SOURCE: Meerhoff, Kees. “The Significance of Philip Melanchthon's Rhetoric in the Renaissance.” In Renaissance Rhetoric, edited by Peter Mack, pp. 46-62. New York: St. Martin's Press, 1994.

In the essay below, Meerhoff shows how Melanchthon applies the precepts of rhetoric to the task of reading and interpreting texts.

Magis affectibus quam argutiis.

Erasmus, Methodus

Since I am going to deal with so wide and complex a topic as ‘the significance of Philip Melanchthon's rhetoric in the renaissance’, I would prefer to begin with an analysis of an example from the huge corpus of Melanchton's writings, and to continue with a description of Melanchthon's teaching practice at the University of Wittenberg (Saxony), where students from all over Europe came to listen to this pale man with his awkward voice.

Philip Melanchthon played a major part in the reformation of the church, as an ally to Martin Luther, as a reformer...