RENOVATION INAUGURATED BY SCHLEIERMACHER.
The commencement of the nineteenth century found the German people in a
state of almost hopeless depression. They saw their territory laid waste
by the victorious Napoleon, and their thrones occupied by rulers of
Gallic or Italian preferences. They had striven very sluggishly to stem
the current of national subjection and humiliation. The star of France
being in the ascendant, the Rhine was no longer their friendly ally and
western limit. No stage in the history of a people is more gloomy and
calls more loudly for sympathy than when national prestige is gone, and
dignities usurped by foreign conquerors. Though the apathy of despair is
a theme more becoming the poet than the historian, we find a vivid
description of the sadness and desolation produced by the French
domination given by one who deeply felt the disgrace of his country.
This writer says:
"The Divine Nemesis now stretched forth her hand against devoted
Germany, and chastened her rulers and her people for the sins and
transgressions of many generations. Like those wild sons of the desert,
whom in the seventh century, heaven let loose to punish the degenerate
Christians of the East, the new Islamite hordes of revolutionary France
were permitted by Divine Providence to spread through Germany, as
through almost every country in Europe, terror and desolation.
"What shall I say of the endless evils that accompanied and followed the
march of her armies, the desolation of provinces, the plunder of cities,
the spoliation of church property, the desecration of altars, the
proscription of the virtuous, the exaltation of the unworthy members of
society, the horrid mummeries of irreligion practised in many of the
conquered cities, the degradation of life and the profanation of death.
Such were the calamities that marked the course of these devastating
hosts. And yet the evils inflicted by Jacobin France were less intense
and less permanent than those exercised by her legislation. In politics
the expulsion of the ecclesiastical electors, who, though they had
sometimes given in to the false spirit of the age, had ever been the
mildest and most benevolent of rulers; the proscription of a nobility
that had ever lived in the kindliest relations with its tenantry; and on
the ruins of old aristocratic and municipal institutions that had long
guarded and sustained popular freedom, a coarse, leveling tyranny,
sometimes democratic, sometimes imperial, established; in the church the
oppression of the priesthood, a heartless religious indifferentism,
undignified even by attempts at philosophic speculation, propagated and
encouraged; and through the poisoned channels of education the taint of
infidelity transmitted to generations yet unborn. Such were the evils
that followed the establishment of the French domination in the
conquered provinces of Germany. Doubtless, through the all-wise
dispensations of that Providence who bringeth good out of evil, this
fearful revolution has partly become, and will yet further become, the
occasion of the moral and social regeneration of Europe."[52]
The patriot saw his country degraded; but the Christian wept for his
absent faith. Rationalism was strongest when national humiliation was
deepest. These formed a fitting twinship. It is a scathing comment on
the influence of skepticism upon a people that, in general, the highest
feeling of nationality is coexistent with the devoutest piety. It is the
very nature of infidelity to deaden the emotions of patriotism, and that
country can hardly expect to prove successful if it engage in war while
its citizens are imbued with religious doubt. If lands are conquered, it
knows not how to govern them; if defeated, skepticism affords but little
comfort in the night of disaster. We do not attach a fictitious
importance to Rationalism when we say that it was the prime agent which
prevented the Germans from the struggle of self-liberation, and that the
victory of Waterloo and the Congress of Vienna would never have been
needed had those people remained faithful to the precedents furnished by
the Reformers.
When Fichte was in his old age, and had completed his system of
philosophy, he published his _Addresses to the German People_. Political
writing was a new field for him, and yet, whoever will take the pains to
study the fruits of his thinking, will easily perceive that the spirit
animating the _Addresses_ was the same which pervaded his entire
philosophy. He saw the degradation of his country. Though at a time of
life when youthful fervor is supposed to have passed away, he became
inflamed with indignation at the insolence of the conqueror and the
apathy of his countrymen, and addressed himself to the consciousness of
the people by calling upon them to arise, and reclothe themselves with
their old historic strength. His voice was not disregarded. The result
proved that those who had thought him in his dotage, and only indulging
its loquacity, were much mistaken. He wrote that enthusiastic appeal
with a great aim. He had spent the most of his life in other fields, but
posterity will never fail to honor those who, whatever their habits of
thinking may have been, for once at least have the sagacity to see the
wants of their times, and possess the still higher wisdom of meeting
them. Fichte died in 1814; but it was at a time when, Simeon-like, he
could congratulate himself upon the prospects of humanity. He still felt
the rich glow of youth when, in his last days, he could say: "The
morning light has broken, and already gilds the mountain-tops, and gives
promise of the great coming day."
After independence had been achieved and the downfall of Napoleon had
become a fact, there appeared evidences of new evangelical life. When
the German soldiers recrossed the river which their ancestors had loved
to call "Father Rhine," and felt themselves the proud possessors of free
soil, not only they, but all their countrymen living in the Protestant
principalities, manifested a decided dissatisfaction with that
skepticism which had paralyzed them. Moreover, the memory that France
had been the chief agent in introducing Rationalism was not likely to
diminish their hatred of all infidelity. The masses breathed more
freely, but they were still imbued with serious error. Restoration was
the watchword in politics; but it was soon transferred to the domain of
religion and theology.
But great as was the influence of the wars of freedom in bringing back
the German heart to an intense desire for a more elevated nationality,
we must not be unmindful of the great theological forces which were
preparing for a thorough religious renovation.
They met in Schleiermacher. When quite young he was placed, first at
Niesky and afterward at Barby, in the care of the Moravians. It was
among these devout people that he became inspired with that enthusiastic
love of inner religious feeling which characterized his entire career.
The traces of Moravian piety are perceptible in all his writings. His
own words concerning his early training are very touching. "Piety," says
he, "was the maternal bosom, in the sacred shade of which my youth was
passed, and which prepared me for the yet unknown scenes of the world.
In piety my spirit breathed before I found my peculiar station in
science and the affairs of life; it aided me when I began to examine
into the faith of my fathers, and to purify my thoughts and feelings
from all alloy; it remained with me when the God and immortality of my
childhood disappeared from my doubting sight; it guided me in active
life; it enabled me to keep my character duly balanced between my faults
and virtues; through its means I have experienced friendship and love."
He became a student at Halle, and thence removed to Berlin, where he was
appointed chaplain to the _House of Charity_. While in that metropolis
he had rare opportunities for the study of his times. He saw that the
indifference and doubt which centered in the court and the university,
controlled the leaders of theology, literature, and statesmanship. He
drew his philosophy largely from Jacobi, exhibiting with that thinker
his dissatisfaction at the existing condition of metaphysics and
theology. Schleiermacher could not look upon the dearth around him
without the deepest emotion. He asked himself if there was no remedy
for the wide-spread evil. The seat of the disease appeared to him to be
the false deification of reason in particular; and the general mistake
of making religion dependent upon external bases instead of upon the
heart and consciousness of man. His conclusion was that both the friends
and enemies of Rationalism were mistaken, and that religion consists not
in knowledge but in feeling. It was in 1799 that he wrote his
_Discourses on Religion addressed to its Cultivated Despisers_. Striking
at the principal existing evil, which was indifference, he aimed to show
the only method for the eradication of them all.
The late Mr. Vaughan, in speaking of the position of this work, says:
"In these essays Schleiermacher meets the Rationalist objector on his
own ground. In what aspect, he asks, have you considered religion that
you so despise it? Have you looked on its outward manifestations only?
These the peculiarities of an age or a nation may modify. You should
have looked deeper. That which constitutes the religious _life_ has
escaped you. Your criticism has dissected a dead creed. That scalpel
will never detect a soul. Or will you aver that you have indeed looked
upon religion in its inward reality? Then you must acknowledge that the
idea of religion is inherent in human nature, that it is a great
necessity of our kind. Your quarrel lies in this case, not with religion
itself, but with the corruptions of it. In the name of humanity you are
called on to examine closely, to appreciate duly what has been already
done towards the emancipation of the true and eternal which lies beneath
these forms,--to assist in what may yet remain. Schleiermacher separates
the province of religion from those of action and of knowledge. Religion
is not morality, it is not science. Its seat is found accordingly in
the third element of our nature--the feeling. Its essential is a right
state of the heart. To degrade religion to the position of a mere
purveyor of motive to morality is not more dishonorable to the ethics
which must ask than to the religion which will render such
assistance.... The feeling Schleiermacher advocates, is not the
fanaticism of the ignorant or the visionary emotion of the idle. It is
not an aimless reverie shrinking morbidly from the light of clear and
definite thought. Feeling, in its sound condition, affects both our
conception and our will, leads to knowledge and to action. Neither
knowledge nor morality are in themselves the measure of a man's
religiousness. Yet religion is requisite to true wisdom and morality
inseparable from true religion. He points out the hurtfulness of a union
between church and state. With indignant eloquence he descants on the
evils which have befallen the church since first the hem of the priestly
robe swept the marble of the imperial palace."[53]
Religion being subjective, according to Schleiermacher, there can be
interminable varieties of it. As we look at the universe in numerous
lights, and thereby derive different impressions, so do we acquire a
diversity of conceptions of religion. Hence it has had many forms among
the nations of the earth. There is in each breast a religion derived
from the object of intellectual or spiritual vision. Christianity is the
great sum resulting from the antagonism of the finite and the infinite,
the human and divine. The fall and redemption, separation and reunion,
are the great elements from which we behold Christianity arise. Of all
kinds of religion this alone can claim universal adaptation and rightful
supremacy. Christ was the revelator of a system more advanced than
Polytheism or Judaism. Only by viewing his religion in the simple light
in which he places it can the mind find safety in its attempts to seek
for a basis of faith. But, important as Christianity is, it will avail
but little unless it become the heart-property of the theoretical
believer.
The _Discourses_ produced a deep impression. They inspired the class to
whom they had been directed with what it needed most of all, _a sense of
dependence_. One could not read them and close the volume without
wondering how reason could be deified and the feeling of the heart
ignored. There were multitudes of the educated and cultivated throughout
the land who, having become unfriendly to Christianity through the
persistence of the Rationalists, were equally indisposed to be satisfied
with a mere destructive theology. Something positive was what they
wanted; hence the great service of Schleiermacher in directing them to
Christianity as the great sun in the heavens, and then to the heart as
the organ able to behold the light. His labor was inestimably valuable.
His utterances were full of the enthusiasm of youth, and, years later,
he became so dissatisfied with the work, that he said it had grown
strange even to himself. As if over-careful of his reputation, to a
subsequent edition he appended large explanatory notes in order to
harmonize his recent with his former views. It would have been more
becoming the mature man to leave those earnest appeals to reap their own
reward. The times had changed; and the necessity which had first called
forth his appeal to the idolaters of doubt was sufficient apology.
Schleiermacher wrote other works, of which he and his disciples were
much prouder; but we doubt if he ever issued one more befitting the
class addressed, or followed with more beneficial results. Since his
pen has been stopped by death, those very discourses have led many a
skeptic in from the cold storm which beat about him, and given him a
place at the warm, cheerful fireside of Christian faith. Severe censure
has been cast upon them because of their traces of Spinoza. It is enough
to reply that their author, in the fourth edition, repudiated every word
savoring of Pantheism. Of books, as of men, it is best to form an
estimate according to the purpose creating them, and the moral results
following them. Neander, who could well observe the influence of the
_Discourses_, gives his testimony in the following language: "Those who
at that time belonged to the rising generation will remember with what
power this book influenced the minds of the young, being written in all
the vigor of youthful enthusiasm, and bearing witness to the neglected,
undeniable religious element in human nature. That which constitutes the
peculiar characteristic of religion, namely, that it is an independent
element in human nature, had fallen into oblivion by a one-sided
rational or speculative tendency, or a one-sided disposition to absorb
it in ethics. Schleiermacher had touched a note which, especially in the
minds of youth, was sure to send forth its melody over the land. Men
were led back into the depth of their heart, to perceive here a divine
drawing which, when once called forth, might lead them beyond that which
the author of this impulse had expressed with distinct consciousness."
In the year following the publication of the _Discourses on Religion_,
Schleiermacher issued his _Monologues_. Here he gave the keynote to the
century. While, only the year before, he would cultivate the feeling of
dependence and turn the mind inward, in the _Monologues_ he would lead
man to a knowledge of his own power, and show how far his individuality
can go upon its mission of success. Here he lauds independence. Hence
the latter work exerted the same kind of influence which attended
Fichte's _Addresses_, and it had no small share in the reäwakening of
the people to their innate power. There might appear an antagonism
between these two works of Schleiermacher, but, while the _Discourses_
were the exposition of his religious views, the _Monologues_ were merely
the annunciation of his moral opinions subsequently developed in his
_System of Christian Ethics_. The latter production was not destitute of
enthusiasm. In fact, the _Monologues_, cultivating the spirit of
independence, were far more capable of arousing and invigorating the
mind and heart. The author would have no one blind to the native
strength secreted in every breast, nor fail to cultivate sympathy and
love through every period of life. The consciousness should be a world
in itself; not even seeking an external support, but satisfied with its
own introspection; not watching the storm without, but satisfied with
surveying the gilded halls of its own castle-home. Thus there becomes,
instead of old age, continuous youth. This was his own pure experience.
"For," said he, "to the consciousness of inner freedom, and acting in
accordance with it, correspond eternal youth and joy. This I have got
hold of, and shall never give it up again; and with a smile I thus see
vanishing the light of mine eyes, and white hairs springing up among my
fair locks. Whatever may happen, nothing shall grieve my heart; the
pulse of my inner life shall remain fresh until I die."
A strong evidence that the German people were learning well the lessons
now impressed upon them, was the increasing fondness for the
institutions of purer times and a growing taste for history. The mind
found no comfort in the present, and it was therefore driven back upon
the past for solace. Poets began to start up, clothed with the spirit of
independence, and singing of bygone days in such a way that they were
understood as saying, "Now you see what our fathers did; how they
believed and fought; go you and do likewise." This new race sprang from
the Romantic School, led by Tieck, Schlegel, and others; but while it
possessed that enthusiastic admiration of the past which these men
indulged, their literary offspring exhibited a more earnest Christian
faith. It was in that day of distress that Uhland first poured forth his
notes of awakening; that Körner sounded the bugle-call of freedom; that
Rückert molded sonnets stronger than bullets; and Kerner sighed for a
world where there is no war, and no rumors of war.
Thus, when liberation came, no one class could claim to be the sole
agent of its accomplishment. But it is certain that if the religious
spirit of the people had not been appealed to and aroused, all literary
and æsthetic efforts would have been in vain. It was the religious
consciousness of the masses east of the Rhine which, being thoroughly
awakened, drew the sword, and gained the victory of Waterloo. If we view
that great crisis in European history in any light whatever, we cannot
resist the conviction that its importance in the sphere of religion was
equally great with its political magnitude.
The King of Prussia, Frederic William III., began the work of
ecclesiastical reconstruction. There were three questions of great
delicacy, but of prime importance, which he attempted to solve; the
constitution of the Protestant church; the improvement of liturgical
forms; and the union of the two Protestant confessions. Whatever course
the king might adopt could not fail to make many enemies. But he
belonged to a line of princes who had been aiming at the unity of the
church for more than two centuries, and who, with the single exception
of Frederic II., had endeavored to preserve popular faith in the
Scriptures. Preparations were being made for the three hundredth
anniversary jubilee of the Reformation. The land being now redeemed, it
was hoped that the occasion would inspire all hearts with confidence in
the future of both state and church. The king deemed it a most favorable
opportunity to bring the two branches of the Protestant church together,
not by one coming over to the territory of the other, but by mutual
compromise, by the rejection of the terms Lutheran and Reformed, and by
the assumption of a new denominational name.
There was really no reason why the two confessions should not be united,
for it was very plain that the adherents of both were not rigid in their
attachment. The Calvinists were no longer tenaciously devoted to their
founder's views of absolute predestination, while the Lutherans, having
departed from the doctrine of the real presence in the Lord's Supper,
had adopted the Zwinglian theory. The rigid authority of the symbolical
books was but loosely held by Lutherans and Calvinists. Frederic William
III., seeing that the separation was more imaginary than real, wrote a
letter on the second of May, 1817, to Bishop Sack and Provost Hanstein,
in which he said: "I expect proposals from you concerning the union of
the two confessions, which are in fact so similar; and as to the easiest
method of effecting the same." On the twenty-seventh day of the same
month he addressed a circular to all ecclesiastical functionaries
within his dominions, calling upon them to exert their influence for the
union of the two churches, and to give notice that the approaching
jubilee would be the signal for it to take place. The thirty-first of
October was the anniversary, and the plan was so far successful that in
many places the people and ministry of both confessions met on that day
for divine worship and partook of the Lord's Supper together. The fruit
of the movement was highly satisfactory to the Prussian King. Very soon
after the anniversary of the Reformation, the terms _Lutheran_ and
_Reformed_ were stricken from official documents, and the united State
Church was henceforth known as the Evangelical Church.
Beyond the limits of Prussia the Union gave rise to animated discussion;
but within the space of five years it was effected in Nassau, Rhenish
Bavaria, the Palatinate, Rhenish Hesse, and Dessau. It encountered the
most decided opposition in the person of Harms, a pastor of the city of
Kiel. He was not opposed to any movement which he thought would conduce
to the advantage of Christ's kingdom, but it was his opinion that a
return to the old Lutheran orthodoxy was more needed than the union of
the two churches. The faith of the fathers, and not the union of
Rationalistic divines, was, in his view, the only method of deliverance.
Harms was little known outside his own province until the publication of
his ninety-five _Theses_ in connection with the original ninety-five
nailed by Luther to the door of the Schlosskirche in Wittenberg. He was
the son of a plain Holstein miller, and had been indoctrinated into the
Lutheran catechism during his early youth. His first lessons in Latin
and Greek were received at the hands of a Rationalistic pastor in his
native town, but he assisted his father in the mill until he was
nineteen years of age. He then visited the university of Kiel, and in
due time entered upon the pastoral work. He scorned the customary dry
method of preaching, and aimed to reach the hearts of his hearers by any
praiseworthy method within his power. He made use of popular
illustrations and ordinary incidents. His congregations increased, not
only in the attendance of the middle and lower classes, but of the
gentry and wealthy. His earnest plainness was so novel and unexpected
that those who had long absented themselves from the sanctuary were
rejoiced to attend the ministrations of a preacher who seemed to believe
something positive and Scriptural, and who had the boldness to say what
he did believe.
This was the man who came forth on the occasion of the anniversary of
the Reformation as the champion for a return to the spirit of the olden
time. He held that reason had totally supplanted revelation in the
pulpits, universities, and lower schools, and that, until faith was
crowned with supremacy, there was no hope of relief. The _Theses_
exhibited great directness and clearness of appeal, and a keen insight
into the methods of popular address. As a specimen of their style we
introduce the following extracts: "III. With the idea of a progressing
Reformation, in the manner in which this idea is at present understood,
and especially in the manner in which we are reminded of it, Lutheranism
will be reformed back into heathenism, and Christianity out of the
world. IX. In matters of faith, reason; and as regards the life,
conscience, may be called the Popes of our age. XI. Conscience cannot
pardon sins. XXI. In the sixteenth century the pardon of sins cost
money, after all; in the nineteenth it may be had without money, for
people help themselves to it. XXIV. In an old hymn-book it was said,
'Two places, O man, thou hast before thee;' but in modern times they
have slain the devil and dammed up hell. XXXII. The so-called religion
of reason is destitute either of reason or religion, or both. XLVII. If
in matters of religion, reason claims to be more than a layman, it
becomes a heretic; that avoid, Titus iii. 10. LXIV. Christians should be
taught that they have the right not to tolerate any unchristian and
un-Lutheran doctrine in the pulpits, hymn-books, and school-books.
LXVII. It is a strange claim that it must be permitted to teach a new
faith from a chair which the old faith had set up, and from a mouth to
which the old faith gives food. LXXI. Reason, turned head, goes about in
the Lutheran church: it tears Christianity from the altar, casts God's
works out of the pulpit, throws dirt into the baptismal water, receives
all kinds of people as godfathers, hisses the priests; and all the
people follow its example, and have done so for a long time. And yet it
is not bound. On the contrary, this is thought to be the genuine
doctrine of Luther, and not of Carlstadt. LXXIV. The assertion that we
are more advanced and enlightened can surely not be proved by the
present ignorance as regards true Christianity. Many thousands can
declare, as did once the disciples of John, 'We have not so much as
heard whether there be any Holy Ghost.' LXXV. Like a poor maid, they
would not enrich the Lutheran church by a marriage. Do not perform it
over Luther's bones! He will thereby be recalled to life, and then--wo
to you! LXXVII. To say that time has taken away the wall of separation
between Lutherans and Reformed is not a clear speech. LXXXII. Just as
reason has prevented the Reformed from finishing their church and
reducing it to unity, so the reception of reason into the Lutheran
church would cause nothing but confusion and destruction. XCII. The
Evangelical Catholic church is a glorious church; she holds and forms
herself preëminently by the Sacrament. XCIII. The Evangelical Reformed
church is a glorious church; she holds and forms herself by the Word of
God. XCIV. More glorious than either is the Evangelical Lutheran church;
she holds and forms herself both by the Sacrament and the Word of
God."[54]
The appearance of the _Theses_ of Harms created a great sensation. At a
time when the union of the two churches became so desirable to many,
they seemed to be a firebrand of destruction. Plainly, it would be best
to return to the faith of the Reformers, but some of the most
evangelical men claimed that the speediest method of return was through
the Union. There appeared replies to the _Theses_ from all quarters of
the country, almost every theologian of distinction assuming the
character of the controversialist. As many as two hundred works appeared
on the subject, the most of them bearing strongly against Harms. In Kiel
and Holstein, where he was best known, the excitement was intense. Even
churches and clubs were divided, and the rancor went so far as to invade
private families, and create domestic divisions and heart-burnings.
Seldom has a theological topic caused such a blaze of tumult. Harms was
declared guilty of heinous offenses. He was charged with Catholicism,
and reminded that attention to the mill would be much better employment
than wielding the pen. He was accused of aiming at the protracted
division of the sects, and ministering in all possible ways to the
devices of Satan. His was the fate of the partisan. He did a great
work, for the controversy arising from his _Theses_ hastened the
settlement of those points which the times required should be solved as
speedily as possible. Indeed, this very discussion was a hopeful
indication; for it proved that, long and terrible as the sway of
Rationalism had been, there was still some interest felt among the
people on the themes most intimately connected with faith and practice.
It was a bright ray of the morning of renovation when the mere fact of
vital religion was powerful enough to enlist public attention.
FOOTNOTES:
[52] Möhler's _Symbolism_, Memoir of Author.
[53] _Essays and Remains._ Vol. 1, pp. 61-62.
[54] Quoted from Kahnis, _History of German Protestantism_, pp. 224-225.