Page:French Calvinism, German Lutheranism and the War.pdf/4

- 3 - years of religion or irreligion. It has taken forty years to build up the German military machine. But it has taken exactly four centuries to build up the German soul. And that German soul was first built up by Luther. Luther, as I am presently going to show and as is admitted and proclaimed by every Patriotic German, is the spiritual father of Prussianism.

It is now exactly four hundred years since Luther affixed his famous propositions on the portals of the Church at Wittenberg. I have no desire to inflict upon my audience a theological disputation. But if it were still the custom of having theological disputations, I would like to affix on the portals of any of the Edinburgh Churches, say, to begin with, the following five historical theses.

My first thesis is that Latheranism has been primarily the insurrection of the Teuton against the Latin, of organised barbarism against civilisation.

My second thesis is that Lutheranism has been the insurrection of the national spirit against the universal Catholic spirit. I am using the word "catholic" in its strict etymological sense. My/