[158] An untranslatable pun: _non iustitia sed inscitia_. [159] Page 244. [160] See p. 263, note 2. [161] Page 242. [162] The following points need to be borne in mind in order to a fair evaluation of this much criticized section: (1) What is here given is in the nature of advice to confessors, and the one guiding principle is the relief of souls in peril. (2) It must not be forgotten that Luther wrote the treatise in Latin, and not for the general public. There is without doubt a certain betrayal in turning into the vernacular a passage written in the language of the learned. Yet we have done this, being unwilling to all under the charge of giving a garbled version. (3) The hindrance Luther is here discussing was one recognized and provided or by the Church of Rome, and the remedy suggested by him was prescribed by the German _Volksrecht_ in many localities. (4) Divorce was absolutely forbidden. (5) Luther's error grew out of an unhistorical interpretation of the Old Testament, and consisted in his undervaluing the importance of the public law. "To make the individual conscience the sole arbiter in matters belonging to public law, leads to dangerous consequences." (See Kawarau, _Berlin Ed._, II, 482 f., where references are given.) [163] As he actually did in the case of Henry VIII and Philip of Hesse. [164] See above, p. 269, note 1. [165] Page 271. [166] An allusion to the act that what he is writing is a "Prelude." See Introduction, p. 168. [167] _Contra epistolam Manichaei_, 5, 6 (Migne, XLII, 176). Cf. below, p. 451. [168] _De trinitate_, 9, 6, 10 (Migne, VIII, 966). [169] See below, pp. 451 ff. [170] The council that condemned and burned John Hus (1414-1418). [171] Dionysius Areopagita, the pseudonym (cf. Acts 17:54) of the unknown author (about 500, in Syria?) of the neoplatonic writings, _Of the Celestial_, and _Of the Ecclesiastical Hierarchy_, etc. [172] William Durandus the elder, died 1296. [173] The Franciscan Bonaventura (†1274) in his _De reductione artium ad theologiara_. [174] Donatus (ab. 350 A.D.), a famous Latin grammarian, whose _Ars minor_ was a favorite mediæval text-book. The chancellor of the University of Paris, John Gerson († 1429), published a _Donatus moralisatus seu per allegoriam traductus_--a mystical grammar, in which the noun was compared to man, the pronoun to man's sinful state, the verb to the divine command to love, the _adverb_ to the fulfilment of the divine law, etc. [175] See above, p. 190. [176] The so-called _character indelebilis_, the peculiar gift of ordination, so that "once a priest, always a priest." See above, p. 68, note 5. [177] See above, pp. 178 ff. [178] The stated daily prayers, fixed by canon, of the clergy. The seven hours are respectively: matins (including noctums and lauds), prime, tierce, sext, nones, vespers, and compline.