THE NEW SCHAFF-HERZOG
belief and impenitence;' In 1533, and again in 1536, Luther approved the retention of public general absolution together with private confession at Nuremberg, and even drew "up a formula for such absolution. Nevertheless, holding that absolution was not conditioned by priestly judgment (though it was an objective and effectual conferring of forgiveness), he later declared that it might be conferred by one layman on another in virtue of the " power of the keys." On the other hand, in 1538 he stated that those capable of instructing themselves need not make a formal confession before receiving the Eucharist. In 1537 a controversy broke out with Johann Agricola on the nature of the law (see Agricola, Johann; and Antinomianism). Sharply opposed by Luther in theses of 1537-38 and the Wider die Antinomer (1539), Agricola held that the Mosaic law had been abrogated, and that repentance should be preached only on the basis of the Gospel (the word of grace in Christ), not because of the lawi / Luther, on the contrary, maintained that the word of salvation could not awaken faith in the sinful heart unless it had first been broken by the law and its resultant terrors of conscience. This is, indeed, not true repentance, but is a preparation for it; and stress was also laid by Luther on the fact that wherever in the New Testament sin, wrath, and judgment are revealed, thgjaw, and not the Gospel, prevails.
VThe most important part in Church organization
yet in store for Luther was the establishment of
consistories. These were especially needed for the
regulation of marriage. Luther, pro-
2i. Estab- ceeding on his theory of the relation
lishment of of the secular to the Mosaic law, and
Consistories regarding marriage as a secular, though
and the holy estate, relegated it to the State;
Marriage and held that the clergy were conof Philip cerned with it in so far as, from its
of Hesse, very nature, it led to questions of conscience more than any other secular statej(see Marriage, I., § 6, II. 2, § 5). The first consistory was established at Wittenberg in 1539 with Luther's approval. The chief importance of the consistory for the organization and life of the Church, however, came from the fact that the duty entrusted to it was discipline. This, it was thought, would lead to the introduction of the public ban, with its civic consequences, but when opposition was raised in Wittenberg in 1539 on the matter, Luther set forth very clearly the ban he would be willing to establish— one based on Matt, xviii. 15 sqq. There is no record, however, that such a plan, so eminently in accord with the Evangelical concept of the Church, was anywhere carried out; nor had Luther himself much hope of the consistories' actual disciplinary powers. The end of Luther's life was now approaching, and he had already received warning in a sharp attack of calculus at Schmalkald in 1537. Beneath his external bravery, he felt himself aging, and while full of gratitude for the grace of the Gospel, he felt the world an alien to it in precept and practise, and looked forward to a time of distress and judgment for the Church. He was pained most of all by the attitude of the masses and of the nobility toward the Gospel,
illustrated by the marital relations of Philip of Hesse. The latter, though married, was enamored of a girl of the nobility, and asserted that he was compelled by most urgent reasons of conscience to search for another wife. He conceived the idea of a double marriage, and as early as 1526 asked Luther's opinion on it, renewing his inquiries most urgently through Butzer after 1539. -Though Luther held that monogamy was, the original institution of God, he nevertheless granted the possibility of cases in which a dispensation was admissible, even among Christians, especially as such a double marriage was preferable to an illegal divorce. This dispensation, however, could be given only as confessional advice, and could not alter the law, which recognized only a single wife; land it must, therefore, remain absolutely secretTTo avoid scandal. While sharply admonishing Philip of his sins and his duty, Luther and Melanchthon granted that his was a case for a dispensation, and the wedding took place on Mar. 3, 1540. Luther insisted that the affair be kept secret, and that the new wife be represented to the emperor as a mistress, knowing that he could not justify his attitude to the world, though he thought he might to God.
The impossibility of peaceable relations with the Roman Catholic Church was felt still more keenly by Luther in these last years when new attempts at reconciliation were made. He was obliged to deliberate with his colleagues in Jan., 1540, with only the passing hope that the em-
22. Re- peror might convene a national coun-
newed cil, for there was no remedy unless
Eucharistic doctrines contrary to Scripture should
Contro- first be openly renounced. He ac-
versies. cordingly felt little sympathy with the Regensburg Conference in 1541 (q.V.), headed by Melanchthon and Cruciger, condemning their attitude toward both the Eucharist and the doctrine of justification. When, however, the emperor sought to reopen negotiations in 1545, Luther subscribed to Melanchthon's proposal to reunite with the episcopate, but his diatribes against the Roman Catholic Church were even more bitter than ever, as is amply illustrated by his Wider das Papst- %tum zu Rom, which appeared in the year before his death. He gave a very real ground of offense, moreover, to his opponents, when in 1542, despite the protests of the chapter, he made Nikolaus von Amsdorf bishop of Nuremberg, an act which he defended in his Exempel einen rechten christlichen Bischof zu weihen, wherein he sought to establish from the Evangelical point of view the validity of the consecration which he had performed. With the growth of dissension between the two Saxon houses after 1542 came a break in the unity of the Evangelicals. Luther had never ceased warning against the doctrines of Zwingli, and he now found his suspicions increased by the fact that Zurich refused to give up these tenets. /He formally renounced fellowship with the preachers of Zurich, but deemed that the heresy had entered Germany through the Cologne scheme of reformation drawn up by Butzer and Melanchthon, who made reception of the Eucharist simply a heavenly work and a matter of faitbj Aroused to fresh elucidations,