< Mental Blessing of one knei ling.
I V For the attitude at meals, see Accubation.
Atto. See IIatto.
Attributes of God. See God.
Attrition, in the Romish theology, means imper- fect contrition. See Contrition. The term was in- troduced by the schoolmen in the twelfth century, to make a distinction between a perfect and an imperfect st they had brought penance into the number of the sacraments. By contrition they mean a thorough or complete repentance (contritio 'cordis), the spirit being crushed under a Bense of sin ; by attri- tion, they mean an inferior degree of sorrow, such as
may arise from a consideration of the turpitude of sin or from the fear of hell (timor senilis). Alexander of Hales distinguishes as follows (p. 4, qu. 74, membr. 1) : Timor servilis principium est attritionis, timor ini- tialis (i. e. that with which the life of sanctification begins) principium est contritionis. . . . Item contritio est a gratia gratum faciente, attritio a gratia gratis data, fjomp. Thoni. Aquinas, qu. 1, art. 2 ; Bonaven- tura, in lib. iv, dist. 17, p. 1, art. 2, qu. 3 (Hagenbach, Hist, of Doctrines, § 198). This distinction is main- tained by the Council of Trent as follows : " Imperfect contrition, which is called attrition, commonly aris- ing from a consideration of the turpitude of sin and a fear of hell and punishment, the intention of contin- uing in sin with the hope of receiving pardon at last being disavowed, not only does not make a man a hyp- ocrite and a greater sinner, but is really a gift of God and an impulse of the Holy Spirit ; not that the Spirit does as yet dwell in the soul, but merely excites the penitent, who, thus aided, prepares his way to right- eousness. And although it cannot of itself conduct the sinner to justification without the sacrament of pen- ance, yet it disposes him to seek the grace of God in the sacrifice of penance" (Sess. xiv, c. iv). To Prot- estant eyes, attrition seems to have been devised to make a way of salvation easier than contrition. If attrition, with penance and priestly absolution, avail before God unto justification, then imperfect repent- ance, arising from fear, is all the repentance neces- sary in practice to a sinner, whatever the theory may be. So Dens : " Imperfect contrition is required, and it is sufficient ; perfect contrition, though best, is not absolutely required, because this last justifies without the sacrament" (Theologia, t. vi, no. 51). This is one of the worst features of the Romish theology. "A belief in sacerdotal power to procure acceptance for those who merely feel a servile fear of divine wrath is one of those things that require to be plucked up by the roots," if human society, in Roman Catholic coun- tries, is to be preserved pure. The better class of di- vines in that church seek to palliate this doctrine ; they would do better to conspire for its subversion. — Elliott, Delineation of Romanism, bk. ii, c. x ; Bergier, Diet, de Theologie, i, 210 ; Perrone, Predict. Theologicw, ii, 337 ; Gibson, Preservative against Popery, ii, 3G (fol. ed.) ; Soames, Latin Church, p. 98 ; Ferraris, Prorata Bibliotheca, s. v. Baptismus.
Attud. See Goat.
Atwater, Jeremiah, D.D., a Congregational min- ister, was born at New Haven in 1 774 ; graduated at Yale College in 1793 ; was tutor in that college from 1795 to 1799 ; president of Middlebury College from 1800 to 1809 ; and president, of Dickinson College, Car- lisle, from 1810 to 1818. From that period he lived in retirement until his death, July 29th, 1858. Dr. At- water was a man of great reading, and of a retentive memory, especially of historical events, and the lives and characters of men he had known, but he bad no fondness for writing, and has left, it is believed, but few literary remains. — Am. Cong. Year-book (vol. vi, 1859, p. 118).
Auberlen, Karl August, an eminent German theologian, was born November 19, 1824, at Fellbach, near Stuttgardt. He studied four years, from 1837, at Blaubeuern, and in 1841 entered the University of Tu- bingen as theological student. F. C. Baur (q. v.) was then at the height of his glorj', and Auberlen for a time was carried away by this brilliant Rationalist; a discipline which probably helped to fit him for his later work in resisting the destructive school of theo- logians. The lectures of Schmid and Beck (wdio came to Tubingen in 1843) helped to save him from the abyss of Pantheism. He had hardly taken his doctor's degree when he published Die Theosophi Oetinger's, ein lii-itrag .:. Dogmingeschichte, etc. (Tubingen, 1847, 8vo), showing the higher sphere into which his studies
AUBERTIN
537
AUDIN
had ascended. See Oetixger. lie had previously (1845) become a pastor; and in 1848 he followed Hof- acker (q. v.) in that office. In 1849 he became rep- etent at Tubingen, and in 1851 professor extraordinaiy at Basel. In the same year he married the daughter of Wolfgang Menzel. From this time his labors as teacher, preacher, and author were most abundant and successful to the time of his death. He published in 1855 Zehn Predigten (Basel, 8vo) ; Der Prophet Daniel und die Offenbarung Jukannis (Basel, 185-4, 2d ed. 1857; translated into both French and English), a work which contributed greatly to the revival of sound Biblical theology in Germany ; Zehn Vortrage zur Veranttcortung des Christlichen Glaubens (Basel, 1861, 8vo); Die Gbtt- liehe Offenbarung, ein apologet. Versuch (vol. i, 1861; vol. ii, posthumous, 1864). In part one he undertakes to show "that, even if we accept only those New Tes- tament Scriptures which the most destructive of the Tubingen critics grant to be genuine, to wit, the Epis- tles to the Galatians, Corinthians, and Romans, a strictly scientific and logical method of interpretation forces us to the inevitable conclusion that the extra- ordinary gifts of the apostolic church, the miracles of the apostles, the resurrection of Christ, his manifesta- tion of himself to Saul on the way to Damascus, as also his continued intercourse with him, are facts. In the gospels he asks but one concession, to wit, the historical genuineness of Christ's testimony respecting himself when on trial (and this is granted by Baur, Strauss, etc.), in order to put all deniers of the divini- ty of Christ in a very disagreeable predicament. In the same regressive way he goes back to the Old Tes- tament, and by a sure induction mounts from the patent and undeniable fact-phenomena of the Old Dispensa- tion to a supernatural and divine factor in the whole history. The result of this part of the discussion is this: 'Were the revelations of God, the miracles, not facts, then has the inmost consciousness of all the holy men of old — that is to say, of the noblest and mightiest spirits, the real pillars of human history — reposed upon illusion and mental derangement. The world is either a Bedlam, an insane asylum, or it is a temple, a place of divine epiphanies.' The second, or historical part, is a succinct history of the long struggle in Germany between rationalism and supranaturalism." A trans- lation of part of vol. i, by Professor Flackett, is given in Bibliotheca Sacra, July, 1865. His career was prem- aturely cut short by consumption, May 2, 1864. In the last hour he said, in the fulness of Christian faith, ' ' God be thanked, of death I have no fear ; the Lord Jesus is my light and my song" (sketch of his life in preface to 2d vol. of Die Giitil. Offenbarung). — Herzog, Real-Encyldopiidie, Supplem. i, 793 ; Bibliotheca Scl- era, 1*G5J p. 395, 517.