It is also to be remarked that, on the other hand, there is no “Redeemer-god” in Primitive Christianity. Jesus is, it cannot be sufficiently emphasised, not thought of as a god, but only as a heavenly being, who is entrusted with the mission of bringing in the new world. It was only later in the Greek and Gnostic theology that He was deified. For Paul he is “Son of God” in the simple, Old-Testament and Apocalyptic sense. We may further recall Cumont’s warning that analogies do not necessarily imply dependence. “Resemblances,” he writes in the preface to his _Religions orientales,_ “do not always imply imitation, and the resemblance of views or usages must often be explained by community of origin, not by any kind of borrowing.” In the same essay he points out that analogies are sometimes exaggerated, if not actually created, by the use of language chosen by the critic. And Dieterich expresses himself in the following terms against this mania for finding analogies. “It is,” he writes, in his edition of the “Mithra-liturgy,” “one of the worst faults of the science of Comparative Religion, which is at present becoming constantly less cautious, to overlook the most natural explanations, not to say ignore and avoid them, in order to have recourse to the most far-fetched, and, by the most eccentric methods, to drag out analogies which, to the unsophisticated eye, are absolutely invisible.” These are the principles by which it has to be decided, whether Comparative Religion has hunted down its game according to fair forest-law, or whether its “bag” is poached. The chief point to which research was at first directed was the discovery of relationships between the two sets of sacramental views. It seemed so easy to discover common conceptions [pg 195] here, in view of the fact that in both cases cultus-meals and lustrations played a part and had a sacramental value. But, on closer examination, it appears that it is very difficult to get beyond the simple fact of resemblance of a very general character. Dieterich, in his commentary on the “Mithra-liturgy,” is obliged to admit that we have very little exact knowledge regarding the sacred meals of the Mystery-religions._(_163_)_ That they were supposed to convey supernatural powers is about the only thing that can be said with safety. Regarding the special conceptions and actions which made this eating and drinking sacramental no information has been preserved. A comparison—not to speak of the establishment of a relation of dependence—is therefore impossible.