The Romance of the Chess World Championship Match and the World Champions that won them:

There can only be Two.

The Champion to hold the Title he beat all the masters for.

The Challenger on quest for same Title of yore.

Emanuel Lasker

Emanuel Lasker was the second chessplayer to play at super GM level (the first being Morphy), and the first to do so for a long period of time. Lasker belonged to the first generation of masters who all throughout their careers played in competitive tournaments in the presence of the newly invented chess clock, which seems to have standardized what could have been rather messy and irregular past tournament conditions and so allowed the regular rise of the super GM caliber chessplayer. His middlegames were at least at par with present-day super GMs, and his endgames were better than most.

Given that the human genome and the brain it blueprints, and chess rules, the chess clock, and time controls remain very similar, it would follow that the human brain limits the human ability to play classical chess. Increasing the number of human chess players, thus expanding the normal curve of players, simply creates a larger probability of players playing at the brain's limit, but will not create a mental superman who plays chess at computer levels; there would always be a sudden limit seen as a drop on the right side of the normal curve. Players who do play close to this limit, assuming they occur at a very low proportion of the chess-playing population, say one out of hundreds of millions, would tend to be rarities in each generation or not exist at all, and they would all play at a similar level close to this limit. Lasker was the first.

This explains why human and computer analysis indicate that Lasker at his prime was playing on a qualitatively similar level as more recent dominant World Champions who during some periods of their career played close to this limit, or as well as a human being could. Lasker totally demolished the first official Titleholder Wilhelm Steinitz, who may have played significantly below super GM level.

IMO Emanuel Lasker was the real founder of modern dynamics-oriented chess; and like modern super GMs knew exactly when it was advantageous to trade material and static advantages for dynamic play and piece activity. World Champion for a record 27 years, he definitively relinquished his Title in 1921 to Capablanca in what could be the most error-free and well-played World Championship match in all of chess history. Until he was in his mid fifties Lasker played World Championship caliber chess; until 1924 he was still regarded as the second best chessplayer in the world.

Emanuel Lasker vs. Wilhelm Steinitz 26 - 8 (plus 12 draws)

Emanuel Lasker vs. Jose Raul Capablanca 2 - 6 (plus 16 draws)

Emanuel Lasker vs. Alexander Alekhine 3 - 1 (plus 4 draws)

Emanuel Lasker vs. Max Euwe 3 - 0 (no draws)

Emanuel Lasker vs. Mikhail Botvinnik 0 - 1 (plus 3 draws)