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or the moral ideal of character exhibited on the Cross;—these, as ethical ideals, represent the whole core of the matter. It is a great appeal to men to conform themselves to a certain type of character. The moral ideal is the great thing, and the greatness of the ideal constitutes in itself an effective appeal. Now of course this is one absolutely true aspect of Christianity, an aspect inseparable from its central reality. And, since it is so, there is no difficulty whatever in finding the weightiest scriptural testimony to this most necessary and important aspect of the truth. It constitutes perhaps nowadays the most superficially popular view of the matter; while it certainly can claim weighty names among professed theologians. But is it the heart of the Gospel? Does the Gospel mean an appeal to motives, a standard of conduct, a rule of life;—however lofty, or beautiful, or true, or divine, the appeal as appeal, the standard as standard may be? This is a view of Christianity to which indeed churches, and ministries, and sacraments, creeds and catechisms and theologies, from the least of them to the greatest of them, may well be made to appear subsidiary and almost irrelevant. But is it, in any sense, distinctively Christian? Of course it is true that the ethical standard of Christianity is at once saner and loftier, as ethical standard, than that of any other religion in the world. But it is probably also true that it is in respect of excellence of ethical standard that some non-Christian religions approach most nearly towards a real comparison with Christianity. There are phases alike of Greek philosophy and of Oriental asceticism, which so far as insight and aspiration go, are very nearly as Christian as Christianity itself. What they lack is not so much moral insight, or the appeal which a moral ideal can make, as any effective means of entering into relation with the ideal. What they lack is power. They see, but they cannot do. They desire, but in the attempt to attain
