THE life of Christ is the noblest and most fruitful study for men of every age. He spake as never man spake, and his life was an illustration of the truths he taught. Adherents to every faith acknowledge him to be above all the prophets. The Jews confess admiration of his character as exhibited in the gospel. Great men of every age, whether Christians or infidels, set the name of Jesus Christ above every other. Says one writer, "The life of Christ concerns Him who, being the holiest among the mighty, the mightiest among the holy, lifted with his pierced hand empires off their hinges, and turned the stream of centuries out of its channel, and still governs the ages." Goethe in his conversation with Eckerman, says, "I esteem the gospels to be thoroughly genuine, for there shines forth from them the reflected splendor of a sublimity, proceeding from the person of Jesus Christ, of so divine a kind as only the divine could ever have manifested upon earth." Rousseau, who with Voltaire exerted a powerful influence over French culture in the eighteenth century, says, "How petty are the books of the philosophers, with all their pomp, compared with the gospels." In speaking of Christ he says, "What sweetness, what purity in his ways, what touching grace in his teachings! what a loftiness in his maxims, what profound wisdom in his words! what presence of mind, what delicacy and aptness in his replies! what an empire over his passions! where is the man, where is the sage, who knows how to act, to suffer, and to die without weakness and without display? My friend, men do not invent like this. These Jews could never have struck this tone, or thought of this morality."
Thomas Carlyle whose fame as a writer of fiction is world wide, thus expresses himself in one of his books, "Jesus of Nazareth, our divinest symbol! Higher has the human thought not yet reached," and then he goes on to say that his infinite character is beyond human comprehension.
The Bible presents Christ as God and requires that all men shall worship him, and in his worship men become unselfish. It ennobles and elevates them, while the same devotion paid to any human being belittles the soul, enslaves the mind, and destroys those powers which elevate and civilize society.
The first Napoleon was neither a pious nor weak-minded man. However worthless and depraved in a moral sense, he was a man of gigantic intellect, and he studied the great men of antiquity, comparing himself with them, and seeking to excel them all. Conversing one day at St. Helena with one of his suite, he said to him, "Can you tell me who Jesus Christ was?" The officer made an evasive answer. "Well, I will tell you," said Napoleon, and then went on to compare Christ with himself, and with the heroes of antiquity, showing how far he surpassed them all. "I think I understand somewhat of human nature," he continued, "and I tell you all these were men, and I am a man, but not one is like Him. Jesus Christ was more than a man. Alexander, Cæsar, Charlemagne, and myself founded great empires; but upon what did the creatures of our genius depend? Upon force. Jesus alone founded his empire upon love, and to this very day millions would die for him." "The gospel is no mere book," said he at another time, "but a living creature, with a vigor, a power, which conquers all that opposes it. Here lies the Book of books upon the table (touching it reverently); I do not tire of reading it, and do so daily with pleasure. . . . Men wonder at the conquests of Alexander, but here is a conqueror who draws men to himself for their highest good; who unites to himself, incorporates with himself, not a nation, but the whole human race."
Again he says, "Jesus is the same; always the same—majestic, and simple, infinitely severe and infinitely gentle. Throughout a life passed under the public eye, he never gives occasion to find fault. The prudence of his conduct compels our admiration by its union of force and gentleness. Alike in speech and action, he is enlightened, consistent, and calm. I know men; and I tell you Jesus is not a man. Everything in him amazes me. His spirit outstretches mine, and his will confounds me. Comparison between him and any other being in the world is impossible. His ideas and his sentiments, the truth that he announces, his manner of convincing, are all beyond humanity and the natural order of things. His birth, and the story of his life, the profoundness of his doctrines, which overturns all difficulties, and is their most complete solution, his gospel, his appearance, his empire, his progress through all centuries and kingdoms: all this is to me an unfathomable mystery. I defy you to cite another life like that of Christ." Thus Christ stands as a beacon light to those who wish light, and a marvel to the unbeliever.