A sculptured
chair, the back of which is carved into a cherub's head, bending
forward and shadowing with its wings the head of the sitter, was said
to be of the time of Luther, but not _his_ chair. There were some
of his books, and a rude, iron-studded clothes press.
Thus ended for me the Lutheran pilgrimage. I had now been
perseveringly to all the shrines, and often inquired of myself whether
our conceptions are helped by such visitations. I decided the question
in the affirmative; that they are, if from the dust of the present we
can recreate the past, and bring again before us the forms as they
then lived, moved, and had their being. For me, I seem to have seen
Luther, Cranach, Melanchthon, and all the rest of them--to have talked
with them. By the by, I forgot to mention the portraits of Luther's
father and mother, which are in his cell. They show that his
_mother_ was no common woman. She puts me in mind of the mother
of Samuel J. Mills--a strong, shrewd, bright, New England character.
I must not forget to notice, too, a little glitter of effect--a
little, shadowy, fanciful phase of feeling--that came over me when in
Luther's cell at Erfurt.
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