Identifier: martinluthermanh00mcgi (find matches)
Title: Martin Luther, the man and his work
Year: 1911 (1910s)
Authors: McGiffert, Arthur Cushman, 1861-1933
Subjects: Luther, Martin, 1483-1546
Publisher: New York, The Century Co.
Contributing Library: Princeton Theological Seminary Library
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN

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consider my own weak-ness, how I eat and drink, and at times am merry anda good table companion, I begin to be in doubt. Onanother occasion, when entertaining some of his col-leagues at dinner, he called the companys attentionto a large wine-glass encircled with three rings. Thefirst, he said, represented the Ten Commandments, thesecond the Creed, and the third the Lords Prayer.Having emptied it at a single draft, he filled it againand passed it to Agricola, something of a fanatic onthe subject of faith, who was able to get no furtherthan the Ten Commandments, to Luthers greatamusement. Beer and wine he partook of freely, as was the cus-tom of his countrymen, and his table conversationmay often have been less restrained in consequence;but his enemies exaggerated when they accused him ofbeing a hard drinker. While he never criticized themoderate use of wine and beer, he always severelydenounced over-indulgence in them, not sparing evenhis own elector, John Frederick, who, with all his
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Painted by Lucas Cranach BUGENHAGEN, 153; HOME LIFE 301 piety, was prone to frequent intoxication. Accordingto Melanchthon, Luther was always abstemious bothin food and drink, and often, when absorbed in work,fasted completely for days at a time. An immoderatedrinker, at any rate, he certainly was not. Had hebeen, he could not possibly have kept up year afteryear, day in and day out, to the very end of his life,his tremendous and unremitting labors. Almost super-human they seem, as we look back upon them. Onlya man of extraordinary self-control and constant con-centration of purpose could have accomplished whathe did. Despite his public labors, which continued unabated,Luther showed himself no little of a family man. Hedid considerable gardening, and took a great interestin getting rare plants from distant parts of the country.Not long after his marriage he wrote Spalatin: I haveplanted a garden and dug a well, and both have turnedout successfully. Come, and you shall be crownedwith l

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