RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Wilson Winchester
the monks, while a flood of literature poured forth in poetry and prose. Wimpfeling was accused at Rome and cited before the pope; but the popular voice was in his favor, and the two bishops of Strasburg and Basel defended him. Between 1508 and 1512 Wimpfeling frequently changed his home, and in 1513 Christoph von Utenheim, bishop of Basel, requested him “ to assume the leadership of a newly reformed convent,” the locality of which is not known. In 1515 he left this office and removed to Schlettstadt, where he spent the last years of his life. As in Strasburg, so here he gathered a circle of disciples and admirers who about 1518 seem to have organized in a literary society which fell to pieces before Luther’s movement.
Wimpfeling planned great things, but accomplished little. He was overshadowed by Erasmus and left no generally diffused influence; in his narrower circle he unintentionally prepared the way for the Reformation. His numerous works are concerned with politics, philology, theology, history, and poetry. Worthy of special mention are his pedagogical treatises Isidoneus germanicus (1496) and Adolescentia, which are distinguished by sound thoughts on education. In his Germania (1501) he showed himself an enthusiastic German patriot; in the first part he attempted to prove that the left border of the Rhine never belonged to Gaul. In Epitome rerum Germanicarum (1505) Wimpfeling presented a concise history of the Germans.
(H. HeERMELINE.)
BrsitiocrapHy: The autobiographic Hxpurgatio is reproduced in J. A. Riegger’s Amoenitatis litterarie Friburgenses, Ulm, 1775. Consult further: J. Knepper, in Erléiuterungen . . . zu Janssens Geschichte, vol. iii., parts 2-4, Freiburg, 1902; Zeitschrift fiir Geschichte des Oberrheins, 1903, pp. 46 sqq., 1906, pp. 40 sqq., 262 sqq., 1907, pp. 478 sqq.; also C. Schmidt, Hist. littéraire de I’ Alsace, Paris, 1879; and J. Janssen, Hist. of the German People, iii. 1-8, St. Louis, 1900; KZ, xii. 1675-82 (gives titles of the earlier biographies, which are reviewed ably in Knepper’s work referred to above).
WIMPINA, vim-pi/na (KOCH), KONRAD: Catholic theologian; b. at Buchen (29 m. e.n.e. of Hei-
delberg) about 1465; d. at Amorbach (44 m. s.s.e. |
of Frankfort) May 17, 1531. The family name was Koch, but Konrad called himself Wimpina, probably because his family originally had their home in the neighboring Wimpfen-on-the-Neckar. In 1479 he entered the University of Leipsic, became a Thomist in philosophy; in 1491 he was received into the council of the philosophical faculty; in 1494 was rector, and the same year dean of his faculty, at a later time vice-chancellor for three years. After 1486 he devoted himself also to the study of theology, and in 1495 became subdeacon. In 1500 he became involved with his former teacher and friend Polich in a passionate dispute concerning Humanism and Scholasticism, or, as the opponents formulated it, over the question whether the art of poetry is the source of theology. In assigning a very low place to poetry, Wimpina aroused the Humanists against himself, while Polich became one of their stanchest defenders. In 1505 Joachim I. and his brother Albrecht called Wimpina to the newly established University of Frankfort as its first rector. In 1518 he became involved in a, dispute with Luther concerning indulgences, and. into
this dispute Tetzel was drawn, participating on Jan. 20, 1518, in Frankfort in a disputation concerning theses which had been formulated by Wimpina in opposition to Luther. Wimpina thus appears as one of the earliest literary opponents of Luther, and he devoted the following years to an intensive refutation of the doctrine of Luther, at first only in disputations, then, in 1528, he published his great work of refutation Anacephaleosis, a production of intense intellectual labor. It represents Lutheranism as the rallying-point of the sects and heresies of all times. All heresy, Wimpina states, is directed fundamentally against the Church as a divine foundation. Wyclif is the father of the doctrine of the Hussites, and that is the source of the Lutheran heresy. By a necessity of nature the pope, Wimpina argues, stands above the emperor and possesses not only doctrinal power, but also executive and disciplinary power. Wimpina went to the Diet of Augsburg as the theologian of Joachim I. When at the beginning of the diet without the knowledge of Luther the Articles of Schwabach (see ScHwa- BACH ARTICLES) had been printed and communicated to Joachim, Wimpina together with his Brandenburg colleagues Mensing, Redorfer, and Elgersma published as refutation Christlicher Unterricht gegen die Bekanntnus M. Luthers. He was also one of the circle of theologians to whom was entrusted the confutation of the Augsburg Confession, but Wimpina’s part was evidently small. After the diet he accompanied his elector to Cologne. Then he returned to his native state and lived thereafter in the Benedictine monastery of Amorbach. Besides his great work Anacephaleosis (1528) he published Precepta coaugmentande Rethorice orationis, or Ars epistolandi (c. 1486); Alme universitatis studit Lipzensis et urbis Lipteg descriptio (1488, newly edited by C. F. Eberhard, Leipsic, 1802); Tractatus de erroribus philosophorum (1493); Congestio textus nova proprietatum logicalium cum commentatione (1498); Apologeticus in sacre theologie defensionem (1500); De D. Anne trinubio (1518); De signis et insomniis (1529); Farrago miscellaneorum (1531; contains his Leipsie writings); his anti-Luther writings are in Sectarum, errorum . . . librorum partes tres (Frankfort, 1528). (G. KAWERAU.) BrsiioGraPHy: J.C. Beckmann, Notitia Universitatis Francofurtane, Frankfort, 1707; J. Gropp, Htas mille annorum - ++ monastertt . . . in Amorbach, Frankfort, 1736; G. Bauch, in Zeitschrift des Vereins fiir Geschichte und Alterthum Schlesiens, xxx (1896), 133 sqq.; idem in Neues Archiv fiir stichische Gesellschaft, xviii (1897), 293 sqq.; idem, Geschichte des Leipziger Friihhumanismus, Leipsic, 1899; idem, Die Anfinge der Universitit Frankfurt, Freiburg, 1903; E. Friedlander, Matrikel der Universitiit Frankfurt, pp. 1-2, 48, Leipsic, 1887; N. Miller, in TSK, 1893, pp. 83 sqq., 1894, pp. 389 sqq.; G. Erler, Die Matrikel der Universitat Leipzig, Leipsic, 1895-97; N. Paulus, in Der Katholik, 1900, ii. 281 sqq.; idem, Die deutschen Dominikaner im Kampfe gegen Luther, pp. 134 sqq., Freiburg, 1903; J. Negwer, Konrad Wimpina, Breslau, 1907- 1909; ADB, xliii. 330 saq.; KL, xii. 1682-85. WINCHESTER, CALEB THOMAS: Methodist Episcopal layman; b. at Montville, Conn., Jan. 18, 1847. He was educated at Wesleyan University, Middletown, Conn. (A.B., 1869), with which he has been connected ever since, being librarian (1869- 1879), associate professor of English (1872-78), and full professor of the same subject since 1878. He
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