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A member of the Dominican Order who would otherwise have remained but little known in history obtained through Luther a world-wide name.

Everyone has heard of the Indulgence-preacher, John Tetzel, the active and able popular speaker, to whom Albert of Brandenburg, Archbishop and Elector of Mayence, entrusted the proclamation of the Indulgence granted by Leo X for the building of the new Church of St. Peter. In 1516 and 1517 he made the Indulgence known throughout the dioceses of Magdeburg and Halberstadt, appealing everywhere for funds to carry out the great enterprise in Rome. What he taught was, in the main, the same as Luther had previously taught regarding Indulgences (see above, p. 324); he, like all theologians, was careful to point out that an Indulgence was to be considered merely as a remission of the temporal punishment due to sin, but not of the actual guilt of sin.[858] He declared, quite rightly, that the erection of the Church of St. Peter was a matter of common interest to the whole Christian world, and that the donations towards it were to be looked upon as part of the pious undertakings and good works which were always required by the Church as one of the conditions for gaining an Indulgence. At the same time, in accordance with the teaching and practice of the Church, he demanded of all, as an essential preparation for the Indulgence, conversion and change of heart together with a good confession.[859]

The proclamation of this Indulgence on behalf of St. Peter’s—which was preached throughout almost the whole of the Christian world—in the great dioceses of Mayence and Magdeburg, had been entrusted by Leo X, in 1514, to Archbishop Albert of Brandenburg, who held both these sees.

This respected but worldly minded Elector had made the customary payment, in this instance a very heavy one, to the Roman Court for his confirmation in the see of Mayence and in return for the pallium. He had also, in compliance with an appeal made by the Papal Dataria, presented to the Holy See ten thousand ducats, which he had raised through the Fuggers of Augsburg, in order to secure the above Indulgence for his dioceses; in return for this the Pope had made over to him, once for all, one-half of the total proceeds of the Indulgence. With this he hoped to repay his creditors, the Fuggers.[860] The details of this affair will be dealt with later, but we may here remark that it was a transaction which certainly was unworthy of so sacred a cause as that of an Indulgence, and which can only be explained by the evil customs of that day, the pressure applied by Albert’s agents, and the influence of the avaricious Florentine party at the Papal Court. Though perhaps not actually simoniacal it certainly cannot be approved.

We cannot here refrain from drawing attention to a fact which stands for all time as a solemn warning to the pastors of the Church. Just as the sight of the corruption, both ecclesiastical and moral, in Rome under Julius II, and the remembrance of an Alexander VI, had filled Luther with bitter prejudice on his journey to Italy, so the extremely worldly and regrettable action of the Curia, and episcopal toleration of actual abuses in the promulgation of the Indulgence, supplied him with welcome matter for his charges and with a deceitful pretext for the seducing of countless souls.

Luther learned many discreditable particulars concerning the arrangement arrived at between Rome and Mayence for the preaching of the Indulgence and the use to which half of the spoils was to be applied. What provoked Luther and many others was not only the abuses which prevailed in the use of Indulgences, about which there was much grumbling, and the constantly recurring collections which were a burden both to the rulers and their people, but also the tales current regarding the behaviour of the monk acting as Indulgence-preacher. Tetzel did not exactly shine as an example of virtue, although the charges against his earlier life are as baseless as the reproach of gross ignorance. He was, as impartial historians have established, forward and audacious and given to exaggeration. In his sermons, mainly owing to his popular style of address, he erred by using expressions only to be styled as strained and ill-considered. He even employed phrases of a repulsive nature in his attempts to extol the power of the Indulgence preached by him. In addition to this, in explaining how the Indulgence might be applied to the departed, he made his own the wrong, exaggerated and quite unauthorised opinions of certain isolated theologians, putting them on an equal footing with the real teaching of the Church. Such private opinions, it is true, had also found their way into some of the official instructions on Indulgences. At any rate, Tetzel, with misplaced zeal, mingled what was true with what was false or uncertain. The great concourse of people who gathered to hear the celebrated preacher also led to many disorders, more particularly when, as was the case at Annaberg, the occasion of the yearly fair was turned to account in order to publish the Indulgence.

Shortly after the sermon already spoken of Luther preached again at Wittenberg on the Indulgence and its abuses, but without expressly referring to Tetzel. Another sermon on the same subject was delivered at the Castle in the presence of the Elector on the occasion of the exposition of the rich collection of relics belonging to the Castle Church. He still openly admitted the value of Indulgences, but more and more he was disposed to find fault with the formalism into which the system had degenerated. Later he declared that he had begun, already in 1516, “to dispute about Indulgences and to write against the Pope”; only the first part of this clause is, however, true, and that only in a certain sense. He had as yet written nothing against the Primacy or against Indulgences as such. There is also no foundation for the statement that, as soon as he heard from Staupitz (at Grimma) of Tetzel’s behaviour, he exclaimed: “Please God, I will knock a hole in his drum.”

It was on the question of Indulgences that the wider controversy around his new doctrines, which were now complete, was to commence. In October, 1517, he decided to make a public attack on Tetzel. This he did when, on the Eve of All Saints, October 31, 1517, he nailed up his 95 theses on Indulgences on the door of the Castle Church at Wittenberg. As All Saints was the Titular Feast of the Church[861] and as, on that day, numbers would be flocking thither to celebrate the festival, he counted on securing wide publicity for his theses. As a matter of fact, by this means, and thanks to the efforts of Luther and his friends, the printed theses were soon known everywhere. Their very boldness and impudence also contributed to their popularity. They were soon being read throughout Germany, exciting general surprise and even admiration of the Monk’s language. The number of those who sincerely applauded the theses, or who, at any rate, approved of the greater part of their contents, was much greater than has been generally believed.

The theses, of course, contained things which were incomprehensible to non-theologians, but the very tone in which they were written showed all the stupendous importance of the step which had been taken. The more timid were pacified by an introductory explanation of the author embodied in the paper containing the theses, which stated that the propositions did not determine anything definite, but that “out of love and zeal for the ascertaining of the truth” a public Disputation on these questions would be held by Luther at Wittenberg, and that those who were precluded from taking a personal part in the debate might state their objections in writing.[862]

If we examine the theses more closely and watch the behaviour of their author after they were made public, there appears to be no doubt that they were considered by him as settled beforehand and not merely as tentative propositions. Many of them, from the theological point of view, go far beyond a mere opposition of the abuse of Indulgences. Luther, stimulated by contradiction, had to some extent altered his previous views on the nature of Indulgences, and brought them more into touch with the fundamental principles of his erroneous theology.

A practical renunciation of the doctrine of Indulgences, as it had been held up to that time, is to be found in the theses, where Luther states that Indulgences have no value in God’s sight, but are merely to be regarded as the remission by the Church of the canonical punishment (theses 5, 20, 21, etc.). This destroys the theological meaning of Indulgences, for they had always been considered as a remission of the temporal punishment of sin, but as a remission which held good before the Divine Judgment-seat.[863] In some of the theses (58, 60) Luther likewise attacks the generally accepted teaching with regard to the Church’s treasury of grace, on which Indulgences are based. Erroneous views concerning the state of purgation of the departed occur in some of the propositions (18, 19, 29). Others appear to contain what is theologically incorrect, and connected with his opinion regarding grace and justification; this opinion is not, however, clearly set forth in the list of theses.

Many of the statements are mere irritating, insulting and cynical observations on Indulgences in general, no distinction being made between what was good and what was perverted. Thus, for instance, thesis 66 declares the “treasures of Indulgences” to be simply nets “in which the wealth of mankind is caught.” Others again scoff and mock at the authority of the Church, as, for example, thesis 86. “Why does not the Pope build the Basilica of St. Peter with his own money and not with that of the poverty-stricken faithful, seeing that he possesses to-day greater riches than the most wealthy Crœsus?”

In order that a certain echo of the author’s mystical Theologia Crucis may not be wanting even in this public document, the last two theses contain a protest against the formalism of the system of Indulgences: “Let Christians be exhorted to follow Christ, their Head, through suffering and through the pains of death and hell,” “in order the better to reach heaven they should put their trust in much tribulation rather than in the certainty of peace.”

The 95 theses spread rapidly through Germany, adding dangerously to the already widespread dissatisfaction with the Church and the Pope.

To Scultetus, Bishop of Brandenburg, within whose jurisdiction Wittenberg lay, and to others, too, Luther continued to explain the matter as though the theses were merely intended to serve as the basis for a useful Disputation,[864] which, however, as a matter of fact, never took place. He assured the chief pastor of Brandenburg of his absolute submission and his readiness to follow the Catholic Church in everything. At the same time, however, he stated quite clearly that, in his opinion, nothing could be advanced against his theses either from Holy Scripture, Catholic doctrine or canon law, with the exception of the utterances “of some few canonists, who spoke without proofs, and of some of the scholastic Doctors who cherished similar views, but who also were unable to demonstrate anything”; it was not, of course, for him to give any decision, but he might surely be permitted to open a discussion by means of the Disputation.

Relying on his skill at debate, he looked forward to a victory over Tetzel and to an opening for commencing the struggle against the abuses connected with the preaching of the Indulgence. Here we may recall the words of his pupil Oldecop, already quoted before: “He spoke in unmeasured terms against it [i.e. Indulgence-preaching], with great impetuosity and audacity.” He started the controversy, being, says Oldecop, “by nature proud and audacious.”[865]

Carried away by the astounding and ever-growing applause of those who were otherwise loyal to the Church, and deaf to the warnings and admonitions given him, Luther launched among the people a German work entitled “A Sermon on Indulgences and Grace,” which contains statements yet more vehement and seditious. Almost at the same time, and in the greatest haste, he put on paper the weighty “Resolutions” on his theses, written in Latin for the benefit of the more learned. The latter appeared in print in the spring of 1518.

Meanwhile, at the beginning of 1518, the Archbishop of Mayence had forwarded to Rome an account of the movement which had been started and of the Monk’s theses. As a result of this step the Pope, Leo X, on February 3, instructed P. Gabriele della Volta, Vicar to the General of the Augustinians, to seek to turn Luther aside from his erroneous views by letter and by the admonitions of honest and learned men; delay might fan the spark into a flame which it might be impossible to extinguish.[866]

There is no doubt that instructions to this effect were despatched by Volta to Staupitz, and probably other measures were contemplated at the approaching Chapter of the German Augustinian Congregation at Heidelberg; the calming of the storm was a duty incumbent primarily on the Order itself, and the Holy See accordingly decided to act through Luther’s immediate superiors. Unfortunately, nothing whatever is known of any steps taken by the Order at this early stage. At the Heidelberg Chapter, which was held towards the end of April (above, p. 315) the election of a new Vicar-General of the Congregation to which Luther belonged had to take place; a new Rural Vicar had also to be elected in place of Luther, as the latter had now completed his term of office. It seems plain that Staupitz and the large party who favoured Luther wished to act as gently as possible and not to interfere in the movement beyond making the necessary change in the person of the Rural Vicar.

After Luther had received the summons to Heidelberg, the Elector wrote to Staupitz a letter dated Friday in Easter week, with a request to see that Luther, on account of his lectures, “shall return here at the very earliest and not be delayed or detained.”[867] We cannot infer from this or from the Elector’s letter of safe conduct for Luther himself, that measures against him were anticipated at the Chapter. These documents merely prove the exceptional favour which Luther enjoyed with the reigning Prince.

Luther started from Wittenberg on April 11. Being a monk he had to make the journey on foot as far as Würzburg; after having been hospitably entertained by the Bishop, Lorenz von Bibra, who was very well disposed towards him, he proceeded to Heidelberg by coach, together with Johann Lang and some other monks. The Chapter re-elected Staupitz and made Johann Lang Rural Vicar in Luther’s stead, a choice which, as already hinted, expressed approval rather than disapproval of what Luther had done. It was also very significant of the position adopted by the Augustinian Congregation, that Luther should have been permitted to preside at the Heidelberg Disputation. He advanced the theses, which have already been discussed (above, p. 317), containing the denial of free will, i.e. the most important element of his new teaching, and entrusted their defence to Master Leonard Beyer, an Augustinian of Wittenberg, who conducted the debate in the presence of the assembled Chapter and professors of Heidelberg University, who had also been invited. It is remarkable that the question of Indulgences, which was so greatly agitating the minds of all, was not touched upon in the Disputation. Perhaps it was thought better, from motives of prudence, to avoid this subject altogether at Heidelberg.

At the beginning of May Luther returned to Wittenberg by way of Würzburg and Erfurt. He took advantage of his stay at Dresden to preach a sermon before Duke George and his Court on July 25, 1518. In this sermon he spoke in such a way of “the true understanding of the Word of God,” of the “Grace of Christ and eternal Predestination,” and of the overcoming of the “Fear of God,” that the Duke, who was a staunch adherent of the Church, was much displeased, and often declared afterwards that such teaching only made men presumptuous. The account of the sermon and of Duke George’s opinion is first found in the “Origines Saxonicæ”[868] of George Fabricius, who died in 1571. But Luther himself refers to the opposition excited in several quarters by a controversial sermon he preached there, and remarks, cynically: such fault-finders only speak from an idle desire for praise; these gossips want everything and are able to do nothing, they are a “serpent’s brood,” “masked faces” whom I despise.[869]

On his return to Wittenberg he devoted himself to finishing the Resolutions on the Indulgence theses. On August 21 he sent the first printed copy to Spalatin.

These Latin Resolutiones disputationis de virtute indulgentiarum, which dealt exclusively with the defence of the 95 theses, were more hostile in tone towards the whole system of Indulgences than any of his previous utterances. They show Luther’s fiery temper and his state of irritation even more plainly than the theses themselves. In them his new teaching on faith and grace was for the first time launched on the public in unmistakable outline. Even abroad the learned were drawn into the movement by the Latin publication which brought the matter within their range.

Together with his Resolutions, Luther published two letters, very submissive in tone, addressed, one to the Bishop of Brandenburg, as Ordinary of Wittenberg, and the other to Pope Leo X. To the Pope he said that he had ventured to address himself to him because he had learned that some persons at Rome were attempting to blacken his reputation, as though he were infringing the power of the Keys of the successor of St. Peter. He explained the reason of the controversy from his own point of view and declared: “I cannot recant.” In the same letter, however, he asserts his readiness to listen to Leo’s voice “as to the Voice of Christ, who presides in him and speaks through him”; one thing only he asks, viz. that the Pope will deal with him just as he pleases. “Enliven me, kill me, call me back, confirm me, reject me, just as it pleases you!”[870] In the Resolutions, on the other hand, we read: “It makes no impression on me what pleases or does not please the Pope. He is a man like other men. There have been many Popes to whom not only errors and vices, but even enormities (monstra) were pleasing. I attend to the Pope as Pope, i.e. as he speaks in the laws of the Church, or when he decides in accordance with them, or with a Council, but not when he speaks out of his own head.”[871]

At a later date he did not make any secret of the weakness of so ambiguous a position. On one occasion in later years when looking back upon the commencement of the struggle, he said he had begun the controversy “as an unreflecting and stupid Papist,” that he had been drawn into the business by “his own foolishness,” that his “weakness and inconsequence” had been deplorably exhibited, seeing that he then still worshipped the Pope; before this Lord of Heaven and Earth, he writes, everything still trembled, and he, the little monk, more like a corpse than a man, had only dared to advance with lamentable uncertainty and fear.[872]

In the same passage, he says: “I was certainly not glad and confident at the outset.” “What my heart suffered in the first and second years, how I lay on the ground, yea, almost despaired, of that they [my rivals, the fanatics] know nothing, though they were happy to fall upon the Pope after he had been severely wounded [by me]. They have sought to take this honour to themselves, and, for all I care, they are welcome to it.” “They are ignorant of the Cross and of Satan”; but I only attained “to strength and wisdom through death agonies and combats.”

While Luther was superintending the printing of the Resolutions at Wittenberg he was at the same time engaged on other works.

Johann Eck had replied to his Indulgence theses by the so-called “Obelisci,” which Luther met with the “Asterisci,” and as Tetzel, for his part, had issued a refutation of the sermon on Indulgence and Grace, Luther brought out a work in reply, entitled “Freedom of the Sermon on Indulgence and Grace.”

Fearing that the Pope would excommunicate him, Luther preached a sermon to the inhabitants of Wittenberg in the early summer of 1518, possibly on May 16, on the power of excommunication; what he there put forth excited widespread comment and irritation. This sermon he issued in print in August, but in an amended form. In it he says excommunication is invalid in the case of one who honestly asserts the truth; nevertheless, it must be obeyed. He blames the all too frequent use of excommunication, as many good Churchmen had done before him. It had been recognised and taught from Patristic times that unjust excommunication did not deprive the excommunicate of a part in the inward life of the Church (anima ecclesiæ). This Luther emphasises for his own party purposes, but without as yet setting up “a new view of the nature of the Church.”

He says, in a letter to his elderly friend Staupitz, that, owing to the action of his adversaries, “a new flame” would surely be kindled by this sermon, though he had extolled the power of the Pope in it, as was fitting; he declares that he is the persecuted party; “but Christ still lives and reigns yesterday, to-day and for ever. My conscience tells me I have taught the truth; but it is just this which is hated whenever its name is mentioned. Pray for me that I may not rejoice overmuch nor be over-confident in myself in this trouble.” He trusts to triumph, by printing the sermon referred to, over all those who had listened to it with jealousy, and maliciously misrepresented it. Yet his mood is by no means one of unmixed joy; he hints in the same letter to Staupitz at mysterious interior sufferings which weigh upon him “incomparably more heavily,” so he says, than the fear of any measures Rome may take. At the same time he is quite carried away by the idea that he must, at any cost, fight against the contempt which the Romanists are heaping upon the Kingdom of Christ.[873]

Meanwhile, in March, 1518, complaints had again been carried to Rome by some Dominicans. Towards the middle of June fresh official steps were taken by Rome against Luther’s person, this time without the intervention of the Order. The course of these proceedings has been made plain by recent research. The Papal Procurator Fiscal, Mario de Perusco, raised a formal charge against the monk on the suspicion of spreading heresy. By order of the Pope, the preliminary examination was conducted by the Bishop of Ascoli, Girolamo Ghinucci, as Auditor-General for suits in the Apostolic Camera, while Silvester Mazzolini of Prierio (Prierias), the Magister S. Palatii, who, like all Mayors of the Apostolic Palace, belonged to the Dominican Order, was entrusted with the task of penning a learned opinion on the questions involved.

As Prierias had already made a study of the Indulgence theses, he, as he himself says, took only three days to draw up the opinion, which, moreover, he did not intend to stand as an actual theological refutation. It was at once printed, being entitled “In præsumptuosas M. Lutheri conclusiones de potestate papæ dialogus.” The work was not free from exaggerations and gratuitous insults.

At the beginning of July, 1518, Luther was summoned to appear within sixty days at Rome to stand his trial. Ghinucci and Prierias sent the summons to Cardinal Cajetan, who was then stopping at Augsburg, in order that he might forward it to the Wittenberg Professor. Prierias’s pamphlet accompanied it, and Luther received both together on August 7. He said at a later date in his Table-Talk, alluding to the work of the Mayor of the Apostolic Palace, that the despatch from Rome had stirred his blood to the utmost, as he had then realised that the matter was deadly earnest, since Rome was inexorable.

The very next day, with many contemptuous and disaffected remarks on the citation, he set about inducing the Elector to use his influence with the Holy See in order that judges might be appointed to try the case in Germany; he hoped to be thereby spared the dreaded journey to Rome. It was at that time that he published the sermon on excommunication referred to above. On the day following the receipt of the summons he set to work on a pamphlet in reply to the Dialogus of Prierias, which appeared at the end of August.[874] This Latin Responsio he finished in two days, thus beating Prierias, as he triumphantly informs him. It is arrogant and insulting in tone, vindicates all the theses one by one, and asserts some of the errors contained in them in still stronger terms than before. He does not as yet deny the infallibility of the Councils, on the contrary, he explicitly admits it;[875] neither does he in set words state that the Pope may emit false opinions when teaching on faith and morals, although in recent times both these errors have been said to be embodied in his reply.

The obscure passage regarding the possibility of the Councils and Popes erring refers to their action in ecclesiastico-political matters, as the cases instanced by Luther show more clearly, e.g. the wars of Pope Julius II and the “tyrannical acts” which he attributes to Boniface VIII.

It is true that the want of any clear admission in his reply of the doctrinal authority of the Church, his violent insistence on the Bible as interpreted by himself, and his arbitrary handling of the older theology and practice, gave cause for apprehending the worst.

Against Prierias he defends the opinion, that our Saviour commanded what was impossible because we are always subject to concupiscence; that the sons of God are forced to do what is good rather than left to perform it of their own accord, and, for this reason, the higher theology teaches that those actions are the best which Christ works in us without our co-operation, and those the worst “which—according to the absolutely false teaching of Aristotle—we perform by our own so-called free will.”

From the latter circumstance the pseudo-mystic infers that fasting, for instance, is excellent when the person who fasts is absolutely unconscious of what he is doing and thinking of something higher; at such a moment he is furthest removed from any craving for food. Sacramental Penance, he says, is merely the commencement of penance, and zeal in its use could only be maintained by a miracle.[876]

All these ideas, which, as we know from what has gone before, give a true picture of the direction of his mind, are to be found at the beginning of the work, of which the confusion is matched only by its pretensions.

Because Prierias was a Dominican and Thomist, Luther here displays the bitterest animosity against the Thomistic school, an animosity which was henceforth never to cease, and likewise summons his national feeling as a German to help him against the Italian. In one of his letters Luther declared that he would let him see there were men in Germany well versed in the arts and wily tricks of the Romans; if he continued to incense him, he would make free use of his wit and pen against him.[877]

In his reply to Prierias, Luther had referred his opponent to the Resolutions to his Indulgence theses, which were then already in print. Staupitz forwarded to Rome the copy destined for the Pope. The letters to Staupitz and Leo X, which were incorporated in the work, were dated May 30, 1518, though the printing was not finished before August 21. As the Resolutions, Luther’s most important work on the question of Indulgences, obstinately confirmed the errors already expressed, more severe measures were anticipated on the part of the Curia.

In his efforts to procure the appointment of judges to try his cause in Germany, Luther sought, through the Elector, to make use of the mediation of the Emperor Maximilian. But the Emperor, who was earnestly solicitous for the welfare of religion, and at the same time was anxious to secure the Pope’s favour on behalf of the election of his grandson Charles as King of Rome, wrote to Leo X, August 5, 1518, from Augsburg, that out of love for the unity of the faith he would support any measures the Pope might take against Luther.

More severe proceedings against Luther were accordingly set on foot in Rome, even before the sixty days were over. These measures are outlined in the Brief of August 23, 1518, sent to Cardinal Cajetan, the Papal Legate at the Diet of Augsburg.

In view of the notoriety of Luther’s acts and teaching, with the assistance of the spiritual and secular power, Cajetan was to have him brought to Augsburg; should force have to be used, or should Luther not recant, then Cajetan was to hand him over to Rome for trial and punishment; he himself therefore was not to be the actual judge, but only to receive Luther’s recantation. In the event of his presenting himself voluntarily at Augsburg and recanting, so ran the instructions, Luther was to find pardon and mercy. Should it be impossible to procure his appearance at Augsburg, then the measures provided by law and custom for such cases were to be enforced; he and his followers were to be publicly excommunicated, and the authorities in Church and State were to be forced, if necessary under pain of interdict, to seize and deliver up the excommunicate.

The Elector, Frederick the Wise, however, demanded a trial before Cardinal Cajetan at Augsburg; this was to be carried out with “paternal gentleness.” He would not consent to sanction any other measures. Cajetan met his wishes without being untrue either to the Pope or to himself. “A man entirely devoted to study, without much practical knowledge of the world, he was no match for such an expert politician as Frederick of Saxony.”[878] On September 11 he obtained from Leo X a Brief placing in his own hands the trial and decision on Luther’s case.

Thus the way was paved for Luther’s historic trial at Augsburg.

Fables regarding Luther and Tetzel

Before passing on to the trial at Augsburg, we must first deal with the legends which cluster round the name of Tetzel and which were mostly started by Luther and the Papal Chamberlain, Carl von Miltitz.

We have a detailed critical monograph on Tetzel by Dr. N. Paulus: “Johann Tetzel, der Ablassprediger,” Mayence, 1899, which the same author[879] has since supplemented by other publications. Paulus by his impartial research has sealed the fate of the principal legends connected with Tetzel’s name.

A statement made by Luther in 1541, i.e. at the time of his most bitter polemics, has been repeated countless times since, viz. that, in 1512, at Innsbruck, Tetzel the monk was condemned by the Emperor Maximilian to be drowned in the River Inn for the crime of adultery, and that only the intervention of the Elector, Frederick the Wise, had saved him from this fate. This is an untruth which Luther first made use of in his violent pamphlet “Wider Hans Worst.”[880] Before that time he had never mentioned anything of the kind. A. Berger says of the supposed condemnation at Innsbruck: “Paulus has finally disposed of the infamous tale of adultery and no one will ever venture to bring it forward again.”[881] Before this Th. Brieger had declared: “It is high time that this story which has been questioned even by Protestants should disappear.”[882] No authority whatever can be quoted for representing in an unfavourable light the private life of this man, who stood so prominently before the public. Concerning the supposed Innsbruck incident, Fr. Dibelius, Superintendent at Dresden, says: “among the imperfections and crimes alleged against Tetzel by his enemies the charge of immorality cannot be sustained.”[883]

The shortsighted Papal Chamberlain Miltitz, in his eagerness to secure peace on any terms, in the first years of the Indulgence controversy made common cause with those opponents of Tetzel who brought forward baseless charges of immorality against him after he had withdrawn, at the end of 1518, to the pious seclusion of his Dominican priory at Leipzig. In mid-January, 1519, Tetzel had to endure the most bitter reproaches from the ill-informed Papal agent. But, as Oscar Michael remarks, “all attempts to set up Miltitz as a reliable witness will be in vain.”[884] “What Miltitz relates of Tetzel is altogether unworthy of credence.” Another Protestant writer had already before that expressed himself likewise.[885]

With regard to the matter of Tetzel’s sermons above referred to, it is chiefly to Luther that we owe the charge of flagrant errors and gross abuses in his proclamation of the Indulgence. “He wrote,” so Luther explained to his friends, “that an Indulgence is a reconciliation between God and man and takes effect even though a man performs no penance, and manifests neither contrition nor sorrow.”[886] “Tetzel put it so crudely that no one could fail to understand his meaning.”[887]

In his pamphlet of 1541 Luther says: “He sold grace for money at the highest price he could.” He then instances six “horrible, dreadful articles” which the avaricious monk had preached.

One of these which extols his Indulgence contains an offensive statement respecting Our Lady; another declares that, according to Tetzel, “it was not necessary to feel sorrow or pain or contrition for sin, but whoever bought the Indulgence, or the Indulgence-letters,” had also bought an Indulgence for “future sins”; three of the articles say he had magnified the effects of the Indulgence by the use of unseemly comparisons, and finally, one states that his teaching was that embodied in the ribald rhyme: “As soon as money in the coffer rings, the soul from purgatory’s fire springs.”

As a matter of fact, the accusations brought against Tetzel, of having sold forgiveness of sins for money without requiring contrition, and of having even been ready to absolve from future sins in return for a money payment, are, as N. Paulus, and others before him, pointed out, utterly unjust.[888] Even Carlstadt, after he had gone over to the hostile camp of the new teaching, admitted that the Indulgence sermons, including those of Tetzel, were in agreement with the generally accepted teaching of the Church; of the enormities just referred to he knows nothing. Above all, Tetzel’s own writings, likewise his instructions and also the testimony of strangers, all speak in his favour. “The Indulgence,” Tetzel says in his “Vorlegung,” “remits only the pain [i.e. the penalty] of sins which have been repented of and confessed.” “No one merits an Indulgence unless he is in a truly contrite state.”[889] Those who procured a Confession-letter received, according to an ancient usage, with the same letter permission to select a suitable confessor; for this an alms was given. The confessor was able to absolve, after a good confession, from all sins, even in reserved cases, and to impart a Plenary Indulgence by virtue of the Papal authorisation.

Tetzel was able with the help of official witnesses to refute the calumny with regard to Mary in his eulogy of the Indulgence. There can, however, be no doubt that he brought the pecuniary side of the Indulgence too much into the foreground. Another Dominican, a contemporary of his, Johann Lindner, criticises his behaviour as follows: Dr. Johann Tetzel of Pirna, of the Order of Preachers, from the Leipzig priory, a world-renowned preacher, proclaimed the Jubilee Year [Jubilee Indulgence] at Naumburg, Leipzig, Magdeburg, Zwickau, Bautzen, Görlitz, Cologne, Halle and many other places.... His teaching found favour with many; but he devised unheard-of ways of raising money, was far too liberal in conferring offices, put up far too many public crosses [as a sign of the Indulgence-preaching] in towns and villages, which caused scandal and bred complaints among the people and brought the spiritual treasury into disrepute.”[890]

Finally the last of the “horrible articles” mentioned above does to some extent approach the truth. The saying about the money in the coffer cannot, indeed, be traced to Tetzel’s own lips, yet in his sermons he advocated a certain opinion held by some Schoolmen (though in no sense a doctrine of the Church), viz. that an indulgence gained for the departed was at once and infallibly applied to this or that soul for whom it was destined. This view was not supported by the Papal Bulls of Indulgence, and Luther was not justified in asserting at a later date that the Pope had actually taught this.[891] Great theologians, such as Cardinal Cajetan, for instance, even then expressed themselves against such a view, which now is universally recognised as untenable. It was the wish of Cajetan that no faith should be given those preachers who taught such extravagances. “Preachers speak in the name of the Church,”[892] he wrote, “only so long as they proclaim the teaching of Christ and the Church; but if for purposes of their own, they teach that about which they know nothing and which is only their own imagination, they cannot be regarded as mouthpieces of the Church; no one must be surprised if such as these fall into error.” It is true, however, that even the more highly placed Indulgence Commissaries did not scruple, in their official proclamations, to set forth as certain this doubtful scholastic opinion. It is no wonder that Tetzel in his popular appeals seized upon it with avidity, for, in spite of certain gifts, he was no great theologian. He not only taught the certain and immediate liberation of the soul in the above sense but also the erroneous proposition that a Plenary Indulgence for the departed could be obtained without contrition and penance on the part of the living, simply by means of a money payment.

Some of Tetzel’s more recent champions have insinuated that the unfavourable opinion concerning his teaching rests merely on witnesses who reported on his sermons from hearsay without having themselves been present. As a matter of fact, however, the accusations do not rest merely on such testimony, but more especially on Tetzel’s own theses, or “Anti-theses,” as he called them, on his “Vorlegung” against Luther and on his second set of theses. This is reinforced by the official instructions on the Indulgence to which he was bound to conform. That a money payment alone is necessary for obtaining an Indulgence for the departed is indeed stated—though wrongly—in the instructions of Bomhauer and also in those of Arcimboldi and Albert of Brandenburg. The Anti-theses above mentioned were publicly defended by Tetzel on January 20, 1518, at the University of Frankfort on the Oder; they thus belong to Tetzel, though in reality they were drawn up by Conrad Wimpina. a Professor of Theology in that town. Paulus published a new edition of the Anti-theses, which were already known, from the original broadsheet which he discovered in the Court Library at Munich.[893] Four witnesses to the inaccuracy of Tetzel’s sermons must be mentioned: firstly, the Town Clerk of Görlitz, Johann Hass; then Bertold Pirstinger, Bishop of Chiemsee and author of the “Tewtsche Theologey”; thirdly, the Saxon Franciscan Franz Polygranus; and lastly, Duke George of Saxony. They confirm the statements taken from the above sources, and though their assertions do not rest on what they themselves heard, yet they may be considered as the echo of actual hearers.

In connection with the above “horrible, terrible articles” taken from Tetzel’s teaching, Luther makes a statement with regard to his own position and knowledge at that time, which, notwithstanding the sacred affirmation with which he introduces it, is of very doubtful veracity.

“So truly as I have been saved by my Lord Christ,” he says of the beginning of the Indulgence controversy in 1517, “I knew nothing of what an Indulgence was, and no more did anyone else.”[894]

It is possible that in 1541, when, as an elderly man, he wrote these words, they may have appeared to him to be true, but the sources from which history is taken demand that he himself as well as his Catholic contemporaries should be protected against such a charge of ignorance. His assertion has been defended by some Protestants on the assumption that his ignorance was only concerning the recipients of the revenues proceeding from the Indulgence. But why force his words? They refer, as the whole context shows, to the theological doctrine of Indulgences.

We need hardly remind our readers that the conviction that Luther was thoroughly well acquainted with the Catholic doctrine on Indulgences can be demonstrated by his own sermon on Indulgences of the year 1516.[895] He there shows himself perfectly capable of distinguishing between the essentials of the Church’s doctrine and the obscure and difficult questions which the theologians were wont to propound in their discussions. With regard to these latter, and these only, he admitted his uncertainty, as did other theologians too. This was as little a disgrace to him as the obscurity surrounding certain points was to the theology of the Church. But it is quite another matter when he says he did not even know what an Indulgence was. That no one else knew either, is a statement disposed of by his own sermon of 1516 and the various theological tracts on this subject. We need only recall the explanations of Cardinal Cajetan, of the Augustinian theologian and preacher Johann Paltz and of the continuator of the work of Gabriel Biel—so much studied among the Augustinians—Wendelin Steinbach, who succeeded Biel as professor at Tübingen. Biel himself had written on the question of Indulgences for the departed, and, in his appendices on this subject, had expressed himself quite correctly.

Of the older theologians who preceded those we have mentioned in a right appreciation of this subject, we may enumerate the Franciscans Richard of Middletown, Petrus de Palude and Franciscus Mayron; the Dominicans Heinrich Kalteisen of Coblentz, whose writings on Indulgences have been re-edited by Dr. N. Paulus. All these treated the subject in accordance with the doctrine of St. Thomas of Aquin and St. Bonaventure. Kalteisen in his work, written in 1448 while he was Magister S. Palatii, refers expressly to St. Thomas, whose opinion on questions not yet definitively settled was ever considered the best. To mention only one point, all agree in interpreting the old expression (remissio peccatorum) usual in Indulgence-formulæ, as meaning a remission of the temporal punishment. Suarez, at a later date, could well refer not only to “all theologians,” but also to “all ‘Summists,’” i.e. to all those who had compiled moral Sums from the thirteenth to the sixteenth century.[896]

Thus, in 1517, the theological side of the question of Indulgences was quite clear, and the statements made by Luther at a later date are not deserving of credit. It was Luther’s false ideas on other points of theology and his determination to put an immediate end to the abuses connected with Indulgences, which led him in 1517 to make a general attack, even though partly veiled, on the whole ecclesiastical system of Indulgences.

If we keep this in view, a statement of Luther’s to which a false interpretation has been frequently given, becomes clear. According to an account given by Hieronymus Emser, he wrote to Tetzel at a time when the latter was suffering keenly under the reproaches heaped upon him: Not to worry, for it was not he who had begun the business, but that the child had quite another father.[897]