§ 24, LUTHER ORDAINED TO THE PRIESTHOOD. 125
In one word, Luther passed through the experience of Paul. He understood him better than any medieval schoolman or ancient father. His commentary on the Epistle to the Galatians is still one of the best, for its sympathetic grasp of the contrast between law and gospel, between spiritual slavery and spiritual freedom.
Luther held this conviction without dreaming that it conflicted with the traditional creed and piety of the church. He was brought to it step by step. The old views and practices ran along side with it, and for several years he continued to be a sincere and devout Catholic. It was only the war with Tetzel and its consequences that forced him into the position of a Reformer and emancipated him from his old connections.
§ 24. ILnther Ordained to the Priesthood.
In the second year of his monastic life and when he was still in a state of perplexity, Luther was ordained to the priesthood, and on May 2, 1507, he said his first mass. This was a great event in the life of a priest. He was so overwhelmed by the solemnity of offering the tremendous sacrifice for the living and the dead that he nearly fainted at the altar.
His father had come with several friends to witness the solemnity and brought him a present of twenty guilders. He was not yet satisfied with the monastic vows. “Have you not read in Holy Writ,” he said to the brethren at the entertainment given to the young priest, “that a man must honor father and mother?” And when he was reminded, that his son was called to the convent by a voice from heaven, he answered: “ Would to God, it were no spirit of fhe devil.” He was not fully reconciled to his son till after he had acquired fame and entered the married state.
Luther performed the duties of the new dignity with conscientious fidelity. He read mass every morning, and invoked during the week twenty-one particular saints whom he had chosen as his helpers, three on each day.
But he was soon to be called to a larger field of influence.
126 THE GERMAN REFORMATION. A.D. 1517 τὸ 1530,
§ 25. Luther in Rome."
“ Roma qua nihil possis visere majus.”’—(Horace.)
“ Vivere qui sancte vultis, discedite Roma. Omnia hic ecce licent, non licet esse probum.” “ Wer christlich leben will und rein, Der zieh aus Rom und bleib daheim. Hie mag man thun was man nur will, Allein fromm sein gilt hier nicht viel.” (Old poetry quoted by Luther,in Walch, XXII, 2372.)
“ Prachtiger, als wir in unserm Norden, Wohnt der Bettiler an der Engelspforten, Denn er sieht das ewig einz ge Rom: Ihn umgibt der Schénheit Glanzgewimmel, Und ein zweiter Himmel in den Himmel Steigt Sanct Peter’s wundersamer Dom. Aber Rom in allem seinem Glanze Ist ein Grab nur der Vergangenheit, Leben duftet nur die frische Pflanze, Die die griine Stunde streut.”—(Schiller.)
An interesting episode in the history of Luther’s training for the Reformation was his visit to Rome. It madea deep impression on his mind, and became effective, not immediately, but several years afterward through the recollection of what he had seen and heard, as a good Catholic, in the metropolis of Christendom.
In the autumn of the year 1510,? after his removal to Wittenberg, but before his graduation as doctor of divinity, Luther was sent to Rome in the interest of his order and at the suggestion
1 Luther’s dicta about Rome and his Roman journey are collected in Walch’s ed., vol. X XIT., 2372-2379; Ka@HLER: Luther's Reisen (1872), p. 2-20; JURGENS, II., 266-358; Kasrui, I., 100-107 ; Lenz, 45-47; Kops, 1., 73-79; and in Brieger’s “ Zeitschrift fiir Kirchengesch,” II., 460 sqq. Comp. also, on the R. Cath. side, the brief account of Janssen, II., 72. Auprn devotes his third chapter to the Roman journey (I., 52-65).
2 The chronology is not quite certain. The date 1511 is adopted by Kostlin and Kolde. Others date the Rome journey back to 1510 (Mathesius, Seckendorf, Jiirgens, and Luther himself, in his tract Against Popery invented by the Devil, Erl. ed. XXVI., 125, though once he names the year 1511).