immeasurably in advance of all others, that it may fairly be said, if it
had not been for the Jews, the human race would not have had any
religion worth our serious attention as such. The whole of that side of
human nature would never have been developed in civilized life. And
although there are numberless individuals who are not conscious of its
development in themselves, yet even these have been influenced to an
enormous extent by the atmosphere of religion around them.

But not only is Christianity thus so immeasurably in advance of all
other religions. It is no less so of every other system of thought that
has ever been promulgated in regard to all that is moral and spiritual.
Whether it be true or false, it is certain that neither philosophy,
science, nor poetry has ever produced results in thought, conduct, or
beauty in any degree to be compared with it. This I think will be on all
hands allowed as regards conduct. As regards thought and beauty it may
be disputed. But, consider, what has all the science or all the
philosophy of the world done for the thought of mankind to be compared
with the one doctrine, 'God is love'? Whether or not true, conceive what
belief in it has been to thousands of millions of our race--i.e. its
influence on human thought, and thence on human conduct. Thus to admit
its incomparable influence in conduct is indirectly to admit it as
regards thought. Again, as regards beauty, the man who fails to see its
incomparable excellence in this respect merely shows his own deficiency
in the appreciation of all that is noblest in man. True or not true, the
entire Story of the Cross, from its commencement in prophetic aspiration
to its culmination in the Gospel, is by far the most magnificent
[presentation] in literature. And surely the fact of its having all been
lived does not detract from its poetic value. Nor does the fact of its
being capable of appropriation by the individual Christian of to-day as
still a vital religion detract from its sublimity. Only to a man wholly