doctrine of the parity of ministers.^673 The organization of the Lutheran churches was, however, for
a number of years regarded as provisional, and kept open for a possible reconciliation with the
episcopate. Hence the princes were called Nothbischöfe.
- To organize a presbyterian polity on the basis of the parity of ministers, congregational
lay-elders, and deacons, and a representative synodical government, with strict discipline, and a
distinction between nominal and communicant membership. This was attempted in Hesse at the
Synod of Homberg (1526) by Lambert (a pupil of Zwingli and Luther), developed by Calvin in
Geneva, and carried out in the Reformed churches of France, Holland, Scotland, and the Presbyterian
churches of North America. Luther rather discouraged this plan in a letter to Philip of Hesse; but
in 1540 he expressed a wish, with Jonas, Bugenhagen, and Melanchthon, to introduce Christian
discipline with the aid of elders (seniores) in each congregation. Several Lutheran Church
constitutions exclude adulterers, drunkards, and blasphemers from the communion. - Congregational independency; i.e., the organization of self-governing congregations of
true believers in free association with each other. This was once suggested by Luther, but soon
abandoned without a trial. It appeared in isolated attempts under Queen Elizabeth, and was
successfully developed in the seventeenth century by the Independents in England, and the
Congregationalists in New England.
The last two ways are more thoroughly Protestant and consistent with the principle of the
general priesthood of believers; but they presuppose a higher grade of self-governing capacity in
the laity than the episcopal polity.
All these forms of government admit of a union with the state (as in Europe), or a separation
from the state (as in America). Union of church and state was the traditional system since the days
of Constantine and Charlemagne, and was adhered to by all the Reformers. They had no idea of a
separation; they even brought the two powers into closer relationship by increasing the authority
of the state over the church. Separation of the two was barely mentioned by Luther, as a private
opinion, we may say almost as a prophetic dream, but was soon abandoned as an impossibility.
Luther, in harmony with his unique personal experience, made the doctrine of justification
the cardinal truth of Christianity, and believed that the preaching of that doctrine would of itself
produce all the necessary changes in worship and discipline. But the abuse of evangelical freedom
taught him the necessity of discipline, and he raised his protest against antinomianism. His complaints
of the degeneracy of the times increased with his age and his bodily infirmities. The world seemed
to him to be getting worse and worse, and fast rushing to judgment. He was so disgusted with the
immorality prevailing among the citizens and students at Wittenberg, that he threatened to leave
the town altogether in 1544, but yielded to the earnest entreaties of the university and magistrate
to remain.^674
(^673) See the Appendix to the Smalcald Articles, which have symbolical authority, on the Power and Primacy of the Pope (Müller’s ed.,
p. 341): "Quum jure divino non sint diversi gradus episcopi et pastoris manifestum est ordinationem a pastore in sua ecclesia factam jure
divino ratam esse. Itaque cum episcopi ordinarii fiunt hostes ecclesia aut nolunt impartire ordinationem, ecclesiae retinent ius suum."
(^674) See his letters to Jonas, Lauterbach, Link, Probst, and others, in De Wette, vol. V. To Lauterbach he wrote, Nov. 10, 1541 (V. 407),
"Ego paene de Germania desperavi, postquam recepit inter parietes veros illos Turkas seu veros illos diabolos, avaritiam, usuram,
tyrannidem, discordiam et totam illam Lernam perfidiae, malitiae, et nequitiae, in nobilitate, in aulis, in curiis, in oppidis, in villis, super
haec autem contemtum verbi et ingratitudinem inauditam." To Jonas he wrote, March 7, 1543 (V. 548), that the German nobility and
princes were worse than the Turks, and bent upon enslaving Germany, and exhausting the people. To the same he gives, June 18, 1543
(V. 570), an account of the immorality of Wittenberg, and the indifference of the magistrate, and concludes, "Es ist ein verdriesslich Ding
um die Welt." He thought that the end of the wicked world was near (Letter to Probst, Dec. 5, 1544, vol. V. 703).