the Son of God. The highest consciousness of God which has existed in the bosom of humanity was that of Jesus. We understand, on the other hand, how Jesus, starting with such a disposition of spirit, could never be a speculative philosopher like Cakya-Mouni. Nothing is further from scholastic theology than the Gospel.[1] The speculations of the Greek fathers on the Divine essence proceed from an entirely different spirit. God, conceived simply as Father, was all the theology of Jesus. And this was not with him a theoretical principle, a doctrine more or less proved, which he sought to inculcate in others. He did not argue with his disciples;[2] he demanded from them no effort of attention. He did not preach his opinions; he preached himself. Very great and very disinterested minds often present, associated with much elevation, that character of perpetual attention to themselves, and extreme personal susceptibility, which, in general, is peculiar to women.[3] Their conviction that God is in them, and occupies Himself perpetually with them, is so strong, that they have no fear of obtruding themselves upon others; our reserve, and our respect for the opinion of others, which is a part of our weakness, could not belong to them. This exaltation of self is not egotism; for such men, possessed by their idea, give their lives freely, in order to seal their work; it is the identification of self with the object it has embraced, carried to its utmost limit. It is regarded as vain-glory by those who see in the new teaching only the personal phantasy of the founder; but it is the finger of God to those who see the result. The fool stands side by side here with the inspired man, only the fool never succeeds. It has not yet been given to insanity to influence seriously the progress of humanity. [Footnote 1: The discourses which the fourth Gospel attributes to Jesus contain some germs of theology. But these discourses being in absolute contradiction with those of the synoptical Gospels, which represent, without any doubt, the primitive _Logia_, ought to count simply as documents of apostolic history, and not as elements of the life of Jesus.] [Footnote 2: See Matt. ix. 9, and other analogous accounts.] [Footnote 3: See, for example, John xxi. 15, and following.]