The fact is, that, for all his sufferings and frequent temptations, Luther for a long while felt himself perfectly at ease in monasticism. In the fulness of his Catholic convictions he extolled the goodness of God, who, in His loving-kindness, had bestowed such spiritual blessings on him. In 1507 he wrote that he could never be thankful enough “for the goodness of God towards him, Who of His boundless mercy had raised him, an unworthy sinner, to the dignity of the priesthood.”[686] The elderly friend to whom he thus opened his heart was the same Johannes Braun, Vicar of the Marienstift at Eisenach, to whom he again gave an account of his welfare in 1509. To him he then wrote: “God is God; man is often, in fact nearly always, wrong in his judgments. God is our God, and will guide us sweetly through everlasting ages.”[687]—The inward joy which he found in the monastery gave him strength to bear his father’s displeasure. He not only pointed out to him that it was “a peaceful and heavenly life,”[688] but he even tried so to paint the happy life he led in his cell as to induce his friend and teacher Usingen to become an Augustinian too.[689] We may also recall his praise of his “preceptor” (i.e. novice master), whom he speaks of as a “dear old man” and “a true Christian under the damned frock.” He repeats some of his beautiful, witty sayings and was always grateful to him for his having lent him a copy, made by his own hand, of a work by St. Athanasius.[690] The exhortations addressed to him by Staupitz when he was worried by doubts and fears, for instance his excellent allusion to the wounds of Christ,[691] found an echo in Luther’s soul, and, in spite of his trouble of mind, brought him back to the true ideal of asceticism. We also know how he praised Usingen, his friend at Erfurt, as the “best paraclete and comforter,” and wrote to a despondent monk, that his words were helpful to troubled souls, provided always that they laid aside all self-will.[692] Hence, for a considerable part of his life in the monastery, Luther was not entirely deprived of consolations; apart from the darker side of his life, on which his legend dwells too exclusively, there was also a brighter side, and this is true particularly of his earlier years.