t age, and he
entered a Dominican convent, as Luther, a few years later, entered an
Augustinian. But he was not an original genius, or a bold and
independent thinker like Luther, so he was not emancipated from the
ideas of his age. How few men can go counter to prevailing ideas! It
takes a prodigious genius, and a fearless, inquiring mind, to break away
from their bondage. Abraham could renounce the idolatries which
surrounded him, when called by a supernatural voice; Paul could give up
the Phariseeism which-reigned in the Jewish schools and synagogues, when
stricken blind by the hand of God; Luther could break away from monastic
rules and papal denunciation, when taught by the Bible the true ground
of justification,--but Savonarola could not. He pursued the path to
heaven in the beaten track, after the fashion of Jerome and Bernard and
Thomas Aquinas, after the style of the Middle Ages, and was sincere,
devout, and lofty, like the saints of the fifth century, and read his
Bible as they did, and essayed a high religious life; but he was stern,
gloomy, and austere, emaciated by fasts and self-denial. He had,
however, those passive virtues which Mediaeval piety ever
enjoined,--yea, which Christ himself preached upon the Mount, and which
Protestantism, in the arrogance of reason, is in danger of losing sight
of,--humility, submission, and contempt of material gains. He won the
admiration of his superiors for his attainments and his piety, being
equally versed in Aristotle and the Holy Scriptures. He delighted most
in the Old Testament heroes and prophets, and caught their sternness and
invective.

He was not so much interested in dogmas as he was in morals. He had
not, indeed, a turn of mind for theology, like Anselm and Calvin; but he
took a practical view of the evils of society. At thirty years of age he
began to preach in Ferrara and Florence, but was not very successful.
His sermons at first created but little interest, and he sometimes
preached to as few as twenty-five people. Probably he was too rough and
vehement to suit the fastidious ears of the most refined city in Italy.
People will not ordinarily bear uncouthness from preachers, however
gifted, until they have earned a reputation; they prefer pretty and
polished young men with nothing but platitudes or extravagances to
utter. Savonarola seems to have been discouraged and humiliated at his
failure, and was sent to preach to the rustic villagers, amid the
mount