I can do all things through Christ who
strengtheneth me." "I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." These
convictions are not dogmas and have no history, and they can only be
propagated in the manner described by Paul, Gal. I. 15, 16.

3. It was of the utmost importance for the legitimising of the later
development of Christianity as a system of doctrine, that early
Christianity had an Apostle who was a theologian, and that his Epistles
were received into the canon. That the doctrine about Christ has become
the main article in Christianity is not of course the result of Paul's
preaching, but is based on the confession that Jesus is the Christ. The
theology of Paul was not even the most prominent ruling factor in the
transformation of the Gospel to the Catholic doctrine of faith, although
an earnest study of the Pauline Epistles by the earliest Gentile
Christian theologians, the Gnostics, and their later opponents, is
unmistakable. But the decisive importance of this theology lies in the
fact that, as a rule, it formed the boundary and the foundation--just as
the words of the Lord himself--for those who in the following period
endeavoured to ascertain original Christianity, because the Epistles
attesting it stood in the canon of the New Testament. Now, as this
theology comprised both speculative and apologetic elements, as it can
be thought of as a system, as it contained a theory of history and a
definite conception of the Old Testament, finally, as it was composed of
objective and subjective ethical considerations and included the
realistic elements of a national religion (wrath of God, sacrifice,
reconciliation, Kingdom of glory), as well as profound psychological
perceptions and the highest appreciation of spiritual blessings, the
Catholic doctrine of faith as it was formed in the course of time,
seemed, at least in its leading features, to be related to it, nay,
demanded by it. For the ascertaining of the deep-lying distinctions,
above all for the perception that the question in the two cases is about
elements quite differently conditioned, that even the method is
different, in short, that the Pauline Gospel is not identical with the
original Gospel and much less with any later doctrine of faith, there is
required such historical judgment and such honesty of purpose not to be
led astray in the investigation by the canon of the New Testament,[136]
that no change in the prevailing ideas can be hoped for for long ye