Page:Luther's correspondence and other contemporary letters 1507-1521.djvu/234

 186. CROTUS RUBEANUS TO LUTHER.

Enders, ii. 204. Bologna, October 16, 15 19.

John Jager of Dornheitn (Crotus Rubeanus, 1480-c. 1539), matricu- lated at Erfurt, 1498, B. A. 1500, M. A. 1507. In 1510 he went with Hutten to Fulda. In 1515 he published the first series of the Epistolae Obscurorum Virorum. From 1517-20 he was at Bologna, 1524-31 with Albert of Brandenburg (Duke of Prussia) at Konigsberg, from that time on a canon at Halle. Until 1531 he was an enthusiastic admirer of Luther, more from patriotic than religious reasons, but after this he broke with the Reformer. Life in Allgemeine deutsche Biographie and cf. G. Stokes: Epistolae Obscurorum Virorum, Intro- duction, pp. lx.ff, and W. Reindell: Luther, Crotus und Hutten, Marburg, 1890. The bearer of the letter was John Hess of Nurem- berg. Luther received it early in December.

Greeting. Two things, reverend and beloved Martin, have kept my love for you strong: first, our intimacy while in youth we were studying at Erfurt, an intimacy which time and similarity of character made the foundation of a close friendship; and secondly, because we have in you a splendid defender of true piety, which you protect with the shield of Scripture while others, in the main, try to destroy it. Where- fore it has come to pass that I who have been so long absent chat with you, clasp your hand and dream of you more often than those whom you have near you. I make our friend Hess* witness of this, who is my ambassador to you as well as his own.

Martin, I am moved by your controversy with the Domin- icans, who, with many others, conspire against your life. And had you not been sent by Heaven to this corrupt age, and had not a celestial hand guarded you as a teacher of Christian doctrine, we should long ago have delivered your funeral oration, so great is the fury of those who prefer their doctrine to that of Christ;' so great is Roman avarice that it would find a thousand ways of poison and treason, if there

tken at Wittenberg till 1513. He then became secretary of John Turzo, Bishop of Brcslau. In 1517 he was in Italy, in 15 19 back at Wittenberg. Then he went to Breslau, which he reformed. He had a good deal to do with Caspar Schwenckfeld. In 1S22 he went to Gels, in 1523 to Nuremberg, and then back to Breslau, where he remained the rcftt of his life. Biography by Kdstlin in Zeiischrift fSr Geschichte und Altertum Schlesiens, vi. 97ff, 181 fiF, xii. 4108.
 * John Hess of Nuremberg (uQo-January 5, 1547)1 studied at Leipsic 1506-10,

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