known: "Whatever may be the ideas of our minds as to the truth of Luther's doctrines, we should be careful .... not to be misled by the superficial and ungrounded representations which we sometimes find in modern writers. Such is this that Luther, struck by the absurdity of the prevailing superstitions, was desirous of introducing a more rational system of religion ...., or, what others have been pleased to suggest, that his zeal for learning and ancient philosophy led him to attack the ignorance of the monks and the crafty policy of the Church, which withstood all liberal studies. These notions are merely fallacious refinements, as every man of plain understanding who is acquainted with the writings of the early reformers, or has considered their history, must acknowledge. The doctrines of Luther, taken altogether, are not more rational than those of the Church of Rome; nor did he even pretend that they were so ... nor, again, is there any foundation for imagining that Luther was concerned for the interests of literature. None had he himself, save theological; nor are there, as I apprehend, many allusions to profane studies, or any proof of his regard to them, in all his works. "On the contrary", it is probable that both the principles of this great founder of the Reformation, and the natural tendency of so intense an application to theological controversy, checked for a. time the progress of philological and philosophical literature on this side of the Alps."[1] As regards the much vaunted intellectual
- ↑ "Introduction to the Literature of Europe", vol. I, p. 165 (Harper's ed. 1842). — Hence it is utterly false to say that the reform of the studies in the sixteenth century was, in the first place, a Protestant work. And yet this statement is repeated again and again.
