Note 12 — BOOK II.—THE RENAISSANCE (Continued)

Melanchthon, preface to Luther's works: "It is clear that the works of Thomas, Scotus, and the like, are utterly silent about the element of justification by faith, and contain many errors concerning the most important questions relating to the church. It is clear that, the discourses of the monks in their churches almost throughout the world were either fables about purgatory and the saints or else some kind of dogma of law or discipline, without a word of the gospel concerning Christ, or else were vain trifles about distinctions in the matter of food, about feasts, and other human traditions.... The gospel is pure, incorruptible, and not diluted with Gentile opinions." See also Fox, "Acts and Monuments," 8 vols. ed. Townsend, 1843, II. 42.