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

It’s character and contents.
It will be seen from this that Dr. Shedd hardly does justice to the
historical dignity of this great Confession, when It he says: "It was a
polemic document, constructed by that portion of the Lutheran Church
that was hostile to the Calvinistic theory of the Sacraments." Certainly,
although the Formula is polemic in meeting error, its main end is irenical,
and its general tone exceedingly moderate. When Dr. Shedd leaves the
reader to imagine that this Confession was not only, as it would seem from
his representation mainly, but was exclusively directed against the
Calvinistic theory of the Sacraments, he does injustice to the Formula and
to the reader. Of the twelve Articles, but one is devoted to either of the
Sacraments, and in the others there is much in which true Calvinists would
feel a deep sympathy--much that nobly defends great points of doctrine
common to the whole Evangelical faith. In the first Article, which treats of
Original Sin--in the second, of the Freedom of the Will--in the third, of
Justification--in the fourth, of Good Works--in the fifth, of the Law and the
Gospel--in the sixth, of the third use of the Law, the most rigid Calvinist
would be forced to confess that there is a noble and Scriptural presentation
of those great doctrines. They defend what all pure Christendom is
interested in defending. In many of the antitheses of the twelfth Article a
Calvinist would heartily join, as he would in the masterly discussion of the
adiaphora in Article tenth. In Article eleventh, of the eternal
foreknowledge and election of God, the Calvinist would find the distinctive
doctrine of Calvin rejected, but he could not but be pleased with the
profound reverence and exquisite skill with which the doctrine is
discussed, and by which it is redeemed from the extreme of Calvinism
without running into the opposite and far more dangerous one of
Pelagianism, or of low Arminianism. In the Articles, seventh and eighth, a
Calvinist might discover much in regard to the Lord's Supper and the
Person of Christ, in which he might not concur; and in. Article ninth, on
the Descent of Christ into Hell, he would find a view very different from
Calvin's, which Calvinists themselves now almost universally reject.
Nevertheless, he would discover in such a perusal., as