Page:Thirty-five years of Luther research.djvu/68

38 bingen, 1916), in which, by means of the school statutes of the late Middle Ages, the teaching and the learning in the preparatory schools of the universities is minutely described, although here the error is also made that the author in unwarranted and arbitrary fashion pictures the conditions better than they in reality were. E. Schneidewind, 1883, in his booklet, "Das Lutherhaus in Eisenach," offers much concerning the Cotta family, that so generously welcomed Luther into its midst. Buchwald also gives a happy account of Luther's stay here.32

2. Luther at the University

In the summer of 1501 Luther matriculated at the University of Erfurt. Today we have a much truer and detailed conception of the conditions prevailing at Erfurt at that time, and of its teachers than the one obtained through F. W. Kampschulte's "Die Universitaet Erfurt in ihrem Verhaeltnis zu deni Humanismus und der Reformation" (1858 and 1860), which, however, is still worthy of notice today. This change was primarily brought about by Oergel, Kolde, Bauch, Hermelink and Scheel.33 Hermelink has taught us better to understand the teaching of the Humanists, which naturalized itself also in Erfurt. He pointed out, above all things, that it was by no means an offshoot of the Italian Renaissance movement, but, on the contrary a relatively independent reform endeavor on German soil, which, although desiring to be unhampered by the guardianship of the clergy, still remained entirely within the pale of the Mediaeval Age, and was in nowise modernly pagan and materialistically inclined. With these Humanists Luther could be related and yet remain a Catholic.

Hermelink has also made us better acquainted with