ker wrote, in
defense of the Lutheran doctrine of the Person of Christ: "Only lack of
insight and of clearness of intellect can mislead an honest opponent to
impute a contradiction to the doctrine when it denies that the glorified
body of Christ has the properties and is subjected to the laws which we
call properties and laws of matter." (_Lutheraner_, April 12, 1852.)
When, in 1825, the statutes for the government of the Seminary at
Gettysburg were adopted, it was at the instance of Schmucker, the first
chairman of the faculty and for nearly forty years a teacher at the
Seminary, that the General Synod declared "that in this Seminary shall
be taught in the German and English languages, the fundamental doctrines
of the sacred Scriptures as contained in the Augsburg Confession of
Faith," and that any professor may be removed "on account of error
fundamental doctrines, immorality," etc. (5.) Article I, Section 2, of
the Constitution of the Seminary, drawn up Schmucker and adopted by
Synod, states that the Seminary is designed "to provide our churches
with pastors who sincerely believe, and cordially approve of, the
doctrines of the Holy Scriptures as they are fundamentally taught in the
Augsburg Confession." Another article requires every professor-elect to
publicly pronounce and subscribe the following declaration: "I believe
the Augsburg Confession and the Catechisms of Luther to be a summary and
just exhibition of the fundamental doctrines of the Word of God." And
when Schmucker, September 5, 1826, was inducted into the "professorship
Christian theology," D. F. Schaeffer, who delivered the charge, said:
"As the Lord has signally favored our beloved Church, as her tenets are
Biblical, and her veriest enemies cannot point out an important error in
her articles of faith, no more than could the enemies of the truth at
the Diet of Worms prove the books of the immortal Reformer erroneous,
therefore the Church which entrusts you with the preparation and
formation of her pastors, demands of you (and in her behalf I solemnly
charge you) to establish all students confided to your care in that
faith which distinguishes our Church from others. If any should object
to such faith, or any part of it, or refuse to be convinced of the
excellence of our discipline, they have their choice to unite with such
of our Christian brethren whose particular views in matters of faith and
discipline may suit them better. I hold it, however, as indis