On the Life and Missions of Jacobus Andreae for the Reformation of the Lutheran Church, Part I

of the sons whom the father had left surviving, only Jacobus had gained celebrity for himself.

e) year 1539.

The hope that Jacobus could cherish was not very promising, as his resources were so meager that his course of studies could scarcely be sustained. It seemed better to his father, therefore, to destine him for a mechanical trade by which he might sustain his life, rather than to cherish a long hope and occupy himself with the many complications of letters. Therefore, the father commended his son to a certain carpenter, a citizen of Waiblingen e, but having been importuned by Sebastian Mader, a citizen of Waiblingen, he was called back to cultivate his letters.

That example taught how much Prince Ulricus had commended himself to the citizens, for he judged that ecclesiastical revenues should be applied in such a way that he might take care of nourishing students of the liberal arts for the use of the church. Thus, the Reformation was to prove useful to the citizens, and it increased the hope of civil convenience, through which the Prince obtained the favor of the people. Therefore, serving the needs of his own municipality, Waiblingen interceded through the Senate with letters written to the Noble Georgius ab Owe and to Erhardus Snepfius, the leaders of the Stuttgart church. In this way, excellent provision was made for the affairs of Jacobus, which fell into the hands of men to whom he owed a great deal throughout his entire life. Snepfius, thinking that the genius of the ten-year-old boy should be tested above all else, examined him and found him completely unpolished and still entirely ignorant of Latin, but in other respects lovable and showing sparks of a genius that was not to be despised. He sought the cause of the boy's meager progress not in the boy, but in the tutor, who had not done his duty. Therefore, Snepfius judged to Georgius ab Owe that the boy could be destined for letters, and thus they decided to write back to the Waiblingen Senate that they should contribute seven florins for a year to Jacobus from the ecclesiastical revenues which Ulricus had granted to the people of Waiblingen, while the father himself would provide the remaining subsidies for his letters, and send the boy to the Stuttgart pedagogy school/preparatory academy at Marcoleon.

e) year 1539.