It is simply a matter of a man's theory of things.

Therefore in dealing with any historical answer, the point is not whether it was given in our time, but whether it was given in answer to our question.
And the more I thought about when and how Christianity had come into the world, the more I felt that it had actually come to answer this question.
It is commonly the loose and latitudinarian Christians who pay quite indefensible compliments to Christianity.

They talk as if there had never been any piety or pity until Christianity came, a point on which any mediaeval would have been eager to correct them.

They represent that the remarkable thing about Christianity was that it was the first to preach simplicity or self-restraint, or inwardness and sincerity.

They will think me very narrow (whatever that means) if I say that the remarkable thing about Christianity was that it was the first to preach Christianity.