Because, says Koellner, "the Augsburg Confession had been prepared with the view to give the _least possible offence to the opponents_.

But now, the Evangelical party, being stronger, were not only able to avow the points of difference more openly; but they were also determined to do so; and for such negotiations a different form (from that of the Augsburg Confession) was of course requisite.

Finally, the transactions at Augsburg, during the reciprocal efforts at reconciliation, and especially through the great mildness and yielding disposition of Melancthon, had in regard to many doctrines, obliterated the clear and real point of difference, so that in many of them the _opponents affirmed, there was no longer any difference at all_." Koellner's Symbolik, Vol.

I., p.

441.
Note 1.