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NOTES

ON THE

PARABLES OF OUR LORD.

BY
RICHARD CHENEVIX TRENCH.

CONDENSED.

NEW YORK :
D. APPLETON AND COMPANY,
443 & 445 BEOADWAT.
LONDON: 16 LITTLE BRITAIN.
M.DOOO.LXI.

Enteeed, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1860,
Bt D. APPLETON & CO.,
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court ofthe United States for the Southern
District of New York.

m

t.110

PKEFACE.

All freely acknowledge the great superiority of Dean
Trench's work on the Parables to any other on the subject
in the English language. Unsurpassed by none in depth of
spiritual insight or in truly evangelical sentiment, it is un
rivaled by any in elaborateness and critical value, or in
familiar and felicitous use of the labors of others, ancient
and modern. The author would seem to have left well-nigh
nothing unexamined that could by possibility throw even
a side-light on his theme. To the Christian student, the
book is as invaluable as it is delightful.
But the size and consequent cost of the work have kept
it beyond the easy reach of very many, and both size and
cost are objections the more fatal — to multitudes of laymen
especially — in that nearly, if not quite, one-third of the
book is in the shape of notes in other languages — Greek,
Latin, French, and German. It must be confessed, too, that
the style, excellent as it is in some respects, is often lacking
in conciseness and simplicity.
A chief object of the present volume is to meet the
wants of the large class of readers just referred to ; it has
been thought, also, that "Bible Classes" would be alike
profited and pleased in its use. The substance of the larger

4 PREFACE.
work is given in very nearly the author's own words, but a
reduction in size has been effected mainly by the omission
of detailed accounts of erroneous views and their refutation,
and of most of the notes — these last being generally cita
tions from other writers in confirmation of the author's in
terpretations. All of the notes have been carefully read,
and some (translated, when necessary) have been inwoven
with the text ; some, together with more or less of other
illustrative matter from the body of the larger book, have
been transferred to an Appendix. Thus, little of interest to
the merely English reader has been omitted in this humbler
volume. It is now submitted to the Christian public, — not with
the desire of supplanting the original work which still has
the first claim on a large circle of readers, but in the hope
of contributing to the more universal knowledge of the
Gospel, — with the prayer, also, that it may aid in making
some " wise unto salvation."

CONTENTS.

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS,
CHAP. PAGE
I. On the Definition of the Parable, . . 7
II. On Teaching by Parables, ... 12
JIL On the Interpretation of Parables, . . 22

PARABLES.
I. The Sower,
II, The Tares, .
IH. The Mustard Seed,
IV. The Leaven,
V. The Hid Treasure,
VI. The Pearl, .
VII. The Draw-Net, .
VIII. The Unmerciful Servant,
IX. The Laborers in the Vineyard,
X. The Two Sons,
XI. The "Wicked Husbandman, .
XII. The Marriage of the King's Son,
XIII. The Ten Virgins, .
XTV. The Talents,
XV. The Seed Growing Secretly,
XVI. The Two Debtors,
XVII. The Good Samaritan,
XVIII. The Friend at Midnight,
XIX. The Rich Fool, ,

29 36
424649 54SI62
YO 8084 93
106116126,
130;131 '
Ul 151

6 CONTENTS.

CHAP.

PASS

XX. The Barren Fig Tree,

. 156

XXI. The Great Supper,

163

XXII. The Lost Sheep,

. 170

XXIII. The Lost Piece of Money, .

111

XXIV. The Prodigal Son,

. 181

XXV. The Unjust Steward,

200

XXVI. The Rich Man and Lazarus,

. 212

XXVII. Unprofitable Servants,

229

XXVTII. The Unjust Judge, .

. 234

XXIX. The Pharisee and the Publican,

239

XXX. The Pounds,

. 244

Appendix :

On other Parables besides those in the Scriptures,

. 249

Notes, .....

255

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS.

CHAPTER I.
ON THE DEFINITION OF THE PARABLE.
Those wbo have had occasion to define a parable,
do not appear to have found it an easy task. Rather
than attempt to add another definition to those already
given, I will seek to note briefly what seems to me to
distinguish it from the fable, the allegory, and such
otherforms of composition as most closely border on it.
1. Some have confounded the parable with the
^Esopic fable, or drawn between them only a slight
and hardly perceptible line of distinction. But the
parable is constructed to set forth a spiritual truth ;
while the fable is essentially of the earth, and never
lifts itself above the earth. The fable just reaches

8 INTRODITCTOEY BEMAEKS.
that pitch of morality which the world will under
stand and approve. But it has no place in Scrip
ture, for the purpose of Scripture — namely, the
awakening of man to a consciousness of a Divine
original, and the education of the spiritual in him —
excludes it. The two fables in the Old Testament
(Judges ix. 8-15, and 2 Kings xiv. 9) do not im
peach the universality of this rule, for in neither case
is it God that is speaking. For the purposes of the
fable, which are the recommendation and enforce-
•ment of the prudential virtues, examples taken from
the world beneath us are admirably suited. The
greatest of all fables, Reynard the Fox, affords ample
illustration of this.
It belongs to the loftier standing point of the
parable that it should be deeply earnest. Severe and
indignant it may be, but it never jests with the
calamities of men, however well deserved, and its
indignation is that of holy love. In this raillery, the
fabulist frequently indulges. There is still another
point of difference between the parable and the fable.
Although it cannot be said that the fabulist intends
to deceive, when he attributes reason and language to
beasts and trees, yet the severer reverence for truth,
belonging to the higher moral teacher, will not allow
even of this sporting with the truth. The great
Teacher in His parables allowed Himself in nothing

INTEODUCTOEY EEMAEKS. 9
marvellous or anomalous ; He presents to us no speak
ing trees, or reasoning beasts.
2. The parable is also different from the mythus.
The mythic narrative presents itself not merely as the
vehicle of the truth, but as being itself the truth ;
while in the parable we see the perfect distinctness
between form and essence, shell and kernel. There is
indeed a resemblance, when upon some old legend or
myth there is thrust some spiritual significance,
which is clearly an after-thought. For instance,
Narcissus was to the later Platonists the symbol of
man, casting himself forth into the world, expecting
to find the good answering to his nature, but finding
death instead. It was their aim hereby to put a
moral life into mythology, so that it might maintain
its ground against the new life of Christianity.
3. The parable is also clearly distinguishable from
the proverb, though it is true that the words are some
times used interchangeably in the New Testament.
(Thus, Matt. xv. 14, 15.) This interchange has come
to pass, partly because there is but one word in the
Hebrew to signify both parable and proverb ; and
also, because the proverb, like the parable, very com
monly rests upon some comparison, expressed or
implied (2 Peter ii. 22). Or again, the proverb is
often a concentrated parable ; as for instance, " If the
1*

10 INTEODITCTOEY BEMAKKS.
blind lead the blind, both shall fall into the ditch,"
might easily be extended into a parable.
¦4. The parable differs from the allegory, but it is
more in form than in essence. In the allegory, there is
a blending, an interpenetration of the thing signifying
and the thing signified. It needs not, as the parable,
an interpretation from without, for it contains its inter
pretation within itself, and as it proceeds, that also
proceeds, or at least is never far behind it. (The
" Pilgrim's Progress " amply illustrates this.) Thus
Isaiah v. 1-6, is a parable, the explanation being in ver.
7 ; while Psalm Ixxx. 8-16, resting on the same image,
is an allegory. And as we have seen that many prov
erbs are concise parables, in like manner also, many
are brief allegories. Tbe eastern proverb, " The world
is a carcass, and they who gather round it are dogs,"
interprets itself as it goes along ; while the proverb
spoken by our Lord, " "Wheresoever the carcass is, there
will the eagles be gathered together," gives no inter
pretation of itself.
To sum up all, the parable differs from the fable,
by moving in a spiritual world, and never transgress
ing the actual order of natural things, — from the
mythus, because in that there is an unconscious blend
ing of the deeper meaning with the outward symbol
the two remaining separate in the parable, — from the
proverb, inasmuch as it is longer carried out, and not

INTRODUCTORY REMARKS. 11
merely accidentally but necessarily figurative, — from
the allegory, by comparing one thing with another,
and not transferring, as the allegory, the properties
of one to the other.

CHAPTER II.
ON TEACHING BT PAKAKLES.
No one can deny, without doing great violence to
our Lord's words as recorded in Matt. xiii. 10-15 ;
Mark iv. 11, 12 ; Luke viii. 9, 10, that it was some
times his purpose in teaching by parables, to with
draw from certain of his hearers the knowledge of
truths which they were unworthy or unfit to receive.
If not, where would be the fulfilment of the prophe
cy in Isaiah vi. 10 ? It is not that by the command,
" Make the heart of this people fat," we need under
stand that any peculiar hardening passed upon them,
but that the Lord. having constituted as the righteous
law of his moral government, that sin should produce
moral insensibility, declared that he Would allow the
law in their case to take its course. The fearful curse
of sin is, that it has ever the tendency to reproduce
itself, that he who sows in sin reaps in spiritual
darkness, which delivers him over again to worse
sin.

INTE0DUCT0EY BEMABKB. 13
But, notwithstanding this, we may assume as
certain, that the general aim of our Lord in teaching
by parables, was either to illustrate or to prove, and
thus to make clearer, the truths which he had in hand.
Or to prove, I say ; the parable, or other analogy to
spiritual truth appropriated from the world of nature
or man, is not merely illustration, but, in some sort,
proof. For the power of such analogies lies in the
harmony unconsciously felt by all, and by deeper
minds plainly perceived, between the natural and
spiritual worlds ; the world of nature being through
out a witness for the world of spirit. To lovers of
truth the things on earth are copies of the things in
heaven. Bather, instead of being happily, but arbi
trarily, chosen illustrations, do they belong to one
another, the type and the thing typified, by an in'
ward necessity. It is not a happy accident that the
analogy of husband and wife sets forth the mystery
of Christ's relation to His elect Church ; but rather,
the earthly relation is only a lower form of the heav
enly, on which it rests, and of which it is the utter
ance. The Lord is king, not borrowing this title from
the kings of the earth, but having lent His own title
to them ; and the " kingdom of God " is, in fact, a most
literal expression ; it is rather the earthly kingdoms
that are figures and shadows of the true. The un-
tended soil yielding thorns and briers, is ever a type

14 IHTR0DUCT0BY BEMARKS.
of man's heart, which, if neglected, will bring forth
its thorns and its briers ; and the weeds that will
mingle during the time of growth with the corn, and
yet are separated from it at last, tell always the same
tale of the present mingling and future sundering of
the righteous and the wicked. And so, also, in the
decaying of the seed, and from that the rising of the
fruitful ear, we see evermore the prophecy of the final
resurrection, — it is the same power putting itself forth
upon meaner things. And thus, besides his written
revelation, God has an elder, and one without which
we cannot conceive how that other could be made, for
from this it appropriates all its signs of communica
tion. The entire moral and visible world, with its
kings and its subjects, its sun and its moon, its sleep
ing and its waking, and all its variety of opera
tions, is one mighty parable.
It is true tbat men are ever in danger of losing
" the key of knowledge " which opens the portals of
this palace ; and indeed in all, save in the one Man,
there is more or less of the dulled ear, and the filmed
eye. There is none to whom nature tells all that she
has to tell. Now, the whole of Scripture, with its
constant use of figurative language, is a re-awakening
of man to the mystery of nature, and giving back to
him the key of knowledge ; and this comes out in its
highest form, but by no means exclusively, in the

INTEODUOTORY EEMABKS. 15
parables. These were a calling of attention to the
spiritual facts which underlie all processes of nature,
all human institutions. Christ moved in the midst
of what seemed to the eye of sense an old and worn-
out world, and it became new at his touch ; for it
told to man the imnost secrets of his being, and he
found that of these two worlds, without him, and
within, each threw a light and glory on the other.
For the possibility of a real teaching by parables,
rests on this — that this is God's world, the same God
who is leading us into spiritual truth, and that being
God's, it is a sharer in his great redemption. "We
must not forget, indeed, that nature in its present
state contains but a prophecy of its coming glory ;
it " groaneth and travaileth ;" it is suffering under
our curse. Yet suffering thus, it has more fitting
symbols to declare to us our disease and misery, and
the processes of their healing. It has its storms, and
wildernesses, its lions and adders, by these interpret
ing to us death and all that leads to death, no less
than by its more beneficent workings life and all
that tends to the restoring and maintaining of life.
Still, not the less does it come short of its full
purpose and meaning. It does not always speak out,
in distinct accents, of God's, truth and love. One
day it will be translucent with the divine idea which
it embodies, and which even now shines through it

16 INTRODUCTOEY EEMABSS.
so wondrously. For no doubt the end will be, not
the abohtion of this nature, but the glorifying of it,
— that which is now nature (naburd), always, as the
word expresses it, struggling to the birth, will then
be born ; and the new creation will be as the glorious
child born out of tbe world-long throes of the old.
But at present, the natural world, through its share
in man's fall, has lost in some measure its fitness for
the expressing of his higher condition. Obnoxious
to change, tainted with decay, all earthly things are
weak and temporary, when they undertake to set
forth things strong and eternal. . They break down
under the weight that is laid upon them. The father,
unlike that heavenly Father, chastens after his own
pleasure. The word of God, which liveth and abideth
forever, is set forth by the seed which itself perishes
at last. There is something exactly analogous to all
this, in the personages mentioned in Scripture, as
typical of the Divine Man. Through their sins and
imperfections they all break down, sooner or later.
For instance, few would deny the typical character of
Solomon. Yet all that gorgeous forecasting of the
coming glory is vouchsafed to us only for an instant.
Even before his reign is done, we lose the brightness
of the coloring, the distinctness of the outline.
Again, we see some men, in whom there is but a
single point in their history which brings them into

INTRODUCTOBY EEMAEKS. 17
typical relation to Christ ; such was Jonah, the type
of the Resurrection : or persons whose lives at one
moment and another seem to stand out as symbolic ;
Samson will suggest himself as one of these. It is
scarcely possible to believe that Judges xiv. 14 and
xvi. 30 mean nothing more than is contained in the
letter. And so it is in every case, for somewhere or
other every man is a liar ; he is false, that is, to the
Divine idea, which he was meant to embody. So
that of the truths of God in the language of men,
which language, of course, includes man's acts as
well as his words, it may truly be said, " we have
this treasure in earthen vessels." No doubt it was this
consciousness of the drawbacks that attend all our
means of communication, that caused the mystics to
press the idea that we should seek to abstract our
selves from all images of things, and that to raise
ourselves to the contemplation of pure and naked
truth is the height of spiritual attainment. It has
been said that as the kernel of the seed while in the
earth disengages itself from the outer coating, and
alone fructifies while the husk perishes, so in the seed
of God's word, deposited in man's heart, the sensible
form must fall off, that the inner germ may germi
nate. But, we must observe, the outer covering is
not to fall off and perish, but to become glorified.
Man is body and soul, and the truth has, for him,

18 INTRODUCTORY REMARKS.
need of a body and soul likewise ; it is well that he
should be able to distinguish between the two, but
not that he should seek to kill the body, that he may
get at the soul.
The teacher, who would find his way to the hearts
and understandings of his hearers, will never keep
down the parabolical element of his teaching, but
will make as frequent use of it as he can. To do this
effectually, will need a fresh effort of his own ; for
while all language is more or less, figurative, yet
long use has worn out the freshness of the stamp, so
that, to create a powerful impression, language must
be cast into novel forms, as was done by our Saviour.
He gave no doctrine in an abstract form, no skeleton
of truth, but clothed them all, as it were, with flesh
and blood. He acted Himself as He declared to His
apostles they must act (Matt. xiii. 52 ); He brought
forth out of His treasure things new and old ; by the
help of the old, making intelligible the new. And
thus in His own example He has given us the secret
of all effectual teaching.
Had our Lord spoken naked spiritual truth, how
many of His words would have entirely passed away
from the hearts and memories of His hearers. But
being imparted to them in this form, under some
lively image, or in some brief but interesting narra
tive, they awakened attention, and excited inquiry ;

INTRODUCTORY EEMABK8. 19
or even if, at the time, the truth did not find an
entrance into the mind, His words laid up in the
memory, were, to many that heard Him, like the
money of another country, of which they knew not
the value, but which yet was ready for use when they
reached that land. "When the Spirit brought all things
to their remembrance, He quickened the forms of truth,
which they already possessed, with the power and
spirit of life. Gradually, the meanings of what they
had heard, unfolded themselves. And thus must it
ever be with all true knowledge,- which is not the
communication of information, but the planting seeds
of truth, which shall take root in the new soil, and
striking their roots downward, and sending their
branches upward, shall grow into goodly trees.
We may also notice, that besides the spoken, there
is much of acted, parable in Scripture. Every type
is a real parable. The whole Levitical constitution,
with its outer court, its holiest of all, its sacrifices,
and all its ordinances, is declared to be such in the
Epistle to the Hebrews (ix. 9). The wanderings of
the children of Israel have ever been regarded as a
parable of the spiritual life. ¥e have, also, para
bolic persons, who represented One higher and greater
than themselves ; men, who by their actions and suffer
ings were unconsciously drawing lines which another
should hereafter fill up, as Abraham casting out

20 INTEODUCTOEY EEMAEKS.
Hagar (Gal. iv. 30), Jonah in the whale's belly, David
in his hour of agony (Ps. 22). And, in a narrower
circle, how often has God chosen that His servants
should teach by an acted parable in order to make a
more lasting impression. This will be seen in the
conduct of Jeremiah ; he breaks a potter's vessel
(xix. 1-11) ; he wears a yoke (xxvii. 2, xxviii. 10) ; he
redeems a field in pledge (xxxii. 6-15). All these
acts were symbolical. And as God chooses that His
servants shall teach by these means, so does He teach
them by the same. Not by His word alone, does
He teach His prophets, but the great truths of His
kingdom pass before their eyes incorporated in symbols.
They are indeed, and eminently, seers. This was per
haps more true of Ezekiel and Zechariah than of any
others. "We have an example of the same teaching
in St. Peter's vision (Acts x. 9-16), and throughout
all tbe visions of the Apocalypse. Nay, we might
venture to affirm that so it was with the greatest truth,
that which includes all others, — the manifestation of
God in the flesh. This, inasmuch as it was a making
visible the invisible, a teaching not by doctrine, but
by the embodied doctrine of a divine life, was the
most glorious of all parables.
Our Lord's parables are found only in the three
first Gospels ; that of St. John containing allegories
(x. 1 ; xv. 1). The gospel of St. Matthew was written

INTE0DIT0T0EY EEMAEKS. 21
originally for Jewish readers, and mainly for those of
Palestine ; and its leading purpose was to show that
Jesus was the promised Messiah — the expected king
of the Jews — the son of David ; the parables recorded
by him are concerning the kingdom, in harmony with
the theocratic spirit of his Gospel. The main purpose
of Luke was to show, not that Jesus was the king of
the Jews, but the Saviour of the world ; and there
fore he traces our Lord's descent not merely from
David, but from Adam. He, the chosen companion
of the Apostle of the Gentiles, wrote his Gospel origi
nally for Gentile readers ; and, therefore, has been
most careful to record the Lord's declarations con
cerning God's free mercy — that tbere is no departure
from God so wide as to preclude a return. In this
view, the three parables in chap. xv. are especially
characteristic. St. Mark has but one parable peculiar
to himself, namely, that of the seed growing by itself
(iv. 26), and there is nothing in his record, I beheve,
to demand special notice.

CHAPTER III.
ON THE INTEBPKETATION OF PAKABLES.
Each one of the parables is like a casket, itself of
exquisite workmanship, but in which jewels richer
than itself are laid up ; or like fruit, which, however
lovely to look upon, is yet more delectable in its inner
sweetness. To find, then, the golden key at the touch
of which the casket shall reveal its treasures, to open
this fruit so that nothing of its hidden kernel shall be
lost, has ever been regarded as a matter of high con
cern. In the interpretation of the parable, the ques
tion, how much is significant ? is one which has given
rise to the most opposite theories. Some have gone
a great way in saying, This is merely drapery, and
not the vehicle of essential truth. Chrysostom con
tinually warns against pressing too anxiously all the
circumstances of a parable, and so also is it with The-
ophylact and Origen. It has been said that the para
ble and its interpretation are as a plane and a globe,
which, though brought into contact, yet touch each

INTEODUCTOEY EEMABKS. 23
other but in one point. On the other hand, Augus
tine, though sometimes laying down the same princi
ple, frequently extends the interpretation through all
the minutest fibres of the narrative. And in modern
times, the followers of Coceeius have been particularly
earnest in affirming all parts ofa parable to be signifi
cant. It may well be considered whether those in
terpreters who claim that much of a parable is simply
ornament, have not run into an extreme. It is quite
true, as they say, that a knife is not all edge, nor a
harp all strings. It is true, also, that in the other
scheme of interpretation, there is danger lest a love
for the exercise of ingenuity on the part of the inter
preter, and admiration of the ingenuity so exercised
on the part of the readers and hearers, may cause it
to be forgotten that sanctification of the heart through
the truth is the main purpose of all Scripture.
Yet, on the other hand, there is a shallow spirit ever
ready to empty Scripture of the depth of its meaning,
to exclaim, " This means nothing, this circumstance is
not to be pressed ;" and thus saying, we may fail to
draw out from the "Word of God all the riches therein
contained ; we may fail to admire the wisdom with
which the type was constructed to correspond with
its antitype. And still further, of those who start
with the principle that much is to be set aside as non
essential, scarcely any two are agreed as to what act-

24 INTR0DUCT0EY REMARKS.
ually is to be set aside ; what one rejects, another re
tains, and the contrary. Besides, it is always observ
able that the more this system is carried out, the more
the peculiar beauty of the parable disappears. "When
Storr, for instance, denies that the Prodigal leaving
his father's house has any direct reference to man's
departure from his heavenly Father, it is at once evi
dent how much, both of pleasure and of instruction,
is taken from us. It may also be remarked, in oppo
sition to the interpretation of the parables in the gross,
that when our Lord himself interpreted the two first
which he delivered, those of the Sower and of the
Tares, it is more than probable that he intended to
furnish us with a key to the interpretation of 'them
all. Now, in these, the moral application descends to
some of the minutest details of the narrative. •
It will help us much in this matter of determining
what is essential and what not, if we first obtain fast
hold of the central truth which the parable would set
forth, and distinguish it in the mind as accurately as
we can from all truths which border upon it ; for only
as seen from that middle point will the different parts
appear in their true light. There is also this rule,
that the introduction and application must be most
carefully attended to. These helps to interpretation
are rarely or never lacking, though given in no fixed
or formal manner ; sometimes they are supplied by

INTEODUCTOEY EEMAEKS. 25
our Lord himself (Matt. xxii. 14 ; xxv. 13) ; sometimes
by the inspired narrators of His words (Luke xv. 1,
2 ; xviii. 1) ; sometimes they precede the parable
(Luke xviii. 9 ; xix. 11) ; sometimes they follow
(Matt. xxv. 13 ; Luke xvi. 9). The parable of the
Unmerciful Servant (Matt, xviii. 23) is furnished with
these helps to its right understanding, both at its
opening and at its close. So also are Matt. xx. 1-15,
and Luke xii. 16-20.
AgdSn we may observe that an interpretation, be
sides being thus in accordance with its context, must
be so without the use of any very violent means ;
even, as generally, the interpretation must be easy —
if not always easy to be discovered, yet being discov
ered, easy. For it is here as with the laws of Nature :
genius may be needful to discover the law, but being
discovered it throws back light upon itself, and com
mends itself unto all. Again, as it is the proof of the
law that it explains all the phenomena, so it is toler
able evidence that we have found the right interpre
tation of a parable, if it leave none of the main cir
cumstances unexplained.
Once more — the parables are not to be made first
sources of doctrine. Doctrines otherwise grounded
may be illustrated, or even further confirmed by
them ; but it is not allowable to constitute doctrines
first by their aid. For from the literal to the figura-

26 INTEODUOTOEY EBMAEKS.
tive, from the clearer to the more obscure, has ever
been recognized as the law of Scripture interpretation.
This rule, however, has been often forgotten, and
controversialists, looking around for arguments with
which to sustain some weak position, often invent for
themselves supports in these. Thus Faustus Socinus
argues from the parable of the Unmerciful Servant,
that as the king pardoned his servant merely on his
petition, so in the same way God, without requiring
sacrifice or intercessor, pardons Mis debtors sftnply on
the ground of their prayers. Socinus here sins against
another rule of Scripture interpretation, as of common
sense, which is, that we are not to expect, in every
place, the whole circle of Christian truth to be fully
stated, and that no conclusion may be drawn from the
absence of a doctrine from one passage which is
clearly stated in others.
But the greatest sinners against this rule, namely,
that the parables are not to be made first sources of
doctrine, were the Gnostics and Manicheans, but es
pecially the former. They only came to the Scripture
to find an outer Christian coloring for a system essen
tially anti-Christian. They came, not to draw out of
Scripture its meaning, but to thrust into Scripture
their own (all of which very nearly repeats itself in
Swedenborg). To sustain their doctrine, they were
obliged to abandon the literal portions of Scripture ;

INTEODUOTOEY EEMARKS. 27
their only refuge was in the figurative, in those which
might receive more interpretations than one; such
perhaps they might bend to their purposes. And as
it was with the Gnostics, so was it with those sects of
a later day, the Cathari and Bogomili. They too
found in the parables no teaching of sin and grace, no
truths of the kingdom of God, but fitted to them the
speculations about the creation, the origin of evil, the
fall of angels, which they had themselves framed.
Thus, in the parable of the Unjust Steward, they
made Satan the chief steward over God's house, de
posed from his high position, and drawing after him
other angels with the suggestion of lighter tasks, and
rehef from the burden of their imposed duties.
There is another theory concerning the interpreta
tion of the parables, held by Cocceius and his follow
ers of what we may call the historico-prophetical
school. By the parables, they say, and so far they
are right, are declared the mysteries of the kingdom
of God. Understanding these words — the kingdom
of God — in far too exclusive a sense, they find in. every
one of the parables a part of the history of that king
dom's progressive development in the world, to the
remotest times. They will not allow that any are
merely for exhortation, for reproof, for instruction in
righteousness. In the words of one of their own num
ber : — " The parables connect themselves with certain

28 INTRODUCTORY BEMAEKS.
fixed periods of the progressive development of the
Gospel of the kingdom, and as soon as these periods
are completed, lose themselves in the very comple
tion," that is, like all other fulfilled prophecy. Pro
phetical, no doubt, many of the parables are, for they
declare how the new element of life, which the Lord
was bringing into men's hearts and into the world,
would work — the little mustard seed should grow
to a great tree. But they do not declare so much the
facts as the laws of the kingdom. Only a few are
historico-prophetical. In the "Wicked Husbandmen,
for example, there is a clear prophecy of the death of
Christ ; and in the Marriage of the King's Son, there
is also a clear announcement of the destruction of Je
rusalem, and the transfer of the privileges of the king
dom of God from the Jews to the Gentiles.
Note. — For remarks " on other parables besides
those in the Scriptures," see the Appendix.

PAEABLES.

I.
THE SOWER.
Matt. xiii. 3-8, and 18-23 ; Mark iv. 3-8, and 14^-20 ; Luke
viii. 5-8, and 11-15.
It is evidently the purpose of St. Matthew to pre
sent to his readers the parables recorded in the thir
teenth chapter of his Gospel, as the first which the
Lord spoke ; with this of the Sower he commenced a
manner of teaching which he had not hitherto used.
We have not anywhere else in the Gospels so rich a
group Of parables assembled together. The only pas
sage that will bear comparison is chapters xv. and
xvi. of St. Luke, where there are recorded five parables
that were all apparently spoken on the same occasion.
St. Matthew tells us, that " Jesus went out from
the house," probably at Capernaum, which was the

30 THE SOWEB.
city where he commonly dwelt after his open ministry
began — " his own city " (Matt. ix. 1), and which was
close by the sea-shore ; and going out he " sat down
by the sea-side," that is, by the lake of Genesareth.
This lake (now Bahr Tabaria) goes by many names in
the Gospels. It is often called simply " the sea," or,
" the Sea of Galilee," or, " the Sea of Tiberias," though
indeed it was an inland lake of no very great extent,
being but about sixteen miles in length, and no more
than six in breadth.
The Lord lifted, it may be, his eyes, and saw at no
great distance an husbandman scattering his seed in
the furrows. "We find this comparison of the teach
er and the taught to the sower and the soil, of very
frequent recurrence, not merely in Scripture (1 Pet. i.
23 ; 1 John hi. 9), but in the works of all the wiser
heathen, such as Aristotle, Cicero, Plutarch, and
others. "While all teaching that is worthy the name,
is as seed, with a power to take root in the hearts of
those that hear it, in a much higher sense must this
be true of the words which He spake who was him
self the Seminal "Word which he communicated. I
cannot doubt that the Lord intended to set himself
forth as the chief sower of the seed. His entrance
into the world was a going forth to sow ; the word of
the kingdom was his seed ; the hearts of men his soil.
" And when lie sowed, some seeds fell by the way-

THE S0WEE. 31
side [and it was trodden down], and the fowls came
and devoured them up." Some, that is, fell on the
hard road, where it could not sink down in the earth,
but lay exposed to the feet of passers by, till at length
it became an easy prey to the birds, which in the East
follow in large flocks the husbandman, to gather up,
if possible, the scattered seed-corn. Christ thus ex
plains this : " When any one heareth the word of the
kingdom, and understandeth it not, then cometh the
wicked one, and catcheth away that which was sown
in his heart." The words which St. Matthew alone
records, " and understandeth it not," are very impor
tant for the comprehending of what this first state of
mind and heart is, in which the "Word of God is un
productive of any effect. The man understands it
not ; he does not recognize himself as standing in
any relation to the word, or to the kingdom of grace
which that word proclaims. All that speaks of man's
connection with an invisible world, all that speaks of
sin, of redemption, of holiness, is unintelligible, and
wholly without significance. He has exposed his
heart as a common road to every evil influence of the
world, till it has become hard as a pavement. Besides
all this, there is one always watching to take advan
tage of this evil condition of the soil, and he sends his
ministers in the shape of evil thoughts, worldly lusts,
&c, &c, and by their help " immediately taketh away

32 the sowee.
the word that was sown in their hearts." And the
Lord concludes, " This is he that receiveth seed by the
way-side." " Some fell upon stony places, where they had not
much earth, and forthwith they sprung up, because
they had no deepness of earth ; and when the sun was
up, they were scorched, and because they had no root
they withered away." A soil mingled with stones is
not meant by the expression, " stony places," for this
would not hinder the roots from striking downward.
But what is meant is a ground where a thin coating
of mould covered the surface of a rock. Christ then
says, "They on the rock are they which, when they
hear, receive the word with joy / and these home no
root, which for a while believe, and in time of tempta
tion fall away." "We have here a state of mind not
stubbornly repelling the truth, but lacking in earnest
ness ; the same spirit which was in the minds of the
great multitudes who followed Jesus, to whom he
turned and told in the strongest language what disci-
pleship to him involved (Luke xiv. 25-33). " So
hath he not root in himself, but durethfor a while,
for when tribulation or persecution ariseth because of
the word, by and by he is offended." The troubles
and afflictions which would have strengthened a true
faith, cause a merely temporary faith to fail. The
having the inward root answers to having a founda-

the sowee. 33
tion on a rock (Matt. vii. 25), and the image itself
is not an unfrequent one in Scripture (Ephes. iii. 17 ;
Col. ii. 7). Illustrations may be taken of this endur
ing faith from Heb. x. 34, and 2 Cor. iv. 17, 18.
Demas on the other hand lacked that root.
Thirdly — " Some fell among thorns, and the thorns
sprung up and choked it," so that " it yielded no fruit."
Here there was no lack of soil, perhaps good soil ; but
what was deficient was a careful husbandry, the ex
termination of thorns and weeds. Christ says — " He
also that recei/oed seed among the thorns, is he that
heareth the word, and the cares of this world and the
deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and he becom
eth unfruitful." In this case, the profession of a spir
itual life is retained, but the power of religion is by
degrees eaten out. This is to be attributed to two
things : the cares of this world, and its pleasures ;
these are the thorns and briers that strangle the life
of the soul. "While that which God promises is felt to
be good, but also what the world promises is felt to
be equally good, there will be an attempt made to
serve God and Mammon (Luke xxi. 34 ; 1 Tim. vi. 9).
But " Other fell into good ground, and brought
forth fruit, some an hundred fold, some sixty fold,
some thirty fold." The return of a hundred for one
is not unheard of in the East (Gen. xxvi. 12). He
rodotus says that two hundred fold was a common re-

34 THE SOWEE.
turn in the plain of Babylon, and sometimes three.
We learn that " He that receiveth seed into the good
ground, is he that heareth the word, and understand
eth it, which also beareth fruit," &c, &c. ; or with
St. Luke, " That on the good ground are they, who in
an honest and good heart, having heard the word,
keep it, and bring forth fruit with patience." How
can any heart be called good, before the "Word and
the Spirit have made it so ? " Being of the truth,"
" doing truth," " having the soil of a good and honest
heart," all mean the same thing, viz., a receptivity for
the truth. The preaching of the Gospel may be liken
ed to the scattering of sparks ; where they find tinder,
they fasten and kindle into a flame. So when Christ
preached the word, there were, as there still are, two
divisions of men. One was of the false-hearted, who
called good evil, and evil good, self-excusers and self-
justifiers, such as were the Scribes and Pharisees for
the most part. The other class were sinners too, but
yet acknowledging their sins, and having no wish to
alter the everlasting relations between right and
wrong. Such were the Matthews and the Zaccheus-
es. Nathaniel would be yet a more perfect specimen
— a man of a simple, earnest, truthful nature, who
had been faithful to the light which he had — who had
not resisted God's preparation for imparting to him His

THE SOWEE. 35
best gift, — for we must keep in mind that the good
soil comes as much from God as the seed.
I suppose that the different measures of prosperity
given in the return, indicate different degrees of fidel
ity in those that receive the word. Tlie words, " Take
heed, therefore, how ye hear / for whosoever hath, to
him shall be given, and whosoever hath not, from him
shall be taken even that which he seemeth to have"
are very important. The disciples might have been
in danger of supposing that these four conditions of
heart were permanently fixed. The warning, " Take
heed how ye hear," obviates the possibility of such a
mistake, for it tells us that according as we hear and
receive the word, so will its success be — that even for
those who have brought themselves into an evil con
dition, recovery is still, through the grace of God, pos
sible. For, whilst it is true that there is such a thing
as laying waste the very soil, yet, on the other hand,
the hard soil may again become soft — the shallow soil
deep — the soil beset with thorns clear. For the
heavenly seed, if acted on by the soil, also reacts
more mightily upon it (Jer. xxiii. 29).

n.
THE TARES.
Matt. xiii. 24r-30, and 36-43.
" The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man
that smoed good seed in his field." " He that sowed
good seed, is the Son of man." This is the most fre
quent title by which our Lord designates Himself,
though it is never given Him by any other, except by
Stephen (Acts vii. 56), to whom it would seem prob
able the glorified Saviour appeared bodily. " The
field is the world." This parable relates, as our Lord
tells us at the beginning, to the kingdom of heaven, or
the church. The word " world" need not perplex us ;
it was the world, and therefore was rightly called so,
till this seed was sown in it, but thenceforth was
the world no longer. No narrower word would have
sufficed for Him, in whose prophetic eye the word of
the Gospel was contemplated as going forth, to be
sown in every part of the great field of the nations.

THE TABES. 37
" But while men slept, his enemy came and sowed
tares among the wheat, and went his way." Our
Lord here alluded to a form of malice which was
familiar to his Hearers. It involved little risk, and
yet accomplished great mischief. A modern writer
affirms the same to be now practised in India. In
Ireland, an outgoing tenant, in spite, sowed wild oats
in the fields which he was leaving, and it was next
to impossible to exterminate them. The phrase
" while men slept," is equivalent to " at night," and
means nothing more.
" The enemy that sowed " the tares " is tlie devil"
so that we see Satan here, not as he works beyond
the limits of the church, but in his malignity, mim
icking and counterworking the work of Christ. "We
may here also notice the increasing distinctness (in
comparison with the Old Testament) with which the
doctrine of Satan's agency and of his active hostility
to the blessedness of man is brought out ; as the lights
become brighter, the shadows become deeper. It
was not until the Son of man actually appeared on
the stage of the world, that Satan came distinctly
forward upon it also. And instead of hearing less
of Satan, as the mystery of the kingdom of God
unfolds itself, in the last book of Scripture, which
details the fortune of the church till the end of time,

38 THE TAEES.
he is brought in as more openly working than in any
other. It is observable, too, that Satan is spoken of as
his enemy ; for here the great conflict is spoken of as
rather between Satan and the Son of man, than
between Satan and God. (Compare Gen. iii. 15.) It
was part of the plan of redemption that the victory
over evil should be a moral, rather than a physical,
triumph. It was important, then, that man, who lost
the battle, should also win it. (1 Cor. xv. 21.) Satan
is all darkness ; in him is no light. God is all light,
and in. Him is no darkness at all. Man holds a middle
ground. In him, light and darkness are struggling.
Herein lies the possibihty of redemption, because his
will is only perverted ; Satan's will is inverted, for
he has said, what it is never possible for a mxafuUyto
act upon, " Evil be thou my good ; " and therefore,
as far as we can see, restoration is impossible for him.
This thought, also, is full of instruction, that wheat and
tares are not seeds of different kinds, but that tares are a
bastard wheat. This fact makes the image curiously
adapted to the setting forth the origin of evil, that it is
not a generation, but a degeneration. — Having sown his
tares, the enemy " went his way." How often, in the
church, the beginnings of evil have been scarcely dis
cernible. The tares did not appear to be such till " ihe
blade was sprung up, and brought forth fruit." The

THE TABES. 39
difference between the wheat, and this lolium or tare,
is only distinguishable when the ear is formed ; thus
fulfilling literally the Lord's words, " By their fruits
ye shall know them." Augustine remarks that it is
only the opposition of good which makes evil to ap
pear. As there must be light, with which to con
trast the darkness, height wherewith to measure
depth, so there must be holiness to be grieved at un-
holiness. This is as true of each individual heart's
experience as of the collective church.
" So the servants of the householder came and said
unto him, Sir, didst not thou sow good seed in thy
field ? from whence then hath it tares ? " These ser
vants are not angels, but men who indeed had a right
eous zeal for their master's honor ; but it needed to be
tempered and restrained (compare Luke ix. 54). The
question, "Didst not thou sow good seed in thy field ? "
expresses well the surprise and perplexity which must
have been felt by all, in the first ages especially, who
were zealous for God, at the woeful appearance which
the visible church presented. "Where was the " glori
ous church, not having spot or wrinkle, or any such
thing " ? But the reply is, " An enemy hath done
this." It is attributed not to the imperfection which
clings to every thing human, but to the distinct coun
terworking of the great spiritual enemy. In the
question " Wilt thou then that we go and gather them

40 THE TABES.
up t " the temptation to use outward power fbr the
suppression of error finds utterance. Therefore he
said " Nay." By this probibition are doubtless for
bidden all such measures for the excision of offenders
as shall leave them no possibility for repentance.
" Let both^grow together until the harvest." "We
learn from this, that evil is not to disappear before
good, but to develop itself more fully, as on the other
side good is to unfold itself more mightily also. Thus
it will go on, until they stand face to face in the per
sons of Christ and Antichrist. It is clear that when
Christ asserts that it is His purpose to make a com
plete separation at the end, He forbids, not the exer
cise of godly discipline, but any attempts to antici
pate the final separation. At. that time, He will give
the command, not to these servants, but to the reapers
— " his angels, and they shall gather out of his king
dom, all things that offend, and all which do iniquity."
The lot of the tares is to be gathered into bundles,
and burned, or, as it is here, the angels " shall cast
them into the furnace of fire." Augustine explains
this gathering into bundles by the idea of " like to
like ; " " that is," he says, " extortioners with extor
tioners, adulterers with adulterers, murderers with
murderers, thieves with thieves, &c." The punish
ment by fire was one that was not in use among the
Jews, but one with which they were not unacquainted.

THE TABES. 41
It was employed by the Chaldeans, Jer. xxix. 22,
Dan. iii. 6. The waihng and gnashing of teeth are
expressions of rage and impatience (Acts vii. 54).
"Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun
in the kingdom of their Father." A glory shall be
revealed m the saints ; it shall not- merely be brought
to them. It shall be a glory which they before had,
but which did not appear. That shall be the day of
the manifestation of the sons of God ; they shall be
acknowledged as children of the Father of Lights
(Jam. i. 17). Not till then shall be accomplished
those glorious prophecies recorded in the Old Testa
ment : " Henceforth there shall no more come into
thee the uncircumcised and the unclean " (Isa. Iii. 1) ;
"Thy people also shall be all righteous" (Isa. lx.
21) ; compare Zech. xiv. 21 ; Isa. xxxv. 8 ; Joel iii. 17 ;
Ezek. xxxvii. 21-27 ; Zeph. iii. 13.
(See Notes on this, as on others of the parables, in
the Appendix.)

in.
THE MUSTARD SEED.
Matt. xiii. 31, 32 ; Mark iv. 30-32 ; Luke xiii. 18, 19.
This parable, and the one that follows, would
seem, at first sight, merely repetitions of the same
truth ; but upon inspection, essential differences ap
pear. The other, of the leaven, is concerning the
kingdom of God, which " cometh not with observa
tion ; " this is concerning the same kingdom, as it
displays itself openly, and cannot be hid. That sets
forth the power of the truth on the world brought in
contact with it, — this the power of the truth to develop
itself from within itself. The description of the small
and slight beginnings and of the marvellous increase
of the church is common to both.
The connection between this parable and all that
has gone before, is thus traced by Chrysostom. In
the parable of the Sower, the disciples had heard
that only a fourth part of the seed sown had pros-

THE MUSTARD SEED. 43
pered ; in the Tares, they had heard of the hindrances
which beset even the part that remained. Lest they
should be tempted to despair, our Lord speaks these
two parables for their encouragement.
The comparison of the growth of His kingdom to
that of a tree, was one made familiar to His hearers
from the Old Testament. The growth of a worldly
kingdom had been set forth under this image (Dan.
iv. 10-12 ; Ezek. xxxi. 3-9) ; as also that of the king
dom of God (Ps. Ixxx. 8). "We may also notice
the reverence with which all antiquity was accus
tomed to look upon trees. The most accurate inqui
ries of naturalists seem to point out as the mustard
tree of this parable, not that which goes by this name
in "Western Europe, but what is commonly called in
Syria, Khardal. It is described as having a pleasant,
though strongly aromatic taste, like mustard. The
mustard-seed is here chosen because of the proportion
between the smallness of its seed and the greatness
of the plant which unfolds from it. The Lord wishes
to set before His disciples the fact, that His kingdom
should be glorious in spite of its weak and despised
beginning. Nor can I see any thing so very ridicu
lous in the supposition that this seed was chosen on
account of further qualities which it possessed ; its
fiery vigor, the fact that through being bruised, it
gives out its best virtues, and all this in so small a

44 THE MUSTARD SEED.
compass, may have moved him to select this as an
image of the doctrine of a crucified Redeemer, which,
though a foolishness and a stumbling-block to some,
should prove, to them that believed, " the power of God
unto salvation." Nor is it his doctrine merely, but
Christ himself that is the grain of mustard seed, for
the kingdom of heaven, or the church, was originally
enclosed in him, and from him unfolded itself.
This seed is, when cast into the ground, " ths
least of all seeds." Although this is not literally
true, yet the words "Small as a grain of mustard
seed " were a proverbial expression among the Jews
(Luke xvii. 6). The Koran reads — " Oh, my son,
every matter, though it be of the weight of a grain
of mustard seed," &c. The Son of man grew up in
a despised province ; he did not appear in public
until his thirtieth year ; then taught for two or three
years in neighboring villages, and occasionally at
Jerusalem ; made a few converts, chiefly among the
poor and unlearned ; and then falling into the hands
of his enemies, died the shameful death of the cross ;
such, and so slight, was the commencement of the
universal kingdom of God. The great schemes of
this world have a proud beginning, a miserable
end— like the towers of Babel; but the works of
God, most of all His church, have a slight beginning,
with gradual increase, and a glorious consummation.

THE MUSTARD SEED. 45
So it is with His kingdom also in every single
heart. The seed, " when it is grown, is the greatest among
herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air
come and lodge in the branches thereof." It is well
known that in hot countries, as in Judea, the mustard
tree attains a size never reached in colder latitudes.
A traveller in Chili mentions the fact of riding on
horseback under a tree of this kind. Maldonatus
relates that in Spain the birds are exceedingly fond
of the seed, so that at times he has seen them light
ing in great numbers on the boughs. In the image
Of the birds flocking to the boughs of the tree, and
there finding shelter and food (Ezek. xvii. 23), we are
to recognize a prophecy of the refuge and defence
there should be for all men in the church ; how that
multitudes should find here protection, as well as
satisfaction for all the wants of their souls.

IV.
THE LEAVEN.
Matt. xiii. 33 ; Luke xiii. 20, 21.
This parable relates also to the marvellous increase
of the kingdom of God ; and not merely its develop
ment from within itself, but its influence on the
world which it touches on all sides. The mustard-
seed for a while does not attract observation, but the
active working of the leaven has been from the mo
ment that it was hidden in the lump. It is undoubt
edly true, that leaven is used most frequently in
Scripture as the symbol of something evil (1 Cor. v.
7 ; Luke xii. 1). Yet, because such is its most fre
quent use, it is not necessary to interpret the parable,
as some do, as though it were a prophecy of the work
ings of the future mystery of iniquity. In the present
case, its warmth, its penetrative energy, the power
which, a little of it has to lend its savor and virtue to

the leaven. 47
much with which it comes in contact, are the chief
points of comparison.
There is no need, then, to take the parable in any
other than its obvious sense, namely, that it concerns
the diffusion, and not the corruptions, of the Gospel.
By the leaven we are to understand the word of the
kingdom, which "Word in its highest sense Christ him
self was. Of Him it was said, " He hath no form nor
comeliness, and when we shall see him, there is no
beauty that we should desire him ; " but presently,
" By his knowledge shall my righteous Servant justify
many ; he shall divide the spoil with the strong"
(Isa. liii. 2, 11, 12) ; and when He had given of His
hfe and spirit to the Apostles, they too, though poor
and unlearned, became the leaven of the world.
"We see that the woman took the leaven from else
where to mingle it with the lump ; even such is the
Gospel, a kingdom not of this world (John xviii. 36).
It was not the unfolding of any powers already exist
ing in the world, but a new power brought from
above ; not a philosophy, but a Revelation. This leav
en is said to have been hidden in the mass. The ren
ovation which God effects is ever thus, from the in
ward to the outward. In the early history of Chris
tianity the leaven was effectually hidden. This is
shown by the entire ignorance which heathen writers
betray of all that was going forward a little below the

48 s THE LEAVEN.
surface of society, even up to the very moment (with
shght exceptions) when the triumph of Christianity
was at hand.
"We cannot consider the words, " till the whole is
leavened" as less than a prophecy of a final triumph
of Christianity. "We may also see in these words an
assurance that the word of life, received into any
single heart, shall not cease its working till it has
brought the whole man into obedience to it, sanctify
ing him wholly, so that he shall be altogether a new
creation in Christ Jesus. The parable sets forth the
mystery of regeneration, both in its first act, which
can be but once, as the leaven is but once hidden ;
and also in the consequent work of the Holy Ghost,
which, as the working of the leaven, is continual and
progressive.

V.
THE HID TREASURE.
Matt. xiii. 44.
The kingdom of God is not merely a general, it is
also an individual, thing. A man may dwell in a
Christendom which has been leavened, and so in a
manner share in the universal leavening ; but more
than this is needed, and more than this in every elect
soul will find place. There will be a personal appro
priation of the benefit, and we have the history of this
in these two parables which follow. The two are each
the complement of the other ; so that as finders either
of the pearl or of the hid treasure, may be classed all
who become partakers of the rich treasures of the Gos
pel of Christ. One class is of those who feel that there
must be some absolute good for man, and are, there
fore, seeking everywhere for this good. Such are lik
ened to the merchant who has the distinct purpose set
before him of seeking goodly pearls. These are the

50 THE HID TREASURE.
fewest in number, but are, perhaps, the noblest con
verts to the truth. Again, there are others, who do
not discover that there is an aim and a purpose for
man's life, until the truth as it is in Jesus is revealed
to them. Such are likened to the finder of the hid
treasure, who stumbled upon it unawares. The joy
of this last class— being the joy at the discovery of an
unlooked-for treasure — is expressed.
The case of the Jews may illustrate the parable
of the Pearl ; though it cannot be fully carried out,
for the most of them, although seeking the pearl, hav
ing a zeal for righteousness, yet when the pearl of
great price was offered to them, were not willing to
sell all — to renounce their self-righteousness, and all
else that they held dear, that they might buy it. The
Gentiles, on the contrary, at least most of them, came
upon the treasure unawares. Christ was found of them
that sought him not. The case of Nathanael was of
this kind. The Samaritan woman (John iv.) is a still
more striking example. There must be in such char
acters a desire for the truth (though previously it may
have slumbered in the soul), displaying itself in joyful
acquiescence in it when revealed. On the other
hand, we have a picture of a noble nature, seeking
earnestly for the pearl of great price, in Augustine.
A writer on Oriental customs says, that in the
East, on account of frequent changes in dynasties, and

THE HID TREASURE. 51
consequent revolutions, many rich men divide their
goods into three parts : one they employ in commerce,
or for their support ; one they turn into jewels, which
might be easily carried ; and a third part they bury.
The traveller in modern times often finds great diffi
culty in obtaining information about antiquities, owing
to the jealousy of the neighboring inhabitants, who
fear lest he is coming to carry away concealed hoards
of wealth from among them. Often, too, a man aban
doning his regular occupation, will devote himself to
treasure-seeking, in the hope of growing suddenly rich
(Job iii. 21 ; Prov. ii. 4).
Some draw a distinction between the field and the
treasure, making the first to be the Scriptures, the
second the knowledge of Christ. To me the "field "
rather represents the outer visible Church, as distin
guished from the inward spiritual. He who recog
nizes the Church not as a human institute, but a di
vine, who has learned that God is in the midst of it,
sees now that it is something beyond all earthly so
cieties with which he has confounded it ; and hence
forth it is precious in his sight, even to its outermost
skirts, for the sake of its inward glory, which is now
revealed to his eyes. And as the man cannot have
the treasure, and leave the field, so he cannot have
Christ except in his church ; he cannot have Christ in
his heart, and at the same time separate his fortunes

52 The hid teeasuee.
from those of Christ's struggling, suffering Church ;
the treasure and the field go together.
But not to anticipate, — this treasure, " when a man
hath found, he hideth." If one hide the spiritual
treasure, it will be not lest another should find it, but
lest he himself should lose it. In the first moments
that the truth is revealed to the soul, there may well
be a fear lest the blessing should by some means es
cape from it ; and this anxiety and the consequent
precautions seem to be indicated here. Having thus
secured it, the finder, "for joy thereof, goeth and sell-
eth all that he hath, and buyeth that field." It is in
the strength of this joy that the finder of the spiritual
treasure is enabled to go and sell all that he hath ; all
other things have now no glory, " by reason of the
glory which excelleth." Augustine says, in describ
ing his conversion, " How sweet did it at once become
to me, to want the sweetness of those toys ! and what
I feared to be parted from was now a joy to part
with." Compare Phil. ih. 4-11. So, whenever
any man renounces the thing that is closest to him —
when the lover of money renounces his covetousness
— and the lover of pleasure, his pleasure — then each
is selling what he has that he may buy the field which
contains the treasure. Compare Matt. xvi. 24;
Mark ix. 43-48.
¦ Some have- found a difficulty in the circumstance

the hid tbkasuee. 53
that the finder of the treasure kept back from the
owner of the field the knowledge of the fact. But to
this objection, it seems a sufficient reply to say that not
every part of his conduct who found the treasure is
proposed for imitation, but only his earnestness in se
curing the treasure found, his fixed purpose to make
it his own, and his prudence.

VI.
THE PEARL.
Matt. xiii. 45, 46.
Almost all which would have been said on this
parable, had it stood alone, has been anticipated in
the previous one. " The kingdom of God is like unto
a, merchantman seeking goodly pearls." To find them
has been the object of his labors. He is one who has
felt that man was 'not made in vain, that there must
be a centre of peace for him, who is determined not
to rest until the good is found. Perhaps he does not
yet know that it is but one, for at his starting he is
seeking many goodly pearls.
"We must keep in mind the great esteem in which
the pearl was held in antiquity, so that there is record
of almost incredible sums offered for single pearls,
when perfect. A yellow or dusky tinge, or a want of
entire smoothness or roundness, materially diminished
their value. Origen observes that the fact of there

THE PEABL. 55
being so many inferior pearls, adds an emphasis to
the epithet here used. The theory of the formation
of pearls, current in ancient times, is told by Origen.
The fish conceived the pearl from the dew of heaven,
and according to the quality of the dew, it was pure
and round, or cloudy and deformed with specks. Tbe
merchant is seeking " goodly" pearls. Thus the one
represented is not living for sensual objects. He has
been, it may be, a seeker of wisdom, a philanthropist,
a worshipper of the beautiful in nature or art — who
has hoped to find his soul's satisfaction in these. But
the pearl of price, which at length he finds — this pearl
is the kingdom of God within a man — or the knowl
edge of Christ.
But when he had found it, he " went and sold all
that he had, and bought it." "What this selling means,
has been told in the previous parable, and to under
stand what the buying means, we may compare Isa.
lv. 1 ; Matt. xxv. 9, 10 ; Rev. iii. 18 ; Prov. xxiii.
23. The contrast between the .one pearl found, and
the many which he had been seeking, is not to be
overlooked. Martha and Mary are illustrations of
this point (Luke x. 41, 42). There is but one such
pearl, since the truth is one, even as God is one ; and
the truth possessed brings that unity into the heart of
man which sin has destroyed. Only when man has

56 THE PEARL.
found God does the great Eureka break forth from his
lips. It may be worth while to mention, before closing,
the following singular interpretation: the merchant
seeking goodly pearls is Christ ; the Church of the
elect is the pearl of price ; to make which his own he
parted with all that he had, emptying himself of his
divine glory, and taking the form of a servant.

vn.
THE DRAW NET.
Matt. xiii. 47-50.
Although at first sight this parable would seem to
say exactly the same thing as that of the Tares, yet
there is this fundamental difference : that the central
truth of that is the present intermixture of the good
and bad ; of this, ihe future separation ; of that, that
men are not to effect the separation ; of this, that the
separation will one day be effected by God. That con
cerns the gradual development, — this, the final con
summation of the Church.
Our Lord did not contemplate His visible Church
as a perfect communion ; but as there was a Ham in
the Ark, and a Judas among the twelve, so there
should be a Babylon even within the bosom of the
spiritual Israel. "We may notice what manner of net
it is which is here spoken of. It is called a draw net,
and the particular kind is specified by the word in the
3*

58 THE DRAW NET.
original. On the coast of Cornwall, England, where it
is now used, and bears the same name, seine or sean, it
is sometimes half a mile in length. It is leaded below
that it may sweep the bottom of the sea, and support
ed with corks above ; and having been carried out so
as to inclose a large space of sea, the ends are brought
together, and it is drawn upon the beach with all that
it contains. This all-embracing nature of the net must
not be left out of sight, but contains in fact a prophecy
of the wide reach and potent operation of the Gospel
(John xi. 52). As the servants told of in Matt. xxii.
10, " gathered together all, as many as they found,
both bad and good," so here the fishers take fish of
all kinds within the folds of the net ; men of all shades
of moral character have the Gospel preached to them,
and find themselves within the limits of the visible
Church. But we read that the net, " when it was full, they
drew to shore, and sat down, and gathered the good
into vessels, but cast the bad away." The " sitting
down" of the fishers to the task of separation may in
dicate that it will be done with entire consideration,
and without haste. When the number of God's elect
is accomplished, then the separation of the precious
from the vile shall follow. The " leaving " and " tak
ing," in Matt. xxiv. 40, 41, is most likely to be ex
plained by some such image as this. Probably there,

THE DEAW NET. 59
as here, the taking is for blessedness, the leaving for
destruction. The dead or worthless fish are " cast
away." An entire freedom from all evil belongs to
the idea of the Church. In this, as in many other
passages, the Church is contemplated as a holy inclos
ure, into which nothing unclean has a right to enter,
and from which, if it has by stealth or force effected
an entrance, it shall finally be excluded, even as those
ceremonially unclean, in witness of this, were obliged
to remain for a season without the camp, which was
the figure of the true kingdom of God. "What the
" barn" was at ver. 30, the " vessels" are here ; the
" many mansions " (John xiv. 2) which the Lord
went to prepare for his people. Compare Luke xvi.
9 ; Heb. xi. 10.
In the familiar occurrence which supplies the
groundwork of the parable, the same who carried out
the net would naturally be they who would inspect
its contents, for the purpose of selecting the good, and
casting the worthless away ; but it is pushing this cir
cumstance, which is, in fact, the weak side of the com
parison, too far, to require that the same should also
hold good in the spiritual thing signified. When the
Lord interprets the parable, he passes over without a
word the beginning of it ; and explains only the latter
part, where the point and stress of it lay : " So shall
it be at the end of the world : the angels shall come

60 THE DRAW NET.
forth and sever the wicked from among the just, and
shall cast them into the furnace of fire." We may
here find an emphasis in the words " coming forth."
The angels have been hidden ever since the first con
stitution of the Church. But then, at that great epoch
of the kingdom, they shall again " come forth " from
before the throne of God, and walk up and down
among men, the visible ministers of his judgments.
The moral of this parable is different from that of
the Tares. This teaches us that we be not content
with being enclosed within the Gospel-net, — that
" they are not all Israel who are of Israel," — but that,
in the " great house" of the Church, " there are not
only vessels of gold and silver, but of wood and earth,
and some to honor and some to dishonor ;" that each
of us therefore seek to be " a vessel unto honor, sanc
tified and meet for the master's use " (2 Tim. ii. 20,
21 ;) since in the midst of all confusions, " the Lord
knoweth them that are his," and will one day bring
all confusion to an end, separating forever the pre
cious from the vile.
The seven parables related in this chapter, were
(as many have supposed) in a certain sense prophet
ical, for they foretold things that were to come to
pass ; only it was not the Lord's main purpose to ac
quaint his servants with the future destinies of his
Church, but rather to give them practical rules and

THE DBAW NET. 61
. warnings for their conduct. So, too, they all have a
certain unity, succeeding one another in natural order ;
thus, in the Sower, are set forth the causes of the fail
ures and success which the word of the Gospel meets,
when preached in the world. In the Tares, the obsta
cles to the internal development of Christ's kingdom
are declared, and are traced up to their true author,
with a warning against unwarranted human interven
tion. The Mustard Seed and the Leaven declare the
victorious might — the first the outward, the second
the inward might, of that kingdom. As these two are
objective and general, so the two which follow are
subjective and individual, declaring the relation of the
kingdom to every man, and how those who have dis
covered its supreme worth will be willing to renounce
all things for its sake. This last parable declares how
that entire separation from evil, which in the second
we saw that men might be tempted to anticipate by
improper methods, shall yet come to pass ; and look
ing forward to which, each is to strive that he may so
use his present means of grace that he may be found
among those who shall be the Lord's.

vm.
THE UNMERCIFUL SERVANT.
Matt, xviii. 23-35.
Chrysostom observes, that when Peter (v. 21) in
stanced seven as the number of times that an offend
ing brother should be forgiven, he thought certainly
he was doing some great thing, — these seven being
four times more than the Jewish masters enjoined.
They grounded the duty of forgiving no oftener than
three times on Amos i. 3 and ii. 6 ; also on Job xxxiii.
29, 30 (see the marginal translation). Tbere was in
Peter's mind a consciousness of the new law of love,
which Christ had brought into the world, — though
an obscure one, since he supposed it possible that
love could ever be overcome by hate. But there was
a fundamental error in the question itself, for in pro
posing a limit to our forgiveness, there was implied
the notion, that a man in forgiving gave up a right
which he might, under certain circumstances, exer-

THE UNMEBCIFUL SEEVANT. 63
cise. The purpose of this parable is to make clear
that when God calls on a member of His kingdom to
forgive, He does not call on him to renounce a right,
but that he has now no right to exercise in the mat
ter ; asking for and accepting forgiveness, he has im
plicitly pledged himself to show it.
" Therefore" that yon may understand the better
what I say, " is the kingdom of heaven likened unto
a certain king, which would take account of his ser
vants." This is the first of the parables in which God
appears in His character of King. We are the ser
vants. It is plain this is not the final reckoning, but
such as is mentioned in Luke xvi. 2. To this He
brings ns by the preaching of the law, — by the setting
of our sins before our face, — by leading us into adver
sities ; He takes account with us, when through one
means or another He brings our careless security to an
utter end. Compare 2 Sam. xii. ; the Ninevites ; the
Jews, through John the Baptist.
" And when he had begun to reckon, one was
brought unto him, which owed Mm ten thousand tal
ents." He had only " begun to reckon /" this was per
haps the first into whose accounts he looked. This
one " was brought unto him y" he never would have
come of himself ; he would have made that ten into
twenty thousand, for the secure sinner goes on treas
uring up (Rom. ii. 5) an ever mightier sum, to be one

64 THE UNMERCIFUL SERVANT.
day required of him. In all probability, from the im
mensity of the debt, this man was one to whom some
chief post of honor and dignity in the kingdom had
been committed, — a satrap who should have remitted
the revenues of his province to the royal treasury.
The sale of the debtor's wife and children, — for the
king commanded them to be sold with him, — rested
upon the theory that they were a part of his property.
By the selling here may be indicated God's alienation
of the wicked from Himself, and their everlasting de
struction from the presence of the Lord, and the glory
of His power. Compare Ps. xliv. 12.
The servant, hearing the dreadful doom, "fell
down and worshipped him" — prostrated himself on
the ground, kissing his feet and knees. This servant
" worshipped " the king ; the other servant only " be
sought " his fellow-servant. His words, " Lord, have
patience with me, and Twill pay thee all," show the
extreme fear of the moment, which made him ready
to promise impossible things, even mountains of gold,
if he might but be delivered from present danger.
The sinner using such words, shows that he expects
that future obedience can make up for past disobedi
ence. At the earnestness of his prayer, " the lord of
that servant was moved with compassion, and loosed
him, and forgave him the debt." The severity of
God, having brought the sinner to a sense of his sin,

THE UNMEECIFUX SEBVANT. 65
reappears (for it has been only love in disguise) as
grace again. His lord "forgave him the debt" and
thus this very reckoning, which threatened ruin,
might have been the greatest mercy of all. God will
forgive ; but He will have the sinner to know what
and how much he is forgiven. But too soon this
mercy was forgotten, for going out from the presence
of his lord, he found " one of his fellow-servants, who
owed him a hundred pence." That word, " going
out," is one of the key-words of the parable. It is be
cause we " go out " of the presence of our God,
because we do not abide there, that we are ever in
danger of acting as this servant. By the servant's
going out is expressed the sinner's forgetfulness of the
benefits received from God. The term "fellow-ser
vant " does not imply an equality of rank between
the two, but only that they were both servants to a
common lord ; and the small sum of his debt is men
tioned, to show how little man can offend against his
brother, compared with the amount in which every
man has offended against his God.
" He laid hands on him, and took him by the
throat, saying, Pay me that thou owest. His fellow-
servant fell down at his feet, and besought him," using
exactly the same words which he himself had used,
and using, had found mercy ; but he was inexorable ;
— he " went," dragging the debtor with him, till he

66 THE UNMEECQ'UL SEEVANT.
could dehver him to the jailer. The man who knows
not his own guilt is ever ready to exclaim with David,
" The man that hath done this thing shall surely die ;"
while, on the contrary, it is they that are spiritual to
whom Paul commits the restoring of an offending
brother (Gal. vi. 1). It is just in man to be hu
mane, — to be humane is human ; none but the alto
gether righteous may press his utmost rights, and this
no man is.
" When his fellow-servants saw what was done,
they were very sorry." They were sorry y their lord
was wroth. This distinction is not accidental. In
man, the sense of his own guilt, the deep consciousness
that whatever sin he sees ripen in another, exists in
its germ in his own heart, will ever cause him to feel
sorrow when the spectacle of moral evil is brought
before his eyes ; but in God, the pure hatred of sin —
His love of hohness on its negative side — finds place.
Being sorry, " they came and told unto their lord all
that was done y" even as the righteous complain to
God, and mourn in their prayer over the oppressions
wrought in their sight, and which they are powerless
to redress. The king summons the unthankful servant
into his presence, and uses severe words, which in
view of the great debt he had not used, " O thou
wicked servant y I forgave thee all that debt, because
thou desiredst me : shouldst not thou also have had

THE UNMERCIFUL SEEVANT. 67
compassion on thy fellow-servant, even as I had pity
on thee f " The guilt laid to his charge is, not that
needing mercy he refused to show it, but tbat having
received mercy, he remains unmerciful still ; ¦ a most
important difference ! — so that they who like him are
hard and cruel, do not thereby bear witness that they
have received no mercy ; on the contrary, their offence
is, that having received an infinite mercy, they remain
unmerciful yet. The great mercy for the world, that
Christ has put away sin, stands firm, whether we
allow i\ to have a purifying influence on our hearts or
not. " And his lord was wroth, and delivered him to
the tormentors" according to the warning in James
ii. 13. " The tormentors" are not merely the keepers
of the prison ; but those who shall make the life of
the prisoner bitter to him ; even as there are " tor
mentors " in the world of woe — fellow-sinners and evil
angels. It is strange that the king finally delivers up
the offender, not for cruelty, but for the very debt
which would appear to have been entirely remitted to
him. The question is here involved, Do sins, once for
given, return on the sinner through his after offences ?
But do not the difficulties of such a question arise
from our viewing the forgiveness of sins in too formal
a way ; — from our suffering the earthly circumstances
of the remission of a debt, to embarrass the heavenly

68 THE UNMERCIFUL SEEVANT.
truth, instead of regarding them as helps, and often
weak ones, for the setting forth of that truth ? A
state of nature is itself a state of condemnation. If,
then, laying aside the contemplation of a man's sins as
a formal debt, which must either be forgiven him or
not, we contemplate the life out of Christ as a state of
wrath, and the hfe in Christ as a state of grace, we
can better understand how a man's sins may return
upon him ; that is, he sinning anew falls back into the
darkness out of which he had been delivered, and all
that he has done of former evil, adds to the darkness
¦(John v. 14). He that is to partake of the final sal
vation must abide in Christ, else he will be " cast
forth as a branch and withered." This is the condition
belonging to the very essence of salvation itself.
1 John i. 7 is an interesting parallel.
The Romish theologians find an argument for pur
gatory in the words, " till he should pay all that was
due," as also in Matt. v. 26. ¦¦ But it seems plainly a
proverbial expression ; for since man could never ac
quit the slightest portion of the debt which he owes
to God, the putting of such a condition was the strong
est possible way of expressing the eternal duration of
his punishment. The Lord concludes with an earnest
warning : " So likewise shall my heavenly Father do
alsd unto you, if ye from your hearts forgive not every
one his brother their trespasses." "So,"  with the

THE UNMEECIFUL SEEVANT. 69
same rigor ; such treasures of wrath, as well as such
treasures of grace, are with Him. We may observe
that, according to Scripture views, the Christian stands
in a middle point, between a mercy received and a
mercy yet needed. Sometimes the first is used as an
argument for showing mercy — " forgiving one an
other, as Christ forgave you " (Col. iii. 13 ; Ephes. iv.
32) ; sometimes the last, " Blessed are the merciful,
for they shall obtain mercy " (Matt. v. 7 ; Luke vi.
37 ; James v. 9).

IX.
THE LABORERS IN THE VINEYARD.
Matt. xx. 1-16.
This parable stands in the closest connection with
the four last verses of the preceding chapter, and can
only be rightly understood by .their help. On the
right tracing of this connection, and the showing how
the parable grew out of, and was in fact an answer
to, Peter's question, " What shall we have ? " the suc
cess of the exposition will mainly depend. Numerous
difficulties beset the explanation. There is first the
difficulty of bringing tbe parable into harmony with
the saying by which it is introduced and concluded,
and which it is plainly intended to illustrate ; second
ly, there is the moral difficulty, viz., how canzone who
is a member of the kingdom of God grudge in his
heart the favors shown to other members of that
kingdom ? or, if it is denied that these murmurers
are members of the kingdom, how can we reconcile

THE LABOEEES IN THE VINEYARD. 71
the fact of their having labored all day in the vine
yard, and finally carrying away their own reward ?
And lastly, there is the difficulty of deciding what is
the particular point of the parable, what is its main
doctrine. There have been various interpretations of this
parable. One of the best is that which makes it a
warning and a prophecy of the causes which would
lead to the rejection of the Jews, the first called into
the vineyard of the Lord ; — these causes being mainly
their proud appreciation of themselves, and their dis
like at seeing the Gentiles admitted at once to equal
privileges with themselves in the kingdom of God.
An agreement or covenant being made with those first
hired, and none with those subsequently engaged, has
seemed a confirmation of this view. It was notably
fulfilled in the Jews ; but its apphcation is universal
and not particular ; this fulfilment was only one ont
of many. Had this been exclusively, or even prima
rily our Lord's meaning, we should expect to hear of
but two bands of laborers, the first hired and the last ;
all those who come between would only serve to con
fuse the image.
Better, then, to say that the parable is directed
against a wrong spirit of mind, which indeed was no
tably manifested in the Jews, but which all men in
possession of spiritual privileges are here warned

72 THE LABOEEES IN THE VINEYARD.
against; while the immediate occasion from which
the parable arose, was not one in which they (the
Jews) were involved. The warning was not primarily
addressed to them, but to the Apostles, as the earliest
called to labor in the Lord's vineyard, — " the first,"
both in time, and the amount of toil and suffering
they would have to undergo. They had seen the rich
young man (xix. 22) go away, unable to abide the
proof by which the Lord had revealed to him how
strongly he was yet holden to the things of the world.
Peter, as their spokesman, would fain know what their
reward would be who had done this very thing from
which he had shrunk, and had forsaken all for the
Gospel's sake (ver. 27). The Lord answers first and
fully in the verses foUowing (vers. 28, 29). But the
question, " What shall we have ? " was not a right
one ; there was a tendency to bring their obedience
to a calculation of so much work, so much reward.
There was also lurking a certain self-complacency in
the speech, a comparison for self-exaltation with
others ; they had not shrunk from the command to
forsake all, as the yonng man had. Unless the answer
which the Lord gave had been accompanied with the
warning of the parable, it would but have served as
fuel to the fire. " Not of works, lest any man should
boast ;" this was the truth which He would now by
the parable enforce ; and if nothing of works but all

THE LAB0EEES IN THE VINEYAED. 73
of grace for all, then no claim as of right upon the
part of any. In short, the spirit of the hireling spoke
in that question, and it is against this spirit that the
parable is directed, which might be entitled, On the
nature of rewards in the kingdom of God, — the whole
finding a most instructive commentary in Rom. iv.
1-4, which passage supplies a parallel with the
present. As far as it is addressed to all true behevers, the
parable is rather a warning against what might be,
than a prophecy of what would be. For we cannot
imagine him who dwells in love as allowing himself
in envious thoughts against any of his brethren, be
cause, though they have entered later on the service
of God, they will yet be sharers with him of the same
heavenly reward. Least of all, can we imagine him
to allow such hateful feelings actually to take shape,
or as justifying them to himself or to God, like the
spokesman among the murmurers here. The lesson
taught is, that those who seem chiefest in labor, yet,
if they forget that the reward is of grace, and not of
works, may altogether lose the things which they have
wrought ; and those who seem last, may, by keeping
tbeir humility, be acknowledged first in the day of
God. " The kingdom of heaven is like unto a man that
is an householder, which went out early in the morning

74 THE LABOBEES IN THE VINEYAED.
to hire laborers into his vineyard." This is ever true
in the spiritual world, that God seeks His laborers, and
not they Him (John xv. 16) ; but, as in the natural
world a call implies no force, but is something which
may be obeyed or refused, so also is it in the spiritual
world. The agreement made by these first hired labor
ers, was exactly the one Peter wished to make, " What
shall we have ? " — while those subsequently engaged
went in a simpler spirit, trusting that whatever was
right would be given to them. Thus we see on the
one side early indications of that wrong spirit which
comes to a head in ver. 11, 12 ; on the other side we
have the true spirit of humble waiting upon the Lord,
in full assurance that He will give far more than we
can deserve.
At nine in the morning, at mid-day, and at three
in the afternoon, he again went into the market-place,
and those who were disengaged, he employed. "And
about the eleventh hour, he went out and found others
standing idle, and saith unto them, Why stand ye
here all the day idle f " All activity out of Christ is
in His sight a standing idle. " They say unto him,
Because no man hath hired us." It can only be
when the kingdom of God is first set up in a land,
that sinful men with full. truth can answer in these
words. The excuse which these laborers plead, ap
pertains not to them who, growing up within the

THE LAB0EEES IN THE VINEYAED. 75
Church, have despised nearly to the last God's repeat
ed biddings to go work in His vineyard. Still one
would not deny that there is such a thing even in the
Christian Church as men being called — or, to speak
more correctly, — as men obeying the call long before
given, and entering on God's service, at the third, or
ninth, or even the eleventh hour ; who, truly repent
ing of their past unprofitableness, may find their work
graciously accepted now, and may share hereafter in
the full rewards of the kingdom.
" So when even was come, the lord of the vineyard
saith unto his steward, Call the laborers, and give
them their hire, beginning from the last unto the
first." The laborers are called together ; the last
hired, those who came in without any agreement
made, receive a full penny. Here is encouragement
for those who have delayed to enter on God's service
till late in their lives, to work heartily, and with their
might. But those who were first hired " murmured
against the good man of the house, saying, These last
have wrought but one hour, and thou hast made them
equal unto us, which have borne the burden and heat
of the day." Here the perplexing dilemma meets
us : If these are of God's faithful people, how can they
murmur against Him, and grudge against their fel
lows ? or if they are not of His people, how can they at
last carry away the penny, the reward of eternal hfe ?

76 THE LABOEERS IN THE VINEYAED.
But there is here rather a teaching by contraries :
' Since yon cannot imagine such a hateful spirit find
ing place in the perfected kingdom of God, check its
beginnings — check all inclination to look grudgingly
at your brethren, who, having in times past grievous
ly departed from God, have now found a place beside
yourselves in His kingdom — check all inclination to
pride yourselves on your own doings, as though they
gave you a claim of right upon God, instead of re
ceiving all from the free mercy of God.'
The penny given to ah, though objectively the same,
subjectively is very different ; it is, in fact, to every
one exactly what he will make it. The Lord says, " I
am thy exceeding great reward," and He has no other
reward to impart to any but this, namely, Himself.
To see Him. as He is, this is the reward which He has
for all His people, the penny unto all. But what these
murmuring laborers desire, is not to have much, but
to have more than others ; they did not wish to grow
together with the whole body of Christ, but to get be
fore their brethren, and the penny, because common
to all, did not seem enough — while it was in fact to
each what he would make it. For since only like
can know hke, all advances made here in humility,
in holiness, in love, are a polishing of the mirror that
it may reflect more distinctly the Divine image, a
purging of the eye that it may see more clearly the

THE LABOEEES IN THE VINEYAED. 77
Divine glory. On the contrary, all self-righteousness
and sin of every kind, whether it stop short with im
pairing or end by altogether destroying the capacities
for receiving from God, is in its degree a staining of
the mirror, a darkening of the eye.
" But he answered one of them," probably him
who was loudest and foremost, " and said, Friend, I
do thee no wrong : didst thou not agree with me for a
penny ? " He justifies his manner of dealing with
them, as well as his sovereign right in his own things.
They had put their claim on the footing of right, and
on that footing they are answered, "Take that thine
is, and go thy way y" and again, " Ls thine eye evil
because Lam good ? so long as I am just to you, may
I not be good and liberal to them % " Envy is ever
spoken of as finding its expression in the eye (Deut.
xv. 9 ; 1 Sam. xviii. 9—" Saul eyed David "). The
solution of the difficulty that these complainers should
get their reward is, that according to human relations,
on which the parable is founded, and to which it must
adapt itself, it would not have been consistent with
equity to have made them forfeit their hire, notwith
standing the bad feeling which they displayed.
But the words which follow, " So ihe last shall be
first, and the first last," sufficiently indicate that with
God an absolute forfeiture might follow, nay, must

78 THE LABOEEES IN THE VINEYAED.
follow, where this grudging, unloving spirit has come
to its full head.
Many have been troubled to bring these last words
(" So the last," &c.) into agreement with the parable ;
for in it first and last seem all put on the same foot
ing, while here a complete change of place is asserted.
Some have sought an explanation in the fact that the
last hired are the first in order of payment ; but this
is too trifling an advantage. What has been already
observed may furnish a sufficient answer ; the saying
is necessary to complete the moral — to express that
which the parable did not and could not express, viz.,
the entire forfeiture which would follow on the indul
gence of such a temper as that here displayed.
The words which follow, " Many be called, but
few chosen" are difficult, on account of the position
which they occupy. Olshausen makes the " called "
and the " chosen " alike partakers of final salvation,
but holds that by these terms are signified different
standings of men in the kingdom of God. The easiest
interpretation seems to be, — Many are called to work
in God's vineyard, but few retain that humility, that
utter denial of any claim as of right on their own
part, which will allow them in the end to be partakers
of His reward. — In the reward there is a certain re
trospect to the work done, but no proportion between
them, except such as may have been established by

THE LAB0EEES IN THE VINEYAED. 79
the free appointment of the Giver. " He is faithful
that promised ;" this, and not any other thing, must re
main always the ground of all expectations and hopes ;
and what these are to be and what they are not to be,
it is the main purpose of this parable to declare.

X.
THE TWO SONS.
Matt. xxi. 28-32.
In the 23d verse of this chapter we see that our
Lord was asked a question by His adversaries, they
hoping to find accusation against Him. Now He be
comes the assailing party, and begins that series of
parables, in which, as in a glass, they might see them
selves. Yet they are not spoken in words of defiance,
but of earnest love — if possibly He might save them
from the fearful sin they were about to commit.
" But what think ye f — A certain man had two
sons." Under the image of two sons are ranged al
most all with whom our Lord came in contact. Of
one of these classes the Pharisees were specimens,
though all are included who have sought a righteous
ness through the law. In the second class are con
tained all who have openly transgressed the laws of

THE TWO SONS. 81
God. The condition of these first is preferable, pro
vided they give place to the righteousness of faith
when that appears. But if their righteousness is cold
and proud, and imagines that it wants nothing, then
far better off is the sinner who has his eyes opened to
perceive his misery and guilt, even though it should
have been by grievous transgressions. The same les
son is taught us in all Scripture — that there is no such
fault as counting we have no fault. Compare Rom.
vh. 7-9 ; Luke xviii. 10-14.
"And he came to the first and said, Son, go work
to-day in, my vineyard." This was the general sum
mons made both by the natural law in the conscience,
and also by the revealed law which Moses gave, to
bring forth fruit unto God. The son first bidden
" said, L will not." He does not say, " I pray thee,
have me excused," but flatly refuses ; he is the repre
sentative of careless, reckless sinners. "And he came
to the second and said likewise: and he answered and
said, L go, sw." The Scribes and Pharisees professed
zeal for the law, but their profession was like the
second son's promised obedience ; for when the time
arrived when it was necessary to be on one side or
the other, when John the Baptist came to them and
summoned them to earnest repentance, their real un
righteousness was declared ; professing willingness to
go, they yet " went not." On the other hand, many of
4*

82 THE TWO SONS.
those who had been openly profane, were baptized,
confessing their sins, and like the son who at first re
fused to do his father's bidding, "repented and
went." The Lord then asks, " Whether qf the twain did
the will of his father t" They are obhged to reply,
" The first" of course, in comparison with the other.
The Lord immediately makes the application, " Verily
Lsay unto you, that the publicans and harlots go into
the kingdom of God before you." Li the words, " go
before you," or take the lead of you, he would indicate
that the door of hope was yet open ; the others had in
deed preceded them, but they might still follow, if they
would. Some interpreters lay an emphasis on the
words, " in the way of righteousness," as though Christ
would say, " The Baptist came, a pattern of that very
righteousness of the law, in which you profess to exer
cise yourselves. He did not come, calling to the new
life of the Gospel, of which I am the pattern ; he did
not come, seeking to put new wine into old bottles ;
but he came, fulfilling that idea of righteousness which
you pretended to have set before yourselves, which
consisted in separation from sinners ; and yet yon re
jected him, and when ye had seen the fruits of his
ministry in the conversion of sinners, repented not,
that ye might believe him."
This parable does not primarily apply to the Jews

THE TWO SONS. 83
and Gentiles, but must be referred rather to the two
bodies within the bosom of the Jewish people : — it is
not said, the Gentiles enter heaven before you, but
the pubhcans and harlots.

XI.
¦THE WICKED HUSBANDMEN.
Matt. xxi. 33-44; Mark xii. 1-12 ; Luke xx. 9-18.
Matthew and Mark relate this parable as ad
dressed to the Pharisees, while, according to St. Luke,
it was addressed to the people. But this is explained
by the account itself, Luke mentioning the chief
priests and scribes (ver. 19), in such a way as to
show that they were present as listeners.
The image of the kingdom of God as a vine-stock,
or as a vineyard, runs through the whole Old Testa
ment (Ps. Ixkx. 8-16 ; Isai. v. 1-7 ; xxvii. 1-7 ;
Jer. ii. 21). No property was considered to yield so
large a return, and none required such unceasing care.
Our Lord compares Himself to the vine as the noblest
of earthly plants (John xv. 1), and in prophecy had
been compared to it long before (Gen. xhx. 11). We
cannot interpret the vineyard here, as the Jewish

THE WICKED HUSBANDMEN. 85
Church, since it is said to be taken away from the
Jews, and given to another nation ; we must rather
understand by it the kingdom of God in its idea,
which idea Jew and Gentile have been successively
placed in conditions to realize.
The householder not only possessed this vineyard, he
had himself "planted " it. The planting of this spirit
ual vineyard found place under Moses and Joshua, in
the establishment of the Jewish pohty in the land of
Canaan (Deut. xxxii. 12-14 ; Ezek. xvi. 9-14 ; Neh. ix.
23-25). By the hedging of it round about, we may
understand their circumscription through the law, the
Jews thus becoming a people dwelhng alone, and not
reckoned among the nations (Num. xxiii. 9). In keep
ing distinct the hne of separation between themselves
and the idolatrous nations, lay their security that they
should enjoy the protection of God. (Zech. h. 5,
Isai. xxvi. 1.) Outwardly also, Judea was hedged
about through its geographical position, between the
Jordan and the two lakes, the desert and Idnmea, the
sea and Anti-Libanns. The wine-press and the tower
would both be necessary to a vineyard. The tower
was not merely for ornament, a kiosk, but a place of
shelter for the watchmen, who should protect the
fruits. The wine-press was often made by digging
ont the earth, and lining it with masonry. In the
press above, the grapes were placed, and were com-

86 THE WICKED HUSBANDMEN.
monly crushed out by the feet of men (Judg. ix.
27 ; Isai. lxiii. 3). A closely-grated hole at the bot
tom ofthe press permitted the juice to pass through
into the vat. Nothing more is probably meant by
these arrangements than that God provided His people
with all things necessary for life and godliness.
" He let it out to husbandmen" The vineyard it
self will signify the great body of the people, who
were to be taught, to the end that they might bring
forth fruits of righteousness ; and the husbandmen
may be compared to the priests and Levites to whose
charge this vineyard was given ; their solemn com
mission is recognized in such passages as Mai. ii. 7 ;
Ezek. xxxiv. 2. Every thing implies that they had
entered into covenant with the proprietor, even as the
Jewish people made a covenant with God at Horeb.
The householder then " went into afar country, for a
long while." At Sinai, and in the miracles which
accompanied the deliverance from Egypt, the Lord
may be said to have openly manifested Himself to Is
rael, and then to have withdrawn Himself for a while,
not speaking to the people again face to face (Deut.
xxxiv. 10-12), but waiting in patience to see what
manner of works the people under the teaching of
their spiritual guides would bring forth.
"And when the time of the fruit drew near, he
sent his servants to the husbandmen that they might

THE WICKED HUSBANDMEN. 87
receive the fruits of it." These servants are to be
explained as meaning the prophets who were sent,
being raised up at particular times, having particular
missions — their power lying in their mission. They
were sent to receive " of the fruit of the vineyard,"
the householder's share of the produce — the rent
being paid in a fixed proportion of the fruits. Olshau-
sen says : " These fruits which are demanded, are not
to be explained as particular works, but rather as the
repentance, and inward longing after true righteous
ness, which the law was unable to bring about. The
servants therefore are those who seek for these spirit
ual needs, that they may link to them the promises
concerning a coming Redeemer."
When the first servant came, they " beat him, and
sent him away empty y " the next they beat, and
" entreated him shamefully." The third they wound
ed and cast out of the vineyard with violence. In
St. Luke's narrative the last and worst outrage is
reserved for the son himself, but if we may trust
Jewish tradition, Jeremiah was stoned by the exiles
in Egypt, Isaiah was sawn asunder by king Manas
seh ; and see 2 Kings, vi. 31 ; 2 Chron. xxiv. 20, 21 ;
xxxvi. 16 ; Acts vii. 52 ; and the whole passage finds
a parallel in Hebrew xi. 36. The patience of the
householder under these extraordinary provocations
is wonderful ; and it is thus brought out that it may

88 THE WICKED HUSBANDMEN.
set forth the yet more wonderful long-suffering of
God ; Jer. xliv. 4. The whole confession made by
the Levites in Neh. ix., is an admirable commentary
on this parable.
"But last of all he sent unto them his son, his
well-beloved, saying, They will reverence my son."
(Heb. i. 1.) This was the last and crowning effort of
Divine mercy, after which, on the one side, all the
resources even of heavenly love are exhausted, on the
other the measure of sins is perfectly filled up. Christ
was a Son in the highest sense of the word (Heb.
iii. 5, 6). " But when the husbandmen saw the son,
they said among themselves, This is the heir y come,
let us kill him, and let us seize on his inheritance."
Compare John xi. 47-53, and the counsels of Joseph's
brethren against him (Gen. xxxvii. 19). As they,
thinking to defeat the purpose of God, helped to bring
it to pass, so the Jewish rulers were the instruments
to fulfil that purpose of God concerning Christ which
they meant to bring to nothing. (Acts ih. 18 ; iv. 27,
28.)% "This is the heir y " he to whom the inheritance
will in due time descend. The husbandmen say,
" Come, let us kill him y " not that the Pharisees ever
said such a thing in so many words ; but they desired
the inheritance, they desired that what God had in
tended should only be temporary, enduring till the
times of reformation, should be made permanent, —

THE WICKED HUSBANDMEN. 89
and this because they had privileges under the imper
fect system which would cease when the more perfect
scheme was brought in, or rather which would be
transformed into higher privileges for which they had
no care. "And they caught him and cast him out of
the vineyard, and slew him." By this we are re
minded of Him who " suffered without the gate."
(Heb. xiii. 12, 13 ; John xix. 17.) By that, as by the
exclusion from the camp, was signified the cutting off
from the people of God, and from all share in their
blessings. Having thus prophesied of their conduct
to the Jewish rulers, Christ asks, " When the lord
therefore of the vineyard cometh, what will he do unto
those husbandmen?" We see how the successive
generations, who for so many centuries had been
filling up the measure of the iniquity of Israel, are
considered, through this parable, as but one body of
husbandmen. God's truth is opposed to that shallow
ness which would make such a word as " nation " a
dead abstraction. God will deal "with nations, as in
fact bodies, and not as being merely convenient terms
to express certain aggregations of individuals. There
is no injustice in this ; for while there is a life of the
whole, there is a life of each part, so that even if we
should belong to a nation in that of its generations
which is chastised for its own and its fathers' iniqui
ties, yet it remains always possible for each individual

90 THE WICKED HUSBANDMEN.
by- faith and repentance to withdraw himself from
that which really constitutes the calamity, — the
wrath of God.
In the question itself, " What will he do unto those
husbandmen ? " Christ makes the same appeal to his
hearers as Isaiah had done (v. 3), compelling them
to condemn themselves ont of their own months.
Vitringa observes : " God condemns no one who is
not condemned by his own conscience. For God has
in every man His judgment-seat, and by man He
judges concerning man." It may be, from the answer
of the Pharisees, "He will miserably destroy those
wicked men, and will let out his vineyard unto other
husbandmen," that they did not see the point of the
parable, or perhaps it may be, as Olshausen says, that
they pretended not to see its drift, and that therefore
Christ spoke more plainly in ver. 42-44 : " Therefore
L say unto you, The kingdom of Ood shall be taken
from you, and gwen to a nation bringing forth the
fruits thereof." Then at length, Christ and His adver
saries stood face to face. The " God forbid " uttered
by the people (Luke xx. 16), gives evidence that they
had understood the parable, even before its plain
interpretation at the last.
Our Lord then quotes a prophecy from the Old
Testament, proving that such a turn of things had

THE WICKED HUSBANDMEN. 91
been contemplated long before in the counsels of God.
" Did ye never read in the Scriptures, The stone
which the builders rejected, the same is become the
head of the corner ? " The Psalm (cxviii.) from which
it is taken, was recognized by the Jews as applicable
to the Messiah. The reason why He leaves for a
moment the image of the vineyard, is because of its
inadequacy to set forth one important part of the
truth, that the malice of the Pharisees should not
defeat the purpose of God, — that the Son should yet
be Heir. This is distinctly declared by the rejected
stone becoming the head of the corner, on which the
builders stumbled and fell, and were broken, and
which, if they set themselves against it to the end,
would fall upon them, and crush and destroy them
utterly. They fall on tbe stone, who are offended at
Christ in His low estate (Isaiah viii. 14 ; Luke ii. 34) ;
of this sin His hearers were aheady guilty. He warns
them against a worse sin which they were on the
point of committing, and which would be followed by
a heavier punishment ; they on whom the stone falls,
are they who dehberately set themselves in opposition
against the Lord — knowing who He is. They shall
not merely fall and be broken, for one might, al
though suffering some harm, recover himself, — but
on them the stone shall fall and shall grind them to
powder.

92 THE WICKED HUSBANDMEN.
All three Evangelists notice the exasperation of
the chief priests and scribes, when they perceived
that the parable was spoken against them y had they
not feared the people, they would have laid violent
hands on Him at once.

xn.
THE MARRIAGE OF THE KING'S SON.
Matt. xxii. 1-14.
This parable, and that which is found at Luke
xiv. 16, are not to be confounded with one another.
It is plain that they were spoken on different occa
sions, — that at a meal, this in the temple, and that,
too, at a much earlier period of our Lord's ministry
than this. Then the hostihty of the Pharisees had
not yet declared itself; but now they had come to
the formal determination of making away with Christ
by violent means. In that, the contemptuous guests
are merely excluded from the festival, — in this, their
city is burned up and themselves destroyed. Their
increased guilt is set forth in this one, by the fact of
its being a king who makes the festival, and a festival
in honor of his son's marriage ; by which fact is
brought out the relation of the Jews to Jesus, the
personal theocratic king, and in every way the guilt

94 THE MABEIAGE OF THE KING'S SON.
involved in their rejection of Him is heightened.
Again, in the parable recorded by St. Luke, nothing
more is threatened than that God would turn from
the priests and Pharisees to another portion of the
same nation, the publicans and harlots, — with only a
slight intimation of the call of the Gentiles ; while
here it is threatened that the kingdom of God shall
be wholly taken from the Jewish people, and given
to the Gentiles.
In the present parable, as compared with the last
one, we see how the Lord is revealing Himself in ever
clearer hght, as the central person of the kingdom.
There He was indeed the son ; but here His race
is royal (Ps. lxxii. 1). That last was a parable of
the Old Testament history ; even Christ appears there
rather as the last of the hne of prophets and teachers,
than as the founder of a new kingdom. In that, a
parable of the law, God appears demanding some
thing from men ; in this, a parable of grace, God
appears as giving something to them. The two fa
vorite images under which the prophets set forth the
blessings of the new covenant, — that of a festival
(Isai. xxv. 6 ; lxv. 13), and that of a marriage
(Isai. lxi. 10 ; lxii. 5 ; Hos. ii. 19, &c, &c), are
united in the marriage festival here. There appears,
indeed, an inconvenience in the fact that the mem
bers of the Church are at once the guests invited to

THE MAEEIAGE OF THE KING'S SON. 95
the feast, and in their collective capacity constitute
the bride at whose espousals the feast is given ; but
in the progress of the narrative the circumstances of
the marriage altogether fall into the background, and
the different conduct of the invited guests becomes
the prominent feature. This parable has its ground
work in the Old Testament (Exod. xxiv. 11 ; Zeph.
i. 7, 8), and it entered into the circle of Jewish expec
tations that the Messiah's kingdom should be ushered
in by a glorious festival. Our Lord Himself (Luke
xxii. 18, 30) uses this image. It is true that the mar
riage is spoken of there, and at Rev. xix. 7, as not
taking place till the end of the present age, while
here the Lord speaks of it as present ; but we must
keep in mind how distinct were the espousals and the
actual marriage in the East, and contemplate His first
coming as the time of His espousals, while not till His
second coming will He lead home His bride.
At a fitting time the king " sent forth his servants
to call them that were bidden to the wedding." This
second invitation, or rather admonishment, is quite
according to Eastern manners (Esth. v. 8 ; vi. 14).
Modern travellers testify that the same custom still
prevails. When Christ says, " to call them that were
bidden," Pie would have His hearers understand,, that
there was nothing sudden in the coming in of His
kingdom. The invitation first went forth at the con-

96 THE MAEEIAGE OF THE KING'S SON.
stitution of the Jewish nation as God's elect people,
and ran through all their history, being taken up and
repeated by each succeeding prophet. Yet they never
did more than thus bid the guests, for they only spoke
of good things to come. The actual calling of " them
that were bidden " did not pertain to them. John
the Baptist was the first in whose time the kingdom
was actually present, the wedding-feast prepared, the
king and the king's son manifested, and the long-
invited guests summoned. By the first band of
servants, I understand John and the Apostles in their
first mission — that which they accomphshed during
the lifetime of our Lord. His own share in summon
ing the guests unto Himself, " Come unto me," is
naturally kept out of sight in the parable, as it would
have disturbed the proprieties of the characters
represented. We see here that there was no actual
maltreatment of these first messengers,' — nor was
there at the first against the Lord, nor against the
Apostles during His lifetime. (The death of John
cannot be urged here ; for Herod was an Edomite,
and therefore not an invited guest ; and moreover it
was for preaching the law, not the Gospel, that he
died.) It was simply " they would not come." " Ye
will not come to me," &c, &c.
"Again he sent forth other servants." Here is
described that renewed invitation to the Jews, which

97
was made subsequent to the Crucifixion. There need
be no perplexity in the words " other servants ; " for
tbere were many others besides the Apostles, such as
Stephen, Paul, Barnabas. Those, too, who were the
same, went forth as new men, full of the Holy Ghost,
not preaching generally a kingdom of God, but
" Jesus and the resurrection ; " declaring that ah
things were ready — that ah the obstacles reared up by
man's sin, were removed by God's grace (Acts ii. 38,
39 ; iii. 19-26) ; that in that very blood, which had
been impiously shed, there was forgiveness of all sins.
And let us notice that the king, instead of threaten
ing or rebuking, told his servants only to press the
message with greater urgency. " Tell them which
are bidden" so tell them that they cannot mistake,
that " all things are ready P (" My oxen and my fat-
lings are killed." This would be a sign of the imme
diate nearness of the feast. Chardin : In the morn
ing the mutton and lamb are killed, which are to be
eaten in the evening.) It was exactly thus with the
Apostles ; thus Peter (Acts iii. 17), — " I wot that
through ignorance ye did it ; " — how did they refuse
to dwell upon the past sin, urging rather the present
grace !
But the guests " made light of it, and went their
ways, one to his farm, another to his merchandised
Nor is this the worst ; "The remnant took his servants,
5

98 and entreated them spitefully, and slew them." So
there are ever in the world two kinds of despisers of
the Gospel of God ; some who may say, " I pray thee
have me excused," — others in whom it excites feel
ings of positive enmity. Those in the first class are
again subdivided ; for they " went their ways, one to
his farm, another to his merchandise." The question
naturally arises, Did the Lord intend a distinction ?
The dangers of homing (" one to his farm or estate"),
and of getting (" another to his merchandise"), though
cognate, are yet not at all the same. There are those
who are full, and there are those who are hoping to
be full, of this world ; in neither has the divine hunger
ever been awakened in the soul.
" The remnant took his servants, and entreated
them spitefully, and slew them." The oppositions to
the Gospel are not merely natural, they are also devil
ish. There are other evils in the heart besides world-
liness, stirred up by it. It wounds men's pride,
affronts their self-righteousness, and they visit on the
bringers of it the hate tbey bear to itself. The Acts
of the Apostles and later Scriptures bear abundant
evidence of the three forms of outrage mentioned here.
They " took his servants " (Acts iv. 3 ; v. 18 ; viii.
3) ; they " entreated them spitefully " (Acts v. 40 ;
xiv. 5, 19 ; xvii. 5 ; xxi. 30 ; xxiii, 2) ; they " slew
them " (Acts vii. 58 ; xii. 3 ; compare Matt, xxiii.

99
34). To this part of the parable, 2 Chron. xxx. 1-11
forms an interesting parallel. — But one of the latest
cavillers (Strauss) thinks it inconceivable that invited
guests should act thus. May we not presume, how
ever, that a deep alienation from their king, with a
readiness to rebel against him, existing long before,
found its utterance here ? The httle apparent motive
makes their conduct almost monstrous, yet thus fitter
to declare the monstrous fact that men should slay
the messengers of God's grace, the ambassadors of
Christ. "But when the king heard thereof, he was wroth."
The insult was intended for him ; and as such it was
avenged ; for he " sent forth his armies," that is, say
some, his avenging angels (Rev. xix. 14), or it may
be the hosts of Rome (Dan. ix. 26), which were
equally " his armies," since even ungodly men are
men of God's hand, by whom He executes vengeance
on other wicked (compare Isai. x. 5, &c). It may
mean both combined, for when God's wrath is to be
executed, the visible and the unseen instrnmentahties
are evermore leagued together. The natural eye sees
only one, the spiritual eye sees also the other. The
" city of those murderers " can be no other than Jeru
salem. It is their city, not any longer the city of the
great King, who acknowledges it no more for His own.
Compare " Your house " (Matt, xxiih 38).

100 THE MAEEIAGE OF THE KING'S SON.
" Then " (compare Acts xiii. 46) " saith he to his
servants, The wedding is ready, but they which were
bidden were not worthy." Their unworthiness con
sisted in their rejection of the invitation, even as the
worthiness of those who did find a place at the festival
consisted in their acceptance of the invitation. " Go
ye therefore into the highways, and as many as ye shall
find, bid to the marriage." Here the doctrine so
hateful to Jewish ears (Acts xxii. 21, 22), the calling
of the Gentiles, and that through the Jews' dis
obedience, is again plainly declared. (Rom. xi. ;
Matt. viii. 10-12.) Hereupon the servants " went out
into the highways, and gathered together all, as many
as they found, both bad and good." In the spirit of
this command, Philip went down to Samaria, and
Peter baptized Cornelius and his company. When it
is said that they gathered in " bad " as well as " good,"
we are not to see in it an explanation of the fact that
one should hereafter be found at the festival without a
wedding garment. On the contrary, many were
" bad " when invited, who, through accepting the invi
tation, passed into the number of "good." Neither
must the terms be pressed too far, for none (speaking
with strict accuracy) are good, till they are incorpo
rated into the body of Christ. Yet, few will deny that
there are different degrees of moral life, even before
obedience to the call of the Gospel. Cornelius, or

101
those mentioned in Rom. ii. 14, are instances of being
"¦good" while by " bad " we mean those who to man
seem hopelessly gone in moral depravity (see 1 Cor.
vi. 9-11). The invitation is accepted by some of both
classes ; " The wedding was furnished with guests."
There is still another solemn act of judgment to
follow. There is to be a second separation. We have
had the judgment on the avowed foe ; that on the false
friend is yet to find place. But it is not the servants'
office here, any more than in the Tares, to make it.
" When the king came in to see the guests, he saw there
a man which had not on a wedding garment." Him
he addresses, though mildly ; for it was yet to be seen
whether he could explain his conduct. "Friend, how
earnest thou in hither, not having a wedding gar
ment ? " But, " he was speechless." It was part of
the state of wealthy persons in the East, to have great
store of costly dresses laid up (Isa. iii. 6 ; 2 Kings
x. 22). Chardin says, " The expenditure of the king
of Persia for presents cannot be credited. The num
ber of dresses which he gives is infinite. His ward
robes are always full of them ; they are kept assort
ed in warehouses." We know, moreover, that costly
dresses were often given as honorable presents, marks
of especial favor (Gen. xiv. 22 ; 2 Kings v. 5) ; that
they were then, as now, the most customary gifts ; and
that upon marriage festivals (Est. ii. 18) gifts were dis-

102 THE MAEEIAGE OF THE KING'S SON.
tributed with the largest hand. If the gift was one
of costly raiment, it would reasonably be expected
that it should be worn at once, to add to the splendor
and glory of the festal time — not to say that the re
jection of a gift, or the appearance of a slight put
upon it, is ever esteemed as a contempt of the giver.
But this guest was guilty of a further affront in ap
pearing at the festival in mean and sordid apparel.
He did not feel that he had any thing to say for him
self ; " he was speechless," literally, his mouth was
stopped ; he stood self-condemned. "Then said the
king to the servants, Bind him hand and foot, and
take him away, and cast him into outer darkness."
Within the palace was hght and joy, but without it
was cold and darkness ; into this the unworthy guest
was to be cast — and there for him, under the sense
of his shame, would be " weeping and gnashing of
teeth." But there is much in this latter part of the parable
which demands an accurate inquiry. When does the
king come in to see, or scrutinize the guests ? Not
exclusively in the day of final judgment, but at every
other judgment whereby hypocrites are revealed, or
self-deceivers laid bare to themselves or to others, — at
every time of trial, which is also in its nature a time
of separation, a time when the thoughts of many
hearts are disclosed. Some have suggested that by

THE MARRIAGE OF THE KING'S SON. 103
the singleness of the guest without a wedding gar
ment, Judas may be pointed out. It certainly is not
impossible, but it is .hardly probable that any one
person is intended, but rather under this one a great
multitude, for the "few " said to be chosen in com
parison to the " many called " show that there had
been a great sifting. Nor is there any difficulty in
this view ; as the righteous are one, being gathered
under their one head, which is Christ, so the wicked
are one, being gathered also under their one head,
Satan. The mystical Babylon is one city no less than
the mystical Jerusalem.
It has been abundantly disputed what particular
spiritual grace was lacking in him who was without
the wedding garment ; the Romanists eagerly assert
ing it to be charity in opposition to faith. It was
righteousness, both in its root of faith and in its flow
er of charity. According to Paul's image, here pe
culiarly appropriate, he had not " put on Christ " — ¦
in which putting on of Christ both faith and charity
are included — the whole adornment of the new and
spiritual man. Let us contemplate this guest as a
self-righteous man, making and trusting in a right
eousness of his own, instead of beheving in a right
eousness of Christ's, imputed and imparted, — or let us
see in him a more ordinary sinner, who, with the
Christian profession and privileges, is yet walking

104 THE MAEEIAGE OF THE KING'S SON.
after the lusts of the flesh in sin ; he is, in either case,
a despiser, counting himself good enough in himself,
in the flesh and not in the spirit, to appear before
God. But a time arrives when every man will dis
cover that he needs another covering for his soul.
Woe unto him who, like this guest, only discovers it
when it is too late to provide himself with such ! It
will be the light of God, as it was the king's word,
which will at the last day reveal to him all the hidden
things of his heart, the greater part of which he had
been wilfully ignorant of. He will be speechless, in
that day his mouth will be stopped.
The ministering attendants, different from the ser
vants sent to invite the guests, can be no other than
the angels (Matt. xiii. 41, 49). They are bidden to
" bind him hand and foot." In this we may see
the sign of the helplessness to which every striver
against God is reduced. "Take him away" refers to
the sinner's exclusion from the Church, now glorious
and triumphant in heaven (Matt. xii. 48 ; 2 Thess. i.
9). And not only is good lost, but he bears the pres
ence of evil. They shall " cast him into outer dark
ness." As hght is the element of God's kingdom, so
whatever is beyond that kingdom is darkness — the
" outer darkness," into which all fall back who refuse
to walk in the hght of God's truth. This parable ter
minates with the weighty saying, " Many are called,

THE MAEEIAGE OF THE KING S SON. 105
but few are chosen." In the " called " and not " cho
sen," must be included those others also that did not
so much as seem to embrace the invitation, and who
suffered in the destuction of their city. These words
do but state a truth which had long before been find
ing its fulfilment in the kingdom of God, which, alas !
is always accomplishing there. They were fulfilled in
the history of that entire generation which went out
of Egypt — they were all " called" yet were not in the
end " chosen," since with most of them God was not
well pleased, &c, &c. (1 Cor. x. 1-10 ; Heb. iii. 7-19).
Of the twelve who were sent to see the promised land,
only Caleb and Joshua were " chosen." Of Gideon's
army, all were " called," but only three hundred
were " chosen" (Judg. 7).
5*

xm.
THE TEN VIRGINS.
Matt. xxv. 1-13.
The customs alluded to in this parable still exist
in the East. The bridegroom, attended by his friends
(" the children of the bride-chamber," Matt. ix. 15 ;
John iii. 29), goes to the house of the bride, and with
pomp and gladness brings her to his own home ; or
if that be too small for the company, to some place
provided for the occasion. She is accompanied from
her father's house by her young companions (Ps. xiv.
15), while others, the virgins of the parable,' meet the
procession at some convenient place, and enter with
the bridal company into the hall of feasting. As
marriages in the East invariably took place, as they
still do, in the night, we are told that these virgins
" took their lamps." The number of the virgins is not
accidental ; it was ruled that wherever there were ten

THE TEN VIEGINS. 107
Jews hving in one place, there was a congregation,
and there a synagogue ought to be built.
The first question is, Who are meant by these vir
gins ? Some argue thus : All are called virgins ; all,
therefore, belong to Christ. Some, from being un
ready at the last moment, suffered a long deferring of
their blessedness ; but none were finally excluded
from salvation. This interpretation is generally con
nected with the doctrine of the thousand years' reign
of Christ on the earth, and a first resurrection. There
might be some force in this argument, if others some
times undertook ihe office of welcoming the bridegroom,
and yet the Lord had chosen to give that appellation
to these, and to specify them as virgins.
Virginity here is the profession of a pure faith,
the soul guiltless of apostasy from God. By these
virgins, then, we are to understand ah who profess to
be waiting for the Son of God from heaven, and who
do not by their deeds openly deny that hope. They
all " took their lamps, and went forth to meet the
bridegroom." But, it is added, "five of them were
wise, and five of them were foolish y " so called rather
than good and bad, because even in the foolish some
good-will toward tbe truth is implied in going to
meet the bridegroom. See both classes in 2 Pet. i.
5-9. " They that were foolish took their lamps,
but took no oil with them y but the wise took oil in

108 THE TEN VIEGINS.
their vessels with their lamps." Here there is a con
troversy between the Romanists and Reformers, the
latter asserting that it was the living principle of
faith which was lacking, the Romanists affirming that
they had faith, but that not having works, it was
" dead, being alone." But we may equally contem
plate the foohsh virgins as those going through a
round of external duties, without hfe ; or, on the other
hand, as those who, confessing Christ with their lips,
are not diligent in acts of humility, charity, &c. It
is clear that whatever is merely outward in the Chris
tian profession is the lamp — whatever is inward and
spiritual is the oil laid up in the vessels. In either case
we must get beyond both works and faith to something
higher — the informing Spirit of God, which prompts
the works and quickens the faith, and of which oil is
ever in Scripture the symbol (Exod. xxx. 22-33 ;
Zech. iv. 2, 12 ; Heb. i. 9).
Tbe purpose of the parable is, to impress upon the
members of the Church their need of vigilance. It
adds much to the solemnity of the lesson, that by the
foolish virgins are meant, not hypocrites, much less
the openly ungodly, but the negligent in prayer, the
slothful in work. Nor is it that they have no oil at
all ; they have some, but not enough. In Matt. xih.
5, the seed springs up till the sun scorches it ; so here,
the lamps burn on till their oil is exhausted. In each

THE TEN VIEGINS. 109
case there is something more than a merely external
profession, conscious that it is only such ; there is the
Christian hfe in manifestation, but not fed from deep
internal fountains. But they are like the wise virgins,
who recognize the fact that the Church may not very
soon enter into its glory ; who foresee that they may
have a long life of self-denial, before they shall be
called from their labors, before the kingdom shall
come unto them ; and who consequently feel that they
must have principle as well as feeling to carry them
on — that their first good impulses will carry them but
a little way, unless they be purified and strengthened
by a constant supply of the Spirit of God.
When it is said that the bridegroom actually tar
ried, we may notice it as one of the many hints given
by our Lord, of the delay of His return. If He had
said plainly that He would not come for many centu
ries, then the first ages of the Church would have been
deprived of that powerful motive to holiness and dili
gence supplied to each generation of the faithful by
the possibility of the Lord's return in their time. Be
sides, prophecy is no fatalism, and it was always open
to every age by faith and prayer to hasten that coming
(2 Pet. iii. 12).
The bridegroom tarrying, the virgins " all slum
bered and slept." By the fact of all sleeping, some
have understood a certain unreadiness that will be

110 THE TEN VIEGINS.
found in the whole Church — though, with a portion,
this unreadiness will be easily removed, while that of
others will be beyond remedy. But Augustine and
nearly all the ancient interpreters make it the sleep
of death. Perhaps by the sleeping is meant nothing
more than that all, having done every thing which
they thought needful in order to meet the bridegroom
as they would wish, calmly and securely awaited his
coming. The fact that the foohsh virgins fell asleep,
and only awoke at the cry of the advancing company,
gives an easy explanation of their utter destitution of
oil at the moment of their greatest need. And had
the wise virgins been watching while the others slept,
it would have seemed hke a lack of love not to have
warned their companions of the increasing dimness
with which their lamps were burning, while yet help
was possible.
It was not until midnight that " there was a cry
.made, Behold the bridegroom cometh y go ye out to
meet him y " — this cry was made either by a part of the
retinue, or by the applauding multitude. As to its
spiritual signification, most are agreed to find an al
lusion to " the voice of the Archangel and the trump
of God " (1 Thess. iv. 16). Some, however, explain
the cry as coming from those watchers in the Church
by whom the signs of the times have been observed,
and who would proclaim aloud the near advent of the

THE TEN VIEGINS. Ill
Heavenly Bridegroom, leading home the triumphant
Church, and looking to be met by the members of His
Church yet militant. It was a current opinion among
the Jews, that the Messiah would 'come suddenly at
midnight, as their forefathers obtained their deliver
ance at that very hour (Ex. xii. 29). But it is proba
ble that midnight is named simply because that is the
time when deep sleep falls upon men ; and because
thus the unexpectedness of Christ's coming (1 Thess.
v. 2) is set forth in a hvely manner.
When the cry was heard, " then all those virgins
arose, and trimmed their lamps." Every, one at the
last prepares to give an account of his works, seriously
searches whether his hfe has been one which will
have praise of God. Many put off this examination
to the last moment, but beyond the day of judgment
at farthest it cannot be delayed. When the day of
Christ comes, a flood of hght shall pour into the dark
est corners of all hearts, so that self-deception will be
no longer possible. Thus when the foohsh virgins
arose to trim their lamps, they discovered, to their
dismay, that their lamps were about going ont, and
they had no more oil ; so that they were compelled to
turn to their companions. " Give us of your oil, for
our lamps are gone (or, as the margin says correctly),
going out." The request and the refusal, like the dis
course between Abraham and Dives, are only the

112 THE TEN VIEGINS.
clothing of this truth — that we shall look in vain from
men for that grace which God alone can supply. We
cannot borrow that which must be bought — won, that
is, by earnest prayer and diligent endeavor.
" But the wise answered, saying, JVot so y lest there
be not enough for us and you." Every man must hve
by his own faith. There is that which one can com
municate to another, and make himself the richer ;
but there is also that which, being Divine, is in its
very nature incommunicable from man to man, and
which every man must obtain for himself. The wise
virgins gave the best counsel they could when they
said, "Go ye rather to them that sell, and buy for
yourselves : " turn to them whom God has appointed
in the Church, as channels of his gifts, or, as some
would explain it, to the apostles and prophets, and
learn from their teaching how to revive the work of
God in your souls, if yet there be time. We see in
the words, " lest there be not enough for us and you,"
an argument against works of supererogation. The
wise virgins did not feel that they had any thing over.
All which they hoped to attain was, that their own
lamps might burn bright enough to allow them to
make part of the bridal company.
While the others were absent, seeking to repair
past neglect, " the bridegroom came, and they that
were ready," they whose lamps were burning, " went

THE TEN VIEGINS. 113
in with him to the marriage, and the door was shut "
— that Door, says one, which saith, " Him that com
eth to me, I will in no wise cast out." Behold how
it is now open, which shall then be closed for ever
more. Murderers, publicans, harlots all come, and
they are all received, but then — the door is shut. No
one's penitence, no one's prayer, shall be any more
admitted (Luke xvi. 26). The door once shut, " after
wards came the other virgins, saying, Lord, Lord,
open to us y " having sought for the oil in vain, they
come looking for mercy, when now it is the time of
judgment. In the title "Lord " they claim to stand
in an intimate relation with the bridegroom ; while
in the repetition of the title, we see an evidence of
their earnestness in seeking admission. But " he an
swered and said, Yerily, L say unto you, Lknow you
not." It is not that he disclaims outward knowledge,
but he does not know them in that sense in which the
Lord says, " I know My sheep, and am known of
Mine." Augustine says profoundly, it is nothing else
than " Ye know not Me." The issue is that the foolish
virgins remain forever excluded from the marriage
feast (Isa. lxv. 13). On this Bengel observes, that
there are four classes of persons : those that have an
abundant entrance into the kingdom ; those that are
saved, as shipwrecked mariners with difficulty reach
ing the shore : On the other side, there are those who

114 THE TEN VIEGINS.
go evidently the broad way to destruction, whose
sins go before them ; while again there are those who,
though they seemed not far from the kingdom, yet
miss it after ah. Such was the fate of these five fool
ish virgins, and it is the most miserable of all. Lest
that may be our fate, the Lord says to us, " Watch
therefore, for ye know neither the day nor the how "
(the rest of this verse has no place in the text) ; " and
this being so, the only certain way of being ready
upon that day, is that you be ready upon every day.
Unreadiness upon that day is without remedy. That
which should have been the work of a hfe cannot be
huddled into a moment. ' Watch therefore, for ye
know neither the day nor the hour.' "
It is quite true that there is one great coming of
the Lord at the last ; yet not the less does He come in
all the great crises of His Church. He came at Pen
tecost ; the prudent in Israel went in with Him to the
feast, the foolish tarried without. He came at the
Reformation, when the same thing took place.
A few words may be said on the relation which
this parable bears to the Marriage of the King's Son,
and how it happens that in that the unworthy guest
actually finds admission to the marriage supper, while
here the foolish virgins are not admitted to the feast.
It is probable that the marriage festivities which are
spoken of there, are different from these. In Ger-

THE TEN VIEGINS. 115
hardY words, " Those are celebrated in this life in the
Church militant, these at the last day in the Church
triumphant. To those, men are called by the trum
pet of the Gospel ; to these, by the trumpet of the
Archangel. To those, who enter, can again go out
from them, or be cast out ; who is once introduced to
these, never goes out nor is cast out — wherefore it is
said, '¦The door was shut} ''

XIV.
THE TALENTS.
Matt. xxv. 14-30.
While the virgins were represented as waiting for
their Lord, we have here the servants working for
him. There by the end of the foohsh virgins we were
warned against declensions in the spiritual life ; here
against slothfulness in our outward work. It is, there
fore, with good reason that the parable of the Virgins
precedes this of the Talents, since the sole condition
of a profitable outward work for God, is that the life
of God be diligently maintained in the heart. Or we
may consider the distinction between the two as this :
that the virgins are the more contemplative, the ser
vants the more active working members ofthe Church.
This is no doubt the same discourse with that in Mark
xiii. 34. St. Luke (xix. 11) has recorded for us a par
able similar to this, but not identical. The time and
place are different ; the one in Luke having been

THE TALENTS. 117
spoken when Jesus was drawing near to Jerusalem ;
this, while seated on the Mount of Olives, the third
day after His entry into the city. That was spoken to
the multitude as well as to His disciples ; this in the
innermost circle of His most trusted followers. The
scope of the parable in Luke is twofold. It is ad
dressed in part to the giddy multitude, who were fol
lowing Jesus with high temporal expectations, and
who when disappointed might turn and join in the
cry, " Crucify him." He warns them, that His tri
umph, if not speedy, should yet be certain and terri
ble over His enemies, and it contains for them a double
warning, that they be not prevented from attaching
themselves to Him yet closer by the things which
should befall Him at Jerusalem ; and that, least of all,
they should suffer themselves to be numbered among
His foes, since these were doomed to destruction. It
has an admonition for the disciples, also, that this
long period before His coming again in glory and
power, was not to be for them a time of sloth, but a
time in which to show all good fidelity to their ab
sent Lord.
To no other than the Apostles was the parable of
the Talents spoken. We must keep in mind the rela
tion of masters and slaves in antiquity. Slaves then
were often allowed to engage freely in business, pay
ing a fixed yearly sum to their masters ; or, as here,

118 THE TALEKTS.
they had money given them, wherewith to trade on
his account, or with which to enlarge their business,
bringing him in a share of the profits. Here, some
thing of the kind is assumed. "The kingdom of heav
en is as a man travelling into a far country, who
called his own servants, and delivered to them his
goods " (it should not be " his own servants ;" for
there is no emphasis in the original). It was " a far
country " into which our Lord was about to travel,
and that His servants might be furnished in his ab
sence, He was about to intrust to them many excel
lent gifts. The day of Pentecost was doubtless the
time when the goods, i. e. the spiritual powers and
capacities, were most abundantly communicated (Eph.
iv. 8-12). Yet the Saviour had communicated much
to them while He was on earth (John xv. 3 and xx.
22), and from that day He has been ever dehvering His
goods to each successive generation of His servants.
Hence, although this parable was first addressed to
the Apostles alone, it has reference to all times ; and
as all Christians are intrusted with gifts, for which
they will have to render an account, the parable is
applicable to all. And these gifts are not spiritual
merely, for wealth, reputation, abihty, are given to
men to be turned to spiritual ends ; and for the use
of these also will a reckoning be held with their pos
sessors. There is a witness for this in our word " talr

THE TALENTS. 119
ent," which has come to signify any mental faculties
or endowments whatever.
But these gifts are in different proportions : " Unto
one he gave five talents, to another two, and to another
one : to every man according to his several ability."
The natural is the ground upon which the spiritual
is superinduced. Grace does not dissolve the ground
work of individual character (1 Cor. xii. 4^31 ; Ephes.
iv. 16). The natural gifts are as the vessel, which may
be either large or small, but in each case is filled.
The one who received two talents might be unfitted
for such a sphere of labor as he who had received five,
but he was fully supplied for that to which he was
destined, for " there are diversities of gifts, but the
same Spirit ; " and as in an army all are not generals,
so in the Church all are not furnished to be leaders.
But in speaking of natural capacity, we must not for
get that comparative unfaithfulness will narrow the
vessel, even as faithfulness has a tendency to dilate it.
Having thus made ah his arrangements, the lord
" straightway took his journey." The three verses
following embrace the whole period between the first
and second coming of Christ. The two faithful ser
vants are the representatives of all that are diligent
in their office and ministry, whatsoever that may be.
In this parable the faithful servants multiply their un
equal sums in the same proportions : "He that had re-

120 THE TALENTS.
ceived the five talents, made them other five talents"
&c, &c. ; while in the parable recorded by St. Luke,
the servants multiply their equal sums in unequal
proportions. The truth as brought out in St. Matthew
is, that according as we have received will it be ex
pected from us ; and that in St. Luke, that as men
differ in fidelity and zeal, so will they differ in the
amount of their spiritual gains. But, "He that had
received one " talent, " went and digged in the earth,
and hid his lord's money," — an apt image for neglect
to use divinely imparted gifts.
"After a long time the lord of those servants cometh
and reckoneth with them." In the joyful coming for
ward of the faithful servants, we see an example of
boldness in the day of judgment ; they had something
to show, as Paul earnestly desired that he might have
(1 Thess. ii. 19 ; 2 Cor. i. 14 ; Phil. iv. 1). In St.
Matthew the servant says, "Behold L have gained,"
&c, while in St. Luke it is, " Thy pound hath gain
ed ; " thus they make up the speech of St. Paul, " I —
yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me."
The commendation of the servants is in the same lan
guage, even as their gain was in the same proportion
to their talents — five for five and two for two. "Enter
thou into the joy of thy lord " — that is, become a
sharer of my joy. Leighton says- very beautifully
here : " It is but little we can receive here, some drops

THE TALENTS. 121
of joy that enter into us y but there we shall enter into
joy, as vessels put into a sea of happiness." No doubt
the underlying image is that the master celebrates his
return by a great festival. It is well known that
under certain circumstances the master's inviting his
slave to sit down with him at table, did itself consti
tute the act of manumission ; henceforth he was free.
Perhaps there may be here allusion to something of
the kind. " Henceforth I call you not servants," &c.
(John xv. 15 ; Luke xii. 37 ; Rev. ih. 20.)
But he to whom only one talent had been given,
is the one who is found faulty — a solemn warning to
how many, since this excuse might occur to such :
" So httle is committed to my charge, that it does not
signify what becomes of it." But the Lord looks for
fidelity in little as well as in much. It is true he had
not been guilty in the same way as the Prodigal Son
wasting his substance, nor was he ten thousand talents
in debt like the Unmerciful Servant ; but this parable
is not for those who are by their lives denying that
they count Christ as their master at ah : the warn
ing is for them who hide their talent. There is great
danger that such persons may deceive themselves ; for
there is a show of humility in the excuses often made
by persons so inchned : " The care of my own soul is
sufficient to occupy me wholly ; while I am employed
about the souls of others, I may perhaps be losing my
6

122 THE TALENTS.
own." This was repeatedly the case in the history of
the early Church. Augustine, on the other hand,
makes striking use of this parable, while speaking of
the temptation of which he was conscious, to withdraw
from active labor, and to cultivate a sohtary piety :
" Nothing is better, nothing sweeter," he says, " than
to search the divine storehouse with none to disturb.
To preach, to argue, to build up, to take care of each
one, is a great load, great toil ; who would not escape
from it ? But the Gospel deters."
The root out of which this mischief grows, is laid
bare in the words, "Lord, L knew thee, that thou art
a hard man" It has its rise, as almost every thing
else that is evil, in a false view of the character of
God. This speech is not a mere excuse, but it is
the out-speaking of the heart. The churl accounted
his lord churlish, thought him even such an one as
himself. But to know God's name is to trust in Him.
Tbey indeed who undertake any work for God know
that they shall commit many mistakes, and perhaps
sins, which they might avoid, if they declined the
work altogether ; but would they not by so doing tes
tify that they thought that their Master was a hard
lord, making no allowances, and never accepting the
will for the deed, but watching to take advantage of
the least failure on the part of His servants ?
In these words, " reaping where thou hast not

THE TALENTS. 123
sown, and gathering where thou hast not strawed," he
gives evidence that he has also entirely mistaken the
nature of the work to which he was called. (" Where
thou hast not strawed," or better, "scattered" with
the fan on the barn-floor, there expectest thou to " gatlv-
er " with the rake, — as one who will not be at the trou
ble to purge away the chaff, yet expects to gather in
the golden grain.) He thought it something to be
done/or God, instead of being a work to be wrought in
Ham, or rather which He would work in and through
His servants. Aquinas says truly, " God requireth
from man nothing but the good which Himself hath
sowed in us ; " and Augustine, in a prayer : " Give
what Thou dost command, and command what Thou
wilt." The servant goes on to say, " Lwas afraid y " he
justifies his timidity ; he feared to trade, lest he should
lose all, and thus incur his master's displeasure. "Lo,
there thou hast that is thine." In reality, God's gifts
cannot be so restored, for keeping the negative pre
cepts only is not enough. But his lord answers him
on his own grounds, not seeking to justify himself
from the charges made against him : "Thou wicked
and slothful servant y thou knewest that L reap where
L sowed not, and gather where 1 had not strawed y yet
even then thou art not cleared ; for thou oughtest to
have done me justice still : Thou oughtest therefore lo

124 THE TALENTS.
have put my money to the exchcmgers, and then at my
coming L should have received mine own with usury."
This is explained by Olshausen thus : " Those timid
natures which are not suited to independent labor in
the kingdom of God, are here counselled to attach
themselves to other stronger characters, under whose
leading they may lay out their gifts to the service of
the Church."
His doom is now pronounced. First, "Take there
fore the talent from him." We have here a limita
tion of Rom. xi. 29. This deprivation may be consid
ered partly as directly penal, and partly as the natu
ral consequence of his sloth ; for as in the natural
world a limb never exercised loses its strength, so the
gifts of God unexercised fall away from us : "From
him that hath not shall be taken away even that which
he hath." On the other hand, the gifts of God are
multiplied by being laid out : " Unto every one which
hath shall be given, and he shall have abundance "
(Heb. vi. 7). And not only is this the case, but that
very gift which the one loses the other receives. We
see this continually ; by the providence of God, one
steps into the place and opportunities which another
has left unused, and so has forfeited (1 Sam. xv. 28).
And herein is mercy, that it is not done all at once,
but little by little ; and there is always a warning,
" to strengthen the things which remain, that are ready

THE TALENTS. 125
to die." But this servant had never seen his danger
until it was too late ; and he not merely should forfeit
his talent, but also, " Cast ye the unprofitable servant
into outer darkness y there shall be wailing and gnash
ing of teeth."
The foohsh virgins erred through a vain over-con
fidence, this servant through an under-confidence that
was equally vain and sinful. Thus we see the two
opposing rocks on which faith is in danger of making
shipwreck. Those virgins thought it too easy a thing
to serve the Lord — this servant thought it too hard.
The class to which they belong, need such warnings
as this : " Strait is the gate and narrow is the way
that leadeth unto hfe, and few there be that find it "
(Matt. vii. 14 ; Phil. ii. 12 ; Matt. xvi. 24). He was
representative of a class needing the following : " Ye
have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear "
(Rom. viii. 15 ; Heb. xii. 18, 22, 24).

XV.
THE SEED GROWING SECRETLY.
Mark iv. 26-29.
This is the only parable which is peculiar to St.
Mark. It seems to occupy the place of the Leaven,
and besides what it has in common with that parable,
declares further, that this word of the kingdom has
that in it which will allow it to be safely left to itself.
The main difficulty is this : Who is this man casting
seed into the ground ? — is it the Son of Man Himself,
or those ministers and others who declare the Gospel of
the kingdom,? If we say that the Lord means Him
self, how cau it be said that He knows not how the
seed sprirfgs and grows up ? since it is only by His
Spirit in the heart that it grows at ah. Neither can
He be compared to one who sows seed, and then goes
away and is occupied with other business ; for He is
not merely the author and finisher of our faith, but
also conducts it through all its intermediate stages.

THE SEED GE0WING SECEETLY. 127
Or, on the other hand, if we say that by the sower is
meant one of the inferior messengers of the truth, how
shah we reconcile the words at ver. 29, " When the
fruit is brought forth, immediately he putteth in the
sickle, because the harvest is come " ? Of whom can
this be said, save of the Son of Man, the Lord of the
harvest ? So that, on the one hand, we meet a diffi
culty when we call the sower the Son of Man, by at
tributing to Him something less than appertains to
Him ; and, on the other hand, if we take the sower to
be inferior ministers, we attribute to them something
which can only belong rightly to Him. I cannot see
any perfectly satisfactory way of escape from this per
plexity. It will hardly do to say that ver. 27 belongs
only to the drapery of the parable, for it is the very
point and moral of the whole.
I will, however, take the parable as having refer
ence in the first place, though not exclusively, to the
Lord Himself. It begins thus : " So is the kingdom of
God, as if a man should cast seed into the ground,
and should sleep, and rise night and day." By these
last words is signified an absence of after-carefulness ;
he sleeps securely by night, and by day is about his
ordinary business. Meanwhile, the " seed should
spring and grow up, he knoweth not how." These
words have no difficulty, so long as we apply them to
those who are teachers in the Church. They are here

128 THE SEED GEOWING SECBETLY.
bidden to have faith in the seed which they sow, for
it is the seed of God ; when it has found place in a
heart, they are not to be tormented with anxiety con
cerning the final issue, but to have confidence in its
indwelling power ; for God undertakes to maintain its
life. They are also to be content that the seed should
grow up without their knowing exactly how ; the
mystery of the life of God in any heart is unfathom
able. It has a law indeed, "First the blade, then the
ear," &c, &c, but that law is hidden. It is not, of
course, meant that they are not to follow up their
work ; but then it is a different thing to impart life,
and to impart the sustenance for life.
But in what sense can that which is said of leaving
the seed to itself be affirmed, of Christ ? Olshausen
suggests the following : It is true, he says, that the
spiritual life of men is never at any time without the
care and watchfulness of the Lord who first gave that
hfe ; yet there are two moments when He may be
said especially to visit the soul — at the beginning of
spiritual life, which is the seed-time, and again when
He takes His people to Himself, which is their time
of harvest. Between these times, the work of the
Lord is going forward — not, indeed, without the daily
supply of His Spirit, but He does not appear so plain
ly as at those two cardinal moments. We see this
even more in the growth of the Universal Church.

THE SEED GEOWING SECRETLY. 129
The Lord, at His first coming in the flesh, planted a
Church in the world, which having done, He withdrew
Himself. Often since that time has it appeared to
man as if the Church were at its last gasp, yet He has
not come forth. He has helped it to surmount all ob
stacles, but without visible interference. He has left
the divine seed to grow on by night and by day, and
only when the harvest of the world is ripe, when the
number of the elect is accomplished, will He appear
the second time unto salvation, reaping the earth, and
gathering the wheat into His barns.
Our Lord's object in using the words, "The earth
bringeth forth fruit of herself" is pointedly to exclude
the continuous agency of the sower. The three stages
of spiritual growth implied in the " blade," " the ear,"
" the full corn in, the ear" suggest a comparison with
1 John ii. 12-14. With ver. 29 we may compare Rev.
xiv. 14, 15. The entire parable gives the same en
couragement which St. Peter means to give when he
addresses the faithful in Christ Jesus (1 Pet i. 23-25).

XVI.
THE TWO DEBTORS.
Luke vii 41-43.
It is tolerably certain that the accounts of our
Lord's anointing, given in Matt. xxvi. 7, Mark xiv.
8, and John xii. 3, all refer to the same event. But
whether St. Luke narrates the same circumstance, and
whether the woman here, " which was a sinner," be
Mary, the sister of Lazarus, which must then follow,
is a more difficult question. There are three main ar
guments for the identity of all the relations : first, the
name of Simon as the giver of the feast ; secondly,
the seeming unlikelihood that twice the Lord should
have been so unusually honored ; and thirdly, the
coincidence that in each case some one should have
taken offence.
But it may be answered that the name Simon was
of too frequent use among the Jews, for any stress to
be laid upon the sameness of the name. Again, the

THE TWO DEBTOES. 131
anointing of the feet, though not so common as the
anointing of the head, still was not without prece
dent ; the only remarkable coincidence here being
tbat each of these women should have wiped our
Lord's feet with the hairs of her head. But if we take
it as an expression of homage and love, then its re
currence is nowise wonderful. And such it is ; in
the hair is the glory of the woman ; in the human per
son it is highest in place and honor, while the feet are
the lowest. This service, then, was but the outward
expression of the inward truth, that the chiefest of
man's glory was lower than the lowest that belonged
to the Son of God. Yet it was an honor with some
differences in the motives which called it forth. In
the case of Mary, the sister of Lazarus, the impelling
cause was intense gratitude : Christ had crowned His
spiritual gifts to her by giving back her beloved bro
ther ; the costly ointment was a thank-offering, and
as less of shame was mingled in her feelings, she
anointed her Lord's head as well as His feet. But it
was the earnest yearning after forgiveness that brought
this woman to the feet of Jesus, and she, in her deep
shame, presumed to anoint only His feet, standing the
while behind Him ; and in kissing them and wiping
them with the hair of her head, she reahzed the bid
ding of St. Paul (Rom. vi. 19). Finally, although in
each case there was an offence taken, yet in the one

132 THE TWO DEBTOES.
case, it is the giver of the feast who is offended — and
he at our Lord ; while in the other it is principally
Judas — and he against the woman rather. To all this
it may be added, that there is no probability that the
Mary of the happy family in Bethany had ever been
one to whom the title of " sinner" as here meant,
could be applied. The passage, then, containing the
parable of the Two Debtors, will be considered without
any reference to the accounts in the other Gospels, of
which, indeed, I have the firmest conviction that it is
altogether independent.
Our Lord having been invited to the house of a
Pharisee, had there " sat down to meat." That a wo
man, uninvited, and of such a character, should have
pressed into the chamber, and should have been per
mitted to offer such homage to the Saviour, may at
first sight appear strange ; but it can easily be ex
plained when we remember that in the East the meals
are often almost public. We must remember her
present earnestness, too. In the thoughts which passed
through Simon's heart, we see the true spirit of a
Pharisee : of one who would have said, had the wo
man dared to approach him, " Stand by thyself, for I
am holier than thou ! " In the conclusion to which
he came, "This man, if he were a prophet, would
have known who and what manner of woman this is,"
we trace the current belief of the Jews, that discerning

THE TWO DEBTOES.

133

of spirits was an especial mark of the great prophet,
the Messiah — a behef founded on Isa. xi. 3, 4. Thus
Nathanael (John i. 48, 49 ; see also John iv. 29). The
Pharisee thought : Either he does not know the char
acter of this woman, in which case he lacks the dis
cernment of a true prophet ; or if he knows it, and
yet accepts a service at such hands, he is lacking in
that holiness, which also is a mark of a prophet of
God. But the Lord satisfied him of His discernment
by laying his finger on the tainted spot of his heart.
"Simon, L have somewhat to say unto thee." He could
not refuse to listen — " Master, say on." With this
leave to speak, the parable is uttered :
"There was a certain creditor which had two debt
ors : the one owed five hundred pence, and the other
fifty. And when they had nothing to pay, he frank
ly forgave them both." God is the creditor, men the
debtors, and sins the debts. " TeU me, therefore,
which of them will love him most ? Simon answer
ed, L suppose that he to whom he forgave most."
Difficulties meet us when we come to the apphcation
of these words. Are we to conclude that there is any
advantage in having multiplied transgressions? the
more sin, the more love? And to understand the
passage thus, would it not be to affirm a moral contra
diction — to affirm that the deeper man's heart is sunk

134 THE TWO DEBTOES.
in selfishness and sensuality, the more capable he will
be of the highest and purest love ?
But all will be clear if we consider the debt, not as
so many outward transgressions, but as so much con
science of sin. Often they who have the least of what
the world calls crime (for the world knows nothing of
sin), have yet the deepest sense of the exceeding sin
fulness of sin, and, therefore, are the most thankful
for the gift of a Redeemer. But he who has little for
given is not necessarily he who has sinned little, but
he who is lacking in any strong conviction of the
great evil of sin, who has never learned to take home
his sin to himself ; and who, therefore, while he may
have no great objection to the plan of salvation, yet
thinks he could have done nearly or quite as well
without Christ. He loves little, because he has little
sense of deliverance wrought for him.
Simon himself was an example of one who thus
loved little ; and he had betrayed this lack of love in
small yet insignificant matters. He had withheld
from his guest the ordinary Eastern courtesies, had
neither given Him water for His feet (Gen. xviii. 4),
nor offered Him the kiss of peace (Gen. xxii. 4), nor
anointed His head with oil, as was customary at festi
vals (Ps. xxiii. 5). But this woman had far exceeded
them. She had washed the Saviour's feet with her
tears, and wiped them with the hairs of her head ; she

THE TWO DEBTOES. 135
had multiplied kisses, and those upon the feet ; while
she had with precious ointment anointed even his
feet. " Wherefore L say unto thee, Her sins, which are
many, are forgiven : for she loved much y but to whom
little is forgiven, the same loveth little." There is
here an embarrassment, how to reconcile these words
with the parable, where the debtor is said to love
much, because forgiven much, and not to be forgiven
much, because he loved much ; and again, to make
them agree with the Scriptural doctrine, that we love
God because He first loved us — that faith, and not
love, is the pre-requisite for forgiveness.
But the words, "for she loved much," may best
be explained by considering what the strong sorrow
for sin, and earnest desire for forgiveness, mean, and
from whence they arise ; surely, from this, from the
deep feeling in the sinner's heart, that by his sins he
has separated himself from that God who is Love,
while yet he cannot do without His love ; from the
feeling that the heart must be permitted to love Him,
and be again assured of His love toward it, else it will
die. Sin unforgiven is felt to be the great barrier to
this ; and the desire after forgiveness, if it be not a
mere selfish desire for personal safety, is the desire for
the removal of this barrier, that so the heart may be
free to love, and to know itself beloved again ; it is

136 THE TWO DEBTOES.
the flower of love desiring to bloom, but afraid of the
chilling atmosphere of the anger of God, — but which
will do so at once, when the genial spring of His love
succeeds. In this sense that woman " loved mush."
On account of this, which in fact was faith (ver. 50),
she obtained forgiveness of her sins. This sense of
emptiness, this feeling and acknowledgment that a
life apart from God is not life, but death, with the
conviction that in God is fulness, which He is willing
to impart to all who bring the empty vessel of the
heart to be filled by Him ; this, call it faith, or initia
tory love, is what that Pharisee, in his legahty and
pride, had scarcely at all, and therefore he derived
httle or no good from communion with Christ. But
that woman had it in large measure, and bore away
the best blessing, even the forgiveness of her sins. In
her it was proved true that " where sin abounded,
grace did much more abound."

XVH.
THE GOOD SAMARITAN.
Luke x. 30-37.
We need not suppose that the lawyer who " stood
up," and proposed to our Lord the question out of
which this parable grew, had any malicious intentions,
nor even a desire to perplex and silence the Saviour.
The question, " What shall I do to inherit eternal
hfe ? " was not an ensnaring one. He is said, indeed,
to have put the question to Christ, " tempting him."
But to tempt properly means to make trial of, and
whether the tempting be good or evil, is determined
by the motive from which it springs. Thus God
tempts man, when he puts him to the proof, that He
may show him what is in himself (James i. 12) ; He
tempts man to bring out his good, and to strengthen
it (Gen. xxii. 1) ; or if to bring his evil out, it is that
the man may himself know it, and watch and pray
against it: only Satan tempts man purely to bring

138 THE GOOD SAMARITAN.
out his evil. Compare Matt. xxii. 35 with Mark xii.
28-34 — both records of the same conversation. In
the second account, our Lord bears witness of the
questioner, that he was a seeker after truth. This
lawyer would fain make proof of the skill of the Gali
lean teacher, and thus brought forward the question
of questions. Our Lord in substance says, — The question you
ask is already answered. " How readest thou ? " That
the lawyer should at once lay his finger on the great
commandment which Christ Himself had quoted on
that other occasion, showed spiritual insight ; that he
was superior to the common range of his countrymen.
He cites Deut. vi. 5 in connection with Lev. xix. 18.
Thereupon our Lord says, " Thou hast answered right ;
this do, and thou shalt live," — let what thou knowest
pass from dead knowledge into living practice, and it
will be well. Still the lawyer would justify himself :
" True, I am to love my neighbor as myself; but who
is my neighbor ? " This very question, hke Peter's
(Matt, xviii. 21), was one involving a wrong condition
of mind. He who asked, " Whom shall I love ? "
proved that he did not understand what love meant ;
for he wished to have it known beforehand where he
should be at liberty to stop, while the very essence of
love is, that it has no lhnit, except in its own inability

THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 139
to proceed further, that it is a debt which we must be
forever paying (Rom. xiii. 8).
The Saviour's reply is wonderful in its adaptation,
leading him to take off his eye from the object to
which love is to be shown, and turning it inward upon
him who is to show the love ; for this is the key to
the following parable : "A certain man went down
from Jerusalem to Jericho." These words are used
not merely because Jerusalem stood higher than Jeri
cho, but because the going to Jerusalem, as the me
tropolis, was always spoken of as going up (Acts xviii.
22). The distance between the two cities was about
a hundred and fifty stadia (eighteen miles), the road
lying through a desolate and rocky region. St. Je
rome mentions that a particular part of this road was
called the red or the bloody way, so much blood had
there been shed by robbers. Such as these " stripped
him of his raiment, wounded him, and departed, leav
ing him half dead."
As he lay bleeding in the road, " by chance "
(or " by coincidence," as the original would imply),
" there came down a certain priest that way." Thus
is sho*wn the fine weaving in, by God's providence,
of tbe threads of different men's lives into one com
mon woof. He brings one man's emptiness into re
lation with another's fulness. Many of our calls to
love are of this kind ; and perhaps they are those

140 THE GOOD SAMARITAN.
which we are most in danger of missing, by failing
to see in them the finger of God. This priest missed
his opportunity. He may have been to Jerusalem,
accomplishing his term of service, and now on his way
home; but he was one who had never learned, "I
will have mercy, and not sacrifice." For " when he
saw him, he passed by on the other side." So also
did a Levite, but his conduct was even worse ; for he
looked, and saw the miserable condition of the man,
and yet afforded him no assistance. Thus did these
two, who made their boast, and were the express in
terpreters, of the law. (Compare Deut. xxii. 4 ; Ex.
xxiii. 5.) Here not a brother's ox, but a brother him
self, was lying in his blood, and they hid themselves
from him (Isa. lviii. 7).
"But a certain Samaritan, as he journeyed, came
where he was." He was exposed to the same dangers
as the others, and might have made the same excuses :
the sufferer was beyond the help of man, the robbers
were perhaps not far distant ; if found near him, he
might be accused of being the murderer. But he
heeded not these selfish fears, for " he had compassion
on him." It was left to the excommunicated Samari
tan, whose name even was a by-word of contempt
among the Jews, to show what love was ; and this
not to a fellow-countryman, but to one of a hostile
race, one that cursed his people. All the influences

THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 141
which had surrounded him, probably, would have led
him to repay hate with hate. For if Jews heaped in
dignities on Samaritans, yet Samaritans were not be
hindhand in insults to Jews. Josephus says that they
sometimes fell upon and murdered those who were
going to Jerusalem.
But the heart of this Samaritan was not hardened,
although every thing must have been at work to steel
it against the distresses of a Jew. The minuteness
of the details here is exceedingly touching. He
" bound up his wounds," no doubt with portions of
his own garments, having first poured in wine to
cleanse them, and then oil to allay their smart ; these
two being costly, but highly esteemed, remedies
throughout the East. All this took some time ; but
after he had thus revived in him the dying spark of
life, he " set him on his own beast, and brought him to
an inn," and there again renewed his attention. Nor
did he feel as if he had done all, for " he took out two
pence, and gave them to the host, and said unto him,
Take care of him, and whatsoever thou spendes^ more,
when L come again L will repay thee."
Beautiful as this parable is, taken according to the
letter only, and full of incentives to active mercy and
love, yet we find much more beauty, and much greater
motives to love, when we see the work of Christ por
trayed to us here. Christ, He who accounted Himself

142 THE GOOD SAMAEITAN.
every man's brother, fulfilled the law of love in its
largest extent, showing how we ought to love, and
whom ; and inasmuch as it is faith in His love towards
us, which alone causes us to love one another fervent
ly, He might weh propose Himself and His act in suc
coring the perishing humanity, as the everlasting pat-
_ tern of self-denying love. The present leaders of the
theocracy had not healed the sick, nor sought that
which was driven away- (Ezek. xxxiv. 4), while He
had bound up the broken-hearted (Isa. lxi. 1), and
poured the balm of consolation into wounded spirits.
The traveller, then, is personified human nature,
or Adam as the representative of the race. He has
left Jerusalem, the heavenly city, and is travelling
towards Jericho, the city under a curse (Josh. vi. 26).
But he no sooner turns his desires towards the world,
than he falls under the power of him who is both a
robber and a murderer (John viii. 44), and by him is
stripped of his original righteousness, and left griev
ously wounded, every sin a gash from which the lifer
blood of his soul is flowing. Yet he is not altogether
dead. When the angels fell, it was by a self-deter
mining act of their own will, with no outward tempt
ation, and therefore there was no possible redemption
for them. But man is " half dead ; " he has still a
conscience ; evil is not his good, however little he may
be able to resist its temptations ; he stih feels as if he

THE* GOOD SAMARITAN. 143
had lost something, and has at times a longing for
that which is lost. As concerns his own power to
help himself, his case is desperate, but not when taken
in hand by a Divine Physician. And who else but
such an one can give back to him what he has lost ?
Can the law do it ? "If there had been a law which
could have given life, verily righteousness should
have been by the law " (Gal. hi. 21). The priest and
the Levite — the law and the sacrifices — were ahke
powerless to help. Gihebert says : " Abraham passed
us by, for he was himself justified in the faith of one
to come. Moses passed us by, for he was not the
giver of grace, but of tbe law. Aaron the priest
passed us by, and by sacrifices which he offered was
unable to purge the conscience from dead works to
serve the living God. Thus patriarch, prophet, and
priest passed us by. Only that true Samaritan was
moved with compassion, and poured oil, that is, Him
self, into the heart, purifying all hearts by faith"
(Rom. viii. 3).
We might say with Chrysostom, that the wine is
the blood of the Passion, the oil the anointing of the
Holy Spirit. On the binding up of the wounds, we
notice that the Sacraments are often spoken of in the
early Church as the ligaments for the wounds of the
soul. But Augustine says : " It is the stanching of
the ever-flowing fountain of evil in the heart." When

144 THE GOOD SAMARITAN.
we find the Samaritan walking by the side of his own
beast, upon which he had placed the wounded man,
we are reminded of Him who for our sakes became
poor, that we through His poverty might be rich.
We may see in the inn the figure of the Church, in
which the healing of souls is ever going forward. We
find Christ's work spoken of in the Scriptures as a
work of healing (Mai. iv. 2 ; Hos. xiv. 4 ; Ps. ciii.
3 ; Matt. xiii. 15).
And if, hke the Samaritan, He is not always in
body present with those whose cure He has begun,
He yet makes a rich provision of grace for them dur
ing His absence. As the .Samaritan took money and
gave to the host, saying, " Take care of him" even
so the Lord Jesus said to Peter, and in him to all his
fellow-apostles, having first richly furnished them for
their work, " Feed my sheep," &c. To all that suc
ceed them, also, He has committed an economy of the
truth, that they may dispense the mysteries of God,
for the health and salvation of His people. And as
it was said to the host, " Whatsoever thou spendest
more, when L come again L will repay thee y " so the
Lord has promised that no labor shall be in vain in
Him (1 Peter v. 2, 4).
It is with exceeding great wisdom that the Saviour,
having brought this parable to an end, reverses the

THE GOOD SAMARITAN. 145
question of the lawyer, and asks, " Which now of these
three, thinkest thou, was neighbor unto him that fell
among the thieves ? " He had asked, " Who is the
neighbor to whom I am bound to show love ? " The
Lord's lesson was this : it is not the object which
is to determine the love, but that love has its own
measure in itself ; it is like the sun, which does not
ask on what it shall shine, or what it shah warm, but
shines and warms by the very law of its own being,
so that there is nothing hidden from its light and heat.
The lawyer had said, " What marks a man as my
neighbor ? " The Lord holds up before him a despised
Samaritan, who, instead of asking that question, freely
exercised love towards one who certainly had none of
the signs such as the lawyer conceived might mark
out a neighbor in his sense of the word. The parable
is not a reply to the question, but to the spirit from
which the question proceeded. It was an appeal to
a better principle in the querist's heart, from the nar
row and unloving theories in which he had been
trained. And now in answer to our Lord's question,
" Which was neighbor ? " he says, "He who showed
mercy on him}'' " Go" the Lord says, " and do thou
likewise" He would make the lawyer aware of the
great gulf between his knowing and his doing — how
7

146 THE GOOD SAMARITAN.
little his actual exercise of love kept pace with his
knowledge of the debt of love due from him to his
fellow-men, a point on which his question, " Who is
my neighbor ? " shows a secret misgiving.

xvm.
THE FRIEND AT MIDNIGHT.
Luke xi. 5-8.
The disciples had just asked, " Lord, teach us to
pray," and our Saviour graciously gives them that
perfect form which is the treasure of the Church.
But He also instructs them in what spirit they are to
pray, even in that of persevering faith. There is this
difference between this parable and that of the Unjust
Judge, that here the selfishness of man is set against
the liberality of God, while there it is his unrighteous
ness tacitly contrasted with the righteousness of God.
The conclusion is, that if selfish man can yet be won
by importunity to give, ho'Wimuch more certainly
shall the bountiful Lord bestow, " who both is sleep
less, and when we sleep rouses . us to pray " (Augus
tine). Here, also, it is prayer for the needs of others
in which we are bidden to be instant ; while there it
is rather for our own needs. Yet we must not, in

148 THE FEIEND AT MIDNIGHT.
either case, urge the illustration too far ; for though
God may present Himself to us in aspects similar to
these, yet His is only a seeming neglect, while theirs
is real. We see an illustration of this seeming un
willingness in the conversation with the Syro-Phceni-
cian woman (Matt. xv. 21), and also in the history of
Jacob wrestling with the angel (Gen. xxxii. 24-32).
" Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go
unto him at midnight, and say unto him, Friend,
lend me three loaves : for a friend of mine, in his
journey, is come to me, and L have nothing to set be
fore him." I do not see any deeper meaning in
these words than lies on the surface ; yet they have
given rise to many beautiful allegorical interpreta
tions. It has been said that tbe guest is the spirit of
man, weary of wandering, suddenly desiring heavenly
food. But the host, that is, man in his sensual nature,
has nothing to give, and is here taught to appeal to
God, that he may receive spiritual nourishment for
the soul. Vitringa explains it thus : The guest is the
heathen world ; the host, the servants and disciples of
Jesus, who are taught that they can only nourish it
with the bread of life, as they themselves receive it
from God, — which they must therefore seek with all
perseverance. In like manner, of the three loaves it
has been said that the host craving this number,

THE FEIEND AT MIDNIGHT. 149
craves the knowledge of the Trinity, or, perhaps, the
three gifts of the Spirit — faith, hope, and charity.
The words which he from within replies, "Trouble
me not, the door is now shut" mean more than that it
is merely closed ; it is barred and fastened, and this is
an unseasonable hour. "L say unto you, though he
will not rise and give him because he is his friend,
yet because of his importunity, he will rise and give
him as -many as he needeth." The word translated
" importunity," means rather " shamelessness." But
this shamelessness is mitigated by the thought that it
is not for himself, but that he may not be wanting in
the rites of hospitality to another. Abraham's con
versation with God (Gen. xviii. 23-33) illustrates it.
Through this pertinacity he finally obtains, not merely
three, but " as many as he needeth y " hke the Syro-
Phoenician woman : " Be it unto thee even as thou
wilt." Augustine observes, that he who would not at
first send even one of his house, now rises himself, and
supplies the wants of his friend.
The parable concludes with a commendation of
the same duty of persevering prayer : "And L say
unto you, ask, and it shall be given you y seek, and ye
shall find y knock, and it shall be opened unto you."
This is not mere repetition, for to seek is more than to
ask, and to knock is more than to seek ; and thus an
exhortation is given to increasing urgency in prayer,

150 THE FEIEND AT MIDNIGHT.
even thi the suppliant carries away the blessing which
God is only waiting for the proper time, to give.
" The kingdom of heaven suffereth violence, and the
violent take it by force."

XIX.
THE RICH EOOL.
Luke xii. 16-21.
In the midst of one of our Lord's most interesting
discourses, an interruption occurs. One of His hearers
had so slight an interest in the spiritual truths which
He was communicating, was so concerned about a
wrong which he believed himself to have sustained,
that he broke in upon the Lord's teaching with that
request which gave occasion for this parable, " Master,
speak to my brother, that he divide the inheritance
with me." From his appeal to Jesus, made in the
presence of the whole multitude, it is probable that
his brother was really treating him unjustly. But it
was the extreme inopportuneness of tbe season for
urging his claim, that showed him as one in whom
the worldly prevailed to the danger of exclusion of
the spiritual, and that drew a warning from our Lord.

152 THE EICH FOOL.
He declined in this, as in every other case, to interfere
in the affairs of civil life. His adversaries had sought
to thrust upon Him the exercise of a jurisdiction which
He carefully avoided. See John viii. 1-11, and Matt.
xvii. 24-27. But each time He avoided the snare,
keeping Himself within the hmits of the moral and
spiritual world, as that from which alone effectual
improvements in the outer life of man could proceed.
He would work from the inward to the outward.
Our Lord, having uttered a warning against cov
etousness, a sin always united with the trusting in un
certain riches, shows by a parable the folly of such
trust. For, besides other reasons, security is neces
sary to blessedness ; but that earthly hfe, which is
the necessary condition of drawing enjoyment out of
worldly abundance, may come to an end at any mo
ment. "The ground of a certain rich man brought
forth plentifully." " The prosperity of fools shall
destroy them ; " a truth to which this man sets his
seal, for his prosperity draws out his selfish propensi
ties intq_ stronger action. It might, indeed, seem as
if we should be in the greatest danger of setting our
heart upon riches, when we saw them escaping from
our grasp. But all experience testifies that earthly
losses are the remedy for covetousness, while increase
in worldly goods serves not as water to quench, but
as fuel to increase, the fire (Eccl. v. 10).

THE EICH FOOL. 153
"He thought within himself, saying, What shall
1 do ? " Here we are admitted to the inner chamber
of a worldling's heart, rejoicing over his abundance,
and making " provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts
thereof." "L have no room where to bestow my
fruits." " Thou hast barns — the bosoms of the needy,
the houses of the widows, the mouths of orphans and
of infants " (Ambrose). This would have been his
wisdom thus " to bestow " his wealth ; but he does
not thus provide for himself " bags which wax not
old, a treasure in the heavens which faileth not ; " but,
"L will pull down my barns, and build greater, and
there will L bestou) all my fruits and my goods."
" Observe," says Theophylact, " my goods and my
fruits." His riches were fairly got, and this makes
the example the better to suit the present occasion.
The world would see nothing to condemn in his plans
for future enjoyment : "Twill say to my soul, Soul,
thou hast much goods laid up for many years : take
thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry." He determines
now to rest from his labors. His plans of happiness
rise no higher than to the satisfying of the flesh, and
there is a melancholy irony in making him address
this speech to his soul — to that soul which was capa
ble of knowing and loving and glorifying God.
He expects thus to nourish his soul "for many
years y " he thinks as Job did once, to multiply his
>7*

154 THE EICH FOOL.
days as the sand. " But God said unto him, Thou
fool, this night thy soul shaU be required of thee."
"Thou fool," opposed to his own opinion of his pru
dence, — " this night," to the many years which he had
promised himself, — and that " soul " which he had pur
posed to make fat, shall be " required " of him. We
are not to suppose any direct manifestation in the
idea of God's speaking to this man, but what is more
awful, that while those secure plans were going on in
his thoughts, this sentence was being determined in
the counsels of God. Not as yet was there any direct
communication between God and the man's soul, but
even at the very moment when God was pronouncing
the decree that the thread of his life should in a few
minutes be cut in twain, he was confidently promising
to himself a long period of uninterrupted security.
There is a force in " shall be required of thee."
Theophylact : " For from the righteous his soul is not
required, but he commits it to the Father of spirits,
pleased and rejoicing." The mere worldling is torn
from the world, which is his only sphere of delight, as
the fabled mandrake was torn from the earth, shrieking
and with bleeding roots. "Then whose shall those
things be, which thou, hast provided ? " Solomon,
long before, had noted this uncertainty as constituting
part of the vanity of wealth (Eccl. ii. 18, 19 ; comp.
Ps. xxxix. 6).

THE EICH FOOL. 155
" So is he that layeth up treasure for himself, and
is not rich toward God," or, does not enrich himself
towards God, — for the two clauses of the verse are
parallel. Self and God are here contemplated as the
two poles between which the soul is placed, for one
of which it must determine, and then make that one
the end of all its efforts. The man laying up treasure
for himself, while that is made the end and object of
his being, is impoverishing himself inwardly ; for
there is a continual draining off to worldly objects of
those affections which were given him that they might
be satisfied alone in God ; where his treasure is, there
his heart is also. He that has no love of God, and
no share in the unsearchable riches of Christ, is in
fact " wretched, and miserable, and poor, and bhnd,
and naked," however he may say, " I am rich and in
creased with goods, and have need of nothing." On
the other hand, he who is rich toward God and in
God, possesses ah things, though a beggar in this
world, and will, when he dies, not quit, but go to, his
riches. Our Lord, having thus warned His hearers against
covetousness, and knowing how often it springs from
a distrust in God's providential care, teaches them
(ver. 22-30) the love and care of a heavenly Father.
In the 24th verse, we have, perhaps, a distinct remi
niscence of this parable.

XX.
THE BARREN FIG-TREE.
Luke xiii. 6-9.
The insurrectionary character for which the Gali
leans were noted, may have been the excuse for the
outrage mentioned in ver. 1, which must have been
perpetrated at Jerusalem, for there alone sacrifices were
offered. Those who narrated it to our Lord prob
ably meant to suggest that if men could be safe any
where, it would be at God's altar, but that there must
have been some great hidden guilt, which rendered the
very sacrifices of these men to be sin, so that they them
selves became piacular expiations, their blood ming
ling with, and forming part of, those which they offered.
But our Lord at once laid bare the evil in their hearts,
rebuking their cruel judgments. " Suppose ye, that
these Galileans were sinners above all the Galileans,
because they suffered such things ? " He does not
deny that they were sinners, but He does deny that

THE BAEEEN FIG-TBEE. 157
their calamity marked them out as sinners above all
others of their fellow-countrymen ; and then He leads
His hearers (comp. Luke xiii. 23 ; John xxi. 22) to
take their eyes off from others, and fix them upon
themselves. " Except ye repent, ye shall all likewise
perish." We are here taught that in the calamities
which befall others, we have loud calls to repentance,
for we are to recognize that whatever befalls another,
might justly have befallen ourselves. Moreover,
when we have learned to see the root of sin in our
selves, we shall learn to acknowledge that whatever
deadly fruit it bears in another, it might have borne
the same or even worse, in like circumstances, in our
selves. One who feels thus will not deny, as neither
does our Lord deny, the intimate connection between
sin and suffering, but it is the sin of the race which is
linked with the suffering of the race ; not, of neces
sity at least, the sin of the individual with his par
ticular suffering.
Our blessed Lord, to set the truth yet more plainly
before His hearers, brings forward another instance of
a swift destruction falling upon many at once : —
" Those eighteen on whom the tower of Siloam fell
and slew them, think ye that they were sinners above
all men that dwelt in Jerusalem ? " In these acci
dents, in this disharmony of nature, all were to re
cognize a call to repentance, for all such events are

158 THE BAEEEN FIG-TEEE.
parts of the curse consequent on the sin of man.
There is a force in the original word, which our Eng
lish " likewise " fails to give. The threat is that they
shall literally ih like wise perish. Multitudes of the
inhabitants of Jerusalem were crushed beneath the
ruins of their temple and city ; and during the last
siege and assault, there were numbers also, who were
pierced through with Roman darts in the courts of
the temple, in the very act of preparing their sacri
fices, so that literally their blood was mingled with
their sacrifices.
Olshausen observes : — " The discourse of Jesus, se
vere and full of rebuke, is closed by a parable, in
which the merciful Son of man appears as the In
tercessor for men before the righteousness of the
Heavenly Father ; as He who obtains for them space
for repentance. This idea of deferring the judgment
of men, runs all through the Holy Scriptures (Gen.
vi. 3 ; Gen. xviii. 24) ; the destruction of Jerusalem
was not until forty years after the ascension of our
Lord (see also 2 Pet. iii. 9)." This parable, then,
is at once concerning the long-suffering and severity
of God. " A certain man had a fig-tree planted in his vine
yard." Though by the fig-tree the Jews are directly
meant, yet as Israel according to the flesh was the
representative of all and of each who in after times

THE BAEEEN FIG-TEEE. 159
should be admitted to the principles of a nearer
knowledge of God, so is a warning herein contained
for the Gentile Church, and for every individual soul.
The possessor of the fig-tree "came and sought fruit
thereon, and found none " (Isa. v. 2, 7 ; Jer. ii. 21). The
simple image of men compared to trees, and their work
to fruit, runs through the whole of Scripture (Ps.
i. 3 ; John xv. 2, 4, 5 ; Rom. vii. 4). There are three
kinds of works spoken of in the New Testament,
which may all be illustrated from this image : first,
good works, when the tree, being made good, bears
good fruit ; then dead works — fruit, as it were fas
tened on from without, alms given that they may be
gloried in, prayers made that they may be seen, &c. ;
and lastly, wicked works, when the corrupt tree bears
fruit manifestly of its own kind.
Of the " three years " in which the master of the
vineyard complains that he finds no fruit, many ex
planations have been given. Theophylact : — " Christ
came three times— by Moses, by the Prophets, and in
His own person." Augustine understands by them
the times of the natural law — the written law — and
now, of grace. Olshausen thinks they may refer to
the three years of our Lord's ministry upon earth ;
but Grotius had already observed, that if so, the one
year more must also be chronological, whereas forty
years were allowed before the final destruction of the

160 THE BARREN FIG-TEEE.
Jews. " Cut it down " (Isa. v. 5, 6 ; Matt. vii. 19) ;
why cumbereth it the ground f " (We miss here the
also of the original, after the word " why." It is
really the key-word of the sentence.) St. Basil
beautifully says : " This is peculiar to the clemency
of God toward men, that He does not bring in punish
ments silently or secretly ; but by His threatenings first
proclaims them to be at hand, thus inviting sinners
to repentance." Before the hewing down begins, the
axe is laid at the root of the tree (Matt. iii. 10). The
cumbering of the ground implies more than that it
occupied a place which might be more profitably
filled ; the barren tree injured the land around.
Thus, the Jewish Church not merely did not bring
forth fruits of righteousness, but through them the
name of God was blasphemed among the Gentiles
(Rom. ii. 24 ; Matt. xxih. 13, 15). So is this true of
the individual sinner ; that he is not only unprofitable
to God, but, by his evil example, he is a stumbling-
block to others.
The dresser of the vineyard, who pleads, "Lord,
let it alone this year also," is manifestly the Son of
God Himself (Job xxxiii. 23 ; Zech. i. 12 ; Heb. vii.
25) ; yet not as though the Father and Son had differ
ent minds concerning sinners, as though the counsels
of the Father were wrath, and of the Son mercy.
But at the same time we must not fall into the oppo-

THE BAEEEN FIG-TEEE. 161
site error, letting go the reahty of God's wrath against
sin, and the reality of the sacrifice of Christ on that
side which looks towards God ; the death of Christ
was really a propitiation of God, not merely an assur
ance of God's love towards sinners. We see the way
of escape from both of these errors in those words :
" The Lamb slain from the foundation of the world "
(Rev. xiii. 8) .; "foreordained before the foundation of
the world " (1 Pet. i. 20) ; we must not conceive of man
as ever not contemplated by God in Christ (Rom. xvi.
25, 26). In this view we may consider the high-priestly
intercession of Christ as having found place and been
effectual even before He passed into the heavens —
before He had carried His own blood into the truly
Holy of Hohes.
The vine-dresser pleads not that the barren tree
may stand forever, though it continue barren ; for he
consents to its doom, if it remain unfruitful ; but he
asks for it one year of grace ; " Lf it bear fruit, well y
and if not, then after that thou shall cut it down."
During this year, " he will dig about it, and dung
it y " that is, he will hollow out the earth from around
the stem, and fill up the hollow with manure ; as one
may often see done now to orange-trees in the south
of Italy. By this is signified the multiplication of
the means of grace, which God gives before they are
withdrawn forever. Thus before the flood, Noah

162 THE BAEEEN FIG-TEEE.
appeared a " preacher of righteousness," — before the
great catastrophes of the Jews, some of their most
eminent prophets appeared, — and before the final de
struction of Jerusalem, they enjoyed the ministry of
Christ and His Apostles. To this last, allusion is here
no doubt immediately made, to that larger, richer
supply of grace, consequent on the death, resurrection,
and ascension of our Lord. Doubtless this is true of
men's lives as well.
Such a time of visitation to the Jewish nation was
our Lord's ministry (Luke xix. 42). There was
the digging about the tree which had so long been
barren. But it abode in its barrenness, and, as was
threatened, was cut down. Yet our Lord's words,
" Lf it bear fruit, well" show that there was another
alternative. The door of repentance is left open to
all ; they are warned that it is only themselves who
make their doom inevitable.

XXI.
THE GREAT SUPPER.
Luke xiv. 15-24.
It has already been proved that this parable and
the one recorded at Matt. xxii. 2 are entirely different.
On the present occasion our Lord had been invited to
eat bread at the house of one of the chief Pharisees (ver.
1). This was probably an expensive entertainment ;
from the various circumstances related in verses 7
and 12, we may conclude that many were present,
and, it is likely, guests of consideration. This sup
position adds much force to the admonishment (ver.
12). Our Lord's words in ver. 14, " Thou shalt be
recompensed at the resurrection of the just," called
forth from one present the admiring exclamation,
"Blessed is he that shall eat bread in the kingdom
of God ! " The Jews beheved that the resurrection
of the just, the open setting up of the kingdom of
God, would be ushered in by a great festival, of

164

THE GEEAT SUPPEE.

which all the members of that kingdom should be
partakers. This, therefore, was an earthly way of say
ing, " Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first
resurrection." He spoke these words, it is likely,
with an easy assurance that he should be one of the
privileged number. He, as a Jew, a member of the
elect nation, had been invited to that great feast of
God ; he did not pause to consider whether he had
truly accepted the call, and certainly he had not con
sidered whether in the refusal to enter into the higher
spiritual life, to which Christ was inviting him, there
was not involved his own final rejection from the
heavenly festival. To him, and to others like him,
the parable was spoken.
" A certain man made a great supper '." Men's
relish for heavenly things is so little that they are
presented to them under such inviting images as
this, that, if possible, they may be stirred up to a
more earnest longing after them. " And bade many; "
these were, as the latter part of the parable indicates,
the priests, elders, scribes, and Pharisees. These, as
claiming to be following after righteousness, seemed
to be pointed out as the first who should embrace
the invitation of Christ. The maker of the feast
" sent his servant at supper-time, to say to them that
were bidden, Come, for all things are now ready."
This was the usual custom, and their contempt of the

THE GEEAT SUPPEE. 165
honor done them, and neglect of their given word, —
for we must suppose that they had already accepted
the invitation, — are testified by the excuses which they
make for not appearing at the festival. There was,
without doubt, a time when more than any other it
might be said, " all things are now ready," a fulness
of time, when the kingdom of heaven was set up, and
men were invited to enter into it, first the Jew, and
afterwards the Gentile. By the servant sent to bid
the guests is not meant our Saviour ; neither does he
represent the prophets, for it is not till " all things
are now ready" that he is sent forth. He rather
represents those who accompanied the Saviour, preach
ers, evangelists, apostles, and all who, reminding the
Jews of the ancient prophecies concerning the king
dom of God, and their share therein, bade them now
enter on the enjoyment of these good things.
" And they all with one consent " (or, out of one
mind or spirit) " began to make excuse." Perhaps
he who said "L have bought a piece of ground, and
Lmust needs go and see it," represents those who are
elate of heart through acquired possessions. It adds
much to the earnestness of the warning of the parable
that none of the guests are kept away by occupations
in themselves sinful, and yet all become sinful, be
cause the first place is given to them. While with
him it is " the lust of the eye and the pride of life "

166 THE GEEAT SUPPEE.
(Dan. iv. 30), which keep him from Christ, in the
second it is rather the care and anxiety of business
which fill the soul; " L have bought Jive yoke of oxen,
and L go to prove them." This trial of the oxen was
probably to take place before the purchase was finally
concluded. He is getting what the other has aheady
got. In the last we see that it is the pleasure of the
world that keeps him from Christ : " See you not
that I have a feast of my own ? why trouble me with
yours ? Lhave married a wife, and therefore L cannot
come." This one accounts that' he has a reason per
fectly good, and therefore does not trouble himself
with the words, " Lpray thee, have me excused," but
bluntly refuses. As in Matt. xxii. so here, there is
an ascending scale. The first would be very glad to
come, if it were possible ; the second alleges no such
necessity of absence, but is simply going upon suffi
cient reason in another direction ; yet he too prays to
be excused. The third has plans of his own, and
says outright, " L cannot come." In what remarkable
connection do these excuses stand with the words of
our Lord, which follow so soon after (verse 26), and
how apt a commentary does St. Paul supply (ICor. vii.
29-31). They had nothing which it was not lawful to
have, but the undue love of earthly possessions ulti
mately excluded them from the feast. — The servant
returns and declares to his lord, how all have excused

THE GEEAT SUPPEE. 167
themselves from coming ; even so it was said, " Have
any of the rulers or of the Pharisees beheved on
him ? " (John vii. 48). " Then the master of the
house, being angry, said to his servant, Go out quickly
into the streets and lanes of the city, and bring in
hither the poor, and the maimed, and the halt, and
the blind." We have here a distinct reminiscence
of ver. 13. Thus is it with the great Giver of the
heavenly feast. He calls the spiritually sick and needy,
while those who are rich in their own merits exclude
themselves and are excluded by Him. The publicans
and sinners, the despised and outcast of the nation,
should enter into the kingdom of God before those
who thanked God they were not as other men.
Hitherto the parable has been historic, now it
passes on to the prophetic, for it declares how God
had prepared a feast, at which more shall sit down
than a remnant of the Jewish people — that He has
founded a Church in which there would be room for
Gentile as well as Jew. Not that this is explicitly
declared, but it lay wrapt up in the parable. The
servant, returning from his second mission, had said,
" Lord, it is done as thou hast commanded, and yet
there is room," whereupon, since grace will endure a
vacuum as httle as nature, he receives a new com
mission, " Go out into the highways and hedges, and
compel them to come in, that my house may be filled."

168 THE GEEAT SUPPEE
If those in the lanes of the city are the most miserable
and sinful of the Jews, then those without the city — in
the country around — will be the yet more abject Gen
tiles, the pagans in all senses of the word. Concerning
these, the word is, " Compel them to come in." Of
course this means a moral compulsion. It is not impli ed
that there would be any indifference toward the invita
tion, but that these houseless wanderers would think
themselves so unworthy of it as not to believe it, and.
could scarcely be induced without much persuasion to
enter the rich man's dwelling, and share in his enter
tainment. And since faith cannot be compelled, this word
must be applied to that strong, earnest exhortation
which the ambassadors of Christ will address to men
when they are themselves deeply convinced of the
importance of their message and of the great results
depending. If they " compel," it will be as the
angels compehed Lot (Gen. xix. 16) ; or they will, in
another way, compel men to come in, for they wih
speak the words of Him who not merely entreats, but
commands, all men everywhere to repent and believe
the Gospel. As Luther explains it, men are com
pelled to come in when the law is preached, terrify
ing their consciences, and driving them to Christ as
their only refuge. The parable closes with the indig
nant exclamation of the householder, " For L say

THE GEEAT SUPPEE. 169
wnto you that none of those men that were bidden,
shall taste of my supper ; " this is the penalty with
which he threatens them — no after earnestness in
claiming admission shall profit them (Prov. i. 28 ;
Matt. xxv. 11, 12). This exclusion is nothing less
than exclusion from the kingdom of God, and from
ah the blessings of the communion of Christ, and that
implies " everlasting destruction from the presence of
the Lord, and the glory of His power."
This whole parable suggests a parallel with 1 Cor.
i. 26-29.

xxn.
THE LOST SHEEP.
Matt, xviii. 12-14 ; Luke xv. 3-7.
When St. Luke says, " Then draw near to the
Lord all the publicans and sinners for to hear him,"
we must understand him as giving the prevailing
feature in the whole of Christ's ministry, or at least
in one epoch of it. The pubhcans were hateful to
their countrymen, being accounted as traitors who
for the sake of filthy lucre had sided with the Ro
mans, the oppressors of the theocracy, and now col
lected tribute for a heathen treasury. No alms might
be received from their money-chest ; their evidence
was not taken in courts of justice, and they were put
on the same level with heathens (this fact gives an
emphasis to Luke xix. 9), By the word " sinners " is
meant all those who, till awakened by the Lord to re
pentance, had been notorious transgressors. Being
come to seek and to save that which was lost, He re-

THE LOST SHEEP. 171
ceived them graciously, and hved in familiar inter
course with them. At this the Scribes and Pharisees
took offence. They could have understood a John
the Baptist flying to the wilderness to escape con
tamination, but Christ was the physician who rather
came boldly to seek out the infected, in order to heal
them. The Pharisees had neither love to hope for
the recovery of such, nor medicines to effect it.
Their murmurings were the occasion of the three
parables which follow. Christ holds up to them God
and the angels of God rejoicing at the conversion of
a sinner, and silently contrasts this with their envious
repinings. More than this, He warns them that if
they indulge in this proud self-righteousness, there
will be more joy in heaven over one of these penitents
whom they despised, than over ninety-nine of such
as themselves. He does not deny the good that
might be in them ; but if now they refused the higher
righteousness of faith, the new life of the Gospel, then
such as would receive this life from Him, though hav
ing in times past departed infinitely wider from God
than they had done, would now be brought infinitely
nearer to Him.
The first two parables set forth mainly the seeking
love of God ; while the third describes to us rather
the rise and growth of repentance responsive to that
love. The three would have seemed incomplete if

172 THE LOST SHEEP.
separated, for the two first speak nothing of a changed
heart toward God, nor indeed would the images used
have allowed of this ; while the last speaks only of
this change, and nothing of that which must have
caused it, namely, the antecedent working of the
Spirit of God in the heart. But there are also many
other inner harmonies between them, interesting to
trace. The possessor of a hundred sheep, in some
sort a rich man, was not likely to feel the loss of a
single one so deeply as the woman who, out of ten
small pieces of money, should lose one ; and her feel
ings would come infinitely short of the parental
affection of a father who, having but two sons, should
behold one of them going astray. Thus we find our
selves moving in ever narrower, and so ever intenser
circles of hope, and fear, and love — drawing thus
nearer to the innermost centre and heart of the truth.
We see also, in each case, shadowed forth a greater
guilt, and therefore a greater grace. In the first
parable, the sinner is set forth as a silly wandering
sheep. Though this is but one side of the truth, yet
it is a most real one, that sin is oftentimes an igno
rance ; the sinner knows not what he does. Multi
tudes of wanderers go astray, before they have even
learned that they have a shepherd. But there are
others, set forth under the lost money, who, having
known themselves to be God's, and to be stamped

THE LOST SHEEP. 173
with the image of the Great King, do yet throw
themselves away, and renounce their high birth.
But there is a sin yet greater — the sin of the prodigal
— to have known something of the love of God, not
as our King, but as our Father, and yet to have
slighted that love, and forsaken His house — this is the
crowning guilt ; and yet the grace of God is sufficient
to reclaim even such a wanderer.
The first parable had a peculiar fitness to the
spiritual rulers of the Jewish people. They were
warned, rebuked, and charged continually under this
very title of shepherds (Ezek. xxxiv ; Zech. xi. 16) ;
yet now they were finding fault with Christ for doing
that very thing which they ought to have done.
There is in sin a centrifugal tendency, and of neces
sity the wanderings of the sheep would be farther
and farther away. Therefore, without the shepherd's
going forth to seek it, it must be lost forever. We
are not to understand by the " wilderness " in which
the ninety-nine sheep were left, any thing more than
wide-extended grassy plains, called desert because
without habitations of men. Thus we read in John
(vi. 10) that there was much grass in a place which
another Evangelist calls a desert. So that the residue
of the flock are left in their ordinary pasturage, while
the shepherd seeks the lost sheep.
Christ's Incarnation was a girding of Himself to go

174 THE LOST SHEEP.
after His lost sheep. In His own words, He " came to
seek and to save that which was lost." And He
sought His own till He found it. He followed us into
the deep of our misery. And having found his
sheep, the shepherd does not punish it, nor even
harshly drive it back into the fold, but he lays it
upon his own shoulders and carefully carries it home.
In this last we see an image of the supporting grace
of Christ, which ceases not till His rescued are made
partakers of final salvation. And as the man reach
ing home summons friends and neighbors to share his
joy, so Christ declares there shall be joy in heaven on
the occasion of one sinner repenting. Though not
distinctly declared, He lets it sufficiently appear, tbat
it is even Himself who, returning to the heavenly
places, shall cause jubilee there. For we must notice,
that this joy of which He speaks is future ; He has
not yet risen and ascended, leading captivity captive,
and bringing with Him His redeemed. Nor let us
miss the intimation of the dignity of His person given
in " L say unto you " — I who know, I who tell you of
things which I have seen (John iii. 11), I say to you
that this joy shall be in heaven.
Were this all the declaration, there would be
nothing to perplex us ; but there is more joy over the
penitents " than over ninety and nine just persons
which need no repentance." We can easily under-

THE LOST SHEEP. 175
stand how, among men, there should be more joy for
a small portion which has been endangered, than for
the continued secure possession of a much larger por
tion. More joy is felt upon the recovery of a sick
friend, even though as yet it be not entire, than when
he walked sound and strong. Yet this dispropor
tionate joy arises clearly from the unexpectedness of
the result, from the temporary uncertainty of it.
But God who knows the end from the beginning
needs not to have a joy heightened by a fear going
before. Still further, the words, " which need no repent
ance," are difficult, since we read, " AU we hke sheep
have gone astray." We may indeed get rid of both
difficulties by seeing here an instance of our Lord's
severe yet loving irony, and finding in the ninety and
nine the self-righteous. But the whole construction of
the parable is against such a supposition ; the ninety
and nine sheep have not wandered. The one view which
affords a solution is this — that we understand these
" righteous " as really such, but that their righteousness
is merely legal. The law had done a part of its work
for them, keeping them from gross positive transgres
sions of its enactments, but it had not brought them, as
God intended it should, to a conviction of sin ; it had
not prepared them to embrace the salvation offered by
Christ. He now declares that there was more real

176 THE LOST SHEEP.
joy over one of these publicans and sinners, who were
entering into the inner sanctuary of faith, than over
ninety and nine of themselves, who lingered at the
legal vestibule, refusing to enter. Gregory the Great
observes : " A general in battle prefers that soldier
who, turning back from flight, charges the enemy
bravely, to him who never fled, and never showed
any valor."

xxni.
THE LOST PIECE OF MONEY.
Luke xv. 8-10.
It would be against ah analogy of preceding
parables to presume that this, and the one that has
gone just before, although so much ahke, say merely
the same thing. If the shepherd in the last parable
was Christ, the woman in this may, perhaps, TJe the
Church, or the Divine Wisdom which so often in
Proverbs is described as seeking the salvation of men,
and is here as elsewhere set forth as a person (Luke
xi. 49). Rather these two explanations flow into one,
when we keep in mind how the Church is the organ
in and through which the Holy Spirit seeks for the
lost. Keeping the fact prominently in view that it
is only as the Church is dwelt in by the Holy Spirit,
that it can appear as the woman seeking her lost,
and that it is only as the Spirit says " Come," that
the Bride can say it, we shall have in the three para
s'

178 THE LOST PIECE OF MONEY.
bles the three Persons of the Holy Trinity, although
not in their order.
In the lost piece of money, expositors have traced
a resemblance to the human soul (" God created man
in His own image," Gen. i. 27), which still retains
traces ofthe mint from which it proceeded, though the
image has been nearly effaced by sin ; farther, as the
piece of money is lost for all useful purposes to its
owner, so man through sin has become unprofitable to
God. But as the woman, having lost her piece of
money, will " light a candle, and sweep the house,
and seek diligently till she find it," even so the Lord,
through the ministrations of the Church, gives dili
gence to recover $ie lost sinner. The lighting of the
candle may be explained by such passages as Matt. v.
14 ; Phil. ii. 15. The candle is the word of God, which
the Church holds forth ; and it is by this light that
sinners are found — that they find themselves, and the
Church finds them. Having this candle, she pro
ceeds to sweep the house, deranging every thing for a
time. The charge evermore is that the world is
turned upside down. But amidst all the outcry, she
that bears the candle of the Lord ceases not from her
labor, until she has recovered her own again.
We must not omit to remark a difference between
this parable and the preceding, which is more than

THE LOST PIECE OF MONEY. 179
accidental. In that the shepherd sought his lost
sheep in the wilderness ; but it is in the house that
this piece of money is lost and looked for. There is,
then, a progress from that to this. The visible Church
now first appears. There are other variations also,
to be explained on the same supposition that we have
there the more immediate ministry of Christ, and here
the secondary ministry of His Church. The shepherd
says, " I have found my sheep ; " the woman, " I
have found the coin ; " for it was not hers in the sense
in which the sheep was his. He says, " which was
lost ; " she says, " which / lost," confessing a fault of
her own, the original cause of the loss ; for a sheep
strays of itself, but a piece of money could only be
lost by a certain negligence on the part of the pos
sessor. The woman having found her own, " calleth her
friends and her neighbors together," that they may
share her joy. We have in the next verse our Lord's
warrant for applying this to the angels, whose place
is not " in heaven," as in the last parable : for this is
the rejoicing together of the redeemed creation upon
earth at the repentance of a sinner. The angels that
walk up and down the earth, that are present in the
congregations ofthe faithful— there shall be joy before
them when the Church of the redeemed, quickened

180 THE LOST PIECE OF MONEY.
by the Holy Spirit, summons them to join with it in
thanksgiving for the recovery of a lost soul ; for, as
St. Bernard says, the tears of penitence are the wine
of angels.

XXIV.
THE PRODIGAL SON.
Luke xv. 11-32
This might be called the pearl and crown of all the
parables of Scripture ; one containing within itself
such a circle of doctrine as abundantly to justify the
title sometimes given it of Evangelium in Evangelio,
The Gospel within the Gospel. In respect to its
primary application, there have always been two differ
ent views ; some considering the sons as the Jew and
the Gentile, the younger representing by his conduct
the apostasy and return of the Gentile world, the
elder, the narrow- hearted, self-extolling Jews, grudg
ing that the " sinners of the Gentiles " should be ad
mitted to the same blessing with themselves ; others
looking upon the younger son as representing all who
have widely departed from God, and who having in
consequence experienced misery, have by His grace
been brought back to Him, while in the elder brother

182 the peodigal son.
they see either a narrow form of real righteousness,
or one righteous in his own sight, not in the Lord's.
The latter view is the more correct one, though not
rigorously excluding the former. The parables in this
chapter are spoken by Jesus to justify His conduct in
receiving " publicans and sinners," who were Jews,
and not to unfold that far deeper mystery, the calhng
of the Gentiles, of which he gave only a few hints to
His chosen disciples, and which was for a long time a
stumbling-block even to them.
" The younger " of these two sons " said to his
father, Give me the portion of goods that falleth to
me." We need not conceive of his asking this as a
right, though it may have been so, but only as a
favor. The portion, according to the Jewish law,
would be the half of what the elder brother would re
ceive (Deut. xxi. 17). In a spiritual sense, this request
is an expression of man's desire to be independent of
God (Gen. iii. 5), of his desire to take the ordering of
his life into his own hands, believing that he can be
a fountain of blessedness to himself. All subsequent
sins are included in this one. We express the feeling
directly opposed to this in the words, " Give us this
day our daily bread," in which we acknowledge that
we desire to wait continually upon God for the supply
of our bodily and spiritual needs.
The father " divided unto them his living." It

THE PBODIGAL SON. 183
would have little profited to retain him at home, who
had already in heart become strange to that home.
Such is the dealing of God ; He has constituted man a
being with a will ; and when His service no longer
appears a perfect freedom, and man promises himself
liberty elsewhere, he is allowed to make the trial, and
to discover that in departing from Him he falls under
the horrible bondage of his own lusts and of the
world, and under the tyranny of the devil. And
now, the younger son is
" Lord of himself— that heritage of woe."
Yet although he had gained his portion, he did not
immediately leave his home. St. Bernard sees a force
in this, and observes how the apostasy of the heart
wih often precede the apostasy of the hfe. The diver
gence of the sinner's will and the will of God does not
immediately appear. Soon, however, it must, for
" not many days after, the younger son gathered all
together, and took his journey into a far country."
By this gathering together of ah, and departing,
seems intimated the collecting on man's part of all
his energies, with the deliberate determination of
getting all that he can out of the world. The "far
country " is a world where God is not, or, as Augus
tine has it, " The ' far country ' is forgetfulness of
God." There he " wasted " or scattered " his sub-

184 THE PEODIGAL SON.
stance with riotous living," so quickly has the gather
ing issued in a scattering.
The supphes lasted for a while, and he may have
congratulated himself upon his liberty. Even so the
sinner does not discover at once his misery and pov
erty ; for the world has its attractions, and the flesh
its pleasures. But "the time arrives when he comes
to the end of all that the creature can give him ;
" when he had spent all, there arose a mighty famine
in that land and he began to be in want." He begins
to discover his misery, and that it is an evil thing
and a bitter to have forsaken the Lord his God (Jer.
ii. 19 ; xvii. 5, 6). In the spiritual world, there need be,
though often there will be, no outward calamities to
bring on this sense of famine. It sits unbidden at
rich men's tables, and enters into kings' palaces.
There, the immortal soul may be ready to "perish
with hunger."
If we see here the great apostasy of the heathen
world, as well as the departure of a single soul, this
wasting of goods will be exactly that in Rom. i. 19-
23, as the remainder of the chapter will exactly an
swer to the residue of the prodigal's sad experience.
The great famine of the heathen world was at its
height when the Son of God came in the flesh. AU
childlike faith in the old religions had departed. The
Greek philosophy had failed.

THE PEODIGAL SON. 185
That the prodigal " began to be in want" was, no
doubt, a summons to him to return home, but as yet
his confidence in his own resources was not altogether
exhausted. " He went and joined himself to a citi
zen of that country" hoping to repair his broken for
tunes by his help. And here we see a fall within a
fall — a more entire yielding of himself by the sinner
to the service of the world. Still, this prodigal with
all his misery was not yet a " citizen " in that far
country. There is hope for the sinner so long as
he feels himself a miserable alien in the land of sin.
By his joining himself to the citizen, our Lord gives
us a hint of that dark mystery in the downward pro
gress of souls, by which he who begins by using the
world as his servant to minister to his pleasures, ends
by becoming its slave.
But sinful man finds no love, no pity from his
fellow-sinner. This new master dismisses him from
his sight, and sends him to the vilest employment,
" to feed swine." We know that it was even accursed
. in the eyes of a Jew ; so that the prodigal's cup of
misery was full. And now, " he would fain have filled
his belly with the husks that the swine did eat y and no
man game unto him." (These " husks " are not the pods
of some other fruit, but themselves the fruit of the
carob tree. They are very common in the Levant.
The shell or pod alone is eaten.) This is generally

186 THE PEODIGAL SON.
taken as meaning that he could not obtain even these
husks ; but seeing they must have been in his power,
we may suppose that he did eat them, no man giving
him any thing more satisfactory. The expression
"filled hiz belly" is chosen of design — ah he could
do was to dull his gnawing pain, for the food of beasts
could not appease the cravings of man. So, also,
none but God can satisfy the longings of an immortal
soul. The whole description is wonderful ; we see the
evident relation in which his punishment stands to
his sin. " He who would not be ruled by God, is
compelled to serve the devil — he who would not feed
on the bread of angels, petitions for the husks of
swine." In his feeding of swine, what a picture we
have of man serving divers lusts and pleasures, the
bestial merely predominant ; and in his fruitless at
tempt to fill his belly with the husks, what a picture
again of man seeking to satisfy the fierce hunger of
the soul by the unlimited gratification of his appetites.
All the monstrous luxuries and frantic wickednesses,
which we read of in the later Roman history, stand
hke the last despairing effort of man to fill his belly
with husks. The experiment carried out on this
largest scale only proved tbat the food of beasts could
not be made the nourishment of men.
It is true that this picture, if applied to more than

THE PEODIGAL SON. 187
a few, is an exaggeration of the misery and wicked
ness of those who have turned their backs upon God ;
but yet it is also true, that all this misery and sin are
rendered possible by, and are the legitimate results
of, a first departure from God ; and nothing hinders
them from following, but the restraining grace of
God. In the present case, sin is suffered to bear all
its bitter fruit ; we see one who has debased himself
even unto hell. Were it not for this, it would not be
a parable for all sinners, since it would fail to show
that there is no extent of departure from God, which
renders a return to Him impossible.
As we have followed the sinner, step by step, in
his downward career, so will we now trace his return,
for though he has forsaken his God, he has not been
forsaken by Him. He makes his sin bitter to him,
that he may leave it. In this way God pursues His
fugitives, calhng them back in that only language
which they will now understand. Here we have one,
upon whom this " stern discipline of divine mercy "
(Augustine) is not wasted. Presently, " he came to
himself." How deeply significant are these words,
" he came to himself" — so that to come to one's self,
and to coine to God, are the same thing. It is not,
then, the man living in union with God, who is raised
above the true condition of humanity, but the man
not so living, who has fallen below that condition.

188 THE PE0DIGAL SON.
God, being the true ground of our being, when and
because we have found Him, we find ourselves also.
When he thus " came to himself, he said, How
many hired servants of my father's have bread enough
and to spare, and L perish with hunger." This, too,
is a touch of the deepest nature ; for the sinner be
holds everywhere but in himself peace and harmony,
he sees nature calm and at rest, fufilling in law and
order the purposes for which it was ordained. He
sees also many of his fellow-men, who find their satis
faction in the discharge of their daily duties ; who,
though doing their work more in the spirit of servants
than of sons, are yet not without their reward ; al
though they may not have the highest joy of God's
salvation, they have bread enough and to spare, while
he is perishing with hunger. Even at this point, how
many come to a different determination from this
prodigal. They betake them to some other citizen,
who deludes them with false promises ; or they dress
their husks so that they look like human food ; or
they wallow in the same sty with the beasts they
feed. But it is otherwise with him. " Twill arise."
We may picture him as having sat long on the
ground, revolving the extreme misery of his condition
(Job ii. 8, 13). But now he gathers up anew his
prostrate energies ; " Why sit I here among the
swine ? I will arise and go to my father." These

THE PEODIGAL son. 189
words were cited by the Pelagians of old, in proof
that man could turn to God in his own strength :
just as the (self-styled) Unitarians of modern times
find in the circumstances of the prodigal's return a
proof that the sinner's repentance alone is sufficient
to reconcile him with his God — that he needs no
Mediator. But these conclusions are guarded against
by the clearest declarations, the first by such as John
vi. 44 ; the second by such passages as Heb. x. 19-
22 ; nor are we to expect that every passage in Scrip
ture is to contain the whole circle of Christian doc
trine. Returning to that father, he " will say unto him,
Father." What is it that gives the sinner confidence,
that returning to God he shall not be repelled ? The
adoption of sonship, which he received in Christ Jesus
at his baptism, and his faith that the gifts and calhng
of God are without repentance or recall. He may
claim anew his admission to the household, on the
ground that he was once made a member thereof.
" Lhave sinned against heaven and before thee y " he
shows his repentance, to have been the work of the
Spirit, in that he acknowledges his sin in its root, as a
transgression ofthedivinelaw,asbeing wrought against
God. Thus David exclaimed, "Against thee, thee
only have I sinned," while yet his offences had been
against the second table. For we may injure our-

190 THE PEODIGAL SON.
selves by our evil, we may wrong our neighbors, but we
can sin only against God ; and the recognition of our
evil as first and chiefly against Him, is of the essence
of all true repentance. When we come to give these
words their higher application, the two acknowledg
ments merge into one, " I have sinned against Thee,
my Father in heaven." Throughout ah Scripture
this willingness to confess is ever noted as a sign of
true repentance begun, even as the sinner's refusal to
humble himself by this confession is the sure sign of
continued hardness (2 Sam. xii, 13 ; Job ix. 20 ; Prov.
xxviii. 13 ; Jer. ii. 35 ; 1 John i. 9, 10). Tertullian ;—
" In as far as thou hast not spared thyself, so far, be
heve me, will God spare thee." With this deep feel
ing of unworthiness, he will confess, " 7* am no more
worthy to be called thy son." A confession such as
this belongs to the essence of all true repentance.
But are the words which follow, " Make me as one of
thy hired servants," those of returning spiritual health?
We shall find that at a later period (ver. 21) he drops
them, and shall refer to them then.
There is no tarrying now : " He arose and came to
his father y but when he was yet a great way off, his
father saw him, and had compassion, and ran, and
fell on his neck (Gen. xiv. 14) and kissed him," The
evidences of the father's love are described with
touching minuteness ; he does not wait until his son

THE PE0DIGAL SON. 191
has come all the way, but hastens forward to meet
him, and at once welcomes him with the kiss, in the
East the pledge of reconciliation and peace (Gen.
xxxiii. 4 ; 2 Sam xiv. 33). Compare James iv. 8.
The Lord sees His returning wanderers, while they
are " yet a great way off y " He listens to the first faint
sighing of their hearts after Him, for it was He that
first awoke those sighings there (Ps. x. 17). And
though they may be " a great way off" though they
may have far too slight a view of the evil of sin, or
of the holiness of God, yet He meets them, notwith
standing, with the evidences of His reconciled love.
Nor does He cause them to serve a dreary apprentice
ship of servile fear, but at once embraces them in the
arms of His love, giving them perhaps stronger con
solations than they will have, oftentimes, after they
become settled in the Christian course. And this
He does because they need at this moment to be
assured ; notwithstanding their moral loathsomeness
and misery they are accepted in Christ Jesus, a truth
which it is so hard for the sinner to believe.
But although the son hears not his sin mentioned,
he yet makes his confession ; and this was fitting, for
though God may forgive, man may not therefore
forget. We must take notice that it is after, and
not before, the kiss of reconciliation that the confes
sion takes place ; for, the more the sinner knows and

192 THE PE0DIGAL SON.
tastes of the love of God, the more he grieves ever to
have sinned against that love. And thus will repent
ance be a life-long thing, for every new insight into
that forgiving love is a new reason for mourning that
we have ever sinned against it. The true relation
between repentance and a sense of forgiveness is
opened to us in such passages as Ezekiel xxxvi. 31,
where the Lord says, " Then " (and for the meaning
of " then," see ver. 24-30) " shall ye remember
your own evil ways," &c, &c. Compare Ezek. xvi.
60-63. The son does not indeed say, " Make me as
one of thy hired servants," for this shrinking back
from the free grace which would restore to him ah,
had been the one troubled element of his repentance ;
and in his dropping of these words, in his willingness
to be blest by his father to the uttermost, there is
evidence that the grace which he has already re
ceived, has not been in vain.
And now the father showed that he meant to give
him a place and a name in his house once more ; for
he "said to his servants, Bring forth the best robe
and put it on him, and put a ring on his hand and
shoes on his feet," these being among the highest
tokens of favor and honor (Gen. xh. 42). Probably by
the giving of the robe is especially signified that act
of God, which on the one side is a release from con
demnation, and on the other an imputation of the

THE PEODIGAL SON. 193
righteousness of Christ (Zech. iii. 4). They who bring
forth the robe are generally interpreted as the ministers
of reconciliation. We have the gift of the Spirit in
dicated in the ring which is here given. In the East,
the ring • was used often as a seal (Est. iii. 10, 12),
which naturally brings to our minds such passages as
Ephes. i. 13, 14 ; 2 Cor i. 22, in which a sealing by
God's Spirit is spoken of. The shoes also are given
him, to which answers a promise (Zech. x. 12 ; Ephes.
vi. 15). In the words, "Bring hither the fatted calf,
and kill it," I do not see, as some have done, any
special allusion to the Eucharist, but more generally
to the festal rejoicing in heaven at the sinner's re
turn, and also in the Church and in the sinner's own
heart. As in the preceding parables (verses 6 and 9),
so here ; the householder summons his servants to
share his joy. For this is the very nature of true joy
— that it desires to impart itself, it runs over ; and if
this be true of the joy on earth, how much more of
the yet hoher joy of heaven ! The father solemnly
reinstates the wanderer, before them all, in the honors
of a son. " This my son was dead, and is alive
again " (Ephes. ii. 1), " he was lost, and is found,"
(1 Pet. ii. 25) ; " and they began to be merry."
Here this parable, hke the two preceding, might
have ended. But our Lord, by saying " two sons," had

194 THE PE0DIGAL SON.
promised something more. It is to derive new beauty
from the contrast brought out between the large
heart of God and the grudging heart of man. The
elder brother, while the bouse is ringing with festal
rejoicing, returns from " the field" where, no doubt,
he had been as usual laboriously occupied. As he
" drew nigh to the house, he heard music and dan
cing." The singers and dancers were hired, as was
the custom, on such occasions. Surprised, " he called
one of the servants, and asked what these things
meant." Note how delicately his ungenial character
is already indicated. He does not go in, taking it
for granted that when his father makes a feast, there
is good cause for merriment. He prefers to learn
from a servant " what these things meant," demand
ing an explanation. And then the tidings that his
father had received his brother " safe and sound,"
with the thought of his father's joy, move hhn rather
to displeasure ; " he was angry," and in place of
rushing to that brother's arms, " would not go in."
Nor even when his father came out, and entreated
him, would he lay aside his displeasure, but loudly
complained, " Lo these many years do L serve thee,
neither transgressed J at any time thy commandmmt,
and yet thou never gavest me a kid, that L might make
merry with my friends ; " but "this thy son,"— he
does not say my brother,— " which hath devoured

THE PEODIGAL SON. 195
thy living," invidiously, for in a sense it was his own,
— " with harlots," very probably, yet only but a pre
sumption on his part, — " as soon as he was come," he
says not, was returned, but speaks of him as a stran
ger — upon the first moment of his arrival, " thou hast
killed for him," not a kid, but the choicest calf in the
stall. But there shaU not be, if the father can help it,
a cloud upon any brow, and instead of answering with
severity, he expostulates, and would have him see his
unreasonableness. The father's answer to the son is a
warning, too, that he is falling into the very sin of his
brother, when he said, " Give me the portion of goods
that falleth to me." He is feehng as though he did
not truly possess what he had with his father. " Son,
thou art ever with me, and all that L have is thine y "
and then he would make him see his unloving spirit ;
" Lt was meet that we should make merry and be glad y
for this thy brother " (not merely " my son," but " thy
brother ") " was dead, and is alive again y was lost and
is found." Our view of the success of the father's expostula
tions, of which we are not told, will be mainly deter
mined by the interpretation which we give to this
concluding portion of the parable. Those who see
in the two brothers the relations of the Jew and
Gentile to each other and to God, have here fewer
difficulties, than the other class of interpreters. But

196 THE PEODIGAL SON.
as in the interpretation I have sought to estabhsh,
this is denied to be the primary object of the parable,
we must look elsewhere for a solution of the difficul
ties, which are indeed the same which beset us in the
parable of the Laborers in the Vineyard. They re
solve themselves into this single one: Is their
righteousness, whom the elder brother represents,
real or not ? If real, how can it be reconciled with
his contumacy to his father, and his unloving spirit
towards his brother ? and how does it agree with the
aim of this part of the parable, which is directed
against the Pharisees, whose righteousness, for the
most part, was hypocritical ? But, on the other side,
if not real, how is this to be reconciled with the story,
according to which the elder brother had remained
ever in his father's house, or with his uncontradicted
assertion of his own continued obedience ? Each de
termination of the question is embarrassed with
difficulties. But there seems this possible middle course — that
we see in those whom he represents, a low, but not
altogether false form of legal righteousness. Such,
had many of the Pharisees, — following, though in
much blindness of heart, after righteousness (Rom.
x. 1, 2), a righteousness indeed of a low sort, in the
strivings after which they did not attain to any such
knowledge of the plague of their own hearts as should

THE PEODIGAL SON. 197
render them mild and merciful to others, or thorough
ly humble before God. Such may have been some of
the murmurers present — in whom the good was not to
be utterly denied, but who had need to be invited to
renounce their servile for a filial spirit. And in this
sense we must then understand the father's invitation
to the elder son to come in. Hitherto, he had been
laboring " im, the field," but now is invited to a festi
val. Those whose work for God had been the task
work of the law, are now invited to enter into the joy
of the Lord, the freedom of the Spirit. Thus we have
the Gospel preached to the legalist as well as to the
gross sinner, love speaking in both cases.
It is plainly seen by the elder son's reply, " thou
never gavest me a kid, " that he is ignorant of the
nature of that kingdom to which he is uninvited. He
is looking to get something from God, instead 'of pos
sessing all things in God. Instead of feeling it his
true reward, that he had ever been with his father,
he rather would plead this as estabhshing his claim
to some other reward. In the reply, " Son, thou art
ever with me, and all that L have is thine," we must
place the emphasis not on " thou," but on " with me."
What need to talk of other friends ? Thou art ever
with a better than ah, with myself. Why shouldest
thou have expected a kid, when "all that Lhave is

198 THE PEODIGAL SON.
thine " ? These last words wonderfully declare to us
the true nature of the rewards of the kingdom. In
the free kingdom of love one has not less because
another has more. To each of his children the
Lord says, "AU that L have is thine : " if then
any is straitened, it is not in God, but in his own
heart. The issue of these expostulations could not yet
be told, even as it was still uncertain whether the
Scribes and Pharisees might not be won to repent
ance. The Lord was intimating that as yet the king
dom of God was not closed against them — that they,
as well as publicans and harlots, were invited to
leave their poor, formal service (Gal. iv. 3, 9), and to
enter into the glorious liberties of the kingdom of
Christ. It is true that the refusal to go in, and on
these grounds, was fearfully fulfilled, when the Jew
in apostohc times refused to take part in the festival
of reconciliation, with which the Gentile world's com
ing into the kingdom was being celebrated. (Acts xiii.
45 ; xiv. 19 ; xvii. 5, 13 ; xviii. 12.) If his brother had
first been obliged to serve a painful apprenticeship to
the law, it might have been different (Acts. xv. 1).
But as it was, it was more than could be borne. At
the same time, we Gentiles must not forget that at
the end of the present dispensation all will be re
versed, and that we shall be in danger of playing the

THE PEODIGAL SON. 199
part of the elder brother, and shall do so if we grudge
at the largeness of the grace bestowed upon the Jew,
who is now feeding upon husks, far away from his
Father's house.

xxv.
THE UNJUST STEWARD.
Luke xvi. 1-9.
This parable, of which the difficulties are exceed
ingly great, has been the subject of manifold, and
those the most opposite, interpretations. I cannot
doubt, however, that we have here a parable of
Christian prudence, Christ exhorting us to use the
world and the world's goods in a manner against itself
and for God. As I proceed, I shall note the meanings
given to the parable by the best interpreters, and
also, what seem the weak points in those explanations
which I reject.
The Lord, having finished the parable of the-
Prodigal Son, did not break off the conversation,
but, probably after a short pause, resumed, address
ing His words, not to the Pharisees, but to those who
heard Him gladly, — to "His disciples." By " His dis
ciples," we must not understand exclusively the

THE UNJUST STEWARD. 201
twelve, nor yet the multitude which hung loosely upon
Him, but rather the whole body of those who having
left the world's service had passed over into the ranks
of His people. The Pharisees, it is true, were also
hearers of His words (ver. 14), but the very mention
of them as such shows that they were not the persons
to whom the parable was primarily addressed. The
Lord most probably intended, however, that some of
His shafts should glance off upon them.
" There was a certain rich man, which had a
steward." Such was Eliezer in the house of Abraham
(Gen. xxiv. 2-12, and see Gen. xxxix. 4). There is
not the slightest ground for supposing that the stew
ard was falsely " accused." This meaning does not lie
in the word. Indeed, his own words (ver. 3) seem an
acknowledgment of his guilt ; and his after con
duct will allow no conclusion, but that the accusation
had its foundation in truth. The charge against him
was, that he had administered his master's goods
without due fidelity, laying them out for himself, and
not for his lord. His lord " called him, and said unto
him, How is it that Lhear this of thee ? " — " of thee,"
the expostulation of indignant surprise. " Give an
account of thy stewardship, for thou mayest be no
longer steward."
They who, hke Anselm, see in this parable the
rise, growth, and fruits of repentance, lay much stress
9*

202 THE UNJUST STEWARD.
on these words, " How is it that L hear this of thee ? "
It is, they think, the voice of God speaking to the
sinner ; and the threat, " thou mayest be no longer
steward," is in hke manner a warning that he will
soon be removed from his earthly stewardship, and
have to render an account. He feels that when he is
once removed, there will be no help for him, and there
fore he seeks, while he has time, to do good with that
which is committed to him. He is, they say, still called
the " unjust " steward, not because he remains such,
but for the encouragement of penitents, hke Rahab
the harlot, &c. But there is nothing in the man
which shows repentance, but only an utterance of fear
lest poverty and distress come upon him ; and the
explanation of his being still called " unjust," is quite
unsatisfactory. But now he counsels with himself, and first he
feels his helplessness ; yet this does not last long.
"Lam resolved what to do y that when L am put out
of the stewardship they may receive me into their
houses," as one from whom they have received kind
nesses. Hereupon follows the collusion between him
and his lord's debtors. The two, who are spoken of
here, owed, the one a hundred measures of oil, the
other a hundred measures of wheat. We may sup
pose that the rich man had sold, through his steward,
a portion of his farm products to these debtors, on

THE UNJUST STEWARD. 203
credit. They were probably merchants, or other
factors, who had given their notes of hand, in which
they acknowledged the amount received, and their in
debtedness to that amount. These, which remained
in the steward's keeping, he now returns to them, —
" Take back thy bill,"' — bidding them to alter them,
or make new ones, in which they should confess to
having received smaller amounts of oil and wheat,
and consequently to owe so much less.
In this lowering of the bills, Vitringa finds the
key of the parable, and gives the following interpreta
tion, noteworthy for its exceeding ingeniousness. The
rich man is God, the steward the Pharisees, or rather
all the ecclesiastical leaders of the people, who were
stewards of the mysteries of the kingdom of God.
But they were accused by the prophets (Ezek. xxxiv.
2, Mai. ii. 8), and also by Christ, that they used their
power, not for the glory of God, but for themselves.
They feel the justice of the accusation, and they now
therefore seek to make themselves friends of the debt
ors of their Lord, of sinful men, — acting still as if
they had authority. They seek to make these friends
by lowering the standard of righteousness and obedi
ence, allowing men to say, " It is a gift " (Matt. xv.
5), suffering them hghtly to put away their wives
(Luke xvi. 18), and by various devices making slack
the law of God (Matt, xxiii. 16), — thus obtaining favor

204 THE UNJUST 6TEWAED.
with men, and enabhng themselves to retain their
honors. This interpretation gives a distinct meaning
to the lowering of the bills, — ," Write fifty," " Write
fourscore," — which very few others do. The moral
will then be that which is- commonly drawn from the
parable : Be prudent as these children of this world,
but while they use heavenly things for earthly objects,
do you use earthly things for heavenly objects.
Connected with this view is another, according to
which the unjust steward is set forth for the Phari
sees to imitate. They were the stewards in a dispen
sation soon to close ; and an exhortation is found here,
that in the httle while before the kingdom of Christ
should be set up, they should cultivate that spirit
which alone would give them entrance into the king
dom not to be moved, the spirit which they so much
lacked, of love and meekness toward all men. But
how shall this interpretation be reconciled with the
words, " He said also unto his disciples," with which
the Evangelist introduces the parable?
But to return ; — this child of the present world
filled up the short time remaining to him with new
acts of unrighteousness. It is not said that he at
tempted to conceal his fraudulent arrangement, or
that he called his lord's debtors together secretly.
Probably, in his desperation, the thing was done open
ly, and the arrangement was such as, from some cause

THE UNJUST STEVVAED. 205
or other, being once completed, must be permitted to
stand. Were it meant to have been a secret transac
tion, the steward would scarcely have obtained even
the limited praise which he does obtain as a skilful
adapter of his means to his ends. Least of all, would
he have obtained such praise, if it had depended
merely on the forbearance of his master, in the case
of discovery being made, whether the arrangement
should be allowed to stand.
But whether clandestine or not, the arrangement
was certainly a fraudulent one, and any attempt to
mitigate the dishonesty is hopeless. It may be said,
indeed, that this dishonesty is not of the essence of the
parable, but an inconvenience arising from the inade
quacy of earthly relationships to set forth divine ; that
while in worldly things it never can be that a servant
dealing wholly with reference to his own interests
would at the same time forward in the best manner
his lord's, in heavenly things our true interests abso
lutely coincide with those of our heavenly Lord ; so
that when we administer the things committed to us for
Him, then we lay them out also for ourselves, and when
for ourselves, for our eternal gain, then also for Him.
"And the lord commended the unjust steward,
because he had done wisely." It is the lord of the
steward, who is here meant, and not our Lord, who
does not begin to speak directly in His own person till

206 THE UNJUST STEWARD.
ver. 9. " Wisely " is not the happiest word that could
have been chosen, since wisdom is never in Scripture
disconnected from moral goodness. " Prudently " is
clearly the right word, and is found in Wichf's trans
lation. Few will deny that the phrase has something
perplexing in it, not from its being incapable of a fair
explanation, but from the liability of the passage to
abuse, though it is not really as unguarded as at first
sight it appears, for ver. 11 should never be discon
nected from the parable. The explanation is clearly
this : the man's deed has two sides ; one, the side of its
dishonesty, upon which it is most blameworthy — the
other, the side of its prudence, which, if it be not
particularly praiseworthy, yet is sufficiently analogous
to a Christian virtue to make it the ground of an ex
hortation and rebuke to the followers of Christ.
There are martyrs of the Devil, who put to shame the
saints of God, and running as they do with more
alacrity to death, than these to hfe (Bernard), may be
proposed to them for their imitation. Even so our
Lord here disentangles the steward's dishonesty from
his prudence ; the one, of course, can only have His
earnest rebuke, — the other may serve to provoke His
people to a like prudence, which yet should be at
once a holy prudence, and employed about things of
far higher and more lasting importance.
The next verse fully confirms this view : "For the

THE UNJUST STEWAED. 207
children of this world are in their generation wiser
than the children of light ; " that is, " more prudent."
The " children of this world" evidently means those
who look not beyond this earth, being born of the
spirit of the world and not of God. The phrase
occurs but once else in Scripture (Luke xx. 34);
though the term " children of light " may be found
John xii. 36 ; 1 Thess. v. 5 ; Ephes. v. 8. The decla
ration itself has been differently understood, according
as the words wanting to complete the sentence have
been differently supplied. Some complete it thus —
" The children of this world are wiser in their gene
ration" namely, in worldly things, " than the children
of light " are in those same worldly things ; that is,
earthly men are more prudent than spiritual men in
earthly things ; even as owls see better than eagles in
the dark. But it is hard to see how a general state
ment of this kind bears on the parable, which most are
agreed urges upon the Christian a heavenly prudence.
Others, then, are nearer the truth who complete
the sentence thus — " The children of this world are
wiser in their generation " (in worldly matters) " than
tlie children of light " in theirs, that is, in heavenly
matters ; the children of light being thus rebuked that
they are not at half the pains to win heaven, which
the men of this world are to win earth. This is the
meaning given, though too vaguely, by many, for it is

208 THE UNJUST STEWARD.
only perfectly seized when we see in the words, " in
their generation," or as they ought to be translated,
" unto " or " towards their generation," an allusion to
the debtors in the parable. They, the ready accom
plices in the steward's fraud, showed themselves to be
of the same generation as he was, — they were all
children of the ungodly world ; and the Lord's dec
laration is, that the men of this world make their
intercourse with one another more profitable, — obtain
more from it, — than do the children of light their
intercourse with one another. For what opportunities
are missed by Christians to whom a share of the earth
ly mammon is intrusted, of laying up treasure in
heaven, — of making friends for the time to come by
showing love to the poor saints, — or generally of
doing offices of kindness to the household of faith — to
the men of the same generation as themselves !
In the following verse the Lord exhorts His disci
ples not to miss these opportunities, — " And L say
unto you, Make to yourselves friends of the mammon
of 'unrighteousness, that when ye fail, they may receive
you into everlasting habitations." Some explain this
"mammon of unrighteousness" as wealth unjustly
gained by fraud and violence, but if so, the first
recommendation would be to restore it to its rightful
owners (Luke xix. 8). Others say it is not exactly
wealth unjustly acquired, but that wealth which

THE UNJUST STEWAED. 209
from the very nature of the world's business has
somewhat of defilement clinging to it. But a com
parison with ver. 11, where the equivalent phrase
"unrighteous mammon" is set against "true riches,"
— heavenly, enduring goods, — makes it far more prob
able that the words mean the uncertain mammon,
which is one man's to-day, and another's to-morrow.
And " mammon of unrighteousness " it may be called
in a deeper sense, since it is certain that in all wealth
a principle of evil is implied. In the moment of the
Church's first love, " all that believed were together,
and had all things common." So that though the
possessor of the wealth may have fairly acquired it,
yet is it not less the "unrighteous" mammon, witness
ing in its very existence to the absence of that highest
love which would have rendered it impossible that a
mine and thine should ever have existed.
The words " that when ye fail," are, of course,
equivalent to " that when ye die." Many, however,
have been unwilling to refer the words that follow,
" they may receive you" to the friends which were to
be made by the help of the unrighteous mammon,
as seeming to attribute too much to men and to their
intercession. It has been thought by some, that
" they " are the angels, and by others that God and
Christ are to receive ; by others, again, that the
phrase is impersonal, simply meaning " you may be

210 THE UNJUST STEWARD.
received." But if we look at this verse as standing
in close connection with the parable, of which indeed
it gives the moral, we shall see how this phrase comes
to be used. The debtors, being made friends, were to
receive the deposed steward into temporary habita
tions ; and by using these words in His practical
application of the parable, our Lord throws back
light upon it, and at once explains to His hearers its
most important part. And while it is idle to assert
that there will reside power of their own with the
glorified saints to admit any into the kingdom of
heaven, it is also idle to affirm that the words, " they
may receive you" in the second clause of the sentence,
can refer to any other than the friends mentioned in the
first. The true parallel to, and at once the explanation
and the guard of, this passage, is Matt. xxv. 34^-40.
In the verses 10-13, which stand in vital connec
tion with the parable, it is very observable that not
prudence, but faithfulness, is especially commended,
so as to put far away any possible abuse of it; just as
when our Saviour said, " Be wise as serpents," He
immediately guarded the precept, lest it should de
generate into cunning, by adding, " and harmless as
doves." Earthly things are slightingly called " that
which is least," as compared with those spiritual gifts
which are " much " y they are called " that which is
another man's," by comparison with the heavenly

THE UNJUST STEWARD. 211
goods, which when possessed are our own, and be
come a part of our very selves. In the dispensing, how
ever, of these worldly things, He declares that a man
may prove his fidelity, and will inevitably show what is
in him, and whether he be fit to be intrusted with that
which has a true and enduring value, namely, with a
ministration in the kingdom of God. And in ver. 13,
He further states what the fidelity is, which is required
in this stewardship, — it is a choosing of God instead
of mammon for our lord. For in this world, we are
claimed by two masters : one is God, man's rightful
lord ; the other is this unrighteous mammon, which
was given to be our servant, to be used by us for God
— but which has, in this sinful world, erected itself
into a lord, and now demands obedience from us,
which if we yield, we can no longer be the faithful
servants of God. God, for instance, will command a
scattering, when mammon will urge to a further gath
ering ; God will require spending upon others, when
mammon, or the world, will urge to a spending upon
our own lusts (Jas. iv. 4) ; one must be despised, if
the other is held to — it is impossible to be faithful to
both : " Ye cannot serve God and Mammon." Such
appears to me to be the connection between ver. 13
and the preceding verses, and between the whole of
these verses and the parable of which they are in
tended to give the moral.

XXVI.
THE RICH MAN AND LAZARUS.
Luke xvi. 19-31.
However loosely strung together verses 15-18
may at first sight appear, there is a thread of connec
tion running through them, and afterwards joining
them with the parable, — there is one leading thought
throughout, namely, that in all are contained rebuke
and threatening for the Pharisees. They had heard
our Lord's exhortation to a hberal bounty, and they
testified their scorn, whereupon He turned to them,
and rebuked their hypocrisy ; while they were covet
ous, they sought a reputation for righteousness among
men. It is then announced to them (ver. 16) that that
dispensation, of which they were the stewards, was
passing away, and a larger dispensation, in which they
should no more have the " key of knowledge " to ad
mit or to exclude, is begun, — and " every mem, press-;
eth into it." Not that the law itself was to be abol-

THE EICH MAN AND LAZARUS. 213
ished, for that would be eternal as the God who gave
it (ver. 17); and how great was their guilt, who,
while pretending to guard its honor, tampered with
some of its most sacred requirements, as in those con
cerning marriage (ver. 18) ; and thereupon the parable
follows. But, that being evidently addressed to the Phari
sees, a difficulty appears. They were indeed " covet
ous" (ver. 14), but prodigal excess in living, like
that of the rich man, is nowhere imputed to them.
On the contrary, we learn from contemporary histori
cal sources that they were remarkably abstemious.
Their sins were in the main spiritual, and what other
sins they had were such as were compatible with a
high reputation ¦ for spirituality. Mosheim supposes
the parable, therefore, to have been directed against
the Sadducees ; but there is no proof that any were
present ; nor is there any break between ver. 18 and
19. The following seems to be the explanation : While
it is true that covetousness, and not prodigality, was
the sin of the Pharisees, yet both of these, hoarding
and squandering, are so equally the consequences of
unbelief in God, and in God's word, that when the
Lord would rebuke their sin, He might take His exam
ple from a sin opposite in appearance to theirs. For
it ought never to be forgotten, that it is not the pri-

214 THE EICH MAN AND LAZARUS.
mary purpose of the parable to teach the fearful
consequences which will follow the abuse of wealth
and contempt of the poor, but the fearful consequences
of unbelief, of having the heart set on this world, and
refusing to believe in that invisible world, here known
only to faith, until by 'a miserable and too late expe
rience the existence of such an unseen world has been
discovered. The sin of Dives in its root is unbelief : the
squandering on self, and contempt of the poor, are
only the forms which it takes. His unbelief also
shows itself in supposing that his brethren, while
refusing to give heed to the sure word of God, would
heed a ghost. This is of the very essence of unbelief,
that it gives that credence to portents which it refuses
to the truth of God. Caligula, who mocked at the
existence of the gods, would hide himself under a bed
when it thundered ; and superstition and incredulity
are twin brothers. It is most important to keep in
mind that this, the rebuke of unbelief, is the central
thought and aim of the parable.
But it is worthy of notice, that besides the hteral
and obvious, there has also ever been an allegorical
interpretation of it. It has been suggested by Augus
tine, Theophylact, and some modern commentators,
that the past and future relations of the Jew and Gen
tile are here set forth. Dives is the Jew, or the Jewish
people, favored, self-righteous, and contemptuous of

THE EICH MAN AND LAZARUS. 215
the Gentile. To the Pharisees, as the representatives of
the nation, it is announced that an end is approaching,
nay, has come upon them already — the former state of
things is to be utterly abolished. The believing Gen
tiles — Lazarus — are to be brought by the messengers
of the new covenant into the consolations of the Gos
pel ; but the Jews — Dives — are to forfeit all the priv
ileges which they have abused, and will find themselves
with God's wrath abiding upon them to the uttermost.
If the present had been expressly named a para
ble, it would tend to confirm this or some similar
interpretation ; for according to that commonly re
ceived, it is no parable, the rich man means a rich
man, and the poor man, a poor — the purple and fine
linen mean just those things, and so on. Thus, in fact,
the question whether this is a parable or simply a
history (real or fictitious, it matters not), depends on
the manner in which it is interpreted. Those, who
support the allegorical interpretation, insist that it
loses none of its practical value thereby, only the
lower selfishness of the flesh will be used as a symbol
to set forth the more spiritual selfishness ; in addition
to the warning to the world, there will be another
deeper warning to the Church that it exalt not itself
in the multitude of its own privileges, but that it
have a deep and feeling sense of the spiritual wants
of .all who know not God, and seek earnestly to re-

216 THE EICH MAN AND LAZAEUS.
move them. I will say more of this interpretation
presently : it is not incompatible with the commonly
received interpretation, to which we now return.
" There was a certain rich man, which was cloth
ed in purple and fine linen, and fared sumptuously
every day," — habitually clothed, for this the word
implies. The extreme costliness of the purple dye of
antiquity is well known ; it was accounted, too, the
royal color, and the purple garment was then, as now
in the East, a royal gift (Esth. viii. 15 ; Dan. v. 7).
With it, idols were often clothed (Jer. x. 9). There
was pride, then, as well as luxury in its use. And the
byssus, rightly translated "fine linen," was hardly in
less price or esteem. Yet, while the rich man plainly
sought out for himself all that was costliest, it cannot
be observed too often that he is not accused of any
breach of the law, like those mentioned in Jas. v. 1-6.
In Augustine's words, — " Jesus said not, a calumnia
tor, — he said not, an oppressor of the poor, — he said
not, a spoiler of orphans : nothing of these. But — <
' There was a certain rich man.' And what was
his crime ? A lazar lying at his gate, and lying unre
lieved." He is not even accused of being a glutton.
There is nothing to make us think of him as other
than a reputable man, — one who desired to remove
from himself all things painful to the flesh, to sur
round himself with all things pleasurable. — His name

THE EICH MAN AND LAZARUS. 217
Christ has not told us, but the poor man's only.
" Jesus," says Cajetan, " of a purpose named the beggar,
but the rich man he designated merely as ' a certain
man,' so to testify that the spiritual order of things is
contrary to the worldly. In the world, the names of
the rich are known, but the names of the poor are
either not known, or if known are counted as unworthy
to be particularly noted."
At the gate of this rich man, the beggar Lazarus
was flung — brought there, it may be, by those who
counted they had done enough in casting him under
the eye of one who might so easily help him. As the
rich man's splendor was painted in a few strokes, so
in a few as expressive is the utter misery of Lazarus
set forth. Like Job, he was " full of sores," — hungry,
and no man gave to him, for it seems most probable,
that he desired, but in vain, " to be fed with the
crumbs which fell from the rich man's table." He
found sympathy only from the dumb animals ; " the
dogs came and licked his sores." This circumstance
seems mentioned to set forth the cruelty of the rich
man in its strongest light ; — that while he remained un
moved, even the pity of the brutes was stirred. We
have in fact in the two descriptions stroke for stroke.
Dives is covered with purple and fine linen ; Lazarus
is covered only with sores. The one fares sumptuous
ly ; the other desires to be fed with crumbs. The one
10

218 THE EICH MAN AND LAZARUS.
(as we may imagine) has numerous attendants to humor
every caprice ; the other, only dogs to tend his sores.
The faith and patience of Lazarus must be assumed,
since his poverty of itself would never have brought
him to Abraham's bosom. In all homiletic use of this
parable, this never should be left out of sight. Thus
Augustine tells the poor that poverty of spirit must
go along with external poverty ; and he often bids
them note, how the very Abraham into whose bosom
Lazarus was carried, was one who on earth had been
rich in flocks, and in herds, and in all possessions.
" What doth it profit thee," he says, " if thou lackest
opportunity and burnest with desire ? "
But this worldly glory and worldly misery are
alike to have an end ; "Lt came to pass that the beg
gar died;" and how mighty the change ! he whom
none but the dogs had cared for, is now carried by
angels " into Abraham's bosom." This last phrase
has been sometimes explained as though he was
brought into the chiefest place of honor and felicity.
But it is rather to find its explanation from John i. 18,
as a figurative phrase to express the deep quietness
of an innermost communion. It is the state of pain
less expectation intervening between the death of Chris
tians, and their perfect bliss at the Saviour's coming
in His kingdom. It is the " Paradise " of Luke xxiii.
43, the place of the souls under the altar, Rev. vi. 9 ;

THE EICH MAN AND LAZARUS. 219
as some distinguish it, it is blessedness, but not glory.
To this haven of rest, Lazarus was safely borne.
But " the rich man also died, and was buried,"
subsequently, as it would appear. Lazarus was more
early exempted from the misery of his earthly lot;
Dives was allowed a longer time for repentance. It
is possible that the putting of Lazarus under his eye
had been his final trial ; his neglect of him, the last
drop that made the cup of God's long-suffering to run
over. He " also died and was bitried." There is a
sublime irony, a stain upon ah earthly glory, in this
mention of his burial, connected as it is with what
follows. No doubt we may infer that he had a splen
did funeral ; this splendid carrying to the grave is for
him what the carrying into Abraham's bosom was for
Lazarus, — it is his equivalent. But his death is for
him an awakening from his flattering dream of ease
and pleasure upon the stern and terrible realities of
the hfe to come. He has sought to save his life, and
has lost it. The play, in which he has acted the rich
man, is ended, and as he goes .off the stage, he is strip
ped bare of all the trappings with which he has been
furnished in order to sustain his " part ; " all that re
mains is the fact that he has played it badly, and so
will have extremest blame from Him who. allotted
him the character to sustain. (See Chrysostom's fine
illustration, in the Appendix.)

220 THE EICH MAN AND LAZARUS.
From this verse, the scene of the parable passes
into the unknown world of spirits, but He to whom
both worlds are open and manifest speaks without
astonishment, as of things which He knows. It is not
easy now to separate between what is merely figure,
vehicle for truth, and the essential truth itself. We
may safely say that the form in which the expression
of pain, and of desire after alleviation, embodies itself,
is figurative, as is the dialogue between Dives and
Abraham. It is indeed the hope and longing for de
hverance which alternately rises, and is again crushed
by the voice of the condemning law speaking in and
through the conscience ; as by the seeing of Lazarus in
Abraham's bosom, we recognize the truth that the
misery of the wicked will be heightened by the com
parison which they will be continually making of
their lost estate with the blessedness of the faithful.
But to return ; he that had that gorgeous funeral,
is now " in hell," or rather, in Hades ; for as " Abra
ham's bosom " is not heaven, though it will issue in
heaven, so neither is Hades " hell," though to issue in
it, when death and Hades shah be cast into the lake
of fire, which is the proper hell (Rev. xx. 14). It is
the place of painful restraint, where the souls of the
wicked are reserved to the judgment of the great day ;
it is " the deep " mentioned in Luke viii. 31, — for as
that other blessed place has a foretaste of heaven, so

THE RICH MAN AND LAZAEUS. 221
has this place a foretaste of hell ; Dives is " in tor
ments," his purple robe has become a garment of
fire, as he himself says: "Lam tormented in this
flame." We can beheve that for a while all may have
seemed as a fearful dream. But when at length he
had convinced himself it was no dream, but an awak
ing, and would take the measure of his actual condi
tion, " he lifted up his eyes, and seeth Abraham afar
off, and Lazarus in his bosom" (Isai. lxv. 13, 14).
" And he cried and said, Father Abraham" still
clinging to the hope that his fleshly privileges will
profit him something. But this, which was once his
glory, is now the very stress of his guilt. That he, a
son of Abraham, that man of princely heart, should
have so denied through his life all which the name
" son of Abraham" was meant to teach him, this it
was which had brought him to that place. Nor does
Abraham deny the relationship — "Sow" yet this,
coupled as it was with the refusal of his request,
rings the knell of his latest hope. Infinitely slight
was the best alleviation he had looked for, — a drop
of water on his fiery tongue ! Nothing could have
marked more strongly how far he has fallen, how
conscious he has himself become of the depth of that
fall. Augustine : " The proud man of time, the beg
gar of hell."

222 THE EICH MAN AND LAZAEUS.
In this prayer of the rich man we have the only
invocation of 6aints in Scripture, and certainly not a
very encouraging one. He can speak of "father
Abraham," and his "father's house," but he will
know nothing of that other Father whom the Prodi
gal had found. For he is as far as heaven is from
hell, from the faith of the prophet (Isai. lxiii. 16).
And the pity which he refused to show, he fails to
obtain. " He lacked the drop, who denied the crumb "
(Augustine). He has not made friends of the mam
mon of unrighteousness, and now has none to receive
him into everlasting habitations. It is clear that
Abraham's reply is a refusal of his petition, but the
exact meaning of the words, " Thou in thy lifetime
receivedst thy good things," is not so certain. There are
two explanations, — the commonest one makes " thy
good things " to signify temporal felicities. " Son,
thou hadst thy choice, the things temporal, or the
things eternal, thou didst choose those ; and now it is
idle to think of altering thy choice." The other ex
planation would make " thy good things " to be good
actions or good qualities. In the words of Bishop
Sanderson, it was as if Abraham had said, " If thou
hadst anything good in thee, remember thou hast
bad thy reward in earth already, and now there re-
maineth nothing but the full punishment of thine
ungodliness in hell ; but as for Lazarus, he hath had

THE EICH MAN AND LAZAEUS. 223
the chastisement of his infirmities [his ' evil things ']
on earth already, and now remaineth for him nothing
but the full rewards (through grace) of his godliness,
in heaven." This was the view of Chrysostom, as
also of Gregory the Great, and it has certainly some
thing to commend it.
But however this may be, there is this meaning in
the passage, which is found so often in Scripture,
namely, that a course of unbroken prosperity is ever
an augury of ultimate reprobation (Ps. xvii. 14, Luke
vi. 24, 25). If the dross which is in every man be not
purged out by the fire of affliction, he cannot be a
partaker of holiness. Such was the experience of
Dives. Moreover, besides that law of retaliation,
requiring that the unmerciful should not receive
mercy, the fact is brought home to Dives, that with
death begins the separation of the elements of good
and evil, which elements in this world are mingled.
Good is gathered to good, and evil to evil, — and this
separation is permanent. " Between us and you there
is a great gulf fixed" a yawning chasm, too deep to
be filled up, and too wide to be bridged over ; " so
that they who would pass from hence to you cannot,
neither can they pass to us that would come from
thence." Of course the desire of passing thither
cannot be for the purpose of changing their con
dition ; but they cannot pass, he would say, even to

224 THE EICH MAN AND LAZAEUS.
yield a moment's comfort to any who are in that
place. But though repulsed for himself, he has a request
to urge for others. " L pray tliee, therefore, father,
that thou wouldest send him to my father's house, for
L have five brethren, that lie may testify unto them,
lest they also come into this place qf torment." Laz
arus will be able to " testify " to the reahty of that
unseen world at which he and his brothers perhaps
had mocked together. In this anxiety for his breth
ren's good, some have found the proof that suffering
was already doing its work by awakening within him
the slumbering germ of good ; and with this view,
would of necessity be connected his own ultimate res
toration. But the request grows out of another root.
There lies in it a secret justifying of himself, and ac
cusing of God : " If only I had been sufficiently
warned, if God had only given me clear evidences of
the need of repentance, and of this place as the goal
of a worldly life, I had never come hither. But at
least, let my brethren be warned."
Abraham's answer is brief, and almost stern.
" They are warned. They have Moses and the proph
ets, let them hear them." Our Lord plainly indicated
thus, tbat to hear Moses was to hear of life eternal
and an after retribution (Matt. xxii. 31, 32). But he
again cries : " Nay, father Abraham, but if one went

THE EICH MAN AND LAZAEUS. 225
unto them from the dead, they will repent." The
man's contempt of God's word, which he showed on
earth, follows him beyond the grave. We have here,
reappearing in hell, that " Show us a sign that we
may believe," which was so often on the lips of the
Pharisees on earth. But "if they hear not Moses
and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded
though one rose from the dead." These words de
mand care. Dives had said, " they will repent y "
Abraham replies, they will not even "be persuaded."
Dives — "if one went unto them from the dead;"
Abraham — " No, not if one rose from the dead."
This reply of Abraham's is most weighty, as giv
ing us an insight into the nature of faith, that it is a
moral act ; an aet of the will and the affections as
well as of the understanding ; so that it cannot be
forced by signs and miracles, for where there is a de
termined alienation of the will and affections from the
truth, no impression made by these miracles, even if
they be allowed to be genuine, wih be more than tran
sitory. Nor wih there fail always to be a loophole
somewhere, by which unbelief can escape ; and this
is well, or we should have in the Church the faith of
devils, who beheve and tremble. Compare the con
duct of the Pharisees (John xi. 47 ; xii. 10). We see
what multitudes acknowledge that the resurrection of
Christ sets the seal to His claims, and yet are not
10*

226 THE EICH MATT AND LAZAEUS.
brought at all nearer to repentance and faith. In ex
actly the spirit of Abraham's refusal, our Lord acted
after His resurrection (Acts x. 41). This was a mercy
as well as a judgment, for they would not have been
persuaded even by one who rose from the dead.
It remains only to give a slight sketch of their in
terpretation, who maintain that this parable has also
an allegorical meaning. Dives then represents the
Jewish nation, clad in the purple of the king, and the
fine linen of the priest. Tbey were amply furnished
with ah spiritual blessings (Isai. v. 2, 4 ; Rom. ix. 4).
But this talent of talents they turned into a selfish
thing ; Lazarus the beggar lay unreheved at their
gate, and without it, for the Gentiles were " aliens
from the commonwealth of Israel," — and full of
sores. These sores of the Gentile world are enumer
ated in Rom. i. 23-32. That the beggar desired the
crumbs of the rich man's table, has plainly a mean
ing. The yearning of the Gentiles after something
better than aught they possessed, was, in fact, a yearn
ing after that which the Jew had, and which, had he
been faithful, he would have imparted.
The dying of Lazarus and his reception into Abra
ham's bosom are explained by 1 Pet. ii. 10 — " which
in time past were not a people, but are now the peo
ple of God," &c, &c. (Eph. ii. 11-13). But Dives
dies also, — the Jewish economy comes to an end, and

THE EICH MAN AND LAZAEUS. 227
now Dives is " in hell." Who can read the history of
the latter days of the Jewish nation, and not feel the
force of this? Nay, and ever since have they not
been " in torments ? " In proof, turn to the word of
prophecy (Lev. xxvi. 14-39 ; Deut. xxviii. 15-68), or
call to mind our Lord's words (Luke xiii. 28-30).
But as Dives looked for relief from Lazarus, so is the
Jew looking for the alleviation of his miseries through
some bettering of his outward estate, — some improve
ment of his civil condition, but which, if granted to
him, would prove no more than a drop of water on the
tongue. He knows not that it is the wrath of God
which constitutes his misery.
By the five brethren of Dives will be set forth,
according to this scheme, all who hereafter are tempt
ed to the same abuse of their spiritual privileges.
When the Gentile Church sins as the Jewish Church
did before it, glorying in its gifts rather than using
them for others, contented to see in its very bosom a
population outcast, save in name, from its privileges
and blessings, and to see beyond its limits milhons of
heathens to whom it has but httle care to impart the
knowledge of Christ, then is it in danger, like the
brethren of Dives, of coming with him to this place of
torment. So that the latter part of this parable
speaks to us Gentiles, as Paul spoke to the Gentile
converts at Rome; "Behold therefore the goodness

228 THE EICH MAN AND LAZAEUS.
and severity of God ; on them which fell severity, but
towards thee, goodness, if thou continue in His good
ness ; otherwise, thou also shalt be cut off" (Rom.
xi. 22).

XXVH.
UNPROFITABLE SERVANTS.
Luke xvii. 7-10.
Some interpreters find a connection between this
parable and the discourse which precedes it, while
others affirm that none can be traced. Theophylact
supposes, that in the sixth verse the Lord had declared
how great things a hving faith would enable His dis
ciples to perform ; but lest they should thereby fall
into a snare of pride, He spoke this parable. Other
expositors, seeking no connection, affirm that it merely
teaches, in a general manner, how God is debtor to no
man, that ah we can do is of duty, and nothing of
merit, and hence that deep humility becomes us.
Altogether different from these interpretations is
that proposed by Grotius. According to this, the
parable is made to represent the servile standing of
the Jew under the old covenant. The arguments are

230 UNPEOFITABLE SEEVANTS.
mainly these : the common interpretation sets forth in
a wrong aspect the relations between Christ and His
people. Is it hkely that He who said, " Henceforth
I call you not servants, but I have called you friends;"
would bring forward in so strong a hght, the service
done to Him as one merely servile, and for which He
would render them no thanks ? Compare Luke xii.
37. On the other hand, the parable does, it is affirmed,
exactly set forth the relation of the greater part of
the Jews to God. To be sure, they did a certain
work, but as it was without love and faith, they were
" unprofitable servants" in whom the Lord could take
no pleasure. There is something attractive in this exposition,
and it is worthy of respectful consideration. Yet the
present parable need not be opposed to, but rather
should be balanced with, that other saying of our
Lord's (Luke xii. 37) above referred to. This is the
way God might deal ; it is not said that He will deal
in this way. This is the relation which, in strict jus
tice, He might assume ; the other is that which, ac
cording to the riches of His grace, He will assume.
We are humbly to remember this. It is only to the
humble, indeed, that He can give grace, for as it is
certain that the unclean vessel will altogether taint
the wine poured into it, so, without humility, the gifts
of God wih be perverted to spiritual wickedness, more

UNPEOFITABLE SEEVANTS. 231
deadly than the natural corruptions of the heart.
Doubtless, the relation of tbe Christian to his Lord is
set forth here under a somewhat severer aspect than
is usual under the New Covenant. (Our translation
makes it seem severer than it need ; for the words,
"Both He thank that servant?" would be better,
" Doth He count Himself especially beholden to that
servant ? " ) Yet the experience of every heart will
bear witness that this side of the truth as well as the
other, should be set forth, — that we should feel that a
necessity is laid upon us, — that we are not to question
our Master's will, but to do it. This fear does not
exclude love, but is its true guardian ; they mutually
support one another : for while it is true that motives
drawn from gratitude and love must ever be the chief
incentives to obedience (Rom. xii. 1), yet so long as
our hearts are not made perfect in love, we must be
presented with others also. And while our Lord is
graciously pleased to accept our work, and to reward
it, we should ever be reminded that this is an act of
His free grace ; for there is another footing upon
which it might be placed, that of the parable, upon
which we ourselves must evermore put it.
A more real difficulty, as it appears to me, is this :
that in the first part of the parable (ver. 7, 8) the
purpose seems to be to commend patience in the
Lord's work — that we do not, after we have made

232 UNPEOFITABLE SEEVANTS.
6ome exertion, account that we have a claim to be
exempted henceforth from strenuous toil, but rather
take example from the servant. But in the second
part (vers. 9, 10), it is no longer this patient continu
ance in well-doing, buthumihty, that is enjoined — the
confession that, at best, our service is poor and of
little value. The solution is, however, I suppose, that
impatience under deferred reward, with the desire to
be released from labor, springs from over-estimation of
our work ; while he who feels that all which he has yet
done is but little, as he will not think that he has a
claim to a release from toil, so neither wih he count
that God is his debtor. The two wrong states of mind
spring from the same root, and are to be met by the
same remedy, namely, by our learning to know what
our actual relation to God is, — that it is one of ser
vants to a master.
With regard to the actual words of the parable,
there is not much to remark. The waiting at the
table with the dress girded was a mark of servitude.
Note, then, the condescension of the Son of God, in
His saying, Luke xii. 37, and in His doing, John xiii.
4. As to the confession which He puts into the
mouths of His disciples, " When ye shall have done
all these things which are commanded you, say, We
are unprofitable servants " (as many have observed
before), if this they are to say when they have done

UNPEOFITABLE SEEVANTS. 233
all, how much more, when their consciences bear them
witness, as his conscience must bear witness to every
man, that they have grievously failed and come short
of their duty.

XXVIH.
THE UNJUST JUDGE.
Luke xviii. 1-8.
" He spake a parable unto them" the disciples,
" that men ought always to pray" that men must needs
pray always, if they would escape the things coming
on the earth (see Luke xvii.). Not so much the duty,
or the suitableness, as the absolute necessity of instant
persevering prayer is here declared. In this pre
cept to pray always (comp. Eph. vi. 18 ; 1 Thess. v.
17), there is nothing impossible commanded if we re
gard prayer as the continual desire of the soul after
God, — having indeed its times of intensity, but not
being confined to those times. "That soul," says
Donne, " that is accustomed to direct herself to God
upon every occasion, that, whatsoever string be strick
en in her, base or treble, her high or her low estate,
is ever turned towards God — that soul prays some
times when it does not know that it prays."

THE UNJUST JUDGE. 235
None but the Son of God might have ventured
to use the comparison of an unrighteous judge. We
must not seek, as many have striven to do, to extenu
ate his unrighteousness ; but on the contrary, the
greater we conceive this to have been, the more does
the encouraging truth come out which the Lord
would enforce. If a bad man will yield to the mere
force of the importunity which he hates, how much
more certainly will a righteous God be prevailed
on by the faithful prayer which He loves. This judge
had reached that point of reckless wickedness, that
he was ahke indifferent to God and man. The case,
therefore, of any supphant was the more hopeless,
especially of one weak and poor. Such, no doubt,
was the widow of the parable. Many writers have
noticed the exceeding desolation of the state of widow
hood in the East, and the consequent exposure to all
manner of oppression ; of this, the numerous warnings
in Scripture against such oppression, are sufficient
evidence (Exod. xxii. 22 ; Deut. xxiv. 17 ; Mai. iii.
5, and many more).
How fitly, then, does this widow represent the
Church under that persecution which is always going
forward. Nor need we see in her only the Church
at large, but also any single soul in conflict with the
powers of darkness and the world. The adversary
then (1 Pet. v. 8) is the prince of the darkness of

236 THE UNJUST JUDGE.
this world. The elect are here represented as in con
flict with those adverse powers, till under a sense of
their helplessness to affect their own dehverance, a
cry is wrung out from them for aid ; chiefly for that
which shah be final and complete, at the revelation of
the Son of Man in His glory. The words in which
their need finds utterance, "Avenge me of mine adver
sary" wonderfully express the relation in which we
stand to the evil which, we are conscious, is mightily
working within us, — that it is not our very self, but
an ahen power, holding us in bondage. It is one
great work of the Spirit of Gdd to make us feel this
distinctness between us and the evil which is in us
(Rom vii.). The renewed man knows that he has an
adversary, but for his comfort he knows also that this
adversary is not his very self ; and knowing this, he
is able to cry, " Deliver me from the oppression of
mine adversary." This is the same petition that we
make daily, when we say, " Dehver us from evil," or
rather " from the Evil One."
For a time the judge was deaf to the widow's pe
tition ; " He would not for a while." God often seems
to man to be acting thus. And when His people re
ceive no speedy answer, they are tempted to hard
thoughts of God, and to say with the storm-tost disci
ples, " Carest thou not that we perish " ? Now this
parable is intended, in fact, to meet this very difficulty

THE UNJUST JUDGE. 237
and temptation. — We have, in ver. 4, 5, recorded, not
what was spoken aloud, but the voice of the heart, as
that heart spake in the hearing of God. " He said
within himself, Though L fear not God, nor regard
man, yet because this widow troubleth me, L will
avenge her, lest by her continual coming she weary me."
Compare Matt. xv. 23 ; this parable and the miracle
there recorded, form altogether an interesting parallel.
It is likely that between the parable and its appli
cation, — between ver. 5 and 6, — the Lord paused
awhile, and then again resumed ; " Hear what the
unjust judge saith; and shall not God avenge His
own elect ? " The righteous God is here opposed to
the unrighteous judge ; the elect, the precious before
God, to the widow, the despised among men ; their
prayers, to her clamor; and the days and nights
during which those prayers are made, to the compara
tively short time during which she beset the judge.
The certainty that the elect will be heard, rests not,
however, on their mighty and assiduous crying, as its
ultimate ground, but on their election by -God, which
is, therefore, here brought especially into notice. Shall
He not avenge them, asks the Lord, " though He bear
long with them ? " or since that phrase is mostly used
in Scripture, to set forth the relation of God to the
sins of men, it would avoid perplexity if here we
should use the phrase, " though He bear them long in

238 THE UNJUST JUDGE.
hand ? " or, " though He delay with them long ? " that
is, long, as men count length. In fact " He will avenge
them speedily" delivering them from the furnace of
affliction the instant that patience has had its perfect
work ; so that there is meant to be an apparent con
tradiction between ver. 7 and that which follows,
while there really is none. The relief which to man's
impatience seems to tarry long, in fact arrives speed
ily ; it could not, according to the far-seeing and lov
ing counsels of God, have arrived a moment earlier.
We find practical ihustrations of these words in our
Lord's conduct with the family of Bethany (John xi.
and see also Matt. xiv. 24, 25). The point of the
closing words, " Nevertheless, when the Son of man
cometh, shall He find faith on the earth ? " is not that
there will be at the last but few, if any, faithful ; but
that the faith even of the faithful will be almost
failing, so urgent will be the distress when He shall
appear for salvation and deliverance. All help will
seem utterly to have failed, so that the Son of man
will hardly find that faith which believes that light
will break forth even when the darkness is thickest,
and believing this, continues to pray. The verse
stands parallel to, and may be explained by, those
other words of our Lord : " For the elect's sake," lest
their faith also should fail, and so no flesh be saved,
" those days shall be shortened " (Matt. xxiv. 22).

XXIX.
THE PHARISEE AND THE PUBLICAN.
Luke xviii. 9-14.
The last parable was to teach us that prayer must
be earnest and persevering ; this, that it must also
be humble. It was spoken " unto certain which
trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and
despised others."
" Two men went up into the temple to pray" we
are to suppose at one of the fixed hours of devotion,
(Acts iii. 1) ; — the Pharisee, a specimen of those, who,
satisfying themselves with a certain external freedom
from gross offences, have remained ignorant of the
plague of their own hearts ; the Publican, the repre
sentative of all who, though they have grievously
transgressed, are now heartily mourning for their sins,
and yearning after one who shall dehver them from
these, and from their penalty. To pray standing was

240 THE PHARISEE AND THE PUBLICAN.
the manner of the Jews (1 Kin. viii. 22 ; 2 Chron. vi.
12 ; Matt. vi. 5) ; though in moments of a more than
ordinary humiliation, they prostrated themselves (Dan.
vi. 10 ; 2 Chron. vi. 13 ; Acts xxi. 5).
The Pharisee's prayer at first seems to promise
well — " God, L thank thee" yet its early promise
quickly disappears ; under pretended thankfulness
self-exaltation is thinly veiled. He thanks God, in
deed, but not aright ; for the right recognition of
God's grace wih always be accompanied with deep
self-abasement, while we confess our infinite shortcom
ings with such help at command ; and moreover we
shall thank Him as much for the sense of need which
He has awakened within us, as for the supplies of grace
which he has given us. But this Pharisee thanks God
that He is " not as other men" dividing the whole of
mankind into two classes, he in the one class, all the
world besides in the other. And as he can think noth
ing too good of himself, so nothing too bad of them ;
they are " extortioners, unjust, adulterers}' And then
his eye alighting on the pubhean, of whom he may
have known nothing except that he was a publican, he
drags him into his prayer. He, thank God, has no
need to beat his breast, nor to cast his eyes in shame
upon the ground.
So perfect is he in regard to the commands of the
second table. He now returns to the first. " L fast

THE PHARISEE AND THE PUBLICAN.

241

twice in the week." According to the law of Moses,
but one fast-day in the year was appointed, the great
day of atonement (Lev. xvi. 29), but the more religious
Jews, and especially the Pharisees, kept two fasts
weekly. Thus does he ; nor is this aU : " Lgive tithes
of all that L possess" (rather of all that I earn).
The law commanded only to tithe the fruit of the
field and produce of the cattle (Num. xviii. 21 ;
Deut. xiv. 22 ; Lev. xxvii. 30), but he tithed mint and
cummin (Matt, xxiii. 23),— ah. He would, therefore,
in both respects, lay claim to doing more than might
strictly be demanded of him ; he would bring in God
as his debtor. Acknowledgment of wants or confes
sion of sins, there is none in his prayer, if prayer it
can be called. Augustine — " Thou hast said that thou
hast ah, thou hast asked for nothing ; — in what respect,
then, hast thou come to pray ? "
It aggravates our sense of the moral outrage in
volved in the Pharisee's contemptuous allusion to his
fehow-worshipper, if we keep in mind that in this last
we are to see one who at this very moment was passing
into the kingdom of God, one in whom under sore
pangs the new man was being born. For " the pub
lican standing afar off, would not lift up so much as
his eyes unto heaven," to the dwelling of the Holy One
(Ezra ix. 6). He stood " afar off," not but that he
had a fuh right to approach, for undoubtedly he also
11

242 THE PHARISEE AND THE PUBLICAN.
was a Jew ; but in reverent awe, not presuming to
press nearer to the holy place. Moreover, he " smote
upon his breast," a sign of self-accusation,* or inward
grief, at the same time " saying, God be merciful to
me a sinner," or " to me the sinful one." The selection
of the word here rendered " be merciful," is very ob
servable, for it implies not reconcihation merely, but
reconcihation affected through some gift, or sacrifice,
or offering. And as the other had singled himself out
as the one holy one in the world, so the pubhean
singles himself out as 'the chief of sinners — the man
in whom all sins have met. Who at that moment
when he is first truly convinced of his sins, thinks any
other man's sins can be equalto his own ?
And he found the mercy which he' asked ; his
prayer ascended, a sacrifice of sweet savor, while the
prayer of the other was blown back like smoke into
his own eyes ; " Ltell you this man went down to his
house justified rather than the other." Not merely
was he justified in the secret counsels of God, but
a sweet sense of a received forgiveness was shed
abroad upon his heart. The other meanwhile went
down from the temple with the same cold, dead heart,
with which he had gone up. Christ does not mean
that one by comparison with the other was justified,
for there are no degrees in justification, but that the
one absolutely was justified, and the other was not ;

THE PHAEISEE AND THE PUBLICAN. 243
so that here the words recorded in Ps. cxxxviii. 6 ;
Isai. lvii, 15, have their fulfilment.
The whole parable fitly concludes with that weighty
saying, " For every one that exalteth himself shall be
abased, and he that hwnbleth himself shall be exalt
ed."

xxx.
THE POUNDS.
Luke xix. 11-27.
Most of what might be said upon this parable has
been anticipated in that of the Talents. Each bears
the most decisive marks of its adaptation to the peculiar
circumstances under which each was spoken. " He
added and spake a parable, because he was nigh to
Jerusalem, and because they thought that the kingdom
of God should immediately appear." It was uttered,
then, to teach the need of a patient waiting for Christ
by His disciples ; and not merely that, but also of an
active working for Him during His absence. But He
had also other hearers on this His last journey to Jeru
salem- — a multitude drawn together by curiosity, and
by other mingled motives. These were hable to be
drawn presently into the mighty stream of hostihty
which was running against Him. For them is meant
that part of the parable recorded in ver. 14-27.
In the great Roman empire, such a circumstance

THE POUNDS.

245

as that which serves for the groundwork of this para
ble can have been of no infrequent occurrence. That
he who should thus seek and obtain a kingdom was a
" nobleman" is only what we should expect. And
this has its deeper significance, for who was of such
noble birth as He who, even according to the flesh,
came of earth's first blood — was the Son of Abraham,
the Son of David ; who was, besides, the only-begot
ten Son of God ?
This nobleman goes to receive, not a kingdom at a
distance, but rather the investiture of that kingdom
whereof he has hitherto been only one of the more
illustrious citizens. This is implied by the message
of his fellow-citizens, " We will not have this man to
reign over us." And Christ went, not only to be en
throned in His heavenly state, but also to receive
solemn investiture of that earthly kingdom which
hereafter He shall, returning, claim as His own.
Before he went, however, " he called his ten ser
vants," or rather ten servants of his, " and delivered
them ten pounds, and said unto them, Occupy till L
come." A pound (mina) is equal to £4 ls. 3d. In
St. Matthew, talents (a talent=£243 15s.) were given,
for that parable was to the apostles. How remarkable
are these occupations of peace in which they should
be engaged, and that too, while a rebehion was going
on. Men, feehng strongly, have supposed that the

246 THE POUNDS.
kingdom of God was immediately to appear (ver. 11),
and that they, and not Christ Himself, were to bring
it into its outward form and subsistence — instead of
seeing that their part was, with the silent occupation
of their talent, to prepare the world for the coming
of that kingdom, which should take place on the re
turn of the King in His glory.
The Jews were especially Christ's fellow-" citi
zens," for, according to the flesh, He was of the seed
of Abraham ; and they hated Him not merely in His
life, but every persecution of His servants was a mes
sage of defiance sent after Him, " We will not have
this man to reign over us." And Tbeophylact well
observes, how twice this Very declaration found formal
utterance from their hps — once when they cried to
Pilate, " We have no king but Caesar ; " and again
when tbey said, " Write not, the King of the Jews."
If we find the fall accomphshment of all which this
parable contains, not at the destruction of Jerusalem,
but at the day of judgment, then these rebehious citi
zens wih be not merely the Jews, but ah such evil
men as by word or deed openly deny their relation
and subjection to Jesus, as their Lord and King, and
their message wih have its entire fulfilment in the
great apostacy of -the last days, which shah be a
speaking of great things against Him. (Rev. xiii. 5,
6 ; Dan. vii. 25.)

THE POUNDS.

247

On the following verses (15—23) there is little to
say which has not been said elsewhere. The rewards
which the nobleman imparts to his faithful servants
are royal : he sets them over cities. This method of
showing grace to servants was not uncommon in the
East. The rewards, too, are proportioned to their
fidelity. Those who stand by, and are bidden to take
the pound from the slothful servant, and give it to the
ablest, are clearly the angels, who never fail to take
an active part in all scenes descriptive of the final
judgment. When the king has thus distributed rewards and
penalties to those of his own household — for the
Church is the household of God — he proceeds to exe
cute vengeance on ah who had openly cast off aUe
giance to him (Prov. xx. 8). They are slain before his
face ; as their guilt was greater, so their punishment
is more terrible, than that of the slothful servant.
The slaying of the king's enemies in his presence be
longs to the innermost kernel of the parable. The
words set forth fearfully the unmitigated wrath of the
Lord Jesus against His enemies — His enemies only as
they are the enemies of ah righteousness — which
shall be revealed at the last (Rev. xiv. 10). We
may compare Heb. i. 13, and we can learn from
Josh. x. 24, what the image is, that underlies that

APPENDIX.

ON OTHER PARABLES BESIDES THOSE IN THE
SCRIPTURES.
It has been denied by some, but against all testimony, that
tbe method of teaching by parables was current among the Jews
before our Saviour's time. Tq this they had been mainly led by
the fear lest it should detract from His glory, to suppose that He
had availed Himself of a manner of teaching already in use. But
if Christianity is indeed the world-religion, it must gather into
one all dispersed rays of hght ; it must appropriate to itself all
elements of truth which are anywhere scattered abroad, claiming
thus its own. Our blessed Lord so spake, as that His doctrine,
according to its outward form, should commend itself to His
countrymen. Thus He appealed to proverbs in common use
among them. He used the terms which they had employed,
but all His words being creative, He breathed into them also a
new spirit of life. The prayer, " Thy kingdom come," formed
already a part of the Jewish liturgy, yet not the less was it a
new prayer on the lips of all who had realized in any measure
the idea of the kingdom, and what was signified by the coming
of that kingdom, as He first had enabled them to realize it. In
hke manner it is not to be doubted that a proselyte was in the
Jewish schools entitled " a new creature," and his passing over
to Judaism was called " a new birth ; " yet these terms were
11*

250 APPENDIX.
probably used to express a change only in his outward relations
— that his kinsmen were his no more ; it remained for Christ
and His apostles to appropriate them to the higher mysteries of
the kingdom of heaven.
It is also certain that the use of parables or briefer compari
sons to illustrate doctrines, was eminently in use among the Jew
ish teachers. Hillel and Schammai were the most illustrious
teachers by parables before the time of our Saviour ; R. Meir
immediately after. With this last, as tradition goes, the power
of inventing parables notably declined. I will quote some of
the best Jewish parables which I have met with. The following
is occasioned by a question which has arisen, namely, Why the
good so often die young ? It is answered, that God foresees that
if they lived they would fall into sin. " To what is this like ?
It is like a king who, walking in his garden, saw some roses
which were yet buds, breathing an inefiable sweetness. He
thought, If these shed such sweetness while yet they are buds,
what will they do when they are fully blown ? After a while,
the king entered the garden anew, thinking to find the roses now
blown, and to delight himself with their fragrance ; but arriving
at the place, he found them pale and withered, and yielding no
smell. He exclaimed with regret, Had I gathered them while
yet tender and young, and while they gave forth their sweetness,
I might have delighted myself with them, but now I have no
pleasure in them. The next year the king walked in his garden,
and finding rosebuds scattering fragrance, he commanded his
servants, Gather them, that I may enjoy them before they
wither, as last year they did." The next is ingenious enough,
though a notable specimen of Jewish self-righteousness : — " A
man had three friends : being summoned to appear before the
king, he was terrified, and looked for an advocate ; the first,
whom he had accounted the best, altogether refused to go with
him ; another replied that he would accompany him to the door
of the palace, but could not speak for him ; the third, whom he
had held in least esteem, appeared with him before the king,
and pleaded for him so well as to procure his deliverance. So
every man has three friends, when summoned by death before

APPENDIX.

251

God, his Judge : the first, whom he most prized, his money, will
not go with him a step ; the second, his friends and kinsmen,
accompany him to the tomb, but no further, nor can they deliver
him in the judgment ; while the third, whom he held in least
esteem, the Law and good works, appear with him before the
King, and deliver him from condemnation." How different is
this view of the Law as an advocate with the Judge, from that
given by our Lord (Matt. v. 25, 26), who compares it to an adver
sary dragging us before a tribunal where we are certain to be
worsted !
There is a fine one of the fox, who seeing the fish in great
trouble, darting hither and thither, while the stream was being
drawn with nets, proposed to them to leap on dry land. This is
put in a Rabbi's mouth, who, when the GrEeco-Syrian kings
were threatening with death all who observed the law, was
counselled by his friends to abandon it. There are besides these,
a multitude of briefer ones, deserving the title of similitudes
rather than of parables. Thus, the death common to all, and
the doom after death so different to each, is likened to a king's
retinue entering a city at a single gate, but afterward lodged
within it very differently, according to their several dignity.
In another it is shown how body and soul are partners in sin,
and so will justly be partners in punishment. Thus : A mortal
king assigned to an excellent garden in which were ripe fruits,
two keepers, a lame man, and a blind man. The lame man
seeing the fruit, persuaded the blind man to take him on his
shoulders, so that he might pluck, and they both might eat, &o.
The resemblance which is seen between some of the Jewish
parables and those related by our Lord, is merely such as must
needs have found place, when the same external life, and the
same outward nature, were used as the common storehouse from
whence images and examples we^ drawn alike by all. The
following is one of the best of those which pretend to any simi
larity with His, and has been sometimes likened ,to that part of
the Marriage of the King's Son which relates to the wedding
garment. " The Rabbis have delivered what follows, on Eccl.
xii. 7, where it is written, ' The spirit shall return unto God

252 APPENDIX.
who gave it.' He gave it to thee unspotted, see that thou re
store it unspotted to Him again. It is like a mortal king, who
distributed royal vestments to his servants. Then those that
were wise, folded them carefully up, and laid them by in the
wardrobe ; but those that were foolish went their way, and,
clothed in these garments, engaged in their ordinary work.
After a while the king required his garments again ; the wise
returned them white as they had received them ; but the foolish,
soiled and stained. Then the king was well pleased with the
wise, and said, Let the vestments be laid up in the wardrobe,
and let these depart in peace ; but he was angry with the foolish,
and said, Let the vestments be given to be washed, and those
servants be cast into prison : — so will the Lord do with the
bodies of the righteous, as it is written, Isa. lvii. 2 ; with their
souls, 1 Sam. xxv. 29 ; but with the bodies of the wicked, Isa.
xlviii. 22, lvii. 21 ; and with their souls, 1 Sam. xxv. 29." But
how slight the resemblance !
Thus much in regard of the Jewish parables. Among the
Fathers of the Christian Church, there are not many, as far as
I am aware, who have professedly constructed parables for the
setting forth of spiritual mysteries. Eadmer, a disciple of An
selm, has preserved a sort of basket of fragments from his ser
mons and his table-talk. Far better are those interspersed
through the Greek religious romance of the seventh or eight
century, Barlaam and Josaphat, ascribed, though I believe
without sufficient grounds, to St. John of Damascus, and often
printed with his works. Those which are entitled parables in
the writings of St Bernard, although containing much of beauty
and instruction, are rather allegories than parables. But if para
bles, professedly such, are not of frequent occurrence in the
early Church writers, the parabolical element is, notwithstand
ing, very prominent in their ^aching. For instance, in the writ
ings of St. Augustine, one is only perplexed amid the endless
variety what instances to select : but we may take this one as
an example. He is speaking of the Son of God and the sinner
in the same world, and appearing under the same conditions of
humanity. " But," he proceeds, " how great a difference there

APPENDIX. 253
is between the prisoner in his dungeon and the visitor that has
come to see him. They are both within the walls of the dun
geon : one who did not know might suppose them under equal
restraint, but one is the compassionate visitor who can use his
freedom when he will, the other is fast bound there for his
offences. So great is the difference between Christ, the com
passionate visitor of man, and man himself, the criminal in
bondage for his offences." Chrysostom, too, is very rich in such
similitudes ; as for instance, when speaking of the exaltation of
outward nature, the redemption of the creature which shall
accompany the manifestation of the sons of God, he says, " To
what is the creation like ? It is like a nurse that has brought up
a royal child, and when he ascends his paternal throne, she too
rejoices with him, and is partaker of the benefit." But the field
here opening before us, is too wide to enter on. I will not deny
myself the pleasure, however, of transcribing the following para
ble from H. de Sto. Victore. " A certain father drove out his
rebellious son with much seeming rage, that he might thus learn
humility. But persisting in his obstinacy, his mother, according
to a secret plan, is sent by the father, that, not as if sent thus,
but as if led by her own affection, she may soothe him by her
gentleness, incline him to humility, declare that his father is
greatly angered, yet promise to intercede, say that his father
cannot be appeased except by great entreaties, but engage to
undertake his cause herself, and to bring the affair to a happy
termination." The mother, here, he presently explains as divine
Grace. One Persian parable, too, I will quote for its deep significance.
" Mankind cannot be better compared than to a man who, flee
ing from an enraged elephant, goes down into a well ; he is
caught on two boughs which cover its mouth, and his feet are
placed upon something which projects from the interior of the well
—it is four serpents, who put their heads out of their dens ; he
perceives at the bottom of the well a dragon, which, with open
maw, awaits only the moment of his fall to devour him. His
attention is turned to the two boughs, from which he is sus
pended, and he sees at their starting-point two rats, the one

254 APPENDIX.
black, the other white, which cease not to gnaw them. Another
object, however, presents itself to his notice ; it is a beehive
filled with bees : he applies himself to eating of their honey, and
the pleasure he finds in it causes him to forget the serpents on
which rest his feet, the rats which gnaw the branches, and the
danger which every moment threatens him of becoming the
prey of the dragon. His folly and delusion cease only with his
life. This well — 'tis the world filled with perils and miseries ;
the four serpents are the four humors whose mixture forms our
body, but which, when their equilibrium is destroyed, become so
many fatal poisons ; the two rats, black and white, are day and
night, whose succession consumes our life ; the dragon is the in
evitable limit which awaits us all ; the honey, finally, is those
pleasures whose false sweetness allures and misleads us."

NOTES.
Page 7. — " A parable ; " from the Greek parabole, which is
from a verb signifying to put forth one thing before or beside
another ; and it is assumed, when pwrdbole is used for parable,
though not necessarily included in the word, that the purpose
for which they are set side by side is that they may be compared
one with the other.
Jerome finely calls a parable " a shadow, as it were, of truth,
cast before."
Page 8. — " In this raillery the fabulist frequently indulges,"
as in La Fontaine's celebrated fable of The Ant and the Grass
hopper, in which the ant, in reply to the petition of the grass
hopper which is starving in the winter, reminds it how it sung
all the summer.
Page 12.—" The fearful curse of sin," &c.
" Por when we in our viciousness grow hard,
Oh misery on't, the wise gods seal our eyes,
In our own filth drop our clear judgments, make us
Adore our errors, laugh at us, while we strut
To our confusion!" Shakspeare.
Page 13. — " The things on earth are copies of the things in
heaven." "What if earth
Be but the shadow of heaven, and things therein
Each to other like, more than on earth is thought." Milton.
Out of a true sense of the intimate connection between the

256 NOTES.
type and the thing typified, has grown our use of the word likely.
Butler's Analogy is just the unfolding, in one particular line, of
this thought, that the like is also the lihely.
Page 18. — " The parabolical element of teaching." There is
a natural delight in this, which has impressed itself upon our lan
guage. To Wee a thing is to compare it to some other thing,
from which process arises a pleasurable emotion. That we like
what is lake, is the explanation of the pleasure which rhymes
give us.
Page 26. — The Gnostics. Ireneeus likens their dealings with
Scripture to their fraud who should break up some work of ex
quisite mosaic, bearing the likeness of a king, and then so re-
compose the pieces as to express the image of a dog or fox, hop
ing that, since they could point to the stones as the same, they
should be able to persuade the simple that this was the king's
likeness still. The miracles were submitted by them to the same
process of interpretation.
Page 27. — The Oathari and Bogomili. They made the ser.
vant that owed the ten thousand talents to be Satan, the ser
vant's wife his intelligence, the children the angels subject to
him. God pitied him, and did not take from him his higher in
telligence, his subjects or his goods ; he promising, if God would
be patient with him, to create men enough to fill the fallen
angels' place.
Page. 30. — The sea of Galilee. The Jewish writers would
have it that it was beloved by God above all the waters of
Canaan ; and because of the beauty and rich fertility of its banks,
its name Genesareth has been sometimes derived, which some
interpret " the garden of riches," though the derivation, I be
lieve, is insecure. Josephus rises into high poetical animation
while he is describing its attractions. Robinson (Bibl. Re
searches) gives a far less enthusiastic account ; when he visited
it, the verdure of the spring had disappeared.

NOTES.

257

" A sower went forth to sow." As it belongs to the essen
tially popular nature of the Gospels that parables should be foubd
in them rather than in the Epistles, where indeed they never
appear, so it belongs to the popular character of the parable that
it should thus rest upon the familiar doings of common life ;
while at the same time the Loi;d, using these to set forth eternal
and spiritual truths, ennobles them, showing, as He does, how
they continually reveal the deepest mysteries of His kingdom.
What a dignity and significance have these few words (" a sower
went forth to sow") given in all after times to the toils of the
husbandman. Shakspeare, of a man of thoughtful wisdom : —
" His plausive words
Ee scattered not in ears, but gratfed them
To grow there and to bear."
Salmeron, very beautifully : ' As Christ is Physician and
medicine, Priest and victim, Redeemer and redemption, Law
maker and law, Doorkeeper and door, so Sower and seed. For
the Gospel itself is nothing else than Christ incarnate, born,
preaching, dying, rising, sending the Holy Spirit, collecting the
Church, and sanctifying and guiding it.'
Page 31. — " Hard as a pavement." H. de Sto. Victore : ' The
" way " is the heart worn down and made barren by the con
stant passage of evil thoughts.'
Page 32. — "When the sun, was up," &c. Generally the light
and warmth of the sun set forth the genial and comfortable
workings of God's grace, as eminently Mai. iv. 2; but not
always, for see, besides the passage before us, Ps. cxxi. 6 ; Isa.
xlix. 10 ; Rev. vii. 16. Bede : ' Those are hearts which, for the
hour, are delighted with the sweetness only of the discourse
they have heard, and with its heavenly promises.'
" Tribulation:'' This word rests upon the idea of sifting—
tribulatio from tribulum, the threshing-roller, and thus used to
signify those afflictive processes by which in the moral discipline

258 NOTES.
of men, God separates their good from their evil, their .wheat
from their chaff.
" Boot in himself." With allusion to this passage, the Greek
Fathers call men of faith deep-rooted, and many-rooted.
Page 33. — '' Choked it." The image of an evil growth strang
ling a nobler is permanently embodied in our language in cockle,
a well known weed, a word derived from the Anglo-Saxon, ceo-
can, to choke.
It is evident that, in the great symbolic language of the out
ward world, " thorns " have a peculiar fitness to express in
fluences hostile to the truth, themselves the consequences and
evidences of sin, of a curse which has passed on from man to
earth (Gen. iii. 17, 18), till that earth had none other but a thorn-
crown to yield- to its Lord.
Page 33. — It may seem strange at first sight that cares and
pleasures, which appear so opposite to one another, should here be
linked together, and have the same evil consequences attributed
to them ; but the Lord does in fact here present earthly life on
its two sides — its crushing, oppressive side, the poor man's toil
how to live at all, and its flattering side.
Page 34. — How can any heart be called " good," before the
Lord and the Spirit have made it so ? Augustine asks : ' What
is this ? whose were the good works ? ' and answers : ' The be
ginning of good works is the confession of evil works. Thou
doest truth, how ? thou dost not flatter thyself, dost not say, I
am righteous, when thou art wicked ; and thou beginnest to do
truth.'— As our Saviour in this parable, so the Jewish doctors divide
hearers of the words of wisdom into four classes. The best
they liken to a sponge, that drinks in all it receives, and again
.expresses it to others ; the worst to a strainer, that retains only
the dregs, or to a sieve, that retains only the bran.
Page 36. — " The Son of man." Our Lord was often under
stood, in the early Church and among the Reformers, by this

NOTES.

259

title to signify nothing more than His participation in the human
nature ; while others have said that He assumed the name as
the one by which the hoped-for Messiah was already commonly
known among the people. But it is clear that, on the contrary,
the name was a strange one to them ; compare John xii. 34.
The popular name for the Messiah, when Christ came, was, Son
of David. (Matt. ix. 27 ; xii. 23 ; xv. 22 ; xx. 81, &c.) No
doubt He claimed the title (already given Him in the Old Test.
Dan. vii. 13), inasmuch as it was He who alone realized the idea
of man, the one true and perfect flower which had ever unfolded
itself out of the root and stalk of humanity.
" Tlie field is the world." Words few and slight, a great
battle has been fought over them, greater perhaps than over any
single phrase in the Scripture, if we except the consecrating
words at the Eucharist. Aside from the merely personal ques
tion concerning the irregularity of certain ordinations, the
grounds on which the Donatists justified their separation from
the Church Catholic were these : The idea of the Church, they
said, is that of a perfectly holy body ; holiness is not merely one
of its essential predicates, but the essential, to which all others
must be subordinated. They did not deny that it was possible
that hypocrites might be concealed in its bosom, but where the
evidently ungodly were suffered to remain .in communion with
it, not separated off by the exercise of discipline, then it forfeited
the character of the true Church, and the faithful were to come
out from it ; else, they would themselves be defiled. In support
of this view, they maintained that such passages as Isa. Iii. 1,
and all others which spoke of the future freedom of the Church
from evil, were meant to be applicable to it in its present con
dition, and consequently, where they were not applicable, there
could not be the Church. Here, as on so many other points, the
Church owes to Augustine, not the forming of her doctrine, for
that she owes to no man, but the bringing out into her clear
consciousness that which hitherto she had indeed possessed, yet
had not worked out into a perfect clearness, even for herself.
By him she replied, not in any way gainsaying the truth which
the Donatists proclaimed, that holiness must be an essential pre-

260 NOTES.
dicate of the Church, but only refusing to accept their idea of
that holiness, and showing how in the Church, which they had
forsaken, this quality was to be found, and combined with other
as essential qualities.
The Church Catholic, he affirmed, despite all appearances to
the contrary, is a holy body, for they only are its members who
are in true and living fellowship with Christ, therefore partakers
of His sanctifying Spirit. All others, however they may have
the outward notes of belonging to it, are in it, but not of it ;
they press upon Christ, like the thronging multitude, they do not
touch Him, like the believing woman (Luke viii. 45). There are
certain outward conditions, without which one cannot pertain
to His Church, but with which one does not necessarily do so.
And they who are thus in it, but not of it, whether hypocrites
lying hid, or open offenders, who, from their numbers, may not
without greater evils be expelled, do not defile the true members
so long as these share not in their spirit, nor communicate with
their evil deeds.
The Donatists wished to make the Church in its visible form
and historic manifestation identioal and co-extensive with the
true Church which the Lord knoweth, and not man. Augustine
also affirmed the identity of the Church now existing with the
final and glorious Church ; but he denied that they were co
extensive. He laid especial stress upon the fact that the Lord
Himself had not contemplated His Church in its present state as
perfectly free from evil. In proof, he appealed to this parable
and that of the Draw-net, and not merely as stating historic fact
— he urged also that all attempts to have it otherwise are here
expressly forbidden.
We shall see hereafter how the Donatists sought to escape
the argument drawn from the other parable. To this, they
made answer :— " By the Lord's own showing, ' the field ' is not
.the Church, but the world. The parable, therefore, does not
bear on the dispute betwixt us and you in the least." But
it must be evident to every one not warped by a dogmatic
interest, that the parable is, as the Lord announces at its first
utterance, concerning the kingdom of heaven, or the Church.

NOTES.

261

(Calvin : ' Although Christ adds that the field is the world, yet
it is not doubtful that He wished to apply this name to the
Church in particular, concerning which He had begun His dis
course. But since He was about to draw His plough promiscu
ously through all regions of the world, so that He might culti
vate for Himself fields everywhere, and scatter the seed of life,
He transferred by synecdoche to the world what fitted a part
only.') It required no especial teaching to acquaint the dis
ciples that in the world there would ever be a mixture of good
and bad, though they must have been so little prepared to ex
pect the same in the Church, that it was very needful to warn
them beforehand, both that they might not be stumbled, and
that they might know how to conduct themselves.
" Let both grow together until the haruest." The visible
Church is to have its intermixture of good and bad until the end
of time, and by consequence the fact of the bad being found
mingled with the good will in no wise justify a separation from
it, or an attempt to set up a little Church of our own. Where
men will attempt this, besides the guilt of transgressing a plain
command, it is not difficult to see what fatal effects on their own
spiritual hfe it must have, what darkness it must bring upon
them, and into what a snare of pride it must cast them. Thus
Augustine often appeals to the fact that the Donatists had not suc
ceeded, that they themselves would not dare to assert that they
had succeeded, in forming what should even externally appear a
pure communion ; and since by their own acknowledgment
there might be, and probably were, hypocrites and concealed
ungodly among themselves, this was enough to render all such
passages as Isa. Iii. 1, as inapplicable to them as to the Church
in its present condition.
Every young Christian, in the time of his first zeal is tempted
to be somewhat of a Donatist in spirit. Nay, it would argue
little love or holy earnestness in him, if he had not this longing
to see the Church of his Saviour a glorious Church without spot
or wrinkle. But he must learn that the desire, righteous and
holy as in itself it is, yet it is not to find its fulfilment in this
present evil time ; that on the contrary, the suffering from false

262 NOTES.
brethren is one of the pressures upon him, which is meant to
wring out from him a more earnest prayer that the Kingdom of
God may appear.
Calvin's words are excellent : ' There is this dangerous
temptation, to think that there is no Church where complete
purity may not appear. For whosoever may be carried away
with this, it will at last be inevitable, that having separated from
everybody else, he shall seem to himself the only holy person
in the world, or in company with a few hypocrites set up a sect
of his own. Why then did Paul recognize the Church of God
in Corinth? Because he saw among them, Gospel-doctrine,
Baptism, the Lord's Supper, by which marks merely a Church
should be judged.'
Page 38. — Evil, not a generation, but a degeneration; as
Augustine often expresses it, it has not an efficient but only a de
ficient cause.
Page 40. — " Tlie harvest." Bishop Horsley distinguishes be
tween the vintage and the harvest, which are the two images
under which the consummation is so commonly represented.
" The vintage is always an image of the season of judgment, but
the harvest of the ingathering of the objects of God's final mercy.
I am not aware that a single unexceptionable instance is to be
found, in which the harvest is a type of judgment. In Rev. xiv.
15, 16, the sickle is thrust into the ripe harvest, and the earth
is reaped, i. e., the elect are gathered from the four winds of
heaven. After this reaping of the earth the sickle is applied to
the clusters of the vine, and they are cast into the great wine
press of the wrath of God (ver. 18-20). In Joel iii. 13, the ripe
harvest is the harvest of the vine, i. e., the grapes fit for gather
ing, as appears by the context. In Jer. li. 33, the act of thresh
ing out the harvest is the image of judgment. It is true the
burning of the tares in Matt. xiii. is a work of judgment ; but it
is an accidental adjunct of the business, not the harvest itself."
It may be a question whether the manner in which he makes
our parable fit into his scheme is quite satisfactory.

NOTES.

263

Page 41. — " Then shall the righteous shine forth." Full
force is to be given to "forth." Calvin : " It is a very great
comfort that the sons of God, who now are either lying covered
with squalor, or are hidden and unesteemed, or are even buried
under reproaches, shall then, as in a clear sky and with every
cloud dissipated, at once shine out brightly." Using a different
image, Augustine says of the Christian as he is now — ' His glory
is hidden ; when the Lord shall have come, then will it appear.
For he flourishes, but as yet in winter ; the root flourishes, but
the branches are as if withered. Within is the pith which is
flourishing, within are leaves, within is fruit ; but they await
the summer.'
Page 47.—" There is no need, then," &c. The devil is " a
roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour " (1 Pet. v. 8), yet
this does not hinder the same title from being applied to Christ,
" the hon of the tribe of Judah " (Rev. v. 5). Nor is it to be
forgotten that if, on one side, the effects of leaven on meal
present an analogy to something evil in the spiritual world, they
do also, on the other, to something good, as it is universally
agreed that its effects on bread are to render it more tasteful,
lighter, and more nourishing, and generally more wholesome.
Is it only a part of the suitable machinery of the parable,
that the act of kneading being proper to women, it is " a woman "
here who takes the leaven and puts it in the meal ? or may we
look for something more ? Luke xv. 8 may suggest that the
Holy Spirit is here meant. If it be asked, why as a woman ? it
may be replied, that the Spirit's organ is the Church. Again,
why three measures of meal ? Perhaps, because that was a common
amount to mix at one time (Gen. xviii. 6). Yet it may be that
it means something more. Some perceive in it allusion to the
spread of the Gospel through the three parts of the then known
world ; some, like Jerome and Ambrose, find in it a pledge of the
sanctification of body, soul, and spirit.
" A new power brought from above." Augustine, in whose
time the fading away of all the glory of the ancient world was
daily becoming more apparent, loved to contemplate the coming

264 NOTES.
of Christ as a new and quickening power cast into the midst of
an old and dying world, by the help of which the world might
renew its youth.
Page 51.—" Some draw a distinction between the field and
the treasure ; making the first to be the Scriptures, the second
the knowledge of Christ : " so Augustine and Jerome.
Page 52. — " Selleth all that he hath, and buyeth this field."
The Lord is in fact exhorting to this in Matt. x. 37-39. And
yet it is not merely a command. The dead leaves easily and as
of themselves fall off from the tree, when propelled by the new
blossoms and buds which are forcing their way from behind.
" Some have found a difficulty," &c. In books of casuistry,
where they treat of the question how far and when a finder has
a right to appropriate things found, this parable is frequently
adduced. Apollonius of Tyana, being called in to decide a quar
rel between the buyer and seller of such a field, adjudged it
to whichever of the parties should be found, on scrutiny, to have
lived the holiest life.
Page 56. — " The great Eureka breaks forth from his lips."
Augustine : ' Lord, Thou hast made us for Thee, and our heart
is disquieted till it reacheth to Thee.'
Page 57. — Much of what has been already said in considering
the Tares (see notes in this Appendix) will apply here. The
same use has been made of either parable ; there is the same
continual appeal to this as to that in the Donatist controversy,
and this conveys to all ages the same instruction as that. The
minutes of the conference at Carthage show how the Donatists
sought to evade the force of the arguments drawn: from this
parable. They did not deny that Christ spoke, in this parable,
of sinners being found mingled with the righteous in the Church,
yet it was only concealed sinners, ' since the fishermen do not know
what is in the net, placed as it is in the sea, until it is brought to
the shore ' ; taking refuge in an accidental circumstance in the

NOTES.

265

parable, viz., that so long as the nets are under water their con
tents cannot be seen.
Page 59. — " The angels shall come forth." Everywhere in
the Scripture we find the angels distinctly named as the execu
tioners of the final separation (Matt. xiii. 41 ; xxiv. 31 ; xxv. 31 ;
Rev. xiv. 18, 19). Moreover, in each of the other parables of
judgment, there is a marked distinction, which it is little likely
should have been here renounced, between the present ministers
of the kingdom and the future executors of doom — in the Tares,
between the servants and the reapers, in the Marriage of the
King's Son (Matt, xxii.) between the servants (douloi) and at
tendants (diakonoi), in the Pounds (Luke xix.) between the
servants and those that stand by.
Page 60. — " The seven parables related in this chapter," &c.
The mystical number seven has offered to many interpreters a
temptation too strong to be resisted for seeking in them some
hidden mystery, and when the seven petitions of the Lord's
prayer, and the names of the seven original deacons (Acts vi. 5.)
have been turned into prophecy of seven successive states of the
Church, not to speak of the seven Apocalyptic Epistles (Rev. ii.
iii.), it was scarcely to be expected that these seven parables should
have escaped being made prophetic of the same. Bengel applies
the first parable to the times of Christ and His Apostles — the
original period of sowing ; the second (the Tares), to the age
immediately following, when heresies began to abound; the
third (the Mustard Seed), to the time of Constantine, when the
Church evidently gave support, and furnished protection to the
great ones of earth ; the fourth (the Leaven), to the propagation
of true religion through the whole world ; the Hid Treasure, to
the more hidden state of the Church signified in Rev, xii. 6 ; the
Pearl, to the time when the kingdom shall be esteemed above all
things, Satan being bound ; while the Draw -Net details the
ultimate confusion, separation, and judgment.
Page 62. — There is nothing in the discourse going before, to
lead immediately to Peter's question, to which this parable is an
12

266 NOTES.
answer ; and yet the words "Then came Peter," seem to make
an unbroken connection. Perhaps it is thus : Peter must have
felt in his Lord's injunctions concerning . an offending brother
(ver. 15-17), that the forgiveness of his fault was necessarily im
plied as having already taken place ; since, till we had forgiven,
we could not be in the condition to deal with him thus, for this
dealing, even to the exclusion of him from Church-fellowship, is
entirely a dealing in love (2 Thes. iii. 14, 15), and with a view to
his recovery.
The command, in ver. 22, to forgive till seventy times seven,
does not exclude a dealing, if need be, of severity, provided
always it be a dealing in love. Our Lord's seventy times seven
makes a wonderful contrast with Lamech's, the antediluvian
Antichrist's, seventy and seven-fold of revenge (Gen. iv. 24).
" Peter's consciousness of this new law of love," that it was
a law larger, more long-suffering, than the old ; but there were
yet deeper motives for his selection of the number seven. It is
the number in the divine law with which the idea of remission
was ever linked. The seven times seventh year was the year of
jubilee (Lev. xxv. 28 ; comp. iv. 6, 17 ; xvi. 14, 15). Gregory of
Nyssa suggests also the fact of the Sabbath being the seventh
day. Page 63. — " Ten thousand talents." The sum here is im
mense, whatever talents we suppose these to have been, though
it would differ very much in amount according to the talent
which we assumed. According to Plutarch, it was exactly this
sum of ten thousand talents with which Darius sought to buy off
Alexander. We have some almost incredible notices of the
quantities of gold in the East. Perchance the immensity of the
sum may partly have moved Origen to his supposition, that it
can only have been the Man of Sin that is here indicated, or
stranger still, the Devil !
Page 64. — " A part of his property ; " so, according to Roman
law.

NOTES.

267

Page 65.—" It is because we go out," &c. Theophylact : ' For
no one abiding in God is without sympathy.'
" How little man can offend against his brother, compared,"
&c. The Hebrew talent— 300 shekels (Exod. xxxviii. 25, 26).
Assuming this, the proportion of the two debts would be :
10,000 talents : 100 pence : : 1,250,000 : 1, that is, one mil
lion two hundred and fifty thousand to one.
Page 73. — " For we cannot imagine," &c. ; not even here in
our present imperfect state, and much less in the perfected king
dom hereafter, for love "rejoices in the truth." Leighton:
' Envy is without the divine choir, but the most absolute char
ity, by which each one, at the same time with his own, enjoys
likewise the happiness of another, and is blessed, rejoicing in
that indeed as if it were his own ; whence there is amongst
them a certain rebound and multiplication of blessedness ; such
as would be the splendor of a hall glittering with gold and
gems, with a full circle of kings and magnates, whose walls
should be covered on every side with the most brilliant mir
rors.' Page 74. — " A penny a day ; " a denarius, a Roman silver
coin. It was equal to about 16 or 17 cts., at the latter end of
the commonwealth ; afterwards, something less. It was not an
uncommon, though a liberal day's pay. Morier mentions having
noticed in the market-place at Hamadan (Persia) a custom like
that alluded to in the parable : " Here we observed every morn
ing before the sun rose, that a numerous band of peasants were
collected with spades in their hands, waiting to be hired for the
day to work in the surrounding fields. This custom struck me
as a most happy illustration of our Saviour's parable, particularly
when, passing by the same place late in the day, we found
others standing idle, and remembered His words, ' Why stand
ye here all the day idle ? ' as most applicable to their situation,
for on putting the very same question to them they answered us,
' Because no man hath hired us.' "

268 NOTES.
Page 74.—" At nine," &c. These would not, except just at
the equinoxes, be exactly the hours, for the Jews, as well as the
Greeks and Romans, divided the natural day, that between sun
rise and sunset, into twelve equal parts (John xi. 9), which parts
must of course have been considerably longer in summer than
in winter. The longest day is a little more than fourteen hours,
the shortest a little less than ten hours ; an hour on the longest
day was exactly twenty-two minutes longer than an hour on the
shortest. Probably the day was also divided into four larger
parts here indicated.
Page 75. — " Still one would not deny," &c. For in truth
time belongs not to the kingdom of God. Not " How much
hast thou done ? " but " What art thou now ? " will be the great
question of the last day. Of course we must never forget that
all which men have done will greatly affect what they are ; yet
still the parable is a protest against the Romanist's estimate of
men's works, against all which would make the works the end,
and man the means, instead of man the end, and the works the
means — against that scheme which, however unconsciously, lies at
the root of so many of the confusions in our theology at this day.
This mechanical, as opposed to the dynamic idea of righteous
ness, is carried to the greatest perfection of all in the Chinese
theology. Thus in that remarkable Livre des recompenses et des
peines, the mechanic, or to speak more truly, the arithmetic idea
of righteousness comes out with all possible distinctness ; for ex
ample : ' To become immortal, one must have amassed three
thousand merits and eight hundred virtuous actions.' How
glorious, on the other hand, are Thauler's words upon the way in
which we may have restored to us " the years which the canker-
worm has eaten" (Joel ii. 25) : ' Let each one turn himself with
all his powers highest and lowest away from every circumstance
of place and time, and betake himself into that Now of eternity,
where God essentially exists in a certain immovable Now.
There, there is nothing past or future. There, the beginning
and end of universal time are alike present. There, in God
namely, all lost things are found, and they who are accustomed

NOTES. 269
to betake themselves to God and abide in Him, become exceed
ing rich, nay, they find more than it is possible to lose.' — It may
be securely inferred that all between the last and the first hired
received the penny as well ; though it is the case of the first
hired alone which is brought forward, as that in which the in
justice, as the others conceived it, appeared the most striking.
To assume, as so many have done, e. g. Olshausen, that these
first hired had been doing their work negligently by comparison,
is to assume that of which there is not the slightest trace in the
narrative, and which morever effectually blunts the point of the
parable — brings us baek to the level of debt instead of grace
from which to raise us the parable was expressly spoken. Sin
gularly enough, exactly such a Jewish parable is to be found in
the Talmud : " To what was R. Bon Bar Chaija like ? To a
king who hired many laborers, among whom there was one
hired, who performed his task extraordinarily well 
And the laborers murmured, saying, ' We have labored hard all
the day, and this man only two hours, yet he hath received as
much wages as we.' The king said to them, ' He hath labored
more in those two hours than you in the whole day.' So R.
Bon plied the law more in eight and twenty years than another
in a hundred years."
Josephus (Antiquities, 20, 9, 7) expressly says that Ananus
(the Annas of the New Test.) paid the workmen who were
employed in rebuilding or beautifying the temple a whole
day's pay, even though they should have labored but a single
hour. Page 76. — " The penny is to each what he would make it."
Bellarmine : ' The penny signifies eternal life ; but as the same
sun is seen more clearly by the eagle than by other birds, and
the same fire warms those near to it more than those far off, so
in the same eternal life one will see more clearly and enjoy more
fully than another.'
Page 77. — " Just to you, and good to them." Comp. Rom.
v. 7 (" righteous " and " good "), which is only to be explained
by keeping fast hold of the opposition between the words.

270 NOTES.
Page 78.— The " reward " has. relation to the work, but we
receive a reward because God has promised it, not because we
earn it.
Page 84.— " The image," &c. (Seels, v. 1-7.) No doubt our
Lord here takes up the prophecy there, the more willingly build
ing on the old foundations, that His adversaries accused Him of
destroying the law ; and not in word only, but by the whole
structure of the parable, connecting His own appearance with all
that had gone before in Jewish history, so that men should look
at it as the crowning and final act of that great dealing of mercy
and judgment which had ever been going forward.
Bernard, comparing the Church to the vineyard, says:
' Planted in faith, it sends out roots in charity, is dug about by
the hoe of discipline, manured with the tears of the penitent,
watered by the words of preachers, and so truly abounds in wine
&c. ; this wine, of a truth, maketh glad the heart of man, and
the angels drink it with joy ! ' It no doubt belongs to the fitness
of the image that a vineyard, if it is to bring forth richly, requires
the most diligent and unceasing care, that there is no season in
the year in which much has not to be done in it.
The vine-stock often appears on the Maccabaean coins as the
emblem of Palestine ; sometimes, too, the bunch of grapes and
the vine-leaf.
Page 86. — " Nothing more," &c. Generally the wine-press is
taken to signify the prophetic institution; thus, Irenaeus, Hil
ary, Ambrose. But all the explanations that are given appear
fanciful. " The vineyard itself will signify, &c. ; and the husbandman
may be compared to the priests," &c. A friend adds a note
which I am sure every reader will be glad I have preserved : " I
do not absolutely question the truth of this interpretation ; but it
seems to me rather an escape from a difficulty which does not exist
more in the parable than in all our customary language about
the Church. The Church is both teacher and taught ; but the
teachers are not merely the ministers : the whole Church of one

NOTES. 271
generation teaches the whole Church of another, by its history,
acts, words, mistakes," &c.
Page 88. — " Eis Son," or as St. Mark has it, " One Son, Eis
well-beloved." This description marks as strongly as possible the
dignity of Christ's person, and undoubtedly our Lord's hearers
quite understood what He meant. This has been often observed
by the early Church writers, when proving the divinity of the
Son. " The heir." Christ is "heir of all things" (Heb. i. 2), not
as He is the Son of God, for there have always been Arian ten
dencies lurking in that interpretation, but as He is the Son of
man. May we not see in the thought of killing the heir and seizing
on the inheritance, an allusion to the principle of all self-righteous
ness, which is a seizing on the Divine inheritance, a seeking to
take down into self that light which is only light while it is
recognized as something above self?
Page 89. — " Having thus prophesied," &c. We have a remark
able example of a like prophesying to men their wickedness, as
a last endeavor to turn them from that wickedness, in 2 Kings
viii. 12-15.
" God will deal with nations," &c. Unless this were so [i. e,,
that nations have a living unity in themselves], all confession of
our fathers' sin would be mere mockery, and such passages as
Matt, xxiii. 32-35 without any meaning at all. This is one of the
many ways in which God encounters our selfish, self-isolating
tendencies. Page 93. — The chief priests and scribes would have laid hands
on Christ at the close of the foregoing parable, but for their fear
of the people. Yet not even so did He give them up ; but as
He had set forth their relation to God as a relation of duty, so
in this parable of the marriage of the King's Son He sets it forth
in a more inviting hght as a relation of privilege.

272 NOTES.
Page 94. — " The two favorite images— a marriage festival
here." Vitringa : ' The marriage symbolizes the very inti
mate union of Christ with the Church; the nuptial banquet
shadows forth the blessings of grace, communion in those bless
ings, joy, and festivity.'
Page 98. — " The dangers of having and of getting," &c.
Comp. Luke xiv. 18, 19, where the guest who has bought a
property and must needs go and see it, corresponds to the landed
proprietor here — is one who would enjoy what he already pos
sesses ; and the guest who would fain try his five yoke of oxen,
corresponds to the merchant here — being one who would acquire
what as yet is his only in anticipation.
Page 99. — " May we not presume," &c. Often in the East a
feast would have a great political significance, would in fact be
a great gathering of the vassals of the king ; contemplated on this
side, their refusal to come at once assumes the aspect of rebellion.
Thus there are many reasons for supposing that the feast recorded
in Esth. i., is the same as the great gathering which Xerxes
(Ahasuerus) made when he was planning his Greek expedi
tion. " The natural eye sees only one," &c. Comp. 1 Chr. xxi. 16;
the multitude beheld only the outward calamity, the pestilence,
but David, with purged spiritual eye, saw the angel.
Page 100. — " The highways." We must not permit this Eng
hsh expression to make us think of places in the country ; the
image throughout the parable is of a city.
Page 102.—" If the gift, &c, a contempt of the giver." We
are not without example in the modern history of the East, of a
vizier having lost his life, through this very failing to wear a
garment of honor sent to him by the king. Olearius says, in
describing an invitation to the table of the Persian king : "It
was told us by the mehmandar, that 'we, according to their
usage, must hang the splendid vests that were sent us from the

NOTES. 273
king over our dresses, and so appear in his presence. The am
bassadors at first refused ; but it was urged so earnestly, the
mehmandar alleging that the omission would greatly displease
the king, that they finally consented, and hanged, as did we also,
the splendid vests over their shoulders, and so the cavalcade
proceeded." This passage is of value also as it clears away any
difficulty which might have occurred to any from the apparent
unfitness of the king's palace as a place for changing of apparel ;
in fact, there was no change of apparel, for the garment of honor
was either a vest drawn over the other garments, or a mantle
hung on the shoulders.
The Jews have a curious tradition about Esau, that he will
be such a guest thrust out from the kingdom of God. " Esau
the wicked will veil himself with his mantle, and sit among the
righteous in Paradise ; and the holy blessed God will draw and
bring him out from thence, which is the sense of those words,
Obad. 4, 6." (Jerusalem Talmud.)
Page 103. — " It has been abundantly disputed," &c. The
Romanists have been eager to press this passage into their ser
vice. But when they assert that it must have been charity in
which this guest was deficient, and not faith— for that he had
faith, since he would not have been present at the feast at all
unless externally a believer — they are merely taking advantage
of the double meaning of the word faith, and playing off the
occasional use of it as a bare assent to the truth against St. Paul's
far deeper Use of the word ; and this most unfairly, for only in
this latter sense would any attribute the exclusion to want of
faith. Were it needful to decide absolutely for one or the other
interpretation, 1 would far sooner accept the Reformers', for the
flower may be said to be contained in the root, but not the root
in the flower, and so charity in faith, but not faith in charity.
(See page 108, and note thereon in this appendix.)
Page 106. — Tertullian mentions an abuse which some of the
Gnostics made of this parable : " The five foolish virgins are the
five senses ; foolish, inasmuch as they are easily deceived, and
12*

274 NOTES.
often give fallacious notices, while the five wise are the reasonable
powers, which have the capability of apprehending ideas."
Page 107. — " Wise " and "foolish," rather than good and bad,
just as in Matt. vii. 25-27, where a certain degree of good-will
toward the truth is assumed in the foolish, from their putting
themselves in the relation of hearers, and even attempting to
build. Page 108. — " Here there is a controversy," &c. ; the same as
that concerning the import of the wedding-garment (page 103,
and note). The Reformers maintained that the lamps of the
virgins were the outer deeds of Christianity, and that what the
foohsh virgins lacked, was the inner spirit of life, the living faith ;
the Romanist reversed the whole, and affirmed that what they
had was faith, but a faith without works — that they were not
careful to nourish the lamp of faith, which they bore in sight of
men, with deeds of light done for and in sight of God. It is
needless to remark in what different senses the two parties use
the word faith — the Romanist as the outward profession of the
truth ; the reformers, as the root and living principle of Chris
tian life. But for these opposite uses of the same term, the two
interpretations would not be incapable of a fair reconciliation.
Page 109. — The coming of the bridegroom : The love, the
earnest longing of the first Christians, made them to assume it
to be close at hand ; when they died, the kingdom was indeed
come unto them. While the matter was left in this uncertainty,
it was yet important that after the expectations of the first ages
of the Church had proved to be ungrounded, those who ex
amined the Scriptures should find intimations that this might
probably be the case ; of these there are many, and this passage
is one. " The virgins all slumbered," or nodded ; next, they " slept "
profoundly.

NOTES.

275

Page 111.—" Trimmed their lamps." Ward, describing the
parts of a marriage ceremony in India, of which he was an eye
witness, says: "After waiting two or three hours, at length
near midnight it was announced, 'Behold, the bridegroom
cometh ; go ye out to meet him.' All now' lighted their lamps,
and ran to take their stations in the procession ; some of them
had lost their lights and were unprepared, but it was then too
late to seek them, and the procession moved forward." — " Our
lamps are going out." The hand-lamp was small; even the
lamps used at a festival, which would be larger, needed to be
replenished if kept burning long into the night.
Page 113. — " Went in with him to the marriage." Comp.
Milton's " Sonnet to a Virtuous Young Lady," where there is
constant allusion to this portion of the parable.
In early times, and in the middle ages, this parable was a
very favorite subject of Christian art. It may be added that it
was a favorite subject for the mysteries in the middle ages.
Page 123. — " Lo, there thou hast that is thine. In reality," &c.
There is an instructive Eastern tale, which in its deeper meaning
runs remarkably parallel to this parable. It is as follows :
" There went a man from home : and to his neighbors twain,
He gave, to keep for him, two sacks of golden grain.
Deep in his cellar one the precious charge concealed ;
And forth the other went and strewed it in his field.
The man returns at last — asks of the first his sack :
' Here, take it ; 'tis the same ; thou hast it safely back.'
Unharmed it shows without ; but when he would explore
His sack's recesses, corn there finds he now no more :
One half of what was there proves rotten and decayed,
Upon the other half have worm and mildew preyed.
The putrid heap to him in ire he doth return,
Then of the other asks, ' Where is my sack of corn ? '
Who answered, ' Come with me and see how it has sped ' —
And took and showed him fields with waving harvests spread.
Then cheerfully the man laughed out and cried, ' This one
Had insight, to make up for the other that had none.

276 NOTES.
The letter he observed, but thou the precept's sense)
And thus to thee and me shall profit grow from hence ;
In harvest thou shalt fill two sacks of corn for me,
The residue of right remains in full for thee.' "
Page 124. — " From Mm that hath not shall be taken," &c,
Chrysostom : "As a fountain from which water is continually
drawn forth, is thereby rather purified, and bubbles up the more,
but being stanched, fails altogether ; so [with] the spiritual gift
and word of doctrine." Augustine, applying 2 Kings iv.r" So,
dearly beloved brethren, love increases as long as it is imparted,
and therefore we ought industriously to seek vessels into whicb
we can pour the oil — the vessels of love are human beings,"
—This parable suggests Shakspeare's lines :
"Heaven does with us, as we with torches do;
Not light them for themselves ; for if our virtues
Did not go forth of us, 'twere all alike
As if we had them not. Spirits are not finely touchect
But for fine issues ; nor Nature never lends
The smallest scruple of her excellence,
But like a thrifty goddess she determines
Herself the glory of a creditor,
Both thanks and use."
Page 128. — " It is not of course meant," &c. ; as when it is
said, " the earth bringeth forth fruit of herself" this does not
exclude the rain, and sun, and all other favorable circumstances.
Page 129. — •" Our Lord's object, &c, to exclude the continuous
agency of the sower," *'. e., of the same kind as he exercises at
the first.
Page 132.— "To all this," &c. Note, "which was"— not,
which had been " a sinner ; " and again, " She is a sinner," and
also, " Thy sins are forgiven."
The belief in the identity of Mary Magdalene and this woman
has impressed itself on the very language of Christendom ; but
without good reason.
" That a woman," &a " At a dinner at the consul's house at

NOTES. 277
Damietta, we were much interested in observing a custom of the
country. In the room where we were received, besides the divan
on which we sat, there were seats all round the walls. Many
came in and took their places on those side-seats, uninvited and
yet unchallenged. They spoke to those at the table on business
or the news of the day, and our host spoke freely to them. We
afterwards saw the same custom at Jerusalem." — Narr. of a Miss.
of Inquiry to the Jews from the Ch. of Scotland in 1839.
As a specimen of notions of holiness, like Simon's, current
among the Jews, a commentator on Prov. v. 8 puts this very
question : " How far must one keep away from a harlot ? "
Rabbi Ohasda answers : " Four cubits." And again, various
rabbies are extolled for their precautions in keeping lepers at a
distance ; for ex., by flinging stones at them if they come too
near. Gregory the Great : ' True righteousness has compassion ;
false righteousness, disdain.'
Page 135. — " There is, &c. ; faith, and not love, is the pre
requisite for forgiveness ; " comp v. 50, " thy faith hath saved
thee." In the parable, he who owed the large debt is not forgiven
it as freely as the other debtor, because of his greater previous
love ; but, on the contrary, the sense of" a larger debt remitted,
makes him afterwards love his creditor more. The parable, then,
is not in favor of the Romish theology.
Let me quote, were it only with the hope of bringing it before
one reader hitherto ignorant of it, the foUowing passage on the
attempt thus to substitute charity for faith in the justification of
man. "Sin is the disease. What is the remedy? Charity?
Pshaw ! Charity, in the large apostolic sense of the term, is the
health, the state to be obtained by the use of the remedy, not
the sovereign balm itself— faith of grace — faith in the God-man
hood, the cross, the mediation, the perfected righteousness of
Jesus, to the utter rejection and abjuration of all righteousness
of our own ! Faith alone is the restorative. The Romish
scheme is preposterous ; it puts the rill before the spring. Faith
is the source, — charity, that is, the whole Christian life, is the
stream from it. It is quite childish to talk of faith being im-

278 NOTES.
perfect without charity ; as wisely might you say that a fire,
however bright and strong, was imperfect without heat ; or that
the sun, however cloudless, is imperfect without beams. The
true answer would be : It is not faith, but utter reprobate faith
lessness." — Coleridge.
In the Bustan of the famous Persian poet Saadi, there is a
story which seems an echo of this evangelical history. Jesus,
while on earth, was once entertained in the cell of a monk of
eminent reputation for sanctity ; in the same city dwelt a youth
sunk in every sin, " whose heart was so black that Satan himself
shrank back from it in horror." This last presently appeared
before the cell of the monk, and, as smitten by the very presence
of the Divine prophet, began to lament with tears the sins of his
past life, and to implore pardon and grace. The monk indig
nantly interrupted him, demanding how he dared to appear in
his presence and in that of God's holy prophet ; assured him that
for him it was in vain to seek forgiveness ; and in proof how
inexorably he considered his lot was fixed for hell, exclaimed,
" My God, grant me but one thing, that I may stand far from
this man on the judgment day." On this Jesus spoke. "It
shall be even so : the prayer of both is granted. This sinner has
sought mercy and grace, and has not sought them in vain — his
sins are forgiven — his place shall be in Paradise at the last day.
But this monk has prayed tbat he may never stand near this
sinner — this prayer too is granted : hell shall be his place ; for
there this sinner shall never come."
Page 138. — " Who is my neighbor ? " It is striking to see this
question of the narrow-hearted scribe, reappearing in one who
would think that they had little in common. Emerson's Essays :
" Do not tell me, as a good man did to-day, of my obligation to
put all poor men in good situations. Are they my poor ? I
tell thee, thou foolish philanthropist, that I grudge the dollar,
the dime, the cent, I give to such men as do not belong to me, and
to whom I do not belong. There is a class of persons to whom by
all spiritual affinity I am bought and sold ; for them I will go to
prison, if need be ; but your miscellaneous popular charities," &c.

NOTES. 279
Page 140.— ".4 Samaritan." It is very curious how the
notion that the Samaritans are a mingled people, of two elements,
one heathen, one Israelitish, should have found way of late even
into learned books. Christian antiquity saw in them a people
of umningled heathen blood, and the expositors of two hundred
years ago are quite clear of the mistake.
Page 141. — "I will repay thee." " I " is emphatic : Trouble
not the poor man on that score ; or, Fear not to be a loser.
Page 142. — Of course, this deeper interpretation was not
meant for the lawyer, but for the (then) future Church. It was
held by most of the Fathers.
Page 143.—" We might say," &c. ; *. «., if absolutely needful
to give a precise meaning to the oil and wine.
Page 149. — Stella remarks that by God's delay in answering
prayer it is seen who will prove but as the leopard, which, if it
does not attain its prey at the first spring, turns sullenly back,
and cannot be induced to repeat the attempt.
Page 151. — That love of the world, which, keeping itself
within the limits of decency, yet takes all the affections of the
heart from God — against that men have need to be continually
warned, and such a warning is here ; not against unrighteous
ness, but against covetousness.— He desired Christ to be an um
pire — such only the original means. * It is decidedly best to take
" Ufe," in v. 15, as man's true life — his blessedness : so ever in
Scripture. Page 153. — " Thou hast barns," &c. Augustine : \ " Suppose
a friend should enter thy house, and find that thou hadst lodged
thy fruits on a damp floor, and he should advise, ' Brother, thou
losest the things which thou hast gathered with great labor ; in
a few days they will corrupt.' 'And what, brother, shall I
do ? ' ' Raise them to a higher room.' Thou wouldst listen to
him, and thou wilt not listen to Christ."

280 NOTES.
Page 154. — " Shall be required of thee." The Jewish doctors
taught that Gabriel drew gently out with a kiss the souls of the
righteous from their mouths.
Page 157.—" Sinners above all men ; " literally, debtors, with
a reference to Luke xii. 58, 59. (Comp. Matt. v. 25, 26 ; xviii.
24, &c.)
Page 162. — " Doubtless this is true of men's lives as well ; "
there are critical moments to which all the future is linked,
times of gracious visitation which it is of the deepest importance
to observe and improve. — An Arabian writer gives as a receipt for
a barren palm-tree, that its owner, accompanied by a friend, go
with a hatchet, and giving the stem three blows with the back
of it, declare to his friend his purpose of cutting it down. He
intercedes for and saves it, and the tree will be certainly fruitful
that year.
Page 165. — " Perhaps," &c. Comp. p. 98, and note. Comp.
this parable and that in Matt, xxii., and observe in what consistent
keeping all the minor circumstances are arranged in each. There,
a king has armies, and also whole bands of servants, and not
merely a single one ; the refusal to accept his invitation was
rebellion, &c.
Page 170. — " When St. Luke," Sac. : so the original indicates.
There is no image upon which the early Church seems to
have dwelt with greater delight than this of Christ as the good
Shepherd bringing home His lost sheep. Very many gems,
seals, &c, represent Him as bringing back a lost sheep on His
shoulders. In Tertullian's time, it was painted on the com
munion chalice ; so in bas-reliefs on sarcophagi, and paintings
in the catacombs. Sometimes He is sitting as if weary ; and this
representation always occupies the place of honor, the centre of
the vault or tomb.
Page 182. — " Publicans," Jews ; if not all, yet far the greater
number, in Judea. Comp. Luke xix. 9.

NOTES. 281
Page 184. — "Ee began," &c. ; literally, "He began himself to
be in want ; " the famine reached even to him.
" He begins," &c. Thus, when a great English poet, with
every thing that fortune and rank and genius could give him, and
who had laid out his whole life for pleasure and not for duty —
before he had reached half the allotted period of man, exclaimed,
"My days are in the yellow leaf,
The flowers, the fruits, of love are gone ;
The worm, the canker, and the grief
Are mine alone — "
what is this but the confession of one who, having spent all, had
found himself ih want ? Or again, the prodigal's misery, his
sense of the barrenness of sin, find a yet deeper voice :
" The fire that on my bosom preys,
Is lone as some volcanic isle ;
No torch is lighted at its blaze —
A funeral pile ! "
Page 186. — " We may suppose he did eat them," &c. So
Calvin. Bernard : ' Foolish sons of Adam, by devouring the husks of
swine, ye feed not your hungering souls, but the hunger itself of
your souls.'
Page 190. — " When he was yet a great way off," &c. Eastern
proverb : " If a man draws near to God an inch, God will draw
near to him an ell ; " or as Von Hammer gives it : " Who approaches
me a span, to him do I make haste an eh ; and who comes to
meet me, to him do I make haste in leaps."
Page 193. — The ring, too, may be the pledge of betrothal.
Comp. Hos. ii. 19, 20, and indeed the whole chapter.
Page 194. — "Safe and sound;" the servant's words: the
father has a deeper joy — his son has come back a different man
(v. 32).

282 NOTES.
Page 197. — We must place the emphasis on "with me,"
else we shall entirely miss the meaning.
Page 202. — " He feels," &c. They see, then, in the lowering
of the bills the first act of his righteousness, getting over its
dishonesty by giving it altogether a mystical meaning, and so
refusing to contemplate it in the letter at all, or in a way which
we shall soon notice. — " Rahab the harlot;" Comp. Matt. x.
3 ; xxvi. 6 ; Tit. iii. 13. — The two debtors are plainly representa
tives here of many more ; just as but three servants are named
out of the ten, Luke xix. 13. — To one he remits half, to the other
the fifth of his debt ; by these different proportions teaching us,
say many, that charity is not to be a blind profuseness.
The transaction was plainly not with the debtors apart from
each other, as is indicated by "And — thou?" v. 7.
Page 206. — " There are martyrs of the devil," &c. There is
a story of an Egyptian eremite, which illustrates this — chancing
to see a dancing girl, he was moved to tears. Being asked the
reason, he rephed, That she should be at such pains to please
men in her sinful vocation ; and we in our holy calling use so little
diligence to please God.
Page 207. — " This is the meaning given, though too vaguely,"
— as by Calvin, who says : ' The sum of this parable is that we
are to deal kindly and generously with our neighbors, so that
when we come to the judgment the fruit of our liberality may
return to us.' If this be all, why an unjust steward ? Yet this
was the point mainly, often exclusively, made by the early
Church writers — liberal almsgiving. So Irensaus, Augustine,
Athanasius. And so also Erasmus, Luther, and many more.
Page 208. — " Mammon " would, I believe, be more correctly
spelt with a single m.
" Others say," &c. Sirac. xxvii. 2 : "As a nail sticketh
fast between the joinings of the stones, so doth sin stick close
between buying and selling." Cajetan : ' Mammon of unright-

notes. 283
eousness, because rarely or never is there wealth in whose accumu
lation or management there has not occurred sin, either on the
part of its possessors, or their agents, or their ancestors.'
Page 209. — The use of adikos ("unrighteous ") for "false"
runs through the whole Septuagint. Thus Deut. xix. 16. — " In
the moment," &c. The existence of property has ever been
strongly felt as a witness for the selfishness of man. But with
all this, we must not forget that the attempt prematurely to
realize this or any other little fragment or corner of the king
dom of God apart from the rest — the corruption of man's heart
remaining unremoved and being either overlooked or denied —
has ever been one of the most fruitful sources of the worst mis
chiefs. — " That when ye fail." It may perhaps be a question
whether this should not be " that when it fails," *'. e., the mam
mon. In that case Seneca has a striking parallel : ' Marc Antony,
when he saw his fortune passing over to another, and nothing
left for himself, exclaimed, finely: Whatsoever I have given
away, this I have. These are sure riches that will abide in one
spot, in whatsoever fickleness of fortune.'
" Enerlasting habitations," thus tacitly contrasted with the
temporary shelter which was all that the steward could secure ;
also, perhaps, with the temporary stewardship of every man
here. An ancient writer supposes the unjust steward to have
been the Apostle Paul thrust out by God of his Judaism, then
making himself a reception in many hearts by preaching the
Gospel ; and a modern author affirms the Lord Himself to have
been meant !
Page 214. — " It is most important," &c. ; if we conceive of
its primary purpose as to warn against the abuse of riches, it
will neither satisfactorily cohere with the remaining discourse,
nor will the parable itself possess that unity of purpose so charac
teristic of our Lord's parables — it will seem to have a double
point. Page 216. — " The extreme costliness of the purple dye," i. e.,

284 NOTES.
the true sea-purple, but a few drops of dyeing liquid being found
in each fish ; what fish exactly is not now known.
" Byssus." Pliny tells of a kind exchanged for its weight in
gold. Page 217. — Lazarus ; it is a striking witness of the impres
sion this parable has made, that lazar should have passed into so
many languages, losing altogether its signification as a proper
name. " His name," &c. Augustine : " Seems he not to you to have
been reading from that book where he found the name of the
poor man written, but found not the name of the rich ; for that
book is the book of life ? "
Page 218. — Luther : ' Behold, he, who while living had not
even one man for a friend, is suddenly honored with the ministry
not of one angel but of many.'
Page 219. — Chrysostom : " For as on the stage some enter,
assuming the masks of kings and captains, physicians and orators,
philosophers and soldiers, being in truth nothing of the kind ; so
also in the present life, wealth and poverty are only masks. As
then, when thou sittest in the theatre, and beholdest one playing
below who sustains the part of a king, thou dost not count him
happy, nor esteemest him a king, nor desirest to be such as he ;
but knowing him to be one of the common people, a ropemaker
or a blacksmith, or some such a one as this, thou dost not esteem
him happy for his mask, and his robe's sake, nor judgest of his
condition from these, but holdest him cheap for the meannness
of his true condition : so also, here sitting in the world as in a
theatre, and beholding men playing as on a stage, when thou seest
many rich, count them not to be truly rich, but to be wearing
the masks of rich. For as he, who on the stage plays the king
or captain, is often a slave, or one who sells figs or grapes in the
market, so also this rich man is often in reahty poorest of all.
For if thou strip him of his mask, and unfold his conscience, and
scrutinize his inward parts, thou wilt there find a great penury

NOTES. 285
of virtue ; thou wilt find him to be indeed the most abject of
men. And as in the theatre, when evening is come and the
spectators are departed, and the players are gone forth thence,
having laid aside their masks and their dresses, then they who
before showed as kings and captains to all, appear now as they
truly are ; so now, when death approaches and the audience is
dismissed, all, laying aside the masks of wealth and poverty, de
part from hence, and, being judged only by their works, appear
some indeed truly rich, but some poor ; and some glorious, but
others without honor." Arndt compares such as the rich man
in the parable to camels and mules, who carry all day silken
vestments, gems, perfumes, and generous wines, but as soon as
they reach the stall at night, are unladen, and show nothing
but the marks of blows. Shakspeare, too :
" If thou art rich, thou art poor,
For like an ass whose back with ingots bows,
Thou bear'st thy heavy riches but a journey,
And death unloads thee."
Page 223. — " Such was," &c. Thus in the Jewish books the
scholar of an eminent rabbi found his master one day in extreme
affliction, and began to laugh, while all the other scholars were
weeping around him. Being upbraided, he answered that he
had often feared lest his master was receiving his portion in this
world, but now seeing him afflicted, he took courage again.
"A great gulf" there, not merely, but "fixed " there.
Page 225. — " If they hear not," &e. In effect saying : A far
greater act than you desire would fail to produce afar less effect :
you suppose that wicked men would repent on the return of a
spirit ; I tell you they would not even be persuaded by the rising
of one from the dead. It is a pity that we have not " if one " in
v. 31 as in v. 30.
Page 227. — " When the Gentile Church," &c. Nor are we
to expect, before its judgment, any startling summons to rouse it
— any novel sign.

286 NOTES.
Page 232. — " Say, we are unprofitable servants." Bengel :
' Wretched is he whom the Lord calls an unprofitable servant
(Matt. xxv. 30) — blessed, he who calls himself so.'
Page 234. — This parable is addressed to the disciples, and
stands in closest relation with what has gone immediately before,
with the description of the sufferings of the last times, when even
the disciples " shah desire to see one of the days of the Son of
man, and shah not see it " (Luke xvii. 22).
" In this precept," &c. Origen : " The whole hfe of the
faithful should be one connected prayer." St. Basil : " Prayer
should be the salt which is to salt every thing besides." Augus
tine : " There is another interior prayer without intermission,
and that is the longing of thy heart. — Thy continual desire is thy
continual voice. Thou wilt be silent, if thou leave off to love.
The coldness of love is the silence of the heart — the fervency of
love is the cry of the heart ! "
Page 235. — " This judge," &c. ; and he dared to avow this
contempt to himself.
" How fitly, then," &c. It would be a very imperfect view of
those cries for deliverance, occurring so often in the Psalms and
Prophets, to refer them to any particular and transient outward
persecutions. The world is always, consciously or unconsciously,
by flattery or by hostile violence, oppressing God's people ; and
Satan evermore seeking to hinder the manifestation of the life
of God in them.
Page 236. — " From the Evil One " — the source and centre of
all evil. The analogy of other passages, Matt. xiii. 19, 38, 39 ;
Eph. vi. 16 ; 2 Thess. iii. 3, would lead us so to translate ; and
so was it interpreted in the Greek Church.
Page 237. — " Ee said" &c. The endeavor to obtain help or
redress by long-continued crying and mere importunity — to ex
tort thus a boon or a right — is quite in the spirit of the East.
" The certainty, &c, on their election ; " Comp. Daniel xii.
1, 1. e.

NOTES. 287
Page 238.—" All help," &c. The lateness of the help Zecha
riah (xiv. 1-5) describes, under the images of the old theocracy
— Jerusalem shall be already taken, the enemy within its walls
and spoiling, when the Lord shah come forth.
" Shall he find faith ? " or rather that faith, the faith which
does not faint in prayer, with allusion to v. 1.
Page 239. — " The last," &c. Augustine finds a yet closer
connection : ' Because faith belongs not to the proud but to the
humble, He added a parable about humility in contrast with
pride.' He had seen in some of His followers spiritual pride
and contempt for others. — This Pharisee, with all who pride
themselves because of their victory over certain temptations, is
wittily likened by Gregory the Great to Eleazar, who killed the
elephant, but was himself crushed by its falling body (1 Mace.
vi. 46).Page 241. — " Acknowledgment," &c. Augustine : ' Had he
then no sins to confess ? Yes, but — he was like a patient on the
table of a surgeon, who should show his sound limbs, and cover
his hurts. But let God cover thy hurts, and not thou. Let Him
cover and cure them ; for under the covering of the physician
the wound is healed, under the covering of the sufferer, it is only
concealed ; and concealed from whom ? From Him to Whom all
things are known ! '
" Not so much as his eyes : " far less, then, his hands and his
countenance, which yet would be usually lifted up in prayer
(1 Tim. ii. 8 ; 1 Kings viii. 54 ; Heb. xii. 12 ; Ps. xxviii. 2), which
no doubt the Pharisee had lifted up in his.
Page 242. — " Christ does 'not mean," &c. It is characteristic
that this should be denied by nearly all the chief Romanist com
mentators, though in fact this is the very truth which the para-
. ble is to teach.
Page 244. — " In the great Roman Empire," &c. Thus Herod
the Great was at first no more than a subordinate offioer in

288 NOTES.
Judea, and flying to Rome before Antigonus, was there declared
by the Senate, through Antony's influence, King of the Jews.
Archelaus, his son, too, had personally to wait on Augustus in
Rome before inheriting his father's dominions.
Page 245. — " This nobleman," &c. Either supposition, it is
true, would suit Christ's case.
" We will not," &c. Exactly thus, a faction of the Jews, in
the case of Archelaus, sent ambassadors to the court of Augustus
to accuse him there, and if possible prevent his elevation.
" Occupy," i. e., employ in trading.
Page 246. — " If we find," &c. The parable is equally capable
of the narrower and the wider interpretation. — " A speaking of
great things against Him ; " not merely disobedience but de
fiance. Page 247.—" The rewards," &c. Contrast Matt. xxv. 14-30,
where the master is but a private man, and gives therefore hum
bler rewards.
" Those who stand by," &c. The servant not needing his
napkin for its proper use ("in the sweat," &c, Gen. iii. 19),
naturally uses it to wrap up his pound.
" The words," &c. As there is love in th© Old Testament, so
fear and that which should awaken it in the New.

THE END.

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