640 HISTORY OF THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH 



their theology, or of their speculations. Too romantic pupils of 

 Herder or of Schelling wrote romances instead of strict and conscien- 

 tious history. The theologians, who followed Schleiermacher, too 

 anxious to reconcile their scientific work with their ecclesiastical 

 or dogmatical belief, forfeited treasuries of scholarship in sad com- 

 binations of the " Vermittlungstheologie." 1 The too zealous disciples 

 of Hegel made history subordinate to philosophical speculation 

 and wrote historical works, which in spite of their more severe form 

 were, in the main, not much different from the historical romances. 



But those who knew how to derive profit from such a strong spirit- 

 ual education, without giving up what requires a severe historical 

 method, had a great influence over our studies. It will be sufficient 

 to notice that from Schleiermacher proceeds Neander, the historian 

 who perhaps better than any other knew how to bring to life again 

 some of the great Christian personalities of the past, and that we 

 owe to the Hegelian school F. Chr. Baur and D. F. Strauss. 



Strauss's work has been chiefly negative. His impressive criticism 

 overturned the precarious display of the midway theologians and 

 proved the weakness of many traditional certainties which passed 

 for inexpugnable. But his criticism was too theoretic, too little 

 caring for precise texts and facts as to be able to produce lasting 

 positive results. 



F. Chr. Baur is of another value. With him begins really the 

 modern era of ecclesiastical history. For once and for all he put in 

 a clear light the principal tendencies whose clash forms the woof of 

 the first Christianity. His chronological or critical judgments on 

 several texts or documents of ancient Christian literature may be 

 sometimes erroneous; the Hegelian dialectics may have mastered 

 him more than it ought; he may 'be too much an intellectualist, too 

 anxious for evolution of the ideas and not enough for that of feelings, 

 of religious life, or of the real and complicated conditions of social life. 

 Nevertheless, his dissection of primitive Christianity the antithesis 

 of the Judsean and the universalist Hellenic Christianity, the very 

 importance of the Gnostic movement (already hinted at by Neander 

 indeed) has supplied data which have become since a common 

 good for us all and which are no longer contested. Before him none 

 had cleared so distinctly the internal dialectics of the Christian 

 dogmatic evolution or of the origins of the Catholic Church. At least 

 he was one of the first ecclesiastical historians who saw so distinctly 

 how important it is to know other ancient religions to understand 

 the history of ancient Christianity. 



Ecclesiastical history as conceived by Baur is just the contrary 



1 Most of the representatives of that " Vermittlungstheologie " are dogmatists 

 rather than historians. Such are: Twesten, Nitzsch, Julius Miiller, Dorner. 

 More properly historians are Ullmann and chiefly Alexander Schweizer (of Zu- 

 rich), the most original of Schleiermacher's continuers. 



