Protestant thought before Kant

Front matter

1861-1933.

Protestant thought before

Kant

Preface

In accordance with the plan of the series the present volume deals with religious thought alone and not with philosophy, science, or ethics. Even this narrow field is over large for treatment in so small a compass, and in order to avoid making the book a mere encyclopaedia of names and opinions it has been found necessary to omit a vast mass of material, some of it perhaps as important, in the judgment of many doubtless more important, than much that is included, but it is hoped that enough has been given to make the general course of development plain, however summary and inadequate the treatment of many topics.

The relatively large space devoted to rationalism is justified by the contrast between it and all that went before. Until the eighteenth century Protestantism moved largely within the confines of an ancient past ; only with the spread of rationalism did it enter what was then the modern world of thought. It has therefore seemed imperative for the better understanding both of the older and the newer Protestantism to construct the final chapter on a somewhat different scale from most of the others.

There is an unfortunate lack of works covering the

h entire history of Protestant thought; aside from the old one of Dorner there is none of any great value. Particular topics have been treated in numberless books and articles, and a few of the most useful and comprehensive of the former are mentioned in the brief biblio graphy at the close of this volume.

Introduction

I. MedicBval Christianity.

The theological system of the Middle Ages was in its controlling principles as old as the Apostle Paul. He was led by his o^n experience to draw a sharp distinction between the fleshly man, who is essentially corrupt, and the spiritual man, who is essentially holy. The one is natural, the other supernatural. The one is doomed to destruction, the other is an heir of eternal life. The spiritual man does not come from the natural by a process of development and growth, but is a new creature born directly from above. Wherever Paul may have got the suggestion which led him to interpret his experience in this way, his low estimate of man and his contrast between flesh and spirit, revealed the ultimate influence of oriental dualism which was profoundly affecting the Hellenistic world of the day. A sense of moral evil, a conviction of human corruption and helplessness, and a recognition of the worthlessness of the present world, were becoming more and more common, and men everywhere were looking for aid and comfort to supernatural powers of one kind and another. The later Platonism, from which the theological thinking of the great fathers chiefly drew its sustenance, was completely

A under the sway of this spirit. Justin Martyr, Clement of Alexandria, and some other Fathers felt other influences and emphasised the moral ability of the natural man. But their optimistic view was rare in the early Church, and lasted but a little while. The dominant temper of the age was against it, and in the Epistles of Paul that temper found support. Even where the estimate of human nature was least sombre, it was still such as to make supernatural aid essential to its betterment. No man can enjoy the vision of God and eternal hfe unless he be born from above, unless he be recreated by divine power. Upon this need the historic Catholic system, both of east and west, was built, and in all its essential features it was complete before Augustine. came upon the scene. His extreme doctrine of human bondage and unconditional predestination never found acceptance in the east, and was unpopular even in the west, but the old conviction of man's need still prevailed, and at the second Council of Orange in 529, it was declared in the most unequivocal terms that no one can take even the first step toward the good until he has received divine grace. This remained throughout the Middle Ages not only the official doctrine but also the popular belief of the Catholic Church. Emphasis might be laid upon human merit, and upon man's ability to earn reward by making the right use of grace, but without it he could do nothing at all. Unless regenerated, he was doomed to destruction, and his most strenuous efforts could not avail.

In the canons of the Council of Trent, whose first doctrinal decree had to do with original sin, it is said : Mf any one saith that divine grace is given through Jesus Christ only for this that man may be able more easily to live justly and to merit eternal life, as if by free will without grace he were able to do both, though hardly indeed, and with difficulty ; let him be anathema.'

(Session 6, Canon 2.) ' If any one saith that without the prevenient inspiration of the Holy Ghost and without His help man can beheve, hope, love, or be penitent as he ought, so that the grace of justification may be bestowed upon him ; let him be anathema.' {Ibid., Canon 3.)

The mediaeval view involved, not simply the conviction that the natural man is corrupt and depraved, but that he is fallen. Originally created holy, he lapsed from his high estate, and cannot raise himself again without supernatural aid. The idea was the exact opposite of modern evolutionary notions. Man did not begin on a low plane and gradually ascend, but on a high plane, from which he abruptly fell. Having fallen and transgressed the divine law, he is doomed to eternal punishment. God is the great Judge and Avenger, a righteous Being who allows no sin to go unpunished ; but He is also merciful, and has provided for guilty men a means of escape from the consequences of their wickedness. The supreme need is salvation from the impending doom, and this God has provided in Christianity. In it is found the promise of divine grace adequate to human wants.

If the mediaeval view of man's corruption and inabihty was due to Paul, the mediaeval view of human merit had another root. Paul had denied all merit to man, and made salvation a pure gift of God. But from the second century on, his conception of divine grace, and the common legaHsm of the early Christians, lay side by side in the thinking of the Church. Without grace no man can be saved ; his nature is corrupt and must be transformed by supernatural power. But he must make the right use of the saving grace received through -the sacraments. Under its influence, and in the power imparted by it, he must live righteously, overcoming his faults, and growing day by day in virtue. If he does this and secures forgiveness for his sins through the sacrament of penance, he will merit the gift of salvation which

God has in store for him. This form of synergism is technically kno\\Ti as semi-Pelagianism, but it is much older than the semi-Pelagians, being essentially the view of the Church, both east and west, ever since Irenseus.

Upon the conviction of man's need was based the traditional idea of Jesus Christ as a Saviour, and His saving work was so conceived that the belief in His deity necessarily followed. He was thought by Paul to be divine, not because of the perfection of His character, or the completeness of His revelation of God's will and truth, but because by His indwelling the nature of man is transformed. Through Ignatius and Irenseus this idea of Christ's work entered into the thought of the Church, and became the basis of the Nicene doctrine of His deity. From a different point of view Anselm reached the same result when he made the infinite guilt of human transgression require an infinite penance, and hence the death of an infinite Being, the god-man, Jesus Christ, The deity of Christ being the essential element in the historic doctrine of the Trinity, that doctrine, too, rested ultimately upon the belief in human corruption and helplessness, and would not have become a part of the faith of the Church had man been thought of in a different way.

With the traditional view of human nature was correlated the notion of the present world as evil, sharing in the curse of man and doomed to destruction as he is. To escape from it was the one great aim of the serious-minded man. Salvation meant not the salvation of the world itself, its transformation into something better and holier, but release from it in order to enjoy the blessedness of another world altogether. The dominant spirit was that of other-worldliness. To be a Christian meant to belong to another sphere than this, to have one's interest set on higher things, to live in the future, and to eschew the pleasures and enjoyments of the present. Asceticism was the Christian ideal of life. Man stands, as Thomas

L] INTRODUCTION 5

Aquinas says, between the goods of this world and those of another. He who would possess the latter must eschew the former. He cannot have both, and he must take his choice. The more he crucifies his worldly desires and affections, and denies himself good things here, the more he may enjoy of future bliss. Christianity promised men blessings in a life beyond the grave at the expense of blessings here. It might, of course, bring happiness in this life, as the Christian contemplated the thought of the eternal felicity to come, but of earthly delight it had none to offer. Rather it demanded the sacrifice of such delight in order to the inheritance of joys belonging to another world. Belief in a future life was fundamental, and immortality an essential article of faith. Given doubt as to its reality, and the whole structure of Christian faith must fall to the ground. The sole significance of the present life lay in the fact that it was a probation for the life to come. It had worth only because of the everlasting issues which were determined by it. The few short years here are as nothing compared with the eternity beyond, and the wise man will think of that eternity, and live for it alone. So far as he may have interest in his fellowmen, and the spirit of love may prompt him to concern himself with their welfare, it will not be their present state which he will chiefly labour to improve. For them, as for himself, earthly conditions are of small account ; the one important thing is the salvation of their immortal souls. It was not a mere accident, nor was it due to the immaturity of civilisation and the lack of sensibility to physical comfort, that social service on a large scale was postponed to modern times. Rather, it was because of an altogether different ideal, and an altogether different estimate of the present world.

It was of a piece with the mediaeval view of the world that Nature lost independent interest, and was subordinated to the eternal destinies of men. The heavens and the

6 PROTESTANT THOUGHT BEFORE KANT [cb.

earth were to pass away, and hence it was not important to study them. Only spiritual things were worthy of attention. If Nature was investigated at all, it was for the light it might throw on eternal realities, and the revelation it might give of God and His will. According to Vincent of Beauvais, ' Natural science treats of the invisible causes of visible things,' and ' the knowledge of all wisdom has no value if it remain without the knowledge of God.' The few notable exceptions to this way of looking at things serve only to prove the rule. Under these circumstances, natural science in the modern sense of the term was, of course, impossible. Only supernatural knowledge, which brings a man into touch with eternity and prepares him for life beyond the grave, has real and permanent worth.

Upon man's need of salvation was based the historic view of the Church. Before the end of the second century it had come to be looked upon as the sole ark of salvation, outside of which there was no possibility of life. Cyprian's famous dictum, nulla salus extra ecdesiam, and his declaration that he who would have God for his Father must have the Church for his mother, but gave terse expression to a belief common already before his day, and rapidly becoming universal. The necessity of membership in the Church rested upon the theory that saving grace had been entrusted by the apostles to their successors, the bishops, and could be dispensed only by them. Out of communion with the bishop, therefore, meant out of communion with Christ. The clergy who derived their character from the episcopate constituted the sole mediators of saving grace, and upon them the laity were dependent for salvation. In religious things the latter had no rights and privileges of their own ; by themselves no access to God or Christ. The Church was composed primarily, not of the laity, but of the hierarchy. Where the bishop is, there is the Church, for there are grace and salvation.

Where he is not, there is no Church, though there be a great multitude of devout behevers.

The means of grace, by which salvation is mediated to men, are the sacraments. They have saving efficacy only when administered within the Catholic Church, and by one episcopally ordained, though an exception is made for prudential reasons in the case of baptism. From birth to death the Church accompanies the Christian with its gracious ministrations, supplying him all needed help, sanctifying the most important relationships and experiences of life, and enabling him to atone for his sins, and to secure strength to overcome them. It belongs to her to dictate the terms upon which the reconciliation of the sinning Christian shall be permitted, and to indicate the amount of penance required for his offences. To this was due the great elaboration of rites and ceremonies, sacred days, pilgrimages, hoarding of relics, fastings, and other ascetic practices, which marked the Middle Ages, and were so characteristic a feature of the religious life of the period.

The Christian Church was looked upon, not simply as an ark of salvation, but also as the supreme authority upon earth. The corruptness and inability with which all humanity is beset extends to the intellect as well as the will. Man is blind as well as depraved, and is incapable, not only of doing, but even of knowing the right, unless illuminated by divine revelation. It is true he may possess knowledge sufficient to guide him in the ordinary affairs of life, he may know what common morality requires, and may have the power to perform it, but the conditions of salvation he can learn and the ability to attain it he can gain only from above. And in the one case, as in the other, he owes all he has to the Church. Mediator of grace, she is also mediator of light ; by her alone the will and truth of God are infallibly declared. The crisis out of which was born the theory of the Catholic Apostolic Church as the sole ark of salvation, was due to the spread of heretical opinions in the second century, and it was the need of an objective authority that the doctrine of ApostoHc Succession was designed by Irenseus to meet. From the beginning, therefore, the CathoHc Church was the infalhble organ of divine truth as well as the sole mediator of divine grace. The heretic was as much outside of her pale as the schismatic. In his famous work on the city of God, Augustine broadened the traditional notion to include political as well as intellectual and moral authority. In the present millennial age the Catholic Church, which is the kingdom of God on earth, has authority over nations as well as individuals. In Augustine's notion of the civitas dei and the civitas terrena was rooted the papal theory of the Middle Ages, that the Church has two swords, the spiritual and the temporal, that the Pope, as head of the Church and vice-gerent of Christ, is supreme both in civil and spiritual things, and that all the nations and sovereigns of the earth are subject to him. Thus the Catholic Church of the Middle Ages was at once the sole ark of salvation and the supreme authority upon earth, moral, intellectual, and political, and submission to her was the one indispensable requirement.

The recognition of supernatural authority was carried so far in the Middle Ages that it even controlled men's ideas of the physical universe, and dictated the prevailing world- view of the period. It w^as commonly believed that in the Bible is contained an inspired account of the origin and structure of the world, and to depart from it is to fall not only into error but also into sin. According to St. Augustine nothing was to be accepted save on the authority of the Scriptures, ' for greater is that authority than all the powers of the human mind.' If any one wished to know more about the world in which he lived, he turned not to the world itself but to the Scriptures. Growth in the knowledge of Nature as well as of spiritual things could come only from a study of divine revelation. The supernaturalism of the Biblical writers was controlling in this sphere as in every other, and the world-view was far more primitive than that of the Greeks, for it was based upon the naive ideas of the Hebrew Scriptures.

In the Catholicism of the Middle Ages humility, both moral and intellectual, was the supreme virtue, self-confidence the worst of sins. Religion found its highest exercise in magnifying God as the All-hoty, Powerful, and Wise Being in contrast with corrupt, helpless, and blind humanity. Pride was the root of all evil. The fall of man, hke the fall of Satan, was due to it, and from it sprang sacrilege, schism, and heresy, the most awful crimes ; all were the fruits of self-love and self-confidence, the preference of one's own ways and opinions to those prescribed by the Church, God's representative on earth.

II. The Eve of the Be formation

The Protestant Reformation was not exclusively nor even chiefly a religious movement. It involved a break with the historical ecclesiastical institution and the organisation of new churches independent of Rome, but the break itself was as much political as religious, both in its causes and in its results. Dissatisfaction with the existing order of things was widespread in Western Europe, and was coming to ever more active expression. It was not confined to one class of society, nor limited to one set of conditions. The period was marked by discontent and unrest, moral, religious, social, economical, and political. The conviction was growing that traditional customs and institutions needed adjustment to the new needs of a new age, and on every hand criticisms of the old were rife and programmes of reform were multiplying. For centuries the Church had been the most imposing

10 PEOTESTANT THOUGHT BEFORE KANT [ch.

institution in Europe, and the most influential factor in its life. Rightly or wrongly it was widely held responsil)le for current evils in every Une, and every project for the betterment of society concerned itself in one or another way with the ecclesiastical establishment. As a rule, however, the criticisms of the existing system affected only superficial details, and were neither radical nor farreaching. Abuses in ecclesiastical administration, financial exactions on the part of the ecclesiastical authorities, ignorance, immorality, and venality on the part of the clergy — these constituted in most cases the burden of complaint. The fundamental principles on which the mediaeval system rested were seldom made the object of criticism or of question. The traditional Catholic dogmas and the beliefs underlying existing religious practices were commonly taken for granted. Criticism confined itself chiefly, either to the over-emphasis of theology and the substitution of barren orthodoxy for practical religion, or to abuses in the application of accepted principles and the displacement of vital piety by formalism and externality.^

Notable among the phenomena of the age was the tendency which we know as humanism, the most modern expression of the intellectual life of the period. It is true that its significance has been greatly exaggerated, and the contrast between the intellectual life of the fifteenth and that of the thirteenth century much over-emphasised. At the same time it is abundantly clear that the general temper of those whom we call humanists was unlike that of the leading thinkers of the Middle Ages. The difference was not in the matter of seriousness, as often said, for in spite of the frivolity of many humanists, some of the most notable of them were as earnest in purpose as any of the leaders of the Mediaeval Church. It lay rather in a

1 Cf. what Luther has to say about his predecessors in his 'Table Talk' Works, vol. Ix. pp. 216, 252; vol. Ixii. pp. 118, 124.

l] introduction 11

difference of attitude toward the present world both of man and of nature, a recognition of its independent value and an interest in it for its own sake. There was widespread rebelHon among the humanists against the trammels of mediaeval Catholicism, and against the tyranny of the ecclesiastical establishment, and the growing loss of reverence for the existing system which made the spread of Protestantism possible was in no small part due to their influence, as was also the increasing conviction that a reformation of some sort was needed. But with the constructive work of the Protestant Reformation and with the framing of its principles and ideals they had little to do.

Of the humanists who desired to promote a reformation of one kind or another, or at least to improve religious and moral conditions within the Church, Erasmus of Rotterdam may be taken as a representative.^ To Erasmus Christianity was primarily an ethical system ; Christ was its great teacher and exemplar ; and to be a Christian meant to conduct one's life in accordance with the principles which governed Him. Jesus appeared in the role of a sage, and Christianity under the aspect of a moral philosophy rather than a religion of redemption. In opposition to the schoolmen the elaborate theology of the Middle Ages was pushed to one side and the emphasis laid on practical conduct, and in opposition to the externality and formalism of the prevailing religious life of the day the inner disposition was made alone essential. All the paraphernalia of mediaeval Christianity — its sacraments, relics, pilgrimages, rites and ceremonies, ecclesiasticism and asceticism — were looked on as unimportant. Not that they were necessarily bad in themselves, but that they were not of the essence of the Gospel, and became vicious when they obscured the more vital matters. The heart of Christianity, the one all-important thing accord-

ing to Erasmus, is love for one's fellows, manifesting itself in charity, sympathy, and forbearance. The governing motive of Jesus' life was brotherly love, and in it the Christian life finds its controlling principle. Erasmus did not break with the Catholic Church, nor did he, in spite of the ridicule he continually heaped upon the follies and vices of priests and monks (as for instance in his Praise of Folly), reject the doctrines and principles of the mediaeval system. He was an orthodox Catholic, as his work on the Symbol abundantly shows, but his teaching was inevitably disintegrating in its tendency, and Pope Paul IV. was perfectly right in putting his works on the Index. The distinction between essential and non-essential in the existing system, and the reduction of the former to the moral principles taught by Jesus, must accrue to the neglect and disregard of a large part of the traditional theory and practice of the Catholic Church, and though Erasmus might not himself draw the natural conclusion, it was clear enough that others would.

In his endeavour to bring out distinctly the essence of Christianity in contrast with the excrescences which so commonly obscured it, Erasmus, like most of the humanists, was led to lay emphasis upon the supreme authority of the Bible. In the Primitive Church — in the days of Christ Himself and His Apostles — it might be assumed that the Gospel appeared in its purest form, unadulterated by the accretions of the centuries, and so the Bible, particularly the New Testament, became an object of diligent study. Erasmus himself published the first edition of the New Testament in the original Greek in 1516, and followed it with numerous commentaries and editions of the Fathers, who were supposed, after the apostles themselves, to be the most authentic witnesses to Christian truth, and the most competent interpreters of the Scriptures. The recognition of the authority of the Bible was not an innovation; theoretically, it had been supreme since an early day. It had been the object of diligent and faithful study on the part of theologians, and the comfort and inspiration of multitudes of devout and pious souls during all the centuries. In the later Middle Ages vernacular translations of it became very common, and in many cases received ecclesiastical approval. But it was not the exclusive authority of Catholic Christians. The Church was believed to be the living and infallible mediator and interpreter of divine truth. To its custody the Bible had been committed, and in the light of its teaching it was read. So long as the Bible and the Church were believed to speak the same language there was no difficulty and no need of defining the authority of the one as distinguished from the other. Only when sectaries and heretics set the Bible against the Church, and employed its teachings as a weapon to break down the existing system, did the ecclesiastical authorities begin to look askance upon it, and to condemn its unauthorised use. The significance of the humanists' attitude in the matter lay just here. Not that they recognised the authority of the Scriptures, but that they saw and emphasised the contrast between Biblical and traditional Christianity, and tried the latter by the former. In the later Middle Ages this was very common even beyond humanistic circles. It became more and more the custom for innovators of all kinds to appeal to the Scriptures against the Church, and to find warrant in the former for every deviation from existing principles and practices in the political and social as well as in the religious sphere. With denunciations of the existing situation were joined representations of the ideal conditions of primitive days to which it was desired to return. Some even went so far as to call the Catholic Church anti-Christian, and the Pope anti-Christ. While most of the humanists, including Erasmus himself, were not as severe and radical as this, the watchword ' back to Christ ' was on the lips of multitudes.

Another influence working in the same general direction, to minimise the importance of external rites and ceremonies, and to magnify the inner and vital essence of religion, was mediaeval mysticism. Mysticism has always existed within Christian circles. In the later Middle Ages it was very widespread, and became a disintegrating force on a large scale. The mystics emphasised personal salvation to the exclusion of all else. The contrast between them and the humanists was extreme in this respect. Christianity was regarded not as a moral philosophy but as a religion of redemption. The attention was turned wholly upon the one question of immediate personal concern. How am I to be saved ? The mystical interpretations of salvation, widely as they might differ in detail, commonly made it consist in union with God to be brought about by meditation and prayer, carried on largely apart from the ordinary offices of the Church. The result was the growing currency of a non-ecclesiastical piety which might or might not be hostile to the Church and the hierarchy, but was at any rate largely independent of them. By most of the mystics no criticism was passed upon the traditional dogmas or customs of the Church, but they were subordinated to the inner life with God. As is said in the famous Theologia Germanica : ' Now w^hat is this union ? It is that we should be of a truth purely, simply, and wholly at one with the One Eternal Will of God, or altogether without will, so that the created will should flow out into the Eternal Will, and be swallowed up and lost therein, so that the Eternal Will alone should do and leave undone in us. Now mark what may help or further us towards this end. Behold, neither exercises, nor words, nor works, nor any creature, nor creature's work, can do this. In this wise, therefore, must we renounce and forsake all things, that we must not imagine or suppose that any words, works, or exercises, any skill, or cunning, or any created thing can help or serve us thereto. Therefore we must suffer these things to be what they are, and enter into the union with God.' (Miss Winkworth's translation, chap, xxvii.)

Similarly there was widely current a simple evangelical piety closely akin to that existing in Protestantism from the beginning. Doubtless there had always been a good deal of it, perhaps as much as in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, but it is in the literature of that period that we discover the most frequent expressions of it. Its essence was recognition of the love of God revealed in Christ, renunciation of all merit of one's own, dependence upon God and trust in Him. The evangelical theology which Luther later taught came to multitudes of Christians with a very familiar sound. It was in fact little else than a translation into articulate terms of a piety in which they had always lived. This kind of piety also meant as a rule no criticism of or breach with the existing: system. Those who were dominated by it commonly remained devout and loyal Catholics, and never thought of questioning the divine character of the Church, but they became inevitably, even if insensibly, less dependent upon external forms, and less subject to an objective authority. They made little stir in the world, but they were quick to respond to such a gospel as Luther proclaimed. The rapid spread of his influence among the German people was in no small part due to the wide prevalence of this kind of piety, and because its existence was hardly suspected by the authorities the success of his preaching remained inexplicable to them.