Melanchthon came to Wittenberg at twenty-one as professor of Greek and stayed for the rest of his life. Where Luther was volcanic he was precise and conciliatory, and the division of labour served the Reformation well: the Loci Communes of 1521 was its first systematic theology, and the Augsburg Confession of 1530 is still the doctrinal basis of the Lutheran churches.
He was also a reformer of education — the Praeceptor Germaniae, Germany's schoolmaster, who reorganised universities and founded schools. His temperament, which sought agreement wherever it could be had, made him suspect to harder Lutherans after Luther's death, and his last years were embittered by controversies among people who agreed with him about almost everything.