Wittemberg,May, 1530.
Wittemberg,May, 1530.
Of all the happy homes God has given to Germany through Dr. Luther, I think none are happier than his own.
The walls of the Augustine convent echo now with the pattering feet and ringing voices of little children, and every night the angels watch over the sanctuary of a home. The birthdays of Dr. Luther's children are festivals to us all, and more especially the birthday of little Hans the first-born was so.
Yet death also has been in that bright home. Their second child, a babe, Elizabeth, was early taken from her parents. Dr. Luther grieved over her much. A little while after her death he wrote to his friend Hausmann:
"Grace and peace. My Johannulus thanks thee, best Nicholas, for the rattle, in which he glories and rejoices wondrously.
"I have begun to write something about the Turkish war, which will not, I hope, be useless.
"My little daughter is dead; my darling little Elizabeth. It is strange how sick and wounded she has left my heart, almost as tender as a woman's, such pity moves me for that little one. I never could have believed before what is the tenderness of a father's heart for his children. Do thou pray to the Lord for me, in Whom fare-thee-well."
Catherine von Bora is honoured and beloved by all. Some indeed complain of her being too economical; but what would become of Dr. Luther and his family if she were as reckless in giving as he is? He has been known even to take advantage of her illness to bestow his plate on some needy student. He never will receive a kreuzer from the students he teaches, and he refuses to sell his writings, which provokes both Gottfried and me, noble as it is of him, because the great profits they bring would surely be better spent by Dr. Luther than by the printers who get them now. Our belief is, that were it not for Mistress Luther, the whole household would have long since been reduced to beggary, and Dr. Luther, who does not scruple to beg of the Elector or of any wealthy person for the needs of others (although never for his own), knows well how precarious such a livelihood is.
His wife does not, however, always succeed in restraining his propensities to give everything away. Not long ago, in defiance of her remonstrating looks, in her presence he bestowed on a student who came to him asking money to help him home from the university, a silver goblet which had been presented to him, saying that he had no need to drink out of silver.
We all feel the tender care with which she watches over his health, a gift to the whole land. His strength has never quite recovered the strain on it during those years of conflict and penance in the monastery at Erfurt. And it is often strained to the utmost now. All the monks and nuns who have renounced their idle maintenance in convents for conscience' sake; all congregations that desire an evangelical pastor; all people of all kinds in trouble of mind, body, or estate, turn to Dr. Luther for aid or counsel, as to the warmest heart and the clearest head in the land. His correspondence is incessant, embracing and answering every variety of perplexity, from counselling evangelical princes how best to reform their states, to directions to some humble Christian woman how to find peace for her conscience in Christ. And besides the countless applications to him for advice, his large heart seems always at leisure to listen to the appeal of the persecuted far and near, or to the cry of the bereaved and sorrowful.
Where shall we find the spring of all this activity but in theBible, of which he says, "There are few trees in that garden which I have not shaken for fruit;" and inprayer, of which he, the busiest man in Christendom, (as if he were a contemplative hermit) says, "Prayer is the Christian's business (Das Gebet ist des Christen Handwerk)."
Yes, it is the leisure he makes for prayer which gives leisure for all besides. It is the hours passed with the life-giving word which make sermons, and correspondence, and teaching of all kinds to him simply the out-pouring of a full heart.
Yet such a life wears out too quickly. More than once has Mistress Luther been in sore anxiety about him during the four years they have been married.
Once, in 1527, when little Hans was the baby, and he believed he should soon have to leave her a widow with the fatherless little one, he said rather sadly he had nothing to leave her but the silver tankards which had been presented to him.
"Dear doctor," she replied, "if it be God's will, then I also choose that you be with him rather than me. It is not so much I and my child even that need you as the multitude of pious Christians. Trouble yourself not about me."
What her courageous hopefulness and her tender watchfulness have been to him, he showed when he said,—
"I am too apt to expect more from my Käthe, and from Melancthon, than I do from Christ, my Lord. And yet I well know that neither they nor any one on earth has suffered, or can suffer, what he hath suffered for me."
But although incessant work may weigh upon his body, there are severer trials which weigh upon his spirit. The heart so quick to every touch of affection or pleasure cannot but be sensitive to injustice or disappointment. It cannot therefore be easy for him to bear that at one time it should be perilous for him to travel on account of the indignation of the nobles, whose relatives he has rescued from nunneries; and at another time equally unsafe because of the indignation of the peasants, for whom, though he boldly and openly denounced their made insurrection, he pleads fervently with nobles and princes.
But bitterer than all other things to him, are the divisions among evangelical Christians. Every truth he believes flashes on his mind with such overwhelming conviction that it seems to him nothing but incomprehensible wilfulness for any one else not to see it. Every conviction he holds, he holds with the grasp of one ready to die for it—not only with the tenacity of possession, but of a soldier to whom its defence has been intrusted. He would not, indeed, have any put to death or imprisoned for their misbelief. But hold out the hand of fellowship to those who betray any part of his Lords trust, he thinks,—how dare he? Are a few peaceable days to be purchased at the sacrifice of eternal truth?
And so the division has taken place between us and the Swiss.
My Gretchen perplexed me the other day, when we were coming from the city church, where Dr. Luther had been preaching against the Anabaptists and the Swiss, (whom he will persist in classing together,) by saying,—
"Mother, is not Uncle Winkelried a Swiss, and is he not a good man?"
"Of course Uncle Conrad is a good man, Gretchen," rejoined our Fritz, who had just returned from a visit to Atlantis and Conrad. "How can you ask such questions?"
"But he is a Swiss, and Dr. Luther said we must take care not to be like the Swiss, because they say wicked things about the holy sacraments."
"I am sure Uncle Conrad does not say wicked things," retorted Fritz, vehemently. "I think he is almost the best man I ever saw. Mother," he continued, "why does Dr. Luther speak so of the Swiss?"
"You see, Fritz," I said, "Dr. Luther never stayed six months among them as you did; and so he has never seen how good they are at home."
"Then," rejoined Fritz, sturdily, "if Dr. Luther has not seen them, I do not think he should speak so of them."
I was driven to have recourse to maternal authority to close the discussion, reminding Fritz that he was a little boy, and could not pretend to judge of good and great men, like Dr. Luther. But, indeed, I could not help half agreeing with the child. It was impossible to make him understand how Dr. Luther has fought his way inch by inch to the freedom in which we now stand at ease; how he detests the Zwinglian doctrines, not so much for themselves, as for what he thinks they imply. How will it be possible to make our children, who enter on the peaceful inheritance so dearly won, understand the rough, soldierly vehemence, of the warrior race, who re-conquered that inheritance for them?
As Dr. Luther says, "It is not a little thing to change the whole religion and doctrine of the Papacy. How hard it has been to me, they will see in that Day. Now no one believes it!"
God appointed David to fight the wars of Israel, and Solomon to build the temple. Dr. Luther has had to do both. What wonder if the hand of the soldier can sometimes be traced in the work of peace!
Yet, why should I perplex myself about this? Soon, too soon, death will come, and consecrate the virtues of our generation to our children, and throw a softening veil over our mistakes.
Even now that Dr. Luther is absent from us at Coburg, in the castle there, how precious his letters are; and how doubly sacred the words he preached to us last Sunday from the pulpit, now that to-morrow we are not to hear him.
He is placed in the castle at Coburg, in order to be nearer the Diet at Augsburg, so as to aid Dr. Melancthon, who is there, with his counsel. The Elector dare not trust the royal heart and straightforward spirit of our Luther among the prudent diplomatists at the Diet.
Mistress Luther is having a portrait taken of their little Magdalen, who is now a year old, and especially dear to the Doctor, to send to him in the fortress.
June, 1530.
June, 1530.
Letters have arrived from and about Dr. Luther. His father is dead—the brave, persevering, self-denying, truthful old man, who had stamped so much of his own character on his son. "It is meet I should mourn such a parent," Luther writes, "who through the sweat of his brow had nurtured and educated me, and made me what I am." He felt it keenly, especially since he could not be with his father at the last; although he gives thanks that he lived in these times of light, and departed strong in the faith of Christ. Dr. Luther's secretary writes, however, that the portrait of his little Magdalen comforts him much. He has hung it on the wall opposite to the place where he sits at meals.
Dr. Luther is now the eldest of his race. He stands in the foremost rank of the generations slowly advancing to confront death.
To-day I have been sitting with Mistress Luther in the garden behind the
Augustei, under the shade of the pear-tree, where she so often sits beside the Doctor. Our children were playing around us—her little Hänschen with the boys, while the little Magdalen sat cooing like a dove over some flowers, which she was pulling to pieces, on the grass at our feet.
She talked to me much about the Doctor; how dearly he loves the little ones, and what lessons of divine love and wisdom he learns from their little plays. He says often, that beautiful as all God's works are, little children are the fairest of all; that the dear angels especially watch over them. He is very tender with them, and says sometimes they are better theologians than he is, for they trust God. Deeper prayers and higher theology he never hopes to reach than the first the little ones learn—the Lord's Prayer and the Catechism. Often, she said, he says over the Catechism, to remind himself of all the treasures of faith we possess.
It is delightful too, she says, to listen to the heavenly theology he draws from birds and leaves and flowers, and the commonest gifts of God or events of life. At table, a plate of fruit will open to him a whole volume of God's bounty, on which he will discourse. Or, taking a rose in his hand, he will say, "A man who could make one rose like this would be accounted most wonderful; and God scatters countless such flowers around us! But the very infinity of his gifts makes us blind to them."
And one evening, he said of a little bird, warbling its last little song before it went to roost, "Ah, dear little bird! he has chosen his shelter, and is quietly rocking himself to sleep, without a care for to-morrow's lodging; calmly holding by his little twig, and leaving God to think for him."
In spring he loves to direct her attention to the little points and tufts of life peeping everywhere from the brown earth or the bare branches. "Who," he said, "that had never witnessed a spring-time would have guessed, two months since, that these lifeless branches had concealed within them all that hidden power of life? It will be thus with us at the resurrection. God writes his gospel, not in the Bible alone, but in trees, and flowers, and clouds, and stars."
And thus, to Mistress Luther, that little garden, with his presence and his discourse, has become like an illuminated Gospel and Psalter.
I ventured to ask her some questions, and, among others, if she had ever heard him speak of using a form of words in prayer. She said she had once heard him say "we might use forms of words in private prayer until the wings and feathers of our souls are grown, that we may soar freely upward into the pure air of God's presence." Buthisprayers, she says, are sometimes like the trustful pleadings of his little boy Hänschen with him; and sometimes like the wrestling of a giant in an agony of conflict.
She said, also, that she often thanks God for the Doctor's love of music. When his mind and heart have been strained to the utmost, music seems to be like a bath of pure fresh water to his spirit, bracing and resting it at once.
I indeed have myself heard him speak of this, when I have been present at the meetings he has every week at his house for singing in parts. "The devil," he says—"that lost spirit—cannot endure sacred songs of joy. Our passions and impatiences, our complainings and our cryings, our Alas! and our Woe is me! please him well; but our songs and psalms vex him and grieve him sorely."
Mistress Luther told me she had many an anxious hour about the Doctor's health. He is often so sorely pressed with work and care; and he has never recovered the weakening effects of his early fasts and conflicts.
His tastes at table are very simple, his favourite dishes are herrings and pease-soup. His habits are abstemious, and when engrossed with any especial work, he would forget or go without his meals altogether if she did not press him to take them. When writing his Commentary on the Twenty-second Psalm, he shut himself up for three days with nothing but bread and salt; until, at last, she had to send for a locksmith to break open the door, when they found him absorbed in meditation.
And yet, with all his deep thoughts and his wide cares, like a king's or an archbishop's, he enters into his children's games as if he were a boy; and never fails, if he is at a fair on his travels, to bring the little ones home some gift for a fairing.
She showed me a letter she had just received from him from Coburg, for his little son Hänschen. She allowed me to copy it. It is written thus:—
"Grace and peace in Christ to my heartily dear little son."I see gladly that thou learnest well and prayest earnestly. Do thus, my little son, and go on. When I come home I will bring thee a beautiful fairing. I know a pleasant garden, wherein many children walk about. They have little golden coats, and pick up beautiful apples under the trees, and pears, cherries, and plums. They dance and are merry, and have also beautiful little ponies, with golden reins and silver saddles. Then I asked the man whose the garden is, whose children those were. He said, 'These are the children who love to pray, who learn their lessons, and are good.' Then I said, 'Dear man, I also have a little son; he is called Hänsichen Luther. Might not he also come into the garden, that he might eat such apples and pears, and ride on such beautiful little ponies, and play with these children?' Then the man said, 'If he loves to pray, learn his lessons, and is good, he also shall come into the garden—Lippus and Jost also (the little sons of Melancthon and Justus Jonas); and when they all come together, they also shall have pipes, drums, lutes, and all kinds of music; and shall dance, and shoot with little bows and arrows.'"And he showed me there a fair meadow in the garden, prepared for dancing. There were many pipes of pure gold, drums, and silver bows and arrows. But it was still early in the day, so that the children had not had their breakfasts. Therefore I could not wait for the dancing, and said to the man, 'Ah, dear sir, I will go away at once, and write all this to my little son Hänsichen, that he may be sure to pray and to learn well, and be good, that he also may come into this garden. But he has a dear aunt, Lena; he must bring her with him.' Then said the man, 'Let it be so; go and write him thus.'"Therefore, my dear little son Hänsichen, learn thy lessons, and pray with a cheerful heart; and tell all this to Lippus and Justus too, that they also may learn their lessons and pray. So shall you all come together into this garden. Herewith I commend you to the Almighty God; and greet Aunt Lena, and give her a kiss from me.—Thy dear father,"Martin Luther."
"Grace and peace in Christ to my heartily dear little son.
"I see gladly that thou learnest well and prayest earnestly. Do thus, my little son, and go on. When I come home I will bring thee a beautiful fairing. I know a pleasant garden, wherein many children walk about. They have little golden coats, and pick up beautiful apples under the trees, and pears, cherries, and plums. They dance and are merry, and have also beautiful little ponies, with golden reins and silver saddles. Then I asked the man whose the garden is, whose children those were. He said, 'These are the children who love to pray, who learn their lessons, and are good.' Then I said, 'Dear man, I also have a little son; he is called Hänsichen Luther. Might not he also come into the garden, that he might eat such apples and pears, and ride on such beautiful little ponies, and play with these children?' Then the man said, 'If he loves to pray, learn his lessons, and is good, he also shall come into the garden—Lippus and Jost also (the little sons of Melancthon and Justus Jonas); and when they all come together, they also shall have pipes, drums, lutes, and all kinds of music; and shall dance, and shoot with little bows and arrows.'
"And he showed me there a fair meadow in the garden, prepared for dancing. There were many pipes of pure gold, drums, and silver bows and arrows. But it was still early in the day, so that the children had not had their breakfasts. Therefore I could not wait for the dancing, and said to the man, 'Ah, dear sir, I will go away at once, and write all this to my little son Hänsichen, that he may be sure to pray and to learn well, and be good, that he also may come into this garden. But he has a dear aunt, Lena; he must bring her with him.' Then said the man, 'Let it be so; go and write him thus.'
"Therefore, my dear little son Hänsichen, learn thy lessons, and pray with a cheerful heart; and tell all this to Lippus and Justus too, that they also may learn their lessons and pray. So shall you all come together into this garden. Herewith I commend you to the Almighty God; and greet Aunt Lena, and give her a kiss from me.—Thy dear father,
"Martin Luther."
Some who have seen this letter say it is too trifling for such serious subjects. But heaven is not a grim and austere, but a most bright and joyful place; and Dr. Luther is only telling the child in his own childish language what a happy place it is. Does not God our heavenly Father do even so with us?
I should like to have seen Dr. Luther turn from his grave letters to princes and doctors about the great Augsburg Confession, which they are now preparing, to write these loving words to his little Hans. No wonder "Catharine Lutherinn," "Doctoress Luther," "mea dominus Ketha," "my lord Käthe," as he calls her, is a happy woman. Happy for Germany that the Catechism in which our children learn the first elements of divine truth, grew out of the fatherly heart of Luther, instead of being put together by a Diet or a General Council.
One more letter I have copied, because my children were so interested in it. Dr. Luther finds at all times great delight in the songs of birds. The letter I have copied was written on the 28th April to his friends who meet around his table at home.
"Grace and peace in Christ, dear sirs and friends! I have received all your letters, and understand how things are going on with you. That you, on the other hand, may understand how things are going on here, I would have you know that we, namely, I, Master Veit, and Cyriacus, are not going to the Diet at Augsburg. We have, however, another Diet of our own here."Just under our window there is a grove like a little forest, where the choughs and crows have convened a diet, and there is such a riding hither and thither, such an incessant tumult, day and night, as if they were all merry and mad with drinking. Young and old chatter together, until I wonder how their breath can hold out so long. I should like to know if any of those nobles and cavaliers are with you; it seems to me they must be gathered here out of the whole world."I have not yet seen their emperor; but their great people are always strutting and prancing before our eyes, not, indeed, in costly robes, but all simply clad in one uniform, all alike black, all alike grey-eyed, and all singing one song, only with the most amusing varieties between young and old, and great and small. They are not careful to have a great palace and hall of assembly, for their hall is vaulted with the beautiful, broad sky, their floor is the field strewn with fair, green branches, and their walls reach as far as the ends of the world. Neither do they require steeds and armour; they have feathered wheels with which they fly from shot and danger. They are, doubtless, great and mighty lords, but what they are debating I do not yet know."As far, however, as I understand through an interpreter, they are planning a great foray and campaign against the wheat, barley, oats, and all kinds of grain, and many a knight will win his spurs in this war, and many a brave deed will be done."Thus we sit here in our Diet, and hear and listen with great delight, and learn how the princes and lords, with all the other estates of the empire, sing and live so merrily. But our especial pleasure is to see how cavalierly they pace about, whet their beaks, and furbish their armour, that they may win glory and victory from wheat and oats. We wish them health and wealth,—and that they may all at once be impaled on a quickset hedge!"For I hold they are nothing better than sophists and Papists with their preaching and writing; and I should like to have these also before me in our assembly, that I might hear their pleasant voices and sermons, and see what a useful people they are to devour all that is on the face of the earth, and afterwards chatter no one knows how long!"To-day we have heard the first nightingale; for they would not trust April. We have had delightful weather here, no rain, except a little yesterday. With you, perhaps, it is otherwise. Herewith I commend you to God. Keep house well. Given from the Diet of the grain-Turks, the 28th of April, anno 1530."Martinus Luther."
"Grace and peace in Christ, dear sirs and friends! I have received all your letters, and understand how things are going on with you. That you, on the other hand, may understand how things are going on here, I would have you know that we, namely, I, Master Veit, and Cyriacus, are not going to the Diet at Augsburg. We have, however, another Diet of our own here.
"Just under our window there is a grove like a little forest, where the choughs and crows have convened a diet, and there is such a riding hither and thither, such an incessant tumult, day and night, as if they were all merry and mad with drinking. Young and old chatter together, until I wonder how their breath can hold out so long. I should like to know if any of those nobles and cavaliers are with you; it seems to me they must be gathered here out of the whole world.
"I have not yet seen their emperor; but their great people are always strutting and prancing before our eyes, not, indeed, in costly robes, but all simply clad in one uniform, all alike black, all alike grey-eyed, and all singing one song, only with the most amusing varieties between young and old, and great and small. They are not careful to have a great palace and hall of assembly, for their hall is vaulted with the beautiful, broad sky, their floor is the field strewn with fair, green branches, and their walls reach as far as the ends of the world. Neither do they require steeds and armour; they have feathered wheels with which they fly from shot and danger. They are, doubtless, great and mighty lords, but what they are debating I do not yet know.
"As far, however, as I understand through an interpreter, they are planning a great foray and campaign against the wheat, barley, oats, and all kinds of grain, and many a knight will win his spurs in this war, and many a brave deed will be done.
"Thus we sit here in our Diet, and hear and listen with great delight, and learn how the princes and lords, with all the other estates of the empire, sing and live so merrily. But our especial pleasure is to see how cavalierly they pace about, whet their beaks, and furbish their armour, that they may win glory and victory from wheat and oats. We wish them health and wealth,—and that they may all at once be impaled on a quickset hedge!
"For I hold they are nothing better than sophists and Papists with their preaching and writing; and I should like to have these also before me in our assembly, that I might hear their pleasant voices and sermons, and see what a useful people they are to devour all that is on the face of the earth, and afterwards chatter no one knows how long!
"To-day we have heard the first nightingale; for they would not trust April. We have had delightful weather here, no rain, except a little yesterday. With you, perhaps, it is otherwise. Herewith I commend you to God. Keep house well. Given from the Diet of the grain-Turks, the 28th of April, anno 1530.
"Martinus Luther."
Yet, peaceful and at leisure as he seems, Gottfried says the whole of Germany is leaning now once more on the strength of that faithful heart.
The Roman diplomatists again and again have all but persuaded Melancthon to yield everything for peace; and, but for the firm and faithful words which issue from "this wilderness," as Luther calls the Coburg fortress, Gottfried believes all might have gone wrong. Severely and mournfully has Dr. Luther been constrained to write more than once to "Philip Pusillanimity," demanding that at least he should not give up the doctrine of justification by faith, and abandon all to the decision of the bishops!
It is faith which gives Luther this clearness of vision. "It is God's word and cause," he writes, "therefore our prayer is certainly heard, and already he has determined and prepared the help that shall help us. This cannot fail. For he says, 'Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb? yea, they may forget, yet will I not forget thee. See, I have graven thee on the palms of my hands.' I have lately seen two miracles," he continues; "the first, as I was looking out of my window and saw the stars in heaven, and all that beautiful vaulted roof of God, and yet saw no pillars on which the Master Builder had fixed this vault; yet the heaven fell not, but all that grand arch stood firm. Now, there are some who search for such pillars, and want to touch and grasp them, and since they cannot, they wonder and tremble as if the heaven must certainly fall, for no other reason but because they cannot touch and grasp its pillars. If they could lay hold on those, think they, then the heaven would stand firm!
"The second miracle was—I saw great clouds rolling over us, with such a ponderous weight that they might be compared to a great ocean, and yet I saw no foundation on which they rested or were based, nor any shore which kept them back; yet they fell not on us, but frowned on us with a stern countenance, and fled. But when they had passed by, then shone forth both their foundation and our roof which had kept them back—the rainbow! Truly a weak, thin, slight foundation and roof, which soon melted away into the clouds, and was more like a shadowy prism, such as we see through coloured glass, than a strong and firm foundation! so that we might well distrust that feeble dyke which kept back that terrible weight of waters. Yet we found, in fact, that this unsubstantial prism could bear up the weight of waters, and that it guards us safely. But there are some who look rather at the thickness and massy weight of the waters and clouds, than at this thin, slight, narrow bow of promise. They would like tofeel the strengthof that shadowy, evanescent arch, and because they cannot do this, they are ever fearing that the clouds will bring back the deluge."
Heavenly Father, since one man who trusts thy word can thus uphold a nation, what could not thy word do for each of us if we would each of us thus trust it, and Thee who speakest it.
Wittemberg, 1540.
Wittemberg, 1540.
The time I used to dread most of all in my life, after that great bereavement which laid it waste, is come. I am in the monotonous level of solitary middle age. The sunny heights of childhood, and even the joyous breezy slopes of youth, are almost out of sight behind me; and the snowy heights of reverend age, from which we can look over into the promised land beyond, are almost as far before me. Other lives have grown from the bubbling spring into the broad and placid river, while mine is still the little narrow stream it was at first; only, creeping slow and noiseless through the flats, instead of springing gladly from rock to rock, making music wherever it came. Yet I am content; absolutely, fully content. I am sure that my life also has been ordered by the highest wisdom and love; and that (as far as my faithless heart does not hinder it) God is leading me also on to the very highest and best destiny for me.
I did not always think so. I used to fear that not only would this bereavement throw a shadow on my earthly life, but that it would stunt and enfeeble my nature for ever; that missing all the sweet, ennobling relationships of married life, even throughout the ages I should be but an undeveloped, one-sided creature.
But one day I was reading in Dr. Luther's German Bible the chapter about the body of Christ, the twelfth of First Corinthians, and great comfort came into my heart through it. I saw that we are not meant to be separate atoms, each complete in itself, but members of a body, each only complete through union with all the rest. And then I saw how entirely unimportant it is in what place Christ shall set me in his body; and how impossible it is for us to judge what he is training us for, until the body is perfected and we see what we are to be in it.
On the Düben Heath also, soon after, when I was walking home with Elsè's Gretchen, the same lesson came to me in a parable, through a clump of trees under the shade of which we were resting. Often, from a distance, we had admired the beautiful symmetry of the group, and now, looking up, I saw how imperfect every separate tree was, all leaning in various directions, and all only developed on one side. If each tree had said, "I am a beech tree, and I ought to throw out branches on every side, like my brother standing alone on the heath," what would have become of that beautiful clump? And looking up through the green interwoven leaves to the blue sky I said,—
"Heavenly Father, thou art wise! I will doubt no more. Plant me where thou wilt in thy garden, and let me grow as thou wilt! Thou wilt not let me fail of my highest end."
Dr. Luther also said many things which helped me from time to time, in conversation or in his sermons.
"The barley," he said, "must suffer much from man. First, it is cast into the earth that it may decay. Then, when it is grown up and ripe, it is cut and mown down. Then it is crushed and pressed, fermented and brewed into beer.
"Just such a martyr also is the linen or flax. When it is ripe it is plucked, steeped in water, beaten, dried, hacked, spun, and woven into linen, which again is torn and cut. Afterwards it is made into plaster for sores, and used for binding up wounds. Then it becomes lint, is laid under the stamping machines in the paper mill, and torn into small bits. From this they make paper for writing and printing.
"These creatures, and many others like them, which are of great use to us, must thus suffer. Thus also must good, godly Christians suffer much from the ungodly and wicked. Thus, however, the barley, wine, and corn are ennobled; in man becoming flesh, and in the Christian man's flesh entering into the heavenly kingdom."
Often he speaks of the "dear, holy cross, a portion of which is given to all Christians."
"All the saints," he said once, when a little child of one of his friends lay ill, "must drink of the bitter cup. Could Mary even, the dear mother of our Lord, escape? All who are dear to him must suffer. Christians conquer when they suffer; only when they rebel and resist are they defeated and lose the day."
He, indeed, knows what trial and temptation mean. Many a bitter cup has he had to drink, he to whom the sins, and selfishness, and divisions of Christians are personal sorrow and shame. It is therefore, no doubt, that he knows so well how to sustain and comfort. Those, he says, who are to be the bones and sinews of the Church must expect the hardest blows.
Well I remember his saying, when, on the 8th of August, 1529, before his going to Coburg, he and his wife lay sick of a fever, while he suffered also from sciatica, and many other ailments,—
"God has touched me sorely. I have been impatient; but God knows better than I whereto it serves.Our Lord God is like a printer who sets the letters backwards, so that here we cannot read them. When we are printed off yonder, in the life to come, we shall read all clear and straightforward.Meantime we must have patience."
In other ways more than I can number he and his words have helped me. No one seems to understand as he does what the devil is and does. It is thetemptationin the sorrow which is the thing to be dreaded and guarded against. This was what I did not understand at first when Bertrand died. I thought I was rebellious, and dared not approach God till I ceased to feel rebellious. I did not understand that the malignant one who tempted me to rebel also tempted me to think God would not forgive. I had thought before of affliction as a kind of sanctuary where naturally I should feel God near. I had to learn that it is also night-time, even "the hour of darkness," in which the prince of darkness draws near unseen. As Luther says, "The devil torments us in the place where we are most tender and weak, as in Paradise he fell not on Adam, but on Eve."
Inexpressible was the relief to me when I learned who had been tormenting me, and turned to Him who vanquished the tempter of old to banish him now from me. For terrible as Dr. Luther knows that fallen angel to be,—"the antithesis," as he said, "of the Ten Commandments," who for thousands of years has been studying with an angel's intellectual power, or how most effectually to distress and ruin man,—he always reminds us that, nevertheless, the devil is a vanquished foe, that the victory has not now to be won; that, bold as the evil one is to assail and tempt the unguarded, a word or look of faith will compel him to flee "like a beaten hound." It is this blending of the sense of Satan's power to tempt, with the conviction of his powerlessness to injure the believing heart, which has so often sustained me in Dr. Luther's words.
But it is not only thus that he has helped me. He presses on us often the necessity of occupation. It is better, he says, to engage in the humblest work, than to sit still alone and encounter the temptations of Satan. "Oft in my temptations I have need to talk even with a child, in order to expel such thoughts as the devil possesses me with; and this teaches me not to boast as if of myself I were able to help myself, and to subsist without the strength of Christ. I need one at times to help me who in his whole body has not as much theology as I have in one finger." "The human heart," he says, "is like a millstone in a mill: when you put wheat under it, it turns, and grinds, and bruises the wheat to flour; if you put no wheat it still grinds on, but then it is itself it grinds and wears away. So the human heart, unless it be occupied with some employment, leaves space for the devil, who wriggles himself in, and brings with him a whole host of evil thoughts, temptations, tribulations, which grind away the heart."
After hearing him say this, I tried hard to find myself some occupation. At first it seemed difficult. Elsè wanted little help with her children, or only occasionally. At home the cares of poverty were over, and my dear father and mother lived in comfort, without my aid. I used discontentedly to wish sometimes that we were poor again, as in Elsè's girlish days, that I might be needed, and really feel it of some use to spin and embroider, instead of feeling that I only worked for the sake of not being idle, and that no one would be the better for what I did.
At other times I used to long to seclude myself from all the happy life around, and half to reproach Dr. Luther in my heart for causing the suppression of the convents. In a nunnery, at least, I thought I should have been something definite and recognized, instead of the negative, undeveloped creature, I felt myself to be, only distinguished from those around by the absence of what made their lives real and happy.
My mother's recovery from the plague helped to cure me of that, by reminding me of the home blessings still left. I began, too, to confide once more in God, and I was comforted by thinking of what my grandmother said to me one day when I was a little girl, crying hopelessly over a tangled skein and sobbing, "I shall never untangle it." "Wind, dear child,wind on, inch by inch, undo each knot one by one, and the skein will soon disentangle itself." So I resolved to wind on my little thread of life day by day, and undo one little knot after another, until now, indeed, the skein has disentangled itself.
Few women, I think, have a life more full of love and interest than mine. I have undertaken the care of a school for little girls, among whom are two orphans, made fatherless by the peasants' war, who were sent to us; and this also I owe to Dr. Luther. He has nothing more at heart than the education of the young; nothing gives him more pain than to see the covetousness which grudges funds for schools; and nothing more joy than to see the little ones grow up in all good knowledge. As he wrote to the Elector John from Coburg twelve years ago:—
"The merciful God shows himself indeed gracious in making his Word so fruitful in your land. The tender little boys and maidens are so well instructed in the Catechism and Scriptures, that my heart melts when I see that young boys and girls can pray, believe, and speak better of God and Christ than all the convents and schools could in the olden time.
"Such youth in your grace's land are a fair Paradise, of which the like is not in the world. It is as if God said, 'Courage, dear Duke John, I commit to thee my noblest treasure, my pleasant Paradise; thou shalt be father over it. For under thy guard and rule I place it, and give thee the honour that thou shalt be my gardener and steward.' This is assuredly true. It is even as if our Lord himself were your grace's guest and ward, since his Word and his little ones are your perpetual guests and wards."
For a little while a lady, a friend of his wife, resided in his house in order to commence such a school at Wittemberg for young girls; and now it has become my charge. And often Dr. Luther comes in and lays his hands on the heads of the little ones, and asks God to bless them, or listens while they repeat the Catechism or the Holy Scriptures.
December25, 1542.
December25, 1542.
Once more the Christmas tree has been planted in our homes at Wittemberg. How many such happy Christian homes there are among us! Our Elsè's, Justus Jonas', and his gentle, sympathizing wife, who, Dr. Luther says, "always brings comfort in her kind pleasant countenance." We all meet at Elsè's home on such occasions now. The voices of the children are better than light to the blind eyes of my father, and my mother renews her own maternal joys again in her grandchildren, without the cares.
But of all these homes, none is happier or more united than Dr. Luther's. His child-like pleasure in little things makes every family festival in his house so joyous; and the children's plays and pleasures, as well as their little troubles, are to him a perpetual parable of the heavenly family, and of our relationship to God. There are five children in his family now; Hans, the first born; Magdalen, a lovely, loving girl of thirteen; Paul, Martin, and Margaretha.
How good it is for those who are bereaved and sorrowful that our Christian festivals point forward and upward as well as backward; that the eternal joy to which we are drawing ever nearer is linked to the earthly joy which has passed away. Yes, the old heathen tree of life, which that young green fir from the primeval forests of our land is said to typify, has been christened into the Christmas tree. The old tree of life was a tree of sorrow, and had its roots in the evanescent earth, and at its base sat the mournful Destinies, ready to cut the thread of human life. Nature ever renewing herself contrasted mournfully with the human life that blooms but once. But our tree of life is a tree of joy, and is rooted in the eternal Paradise of joy. The angels watch over it, and it recalls the birth of the Second Man—the Lord from heaven—who is not merely "a living soul, but a life-giving spirit." In it the evanescence of Nature, immortal as she seems, is contrasted with the true eternal life of mortal man. In the joy of the little ones, once more, thank God, my whole heart seems to rejoice; for I also have my face towards the dawn, and I can hear the fountain of life bubbling up whichever way I turn. Only,beforeme it is best and freshest! for it is springing up to life everlasting.
December, 1542.
December, 1542.
A shadow has fallen on the peaceful home of Dr. Luther: Magdalen, the unselfish, obedient, pious, loving child—the darling of her father's heart—is dead; the first-born daughter, whose portrait, when she was a year old, used to cheer and delight him at Coburg.
On the 5th of this last September she was taken ill, and then Luther wrote at once to his friend Marcus Crodel to send his son John from Torgau, where he was studying, to see his sister. He wrote,—
"Grace and peace, my Marcus Crodel. I request that you will conceal from my John what I am writing to you. My daughter Magdalen is literally almost at the point of death—soon about to depart to her Father in heaven, unless it should yet seem fit to God to spare her. But she herself so sighs to see her brother, that I am constrained to send a carriage to fetch him. They indeed loved one another greatly. May she survive to his coming! I do what I can, lest afterwards the sense of having neglected anything should torture me. Desire him, therefore, without mentioning the cause, to return hither at once with all speed in this carriage; hither,—where she will either sleep in the Lord or be restored. Farewell in the Lord."
Her brother came, but she was not restored.
As she lay very ill, Doctor Martin said,—
"She is very dear to me; but, gracious God, if it is thy will to take her hence, I am content to know that she will be with thee."
And as she lay in the bed, he said to her,—
"Magdalenchen, my little daughter, thou wouldst like to stay with thy father; and thou art content also to go to thy Father yonder."
Said she, "Yes, dearest father; as God wills."
Then said the father,—
"Thou darling child, the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak."
Then he turned away and said,—
"She is very dear to me. If the flesh is so strong, what will the spirit be?"
And among other things he said,—
"For a thousand years God has given no bishop such great gifts as he has given me; and we should rejoice in his gifts. I am angry with myself that I cannot rejoice in my heart over her, nor give thanks; although now and then I can sing a little song to our God, and thank him a little for all this. But let us take courage; living or dying, we are the Lord's. 'Sive vivimus, sive moremur, Domini sumus.' This is true, whether we take 'Domini' in the nominative or the genitive: we are the Lord's, and in him we are lords over death and life."
Then said Master George Rörer,—
"I once heard your reverence say a thing which often comforts me—namely, 'I have prayed our Lord God that he will give me a happy departure when I journey hence. And he will do it; of that I feel sure. At my latter end I shall yet speak with Christ my Lord, were it for ever so brief a space.' I fear sometimes," continued Master Rörer, "that I shall depart hence suddenly, in silence, without being able to speak a word."
Then said Dr. Martin Luther,—
"Living or dying, we are the Lord's. It is equally so whether you are killed by falling down stairs, or were sitting and writing, and suddenly should die. It would not injure me if I fell from a ladder and lay dead at its foot; for the devil hates us grievously, and might even bring about such a thing as that."
When, at last, the little Magdalen lay at the point of death, her father fell on his knees by her bed-side, wept bitterly and prayed that God would receive her. Then she departed, and fell asleep in her father's arms. Her mother was also in the room, but further off, on account of her grief. This happened a little after nine o'clock on the Wednesday after the 19th Sunday after Trinity, 1542.
The doctor repeated often, as before said,—
"I would desire indeed to keep my daughter, if our Lord God would leave her with me; for I love her very dearly. But His will be done; for nothing can be better than that for her."
Whilst she still lived, he said to her,—
"Dear daughter, thou hast also a Father in heaven: thou art going to him."
Then said Master Philip,—
"The love of parents is an image and illustration of the love of God, engraven on the human heart. If, then, the love of God to the human race is as great as that of parents to their children, it is indeed great and fervent."
When she was laid in the coffin, Doctor Martin said,—
"Thou darling Lenichen, how well it is with thee!"
And as he gazed on her lying there, he said,—
"Ah, thou sweet Lenichen, thou shalt rise again, and shine like a star; yes, like the sun!"
They had made the coffin too narrow and too short, and he said,—
"The bed is too small for thee! I am indeed joyful in spirit, but after the flesh I am very sad, this parting is so beyond measure trying. Wonderful it is that I should know she is certainly at peace, and that all is well with her, and yet should be so sad."
And when the people who came to lay out the corpse, according to custom, spoke to the doctor, and said they were sorry for his affliction, he said,—
"You should rejoice. I have sent a saint to heaven; yes, a living saint! May we have such a death! Such a death I would gladly die this very hour."
Then said one, "That is true indeed; yet every one would wish to keep his own."
Doctor Martin answered,—
"Flesh is flesh, and blood is blood. I am glad that she is yonder. There is no sorrow but that of the flesh."
To others who came he said,—
"Grieve not. I have sent a saint to heaven; yes, I have sent two such thither!" alluding to his infant Elizabeth.
As they were chanting by the corpse, "Lord, remember not our former sins, which are of old," he said,—
"I say, O Lord, not our former sins only, nor only those of old, but our present sins; for we are usurers, exactors, misers. Yea, the abomination of the mass is still in the world!"
When the coffin was closed, and she was buried, he said, "There is indeed a resurrection of the body."
And as they returned from the funeral, he said,—
"My daughter is now provided for in body and soul. We Christians have nothing to complain of; we know it must be so. We are more certain of eternal life than of anything else; for God who has promised it to us for his dear Son's sake, can never lie. Two saints of my flesh our Lord God has taken, but not of my blood. Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom."
Among other things, he said,—
"We must take great care for our children, and especially for the poor little maidens; we must not leave it to others to care for them. I have no compassion on the boys. A lad can maintain himself wherever he is, if he will only work; and if he will not work, he is a scoundrel. But the poor maiden-kind must have a staff to lean on."
And again,—
"I gave this daughter very willingly to our God. After the flesh, I would indeed have wished to keep her longer with me; but since he has taken her hence, I thank him."
The night before Magdalen Luther died, her mother had a dream, in which she saw two men clothed in fair raiment, beautiful and young, come and lead her daughter away to her bridal. When, on the next morning, Philip Melancthon came into the cloister, and asked her how her daughter was, she told him her dream.
But he was alarmed at it, and said to others,—
"Those young men are the dear angels who will come and lead this maiden into the kingdom of heaven, to the true Bridal."
And the same day she died.
Some little time after her death, Dr. Martin Luther said,—
"If my daughter Magdalen could come to life again and bring with her to me the Turkish kingdom, I would not have it. Oh, she is well cared for; 'Beati mortui qui in Domino moriuntur.' Who dies thus, certainly has eternal life. I would that I, and my children, and ye all could thus all depart; for evil days are coming. There is neither help nor counsel more on earth, I see, until the Judgment Day. I hope, if God will, it will not be long delayed; for covetousness and usury increase."
And often at supper he repeated, "Et multipicata sunt mala in terris."
He himself made this epitaph, and had it placed on his Magdalen's tomb:—