CHAPTER I. RATIONALISTIC LIVES OF CHRIST. CHRIST'S EXISTENCE ON EARTH, THE GREAT FACT OF HISTORY-QUERIES "WHAT shall I do with Jesus who is called Christ?" Pilate could not evade the question; neither can we. Something must be done with Jesus who is called Christ. That Jesus once lived on the earth is confessedly the most important fact in history. Why, indeed, has no philosopher attempted to write the history of the world as it would have gone on, had Jesus never been born? What civilization would have replaced that of Rome, already in the "sere and yellow leaf" when He appeared? What religion would have built itself up on the ruins of the Pantheon? What art, if any, would have flourished after the decay of Greek painting, sculpture and architecture? What literature would have sprung up out of the rich mould of the dead classics? Perhaps the problem is too deep for philosophy to deal with; but there can be no doubt that Jesus turned the stream of world-history into a new channel. During the last fifteen hundred years, at least, the history of the world has been the history of Christendom; that is to say, of that portion of the world which has been most profoundly moved and moulded by Christianity. The thoughts and feelings of millions are to-day inspired by Christ, whom, not having seen they love; whom they adore and serve as a living Master and Lord. The intellectual activities and social movements of the age are, to a large extent, quickened and determined by the mind of Jesus. Whatever sciolists may say touching the decay or eclipse of faith, and they are doubtless competent to speak for themselves,-Christianity is not dead; neither is its glory extinguished; but it is still, in human hearts and in human society, not only a vital force of wide and wondrous energy, but "the master-light of all their seeing." Else, why is it so bitterly assailed? Do men wage war against noisome carcasses and "old clothes ?"* None are more conscious than the enemies of the gospel that it is a living and powerful reality. Of this, their virulent and ever-growing hostility is a sufficient proof. They are witnesses that our holy religion is not age-stricken and feeble, but full of youthful vigor, and is even now buckling on its armor for glorious war, for universal conquest. Now such a religion must be accounted for by those who deny its supernatural origin. The problem presses itself upon them; it refuses to be put by; it has become a sphinx-riddle; they must solve it or die. With this problem modern unbelievers have repeatedly and vigorously grappled. Gibbon, in his disingenuous way, attempted it in his celebrated Fifteenth Chapter. His *See Carlyle, passim. acknowledged failure did not discourage later assailants. Semler, Paulus, and other German rationalists, pretended to demonstrate that Christianity was a natural and in evitable product of the normal, historic development of mankind; and that its existence, its wide diffusion, its prodigious power, its heavenly spirit, and its victorious. persistency through so many ages of conflict and persecution, could all be accounted for without reference to any special divine intervention. The earlier rationalists, however, were comparatively feeble and cowardly. It was reserved for our own century to produce the ablest and most determined foes that Christianity has ever encountered. Two celebrated writers of our own time have assailed the gospel with such imposing erudition, such splendor of rhetoric, such amazing audacity, and such relentless hate, that the names of their predecessors in the same unholy crusade are now scarcely remembered. I refer, of course, to DAVID FREDERIC STRAUSS and ERNEST RENAN. The "Life of Jesus" by Strauss, published in 1835, created a prodigious sensation. Addressed only to the learned, it ran through innumerable cheap editions, both in German and English, and was eagerly read, not only by students in the universities, but also by travelers on steam-boats, by artisans and tradesmen in their shops, and even by women and children in the domestic circle. A vast and motley audience hung upon his lips with mingled terror, wonder and delight. To his own amazement, Strauss, like Byron, "awoke one morning and found himself famous." He had given voice to a wide-spread, waiting skepticism, the growth of ages of superstition and formalism. Infidels everywhere claimed a decisive victory, and not a few sincere believers were staggered and disheartened. Strauss' "mythical theory" was so plausi ble, his criticism was so cold-blooded and malignant, and |