The firmness with which Luther fortified himself by Scripture gave great authority to his teaching, while other circumstances added to his power. His life corresponded to his words--his discourses were not merely from the life,[249] they came from the heart, and were exemplified in all his conduct. And when the Reformation burst forth many influential men, who were much grieved at seeing the rents that were made in the Church, won over by the Reformer's purity of conduct, and his admirable talents, not only did not oppose him, but even embraced the doctrine to which his works bore testimony.[250] The more they loved Christian virtue the more they inclined to the Reformer. All honest theologians were in his favour.[251] Such is the testimony of those who knew him, in particular of Melancthon, the wisest man of his age, and Erasmus, Luther's celebrated opponent. Yet prejudice has dared to speak of his debauchery. Wittemberg was changed by this preaching of faith, and became the focus of a light which was soon to illumine Germany, and diffuse itself over all the Church. [249] "Oratio non in labris nasci, sed in pectore." (Ibid.) [250] "Eique propter auctoritatem, quam sanctitate morum antea pepererat, adsenserunt." (Melancth. Vita Luth.) [251] "Puto et hodie theologos omnes probos favere Luthero." (Erasmi, Ep. i, 652.) In 1516, Luther published a treatise by an anonymous mystic theologian, (probably Ebland, priest at Frankfort,) entitled _German Theology_, wherein the author shows how man may attain perfection by the three methods of purification, illumination, and communion. Luther never plunged into mystical theology, but he received a salutary impression from it. It confirmed him in the disgust which he felt for dry scholastics--in his contempt for the works and observances so much dwelt upon by the Church--in his conviction of man's spiritual impotence, and of the necessity of grace, and in his attachment to the Bible. "To the schoolmen,"[252] wrote he to Staupitz, "I prefer the Mystics and the Bible;" thus placing the Mystics by the side of the inspired writers. Perhaps the _German Theology_ also assisted him in forming a sounder idea of the sacraments, and especially of the mass. For the author of that work insists that the Eucharist gives Christ to man, but does not offer Christ to God. Luther accompanied this publication with a preface, in which he declared, that next to the Bible and St. Augustine, there was no book he had ever met with, from which he had learned more respecting God, Christ, man, and all things. Already several doctors had begun to inveigh against the Professors of Wittemberg, and to accuse them of innovation. "One would suppose," continues Luther, "that there never were men before us who taught as we do; yea, verily, there were. But the wrath of God, which our sins have deserved, did not permit us to see them, and to hear them. For a long time the universities kept the word of God lying in a corner. Let