Acta Academiae Lovaniensis Contra Lvthervm

Abstract

At the time when Erasmus’ reform programme, which we have considered in connection with the Dialogus bilinguium ac trilinguium, was bringing him into conflict with the monks and theologians, the situation was made much more difficult for him by the appearance of Martin Luther on the stage of Christendom. The reform movement led by the friar of Wittenberg was to bring about a crisis in the life of Erasmus, as in that of the Catholic Church — a crisis scarcely more welcome to the one than to the other. The relation of Erasmus to Luther has been much discussed ¹). For long an enigma, because of the apparent impossibility of understanding a middle-course policy in the absorbing struggle of the sixteenth century, his conduct has at last found adequate interpretation by modern scholars ²). The problem was rendered more difficult by the efforts of Erasmus himself to cover up the traces of his activity during the critical years before Worms. The three Reformation tracts, the Acta, the Axiomata and the Consilium cuiusdam, are therefore of great value as aids in determining his actual policy at that time.