Melancthon’s life was not devoted alone to the education of such students as could attend Wittemberg, nor were his changes of the educational system applicable only to the higher schools and universities. Stump says: “Amid all the distractions and anxieties of this period, Melancthon steadily directed his efforts to the advancement of education and the building up of good Christian schools. During a period covering many years, he found time, in spite of his numerous other engagements, to give elementary instruction to a number of young men who lived with him in his own house. He did this on account of the lamentable lack of suitable preparatory schools. He lost no opportunity, however, to provide for this lack, whenever he found it possible to do so.
“In the spring of 1525, with Luther’s help, he reorganized the schools of Eisleben and Magdeburg. He went to Nuremberg, and assisted in the establishment of a gymnasium [high school] in that city; and in the following spring he returned to Nuremberg, and formally opened the school. He delivered an address in Latin, in which he dwelt upon the importance of education, and the credit which the movers in this enterprise deserved. He declared that ... ‘the cause of true education is the cause of God.’”[126]
Both church schools and higher schools, those offering instruction for students preparing for the universities, were organized by Melancthon.
Changes were bitterly opposed
This work was not allowed to proceed without some bitter attacks from the schoolmen and representatives of papal education. For illustration of this fact, we have the words of D’Aubigné: “The schools, which for five centuries past had domineered over Christendom, far from giving way at the first blow of the Reformer [Luther], rose up haughtily to crush the man who dared pour out upon them the flood of his contempt.” “Doctor Eck, the celebrated professor of Ingolstadt, ... was a doctor of the schools and not of the Bible; well versed in the scholastic writings, but not in the Word of God.... Eck represented the schoolmen.” “Eck was a far more formidable adversary than Tetzel [the vender of indulgences], Prierio, or Hochstraten; the more his work surpassed theirs in learning and in subtlety, the more dangerous it was.”[127] Thus Luther’s most bitter enemies were those who had once been his warm friends, and those who offered the strongest opposition to his work were the teachers in the universities of Germany. Luther was sometimes almost overcome in spirit by the ingratitude shown, and of Doctor Eck he once wrote: “If I did not know Satan’s thoughts, I should be astonished at the fury which has led this man to break off so sweet and so new a friendship, and that, too, without warning me, without writing to me, without saying a single word.”
The Saxony school plan
It was in order to meet the opposition offered by the schoolmen, and to put the Reformation on a firm basis, that Luther and Melancthon formulated the Saxony school plan, and reorganized the German schools.
Stump says: “In the year 1527, Melancthon took part with Luther in the visitation of the schools and churches of Saxony. It was high time for such a step. Affairs were in a wretched condition. In many places no religious instruction was given at all, because there were either no pastors and teachers stationed there, or those who were stationed there were grossly ignorant themselves. The greatest disorder imaginable reigned nearly everywhere.... The financial condition of many of the churches was equally bad.... It was the object of the visitation to bring order out of this chaos. Melancthon was charged with making a beginning in Thuringia. The spiritual distress which he discovered rent his heart, and he often went aside, and wept over what he saw.” “In 1528 Melancthon drew up the ‘Saxony school plan,’ which served as the basis of organization for many schools throughout Germany.”
Reforms advocated by this plan