explicit and ingenuous, laid for the foundation of his scheme certain principles, according to which, if they should be approved, not only Lutherans and the Reformed, but christians of all sects whatever might easily become associated. For first he contended that what is called the Apostles' Creed embraced all the doctrines necessary to be believed, and the ten commandments all the laws of conduct to be observed, and the Lord's prayer all the promises of God: and if this were true, then all christians might unite in one family. In the next place, as appears from adequate proof, he endeavoured to attain his object by means of mystical or Quakerish sentiments. For he placed all religion in the elevation of the soul to God, or in eliciting that internal divine spark, or word, that dwells in the human mind; from which it would follow, that difference of opinion on divine subjects has no connexion with religion. § 7. The principal Lutherans who engaged in this business were John Matthiæ, a Swede, bishop of Strengnas, and formerly preceptor to queen Christina, whom Dury had warmed with zeal for a coalition; and George Calixtus, a divine of Helmstadt, who had few equals in that age, either in learning, genius, or probity: but neither of these met with the success he desired. The Olive Branches of the former, (for such was the and manuscript. Some documents of this kind were published by Theodore Hasæus, in the Bibliotheca Bremens. Theologico-Philologica, tom. i. p. 911, &c. and tom. iv. p. 683. A great number are given by Timann Gesselius, in the Addenda Irenica, in his Historia Eccles. tom. ii. p. 614. His transactions with the Marpurgers, are in Tilemann von Schenck's Vita Professorum Theol. Marpurgensium, p. 202, &c. What he attempted in Holstein, may be learned from the Epistles which Adam Henry Lackmann has published along with the Epistles of Luke Lossius, p. 245. How he conducted himself in Prussia and Poland, we are informed by Dan. Ern. Jablonsky, Historia Consensus Sendomiriensis, p. 127. His proceedings in Denmark, are stated by Jac. Herm. von Elswich, Fasciculus i. Epistolar. Familiarum Theologicar. p. 147. His acts in the Palatinate, are in Jo. Henry von Seelen's Delicia Epistolicæ, p. 353. His proceedings in Switzerland are illustrated by the Acts and Epistles, published in the Museum Helveticum, tom. iii. iv. v. p. 602, &c. Many things also, on this subject, are brought forward by Jo. Wolfg. Jaeger's Historia Sæculi xvii. decenn. vii. p. 172. and elsewhere. In general, respecting Duræus, the reader may consult Anth. Wilh. Böhm's Englische Reformationshistorie, p. 944, and the Dissertation, derived very much from unpublished documents, which Charles Jasper Benzel exhibited at Helmstadt, under my auspices, in 1744, entitled: de Joh. Durao, maxime de Actis ejus Suecanis. [See also Peter Bayle, Dictionnaire, art. Dureus; Godfr. Arnold's Kir chen- und Ketzerhistorie, pt. ii. b. xvii. ch. xi. § 23, &c. p. 152, &c. and Brook's Lives of the Puritans, vol. iii. p. 369, &c. Tr.] title of his pamphlets on the subject,) were publicly condemned; and by a royal edict were excluded from the territories of Sweden. And he himself, at last, in order to appease in some measure his enemies, had to relinquish his office, and retire to a private life'. Calixtus, while he dissuaded others from contention, drew on himself an immense load of accusations and conflicts; and while he endeavoured to free the church from all sects, was thought by great numbers of his brethren to be the father and author of a new sect, that of the Syncretists; that is the sect which pur su peace and union at the expense of divine truth'. We shall find hereafter a more convenient place for speaking of the fortunes and the opinions of this great man; for he was charged with many other offences besides that of being zealous for peace with the Reformed; and the attacks made upon him threw the whole Lutheran community into commotion. § 8. To say something of the external prosperity of the Lutheran church, the most important circumstance is, that this church, though beset with the numberless machinations and oppressions of its enemies, could no where be entirely extirpated and obliterated. There are, to this day, and it may justly excite our wonder, very many Lutherans, even in those countries in which Lutheran worship is prohibited: nay, (as appears from the recent emigration of the Saltsburgers', which deserves to be told to all future ages,) in those countries in which even a silent and most cautious dissent from the established religion is a capital crime, there lie concealed vast numbers who regard all superstition with abhorrence, and who observe in the best manner they can, the great precepts of the purified religion. The See Jo. Scheffer's Suecia Litterata, p. 123. and Jo. Möller's Hypomnemata, upon it, p. 387. Archenholz, Mémoires de la Reine Christine, tom. i. p. 320. p. 505, &c. tom. ii. p. 63. [Matthiæ published two works, which gave offence to the Swedes, namely, Idea boni Ordinis in Ecclesia Christi; and Ramus Oliva Septentrionalis. The last was published in ten parts, Strengnas, 1661, 1662. 12mo. and in the latter year was placed in the list of the forbidden books. Tr.] 1 The views of this excellent man, which many have stated incorrectly, may be learned from his tract, often printed, with the title: Judicium de Controversiis Theologicis inter Lutheranos et Reformatos, et de mutua partium fraternitate et tolerantia. 2 [There was an emigration of over one thousand Saltsburgers, in the years 1684, 1685, 1686: but the great emigration was in the years 1731, and onwards, amounting to between 30,000 and 40,000 persons. Tr.] countries which are inhabited by persons of different religions, yet are under the spiritual dominion of the Roman pontiff, afford us numerous examples of cruelty, inhumanity, and injustice, which the Romanists think perfectly justifiable against those who dissent from them, and whom they regard as seditious citizens: yet no where could either violence or fraud wrest from the Lutherans all their rights and liberties. It may be added, that the Lutheran religion was transplanted by merchants and other emigrants to America, Asia, and Africa; and was introduced into various places of Europe, where it was before unknown. § 9. The internal condition of the Lutheran church, in this century, presents indeed many things to be commended, but not a few things also that deformed it. First, it was most honourable to the Lutherans that they cultivated every where with diligence not only sacred learning but also every branch of human knowledge; and that they enlarged and illustrated both literature and theology with many and important accessions. This is so generally known, that we need not go into a prolix enumeration of the revolutions and improvements of the several sciences. From most of them religion derived some benefit; but some of them were abused by injudicious or illdesigning men,-such is the common lot of all human affairs, -to corrupt and to explain away that religion which the Bible reveals. In the first part of the century, those branches of learning in which intellect is chiefly concerned were the most taught in schools; and in a method not very alluring and pleasant but in the latter part of it, more attention was paid to the branches which depend on genius and memory, and which afford more entertainment and pleasure, such as history, civil as well as literary and natural, antiquities, criticism, eloquence, and the like. Moreover, both kinds of learning were treated in a more convenient, neat, and elegant manner. Yet it was unhappily the fact, that while human knowledge was advanced and polished, the estimation in which learning and learned men were held was gradually lessened; which, among other causes which it is not best to mention, may be ascribed to the multitude of those who applied themselves to study without possessing native talents and a taste for learning. § 10. During the greatest part of the century no other rule of philosophizing flourished in the schools except the Aristotelico-Scholastic: and for a long time those who thought Aristotle should either be given up or amended were considered as threatening as much danger to the church as if they had undertaken to falsify some portion of the Bible. In this zeal for the peripatetic philosophy, the doctors of Leipsic, Tubingen, Helmstadt, and Altdorf, went beyond almost all others. Many indeed envied Aristotle his high reputation. In the first place, there were certain wise and honest men among the theologians who admitted that it was proper to philosophize, though briefly, but who complained that the name of philosophy was attached to words and distinctions void of all meaning'. Next came the disciples of Peter Ramus; who with great diligence inculcated the precepts of their master, which were of greater practical utility, in many both of the higher and inferior schools, to the exclusion of the Aristotelians. Lastly, there were those who either condemned all philosophy as injurious to religion and to the community, (which Daniel Hoffmann did no less unskilfully than contentiously at Helmstadt,) or who, with Robert Fludd and Jacob Böhmen, (already mentioned 3) boasted of having discovered, by means of fire and illumination, an admirable and celestial mode of philosophizing. But if there had been as much harmony among these sects as there was dissension and disagreement, they had far less power than was necessary to overthrow the empire of Aristotle, now confirmed by time and strong in the multitude of its defenders. § 11. But more danger impended over Aristotle from Des Cartes and Gassendi; whose lucid and well arranged treatises, as early as the middle of the century, better pleased many of our theologians than the many huge volumes of the Peripatetics, in which the stale and insipid wisdom of the schools was exhibited without taste or elegance. These new teachers of 3 Such was Wenzel Schilling, with his associates; (concerning whom see Godfr. Arnold's Kirchen- und Ketzerhistorie, pt. ii. book xvii. ch. vi. p. 499.) and others of our best theologians. 4 See Jo. Herm. von Elswich, de Varia Aristotelis in Protestant. scholis Fortuna, § xxi. p. 54, &c, and Jo. Geo. Walch's Historia Logices, lib. ii. cap. i. sect. iii. § 5. in his Parerga Academica, p. 613, &c. 5 See above, the general history of the church, § 30, &c. p. 46, &c. philosophy the Aristotelians first endeavoured to repel by arguments of an invidious nature, copiously displaying the great danger which this new mode of philosophizing portended to religion and to true piety; and afterwards, when they saw these weapons unsuccessful, by retreating a little, and defending only the citadel of their cause and abandoning the outworks. For some of them coupled elegance of diction and polite literature with their precepts; nor did they deny that there were in Aristotle, though he was the prince of philosophers, some blemishes and faults which a wise man might lawfully amend. But this very prudence made their adversaries more bold and daring: for they now contended that they had obliged them to confess guilt; and therefore opened all their batteries upon the whole school of the Stagirite, which the others had conceded to need amendment only in part. After Hugo Grotius, who was but a timid opposer of the Stagirite, Samuel Puffendorf first pointed out, freely and openly, a new and very different course from the Peripatetic on the law of nature and the science of morals. He was followed with still greater zeal, (notwithstanding he was nearly overwhelmed by the multitude. of his enemies,) by Christian Thomasius, a jurist first of Leipsic, and then at Halle; who was not, indeed, a man to whose protection the interests of philosophy might be entrusted with entire confidence, yet he possessed a fearless mind and very superior genius. He attempted a reformation, not of a single science only, but of every branch of philosophy; and both by words and by example continually urged his fellow citizens to burst asunder the bonds of Aristotle; whom however he did not understand, nor had he even read him. The particular mode of philosophizing which he substituted in place of that which had prevailed, was not very favourably received, and soon fell into neglect: but the spirit of innovation which he diffused, made so great progress in a short time, that he may be justly accounted the subduer of philosophic tyranny, or of sectarian philosophy, especially among the Germans. The • [Concerning Christian Thomasius, see Brucker's Historia crit. Philosophia, tom. v. and his Append. Hist. crit. Philos. p. 859, &c. Yet Mosheim judged more correctly of this memorable man than Brucker did, who unjustly accounted him a reformer of philosophy. Thomasius was not properly a reformer of philosophy, though he was the occasion of a reform in it; for he improved |