and
unauthoritative system. Take away these incongruous and outgrown
errors, and the pure religion of Christ will be seen, and will be
seen to be the everlasting truth of God.

In attempting to estimate the actual influence of Christianity,
wherever it has spread, in establishing among men a faith in
immortality, we must specify six separate considerations. First,
the immediate reception of the resurrection and ascension of
Christ as a miraculous and typical fact, putting an infallible
seal on his teachings, and demonstrating, even to the senses of
men, the reality of a heavenly life, was an extremely potent
influence in giving form and vigor to faith, more potent for ages
than every thing else combined. The image of the victorious Christ
taken up to heaven and glorified there forever, this image,
pictured in every believer's mind, stimulated the imagination and
kept an ideal vision of heaven in constant remembrance as an
apprehended reality. "There is Jesus," they said, pointing up to
heaven; "and there one day we shall be with him."

Secondly, the obloquy and desertion experienced by the early
Christians threw them back upon a double strength of spiritual
faith, and opened to them an intensified communion with God. As
worldly goods and pleasures were sacrificed, the more powerful
became their

5 Eschatologie, oder die Lebre von den Letzten Dingen. Mit
besonderer Rucksicht anf die gangbare Irriehre vom Hades. Basel,
1840. De Wette interprets the doctrine of Christ's descent into
Hades as a myth derived from the idea that he was the Savior not
only of his living followers but also of the heathen and the dead.
Bibl. Dogmatik, s. 272.

perception of moral truths and their grasp of invisible treasures.
The more fiercely they were assailed, the dearer became the cause
for which they suffered, and the more profoundly the moral springs
of faith were stirred in their souls. The natural revulsion of
their souls was from destitution, contempt, peril, and pain on
earth to a more vivid and magnified trust in a great reward laid
up for them in heaven.

Thirdly, the unflinching zeal kindled in the early confessors of
Christianity, the sublime heroism shown by them amidst the awful
tortures inflicted on them by the persecuting Jews and Romans,
reacted on their brethren to give profounder firmness and new
intensity to their faith in a glorious life beyond the grave. The
Christians thrown into the amphitheatre to the lions