JOHANN ADAM, one of the most distinguished modern polemical divines of the Boman Catholic church, was b. of humble parentage at Igersheim, in AVtIrtem berg, May 6, 1796. Ife received his early education at the gymnasium of Mergentheim, whence, in his 17th year, he was transferred, for the higher studies, to the lyceum of Ellwangen; and soon afterward entered upon the theological course in the university of Titbingen. Ile received priest's orders in 1819, and for a short time was employed in missionary duty; but, in 1820, he returned to college life, for two years was engaged as classical tutor; but, in 1822, the offer of a theological appointment in the university of Tubingen finally decided his choice of the study of divinity. Ile was permitted, before entering on his studies, to spend some time in making himself acquainted with the routine of the theological courses of other universities—as Gottingen, Berlin, Prague, Vienna, and Landshut; and in 1823 he entered upon his new position. In 1828, in which year he was also admitted to the degree of doctor of divinity, he was appointed ordinary professor of theology. His earliest publication was a treatise On the Unity of the Church (1825). which was followed, iu 1827, by a historico-theological essay on Athanasius and the Church of his Time, in Conflict with Arianism. But his reputation, both posthumous and among his own contemporaries, rests mainly on his well-known S.gmbolism; or the Doctrinal Differences between Catholics and Protestants, as represental by their Public Confessions of Rath (1832). This remarkable book at once fixed the atten tion of the theological world. It passed through five large editions in six years. It was translated into all the leading languages of Europe, and drew forth numerous criticisms and rejoinders, the most considerable of which is that of Dr. F. C. Baur (q.v.), 1833. To
this Molder replied in 1834, by a work entitled Further Researches into the Doctrinal Differences of Catholics and Protestants. The polemical bitterness evoked by these con troversies made it desirable that Mohler should leave the university of Tiibingen. He was invited to Breslau, and also to Bonn, but ultimately selected (1835) the university of Munich, then in the first flush of its efficiency, under king Louis. His first appointment was nominally the chair of biblical exegesis, but he really devoted himself to the depart ment of church history, in which his opening course was eminently successful; but, unhappily, a naturally delicate constitution began to give way under the constant fatigues of a student's life; and although he continued, under all these disadvantages, to main tain and to add to his reputation, and although, in 1837, the invitation to the Bonn professorship was renewed in still more flattering terms, he gradually sunk under eon. sumptinn, and died April 12, 1838. His miscellaneous works were collected and published posthumously, in 2 vols. 8vo (1835-40), by his friend, the now celebrated Dr Dellinger. Molder may be regarded a' at once the most acute and the most philosoph ical of the modern controversialists of his church. He deals more, however, with the exposition of the points and the grounds of the doctrinal differences of modern sects. than with the discussion of the scriptural or traditional evidences of the peculiar doc trines of any among them.