the ballot. If Christianity had never presented itself under any
other aspect than this to Isaac Hecker, it is certain that it would
never have obtained his allegiance. Yet it is equally certain that he
never rejected Christ under any aspect in which He was presented to
him.

Even concerning the period of his life with which we are now engaged,
and in which we have already represented him as having lost hold of
all distinctively Christian doctrines, we must emphasize the precise
words we have employed. He "lost hold"; that was because his original
grasp was weak. While no authoritative dogmatic teaching had given
him an even approximately full and definite idea of the God-man, His
personality, His character, and His mission, the fragmentary truths
offered him had made His influence seem restrictive rather than
liberative of human energies. Yet even so he had not deliberately
turned his back upon Him, though his tendency at this time was
doubtless toward simple Theism. He had begun to ignore Christianity,
simply because his own problems were dominantly social, and orthodox
Protestantism, the only form of religion which he knew, had no social
force corresponding to its pretensions and demands.

Now, upon this state of mind the teaching of Dr. Brownson came like
seed upon a fallow soil. Like that which preceded it, it erred rather
by defect than by actual or, at any rate, by wilful deviation from
true doctrine. Isaac Hecker met for the first time in Orestes
Brownson an exponent of Jesus Christ as the great Benefactor and
Uplifter of the human race in this present life. Dr. Brownson has
himself given a statement of the views which he held and inculcated
between 1834 and 1843--which includes the period we are at present
considering--and it is so brief and to the point that we cannot do