Chapter 7 - Page 2

Crucifixion might end in suggesting a natural instead of a miraculous explanation of the Resurrection, for the comfort of such--and they indeed stand in need of comfort--let me say at once that the ablest of our adversaries would tell them that they need be under no such fear. Strauss himself admits that our Lord died upon the Cross; he does not even attempt to dispute it, but writes as though he were well aware that there was no room for any difference of opinion about the matter. He has therefore been compelled to adopt the hallucination theory, with a result which we have already considered. Yet who can question that Strauss would have maintained the position that our Lord did not die upon the Cross, unless he had felt that it was one in which he would not be able to secure the support even of those who were inclined to disbelieve? We cannot doubt that the conviction of the reality of our Lord's death has been forced upon him by a weight of testimony which, like St. Paul, he has found himself utterly unable to resist.

Here then, we might almost pause. Strauss admits that our Lord died upon the Cross. Yet can the reader help feeling that the vindication of the reality of our Lord's reappearances, and the refutation of Strauss's theories with which this work opened, was triumphant and conclusive? Then what follows? That Christ died and rose again! The central fact of our faith is proved. It is proved externally by the most solid and irrefragable proofs, such as should appeal even to minds which reject all spiritual evidence, and recognise no canons of investigation but those of the purest reason.

But anything and everything is believable concerning one whose resurrection from death to life has been established. What need, then, to enter upon any consideration of the other miracles? Of the Ascension? Of the descent of the Holy Spirit? Who can feel difficulty about these things? Would not the miracle rather be that they should NOT have happened! May we not now let the wings of our soul expand, and soar into the heaven of heavens, to the footstool of the Throne of Grace, secure that we have earned the right to hope and to glory by having consented to the pain of understanding?

We may: and I have given the reader this foretaste of the prize which he may justly claim, lest he should be swallowed up in overmuch grief at the journey which is yet before him ere he shall have done all which may justly be required of him. For it is not enough that his own sense of security should be perfected. This is well; but let him also think of others.

What then is their main difficulty, now that it has been shewn that the reappearances of our Lord were not due to hallucination?

I propose to shew this by collecting from all the sources with which I was familiar in former years, and throwing the whole together as if it were my own. I shall spare no pains to make the argument tell with as much force as fairness will