LUTHER ON EDUCATION. CHAPTER I. CAUSES OF THE REFORMATION. THE greatest achievement of the Germanic race, and the most important event in history since the advent of Christ, is the Reformation of the sixteenth century. Though involving a multitude of interests, it was essentially a religious movement, which sought to correct the errors in doctrine and practice that had crept into the Church. In connection with cooperating influences presently to be noticed, the Reformation began a new stage in human progress; it marks the close of the Middle Ages, and the dawn of the modern era. Insignificant in its beginning, it appealed so strongly to the conscience of the Teutonic nations that it speedily assumed a world-wide significance. There is scarcely an important human interest that it has not affected. It has secured greater purity and spirituality in religion; it has contributed to the elevation of the laity and the advancement of woman; it has confirmed the separation of the secular and the ecclesiastical power; it has given an extraordinary impulse to literature and science; it has established the right of liberty of conscience; in a word, it is closely related to all that distinguishes and ennobles our modern civilization. The Reformation has long been a subject of controversy; and at the present time, because of recent Roman Catholic attacks, its origin and significance are being investigated with renewed interest. In many of the discussions of the past, ignorance, prejudice, and passion have led to one-sided statements, and to erroneous or inadequate explanations. There have been writers of high rank, as Hume and Voltaire, who have alleged the rivalry between the Augustinian and the Dominican friars as the origin of the Reformation. "You are not unaware," says the Frenchman," that this great revolution in the human mind and in the political system of Europe began with Martin Luther, an Augustinian monk, whom his superiors deputed to preach against the traffic in indulgences which had been refused them. The quarrel was at first between the Augustinians and the Dominicans."* The state * Voltaire, Essai sur les Moeurs, chapter 127. |