FAITH
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FAITH
gau Book", was drawn up entirely in the spirit of
Luther, eliminating Calvinism and Phihpism. This
book not being favourably received by several princes,
Augustus summoned a fresh convention in the monas-
tery of Bergen, near Magdeburg, where several altera-
tions were proposed. As finally revised, the " For-
mula of Concord" was sent to the princes to be pro-
mulgated and enforced. Augustus of Saxony, John
George of Brandenburg, and other princes, gathered
their preachers together and compelled them publicly
to subscribe their signatures, " not only with their
hands, but with their hearts". Many of the princes
repudiated the book; the King of Denmark threw his
copy into the fire. The only Lutherans at the present
day who attach any importance to it are in Missouri.
The " Formula" is divided into two parts (1) the Epit-
ome, and (2) the Solida Declaratio. The Epitome
sums up Luther's "pure doctrine" in succinct form;
the second part goes over the same ground more at
large. Although the "Formula" begins with the
stereotype Protestant declaration that the Bible is
"the only rule and norm" of faith, yet, as Dr. Schaff
remarks, it quotes Dr. Luther "as freely, and with at
least as much deference to his authority, as Roman
Catholics quote the Fathers".
C0NFESS10N.S OF THE "Reformed" Churches. — The so-called Reformed creeds, of which thirty or more are extant, are based on the radical tenets of Zwingli and Calvin. We can only notice the most im- portant of them. The Conjessio Tetra poIiUina. — As the Straslmrg preachers, Bucer and Capito, inclined to the Zwinglian view of the Eucharist, they were shunned by the Lutherans at the Diet of Augsburg (1530), and were not allowed to sign the Augustana. They therefore drew up a separate Confession, following the general lines of the Lutheran document, a copy of which had been given to them by Philip of Hesse. Bucer touches upon several topics that Melanchthon had cautiously avoided, among them "the invisible church", the rejection of tradition and of images. The Mass is denounced as "an mtolerable abomina- tion". Art. IS, " On the Eucharist", is given so enig- matically, that it is impossible to discover the real meaning. After great trouble the Strasburgers were able to secure the adhesion of three Southern German towns, Constance, Memmingen, and Lindau. From these four cities the Confession obtained the name of Tetrapolitan. It was delivered to the Emperor, 9 July. Charles refused to permit it to be read at the Diet, and commissioned the Catholic theologians to confute it. It was printed in the autmnn of 1531 at Strasburg, together with a " Vindication ' '. It did not long remain in authority, for the towns subscribed to the Augsburg Confession in order to join the Smalcald League. Zwingli himself sent to the Diet, July 1530, a Confession of Faith in which he openly denied the Real Presence, and denounced purgatory as "an in- jurious fiction which sets Christ's merits at naught." He also, shortly before his death, sent a Confession to Francis I.
The First Confession of Basle, also called of Miil- hausen because adopted by that city, was drafted in 1531 by (Ecolampadius and after his death elaborated by his successor, Oswald Myconius. It was promul- gated by the city authorities of Basle, 21 Jan., 1534. It is a brief document, moderate in tone and calcu- lated to conciliate the Lutherans. The text, as we now possess it, was revised in a Calvinistic sen.se in 1561. Of more importance is the Second Confession of Basle, known also as the "Helvetica Prior". In the "Wit^ tenberg Concord" Luther had forced his peculiar views, regarding the Euchari.st, on Bucer and .several other mediating preachers. The formula was reluct- antly accepted by the Southern German towns, whose only protection was to be admitted into the Smalcald League; but it was rejected liy the inde])enileiit Swi.ss. At the same time, it was recognized that .some means
should be devised of healing the dissensions among the
Protestants, now that the convening of a General
Council was in prospect. It was resolved to draft a
new Confession which should be presented to the coun-
cil as the national creed of the Protestant Cantons.
An asseiubly met at Basle, 30 Jan., 1530, composed of
the most prominent Swiss preacliers and delegates
from Zurich, Bern, Basle, Schaffhausen, St. Gall, Mijl-
hausen, and Biel. A committee consistmg of Henry
BuUinger, Oswald Myconius and Simon Grynaeus, was
commissioned to draw up the document. It was writ-
ten in Latin, and a free Cierman translation made by
Leo Juda was adopted by the meeting. Its tone is
decidedly Zwinglian, but on the disputed points of the
sacraments and the Lord's Supper there is an evident
effort to approach as near as possible to the Lutheran
phraseology.
A copy of the Confession was brought to Luther by Bucer ; and it was a great surprise to the Swiss that the Wittenberg reformer declared hunself satisfied with it. Luther's change of attitude was due partly to the political needs and wishes of the Smalcald princes, and partly to the altered phraseology of the Confession on the subject of the sacraments, due to the growing in- fluence of Calvin. Whereas the Zwinglian flatly de- nied the corporal presence of Christ in the Eucharist, Calvin preached His "spiritual presence," which really amounts to the same thmg. The "Helvetica Prior" remained for some years the national creed of the Swiss Protestants; but it was superseded in 1566 by the " Helvetica Posterior ' '. This latter document was originally the private confession of Henry BuUinger of Zurich ; but it was formally accepted as a symbolic book by nearly all the Reformed Churches of Europe. It follows the main lines of the earlier confessions, but is much lengthier, and more in the nature of a theological treatise. It is the storehouse from which later framers of Reformed Confessions have copiously drawn. These documents of Calvin have been looked upon as of dogmatic authority, viz. "The Catechism of Geneva" (1541), the "Consensus of Zurich" (1549), which in twenty-six articles expounds Calvin's views on the sacraments, and the " Consensus of the pastors of the Church of Geneva" (1552), which proclauns the Calvinistic dogma of absolute predestination.
The GalUcana, for the use of the French Protestants, was the first of the purely Calvinistic Confessions. The orio;inal draft was made by Calvin himself. It was revised in various synods, from the first of Paris (1559), to the seventh National Synod at La Rochelle (1571), from which latter town it drew its popular name of " the Rochelle Confession". Its Calvinism is undiluted, and it offers all the peculiar doctrines of that innovator. The Roman Church comes in for a fair share of vituperation, for its "corruptions", " superstitions ' ', and " idolatries ". " Nevertheless ' ', it says, " as some trace of the Church is left in the papacy ... we confess that those baptized in it do not nceil a second baptism." This concession does not imjily that " idolaters" are to be tolerated ; for the .\uthor of jiLst government "has put the sword into the hands of magistrates, to suppress crimes against the first as well as against the second table of the Conunand- ments of God." This Confession remained in author- ity among French Protestants, until the Voltairianism and Rationalism of the eighteenth and nineteenth cen- turies <leprived it of all value. In the thirtieth Gen- eral Syiuul of the Reformed Church of France (6 June to 10 July, 1872), the only approach to a Confession of Faith that could be made was the adoption by the slender majority of sixteen votes of the following vague resolution:
"The Reformed Church of France, on resuming her synodical action, which for so many years had been interrupted, desires, before all things to offer her thanks to God, and to testify her love to Jesus Christ, her Divine Head, who has sustained and comforted
