darkness it was done in the night. "He that doeth evil hateth the light." By "tares" is not meant the weed we understand by that word, but a sort of degenerate wheat, which is found among the corn abundantly in Palestine. It is not said that the tares may be mistaken for wheat (though doubtless this might sometimes be the case) but that wheat may be taken for tares. Good men are sometimes denounced as bad, and their names cast out as evil, in those same societies where hypocrites and worthless persons pass for good.1 "We may not separate from the Church, therefore, on pretence of belonging to some holier society. . . This is schism," from which in the Litany we pray the good Lord to deliver us. So doing, that is separating ourselves, "we are guilty of great presumption and self-conceit. We pretend to know the secrets of other men's hearts; whereas a little reflection might convince us that we know not the secrets of our own."2 Judgment in this world seems delayed. The ungodly triumph, and tares annoy the wheat. But in the end of the world, judgment will take place first of all. The tares will be gathered for the burning before the wheat is gathered into the barn. The binding in bundles seems to point to "different classes of offenders." Like is gathered to like.

All readers of Church History will recall the too numerous instances. First the Montanists (those primæval Puritans) by whom even a Tertullian was led away. Then the Donatists, against whose errors Augustine makes excellent use of this parable. Afterwards, to pass over the case of the Marian and other martyrs (for the spirit of "the servants was not restricted to Rome or to any one body of mis-judging Christians), we come down to the Puritans, to the Pilgrim Fathers, to those modern Montanists against whose particular error our 34th Article seems partially directed;

and so on to the most recent theological adventurer and the shallowest manufacturer of sects.

2 A Plain Commentary.

3 Abp. Trench (Parr. 98) speaks excellently "concerning the vanity of every attempt to found a church on a subjective instead of an objective basis; on the personal holiness of the members, instead of recognising one there to be founded for us, where the pure Word of God is preached, and the sacraments administered, by those duly commissioned to the office. 4 Heb. vi. 7, 8.

CCXIII.

WE MUST COMMUNICATE OUR LIGHT.

St. Mark iv. 21-25.

And he said unto them, Is a candle brought to be put under a bushel, or under a bed? and not to be set on a candlestick? For there is nothing hid, which shall not be manifested; neither was anything kept secret, but that it should come abroad. If any man have ears to hear, let him hear. And he said unto them, Take heed what ye hear: with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you: and unto you that hear shall more be given. For he that hath, to him shall be given: and he that hath not, from him shall be taken even that which he hath.

In the midst of His parables our Lord turns to His Disciples and tells them as before,' what is required of those to whom the light of His knowledge has been communicated. They must in turn communicate it unto others. He puts it in the form of a question, to which one only answer can be returned. It is most reasonable. As a candle is lighted, not to be concealed under a vessel of any sort, but for the purpose of giving light, so had He kindled these torches, as it were, with the light of God's truth; instructed them in the knowledge of Divine things, that they might be able to teach others also.3 Though hidden now, as it were, under the form of parables, it is meant to be manifested. It has been kept secret for a time, but with the design that it should be ultimately divulged. And again, in a frequent proverbial saying, He calls upon them to open their ears, and to take heed what and how they hear. In proportion to the attention they paid would be the return they should receive. The careless, who paid no attention, should by a just retribution lose even what they had, or seemed to have.5

1 St. Matt. v. 15. Compare also for what follows, St. Matt. vii. 2; x. 26; xiii. 12. Proverbial sayings the Lord often repeated under different circumstances and with varying ap

plications.

2 St. Luke viii. 16.
3 2 Tim. ii. 2.

4 St. Matt. xiii. 35.
5 St. Luke viii. 18.

The limb not used withers and becomes worthless, the mere semblance of a limb. From the conduct of too many in matters of religion, one would imagine that these were of little importance and easy to be understood. It is the direct opposite of what our Lord here tells His Disciples; the direct opposite of what men do in matters of business or of human learning. Who ever think of giving to Divine things the time and attention required to make a fortune, or even to acquire a single accomplishment?

CCXIV.

THE SEED GROWING SECRETLY.

St. Mark iv. 26-29.

And he said, So is the kingdom of God, as if a man should cast seed into the ground; and should sleep, and rise night and day, and the seed should spring and grow up, he knoweth not how. For the earth bringeth forth fruit of herself; first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear. But when the fruit is brought forth, immediately he putteth in the sickle, because the harvest is come.

The growth of Christ's Church is compared to that of a seed. Christ came down from Heaven and sowed this divine seed in the earth. He who slept in the night of death, and rose that Easter morn, here likens Himself to a man who, having done as God bids, may sleep night by night, and rise day by day, assured at the end of the revolving days' that it will come to perfection; God will give the increase. It springs, it increases, how a man knows not,3 no more than he knows the way of the wind.

1 Dan. xii. 13.

2 Lit." is lengthened."

In this alone the comparison to Christ is not meant to hold. Not all the points of a parable must be pressed. Some of it is no more than

The cause is concealed; the

scaffolding. "It is not the act of the sower, but simply the property of the seed, which is meant to engage our attention."-A Plain Commentary.

Ecclus. xi. 5; St. John iii. 8.,

3

effect known and read of all men. So with those who labour after their Lord, sowing in the field of this world1 the seed of the Divine Word. As the earth seems to bring forth spontaneously, of its own accord, that is according to the law impressed upon it by its Creator, "the kindly fruits of the earth," that is the fruits of the earth each after its kind; and as these fruits are not produced full grown at once, but proceed according to their regular stages of growth; so shall it be with the seed intrusted to these tillers of a spiritual soil. The Church was not produced fully developed; neither is any individual member of Christ's Church a full grown Christian all at once. In either case, in the case of the individual as in the case of the aggregate number of which the body corporate is composed, we cannot fail to see this Divine law of their being, impressed upon the Church no less than on the world; growth, gradual increase, from littleness to greatness, as is shadowed forth in more than one parable. This is God's law, and any attempt on the part of ignorant and impatient man to contravene it, and to hasten a process which He declares, and which in earthly matters experience shews, must be gradual, will only end in disappointment." But the Lord's Word shall not return unto Him void. It shall surely in His time, and by His providence, come to perfection. Let us only do faithfully our appointed part. Then 8 may we take our rest, so far free from care. He will give the increase." There is a glance too, in the end of the

1 St. Matt. xiii. 38.

2 St. Matt. xiii. 19.

3 Abp. Trench suggests a comparison with 1 St. John ii. 12–14.

2 St. Pet. iii. 18; Eph. iv. 13.
Job. viii. 7.

"For a man cannot, after a state of sin, be instantly a saint. The work of Heaven is not done by a flash of lightning, or a dash of affectionate rain, or a few tears of a relenting pity."-Bp. Taylor, Ser. Of growth in Grace. "No trouble of ours can accelerate the growth, or shorten the stages through which each seed must pass. It is the mistake of modern Methodism, for instance, to be always

working at the seed, taking it up to see whether it is growing."-Alford. 7 Is. lv. 10, 11.

8 It seems a caution against overanxiety, which often wears a man, and notably a clergyman, out before his time. The writer remembers having heard from Bp. Wilberforce, who but for the temperament here recommended could never have accomplished his vast undertakings, an anecdote with reference to Abp. Sumber, who was in the habit of saying "I have done my best," and so leaving the matter in the hand of God.

1 Cor. iii. 5-9; Ps. cxxvii. 1, 2.

parable,' at the joyful ingathering of the ripe and fruitful Church at the end of the world.2

CCXV.

THE PARABLE OF THE GRAIN OF MUSTARD

SEED.

St. Mark iv. 30-32.

And he said, Whereunto shall we liken the kingdom of God? or with what comparison shall we compare it? It is like a grain of mustard seed, which, when it is sown in the earth, is less than all the seeds that be in the earth: but when it is sown, it groweth up, and becometh greater than all herbs, and shooteth out great branches; so that the fowls of the air may lodge under the shadow of it.

The Lord not only adopts the method, to which the people were accustomed, of teaching by parables, but He adopts also the manner, with which they were familiar, of their best teachers. He begins with a customary question.3 In His humility He sets Himself, as it were, on a level with His hearers. The Creator of all seems, looking abroad upon the works of His own hands, to be casting about, as it were, for a comparison which might befit His greatest work of all. The kingdom of God, or as it is sometimes called "the Kingdom of Heaven," in other words the Church of Christ, which has God for its Author and Heaven for its home and place of birth, this He likens to a grain of mustard seed. This among the Jews was a frequent and proverbial standard of comparison for anything which from a small beginning

The parable, it may be noted, is peculiar to St. Mark.

2 Joel iii. 13; Rev. xiv. 14, 15; 1 St. Pet. i. 25.

3"How amiable is this carefulness of the Son of God! How instructive to the ministers of His Word! ... He studies only to make Himself

understood, to instruct to advantage, to give true ideas of faith and piety, and to find out such expressions as may render necessary truths easy and intelligible to the meanest capacities. This is what must be imitated."-Quesnel.