1030 Krasniski, Reformation in Poland, I. 110.

1031 Gravamina German. Nationis, No. VII.—Remed. contra Gravamina (Freher. et Struv. II. 677-8).

In the previous century some remonstrances against grievances had been uttered, but in a very different tone from this.

1032 Avisamenta ad Cæsar. Majest. (Ibid. p. 680).

1033 When Diether was elected Archbishop of Mainz, in 1459, his envoys sent to obtain his confirmation from Pius II. were stupefied with a demand for 20,506 florins—more than double the amount of annates previously assessed on the see. He refused to yield to the demand, but by a little sharp practice between the Apostolic Chamber and the Roman bankers he became entangled, and on his persistent refusal he was prosecuted for the amount, deposed by the pope, and Adolph of Nassau appointed in his place, leading to a bloody war and the devastation of city and territory.—Appell. Dom. Dytheri (Senckenberg. Selecta Juris T. IV. p. 393).—Cf. Helwich de Dissidio Moguntino (Rer. Moguntiac. Script. T. II.). This is probably the fraud alluded to by the Diet of 1510, where it was complained that the annates of the see of Mainz were raised from 10,000 florins to 25,000; and this latter sum was exacted seven times in one generation, resulting in taxation on the peasantry so severe that an insurrection against the clergy was threatened.—Remed. contra Gravam. (Freher. et Struv. II. 678).

In the complaint made to Adrian VI., in 1523, by the Diet of Nürnberg, it is asserted that three generals of the mendicant orders at Rome had purchased the cardinalate with gold wrung from Germany.—Gravam. Nationis German, cap. lxxiii.—ap. Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. II. 203.

The general popular opinion of the Roman court is manifested in the Epistolæ Obscurorum Virorum, when speaking of the quarrel between Reuchlin and the theologians, which had been carried before the papal tribunal—“Si Papa est pro theologi, tunc non timeo; etiam audivi ab uno notabili viro, qui est officialis curiæ, qui dixit. Quid nobis hic cum literis? Si Reuchlin habet pecuniam, mittat huc: quia in curia oportet habere pecunias, alias nihil potest expedire.”

That this estimate of the papal curia was shared by the orthodox is shown in the story told of Pierre Danes, Bishop of Vaur, who in 1545 was sent as ambassador by Francis I. to the Council of Trent. In debate a French theologian was inveighing against the corruptions of the Rota, when an Italian ecclesiastic sneeringly cried out, “Gallus cantat.” Danes promptly rejoined, “Utinam illo gallicinio Petrus ad resipiscentiam et fletum excitetur.”—Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. VII. 224.

1034 The Epist. Obseur. Viror. probably reflects the general sentiment of the conservatives of the time in denouncing Erasmus and the learned wits as heretics. “Quia juvenes volunt se æquiparare senibus, et discipuli magistris, et juristæ theologis, et est magna confusio, et surgunt multi hæretici et pseudochristiani, Iohann. Reuchlin, Erasmus Roterodamus: Bilibaldus nescio quis, et Ulricus Huttenus, Hermannus Buschius, Jacobus Wimphelingus, qui scripsit contra Augustinenses, et Sebastianus Brandt, qui scripsit contra prædicatores, etc.”

So, at a later date, after Luther had arisen, the “Conciliabulum Theologistarum” classes them together “Habeo etiam ego unum spiritum familiarem; illum ego volo mittere ad Lutherum et Erasmum de nocte in lectum, ut eos tribulet et vexet.”

1035 Erasmi Colloq. Confabulatio Pia.

1036 Ibid. See also the Encomium Moriæ.—“Nam quid dicam de iis qui sibi fictis scelerum condonationibus suavissime blandiuntur, ac purgatorii spatia veluti clepsydris metiuntur, secula, annos, menses, dies, horas, tanquam e tabula mathematica citra ullum errorem dimentientes?”

1037 Confabulatio Pia (Colloquia).

1038 Speaking of the Virgin’s milk and the countless relics of the cross everywhere exposed to the adoration of the pious, he exclaims, “O matrem filio simillimam! ille nobis tantum sanguinis reliquit in terris; hæc tantum lactis quantum vix credibile est esse posse uni mulieri uniparæ, etiamsi nihil bibisset infans.... Idem caussantur de cruce Domini, quæ privatum ac publice tot locis ostenditur, ut si fragmenta conferantur in unum, navis onerariæ justum onus videri possint; et tamen totam crucem suam bajulavit Dominus”—to which he makes a pious interlocutor reply, “Novum fortasse dici possit; mirum nequaquam, quum Dominus, qui hæc auget pro suo arbitrio, sit omnipotens.”—Colloq. Peregrinat. Religionis.

1039 Supplement. Epist. M. Lutheri, No. II. (Halæ, 1703).

1040 The popular view of the priesthood is well summed up by Erasmus in the following dialogue: “Cocles, Cur mavis sacerdotium quam uxorem?—Pamphagus, Quia mihi placet otium. Arridet Epicurea vita.—Co. At mea sententia suavius vivunt, quibus est lepida puella domi, quam complectantur, quoties libet.—Pam. Sed adde, nonnunquam quum non libet. Amo voluptatem perpetuam. Qui ducit uxorem, uno mense felix est: cui contingit optimum sacerdotium, in omnem usque vitam fruitur gaudio.—Co. Sed tristis est solitudo, adeo ut nec Adam suaviter victurus fuerit in Paradiso nisi deus illi adjunxisset Evam.—Pam. Non deerit Eva cui sit opulentum sacerdotium,” etc.—Erasmi Colloq. de Captandis Sacerdotiis.

It is, however, perhaps, in the “Encomium Moriæ” that he gives fullest rein to his bitter satire. His own sad experience of conventual life gave him special opportunity of declaiming against the monks “qui se vulgo religiosos ac monachos appellant, utroque falsissimo cognomine, quum et bona pars istorum longissime absit a religione, et nulli magis omnibus locis sint obvii.” Their habit, their observances, their discipline, their ignorance, idleness, vices, are recounted at great length and with the most stinging ridicule, and he makes Folly dismiss them with the contemptuous valediction, “Verum ego istos histriones, tam ingratos beneficiorum meorum dissimulatores quam improbos simulatores pietatis libenter relinquo.” The secular priesthood, the bishops, and even the pope himself, are treated with little more respect, and every class of the ecclesiastical body is stigmatized as endeavoring to thrust upon others the care of the flock and industrious only in shearing the sheep.

The “Encomium Moriæ” had an immediate and immense success. Numberless editions were required to supply the avidity of the learned, and it was immediately translated into almost every language of Europe for the benefit of the unlearned. It appeared in 1509; the Colloquies in 1516.—When these works had produced their result, their dangerous tendencies were discovered, and they enjoyed the honor of being included in the first Index Expurgatorius (App. Concil. Trident). Cardinal Caraffa, indeed, in 1538, had urged upon Paul III. the propriety of excluding the Colloquies from use in schools as a text-book for students.—Concil. de Emend. Eccles. (Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. II. 602).

1041 The “Epistolæ Obscurorum Virorum” was certainly published before 1516, probably in 1515 (Ebert, Bibliog. Dict. s. v.).—It is equally severe upon the monks—“Tunc ille dixit: ego distinguo de monachis, quia accipiuntur tribus modis. Primo, pro sanctis et utilibus, sed illi sunt in cœlo. Secundo, pro nec utilibus nec inutilibus, et illi sunt picti in ecclesia. Tertio modo pro illis qui adhuc vivunt, et illi multis nocent, etiam non sunt sancti, quia ita superbi sunt sicut unus sæcularium. Et ita libenter habent pecunias et pulchras mulieres,” etc. And again, “Ubi enim diabolus pervenire vel aliquid officere non potest, ibi semper mittit unam malam antiquam vetulam vel unum monachum.”

1042 De Vanitate Scientiarum cap. lxi., lxii., lxiv.

1043 Orat. in Comit. Augustan. (Freher. et Struv. II. 702.)

1044 Bartholini Comment. de Comit. Augustens. ann. 1518 (Senckenberg. Selecta Juris T. IV. pp. 669-70).

1045 Rymer, Fœdera XIII. 586-7.

1046 Even in this, Luther was by no means the first. Erasmus had exposed the wickedness of the system with fully as much fervor in the “Encomium Moriæ.”—“Hic mihi puta negotiator aliquis, aut miles, aut judex, abjecto ex tot rapinis unico nummulo, universam vitæ Lernam semel expurgatam putat, totque perjuria, tot libidines, tot ebrietates, tot rixas, tot cædes, tot imposturas, tot perfidias, tot proditiones existimat velut ex pacto redimi, et ita redimi ut jam liceat ad novum scelerum orbem de integro reverti.”—And in the “Epistolæ Obscurorum Vivorum” the falseness of its promises was unflinchingly asserted.

1047 Ranke, Reformation in Germany, B. II. chap. 3.

1048 Lutheri Opp. T. I. fol. 335a (Jenæ, 1564).

1049 Mag. Bull. Roman. Ed. 1692, I. 614.

1050 De Captiv. Babylon. Eccles. (Lutheri Opp. Jenæ, 1581, II. fol. 283a).

1051 Artic. et Errores Libb. Jur. Canon. No. 18 (Lutheri Opp. Jenæ, 1581, II. fol. 318a).

1052 Ibid. fol. 319b.

1053 Ibid. fol. 362a, 374a.

1054 Krasinski, op. cit. I. 112-3.

1055 Lutheri Opp. Jenæ, 1581, T. II. fol. 438, 440.

1056 Spalatin. Annal. ann. 1521.

1057 Lutheri Epistt. Jenæ, 1545, T. II. fol. 38, 39.

1058 Synod. Vuitemberg. (Lutheri Opp. II. 470).

1059 Lutheri Opp. II. 477 sqq.—In this edition the tract is dated 1522 in the index and 1521 in the text. Henke and Ranke, however, agree in assigning it to a period subsequent to his return from Wartburg.

1060 Spalatin. Annal. ann. 1523.—The fact that Spalatin recorded whether he wore the cowl or not, shows the importance which Luther’s friends attached to his example with respect to it.

1061 Spalatin. Annal. ann. 1522.

1062 Supplement. Epistt. M. Lutheri No. 31 (Halæ, 1703).

1063 Spalatin. Annal. ann. 1523.—Thammii Chron. Colditens.—Link married a daughter of Suicer, a lawyer of Oldenburg in Misnia, and the bride’s example was shortly afterwards followed by her two sisters, one of whom was united to Wolfgang Fuess, parish priest of Kolditz, and formerly a monk of Gera; while the other accepted the addresses of the parish priest of Kitscheren. (Spalatin, ubi sup.)

1064 Spalatin, ubi sup.—How these innovations were regarded in Rome is manifested in a minatory epistle addressed, in 1522, by Adrian II. to the Elector Frederic of Saxony. “Et cum ipse sit apostata ac professionis suæ desertor, ut plurimos sui faciat similes, sancta illa Deo vasa polluere non veretur, consecratasque virgines et vitam monasticam professas extrahere a monasteriis suis, et mundo imo diabolo, quem semel abjuraverunt, reddere ... Christi sacerdotes etiam vilissimis copulat meretricibus etc.” (Hartzheim VI. 192.)

1065 See the address of Frederic Nausea, surnamed Blancicampianus, afterwards Bishop of Vienna, at the Council of Mainz in 1527.—Synod. Mogunt. ann. 1527 (Hartzheim VI. 207).

1066 Reformat. Cleri German. ann. 1524 c. 26 (Goldast. Constit. Imp. III. 491).

1067 Spalatin. Annal. ann. 1524.

1068 Respons. S. R. I. Ordinum Norim b. cap. 18 (Goldast. op. cit. I. 455).—With this the Legate Cheregato professed himself to be content, but he bitterly complained of an intimation that if these apostate priests and nuns transgressed the laws in any other way, the secular tribunals would punish them. He held that, though apostates, they were still ecclesiastics, only amenable to the courts Christian, and he protested against any violation of the privileges and jurisdiction of the church such as would be committed in bringing them before a civil magistrate. (Ibid. p. 456.)

1069 Spalatin. ann. 1523.

1070 Edict. Norimb. Convent, ann. 1523 c. 10, 18, 19 (Goldast. II. 151).—This illustrates well the vacillating conduct of the Council of Regency during this period.

1071 Chron. Torgaviæ—Spalatin. Annal. ann. 1523. He conveyed them at once to Wittenberg, and Luther writes to Spalatin asking him to collect funds for their support until they can be permanently provided for.

1072 Spalatin. ubi sup.

1073 Spalatin. ann. 1524.

1074 Melanchthon to Camerarius (ap. Mayeri Dissert. de Cath. Lutheri conjuge. pp. 25-6).—Melanchthon can only suggest that it was a mysterious act of Providence.—“Isto enim sub negotio fortassi aliquid occulti et quiddam divinius subest, de quo nos curiose quærere non decet.”—The whole letter is singularly apologetic in its tone.

1075 Spalatin. ann. 1525.

Pomeranius, a priest of Wittenberg, in writing to Spalatin, gives as the reason of Luther’s marriage—“Maligna fama effecit ut Doct. Martinus insperato fieret conjunx;” and Luther, in a letter to the same, admits this even more distinctly—“Os obstruxi infamantibus me cum Catherina Borana.” That his action was not generally approved by his friends is apparent from his asking Michael Stiefel to pray that his new life may sanctify him—“Nam vehementer irritantur sapientes, etiam inter nostros.”—Spalatin. ubi sup.

That surprise should have been aroused is singular, when he had already proclaimed the most extreme views in favor of matrimony. As early as 1522 he delivered his famous “Sermo de Matrimonio,” in which he enjoins it in the strictest manner as a duty incumbent upon all. Thus, in considering the impediments to marriage, he treats of vows, concerning which he says: “Sin votum admissum est, videndum tibi est, ut supra memoravi, num tribus eviratorum generibus comprehendaris, quæ conjugio ademit Deus, ubi te in aliquo istorum uno non repereris, votum rescindas, monasticen deseras oportet; moxque ad naturalem sociam adjungas te matrimonii lege.”—P. I. c. 8 (Opp. Ed. Vuitemberg. V. 121). To this must be added his decided opinions on the subject of conjugal rights, as developed in the well-known passage which has excited so much animadversion, and which, if we are to interpret it literally, conveys a doctrine which sounds so strangely as the precept of a teacher of morality. In treating of the causes of divorce, he remarks: “Tertia ratio est, ubi alter alteri sese subduxerit, ut debitam benevolentiam persolvere nolit, aut habitare cum renuerit. Reperiuntur enim interdum adeo pertinaces uxores, qui etiam si decies in libidinem prolabentur mariti pro sua duritia non curarent. Hic oportunum est ut maritus dicat ‘Si tu nolueris, alia volet.’ Si domina nolit, adveniat ancilla, ita tamen ut antea iterum et tertio uxorem admoneat maritus, et coram aliis ejus etiam pertinaciam detegat, ut publice et ante conspectum ecclesiæ, duritia ejus et agnoscatur et reprehendatur. Si tum renuat, repudia eam, et in vicem Vasti, Ester surroga, Assueri regis exemplo” (Ibid. p. 123).

One conclusion, at least, can safely be drawn from this, that the morality of the age had impressed Luther with the belief that the self-restraint of chastity was impossible.

That the Catholics should make themselves merry over the marriage of the apostate monk and nun was to be expected, and Jerome Emser did not think it beneath him to write an epithalamium on the wedding of his former friend, of which the following may be taken as a specimen—

1076 Mayeri de Cath. Luth. conjug. Dissert. 4to. Hamburgi, 1702. Cranach, as we have seen, was one of the three witnesses present at the marriage.

1077 Lutheri Opp. (Jenæ, 1564, T. I. fol. 496-500).

1078 Supplement Epistt. M. Lutheri No. 212 (Halæ, 1703).

1079 Avisamentum de Concubinariis non absolvendis, 4to. 1505.—The author devotes a long argument to prove that incontinence in a priest is worse than homicide. His conclusion is “Omnis sacerdos fornicando est sacrilegus et perjurus; et gravius totiens quotiens peccat quam si hominem occidat.”

1080 Wideman. Chron. Curiæ ann. 1505.

1081 Neque superiorum tolerantia, seu prava consuetudo, quæ potius corruptela dicenda est, a multitudine peccantium, aliave quælibet excusatio eis aliquo modo suffragetur.—Concil. Lateran. V. ann. 1514 Sess. IX.

1082 Quia vero in quibusdam regionibus nonnulli jurisdictionem ecclesiasticam habentes, pecuniarios quæstus a concubinariis percipere non erubescunt, patientes eos in tali fœditate sordescere.—Concil. Lateran. V. ann. 1516 Sess. XI.—Cf. Cornel. Agripp. De Vanitate Scient, c. lxiv.—Agrippa even states that it was a common thing for bishops to sell to women whose husbands were absent the right to commit adultery without sin.

1083 Taxæ Sacræ Pœnitentiariæ, Friedrich’s Ed. p. 38; Gibbings’s, p. 3; Saint-André’s, p. 8.

1084 Gerardi Noviomagi Philippus Burgundus (Mathæi Analect. I. 230).

1085 Statut. Synod. Joan. Episc. Ratispon. ann. 1512 (Hartzheim VI. 86).

1086 Art. 18e “Item. Mais, Nous nous plaignions d’aucuns chanoines qui nous gâtent nôtre bordeau de la ville, car il y en a qui le tiennent en leurs maisons, privément, pour tous venans.”—Quoted from a contemporary MS. by Abraham Ruchat in his “Histoire de la Reformation de la Suisse,” T. I. p. xxxiii.-v. (Genève, 1727). According to Cornelius Agrippa, the Roman prelates derived a regular revenue from this source, the right to keep definite numbers of strumpets in the public brothels being partitioned out between them.—De Vanitate Scient, c. lxiv.

1087 See, for instance, Novelle, P. III. Nov. lvi.

1088 Reformat. Cleri German. (Hartzheim VI. 198).—“Hanc perditissimam hæresin ... non parvam habuisse occasionem, partim a perditis moribus et vita clericorum etc.”

There was no scruple in confessing this fact by those who spoke authoritatively for the Catholic church, and it long continued to be alleged as the cause of the stubbornness of the heretics. Thus the Bishop of Constance, in the canons of his Synod of 1567—“Estote etiam memores, damnatam et detestandam cleri vitam huic malo in quo, proh dolor! versamur, majori ex parte ansam præbuisse.... Omnes sapientes peritique viri unanimi sententia hoc asserunt, hocque efflagitant penitus, ut prius clerus ecclesiarumque ministri ac doctores a vitæ sordibus repurgentur, quam ulla cum adversariis nostris de doctrina concordia expectari queat.” And then, after describing in the strongest terms the vices of the clergy and their unwillingness to reform, he adds “Quæ sane morum turpitudo, vehementer et tantopere imperiti populi animos offendit ut subinde magis magisque a catholica nostra religione alienior efficiatur, atque sacerdotium una cum sacerdotibus doctrinam juxta atque doctores, execretur, dirisque devoveat: ita ut protinus ad quamvis sectam deficere potius paratus sit quam quod ad ecclesiam redire velit.”—Synod. Constant. ann. 1567 (Hartzheim VII. 455).

Pius V. himself did not hesitate to adopt the same view. In an epistle addressed to the abbots and priors of the diocese of Freysingen, in 1567, he says—“Cum nobiscum ipsi cogitamus quæ res materiam præbuerit tot tantisque pestiferis hæresibus ... tanti mali causam præcipue fuisse judicamus corruptos prælatorum mores, qui ... eandemque vivendi licentiam iis, quibus præerant permittentes et exemplo eos suo corrumpentes, maximum apud laicos odium contemptionem et invidiam non immerito contraxerunt.” (Hartzheim. VII. 586).

Alfonso de Castro in 1556 declares that the priesthood was one of the efficient causes of the spread of heresy. It would be difficult for orthodoxy to maintain itself without the direct interposition of God, in view of the scandalous lives, and general worthlessness of all orders of ecclesiastics, whose excessive numbers, ignorance, and turpitude exposed them to contempt.—Alph. de Castro de Just. Punit. Hæres. Lib. III. c. 5.

1089 Reformat. Cleri German, cap. xv.—So when, in 1521, Conrad, Bishop of Wurzburg, issued a mandate for the reformation of his clergy, he described them as for the most part abandoned to gluttony, drunkenness, gambling, quarrelling, and lust.—Mandat. pro. Reformat. Cleri. (Gropp, Script. Rer. Wirceburg. I. 269).—In 1505 the Bishop of Bamberg, in complaining of his clergy, shows us how little respect was habitually paid to the incessant repetition of the canons.—“Condolenter referimus vitam et honestatem clericalem adeo apud quamplures nostrarum civitatis et dioceseos clericos esse obumbratam ut vix inter clericos et laycos discrimen habeatur: et ipsa statuta nostra synodalia in ipsorum clericorum cordibus obliterata et a pluribus non visa aut perlecta vilipendantur: nullam propter nostram, quam hactenus pii pastoris more tolleravimus patientiam, capientes emendationem.”—(Hartzheim VI. 66.)

1090 Grillandi Tract. de Sortilegiis Quæst. xvii. No. 1.

1091 Gravamin. Ordin. Imperii cap. xxi., lvii., lxx. (Goldast. I. 464).

When such complaints were made by the highest authority in the empire, it is not difficult to understand the reasons which led the senate of Nürnberg—which city had not yet embraced the Reformation—to deprive, in 1524, the Dominicans and Franciscans of the superintendence and visitation of the nuns of St. Catharine and St.. Clare; nor do we need Spalatin’s malicious suggestion—“cura et visitatione, pene dixeram corruptione.”—Spalatin. Annal. ann. 1524.

1092 Adriani PP. VI. Instructio data Fr. Cheregato, Nov. 25, 1522 (Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. II. 146).

1093 Adriani PP. VI. Breve ad Frid. Saxon. (Lutheri Opp. T. II. fol. 542b.—Le Plat, II. 134).

1094 Erasmi Lib. XXXI. Epist. 43.

Notwithstanding the sarcasm, popularly attributed to Erasmus, on the occasion of Luther’s union with Catharine von Bora—that the Reformation had turned out to be a comedy, seeing that it resulted in a marriage—he continued to raise his voice in favor of abolishing the rule of celibacy. Thus he writes, in October, 1525, “Vehementer laudo cœlibatum, sed ut nunc habet sacerdotum ac monachorum vita, præsertim apud Germanos, præstaret indulgeri remedium matrimonii” (Lib. XVIII. Epist. 9). And again, in 1526, “Ego nec sacerdotibus permitto conjugium, nec monachis relaxo vota, ni id fiat ex auctoritate Pontificum, ad ædificationem ecclesiæ non ad destructionem.... In primis optandum esset sacerdotes et monachos castitatem ac cœlestem vitam amplecti. Nunc rebus adeo contaminatis, fortasse levius malum erat eligendum” (Lib. XVIII. Epist. 4).

Yet, in his “Liber de Amabili Ecclesiæ Concordia,” written in 1533 in the hope of reuniting the severed church, while awaiting the promised general council which was to reconcile all things, Erasmus did not hesitate to give utterance to the opinion that those who fell away in heresy or even schism were worse than those who lived impurely in the true faith.

1095 Spalatin. Annal. ann. 1525.

1096 Ibid. ann. 1526.

1097 Henke Append. ad Calixt. p. 595.—Serrarii Rerum Mogunt. Lib. v. (Script. Rer. Mogunt. I. 831, 839). As Albert, though Primate of Germany, was only thirty-five or six years of age, the proposition was not an unreasonable one.

1098 Spalatin. Annal. ann. 1526.

1099 Thammii Chron. Coldicens.

1100 Chron. Waldeccense (Hahnii Collect. Monument. I. 851).

1101 Confess. Augustanæ P. II. Art. ii., vi.

In his Apology for the Augsburg Confession, however, even the coldness of Melanchthon is warmed in describing the hideous licentiousness caused by the law of celibacy (Lutheri Opp. Jenæ, T. IV. p. 252-3).

1102 Deliberat. de Concordia etc. c. iii., v. (Goldast. I. 509).

1103 See Letter of Bergenroth to Romilly, from Simancas, June 14th, 1863 (Cartwright’s Memoir of Bergenroth, London, 1870, p. 124).

1104 Sentent. Caroli V. § 5 (Ibid. I. 510).—Rescript. Caroli V. § 5 (Ibid. III. 512). Henke, Append. ad Calixt. pp. 595-6.

1105 Kerssenbroch Bell. Anabaptist. cap. 15, 31.

1106 How little the situation was comprehended is amusingly shown in a letter from an enlightened and liberal prelate, Johann Schmidt, Bishop of Vienna, to Ferdinand, in 1540, concerning some proposed negotiations then on foot for a reconciliation between the churches. He lays down as a condition precedent to reunion that all the church lands confiscated by the Protestants shall be restored, and the monastic orders reëstablished. The mesne profits, he admits, cannot be collected, but some composition for them should be made.—Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. II. 649.

1107 An elaborate series of documents relating to these transactions may be found in Goldast. Constit. Imp. I. 511, III. 172-235. Also in Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. Vol. II.

1108 Artic. Melanch. ad Regem Franciæ, No. X., XI. (Le Plat, op. cit. II. 785-7).

1109 Lib. ad Rationem Concord. ineundam Art. XXII. § 13 (Goldast. II. 199).

1110 Respons. Protestant. Art. X. § 3 (Ibid. II. 206). This was still more strongly insisted on in a paper subsequently drawn up by Bucer and presented in the name of the Protestants.—Respons. Protestant. c. 11-14 (Ibid. p. 213).

1111 Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. III. 152-3.

1112 Et quanquam cum Apostolo sentiendum eum qui cœlebs est curare quæ sunt Domini etc. (I. Cor. vii.) eoque magis optandum multos inveniri clericos qui cum cœlibes sint vere etiam contineant, tamen quum multi qui ministerii ecclesiastici functiones tenent, jam multis in locis duxerint uxores, quas a se dimittere nolint; super ea re generalis concilii sententia expectetur, cum alioqui mutatio in ea re, ut nunc sunt tempora, sine gravi rerum perturbatione nunc fieri non possit.—Interim cap. XXVI. § 17.

Charles must have entertained the expectation that a change would be authorized by the council of Trent, or prudence would have dictated the policy of not leaving the matter open with the consciousness that the difficulty could only become daily greater by tolerance.

1113 Le Plat, Monument. Concil. Trident. IV. 19-25.

1114 Pallavicini, Storia del Concilio di Trento Lib. XII. c. 8. Zaccaria (Nuova Giustificaz. pp. 145, 266), while admitting the fact, states that the original of this document has been sought for in vain; though it had long before been published by Dom Martene (Ampliss. Collect. VIII. 1203). In appointing, however, Jodocus, Bishop of Lubec, as a substitute to exercise their powers, the legates require that priests thus restored shall abandon their wives—a condition not expressed in the original bull (Ibid. p. 1211).

Both from this and from the language of the Interim, it appears that even the Catholic priesthood had begun to arrogate for themselves the right of marriage. That such was the case to a great extent will be seen hereafter.

1115 Le Plat, T. IV. p. 27.

1116 Recess. ann. 1551 c. 10 (Goldast. II. 341).

1117 Transac. Pataviens. Artic. de Relig. (Ibid. I. 573).

1118 Ibid. I. 574.

1119 Vision of Piers Ploughman, Wright’s ed., pp. 300, 303.

1120 Ibid. p. 325.—According to David Buchanan, Langlande was also author of a tract “Pro conjugio sacerdotum.” (Ibid. Introduction, p. x.)

1121 In a sermon before the Convocation of 1512, Colet is very severe upon the vices of the church—“we are troubled in these days by heretics—men mad with strange folly—but this heresy of theirs is not so pestilential and pernicious to us and the people as the vicious and depraved lives of the clergy”—and he urges the prelates to revive the ancient canons, the enforcement of which would purify the church. (Seebohm’s Oxford Reformers of 1498, p. 170. London, 1867.)

The title of this work seems to me a misnomer. Neither Colet nor Erasmus had the aggressive spirit of martyrdom which was essential to the character of a reformer in those fierce times. They could deplore existing evils, but lacked all practical boldness in applying remedies, and their influence is only to be traced in the minds which they unwittingly trained to do work which they themselves abhorred.

1122 Thus, in his Epigrams, he ridicules the bishops as a class:—

And he addresses a parish priest:—

See also his epigrams “In Posthumum Episcopum,” “In Episcopum illiteratum,” “De Nautis ejicientibus Monachum,” etc.

1123 Responsio ad Lutherum, passim: “Pater, frater, potator Lutherus,” seems to be a favorite expression, but is mild in comparison with others—“novum inferorum Deum,” “Satanista Lutherus,” “pediculoso fraterculo.” Luther’s friends are “nebulonum, potatorum, scortatorum, sicariorum, senatum,” and More winds up his theological argument with—“furiosum fraterculum et latrinarium nebulonem cum suis furiis et furoribus, cum suis merdis et stercoribus cacantem cacatumque relinquere.”

Luther was himself a master in theological abuse, but More’s admiring biographer, Stapleton, boasts that the German was appalled at the superior vigor of the Englishman, and for the first time in his life he declined further controversy—“magis mutus factus est quam piscis.” (Stapletoni Vit. T. Mori cap. iv.) As More, however, published the tract under the name of “William Rosse, an Englishman who had recently died in Rome, Luther’s reticence is more easily to be accounted for”.