dissent from all heathen, heretical, fanatical and unholy opinions. Fifth, a weighty exhortation to persevere in the baptismal covenant. Sixth, public prayer, that God should be pleased by His Holy Spirit to govern, preserve, and confirm them in this profession. To this prayer might be added the imposition of hands, without any superstition. (Schmucker.)

The Catechism was adopted in all Lutheran lands and churches. There was a diligent instruction of those admitted for the first time to the Lord's Supper and a careful examination of their preparation, but a special act of Confirmation was left among the adiaphora or matters in which evangelical liberty was allowed. By many Lutherans Confirmation was not adopted, or, on account of interimistic and adiaphoristic controversies, positively rejected. By others it was retained, or its introduction desired, either because an ancient and wholesome usage, or in order to differ as little as possible from the Catholic Church, or for the maintenance of discipline. (Schmucker.)

As early as the 16th century we meet three distinct views of Confirmation, which differ according as they view the relative importance of the sacraments between which Confirmation logically stands and which are the two biblical pillars of churchly instruction, and as they view separately or emphasize specially the three essential and component parts of Confirmation, viz., Examination, Profession and Vow, Prayer (intercession) with imposition of hands. The first view is the catechetical. This is most closely connected with the Lutheran doctrine of the means of grace: Word and Sacraments. On the basis of baptism, the child is to be brought by instruction and training to the ability of giving a reason for the faith that is in it and when this end is reached, it is to be examined in church, is to affirm, confess and promise what the sponsors have done for it in baptism, and if it thus be proven prepared for the Lord's Supper, it is to be admitted to the same. Among the representatives of this view there is never any mention made of a renewal of the covenant of baptism, but only of a reminding of this covenant. Another view, just as old, may be denoted as the sacramental one, in so far as it lays stress on the third point in Confirmation: the prayer with the laying on of hands. It looks upon this as an act that is sacramental, bestowing grace and salvation. It appeals to Acts 8: 17; 19: 6, 2 Tim. 1: 6. It arose in such German churches as witnessed in their

midst, especially in the beginning of the Reformation, Swiss Reformed ideas and German Lutheran ideas in constant intermingling, and in which beside the desire to apply grace and salvation to men by churchly means, there was a secret distrust of the complete efficiency of infant baptism. According to this view Confirmation is the completion of baptism. (Cf. Kassel KO. 1539 where occurs for the first time the formula of benediction: "Receive the Holy Ghost, protection and defence from all evil, etc., etc.") A third view, in some instances approaching the sacramental view, is called the church-disciplinary view. According to this special stress is laid not as in the catechetical, on the examination, or as in the sacramental, on prayer and imposition of hands, but on the profession of faith and the vow connected with it. (Hessen-Kassel-Nassau.) This view looks upon the congregation of the baptized merely as the congregation of the called, from which the congregation of believers must be segregated. Thus Confirmation becomes the act by which a Christian is received into the narrower circle or congregation privileged to administer the power of the Church. This view depreciates baptism in favor of a churchly ordinance of human election, and leads to a separation or disjunction of the Church, which can not be admitted according to Art. VIII Conf. Augsb. Schmucker, in his article The Rite of Confirmation (Lutheran Church Review, April 1883) gives a list of the various KOO which either omit or reject Confirmation and those which adopt it and make provision for it. To give these lists, which have the merit of personal investigation by their author, would unduly swell the length of the present article but the following summary which Schmucker quotes from Bachmann, may perhaps be of interest, as presenting a brief geographical survey:

"The original Lutheran churches (gnesio-Lutheran), that is, those of middle Germany distinctively, except Mansfield, know nothing of Confirmation as a special rite; it is found only in northern, western and southwestern Germany and there is not of universal acceptance. In Austria, in addition, it is found standing alone through the personal influence of Chytræus and with much opposition from congregations and pastors. In North Germany it was carried from Pomerania by Bugenhagen to Stralsund and from Brandenburg by the relation of the reigning houses to Brunswick, where afterwards Chemnitz secured and enlarged its preva

lence. From Brunswick it passed to Hoya (Hannover). In the western countries it owed its acceptance partly to the Reformation of Cologne, but preeminently to Hesse, which under the influence of Strasburg, and especially of Francis Lambert, tended toward a Reformed type. Waldeck, Nassau and Lower Saxony received their order of Confirmation from Hesse." (Bachmann).

"The efforts for the restoration or introduction of Confirmation began here and there early in the seventeenth century and increased in energy until in and after Spener's time, they so influenced the action of the Church as to effect its official adoption in one land after another. Among its early advocates were Teleman Heshusius, Aeg. Hunnius, Polycarp Lyser, Leonh. Hutter, Fred Baldwin, Jno. Tarnow, Jno. Gerhard, Conr. Dietrich, Geo. Calixtus, Theoph. Grossgebauer, Martin Heinsius, and preeminently in practical efficiency, Jacob Spener." (Schmucker.)

It was Spener who after the middle of the 17th century introduced Confirmation. He based his views on the pietistic view of baptism, which in connection with 1 Peter 3: 21 is regarded more as a covenant between God and men, than a laver of regeneration, so that infant baptism necessarily appeared incomplete and defective. The key-word now became "renewal of the baptismal covenant" and this was to be accomplished by means of conversion (piercing of the heart), for which the time of Confirmation was deemed to be the most suitable time. The main stress was laid on the vow, which was regarded as a sign of conversion and renewal of the baptismal covenant. The universal practice was to appeal to the emotions of the children and to work with all available means to bring about a conversion (Die Bekehrung zum "Durchbruch" zu bringen).

Rationalism finally voided Confirmation of its churchly contents. The renewal of the baptismal covenant now became an actual covenant-pledging, which the child itself performed in Confirmation. In a strange contrast to this inner voiding, the rationalistic Confirmation appeared in very pretentious garb. The inner emptiness and shallowness was concealed by outward pomp; the children were dressed up; they were marched out in solemn procession, grouped theatrically and were made to perform their vow to the covenant of virtue in the most touching manner. In this form Confirmation found its way into most congregations and became a part of their church life. But the influences of rational

ism upon Confirmation are seen also in another direction. While it had been officially adopted in various parts of Germany from 1646 to 1724, its actual insertion into the system of church life was not completed until the period of rationalism. In this period. we find the regulations of age, time of the year, etc.; in it also the connection between Confirmation, catechisation and the public schools of Germany.

With the revival of religious life in the nineteenth century, Confirmation too, has had the gain of material advantages. Through this revival it received again its original import, and its relation to the sacraments once scripturally and confessionally established, has given its important parts correctly according to this relation. Still there is not yet a uniform view of the full meaning of Confirmation. The original three views of the 16th century have again found representatives, the sacramental view is defended by Villmar, the church-disciplinary view by Schleiermacher, Hoefling, von Hoffmann, Harnack, von Zezschwitz. The latter are influenced by the desire to prevent an unworthy participation in the Lord's Supper, and to protect the church from violence by unbelieving majorities.

This closes the outline of the liturgical history of Confirmation. The writer of the article has endeavored to trace the development of the rite in its details historically and in their relation to the doctrines of the Lutheran Church. One feature still might remain for inquiry, namely, the relation of Confirmation to the doctrines of the sacraments, of catechization and of Christian life, and the successive development of each detail bearing upon these relations, but that would unduly increase the extent of the article and might best be made the subject of further inquiry.

Authorities consulted:-SCHMUCKER: Confirmation in the Lutheran Church; LÖHE: Liturgische Formulare; SCHAEFER: Evangelisches Volkslexikon; HERZOG-PLITT: Real Encyclopedia; MEUSEL: Kirchliches Handlexikon; PALMER'S Katechetik; ZOCKLER'S Handbuch der theol. Wissenschaften; KURTZ' Church History; etc., etc.

Chief Authorities:-BACHMANN: Die Confirmation, etc.; KLIEFOTH: Bd. 3; W. CASPARI: Die evang. Confirmation.

Erie, Pa.

C. THEODORE BENZE.

THE CHURCH AND THE LITURGY.

THE subject indicated in the title of this paper-The Church and the Liturgy is so broad that there is need to preface the discussion of the theme, with a few words of explanation and definition.

There have been two great epochs in the history of church doctrine, the formative-in which the self-consciousness of the Church was developed from its rudimentary form in the minds of the Apostolic Fathers and their immediate successors with the elaborate corpora doctrine of the later Middle Ages, and the reformative-in which the results of the earlier period were tested and sifted, emerging finally in the three or four types of dogmatic theology which are, in the main, the recognized standards of the present day. Similarly the liturgical idea has had its two epochs, the formative during which the rudimentary liturgy, the earliest indications of which are found in the Didache, grew into the elaborate ritual of the Mediæval Church, and the reformativein which that liturgy-subjected to the same criticism as its cotemporary doctrine, was tested and proved, emerging finally in the forms of worship used in the modern churches. This historical parallelism is not without its significance. It is, in fact, more than mere parallelism, for the two lines of development are closely related and the general relation is one of cause and effect. Unconscious this relation may at times have been, other than doctrinal considerations have certainly had their influence in liturgical development and practice, but the underlying principles of liturgical service, the decisive factors in moulding the Church's forms of worship have been neither artistic nor æsthetic but doctrinal, and the mere circumstance that the greatest diversity in methods of conducting public worship exists among those denominations which are most radically different in dogmatical bias, furnishes convincing testimony to this fact.

Now the doctrines which have most vitally affected the litur