him, though He would have reproved him. There can have been nothing really noble in those respectable Pharisees whom Jesus so sternly reproved.

Again, we look, in estimating men, too much to results and too little to motives and efforts. Men do not start equal. To some goodness is easy, to others terribly hard; and the All-just may often doubtless see more of real self-sacrifice, more of real nobleness, in the widow's mite of a few good actions forced out of a reluctant and rebellious nature, than in the copious offerings of a long life of benevolence, rendered easy by a fortunate original temperament.

And we judge men too much by their opinions. We are far too apt to curse St. Thomas and applaud Dives. We do not see that unorthodox earnestness is better than slumbering orthodoxy. We are ever forgetting the criterion and the touchstone of Jesus. We forget that loyalty to conscience, and real love of goodness, constitute the only true passport to heaven. We forget that for us mortals there are many tongues in which we may glorify God, and that not till we reach the Eternal City can we learn that one language of the Immortals, which shall at last supersede our diverse stammering efforts to express what is infinite.

XII.

AUTHORITY IN RELIGIOUS MATTERS.

Then spake Jesus to the multitude and to His disciples, saying, The Scribes and the Pharisees sit in Moses' seat; all, therefore, whatsoever they bid you observe, that observe and do.-Matthew xxiii. 1–3.

For He taught them as one having authority, and not as the Scribes. Matthew vii. 29.

IN our days there are two very prevalent mistakes about authority in religion, and the degree to which we should submit to it. One class of men submits far too much to authority, and another class far too little. The one error leads to bondage in religious matters, the other to a commonplace democratical mediocrity, which looks with suspicion on originality, and strives to eliminate from religion a large portion of its profounder and less obvious. elements. The religion of the one class inevitably lacks robustness and manliness; that of the other class is greatly deficient in profundity and spiritual insight.

It may, therefore, be well for us to consider carefully what constitutes true authority in religion, and how far we ought to be guided by it. Now, I think the two texts which I have chosen, taken together, supply us with a principle by which to determine the question. Our Saviour distinctly commands His hearers to obey the Scribes on the ground of their authority, because they sat in the seat of Moses. And yet the other passage of Scripture plainly implies that the Scribes had no authority: "For He taught them as one having authority, and not as the Scribes." Hence I think it is evident that there are two sorts of authority-ordinary and extraordinary, and that the latter has a persuasive and constraining influence, which is wanting in the former.

Ordinary commonplace authority may be compared to that of kings and priests in Israel; extraordinary, transcendent authority, resembles that of prophets in Israel. It was well for Israel as a rule to follow the teaching of its ordinary religious guides, but it was necessary that the tendency to conventionality and commonplace ideas in these guides should be occasionally mitigated by the startling utterances of originality and spiritual genius. Priests or Scribes did well enough for a tribunal to decide ordinary matters, but it was necessary that there

should be an appeal from them to that higher court of law presided over by judges in more direct intercourse with the one great Lawgiver.

The religious knowledge of the Scribes was obtained secondhand, as it were; whereas the prophets drank in wisdom and inspiration from the fountain itself. The Scribes gathered a few drops of water in partially broken cisterns. The prophets had free access to the fountain of living waters. The Scribes were like ordinary military commanders, who do well enough for the routine of a time of peace, but utterly fail in the sudden emergencies of war. The Scribes had no genius. At certain spiritual crises it is expedient that the consuls should retire in favour of a dictator. One Luther was of more power to reform the Church than ten thousand Scribes.

The highest, the dictator-like authority in religion is incommunicable, and cannot belong to any class of men, as a class. The Scribes had no authority of this sort, because they had no inspiration, no genuine enthusiasm, no prophet-like intuitions, no religious genius. They could quote chapter and verse, but they could not seize hold of men's minds and carry them away with them. They had no great insight into human nature; of them it was never said, as of our Lord, that they "told men all that ever they did." In a kind of way they could tell men what they ought

to do, but they could not infuse into their hearers that enthusiastic conviction which is ever the source of the truest strength. The Scribes assailed the conscience only indirectly, by syllogisms and inferences gathered from tradition, and addressed to the reason. They knew nothing of St. Paul's more direct and powerful method, "by manifestation of the truth, commending ourselves to every man's conscience." The Scribes scarcely dared to declare, "Thus saith the Lord." They could only say, "Thus saith Moses that the Lord said." They did not hear the voice of God Himself, but only echoes of God's voice. Hence their teaching lacked the constraining imperiousness of the prophets.

The Scribes were not possessed by ideas, or carried away by grand thoughts coming to them they knew not whence, and bearing them they knew not whither. On the contrary, they possessed their ideas; their thoughts were no fiery steeds of celestial mould, scarcely to be guided by human hands; rather they were quite common hacks, well suited to amble gently along the high-road of respectable commonplace conventionality. The Scribes had never been caught up into the third heaven, neither had they descended into hell. They could not "minister to a mind diseased;" but they were great authorities on points of ritual.