And, in point of fact, those teachers who felt themselves bound in conscience to differ from him and go their own way—for instance, the “Sacramentarians” in their interpretation of the words of consecration—were made to smart. Of this the example of Schwenckfeld was a new and striking proof.
The contradiction presented on the one hand by Luther’s disposition to grant the most absolute freedom of conscience, and on the other by his rigid exclusiveness, is aptly described by Friedrich Paulsen: “In the region of morals Luther leaves the decision to the individual conscience as instructed by the Word of God. To rely on human authority in questions of morals appeared to him not much better than blasphemy.... True enough, however, this very Luther, at a later date, attacked those whose conscience found in God’s Word doctrines at all different from those taught at Wittenberg.”[275]
Hence, neither to the heretics in his own camp nor to the adherents of the olden faith would he allow the right of private judgment, so greatly extolled both by himself and his followers. Nothing had been dearer to the people of mediæval times, who for all their love of freedom were faithful children of the Church, than regard and esteem for the rights of personality in its own domain. Personality, denoting man’s unfettered and reasonable nature stamped with its own peculiar individuality, is assuredly something noble. The Catholic Church, far from setting limits to the development of personality, promoted both its real freedom and the growth of individuality in ways suited to man’s nature and his supernatural vocation. Even the monastic life, so odious to Luther, was anything but “hostile to the ideal of personality.” An impartial observer, prepared to disregard fortuitous abuses, could have seen even then, that the religious life strives after the fairest fruits of ethical personality, which are fostered by the very sacrifice of self-will: Obedience is but a sacrifice “made in the interests of personality.”[276] Mere wilfulness and the spirit of “defiance,” ever ready to overstep the bounds set by reason and grace, creates, not a person, but a “superman,” whose existence we could well spare; of such a being Luther’s behaviour reminds us more than once.
After all we have said it would be superfluous to deal in detail with the opinion expressed above (p. 66) by certain Protestant judges, viz. that Luther reinstated conscience, which had fallen into the toils of “legalism,” and set it again on its “true basis,” insisting on “feeling” and on real “morality.” Nor shall we enquire whether it is seriously implied, that, before Luther’s day, people were not aware that the mere “legality” of a deed did not suffice unless first of all morality was recognised as the true guide of conduct.
We may repeat yet once again that Luther was not the first to brand “outward holiness-by-works” in the sphere of morality.[277] Berthold of Ratisbon, whose voice re-echoed through the whole of Germany, summing up the teaching of the mediæval moral theologians, reprobates most sternly any false confidence in outward deeds. No heaping up of external works, no matter how eager, can, according to him, prove of any profit to the soul, not even if the sinner, after unheard-of macerations, goes loaded with chains on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem and there lays himself down to die within the very sepulchre of the Lord; all that, so he points out with an eloquence all his own, would be thrown away were there lacking the inward spirit of love and contrition for the sins committed.
The doctrine on contrition of the earlier Catholic theologians and popular writers, which we have already had occasion to review, forms an excellent test when compared with Luther’s own, by which to decide the question: Which is the outward and which the inward morality? Their doctrine is based both on Scripture and on the traditions of antiquity. Similarly the Catholic teaching on moral self-adaptation to Christ, such as we find it, for instance, in St. Benedict’s Prologue to his world-famous Rule, that textbook of the mediæval ascetics, in the models and examples of the Fathers and even in the popular Catholic works of piety so widely read in Luther’s day, strikingly confutes the charge, that, by the stress it laid on certain commandments and practices, Catholicism proved it had lost sight of “the existence of a living personal morality” and that it fell to Luther once more to recall to life this ideal. The imitation of Christ in the spirit of love was undoubtedly regarded as the highest aim of morality, and this aim necessarily included “personal morality” in its most real sense, and Luther was not in the least necessity of inaugurating any new ideals of virtue.
Luther’s Warfare with his old friend Caspar Schwenckfeld
Caspar Schwenckfeld, a man of noble birth hailing from Ossig near Lüben in Silesia, after having studied at Cologne, Frankfurt-on-the-Oder and perhaps also at Erfurt, was, in 1519, won over by Luther’s writings to the religious innovations. Being idealistically inclined, the Wittenberg preaching against formalism in religion and on the need of returning to a truly spiritual understanding of the Bible roused him to enthusiasm. He attempted, with rather more logic than Luther, to put in practice the latter’s admonitions concerning the inward life and therefore started a movement, half pietist, half mystic, for bringing together those who had been really awakened.
Schwenckfeld was a man of broad mind, with considerable independence of judgment and of a noble and generous disposition. His good position in the world gave him what many of the other Lutheran leaders lacked, viz. a free hand. His frank criticism did not spare the faults in their preaching. The sight of the sordid elements which attached themselves to Luther strengthened him in his resolve to establish communities—first of all in Silesia—modelled on the very lines roughly sketched by Luther, which should present a picture of the apostolic age of the Church. The Duke of Silesia and many of the nobility were induced to desert Catholicism, and a wide field was won in Silesia for the new ideals of Wittenberg.
In spite of his high esteem for Luther, Schwenckfeld wrote, in 1523: It is evident “that little improvement can be discerned emerging from the new teaching, and that those who boast of the Evangel lead a bad and scandalous life.... This moves us not a little, indeed pierces our heart when we hear of it.”[278] To the Duke he dedicated, in 1524, a writing entitled: “An exhortation regarding the misuse of sundry notable Articles of the Evangel, through the wrong understanding of which the common man is led into the freedom of the flesh and into error.” The book forms a valuable source of information on the religious state of the people at the time of the rise of Lutheranism. Therein he laments, with deep feeling and with an able pen, that so many Lutherans were being influenced by the most worldly of motives, and that a pernicious tendency towards freedom from social restrictions was rife amongst them.[279]