st. john of damascus (676-749 - Cristo Raul

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CONCLUSION. 209
and illiterate, would have been to abandon a precious
means of fostering devotion and instructing the
ignorant. More than that, it would have helped to
forward the spread of a bare theism in Christendom,
to deaden the belief in a Saviour who took our like
ness upon Him and so glorified
human nature. It
may be so. But, having regard
to the undoubted
repudiation of everything approaching image-worship
(even in the most qualified sense of worship in
")
the early Church, and bearing in mind also the
development of the practice in later times, and the
abuses that have flowed from it, I for one cannot but
regret that the eloquence and enthusiasm of Datnascenus
were enlisted in this cause. No doubt there
was much to provoke such a course of action, and to
make it natural and intelligible to us, in the high
handed and arbitrary conduct of Leo the Isaurian.
If Leo thought
it well to let it be known to the world
that what most offended Mahometans in Christianity
was not of the essence of that religion, but only a false
growth that had become attached to it, his opponents
may have been equally sincere in believing that the
prophet s followers were not to be won over by such
means. We may see these two lines of conduct
actively followed in our own day. Some would con
ciliate opponents, or remove the causes of their op
position, by keeping in the background what most
offends them in their own principles. Others think
that the truest wisdom is to hold fast what they believe
to be true, and let the contrast strike as sharply as
possible on the minds of their antagonists, with such
results as Providence shall determine. It is not