grace, and that he may accompany your intentions and the diligence of those who shall study here, with his blessing." Among his friends in Nuremberg, he also numbered the celebrated painter, ALBERT DUeRER, whose heart was also with the work of the Reformation. He spent a few very pleasant days with him and the rest of his friends, but returned to Wittenberg in June. Important business awaited him there, but in the middle of July he was seized with a severe illness, and his physician considered his recovery doubtful; but the Lord could not spare him yet. In the beginning of the year 1526, he was formally appointed to deliver lectures on Theology, although he remonstrated against it. His salary was increased to 200 florins. But the most important duty in which he was engaged at that time was in participating in the visitation of the schools and churches in Saxony. It may well be imagined that these were in a miserable condition. The Apostolic doctrine, which was proclaimed in Wittenberg with Apostolical power, had not found an entrance everywhere. In some of the schools and churches they still pertinaciously adhered to the beaten path. In other quarters it was patchwork, a new patch upon an old garment. There was one case of a minister who preached the gospel in his principal church, but read mass in the under-parochial church where they required a different practice. The confusion in doctrine, church customs, and church treasuries was truly deplorable. Luther did not complain without reason: "Help, dear Lord, what frequent distress have I seen, because the common people, particularly in villages, know nothing at all of Christian doctrine, and it is but too true that many ministers are unskilful and unfit to teach. And yet all are called Christians, are baptized, and enjoy the holy sacraments, and do not even know the Lord's Prayer, or the Creed, or the Ten Commandments, and live on like the brutes...."