best capital. All the Reformers were poor, and singularly free from avarice; they moved in a lofty
sphere, and despised the vanities of the world.
Luther’s income was very small, even for the standard of his times, and presents a striking
contrast to the royal splendor and luxury of bishops and cardinals. His highest annual salary as
professor was three hundred guilders; it was first a hundred guilders; on his marriage the Elector
John doubled it; the Elector John Frederick added a hundred; a guilder being equal in value to about
sixteen marks or shillings (four dollars) of the present day. He received no honorarium from the
students, nor any salary as preacher in the town church; but regular payments in wood and grain,
and occasional presents of a fine suit, a cask of wine, or venison, or a silver cup from the Elector,
with his greetings. Admiring friends gave him rings, chains, and other valuables, which he estimated
in 1542 at a thousand guilders. In his last years (from 1541) he, as well as Bugenhagen, Melanchthon,
and Jonas, received an annual honorary pension of fifty guilders from the king of Denmark, who
thereby wished to show his gratitude for the Lutheran Reformation, and had previously (1539) sent
him a special present of a hundred guilders through Bugenhagen. From his father, who left twelve
hundred and fifty guilders, he inherited two hundred and fifty guilders. The publishers offered him
(as he reported in 1539) a yearly grant of four hundred guilders for the free use of his manuscripts,
but he refused "to make money out of the gifts of God." If he had been rewarded according to
modern ideas, the royalty of his German Bible Version alone would have amounted to a handsome
fortune before his death. He bought in 1540 from his brother-in-law a little farm, Zulsdorf, between
Leipzig and Borna, for six hundred and ten guilders, as a home for his family. His wife cultivated
a little garden with fruit-trees, even mulberry and fig trees, raised hops and brewed beer for domestic
use, as was then the custom. She also had a small fish-pond. She enjoyed hard work. Luther assisted
her in gardening and fishing. In 1541 he purchased a small house near the convent, for his wife.^601
He willed all his property, which amounted to about nine thousand guilders, to his wife during her
lifetime, wishing that, she should not receive from her children, but the children from her; that they
must honor and obey her, as God has commanded."
His widow survived him seven years, and suffered from poverty and affliction. The Elector,
the Counts of Mansfeld, and the King of Denmark added small sums to her income; but the
unfortunate issue of the Smalkaldian war (1547) disturbed her peace, and drove her from Wittenberg.
She returned after the war. Melanchthon and Bugenhagen did for her what they could. When the
pestilence broke out at Wittenberg in 1552, and the university was moved to Torgau, she followed
with her children; but on the journey she was thrown from the wagon into a ditch, and contracted
a cold which soon passed into consumption. She died Dec. 20, 1552, at Torgau; her last prayer was
for her children and the Lutheran Church.
A few words about Luther’s personal appearance. In early life, as we have seen, he looked
like an ascetic monk, pale, haggard, emaciated.^602 But in latter years he grew stout and portly. The
change is characteristic of his transition from legalistic gloom to evangelical cheerfulness. He was
of middle stature, had a large head and broad chest, a bold and open face without any dissimulation
lurking behind, prominent lips, short curly hair, and uncommonly brilliant and penetrating eyes.
His enemies saw in them the fire of a demon. His countenance makes the impression of frankness,
firmness, courage, and trust in God. He looks like a hero of faith, who, with the Bible in his hand,
(^601) On Luther’s Vermögensumstände, see Seidemann, Luther’s Grundbesitz, 1860. Köstlin, II. 498 sqq., and his references, p. 678.
(^602) See the description of Mosellanus, p. 180, and Cranach’s engraving from the year 1520, in Köstlin, p. 120 (Scribner’s ed.).