In all the Oriental systems there is nothing like this, either as a divine source of all-availing help and rescue, or as a celestial spring of human action.  It is through this communicable grace that Christ becomes the Way, the Truth, the Life.  Well might Augustine say that while the philosophy of Plato led him to lofty conceptions of God, it could not show him how to approach Him or be reconciled unto Him.  “For it is one thing,” he says, “from the mountain’s shaggy top to see the land of peace and to find no way thither; and in vain to essay through ways impossible, opposed and beset by fugitives and deserters, under their captain the lion and the dragon; and another to keep on the way that leads thither guarded by the host of the heavenly General, where they spoil not that have deserted the heavenly army; for they avoid it as very torment.  These things did wonderfully sink into my bowels when I read that least of Thy Apostles, and had meditated upon Thy works and trembled exceedingly.”  While Christianity is wholly unique in providing an objective Salvation instead of attempting to work out perfection from “beggarly elements” within the soul itself, as all heathen systems do, and as all our modern schemes of mere ethical culture do, it at the same time implants in the heart the most fruitful germs of subjective spiritual life.  Its superior transformation of human character, as compared with all other cults, is not only a matter of doctrine but also a matter of history.  It is acknowledged that Christianity has wrought most powerfully of all faiths in taming savage races as well as individual men, in moulding higher civilizations and inspiring sentiments of humanity and brotherly love.  “Christ,” says one of the Bampton Lecturers, “is the Light that broods over all history....  All that there is upon earth of beauty, truth, and goodness, all that distinguishes the civilized man from the savage is this gift.”  And if it be asked how the leaven of Christ’s influence has pervaded all society, the answer is that the work is presided over by a divine and omnipotent Spirit who represents Christ, who carries out what He began, who by a direct and transforming power renews and enlightens and prompts the soul.

Christianity, then, is not a record, a history of what was said and done eighteen centuries ago:  it is not a body of doctrines and precepts:  it is the living power of God in the soul of man.  The written Word is the sword of this Divine Spirit.  The renewed soul is begotten of the Spirit and it is instinct with the indwelling of the Spirit.  No other system makes any claim to such an influence as that of the Holy Ghost.  Sacred books, written systems of law or ethics would all prove a dead letter—­the Bible itself, as well as the Veda, would be a dead letter but for the co-operation of this Divine Spirit.  Sacred Scriptures might be venerated, they would not be obeyed.  The dead heart must be quickened and renewed and only Christianity reveals the Transforming Power. Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again he cannot see the Kingdom of God.