d not the spiritual and temporal powers combine to find some means
of meeting these difficulties without any such heathen practise? If the
people of Israel existed without this scandal, why should not a
Christian nation be able do so? How do so many towns and villages manage
to exist without these houses? Why should not great cities be able to do
so? . . . It is the duty of those in authority to see the good of their
subjects. But if those in authority considered how young people might be
brought together in marriage, the prospect of marriage would help every
man and protect him from temptations." (10, 349; transl. by Waring.)

This is the Luther of whom Catholic writers say that he would not be
considered qualified to sit with a modern Vice Commission.

But what about the many coarse references in Luther's writings to sexual
matters-references which are unprintable nowadays? Do these not show
that Luther was far from being even an ordinary gentleman, that he was
depraved in thought and vulgar nauseating, in speech whenever he
approached the subject of marriage and sexual conditions? We have just
cited a few of Luther's references to these matters. They are clean and
proper. We could fill pages with them, and they would prove most
profitable reading in our loose, profligate, and adulterous age. Those
other references which are also found in Luther's writings should be
studied in their connection. Leaving out of the account humorous
references and playful remarks, which only malice can twist into a
lascivious meaning, they are indignant and scornful expostulations with
the defenders and practisers of vice that flaunted its shame in the face
of the public. Righteous anger will give a person the courage to speak
out boldly and in no mincing words about things which otherwise nauseate
him. When Catholic writers cull from Luther vile and disgusting remarks
about sexual affairs, it should be investigated to whom Luther made
those remarks, and what reason he had for making them. There is another
side to this matter, and that concerns medieval Catholicism itself. We
have indicated in sundry places in this review the social conditions in
respect of the sex relations that existed under the spiritual
sovereignty of the Roman Church in Luther's day in the very city of
Rome, and had grown up and were being fostered by her leading men.
Luther's references to lustfulness are paraded as evidence of the lust
that was consuming him; they