Nor do we demand that they interpret Christ's teaching as a twentieth-century theologian would, and give us their opinion of its meaning. All we ask of them is a correct statement of just what Jesus did do and say; then we ourselves can supply the scientific explanation or the theological interpretation. Did they see five thousand men fed with a few loaves and fishes? Did they hear Jesus say, "I am the light of the world"? Or were they so incompetent to see and hear that we cannot accept their testimony, though they honestly try to tell the truth? Would men like the apostles be believed in their statement of facts if on the witness stand to-day?

The answer to this is well put by Dr. Gore: "The apostles will take very high rank among the world's witnesses. As represented in the gospels they were men not of the poorest but of the more independent trading class; simple, literal-minded men; not superstitious and still less romantic; free from all traces of morbidness; slow of belief through lack of imagination; as individuals strikingly different in character, so as not easily to be led in the same way; with the exception of St. John not well adapted to be theologians, and none of them (like St. Paul) controversial theologians; but singularly well qualified as witnesses. They were qualified as witnesses because, free from all preoccupation with ideas and systems, they were plain men who could receive the impress of facts; who

could tell a simple, plain tale, and show by their lives how much they believed it. And they were trained to be witnesses. Jesus Christ intended his gospel to rest on facts; and, in correspondence with this intention, the whole stress in the apostolic church was laid on witness. The first thing the church had to do, before it developed its theology, was to tell its tale of fact. 'We are witnesses of these things"" ("The Incarnation," 81f.).

The presence of errors and discrepancies in the gospels would not overthrow our belief that the apostles were trustworthy witnesses if we saw that these arose from (a) limitations in knowledge common to their land and century, e. g., the belief that certain diseases were caused by demons-provided, of course, that demoniacal possession is proved an error; or (b) misunderstandings on the part of the apostles or their reporters of statements evidently open to misunderstanding, e. g., Christ's teaching about his second coming; or (c) the natural variations of different persons telling the same story, e. g., the opening of the eyes of the blind at Jericho. Nor are the gospels discredited by the fact that each writer has his own way of treating the subject. This is true of all historians; the personal equation must be taken into account in estimating the value of their testimony. In the case of the evangelists, however, we are surprised to find how little change that equation makes. Their reverence for the

truth kept them from yielding to personal preferences and prejudices in reporting the facts.

The frequent allusions in other New Testament books to facts about Christ furnishes another test of the trustworthiness of the evangelists and their sources. We have already noticed (p. 13) that from such undisputed works as Paul's four great epistles we can gather enough to make a valuable outline of the life of Jesus, and that this outline agrees completely with the record given in the gospels. Now, unless the story thus outlined in Paul's letters is true, we must suppose that, less than thirty years after the death of Jesus, the real facts had been so completely lost that a scholar most eager and competent to recover them could not do so; and also that a fictitious story had been so cunningly framed as to deceive the keenest mind of the apostolic age. But if we accept the testimony of Paul as trustworthy, we have new and independent confirmation of the trustworthiness of the witnesses whose testimony is recorded in the Four Gospels.

A much stronger objection to the theory that the story of Jesus is fiction reverently framed by the early church, lies in the character it portrays. The gospels are four sketches of the life of Jesus, made at different times and for different purposes. The first three have most material in common, yet each has its independent contribution; the fourth is almost entirely independent and supplementary. They may be compared to

four pictures painted by different artists from different stand-points. Notice first, that all are pictures of the same person. Some critics dispute this, declaring that the Jesus of the synoptics is not the same as the Jesus of John; but the Christian Church throughout the centuries has never perceived any difference save that John portrays more clearly the inner, divine nature of the Lord. The pictures are composed of a multitude of details, each adding its touch to the portrait; yet all are in perfect harmony, so that at no point in the story can we pronounce an act or saying of Jesus to be out of keeping with his character. Captious critics have tried to do this, but have not succeeded.

The character of Jesus, as thus portrayed in the gospels, is certainly most remarkable. It is symmetrical, sinless, unique: it is the noblest ever placed before human contemplation: it is a perfect blending of the human and the divine. The evangelists do not try to impress this upon us by laudatory epithets: they do not even state it in abstract form: they simply give us a plain narrative of deeds and words, and leave us to form our own opinion of Jesus. What opinion has been formed, even by men who reject the miracles, is well stated by Lecky in words often quoted: "It was reserved for Christianity to present to the world an ideal character, which through all the changes of eighteen centuries has inspired the hearts of men with an impassioned love; has shown itself capable of acting

on all nations, ages, temperaments, and conditions; has been not only the highest pattern of virtue, but the strongest incentive to its practice; and has exercised so deep an influence that it may truly be said that the simple record of three short years of active life has done more to regenerate and soften mankind than all the disquisitions of philosophers, and all the exhortations of moralists. This has indeed been the well-spring of whatever is best and purest in the Christian life" ("History of European Morals," 2:8).

If the story of Jesus is fiction, it is the most wonderful fiction in all literature. "The inventor of it," as Rousseau declared, "would be more astonishing than the hero." Shakespeare is not worthy of comparison with the unknown man who had the genius to imagine such a character as that of Jesus and such a life as he lived. "It takes a Newton to forge a Newton. What man could have fabricated a Jesus? None but a Jesus," said Theodore Parker. But according to the theory of sceptics the transformation of the historical figure of a simple Galilean reformer into the wonderful God-man, the Lord and Saviour of the world, was accomplished not by the genius of any one man, but by the collective thought of the early church dwelling reverently upon its Master. If we accept this theory we must believe:

(1) That a body of ignorant, self-deluded men and women of the first century, some of them reared in the