What but the mighty mastership of religion has ever led a people up through civil wars and revolutions into a regenerated order and liberty? What has planted colonies for a great history but religion? The most august and beautiful structures of the world have been temples of religion, crystallizations, we may say, of worship. The noblest charities, the best fruits of learning, the richest discoveries, the best institutions of law and justice, every greatest thing the world has seen, represents more or less directly the fruitfulness and creativeness of religion.
All noblest things are religious,—not temples and martyrdoms only, but the best books, pictures, poetry, statues, and music.
Other religions have risen and decayed; Christ's comes down the ages in the strength of youth, through the seas of popular commotion, like the Spirit of God on the face of the waters, through the storms of philosophy, like an apocalyptic angel, and through all the wilderness of human thought and action, like the pillar of fire before the camp of the Israelites.
The heathen mythology not only was not true, but was not even supported as true; it not only deserved no faith, but it demanded none. The very pretension to truth, the very demand of faith, were characteristic distinctions of Christianity.
Beware of a religion of mere sentiment which gazes and sighs and wishes, but makes no sacrifice, which hides the cross with flowers, and wears it over, but not within the heart. Beware of a religion which costs you nothing, never rises an hour earlier, never denies itself a pleasure, never gives that which it will miss, for the sake of Christ and the soul.
