Page:Luther's correspondence and other contemporary letters 1507-1521.djvu/377

 372 LUTHER'S CORRESPONDENCE AND Let 3«

second a certain Franciscan/ the third* wrote anonymously, though he confessed he was a Dominican and received a sal- ary from the French King. . ..

If I were devoted to your order and most hostile to Luther what other advice could I have given than I did give? Burn- ing Luther's books may remove them from the bookstores; I doubt whether they can thus be removed from the minds of the people. But this might have been done if you had fol- lowed my advice. Even if my counsel did not please you, yet it ought not to be thrown in my teeth as a bit of hypoc- risy that I gave it honestly to the Cardinal of Mayence who deserved this service from me. I gave him the advice in a sealed letter, thinking nothing less than that it should be pub- lished, but I hear that it was published before it was given to the cardinal, and not edited as I wrote them. For when they charge me with saying **our Luther" it is certain that I never said it, and would not have said it even if he had been mine.* . ..

312. ERASMUS TO GODSCHALK ROSEMUND, RECTOR OF

THE UNIVERSITY OF LOUVAIN.

Erasmi opera (1703), iii. 536. (Louvain, October?, 1520.)

In this letter Erasmus relates the course of his quarrel with Egmood This letter is dated loc, cit, and in the London 1642 edition, xiL i8» 1519, but the contents show that it should rather be 152a Moreover, Rosemund was rector only between August, 1520^ and February, 1521.

. . . Invoking St. Paul Egmond prayed that as Paul had been changed from a persecutor of the Church into a doctor of the Church, so Luther and Erasmus might be. Why do they do such things? Because they desire nothing so mud*- as to annoy. They take it ill that I am not a Lutheran, a.^ truly I am not, unless it be for Christ's service. I know tha^ I am too free with my tongue, but no one has ever beared' me approve Luther's doctrine. I have never cared to reac^ his books except a few pages which I only glanced at. I al- ways favored your debates against Luther, especially the

'Perhaps Augustine Alreld. 1 do not know who is meant.

'Erasmus means that in publishing his letter to Albert of Mayence (no. 19a) they changed "Luther" into "our Luther." Smith, 201.

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