§ 100. THE VISIBLE AND INVISIBLE CHURCH. 457
private judgment at Worms against popes and councils, because he deemed it "unsafe and dangerous to do anything against tlie conscience bound in tlie Word of God."
§ 100. The Visible and Inviaihle Church. Comp. vol. VI. § 85, and the literature there quoted.
A distinction between real and nominal Christianity is as old as the Church, and has never been denied. " Many are called, but few are chosen." We can know all that are actually called, but God only knows those who are truly chosen. The kindred parables of the tares and of the net illustrate the fact that the kingdom of heaven in this world includes good and bad men, and that a final separation will not take place before the judgment day.^ Paul distinguishes between an outward circumcision of the flesh and an inward circumcision of the heart ; between a carnal Israel and a spiritual Israel ; and he speaks of Gentiles who are ignorant of the written law, yet " do by nature the things of the law," and will judge those who, " with the letter and circumcision, are transgressors of the law." He thereby intimates that God's mercy is not bounded by the limits of the visible Church.^
Augustin makes a distinction between the true body of Christ, which consists of the elect children of God from the beginning, and the mixed body of Christ, which comprehends all the baptized.^ In the Middle Ages the Church was identified with the dominion of the papacy, and the Cyprianic
heit, und viel fronvner grosser Heiligen." Werke, XXVI. 257, Erlangen ed. Mohler (in his Symbolik, pp. 421, 437) sees in such expressions so many selfrefutations of the Reformers in separating from the Catholic Church, and forgets that they were cast out with curses and anathemas.
1 Matt. 13: 24-30; 47-49.
2 Rom. 2 : 14, 15, 28, 29 ; Col. 2 : 11.
3 Corpus Ckristi merutn, and corpus Christi mixtwn. De Doctr. Christ. III. 32; De Baptismo contra Donatistas, IV. 5. The Donatist Tichonius used the less suitable designation of a twofold body of Christ (corpus Christi bipartitum ) .
458 THE REFORMATION IN FRENCH SWITZERLAND.
maxim, '•'•Extra ecclesiam nulla salus,'' was narrowed into " Extra ecclesiam Romanam nulla salus,'' to the exclusion not only of heretical sects, but also of the Oriental Church. Wiclif and Hus, in opposition to the corruptions of the papal Church, renewed the distinction of Augustin, under a different and less happy designation of the congregation of the predestinated or the elect, and the congregation of those who are only foreknown.^
The Reformers introduced the terminology " visible " and " invisible " Church. By this they did not mean two distinct and separate Churches, but rather two classes of Christians within the same outward communion. The invisible Church is in the visible Church, as the soul is in the body, or the kernel in the shell, but God only knows with certainty who belong to the invisible Church and will ultimately be saved ; and in this sense his true children are invisible, that is, not certainly recognizable and known to men. We may object to the terminology, but the distinction is real and important.
Luther, who openly adopted the view of Hus at the disputation of Leipzig, first applied the term "invisible" to the true Church, which is meant in the Apostles' Creed.^ The Augsburg Confession defines the Church to be " the congregation of saints (or believers), in which the Gospel is purely taught, and the sacraments are rightly administered." This definition is too narrow for the invisible Church, and would exclude the Baptists and Quakers.^
The Reformed system of doctrine extends the domain of the invisible or true Church and the possibility of salvation
1 See Wiclif s tract De Ecclesia, published by Loserth, 1886. Hus, in his tract on the same subject, literally adopted Wiclif s view.
2 He speaks of the ecclesia invisihilis in his second Commentary on the Galatians, vol. III.- 38. Erlangen ed. The Lutheran symbolical books do not use the term, but teach the thing.
^ The Ninth Article of the Augsburg Confession expressly condemns the Anabaptists for rejecting infant baptism and maintaining the salvation of unbaptized infants.