Baumgarten, though he did not renounce the Pietistic doctrine, began the process which Semler completed.
It had a wide influence in awakening popular piety, and the works that issued from it formed the textbooks of mystical and pietistic minds in the centuries that followed.
The sect was the outcome of one of the many Pietistic movements of the 17th century, and was founded in 1708 by Alexander Mack of Schwarzenau, Germany, and seven of his followers, upon the general issue that both the Lutheran and Reformed churches were taking liberties with the literal teachings of the Scriptures.
He was also known as the author of sacred poems. Gottfried Arnold has rightly been classed with the pietistic section of Protestant historians (Bibliotheca Sacra, 1850).
Protestantism; on the contrary, he yearned to beat these by their own weapons, chiefly by showing them that Catholics could interpret the Bible in a manner quite as mystical and pietistic as theirs.