eds,_ 1, 259.) This is correct; but the stricture
must be added that, since unionism and liberalism are incompatible with
the very essence of Lutheranism, Melanchthonianism as such was in
reality not a "type," but a denial of Lutheranism.

Melanchthon lacked the simple faith in, and the firm adherence and
implicit submission to, the Word of God which made Luther the undaunted
and invincible hero of the Reformation. Standing four-square on the
Bible and deriving from this source of divine power alone all his
theological thoughts and convictions, Luther was a rock, firm and
immovable. With him every theological question was decided and settled
conclusively by quoting a clear passage from the Holy Scriptures, while
Melanchthon, devoid of Luther's single-minded and whole-hearted devotion
to the Word of God, endeavored to satisfy his reason as well.
Consequently he lacked assurance and firm conviction, wavered and
vacillated, and was never fully satisfied that the position he occupied
was really the only correct one, while, on the other hand, he endeavored
to present his views concerning some of the disputed doctrines in
ambiguous and indefinite terms. "We have twenty-eight large volumes of
Melanchthon's writings," says C. P. Krauth, "and, at this hour,
impartial and learned men are not agreed as to what were his views on
some of the profoundest questions of church doctrine, on which
Melanchthon was writing all his life!" (_Conservative Ref.,_ 291;
Schmauk, 748.) This indefinite and wavering attitude towards divine
truth, the natural consequence of the humanistic bent of his mind,
produced in Melanchthon a general tendency and proneness to surrender or
compromise doctrinal matters in the interest of policy, and to barter
away eternal truth for temporal peace. It made him an indifferentist and
a unionist, always ready to strike a bargain also in matters pertaining
to Christian faith, and to cover doctrinal differences with ambiguous
formulas. While Luther's lifelong attitude on matters of Christian
doctrine is characterized by the famous words spoken by him at Worms in
1521: "_Ich kann nicht anders,_ I cannot do otherwise," Melanchthon,
treating even questions of faith as matters of expediency rather than of
conscience, was the man who, as a rule, could also do otherwise, and who
was great in manufacturing "Polish boots," as the ambiguous phrases by
which he endeavored to unite opposing parties were called by the
Lutherans in