Page:Luther's correspondence and other contemporary letters 1521-1530.djvu/357

 parishes and their income, and learn what the pastor needs, and then lay upon the parishes your Grace's command re- garding the annual tax. But if the expense or the trouble of this procedure were too great for your Grace, citizens from the towns could be used for this purpose, or representatives of the chief towns of the district could be summoned and the matter discussed with them. Whatever best pleases your Grace let that be done.

Moreover, care must be taken concerning the old pastors or those otherwise unfit for office. If they are good men in other respects and not opposed to the Gospel, they ought to be obligated to read the Gospels and the Postils* (if they are not qualified to preach), or to have them read. Thus the people would receive a true ministration of the Gospel in re- turn for the support they gave the pastor. It would not be a good thing to put the men out of the office they have been holding without some recompense, if only they are not opposed to the Gospel. I htmibly make this suggestion to your Grace at your Grace's request, commending your Grace to God.

Your Grace's humble servant,

Martin Luther,

717. LEE TO WOLSEY.

Letters and Papers of Henry VIII, iv, no. 1803.

BouRDEAUx, December 2, 1525.

Hears that an Englishman,' at Luther's instigation, has trans- lated the New Testament into English, and will bring printed copies into England in a few days. Wolsey can foresee the harm that may come thereof better than he can. Has written

1 Homilies on the Gospels.

Cologne and was completed at Worms at this time. He was greatly indebted to Luther's version^ see parallel passages in J. J. Momfret: English Versions of the Bible, 1907, SyS. Many contemporaries stated that he was with Luther at Wittenberg, e.g* Lee, Thomas More, Cochlaeus and Henry VIII, and this has been repeated by J. A. Froude: History of England, 1875, ii, 31; Dictionary of National Biography under "Tyndale"; Gairdner: Lollardy and the Reformation, 1908, ii, 227; R. Demaus: W. Tindale, 1904, ii7ff, Momfret, op. eit, Saff. Tyn- dale himself, however, denied that he was ever "confederate with Luther," and as we hear nothing of him at Wittenberg, it is most improbable that he ever faw Luther. See P. Smith's article in The Notion, May 16, 191 2, also H. E. Jacobs, The Lutheran Movement in England during the Reigns of Henry VUl end Edward VI (Philadelphia, 1890), pp. i4ff.
 * William Tyndale's translation of the New Testament began to be printed At

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