Still,  if  no  priest,  there  was  about  him  all  the  gravity  of
the  German  as  distinguished  from  the  Italian  humanist.  He
threw  the  whole  energy  of  his  mind,  especially  in  later  life,
into  a  certain  kind  of  theology.  His  only  heresy  was  that
of  the  scholar,  who  is  suspected  of  wandering  in  forbidden
paths  as  soon  as  he  passes  out  of  sight  of  the  vulgar.  He
did  not  scruple,  for  instance,  to  point  out  errors  in  the  Vul-
gate, appealing  from  it  to  the  Hebrew  original,  and,  when
reproved,  nobly  replying,  "  I  revere  St.  Jerome  as  an  angel ;
I  respect  De  Lyra  as  a  master,  but  I  adore  truth  as  a  God."
So,  too,  his  Cabbalistic  studies  brought  him  into  a  certain
kind  of  disrepute.  Greek,  as  the  language  of  schismatics,  was
abhorred  of  monkish  theologians,  how  much  more  Hebrew,  the
tongue  of  an  accursed  race  ?  Otherwise  he  stood  high  in
,  general  esteem.  The  Emperor  ennobled  him,  giving  him  a
grant  of  arms.  Men  spoke  well  of  him  as  a  lawyer  and  a
diplomatist.  All  scholars,  both  in  Italy  and  in  Germany,  were
his  friends,  looking  'upon  him  as  a  light  of  modern  erudition.
A  little  later  Ulrich  von  Hutten  coupled  him  with  Erasmus
as  "  the  two  eyes  of  Germany,"  "  to  whom  we  owe  it  that  this
nation  has  ceased  to  be  barbarous."

Eeuchlin's  contributions  to  the  humanist  literature  of  the
time  were  neither  large  nor  particularly  valuable.  At  the
very  beginning  of  his  career  he  had  been  the  author  of  a
Latin  dictionary,  afterwards  he  wrote  two  comedies  in  Latin,  on
one  of  which,  Sergius,  Hieronymus  Emser  lectured  at  Erfurt
in  1504^;  nor  was  he,  in  truth,  an  elegant  Latinist.  The
more  graceful  qualities  of  scholarship  he  did  not  possess.
