The best refutation of such and similar aspersions is a reference to the enormous circulation which Luther's Small Catechism has enjoyed, to its countless editions, translations, elaborations, and its universal use in church, school, and home for four centuries. Thirty-seven years after the publication of Luther's Catechisms, Mathesius wrote: "Praise God it is said that in our times over one hundred thousand copies have been printed and used in great numbers in all kinds of languages in foreign lands and in all Latin and German schools." And since then, down to the present day, millions and millions of hands have been stretched forth to receive Luther's catechetical classic. While during the last four centuries hundreds of catechisms have gone under, Luther's Enchiridion is afloat to-day and is just as seaworthy as when it was first launched. A person, however, endowed with an average measure of common sense will hardly be able to believe that the entire Lutheran Church has, for four centuries, been so stupid as would have been the case if men of Dr. Gurlitt's stripe had spoken only half the truth in their criticisms. Moreover, the number of detractors disappears in the great host of friends who down to the present day have not tired of praising the Catechisms, especially the Enchiridion. They admire its artistic and perfect form; its harmonious grouping, as of the petals of a flower, the melody and rhythm of its language, notably in the explanation of the Second Article, its clarity, perspicuity, and popularity; its simplicity, coupled with depth and richness of thought; the absence of polemics and of theological terminology, etc. However, with all this and many other things which have been and might be said in praise of the Catechism, the feature which made it what it truly was, a Great Deed of the Reformation, has not as yet been pointed out. Luther Paulinized, Evangelicalized, the Catechism by properly setting forth in his explanations the _finis historiae,_ the blessed meaning of the great deeds of God, the doctrine of justificaiton. Indeed, also Luther's Catechism is, in more than one way, conditioned by its times, but in its kernel, in its doctrine, it contains, as Albrecht puts it, "timeless, never-aging material. For in it pulsates the heartbeat of the primitive Christian faith, as witnessed by the apostles, and experienced anew by the Reformer." (648.) This, too, is the reason why Luther's Enchiridion is, indeed, as G. v. Zezschwitz remarks, "a booklet which a theologian never finishes learning, and a Christian never finishes living." 117. Evaluation of Small Catechism.