Note 781 — Chapter VII

Apart from Luther, we have another example of the same kind in Gabriel Zwilling, who also left the Church, and of whom Luther says in a letter to Johann Lang at Erfurt (March 1, 1517, “Briefwechsel,” 1, p. 87 f.), that he was sending him to the Erfurt monastery in accordance with Staupitz’s directions, and that care was to be taken “ut conventualiter se gerat: scis enim quod necdum ritus et mores ordinis viderit aut didicerit.” Thus he had been allowed to live at Wittenberg without conforming to community rule, unless, indeed, we read the passage as implying that at the Wittenberg monastery no attention was paid to the rule by anybody.