While studies of the Reformation on the Continent have long emphasized the importance and the influence of the middle class, the dominating figures in many accounts of this movement in Scotland have been the nobles and the preachers. The Lords of the Congregation, along with such ministers as Knox, Wynram, and Harlaw have usually received most of the credit—or blame, depending upon one's point of view—for what took place. While this may be accepted as natural, yet it must be remembered that the Scottish Reformation was neither Lutheran nor Anglican in its final form, but thoroughly Calvinistic. Although Calvinism was not the original moving force, by 1560 it was dominant. By analogy with the parallel movements on the Continent, it is hard to believe that such a development could have come from a purely feudal or princely origin. Following the example of the Reformation in Holland, for example, we are obliged to realize that another important factor was involved: the middle class. Neither the nobles nor the preachers give a complete answer to questions regarding the reason for, and the form of, the Scottish reform movement. True, they held an exceedingly important place in its history. Without the nobles the Reformation might never have taken place. Yet when all this is said, it would seem that if we are to have a proper understanding of the Scottish religious movement it is necessary to study the place held in it by the merchants and master craftsmen. These were the men who in no small way made the Reformation in Scotland possible, and enabled it for the next three hundred years to wield such an enormous influence on the life of the people.

Canon Raven of the University of Cambridge, in his recently published book, expressed a significant, if somewhat startling, judgment regarding the historical trend of Western theology:

The first adequate theology, still perhaps the noblest ever formulated, [was] the Logos theology of the Greek Apologists, which had its fullest expression in the Christian Platonism of Clement of Alexandria and Origen. … It is one of the tragedies of history that the work of this brilliant succession of Christian thinkers was allowed not merely to come to an end, but to fall into neglect, oblivion and condemnation. If we are to handle effectively the task of elucidating a Christian theology for the twentieth century, we must, I think, ignore all the elaborate structures of later orthodoxy, Catholic and Protestant, which for today are literally irrelevant, and return to the point at which Origen was removed.

Philip Melanchthon was the author of the first book of Protestant theology, which he called Loci communes rerum theologicarum seu hypotyposes theologicae (Wittenberg, 1521). As a first it is worth some study, for firsts are likely to be models for later things of their kind. Moreover, while Melanchthon is by some considered to depart from early Protestant thought (cf. Philippism), Luther gave unqualified and almost extravagant praise to his young collaborator's first work. This justifies putting at least the 1521 edition in the fundamental canon of Protestantism. Finally, if suth is its importance Melanchthon's method deserves examination.

Christian history demonstrates repeatedly that the church at its best has been a self-criticizing institution. Furthermore, the call to both corporate and individual reformation has never ceased to be regarded as the special obligation of Christian, preachers. Their hearers through the centuries have often been, highly sensitive, as individuals and groups, to castigation of any kind emanating from whatever quarter. In every era, however, there have been some prophetic spokesmen who have continued to take seriously the censures of the church's enemies and to call for self-examination, repentance, and rededication—both personal and social—on the part of its true friends.

A new examination of this well worn theme seems to be appropriate in view of the current discussion of the place of metaphysics in the study of philosophy. The familiar supposition that philosophy may, and indeed should, dispense with all high speculations concerning the nature of “the grand scheme of things entire” while it devotes its time to “the order and connection of ideas in the mind,” or to that quasi-mental order known as scientific methodology, would make of philosophy either a segment of natural science or a footless and irresponsible expression of animal hungers and party causes. Any philosophy, so we are told, which indulges in metaphysics is a mere rationalization of animal “drives” on a par with folklore, religion, and magic. Aside from the suspicion that this supposition is itself a metaphysical hypothesis not subject to scientific verification, the reasonable manner of dealing with it is to test it by comparison with rival suppositions in the history of man.

During the 19th century a concept, in itself neither religious nor anti-religious, modified the thought of a great number of Americans. This was the concept of gradual development. One application of this concept, which had a profound effect upon Congregational thought, was the assumption that insight into religious truth comes only gradually. This view seemed to threaten all formulations of tradition and all embodiments of revelation which had been assumed to be final and complete. Another concept, closely related to that of development, also gravely disturbed the New England theology of the latter 19th century. There was a revival of stress on the immanence of God within the created world. For certain Congregationalists, divine influence upon man came to be viewed as working wholly through the channels of natural law and natural growth, rather than by sudden invasion from without. To conservatives, this stress seemed to blur a central truth in evangelical theology, the perilous chasm between sinful men and the holy, judging God.

If it be assumed that in any survey of the religious situation in post-war Europe, reconstruction and the struggle against Stalinist communism are the two main themes, Germany is deserving of attention on both counts. By the end of the war, approximately fifty per cent of the church's physical property in cities of more than thirty thousand people had been destroyed. The Nazi penetration into the ecclesiastical hierarchy of the Evangelical Church and practically all the minor Protestant sects also presented a reconstruction problem of major proportions. In the matter of communism, Germany at the crossroads of East and West was soon subjected to a determined leftist drive, conducted in the guise of anti-fascism, to remake its society on an anticlerical and irreligious pattern.

Although nothing approaching the number of words written by Benjamin Hoadly during the eighty-five years of life has been written about him in the 185 years since his death—still, the contentious Bishop has been by no means neglected by historians of eighteenth century England. Hoadly's peculiar position with respect to the Established Church has been dissected out of the complicated anatomy of the Bangorian controversy. His major political treatises have been screened to reveal original contributions to political theory—with largely negative results. His remarkable and rapid climb up the ladder of preferment after the accession of George I, when the Whigs once more prevailed in ministerial and parlimentary positions, has been generally interpreted as payment for substantial services rendered. However, so far as the writer is aware, the preliminary establishment of Benjamin Hoadly's right to Whig patronage has not received detailed consideration.

During the reign of Mary Tudor, Queen of England from 1553 to 1558, Roman Catholicism became the official religion of the English state; and the English Crown once again recognized the authority of the pope. English Roman Catholics were jubilant while the Protestants believed that all of the gains of the English Reformation had been lost. The religious and even the political future of England was therefore clearly in the hands of Queen Elizabeth when she ascended the throne in 1558. She was subjected to strong pressure from both the Roman Catholics and the Protestants, and for some years the ultimate issue was in doubt. The religious decisions which were made in England during this period were, however, vital for the cause of Protestantism and of extreme significance for Roman Catholicism. Much of the historical writing which describes these crucial events is, naturally enough, the product of Protestant or Roman Catholic apologetic; and the subject is one which has need of calm and reasoned study as well as of ordered presentation.

“It is not permitted that country bishops should ordain presbyters or deacons, nor, moreover, may city presbyters do so, without the written permission of the bishop in each parish.” This canon, which is still on occasion cited to uphold presbyterian ordination in the early church,1 so bristles with difficulties, that it is perhaps advisable to refrain from using it to prove anything.

Many forces, ancient and modern, European and Asiatic, political and economic, have combined to produce the present state of unrest and political turmoil in Indonesia, otherwise known as the Dutch East Indies. No one can fully understand the present situation with all its emotional tensions, unless he appreciates the various religious factors which are operative, to a greater or less degree, in the Indonesian nationalist movement.