The  English  apologists  of  the  next  century  left  for  the  most
part  unnoticed  those  passages  in  Church  History  that  might
have  rendered,  even  in  such  a  time  as  theirs,  some  most
valuable  services  in  the  controversy  against  deism.  We  refer
especially  to  those  passages  in  which  are  set  forth  the  moral
and  social  benefits  derived  from  the  original  principles  and
motives  of  Christian  ethics.  These  benefits  had  been,
spread  so  widely  that  the  principle  of  universal  freedom,
of  which  Plato  and  Aristotle  had  never  dreamed,  was
reduced  to  the  level  of  commonplace,  and  was  claimed
by  deistic  writers  as  the  birth-right  of  mankind.  As
regards  the  ethical  teaching  of  numerous  deistic  books —

2


18  GERMAN    CULTURE   AND    CHRISTIANITY.
English,  French,  and  German — widely  circulated  in  the
course  of  the  eighteenth  century,  there  is  an  important
distinction  to  be  made.  Suum  cuique — Let  the  deists  keep
their  own  ;  bat  let  them,  at  the  same  time,  restore  what  has
been  either  unconsciously  taken  away,  or  deliberately  stolen
from  Christianity.  It  is  not  said  that  no  effort  was  made  by
Christian  apologists  to  claim  for  the  religion  they  defended
the  morals  and  motives  essentially  belonging  to  their  creed  ;
but  it  is  suggested  that,  with  such  learning  as  in  several
instances  was  arrayed  on  their  side,  they  might  have  done
more  in  dispelling  errors — partly  remaining  at  the  present
day — respecting  the  moral  and  the  historical  claims  of  deistic
philosophy.
