Page:A history of the Inquisition of the Middle Ages, volume 2.djvu/439

JOHN REUCHLIN. ^oo of Germany, who were shocked at this treatment of a man so emment and distinguished. Yet his writings survived him and proved greatly encouraging to the early Reformers. Melanchthon enumerates him among those who by their works kept up the contmuity of the Church of Christ.* It is evident from this case that the Inquisition, though not extmet m Germany, was not in working order, and that even where It existed nominaUy a special effort was requisite to make It function. Still we hear occasionally of the appointment of in- quisitors and from the career of Sprenger we know that their la- bors could be fruitfully directed to the extirpation of witchcraft Sorcery, indeed, had become the most threatening heresy S the time, and other spiritual aberrations were attractfng httle atten TlJMt' 'f "'".*' '!**"* ^"'^^ ^y "^-^ Sy'^od °f Bamberg," in 1491, the section devoted to heresy dwells at much length on the details of witchcraft and magic, and mentions only one oZ doctrinal error-the vitiation of sacraments in polluted hands and It directs that all who neglect to denounce heretics are to^ nSZ *"stm 2 '"°"^"^^' '"* "^^^^^ - allusion t^^th inquisition. Still there is an occasional manifestation showing that inquisitors existed and sometimes exercised their powm I shall hereafter have occasion to refer to the case of Herml of Ryswick, who was condemned and abjured in 1499 escapeifrom Cue i^'lsT '71 ^^ii^^^^^P-^ 'y '^^ inq;S;rft'Tr ^'^::^:^^ *^ " '-^ - - -^^- of co. The persecution of John Reuohlin, like that of John of Wesel sprang from scholastic antagonisms, but its development lows Germa„,r ^f ti, ^™amsts, and the foremost representative in Teriv Shtb n'" '""^' ^' ""^ '""^^^'^^ ^ bitter contro- versy with the Dominicans, who, as traditional Thomists werp ready to do battle tott^deathfor^chola^sm. TtetlooZ lanchthon Tr' ^^^J^-Conf- Ursperg. Chron. Continuat. ann. 1479 -Me lanchthon. Respons. ad Bavar. luquis., Witeberg^e, 1559, Si^ B 3 tRipoll IV. 5.— Synod Bambero- ,„n UQi th a, rr ^ Oerm. 1. 1242^4).-D-Argeutr6 Xn'sir' ' ^"'"'« '"'P"' ^^^'