Page:History of the German people at the close of the Middle Ages vol1.djvu/219

 SCULPTURE AND PAINTING 207 taken so sick one morning that we had to break open her door, as she could not open it to us. We carried her into another room and the last sacraments were admin- istered to her, for everyone thought she was dying. . . . On May 17, 1514, a year from the day on which she was taken ill, two hours before nightfall, my mother departed this life in Christian peace and fortitude, and with the consolation of both the holy sacraments. She gave me her blessing, prayed that the peace of God might be with me, and exhorted me to keep free from sin. She asked for some holy water to drink. She feared the pains of death, but said she had no fear of appearing before God. She was seized with a painful agony and seemed troubled by some apparition, for after a long silence she asked for holy water. Then her eyes grew dim ; I noticed she had two convulsions of the heart ; she closed her eyes and lips and died in great pain. I prayed aloud for her. I cannot express my grief. God be gracious to her ! Her greatest happiness was to speak of God, and she loved to see Him honoured. She was in her sixty-third year. I buried her as honour- ably as my means would allow. God grant me a death as beautiful as hers. May God Himself and His heavenly hosts, my father, mother, friends, and relations be pre- sent with me at that hour ! May God grant us ever- lasting life, Amen ! She looked even more beautiful in death than she had done in life.' 1 1 Thausing, Diirer's Brief e unci Tagebiicher,^. 136-138. Thansing, in commenting on those letters, says : ' We find no pride, no morbid humility, no dissension. His practical attention to present duties and his firm faith in religion saved him from despondency. His heart was too strong and elastic to give way to grief. The man puts his mind in his work, and in the details which he gives in those records we are move d by his earnestness and simplicity.'