Survival of the Fittest. 459 



succeeding form of religion by its superior advantages over 

 its predecessor tending to supplant it wherever and whenever 

 its beneficent influences are felt. It is true that fetishism 

 and polytheism still prevail among rude, uncultured peo- 

 ples, as well as the worship of false deities and prophets, but 

 with the spread of the civilizing and elevating influence of 

 Christianity these religions in the fitness of time will disap- 

 pear. 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 one of profound- 

 est happiness to its votaries. While fakirs hang on hooks, 

 and pagans cut themselves and even their children, for the 

 sake of propitiating diabolical deities, yet Christianity, which 

 has its roots in Judaism, has no need for such practices. It 

 is 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 presum- 

 ably non-existent except in civilized man. They are the 

 sorrows and joys which arise from the fully-developed con- 

 sciousness of sin against a God of Love, as distinguished 

 from propitiation of malignant spirits. These joys and sor- 

 rows are wholly spiritual, not merely physical. " Thou 

 desirest no sacrifice." God's only sacrifice at the hands of 

 sinful man is a troubled spirit. 



Estimated by the influence which He has exerted on man- 

 kind, there can be no question, even from a secular point of 

 view, that Christ is much the greatest man who has ever 

 lived. That the revolution which His teachings have effected 

 in human life is immeasurable and unparalleled by any other 

 movement in history is unquestioned. Though most nearly 

 approached by the religion of the Jews, of which it is a 

 development, so that it may be regarded as of a piece with 

 it, it is evident that this whole system of religion is so 

 immeasurably in advance of all others that it may be truth- 

 fully said, if it had not been for the Jews, the human race 

 would have had no religion worthy of serious consideration. 



