THE JAMES K. MOFFITT FUND. LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA. GIFT OF JAMES KENNEDY MOFFITT OF THE CLASS OF '86. + Deceived Accession No. , /Sp.T" ass No. , H ': -. ' : m Sjti ^1 m ijR. SOCRATES AND CHRIST " Subsists no law of Life outside of Life. The Christ himself had been no Lawgiver, Unless he had given the life, too, with the Law." Aurora Leigh. 11 He led him, step by step, through the noble resolve by which Socrates at frightful odds, and with all ordinary experience against him main- tains the advantage to be derived from truth ; . . . and he showed him how ... it was expedient that a nobler than Socrates should die for the people, nobler, that is, in that he did what Socrates failed in doing, and carried the lowest of the people with him to the ethereal gates." John Inglesant. " There is no word of life in Socrates. This little period of life ... is an infinite arena, where infinite issues are played out. . . . This truth we must recognise in Christianity and its belief independent of all theories." CARLYLE. SOCRATES AND CHRIST A STUDY IN THE PHILOSOPHY OF RELIGION BY R M. WENLEY, M.A. 11 LECTURER ON MENTAL AND MORAL PHILOSOPHY IN QUEEN MARGARET COLLEGE, GLASGOW; EXAMINER IN PHILOSOPHY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF GLASGOW WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS EDINBURGH AND LONDON MDCCCLXXXIX I? UFI7BRSIT7 PREFACE. THIS brief study, covering as % it does a wide and pre- eminently important period bf-liuman history, is not in any way exhaustive. Of its shortcomings in many directions I am deeply sensible. Throughout, the de- sign has been to group afresh ascertained facts, to exhibit their inter-connection, and to emphasise their essential differences, rather than to bring forward evi- dence which had been neglected or even unnoted hitherto. An attempt has been made to show that the development of Greek thought and the peculiar charac- ter of Judaism necessarily rendered Christ's work dif- ferqnt from that of Socrates. While dogmatic theology undoubtedly contains very many elements derived from Greek philosophy, Christianity at its source is in no wise Greek. Philosophy partly prepared the way for it, and originated not a few doctrines which afterwards became incorporated in Christian dogma. This, how- ever, was only a secondary relationship. vi Preface. It has been my endeavour to eliminate doctrinal con- siderations as far as possible, and to lay stress on what is inherent in the Christian religion. As a study in the Philosophy of Keligion, which "seeks to ascer- tain how much of the content of religion may be dis- covered, proved, or at least confirmed, agreeably to reason," the book aims at being constructive and not controversial. No pretence is made to trench upon disputed points of creed. I am indebted to many sources of information, and I have tried to indicate my main obligations in the notes. It need scarcely be said that without the venerable Zeller's monumental work this study could not have been undertaken. I should like to add that, in their various departments, the books of Drs Jowett, James Drummond, Kuenen, Wellhausen, and Keim, have been of the utmost assistance. But these writers are in no way to be held responsible for the errors into which I may have fallen. It may be of interest to state that direction was first given to this review by the preparation of an essay to which the Kae- Wilson Medal at Glasgow University was awarded in 1883. But no part of that dissertation has been reproduced here. K. M. W. QUEEN MARGARET COLLEGE, GLASGOW, May 1889. CONTENTS. CHAP. PAGR I. INTRODUCTORY SOCRATES AND CHRIST, . . 1 II. THE ANTECEDENTS OF SOCRATES, ... 13 III. THE MISSION AND PHILOSOPHY OP SOCRATES, . 31 IV. FROM SOCRATES TO ZENO, .... 70 V. THE SEARCH FOR INDEPENDENCE AND WISDOM, . 83 VI. SCEPTICISM, COMPLACENCY, AND SUPERSTITION, . 126 VII. THE IMPORTANCE OF THE CONTACT BETWEEN JEW AND GREEK, ...... 149 VIII. PHILO-JUD^EUS AND HIS SIGNIFICANCE, . . 163 IX. THE JEWISH IDEAL OF GOD, .... 183 X. JUDAISM AND JESUS, ..... 201 XI. SOCRATES AND CHRIST, ..... 236 INDEX, ....... 265 UIITSRSIT7 SOCEATES AND CHEIST, CHAPTEE I. INTRODUCTORY SOCRATES AND CHRIST. SINCE the time of Bossuet's ' Histoire Universelle,' as Burnouf points out, 1 many have supposed the various forms of religion to be but corruptions of an original revelation. The Platonic doctrine of reminiscence was resuscitated after a fashion, and employed to explain the apparently inexplicable. If the Greek philosopher thought that man's sublimer moments were simply faint memories of a former pure state, the earlier modern in- vestigators of the " science of religion " believed, sim- ilarly, that faith and worship were adaptations of a " primordial revelation." On this theory it would not be difficult to form a comparative estimate of any given religious system. For, if at the outset of the inquiry a deus ex machind be assumed, it is easy to deal with even the most formidable problems. But, unfortun- 1 Cf. La Science des Religions, p. 81. A 2 Socrates and Christ. ately, the opinion of Bossuet and those who think with him is no longer tenable. Eeligion is progressing to- wards a pure manifestation rather than looking back with more or less distorted vision. Had a specific revelation been planted on this earth at the first, and left to take its chance, so to speak, then of the " Three Reverences" 1 the first alone would have been possible. The fear of the Lord is only the beginning of wisdom, and reverence for what is above us is only the begin- ning of religion. " The Second Eeligion," as Goethe has it, " founds itself on reverence for what is around us. . . . The Third Keligion is grounded on reverence for what is beneath us. ... And this being now at- tained, the human species cannot retrograde." For, " out of those three Eeverences springs the highest reverence, reverence for one's self, and those again un- fold themselves from this ; so that man attains the highest elevation of which he is capable, that of being justified in reckoning himself the best that God and Nature have produced : nay, of being able to continue on this lofty eminence, without being again by self- conceit and presumption drawn down from it into the vulgar level." 2 In other words, each one has his own place in the spiritual order of the world, and his work cannot be done for him by any other person. His value is absolute because he is unique. If this doctrine be true universally, its significance in special cases is supreme. Those who have given shape to the ideals of entire nations and ages achieve a fuller immortality. Sacredness diffuses itself over all who have toiled amidst difficulty, or suffered for con- 1 Cf. Wilhelm Meister's Wanderjahre, chaps, x. , xi. 2 The translation is Carlyle's. Introductory. 3 science' sake, but of some few a double portion re- mains the peculiar possession. " Such souls Whose sudden visitations daze the world, Vanish like lightning, but they leave behind A voice that in the distance far away Wakens the slumbering ages." From this point of view, the old opposition between the so-called sacred and the secular is not only hurtful but impossible. The two spheres overlap, or the one is complementary to the other. The recognition that everyday existence possesses a depth usually associated with religion, and that spiritual life has a usefulness reserved, as some are apt to suppose, for profession or occupation, is sure to lend added significance to indi- vidual effort. When, in some such way, the secular is transformed by the sacred, when the finer perceptions are permitted to qualify the grosser continually, and not at stated times only, then the growing identifica- tion of creed with conduct is an undeniable benefit. Sometimes, however, this higher aspect seems to be forgotten ; and of late years a false direction has on several occasions been given to the doctrine of spiritual continuity. It is not impossible to find a reputation for liberality in questions of faith based on a species of special pleading. Ingenious parallels between Greek and barbarian, striking coincidences in the lives of great teachers, learned disquisitions on Christianity before Christ, and the like, serve to invest their in- ventors or authors with a superiority based on their presumed freedom from dogmatic prejudice. Now it is possible to be wholly in sympathy with those who desire to see in all religion a uniform manifestation of 4 Socrates and Christ. the higher life, and in all sincere searching after God a pathetic confession of finitude that cannot be too tenderly treated, and at the same time to pervert their views by an undue identification of ideas or individuals seemingly alike. The truth that natura nonfacit saltus has, as its reverse side, the fact that nature never stands still. The life of the Greek protomartyr invites com- passion, misleading in its completeness, with that of Christ. Yet there is no immediate connection be- tween the two. History and the ascertained course of religious development are arrayed against the par- allelism. Nevertheless, some who take their stand upon these very principles who well know how to use the historical and comparative methods are prone to forget that a due sense of perspective is the one faculty with which their favourite study is unable to dispense. Wherein do we detract from the sublimity of Socrates' life and death when we say that he only originated, or perhaps only gave new direction to a growth which more than four centuries of half -hidden progress, and the influence of several civilisations, were at length to make perfect in weakness ? There is little essential similarity between Socrates and Christ, for the simple reason that the work which was given them to do has value in that it was different for each. It need hardly be said that one by no means intends to dispute the many literary and other references to the likeness between Socrates and Christ. When, for example, Justin Martyr claims inspiration for Socrates, and almost classes him as a Christian ; 1 when Shelley calls him " the Jesus Christ of Greece " ; when, in the preface to Lamartine's 'La Mort de Socrate,' it 1 Cf. Apol., ii. 8, 12, 13. Introductory. 5 is written, " II avait combattu toute sa vie cet empire des sens que le Christ venait renverser ; sa philosophic etait toute religieuse ; " when Hugo exclaims " Dieu que cherchait Socrate, et que Jesus trouva," or cries " Oui, c'est un pretre que Socrate ! " no one need question the appropriateness of the parallel. Nor, again, is it possible to complain when Professor Mayor 1 and Mr Benn, following Schleiermacher, who speaks of " the too prosaic Xenophon, and the idealising Plato," write that " there is, curiously enough, much the same inner discrepancy between Xenophon's ' Me- morabilia ' and those Platonic dialogues where Socrates is the principal spokesman, as that which distinguishes the Synoptic from the Johannine Gospels." 2 Ehetorical licence and legitimate illustration lend little aid in the creation of illegitimate identities. But another and widely different kind of comparison merits attention, even if it do not excite immediate opposition. In the introduction to his large work on 1 Le Christianisme et ses Origines,' M. Ernest Havet, writing of the general relation between Greek philoso- phy and Christianity, makes the following remarkable statement : " J'etudie le Christianisme dans ses origines, non pas seulement dans ses origines immediates, c'est- a-dire la predication de celui qu'on nomme le Christ et de ses apotres, mais dans ses sources premieres et plus profondes, celles de 1'antiquite hellenique, dont il est sorti presque tout entier ; " 3 and again, " C'est precise*- 1 Of. Sketch of Ancient Philosophy, pp. 31, 32. 2 The Greek Philosophers, A. W. Benn, vol. i. pp. 110, 111. 3 Vol. I., Introduction, p. v. 6 Socrates and Christ. ment ce que je me propose d'etablir, que le Christian- isme est beaucoup plus hellenique qu'il n'est juif." 1 Further, coming now more particularly to the connec- tion between Socrates and Christ, another author has committed himself to a somewhat extreme opinion. " The Christian movement was, in many respects, anal- ogous to the philosophic movement begun with Socrates. . . . Ideal righteousness, the search for divine perfec- tion, the endeavour to be ' as good and wise as possible/ these were the true and only means of ' escape,' or sal- vation contemplated both by Socrates and Jesus. To the truths already uttered in the Athenian prison, Chris- tianity added little or nothing, except a few symbols, which, though perhaps well calculated for popular acceptance, are more likely to perplex than to instruct, and offer the best opportunity for priestly mystifica- tion." 2 Comparisons of this sort are doubtless insti- tuted sincerely in the name of scientific inquiry. Yet, although they have an element of truth, they are in many ways misleading. For, having assumed the fact of development in religion, their authors proceed to for- get its chief characteristic. 3 In religious as in other progress, growth is from the less to the greater, from the half to the whole truth. 4 Christianity is a historical religion in the strictest sense only because, as Novalis said, " the spirit leads an eternal self-demonstration." It may possibly be profitable to consider some of the phases of this " self-demonstration " now in question. 1 Yol. I., Introduction, p. vi. (The italics are mine.) 2 The Eise and Progress of Christianity, R. W. Mackay, pp. 19, 20. (The italics are mine. ) 3 Cf. Bruno Bauer's ' Christus und die Csesaren, ' see below, p. 204, n. 2. 4 I willingly acknowledge the value of M. Havet's work as a study of Greek monotheism. Introductory. 7 At the outset, it must be admitted with F. C. Baur that " the well-known parallel drawn by so many writers between Socrates and Christ ... is certainly not without justice." l Yet, as we hope to see in the sequel, for the very reason that "Christianity closes a movement which arose upon the soil of pagan religion and philosophy, and the seed of which was sown by Socrates," that " each of the principal forms assumed by Greek philosophy during this interval must have been a step in the preparation for Christianity," 2 the comparison is, in what may fairly be termed essentials, of external in- terest only. It is easy to show that the life of Socrates, like that of Christ, was remarkable for its consistency. Neither the one nor the other found a kingdom in this world ; gain and loss were not meted out to them in terms of drachma or shekel, notwithstanding the mina of silver and the reward of Judas. We know, again, that the personality of each was endowed with a won- derful magnetic charm, a faculty of drawing men to it. Both were inspired, not only in their ability to rise superior to their age, but because they were quite con- scious of this power. An unseen spiritual force, the r Daemon of Socrates, the Father in heaven of Christ, ; ruled them alike. Both were faithful unto death that they might in no wise deviate from their obedience to this strange self-consciousness. For this reason, if for none other, " Christians deem it no irreverence to com- pare " Socrates " with the Founder of their religion." Continuing the parallel, one might further show that the aims of both were not unlike. Socrates continually insisted upon man's ignorance of himself, and pled for 1 Church History of the First Three Centuries, vol. i. pp. 11, 12. 2 Ibid., p. 12. 8 Socrates and Christ. self-knowledge, for the recognition that his moral nature makes man half divine. Christ came preaching repentance, calling upon men to recognise their own sinfulness, and bidding them render satisfaction by striving to be at one with God as of old. The methods employed in the furtherance of those aims also present a certain likeness. Mixing with all sorts and conditions of people, both teachers strove, by cross-examination, and by a species of enigmatic ex- hortation, to impress upon their hearers the illusiveness of this present life. Once more, Socrates before the Dicastery, and Christ before the Sanhedrim, were alike accused of endangering public morals. They came not to send peace on earth, but a sword. Christ openly proclaimed that the good tidings would cause division ; Socrates was condemned because the judges considered that his message had separated the children from their fathers. In short, the Socratic method, and the para- bolic discourse, both served to reveal a new order of existence. Finally, it might even be allowed that a " Passion " was common to Socrates and to Christ. Be this as it may, there is no question that one so disposed could easily institute a satisfactory comparison between the two " apologies." " Socrates, this time we will let you go, but on one condition, that you cease from carry- ing on this search, and from philosophy. . . . Athenians, I hold you in the highest regard and love ; but I shall obey the God rather than you : and so long as I have life and strength I shall not cease from philosophy, ex- horting any one whom I meet after my manner, and setting forth the truth, saying : my friend, you are a citizen of Athens, a city very great and very famous for wisdom and power of mind; are you not ashamed of caring Introductory. so much for the making of money, and for reputation and honour ? Will you not spend thought or care on wisdom and truth, and the perfecting of your soul ? . . . And therefore, Athenians, . . . either acquit me, or do not acquit me ; but be sure that I shall never alter my life, not even if I have to die many times." l " Jesus an- swered him, I spake openly to the world ; I ever taught in the synagogue, and in the temple, whither the Jews always resort ; and in secret have I said nothing. . . . My kingdom is not of this world : if my kingdom were of this world, then would my servants fight, that I should not be delivered to the Jews : but now is my kingdom not from hence. Pilate therefore said unto Him, Art thou a king then ? Jesus answered, Thou sayest that I am a king. To this end was I born, and for this cause came I into the world, that I should bear witness unto the truth." 2 Socrates died because he was a philosopher, Christ because He was the founder of a new religion. But, notwithstanding this difference with its wealth of significance, later ages owe the poison- cup and the cross a debt which can never be estimated. The doctrines of the dead were transfigured, their fol- lowers touched, and transformed into living epistles. This no other cause could have wrought. Out of death came life. The Athenian prison gave Plato to human- ity, Golgotha gifted Paul. Yet, even allowing all this, the parallel holds of externals rather than of essentials. Although it refers to certain personal traits, it tells nothing of the gen- esis of character, or of the surroundings in relation to which life came to be what it was. Consider the mutual interaction of individual and environment, com- 1 Plato's Apology, 29, 30. 2 St John, xviii. 20, 36, 37. io Socrates and Christ. pare the varied conditions out of which Greek philosophy and Christianity respectively grew, and it must become abundantly plain that, saving the external resem- blances already noted, there is no more parallelism between Socrates and Christ than between Plato and Paul. Nay, sometimes the undeniable similarity serves only to confuse. The familiar puzzle about the pound of lead and the pound of feathers is, in a sense, more fully solved when wrongly answered. External points of contact for the most part obscure internal differ- ences. As a rule exceptional standards are applied to great men. Perhaps those whom " the great man condemns to the task of explaining him " have no other convenient means of revenge. But in practice this is so far dis- advantageous that two errors often occur. The tend- ency is either to magnify the hero overmuch or to belittle him unfairly. Hegel and Emerson estimate Plato somewhat differently from De Quincey, to make no mention of the naive utilitarian Bentham. 1 One living writer, again, regards the 'Critique of Pure Eeason' as the key to modern philosophy, another rests satisfied when he has reduced it to its lowest terms. Such variations serve to hint that genius is paradoxical in nature. And so it is. The individual is never greater than his age. Yet, if he have any sort of inspiration, he is always greater than his age. His work is wrought out of elements which he finds lying ready to hand ; these are given to him. No man 1 Cf. Deontology, vol. i. p. 39, where Bentham, with original genius, says : " While Xenophon was writing history, and Euclid giving instructions in geometry, Socrates and Plato were talking nonsense, under pretence of teaching wisdom." Introductory. 1 1 ever created anything out of nothing. But, on the other side, the unity of purpose which pervades all, the faculty that sets all the endless parts in fresh relations to one another and to the whole, those are his own. Genius cannot indeed destroy, but it can build up. What is history but a series of biographies ? When " the power of the man and the power of the moment concur," 1 the present is thereby rendered the sure foun- dation of the future. Even Mill, with his tinkering " permanent possibilities of sensation," is constrained to put aside his baneful "acuteness," and to admit that " the volitions of exceptional persons . . . may be indis- pensable links in the chain of causation by which even the general causes produce their effects. . . . Philosophy and religion are abundantly amenable to general causes ; yet few will doubt, that had there been no Socrates, no Plato, and no Aristotle, there would have been no philosophy for the next two thousand years, nor in all probability then; and that if there had been no Christ, and no St Paul, there would have been no Christianity." 5 A man cannot rise superior to his environment, except as he is able to fertilise what he receives from it, and thus to fill it with the promise of new life. Goethe was right when, in reply to Eckermann's suggestion, that every line of ' Faust ' bore marks of a careful study of life and the world, he said, "Perhaps so; yet, had I not the world already in my soul through anticipation, I should have remained blind with seeing eyes, and all experience and obser- vation would have been dead, unproductive labour." 3 1 Essays in Criticism, Matthew Arnold, p. 5. 2 Logic, vol. ii. pp. 538, 539. 3 Conversations, p. 70. 1 2 Socrates and Christ. He knew there was that within him which no study could give. In like manner, it may be affirmed of every master-spirit, that "the more you take from it the greater it appears." The secret source of its signi- ficance is an inalienable property. Nor can Socrates be deprived of this. What is indestructible in him does not pertain to this or that aspect of his life, as others saw it ; his relation to the entire movement of Greek thought, and, very specially, the new direction which he gave to the search for self-knowledge, these constitute his own contribution to universal history. In a degree rarely paralleled he was both product and producer. Free, under certain conditions, those very limitations rendered his freedom worth the name. Attention thus divides itself naturally between the character of Greek life, especially as influencing Soc- rates, and Socrates' interpretation of that life, with its results. CHAPTER II. THE ANTECEDENTS OF SOCEATES. DESPITE the long age of laborious scholarship, with all its subtle reconstruction and minute explanation of the ancient world, Greek thought must ever remain remote from us. Some, no doubt, like Landor, or Winckelmann, or Hegel in his early period, are richer than others in pagan affinities. Still, even for them, a great gulf is fixed between the Greek and the modern mind. It is no more possible to set aside completely the achievements of the Christian centuries than to be unaffected by the law of gravitation. And, in propor- tion to this inability, is the past, or any given part of it, mysterious. " We know little indeed of the ways our own thoughts take ; still less of those of our best friends. What, then, can we know of the thoughts of men whom we never saw, who lived centuries before us ? What of the intellectual current which prevailed when they lived ? For each age has its peculiar atmo- sphere, through which it must be viewed if we are to understand it clearly. . . . Shakespeare describes Csesar as fighting with cannon ; of course, we all know better. But how his battles were carried on no one can 14 Socrates and Christ. say ; for, were his own accounts of them twice as clear and exact as they are, there would still be so much omitted that was familiar to his contemporaries, that we should need the Eoman public of his day to interpret Caesar's words precisely in the sense in which he uses them, to enable us to obtain a distinct picture of his manner of action." 1 But, on the other hand, there had been no progress in civilisation did not all, unconsciously perhaps, share the legacy of the past. Nor would any knowledge of olden time be possible did not a select mind, once and again, put forth " an infinite and electrical power of combina- tion, bringing together from the four winds, like the angel of the resurrection, what else were dust from dead men's bones, into the unity of breathing life." Greek thought was sui generis ; as such it has become an integral portion of later culture. Yet, in so far as it can be disentangled from this highly complex growth, it presents certain peculiar qualities which the abundant records of history, art, religion, and social life mirror with tolerable vividness even at so late a day. Athens during the life of Socrates, B.C. 469-399, was the most marvellous microcosm that the world has ever witnessed. In later times whole empires must be laid under contribution to furnish a galaxy of talent at all comparable with that which once graced a single city. Yet even thus, traces of that mysterious oft- repeated writing on the wall, " Thou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting," were not absent. The Greek religion is not altogether " the religion of the beautiful," 2 as is frequently supposed. And, even amid 1 Essays, H. Grimm, pp. 132-134. 2 Hegel. Antecedents of Socrates. 15 the glory of the Periclean era, the ideal of the beautiful had experienced several rude shocks. Greek mythology, rooted as it was in the nature- worship common to the Indo- German peoples, 1 orig- inally possessed few of the elements indispensable to religion. Gradually, however, as anthropomorphism progressed, man's ethical qualities came to be associated more and more intimately with the objects of worship. No doubt, in comparatively early stages, when the animistic phase was ended, and when the new-found humanity of the gods was coalescing with the other accessories of naturalism, the maxim that what is natural is not wonderful acquired surprising im- portance. The varied peccadilloes of the Pantheon only proved that its members were very near to their devotees. The freedom of a joyous light-hearted exist- ence was characteristic of the gods as of men. The purely pagan sentiment, which finds no place for spirit save in body, never received illustration so perfect as in the days of the heroes before Agamemnon, and in the epic of the Trojan war. Certainly, in one aspect, Hellenic religion is the religion of the beautiful. But just where this is most true is it also least true. The more of the beautiful, the less of religion ; the deeper really religious life, the more marked the departure from the artistically conceived deities. Originally it was not an ethical, but an imaginative faith that Phidias and the rest served. "The national games, the religious pageants, the theatrical shows, and the gymnastic exercises of the Greeks were sculpturesque. The conditions of their speculative thought in the first dawn of civilised self - consciousness, when spiritual 1 Cf. Outlines of the History of Religion, C. P. Tiele, p. 202 sq. 1 6 Socrates and Christ. energy was still conceived as incarnate only in a form of flesh, and the soul was inseparable from the body except by an unfamiliar process of analysis, harmonised with the art which interprets the mind in all its movements by the features and the limbs." 1 It is true, further, that the Greeks ever remained the children of their own deeds. For, although Zeus and Apollo, Athene and Aphrodite, stood at the last outside of religious life, the aesthetic sense, in answer to which they were of old embodied in perfect plastic forms, was not dulled. The art of the tragedians, and no less the skill of the Platonic dialogue witness the ' Apology ' itself the Aristotelian theory of virtue, nay, even the far-off "harmony with self" of the later Eoman Stoics, owe dignity and repose to that antique lore, happy in its innocence of reflection, which found heaven enough in contemplating the perfection of bodily grace or strength. A mythology like the Greek, lacking conspicuously the internals of religion, and, at the same time, so intimately connected with human life, must at some period be either thoroughly modified or cast aside altogether. Man's ethical nature is fated to develop in spite of every obstruction. The Greeks, as has been hinted, were not a religious people, in the usual accep- tation of the term, but their affinity for things moral amounted to genius. The strange division between religion, as delineated say in Homer, and the deeper tendencies of life, as expressed by the dramatists, by Xenophanes, and by Socrates, precipitated a crisis dis- astrous enough for Greece, but of the last importance to the world at lame. The moment at which the Hellenic o 1 Studies of the Greek Poets (second series), J. A. Symonds, p. 376. A ntecedents of Socrates. 1 7 mythology became anthropomorphic was the hour of its strength and weakness alike. For, as Aristotle declares, the Greeks made the gods in their own image. To equal the perfection of this humanised form has been the despair of later artists. Never- theless, the men who made the gods thus, were as yet unconscious of their own real nature. The holiness of beauty is no sufficient creed for one who has had a glimpse of the beauty of holiness. The individual is not enriched by appearance, but by character. But great poets, artists, and men of action so consecrated this holiness of beauty by their shining words, choice works, and high deeds, 1 that it became an integral portion of the national mind. As civilisation advanced and morality grew more definite, the ancient religion of external form was less and less able to express current ideas of the spiritual. The mythology, which is some- times taken to be the whole of Hellenic religion, remained; nay, long after literary and philosophical activity had ended, sacrifice and adoration were rendered to the old gods. But it remained stationary. The reflective side of Greek life, disguise it as one may, was the more truly religious. It came into existence beside, and, in a sense, away from, the older belief. Finding no place for an ever-deepening ethical consciousness even in the gratification of a strongly marked aesthetic sympathy, the dramatists and philosophers turned from the material to the spiritual. ^Eschylus and Sophocles, Socrates and Plato were, in their day, the true repre- sentatives of what was essential in Greek religion. It no longer suffices to picture the gods sipping am- brosia on Olympus under the presidency of Zeus, but 1 Cf. Preller, Griech. Myth., vol. i. p. 155. B 1 8 Socrates and Christ. the god is found within, Socrates knows that he has a Daemon. As everywhere, so in Greece, mythology may serve the purpose of religion. But when man begins to realise that the earth is not his sole possession, he is done with mythology. It remains maybe, as it did in Greece, shrined in " a magnificent ritualistic system, and a cycle of poetical conceptions," 1 but it no longer plays the part of religion. The glory of Greek art, in its relation to this mythology, is that it was adequate to what it expressed. Yet this very adequacy caused its office in religion to be fleeting. Art can no more com- pletely represent Sophocles' Nemesis, Socrates' Daemon, Plato's Idea of the Good, or even the Stoic wise man, than it can sum in picture or pieta the agonised " Eloi, Eloi, lama sabachthani ? " While the Greek religion thus passed through a per- fectly natural development, the coexistence of the early mythology with the later ethical religion of the poets and philosophers rendered it peculiarly interesting. When Socrates began his exhortations, the inevitable rupture between old and new had already taken place. Not, cer- tainly, that the people as a whole had lost touch with the Homeric gods. Their attitude towards JEschylus, Euripides, Anaxagoras, and Socrates, tells another tale. Yet, in what proved to be of moment to the advance of civilisation, a transformation had occurred. The now full-grown drama opened up the sphere of the moral consciousness, and gave the first articulate expres- sion to ideas which the plastic arts could not embody. " Tragedy is better suited than any other kind of poetry to arouse ethical reflection, to portray the moral con- sciousness of a people, and to express the highest senti- 1 The Renaissance, Walter Pater, p. 189. Antecedents of Socrates. 19 ments of which an age, or at least individual prominent spirits in an age, are capable. Every deeper tragic plot rests on the conflicting calls of duty and interest." l Man, struggling with himself, could find no sort of satisfaction in the external representations of deity. The individual is free, yet he finds himself overcome by the stress of outer necessity. Some power, imper- sonal and changeless, rules men and gods alike. The semi-monotheism of ^Eschylus and Sophocles points to a supreme being, but a being whose very supremacy precludes the definite revelation inseparable from per- sonality. Nemesis is not a subject, but rather a prin- ciple everywhere visible yet nowhere accessible. It is sublime in both the Kantian senses. For, while the imagination can form no definite representation of it, Greek heroism, in pride of hopelessness, accepts it as a fact. The dramatists thus grafted one species of poetry on to another, as Schlegel remarks. They rose superior to the physical godhead of the popular mythology, but their ideal of deity was largely abstract. Advance in ethical life had become a necessity; the direction in which to seek the commentary on human nature incident to that advance was not yet clear, Socrates was the first to realise this defect, and to indicate how it might be made good. ^Eschylus and Sophocles could no more cast . away the past, than they could add one cubit to their stature by going beyond their set task. Even if they would not, the poetry of ancestral nature-worship held them ever in its spell. With them, no less than with all the Greeks, " beauty was the tongue on the balance of expression." It was reserved for Socrates not only 1 Socrates and the Socratic School, Zeller, pp. 4, 5. 2O Socrates and Christ. to furnish the first intelligent utterance, but also to speak the truth. Greek philosophy, in its initial period, was a semi- scientific counterpart of that satisfaction with the world which the old mythology evidenced. As a race the Greeks were long preoccupied with things seen and temporal. Eminently at home in their lovely sur- roundings, they found the attraction of visible nature irresistible. Accordingly, the early thinkers concern themselves to discover the origins and properties of matter. They, more than any pre-Christian philoso- phers, warrant the common generalisation that ancient speculation, as contrasted with modern, addresses itself to the problem of being rather than of knowing. No theory of self-consciousness was necessary, for the fact of self-consciousness had been little, if at all, realised. The universe of mind was as yet outside the range of philosophical experiment. Man, the thinker, and his immediate knowledge of the objects about which he thinks, were taken for granted. Investigation confined its efforts to the explanation of the material world. The tendency of pre-Socratic speculation is thus entirely in consonance with the character of Hellenic naturalism. Slightly as poetry and science seem to be connected, they were even thus early intimately related. The free- dom from dogmatic restraint which enabled the Greeks to deify all nature, was also the essential condition of the fearless inquiries conducted by the first physicists. " This objectivity was no doubt far more easily attain- able for Greek philosophy than for our own ; thought, having then before it neither a previous scientific de- velopment nor a fixed religious system, could grapple with scientific problems from their very commencement Antecedents of Socrates. 2 1 with complete freedom. Such objectivity, furthermore, constitutes not only the strength, but also the weakness of this philosophy ; for it is essentially conditional on man's not having yet become mistrustful of his thought, on his being but partially conscious of the subjective activity through which his presentations are formed, and therefore of the share which this activity has in their content ; in a word, on his not having arrived at self-criticism." l . . . " The intuition of nature is thus the starting-point of the earliest philosophy, and even when immaterial principles are admitted, it is evident that they have been attained through reflection on the data furnished by the senses, not through observation of spiritual life." 2 Moreover, this philosophy was a genuine outgrowth of the mind of a specially gifted people, as the circumstances of its wide diffusion yet invariable Hellenic origin prove. Thales, Pythagoras, Parmenides, Zeno, Empedocles, and Anaxagoras were all, with one doubtful exception, 3 sprung from the Greek stock scattered among the widespread colonies of Hellas. The subtle intensiveness of philosophy, due to the contact of mind with mind, may account to some extent for the gathering of later and more subjective thinkers into one city. This question, though full of interest, is beyond our present inquiry. Whatever be the explanation, certain it is that, to the fifth century B.C., Greek philosophy, from Agrigentum in the West to Colophon in the East, confined itself to theories re- specting the constitution of the physical world. The lonians, the Pythagoreans, and the Eleatics alike in- 1 Pre-Socratic Philosophy, Zeller, vol. i. pp. 145, 146. 2 Ibid., pp. 197, 198. 3 Thales was said to have been of Phoenician descent. 22 Socrates and Christ. vestigate the origin of material things. For Thales " water is the one original substance ;" Pythagoras systematise the universe by means of number ; Xeno- phanes, in a tone of polemic, and Parmenides, with some regard for detail, formulate a doctrine not without analogy to the theory of the conservation of energy. For, according to the Eleatics, change is an illusion, the permanent sum-total of Being is the only reality. These, then, were all so-called " positive " thinkers in the strictest sense of the term. But, as Greek religion had undergone a change ere the time of Socrates, so the philosophy of external phenomena began to present new features. Pytha- goreanism was less concrete then the Ionian physics, and the Eleatic metaphysic was in turn more abstract than either. Finally, with the appearance of Heracleitus reflection entered upon a new stage. The customary classification of Parmenides with Xenophanes and the Eleatics is so far unfortunate that it obscures or leaves out of account his relation to Heracleitus. Whether these thinkers were thoroughly conscious of the an- tagonism or not, there can be no question that " the clearly marked opposition between the Ionic and the Eleatic views of nature, as shown in Heracleitus and Parmenides, had a powerful influence on the subsequent course of philosophy." 1 Previously the schools had been content to assume the facts of Being and change ; but the conflict between Parmenides and Heracleitus rendered the explanation of these terms necessary. Thus philosophy was diverted from the investigation of external phenomena to the discussion of universal prin- 1 Ancient Philosophy, J. B. Mayor, p. 17. A ntecedents of Socrates. 2 3 ciples. 1 In this respect the antagonism brought about a twofold result. On the one hand, both thinkers denied the ordinary conception of phenomena, yet the theories substituted by them were mutually contradic- tory. And when doctors differ, who shall decide ? In this difficulty the Sophists appeared teaching philoso- phical despair, and advising every individual to consider his own prejudices paramount. On the other hand, the opposition between the doctrines of changeless Being and of ever-changing Becoming caused later philosophy to reconsider these concepts. This reconsideration was the work of a school which still nourished in the latest days of the pre-Christian world. While the physicists of the fifth century thus altered the direction of Greek speculation, it cannot be said that their influence was directly formative of Socrates. At the same time, the two radical changes which overtook philosophy before the outbreak of the Peloponnesian war were largely due to them. Parmenides and Heracleitus, in short, deter- mined Socrates through the medium of Anaxagoras and the Sophists. It may therefore be maintained that, just as the dramatists denote the advance in religious and ethical ideas, of which Socrates was an heir, so Anaxagoras and the Sophists are the representatives of speculative progress. The Atomists, who in a manner attempted to unify the contradictions of Parmenides and Hera- cleitus, formulated a mechanical theory of the universe. Like Parmenides they held the unchangeableness of Being, like Heracleitus they taught the plurality of phenomena. They were thus at a disadvantage in their explanation of the world. For, on the supposi- 1 Cf. Pre-SocraiicJ^tiosophy^Zeller, p. 19 sq. 24 Socrates and Christ. tion that atoms, the original Being of Parmenides, were fixed quantities alike as single units and as mem- bers of a universe, the whole question of phenomenal difference presented much difficulty. Plainly, one course alone was possible for the solution of this problem. The world could only be regarded as a series of conjoined particles, united so externally that the interconnection produced no alteration in their ultimate nature. This, the last of the purely physical philosophies, was so far identical with the earliest, that troubles occasioned by the separation between sub- jective and objective were unknown to it. Knowledge seemed to be taken as a fact, its processes and their conditions were still left unconsidered. The first great change which pointed directly to the Socratic philosophy was effected by Anaxagoras. In some respects his importance for the history of Greek thought is apt to be underestimated. No doubt he may be classed with the other physicists, yet his distinctive contribution to the progress of philosophy entitles him to more pointed recognition. For he was the first to throw any light upon the absolute difference between spirit and matter. The intimate of Pericles and Aspasia, he also made philosophy the prominent social force which it afterwards remained. Moreover, if there be solid truth in the remark of Xenophon, 1 that Soc- rates sat at the feet of Aspasia as a learner in love, it may be inferred that the discussions at the house of Pericles, in which Anaxagoras figured prominently, 2 1 Of. Memorabilia, ii. 6, 36. 2 It seems possible that Socrates never met Anaxagoras, but this does not affect the fact that such discussions did take place, as Aristophanes very well knew. Cf. History of Philosophy, Ueberweg, vol. i. p. 87. Antecedents of Socrates. 25 were among the earliest illustrations of the Socratic method. Anaxagoras is to be linked with Socrates in that his " reflection was directed to subjective processes and phenomena." l Like the Atomists, Anaxagoras held that there were a number of original substances. But these differed from the atoms because they might be divided, they were not simple. Various qualities were supposed to pertain to each of the combining parts, and the character of the resultant whole was determined by the qualities of the predominating elements. Thus, whilst denying real qualitative change, Anaxagoras leaves room for apparent variation. This is the purely physical side of his philosophy, and it results in a chaos. For, obviously, a world composed of substances which are in turn compounded of fortui- tous elements, is a mere aggregate in which no definite differentiation can be manifested. Therefore Eeason, which is one in itself, and has no admixture of natures, must be the power which reduces this chaos to order. " All things were in chaos, Eeason came and arranged them." Spirit is thus at last distinguished from matter, and the dualism, of which all later philosophy is the history, receives half-conscious recognition. Anaxagoras is the true forerunner of Socrates because he introduced a new object of thought. Nature is no longer alone, but is controlled by a higher power, which must also be in- vestigated. This, then, is the first conscious glimpse of that inner spirit which Socrates was to emphasise so strongly. But Anaxagoras, like many reformers, did not appreciate his discovery to the full. His concep- tion of Keason was elementary, and was formulated almost entirely by means of physical analogies. Mind 1 Cf. Phsedo, 97. 26 Socrates and Christ. is not a presupposition of the world, the two are coeternal. Personality is not among its attributes. Indeed Anaxagoras' conception and use of Eeason point rather to a principle of motion than to a spirit which arranges phenomena in rational order. Aris- totle's criticism l is quite to the point, for mind is only employed because matter avails not. That is to say, it does what mechanism cannot do, but, as far as possible, it is kept down to the mechanical level. Eeason is set by itself, and made the cause of motion, but how it performs the characteristic functions of spirit Anaxagoras does not explain. 2 It remained for Socrates to show the nature of knowledge, although the direction in which the explanation was to be sought had been indicated. Like the Nemesis of the drama- tists, the Nous of Anaxagoras was something more than the old Greek mythology had thought of, men were now desirous of seeing beyond the material world to its conditions. If, then, it may be fairly held that the speculations of Anaxagoras gave direction to Socrates' investiga- tions, the immediate cause of his activity must now be sought. The philosophy of Socrates was developed in op- position to the teaching of the Sophists. These often maligned men were characteristic products of their age. The success which they achieved, whether merited or not, corresponded to the need which they supplied. Three main circumstances, none of them without in- fluence on Socrates also, may be said to have brought forth Protagoras, Gorgias, and the host of their less known fellows. Two of these have already received 1 Cf. Metaphysics, i. 3, 4. 2 Cf. De Anima, Bk. i. ii., 13, 22. A ntecedents of Socrates. 2 7 / some attention. First, the break between the old re- ligion and the recent drama had become very marked. If ^Eschylus and Sophocles went beyond the traditional conception of the gods, they never gave rein to any undue irreverence. But the inevitable trend of "the dialectic of moral relations and duties " could not fail to result in a more pronounced scepticism. Discounting entirely the influence of the Sophists, Euripides was, from the nature of the case, the exponent of defection from the ancient faith in its less pleasing aspects. His attitude in this matter exhibits most clearly the state of the religious atmosphere in which Socrates moved. Secondly, in spite of Anaxagoras' affirmative tendency, he, in common with Parmenides and Heracleitus, had administered a rude shock to the complacency of ordinary opinion. Parmenides had asserted that the customary conviction of the senses with regard to the endless differentiation of phenomena was unjustifiable. Her- acleitus, on the contrary, had as confidently declared that the senses deceive themselves when they attribute permanence and stability to material things. And now Anaxagoras denied that the ordinary perceptions of sense were able to furnish any adequate knowledge of the real in phenomenal nature. This universal doubt concerning matters of which doubt is usually thought impossible was, in a way, the starting-point of the Sophistic dialectic. But, in addition to the failing ' strength of traditional religion, and the growing bold- ness of philosophical speculation, a third and most important influence was at work. Athens, from being a city among cities, had suddenly become the first power of the civilised world. Like a victorious leader in a momentous struggle, she had reaped a reward out 28 Socrates and Christ. of all proportion to tliat bestowed on the rank and file who fought with her. Her citizens, as partakers in the new-found dignity, came to regard themselves with peculiar satisfaction. The sovereign people acquired unexpected importance, and those who could sway the democracy by art or by ability were assured of surpass- ing success in life. Till Socrates taught a more excel- lent way, it was altogether forgotten that " where rhet- orical skill is regarded as paramount, the higher ends of education are apt to be overlooked, for readiness and fluency of speech may proceed out of emptiness, no less than out of fulness, of mind." 1 In response to some such combination of influences the Sophists appeared. Many of them were, no doubt, sincere and able men. But for others, and those were perhaps the majority, it was as certainly true that skill to prove the worse the better reason stood in place of higher wisdom. The delightful contrast between Gorgias' theory and his practice may serve to illustrate their general morale. He was able to show metaphysically "that nothing could exist, that what did exist could not be known by us, and that what was known could not be imparted " to any one. Yet we are aware that he amassed wealth, and was held in much repute as a teacher. Surely the apotheosis of eristic to teach that teaching is impossi- ble! The inevitable result was, that "to expose fallacy or inconsistency was found to be both an easier process, and a more appreciable display of ingenuity, than the discovery and establishment of truth in such a manner as to command assent." 3 Cultivated criticism, secured 1 Terrier's Greek Philosophy, p. 188. 2 Outlines of Greek Philosophy, Zeller, p. 93. 3 Plato, Grote, vol. i. p. 106 (ed. 1885). Antecedents of Socrates. 29 from defeat by a recognised dogmatic appeal to self, took the place of the older positive philosophy. Matter and mind, no less than physics and ethics, were forgotten for the moment amid the parade of a wisdom which recommended itself by a certain ease of attainment. Opinion celebrated its triumph in obliteration of the distinction between right and wrong, or in convenient disregard of the evidence of sense-perception. Socrates thus appeared at a turning-point in the his- tory of Greek thought. Eeligion could not be expanded so as to include man's growing ethical consciousness within its purely mythological and naturalistic concep- tions. Philosophy, while discrediting the objectivity of truth, had failed to furnish any homogeneous account of the world or of human life. The subordination of the individual to the state had resulted in such splendid achievement, that each citizen now sought his own share of the general good, plus as much more as superior education or cunning enabled him to filch. Disregard for customs once venerated, degradation if not despair of philosophy, and belief only in self were not a little characteristic of the Athenians towards the close of the Periclean era. But the crisis was not merely subjective. When Socrates began to teach, it was aggravated by certain objective relationships. After Pericles' death the glory slowly departed from Athens. The exhaust- ing and disastrous course of the Peloponnesian war was but the prelude to a continuous and almost unparal- leled decline. Socrates did his best work during the years of this war. While Athens and Lacedaemon were ruining Greece by their bootless rivalry, he was providing his countrymen with a more lasting kingdom than that built up at the expense of Xerxes. The city- 30 Socrates and Christ. state, for which every one had hitherto been spent, was already in process of passing away. Yet the individual, at least so far as concerned his moral and spiritual value, was scarcely discovered. For Socrates the years had re- served the appreciation of this new factor in philosophy and in life. His it was to react on his conditions, to transform them, and so to render them organic factors in the development not only of Greek, but also of all civilisation. He was "an exceptional person" who came to deliver man from an exceptional difficulty, and, as a consequence, the interaction between his person- ality and the circumstances of the time was unusually intense. To this attention must now be given. CHAPTER III. THE MISSION AND PHILOSOPHY OF SOCRATES. AT the outset it is to be remembered that Socrates is known to us only as an elderly man. The period of his life with which we are directly acquainted does not begin before his forty-fifth year, and the principal re- cords relate to the last decade of his life. In short, the historical Socrates is neither a youth suffering the pangs of ivelt-schmerZy nor a young man striving, like Goetz von Berlichingen, to subdue the world by force. He has cast away the illusions and hopes of early life, and Has consciously set himself to realise more serious aims. What, then, was his peculiar work, and how came it to be forced upon him ? Socrates is, in a sense, the first of the Greeks who was not entirely Greek. " The Grecian state," Emerson said, " is the era of the bodily nature, the perfection of the senses of the spiritual nature unfolded in strict unity with the body." l In Socrates this characteristic unconsciousness passed away never to be regained. The personal nature of man, with its implications of intel- lectual and practical activity, asserted itself. Great 1 Essay on History. 32 Socrates and Christ. questions regarding knowledge and conduct were now for the first time consciously put. Metaphysical dif- ficulties vaguely indicated by Socrates still engage thinkers, while his ethical problem, with which, as we shall see, no Greek could be fully acquainted, was to find solution not in any theory, but in a unique life. It is a commonplace to say that the atmosphere in which Socrates found himself was eminently favourable to the decisive change which he was to inaugurate. The serious events which marked the struggle for the hege- mony of Greece could not fail to turn some away from the barren irreflective scepticism of the Sophists and the educated class. If knowledge were valueless save to the individual in possession of it, if religious belief existed only to draw down insult, and if, after all sacri- fices, the greatness of his city were not eternally assured, what resource had the Athenian but in his own human nature ? As strong manhood ripened into vigorous age, Socrates appears to have appreciated more and more the necessity of his time. It is easy to contrast his lack of customary philosophical formalism with the importance assigned to him in the progress of Greek thought, 1 and to cavil at " his excellent qualities, which, yet, are not such as fit a man to play a brilliant part in history." But this has about as much integral bear- ing on the state of the case as has Heine's typical comment, "that Xanthippe's husband should have become so great a philosopher, is remarkable. Amid all the scolding, to be able to think ! But he could not write; that was impossible." The very fact that Socrates revealed a theory through the medium of his 1 Cf. Schleiermacher, The Worth of Socrates as a Philosopher, pp. 129, 141. Mission and Philosophy of Socrates. 3 3 common life and conversation is the cause of his re- markable influence. When scepticism is rife, fine words avail little, if unaccompanied by fine works, which prove that the spoken gospel has a real and applicable mean- ing. The merest glance at the 'Memorabilia' brings home an irresistible conviction that Socrates was an " epoch-making " thinker more because he was a living- person than because he discovered an abstract principle. No doubt there was such a principle present in his life, yet it appealed to Xenophon, Plato, and the others, not as an abstraction, but as the pervading secret of the moral power which prevailed in the deeds of Socrates the man. Was his admonition to Aristippus, 1 concern- ing the necessity of temperance as a statesman's virtue, a bare dogma founded on some preconceived Greek idea of a ruler ? Certainly not. " He disciplined his mind and body by such a course of life," Xenophon tells us, 2 [' that he who should adopt a similar one would, if no supernatural influence prevented, live in good spirits and uninterrupted health ; nor would he ever be in want of the necessary expenses for it. So frugal was he, that I do not know whether any one could earn so little by the labour of his hands, as not to procure sufficient \food to have satisfied Socrates." The difficulty of estimating Socrates' work with any approach to fair- ness, is chiefly occasioned by this intimate connection between doctrine and life. The theory that "virtue is knowledge," for example, loses much significance if divorced from the circumstances in which Socrates himself gave practical illustration to the maxim. The spirit of his interpretation of Circe and the swine is also that in which his life must be viewed. The 1 Cf. Memorabilia, ii. 1, 1-7. 2 Ibid., i. 3, 5. C 34 Socrates and Christ. sorceress did not transform men into swine, but pro- vided opportunities which inevitably issued in acts of self-brutalisation. Socrates, too, had his opportu- nities, and his life was the embodiment of the doc- trines which he considered suitable to the occasion. He was, in fact, the first moral philosopher who understood that intellect and will are but different revelations of the same spirit. His insistence upon self-knowledge lends an apparent truth to Hegel's view of his position in Greek philosophy. 1 But, notwith- standing, Hegel forgets that, even if Socrates were subjective as regards his theorising about the external universe, he was also objective because he considered in- dividual life in relation to its social surroundings. In other words, so far as his really important achievement, that is, his ethical work, was concerned, Socrates was not more subjective than objective. Contemporary events, political and social, had filled him with a deep sense of the grave defect in the conditions of man's moral wellbeing, and his scheme of regeneration was ex- emplified in his life. Action based on self-knowledge formed the remedy he had to offer. His own per- sonality was the medium through which this remedy found application. The former is subjective, if such you choose to term it ; the latter, surely as essential, is objective. It concerned others as much as, nay, as the result proved, far more than, it did Socrates himself. The mission of Socrates was the natural outgrowth of the entire past course of Greek thought. It could not have been other than it was, and without it his freedom would have proved an empty name. His own contribution to the burden of history lay in his con- 1 Of. Gesch. d. Phil., vol. ii. p. 40 sq. Mission and Philosophy of Socrates. 3 5 ception of his office, and in the methods which he employed to realise its demands. The various ideas which were dominant in Athens, at the time say of Anaxagoras (434 B.C.), all tended in one direction. Be- construction of opinion concerning the deep things of life had become an absolute necessity. The accusation of Anaxagoras was, in part, a result of the desire to rehabilitate traditional religion. But Greece formed no exception to the general rule, and reconstruction by way of harking back on the course of development was impossible. Although a new basis for religion might not be at once discoverable, the assumptions of Sophistic teachers might at least be subjected to searching scrutiny. From this point of view, then, the mission which waited Socrates' coming was to probe the commonly accepted dogmas of philosophy, and thus to show how far scepticism was capable of justification, or to what extent it was unwarrantable. Intensiveness is one of the most prominent characteristics of philosophical inquiry. Friction among men seems to be a condition of that quick perception which observes things under new aspects, and SCK produces fresh ideas to correct or transform the old. Given such circumstances, progress only needs a Socrates to fix the form which these ideas ought to take. It was for Socrates to fall into line with his age, in order to lead it eventually. His skill in the Sophists' special art, although put to very different use, cost him his life. Yet, without dialectic deftness, he had been unable to transcend the frivolous jugglery in which eristic ended. His life-work, as prepared for him by historical progress, was to turn investiga- tion from nature to man, and, by a refutation of ordi- nary Sophistic assumption, to reconstruct the theory 36 Socrates and Christ. of conduct on a totally new basis. To the successful accomplishment of this task his individuality lent in- calculable weight. For his conflict was not merely with subjective ideas, but also with the whole practice of those who imparted wisdom in consideration of personal gain. Of the slow steps by which Socrates gradually arrived at an understanding of his mission no record remains. During the period of his life sketched by Xenophon and Plato he was quite conscious of it. He knew that his office was to reform philosophy rather than to purify religion. With regard to the latter he seems to have maintained an attitude of reserve, and to have pro- nounced no very definite opinions. He unquestionably rebuked scepticism for the sake of scepticism in religious matters, 1 and appeared in no wise averse to accept established customs 2 when they did not inter- fere with free self-examination. If the early physical philosophies were objectionable in that they attempted secrets beyond human ken, so, Socrates apparently argued, the teaching of the Sophists was hurtful because, although assuming the activity of mind, it sought to deprive thought of all value. He therefore proceeded to examine the implications of the Sophistic dialectic. The extraordinary interest which his personality ex- cited, as well as the influence which he is known to have had, prove that he was aware of the difference between himself and other teachers. In many ways he was by no means unlike the Sophists. The same spirit of free and fearless inquiry was evinced by them. Like Socrates, they were accustomed to converse in market- place and in social gathering, and all, equally, discussed 1 Cf. Memorabilia, iv. 7. 2 Cf. Phsedo, 118; and Memorabilia, i. 1, 2. Mission and Philosophy of Socrates. 3 7 common subjects. But Socrates, being in his own esti- mation only a learner, had no pupils ; he talked with intimates and acquaintances. The result of his argu- ments, the simplicity of his ways, and his refusal to re- ceive money, indicated that he was conscious of a new mission. For example, he entices into conversation one Euthydemus, " who had collected many writings of the most celebrated poets and Sophists, and imagined that by that means he was outstripping his contemporaries in accomplishments." 1 But the Sophist, who is at first represented as having "never learned anything from any person," 2 and yet is " willing to offer such advice as may occur to him without premeditation," 3 finds him- self forced to declare after a little discussion : "I no longer put confidence in the answers which I give ; for all that I said before appears to me now to be quite different from what I then thought." 4 After this confession Socrates goes on to point out positively the value of self-knowledge. Euthydemus in the end admits his ignorance, and departs holding himself in contempt. But, thereafter, he associates constantly with Socrates ; and, as Xenophon adds, " when Socrates saw that he was thus disposed, he no longer puzzled him with questions, but explained to him, in the simplest and clearest manner, what he thought that he ought to know, and what it would be best for him to study." 5 Throughout there is not only an obvious purpose, but also a method of pursuing it. This pur- pose was Socrates' mission as he conceived it. His aim was to arrive at clear notions respecting life and self. The assurance that he was able to reach such certainty, and the belief that serious personal convic- 1 Memorabilia, iv. 2, 1. 2 Ibid., iv. 2, 4. 3 Ibid. 4 Ibid., iv. 2, 19. 5 Ibid., iv. 2, 40. 38 Socrates and Christ. tion was the sole hope at the moment for the elevat- ing of the Greek citizen, were chief among the ele- ments in what is termed his Daimonion. He had discerned the signs of the times. The necessity for a reformation of knowledge respecting ethico- reli- gious questions pressed upon him as it did upon a later teacher. His consciousness that he must needs be the organ of this reconstruction his Dsemon guided him throughout life, and nerved him to meet a death which, in his refusal to permit the easy removal of a misunderstanding which he considered final, came very near to sublime suicide. The methods by which Socrates sought to carry out his work have been variously classed and analysed. Probably Cicero's famous statement implies more than most commentaries : " Socrates called philosophy down from the heavens to earth, and introduced it into the cities and houses of men, compelling men to inquire concerning life and morals, and things good and evil." 1 A philosophy, taught objectively in social intercourse with all sorts and conditions of men, could not have been the " cut and dried " theoretical system to which the term is now apt to be applied. It was rather a species of reflection upon common things, with a view to the discovery of underlying conceptions. The so- phistic disputations concerning knowledge and morals resulted only in the discrediting of philosophy. The individual was so exalted, that no authority save his own formed an ultimate court of appeal in matters of thought. One man's ideas were as good as his neigh- bour's, and so truth and falsehood were such to the person for whom they seemed truth or falsehood. 1 Tusc., v. 4, 10. Mission and Philosophy of Socrates. 39 But, although eristic was thus negative, it had a certain positive aspect also. " Man is the measure of all things, of the existence of things that are, and of the non-existence of things that are not." 1 Absolute within his own sphere, the individual might well consider that lie, and not the external physical world, should be the object of philosophical investigation. This was, by implication, the teaching of the Sophists, but they never carried it out. On the other hand, Socrates, perceiving the real tendency, proceeded to develop and to improve upon it. He adopted the sophistical dialectic, not for the purpose of exalting the individual, but in the hope of finding a principle to which all acts of reason, both in knowledge and life, might be referred. His dialogues " were essentially a negative discussion of the great questions of philosophy and life, directed with consummate skill to the purpose of convincing any one who had merely adopted the commonplaces of received opinion, that he did not understand the subject that he as yet attached no definite meaning to the doctrines he ' professed in order that, becoming aware of his ignorance, he might be put in the way to obtain a stable belief, resting on a clear apprehension both of the meaning of the doctrines and of their evidence." 2 Socrates, in short, accepted the abstract subjective individual as presupposed by the Sophists, and, by bringing him to confess his obligations, made him objective related him to other minds in thought, and to other persons in society. This was what Aris- totle meant when he said that Socrates discovered the 1 Tliesetetus, 152. 2 On Liberty, J. S. Mill, p. 26 (people's edition). Cf. Zeller's Socrates, p. 113 sq. 4O Socrates and Christ. inductive mode of inquiry, and introduced the practice of seeking general definitions." 1 By this, however, the modern conceptions of general definition and of the induction to which it is subordinate, must not be understood. For Socrates excluded physical specula- tions from his philosophy, and concerned himself solely with man's intellectual and moral nature. He gained Aristotle's approbation, not on account of discoveries such as those for which Bacon, Newton, or Mill might be praised, but because he sought the essence of truth outside of the isolated individual, yet not apart from reason. Man was no longer the measure of all things, but thoughts and acts were to be judged by their agree- ment with what is universally acknowledged true or right. Thus the general definitions of Socrates related to mind as it diffused itself throughout society, and thereby afforded a basis for the regulation of life. His aim was to bring about the recognition of reason viewed in this way. Time was not yet for a completed theory of knowledge, and so the Socratic method cannot be treated like the customary organon of philosophy. Insisting, as he did, upon the importance of mind, Socrates tried to impress this upon others. And surely the most obvious method was that which he adopted ; he tried to induce others to use their own rational faculties. For this purpose the sophistical dialectic was an excellent instrument. When Theo- dorus said to Socrates, "You will not allow any one who approaches you to depart until you have stripped him, and he has tried a fall with you in argument," he received the frank enough avowal, "I am always at this rough game, which inspires me like a passion." 2 1 Metaph., xiii. 4. 2 Theaetetus, 169. Mission and Philosophy of Socrates. 4 1 Accordingly, we do nojL-fincL Socrates teadiing the art of wisdom, but preaching the virtue of knowledge. He put his associates to the question, and, by skill in interrogation, gradually induced them to draw conclu- sions of which they had no conscious idea at the outset. He thereby showed that a certain mental nature was common to men, if they but knew how to seek for it. "As part, therefore, of the Socratic dialectic, it was quite indispensable to show that thought was an in- digenous endowment, a quality of human nature no less than sensation, appetite, and desire. This proof, accordingly, was the main part of the business which Socrates was called upon to perform." 1 Yet he did not rest satisfied even here. Not only do men possess certain ideas in common, but they also act together. Knowledge manifests itself in specific concepts upon the import of which all are agreed. The numerous acts of life, both as they proceed from one will and as they concern many, are therefore referable to certain general conceptions. Socrates thus " brought into con- scious review the method of philosophising, which was afterwards still further considered and illustrated by Plato. General and abstract terms and their meaning stood out as the capital problems of philosophical research, and as the governing agents of the human mind during the process." 2 Out of apparent conflict he aimed thus to bring consistency. Consequently, his method, taken as a whole, is at once analytic and synthetic. It seeks, first, to prove the unity of ex- perience for all men, and then to trace the result of this agreement in special ideas according to a common 1 Ferrier's Greek Philosophy, p. 217. 2 Grote's Plato, vol. i. p. 92. 42 Socrates and Christ. understanding of which both individuals and com- munities act. The object is "to doubt men's doubts away," to rehabilitate the testimony of the senses by showing that multifarious perceptions originate certain conceptions which all men alike possess. Derived from the Sophists, the use of the method in Socrates' hands was entirely original, and its results unexampled. A far greater exemplar than any Sophist of the truth that every individual has his own " personal equation," his life yet served to prove that the unique charac- ter is peculiar in development but not in natural con- stitution. The general effect of the Socratic method, then, was to bring about a reconstruction of knowledge concern- ing the isolated individual of whom the Sophists had made so much. Each one has a proprium only in that, as a condition, he shares in a community of mental goods. In knowledge, just as in life, debt is the source of wealth. Socrates probably did not see that the " soli- tary man is either a god or a beast," but of the non- existence of such an one he was perfectly aware. Self- knowledge is thus the panacea for the evils of scepticism and of intellectual pride. But, what is its content, to what does it amount ? The interpretations of Socrates' maxim, " Know thyself," have generally been in number according to the interpreters. Some have thought that it implied an analytic self-reflection, such as that in which introspective psychology deals ; others have supposed that, in opposition to the assurance of the Sophists, it was the enunciation of human frailty; while, again, it has been taken as the starting-point of a search for the unity of contradictories which cannot be unified. But to force any such meaning upon the Mission and Philosophy of Socrates. 43 phrase is more than unfair. Socrates has no system, and although his maxim may post facto be turned to the defence of modern theory, it is to be remembered that such was not its original object. Kather let it be read in its own light. The true meaning is negatively put in ' The Apology,' * thus" If I tell you that no better thing can happen to a man than to converse every day about virtue, and the other matters on which you have heard me conversing, and examining myself and others, and that an unexamined life is not worth living, then you will believe me still less. But that is the truth, my friends, though it is not easy to convince you of it." Yes, " an unexamined life is not worth living," it is not a life at all in the Socratic sense. It is because this was the manner in which Socrates understood his maxim that he is worthy of comparison with Christ. Virtue is its own reward; and Socrates' whole phil- osophy, both in its theoretical and practical aspects, was there only for the sake of its ethical conclusion. Self-knowledge was a means, but not an end. Admi- rable because it led to a better life, it was in no way valued except as it found practical application in rais- ing its possessors above the ordinary complacencies of the day. " This examination was not a mere discipline ending in itself, but a preparation to qualify a man for receiving culture and improvement, for attaining cor- rectedness of knowledge and rational method in action, and for doing the best by himself and the state." 5 Socratic self-knowledge, then, means primarily a search for convictions, for generally admitted truths, and results in an application of these convictions to life. So too, in practice, the individual is only able to live 1 38. 2 The Apology (Riddell's edition), p. 90, note 1. 44 Socrates and Christ. consistently when he is acquainted with the ideas which are operative there. He cannot be a good citi- zen, for example, unless he is familiar with the implicit but recognisable relationship between fellow-country- men. The solidarity of knowledge and action, appre- hended by an understanding of universally diffused concepts, is thus the import of the Socratic maxim. This, in turn, naturally led to some very important deductions, which may fairly be taken as indicative of Socrates' creative activity, and which furnish his contri- bution to his age, as indeed to all time. Virtue and knowledge, if not absolutely identical, are in any case inseparable. Hence the immediate value of self-know- ledge lies in its intimate connection with life. This, then, indicates the two points in Socratic theory. Virtue and knowledge have one bearing on the indi- vidual life taken by itself, another on social relation- ship. If virtue and knowledge be inseparable, it is necessary that the individual should know himself. In other words, the presupposition of a moral life is a certain intellectual activity. Mind, on this view, is a causa sui. because it contains something ultimate which must be made matter of discovery. A ... if, now and then, they apprehended the world in its fulness, and had a vision, almost ' beatific/ of ideal personalities in life and art ; yet these moments were a very costly matter : they paid a great price for them, if we duly consider it, in a thousand possible sympathies, and things only to be enjoyed through sympathy, from which they detached themselves, in the mere intellectual pride of loyalty to a theory which could take nothing for granted, and assent to no hypothetical or approximate truths." 2 The new Eclecticism, then, was constructed from the more commonly accepted elements of the preceding systems. Stoicism took on a certain amount of tender- ness from Epicureanism ; Epicureanism was so far braced by Stoicism. 3 Yet, despite advantages of this kind, Koman Eclecticism, like all its kind, was mainly a stop-gap theory. With it philosophy ceased to strive after man's eternal welfare. The problem of life as a whole received but scant attention at a time when the 1 Marius the Epicurean, vol. ii. ch. ii. 2 Ibid., pp. 23-25. 3 Cf. Mr Lecky, following Plutarch, History of European Morals, vol. i. pp. 263 sq. Scepticism, Complacency, and Superstition. 133 all-absorbing pursuits of the present limited the intel- lectual outlook. It is to be remembered that, taken even at its best, all Eclecticism must in a manner be a confession of failure. Systems set about to solve the riddles of knowing and being, and so long as they are vigorous, they turn neither to the right nor to the left from their search after truth. But when a moment comes, as come it often does, in which the deep plum- met seems but to tell of a bottomless abyss, then there is faltering. A philosophy seeks aid from without only when it begins to be doubtful of itself. And when such doubt is abroad, the earnest single-mindedness neces- sary for grappling with higher problems cannot but be wanting. Stoicism, ere it arrived at Rome, was filled with strength for the resolution of Aristotelian dualism. But changed circumstances rendered the worse Stoicism the more successful philosophy at the great city. Hence the Eclecticism which grew out of it no longer pursued the essential search of speculation, but paused in order the better to adapt itself to numerous moment- ary demands. Adaptation was the new but barren principle which it thrust upon philosophy. Amid the busy practical life of a ruling people, the desire to escape from the world's limitations vanished awhile. Scepticism occasioned a sense of need for some sort of certainty in things spiritual. Eclecticism, quarrying in previous systems, heaped up a miscellaneous pile of doctrines applicable to life, and, as an addition of its own, proceeded to impress the individual with an idea of his resultant ability. The business of the philoso- pher is, therefore, to justify each man's particular acts to himself, and that in accordance with a standard of truth or right which recommends itself to the person 1 34 Socrates and Christ. whose knowledge or morality happens to be under judg- ment. The "probability" of Carneades naturally be- comes respectable when invested with the cloak of Stoic virtue, and in displaying the adaptability of Epicurean happiness inevitably makes itself useful. Theory is now degraded to the menial task of discovering for citizen or slave what he had best do in a minor difficulty, or of justifying, post facto, such actions as a little forethought might have prevented. Not what is eternally true and right, but what is expedient and justifiable for this man here and now that is the question. And as " one man's meat is another man's poison," the ethical value of this philosophy may easily be gauged. Eclecticism, in fact, is not only no effectual answer to Scepticism, but is itself the cause of further doubt. To find and describe " the immediately certain " is unquestionably a laud- able object. Yet the search must be initiated with the question, what is " the immediately certain " ? Each individual must be left to judge for himself, or, to every man a specially measured and clipped system must be supplied. Knowledge, as it really is, becomes one thing for the judge, another for the criminal. Doubt concern- ing punishment is the unavoidable result. Knowledge is known to exist, yet, somehow, man is apparently unable to arrive at it. In some such way Eclecticism reproduces the very doubt against which it arose to protest. It applies itself to the endless task of adjudi- cating on each individual's every act, and that with a special standard for each. " Non numero hcec judi- cantur sed pondere" Assuredly. But who is to be the judge ? Here, as ever, the casuistry which begins by regarding all doubts as duties, ends by reducing all duties to doubts. Scepticism, Complacency, and Superstition. 135 Philo of Larissa and Antiochus of Ascalon were the chief founders and teachers of Eclecticism as a formal system. The influence of the new tendency on the life of the day, however, was represented not by the pro- fessional thinkers, but by a pupil of Antiochus, who was only an " amateur in philosophy." Marcus Tullius Cicero, to whom one would willingly devote much more consideration than is here possible, was the microcosm of the thought of his age. In him the decline of Stoi- cism into a system of mere utility, and the subordination of ethical research to casuistical argument, found full exemplification. It has long been the custom to dis- parage his power as a thinker ; probably it were fairer to blame the period than the man. To tell the honest truth, Cicero was no original thinker. The conflict of contending opinions effectively prevented the tranquil- lity essential to achievement in abstract thought. At the same time, he was a diligent student who possessed unusual faculty of selection and restatement. Without the learning of Varro, he had the more effective gift of lucid exposition. Neither an Academician, an Epi- curean, nor a Stoic, his varied practical experience fitted him to cull from all these schools such senti- ments as were best suited to contemporary require- ments. If he doubts, it is more because he despairs of theory than of thought. Firm footing is to be found in none of the competing philosophies ; therefore, as a last resort, the would-be thinker must look to himself for the criterion of truth. On this account Ciceronianism has been stigmatised as time-serving. In one sense it was. Cicero never saw that the ideal of Stoicism, and of his own revered Plato, had nothing in common with the variegated individual utilities which, with him, went 136 Socrates and Christ. to make up " the good." But, on the other hand, everything that has any meaning must be time-serving. And this blindness was the distinguishing characteristic of the Eclecticism of the day. Philosophy was phil- osophy then only so be that it transformed itself into obiter dicta as quickly as possible. 1 The Ciceronian ethical code advises a well-considered compliance with use and wont. The ' De Officiis,' with its careful anat- omy of moral probabilities, is a fitting introduction to the ' Tusculanae Disputationes ' and the doctrine of in- dividual complacency. This pliability in action was the immediate result of a train of thought which made provision for guidance on particular occasions only. To " know nothing with absolute certainty," even if we do " know that which is most important with as much certainty as we require to know it," 2 is a species of assurance that may do well at rare intervals, but which, as a universal principle, is certain to break down at all other times. Macaulay's characterisation 3 sweeping, suo more overshoots the mark ; but Plato's gentler phrase prophetically sums up Cicero's case " the last garment which the pure man doffs is the love of fame." 4 From a rounded theory of man and the world, philosophy had now sunk to the level of a machine for the production of virtue as required. The heart's desire of the old Stoics, to bring God back to earth, and to raise man to a divine state, ended here in an 1 Compare the interesting parallel drawn between Cicero and Soc- rates in Mr Benn's The Greek Philosophers, vol. ii. p. 170 sq. 2 Zeller's Eclectics, p. 157. 3 Cf. Essay on Bacon. 4 Quoted by Niebuhr in his Lectures on Roman History, vol. iii. p. 24. Scepticism, Complacency, and Superstition. 137 amazing inability to make any ethical use of the idea of deity, and in an equally curious attempt to square moral precept with customary practice. For Cicero's reputation, the incidence of "the power of the man and the power of the moment " was unfortunate. Yet he was great for the very reason that he represented his age so completely. Constant dissipation of energy in other directions left neither time nor inclination to the Komans for the pondering of problems which did not directly affect the pursuits of the hour. With Marcus Terentius Varro Doctissimus Roman- orum the Ciceronian epoch gave place to the Augustan. And, indeed, time was ripe for the transition. For, Varro's Eclecticism bore no such recommendations as that of Cicero. This " able man was unfortunately too much a scholar to confess that he neither could nor would be a philosopher, and accordingly as such throughout life he performed a blind dance not altogether becoming between the Stoa, Pythagorean- ism, and Diogenism." x As contrasted with a busy age, represented by a busy man, the Augustan era was a time rather of rest and literary reflectiveness. Save for the interesting school of the Sextii, to which we owe Seneca, philosophy re- mained very much as it had been. The disquietude of republican political life was succeeded by the compara- tive calm of imperial rule, and mere appropriation of Greek culture, at high pressure as it were, gave place to its more unobtrusive appreciation by the finished scholar. 2 The empire at last contained but one people, 1 History of Rome, Momrasen, vol. iv. p. 593, note. 2 The change in the influence of Greek culture is well depicted by Jahn in his Populare Aufsatze, Hofische Kunst und Poesie unter 138 Socrates and Christ. and the Eomans paused a while to enjoy their con- quests, material and spiritual. At such a time a dis- tinctive development of Eoman genius was only natural, and the remarkable efflorescence of literature formed the memorable feature of this revival. But another tendency also made its appearance a leaning towards the old religion which was later to work momentous results. At first this rehabilitation of the ancient Eoman gods, and of the characteristic national pietas, had a some- what close connection with philosophy. The old deities were so many " familiars " or reproductions of their worshippers, just as ethical philosophy consisted in a series of concessions to popular use and wont. But this likeness, even founded as it was on the genius of a people, could not withstand the progress of uni- versal religious consciousness. The pagan reaction, which soon followed, involved issues immeasurably more important than any incident to a simple re- adoption of a former faith. Meanwhile, although changed much by the course of thought, Stoicism had not been destroyed. And the school of the Sextii, as represented by Sotion, had the honour of training a man who, while clinging to the older philosophy of Zeno, was also heir to " the fulness of the time." Seneca might indeed be of the Stoa, but Christian Fathers claimed him after as almost their own. Nor was their contention without justification, unconscious of it though they were. For Seneca was not only a Stoic of the later eclectic kind, he was also a man of the world, and open to influences as powerful as any exercised by abstract theory. As a consequence, Augustus. See also Professor Sellar's Roman Poets of the Augustan Age, ch. i. Scepticism, Complacency, and Superstition. 139 like Cicero, he has been variously denounced with- out measure, or indiscriminately lauded by modern writers. Gibbeted by Macaulay, 1 partly, one fancies, for the mere words' sake ; damned with faint praise by Me- buhr ; 2 dubbed "rhetorician" by Dollinger ; 3 he has also been considered capable of regenerating " an age desper- ately overrun with drolls and sceptics " 4 by Sir Eoger L'Estrange. Thoroughly representative of his age, Seneca has either been made its scapegoat unfairly, or, to his equal misfortune, he has been judged by reference to one portion of his work alone. A less partial view might result were he to be regarded in three different aspects. He is typical, first, of the reaction to Stoicism, which, in the early empire, was the only creed with sufficient affinity for the old Eomau character that the cultured sought to revive. Again, and operating in another direction, the eclectic tendency of philosophy, particularly as it attempted to adapt itself to the com- mon difficulties of ordinary people, affected him strongly* Moreover, his own private circumstances favoured this influence. A theory that inculcated poverty lost a portion of its power when practised by a rich man, and the independence of the ideal Stoic suffered certain rude shocks in the person of an emperor's adviser. Thirdly, Seneca, no matter how he might flout the popular religion, was himself swayed, far more than he knew, by that deep-seated " wish to believe " which, 1 See Essay on Bacon towards the close just before the character- istically valuable "smut and stubble" estimate of Greek philosophy. 2 Cf. Lectures on Roman History, vol. iii. p. 185 sq. 3 Cf. The Gentile and the Jew, vol. ii. p. 125. 4 Cf. Seneca's Morals by way of Abstract, edited by W. Clode, Introd., p. xiv. 140 Socrates and Christ. originating in the Augustan era, continued for long years to increase in fervour. When one remembers that Seneca was not a pro- fessional thinker, but rather a reflective man whose position entailed much practical work, his contribution to philosophy at once appears less inconsiderable. His office was in no sense that of a schoolman or of a system-maker. Brought into constant contact with common life, his reflections were primarily directed towards the amelioration of society by a comparison between what it was and what it conceivably might be. His meditations, as has been well said, " took the place of religious principles among the educated circles of the Eoman empire ; were a protest of real value against the coarse materialism of the old heathen world ; taught the choicer spirits how to live with dignity and die with honour." 1 To such protest Stoic doctrine was, of all others, best suited. Accordingly, Seneca reproduces many of the ideas usually associated with the teaching of Zeno and Chrysippus. In particular, the ideal of the wise man, with its accompaniment of freedom from aught but self, figures prominently; physical specula- tions also receive some attention. But, for all this, Seneca could not escape the "down grade" of phil- osophy. For him, as perhaps for no other Stoic, the wise man remained a mere ideal. Eclecticism, having accommodated itself to the wants of the time, 2 was not to be easily displaced by the reintroduction of any former theory, however desirable. The monism of 1 Stoicism, W. W. Capes, p. 161. 2 Seneca's respect for Epicurus whose philosophy was most adaptable and his frequent quotations from him, are important in this connection. Scepticism, Complacency, and Superstition. 141 the Stoics might indeed be the mainspring of Seneca's physics, but the logic of accomplished changes forced him to a dualism. The wise man of Zeno might be his pattern, but rude use defaced it, if not beyond recog- nition, at least beyond reproduction. Seneca sometimes takes good heart enough to give a species of theoretical reality to man's self -appreciation to the complacency which, under the name of honestum, played a prominent part in Ciceronian ethics. But, alas ! experience is against even such justifiable pride. " Conceive in this vast city, where without cease a crowd pours through the broadest streets, and like a river dashes against anything that impedes its rapid course this city, that consumes the grain of all lands what a solitude and desolation there would be if nothing were left save what a severe judge could absolve of fault ! We have all sinned (peccavimus omnes), some more gravely, others more lightly some from purpose, others by chance impulse, or else carried away by wickedness external to them ; others of us have wanted fortitude to stand by our resolutions, and have lost our innocence unwillingly and not without a struggle. Not only have we erred, but to the end of time we shall continue to err. Even if any one has already so well purified his mind that nothing can shake or decoy him any more, it is through sinning that he has arrived at this state of innocence." 1 So far as he was able to overcome this deep sense of defect, Seneca still clung to the abstract freedom of the Stoics. The ideal man is he who attains liberty in loneliness. Longing for retirement from the world the consequence, no doubt, of inability 1 De dementia, i. 6. Cf. Grant's Ethics of Aristotle, vol. i. p. 356 sq. 142 Socrates and Christ. to accommodate his ideal to circumstances, and yet to keep it gradually grew upon Seneca. Anxiety to show a balance to the right side in a life which ended here, naturally filled him with a desire to isolate himself from the contaminating influences of ordinary society. Here Seneca's essential affinity for the religious reac- tion of his time appears. Truth to tell, it is not so much freedom that is now the ideal, as salvation from a self which finds its only life amid circumstances entirely unsuited to the evolution of goodness. The old Platonic conception, that body is somehow indissolubly associ- ated with evil, affected Seneca's final account of man not a little. The problem of existence, as it presents itself to the sage, has almost passed from the search after freedom here, to the vague groping for individual perfection to be realised in another state, where earthly hindrances do not obtain. The deep religious tone dis- played by Seneca is only a result of this, the altered mood of self-examination. He was not acquainted with Paul, 1 neither did he adopt phrases from Chris- tian sources. But he felt the need of which Paul had conviction ; he saw, if only " through a glass darkly," that man in his common state is unable to rebuild life to his own soul his materials are far too scant. Seneca's supreme contempt for the popular religion was not unlike Voltaire's hatred of theological dogma. After his own manner, he illustrated the attitude of mind expressed in the " si Dieu n'existait pas, il faud- rait 1'inventer." The official resuscitation of religion 1 Compare Aubertin's Rapports supposees entre Seneque et St Paul ; Lightfoot's Epistle to the Philippians, p. 268 sq., especially p. 276, note 1 ; Farrar's Seekers after God, chaps, xiv. and xv. Scepticism, Complacency, and Superstition. 143 by Augustus was but the prelude to a spontaneous popular movement towards a faith of some kind. The struggle against evil, the depreciation of man as he is, in short, the perception that this life was not what it ought to be, proved that, despite the circlet of philo- sophical culture, Seneca was himself in no wise exempt from the needs which originated the popular religious revival. Superstition he hated, but he did not perceive that such bizarre beliefs as then prevailed were, to the uninstructed, what the conviction of the good man's divinity was to himself. Seneca was a " Platonising Stoic," just in proportion as he felt the inadequacy of the old Stoic freedom. Neither longing for the posses- sion of self, nor necessity for expulsion of the passions, was the conclusion which persistence of evil forced upon him, but the half-consciously apprehended search after a new life, or after a positive end to which the passions might be subordinated. In another sphere and in a different fashion, the same alteration of man's attitude towards the present life was expressing itself in a quickened sense of an indefinable spiritual need, and in a remarkable up-growth of superstition. An hungered and without proper sustenance, man " would fain have filled his belly with the husks that the swine did eat." Stoicism failed to satisfy the spiritual necessities of the ancient world. Even when tempered by the adap- tations of Eclecticism, it was unable to remove man be- yond the reach of evil, either by raising him above it, or by teaching him how to control it. After all its theorising, the explanation of things appeared as in- effective as before. The demand for a cause sufficient to account for the universe, which is the invariable 144 Socrates and Christ. accompaniment of self - consciousness, 1 finds satisfac- tion, of a rough and ready sort perhaps, in religious doctrine. "The first function of religion is to fur- nish an answer to the question of the origin of the world and the phenomena of human life." 2 And, at Eome, the movement towards Eclecticism which, among the educated classes, indicated a sense of Stoic failure, found parallel, among the people, in an eclectic religi- ous revival. The steady effort of Augustus to rehabilitate the ancient Koman worship was prompted not only by reasons of statecraft, but also by a desire to divert sup- port from foreign deities, some of whom had numerous devotees. But paganism was not simplified in this way. The idea of an imperial religion, of one faith for the whole empire, was doubtless thus originated. But the form which it ultimately took was more that of a wise toleration, permissive of all gods, plus the deified emperor,' than of a state religion, selected from the rest, and enforced by government authority. For long years scepticism had been undermining the sanctions of re- ligion, and, when the natural reaction came, credu- lity of the most abject kind abounded everywhere.* Superstitions, as endless in their variety as the people of the great metropolis, were rampant. The worship of Isis, of Serapis, of Mithras, and of the Idean Mother, belief in omens and miracles, flourished with oriental luxuriance, beside the cult of Jove and the other old 1 Compare the suggestive discussion in Mr Crozier's Civilisation and Progress, p. 263 sg. (new ed.) 2 Ibid., p. 264. 3 Cf. Friedlander's Darstellung aus der Sitten Geschichte Roms, Part iii., chaps, iv. and vi. Cf. also The Greek Philosophers, A. W. Benn, vol. ii., chap, iv., especially p. 224 sq. Scepticism, Complacency , and Superstition. 145 Eoman deities. While, more remarkable than any, the religion of Judea, despite its despised votaries, began to attract many adherents. Paganism, in short, took a new lease of life in the absence of any authoritative source of spiritual comfort. The tendency of the time, towards living for the moment, had philosophical effects which have already been noted. 1 Here it was exemplified in the multiplica- tion of rite and ceremony. Outward observance seemed to do duty for depth of inner feeling or conviction. In this connection Mr Benn's remark, 2 that the Jewish proselytes were attracted more by Sabbath observance than by theological doctrine, is full of meaning. The existence of this craving for something concrete receives further proof from the spontaneity with which the wor- ship of the emperor was often carried out. It was not a mere fashionable foible. For, when the Caesar had be- stowed real benefits upon his people as in the case of Augustus, or was himself a saintly man as in the case of Marcus Aurelius, the veneration of his person became the more sincere and permanent. As regards "the philosopher ruler," this is specially remarkable. Without entering into further details, it may be said that the pagan reaction during the Empire marked the transition from the abstract problem of man's individual freedom to that of concrete individual salvation. A widespread sense of failure and defect existed. Paganism received an unexpected respite in that it so far ministered to this need. It was not so utterly dead as the philosophers had thought, otherwise it had fallen before Christianity far more unresistingly than proved 1 See above, p. 136. 2 The Greek Philosophers, vol. ii. p. 218. K 1 46 Socrates and Christ. to be the case. But the very necessities which cradled the new religion of the Cross also revived beliefs which, in speculative theory at least, had long been set aside. Greek influence had softened Eoman hardness; and Stoicism, taking on in its eclectic form unwonted ten- derness and adaptability, had lent itself to its own de- struction by cultivating " passions " which only tangible realities could satisfy. Not an abstract rule of life, but a plain statement of duty, no matter how absurd, was acceptable to a people whose corruption naturally fol- lowed from a sufficiency of things for this world, and whose spiritual emptiness found no satisfaction in State grants of grain, or in luxuries fetched from the ends of the earth. Paganism flourished as it provided, in posi- tive ritual, a seeming performance of virtuous acts. But it furnished no lasting salvation from self and the evil that is in self, because it could not set a pattern of manhood in the midst of sinners who longed for such exemplar. 1 "We too desire, not a fair one, but the fairest of all. Unless we find him, we shall think we have failed." 2 The causes of the pagan reaction lay deep down in the civilisation of the Koman world. Then, as at no other time, sin and suffering triumphed over holiness. Philosophy, reasoning to an impersonal God, could not satisfy the head, nor was the old religion, with its array of pretty tales, sufficient to stay the cravings of the heart. Stoicism, in its search for a first principle, only arrived at self-contradiction. To live in conformity with Nature the best must needs be made of irresistible natural law. Yet the wise man is, or ought to be, free ; for he is wise because he deliberately chooses the good. 1 Cf. Virgil, Eclog. iv. 2 Marias the Epicurean, vol. ii. p. 191. Scepticism, Complacency, and Superstition. 147 God is far from man, and even the theism of Cicero fails to connect morality with religion. The Stoic theory of self-dependence arrives at a consciousness of its own inemcacy in Seneca. 1 A readiness is evinced to link man with God, and to emphasise the necessity for redemption from self. Asceticism, while driving away the grosser passions, at the same time occasioned the loss of many opportunities for developing the more pleasing graces. Eemnants of faith, and even of hope, remained, but no charity could abide with cynicism. Indifference took the place of pity for suffering, for sin scorn served instead of shame. Nor did the outburst of superstition promise any more permanent satisfaction. It bore witness to a diffused need for a revelation of truth. But the whereabouts of the desired light was unknown, and worse, was acknow- ledged to be unknowable. Yet such were the necessities, that multitudes deceived themselves into thinking that time was when the gods dwelt upon earth. With many mysterious rites and significant ceremonies, they sought to propitiate the departed deities, so as to win their presence here below once again. Behind all these undoubtedly lay the deep thoughts concerning things unseen accumulated by the ancient world. The har- mony with self of the philosopher had relation to a harmony with a material or spiritual not-self, as the case might be. Duty, conceived as obedience to a law, 2 could not be explained unless the double application of law itself were regarded. A command is from the out- side inwards, and to obey it is virtuous only when the act implies a transformation possible alone in a movement 1 Cf. Baur's Church History, vol. i. p. 16, note 1. 2 Cf. Plutarch, Sto. Rep., ii. 1. 148 Socrates and Christ. from the inside outwards. Philosophy failed to set forth the true freedom of virtue, just as religion could not reveal the one source of moral obligation. Yet the Ko- man citizen yearned for knowledge and for faith alike. What other interpretation can be put upon the fourth Eclogue ? 1 A conviction of defect was abroad, like- wise an ardent longing for better things, if only for the return of some mythical golden age. Nor, in succeeding years, did the dire social fortunes of the dominant peo- ple fail to quicken their recognition of present imper- fection. " Long before death ended the astute comedy in which Augustus had so gravely borne his part, he had experienced the Nemesis of Absolutism, and foreseen the awful possibilities which it involved. But neither he, nor any one else, could have divined that four such rulers as Tiberius, Gaius, Claudius, and Nero the first a sanguinary tyrant, the second a furious madman, the third an uxorious imbecile, the fourth a heartless buffoon would in succession afflict and horrify the world. Yet these rulers sat upon the breast of Eome with the paralysing spell of a nightmare." 2 With such divinities a large class might well rise who regarded all conviction as fanatical and all enthusiasm as ill-man- nered. Yet Pilate's question only represents the post- ponement of man's inevitable reckoning with his own nature. To pass " the impracticable hours " is a way of living ; it is not a way of life. And, as if in answer to this deeper need, a new philosophy, with a message akin in some sort to the "good news," arose to mark the " fulness of the time." 1 Cf. Roman Poets of the Augustan Age, W. Y. Sellar, p. 144 sq. 2 The Early Years of Christianity, F. W. Farrar, pp. 10, 11 (pop. edition). 149 CHAPTEE VII. THE IMPORTANCE OF THE CONTACT BETWEEN JEW AND GREEK. THE world peace forced upon the nations by Eoman supremacy had, as its counterpart, a certain feeling of general unrest. Just as the social bonds so congenial to Plato and Aristotle proved obstacles to the individual freedom of the Stoics, so this very freedom, guaranteed now by Koman citizenship, issued in a desire to escape from self altogether. When self-sufficiency and self- indulgence fail to fill life when human nature, weary both of the world and of its own disquiet, begins to take thought concerning itself then the too obvious method of suicide is supplemented by some more efficient, if less speedy plan of salvation. The anxiety to escape from self engenders the belief that there is some beatific state, or some divine person in whom exist none of the defects so bitterly experienced by man. Set over against the world, pure in contrast to its impurity, is a higher individual, communion with whom may mean deliverance. The great problems for the sin-oppressed thus come to be, what is the nature of such a being ? and how is he related to this world ? The latter is 1 50 Socrates and Christ. plainly the more important question ; for, the connect- ing link between God and the world is also the bridge across which the sinner must escape to rest. A mediating essence of this sort, a power lying behind things and revealed in them, was not unknown to the Greeks. "To the most cultivated, it was awe and acceptance of the fact of mystery, and not the thrilling at the consciousness of realised beauty in stone or otherwise, that ruled their souls. The same thing is patent in our own popular holy feasts of Baptism and the Supper. Beauty is there as the attendant to solemnity, the awfulness of life and death." 1 This is the key to the view of deity taken by Plato. There is here a great mystery ; and because that mystery was acknowledged, the Platonic philosophy recommended itself, towards the close of ancient order, to all who were searching vaguely for some transcendent being or state. To this correlation of supply with demand must be traced the wonderful renaissance of Platonic influ- ence in the Grseco-Jewish school of Alexandria. Mysticism, particularly when it takes the form of religious philosophy, commonly concerns itself with soteriology. Salvation from self, by means of union with God, is the end, and abstraction from the things of sense is the method. Mysticism of this kind pre- supposes a deity separated from and superior to the world. Now the rehabilitation of Platonism, in certain of its aspects, was caused by its obvious ability to supply such a deity. In 'The Eepublic' or c Parmen- ides' God is a transcendent being, who not only possesses freedom by his very nature, but is also un- touched by mundane imperfections. In short, he is 1 Quest, T. Sinclair, p. 101. Contact between Jew and Greek. 151 what the mystic desires to become. Nor is this all. According to the Platonic metaphor, God, qud " Idea of the Good," stands definitely related to man. Persistent evils notwithstanding, man knows " the good " in part, just as he sees the light in part, and he can trace it back to its source. Should he desire to rise to a higher state, he already has a certain conception of the one being whose life is a realisation of that state, nay more, he feels, indefinably perhaps, that he bears kinship to this being. In such a case, consciousness of the im- perfection, if not of the unreality of life, is, as it was to Plato, the earnest that a perfect being, and a state to which perfection is organic, exist. Personal salvation does not depend, therefore, on conformity to a law of nature, but rather on such wise direction of life that, in a moment of supreme exaltation, a vision of deity may be obtained. The Jewish- Alexandrians were not influenced so much by Plato's later idea of love to a Divine Person. They were attracted more by his enunciation of the fact that such a Being existed, and of the necessity that man should assimilate himself to this deity. The idea involved was thus religious rather than moral. Not purity, but individual perfection especially in the shape of freedom from temptation was desired. And the element of extreme mysticism in this conception sprang from the belief that likeness to God, with its attendant disappearance of evil propensities, could be attained only in proportion to the severity of self -negation. Accordingly, the first factor in the new philosophy was the transcendent God of Plato the simple unity removed beyond all possible differences, at once perfect and without attributes. Man's sole way of salvation lies in striving to liken himself to 152 Socrates and Christ. this abstract entity. The dualism between God and the world, between the divine and the human, will disappear when the latter have been absorbed in the former, but not till then. God is ; what he is can be revealed only in a state of union with him. Platonism alone, however, did not supply all the elements formative of this new school. Nay, its more characteristic doctrines were originally derived from the Stoics. God may transcend the world, yet if he is to be a real deity, he must relate himself to creation. The Platonic conception of the Divine Being, as set forth in the ' Timaeus,' doubtless formulates such a relation- ship. But the world-process of Chrysippus illustrates it in a far more developed form. While, therefore, the origin of the Alexandrian Logos may be credited to Plato, it is referable more properly to Stoicism. 1 The transcendent view of deity, as taken partly by Plato and completely by Aristotle, was here exchanged for a doctrine of immanency, in which both the world and man were included. The universe is ruled by an all- present wisdom which, even if impersonal, constitutes the sole simulacrum of deity. God is no longer set over against the world, but becomes practically identical with it. Mediation between God and creation is not necessary, because the deity only exists in so far as he is seen causing all things to work together. Now the advance towards a solution of the constant question re- specting the relationship between man and God, which was signalised in the Jewish-Alexandrians, was largely due to their adoption not only of the Platonic, but also of the Stoic theory. They accepted the Platonic 1 Cf. Philo-Judseus, R. B. Drummond, vol. i. p. 75 sq. Heinze in Theol. Litztg. (1877), 112; and in Die Lehre vom Logos, p. 140 sq. Contact between Jew and Greek. 1 5 3 conception of an absolute and abstract entity which is above all imperfection. But they provided themselves with a way of escape from the conclusion of God's aloofness. The Stoic pantheism taught them the pro- per direction in which to look for a link of connec- tion with the hitherto transcendent deity. But their materials did not end here. Yet another, and that the most important influence, affected them. 1 As its name purports, the Graeco-Jewish school of Alexandria was the first in which Greek philosophy experienced the action of Jewish religion. Eeason, which had thus far gone about to provide man with freedom, god, and salvation, was now to be impinged upon by a faith that had postulated a certain view of deity as its starting-point. The result, thanks to favour- ing cosmopolitanism, was highly instructive. Greek philosophy received what it had so long sought in vain ; Jewish religion lost much that had hitherto cramped its inner development. An excellent indication of the character of the new factor, with which Judaism was able to furnish Hellenism, is supplied by the causes of the successful Jewish proselytism at Eome during the pagan reaction. Broken as a compact nation by the Captivity, and only retaining place as a state by in- 1 It seemed unnecessary, for the present purpose, to enter upon a consideration of possible Neo-Pythagorean influences, more particularly as this question has been connected with theological controversies which it was desirable to avoid. Compare Zeller's Phil, der Griechen, iii., Abth. 2, p. 281 sq. ; Lightfoot's Epistle to the Colossians, p. 394 sq., especially pp. 382-386. The statement on p. 383 that the Pytha- gorean school entirely disappears before the middle of the fourth century B.C. appears a little too strong in view of Nicomachus of Gerasa, P. Nigidius Figulus, and of the Augustan works purporting to be of ancient Pythagorean origin. Probably Keim's view is truer. See Jesus of Nazara, vol. i. p. 365 sq. 154 Socrates and Christ. trigue with successive heathen rulers, the Jews were scattered abroad among all the kingdoms which rose on the ruins of Alexander's empire. Yet, wherever they happened to be, in Athens, or Eome, or Alexandria, they preserved their peculiar religion intact. The punc- tum stans of Judaism was the revelation of himself vouchsafed by a monotheistic God ; and the resultant conviction of almost fanatical intensity regarding the divine nature and presence, could not be ex- changed for the flexible doctrine of any less spiritually grounded creed. The force of this belief, and the clear views of deity which it embodied, were the qualities that attracted men towards the religion of a despised people, at a time when scepticism and superstition flourished remarkably. In the same way, the Graeco- Jewish phil- osophy of Alexandria added the monotheistic concep- tion of deity to the many elements furnished by Greek reason. Men might now "know him that is." 1 And, in- deed, this addition was inevitable. For, " the one God of heathenism was another than that of Israel ; he was not like the latter if I may so express myself ethical to the very core. Certainly he had moral attributes also ; in the system of some philosophers in that of Plato, for instance they came even prominently into the foreground. But it is very doubtful whether this- would have been the case also in the popular belief, even though it were granted that it could have been developed on the ground of philosophical reflection. But, on the other hand, holiness, righteousness, mercy, formed the very nature of the God of the prophets. And a thing which above all we must never lose sight of that which they themselves possessed, and 1 Wisdom of Solomon, chap. xiii. 1. Contact between Jew and Greek. 155 therefore could awaken in others also, was religion, no speculation, but a reality of life. The influence of philosophy would have always been more negative ; it undermined polytheism, but it did not show at least that it could build anything better on its ruins." 1 An ethical conception of God of a deity who is the postulate, and not the mere goal, of thought was the Judaic contribution to the new philosophy. Moreover, this was the most important, because the distinctive, element that it contained. For the school remained Hebraic rather than Hellenic in nature. The old Palestinian exclusiveness was never entirely broken down, nor was its resultant bias corrected. Gibbon gauged the case rightly, when he said of the Jews, that " a larger acquaintance with mankind extended their knowledge without correcting their prejudices." Well for the world that it was so. The distinctive Jewish ideal reached Greek philosophy intact, with the result that a flood of fresh light was thrown upon the dark problem of God's relation to mankind. In Franz Baader's phrase, "Not only salvation but also/ wisdom comes from the Jews." Possessed of God, Judaism could offer conditional salvation, and recog- nising the transcendence yet essential moralising power of the divine nature, it knew where to seek for hidden wisdom. Like every movement of thought, the Grseco-Jewish philosophy had a history. It did not spring up and grow to maturity in a night. The Jewish diaspora not only rendered its existence possible, by bringing East into contact with West, but the condition of Juden- heit, particularly as regarded its literature, also indi- 1 The Prophets and Prophecy in Israel, A. Kuenen, pp. 590, 591. 156 Socrates and Christ. cated mental peculiarities which very largely deter- mined the character of the early Alexandrian school. In a word, the literature, of which the Book of Daniel is the prototype, was the outgrowth of a longing for better things, of a desire for salvation from present evils evils which, in their kind, the Jews shared with the Komans. " The majority of those writings were occasioned by times of trouble and distress, or by the depressed circumstances of the people generally." l And the literature " shows with what indefatigable energy the depressed spirit of Israel still strove, amid all the vicissitudes of the age, to hold fast its eternal hope, and, at least, to avoid again losing the blessings of its earlier days." 2 With Jewish Hellenism and its varying fortunes, from the time of Alexander's entry into Jerusalem in 332 B.C., till the defilement of the temple by Antiochus Epiphanes in 167 B.C., and the consequent foundation of the Asmonaean dynasty of Judas Maccabaeus (164 B.C.), we are not now concerned. But it may be inferred that, if Israel were subject to Greek influence at home, the Jews of the Dispersion would be far more deeply affected by " heathen " phil- osophy. And, with curious propriety, the memorial city of the great conqueror who played so important a part in the diffusion of Hellenism, was the scene of the contact between Eastern faith and Western reason. The translation of the Hebrew Scriptures into Greek 3 1 The Jewish People in the Time of Jesus Christ, E. Schiirer, vol. iii. p. 47. 2 History of Israel, Ewald, vol. v. p. 462. 3 B.C. 221-150. Of. Schiirer, ibid., p. 159 sq. ; Philo von Alexandria, Siegfried, p. 6 sq. ; Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah, Edersheim, vol. i. p. 26 sq. Contact between Jew and Greek. 157 set free influences, the importance of which it is diffi- cult to overestimate. The new language introduced the Jews to vistas of thought hitherto unsuspected by them. While the sacred record, now rendered accessible to the Greek, revealed a God and a rule of life, sought in vain by him after the wisdom of this world. Of necessity, the mutual interaction that ensued was at first less intense than it afterwards became. Accord- ingly, we find that the earlier products of Jewish Hel- lenism at Alexandria are coloured not only in matter but also in form by Judaism. In short, the religious element predominates completely over the philosophical or scientific. System-making is discounted in favour of a rationalising of history as read by the Jews. Greek ideas are here rendered subservient to Jewish propaganda, just as, in the time of Antiochus, exhorta- tions against the heathen are put into the mouth of Daniel. In the various spheres, of history, of osten- sible revision of the Hebrew Scriptures, of poetry, and of pseudo-prophecy, such as the Sibylline, this move- ment took form. Nor was philosophy any exception to the general rule. The elaborate 'system' of Philo was foreshadowed in the ' Wisdom of Solomon/ and in the ' Explanation of the Mosaic Laws,' attributed to Aristobulus. These works show how the peculiar re- sults of the contact between Judaism and Greek phil- osophy began to take definite shape. Just as, in the Platonic and Stoic systems, and in the pure Jewish conception of deity, specific elements formative of Philo's philosophy are to be found, so here other factors, compounded of Greek and Jewish ideas, came to light. Difficulties regarding God's relation to the world, and conscientious scruples about the attitude towards sci- 158 Socrates and Christ. ence to be adopted by the " peculiar people " present themselves, and receive a partial solution. The author of the Book of Wisdom, 1 while con- vinced of the natural superiority of the Jews, departs from the distinctive doctrines of Hebraism, or rather supplements them by the addition of Greek elements. He appears to have come under obligation to the Stoics more particularly. At the same time, traces of other Hellenic influences are not wanting, even in the form of the work. 2 The Platonic conception of the soul's pre-existence, 3 with its complementary view of the body as a prison, 4 and the Platonico- Stoic enumeration of the virtues, 5 are all clearly of Greek origin. These, however, are of minor importance, as contrasted with the conceptions of God and of Wisdom presented in the book. As in untainted Judaism, the deity stands over against the world. " For the whole world before thee is as a little grain of the balance, yea, as a drop of the morning dew that falleth down upon the earth." 6 The Almighty transcends all that he controls. But the writer does not stop here. From the Stoic philosophy 1 Cf. Schiirer, ibid., p. 230 sq. ; Heinze, Die Lehre vom Logos, p. 192 sq. ; The Book of Wisdom, W. J. Deane ; and especially Principal Drummond's Philo-Judaens, vol. i. chap. v. one of the most excellent parts of a work which has removed a long-standing reproach from English scholarship. 2 Cf. Deane, p. 29, on the remarkable sorites in chap, vi., w. 17- 21 " The desire of Wisdom is the beginning of Wisdom, And the truest beginning of Wisdom is the desire for instruction, And the care for instruction is love, And love is the keeping of her laws, And attention to her laws is the assurance of immortality, And immortality maketh us to be near unto God ; Therefore, the desire of Wisdom leadeth unto a kingdom." 4 ix. 15. 5 viii. 7. 6 xi. 22. Contact between Jew and Greek. 159 he obtained, and used to great purpose, the idea of the immanence of deity. 1 God's wisdom pervades the world. Acting through it, the deity is omniscient and omnipresent. What was a mere poetic conception with the authors of ' Proverbs ' and ' Jesus Sirach,' as Schurer points out, 2 here emerges as a philosophical theory. God may, indeed, transcend the world, but in virtue of Wis- dom an intrinsic part of his nature he became one with that world, and, as a result, directly controls the universal order. Wisdom, in fact, mediates between God and the world. Further, with our author Wisdom does not remain the same vague impersonal principle as the Stoic world-spirit. It is endowed with specific attributes, 3 and in the very possession of these qualities it appears to attain a being of its own. If it be the " only-begot- ten," surely it must be distinct from if not independent of its begetter. Here, then, in addition to the ordinary Jewish conception of God, is the idea of a power that connects deity with the world ; it is of the one, and in the other. The precise value to be put upon the writer's conscious personification of Wisdom very naturally remains a dis- puted matter. But there can be no doubt that he some- times regarded the divine quality as endowed with a real being of its own. 4 It is something which stands, as it were, outside of God, and is yet inseparable from his nature, a hypostatic attribute. This doctrine, in the form of the pre-existence of Wisdom, is evidently present in Proverbs, 5 and the theory that God created Wisdom is also foreshadowed, without much distinctness how- 1 vii. 22 sq. 2 Ibid., p. 232. 3 Cf. Drummond, ibid., vol. i. p. 219 sq. 4 ix. 4. 5 Chap. viii. 1 60 Socrates and Christ. ever. The author of the Book of Wisdom, then, is the precursor of Philo. in that he formulated, in germ if not finally, the doctrine of a mediating quality, which certainly qud knowledge, perhaps qud being, connects the transcendent God with the world. 1 The probability is that the personality of this mediator was only adum- brated at so early a stage. Wisdom was an attribute, a genus of other attributes, but still an attribute, rather than a person. But, by the fact that other attributes were often attached to it, it naturally tended to become an individualised subject. In either case it was an abstraction, and perhaps the remarkable facility with which Philo afterwards transformed abstractions into persons was not altogether denied to our author. At all events, in this its first philosophical product, the Grseco- Jewish school has already laid hold on the element essential to any scheme of salvation. A method has been indicated of uniting the absolutely perfect and good being to the imperfect and evil universe, without in any respect impairing his tran- scendence or holiness. The little that we know of Aristobulus 2 goes to prove that, whether he lived after the date of the Book of Wisdom or not, he represents a later stage in the development of Graeco-Jewish philosophy. So far as form is concerned, Judaism has disappeared. Aristo- bulus, under Greek influence, had moved so far beyond the orthodox Jewish stand-point, that he found it necessary to pause in order to discover how the new 1 Cf. Article " Philo " in Dictionary of Christian Biography, vol. iv. p. 362. 2 Cf. Clemens Alex., Strom., i., vi. ; Eusebius, Prsep. Evang., vii.- ix., xiii. Contact between Jew and Greek. 161 might be made to tally with the old. His solution of this problem constitutes his importance ; for by its means he contributed a permanent element to the philosophy of Philo. His ' Explanation of the Sacred Laws ' that is, of the ' Pentateuch' was composed in order to show that Greek philosophy must have derived all its most valuable doctrines from Moses. "It is evident that Plato has imitated our legislation, and made himself thoroughly acquainted with all that it contains. Before the conquest of Alexander and the Persians, parts of the law had already been trans- lated, so that it is obvious that the said philosopher borrowed a great deal from it. He was indeed a very learned man, just as Pythagoras has included in his own system much that is ours." 1 In the same place, Socrates also is subjected to similar Judaising ; so too are Homer and Hesiod. 2 From this the complementary proposition follows as matter of course. If the Greeks took their highest ideas from Moses, then the Mosaic writings already contained all that was most valuable in Greek philosophy, if one only knew how to disentangle it. Thus, Aristobulus supplied the Grseco-Jewish thinkers with a ready answer to those Jews who disliked Hellenic influences, and also indicated, if he did not fully formu- late, Philo's famous allegorical method. In such of his philosophical views as have come down to us, traces of his wide acquaintance with Greek philosophy are to be found. Plato and Pythagoras, and more than either, the Peripatetics, influenced him. 3 From the last he derived his doctrine of deity. According to Aristo- bulus, God is invisible, and entirely separated from the 1 Eusebius, Prsep. Evang., xiii. 12. 2 Ibid., 12, 13. 3 Cf, Schurer, ibid., p. 241 ; Zeller's Outlines of Greek Phil., p. 319. L 1 62 Socrates and Christ. world. Like the Aristotelian aduspurus, He affects the world solely as Stvafjus. This doctrine is important only as illustrating the manner in which Aristobulus endeav- oured to fuse all kinds of philosophical dogmas with the Jewish traditional faith. His ingenious defence of this position, though in one sense predetermined, marked a distinct advance in the development towards Philo. Thus, at the time when the ancient world was sick of life, and longing for deliverance, and when Stoicism, in the person of Seneca, was realising what it had long furtively suspected the impracticableness of its stern creed the Graaco- Jewish school, as represented by Philo, once more attacked the great mystery of man's being. This, the last attempt to know God by the intellect, and to gain atonement by the exercise of reason, is notable because it gathered to its aid all the best that ancient civilisation had to bestow. Philo came very near a solution of the dark problem concerning God's relation to the world and man. He had inherited the doctrinal elements necessary to a theoretical or abstract removal of hitherto impassable difficulties. From Plato he had the conception of God's transcendent nature ; the Stoic doctrine of God's immanence in the world descended to him ; and as a Jew, he could grasp the idea of a moral deity who, by His ethical nature, stood in a personal relation to each individual man. Further, the Graeco-Jewish school, as it developed, had furnished him with the means of mediating between the transcen- dent God and the world from which it was of His very divinity to remain aloof. It had also put into his hands a method of reconciling extremest Hellenism with the revelation once delivered to Moses. 1 To what uses, then, did he put this unique wealth of wisdom ? 1 Cf. Siegfried, Philo, p. 160 sq. ; Zeller, Phil, der Gr., iii. 2, p. 265 sq. i6 3 CHAPTEE VIII. PHILO-JUM1US AND HIS SIGNIFICANCE. a few critics of the Jewish-Alexandrians have made it their habit to decry Philo. 1 He has been condemned as a mere commentator, or characterised as an artificer who, though commanding many mate- rials, failed to infuse any synthetic power into his work. His attempt to combine faith and reason has been stigmatised a failure. " Philosophy gained little by it; faith suffered great loss." 2 Such criticism is usually founded on the supposition that Philo's philo- sophy was necessarily artificial, because it tried to unite doctrines which were not of its own invention, but which were derived from many external sources. Now, while it is true that Philonism inherited nearly all its integral elements, it is also true that certain contemporary conditions combined to effect their fusion. The system, it may be fairly claimed, is not 1 Cf. Histoire Critique de 1'Ecole d' Alexandria, E. Vacherot, vol. i. pp. 161-163; St Paul's Epistles, Jowett, vol. i. pp. 369-371; Herzog's Encyclopaedia of Theology, vol. iii. pp. 1832, 1833 ; History of Phil- osophy, Stockl, Part i. p. 170 ; Church History, Neander, vol. i. p. 89 ; Early Years of Christianity, Farrar, pp. 146, 153, 154. 2 Book of Wisdom, Deane, Introduction, p. 14. 164 Socrates and Christ. artificial, in so far as it unites and reproduces in a new form theories of the connection between God and the world, which had previously been isolated from one another. For example, Philo renders Platonism, Stoi- cism, and Judaism to a large extent complementary, and so tries to eliminate the imperfections of each. His plan of salvation is better than that of his predecessors just on this account. Moreover, he represents a most important, and in later times a most influential, phase in the evolution of religious thought. 1 His philosophy is not artificial, again, because it ministered to certain needs, and because, more than any other, it indicated the high-water mark of pre-Christian thought concern- ing the graver questions of religion. 2 No doubt there is a sense in which Philo's want of system may be most reasonably urged. 3 He does not work out any archi- tectonic of salvation, the very fervour of his idealism prevented this. Yet, using the resources of Greek phil- osophy with rare skill and amazing range of knowledge, 4 he defends the Mosaic revelation, now in this, now in that aspect. His importance in the history of thought, which has so often been too little appreciated, is mainly due to his clear consciousness of the ultimate value of the Jewish religion, and to his unremitting efforts to show that, in some way or another, man's highest con- ceptions must be interpreted in the light of an intel- ligible revelation of God. He may have universalised 1 Of. Philon d'Alexandrie, F. Delaunay, and C. G. Prowett on Philo in Eraser's Magazine, August 1874. 2 Of. Ewald, History of Israel, vol. vii. pp. 199, 200 ; Dr Jowett, notwithstanding his immediately following judgment, appears to allow this St Paul's Epistles, vol. i. p. 368. 3 Cf. Schiirer, Jewish People, vol. iii. pp. 366-368. 4 Cf. Siegfried, Philo, pp. 32 sq. Philo-Judceus and his Significance. 165 Judaism, as the Tiibingen school contended, or he may not. It is certain that he was the first to counteract the one-sidedness of Jewish theism by the introduction of a Greek pantheistic element, and thereby to lay the foundation for a characteristically complete that is, a Christian theology. He felt, if he did not fully comprehend, the insufficiency not only of abstract monotheism, but also of ubiquitous polytheism. Par- ticularism played little part either in his religious doctrines or in his learning. Appearing when he did, he was destined to formulate, with such materials as he had, an explanation of God's relation to the world and to man in many ways meet for the " fulness of the time." For the purposes of the present brief survey Philo's philosophy may be conveniently divided as follows. First, the existence and nature of God ; second, God's relation to the world ; third, man's nature ; and lastly, man's life in the light of his own and of God's nature. Philo makes no attempt to prove, in the strict sense, God's existence. His arguments, 1 such as they are, appear rather as poetical ideas than as philosophical principles. Eeasoning from analogy, he contends that God must exist to control the material universe, just as man's mind must furnish the central cause of all his bodily actions. Further, he holds that matter has no causal power in itself. It is not self-determined. Hence, arguing once more from analogy, man intui- tively relegates the origin and ordering of the world to a being who, though infinite, is like, though by no means identical with, the self-determining element in human nature. Mind is the only principle of this kind, 1 Cf. Drummond, Philo-Judseus, vol. ii. p. 3 sq. 1 66 Socrates and Christ. therefore a supreme mind must exist which is the first cause of the world. Philo's most interesting " proof," however, is that in which he proposes to utilise the Socratic knowledge of self l as an introduction to the knowledge of God. The individual as such is possessed of a certain personal identity, which remains unchanged throughout the varied occurrences of life. A proper appreciation of the inner nature of this permanent soul is but a beginning in the perception that, behind the constant flux of phenomena, resides One Self-existent Being, unseen yet most real. He it is who " compre- hends all things, but is not comprehended." 2 Philo's attitude towards the nature of God is largely deter- mined by those so-called proofs. That God is, he is fully persuaded; what God is, he can never exactly tell. Indeed, the doctrine of the transcendence of deity forms an essential portion of Philo's metaphysic. Like Jehovah, Philo's God is separated from the world, but this separation is itself of the last importance. For, seeing that he is unaffected by the imperfections of the world, God represents precisely that state of being for which the entire civilised world was then longing. Here dualism is not an obstacle to salvation, as some would always have us believe ; it is rather a condition without which the problem of salvation would be ren- dered insoluble. Only as he is removed from this sphere of sin and suffering can God be the possessor of such desirable qualities as infinity, unchangeableness, simplicity, freedom, and self-sufficiency. 3 Because he 1 An interesting reference all too brief to Socratic principle in Alexandrian philosophy occurs in E. B. Bax's History of Philosophy, pp. 91, 92. 2 De Mig. Abra., i. 464 (Mangey). 3 Cf. De Mundi Opifico, i. 3. Philo- Judceus and his Significance. 167 is thus elevated, he transcends in his ordinary nature the very highest that man can ever hope to attain. He is of perfection all compact. 1 Yet his being is of the most mystical kind. For, such is its transcendence, that it cannot be conveyed in any attribute or series of attributes. This conception of deity, which was doubtless coloured by Jewish views of the exaltation of Jehovah " I am that I am " is in the main philo- sophical rather than religious. Obtained by analogy from the human mind, it naturally has reference more to a self-sufficient principle than to a self-sacrificing person. On the religious side it represents a desirable state, but affords little comfort as to the possibility of attaining it hereafter, much less of realising it here. God, in short, is pure being. " Ce n'est plus," as Havet pointedly says, " qu'une ide'e d'ide'e ; on est monte' a un sommet Men nu et bien de'pouille'. C'est VUn du Parmtnide ; mais, dans le Parrne'nide, il n'est pas question de religion." 2 Seeing then that God remains a great mystery, Philo finds himself forced, while preserving the transcendent nature of the deity, to mediate between him and the universe. The peculiarity of the dilemma, and the means by which extrication was sought, form one of the most important features of Philonism. In previous times the mysteriousness of God had impressed itself upon man's mind with at least as much force as it did now. But, hitherto, one of two consequences had in- variably followed. Either the material particulars and God were mixed together in inextricable confusion, as by oriental pantheism, or God was banished from the world, as by Aristotelian metaphysic. But Philo was 1 Cf. Legum Alleg., i. 52. 2 Origines, vol. iii. p. 391. 1 68 Socrates and Christ. privileged to stand upon the shoulders of such explana- tions, as it were, and was thus able to face fairly the obvious contradiction between the idea of an absolute person and the clouded conception of a multiplicity of phenomena in which this deity ought somehow to be present, transcendence notwithstanding. His it was to provide in vague outline, if nothing more, an answer to the inevitable demand of the religious consciousness. For religion, when stripped of all fortuitous accretions, imperatively insists upon two things. It asks for a God who, in his purity and exaltation, shall be a worthy deity. But it also demands that a definite relationship should subsist between this God and his worshipper. No thinker ever urged the former with more eloquence and persistency than Philo. And he accounted for the latter at least so far as thought concerning God, apart from life after God's model, could enable him to sur- mount a theoretical difficulty. Philo, like Socrates, saw God through self ; but he did not stop there. He attempted to render the spiritual unity adequate to a full explanation of the natural universe. Now the character of this mediation was determined for Philo by existing philosophy. Stoicism had rendered the personi- fication of the universe, and its consequent elevation to divine honour, out of the question. The time for my- thology was past, and the endless inventions of polythe- ism were consequently useless. The mediatorial power desiderated must not be presented in any fantastic natu- ralism, nor in a mere fable, however pleasing. A real mediator was required who should form a tangible link between the world and its heart's desire the transcen- dent God, through relationship to both. Here a diffi- culty immediately emerges, which, as one must admit, Philo- Judceus and his Significance. 169 Philo could not effectively meet. How is it possible to endow God with attributes which essentially connect Him with the world, and yet to preserve His purity by the mediating presence of the same attributes ? As has been pointed out, 1 Philo never reconciled the conception of these divine powers as, on the one hand, independent of God, and on the other, as determinations immanent in deity. Yet he so far succeeded that he was often able to relegate the duty of mediation in general, and of the unification of God's special powers in particular, to one divine activity. 2 Of the divine powers " the oldest and best, acting as the metropolis, is the divine Logos." 3 The doctrine of the Logos is at once the most obscure and the most distinctive portion of Philo's system. In- fluenced in practical application, as it is, by conceptions drawn indifferently from Platonism, Stoicism, Jewish and rabbinical learning, 4 any accurate reproduction of it, in tolerable unity of form, is almost impossible. At one time the idealism of Plato determines it ; at an- other, Stoic pantheism, with its immanent world-reason, causes Philo to foreshadow here the Christian doctrine of the Trinity ; once more, the endless ramifications of rabbinical lore lead the Logos now to a priestly office, again to an atoning function. But, apart altogether from these considerations, of which mention only can be made, Philo's doctrine is ambiguous in itself. The Logos is not presented under any one well-defined aspect. Philo identifies intelligence and soul, idea and 1 Cf. Schiirer, Jewish People, iii. p. 373. 2 Cf. Drummond, Philo-Judseus, ii. p. 161; Heinze, Lehre vom Logos, p. 248 sq., especially p. 253. F. C. Baur and Zeller hold a contrary view. 3 Cf. De Prof., i. 560 ; given at length by Drummond, vol. ii. pp. 83, 84. 4 Cf. Siegfried, Philo, pp. 142 sq., 219 sq. 1 70 Socrates and Christ. power, in the nature of the Word. 1 Or, to put it other- wise, that which is seen and external proceeds from an unseen and internal principle. The Logos is not only the word, it is also the thought by which that word is formed and put forth. That is, it has equal reference to reason, and to specific effects of rational activity. It may therefore be defined, with Zeller, 2 as the power of God, or the active Divine intelligence in general. But, although it is thus possible to evade the difficulty of confusion between capacity and activity, the am- biguities of the doctrine are by no means at an end. The Logos may be the practical exercise of the poten- tiality of divine intelligence, yet what do we know of its relation either to God or to the world ? Has it any being of its own apart from God, or does it possess any actuality out of relation to matter ? Philo's dualism would seem to preclude a negative reply, and at the same time to render it the only possible one. If God be the transcendent being, and if matter pre-exist in chaos, then the Logos must be different from both, in order to mediate between them. But, on the other hand, it must partake of the nature of both, if its mediation is to bring them into any vital connection. 3 This apparent contradiction constitutes the irremediable difficulty of apprehending the significance of the Logos, and it is further aggravated by Philo's intensely rhe- torical style. Indeed an exact statement of his doc- trine on this point cannot be given at least according to modern standards of accuracy. A clue may possi- bly be found in the sphere of Platonic idealism, rather than in that of Stoic pantheism. 1 Cf. Vacherot, L'^cole d'Alexandrie, vol. i. p. 150, 2 Cf. iii. 2, 371. 3 Cf. Schiirer, Jewish People, iii. 375. Philo-Judceits and his Significance. 171 In its relation to the world the Logos appears to be a generic name for what is permanent and efficient in material phenomena ; it is also the only sphere in which divine activity can be conceived as existent. "The world of ideas has its place in the divine Logos, just as the plan of a city is in the soul of the master- builder." 1 God's thought may become objective in the universe by being impressed upon things, but on account of its subjective nature, it can only be appre- hended in a subjective sphere that is, by one who is capable of entering that sphere. The Logos exists solely in the same realm as deity, and it can mediate between the transcendent and the mundane only if an element proper to the former be discernible in the latter. 2 The Logos, in other words, is a mediator between God and the universe, but it partakes of the divine nature only. So its mediatorial office is limited by the fact, that neither in itself, nor in the lower objects which it connects with deity, does any change of character take place. We have, in short, a piece of machinery, a useful, and indeed a superior, kind of deus ex machina, but not a living principle in any sense capable of transforming evil into good. It may account for creation, after a manner, but it cannot induce man to become better than the presumed limitations of his spirit permit. Salvation, if it be, can only last one moment ; and even that, at what expense ! Man and the world may be fashioned in the image of God, through the instrumentality of the Logos ; but they are so surrounded by the barriers of sense, that eleva- tion to the transcendent sphere is impossible. 1 De Mundi Opif,, i. 4. 2 Cf. Drummond, Philo, vol. ii. pp. 222, 223, note ft- 172 Socrates and Christ. This, then, raises the whole question of the person- ality of the Logos, particularly as it is affected by the idea of mediation between God and the world. On this subject much diversity of opinion exists, and that with good reason. For, "in his utterances respecting the Logos, Philo wavers between the attributive and substantive conception of it ; the latter, according to which the Logos is hypostatised to a person, is already developed in his doctrine to too firm a consistency for us to suppose the personification was for Philo's own consciousness a mere poetic fiction (all the more, since in Plato the ideas are not mere attributes, but possess an independent and almost a personal existence), and yet not to a consistency of so absolute a character that Philo could be interpreted as teaching, as a positive doctrine, the existence beside God of a second person, in no way reducible to a mere attribute or function of the first person." 1 While it is thus hard to arrive at a precise estimate of Philo's doctrine on this all- important point, it is not absolutely impossible to draw certain definite conclusions. The Logos as such is dependent upon God for its being. It stands in the same relation to the deity as human thought, particularly in the form of " genius," bears to the mind from which it proceeds. We say, for example, that Homer, Dante, and Byron created certain ideas which remain permanent possessions. So, it would appear, Philo's God created the Logos. From him it proceeded, and any independence which it has consists not so much in its hypostatised personality, as in the fact that it does not return again to God. It abides as his revelation of himself. In the same 1 History of Philosophy, Ueberweg, vol. i. p. 231. Philo-J^ldczus and his Significance. 1 73 manner, for instance, the so-called " suppliant " Logos, 1 which has so often occasioned misunderstanding, is a manifestation of the peculiar nature of the Israelites. They possess the Logos of God in part, and thus have a special means of communicating with deity. Certainly this conveys the conception of a mediator, but the reference is more to a medium which represents mainly an identity of attribute in the two beings whom it connects than to an individualised person. And not only this. It is also a medium which, apart from its divine source, remains a mere potentiality. The Logos must therefore be viewed as entirely de- pendent on the transcendent God. In this sense it is subjective, nor does it ever become truly objective. When it appears in the universe, it does not assume any specific material form. The subjectivity remains in the notion that the Logos is the diffused power behind things, and not a quality resident in this or that object. Indeed the Logos may be fairly charac- terised as a generalised repetition of Plato's earlier doctrine of ideas. 2 Ideas are the realities behind phenomena, and in the same way, the Logos is the diffused reality which, though immaterial in itself, holds the cosmos together. It passes from God's transcendent state into its own proper immanency, but it never becomes materially objective. It represents a middle kingdom which can be inherited only by those who are able to abstract from objective conditions. It thus mediates between God and the world, not in the sense that it raises the lower to the higher, but in that it 1 Cf. Drummond, Philo, vol. ii. p. 235 sq. 2 It is a reply in some sort to Aristotle's question, which of the Platonic ideas could connect the other ideas with sensible things ? 1 74 Socrates and Christ. accounts for the reasonableness of the lower by refer- ence to a specific attribute of the higher. This attri- bute it itself is. When discussing the mediatorial work of the Logos, with regard more to its activity than to its origin, Philo not unfrequently personifies it. 1 Here Philon- ism achieves its distinctive characteristic as the nearest pre-Christian solution of the difficulties presented by the relationship between God and man. Philo's work in this direction was always retarded by his original doctrine of the entire transcendence of deity, and the consequent impossibility of connecting the divine with the human, even through the Logos. Hypostatise it as he might, the Logos ever remained a principle rather than a person. An abstraction at the first, it lost little of its abstractness by the gift of personality. The movement in this direction represents rather a true instinct on Philo's part, than any particular reali- sation of the intuition to which that instinct testified. His comparatively slight appreciation of the messianic hope bears abundant testimony to this. He conceived a salvation wrought out, not by a personal mediator who should himself be God, but by an abstract essence flowing from deity, an essence which found full ex- pression in the entire cosmic order, rather than in a member of the human family. His God is of Jewish origin ; but, personify as he may, he is unable to deliver himself from the Greek or impersonal presen- tation of the mediator. He proclaims such salvation as the Logos can effect, but the "other worldliness" 1 Cf. Dr Drummond's very cautious treatment, Philo, vol. ii. p. 222 sq.; a list of personifications of the Logos is given in St Paul's Epistles, Jowett, vol. ii. pp. 397, 398. PhUo-Jud&US and his Significance. 1 75 of the immanent saviour necessarily postpones re- demption for an indefinite period. 1 The scheme is theoretical, and no amount of lavish rhetoric can render it practical. Philo indeed realised man's ne- cessity, but his conception of God's nature precluded a fruitful perception of divine opportunity. All the elements of Christianity were present in his philosophy, but the living force requisite to weld them into organic unity was as yet absent. His Logos orders the uni- verse, and so reveals the divine presence in things and in man. But whether called the "Second God," the " First-born of God," the " Messiah," the " High Priest," or the " Mediator," it remains in essence a principle of unity amid plurality, of permanence in change, or of con- scious thought swaying chaotic matter. It can never become a being who is " touched with the feeling of our infirmities, and in all points tempted like as we are." Philo's view of man's nature and duty is a natural consequence of his metaphysico-religious theory of the universe. 2 Spiritually, man is made in the image of God ; reason, which he possesses in common with deity, is a divine gift. But Philo's knowledge of Platonic doctrines modified his anthropology. Man, though he partake of God's rational nature, does not represent the highest type of reason. This " pattern is laid up in the heavens," and the actual man is but a baser reproduc- tion. The bodily frame, in which human reason must needs take up its abode, vitiates original purity, and, in its contact with this lower form of being, reason ceases to be of the same quality as it was in its pre-existent 1 Cf. History of Israel, Ewald, vol. vii. p. 231 sq. 2 Of. Drummond, Philo, vol. ii p. 274 sq.; Zeller, iii. 2, pp. 389- 416 ; Siegfried, Philo, p. 249 sq. ffTTWTVERSITVt 1 76 Socrates and Christ. and divine state. And, in the lapse of ages, the rem- nant of the highest nature has become more and more debased. 1 Yet, sense and its obscuring pleasures not- withstanding, a seed of divinity remains, ready to spring forth with purifying growth in the life of him who nurtures it. Man's salvation, therefore, consists neither in transformation, for which there is no need, nor in becoming as God, of which there is no hope, but in crushing bodily desires and their attendant evils as far as may be. The aim of existence must be to substitute the higher for the lower nature, as completely as condi- tions permit, even although the mere presence of the body implies an influence for evil which cannot be removed. " It is this possession of a higher and a lower nature that makes man a moral agent. Beings above man and beings below him are . . . alike exempt from sin ; but with the possibility of following a better or a worse course of life the whole problem of ethics arises." 2 The more man appreciates his own nature, 3 the more distinctly do questions of duty formulate them- selves. Self-knowledge is the presupposition of self- judgment. The aim of life must be in the mortifi- cation of the corrupt members. For, only by their subjugation can man imitate the deity. 4 He who disregards this duty, like Ishmael, or Cain, or Joseph, extinguishes the spark of divine reason, and is shut out from the number of those who have the privilege of practising the higher life. 5 But he who follows moral- 1 Cf. Mundi Op., i. 33 sq. 2 Drummond, Philo, vol. ii. p. 283. 3 Cf. Vacherot, L'Ecole d'Alexandrie, vol. i. pp. 157, 163. 4 Cf. De Mundi Op., i. 35. 5 For Philo's distinction of lower and higher in life, see Siegfried, Philo, p. 249 sq. Philo-Judceus and his Significance. 177 ity will, in the end, attain true wisdom. Philo's ethics are in many ways kindred to those of the Stoics. They inculcate a vigorous asceticism, which has as reward a certain ecstatic state of being. In a moment of exalta- tion, attainable by long quietism, the saint may per- chance obtain a vision of deity. More than anything else, this conception of practical life proves that Philo, although conscious of the need for a saviour, did not fully understand in what form salvation must present itself. Virtue, which in one aspect of it is the proper end of life, becomes so far self-contradictory, that its realisation implies the destruction of certain natural faculties. It is abstract in character, and therefore represents an ideal of being which requires the elimina- tion of the sole opportunities whereby this very ideal might be achieved. Purity, based on a knowledge of the evil that is in the world, is not less desirable than withdrawal from all society because some men are bad. Yet Philo would have it that the active life is pardon- able only as it gives occasion for battling with evil. In fact, man is to save himself by approximating, as far as possible, to the mystic transcendence of God. Salva- tion is not elevation in the world, rewarded by a power to draw all men to it ; it consists rather in retiral into self, so that a portion of the natural man may, in some ecstatic mood, be able to bring itself face to face with a perfection which it can never hope to enjoy. Admirable in its insistence upon purity and sincerity, no less than in its anti-pharisaic pursuit of virtue for its own sake, this moral philosophy fell short of the teaching of true holiness. Its gospel was for the chil- dren of culture, and, even to them, its message was but the preaching of a half-truth. Philo saw the eternal in M 178 Socrates and Christ. the temporal, and hoped that good was present in evil. But he did not understand that " love for a divine per- son " might be so diffused throughout a human life as to render evil and unreality means to the attainment of good and to the revelation of truth. He did not grasp the fact that salvation is desired not from but in self. Opportunity to flee from self is presented to a few only, for it implies much tuning ere the strings of human nature can be harmonised to divine music. Nay, does not Philo himself tell us, that this harmony with God " is an incomprehensible mystery to the multitude, and is to be imparted to the instructed only" ? l Deliverance from sin on this wise must ever remain a mere idea. The personal example, in which an actual demonstra- tion of the transformation of an entire human life to divine ends is given, fails us. But moral principles operate upon men only through individuals who have lived according to them. Consequently, the ideal of withdrawal into self, of an absorbing pursuit after that Will-o'-the-wisp an ecstatic vision, is of no practical value save for one individual, and even for him it may never leave the range of enigma. Of "the ethereal flight beyond " none can tell. So salvation is bereft of power to touch all men. Philo was indeed of them that also serve who only stand and wait. It was re- served for another to show by his life that renuncia- tion is not desirable of itself, but is good only in so far as the effort which it presupposes has part in the pro- duction of a richer personality. The significance of Philo in the development of reli- gious thought consists chiefly in what he attempted. It is neither fair nor wise to judge him according to the 1 Gentile and Jew, Dollinger, vol. ii. p. 408. Philo-Judceus and his Significance. 1 79 rigorous standards of modern systematic criticism. He was the first who tried to construct a philosophy in which all the elements supplied by ancient religion and speculation should have a place. If he did not uni- versalise Judaism, he at least broke down barriers be- tween Jew and Greek, and between Greek and Bar- barian. So mighty was his intellectual inheritance that he seemed to stagger beneath its weight or to lose him- self in its maze of doctrines. God remains inaccessible to man, in Jewish- Alexandrian theory, not because the elements of divine revelation and human unrighteous- ness are lacking, but rather because accepted Jewish tradition had separated the Deity from creation, and accepted Greek philosophy had brought Him back to earth only as an ineffectual mode, all-present yet of no reality. Judaism and Hellenism had been slowly preparing for Christianity, and all the dry bones into which the breath of life was to be breathed by the prophet of Galilee had been collected, skeleton-like, by the great Alexandrian. It is easy to discount Philo's importance by reference to his comparative want of influence. The truth rather is, that this very lack of " roots in actual life " 1 forms the main testimony to the indispensableness of his phil- osophy. Contemporaneous with the events from which we date our era, Philonism, the idea, immediately passed over into Christianity, the fact. The philosophy was taken up and transformed by the religion. It dis- appeared before the face of Christianity, not from any inherent weakness, but as the star becomes invisible at sunrise. Both were akin in nature, and both arose under similar historical conditions. They came to 1 History of Israel, Kuenen, vol. iii. p. 206. 1 80 Socrates and Christ. solve a clamant problem, and the "ought to be" of the solution was naturally absorbed in the solution itself. Philo recognised God's infinite purity, and man's imperfection by reason of sin. He was clearly conscious of the need for a mediator. The thought of mediation, and its mystical explanation, are the main subjects of his philosophy. But there was no call for further allegorical formulae when a personal mediator appeared among men, realising in his own life the long- sought unity with God. The partial, its work well done, gave place to the perfect. Philo imagined him- self a devout Jew, but, as the mouthpiece of an epoch, he was not entirely his own. His age forced him, all- unconscious, to quit the old religion once and for ever. To this his want of immediate influence on life, and his immense after - influence on dogma, 1 were both due. Had he not adumbrated Christianity, Philo might have been the greatest of the Neo-Platonists; he would never have spoken to the Christian world to-day through the Gospel of John and the Epistle to the Hebrews. 2 Christianity is, in the strictest sense, a historical religion. And even in these times of destructive criti- cism, nothing testifies more to its supernatural or spiritual character than its natural origin. Neither a higher Judaism, nor a transfigured Greek Philosophy, it united, in an entirely new form, ideas drawn from both these sources. As the Eoman Empire was the practical preparation 3 for its reception, so the course of 1 Cf. Siegfried, Philo, p. 273 sq. 2 Cf. Church History, F. C. Baur, vol. i. pp. 18-20. 3 Cf. Neander, Church History, vol. i. p. 6 sq. ; Baur, Church History, vol. i. p. 2 sq. ; Hausrath, New Testament Times, vol. ii. p. 3 sq. ; G. P. Fisher, The Beginnings of Christianity s chap. ii. ; History of Israel, Ewald, vol. vi. p. 1 sq. Philo-Judceus and his Significance. 181 Hellenic thought and the development of Jewish faith were its speculative and religious presuppositions. Amid the degeneracy of the antique world, when the awe-inspiring 1 mystery of the sculptured Zeus had been replaced by the reckless fatuity of the Eoman Emperor, Philosophy found itself helpless. In this the hour of direst need, man could minister no soothing comfort to man's necessity. The humane spirit of Hellenism fathomed the depths of human weakness, which, as if in mockery of material power, was dis- played with accompaniments of unparalleled horror in the empire that " devoured the whole earth, and trod it down, and broke it in pieces." And, as if to teach that " things which are despised hath God chosen to bring to nought things that are," the religion of a small Eoman province, born of a people weak in war but mighty in prayer, was to reveal the righteous deity whom by searching man could not find out. Greek phil- osophy taught that the human spirit was worthy of salva- tion ; Jewish faith pointed to the one God in whom and through whom alone deliverance from sin was possible. Each supplied an element which the other lacked. Hellenism, with its joy in man and all his works, soft- ened the harshness of the exclusive Jewish religion, and claimed the blessings of providential care for the whole human race. Judaism, with its overmastering intuition of deity, set holiness before the Greek in place of happiness, and spiritualised practical as well as speculative life. A Jew by birth and a Greek by education, Philo was in possession of all the elements requisite to the new revelation. But no metaphysical alchemy could amalgamate them. The power which 1 See above, p. 150. 1 82 Socrates and Christ. could create and diffuse higher spiritual force must needs spring from the midst of religious influences, and not from logical abstractions. That the travail of the ages might bring forth a lasting blessing, one was required who should do more than take thought con- cerning God and His relation to man, who should Himself be man, yet live the divine life. The Greeks, thanks to Socrates, were able to appre- ciate in some sense the absolute value of a human soul, but they could not understand how that value might be vindicated. Jesus, who in the course of historical development became the Christ the type of salvation is different from Socrates because he came out from religion and lived for it. Socrates died to teach Greek thought that man is his own noblest study. Jesus appeared to lead man, however full of self-knowledge, up to that higher, and then unrevealed, state where thought takes its proper place as one element in a perfect life. He was moulded primarily by religious influences, as all who reveal God to humanity ever have been. His revelation was the end of Judaism and of Greek philo- sophy alike; it was also the beginning of a religion grounded more deeply in human- nature. As a religious teacher he found his only possible place among the one religious people of antiquity. And, in superseding their faith, by setting the heavenly seal on all work well done, he at the same time transcended an ethical theory which sought to command salvation by surrendering the nearest duties of daily life. CHAPTER IX. THE JEWISH IDEAL OF GOD. 1 THE long development of thought, some features of which have now been reviewed, goes to prove that Christ was absolutely different from and greater than Socrates. But this is not the whole truth. He was also differentiated from the Greek proto-martyr by the totally diverse set of influences under which his life was spent. Not in their own estimation only were the Jews a peculiar people. Like the Greeks, they performed a unique office in the progress of civilisation. Theirs was the charge of moralised religion. ^ The consequent characteristic qualities which marked them off so completely from the other nations, were in large part formative of Christ's intense spiritual consciousness and moral exaltation. Some account of these qualities must therefore be taken. Like every other phenomenon of history, Jewish reli- gion was the subject of change. Moses and the Prophets 1 I am here indebted specially to the following works viz. , Kuenen's Prophets and Prophecy in Israel, History of the Religion of Israel, Hibbert Lectures, The Hexateuch, and Histoire Critique des Livres de 1'Ancient Testament ; to Wellhausen's Prolegomena to the History of Israel, and article on Israel in the Encyclopaedia Brit. ; and to Dr Robertson Smith's The Old Testament in the Jewish Church and The Prophets of Israel. 1 84 Socrates and Christ. on the one hand, and the later Priests and Talmudists on the other, represent phases of this alteration. These, and the many intricate questions which they involve, are not so much connected with our present study as the general character of the inner faith of whose original nature and gradual growth in depth they were the vis- ible manifestations. In the history of Israel religion underwent many vicissitudes, but its great central idea remained ever the same. When the Jews had emanci- pated themselves from the bonds of a crude polytheism, Moses formulated their nascent religion on what was to him, and is to every theist, the fad of revelation. Jehovah 1 was at once the origin and the object of his faith. Jewish knowledge of Jehovah increased from this time forward, and at length culminated in the appearance of a deliverer, not from principalities and powers, but from that sin which prevented the realisa- tion of Jehovah's holiness. Yet, despite this progressive revelation, the divine source of it never became other than the " I am that I am." The ideal of the Godhead gained in sublimity under the prophets, but it was brought to birth in the wilderness. 2 The conception of God by the proclamation of which Moses supplied the motive force for the complete deliverance from Egypt, may not then have had any definite connotation. 3 But at Sinai it assumed specific form which no after-growth could hide or supersede. " In the world are two visible 1 Written thus for the same reason for which Mr Arnold would write The Lord or The Eternal. Cf. Isaiah of Jerusalem, p. 7. 2 Cf. The Philosophy of Religion, Pfleiderer, vol. iii. p. 122 sq. 3 Cf. Wellhausen, p. 453 ; The Idea of God, J. Fiske, p. 74 sq. In the Theologische Tijdschrift, Sept. 1888, Kuenen shows, as against Renan, that the religion of the wilderness was not a pure monotheism, Article, "Three Ways; One End." Jewish Ideal of God. 185 figures of Eternity, the Ocean and the Desert. Each has left its imprint on the genius of the religions. The changing gods of India have arisen from the capri- cious and tumultuous Ocean ; the Desert, without voice, without succession, without apparent form, can never reveal any other than the God-Spirit, immutable, in- exorable, incorruptible as itself." * The Jew was thus early intrusted with the keeping of a germinating monotheism which ultimately attained the most pure and exalted ideal of God an ideal which, at the right moment, became the nucleus of a new universal reli- gion. Accordingly, the entire career of the people thus chosen historically chosen is dominated by the exi- gencies of their unique mission. The Old Testament literature, criticise it, alter its chronology, and rearrange the internal relationship of its parts as you please, is a veritable record of intercommunion between the divine and the human. Man here relates himself to a perfect being, the fact of whose existence is the one pervading principle of life. Israel's faith differs from all other pre-Christian religions in this, that for it man is made in God's image, the conception of deity is no human imagination. By a true instinct the Jews perceived that God alone is adequate to the proof of His own existence. Accordingly, as Greek philosophy tended towards monotheism with more or less uncertainty, 2 Jewish religion, even at the time of the exodus, was implicitly monotheistic, and in its later developments the ideal of deity became richer in all the attributes of true divinity. 1 Edgar Quinet, R. Heath, p. 321. 2 Havet insists upon this point with much skill, Origines, vol. ii. p. 319 sq., vol. iil p. 485 sq. Of. Kuenen, Hibbert Lectures, p. 321 sq. 1 86 Socrates and Christ. So long as the cult of Jehovah found no serious competitor in the worship of another deity, the nation which had adopted it went forth conquering and to conquer. Strengthened by the remembrance of what the Eternal had done for them in the great deliver- ance, they subdued hostile clans and tribes by the indwelling power of something very like fanaticism. In other words, the practical effect of the religion for the moment displaced theoretical development. But when contact with the strange peoples, and with other gods whose existence was as yet admitted threatened to bring about apostasy from Jehovah, then the spiritual fervour of true monotheistic con- viction began to be asserted with ever-increasing force. The sublimest thoughts of the ancient world con- cerning things spiritual were uttered by the Hebrew prophets. Theirs it was to insist upon the grand central idea of deity, altogether irrespective of the various doctrines and ceremonies which might have attached themselves to it. What, then, was the idea ? The national unity of Israel was dependent upon the belief in a tutelary deity in Jehovah. When the circumstances which served to stimulate national sentiment were wanting, the correlative religion, espe- cially in the presence of alien worships, was apt to waver. It then found enlivening warmth in the fer- vent poetic utterances of the prophets, who, with deepened religious insight, called the people back to the God who had revealed himself to Moses on Mount Sinai. 1 But their mission was itself progressive. The earlier prophets performed in the main a practical, the later a theoretical, service to Jehovah. Samuel 1 Cf. Wellhausen, p. 399. Jeivish Ideal of God. 187 turned the people from Caananite apostasy,- Elijah 1 and Elisha stemmed the tide of Baal-worship. But their successors, of whom Isaiah is the great type, revealed God in a new character, and demanded that service should be rendered him in more spiritual fashion. The earlier conception of the Lord had always been abstract, and time had only tended to intensify this characteristic. 2 To maintain his exal- tation Jehovah remained far from earth. His supre- macy might be freely acknowledged, and yet no perceptible effect might ensue in the life of his pro- fessing servant. It was in this crisis that the in- sufficiency of prevalent Jewish religion first dawned upon the more spiritually minded among the chosen people. A God who lived apart from the world, and who revealed himself only in the disastrous defeats which he enabled his elect to inflict upon common foes, was a Being of power but not of holiness. The assumption of God's existence, on the basis of his self -manifestation in might, was the initiatory stage in the religion of Israel. The germinating idea of a pure godhead was then impressed upon the Jews. But they had failed in their office as the guardians of this conception, had not the " canonical prophets " insisted that Jewish predilections were not Jehovah's chief characteristic, but rather his holiness. " They laid the chief emphasis on the Holy One of Israel, and understood by this designation Jahveh's exaltation not only above the physical but above the moral imperfection of earthly life, that moral elevation and unconquerable energy which manifests itself in judg- 1 Cf. Prof. Cheyne's Hallowing of Criticism. 2 Cf. The Prophets of Israel, Robertson Smith, p. 224 sq. 1 88 Socrates and Christ. merit and justice upon all evil, whether outside Israel or within: they knew in fact that the Holy One of Israel, since he was a just judge, must set to work first on Israel, that judgment must begin at the house of God, and therefore that his 'day' 1 would be dark- ness and not light to the sinful people." 2 But, in a sense, the tendency of the new ethical conception of God was to render Jewish monotheism too monotheistic. During the wresting of the Promised Land from its aboriginal possessors, God in a manner came down from the high heaven to help his people. He was so far prejudiced in their favour, that he might even bring himself to disregard their lesser backslid- ings in order to vindicate himself against alien deities through them. But with the enunciation of Jehovah's holiness all hope of his revealing himself on such wise vanished. He became not only infinitely exalted above sin, but also absolutely inexorable towards the sinner. Inhabiting a sphere of his own, he was a law to him- self, and ethical changelessness formed the prominent feature in his new character. By the very dynamic force of his holiness he is separated more and more from an unholy world. But although monotheism may thus have been limited by over-abstractness, it gained both in distinctness and in superiority. The God whom the Jewish people were now preserving for humanity was no longer a mighty adjunct of the Hebrew fighting force. He had become the Holy One that is, no other deity was possible beside him. This, at last, was the supreme Jewish contribution to religious development. Set apart from the world 1 Amos v. 18 sq. ; Isaiah v. 16 ; Jeremiah xxv. 29. 2 Philosophy of Religion, Pfleiderer, vol. iii. pp. 130, 131. Jewisk Ideal of God. 189 maybe, but existing nevertheless, is One God, absolute in holiness, without susceptibility to sin, and of in- finite power. This is the true Eternal who was after- wards to be the desire of all nations. The peculiarity of Jewish religion, then, no matter at what point in history it finally emphasised itself, was the conception of God as a transcendent person. Deistic in tendency though it was, and continued to be, the prophetic addition of the attributes requisite to holiness raised it to a unique place. Greek philosophical monotheism could enunciate the transcendence of intelligence qud deity, but not of a holy One. " Thou, in the daily building of thy tower, Hadst ever in thy heart the luring hope Of some eventual rest a-top of it, Whence, all the tumult of the building hushed, Thou first of men mightst look out to the East : And get no answer, and agree in sum, King, with thy profound discouragement, Who seest the wider but to sigh the more." 1 But the prophets, filled with religious fervour, saw in their nation's deity the One God who, by his very holi- ness, was the sole possible pattern for sinful man. They knew where to look for the answer that should put an end to the king's "profound discouragement." They universalised Jehovah by revealing his will that all men should liken themselves to him in holiness. " Jehovah asks nothing for Himself, but asks it as a re- ligious duty that man should render to man what is right, that His will lies not in any unknown height, 1 Men and Women Cleon, Robert Browning, Works, vol. iv. pp. 280, 289, 290. Socrates and Christ. but in the moral sphere which is known and understood by all." 1 But, seeing that Jehovah asks nothing for himself, he is withdrawn from man, and the conception of his holiness tends to render his person less concrete. Accordingly, the Jews, bereft of their wonder-working national deity, sought to possess themselves of the Holy One by methods of their own invention. 2 But, while Jewish monotheism ran to extremes in its conception of God's transcendence, crushing out art, and even interest in nature because the world and the heaven of heavens cannot contain Him it at the same time had a more concrete side. The intense God- consciousness, which was only developed in a higher form by the prophets, ever connected Jehovah with his people by special ties. Malachi 3 might predict the re- cognition and knowledge of the Jewish God among the heathen, but Israel took no notice. Their God Jehovah was, and theirs they intended him to remain. Thus, even after the later view of Jehovah, with its predomi- nating quality of holiness, had been formulated, the tra- dition of national interest, as distinguished from individ- ual conduct, continued to assert itself. God, although infinitely removed from the sins and imperfections of the world, is able to bring peace and prosperity to Israel " by the operation of his spirit." It was this aspect of the Jewish ideal that constituted its per- sistence as a living force. Had the sublime faith of Isaiah and the lesser prophets been confined to a belief in the attributes, to the exclusion of the action of God, the kernel of truth which it preserved would speedily 1 Wellhausen, pp. 487, 488. 2 Cf. ibid., p. 404 sq. ; Kuenen, Religion of Israel, vol. ii. p. 245 sg. 3 I. ii. Jewish Ideal of God. 1 9 1 have dried up. The interpretation put upon prophecy, and that with prophetical warrant, had more reference to God's dealings with his peculiar people than to the precise content of his character. Accordingly, mono- theism continued a self-recuperating power among the Jews, until such time as the whole world stood in need of it, and this rather by its scope in practice than by its theoretical purity. Nor was this unnatural. God is the Holy One, and there is none other God beside him ; such is the prophetical ideal. God is our God, and through his " anointed one " he pervades the entire national economy, social as well as religious ; such was the interpretation which, to the people in general, sup- plied the practical aspect of the prophetic faith. Belief like that of Amos or Hosea, of Micah or Isaiah, was not possible for the people as a whole. The ethical reflections which the holiness of God suggested may doubtless have been in conflict with actual manifesta- tions of providence. But the writer of the Book of Job alone discussed such difficulties. For the nation at large the ideal of the prophets had need to be translated into a concrete fact, just as Job's reflections found their counterpart, not in popular moralisings, but in a people's physical sufferings caused by disastrous defeat. 1 Jeho- vah's presence in common life was the practical side of Jewish monotheism. The conviction that the Holy One condescends to regulate man's work-a-day world was the external husk which protected and kept alive the pure prophetic ideal through long years of nigh unparalleled misfortune. The strange contradiction 1 Josiah defeated by Necho in the battle of Megiddo (B.C. 608) ; Jehoiachim defeated by the Babylonians (B. c. 597) ; sack of Jerusalem (B.C. 586). 192 Socrates and Christ. between most exalted monotheism, with its transcen- dent view of deity, and the crudest belief in divine in- terference this contradiction, which makes Judaism so hard to understand, was also at the root of its signifi- cance for the world. The Jews interested themselves in the pure Godhead of prophecy, because they saw God's hand favouring them in the most ordinary avo- cations of daily life. " The Hebrew saw God's hand and acknowledged His presence in his sowing and his reaping, in his sorrows and his joys. The rules of husbandry were Jehovah's teaching, the harvest glad- ness was Jehovah's feast, the thunderstorm was Jeho- vah's voice. It was the armies of Jehovah that went forth to battle, the Spirit of Jehovah that inspired the king, the oracle of Jehovah that gave forth law and judgment." 1 Later growth did not eliminate this patriarchal faith. Now the acts of common life, taken as a whole, bore witness to some special connection between God and his people. And the entire history of the Hebrews, from the period of their great national disasters till the advent of Jesus, is a commentary upon this unusual relationship. The prophets had left the pure monothe- istic ideal safely enwrapped in the curious doctrine of the messianic hope, and even although hidden by the later Law, it sprang to glorious life in Christ's impas- sioned teaching. The expectation of the "anointed one " is no more than the belief that the supernatural element in Hebrew history, which the successive heathen inroads upon the nation seemed to have ex- tinguished, will again manifest itself. Its main in- terest for the present discussion relates to the power 1 The Prophets of Israel, Robertson Smith, p. 312. Jewish Ideal of God. 193 which it undoubtedly evinced of preserving the Jewish conception of the Supreme Being free from all base admixture. 1 Euled by foreign masters, living partly in a land " far from " Palestine, the Jews needed a hope where- with to buttress their faith. To them the practical manifestation of monotheism must have been bereft of its chief power. God had now little, if any, opportunity to put forth his hand in common life as of old ; for the place of that life now knew it no more. Had belief in Jehovah not found defence in some new tangible evidence, fitted to the altered circumstances, its object might very well have been forgotten. The messianic hope, or the expectation that Jehovah would again reveal himself by means of his "anointed," and thus rule once more over the people who were his peculiar care, supplied the place of that past evidence of over- ruling deity which the destruction of the temple had otherwise effaced from memory. His people might be broken, his service might be neglected, but Jehovah still lived in his far-off home, and would in his own good time reveal himself again to his own. The form of this expected revelation was determined by past ex- perience. A united Israel, with a king anointed of God after the manner of David, was the only possible sphere of Jehovah's revelation, as a house at Jerusalem, guarded by " the anointed," was the sole place in which reparation could be made for the sins of the people. This marvellous persistence of belief in the power of Jehovah kept the ideal of God from being lost or de- based. The providential aspect of the messianic expec- 1 This is part of the "inspiration" of Jewish history. Compare Inspiration and the Bible, R. F. Horton, pp. 228, 229. N 1 94 Socrates and Christ. tation lies, not in what it is presumed by many to have foreshadowed, but in what it actually was and did. The preparation for Christianity in the development of Greek philosophy is one of the most impressive proofs that there is a divine order in human affairs. Another, also an integral part in the same preparation, is the preservation intact of the sublime Hebrew God-con- sciousness by a popular faith in the eternity of the Deity whom bygone generations had seen in every event of their national history. Nay, more, this idea of deity itself underwent certain changes which foreshadowed the direction that religious evolution was afterwards to take. Deutero-Isaiah, 1 in some of the sublimest writings that the world pos- sesses, points not only to the transcendence of God, but also to his care for the penitent. He promises the restoration of Jewish nationality in the traditional theocratic form, but he further develops the practical side of monotheism after a new and loftier manner. " Can a woman forget her sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of her womb ? yea, these may forget, yet will not I forget thee. . . . Thus saith the Lord, Even the captives of the mighty shall be taken away, and the prey of the terrible shall be delivered : for I will contend with him that contendeth with thee, and I will save thy children." 2 This is as of old. But there is a higher view. " For thus saith the high and lofty One that inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy : I dwell in the high and holy place, with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit, to revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart 1 Cf. Kuenen, Prophets and Prophecy in Israel, p. 180 sq. 2 Isaiah xlix. 15, 25. Jewish Ideal of God. 195 of the contrite ones." 1 And again: "Arise, shine; for thy light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee. . . . And nations shall come to thy light, and kings to the brightness of thy rising." 2 And with still greater definiteness : " I the Lord have called thee in righteousness, and will hold thine hand, and will keep thee, and give thee for a covenant of the people, for a light of the Gentiles ; to open the blind eyes, to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon, and them that sit in darkness out of the prison-house." 3 Jeho- vah is to be restored to Israel not merely in the former unity and prosperity of the nation, but in a veritable revelation from the one living God, of whose manifesta- tion the Hebrews are the depositaries trustees for the benefit of the whole human family. Thus, the Baby- lonian Isaiah, in promising that restoration which, during trying times, was the main preservative of the Jewish ideal of deity, also forecast, unconsciously but none the less truly, the final purpose for which that ideal had been revealed to God's ancient people. The old order, which the Second Isaiah sought to recall, had gone never to return. But, with the instinct of religious genius, the prophet knew of a surety that God's hand still swayed the nations. The restoration which he anticipated for a contrite people in deliverance from their oppressors, was to be realised in very different form, in a renewed life of salvation from sin, obtainable by any man who is truly repentant. 4 The contrite heart, in which God would take up his abode, had no perfect exemplification before the suffering even unto death on Calvary. The Jews set forth for mankind the 1 Isaiah Ivii. 15. 2 LX. 1, 3, 3 XLII. 6, 7. 4 Of. Kuenen, The Prophets and Prophecy in Israel, p. 534 sq. 196 Socrates and Christ. transcendent ideal of the Holy One. But the full application of holiness in the life of the individual was unknown, until exemplified in a perfect personality. In the former case a certain obligation was laid upon God in the latter, duty is on man's side. Grace having been given, sanctification is thereafter within the power of the individual alone. The Jew could never reach a God whose holiness was transcendent, but the holiness of Christianity is adequate to the holiness of the Chris- tian because it had embodiment on earth. Jehovah was the promise to a nation of what Christ alone was able to do for every individual apart. Mosaism handed down to succeeding ages a doctrine from which the Jews were unable to shake themselves free. God's special interest in his own people had, as invariable corollary, divine obligation to vindicate Israel as a nation. This, as has been remarked, formed the tangible side of monotheism for the popular mind. When, during the Exile, the material supremacy of the peculiar people was beyond the bounds of possi- bility, an anticipation of a like domination, to be gained at some future period, provided the envelope in which the ideal of deity was providentially kept from contami- nation. But the remarkable course of Jewish history was a further phenomenon essential to the preparation for Christianity. The return to the Land of Promise, though at first marked by boundless hope, and by a religious enthusiasm which found expression in the re- building of the Holy Place, did not result in the vindi- cation of Israel, to which Jeremiah and the Babylonian Isaiah looked forward. Thus, the prophets' transcen- dent God, being no longer brought near to the people in concrete form, might easily have passed into oblivion. Jewish Ideal of God. 1 9 7 Jewish faith, however, had not yet performed its part in universal history, and the messianic expectation was supplemented, if not replaced, by another external em- bodiment of the religious ideal which, though strangely different from prophetism, preserved intact the divine conception formulated by the prophets. As the Jews ever cherished the belief in Jehovah's Jewish predilections, so they always regarded the Lord as their own national property. He was the protector not so much of the individual Hebrew as of the nation. Accordingly, if he were under obligation to himself to vindicate his people, they, as a nation, must render God such service as would cause his exhibition of his power to be absolutely necessary. Thus the Law, 1 as repre- senting Israel's debt to Jehovah, took the place of the messianic hope the condition of the conclusion became paramount, instead of the conclusion itself and formed the external manifestation of the transcendent God, 2 whose existence seemed in danger of being effaced from memory. Although there was much in the Law alien to the prophetic spirit, more especially in the tendency of the priesthood to come between the believer and his God, it is certain that, without it, the religion of Israel would have run grave danger of losing its distinctive conception of the divine nature. 3 God's covenant with his own people was impressed upon the popular mind 4 by innumerable rites and sacrifices. Thus the remem- brance of its first author, no matter how far removed 1 Cf. Wellhausen, chaps, viii., ix., and p. 495 sq. ; Kuenen, The Religion of Israel, vol. ii. ch. viii., vol. iii. ch. x. 3 Cf. The Old Testament in the Jewish Church, Robertson Smith, p. 312 sq. 3 Cf. Wellhausen, p. 491. 4 Cf. Philosophy of Religion, Pfleiderer, vol. iii. p. 151 sq. 198 Socrates and Christ. he might be, remained un weakened. The people whose right it was to look for the fulfilment of the messianic expectation, must needs perform the national duty of purification. Till this, their part of the bargain, had been carried out, they could not deem themselves a fit instrument for Jehovah's self-vindication. The Law was an epitome of the Lord's requirements, and in proportion as it was faithfully observed, so was he brought nearer and nearer to the nation. It had not entered into the mind of the Hebrews to frame the notion of a personal obligation. And naturally, a purification, which was primarily the interest of the nation, came to be in the end of secondary moment to the individuals who composed it. The sublime ideas of the prophets, having been long known to all, gradually lost their living significance. But the con- ception of deity, to which they bore witness from the first, remained as a potential force, even amid the pseudo-religious religion of the Scribes and Pharisees. The Law, as it has been said, performed the same function for the Jews which Greek philosophy fulfilled for the Gentiles. It was "the schoolmaster to bring them to Christ." The Law of Moses, in the sense that it kept alive Israel's knowledge of Jehovah, to whom great debts were due, it was also the Law of God, because it protected the pure Jewish conception of the divine nature, which was to pass from under the Law into the life of every man. For, as has been remarked of the beginnings of legalism, " behind the legal aspect of the movement of reformation, as it is expressed in the Deuteronomic code, there lay a larger principle, which no legal system could exhaust, and which never found full embodiment till the religion of the Old Testament Jewish Ideal of God. 199 passed into the religion of Christ. . . . The voice of spiritual faith rises high above all the limits of the dispensation that was to pass away, and sets forth the sum of true religion in words that can never die." 1 The Law did not destroy, but protected the prophetic ideal. Nor was legalism itself entirely barren of results which tended in the direction of purer religion. If the idea of God had been proclaimed more directly and with greater sublimity in prophetic times, it had also been far removed from the comprehension of ordinary men. But later Judaism, though it did much to render this idea secondary to ceremonial observance, and to debar the worshipper from direct contact with deity, by the obtrusion of a priestly mediator, also aided not a little in the universalising and denationalising of religion by the institution of the synagogue. The habit of regularly assembling themselves together for worship, and for instruction in the Law, rendered the people personal partakers in religion far more effectually than the preaching of the inspired prophets had done. They were exceptional men called forth by the stress of unique circumstances. What they gave in the shape of idea, the Law diffused, after its manner, in obser- vance. Few could become prophets, all might hear the Law, and, under the guidance of the priest, give due heed to its more rigorous requirements. In the Book of Psalms some instances of the best results of this popularisation of religion are preserved. The " Songs of Ascent," 2 though differing widely from the earlier psalms in respect of their popular origin, represent a 1 The Prophets of Israel, Robertson Smith, pp. 369, 370, 373. 2 Cf. The Old Testament in the Jewish Church, p. 191 sq. 2OO Socrates and Christ. practical interest in matters of religion which has a distinct value of its own. The Law was not the vehicle of a new revelation, and so must be regarded as subsidiary to other creative periods in Jewish reli- gion. But it served to arouse personal participation in acts of duty, and if it did not, at the same time, kindle new faith, it was valuable as the emblem of a religious intuition that could not be utterly destroyed. 201 CHAPTEE X. JUDAISM AND JESUS. IN that progressive revelation which we call history, the office of Jewish religion and character was to evolve and to preserve in purity a fitting ideal of the divine being. By this, Judaism is once and for ever marked off from the other pre-Christian religions. Thus, the indisputable historical fact that Christianity arose from the midst of Judaism, may be further en- forced by reference to an equally obvious spiritual continuity. Not only was Jesus a Jew " made under the law," but Judaism itself contained the elements necessary to nascent Christianity. The ideal of God which it possessed implicitly pointed to certain demands that the Old Testament dispensation could not supply. In other words, at its birth Christianity was not affected by Greek philosophy, but by the innate logic of the Jewish religion. Apart altogether from theological dogma, and as the result of a natural his- torical development, the person of its founder is unique. His character was moulded by a consciousness of God's nature and purposes, which Judaism, alone among the earlier religions, exhibited. The Old Testament litera- 2O2 Socrates and Christ. ture does not present us with a series of systeinatised dogmas, but it tells of a nation's progress which was ever conditioned by relation to a specific ideal. The theologia civilis of " Deuteronomy " represents far more the means of natural approximation to this ideal here, than any scheme for securing individual bliss hereafter. Yet the God whose exaltation and holiness it attests, cannot but be a person who enters into personal rela- tions with men. ]fis exaltation, so overpowering to the Hebrews, was inseparable from the preservation in purity of man's conception of the transcendent being. But another revelation was required to bring down to earth, as it were, God's power of imparting holiness to the individual sinner. The conception of deity is common to the Law and the Gospel alike. But in each case the manifestation of God's nature is different. Ezra, in the light of the Babylonian Isaiah's teaching, knew that God was ; and the ceremonial law made this knowledge common property. But what God was, Ezra only comprehended in part. The rest of His nature was revealed by one who, as a matter of sober historical truth, stood in a relation to deity which no other ever occupied. No doubt Christianity was also determined by the desire of its founder to transcend or destroy the mechanical legalism into which religion, fenced by the law, had fallen. But, in order to accom- plish this, a return to the nobler prophetic vision of Jehovah was necessary. In this return the mono- theistic ideal was revivified, and the dignity of man as the friend, and not the mere slave, of God was vindicated. God remains, as with the Jews, but a new way of access to Him is opened up, and in this a hitherto unseen element in the divine nature is Judaism and Jesus. 203 brought to light. "Think not that I am come to destroy the Law, or the Prophets : I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil." 1 The past is accepted as a necessary preparation for the present, of which, in turn, the better future will be but a further continuation. Christianity could have sprung from Judaism only because the religion both of the prophets and of Moses was at its origin. The deity whose existence was to be hidden, and whose love was to be entirely obliterated by the Law, had been intimately known to the Prophets, and his close relation to human life had been under- stood so early as Moses. Nascent Christianity goes back to the older faith, exemplified but reduced to mechanism in the Law, and in the very act of fulfilling prophecy and legalism supersedes both. "To become a world-religion it was necessary that Judaism should not merely conceal or renounce its national character for a time, but should lay it aside in sober earnest. ' If a corn of wheat fall not into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.' 2 Would Israel prove herself capable even of this latter act of self-denial ? It is easy to explain and vindicate the answer which history itself has given to this question. If the historian of the Israelitish religion performs his task as he ought, he points to a number of lines which all start from the Old Testament and the later development of Judaism, and end at Jesus of Nazareth"* If the Law, as so many are prone to insist, killed the Judaism of the prophets, it also brought about a better resurrection. Its ceremonies may have obscured Jehovah, its customs may have 1 Matt. v. 17. 2 John xii. 24. 3 Kuenen, Religion of Israel, vol. iii. pp. 276, 277. 204 Socrates and Christ. afforded the soul a sheath of self-righteousness, but they performed an indispensable service in spreading abroad, formally if not materially, the notion of personal obligation in religious conduct. The prophetic ideal, of a God who was a nation's protector, still lived. And the new religion, which was to rehabilitate it, was also to transcend it, partly by the works of the Law. For Jesus, in calling man to a spiritualised faith, found it necessary to replace the accustomed ceremonies of legal- ism by an internal relationship of the individual with the God of Isaiah. By the Law He overcame the Law, and by reinterpretation of the holy life which the Law required according to the flesh, He at length brought the prophetic desire to consummation. It is still the God of the prophets who vindicates Himself, no longer, however, through a holy nation, but in a holy life, which, having been proved possible on earth once, remained possible always. If, then, the origin of Christianity was not only historically, but also spiritually due to Judaism, some elements of the older religion must have entered into the consciousness of Jesus, 1 and by their presence have rendered Him such as no Greek philosopher ever could have been. For Jesus, apart altogether from His office as the Christ, was moulded by conditions to which Seneca and even Philo, and much more Socrates, were complete strangers. 2 1 Cf. Christ and the Jewish Law, Robert Macintosh, chap, x, 2 The contrary is urged by Bruno Bauer in 'Christus und die Caesaren.' Kuenen's judgment on this remarkable work may serve to dismiss it without further comment. ' ' ' The origin of Christianity from Roman Griechenthum ' so runs the untranslatable second title of Bruno Bauer's ' Christ and the Caesars. ' Do not suppose that I am about to attempt, by way of an episode, a refutation of this singular book ! TEOI Judaism and Jesiis. There was something in the very strength, not to say sternness, of Judaism, that altered the entire mental environment of religious conviction at Jerusalem, as contrasted with philosophical enlightenment at Athens or Eome. The divine attribute of righteousness, which had been distinctive of Jehovah from the prophetic age, imported an element of solemnity into life with which the Greeks were never acquainted. Had their civilisa- tion been thus affected, they could never have rendered their own special service to human progress. The in- When I tell you that Seneca and Philo of Alexandria appear in its pages as the founders of Christianity, probably but few of you will wish to hear anything more of it. And yet the eccentricities of this veteran writer deserved mention. A traditional opinion can only be safely followed when it has borne the test of a searching criticism. Now Bruno Bauer's book has demonstrated once for all that in order to make the denial of the Jewish origin of Christianity look, I will not say like the truth, but like a theory capable of discussion, we must set aside the whole of the New Testament, the well-known testimonies of Tacitus, Suetonius, Pliny the Younger, and one might almost say every- thing else ! Here we must deny and reverse all things, there we must ascribe conclusive evidential force to accidental or trivial details, before we can gain even the semblance of a right to come forward with such a denial. The Apocalypse alone, regarded as the work of Galba's con- temporary, or even as written under Domitian, is enough to demolish Bauer's reconstruction of history. Any one of the Pauline Epistles annihilates it. Not only the Founder of Christianity, but Paul and Peter with him, must be banished to the realm of fiction. In a word, we must give full swing no longer to criticism, but to pure caprice. Truly a tradition that can only be attacked across such ruins as these is for the present safe enough. Roman ' Griechenthum ' must remain content with the secondary but by no means unimportant part which has long been assigned it in the spread and development of that Chris- tianity which sprang up quite outside of it." Hibbert Lectures, pp. 191, 192 ; cf. p. 329 sq. Cf. The Jewish and the Christian Messiah, Y. H. Stanton, pp. 11, 12, 119 ; note 3, pp. 142, 143. Compare the interesting address on Roman Stoicism as a Religion, in the Rev. James M. Wilson's Essays and Addresses, p. 304 sq. 206 Socrates and Christ. visibility of the Sinaitic deity, although it cut him off from the earth in a way, found its counterpart in that "religion of common life" which it was the glory of Moses to have established. The naive supernaturalism of the Socratic Dcemon was very far removed from the ethical naturalism of a holy God, who communicated with man through righteousness. Judaism, at its best, did not supply a deity who came forward on special occasions to decide a difficulty. But it recognised that the moral law, which is innate in the natural man, could only grow to fullest strength when fostered by divine care. The progressive disclosure of morality, which has been and is still proceeding, acquired a special significance for the Jews, who ever regarded new ideas as manifestations of the divine being by whom the " Ten Words " had long since been sanctioned. For this reason alone, if for no other, it is true to declare that "the morality of Jesus, considered as morality, is founded, not on the theological theory alone, but also on a peculiar insight that each man is to have into the duty of returning the divine love." 1 Now this constant reference of conduct to an in- dwelling universal principle is the result of the characteristic nature of Judaism. Christianity was determined by it in that unrivalled consciousness of communion with God, which is so conspicuous through- out Jesus' own teaching. The amazing intensity and tenacity of Judaism are almost entirely due to the fact that it, and according to the Hebrew view, it alone, possessed God. What the " heathen " longed for, and so skilfully sought, the Jew already had. God who is the Absolute, the Transcendent, the One, who mani- 1 The Religious Aspect of Philosophy, J. Royce, p. 45. Judaism and Jesus. 207 fests His nature on earth in righteousness, and yet remains a being uplifted above the world, this is the proprium of Judaism. It is the negation at once of the polytheism by which Socrates was surrounded, and of the pantheism to which, in dying Kome, Stoicism fled for consolation. To this conception even the most reflective Hebrew literature adhered. 1 The God "who layeth the beams of his chambers in the waters, and walketh upon the wings of the wind," ever remains, even amid this picturesque materialism, a transcendent person, who can cause the finite to subserve him thus only because he is infinite. 2 Nothing is more remark- able and instructive than the absolute confidence of the Jews in their consciousness of this God. 3 It was not a mere formal statement of faith, but an actual inner illumination. Controlling their social as well as their religious life, it was neither an abstract dogma nor a concrete dogmatism, but a principle which, springing from within, transformed the people of whom it had possession. This sublime God-consciousness, of which the Jews were the stewards for humanity, 4 entered into Jesus. In His personality it burst forth with new and unparalleled force, and that with a permanent applica- tion to common life, which the exigencies of its own preservation had previously denied direction. If it be too strong to say that " there is one stream of revelation only the Jewish," 5 it is at least certain that the Jews alone had revelation after a special and 1 Cf. Psalm civ. 2 Compare the fine passage in Natural Religion, pp. 87-89. 3 Cf. Christ and the Jewish Law, Macintosh, p. 9 sq. 4 Cf. Mozley, On Miracles, Lect. iv. (quoted in Prof. Flint's Theism, pp. 308-310). 5 St Paul's Epistles, Jowett, vol. ii. p, 395. 208 Socrates and Christ. higher kind. What, with other peoples, was either a vague adumbration of deity, or an incentive to search after God if haply he might be found, was vouchsafed to them as a perception of the One God himself. Now this God-consciousness cannot but have given direction to the inspiration of Jesus, rendering Him absolutely different from and inimitable by any non- Jewish teacher. In strictly secular spheres, in art and literature for example, we know that even the greatest achievements have certain presuppositions. Phidias represents the artistic temper of an entire civilisation; Dante is the "voice of ten silent centuries"; and Goethe brings modern European literature to the promised land which, thanks to the French Eevolution, it was able to seek. All alike are not mere individuals who chance upon certain unused and disorderly materials, they are rather the channels through which the struggling but dumb desire of an epoch finally formulates itself. In the same way, though on a higher plane, the conviction concerning deity, which was diffused among the Jewish people, must have affected the intensity of Jesus' com- munion with the Unseen. Through Him, the nation whose thought sprang to fuller expression in His life, at length gave to mankind a God whose whole nature was revealed by the holiness of love. No new deity was sought after the manner of Socratic speculation and doubt, but the divine was practically affirmed in the life and conduct of a human being. Philo's messianic hope 1 was fulfilled when the Logos, having become more than a mere attribute, gained a concrete per- sonality, and was able to display its deepest meaning without severing its relationship with its Creator. 1 Of. Philosophy of Religion, Pfleiderer, vol. iii. p. 176. Judaism and Jesus. 209 Again, just as Socrates was determined by the weak- ness of sophistry, so Jesus found a clamant problem already set in the weakness of Judaism. This, too, rendered Him different from the Greek both in degree and in kind. Despite the service which the law rendered to Judaism, it steadily developed a deadening tendency in the course of its application. "It is but too clear that the teaching of the Scribes and the Pharisaism inseparable from it are smitten with internal contradic- tion. There is no real correlation between the disposi- tions and emotions which they rouse, and on which they desire to rest, and the practical goal to which they direct their efforts." 1 The law aimed at enabling the Jew to perform his part in the covenant with Jehovah, in order that certain benefits might accrue to the nation in order that God might draw nigh. But the multiplication of rites and ceremonies only served to remove the deity further and further from his wor- shippers. For, the more complicated the law, the more difficult its observance, and the less likely the attain- ment of the purity which its performance in every jot and tittle was to assure. But, without this perform- ance, what of divine nearness to the Jews? As the hope of fulfilling the law grew fainter, so, too, the aim of its institution grew difficult, and eventually impossible of realisation. As the naive communion with God of Moses and the judges gave way to the exceptional intuitions of the prophets, so these in turn disappeared, to be replaced by a conditional manifestation of divine presence. Conditional but with a condition which, growing harder and harder to observe, narrowed and finally closed the old channels of Jehovah's self-revela- 1 Kuenen, Hibbert Lectures, p. 215. 2io Socrates and Christ. tion. The need for communion with God was in no wise removed, yet the barrier between Jehovah and the Jew, formed by the sins of omission with respect to an unob- servable law, had become impassable. It was thus necessary that the law should be re- mitted. The exigencies of the case so far determined Jesus' teaching, that He found it advisable to use existent legalism as means to a higher end. He insisted upon its ethical character, and so came to be a moral reformer. Unlike Socrates, Jesus had to meet no scepticism, but rather a species of spiritual self-satisfac- tion. His it was to measure out true judgment to the Pharisee, no less than to reassure the publican. Here neither knowledge of self, nor minute acquaintance with ceremonial requirements, forms the mainspring of man's life, but " a quiet devotion to the sort of work which is permanently useful, and an infinite solicitude to do such work as well as possible." 1 The opposition is more than a Socratic reaction against speculative scepticism, for it is a constructive and concrete answer to practical cynicism in comparison with which intel- lectual doubt must be deemed a good, if not an abso- lutely desirable state. The cynic, proud of experience contained in " knowledge " which is nothing if not per- nicious, scoffs at all ideals ; the sceptic merely doubts present attainment, and for him there is an ideal be- yond. Socrates had to think down the latter on behalf of the Greek, Jesus had to live down the former on behalf of humanity. "Virtue is knowledge," but as such it is a luxury procurable only by the Greek. The best life is that which subserves the upbuilding of the highest type of character. This is free to all, and it has 1 Natural Religion, p. 136. Judaism and Jesus. 211 in itself none of those limits which necessarily fence knowledge. Two and two make four ; further than this man cannot go. But in the moral life knowledge can- not constrain him thus. It may indeed point to many acts which are specially good in themselves, but it can place no end to the growth of the good character which, as an organic creation, goes on ever approximating to an ideal that is to be realised only in perfect sinlessness. As a further consequence of the inherent weakness of Judaism, the individuality of Jesus was distin- guished from that of Socrates by a certain positive attitude. Socrates, so far necessarily sceptical, stood in negative relation to the faith of his generation. But Jesus accepted His ancestral religion, and by a positive addition removed its reproach. Judaism was not left behind like Greek polytheism, outside of which philosophy, and indeed all higher ethical reflec- tion, grew up, but was taken up into and transcended by Christianity. " The Jewish religion/' Gibbon has remarked, "was admirably fitted for defence, but it was not designed for conquest." 1 In post-exilian times the Law was essentially a defence of Jewish theistic purity, and not an instrument whereby the nations might be brought to a knowledge of God. Thus the religious attitude of the Hebrews as a people was almost entirely negative. The positive duty of doing good was conspicuous by its absence, but the apparatus for fending off the external evil of ceremonial impurity was everywhere remarkable for its intricacy. Now the tendency of a machine-made morality is to throw the major weight of responsibility upon the machine. We, in our modern rage for cheapness, encourage the 1 Chap. xv. 2 1 2 Socrates^ and Christ. mechanical production of commodities. Yet we use "machine-made" as a term of reproach. Not the material, but the machine is to blame for the com- parative thriftlessness of the article. So with the Jews, the machinery of the Law began to bear the sins of the people. Kesponsibility was shifted from the individual to the mechanism of his ready-made morality. The relation between man, God, and holi- ness came to be forgotten, and the average Jew was satisfied if regularity at prayers and purifications enabled him to pass muster with his co-religionists. To this inanimate round of posturings, in which "the occupation of the hands and the desire of the heart fall asunder," Jesus of necessity opposed a free religion, based on the ancient prophetical ideal. God, the Infinite One, requires of man no service regulated as to duration and place. His demand, which is also man's own demand, points to a dedication of the in- finite element in human life. The desire of all nations, of Jew and Gentile alike, when Jesus appeared, was for communion with the one Holy God. In opposition to the Law, and without any consciousness of the press- ing speculative problem, Jesus proclaimed Himself as the medium of that communion. And how ? By dedi- cating the divine in Himself to the continuous service of the deity. This, then, is a unique and positive characteristic of His teaching, and it grew out from the midst of the weakness of Judaism. Brushing aside the Law, which, despite endless multiplication of detail could never overstep its own essential finitude, He reveals God once again. But this revelation is, at the same time, a revelation of man. Man, made in the image of God, is partly akin to God by nature. Judaism, and Jesus. 213 Thus his best service to the deity is also his best service to himself. The kingdom of heaven upon earth will be realised only when all men have become as God distinguishing absolutely between good and evil, yet raised above the power of the latter by the fully realised indwelling of the former. Jesus super- seded the Law by referring man back to his own nature. It is in part divine, and the positive personal duty of each individual is to develop this higher portion, not here nor there, but always and in all places. This is neither a theory nor a speculative system, but a scheme of living which is so essentially practical that it is within every man's reach. Some may have ten talents, and others one alone, but to him who buries even this one, the final woe of a wasted life brings, as to the most gifted, the retribu- tion which, in irrevocableness, is stamped eternal. In addition to the native elements of Judaism there were, lastly, several circumstances peculiar to His time and country which exercised a formative influence upon the personality of Jesus. The superstition which, in the absence of living religion, was now rampant at Eorne, found welcome in Palestine also. Hillel's " canons " represent it under one aspect, of which the " secret doctrine," originally imparted to the exiles by Chaldaean soothsayers, was but a particular example. 1 Out of the Law, as out of the Ineffable Name, the secret numerical theory brought many hidden " truths," truths believed to be effective in miracle-working, in exorcism, and in the various kinds of marvel-making now usually associated with the medieval "black art." 2 1 Cf. New Testament Times, Hausrath, vol. i. p. 113 sq. 2 Cf. ibid., pp. 108-131. 214 Socrates and Christ. Sufficient evidence of this may be readily gathered from the attribution of obscure maladies to the agency of demons, so conspicuously recounted in Gospel his- tory. This, then, and many other facts, which might easily be cited, suffice to show that Juvenal's scoffing credat Judceus had a depth of meaning that he himself did not appreciate. The state of mind to which the prevalence of these delusions bears witness had various causes. Chief among them undoubtedly was the Eoman domination, with its taxes, alien customs, and, above all, its arrogant ignorance of the Jewish faith. The cup of Israel's punishment seemed full, and the destruction of Eome, or the entire subversion of the contemporary mundane order, appeared the only means to the long- expected vindication of the nation. This diffused feel- ing of unrest, unrelieved save by the vague hope of some indefinite spiritual interposition, was particularly favourable to the spread of apocalyptic ideas. Indeed the spirit of the writer of Daniel never disappeared from Jewish literature until after the beginning of our era. " Enoch gives his hand to the writer of the Psalter of Solomon, this latter to the Targumists, Philo to the author of Jubilees, and he again to Josephus." 1 Nor should Second Esdras be forgotten, in which the visions of Daniel concerning Borne are repeated with rabbinical illustrations. In Palestine, as throughout Western civilisation, the diffusion of "the wish to believe" attested the im- mediacy of the fulness of time. The Jews longed for that consummation of their religion which, since the return from exile, they had desired, but had in no way seen. With them, as with the " heathen," the seed-plot 1 Hausrath, New Testament Times, vol. i. p. 199. Judaism and Jesus. 215 of a higher faith was now prepared. This readiness to turn in spirit from the old to a new order readiness like that of the desperate to hope against hope formu- lated itself in part round the prophetic doctrine of the messianic expectation. The movement, implicit in Judaism from the days of Amos and Isaiah, was now about to take explicit shape. 1 The anticipated final exhibition of Jehovah's power in behalf of the chosen people still remained as a traditional idea. But for its due fulfilment a new channel of communion with God, through which another potent revelation might flow, was needed. Only some such active display of Jehovah's presence could be adequate to the terrible condition in which the favoured nation found itself. Now this general yearning for contact with God, more especially as it connected itself with the pro- phetic expectation of national deliverance, formed a most powerful factor in Jesus' self-consciousness. He did not come seeking self-knowledge, wherewith to refute scepticism, He rather brought a message of the inner spirit which should be sufficient for the infinite demand of a heart-broken world. His it was to be the organ of a new belief, which historical circum- stances, ordered in the most marvellous manner, im- peratively required. Here, even more than in the development of Greek philosophy, and in the evolution of Judaism, we cannot fail to see " the mystery of that unknown and miraculous element in nature, which is always escaping " 2 us, though we are unable to escape it. When the rulers of the world had given themselves up to despair, and were seeking to forget self-question- 1 Cf. History of Israel, Ewald, vol. vi. p. 121 sq. 2 Westminster Sermons, Kingsley, Preface, xxviii. 2 1 6 Socrates and Christ. ing in the pursuit of pleasure, a people who occupied a small corner of an eastern province was rekindling its half-extinguished faith at the smouldering fires of ancestral religion. The beacon-light that was to dispel the universal darkness flared forth in a most unex- pected quarter. Jesus' conception of His mission was thus largely determined by the religious necessities of the Jews, and by the ancient form in which expression had been given to these needs. But that form had to be broken down. The spiritual starvation of the age, with its accompanying wail for convenient food, deeply affected Jew and Gentile alike. Satisfaction had need to be given not only to the divine in Hebrew man, but also, through Judaism, to the higher nature in all men. The crisis, born of the ages, accordingly placed a problem before Jesus such as no other had been called upon to confront, and which, moreover, none but He could have solved. He was a unique person because He came to remove a unique difficulty. " He forms," it has been admirably said, " the decisive crisis in the develop- ment of humanity, as Socrates was in the development of the Greek consciousness." 1 The spiritual crisis of Judaism was for Him formally what the crisis of universal civilisation was materially. The elements of the solution were set, their form lay in the Jewish messianic expectation. 2 All that now failed was the individual who, in his own person, might supply the revelation for which the ages had wrought, and for whom an expectant but trembling world waited. Was not the man who had power to direct anew the universal 1 Kuno Fischer, Gesch. d. Neuern Phil., vol. i. pp. 50, 51. 2 Cf, Kuenen, Religion of Israel, vol. iii. p. 260 sq. y^lda^sm and Jesus. 217 readiness to believe, a personality in whom elements of the most marvellously diverse character were to find organic unity? The messianic ideal was the magnetic centre round which all the formative factors of Christianity were grouped. An interpretation of the content of this ideal, as it found expression in the Prophet of Nazareth, 1 is quite beyond the limits which we have here assigned ourselves. But, for the purpose of further illustrating the Jewish origin of Christianity, and of emphasising the difference between Jesus and Socrates, some account must be taken of the influence which the environment of a revived messianic hope had upon the Founder of our religion. Setting aside the various theories, many of them invented to buttress a preconceived theological opinion, which have been advanced with respect to Jesus' mes- siahship, it may be said at the outset, that the preva- lent ideal of a better future for Israel was present to Jesus from His early days. And this implies that, by His own inner perception, he ceased to be Jesus, ceased even to be Messiah, and became, for all succeeding ages, the Christ. By His own intuition He assumed the office which, interpret the facts as one may, history had been preparing for some unique person. He felt Himself to be that person, and thereby became unique. " If any man shall say unto you, Lo, here is Christ, or there ; believe it not. . . . For as the lightning cometh out of the east, and shineth even unto the west ; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. For whereso- ever the carcass is, there will the eagles be gathered 1 Cf. The Jewish Messiah, J. Drummond ; The Jewish and the Christian Messiah, V. H. Stanton. 2 1 8 Socrates and Christ. together." x Jesus was divine by His clear vision of His own divinity. There is little need to doubt this, when each one of us, self-confessed, knows that he would be diviner could he liken his life, even a little, to that of the Master. " But the critic leaves no air to poison ; Pumps out by a ruthless ingenuity Atom by atom, and leaves you vacuity. Thus much of Christ does he reject ? And what retain ? His intellect ? What is it I must reverence duly ? . Poor intellect for worship, truly, Which tells me simply what was told Elsewhere by voices manifold ; With this advantage, that the stater Made nowise the important stumble Of adding, he, the sage and humble, Was also one with the Creator. Why need we prove would avail no jot To make Him God, if God he were not 1 " 2 Like Socrates, Jesus spent His youth in retirement. But, from the beginning of His public ministry, He was conscious of His mission. Even Strauss and Eenan cannot gainsay His conviction that He was the Messiah that should come. 3 The form in which the earlier expressions of His conviction were cast might indeed furnish material for sceptical comment. 4 But the ques- 1 Matt. xxiv. 23, 27, 28. 2 Christmas Eve and Easter Day, Robert Browning, "Works, vol. v. pp. 245, 246, 251. The italics are mine. 3 Cf. Strauss, Critical Life of Jesus, vol. ii. p. 6 sq. ; New Life of Jesus, vol. i. pp. 302 sq., 383 ; Renan, Vie de Jesus, p. 245 sq. 4 Cf. Jesus of Nazara, Keim, vol. ii. pp. 292, 293. Judaism and Jesus. 219 tion has relation, not to the words concerning messiah- ship, but to Jesus' self -consciousness that He alone could solve the problem which the ages had prepared. And on this point dispute is impossible. 1 He was aware that the power to fulfil and supersede the Old Testament dispensation was His. Yet He recognised the necessity of previous preparation, no less than the inner rational certainty of present results. " For all the prophets and the law prophesied until John. And if ye will receive it, this is Elias, which was for to come." 2 The effect, then, of the revived belief in a Messiah which, under various guises, 3 was diffused throughout the Jewish world, must be held among the special influences formative of Jesus' personality. He did not realise any of the ideals which were abroad, neither did He seek to conform Himself to them. But in the needs to which they pointed, and in the aspirations of which they were the evidence, He found the reason for His own being. " They that be whole need not a physician, but they that are sick. But go ye and learn what that meaneth, I will have mercy, and not sacrifice : for I am not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance." There was no call for a Christ, except in so far as the world was already conscious of a disease which no power yet known to man could cure. Jesus' perception of His messiahship rendered Him different from all other lead- ers past and to come. The world-crisis could not be repeated, and Jesus, having grasped its significance, undertook a task which had been prepared for Him from the beginning. His messiahship was therefore 1 Of. Jesus of Nazara, Keim, vol. iv. pp. 62 sq., 87 sq. 2 Matt. xi. 13, 14. 3 Cf. Stanton, loc. cit., p. 133 sq. 4 Matt. ix. 12, 13. 220 Socrates and Christ. spiritual, not in the sense that it evaporated the semi- materialised ideal of Jewish prophecy, 1 but because He gave Himself to the solution of a problem which repre- sented all the indispensably important elements of the age, and in His solution perpetuated them as essential parts of universal religious progress. In this way the character of His self-consciousness conditioned the last- ing importance of His work. Being the Son of man, He knew man. His was a knowledge of the weakness of human nature. To this defect the world was already old enough to testify abundantly. Consequently, the messianic office was not assumed after the fashion of a national apotheosis, nor of a speculative theory, but was determined by a perception of the need which, from his very constitution, man must always experience. Jesus recognised Himself to be the Christ at the mo- ment in which He saw that sin could not be removed, like a special impurity, by prescribed means, but only by the transforming power of a principle operative throughout the whole life. The declaration of such a message was the pressing demand of historical conditions; the time of deepest searching after it had arrived; and Jesus' conscious- ness that He could declare it was the spiritual res alt of these circumstances, which found focus in the light of His own pure nature. When He had become convinced of the absolute value of His personality to mankind, then He was, in all essentials, the deliverer for whom the world waited. His inner recognition and certainty of Himself was the only .final answer to His own ques- tion, " Whom say men that I am ? " Was not humanity 1 There was no need for spiritualisation and self-accommodation, as Colani appears to think. Cf. Jesus-Christ et les Croyances messian- iques de son Temps, pp. 139, 140. Judaism and Jesus. 2 2 1 itself asking this very question, and what was to be the fit reply but that life in which alone an answer could be set forth ? His messiahship was therefore an orig- inal possession of His own consciousness, which nat- urally formulated itself in the direction to which the magnetic force of contemporary ideas pointed. 1 The kingdom of heaven was at hand, for He was present as the final, and from one point of view, the immanent, cause of the ages ; He was the Christ because He alone fully appreciated the need for such an one, and saw what He must be and do. Men do not go about to question the authority of the ' Iliad,' of the ' Divine Comedy,' of ' Hamlet,' or of ' Faust.' These are taken on their own credentials as contributions in which the service of the past to the present, and to the future, is summed up. Surely the same, if no higher acceptance, may be claimed for the Gospel of Christ. If one dare so say, it is an outgrowth of His genius. And this, in virtue of which He was raised above His age, could be none other than His own consciousness of what He could at that time perform, and hand down to all eternity. This was the mark of His Christhood that He knew how to respond to the universal appeal for a Saviour. His authority, abstractly taken, may be made subject of dispute, as can every fact of history or achievement of unique power. Yet it must never be forgotten, even in criti- cism, that " man's rational nature affords the very pos- sibility of history. He stands in the stream of develop- ment ; the reason within him answers to the embodied reason without him. His interest in the past, and his power to interpret it, are due to his kinship." 2 But 1 Cf. Jesus of Nazara, Keim, vol. v. pp. 122 and 163 sq. 2 Christ and the Jewish Law, R. Mackintosh, p. 185. 222 Socrates and Christ. this kinship may fail of its effect it too often does. The blind cannot be expected to accept the authority of Eaphael or Murillo as the trained artist can. Nor can the deaf appreciate the schmerz of Chopin, or the stimmung of Wagner. The authority of Jesus as Christ is only for those who, in the life of action and of spec- ulation alike, find reason to realise the enormous signi- ficance of His personality and teaching. Criticism may the probability is that it does reduce direct accurate knowledge of Him to a minimum. But it can never explain away the transformation of classic culture, and the humanisation of Teutonic barbarism, by what is called Christianity. The idea of a dedicated life is comprehensible altogether apart from historical evi- dence. But the lesson which it bears as a personal message to each individual soul can appeal only to those who are in some measure able to grasp its con- tent. What it may be Christ set forth ; His messiah- ship lay in His consciousness of His ability to do so ; His authority rests upon man's faculty of appreciating what such a consciousness, built into such a life, im- plies. It is universal, because it speaks to an element in every human being, and the limitations from which it suffers are the result, not of its weaknesses, historical or other, but of our individual inability to apprehend the universal and eternal in moral progress. We too often forget that, as the best literary and artistic criticism is itself creative, and presupposes the ability indispensable to true creation, so the most Christ-like conduct has a newness of its own, and is consequent on the realisation of a moral faculty which, in turn, is the sole organ of real submission to Christ. His messianic inspiration enabled Him to grapple with Judaism and Jesus. 223 the eternally prepared ethico-religious crisis, as no one else could. But, if the import of that crisis be hidden from us, we can neither be called upon to admit His messiahship, nor to submit ourselves to an incompre- hensible authority. Yet, if this failure to fathom his- tory exist, it must be recognised as failure. If Jesus be not the Christ to this or that man, the fault is the man's, not His. For it is one thing to question the Gospel narratives, another to be insensible to the last- ing significance of the morally ideal personality round whom they cluster. The New Testament might indeed be swept away, and notwithstanding, it would be im- possible to deny that such a deliverer as Jesus was the inevitable sequel to the development of Greek philos- ophy, to the doctrinal evolution of Judaism, and to the universal Koman polity, or to declare that His supreme realisation of ability to reduce the despair of the age was not the best, nay, the only possible, answer to the questionings in which the thought of the day found common expression. " Foolishness " and a " stumbling- block " Christ must ever remain to Greeks and Jews in all generations. But to such as can divest themselves of their Hellenism or their Hebraism, and who can bear the tale of man's necessity, so absolutely true to fact, He is "the power of God, and the wisdom of God." Not that any such light from on high as flashed upon and turned Paul to give this testimony, can now operate in the same degree. But its kind must be ever the same, for it exists "not as a kindled lamp only, but rather as a natural luminary shining by the gift of heaven ; in whose radiance all souls feel that it is well with them." 1 Carlyle On Heroes, p. 2. 224 Socrates and Christ. Finally, it must be asked, within the limits set, what was the value of Christ's own personality in this de- velopment ? The results of human progress, which history embodies, are presented to us and live for us more in general principles than in multifarious details. The Draconian legislation preceded the Periclean State, with its wealth of civilisation. The seed of the Chris- tian Church was sown in Eoman catacombs and amphi- theatres. For the priceless gifts of the Keformation and of the French Eevolution to humanity the world cannot tell to-day who died. " Plain is the story of the Sleeping Beauty ; till the time is come she sleeps ; . . . and the bones of lovers who have perished whiten the ground around; and when she is to wake it only happens that another comes, and does not care about the bones. . . . The question is not whether other men have perished ; only whether she is prepared to wake." 1 What the unknown and irrecoverable past has been preparing, amidst slow individual efforts, with their suffering and self-denial, the present suddenly interprets. " These all ... received not the promise ; . . . that they without us should not be made perfect." 2 Some mighty individuality arises, who calls order from chaos, and, eliminating the temporal, presents the eternal. Now re-creation on such wise implies, not only the power of the moment, but also the power of the man. 3 Elements may be given, but their organic co- operation can only be effected by their passage through a unifying medium through a medium in which they gain something. It thus remains to indicate this inter- 1 The Lawbreaker, James Hinton, p. 164. 2 Hebrews xi. 39, 40. 3 Cf. Essays in Criticism, Matthew Arnold, p. 5 sq. Judaism and Jesns. 225 action here. What was the addition made by Christ, in virtue of His person, to the events of which He was the final interpreter ? It is a solecism to speak of 'Christianity before Christ.' l In a world of reason, such as this is, an ideal may implicitly pre-exist its revealer, but upon him its entire actuality depends. Christ rendered Christianity a" historical fact, by setting forth in His own person that pattern humanity which, in earlier ages, had only such reality " as dreams are made of." His peculiar contribution to the circumstances of uni- versal civilisation, into which He was born, lies most of all in the factual existence with which His pure life invested an ideal formerly unattainable. The self- hood of each individual consists far more in that by which he distinguishes himself from other self-conscious beings, than in his appreciation of the bare fact that he is as they are. The latter is experienced by all, save lunatics of a sort. The former in its fulness is reserved for the few, who become fewer as the intensity of man's self -consciousness reveals itself. 2 In Christ, nearness to a spiritual ideal, necessary for, yet unseen by humanity, formed the self-differentiating factor. His manner of life was His own distinctive peculiarity. He objecti- fied an ideal career, or was Himself the medium in time of a principle which, in its truth, is eternal. The value of Christ's personality in the development of history is thus due to His double nature. Filled with a holiness which only Judaism could impart, and a Jew comprehend, He realised it in common life, thereby 1 Kg., Christianity before Christ, Charles J. Stone; or the treatment of Christianity prior to Christ in H. Lang's Dogmatik. 2 They arc fewest in the sphere of religion. P 226 Socrates and Christ. showing all men that a power capable of transforming evil into good was within Him, and might be reproduced by them. The practical character of His teaching, com- bined as it is with a boundless transcendentalism, was what rendered His personal revelation indispensable. This unaccustomed living of doctrine not arguing nor speculating about it is the formative factor which Christianity cannot want. " I must work . . . while it is day," said Jesus to His disciples, when they in- quired, " Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind ? " l This was a matter of no consequence, but it was very necessary to show in deed that sin might be avoided or removed. Christ knew that perception of holiness was the one means to righteousness ; but He was also convinced that even for man in this evil world, the realisation of holiness was no impossibility. What Christ did, apart from all the preparation for Christianity, was to embody in a human life the ideal righteousness, capacity for which man possesses in com- mon with God. One nature, matchless in its vision of the things unseen and eternal, yet unequalled in tenderness towards earthly suffering in sin, formed at once the medium through which the crisis of the ancient world found solution, and the Mediator through whom the divine element of goodness in humanity received proof in perfect exemplification. Christ's power of combining the ideal and the real in an ordinary human life is His personal contribution to the interpretation of universal history. If this life were lived, then Chris- tianity is the absolute religion; if it were not, then Christianity has no meaning, and we are still in gross 1 John ix. 4, 2. J^lda^sm and Jesus. 227 darkness regarding the possibility of a holy life for man. Nay, if Christ be a myth, Keason has for once contra- dicted herself. Never before, and never since, has the individual, for whom the ages had been preparing a way, failed her. But without the combination of ideal and actual, which Christ personified, the inner principle of ethico-religious development had been going through a long process of self-stultification. Unless the best life possible for man was revealed at the time when historical circumstances called for it, its possibility re- mains out of the question. For such a revelation the ages had conspired. Christ came ; and despite that what He did is still "the most characteristic fact of modern times," 1 we are foolish enough to deny His work. His unique personality, combining the possible for the race with the actual in the individual, forms as essential a part of historical progress as that of Luther, or Shakespeare, or Goethe. All are human, if you so choose to say, but all are divine ; for every character, although it has a history, defies analysis into its simplest elements. Affinity for what is good, with the real elimination of evil which it accomplishes, formithe revelation of Christ. Without Him goodness was doubtless known, but its power to cancel evil was deemed problematical, or at best, of occa- sional efficacy. He lived so that this partial conception of holiness was put away once and for ever. His personal work lay in His application of the highest standard of excellency in every commonest act of life. What we be- lieve regarding His nature matters very little. 2 All his- 1 Prolegomena to the Logic of Hegel, W. Wallace, p. xxvi. 2 " It is a mistake attaching to nearly all preaching, that the utter- ance, ' He that believeth and is baptised shall be saved ; but he that 228 Socrates and Christ. tory goes to prove that man is possessed of a higher ideal, which he is prone to judge too good for this world. Christ's part in the progress of humanity was to overturn this conception, and to show in His own person that the perfect life is not only suited to this world, and possible in it, but that man is man just in proportion as he brings this better self to full stature. So far as know- ledge alone is concerned, even the most acute must be agnostic in a sense. From the very fact that man is a finite intelligence, he cannot grasp the whole plan of God's universal government. Finite theory can never be absolute on every side, if on any. But in the moral life, history has rendered agnosticism impossible. " If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin: but now they have no cloak for their sin." 1 After elaborate preparation for a unique moral person- ality, that Personality, as was inevitable, appeared. Our demonstrable knowledge of God must be very spe- cially through the life of Christ. For that life, if man be in any spiritual sense a moral creation, was a nec- essary revelation. Had Christ not come when He did, the necessity for His coming would still remain ; nay, the " fulness of the time " must have been perpetuated until the present moment. His personal differentia, constituted by His combination of absolute ideal and relative individuality, " is the necessary postulate which gives our will and feelings their final end, their highest good ; not as if a moral consciousness which is based belie veth not shall be damned, ' allowing it to be genuine, is preaching the Gospel. It is not so. To say that he that believes the Gospel shall be saved, is not preaching the Gospel that has to be believed ; nor is condemnation any part of good news." The Problem of Life Consid- ered, Samuel Edger, p. 262. 1 John xv. 22. Judaism and Jesus. 229 upon itself and might be sufficient for itself should need the thought of a transcendental supplement to eke out its partial insufficiency ; on the contrary, all our willing would lack its highest and all-determining goal, our heart would lack rest and satisfaction, if the perfect ideal should be a mere subjective presentment of the mind without objective reality." 1 Man, in short, as an intelligent being, finds God a convenient postulate in metaphysics. But, as a moral being, God is necessary to him. The former idea can never be entirely grasped, the latter is in Christ. Without His personal work, the fact that there is a divine state attainable by humanity, would be as unproved, and would remain as unprovable, as the other. Christianity is not mysticism no substance cut off from the thinker, no thought, human or divine, moving in vacuo, characterises it. A person, who showed what man can rise to be, is its centre ; its principle is a work which every man, for the simple reason that he is human, can do. It is complete, both on the subjective and objective sides, with a completeness created at its origin by Christ's individual union of ideal and life. 2 Nor does Christ's personal contribution to historical development end with this, its general aspect. His too were knowledge of the ideal, and power to apply it in practice. Under these two aspects His individuality may be viewed. One of them represents the universal, the other the particular, side of His life. Through His knowledge, then, Christianity was able to set before men His conception of life as it would be for a perfect 1 Philosophy of Religion, Pfleiderer, vol. iv. pp. 301, 302. 2 Cf, Ewald's four Machte, in Revelation ; its Nature and Record, p, 114, note 1, 230 Socrates and Christ. being. Personality is the highest category known to us, and the more we can expand its content, the less hopeless does the search for absolute truth become. Only in a spiritual person limited like ourselves, yet uplifted as we are not, can we obtain any glimpse of that infinity for which we yearn. Christ's knowledge of the ideal, His clear conception of divine moral per- fection, formed the medium through which His universal nature dominated His particular individuality. Most men, in whom a strong sense of right exists, control the wrong within them more by special means than by the right itself, just as orderly citizens interpose the police between themselves and the ill-affected. But in Christ contact with the ideal was so close as to deter- mine the entire life. His knowledge of the perfect nature is best attested by the influence which His con- ception of it exercised over Him. He does not seek redemption from sin, for He is in possession of the means whereby sin may be overcome. Goodness finds embodiment in Him, because His is the secret of being good. He sees the source of good, and is therefore filled with conviction of the necessity for its revelation. Its incomparable value has impressed Him. He must needs impress it upon others. Hence His knowledge of the ideal at once passes over into real activity. What He Himself added to historical development, then, was the universal prin- ciple implied in the conception that affinity for spiritual good, as it exists in human nature, is not only the sole channel of the highest revelation, but also the one means to the completest service of Deity. He brought down perfection from heaven to earth, and this He was able to do because He knew God's nature Judaism and J esus. 231 in the ideal, as well as man's possibilities in the real. A deep intuition of the one germinated with Him into fullest expansion of the other. " Monotheism used to mean : ' God is one ; there are no divine men.' And Christ's reply was : ' Yes, there are men in whom you see and hear God.'" 1 Christ's knowledge was thus peculiar to Himself, and, withal, was universal. He was acquainted with man's occasional inspiration, just as we are aware of our own heart-beats. But it was His to travel beyond this occasional contact with univer- sality, by proclaiming, in deed no less than in word, that man is the only medium through which the divine personality, as such, can be revealed. By the declaration of this knowledge He annihilated at a stroke the distance of Deity. For He perceived that God's constant activity is here, even although His per- sonal essence, as infinite, may be elsewhere. Know- ledge of God is eternal life a life which is fashioned after a perfect model, but which, if it is to be at all, must begin now and here. God, as Paul teaches, is above Christ, but only in Christ's personal know- ledge has Deity a means of appealing directly to man, showing in a common nature the essential necessity for a common perfection. If Christ were thus, in Schleiermacher's language, a creative person, He was also capable of exemplifying this creativeness in His life. He had the power to practise what He knew. From creation of the know- ledge of God for the human race a universal moral revelation, He passed to the application of that knowledge in His own life a particular moral indi- viduality. He was aware of his ability to develop, 1 The Lawbreaker, James Hinton, p. 186. 232 Socrates and Christ. as far as was humanly possible, the natural element which differentiates man from the beasts. But He also possessed sufficient living energy to carry out this marvellous work. Divine, in that " divinity involves humanity in its highest potence," He was also human in that " humanity implies divinity to a minimum degree." 1 Nor is this a mere speculative faith, as many would explain it. It is the single conclusion which historical circumstances, accurately interpreted, permit. It would be a mere assumption to declare that man is as God, more foolish indeed than to hold that "man is what he eats." 2 But Christ, by His power of applying ideal conviction in practical life, has proved that there is an eternal part of humanity, which is amenable to, and can only grow up under, divine law. " Man is not worthy of God," said Pascal, " but he is not incapable of being rendered worthy." 3 Christ's practical application in life of His intense God -consciousness is our best witness of this. His nearness to God does not rest upon anthropomorphic sonship, but on a conviction that the Eternal, nay, Eternity itself, is unmeaning in relation to a life of sin. His personal power, which is a great portion of His special contribution to religious development, con- sists in His practice of what is eternal and linked with the eternal. He knew the ultimate reality of life, and so was able to live in the light which it shed. Personal ability to pass beyond the grosser limits of self belongs to every man. It was Christ's in the same 1 Journal of Speculative Philosophy, Art. on "The Personal Relation of Christ to the Human Race," G. W. Abbott, vol. viii. p. 356. 2 Feuerbach. 3 Pensees. K. Paul, p. 228. Judaism and Jesus. 233 kind, if not in the minor degree, vouchsafed to His brethren. The whole travail of the world had been for this special manifestation of divine, though never extra- natural spirituality. Nor was the preparation balked of its result. At the head of all that takes place, it has been aptly said, stand individuals. Their power is to be measured by their treatment of the difficulties which, in the nature of things, they must overcome. Nor is progress ever disappointed by failure to remove obstacles which, but for the proper individuals, would bar its way. Christ's unparalleled triumph was rela- tive to the mighty conflict of the time, which He was born to subdue. But His power, thus manifested, was only the reverse side of His knowledge. The world hacl been crying with a loud voice for a new revelation of God. This Christ supplied. Moreover, by His in- tuition of the ideal life as it must appear to a perfect being, He ended the universal question, not with a death, but with a life, which was steadfast even unto the cross for the truth which it alone could convey. The final importance of Christ's person to the devel- opment of history lies in the addition which He Him- self made to recorded events. He changed their entire course. Such, in short, was His consciousness of direct intercourse with the ideal world, and with the Supreme Being in whom it is contained, that He lifted Himself beyond that standard of greatness by which even the most exceptional of men may still be judged. Homer and Dante, Shakespeare and Goethe, can never be re- peated, yet there is a relativity about them all. Christ lived in order to be repeated that we might follow in His footsteps yet He is absolute. Even the most naturalistic admit " that the exceptional goodness of 234 Socrates and Christ. Christ was no figment of the gospels/' 1 that " His moral superiority cannot be disputed," and that " the success of His system shows that He must have possessed unique personal power." 2 No matter how profoundly we may differ in doctrine, or how acrimoniously we may bicker about ritual and vestments, one fact remains, which none who are willing to let history speak can gainsay, even if they would. The genius of Christ is His person, and for that reason He stands alone among great men. All these are mighty according to the flesh ; but in Him the flesh, by the power of the Spirit, is compelled to a new illumination of the one certainty in human life. So long as man is in this world, the struggle between good and evil within him must con- tinue. That it is neither hopeless nor unequal Jesus' life is the sole guarantee. His clear vision of the ulti- mate in man's nature none other ever had. But through His devotedness it was the immediate means of turn- ing many an one terror-stricken by sin. Moreover, it revealed a principle which cannot be taken away. Man has but to fathom his ethical nature, as it now is, to find that salvation lies in the moralising of self. In His own person Christ once proved the possibility of the transformation, and for this reason, He remains to all ages the one pledge that the eternal life of the Spirit is also the sole worthy existence for the flesh. That He was man, and that He yet kept Himself unspotted from the world, these constitute Christ's absoluteness for the realisation of man's highest humanity. The great mystery of holy living is now a mystery no more. 1 The Origin and Development of Christian Dogma, E. A. H. Tut- hill, p. 66. 2 Ibid., p. 70. Judaism and Jesus. 235 Goodness is not far from any one, nor is the perfect way barred. A human being is the more human, as, with increased clearness, he perceives his own divine possibilities. What these are, and to what they may lead, a truly human life has actually revealed. Omni- potence itself could not increase our moral capacity ; the responsibility for its practical use, exemplified as it once has been, is with ourselves. 236 CHAPTER XL SOCEATES AND CHRIST. THE " great solicitude " sometimes " shown by popular Christianity to establish a radical difference between Jesus and a teacher like Socrates," 1 is a misapplication of effort. The contrast stands in need of no further emphasis than that which history has so plainly given it. Antecedents, problems, contemporary influences, were different for both, not in degree alone, but also in essential nature. Neither special pleading, nor intro- duction of supernatural attributes, is necessary in face of authentic occurrences, which must after all be largely self-explanatory. Every leader of men exists, " not for what he can accomplish, but for what can be accom- plished in him." 2 But the " in him " has reference to a living organism, and not to dead matter. What can be accomplished depends very largely upon the co- operation with which the man is able to aid circum- stances. Opportunity is the world's work, but no amount of external pressure will cause two rational beings to interpret opportunity in precisely the same 1 St Paul and Protestantism, Matthew Arnold, pp. 78, 79. 2 Representative Men, Emerson, p. 393 (Bell's edition). Socrates and Christ. 237 manner. Each reacts upon it in his own way, and so the results are invariably diverse. Much more is this true when not only the opportunities, but also the individuals, are entirely different, at the beginning of the process. Action and reaction are not equal and opposite in the spiritual world, for in every given case the rule receives a new application. Abstract from Socrates and Christ everything, except the attributes " Athenian " and " Nazarene," and the " radical differ- ence," which so many sincerely desiderate, but place on a wrong basis, remains unimpaired. But no such narrow distinction needs to be adopted. The natural course of history, without any tendenz interpretation, has set a great gulf between Socrates and Christ. It could be shown, for example, that even if Greek philosophy and Christianity were traceable to a common source, the latter possessed elements which the former had not. 1 The factors of a complete revela- tion, which the Greeks had failed to derive from their Aryan ancestors, reappeared, by some inexplicable process, in Palestine, and that at the time of Christ. These, and like considerations, are, however, foreign to the present task. It is sufficient now to take Socrates and Christ as we find them, and to note, that totally different circumstances influenced them, that alien civ- ilisations produced them, that self-consciousness found distinctive expression in each. The sense of defect which swayed Socrates had reference wholly to man's knowledge of himself. The power of the Sophists was both founded on, and productive of, misbelief. Socrates saw nothing to prevent individual wellbeing, if only self-knowledge could be obtained. ISTor had the time 1 La Science des Religions, Emil Burnouf, p. 220. 238 Socrates and Christ. arrived at which to regard spiritual or mental research as hopeless. The external world, which the older Greek philosophers had studied so assiduously, seemed less important to Socrates than the inner sphere of mind. Of this view, and of the self-study which it implied, he was the Greek pioneer. The difficulties complicating such a search, and the possible illusori- ness of the self-perfection in which it was to end, did not impress Socrates so much as the conviction, of which his daimonion was but an aspect, that there is a permanent principle in man. This, in his view, was far more worthy of attention than culture, than pheno- mena, material or political. To one thus assured of the actual, the question of possible or impossible, probable or improbable, did not appeal with much force. Socrates had nothing to remove, he rather desired to arrive at something which certainly existed. He was thus able, as, for example, in ' Protagoras/ to deny the possibility of virtue through self-knowledge, and yet, by this very denial, to show that his negative is better than the Sophists' positive. Protagoras professed to teach virtue without a basis ; Socrates was only seeking for it. Yet, his tentative efforts resulted in an assurance the bare possibility of which his contemporaries scouted. He set himself to discover a new realm of thought, but he was certain of its discoverableness ere he began to search. His it was to bring this reality home to the everyday life of the time, and to follow out his method of so doing, even though its conclusions were the prison and the poison- cup. He gave himself for the progress of rational inquiry at a crisis in its development, and on this account we enrol him with the greatest. Yet to mistake Socrates and Christ. 239 his work, in this matter, were certainly a poor way to do him reverence. The circumstances into which Jesus was born were of a totally different character. Unacquainted with the learning of the Greeks, and in all probability quite una- ware of that peculiar Judaism 1 which Philo represented, his work had little relation to the discovery of new intellectual spheres. Nay, it was brought about by causes which were in strange contrast to any operative in previous times. The answer to the cry of a world in pain, its inherent force proceeded in great part from its very simplicity, as compared with systems which the mental subtlety of a single people had previously pro- duced. Christ found it necessary not only to enunciate, but also to prove the perfectibility of man. And at the time, such was the state of the nations, that the propo- sition was sufficiently improbable to be startling, the practice unprecedented enough to be convincing. The condition of the Eoman Empire need not be made subject of too complacent comparison. "It is a common remark, that very few lines need be altered in Juvenal's Satires, beyond what is purely local, to make them applicable to the London, or Paris, or Vienna of to-day." 2 But even thus, there is an irreducible differ- ence. The spirit to take but one instance which was so greedy of blood, that the amusing slaughter of 20,000 men, slaves no doubt, could take place almost without comment, has disappeared. Superadd nigh inconceiv- able brutality, rampant cynicism, and barefaced lust, to all that is most devilish in our modern capitals ; take away shame from vice, cancel the sneaking admiration 1 Cf. Is God Knowable? Prof. J. Iverach, p. 186. 2 Catholic Doctrine of the Atonement, Oxenham, p. 202. 240 Socrates and Christ. for goodness which even the worst will to-day accord, and think of the absolute need, yet apparent folly, of a doctrine of perfectibility. In Palestine itself, where a larger remnant of moral effort still remained, goodness was mainly misdirected. For, when morality takes the form of special commands, it loses much of its cogency in transmission. Conventional rules serve but to dry up the springs of sympathy from which all that is most valuable in life all that is not of mere prescription flows." i Christ gave Himself for the perfecting of human- ity at a period when perfection either appeared an absurdity, or was fenced round with regulations that rendered its attainment impossible. To show Kome that there was a life of the spirit, to tell Judaea that her law was morally suicidal, this was His mission. Even Pilate felt that his conduct had finished the former work. As a cultivated Koman he might hopelessly inquire " What is truth ? " but as a responsible man, he could declare, " I am innocent of the blood of this just person." Christ's statement of perfectibility was proved by His practice, but for the finality of the proof He died. "We have a law, and by our law He ought to die." The execution of this condemnation broke the law in pieces, and issued in the possibility of perfection for others everywhere. But even here we cannot stop. Socrates and Christ are separated, once more, by racial diversity. No juggling with subjective presuppositions 1 can explain away the fact that Christianity grew out of Judaism. It did not come forth from a religious idea, but from a religion. No law of abstract logical categories was the cause of its birth. Had the stern intensity of the 1 Cf. Hegel, Werke, xii. 166. Socrates and Christ. 241 Hebrew spirit been absent, Christianity might have appeared, as did Philonism, in the guise of an intellec- tual system, it would never have been a religion. One might as well hope to Hebraise Socrates as to Hellenise Christ. Athens under Pericles brought forth men whose like has never been seen. Yet in a few short years others sprang up, in Greece and elsewhere, to inquire what might be the meaning and permanent value of all that had been achieved by their Periclean predecessors. Socrates was the first of such inquirers. A citizen of a unique city, he found it necessary to ask himself what were the presuppositions of his citizenship. Because he was a Greek, he had the means at his com- mand to found the science which treats of man's relations with his fellows. Nevertheless, the subject-matter of his inquiry a society based on rational principles was known to the Israelites from early times. But they did not come together spontaneously like the Greeks, and thereafter proceed to reflect on the happy chance. They were members of an ordered community, whose relation- ships had been determined according to the dictates of a national conscience. | Socrates could demand justice between Greek and Greek ; Christ could require purity of all men. Eace distinction rendered their respective interpretations of life's realities radically different. In several of its aspects Socrates' work overlaps that commonly considered peculiar to the religious teacher. His conviction, that "the penalty of un- righteousness is swifter than death," 1 might be taken as the motto of his career. While others had been content thoughtlessly to assume the inner life, he was determined to know it, and, in the light of this know- 1 Of. Apology (Introduction), Jowett, vol. i. p. 326 (first edition). Q 242 Socrates and Christ. ledge, to guide his action. Indeed, the formation of character on a new basis, rather than the systematic discussion of ethics, was his life-work. It was ethical in its aim, rational in its method, practical in its results. Without any dry body of doctrine to incul- cate, Socrates was able, mainly by the force of example, and by the application of new standards to things wrongly held precious, to alter current conceptions concerning conduct. By no means a metaphysician, he yet made life subservient to ideas obtained and tested in dialectic dispute. ( For he had already laid hold on the principle that conduct consists in " the application of ideas to life." ISTot to change his fellow- citizens, but to show clearly the generally accepted yet half -apprehended principles, on a tacit under- standing of which the state found basis, was Socrates' business. (The just man has only to perceive the "general definitions" underlying society, to become straightway the good man. In wisdom he realises what is highest. Thus, however little he may have known what the good was, Socrates saw that social wellbeing is dependent upon individual morality. The Athenians had doubtless some vague notion of what "morality" meant for themselves. But, like Euthy- phro's piety, it stood in need of definition. Socrates, by his conduct and conversation, indicated this need, if he did not absolutely supply it. Hence his personality was possessed of a semi- religious influence, or rather, he exerted himself for the conscious moralising of his fellows. The manner in which the entire man Socrates pervades the work of his greatest disciple, and is traceable neither here nor there, neither with this limitation nor with that, Socrates and Christ. 243 but is a constant living presence, may be taken as typical. In such a view Socrates' mission so far overlaps that of the religious teacher. The jailer in ' Phaedo ' felt the magnetism of the martyr's character. It was not the subtlety of metaphysics that caused him, on the bare enunciation of his errand, to burst into tears and go out. 1 He needed no more than Socrates' presence to convince him that this was a just man, for whose death he could assign no adequate reason. The possession of self, which true self-know- ledge alone bestows, was in the highest degree dis- tinctive of Socrates. He cannot but have impressed himself upon others more by his personality than by his doctrines. He could not tell Plato what "the good" was, but Plato knew that Socrates was good. Conviction was written upon his conduct, and this, far rather than set phrases, must have helped his friends to clearer notions of the " ought-to-be." It is exceedingly difficult, if not altogether impos- sible now, to determine to what extent Socrates' ethico- rational work received from his living presence the "touch of emotion" inseparable from religious prin- ciple. Enthusiasm for the man could not, in any case, remove the limitations under which he necessarily laboured. Zeal for a more clearly defined political morality, and supreme confidence in the mental capa- city to discover principles of social action, cannot but have been quickened to fullest life by Socrates' per- sonal example. Yet, in the modern sense of the term, religious influences were but little formative of his career. His petition for " inward purity and for a lot that shall best agree with a right disposition of the 1 Cf. Phjedo, 116. 244 Socrates and Christ. mind," is limited not only in its conception of deity, but also in its grasp of tha possible relationships between divine and human. ^ Concerned chiefly for self-knowledge, 1 he did not depart from this his way to overturn popular belief, and he was satisfied if he could see in the world a principle analogous to the self in individual life. Speculation, and nothing else, led him to entertain such doubts as he may have had respecting traditional polytheism. The unity of pur- pose, which characterised his whole career, was but the other, and the familiar side, of such well-grounded scepticism. \^ Socrates was therefore a religious teacher in that he was true to what he understood. Strength to be himself was his, and, as a consequence, all the qualities of gentle manliness, which issued from con- viction of personal superiority, linked, however, with hesitation in deep consciousness of ignorance, served to endow him with a sway sweeter as well as stronger from its artlessness. Knowledge that the Athenian citizen lacked the inner sense which would have enabled him to act upon prin- ciple rather than from habit, and a presentiment that he could do something to fill this gap, stood to Socrates in place of the more spiritual religion only attainable by a later generation. Had he not been a " religious " man, after the manner in which it was then possible for him to be such, neither Xenophon nor Plato could have had such a testimony to bequeath. His religion consisted in his life, spent as it was in the exercise of his best social and intellectual powers for the discovery of a " good," which all Greeks might consciously pursue. He was " religious," because, realising the reason for his 1 Cf. History of Greece, Thirlwall, vol. iv. p. 268 sq. Socrates and Christ. 245 being, he used his life, regardless of consequences to self, in the true spirit of the moral artist. Nevertheless, it remains true that Socrates was primarily a moralist. The genius of the Greeks pro- duced a unique species of civilisation, which was mainly remarkable for the external presentation of an artistic ideal. Socrates applied this ideal to the life of the individual in the city state. He taught men, that by taking thought, they might put opportunity to better uses, or might be enabled, by the application of dis- coverable methods, to substitute dignity and beauty for the querulousness customary in common life. Laud- able and indispensable as an aim of this sort is, one cannot but admit that it differs widely from the object of religion. Moral philosophy can furnish ideals, but it is unable to tell how far conduct, oppressed as it is by adverse conditions, may be brought into harmony with the universal " ought." " A man's religion is the chief fact with regard to him," 1 not because he can put his signature below the Thirty-Nine Articles or the Westminster Confession, but rather because he has certain convictions with respect to the possibility of realising what is best, even in circumstances which might make the worse appear the more profitable act. igion presents a concrete reality to man's conscious- / ness, while morality witnesses to a mental ideal which is the terminus ad quern of an infinite being. The one is, the other may be. What Christianity has to tell is embodied in a life ; the teaching of Greek philosophy is, that happiness must be sought in wisdom, but what that wisdom contains for the bettering of men it never definitely declares. 1 Carlyle, On Heroes, p. 2. 246 Socrates and Christ. Moral life continually projects itself towards the best conceivable ideal. Formally, it may be entirely an extension of self for the sake of self -improvement. But the religious man cannot rest content with this. The mere growth of self is not sufficient. Nay, the direction which advancement takes, and the process in which it shapes itself, are both altered with him. Per- ception of goodness may assuredly be accompanied by a reaching forth to something like it. This is the highest form of the moral life. But religion implies, in addition, the possession of a goodness which, in the shape of a creative principle, transforms the entire man. It is so far easy to know and to discuss a speculative ideal, and it is well to conform to such an ideal, always granted that it is capable of partial realisation. Yet all this may be done, and thoroughly done, solely with reference to the self. In this sense personal morality is largely illusory, and so remains devoid of that ideal actuality which religion demands. It leaves something to be discovered, of which religion feels itself to be in possession. Morality testifies to the consciousness of a higher life, but it does not give man his kingdom qud that life. Just as idolatry is a makeshift for the satisfaction of faith, so morality is a temporary salve to religious aspiration. It connects man with a super- sensible sphere, through the inner conflict of his own nature, but it can affirm nothing with regard to the reality of that sphere. The truth is, that the ideal which morality sets forth mediately on rational prin- ciples, religion reveals immediately to the soul. The apparatus of proof that points to an unattainable " is " which " ought to be," finds substitute in a positive con- viction of a real " is " which " has been." Self-sacrifice Socrates and Christ. 247 takes the place of mere self -projection towards the ideal, and this means, that the ideal is no longer beyond man, hid away perhaps in some impossible region, but is in him, and is attainable only through his willingness to actualise his own undoubted inner capacity for well- doing. There are many who cannot see that morality finds any extension in religion, or who consider it derogatory to man's dignity, that reverence should be paid to a God known or unknowable. But on the view just stated, religion is an advance upon morality, and its aim is not primarily the glory of God. " It is not for the benefit and honour of God, but for the benefit and ennoblement of Man. . . . God has nothing to gain by our devotion, but men have very much to gain by other men's righteousness." 1 But righteousness is not the result of precept, it is consequent upon the building- up of character. And character is fully formed only when, by its own inner force, it brings forth the best that is, and does not merely abase itself before an external " ought-to-be." Kighteousness, in other words, is a religious product. The moral greatness of Socrates, of Plato, and of many Stoics of antiquity, has rarely found equal in the Christian ages. Yet, in these last, the types of holy living have added something to moral greatness. The ideal has been brought down from an abstract heaven to earth. It is in man's own heart. Not the assertion of self, with its proud humility, but the real sacrifice of the whole man to that which is known to be good character this is the Christian conception. Be- cause the ideal is in man, self-sacrifice must be recognised 1 Christianity in its Cradle, F. W. Newman, p. 127. I have taken the liberty of using the customary orthography. 248 Socrates and Christ. as the sole self-realisation. The beauty of holiness transfigures him in whom others first bear witness to its presence. Socrates gave direction to life, but Christ revealed in His own person the very principle without which there would be no life. The ancient world, in the work of Socrates and of the few who were like him, sought to reconstruct man's life on the basis of a re- interpretation of his nature ; and this must always remain the work of morality. But with the appearance of Christianity, God and man were shown to be co- essential, and the task of morality was superseded, if not eliminated, by the affirmative declaration of religion. Finally, within its sphere, the Socratic teaching had not fathomed reality fully. It is in no sense unfair to say, that the Greek sage knew almost nothing of the inner force by which men, as indeed all things, " fulfil the law of their being." But on the other hand, it would be merest childish- ness to deny the influence of Socrates as a forerunner of Christ. The revelation of the one was preparatory to that of the other, just as morality is frequently the seed of religion. In the development of the religious consciousness, for example, the progress towards mono- theism, so conspicuous in Socrates and the other Greek philosophers, was but one of the many lines that ultimately converged towards Christianity. No doubt, such ideas were peculiar to thinkers who regarded superstition as spiritual food fit for the mob. Yet the confidence of Socrates in a supreme being was the foundation of Plato's affirmation, that man is like to God, 1 and this, in turn, is not very far removed from Christian doctrine. The Greeks had, in short, dis- 1 Cf. Thesetetus, 176. Socrates and Christ. 249 covered a certain element in human nature, which demanded definite satisfaction. With this they were unable to supply it. God might be " single and one " for them, yet they could not conceive how, being such, he was able to enter into relationship with the many. They adumbrated one element in the religious con- ception, more than that they could not grasp. But Socrates, in that he tended to replace polytheism with a species of quietist monotheism, must not be denied his place as a forerunner of fuller religious develop- ment. Whatever may be said of the varied semi- religious conceptions of Greek philosophy, there can be no question that the light thrown back upon the past now enables one to estimate Socrates' value as a herald of Christianity. Here his true greatness must be sought, and that in well-authenticated facts. For "the ideal of Christian life is far more clearly dis- tinguishable from the ideal of Greek and Eoman, than the elements of opinion and belief which have come from a Christian source are from those which have come from a secular or heathen one." 1 jSTow ethically, that is, in principles of rational action, Socrates and his followers were but one remove from Christianity. The investigation of self, begun by Socrates, although it ended for him in the identity of the knowledge of virtue with virtue itself, was the groundwork of the difference between goodness and counterfeit goodness, which Plato and Aristotle after- wards formulated. For these thinkers virtue is its own reward, and their praise is, that whatever be the form of man's religion, virtue must ever remain self- satisfying. This was the great principle which, by 1 St Paul's Epistles, Jowett, vol. ii. p. 392. 250 Socrates and Christ. means of rational investigation, Socrates was the first to bring to light. The common measure of all the virtues is the desire of virtue, which is excited by the knowledge that virtue can be obtained. Thus, Socrates represents in practical life the preparation for Christianity, which the Hebrew prophets supplied on the more strictly religious side. He taught that to be good is good because it is good, and thereby furnished the form in which true Christian morality has always presented itself. In this respect Socrates was a real prophet, reaching forth to an end which he could not fully see. His life, no less than his teaching,, pointed at once to an ideal, and to an acknowledged human need, which he could neither reach nor supply. When he thus gifted the Greeks with a perception of moral quality, he set the seal of insufficiency alike upon their exclusive citizenship, 1 and their polytheistic religion. But he could not tell what " the good " was, and his philosophy was powerless to stay the appetite which it had created. After him ancient thought oc- cupied itself in the attempt to fathom human nature. Ethical need, infinite then as now, was man's to in- crease knowledge and sorrow. Keligious aspiration, was also his. But for the former no full satisfaction was obtainable, for the latter none at all. The Greek protoniartyr merits, and surely none would grudge him, the homage due to his consistent life and glorious death. Yet he was separated from Christ both by attainment and by distance in time. He felt the yearning that Christ came to soothe. And whatever praise may be his, it must always be remembered that the end was not then. When, through what Socrates 1 Cf. Prolegomena to Ethics, T. H. Green, pp. 264-308. Socrates and Christ. 251 had not done, " philosophy had grown sad by thinking beyond its depth/' there was necessity for a greater than he. If the mission of Socrates had been mainly ethical, that of Christ was at once moral and religious. But the religion, of which he was the chief corner-stone, cannot be defined as "morality touched by emotion." Ethical and emotional elements it doubtless had, but these do not represent its entire content. So long as man is upon this earth his lot is to struggle with sin and misery. At 110 period in history did the issue of the conflict seem darker than when ancient philosophy, in the person of Seneca, became helpless to stay Nero's brutality. 1 Consciously or unconsciously, the Eoman Empire was crying aloud for light upon the awful problem of evil. And the light burst forth in a life which, although moral and human, had itself a mag- netic influence which all have agreed to recognise as unique. This is the point which, in the estimation of the properly equipped sceptic, even nineteenth-century blasphemy cannot blaspheme away. Christ taught man how to bear sorrow, and by the sacrifice of self, to eliminate sin from life. It was not possible that the cup of suffering should pass from Him, and as He drained it, He created righteousness, thereby proving that even for us the draught is not too terrible. Now the implication of this holy life is, that the moral philosophy of Socrates had been superseded. The ideal had been made actual, and that not as an abstraction, substantive or other, to which men could only progress. It had taken personal form that is, it had been revealed as a principle organic to life. 1 Cf, Essays and Addresses, J. M. Wilson, p. 107. 252 Socrates and Christ. " If any man be in Christ, he is a new creature," not because something mysterious has been done for him, but because, by his own recognition of kinship with Christ, he is assured that he too can do what the Master did. Self-sacrifice is not only the character of Christ, it is also the one key to the movement of the entire spiritual universe. " Stirb und werde ! Denn so lang du das nicht hast, Bist du nur em triiber Gast Auf der dunkeln Erde." The deepest testimony to this truth is Jesus' growing conviction of it, which only found culmination on Calvary. Nor is this self-sacrifice a mere piece of mechanism for the manufacture of happiness. It is rather a principle of moralisation which, in its long conflict with sin and selfishness, develops new faculties in the individual character. The width of the Christian con- ception, including as it does all men, imposes responsi- bilities upon us which the Greeks, even in their finest moods, could not have imagined. For it points to no small society cinctured with a holiness wrought out of the degradation of all beyond its own circle. It con- stitutes the pursuit of the good by self in sacrifice a means to the bettering of all men. Christ set forth, not the doctrine alone, but its application. He did not come unawares, but brought to an end the problem of evil, then ready for solution. Moreover, he proved the practical value of his solution as a working scheme. His self-sacrifice has nothing in common with asceticism. Eenunciation of self is not sought for the mere sake of Socrates and Christ. 253 renunciation, but in order that, purified of all the self- seeking which shuts out true riches, man may become the instrument at once of his own and of his fellows' perfection. If any one apprehend perfectibility, as it stands revealed in Christ, he cannot but adopt Christian ethics. For only thus will he gain for himself a com- pleteness, which is indissolubly bound up with an identical perfection in others. As Christ was the first to proclaim that God can only be served in man, so He was the first to tell that such service will never be absolutely worthy until wrought in humanity as a whole. In this, His true humanitarianism, Christ super- sedes Socrates. He appeals to the whole man and to mankind, while the Greek sage speaks only to the free- born citizen, and to him rather as a thinker than as an essentially moral agent. For this reason, Christ's work is eternal, and whatever one may think of His nature, Christianity cannot be separated from His person. Eliminate the theory of Christ which was diffused among the Jews prior to His advent; 1 admit that nothing is directly known of Him, save what is told in the discourses collected by Matthew, and in Peter's reminiscences edited by Mark who had never seen the Master ;j allow that the "pedantic ingenuity of rationalism" is misdirected scarce at all, and you do not detract one whit from the value of Christ's Chris- tianity. His " application of ideas to life " still remains the one essential and commanding fact in His career. He not only promulgated but lived a principle, against which intellect cannot revolt, and for which conscience records its whole testimony. His religion is His, not 1 Of. La Science des Religions, E. Burnouf, p. 242. - Cf. Through Nature to Christ, E. A. Abbott, p. 346 sq.\ 373 note. 254 Socrates and Christ. because He formulated any creed concerning Himself, but because He alone trod the only road to man's natural perfection. Christianity is inseparable from His person in no dogmatic sense, but as a matter of everyday experience. We cannot look back across the ages and fortify our faltering faith with " a tremulous ^acknowledge of a whole globe of dogmas." 1 Only if the Christ-life be reproducing itself here and now, can Christianity be regarded as in vital connection with the Person of its founder. That it is thus con- nected His veritable creation of righteousness proves. He did good for the sake of so doing, and this His revelation may, nay, must go on reproducing itself. " So, each ray of thy will. Every flash of thy passion and prowess, long over, shall thrill Thy whole people, the countless, with ardour, till they too give forth A little cheer to their sons : who in turn, fill the South and the North With the radiance thy seed was the germ of." 2 Reasonableness and naturalness are the chief charac- teristics of Christ's revelation. Non mors sed voluntas sponte morientis. 3 Only an unrivalled knowledge of the human heart in its origin and destiny could have effected the combination of material necessity and spiritual inevitableness by which it continues to sway the world. The complete humanity of Christ's life is the cause of the permanence of His religion. " To say that a man has genius is to say that all he effects is truly and entirely the result of others' labours 1 The Kernel and the Husk, p. 257. 2 Saul, Robert Browning, Works, vol. vi. p. 122. 3 St Bernard. Socrates and Christ. 255 and done by their power ; that he is merely a stimulus, and owes his influence solely to his relation to an organisation built up, and a functional power accu- mulated, wholly by others. . . . Genius does things without force because it does not do them, as the fall of an uplifted body needs no force." 1 Of all the great this is true. But in relation to Christ, it receives an application sui generis. Theirs is the result of others' labours, and for Him too the whole course of civilisa- tion had been preparing. But what he effected was not brought about once for all by the co-operation of prior and contemporary influences. His genius is not a mere expression of what others thought and urgently desired; it is a living force which still remains, and reproduces its own qualities in the lives of men now. "Heroes" and " ^Representative Men" are the quint- essence of epochs ; He is the germ which fructifies at all times. In this respect He is without parallel, and so we cannot separate His Person from His work. 2 Nor does the contrast between Christ and the other masters cease here. He superseded Socrates, and it might very well seem, that after so many centuries, and in view of the " service of man," His time to depart had now also come. Notwithstanding, Christ's work can- not but remain so long as human nature retains its pre- sent constitution. Expansion is not without conditions. " Because our present house is too small for us, it is not to be inferred that we shall live henceforth in the 1 Philosophy and Religion, James Hinton, pp. 113, 114. 2 Lessing, in Die Religion Christi, and Herder in Ideen, like Goethe and others of the anti-eighteenth century school, seem to forget that the eternity of Christianity is not based, as they suppose, on a Person who is temporal, but on their own article of faith, that persons alone can transform a momentary act into an eternal principle. 256 Socrates and Christ. open air. As a general rule of life and conduct, we see as yet no reason to believe that liberty, if this be its meaning, is better than service." 1 Christ revealed the source of virtue in His life of lowly obedience. The " service of man," of which we now boast ourselves, is a bare possibility only through Christ's subservience and humiliation. It is easy to take humanity as we find it, and convenient to ignore this fact, but then it is also easy to accept light without a scrupulous recog- nition of the sun's agency. The peculiarity of Positivism is that, apart from its distinctive philosophical tenets, it is virtually a reproduction of one portion of Christ's principle. 2 Why go about with a candle to see the sun ? Its altruism is His also, but without the inte- gration which He deemed necessary to complete the character of an individual. His consciousness of God which is but the more spiritualised expression of what has been rediscovered as " cosmic religion " had its counterpart in His consciousness of mankind, which is to-day the raison d'etre of that second faith so called, the " religion of humanity." The supremacy of Christ is further enhanced by the strange circumstance that His revelation is not, like the work of Socrates, of Luther, or of Carlyle, repre- sentative only of a specific stage in the world's devel- opment. Like others, He came at a crisis which was for Him. It used to be supposed that in Him divine revelation culminated, and remained final thencefor- ward. After a sort it did, but progress has been con- tinuous since. "God did not retire to rest after the well-known six days of creation ; but, on the contrary, 1 Prose Remains of A. H. Clough, p. 409. 2 Cf. The Service of Man, J. C. Morison, P . 177 (head fifth). Socrates and Christ. 257 is constantly active as on the first. It would have been for Him a poor occupation to compose this heavy world out of simple elements, and to keep it rolling in the sunbeams from year to year, if He had. not had the plan of founding a nursery for a world of spirits upon this material basis. So He is now constantly active in higher natures to attract the lower ones." 1 In this later advance the Christian revelation is continually renewing itself. Historically it appeared at the time which was prepared for it. But it is not only a stage like others, for it is perpetuated in a principle which is the motive force of human nature, and must remain operative, no matter how circumstances may change. In the other masters we see all that is, in Christ there was all that ought to be. Socrates was the forerunner of later ideals, Christ Himself was the exhibition of the ideal in history. Christianity, just on account of those elements which differentiate it from Greek philosophy, constantly stimulates the higher life, and that without laying any restrictions upon intellectual activity. For Christ's work is a spontaneous revelation of human nature of a nature which has spiritual as well as men- tal and material needs. His kingdom is not of this world, and only in so, far as this is true can it remain in the world. It makes little difference what dogmatic views recommend themselves to the individual mind. For there is religion without rites, and there may be churches without religion. But the power of a perfect life can never pass away. It is for humanity, because in man full expression was given to it. The eternity of Christianity is based on human nature, the kaleidoscopic creeds are but accidental 1 Conversations of Goethe, Eckermann, pp. 569, 570. 258 Socrates and Christ. embodiments of the true reality. What boots it for practical life that Christianity is often no better to its professors than was Islam to Mrs Skewton. 1 Presented in such shape it is indeed useless, and the sooner that science completes its destruction the better. But the answer given in Christ's life to the timeless question of man's relation to sin and misery, continues among the eternal verities. And so long as man is " Created half to rise and half to fall," it must remain. Art may to-day revive Hellenism, in so far as that is possible, and baptise its find the " Eeligion of Beauty." Physical science may go back to the abstract monotheism of Palestine, and call its setting of God over against man " Agnosticism." But the interpretation of the great truths contained in each of these movements is already beforehand with them in Christianity. There Hellenism and Hebraism met, not under the form of a doctrinal system, but in a nature which at once realised God's transcendence, yet continual presence, in the beauty of the world and in the human spirit. The inner life which Christ illustrated and actualised is the highest revelation to man of the universal moral order. But no seal is thus set upon the potentiality of things. Men are Christians, not because they accept a few dogmas which outrage both intellect and conscience, but because they perceive in the man Christ Jesus a kind of being which is the one permanent index of a universal human " capacity of using and modifying any existing state of things," for the furtherance of well- 1 "There is no What's-his-name but Thingummy, and What-you- may-call-it is his prophet." Socrates and Christ. 259 being, intellectual and social, no less than moral and religious. Man's chief atheism is sin, and if the con- secrated life of Jesus be without message to those who would live sin down, then, so far as revelation has gone, atheist man is doomed to remain. But there is a mes- sage which, whether willing or unwilling, human na- ture cannot shut out. The modernness of Christianity lies in this that for sin we must even now " suffer with Christ whether we believe in Him or not." * /While, then, there are points of external contact between Socrates and Christ, which render comparison by no means unreasonable, it must be remembered that in inner spirit they have little in common. Above all is it necessary to avoid the radical mis- conception of regarding Christianity as a species of sublimated Greek philosophy. The life of Christ could only have been lived when and where it was lived. No speculative system contemplating, like Greek philosophy, an explanation of being, could have produced that sense of sin which culminated in a life of grace. Socrates was able to consider his death an inevitable sacrifice, just as Christ did. Yet he died in the full assurance that punishment had already over- taken the evil men who composed the majority of the Dicastery. For this reason, were there none other, his fate does not appeal to us with the same power as Christ's. Both had strength given them to die in a just cause. But the occasions were not identical. The calmness of Socrates and the agony of Christ are separ- ated by constituent elements which, if subtle, are none the less obvious. The Socratic philosophy represents the bringing to birth of what was highest in Greek 1 John Inglesant, J. H. Shorthouse, p. 259. 260 Socrates and Christ. thought. Its founder was able to die calmly, because he was persuaded that the world-order had univer- sality. This universality he had tried to find in the life of each man. Yet even had he known the reign of law, and of liberty, as it is now understood, his revelation would still have been imperfect. Later thinkers, persuaded of this imperfection, sought to surmount it in various ways. But the conception of the moral governance of man was not to be com- pleted from Greek civilisation. The wise man, so called, might think about it, and describe it, but un- fortunately, the wise man himself never appeared, nor could he. Only in the matrix of Judaism, surrounded by the consciousness of. an ethical God, and determined by the idea of living to this deity, could the wise man appear. The Greek ideal of a mediator between the transcendent God and the world, the Graeco-Boman conception of the sage's life, and the Jewish thought of a saviour, were all requisite to, as they were realised by, the Christ. He did not protest that He was such, but, by living as He did, He solved the universal problem. In a sense, He added nothing to the 'know- ledge of Greek and Jewish thinkers, Philo had all the elements, but he brought thought about God and morality out of the theoretical region of discussion down to the practical sphere of the God -like and moralised life. And of this change the Jewish religion was the prime cause. Socrates and Christ are both revealers of principles, which they incar- nated. For each the crisis of history called. The religious intensity of Jesus was impossible to Socrates, because utterly foreign to the entire mode of thought Socrates and Christ. 261 which he expressed. Yet without it, the lesson of the ages would have been proper only to the Greek man, not to humanity. Socrates and Christ alike had faith in the ideal, but 'this was different for each. The artistically rounded life of the Greek citizen, set with nicest care into the united, social fabric, could not, Socrates was persuaded, be produced on the Sophistic method. His work, there- fore, was to find a new way to the ideal which his age contemplated. Like the other masters, he had to " fit to the finite his infinity." But the ideal, partial even as it was, still remained ideal, and no struggle of later thought availed, save as a process of development, to bring it nearer. Yet, although in Christ the moral possibilities of human nature found realisation, Chris- tianity is no exceptionally supernatural phenomenon. It came in the fulness of time, when the passage of thought from the phenomenal to the real, as seen in Greek philosophy, had prepared a way for it. The spiritual discipline of the Jews was the determining factor in the life of Christ, but the problem, which He died to solve, was also set in the Gentile world. Judaism saw heaven from earth, Hellenism imagined earth heaven, and both at last felt that their concep- tions were illusory. Christianity brought heaven to earth, and, by inculcating, as Christ lived, that this is the place of self-sacrifice for the moralisation of humanity and of the individual, " Goes changing what was wrought, From falsehood like the truth, to truth itself." 1 The comprehensiveness of Christianity is the evi- 1 A Death in the Desert, Robert Browning, Works, vol. vii. p. 145. 262 Socrates and Christ. dence that it is no transfigured Hellenism. Christ breathed a new spirit into the world by living for the sake of righteousness. He put the existence of an ideal life beyond possibility of question. To-day His religion is not a mere recorded fact of intel- lectual history, but because His work is completed and human, Christianity goes on reproducing itself as a manner of life. In its essential eternity for man it depends ultimately, neither on historical occurrences, nor on theological dogmas, but on the constitution of human nature. Knowledge of Christ must be gleaned as is knowledge of Socrates. But, seeing that Socrates was a searcher after the ultimate in man and God, and Christ a verification of the divine in the human, knowledge of Him comes with power. The perfection which is possible for man He had. His life was the answer to every cry for deliverance from the burden of sin, because in it are to be seen certain spiritual experiences which, let knowledge be what it may, are continually repeating themselves in human nature as the sole means to moral perfection. What those ex- periences were, Socrates did not understand. But he was among the first to awaken that consciousness of defect, which went on deepening through the ancient world, until all spiritual functions were "smothered in surmise " of superstition. The appearance of Christ was eminently natural, and in the principle of His life all that the world desired was granted. His Person- ality, and the possibilities of human nature which it revealed, form His indestructible contribution to moral progress. As the great Parson, who subdued the greatest crisis in man's history, He is, and, so long as the world is governed by Keason, must remain, the type, in as- Socrates and Christ. similating themselves to which other persons may rise to further self-completeness. " The true reality that is and ought to be, is not mat- ter, and is still less Idea, but is the living personal Spirit of God and the world of personal spirits which He has created." 1 Before Christ the conception that self-conscious personality was common to God and man alike had been but dimly foreshadowed. The Christ- life elevated it into a certain fact. Here then is Christ's inalienable contribution to human progress. His religion cannot fail of endless application ; for His perfect character is the sole guarantee that every man, though knowing the evil, can be true to himself only in being holy and in following after righteous- ness. But this righteousness is not an external thing upon which one can lay hold or towards which one can progress. In the self-conscious sphere the category of law, as usually conceived, has little or no appli- cation. Yet it must not be supposed, on this account, that personality develops aimlessly. True, present conditions are nought save as interpreted by it : but, wanting them, the interpretation could not be. Both are essential factors in a life which is constantly re- vealing and actualising an immanent cause an inner principle./ Socrates was the first to observe the import- ance of tnis causa mi. It was Christ's to realise the absolute value of personality as such, and to show how, by a full apprehension of all that self -mediation implies, each may, nay, cannot but escape the yoke of the law, by using it as a means to his own perfecting. And this perfecting is righteousness. The good man is truly free ; for, by appreciation of the transforming power of char- 1 Microcosmus, Lotze, vol. ii. p. 728. 264 Socrates and Chrisi. acter, he finds himself capable of subduing all circum- stances to his own growth in moral stature a growth inseparably bound up with a like advancement in his fellows. Christ's life and teaching embody in full that freedom which exists only amid limitation, and issues the more triumphant the more it is circumscribed freedom which, for this very reason, can be attained, in some measure, by all who, as partakers of His hu- manity, are able to make weakness the perfection of strength. INDEX. Abbott, E. A., 96 n., 253 n. G. W., 232 n. Absolute religion, Christianity the, 226. Academy, the New, 127, 128. Importance of, 129. Accommodation theory, 220 n. Adaptation and Eclecticism, 133. ^Eschylus, 17, 18, 19, 27. JEstheticisrn, Positivism, and Chris- tianity, 258. Agnosticism, 258, and Knowledge, Possible in knowledge, impos- sible in morals, 228. Ahriman, 86 n. Alcibiades, 61. Alexander, 82, 156, 161. Altruism, 256. Amos, 188 n., 191. Analogy, reasoning from, 165. Anaxagoras, 18, 21, 23, 24, 35, 47, 60, 63. Nous of, 25 sq. Kelation of, to Socrates, 24 n., 25. Anthropomorphism, Greek, 15, 17. Antiochus Epiphanes, 156, 157. Antiochus of Ascalon, 135. Apathy, Stoic, 110. Apocalypse, 205 n. Apocalyptic literature of the Jews, 156 sq. 'Apology' of Plato, 9 n., 16, 43, 56 n., 59 n., 241 n. Apology, Socrates' compared with Christ's, 8. Archer-Hind's ' Phsedo,' 59 n. Aristippus, 33. Aristo, 98, 99. Aristobulus, 157, 160, 161. On Deity, 161, 162. Aristophanes, 24 n., 58, 60. Aristotle, 17, 39, 48, 67, 68, 70, 78, 99, 100, 102, 106, 108, 114, 116, 149, 152, 167, 173, 249. Aim of, 72. Davidson, T., on, 81 n. ' De Anima ' of, 26 n. , 80 n. , 102 n. Defect of, 82. Deity according to, 80 sq., 87, 162. ' Ethics ' of, 80 n. Ideal life according to, 79. 'Metaphysics' of, 26 n., 40 n., 80 n. Plato contrasted with, 73. Result of his philosophy, 81. Arnold, Matthew, 11 n., 68 n., 184 n., 224 n., 236 n. Art, analogy from and Greek life, 15 sq., 55 sq., 64. The glory of Greek, 18. Asmonsean dynasty, 156. Aspasia, 24. Atheism and sin, 259. Athens, 14, 27, 29, 35, 61, 85, 241. Atomists, 23. Aubertin on Seneca and St Paul, 142 n. Augustan age, 138, 140. Augustus, 138 n., 143, 144, 145. Aulus Gellius, 122. Aurelius, Marcus, 100, 145. Authority of Christ, 221 sq. Baader, Franz, 155. Bauer, Bruno, 6 n. , 204 n. Baur, F. C., 6, 147 n., 169 TO., 180 TO. Bax, E. B., 166 n. 266 Index. Becoming, 23. Being, 22, 23, 24. Belief and salvation, 227, 228 n. Benn, A. W., 5, 61, 70, 114 n., 116 n., 136 n., 144 %., 145. Bentham, 10. Bernard, St, 254 w. Bossuet, 1. Browning, Eobert, 189, 218, 254, 261. Brutus, 120. Burn, R., 120 n., 121 n. Burnouf, E., 1, 237 n., 253 n. Burroughs, J., in 'The Nineteenth Century,' 58. Byron, 172. Caesar, deification of the, 124. Capes, W. W., 140 n. Carlyle, 2, 223 n., 245 n., 256. Carneades, 127, 128, 130, 131, 134. Special doctrines of, 129. Casuistry, 49, 123, 135. Cato, 119, 120. Cause, final, 79. ' Charmides ' of Plato, 58 n. Cheyne, T. K., 187 n. Chopin, 222. Christ. (See also Jesus.) And demonstrable knowledge of God, 228, 231, 248. And the Jewish Law, 204, 210, 212, 213. Authority of, 221 sq. Criticism and, 222. Cynicism and, 210. Goodness exceptional of, 234. His conception of His mission, 216. Historical necessity of, 223, 227. Masters the other and, 233 sq. Messiahship of, 217 sq., 219 sq. Messianic inspiration, value of His, 222 sq. Particular and general aspects of His life distinguished, 229 sq. Person of, and Christianity, 226, 227, 253. Personality, value of His, 224, 225. Philosophers, Greek contrasted with, 204. Place of, in history, 230. Problem of evil and, 227, 234. Self-consciousness of, 220. Supersedes Judaism and Greek philosophy, 182. Superstition at time of, 213. Supremacy of, 256. Teaching, unique character of His, 212, 220, 252 sq. Transcendentalism of, 226, 230. Uniqueness of His individuality, 196, 225, 228, 233 sq., 252, 255. Work of, 227. Christ and Socrates. Apologies of, compared, 8. Circumstances of, diverse, 239 sq. Compared, 4, 7 sq. Contrasted, 182, 183, 204, 209, 211, 217 sq., 236 sq., 248, 250 sq., 256, 259 sq. Deaths of, compared, 9, 259. Early lives of, 218. Individualities of, distinguished, 211, 216. Knowledge of, to be obtained similarly, 262. Methods of, compared, 8. Missions of, diverse, 210. Racial diversity of, 240 sq. Revealers alike, 260. Christian element in Plato, 78. And pagan morality contrasted, 247 sq., 249. Revelation, the, perpetuated in a principle, 257. ' Christianisme et ses Origines, Le,' 5, 55%., 167 n., 185 n. Christianity before Christ, 3, 225. Comprehensiveness of, 261, 262. Elements of, 260. Greek Philosophy contrasted with, 245 ; distinguished from, 259. Modernness of, 259. Monotheism and, 202. Mysticism and, 229. Christianity, naturalness and reason- ableness of, 254, 261. Origin of, 204. Permanence of, 253, 255 n., 257 sq., 263. Person of Christ and, 254, 255. Popular, 236, 258. Positivism and JSstheticism, 258. Preparation for, 196. Preparation for, part of Greek philosophy and Jewish religion in, 194, 201, 249, 250. Religion, a historical, 180. Religion, the absolute, 226. Scepticism and, 251. Index. 267 Socrates as a forerunner of, 248, 257, 259 sq. Undogmatic character of, 257 sq. ' Christus und die Caesaren,' 6 w., 204, 205 n. Chrysippus, 98, 112, 115, 122, 125, 140, 152. Church, A. J., 60. Cicero, 38, 101, 117 n., 120, 122 n., 130, 135, 137, 139. On Epicureanism, 96. Opportunism of, 135 sq. Socrates compared with, 136 n. Theism of, 146. Circe, 33. Cleanthes, 102. Clemens Alexandrinus, 160 n. Clough, A. H., 256. Colani, 220 n. Contact of Jew and Greek, 155. Effect of, 157. Cosmic religion, 256. Cosmopolitanism of the Stoics, 106 aq., 123. Courtney, W. L., 89 n. Crates, 99. Critias, 61. Crozier, J. B., 144 n. Culture, Greek, nature of, 14 sq. And Roman character, 131 sq. Curtius, 557i., 62 n. Cynicism and Stoicism, 98 sq. Cynics, 83, 98, 132. Cyrenaics, 83, 89, 100, 132. Daemon of Socrates, 18, 38, 63, 206, 238. Daniel, Book of, 156, 157, 214. Dante, 172, 208, 233. Darwin, 79. Davidson, Thos., 81 n. Deane, W. J., 158 w., 163 TO. Deaths of Socrates and Christ com- pared, 9, 259. Definitions, general, of Socrates, 40, 72, 242. Deification of the Caesar, 124. Deity. (See also God.) Aristotle's doctrine of, 80 sq., 87, 162. Greek doctrine of, 162. Jewish belief in, persistence of, 190, 193, 206. Jewish belief in, and the form of the Messianic hope, 193 sq. Jewish ideal of, 184 sq., 206, 207. Philo's doctrine of, 165-169, 178, 179. Philo's Logos as related to, 172. Stoic view of, 104, 113 sq., 118. Wisdom as related to, 160. Delaunay, F., 164 n. Demons, 214. ' De Officiis,' 136. ' Deontology,' 10 n. De Quincey, 14. Deutero-Isaiah, 194, 196, 202. Deuteronomic code, the, 198, 202. Dialectic, Socratic, 35, 41, 238. Dialogue, Socratic, 39. Diaspora, Jewish, 155, 156. Dicasts, Dicastery, 8, 61, 259. Dickens, C., 258 n. Diogenes Laertius, 92. 'Divine Comedy,' the, 221. Divine and human, 117, 152, 182, 229, 232. Dogmatism and Scepticism, 127- Dollinger, 58, 113 n., 129, 139, 178 n. Domitian, 205 n. Dramatists, the Greek, 17 sq. Drummond, James, 67, 103 n, 152 n., 158 n., 159 n., 165 n., 169 n., 171 n., 173 n., 174 n., 175 n., 176 n., 217 n. Dualism of Philo, 166, 170. Of Plato, 73, 74, 150-152, 173. Dualistic theism of Aristotle, 67. Eclecticism and adaptation, 133. Effect of, 134. Roman, 130, 132 sq., 139. 'Eclogue,' the fourth, 146 n., 148. Ecstasy, 178. Edersheim, A., 156 n. Edger, S., 227, 228 n. Eleatics, 21, 22. Elijah, 187. Elisha, 187. Emerson, R. W., 10, 31, 57, 236 n. Empedocles, 21. Emperors, the Roman, 148. Empire, the Roman, 180 sq., 239 sq., 251. 'Encyclopaedia Britannica,' 88 n., 183 n. Enoch, 214. Epicurus, Seneca's respect for, 140 n. Epicureanism, agreement of, with Stoicism, 85, 98, 100, 128. Cicero on, 96. Defect of, 97. Elasticity of, 96. 268 Index. Influence of, 88. Main doctrines of, 90. And its philosophy of nature, 90. And pleasure, 88 sq., 91, 97. Problem of, 85. Self-contradiction of, 95, 126. Socrates survives in, 93. Success of, reason for, 95. Wise man of, his defect, 94. ' Epicurean, Marius the,' 91, 100, 132, 146 Eristic, 39. ' Esdras, Second,' 214. Ethics, foundation of Socratic, 44-46. Ethics of Philo, 177. 'Ethics, Prolegomena to,' 250 n. Eupolis, 60. Euripides, 18. Eusebius, 160 ., 161 n. Euthydemus, 37, 46. Euthyphro, 242. Evil, problem of, 68, 74. And Christ, 227, 234. And Seneca, 143, 251. And Stoicism, 112. Ewald, H., 156 n., 164 n., 175 n., 180 n., 215 n., 229 n. 'Explanation of the Mosaic Laws,' 157, 161. Ezra, 202. Farrar, F. W., 65, 142 n., 148 TO., 163 n. Fatalism, Stoic, 117. 'Faust, '11, 221. Ferrier, J. F., 28 n., 41 n., 50 n., 122 n. Feuerbach, 232. Figulus, P. Nigidius, 153 n. Final cause, 79. Finality of Socrates, 249, 250. Fischer, Kuno, 216 n. Fisher, G. P., 180 n. Fiske, J., 184 n. Flint, R., 207 n. Fordyce, J., 57. Foundation of Socratic ethics, 44-46. Freedom, 52, 79, 88, 89, 90, 92, 94, 101, 123, 140, 149, 263. Stoic, 108, 141. Friedlander, 144 TO* Frcehner, W., 121 n. Galba, 205 n. General definitions of Socrates, 40, 72, 242. Genius, 52, 255. Gibbon, 155, 211. God. (See also Deity.) Alone adequate to His own proof, 185. Ethical conception of, 155. Immanency of, 256, 257. Man and religion, 247, 248. Viewed under these aspects, 113 Goethe, 2, 11, 52, 60, 208, 227, 233, 252, 255 n., 257 n. Gorgias, 26, 28. Grseco-Jewish school, 150, 153. Philosophy, factors of, 151. Grant, Sir A., 79 n., 88 n., 141 n. Greek anthropomorphism, 17. Art, the glory of, 18. Attitude towards great men, 60. Contact of, with Jew, 155, 157. Culture, nature of, 14 sq. Culture and Roman character, 131. Doctrine concerning Deity, 162. Dramatists, 17 sq. Life and the analogy from art, 15 sq. Monotheism, 6 n., 18, 19, 248. Monotheism, contrasted with Jewish, 189. Philosophers contrasted with Christ, 204. Philosophy, contrasted with Christianity, 247, 259. Philosophy, defect of, 87. Philosophy, objectivity of early, 20 sq. Religion, 15, 17. State, 31, 241. State, defect of, 77. Thought, development of pre- Socratic, 16 sq. Thought, at time of Socrates' ap- pearance, 29, 32. Green, T. H., 250 n. Grote, G., 28 n., 41 n. 'Hamlet,' 221. Hausrath, A., 180 n., 213 n., 214 TO. Havet, E., 5, 55, 167, 185 TO. Heath, R., 185 n. Hebrews, Epistle to, 180, 224. Hegel, 10, 13, 14 n., 34, 73, 78 n., 116, 131, 227 TO., 240 n. Heine, 32. Heinze, 152 TO., 158 n., 169 TO. Index. 269 'Hellenica,'96 w. Hellenism, Jewish, 157. Heracleitus, 22, 27, 115. Hercules, the Dorian, and Jehovah, 113 n. Herder, 255 n. Herzog's 'Encyclopaedia of Theology,' 163 n. 'Hibbert Lectures,' 185 n., 204, 205 n., 209 n. Hicks, E. D., 88 n. Hillel, 213. Hinton, James, 224, 231, 255 n. History, Jewish and Jesus, 203. History, the Socrates of, 31. Historical necessity of Christ, 223, 227. Holiness of Jehovah, the, 187. Homer, 16, 161, 172, 233. Horace, 89. Horton, R. F., 193 w. Hosea, 191. Hugo, Victor, 5. Human and divine, 117, 152, 182, 229, 232. Hume, 131 n. 'Idea of the Good, '151. Ideal state of Plato, 77. Theory of Plato, 173 w. Mean Mother, the, 144. ' Iliad,' 221. Immanency of God, 256, 257. ' Immortality, Aristotle's conditions of,' 81 n. India, gods of, 185. Individual and the State, 77. Socrates' view of the value of, 58, 62, 64. And universal, 10 sq., 178, 208, 224. Individuals and moral principles, 178. Power of exceptional, 11. louians, 20, 21, 22. Irony of Socrates, 45 sq. Isaiah, 187, 188 n., 191, 194 n., 195 n. The Second, 194, 196, 202. Isis, 144. Iverach, J., 239 n. Jahn, 0., 137 n. Jehoiachim, 191 n. Jehovah, 184, 186, 192, 196, 205, 209. And Jesus, 207. And the Dorian Hercules, 114 n. Doctrine, earlier, of, contrasted with later, 187, 188. Doctrine, later, concerning, 194 sq., 202. Holiness of, 187. Israel's special relation to, 196. Of the Second Isaiah, 195 sq. Jeremiah, 188 n., 196. Jerusalem, sack of, 191 n. Jesus. (See also Christ.) And Judaism, 201 sq., 212. Morality of, 206. ' Jesus Sirach,' 159. Jew and Greek, contact of, 155. Jewish doctrine of deity opposed alike to polytheism and pantheism, 206, 207. Jewish Hellenism, 157. History and Jesus, 203. History, supernatural element in, 192, 193 n., 215. Ideal of deity, 184 sq. Ideal of deity, and form of the messianic hope, 193 sq. Jewish Law, the, and Christ, 204, 210, 212, 213. And the prophetic spirit, 197 sq. Contradiction, inner, of, 209. Effect of, 211. Religious value of, 198 sq. Subsidiary character of, 200. Jewish monotheism, 113, 154, 185 sq. Recuperative power of, 190, 191, 193, 206. Jewish proselytism at Rome, 145. Religion, early, 185 sq. Jews, apocalyptic literature of, 156 sq. And the Law, 197 sq., 203. Historical office of, 183. The, and revelation, 207, 208. The, and Roman rule, 214. Job, Book of, 191. John, St, 9 n., 180, 203 n., 226 n., 228 n. Josephus, 214. Josiah, 191 n. 'Journal of Psychology, American,' 115 n. 'Journal of Speculative Philosophy,' 81 n., 130 n., 232 n. Jowett, B., 163 n., 164 n., 174 n., 207 n., 241 n., 249 n. Judaism, 153. And Christianity, 211. And Jesus, 201 sq., 212. 270 Index. And the moral law, 206. Later, 199. Justin Martyr, 4. Juvenal, 214, 239. Keim, 153 n., 218 n., 219 n., 221 n. 1 Kernel and the Husk, the,' 254 n. Kingsley, C., 215 n. Kuenen, 155 n., 179 n., 183 n., 184 n., 185 n., 190 n., 194 n., 195 n., 197 n., 203 7i., 204 - 205 n., 209 %., 216 w. Lacedaemon, 29. Lamartine, 4. Landor, 13. Lang, H., 225 n. Law and morality, 240. Law, category of, and Spirit. 263. Law, Jewish, 197 sq., 200, 203, 209, 211. And the prophetic spirit, 197 sq. Learning of Philo, 164. Lecky, W. E. H., 104 n., 121 n., 123 n., 132 n. Lessing, 255 n. L'Estrange, Sir Roger, 139. ' Life, an unexamined, is not worth living,' 43. Life, ideal, according to Aristotle, 79. Lightfoot, J. B., 87 n., 125, 142 n., 153 n. 1 Live according to nature,' 101, 123. Logos, Alexandrian, 152. As a mediator, 171, 174. Of Philo, 169 sq., 208. Of Philo, personality of, 172 sq. Of Philo, relation of to Deity, 172. Of Plato, and Stoicism, 152. The Suppliant, 173. Lotze, 263 n. Lucretius, 93. Luther, 227, 256. Macaulay, 136, 139. Maccabseus, Judas, 156. Macintosh, R., 204 n., 207 n. t 221 n. Mackay, R. W., 6. Malachi, 190. Man's chief end, 235. 'Marius the Epicurean,' 91, 100, 132, 146. Mark, St, 253. Matthew, St, 203 n., 218 n., 219 n., 253. Mayor, J. B., 5, 22 n., 121 n. Mediation, 152. Mediator, 168, 180. The Logos as a, 171, 174. Megarians, 83. Megiddo, battle of, 191 n. ' Memorabilia,' 5, 24 n., 33, 36 n., 37, 44 n., 46 n., 47, 51 n., 57 n. Messianic hope, 192, 193, 196, 198, 215, 216. Influence of, on Jesus, 219. Philo and, 174, 208. Methods of Socrates and Christ com- pared, 8. Micah, 191. Mill, J. S., 11, 39, 40, 63. Mind, the Greek and the modern, 13. Minor Socratics, 83. Mithras, 144. Mommsen, 118, 119, 137 n. Monism of the Stoics, 140 sq., 153. Monotheism, 113 sq., 231. And Christianity, 202, 203. Greek, 6 n., 18 sq., 248. Greek, contrasted with Jewish, 189. Jewish, 113, 154, 185 sq. Jewish, recuperative power of, 190, 191, 193, 206. Moral principles and individuals, 178. Morality, Christian and pagan, 247 sq., 249. And law, 240. And religion, 229 sq., 245 sq., 262, 263. Of Jesus, 206. Morison, J. Cotter, 256 n. 1 Mosaic Laws, Explanation of,' 157, 161. Moses, 161, 183, 186, 203, 209. Mozley, J. B., 207 n. Murillo, 222. Mysticism, 150. And Christianity, 229. 'Natural Religion,' 207 n., 210. Neander, 163 n., 180 n. Necho, 191 n. Nemesis, 19, 26. Neo-pythagoreanism, 153 n. Nero, 124, 148, 251. Newman, F. W., 247 n. Nicomachus of Gerasa, 153 n. Niebuhr, 136 n., 139. ' Nothing happens, but it comes, Index. 271 Nous of Anaxagoras, 25 sq. Novalis, 6. Old Testament, 185, 198, 199, 201, 202, 203. Opportunism of Cicero, 135 sq. Origin of Christianity, 204. Oxenham, J. N., 239 n. Pagan and Christian morality, 247 sq., 249. Pagan reaction, 96, 138, 144 sq., 146 sq. Panaetius, 122. Paradoxes of Stoics, 107. Parmenides, 21, 22, 27, 167. Pascal, 232. Pater, Walter, 18 n., 91 n., 100 n., 132, 146 n. Patrick, G. W. T., 115 n. Paul, St, 9, 205 n., 223. Peloponnesian war, 29. Perfectibility, 109, 239, 240, 253. Pericles, 24, 29, 59, 241. Persius, 120 n. Person of Christ and Christianity, 226, 227, 253. Personality, 2, 9, 12, 77, 225, 230, 233, 236 sq., 262 sq. Christ's, value of, 224, 225. Influence of Socrates', 242 sq. Socrates an exceptional, 30, 89. Socrates and, 50, 52. Socrates' contrasted with Christ's, 66, 68. Peter, St, 253. Pfleiderer, 0., 184 n., 188 w.,197 n.. 208 n., 229 n. Phidias, 15, 208. Philo of Alexandria, 157, 160 n., 161, 204, 205 n., 214, 239. Allegorical method of, 161. An abstract thinker, 181 sq., 241. And his age, 180. And his critics, 163. And Plato, 173, 175. And Socrates, 166, 168, 176. And the messianic hope, 174, 208. Christianity, his relation to, 179 sq. Dualism of, 166, 170. Ethics of, 177. His doctrine of Deity, 165 sq., 179. His philosophy, elements of, 162. His philosophy subdivided, 165. His style rhetorical, 170. His view of man, 175 sq. Importance of, 164, 178 sq. Learning of, 164. Logos of, 169, sq., 208. Logos of, and Deity, 172. Logos of, personality of, 172 sq., 174. Logos of, personification of, 174 n., 175. Logos of, the Suppliant, 173. Salvation contemplated by, 171 sq., 176 sq. System, want of, 164. Philo of Larissa, 135. Philosophy, intensiveness of, 35. ' Philosophy, Journal of Speculative, Sin., 130 n., 232 n. Pilate, 148, 240. Plato, 5, 9, 17, 33, 36, 41, 54, 66, 70- 73, 99, 136, 149, 151, 152, 161, 173, 231, 243, 244, 248, 249. Aim of, 72. And Socrates, 242, 243. 'Apology' of, 9 n., 43, 59 n., 241 n. ' Charmides ' of, 58 n. Christian element in, 78. Defect of, 74. Dualism of, 73, 74, 150-152, 173. Ideal state of, 77. Ideal theory of, 173 n. Importance of, 76. ' Laws ' of, 74 n. Logos of, and Stoicism, 152. ' Parmenides ' of, 159, 167. ' Phsedo' of, 25 n., 36 n., 47 n., 60 n., 243. ' Protagoras ' of, 238. Reminiscence, doctrine of, 1, 44, 158, 175. < Republic ' of, 150. ' Statesman ' of, 74 n. < Theaetetus ' of, 39 n., 41 n., 74 n., 75 n., 248 n. ( Timseus ' of, 76, 152. Pleasure according to the Epicureans, 88, 91, 97. Pliny the Younger, 205 n. Plutarch, 112 n., 132 n., 147 n. Positivism, 256. ^Estheticism, and Christianity, 258. Post-Aristotelian schools, 84 sq., 126 sq. Preller, 17 n. 272 Index. Probabilities, theory of. 128, 131, 134. Problem of evil, 68, 74. And Christ, 227, 234. And Seneca, 143, 251. And Stoicism, 112. ' Prolegomena to Ethics,' 250 n. Prophetic office of Socrates, 250. Spirit, the, and the Law, 197 sq. Prophets, the, 183, 203. Early, 186. Later, 186. Protagoras, 26, 238. Proverbs, Book of, 159. Prowett, C. G., 164 n. Psalms, Book of, 199, 207 n. ' Psychology, American Journal of/ 115 n. Pyrrho, 126, 127. Pythagoras, 21, 22, 153 n., 161. Quietism of Philo, 177. Quinet, Edgar, 113 n., 120, 185 n. Raphael, 222. Redeemer, 86 n. Religion of Beauty, 258. And morality, 229 sq., 245 sq., 262, 263. At Rome under Augustus, 144 sq. Cosmic, 256. Early Jewish, 185 sq. First function of, 144. Man, and God, 247, 248. Moralised, and the Jews, 183. Of humanity, 256. Peculiarity of Jewish, 154. Religious influences and Socrates, 243, 244. Reminiscence, Plato's doctrine of, 1, 44, 158, 175. Renan, E., 184 n., 218. Revealers, Socrates and Christ con- sidered as, 260. Revelation, Christian perpetuated in a principle, 257. And the Jews, 207, 208. ' ' Reverences, the Three,' 2. Riddell's 'Apology,' 43 n. Roman character, the, 119 sq. Influence of, on Greek culture, 131 sq. Roman Eclecticism, 130, 132 sq., 139. Eclecticism, effect of, 135. Emperors, 148. Empire, 180 sq., 239 sq., 251. Rule and the Jews, 214. Rome, Jewish proselytism at, 145. Stoicism at, 118 sq. Royce, J., 206 n. Salvation and belief, 227, 228 n. Christ's, 254, 255, 262. Genesis of the problem of, 149 sq. Necessity for, 145 sq., 156, 215 sq. Philo's, 171 sq., 176 sq. Problem of, 147 sq. Stoic, 107. Samuel, 186. Sanhedrim, 8. Satan, 86 n. Scepticism and dogmatism, 127. Post-Aristotelian, 86, 87. Sceptics, the, 126 sq. Influence of, on Stoicism and Epicureanism, 129 sq. Schelling, 130. Schlegel, 19. Schleiermacher, 5, 32 n., 231. Schlirer, E., 156 n., 158 n., 159, 161 n., 164 n., 169 n., 170 n. Scribes and Pharisees, 198, 209. Secular and sacred, the, their re- lation, 3. Self-sacrifice, 246, 247, 252, 253. Sellar, W. Y., 138 n., 148 n. Seneca, 117 n., 137, 138, 147, 162, 204, 205 n., 251. And sense of sin, 141, 142. And the pagan reaction, 139 sq., 142. And the problem of evil, 143, 251. Epicurus and, 140 n. His Stoicism, nature of, 139 sq., 143. ' Septuagint,' 156 sq. Serapis, 144. Service of man, 255, 256. Severitas, 120. Sextii, school of the, 137. School of the, and Stoicism, 138. Sextus, 128. Shakespeare, 13, 229, 233. Shelley, 4. Shorthouse, J. H., 259 n. Sibylline Books, 157. Siegfried, 156 n., 162 n., 164 n., 169 n., 175 n., 176 n., 180 n. Sin and atheism, 259. Sin and eternity, 232. Sinclair, T. ; 150 n, Index. 273 Smith, Robertson, 183 n., 187 n., 192, 197 n., 199 n. Socrates, aim of, 39. A moralist primarily, 245 n. Anaxagoras, relation of, to, 25, 60. And good, the highest, 48, 49, 54. And the Dicasts, 61. Aristotle and Plato, how related, 72 sq. As a forerunner of Christianity, 248, 257, 259 n. Cicero compared with, 136 n. Daemon of, 7, 18, 38, 63, 206, 238. Death of, effect of, 63 sq. Defect of, 48, 53. Dialectic of, 35, 41. Ethics of, their foundation, 44, 46. Finality of, 249, 250. General definitions, nature of his, 40, 242. Greek art, as affected by, 55, 64. Greek thought at time of his ap- pearance, 29, 32. Immoral practices, attitude to- wards, 51, 56 sq. Individual, his view of the value of, 58, 62, 64. Irony of, 45 sq. 'Know thyself' of, 42, 47, 83. Knowledge of self, content of, 48. Life, his manner of, 65. Martyred, why, 60. Method of, 8, 40, 41, 242. Method of, and the Sophists, 42, 52. Method of, effect of, 42. Moral courage of, 55 sq., 59. Personal influence of, 242 sq. Personality, an exceptional, 30, 89. Personality, view of, 50, 52. Philo and, 166, 168, 176. Plato and, 72 sq., 242, 243. Prophetic office of, 250. Religion, attitude towards pop- ular, 61, 244. Religious teacher, his work over- laps that of a, 241 sq., 244, 245. Scepticism, his attitude towards, 36, 237. Senate, and the, 55. Sophists, his difference from the, 52, 261. Sophists, his likeness to the, 27, Sophistic dialectic and, 35, 238. Subjectivity of, 34. Survival of, in Epicureanism, 93. System, his want of, 46, 65. Temperance of, 50 sq., 57. The charges against, 62. The family and, 51. The historical, 31. The ideal of, 59. Theodota and, 57. Tyrants, the, and, 55. 'Virtue is knowledge,' 33, 50. 'Virtue is knowledge,' defect of, 53, 70, 73, 89, 210. Work, difficulty of estimating his, 33. Work of his life, 35, 238, 239. Socrates and Christ. Apologies of, compared, 8. Circumstances of, diverse, 239 sq. Compared, 4, 7 sq. Contrasted, 182, 183, 204, 209, 211, 217 sq., 236 sq., 248, 250 sq., 256, 259 sq. Deaths of, compared, 9, 259. Early lives of, 218. Individualities of, distinguished, 211, 216. Knowledge of, to be obtained similarly, 262. Methods of, compared, 8. Missions of, diverse, 210. Racial diversity of, 240 sq. Revealers alike, 260. ' Songs of Ascent,' 199. Sophists (see also Socrates), 23, 26, 44, 237. Rise of the, 26 sq. The, influenced as Socrates, 27. Sophocles, 17, 19, 27. Sorites, the, in ' Wisdom of Solomon,' 158*. Sotion, 138. Speculation, character of pre-Socratic, 20 sq. 'Speculative Philosophy, Journal of,' 81 n., 130 n., 232 n. Spinoza, 116. Spirit, category of law and, 263. The Prophetic, and the Law, 197 sq. Stanton, V. H., 205 n., 217 n., 219 n. Stirling, J. Hutchison, 78 n. Stockl, A., 163 n. 3 274 Index. Stoicism, Stoics, Csesar-worship and, 124. At Rome, 118 sq., 122 sq., 124, 131 sq. Contradiction, self-, of, 109, 146. Cosmopolitanism of, 106 sq., 123. Cynicism and, 98 sq. Cyrenaics and Epicureans, how related, 100. Defects of, 110 sq. Deity, doctrine of, 104, 113 sq., 118. Dogmatic character of, 101, 103, 127. Epicureanism, agreement of, with, 85, 98, 100, 128. Evil, problem of, and, 112. Ideal of, 102. Importance of, 88, 104, 107. Individual, view of, 105, 106. Logos of Plato and, 152. Monism of, 140 sq., 153. Paradoxes of, 107. Problem of, 85. Reason, view of, 101. Results of, 106 sq. Roman law and, 118, 123. Sceptics and, 127 sq. Seneca and, 138 sq., 162. Socrates and, 98, 99, 102. Suicide and, 109. System, an articulated, 98. Virtue, view of, 105, 107, 108, 110. Wise man of, 105, 110, 117, 141. Stone, C. J., 225 n. Strauss, 218. Suetonius, 205 n. Superstition at the time of Christ, 213. Symonds, J. A., 16 n. Synagogue, 199. Tacitus, 205 n. Temperance of Socrates, 50 sq., 57. 'Ten words, 'the, 206. Thales, 21, 22. 'Thesetetus' of Plato, 39 n., 41 n., 74 n., 75 n., 248 n. Theodoras, 40. Theodota, 57. ' Theologische Tijdschrift,' 184 n. Thirlwall, 244 n. 'Three Reverences,' the, 2. ' Through Nature to Christ,' 253 n. Tiele, C. P., 15 n. Trial of Socrates, 60 sq. Tubingen school, 165. 'Tusculanse Disputationes,' 136. Tuthill, E. A. H., 234 n. Ueberweg, 24 n., 172 n. Universal and individual. 10 so.. 178, 208, 224. Vacherot, E., 163 n., 170 n., 176 n. Varro, 130, 135, 137. Virgil, 146 n., 148. Virtue and passion, 108, 111. Virtue, its own reward, 43, 106, 107, Voltaire, 142. Wagner, 222. Wallace, W., 86 n., 97 n., 227 n. Wedgwood, Julia, 86 n. Wellhausen, J., 183 n., 184 n., 186 n., 190 n., 197 n. ' Wilhelm Meister,' 2. Wilson, J. M., 123 n., 205 n., 251 n. Winckelmann, 13. Wisdom, 93, 158 n., 159 sq. 'Wisdom of Solomon,' the, 156 n. 157, 158 gq. Traces of Greek influence in, 158. 'Wish to believe,' the, 139 sq., 214. Xanthippe, 32. Xenophanes, 16, 22. Xenophon, 5, 24, 33, 36, 37, 47, 66, 244. Youth of Socrates, little known re- garding, 31. 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