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LUTHER'S "DEAR GENESIS."

HIS "SWAN SONG" AND HIS "IT IS FINISHED."

We certainly will be pardoned for issuing here and at this time the Prefaces: of Veit Dietrich, who published the first of these lectures in Latin; of Basil Faber, who was the first to translate parts from Latin into German; of Dr. Walch, who issued one of the best editions of Luther's complete works; and of Dr. Cole, who was the first to translate a small part from Latin into English. The words of these four men are a stronger appeal than we can write for the extensive circulation among English Protestants of this the last and the greatest of Luther's writings.

It is as Mathesius says: "Surely the last thoughts are the best when they at the time refer to the Word of God and spring from it. The sermons and books of aged men are worthy of consideration and preservation." Hence, Jerome Weller called this commentary Luther's Swan Song, and Morlin calls it the "Consummatum Est," "It Is Finished," of Luther.

A new interest will be taken in the lines of this book when it is remembered how dear they were to the Reformer himself. He frequently expresses his love for his "dear Genesis," and had the prophetic impression that his labors in Genesis and his earthly life would terminate together. And so they did. This was the last public work of Luther's forty years of professorial, ministerial and reformatory labors. This saint of God, who was "a lion before men, but a lamb before God," concludes his commentary thus: "This is now the dear Book of Genesis. May our Lord grant that others may do it better than I have done. I can no more; I am so weak. Pray to God for me, that he may grant me a good holy hour at death!"

A friend, one of the collectors of these comments, records these remarkable coincidences at the foot of the Commentary: "The man of God, Doctor Martin Luther, finished his Commentaries on the Book of Genesis in the year of our Lord 1545, on the 17th day of November; having commenced them in the year 1535. In his opening remarks he had said, 'This exposition I shall pore over and die over (immorabor et immoriar).' According to this prophecy concerning himself he died at Eisleben, Feb. 18th, 1546, piously and continually calling upon the Son of God."