not the same cause—whatever be it—help to explain the visions of Paul, the angels, and miracles of the New Testament? It is not many years since the divines of New England made collections of accounts of the devil appearing to men. If a religious teacher should appear at the time and place as Jesus appeared, it would be surprising, almost beyond belief, if miraculous tales were not connected with his birth, life, and death. Antiquity is full of sons of God, and wonder-workers. The story of Lazarus, and even that of the Ascension, is not without its parallels.
But if all the charges against the New Testament are
true, what then? Why, this: honest men; noble, pious,
simple-hearted men; the zealous Apostles of Christianity;
the first to espouse it; willing to leave all, comfort, friends,
life for its sake, after all, were but men, such as are born
in these days, fallible, like ourselves; often in intellectual
and moral error; they shared, like us, the ignorance and
superstition of the times, and though earnest in looking
saw not all things, but, as the wisest of them said,
“through a glass darkly,” and made some confusion
among things they did see. Do we ask miraculous evidence
to prove that Jesus lived a divine life? We can have no
such testimony. We know that if he taught Absolute
Religion, his Christianity is absolutely true; that if he did
not teach it, still Absolute Religion remains, the everlasting
Rock of Faith, in spite of the defects of historical
evidence, or the limitations of this or that man. Has the
New Testament exaggerated the greatness and embellished
the beauty of Jesus? Measure his religious doctrine by
that of the time and place he lived in, or that of any time
and any place! Yes, by the doctrine of eternal truth.
Consider what a work his words and deeds have wrought
in the world; that he is still the Way, the Truth, and
the Life to millions; that he is reckoned a God by the
mass of Christians, his Word their standard of truth,
his Life the Ideal they see too far above them in the
Heavens for their imitation; remember that though other
minds have seen farther, and added new truths to his
doctrine of Religion, yet the richest hearts have felt no
deeper, and added nothing to the sentiment of Religion;
have set no loftier aim, no truer method than his of per-
