actual inequalities, are not among the best features of his ideal system. We cannot but suspect something of a personal bias. Thus, in the parable of the Pharisee and the publican, aimed at a hostile and detested order, the publican is justified by nothing but his humility; while in that of Lazarus and Dives, Lazarus is eternally rewarded for nothing but his poverty. It is no doubt well to be humble, and we should be glad to see poverty removed; but it is not to be assumed that the Pharisee, conscious of leading an honorable life, is therefore a bad man; nor that the rich proprietor should be tormented in hell merely because he does not give alms to all the beggars who throng about his gates. When Jesus desires that virtuous actions should be done as quietly and even as secretly as possible, he inculcates an important principle of morals, and it is devoutly to be wished that we had among us more of this unconspicuous kindness, and less ostentatious charity. Where, however, he preaches on the virtue of bestowing alms on his disciples, he does but echo a sentiment which is natural to religious teachers in all ages, and to which, as we have seen, the emissaries of another and earlier faith, were equally alive. Passing from these comparatively trifling questions, let us consider some of his decisions on the greater moral problems with which he felt called upon to deal.
On a vast social subject—that of divorce—he pronounced an opinion which gives us a little insight into his mode of regarding that most important of all topics, the relations of the sexes. The Pharisees, it appears, came to him and asked him whether it was permissible for a man to put away his wife, Moses having allowed it. Jesus explained that this precept had been given for the hardness of their hearts. His own view was, that man and wife are one flesh, and that if either should leave the other, except on account of unfaithfulness, and marry again, that one would be guilty of adultery. This severe doctrine he supported by one of his short sayings: "What God hath joined together, let not man put asunder" (Mk. x. 1-12; Mt. xix. 1-12; and v. 31, 32). But surely this judgment assumes the very point at issue. The joining together in wedlock is ascribed to God; the putting asunder to man. But granting the sacredness of the marriage tie, it would still be no less possible to invoke the
