Christianity, of the authority of Christ. Without discussing the possibility or credibility of miracles, or denying that the narratives which record them have as high a probability as any other historical narratives, he simply denies that they can be made a ground for believing in truths of another and a higher order. "If I have nothing historically to urge against the statement that Christ raised a dead man to life, must I therefore consider it true that God has a Son who is of the same nature as He? In what relation does my incapacity to adduce any important argument against the former stand to my obligation to believe something against which my reason rebels? If I have nothing historically to urge against the statement that this Christ himself rose from the dead, must I therefore consider it true that this risen Christ was the Son of God?" If, now, it be urged that this same Christ claimed to be the Son of God, still it is only historically certain that he made such a claim. And if, finally, appeal be made to the authority of his biographers as inspired and infallible men, it must be answered that it is only historically certain that they were so inspired and infallible. "That, that is the foul, wide ditch across which I am unable to spring, however often and earnestly I make the attempt. If any one can help me over, let him do it; I entreat him, I conjure him. He will deserve a divine reward from me." 10 To state the matter in a single proposition, Lessing's proposition is, that "if no historical truth can be demonstrated, then nothing can be demonstrated through historical truths. That is, continyent historical truths can never become the proof of necessary truths of reason." 11

It was in this way that Lessing sought to formulate the distinction, which has since become so vital in theology, between the Transient and the Permanent in Christianity, or rather in

10 Sämmtl, Schr, X. p. 40. In the same connection also: "But with that historical truth, to spring over to a wholly different class of truths; to require of me to change all my metaphysical and moral notions; to demand of me to alter all my fundamental ideas of the nature of God, because I can offer no credible evidence against

the resurrection of Christ; if that is not a μετάβασις εις άλλο γενος then I do

not know what Aristotle meant by these words."

11 Sämmtl, Schr, X., p. 39.

the New Testament. According to his view the truths of the Christian revelation depend in no way for their verification on the contingent and temporary historical facts with which they stand connected in the New Testament. Of an entirely different character are such historical elements of Christianity as contain and express what is essential and ideal, eternal, moral and religious truths, and as confirm themselves from age to age in the religious consciousness of men. If historical criticism establishes the fact that miracles were wrought, then we have only a historical fact. We simply know from this fact that eighteen hundred years ago miracles were necessary to awaken the faith of men then living, to whom they may have been "the demonstration of the spirit and of power." But for us there are only accounts of miracles. That these wonderful works, believed in and reported as temporary phenomena of an age long passed, are not essential in the evidence for Christianity is shown by the fact that they have not continued, and hence can no longer be adduced as evidence, because their own proof, depending on a process of historical and critical investigation, can never be beyond question. And if the most stupendous miracle wrought before our eyes could not make us believe in the divine authority of the miracle-worker, if his teachings were unrcasonable and incredible, how can we establish our faith in the divine origin of Christianity on accounts of miracles, the credibility of which depends on the doubtful issue of critical and historical research? Why bring such evidence for truths which must first be believed on other grounds? . What then obliges me to believe in them? Nothing but the doctrines themselves, which eighteen hundred years ago were so new, so strange to the whole compass of truths then known, that nothing less than miracles and fulfilled prophesies were required in order to call the attention of the multitude to them." 99 12

It were a gross misinterpretation of Lessing to construe these statements as attacks on Christianity. His object was

12 Sämmtl, Schr, X., p. 4

to change the ground of its defence. By criticism he would free it from criticism. To do this he believed it must be set free from history, removed from the so-called historical basis. He has, perhaps, been rightly interpreted as teaching that the historical as such can never be the foundation of faith, of the deepest reconciliation, repose and felicity of the inner life. Otherwise this felicity would be in constant dependence on on the operations of criticism, and this repose a continual unrest. He would maintain this position in order the more fully to accord to criticism its rights, and leave to faith full security and quiet. For when the historical accounts about primitive Christianity are identified with Christianity itself, neither criticism nor faith has its rights. Either the former is condemned to silence because attacks upon history are regarded as attacks upon Christianity, or the latter is kept in rigid unrest and insecurity because dependent on every critic and his dictum.18 Not, then, in a Christianity which is identified with its records, and made to depend on the opinions of the evangelists, their interpretations and expectations, nor on views about the person of Christ, whether held by the early church, or crystalized in later dogmas, can the believer find security and peace in believing, and an impregnable position for defence. He can find those only in the Religion of Christ. "Whether Christ was more than man" writes Lessing in the "Testament of John," "is a problem; that he was a true man is undeniable. Consequently, the religion of Christ and the Christian religion are two entirely different things. The religion of Christ is that which he himself knew and practiced as a man, and which every man can have in common with him. The Christian religion is that which assumes it as true that he was more than man and makes him as such an object of veneration. In the Gospels the religion of Christ is contained in the clearest words, but the Christian religion so uncertainly and ambiguously that there is hardly a single passage to which two men have ever attached the same meaning."

13 Schwarz, Lessing als Theologe, p. 54.

This "religion of Christ" was for Lessing contained in Love, whose fruits towards God are worship, obedience, consecration, and towards men self-sacrifice, helpfulness, sympathy, humanity, toleration. This thought appears in his earliest theological writing on the Morovians, whom he commends for having turned aside from false science or useless dogmatic speculation and its conceit to "the practical, simple, sacrificing Christianity of the heart." This, too, is the ground thought of his last and most important work, Nathan the Wise, in which the whole emphasis is laid on the moral, practical spirit of religion, while the historical and dogmatic are characterized as that in all religions which possesses about the same value and is alike uncertain. Which is the true religion of all those that claim to be such, can alone be decided by the fruits which each one bears. "The right ring possesses the wonderful power of making its wearer beloved of God and men." The fruits of religion he sets over against all narratives of legends and miracles which are gathered about the history of the origin of Christianity. "Christianity has borne fruits. Shall I not be permitted to satisfy my hunger with them, because I do not even deny, but simply let alone the pious legends as to the way in which the seed was scattered?" 14 The Permanent and Transient in Christianity are further illustrated by the figure of a building and the scaffolding necessary to its construction. "The miracles wrought by Christ and his disciples were the scaffolding and not the building. The scaffolding is torn down as soon as the building is completed. He must be very little interested in the building who thinks its excellence can only be proved by the scaffolding which has been torn away.'

The most complete and comprehensive statement of Lessing's position in the controversy over the Fragments, and of his attitude towards the whole question of the relation of Christianity to its records, is contained in the Axioms, 15 or 14 Sämmtl, Schr, X., p. 38.

15 Axiomata, wenn es deren in dergleichen Dingen giebt. Sämmtl, Schr, X., p.

29.

ten propositions, of which he says their truth will admit of no doubt if their words are only rightly understood. There is scarcely an objection that can be raised to his position to which these propositions do not contain his answer.

1. The Bible obviously contains more than belongs to religion.

2. It is a mere hypothesis that the Bible is equally infallible as regards this excess.

3. The letter is not the spirit, and the Bible is not religion.

4. Consequently, objections to the letter and to the Bible are not objections to the spirit and to religion.

16

5. There was also a religion before there was a Bible.

6. Christianity existed before the evangelists and the Apostles had written. Sometime elapsed before the first of them wrote, and a considerable time before the whole canon was completed.

7. However much, therefore, may depend upon these writings, the whole truth of the Christian religion can not possibly rest upon them.

8. If there was a period when Christianity had taken possession of many souls, and when, nevertheless, not a letter of what has come down to us was written, then it must be possible that all which the evangelists and apostles have written might be lost, and yet the religion taught by them would abide.

9. Religion is not true because the evangelists and apostes taught it; but they taught it because it is true.

10. By its (religion's) inner truth the Scriptures must be interpreted; and no traditions or transmitted records can give it inner truth if it has none.

In the " necessary answer to a very unnecessary question " 17 directed against his principal opponent, Pastor Goeze of Hamburg, he elucidates the 7th and 8th of the above propositions in twenty statements of facts derived from the history

16 "The least pointing of the finger directed against religion is assassination." 17 Sämmtl, Schr, X., p. 30.