[604] Quoted by Köstlin-Kawerau, 2, p. 663, p. 313, n. 1.
[605] “Colloq.,” ed. Bindseil, 1, p. 275: “Vixit et decessit ut Epicureus sine aliquo ministro et consolatione.... Multa quidem præclara scripsit, habuit ingenium præstantissimum, otium tranquillum.... In agone non expetivit ministrum verbi neque sacramenta, et fortasse ilia verba suæ confessionis in agone ‘Fili Dei miserere mei’ illi affinguntur.” Cp. Luther’s words in 1544 in Mathesius, “Tischreden,” p. 343: “He died ‘sine crux et sine lux’”; here again Luther says he had been the cause of many losing body and soul and had been the originator of the Sacramentarians. See our vol. ii., p. 252, n. 1, for further details of Erasmus’s end. We read in Mathesius, p. 90 (May, 1540): “The Doctor said: He arrogated to himself the Divinity of which he deprived Christ. In his ‘Colloquia’ he compared Christ with Priapus [Kroker remarks: ‘Erasmus did not compare Christ with Priapus’], he mocked at Him in his ‘Catechism’ [’Symbolum’], and particularly in his execrable book the ‘Farragines.’”
[606] See the whole passage in “Colloq.,” ed. Bindseil, 1, p. 272 seq.
[607] “Luthers Werke,” Erl. ed., 25², p. 89. See above, p. 101.
[608] “Werke,” ibid., p. 92.
[609] Ibid.
[610] Luther to Duke George, “Werke,” Erl. ed., 53, p. 338 ff. (“Briefwechsel,” 5, p. 281, with amended date and colophon). George to Luther, “Briefwechsel,” 5, p. 285 ff.
[611] More in the same strain above, p. 173, n. 4.
[612] “Werke,” Erl. ed., 25², p. 134.
[613] “Werke,” Erl. ed., 58, p. 411, Table-Talk.