Since the days of Alexander of Hales, Albert the Great, and Thomas Aquinas the Roman Church teaches that there is in the Church a treasury of supererogatory works, that is, of good works which Christ and the saints have performed in excess of what is ordinarily demanded of every man in the way of upright living.  We shall meet with this idea again in another connection.  It flows from the monastic principles.  Monks must have not only enough sanctity for their own needs, but to spare.  Of this superfluous sanctity they may make an assignment in favor of others.  Do not smile incredulously; monks actually make such assignments.  Luther may not have thought of this when he entered the cloister, but he rejoiced in this scheme of substitutive sanctity later.  He thought he had found in monkery a gold-mine of holiness that would be sufficient not only for himself, but also for his parents.  While at Rome some years later, he was in a way sorry that his father and mother were not already in purgatory.  He had such a fine chance there to accumulate supererogatory good works which he might have transferred to them to shorten their agonies, or release them entirely.

In order to make a successful monk, one must be either a Pharisee or an epicurean.  The Pharisee takes an inventory of the works named in the Law of God, and sets out to perform these in an external, mechanical manner.  He adds a few works of his own invention for good measure.  Every work performed counts; it constitutes merit.  On the basis of his two pecks and a half of merit the Pharisee now begins to drive a bargain with God:  for so much merit he claims so much distinction and glory.  He figures it all out to God, so that God shall not make a mistake at the time of the settlement:  I have not been this, nor that, nor the other thing; I have done this, and that, and some more.  Consequently . . . !  The epicurean is a jolly fatalist.  Whatever is to happen will happen.  Why worry?  Go along at an even pace; eat, drink, be merry, but for Heaven’s sake do not take a serious or tragical view of anything!  Take things as they are; if you can improve them, well and good; if not, let it pass; forget it; eat a good meal and go to sleep.

Luther was never an epicurean.  The seriousness of life had confronted him at a very early date.  The sense of duty was highly developed in him from early youth.  In all that he did he felt himself as a being that is responsible to his Maker and Judge.  Easy-going indifference and ready self-pity were not in his character.  For this Luther is now faulted by Catholics.  It is said he extended the rigors of monasticism beyond the bounds of reasonableness.  He was too severe with himself.  He outraged human nature.  Quite correct; but is not monasticism by itself an outrage upon human nature?  Luther had endured the monastery for the very purpose of enduring hardness.  He did not flinch when the battle into which he had gone commenced in earnest.