The Conservative Reformation and Its Theology - Saint Mary ...

other great part. Puritanism cannot say, even to Romanism, "I have no
need of thee," still less can it say so to the grand portions of evangelical
Protestantism. Dr. Shedd's book shows that he has escaped from many of
the narrownesses which obscured the genuine glory of Puritanism, for
genuine glory it has, and a great deal of it. No book of which we know,
emanating from a New England mind, shows as much acquaintance as this
book does with the character and weight of Lutheran theology.
Nevertheless, one of the greatest weaknesses of the book is its lack of
a thorough and independent knowledge of our Church. Dr. Shedd,
especially in his exhibitions of the Patristic and English views, shows
independent research; but in the treatment of the Lutheran theology-he
gives unmistakable evidence that his reading has been comparatively slight
among the masters, especially the old masters of our Church. He has
trusted too much to manuals, and yet has hardly used them enough. He
exhibits views as characteristic of Calvinistic divines, or of the Calvinistic
symbols, which are mere resonances of the Lutheran theology, whose
glory it is, first to have brought into the distinct sphere of science the great
Biblical truths of which we speak. The scientific development of the
doctrine of the redemptory character of the active obedience of Christ, is
due to the Lutheran theologians. The true and profound views of the
person of Christ, which Dr. Shedd presents in the language of Hooker and
Hopkins, though involved in the Athanasian Creed, received their full
scientific shape from the Christological labors and Controversies of the
Lutheran Church in the Sixteenth Century. The Lutheran Church has
been the ultimate spring of almost all the profound theological thought of
modern times. Even Calvinism, without it, would not have been. Calvin
was saved, we might almost say created, by being first Lutheranized.
It is refreshing to find in Dr. Shedd's book so much that is sound,
and deep, and old; but which will, to the mass of thinkers in New England,
seem like novelty. Nothing, indeed, is so novel in New England as the old
theology, in some of its aspects. How, for example, must the doctrine of the
true sacramental