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questioned as to the source of His authority, He confounded His tormentors with the counter-question concerning the baptism of John. It is probable, therefore, and according to St. Mark's account quite certain, that the query of to-day's Gospel was partly sincere and partly insincere; that the lawyer acted in good faith, but his followers, for whom he spoke, maliciously, for Christ first gives an answer direct and clear, and then reproves the self-wise conceit of His enemies with the, to them, perplexing difficulty of the divine and human origin of the Messias. Charity and prudence are here marvellously mingled. For the sake of the one honest soul among His auditors, Christ expounds the law of love, His action no less than His words a stinging rebuke to the hateful Pharisees. These doctors of the law, forsooth, had so inverted and perverted the Decalogue, that out of ten the insupportable burden of six hundred and thirteen precepts had been evolved, and while trifles were given prominence and rigidly enforced, the great command of charity was placed near the end of the list and utterly neglected in their teachings and practice. This was the evil Christ came to remedy; to show the world by word and deed that charity is the sum and substance of all law, the very temple of our sanctification, around which the other virtues do but serve as scaffolding for its upbuilding. For God is love, and His greatest gift to men is the love He bears them, that love which called them into being, which preserved them and redeemed them, and the most precious offering that