als of His authority, its
lesson is of universal application. The two sons are yet alive in every
human community--the one openly boastful of his sin, the other a
hypocritical pretender. Jesus did not commend the rough refusal of the
first son of whom the father made a righteous demand for service; it was
his subsequent repentance attended by works that made him superior to
his brother who had made fair promise but had kept it not. There are
many today who boast that they make no profession of religion, nor
pretense of godly life. Their frankness will not mitigate their sins; it
simply shows that a certain species of hypocrisy is not prominent among
their numerous offenses; but that a man is innocent of one vice, say
that of drunkenness, in no wise diminishes his measure of guilt if he be
a liar, a thief, an adulterer, or a murderer. Both the sons in the
parable were grievous sinners; but the one turned from his evil ways,
which theretofore he had followed with flagrant openness, while the
other continued in dark deeds of sin, which he sought to cover by a
cloak of hypocrisy. Let no man think that because he becomes intoxicated
at the public bar he is any the less a drunkard than is he who swallows
the "beverage of hell" in comparative privacy, though the latter be both
drunkard and hypocrite. For these sins, as for all others, genuine
repentance is the only saving antidote.

3. Israel Symbolized by Vineyard and Vines.--The aptness of our Lord's
representation of Israel as a vineyard could not have escaped the
perception of the Jews, to whom Old Testament similes of analogous form
were familiar figures. Notable among others is the striking picture
presented by Isaiah (5:1-7), in which the well provided vineyard is
shown as producing wild grapes only, for which grievous disappointment
of his expectations the owner determined to break down the wall, remove
the hedge, and leave the vineyard to its fate of abandonment. The
explication of the parable voiced by Isaiah is thus given: "For the
vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel, and the men of
Judah his pleasant plant: and he looked for judgment, but behold
oppression; for righteousness, but behold a cry." The worthlessness of a
vine save only for its fruit was set forth by the Lord through His
prophet Ezekiel (15:2-5); and truly it is so, that the wood of the grape
plant is fit for nothing but burning; the whole vine as wood is inferior
to a branch from a for