318 THE INFLUENCE OF JESUS REVEALED, Wonderful to their sensibility to the True, in fine, to qualify them to see and hear aright, and to impart what they saw and heard. Upon examination we find, throughout these writings, the most touching indications of precisely that calm and elevated tone of mind and feeling which association with such a one as Jesus was fitted to produce. In their unguardedness, in their unsuspecting simplicity, in their pervading unconsciousness, we see that these authors had completely lost themselves, lost all anxiety about effect, every disposition to embellish, in the abiding and absorbing sense of truth. The factsfacts of which they had such full knowledge,-filled their minds to the exclusion of all self-reference, all fears and misgivings. They tell right on what they know, taking no credit to themselves, and unconscious that there can be anything meritorious in a faithful relation of what so entirely possesses their minds. To the authors of the Gospels, so far as they are disclosed in their writings, may be applied the language of Wordsworth in his Ode to Duty. "There are, who ask not if thine eye Be on them, who in love and truth Where no misgiving is, rely Upon the genial sense of youth; Glad hearts! without reproach or blot, Who do thy work and know it not." Not indeed " upon the genial sense of youth" did the Evangelists rely, but upon a kindred spirit. Between him and the young, of whom he said, "of such is the IN THE STYLE OF THE GOSPELS. 319 kingdom of heaven," there was the greatest congeniality. His spirit had gradually infused itself into the mind of these -writers, until it became as their life-blood, unconsciously animating all their thoughts, inspiring their words, and producing in them the simplicity, the " unchartered freedom" of childhood. It cost them no effort to tell the truth. They could as well have ceased to breathe, as ceased to tell it, let the objections and difficulties it created be what they might. Their reverence for Jesus was so great, their confidence in him so entire, that they never appear to have thought that the most imperfect representation of any part of his conduct was not enough—that he could ever need to be indebted to their pens to save him from being misunderstood. With the poet just quoted, they seem to have thought that their theme 66 might demand a seraph's tongue, Were it not equal to its own support; And therefore no incompetence of theirs Accordingly they never think of explaining or setting off anything they relate concerning him. Thus they show how genuine was their love of their master. This love it was which was their " unerring light," their security against every false bias, enabling them to see what they saw so nearly at the true point of view. That these writers could not have invented the extraordinary character which they have portrayed is, I trust, *The Excursion. Book 8. 320 THE MISTAKES IN THE GOSPELS, abundantly clear from the whole structure of their narratives, wrought all over and inlaid with the characteristics not of fiction but of truth, and especially from the unconscious manner in which the character of Christ is described. The ability, if it existed, to produce so remarkable an invention, necessarily involves qualities of mind and heart, a fine sense of moral truth, utterly inconsistent with the delusion or fraud which such a fabrication would imply. But the ability did not exist. True and singlehearted as the authors of these biographies of Jesus show themselves to have been, still on more than one occasion it appears that there was a spirituality in his sentiments, a meaning in his words, which none of those around him, not even the best disposed, were able to fathom. But further. While it is impossible to conceive how the biographers could have created such a character, it is easy to see how such a character produced the biographers. So far from supposing that they fabricated what they have told, the question is, how with their Jewish prejudices, with their human sensibilities, rendering them liable to be bewildered, carried away, and deluded by their feelings, they were able to attain to such a pervading truthfulness, and to represent Jesus, so nearly as they have done, to the life. That they have committed some errors and mistakes, I do not deny-I believe. That these are so few is the wonder. That there is so much truth in these narratives, so simply and truly exhibited-this it is that should surprise us, and for which we should seek a cause. The influence of Jesus at once adequately and OCCASIONED BY THE TRUTH. 321 naturally explains the character of these writings; and shows us how their authors became the honest, fearless, single-hearted men they have shown themselves to be. Where else but from him could they have derived the spirit that they breathe? In this way these histories are, in the truth of their structure, a tribute, none the less expressive because wholly undesigned, to the force of that remarkable character with which they bring us acquainted. In their general tone and spirit they are as truly an illustration not merely of the existence but of the moral influence of Jesus, as any of the particular facts which they contain. I admit that there are errors and mistakes in the Gospels. This, I suppose, will be deemed a dangerous admission. But let me not be misunderstood-I will not say, misrepresented, for I love to believe that these pages "will come under the perusal of ingenuous eyes and be felt a little by the hearts that look out of them." Let me not be misunderstood. I say there are mistakes in the Gospels. But they are precisely such mistakes as were occasioned by the truth. Where there are misconceptions there must be something, some reality, some fact, to be misconceived. Error implies Truth as the shadow implies Such at least is the character of the mis the substance. takes which we discover in these writings. They result from the substantial truth of the main facts recorded, and they are undesignedly the most decisive evidences of the truth. For instance, these accounts differ as to the hour at which the Crucifixion of Jesus took place. Mark states 322 CHRISTIANITY, EMBODIED that Jesus was crucified at the third hour. According to John, he was not given up by Pilate until about the sixth hour. Now admitting, as I conceive we must, notwithstanding the attempts which have been made to reconcile this difference, that one or the other of the narrators is in error, what does the error show? Not that Jesus was not crucified at all,-it goes to establish the fact by new and most natural evidence. The existence of the error discloses precisely such a state of mind, such an inability to note the lapse of time, as must have been produced in those nearly interested in an event so exciting. So also in the case of the resurrection of Jesus, the mistakes made by the women at the sepulchre furnish evidence undesigned and unanswerable to the reality of the main fact, the actual presence of Jesus alive. This it was that produced the mistakes, and produced them in a perfectly natural way. In short I conceive it may be confidently affirmed, that no error can be detected in these narratives which does not tend directly and decisively to establish far more than it does away. The books which we have now been examining are invaluable for the saving knowledge which they give us of Jesus Christ, of whose life they are the record, and of whose spirit they are an unconscious illustration. In him I see a revelation of religious truth, and consequently a disclosure of the will of God, a representation of the perfection and destiny of man. When we see Jesus Christ as he is, we have come to the knowledge and possession |