They are based on stenographic reports of Diaconus Georg Rörer of Wittenberg (ordained by
Luther 1525, d. at Halle, 1557), who took full Latin notes of Luther’s German sermons, retaining,
however, in strange medley a number of German words and phrases.
P. Tschackert: Unbekannte Predigten u. Scholien Luthers, Berlin, 1888. MSS. of sermons from
Oct. 23, 1519, to April 2, 1521, discovered in the University Library at Königsberg. They will
be publ. in the Weimar edition.
II. Biographies of Luther :
(1) By contemporaries, who may be included in the sources.
Melanchthon wrote Vita Lutheri, a brief but weighty sketch, 1546, often reprinted, translated into
German by Matthias Ritter, 1555, with Melanchthon’s account of Luther’s death to the students
in the lecture room, the funeral orations of Bugenhagen and Cruciger (157 pages); a new transl.
by Zimmermann, with preface by G. J. Planck, Göttingen, 1813; ed. of the original in Vitae
quatuor Reformatorum., Lutheri a Melanchthone, Melanchthonis a Camerario, Zwinglii a
Myconio, Calvini a Beza, prefaced by Neander, Berlin, 1841. Justus Jonas gives an account of
Luther’s last sickness and death as an eye-witness, 1546. Mathesius (Luther’s pupil and friend,
d. 1561) preached seventeen sermons on Luther’s life, first published 1565, and very often
since, though mostly abridged, e.g., an illustrated popular ed. with preface by G. H. v. Schubert,
Stuttgart, 1846; jubilee edition, St. Louis and Dresden, 1883. Joh. Cochlaeus, a Roman Cath.
antagonist of Luther, wrote Commentaria de actis et scriptis Martini Lutheri Saxonis,
chronographica, ex ordine ab anno Dom. 1517 usque ad annum 1546 (inclusive), fideliter
conscripta. Mayence, 1549 fol.
(2) Later Biographies till 1875 (the best marked *) by
*Walch (in his ed. of L.’s Works, vol. XXIV. pp. 3–875); Keil (4 parts in 1 vol., Leipz., 1764);
Schröckh (Leipz., 1778); Ukert (Gotha, 2 vols., 1817); Pfizer (Stuttgart, 1836); Stang (with
illustrations, Stuttg., 1836); Jaekel (Leipz., 1841, new ed. Elberfeld, 1871); *Meurer (Dresden,
1843–’46, 3 vols. with illustrations, abridged in 1 vol., 1850, 3d ed., 1870, mostly in Luther’s
own words); *Juergens (Leipz., 1846–’47, 3 vols., reaching to 1517, very thorough, but
unfinished); J. M. Audin (Rom. Cath., Hist. de la vie, des ouvrages et des doctrines de M. Luth.,
Paris, 1839, 7th ed., revue et corrigée, 1856, 3 vols.—a storehouse of calumnies, also in German
and English);^110 * M. Michelet (Mémoirs de L., écrits par lui-mème, traduits et mis en ordre,
Paris, 1835, also Brussels, 1845, 2 vols.; the best biography in French; Eng. transl. by Hazlitt,
London, 1846, and by G. H. Smith, London and N. Y., 1846);^111 Ledderhose (Karlsruh, 3d ed.,(^110) Audin wrote also the Lives of Calvin, of Henry VIII., and of Leo X. (published between 1839 and 1847), with the same French
vivacity and Roman Catholic hostility; yet, while he does not understand Luther as a Protestant Christian and a reformer, he tries to do
justice to him as a man and a genius. He says (III., 380): "Luther est le grand predicateur de la réforme. Il eut presque tous les dons de
l’orateur; une inèpuisable fécondité de pensées, une imagination aussi prompte à recevoir qu’à produire ses impressions, une abondance
et une suplesse de style inexprimables. Sa voix était claire et retentissante, son oeil brillant de flamme, sa téte antique, sa poitrine large,
ses mains d’unerare beauté, son geste ample et rich .... C’était à la fois Rabelais et Montaigne: Rabelais avec sa verve drolatique de
style, Montaigne avec ses tournures qui burinent et cisètent." The editor of the 7th ed., in his introductory notice (p. xviii.), says that those
biographies of Audin have given to the Reformation "le coup de grace," and thus finished the work of Bossuet’s Variations; but Protestantism
still lives, even in Catholic and infidel France.
(^111) Michelet lets Luther tell his own story as far as possible, and compares this story with the Confessions of Augustin and of Rousseau,
which it unites."Dans saint Augustin" (he says, I., 6), "la passion, la nature, l’individuaté humaine, n’apparaissent que pour étre immolees
à la grâce divine. C’est l’histoire d’une crise de l’ame, d’une renaissance, d’une Vita nuova; le saint eût rouqi de nous faire mieux
connaître l’autre vie qu’il avait quitté. Dans Rousseau, c’est tous le contraire; il ne s’agit plus de la grace; la nature règne sans partage,
elle triomphe, elle s’étale; cela va quelquefois jusqu ’au dégout. Luther a présenté, non pas l’equilibré de la grâce et de la nature, mais
leur plus douloureux combat. Les luttes de la sensibilité, les tentations plus hautes du donte, bien d’autres hommes en eut suffert; Pascal