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victory are too apt to turn their arms against one another. The purpose of this Formula, prepared chiefly by Martin Chemnitz, chief theologian of the Lutheran Church after Luther and Melanchthon, was to reconcile the contending parties, and to affirm the Evangelical Theology on the basis of philosophy and Scripture. It is undoubtedly a masterpiece of controversy, containing, on each several point of the Twelve Articles into which it is divided, a statement of the question at stake, with affirmative and negative sides and carefullyguarded conclusions. It has been very generally, though not universally, adopted by the Lutheran Churches as a supplement and explanation of the Augsburg Confession.1

The age of Protestant discussions and Con

1 On the part of the Reformed or Swiss theologians a Confession was long afterwards prepared, as a final word on the controversies of the day, by Professors Heidegger of Zurich, Turretin of Geneva, and Pastor Gernler of Basle. This Formula Consensus Helvetica (1675) is chiefly noticeable for its uncompromising avowal of the doctrine of verbal and literal inspiration, extending to the Hebrew vowel-points, as against Louis Cappel, who had shown the late origin of the Massorite vocalisation. 'In specie autem Hebraicus Veteris Testamenti codex, quem ex traditione Ecclesiae Judaicae, cui olim oracula Dei commissa sunt, accepimus hodieque retinemus, tum quoad consonas, tum quoad vocalia, sive puncta ipsa, sive punctorum saltem potestatem, et tum quoad res, tum quoad verba, 0eóπveVOTOS.'

fessions was naturally a time of special activity among the theologians of the Romish Church. At first, as we have seen, the hope was cherished that an agreement or compromise might be effected with Protestantism. Even after the Augsburg Diet, and its rival statements of doctrine, that hope was not entirely extinct. Luther's Schmalkald Articles were prepared with a view to discussion in a General Council at Mantua, to which Protestant as well as Papal representatives were to be invited. But the logic of events was too powerful to permit, on either side, the continuance of the pleasing illusion; and instead of the imagined eirenicon of Mantua came the uncompromising affirmations and anathemas of Trent. The famous Romanist Council sat at intervals for eighteen years (1545-1563) considering questions of doctrine and discipline, effecting many useful reforms, but concentrating all its force on the declaration of a series of dogmas, a counter protest against Protestantism, summarised at the close of the Council in a Declaration of Twelve Articles, promulgated as the Creed of Pope Pius the Fourth.1 Of these Twelve Articles, the first

1 See Appendix, Note 9.

Those

is a reaffirmation of the Nicene Creed. that follow declare full assent to Church Tradition and Authority; to the interpretation of Scripture only according to the Church's teaching and the unanimous consent of the Fathers; to the Seven Sacraments; to the Mass as a Sacrifice, and Transubstantiation; to the doctrine of Purgatory and of deliverance therefrom by the suffrages of the faithful; to the Invocation of Saints, the Adoration of Images, the efficacy of Indulgences; to the supremacy of the Roman Church; and to the canons and decrees of all the Ecumenical Councils, especially of the Council of Trent. The prescribed form of assent was in the words, 'I do at this present freely profess and truly hold this true Catholic faith, without which no one can be saved; and I promise most constantly to retain and confess the same entire and inviolate, with God's assistance, to the end of my life.'

This Creed has ever since been the authoritative standard of Romanist belief; and, with the two dogmas added in our own time, that of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary, declared by Papal authority in 1854, and that of the Infallibility of the Pope, decreed by the Vatican

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Council in 1870, must be studied by all who would ascertain in brief compass what Rome really teaches on the most important points of Christian Faith and practice.

The comparison of dates is interesting and suggestive. When this Creed of Pius IV. was set forth in 1564, the Confession of Augsburg was thirty-four years old, the First Helvetic Confession twenty-eight, and the Heidelberg Catechism had only just been issued. Luther had been dead for eighteen years, Melanchthon for four, Calvin was dying; and to pass for a moment beyond the bounds of Theology and Creeds—in this same year Galileo was born in Italy and Shakspeare in England. So brief was the space within which the forces that were to shape the modern life of Christendom had their rise and development; so wonderful the movements of thought that made the middle portion of the sixteenth century, next to the Christian era, the most fruitful and memorable period in the history of mankind.

LECTURE IV

BRITISH CONFESSIONS OF FAITH

THE Reformation in Great Britain was specially marked by the paradoxical combination of a contest for kingly supremacy and a struggle for spiritual freedom. To regard it in the former aspect alone is essentially superficial. Robert Southey sagaciously remarks in his Life of Wesley: 'In England the best people, and the worst, combined in bringing about the Reformation; and in its progress it bore evident marks of both.' revolt of England from the Papacy has often been represented as the result of Henry the Eighth's defiance of the Pope in the matter of the divorce from Queen Katherine; and this is no doubt part of the truth. But the high-handed proceedings of the King were but the culmination of a long series of characteristically English protests against

The

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