In all cases it is not a mere change of belief or opinion; this is by no means the point; the point is that it is a modification of character, more or less profound.

Seeing what a complex thing is character, this change therefore cannot be simple.  That it may all be due to so-called natural causes is no evidence against its so-called supernatural source, unless we beg the whole question of the Divine in Nature.  To pure agnostics the evidence from conversions and regeneration lies in the bulk of these psychological phenomena, shortly after the death of Christ, with their continuance ever since, their general similarity all over the world, &c., &c.

Christianity and Pain.

Christianity, from its foundation in Judaism, has throughout been a religion of sacrifice and sorrow.  It has been a religion of blood and tears, and yet of profoundest happiness to its votaries.  The apparent paradox is due to its depth, and to the union of these seemingly diverse roots in Love.  It has been throughout and growingly a religion—­or rather let us say the religion—­of Love, with these apparently opposite qualities.  Probably it is only those whose characters have been deepened by experiences gained in this religion itself who are so much as capable of intelligently resolving this paradox.

Fakirs hang on hooks, Pagans cut themselves and even their children, sacrifice captives, &c., for the sake of propitiating diabolical deities.  The Jewish and Christian idea of sacrifice is doubtless a survival of this idea of God by way of natural causation, yet this is no evidence against the completed idea of the Godhead being [such as the Christian belief represents it], for supposing the completed idea to be true, the earlier ideals would have been due to the earlier inspirations, in accordance with the developmental method of Revelation hereafter to be discussed[67].

But Christianity, with its roots in Judaism, is, as I have said, par excellence the religion of sorrow, because it reaches to truer and deeper levels of our spiritual nature, and therefore has capabilities both of sorrow and joy which are presumably non-existent except in civilized man.  I mean the sorrows and the joys of a fully evolved spiritual life—­such as were attained wonderfully early, historically speaking, in the case of the Jews, and are now universally diffused throughout Christendom.  In short, the sorrows and the joys in question are those which arise from the fully developed consciousness of sin against a God of Love, as distinguished from propitiation of malignant spirits.  These joys and sorrows are wholly spiritual, not merely physical, and culminate in the cry,’Thou desirest no sacrifice....  The sacrifice of God is a troubled spirit[68].’

I agree with Pascal[69] that there is virtually nothing to be gained by being a theist as distinguished from a Christian.  Unitarianism is only an affair of the reason—­a merely abstract theory of the mind, having nothing to do with the heart, or the real needs of mankind.  It is only when it takes the New Testament, tears out a few of its leaves relating to the divinity of Christ, and appropriates all the rest, that its system becomes in any degree possible as a basis for personal religion.