An Introduction to the History of Western Europe

by James Harvey Robinson

Portrait of Erasmus by Holbein

Erasmus would have had the Bible in the hands of every one. In the introduction to his edition of the New Testament he says that women should read the Gospels and the Epistles of Paul as well as the men. The peasant in the field, the artisan in his shop, and the traveler on the highroad should while away the time with passages from the Bible.

Erasmus' idea of true religion.

Erasmus believed that the two arch enemies of true religion were (1) paganism,—into which many of the more enthusiastic Italian humanists fell in their admiration for the ancient literatures,—and (2) the popular confidence in mere outward acts and ceremonies, like visiting the graves of saints, the mechanical repetition of prayers, and so forth. He claimed that the Church had become careless and had permitted the simple teachings of Christ to be buried under myriads of dogmas introduced by the theologians. "The essence of our religion," he says, "is peace and harmony. These can only exist where there are few dogmas and each individual is left to form his own opinion upon many matters."

In his Praise of Folly Erasmus attacks the evils in the Church.

In his celebrated Praise of Folly,[271] Erasmus has much to say of the weaknesses of the monks and theologians, and of the foolish people who thought that religion consisted simply in pilgrimages, the worship of relics, and the procuring of indulgences. Scarcely one of the abuses which Luther later attacked escaped Erasmus' satirical pen. The book is a mixture of the lightest humor and the bitterest earnestness. As one turns its pages one is sometimes tempted to think Luther half right when he declared Erasmus "a regular jester who makes sport of everything, even of religion and Christ himself." Yet there was in this humorist a deep seriousness that cannot be ignored. Erasmus was really directing his extraordinary industry, knowledge, and insight, not toward a revival of classical literature, but to a renaissance of Christianity. He believed, however, that revolt from the pope and the Church would produce a great disturbance and result in more harm than good. He preferred to trust in the slower but surer effects of enlightenment and knowledge. Popular superstitions and any undue regard for the outward forms of religion would, he argued, be outgrown and quietly disappear as mankind became more cultivated.

To Erasmus and his many sympathizers, culture, promoted especially by classical studies, should be the chief agency in religious reform. Nevertheless, just as Erasmus thought that his dreams of a peaceful reform were to be realized, as he saw the friends and patrons of literature,—Maximilian, Henry VIII, Francis I,—on the thrones of Europe, and a humanist pope, Leo X, at the head of the Church, a very different revolution from that which he had planned, had begun and was to embitter his declining years.

Sources of discontent in Germany with the policy of the papal court.

140. The grudge of Germany against the papal court never found a more eloquent expression than in the verses of its greatest minnesinger, Walther von der Vogelweide. Three hundred years before Luther's time he declared that the pope was making merry over the stupid Germans. "All their goods will be mine, their silver is flowing into my far-away chest; their priests are living on poultry and wine and leaving the silly layman to fast." Similar sentiments may be found in the German writers of all the following generations. Every one of the sources of discontent with the financial administration of the Church which the councils had tried to correct[272] was particularly apparent in Germany. The great German prelates, like the archbishops of Mayence, Treves, Cologne, and Salzburg, were each required to contribute no less than ten thousand gold guldens to the papal treasury upon having their election duly confirmed by the pope; and many thousands more were expected from them when they received the pallium.[273] The pope enjoyed the right to fill many important benefices in Germany, and frequently appointed Italians, who drew the revenue without dreaming of performing any of the duties attached to the office. A single person frequently held several church offices. For example, early in the sixteenth century, the Archbishop of Mayence was at the same time Archbishop of Magdeburg and Bishop of Halberstadt. In some instances a single person had accumulated over a score of benefices.