rable
guardian of tradition, appeared to him far more worthy of respect than
the heterodox innovator who stops in mid-course, and is faithful neither
to reason nor to faith."

But when Lessing published these unhallowed Fragments, the hour of
conflict had sounded, and Goetze cast himself into the arena with a
boldness and impetuosity which Lessing, in his artistic capacity, could
not fail to admire. He spared no possible means of reducing his enemy to
submission. He aroused against him all the constituted authorities,
the consistories, and even the Aulic Council of the Empire, and he
even succeeded in drawing along with him the chief of contemporary
rationalists, Semler, who so far forgot himself as to declare that
Lessing, for what he had done, deserved to be sent to the madhouse. But
with all Goetze's orthodox valour, he was no match for the antagonist
whom he had excited to activity. The great critic replied with pamphlet
after pamphlet, invincible in logic and erudition, sparkling with wit,
and irritating in their utter coolness. Such pamphlets had not been seen
since Pascal published the "Provincial Letters." Goetze found that
he had taken up arms against a master in the arts of controversy, and
before long he became well aware that he was worsted. Having brought
the case before the Aulic Council, which consisted in great part of
Catholics, the stout pastor, forgetting that judgment had not yet been
rendered, allowed himself to proclaim that all who do not recognize
the Bible as the only source of Christianity are not fit to be called
Christians at all. Lessing was not slow to profit by this unlucky
declaration. Questioned, with all manner of ferocious vituperation, by
Goetze, as to what sort of Christianity might have existed prior to
and independently of the New Testament canon, Lessing imperturbably
answered: "By the Christian religion I mean all the confessions of faith
contained in the collection of creeds of the first four centuries of the
Christian Church, including, if you wish it, the so-called creed of
the apostles, as well as the creed of Athanasius. The content of these
confessions is called by the earlier Fathers the regula fidei, or rule
of faith. This rule of faith is not drawn from the writings of the New
Testament. It existed before any of the books in the New Testament were
written. It sufficed not only for the first Christians of the age of the
apostles, but for their descendants during four cent