which, in 1845, Rothe introduced the first volume of his Ethics to the scientific public-words which set in a beautiful light his tender and reverential love to Christ. "Of all the misunderstandings," writes he, "to which my book will unavoidably be exposed, only one of them seriously disquiets me; for the others can affect only my own person, in regard to which I am not especially sensitive. But I would certainly wish never to have laid pen to this work, should the public not perceive that its central animating principle is unconditional faith in Christ as the real and sole Redeemer, and love to him. The corner-stone of all my thinking, I may honestly confess, is the simple Christian faith as it (not under the form of any special dogma or theology) has for eighteen centuries been conquering the world. It is for me the ultimate certainty, for which I am unhesitatingly and joyously ready to cast to the bats every other pretended knowledge which conflicts therewith. I know of no other solid ground upon which, both for my entire human existence and also especially for my thinking, I could cast anchor, aside from the historical phenomenon designated by the holy name Jesus Christ. It is, for me, the unassailable sanctum sanctorum of humanity; the highest element that ever came into a human consciousness; a bright sunrise in history, wherefrom alone light beams out over the totality of objects which lie about us in the universe. With this single absolutely uninventable datum, the knowledge of which witnesses directly to its reality, as light witnesses of itself, and in which lie locked up infinite consequences, stands or falls, for me, definitively every certainty of the spiritual, and hence eternal, dignity of the human being."

With this love to "his Lord Christ" were united in Rothe the greatest unselfishness and humility. His constant desire was to work, not for his own honor, but for that of Christ, and to win hearts, not for himself, but for the truth. The mere thought, that from among the stream of students that was constantly going out into the world from his instruction there might form itself a kind of school in theology, was to Rothe positively distressing. On parting with the young men who had sat entranced at his feet, he was accustomed honestly to say, Pray do your best to shake me off from you." Though the greatest honors were showed him as a scientific theologian, he remained utterly free of scholastic vanity. "I foresee plainly,"

wrote he in 1847, "that if any place is awarded me in the house of theology, it will be in the little chamber of theosophs, close by Etinger, that I will come to stand. I belong really nowhere else, and I wish for no better place. I shall feel inwardly well at the feet of this dear man." Elsewhere he says, "I know that in the choir of modern theology I sing simply the part for which God has endowed me, and I sing this quite alone, because it is a very subordinate part. . . . If I simply know that I sing in this choir, then I am satisfied. Do I then deserve blame for undertaking a work in the household of our theology which seems to all others either too humble or too pains-giving? To me, at least, it is just as I could wish. I do my work quietly and alone, without finding fault with others for seeing things differently."

Another characteristic of his humility was, his cheerful frankness in correcting any formerly expressed view which was dis covered to be erroneous. Take, as an illustration, this statement from the second edition of his Ethics: "In the first edition of this book I was very unfortunate in the treatment of the point developed in this paragraph. As it is there presented, I must have been understood in a manner which, while entirely contrary to my real meaning, was yet wholly my own fault." Such frank unselfishness could not but win its way into all hearts. "We do not believe," says Achelis, "that there has been another teacher in the schools of Germany who was in such a degree as Rothe beloved by his hearers, and, as it were, borne on their hands." And as by the students, so also by his colleagues in all the faculties, as also by the citizens of Heidelberg, was the kindly and highly-renowned, and yet lowly-minded professor, met with the affectionate good-will which he himself constantly showed to all.

While exercising the severest criticism on his own labors he was of a mildness and generosity in the judging of others such as is rarely to be seen under such circumstances. He not only held the highest possible opinion of his fellows, but even in cases of sad disappointment persisted to the very last in saving from the wreck of this good opinion whatever could be saved. Wonderful was his facility in thinking himself into the standpoint from which another viewed and judged things, and in making the greatest possible allowance for the effects of temFOURTH SERIES, VOL. XXIV.—25

men.

perament and peculiar circumstances. He was even too ready subjectively to justify those whom objectively he had to condemn. "Every-where," says Zittel, "he knew how to bear men in his love, for in all men he found something good. His soul knew nothing of hatred. When, after administering to him the eucharist, I remarked, 'You are dying in peace with God,' he joyously answered, 'Yes, and in peace with It is a great grace of God that he has so led me as that bitterness against a human being has never been able to find root in my heart."" And this extraordinary love to man on the part of Rothe was of the right quality, thoroughly ethically tempered, and sprung from love to his Lord. Even of his own personal piety Rothe held very lightly. Well known are the precious words [evidently an amiable self-deception] published in a religious journal in 1864 under befitting circumstances, namely, "I will allow myself no contention as to the personal motives of the individuals in question, but I simply leave them to the Searcher of hearts, and besides add this concession, that for my own part I cannot psychologically induce myself to hold any one whomsoever for a worse Christian than myself." And how lovely sound the same sentiments, as given in writing to his friends from his death-bed, namely, that they should not, in any supposed interest of his good name, allow a single word to fall which might offend any of his opponents, "of whom he had always sincerely held more highly than of himself." Another beautiful trait of the departed great man was his gladness to learn from the experience of other Christians, old and young. His felt need for communion in prayer was so deep as to lead him, on parting even from young students, to make the earnest request, "Pray for me."

It is true, that with his deep knowledge of himself Rothe could not but know that in his personal religion much was given to him; but because it was given to him he praised the grace of God alone which had given it to him. "I hold it," wrote he in 1864, "for a precious thing when one can joyously believe in a God who does miracles. . . . Precious and blessed is it indeed when one can so believe; but when one can do so then is it grace, and one does not boast of grace."

Such was Rothe's religious character, and such he preserved it till death. "His Lord Christ," who had been the life of his

life, continued to be his love and his life until his last breath. To his weeping friends at his death-bed he said, "I die in the faith in which I have lived-I die in the name of Jesus, and I think I understand to some degree what it means to die in the name of Jesus." In his last moments he said, "I trust I may now go home."

Having thus briefly sketched Rothe's outward and inward life, we hope to have prepared the way for some correct appreciation of him as a preacher and theologian.

It might well be anticipated that with so thoroughly a Christpenetrated heart, Rothe could not well lack in preaching potency. Pectus est, quod disertum facit; and it was his pectus, his heart, in its rich acquaintance with Jesus, that he laid open and bare in his sermons. It is well known that during the last ten or twelve years Rothe entered the pulpit but rarely. Whenever word got out that he was to preach, however, the news spread through the town like wild-fire, and the densely crowded University Church, as well as the solemn stillness that prevailed while he preached, evidenced both of the devotion. of the hearers and of their love for the preacher. But wherein lay the secret of his power? Not in his voice or gestures, for his voice was too slender and high-pitched, and in his general bearing there was a certain agitatedness that could not possibly attract. Nor was this power in the depth of his thoughts, or in the new light that he shed upon the darker mysteries of the Christian faith. So far was this from being the case, that one did not discover in the preacher the least trace of the professor. Rothe thought too highly of the evangelical office to beglitter or becloud the simple objective Gospel doctrines by a display of human speculation. His preferred subjects were the plainest precepts of practical religion, such as "seeking first the kingdom of God" or "believing in the risen Saviour." And what he said was generally familiar to every believing Christian; but how he said it, how he brought it irresistibly before the consciencethat was the secret of his extraordinary power. And this was the characteristic of, and the impression made by, his preaching on all classes of minds throughout his career. Nippold relates the incident, that after Rothe had convinced an eminent disciple of Stall, in an earnest debate, that with such views the latter would necessarily have been an opponent of Luther in

the sixteenth century, and that after the latter had related in the further course of conversation that he had never heard the faith preached with such warmth and earnestness as he had heard done many years since by a namesake of Rothe in Rome, he was no little surprised to learn the identity of his admired Roman preacher with his present doughty opponent.

The publication (1868) by Schenkel* of the sermons left by Rothe enables us to see that the deceased was animated from the very start with the same vital Christianity, save only that it grew deeper and richer as experience advanced.

The works which Rothe himself published are not very voluminous. He had a dislike of imitating the perverted much-writing of the day by committing the same fault himself. What he has published, however, will always command respect both for its solidity and for its thoroughness of conviction. His "Beginnings of the Christian Church" (1837) fixed upon him the attention of the whole theological world. But the peculiar view here taken of the relation of the Church to the State hindered it from a popularity which, in other respects, it richly merited. A Latin dissertation, "De disciplinæ arcani Origine," (1841,) is also of great value. A brief contribution to dogmatics (three essays on the idea of dogmatics, on revelation, and inspiration) appeared in 1863 and 1869. Of his lectures on Church history, which he constantly gave alongside of his other four courses of lectures, (Elucidation of the Synoptic Gospels, Life of Christ, Dogmatics, and Ethics,) he has published nothing. Their great worth lay in the masterly manner in which he merged his hearers into the spirit of the past, and deduced therefrom practical lessons for the present and future. But Rothe's chief work, that in which his whole mind and heart were poured out, is his "Theological Ethics," (3 vols., 1846-48; 2d ed., 1867,) and it is in the light of this book that his significance for theology will be definitely measured.

In his theology Rothe was in the highest possible sense a supernaturalist. "So far as I know myself," writes he, "I cannot discover in me the least anti-supranaturalistic artery, and just as little a pantheistic one, nor have I ever felt even

*Schenkel has made of this publication a "literary scandal," in that he has taken the liberty to "emend" these sermons in the sense of the new anti-orthodoxy of Baden, with which Rothe in his latter eight years had some outer connection.