§ 35. THE IMITATION OF CHRIST. 287
virtues. It does not emphasize the manly virtues of courage and loyalty to the truth, nor elaborate upon Christian activities to. be done to our fellow-men. To fall in completely with the spirit of Thomas a Kempis, and to abide there, would mean to follow the best cloistral ideal of the Middle Ages, or rather of the fourteenth century. Its counsels and reflections were meant primarily for those who had made the convent their home, not for the busy traffickers in the marts of the world, and in association with men of all classes. It leans to quietism, and is calculated to promote personal piety for those who dwell much alone rather than to fit men for engaging in the public battles which fall to men's usual lot. Its admonitions are adapted to help men to bear with patience rather than to rectify the evils in the world, to be silent rather than to speak to the throng, to live well in seclusion rather than set an example of manly and womanly endeavor in the shop, on the street and in the family. The charge has been made, and not without some ground, that the Imitation of Christ sets forth a selfish type of religion.^ Its soft words are fitted to quiet the soul and bring it to meek contentment rather than to stir up the combatant virtues of courage and of assistance to others. Its message corresponds to the soft glow of the summer evening, and not to the fresh hours filled with the rays of the morning sun. This plaintive note runs through Thomas' hymns, as may be seen from a verse taken from " The Misery of
this Life": —
Most wonderful would it be If one did not feel and lament That in this world to live Is toil, affliction, pain.'-^
1 This is Milman's judgment. Hist, of Lat. Christ., Bk. XIV., 3, Milman said, "The book's sole, single, exclusive object is the purification, the elevation of the individual soul, of the man absolutely isolated from his kind, of the man dwelling alone in the heritage of his thoughts." 2 Mirum est, si nan liigeat Experimento qui probat Quod vivere in soeculo Labor, dolor, afflictio. Blume and Dreves: Analecta hymnica, XLVIII. 503. Thomas k Kempis' hymns are given Blume and Dreves, XLVIII. 475-514.
288 THE MIDDLE AGES. A.D. 1294-1517.
Over the pages of the book is written tlie word Christ. It is for this reason that Protestants cherish it as well as Catholics. The references to mediaeval errors of doctrine or practice are so rare that it requires diligent search to find them. Such as they are, they are usually erased from English editions, so that the English reader misses them entirely. Thomas introduces the merit of good works, transubstantiation, IV. 2, the doctrine of purgatory, IV. 9, and the worship of saints, I. 13, II. 9, II. 6, 59. But these statements, however, are like the flecks on the marbles of the Parthenon.
The author, Thomas a Kempis^ 1380-1471, was born in Kempen, a town 40 miles northwest oT^ Cologne, and 3Ied at Zwolle, in the Netherlands. His paternal "name was Hemerken or Hiimmerlein, Little Hammer. He was a follower of Groote. In 1395, he was sent to the school of Pevefitar, under the charge of Florentius Radewyn and the" Brothers of the Common Life. Pie became skilful as a copyist, and was thus enabled to support himself. Later he was admitted to the Augustinian convent of Mt. St. Agn^, near Zwolle, received priest's orders, 1413, and was made subprior, 1429. His brother John, a man of rectitude of life, had been there before him, and was prior. Thomas' life seems to have been a quiet one, devoted to meditation, composition and copying. He copied the Bible no less than four times, one of the copies being preserved at Darmstadt. His works abound in quotations of the New Testament. Under an old picture, which is represented as his portrait, are the words, " In all things I sought quiet, and found it not save in retirement and in books. "^ They fit well the author of the famous Imitation of Christy as the world thinks of him. He reached the high age of fourscore years and ten. A monument was dedicated to his memory in the presence of the archbishop of Utrecht in St Michael's Church, Zwolle, Nov. 11, 1897. The writings of a Kempis, which are all of a devotional
1 In omnibus requiem qucesivi ct nnn inveni nisi in een huechsken met een buexkcn. Franciscus Tolensis is tlie first to ascribe the portrait to k Kempis. Kettleweirs statements about h Kempis' active religious services are imaginary, I. 31, 322, etc. See Lindsay's statement, Enc. Brit., XIV. 32.