History of the christian church

CHAPTER IX.
THE PULPIT AND POPULAR PIETY.
§ 72. Literature.
For §§73, 74.—The works of Erasmus, Colet, Tyndale, Geller of Strassburg and other sources quoted in the notes.—Lea: Hist. of Cler. Celibacy. Also Hist. of Span. Inq.—Histt. Of The Engl. Ch. by Capes and Gairdnertraill: Social Hist. of Engl., vol. II.—Seebohm: Oxf. Reformers.—Gasquet: The Old Engl. Bible and Other Essays, Lond., 2d ed., 1907. Also The Eve of the Reformation, pp. 245 sqq.—Cruel: Gesch. d. deutschen Predigt, im MA, pp. 431–663, Detmold, 1879.—Kolde: D. relig. Leben in Erfurt am Ausgange d. MA, 1898.—Landmann: D. Predigttum in Westphalen In d. letzten Zeiten d. MA, pp. 256.—Schön: art. Predigt in Herzog, XV. 642–656. Janssen-Pastor: Hist. of the Ger. People, vol. I.—Pastor: Gesch. d. Päpste, I. 31 sqq., III. 133 sqq.—Hefele-Hergenröther: Conciliengesch., vol. VIII.

For § 75.—Ullmann: Reformers before the Reformation, 2 vols., Hamb., 1841 sq., 2d ed., Gotha, 1866, Engl. trsl, 2 vols., Edinb., 1855; Also J. Wessel, ein Vorgänger Luthers, Hamb., 1834.—Gieseler, II., Part IV. 481–503. Copious excerpts from their writings.—Hergenröther-Kirsch, II., 1047–1049.—Janssen-Pastor: I. 745–747.—Harnack: Dogmengesch., III. 518, etc.—Loofs: Dogmengesch., 4th ed., 655–658.—For Goch: His De libertate christ., etc., ed. by Corn. Graphaeus, Antw., 1520–1523.—O. Clemen: Joh. Pupper von Goch, Leip., 1896 and artt. In Herzog, VI. 740–743, and In Wetzer-Welte, VI. 1678–1684.—For Wesel: his Adv. indulgentias in Walch’s Monumenta medii aevi Götting., 1757.—The proceedings of his trial, in Aeneas Sylvius: Commentarium de concilio Basileae and D’argentré: Col. Nov. judiciorum de erroribus novis, Paris, 1755, and Browne: Fasciculus, 2d ed., Lond., 1690.—Artt. in Herzog by Clemen, xxi, 127–131, and Wetzer-Welte, VI. 1786–1789.—For Wessel: 1st ed. of his works Farrago rerum theol., a collection of his tracts, appeared in the Netherlands about 1521, 2d ed., Wittenb., 1522, containing Luther’s letter, 3d and 4th edd., Basel, 1522, 1523. Complete ed. of his works containing Life, by A. Hardenberg (preacher in Bremen, d. 1574), Groningen, 1614.—Muurling: Commentatio historico-Theol. de Wesseli cum vita tum meritis, Trajecti ad Rhenum, 1831; also de Wesseli principiis ac virtutibus, Amsterd., 1840.—J. Friedrich, Rom. Cath.: J. Wessel, Regensb., 1862.—Artt. Wessel in Herzog, by Van Veen, xxi. 131–147, and Wetzer-Welte, XII. 1339–1343.—P. Hofstede de Groot: J. Wessel Ganzevoort, Groningen, 1871.

For § 76.—Nicolas of Lyra: Postillae sive Commentaria brevia in omnia biblia, Rome, 1541–1543, 5 vols., Introd.—Wyclif: De veritate scrip. Sac., ed. by Buddensieg, 3 vols., Leipzig, 1904.—Gerson: De sensu litterali scrip: sac., Du Pin’s ed., 1728, I. 1 sqq.—Erasmus: Introd. to Gr. Test., 1516.—L. Hain: Repertorium bibliographicum, 4 vols., Stuttg., 1826–1838. Ed. Reuss, d. 1891: D. Gesch. d. heil. Schriften N. T., 6th ed., Braunschweig, 1887, pp. 603 sqq.—F. W. Farrar: Hist. of Interpretation, Lond., 1886, pp. 254–303.—S. Berger: La Bible Française au moyen âge, Paris, 1884. Gasquet: The Old Engl. Bible, etc.; the Eve of the Reformation.—F. Falk: Bibelstudien, Bibelhandschriften und Bibeldrucken, Mainz, 1901: Die Bibel am Ausgange des MA, ihre Kenntnis und ihre Verbreitung, Col., 1905.—W. Walther: D. deutschen Bibelübersetzungen des MA, Braunschweig, 1889–1892.—A. Coppinger: Incunabula bibl. or the First Half Cent. of the Lat. Bible, 1450–1500, with 54 facsimiles, Lond., 1892.—The Histt. of the Engl. Bible, by Westcott, Eadie, Moulton, Kenyon, etc.—Janssen-Pastor: Gesch. des deutschen Volkes, I. 9 sqq.—Bezold: Gesch. der Reformation, pp. 109 sqq.—R. Schmid: Nic. of Lyra, In Herzog XII. 28–30.—Artt. Bibellesen und Bibelverbot and Bibelübersetzungen in Herzog II. 700 sqq., III. 24 sqq. Other works cited in the notes.

For § 77.—I. Sources: Savonarola’s Lat. and Ital. writings consist of sermons, tracts, letters and a few poems. The largest collection of MSS. and original edd. is preserved in the National Library of Florence. It contains 15 edd. of the Triumph of the Cross issued in the 15th and 16th centt. Epp. spirituales et asceticae, ed. Quétif, Paris, 1674. The sermons were collected by a friend, Lorenzo Vivoli, and published as they came fresh from the preacher’s lips. Best ed. Sermoni a Prediche, Prato, 1846. Also ed. by G. Baccini, Flor., 1889. A selection, ed. by Villari and Casanova: Scelta di prediche e scritti, G. Sav., Flor., 1898.—Germ. trsl. of 12 sermons and the poem de ruina mundi by H. Schottmüller: Berlin, 1901, pp. 132. A. Gherardi: Nuovi documenta e studii intorno a Savon., 1876, 2d ed., Flor., 1887.—The Triumph of the Cross, ed. in Lat. and Ital. by L. Ferretti, O. P., Milan, 1901. Engl. trsl. from this ed. by J. Procter, Lond., 1901, pp. 209.—Exposition of Ps. LI and part of Ps. XXXII, Lat. text with Engl. trsl. by E. H. Perowne, Lond., 1900, pp. 227.—Sav.’s Poetry, ed. by C. Guasti, Flor., 1862, pp. xxii, 1864.—Rudelbach, Perrens and Villari give specimens in the original.—E. C. Bayonne: Oeuvres spir. choisies de Sav., 3 vols., Paris, 1880.—Oldest biographies by P. Burlamacchi, d. 1519, founded on an older Latin Life, the work of an eye-witness, ed. by Mansi, 1761: G. F. Pico Della Mirandola (nephew of the celebrated scholar of that name), completed 1520, publ. 1530, ed. by Quétif, 2 vols., Paris, 1674. On these three works, see Villari, Life of Sav., pp. xxvii sqq.—Also J. Nardi (a contemporary): Le storie della cittá di Firenze, 1494–1531, Flor., 1584. Luca Landucci, a pious Florentine apothecary and an ardent admirer of Sav.: Diario Fiorentino, 1450–1516, Florence, 1883. A realistic picture of Florence and the preaching and death of Savonarola.

II. Modern Works.—For extended lit., see Potthast: Bibl. Hist. med., II. 1564 sqq.—Lives by Rudelbach, Hamb., 1835.—Meier, Berl., 1836.—K. Hase in Neue Propheten, Leip., 1851.—F. T. Perrens, 2 vols., Paris, 1853, 3d ed., 1859.—Madden, 2 vols., Lond., 1854.—Padre V. Marchese, Flor., 1855.—*Pasquale Villari: Life and Times of Savon., Flor., 1859–1861, 2d ed., 1887, 1st Engl. trsl. by L. Horner, 2d Engl. trsl. by Mrs. Villari, Lond., 2 vols., 1888, 1 vol. ed., 1899.—Ranke in Hist. biogr. Studien, Leip., 1877.—Bayonne: Paris, 1879.—E. Warren, Lond., 1881.—W. Clark, Prof. Trinity Col., Toronto, Chicago, 1891.—J. L. O’Neil, O. P.: Was Sav. really excommunicated? Bost, 1900; *H. Lucas, St. Louis, 1900.—G. McHardy, Edinb., 1901.—W. H. Crawford: Sav. the Prophet in Men of the Kingdom series.—*J. Schnitzer: Quellen und Forschungen zur Gesch. Savon., 3 vols., Munich, 1902–1904. Vol. II., Sav. und die Fruerprobe, pp. 175.—Also Savon. im Lichte der neuesten Lit. in Hist.-pol. Blätter, 1898–1900.—H. Riesch: Savon. U. S. Zeit, Leip., 1906.—Roscoe in Life of Lorenzo the Magnificent.—E. Comba: Storia della riforma in Italia, Flor., 1881.—P. Schaff, art. Savon. in Herzog II., 2d ed., XIII. 421–431, and Benrath in 3d ed., XVII. 502–513.—Creighton: vol. III.—Gregorovius: VII. 432 sqq.—*Pastor: 4th ed., III. 137–148, 150–162, 396–437: Zur Beurtheilung Sav., pp. 79, Freib. im Br., 1896. This brochure was in answer to sharp attacks upon Pastor’s treatment of Savonarola in the 1st ed. of his Hist., especially those of Luotto and Feretti.—P. Luotto: Il vero Savon. ed il Savon. di L. Pastor, Flor., 1897, p. 620. Luotto also wrote Dello studio di scrittura sacra secondo G. Savon. e Léon XIII., Turin, 1896.—Feretti: Per la causa di Fra G. Savon., Milan, 1897.—Mrs. Oliphant: Makers of Florence. Godkin: The Monastery of San Marco, Lond., 1901.—G. Biermann: Krit. Studie zur Gesch. des Fra G. Savon., Rostock, 1901.—Brie: Savon. und d. deutsche Lit., Breslau, 1903.—G. Bonet-Maury: Les Précurseurs de la Réforme et de la liberté de conscience ... du XII^e et XIII^e siècle, Paris, 1904, contains sketches of Waldo, Bernard of Clairvaux, Peter the Venerable, St. Francis, Dante, Savonarola, etc.—Savonarola has been made the subject of romantic treatment by Lenau In his poem Savonarola, 1844, Geo. Eliot in Romola, and by Alfred Austin in his tragedy, Savonarola, Lond., 1881, with a long preface in which an irreverent, if not blasphemous, parallel is drawn between the Florentine preacher and Christ.

For § 78.—See citations In the Notes.

For § 79.—G. Uhlhorn: Die christl. Liebesthätigkeit im MA, Stuttg., 1884.—P. A Thiejm: Gesch. d. Wohlthätigkeitsanstalten in Belgien, etc., Freib., 1887.—L. Lallemand: Hist. de la charité, 3 vols., Paris, 1906. Vol. 3 covers the 10th-16th century.—T. Kolde: Art. Bruderschaften, in Herzog, III. 434–441.—A. Blaize: Des monts-de-piété et des banques de prêt sur gage, Paris, 1856.—H. Holzapfel: D. Anfänge d. montes pietatis 1462–1515, Munich, 1903.—Toulmin Smith: Engl. Gilds, Lond., 1870.—Thorold Rogers: Work and Wages, ch. XI. sqq.—W. Cunningham: Growth of Engl. Industry and Commerce, bk. II., ch. III. sqq.—Lecky: Hist. of Europ. Morals, II.—Stubbs: Const. Hist., ch. XXI.—W. von Heyd: Gesch. d. Levantenhandels im MA, 2 vols., Stuttg., 1879.—Artt. Aussatz and Zins u. Wucher In Wetzer-Welte, I. 1706 sqq., XII. 1963–1975.—Janssen-Pastor, I. 451 sqq.—Pastor: Gesch. d. Päpste., III.

For § 60.—The Sources are Thomas Aquinas, the papal bulls of indulgence and treatments by Wyclif, Huss, Wessel, John of Paltz, James of Jüterbock, etc. Much material is given by W. Köhler: Dokumente zum Ablassstreit, Tüb., 1902, and A. Schulte: D. Fugger in Rom, 2 vols., Leipz., 1904. Vol. II contains documents.—The authoritative Cath. work is Fr. Beringer: Die Ablässe, ihr Wesen u. Gebrauch, pp. 860 and 64, 13th ed., Paderb., 1906.—Also Nic. Paulus: J. Tetzel, der Ablassprediger, Mainz, 1899.—Best Prot. treatments, H. C. Lea: Hist. of Auric. Conf. and Indulgences in the Lat. Ch., 3 vols., Phil., 1896.—T. Brieger, art. Indulgenzen in Herzog, IX. 76–94, and Schaff-Herzog, V. 485 sqq. and D. Wesen d. Ablasses am Ausgange d. MA, a university address. Brieger has promised an extended treatment in book form.—Schaff: Ch. Hist., V., I. p. 729 sqq., VI. 146 sqq.

§ 73. The Clergy.
Both in respect of morals and education the clergy, during the period following the year 1450, showed improvement over the age of the Avignon captivity and the papal schism. Clerical practice in that former age was so lo that it was impossible for it to go lower and any appearance of true religion remain. One of the healthy signs of this latter period was that, in a spirit of genuine religious devotion, Savonarola in Italy and such men in Germany as Busch, Thomas Murner, Geiler of Strassburg, Sebastian Brant and the Benedictine abbot, Trithemius, held up to condemnation, or ridicule, priestly incompetency and worldliness. The pictures, which they joined Erasmus in drawing, were dark enough. Nevertheless, the clergy both of the higher and lower grades included in its ranks many men who truly sought the well-being of the people and set an example of purity of conduct.

The first cause of the low condition, for low it continued to be, was the impossible requirement of celibacy. The infraction of this rule weakened the whole moral fibre of the clerical order. A second cause is to be looked for in the seizure of the rich ecclesiastical endowments by the aristocracy as its peculiar prize and securing them for the sons of noble parentage without regard to their moral and intellectual fitness. To the evils arising from these two causes must be added the evils arising from the unblushing practice of pluralism. No help came from Rome. The episcopal residences of Toledo, Constance, Paris, Mainz, Cologne and Canterbury could not be expected to be models of domestic and religious order when the tales of Boccaccio were being paralleled in the lives of the supreme functionaries of Christendom at its centre.

The grave discussions of clerical manners, carried on at the Councils of Constance and Basel, revealed the disease without providing a cure. The proposition was even made by Cardinal Zabarella and Gerson, in case further attempts to check priestly concubinage failed, to concede to the clergy the privilege of marriage. ¹¹²⁹ In the programme for a reformation of the Church, offered by Sigismund at Basel, the concession was included and Pius II., one of the attendants on that synod, declared the reasons for restoring the right of matrimony to priests to be stronger in that day than were the reasons in a former age for forbidding it. The need of a relaxation of the rigid rule found recognition in the decrees of Eugenius IV., 1441, and Alexander VI., 1496, releasing some of the military orders from the vow of chastity. Here and there, priests like Lallier of Paris at the close of the 15th century, dared to propose openly, as Wyclif had done a century before, its full abolition. But, for making the proposal, the Sorbonne denied to Lallier the doctorate.

In Spain, the efforts of synods and prelates to put a check upon clerical immorality accomplished little. Finally, the secular power intervened and repeated edicts were issued by Ferdinand and Isabella against priestly concubinage, 1480, 1491, 1502, 1503. So energetic was the attempt at enforcement that, in districts, clerics complained that the secular officials made forcible entrance into their houses and carried off their women companions. ¹¹³⁰ In his History of the Spanish Inquisition, Dr. Lea devotes a special chapter to clerical solicitation at the confessional. Episcopal deliverances show that the priests were often illiterate and without even a knowledge of Latin. The prelates were given to worldliness and the practice of pluralism. The revenues of the see of Toledo were estimated at from 80,000 to 100,000 ducats, with patronage at the disposal of its incumbent amounting to a like sum. A single instance must suffice to show the extent to which pluralism in Spain was carried. Gonzalez de Mendoza, while yet a child, held the curacy of Hita, at twelve was archdeacon of Guadalajara, one of the richest benefices of Spain, and retained the bishopric of Seguenza during his successive administrations of the archbishoprics of Seville and Toledo. Gonzalez was a gallant knight and, in 1484, when he led the army which invaded Granada, he took with him his bastard son, Rodrigo, who was subsequently married in great state in the presence of Ferdinand and Isabella to Ferdinand’s niece. In 1476, when the archbishopric of Saragossa became vacant, king Juan II. applied to Sixtus IV. to appoint his son, Alfonzo, a child of six, to the place. Sixtus declined, but after a spirited controversy preserved the king’s good-will by appointing the boy perpetual administrator of the see.

In France, the bishop of Angers, in an official address to Charles VIII., 1484, declared that the religious orders had fallen below the level of the laity in their morals. ¹¹³¹ To give a case of extravagant pluralism, John, son of the duke of Lorraine, 1498–1550, was appointed bishop-coadjutor of Metz, 1501, entering into full possession seven years later, and, one after the other, he united with this preferment the bishoprics of Toul, 1517, and Térouanne, 1518, Valence and Die, 1521, Verdun, 1523, Alby, 1536, Macon soon after, Agen, 1541 and Nantes, 1542. To these were added the archbishoprics of Narbonne, 1524, Rheims, 1533, and Lyons, 1537. He also held at least nine abbeys, including Cluny. He resigned the sees of Verdun and Metz to a nephew, but resumed them in 1548 when this nephew married Marguerite d’Egmont. ¹¹³² In 1518, he received the red hat. During the 15th century one boy of 10 and another of 17 filled the bishopric of Geneva. A loyal Romanist, Soeur Jeanne de Jussie, writing after the beginning of the 16th century, testifies to the dissoluteness of the bishops and clergy of the Swiss city and charged them with living in adultery. ¹¹³³

In Germany, although as a result of the labors of the Mystics the ecclesiastical condition was much better, the moral and intellectual unfitness was such that it calls forth severe criticism from Catholic as well as Protestant historians. The Catholic, Janssen, says that "the profligacy of the clergy at German cathedrals, as well as their rudeness and ignorance, was proverbial. The complaints which have come down to us from the 15th century of the bad morals of the German clergy are exceedingly numerous." Ficker, a Protestant, speaks of "the extraordinary immorality to which priests and monks yielded themselves." And Bezold, likewise a Protestant, says that "in the 15th century the worldliness of the clergy reached a height not possible to surpass."⁴ The contemporary Jacob Wimpheling, set forth probably the true state of the case. He was severe upon the clergy and yet spoke of many excellent prelates, canons and vicars, known for their piety and good works. He knew of a German cleric who held at one time 20 livings, including 8 canonries. To the archbishopric of Mainz, Albrecht of Hohenzollern added the see of Halberstadt and the archbishopric of Magdeburg. For his promotion to the see of Mainz he paid 30,000 gulden, money he borrowed from the Fuggers.

The bishops were charged with affecting the latest fashions in dress and wearing the finest textures, keeping horses and huntings dogs, surrounding themselves with servants and pages, allowing their beards and hair to grow long, and going about in green- and red-colored shoes and shoes punctured with holes through which ribbons were drawn. They were often seen in coats of mail, and accoutred with helmets and swords, and the tournament often witnessed them entered in the lists. ¹¹³⁵

The custom of reserving the higher offices of the Church for the aristocracy was widely sanctioned by law. As early as 1281 in Worms and 1294 in Osnabruck, no one could be dean who was not of noble lineage. The office of bishop and prebend stalls were limited to men of noble birth by Basel, 1474, Augsburg, 1475, Münster and Paderborn, 1480, and Osnabruck, 1517. The same rule prevailed in Mainz, Halberstadt, Meissen, Merseburg and other dioceses. At the beginning of the 16th century, it was the established custom in Germany that no one should be admitted to a cathedral chapter who could not show 16 ancestors who had joined in the tournament and, as early as 1474, the condition of admission to the chapter of Cologne was that the candidate should show 32 members of his family of noble birth. Of the 228 bishops who successively occupied the 32 German sees from 1400–1517, all but 13 were noblemen. The eight occupants of the see of Münster, 1424–1508, were all counts or dukes. So it was with 10 archbishops of Mainz, 1419–1514, the 7 bishops of Halberstadt, 1407–1513, and the 5 archbishops of Cologne, 1414–1515.⁶ This custom of keeping the high places for men of noble birth was smartly condemned by Geiler of Strassburg and other contemporaries. Geiler declared that Germany was soaked with the folly that to the bishoprics, not the more pious and learned should be promoted but only those who, "as they say, belong to good families." It remained for the Protestant Reformation to reassert the democratic character of the ministry.

A high standard could not be expected of the lower ranks of the clergy where the incumbents of the high positions held them, not by reason of piety or intellectual attainments but as the prize of birth and favoritism. The wonder is, that there was any genuine devotion left among the lower priesthood. Its ranks were greatly overstocked. Every family with several sons expected to find a clerical position for one of them and often the member of the family, least fitted by physical qualifications to make his way in the world, was set apart for religion. Here again Geiler of Strassburg applied his lash of indignation, declaring that, as people set apart for St. Velten the chicken that had the pox and for St. Anthony the pig that was affected with disease, so they devoted the least likely of their children to the holy office.

The German village clergy of the period were as a rule not university bred. The chronicler, Felix Faber of Ulm, in 1490 declared that out of 1000 priests scarcely one had ever seen a university town and a baccalaureate or master was a rarity seldom met with. With a sigh, people of that age spoke of the well-equipped priest of, the good old times."

From the Alps to Scandinavia, concubinage was widely practised and in parts of Germany, such as Saxony, Bavaria, Austria and the Tirol, it was general. The region, where there was the least of it, was the country along the Rhine. In parts of Switzerland and other localities, parishes, as a measure of self-defence, forced their young pastors to take concubines. Two of the Swiss Reformers, Leo Jud and Bullinger, were sons of priests and Zwingli, a prominent priest, was given to incontinence before starting on his reformatory career. It was a common saying that the Turk of clerical sensualism within was harder to drive out than the Turk from the East.

How far the conscientious effort, made in Germany in the last years of the Middle Ages to reform the convents, was attended with success is a matter of doubt. John Busch labored most energetically in that direction for nearly fifty years in Westphalia, Thuringia and other parts. The things that he records seem almost past belief. Nunneries, here and there, were no better than brothels. In cases, they were habitually visited by noblemen. The experience is told of one nobleman who was travelling with his servant and stopped over night at a convent. After the evening meal, the nuns cleared the main room and, dressed in fine apparel, amused their visitor by exhibitions of dancing. ¹¹³⁷ Thomas Murner went so far as to say that convents for women had all been turned into refuges for people of noble birth. ¹¹³⁸ The dancing during the sessions of the Diet of Cologne, 1505, was opened by the archbishop and an abbess, and nuns from St. Ursula’s and St. Mary’s, the king Maximilian looking on. Preachers, like Geiler of Strassburg, cried out against the moral dangers which beset persons taking the monastic vow. ¹¹³⁹ The cloistral life came to be known as "the compulsory vocation." As the time of the Reformation approached, there was no lessening of the outcry against the immorality of the clergy and convents, as appears from the writings of Ulrich von Hutten and Erasmus.