hristian faith is a doctrine given in revelation. Schleiermacher held
that it is a consciousness inspired primarily by the personality of
Jesus. It must be connected with the other data and acta of our
consciousness under the general laws of the operation of the mind.
Against rationalism and much so-called liberal Christianity,
Schleiermacher contended that Christianity is not a new set of
propositions periodically brought up to date and proclaimed as if these
alone were true. New propositions can have only the same relativity of
truth which belonged to the old ones in their day. They may stand
between men and religion as seriously as the others had done.

The condition of the heart, which is religion, the experience through
Jesus which is Christianity, is primarily an individual matter. But it
is not solely such. It is a common experience also. Schleiermacher
recognises the common element in the Christian consciousness, the
element which shows itself in the Christian experience of all ages, of
different races and of countless numbers of men. By this recognition of
the Christian Church in its deep and spiritual sense, Schleiermacher
hopes to escape the vagaries and eccentricities, and again the
narrowness and bigotries of pure individualism. No liberal theologian
until Schleiermacher had had any similar sense of the meaning of the
Christian Church, and of the privilege and duty of Christian thought to
contribute to the welfare of that body of men believing in God and
following Christ which is meant by the Church. This is in marked
contrast with the individualism of Kant. Of course, Schleiermacher would
never have recognised as the Church that part of humanity which is held
together by adherence to particular dogmas, since, for him, Christianity
is not dogma. Still less could he recognise as the Church that part of
mankind which is held together by a common tradition of worship, or by a
given theory of organisation, since these also are historical and
incidental. He meant by the Church that part of humanity, in all places
and at all times, which has been held together by the common possession
of the Christian consciousness and the Christian experience. The outline
of this experience, the content of this consciousness, can never be so
defined as to make it legislatively operative. If it were so defined we
should have dogma and not Christianity. Nevertheless, it may be
practically potent. The degree in which a given man may