it enjoins public reading of certain lessons from the Apocrypha
and uses in worship even the " Athanasian " as well as the two
more ancient creeds. On the basis of belief in inspiration we
find, during the days of Protestant scholasticism, the most
reckless and insane assertions of scriptural perfection. Even
in our own time, popular Protestant evangelicalism joins with
the newer emphasis upon conversion the two great early Pro-
testant appeals — to Atonement and to infallible Scripture. But
the Protestant Church is by no means alone in making such
assertions. Other Churches make them too, though they over-
lay and disguise them with appeals to tradition and to the
authority of the Church itself, or the Fathers. The definite
and limited burden had to be more definitely dealt with; hence
these Protestant extravagances.
The first great rival to Protestant orthodoxy, apart from its old enemy of Rome, was Socinianism, guided by Laelius Socinian- Socinus (?.».), but still more by his nephew Faustus. ism. Thoroughly intellectualist, and rational, and super- naturalist, it has no one to champion it to-day, yet its influence is everywhere. Jesus, a teacher who sealed His testimony with His blood, and, raised from the dead, was exalted or adopted to divine glory, thus giving to men for the first time the certainty that God's favour could be won and eternal life enjoyed — such is the scheme. There is no natural theology; the teachings so described are really part, or rather are the essence, of the revelation of Jesus. Atonement is a dream, and an immoral dream. Supernatural sacraments of course drop out. The Lord's Supper is a simple memorial. Baptism were better disused, though Faustus will leave the matter to each Christian man's discretion. There is not in all Church history any state- ment of doctrine better knit together. Socinus's church is a school — a school of enlightenment. He was also — like Calvin, if on more narrowly common-sense lines — an admirable exegete. Harnack ranks his system with Tridentine and post-Tridentine theology on the one hand, and with Protestantism on the other hand, as the third great outcome of the history of dogma. Nevertheless the judgment of history declares that this brilliant exploit was entirely eccentric, and could only in indirect ways subserve theological study. Those to-day who are nearest the Socini in belief are as far as any from their fashion of approach- ing and justifying their chosen version of Christian doctrine.
Even after the loss of the Protestants and the suppression or expulsion of the Jansenists, the doctrinal history of the Later bis- Church of Rome is described as governed by discus- tory of sions in regard to Thomist Augustinianism. The Roman Molinists {i.e. followers of Louis Molina the Jesuit, doctrine. not Michael Molinos the mystic) are the leading representatives of a different theology. Harnack, a keenly hostile critic, draws attention to a change in the region of moral theology, not dogmatics. After long controversy, St Alfonso Liguori's doctrine of Probabilism (originated by Molina) definitely triumphed everywhere. Conduct is considered lawful if any good Church authority holds it to be defensible; and " probability " warrants the confessor in taking a lenient view of sins which he himself, and authorities of weight in the Church, may regard as black in the extreme. From Harnack's point of view, the theory destroys Augustinianism, whatever honour may still be paid to that name. Another important change in Roman Catholic theology has been the increasing personal power of the pope. This was significantly foreshadowed when Pius IV. put forward by his own act what is known as the creed of the Council of Trent; and, after the coldness of the 18th century and the evil days of the French Revolution, an Ultramontane revival, relying with enthusiasm on the papacy, grew more and more strong until it became all-powerful under Pius IX. It gained a notable victory when that pope, acting on his own authority, defined (1854) as of faith a doctrine which had been long and hotly discussed — the Immaculate or abso- lutely sinless Conception (deeper than mere sinlessness in act and life) of the Blessed Virgin. The second and decisive victory followed at the Vatican Council (1870), which, at the cost of a small secession of distinguished men, declared the pope personally infallible (see Infallibility) and irreformable as often as he rules ex cathedra points of faith or morals. This once again seems to be the last word in a long development. Uncertainty as to the authorities determining religious belief — Scripture, tradition, Fathers, Doctors — is now, at least poten- tially, at an end; the pope can rule every point definitely, if he sees good to do so.
The theory of Development (J. A. Mohler, J. H. Newman), which throws so new a light upon the meaning of tradition, is a valuable support of the conception of a sovereign pontiff drawing out dogmas from implicit into explicit life. Still, new M°dern and obscure questionings may still arise. When is the ,,j 0ry . pope ruling faith and morals from his throne? When aev «'°P m may the Church be assured that the infallible guidance menu is being given? A startling fresh development is suggested by Harnack, while vehemently dismissed as impossible by another Protestant scholar, H. M. Gwatkin. May a reforming or inno- vating pope arise? He would find, in theory at least, that he possessed a weapon of matchless power and precision. But hitherto Roman Catholic theology has refused to conceive of any development except by enlargement of the Church's creed. Much may be added to formulated belief ; it is not admitted that any- thing has been or can be withdrawn. Brilliant Modernist scholars like A. Loisy may have successors who will champion theories of evolutionary transformation. But at the present hour a repre- sentative writer names as a typical open question in his communion the Assumption of the Virgin. Perhaps, indeed, it is rather a dogma hastening towards definition. Is the theory or tradition correct, that, after death and burial, Mary was bodily received into heaven and her grave left empty? Such problems engage the official theologians of the Church of Rome.
It is natural that the " variations " with which Bossuet re- proached the Protestants should demand more space. The Christological problem seems to require separate treatment. In regard to the Trinity, Protestantism tant his- has nothing very new to say, though " Sabellianism " toryot is revived by Swedenborg and Schleiermacher. But doctrlaes ' in regard to Christology opinion takes fresh forms as early as Luther himself. While this became conspicuous in connexion with his doctrine of consubstantiation in the Eucharist, it appears[1] that he had a genuine speculative interest in the matter. Communicatio idiomatum was well known in the schools as an affair of terminology. You might say correctly that God has died (meaning the Godman), or that a man is to be worshipped — Christ Jesus. According to Luther, however, it is not merely in words that the attributes of the Godhead qualify Christ's human nature.[2] That takes place in fact; and so the human glorified body of Christ is, or may become under conditions which please Him, e.g. at the Eucharist, ubiquitous. This new quasi-monophysitism disinclined the Lutherans to make much of Christ's humanity, while the Reformed, partly from the scholarly tradition of Calvin, partly from a polemical motive, laid great emphasis on the manhood. A. Ritschl* even speaks of the Reformed as teaching Kenosis in the modern sense; but it is to be feared they rather taught alternately the manhood and the Godhead than made a serious effort to show the com- patibility of divine and human predicates in one person. Christ as man was one of the Elect (and their head) ; He needed grace; He depended upon the Holy Spirit. On the other hand, as God, He was the very source of grace. The Lutherans held that the Incarnate One possessed all divine attributes, but either willed to suspend their use — this is the Kenosis doctrine of the Lutheran school of Tubingen in the 17th century — or concealed their working; the latter was the doctrine of the Giessen school.
A theory which flickers through Church history in the train of mystical influence proceeding from the pseudo-Dionysius Areopagita has become more prominent in modern.[3] Neces times — that Christ would have become Incarnate stty" of even had man not sinned. Rejected by Thomas, it incarna is patronized by Duns — not, one thinks, that he loved t,0 rational certainties more, but that he loved redemptive necessities
