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Kings no longer submitted to the papal yoke ; the long schism of the fourteenth century had attracted the attention of the multitude to the disorders and ambition of the pontifical government; the bulls were torn in pieces and burnt by order of the magistrates; the very councils were intent upon the means of correcting abuses.

Thus, when Luther appeared, the reformation was in every mind; he culled a fruit which was ripe and ready to drop. Let us, however, consider who this Luther was; he will naturally lead us to Henry VIII., for he is connected with this monarch by his religious innovations, and by his quarrels with the founder of the English church.

LUTHER.

MARTIN LUTHER, the creator of a religion of princes and gentlemen, was the son of a peasant. He tells his own story in a few words, with that impudent humility which springs from the success of a whole life.*

"I have often conversed with Melanchton, and related to him the minutest details of my life. I am the son of a peasant; my father, grandfather, and great grandfather, were mere peasants. My father had removed to Mansfeld, where he became a miner. I was born there. That I should in after-life graduate as a bachelor, a doctor, &c., was not in my destiny. Have I not surprised many people by becoming a monk? and afterwards by exchanging the brown cowl for one of another kind? This greatly distressed

* What I am about to relate of Luther is chiefly extracted from the work lately published by M. Michelet, under the title of Mémoires de Luther.

my father, who fell ill in consequence. I next fell to loggerheads with the Pope: married a nun who had run away from a convent, and have had many children by her. Who could ever have read this in the stars? Who could have foretold that such things were to happen?"

Born at Eisleben, on the 10th of November, 1483, sent at the early age of six years to the school at Eisenach, Luther earned his bread by singing from door to door. "I also," said he,

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was a poor beggar, and have received bread at the doors of houses." Ursula Schweickard, a charitable lady, took pity on him, and paid for his education; in 1501 he entered the university of Erfurt. A poor and obscure boy, he opened that new era which commences with him, an era which so many changes and calamities were to render imperishable in the memory of

men.

Luther at first devoted himself to the study of the law; but he conceived an aversion for it, and turned to theology, music, and literature; in his presence one of his companions was struck dead by lightning; he then vowed to St. Anne that he would turn monk, and on the night of the 17th July, 1505, he entered the Augustine convent at Erfurt: he shut himself up in a cloister with a Plautus and a Virgil, to change

the christian world. Two years afterwards he was ordained a priest. "When I said my first mass I was half dead with fright, for I had no faith; next came weariness, temptations, and doubts." Luther, with a view to strengthen his belief, travelled to Rome.

There he found incredulity seated on the tomb of St. Peter, and paganism revived in the Vatican. Julius II., with a helmet on his head, dreamt only of battles; and the cardinals, ciceronians in their language, were transformed into poets, diplomatists, and warriors. Ready to turn Ghibeline, papacy had, without being itself aware of it, abdicated the temporal authority; the Pope, by becoming a prince in the style of other princes, had ceased to be the representative of the christian republic; he had relinquished the fearful office of Tribune of Nations, with which the popular election had formerly invested him. This escaped Luther's observation; he only took the narrow view of things; and returned to Germany, being merely struck with the scandal exhibited by the atheism and corrupt morals of the court of Rome.

Julius II. was succeeded by Leo X., Luther's rival; the pope and the monk divided the age between them; Leo X. imparted to it his name, and Luther his power.

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