The Kalida venture. [volume] (Kalida, Ohio) 1841-1865, 1845-08-12

CHARACTER OF CHRIsT.-The following
eloquent and beautiful dissertation on the
character Of Christ is from the pen Of Rous-
seau; who nevertheless was disbeliever in
Divine revolution, as understood by Christ
|. ians generally.
"Iwill confess toyou, that the majesty of the
Scriptures strikes me with admiration, as the
purify Of the Gospel hath its influence on my
heart. Peruse the works of our philosophers
with all their pompof diction: how mean, how
contemplate are they, compared with the
Scripture! Is it possible that book, at once
30 simple and sublime, should be merely the
work Of man! Is it possible that the Sacred
Parsonage, whose history it contains, should
be himself mere man? DO we find that
he assumed the tone of an enthusiast or am
bilious sectary? What sweetness, what purity
in his manner! What an affecting graceful
ness in his delivery! What sublimity in his
maxims! What profound wisdom in his dis
courses! What presence of mind, what
subtlety, what truth in his replies! How
great the command over his passions! Where
is the man, where the philosopher, who could
so live, and so die, without weakness, and
without Ostentation!
"When Plato described his imaginary good
man, loaded with all the shame of guilt, yet
meriting the highest rewards, of virtue, he
describes exactly the character of Jesus
Christ; the resemblance was so striking that
all the Fathers perceived it.
What prepossession, what blindness must
"a Tho sos, &c Gophror 60
the Son of Mary! What an infinite dispro-
portion there is between them! Socrates,
dying without pain or ignominy easily sup
ported his character 10 the last: if his death,
however easy, had not crowned his life, it
might have been doubted whether Socrates,
with all his wisdom, was any thing more than
a vain sophist. He invented, it is said, the
theory of MORALS. Others, however, had be:
fore put them in practice. He had only to
say, therefore, what they had done, and TO
reduce their examples to precepts. Aristides
had been just before Socrates defined justice.
Leonidas had given up his life for his coun-
try before Socrates declared patriotism to be
a duty; the Spartans were sober people be-
fore Socrates recommended sobriety; before
he had even defined virtue, Greece abounded
in virtuous men.
" But where could Jesus learn, among his
competitors, that pure and sublime morality
of which he only hath given us both precept
and example? The greatest wisdom was
made known among the most bigoted fanati-
cism, and the simplicity of the most heroic
virtues did honor to the vilest people upon
earth. The death of Socrates, peaceably
philosophizing with his friends, appears the
most agreeable that could be wished for:
that Of Jesus expiring in the midst Of agoni-
zing pains, abused, insulted, and accused by
a whole nation, is the most horrible that
could be feared. Socrates, in receiving the
poison. blessed indeed the weeping execu-
TONER who administered it; but Jesus, in
tbe r;;dst Of excruciating tortures, prayed
for bis merciiesss tormentors. yes II me
life and death Of Socrates were those o. !
sage, the life and death Of Jesus aic those
Of God. Shall we suppose the evangelic |
history a mere fiction? Indeed, my friend,
ii bears not the marks of fiction; on the con-
trary, the history Of Socrates, which nobody
presumes TO doubt, is not SO well attested as
that Of Jesus Christ. Such supposition, in
fact, only shifts the difficulty, without obvia-
ting ii: it is more inconceivable that num-
ber Of persous should agree to write such
history, than that only one should furnish the
history Of IT. The Jewish authors were in
capable of the diction, and strangers to the
morality contained in the Gospel, the marks
Of whose truth are SO striking and inimitable,
that the Inpentor would be more astonishing |,
character that the Hero."-- Treatise on Edu- {
;ation, or Emile, Book ~. Genera, 1928.
The Louisville {Ky.) Journal, says that
he abolition Of slavery would be pleasing to
he people Of that city, the best interests of