Collected Works of Martin Luther

by Martin Luther

  This booklet, which is of great interest for the history of the schools, was translated into Latin in the same year by Vincentius Obsopœus (Koch) and published at Hagenau, with a preface by Melanchthon. It also became widely known throughout Germany, being frequently reprinted in the original tongue. As the title shows, Luther addressed himself in the work “To the Councillors of all the townships,” viz. even to the Catholic magistrates among whom he stood in disfavour. He declares that it was a question of the “salvation and happiness of the whole German land. And were I to hit upon something good, even were I myself a fool, it would be no disgrace to anyone to listen to me.”

  In thus calling for the founding of schools Luther was but reiterating the admonition contained in his writing “To the German Nobility.” Such exhortations were always sure to win applause, and served to recommend not only his own person but even, in the case of many, his undertaking as a whole. In his rules for the administration of the poor-box at Leisnig Luther had been mindful of the claims of the schools, nor did he forget them in the other regulations he drew up later. In his sermons, too, he also dwelt repeatedly on the needs of the elementary schools; when complaining of the decay of charity he is wont to instance the straits, not only of the parsonages and the poor, but also of the schools. “Only reckon up and count on your fingers what here [at Wittenberg] and elsewhere those who bask in the Evangel give and do for it, and see whether, were it not for us who are still living, there would remain a single preacher or student.… Are there then no poor scholars who ought to be studying and exercising themselves in the Word of God?” But “hoarding and scraping” are now the rule, so that hardly a town can be found “that collects enough to keep a schoolmaster or parson.”

  Many wealthy towns had, however, to Luther’s great joy, taken in hand the cause of the schools. Their efforts were to prove very helpful to the new religious system.

  In the same year that the above writing appeared steps were taken at Magdeburg for the promotion of education, and Cruciger, Luther’s own pupil, was summoned from Wittenberg to assume the direction. Melanchthon and Luther repaired to Eisleben in 1525, where Count Albert of Mansfeld had founded a Grammar School. In some towns the Councillors carried out Luther’s proposals, in others, where the town-council was opposed to the innovators and their schools, the burghers “set at naught the Council,” as Luther relates, and erected “schools and parsonages”; in other words, they established schools as the best means to further the new Evangel. At Nuremberg Melanchthon, a zealous promoter of education, exerted himself for the foundation of a “Gymnasium” which was to serve as a model of the new humanistic schools of the Evangelicals, and which was generously provided for by the town. May 6, 1526, saw the opening of this new school. Learned masters were appointed, for instance, Melanchthon’s friend Camerarius, the poet Eobanus Hessus and the humanist Michael Roting. In 1530 Luther speaks of it in words meant to flatter the Nurembergers as “a fine, noble school,” for which the “very best men” had been selected and appointed. He even tells all Germany, that “no University, not even that of Paris itself, was ever so well provided in the way of lecturers”; it was in no small measure owing to this school that “Nuremberg now shone throughout the whole of Germany like a sun, compared with which others were but moon and stars.”

  Yet it was certain disagreeable happenings at Nuremberg itself which led him to write in 1530 his second booklet in favour of the schools. In the flourishing commercial city there were many wealthy burghers who refused to send their children to the “Gymnasium,” thinking that, instead of learning ancient languages, they would be more usefully occupied in acquiring other elements of knowledge more essential to the mercantile calling; by so doing they had raised a certain feeling against the new school. Many were even disposed to scoff at all book-learning and roundly declared, as Luther relates, “If my son knows how to read and reckon then he knows quite enough; we now have plenty German books,” etc.

  In July of the above year, Luther, in the loneliness of the Coburg, penned a sermon having for its title “That children must be kept at school.” The sermon grew into a lengthy work; Luther himself was, later on, to bewail its long-windedness. This writing, taken with that of 1524, supplies the gist of Luther’s teaching with regard to the schools.

  In the preface, printed before the body of the work, he dedicates the writing to the Nuremberg “syndic” or town-clerk, Lazarus Spengler, an ardent promoter of the new teaching. A town like Nuremberg, he there says, “must surely contain more men than merchants, and also others who can do more than merely reckon, or read German books. German books are principally intended for the common people to read at home; but for preaching, governing and administering justice in both ecclesiastical and temporal sphere all the arts and languages in the world are not sufficient.” Already in the preface he inveighs against those who assert that arithmetic and a knowledge of German were quite enough: These small-minded worshippers of Mammon failed to take into consideration what was essential for “ruling”; both the civil and the ecclesiastical office would suffer under such a system.

  In this writing his style follows his mood, being now powerful, now popular and not seldom wearisome. He dwells longest on the spiritual office, expressing his fear, that, should the lack of interest in the schools become general, and the people continue so niggardly in providing for their support, there would result such a spiritual famine with regard to the Word of God, that ten villages would be left in the charge of a single parson. Passing on to the secular office he points out how the latter upholds the “temporal, fleeting peace, life and law.… It is an excellent gift of God Who also instituted and appointed it and Who demands its preservation.” Of this office “It is the work and glory that it makes wild beasts into men and keeps them in this state.… Do you not think that if the poor birds and beasts could speak and were able to see the action of the secular rule among men they would say: Dear fellows, you are no men but gods compared with us; how secure you sit and live, enjoying all good things, whereas we are not safe from each other for a single hour as regards our life, our home or our food.”

  “Such rule cannot continue, but must go to rack and ruin unless the law [the Roman law and the law of the land] is maintained. And what is to maintain it? Fists and blustering cannot do so, but only brains and books; we must learn to understand the wisdom and justice of our secular rule.” Speaking of the lawyers’ office for which the young must prepare themselves, he groups under it the “chancellors, clerks, judges, advocates, notaries and all others who are concerned with the law, not to speak of the great Johnnies who sport the title of Hofrat.” On the calling of the physician he only touches lightly, showing that this “useful, consoling and health-giving” profession demands the retention of the Latin schools, short of which it must fall into decay.

  The following hint was a practical one: Seeing that, in Saxony alone, about 4000 men of learning were needed — what with chaplains, schoolmasters and readers — those who wished to study had good prospects of “great honours and emoluments since two Princes and three townships were all ready to fight for the services of one learned man.” He urges that assistance should be given to poor parents out of the Church property so as to enable them to send their children to school, and that the rich should make foundations for this purpose.

  In this writing, as in that of 1524, he addresses himself to the secular authorities and even demands that they should compel their subjects to send their children to school in order that the supply of capable men might not fail in the future. I consider, he says, “that the authorities are bound to force those under them to see to the schooling of their children, more particularly those just spoken of [the more gifted]; for it is undoubtedly their duty to see to the upkeep of the above-mentioned offices and callings.” If in time of war they could compel their subjects to render assistance and resist the enemy, much more had they the right to coerce them in respect of the children, seeing that this was a war against the de
vil who wished to despoil the land and the townships of able men, so as to be able “to cheat and delude them as he pleased.”

  As regards the question whether all children were to be forced to go to school, in this writing Luther does not speak of any universal compulsion; only “when the authorities see a capable lad” does he wish coercion to be applied to the parents. In his first writing on the schools likewise, he had not advocated universal compulsion but had merely pointed out that it was “becoming” that the authorities should interfere where the parents neglected their duty; he does not say how they are to “interfere,” but merely suggests that one or two “schoolmasters” should be provided whose salary should not be grudged.

  “Hence it is incorrect,” rightly remarks Kawerau, “to represent Luther as the harbinger of universal compulsory education.”

  Fr. Lambert of Avignon, in his ecclesiastical regulations dating from 1526, indeed sought to establish national schools throughout Hesse, but his proposals were never enforced. It was only at the beginning of the 17th century that Wolfgang Ratke (Ratichius, †1635), a pedagogue educated in the Calvinistic schools, established the principle of universal education which then was incorporated in the educational regulations of Weimar in 1619. But the Thirty Years’ War put an end to these attempts, and it was only in the 18th century that the principle of compulsory State education secured general acceptance, and then, too, owing chiefly to non-Lutheran influences.

  Before entering further into the details of Luther’s educational plans we must cast a glance at a factor which seems to permeate both the above writings.

  Polemical Trend of Luther’s Pedagogics

  If we seek to characterise both the writings just spoken of we find that they amount to an appeal called forth by the misery of those times for some provision to be made to ensure a supply of educated men for the future. Frederick Paulsen describes them, particularly the earlier one, as nothing more than a “cry for help, wrung from Luther by the sudden, general collapse of the educational system which followed on the ecclesiastical upheaval.” They were not dictated so much by a love for humanistic studies as such or by the wish to further the interests of learning in Germany, as by the desire to fill the secular-government berths with able, “Christian” men, and, above all, to provide preachers and pastors for the work Luther had commenced and for the struggle against Popery. The schools themselves were unobtrusively to promote the new Evangel amongst the young and in the home. Learning, according to Luther, as a Protestant theologian expressed it, was to enter “into the service of the Evangel and further its right understanding”; “the religious standpoint alone was of any real interest to him.”

  Melanchthon’s attitude to the schools was more broadminded. To some extent his efforts supplied what was wanting in Luther. His object was the education of the people, whereas, in Luther’s eyes, the importance of the schools chiefly lay in their being “seminaria ecclesiarum,” as he once calls them. With him their aim was too much the mere promoting of his specific theological interests, to the “preservation of the Church.”

  According to Luther the first and most important reason for promoting the establishment of schools, was, as he points out to the “Councillors of all the Townships,” to resist the devil, who, the better to maintain his dominion over the German lands, was bent on thwarting the schools; “if we want to prick him on a tender spot then we may best do so by seeing that the young grow up in the knowledge of God, spreading the Word of God and teaching it to others.” “The other [reason] is, as St. Paul says, that we receive not the grace of God in vain, nor neglect the accepted time.” The “donkey-stables and devil-schools” kept by monks and clergy had now seen their day; but, now that the “darkness” has been dispelled by the “Word of God,” we have the “best and most learned of the youths and men, who, equipped with languages and all the arts, can prove of great assistance.” “My dear, good Germans, make use of God’s grace and His Word now you have it! For know this, the Word of God and His grace is indeed here.”

  In many localities preachers of the new faith were in request, moreover, many of the older clergy, who had passed over to Luther’s side, had departed this life or had been removed by the Visitors on account of their incapacity or moral shortcomings. Those who had replaced them were often men of no education whatever. The decline of learning gave rise to many difficulties. Schoolmasters were welcomed not only as simple ministers but, as we have heard Luther declare, even as the candidates best fitted for the post of superintendent. How frequently people of but slight education were appointed pastors is plain from the lists of those ordained at Wittenberg from 1537 onwards; amongst these we find men of every trade: clerks, printers, weavers, cobblers, tailors, and even one peasant. Seven years later, when the handicraftsmen had disappeared, we constantly find sextons and schoolmasters being entrusted with the ministerial office.

  This sad state of things must be carefully kept in mind if we are to understand the ideas which chiefly inspired the above writings, and as these have not so far been sufficiently emphasised we may be permitted to make some reference to them.

  “We must have men,” says Luther in his first writing, viz. that addressed to the councillors, “men to dispense to us God’s Word and the sacraments and to watch over the souls of the people. But whence are we to get them if the schools are allowed to fall to ruin and other more Christian ones are not set up?” “Christendom has always need of such prophets to study and interpret the Scriptures, and, when the call comes, to conduct controversy.” Similar appeals occur even more frequently in the other writing, viz. that dedicated by Luther to his friend at Nuremberg. Already in his first writing, Luther, as the ghostly counsellor of Germany “appointed” in Christ’s name, boldly faces all other teachers, telling the Catholics, that what he was seeking was merely the “happiness and salvation” of the Fatherland. In the second he expressly states that it is to all the German lands that he their “prophet” is speaking: “My dear Germans, I have told you often enough that you have heard your prophet. God grant that we may obey His Word.” So entirely does he identify the interests of his Church with those of the schools. Well might those many Germans who did not hold with him — and at that time Luther was an excommunicate outlaw — well might they have asked themselves with astonishment whence he had the right to address them as though he were the representative and mouthpiece of the whole of Germany. Such exhortations have, however, their root in his usual ideas of religion and in the anxiety caused by the urgent needs of the time.

  At the Coburg the indifference, coldness and avarice of his followers appears to him in an even darker light than usual. He well sees that if the schools continue to be neglected as they have been hitherto the result will be a mere “pig sty,” a “hideous, savage horde of ‘Tatters’ and Turks.” Hence he fulminates against the ingratitude displayed towards the Evangel and against the stinginess which, though it had money for everything, had none to spare for the schools and the parsons; the imagery to which he has recourse leaves far behind that of the Old Testament Prophets.

  Here we have the real Luther whom, as he himself admits, though in a different sense, stands revealed in this writing penned at the Coburg. “Is this not enough to arouse God’s wrath?… Verily it would be no wonder were God to open wide the doors and windows of hell and rain and hail on us nothing but devils, or were He to send fire and brimstone down from heaven and plunge us all into the abyss of hell like Sodom and Gomorrha … for they were not one-tenth as wicked as Germany is now.” Has then Christ, the Son of God, deserved this of us, he asks, that so many care nothing for the schools and parsonages, and “even dissuade the children from becoming ministers, that this office may speedily perish, and the blood and passion of Christ be no longer of any avail.” Here again his chief reason for maintaining the schools is his anxiety: “What is otherwise to become of the ghostly office and calling.” Only after he has considered this question from all sides and demonstrated that his Church’s e
difice stands in need not merely of “worked stones” but also of “rubble,” i.e. both of clever men and of others less highly gifted, does he come in the second place to the importance of having learned men even in the secular office.

  He had begun this writing with an allusion to the devil, viz. to “the wiles of tiresome Satan against the holy Evangel”; he also concludes it in the same vein, speaking of the “tiresome devil,” who secretly plots against the schools and thereby against the salvation of both town and country.

  The author goes at some length into the question of languages and declares that the main reason for learning them was a religious one.

  Languages enable us “to understand Holy Scripture,” he says, “this was well known to the monasteries and universities of the past, hence they had always frowned on the study of languages”; the devil was afraid that languages would make a hole “which afterwards it would not be easy for him to plug.” But the providence of God has outreached him, for, by “making over Greece to the Turks and sending the Greeks into exile, their language was spread abroad and an impetus was given even to the study of other tongues.” And now, thanks to the languages, the Gospel has been restored to its “earlier purity.” Hence, for the sake of the Bible and the Word of God, let us hark back to the languages. His excellent observations on the importance of the study of languages for those in secular authority, though perfectly honest, hold merely a secondary place. The chief use of the languages is as a weapon against the Papacy. “The dearer the Evangel is to us, the more let us hold fast to the languages!”