dogmatical theology. Admiration of the founder demanded exaltation of his character; afterwards it became necessary to determine the precise relation of this exalted character to the Almighty; then to adjust without confounding the various constituent elements of his own mysterious being; to explain how two natures, each perfect in itself, could coexist in one person; next to define man's relation to this compound personality, and the mode in which salvation depends on Christ's agency and office; and thus, after centuries of controversy, were formed certain self-contradictory theses about God, sin, and retribution, which ripened into the Trinitarian, Soteriological, and Eschatological definitions of the creed. And since all these inferences, however really human in their origin, were ascribed to revelation, and in the victorious propagation of Christianity, faith, or the " demonstration of the spirit," not elaborate proof or argument, was prime mover,-it naturally followed that the priority and supremacy of faith, including under this name the creeds and dogmas of the church, continued, except in a few isolated remonstrances,1 to be an admitted postulate throughout the middle ages. During the latter part of this period, a grand effort was made on the part of faith to ally itself condescendingly with reason under the name of scholasticism. But the attempt to bind incongruous elements artificially together ended only in their more decided repulsion and separation. Henceforth religion and philosophy took different paths: and the failure of scholasticism, resulting from the tacit assumption of an undue superiority on one side, eventually became the starting point of a new development on the other. Theology, which from the first courted the alliance of reason only on the footing of a superior, retreated to the supercilious isolation which was natural to it, and took the attitude which it has since generally found it expedient to retain, that of unreasoning dogmatism. Instead of the 1 Erigena and Abelard. scholastic "credo ut intelligam," the nominalists resumed the "credo quia absurdum" of Tertullian.1 On the other hand philosophy, shrinking under church repression, was obliged to confine itself to physical enquiries; or if venturing on higher topics, to accompany the effort with a cringe of obsequious apology expressed in the common formula, "hæc omnia Ecclesiæ Catholicæ auctoritati submitto." Adoption of Dogma by the Reformers. During this nonage of philosophy traditional theology continued supreme, and although heart and intellect were obscurely searching for something better, the long established dominion of the church gave to its books, formalities, and creeds, a spurious vitality long after they should logically have been extinct. The times have been That when the brains were out the man would die, But dogma did not die when by the issue of scholasticism its irrationality was manifested, because men had not been generally taught through cultivation of reason to feel the religious claims of reason; they were far from acknowledging that "credo quia absurdum" is the essence of all absurdity, and that creeds are really and properly subject to rational adjudication. The great lever of the Reformation was religion, and religion carried dogmatical theology along with it. Many external abuses and corruptions which for three centuries had been objects of ridicule or indignation, including several of the more obviously idolatrous practices of the Roman church, were discontinued, but its creeds and books remained. Dissatisfied with a 1 "Mortuus est Dei filius; prorsus credibile est, quia ineptum est; et sepultus resurrexit; certum est quia impossibile." Tertull. de Carne Christi ch. v. hollow ecclesiastical mechanism, the soul rushed eagerly to find a better assurance of salvation with Christ and with God. But in making the appeal it was obliged to seek external guidance, and this could be immediately supplied only out of the shreds and remnants of the old system. It seemed in the first place absolutely necessary to have some visible standard or rule to replace the repudiated authority of the church. The stores of extraneous traditions which, ever since the decay of scholasticism had been ransacked by religious men for this purpose, the Cabbala, the Platonic or Aristotelian philosophies, could be appreciated only by few; generally speaking, Pagan culture seemed alien to religion; and the book of nature, without any sure clue to its interpretation, led only to the mysticism and magic of Reuchlin or Agrippa. Popular feeling under these circumstances had no resource but in the venerable traditions of the Bible; a book claiming equal or even higher antiquity than the church itself, and which, though part of its own machinery, had in times of heresy and danger been always distrusted by it as a possible rival. The religious strength of Protestantism, mingled with an intellectual weakness, which, unreservedly adopting the maxim of belief in absurdity, went far beyond the limits of Catholicism itself in depreciating the reason, and in the self-abasement ascribing nothing to merit, everything to grace. In the exuberance of its faith, added to the growing desire to give form and consistency to a new establishment, it adopted the greater number of the old dogmas. The first edition of Melancthon's "Loci," published A.D. 1521, dwells exclusively on the great soteriological doctrines concerning the nature of law, sin, grace, free will, faith, and justification. The Augsburg" Confession" evinces a still fluctuating opinion, and it is characteristic that Melancthon was busily employed to the last moment in making corrections and alterations in it. At last these provisional and merely apologetic manifestoes were felt to be insufficient. As in early Christianity, the progress of heresy made it necessary to define the barriers of orthodoxy, to legislate rather than plead, and to give the new faith a semblance of historical continuity with the old. Hence the indiscriminate appropriation of catholic theology in subsequent editions and confessions; and though Protestants, recognising in Scripture alone the rule of faith, nominally accepted the confessions only on the hypothesis of their being Scriptural, the condition was practically forgotten, articles and confessional interpretations being taken in Catholic fashion as peremptory and conclusive. 66 Refutation of Dogma. But the force of free spiritualism, though suppressed in the main developments of Protestantism, was working unseen, and was ever ready to emerge wherever discouragement relaxed, or force of character and intelligence insisted on a hearing. When confessions each claiming to be strictly Scriptural were found to vary, and Lutheran "Consubstantiation" proved incompatible with the Calvinistic spiritual presence" in spite of the common sanction of the Holy Ghost, there was an obvious call for the interference of the only umpire that the nature of the case admitted. The first self-emancipating efforts were little more than instinctive ebullitions of irregular feeling, akin to the fanaticism of the "Brethren of the Free Spirit" in former ages; and Melancthon was greatly astonished by the sudden appearance at Wyttenberg of a band of excited mechanics, demanding sweeping changes in creed and ritual, a new church and a new baptism. A more serious protest against the theoretical impurities of Protestantism was that of the Socinians, who, disclaiming confessionalism, and placing genuine religion on a moral basis, employed a forced Scripture exegesis to get rid of the more obviously irrational doctrines, such as the Trinity, free justification, and the atonement; and so far might be said to have completed the work of criticism, were the logical refutation of dogma alone sufficient to extinguish it. To suppose that in the one true God there are three persons, each of whom singly is that only God, is to contradict Scripture as well as reason, said the Socinians; it confounds substantive identity with generic identity; and still more absurd is the idea of combining two contradictory and incompatible natures, one mutable and finite, the other immutable and infinite, in one person; it is like mixing fire and water, or, as Spinoza said, like a circle taking the nature of a square. And then the gross extravagances of the notion of vicarious satisfaction! An absolutely good and omnipotent Being unable or unwilling to forgive freely what was commonly represented under the aspect of a personal affront; or forgiving it after having received his due, when ample satisfaction had made forgiveness superfluous! A Being absolutely just and good not only permitting, but spontaneously contriving a commutation of the innocent for the guilty, as if moral merit and demerit were transferable commodities like money payments;-and effecting a reconciliation between his justice and his goodness by doing what was obviously the very reverse of just or good! Why, asked the Socinians, was vicarious suffering inflicted in the death of Christ, when the communicable merits of his life had already anticipated its object; especially if, as asserted by St. Paul, neither of them, alone or in combination, was sufficient to effect the purpose intended? And, moreover, how could the merit of Christ, considered as man, accrue for the benefit of others, if, as declared in Scripture, his obedience to the extremity of death was no more than his own proper duty to his Father; or how could his temporary suffering, followed as it was by 1 The sense attached by the church to the notion of sin. 2 Because, according to 1 Cor. xv. 17, without the resurrection, the death of Christ had been inefficient. |