[5] Lidgett, idem. But see Bosanquet, Principle of Indiv. and Value, p. 380 ff.
[6] James i. 13, 14.
[7] As, for example, that of Drew's Christus Myth.
[8] Cf. Gospel History and its Transmission.
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CHAPTER III
ETHICAL THOUGHT BEFORE CHRIST
Apart from the writings of the New Testament, which are the primary source of Christian Ethics, a comprehensive view of our subject would include some account of the ethical conceptions of Greece, Rome and Israel, which were at least contributory to the Christian idea of the moral life. Whatever view we take of its origin, Christianity did not come into the world like the goddess Athene, without preparation, but was the product of many factors. The moral problems of to-day cannot be rightly appreciated except in the light of certain concepts which come to us from ancient thought; and Greco-Roman philosophy as well as Hebrew religion have contributed not a little to the form and trend of modern ethical inquiry.
All we can attempt is the briefest outline, first, of the successive epochs of Greek and Roman Ethics; and second, of the leading moral ideas of the Hebrews as indicating the preparatory stages in the evolution of thought which finds its completion in the Ethics of Christianity.