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» • ,• 



* • 



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s 



I 
\ 



THE PpSON OF gHRIST. 






• « 



* 



\ s 



BALLANTYNE, HANSON AND CO. 
EDINBUKGH AND LONDON 



THE 



PERSON OF CHRIST: 



THE PERFECTION OP HIS HUMANITY VIEWED AS 
A PROOF OF HIS DIVINITY. 



• 



.i* ■ -I 



BY 



PHILIP SCHAFF, D.D., LL.D. 

VRQfVSSOR IV THE UMIOK THBOLOOICAL SBMINART, KEW YORK. 



. DEC!? 79 

LONDON: 
JAMES NISBET & CO., 21-.BBENERS STREET. 

HDCCOLXXZ. 



./■■•'•, > 



PREFACE. 



.• 



"What do ye think of the Son of Man?" Thk is 
the religious question of the age. The result of 
the renewed struggle cannot be doubtful: in all 
theological controversies^ truth is the gainer in tiif^ 
end. Though nailed to the cross and Wiried in 
the tomb, it rises again triumphant over error, 
taking captivity, captive, and changing at times 
even a bitter foe, like Saul of Tarsus, into a devoted 
friend. Goethe says: "The conflict of faith and 
unbelief remains the proper, the only, the deepest 
theme of the history of the world and. immkind, 
to which all others are subordinated." This very 
conflict centres in the Christological problem. 

The question of Christ is the question of Chris- 
tianity, which is the manifestation of his life in 
the world ; it is the question of the Church, whidh 
rests upon him as the immovable, rock ; it is the 
question of history, which revolves around him as 



VI PREFACE. 

the sun of the moral universe ; it is the question 
of every man who instinctively yearns after him as 
the object of his noblest and purest aspirations ; 
it is a question of personal salvation, which can 
only be obtained in the blessed name of Jesus. 
The whole fabric of Christianity stands or faUs 
with its divine-human Founder; and if it can 
never perish, it is because Christ lives the same 
yesterday, to-day, and for ever. 

The object of this book is to show, in a popular 
style, that the Person of Christ is the great central 
miracle of history, and the strongest evidence of 
Christianity. The very perfection of his humanity 
is a proof of his Divinity. The indwelling of God 
in him is the only satisfactory explanation of his 
amazing character. 

From his miraculous Person his miraculous 
works follow as an inevitable consequence. Being 
a miracle himself, he must perform miracles with 
the same ease with which ordinary men do their 
ordinary works. " Believe me that I am in the 
Father, and the Father in me ; or else believe me 
for the very works' sake " (John 14: 1 1 ; comp. 
10: 38). We believe in Christ, and therefore we 
believe his works, and the Bible, which bear 
witness to him. 



PREFACE. VU 

Standing on this rock, we may feel safe against 
the attacks of infidelity. The Person of Christ is 
to me the surest as well as the most sacred of all 
facts; as certain as my own personal existence; 
yea, even more so : for Christ lives in me, and he 
is the only valuable part of my existence. I am 
nothing without my Saviour ; I am all with him, 
and would not exchange him for the whole 
world. To give up faith in Christ is to give up 
faith in humanity ; to believe in him is to believe 
in the redemption and final glorification of men ; 
and this faith is the best inspiration to a holy and 
useful life for the good of our race and the glory 
of God. 

September, 1879. 



CONTENTS. 



THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

PAOB 

INTBODUOTOBT I 

THE CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH OF JBSUS . . • 10 

HIS TEAININO l8 

his public lite 24 

his fbeedom from sin 3 1 

his perfect holiness 42 

his intercourse with men 47 

unity of virtue and* piety 53 

completeness and univebbality of christ's 

character 56 

harmony of all oraces and virtues ... 62 

Christ's passion and crucifixion .... 66 
summary: Christ's character the greatest 

MORAL miracle OF HISTORY .... 76 

Christ's own testimony concerning himself . 83 
examination of false theories .... 96 
l the hypothesis of imposture . . i03 
il the theory of enthusiasm of self-decep- 
TION io4 

(l.) CHRIST HIMSELF WAS DECEIVED Io4 

(2.) THE EVANGELISTS WERE DECEIVED . I08 



X CONTENTS. 

PADS 

Uh THB THEOBT OF POETICAL FICTION . . -US 

(l.) THE MYTHICAL HYPOTHESIS . . 'US 

(2.) THE LEGEND ABY HYPOTHESIS . • IJO 

CONCLUSION , . . . . . . . .138 

CRITICAL NOTES • . . . • • •145 



APPENDIX, 

COLLECTION OP IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES 
TO THE CHARACTER OP CHRIST. 

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS 1 83 

PONTIUS PILATE AND HIS WIFE 1 88 

THE CENTURION AT THE CROSS 1 89 

JUDAS THE TRAITOR I90 

FLAVIU8 J08EPHUS I9I 

THB TALMUD . I94 

THE HEATHEN WRITERS AGAINST CHRISTIANITY . 1 96 

TACITUS 197 

PLINY . .198 

CEL8US 199 

LUCIAN 201 

PORPHYRY • • . 201 

JULIAN THE APOSTATE 204 

SPINOZA ......... 207 

THOMAS CHUBB ..•...,. 208 

DENIS DIDEROT 2o8 

JEAN JACQUES ROUSSEAU 211 



COKTENTS. Xi 

PAGB 

NAPOLEON BONAPABTE 219, 284 

P. PBCAUT 250 

GOTHE 252 

THOMAS CARLYLB . . . •' . . .254 

WILLIAM ELLBBT OHANNING 254 

DAVID FBIEDRICH STRAUSS 258 

THEODORB PARKER 260 

FRANCES POWER COBBB 264 

JOHN STUART MILL 269 

ERNEST RENAN 274 

THEODOR KEIM 281 

POSTSCRIPT. — TWO LETTBR3 CONCERNINO NAPOLEON's 

TESTIMONY 284 



THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 



■^4- 



INTRODUCTORY. 

When the angel of the Lord appeared to Moses in 
the burning bush,. he was commanded to put off 
hia shoes from his feet ; for the place whereon he 
stood was holy ground. With what reverence and 
awe, then, should we approach the contemplation 
of the great reality — God manifest in the flesh — 
of which the vision of Moses was but a significant 
type and shadow ! ^ 

The life and character of Jesus Christ is the holy 
of holies in the history of the world. Eighteen 
centuries have passed away since he appeared, in 
the fulness of time, on this earth to redeem a fallen 
race from sin and death, and to open a never-ceas- 
ing fountain of righteousness and life. The ages 
before him anxiously awaited his coming, as the 
fulfilment of the desire of all nations; the ages 
after him proclaim his glory, and ever extend 
his dominion. The noblest and best of men under 



2 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

every clime hold him not only in the purest affec- 
tion and the profoundest gratitude, but in divine 
adoration and worship. His name is above every 
name that may be named in heaven or on earth, 
and the only one whereby sinners can be saved. 
He is the Author of the new creation ; the Way, 
the Truth, and the Life ; the Prophet, Priest, and 
King of regenerate humanity. He is Immanuel, 
God with us; the Eternal Word become flesh; 
very Gk)d and very man in one undivided person,, 
the Saviour of the world. 

Thus he stands out to the faith of the entire 
Christian Church — Greek, Latin, and Evangelical 
— in every civilised country on the globe. Much 
as the various confessions and denominations differ 
in doctrines and usages, they are agreed in their 
love and adoration of Jesus. They lay down their 
arms when they approach the manger of Bethlehem 
where he was born, or the cross of Calvary where 
he died for our sins that we might live for ever in 
heaven. He is the divine harmony of all human 
sects and creeds, the common life-centre of all true 
Christians; where their hearts meet with their 
affections, prayers, and hopes, in spite of the dis- 
cord of their heads. The doctrines and institutions, 
the sciences and arts of Christendom, bear witness 
to the indelible impression he made upon the world ; 
countless churches and cathedrals are as manymonu^ 



INTRODUCTORY. 3 

ments of gratitude to his holy name ; hjnnns and 
prayers are daily and hourly ascending to his praise 
from public and private sanctuaries in all parts of 
the globe. His power is now greater, his kingdom 
higGT, than ever ; and it will continue to spread, 
until all nations shall bow before him and kiss his 
sceptre of righteousness and peace. 

Blessed is he who from the heart can believe 
that Jesus is the Son of God, and the fountain of 
salvation. True faith is an act of God wrought in 
the soul by the Holy Spirit, who reveals Christ to 
us in his true character, as Christ has revealed 
the Father. Faith, with its justifying, sanctifying, 
and saving power, is independent of science and 
learning, and may be kindled even in the heart of 
a little child. It is the peculiar glory of the Ee- 
deemer and his reUgion to be co-extensive with 
humanity itself, without distinction of sex, age, 
nation, and race. His saving grace flows and over- 
flows to all and for all, on the simple condition of 
faith. 

This fact, however, does . not supersede the 
necessity of thought and argument. Eevelation, 
although above nature and above reason, is not 
against nature or against reason. On the contrary, 
nature and the supernatural, as has been well said 
by a distinguished New-England divine, " constitute 
together the one system of God."^ Christianity 



4 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

satisfies the deepest intellectical as well as moral 
wants of man, who is created in the image and for 
the glory of God. It is the revelation of truth as 
well as of life. Faith and knowledge are not an- 
tagonistic, but complementary forces ; not enemies, 
but inseparable twin-sisters. Faith precedes know- 
ledge, but just as necessarily it leads to knowledge ; 
while true knowledge, on the other hand, is always 
rooted and grounded in faith, and tends to confirm 
and to strengthen it. Thus we find the two com- 
bined in the famous confession of Peter, when he 
says, in the name of all the other apostles, "We 
believe and we know that thou art the Christ."' 
So intimately are both connected, that we may also 
reverse the famous maxim of Augustine, Anselm, 
and Schleiermacher, "Faith precedes knowledge,"* 
and say, " Knowledge precedes faith." * For how 
can we believe in any object without at least some 
general historical knowledge of its existence and 
character ? Faith even in its first form, as a sub- 
mission to the authority of God and an assent to 
the truth of his revelation, is an exercise of the 
mind and reason as well as of the heart and the 
will. Hence faith has been defined as implying 
three things, — knowledge, assent, and trust or 
confidence. An idiot or a madman cannot believe. 
Our religion demands a rational, intelligent faith ; 
and this just in proportion to its strength and 



INTEODUCTORY. 5 

fervour, aims at an ever-deepening insight into its 
own sacred contents and object. 

As living faith in Christ is the soul of all sound 
practical Christianity and piety, so the true doctrine 
of Christ is the soul and centre of all sound Chris- 
tian theology. St. John makes the denial of the 
incarnation of the Son of God the criterion of Anti- 
christ, and consequently the belief in this truth the 
test of Christianity. The incarnation of the eternal 
Logos, and the divine glory shining through the 
veil of Christ's humanity, is the grand theme of his 
Gospel, which he wrote with the pen of an angel 
from the very heart of Christ, as his favourite 
disciple and bosom-friend. The Apostles' Creed, 
starting as it does from the confession of Peter, 
makes the article on Christ most prominent, and 
assigns to it the central position between the preced- 
ing article on God the Father, and the succeeding 
article on the Holy Ghost. The development of 
ancient Catholic theology commenced and culmi- 
nated with the triumphant defence of the true 
divinity, and true humanity of Christ, against the 
opposite heresies of Judaising Ebionism, which 
denied the former, and paganising Gnosticism, 
which resolved the latter into a shadowy phantom. 
Evangelical theology is essentially Christological, 
or controlled throughout by the proper idea of 
Christ as the God-Man and Saviour. This is 



6 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

emphatically the article of the standing or falling 
Church. In this, the two most prominent ideas of 
the Eeformation — the doctrine of the supremacy of 
the Scriptures, and the doctrine of justification by 
grace through faith — ^meet, and are vitally united. 
Christ's word, the only unerring and efi&cient guide 
of truth; Christ's work, the only unfailing and 
sufl&cient source of peace ; Christ all in all, — this 
is the principle of genuine Protestantism. 

In the construction of the true doctrine of 
Christ's person, we may, with St. John in the pro- 
logue to his Gospel, begin from above with his 
eternal Godhead, and proceed, through the creation 
and the preparatory revelation of the Old Testa- 
ment economy, till we reach the incarnation and 
his truly human lifa for the redemption of the 
race. Or, with the other Evangelists, we may 
begin from below with his birth from the Virgin 
Mary, and rise, through the successive stages of 
his earthly life, his discourses and miracles, to his 
assumption into that divine glory which he had 
before the foundation of the world. The result 
reached in both cases is the same ; namely, that 
Christ unites in his person the whole fulness of 
the Godhead, and the whole fulness of sinless 
manhood. 

The older theologians, both Catholic and Evan- 
gelical, proved the divinity of the Saviour in a 



INTRODUCTORY. 7 

direct way from the miracles performed by him ; 
from the prophecies and types fulfilled in him; from 
the divine names which he bears ; from the divine 
attributes which are predicated of him ; from the 
divine works which he performed ; and from the 
divine honours which he claims, and which are fuUy 
accorded to him by his apostles and the whole 
Christian Church to this day. 

But the divinity of Christ may also be proved 
by the opposite process, — the contemplation of the 
singular perfection of his humanity; which rises 
by almost universal consent, even of unbelievers, 
so far above every human greatness known before 
or since, that it can only be rationaUy explained 
on the ground of such an essential union with the 
Godhead as he claimed himself, and as his inspired 
apostles ascribed to him. The more deeply we 
penetrate the veil of his flesh, the more clearly we 
behold the glory of the Only -Begotten of the 
Father shining, through the same, full of grace 
and of truth.* 

Modern theology owes this new homage to the 
Saviour. The powerful and subtle attacks of the 
latest phases of infidelity upon the credibility of 
the gospel history call for a more vigorous defence 
than was ever made before, and have already led, 
by way of reaction, to new triumphs of the old 
faith of the Church in her divine Head, 



8 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

Our humanitarian, phUantliropic, and yet scep- 
tical age is more open to this argument, which 
proceeds from the humanity to the divinity, than to 
the old dogmatic method of demonstration which 
follows the opposite process. With Thomas, the 
representative of honest and earnest scepticism 
among the apostles, many noble and inquiring 
minds refuse to believe in the divinity of the Lord 
unless supported by convincing arguments of rea- 
son : they desire to put the finger into the print 
of his nails, and to thrust the hand into his side, 
before they exclaim, in humble adoration : " My 
Lord and my God ! " They cannot easily be 
brought to believe in miracles on abstract reason- 
ing or on historical evidence. But, if they once 
could see the great moral miracle of Christ's per- 
son and character, they would have no difficulty 
with his miraculous works. For a superhuman 
being must of necessity do superhuman deeds. 
The contrary would be unnatural, and the greatest 
miracle. The character of the tree accounts for 
the character of the fruit. We believe in the 
miracles of Christ because we believe in his per- 
son as the divine Man and the central miracle 
of the moral universe. 

It is from this point of view that we shall en- 
deavour to analyse and exhibit the human char- 
acter of Christ. We propose to take up the man, 



INTRODUCTORY. 9 

Jesus of Nazareth, as he appears on the simple, 
unsophisticated record of the honest fishermen of 
Galilee, and as he lives in the faith of Christen- 
dom ; and we shall find him in all the stages of 
his life, both ^as a private individual and as a pub- 
lic character, so far elevated above the reach of 
successful rivalry, and so singularly perfect, that 
this very perfection, in the midst of an imperfect 
and sinful world, constitutes an irresistible proof 
of his divinity. 

A full discussion of the subject would require 
us to consider Christ in his official as well as per- 
sonal character ; and to describe him as a teacher, 
a reformer, a worker of miracles, and the founder 
of a spiritual kingdom universal in extent and 
perpetual in time. From every point of view, we 
should be irresistibly driven to the same result. 
But our present purpose confines us to the consider- 
ation of his personal character ; and this alone, we 
think, is sufficient for the conclusion. 

Infidels, it is true, are seldom converted by 
argument ; for the springs of unbelief are in the 
heart and will rather than in the head. But honest 
and truth-loving inquirers, like Nathanael and 
Thomas, will never refuse, on proper evidence, to 
receive the truth. 

Blessed are they that seek the truth ; for they 
shall find it. 



( 10 ) 



THE CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH 

OF JESUS. 

Jesus passed through all the stages of human life 
from infancy to manhood, and represented each in 
its ideal form, that he might redeem and sanctify 
them all, and be a perpetual model for imitation. 
He was the model infant, the model boy, the 
model youth, and the model man/ But the weak- 
ness, decline, and decrepitude of old age would be 
incompatible with his character and mission as the 
Eegenerator of the race and Prince of life. He 
died and rose in the full bloom of early manhood, 
and lives in the hearts of his people in unfading 
freshness and unbroken vigour for ever. 

Let us first glance at the infancy and childhood 
of Jesus. The history of the race commences with 
the beauty of innocent youth in the garden of 
Eden, " when the morning stars sang together, and 
all the sons of God shouted for joy," in beholding 
Adam and Eve created in the image of their 
Maker, — the crowning glory of all his wonderful 
works. So the second Adam, the Eedeemer of the 
fallen race, the Eestorer and Perfecter of man, 



HIS CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. II 

comes first before us in the accounts of the Gospels 
as a child, bom, not in Paradise, it is true, but 
among the dreary ruins of sin and death ; from an 
humble virgin, I a lowly manger, yet pure and 
innocent, — the subject of the praise of angels, and 
the adoration of men. Even the announcement 
and expectation of his birth transforms his virgin 
mother, the bride of the humble carpenter, into an 
inspired prophetess and poetess ; rejuvenates the 
aged parents of the Eaptist in hopeful anticipation 
of the approaching salvation ; and makes the un- 
born babe leap in Elizabeth's womb, — the babe 
who was to prepare the way for his coming. The 
immortal psalms of Elizabeth, Mary, and Zacharias 
combine the irresistible charms of poetry with 
truth, and are a worthy preparation for the actual 
appearance of the Christ-child, at the very thres- 
hold of the gospel salvation, when the highest poetry 
was to become reality, and reality to surpass the 
sublimest ideal of poetry.® And, when the heavenly 
child was bom, heaven and earth, the shepherds of 
Bethlehem in the name of Israel longing after sal- 
vation, and the wise men from the East as the 
representatives of heathenism in its dark groping 
after the "unknown God," unite in the worship of 
the infant King and Saviour. 

Here we meet, at the very beginning of the 
earthly history of Christ, that singular combination 



12 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

of humility and grandeur, of simplicity and sub- 
limity, of the human and divine, which characterises 
it throughout, and distinguishes it from every other 
history. He appears in the world first as a child, 
as a poor child, in one of the smallest towns of a 
remote country,® in one of the lowliest spots of 
that town, in a stable, in a manger, a helpless 
fugitive from the wrath of a cruel tyrant, — thus 
presenting, at first sight, every stumbling-block to 
our faith. But, on the other hand, the appearance 
of tha angel, the inspired hymns of Zacharias and 
Mary, the holy exultation of Elizabeth, Anna, 
and Simeon, the prophecies of Scripture, the theo- 
logical lore of the scribes at Jerusalem, even the 
dark political suspicion of Herod, the star of Beth- 
lehem, the journey of the Magi from the distant 
East, the dim light of astrology, the significant 
night- vision of Joseph, and God's providence over- 
ruling every event, — form a glorious array of 
evidences for the divine origin of the Christ-child. 
Heaven and earth seem to move around him as 
their centre. What a contrast ! A child in the 
manger, yet bearing the salvation of the world ; a 
child hated and feared, yet longed for and loved ; a 
child poor and despised, yet honoured and adored, 
— ^beset by danger, yet marvellously preserved ; a 
child setting the stars in heaven, the city of Jeru- 
salem, the shepherds of Judsea, and the sages of 



HIS CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 1 3 

the East, in motion, — attracting the best elements 
of the world, and repelling aU that is dark and 
evU! This conception is too deep, too sublime, 
too significant, to be the invention of illiterate 
fishermen.^® 

Yet, with all these marks of divinity upon him, 
the infant Saviour is not represented, either by 
Matthew or Luke, as an unnatural prodigy, antici- 
pating the maturity of a later age, but as a truly 
human child, silently lying and smiling on the 
bosom of his virgin mother; "growing" and 
"waxing strong in spirit," ^^ and therefore subject 
to the law of regular development, though differing 
from all other children by his supernatural concep- 
tion and perfect freedom from hereditary sin and 
guilt. He appears in the celestial beauty of 
imspotted innocence, a veritable flower of paradise. 
He was " that Holy Thing," according to . the 
announcement of the angel Gabriel (Luke i : 35), 
admired and loved by all who approached him in 
a child-like spirit, but exciting the dark suspicion 
of the tyrant king who represented his future 
enemies and persecutors. 

Who can measure the ennobling, purifying, and 
cheeiing influence which proceeds from the con- 
templation of the Christ-child, at each returning 
Christmas season, upon the hearts of young and 
old in every land and nation ! The loss of the 



14 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

first estate is richly compensated by the undying 
innocence of paradise regained 

Of the BOYHOOD of Jesus we know only one fact, 
recorded by Luke; but it is in perfeet keeping 
with the peculiar charm of his childhood, and 
foreshadows at the same time the glory of his 
public life as one uninterrupted service of his 
heavenly Father." When twelve years old, we 
find him in the Temple, in the midst of the Jewish 
doctors ; not teaching and offending them by any 
immodesty or forwardness, but hearing and asking 
questions : thus actually learning from them, and 
yet filling them with astonishment at his under- 
standing and answers. There is nothing premature, 
forced, or unbecoming his age, and yet a degree of 
wisdom and an intensity of interest in religion 
which rises far above a purely human youth. 
*<He increased," we are told, "in wisdom and 
stature, and in favour with God and man " (Luke 
2 : 52). He was subject to his parents, and prac- 
tised all the virtues of an obedient son ; and yet 
he filled them with a sacred awe as they saw him 
absorbed in " the things of his Father," ^^ and heard 
him utter words which they were unable to under- 
stand at the time, but which Mary treasured up 
in her heart as a holy secret, convinced that 
they must have some deep meaning answering to 



HIS CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. IS 

the mystery of his supernatural conception and 
birth. 

Such an idea of a harmless and faultless heavenly 
childhood, of a growing, inquiring, and yet surpris- 
ingly wise boyhood, as it meets us in living reality 
at the portal of the gospel history, never entered 
the imagination of biographer, poet, or philoso- 
pher before. On the contrary, as has been justly 
observed,^* " in all the higher ranges of character, 
the excellence portrayed is never the simple imfold- 
ing of a harmonious and perfect beauty contained 
in the germ of childhood, but is a character 
formed by a process of rectification in which many 
follies are mended and distempers removed; in 
which confidence is checked by defeat, passion 
moderated by reason, smartness sobered by experi- 
ence. Commonly a certain pleasure is taken in 
showing how the many wayward sallies of the boy 
are, at length, reduced by discipline to the character 
of wisdom, justice, and public heroism so much 
admired. Besides, if any writer, of almost any 
age, will undertake to describe, not merely a spot- 
less but a superhuman or celestial childhood, not 
having the reality before him, he must be somewhat 
more than human himself if he does not pile 
together a mass of clumsy exaggerations, and draw 
and overdraw, till neither heaven nor earth C6ui 
find any verisimilitude in the picture." 



l6 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

This mmatural exaggeration, into which the 
mythical fancy of man, in its endeavour to pro- 
duce a superhuman childhood and boyhood, will 
inevitably fall, is strikingly exhibited in the myth 
of Hercules, who, while yet a suckling in the cradle, 
squeezed two monster serpents to death with his 
tender hands; and still more in the accounts of 
,, the apocrjrphal Gospels on the prodigious perform- 
.ances of the infant Saviour. These apocryphal 
Gospels are related to the canonical Gospels as a 
counterfeit to the genuine <#oin, or as a caricature 
to the inimitable original ; but, by the very con- 
trast, they tend, negatively, to corroborate the truth 
of the evangelical history. The strange contrast 
has been frequently urged, especially in the Strauss- 
controversy, and used as an argument against the 
mythical theory. While the Evang^jfcfflfe expressly 
reserve the performance of miracles to the age of 
maturity /ftxid public life, and observe a significant 
silence concerning the parents of Jesus, the pseudo- 
evangelists fill the infancy and early years of the 
Saviour and his mother with the strangest pro- 
digies, and make ^e active intercession of Mary 
very prominent throt^hout. According to their 
representation, even dumb idols, irrational beasts, 
and senseless trees bow in adoration before the 
infant Jesus on his journey to Egypt; and after 
his return, when yet a boy of five or seven years, 



HIS CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH. 1 7 

he changes balls of clay into flying birds for the idle 
amusement of his playmates, strikes terror round 
about him, dries up a stream of water by a mere 
word, transforms his companions into goats, raises 
the dead to life, and performs all sorts of miracu- 
lous cures through a magical influence which pro- 
ceeds from the very water in which he was washed, 
the towels which he used, and the bed on which 
he slept.^* 

Here we have the felsehood and absurdity of 
unnatural fiction ; while the New Testament pre- 
sents to us the truth and beauty of a super- 
natural yet most real history, which shines out 
only in brighter colours by the contrast of the 
mythical shadow. 



4--^ 



B 



( i8 ) 



HIS TRAINING. 

With tlie exception of these few significant hints, 
the youth of\ Jesus, and the preparation for his 
public ministry, are ^shrinod in liysterious silence. 
But we know the outward condition and circum- 
stances under which he grew up ; and these furnish 
no explanation for the astounding results, without 
the admission of the supernatural and divine ele- 
ment in his life. 

Jesus lived among a people which is seldom and 
only contemptuously named by the ancient clas- 
sics, and was subjected at the time to the yoke of 
a foreign oppressor. He grew up in a remote and 
conquered province of the Eoman Empire ; in the 
darkest district of Palestine ; in a country town of 
^ proverbial insigaificance.^^ He spent his youth in 
poverty and manual labour, in the obscurity of a 
carpenter's shop; far away from universities, 
academies, libraries, and literary or polished society. 
He had no opportunities, eawjept the parental care, 
the daily wonders of natuue, the Old-Testament 
Scriptures, the weekly Sabbath services of the 



ms TKAINING. 19 

synagogue (Luke 4: 16), the annual festivals in 
Jerusalem (Luke 2 : 42), and the secret intercourse 
of his soul with God. These are indeed the great 
educators of the mind and heart. The book of 
Nature and the book of Eevelation are filled with 
richer and more important lessons than all the 
works of human art and learning ; but they were 
accessible alike to every Jew, and gave no advan- 
tage to Jesus over his humblest neighbour. 

Hence the qi^tioa ctf Nathanael : " What good 
can come out of Nazareth ? " Hence the natural 
surprise of the Jews, who knew all his human re- 
lations and antecedents. " How knoweth this man 
letters," they asked when they heard Jesus teach^ 
" having never learned ? " (John 7 : 15.) And 6n 
another occasion, when he taught in the synagogue : 
"Whence has this man this wisdom and these 
mighty works ? Is not this the carpenter's son ? 
Is not His mother Marjj^? And his brethren, James 
and Joses and Simon and Judas ? And his sisters 
— are they not all with us ? Whence, then, hath 
this man all these things ? "^^ . These questions 
are unavoidable and imanswerable, if Christ be 
regarded a» a mere man ; for each effect presup- 
poses a corresponding cause. 

The difficulty here, presented can by no means 
be solved by a refeience to the fact that many, 
perhaps the majority of. great laen have risen, by 



20 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

their own industry and perseverance, from the lower 
walks of life, and from a severe contest with 
poverty and obstacles of every kind. The fact it- 
self is readily conceded ; but, in every one of these 
cases, schools and books, or patrons and friends, 
or pecuUar events and influences, can be pointed 
out as auxiliary aids in the development of intel- 
lectual or moral greatness. There is always some 
human and natural cause, or combination of causes, 
which accounts for the final result. 

Luther, for instance, was indeed the son of poor 
peasants, and had a very hard youth : but he went 
to the schools of Mansfeld, Magdeburg, and Eise- 
nach ; to the university of Erfurt ; passed through 
the ascetic discipline of convent life ; studied and 
laboured among professors, students, and libraries ; 
and was innocently, as it were, made a reformer 
by extraordinary events, and the irresistible cur- 
rent of his age. 

Shakspeare is generally and justly regarded as 
the most remarkable and most wonderful example 
of a self-taught man; who, without the regular 
routine of school education, became the greatest 
dramatic poet, not only of his age and country, but 
of aU times. But the absurd idea that the son of 
the Warwickshire yeoman or butcher or glover — 
we hardly know which — was essentially an im- 
learned man, and jumped with one bound from 



HIS TRAINING. 21 

the youthful folly of deer-stealing to the highest 
position in literature, has long since been aban- 
doned by competent judges. It is certain that he 
spent several years in the free grammar-school of 
Stratford-on-Avon, where he probably acquired the 
"small Latin, and less Greek," which, however 
small in the eyes of so profound a classical scholar 
as Ben Jonson, was certainly large enough to un- 
fold to him a general understanding of Greek and 
Eoman antiquity. And, whatever were the de- 
fects of his scholastic training, he must have made 
them up, by intense private study of books, and 
the closest observation of men and things : for his 
dramas — the occasional chronological, historical, 
and geographical mistakes notwithstanding, which 
are small matters at all events, and in most cases, 
as in "Pericles" and in "Midsummer -Night's 
Dream," either intentional, or mere freaks of fancy 
— abound in the most accurate and comprehensive 
knowledge of human nature imder aU its types 
and conditions, — in the cold North and the sunny 
South; in the fifteenth century, and at the time 
of Caesar, under the influence of Christianity and 
of Judaism, — together with a great variety of 
historical and other information, which cannot be 
acquired without study, and the help of oral or 
printed instruction. Moreover, he lived in the 
city of London ; united the offices of actor, manager, 



22 THE PEESON OF CHEIST. 

and writer, in the classic age of Elizabeth, in the 
company of genial and gifted friends, with free 
access to the highest ranks of blood, wealth, and 
wit, and during the closing scenes of the greatest 
upheaving of the human mind which ever took 
place since the introduction of Christianity.^® 

In the case of Christ, no such natural explana- 
tion can be given. He can be ranked neither 
with school-trained, nor with self-trained or self- 
made men ; if by the latter we imderstand, as we 
must, those who, without the regular aid of liviTig 
teachers, yet with the same educational means, such 
as books, the observation of men and things, and 
the intense application of their mental faculties, 
attained to vigour of intellect, and wealth of scholar- 
ship, — ^like Shakspeare, Jacob Boehm, Benjamin 
Franklin, and others. The attempts to bring him 
into contact with Egyptian wisdom, or the Essenic 
theosophy, or other sources of learning, are without 
a shadow of proof, and explain nothing after alL 
He never quotes from books, except the Old Testa- 
ment. He never refers to secular history, poetry, 
rhetoric, mathematics, astronomy, foreign languages, 
natural sciences, discoveries and inventions, or any 
of those branches of knowledge which make up 
human learning and literature. He confined him- 
self strictly to religion. But, from that centre, he 
sheds light over the whole world of man and nature, 



HIS TRAINING. 2$ 

and acts as a universal inspirer of higher and purer 
thought. In this department, unlike all other 
great men, even the prophets and the apostles, he 
is absolutely original and independent. He teaches 
the world as one who had learned nothing from it, 
and is imder no obligation to it. He speaks from 
divine intuition, as one who not only knows the 
truth, but is the truth ; and with an authority that 
commands absolute submission, or provokes rebel- 
lion, but can never be passed by with contempt or 
indifference. " His character and life were origin- 
ated and sustained in spite of circumstances with 
which no earthly force could have contended, and 
therefore must have had their real foimdation in a 
force which was preternatural and divine." ^* 

At the same time, it is easy to see, from the 
admission of Christ's divinity, that by this conde- 
scension he raised humble origin, poverty, manual 
labour, and the lower orders of society, to a dignity 
and sacredness never known before. He set up 
the true standard of judging men and things not 
from their outward appearance, but from their 
intrinsic merits. 



( 24 ) 



HIS PUBLIC LIFE. 

THE SHORT DURATION AND MIGHTY EFFECT OF HIS 

MINISTRY. ABSENCE OF ALL OSTENTATION 

AND WORLDLY GREATNESS. 

We now approach the public life of Jesus. In his 
thirtieth year, after the Messianic inauguration 
through the baptism by John as his forerunner, 
and as the representative of the Old Covenant, 
both in its legal and prophetic or evangelical as- 
pects, and after the Messianic probation by the 
temptation in the wilderness, — the counterpart of 
the temptation of the first Adam in paradise, — ^he 
entered upon his great work. 

His public life lasted only three years ; and, 
before he had reached the age of ordinary maturity 
he died, in the full beauty and vigour of early man- 
hood, without tasting the infirmities of declining 
years. He retained the dew of his youth upon 
him : he never became an old man. Both his per- 
son and his work, every word he spoke, and every 
act he performed, has the freshness, brilliance, and 
vigour of youth, and will retain it to the end of 



HIS PUBUC LIFE. 2$ 

time. All other things fade away ; every book of 
man loses its interest after repeated reading : but 
the gospel of Jesus never wearies ; it becomes 
more interesting the more it is read, and grows 
deeper at every attempt to fathom its depth. 
Even Napoleon is reported to have said on St. 
Helena, pointing to a copy of the Testament on 
his table : " I never tire with reading it,- and I 
read it daily with equal delight. The gospel is 
not a book, but a living power which overwhelms 
every opposing fprce. The soul which is capti- 
vated by the beauty of the gospel does no more 
belong to itself or to the world, but to God. 
What an evidence is this of the divinity of Christ!'* 
The great Orientalist, Henry Ewald, holding a 
Greek Testament in his hand, said to a friend: 
" In this little book is contained the whole wisdom 
of the world." 

And yet, unlike all other men of his years, 
Christ combined, with the freshness, energy, and 
originating power of youth, that wisdom, modera- 
tion, and experience, which belong only to mature 
age. The short triennium of his public ministry 
contains more, even from a purely historical point 
of observation, than the longest life of the greatest 
and best of men. It is pregnant with the deepest 
meaning of the counsel of God and the destiny 
of the race. It is the ripe fruit of all preceding 



26 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

ages, the fiilfilinent of the hopes and desires of the 
Jewish and heathen mind, and the fruitful germ of 
succeeding generations. It contains the impulse 
to the purest thoughts and noblest actions down 
to the end of time. It is " the end of a boundless 
past, the centre of a boundless present, and the 
beginning of a boundless future."^ 

How remarkable, how wonderful, this contrast 
between the short duration and the immeasurable 
significance of Christ's ministry ! The Saviour of 
the world a youth ! 

Other men require a long succession of years to 
mature their mind and character, and to make a 
lasting impression upon the world. There are ex- 
ceptions, we admit. Alexander the Great, the last 
and most brilliant eifflorescence of the ancient Greek 
nationality, died a young man of thirty-three, after 
having conquered the East to the borders of the 
Indus. But who would think of comparing an 
ambitious warrior, conquered by his own lust, and 
dying a victim of his passion, with the spotless 
Friend of sinners ? a few bloody victories of the one 
with the peaceful triumphs of the other ; and a huge 
military empire of force, which crumbled to pieces as 
soon as it was erected, with the spiritual kingdom 
of truth and love which stands to this day, and 
will last for ever? Nor should it be forgotten, 
that the true significance and only value of Alex- 



HIS PUBLIC UFB. 2/ 

ander's conquest lay beyond the horizon of his 
ambition and intention ; and that by carrying the 
language and civilisation of Greece to Asia, and 
bringing together the Oriental and Occidental world 
it prepared the way for the introduction of the 
universal religion of Christ, who occupies the cen- 
tral position in history, all the preceding ages 
looking towards him as the fulfilment of their 
hopes and aspirations, all succeeding ages starting 
from him to carry out the design of his coming. 
Napoleon, in his conversations with Gen. Bertrand 
at St. Helena, made the striking remark : " The 
world admires the conquest of Alexander; but 
Christ is a conqueror who attracts, unites to him- 
self, and incorporates with him, for its own bene- 
fit, not a nation, — no, but the whole human race. 
What a miracle ! The human soul, with all its 
faculties, becomes an annex to the existence ai 
Christ." 

There is another striking distinction of a general 
character, between Christ and the heroes of history 
which we must notice here. We should naturally 
suppose that such an uncommon personage, setting 
up the most astounding claims and proposing the 
most extraordinary work, would surround himself 
with extraordinary circumstances, and maintain a 
position far above the vulgar and degraded multi- 
tude around him. We should expect something 



28 THE Person of Christ. 

uncommon and striking in his look, his dress, his 
manner, his mode of speech, his outward life, and 
the train of his attendants. 

But the very reverse is the case. His greatness 
is singularly unostentatious, modest, and quiet; 
and, far from repelling the beholder, it attracts 
and invites him to familiar approach. His public 
life never moved on the imposing arena of secular 
heroism, but within the humble circle of everyday 
life, and the simple relations of a son, a brother, 
a citizen, a teacher, and a friend. We have no 
authentic description of his "human face divine;*' 
he had not the physiognomy of a sinner, and " the 
glory of the only Begotten of the Father full of 
grace and truth " must have shone through the 
veil of his flesh, but it was perceptible only to a 
deeper penetration, and his outward dress and 
appearance, if we are to judge from the absence of 
all observations on the subject, had nothing start- 
ling or uncommon. He had no army to command, 
no kingdom to rule, no prominent station to fill, no 
worldly favours and rewards to dispense. He was 
an humble individual, without friends and patrons 
in the Sanhedrin or at the court of Herod. He 
never mingled in familiar intercourse with the 
religious or social leaders of the nation, whom he 
had startled in his twelfth year by his questions 
aid answers. He selected his disciples from 



HIS PUBLIC LIFE. 29 

among the illiterate fishermen of Galilee, and 
promised them no reward in this world but a part 
in the bitter cup of his sufferings. He dined with 
publicans and sinners, and mingled with the com- 
mon people, without ever condescending to their 
low manners and habits. He was so poor, that 
he had no place on which to rest his head. He 
depended, for the supply of his modest wants, on 
the voluntary contributions of a few pious females ; 
and the purse was in the hands of a thief and a 
traitor. Nor had he learning, art, or eloquence, 
in the usual sense of the term, or any other kind 
of power by which great men arrest the attention 
and secure the admiration of the world. The 
writers of Greece and Eome were ignorant even of 
his existence, until, several years after the cruci- 
fixion, the effects of his mission, in the steady 
growth of the sect of his followers, forced from 
them some contemptuous notice, and then roused 
them to opposition. 

And yet this Jesus of Nazareth, without money 
and arms, conquered more millions than Alexander, 
Caesar, Mohammed, and Napoleon ; without science 
and learning, he shed more light on things human 
and divine than all philosophers and scholars com- 
bined ; without the eloquence of schools, he spoke 
such words of life as were never spoken before or 
since, and produced effects which lie beyond the 



30 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

reach of orator or poet ; without writing a single 
line, he set more pens in motion, and furnished 
themes for more sermons, orations, discussions, 
learned volumes, works of art, and songs of praise, 
than the whole army of great men of ancient and 
modem times. Bom in a manger, and crucified 
as a malefactor, he now controls the destinies of 
the civilised world, and rules a spiritual empire 
which embraces one-third of the inhabitants of 
the globe. There never was in this world a life 
so unpretending, modest, and lowly in its outward 
form and condition, and yet producing such extra- 
ordinary effects upon all ages, nations, and classes 
of men. The annals of history furnish no other 
example of such complete and astounding success, 
in spite of the absence of those material, social, 
literary, and artistic powers and influences which 
are indispensable to success for a mere man. 
Christ stands, in this respect also, solitary and 
alone among all the heroes of history, and presents 
to us an insolvable problem, unless we admit him 
to be more than man, 'even the eternal Son of God. 
We will now attempt to describe his personal 
or moral and religious character as it appears in 
the record of his public life, and then examine his 
own testimony of himself as giving us the only 
rational solution of this mighty problem. 



( 31 ) 



HIS FREEDOM FROM SIN. 

The first impression which we receive from the 
life of Jesus is that of perfect innocency and sin- 
lessness in the midst of a sinful world. He, and 
he alone, carried the spotless purity of childhood 
untarnished through his youth and manhood. 
Hence the lamb and the dove are his appropriate 
symbols. 

He was, indeed, tempted as we are; but he 
never yielded to temptation." His sinlessness 
was at first only the relative sinlessness of Adam 
before the Fall; which implies the necessity of 
trial and temptation, and the peccability, or the 
possibility of sinniug. Had he been endowed 
from the start with absolute impeccability, or with 
the impossibility of sinning, he could not be a true 
man, nor our model for imitation: his holiness, 
instead of being his own self- acquired act and 
inherent merit, would be an accidental or outward 
gift, and his temptation an xmreal show. As a 
true man, Christ must have been a free and respon- 
sible moral agent : freedom implies the power of 



32 THE PEKSON OF CHRIST. 

choice between good and evil, and the power of 
disobedience as well as obedience to the law of 
God. 

But here is t'he great fundamental difference 
between the first and the second Adam: the first 
Adam lost his innocence by the abuse of his free- 
dom, and fell, by his own act of disobedience, into 
the dire necessity of sin ; while the second Adam 
was innocent in the midst of sinners, and main- 
tained his innocence against all and every tempta- 
tion. Christ's relative sinlessness became absolute 
sinlessness by his own moral act, or the right use 
of his freedom in perfect active and passive obe- 
dience to God. In other words, Christ's original 
possibility of not sinning,^ which includes the 
opposite possibility of sinning, but excludes -the 
actuality of sin, was unfolded into the impossibiLity 
of sinning,^ which can not sin because it vnll not 
This is the highest stage of freedom where it be- 
comes identical with moral necessity, or absolute 
and unchangeable self-determination for goodness 
and holiness. This is the freedom of God, and 
also of the saints in heaven ; with this difference, 
that the saints obtain that position by deliver- 
ance and salvation from sin and death, while Christ 
acquired it by his own merit.^* 

In vain do we look through the entire biography 
of Jesus for a single stain or the slightest shadow 



HIS FKEEDOM FROM SIN. 33 

on his moral character. There never lived a more 
harmless being on earth. He injured nobody, he 
took advantage of nobody. He never spoke an 
improper word, he never committed a wrong action. 
He exhibited a uniform elevation above the objects, 
opinions, pleasures, and passions of this world, and 
disregard to riches, displays, fame, and favour of 
men. " No vice that has a name can be thought 
of in connection with Jesus Christ. Ingenious 
malignity looks in vain for the faintest trace of 
self-seeking in his motives; sensuality shrinks 
abashed from his celestial purity; falsehood can 
leave no stain on Him who is incarnate truth; 
injustice is forgotten beside his errorless equity; 
the very possibility of avarice is swallowed up in 
his benignity and love ; the very idea of ambition 
is lost in his divine wisdom and divine self-abne- 
gation." ^ 

The apparent outbreak of passion in the expul- 
sion of the profane trafl&ckers from the Temple is 
the only instance on the record of his history which 
might be quoted against his freedom from the 
faults of humanity. But the very effect which it 
produced shows that, far from being the outburst 
of passion, the expulsion was a judicial act of a 
religious reformer, vindicating, in just and holy 
zeal, the honour of the Lord of the Temple. It 
was an exhibition, not of weakness, but of dignity 



34 THE PESSON OF CHBIST. 

and majesty; which at once silenced the offenders, 
though they were superior in physical strength, 
and made them submit to their well - deserved 
punishment without a murmur. They were over- 
awed by the presence of a superhuman power. 
The cursing of the unfruitful fig-tree can still less 
be urged ; as it evidently was a significant sym- 
bolical act, foreshadowing the fearful doom of the 
impenitent Jews in the destruction of Jerusalem. 
On the contrary, these two facts become fully in- 
telligible only by the assumption of the presence of 
the Divinity in Christ ; for they represent him as the 
Lord of the Temple, and as the Lord of creation. 

The perfect innocence of Jesus is based, not only 
negatively on the absence of any recorded word or 
act to the contrary, and his exemption from every 
trace of selfishness and worldliness, but positively 
also, on the unanimous testimony of John the 
Baptist, and the apostles who bowed before the 
majesty of his character in unbounded veneration, 
and declare him " just," " holy," and " without 
sin." ^® It is admitted, moreover, by his enemies, 
— the heathen judge Pilate, and his wife, repre- 
senting, as it were, the Eoman law and justice when 
they shuddered with fear, and when Pilate washed 
his hands to be clear of innocent blood ; by the 
rude Boman centurion confessing under the cross, 
in the name of the disinterested spectators : ^^Truly 



HIS FREEDOM FBOM SIN. 35 

this was a Son of God ; '* and by Judas himseK, 
the witness of his whole public and private life, 
when he exclaimed in despair : " I sinned in 
betraying innocent blood." ^^ Even dumb nature 
responded in mysterious sympathy; and the be- 
clouded heavens above, and the shaking earth 
beneath, united in paying their unconscious tri- 
bute to the divine purity of their dying Lord. 

The objection that the Evangelists were either 
not fully informed concerning the facts, or mis- 
taken in their estimate of the character of Christ, 
is of no avail. For, in addition to their testimony, 
we have his own personal conviction of entire 
freedom from sin ; which leaves us only the choice 
between absolute purity and absolute hypocrisy: 
such hypocrisy as would be the greatest moral 
monstrosity on record. 

The very fact that Christ came for the express 
purpose of saving sinners, implies his own con- 
sciousness of personal freedom from guilt and from 
all need of salvation. And this is the impression 
made upon us by his public life and conduct. He 
nowhere shows the least concern for his own salva- 
tion, but knows himseK to be in imdisturbed har- 
mony with his heavenly Father. While calling most 
earnestly upon all other men to repent, he stood 
in no need of conversion and regeneration, but 
simply of the regular harmonious unfolding of his 



36 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

moral powers. While directing all his followers, 
in his model prayer, to ask for the forgiveness 
of their sins as well as their daily bread, he himself 
never asked God for pardon and forgiveness except 
in behalf of others. While freely conversing 
with sinners, he always did so with the love and 
interest of a Saviour of sinners. He always did 
so : this is the historical fact, no matter how 
you may explain it. And, to remove every doubt, 
we have his open and fearless challenge to his 
bitter enemies : " Which of you convicteth me 
of sin ? " 2» In this question, which remains un- 
answered to this day, he clearly exempts himself 
from the common fault and guilt of the race. 
In the mouth of any other man, this question 
would at once betray either the height of hypo- 
crisy, or a degree of self-deception bordering on 
madness itself, and would overthrow the very 
foundation of all human goodness ; while, from 
the mouth of Jesus, we instinctively receive it as 
the triumphant self- vindication of one who stood 
far above the possibility of successful impeachment 
or founded suspicion. 

The assumption that Christ was a sinner, and 
knew himseK such, although he professed the con- 
trary, and made upon friends and enemies the 
impression of spotless innocency, is the most 
monstrous deception that can well be imagined. "If 



HIS FREEDOM FROM Sm. 37 

Jesus was a sinner, he was conscious of sin as all 
sinners are, and therefore was a hypocrite in the 
whole fabric of his character ; realising so much 
of divine beauty in it, maintaining the show of 
such unfelUrin/ h»Mooy ™d ciw g«ce, .nd 
doing all this with a mind confused and fouled by 
the affectations acted for true virtues ! Such an 
example of successful hypocrisy would be itseK the 
greatest miracle ever heard of in the world." ^ 

It is an indisputable fact, then, both from his 
mission and uniform conduct, and his express 
declaration; that Christ knew himself free from sin 
and guilt. The only rational explanation of this 
fact is that Christ was no sinner. And this is 
readily conceded by the greatest divines, even 
those who are by no means regarded as orthodox.'^ 
The admission of this fact implies the further 
admission, that Christ differed from all other men, 
not in degree only, but in kind. For although we 
must utterly repudiate the pantheistic notion of 
the necessity of sin, and maintain that human 
nature in itself considered is capable of sinlessness, 
that it was sinless, in fact, before the Fall, and that 
it will ultimately become sinless again by the 
redemption of Christ, — yet it is equally certain 
that human nature in its present condition is not 
sinless, and never has been since the Fall, except 
in the single case of Christ; and that, for this 



38 THE PERSON OF CHKIST. 

very reason, Christ's sinlessness can only be ex- 
plained on the ground of such an extraordinary 
indwelling of God in him as never took place in 
any other human being before or after. 

The Bible, the conscience of man, and the daily 
experience of life, unite in testifying to the uni- 
versal fact of sin, no matter how we may explain 
it Sin is the deep, dark mystery of history, the 
stumbling-block to reason, the problem of problems, 
the fruitful source of all misery and woe. The 
literature of all nations and ages is full of lamenta- 
tions over this most awful and most stubborn of 
all facts. Even heathen philosophers, historians, 
and poets acknowledge it. "The evil passions," 
says Plutarch, " are inborn in man, and were not 
introduced from without; and, if strict discipline 
would not come to aid, man would hardly be tamer 
than the wildest beast." The well-known line of 
the Eoman poet : — 

" Video meliora proboque, deieriora sequor ; *' 

and that other : — 

" Nitunur in Tetitum semper cupimusque negata," — 

have often been quoted as a striking response of 
the heathen conscience and experience to the in- 
spired description of the moral conflict between 
heaven and heU in every soul (Rom 7). And 



HIS FBEEDOM FBOM SIN. 39 

as to the actual condition of morals in the age of 
Christ and the apostles, Seneca, Tacitus, Fersius, 
and Juvenal give the most tmfavourable accounts, 
which fuUy corroborate the dark picture of St 
Paul in the first chapter of his Epistle to the 
Eomans. "All is full of crime and vice," says 
Seneca; "they are open and manifest: iniquity 
prevails in every heart, tod innocence has not only 
become rare, but has entirely disappeared." Mar- 
cus Aurelius, the Stoic philosopher on the throne 
and the peiS3Cutor of Christians, complains that 
"faithfulness, the sense of honour, righteousness 
and truth, have taken their flight from the wide 
earth to heaven/' 

If this is the testimony of the sages of heathen- 
ism, what shall we say of the Christian, whose 
sense of sm and guUt is deepened and sharpened 
in proportion to his knowledge of God's holiness 
and his experience of God's redeeming grace. The 
entire Christian world, Greek, Latin, and Protestant, 
agree in the scriptural doctrine of the universal 
depravity of human nature since the apostasy of 
the first Adam. (The modem dogma of the Eoman 
Catholic Church, that the Virgin Mary was free 
from hereditary as well as actual sin, might be 
quoted as an exception; but her sinlessness is 
explained, in the papal decision of 1854, by the 
assumption of a miraculous interposition of divine 



40 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

favour, and by the reflex influence of the merits of 
her Son.) There is not a single mortal who has 
not to charge himseK with some defect or folly ; 
and man's consciousness of sin and unworthiness 
deepens just in proportion to his self-knowledge, 
and progress in virtue and goodness. There is 
not a single saint who has not experienced a new 
birth from above, and an ' actual conversion from 
sin to holiness, and who does not feel daily the 
need of repentance and divine forgiveness. The 
very greatest and best of them, as St. Paul and St. 
Augustine, passed through a violent struggle and 
a radical revolution ; and their whole theological 
system and religious experience rest on the felt 
antagonism of sin and grace. 

But in Christ we have the one solitary and ab- 
solute exception to this universal rule, — an indi- 
vidual thinking like a man, feeling like a man, 
speaking, acting, sufiering, and dying like a man, 
surrounded by sinners in every direction, with the 
keenest sense of sin, and the deepest sympathy with 
sinners, commencing his public ministry with the 
call: "Eepent; for the kingdom of heaven is 
at hand " (Matt. 4 : 17); yet never touched in the 
least by the contamination of the world ; never put- 
ting himself in the attitude of a sinner before God ; 
never shedding a tear of repentance ; never regret- 
ting a single thought, word, or deed ; never needing 



HIS FREEDOM FKOM SIN. 4 1 

or asking divine pardon ; never concerned about the 
salvation of his own soul ; and boldly facing all 
his present and future enemies, in the absolute 
certainty of his spotless purity before God and 
man. 

A sinless Saviour, surrounded by a sinful world, 
is an astounding fact indeed; a sublime moral 
miracle in history. But this freedom from the 
common sin and guilt of the race is, after all, only 
the negative side of his character ; which rises in 
magnitude as we contemplate the positive side, — 
namely, his absolute moral and religious perfection. 



( 42 ) 



HIS PERFECT HOLINESS. 

It is universally admitted, even by deists and 
rationalists, that Christ taught the purest and 
Bublimest system of ethics, one which throws the 
moral precepts and maxims of the wisest men of 
antiquity far into the shade. The Sermon on the 
Mount alone is worth infinitely more than all 
that Confucius, Cakya-Mouni, Zoroaster, Socrates, 
and Seneca ever said or wrote on duty and virtue. 
Men of the world can hardly resist its power. 
Napoleon Bonaparte had it once read to him and 
his friends in the solitude of exile by a son of 
Coimt De Las Cases, and '' expressed himself struck 
with the highest admiration of the purity, the 
sublimity, the beauty of the morality which it 
contained." De Las Cases, who relates this fact 
in his Memoires, adds : " We all experienced the 
same feeling." 

But the difference between Christ and the 
moralists of ancient or modem times is still greater 
if we come to the more difficult task of practice. 
All the systems of moral philosophy combined 



HIS PEBFECT HOLINESS. 43 

could not regenerate the world. Words are no- 
thing unless they are supported by deeds. A holy 
life is a greater power for good than the finest 
moral maxim or essay. In this respect, the differ- 
ence between Jesus and the great sages is so 
radical and fundamental, that comparison ceases. 
Cicero, who, with all his excessive vanity, was one 
of the noblest and purest of old Boman characters, 
confessed that he never found a perfect sage in his 
life, and that philosophy only taught how he ought 
to be if he should ever appear on earth. It is 
well known that the wise men of Greece and 
Home sanctioned slavery, oppression, revenge, in- 
fanticide or exposure of infants, polygamy, con- 
cubinage, and worse vices ; or, like the avaricious 
and venal Seneca, belied their purer moral maxims 
by their conduct.*^ The greatest saints of the Old 
Testament, even with the help of divine grace, did 
not rise above reproach ; and some of them are 
stained with the guilt of blood and adultery. 
It may be safely asserted, that the wisest and best 
of men, even among Christian nations, never live 
up to their own imperfect standard of excellency. 

But how is it with Christ ? He fully carried 
out his perfect doctrine in his life and conduct. 
He both vjos and did that which he taught : he 
preached his own life, and lived his own doctrine. 
He is the living incarnation of the ideal standard 



44 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

of virtue and holiness, and the highest model for 
all that is pure and good and noble in the sight of 
God and man. 

Even unbelievers must admit this fact " Christ 
unites ia himself/' says Theodore Parker, "the 
sublimest precepts and divinest practices, thus 
more than realising the dream of prophets and 
sages; rises free from all prejudice of his age, 
nation, or sect ; gives free range to the Spirit of 
God in his breast ; sets aside the law, sacred and 
true, honoured as it was, — its forms, its sacrifice, 
its temple, its priests ; puts away the doctors of 
the law, — subtle, irrefragable; and pours out a 
doctrine beautiful as the light, sublime as heaven, 
and true as God/'*^ And Eenan, much as he 
perverts the life and character of Jesus, freely 
acknowledges, that both in word and in work, in 
the doctrine and practice of morality, the hero of 
Nazareth " is without an equal ; " that " his glory 
remains perfect, and will be renewed for ever." ** 

We find Christ moving in all ordinary and essen- 
tial relations of life,'* as a son, a brother, a friend, 
a citizen, a teacher, at home and in public. We 
find him among aU classes of society, — with sin- 
ners and saints ; with the poor and the wealthy ; 
with the sick and the healthy ; with little children, 
grown men and women ; with plain fishermen and 
learned scribes ; with despised publicans and hon- 



HIS PERFECT HOLINESS. 4$ 

oured members of the Sanhedrin ; with friends and 
foes; with admiring disciples and bitter perse- 
cutors ; now with an individual, as Nicodemus or 
the woman of Samaria ; now in the familiar circle 
of the twelve ; now in the crowds of the people. 
We find him in all situations, — in the synagogue 
and the Temple; at home and on journeys; in 
villages and the city of Jerusalem ; in the desert and 
on the mountain ; along the banks of the Jordan 
and the shores of the Galilean Sea ; at the joyous 
wedding-feast and the solemn grave ; in the awful 
agony of Gethsemane ; in the judgment-hall, before 
the high-priest, the king, the Eoman governor; rude 
soldiers, and the fanatical multitude ; and at last in 
the bitter pains of the cross on Calvary. 

In all these various relations, conditions, and 
situations, as they are crowded within the few 
years of his public ministry, he sustains the same 
consistent character throughout, without ever ex- 
posing himself to censure. As God, according to 
the Bible, is one and the same always, so also 
Christ, according to the gospel. Guizot (in his 
" Meditations on the Essence of the Christian Ee- 
ligion") justly remarks: "The most perfect, the 
most constant unity reigns in Jesus, in his life 
as in his soul, in his words as in his acts. He pro- 
gresses according to the circumstances in which he 
lives ; but his progress produces in him no change 



46 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

of character or design. As he appeared already 
in his twelfth year in the Temple, fuU of the sense 
of his divine nature ; so he remains and manifests 
himself during the whole course of his public mission. 
. . . Everywhere, and under all circumstances, he 
is animated by the same spirit, he sheds the ^ame 
light, he proclaims the same law." He fulfils every 
duty to God, to man, and to himself, with perfect 
ease and freedom, and exhibits an entire conformity 
to the law, in the spirit as well as the letter. 
His life is one unbroken service of God in active 
and passive obedience to his holy will ; one grand 
act of absolute love to God and love to man ; of per- 
sonal self-consecration to the glory of his heavenly 
Father, and the salvation of a fallen race. In the 
language of the people who were " beyond measure 
astonished at his works," we must say, the more 
we study his life : " He did aU things well."'* In 
a solemn appeal to his heavenly Father in the 
parting hour, he could proclaim to the world that 
he had glorified him in the earth, and finished the 
work he gave him to do (John 17 : 3, 22). 



( 47 ) 



CHRIST'S INTERCOURSE WITH MEN. 

Let XLS cast a glance at the intercourse of Jesus 
with various classes of men. 

The relation of Jesus to his mother is without 
a parallel, and points to his divine as weU as 
human character. He treats her with the respect 
and tenderness of a son, and yet with the dignity 
and authority of the Messiah. He obeys her as 
man, and yet commands her to obey and to follow 
him as her Saviour and example. He was subject 
to his parents, and thus fulfilled the cardinal virtue 
of a child (Luke 2 : 51); yet even in his twelfth 
year he told them that he owed supreme allegiance 
to his heavenly Father (Luke 2 : 48, 49). At the 
wedding of Cana, when Mary, with the best inten- 
tion, ventured to interfere with his Messianic ofl&ce, 
he gently rebuked her haste, saying: " Woman, what 
have I to do with thee ? mine hour is not yet 
come." And his mother at once reverently sub- 
mitted (John 2 : 4, 5). On a later occasion when 
she and his brothers and sisters — whether they 
were cousins, or children of Joseph by a former 



48 THE PEESON OF CHRIST. 

marriage, or younger children of Mary, makes no 
difference here — pressed through the crowd to speak 
to him, he stretched forth his hand towards his 
disciples and said : " Behold my mother and my 
brethren ; for whosoever shall do the will of my 
Father which is in heaven, the same is my brother, 
and sister, and mother" (Matt. 12 : 46-50; Luke 
8: 21; Mark 3: 34). And when a certain 
woman lifted up her voice and said to him: " Blessed 
is the womb that bare thee, and the paps which 
thou hast sucked," he replied : " Yea, rather blessed 
are they that hear the word of God and keep it " 
(Luke II: 27, 28). He manifested his filial affec- 
tion in his dying moments on the cross when he 
committed his mother to his bosom disciple with 
the touching words: "Woman, behold thy son" 
(John 19:26). It is the cross which cements pure 
spiritual relationships, and makes them stronger 
and dearer than ties of blood. But it is significant 
that neither here nor elsewhere does he address 
Mary as " mother," but simply as " woman," as in 
prophetic foresight and warning against Mario* 
latry. 

The intercourse of Christ with his disciples was 
frank and familiar, yet inspiring reverence and 
awe. They both loved and adored him as their 
Friend and Lord, and put their whole trust in hiin 
as their Saviour. He called them " friends." He 



cheist's intercourse with men. 49 

washed their feet in condescending humility. He 
kept nothing from them which they could bear and 
which tended to their benefit. He bore meekly 
and patiently with their ignorance, their want of 
faith, their carnal notions of the Messiah, and their 
misimderstandings of his sublime spiritual sayings. 
He forgave the denial of Peter, and would have 
forgiven even the treason of Judas, if, instead of 
hanging himself in despair, he had in tearful repent- 
ance fled to the cross. He promised his disciples 
a glorious reward in heaven, but in this sinful 
world only poverty, hatred, persecution, and death. 
He sent them as sheep among wolves. And yet 
they felt irresistibly drawn to him, and forsook all 
to follow him. Even if he did something which 
offended their Jewish prejudices, as his open 
conversation with a woman, they did not dare to 
remonstrate, being convinced that their Teacher 
could do nothing wrong or improper (John 4 : 27). 
How bitterly did Peter bewail his unfaithfulness 
against the most faithful of the faithful ! Under 
his guidance a dozen poor, unlearned fishermen of 
Galilee, who without him would have been buried 
in obscurity, have become the greatest teachers and 
benefactors of mankind! Where shall we look 
for a parallel case in history ? 

Jesus was a friend of children. All good men 
are. True greatness of character is based on 



50 THE PERSON OF CHRIST, 

childlike simplicity. The innocence, humility, 
and trustfulness of childhood are a reminiscence 
of paradise, and have an irresistible charm. The 
last favourite exhortation of St. John was : " Little 
children, love one another I " Gerson, the celebrated 
Chancellor of the University of Paris, is said to 
have ended his busy life on the heights of learning 
and church government with the instruction of 
children. Luther wrote truly childlike letters to his 
children in the midst of the battles of the Eefor- 
mation during the Diet of Augsburg. How many 
of the noblest men and women now-a-days find 
delight in instructing and caring for children at 
home, in the school, in the orphan asylum ! And 
they draw their inspiration for these labours of 
love from him who took children into his arms 
and said : " Suffer little children to come unto me, 
and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of 
heaven " (Mark lo : 14), who praised his heavenly 
Father for revealing the counsel of his mercy unto 
babes (Matt. 1 1 : 25), and who commended to all 
his followers a childlike spirit as the necessary 
condition of entering into his kingdom (Matt, 

18:3). 

The intercourse of Jesus with women was like- 
wise truly human, and yet truly divine. What 
freedom and intimacy, as contrasted with rab- 
binical prejudices and the Oriental contempt of 



chbist's intercourse with men. 51 

woman I What elevation above sensual passion ! 
What purity combined with familiarity! What ^ 
dignity blended with tenderness ! He who, as 
the Universal Man and Saviour, could enter into 
no relation of equaUty with any faUen daughter of 
Eve, and who can find a worthy bride only in the 
whole Church of the redeemed, did not despise 
the gifts of pious women, and retreated from time 
to time to that home of peace at Bethany, where 
the busy, practical Martha administered to his 
wants, and the retiring, contemplative Mary sat at 
his feet, drinking in his words of life (Luke i o : 38). 
The groans of the woman in travail, and the joys 
of the mother over the new-bom child, reached 
his sympathising ear (John 16: 21). He, the 
purest of the pure, who condemned even the lust- 
ful look, as adultery of the heart (Matt. 5 : 28), 
allowed a woman of ill-repute to wash and wipe 
his feet with tears of repentance in the house of 
a Pharisee (Luke 7: 37, 38), and pardoned an 
open adulteress with the warning : "Go, and sin 
no more" (John 8: 11). How kindly and ear- 
nestly did he speak to the Samaritan Magdalene 
at Jacob's Well, touching her conscience at the 
tenderest spot, directing her mind to the true 
worship of an omnipresent God, and quenching 
the thirst of her soul with the water of life 
(John 4). To the weeping Mary Magdalene he 



52 THE PERSON OF CHBIST. 

appeared in the glory of his resurrection, and 
filled her with comfort and joy. 

He approached women as a friend and brother, 
and yet as their Lord and Saviour. Hence they 
were attracted to him as to no other being, with 
mingled feelings of love and reverence, and in the 
full conviction that he alone could satisfy their 
deepest wants and longing after God. They were 
" the last at the cross and the first at the open 
sepulchre." And ever since, in unbroken succes- 
sion, the noblest and purest of women have fled 
to hiTTi for pardon and peace, and consecrated to 
him their tenderest and strongest afifection, for the 
good of their fellow-men. What would woman be 
without Christ ? Her condition in heathen and 
Mohammedan countries gives but one answer. 



( 53 ) 



UNITY OF VIRTUE AND PIETY, 

The first feature in the singular perfection of 
Christ's character which strikes our attention is 
the harmony of virtue and piety, of morality and 
religion, or of love to God and love to man. He 
is more than moral, and more than pious: he is 
holy .in the strict and full sense of the word. 
There is a divine beauty in his character, the 
mere contemplation of which brings purity, peace, 
and bliss to the souL 

Piety was the soul of his morality, and lifted it 
far above the sphere of legality or conformity to 
law. Every moral action in him proceeded from 
supreme love to God, and looked to the temporal 
and eternal welfare of man. The groundwork of 
his character was the most intimate and uninter- 
rupted union and communion with his heavenly 
Father, from whom he derived, to whom he 
referred, everything. Already in his twelfth 
year he foimd his life-element and delight in the . 
things of his Father (Luke 2 : 49). It was his 
daily food to do the will of him that sent him. 



54 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

and to finish his work (John 4: 34; comp. v, 
30). To him he looked in prayer before every 
important act, and taught his disciples that model 
prayer, which, for simplicity, brevity, comprehen- 
siveness, and suitableness, can never be surpassed. 
He often retired to a mountain or solitary place 
for prayer, and spent days and nights in sacred 
meditation. But so constant and uniform was 
his habit of communion with the great Jehovah 
that he kept it up amid the multitude, and con- 
verted the crowded city into a religious retreat. 
His self-consciousness was at every moment con- 
ditioned, animated, and impregnated by the con- 
sciousness of God. Even when he exclaimed in 
indescribable anguish of body and soul, and in 
vicarious sympathy with the misery of the whole 
race : " My God, my God, why hast thou forsaken 
me ? " ^ the bond of union was not broken, or 
even loosened; it was only obscured, as the 
sun by a passing cloud; and the enjoyment, not 
the possession, of it was for a moment withdrawn 
from his feelings: for immediately afterward he 
triumphantly exclaimed : " It is finished ! " and 
commended his soul into the hands of his Father. 
So strong and complete was this holy union of 
Christ with God at every moment of his life, that 
he fully realised the idea of religion, whose object 
is to bring about such a union, and that he is the 



UNITY OF VIKTUE AND PIETY. 55 

personal representative and living embodiment of 
Christianity, as the true and perfect religion. 

With all this, the piety of Christ was no in- 
active contemplation, or retiring mysticism and 
selfish enjoyment, but thoroughly practical, ever 
active in works of charity, and tending to regene- 
rate and transform the world into the kingdom 
of God. " He went about doing good." His life 
is an unbroken series of good works and virtues 
in active exercise; all proceeding from the same 
union vnth God, animated by the same love, and 
tending to the same end, — the glory of God and 
the happiness of mankind* 



( 56 ) 



COMPLETENESS AND UNIVERSALITY 
OF CHRIS TS CHA RA CTER. 

\ 

•^r- Thb next feature we would notice is the com- 
pleteness or pleromatic fulness of the moral 
and religious character of Christ. While all other 
men represent, at best, but broken fragments of 
the idea of goodness and holiness, he exhausts 
the list of virtues and graces. His soul is a moral 
paradise of charming flowers, that shine in every 
variety of colour under the blue dome 9f the skies, 
drink in the refreshing dews of heaven and the 
warming beams of the sun, send their sweet 
fragrance around, and fill the beholder with rap- 
turous delight. 

History exhibits to us rare men of command- 
ing and comprehensive genius, who stand at the 
head of their age and nation, and furnish material 
for the intellectual activity of whole generations 
and periods, until they are succeeded by other 
heroes at a new epoch of development. As rivers 
generally spring from high mountains, so know- 



t » 









COMPLETENESS OF HIS CHARACTER 57 

ledge and moral power rise and are ever nourished 
from the heights of humanity. 

Abraham, the father of the faithful ; Moses, the 
lawgiver of the Jewish theocracy ; Elijah among 
the prophets; Peter, Paul, and John among the 
apostles; Athanasius and Chrysostom among the 
Greek, Augustine and Jerome among the Latin, 
fathers ; Anselm and Thomas Aquinas among the ^ 
schoolmen; Leo I. and Gregory VIL among the 
popes ; Luther and Calvin in the line of Pifotestant 
reformers and divines; Socrates, the patriarch of 
the ancient schools of philosophy ; Homer, Dante, 
Shakspeare and Milton, Goethe and Schiller, in 
the history of poetry among the various nations 
to which they belong; Eaphael among painters; 
Charlemagne, the first and greatest in the long 
succession of German emperors ; Napoleon, tower- 
ing high above aU the generals of his training; 
Washington, the wisest and best, as well as the 
first, of American Presidents, and the purest and 
noblest type of the American character, — may be 
mentioned as examples of those representative 
heroes in history who anticipate and concentrate 
the powers of whole generations. 

But all these characters represent only sectional, 
never universal, humanity: they are identified 
with a particular people or age, and partake of 
their errors, superstitions, and failings, almost in 



58 THE PEBSON OF CHKIST. 

the same proportion in which they exhibit their 
virtues. Moses, though revered by the followers 
of three religions, was a Jeiw in views, feelings, 
habits, and position, as well as by parentage; 
Socrates never rose above the Greek type of 
character ; Luther was a German in all his virtues 
and faults, in his strength and weakness, and can 
only be properly understood as a German ; Calvin, 
though an exile from his native land, remained a 
Frenchman ; and Washington can be to no nation 
on earth what he is to Americans. The influence 
of these great men may and does extend far be- 
yond their national horizons ; yet they can never 
furnish a universal model for imitation. We re- 
gard them as extraordinary but fallible and imper- 
fect men, whom it would be very unsafe to follow 
in every line of conduct. Very frequently the 
failings and vices of great men are in proportion 
to their virtues and powers, as the tallest bodies 
cast the longest shadows. Even the Apostles are 
models of piety and virtue only as far as they re- 
flect the image of their heavenly Master ; and it 
is with this express limitation that Paul exhorts 
his spiritual children: "Be ye followers of me, 
even as I also am of Christ."*^ 

What these representative men were to particular 
ages or nations or sects, or particular schools of 
science and art, Christ was to the human family 



COMPLETENESS OF HIS CHARACTER. 59 

at large in its relation to God. He, and he alone, 
is the universal tjrpe for universal imitation. 
Hence he could, witihout the least impropriety or 
suspicion of vanity, call upon all men to forsake 
all things and to follow him.^® He stands above 
the limitations of age, school, sect, nation, and 
race. He was indeed an Israelite as to the flesh ; 
walked about in the dress of a Jewish rabbi, and 
not of a Greek philosopher; and conformed, no 
doubt, to the Jewish habits of daily life. But this 
was his merest outside. If we look at his inner 
man, his thoughts and actions, they are of universal 
significance. There is nothing Jewish about him 
that is in the least repulsive or exclusive. The 
particular and national in him is always subor- 
dinated to the general and human. He was never 
identified with a party or sect. He was equally 
removed from the stiff formalism of the Pharisees, 
the loose liberalism of the Sadducees, and the in- 
active mysticism of the Essenes. He rose above 
all the prejudices, bigotries, and superstitions of his 
age aijd people, which exert their power even upon 
the strongest and otherwise most liberal minds. 

Witness his freedom in the observance of the 
Sabbath, by which he offended the scrupulous 
literalists, while he fulfilled, as the Lord of the 
Sabbath, the true spirit of the law in its universal 
and abiding significance ;^* his reply to his disciples. 



60 THE PEESON OF CHRIST. 

when they traced the misfortune of the blind man 
to a particular sin of the man or of his parents ;*® 
his liberal conduct toward the Samaritans, as 
contrasted with the inveterate hatred and preju- 
dice of the Jews, including his own disciples, at 
the time ;*^ and his charitable judgment of the 
slaughtered Galileans, whose blood Pilate had 
mingled with their sacrifices, and the eighteen 
upon whom the tower in Siloam fell (Luke 1 3 : 
1-4). "Think ye," he addressed the children of 
superstition, " that these men were sinners above 
all the Galileans, and above all men that dwelt in 
Jerusalem, because they suflfered such things ? I 
tell you, Nay ; but, except ye repent, ye «hall all 
likewise perish." 

The only instance of Christ's complicity with 
popular error and superstition which rationalists 
can point to with some degree of plausibility, is 
his belief in the devil and in demons. But they 
may say what they please against such a belief as 
irrational; experience everywhere disproves their 
arguments : while they get rid of one devil, they 
cannot deny the many devils in human shape, 
and leave them even more inexplicable ; for it is 
much more irrational to believe in the continued 
existence of a chaotic wilderness of bad men and 
principles, than in an organised empire of evil 
with a controlling head. 



COMPLETENESS OF HIS CHARACTER. 6 1 

As the pyramids rise high above the sandy 
plains of Egypt, so Christ towers above all human 
teachers and founders of sects and religions. He 
is, in the language of a modern infidel, " a man 
of colossal dimensions." He found disciples and 
worshippers among the Jews, although he iden- 
tified himself with none of their sects and tradi- 
tions ; among the Greeks, although he proclaimed 
no new system of philosophy ; among the Eomans, 
although he fought no battle, and founded no 
worldly empire ; among the Hindoos, who despise 
aU men of low caste ; among the black savages of 
Africa and the red men of America, as well as the 
most highly civilised nations of modern times in 
all quarters of the globe. All his words and all 
his actions, while they were fully adapted to the 
occasions which called them forth, retain their 
force and applicability undiminished in all ages 
and nations. He is the same unsurpassed and 
unsurpassable model of every virtue to Christians 
of every generation, every clime, every sect,- every 
nation, and every race. 



( 62 ) 



HARMONY OF ALL GRACES AND 
VIRTUES IN CHRIST. 

It must not be supposed that a complete catalogue 
of virtues would do justice to the character of 
Jesus. It is not only the completeness, but still 
more the even proportion and perfect harmony of 
virtues and graces, apparently opposite and con- 
tradictory, which distinguishes him specifically 
from all other men. This feature gives the finish 
to that beauty of holiness which is the sublimest 
picture that can be presented to our contempla- 
tion. It has struck with singular force the best 
writers on the subject.*^ 

Christ was free from all one-sidedness, which 
constitutes the weakness as well as the strength of 
great men. He was not a man of one idea, nor 
of one virtue towering above all the rest. The 
moral forces were so well tempered and moderated 
by each other, that none was unduly prominent, 
none carried to excess, none alloyed by the 
kindred failing. Each was checked and com- 
pleted by the opposite grace. His character 
never lost its even balance and happy equilibrium, 



HARMONY OF GRACES AND VIRTUES. 63 

never needed modification or readjustment. It 
was thoroughly sound and uniformly consistent 
from the beginning to the end. 

We cannot properly attribute to him any one 
temperament. He was neither sanguine, like 
Peter ; nor choleric, like Paul ; nor melancholic, 
like John. He combined the vivacity of the san- 
guine temperament without its levity, the vigour 
of the choleric without its violence, the serious- 
ness of the melancholic without its austerity, the 
calmness of the phlegmatic without its apathy. 

He was equally far removed from the excesses 
of the legalist, the pietist, the ascetic, and the 
enthusiast. With the strictest obedience to the 
law, he moved in the element of freedom ; with all 
the fervour of the enthusiast, he was always calm, 
sober, and self-possessed. Notwithstanding his 
complete and imiform elevation above the affairs 
of this world, he freely mingled with society, male 
and female, dined with publicans and sinners, played 
with little children and blessed them, honoured the 
wedding-feast with his cheering presence and first 
miracle, shed tears at the sepulchre of a friend, 
delighted in God's nature, admired the beauties of 
the lilies of the field, and ennobled the occupations 
of the husbandman for the illustration of the sublime 
truths of the kingdom of heaven. His virtue, was 
healthy, manly, vigorous, yet genial, social, and 



64 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

winning ; never austere and repulsive ; always in 
full sympathy with innocent joy and pleasure. He, 
the purest and holiest of men, provided wine for the 
wedding-feast; introduced the fatted calf and music 
and dancing into the picture of welcome of the pro- 
digal son to his father's house; and evenprovoked the 
sneer of his adversaries, that he " came eating and 
drinking," and was a "glutton" and a "wine-bibber." 

His zeal never degenerated into passion, nor his 
constancy into obstinacy, nor his benevolence into 
weakness, nor his tenderness into sentimentality. 
His unworldliness was free from indifference and 
unsociability, his dignity from pride and presump. 
tion, his affability from undue familiarity, his self- 
denial from moroseness, his temperance from 
austerity. He combined child-like innocence 
with manly strength, absorbing devotion to God 
with untiring interest in the welfare of man, 
tender love to the sinner with uncompromis- 
ing severity against sin, commanding dignity 
with winning humility, fearless courage with 
wise caution, imyielding firmness with sweet 
gentleness. 

He is justly compared with the lion in strength, 
and with the lamb in meekness. He equally 
possessed the wisdom of the serpent and the 
simplicity of the dove. He brought both the 
sword against every form of wickedness, and the 



HAEMONY OF GRACES AND VIRTUES. 6$ 

peace of the soul which the world cannot give. 
He was the most effective, and yet the least 
noisy, the most radical, and yet the most con- 
servative, calm, and patient, of all reformers. He 
came to fulfil every letter of the law; and yet 
he made all things new. The same hand which 
drove the profane traffickers from the Temple, 
blessed little children, healed the lepers, and 
rescued the sinking disciple ; the same ear which 
heard the voice of approbation from heaven, was 
open to the cries of the woman in travail; the 
same mouth which pronounced the terrible woe 
on hypocrites, and condemned the impure desire 
and unkind feeling as well as the open crime, 
blessed the poor in spirit, announced pardon to 
the adulteress, and prayed for his murderers ; the 
same eye which beheld the mysteries of God, and 
penetrated the heart of man, shed tears of com- 
passion over ungrateful Jerusalem, and tears of 
friendship at the grave of Lazarus. 

These are indeed opposite traits of character, 
yet as little contradictory as the different mani- 
festations of God's power and goodness in the 
tempest and the sunshine, in the towering Alps 
and the lily of the valley, in the boundless ocean 
and the dew-drop of the morning. They are 
separated in imperfect men, but united in Christ, 
the universal model for alL 

E 



( 66 ) 



HIS PASSION AND CRUCIFIXION. 

As all active virtues meet in Jesus, so he unites 
the active or heroic virtues with the passive and 
gentle. He is the highest standard of all true 
martyrdom. 

No character can become complete without trial 
and suffering ; and a noble death is the crowning 
act of a noble life. Edmund Burke said to Fox, 
in the English Parliament : " Obloquy is* a neces- 
sary ingredient of all true glory. Calumny and 
abuse are essential parts of triumph." The ancient 
Greeks and Eomans admired a good man strug- 
gling with misfortune, as a sight worthy of the gods. 
Plato describes the righteous man as one who, 
without doing any injustice, yet has the appear- 
ance of the greatest injustice, and proves his own 
justice by perseverance against all calumny unto 
death ; yea, he predicts, that, if such a righteous 
man should ever appear on earth, he would be 
scourged, tortured, bound, deprived of his sight, 
and, after having suflfered all possible injury, be 
nailed to a post.*^ No wonder that ancient fathers 



HIS PASSION AND CEUCIFIXION. 67 

and modem divines saw in this remarkaLle pas- 
sage a striking parallel to the description of the 
servant of Jehovah in Isaiah oh. 53, and an uncon- 
scious prophecy of the suffering Christ. 

But how far is this abstract ideal of the great 
philosopher from the actual reality as it appeared 
three hundred years afterward ! The great men of 
this world, who rise even above themselves on in- 
spiring occasions, and boldly face a superior army, 
are often thrown off their equilibrium in ordinary 
life, and grow impatient at trifling obstacles. Only 
think of Napoleon at the head of his conquering 
legions and at the helm of an empire, and the same 
Napoleon after the defeat at Waterloo and on the 
Island of St. Helena. The highest form of passive 
virtue attained by ancient heathenism or modern 
secular heroism is that stoicism which meets and 
overcomes the trials and misfortunes of life in the 
spirit of haughty contempt and unfeeling indiffer- 
ence, that is by a destruction of the finer sensi- 
bilities, and another exhibition of selfishness and 
pride. 

Christ has set up a far higher standard by his 
teaching and example, never known before or since, 
except in imperfect imitation of him. He has 
revolutionised moral philosophy, and convinced the 
world that forgiving love, holiness and humility, 
gentle patience in suffering, and cheerful submission 



% 



68 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

to the holy will of God, are the crowning excellency 
of moral greatness. "If thy brother," he says, 
"trespass against thee seven times in a day, and 
seven times in a day turn again to thee, saying, I 
repent ; thou shalt forgive him " (Luke 17: 4). 
" Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do 
good to them that hate you, and pray for them that 
despitefully use you and persecute you " (Matt. 5 : 
44). This is a sublime maxim truly; but still 
more sublime is its actual exhibition in his life. 

Christ's passive virtue is not confined to the 
closing scenes of his ministry. As human life is 
beset at every step with trials, vexations, and hind- 
rances, which should serve the educational purpose 
of developing its resources and proving its strength, 
so was Christ's. During the whole state of his 
humiliation, he was " a man of sorrows, and ac- 
quainted with grief" (Isa. 53: 3), and had to 
endure the " contradiction of sinners " (Heb. 1 2 : 
3). He was poor, and suflfered hunger and fatigue ; 
he was tempted by the devU ; his path was ob- 
structed with apparently insurmountable difficulties 
from the outset; his words and miracles called 
forth the bitter hatred of the world, which resulted 
at last in the bloody council of death. The Phari- 
sees and Sadducees forgot their jealousies and 
quarrels in opposing him They rejected and per- 
verted his testimony ; they laid snares for him by 



HIS PASSION AND CRUCIFIXION. 69 

insidious questions ; they called him a glutton and 
a wine-bibber for eating and drinking like other 
men, a friend of publicans and sinners for his con- 
descending love and mercy, a Sabbath-breaker for 
doing good on the Sabbath day ; they charged him 
with madness and blasphemy for asserting his unity 
with the Father, and derived his miracles from 
Beelzebub, the prince of devils. The common 
people, though astonished at his wisdom and mighty 
works, pointed sneeringly at his origin; his own 
country and native town refused him the honour 
of a prophet : his own brothers, we are told, did 
not believe in him ; and, in their impatient zeal for 
a temporal kingdom, they found fault with his un- 
ostentatious mode of proceeding.*** Even his apos- 
tles and disciples, notwithstanding their profound 
reverence for his character, and faith in his divine 
origin and mission jas the Messiah of God, yet by 
their ignorance, their carnal Jewish notions, and 
their almost habitual misunderstanding of his spiri- 
tual discourses, must have constituted a severe trial 
of patience to a teacher of far less superiority to 
his pupils. 

To all this must be added the constant sufferings 
from sympathy with human misery as it met him 
in various forms at every step. What a trial for 
him, the purest, gentlest, most tender-hearted of men, 
to breathe more than thirty years the foul atmosphere 



70 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

of this fallen world ; to see the constant outbursts 
of sinful passions ; to hear the great wail of human- 
ity borne to his ears on the four winds of heaven ; 
to be brought into personal contact with the blind, 
the lame, the deaf, the paralytic, the lunatic,. the 
possessed, the dead; and to be assaulted, as it were, 
by the concentrated force of sickness, s6rrow, grief, 
and agony ! 

But how shall we describe his passion, more pro- 
perly so called, with which no other suffering can 
be compared for a moment ? There is a lonely 
grandeur in it, foreshadowed in the words of the 
prophet: "I have trodden the wine-press alone, 
and of the people there was none with me " (Isa. 
63 : 3). If great men occupy a solitary position, 
far above the ordinary level, on the sublime heights 
of thought or action, how much more, then, Jesus 
in his sufferings, — he, the purest and holiest of 
beings ! The nearer a man approaches to moral 
perfection, the deeper are his sensibilities, the 
keener his sense of sin and evil and sorrow in 
this wicked world. 

Never did any man suffer more innocently, more 
unjustly, more intensely, than Jesus of Nazareth. 
The history of his passion presents, within the narrow 
limits of a few hours, a tragedy of universal signifi- 
cance, with every form of human weakness and infer- 
nal wickedness; of ingratitude, desertion, injury, and 



HIS PASSION AND CRUCIFIXION. 7 1 

insult; of bodily, and mental pain and anguish; cul- 
minating in the most ignominious death then known 
among Jews and Gentiles, — the death of a male- 
factor and a slave. The government and the people 
combined against him who had come to save them. 
His own disciples forsook him; Peter denied him; 
Judas, under the inspiration of the devil, betrayed 
him ; the rulers of the nation condemned him ; 
rude soldiers mocked him ; the furious mob cried, 
"Crucify him!" He was seized in the night, 
hurried from tribunal to tribunal, arrayed in a 
crown of thorns, insulted, smitten, scourged, spit 
upon, compelled to carry his own cross, and nailed 
to the accursed tree between two robbers and mur- 
derers ! 

How did Christ bear all these little and great 
trials of life, and the death on the cross ? 

Let us remember first, that, unlike the icy 
Stoics in their unnatural and repulsive pseudo- 
virtue, he had the keenest sensibilities and the 
deepest sympathies with all human grief, that 
made him shed tears at the grave of a friend and 
in the ' agony of the garden, and provide a refuge 
for his mother in the last dying hour. But with 
this touching tenderness and delicacy of feeling he 
ever combined a serene dignity, a sublime self-con- 
trol, and imperturbable calmness of mind. There 
is a commanding grandeur and majesty in his 



72 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

deepest sufferings, which forbid a feeling of pity 
and compassion as incompatible with the defe- 
rence for his character. We feel the force of 
his words to the women of Jerusalem, when they 
bewailed him on the way to Calvary: "Weep 
not for me, but weep for yourselves and your 
children." 

He clearly foresaw, and repeatedly foretold his 
passion to his disciples. 

But he never murmured, — never uttered dis- 
content, displeasure, or resentment. He was never 
disheartened, ruffled, or fretted, but full of confi- 
dence that all was well ordered in the providence 
of his heavenly Father. His calmness . in the 
tempest on the lake, when his disciples were trem- 
bling on the brink of destruction and despair, is 
an illustration of his heavenly frame of mind. 
All his works were performed with a quiet dignity 
and ease that contrast strikingly with the sur- 
rounding commotion and excitement. He never 
asked the favour, or heard the applause, or feared 
the threat, of the world. He moved serenely, like 
the sun, above the clouds of human passions and 
trials and commotions as they sailed under him. 
He was ever surrounded with the element of peace, 
even in his parting hour in that dark and solemn 
night, when he said to his disturbed disciples : 
"Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto 



HIS PASSION AND CRUCIFIXION. 73 

you; not as the world giveth give I unto you. 
Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be 
afraid" (John 14: 27). He was never what we 
call unhappy, but full of inward joy, which he be- 
queathed to his disciples in that sublimest of all 
prayers, " that they might have his joy fulfilled in 
themselves " (John 17: 13; comp. 16: 33). With 
all his severe rebuke to the Pharisees, he never 
indulged in personalities. He ever returned good 
for evil. He forgave Peter for his denial; and 
would have forgiven Judas, if, in the exercise of 
sincere repentance, he had sought his pardon. 
Even while hanging on the cross, he had only the 
language of pity for the wretches who were driv- 
ing the nails into his hands and feet ; and prayed 
in their behalf : " Father, forgive them ; for they 
know not what they do." He did not seek or 
hasten his martyrdom, like many of the early 
martyrs of the Ignatian type, in their morbid en- 
thusiasm and ambitious humility, but quietly and 
patiently waited for the hour appointed by the 
will of his heavenly Father. 

But, when the hour came, with what self- 
possession and calmness, with what strength and 
meekness, with what majesty and gentleness, did 
he pass through its dark and trying scenes ! A 
prisoner before Pilate, who represented the power 
of the Eoman Empire, he professes himself a king 



74 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

of truth, and makes the governor tremble before 
him (John i8 : 37 ; Matt. 27 : 19, 24). Charged 
with crime at the tribunal of the high-priest, he 
speaks to him with the majesty and dignity of 
the Judge of the world (Matt. 26: 64); and in 
the agony of death on the cross he dispenses a 
place in paradise to the penitent robber (Luke 22 : 
43). In the history of the passion, every word 
and act are significant ; from the agony in Geth- 
semane, when overwhelmed with the sympathetic 
sense of the guilt of mankind, and in full view of 
the terrible scenes before him, — the only guiltless 
being in the world, — he prayed that the cup might 
pass from him, but immediately added : " Not my, 
but thy, will be done," to the triumphant excla- 
mation on the cross : " It is finished ! " Even his 
dignified silence before the tribunal of his enemies 
and the ^ furious mob, when, " as a lamb dumb 
before his shearers, he opened not his mouth," 
is more eloquent than any apology. Who will 
venture to bring a parallel from the annals of 
ancient or modern sages ? Even a Eousseau con- 
fessed : " If Socrates suffered and died like a philo- 
sopher, Christ suffered and died like a God." *^ 

The nearer we approach to them, the more we 
feel that the sufferings of Christ are unlike any 
other suffering; that he died the just for the un- 
just, the Holy One for sinners ; and washed out 



HIS PASSION AND CRUCIFIXION. 75 

with his blood the guilt of a fallen world. We 
bow down and adore the atoning sacrifice of bound- 
less love. The mere idea of a divine - human 
Redeemer of the race from the thraldom of sin 
and death, is surpassingly sublime and irresistibly- 
attractive : how much more the actual reality ! 
It is, indeed, a mystery which we cannot fully 
grasp; but a mystery so palpably divine and 
heavenly in its origin and character, so blessed 
in its effects, that head and heart are constrained 
to bow in adoration and praise, and are filled with 
gratitude and joy. The passion and crucifixion of 
Jesus, like his whole character, stand without a 
parallel, solitary and alone in their glory, and will 
ever continue to be what they have been for these 
eighteen hundred years to the noblest and best of 
men, — the sacred theme of meditation, the exem- 
plar of suffering virtue, the weapon against sin and 
Satan, the stimulus to gratitude and holiness, the 
source of comfort and peace. 



( 1^ ) 



SUMMARY. 



CHRIST S CHARACTER THE GREATEST 
MORAL MIR A CLE OF HISTOR K 

Such was the Jesus of Nazareth, — a true man in 
body, soul, and spuit, yet differing from all men ; 
a character unique and original from tender child- 
hood to ripe manhood, moving in unbroken union 
with God, overflowing with love to man, free from 
every sin and error, innocent and holy, devoted to 
the noblest ends, teaching and practising aU virtues 
in perfect harmony, sealing the purest life with 
the sublimest death, and ever acknowledged since 
as the one and only perfect model of goodness and 
holiness. All human greatness loses on closer in- 
spection ; but Christ's character grows more pure, 
sacred, and lovely, the better we know him. The 
whole range of history and fiction furnishes no par- 
allel to it. There never was any approach to it, be- 
fore or since, except in faint imitation of his example. 
When the gifted Herder was requested by Lavater 



SUMMAKY. 77 

to write the life of Jesus, he replied : " I to write 
the life of Jesus ? Never ! The Evangelists have 
done it as alone it can and ought to he tvritten." 
Whoever attempts, in the proper spirit, this most 
diflSicult task of history, will lay down his pen 
discouraged, and subscribe to the concluding 
confession of Pressens^ : " Gladly, thou divine Son 
of Mary, had I said something great of thee. 
At times I thought I saw, in the flashing light 
of a blessed hour, thy divine majesty adorned in 
spotless purity ; but as I was about to fix the holy 
vision, the pencil trembled in my unskilled hand, 
and I could give only a pale outline. Who are 
we that attempt to describe thy holiness I" 

No biographer, inoralist, or artist can here do 
justice to the reality. The actual character of 
Jesus is felt to be far greater than any concep- 
tion and representation of it by the mind, the 
tongue, or the pencil of man. We might as well 
attempt to empty the waters of the boundless sea 
into a bucket, or to portray the splendour of the 
risen sun and the starry heavens with ink. No 
picture of the Saviour, though drawn by the 
master hand of a Eaphael or Diirer or Eubens ; 
no epic, though conceived by the genius of a 
Dante or Milton, — can improve on the artless nar- 
rative of the Gospels, whose only but all-powerful 
charm is truth. In this case, certainly, truth is 



78 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

stranger than fiction, and speaks best for itself 
without comment, explanation, or eulogy. Here, 
and here alone, the perfection of art falls short 
of the historical fact, and fancy finds no room for 
idealising the real ; for here we have the absolute 
ideal itself in living reality. It seems to me that 
this consideration alone should satisfy a reflecting 
mind that Christ^s character, though truly natural 
and human, rises far above the proportions of 
humanity, even in its purest and greatest repre- 
sentatives. 

This conviction has forced itself upon many of 
the strongest intellects, among sceptics and men of 
the world, in proportion as they allowed themselves 
to yield to the light of truth and the power of facts. 
Jean Jacques Eousseau, one of the leaders of French 
infidelity in the eighteenth century, admitted that 
there could be no comparison between Socrates 
and Christ; as little as between a sage and a 
God. Napoleon, though a stranger to Christian 
experience, saw with his keen eagle-eye that Christ 
was more than man ; and that, once admitting his 
divinity, the Christian system becomes as clear 
and precise as a problem of algebra. His remark- 
able utterances on this subject at St. Helena may 
have been somewhat modified and expanded, but 
bear the unmistakable evidence of the Napoleonic 
grasp and style. Goethe, the most universal, but 



SUMMARY. 79 

at the same time the most worldly, of modem poets, 
caUs Christ '"the Divine Man," "the Holy One," 
and represents him as the pattern and model of 
humanity. Jean Paul Frederick Eichter, another 
great German poet, represents Jesus of Nazareth 
as " the purest among the mighty, the mightiest 
among the pure, who with his pierced hand has 
raised empires from their foundations, turned the 
stream of history from its old channel, and still 
continues to rule and guide the ages." *^ Thomas 
Carlyle, the British hero-worshipper, finds none 
equal to Jesus in all the range of ancient and 
modern heroism. He call his life a "perfect 
ideal poem," and him "the greatest of all 
heroes," whom he does not name, leaving " sacred 
silence to meditate that sacred matter." Ernest 
Eenan, the famous orientalist and critic, who 
expels all miracles from the gospel-history, feels 
yet constrained to call Jesus " a man of colossal 
dimensions;" "the incomparable man, to whom 
the universal conscience has decreed the title of 
Son of Gody and that with justice, since he caused 
religion to take a step in advance incomparably 
greater than any other in the past, and probably 
than any yd to come ;*' and he closes his "Zife of 
Jesus " with the remarkable concession : " Whatever 
may be the surprises of the future, Jes2is will never 
he surpassed. His worship will grow young with- 






» 



80 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

out ceasing; his legend will call forth tears 
without end ; his suflferings will melt * the noblest 
hearts; all ages will proclaim, that, among the 
sons of men, there is none born greater than 
Jesus." *^ Dr. Baur, the master of the Tubingen 
school and the ablest of sceptical critics, after 
the earnest investigations of a long and intensely 
studious life, came to the conclusion at last that 
the person of Christ remains a great mystery in 
history ; and that, at all events, the whole world- 
historical significance of Christianity hangs on his 
person.*® 

Yes-: Christ's person is, indeed, a great but 
blessed mystery. It cannot be explained on 
purely humanitarian principles, nor derived from 
any intellectual and moral forces of the age in 
which he lived. On the contrary, it stands in 
marked contrast to the whole surrounding world 
of Judaism and Heathenism, which presents to us 
the dreary picture of internal decay, and which 
actually crumbled into ruin before the new moral 
creation of the crucified Jesus of Nazareth. He 
is the one absolute exception to the universal 
experience of mankind. He is the central miracle 
of the whole gospel-history. All his miracles are 
but the natural manifestations of his person, and 
hence they were performed with the same ease 
with which we perform our ordinary daily works. 



•.•■fc 



SmiMAEY. 8 1 



i.V 



In ttie Gospel of St. John, they are simply and 
justly called his "works." It would be the 
greatest miracle indeed, if He, who is a miracle 
himself, should have performed no miracles. 

Here is just the logical inconsistency of those 
unbelievers whot admit the extraordinary character 
. of Christ's person, and yet deny his extraordinary 
works. They admit a cause without a correspond- 
ing effect, and involve the person in conflict with 
his works, or the works with the person. You 
may as well expect the sun to send forth dark- 
ness as to expect ordinary works from such an 
tirtraordinary being. The person of Christ accounts 
for all the wonderful phenomena in his history, as 
a sufl&cient cause for the effect. Such a power as 
he possessed over the soul, and still exercises from 
day to day throughout Christendom, — why should 
it not extend also over the lesser sphere of the 
body ? What was it for him, who is spiritually the 
Eesurrection and the Life of the race, to call forth 
a corpse from the grave ? Could such a heavenly 
life and heavenly death as his end in any other 
way than in absolute triumph over death, and in 
ascension to heaven, its proper origin and home ? 

The supernatural and miraculous element in 
Christ, let it be borne in mind, was not a borrowed 
gift or an occasional manifestation, as we find it 
among the prophets and apostles, but an inherent 



82 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

power in constant silent or public exercise. An 
inward virtue dwelt in his person, and went forth 
from him, so that even the fringe of his garment 
was healing to the touch through the medium of 
faith, which is the bond of union between him and 
the soul. He was the true Shekinah, and shone 
in all his glory, not before the multitude or the 
unbelieving Pharisees and scribes, but when he 
was alone with his Father, or when he walked in 
the dark night over the waves of the sea, calming 
the storm of nature and strengthening the faith of 
his timid disciples, or when he stood, before, his 
favourite three, between Moses and Elijah, on the 
mount of transfiguration. 

Thus from every direction we arrive at the 
conclusion, that Christ, though truly natural and 
human, was at the same time truly supernatural 
and divine. The wonderful character of his per- 
son forces upon us the admission of the indwelling 
' of the Divinity in him, as the only rational and 
satisfactory explanation of this mysterious fact 
And this is the explanation which he gives him- 
self. 



I 



C 83 ) 



CHRIST S OWN TESTIMONY CON- 
CERNING HIMSELF. 

There is but one rational explanation of this sub- 
lime mystery ; and this is found in Christ's own 
testimony concerning his superhuman and divine 
origin and character ** 

This testimony challenges at once our highest 
regard and belief from the absolute veracity which 
no one ever denied him, or could deny, without 
destroying at once the very foundation of his 
moral purity and greatness. 

Christ strongly asserts his humanity, and calls 
himself, about eighty times in the Gospels, the Son 
of man,^ This expression, while it places him in 
one view on common ground with us as flesh of 
our flesh and bone of our bone, already indicates 
at the same time that he is more than an ordinary 
individual, — not merely a son of man like all 
other descendants of Adam, but the Son of man; 
the Man in the highest sense; the ideal, the 
universal, the absolute Man; the second Adam, 
descended from heaven ; the Head of a new and 



84 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

superior order of the race, the King of Israel, and 
the Messiah for Jews and Gentiles.^^ It is more 
comprehensive than the term, " the Son of David," 
which is likewise given to Christ as the promised 
Messiah, with special reference to the Jews/^ 

The appellation the Son of man does not express, 
then, as many suppose, the humiliation and conde- 
scension of Christ simply, but his elevation rather 
above the ordinary level, and the actualisation, in 
him and through him, of the ideal standard of human 
nature under its moral and religious aspect, or in 
its relation to God. He is the centre of the unity 
of mankind, — the " recapitulation " of humanity, 
to use a term of Irenaeus. He is the true seed of 
the woman, the second Adam, who was to restore 
what the first Adam lost. He fulfils and closes the 
preceding, and opens and controls the succeeding, 
history of our race. All men, even the best and the 
greatest, have their weaknesses and defects, and re- 
flect only a fragment of the idea of humanity. Once 
in history, and once only, there was born a man 
who represented humanity in its purity without the 
Satanic adulteration of sin, and in its universality 
without the limitations of nationality and age. 
Christ felt more humanly, spake more humanly, 
acted, suffered, and died more humanly, than any 
man before or since his coming. Every word and 
act of his appeals to universal human sympathies, 



HIS TESTIMONY CONCERNING HIMSELF. 85 

and calls out the moral aflfections of all without dis- 
tinction of race, condition, and culture. He is the 
archetypal or model Man, the King of men. He 
" draws all men " to him. He could not have been 
so perfect a man without being also divine. . 

This interpretation of the title "the Son of 
Man " is supported grammatically by the use of the 
definite article, and historically by the origin of the 
term (according to the usual acceptation) in Dan. 
7: 13, 14, where it signifies the Messiah as the 
head of a universal and eternal kingdom. In the 
eighth Psalm, which is regarded as Messianic, man 
is represented in his ideal destination with refer- 
ence to the Messiah as the true head of humanity 
(comp. Eom. 5 : 1 2 ; i Cor. 15:7; Heb. i : 2-8). 
In the Syriac, the Saviour's native dialect. Bar 
Twsho, the Son of Man, means man generically ; the 
filial part of the compound denotes the identity 
and purity of the generic idea. 

This view commends itself, moreover, at once as 
the most natural and significant, in such passages 
as, " Ye shall see the heavens open, and the angels 
of God ascending and descending upon the Son of 
man" (John i : 51); "He that came down from 
heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven " 
(John 3 : 13); " The Son of man hath power to 
forgive sins " (Matt. 9:6; Mark 2 : 10); " The 
Son of man is Lord even of the Sabbath-day" 



86 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

(Matt. 12:8; Mark 2 : 28) ; "Except ye eat the 
flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye 
have no life in you " (John 6 : 53); " The Son of 
man shall come in the glory of his Father;"*^ 
" The^Son of man is come to save " (Matt. 18: 1 1 ; 
comp. Luke 19: 10); "The Father hath given 
him authority to execute judgment also, because 
he is the Son of man " (John 5 : 27). Even those 
passages which are quoted for the opposite view, 
receive, in our interpretation, a greater force and 
beauty from the sublime contrast which places the 
voluntary condescension and humiliation of Christ 
in the most striking light, as when he says : " Foxes 
have holes, and birds of the air have nests, but 
the Son of man hath not where to lay his head " 
(Luke 9: 58); or, "Whosoever will be chief 
among you, let him be your servant ; even as the 
Son of man came not to be ministered unto, but 
to minister, and to give his life a ransom for 
many" (Matt. 20: 27, 28). 

Thus the manhood of Christ, rising far above all 
ordinary manhood, though freely coming down to its 
lowest ranks with a view to their elevation and 
redemption, is already the portal of his Godhood. 

But he calls himself at the same time, and he 
is most frequently called by his disciples, the Son 
of God, in an equally emphatic sense. He is not 
merely a son of God among others, — angels, arch- 



HIS TESTIMONY CONCEKNING HIMSELF. 8/ 

angels, princes, judges, and redeemed men,— but 
the Son of God as no other being ever was, is, 
or can be; aU others being sons or children of 
God only by derivation or adoption, after a new 
spiritual birth, and in dependence on his absolute 
and eternal Sonship." Bte is, as his favourite 
disciple calls him, the only-legotten Son, or, as the 
old Catholic theology expresses it, "eternally be- 
gotten of the substance of the Father." In this 
high sense the title is freely given to him by his 
disciples,^ without a remonstrance on his part; 
and by God the Father himself at his baptism and 
at the transfiguration.^ It is significant, too, that, 
while he directs us to address God as " our Father," 
he himself always addresses him : "My Father," or 
" Father " simply, because he sustains a peculiar 
relation to him far above the level of human chil- 
dren of God, who are made such only by regenera- 
tion and adoption. 

Christ founds his whole doctrine and kingdom 
on his own person. His divine-human person is 
his constant theme, his cause. He is himself the 
impersonation of the gospel He makes the 
highest claims without the remotest sense of pride 
or ambition or vanity, but with the simplicity and 
authority of self-evident truth. Hence his words 
have such an overwhelming power over the hearts. 
" Verily, verily, I say unto you." So God speaks in 



88 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

the Old Testament, but no man. " If ye believe not 
that I am he, ye shall die in your sins " (John 8 : 
24). What a majesty is implied in this declaration ! 
Christ represents himself constantly as being 
" not of this world," but " sent from God," as 
having " come from God," and as " being in 
heaven," while living on earth (John 3 : 13). 
He not only announces and proclaims the truth 
as other messengers of God, but declares himself 
to be " the Light of the World " (John 8 : 12); 
" the Way, the Truth, and the Life " (John 1 4 : 
6) ; " the Eesurrection and the Life " (John 1 1 : 
25). "All things," he says, "are delivered unto 
me of my Father ; and no man knoweth the Son 
but the Father ; neither knoweth any man the 
Father save the Son, and he to whomsoever the 
Son will reveal him." *^ He invites the weary and 
heavy-laden to come to him for rest and peace 
(Matt. II : 28); he promises life in the highest 
sense, even eternal life, to every one who believes 
in him ; ^ he claims and admits himself to be the 
Christ, or the Messiah, of whom Moses and the 
prophets of old testify, and the King of Israel.^^ 
When, in view of his approaching death, and 
under a solemn appeal to the living God, he was 
challenged by the Jewish high priest, in the name 
of the venerable though corrupt theocracy, with 
the question : '^ Art thou the Christ (the promised 



HIS TESTIMONY CONCERNING fflMSELP. 89 

Messiah), the Son of God ? " he calmly and 
deliberately answered in the afl&rmative, and 
I>ointed him to his glorious return in the clouds 
of heaven ; thus proclaiming himself, in the 
moment of the deepest humiliation and in the 
face of the apparent triumph of the powers of 
darkness, the God - like Euler and Judge of 
mankind ! ^ 

The only choice here is between a truly divine 
man and a mad blasphemer. The high priest 
understood the meaning of this solemn aflSrmation 
better than many modem writers: he rent his 
sacerdotal garment, and exclaimed in indignation 
and horror : " Thou hast spoken blasphemy ! " 

Jesus, moreover, repeatedly represents himself 
as the Lawgiver of the new and last dispensation 
(Matt. 5: 22-24; 28: 19, 20); as the Founder 
of a spiritual kingdom co-extensive with the race, 
and everlasting as eternity itself; *^ as the appointed 
Judge of the quick and the dead ; ^ as the only 
Mediator between God and man ; as the Saviour 
of the world.^ He parts from his disciples with 
these sublime words : " All power is given to me 
in heaven and in earth. Go ye, therefore, and 
teach all nations, baptising them in the name of 
the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy 
Ghost ; teaching them to observe all things what- 
soever I have commanded you*. %iiflL^Vi^\ ^ss^^^r&a^ 



90 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

you alway, even to the end of the world " (Matt. 
28: 18-20). 

Here he claims such a relation to the eternal 
Father and the Holy Spirit as implies both the 
equality of substance and the distinction of person, 
and leads with logical necessity to the doctrine of 
the Holy Trinity. For this doctrine alone saves 
the divinity of Christ and of the Holy Spirit, with- 
out affecting the fundamental truth of the Unity 
of the Godhead; and keeps the proper medium 
between an abstract and lifeless monotheism and 
a polytheistic tritheism. 

Christ always distinguishes himself from God 
the Father, who sent him, whose works he came 
to fulfil, whose will he obeys, by whose power 
he performs his miracles, to whom he prays, and 
with whom he communes, as a self - conscious 
personal being. And so he distinguishes himself 
with equal clearness from the Holy Spirit, whom 
he received at his baptism, whom he breathed 
into his disciples, and whom he promised to send 
and did send on them as the other Paraclete or 
Advocate, as the Spirit of truth and holiness, with 
the whole fulness of the accomplished salvation. 
But he never makes a similar distinction between 
himself and the Son of God ; on the contrary, he 
identifies himself with the Son of God, and uses 
this term, as already remarked, in a sense which 



HIS TESTmOXY COXCERNIXG HIMSELF. pi 

implies much more than the Jewish conception of 
the Messiah, and nothing short of the equality of 
essence or substance. 

For he claims, as the Son of God, a real, self- 
conscious pre-existence before man, and even before 
the world : consequently, also, before time ; for time 
was created with the world.^ Hence the Arian 
notion of a temporal pre-existence of Christ is 
metaphysically untenable. It assumes a creature 
to have existed before the creation, and a finite 
being to have begun existence before time. Be- 
fore the act of creation, there was nothing but God 
and eternity. Time is the necessary form under 
which the world exists successively, as space is 
the form under which all material substances exist 
simultaneously. Time, before the world, could 
only have referred to Grod, who does not exist in 
time, but in eternity. " Before Abraham vxzs lom^ 
or hegan to he, says Christ, " I am ; " significantly 
using two distinct verbs, and the past tense in the 
one and the present in the other case, to mark the 
difference between man's temporal and his own 
eternal mode of existence.** In the sacerdotal prayer, 
he asks to be clothed again with the glory which 
he had with the Father before the foundation of the 
world.^ He assumes divine names and attributes 
as far as consistent with his state of humiliation ; 
he demands and receives divine honours (JohiL c^\ 




92 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

23); he freely and repeatedly exercises the pre- 
rogative of pardoning sin in his own name, which 
the unbelieving scribes and Pharisees, with a logic 
whose force is irresistible on their premises, looked 
upon as blasphemous presumption ; ^^ he familiarly 
classes himself with the infinite Jehovah in one 
common plural, and boldly declares : " He that 
hath seen me hath seen the Father " (John 1 4 : 
9) ; "I and the Father are one " (John 10 : 30).^ 
He co-ordinates himself, in the baptismal formula, 
as we have seen, with the Divine Father, and the 
Divine Spirit (Matt. 28 : 19) ; and allows himself 
to be called by Thomas, in the name of all the 
Apostles, "Lord and God" (John 20: 28). 

These are the most astounding and transcendent 
pretensions ever set up by any being. He, the 
humblest and lowliest of men, makes them repeat- 
edly and uniformly to the last, in the face of the 
whole world, — even in the darkest hour of suffer- 
ing. He makes them, not in swelling, pompous, 
ostentatious language, which almost necessarily 
springs from false pretensions, but in a natural, 
spontaneous style, with perfect ease, freedom, and 
composure, as a native prince would speak of the 
attributes and scenes of royalty at his father's 
court. He never falters or doubts, never apologises 
for them, never enters into an explanation: he 
seta them forth as self-evident truths, which need 



HIS TESTIMONY CONCERNING HIMSELF. 93 

only be stated to challenge the belief and submis- 
sion of mankind. 

Now, suppose for a moment a purely human 
teacher, however great and good ; suppose a Moses 
or Elijah, a John the Baptist, an Apostle Paul, or 
John, — not to speak of any uninspired teacher, — 
to say : " I am the Light of the World ; " "I am 
the Way, the Truth, and the Life ; " " I and the 
Father are one ; " and to call upon all men, " Come 
unto me ; " '* Follow me,'* that you may find " life " 
and " peace," which cannot be found elsewhere : 
would it not create a universal feeling of pity or 
indignation ? No human being on earth could set 
up the least of these pretensions, without being set 
down at once as a madman or a blasphemer.^^ 

But from the mouth of Christ these colossal 
pretensions excite neither pity nor indignation, 
nor even the least feeling of incongruity or impro- 
priety. We read and hear them over and over again 
without surprise.^^ They seem perfectly natural, 
and well sustained by the most extraordinary life 
and the most extraordinary works. There is no 
room here for the least suspicion of vanity, pride, 
or self-deception. For these eighteen hundred, 
years, these claims have been acknowledged by 
nullions of people of all classes and conditions, the 
most learned as well as the most ignorant, with 
an instinctive sense of the perfect a^Q.^xas3c^ ^ 



94 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

what Christ claimed to be with what he really 
was. 

Is not this fact most remarkable ? Is it not a 
triumphant vindication of Christ's claims ? And 
can we deny the truth, and refuse to acknowledge 
his divinity, without destroying his veracity, and 
overthrowing the very foundation of his moral 
goodness and purity, which is universally acknow- 
ledged even by heretics and unbelievers ? If he, the 
wisest, the best, the holiest of men, the greatest 
teacher and benefactor of the race, — acknowledged 
as such by the common consent of the civilised 
world, — declares himself one with the Father, and 
so identifies himself in will and aim, in essence and 
attributes, with the infinite God, to an extent and 
in a sense as no man or angel or archangel could 
do for a moment, without blasphemy or insanity, 
and if he receives the divine adoration from his 

m 

own disciples, how can we, in logical consistency, 
as well as in harmony with the moral and religious 
instincts of our nature, refuse to fall down before 
him, and, with Thomas, to exclaim from the depths 
of our soul : " My Lord and my God " f^ 

This is the *' testimonium animce naturaliter 

Christiance," to use a celebrated expression of Ter- 

tullian. It is the testimony of the soul which is 

originally made for Christ, and longs for him, and 

^jads no satisfaction at its infinite desires for truth. 



HIS TESTIMONY CONCEKNING HIMSELF. 95 

beauty, and goodness, until it believes in Christ 
who is the Way, the Truth, and the Life, the 
divine Man and the incarnate God in one un- 
divided person for ever. 



C 96 ) 



EXAMINA TION OF FALSE THEORIES. 

THE DEKIAX OF MIBACLES. 

There is no other solution of the mighty problem 
within the reach of human learning and ingenuity, 
to th. one given by Chmt M«i,f. 

The infidel and semi-infidel theories of Christ's 
person substitute an unnatural wonder and moral 
monstrosity in the place of the supernatural 
miracle which they endeavour to escape. 

Hume says, in his famous "Essay on Miracles " : 
"When anyone teUs me that he saw a dead 
man restored to life, I immediately consider with 
myself, whether it be more probable that this 
person should either deceive or be deceived, or 
that the fact he relates should reaUy have hap- 
pened. I weigh the one miracle against the 
other ; and, according to the superiority which I 
discover, I pronounce my decision, and always 
reject the greater miracle. lif the falsehood of 
his testimony would be more miraculous than 
the event which he relates, then, and not tQl 
tlieii, can he pretend to demand my belief or 



THE FALSE THEORIES. 9/ 

opinion." We need not fear this test, and can 
turn it in our case against Home and against 
every doubter of the great miracle of Christ's 
person. 

The life of Christ was not spent in an obscure 
comer (Acts 26 : 26), but before the eyes of 
the people, before Pharisees and Sadducees, before 
Herod and Pilate, before Jews and Eomans, before 
friends and foes, in Galilee, Samaria, and Judea. 
His history was openly proclaimed again and 
again by eyewitnesses and their pupils before 
the people and the Sanhedrim, from Jerusalem 
to Eome. It was believed by thousands of con- 
temporary Jews and Gentiles, in spite of bitter 
persecution and death. It was sealed by the 
martyrdom of Apostles, Evangelists, and Christians 
of every grade of society. It is better attested by 
external and internal evidence than any history 
in the world. 

The contemporaries of Jesus, his enemies as 
well as his friends, believed in his power of 
miracles, with this difference : that the one traced 
it to Satan, the other to God. Is it credible that 
John the Baptist, of whom no miracles are re- 
corded, the twelve Apostles, the seventy disciples, 
the learned and clear-headed Paul, the Evangelists, 
Nicodemus, the hostile Pharisees and Sadducees, 
the Sanhedrim, and the common people in. J^tcl- 



98 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

salem and the villages of Galilee who witnessed 
his mighty works, should all have been radically 
mistaken ? Had they not eyes and ears, and 
commonsense as well as we ? Is there a more 
palpable example of obvious honesty and truth- 
fulness in literature than the pages of the canon- 
ical Gospels and Epistles? The disciples were 
by no means over-credulous. Thomas was de- 
cidedly sceptical ; the rest are often censured for 
their want of faith, and it was only after the 
resurrection that they reached the full measure 
of faith. The unbelieving Pharisees and Sadducees 
had every motive to deny the miracles of Jesus, 
but they could not do it without contradicting 
the testimony of their senses. No miracles are 
recorded during the thirty years before he entered 
on his public ministry. This silence is very sig- 
nificant, and an indirect argument for the truth- 
fulness of the canonical, as compared with the 
apocryphal, gospels. He exercised the power of 
miracles sparingly; he never obtruded them on any- 
bodjr ; he made no display ; he never sought gain 
or honour. His miracles were, without exception, 
prompted by the purest motives and aimed at the 
glory of God and the benefit of men ; they are 
miracles of love and mercy, full of instruction and 
significance, and in harmony with his character 
and mission. 



THE FALSE THEORIES. 99 

The historical evidence and the internal char- 
acter of the miracles are entirely in their favour. 
To reject them imposes upon us the incredible 
belief that a whole generation of friends and foes 
were radically mistaken in a matter of common 
experience. 

But we are told that miracles are impossible. 
This is an a priori assumption and pseudo-philo- 
sophical prejudice, in the face of the apostolic age, 
the whole Bible, and the common belief of man- 
kind in aU ages. It is an unproved dogma turned 
against facts. It proceeds from a pantheistic or 
materialistic philosophy which, as Bacon says, 
leads away from God, while true philosophy leads 
back to him. If we believe in a personal God, the 
Maker and Euler of the world, we shaU find no diffi- 
culty in miracles. The act of creation is the first 
and greatest miracle, which no reasonable man can 
deny, any more than the fact of his own birth, and 
which, nevertheless, no philosopher can understand 
or explain. This world and the life in it must have 
had a beginning. Cuvier says: "Life has jiot 
always been on earth, and it is possible to fix the 
time when it originated." Agassiz and other natu- 
ralists are of the same opinion. Geology and biology 
prove the gradual growth and development of earth 
and its inhabitants. The theory of progressive 
development itself necessarily leads haxik ta ^. 



100 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

beginning; and tliis cannot be found in nothing 
(for ex nihUo nihil fit), nor in dead matter which 
could never produce mind, but only in the creative 
will of an infinite intelligence working on a plan 
of infinite wisdom. The same Almighty power 
which called heaven and earth and man into 
being, still controls and directs the laws of nature 
and of history. These laws are not iron chains 
by which their author has bound himself hand 
and foot, but elastic cords, rather, which he can 
expand or contract at his sovereign will. 

It is incorrect to say that miracles are sus- 
pensions or violations of the unchangeable laws 
of nature, and therefore impossible. True miracles 
are above nature, not against nature, as revelation 
is above reason, not against reason. They are a 
manifestation of a higher law, to which the lower 
laws must obey. We find in nature itself one 
kingdom ruling over the other, the animal over 
the vegetable, and man over both. In man, again, 
the mind rules over the body. Man is super- 
natural as compared with the lower nature ; and 
the mind is a miracle as compared with the body. 
If we raise our arm in obedience to our will, the 
law of gravity is held in temporary abeyance, or 
subordinated to the higher law of free action, but 
not abrogated or discontinued. Every virtue is a 
victoiy over nature, though not a suspension or 



THE FALSE THEORIES. 10 1 

annihilation of it. If a man can act upon nature 
from without and control it, why not much more 
God, the independent Lord of creation ? The con- 
trol of nature by the will of man is no miracle, in 
the proper sense of the term, but it involves all the 
speculative difficulties which are urged against it by 
materialists and atheists. Eeasoning from analogy, 
we have a right to ascend to a higher sphereJ^ 

The belief in the supernatural and miraculous, 
far from being a signiof intellectual weakness, has 
been held by the greatest minds in all ages and 
nations. It is only since the last century that the 
opposite tendency has set in, but philosophy itself 
wiU return from materialism and atheism, which 
explain nothing, to Christian theism which alone 
accounts for the problem of the world, by tracing 
the effect to a satisfactory cause. 

To return to the life of Christ, the presumption 
is altogether in favour of his having performed 
extraordinary works in correspondence with his 
extraordinary person. If he really towers so high 
above other mortals as we have seen, and as is 
generally admitted even by unbelievers, we must 
expect from him deeds which equally rise above 
the ordinary leveL To believe in his miraculous 
person is to believe in his miraculous works. To 
do the former without the latter is a palpable 
inconsistency. 



» 



102 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

We shall now examine in detail the infidel 
theories of the life and Character of Christ. They 
may be reduced to three : the hypothesis of Im- 
posture, the hypothesis of Enthusiasm, and the 
hypothesis of Poetic Fiction. In other words, the 
gospel story is either a conscious lie, or a self- 
delusion, or* a poem. In each of the three cases 
the result may be traced either to Christ himself or 
to his disciples. The former method is more ofifen- 
fiive, but more logical; the latter makes the Apostles 
the real authors of Christianity, which is absurd. 
The three hypotheses exhaust the possibilities of 
the case, but they admit of various modifications 
and partly run into each other. They agree in 
rejecting the truth of the supernatural and divine 
in Christ's character, but otherwise they widely 
differ and refute each other. The theory of im- 
posture is the oldest and the most revolting ; the 
theory of poetic fiction is the latest and most in- 
genious, but is logically forced back to the former, 
from which it professed at first to shrink in moral 
indignation ; the theory of enthusiasm occupies an 
untenable middle-ground. Hence the alternative 
remains as at first. Christ is either an impostor 
and blasphemer who wrought miracles by Beel- 
zebub, and was justly crucified by the Jews, or he 
is the Son of the living God and Saviour, and 
rightly irorshipped by the Christian Church. 



THE FALSE THEORIES. IO3 



I. — The Hypothesis of Imposture. 

The hypothesis of imposture is so revolting to 
moral as well as common sense, that its mere 
statement is its condemnation. It was invented by 
the Jews who crucified the Lord to cover their crime, 
but has never been seriously carried out, and no 
scholar of any decency and self-respect would now 
dare to profess it openly.'* How, in the name 
of logic, common sense, and experience, could an 
impostor — that is, a deceitful, selfish, depraved man 
— have invented, and consistently maintained from 
beginning to end, the purest and noblest character 
known in history with the most perfect air of 
truth and reality ? How could he have conceived 
and successfully carried out a plan of unparalleled 
beneficence, moral magnitude, and sublimity, and 
sacrificed his own life for it, in the face of the 
strongest prejudices of his people and age ? 

The difficulty is not much lessened by shifting 
the charge of fraud from Christ to his disciples, who 
were said by the lying Sanhedrim to have stolen 
his body and thus humbugged the world (Matt. 
28 : 13). But the Apostles and Evangelists were 
anything but designing hypocrites and deceivers, and 
leave upon every reader the impression of aiL ostilssak 



104 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

simplicity and honesty rarely equalled and never 
surpassed by any writers, learned or unlearned, of 
ancient or modem times. What imaginable motive 
could have induced them to engage in such a wicked 
scheme, when they knew that the whole world 
would persecute them even to death ? How could 
they have formed and sustained a conspiracy for 
such a purpose, without ever falling out, or betray- 
ing themselves by some inconsistent word or act ? 
And who can seriously believe for a moment 
that the Christian Church for these eighteen 
hundred years, now embracing nearly the whole 
civiKsed world, and among them the strongest 
intellects and the noblest hearts — divines, philo- 
sophers, poets, orators, statesmen, and benefactors of 
the race — could have been duped and fooled by 
a Galilean carpenter, or by a dozen illiterate fisher- 
men? Verily, this lowest form of infidelity is 
the grossest insult to all sound reason and sense, 
and to the dignity of human nature. 

n. — The Theory of Enthusiasm or Self- 

Deception. 

(l.) Christ himself was deceived. 

The hypothesis of enthusiasm or self-deception, 

though less disreputable, is equally unreasonable, 

in view of the uniform clearness, calmness, self- 



THE FALSE THEORIES. IO5 

possession, humility, dignity, and patience of 
Christ, — quaKties the very opposite of those which 
characterise an enthusiast. We might imagine a 
Jew of that age to have fancied himself the 
Messiah and the Son of God; but instead of 
opposing all the popular notions, and discourag- 
ing all the temporal hopes of his countrymen, he 
would, like Barcokeba of a later period, have 
headed a rebellion against the hated tyranny of 
the Eomans, and endeavoured to establish a 
temporal kiqgdom. Enthusiasm, which in this case 
must have bordered on madness itself, instead of 
calmly and patiently bearing tHe malignant opposi- 
tion of the leaders of the nation, would have broken 
out in violent passion and precipitate action. 

Christ's intellect is truly marvellous. He never 
erred in his judgment of men and things ; he was 
never deceived by appearances; he penetrated 
through the surface, and always went straight to 
the heart and marrow ; he never asked a question 
which was not perfectly appropriate; he never 
gave an answer which was not fully to the point, 
or which could be better conceived and expressed. 
How often did he silence his cavillers, the shrewd 
and cunning priests and scribes, by a short sen- 
tence which hit the nail on the head, or struck 
like lightning into their conscience, or wisely 
evaded the trap laid for him ! When tha "BVjsadr 




I06 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

sees and Herodians, with the malicious intention 
to entangle him into their political party quarrels, 
asked him whether it was lawful to pay taxes 
to the Eoman government, he, perceiving their 
wickedness, called for a denarius with the super- 
scription of the Eoman emperor, and said : " Eender 
unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and unto 
God the things that are God's." This word, which 
settles, in principle, the whole vexed question 
between Church and State, may be called the 
wisest answer ever given by any man. When the 
Sadducees, who denied the resurrection, laid before 
him a perplexing question concerning the marriage 
relation in the future state, he solved the difficulty 
by removing all foundation for it; and then, 
appealing to the very part of the Old Testament 
which they professed to believe, to the exclusion 
of the later parts of the canon, he asked them : 
"Have ye not read that which was spoken amto 
you by God, saying, I am the God of Abraham, 
and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? 
Crod is not the God of the dead, hit of the living^ 
By this short conmient he opened the profound 
meaning of this title of God, which no one had 
seen in it before, but which, being once brought to 
light, was so clear and transparent that even the 
Sadducees were silenced, and the multitude aston- 
ished. And when the sanctimonious hypocrites, 



THE FALSE THEORIEa 10/ 

in the case of the adulterous woman, hoped to 
involve him in a contradiction with the rigour of 
the law, he brought the matter home to their own 
conscience by saying: "He that is without sin 
among you, let him first cast a stone at her;" and 
they, "being convicted by their own conscience, 
went out one by one, beginning at the eldest, even 
unto the last." Christ never lost the balance of 
mind under excitement, nor the clearness of vision 
under embarrassment ; he never violated the most 
perfect good taste in any of his sayings. 

Is such an intellect — clear as the sky, bracing 
as the moimtain air, sharp and penetrating as a 
sword, thoroughly healthy and vigorous, always 
ready and always self-possessed — liable to a radical 
and most serious delusion concerning his own char- 
acter and mission ? Preposterous imagination I 

Let us hear the most eminent Unitarian divine 
on this hypothesis : — 

"The charge," says Dr. Channing, "of an ex- 
travagant, self-deluding enthusiasm is the last to 
be JEastened on Jesus. Where can we find the 
traces of it in his history ? Do we detect them in 
the calm authority of his precepts; in the mild, 
practical, and beneficent spirit of his religion; in 
the unlaboured simplicity of the language with 
which he unfolds his high powers and the sublime 
truths of religion; or in the good sense, the 




I08 THE PERSON OF CHEIST. 

knowledge of human nature, which he always dis- 
covers in his estimate and treatment of the differ- 
ent classes of men with whom he acted ? Do we 
discover this enthusiasm in the singular fact, that 
whilst he claimed power in the future world, and 
always turned men's minds to heaven, he never 
indulged his own imagination, or stimulated that 
of his disciples, by giving vivid pictures or any 
minute description of that unseen state? The 
truth is, that, remarkable as was the character of 
Jesus, it was distinguished by nothing more than 
by calmness and self-possession. This trait per- 
vades his other excellences. How calm was his 
piety! Point me, if you can, to one vehement, 
passionate expression of his religious feelings. 
Does the Lord's Prayer breathe a feverish en- 
thusiasm? .... His benevolence, too, though 
singularly earnest and deep, was composed and 
serene. He never lost the possession of himself 
in his sympathy with others; was never hurried 
into the impatient and rash enterprises of an en- 
thusiastic philanthropy; but did good with the 
tranquillity and constancy which mark the pro- 
vidence of God," ^* 

(2.) The Evangelists were deceived. — The Ration- 
alistic Eocplanation. 

The ijpothesis of delusion may be shifted from 



THE FALSE THEOBIEa IO9 

Christ to tHe Apostles and Evangelists. It may 
be supposed that they honestly mistook an ex- 
traordinary man for a divine being, and extra- 
ordinary medical cures for supernatural miracles. 

This is the view of the older rationalistic or the 
natural interpretation so called of the gospel his- 
tory J* It forms a parallel to the heathen ration- 
alism of Euhemerus, of the Cyrenaic school: he 
explained the gods of the Greek mythology as 
human sages, heroes, kings, and tyrants, whose 
superior knowledge or great deeds secured them 
divine honours, and the hero-worship of posterity/* 

The nationalistic explanation, after having been 
tried first, by Eichhom and others, with the 
miracles of the Old Testament, was fully developed 
and applied to the gospel-history, with an imusual 
degree of patient and painstaking learning and 
acumen, by H. E. G. Paulus, of Heidelberg/^ 

This German Euhemerus takes the gospel-history 
as actual history ; but, by a critical separation of 
what he calls fact from what he calls judgment of 
the actor or narrator, he explains it exclusively from 
natural causes, and thus brings it down to the 
level of everyday experience. Jesus was indeed 
a wise, noble, and virtuous Eabbi, who distinguished 
himself above all his contemporaries by works of 
philanthropy, medical skill, perhaps also magnetic 
cures, and exerted an uncommon influence uj^isl 



no THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

the heart. But the supernatural events related 
by the Evangelists, and sincerely believed by them, 
are erroneous conceptions and innocent amplifica- 
tions of historical facts which fall within the sphere 
of the laws of nature. Sometimes the fault lies 
only in the reader or interpreter, and the supposed 
miracle turns out to be a grammatical blamder; 
as, for example, when Christ's "walking on the 
sea " (Matt. 14:25), which means simply his walk- 
ing on the hank of the sea, or on the high shore 
above the sea, — a very easy and natural perform- 
ance indeed! — is turned into a walking on the 
surface of the sea, or over the seaJ® In most cases 
the mistake originated with the first observers. 

This interpretation, which claims to be " natural,'* 
turns out to be very unnatural, and contradicts the 
context, the laws of hermeneutics, and common- 
sense itself. Its exposition is wretched imposition, 
Gt)the characterises it well ia these lines: 

''Im Auslegen seid frisoh und munter 
Legt ihr's nicht aos, so legt was unter." 

It is only necessary to give some specimens 
from the exegesis of Paulus and his school. 

The glory of the Lord, which, in the night of his 
birth, shone around the shepherds, was simply an 
ignis fatuus^ or a meteor, or a lantern which was 
flashed in their eyes. The miracle at Christ's 
baptism may be easily reduced to thunder and 



THE FALSE THEORIES. Ill 

lightning, and a sudden disappearance of the 
clouds. The tempter in the wilderness was a cun- 
ning Pharisee, but was mistaken by the Evangelists 
for the devil, who does not exist, except in the 
imagination of the superstitious. The quieting 
of the storm on the lake might be traced to a 
happy accident, in connection with the calmness 
and dignity of Jesus. His miraculous cures 
turn out, on closer examination, to be simply 
deeds of phHanthropy, or of medical skill, or of good 
luck. Thus the healing of the blind was accom- 
plished through an efficacious powder applied to 
the eye, — a circumstance which was unnoticed 
by the miracle-loving reporters. The coin for the 
payment of tribute was to be obtained by Peter 
not in the mouth of the fish, but by selling the 
fish in the market. The changing of water 
into wine was an innocent and benevolent wedding- 
joke; and the delusion of the company, by the 
sudden appearance of the wine previously provided 
by the disciples, must be charged on the twilight, 
not upon Christ. The feeding of the five thousand 
is easily explained by provisions which the people 
brought with them in their pockets; Jesus ad- 
vising the rich to share their abundance with the 
poor. The daughter of Jairus, the youth of If ain, 
Lazarus, and Jesus himself, were raised, not from 
real death, but simply from a trance or a^jrcy^vsu 



112 THE PERSON OF CHKIST. 

The angels of the resurrection were nothing more 
nor less than the white linen cloths which the 
pious mistook for celestial beings. And, finally, 
the ascension of our Lord resolves itself into his 
sudden disappearance behind a cloud that acci- 
dentally intervened between him and his disciples. 

And yet these very Evangelists, who, accord- 
ing to this most imnatural "natural exegesis,'* 
must have been destitute of the most ordinary 
talent of observation, and even of commonsense, 
contrived to paint a character and to write a story, 
which, in sublimity and interest, throws the pro- 
ductions of the proudest historians into the shade, 
and has exerted an irresistible charm upon Chris- 
tendom for these eighteen hundred years. 

No wonder that those absurdities of a misguided 
learning and ingenuity hardly survived their author. 
It is a decided merit of Strauss, that he, in his 
larger work on the " life of Jesus," has thoroughly 
and step by step refuted the system of his pre- 
decessor, and given it the critical death-blow. He 
very properly says : " If the Gospels are taken to 
be historical documents, the miracle cannot be 
expelled from them." Therefore, to get rid of it, 
he denies their historical character and apostolic 
origin. Eenan too, in his " Essay on the Critical 
Historians of Jesus," speaks quite contemptuously 
ot this " very narrow exegesis of rationalism," this 



THE FALSE THEORIES. -113 

"shabby method of interpretation/' "an exegesis 
made up of subtilities, founded on the mechanical 
use of a few incidents, — ecstasy, lightning, storm, 
cloud," &c. ; and says : " The so-called rationalistic 
interpretation may have satisfied the first bold 
desire of the human mind on its taking possession 
of a long-forbidden domain ; but experience could 
not but disclose very soon the inexcusable defects, 
the dryness, the coarseness of it. Never was better 
realised the ingenious allegory of the daughters of 
Minos, who were turned into bats for having 
seriously criticised the vulgar credences. There is 
as much simplicity and credulity, and much less 
poetry, in clumsily discussing a legend in its 
details, as in accepting it, once for all, as it 
is." '^ 

So one infidel refutes the other, and by the very 
process undermines his own system. Strauss and 
Eenan have fared no better than Paulus, who was 
their equal in learning and acumen« 

III. — The Theory of Poetical Fiction. 

The least dishonourable, and the most plausible, 
of the false theories of the life of Christ, is the 
hypothesis of poetical fiction. This may, again, 
assume two forms, — the mythical and the legendary. 
The former derives its support mainly from t\iL<^ 



114 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

formation of the ancient myths of heathen gods 
and demigods; the latter, from the mediaeval 
legends of Christian martyrs and saints. 

The one was matured and carried out by David 
Friederich Strauss, with the patient research, 
learning, and solidity of a German scholar; the 
other, by Joseph Ernest Eenan, with the bril- 
liancy, elegance, and levity of a Parisian novelist. 
The one was written for students, the other for the 
people; the v one breathes the air of a library, is 
cold and heartless,.^ the other arose under the fresh- 
impressions of travi^ in the Holy Land, as a fifth 
Gospel, broken, ruined, yet legible, and is enlivened 
by picturesque sketches; the one rests on the 
philosophical basis of a speculative or logical 
pantheism, the other on that of a sentimental or 
poetical pantheism. Strauss's ^^ Leben Jesu'' is 
related to Eenan^s " Vie de JdsuSy' as the heavy 
armour of a mediaeval knight to the parade uni- 
form of a holiday-soldier, as a siege-cannon to 
a pop-gun, as an iron statue to a tawdry wax 
figure; but both start essentially from the same 
naturalistic premises, and arrive at the same 
conclusions. They are equally opposed to the 
miraculous and supernatural in the life of our 
Saviour, and leave a mere spectral shadow of 
the real Jesus of the Gospels. 



I 



THE FALSE THEORIES. II5 

(i) The Mythical Hypothesis of Strauss. 

Dr. Strauss wrote two works on the life of 
Jesus: a large one for scholars, which appeared 
first in 183s, in two volumes; and a condensed 
one of a more popular character, in 1864, in one 
volume.^ In both he maintains the same theory, 
with unimportant modifications. The former work 
is the ablest and most elaborate attack upon the 
gospel history ever made, and a well-arranged store- 
house of all the older arguments of infidelity. 

Strauss has found an eloquent advocate in the 
erratic genius and misguided philanthropist, 
Theodore Parker, who passed like a brilliant 
meteor over the American skies to disappear in a 
foreign land.®^ 

What Gabler, Vater, De Wette, and other 
critics, had already done with the miracles of the 
Old Testament and^ some portions of the New, 
Strauss has fully matured and systematically car- 
ried out with referefice to the whole life of Christ. 
He*, sinks the gospel history, as to the mode of its 
origin and realness, substantially on a par with 
the ancient mythologies of Greece and Eome. 

A myth is the representation of a religious idea 
or truth in the form of a fictitious narrative.®^ In 
this respect it resembles the fable and the par- 
able, but differs from both by blending the idea 
with the fact, without any conacioM^'Vis,'^^ ^^ ^ 
difference between them. Tlie io^Aa \s» ^ Si^Nife^^"'^^ 



Il6 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

story, based upon palpable impossibilities, — as 
thinking and speaking animals, — and invented for 
the express purpose of inculcating some moral 
maxim or lesson of prudence ; the parable is like- 
wise a fictitious narrative, deliberately produced, 
but based upon possibilities, and thus intrinsically 
truthful, for the purpose of illustrating a spiritual 
truth; a myth is unconsciously produced with 
the most simple and unreflecting faith in the 
actual occurrence of the story. The mytho-poetic 
faculty presupposes — and this, we may remark, 
by way of anticipation, is a telling argument 
against the theory of Strauss — a childlike age of 
the human race, an entire absence of reflection and 
criticism. It works like the imagination of chil- 
dren, who delight in stories, invent stories, and 
believe their own stories without the least mis- 
giving or doubt, without raising the question of 
truth or falsehood. In this way (according to the 
theory of some distinguished classical scholars 
like Ottfried Miiller, and'Grote) the Greek my- 
thology took its rise, as the spontaneous growth 
of a childlike fancy, which peopled the air and 
the sea, the mountains and the groves, the trees 
and the brooks with divinities, in the fullest belief 
in their actual existence. So, also, much of the 
legendary history of mediaeval Christianity can be 
accounted for without impeachiDg the motives or 
honesty of the narrator, "yet m\j\i ^\a ^^^-t^'ti'i^. 



THE FALSE THEORIES. 11/ 

that the legends of martyrs and saints have, in 
most cases, some foundation in a psychological 
state or historical fact. The rest is either harm- 
less poetry of simple souls, or pious fraud of 
designing monks and priests. 

Strauss does not deny by any means the his- 
torical existence of Jesus. He even admits him to 
have been a religious genius of the first magnitude. 
But from pantheistic premises, and by a cold pro- 
cess of hypercritical dissection of the apparently 
contradictory accounts of the witnesses, he resolves 
all the supernatural and miraculous elements of 
Christ's person and history, from his birth to the 
resurrection and ascension, into myths, or imagina- 
tive representations of religious ideas in the form 
of facts, which were honestly believed by the 
authors to have actually occurred. The ideas 
symbolised in these facts, especially the idea of 
the essential unity of the divine and human, are 
declared to be true in the abstract as applied to 
humanity as a whole ; but denied in the con- 
crete, or in their application to an individual. 
The fulness of the infinite godhead is diffused, as 
it were, throughout the- whole universe, but cannot 
be shut up in Jesus of Nazareth or any single 
person. The authorship of the evangelical myths 
is ascribed to the primitive Christian community, 
pregnant with Jewish Meaaiamc \vq^^^^ ^as^ 



Il8 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

kindled to hero-worship by the appearance of the 
extraordinary person of Jesus of Nazareth, whom 
they took to be the promised Messiah, and adorned 
with this innocent poetry of miracles within thirty 
or forty years after his death. 

The theory may be reduced to the following 
syllogism : There was a fixed idea in the Jewish 
mind, nourished by the Old Testament writings, 
that the Messiah would perform certain miracles 
— heal the sick, raise the dead, &c. ; there was a 
strong persuasion in the minds of the disciples of 
Jesus that he actually was the promised Messiah ; 
therefore the mytho-poetic faculty instinctively 
invented the miracles corresponding to the Mes- 
sianic conception, and ascribed them to him. 

In the execution of his task, Strauss avails him- 
self, at the same time, of all the difficulties and 
objections which the ingenuity of unbelievers of 
opposite philosophical tendencies, from Celsus and 
Porphyry to Eeimarus and Paulus, have urged 
against the credibility of the gospel narrative; 
grouping them with consummate skill for rhetorical 
effect; presenting the most complex details with 
rare clearness ; changing his mode of attack from 
round assertion to cautious insinuation or sugges- 
tive inquiry, and then massing his forces for a 
final assault upon the citadel, against which the 
gates of hell shall never prevail. 



THE FALSE THEORIES. II9 

Let US now proceed to examine the general 
features and defects of this theory. 

First, The philosophic foundation on which the 
mythical hypothesis professedly rests, is the 
alleged impossibility of a miracle ; and this again 
has its root in a pantheistic denial of a personal 
God and an Almighty Maker of heaven and earth. 
But this fundamental principle is a mere assump- 
tion, which the author never attempts to prove. 
It is a pditio principii, and begs the very question 
which it was one of his first duties to discuss. 
Much as he boffsted of possessing that freedom 
from doctrinal prepossessions (dogmatische Varatcs- 
setzungslosigkeif) as a first prerequisite for a scientific 
biography of Jesus, he starts with a philosophical 
prejudice, which is fatal to historical investigation, 
and sacrifices facts to theory. 

Secondly, The critical foundation of the myth- 
ical theory is as unsafe as the philosophical, and 
is one of the weakest parts of the book of Strauss, 
who was justly censured by Dr. Baur for attempt- 
ing to write a criticism of the gospel history with- 
out a criticism of the Gospels. In order to avoid 
the necessity of supposing that Christ and the 
apostles were deceivers or self- deceived, and to 
allow a sufficient time for the formation of myths, 
he must bring down the canonical Gospels at least 
a century later than Christ. B\it» ^.\i ^3ci»^ Mxssi'^ 



120 THE PERSON OP CHRIST. 

they were already acknowledged as canonical writ- 
ings, and used in the Christian churches. Strauss 
has to encounter here the overwhelming mass of 
patristic testimonies in favour of the apostolic origin 
of these Gospels, which are far better supported 
than any of the classical writers of Greece or Eome 
At one time, feeling the force of the unanimous 
voice of Christian antiquity, Strauss was disposed 
to admit the authenticity of the Gospel of, John ; 
but seeing the fatal effect of this concession upon 
his conclusions, he soon after withdrew it (in the 
third edition of his large work), and Baur and the 
whole Tiibingen school came to his aid in disput- 
ing the authorship of John, notwithstanding the 
additional external evidence in favour of it which 
has since been brought to light by the discovery 
of the "Philosophumena" of Hippolitus; from 
which it appears that the fourth Gospel was 
already used by Gnostic heretics in the early part 
of the second century. The controversy concern- 
incr the origin and character of the canonical 
Gospels, into which we cannot here enter, has 
assumed half-a-dozen new phases since the first 
appearance of Strauss's book in 1835, and is still 
in an unsettled condition. We may never be able 
to determine the precise origin of the Gospels and 
their mutual relations, but Christ's teaching and 
Christ's example remain an undoubted fact, and 



• THE FALSE THEORIES. 121 

they cannot possibly be the invention of illiterate 
fishermen of Galilee. As to the fourth Gospel, the 
only alternative in the present stage of the con- 
troversy is truth, or fraud. The assumption of an 
unconscious mytho-poetical fiction is exploded by 
the latter developments of the Tubingen critics. 
Strauss himself now admits, in this case, conscious 
fiction and philosophical construction, and thus 
approaches the very border of the infamous theory 
of imposture.®* 

But suppose we give up the four Gospels : there 
stiU remain the Acts and the Epistles of the 
New Testament to substantiate all the fundamental 
facts of the life of Christ, especially the resurrec- 
tion, — the great crowning and sealing miracle of 
his work, without which the Apostolic Church 
could never have risen at all. Even Dr. Baur, 
who in bold negative and reconstructive criticism 
went further than any sceptic ever did, and who 
resolved most of the New-Testament writings into 
"tendency" books written in the conscious in- 
terest of contending parties and sections of the 
post - apostolic age, ultimately blended in the 
system of ancient Catholicism, — a theory, by the 
way, which overthrows the unconscious mytho- 
poetic origin of the Gospels, — leaves the Apoca- 
lypse of St. John, and four Epistles of St. Paul, 
viz., those to the Eomans (excepting th^ \a&^\2^^ 




122 THE PEESON OF CHRIST. 

chapters), the Corinthians and Galatians, standing 
as genuine apostolic writings. This is enough for 
our purpose. It may perhaps be imagined that 
an illiterate fisherman of Galilee was simple and 
childlike enough to invent miracles, and to mis- 

r 

take the creatures of his fancy for actual facts. 
But this is a psychological impossibility in the 
case of Paul, — the learned, acute, subtle, dialectic, 
well-drilled rabbi of the school of Gamaliel, and 
so long the open and bitter enemy of Christianity. 
How could he submit his strong and clear mind, 
and devote all the energies of his noble life, which 
made him one of the greatest benefactors of man- 
kind, to a poetical fiction, or empty dream of the 
verysect which he fanatically persecuted unto death? 
The difficulty presented here to the infidel bio- 
graphers of Jesus is absolutely insurmountable; 
the mythological hypothesis breaks down com- 
pletely on the rock of the resurrection, and the 
conversion of Paul which is based upon it. 
Strauss must admit that Paul and all the 
apostles believed in the resurrection, and could 
only by this belief pass from the despondency 
created by the death of Jesus, to the joy and 
enthusiasm necessary to spread the gospel and 
found churches at the risk of their lives. But 
he cannot explain this astounding transition, 
which took place already on the third day. He 



THE FALSE THEORIES. 1 23 

very ably refutes, as utterly untenable, the natural 
interpretation of a resurrection from a mere trance, 
followed after a short period of a sickly existence 
by real death, which would have effectually de- 
stroyed again all the hopes of the disciples. In- 
stead of this, he resorts to the hypothesis of 
a purely subjective resurrection of Christ in the 
visionary faith of his disciples, including St. Paul, 
and the more than five hundred to whom he ap- 
peared at once (i Cor. 15 : 6). As if an empty 
dream could suddenly turn desponding gloom into 
enthusiastic joy and world-conquering faith, and 
this in so many persons at the same time, and 
lay the foundation to the indestructible structure 
of the Christian Church ! Credat Jvdceus Apella ! 
It is certainly much easier to believe that Christ 
truly rose from the dead, than that the Christian 
Church — the greatest institution of history — 
should have arisen from a deception or a lie. 

Here, if anywhere, we must bow before the over- 
whelming force of a most glorious fact. Dr. Baur, 
the teacher of Strauss, and his superior in learning 
and critical power, felt the difficulty, and toward 
the close of his life made the honest concession, 
that the conversion ,of Paul was to him a mystery, 
which could only be explained by " the miracle of 
the resurrection." ^ This concession overthrows the 
whole mythical fabric. Admit the ro^-swrL^^^^fsiH^ 



124 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

of Christ, and there can be no difficulty with the 
other miracles. 

A third fundamental error of the mythical hypo- 
thesis consists in a radical inversion of the natural 
order and relation of history and poetry, as it exists 
in any historical age like that in which Christ 
made His appearance on eartL Facts give rise 
to songs, and not vice versd. Prophecies, and 
expectations too, may foreshadow events, but do 
not create them. The real object precedes the 
picture of the artist ; the hero, the epic. Bunyan's 
"Pilgrim's Progress" presupposes the Christian 
experience of which it is a beautiful allegory. 
Milton's "Paradise Lost" could never have pro- 
duced the belief in the fall of man, but rests on 
this belief and the fact it describes with the 
charm and splendour of sanctified genius. All 
the great revolutions in the world have been 
effected, not by fictitious personages, but by real 
living men whose power corresponded to their 
influence. So the American and French Eevolu- 
tions in the eighteenth, the Puritan Eevolution in 
the seventeenth, the Protestant Eeformation in the 
sixteenth century; the founding of modern, mediae- 
val, and ancient empires ; the inventions of arts, and 
the discoveries of new countries, — can all be traced 
to strictly historical and well-defined persons as 
originators or leaders. Why should Christianity, 
I ivlucli produced the greatest ot a\l mox^iX. t^-^iqVm- 



THE FALSE TIIEOIUES. 12$ 

tions of the race, form an oxcoptioti ? Ideas, with- 
out living men to represent and explain them, are 
shadows and abstractions. The pantheistic philo- 
sophy on which the criticism of Strauss and Kenan 
is based, by denying the personality of God, destroys 
also the proper significance of the personality of man, 
and inevitably ends in denying the immortality of 
the soul. 

In the case before us, the diiUculty is greatly 
increased by making, not one great towering 
genius, as Homer, but an illiterate and compara- 
tively ignorant multitude, responsible for the 
gospel poem, which in purity and sublimity rises 
infmitely above all ancient mythologies. Strauss 
assumes that a Messianic community in some terra 
incognita^ probably in the midst of Palestine, 
independent of the apostles, about thirty or forty 
years after the death of Christ, produced the 
gospel history. But this is a mere fiction of his 
brain. At that time, Christianity was already 
planted all over the Koman Empire, as is evident 
from the Epistles of Paul as well us from the 
Acts ; and all these congregations stood under the 
guidance of apostles and apostolic men who were 
eyewitnesses of the events of Clirist, and con- 
trolled the whole Christian tradition. The Gospels, 
moreover, with the exception of that of Matthew, 
bear not the Jewish, but the Gentile-Christian 



126 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

stamp, and were written outside of Palestine, on 
Greek and Eoman soil; which shows that the 
same traditions were spread aU over the empire, 
and form a part of the original Christianity of the 
apostles themselves. The mythological hypothesis 
breaks down half-way, and is forced to make the 
apostles responsible for the story; that is, to 
charge them with downright fraud If Christ did 
not actually perform miracles, they must have 
been invented by the primitive disciples, the 
apostles, and evangelists, to account at all for 
their rapid and universal spread and acceptance 
among Jewish and Gentile Christians from Jeru- 
salem to Eome. 

But admitting such a consolidated, central, and yet 
independent mytho-poetic community of the second 
generation of Christians, how could this Messianic 
congregation itself originate without a Messiah ? 
How could the disciples believe in Jesus, without 
the indispensable signs of the Messiahship ? If 
the early Christians produced Christ, who produced 
the early Christians ? Whence did they derive 
their high spiritual ideal ? Were not the Messianic 
expectations of the Jews at the time sefttional, 
political, and carnal, — the very reverse of those 
encouraged by Christ ? Who ever heard of a 
poem unconsciously produced by a mixed mul- 
titude, and honestly mistaken by them all for 



THE FALSE THEORIES. 12/ 

actual history? How could the five hundred 
persons, to whom the risen Saviour is said to have 
appeared (i Cor. 15:6), dream the same dream at 
the same time, and then believe it as a veritable 
fact, at the risk of their lives ? How could such 
an illusion stand the combined hostility of the 
Jewish and Heathen world, and the searching 
criticism of an age, not of childlike simplicity, but 
of high civilisation, of critical reflection, — even of 
incredulity and scepticism ? How strange, that un- 
lettered and unskilled fishermen, or rather their 
obscure friends and pupils, and not the philosophers 
and poets of classic Greece and Eome, should have 
composed such a grand poem, and painted a char- 
acter to whom Strauss himself is forced to assign 
the very first rank among all the religious geniuses 
and founders of religion! And would they not 
rather have given us at best an improved picture 
of such a rabbi as Hillel or Gamaliel, or of a 
prophet like Elijah or John the Baptist, instead of 
a universal reformer who rises above all the limi- 
tations of nation or sect ? 

The poets must in this case have been superior 
to the hero. St. John must have surpassed Jesus, 
whom he represented as the incarnate God.®^ And 
yet the hero is admitted by the sceptics them- 
selves to be the purest and greatest man that ever 
lived ! 



128 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

But where are the traces of a fervid imagination 
and mytho-poetic art in the gospel history ? Is 
it not, on the contrary, remarkably free from 
all rhetorical and poetical ornament, from every 
admixture of subjective notions and feelings, even 
from the expression of sympathy, admiration, and 
praise ? The writers evidently felt that the story 
speaks best for itself, and could not be improved 
by the art and skill of man. Their discrepancies, 
which at best do not affect the picture of Christ's 
character in the least, but only the subordinate 
details of his history, prove the absence of collu- 
sion, attest the honesty of their intentions, and 
confirm the general credibility of their accounts. 
The Gospels have the character of originality and 
freshness stamped upon every page : they breathe 
the very presence of Jesus Christ ; and this con- 
stitutes their irresistible charm to every unso- 
phisticated reader. It is the history itself which 
speaks to us face to face, without intervening 
reflections and subjective notions. The few oc- 
casional references to geography, archaeology, and 
secular history, only confirm their general credi- 
bility. How different in all these respects the 
apocryphal Gospels ! They are flat, puerile, 
insipid, the absurd productions of a diseased reli- 
gious imagination. Here, indeed, we might speak 
of mythical or legendary fiction, or of downright 



THE FALSE THEORIES. 1 29 

imposition and pious fraud. But this very contrast 
proves the truth of the original history, as the coun- 
terfeit implies the existence of the genuine coin.®* 

The mere fact of the Christian Church, with its 
xmbroken history of eighteen himdred years, is 
an overwhelming evidence of the Christ of the 
Gospels ; and the institution of Christian baptism 
and the holy communion testify every day, all over 
the world, to the two fundamental doctrines of the 
holy Trinity, and of the atonement by the sacrifice 
on the cross. 

Strauss would make us believe in a stream with- 
out a fountain, in a house without a foimdation, 
in an eSect without a cause ; for the facts which 
he and Eenan leave untouched are not sufficient 
to account for the extraordinary and continued 
results. 

The same negative criticism which Strauss 
applied to the Evangelists, would, with equal 
plausibility, destroy the strongest chain of evidence 
before a court of justice, and resolve the life of 
Socrates* or Charlemagne or Luther or Napoleon 
into a mythical dream.®^ 

The secret spring of this hypercriticism is the 
pantheistic or atheistic denial of a personal, living 
God, which consistently and professedly ends with 
the denial of personal immortality ; for the relative 
personality of man depends upon the self-cou-g.o.^sssia.^ 



130 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

self-existent, absolute personality of God. In its 
details, the mythical hypothesis is so complicated 
and artificial, that it cannot be consistently car- 
ried out. It continually crosses the boundary-line 
which divides the mythical from the mendacious ; 
and at the most critical points, as in the origin of 
the fourth Gospel and the miracle of the resurrec- 
tion, it is driven to the alternative of admitting 
the truth, or relapsing to the vulgar and disreput- 
able hypothesis of intentional fraud, from which it 
professed, at the start, to shrink back with horror 
and contempt. 

(2.) The Legendary Hypothesis of Benan. 

Eenan has eclipsed all former infidel biogra- 
phers of Christ, so far as popularity and ephemeral 
eSect is concerned. His " Life of Jesus," which 
first appeared in 1863, has had all the success 
of a sensation novel, and will share the same 
fate.^ In disposing of it, we can be much 
briefer, since a refutation of Strauss is also a 
refutation of Eenan. 

He essentially agrees with Strauss, to whom he 
expressly refers as his main authority for critical 
research ; but he has a better appreciation of the 
realness and environments of the gospel history. 
He correctly remarks that the term myths is 
better applicable to India and primitive Greece 



THE FALSE THEORIES. I3I 

than to the ancient traditions of the Hebrews and 
the Semitic nations in general. He prefers the 
words legends and legendary narratives, "which, 
while they concede a large influence to the work- 
ing of opinions, allow the action and the personal 
character of Jesus to stand out in their complete- 
ness." ^ A myth is purely imaginative ; a legend 
has a nucleus of fact. As Strauss expresses the 
diSerence : " Myth is the creation of fact out of 
an idea; legend is the seeing an idea in a fact." 
This brings the gospel history down to a level 
with the history of Francis of Assissi, and other 
marvellous saints of the Eoman Church ; although 
Eenan, inconsistently enough, prefers a parallel 
between the myth of his favourite Cakya-Mouni, 
the founder of Buddliism, and the legend of Jesus, 
and thus falls back again to the mythical theory.^ 
He regards the so-called legend of Jesus as the 
fruit of the consentaneous enthusiasm and imagi- 
native impulse of the primitive disciples. No great 
event in history has passed without a cycle of 
fables ; and Jesus could not, had he wished, have 
silenced these popular creations.*^ 

Eenan, moreover, differs from Strauss by ad- 
mitting the essential authenticity of the chief 
portions of the four Gospels, including even the 
most contested of all, that of John, — a concession 
almost as fatal to his own aa t» \Jj^fe T£i>jS}K^R.'^ 



132 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

theory, and hence pronounced by Strauss the one 
essential error of Renan. He consequently allows 
a larger body of facts in the life of Christ. He 
undertakes, to some extent, the task of reconstruc- 
tion, and proposes to clothe the cloudy phantom 
and dim shadow of the mythical Jesus with real 
flesh and blood. In his essay on the " Critical 
Historians of Jesus," he quotes with approbation 
the objection of Colani to Strauss: "No doubt 
the apostles, once believing in the Messianic 
character of Jesus, may have added to his actual 
image some lineaments borrowed from prophecy; 
but how came they to believe in his Messianic 
character? Strauss has never explained this. 
What he leaves of the Gospels is insufficient as 
ground for the apostles' faith ; and it is useless to 
ascribe to them a disposition to be content with 
the minimum of proof; the proofs must needs have 
been very strong to overcome the crushing doubts 
occasioned by the death on the cross. In other 
words, the person of Jesus must have singularly 
surpassed ordinary proportions ; a large part of the 
eZgeUcal narratives must be true/- 

Eenan's "Life of Jesus" is interspersed with 
truly eloquent and enthusiastic tributes to Jesus, — 
concessions which must either overthrow his whole 
legendary hypothesis, or else resolve themselves 
into empty declamation. So far, we may regard 



THE FALSE THEORIES. 1 33 

the French child as an improvement on its German 
parent, and a progress in the sceptical world to- 
wards the acknowledgment of the truth. 

But while Eenan, aided by a lively French 
imagination, and a fresh contemplation of the 
Holy Land, which he calls the "Fifth Gospel," 
surpasses Strauss in the estimate of the historical 
character of the gospel-record, he is equally hostile 
to miracles, which, in his oracular opinion, " al- 
ways imply imposture or fraud;" and falls far 
below him on the score of scholarship, consistency, 
and even morality. "We mean, of course, the 
morality of his theory, and have nothing to do 
with the morality of his private character, which 
may be without reproach. Compared with this 
critical master, Eenan is a mere dilettante and a 
charlatan. He nowhere makes a serious attempt 
to prove any of his novel and arbitrary positions, 
refers for detail, once for all, to Strauss and half- 
a-dozen inferigr infidel books, ignores their refuta- 
tion, and deals in oracular assertions and elo- 
quent declamations for artistic effect. His book 
nowhere rises to the. dignity of solid science 
and scholarship. It is essentially a religious novel 
with Jesus as the hero, adapted to the taste of 
the fashionable world.** 

According to Eenan, Jesus was born at Nazareth 
(not at Bethlehem), but assumed tha \.\Afc <^1 "^^-^ 



134 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

of David as a necessary condition of success. He 
grew up amidst the charming scenery of Galilee, 
an ignorant peasant of extraordinary genius and 
spotless virtue. He was a delicious Eabbi {RabU 
delicievx), of ravishing beauty, a preacher of the 
purest code of morals, and a healer of many dis- 
eases of body and mind. Eut finding at last that 
he had either to satisfy the foolish Messianic ex- 
pectations of his people, or to renounce his mission, 
he yielded to his friends, and entered on a course 
of mild and beneficent deception. By a sudden 
and unaccountable transformation of character, this 
greatest man bom of woman became a disappointed 
and morbid fanatic, a thaumaturgist, and a char- 
latan; he connived even at downright imposture 
and falsehood in the so-called resurrection of 
Lazarus, and paid for his error with his blood.** 
His life was at first a delightful pastoral and 
lovely idyl, at last a terrible tragedy, and ends for 
the historian with his expiring sigh on the cross. 
But so deep was the impression which this sublime 
though deluded genius made, that he arose in the 
belief of his ignorant and credulous disciples. 
Thus the death of the man Jesus was the begin- 
ning of the worship of the incarnate God. The 
exact truth about the resurrection, Eenan thinks, 
" on account of the contradictory documents," we 
shall never know, except that " the strong imagina- 



THE FALSE THEORIES. 1 35 

• 

tion of Mary Magdalene here enacted a chief 
part." " Divine power of love ! " adds the enthusi- 
astic declaimer, " sacred moments, when the pas- 
sion of a hallucinated woman gave to the world a 
risen God ! " ^ 

And what a God! — such a God as only a 
heathen idolater, or a polluted fancy, or a crazy 
intellect could worship ; a Jesus who is idolised 
on the one hand as the perfect man, " whose legend 
will call forth tears without end, whose worship 
will grow young without ceasing ;" and who almost 
in the same breath is charged with vanity, self- 
delusion, erotic sentimentalism, fanaticism, and 
complicity with fraud 1 We can hardly trust our 
eyes when we see this great Orientalist digging 
from the grave of disgrace and contempt the ex- 
ploded hypothesis of vulgar imposture, as if it 
were the last conclusion of science, and when we 
read the suggestion that the resurrection of Lazarus 
was a pious fraud, contrived by himself and his 
two sisters, and weakly connived at by Jesus, in 
the hope of producing an impression among the 
unbelieving Jews. But this wretched opinion is, 
if possible, ecUpsed by an entirely original inven- 
tion of which neither Eeimarus nor Paulus nor 
Strauss nor Celsus ever dreamed. Eenan is not 
ashamed to outrage the feelings of Christendom, 
by polluting even the sacred agony in G^^Jo&^TSiSssjkfe 



136 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

with the sensuous picture of a Parisian love-no veL®* 
May God forgive this blasphemy of the Son of 
Man ! Much rather give up, with Strauss, the 
whole scene in the garden as unhistorical, than 
thus insult the suffering Eedeemer, while bear- 
ing in boundless love the accumulated gmlt of 
the whole race. 

Kenan's Jesus is the most contradictory and 
impossible character ever conceived. There are 
many happy and unhappy inconsistencies in the 
world, and even great and good men sometimes 
combine conflicting traits of character. But there 
is a great difference between inconsistencies and 
contradictions ; and not until all the laws of logic 
and psychology are overthrown, not until fire and 
water dwell together in peace, will sensible people 
believe that one and the same person can be a 
sentimentalist, an enthusiast, a fanatic, an im- 
postor, a wise and charming rabbi, an unequalled 
saint, and an incarnate God. The Christ of the 
Gospels requires faith; the Jesus of Eenan, the 
utmost stretch of credulity. The Christ of history 
is a moral miracle ; the Christ of romance, a moral 
monstrosity. Eenan exposes himself to the com- 
bined force of the objections which have been 
urged against all the false theories of the gospel 
history. His self-contradictory picture of Jesus, 
divested of the meretricious charms of a brilliant 



THE FALSE THEOKIES. 1 3/ 

style and sentimental hero-worship, is an insult to 
sound sense and the dignity of man. It rouses the 
noblest instincts of our nature to just indignation. 
To state it in its nakedness is to refute and to 
condemn it. Even as an artist he has failed in 
the main figure, since his hero lacks the essential 
quality of truthfulness of conception, unity, and con- 
sistency of character. This defect arises not from 
any want of artistic power of the author, which he 
possesses in an eminent degree, but from a sort of 
inevitable judgment which must overtake every 
one who dares, with unclean hands, to draw the 
picture of the purest of the pure and the holiest 
of the holy.^ 



( 138 ) 



b 



CONCL US ION. 

« NEBICULA est; transibit" — "It is a little doud; 
it wiU pass away." This was said by Athanasius 
of Julian the Apostate, who, after a short reign 
of active hostility to Christianity, perished with 
a confession of utter failure.*® The same may 
be applied to all the recent attempts to under- 
mine the faith of humanity in the person of its 
divine Lord and Saviour. The clouds, great and 
small, pass away; the sun continues to shine: 
darkness has its hour; the light is eternal No 
argument against the existence or attack upon the 
character of the sun will drive the king of day 
from the sky, or prevent him from blessing the 
earth. And the eye of man, with its sun-like 
nature, will ever turn to the sun, and drink the 
rays of light as they emanate from the face of 
Jesus, the " Light of the World." " God, who com- 
manded the light to shine out of darkness, hath 
shined in our hearts to give the light of the know- 
ledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus 
Christ " (2 Cor. 4 : 4). 



CONCLUSION. 139 

With its last and ablest efforts, infidelity seems 
to have exhausted its scientific resources. It could 
only repeat itself hereafter. Its different theories 
have been tried, and found wanting. One has in 
turn refuted and superseded the other, even during 
the Ufetime of their champion?. They explain 
nothing in the end: on the contrary, they only 
substitute an unnatural prodigy for a supernatural 
miracle, an inextricable enigma for a revealed 
mystery. They equally tend to xmdermine aU 
faith in God's providence, in history, and ultimately 
in every principle of truth and virtue ; and they 
deprive a poor and fallen humanity, in a world of 
sin, temptation, and sorrow, of its only hope and 
comfort in Ufe and in death. 

Dr. Strauss, the most learned of the infidel bio- 
graphers of Jesus, seems to have had a passing 
feeling of the disastrous tendency of his work of 
destruction, and the awful responsibility he assumed. 
" The results of our inquiry," he says in the closing 
chapter of his large " Life of Jesus," " have appa- 
rently annihilated the greatest and most important 
part of that which the Christian has been wont to 
believe concerning his Jesus; have uprooted all 
the encouragements which he has derived from his 
faith, and deprived him of all his consolations. 
The boundless stores of truth and life which for 
eighteen hundred years have been the aliment cit 



« 



140 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

humanity seem irretrievably devastated, the most 
sublime levelled with the dust, God divested of his 
grace, mau^of his dignity,, and the tie between 
heaven and earth broken. Piety turns away with 
horror from so fearful an act of desecration, and, 
strong in the impregnable self- evidence of its faith, 
boldly pronounces that — let an audacious criticism 
attempt what it will — all that the Scriptures declare 
and the Church believes of Christ will still subsist 
as eternal truth; nor need one iota of it be re- 
noxmced."*® Strauss makes then an attempt, it is 
true, at a philosophical reconstruction of what he 
vainly imagines to have annihilated as an historical 
fact by his sophistical criticism. He professes to 
admit the abstract truth of the orthodox Christology, 
or the union of the divine and human, but perverts 
it into a purely intellectual and pantheistic mean- 
ing. He refuses divine attributes and honours to 
the glorious Head of the race, but applies them to 
a decapitated humanity. He thus substitutes, fjom 
pantheistic prejudice, a metaphysical abstraction for 
a living reality; a mere notion for an historical 
fact ; a progress in philosophy and mechanical arts 
for the moral victory over sin and death ; a pan- 
theistic hero-worship, or self-adoration of a fallen 
race, for the worship of the only true and living 
God ; the gift of a stone for the nourishing bread ; 



CONCLUSION. 141 

a gospel of despair and final annihilation for the 
gospel of hope and eternal life.^°^ 

Humanity scorns such a miserable substitute, 
which has yet to give the first proof of any power 
for good, and which is not likely ever to convert 
or improve a single individual Humanity must 
have a living Head, a real Lord, and Saviour from 
sin and death. With renewed faith and stronger 
confidence, it will return from the dreary desola- 
tions of a heartless infidelity, and the vain conceits 
of a philosophy falsely so called, to the historical 
Christ, the promised Messiah, the God incarnate, 
and will exclaim with Peter : " Lord, where shall 
we go but to thee ? Thou alone hast the words of 
eternal life, and we believe and are sure that thou 
art the Son of God ! " 

Yes ! He stiU lives, the divine Man and incar- 
nate God, on the ever-fresh and seK-authenticating 
records of the Gospels, in the unbroken history of 
eighteen centuries, and in the hearts and lives of 
the wisest and best of our race ; and there he will 
live for ever. His person and work are the book 
of life, which will never grow old. Christianity 
lives and will continue to live with him, because 
he Uves, the same yesterday, to-day, and for 
ever. 

Jesus Christ is the most sacred, the most glo- 
rious, the most certain of all facts; arrayed ixsL 



142 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

a beauty and majesty which throws the " starry 
heavens above ns and the moral law within us " 
into obscurity, and fills us truly with ever-growing 
reverence and awe. He shines forth with the seK- 
evidencing light of the noonday sun. He is too 
great, too pure, too perfect, to have been invented 
by any sinful and erring man. His character and 
claims are confirmed by the sublimest doctrine, 
the purest ethics, the mightiest miracles, the 
grandest spiritual kingdom, and are daily and 
hourly exhibited in the virtues and graces of all 
who yield to the regenerating and sanctifying 
power of his spirit and example. The historical 
Christ meets and satisfies all moral and religious 
aspirations. The soul, if left to its noblest im- 
pulses and aspirations, instinctively turns to him, 
as the needle to the magnet, as the flower to the 
sun, as the panting hart to the fresh fountain. 
We are made for him, and " our heart is without 
rest until it rests in him." He commands our 
assent, he wins our affections and adoration. We 
cannot look upon him without spiritual benefit. 
We cannot think of him without being elevated 
above all that is low and mean, and encouraged 
to all that is good and noble. The very hem of 
his garment is healing to the touch. One hour 
spent in his communion outweighs all the plea- 



CONCLUSION. 143 

sures of sin. He is the most precious gift of a 
merciful God to a fallen world. In him are the 
treasures of wisdom, in him the fountain of pardon 
and peace, in him the only hope and comfort in 
this world and that which is to come. Mankind 
could better afford to lose the literature of Greece 
and Eome, of Germany and France, of England 
and America, than the story of Jesus of Nazareth. 
Without him, history is a dreary waste, a labyrinth 
of facts without meaning, connection, and aim: 
with him, it is a beautiful, harmonious revelation 
of God, the unfolding of a plan of infinite wisdom 
and love; all ancient history converges to his 
coming, all modern history receives from him its 
higher life and inspiration. He is the glory of the 
past, the life of the present, the hope of the future. 
We cannot even imderstand ourselves without 
him. According to an old Jewish proverb : " The 
secret of man is the secret of the Messiah." 
Christ is the great central Light of history, and, at 
the same time, the Light of every soul : he alone 
can solve the mystery of our being, and fulfil our 
intellectual desires after truth, our moral aspira- 
tions after goodness and holiness, and the longing 
of our feelings after peace and happiness. 

Not for all the wealth and wisdom of this 
world would I weaken the faith of the humblest 



144 "^^^^ PERSOU OF CHRIST. 

Christian in his divine Lord and Saviour ; but if, 
by the grace of God, I could convert a single 
sceptic to a child-like faith in him who lived and 
died for me and for all, I would feel that I had 
not lived in vain. 



( 145 ) 



CRITICAL NOTES. 



-M- 



LITERATURE. 

The literatnre on the Life and Character of our Lord has 
received innumerable additions during the last fifty years 
in Germany, France, Holland, England, and America. This 
increase is due in part to the attacks of Strauss and Renan^ 
and is a healthy sign of growing interest in the Christ- 
question as the central question of theology and religion. We 
omit the many Lives of Christ from those of Neander and 
Lanoe to those of Farrar and Geikie (some of which had 
an unprecedented sale), and confine ourselves here to a list of 
special treatises on the moral character of Christ as a man, 
which pursue a similar line of argument as the present work ; 
namely, to lead the doubter from the contemplation of his per- 
fect humanity to the recognition of his divinity. 

i)r. Carl Ullmann (formerly Professor of Church Hietory 
in Heidelberg, died Jan. 1865) : — Die Sundlosigkeit Jesu, 
Fine apologetische Betracktung. {The SinUssness of Jesus : 
An Evidence of Christianity, ) First published as an article 
in the German Theological Quarterly Review, Studien und 
Kritikerif for 1828, No. i ; then as a separate book, 6th 
edition, Heidelberg, 1853 ; 7th edition, partly rewritten, 1863. 
English translation from the 6th edition by LuNDiN Brown, 
Edinburgh, 1858. This important work broke the path in 
this line of argument^ and is still the best on the subject. 
The references are partly to the 6th, partly to the 7th, German 
edition. 

Dr. James Waddell Alexander (of New York, died 
1859) : — The Character of Jesw : An Argument for the Divine 



146 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

Origin of Christianity. Published in the Lectures on the 
Evidences of Christianity delivered at the University of Vir- 
ginia. New York, 1852. pp. 193-21 1. 

John Young*.— TAc Christ of History: An Argument 
grounded in the Facts of his Life on Earth, London and 
New York, 1858. 

Dr. Horace Bushnell (of Hartford, died 1876) :— 2%« 
Character of Jesus forbidding His Classification vnth Men. 
New York, 1861. A tract of rare ability and force, originally 
the tenth and by far the most important chapter of his work, 
Nature and the Supernatural^ as together constituting the one 
System of God. New York, 1858. pp. 276-299. 

Dr. Philip Schaff i—The Moral Character of Christ : The 
Perfection of his Humanity a Proof of his Divinity. Mercers* 
burg, Pa., 1 86 1. This tract was first delivered as an address 
before the Theological Seminary at Andover, Mass., and is the 
germ of the present work, which was published in several edi- 
tions in America and translated into several languages. It is 
now reissued after a final revision (1879). 

Peter Bayne (M.A., of Scotland) :—I%e Testimony of 
Christ to Christianity. Repu^ished in Boston, 1862. 

Dr. Isaac Dorner (Professor of Theology at Berlin) '.-—On 
the Sinless Perfection of Jesus {Ueber Jesu sundlose Vollkom^ 
menheit)y in the Annals of German Theology. Gotha, vol. 
viL 1862, pp. 49-106 ; and in pamphlet form. Also trans- 
lated into French for the Revue Chritienne, and into English 
by Prof. Dr. Henry B. Smith for the American Presbyterian 
Review. New York, 1863. 

Dr. J. J. VAN OosTERZEE (Professor of Theology at 
Utrecht) : — Da>s Bild Christi rmch der Schrift, Hamburg : 
1864. (The Image of Christ according to the Scriptures.) 
Translated from the Dutch by F. Meyeringh. It is lie third 
part of a larger work of the author, published at Rotterdam, 
1855-1861, in three parts, — part first treating of the Christo- 
logy of the Old Testament, part second of the Christology of 
the New Testament, part third stating the results, and form- 
ing a complete work by itself. It describes the Son of God 
before his incarnation, the Son of God in the flesh, and the 
Son of Grod in glory. 

• M. GuizoT : — Meditations su/r V Essence de la Religion 
ChrUienne. Premiere sdrie. Paris and Leipzig, 1864. The 8th 



N 



CRITICAL NOTES. 1 4/ 

Meditation, pp. 251-329, treats of Christ according to the 
Gospels. 

Two other French works, which seem to follow the same 
train of thought, I know only by name : E. Dandiran : — 
Essai sur la DiviniU du CharacUre Moral de J6sus-Christ. 
Geneve, 1850. And Edm. de Pressens^ i—Le lUdempteur, 
Paris, 1854. (Translated into English.) 

EcCE Homo : — A Survey of the Life and Work of Jesus 
Christ, London, Macmillan & Co., 1866. This work, said to 
he written by Professor Seeley (now of Cambridge), created a 
sensation almost as great as Kenan's Life of Jesus, but in a 
healthy direction, and leads at least to the threshold of Christ's 
divinity, although it deals exclusively with his humanity. 
Among the many criticisms and replies called forth, compare, 
especially, W. E. Gladstone : — Ecce Homo, London (Strahan 
& Co.), 1868. 

For older works on the sinless character of Christ, see Ull- 
mann's book above quoted, pp. 231-240, of the seventh edition. 

Note i, page i. 

The painter-monk Fra Beato Angelico da Fiesole (bom in 
Fiesole, near Florence, in 1387, died in Rome in 1455), one of 
the purest characters in the whole history of art, who from 
the seraphic beauty of his angels and glorified saints was 
called "the bl jessed" and **the angelic," painted the head of 
Christ and of the holy Virgin always in a praying frame of 
mind and on his knees. "It would be well for criticism," 
says E. Renan (in his ** Studies of Eeligious History and 
Criticism" trans, by 0. B. Frothingham, New York, 1864, p. 
168), " to imitate his example, and, only after having adored 
them, to face the radiance of certain figures before which the 
ages have bent low.'* Unfortunately, the French philosopher 
understands this in the sense of pantheistic hero-woi-^ip. 
We regard only one man as worthy of divine honour and 
worship, — the God-man Jesus of Nazareth. 

Note 2, page 3. 

See Dr. Horace Bushnell's able work on ** Nature and 
the Supernatural^'* 1858. The same idea is expressed by Dr. 
John W. Nevin, in " The Mystical Presencey"^ Philad., 1846, 
p. 199, in these words : *' Nature and revelation, the 'wotl^^xA. 



148 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

Christianity, as springing from the same Divine Mind, are 
not two different systems joined together in a merely outward 
way. They form a single whole, harmonious with itself in all 
its parts. The sense of the one, then, is necessarily included 
and comprehended in the sense of the other. The mystery of 
the new creation must involve, in the end, the mystery of the 
old ; and the key that serves to unlock the meaning of the 
iirst must serve to unlock the inmost secret of the last" 

Note 3, page 4. 

John 6 : 69 : "We have believed and know" {ifM^U «reT«^- 
Tej&Ka/uy Kal iyy^Kafiep, credidimus et eognovimus). The reverse 
order we have in John 10 : 38 : '* That ye may know and believe 
that the Father is in me, and I in him ; ** and in i John 5 : 13. 

Note 4, page 4. 

^^ Fides prascedit intellectum.** Or more fully, in the lan- 
guage of Anselm of Canterbury, adopted by Schleiermacher as 
the motto of his Dogmatics : **Neqtte enim qtuero intelligere ut 
credam, sed credo ut intelligam. Nam qui non crediderit, rum 
experietuVf et qui expertus non/uerit, non intelliget,** 

Note 5, page 4. 

** Intellecttu proicedit Jldem,** This was Abelard's maxim, 
which, without the restriction of the opposite maxim, must 
lead to rationalism and scepticism. 

Note 6, page 7. 

Dr. Ullma^n, ** Die Sundlosigkeit JesUy* 6th ed. p. 215 : 
*^Sofuhrt sckon das Vollendet-Menschliche in Jesu, wenn wir 
es mit allem Uebrigen, was die Menschheit darbietet, ver- 
gleichen, zur Anerkennung des Gottlichen in ihm," Dr. DOB- 
NEB, *^ Entwicldungsgeschichte der Lehre von der Person 
Christi" 2d. ed. vol. ii. p. 121 1 : ** Jesu Heiligkeit und WeiS' 
heit, durch die er unter den siindigen, viel-irrenden Menschen 
einzig dasteht, weiset. , . . auf einen uhematurlichen Ur- 
sprung seiner Person, Diese muss, um inmitten der Siinder' 
welt hegreiflich zu sein^ atis einer eigenthumlichen undumnder- 
har schopferischen That Gottes dbgeleitetja es mtiss in Chriitus 
, . . v(m Gott aits betrachtet^ eine Incarnation gottlicher Liebe, 
also gottlichen Wesens gesehen werden, was ihn als den Punkt 



CRITICAL NOTES. 1 49 

erscheinen Idsst, wo Gott und die Menschheit einzig und innigst 
geeinigt sind/' 

Note 7, page 10. 

This idea is almost as old as the Christian Church, and was 
already taught hy iREi^^us, who, through the single link of 
his teacher Polycarp, stood connected with the age of St. John 
the apostle. He says (Adv, ffcereses, lib. ii. cap. 22, § 4) : 
" Omnes enim venit [Christus] per semetipsum salvare, omnes, 
inquam, qui per eum renascuntur in Deum, infantes et par^ 
viUos et pueros et seniores, Ideo per omnem venit cetatem et 
infantibus infans factus, sanctificans infantes ; in parvulis 
partrultUf sanctificans hanc ipsam hahentes cetatem^ gimul et 
exemplum illis pietatis effectus et jiLstitioe et subjeciionis ; in 
juvenibus juvenis, exemplum juvenibus fiens et sanctificans 
Domino, Sic et senior in senioribus {^)t ut sit perfectus m/Of 
gister in omnibus," &c. But Irenseus eiTed in carrying the 
idea too far, and assuming Christ to have lived over fifty 
years, on the ground of the indefinite estimate of the Jews, 
John 8 : 57. Hippolytus, in his Philosopkumena, expresses 
the same view." 

Note 8, page 1 1. 

See Luke i : 41-45 ; the Magnificat, or the Virgin's Song, 
vers. 46-55 ; the Benedictus, or the Song of Zacharias, vers. 

67-79. 

Note 9, page 12. 

Bethlehem was indeed the ancestral seat of the house of 
David ("Ruth 1:1,2), and fortified by Rehoboam (2 Chron. 11 : 
16), but remained an insignificant place, and is not even men- 
tioned among the towns of Judah in the Hebrew text of 
Joshua, nor in Neh. 11 : 25. Comp. Micah. 5 : i, where the 
prophet thus contrasts its insignificance with its future destiny 
as the birthplace of the Saviour (according to the Hebrew 
text): "But thou Bethlehem Ephratah, too small to be 
among the thousands of JudahriTj-inVB^fe??—*-*' I t^^e central 
towns where the heads of thousands or subordinate divisions 
of tribes resided], out of thee shaU come forth unto me One 
who is to be the ruler in Israel ; whose origin is from the first 
of time, from the days of eternity." 

Note 10, page 13. 
Compare the rich remarks of Dr. La.^o^ \TL\ick& ^ntcos^^T^^wri 



150 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

on the second chapter of Matthew, vers. i-ii. (Am. ed. voL 

i.p. 55ff-) 

Note ii, page 13. 

Luke 2: 40, **And the child grew and waxed strong in 
spirit ; " precisely the same expression which Luke used, i : 
80, of John the Baptist. Compare also for the human growth 
and development of Christ, Luke 2 : 52 ; Heb. 2 : 10-18 and 
5 : 8 and 9, where it is said that he learned obedience, and, 
being made perfect, he became the author of eternal salva- 
tion. 

Note 12, page 14. 

Dr. J. P. Lange, in his *' Leben Jesu nach den Evangelien," 
Heidelberg, 1844 ff. vol. ii. p. 127, says : "The history of Jesus 
in his twelfth year represents his whole development. It is 
the characteristic deed of his youth, the revelation of his 
youthful life, a reflection of his birth, a sign and anticipation 
of his future heroic career. It represents the childhood of his 
ideality, therefore also the ideality of childhood in general." 
Compare also the suggestive remarks of Olshausen on that 
passage, ** Cammentar" (3d Germ. ed. vol. i. p. 145 flf.) ; and 
of Van Oosterzee, in Lange's ** Bibeliverk." 

Note 13, page 14. 

Luke 2 : 49 ; ^ rots roO rarpds fiov det, [Bel indicates a moral 
necessity which is identical with true freedom,] etvai fie. The 
fathers and most of the modern commentators refer the tm to 
the house of God, or the Temple. This is grammatically 
allowable, but restricts the sense, and deprives it of its deeper 
meaning ; for he could only occasionally be in the Temple of 
Jerusalem, which besides had already become a house of mer- 
chandise, (John 2:16) and was soon to be destroyed. Nearly 
all the English versions, Tyndale, Cranmer, the Genevan, 
and James, translate more correctly, ** about my Father's 
business." But we object to the term business in this con- 
nection, and prefer the more literal translation *^in the 
things (or affairs) of my Father." The in signifies the 
life-element in which Christ moved during his whole life, 
whether in the Temple or out of it. 

Note 14, page 15. 
By Dr. Horace Bushkell, in his genial work, already 



CRITICAL NOTES. I5I 

quoted, on ** Nature and the Supernatural^*' page 280. (" The 
Character ofJesiiSf" page 19 ff.) 

Note 15, page 17. 

See the particulars, with ample quotations from the sources, 
in RuD. Hoffmann's *' Leben Jesu nach den Apokryphen im 
Zusammenhang aus den Quellen erzaehlt und wissenschaftUch 
tintersucht," Leipzig, 1851, p. 140-263. Also the Apocry- 
phal Gospels by Tischendorf. 

Note 16, page 18. 

Renan, in his Life, or Romance rather, of Jesfos, chap, ii., 
gives a graphic description of the natural beauties of Naza- 
reth, as among the educational influences which account for 
the greatness of Christ ; but all this cannot do away with the 
seclusion and proverbial insignificance of the place (John i : 
48), and loses much of its force when we remember the narrow 
streets and filth of an Oriental town. "Nazareth," says 
Renan, "was a little town, situated in a fold of land broadly 
open at the summit of the group of mountains which closes on 
the noi-th the Plain of Esdraelon. The population is now from 
three to four thousand, and it cannot have varied very much. 
.... The environs are charming, and no place in the world 
was so well adapted to dreams of absolute happiness. Even 
in our days, Nazareth is a delightful sojourn, — the only place 
perhaps, in Palestine, where the soul feels a little relieved 
of the burden which weighs upon it in the midst of this 
unequalled desolation. The people are friendly and good- 
natured ; the gardens are fresh and green. . . . The beauty 
of the women who gather there at night — this beauty which 
was already remarked in the sixth century, and in which was 
seen the gift of the Virgin Mary (by Antonius Martyr, Itiner, 
§ 5) — has been surprisingly well preserved. It is the Syiian 
type in all its languishing grace." Comp. my book Through 
Bible Lands (New York and London, 1879), pp. 320-329. 

Note 17, page 19. 

Matt. 13 : 54-56. Compare also Mark 6:3, "Is not this 
the carpenter, the son of Mary ? " &c. ; from which it would 
appear that Jesus himself engaged in the trade of Joseph. 
This is confirmed by ancient tradition axvd l\i<^ ^^<qs^j(s«^ ^S^ 



152 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

Jewish Rabbis. Thus St Paul was a tent-maker (Acts i8 : 
3). The profession of a carpenter was by no means degrad- 
ing, but regarded among the most honourable and nsefuL 
Hence the question of the Nazarenes, '*/« not this the car- 
penter^s son ? '^ is to be taken as a question of surprise rather 
than of contempt. They denied the superiority, not the 
equality, of Jesus with them ; and could not understand from 
his social position how he could rise above the common level, 
and perform such wonderful works. 

Note i8, page 22. 

CJomp. G. G. Gervinus : ** Shakspeare,^^ Leipzig, 1850, voL 
i. pp. 38-41. This masterly critic and expounder of the 
British poet pronounces him one of the best and most exten- 
sively informed men of his age : ** Esist heute kein Wagndss 
mehr, zu sctgen, doss Shakspeare in jener Zdt an Umfang 
vielfachen Wistens sehr wenige seines Gleichen gehabt hdbeP 

Note 19, page 23. 
John Young : ** The Christ of Hist<yry,^* p. 35. 

Note 20, page 26. 

Heinrich Steffens, a follower of Schelling, and a Christian 
philosopher, bases his ** System of Anthropology" upon the 
thought expressed in the text. But it may be applied in 
its fullest and absolute sense only to Christ, as the ideal man, 
in whom and through whom alone the race can become com- 
plete. 

Note 21, page 31. 

Comp. with the history of the temptation in the wilderness, 
Matt. 4 and Luke 4, the significant passages in the Epistle to 
the Hebrews 4:15, "Tempted in all points as we are, yet 
without sin^' (ireireipavfs^ov icard irdvTa ica^' hfioibryp-a^ xo^p^f 
i.lMprlM)y and 5:8; ** Though he was a son, yet learned he 
obedience by the things which he suffered" (/ca/re/) &v vWf, 

Note 22, page 32. 

In scholastic terminology, relative freedom from sin is 
called posse non peccare, or impeccahilitas minor. To this 
corresponds the posse wm mori, or imvMrtaXitas minora ie., 



CRITICAL NOTES. 153 

the relative or conditional immortality of Adam in Paradise, 
which depended on his probation, and was lost by the Fall. 

Note 23, page 32. 

The non posse peccare^ or impeccabilitas majoi^'Wiih. this is 
closely connected the nan posse mori, or immortalitas major, 
the absolute immortality of the resurrection-state, which can 
never be lost. 

Note 24, page 32. 

Dr. Jos. Berg (formerly professor in the Theological Semi- 
nary at New Brunswick), in a friendly notice of the first 
edition of this essay (in his ** Evangelical Quarterly" for 
April 1 861, p. 289), objects to this view of the peccability of 
the man Jesus, that it is inconsistent with his absolute holi- 
ness. But I cannot see the force of his objection. Peccability 
is merely the possibility of sin, such as attached also to Adam 
in the state of innocence ; and it by no means involves Christ 
in the reality of sin, either original or actual. Against such 
an inference the language of the text is sufficiently guarded. 
It is true, the angel called Christ the Holy Thing from the 
moment of his conception, rd yemftbfievov Ayiov (Luke i : 35). 
But Adam was holy too, though "subject to fall" (as the 
Larger Westminster Confession expresses it, qu. 17). More- 
over, this original holiness cannot exclude the idea of the 
physical and moral growth of the Christ-child; for this is 
distinctly asserted by the same Evangelist (Luke 2 : 40, 52 ; 
comp. Heb. 5 : 8). The denial of the possibility of sin over- 
throws the realness of Christ's humanity, and turns the history 
of the Temptation into a Gnostic phantom and mere sham. It 
is just because Christ was really and actually tempted, and 
this not only by the Devil in the wilderness (Matt. 4), but 
throughout his whole life (Luke 22 : 28, Heb. 4 : 15), and 
because he successfully resisted the temptation under every 
form, that he became both our Saviour and our Example 
(comp. Heb. 5 : 7-9). 

Note 25, page 33. 

Peter Bayne : " The Testimony of Christ to Christianity,'* 

p. 105. 

Note 26, page 34. 

Comp. Acts 3 : 14; 1 Pet. i : 19; 2; 22 \ "i; \^\ a^x, V 



154 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

21 ; I John 2 : 29 ; 3 : 5, 7 ; Heb. 4:15; 7 : 26. Considering 
the infinite superiority of the ethics of the apostles to the 
ethics of the ancient Greeks, it is absurd to weaken the force 
of this unanimous testimony (as is done by D. F. STRAUSS, 
**IHe christlu^ Glaubenslehrt," vol. ii. p. 192 ; and to some 
extent even by Hase, **Leben Jesu" p. 61) by a reference to 
Xenophon's estimate of Socrates : " No one ever saw Socrates 
do, or heard him say, anything impious or unholy " [OiMs 
Vibrore 'LwKpdTOW oitbkv iae^is oidi dpdaiov oihe irpdrrotn-os etScF, 
oih-e "k^mn-oi IJKovaev. — Memorab.j i. 11), In the best case, 
this is only a negative judgment of his conduct, and not of 
the state of his heart ; it acquits Socrates of all manifesta- 
tion of impiety, without attributing to him, positively, reli- 
gious or moral perfection. It is a very different thing to 
assert of a man that he was free from sin and error, and to 
set forth in actual life a consistent sinless character. The 
purest man, if he were to invent such a character, would 
inevitably mix up with it some traits of human imperfection, 
or overdraw the picture beyond the truly human sphere. But 
the gospel-picture of Christ is throughout perfectly original 
and truthful, and maintains its spotless purity in every trait^ 
and under every situation and temptation. 

Note 27, page 35. 
Matt. 27 : 19, 24-54 ; Luke 23 : 22-47 > Matt. 27 : 4. 

Note 28, page 36. 

John 8 : 46. Compare the commentators, and the reflec- 
tions of Ullmakn, 1. c. pp. 92 S, 

Note 29, page 37. 

Quoted from Dr. H. Bushnell, 1. c. p. 325. The sinless- 
ness of Jesus is denied by D. F. Strauss, in his two destruc- 
tive works, ** The Life ofJestts" and " The Dogmatics in Con- 
Jlict with Modern Science ; " and this mainly from the d-priori 
philosophical argument of the impossibility of sinlessness, or 
the pantheistic notion of the inseparableness of sin from all 
finite existence. The only exegetical proof he urges (** Dog- 
mctt.y" ii. 192) is Christ's word. Matt. 19: 17: ** There is 
none good but one, that is God." But Christ answers here to 
the preceding question, and the implied misconception of 



CRITICAL NOTES. 155 

goodness. He does not decline the epithet good as such, but 
only in the superficial sense of the rich youth who regarded 
him simply as a distinguished Rabbi and a good man, not as 
one with God. He did not say, / am not good ; but None is 
good, no man is good, — much less in comparison with God. 
In other words, he rejected not so much the title Good 
Master, as that spirit and state of mind which looked upon 
him only as an exemplar of human wisdom and morality. 
In no case can he be supposed to have contradicted his own 
testimony concerning his innocence. The difficulty of the 
passage is still more effectually removed if we read with the 
best authorities : ** Wliy askest thou me of that which is 
good? One there is who is good." See the commentators 
ad locum, especially Olshausen, Meyer, and Lange. 

A French writer, F. Pecaut, "Xe Christ et la Conscience,^* 
Paris, 1859, likewise denies the sinlessness of Christ. Pecaut 
refers to the following facts as evidences of moral imperfection, 
— the conduct of Jesus toward his mother in his twelfth year, 
his rebuke administered to her at the wedding-feast of Cana, 
his expulsion of the profane traffickers from the Temple, his 
cursing of the unfruitful fig-tree, the destruction of the herd of 
swine, his bitter invectives against the Pharisees, and his own 
rejection of the attribute good in the dialogue with the rich 
youth. But all these difficulties are of easy solution, and not 
to be compared with the difficulties on the other side as pre- 
sented in the text. On the other hand, Pecaut himself, in- 
consistently enough, admits in a very eloquent passage that 
Christ's moral character rose beyond comparison above that 
of any other great man in antiquity, and was wholly pene- 
trated by God. How, in the name of logic, is it possible to 
admit so much of goodness, and yet to impeach his veracity 
when he claims to be entirely free from sin, and equal with 
Grod ? Veracity and honesty are the very foundation of a good 
character, and there can be no morality without them. Com- 
pare also, against Pecaut, the remarks of Dr. Van Ooster- 
zee in his work on Christ, German translation, page 166 £f. 

Note 30, page 37. 

So Schleiermacher, the greatest theological genius since 
Calvin, in his work, **Der christliche Glaube," 3d edition 
(1836), voL ii. p. 78 : **Christns war von alien audcra !&e?<Ar 



IS6 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

schen unterschieden dutch seine wesentliche Unsundlichkeit 
und seine sMechthinige Vollkommenheit ; ** i,e,, ** Christ 
differed from all other men by his essential sinlessness and 
his abBolute perfection ; " a proposition which Schleiermacher 
most ably establishes not only in his *' Dogmatics " but also 
in many of his sermons. Hase and Keim likewise admit the 
sinless perfection of Jesus. 

Note 31, page 43. 

Cicero, Qucest Ttisctil,, ii 22 : ** Qtiem [in quo erit per- 
fecta sapiential adhuc nos quidem vidimus nemineTn, sed 
philosophorum sententiis, quaXis futurus sit, si modo aliquando 
fuerit, eaponitur." The same writer, in the same work, ii. 4, 
speaks in the strongest terms of the gross contrast between 
the doctrine and the life of the philosophers. Quintillian 
accuses them of concealing the worst vices under the name 
of the ancient philosophy {Instit, i. Proasm.) The virtue of 
chastity, in our Christian sense, was almost unknown among 
the heathen. Woman was essentially a slave of man's lower 
passions. It is notorious that disreputable women, called 
h-aipaif or amicoe, were attached in Corinth to the Temple of 
Aphrodite, and enjoyed the sanction of religion for the prac- 
tice of vice. These dissolute characters were esteemed above 
housewives, and became the proper representatives of female 
culture and social elegance. Remember Aspasia, Phryne, 
Lais, Theodora, who attracted the admiration and courtship 
even of earnest philosophers like Socrates, and statesmen like 
Pericles. To the question of Socrates, " Is there any one with 
whom you converse less than with the wife?" his pupil 
Aristobolus replied, ** No one, or at least very few." Worse 
than this, the disgusting vice of psederastia, which even de- 
praved nature abhors, was practised as a national habit among 
the Greeks, without punishment or dishonour; was freely 
discussed, commended, and praised by their poets and philo- 
sophers, and likewise divinely sanctioned by the lewdness of 
Jupiter with Ganymede. Dr. DoLLlNGER, in his instructive 
and learned work, ** Heidenthum und Judenthum^^^ 1857, p. 
684 ff., sums up his investigation on this subject with the 
following statement : " Bei den Griechen tritt das Laster der 
Fcederastie nut alien Symptom^n einer grossen nationalen 
Krankheity gleichsam eines ethischen Miasma auf; es zeigt 



CRITICAL NOTES. 157 

sich als ein GefiiM, das starker vnd he/tiger wirktef als die 
Weiberliebe bet anderen Volkem, massloser, leidenschaftlicher 
in seinen Ansbriichen war, Ba^ende Eifersttcht, tmhedingte 
Hingebungt sinnliche Gluth, zdrtliche Tdnddei, ndchtliches 
Weilen vor der Thure des Geliebien, Alles, was zur Carricatur 
der naturlichen Geschlechtsliebe gehort, findet sich dahei. 
Auch die emstesten Moralisten war en in der BeurtheUung des 
Verhdltnisses hochst nachsichtig, sie behandelten die Sachs 
hdufig mehr mit leichtsinnigem Scherze, und dnldeten die 
Schvidigen in ihrer Gesellschaft In der ganzen Literatur der 
vorchristlichen Periode ist kaum ein Schriftsteller zu finden^ 
der sich entschieden dagegen erkldrt hdtte, Viehnekr war die 
ganze Gesellschaft davon angesteekt, und man athmete das 
Miasmaj sa zu sagen^ mit der Luft ein."*"* On the whole suh- 
ject of heathen morals, compare this work of Dollinoer ; 
also C. Schmidt, **Essai Historique sur la SocUti dans le 
Monde Bomuiny etsur la Transformaiion par le Christianism^,** 
Paris, 1853; and SCHAFF, ** History of the Apostolic Church " 
pp. 147-157, 443-454; and " History of the Christian Church " 
vol. i. p. 302. 

Note 32, page 44. 
Theodore Parker : "Discourses of Beligion," p. 294. 

Note 33, page 44. 

Renan makes some striking admissions on this point, 
though not unmixed with error. *' Morality," he says in the 
fifth chapter of his ** Vie de Jisus," **is not composed of 
principles more or less well expressed. The poetiy of the pre- 
cept which makes it lovely is more than the precept itself, 
taken as an abstract verity. Now, it cannot be denied that 
the maxims borrowed by Jesus from his predecessors" 
[Christ borrowed nothing from anybody] "produce in the 
Gospel an effect totally different from that in the ancient 
Law, in the Pirke Aboth, or in the Talmud, It is not the 
ancient Law, it is not the Talmud, which has conquered and 
changed the world. Little original in itself [?], if by that is 
meant that it can be recomposed almost entirely with more 
ancient maxims, the evangelical morality remains none the 
less the highest creation which has emanated from the human 
consciousness, the most beautiful code of perfect life th&i «s^ 



158 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

moralist has traced (la morale &vangiltque n'en reste pas moins 
la plus haute creation qui soil sortie de la conscience humaine^ 
le plus beau code de la vie parfaite qu'aucun moraliste ait 
tra>c€).'\ . . "Jesus, son of Sirach, and Hillel, had enimci- 
ated aphorisms almost as lofty as those of Jesus. Hillel, 
however, will never be considered the real founder of Chris- 
tianity. In morality, as in art, words are nothing; deeds 
are everything.. The idea which is concealed beneath a 
picture of Raphael is a small thing : it is the picture alone 
that counts. Likewise, in morality, truth becomes of value 
only if it pass to the condition of feeling ; and it attains all 
its preciousness only when it is realised in the world as a 
fact. Men of indifferent morals have written very good 
maxims. Men very virtuous, also, have done nothing to 
continue the tradition of their virtue in the world. The 
palm belongs to him who has been mighty in word and in 
work ; who has felt the truth, and, at the price of his blood, . 
has made it triumph. Jesus, from this double point of view, 
is without equal : his glory remains complete, and will be 
renewed for ever. {J^suSf d se double point de vue, est sans 
6gal ; sa gloire reste entUre et sera toujours reTWUvelie.)*' 

Note 34, page 44. 

The relation of husband and father must be excepted, on 
account of his elevation above all equal partnership, and the 
universalness of his character and mission which requires the 
entire community of the redeemed as his bride instead of any 
individual daughter of Eve. 

Note 35, page 46. 

Mark 7 : 37. The expression of the people, koKws rdtn-a 
rerolrjKe {bene omnia fecit), must be taken as a general judg- 
ment, inferred not only from the particular case related 
before, but from all they had heard and seen of Christ. 

Note 36, page 54. 

Matt. 27 : 46. It should be remembered that Jesus speaks 
here in the prophetical and typical words of David, Ps. 22 : 
2 ; while, when speaking in his own language, he uniformly 
addresses God as his Father, 



CRITICAL NOTES. ^ 159 

Note 37, page 58. 

X Cor. II : I. Comp. i Thess. 1:6: "Ye became fol- 
lowers of us and of the Lord. " 

Note 38, page 59. 

Matt. 4 : 19 ; 8 : 22 ; 9 : 9 ; Mark 2 : 14 ; 8 : 34 ; 10 : 21 ; 
Luke 5 : 27 ; 9 : 23, 59 ; 18 : 22 ; John i : 43 ; 10 : 27 ; 
12 : 26. 

Note 39, page 59. 

ilatt. 12 : 1-8 ; Mark 2 : 23-28 ; Luke 5:1-9; John 5 : 

16-18. 

Note 40, page 60, 

John 9:3: ''Neither hath this man sinned, nor his 
parents; (but he was born blind) that the works of God 
should be made manifest in him. " 

^ Note 41, page 60. 

See the dialogue with the woman of Samaria, John 4 : 
5 ff. ; and the parable of the merciful Samaritan, Luke 10 : 

Note 42, page 62. 
Comp. Ullmann, ** Sundlosigkeit" p. 67; J. P. Lange, 
** Leben Jesu" i. 27-34; Ebrard, ** Dogmatik" vol. ii. 23, 
24. Also Hase, in his ** Lehen JesUy" p. 63 (4th ed.), places 
the ideal beauty of Christ's character in ^* das schone Eben- 
maass alter Krafte" and in ** vollendete Gottesliehe dargestellt 
in reinster Humanitdt^^ (**The beautiful symmetry of all 
powers,'* and ** perfect love to God, exhibited in the purest 
humanity "). Bishop D. Wilson, in his * * Evidences of Chns- 
tianityj* voL ii. 116 (Boston ed. of 1830), remarks: "The 
opposite, and to us apparently contradictory, graces were 
found in Christ in equal proportion." Dr. W. E. Channing, 
the Unitarian, in his able sermon on the ** Character of 
Christ*^ {Works i vol. iv. p. 23), says : "This combination of 
the spirit of humanity, in its lowliest, tenderest form, with the 
consciousness of unrivalled and divine glories, is the most 
wonderful distinction of this wonderful character." GUIZOT, 
Meditations sur V Essence de la Belig. Chr^tienne, 1864, p. 
274 : ** Bien ne me frappe plus dans les J^vangiles que ce 
double charactdre de sMriti et d'amour^ de puret6 austdre et 



l60 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

de $ympathie tendre qui apparatt et rigne constamment dans 
les cuUes et dans les paroles de Jistu-Christf en tout ee qui 
toucJie aux rapports de Dieu avec les hommes.'* I 'add a 
testimony from Dr. LuTHARDT'S " Apologetische Vortrdge 
uber die Grundvxihrheiten des Christenthums," Leipz. 1864, p. 
204 : ** The image of Jesus is the image of the highest and 
purest harmony both of his natural and his moral being. 
With all other men there is some discrepancy in the inner 
life. The two poles of intellectual life, knowledge and feel- 
ing, head and heart, the two powera of the moral life, 
thought and will,— in whom are they fully agreed? But as 
to Jesus, we all have the lively impression, here reigns 
perfect harmony of the inner spiritual life. His soul is at 
absolute peace. ... He is all love, all heart, all feeling; 
and yet, on the other hand, all intellect, all clearness, all 
majesty. . . . All is quiet greatness, peaceful simplicity, 
sublime harmony." 

Note 43, page 66. 

**Politia," p. 74 sq. ed. Ast. {**Plat. Opera^*^ vol. iv. p. 
360, E. ed. Bip.) Compare the author's ** History of the 
Apostolic Church" English edition, § 109, page 433. Jean 
Jacques Rousseau was struck with this remarkable heathen 
prophecy of the suffering Saviour, who died the death of a 
malefactor and a slave to redeem us. ** Quand Platon," he 
says in his £mil, **peint son Juste imaginaire convert de 
tout Vopprohre du crime et digne de tons les prix de la vertu, 
ilpeint trait pour trait J6sus-Christ : la ressemblance est si 
frappante, que tous les pdres Vont sentie, et qu'il rCest pas 
possible de s'y tromper, " 

Note 44, page 69. 

John 7 : 3-10. The brethren of Jesus appear, at aU events, 

as members and inmates of the holy family either by birth or 

adoption. Compare the author's exegetical article on the 

*^ Brothers of Christ,^' in the ** Bibliotheca Sacra" for October 

1864 ; and notes in his edition of Lange's *' Commentary on 

Matthew" p. 256. 

Note 45, page 74. 

Rousseau, kmil^ iv. p. 11 1 : " Owt, si la me et la mart de 
Socrate sont d'un sage ; la vie et la mort de Jistis sant (Tun 
dieu I ** See Appendix, 



<( 



CRITICAL NOTES. l6l 

Note 46, page 79. 

Der Reinste unter den Mdchtigen^ der Mdchtigste unter 
den Reinen^ der mit seiner durchstochenen Hand Reiche aus 
der Angelf den Strom der Jahrhunderte aus dem Bette hob 
nnd noch fortgehietet den Zeiten." Jean Paul, '* Ueber den 
Gott in der Geschichte und im Leben." Sdmmtliche Werke, 
vol. xxxiii. 6. 

Note 47, page 80. 

** Vie de Jdsus,'* 7th ed. Paris, 1864, p. 325 : "Quels que 
puissent itre les pMnom^es inattendues de I'avenir, Jisus ne 
serapas mrpa^s6. Son culte se rajeunira sans cesse ; sa Ugende 
vrovoquera des larmes sans Jin ; ses souff ranees attendriront les 
meUleurs cosurs ; tous les siicles proclameront qu'entre les fils 
des hommeSi il n'en est pas n6 de plus grand que Jisus.^^ 
Renan, however, spoils his concessions, which are quite fre- 
quent and enthusiastic, by his pantheistio man-worship, and 
by placing Gakya-Mouni, the founder of Buddhism, on a par 
with Christ. Compare the last chapter of his " Vie de Jisus^^ 
and also the conclusion of his essay on the '* Critical Histo- 
rians of Jesus J* where he says of Christ : * * The wonder-worker 
and the prophet will die ; the man and the sage will endure ; 
or, rather, the eternal beauty will live for ever in this sublime 
name, as in all those whom humanity has chosen to keep it in 
mind of its own nature, and to transport it by the view of its 
own image. Behold there the living God ! This is the ador- 
able One!" 

Note 48, page 80. 

Dr. Baur: **Das Christcnthum und die christliche Kirche 
der ersten drei Jahrhunderte." (See note 85, p. 172.) 

Note 49, page 83. 

For a very full exposition of this testimony we refer to the 
instructive and able work of W. Fr. Gess : **Die Lehre von 
der Person Christi entwicJcelt aus dem Sebstbewusstsein Christi 
und aus dem Zeugnisse der AposteV* Basel. 1856, new ed., 
much enlarged, 1879. I^r. Bushnell's admirable essay on the 
character of Jesus is defective here. He does not establish 
the proper divinity of Christ, but seems content with the proof 
that he was more than man, and cannot be classified with 
men. Having carried the reader over the great difficulty^ a.w<^ 



1 62 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

beyond the boundary of hnmanitarianism, he leaves him to 
his own conclusion concerning the merits of the orthodox view 
of Christ. The same is true of Prof. Seeley's " Ecce Homo,'' 

Note 50, page 83. 
* Compare the .dictionaries, and especially Bruder's V Greek 
Concordance of the New Testament" sub verbo vlbs rod dt^ptinrov. 

Note 51, page 84. 

So many modem Grerman commentators, and also Dr. 
Trench, who remarks: "He was *Son of man^ as alone 
realising all which in the idea of man was contained, as the 
second Adam, the head and representative of the race, — ^the 
one true and perfect flower, which ever unfolded itself, of the 
root and stock of humanity. Claiming this title as his own, 
he witnessed against opposite poles of error concerning his 
person, — the Ebionite, to which the exclusive use of the title 
* Son of David ' might have led ; and the Gnostic, which 
denied the reality of the human nature that bore it " (** Note» 
on the Parables^'* mnih London edition, page 84). LiDDON 
{** Bampton Lectures on the Divinity of Christ," 1868, p. 8): 
**The title *Son of Man' does not merely assert his real in- 
corporation with our kind ; it exalts Him indefinitely above 
us all as the representative, the ideal, the pattern. Man." 
Philo, the Jewish divine and philosopher, a contemporary of 
Christ, calls the Logos the true man, 6 dXrj^ufbs Av^/owtos. 

Note 52, page 84. 
Matt. 9 : 27; 15 : 22 ; 12 : 23 ; 21 : 9; 22 : 41 ff., &c. 

Note 53, page 86. 
Matt. 16 : 17 ; compare 19 : 28 ; 24 : 30 ; 25 : 31 ; 26 : 64; 
Luke 21 : 27, 36. 

Note 54, page 87. 
Matt, II : 27 ; 21 : 37 ; 22 : 42 ; 26 : 63 f. ; 27 : 43 ; Mark 
12: 6; 13: 32; 14: 62; Luke 10: 22; John 5: 19-26; 9: 
35-38 ; 10 : 36 ; 11:45 H : ^3 J ^7 : i ; I9 '• 7« 

Note 55, page 87. 
Matt. 16 : 16; Mark 3:11; John i : 18, 34, 49; 11 : 27; 
20 : 31, — besides the many passages in the Acts and Epistles, 



CRITICAL NOTES. 1 63 

where the term vlbs toD GeoD is as frequent as the term vlbs roO 
dv'^pd)vov in the Gospels. 

Note 56, page 87. 
Matt. 3:17; Luke 3 : 22 ; Matt. 17 : 5 ; Luke 9 : 35. 

Note 57, page 88. 
Matt. 11: 27. This passage is a striking parallel to the suh- 
limest sayings in the fourth Gospel, and proves the essential 
identity of the Synoptist and Johannean picture of Christ. 

^ Note 58, page 88. 

John 3 : 36 ; 5 : 24 ; 6 : 40, 47, 50-58 ; ii : 25. 

Note 59, page 88. 

John 4 : 26 ; 5 : 36, 39 ; Matt. 14 : 33 ; 16 : 16 f . ; 26 : 63 f. ; 
&c. 

Note 60, page 89. 

Matt. 26 : 63-65. Schleiermacher pronounces this aflBrma- 
tive Yea of Christ, in view of the surrounding circumstances, 
the greatest word ever spoken by any man, the most glorious 
apotheosis, and the most certain assurance by which any 
divinity could proclaim itself {**das grosste Worty was je ein 
Sterhlicher gesagt hat, die herrlichste Apotheose ; keine Gott' 
heit kann gewisser sein als die, welche so sich selbst verkuri' 
diget"). See his youthful work, ** Discourses on Beligion" 
(Eeden uber die Religion), 4th edition, Berlin, 183 1, p. 292, 



« 



Note 61, page 89. 
Matt. 16 : 19 ; 27 : 11 ; Luke 22 : 30 ; John 18 : 36. Com* 
pare Dan. 7 : 13 ; Luke i : 33. 



John 5 : 22, 25-27 



Note 62, page 89. 
;-27 ; Matt, 25 : 31 ff., &C. 



Note 63, page 89. 
Matt. 18 : II ; Luke 9 : 56; 19 : 10 ; John 3 : 17; 5: 34; 
10 : 9 ; 12 ; 47. Compare Luke i : 47; 2 : 11 ; John 4 : 42, 
&c. 

Note 64, page 91. 

**Mundu8 nan foetus est in tempore^ sed cum t»nv"pwer 



164 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

Note 65, page 91. 
John 8 : 58 : *AfjL^y, dfi^y [the solemn announcement of an 
important truth] Xiyu) vpuv, irplv *A^paiLfi yevia^ai iyd> elfiu 
Mark also the difference of the verb (which is lost in our 
li^nglish version), besides the difference of the tense. For 
ylvecr^aL, to become^ to begin to be, to pass from non-existence 
into existence^ implies origin in time or previous non-existence, 
-and is applicable only to^created beings; while cXvai is equally 
applicable to God and to eternal existence. Compare the ^p 
of the A070S, John i : i, with the iyivero of the man John, 
ver. 6. H. A. W. Meyer, one of the fairest and most accurate 
grammatical commentators, correctly remarks on John 8 : 58 : 
**Z>a Abraham nicht prdexistirt hatte^ sondem {durch seine 
Geburt) ZUR ExiSTENZ KAM, so steht yep^a^ai^ wogegen mit 
el/jX das Sein AN SICH gemeint ist, welches bei Jesu (so/em er 
nach seinem gottlichen Wesen vorzeitlich war) ohne vorgdngiges 
Gewordensein tvar. Das PRA.ESENS bezeichnet das aus der Ver- 
gangenheit heVf d. i. hier : aus der VorzeitUchkeit her (Joh. 
I : I ; 17 : 5), Fortdauemde, Vrgl. Ixx., Jer. 1:5; Ps. 90 : 2 ; 
Winer, Gramm, p. 309." Meyer then goes on to refute the 
Socinian and rationalistic misinterpretations of the passage. 

Note 66, page 91. 
John 17 : 5. Compare the testimony of the apostles on the 
pre-existence, — John i : 1-14; Col. i : 16; Heb. i : 2, 3. 



Note 67, page 92. 
Matt. 9 :*6 ; Luke 5 : 20-24 J 7 J 47» 48. 



Note 68, page 92. 
John 10 : 30. The passage teaches, certainly, more than 
the ethical unity of will : it asserts, according to the context, 
the unity of power which is based on the unity of essence, or 
the homousia. The iv excludes Arianism ; the plural icrfUPt 
Sabellianism and Patripassianism. 

Note 69, page 93. 

Dr. Hengstenberg, in his ** Commentary on the Gospel 
of St. John," 1863, vol. iii. p. 361, justly remarks : ** Men- 
schen, die sich selbst zu Gott machen, sind immer entweder 
Verriickte oder Bbsewichter, Wer anders, als wer selbst ein 



CRITICAL NOTES. 1 65 

Frevler tst, wird es wagen Jesum^ in die eine oder die andere 
dieser Classen zu setzen ? " The anonymous author of *' Ecce 
Deua" (Boston ed., p. 23) remarks : "Christ must be more 
than a good man, or worse than the worst man. If he be not 
God, he is the Devil." 

Note 70, page 93. 
** Of all the readers of the gospel," says BuSHNELL, p. 290, 
" it probably never even occurs to one in a hundred thousand 
to blame his conceit, or the egregious vanity of his preten- 
sions." 

Note 71, page 94. 

The explanation which some Socinian and Unitarian divines 
give of these words of Thomas, by resolving them into u 
mere exclamation of surprise at the fact of the resurrection, 
** O my Grod !'* is simply absurd, and only worthy of notice 
as revealing the inextricable diflSculty which it presents to 
the Unitarian Christology. 

Note 72, page loi. 
Similar views are more fully carried out by Dr. Bushnell 
(** Nature and the Supernatural ")i and Professor Christlieb 
( * * Modem Doubts, " dec. ) 

Note 73, page 103. 
Is was first suggested by the heathen assailants of Chris- 
tianity, Celsus and Julian the Apostate, then insinuated 
by French Deists of the school of Voltaire, but never raised 
to the dignity of scientific argument. The only attempt to 
carry it out, and that a mere fragmentary one, was made by 
the anonymous ** Wolfenhiittel Fragmentist,'' since known 
as Hermann Samuel Reimarus, professor of Oriental 
Literature in the College at Hamburg, who died in 1786. 
His ^^ Fragments''* were never intended for publication, but 
only for a few friends. Lessing found them in the library at 
Wolfenhiittel, and commenced to publish them, without the 
author's knowledge, in 1774 ; not, as he said, because he 
agreed with them, but because he wished to arouse the spirit 
of investigation. This mode of procedure, Semler, the father 
of German neology, wittily compared to the act of setting a 
city on fire for the purpose of trying the engines. In our own 
time, Bruno Bauer, a theological weathercock, va^eJacsvA^ 
and final apostate (not to be coafouuded. \«\\)ti \i\i<& i«b\ wi^^xv^^ 



1 66 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

Dr. F. Ch. Baur), has endeavoured to revive, "but without 
elfect, this exploded theory, and has misrepresented the 
Gospels as deliberate fabrications. But even Strauss ignores 
him (in his new ** Life of Jesus ") as uniit for his company. 

Note 74, page 108. 
''Discourse on the Character of Christ,** — Chai^niNG's 
Works, vol. iv. 17, 18. 

Note 75, page 109. 
The so-called rationalismtis communis, or vulgaris, or the 
rationalism of common sense, as distinct from the transcen- 
dental rationalism of uncommon sense or speculative reason. 
The sense of both systems, however, ends in nonsense. Dr. 
Marheineke defined a Rationalist, or, as Paulus (not of 
Tarsus, but of Heidelberg) called him, a Denkgldubige, as a 
man, der zu denken glauht und zu glauben denkt ; esist aiber 
mit beidem gleich null; i.e., a man who helieves that he 
thinks, and thinks that he believes ; but both amounts to 
nothing. The Hegelian School has successfully ridiculed 
common or vulgar rationalism, and made every scholar of 
philosophical pretensions ashamed of it. But the infidel 
wing of that school has at last relapsed into the same or still 
greater absurdities. 

Note 76, page 109. 

Compare DiODORUS Siculus, Bibli. Fragm,, i. 7 ; CiCERO, 
De natura deor., i, 42 ; Sextus Empir., Adv. math., ix. 17. 

Note 77, page 109. 

Dr. Paulus was bom at Leonberg, in the kingdom of 
Wiirttemberg, 1761 ; then successively professor in different 
universities; at last in Heidelberg, where he died in 185 1, 
after having long outlived himself. His rationalistic exegesis 
is laid down in his ** Commentary on the Gospels," published 
since i8cx) ; and in his ** Life of Jesus," 1828. 

Note 78, page 1 10. 

The rationalistic interpretation of irepiTdTCbv ivl Trjs ^akdc- 

uyfi (according to the reading of the received text), or ivX 

rfjp ^d\a(T(Tav (according to the better authenticated reading 

of the modern critical editions), in Matt. 14 : 25, is inconsis- 



CRITICAL NOTES. 1 67 

tent with the context as well as with the expression in verse 
29, ir€pL€irdTri(T€v ivl ri OSaTa, and abandoned by all good 
commentators. It is true that the Greek preposition ^t^ 
with the genitive may mean, on the bank of, but only after 
verbs of rest, as in John 20: i, iirl rijs ^Xdo-o-iys ttjs TtjScptdSos, 
not after verbs of motion, as wcpiiraTCiv, and still less with the 
accusative, according to the proper reading of the oldest 

manuscripts. 

Note 79, page 113. 

Ren AN: ** Studies of Religious History and Criticism," 

translated by O. B. Frothingham. New York, 1864. pp. 176, 

177. 

Note 80, page 115. 

David Friedrich Strauss, Doctor of Philosophy, was bom 
January 27, 1808, at Ludwigsburg, near Stuttgart, in Wiirt- 
temberg, a little kingdom >yhich has produced an unusual 
number of distinguished men, — poets like Schiller and Uhland, 
philosophers like Schelling and Hegel, astronomers like Kep- 
ler, and some of the most orthodox and pious divines, as 
Bengel and Storr, but also the very leaders of both the com- 
mon and transcendental rationalism, viz., Paulus, Baur, and 
Strauss. Dr. Baur, Professor of Church History in Tubingen, 
who died i860, was the founder of the so-called Tiibingen 
School of negative historical criticism, which aimed at a 
radical reconstruction of the history of primitive Christianity, 
on the basis of a pantheistic (Hegelian) intellectualism. He 
is, upon the whole, the ablest and most respectable of all the 
opponents of Christianity. It was mainly under his instruc- 
tion that Strauss was educated, and unfitted for the Christian 
ministry, at the University of Tiibingen. He was the first in 
his class, and exhibited unusual talent and industry. After 
a literary journey to the north of Germany, he became Repe^ 
tent, or theological tutor and lecturer, at the Stift (Seminary) 
of his Alma Mater ; but was removed from this post and the 
service of the Church in 1836, after the publication of his first 
**Life of Jestis," which created an extraordinary sensation in 
the theological and literary world. Since that time he led a 
rather unsteady and apparently unhappy life in different 
places, — at Ludwigsburg, Stuttgart, Heilbronn, Weimar, 
Cologne, Munich, and again at Heilbronn, Darmstadt, and 
Ludwigsburg. He waa married to a famous OAtt^^ Kj^^^^ij^ 



I 



1 68 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

Schebest ; but was shortly afterwards divorced from her, on 
account of incompatibility of temper. In 1839 he was called 
to a professorship of didactic theology at the University of 
Zurich, but was prevented from taking possession of his chair 
by a revolution of the people of the canton, who stormed the 
city, and expelled the radical and infidel administration which 
had called him to undermine the very foundations of the Chris- 
tian faith in the rising ministry of the Church. He wrote a de- 
structive system of theology, several biographies, of Hutten, 
Schubert, Reimarus, Voltaire, literary and political essays, a 
new Life of Jesus,and a work on " The Old and the New Faith" 
(1873), wherein he professed, shortly before his death, his con- 
version from ideal pantheism to a dreary materialism with- 
out God and without hope. In several poems of cold classic 
finish, written under severe physical pain, he reveals the resig- 
nation of a Stoic philosopher. He died in his native town, 
Ludwigsburg, 1874. His friend, Edward Zeller, Professor of 
Philosophy in Berlin, and son-in-law of Dr. Baur, wrote a 
memoir, and edited his works. Hausrath prepared an ex- 
tensive biography. 

Strauss was a good classical and general scholar, and a 
master in the art of composition. He had a clear, methodical, 
logical, and acute mind, a rare power of critical analysis, and 
a trenchant style, but no constructive genius. He was a skilful 
** architect of ruin." When a student, he was quite super- 
stitious, and believed in the ghost stories and demoniacal 
possessions which then agitated Wtirttemberg, and clustered 
around his friend, the amiable and humorous poet-physician 
and ghost-seer, Justinus Kemer of Weinsberg (who, by the 
way, called Strauss's marriage and subsequent divorce a mere 
"myth," and played many good-humoured jokes on him). 
This is a striking illustration of the close affinity of super- 
stition and infidelity, and the easy transition from one to the 
other. We have the same law exemplij&ed on a large scale 
in the close alliance between infidelity and modem spiritual- 
ism falsely so called. Man must believe in something ; either 
in the true God or in dumb idols, either in the Holy Ghost or 
in spectres. 

The first and larger ** Leben Jesu " of Strauss appeared at 
Tiibingen in 1835 and 1836, in two volumes ; the fourth, and 
j^robably the last, edition in 1840 ; and was translated into 



CRITICAL NOTES. 1 69 

French by l^mile Littr^, member of the Institute (Paris, 2d ed. 
1856), and into English by Miss Marian Evans (** George 
Eliot," London, 1846, in three volumes; republished in New 
York by some obscure house, 1850). The smaller work under 
the same title, in one volume of 633 pages, appeared at Leip- 
zig in 1864, and passed through several editions. While 
the first was intended exclusively for learned readers, the 
second is more popular {Jur das deutsche Volk bearbeitetj as 
the title-page says), and aims to be the same for the Ger- 
man people that Kenan's " Vie de Jesus'* was for the French, 
although it is as far below the latter in easy elegance and 
popularity as it is above it in scholarship and accuracy. He 
dedicated it to the memory of his deceased brother, as Kenan 
dedicated his work to the memory of his deceased sister. 
With slight modifications, he adheres to his old position, 
with increased bitterness to the clergy and the Church, whom 
he gives up hopelessly, turning to the people, and assuming 
the part of a theological deserter and spiritual demagogue. 
He has the impudence, in the preface (page 12), to appeal to 
the example of St. Paul, who, after being rejected by the 
Jews, offered the gospel to the Gentiles. He hopes that the 
annihilation of the popular faith in miracles will overthrow at 
last the Christian ministry, as a useless and even injurious 
encumbrance of society in the present advanced state of civil- 
isation. ** Wer die P faff en aus der Kirche schaffen vsilly'* 
he says (preface, page 9), " der muss erst das Wunder aus der 
Religion schaffen.^^ The nature of the religion or philosophy 
which he would like to substitute for a supernatural Chris- 
tianity may be judged from his undisguised denial of the 
immortality of the soul. He praises his deceased brother, in 
the words of dedication, for having never yielded, not even 
on his death- bed, to the deceitful temptation of deriving com- 
fort fi'om the empty dream of another world. ** Du hast" he 
says, "selbst in solchen Augenhlicken, wojede Lehenshoffnung 
erloschen war, niemals der Versuchung uachgegeben, durch 
Anlehnen an^s Jenseits dich zu tduschen" This philosophy 
of death was well characterised, at the appearance of his first 
"LebenJesu "in the lines of Gustav Schwab, the Swabian poet: 

" Ich bin der Weg, die Wahrheit und daa Leberif 
Bprach Der, den Gott ziim FQhrer uns gegeben ; 
Doch wie spricht der, mit dem Jhr uns bedroMit 
Ich bin der Weg, die Wahrlitjlt >md dat Tod.** 



170 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

The mythical theory of Strauss has been refuted, first 
poditively, by Neander, Lange, Tholuck, Ebrard, and other 
Biblical scholars, who met his ** Life of Jesus** with suc- 
cessful vindications of the gospel history ; negatively also by 
Baur, Schwegler, Keim, and other advanced critics of the 
Tubingen School, who derive the Grospels and Epistles, not 
from the unconscious myth-producing faculty of the early 
Christians, but from conscious and antagonistic religious 
tendencies of the fermenting Pauline and post-apostolic a^ 
which resulted at last in the formation of Catholic Chris- 
tianity. 

But Strauss himself has furnished the most e£fective refu- 
tation of his ^^ Life of Jesus " in his own last work, ** The 014 
and the New Faith" which contains his dying creed of des- 
pair. Here he cast off all half-way measures, and even the 
last concessions he had formerly made to Christ and the 
Christian faith. Beginning as a Hegelian, he ended as a 
Darwinian ; from the empyrean of idealism, he sank down to 
the slough of materialism, and exchanged his gospel of poetry 
for the gospel of dirt. This is the logical termination of infi- 
delity. Compare an able and searching criticism of " The 
New Faith of Strauss " by my late colleague and friend. Dr. 
Henry B. Smith, in ** Faith and Philosophy" New York, 
1878, page 443. 

Note 81, page 115. 

Theodore Parker, bom in Massachusetts, 1810 ; died in 
Florence, i860. ** Discourse of Matters pertaining to Bdi' 
gion" 1849. Compare his review of Strauss in the " Christian 
Examiner" for April 1840. Mr. Weiss makes out a distinc- 
tion between the theories of Strauss and Parker, but on a par- 
tial misapprehension of the former. The diff'erence lies more 
in the practical turn of the American orator and the specula- 
tive turn of the German student. Parker was an enthusiast 
for liberty and social progress ; Strauss was selfishly conser- 
vative in politics, and cared little for the people. See **Life 
and Correspondence of Theodore Parker" by John Weiss, 
New York, 1864, 2 vols. ; and an able review of this work by 
Professor NOAH PoRTER in the ** New-Englander" for 1864, 

page 359 ff. 

Note 82, page 115. 

The word myth is derived from the Greek verb au^w, to shut 



CRITICAL NOTES. I7I 

the eyes or the lips, whence mystery and mysticism, and 
means speech, tale, fable, fiction ; /M7}So\oyla is the narrative 
of fabulous stories of the gpds, mythology. The miracles of 
Christ have a symbolical, but no mythical, character ; they 
imply a religious idea, and yet they are facts; they are both true 
and real. The Gospels move altogether on the terra firma of 
historical reality. Compare George, ** My thus vnd Sage," 
1837, and especially Ullmann, ** Historisch oder Mythisch ? ** 
1838. 

Note 83, page 121. 
In his new ** Leben Jesu," page 79, Strauss says, with refer- 
ence to the Gospel of St. John : **ffier hat sogar die Sinmis- 
ehung philosophischer Construction und beumsster Dichtung 
cUle Wahrscheinlichkeit." 

Note 84, page 123. 

Dr. Baur, in the second and revised edition of his last im- 
portant work, on *' Christianity and the Christian Church in the 
First Three Centuries," which appeared shortly before his 
death (a. i860), makes the remarkable concession that the 
conversion of St. Paul remained at all times an enigma to him, 
which cannot be satisfactorily solved by any psychological or 
dialectical analysis. *^ Keine weder psychologische noch dia- 
lektische Analyse kann das innere Geheimniss des Actes erfoT' 
schen, in welchem Gott seinen Sohn in ihm enthuUte " (page 45). 
In this connection he allows himself to speak of the miracle 
of the resurrection, ** which alone could disperse the doubts 
of the older apostles, which seemed to doom faith itself to the 
eternal night of death " {**das Wunder der Auferstehung, das 
dllein die Zweifel der dlteren Apostel zerstreuen konnte, welche 
den Glauhen selbst in die evnge Nacht des Todes verstossen zu 
mussen schienen*' (p. 39). He also speaks of the miracleol Paul's 
conversion, which appears the greater, since he, " in the sudden 
change from the most violent enemy to the most determined 
herald of Christianity, broke through the barriers of Jewish 
particularism, and dissolved it in the universal idea of Chris- 
tianity " (page 45). We honour the honesty of this greatest of 
modern sceptics, and cherish the hope that he was saved at 
last from "the eternal night " of despair which is the legiti- 
mate end of scepticism. One of his last words, I am told, 
was the sigh, " Lord, grant unto me a peaceful end." 



172 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

Note 85, page 127. 
The same objection against the theory of fiction was already 
raised by the infidel Rousseau, in his **Emile," L. iv. p. iii : 
^* Jamais des auteurs juifs n'eussent trouvi ni ce ton, ni cette 
morale ; et Vivangile a des caraeUres de vSriU si grands, si 
frappants, si par/aitement iniinitahles, que Vinventeur en sercdt 
jdus dtonnant que le hiros.'* THEODORE PARKER, in arguing 
against the total denial of the existence of Jesus, which no 
sane man ever ventured upon, supplies an argument against 
the partial denial : ** Measure Jesus by the shadow lie has 
cast into the world ; no, by the light he has shed upon it 
Shall we be told such a man never lived ? the whole story is 
a lie ? Suppose that Plato and Newton never lived. But who 
did their works, and thought their thought ? It takes a New- 
ton to forge a Newton. What man could have fabricated a 
Jesus ? None but a Jesus.*' Even Renan himself, unmindful 
of his theory, says, ** Life of Jesus," chap, xxviii. p. 367 : " Far 
from having been created by his disciples, Jesus appears in 
all things superior to his disciples. They, St. Paul and St 
John excepted, were men without talent or genius. . . . Upon 
the whole, the character of Jesus, far from having been em- 
bellished by his biographers, has been belittled by them." 
What a pity that the world had to wait eighteen hundred 
years for a restoration of the true picture of Jesus from the 
imperfect and distorted fragments of his ignorant disciples ! 

Note 86, page 129. 

Goethe, in his ** Conversations with Eckermann^^ (vol. iiL 
371), fully. acknowledges the genuineness, credibility, and in- 
comparable majesty of the Gospels. (See Appendix.) GuizOT, 
in his ** Meditations,'''' premiere s^rie, p. 252, makes the follow- 
ing truthful remarks on them : **The mighty power of these 
books and their accounts have been tested and proved. They 
have overcome paganism ; they have conquered Greece, Rome, 
and barbarous Europe ; they are on the way of conquering 
the world. And the sincerity of the authors is no less certain 
than the power of the books. We may contest the learning 
and critical sagacity of the first historians of Jesus Christ; 
but it is impossible to contest their good faith ; it shines from 
their words : they believed what they said ; they sealed their 
assertions with their blood." 



CRITICAL NOTES. 173 

Note 87, page 129. 
This argument has been used, with reference to flume, 
"by Archbishop Whately, in his *^ Historic Doubts relative 
to Napoleon Bormparte,^'* Oxford, 1821 ; and against Strauss 
(which means Ostrich) by Dr. WuRM (under the name of 
Caspar f i.e., Cassmjoary^ a cousin to the ostrich), in his " Life 
of Luther ^^^ 1836, but dated Mexico, 1936, a hundred years 
after Strauss's *^ Life of Jesus,^^ when criticism shall have 
reached its climax, in the New World. This clever parody 
strictly follows the method of Strauss, and applies it to 
the documents relating to the life of Luther, which are often 
contradictory ; for instance, as to his birthplace, Mohra, 
or Eisleben, or Mansfeld (compare Bethlehem and Naza- 
reth), and the date and manner of his conversion at Erfurt, 
whether it was brought about by a duel, or by a thunderstorm 
and lightning, &c. Professor Norton, in his *^ Internal Evi- 
dences of the Gospels,'^ has likewise employed this weapon 
against Strauss, and by his own process conclusively proven 
that Julius Caesar was never assassinated. 

Note 88, page 130, 
Joseph Ernest Renan was bom Feb. 27, 1823, at Treguier 
in Brittany, of humble parents, and educated for . the 
Roman Catholic priesthood in the Theological Seminary 
of St. Sulpice, at Paris. But, before taking orders, he was 
compelled to leave this institution on account of some religious 
difficulties which his superiors were unable or unwilling to 
solve. He then devoted himself to the comparative study of 
the Semitic languages, for which he endeavoured to do what 
Professor Bopp of Berlin had so successfully accomplished for 
the Indo-Germanic or Aryan family of languages. In 1847, he 
gained the Volney Prize for an essay, since expanded into a 
history of the Semitic languages, and acquired the reputation 
of one of the first living Orientalists of Europe. In 1856, he 
was elected (in place of Augustin ThieiTy) a member of the 
Institute of France. In i860, he was intrusted by Napoleon 
III. with a mission for archaeological explorations on the sup- 
posed sites of the Phoenician cities, and published the results 
of his investigations in an ample collection of epigraphic 
monuments from the time of the Assyrian domination to that 
of the Seleucides. On his retuiii, he was appointed to the 



174 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

professorship of Hebrew in the College of France, "but lost his 
position in consequence of his inaugural address, in which he 
boldly attacked, in the name of free science, the traditional 
orthodoxy of the clerical party, and the dogma of the divinity 
of Christ. 

Renau's ** Vie de Jisus"*^ was prepared, as to its outline, 
during his journey in the East, at the side of his since departed 
sister, in fresh view of the holy places, and published at Paris 
in 1863, as the first part of u work (now finished in four 
volumes) on the * *■ Origins of Christianity^'* It marks an epoch 
in the religious literature of France, and found an unparalleled 
circulation on the continent of Europe, and also in England 
and America. I have before me the seventh edition, Paris, 
1864- An English translation, by Ch. E. Wilbour, appeared 
in New York, 1864. The book of Renan has all the charm of a 
religious romance, and may have benefited many novel-readers, 
who never knew that Jesus was such an interesting character, 
by inducing them to study the New Testament. So good has 
no doubt come out of evil also in this case. But, as a critical 
or scientific work, his book has no value. In the introduc- 
tion, he refers, among six works, mainly to the **Li/e of 
Jestis " by Strauss, as translated by Littr^, for information in 
critical details. He contents himself with stating his views 
with oracular self-assurance, and a show of indiscriminate re- 
ferences to the New Testament and the Talmud, several of 
which prove the very reverse of the assertions in the text 
Of the many refutations of Strauss he says not a word. He 
published also a smaller edition of his **Life of Jesus" pre- 
senting him, as he says, in ** pure white marble" (in sugar- 
candy rather), without spot or wrinkle, for the edification of 
the French people. Among the many replies to Renan, I 
mention those of E. DE Peessense, Van Oosterzeb, Bey- 
SCHLAG, and Henry B. Smith. 

Note 89, page 131. 

See Renan 's essay on the " Critical Historians of Jesus,** 
in his ^'Studies of Beligiaus History and Criticism,** trans- 
lated by O. B. Frothingham, New York, 1864, page 189. 

Note 90, page 131. 
In the essay just quoted, p. 197, Renan says : **The legend 



CRITICAL NOTES. 175 

of the Buddha Cakya-Mouni is the one which, in its mode of 
formation, most resembles that of Christ ; as Buddhism is the 
religion which, in the law of development, most resembles 
Christianity.'* 

Note 91, page 131. 
" ViedeJisus" (chap. xv. p. 172) : ** LaUgendeitaitainsile 
fruit d*une grande conspiration toute spontanie et s^Uahorait 
autour de lui de son vivant. Aucun grand ^inement de 
rhistoire ne s'est pass^ sans donner lieu d un cycle de fables, 
et Jisus n'eUt pu, quand il VeUt voulu, couper court d ces 
creations populaires. " 

Note 92, page 132. 
"Studies of Religious History and Criticism,^* &c., page 192. 

Note 93, page 133. 
All competent judges seem to agree in a very low estimate 
of the scientific and critical value of Kenan's book. Dr. 
H. B. Smith of New York, in his excellent review of 
Kenan's ^^ Life of Jesus ^^ (in the ** American Presbyterian 
and Theological Review" for January 1864, page 145), justly 
remarks: "In point of learning, intellect, and consistency, 
the Teutonic work of Strauss is immeasurably superior to 
the light and airy French romance." The Rev. Samuel J. 
Andrews, in the preface to a new edition of his ^* Life of 
our Lord upon Earth" New York, 1864, part vi., denies to 
Kenan's book all critical value, and adds : " I do not recall 
any particular in which it adds anything to our knowledge 
of the gospel history, even in its external features : much 
less does it render us any aid iii the understanding of its 
higher meaning." 

Note 94, page 134. 

'* Jesus was a thaumaturgist only at a late period, and 
against his will." * * He was a miracle-worker and an exorcist 
only in spite of himself. Miracles are ordinarily the work of 
the public even more than of him to whom they are attri- 
buted. . . . The miracles of Jesus were a violence done him 
by his time, a concession which the necessity of the hour 
wrung from him. So the exorcist and the miracle- worker 
have fallen ; but the religious reformer shall live for ey«t" 



176 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

(Renan, chap, xvi.) '' Desperate, pushed to extremities, he no 
longer retained possession of himself. His mission imposed 
itself upon him, and he obeyed the torrent. As always 
happens in great and divine careers, he suffered the miracles 
which public opinion demanded of him, rather than performed 
them. Thoroughly persuaded that Jesus was a worker of 
miracles, Lazarus and his two sisters may have aided in the 
performance of one [the apparent resurrection of Lazarus], as 
so many pious men, convinced of the truth of their religion, 
have sought to triumph over human obstinacy by means of 
the weakness of which they were well aware. The state of 
their conscience was that of the Stigmatists, the Convulsion- 
ists, the Observed Nuns, led on by the influence of the world 
in which they live, and by their own belief in the pretended 
acts. As to Jesus, he had no more power than St. Bernard 
or St. Francis d'Assisi to moderate the avidity of the multi- 
tude and of his own disciples for the marvellous. Death, 
moreover, was in a few days to restore to him his divine 
liberty, and to snatoh him from the fatal necessities of a 
character which became each day more exacting, more 
difficult to sustain'' (chap, xxii.) So Jesus lent himself 
an instrument to a pious fraud. Of course, it would not be 
in keeping with French politeness or ordinary prudence to 
say, in plump terms, that Christ was an impostor ; but the 
insiuuation is clear enough for any reflecting reader. 

Note 95, page 135. 
At the close of chap. xxvi. (page 308 of the French 
original) : ** Son corps avait-il 6t6 enlev^j ou bien PenthoU' 
siasme, toujours cr^dulCy fit-il iclore aprds coup V ensemble de 
rdcttspar lesqtiels on chereha d ^tablir lafoi d la resurrection ? 
Cest ce que, faute de documents contradictoires — [which the 
American translation, page 357, has softened into, *for want 
of peremptory evidence '] — nous ignorerons d jamais, Disons 
cependant que la forte imagination de Marie de Magdala 
joua dans cette circonstance un rdle capital. Pouvoir divin 
de V amour I moments sacris oil la passion d'une hallueitUe 
donne au rnonde un Dieu ressusciti ! " 

Note 96, page 136. 
The reader will hardly believe it, until he reads the pas- 



CRITICAL NOTES. \^^ 

sage in ** Vie de J^sris" chap, xxiii., which we reluctantly 
copy: "Did he [Christ in Gethsemane] recall the clear 
fountains of Galilee where he might have refreshed himself ; 
the vineyard and fig-tree under which he might have heen 
seated ; les jeunes files qui auraient peut-itre consenti d l' ai- 
mer ? Maudit-il son dpre destin6e, qui lui avait interdit les 
joies conc^d6es d tous les autres ? Regretta-t-il sa trop haute 
nature^ et, victime de sa grandeur, pleura-t-il de n'Strepas resU 
un simple artisan de Nazareth ? " Renan most arbitrarily 
places the scene in Gethsemane several days before the night 
of the passion, contrary to the unanimous testimony of the 
Synoptical Gospels as well as the inherent probability of 
the case. But the opinions of this frivolous critic on such 
subjects are worth nothing at all. The maidens of Galilee 
and Judaea figure prominently in his Life of Jesus, and 
make it the more palatable to novel-readers. In chap. v. 
(page 52 of the original, page 102 of the English translation) 
occurs the following passage: **A11 his power to love was 
transferred to what he considered his celestial vocation. 
The extremely delicate feeling {le sentiment extrim^ment 
dUicat) which we notice in him towards women never 
departed from the exclusive devotion which he had to his 
idea. He treated as sisters, like Francis d'Assisi and Francis 
de Sales, those women who were enamoured with the same 
work as he : he had his St Claires, his Fran9oises de Chantal. 
Only it is probable that they loved him more than the work. 
He was undoubtedly more loved than loving. As often 
happens in very lofty natures, tenderness of heart was in 
him transformed into an infinite sweetness, a vague poetry, a 
univeraal charm. His relations, intimate and free, but of an 
entirely moral order, with women of equivocal conduct (avec 
des femmes d^une conduite Equivoque), are explained also by 
the passion which attached him to the glory of h'is Father, and 
inspired in him a kind of jealousy of all beautiful creatures 
(une sorte de jalousie pour toutes les belles creatures) who 
might contribute to it." In proof of this reckless and 
frivolous talk, Renan quotes Luke 7 : 37 ; John 4 : 7 ; 8 : 3. 
Guizot, no doubt with reference to Renan, devotes a special 
chapter of his ** MMitations" to J^us-Christ et les femmes 
(page 309 if.), and justly maintains that nowhere is there less 
of man, and more of God, than in Christ's relatione 'm^Vi.^iX^!^ 



178 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

women who approach him, and in the absolute purity which 
characterises his sayings on adultery and on the sanctity of 
the marriage relation. Compare Matt. 5 : 27, 28 ; 19 : 4-9, &c. 
It is characteiistic of Renan that, in his "Xt/e of St. Favl^^ 
likewise, he invents an erotic episode, and makes the AposUe 
of the Gentiles marry Lydia of Philippi. 



Note 97, page 137. 

The late Dr. Henry B. Smith (in the article alluded to, 
pages 157 and 169, and reprinted in his essays, ^^ Faith and 
Philosophy,** New York, 1878) thus severely but justly con- 
demns the book of Renan : " In passing judgment on such a 
representation, there is no need of circumlocution or eupho- 
nisms. It is utterly disgraceful and disingenuous. It assails 
the very honesty and credibility of Jesus. It makes success 
the standard. It is the essence of Jesuitism. The apology 
is as superficial as it is ignominious. The worst ethics of the 
French stage cannot surpass it. Nobody but a Frenchman 
could, after this, still idolise his hero as the perfection of 
humanity. And, in the midst of such profligate representa* 
tions, to interject phrases about * our profound seriousness,' 
'rigid conscience,* and 'absolute sincerity,' in contrast with 
the delusions and falsity attributed to Jesus, is to carry to 
its height a base invention, from which every right-minded 
man will instinctively recoil, and which every true believer 
in Christ will stamp as blasphemy. Better for Jesus, — as a 
mere man, — a thousandfold better, to have died unknown, 
than to have lent himself to impostures which he must have 
known to be false, to a conspiracy founded on a lie or a 
hallucination. But this is not all, nor the worst. The part 
of the Messiah made it necessary that Jesus should also give 
himself forth as an * exorcist and a thaumaturge.' Charla- 
tanry must complete the work begun in hallucination. . . . 
The Jesus depicted by Kenan is a figment of naturalism, 
a conception that can neither be imaged forth nor realised. 
It has the outward forms and framework of human life, but 
within there is not even an immortal personal consciousness. 
We have, in the last analysis, only the shadow of death." 



CRITICAL NOTES. 1 79 

Note 98, page 138. 

The dying exclamation of Julian the Apostate — " Galilaean, 
thou hast conquered ! " — rests on too late authorities to claim 
credibility, especially in view of the silence of the impai-tial 
Ammianus Marcellinus, who furnishes a full account of the, 
last hours of the emperor ; but it contains the philosophy of 
his reign, and the Italian proverb may be applied to it: Se 
non e vero, e ben trovato. 

Note 99, page 140. 

See his large "Leben JesUj* Schlussabhandlung, voL iL 
page 663 (4th ed., 1840). 

Note 100, page 141. 

*'In an individual," says Strauss, **Leben Jesu,*' vol. ii. 
page 710, " in one God-man, the properties and functions which 
the church doctrine ascribes to Christ contradict themselves ; 
in the idea of the race, they agree. Humanity is the union 
of the two natures, — the incarnate Grod, the Infinite external- 
ising itself in the finite, and the finite spirit remembering its 
infinitude. It is the child of the visible mother and the in- 
visible father, Nature and Spirit ; it is the worker of miracles, 
in so far as in the course of human history the spirit more and 
more completely subjugates nature both within and around 
man, until it lies before him as an inert matter of his activity ; 
it is the sinless existence, for the course of its development is 
a blameless one : pollution cleaves to the individual onlj', and 
does not touch the race or its historJ^ It is humanity that 
dies, rises, and ascends to heaven : for from the negation of 
its natural life there ever proceeds a higher spiritual life ; from 
the suppression of its limitation as a personal, rational, and 
terrestrial spirit, arises its union with the infinite Spirit of the 
heavens. By faith in this Christ, especially in his death and 
resurrection, man is justified before God; that is, by the 
kindling within him of the idea of humanity, especially by 
the negation of its natural and sensual aspects, the individual 
man partakes of the divinely human life of the species." The 
popular *' Life of Jesus y** by the same author, concludes in a 
similar manner, page 627 ; and the same idea is repeated in 
his "TAe Christ ofFaith, and the Jesus ofHittory^'* i8,6^^HiVsk\s^ 



lii 



1 80 THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 

is an appendix to his shorter **Life of Jesus" But the i( 
of the union of the human and divine is no more contradicts 
in an individual than in the raca What is true in idea 
principle must also actualise itself, or be capable of actuali 
tion, in a concrete living fact. History teaches, moreov 
that every age, every great movement, and every nation, hi 
their representative heads, who comprehend and act out 1 
life of the respective whole. This analogy points us tc 
general representative head of the entire race, — Adam in 1 
natural, and Christ in the spiritual order. The divine hun 
nity of Strauss is like a stream without a fountain, or lik 
body without a head, a metaphysical abstraction and i< 
delusion. The historical Jesus of Nazareth is the ideal Chri 
In his last book, on ** Tht Old and New Faith,'" Strauss 
nounces aU deceptive accommodations and restraints, a 
leaves no middle ground between hopeless atheism and p< 
tive historical Christianity. 



Y\ 



APPENDIX. 



IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES 



TO THB 



CHARACTER OP CHRIST. 



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( i83 ) 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 



We present, by way of Appendix to our argument, 
a number of striking and remarkable concessions 
and testimonies to the perfection of Christ's char- 
acter as a man, from eminent writers who were 
either professed unbelievers and sceptics, or, at 
least, free from dogmatic bias, and can therefore 
not be suspected of partiality. This makes their 
testimony all the more valuable for apologetic 
purposes. It is the homage of their genius and 
intellect to him whose power and authority they 
must acknowledge theoretically, though they may 
practically refuse to accept him as their Lord and 
Saviour. The concession of an enemy, or an 
outsider, sometimes carries more weight in an 
argument than the assertion of a friend. Honey 
may be extracted even from a dead lion. " Out 
of the eater came forth meat, and out of the 
strong came forth sweetness" (Judges 14: 14). 
The testimonies we are goin^ \^ ^-t^^^^ ^ix^ 



1 84 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES, 

important and interesting in various ways. They 
prove that there is in the inmost heart of man an 
instinctive and growing reverence and admiration 
for the spotless purity of Christ. Infidels may 
deny his miracles, but they cannot deny his 
power, or assail his character, without doing 
violence to the better feelings and aspirations of 
their own nature, and forfeiting all claim to the 
moral respect of their fellow-men. It seems to 
be felt that he is, without controversy, the very 
best being that ever walked on this earth, and 
that an attack on his character is an attack on 
the honour and dignity of humanity itself. And 
this feeling and conviction becomes stronger and 
deeper as history advances. The impression of 
Christ upon the world, far from losing ground, is 
gaining new strength with every stage of civilisa- 
tion, and controls even the best thinking of his 
enemies. 

These testimonies, on the other hand, expose 
also the glaring inconsistency of unbelief, in ad- 
mitting the absolute purity and truthfulness of 
Christ, and yet refusing his own testimony con- 
cerning himself; in praising his perfection as a 
man, and yet denying his Divinity which he 
claims himself, and which alone can satisfactorily 
explain his human perfection in a universally 
imperfect world. 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 1 8$ 

This inconsistency was clearly brought out, with 
special reference to Eenan, by the distinguished 
French statesman and historian, M. Guizot, who con- 
secrated the closing years of his retreat from public 
life to the defence of revealed religion, in his 
"Meditations on the Essence of the Christian 
Eeligion," where he says : ^ 

" Those who do not believe in Jesus, nor admit 
the supernatural character of his person, of his 
life, and of his work, are free of this difficulty [of 
giving adequate expression in human language to 
the intimate and continual intermixture of the 
divine and human in Christ]. Having beforehand 
suppressed the divinity and the miracles, they see 
in the history of Jesus Christ nothing more than 
an ordinary history, which they narrate and ex- 
plain like any other biography of man. But they 
fall into a far different difficulty, and wreck them- 
selves on a far different rock. The supernatural 
being and power of Jesus Christ may be disputed ; 
but the perfection, the sublimity ' of his actions 
and of his precepts, of his life and of his moral 
law, are incontestable : and, in effect, not only are 
they not contested, but they are admired and 

^ ** Meditations 8ur V Essence de la Religion Chr6tienne " (Paris and 
Leipzig, 1864, pp. 324-327). The English translation, New York, 
1865 (comp. p. 335), omits the Scripture quotations of Guizot from 
the Latin Yulgate (which are intended for Roman-Catholio 
readers). 



i 



1 86 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

celebrated enthusiastically and complacently. It 
would seem as if it were desired to restore to 
Jesus Christ as a mere man the superiority of 
which they deprive him in refusing to see in him 
the Godhead. But then, what incoherence, what 
contradictions, what falsehood, what moral im- 
possibility, in his history, such as they make it I 
What a series of suppositions, irreconcilable with 
the facts which they admit ! This man they make 
so perfect and sublime becomes by turns a dreamer 
or a charlatan ; at once dupe and deceiver, — dupe 
of his own mystical enthusiasm in believing in 
his own miracles, wiKul deceiver in tampering 
with evidence in order to accredit himself. The 
history of Jesus Christ is thus but a tissue of fables 
and falsehood ; and, nevertheless, the hero of this 
history remains perfect, sublime, incomparable, — 
the greatest genius, the noblest heart, that the 
world ever saw; the type of virtue and moral 
beauty ; the supreme and rightful chief of mankind. 
And his disciples in their turn, justly admirable, 
have braved everything, suffered everything, in 
order to abide faithful to him, and to accompL'sh 
his work ; and, in eflfect, the work has been accom- 
plished, — the Pagan world has become Christian, 
and the whole world has nothing better to do than 
to follow the example. 

" What a contradictory and insolvable problem 



INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 1 8/ 

they present to us instead of the one they labour 
so hard to suppress ! 

"History reposes upon two foundations, — the 
positive evidence or documents concerning the 
facts and persons, and presumptive evidence or 
moral probabilities resulting from the connection 
of facts and the action of persons. These two 
foundations are entirely wanting in the history of 
Jesus Christ, such as it is related, or rather con- 
structed, in these days. It is, on the one hand, in 
evident and shocking contradiction with the testi- 
mony of the men who saw Jesus Christ, or of the 
men who lived near those who had seen him : on 
the other hand, it equally conflicts with the 
natural laws presiding over the actions of men 
and the course of events. This does not deserve 
the name of historical criticism: it is a philoso- 
phical system and a romantic narrative substi- 
tuted for the substantial proof of the moral 
evidence; it is a Jesus false,- and impossible, 
made by the hand of man, pretending to dethrone 
the real living Jesus Christ, the Son of God.^ 

" The choice lies between the system and the 
mystery; between the romance of man and the 
design of God." 

* **Ce8t un Ji8U8'Ch/ritt faux et impoisihUy fait de main 
d^homme, qui pritend d, ditrdner le J^sus- Christ rid et vivant, jUm 
de Dieu." This applies especially to the legendary Jeaua ot Ba^^asl^ 
even more than to the mythical Jqkua oi ^tt«.\A%« 



( 188 ) 



IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES TO THE 
CHARACTER OF CHRIST. 



PONTIUS PILATE AND HIS WIFR 

Matt. 27 : 19, 24. 

" When he [Pilate] was set down on the judgment- 
seat, his wife sent nnto him, saying : Have thou 
nothing to do with THAT JUST MAN; for I have 
suffered many things this day in a dream because 
of him. 

" When Pilate saw that he could prevail [avail] 
nothing, but that rather a tumult was made, he 
took water, and washed his hands before the 
multitude, saying : I am innocent of the blood of 
this JUST PERSON ; see ye to it." 

Note. — It is a remarkable fact, that a heathen woman 
had the courage to plead the cause of our Saviour when his 
own disciples forsook him, and when the Jewish people and 
authorities thirsted for his innocent blood. It is equally 
remarkable, that she and her weak husband, clothed with 
the authority of the Roman law and justice, should charac- 
terise the condemned Jesus as that just man (SlKaios iKcTvos), 
The istudent of the unconscio\\a '^lo^Viecv^^ ot hK^athenism will 



THE CENTURION AT THE CROSS. 1 89 

naturally connect this expression with the famous passage in 
Plato's Republic, where the great sage of Greece describes 
the ideal of a just man {hlKaioi), as one who, *' without doing 
any wrong, may assume the appearance of the gi'ossest 
injustice {tifj^kv yh.p &SikQv d6^av ix^ru r^ fieylffTTjs ddiKlas) ;" 
yea, who **shaU be scourged, tortured, fettered, deprived of 
his eyes, and, after having endured aU possible sufferings, 
fastened to a post, and who must restore again the beginning 
and prototype of righteousness" (Plato's Works, vol. iv. 
p. 74, sqq. ed. Ast, p. 360, E. ed. Bip.) Aristotle also says 
of the perfectly just man, "that he stands far above the 
political order and constitution as it exists ; that he must 
break it wherever he appears.** 

The prophecies of Greek wisdom, and the majesty of the 
Roman law, here unite in the representative of imperial 
Rome at Jerusalem, to testify to the innocence and righteous- 
ness of Christ in the darkest hour of his trial before wicked 
men. Pilate excites mingled feelings of pity and contempt 
He washed his hands, but not his heart ; and in delivering 
up Christ, whom he pronounced innocent and just, he con- 
demned himself. 



THE CENTUEION AT THE CEOSS. 

Matt. 27 : 54. Comp. Mark 15 : 39. 

** Now, when the centurion, and they that were 

with him watching Jesus, saw the earthquake, 

and those things that were done, they feared 

greatly, saying : Truly this was the [a] Son of 

God." 

Luke 23 : 47. 

" Now, when the centurion saw what was done, 
he glorified God, saying: Cektainly this was a 

BIGHTEOUS MAN." 



1 90 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

Note. — The centurion here spoken of is the one who, 
according to Roman custom, presided over the execution 
(hence called by Seneca centurio supplicio prteposittts ; or 
by Tacitus, exactor mortis). This centurion, the captain in 
Caper uaum (Matt. viiL), and the captain Cornelius at Caesarea 
(Acts z.), form a triumvirate of believing Gentile soldiers in 
the New Testament. The confession, ** Truly this (or this 
man, as Mark has it) was a Son of Grod " i^eov v26f ), may be 
taken (with Meyer) in a polytheistic sense, or equivalent to 
demigod ; an interpretation which is supported by the ab- 
sence of the definite article before vUn, and by the parallel 
passage of Luke, who substitutes ZUcaioi for the ^oO vi6% 
of Matthew and Mark. But Lange and Alford maintain 
that the centurion used the expression in a Jewish or Chris- 
tian sense, acknowledging Jesus as the Messiah. It is by 
no means improbable that he was previously acquainted with 
the Jewish expectations and the claims of Christ. 



JUDAS, THE TRAITOR 

Matt. 27 : 3, 4. 

"Then Judas, which had betrayed him, when 
he saw that he was condemned, repented himself, 
and brought again [brought back] the thirty 
pieces of silver to the chief priests and elders, 
saying : I have sinned, in that I have betrayed 

THE INNOCENT BLOOD." 

Note. — The confession of the despairing traitor— "H|ta/»roi» 
vapadoifs alfia d'^uov — may be more concisely and pointedly 
translated, " I sinned in betraying innocent blood.** In con- 
nection with the testimony of Pilate, and that of the San- 
hedrin, which could prefer no other charge against Jesus 
than that he had called himself the Messiah, this confession 
amounts to a complete vindication of the innocence of Jesus, 
and the justice of hia extiaoTdm^t^ c\aSi£Li&. It Judas^ from 



FLAVITTS JOSEPHXTS. I9I 

three years' familiar intercourse, had known anything in the 
least degree affecting the moral purity of his Master, he 
would have eagerly availed himself of it for his self -justi- 
fication and peace of conscience. 



FLAVIUS JOSEPHUS. 

From THE "Antiquities of the Jews," 
Book xviii. Chap. ni. Sect. 3. 

"About this time lived Jesus, a wise man, if it 
be proper to caU him a maa ; for he was a doer 
of wonderful works,^ — a teacher of such men as 
receive the truth with pleasure. He drew over 
to him both many of the Jews and many of the 
Greeks. He was the Christ.^ And when Pilate, 
at the instigation of the principal men among us, 
had condemned him to the cross, those who had 
loved him at first did not forsake him. For he 
appeared to them alive again on the third day;* 
the divine prophets having foretold these and many 
other wonderful things concerning him. And the 
sect of Christians, so named after him, are not 
extinct to this day." 

Note. — This remarkable testimony of the celebrated Jewish 
priest and historian, who flourished in the latter part of the 
iirst century, is found in all the known copies of his works, 
both printed and manuscript ; it is twice quoted at large by 

^ vapadd^wv fpywv rowyrijy. 

' 6 Xpurrbs odros ^v, 

• itpdyrj yh.p avroTi TpiTqv ly^v ^p.4pav \Ojv» 



192 IMPABTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

Eusebius, without suspicion of an interpolation, and is there- 
fore received as genuine by many learned divines. It may 
also be urged in favour of the passage, that Joeephus, in a 
complete history of the Jews, reaching down to A. D. 66, and 
written about a.d. 93, could not easily pass by Christy especi- 
ally as he made honourable mention of John the Baptist {Arch. 
xviiL 5, 2) and James the Just in other parts of the same work. 
In speaking of the martyr-death of James (Arch,, book zx. 
chap. 9, sect, i), he refers to our passage ; and there are no 
good reasons to reject the passage on James, together with 
that on Christ. 

But the majority of critics since Lardner reject the testi- 
mony in its present form, either in whole or in part» as an 
early interpolation by some Christian hand, for the following 
reasons : — 

1. This paragraph is not noticed by any Christian writer 
before Eusebius, who died A.D. 340. Justin Martyr, Clement 
of Alexandra, Origen, Tertullian, and other ante-Nicene 
fathers, might and probably would have made good use of 
it in their apologetic and polemic works against Jews and 
Crentiles, if they had known it. 

2. The paragraph is not necessary for the connection; but 
rather interrupts the course of the preceding narrative about 
a sedition and consequent calamity of the Jews, which occurred 
under Pilate; and the following narrative about ''another 
sad calamity,** — namely, the banishment of the Jews from 
Rome by order of Claudius. Josephus might, however, have 
reckoned the crucifixion of Jesus among the calamities of the 
Jews. 

3. The disputed passage is inconsistent with the whole 
character and position of Josephus. He could not have thus 
written of Christ, without being, in theory or in conviction, a 
Christian, and belying his profession as a Jewish priest and 
Pharisee. But Josephus, it is urged against this argument^ 
may have been inconsistent in this as he was in other things. 
Though learned and eminent, he was contemptibly weak in 
character ; and showed in all his positions, as a Jewish priest 
and magistrate, and as a Roman general and courtier, a 
worldly mind, and an easy disposition to accommodate himself 
to different stations and employments, even at the sacrifice of 
principle. 



FLAVIUS JOSEPHUS. 193 

In view, then, of the great improbability of an absolute 
silence of Josephus on the history of Christ, and the still 
greater improbability of such a Christian testimony from his 
pen, the hypothesis becomes quite plausible, that Josephus, 
like the Pharisees and scribes in the Gospels and the compilers 
of the Jewish Talmud, represented Jesus as a pseudo-prophet 
and magician, who performed miraclps by Beelzebub, but that 
a Christian changed the ofifensive passage at an early time, 
before Eusebius, into its present shape and form. This is 
substantially the view of the great Oriental scholar, Ewald. 

Renan, in his ''Life of Jesus," goes further, and considers 
the passage authentic, with the exception of a few changes, 
as Xpiarbs oSros ^v (he was the Christ), for the supposed origi- 
nal non-committal sentence, Xpiarbs oSros iXiyero (he was 
called the Christ). "Je crois," he says {Vie de Jisus^ Intro- 
duction, p. xii.), ''Ze passage sur Jistis authentique, H est 
par/aitement dans le goUt de Jos^phe, et si cet historien a fait 
mention de J^tis, c'est bien comme cela qu*{l a dH en parler. 
On tent seulement qtCune main chritienne a retoucM le morceau, 
y a ajoutt qtielques mots sans lesquels il eUt 6ttpresque hlaspJU- 
mMtoire, et peutitre retranch^, ou modiJU quelqttes expressions" 

The literature on this much-disputed passage, see in Haver- 
KAMP's edition of ** Josephus" vol. ii. Appendix ; in Hase's 
**Life of Jesus " sect. lo, p. 12 (fourth ed.) ; in Winer's 
* * Bibl, Bealworterbuchf " vol. i. p. 558 (third ed .) Compare also 
Ewald, **Geschichte Christus\" pp. 104-107; Paret, art. 
^^ Josephus" in Herzog*s TheoL Encyclop,, vol. vii. p. 27; and 
Keim, ** Geschichte Jesu von Nazara," i. 11-15. 

In many respects, the writings of Josephus contain, indi- 
rectly, much valuable testimony to the truth of the gospel 
history. His ** History of the Jewish War " is undesignedly a 
striking commentary on the predictions of our Saviour con- 
cerning the destruction of the city and the Temple of Jerusa- 
lem ; the great distress and affliction of the Jewish people at 
that time ; the famine, pestilence, and earthquake ; the rise 
of false prophets and impostors, aud the flight of his disciples 
at the approach of these calamities. All these coincidences 
have been traced out in full by the learned Dr. Lardner, in 
his " Collection of Ancient Jewish and Heathen Testimonies 
to the Truth of the Christian Religion " (see vol. vi p. 406 of 
his Works, ed. by Kippis, Lond. 1838), 



194 IMFABTUL TESTIMOinES. 



THE TALMUD. 

• 

The Talmud piD^JT), i,e., Doctrine, Book of Doc* 
trines, Corpus Doctrince), that immense depository 
of Jewish theology and jurisprudence, of Eabbi- 
nical wisdom and folly, embracing twelve large foUo 
volumes, has very little to say about Christ and 
his religion, which is the fulfilment of the Law and 
the Prophets, and without which the Old Testa- 
ment is a sealed book. 

The first part, called the MiSHNA (i,e,, Bepetition, 
viz., of the law), which comprehends the oral tradi- 
tions and Eabbinical expositions of the law from 
about 400 before to about 200 after Christ's birth, 
ignores Christianity, although it includes the say- 
ings of many Eabbins of the first century, and was 
composed, according to Dr. Jost, about the year 
230, in the city of Tiberias, on the Lake of Galilee, 
the region where Jesus lived and taught. 

The second part of the Talmud, called the Gemara 
(i.e., Concltcsion, viz., of Eabbinical wisdom), or the 
Talmud proper, is a vast collection of the Eabbi- 
nical expositions of the Mishna, which again became 
a subject of investigation and interpretation. There 
are two Gemaras, — that of Jerusalem, compiled 
in Palestine about A.D. 390 ; and that of Babylon, 
compiled about a.d. 500, under the supervision 



THE TALMUD. I95 

of the Patriarch of Babylon. Both these Gemaraa 
— the Palestinian and the Babylonian — allude to 
Jesus and the apostles, but very briefly, and in a 
bitter and malignant spirit ; they admit the miracles 
of Jesus, but derive them from evil spirits, like 
the Pharisees in the Gospels.-^ According to the 
Gemara, Jesus was the illegitimate son of Mary (a 
hairdresser) and a man variously called Stada, Pan- 
dera,^ and Pappus (a soldier) ; learned the magical 
arts in Egypt, practised them in Palestine ; and 
for this reason, as well as for seducing and instigat- 
ing the Israelites, he was crucified on the day pre- 
ceding the Passover. We have here evidently a 
malignant perversion and indirect admission of 
the facts of the supernatural conception, the flight 
to Egypt, the miracles, and the crucifixion of our 
Saviour. 

At a later period, the Jewish hatred of Chris- 
tianity produced an infamous book, entitled " Tol- 
doth JeschUy' i,e,, the " Birth or History of Jesus," 
where the Talmudic tradition, especially the 

^ The passages of the Talmud relating to Christ are collected in 
Lardner's work already quoted; and in SCHEIDII, **Loca TaXmudica, 
in quibus Jesu et diacipulorum ejus fit mentio ; " also in Meelfuhbeb, 
''Jesus in Tulmude" Altdorf, 1699, 2 vols. 

2 This Fandera, who figures also in the book of Oelsus» and in 
Toldoth Jeschu (where he is called Joseph Pandera), is no doubt a 
name of hatred and contempt invented by the Jews, and means 
either scourge ; or, like the Greek irdv'S^p^ and the Latin lupa^ it is 
synonymous with ravenous lust^ and hence used aa a a^ixi\^^\is^ 
name for adultery. 



196 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

wretched slander about the birth of our Saviour, 
and the most absurd fables, are related with maUg- 
nant hatred. Even according to this miserable 
production, Christ performed miracles ; not, how- 
ever, by an art acquired in Egypt, as the Talmud 
and Celsus assert, but by pronouncing the holy 
name of Jehovah, which was a secret known only 
to the founder of Christianity.^ 

In a very diflferent sense, Christ has indeed made 
known the name of the only true and living God. 

Among the better and more enlightened class of 
modem Jews, the opinion seems to be gaining 
ground that Jesus of Nazareth was the Messiah of 
the Gentiles, to be followed by the true Messiah of 
the Jews. But the majority of the Eeform Jews are 
Deists, and substitute their nationality for religion. 



THE HEATHEN WEITEES AGAINST 
CHEISTIANITY. 

The Greek and Eoman writers of the first five 
centuries took, upon the whole, very little notice 
of Christ and Christianity, and were mostly quite 
ignorant of their character and history. Tacitus, 
Suetonius, the Younger Pliny, Epictetus, Lucian, 

^ There are two very different versions of this book : the one 
publiithed by Wagenseil, under the title, ** Tela ignea ScUance; hoe 
esty arcani et honribiles Judceoimm adversus Christum Deum et 
christianam reiigionem anecdotic" Altdorf, 168 1 ; the other, edited 
by Huidreich, Leyden, 1705. 



TACITUS. 197 

Aristides, Galenus, Lampridius, Dio Cassius, Hi- 
merius, Libanms, Ammianus Marcellinus, Euna- 
pius, and Zosimus, mention them incidentally, and 
generally with contempt or hatred. The only 
heathen authors who wrote special works against 
the Christian religion are Lucian (who assailed it 
at least indirectly), Celsus, Porphyry, Hierocles, 
and Julian the Apostate. 

But even the incidental allusions of the former 
and the assaults of the latter contain much that 
tends to confirm the credibility of the gospel 
history and the miracles of Christ. Let us briefly 
sum up the chief references.^ 



TACITUS. 

Tacitus (who lived in the second half of the 
first and the first quarter of the second century), 
in giving an account of the Neronian persecution 
of the Christians at Eome, which occurred A.D. 
64,^ incidentally attests that Christ was put to 
death as a malefactor by Pontius Pilate in the 
reign of Tiberius ; that he was the founder of the 
Christian sect; that the latter took its rise in 
Judaea, and spread, in spite of the ignominious 

^ For a fuller discussion of the heathen attacks on Christianity 
the reader is referred to the author's ** History of the Christian 
Church," New York, vol. i. p. 185 flE. 

2 Annates J lih. xv. 0. 44. 



198 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

death of Christ, and the hatred and contempt it 
encountered throughout the empire, so that a vast 
multitude (multitudo ingens) of them were most 
cruelly put to death in the city of Eome. He 
clearly intimates that they were entirely innocent 
of the crime laid to their charge by Nero, who him- 
self set the city on fire (to enjoy the spectacle of 
burning Troy), and wickedly made the Christians 
responsible for it. 

Tacitus bears also valuable testimony, together 
with Josephus, from whom he mainly, though not 
exclusively, takes his account, to the fulfilment of 
Christ's prophecy concerning the destruction of 
Jerusalem, and the overthrow of the Jewish people.^ 



PLINY. 

Pliny the Younger, a contemporary and friend 
of Tacitus and the Emperor Trajan, in his famous 
Letter to Trajan, about 107, bears testimony to 
the rapid spread of Christianity in Asia Minor at 
that time among all ranks of society ; the general 
moral purity and steadfastness of its professors 
amid cruel persecution ; their mode and time of 
worship; their adoration of Christ as God; their 
observance of a " stated day," which is undoubt- 
edly Sunday ; and other facts of importance in the 

^ In the Mtti book. oi\sM^H\AlQrr)|« 



CELSUS. 199 

early history of the Church. Trajan's rescript, in 
reply to Pliny's inquiry, furnishes evidence of the 
innocence of the Christians. He notices no charge 
against them except their disregard of the worship 
of the gods, and forbids them to be sought after. 



CELSUS. 

Celsug, a Grecian eclectic philosopher of the 
second century, is the first heathen author who wrote 
an express work against Christianity. It bears 
the title, " A True Discourse." Origen, in his able 
and effective refutation, has faithfully preserved the 
principal portions of it in the author's own lan- 
guage.^ Celsus employs all the aids which the 
culture of his age afforded — the weapons of learn- 
ing, philosophy, common sense, wit, sarcasm, and 
dramatic animacion of style — to disprove and ridi- 
cule Christianity and its followers. He combines the 
hatred of Judaism and the contempt of heathenism, 
and anticipates most of the arguments and sophisms 
of the Deists and Naturalists of later times. 

And yet even this able infidel assailant, who 
lived almost within hailing distance of the apos- 
tolic age, bears witness, as St. Chrysostom already 

^ Professor Keim, the author of **The History of Jesus of Na- 
sara," has reconstructed the work of Cekua tcom \.\i»«!^lT&:;gEsx^\^NA« 



200 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

remarked, to the antiquity of the apostolic writ- 
ings and the main factd of the gospel history 
He thus furnishes a strong argument against th( 
modem mythical and legendary biographists o: 
Jesus. Celsus refers to the Gospels of Matthew 
Luke, and John; and makes, upon the whole 
about eighty allusions to, or quotations from, th( 
New Testament. He takes notice of Christ's birtl 
from a virgin in a small village of Judaea; th( 
adoration of the wise men from the East; tb 
slaughter of the infants by order of Herod; th( 
flight to Egypt, where he supposes Christ leamec 
the charms of magicians ; his residence in Naza 
reth ; his baptism, and the descent of the Hoi] 
Spirit in the shape of a dove, and the voice fron 
heaven; the election of his disciples; his friend 
ship with publicans and other low people ; his cure! 
of the lame and the blind, and raising of the dead 
the betrayal of Judas ; the denial of Peter ; the prin 
cipal circumstances in the history of the passioi 
and crucifixion ; also the resurrection of Christ. 

It is true, he perverts or abuses most of thes< 
facts; but, according to his own showing, the] 
were then generally, and had always been, believec 
by the Christians. He does not deny the miracle 
of Jesus, but, like the Jews, he derives them fron 
evil spirits, and makes Jesus a magician and im 
postor. He alludes also to some of the principa 



LUCIAN — PORPHYRY. 20 1 

doctrines of the Christians, to their private assem- 
blies for worship, and to the office of presbyters. 
He omits the grosser charges of immoraKty, which 
he probably considered absurd and incredible.* 



LUCIAK 

Lncian, a brilliant but frivolous rhetorician of 
Syria, who died in Egypt or Greece about a.d. 200, 
wrote indirectly against Christianity in his " Life 
of Peregrinus," and treated it under disguise, as one 
of the many follies of the age, with the light 
weapons of wit and ridicule. Yet he never calls 
Christ an impostor, as Celsus did, but a crucified 
sophist ; a term which he uses as often in a good 
sense as in the bad.^ 



POEPHYET. 

From his "Philosophy of Oracles.** 

Porphyry, a Phoenician by birth, was a heathen 
philosopher of the new Platonist school toward the 
end of the third century, and taught and died at 

^ For a fuller account of Celsus' argument, see the author's 
"Church History," vol. i. p. 187. Lardner, Doddridge, and Leland 
made good use of Celsus against the Deists of their day. He may, 
-with stiU greater effect, be turned against Strauss and Renan. 

2 Compare, on Lucian, the author's " CliuiGh. "BikaVsrj ^"^ \.. "sX^^^ 



202 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

Eome, A.D. 304. He wrote, besides a number of 
books which have no bearing upon the subject 
before us, an extensive work against the Christian 
religion, in fifteen books ; ^ and a sort of text-book 
of heathen theology, under the title " The Philo- 
sophy of Oracles." ^ Both are lost, with the ex- 
ception of some fragments in the writings of the 
fathers. A letter to his wife Marcella has been 
recently brought to light. 

Porphyry is more serious and profound in spirit^ 
and respectful in tone toward Christianity, than 
Lucian and Celsus or any heathen opponent before 
him. He made an approach to some Christian 
ideas, or was unconsciously under the influence 
which they exerted over the intelligent and reflect- 
ing minds of that age. In the letter to his wife, 
he represents the ethical triad of St. Paul, — ^faith, 
love, and hope, — in connection with truth, as the 
foundation of true piety.* In the same letter, he 



^ Kard XpuTTiapQv X6701. Oompare Eusebius, Hist. Ecclet.^ lib. 
vi. cap. 19 ; Socrates, HUt. Eccl. i. 9 (in a letter of Constantine, who 
boasts of having caused the destruction of the infamous writings 
of Porphyry), iii. 23; Euseb., Prcepar. Evang., &c. 

3 TLepl TTji ix Xoyitav (piXoffcxpias. Extracts from it are contaiiied 
in Eusebius' '^ Frceparatio Evangelica, and Demonstratio Evan- 
gelica;" in Augustine's '^ De Civitate Dei;^'' and in Theodoret's 
"Twelve Apologetic Discourses." Lardner denies the genuineness 
of this work, on insufficient grounds; but Fabricius, Mosheim, 
Neander, and others, treat it as a production of Porphyry. 

' Ep» ad Marcellam (ed. by Card. Angelo Mai, Milan, 1816), cap. 
zxiv. : T^ffffxpa ffroLxeia fid\i<rTCL KeKpaniv^u irepl ^eov, irlffns, 



PORPHYRY. 203 

utters other sentences which sound Kke remi- 
niscences of Bible passages, although he no doubt 
put a different philosophical meaning into them. 
Like many Eationalists of more recent times, 
he made a distinction between the origiaal, pure 
Christianity of Christ, and the corruption of Chris- 
tianity by the Apostles. In his work on the 
"Philosophy of Oracles," he says of Christ, as 
quoted by St. Augustine {De Civitate Dei, 1. xix 
cap. 23 ; compare also Eusebius' Demonst Uvang, 
iii. 6): — 

" The oracle declared Christ to be a most pious 
man, and his soul, like the soul of other pious men 
after death, favoured with immortality; and that 
the mistaken Christians worship him. And when 
we asked. Why, then, was he condemned? the 
goddess (Hecate) answered in the oracle : The body 
indeed is ever liable to debilitating torments ; but 
the soul of the pious dwells in the heavenly man- 
sion. But that soul has fatally been the occasion 
to many other souls to be involved in error, to 
whom it has not been given to acknowledge the 
immortal Jove. But himself is pious, and gone to 
heaven as other pious men do. Him, therefore, 
thou shalt not blaspheme; but pity the folly of 
men, because of the danger they are in." 

aXi^^eta, ipws [a Platonic substitute for the Ohristian dydmflj 
iXvis. Angelo Mai inferred, without good reason, that Max<:j%U^ 
was a Christian. 



204 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 



JULIAN TBE APOSTATE. 

From Cyrillus Alex., Contra Julian.^ lib. 

vi p. 191. 

Julian the Apostate, Eoman emperor from 361 
to 363, the most gifted and the most bitter of all 
the ancient assailants of Christianity, endeavoured, 
with the whole combined influence of his station, 
talent, and example, to restore idolatry throughout 
the Eoman empire, but in vain. His reign passed 
away like the " baseless fabric of a vision, leaving 
no wreck behind," save the important lesson that 
ancient paganism was hopelessly extinct, and that 
no human power can arrest the triumphant march 
of Christianity.^ 

In his work against the Christian religion, 
where he combined all former attacks, and infused 
into them his own sarcastic spirit, he says of 
Christ, as quoted by his opponent Cyril, Bishop of 
Alexandria, Contr, Jul. : — 

"Jesus, having persuaded a few among you 
[Galileans, as he contemptuously called the Chris- 
tians], and those of the worst of men, has now 
been celebrated about three hundred years ; having 

^ For a fuller account of Julian and his reign, see the author*! 
••Church History," vol. ii. pp. 39 and 75. 



JULIAN THE APOSTATE. 20$ 

done nothing in his lifetime worthy of fame/ un- 
less any one thinks it a very great work to heal 
lame and blind people and exorcise demoniacs ^ in 
the villages of Bethsaida and Bethany." 

Note. — This is sufficiently bitter and contemptuous ; and 
yet it concedes to Christ the power of working miracles ; and 
these miracles, having all the highest moral and beneVolent 
character, are an argument for the purity and divine mission 
of Christ's person. Dr. Lardner, in his ** Credibility of the 
Gospel History,'* makes the following judicious remarks on 
this passage : * — 

" (i.) This is plainly acknowledging the tnith of the evan- 
gelical history, though he [Julian] does not refer to the whole 
of it, nor specify all the great works that Jesus did, nor all 
the places in which they were performed. (2.) He acknow- 
ledgeth that, for three hundred years or more, Jesus had been 
celebrated ; which regard for him was founded upon the 
works done by him in his lifetime ; which works had been 
recorded by his disciples, eye-witnesses of those works ; and 
the tradition had been handed down from the beginning to 
the time in which Julian lived. (3.) Why should not * healing 
lame and blind men, and such as were afflicted with other dis- 
tempers generally ascribed to demons,* be reckonedgreatworks? 
All judicious and impartial men must esteem them great 
works when perfoimed on the sudden, and completely, as all 
our Lord's works of healing were, — greater works than found- 
ing cities, erecting an extensive monarchy, or subduing whole 
nations by slaughter and the common methods of conquest, 
though such things have been often thought more worthy to 
be numbered and recorded by historians. (4.) If there were 
but a few only persuaded by Jesus during his abode on this 
earth, it was not for want of sufficient evidence. There was 

^ oifbh &Ko^s A^iop. 

^ Toi/s Kiu>\\ovs Kal TO^s TV<p\ods Idffaa^aLy Kal daifiovQvTas 

3 Lardner's Works, ed. by Dr. Kippis, London, 1838, vol. vii. p. 
628. 



206 DfPABTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

enough, it seems, to persuade some bad men^ called in the 
GoHi>elH * publicans and sinners ; ' the ' worst men,' as you 
say. But there were also some serions and pious men, 
thouglitful and inquisitive, as Nathanael, Nicodemns, and 
others, who were persuaded and fully satisfied, though for a 
while they had been adverse and prejudiced. And there were 
woFHe men than those whom you call 'the worst,' even Scribes 
and l'hari»ees, proud, covetous, ambitious men, wh<Mn no 
rational evidence, however clear and strong, could persuade 
to receive religious principles contrary to their present worldly 
interests." 

The same writer, after a careful examination of all the 
arguments of Julian against the religion of the Bible and the 
character of Christ and his apostles, thus ably and truthfully 
sums up their value as an undesigned and involuntary in- 
direct teHtimouy for the truth and credibility of the gospel 
history : ^ — 

''Julian has borne a valuable testimony to the history and 
to the books of the New Testament, as all must acknowledge 
who have read the extracts just made from his works. He 
allows that Jesus was bom in the reign of Augustus, at the 
time of tho taxing made in Judsea by Cyrenius; that the 
Christian reli<rion had its rise, and began to be propagated, in 
the times of the emperors Tiberias and Claudius. He bears 
witness to the genuineness and authenticity of the four 
Gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and the Acts of 
the Apostles ; and he so quotes them as to intimate that they 
were the only historical books received by Christians as of 
authority, and tho only authentic memoirs of Jesus Christ 
and his Apostles, and the doctrines preached by theuL He 
allows their early date, and even argues for it. He also 
quotes, or plainly refers to, the Acts of the Apostles, to St. 
Paul's Epistles to the Romans, the Corinthians, and the 
Galatians. He does not deny the miracles of Jesus Christ, 
but allows him to have ' healed the blind, and the lame, and 
demoniacs ; ' and * to have rebuked the winds, and walked 
upon the waves of the sea.* He endeavours, indeed, to 
diminish these works, but in vain. The consequence is un« 

^ Lardner's Works^ vii. pp. 6^8, 639, 



JULIAN THE APOSTATE. 20/ 

deniable, — such works are good proofs of a divine mission. 
He endeavours also to lessen the number of the early believers 
in Jesus ; and yet he acknowledgeth that there were * multi- 
tudes of such men in Greece and Italy ' before St. John wrote 
his Gospel. He likewise afifects to diminish the quality of 
the early believers; and yet acknowledgeth, that, beside 
'men-servants and maid-servants,' Cornelius, a Roman centu- 
rion at Csesarca, and Sergius Paulus, Proconsul of Cyprus, 
were converted to the faith of Jesus before the end of the 
reign of Claudius. And he often speaks with great indigna- 
tion of Peter and Paul, those two great Apostles of Jesus, and 
successful preachers of his gospel So that, upon the whole, 
he has undesignedly borne witness to the truth of many 
things recorded in the books of the New Testament He 
aimed to overthrow the Christian religion, but has confirmed 
it : his arguments against it are perfectly harmless, and in- 
sufficient to unsettle the weakest Christian. He justly 
excepts to some things introduced into the Christian profes- 
sion by the late professors of it, in his own time or sooner, 
but has not made one objection of moment against the Chris- 
tian religion as contained in the genuine and authentic books 
of the New Testament." 



SPINOZA. 

The great Jewish philosopher, bom at Amsterdam 

1632 ; died 1677. 

Epistola 23. 

Christ was the temple of God, because in^ him 
God has most fully revealed himself. 

'* Atqui hoc summum est quod Christtis de se ipso dixit, se 
8cil. t&mplum Dei esse^ nimirum, quia Deus sese maxime in 
Christo manifestavitf quod Johannes, ut efficacius exprimeret, 
dixit : mrhum factum esse camem" 



208 mpABTIAL TESTDIONIEa 



THOMAS CHUBB. 

An English Deist (1679-1748). From the ** True Gospel 
0/ Jesus Christ," sect, viii pp. 55, 56. 

" In Christ we have an example of a quiet and 
peaceable spirit; of a becoming modesty and 
sobriety ; just, honest, upright, sincere ; and, above 
all, of a most gracious and benevolent temper and 
behaviour. One who did no wrong, no injury to 
any man; in whose mouth was no guile; who 
went about doing good, not only by his ministry, 
but also in curing all manner of diseases among 
the people. His life was a beautiful picture of 
human nature in its native purity and simplicity, 
and showed at once what excellent creatures men 
would be when under the influence and power of 
that gospel which he preached unto them,' 



M 



DENIS DIDEROT. 

This French philosopher (born in Langres, 1 7 1 3, 
died in Paris, 1784) founded and edited, with other 
free - thinkers, the famous " Uncyclopedie " (since 
175 1 ), which, with the professed aim of presenting 
a summary of all the branches of human learning 
and art, became the chief repository of the revolu- 



DENIS DIDEROT. 209 

tionary and infidel ideas of the eighteenth century, 
and was several times suspended by the government, 
but completed at last. He was all his life con- 
sidered a confirmed atheist ; but during his later 
years, to the astonishment of his friends, he made 
the Bible a part of the education of his only 
daughter, who subsequently wrote his " MeTnoires*' 
and frequently received visits from a clergyman. 

The late venerable Antistes Hess of Zurich, the 
author of a " Life of Jesus " and other good works, 
relates from the mouth of a personal witness the 
following interesting anecdote, which we will give 
(from Stier's '' Reden JemI' Part vi p. 496) in 
French and English: — 

" Dans UTie de ces soirees du Baron d'Holbach oiu 
se reunissaient les plus MSbres incredules du siMle, 
on venait de se donner pleine carrUre pour relever 
le plus plaisamment du monde les pr4tendues aJb^ 
surditdSy les bStises, les inepties de tout genre dont 
fourmUlent nos livres sacr4s, Le philosophe Diderot, 
qui n*avait pas pris lui-mSme une mince part a la 
conversation, finit par Varriter tout d coup en 
disant : 

" ' A merveilles, messieurs, A merveilles,je ne connais 
personne en France ni aUleurs, qui sache dcrire et 
parler avec plus d'art et de talent, Cependant 
malgr4 tout le mal que nous avons dit, et sans doiUe 
avec heaucoup de raison, de ce didble de Iwc^^ J o^^ 



210 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

vans cU/ier terns tant que vous Stes, de /aire wn, rMt 
qui 8oit aussi simple, mais en mime temps aussi 
sublime, aussi touchant que le ricit de la passion et 
de la mort de J^us-Christ, qui produise le Tnhne 
effet, qui fosse une sensation avssi forte, aussi 
g4n6ralement ressentie, et dont Vinfluence soit encore 
la mime apr^ tant de siMes* 

" Cette apostrophe imprivue itonna tons les audi- 
tev/rs, etfut suivie mime dlun assez long silence.** 

"In one of those evening parties of Baxon 
d'Holbacli, where the most celebrated infidels of 
the century used to assemble, the conversation 
turned freely, and in the most amusing manner, 
on the supposed absurdities, stupidities, and all 
kind of inconsistencies, of the Sacred Scriptures. 
The philosopher Diderot, who had taken no small 
part in the conversation, brought it suddenly to a 
close by the following remark : — 

" ' For a wonder, gentlemen, for a wonder, I know 
nobody, either in France or anywhere else, who 
could write and speak with more art and talent 
Notwithstanding all the bad which we have said, 
and no doubt with good reason, of this devil of a 
book {de ce diahle de livre), I defy you all — as many 
as are here — to prepare a tale so simple, and at 
the same time so sublime and so touching, as the 
tale of the passion and death of Jesus Christ; 



JEAN JACQUES ROUSSEAU. 211 

which produces the same eflfect, which makes a 
sensation as strong and as generally felt, and 
whose influence will be the same, after so many- 
centuries.' 

" This unexpected speech astonished all the hear- 
ers, and was followed by a pretty long silence." 



JEAN JACQUES EOUSSEAU. 

Frofm hu **Emile ou de L* Education,** livre iv. {Profession 
de Foi du Vicaire Savoyard.) (Euvres computes, Paris^ 
1839, tome iii. pp. 365-367. 

This famous French philosopher and rhetorician 
was bom in Geneva, the city of Calvin, in 1 7 1 2 ; 
and died, after a restless, changeful, and imhappy 
life, near Chantilly, in 1778. He did as much as 
any writer, Voltaire not excepted, to prepare the 
way for the French Eevolution, and the consequent 
overthrow of the whole social order in France. 
His life is marked by a series of blunders, caprices, 
glaring inconsistencies, and violent changes from 
Calvinism to Eomanism, from Eomanism to infi- 
delity, from infidelity to transient belief, from 
poverty and misery, persecution and exile, to glory 
and happiness, and back again to misery, from 
philanthropy to misanthropy, from sense to the 
very borders of insanity, — all iIL\imma.\»^ftL\s^ ^^b^^^ 



212 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

of genius. He was one of the most eloquent and 
fascinating, but also one of the most paradoxical 
and dangerous, of writers. He viewed everything 
from his lively imagination, and wrote every line 
under the impulse of feeling and passion. His 
judgment was on the side of virtue and religion; 
but in his conduct he betrayed every principle he 
enjoined. He drew the most charming pictures of 
female loveliness, and yet he lived long in illegal in- 
tercourse, and at last married his servant, — ^a vulgar 
and ill-tempered woman. He rebuked the ladies of 
France for intrusting their children to nurses, and 
yet he placed his own in a foundling-hospital 

His remarkable testimony to Christ and the 
Gospels is the best thing he ever wrote, and will 
last the longest. It was written about A.D. 1760, 
and appeared in his work on education, which was 
condemned for its dangerous speculations on religion 
and morals by the Parliament of France, and caused 
his banishment from the kingdom. We quote it 
first in the original French : — 

" e/e vous av(me aussi que la majest6 des Scritures 
m'^tonne, la sainteU de VJ^vangile parle d man 
coeur} Voyez les livres des philosophes avec totUe 
leur pompe ; quails sont petits prds de celui-ld ! Se 

^ Var. Je vous avoue amsi que la sainteU de VBvangUe est vn 
argument qui parle d mon ccsur, et auquel faurais mSme regret de 
irouver quelquehonntriporMit. Voye&\c%l\vrt»« « « • 



• JEAN JACQUES ROUSSEAU. 213 

peut-U qu*un livre A la fois €i stcblime et si simple soit 
Vouvrage des hommes? Se peut-il que celui dont 
il fait rhistoire ne soit qu*un homme lui-mSme? 
JEst'Ce Id le ton cCun enthousiaste ou d*un ambitievx 
sectaire ? Quelle douceur, quelle puret^, dans ses 
mosurs ! quelle grace touchante dans ses instruc- 
tions! quelle Mvation dans ses maxiines! quelle 
profonde sagesse dans ses discours! quelle pre- 
sence d'esprit, quelle finesse et quelle justesse dans 
ses r4ponses! quel empire sur ses passions! Oib est 
thommCy oil est le sage qui sait a^ir, souffrir et 
mourir sans foiblesse et sans ostentation ? Quand 
Platon peint son juste imaginaire ^ convert de tout 
Vopprohre du crime, et digne de tous les prix de la 
vertu; il peint trait pour trait Jisus-Christ : la 
ressemblance est si frappante, que tous les Fires Vont 
sentie, et quil n'est pas possible de s*y tromper? 
Quels pr4jv^4s, quel aveuglement ^ ne faut-U point 
avoir pour oser comparer le fils de Sophronisque au 
fils de Marie? Quelle distance de Vun A V autre! 
Socrate, mourant sans douleur, sans ignomie, soviint 

1 De. Eep. lib. i. 

3 QeiiB ressemblance est le r^sultat g^n^ral des deux premiers 
livres ou dialogues du traits de Platon, intitule *^ Dela Bipubliqiie.'* 
Le passage le plus remarquable & ce sujet est celui qu'il met dans la 
bouche de son adversaire (tome ii. p. 361, E. Edition de H. Etienne, 
ou tome vi. pp. 215 et 216, Edition de Deux-Ponts). Quant aux 
Pdres de TEglise dont il est question ici, voyez entre autres Saint 
Justin {Apologia primaf No. 5), et Saint C16ment d'Alexandrie 
{Stromata, lib. iv.) 

3 Var. . . . Quel aveuglement ou quelle mourcaut {o\ iwt. * * « 



s 



2 14 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

aisSment jusqu'au b(mt son personage; et si t 
facile mort tiefdtJt honori sa vie, on douteraU 
Socrate, avec tout son esprit, fut avJtre chose qu 
sophiste, H inventa, dit-on, la morale; dHavx 
avant lui Vavoient mise en praiique : U ne fit i 
dire ce qvOls avoient fait, il ne Jit que mettre 
kfons leurs exemples. Aristide avait 6t6 juste avi 
que Socrate eiU dit ce que c'6taU que justice. L^oni 
4tait mort pour son pays avant que Socrate e4t J 
un devoir d'airaer la patrie ; Sparte itait sohre aVi 
que Socrate cAt lov4 la s6bri6t4; avant qu'U i 
d^fini la vertu, la Gfrece dbondait en hommes vertue 
Mais oil J^svs avait-il pris chez les siens cette mor 
Slev^e et pure dont lui sevl a donn6 les lemons 
Vexemple ? ^ Du sein du plus furieux fanaJtismt 
plus haute sagesse se fit entendre, et la simplicity 
plus h4r&lques vertus honora le plus vU de tous 
peuples. La mort de Socrate, philosophant tran^ 
lement avec ses amis, est la plus douce qu'on pw 
dSsirer ; celle de J4sus expirard dans les tourmCi 
injuria, railU, maudit de tout un peuple, est la p 
horrible qu^on puisse craindre, Socrate prenant 
coupe empoisonnde h^nit celui qu4, la lui pr^ntt 
qui pleure ; J4sus, au milieu d'un supplice affre 
prie pour ses hourreaux acharn^s, 

" Oui, si la vie et la mort de Socrate sont d 

1 Voyez, dans le discours sur la montagne, le parallMe qu'il 
lui-meme de la morale de Mo'ise h. la sienue, Matt cap. y. vera 
etseq. 



JEAN JACQUES ROUSSEAU. 215 

sage, la vie et la mort de Jdsus sont d*im Dieu. 
DiroTis-nous que Phistoire de r£vangile est invents 
d plaisir ? Mon ami, ce rCest pas ainsi qu'on iu" 
vente ; et les faits de Socrate dont personne ne 
doute, sont moins attest^s que ceux de Jdsus-Christ. 
Au fond, c'est reculer la diffi/yult4 sans la d4truire ; 
il seroit plus inconcevable que plusieurs hommes 
d'accord^ eussent fabriqu^ ce livre, qu'il ne Test 
qu'un seul en ait fourni le sujet. Jamais des 
auteurs juifs n' eussent trouvi ni ce ton, ni cette mo- 
rale ; et r£vangile a des caractires de v4rit6 si 
grands, sifrappants, si parfaitement inimitahles, gue 
rinventeur en seroit plus ^tonnant que le hdros.* 

" Avec tout cela, ce mSme £vangile est plein de 
choses incroydbles, de chases qui r4pugnent A la 
raison, et qv!U est impossible d tout homrfie sens4 de 
concevoir ni d'admettre. Que/aire au milieu de toutes 
ces contradictions ? tltre toujours modeste et circon- 
spect, mon enfant; respecter en silence ce qu*on ne 
saurait ni rejeter, ni comprendre, et s'humilier de- 
vant le grand litre, qui seul sait la v4rit4" 

^ Yar. . . . que quatre hommes d'accord. ... A la suite de ces 
mots est une note ainsi con9ue ; Je veux bien n'en pas compter 
davantage, parceque leurs quatre livres sont Us seuLes vies de Jisus* 
Christ qui nous sont restSes du grand nomhre qui avoient €ti icrites, 

3 Dans une lettre kM.de..., dat^e de 1769, Rousseau revient 
encore sur ce paraUMe ^tabli par lui entre J^sus et Socrate ; et ne 
supposant aucun caract^re divin ni mission sumatureUe au sage 
h^breu, qu'il oppose de nouveau au sage grec, il prdsente sur les 
vues et la conduite du premier des considerations touted XL<;^\^^!2kSs^ 
Voyez la Corresjoondance, 



2 1 6 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

" I will confess to you, that the majesty of the 
Scriptures strikes me with admiration, as the 
purity of the gospel has its influence on my heart. 
Peruse the works of our philosophers, with all 
their pomp of diction, how mean, how contemp- 
tible are they, compared with the Scriptures ! Is 
it possible that a book, at once so simple and so 
sublime, should be merely the work of man ? Is 
it possible that the sacred personage whose history 
it contains should be himself a mere man ? Do 
we find that he assumed the tone of an enthusiast 
or ambitious sectary ? What sweetness, what 
purity in his manner ! What an affecting grace- 
fulness in his instructions ! What sublimity in 
his maxims ! What profound wisdom in his dis- 
courses ! What presence of mind, what subtlety, 
what fitness, in his replies ! How great the 
command over his passions ! Where is the man, 
where the philosopher, who could so live and so 
die, without weakness, and without ostentation? 
When Plato describes his imaginary righteous 
man, loaded with all the punishments of guilt, 
yet meriting the highest rewards of virtue, he 
describes exactly the character of Jesus Christ: 
the resemblance is so striking, that aU the Church 
Fathers perceived it. What prepossession, what 
blindness must it be to compare the son of 
Sophroniscus to the sou of Mary I What an 



JEAN JACQUES ROUSSEAU. 21/ 

infinite disproportion there is between them! 
Socrates, dying without pain or ignominy, easily 
supported his character to the last; and, if this 
easy death had not crowned his life, it might 
have been doubted whether Socrates, with all his 
wisdom, was anything more than a mere sophist. 
He invented, it is said, the theory of ethics. 
Others, however, had before put them into 
practice : he had only to say, therefore, what they 
had done, and to reduce their examples to pre- 
cepts. Aristides had been just before Socrates 
defined justice. Leonidas had given up his life 
for his country before Socrates declared patriotism 
to be a duty. The Spartans were a sober people 
before Socrates recommended sobriety. Before he 
had even defined virtue, Greece abounded in 
virtuous men. But where could Jesus learn, 
among his contemporaries, that pure and sublime 
morality of which he only has given us both pre- 
cept and example ? The greatest wisdom was 
made known among the most bigoted fanaticism ; 
and the simplicity of the most heroic virtues did 
honour to the vilest people on earth. The death 
of Socrates, peacefully philosophising among friends, 
appears the most agreeable that one could wish: 
that of Jesus, expiring in agonies, abused, insulted, 
and accused by a whole nation, is the most 
horrible that one could fear. SoQ,t^,\,^'a»^\sjA&fc^^'>si. 



2l8 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

receiving the cup of poison, blessed the weeping 
executioner who administered it; but Jesus, 
amidst excruciating tortures, prayed for his merci- 
less tormentors. 

" Yes^ if the life and death of Socrates were those 
of a sage, the life and death of Jesus are those of a 
Oodr 

" Shall we suppose the evangelical history a mere 
fiction ? Indeed, my friend, it bears no marks of 
fiction. On the contrary, the history of Socrates, 
which no one presumes to doubt, is not so well 
attested as that of Jesus Christ. Such a supposi- 
tion, in fact, only shifts the difficulty without ob- 
viating it : it is more inconceivable that a number 
of persons should agree to write such a history, 
than that one should furnish the subject of it 
The Jewish authors were incapable of the diction, 
and strangers to the morality contained in the 
gospeL The marks of its truth are so striking 
and inimitable, that the inventor wovld he a mim 
astonishing character than the hero. 

"With all this, the same gospel is full of in- 
credible things which are repugnant to reason, and 
which it is impossible for a sensible man to con- 
ceive and to admit. What shall we do in the 
midst of all these contradictions ? We should 
be always modest and circumspect, my child; 
respect in silence what we can neither reject ilor 



NAPOLEON BONAPAETK 219 

understand ; and humble ourselves before that great 
Being who alone knows the truth.'* 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 

Napoleon the First grew up in the infidel atmo- 
sphere of the eighteenth century, and was all his 
life so much absorbed with schemes of military- 
conquest and political dominion that ho had no 
time, even if he had the inclination, to reflect 
seriously on the subject of religion. Ambition 
was the idol monster to which he sacrificed millions 
of human beings, and even his devoted wife, whom 
he ardently loved and admired. But he had too 
profound an intellect ever to be an atheist. He 
was constitutionally inclined to fatalism ; and like 
his nephew,« Napoleon III., he believed in his star. 
He knew that religion was an essential element in 
human nature, and the strongest pillar of public 
morals and social order. In his Egyptian cam- 
paign, it is said, he carried with him a New 
Testament along with the Koran, under the char- 
acteristic title, "Politics." It was from this 
political point of view that he restored the Eoman 
Catholic Church in France (whicli \.\i^ i^^J^ '^JL 



220 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

the Revolution had swept away), and secured to 
the Protestants the liberty of public worship, but 
kept both subject to the secular power and his 
despotic will. 

During his exile at St. Helena, Napoleon had 
the best opportunity of reflecting on his unrivalled 
career of brilliant victory and crushing defeat, and 
the vanity of all earthly things. He frequently 
read the Bible. Count de las Casas relates^ 
the following fact, which proves at least his 
respect for the morality of the gospel : " The 
Emperor ended the conversation by desiring my 
son to bring him the New Testament ; and, taking 
it from the beginning, he read as far as the 
conclusion of the discourse of Jesus on the mount. 
He expressed Mmself struck with the highest admi- 
ration of the jpurUy, the sublimity, the heauty of 
the morality which it contained; and we all ex- 
perienced the same feeling." Napoleon said to 
0*Meara, Oct. 9, 1866: ''Credo tutto che crede 
la chiesa (I believe all that the Church believes). 
The Pope wanted me to confess, which I always 
evaded by saying, *Holy father (santo padre), I 
am too much occupied at present : when I get 

older ' I took a pleasure in conversing with 

the Pope, who was a good old man, Tna testardo (but 

^ In his ** Memoirs of the Life, Exile, and Conversations of the 
Emperor Napoleon," Eng. txttOB..) ^d- "^.X,, "vasTi "'<^1- ii« p. 256. 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 221 

obstinate). I am of the opinion that every per- 
son ought to continue in the religion in which 
he was brought up, in that of his fathers."^ 
In 1 8 17, March 19, he was reading a French 
New Testament, when 0*Meara remarked that 
some believed him an unbeliever; Napoleon laughed, 
and replied : " Nevertheless it is not true ; I am 
far from being an atheist (CependarU, ce n'est pas 
vrai. Je suis loin cPetre athee) Man has need 
of something wonderful. It is better for him to 
seek it in religion than in Mile, le Normand " (a 
celebrated fortune-teller at Paris). " Moreover, 
religion is a great consolation and resource to those 
who possess it, and no man can pronounce what 
he will do in his last moments." 

In his last will and testament, which was drawn 
up six years before his death, at Longwood, Island 
of St. Helena, he declares : " I die in the apostoHc 
Eoman religion, in the bosom of which I was bom 
more than fifty years ago." But this is a con- 
ventional phrase in Eoman Catholic countries. In 
1 8 19 he sent for two Italian priests, — the aged 
Abb6 Buonavita, who had been chaplain to his 
mother at Elba and to the Princess Pauline at 
Eome; and the young Abb6 Vignali, who was 
also a physician. He professed his assent and 
submission to the faith and discipline of the 
Catholic Christian religion, attended maa^ ^j^'ec^ 

» " O'Meara," i lai, Am. %dX\aoxu 



222 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

Sunday, and received the sacrament of eztieme 
unction before his death. 

These facts do not justify the inference that 
Napoleon became a true Christian. His pnblic and 
private life exhibit no trace of piety. Hia sub- 
mission to the rites of the Boman Church on his 
death-bed is hardly sufficient to be construed into 
an act of genuine repentance, and may have been 
dictated in part by policy, or a prudent regard for 
his own reputation, the interests of his dynasty, 
and the public sentiment in France. He died 
amidst dreams and visions of war and victory. 
" France ! Josephine ! head of the army ! " were 
his last words, — a suitable summing-up of his 
life. 

But I have no doubt that his intellect bowed be- 
fore the majesty of Christ. Eeasoning from the 
overpowering authority and dignity of Christ as a 
teacher, from the amazing result of his peaceful 
mission, and the imperishable nature of his king- 
dom as contrasted with the vanity of all human 
conquests and secular empires, he justly inferred 
that Christ was more than man, that he was 
truly divine, and that his Divinity is the key 
which unlocks the mysteries of Christianity. In 
this respect he went further than any of the 
witnesses in this collection, who stop with the 
concession of the unparalleled human greatness of 
Christ The logical coTXcXAmoii oi \}aa TCkajcvi^^jssia, 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 223 

intellect of Napoleon, and his profound know- 
ledge of men, may be fairly set over against the 
illogical denial of Christ's Divinity by inferior 
minds. 

It is with these restrictions that we insert here 
the famous testimony of the greatest military 
genius, which has been extensively circulated by 
Eeligious Tract Societies in Europe and America, 
and is embodied, among other books, in John S. 
C. Abbott's "Life of Napoleon" (vol. ii. chap, 
xxxii. p. 6 1 2 ff.), as also in Abbott's " Confidential 
Correspondence of the Emperor Napoleon with the 
Empress Josephine " (New York, 1855, pp. 353- 
363), without, however, being traced to a reliable 
source. General Bertrand, an avowed unbeliever, 
and General Montholon, who, after his return to 
Europe, became a believer, or at least seriously 
inclined, would be the proper vouchers, since they 
heard, and must have reported, these utterances at 
St. Helena ; but I cannot find them in their writ- 
ings, so far as they came to my knowledge. I 
was informed by Dr. Stowe, that General Bertrand, 
when on a visit to America, ^as asked by a 
company of ministers at Pittsburg, whether Na- 
poleon really uttered those sentiments in con- 
versations with him, and that he gave an 
affirmative answer. But, on further inquiry, I 
could get no satisfactory reply from PittsfcKis.%. "V 



224 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

also looked in vain for such strong and explicit 
coi^fessions in the Memoirs of Las Casas, Antom- 
marchi^ and O'Meara, and other authentic sources 
on the life of Napoleon at St. Helena, although 
they contain some religious conversations of the 
emperor, more or less favourable to Christianity 
and the Bible. The tracts containing Napoleon's 
sentiments on Christianity are probably derived 
from a book, of which, unfortunately, I could only 
lind the title, in French catalogues ; viz., " Eobert- 
Antoine de Beauterne : Sentiments de Nwpoli(m sur 
le Christianisme, Conversations religieuses recueiUies 
a Sainte-Hdlene, par le Odn. comte de Montholan." 
Paris, 1843, third ed. (see the title in Oettinger's 
'* Bibliographie Biographiqrie"), From GuERAED*S 
*' Literature Frangaise Contemporaine" xix. Siede, 
tom. i., Paris, 1842, I infer that this is the same 
author who wrote a book entitled : " Uhe Lamenta- 
tion chretienne, ou Mort dHun enfant impie*^ Paris, 
1836, which contains a chapter on the "religious 
death of Napoleon." 

How far this book is based upon personal com- 
munications of Montholon or other authentic 
sources, I am unable to say, having sought in 
vain for a copy in the public libraries of New • 
York. Professor G. de Felice of Montauban, in a 
letter to the "New- York Observer" of April 16, 
1 842, asserts that the testimony, as published in 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 22 5 

the Frencli tract below, is undoubtedly genuine, 
but gives no proof ; and states also that Eev. Dr. 
Bogue sent to Napoleon at St. Helena a copy of 
his essay on the " Divinity and Authority of the 
New Testament," which, according to the testimony 
of eye-witnesses, he read with interest and satis- 
faction. 

In view of all I could gather, I am inclined to 
believe that these religious conversations of Na- 
poleon have been enlarged or modified in the 
recollection of reporters, but are authentic in 
substance; because they have the grandiloquent 
and egotistic manner of Napoleon, and are marked 
by that massive grandeur and granite-Uke simpli- 
city of thought and style which characterise the 
best of his utterances. They are, moreover, quite 
consistent with the undeniable fact, that he ex- 
pressed himself, both in his testament and on his 
death-bed, a believer in the Catholic Christian 
religion, which always taught the Divinity of 
Christ as a fundamental article of faith. 

We give the testimony as we find it, first in 
a French tract, marked No. 51, but without date; 
and then in an enlarged form from Tract No. 477 
of the American Tract Society (New York), and from 
Abbott's works on Napoleon, alluded to above. It 
will be seen that the French and English differ 
considerably, but they breathe the same sijirife. 



226 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIEa 



NAPOLEON* 

"II est vrai que le Christ propose d riotre foi %m 
sirie de mystdres, H commande avec autoriU iy 
croire, sans donner cCautres raisons que cette pardU 
epouvantdble : Je suis Dieu. 

** Sans doute ilfaut la foi pour cet article-Id,, quied 
celui duquel derive toils les autres articles, Mais 
le caractire de la divinity du Christ une fois admis, 
la doctrine chr6tienne se pr^sente avec la precision 
et la clartd de Talgfebre : il f aut y admirer renchatne- 
ment et runit(5 d'line science. 

" Appuy^e sur la Bible, cette doctrine eapliqm le 
mieicx les traditions du monde ; elle les Mairdt, et 
les avires dogmes s'y rapportent 4troitement com/me les 
anneavx scell4s d*une mime chaine, L'existence du 
Christ d'un lout d V autre est un tissu tout mysteri- 
eiiXy fen conviens, mais ce mystlre r4pond db des diffir 
cultds qui sent dans toutes les existences ; refetez-le, le 
monde est u/ne 4nigme: acceptez-le, vous avez une 
admirable solution de Vhistoire de Vhomme, 

" Le christianisme a un avantage sur tons les philo' 
sophes et sur toutes les religions : les chrdtiens ne se 
font pas illusion sur la nature des chases. On ne 

* Les documents que je publie, contiennent la pens^ intime de 
Nai)oleon but le Christianisme, et spdcialement sur la diyinitd de 
rHomme-Dlea. 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 22/ 

pent leur reprocher ni la suhtiliU ni le charlatanisme 
des idMogues, qui ont cru r4soudre la grande 4nigme 
des questions thMogiques, avec des vairies dissertations 
sur ces grands objets. Insensis, dont lafolie ressemble 
d celle d*un petit enfant qui vevi toucher le ciel avec 
sa main, ou qui demande la lune pour son jouet ou sa 
curiosity, Ze christianisme dit avec simplicity: " Nul 
homme vHa vu Dieu, si ce n*est Dieu, Dieu a r4v4U 
ce qu*il 4tait : sa r4v4lcUion est un mystdre que la 
raison ni V esprit Tie peuvent concevoir, Mais puisqus 
Dieu aparU, Ufaut y croire** Cda est d'un grand 
bon sens. 

" L'Evangile possdde une vertu secrUeJe ne sais qum 
d'efficace, une chaleur qui agit sur rentendement et 
qui charme le cceur ; on 4prouve d le mSditer, ce qu'on 
4prouve d contempler le del, L'EvangUe rCest pas un 
livrcy c'est un Stre vivant, avec v/ne a^ion, une 
puissance, qui envahit tout ce qui s'oppose d son 
extension, Le void sur cette table, ce livre par 
excellence [et id TEmpereur le toucha avec respect"] ; 
je ne me lasse pas de le lire, et tous les jours avec le 
m>Sme plaisir. 

" Le Christ ne variepas, il n'Msitejamms dans son 
ensdgnem^ent, et la moindre affirmation de lui est 
mxirquie d!un cachet de dmplidt4 et de profondear 
qui captive Vign^orant et le savant, pour peu qu'Us y 
pritent leur attention. 

" NvlU part on ne trouve cette sirie delidW \A^>^ 



228 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONISa 

belles maximes morales, qui ddJUent comme les bataU- 
Ions de la milice cSleste, et qui produisent dans notre 
dme le mSme sentiment que Von 6prov/oe d considSrer 
V^tendue infinie du del resplendissant, par une helU 
nuit d'6t4, de tout V4clat des astres. 

" Non-seulement notre esprit est pr6occup6^ rnais U est 
doming par cette lecture, et jamais Vdme ne court 
risque de s'4garer avec ce livre. 

" Unefois maitre de notre esprit, VEvangUe fdiU 
nous aime, Dieu mSme est notre ami, notre phe et 
vraiment notre Dieu, Une rrUre rCa pas plus de soin 
de Venfant qvJelle aUaite, Vdme s6dv/Ue par la 
beauts de VEvangUe, ns s'appartient pltis. IHeu s'en 
empare tout-dr-fait ; U en dirige les pens^ et totUes 
tesfacultSs, elle est d lui. 

" Qitelle preuve de la divinity du Christ ! avec un 
empire aussi absolu, il ria qyHun sevl btU, VanUlicyrar 
tion spirituelle des individus, la puret^ de la coti- 
science, Vunion d ce qui est vrai, la saintet^ d^ Vdme. 

^' Enfin, et c*est mon dernier argument, il rCy a pas 
de Dieu dans^le del, si un homme a pu concevoir et 
eoc4cuter, avec un plein succ^, le dessein gigantesque 
de d4roher pour lui le cidte suprime, en usv/rpavJt le 
nom de Dieu. J6su8 est le s&ul qui Vait os4, il est le 
seul qui ait dit clairement, affirmd imperturbablement 
lui-mAme de lui-mSme: Je suis Dieu. Ce qui est 
bien different de cette affirmation : Je suis un dieu, 
ou de cette autre : II '^ ^ d&^ ^iio^vsu L'histoire ne 



NAPOLEON BONAJPARTK 229 

mentionne aucun autre individu qui se soit qualifi4 
lui-mSme de ce Hire de Dieu dans le sens dbsolu. La 
faile n'4tdblit nulle part, que Jupiter et les autres 
dieux se soient eux-mSmes divinisds. Ceut 4t4 de leur 
part le comhle de VorgueU, et v/ne monstruositS, une 
extravagance ahsurde. Cest la postSrit^, ce sont les 
Mritiers des premiers despotes qui les ont d6ijUs, 
Tous les hommes 4tant d'une mSme race, Aleocandre a 
pu se dire lefils de Jupiter, Mais toute la Grice a 
souri de cette supercherie ; et de mSme VapotMose des 
empereurs romains rCa jamais 6t6 une chose s4rieuse 
pour les Romains, Mahomet et Confucius se sont 
donn4s simplement pour des agents de la divinity. La 
dSesse Eg^rie de Numa, n^ajanfiais 6t6 que la person-- 
nificaiion d^une inspiration puisne dans la solitude 
des bois, Les dieux Brama, de Vlnde, sont une inno- 
vation psychologique, 

" Comment done v/njuif dont F existence historiqtce 
est plus av6r6 que toutes celles des temps oib il a vScu, 
lui seul, fits d!un charpentier, se donne-t-il tout 
d^dbord pour Dieu mime, pour Vitre par excellence^ 
pour le CrMeur de tous les Stres. II s'arroge toutes 
les sortes d! adorations. II bdtit son culte de ses mains, 
non avec des pierres, mais avec des hommes. On s'ex» 
tasie sur les conqtcStes d^ Alexandre ! Eh bien ! void 
un conqu^rant qui confisque d son profit, qui unit* 
qui incorpore d luirmime, non pas une nation, mais 



230 IMPABTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

Vespke humaine. Qttel miracle / Fdme humaiiUy 
avec toutes sesfciculUs, dement une annesce avec texis' 
ttiice du Christ, 

" Et comment f par un pradige qui surpasse tofud 
prodige. II veut Xamov/r des hommes, c'est-d-dire, ce 
guil est le plus difficile au monde d*obtenir : ce qum 
sage demands vainement d quelques amis, v/n p^e d 
ses en/ants, une Spouse d son iipofwjc, un frire d sm 
frhre, en un m^t, le cosur: cest Id ce gru'U veiU p<mr 
lui, il Vexige ahsolument, et U y r&ussit tout de suiU. 
J^en condus sa divinity, Alexandre, C^sar, Annibd, 
Louis XIV,y avec tout leur gSnie, y ont dchou^. Bs 
ont conguis le Trumde et il n'ont pu parvenir db avoir 
un ami, Je suis peut-Stre le setU, de nos jours, gvi 
aims Annibal, CSsar, Alexandre, Le grand L&m 
XIV,y qui a jet6 tant d'Mat sur la France et dans U 
monde, n*avait pas un ami dans tout son royaurrUy 
mime dans sa famUle. II est vrai, nous aimons nos 
en/ants : pourquoi ? Nous ob^issons d un instinct de 
la nature, d une volontd de Dieu, d une 7i4cessiM gut 
les bStes elles-mSmes reconnaissent et remplissent ; mais 
combien d^enfants qiti restent insensibles d nos caresses, 
d tant de soins que nous leur prodiguons, combien 
d*enfants ingrats? Vos enfants, g&n4ral Bertrani, 
vous aiment'ils ? vous les aimez, et vous rHUes pas sAr 
dUtre pay4 de retour, Ni vos bienfaits, ni la nature, 
ne r^ussiront jamais d leur inspirer un amour td que 
celui des chrUiens pour Dieu! Si vous veniez a 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 23 1 

mourir, vos en/ants se souviendraierU de vous en 
d4jpensant votre fortune, sans doute, mais vos petits 
enfants sauraient d peine si vous avez exisU. Et 
vous ites le g6n4ral Bertrand ! Et nous sommes dans 
tcne Ue, et vous n'avez d'autre distraction que la vus 
de votre famille, 

" Ze Christ parle, et ddsormais les generations lui ap' 
partiennent par des liens plus 6troits, plus intimes qus 
ceux du sang ; par une union plus sacrde, plus im- 
p4rieuse que quelque union que ce soit. II allume la 
flamme d'un amour qui fait mourir V amour de soi, 
qui prdvaut sur tout autre am/mr, 

" A ce miracle de sa volontS, comment ne pas recon- 
naitre le Verhe crMeur du monde, 

" Les fondateurs de religion n'ontpas mime eu Vid6e 
de cet amour mystique, qui est V essence du christian- 
isme, sous le beau nom de charitS. 

" C*est qu!il n'avaieni garde de se lancer contre un 
^cueil, Oest que dans une operation semhlable, se 
f aire aimer, Vhomme porte en lui-mime le sentiment . 
profond de son impuissance. 

" Aussi le plus grand miracle du Christ, sans con- 
tredit, c*est le rdgne de la charit4, 

** Lui seul, il est parvenu A 4lever le cceur des horn- 
mes jusqu'dj V invisible, jusqu*au sacrifice du temps : 
lui seul, en criant cette immolation, a crU v/n lien 
entre le ciel et la terre. 

" Tous ceux qui croient smciremeirct euVuA, TesawtvXAtvX 



232 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

cet amour admirable, mmatural, supSrieur; phiruh 
mMe inexplicable, impossible d la raison, et auxform 
de Vhomme ; feu sacrSdonnSA la terre par ce riouveau 
ProrrUthie, dorU le temps, ce grand destrtccteur, ns pent 
ni user la force ni limiter la durie, Moi, Napolion, 
c*est ce qu>e f admire davantage, parce que fy ai pensS 
souvent. Et c'est ce qui me prouve absolument la di- 
vinity du Christ ! 

" fTai passionn4 des multitudes qui m^mraient pmr 
mm. A Dieu ne plaise que je forme aucune compar- 
aison entre Venthousiasme des soldats et la chariU 
chr4tienne, qui sent aussi diff4rents que leur cause. 

" Mais enfin, il fallait m^a presence, V4lectricU6 de 
mon regard, mon accent, une parole de moi; alors, 
fodlumais le feu sa/^ri dans les cceurs. Certes je pes- 
sdde le secret de cette puissance m/igique qui enUve 
V esprit, mais je ne sawrais le communiquer A per- 
Sonne ; aucun de mes g6n4raux ne Va regu ou devinS 
de moi; je n*ai pas d^avantage le secret d^^temiser 
mon n^m et mon amour dans les cosurs, et dCy op6r^ 
des prodiges sans les secours de la motive. 

" Maintenant queje suisd Sainte-H^Uns — mainte- 
nant que je suis seul et clou4 sur ce roc, qui hataille et 
conquiert des empires pour moi ? Oil sont les courti- 
sans de mon infortune ? Pense-t-on d moi ? Qui se 
remuepour moi en Europe ? Qui m'est demeur4fidile, 
ail sont mes amis ? Qui, deux ou trois, que votrefM- 
IM immortalise, rcms partcigea^'oofUA wtv&olez mow erf//' 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 233 

Id la voix de VEmpereurprit un accent particulier 
dJironique mdancolie et de profonde tristesse. 

" Oui, notre existence a hrilU de tout V4clat du 
diadSme et de la souveraineti ; et la vStre, Bertrand, 
T4Jl6chissait cet Mat comme le dSme des Invalides, dor6 
par nous, r^flichit les rayons du soleil, Mais les revers 
sont venus, Vor peu d peu s*est effacS. La pluie du 
malheur et des outrages, dont on m*ahreuve chaquejour, 
en emporte les demises parcelles. Nous ne sommes 
plus que du plomb, g4ndral Bertrand, et biendt Je serai 
de la terre, 

" Telle est la destine des grands hommes ! Telle 
de Gisar et d! Alexandre, et Von nous oublie! et le 
nom d*un conqu^rant, comme celui d*un empereur 
n'est plus q\Cun thhm de colUge ! Nos exploits torn- 
tent sous la f&rule d!un pMant qui nous inMlte ou 
nous lous, 

" Qiie de jugements divers on se permet sur le grand 
Louis XIV. ! A peine mort, le grand roi lui-mSme 
fut laiss4 setd, dans Visolement de sa chambre d 
coucher de Versailles — n^glig4 par ses courtisans et 
peut'itre Vobjet de la ris4e, Ce n'Stait plus leur 
maitre ! C^tait un cadavre, un cercvsil, une fosse, 
et Vhorreur d!une immin&nte decomposition. 

" En/iore urn, moment : — voilcb mon sort et ce qui va 
m'arriver d moi-mSme — assassin^ par Foligarchie 
anglaise, je meurs avant le temps, et mon cadavre. 



234 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

aibssi va itre rendu d la terre pour y devenir la 
pdture des vers. 

" Voild, la destine tris prochairve du grand Nofpch 
Uon — Qad aMme entre rna mistre prqfonde, et k 
rdgne itemd du Christ priM, encens^, aimS, adcri, 
vivant dans tout Vunivers — Est-ce lA mourir t riegt- 
ce pas pltUdt vivre f voild la mort du Christ f voiUt 
celle de Dieu," 

Lempereur se tiU, et comme le g^n4raZ Bertrard 
gardait ^gaUrnent le silence : " Vous ne comprenez 
pas" reprit Fempereur, " que J^sus-Christ est Dieu; 
eh Men I fai m tort de vous /aire ginirai!** 



NAPOLEON. 

One day, Napoleon was speaking of the Divinity 
of Christ ; when General Bertrand said : — 

" I cannot conceive, sire, how a great man like 
you can believe that the Supreme Being ever 
exhibited himself to men under a human form, 
with a body, a face, mouth, and eyes. Let Jesus 
be whatever you please, — the highest intelligence, 
the purest heart, the most profound legislator, and, 
in all respects, the most singular being who has 
ever existed : I grant it. Still, he was simply a 
man, who taught his disciples, and deluded credu- 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 235 

lous people, as did ' Orpheus, Confucius, Brahma. 
Jesus caused himself to be adored, because his 
predecessors, Isis and Osiris, Jupiter and Juno, 
had proudly made themselves objects of worship. 
The ascendancy of Jesus over his time was like 
the ascendancy of the gods and the heroes of fable. 
If Jesus has impassioned and attached to his 
chariot the multitude, if he has revolutionised the 
world, I see in that only the power of genius, and 
the action of a commanding spirit, which van- 
quishes the world, as so many conquerors have 
done — Alexander, Caesar, you, sire, and Moham- 
med — with a sword." 

Napoleon replied : — 

" I know men ; and I tell you that Jesus 
Christ is not a man. Superficial minds see a 
resemblance between Christ and the founders of 
empires, and the gods of other religions. That 
resemblance does not exist. There is between 
Christianity and whatever other religions the dis- 
tance of infinity. 

"We can say to the authors of every other 
religion, * You are neither gods, nor the agents of 
the Deity. You are but missionaries of falsehood, 
moulded from the same clay with the rest of 
mortals. You are made with all the passions and 
vices inseparable from them. Your temples and 
your priests proclaim your origiii.' ^skjlOql ^^^\sf^ 



236 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

the judgment, the cry of conscience, of whoever 
examines the gods and the temples of paganism. 

" Paganism was never accepted as truth by the 
wise men of Greece ; neither by Socrates, Pytha- 
goras, Plato, Anaxagoras, or Pericles. On the 
other side, the loftiest intellects, since the advent 
of Christianity, have had faith, a living faith, a 
practical faith, in the mysteries and the doctrines 
of the gospel ; not only Bossuet and F^nflon 
who were preachers, but Descartes and Newton, 
Leibnitz and Pascal, ComeiUe and Bacine, Charle- 
magne and Louis XIV. 

" Paganism is the work of man. One can here 
read but our imbecility. What do these gods, so 
boastful, know more than other mortals ; these 
legislators, Greek or Eoman; this Numa; this 
Lycurgus ; these priests of India or of Memphis ; 
this Confucius; this Mohammed? — absolutely 
nothing. They have made a perfect chaos of 
mortals. There is not one among them all who 
has said any thing new in reference to our future 
destiny, to the soul, to the essence of God, to the 
creation. Enter the sanctuaries of paganism : you 
there find perfect chaos, a thousand contradictions, 
war between the gods, the immobility of sculp- 
ture, the division and the rending of unity, the 
parcelling out of the divine attributes mutilated or 
denied in their essence, the sophisms of ignorance 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 237 

and presumption, polluted fetes, impurity and 
abomination adored, aU sorts of corruption fester- 
ing in the thick shades, with the rotten wood, the 
idol, and the priest. Does this honour God, or 
does it dishonour him ? Are these religions and 
these gods to be compared with Christianity ? 

"As for me, I say. No. I summon the entire 
Olympus to my tribimal. I judge the gods, but 
am far from prostrating myself before their vain 
images. The gods, the legislators of India and of 
China, of Eome and of Athens, have nothing which 
can overawe me. Not that I am imjust to them. 
No : I appreciate them, because 1 know their 
value. Undeniably, princes, whose existence is 
fixed in the memory as an image of order and of 
power, as the ideal of force and beauty, such 
princes were no ordinary men, 

" I see in Lycurgus, Numa, and Mohammed, 
only legislators, who have the first rank in the 
state ; have sought the best solution of the social 
problem: but I see nothing there which reveals 
Divinity. They themselves have never raised 
their pretensions so high. As for me, I recognise 
the gods, and these great men, as beings like my- 
self. They have performed a lofty part in their 
times, as I have done. Nothing announces them 
divine. On the contrary, there are numerous 
resemblances between them and myaeli^ — l^a^s^^s^ 



238 IMPAETIAL TESTIMONIES. 

and errors whichi ally them to me and to hu- 
manity. 

" It is not so with Christ. Everything in him 
astonishes me. His spirit overawes me, and his 
will confounds me. Between him and whoever 
else in the world there is no possible term of com- 
parison. He is truly a being by himself. His 
ideas and his sentiments, the truth which he 
announces, his manner of convincing, are not 
explained either by human organisation or by the 
nature of things. 

"His birth, and the history of his life; the 
profundity of his doctrine, which grapples the 
mightiest difficulties, and which is of those diffi- 
culties the most admirable solution; his gospel, 
his apparition, his empire, his march across the 
ages and the realms, — everything is for me a 
prodigy, a mystery insoluble, which plunges me 
into reveries which I cannot escape; a mystery 
which is there before my eyes ; a mystery which 
I can neither deny nor explain. Here I see no- 
thing human. 

"The nearer I approach, the more carefully I 
examine, everything is above me; everything 
remains grand, — of a grandeur which overpowers. 
His religion is a revelation jfrom an intelligence 
which certainly is not that of man. There is 
there a profound originality which has created a 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 239 

series of words and of maxims before unknown. 
Jesus borrowed notbing from our science. One 
can absolutely find nowhere, but in him alone, 
the imitation or the example of his life. He is 
not a philosopher, since he advances by miracles ; 
and, from the commencement, his disciples wor- 
shipped him. He persuaded them far more by an 
appeal to the heart than by any display of method 
and of logic. Neither did he impose upon them 
any preliminary studies, or any knowledge of 
letters. AU his religion consists in believing. 

"In fact, the sciences and philosophy avail 
nothing for salvation; and Jesus came into the 
world to reveal the mysteries of heaven and the 
laws of the spirit. Also he has nothing to do but * 
with the soul ; and to that alone he brings his gospel. 
The soul is sufi&cient for him, as he is sufficient 
for the soul. Before him, the soul was nothing. 
Matter and time were the masters of the world. 
At his voice, everything returns to order. Science 
and philosophy become secondary. The soul has 
reconquered its sovereignty. All the scholastic 
scaffolding falls as an edifice ruined, before one 
single word, — faith. 

" What a master, and what a word, which can 
effect such a revolution! With what authority 
does he teach men to pray ! He imposes his belief; 
and no one, thus far, has been able to contc^^^^J^ 



240 IMPABTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

him : first, because the gospel contains the purest 
morality ; and also because the doctrine which it 
contains of obscurity is only the proclamation and 
the truth of that which exists where no eye can 
see, and no reason can penetrate. Who is the in- 
sensate who will say * No ' to the intrepid voyager 
who recounts the marvels of the icy peaks which 
he alone has had the boldness to visit ? Christ is 
that bold voyager. One can, doubtless, remain in- 
credulous ; but no one can venture to say, * It is 
not so.' 

" Moreover, consult the philosophers upon those 
mysterious questions which relate to the essence 
of man and the essence of religion. What is their 
response ? Where is the man of good sense who 
has never learned anything from the system of 
metaphysics, ancient or modem, which is not truly 
a vain and pompous ideology, without any connec- 
tion with our domestic life, with our passions? 
Unquestionably, with skill in thinking, one can 
seize the key of the philosophy of Socrates and 
Plato. But, to do this, it is necessary to be a 
metaphysician ; and moreover, with years of study, 
one must possess special aptitude. But good sense 
alone, the heart, an honest spirit, are sufficient to 
comprehend Christianity. The Christian religion 
is neither ideology nor metaphysics, but a practical 
rule which directs the actions of man, corrects him, 



NAPOLEON BONAPAETE. 24 1 

counsels him, and assists him in aU his conduct. 
The Bible contains a complete series of facts and 
of historical men, to explain time and eternity, 
such as no other religion has to offer. If it is not 
the true religion, one is very excusable in being 
deceived ; for everything in it is grand, and worthy 
of God. I search in vain in history to find the 
similar to Jesus Christ, or anything which can ap- 
proach the gospel Neither history, nor humanity, 
nor the ages, nor nature, offer me anything with 
which I am able to compare it or to explain it. 
Here everything is extraordinary. The more I 
consider the gospel, the more I am assured that 
there is nothing there which is not beyond the 
march of events, and above the human mind. Even 
the impious themselves have never dared to deny 
the sublimity of the gospel, which inspires them 
with a sort of compulsory veneration. What hap- 
piness that book procures for those who believe it ! 
What marvels those admire there who reflect upon 
it! 

" All the words there are embedded, and joined 
oner upon another, like the stones of an edifice. The 
spirit which binds these words together is a divine 
cement, which now reveals the sense, and again 
veils it from the mind. Each phrase has a sense 
complete, which traces the perfection of unity and 
the profundity of the whole. Book unio^^^V ^\sK5fe 



242 DIPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

the mind finds a moral beauty before unknown; 
and an idea of the Supreme, superior even to that 
which creation suggests.. Who but God could 
produce that type, that idea of perfection, equally 
exclusive and original ? 

" Christ, having but a few weak disciples, was 
condemned to death. He died the object of the 
wrath of the Jewish priests, and of the contempt 
of the nation, and abandoned and denied by his 
own disciples. 

***They are about to take me, and to crucify 
me,' said he. *I shall be abandoned of all the 
world. My chief disciples will deny me at the 
commencement of my punishment. I shall be left 
to the wicked. But then, divine justice being 
satisfied, original sin being expiated by my suffer- 
ings, the bond of man to God will be renewed, and 
my death will be the life of my disciples. Then 
they will be more strong without me than with 
me; for they shall see me rise again. I shall 
ascend to the skies, and I shall send to them from 
heaven a Spirit who will instruct them. The Spirit 
of the Cross will enable them to understand iny 
gospel. In fine, they will believe it; they will 
preach it ; and they will convert the world.' 

"And this strange promise, so aptly called by 
Paul ' the foolishness of the cross,' this prediction 
of one miserably crucified, is literally accomplished; 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 243 

and the mode of the accomplishment is perhaps 
more prodigious than the promise. 

" It is not a day, nor a battle, which has decided 
it. Is it the lifetime of a man ? No : it is a 
war, a long combat, of three hundred years, com- 
menced by the apostles, and continued by their 
successors and by succeeding generations of Chris- 
tians. In this conflict, all the kings and &11 the 
forces of the earth were arrayed on one side. Upon 
the other, I see no army but a mysterious energy, 
individuals scattered here and there, in all parts of 
the globe, having no other rallying sign than a 
common faith in the mysteries of the Cross. 

"What a mysterious symbol, the instrument of 
the punishment of the Man-God ! His disciples 
were armed with it. * The Christ,' they said, * God, 
has died for the salvation of men.' What a strife, 
what a tempest, these simple words have raised 
around the humble standard of the punishment of 
the Man-God ! On the one side we see rage and 
all the furies of hatred and violence ; on the other 
there are gentleness, moral courage, infinite resig- 
nation. For three hundred years, spirit struggled 
against the brutality of sense, conscience against 
despotism, the soul against the body, virtue against 
all the vices. The blood of Christians flowed in 
torrents. They died kissing the hand which slew 
them. The soul alone protested^ ^\^<^ ^Scl^"^*^^ 



244 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

surrendered itself to all tortures. Everywhere 
Christians fell, and everywhere they triumphed. 

"You speak of Caesar, of Alexander, of their 
conquests, and of the enthusiasm which they en- 
kindled in the hearts of their soldiers ; but can you 
conceive of a dead man making conquests, with an 
army faithful, and entirely devoted to his memory? 
My arftiies have forgotten me even while living, as 
the Carthaginian army forgot HannibaL Such is 
our power ! A single battle lost crushes us, and 
adversity scatters our friends. 

" Can you conceive of Caesar as the eternal em- 
peror of the Boman senate, and, from the depth of 
his mausoleum, governing the empire, watching 
over the destinies of Bome ? Such is the history 
of the invasion and conquest of the world by 
Christianity ; such is the power of the God of the 
Christians; and such is the perpetual miracle of 
the progress of the faith, and of the government of 
his Church. Nations pass away, thrones crumble; 
but the Church remains. What is, then, the power 
which has protected this Church, thus assailed by 
the furious billows of rage and the hostility of 
ages ? Whose is the arm which, for eighteen 
hundred years, has protected the Church from so 
many storms which have threatened to engulf it ? 

"Alexander, Caesar, Charlemagne, and myself 
founded empires. But on what did we rest the 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTK 24S 

creations of our genius ? Upon force. Jesus Christ 
alone founded his empire upon love ; and, at this 
hour, millions of men would die for him. 

" In every other existence but that of Christ, 
how many imperfections ! Where is the character 
which has not yielded, vanquished by obstacles ? 
Where is the individual who has never been gov- 
erned by circumstances or places ; who has never 
succumbed to the influences of the times ; who has 
never compounded with any customs or passions ? 
From the first day to the last he is the same, 
always the same ; majestic and simple ; infinitely 
firm, and infinitely gentle. 

" Truth should embrace the universe. Such is 
Christianity, — the only religion which destroys 
sectional prejudices ; the only one which proclaims 
the unity and the absolute brotherhood of the whole 
human family ; the only one which is purely spm- 
tual ; in fine, the only one which assigns to all, 
without distinction, for a true country, the bosom 
of the Creator, God. Christ proved that he was 
the Son of the Eternal by his disregard of time. 
All his doctrines signify one only and the same 
thing,— eternity. 

" It is true that Christ proposes to our faith a 
series of mysteries. He commands with authority, 
that we should believe them, — giving no other 
reason than those tremendous worda^ * I ^xcl Qr^V. 



246 IMPABTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

He declares it. What an abyss he creates, by that 
declaration, between himself and all the fabiicatois 
of religion ! What audacity, what sacril^, what 
blasphemy, if it were not true ! I say more : The 
universal triumph of an afi&rmation of that kind, 
if the triumph were not really that of God him- 
self, would be a plausible excuse, and the proof of 
atheism. 

"Moreover, in propounding mysteries, Christ 
is harmonious with Nature, which is profoundly 
mysterious. From whence do I come ? whither 
do I go ? who am I ? Human life is a mystery 
in its origin, its organisation, and its end. In 
man and out of man, in Nature, everything is 
mysterious. And can one wish that religion 
should not be mysterious ? The creation and the 
destiny of the world are an unfathomable abyss, 
as also are the creation and destiny of each indi- 
vidual. Christianity at least does not evade these 
great questions; it meets them boldly: and our 
doctrines are a solution of them for every one who 
believes. 

" The gospel possesses a secret virtue, a mys- 
terious efiScacy, a warmth which penetrates and 
soothes the heart. One finds, in meditating upon 
it, that which one experiences in contemplating 
the heavens. The gospel is not a book: it is 
a living being, with an action, a power, which 



NAPOLEON BONAPAETE. 247 

invades everything that opposes its extension. Be- 
hold ! it is upon this table : this book, surpassing 
all others " [here the emperor deferentially placed 
his hand upon it], " I never omit to read it, and 
every day with the same pleasure. 

" Nowhere is to be found such a series of beauti- 
ful ideas; admirable moral maxims, which pass 
before us like the battalions of a celestial army, 
and which produce in our soul the same emotions 
which one experiences in contemplating the infi- 
nite expanse of the skies, resplendent in a sum- 
mer's night with all the brilliance of the stars. Not 
only is our mind absorbed; it is controlled: 
and the soul can never go astray with this 
book for its guide. Once master of our spirit, 
the faithful gospel loves us. God even is our 
friend, our father, and truly our God. The 
mother has no greater care for the infant whom 
she nurses. 

" What a proof of the Divinity of Christ ! With 
an empire so absolute, he has but one single end, 
— the spiritual melioration of individuals, the 
purity of flie conscience, the imion to that which 
is true, the holiness of the soul. 

" Christ speaks, and at once generations become 
his by stricter, closer ties than those of blood, — ^by 
the most sacred, the most indissoluble, of unions. 
He lights up the flames of a love whick ^^^s^-^^^s^ 



248 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

over every other love. The founders of other 
religions never conceived of this mystical love, 
which is the essence of Christianity^ and is beauti- 
fully called charity. In every attempt to effect 
this thing, viz., to make himself beloved, man 
deeply feels his own impotence. So that Christ's 
greatest miracle undoubtedly is the reign of 
charity. 

" I have 80 inspired multitudes, that they would 
die for me. God forbid that I should form any 
comparison between the enthusiasm of the soldier 
and Christian charity, which are as unlike as their 
cause. 

"But, after all, my presence was necessary: 
the lightning of my eye, my voice, a word fix)m 
me, then the sacred fire was kindled in their hearts. 
I do, indeed, possess the secret of this magical 
power which lifts the soul ; but I could never im- 
part it to any one. None of my generals ever 
learned it from me. Nor have I the means of 
perpetuating my name and love for me in the 
hearts of men, and to effect these things without 
physical means. 

" Now that I am at St. Helena, now that I am 
alone, chained upon this rock, who fights and wins 
empires for me ? who are the courtiers of my mis- 
fortunes ? who thinks of me ? who makes effort 
for me in Europe ? Where are my friends ? Yes : 



NAPOLEON BONAPARTE. 249 

two or three, whom your fidelity immortalises, you 
share, you console, my exile." 

Here the emperor's voice trembled with emotion, 
and for a moment he was silent. He then con- 
tinued : — 

"Yes: our life once shone with all the bril- 
liance of the diadem and the throne ; and yours, 
Bertrand, reflected that splendour, as the dome of 
the Invalides, gilt by us, reflects the rays of the 
sun. But disaster came : the gold gradually be- 
came dim. The rain of misfortune and outrage, 
with which I am daily deluged, has effaced all the 
brightness. We are mere lead now. General Ber- 
trand ; and soon I shall be in my grave. 

" Such is the fa^e of great men ! So it was 
with Caesar and Alexander. And I, too, am for- 
gotten; and the name of a conqueror and an 
emperor is a college theme! Our exploits are 
tasks given to pupils by their tutors, who sit in 
judgment upon us, awarding censure or praise. 
And mark what is soon to become of me : assassi- 
nated by the English oligarchy, I die before my 
time ; and my dead body, too, must return to the 
earth, to become food for worms. Behold the des- 
tiny, near at hand, of him whom the world called 
the Great Napoleon 1 What an abyss between my 
deep misery and the eternal reign of Christ, which 
is proclaimed, loved, adored, and "wlakk \^ ^i^^k^A.- 



250 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

ing over all the earth ! Is this to die ? is it not 
rather to live? The death of Christ — U is the 
death of God!" 

For a moment the emperor was silent. As 
General Bertrand made no reply, he solemnly added, 
" If you do not perceive that Jesus Christ is God, 
very well: then I did wrong to iQake you a 
general" 



F. PECAUT. 

This modem French author, in a work entitled 
" Le Christ et la Conscience" Paris, 1859 (which I 
know only from reviews and extracts), assails the 
doctrine of the sinlessness of Christ, and tries to 
show that his answers to his mother (Luke 2 : 49, 
and John 2 : 4), the expulsion of the profane 
traffickers from the Temple, the cursing of the im- 
fruitful fig-tree, the destruction of the herd of swine 
at Gadara, his bitter invective against the Pharisees, 
and his apparent refusal of the epithet good, indi- 
cate certain moral defects or imperfections in his 
character. Notwithstanding this studied attempt 
to disprove the sinless perfection of Christ, he feels 
constrained to make the following remarkable con- 
cession (pp. 245-247), as quoted in the Dutch 
work of Dr. van Oosterzee of Utrecht, on the 
" Person of Christ : "— 



F. PECAUT. 251 

"To what height does the character of Jesus 
Christ rise above the most sublime and yet ever 
imperfect types of antiquity! What man ever 
knew to offer a more manly resistance to evil ? 
Who endured vexation and contradiction better 
than he ? Where is such a development of moral 
power united with less severity ? Was there ever 
one seen who made himself heard with such royal 
authority ? And yet no one ever was so gentle, 
so humble and kind, as he. What cordial sym- 
pathy at the sight of misery, and the spiritual need 
of his brethren ! and yet, even when his counte- 
nance is moistened by tears, it continues to shine 
in indestructible peace. In his spirit, he lives in 
the house of his heavenly Father. He never loses 
sight of the invisible world; and at the same 
time reveals a moral and practical sense possessed 
by no son of the dust. Which is more wonderful 
— the nobility of his princely greatness spread 
over his person, or the inimitable simplicity which 
surrounds his whole appearance ? Pascal had seen 
this heavenly form when describing it in a manner 
worthy of the object: Jesus Christ has been 
humble and patient ; holy, holy, holy before God ; 
terrible to devils; without any sin. In what 
great brilliancy and wonderful magmficence he 
appears to the eye of the spirit which is open to 
wisdom ! To shine forth in all his princely ^^^ix>^- 



252 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

<Iour of his holiness, it was not necessary that he 
should appear as a king ; and yet he came with 
all the splendour of his standing. He was the 
master of all, because he is really their brother. 
His moral life is wholly penetrated by God. He 
represents virtue to me under the form of love 
and obedience. In our part, we do more than 
esteem him: we offer him lova" 



GOTHE 

Gothe, the most universal and most highly 
cultivated of poets, was probably, like Napoleon, 
theoretically convinced of the divinity of Christ, 
but too much a man of the world to give himself 
any serious practical concern about it. In his 
youth he was, through his friendship with Jung 
Stilling, Lavater, Fraiilein von Klettenberg (whose 
" Confessions of a Beautiful Soul " he incorporated 
in his " Wilhelm Meiater "), not far from the king- 
dom of Christ, but never surrendered himself to its 
spiritual power. " Prophet to the right and prophet 
to the left, he stood between them, a child of the 
world. (Praphete rechts, Prophete links, das Wdtkind 
in der Mitte.) " After his journey to Italy he broke 
off these Christian associations, and declined, with 



G5THE. 253 

cold politeness, well-meant monitions of noble Chris- 
tian friends such as the Countess of Stolberg. 

An interesting selection of deep Christian thoughts 
might be made from his " Faust," and other works ; 
but his poetic effusions do not always express 
his personal convictions. We present here only a 
direct testimony to the truth of the gospel histpry 
and the superhuman nature of Christ from the last 
years of his life. It is found in his " Geaprdche 
mit Uckermann/^ iii, 371. 

" I consider the Gospels to be thoroughly genu- 
ine ; for in them there is the effective reflection of 
a sublimity which emanated from the Person of 
Christ ; and this is as Divine as ever the Divine 
appeared on earth." 

"/cA halte die Evangelien filr durchaus dcht ; 
denn es ist in ihnen der Abglanz einer HoheU 
vnrksam, die von der Person Christi ausging, die 
ist gottlicher AH^ vne nur je auf Erdendas Gottliche 
erschienen ist" 



\ 



9 



i 



254 DfPABTIAL TESTIMOKIBa. 



; THOMAS CARLYLE. 

, j( This powerful writer is an open worshipper 0: 

\ human heroes like Cromwell, Frederick the Great 

Luther, and John Knox, but also a silent worshippei 

of the Divine hero, whom he was taught to love 

:* and adore on the knees of a pious Scotch mother. 

^ He calls Jesus of Nazareth " our divinest symbol 

Higher has the human thought not yet reached 

r' * A symbol of quite perennial, infinite character, anc 

. its significance will ever deinand to be anew in- 

m quired into, and anew made manifest" — SarU/i 

Besartus, 137, 140. 



WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNTNa. 

. Jj "We are far from placing Dr. Channing, the 

- [ i great leader of American Unitarianism, and one 

jj of the brightest ornaments of American literature 

^ 1! (bom 1780, at Newport, Rhode Island ; died 1 842, 

at Bennington, Vermont), in the company of sceptics 

• is or unbelievers. Although heterodox on the vital 

I articles of the Holy Trinity and the Atonement, 

I he was, in his way, a worshipper of Jesus, and ex- 



WILLUM ELLERY CHANNING. 2$ 5 

hibited the power of his holy example in his lovely 
character and written works. He was deeply pene- 
trated with the ethical spirit of Christianity, more 
so than many of his orthodox opponents. "We 
select two passages from his admirable SermonSy 
which bear strong testimony to the perfection of 
Christ's character, and which consistently woiQd 
lead far beyond the Socinian or Unitarian chris- 
tology which he advocated. The italics are omr 
own. 

From the Sermon on the ** Character of Christ*' (on Matt. 
17 : 5), in Dr. Channing's Works, Boston, 1848, voL iv. 
pp. 1-29: — 

" This Jesus lived with men : with the conscious- 
ness of unutterable majesty, he joined a lowliness, 
gentleness, humanity, and sympathy which have 
no example in human history. I ask you to con- 
template this wonderful union. In proportion to 
the superiority of Jesus to aU around him, was the 
intimacy, the brotherly love, with which he bound 
himself to them. I maintain that this is a character 
wholly remote from human conception. To imagine 
it to be the production of imposture or enthusiasm, 
shows a strange unsoundness of mind. I contem- 
plate it with a veneration second only to the pro- 
found awe with which I look up to God. It 
bears no mark of human invention. It waa \5^^ 



256 niPARTUI. TESTIMONIES. 

It belonged to, and it nuuiifested, the beloved Soi 
of God. . . . 

" Here I pause ; and indeed I know not wlia 
can be added to heighten the wonder, revetenct 
and love which ore due to Jesu& When I con 
sidei him, not only as possessed with the conscioni 
ness of an unexampled and unboouded m^esty, bn 
as recognising a kindred nature in human being! 
and living and dying to raise them to a participa 
tion of bis divine glories ; and when I see bin 
under these views, allying himself to men by tb 
tenderest ties, embracing them with a spirit c 
humanity, which no insult, injury, or pain coul' 
for a moment repel or overpower, — I am filled vrit 
wonder as well as reverence and love, I feel tha 
this character is not of human invention ; that i 
was not assumed through fraud, or struck out h 
enthusiasm ; for it is infinitely above their read 
When I add this character of Jesus to the othe 
evidences of Ma religion, it gives, to what befoi 
seemed so strong, a new and a vast accession ( 
strength : I feel as if I could not be deceive( 
The Gospds must be true : they were drawn front 
living origincd ; they were founded on reality. Th 
character of Jesus is not a fiction : he vxia what l 
claimed to he, and what his followers attested. Nc 
is this all Jesus not only was, he is still, the So 
of God, the Saviour of the world. He exists now 



WILLIAM ELLERY CHANNING. 2$/ 

he has entered that heaven to which he always 
looked forward on earth. There he lives and reigns. 
With a clear, calm faith, I see him in that state 
of glory J and I confidently expect, at no distant 
period, to see him face to face. We have, indeed, 
no absent friend whom we shall so surely meet. 
Let us, then, my hearers, by imitation of his virtues 
and obedience to his word, prepare ourselves to 
join him in those pure mansions, where he is sur- 
rounding himseK with the good and pure of our 
race, and will communicate to them for ever his 
own spirit, power, and joy." 

From Dr. Channing's Discourse on " The Imitableness 
of Christ" {Works, vol. iv. p. 140) : — 

" I believe Jesus Christ to be more than a human 
being. In truth, all Christians so believe him. 
Those who suppose him not to have existed before 
his birth do not regard him as a mere man, though 
so reproached. They always separate him by broad 
distinctions from other men. They consider him 
as enjoying a communion with God, and as having 
received gifts, endowments, aid, lights, from him, 
granted to no other ; and as having exhibited a 
spotless purity, which is the highest distinction of 
heaven. All admit, and joyfully admit, that Jesus 
Christ, by his greatness and goodness, throws all 
other human attainments into obscurity," 



258 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 



DAVID FEIEDEICH STEAUSS. 

From his Essay, '' Vergdngliches und Bleihendes im ChriS' 
tenthum" 1838 {Freihafen^ 3tes Heft, page 47). See the 
original in the revised German edition of this work, New 
York (Amer. Tract Society), 187 1, page 308. OnStransa^ 
and his Leben Jesu, compare pp. 113 fil 

" If in Jesus the union of the self-consciousness 
with the consciousness of Gk)d has been real, and 
expressed not only in words, but actually revealed 
in aU the conditions of his life, he represents 
within the reKgious sphere the highest point, 
beyond which posterity cannot go ; yea, whom it 
cannot even equal, inasmuch as every one who 
hereafter should climb the same height, could only 
do it with the help of Jesus, who first attained it 
As little as .humanity will ever be without reU- 
gion, as little will it be without Christ; for to 
have religion without Christ would be as absurd 
as to enjoy poetry without regard to Homer or 
Shakespeare. And this Christ, as far as he is 
inseparable from the highest style of religion, is 
historical, not mythical ; is an individtuily no mere 
symbol. To the historical person of Christ be- 
longs all in his life that exhibits his religious 
perfection, his discourses, his moral action, and 

his passion Me remains the highest model of 

religion within the reach of our thought; and no 



DAVID FRIEDEICH STRAUSS. 259 

perfect piety is possible without his presence in the 
heart.*' From his new " Life of Jesus," Leipzig, 
1864, page 208. Third Edition. 

" If we ask how Jesus attained that harmony of 
the soul, we find in the existing records of his Ufe 
no trace of painful conflicts from which it might 
have proceeded. ... In all those great natures 
which were purified by violent conflict, as Paul, 
Augustin, Luther, there remained wound-prints 
for all time, something harsh and sad which 
adhered to them through life. But in Jesus not 
a trace of this is foimd. Jesus appears a beauti- 
ful nature from the very start, which had only to 
unfold itself from within, to become more and 
more clearly conscious of itself, and more firm in 
itself, but had no need of returning and beginning 
another life.^ ... In this respect, as already 
intimated, the highly-gifted Apostle of the Gen- 
tiles was not equal to his Master; and the two 
great renovators of Christianity in later times, 
Augustin and Luther, were more Pauline than 
Christ-like." 



* *'Jesns erscheint ctls eine schone Natur von Hause aus, 
die sich nur aus sich selhst heraics zu entfalten, sich ihrer selbst 
immer klarer bewussty immer fester in sich zu werden, nicht 
aher umzukehren und ein anderes Leben zu beginnen brauchte" 



260 IMPABTIAL TESTIMONIES. 



THEODOEE PAEKEK. 

Bom in Lexingtou, Mass., ^8io ; died in Florence, i86a 

From ** A Discourse of Matters pertaining to Beligton.* 
Third ed. Boston, 1847, p. 275 ff. 

Theodore Parker represents the left or radical 
wing of American Unitarianism, as Channing 
represents the right or conservative wing. He 
adopted, with some exceptions, the mythical theory 
of Dr. Strauss. He speaks of "limitations of 
Jesus ; " says that Jesus " shared the erroneous 
notions of the times respecting devils, possessions, 
and demonology in general ; " that he " was mis- 
taken in his interpretation of the Old Testament;" 

that he was an "enthusiast," at least to some 
extent, — all of which, however, he regards as 
mere trifles, not affecting in the least his moral 
and religious character. Then he finds fault with 
Jesus for denouncing his opponents in no measured 
terms, calling the Pharisees "hypocrites," and 
" children of the devil." " We cannot tell how 
far the historians have added to the fierceness of 
this invective ; but the general fact must probably 
remain, that he did not use courteous speech." 



THEODORE PARKER. 26 1 

But that, he thinks, considering the youth of the 
man, was a very venial error, to make the worst 
of it. This is what Parker calls "the negative 
side, or the limitations of Jesus." He then con- 
siders, page 278, the "positive side, or the excel- 
lences of Jesus." From this chapter we make 
the following extracts : — 

" In estimating the character of Jesus, it must 
be remembered that he died at an age when man 
has not reached his fullest vigour. The great 
works of creative intellect, the maturest products 
of man, all the deep and settled plans of reform- 
ing the world, come from a period when experience 
gives a wider iSeld as the basis of hope. Socrates 
was but an embryo sage till long after the age of 
Jesus : poems, and philosophies that live, come at 
a later date. Now, here we see a young man, but 
little more than thirty years old, with no advan- 
tage of position ; the son and companion of rude 
people; bom in a town whose inhabitants were 
wicked to a proverb ; of a nation, above all others 
distinguished for their superstition, for national 
pride, exaltation of themselves, and contempt for 
all others ; in an age of singular corruption, when 
the substance of religion had faded out from the 
mind of its anointed ministers, and sin had spread 
wide among a people turbulent, oppressed, and 
down-trodden. A man ridiculed for Ida WIsl ^^ 



262 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

knowledge, in this nation of forms, of hypocritical 
priests, and corrupt people, falls back on simple 
morality, simple religion ; unites in himself the 
sublimest precepts and divinest practices, thus 
more than reaUsing the dream of prophets and 
sages; rises free from aU prejudice of his age, 
nation, or sect; gives free range to the Spirit of 
God in his breast ; sets aside the law, sacred and 
time-honoured as it was, its forms, its sacrifice, its 
temple, and its priests; puts away the doctors of 
the law, subtle, learned, irrefragable, and pours 
out a doctrine beautiful as the light, sublime as 
heaven, and true as God. The philosophers, the 
poets, the prophets, the Eabbis, — ^he rises above 
them all. Yet Nazareth was no Athens, where 
philosophy breathed in the circumambient air : it 
had neither Porch nor Lyceum ; not even a school 
of the prophets. There is God in the heart of this 
youth." (Pages 278, 279.) 

"That mightiest heart that ever beat, stirred 
by the Spirit of God, how it wrought in his 
bosom ! What words of rebuke, of comfort, 
counsel, admonition, promise, hope, did he pour 
out ! words that stir the soul as summer dews 
call up the faint and sickly grass. What pro- 
found instruction in his proverbs and discourses ! 
what wisdom in his homely sayings, so rich with 
Jewish life! what deep divinity of soul in his 



THEODORE PARKER. 263 

prayers, his action, sympathy, resignation ! " (Page 
281.) 

"Try him as we try other teachers. They 
deliver their word; find a few waiting for the 
consolation, who accept the new tidings, follow 
the new method, and soon go beyond their teacher, 
though less mighty minds than he. Such is the 
case with each founder of a school of philosophy, 
each sect in religion. Though humble men, we 
see what Socrates and Luther never saw. But 
eighteen centuries have passed since the tide of 
humanity rose so high in Jesus : what man, what 
sect, what church, has mastered his thought, com- 
prehended his method, and so fully applied it to 
life ? Let the World answer in its cry of anguish. 
Men have parted his raiment among them, cast 
lots for his seamless coat; but that spirit which 
toiled so manfully in a world of sin and death, 
which died and suffered and overcame the world, 
— is that foimd, possessed, understood ? Nay, is 
it sought for and recommended by any of our 
churches?" (Page 287.) 



^ 



264 IMPARnAL TESTIMONIES. 



FEANCES POWER COBBR 

From " Broken Lights : An Inquiry into the present Con- 
ditian and future Prospects of Beligious Faith. *' Boston, 
1864. Page 150 ff. 

This is a spirited and interesting book, on the 
aspect of religious controversy in England at the 
time of its composition, by an admirer and follower 
of Theodore Parker. Miss Cobbe is disposed to 
attribute the supernatural portions of the gospel 
history, " if not to the invention, yet, at least, to 
the exaggerating homage, of adoring disciples; 
proceeding stage after stage to magnify the pro- 
phet into the Messiah, the Messiah into the Son 
of God, and the Son of God into the incarnate 
Logos, — ^himself a God" (page ISS). She speaks 
highly of Eenan's " Life of Jesus," as transcending, 
" for power and skill, for vivid presentation of all 
the outward conditions of the life of Christ, all 
older books on the subject, heterodox or ortho- 
dox." But she justly objects, that after all, in 
his principcd Jigure, Eenan has failed, owing to his 
semi-pantheistic standpoint, which ignores the per- 
sonality of God as our moral Lord, with whom our 
souls must have the actual axid real transactions 



FRANCES POWER COBBE. 26$ 

of repentance, forgiveness, regeneration. She inti- 
mates that " the treatment of a subject essentially 
spiritvAily from a merely moral and aesthetic point 
of view, must inevitably be a failure " (page 1 50). 
In many passages of the " Vie de Jisus " she re- 
marks (pp. 150, 151), "the intrusion of aesthetic 
criticism into the profoundest penetralia of reli- 
gion, is, in the last degree, painful, and surely 
must be held to betray a very slight sense of the 
sanctity of the ideas subjected to such criticism. 
That the story of the prodigal could be styled * a 
dilicieuse parahole' and Christ's pity for the repen- 
tant Magdalenes be spoken of as a * jalousie pour 
la gloire de son Fere dans ces helles creatures,' seems 
almost to reveal the inability of the speaker to 
comprehend the divinest thing in Christ — his 
treatment of sin." The question, therefore, stUl 
recurs : " What think ye of Christ ? whose son is 
he ? who and what was that great prophet who 
t]:od the fields of Palestine nineteen centuries ago, 
and who has ever since been worshipped as a God 
by the foremost nations of the world?" Miss 
Cobbe then proceeds to give her own views of 
Christ from what she calls "the standpoint of 
Theism," which, however, differs very widely from 
the Theism of the Bible, and is only a new phase 
of Deism and Naturalism, enlivened and improved 
by modem philanthropy and religious s^\>A»yksk^^- 



266 mPABTTAL TESTIMONIES. 

ism. We select the more striking passages as 
testimonies of a misguided but uoble and higUy 
gifted soul, groping in the dark after the unknown 
Saviour. 

" The four Gospels have given us so living, if 
not so correct^ an image, and that image has shone 
out so long in golden radiance before the dazzled 
eyes of Christendom, that to admit it may be par- 
tially erroneous is the utmost stretch of our philo- 
sophy. We still persist in arguing and debating 
as if it were absolutely perfect. SmaU. marvel, 
truly, is it so, when even the confessed creations 
of the poet's genius — a Hamlet or a Lear — become 
to us real persons on whom we argue and debate. 
Who shall say how reai is that ideal Christ whom 
aU of us hold in our hearts, whom nearly all of us 
have worshipped on our knees ? . . . 

" Of that noblest countenance which once smiled 
upon the plains of Palestine, we possess not, nor 
will mankind ever recover, any perfect and infal- 
lible picture, any sun-drawn photograph which 
might tell us, with unerring certainty, he was or 
he was not as our hearts may conceive of him. 

"One thing, however, we may hold with ap- 
proximate certainty, and that is, that all the high- 
est doctrines, the purest moral precepts, the most 
profound spiritual revelations, recorded in the 
Gospels, were actually those of Christ himself 



FRANCES POWER COBBE. 26/ 

The originator of the Christian movement must 
have been the greatest soul of his time, as of all 
time. If he did not speak those words of wisdom, 
who could have recorded them for him? *It 
would have taken a Jesus to forge a Jesus' 
(Theodore Parker.) . . • 

" The view which seems to be the sole fitting 
one for our estimate of the character of Christ, is 
that which regards him as the great regenerator 
of humanity. Sis coming was, to the life of 
humanity, what regeneration is to the life of the 
individvul. This is not a conclusion doubtfully- 
deduced from questionable biographies, but a 
broad plain inference from the universal history 
of our race. We may dispute aU details ; but the 
grand result is beyond criticism. The world has 
changed, and that change is historically traceable 
to Christ. The honour, then, which Christ de- 
mands of us, must be in proportion to our estimate 
of the value of such regeneration. He is not 
merely a moral reformer, inculcating pure ethics ; 
not merely a religious reformer, clearing away old 
theological errors, and teaching higher ideas of 
God. These things he was ; but he might, for all 
we can tell, have been them both as fully, and yet 
have failed to be what he has actually been to our 
race. He might have taught the world better 
ethics and better theology, and yet have failed tA 



268 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

infuse into it that new life which has ever since 
coursed through its arteries and penetrated its 
minutest veins. What Christ has really done is 
beyond the kingdom of the intellect and its theo- 
logies ; nay, even beyond the kingdom of the con- 
science, and its recognition of duty. His work has 
been in that of the heart He has transformed the 
law into the gospeL He has changed the bondage 
of the alien for the liberty of the sons of God. He 
has glorified virtue into holiness, religion into piety, 
and duty into love. . . . 

" When the fulness of time had come, and the 
creeds of the world's childhood were worn out, 
and the restless question was on every lip, ' Who 
will show us any good ? ' when the whole heart of 
humanity was sick of its sin, and weary of its 
wickedness, — ^then God gave to one man, for man- 
kind at large, that same blessed task he gives to 
many for a few. Christ, the elder brother of the 
human family, was the helper and (in the highest 
philosophic sense) the Saviour of humanity." 



JOHN STUART MILL. 269 



JOHN STUAET MILL (b. 1806, d. 1873). 

From his essay on Thetam^ completed shortly before his death, 
and published, 1874, with two other essays under the 
title, Three Essays on Religion (Am. ed. by Holt, p. 253). 
In this essay Mill imsettles all the arguments for the 
existence of God and the immortality of the soul, but 
winds up with the following testimony to Christ. He 
said of himself that he never had any religious belief, but 
he made an idol of his wife, especially after her death. 
We have here his last utterance. 

" Above all, the most valuable part of the effect 
on the character which Christianity has produced 
by holding up in a Divine Person a standard of 
excellence and a model for imitation, is available 
even to the absolute unbeliever, and can never 
more be lost to humanity. For it is Christ, rather 
than God, whom Christianity has held up to 
believers as the pattern of perfection for humanity. 
It is the. God incarnate, more than the God of the 
Jews or of nature, who being idealised has taken 
so great and salutary a hold on the modern mind. 
And whatever else may be taken away from us by 
, rational criticism, Christ is stiU left; a unique 
figure, not more unlike all his precursors than all 
his followers, even those who had the direct 
benefit of his personal teaching. It is of no use 
to say that Christ as exhibited in the Gospels is 



270 IMPARTUL TESTIMONIES. 

not historical, and that we know not how much 
of what is admirable has been superadded by the 
tradition of his followers. The tradition of fol- 
lowers suffices to insert any number of marvels, 
and may have inserted aU the miracles which he 
is reputed to have wrought. But who among his 
disciples or among their proselytes was capable of 
inventing the sayings ascribed to Jesus, or imagin- 
ing the life and character revealed in the Gospels ? 
Certainly not the fishermen of Galilee ; as certainly 
not St. Paul, whose character and idiosyncrasies 
were of a totally different sort ; still less the early 
Christian writers, in whom nothing is more evident 
than that the good which was in them was aU de- 
rived, as they always professed that it was derived, 
from the higher source. What could be added 
and interpolated by a disciple we may see in the 
mystical parts of the Gospel of St. John, matter 
imported from Philo and the Alexandrian Platon- 
ists and put into the mouth of the Saviour in long 
speeches about himself, such as the other Gospels 
contain not the slightest vestige of, though pre- 
tended to have been delivered on occasions of the 
deepest interest and when his principal followers 
were all present ; most prominently at the last 
supper. The East was full of men who could have 
stolen any quantity of this poor stuff, as the mul- 
titudinous Oriental sects of Gnostics afterwards 



JOHN STUART MILL. 2/1 

did.^ But about the life and sayings of Jesus 
there is a stamp of personal originality combined 
with profundity of insight, which, if we abandon 
the idle expectation of finding scientific precision 
where something very different was aimed at, must 
place the Prophet of Nazareth, even in the estima- 
tion of those who have no belief in his inspiration, 
in the very first rank of the men of sublime genius 
of whom our species can boast. When this pre- 
eminent genius is combined with the qualities of 
probably the greatest moral reformer, and martyr 
to that mission, who ever existed upon earth, 
religion cannot be said to have made a bad choice 
in pitching on this man as the ideal representative 
and guide of humanity ; nor, even now, would it 
be easy, even for an unbeliever, to find a better 
translation of the rule of virtue from the abstract 
into the concrete, than to endeavour so to live that 
Christ would approve our life. When to this we 
add that, to the conception of the rational sceptic, 
it remains a possibility that Christ actually was 
what he supposed himself to be — not God, for he 
never made the smallest pretension to that char- 



^ This irreyerent fling at St. John shows the utter incapacity of 
this eminent philosopher to understand the sublimest discourses 
ever spoken on earth, and his ignorance of the Gnostic writings, 
which bear no comparison whatever with them. Philosophers of 
a far higher order than Mill have found unfathomable depths of 
thought in the Gospel of John. 



272 niPAETIAL TESTIMONIES. 

acter, and would probably have thought such a 
pretension as blasphemous as it seemed to the men 
who condemned him [?] — ^but a man charged with 
a special, express, and unique commission from God 
to lead mankind to truth and virtue, — we may well 
conclude that the influences of religion on the 
character which will remain after rational criticism 
has done its utmost against the evidences of 
religion, are well worth preserving, and that what 
they lack in direct strength as compared with those 
of a firmer belief, is more than compensated by 
the greater truth and rectitude of the morality 
they sanction. 

" Impressions such as these, though not in them- 
selves amounting to what can properly be called 
a religion, seem to me excellently fitted to aid and 
fortify that real, though purely human religion, 
which sometimes calls itself the Eeligion of 
Humanity, and sometimes that of Duty. To the 
other inducements for cultivating a religious devo- 
tion to the welfare of our fellow-creatures as an 
obligatory limit to every selfish aim, and an end 
for the direct promotion of which no sacrifice can 
be too great, it superadds the feeling that in mak- 
ing this the rule of our life, we may be co-operating 
with the unseen Being to whom we owe all that 
is enjoyable in life. One elevated feeling this form 
of religious idea admits of, which is not open to 



JOHN STUAET MILL. 273 

those who believe in the omnipotence of the good 
principle in the universe, the feeling of helping 
God — of requiting the good he has given by a 
voluntary co-operation which he, not being omni- 
potent, really needs, and by which a somewhat 
nearer approach may be made to the fulfilment of 
his purposes. The conditions of human existence 
are highly favourable to the growth of such a feel- 
ing, inasmuch as a battle is constantly going on, in 
which the humblest human creature is not incapable 
of taking some part, between the powers of good 
and those of evil, and in which every, even the 
smallest, help to the right side has its value in pro- 
moting the very slow and often almost insensible 
progress by which good is gradually gaining ground 
from evil, yet gaining it so visibly at considerable 
intervals as to promise the very distant but not 
uncertain final victory of Good To do something 
during life on even the humblest scale, if nothing 
more is within reach, towards bringing this con- 
summation ever so little nearer, is the most ani- 
mating and invigorating thought which can inspire 
a human creature ; and that it is destined, with or 
without supernatural sanctions, to be the religion 
of the future I cannot entertain a doubt. But it 
appears to me that supernatural hopes, in the de- 
gree and kind in which what I have called rational 
scepticism does not refuse to sanction them^ laa.^ 



2/4 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

still contribute not a little to give to this religion 
its due ascendancy over the human mind." 



EENEST EEN"AK 

From the " Vie de Jims, par E. Renak, membre de VlnstUuV* 
Septi^me edition, Paris, 1864. English translation by 
Charles Edwin Wilbour, translator of "Les MiserablesJ* 
New York, 1864. (On Renan and his book, compare the 
preceding Essay, p. 130.) 

"Jesus cannot belong exclusively to those who 
call themselves his disciples. He is the common 
honour of all who bear a human heart.. His glory 
consists not in being banished from history: we 
render him a truer worship by showing that cdl 
history is incomprehensible without him {Phistoire 
entiere est incomprehensible sans lui)." 

Page 50. (French ed. p. xlviii, close of the Introduction.) 

" The capital event in the history of the world 
is the revolution by which the noblest portions of 
humanity passed from the ancient religions, com- 
prised under the vague name of paganism, to a 
religion founded upon the divine unity, the Trinity, 
the incarnation of the Son of God. This conver- 
sion required nearly a thousand years for its accom- 
plishment. The new religion occupied at least 
three hundred years in its formation alone. But 



ERNEST RENAN. 2/5 

the origin of the revolution with which we have 
to do is an event which occurred during the reigns 
of Augustus and Tiberius. Then Kved a superior 
person, who, by his bold initiative, and by the love 
which he inspired, created the object, and fixed 
the starting-point, of the future fate of humanity. 
(Alors vicut une personne supirieure qui, par son 
initiative Jiardie, et par Vamour qu'elle mt inspirer, 
cria Vobjet et posa le point de depart de la foi 
future de Vhumanitd)** 

Page 51. (French ed. page i, beginning of chap, i.) 

"This confused medley of [Messianic Jewish] 
visions and dreams, this alternation of hopes and 
deceptions, these aspirations incessantly trampled 
down by a hateful reality, at length found their 
interpreter in the incomparable man to whom the 
universal conscience has decreed the title of Son 
of God, and that with justice; since he caused 
religion to take a step in advance, incomparably 
greater than any other in the past, and, probably, 
than any yet to come. {L'homme incomparable 
auquel la conscience universelle a ddcernd le titre de 
Fils de DieUy et cela avec justice, puisquHl a fait faire 
d la religion un pas auquel nul autre ne pent et 
prohdblement ne pourra jamais etre compard)'^ 

Page 64. (French ed. page 13, close of chap, i.) 

" Were the men who have most loftily ccyccc^^- 



276 IMPAETIAL TESTIMONIES. 

hended God, — Cakya-Mouni, Plato, St. Paul, St. 
Francis d'Assisi, and St. Augustin, — at some mo- 
ments of his changeful life, deists or pantheists ? 
Such a question has no meaning. The physical 
and metaphysical proofs of the existence of God to 
them would have had no interest. They felt the 
divine within themselves. In the first rank of this 
grand family of the true sons of God we must 
place Jesus. Jesus has no visions ; God does not 
speak to him from without ; God is in him ; he 
feels that he is with God, and he draws, from his 
heart what he says of his Father. He lives in the 
bosom of God by uninterrupted communication: 
he does not see him, but he understands him with- 
out need of thunder and burning bush like Moses, 
of a revealing tempest like Job, of an oracle like 
the old Greek sages, of a familiar genius like 
Socrates, or of an angel Gabriel lil^e Mohammed. 
The imagination and hallucination of a St. Theresa, 
for example, here go for nothing. The intoxication 
of the Soufi, proclaiming himself identical with 
God, is also an entirely different thing. Jesus 
never for a moment enounces the sacrilegious idea 
that he is God [?]. He believes that he is in direct 
communion with God: he believes himself the 
Son of God. The highest consciousness of God 
which ever existed in the breast of humanity was 
that of Jesus. {La pltis haute conscience de Dieu 



ERNEST BENAN. 2// 

qui ait exists au sein de Vhumaniti a 4ti cdle de 

Page 104. (French ed. page 54, chap, iv.) 

"It is probable that, from the very first, he 
looked to God in the relation of a son to a father. 
This is his great act of originality : in this he is in 
no wise of his race. {En cela il n'est nullement de 
sa race) Neither the Jew nor the Moslem has 
learned this delightful theology of love. The God 
of Jesus is not the hateful master who kills us 
when he pleases, damns us when he pleases, saves 
us when he pleases. The God of Jesus is our 
Father. We hear him when we listen to a low 
whisper within us, which says, * Father.' The God 
of Jesus is not the partial despot who has chosen 
Israel for his people, and protects it in the face of 
all and against all. He is the God of humanity." 

Page 106. (Page 56, chap, v.) 

"It cannot be denied, that the maxims bor- 
rowed [?] by Jesus from his predecessors produce, 
in the gospel, an effect totally different from that 
in the ancient law, in the Pirke Aloth} or in the 
Talmud. It is not the ancient law, it is not the 
Talmud, which has conquered and changed the 
world. Little original in itself, — if by that is 
meant that it can be recomposed almost entirely [?] 

^ A coUection of sentences and m&xVmB ol «,TL<(^%T^.'^«'m3fic!LT(»^v^' 



2/8 IMPABTIAX TESTIMONIES. 

with more ancient maxims, — the evangelical 
morality remains none the less the highest creation 
which has emanated from the human conscience, 
the most beautiful code of perfect life that any 
moralist has traced. {La jpltcs haute creation qui 
8oit sortie de la conscience hwnaine, le jplus heaic code 

de la vie parfaite gu'aucun moraliste ait tracd)'* 
Page 1 10. (Page 6i, chap. v. ) 

« The gospel has been the supreme remedy for 
the sorrows of common life ; a perpetual sursum 
corda; a mighty distraction from the wretched 
cares of earth ; a sweet appeal, like that of Jesus 
to the ear of Martha : ' Martha, Martha, thou 
art careful and troubled about many things ; but 
one thing is needful.* Thanks to Jesus, the most 
spiritless existence, that most absorbed in sad or 
humiliating duties, has had its glimpse of heaven ! 
In our bustling civilisation, the memory of the free 
life of Galilee has been like the perfume of another 
world ; like a * dew of Hermon,' which has pre- 
vented sterility and vulgarity from completely 
usurping the field of God." 

Page 175. (Page 127, chap, x.) 

" Christ, for the first time, gave utterance to the 
idea upon which shall rest the edifice of the ever- 
lasting religion. He founded the pure worship — 
of no age, of no clime — ^which shall be that of all 
loity souls to th^ end of time. , .• . K other 



ERNEST RENAK. 279 

planets have inhabitants endowed with reason and 
morality, their religion cannot be different from that 
which Jesus proclaimed at Jacob's Well. Man has 
not been able to abide by this worship [in spirit 
and in truth]: we attain the ideal only for a 
moment. The words of Jesus were a gleam in 
thick night : it has taken eighteen hundred yearai^ 
for the eyes of humanity (what do I say ! of an 
infinitely small portion of humanity) to learn to 
abide by it. But the gleam shall become the full 
day; and, after passing through all the circles of 
error, humanity will return to these words, as to 
the immortal expression of its faith and its hopes. 
(L'humaniti revicndra a ce mot-Id [John iv. 23] 
comme d Vexpression immortelle de sa foi et de ses 
esp^rances.y* 

Page 215. (Page 168, chap, xiv.) 

" Eepose now in thy glory, noble founder ! Thy 
work is finished ; thy divinity is established. Fear 
no more to see the edifice of thy labours fall by 
any fault. Henceforth, beyond the reach of frailty, 
thou shalt witness, from the heights of divine 
peace, the infinite results of thy acts. At the 
price of a few hours of suffering, which did not 
even reach thy grand soul, thou hast bought the 
most complete immortality. For thousands of 
years, the world will defend thee ! Banner of our 
contests, thou shalt be tk^ ^\axAaxft. ^^-^"^^ts^s^ 



280 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

the hottest battle will be given. A thousand times 

more alive, a thousand times more beloved since 

thy death than during thy passage here below, 

thou shalt become the corner-stone of humanity 

so entirely, that to tear thy name from this 

world would be to rend it to its foundations. 

Between thee and God there will be no longer 

* any distinction. {Entre toi et Dieu on ne distin- 

guefra plies,) Complete conqueror of death, take 

possession of thy kingdom ; whither shall follow 

thee, by the royal road which thou hast traced, 

ages of worshippers (des siecles d'adorateursy 
Page 351. (Page 303, close of chap, xxv.) 

" Whatever may be the surprises of the future, 
Jesus will never be surpassed. His worship will 
. grow young without ceasing ; his legend will call 
forth tears without end ; his sufferings will melt the 
noblest hearts ; all ages will proclaim, that, among 
the sons of men, there is none bom greater than 
Jesus. {Quels que puissent etre les phinomdnes in- 
attendus de ravenir, Jdsus ne sera pas surpass^. 
Son culte se rajeunira sans cesse ; sa Ugende provo- 
quera des larmes sans fin ; ses souffrances attendri- 
Tont les meilleurs coeurs : tons les siecles proclameront 
qu' entre les jils des fiomraes, il n'en est pas nd plus 
grand que Jdsm?)*' 

Page 376. (Page 325, end of the xxviii. and last chap.) 



<•■;, 



THEODOR E£IM. 281 

THEODOE KEIM. 

Dr. Theodob Keim (a native of the kingdom of 
Wurttemberg, Professor of Theology in the Univer- 
sity of Zurich, and afterwards in Giessen, died 1 879) 
wrote three very able essays on the Historical 
Christ {** Ber geschicMliche ChHsttts" Zwdchy 1866), 
and an elaborate Life of Jesus (" Geschichte Jesu 
von Nazara^ Zurich, 1 867—1 872, 3 vols., also 
translated into English), which belong to the liberal 
critical school, but mark a considerable advance be^ 
yond the destructive criticism of Strauss and Eenan, 
and aim at a reconstruction of a historical Christ on 
the basis of the Synoptical Gospels (without the 
aid of John) and in the light of the whole con- 
temporary history, as brought before us especially 
in the works of Josephus. 

Keim strongly aaserts the sinlessness of Christ as 
being implied in his words and work and admitted 
by friend and foe, although it may not be capable 
of absolute proof as an experimental fact. He ably 
refutes the subjective vision-hypothesis of Strauss 
and Eenan, and admits an actual, though only 
spiritual, resurrection of Christ, and his objective 
appearance to the disciples. "The fact stands 
firm," he says, " not indeed, as was always believed, 
that the tomb of Jesus was empty, but that the 
Apostles saw their Lord again after hia dsa^^ ^^ 



282 IMPARTIAL TESTIMONIES. 

• 

were thoroughly convinced that they saw him." 
He does not inform us what became of his body. 

We select a few passages from Keim's " Ges- 
chichte Jesu von Nazara^ His style is artificial 
and hard to translate. His small work in one 
volxmie (1872) is a popular extract, and contains 
similar admissions in somewhat different language. 

" Thus the religion of Christ goes mysteriously 
back to his person, ... In his personal life there 
must have been from the very beginning and 
always a sentiment of human elevation, a feeling 
of divine love, and an aspiration after perfection 
in God, mighty, pure, without bitter drops of 
human weakness, impurity, unworthiness — a per- 
fection such as we find elsewhere reflected only in 
broken and disturbed fragments. This fundamen- 
tal fact alone, which with Paul we call the higher, 
complete, divine-human creation of the great God 
in the fulness of time, enables us to understand 
the religion which sprang from it and the Man 
himself, the pure one, the sinless one, the Son of 
God." Vol. i. p. 448. 

Christ, in his gigantic elevation above his own 
and succeeding ages, " makes the impression of 
mysterious loneliness, superhuman miracle, moral 
creation.''^ Vol. iii p. 662. * 

^ " Den Eindruck geheimniasvoUer HinsamkeU, iibermenscfUichen 
WunderSf gUUich&r ScJibp^ug;'' 



NAPOLEON'S TESTIMONY. 283 

" The person of Jesus is not only a deed among 
the many deeds of God, but the peculiar work, the 
specific revelation of God. . . . Christianity is the 
crown of the creations of God, and Jesus is the 
Chosen of God, his Image, his Darling, his World- 
Guide and World-Shaper in the history of man- 
kind. He is the rest, and he is the fly-wheel of 
the history of the world." ^ Vol. iii. p. 66^. 



TWO LETTEES CONCEENING NAPOLEON'S 

TESTIMONY. 

{Compare page 219.) 

While this book was passing through the press, 
I received from two well-informed gentlemen of 
France, the Eev. Eugene Bersier and Mons. Lut- 
teroth, the following replies to inquiries concerning 

1 ** Weil in seiner Person gegeniiber dem StUckwerk seiner Zeit und 
dem StUckwerk der Jahrtausende der Mensch und die Menschkeit 
tick vollendetCf darum ist es gegen leere Einw'dnde noch fieute mdglich 
und vemilnftig zu sagen, die Person Jesu ist nicht nur eine That 
unter vielen Thaten GoUes, sie ist das eigenste Werk, die specifische 
Offenbarung Gottes gewesen; nur kein Werk des Ahbruchs, sondern 
des AhscJdusses und Aufbaus der gottgesetzten Weltordnung, Hat 
von ihm selbst Spinoza bekannt, dass er der Tempel Gottes gewesen, in 
welcJum Gott sich am meisten offenbarie, so ruft es bei uns nock freu' 
diger : das Christenthum ist die Krone der Schdpfungen Gottes, und 
Jesus der Erwdhlte Gottes, Abbild, Liebling, Wdtfuhrer und Welt- 
bildner Gottes in der Menschheitsgeschichte, Er ist die Muhe und er 
est das Triebrad der WeltgeschichAeJ* 



284 IMPABHAL TESTIHOKIES. 

the origin and authenticity of the remarkable 

testimony of the great Napoleon to the Divinity of 

Christ: — 

''Pabis, 2i6 Boulevard Pereibe, 
le 23 AoiU 1879. 

" Cher Monsieur, — Le seul homme qui, k ma 
connaissance, puisse vous renseigner exactement 
sur la question que vous me pr^sentez, est M. 
Henry Lutteroth, Ch&teau de Boumeville par la fert^ 
Milon(Aisne). M. Lutterothfitait membreduComit^ 
des Trait^s quand fut public le traite Napoleon. 

" On m'a toujours dit que les paroles cities de 
Napoleon ont 6t^ rapport^es verbatim par Montho- 
lon et tr^nscrites par un de ses amis protestants 
(le g^n^ral Maurice ou Tamiral Verruel). Je n'en 
sais pas davantage. Je crois k leur parfaite au- 
thenticit($. Personne, surtout alors, n'aurait trouv6 
cela. II y a 15, la griflfe du lion. — Tout k vous, 

" EuG. Bersier." 

'* £onBineyn.LB, par la Fertj^-Milon. 
(Aisne), U \er Septembre 1879. 

" Monsieur, — Je serais heureux de pouvoir vous 
dormer quelques renseignements precis sur la 
source oil ont ^t^ pulsus les entretiens de Napoleon 
avec le general Bertrand relatifs au Christianisme, 
reproduits dans un traits de la Soci^t6 des Traites 
religieux de Paris, portant le No. 200, et non le 
No. 51, k moins que le No. n'ait 6tA change 
d^puis pen. 

" Ce traits a ^t^ imprim^ pour la premiere fois, 



napoleon's testimony. 285 

je crois en 1843. II en est fait mention dans le 
rapport de 1842 k 1843 en ces mots : * Napoldon 
lisait TEvangile k Sainte-Hel^ne ; le fait est 
certain ; Ton a m6me public sur les reflexions que 
cette lection lui suggdrait, dans ses entretiens, des 
pages qu'on a plac^es sous la protection du nom 
de Tun de ses compagnons d'infortune, qui n'en a 
pas repouss6 la responsabilite. II nous a paru 
que ce fait et ces paroles ^taient de nature a 
produire une s^rieuse impression ; que les militaires 
surtout pourraient etre conduits par ce memorable 
exemple k vouloir lire le livre qu'dtudiait Condo 
et que m^ditait Napoleon/ 

"La feuille religieux du canton de Vaud de 
1843, publiee k Lausanne, avait aussi donn^ des 
extraits de ces entretiens ; mais je ne saurais dire 
s'ils sont tir& du livre de M. de Beauteme : 
Sentiments de NajpoUon mr le Christianisme, ou 
d'ailleurs 

"Eecevez, Monsieur, Tassurance de mes senti- 
ments distinguds, 

" Henri Lutteroth." 



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