one did not trouble to impart
to men true notions of God and of the soul.

Of all ancient peoples, it appears that the Hebrews alone had public dogmas
for their religion. Abraham and Moses established the belief in one God,
source of all good, author of all things. The Hebrews speak of him in a
manner worthy of the Supreme Substance; and one wonders at seeing the
inhabitants of one small region of the earth more enlightened than the rest
of the human race. Peradventure the wise men of other nations have
sometimes said the same, but they have not had the good fortune to find a
sufficient following and to convert the dogma into law. Nevertheless Moses
had not inserted in his laws the doctrine of the immortality of souls: it
was consistent with his ideas, it was taught by oral tradition; but it was
not proclaimed for popular acceptance until Jesus Christ lifted the veil,
and, without having force in his hand, taught with all the force of a
lawgiver that immortal souls pass into another life, wherein they shall
receive the wages of their deeds. Moses had already expressed the beautiful
conceptions of the greatness and the goodness of God, whereto many
civilized peoples to-day assent; but Jesus Christ demonstrated fully [51]
the results of these ideas, proclaiming that divine goodness and justice
are shown forth to perfection in God's designs for the souls of men.

I refrain from considering here the other points of the Christian doctrine,
and I will show only how Jesus Christ brought about the conversion of
natural religion into law, and gained for it the authority of a public
dogma. He alone did that which so many philosophers had endeavoured in vain
to do; and Christians having at last gained the upper hand in the Roman
Empire, the master of the greater part of the known earth, the religion of
the wise men became that of the nations. Later also Mahomet showed no
divergence from the great dogmas of natural theology: his followers spread
them abroad even among the most remote races of Asia and of Africa, whither
Christianity had not been carried; and they abolished in many countries
heathen superstitions which were contrary to the true doctrine of the unity
of God and the immortality of souls.

It is clear that Jesus Christ, completing what Moses had begun, wished that
the Divinity should be the object not only of our fear and veneration but
also of our love and devotion. Thus he made men happy by anticipation, and
gave