respect of naturalistic theology, taking refuge in that agnostic
confession, which appears to me to be the only position for people who
object to say that they know what they are quite aware they do not know.
As to the interests of morality, I am disposed to think that if mankind
could be got to act up to this last principle in every relation of life,
a reformation would be effected such as the world has not yet seen; an
approximation to the millennium, such as no supernaturalistic religion
has ever yet succeeded, or seems likely ever to succeed, in effecting.
THE VALUE OF WITNESS TO THE MIRACULOUS
[1889]
Charles, or more properly, Karl, King of the Franks, consecrated Roman
Emperor in St. Peter's on Christmas Day, A.D. 800, and known to
posterity as the Great (chiefly by his agglutinative Gallicised
denomination of Charlemagne), was a man great in all ways, physically
and mentally. Within a couple of centuries after his death Charlemagne
became the centre of innumerable legends; and the myth-making process
does not seem to have been sensibly interfered with by the existence of
sober and truthful histories of the Emperor and of the times which
immediately preceded and followed his reign, by a contemporary writer
who occupied a high and confidential position in his court, and in that
of his successor. This was one Eginhard, or Einhard, who appears to have
been born about A.D. 770, and spent his youth at the court, being
educated along with Charles's sons. There is excellent contemporary
testimony not only to Eginhard's existence, but to his abilities, and to
the place which he occupied in the circle of the intimate friends of the
great ruler whose life he subsequently wrote. In fact, there is as good
evidence of Eginhard's existence, of his official position, and of his
being the author of the chief works attributed to him, as can reasonably
be expected in the case of a man who lived more than a thousand years
ago, and was neither a great king nor a great warrior. The works
are--1. "The Life of the Emperor Karl." 2. "The Annals of the Franks."
3. "Letters." 4. "The History of the Translation of the Blessed Martyrs
of Christ, SS. Marcellinus and Petrus."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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