Saint Matthew, Saint Peter, Saint Jude, Saint James

of conscience, the scornings and reproaches of men. They include all the elements of suffering which men must endure as a refining and purifying from evil, whether this suffering is endured here in this present world or in the world to come.

The fact is, the imagery of the parable leaves us in silent awe. We can find a safe refuge from the questionings it raises within us, only in the all-satisfying thought that the impossible with man is possible with God.

18:35. "In the same way will my Heavenly Father treat you."

These words cut through the meshes of many a theological system by which men have deceived themselves. The self assurance of justification by faith, the absolution of the Priest of God, are good enough in their place. But they are not to be depended upon as final and irreversible. The forgiven debt is liable to come back upon us. If faith does not work by love it ceases to justify. If a man returns as a dog to his vomit, no past absolution can avail him in the least. The characters of our discharge are as it were traced in sympathetic ink. They appear or disappear according to the greater or less glow of the faith and love of the pardoned debtor.

19: 10.

If the case of the man is so with his wife, it is not good to marry."

Nothing testifies better than this saying to what an extent the morals of the people had become corrupted. The Apostles of our Lord themselves did not maintain the thought of conjugal fidelity.

See also note on Mark 10:9.

19:13. "Then little children were brought to him that he should lay his hands on them and pray," etc.

See note on S. Mark 10:13-16.

19:16.

"Master, what good thing shall I do that I may have eternal life?"

See notes on S. Mark 10: 19, 20, and S. Luke 10: 25, 30, and 18:9.

19:24. "It is easier for a camel to go through a needle's eye than for a rich man to go into the Kingdom of God."

This expression whose interpretation from an absolute point of view has sometimes embarrassed commentators, has a very simple explanation. In the East they still call "a needle's eye" certain obscure passages, sometimes created by the hand of man, sometimes and more frequently formed by natural caves piercing through some mountain. These kinds of tunnels by means of which sometimes a very long circuit is avoided, are usually quite low so that camels can pass through them only by being unloaded and even in some narrow places by going on their knees. The camel drivers prefer to discharge and reload the camels to being compelled to go about the mountain and to make a detour of some places.

This same name "needle's eye" was likewise given to low porches built in the fortifications of a city. They were built in such a way that the enemies' cavalry could not make a sally, but camels could pass under the conditions just mentioned.

Meanwhile the allegorical meaning of the parable is understood. To enter the gate of the Kingdom of Heaven, the rich are obliged to unburden themselves of their riches, to make themselves little in their own eyes, to humble themselves, to fall upon their knees. For this gate is very

narrow, very low, very contracted. narrow the way."

"Strait is the gate and

19:29. "Shall receive a hundredfold." See note on S. Mark 10:29, 30.

The number of things to be forsaken is here enumerated to the perfect number seven, just as in 15:19 the things which defile a man are ennumerated to the same perfect number. Compare S. Mark 10: 29, 30.

19:30. "But many will be last who are first." See note on 20: 16, S. Mark 10: 31.

20: 2. "When he had agreed with the laborers for a dollar a day."

The denarius of the original translated by "penny" in our King James' version, was the ordinary day's wage of a common laborer. In that respect, therefore, and in its purchasing power, it was about equivalent to a dollar of our money to-day.

See also notes on 18: 23, 28, and S. Mark 14:5, 6.

20:8. Pay them their wages."

According to the law of Moses a laborer's wages must be paid the same day. (Deut. xxiv, 15).

20: 10. They too received each man a dollar."

A small thing done in an humble, self-forgetful, devoted, spirit is of more value in God's sight than a great sacrifice done in a mercenary spirit, or in a spirit of self righteous self complacency. God always gives grace to the lowly.

20:15. "Are you envious because I am generous?”

The “evil eye,” Prov. 28: 22, S. Mark 7:22, was the one looking with envy and ill will at the prosperity of others, and so in S. Mark it is noted as among the evil things proceeding from an evil heart. On the other hand,

as Bruce in his "Parabolic Teaching " so well shows, a good man is a generous, whole-souled, man, full of the milk of human kindness and overflowing with generous impulse.

20:16. "The last will be first and the first last." This saying does not point to a leveling of distinctions in the Kingdom of God. It points rather to an exchange of places. The first in the amount of service and sacrifice in this present world, becomes last in the esteem of God, because of pride or vainglory or self seeking.

We believe this law of last first, first last, applies as well to the eternal as to the temporal side of our natures. We do not believe in the equality of men's condition in the life to come any more than in this life. The general felicity of the life eternal common to all will embrace much variety of special conditions corresponding to the spiritual histories of individuals. Then some last ones will be seen to take precedence of some who in this life were reputed to be first.

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