108 THE GERMAN REFORMATION. A.D. 1517 To 1530.
a guilder being worth at that time about sixteen marks, or four dollars."
Luther had a hard youth, without sunny memories, and was brought up under stern discipline. His mother chastised him, for stealing a paltry nut, till the blood came; and his father once flogged him so severely that he fled away and bore him a temporary grudge ;? but Luther recognized their good intentions, and cherished filial affection, although they knew not, as he said, to distinguish the tngenia to which education should be adapted. He was taught at home to pray to God and the saints, to revere the church and the priests, and was told frightful stories about the devil and witches which haunted his imagination all his life.
In the school the discipline was equally severe, and the rod took the place of kindly admonition. He remembered to have been chastised no less than fifteen times in one single morning. But he had also better things to say. He learned the Catechism,
e.: the Creed, the Lord’s Prayer, and the Ten Commandments, and several Latin and German hymns. He treasured in his memory the proverbial wisdom of the people and the legendary lore of Dietrich von Bern, of Eulenspiegel and Markolf.
He received his elementary education in the schools of Mansfeld, Magdeburg, and Eisenach. Already in his fourteenth year he had to support himself by singing in the street.
Frau Ursula Cotta, the wife of the wealthiest merchant at
1 Kostlin, I., 26 ; II., 498. In his small biography, pp. 6 and 7 (Engl. ed.), Késtlin gives the pictures of Hans and Margaret Luther. There is a striking resemblance between Luther and his mother, whom Melanchthon describes as a modest, God-fearing, and devout woman. Her maiden name was Ziegler (not Lindemann, as usually given). Luther’s father is said to have escaped by flight trial for murdering a peasant at Méhra in a fit of anger; but this tradition rests only on the testimony of J. Wicel (Epist. libri quatuor, Lips., 1537), who fell. away from Protestantism. It is discredited by coe or 24), Janssen (II. 66) leaves it in doubt.
2 Table Talk (Erl. Frkf. ed. LXI. 213): “Man soll die Kinder nicht zu hart statipen ; denn mein Vater stéupet mich einmal so sehr, dass ich thn flohe und ward tm gram, bis er mich wieder zu thm gewohnete.”
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§ 19. LUTHER IN THE UNIVERSITY OF ERFURT. 109
Kisenach, immortalized herself by the benevolent interest she took in the poor student. She invited him to her table “on account.of his hearty singing and praying,” and gave him the first impression of a lady of some education and refinement. She died, 1511, but he kept up an acquaintance with her sons and entertained one of them who studied at Wittenberg. From her he learned the word: “ There is nothing dearer in this world than the love of woman.” ὦ
The hardships of Luther’s youth and the want of refined breeding show their effects in his writings and actions. They limited his influence among the higher and cultivated classes, but increased his power over the middle and lower classes. He was a man of the people and for the people. He was of the earth earthy, but with his bold face lifted to heaven. He was not a polished diamond, but a rough block cut out from a granite mountain and well fitted for a solid base of a mighty structure. He laid the foundation, and others finished the upper stories,
§ 19. Luther in the University of Erfurt.
At the age of eighteen, in the year 1501, he entered, as “ Martinus Ludher ex Mansfeld,” the University of Erfurt, which had been founded a hundred years before (1392) and was then one of the best in Germany.? By that time his father was able to assist him so that he was free of care and could acquire a little library.
1 He says in his Table-Talk : “‘ Darumb sagte meine Wirthin zu Eisenach recht, als ich daselbst in die Schule ging: ‘ Es ist kein lieber Ding auf Erden Als Frauenlieb’, wem sie mag werden.’ ”
See Works, ἘΠῚ. Frkf. ed. LXI., 212; Jiirgens, I., 281 sqq.; Kolde, 1., 36; Janssen, II.,67. The relation of Luther to this excellent lady has been made the subject of a useful religious novel by Mrs. Eliz. Charles, under the title: Chronicles of the Schénberg-Cotta Family. By two of themselves. London and New York (M. W. Dodd), 1864. The diary is fictitious.
2 See the description by Jiirgens, I., 351 sqq.; and Kampschulte, Die Universitdt Erfurt in ihrem Verh. z. Humanismus u. Reformation, Trier, 2258. Two parts. The University was abolished in 1816,