1. good books, and the little, you should read often.
2. from comedies.
3. of various arts and crafts.
4. of the infidelity of craftsmen.
5. from the painters.
6. the art of the seig.
7. from the exercise with singing and fencing.
1. good books, and the little, you should read often.
(The first paragraph Cordatus No. 1138.)
A student who does not want to lose his effort should read and reread any good writer in such a way that it becomes second nature to him. For useless reading [lectiones -- lectures] confuses, but does not teach. Likewise, reading many but good things makes the student one who is at home everywhere, and therefore nowhere. And just as in human society we do not cultivate friendship with every single friend every day, but with select ones, so it should be in study.
Anno 1538, on the 15th day of August, a fine, skilful student fell into madness, worked and made himself weak and unwell with constant waking and talking. The cause of his illness was that he had lain too much over the books and was fond of a maiden. With the latter, D. Martin Luther dealt with her in the most friendly way, waited for her to get better, and said: "That love was the cause of his illness, but study would bring this effect and effect in very few; just as something similar had happened to him in the beginning of the Gospels.
He told an example of a student who had been his room-mate in Erfurt for two years. He said that he did not look at a book, but at last, since he had been admonished so often to stop for a full week, when he had done so and had sat for half an hour looking at the book, he got up, became angry, threw the book on the ground, stepped on it with his feet, and said, "Do you want to make me foolish? Studeo, Studes, Studui, Studere habet Stultum in Supino: Studiren macht zu Narren.
2. from comedies.
(Cordatus No. 1709.)
Comedies must be recited by the boys, first, so that they have practice in the Latin language; then the people are instructed by the fictional characters, and each is reminded of his office. Moreover, the cunning plots of immoral women are set forth, and how parents should exalt their children in honor, and how children should obey their parents in it. And if the comedies should not be performed among Christians because of some offensive [obscoena] things, the Bible should not be read either. But he who takes offense at such things takes offense where no one gives it.
(This paragraph in Lauterbach, May 29, 1538, p. 89.)
I like the comedies of the Romans, whose main purpose was to encourage young people to marry. For the world regiment cannot exist without the marriage state. That is why those reasonable people enticed the youth to marriage in the best possible way by means of comedies, as well as by means of pictures; for fornication and a life without marriage are the ruin of the state.
3. of various feats and crafts.
(Lauterbach, Aug. 4, 1538, p. 107.)
After that, the Fugger was shown handwriting that changed the letters in various ways so that no one could read it. He said: This is invented by the best minds, and is caused by very evil times, as one reads of Julius Caesar, that he also used such letters. And it is said that our Emperor Carl because of the infidelity
He said that he always writes two letters to his scribes on important matters, which have opposite meanings, and then he secretly seals one of them without them knowing.
4. of the infidelity of craftsmen.
(Lauterbach, Aug. 4, 1538, p. 111.)
He said a lot about the proud behavior and carelessness of the craftsmen, who had too little care and too much pay. I have enough cloth, but I don't want to have pants made. I have mended this pair of pants four times myself, and I will mend them even more before I have new ones made, because it is not diligence: it takes a lot of fabric, but gives no chic. That's why they have it very well arranged in Italy, where the tailors have a special guild that only makes pants. Here they cast pants, dusters, skirts, everything in one mold.
5. from painters.
In 1539, February 9, Luther spoke of German painters, how skillful and meaningful they were, because they could follow and imitate nature so masterfully and actually in paintings, that they not only give the right natural color and shape to all limbs, but also the gesture, as if they lived and moved.
Flanders follows and imitates them to a certain extent; for the Dutch, especially the Flemings, are mischievous and cunning, and soon and easily learn foreign languages.
They have a nimble and ready tongue, and if you were to take a flaming in a sack through Italy or France, he would soon learn the language.
6. the art of the seig.
(Cordatus No. 968.)
Wonderful is the invention of a clock that tells the time so accurately. If it could talk, it would really have the office of a human being.
7. exercise with singing and fencing.
It is, said D. M. Luther, very well considered and ordered by the ancients that the people exercise themselves, and intend something honest and useful, so that they do not get into revelry, fornication, eating, drinking and playing. That is why I like these two exercises and amusements best of all, namely musica and jousting, with fencing, wrestling 2c., among which the first drives away the sorrow of the heart and melancholy thoughts; the other makes fine dexterous limbs on the body, and keeps it in health with jumping 2c. The final cause is also that one does not get into carousing, fornication, gambling and doubling; as one sees now, unfortunately, in courts and in cities, there is no more, because: It's up to you! Drink up! After that, people gamble for several hundred or more guilders. So it goes, if one despises such honorable exercises and knightly games and lets them go.