(Fragment. )
A harsh statement about Erfurt.
From an old copy in J. E. Kappen's Reformation Documents, Th. 2, p. 747 and in De Wette, Vol. IV, p. 582.
Your Erfurt, as I see, thus struck and stunned by a fatal and sulfurous lightning, can, as he says, neither sleep when it is drunk, nor wake when it is awakened. God take care and make it not finally become Sodom and Capernaum, and He destroy this lightning of Satan by His better and stronger lightning.
3) Gemini.
No. 2107.
Without date 1534.
Concerns why loneliness to flee.
There are three different redactions of this concern, one Latin and two German, which Seidemann has excluded from De Wette, vol. VI, p. 155 ff. In terms of content, they coincide completely, and, as Förstemann, Tischreden, vol. III, p. 167, note, correctly remarks, both German redactions seem to have a common Latin text. - The Latin text is found in Manlii epistolarum D. Philippi Melanchtonis Farrago etc pag. 485 sq. and from it in De Wette-Seidemann, vol. VI, p. 155. - The one German text is found in the Trostschriften, Jena, Rödingers Erben, Bl. Giiijb ; in the Wittenberg edition (1559), vol. XII, Bl. 166; in the Jena (1568), vol. VI, p. 274; in the Altenburg, vol. VI, p. 336; in the Leipzig, vol. XXII, p. 376; in Walch, vol. XXI, 179*; in De Wette-Seidemann, vol. VI, p. 156; in Erlanger Ausgabe, vol. 65, p. 226 and (duplicate) vol. 60, p. 168, note (reprinted from Förstemann, vol. III, p. 166, note ). Also in Stangwald, p. 341. -The second German text, probably Aurifaber's translation, is found in all other editions of the Tischreden, Cap. 26, Z 82 (with the exception of St. Louis, where reference is made to vol. XXI). We give here a new translation of the Latin, and leave the two other German redactions as superfluous.
Exhortation to flee loneliness.
More and more serious sins are committed in solitude than in the company of people. Eve in Paradise was deceived by the serpent because she was lonely. Murder, robbery and theft are committed in solitude; there Satan is given space and opportunity. Then, too, one is ashamed to commit an outrage among many people or in the company of people. Christ promised that where two or three were gathered in his name, he would be in their midst. The devil tempted Christ in solitude. David fell into murder and adultery at the time when he was alone and idle. And I have learned that I have never fallen into sin more often than when I lived alone. God created man for companionship, not for solitude [as can be seen in the two sexes] 1) of rational beings and unreasonable animals. But man was created in such a way that there should be two of them at the same time, a male and a female, from whose
1) Here something is missing in the Latin redaction, which we have added after the first German one.
Before God gathers an eternal church. And Almighty God has ordained, not for the sake of solitude, but for the sake of the gatherings of people, the sacraments and the holy sermons in the Church, from which lasting consolation is drawn. But loneliness, on the other hand, produces the most evil sadness, and whatever may come to our mind, we consider everything evil extremely carefully. And if there is anything unpleasant in our affairs, we make it extremely great for ourselves, and, as if no one were more unhappy, we invent for ourselves the worst outcome of all things. In short, we deduce one thing from another and interpret all this in the worst way. On the other hand, we imagine that others are exceedingly happy, and we torment ourselves very much that they are doing well, but we are doing badly.
No. 2108.