25. The whole doctrine of Christ is founded upon the character he attributes to divinity. With an impartial God, perfectly just, good, and merciful, he has been able to make of the love of God and charity toward one’s neighbor the express conditions of salvation, and to say, “Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the first and greatest commandment.” And the second is like it: Love your neighbor as yourself. All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments. Upon this belief alone he has been able to base the principle of the equality of men before God, and of universal fraternity. Yet, would it be possible to love this God of Moses? No; one could but fear him.
This revelation of the true attributes of divinity, joined to that of the immortality of the soul and of man’s future life, deeply modified the mutual relations of men, imposed upon them new obligations, caused them to view the present life under another light. It effected a marked change for the better in the manners and social relations of humanity. It is incontestably, in its consequences, the most important point in the revelation of Christ, of which one can never fully appreciate the importance. Sad to say, it is the point least commented upon, - the one which has been misconstrued in a greater degree than all his other teachings.
