notwithstanding they often unavoidably fell into frequent mistakes while the first and fundamental principles of morals were not yet accurately laid down. George Calixtus, whose merits are so great in regard to all other branches of theology, first separated the science of morals from that of dogmatics, and gave it the form of an independent science. He was not indeed allowed to complete the design which all admired in its commencement; but his disciples applied the materials they got from him to construct, not unsuccessfully, a proper system of moral theology. Scarcely any thing injured more their labours, in process of time, than the Peripatetic dress, with which Calixtus chose to invest also this part of divine truth. Hence the moderns have torn off this dress, and calling in the aid of the law of nature, which Puffendorf and others had purified and illustrated, and collating it carefully with the sacred Scriptures, have not only more clearly laid open the sources of christian duties, and more correctly ascertained the import of the divine laws, but have digested and arranged this whole science in a much better manner. § 20. During this whole century the Lutheran church was greatly agitated; partly by controversies among the principal doctors, to the great injury of the whole community; and partly by the extravagant zeal and plans of certain persons who disseminated new and strange opinions, uttered prophecies, and attempted to change all our doctrines and institutions. The controversies, which drew the doctors into parties, may be fitly divided into the greater and the less; the former such as disturbed the whole church, and the latter such as disquieted only some part of it. Of the first kind, there were two, which occupied the greatest part of the century; the Syncretistic, which, from the place whence it arose, was called the Helmstadian controversy, and from the man chiefly concerned in it, the Calixtine controversy; and the Pietistic, which some call the Hallensian controversy, from the university with which it was waged. Both were occasioned by principles, than which nothing is more holy and lovely: the former by the love of peace and christian forbearance, so highly commended by our Saviour; and the latter, by the desire of restoring and advancing fallen piety, which every good man admits should be among the first cares of a christian teacher. Against these two great virtues, zeal for maintaining the truth and for preserving it from all mixture of error, which is likewise an excellent and very useful virtue, engaged in open war. For so critical and hazardous is the condition of human nature, that from the best things as their source, wars and pests may flow, if turbid emotions get control of the mind. § 21. George Calixtus, of Sleswick, a theologian who had few equals in this century, either for learning or for genius, while teaching in that university, which from its first establishment granted proper liberty of thought to its professors, early intimated that in his view there were some defects in the common opinions of theologians. Afterwards he went farther, and showed in various ways that he had a strong desire not so much to establish peace and harmony among disagreeing christians as to diminish their anger and implacable hatred to each other. Nor did his colleagues differ much from him in this matter which will the less surprise those who know that such as are created doctors of theology in the university of Helmstadt, are accustomed, all of them, to make oath that they will endeavour, according to their ability, to reconcile and settle the controversies among christians. The first avowed attack upon them was made in 1639 by Statius Buscher, a minister of St. Giles' church in Hanover, an indiscreet man, of the Ramist school, and hostile to [the prevailing] philosophy; who was much displeased because Calixtus and his associates preferred the Peripatetic philosophy before that of the sect he had embraced. The attack was made in a very malignant book, entitled: Crypto-Papismus Nova Theologiæ Helmstadiensis2; in which he accused Calixtus especially of numerous errors. Though Buscher made some impression on the minds of individuals, he would perhaps have incurred the reproach of being a rash and unjust accuser, if he had only induced Calixtus to be more cautious. But the latter possessing a generous spirit that disdained all dissimulation, not only persevered, with his colleague Conrad Horneius, in confidently asserting and defending the things which Buscher had brought many to regard as 2 [i.e. The disguised popery of the theology at Helmstadt. Tr.] novelties and dangerous; but likewise, in the conference at Thorn, in 1645, he incurred the indignation and enmity of the Saxon divines, who were there present. Frederic William, elector of Brandenburg, had made him colleague and assistant to the divines whom he sent from Königsberg to that conference and the Saxon deputies thought it horrible, that a Lutheran divine should afford any aid to the Reformed. This first cause of offence in that conference, was followed by others, which occasioned the Saxons to accuse Calixtus, of being too friendly to the Reformed. The story is too long to be fully stated here. But after the conference broke np, the Saxon divines, John Hülsemann, James Weller, John Scharf, Abraham Calovius, and others, attacked Calixtus in their public writings, maintaining, that he had apostatized from the Lutheran doctrines to the sentiments of the Reformed and the papists. These their attacks he repelled, with great vigour, and uncommon erudition, being profoundly versed in philosophy and all antiquity; until the year 1656, when he passed from these scenes of discord to heavenly rest'. 3 Whoever wishes to know merely the series of events in this controversy, the titles of the books published, the doctrines that were controverted, and similar things, may find writers enough to consult; such as Walch, Introduction to the Controversies in our church, (in German,) Andr. Charles Weismann, Historia Eccles. sæcul. xvii. p. 1194.] Arnold, [Kirchen-und Ketzerhistorie, pt. ii. book xvii. ch. xi. § 1, &c.] and many others; but especially Jo. Möller's Cimbria Litterata, tom. iii. p. 121. where he treats largely of the life, fortunes, and writings of Calixtus. But whoever wishes to understand the internal character of this controversy, the causes of the several events, the characters of the disputants, the arguments on both sides, in short, the things that are of the highest importance in the controversy, will find no writer, to whose fidelity he can safely trust. This history requires a man of ingenuousness, of extensive knowledge of the world, well furnished with documents, which are in a great measure not yet published, and also not a novice in court policy. And I am not certain whether even in this age, if a man could be fouud competent to do it, all that is important to the history of this controversy, could be published to the world, without exciting odium, and producing harm. [The translator, (says Schlegel, who was a pupil of Mosheim,) may be allowed here to insert the judgment of Mosheim, which he brought forward in his Lectures; in which he communicated with his hearers, more freely, than he usually does in his writings with his readers.— Calixtus, by his travels, became acquainted with people of various creeds, and particularly with Romish catholics and the Reformed; and by this intercourse, he acquired a kind of moderation in his judgments respecting persons of other denominations. In particular, he had resided long in England, and contracted intimacy with several bishops. Here he imbibed the fundamental principles of the English reformation, and his partiality for the ancient churches. And hence he assumed the consent of the church in the five first centuries, as a second source of a true knowledge of the christian § 22. After the death of Calixtus, and the decease also of those by whom he had been most opposed, the flames of this faith; and was of opinion that we had gone too far in the reformation, and that we should have done better, if we had regulated the church according to the pattern of the early churches. From this source, afterwards, followed all his peculiarities of sentiment. Hence his attachment to ecslesiastical antiquity hence his desire for the union of all classes of christians: hence his inclination towards the Romish church; which cannot be denied, though he acknowledged and exposed numerous faults and abuses in that church. And hence also, it arose, that he had a particular respect for the English church, as retaining more of the usages of the ancient church: and that many of his pupils went over, some to the Romish, and others to the English church. Calixtus became renowned in early life. A young lord of Klenck had been prepossessed in favour of the catholic religion, by the Jesuit, Augustine Turrianus of Hildesheim. The mother, wishing to prevent his apostacy, invited Cornelius Martini, a professor at Helmstadt, and the strongest metaphysician of his age, to come to her castle at Hildesheim, and dispute with the Jesuit, in the presence of her son. Mar tini denied himself this honour, and recommended to it his pupil, the young Calixtus. He, on the first day, drove the Jesuit into such straits that he could say nothing: and the next morning he secretly decamped. The history of this transaction may be found in the Summa Colloquii Hemelschenburgensis. This remarkable victory led the duke of Brunswick to raise him from a master in philosophy to the rank of professor in theology. While only a master, he had published 15 Disputationes de Præcipuis Religionis Christianæ capitibus; in which he intimated pretty clearly, that he did not believe all that was generally believed in our church; and particularly, he explained the doctrine of the transfer of attributes (Communicatio Idiomatum), differently from the common explanation. Likewise to his Epitome Theologia, published in 1619, Balthasar Menzer of Giessen, and Henry Höpfner of Leipsic, made many exceptions. For he mixed his scholastic philosophy with theology; and taught, among other things, that God was the accidental cause of sin, a proposition, which was liable to be very ill interpreted, and which he afterwards recalled, on account of its liability to misinterpretation. Thus he was involved in contentions from the commencement of his professorship; and they were increased in 1634, when he published the first part of his Epitome Theologia Moralis, and subjoined to it a Digression, de Nova Arte, in opposition to Barthold Nihusen. In particular, the Ramists were his mortal enemies, because he was an Aristotelian. One of these Ramists, Statius Buscher, (who had read lectures at Helmstadt as a master, before Calixtus did, being prompted to it by some enemies of Calixtus, published his Crypto-Papismus Nova Theologia Helmstadiensis; to which Calixtus and Horneius made answer. The honest Buscher was summoned before the Consistory but he chose not to appear personally, and therefore defended himself in writing. He gave up his office, retired to Stade, where he died of grief, in 1641. Thus this. contest faded away. Buscher's accusations were ill founded; and his patrons were afraid to expose themselves. But four years after, a very different conflict arose, which lasted as long as Calixtus lived. The king of Poland, Ladislav IV. appointed the Charitable Conference (Colloquium Charitativum), at Thorn in which all religious parties were to appear, and confer together on religion, and come to agreement. To this conference, on the side of the Lutherans, some Saxon divines of Wittemberg especially, were invited from Germany; for they were regarded as standing at the head of all the German theologians. The great elector of Brandenburg, prince Frederic William, invited Calixtus of Brunswick to accompany and assist the Königsberg divines: and Calixtus not only complied, but also committed the error, of going previously to Berlin, and hence travelling in company with war raged far worse than before. The Saxons continued, and especially Calovius, most bitterly to insult the dead lion; nay, the Reformed divines to Thorn, lodging in the same house, eating at the same table, and in general having the greatest familiarity with them. As the Königsberg divines had not yet arrived, and so Calixtus had nothing to do in the Conference, the magistrates of Elbingen and Thorn invited him to assist them; which he engaged to do. But the Saxon and Dantzik divines, (among the latter of whom Calovius was the most violent,) threw in their remonstrance; alleging, that he could not be admitted as a speaker in behalf of the divines of these cities, because he belonged to a university which did not embrace the Formula of Concord, and because he had rendered himself suspected, by his intimacy with the Reformed. This remonstrance induced the senate of Elbingen to desist from the measure. As Calixtus could not in this way be brought to take an active part, another occurrence afforded him something to do. The Polish Reformed and the Bohemian Brethren, when they saw that the Dantzik divines would not tolerate him among the Lutheran speakers, invited him to be their speaker; which he consented to, yet with the restriction, that he should hold with them, only in the points, on which protestants were at issue with the catholics. He afterwards printed some notes on the Creed, which were laid before the Conference; in which he made it appear, that he did not, in all points, agree with the Reformed. But all this was insufficient to quiet the suspicion against him. The rumour spread every where, that Calixtus was an apostate. The disaffection towards him was increased, as the Polish Roman-catholic lords of Thorn treated him with more attention, than they did the other divines, and associated more frequently with him. If Calixtus had possessed more prudence and foresight, and his opposers more candour and justice, things would not have come to such a pass. While these events were going on, the Königsberg divines arrived. But now a contest arose between them and the divines of Dantzik, respecting precedence. The former claimed precedence, as being envoys of the great electoral prince; and the latter, because they previously arrived, and had taken their seats. In such contests, the whole three months allotted to the Conference, passed away; and the deputies returned home, having accomplished nothing. The contest with Calixtus now became warm. The Saxon divines were obliged to justify their conduct towards him at the Conference; and they found it necessary to charge him with being a corrupter of religion, a concealed Calvinist, and a wicked heretic. Calixtus himself gave occasion for increasing the strife, by a disputation on the mystery of the Trinity, which Dr. Jo. Latermann wrote and defended, under him, in 1645; in which it was maintained, that the doctrine of the Trinity was not made known to the fathers under the Old Testament, and that it was a created angel, and not the Son of God, who appeared to the patriarchs. On this point he was assailed, although he had so explained himself, as ought to have given satisfaction. Our whole church was, by this contest, wrought into a flame, which it was difficult to extinguish. Solomon Glassius, by order of Ernest, duke of Gotha, published his Thoughts; which aimed to restore peace, and in many points did justice to Calixtus. But the effort was fruitless. Duke Ernest went farther; he wrote to the electoral court of Saxony, and to the court of Brunswick, and urged them to lend aid to allay these angry disputes. But the minds of men were so embittered, that they could not think of peace. At length, as the Saxon divines, and particularly Calovius, (who had previously been invited to Wittemberg,) urged the setting forth a new symbolical book, the princes of electoral Saxony so vividly depicted the mischiefs which would thence result to our church, that, in view of these representations, the proposed introduction of what was called the Consensus Repetitus, was laid aside. Yet the conflicts went on, and were conducted with so much bit |