Though Flacius, when he first made his statement concerning the
substantiality of original sin may not have felt absolutely sure of the
exact meaning, bearing, and correctness of his position, yet the facts
do not warrant the assumption that afterwards he was in any way
diffident or wavering in his attitude. Whatever his views on this
subject may have been before 1560--after the fatal phrase had fallen
from his lips, he never flinched nor flagged in zealously defending it.
Nor was he ever disposed to compromise the matter as far as the
substance of his doctrine was concerned. In 1570 Spangenberg of
Mansfeld, who sided with Flacius, suggested that he retain his meaning,
but change his language: "_Teneat Illyricus mentem, mutet linguam._" To
this Flacius consented. On September 28 1570, he published his _Brief
Confession,_ in which he agreed to abstain from the use of the term
"substance." However, what he suggested as a substitute, _viz._, that
original sin be defined as the nature of man (the word "nature," as he
particularly emphasized, to be taken not in a figurative, but in its
proper meaning), was in reality but another way of repeating his error.
The same was the case in 1572, when Flacius, opposed and sorely pressed
by the ministerium of Strassburg (whence he was banished the following
year), offered to substitute for the word "substance" the phrase
"essential powers." (Preger 2, 371.) Two years later, at the public
disputation in Langenau, Silesia, where Flacius defended his doctrine
with favorable results for himself against Jacob Coler [born 1537;
studied in Frankfort-on-the-Oder, 1564 pastor in Lauban, Upper Lausatia
(Oberlausitz); 1573 in Neukirch; 1574 he opposed Leonard Crentzheim and
Flacius; 1575 professor in Frankfort; afterwards active first as
Praepositus in Berlin and later on as Superintendent in Mecklenburg,
published _Disputatio De Libero Arbitrio;_ died March 7, 1612], he
declared that he did not insist on his phrase as long as the doctrine
itself was adopted and original sin was not declared to be a mere
accident. But this, too, was no real retraction of his error. (Preger 2,
387.) In a similar way Flacius repeatedly declared himself willing to
abstain from the use of the word "substance" in connection with his
doctrine concerning original sin, but with conditions and limitations
which made his concessions illusory, and neither did nor could satisfy
his opponents.
At the disputation in Weimar, 1560, Wigand and Musaeus, as stated,
warned Flacius immediately after the session in which he had made his
statement. Schluesselburg relates: "Immediately during the disputation,
as I frequently heard from their own lips, Dr. Wigand, Dr. Simon
Musaeus, and other colleagues of his who attended the disputation ...
admonished Illyricus in a brotherly and faithful manner to abstain from
this new, perilous and blasphemous proposition of the ancient
Manicheans, which would cause great turmoil in the Church of God, and to
refute the error of Victorin [Strigel] concerning free will not by means
of a false proposition, but with the Word of God. However, intoxicated
with ambition, and relying, in the heat of the conflict, too much on the
acumen and sagacity of his own mind, Illyricus haughtily spurned the
brotherly and faithful admonitions of all his colleagues." (_Catalogus_
2, 4.) In his book _De Manichaeismo Renovato_ Wigand himself reports:
"Illyricus answered [to the admonition of his colleagues to abstain from
the Manichean phrase] that he had been drawn into this discussion by his
opponent against his own will. But what happened? Contrary to the
expectations of his colleagues, Illyricus in the following session
continued, as he had begun, to defend this insanity." (Preger 2, 324;
Planck 4, 611.) However, it does not appear that after the disputation
his friends pressed the matter any further, or that they made any
efforts publicly to disavow the Flacian proposition.
In 1567 Flacius published his tract _De Peccati Originalis aut Veteris
Adami Appellationibus et Essentia,_ "On the Appellations and Essence of
Original Sin or the Old Adam," appending it to his famous _Clavis
Scripturae_ of the same year. He had written this tract probably even
before 1564. In 1566 he sent it to Simon Musaeus, requesting his opinion
and the opinion of Hesshusius, who at that time was celebrating his
marriage with the daughter of Musaeus. In his answer, Musaeus approved
the tract, but desired that the term "substance" be explained as meaning
not the matter, but the form of the substance to which Hesshusius also
agreed. After the tract had appeared, Musaeus again wrote to Flacius,
June 21, 1568, saying that he agreed with his presentation of original
sin. At the same time, however, he expressed the fear that the bold
statement which Flacius had retained, "Sin is substance," would be
dangerously misinterpreted. (Preger 2, 327.) And before long a storm was
brewing, in which animosity registered its highest point, and a
veritable flood of controversial literature (one publication following
the other in rapid succession) was poured out upon the Church, which was
already distracted and divided by numerous and serious theological
conflicts.
By the publication of this treatise Flacius, who before long also was
harassed and ostracized everywhere, had himself made a public
controversy unavoidable. In the conflict which it precipitated, he was
opposed by all parties, not only by his old enemies, the Philippists,
but also by his former friends. According to the maxim: _Amicus Plato,
amicus Socrates, sed magis amica veritas,_ they now felt constrained,
in the interest of truth, to turn their weapons against their former
comrade and leader. Flacius himself had made it impossible for his
friends to spare him any longer. Nor did he deceive himself as to the
real situation. In a letter written to Wigand he reveals his fear that
the Lutherans and Philippists, then assembled at the Colloquium in
Altenburg (held from October 21, 1568, to March, 1569, between the
theologians of Thuringia and those of Electoral Saxony), would unite in
a public declaration against his teaching. Wigand whose warning Flacius
had disregarded at Weimar, wrote to Gallus: Flacius has forfeited the
right to request that nothing be published against him, because he
himself has already spread his views in print. And before long Wigand
began to denounce publicly the Flacian doctrine as "new and prolific
monsters, _monstra nova et fecunda._"