rich men like them to make rules for poor ones. Indeed our Lord
said the very same of them--'Binding heavy burdens, and grievous to
be borne, and laying them on men's shoulders; while they themselves
would not touch them with one of their fingers.'

Then the Lord himself came and preached to these poor wild folk, and
they heard him gladly. And why? Because his speech was too deep
for them? Because he scolded and threatened them? No.

We never find that our Lord spoke harshly to them. They had plenty
of sins, and he knew it: but it is most remarkable that the
Evangelists never tell us what he said about those sins. What they
do tell us is, that he spoke to them of the common things around
them, of the flowers of the field, the birds of the air, of sowing
and reaping, and feeding sheep; and taught them by parables, taken
from the common country life which they lived, and the common
country things which they saw; and shewed them how the kingdom of
God was like unto this and that which they had seen from their
childhood, and how earth was a pattern of heaven. And they could
understand that. Not all of it perhaps: but still they heard him
gladly. His preaching made them understand themselves, and their
own souls, and what God felt for them, and what was right and wrong,
and what would become of them, as they never felt before. It is
plain and certain that the country people could understand Christ's
parables, when the Scribes and Pharisees could not. The Scribes and
Pharisees, in spite of all their learning, were those who were
without (as our Lord said); who had eyes and could not see, and ears
and could not hear, for their hearts were grown fat and gross. With
all their learning, they were not wise enough to understand the
message which God sends in every flower and every sunbeam; the