earth; secondly, the Hebraizing of this language, by which means
the Evangelists found a new material made plastic and obedient to
these new ideas, which they had to build with, and which they had
to build upon.] into either of the classical languages; and, β, A
system of mysteries; as, for instance, the mystery of the Trinity,
of the Divine Incarnation, of the Atonement, of the Resurrection,
and others.

Here are great elements; and now let me ask, how many of these
are found in the Heathen religion of Greece and Rome? This is an
important question; it being my object to show that no religion
but the Christian, and precisely through some one or two of its
_differential_ elements, could have been an organ of political
movement.

Most divines who anywhere glance at this question, are here found
in, what seems to me, the deepest of errors. Great theologians are
they, and eminent philosophers, who have presumed that (as a matter
of course) all religions, however false, are introductory to some
scheme of morality, however imperfect. They grant you that the
morality is oftentimes unsound; but still, they think that some
morality there must have been, or else for what purpose was the
religion? This I pronounce error.

All the moral theories of antiquity were utterly disjoined from
religion. But this fallacy of a dogmatic or doctrinal part in Paganism
is born out of Anachronism. It is the anachronism of unconsciously
reflecting back upon the ancient religions of darkness, and as if
essential to _all_ religions, features that never were suspected
as possible, until they had been revealed in Christianity.[Footnote: Once