selves away, like the publicans and
harlots--but those who would not be sorry to have that ring of Gyges
which Plato described, who would like to do certain things if they
could, who at all events are not unwilling to picture what they
would wish to do, if it were available, and meanwhile enjoy the
thought (Matt. 5:21, 22, 27-29). Here St. Paul can supply commentary
with his suggestion that one form of God's condemnation is where he
gives up a man to his own reprobate mind (Romans 1:28--the whole
passage is worth study in the Greek). The mind, in Paul's phrases,
becomes darkened (Rom. 1:21), stained (Titus 1:15), and cauterized
(1 Tim. 4:2), invalidated for the discharge of its proper functions,
as a burnt hand loses the sense of touch, or a stained glass gives
the man a blue or red world instead of the real one. Blindness and
mutilation are better, Jesus said, than the eye of lust (Matt.
5:28). How different from the moralists, for whom sin lies in
action, and all actions are physical! The idle word is to condemn a
man, not because it is idle, but because, being unstudied, it speaks
of his heart and reveals, unconsciously but plainly, what he is in
reality (Matt. 12:36). Thus it is that what comes out of the mouth
defiles a man (Matt. 15:18)--with the curious suggestion, whether
intended or not, that the formulation of a floating thought gives it
new power to injure or to help. That is true; impression loose, as
it were, in the mind, mere thought--stuff, is one thing; formulated,
brought to phrase and form, it takes on new life and force; and when
it is evil, it does defile, and in a permanent way. Marcus Aurelius
has a very similar warning (v. 16)--"Whatever the colour of the
thoughts often before thy mind, that colour will thy mind take. For
the mind is dyed (or stained) by its thoughts." "Phantazesthai" and
"phantasiai" are the words--and they suggest something between
thoughts and imaginations--mental pictures would be very near it.

The third group whom Jesus warned, the most notorious of all, was
the Pharisee class. They played at religion--tithed mint and anise
and cumin, and forgot judgement and mercy and faith (Matt. 23:23).
Jesus said that the Pharisee was never quite sure whether the
creature he was looking at was a camel or a mosquito--he got them
mixed (Matt. 23:24). Once we realize what this tremendous irony
means, we are better able to grasp his thought. The Pharisee was
living in a world that was not t