LEONHAKD FUCHS — NEUMANN. 637 



only 5 years of age, the credit for his education belongs to his mother. 

 He first attended school in the town of his birth, and must have 

 manifested exceptional ability and zeal for learning even at that early 

 age, for he was only 10 years old when his mother, who evidently was 

 in good circumstances, sent him to Heilbronn, in Wiirtemberg, to 

 a school which had w^on a great reputation under a certain Conrad as 

 head master, who instructed in Latin and read with his pupils the 

 comedies of Terence' and the odes of Horace. Here he made such 

 rapid progress within a year that it was thought advisable to send 

 him to the St. Maria School at Erfurt in Thuringia. There he re- 

 mained a 3"ear and. a half and distinguished himself to such a degree 

 that he was able to enter the University at Erfurt when in his thir- 

 teenth year. He pursued his studies with the same eagerness and suc- 

 cess as before, and the baccalaureate degree was conferred upon him. 

 He was also given an appointment as instructor in the same institu- 

 tion. He returned to his home town for a short interval and, al- 

 though very young, conducted a school with great success. But his 

 ambition and zeal for learning was not satisfied, and in 1519 he be- 

 took himself to the University at Ingolstadt, Bavaria, where he 

 studied philology and philosophy. The University of Ingolstadt 

 since its foundation in 1472 had taken a prominent part in the dis- 

 semination of humanism ^ and had counted among its teachers 

 scholars of the highest scientific reputation, among them none more 

 famous than Johann Reuchlin, perhaps the greatest of the humanists, 

 the resuscitator of Hebrew and Greek learning, and who is rightly 

 called " the Father of the Reformation." This great man was one 

 of the chief teachers of Leonhard Fuchs, with whom he studied 

 Greek, Hebrew, Latin, and philosophy. Another teacher of high 

 standing was Jacobus Ceporinus, who was also his instructor in 

 these three languages. In 1521, when 20 years of age, Fuchs finished 

 his studies, after having received his master's degree. 



During this period he acquainted himself with the writings of 

 Martin Luther and accepted his doctrines, a fact which had great 

 influence on his life. Indeed, it is not impossible that the acceptance 

 of the new creed led him to the study of medicine. His critical mind 

 was awakened and sharpened ; he was essentially a man of facts, al- 

 though still very young. For three years he studied medicine at the 

 University of Ingolstadt, but he did not neglect his classical studies, 

 which enabled him to read fluently and to understand thoroughly 

 the noted Greek writers and made him one of the best Latin writers 

 of the sixteenth century. On March 1, 1524, he acquired the degree 

 of doctor of medicine, then moved to Munich where he practiced his 

 profession successfully. His residence in Munich, where he married 



' Baueh, Gustav. Die Anfange des Humanismus in Ingolstadt, Miinchen, R. Oldon- 

 bourg, 1901. 



