and ethical relation, that, if that element be subtracted, it is very questionable whether the idea thereafter carries in it any self constituting notion at all.

In thus representing regeneration as the unifying of the desires and tendencies of an inward law in the heart with the demands of the outward law of God, it is possible we may be charged with forgetting that, at an earlier stage of this brief discussion, we indicated a risk or danger, in man's original state, that might arise from this very accordance-a kind of possible tendency towards trusting to the law of the heart, as if it would operate spontaneously and render careful consideration of moral law, as expressing God's authority, unnecessary. It is true, we spoke of this possible tendency as accounting for the necessity of such probation as that of Eden, in which the "categorical imperative" is introduced as clothing the subjectmatter of a requirement which could appeal to nothing corresponding to it pre-existing in man's spiritual constitution. And assuredly if any danger existed of law moral lapsing, in man's regard, into the aspect of law physical, such probation was adapted with singular precision to meet the case. But it cannot be asserted that this danger can arise in that re-instated harmony of objective and subjective law which it is the very function of regeneration to establish; nor can subsequent probation be required when this harmony is complete, on the ground, as in the former case, that danger arises from its very completeness. For there is a mighty difference between a harmony that has undergone no ordeal, like that of Eden, and one that has been established as the very result of an ordeal exactly similar in kind but immeasurably more intense in degree. This difference, of course, cannot appear in a scheme which presents a regeneration that is dissociated from whatever is specific in redemption and reconciliation, in the strict meaning of these terms. it does appear very strikingly in the regeneration which the covenant of grace recognises and provides. For the absolute sovereignty of God is brought out in redemption, in the terrible and matchless probation of the second Adam; and absolute subjection to God as Sovereign is secured, in the reconciliation of men to God individually, by the imperative demand for faith in Christ and submission in him to the righteousness of God. It is in indissoluble connection with this crucial instance and culminating display of God's sovereignty on the one hand, and this conclusively testing demand for man's submission on the other, that regeneration is righteously granted on God's part, and intelligently reached and realised on the part of him that believeth. The unifying of the inward subjective law of the will in its renewed state with the objective authoritative "commandment" under which the regenerated soul delights to live,

But

Saving Faith the Highest Probation.

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takes place with no risk to the recognition of the "categorical imperative" in this second creation. Nor is any subsequent institute of probation needed to prevent the possibility of law moral lapsing into the likeness of law physical now. "The darkness is past; and the true light now shineth." The sovereignty of Law has been recognised and established in the probation and righteousness of that Eternal Son of God, who received from his Father a commandment to lay down his life for the sheep, and who, though he were a Son, yet learned obedience by the things which he suffered; the whole import of his Incarnation and its object being given us by himself when he says, "I came not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me." Nor is his representative probation, when viewed as the heritage of his people, to be considered as their probation by proxy merely. It becomes their own probation most truly; as truly theirs as the first Adam's was his own, and immeasurably more intense and satisfactory. For it is impossible that Christ's righteousness can be imputed on God's part, or on man's part appropriated, on any principle, or scheme, or understanding that should dispense with the real probation of men individually, in their entrance into the favour and kingdom of God. The command to kiss the Son lest his wrath should burn and we perish from the way the command to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and submit in him to the righteousness of God, carrying in it, as it evidently does, the imperative requirements that we should acknowledge the absolute righteousness of eternal death as the wages due to sin, and look to grace, absolutely sovereign, as the only source of exemption from it, and own that grace as reigning through righteousness by the substitution of God's dear Son under the inflicting stroke of God's awakened and avenging sword :-this is the highest and most conclusive possible probation. And this is that ordeal under whose all-testing fires law moral from God and law subjective in the heart are, in regeneration, welded into a harmony which the eventualities of even eternity itself will never prevail to disturb. The living faith of the regenerated spirit, appropriating the righteousness of God, carries in its heart an oath of allegiance to the sovereignty of God Most High; an oath which is at once the echo and the offspring of God's own oath of sovereignty-sovereignty alike both in law and in grace-and which, for that very reason, shall never fail unto eternity, any more than the divine oath original from which it springs and to which it answers ;—“I have sworn by myself, the word is gone out of my mouth in righteousness, and shall not returu, That unto me every knee shall bow, every tongue shall swear. Surely, shall one say, in the Lord have I righteousness and strength" (Isa. xlv. 23, 24). We almost owe our readers an apology for dwelling at such

length on a distinction which is in fact a postulate indispensable alike to Christian Theology and Moral Science. But the miserable fallacy which has detained us so long has given occasion for bringing out some of the finest harmonies between the divine word and the depositions of true Christian consciousness. And we close with the question,-Are the very postulates of theology and the profoundest harmonies of Law and Grace, to be all brushed aside to let the "nineteenth century theologists" pass proudly on? Nay, rather; Zion calls on them to lower their flag, because the shout of her King is in her; and if they meet not this demand, she reaves it from their grasp to wrap their sophistries in winding-sheet for burial.

ART. V.-George Calixtus.*

BY CHARLES M. MEAD, M.A., BERLIN, PRUSSIA.

THE first half of the seventeenth century was a period fruitful of abiding influence on the succeeding condition of Germany. The treaty of 1555, which conceded to the several states the management of their own ecclesiastical affairs-a concession of which the Protestants did, but the Roman Catholics did not, avail themselves-secured, indeed, a temporary quiet; but the storm was only postponed, not averted. The immediate danger of a violent struggle between the two sections of the church passed away, but Germany lost in unity what the Protestants gained in immunity. The process of dissolution was further prompted by the incessant bickerings and conflicting claims of rival princes, more bitterly prosecuted now than ever before, because difference of religious belief was often added to the lust for power, and the decisions of the emperors themselves, not seldom determined by religious considerations more than by regard for inherent right, irritated more than they soothed. Above all, these tendencies to dissolution were busily and cunningly fostered by the other European powers. And, finally, to all other causes at work was added the bitterness of opposition between the Lutheran

*The materials of this Article are taken from "George Calixtus und seine Zeit," by Professor Henke, of Marburg, Hessen Cassel. In this work, consisting of two octavo volumes, the subject is presented with a master's hand, a view being given not only of Calixtus's life and labours, but also, as fully as the nature of the work admits, of the general political and ecclesiastical condition of Germany, particularly of Brunswick, during the period treated of. Without attempting any further analysis or criticism of Henke's work, we avail ourselves of it in composing the following sketch.-(The Bibliotheca Sacra, April 1865.)

The Thirty Years' War.

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and Reformed Churches. Encouraged by the check which these intestine quarrels had put to the progress of the Reformation, itself awakened into a new life, and freed from many of its worst failings, the Papal Church, acting more or less in concert with the German emperors, aspired to reconquer the lost ground. At the diet of 1608, the Archduke Ferdinand, a Hannibal among the Jesuits, violating the wishes of the more pacific emperor Rudolph II., whom he there represented, secured the enactment of measures which impelled the Protestants to leave the diet and form a Union, headed by the Palatinate, while the Catholics formed the League, under the lead of the Duke of Bavaria, a prince devoted to the emperor, but still more to Catholicism, and most of all to himself. The more remote result of the breach was the Thirty Years' War, whose movements seemed to be dictated by no plan, and to promise no result, except to subject Germany to the devastations of the armies of Wallenstein, Pappenheim, Tilly, and Gustavus Adolphus; the various changes depending on the varying policy of the discordant princes, each too weak to rely on himself, and hence leaning on the emperor, the king of Sweden, or the king of France, according as caprice, the chances of war, the prospects of personal aggrandisement, or the influence of religious convictions held sway. To the people, if not to the rulers, it was a religious war; but not only were Catholics opposed to Protestants, but each of these parties was afflicted with intestine dissensions, while among the Protestants, not only were the Lutherans and the Reformed Church at variance with each other, but even in each of these divisions, especially among the Lutherans, there was no concert, some siding with the emperor, others with the Swedes.

The duchy Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel suffered its full share of the devastations of the war. Duke Frederick Ulrich (1613-34), a weak and irresolute prince, at first took part with the Palatinate and the Hessians, but afterwards attempted to maintain a neutral position, which not being able to do, he was forced to throw himself successively into the arms of the king of Denmark, of the emperor, and of Gustavus Adolphus, and was thus compelled to see his land ravaged, in turn, by Swedes and Germans, by friends and foes alike, himself impotent to avert the disaster. After his death, a new division among its various dukes led to new complications, not only in the relations of Brunswick to the war in general, but in those of the rival dukes to each other. Duke August, who inherited the most of Frederick Ulrich's territory, was inclined to side with the emperor; but, irritated by breach of faith on the side of the latter, he allied

himself with the Swedes, yet afterwards renewed his old. allegiance, receiving as a reward, what his predecessors had long sought in vain, full possession of the city of Brunswick, which now became his capital instead of Wolfenbüttel. The treaty of Westphalia soon followed (1648), and the duchy began to resume its former prosperity.

It was during this period, and in this duchy, that George Calixtus flourished.

He was born in Medelbye, near Flensburg in Schleswig, December 14, 1586. His father, in his student-years a pupil, and always a warm admirer of Melancthon, served fifty years as pastor. George, studying partly at home, partly at the gymnasium in Flensburg, finished his preparatory course in 1602, and in the spring of 1603 entered the University of Helmstädt, was made master of arts two years afterwards, and permitted to read private lectures. He did not devote himself specially to theology until 1607. Then, after making a short visit home, where he was somewhat inclined to remain as his father's colleague, he returned, in 1609, and resumed his lectures. Not seeing any prospect of a speedy appointment to a professorship, he undertook, in the same year, a journey for the purpose of enlarging his acquaintance with the men and the movements of the time. He visited Jena, Giessen, Frankfurt, Tübingen, Augsburg, and other cities, forming a personal acquaintance with many prominent theologians, and returned in May 1610. He now resumed his lectures as Privat-docent, studying at the same time mathematics, medicine, and physics. A year later, he undertook another still greater journey, this time spending some months in Cologne among the Roman Catholics, passing somewhat hastily through Holland, visiting in England the distinguished Protestant Casaubon, and, on his return, the equally distinguished, though far from bigoted Catholic de Thou, in Paris. After the death of Duke Henry Julius, he made another short stay in Schleswig, and then once more resumed his lectures in Helmstädt. Soon after, by a disputation at Hämelschenberg with the Jesuit Turrianus, undertaken for the sake of winning back from an inclination to Popery the young knight Ludolph von Klencke, although unsuccessful in this object, he so increased his previous reputation for ability and scholarship, that, in spite of resolute opposition from many who distrusted his orthodoxy, or were jealous of his talents, he was installed as Professor Ordinarius of Theology, January 18, 1615. In this position he remained until his death, March 19, 1656.

The University of Helmstädt, in Brunswick, extinct since the beginning of the present century, was founded by Duke