preferred in whose writings facts and quotations had already undergone embellishment. In this wise the older popular literature came to attribute to Luther the strangest statements and to make complaints for which no foundation existed in fact. Incautious interpretation by more recent writers, whose training scarcely fitted them for the task and who might have learnt better by consulting Luther’s works and letters, has led to a still greater increase of the evil. In the following pages we propose to examine rather more narrowly certain statements which appear in the older and also more recent controversial works. _Had Luther three children of his own apart from those born of his union with Bora?_ By his wife Luther was father to five children, viz. Hans (1526), Magdalene (1529), Martin (1531), Paul (1533) and Margaret (1534). The paternity of another child born of a certain Rosina Truchsess, a servant in his house, has also been ascribed to him, it being alleged that his references to this girl are very compromising.[926] The latter assertion, however, does not hold good, if only we read the passages in an unprejudiced spirit; at most they prove that Luther allowed his kindliness to get the better of his caution in receiving into his house one who subsequently proved herself to be both untruthful and immoral, and that, when by her misconduct she had compromised her master and his family, he was exceedingly angry with her. It is incorrect to say that Rosina ever designated Luther as the father of her baby. The second child was one named Andreas, of whom Luther is said to have spoken as his son. This boy, however, has been proved to have been his nephew, Andreas Kaufmann, who was brought up in Luther’s family. Only through a mistake of the editor is he spoken of in the Table-Talk as “My Enders” and “My son”; later a fresh alteration of the text resulted in: “_filius meus Andreas_.”[927] The third child was said to have been referred to in the Table-Talk as an “_adulter infans_,” in a passage where mention is made of its having been suckled by Catherine during pregnancy. In Aurifaber’s Table-Talk (1569 edition) “_adulterum infantem_” is, however, a misprint for “_alterum infantem_,” which is the true reading as it appears in the first (1568) edition. It is true that the passage in question mentions of two of Luther’s own children, that his wife was already with child before the first had been weaned.[928] _Luther and Catherine Bora._