TO MARTIN LUTHER belongs, with strict propriety, the foremost place in this collection intended to represent the German mind. Luther is regarded by his countrymen as the original of that mind, the prototype of all that is most distinctive in German modes of thought and speech. Other writers of German had attained to eminence before him. Tauler, in particular, the celebrated mystic of Strasburg, is still an honored name. Nevertheless, the national-intellectual life of Germany dates from Luther as its parent source, and is emphatically referred to him by a grateful posterity. There is scarcely another instance in history, in which an individual, without secular authority or military achievement, has so stamped himself upon a people and made himself, to so great an extent, the leader, the representative, the voice of the nation. He has been to Germany, in this respect, what Homer was to Greece.

While devoting himself to the regeneration of the national religion, he unconsciously conferred upon the national literature a service as signal in its kind, as any which the church derived from his labors. He first gave to that literature an adequate organ. He created the language which is now written and spoken by educated Germans. For though a constant approximation to the modern High German is undoubtedly visible in the writings of his immediate predecessors, -as e. g. in Albrecht Dürer, the painter, and the translator of the Gesta Romanorum, there is still a great stride between their language and the Lutheran, in point of movement and well-defined inflection. On the whole, the modern High German must be considered as having first at

"Er schuf die Deutsche Sprache." Heine. This may seem too strongly put, when we consider the necessary laws of language. The Lutheran was not a creation out of nothing, certainly; but it was the evolution of a perfeet and harmonious form out of a rude and undigested

mass.

tained its full development and perfect finish in Luther's version of the Bible. By means of that book, it obtained a currency which nothing else could have given it. It became fixed. It became universal. It became the organ of a literature which, more than any other since the Greek, has been a literature of ideas. It became the vehicle of modern philosophy, the cradle of those thoughts which, at this moment, act most intensely on the human mind.

Martin Luther was born at Eisleben, in Saxony, during a visit of his parents to that city, November 10, 1483. His father, Hans Luther, a poor miner, who had previously resided in the village of Mohra, removed to Mansfeld the following year; and here it was that Martin received the first rudiments of education. At the age of twenty, he obtained the degree of Master at the University of Erfurth. His father had destined him to the study of the Law, but Theology drew him with irresistible attraction. He became a monk of the Augustine order, at Erfurth, and, in process of time, Doctor of Divinity, at Wittenberg.

He began his labors, as a reformer, in the year 1517, with an attack on the sale of Indulgences, in ninety-five propositions, which he sent forth into the world, as it were a cartel aimed at Tetzel and Rome. Three years later we find him at the Diet of Worms, defending himself and his doctrine before the emperor Charles V. and the German princes. That was the most remarkable assembly ever convened on earth,-an empire against a man! Lucas Cranach's picture represents Luther as he stood there, so lone and strong, with his great fire-heart,- -a new Prometheus, confronting the Jove of the sixteenth century and the German Olympus. "Here I stand, I cannot otherwise. God help me! Amen." Immediately upon this followed his translation of the Bible, which was his best defence; and

from this time, until his death, which occurred on the 18th February, 1546, such a succession of labors in behalf of the Reformed religion, as to justify the epitaph,

"Pestis eram vivens, moriens, tua mors ero Papa!"

Luther is represented as a man of low stature* but handsome person, with a "clear brave countenance," lively complexion, and falcon eyes. Antonio Varillast says; "Nature gave him an Italian head upon a German body; such was his vivacity and diligence, his cheerfulness and health." His voice was clear and penetrating, his eloquence overpowering. Melanchthon, on beholding his picture, exclaimed, “Fulmina erant singula verba tua." Another contemporary said of him, that he was a man "to stop the wrath of God." Another calls him the third Elias. He was a husband and a father, fond of society, of a free and jovial nature, much given to music, himself a composer and an able performer on the flute. A man of singular temperance and great industry. He throve best on hard work and spare diet. An easy life made him sick. As to his character, a man without guile, open, sincere, generous, obliging, patient, brave, devout. "He was not only the greatest," says Henry Heine,‡ "but the most German man of our history. In his character all the faults and all the virtues of the Germans are combined on the largest scale. Then he had qualities which are very seldom found united, which we are accustomed to regard as irreconcileable antagonisms. He was, at the same time, a dreamy mystic and a practical man of action. His thoughts had not only wings but hands. He spoke, and he acted. He was not only the tongue but the sword of his time. Moreover, he was, at the same time, a scholastic word-thresher and an inspired, God-intoxicated prophet. When he had plagued himself all day long with his dogmatic distinctions, in the evening he took his

"Untergesetzter Statur." See Des seligen Zeugen Gottes. D. Martin Luther's Lebens umstände in 4. Th von Friedrich Siegmund Keil. Leipzig. 1764. ↑ Liber hist. de haeres, quoted by Keil, Zur Geschichte der Religion und Philosophie in Deutschland. Salon, vol. 2d. Hamburg. 1835.

flute and gazed at the stars, dissolved in melody and devotion. He could scold like a fishwife, and he could be soft, too, as a tender maiden. Sometimes he was wild as the storm that uproots the oak, and then again, he was gentle as the zephyr that dallies with the violet. He was full of the most awful reverence and of self-sacrifice in honor of the Holy Spirit. He could merge himself entirely in pure spirituality. And yet he was well acquainted with the glories of this world, and knew how to prize them; and out of his mouth blossomed the famous saying,

"Wer nicht liebt Wein, Weiber und Gesang,
Der bleibt ein Narr sein Leben lang."

He was a complete man, I would say, an absolute man, one in whom matter and spirit were not divided. To call him a spiritualist, therefore, would be as great an error as to call him a sensualist. How shall I express it? He had something original, incomprehensible, miraculous, such as we find in all providential men,-something awfully naive, blunderingly wise, sublimely narrow;-something invincible, demoniacal."

The position which Luther holds in the estimation of his countrymen, as father of the German language and literature, together with the intrinsic worth of his writings, has seemed to me to justify more copious extracts, than one who knows him only as the great Reformer or the dogmatic theologian, might expect to find in a work like this. I have endeavored to preserve in the translation the slight taste of antiquity which marks the writer of the sixteenth century; although the language of Luther is less antiquated than that of contemporary English writers. In fact the antiquity resides in the thought rather than the idiom. The idiom is substantially that of the present day.

The following specimens, with the exception of the letters, are taken from the edition of Luther's works by Walch, in twenty-four vols. 4to. The letters are from the complete collection published by Martin Leberecht de Wette, in five vols. 8vo. Berlin. 1826.

and stares at the ease of others. True it is, it would be difficult for me to ride in armour; but then, on the other hand, I would like to see the rider who should sit me still the whole day long and look into a book, though he were not compelled to care for aught, to invent or think or read. Ask a chancery-clerk, a preacher or an orator, what kind of work writing and haranguing is? Ask a schoolmaster what kind of work is teaching and bringing up of boys? The pen is light, it is true, and among all trades no tool so easily furnished as that of the writingtrade, for it needeth only a goose's wing, of which one shall everywhere find a sufficiency, gratis. Nevertheless, in this employment, the best piece in the human body, (as the head) and the noblest member, (as the tongue) and the highest work (as speech) must take part and labour most; while, in others, either the fist or the feet or the back, or members of that class alone work; and they that pursue them may sing merrily the while, and jest freely, which a writer cannot do. Three fingers do the work (so they say of writers), but the whole body and soul must coöperate.

I have heard of the worthy and beloved emperor Maximilian, how, when the great boobies complained that he employed so many writers for missions and other purposes, he is reported to have said; "what shall I do? They will not suffer themselves to be used in this way, therefore I must employ writers." And further: "Knights I can create, but doctors I cannot create." So have I likewise heard of a fine nobleman, that he said, "I will let my son study. It is no great art to hang two legs over a steed and be a rider; he shall soon learn me that; and he shall be fine and well-spoken."

They say, and it is true, the pope was once a pupil too. Therefore despise me not the fellows who say "panem propter Deum" before the doors and sing the bread-song. Thou hearest, as this psalm says, great princes and lords sing. I too have been one of these fellows, and have received bread at the houses, especially at Eisenach, my native city. Although, afterward, my dear father maintained me, with all love and faith, in the high school at Erfurt, and, by his sore sweat and labour, has helped me to what I have become,-still I have been a beggar at the doors of the rich, and, according to this psalm, have attained so far by means of the pen, that, now, I would not compound with the Turkish emperor, to have his wealth and forego my art. Yea I would not take for it the wealth of the world many times multiplied; and yet, without doubt, I had never attained to it, had I not chanced upon a school and the writers' trade.

Therefore let thy son study, nothing doubting, and though he should beg his bread the while,

* A song or psalm which the poor students of Luther's time sang, when they went about imploring charity at the doors of the rich.

yet shalt thou give to our Lord God a fine piece of wood out of which he can whittle thee a lord. And be not disturbed that vulgar niggards contemn the art so disdainfully, and say: Aha! if my son can write German and read and cipher, he knows enough; I will have him a merchant. They shall soon become so tame that they will be fain to dig with their fingers, ten yards deep in the earth, for a scholar. For my merchant will not be a merchant long, when law and preaching fail. That know I for certain; we theologians and lawyers must remain, or all must go down with us together. It cannot be otherwise. When theologians go, then goes the word of God, and remains nothing but the heathen, yea! mere devils. When jurists go, then goes justice together with peace, and remains only murder, robbery, outrage, force, yea! mere wild beasts. But what the merchant shall earn and win, when peace is gone, I will leave it to his books to inform him. And how much profit all his wealth shall be to him when preaching fails, his conscience, I trow, shall declare to him.

I will say briefly of a diligent pious school-teacher or magister, or of whomsoever it is, that faithfully brings up boys and instructs them, that such an one can never be sufficiently recompensed or paid with money; as also the heathen Aristotle says. Yet is this calling so shamefully despised among us, as though it were altogether nought. And we call ourselves Christians!

And if I must or could relinquish the office of preacher and other matters, there is no office I would more willingly have than that of schoolmaster or teacher of boys. For I know that this work, next to the office of preacher, is the most profitable, the greatest and the best. Besides, I know not even, which is the best of the two. For it is hard to make old dogs tame and old rogues upright; at which task, nevertheless, the preacher's office labours, and often labours in vain. But young trees be more easily bent and trained, howbeit some should break in the effort. Beloved! count it one of the highest virtues upon earth, to educate faithfully the children of others, which so few, and scarcely any, do by their

own.

ON THE SAME SUBJECT.

FROM AN EXHORTATION OF M. LUTHER TO THE COUNCILMEN OF ALL THE CITIES OF GERMANY TO ESTABLISH AND MAINTAIN CHRISTIAN SCHOOLS.

LET us consider our former misery and the darkness wherein we have been. I deem that Germany has never before heard so much of God's word as now. One finds no trace of it in history. If, then, we let it pass thus, without thanks or honour, it is to be feared we shall suffer yet more horrible darkness and plagues. Dear Germans! buy while the market is at the door. Gather while the sun shines and the weather is good. Use God's grace and word