Planck the subjective, pragmatic method reaches its height. History is only the drear}' theatre of human interests and passions. It is therefore truly amazing that, with his indifference to Church doctrine, he could bestow so much toilsome study and learned industry on such 'perfectly indifferent antiquations' as the theolog- ical contentions of the 16th and 17th centuries. Of course his work, with all its great and enduring merits, and the relative truth and necessity of its position, could not fail to have a bad effect, in completely sundering the doctrinal consciousness of its age from the basis of the older Church orthodoxy, and in justifying this rup- ture as a pretended advance. In his other large work, The History of Church Government, Planck likewise starts from that rationalistic conception of the Church, which dates from Locke, viz., that this divine establish- ment was originally a mere voluntary association, which formed its laws and institutions in accordance with the changing wants of the times, and under the influence of fortuitous, external circumstances; and that, in this way, it gradually assumed an aspect altogether different from what its founder and first members intended or foresaw. In this way he accounts for the gigantic hierarchy of the Middle Ages, which he looks upon in a simply po- litical light, with the calmness of a learned but indiffer- ent spectator ; while the older Protestant orthodoxy had held it in pious abhorrence, as the broken bulwark of the veritable Antichrist" (Schaff, Hist, of the Apostolic Church, p. 73). A complete list of all his writings is given in Flutter, Gesch. der Universitat Gottingi n, ii, 121; iii, 283 sq. ; iv, 270. See Liicke, Gottlieb Jacob Planck, ein bioi/raphischer Vrrsurh (Gott. 1838, 8vo) ; Illgen, Zeitschr.fur histor. Theol. 1843, iv, 75-88; Rhein- wald, Repert. of theol. Liter atur, 1839, xxv, 105 sq.; Hallesche allgem. Zeit. 1837, iii, 281 sq. ; Domer, Hist, of Protestant Theology, Li, 283 ; Kahnis. Hist, of German Protestantism, p. 176; Hurst's Hagenbach, Church Hist. of the lS/h and 19/7; Centuries; Alzog, Kirchengesch. ii, 286,731. (J.H.W.)
Planck, Heiniich Ludwig, another German Protestant divine, son of the preceding, was born at Gottingen July 19, 1785, and educated at the university of that place, where his lather was then a professor. In 1809 young Planck appeared as author of a work enti- tled Versuch einer neuen synoptischen Zusammenstellung der drei ersten Evangelien, nach Grundsatzen der hohem Kritik ( ( ii itting. 1809, 8vo). In 1810 he was appointed extraordinary professor of theology at Gottingen; and his introductory programme, De vera natura atqut 'it- dole orationis Grcecce Novi Testamenti Commentatio (Gottingen, 1810, 4to), added greatly to his reputation. The value of this essay can scarcely be overrated, and its influence has been equal to its worth. It has wrought an entire change of opinion respecting the N.-T. Greek, and upon the views which it enforced all subsequent investigations have been based. An English transla- tion is published in the second volume of the Edinburgh Biblical Cabinet. It was Planck's intention, as stated in this essay, to exhibit his views in a more perfected form, in a work to be entitled Isagoge Philologica in Novum Testamentum ; but from this he was diverted by an engagement into which he entered upon the strong recommendation of Gesenius, namely, to prepare a lex- icon of the N. T. similar to that which the latter had published of the O. T. Unhappily the expectations awakened by his early promise were unfulfilled. His health was undermined by frequent attacks of epilepsy, and ii was with difficulty that he could go through the duties of his office as ordinary professor of theology, to which he was appointed in 1823. Other works of his are. -Y< ir /A vi lotion and Inspiration (1817), and a Short Sch m* of the Philosophic Doctrines of Religion I 1821). He died Sept, 23, 1831. See Llicke's biography of Gott- lieb Jacob Planck. (J. H. W.)
Plane (ilSSpa, makstudh, a chisel for carpenter's work, Isa. xliv, 13). Sec HANDICRAFT.
PLANE-TREE 268
Plane-tree (F.cclus. xxiv. 1 1. See Chestxi r.
Planet. See M \// lroth.
Planet -■worship is a prominent constructive feature in all mystic Bystems of antiquity. Thus the primitive worship of all objects like Osiris (q. v.) may be contemplated under two aspects, differing Bomewhat from ■ "li other, but incapable of any rigorous or formal separation. That worship seems to be in some local- ity - directly solar. I ■ i ■ urn 3 of ( Isiris 1 1 .- 1 \ e been inter- woven or identified with those of the great orb of the day. His votaries have an eye exclusively to periodic motions of the sun and the vicissitudes ol the seasons ; auch in reference to the increase or i he decrease of hi> luminous functions a- to seeming changes in his fructifying, fertilizing power. In winter he appears to the imagination of the worshipper as languishing and dying; and all nature, ceasing to pul forth her buds and blossoms, is believed to suffer with him; while at other seasons of the year the majesty of this greal king of heaven i- reasserted in the vivifying of creation and the gladdening of the human heart. There is an an- nual resurrection of all nature, for the sun-god is him- self returning from the under-world— the region of the dead Or, if we study the same representation in its luric aspect, « hal is there depicted as a mourn- • Isiris is no longer emblematic merely of pros- tration in the sun-god: it imports mure frequently the loss of vital forces in the vegetable kingdom as the consequence of the withdrawal of the solstitial heat. The earth her-. It becomes the principal sufferer; and the cause of all her passionate and despairing lamenta- tion-, is the influence thai dries up the fountains of her <>wu vitality. Now, whichever be adjudged the prim- itive form or the correct interpretation of this old Osirian myth, we musl remember that, historically speaking, the substance of the myth itself is not by any means peculiar to the valley of the Nile. It recurs in nearly all countries bordering on the Mediterranean. It can often be directly traced to Asia, and as often to the agency of those Phoenician colonists who, scattered thickly in the islands to the wesl of S\ ria, were import- ing to far distant havens not their amber only, bul their