evening he invited some of his fellow students to supper, gives them of his best cheer: music and jest enliven the company, and the entertainment closes in a full burst of merriment. The same night there is a solitary knock at the door of the Augustine Convent, and the student, who has just gaily parted from his companions, two volumes alone in his hand, a Virgil and a Plautus, passes beneath its portal. He has separated from the world, and devoted himself to God, as he and the world then understood devotion."

Here at Erfurt, in the convent which he had thus voluntarily made his home, the seeds of thought that came to bear so much fruit sprang up in his heart, and he began the struggle which was to issue in such tremendous results. Here his intellectual and moral nature were aroused, and the result was dissatisfaction with the thought, the teaching, and the practices of the Church, and intense dissatisfaction with his own spiritual condition. He could find no real peace for his soul in the ways to which his Church pointed. "If ever monk could have got to heaven by monkery I might have done so," he said. I wore out my body with watching, fasting, praying, and other works." It was of no use. His sins were ever before him. The clouds of judgment were in the sky above him. One day at Mass they seemed to be enveloping him, and he cried aloud-"It is not I. It is not I!"

Fortunately for him, just at this time the darkness was deepest, he made the acquaintance of Staupitz, the Vicar-general of the Augustines, who came to inspect the Convent at Erfurt. 'Through him," says Luther, "the light of the Gospel first dawned out of the darkness on my heart." He had said to him: “It is in vain that I promise to God: sin is always too strong for me;" and Staupitz had replied, and we must all feel the truth of his words-"I have vowed more than a thousand times to lead a holy life, and as

often broken my vows. I now trust only in the mercy and grace of God in Christ. Look at the wounds of Christ. See the Saviour bleeding upon the cross, and believe in the mercy of God. There is no true repentance but that which begins in the love of God and of righteousness. Conversion does not come from such works as you have been practising. Love Him who has first loved you!" How Luther welcomed such teaching as that, and in the light and love of it his gloom was gradually dispelled. One day when he had partially lost the comfort he had felt, he wrote, "My sins -my sins;" and Staupitz replied, "It is just your sins. that make you an object of salvation. Would you be only the semblance of a sinner, and have only the semblance of a Saviour? Jesus Christ is the Saviour of those who are real and great sinners." Another day, when he was very full of gloom and fear, and an old monk was repeating the Creed to him, the words "I believe in the forgiveness of sins," fell upon his ear, like the music he loved so well. "I saw the Scripture in an entirely new light, and straightway I felt as I were born anew-it was as if I had found the door of Paradise thrown wide open."

In 1507 he was ordained a priest, and in two years he took the degree of Bachelor of Theology at Wittenberg, and began to lecture on theology, "that theology which seeks out the kernel from the nut, and the flour from the wheat, and the marrow from the bones." The nature of these lectures may be inferred from what the Rector of the University said about them-"This monk will puzzle all our doctors, and bring in a new doctrine, and reform the whole Roman Church, for he takes his stand on the writings of the Apostles and Prophets, and on the Word of Jesus Christ." His preaching produced a similar impression and many flocked to hear the words which, as Melancthon said, were born not on his lips but in his soul."

In 1511, along with another monk, he was sent to Rome on business. He approached the great city with emotion so intense that on beholding it he flung himself on his knees in a transport of feeling. He left it in disgust and disappointment, but the visit was pregnant with results. "I would not take 100,000 florins not to have seen Rome. I might have thought else that I did the Pope injustice. I have said many masses there, and heard many said, so that I shudder when I think of it. There I heard, among other coarse jests, courtiers laughing at table and bragging that some said. mass and repeated these words over the bread and wine -Panis es panis manebis; vinum es vinum manebis"Bread thou art and bread thou remainest; wine thou art and wine thou remainest." Here too it was while essaying to mount the stairs of the Sancta Scala, that

hearing the words thundering in his ears-"The just shall live by faith," he gave up the task.

Returning home, his preaching became more real and living than ever. His subjects were sin and atonement, human wretchedness, and the mercy and grace of the Almighty, and "his impassioned words, were drawn fresh through his own heart, from the Epistles of St. Paul. His look, his manner, his demonic eyes, brilliant black, with a yellow rim round the iris, like a lynx's, were startling and impressive." He attracted the attention of the Elector, and Spalatin his secretary and chaplain, became his friend. In 1512 he was made a Doctor of Theology, and had to swear on the Bible that he would "study and preach it all his life, and maintain the Christian faith against all heretics," an oath which is said to have been a great source of comfort to him in after years.

Leo the Tenth was now Pope. He needed money, for he wished to signalise his reign by building the most magnificent church in the world. He resolved to raise the necessary funds by a general sale of indulgences throughout Catholic Europe. The Commissioner for Germany was Albert, Archbishop of Mayence, Cardinal and Prince of the Empire, a youth of twenty-seven years of age, loose, luxurious, sensual. His agent in Saxony was John Tetzel, and thus at Juterboch, a few miles from Wittenberg, a "shameless traffic" fell into the hands of a man conspicuous for shamelessness of tongue, and who scrupled not at any blasphemy to exalt the value of his wares." "Come and buy, come and buy," he called to all. "When one drops a penny into the box for a soul in Purgatory, so soon as the money chinks in the chest the soul flies up to heaven.” It may well be imagined how Luther's indignation was aroused, especially when we consider that he had already said of many of the practices of the Church, "The whole ground was covered, nay heaped up, with the rubbish of all manner of strange doctrines and superstitions so that the word of truth can barely shine through; nay, in many places, not a ray of it is visible." At first, indeed, he only warned his people that "they might do something better and more certain than buying pardons." But as the evil increased and the noise of Tetzel's infamous traffic sounded louder in his ears, he called forth-"God willing, I will beat a hole in his drum." He determined to avail himself of the practice, then common in Germany, in regard to disputed points, and on the 31st of October, 1517, he affixed to the door of Wittenberg Church ninety-five theses, affirming the necessity of spiritual repentance, and calling in question the Pope's right to traffic in indulgences. "If

the sinner had true contrition," he maintained, "he received complete forgiveness; if he had not, no brief of indulgence could avail him, for the Pope's absolution had no value in and for itself, but only in so far as it was a mark of Divine favour."

And now the great battle began in earnest. Tetzel answered that the Pope was infallible, and publicly burned the theses of Luther. The students of Wittenberg burned the theses of Tetzel. Pope Leo seemed at first only amused. "It is only a quarrel of envious monks;" but when he saw the theses he said, "A drunken German has written these, when he is sober he will be of another mind." After a year he dispatched a legate to Germany, and by his desire a Diet of the Empire was summoned to meet at Augsburg, in August, 1518, and Luther was required to attend. By this time the Reformer found that he had been as a magnet, attracting to himself men who had only been waiting for some one to give expression to their long pent up thoughts and wishes. "The Humanists, Reuchlin, Erasmus, and others, expressed their sympathy; the war party, Hutten and Seckingen uttered their joy; above all the great heart of the German people responded; and while the monk of Wittenburg seemed, as he said afterwards, to stand solitary in the breach, he was in reality encompassed by a cloud of witnesses, a great army of truthseekers, at whose head he was destined to win for the world once more the triumph of truth and righteousness."

On Luther's appearing at the Diet of Augsburg, Cajetan, the Pope's legate, found that he had no ordinary person to deal with; that the young peasant preacher was not to be cajoled into silence or retraction. Retract he would not against his conscience. Cajetan tried to frighten him into submission. It was in vain. "Think you," he said, "that the Pope cares for the opinions of Germany? Think you that the princes will take up arms for you? No, indeed; and where will you be then?" "Under Heaven!" replied Luther.

Feeling that he was in danger, he escaped to Wittenberg "in a monk's gown and unbreeched." Settling down again, he wrote an account of the proceedings at Augsburg, and a tract on the Papal supremacy. He appealed to a General Council. The Pope saw that further negotiations were necessary, and Militz, his Chamberlain, a Saxon nobleman, was chosen for the purpose. He tried to temporise, to cajole, to flatter, but still in vain. Militz discovered to his amazement that three-fourths of Germany were upon Luther's side. He was discomfited.

The next passage of arms between the contending parties was, in the summer of 1519, at Leipzig, before Duke George of Saxony. Luther's opponent was Dr.

John Eck, who had previously attacked the original theses. Both sides claimed the victory. The real question at issue emerged into the light of day. They were "Germany or Rome, national independence, or hierarchcal bondage, and still more deeply Scripture or Church, conscience or authority?" That Luther was drifting further and further from all hope of compromise with the Church of Rome, may be gathered from some of his sayings at this period. "The time for silence is past. The time to speak is come. Talk of war against the Turk? The Roman Turk is the fellest Turk in the world. Roman avarice, the greatest thief that ever walked the earth. All goes into the Roman sack, which has no bottom-and all in the name of God, too! Hearest thou, O, Pope !-not all holy, but all sinful-who gave thee power to lift thyself above God, and break His laws? The wicked Satan lies through thy throat. O, my Lord Christ! Hasten the last day, and destroy the devil's nest at Rome." "I must now deny that there are seven Sacraments, and bind them to three-Baptism, the Lord's Supper, and Penance and even these are led by the Church of Rome into a wretched prison, and the Church is robbed of all her liberty." After such language as this we are quite prepared to hear that the Pope condemned Luther's writings to the fire, and equally prepared to hear that Luther retaliated on the 10th of December, 1520, by solemnly burning at Wittenberg a copy of the Papal decretals. "Because thou hast troubled the Lord's saints, let eternal fire consume thee!" he said, as he consigned them to the flames. Round the flames these student's sang the Te Deum, and the rejoicing grew louder as the Bull brought by Eck was added to the fire. The deed was done-Luther, timorous at first, was now strong. A storm had now burst which, he said, would not end till the day of judgment. He and all his followers were excommunicated.

The German people were on his side. What about the German Emperor? Maximilian had died in January 1519, and Charles the V., a young man of twenty years, had succeeded him. He knew little of German life or thought. It is said he did not even understand its language. "He represented the institututions of 1500 years, which if corrupt in some parts of Europe, in others had not lost their old vitality, and were bearing fruit still in brave and noble forms of human nature." And now he was not only "Emperor of the Germany of Luther, but he was also King of the Spain of St. Ignatius. By nature and instinct Charles the V. belonged to the side of authority and interest. Indeed, necessity combined to hold him to it. In Germany he was king of kings, but of kings over whom, unless he was supported by the Diet, his

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