A SKEPTIC'S ESTIMATE OF CHRIST.
By John Stuart Mill
"It remains a possibility that Christ actually was what he supposed himself to be, . . . a man charged with a special, express and unique commission from God, to lead mankind to truth and virtue. About the life and sayings of Jesus there is a stamp of personal originality, combined with profundity of insight, that. . . must place the prophet of Nazareth, even in the estimation of those who have no belief in his inspiration, in the very first rank of the men of sublime genius of whom our species can boast. When this preeminent genius is combined with the qualities of probably the greatest reformer and martyr to that mission who ever existed upon earth, religion cannot be said to have made a bad choice, in pitching on this man, as the ideal representative and guide of humanity, nor, even now, would it be easy, even for an unbeliever, to find a better translation of the rule of virtue from the abstract into the concrete, than to endeavor so to live that Christ would approve our life."—John Stuart Mill, in Essays on Religion.