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in the story of the children who will play neither at funerals nor at weddings ! What ileepercriticism of a prudential morality is there than in the words ' he that savetli his life" shall lose it ' ? what clearer perception of the hopelessness of a man's attemi>t at self-deliverance than the parable of the house swept and garnished but empty ? There is His indictment of the I'harisees (Mt 23). It is the most i)assionate invective in literature. But the marvel of it, the inner justification of it, is that there with utter clearness and jjrecision He lays bare the essential evil of Pharisaism. Passion easily contents itself with strong denunciation. The words of Jesus are a stream of lava seven times heated from a burning heart ; but they are full of light ; they track the hidden ways of jiride and .self-seeking in the religious heart. We see in them the thinker, the seer before whose glance secret things lie open and bare, as well as the projiliet Avith his passion for simplicitj- and truth.
Jesus was an artist also in His teaching. He was not content to bring before men truths about God and the way of life. He clothed His teaching in beauty. He uttered the deep things of the King- dom in paral)les. And these are simple, pellucid, beautiful as with the loveliness of waters stilled at even. See art. PoET.
(b) There are the men of action, men in whom the will is predominant. Jesus shows them their ideal. He was no dreamer, but a man of deeds. Will was as mighty in Him as thought. He im- pressed all with a sense of po\\er and mastery. The i)eople recognized that note in His teaching : He spake with autlioritj-, and not as the scribes. It was felt at Nazareth when they took up stones to stone Him and He passed through their midst (Lk 4*'). and at Gethsemane when the soldiers fell back before the majesty of His bearing (Jn 18''). He dominated friend and foe by the calm strength of a sovereign will. And His days \\e\e lilled a\ ith active service, teaching and healing, so that St. Peter summed up His life as that of One ' who went about doing good ' (Ac ICP). INlen of action have their limitations. Their energy outstrips the illumination of their mimls ; they work for the dny and its needs ; their outlook is narrow and dim. But .lesus ever fed the si)rings of action with thought. He was no less than thirty years of age when He was baptized in Jordan. He had been content to live with His thoughts ami simi)le duties, perfecting there, in patient obedience, mind and heart and will for the great work. Ami even after the bai)tism, when the call had come, He went first to the Milderness. there in juaver and meditation to understand His work and flis own heart. And often He stole away from the crowd, from the blinding pressure of constant activity, to gather light and balance in prayer (Mk 1^ G'"^, Lk 6'-, .Jn 8')- Hence the crown which rests on His activities. He never turned aside from His jiath. One j)urpose shapes every word and act from the beginning. Will sits untroubled on its throne, whatever dissonances of earth be round Him, though world and friend and foe consjiire to turn Him aside. And peace rests upon all He does. There was no hurry in His hands, no huny in His feet. His life was full, crowded with incident ; but it flowed on quiet, unchanging, harmonious as a poet's dream. The mountain with its peace and quietness, its hours of jjiayer and still thought, was His place of transfiguration. There He looked into the Father's ])urpose, till the glory that lay beyond and the love that shone through it kindled their reflexion on His face, till He saw His way so dearly that He could never miss it, never l)e in any hesitation about it, — the way, amid the conflicting passions of men, to His throne on Cahary.
((■) There remains another great class, the men of
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passion. Among them have been some of the greatest and sweetest of the children of men- gentle souls with the grace of sympathy and self- forgetfulness ; generous and magnanimous souls like David, whose inspirations have been to men an abiding memorial of the beauty of chivalry ; heroes of faith like Paul and Luther, who change the current of human life. Jesus is the Lord of all such. Men of thought or action grow great often- times at the expense of their heart ; but in Jesus the heart has equal sway with the mind or the will. He was full of sympathy. The sick and the sorrow- ful never appealed to Him in vain ; His hand was laid gently and lovingly on the loathsome body of the leper ; the sinful and outcast knew there was understanding and gentle judgment with Him. And His miracles of healing were never demonstra- tions, seals of His Messiahship ; personal sym- pathy was their source and regulator. But Jesus does not throw the reins to sympathy. ' His sanity of judgment is as extraordinary as His depth of sympathy' (Peabody, Jesus Christ and the Social Question, p. 85). He could not look on the adul- terous woman brought to Him for judgment — He felt for her so ; but though He would not condemn, neither did He excuse ; He said, ' Go, and sin no more ' ( Jn 8^"'^). His gospel was that there is in- finite patience and forgiveness with God ; and yet there are no sterner words in the NT than His. He who told the parable of the Prodigal Son told also the parables of the Ten Virgins, the Man without the Wedding Garment, and the Talents. And the woman who bathed His feet in Simon's house, and Zacchaeus who lodged Him for the night, and Peter who listened to Him in the boat, all bear witness how, in His gracious presence, the sincere soul felt the evil of sin and the inflexible order of righteousness as it had never felt them before.