r acceptance; but it is
wrong to assume the propagandist. Let men have their own views; we have
no right to force others upon them. Man is very much attached to the
theories contained in the world's first religion. He has given it
symbolical expression, for it is thus that religion will always embody
itself. Man wants some way by which to tell how and what he thinks of
God.[114]

The Gospels were all written, Renan contends, in the first century. The
Jews were anticipating somebody who would prove a means of their
improvement. Christ fitted the ideal, and the way was smoothed for his
success by their visions, dreams, and hopes. The beautiful scenery of
lake, valley, mountain, and river developed his poetic temperament. Then
the Old Testament made a deep impression on him, for he imagined it was
full of voices pointing him out as the great future reformer. He was
unacquainted with Hellenic culture, and hence it was his misfortune not
to know that miracles had been wisely rejected by the schools which had
received the Greek wisdom. In course of time a period of intoxication
came upon him. He imagined that he was to bring about a new church which
he everywhere calls the Kingdom of God. His views were Utopian; he lived
in a dream life, and his idealism elevated him above all other
agitators. He founded a sect, and his disciples became intoxicated with
his own dreams. But he did not sanction all their excesses: for
instance, he did not believe the inexact and contradictory genealogies
which we find in his historians.

Yet he was a thorough thaumaturgist and sometimes indulged a gloomy
feeling of resentment. His miracles are greatly exaggerated. He probably
did some things which, to ignorant minds, appeared prodigies, but they
were very few in number. He never rose from the dead; he had never
raised Lazarus. By and by, the love of his disciples created him into a
divinity, clothed him with wonderful powers, made him greater than he
had ever pretended to be. Hence Christianity arose. It was love like
that of Mary Magdalene, "a hallucinated woman, whose passion gave to the
world a resurrected God."[115] Renan's position will explain all that he
says of Christ. He looks at him from the stand-point of naturalism.
Christ is no mediator. As an American writer has well said: "From this
life of Christ no one would ever infer that there was sin in the world
and that Christ came to save sinners."

The reception of the _Life of Jesus