trait of a good man; a work which Plato and Xenophon, master-geniuses of antiquity, in vain attempted; which required something more than rhetoric or skill in composition to effect: and yet the Evangelists have succeeded not by any professed attempts at delineation, but by a detail of facts, which doubtless arose from something more than rhetorical proficiency, namely, the real existence of those virtues, and the perfect impeccability which distinguished him of whom they wrote. What enhances the wonder is, that though each Evangelist pursues a separate method, and is distinguished by peculiarity of style and manner, yet they have all alike reached the standard, and furnished a model of perfection in the character of Jesus of Nazareth.
Islamism appears to most advantage when viewed distinct from Christianity; the nearer they approximate, the more glaring its de-
