e Altar, true keys for the forgiveness of sins, the true office of
the ministry, the true catechism, such as the Lord's Prayer, the Ten
Commandments the Articles of Faith, etc." (26, 147.) Luther's meaning
is, that in the midst of antichristendom and despite the Pope, the text
of the three chief parts was, among other things, preserved to the
Church.

85. Service Rendered Catechism by Luther.

The fact that the text of the three chief parts existed long before
Luther does not detract from the service which he rendered the
Catechism. Luther's work, moreover, consisted in this, 1. that he
brought about a general revival of the instruction in the Catechism of
the ancient Church; 2. that he completed it by adding the parts treating
of Baptism, Confession, and the Lord's Supper; 3. that he purged its
material from all manner of papal ballast; 4. that he eliminated the
Romish interpretation and adulteration in the interest of
work-righteousness; 5. that he refilled the ancient forms with their
genuine Evangelical and Scriptural meaning. Before Luther's time the
study of the Catechism had everywhere fallen into decay. There were but
few who knew its text, and when able to recite it, they did not
understand it. The soul of all Christian truths, the Gospel of God's
free pardon for Christ's sake, had departed. Concerning "the three parts
which have remained in Christendom from of old" Luther said that "little
of it had been taught and treated correctly." (CONC. TRIGL. 575, 6.)

In his _Warning to My Dear Germans,_ of 1531, he enlarges on the same
thought as follows; "Thanks to God, our Gospel has produced much and
great good. Formerly no one knew what was Gospel, what Christ, what
Baptism, what Confession, what Sacrament, what faith, what spirit, what
flesh, what good works, what the Ten Commandments, what the Lord's
Prayer, what praying, what suffering, what comfort, what civil
government, what matrimony, what parents, what children, what lords,
what servant, what mistress what maid, what devil, what angel, what
world, what life, what death, what sin, what right, what forgiveness of
sin, what God, what bishop, what pastor, what Church, what a Christian,
what the cross. Sum, we knew nothing of what a Christian should know.
Everything was obscured and suppressed by the papal asses. For in
Christian matters they are asses indeed, aye, great, coarse, unlearned
asses. For I also was one of them and know that in this I am speaking