Page:History of the German people at the close of the Middle Ages vol1.djvu/49

 ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS AND RELIGIOUS EDUCATION 37 excommunication, to assist on Sundays and feast days at the parish mass and sermon, and to remain to the end. In like manner the Liibeck ' Manuals for Con- fession ' enjoin : ' Whoever will not hear the whole sermon on Sunday shall be excommunicated.' All ' Confessionals ' of this period treat the evasion of the sermon through neglect or contempt as a heavy sin. Nicolaus Eus, of Eostock, says also : ' The laity who leave the church when the Word of God is being preached shall be excommunicated by the bishop.' ' If you do not hear mass and a sermon on Sundays,' says Wolf, ' you sin against the third commandment.' In the ' Spiegel der Sunder ' (' Mirror of Sin ') occurs the following injunction to heads of families : ' If you have in your house boys and girls arrived at years of discretion, that is, girls of twelve and boys of fourteen years old, whom you have not taken to hear a whole mass and sermon on Sundays, you and they are guilty of mortal sin ; for all Christians of an understanding age are in duty bound to hear mass and the preaching of the Word with reverence and piety.' The anecdotes introduced occasionally in the significant of the attitude of the time with regard to the value of preaching. It is related, for instance, that there was once ' a holy man who met a devil carry- ing a bag. He asked him what he was carrying. The devil answered " Boxes of different kinds of ointment. In this " (showing him a black box) " is an ointment with which I close men's eyes that they may sleep during the sermon ; for the preachers are too clever at getting men away from me. One sermon will rob me
 * Seelentrost ' ('Spiritual Comfort') of 1483 are very