There was grave peril to himself in that sort of spiritualism, thanks to which he so frequently attributes all his doings to the direct inspiration and guidance of Almighty God; real and enlightened dependence on God is something very different; again, there was danger in his perverted interpretation of the teaching of the mystics of the past, in his exaggeration of the strength of man’s sinful concupiscence and neglect of the remedies prescribed in ages past, particularly of the practices of his own Order, also in his passionate struggles against the so-called holiness-by-works prevalent among the Augustinians, in his characteristic violence and tendency to pick a quarrel, and, above all, in the working of his inordinate self-esteem and unbounded appreciation of his own achievements as the leader of the new movement, which led him to exalt himself above all divinely appointed ecclesiastical authority. In the above we were obliged to hark back to Luther’s earlier days, and this we shall again have to do in the following pages. The truth is, that many of the secrets of his earlier years can be explained only in the light of his later life, whilst, conversely, his youth and years of ripening manhood assist us in solving some of the riddles of later years. Hence we cannot be justly charged with repeating needlessly incidents that have already been related. * * * * * Just as the Wartburg witnessed the strongest temptations that Luther had ever to bear, so, too, it formed the stage of certain of those manifestations from the other world of which he fancied himself the recipient. Such manifestations, which lead one to wonder whether Luther suffered from hallucinations, are of frequent occurrence in his story. We shall now proceed to review them in their entirety. 3. Ghosts, Delusions, Apparitions of the Devil In investigating the many ghostly apparitions with which Luther believed he had been favoured, our attention is perforce drawn to the Wartburg. We must, however, be careful to distinguish the authentic traditions from what has been unjustifiably added thereto. As to the explaining and interpreting of such testimonies as have a right to be regarded as historical, that will form the matter of a special study. In order that the reader may build up an opinion of his own we shall meanwhile only set on record what the sources say, the views of those concerned being given literally and unabridged. This method, essential though it be for the purposes of an unbiassed examination, has too often been set aside, recourse being had instead to mere assertions, denials and pathological explanations. _The Statements Concerning Luther’s Intercourse with the Beyond_