S VMM A RY AND CONCL US ION 405 



able to read the same books. The thought and the 

 education of the mediaeval craftsmen were not widely 

 diverse from those of other social groups. Albrecht 

 Diirer was a craftsman, and his wife sold his woodcuts on 

 the market-place. Ambrose Holbein and probably his 

 greater brother were members of the " Zunft zum 

 Himmel," a guild containing the painters, glaziers, 

 saddlers, and barbers of Basel. 1 Luther and his opponent 

 Eck were both peasants' sons. Yet these men were able 

 to grasp the thought and feeling of their day, while they 

 remained essentially of their own class. None of their 

 contemporaries thought of referring to them as exceptions 

 who had ' risen from the ranks ' to be leaders of men. 

 If the old socialistic mediaeval system with its guilds of 

 craftsmen made social life more homogeneous, we may 

 perhaps hesitate to approve of the spirit of the Reformers, 

 who, finding them centres of Catholic superstition, did 

 much to weaken or destroy what they should rather 

 have reformed. 2 As in the case of the monasteries, the 

 guild funds too often dropped into the private purse of 

 prince or noble. With the actors went the drama, of 

 which it has been well written that- 

 Such an age as ours will not understand the good which in a 

 moral and social point of view was bestowed upon this country by 

 the religious pageants, and pious plays and interludes of a bygone 

 epoch. Through such means, however, not only were the working- 

 classes furnished with a needful relaxation, but their very merry- 

 makings instructed while they diverted them. 3 



1 That the greatest painters of the Middle Ages were looked upon as craftsmen 

 is well shown by the letters of Erasmus (see Woltmann's Holbein, p. 317). 



2 Toulmin Smith, English Gilds, Introduction, p. xc. 



3 Rock, Church of our Fathers, vol. ii. p. 418. 



