§ 179.3. =Melancthonianism [Melanchthonianism] and Calvinism.=--The Reformed church of Germany has maintained a position midway between Lutheranism and Calvinism very similar to the later Melanchthonianism. Ebrard indeed sought to prove that strict predestinarianism was only an excrescence of the Reformed system, whereas Schweitzer, purely in the interests of science (§ 182, 9, 16), has shown that it is its all-conditioning nerve and centre, to which it owes its wonderful vitality, force, and consistency. Heppe of Marburg went still further than Ebrard in his attempt to combine Lutheranism and Calvinism in a =Melancthonian [Melanchthonian] church= (§ 182, 16), by seeking to prove that the original evangelical church of Germany was Melanchthonian, that after Luther’s death the fanatics, more Lutheran than Luther, founded the so-called Lutheran church and completed it by issuing the Formula of Concord; that the Calvinizing of the Palatinate, Hesse, Brandenburg, Anhalt was only a reaction against hyper- or pseudo-Lutheranism, and that the restoration of the original Melanchthonianism, and the modern union movement were only the completion of that restoration. Schenkel’s earlier contributions to Reformation history moved in a similar direction. Ebrard also, in A.D. 1851, founded a “_Ref. Kirchenzeitung_.”--But even the genuine strict =Calvinism= had zealous adherents during this century, not only in Scotland (§ 202, 7) and the Netherlands (§ 200, 2), but also in Germany, especially in the Wupperthal. G. D. Krummacher, from A.D. 1816 pastor in Elberfeld, and his nephew F. W. Krummacher of Barmen, were long its chief representatives. When Prussia sought in A.D. 1835 to force the union in the Wupperthal, and threatened the opposing Reformed pastors with deposition, the revolt here proved almost as serious as that of the Lutherans in Silesia. The pastors, with the majority of their people agreed at last to the union only in so far as it was in accordance with the Reformed mode of worship. But a portion, embracing their most important members, stood apart and refused all conciliation. The royal Toleration Act of A.D. 1847 allowed them to form an independent congregation at Elberfeld with Dr. Kohlbrügge as their minister. This divine, formerly Lutheran pastor at Amsterdam, was driven out owing to a contest with a rationalising colleague, and afterwards, through study of Calvin’s writings, became an ardent Calvinist. This body, under the name of the Dutch Reformed church, constituted the one anti-unionist, strictly Calvinistic denomination in Prussia.--The De Cock movement (§ 200, 2), out of which in A.D. 1830 the separate “Chr. Ref. Church of Holland” sprang, spread over the German frontiers and led to the founding there of the “Old Ref. Church of East Frisia and Bentheim,” which has now nine congregations and seven pastors.--At the meeting of the Evangelical Alliance in New York in A.D. 1873, the Presbyterians present resolved to convoke an œcumenical Reformed council. A conference in London in A.D. 1875 brought to maturity the idea of a Pan-Presbyterian assembly. The council is to meet every third year; the members recognise the supreme authority of the Old and New Testament in matters of faith and practice, and accept the consensus of all the Reformed confessions. The first “=General Presbyterian Council=” met in Edinburgh from 3rd to 10th July, A.D. 1877, about 300 delegates being present. The proceedings consisted in unmeasured glorification of presbyterianism “drawn from the whole Scripture, from the seventy elders of the Pentateuch to the twenty-four elders of the Apocalypse.” The second council met at Philadelphia in A.D. 1880, and boasted that it represented forty millions of Presbyterians. It appointed a committee to draw up a consensus of the confessions of all Reformed churches. The third council of 305 members met at Belfast in A.D. 1884, and after a long debate declined, by a great majority, to adopt a strictly formulated consensus of doctrine as uncalled for and undesirable, and by the reception of the Cumberland Presbyterians they even surrendered the Westminster Confession (§ 155, 1) as the only symbol qualifying for membership of the council. The fourth council met in London in A.D. 1887.--An œcumenical Methodist congress was held in London in A.D. 1881, attended by 400 delegates.