appointed ruler (Rom. 13), to exercise his authority for the protection and promotion of the gospel.
Although he is not called to teach, he may restore peace and order, as the Emperor Constantine did
when he called the Council of Nicaea for the settlement of the Arian controversy.^726
Melanchthon wisely abstained from polemics, and advised the preachers to attack sin and
vice, but to let the pope and the bishops alone. Luther was not pleased with this moderation, and
added the margin: "But they shall violently condemn popery with its devotees, since it is condemned
by God; for popery is the reign of Antichrist, and, by instigation of the Devil, it terribly persecutes
the Christian church and God’s Word."^727
The Elector appointed Luther, Melanchthon, Jonas, Spalatin, and Myconius, besides some
prominent laymen, among the visitors. They carried on their work in 1528 and 1529. They found
the churches in a most deplorable condition, which was inherited from the times of the papacy, and
aggravated by the abuse of the liberty of the Reformation. Pastors and people had broken loose
from all restraint, churches and schools were in ruins, the ministers without income, ignorant,
indifferent, and demoralized. Some kept taverns, were themselves drunkards, and led a scandalous
life. The people, of course, were no better. "The peasants," wrote Luther to Spalatin, "learn nothing,
know nothing, and abuse all their liberty. They have ceased to pray, to confess, to commune, as if
they were bare of all religion. As they despised popery, so they now despise us. It is horrible to
behold the administration of the popish bishops."^728
The strong arm of the law was necessary. Order was measurably restored. The property of
churches and convents was devoted to the endowment of parishes and schools, and stipends for
theological students (1531). The appointment of ministers passed into the hands of the Elector. The
visitations were repeated from time to time under the care of regular superintendents and consistories
which formed the highest ecclesiastical Councils, under the sovereign as the supreme bishop.
In this way, the territorial state-church government was established and order restored in
Saxony, Hesse, Braunschweig-Lüneburg, Mecklenburg, East Friesland, Silesia, and other Protestant
sovereignties of Germany.
§ 89. Luther’s Catechisms. 1529.
I. Critical editions of Luther’s Catechisms in his Works, Erl. ed., vol. XXI. (contains the two
catechisms and some other catechetical writings); by Mönckeberg (Hamburg, 1851, second ed.
1868); Schneider (Berlin, 1853, a reprint of the standard ed. of 1531 with a critical introduction);
Theodos. Harnack (Stuttgart, 1856; a reprint of two editions of 1529 and 1539, and a table of
the chief textual variations till 1842); Zezschwitz (Leipz. 1881); Calinich (Leipz. 1882). See
titles in Schaff: Creeds of Christendom, I. 245. The Catechisms are also printed in the editions
of the Symbolical Books of the Lutheran Church, and the Little (or Small) Catechism, with
(^726) "Denn obwol S. K. F. Gnaden zu lehren und geistlich regieren nicht befohlen ist, so sind sie doch schuldig, als weltliche Obrigkeit,
darob zu halten, dass nicht Zwietracht, Rotten und Aufruhr sich unter den Unterthanen erheben, wie auch der Kaiser Constantinus die
Bischöfe gen Nicaea fordert," etc. Corp. Ref., XXVI. fol. 46.
(^727) See the note in full, l.c., fol. 85.
(^728) Letter of February, 1529, in De Wette, 1II. 424. Comp. also the prefaces to his Catechisms. It is characteristic of the Ultramontane
history of Janssen, that, while he dwells largely on the lamentations of Luther over the wretched condition of the churches in Saxony, and
derives them from his doctrine of justification by faith alone (vol. III. 67-69), he completely ignores Luther’s Catechisms which were to
cure these evils.