such, but attacked instead the prevailing educational system, which
they held to be responsible for the widespread ignorance and general
decline of the religious spirit. Many of the leading German scholars
were exemplary in their moral character and in their loyalty to the
Church, and few, even of those who were regarded as hostile, showed
any sympathy with Luther once they understood that he aimed at revolt
rather than reform.

Some of the greatest of the German Humanists differed from their
Italian contemporaries also in the fact that they turned the
intellectual revival into scientific channels, and made the study of
the classics subservient to mathematical and astronomical research.
Cardinal Nicholas of Cusa (1400-64), George Peurbach of Vienna (d.
1461), John Muller of Konigsberg (1436-76), better known by his Latin
name Regiomontanus, and the great churchman and astronomer Copernicus
(1473-1543) belonged to this section, which prepared the way for
modern scientific developments. With these men religion and science
went hand in hand.

On the purely literary side the most famous of the German Humanists
were Conrad Celtes (1459-1508) the most active of the promoters of the
classical revival beyond the Alps and one of the earliest of the
German poets; Pirkeimer (1470-1528), who hoped for great things from
the Lutheran movement at first, but having realised its real nature
remained loyal to the Church; Mutianus Rufus (1471-1526), a canon of
Gotha and at the same time a well-known free-thinker; Grotus Rubeanus
(1480-1504), who at first favoured Luther; Jakob Wimpheling (1450-
1528), and Johannes Trithemius (1462-1516), the learned historian and
abbot of Sponheim; Ulrich von Hutten (1488-1523), and Johann Reuchlin
(1455-1522).