Desiderius Erasmus of Rotterdam

by Ephraim Emerton

"And yet, even if I did favour him as a good man, which his enemies admit him to be; or as an accused man, and that the laws permit even to sworn judges; or as a man oppressed and crushed down by those who, under some made-up pretext, are working all they can against pure learning, what ground of fault-finding against me were that, so long as I do not mix myself in the matter? In fine, it seems to me the part of a Christian to favour Luther, in this sense, that if he is innocent I do not wish him to be crushed by the factions of the wicked; if he is wrong I wish him to be set right, not ruined....

"But now certain theologians whom I know are neither warning nor teaching Luther, but are only with mad howlings reviling him before the people and tearing him in pieces with the most violent abuse and continually having in their mouths the words 'heresy!', 'heretic', 'heresiarch!', 'schism!', 'antichrist!' It cannot be denied that these clamours were raised among the people chiefly by men who had never seen the books of Luther. It is well proved that things are condemned by these people as heretical in Luther which in Bernard or Augustine are read as orthodox, nay, as pious words. I warned them at the beginning to abstain from clamour of this sort and to carry on the affair rather with writings and arguments. I said they ought not publicly to condemn what they had not read and carefully thought out, I will not say, understood. Then I told them it was unbecoming for theologians to carry anything through by violence, for their judgment ought to be of the most serious kind, and that it was not an easy thing to gain their point by raging against a man whose life was approved by everyone. Finally, that perhaps it was not a safe thing to touch upon such matters before a mixed crowd, in which there are many who greatly dislike the confession of secret sins and if these should hear that there are theologians who say one need not confess all faults, they will readily snatch at it and get a perverted notion. Now though all this must strike every man of spirit as it does me, yet from this friendly admonition they have conceived the suspicion that Luther's books are in great part mine, and produced at Louvain, whereas not one stroke in them is mine or published with my knowledge or my will. Still, acting upon this false suspicion and in spite of all denial, they have raised here disturbances more furious than I have ever seen in my life.

"Further, though the special function of theologians is to teach, I see many nowadays who are doing nothing but compelling men, bringing them to ruin or to silence, whereas Augustine, even in the case of the Donatists, who were not merely heretics but furious brigands, does not approve those who would merely compel, without also teaching them. Men to whom gentleness is a duty, seem to be simply thirsting for human blood, so eager are they to ensnare and ruin Luther. Now this is playing the butcher, not the theologian. If they want to show themselves great theologians let them convert the Jews, let them turn to Christ those who are strangers to him, let them mend the public morals of Christians, even more corrupt than those of Turks. What justice is there in leading him to punishment, who has now first proposed for discussion things which have always been discussed in all the schools of theologians? Why ought he to be persecuted, who begs to be instructed, who submits himself to the judgment of the Roman See and of the schools, which they call 'universities?' And if he refuses to trust himself in the hands of certain persons who would rather see him crushed than instructed, surely that is not strange."

For a man who was a total stranger to Luther and his books, Erasmus shows himself surprisingly well informed.

"Let us examine into the origin of the present troubles. The world is burdened with human devices, with the opinions and the dogmas of the schools, with the tyranny of the Mendicant Friars, who, though they are the servants of the Roman See, are making themselves a danger to the pope himself and even to kings, by their power and their numbers. When the pope is working for them he is more than a God; if he does anything contrary to their convenience, he is of no more account than a dream. I am not condemning them all; but very many are the kind of persons, who for the sake of power and gain are seeking to ensnare the consciences of men. With shameless effrontery they were beginning to leave out Christ entirely and to preach nothing but their own novel and impudent doctrines. About indulgences they were talking in a way that not even idiots could stand. Through this and many other things the vigour of apostolic teaching was gradually disappearing and it was likely to happen that things would go from bad to worse until that spark of Christian piety should be extinguished, from which the dying flame of Christian love might have been rekindled. The whole of religion was turning towards more than Jewish ceremonialism. Good men grieved over all these things. Even theologians who are not monks, and some monks, confessed to them in private conversation. These are the things, as I think, which first moved the heart of Luther to set himself boldly against the intolerable insolence of certain persons. For what else can I suspect of a man who is aiming at neither honours nor wealth? As to the propositions which they object to in Luther, I am not at present discussing them, but only the manner and the occasion of them.

"Luther dared to have doubts about indulgences, but others before him had made bold enough statements about these. He dared to speak rather unrestrainedly about the authority of the Roman pontiff; but others had shown little enough restraint in this matter, and among them especially Alvarus, Sylvester, and the cardinal of San Sisto. He dared despise the judgment of St. Thomas, but the Dominicans had almost set Thomas above the Gospels. He dared in the matter of the confessional to discuss certain scruples, but in this thing the monks have entangled the consciences of men without limit. He dared in part to despise the conclusions of the schools; but they had laid far too great weight upon these, and yet cannot agree upon them among themselves, but are always changing them, cutting out the old and putting in new. This was a pain to pious souls: to hear in the schools scarcely a word about the apostolic teaching, but to learn that the ancient sacred writers, long approved by the Church, were now quite antiquated, and to hear in public preaching seldom a word of Christ, but always of the power of the pope and the opinions of the moderns; to know that the whole discourse was filled with lust of gain, with flatteries, ambition, and deceit.

"I think the blame ought to be put upon these things, if Luther wrote a little too violently. Whoever defends the apostolic doctrine defends the pope, who is its chief herald, as the rest of the bishops are his heralds. All bishops stand in the place of Christ, but among them the Roman pontiff stands first. We must believe of him that he cares for nothing more than the glory of Christ, whose minister he boasts himself to be. They deserve very badly of him who ascribe to him things which he would not himself recognise and which are far from helpful to the flock of Christ. And yet some who are stirring up these disorders are not doing it out of love for the pope, but are abusing his authority for their own profit and power. We have, as I believe, a pious pope; but in the vast flood of affairs there are many things of which he is ignorant, which even if he would he cannot get at, but as Virgil says, the driver is 'swept along by the steeds and the car heeds not the rein.' He therefore is aiding the good-will of the pope, who exhorts him to those things that are especially worthy of Christ.

"It is no secret that there are persons who are stirring up his Holiness against Luther and against all who dare to murmur against their dogmas. But the great princes ought rather to consider what is demanded by the permanent will of the pope, than by a loyalty extorted by base means. What kind of people the authors of these dissensions are I could make perfectly clear, if I did not fear that while I am telling the truth I may seem to be uttering abuse. Many of them I know intimately; many have declared their quality by their writings, so that no mirror could more clearly reflect the image of their heart and life. Would that they who take up the Censor's rod to drive out of the Senate of Christians whomever they will, had drunk more deeply of the teaching and the spirit of Christ....