§ 27. THE EUCHAKISTIC CONTROVERSY. 85
Germany and Switzerland have changed their poUcy, and allow to Baptists, Methodists, and other Dissenters from the state-church that liberty of public worship which was formerly denied them ; and the state-churches reap the benefit of being stirred up by them to greater vitality. In England the Baptists are one of the leading bodies of Dissenters, and in the United States the largfest denomination next to the Methodists and Roman Catholics.
§ 27. The EucTiaristic Controversy . Zwingli and Luther.
ZwiNGLi's eucharistic writings : On the Canon of the Mass (1523) ; On the same, against Emser (1524) ; Letter to Matthew Alber at Reutlingen (1524) ; The 17th ch. of his Com. on the True and False Religion (in Latin and German, March 23, 1525) ; Answer to Bugenhagen (1525) ; Letter to Billicanus and Urbanus Rhegius (1526) ; Address to Osiander of Niirnberg (1527) ; Friendly Exegesis, addressed to Luther (Feb. 20, 1527) ; Reply to Luther on the true sense of the words of institution of the Lord's Supper (1527) ; The report on the Marburg Colloquy (1529). In Opera, vol. II. B., III., IV. 173 sqq. For an exposition of Zwingli's doctrine on the Lord's Supper and his
controversy with Luther, see vol. VI. 520-550 and 669-682 ; and A. Baur,
Zwingli's Theol. II. 268 sqq. (very full and fair) .
The eucharistic controversy between Zwingli and Luther has been already considered in connection with the German Reformation, and requires only a brief notice here. It lasted from 1524 to 1529, and culminated in the Colloquy at Marburg, where the two views came into closer contact and collision than ever before or since, and where every argument for or against the literal interpretation of the words of institution and the corporal presence was set forth with the clearness and force of the two champions.
Zwingli and Luther agreed in the principle of a statechurch or people's church (^Volks-Kirehe'), as opposed to individualism, separatism, and schism. Both defended the historic continuity of the Church, and put down the revolutionary radicalism which constructed a new church on the voluntary principle. Both retained infant baptism as a part
86 THE SWISS REFORMATION.
of Christian family religion, against the Anabaptists, who introduced a new baptism with their new church of converts. Luther never appreciated this agreement in the general standpoint, and made at the outset the radical mistake of confounding Zwingli with Carlstadt and the Radicals.^
But there was a characteristic difference between the two Reformers in the general theory of the sacraments, and especially the Lord's Supper. Zwingli stood midway between Luther and the Anabaptists. He regarded the sacraments as signs and seals of a grace already received rather than as means of a grace to be received. They set forth and confirm, but do not create, the thing signified. He rejected the doctrine of baptismal regeneration and of the corporal presence ; while Luther adhered to both with intense earnestness and treated a departure as damnable heresy. Zwingli's -iheory reveals the spiritualizing and rationalizing tendency of his mind; while Luther's theory reveals his realistic and mystical tendency. Yet both were equally earnest in their devotion to the Scriptures as the Word of God and the supreme rule of faith and practice.
When they met face to face at Marburg, — once, and only once, in this life, — they came to agree in fourteen out of fifteen articles, and even in the fifteenth article they agreed in the principal part, namely, the spiritual presence and fruition of Christ's body and blood, differing only in regard to the corporal presence and oral manducation, which the one denied, the other asserted. Zwingli showed on that occasion marked ability as a debater, and superior courtesy
1 A. Baur (Zw. TheoL, II. 811) says on this misunderstanding: "Luther war f von Anfang an Zwhujli mit Miinzer unci Karlstadt zusammen. Kein Vorwurf itnd Vorurtheil gegen Zwingli ist ungerechter, aber auch kein Vorwurf gldnzender widerlegt, als dieser, und zwar eben durch die Klarheit und Bestimmtheit, mit welcher Zwingli seine Principien gegen die Wiedertdufer entfaltet. Im Gegentheil; die maasslose Suhjectivitdt die bei Miinzer, Karlstadt, bei den Wiedertdufern zum Ausbruch Jcommt, und die solche WillkiiJir bleibt, auch wenn sie sich auf den Buchstaben der Schrift beruft, ist das vollstdndige Gegentheil der Principien Zwingli's."