732 THE GERMAN REFORMATION. A.D. 1517 τὸ 1580.
the substance of his teaching; and the rationalists, who reject his creed, but regard him as the standard-bearer of the freedom of private judgment and dissent from all authority.
His real strength lies in his German writings, which created . the modern High-German book-language, and went right to the heart of the people. His greatest production is a translation, —the German Bible. Italians, Spaniards, and Frenchmen, who knew him only from his Latin books, received a very feeble idea of his power, and could not understand the secret of his influence. The contemptuous judgments of Pope Leo, Cardinal Cajetan, Aleander, and Emperor Charles, echo the sentiments of their nations, and re-appear again and again among modern writers of the Latin races and the Romish faith. |
Nevertheless, Martin Luther’s influence extends far beyond the limits of his native land. He belongs to the church and the world.
Luther has written his own biography, as well as the early history of the German Reformation, in his numerous letters, without a thought of their publication. He lays himself open before the world without reservation. He was the frankest and most outspoken of men, and swayed by the impulse of the moment, without regard to logical consistency or fear of consequences. His faults as well as his virtues lay on the surface of his German works. He infused into them his intense personality to a degree which
1 Professor Ad. Harnack (Martin Luther, Giessen, 1883, p. 4) well says: “* Fast jede Partei unter uns hat ihren Luther und meint den wahren zu haben. Die Verehrung fiir Luther vereinigt mehr als die Halfte unserer Nation und die Auffassung Luther’s trennt sie. Won Luther’s Namen lasst so leicht kein Deutscher. Ein unvergleichlicher Mann ist er Allen, οὗ man ihm nun aufpasst, um ihn anzugreifen, oder οὗ man ihn riihmt und hoch preist.”’ The Germans, if we may say so, worship Luther, Frederick the Great, Goethe, and Bismarck. Of these, Luther is most worthy, and was least desirous, of praise.
2 Hallam also, ignoring Luther’s German writings, calls his polemical books ““ bellowing in bad Latin,’”’ ‘‘ scandalous,’’ and “‘ disgusting.”’ (Literature of Europe in the 15th, 16th, and 17th centuries, II. 306, N.Y. ed.)
§ 124, LUTHER’S PUBLIC CHARACTER. 733
hardly finds a parallel except in the Epistles of the Apostle Paul.
He knew himself very well. A high sense of his calling ani a deep sense of personal unworthiness are inseparably combined in his self-estimate. He was conscious of his prophetic and apostolic mission in republishing the primitive gospel for the German people; and yet he wrote to his wife not to be concerned about him, for God could make a dozen Luthers at any time. In his last will and testament (Jan. 6, 1542) he calls himself “a man well known in heaven, on earth, and in hell,” but also “a poor, miserable, unworthy sinner,” to whom “God, the Father of all mercies, has intrusted the gospel of His dear Son, and made him a teacher of His truth in spite of the Pope, the Emperor, and the Devil.” He signs himself, in that characteristic document, “God’s notary and witness in His gospel.” One of his last words was, “ We are beggars.” And in the preface of the first collected edition of his works, he expresses a wish that they might all perish, and God’s Word alone be read.
Luther was a genuine man of the people, rooted and grounded in rustic soil, but looking boldly and trustingly to heaven with the everlasting gospel in his hand. He was a plebeian, without a drop of patrician blood, and never ashamed of his lowly origin. But what king or emperor or pope of his age could compare with him in intellectual and moral force? He was endowed with an overwhelming genius and indomitable energy, with fiery temper and strong passions, with irresistible eloquence, native wit, and harmless humor, absolutely honest and disinterested, strong in faith, fervent in prayer, and wholly devoted to Christ and His gospel. Many of his wise, quaint, and witty sayings have passed into popular proverbs; and no German writer is more frequently named and quoted than Luther.
Like all great men, he harbored in his mind colossal con-