the instruction also in the
Catechism. Geiler's sermons on the Lord's Prayer were published. Gerson
admonished: "The reformation of the Church must begin with the young,"
and published sermons on the Decalog as models for the use of the
clergy. John Wolf also urged that the young be instructed, and
endeavored to substitute the Decalog for the prevalent catalogs of sins.
The Humanists John Wimpheling, Erasmus, and John Colet (who wrote the
_Catechyzon,_ which Erasmus rendered into Latin hexameters) urged the
same thing. Peter Tritonius Athesinus wrote a similar book of
instruction for the Latin schools. However, all of these attempts proved
ineffectual, and even if successful, they would have accomplished little
for truly Christian instruction, such as Luther advocated, since the
real essence of Christianity, the doctrine of justification, was unknown
to these reformers.

Thus in the course of time the people, and especially the young, grew
more and more deficient in the knowledge of even the simplest Christian
truths and facts. And bishops and priests, unconcerned about the ancient
canons, stolidly looked on while Christendom was sinking deeper and
deeper into the quagmire of total religious ignorance and indifference.
Without fearing contradiction, Melanchthon declared in his Apology:
"Among the adversaries there is no catechization of the children
whatever, concerning which even the canons give commands. ... Among the
adversaries, in many regions [as in Italy and Spain], during the entire
year no sermons are delivered, except in Lent." (325, 41.)

87. Medieval Books of Prayer and Instruction.

Concerning the aforementioned Catholic books of prayer and edification
which, during the Middle Ages, served the people as catechisms, Luther,
in his Prayer-Booklet of 1522 (which was intended to supplant the Romish
prayer-books), writes as follows: "Among many other harmful doctrines
and booklets which have seduced and deceived Christians and given rise
to countless superstitions, I do not consider as the least the
prayer-booklets, by which so much distress of confessing and enumerating
sins, such unchristian folly in the prayers to God and His saints was
inculcated upon the unlearned, and which, nevertheless, were highly
puffed with indulgences and red titles, and, in addition, bore precious
names, one being called _Hortulus Animae,_ the other _Paradisus Animae,_
and so forth. They are in sore need of a thorough and sound re