anise and cummin, and have omitted the weightier matters of the law, judgment, mercy, and faith: these ought ye to have done, and not to leave the other undone. Ye blind guides, which strain at a gnat and swallow a camel.—Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye make clean the outside of the cup and of the platter, but within they are full of extortion and excess. Thou blind Pharisee, cleanse first that which is within the cup and platter, that the outside of them may be clean also. Woe unto you, Scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! for ye are like unto whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outward, but are within full of dead men's bones, and of all uncleanness. Even so ye also outwardly appear righteous unto men, but within ye are full of hypocrisy and iniquity."

These men are the representatives of too many in every age of the Church, who, whether ministers or members of the Church, mistake the form for the substance, the letter for the spirit, phrases for things, profession for practice, knowledge for obedience, and things about religion for religion itself; men who may be very conscientious, yet very ignorant; men very loud in the profession of their love

of truth and zeal for God's honour, yet false and malicious in their hearts; men who, in one word, forget that religion in its sum and substance is, as has been already said, love to God and man, such as never was or can be except through faith in the living Christ, and through the power of his indwelling Spirit.

All these Pharisees murmured at Christ for eating and drinking with such wicked, bad people as publicans and sinners. Had He made his court to themselves had He asked their advice and opinion with becoming deference-He would have been called all that was good. Alas, for such vain, proud, selfish, ambitious people! They were much farther from the kingdom of heaven, and in infinitely greater danger, than were the poor publicans and sinners whom they despised.

Here I pause in the exposition of this narrative to give one or two advices from what has been said.

One is never to delude ourselves with the idea that any amount of talk about religion, or, as the phrase is, "making a great work" about even its doctrines or practices—or making great sacrifices of time, labour, or money for some "religious

cause

or having a name for being "very strict," or "very particular," or "very religious,” or "very conscientious" - necessarily proves that we have any real religion. There may be fasting without repentance; the words of prayer without its spirit ;-much given, and much done, for our sect, party, or church, yet nothing done for God; proselytism and bringing persons to ourselves, yet no bringing of them to God; the idolatry of a religious system with practical atheism. Christ tells us what true religion is-" This is eternal life, to know Thee the only living and true God, and Jesus Christ whom Thou has sent."

Hear what the holy Apostle Paul says:-"Though I speak with the tongue of men and of angels, and have not love, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal. And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not love, I am nothing. And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing. Love suffereth long, and is kind; love envieth not; love vaunteth not itself, is not

puffed up, doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil; rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth; beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things."

Let this be the test of the reality of religion in ourselves and others,-love with its fruits. There are many means, many instrumentalities, to impart religion to the soul, but there is only one religion. There are things innumerable which help us to it, but this is the thing itself.

On the other hand, let us beware of calling men Pharisees, who are strict in the performances of what are styled religious duties. Very likely the world would now call such a man as the Apostle Paul a Pharisee, merely because he was separated from the world, and condemned the world while he wept over it, and because he was one with Christ in holiness and love.

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Again if we discover by the light of truth that the form which evil has taken in our minds is not that of the Scribe or Pharisee, but rather that of the publican and sinner, not evil in the spirit so much as evil in the flesh, and visible therefore to all-let us not, I say, in such a case be kept back

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from going to Christ by the harsh judgments which may be passed upon us, nor by the hypocrisies, inconsistencies, and manifold evils of professing Christians. It is a common excuse with those who are careless and ungodly, to assert that many professing Christians are as bad as themselves, and that there are to be found numbers of even so-called 'religious" people who are not better but often worse than others. Suppose all this were true, and that genuine Christians were rare and seldom met with though, after all, publicans and sinners are the least likely to meet them, or, if they met them, the least able or willing perhaps to recognise their goodness, or have any sympathy with them— yet why should this hinder sinners from drawing near to Jesus Christ? Why should Scribes and Pharisees stand in the way of their doing so now any more than then? It is Christ Himself on whom we each depend for every blessing, to whom each man is responsible, with whom we have each to do. And if you admit that to be like Him must be very heaven and blessedness itself, then surely it must be right to draw near to hear Him; to become his disciple and learn of Him; to try Him at least, if it were even a may be that He will draw