argument; nor the learned charge the preacher with a pride of knowledge
foreign to the occasion and not always thorough."[13]

In his first controversial work, _Chief Points of the Christian
Religion_, Calixtus gave expression to many solid thoughts, which
subsequently produced an abundant harvest. His _Theological Apparatus_
was written for young ministers, and designed to meet the immediate
necessities of the times. But it is to his great work, the _Desire and
Effort for Ecclesiastical Concord_, that we must turn to find the true
man spending his greatest power toward the unification of Christians. In
terms of communion, he contends, we must distinguish between what is,
and what is not, essential to salvation. In all that relates to the
Christian mysteries we must content ourselves with the _quod_ and not
dispute about the _quo modo_. In stating these mysteries we should use
the simplest language. There is a natural brotherhood of men, and this
should bind them together in matters of religion. We must love all men,
even idolaters, in order to save them. The Jews and Mohammedans stand
nearer to us than they, and we should cherish affection also for them.
Those who are most closely united to us are all who believe that they
can be saved only by the merits of Christ. All who thus recognize the
saving power of Christ are members of his body, brothers and sisters
with him. We should live, therefore, as members of one family, though
adhering to different sects.

But we must not be neutral. Every one should join the church to which
his own conscientious convictions would lead him. Yet when we do this,
we must love all who think differently. Those who have been martyrs for
the Christian faith were in the right path; we cannot do better than to
follow them in love and doctrine. The outpouring of the Spirit would be
meagre indeed if the church existed for the stringent Lutherans
alone.[14]

But the intense desire of Calixtus to unite the various Christian bodies
was poorly rewarded by the sympathy of his contemporaries. He was
charged with religious indifference because he looked with mildness on
those who differed from him. Though a strict Lutheran, he was accused of
secretly favoring the Reformed church; and Arianism and Judaism were
imputed to him, because he thought that the doctrine of the Trinity was
not revealed with equal clearness in the Old and New Testaments! When he
affirmed that the epithets Lutheran, Reformed,