Melanchthon’s Loci are the ablest theological work of the Lutheran Church in the sixteenth
century. Calvin’s Institutes (1536) equal them in freshness and fervor, and surpass them in
completeness, logical order, philosophical grasp, and classical finish.
It is remarkable that the first and greatest dogmatic systems of the Reformation proceeded
from these two lay-theologians who were never ordained by human hands, but received the unction
from on high.^474 So the twelve apostles were not baptized by Christ with water, but with the Holy
Spirit on the day of Pentecost.
§ 65. Protestant Radicalism. Disturbances at Erfurt.
I. Letters of Luther from May, 1521, to March, 1522, to Melanchthon, Link, Lange, Spalatin, etc.,
in De Wette, vol. II.
II. F. W. Kampschulte: Die Universität Erfurt in ihrem Verh. zu dem Humanismus und der
Reformation. Trier, 1858. Second part, chs. III. and IV. pp. 106 sqq.
III. Biographies of Andreas Bodenstein von Carlstadt, by Füsslin (1776), Jäger (Stuttgart, 1856),
Erbkam (in Herzogii, VII. 523 sqq.).
IV. Gieseler, IV. 61–65 (Am. ed.). Marheineke, chs. X. and XI. (I. 303 sqq.). Merle D’AuB., bk.
IX. chs. 6–8. Köstlin, bk. IV. chs. 3 and 4 (I. 494 sqq.). Ranke, II. 7–26. Janssen, II. 204–227.
While Luther and Melanchthon laid a solid foundation for an evangelical church and evangelical
theology, their work was endangered by the destructive zeal of friends who turned the reformation
into a revolution. The best thing may be undone by being overdone. Freedom is a two-edged sword,
and liable to the worst abuse as well as to the best use. Tares will grow up in every wheat-field,
and they sometimes choke the wheat. But the work of destruction was overruled for the consolidation
of the Reformation. Old rotten buildings had to be broken down before a new one could be
constructed.
The Reformation during its first five years was a battle of words, not of deeds. It scattered
the seeds of new institutions all over Germany, but the old forms and usages still remained. The
new wine had not yet burst the old skin bottles. The Protestant soul dwelt in the Catholic body. The
apostles after the day of Pentecost continued to visit the temple and the synagogue, and to observe
circumcision, the sabbath, and other customs of the fathers, hoping for the conversion of all Israel,
until they were cast out by the Jewish hierarchy. So the Protestants remained in external communion
with the mother Church, attending Latin mass, bowing before the transubstantiated elements on
the altar, praying the Ave Maria, worshiping saints, pictures, and crucifixes, making pilgrimages
to holy shrines, observing the festivals of the Roman calendar, and conforming to the seven
sacraments which accompanied them at every step of life from the cradle to the grave. The bishops
were still in charge of their dioceses, and unmarried priests and deacons performed all the
ecclesiastical functions. The convents were still occupied by monks and nuns, who went through
their daily devotions and ascetic exercises. The outside looked just as before, while the inside had
undergone a radical change.
(^474) Melanchthon was simply professor, first of Greek, then of theology. Calvin was destined by his father for the clerical profession,
and he received the tonsure; but there is no record of his ordination for the priesthood.