The Parable of the Pharisee and the Publican

Luke xvii. 9-14.

Nature divides our globe into different belts of vegetation. Hach zone has plants peculiar to itself. Under and beside the burning line lies the region of palms and bananas; then appear the vine and olive; then the oak and chestnut; the forests of evergreen of pine, with fields of hardy oats; then the birch with its silver dress and the mountain-ash with its coral berries, dwarfing away as you approach the pole — till they vanish; and, the utmost limits of vegetation reached, you enter the domain of eternal winter, snow and ice, silence and death. While there is only one bird that, a citizen of the world, frequents every shore, there is not one plant, so far as I know, that inhabits every country. Plants grow only in certain soils, or at certain heights, or under certain lines of latitude. Unlike these, pride is a weed that, springing up in every heart, grows at all elevations — as well in the humblest as in the highest stations of life; and under every system of religion, the true as well as the false. Strange to say, it is often found where it seems to

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have nothing to feed on, where there is the least occasion and the least excuse for it — like the wallflower rooted in the crevices of shattered rock or mouldering tower, it seems to grow best on ruins. Never till man fell, did he form the ambitious project of building a tower whose top should reach to heaven.

Pride is a sin of the heart; and while in his prayer, ‘Cleanse thou me from secret errors, keep back thy servant also from presumptuous sins,’ David showed himself alive to the dangers of such sins, others, in guarding only against the temptation to gross offences, leave themselves exposed to what is their greatest danger. Lodged in the heart like a robber who has concealed himself in some dark recess, and waits till nightfall to seize the plunder, this sin is more likely than many others to escape our notice. Not entailing the loss of character, or health, or wealth, which are the common penalties of crime, it can be indulged in with apparent impunity. Not always early or easily detected, this vice sometimes indeed assumes the features of a virtue — apes a noble independence of spirit, self-respect, a due regard to our rank and position; nay, even a sacred respect to God’s truth, to purity of doctrine or holiness of life. In Herod it wore the mask of conscience, and for his oath’s sake he beheaded John; in the Jews, of a tender regard for God’s honor, and they would have no dealings with the Samaritans; in the Pharisee, of purity of life, and so, sailing magnificently past the woman that was a sinner, lest his robes should be defiled by the touch of hers, he warns her off, saying, Stand aside, I am holier than thou. Obtaining access to hearts which would close the door in the face of grosser vices, pride, besides, is a very dreadful and deadly sin. Has it not proved itself so? It cost Nebuchadnezzar his reason; in his successors it cost Hezekiah his kingdom; on Galilee it nearly cost Simon Peter his life; taking root in the hearts of our first parents, it cost them and mankind Eden; springing up in angels’ bosoms, it cost them heaven. And as the wary mariner, dreading it more than lowering skies or stormy sea, takes alarm at the first sign of the leak which, hid beneath the surface and gaping by the keel, admits the water into the hold, our Lord, alarmed, if I may say so, at the first signs of this insidious and fatal sin in his disciples, promptly proceeds to stop the evil; and for this purpose, to instruct, warn, and alarm them, he relates the parable of the Pharisee and the Publican.

Before studying these two characters in their order, let us take a general survey of the religion of the Pharisees, and attend to such practical lessons as it is calculated to suggest and teach.

THEIR RELIGION HAD NOT ITS SEAT IN THE
HEART.

Baron Humboldt mentions a remarkable custom of some of the native tribes of America — one that would have carried our thoughts homeward as much as a daisy springing from the sod of their prairies, or a lark singing in Indian skies. Some time after a child is born, a font full of water is brought into the tent, and a fire kindled on its floor. The babe is then taken from its mother’s arms, not to be burned or drowned, but plunged over head into the water and swung rapidly through the flames. In this custom, which is practised on all their children, we see a rude baptismal rite: nor is it possible to read of it and still less were it possible to see this ceremony without recalling the words of John: ‘“‘ He shall baptize you with the Holy Ghost and with jire;” and those of Christ Himself: “Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.’ As I have seen an insect that may have fluttered among the flowers of Hden, or perished amidst the waters of the flood, embalmed in amber, in this custom we seem to see, embalmed in tradition, a fragment of patriarchal piety, and of the divine truths which man knew when the ancestors of these Indians — perhaps the world’s earliest emigrants — left the cradle of mankind. It is a symbolical confession of human depravity, and of the necessity that the soul should be purified as by fire and water from inborn corruption; and te witness this remarkable rite among these distant heathen could hardly fail to transport us on the wings of fancy to the old church at home, where a father was holding up his babe for baptism, or the voices of the great congregation were singing to some familiar, plaintive tune, 7 Behold I in iniquity - Was formed the womb within,

My mother also me conceived
In guiltiness and sin,

How strange to turn to the Pharisees, and find them, with the Word of God in their hands, apparently more ignorant than those painted savages — illustrating the paradox of Scripture: ‘ They have eyes but they see not, ears but they hear not, and minds but they do not understand.’ They were profoundly ignorant of the plague of their own hearts. They did not feel the. need of being renewed, or know that religion cannot’ live anywhere but in the heart, and lies in nothing so much as a heart right with God. Hven Nicodemus seemed ignorant of this. When informed by our Lord that he must be born again, he was surprised, filled with astonishment; and with a simplicity which we might expect, and would excuse in a child, replied, ‘* How can a man be born when he is old? Can he enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born?” If it was thus with him — a ruler in Israel, a man who felt such an interest in religion that he sought our Lord, though under the cloak of night, what must it have been with others? How appropriate to the followers of such leaders, the question, ‘‘If the light that is in you be darkness, how great is that darkness!”

It was great, gross, darkness. The religion of these Pharisees consisting of mere ceremonial observances, lying in such matters as meats and drinks, washing platters, paying tithes and keeping fasts, the worst - passions were left to rage and burn within their hearts — as do volcanic fires beneath the purple vineyards and green forests of Vesuvius’ slopes. Outwardly saints, they were inwardly devils. And lest I should be considered uncharitable, let us hear his account of them, who in the fullness of his tenderness and mercy promised Paradise to a dying thief, and turned eyes of pity on the woman that was a sinner. ‘Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites,” said our Lord, ‘for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but within are full of dead men’s bones and of all uncleanness. Even so ye also appear outwardly righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity. Fill ye up the measure of your fathers. Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell.’’

THEIR RELIGION LAY IN OUTWARD ACTS OF WORSHIP AND A SCRUPULOUS OBSERVANCE OF ITS FORMS.

In one of our late Indian battles, a native officer lay mortally wounded on the field beside one of our own. Exhausted with loss of blood and exposed to the fierce rays of a burning sun, both were tortured with thirst. One, whose motions they eagerly watched, at length approached them with a supply of water. After our countryman had taken a long, deep draught, it was presented to the Hindoo. He had been crying for water, and had it now. ‘Yet, ere he drinks, he turns a dying eye on the Good Samaritan to ask his caste. It is low; and his religion forbids him to take meat or drink from such impure hands. Our countryman, see-. ing him hesitate, remonstrates — telling how it will ase! suage his sufferings, and may save his life: but remon- — strates in vain. ‘The other turns one greedy look on the blessed water, and pours it out on the ground — a sacrifice to the claims of conscience. And esteeming a devout Pagan a better man in God’s sight than a careless, unconscientious Christian, I say, whatever judgment others may pronounce on this act, would God that Christ’s followers were as ready to take up their cross, deny themselves daily, and follow Jesus; dying with Him rather than denying Him!

The scrupulous observance which the Pharisees paid to mere forms, has no such claims on our respect. They knew, or ought to have known, better. Yet, neglecting the moral law and even violating its plainest precepts, they made religion lie wholly in ritual observances and certain outward acts of worship. They gave alms. They prayed often. They fasted and paid tithes; fasting oftener and paying tithes on more things than even the law required — as if they would make God their debtor. They were scrupulously careful to avoid any ceremonial uncleanness; and that was one reason perhaps why the priest and Levite left the wounded man on the road, lest the touch of what might be a dead body should render them unclean. They were particularly careful also to observe all ceremonial duties; and therefore the murderers of our Lord, with his blood still red on their guilty hands, sought to have his body removed from the cross, and respect rendered to the law which required that whosoever was hanged should be taken down by sunset. ‘They were close attenders also on the temple, where, as in a Roman Catholic church, with a crowd of worshipers, on their knees, telling their beads, repeating their prayers with eyes cast on the ground or raised to an image, there was great appearance of devotion. Apparently abstracted from all sublunary things, with hands and eyes raised to heaven, with loud and sonorous voice sounding forth his prayer, with texts of Scripture sawn on NG dress, and ashes sprinkled on his head, there stood the Pharisee — a living lie — a whited sepulchre, with a head as dark and a heart as foul as the grave. Lights are kindled on the seaboard, some to guide the ship in, others to warn her off: this burns at the harbor’s mouth, and that, a beacon of danger, flashes where the sea breaks foaming on a fatal reef. And the Pharisees have left us, not an example to follow, but to avoid. How does their case warn the churches against attaching much importance to religious forms, either in the way of unreasonably adhering to such as are old, or unnecessarily introducing such as are new. It is in the nature of a religion of many forms to degenerate into one of form. By occupying and indeed engrossing the attention of the worshiper, they withdraw it from the state of his heart, and prove as pernicious to true piety as a superabundance of leaves to the plant, whose sap is spent on feeding the leaf, to the detriment of the fruit: and perhaps some churches might be benefited by a free use of the knife with which the gardener prunes away the flush of green wood to increase the crop of fruit. I see much danger in a multiplicity, but little, or none, in a variety of

forms. Unity with variety is God’s law in the king-.

dom of nature; and why should not his law in the

kingdom of grace be unity of spirit with variety of

forms? Uniformity is but the shadow of unity: and how often have churches in vain attempts after the first,

eatin lost the second — like the dog in the fable lost both? At the Lord’s table I have knelt with Episcopalians, I have sat with Presbyterians, and I have stood with fellowworshipers in a foreign church under the shadow of the Alps; and I can only pity the person who, believing in the communion of the saints, could find in the attitude any reason for not engaging in the ordinance. This were to be great in little things; and forget that Christian love and charity which are the weightier matters of the law. It may be that the forms of worship in some of our churches are, as is alleged, bald and bare.. If so, there is no reason why this should not be amended. But there is much reason why we should beware, on the one hand, of putting uniformity of worship in room of the unity of the spirit, and, on the other, of substituting dead forms for a living faith. Let us never forget that forms are not religion, but only its drapery; and that, as they dress children lightly who wish to brace their frames, as the laborer throws off his coat to work, and as in the ancient gaimes the candidates stepped into the race-course unencumbered with many, or heavy, garments, the fewer forms which religion wears, consistent with decency and order, the more robust she will grow — she will work with greater energy — and, like one of beautiful mould and symmetry, she will walk with more native, queenly, grace — when

Unadorned, adorned the most.

THEIR RELIGION WAS CHARACTERIZED BY
i OSTENTATION.

The Pharisees distributed charity; but it was to the sound of a trumpet, seeking the praise of men under pretence of caring for the poor; — therefore our Lord said, ‘‘ When thou doest thine alms, do not sound a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues, and in the streets, that they may have glory of men.” They fasted; but not from sin ; — therefore our Lord, detecting ‘“‘the lust of the eyes and the pride of life’ looking out from the holes of their rueful mask, warned his disciples, saying: ‘‘ When ye fast be not as the hypocrites, of a sad countenance, for they disfigure their faces that they may appear unto men to fast.’ They prayed; not that they might be pardoned of God, but praised of men, and gaining a character for piety, gain the widow’s esteem for the villancus purpose of plundering her house. Their humility was but the stepping-stone of their ambition — tigers, they crouched to make the surer, deadlier, spring; and therefore our Lord warned his disciples, saying, ‘‘Tkou shalt not be as the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and in the corners of the street, that they may be seen of men.”’ That they may be seen of men! he rings the changes on that — exposing the pride and vanity that lay at the root of their religion. Loud, ostentatious, and unprofitable, it was like the brawling, noisy, foaming, frothy torrent, which, with a rock for its bed and barrenness on its banks, makes itself sven and heard. How different genuine, gracious piety! Affluent in blessings but retiring from observation, it has its symbol in the stream that pursues a silent course, and, flashing out in the light of day but here and there, but’ now and then, is not known but by the good it does — the flowers that bloom on its banks, and the evergreen verdure which it gives to the pastures through which it winds on its quiet path.

To appreciate the justice of these remarks, we have only to look at the sect in the specimen of it this parable presents. Judging the stock by the sample, look at

THE. PHARISEE.

Sweeping contemptuously by others who, feeling themselves unworthy to tread the holy courts, worshiped reverently at a distance, he makes his way to the front, pride in his eye, and self-complacency in his bearing; and now beyond the vulgar throng, he stands to begin his devotions, not only to pray thus with himself, but that he might be the observed of all observers by himself — an interpretation of the words which betrays no lack of charity, since our Lord has told us that the Pharisees did pray to be seen of men. There is often a great incongruity between the language of our prayers and the state of our hearts — the one, alas, is so much more devout than the other. But there was no inconsistency here. Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth spake here; and seldom has God listened to such an offensive outpouring of pride and arrogance. Observe first the fashion and form of his prayer. In a sense, it is no prayer — it contains neither confession nor petition; there is neither guilt acknowledged nor pardon asked; it expresses no want, and it asks no help. No doubt there is an acknowledgment of divine goodness — God is mentioned, is thanked; yet there is no redeeming point in this. Under a flimsy pretense of glorifying God, he glorifies himself, and as to his expression of thanks, I regard that as on a par with those professions of humility in which many vain men are in the habit of indulging; and which are but a cover, and a very transparent one, for their self-conceit — for telling what feeds their vanity and is intended to exalt themselves. To thank God is right. We have much to thank him for; and had the Pharisee said, God, I thank thee that LT am not in hell, that thou hast not dealt with me according to my sins, that thou hast so restrained the corruptions of this wicked heart as to keep me back from presumptuous, flagrant sins — if the thought of others had excited such gratitude in his heart as was expressed by one who, seeing a felon led to the gallows, exclaimed, speaking of himself, But for the grace of God, there goes John Bradford ! — imperfect as his prayer was, on that one leg it might have limped to heaven. Done in the spirit that does not despise but pity the wicked, to thank God that we are not as they. are is a pious thing. All are hewn out of the same rock, and dug out of the hole of the same pit; and the purest woman therefore has cause to thank God that she is not as the basest of her sex; nor is there a good man who has been preserved from be. coming, like some of his early associates, a wreck of character, of body, of soul, but, as he sees in their fate what his might have been, will thank God that he is not as others — giving the glory where it is due; saying, with the apostle, ‘“‘By grace I am what Dean.)

Secondly, observe the substance of his prayer. He tells God how he fasted and paid tithes. And if religion lay in abstaining from food but not from sin, in giving our property but not our hearts to God, he was indeed a religious man — and more religious than may at first appear. The Mosaic economy, which is misrepresented by many as a system of great austerity, established numerous feasts during which the people, set loose from toil and arrayed in holiday attire, were to eat of the fat and drink of the sweet and pass their time in innocentpleasures. It enjoined but one fast — only one in the whole fifty-two weeks of the year. But this Pharisee, not content with fasting once each year as the law required, fasted twice each week; and, teaching us to set little value on such ritual observances, the fasts that starved his body seem only to have fed his pride; the austerities which mortified his flesh became the means of gratifying his vanity. ‘ He showed a corresponding excess of zeal in the matter of tithes. God required his people to tithe the fruits of the olive and vine, the sheaves of the field and the produce of their flocks: but as in those countries where, devoted to a life of celibacy, men immure themselves in monasteries, and women wither in convents, the sacrifices of the Pharisee rose above the ree quirements of the law — anise and cummin and other common pot-herbs were all scrupulously tithed. Hence his boast, I fast twice a week, and pay tithes of all that I possess. In other words: What a good man I am; let others acknowledge their shortcomings; as for me, I dread not a day of count and reckoning; for me, the day of judgment that brings man face to face with God has no terrors; I have done more than he requires; He is my debtor rather than I his — the balance will stand in my favor. What great, swelling words of vanity! How may we apply to this miserable self-deceiver, and to all that self-righteous class of whom, though the pride of their hearts may not be so fully developed, he is the type, our Lord’s language to the Laodiceans, “Thou sayest, I am rich, and increased with goods, and have need of nothing: and knowest not that thou art wretched, and miserable, and poor, and blind, and naked.’’ So we might dismiss him to make way for a better man — praying God by his Holy Spirit to keep us not only from the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eye, but also from the pride of life.

But we are not done with the Pharisee. He has certain negative as well as positive merits. Here is what he is not, ‘‘Iam not as other men are.” To “entertain a bad opinion of others without sufficient evidence proves more than the lack of the charity which hopeth all things, and believeth all things. Who does not believe others virtuous would be found, were the secrets of his heart and life known, to be himself vicious. We may lay it down as an axiom, that those who are ready to suspect others of being actuated by a regard to self-interest, are themselves selfish. Thieves do not believe in the existence of honesty; nor rakes in virtue; nor mercenary politicians in patriotism; and the reason why worldlings regard religious people as hypocrites is their own want of religion — knowing that were they to profess a warm regard for Christ, the glory of God, and the salvation of souls, they would be hypocrites, they conclude others to be so. Hence also you find many novelists representing every man into whose mouth they put the language of piety as either a rogue or a fool, most commonly a rogue — a very unsound but not unnatural conclusion on their part; for prejudices resemble the fogs that turn the bright sun into a dull, copper ball, and a bad heart is like the jaundice that sees its own dingy yellow in the purest lily. I conclude, therefore, however fair the whited sepulchre looked, that in his heart at least this Pharisee was, what he tock other men to be — an extortioner, unjust, and an adulterer. He had no right to put on such airs, or, as his eye fell on him, to make a footstool of the publican to stand higher before God — saying by way of climax, ‘nor as this publican.”’

- In this proud, arrogant man we see the spirit of self-righteousness fully developed. Although they may not come out so prominently, the elements of his character are in all who trust in themselves for salvation. May God enlighten our eyes, show us ourselves! For who knows himself, knowing much more ill of himself than he can of any one else, will indulge in no such proud, and self-complacent and odious comparisons — his prayer will be that of David, Enter not into judgment with thy servant, for in thy. sight shall no man living be justified — his language that of, O my God, I am ashamed, and blush to lift up my face to thee, my God — and glad to enter heaven at the back of Manasseh, or the woman that was a sinner, or the thief of the cross, he will leave the Pharisee to place himself beside the publican, and catch from his lips the heartfelt prayer, God be merciful to me a sinner!

THE PUBLICAN.

The white trimmings on a coffin catch the eye; and pure as it seems when, falling softly, it lies level on the fields, or the sport of wintry winds, has been tossed into fantastic wreaths, snow never looks so white as in the church-yard — beside the black mould and gaping mouth of a new-dug grave. Studying effect, the painter and orator make use of such strong contrasts: and no doubt it was for this purpose that the Pharisee dragged the publican into his prayer, using him as a foil to set off himself — a dark and sombre background to present his merits in a more striking light. In this, ‘‘He made a pit and digged it, and is fallen into the ditch which he made.’’ The Pharisee becomes a background to set off the publican; and never did humility appear more beautiful in the eyes of God and man than here, where it stands contrasted with the empty vanity and haughty arrogance of this inflated Pharisee. In illustration of this, observe

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THE MANNER OF HIS PRAYER.

He stood afar off. — Both prayed standing, teaching that that attitude, which was the one commonly asmed by the Jews in the temple, is one which we may e with propriety in public worship. It is equally th kneeling an attitude of worship — though the latter xy be more suitable for prayer where the congretion stand up to sing. There is propriety, but there n be no devotion in an attitude. Man looketh on the tward appearance, but God looketh on the heart; d the only rule applicable to such matters as are t the weighty matters of the law, is to assume attitude which rather aids than hinders devotion, d avoid that, which, acting through the senses, dis- ‘bs the mind. That posture is the best which least tracts attention by a feeling of bodily weariness, or ierwise drags our thoughts downward — hanging like lead weight on the wings of prayer.

But while both stood, the publican stood afar off, as e who felt himself unworthy to enter the house of d — as a beggar with the mud of the road on his yes and the rags of poverty on his back might hang out the door of a lordly hall, and, oppressed with a ise of his meanness, modestly decline the invitation enter. Men often, very often, speak more eloquently acts than words; and in the arrestment of his steps, the reverential distance at which he stands, the poor blican seems to say, I am less than the least of all y mercies. Blessed are the poor in spirit! It is to n and all such as come modestly in to seat themselves down, if I may say so, at the lower end of the table, that the Lord, who has his eye on them, will send the message, ‘‘Come ye up hither!’’ — for, while every one that exalteth himself shall be abased, he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.

He would not Lift up so much as his eyes to heaven. — The Pharisee looked boldly up. Why not? There was nothing in heaven’s cloudless azure purer than himself. No doubt the angels veil their faces with their wings; but there is no brightness in God’s giory, sunlike, to dazzle him — nor awfulness in God’s holiness to daunt him. Standing to God in the relation of a creditor rather than a debtor, why should he be ashamed to look him in the face? Fasting twice a week, and paying tithes of all that he possessed, he has not overdrawn but overpaid his accounts — doing more than the law required. Turn now to the publican, and what a contrast! There, like one caught in some act which overwhelms with a sense of shame, and covers the cheek with burning blushes, he stands with his head bent and his eyes cast on the ground. Self-accused, self-abased, and self-condemned, he shrinks within himself, and wonders perhaps that the very earth does not open its mouth to swallow him up. He does not dare to look up. But though his eyes are — not lifted to heaven, his heart is; and, while he seems ready to sink to the ground, his soul is soaring aloft on the wings of prayer, upward to*the heaven of heavens.

He smote upon his breast. — The hands of the Pharisee are stretched to heaven to receive the reward he expects at God’s. There he stands, proud as the victor who, covered with the blood of a hundred battles and the laurels of a hundred victories, only bends his head to receive the crown from a king whose throne and whose country his valor has defended; and from whose hands he accepts the proudest honor, not so much as a matter of grace as of right. The hands of the publican are otherwise employed — he smote upon his breast. By this action, or by smiting on the thigh, the impassioned natives of the Hast expressed the deepest sorrow. But these sounding blows expressed more than sorrow. They said, as they fell thick and heavy on his bosom, Here lies the root of all my sins — O, this hard, foul, wicked heart ! — My life has been bad, but it has been worse — here lies the inner spring of all these polluted streams! These blows were inarticulate prayers. They sounded forth to God’s ear such wishes as these: ‘‘ Create in me a clean heart and renew a right spirit within me.” It had surely been done; for it was from the bosom which he smote that there went up to heaven, like an arrow from the bow-string, this brief, but blessed believing prayer:

GOD BE MERCIFUL TO ME.A SINNER.

Earnestness does not express itself in long, inflated, pompous sentences. It is brief; it is simple. The moment has arrived when victory, long doubtful as the tide of success ebbed and flowed, may be won by one splendid, dashing, daring attack — the order is given in one brief word, Charge! On the distant waves a flag is seen now sinking in the trough and again rising on the crest of the foaming billows; and beneath that signal, clinging to the fragment of a vessel that lies many fathoms down in the depths of ocean, are two human forms — and all the ery that sounds from stem to stern is, A wreck, a wreck! and all the order, Lower the boat ! — words hardly uttered when she drops on the water, and, pulled by stout rowers, is leaping over the waves to the rescue. One late in the deserted streets sees the smoke creep, and the flames begin to flash and flicker from a house whose tenants are buried in sleep; he bounds to the door and thunders on it — ali his ery, Fire, Fire! Peter sinks amid the boisterous waves of Galilee and all the prayer of lips the cold water kisses is, as he stretches out his hand to Jesus, Save me, I perish! And with the brief, urgent, earnestness of one who seeing his danger, knows that there is no time, and believing in God’s great mercy, feels that there is no need for long prayers, the publican, like a man who in falling over a crag catches the arm of a friendly tree, throws his whole soul into this cry, these few, blessed, accepted words, ‘‘God be merciful to me, a sinner!”

Both have prayed, and.our Lord tells us the result. Insulting to God and man, the prayer of the Pharisee, like a stone cast at heaven, falls back and returns to break his own head — while the Publican’s ascends like the cloud of incense that floated away fragrant and heavenward from the morning or evening sacrifice. Perfumed with a Saviour’s merits, it is accepted as a sweet-smelling savor, and sins confessed are sins forgiven. Not that his confession and sorrow were the te price of pardon; but that, feeling undone and lost, he east himself on divine mercy, and so became a partaker of the righteousness which Jesus Christ has provided for the chief of sinners.

Thus he went down to his house ‘justified;”’ and so may we all — with a pardon in our bosoms and the peace of God in our hearts. Ah, that were the happiest home-going we ever made — suflicient to turn the barest hovel into a palace, and impart to the humblest fare more enjoyment than sumptuous banquets afford. Light is the step of one before whom the prison gates roll open, leaving him to walk forth to life and liberty. The sun never shone so bright, the flowers by the wayside never looked so beautiful, the birds in sky and merry woodland never sang so sweet, nor did love to everything ever glow and burn so in his bosom, as now, when taking an everlasting leave of strong jail and gloomy cell, he hastens home to embrace his wife and little ones — goes down to his house a free, pardoned, happy, blessed, man. Yet lighter his steps, and happier his heart, who, accepting Christ in God’s house, goes down justified to his own. And what should hinder us? We have only to throw away all confidence in ourselves; and with confidence throw ourselves at Jesus’s feet, or rather into his open arms, on his loving bosom — on which, when the work of our sanctification is completed, we shall be borne up to another and a better house, there to be crowned with everlasting glory and dwell forever with the Lord. ‘Thus, while casting the proud down into hell God abases them, he will exalt the humble — them, and them only.

He dwelleth with such as are of an humble and contrite spirit; and they only with whom he dwells on earth, shall dwell with him in heaven.

I cannot close these observations without remarking that the Pharisees, of whom the man before us is as specimen, have furnished the world with a term wherewith to reproach those whose religion is less loose than its own. Such as are for living a strict and pure and holy life, who, believing that no man on his death-bed ever found that he had given too much time to God and Christ, the interest of his soul, and that eternal world on whose verge he stands, wish the Sabbath day to be spent in the public or private exercises of God’s worship, such as seek to remove all temptations to spend it otherwise — whether in the form of theatres, or museums, public-gardens or public-houses, such men are opprobriously called Pharisees. Now, not to say that it is a bad cause which needs to be supported by calling bad names, this application of the term betrays, as I undertake and proceed to show, the grossest ignorance.

The Pharisees cared nothing for the poor. Does this character apply most to those who are called Pharisees, or to those who call them so? Which of these two classes are most frequently found imparting both material and spiritual comforts to the desolate abodes of poverty, I would leave the poor to say. It is no breach of charity to fancy them turning from those called Pharisees to such as call them so, to say, ‘¢ Jesus we know, and Paul we know — these others we know — but who are ye?”

Again, the Pharisees, devouring widows’ houses, made religion a mere pretense to promote their own secular and selfish ends. Now let impartial history say, whether in the dark days of trial, in times that demanded a noble self-denial, those called Pharisees, or those calling them so, have been the most ready to sacrifice their interests to their religion, their place to their principles, and leave father and mother, wife and children, houses and lands, to take up their cross and follow Christ.

Again, the Pharisees were sensual and self-indulgent. ‘<They bound,” said our Lord, ‘heavy burdens, and laid them on men’s shoulders, but they themselves would not move them with one of their fingers.”” And do those whom the world calls Pharisees ask others to make efforts on behalf. of humanity or of religion, while they themselves make none? Are theirs the names you miss in the lists of public charities? Do they bear the least part of such burdens? I venture to affirm the contrary: and that, were their support withdrawn, many of our philanthropic and religious schemes would tumble into ruins, like an arch deprived of its piers.;

Again, the Pharisees were men of low morale; and therefore our Lord said, ‘‘ Except your righteousness exceed the righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees, ye shall in no wise enter into the kingdom of heaven.”’ Now are those whom the world reproaches as such, less 1aoral than those who reproach them? As a class, do their greater sins distinguish them from others as much as their greater professions? In the upper ranks of society, are impurity and loose morals more characteristic of those who keep the Lord’s day sacred, than of those who make it one of business or of pleasure? and among the lower classes, is it those who resort to the church or to the public house on the Sabbath, who supply most work to the police and the greatest number of tenants to the prison?

Again, the Pharisees persecuted piety, and hating Jesus because he was holier than they, called him bad names, imputed to him bad motives, and held him up to public scorn — charging him with crimes which his soul abhorred, and of which he was innocent as the babe unborn. Now are those whom the world calls Pharisees, haters of serious and pure religion? Is it their pens and tongues which are dipped in poison, and employed to wound Christ in his members? Are they the successors of the men who, hating religion in their hearts and feeling that Christ’s holy and unselfish life condemned theirs, crowned his forehead with thorns, and cried, Away with him to the cross?

Again, the Pharisees were a self-righteous class. They trusted to their own works for salvation, and were, however little occasion they had to be so, remarkably well pleased with themselves. Puffed up with vanity, they thanked God that they were not as others who might need a Saviour — they did not. But whoever found these to be the features of such as the world calls Pharisees? On the contrary, is not Jesus Christ and him crucified the very centre of their religion — the sun of their sky — the foundation of their most precious hopes? Disclaiming all self-confidence and merit in their own works, may not their creed be summed up in the words of him who raised himself on his dying bed to exclaim with life’s latest breath, None but Christ, none but Christ! Let the world call white black, or light darkness, or sweet bitter, but not such men Pharisees. The north and south poles are not farther asunder.

Inapplicable as is such an epithet to devout Christians, let them beware how they furnish any, the least occasion for others using it by any inconsistency between their profession and their practice — by magnifying little things and overlooking the weightier matters of the law — by straining at a gnat, and swallowing a camel. Never overlook the difference between what is vital in divine truth and what is indifferent in human forms. Never mistake the dead robes for the living body of religion. Never forget that ‘‘to do justly and love mercy and walk humbly before God,” is what the Lord requires of thee; that faith without works is dead; that form without spirit is dead; and that, the highest piety being ever associated with the deepest humility, true religion is like that sweetest of all singing-birds, the skylark, which with the lowest nest but highest wing dwells on the ground, and yet soars to the skies.

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