The Conservative Reformation and Its Theology - Saint Mary ...

“A better tone" (in preaching) "began with Luther. His language
was sometimes rude and low, but persuasive, artless, powerful. He gave
many useful precepts, as well as examples, for pulpit eloquence.”--"In the
history of the Reformation, Luther is incomparably the greatest name. We
see him, in the skilful composition of Robertson, the chief figure of a group
of gownsmen, standing in contrast on the canvas with the crowned rivals
of France and Austria, and their attendant warriors, but blended in the
unity of that historic picture. It is admitted on all sides, that he wrote his
own language with force, and he is reckoned one of its best models. The
hymns in use with the Lutheran Church, many of which are his own,
possess a simple dignity and devoutness never probably excelled in that
class of poetry, and alike distinguished from the poverty of Sternhold or
Brady, and from the meretricious ornament of later writers."--"It is not to
be imagined that a man of his vivid parts fails to perceive an advantage in
that close grappling, sentence by sentence, with an adversary, which fills
most of his controversial writings; and in scornful irony he had no
superior." 74
74 Literature of Europe, vol. i., p. 197. The great currency which Hallam's name gives to any view he expresses,
would make it well worth while for some one competent to the task, to review all his charges against Luther, and
positive Evangelical Protestantism, as has been done, so ably, on some points, by Archdeacon Hare. An instance of
the knowing air with which a man ignorant of his subject may write about it, occurs in the following sentence (i.
278): "' After the death of Melanchthon, a controversy, began by one Brentius, relating to the ubiquity, as it was
called, of Christ's body, proceeded with much heat." "One Milton. a blind man," has grown into a classic illustration
of happy appreciation of character. "One Brentius" ought to contest a place with it. Brentius, whose name, in the
department of polemic theology, is mentioned next that of Luther and of Melanchthon in the early history of the
Reformation- Brentius, who stood so high in the judgment of Luther himself,. one of the acutest judges of character,
to whom Luther applied terms of commendation which seemed so near an approach to flattery, that he felt it
necessary to protest that he is speaking in godly sincerity, whom he compared, in relation to himself, to the "still
small voice following the whirlwind, earthquake, and fire"- Brentius, whose contributions to sacred interpretation not
only stood in the highest repute in his own land, but several of which had sufficient reputation to lead to their
translation in England, (as, for instance, his "Arguments and Summaries," translated by John Calcaskie, London,
1550; his Commentary on Esther, by John Stockwood, London, 1554; his Homilies and Exegesis on John, by
Richard Shirry, London, 1550;) and whose writings are still consulted with delight by the scholar, and republished -
such a man could not have had such a seal of insignificance attached to his name by any other than a writer ignorant
at least of this part of his theme.