family for the glory of the Only-begotten.' He, who would anyhow have been the Mediator of an imperfect race, has humbled Himself yet further to become the Redeemer of a sinful race. (Christ. Dogm. pp. 157, 193-5, 294.) The author, while accepting generally the language of the Lutheran formulas, gives them an interpretation widely different from that of their founders. The shocking exaggera tions of Luther and Calvin on the nature and consequences of original sin are softened down to a sense little, if at all, different from that of Catholic tradition. The satisfaction of Christ is explained through His redemption, and justification as implying the gift of a new principle of holiness implanted in the soul. The appeasing the wrath of God, and the active obedience' of Christ, which play so important a part in earlier Protestant theology, are reduced to conformity with the teaching of the Fathers; while many Lutheran opinions are expressly rejected, as the ubiquity of Christ's Body, and the Lutheran gloss on the descent into Hell. An intermediate state of purification between death and judgment is maintained, nor does Martensen object to call it Purgatory; he prefers the medieval opinion to that of the Reformers as to the age of the resurrection body. The book is interesting in itself, and as marking the contrast between earlier and later Lutheranism. It closes with a remarkable discussion on the future condition of the wicked, with scriptural and patristic authorities.

Thomasius, a professor at Erlangen, of narrower views than Martensen, whose work on Origen has already been referred to, discusses the motive of the Incarnation at some length in his Christi Person und Werk (Erlangen, 1853), urging the authority of Scripture, Fathers, and Schoolmen against Martensen's view, which he rejects as well on that account as from thinking that it derogates from the love of Christ, and refers His taking our nature to an internal necessity in the being of God, not to compassion for man-an objection which would be at least equally applicable to the Anselmic and many Protestant theories of satisfaction; but in fact it does not really apply at all here, for the intention of taking our humanity in order to unite us with God is itself one free act of love, the further purpose of suffering for our redemption is another. Thomasius considers the decree of the Incarnation to be included in the decree of creation, modified through the entrance of sin foreseen though not predestined by God. He says that in Christ the archetype of humanity is bodily fulfilled. He quotes Dorner, as holding the opposite (Scotist) view; but the

purely historical character of Dorner's work does not give scope for treating such questions directly.

Nägelsbach, in his work Der Gottmensch (Nürnberg, 1853), devoted to showing, as against atheism and pantheism, that the Godman is the fundamental idea of revelation in its unity and historical development,' maintains that the union between God and man, which love requires, can only be realized by God taking on Himself not abstract but actual humanity, i. e. becoming man. His Incarnation cannot be accidental. It is opposed, as Kurtz says, to all Christian feeling and consciousness, that we should owe it, and the deification of our nature, only to sin. It is implied in the very principle of love, that this was from the first the end and scope of human history. Its first prophecy is not Gen. iii. 15, but Gen. i. 26. The First Adam implies the Second. All previous history was an education of the world for His coming, all Christian history springs from Him as its Root, whose appearance is the centre-point in the life of the world. (Der Gottmensch, vol. i. pp. 28-32.) Liebner, in his Christologie (Gottingen, 1849), argues at length, that the Incarnation and the consequent deification of our nature were involved in the original act of creative love, as the archetype and proper term of humanity. He answers in detail the objections of Thomasius.

Rothe, one of the greatest Lutheran divines of the day, in his Theologische Ethik (vol. ii. pp. 252-338), treats of the redemption wrought by Christ. He does not expressly touch on the probabilities of the Incarnation, as antecedent to sin; but he considers redemption involved in the original act of creation, though requiring a fresh creative act or new beginning of the race, proceeding from the race itself, but by a supernatural origin: i. e. a Second Adam. The author traces out the preparation for Christ's coming under the Old Law by the moral education of mankind, and by miracle and prophecy, leading up to the final revelation in His personal appearance, the end of which is redemption, or restored communion between God and men, by the removal of sin which divided them. In order to mediate between God and man, He must share the nature of both perfectly, and must make a free and complete self-oblation of His whole being for the honour of God, and for love of man; and this in a sinful world, hating holiness and truth, and under the dominion of Satan, can only be consummated through the sacrifice of His life. To impart the fruits of His redemption, He has founded a spiritual kingdom or family among men, whereof He is the Head and Heart,

from which the life of the whole body is derived. For the redemption of sinful humanity, wrought fully once for all by Himself, must be applied separately to individual members of the race. Only so can actual redemption and propitiation before God be accomplished for them, through the removal of sin and of the debt and punishment which are its consequences. Pardon cannot be bestowed, unless there is a guarantee for the actual casting out of sin. When the sinner is thus reconciled with God, a gradual process of renewal follows, in which the moral and religious elements are constantly tending to become identified. For cases of death-bed conversion, and even for those who die unconverted, there still remains till the end of the present world and the general judgment an intermediate state of trial, probably by fire (for which Mark ix. 49 is quoted). But a time comes sooner or later, when the being is wholly turned to evil, (dämonisirt,) and no further change is possible. Conversion after death is harder than before, and the higher position once forfeited can never be regained. (Ib., pp. 190-2, 484, 488.)

Similar specimens of modern Lutheran teaching might easily be multiplied; but these are taken as a sample, from some of the principal contemporary divines of that body.

CHAPTER VII.

MORAL FITNESS OF THE ATONEMENT IN RELATION TO MAN.

AND now that we are come to the end of our inquiry, does it not almost seem as if we were still at the beginning? Are we not tempted to exclaim, with the philosopher of old, that the end of all knowledge is the consciousness of our ignorance? Doubtless what Coleridge said of philosophy is even more true of theology, that it begins in wonder and ends in wonder. Indeed this is but to repeat the language of the ritual, that He, who has wonderfully created our nature, has yet more wonderfully redeemed it.

"Das Wunder ist des Glaubens liebstes Kind."*

After all has been said, much must ever remain unsaid. Our deepest feelings are precisely those we are least able to express; and, even in the act of adoration, silence is our highest praise. Still, without attempting to dogmatize on points beyond the sphere of revelation, we may gather up some results, both negative and positive, from what has been recorded of the past. Not to dwell on minor undercurrents of opinion or

Göthe's Faust.

belief, we have seen the successive waves of two great theories of satisfaction pass over the surface of theology, and again retire, but not without leaving indelible traces behind them. First came the Origenist notion of a ransom paid to the Evil Spirit, which found its latest utterance in Peter Lombard, but was then already merging into the broader and more spiritual conception of a victory over sin, and therefore over him who is its author. After this followed the Anselmic conception of an infinite satisfaction for an infinite debt, discussed in all its bearings throughout the scholastic period, and almost universally rejected, but finding new advocates at the Reformation, and becoming in their hands the basis of a system, which has served first to distort, and then to alienate, the moral and religious convictions of a large section of Christendom. The scholastic controversy brought out with peculiar clearness that, while we have no right to assume that an adequate satisfaction was necessary, a satisfaction not only sufficient but superabundant has certainly been made, owing to the infinite worth, by virtue of the hypostatic union, of those human acts and sufferings which the Redeemer offered as the Head and Representative of our race. We cannot, again, say, except by a figure of speech, that our sins were imputed to Him, or that He who was sinless endured the wrath of God; still less, in the blasphemous language of several Lutheran divines, that He suffered the torments of the damned. Yet it is certain, that the mental greatly exceeded the bodily sufferings of the Passion, and that they were chiefly, though not exclusively, supernatural. Even those which at first blush might seem purely natural, as the awful solitude