than the meaning of what is sung; when directions are multiplied until the outward ordering of the service pre-occupies the worshipper, to the exclusion of its spiritual things; when the rites themselves become a puzzle and mystification of the truth, instead of illuminating and enforcing it, then, under whatever names, we are only going back to "the beggarly elements,” and forgetting the higher teaching and worship of the New Testament.

ST. HELIERS, JERSEY, September 1870.

G. L.

OLLOWING the illustrations of the king

dom of God presented in the Parables, we have seen that, within the kingdom, God has a great feast provided for men, while he sends forth repeated and earnest invitations to this feast. We are thus taught that in the kingdom of grace it is characteristic of God's reign that he earnestly entreats men to come to him, that they may share in the blessings he has provided. We have now another view of the arrangements within the kingdom of grace. We see that men must plead with God in order to become partakers of his grace, and in what manner, as well as with what earnestness, they must plead. We have heard God calling unto men; we must hear men calling unto God. We must understand that such calling on man's part is quite essential for entrance into the kingdom, and that this opportunity of pleading with God is one of the privileges of the kingdom. We must learn that men cannot serve themselves heirs to this kingdom by any long course of strivings after great deeds of holiness; but may have their names placed on the roll of its subjects by lowly acknowledgment of their failures. It is not chivalry, bearing down the selected course through heats of passion, and wearing with pride the signs of its triumphs, which wins the favour of this king; but humility, bending in lowly mien at the gate, owning the imperfection of the past, and longing for an elevation which hitherto has seemed unattainable. If the plans of the Lord of the kingdom are to be carried out, they who trust in themselves that they are righteous must be undeceived.

Prayer is, on the one side, need; on the other, entreaty for supply. It is need finding expression in the hearing of God. This exercise is first the duty of men in coming to God, and thereafter the established privilege of those who have come in faith. We now, therefore,

enter upon a series of parables setting forth the truth as to prayer, of which this parable of the Pharisee and publican is first and chief. Among the parables on prayer it holds the place which the parable of the prodigal does among those which represent man's wandering and deliverance. The analogy between the two sons there, and the two suppliants here, is very close. An expositor cannot be far astray in detecting in the Pharisee the re-appearance of the likeness of the elder brother, who says, "Neither transgressed I at any time thy commandment;" and in the publican the likeness of him who said, “I have sinned, and am no more worthy to be called thy son." The characters are the same, only the development of truth is more advanced. In the observance of such points of analogy the real unity of the parables becomes apparent.

The peculiarity of the parable of the Pharisee and publican is, that the true nature of the prayer by which men enter the kingdom is illustrated by the narration of examples of the thing to be explained. In other cases the parabolic narrative is drawn from pastoral, domestic, or social life. But the prayer to be offered by men, in seeking admission to the kingdom, is so thoroughly distinct from anything in the relations of men to each other, that such relations are searched in vain for anything sufficiently analagous to serve the end of illustration. This fact our Saviour proclaims, when now, contrary to his custom in other cases, he constructs his parable by selecting illustrative examples of the exercise of prayer itself. Man is, indeed, often a suppliant before his fellow-man, and our Lord will find aid for illustration in this before he has finished his teaching as to prayer; but no example of this kind will suffice to bring out the true nature of that exercise which is required of them who draw near to God. To serve his end, our great Teacher must select examples of the

homage which is proferred in presence of the Deity. He who knew the heart of man, and needed not that any should testify what was in man, must go into the secrets of the soul, and present illustrative examples of prayer which shall be truly representative. This he has done in constructing the parable before us, setting forth how extremely different are the views of men as to prayer, and how different is the estimate which God sets on a variety of exercises bearing the same name.

"Two men went up into the temple to pray, the one a Pharisee, and the other a publican." "Two men." This is another example of the selection of two to represent the whole. All suppliants may be included within this comprehensive grouping. But all men are not suppliants. There is another class of men which cannot be here represented. They are strangers to prayer. Their absence is allowed for in the fact that the reference of the parable is exclusively to those who do appear before God in some way, while their case has been dimly indicated in the parable of the prodigal, where they are mentioned as citizens of a far country; they are by their own choice "far off," as these two do at least seek to draw nigh to God. For the present our attention is concentrated upon praying nien-upon as many of our race as own that it is rational to pray, and that it is dutiful. Thus persuaded, and in a sense urged, they agree in appearing before God in the attitude of suppliants.

That the representation may be the more compact in form, and striking to the observer, these two men are brought together at their devotions, and their meetingplace is the temple of God. Whatever their private exercise before they thus met, they have come together for the same exercise now, and they meet in that place rendered sacred as the scene of divine service, where the tokens of the divine presence have often been given. As they enter the outer court everything before them conveys instruction as to the true manner of approaching God. Here, in the very centre, the most prominent object to every observer is the great altar of sacrifice, over which the blood of victims is daily pouring in token of sin; and behind it, the laver for cleansing; and within the holy place, the altar of incense, symbol of prayer. This is the divinely-appointed order: atonement for sin, cleansing from sin, then homage sweet as incense. This great lesson of approach to God has been familiar to them from their youth, and it is before their eyes now as they enter. One in their purpose, with a common meeting-place for their devotions, they have had very different courses of life, while their traditional places in the judgment of others have been far apart. The one is a Pharisee, the other a publican; the one has been marked for his profession of religion, the other at the least has not been noted for this. How they stand relatively in the midst of the class to which they respectively belong, is not stated; but they may be taken as fairly represented by the designation of these classes. A Pharisee and a publican are drawing near to God in

the temple. And God is there to meet them, as he waits to receive all who come. He is there, not as the householder and friend, as he has appeared in other parables,-not as a judge who has summoned them to hear him pronounce some verdict upon them,— but simply as God, the Hearer of what these men will say, and the Answerer, according to his sovereign and righteous pleasure.

In this narrative the Pharisee finds precedence, as he claims it for himself, and this precedence is granted here, with ominous tokens that he may afford an example of the accuracy of that saying, "The first shall be last, and the last first." Advancing to a conspicuous position, as is obviously implied, he began as one who accounted himself a special favourite of Heaven

"The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, God, I thank thee, that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican. I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess."

The introductory words employed by the Lord in describing his position, seem to forewarn the reader of the want of reality in the prayer. He prayed with himself. He was in the house of prayer, his attitude was that of a suppliant, his exercise was in the form of prayer, but in reality he spoke only with himself. The prayer bears witness to unreality. His thankfulness that he is not as other men, is the centre and substance of the whole. What follows is only an amplification of this. He condescends on particulars that he may establish his claim to precedence, which is the one thing on which his heart is set. Comparison with other men is so vague, and so often employed with varied extent of signification-sometimes implying comparison only with some, at other times with many, and often with most others-that it hardly conveys the literal interpretation of his words. He really says, "God, I thank thee that I am not like the rest of men." He too has a way of dividing men into two classes; but the division is such that he is the sole representative of the one, while all other men are crowded together into the other, with wonderful facility, and no misgiving as to accuracy. So completely is he absorbed with the conviction that his own life presents the solitary example of perfection in the world, that he feels no compunction in placing the whole company of the Pharisees in the fellowship of publicans and sinners. How much of thought and how much of mere pride of feeling there is here it would be difficult to estimate, unless we were to be satisfied with the conclusion that there is no thought, and that all is pride. But there is a kind of thought involved in the state of mind which produces this prayer, even so much as seeks to establish the validity of its claim on some kind of evidence. And it is such thought as pride commonly rests upon. He seeks to establish innocence for himself by charging iniquity upon others. They are extortioners, unjust, and adulterers. This hideons charge he makes up against all his fellow-men, he credits

October 1, 1970.

it with the testimony of his own belief, and then he lodges it in the presence of God as the buttress on which he rests his claim to goodness. They all do wilfully injure their fellow-men in any way within their reach. If opportunity offer, they plunder by violence; if it be more convenient, they gain their own ends by deceit; and in their career of self-indulgence, they rob others of purity and peace, and of all that makes home precious. And as if to show the intensely personal form which his views take, he catches at the case of the solitary worshipper whom he sees at the footstool with him, and as if he would establish a rivalry between himself and this other suppliant at the throne, and, if possible, throw back some distance his prospect of approval, he says, "I thank thee that I am not even as this publican." The offensive character of the self-righteous disposition could not be painted in darker colours than in this typical prayer which the Lord has given in this parable. Such a disposition is ever untrue as to self, unjust as to others, and dishonouring to God when it seeks utterance in prayer. So our Lord represents it. How different is true prayer as illustrated in Scripture! Its disposition is exactly the opposite, as exemplified in the utterances of David, such as this, "Search me, O God, and know my heart; try me, and know my thoughts: and see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting" (Ps. cxxxix. 23, 24). In contrast with these words, those of the Pharisee are so confident as to his own goodness, that he feels as if no search ing were needful, or could be supposed to lead to another result. David, in the presence of God, always speaks as if his knowledge of the sin which he confesses were enough to satisfy him that there must be much more than he has detected: this Pharisee speaks as if God's knowledge of his heart can involve nothing except the freedom from sin to which he himself bears witness, whereas even if he were no plunderer, deceiver, or adulterer, the absence of these vices would go but a little way to establish moral purity.

But the absence of vice is never the only thing on which the self-righteous disposition leans. Something more decided, in the form and clothing of righteousness itself, there must be. And so our Lord represents it here, although in such a way as to throw wonderful discredit on the righteousness of the self-righteous, and expose to view its littleness when it testifies concerning itself in the presence of God. "I fast twice in the week, I give tithes of all that I possess." The narrowness of this as a representation of a holy life is painfully obvious, the meagreness of it as an offering to God is still more so. In the eyes of such a man this is righteousness, and this of all offerings is that with which God must be pleased.

In estimating the significance of this prayer, its essentially parabolic character must be kept in view. It were easy to break forth in invective upon such a Pharisee as this; but invective were useless, and would miss the mark. This is a prayer of the Saviour's own sketching,

drawn up in a manner so comprehensive and suggestive as to stand for an accurate representation of all prayer based in self-righteousness. In this light it must be studied. To catch our Lord's meaning, it will be well to mark off what is true and good here; then will the false and wicked stand out conspicuously. To render homage to the Deity, to acknowledge before him the evil of sin, to render thanks for deliverance from it, and to offer thanksgiving for attainment in holiness-all these are good. To make God the sovereign of the soul, and to have "a conscience void of offence toward God and toward men," must be the very end of life. Thus far the Pharisee's prayer carries in it a kind of acknowledgment of what is true and good. This admitted, we straightway come upon what Jesus condemns in the prayer of the self-righteous. Such prayer is not the utterance of need in the hearing of the Deity. Under the profession and form of the reality, it involves the reversal of every element of true prayer. Confession is perverted, the language of thanksgiving is used to cover self-adulation, supplication is wanting, and professed homage to God is turned to its opposite. There is confession, but it is only of the sins of others. Self-glorification is not concealed under the slim guise of thanksgiving thrown over it. Supplication there is none. The presumption of the whole when regarded as a prayer is apparent. The catalogue of his own excellences is presented merely as if for a formal recognition of the Deity. This is the general testimony against the selfrighteous prayer, that it completely reverses the nature of prayer. The spirit of self-confidence cannot live with the spirit of prayer. The one is the contrary of the other. Hence it happens that the self-confident do only appearance, and not in reality, approach God as suppliants. They own that prayer is rational and dutiful, and yet act as if reason and conscience might be satisfied with a pretence.

in

This radical inconsistency is accompanied naturally with other features which give force to the condemnation of such prayer. 1. The self-righteous spirit is harsh in its judgments of others. Conscious of the weakness and falseness of its own claims, it does not shrink from injustice, in reckoning others unjust. The thing which could not be uttered in the hearing of fellow-men, because of its falseness, is nevertheless tacitly assumed in support of the pretentious claims of self. Hence the claim to holiness takes shape in comparison with others, who are represented as evil. It is not, "O God, I am what thou wouldest have me to be;" but, "I am not as other men." 2. The self-righteous spirit is inconsistent in its utterances. This is the uniform penalty of falseness. It is always self-condemned, by being self-contradictory. With truthfulness alone is it easy and natural to be consistent. The self-righteous man cannot utter his thoughts regarding himself withont contradiction. With one breath this Pharisee declares he has no sin, and with the next he tells that he fasts twice in the week, as if he were laborious in his

confessions. Either his profession of holiness is false, or his fasting is mockery. 3. The self-righteous spirit is ever prone to magnify formal service. Fasting and tithing are the symbols of highest excellence. Other virtues seem ordinary and commonplace. That man is thought to reach to unusual eminence whose life is greatly occupied with observing fasts, and calculating tithes to the fraction of a penny on the "mint, the anise, and the cummin" growing in the corners of the garden. This tendency to formalism is the natural fruit of selfrighteousness. Fundamental virtues of character are assumed to be easy; multiplication of forms is assumed to be difficult, and therefore made to wear a fictitious importance. God had appointed one day of humiliation annually-the great day of atonement-but if a man can fast twice in the week, what an addition to his holiness there must be! God required that they should give tithes of all their increase; and if a man should take reckoning scrupulously of the very flowers in his garden, how high his excellence must be! Thus it is that formalism, which first is chosen to illustrate spiritual service, grows apace, until it chokes the better life. Where formalism reigns, these features abound; where it finds place even in slight measure, some of them will appear. The sincere prayer may have parts tarnished in this way, and even the genuine Christian life may have some admixture of self-righteousness. Our Lord's parable, which carries condemnation of the self-righteous spirit, has its warning for all his people who are apt to be ensnared by the insinuations of spiritual pride.

We have thus had an example of the prayer of the self-righteous. It is not indeed such a prayer as any man could be heard to utter. A prayer of this model is not to be heard in a lifetime. It is not on this account, however, unreal and inappropriate as a model. It is an illustration of the fact, too apt to be forgotten by us, that the Ilearer of prayer reads our utterance in the light of the suppressed thought and feeling uniformly cherished within the mind. Perhaps in successive generations no one man shapes the utterance of his self-confidence exactly as we have it here, or even thinks and feels in all respects as is implied by such a prayer. And yet there is no man indulging in any degree the self-righteous spirit, who does not find his own thought in some measure embodied here. That men do not express themselves thus in actual form of prayer, is only because the spirit of self-reliance leaves still such a regard to truth, and such a dread of certain condemnation from others, that men can deceive themselves in the silence of thought, while they would be overwhelmed with confusion did the sound of the utterance of their thought fall upon their own ear.

. From this form of prayer, which is utterly unreal, and laden with sin, we turn to another example, which our Lord sets forth before all generations as an illustration of true prayer. That it is a publican's prayer, is of no account; that he has not previously been esteemed a religious man, does not affect the worth of what he

| utters now; the prayer is real-it befits the man, and as such it bears the stamp of divine approval. The description of his attitude and manner, with which the prayer is introduced, discovers the sincerity, the earnestness, and the lowliness of the suppliant. "The publican, standing afar off, would not lift up so much as his eyes to heaven; but smote upon his breast, saying, God be merciful to me a sinner!" It is not merely the appearance and demeanour of the man which are different here. The attitude of soul is different-the relation to God is different-while the two prayers are wide as the poles asunder. There is one thing which this publican needs and longs for-one thing which here at the footstool of the throne of mercy he pleads for with all the earnestness of his soul. His prayer is simple, concentrated, all-embracing. He is a sinner, hungering for mercy, and asking for his famishing soul the bread he needs, where alone supply can be had. This is the cry often extorted from the sin-burdened soul. And here it stands in Scripture as the Saviour's embodiment of a sinner's great need, and a sinner's appropriate prayer. With such an example of the prayer which is acceptable to the Deity, there is not a soul on earth which may not take courage in drawing nigh to God. 1. At the basis of this prayer is the unqualified confession of personal sinfulness. It is the perception of this as a dread reality, and the sense of it as a mighty burden on his spirit, which give form and meaning to his prayer. Bunyan has exactly caught the ruling thought when he represents Christian as carrying a great burden on his back, until he comes in sight of the cross, when it suddenly falls from his shoulders and is borne no more. The publican comes burdened in spirit to the footstool of the throne of mercy. His sinfulness absorbs his thoughts. In this he does indeed stand at the opposite extreme from the Pharisee. The selfrighteous spirit is not only wanting, but the soul recoils from it as untruthful. As a sinner he comes; as such he presents himself before God; and as such he pleads with the Holy One of Israel. This example our divine Master gives as indicating the spirit in which men should appear before God. And in presenting this example, it is to be observed that there is nothing in the prayer which indicates the degree or the aggravation of his sin. If these had been included, the prayer would have assumed a shape applicable only to his individual case, and would in this way have lost the universal applicability which our Lord desires to preserve, in accordance with the aim of parabolic teaching. Each suppliant can make mention for himself of the character, and extent, and aggravation of his own sins. But our Saviour here presents the basis of all true praying on our part. The publican says: "I am a sinful man, O Lord." He who takes his place at the footstool in this way comes as he should into the presence of the Holy One, to whom all sin is hateful. It is a dark view of himself which this man has. He sees sin in his heart and life. The evil thing is everywhere present. He has

Family Treasury

1

wilfully done what conscience and Scripture alike condemn. The terrible evil now appears in its true character. He sees it now in some measure as God does. It is darkness without trace of light; evil without mixture of good. It is evil of his own working, which cannot now be undone, and for which no subsequent acts can atone. This is the view of his condition which deeply troubles his spirit. The one evil which displeases God, and ruins man, cleaves to his soul. Before God he appears to declare his sense of this, and his grief because of it. Such is true prayer, having its foundation in truthfulness, humility, and penitence.

2. That which gives confidence to the prayer, is trust in the mercy of God. In sight of personal sin all is fear; but when from self he turns to God, and beholds the divine mercy, trust banishes fear. There is no inconsistency in a man seeing himself so low, and yet aspiring so high. It is the harmony of divine mercy with the forgiveness of sin which takes the spirit beyond the cloud which gathers thick and threatening, as one beholds the harmony of divine justice with the punishment of sin. This suppliant does not expect that God will excuse his sin, or that he will do otherwise than he himself has done in condemning it. He acknowledges the divine purity, and expects that the divine condemnation of his sinful conduct will be more searching and more sweeping than his own has been. That he has often done what was right in the sight of God, he knows; and he does not expect that he will be condemned for well-doing; but neither does he hope that God will find in such imperfect acts of well-doing even a small compensation for the sinfulness of his life. He has but one ground of confidence. The God of purity and of judgment is a God of mercy, and he will be a Saviour-God. This is the thought which the God-man, the Redeemer, is putting into the minds of men when he sketches this prayer for a suppliant. God will be a Saviour-God. This is the thought soon to be made conspicuous in Calvary's Cross, when he, at once the High Priest and the Victim, should present himself as an offering for sin. Then as previously should the mercy of God be the ground of hope; but thenceforth as never before should the prayer for mercy be offered in the name of Jesus Christ, with reliance on his atoning sacrifice. Thenceforth the prayers of sinful men will ascend, freighted with the merit of the Lord Jesus. The cry of sin shall still as ever carry its own condemnation; but the name of Jesus in the midst of the cry shall plead the merit of an all-sufficient atonement. Divine mercy is thus the ground of confidence for the prayer burdened with confession of sin. The God in whose hearing the suppliant speaks is "the Lord God, merciful and gracious, long-suffering, and abundant in goodness and truth; keeping mercy for thousands, forgiving iniquity and transgression and sin." The sinful suppliant has warrant from God himself for the trust which inspires his prayer, for the Lord "delighteth in mercy."

3. The trust which encourages prayer, at the same

ness.

time makes prayer a necessity in order to obtain forgiveThe trust which warrants prayer, is not such as to admit of our dispensing with prayer. Mercy does not go forth to vanquish sin with a conqueror's might, as justice may do it waits the coming of the penitent sinner, stretching out his hand to be rescued from perdition. "Therefore will the Lord wait, that he may be gracious unto you; therefore will he be exalted, that he may have mercy upon you; for the Lord is a God of judgment: blessed are all they that wait for him" (Isa. Xxx. 18). God does indeed go forth in the exercise of his mercy to visit sinful men, but it is to call, to invite, even to entreat them to come to him. All this has been already set forth in these parables with clearness and impressiveness. But what is now shown with no less vividness is, that men in coming to God must call upon him for mercy. This is the exposition of what is otherwise spoken of as coming. Prayer is the true coming. Such prayer as is here described, simple, earnest, and solemn. In this relation prayer is recognized not only as a rational exercise, and as a dutiful exercise, with something of the urgency of a present duty attaching to it, but further and more expressly as an exercise required by the urgency of deep personal need. This was entirely wanting in the Pharisee's prayer. He came as if to testify that he was in want of nothing; the publican comes to declare that he is in want of everything. From the depth this cry ascends unto the Lord, bearing witness that thence the suppliant must be lifted if he is to rise into the sunshine of the divine favour. This parable holds in permanent representation the type of true prayer, while, at the same time, the contrast between the true and the false is rendered conspicuous. Prayer has place in the divine plan, not because God asks to be informed of our need, but because we ourselves must feel that need, and own it in the presence of him who alone can supply the great want. He who prays thus, pleads on the warrant of the divine pledge that mercy shall straightway have exercise.

The publican's

With this representation of prayer before the mind, the Lord who can answer prayer proclaims the result. With authority he can declare the decisions given from the mercy-seat. "I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other: for every one that exalteth himself shall be abased; and he that humbleth himself shall be exalted.” prayer was answered; the Pharisee's called forth no response. This is implied, but something more is expressed. "Justified" is the term employed; in contrast with which stands the word "condemned." Something more than the result of the prayer is here announced. The condition of the man before God is decided. The one man is condemned, prayer and character at once. The other man is justified in his prayer with its confession, and in his person as a penitent sinner. The one man is abased, the other is exalted. The line which encompasses the kingdom of God runs between these two men, enclosing the publican,