Encyclopedia of sacred theology - pagina 683

Chap. V]

sought

§ 104.

DEVELOPMENT OF MULTIFOKMITY

in the principle of free investigation,

659

but only to be

overthrown by the confession of the Reformers themselves, that they never pleaded for a freedom of investigation which lacked that he

all

foundation in faith.

who

finds the

It is self-evident,

motive of the

new

moreover,

evolution of the

science of theology too exclusively in the return to the Holy Scripture or too formally in freedom of investigation, excludes

thereby Romish theology altogether, and arbitrarily contracts That the labor of the Romish the domain of theology.

but at first disqualified, is readily understood narrow view has been abandoned a century ago, and in theological circles the learned Jesuits especially are duly

Church was

;

this

recognized again.

It

certainly cannot be questioned that

Romish theology of the last decenniums can claim the name of theology in the strict sense of the word with far more justice than what is still brought to the market under the name of theology by the men of the Science of Religion In view or by the speculative or ethical modern tendency.

the

of this the point of departure for this period lies for us in the

Not

develoiymeyit of multiforinity.

as

if

were intended by Luther or Calvin. asserted here.

At Wittenberg,

such a multiformity is by no means

This

as well as at

Geneva, the con-

viction was unassailable for long years that their

sion bore an absolute

and

exclusive character.

own

confes-

Everything

that contradicted this was a falsification of the truth, just as in both spheres of the Reformation one's

held to be the purest, not merely by so as to be actually looked

upon

way

own Church was

of comparison, but

as the only lawful contin-

and Rome's Church was not only rejected as deformed, but, as a false imitation of the Church, was abhorred by the epigones of the ReformaAnd this could not be tion as the Church of the Antichrist. uance of

the

Church

of the apostles

;

Notwithstanding the fact that the schism of the Eastern Church had been continued for more than four centuries, men had still refused to consider it anything more than a schism. Age after age they were accustomed to the

otherwise at

first.

idea that truth, which of necessity also

bound

must be

absolute,

was

to maintain this absolute character in the unity of

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