RELIGION IN GERMANY.*

It cannot for a moment be doubted that German morality is in no wise inferior to our own. All the quiet graces of character, all the domestic, social virtues, flourish there as happily as here. The German nationality favors the preservation and development of the hereditary culture of many centuries, with the special impetus afforded by the Reformation. They are inferior to no nation, superior to many, in the actual quantity and positiveness of their ethical life. But it has become organic and hereditary: there is no quickening power in the religious establishment. The Church there has no recuperative energy. It is only a thinking machine, whence emanates a great deal of intellectual light, but little spiritual heat. The special impetus of the Reformation has spent its force, and the existing Protestantism still retains too much of the old negativeness. In short, Germany has nothing to repair the natural waste in the public religion. So that from this spiritual immobility may be dreaded a future spiritual death. A glance at the nature of the Church will, at least, prove these statements to be highly probable. An adequate cause will seem to be contained in the intimate and disastrous alliance between Church and State, which obtains there.

In Germany the State is omnipotent and omnipresent. Nothing exists, there is only the State. All things are dispensed and in nothing is the theory of Hahnemann so strictly pursued, as in the dispensing of religion; unless we except the application of the same to that which dispenses. A brief outline of the religious establishment will serve to indicate the State's inordinate power.

Next to the head of the State, and ranking with the other Crown Ministers, is the Minister of Ecclesiastical Affairs; over which he has the entire control. His department appoints the members of the Consistories in the several provinces, and through them confirms to all vacant parishes. The Consistory is that which superintends the ecclesiastical affairs in each province, and the Presi

For the bare outline of the Church-system, the writer was indebted to the excellent articles of Professor Robinson, in the Biblical Repository for 1831, whence the quotations relating to that subject were drawn.

"To the

dent of the latter is always the President of the former. Consistories belongs exclusively the examination of candidates for the ministerial office; it has also in many, if not most instances, the disposal of vacant livings within its jurisdiction. But between these Consistories and governments and the pastors of the churches there is still another intervening class or office, viz., that of Superintendent." He is generally a pastor of a particular church, and is, in one sense, a Bishop, as he oversees the churches: "but then this oversight seems intended only to enable him to make report to the higher powers, for he has himself no power of introducing improvements, nor of correcting abuses." He merely communicates between the Government and the lower clergy. This arrangement is that which is generally found in Prussia, and "will apply, mutatis mutandis, to all the other States of Protestant Germany. The King's Ministry retains the charge of all the Universities in its own hands; it appoints all the professors and instructers, and prescribes the requisitions which shall be made on all those who will enter upon the sacred office, or become theological teachers. It appoints also the Consistories, and commits to them the charge of examining the candidates, and often of nominating them to vacant places. To aid them in their duties, it also establishes in the Universities, when necessary, standing Commissions for holding the first theological examinations. These are the several bodies to which a young man has to look, in order to enter the ministry, after he has completed his University course."

What advantage accrues from such an organization as this? "The dependence of the Church upon the civil power, or its union with that power in any shape, pregnant as it is with a host of unutterable evils, brings in its train this one solitary advantage, viz., that, supported by the State, the Church can enforce and render uniform its own recommendations in regard to Church polity and religious instruction." In this way the latter has been introduced into the preparatory schools. But the difficulty appears to be, that the teacher is selected more for his intellectual than religious qualifications. And the same remark will apply to the Consistorial examinations of candidates for the ministry. These are thorough and severe, and the young catechumen must display the results of many midnight hours, if he hopes to enter within the

pale of the Church. But the motives with which the young man has chosen the profession, or the amount of his religious feeling, is never scrutinized. There is no paternal, no spiritual oversight: it is entirely an affair of the intellect. If he fails in the severe ordeal, the profession is closed against him. For "there is no other way of access to the Church, but through the course thus straightly hedged. All other avenues are entirely closed up; and should any one attempt to climb up some other way' into the fold, should any one attempt to preach the Gospel of salvation, or publicly to arouse the attention of sinners to their spiritual dangers and duties, without having first passed through these years of preparation and trial, there is not a spot in Germany where imprisonment or banishment would not be his lot."

The result is, that the theological students are much the same as the other University students. Kneip-drinking, duelling and "renowning" are not considered incompatible with the character of their future duties. Every thing is brought down to the usual intellectual level. A writer in 1831 remarks, that among the nine hundred theological students at Halle, not more than one hundred and fifty could be reckoned as possessing seriousness of character in any degree, or as having chosen the profession from any motives but the most worldly. He adds, that about one half of that small number might be regarded as possessing personal religion. From the low or indifferent motives which prompt to the profession, and from the purely scientific preparation that the system requires, results the want of intercourse between the preacher and his parish. The pastoral duties, which we consider so important and the right arm of the minister, are not generally practised. It will be safe to say, that out of the larger cities, where there is a cultivated society, the non-intercourse between the clergy and the peasantry is nearly complete. Of course, there are exceptions to this statement and others too may be taken cum grano salis; the design being merely to exhibit the general influence of this union of Church and State.

It is from these habits of non-intercourse that the minister obtains time for extensive study and continuous thought. To this fact we may attribute the large amount of their writings, their homiletics and criticisms, their editions of the classics and their com

plete bodies of divinity. "It is in this way also, that distinguished professors in the Universities can, at the same time, be pastors of churches. They have time for all these things, because they do not give themselves wholly to the ministry. It is this devotion to literary pursuits, together with the very ordinary spiritual qualifications of the minister, which renders the common preaching so vapid and useless. The deep necessity of making human sin objective, and so, repulsive, does not appear to be a central thought in the preacher's heart. There is prevalent a wonderfully meagre philosophy which doubts the fact of sin, and considers virtuous humanity as laboring under a misapprehension on the subject: from which misapprehension the author of the Epistle to the Romans does not appear to have been entirely free. But even where the fact is acknowledged and the preacher sees its hatefulness, at least in theory, he does not feel, that "to be hated" by humanity, it needs but to be seen."

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Is it a matter of wonder, then, that the churches are deserted and are falling to decay? People of taste and intelligence are accustomed to say, that they abstain from church on Sunday, from an utter inability to sustain the sermonic infliction. All classes seek relief from the drowsiness of the pulpit, in social intercourse; and the peasantry employ the latter part of the Sabbath in dancing and drinking. It is not an uncommon thing, on Monday to see a peasant or two not yet recovered from the Sunday's potations. The day is selected for relaxation and amusement; amusement is often merged in license, and the other six days of the week have no other principle of re-action, save in inducing physical sobriety. Neither has the Church any recuperative force. It is like a reed against the mighty tide of custom and example. Neither can the

sponse of the Church, the State, reform the people. so because it is the spouse of the Church.

Things are

The effect of Rationalism is exceedingly disastrous to the growth of public religion. And in this matter we find that the sole advantage resulting from the slavery of the Church to the State becomes a disadvantage. For if by this union the Church can enforce and render uniform its own recommendations, Rationalism can become the State religion, for that is the predominant tendency within the Church; a tendency reproducing itself in various forms.