[3] Reckoning schools were to meet direct commercial needs in the cities, and were seldom found outside of commercial towns. The arithmetic taught in the Latin schools as a part of the Seven Liberal Arts was largely theoretical; the arithmetic in the reckoning schools was practical. The work of the professional reckoner in time developed similarly to that of the professional writer, and often the two were combined in one person. When employed by a city he was known as the city clerk. In 1482 the first reckoning book to be published in Germany appeared, filled with merchant's rules and applied problems in denominate numbers and exchange. See an interesting monograph by Jackson, L. L., Sixteenth Century Arithmetic (Trs. College Pubs., No. 8, 1906).
[4] Luther tried to make a translation so simple that even the unlearned might profit by listening to its reading. To insure that his translation should be in a language that would be perfectly clear and natural to the common people, he went about asking questions of laborers, children, and mothers to secure good colloquial expressions. It sometimes took him weeks to secure the right word, but so satisfactory was the result that it fixed the standard for modern German, and still stands as the most conspicuous landmark in the history of the German language.
[5] The French version of this great original work represents the first use of French as a language for an argumentative treatise, and, as Calvin's work was more widely discussed than any other Protestant theological treatise, it did much to fix the character of this national language.
[6] "Tyndale's translation is not only the first which goes back to the original tongues, but it is so noble a translation in its mingled tenderness and majesty, its Saxon simplicity, and its smooth, beautiful diction that it has been but little improved on since. Every succeeding version is little more than a revision of Tyndale's." (J. Paterson Smyth, How We Got Our Bible.)
The following extract from Matthew is illustrative: "O oure father which art in heven, halewed be thy name. Let thy kingdom come. Thy wyll be fulfilled, as well in erth, as hit ys in heven. Geve vs this daye oure dayly breade. And forgeve vs oure treaspases, even as we forgeve them whych treaspas vs. Lede vs nott in to temptacion, but delyvre vs from yvell. Amen."
[7] The most famous of Luther's German hymns, and one expressive of the Protestant spirit, is the one beginning:
"Ein feste Burg ist unser Gott, "A mighty fortress is our God,
Ein gute Wehr und Waffen." A bulwark never failing."
This hymn has often been called "The Marseillaise of the Reformation."
[8] The evolution, during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, of the German vernacular school-teacher out of the parish sexton is one of the interesting bits of our educational history.
[9] Magdeburg is typical, where the Lutherans united all the parish schools under the supervision of one pastor.