No one who is familiar with his homely mode of speech will take offence at his calling himself on one occasion the “corpulent Doctor,” and in any case this involves neither gluttony nor drunkenness. Moreover, the words occur in a serious connection, for we shall hear it from him during the last days of his life: “When I return again to Wittenberg I shall lay myself in my coffin and give the worms a corpulent doctor to feast on,”[973] referring, of course, to his natural stoutness. Offence has also been taken at a sentence met with in Luther’s Table-Talk, where he says of his contemporaries of fifty years before: “How thin they [i.e. their ranks] have become”; from which it was inferred that he wished them a luxurious life and corpulence, and that he “regarded pot bellies as an ornament and a thing to be desired.” From its context, however, the meaning of the word “thin” is clear. What Luther means is: How few of them remain in the land of the living.
But does not Luther in a letter of his let fall a remark scarcely beseeming one in his position, viz. that he would like to be more frequently in the company of those “good fellows, the students,” “the beer is good, the parlour-maid pretty, the lads friendly (innig)”?[974] Such is one of the statements brought forward against him to show his inordinate love of drink. Yet, when examined, the letter is found to say nothing of any yearning of Luther’s to join in the drinking-bouts of the students or of any interest of his in the maid. “Two honest students” had been recommended to Luther, and the letter informs its addressee, the Mansfeld Chancellor Müller at Eisleben, of the rumour that “too much was being consumed without any necessity by the pair”; the Chancellor was to inform the Count of Mansfeld of the fact in order that he (whose protégés they may have been) “might keep an eye on them.” Then come the words: “What harm would friendly supervision do? The beer is good, the parlour-maid pretty and the lads young (‘jung’ not ‘innig’); the students really behave very well, and my only regret is that, owing to my weak health, I am unable to be oftener with them.” This letter surely does Luther credit. It testifies to his solicitude for the two youths committed to his care; seeing they are still “good and pious,” he is anxious to preserve them from intemperance and other dangers, and regrets that, owing to his poor state of health, he is unable to have the pleasure of visiting these young fellows more often.
We must also caution our readers against an alleged quotation from Luther’s contemporary, Simon Lemnius. Lemnius is reported to have said: “His excessive indulgence in wine and beer made Luther at times so ill that he quite expected to die.” No such statement occurs in the works of Lemnius. What this writer actually did say of Luther on the score of drunkenness will be given later. The above words are a modern invention, though one author, strange to say, actually tacked them on to the authentic passage in Lemnius as though they had belonged to the latter.
Again, it has been said that excessive indulgence in some Malvasian wine was, on Luther’s own admission, the cause of a malady which troubled him for a considerable time in 1529. Luther’s letter in question speaks, however, of a “severe and almost fatal catarrh,” which lasted for a long time and almost deprived him of his voice; others, too, says Luther, had suffered from the catarrh (no great wonder in the month of March or April), but not to the same extent as he. He had imprudently aggravated the trouble possibly by preaching too energetically or—and here comes the incriminating passage—“by drinking some adulterated Malvasian to the health of Amsdorf.” Such were his words to his confidential friend Jonas. The fact is that a wine so expensive as Malvasian was then very liable to being adulterated, the demand far exceeding the supply of this beverage, which was always expected to figure on the table on great occasions. At any rate, there is no mention here of Luther’s illness having arisen from continuous and excessive indulgence in wine. At the conclusion of this chapter we shall have to consider a similar passage.
In the above we have examined about a dozen witnesses, whose testimony has been shown quite valueless to prove Luther’s alleged devotion to drink.
The conclusions which have been drawn from the character of certain of Luther’s writings or utterances are also worthless. It has been affirmed that his “Wider das Bapstum vom Teuffel gestifft” could only have been written “under the excitement produced by drink,” and that many of his sayings, such as his exhortation to “pray for Our Lord God,” could have been uttered “only by a drunken man.”
Yet his incredible hatred sufficed of itself to explain the frenzy of his utterances, nor must we forget that some of his expressions, out of place though they may seem, were chosen as best fitted to appeal to the populace. “Pray for Our Lord God,” interpreted in the light of other similar expressions used by him, means: Pray for the interests of our Lord God and of the new Evangel.
Other Witnesses, Friendly and Hostile.
Before proceeding to scrutinise in detail the more cogent testimonies, we may remark that one trait in Luther’s character, that namely which caused him to be called the “merry boon companion,” might possibly be invoked in support of the charge now under consideration.