The “Wyhegertlin,” printed at Mayence in 1509, says: “When work is done diligently and skilfully both God and man take pleasure in it, and it is a real good work when skilful artisans contribute to God’s glory by their handicraft, by beautiful buildings and images of every kind, and soften men’s hearts so that they take pleasure in the beautiful, and regard every art and handicraft as a gift of God for the profit, comfort and edification of man.”—“For seeing that the Saints also worked and laboured, so shall the Christian learn from their example that by honourable labour he can glorify God, do good and, through God’s mercy, save his own soul.”[195] In an “Ermanung” of 1513, which also appeared at Mayence, we read: “To work is to serve God according to His command and therefore all must work, the one with his hands, in the field, the house or the workshop, others by art and learning, others again as rulers of the people or other authorities, others by fighting in defence of their country, others again as ghostly ministers of Christ in the churches and monasteries.… Whoever stands idle is a despiser of God’s commands.”[196] These instances must suffice. Though many others could be quoted, Protestants will, nevertheless, still be found to repeat such statements as the following: “Any appreciation of secular work as something really moral was impossible in the Catholic Church.” “The Catholic view of the Church belittled the secular callings.” “The ethical appreciation of one’s calling is a significant achievement of the reformation on which rests the present division of society.” Luther it was who “discovered the true meaning of callings … which has since become the property of the civilised world.” “The modern ethical conception of one’s calling, which is common to all Protestant nations and which all others lack, was a creation of the reformation,” etc. Others better acquainted with the Middle Ages have argued, that, though the olden theologians expressed themselves correctly on the importance of secular callings, yet theirs was not the view of the people.—But the above passages, like those previously quoted elsewhere, do not hail from theologians quite ignorant of the world, but from sermons and popular writings. What they reflect is simply the popular ideas and practice. That errors were made is, of course, quite true. That, at a time when the Church stood over all, the excessive and ill-advised zeal of certain of the clergy and religious did occasionally lead them to belittle unduly the secular callings may readily be admitted; what they did furnished some excuse for the Lutheran reaction. What above all moved Luther was, however, the fact that he himself had become a layman. To assert that even the very words “calling” or “vocation” in their modern sense were first coined by him is not in agreement with the facts of the case.