I, for my part, could not believe in Christ at all save as a superior moralist, a wise teacher—and who would care to believe in Him for that—if I thought that any other system could do any part of what He came to do. No; if I believed that other religions could cleanse the heart, and release the conscience from guilt, give the assurance of pardon, reconcile the alienated child to the Father, fill the life with righteousness, peace, and joy, renew the nature, sanctify the will—in a word, if they could save men in the real deep sense of that word, then all that He suffered, His incarnation and His cross, His resurrection and the giving of His Spirit, were just a useless expenditure, a Divine waste a grand superfluity, a much ado about nothing.

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