and Aristotle, with the subtleties of the Stoics, and with countless
admixtures of Persian mysticism, had, humanly speaking, quite as
formidable a task as those that are presented in the heathen systems of
to-day. Very few of the champions of modern heathenism can compare with
Celsus, and there are no more subtle philosophies than those of ancient
Greece. Evidently, the one thing needed to disenchant the false systems
of our time is a clear and accurate knowledge of their merits and
demerits, and of their true relation to Christianity.

It will be of advantage, for one thing, if we learn to give credit to
the non-Christian religions for the good which they may fairly claim.
There has existed a feeling that they had no rights which Christian men
were bound to respect. They have been looked upon as systems of unmixed
evil, whose enormities it were impossible to exaggerate. And all such
misconceptions and exaggerations have only led to serious reactions.
Anti-Christian writers have made great capital of the alleged
misrepresentations which zealous friends of missions have put upon
heathenism; and there is always great force in any appeal for fair play,
on whichever side the truth may lie. Where the popular Christian idea
has presented a low view of some system, scarcely rising above the grade
of fetichism, the apologists have triumphantly displayed a profound
philosophy. Where the masses of Christian people have credited whole
nations with no higher notions of worship than a supreme trust in
senseless stocks and stones, some skilful defender has claimed that the
idols were only the outward symbols of an indwelling conception of
deity, and has proceeded with keen relish to point out a similar use of
symbols in the pictures and images of the Christian Church.

From one extreme many people have passed to another, and in the end have
credited heathen systems with greater merit than they possess. A marked