There is no debating the truth of the Pythagorean theorem; but questions like whether to choose this alliance or that, to make war or peace, to marry or remain single, to invest in a certain business or not, can be decided only by choosing between alternatives that seem more or less probable. Practical moral judgments involving everyday experience, not the Pythagorean theorem, constitute the real business of life. Humanistic education, offering special attention to the making of probable decisions and moral choices, seemed far more practical, far better suited to the human condition, than training in speculative and scientific questions...Poetry was indeed more practical than physics; and the fact that this sounds strange to the modern ear may not rest entirely on our possessing a better understanding of physics. It may also reflect the spiritual, ethical, and social poverty of the modern world (Charles G. Nauert, Humanism and the Culture of Renaissance Europe, 2nd ed., p. 16).
Luther and Humanism, see Charles G. Nauert, Humanism and the Culture of Renaissance Europe, 2nd ed., p. 140ff.
Humanist skills and interest were prominent among Erfurt Augustinians on the eve of the Reformation, thanks to the work of Johann Lang (1488-1548), and accomplished Hebraist and Graecist and friend of Luther, and Johannes Altensteig, the author of a major dictionary of late medieval philosophy and theology, the Vocabularium theologiae (Ozment, The Age of Reform 1250-1550, Yale: 1980, 19).