is bounty itself? The love which you have for your children, it is he that has created it in your hearts, how then should he not find it in his own? Do you imagine that he has made you better than he is himself? This is what I conceive to be contained in this admirable exhortation of Jesus Christ. Can there be any thing in the world more true, more beautiful, more sensible, and more persuasive? And who does not feel that it is thus a God-man was to plead before men the cause of his divine attributes ?*

"If any one doubts," says a judicious writer, "of the superiority and transcendent excellence of the doctrine of Jesus Christ above all others that have been precedently taught, let him read with attention those incomparable writings, through the channel of which it has been transmitted to us; and let him compare them with the most renowned productions of the pagan world; and if he does not feel, that they are more than any other writing beautiful, simple, original, I have no difficulty to pronounce him as destitute of taste as of faith, and as poor a critic, as bad a christian. For, where shall we find, in the school of ancient philosophy, lessons of morality comparable to those which are set forth by the Incarnate Wisdom in his Sermon on the Mountain? From what philosopher shall we learn an address to the Deity, such as our Lord's prayer, at once so concise and so expressive, as to contain all our wants and all we are to sue for?

What writing of the sages of antiquity shall furnish us with an exhortation as pathetic and as cogent to engage men to succour those that are in distress, as those words of Jesus Christ: "Then shall the King say to them that are on his right hand: come, ye blessed of my Father, possess the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry, and you gave me to eat: I was thirsty, and you gave me to drink: I was a stranger, and you took me in: naked, and you clothed me: sick, and you visited me: was in prison, and you came to me, Then shall the just answer him, saying: Lord, when did we see thee hungry, and fed thee: thirsty, and gave thee drink? And when did we see thee a stranger, and took thee in, or naked and clothed thee? Or when did we see thee sick or in prison, and came to thee? And the king, answering, shall say unto them: Amen, I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these my least brethren, yon did it to me," &c. Math. xxiv. 34–41. What is there in any of the most celebrated poets of pagan antiquity, that can equal in sublimity the description of the joys which are reserved for the just in the life to come: "then shall the just shine as the sun, in the kingdom of their Father." Math. xiii. 43. "Come ye blessed of my Father, possess the kingdom, prepared for you from the foundation of the world." Math. xxvi. 34. "The eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither has it entered into the heart of man, what things God hath prepared for them that love him," 1 Cor. ii. 9.

CLXII. The characteristics of the eloquence of Jesus Christ are not less striking, and prove him to be more than man. In his discourses this venerable man is so true, so simple, so familiar, so full of good sense, that, whosoever has but the first degree of reason, is capable of understanding him. He is so great, so wise, so deep, that he astonishes the greatest geniuses; however little conception one has, he understands him; and the more wit one possesses, the more he admires him. He is proportionate to the narrowest understandings, and at the same time he is above the most sublime minds.

CLXIII. In the discourses of Jesus Christ, you discover nothing that savours of pageantry and ostentation, because he is without pride: you see nothing that looks like affectation, neither in the choice of words or that of figures, because he has no vanity, and does not seek to make himself to be admired;

Through which of the dark clouds of ancient philosophy could you make us perceive as brilliant a perspective of the life to come, of the immortality of the soul, of the resurrection of the dead, of the universal last judgment, as that which is held forth to the christian in the four gospels?

Where in paganism shall we meet with exhortations as pressing to the prac tice of every virtue, with motives as powerful to piety and zeal, with means as well calculated to make us attain them, as are those which we read at every page in that inimitable book? Were I called upon to cite passages relative to these divine objects, I would have to transcribe almost the whole book. Suffice it to observe, that every where we remark striking traits of a more than hu man wisdom, which not only renders it superior to all the productions of the human mind, but moreover entirely different from them. This superiority and difference are still more strongly marked by a circumstance which is peculiar to these books, to wit: that whilst their moral part, which is of a more general is found to be so clear, and so set within the reach of persons of all states and capacities, the learned in exploring its hidden treasures find it to be an inexhaustible mine, which enables them to draw thence, continually, new discoveries on the nature, the attributes, and the dispensations of divine providence. Is it to be wondered at, that after perusing the sacred books, and especially the gospels, one should not be able to read without weariness and disgust the cold maxims of a Zeno, of a Marcus Aurelius, of an Epictetus: maxims delivered without authority, without sanction, without any motive that might guarrantee their observance. I have always admired the good sense of a man who found nothing more insupportable, than those purely philosophical moralities." Ex amen of the intrinsic evidence of Christianity, by L.Jenyns,

use,

1

nothing that is said to please men, because he is not their flatterer; nothing that is said to strike agreeably the imagination, because he does not seek to amuse them; nothing that savours of satire, because he has too much pity for the miseries of men, to make a sport of them. All the discourses of Jesus Christ retrace to me a man who does not speak to men but to teach them how to be good and happy; who loves them with the purest and most disinterested love. His eloquence is sublime, but this sublimity is that of good sense, that is to say, that, which produces the most prompt, the most universal and the most durable effect, because it is impossible to contradict it, every one imagining within himself, what good sense has dictated to others; that, which we least distrust because it cannot be suspected either of passion, or interestedness, or artifice; that in fine which owes its success but to truth, and, of course, that, which was to characterize the Incarnate Truth.

The more we study Jesus Christ in that admirable book, the Gospel, which religion has happily placed in our hands from our first youth, the more we shall be struck at the greatness of this adorable God-man. Jesus will always be new for us, we will always imagine we behold him for the first time. Every day we shall discover in his speeches some new trait of reason and wisdom, which we had not as yet seen: every one of his words is a treasure; the body of his doctrine is like a mine of precious metal, which has not as yet been exhausted, although it has been searched for upwards of eighteen hundred years, and that will never be exhausted. in it is true, all is beautiful, all full of sense: the purest reason beams in it throughout: nothing can be added to it, and nothing can be retrenched from it: all in it is necessary, and nothing is wanting. It is the master-piece of him who makes nothing but what is perfect-I mean, of God.

All

ARTICLE II.

Sanctity of Jesus Christ.

CLXIV. To have shown that Jesus Christ was the wisest of men, a man perfectly wise, is to have demonstrated, that he was also the holiest of men, a man perfectly holy. This second assertion becomes not only probable, when the first is established: but it becomes absolutely certain. As man is constituted at present, the vices of the heart never fail to darken the dictates of reason, although they never entirely extinguish them in those whose heart is depraved, reason is never pure, and, of course, perfect virtue is inseparable from perfect reason, and no one can be wise with that complete and absolute wisdom to which nothing is wanting, without being at the same time holy, with that holiness without spot, which leaves nothing to be desired. A man that is not perfectly holy, could not even have an idea of perfect sanctity: such a man can neither form to himself, nor, of course, present to others an image of virtue that will portray it, such as it is, and that will bear all its features.

CLXV. The passions and the vices which corrupt the will of men, (especially pride,) always pervert reason and impress it with false ideas in matter of morality. It is from the passions that moral errors, private and public, spring. It is the passions which, at all times and among all nations, have begotten those monstrous prejudices which change vice into virtue and virtue into vice, and reduce men to the painful necessity either of being wicked or dishonouring themselves. For men always wish to be able to think themselves good, and by a necessary consequence of this sentiment, they strive to transform into a virtue the vice that pleases them.

Let a vicious man undertake to paint virtue, whatever may be his genius, his vices, without his being aware of it, will guide his pencil and throw on the picture such traits as will disfigure it. This is what has happened to those ancient phiTosophers, whom pagan antiquity has so much eulogized and

raised to the very skies. The Socrates, the Platos, the Aristotles, the Tullies, the Senecas: all have missed the portrait of virtue, all have disfigured it: their pictures are full of beauties and full of spots. Beside the traits which reason has given, are seen the traits which passion and prejudice have furnished, they are monsters. What has happened to the philosophers of pagan antiquity, has happened likewise to the philosophers of our days. Why could these great geniuses never succeed in making a likeness perfectly resembling virtue and sanctity? It is because it was not in them. Jesus Christ had the true idea of perfect sanctity; he, therefore, possessed perfect sanctity: his reason was never darkened by any cloud, his heart was never troubled by any passion. He was perfectly wise, he was, therefore, perfectly holy: he knew how to paint virtue with all the traits that characterize it; it is therefore from within himself he has taken the idea of it.

But, after all, it is not by reasonings, but by facts, that we are to judge of the Sanctity of Jesus Christ; it is from his actions we must form his portrait. He, himself, must furnish the features which characterize him; and to enable mankind to judge what he is, he himself must be exhibited. Let us, then take up the Gospel, and study Jesus Christ.

CLXVI. First, no sooner does Jesus Christ show himself, than we are struck, and, as it were, dazzled with his sanctity. First, we see shine forth in him those primary virtues, which are, as it were, the foundation of all sanctity; I mean, of the love of God, and of that of our fellow men. What a profound respect for God, whom he always styles his Father! What a dependence on his will! What a zeal for his glory! What an immense desire to make him known, and to procure him adorers! No man has ever loved men with a love so pure, so sincere, so disinterested, as he did. Can we imagine any thing comparable to the zeal with which he instructed them? to the patience which he displayed towards them? The innocency of his manners, his moderation, his disengagement, his aversion for all that savours of pomp and vain glory, equalled his other virtues. He never possessed any earthly No. VI. 31