The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1913-08-30

and astonishment with which he
read this strange book which, &C
cording to them, was destined to
exercise so profound an influence
on his subsequent career. They
allow their Imagination full scope
in picturing him porting over its
sacred pages, filing his soul with
the sweet JUNCTION of its inspiring
words and registering vow to
make its contents known to the
people in their own language.
Evidently they believe that
their readers or hearers are as
ignorant of the facts Of the case
as they themselves are, or pretend
to be. A little effort on their
part, if they are honest in their
desire to get at the facts, would
bring them to knowledge of the
truth. In many cases, they prefer
the darkness rather than the
light, because they need to be
unhampered by knowledge Of
facts in order to bait the Catholic
Church, and hold her up to the
gaze of their benighted followers
as the enemy of enlightenment
and progress.
Such an attitude does not take,
as it formerly did, among nom
Catholics, save where the results
of modern research and scholar
ship are unknown. Intelligent
on-Catholics have long ago dis
carded, among other relics of dis
credited history, the tabled story
of Luther's finding of the Bible
which can be traced to the I'M
scholarly work of Merle D'Aub-
igne, a renegade priest who, like
others of his kind, sought to justi-
| fly his own conduct by slandering
the Mother Church.
DIR. Maitland, Protestant his
torian, deals with this historical
romance in his work on "The
Dark Ages in the following
words: Really one hardly knows
how to meet such statements; but
will the reader be so good as to
remember that we are not now
talking of the Dark Ages, but of
period when the press had been
half century in operation; and
will he give a minutes reflection
to the following statement, which
[ believe to be correct, and which
cannot, / think, be so far mac
curate as to affect the argument?
To say nothing Of parts Of the
Bible, or of books whose place is
uncertain, we know of at least
twenty different editions Of the
whole Latin Bible printed in Ger
many only before Luther was born.
These had issued from Augsburg,
Strausburg, Cologne, Ulm, Mentz
(two), Balse (four), Nuremberg
(ten) and were dispersed
through Germany, | repeat, before
Luther was born; and | may remark
that before that event there was
a printing press at work in this
very town of Erfurth, where more
than twenty years after he is said
to have made his discovery. :
Some may ask what the Pope was
about all this time? Truly, one
would think he must have been
off his guard; but as to these Ger
man performances, he might have
found employment nearer home,
if he had looked for it. Before
Luther was born, the Bible was
printed in Rome, and the printers
had had the assurance to memo
rialize his Holiness, praying that
he would help them off with some
copies. 1t had been printed, too,
at Naples, Florence, and Placenza
and Venice alone had furnished
eleven editions. No doubt, we
should be within the truth, if we
were to say that, besides the null
titude of manuscript copies, not
yet fallen into disuse, the press
had issued fifty different editions
of the whole Latin Bible; to say
nothing Of Psalters, New Testa-
ments, or other parts. And yet,
more than twenty years after, we
find a young man who had re-
ceived a very liberal education,
who had made great proficiency
in his studies at Magdeburg, Eli
senbach, and Erfurth, and who,
nevertheless, did not know what
Bible was, simply because the
Bible was unknown in those
daysl'"
Mcneil in his History of Ger
many" confirms the statements
of DR.. Maitland when he says
Before the time of Luther, the
Bible had already been translated
and printed in both High and Low
Dutch. !" Seckendorf, Luther's
biographer and admirer, tells us
that "three distinct editions Of
the Bible translated into German,
were published at Wittenberg
(near Luther's birthplace) in
1470, 1883, and 1490-one of them
r A n.