The fourth article, on the 'Resurrection of Christ,' Art. IV. is a complement of the second and third, affirming the proper manhood of our Saviour, against the errors of the Anabaptists. The particular fact of His resurrection had been also distinctly impugned by a Silesian knight, named Gaspar Schwenkfels', who died in 1561, and the heresy which he persisted in defending was doubtless inculcated by others of the same proselyting faction. The fifth article, on the 'Sufficiency of Holy Scrip- Art. v. ture,' appears to have been originally constructed with a two-fold application. It asserted the necessity of scriptural proof for every doctrine of the Church, in reply to scholastic and Tridentine errors on the subject of the Word unwritten2;' and also condemned the opposite misbelievers, whom we have seen disparaging the authority of the Bible, as compared with the immediate and fanatical inspirations, of which they were the favoured channel3. It is at the same time careful in the second clause to guard against a prevailing error, which maintained that all the usages of the Church must be clearly deducible from Holy Scripture1. The sixth article, on a due reverence for the Old Art. VI. Testament, was manifestly levelled at the Anabaptist teachers, many of whom, like Servetus, denied that 1 Hey, On the Articles, II. 388: Camb. 1798. 2 See above, pp. 46, 47. The Council of Trent had stereotyped this error, in the year 1546. Sarpi, 1. 266; ed. Courayer. 3 'In quo genere teterrimi illi sunt, (itaque a nobis primum nominabuntur,) qui sacras scripturas ad infirmorum tantum hominum debilitatem ablegant et detrudunt, sibi sic ipsi interim præfidentes, ut earum authoritate se teneri non putent, sed peculiarem quendam spiritum jactant, a quo sibi omnia suppeditari Lond. 1565. 4 See above, p. 22. 5 Multi nostris temporibus inveniuntur, inter quos Anabaptistæ præcipue sunt collocandi, ad quos si quis vetus Testamentum alleget, illud pro abrogato Art. VII. Art. VIII. Art. IX. Art. x. the elder worthies had even the most indefinite expectation of a life beyond the present1. The seventh article, like the first of those which had been published in 1536, accepted the authoritative definitions contained in the Three Creeds, and by this act condemned all the heresies both of modern and of ancient growth, which had assailed the fundamental verities of the Gospel. The eighth article, 'Of Original or Birth Sin,' is directed against the early misbelief which had been propagated by Pelagius and his party; whiche also the Anabaptistes2 doe now-a-daies renue.' Like the second of the Augsburg Articles, from which it was evidently drawn, it may also be intended to glance at the errors of the schoolmen touching the absolute extirpation of sin by the sacrament of baptism, or even at the formal determinations on that subject, which had been recently established in the Council of Trent3. The ninth article, Of Free Will,' is intimately related to the one preceding, and was intended to repel the Anabaptist errors on the subject of preventing and co-operating grace1. The tenth article, 'Of Grace,' was a reply to an opposite error entertained by a second school of Anabaptists, and also by some of the more violent reformers, who went under the name of Gospellers". They pushed their belief in predestination so far as to render the acts of man altogether involuntary, and to attribute his evil choice to the direct agency of his Maker. jam et obsoleto penitus habent, 1 Calvin, Instit. Lib. I. c. 2 Cf. Reform. Leg. Eccl. ibid. c. 7. The question had been decided by the Tridentine divines, June 17, 1546: Sarpi, 1. 319. 4 See above, p. 91. This reference is clearly established by the testimony of the 'Reformatio Legum,' ibid. c. 7. 5 See Bp Hooper's Letter, above cited, p. 95. 6 Hooper's Early Writings, 3 See above, p. 26, note (2). 421, ed. P. S. The eleventh article, touching our justification by Art. XI. only faith in Jesus Christ,' coincides with the fourth of the Augsburg Articles, and like it was primarily directed against the notions of human merit, which had been long taught, more or less distinctly, in the whole of the Western Church'. It was also designed to include under the range of its animadversion the kindred tenets of the Anabaptists on the same vital question?. The twelfth article, entitled Works before Jus- Art. XII. tification,' repudiates the error of certain 'scholeaucthores,' who had affirmed, and were still affirming, that the favour of God is recoverable (or that man may be entitled to receive grace), in consideration of the merit of actions, which resulted from his own strength, or had been wrought independently of the Holy Spirit3. 6 The thirteenth article, on Works of Supereroga- Art. XIII. tion,' is in like manner levelled against a well-known scholastic figment1. The fourteenth article, affirming that our blessed Art. XIV. Lord was alone born without sin, impugns the 'Romish' doctrine of the immaculate conception of the Virgin 5. The fifteenth, Of Sin against the Holy Ghost,' is Art. xv. derived for the most part from the Augsburg Confession, and asserts the remissibility of sins committed. after baptism. The errors broached on this subject in the primitive Church, were revived (as we have seen) by the Anabaptists at the time of the Reformation". The sixteenth article, entitled 'Blasphemy against Art. XVI. the Holy Ghost,' defines the nature of this unpardon 1 For the existence of a sounder doctrine, even among the schoolmen, see Field, On the Church, App. Book III. c. xii. 2 See above, p. 91; and compare Reform. Legum Eccl. ibid. c. 7. 3 The Dominicans, at the council of Trent, condemned this idea of merit de congruo as Pelagian: Sarpi, I. 344. 4 Cf. Reformat. Legum Eccl. ibid. c. 8: Field, On the Church, App. Book II. c. xiii.: Joliffe against Hooper, fol. 175. 5 See Field, ibid. c. vI. Joliffe against Hooper, fol. 165. 6 See above, p. 95, and compare Reform. Leg. Eccl. ibid. c. 9. Art. XVII. Art. XVIII. Art. XIX. Art. xx. able sin, apparently with the view of removing the strong temptations to despair, which had been introduced by the misbelief proscribed in the former article. The seventeenth article, 'Of Predestination and Election,' was designed to allay the numerous altercations which had been raised in the reforming body1, as well as in the older 'schools,' by these deeply speculative topics. It is at the same time careful to guard against the fatalistic errors, into which curious and carnal persons' had fallen from a one-sided view of the doctrines in question2. The eighteenth article is manifestly intended to condemn the assertion of the Anabaptists, that, provided men are sincere in following their own systems, the rejection of the one Saviour of the world will not hinder their salvation. The nineteenth is directed against another branch of the same faction', who, under the plea of internal illumination had dispensed with the moral law, and circulated opinions respecting it 'most evidently repugnant to the Holy Scripture.' The twentieth article, while defining the Church 1 Many of the particulars of these disputes have been transcribed by archbishop Laurence, from a MS. in the Bodleian, and published under the title Authentic Documents relating to the Predestinarian Controversy.' For still earlier traces of it, see Bp Gardiner's 'Declaration' (against George Joye), fol. LI. seqq. Lond. 1546. 2 The prevalence of these perversions is thus noted in the 'Reformatio Legum': 'Ad extremum in Ecclesia multi feris et dissolutis moribus vivunt, qui eum re ipsa curiosi sint, differti luxu, et a Christi Spiritu prorsus alieni, semper prædestinationem et rejectionem, vel, ut usitate loquuntur, reprobationem, in sermone jactant.' Ibid. c. 22. 3 See above, p. 91: cf. 'Reformatio Legum,' which characterizes this error as 'horribilis et immanis audacia.' Ibid. c. 11. 4 See above, p. 92. 5 The Worcester prebendaries thought this definition imperfect on account of its silence touching the oneness of the Church, and the 'continuous succession of the vicars of Christ.' They admit that the Roman Church had erred in the 'agenda' of religion, but not in the 'credenda.' fol. 80: cf. Reform. Leg. Ibid. c. 21. in terms very similar to those employed in the seventh of the Augsburg Articles, proceeds to repel a prevalent objection respecting the infallibility of the particular Church of Rome. The twenty-first article, 'Of the Authority of the Art. XXI. Church,' was directed in like manner against the Romanizing party', and though it claims for the Church the prerogative of acting as a witness and keeper of Holy Writ, pronounces her incompetent to decree anything at variance with that record. The twenty-second article, Of the Authority of Art. xxII. General Councils,' vindicates the right of the civil power in convoking such assemblies, from the later encroachments of the pope; and maintains that some of the councils reputed 'general' at the time of the Reformation2, had actually fallen into error. The twenty-third pronounces the doctrine of Art. XXIII. school-authors, concerning purgatory, image-worship, and other similar superstitions3, to be follies and figments unsupported by holy Scripture, or rather repugnant to its teaching. The twenty-fourth is manifestly levelled against Art. XXIV. the Anabaptist error, that every one who fancied himself called to the work of the ministry was bound to assume the office of a teacher in defiance of the authority of the Church. It is based on the fourteenth of the Augsburg Articles1. The twenty-fifth declares, in opposition to the Art. xxv. Romanizing party, that the language of the public 1 Joliffe against Hooper, fol. 82, 83. 2 The 'Reformatio Legum,' is an excellent commentary on the meaning of this Article. It declares that we reverently accept the four great oecumenical councils, and defer to the decisions of many of the later synods, so far as they upheld the fundamentals of religion. De Summa Trinitate et Fide Catholica, c. 14. 3 Cf. Reform. Leg. de Hæresibus, c. 10, and Joliffe against Hooper, fol. 90. seqq. It is remarkable that the copy of this Article, as signed by the royal chaplains, (see above, p. 80) contains a censure of 'praying for the dead,' which had been subsequently dropped. 4 See above, p. 28: and comp. Reform. Leg. Ibid. c. 16. |