Luther was now the acknowledged head of the reformation. He continued by preaching and writing to aid the great cause of Protestantism. His productions were stained with coarse invective; but this was the taste of the age, and belongs equally to his opponents. In 1524, he threw off his monastic dress, and condemned monastic institutions. Convents both of men and women were now rapidly suppressed, and the reformation in some cases ran into fanaticism. A sect called Anabaptists ran into the wildest extremes at Munster. They made war upon property and law, and in their madness practised the grossest vices and crimes under the sanction of religion. Luther was sorely grieved at these things, and did all in his power to correct them, though not with complete success.
In 1525, he married Catherine de Bora, a young nun, who had left her convent a year before, and resided with Melancthon. He was happy in this marriage, and though at the age of forty-two, seems to have entered into it almost with the affections of youth. In 1534, he completed his great work, the German version of the Bible, which is much admired for its elegance, force and precision, and has rendered the Scriptures really popular in Germany.
The remaining years of his life were passed in comparative quiet. In 1546, being at Eisleben, he fell sick on the 17th of February, and seemed at once to be aware of his approaching end. He grew worse in the evening, and died in the midst of his friends, expressing a firm conviction of the truth of that faith, which he had taught. His body was carried to Wittemberg, and buried with great honors.
Luther’s works are voluminous, and great favorites in Germany. In company, he was always lively, and abounded in sallies of wit and good humor; he gave advice and assistance wherever it was needed; he interested himself for every indigent person who applied to him, and devoted himself with his whole soul to the pleasures of society. Rough and stormy as are his controversial writings, he was no stranger to the elegant arts. His soul was filled with music, and he often solaced himself by singing and playing upon the flute and lute.
Nor is Luther to be regarded only in the light of a religious reformer. He not only burst the bonds of religious tyranny throughout Christendom, but he created in Germany that impulse towards spiritual philosophy, that thirst for knowledge, that logical exercise of the mind, which have made the Germans the most intellectual people in Europe. He was the friend of education, of mental freedom, of religious light, of civil liberty. He rescued the Bible from the exclusive grasp of the Church of Rome; by a gigantic effort he translated it into his native tongue; he not only made it acceptable to forty millions who spoke his native language, but he made it the common property of the people of all Europe. He was no courtly flatterer—but the friend of the poor and the humble; he was as ready to condemn cupidity and extravagance among his followers, as among those who adhered to the Church of Rome.
The life which Luther led was calculated to develop the sterner parts of his character, and we must admit that his writings display many gross and abusive passages; yet he possessed many gentle and attractive qualities. His love of music amounted to a passion; “Old Hundred,” a tune which has guided and elevated the devotion of millions, was his composition, and some of our sweetest hymns were written by him. His familiar letters are full of gentle affections. Even when Tetzel, his special enemy, was deserted by those who had used him, and now, in poverty and desolation, was upon his deathbed, Luther was at his side, pouring into his harassed soul the oil of consolation. One of his last acts, was that of reconciliation, in a noble but distracted house. When we look through the steel mail of the controversialist, the reformer, and observe traits of character like these, we cannot but lift our thoughts with thanks to Heaven, that human nature—with all its drawbacks—when elevated by religion, has such capacities as these.
To estimate Luther’s character, and the work he accomplished, we must bear in mind the circumstances under which he acted. He was educated a Catholic, in a country where the dominion of the Romish Church was complete, as well over the government as the people. All around him, father, mother, friends, society were living in abject submission to the established creed. Doubts were held as the suggestions of the Devil; freedom of thought was infidelity; denial of any received dogma was heresy, and worthy the judgments of the Inquisitor—of punishment here and hereafter. These were the orthodox notions of the age, and Luther was a priest of that church which bound the civilized world to such a system.
What a fearful struggle in his own mind, with his own habits of thought, his associations and convictions, did it involve, for the Reformer first to doubt, and then to repudiate, the faith which thus enthralled him! What courage of soul, to meet the fears that spring up in the bosom; what energy of mind, to rend asunder the chains that fetter the reason, in such a condition! And when he had triumphed over internal difficulties, what a work was still before him! The pope, by the invisible cords of spiritual despotism, held all Europe in subjection. Every monarch was more or less his slave; every prison, like some fearful monster, was ready to open its jaws at his command, and close them upon whomsoever he might designate: the jealous inquisition, with all-seeing eyes, all-hearing ears, spread its net on every hand. All the united powers and prejudices of society—public opinion, laws, institutions, armies, prisons, chains, fire, the rack—were in the hands of the church, and it was against this that one man was called to contend. It was as if a single knight, and he without arms, were called to attack the lordly castle, whose massive walls and towering battlements might look down with disdain upon the assailant.
And yet Luther triumphed. We cannot doubt that he was sustained by a deep conviction of the rectitude of his cause; that a sense of duty raised him above the considerations of personal interest and safety; that he acted as if in the presence of God, and in the hope of a heavenly, not an earthly, recompense. We must not only admit that his abilities were great; his qualities rare and well adapted to his work; that he was a man of peculiar singleness and sincerity of aim; and that he was endowed with the richest graces of religion; but we must admit something more—that truth is mighty; that the abuses of the Church of Rome had risen to such a pitch as to furnish the very elements of revolution; and finally, that the good providence of God shaped events to their great issues in behalf of liberty and light. Can any one explain the revolution achieved by Luther, on any grounds short of these?
