temperament--for he was a Bavarian by birth--he wrote in that easy, natural, and earnest style which renders him a popular writer not only in his own language but when translated into foreign tongues. We find in Dorner one of the most acute speculative theologians produced by the later Protestant church. His style is as complex as Ullmann's is simple. It is amusing that, in one place, he even enters into a justification of his technical and abstruse writing. Applying himself to dogmatic investigations, the fruit of his labor is his _Doctrine of the Person of Christ_. Christianity was the world's great want, and all the religions of the natural man could not supply its place. But Christianity is vague unless the question be settled concerning the person of Christ. Here is the battle-ground where Christianity and reason must meet and decide the great issue. Hence Dorner passes by the personal ministry and history of Christ on earth and attempts the proper mode of construing his person. The Person of Christ is, in the trials and triumphs of individuals and the church, the central point of the Christian religion. He is the perfect Lawgiver, and also the Judge of the world. He controls the universe. Here he communicates the forgiveness of sins and the Holy Ghost, and in heaven, eternal felicity. The happiness of heaven is formed by perfect fellowship with his person. He has left his followers only in appearance, for, wherever two or three are assembled in his name, there he is in the midst of them. He is with his own always, even to the end of the world. To know Christ in his nearness belongs to the Christian worship; and this institution is appointed for the church as the highest means for the enjoyment of his nearness.[70] According to Dorner, heathendom longed for the apotheosis of human nature. Judaism sought the fulfillment of the revelation not completed by the law, and strained after the love of God as the consummation of the holy law. All these wants are met in Christ. He is the innermost revelation of the mystery, and the fullest condescension of God. For God has in Christ become man. Here is the point of unity between God and the world. But Christ did not appear in order to be the Son of God, as if this were the ultimate end; but the ultimate end was the glorifying of man, and therewith of God, in and through him. He is officially God's son.[71]