Page:Essays on Catholicism, Liberalism, and Socialism.djvu/68

nature of things by his word alone, who saw him walk upon the waters, quiet the sea, calm the winds, and restore the dead to life, some called him God, others devil, and others again, a juggler and a magician.

Our Lord Jesus Christ did not conquer the world because the ancient prophecies were fulfilled in him. The synagogue, which had the keeping of them, was not converted, nor the doctors who knew these prophecies by heart, nor the multitude who had learned them from the doctors

Our Lord Jesus Christ did not conquer the world by the power of truth. The essential truth of Christianity was in the Old as in the New Testament, as it is necessarily one, eternal, and the same. This truth, which existed forever in the mind of God, was revealed to man, instilled into his soul, and preserved in history, from the first promulgation of the divine word to the world. Yet the Old Testament, both in its eternal and essential teachings, and in what was secondary, local, and contingent, both in its dogmas and its rites, never passed beyond the territory of the chosen people of God. This people were many times guilty of rebellion, they persecuted their prophets, treated their doctors with derision, worshiped the idols of the heathen nations, made unlawful covenants with infernal spirits, gave themselves up, body and soul, to horrible and bloody superstitions; and, finally, when the Word became flesh, cursed him, denied him, and crucified him on Calvary. And while the Truth was crucified, which had been hidden in the ancient symbols, represented in the ancient types, announced by the prophets of old, and attested by striking prodigies and stupendous miracles; while this Truth came by its presence to explain the meaning of those