of his cup; but he forgets to clean the inside. Most
people drink from the inside, but the Pharisee forgot it, dirty as
it was, and left it untouched. Then he sets about straining what he
is going to drink--another elaborate process; he holds a piece of
muslin over the cup and pours with care; he pauses--he sees a
mosquito; he has caught it in time and flicks it away; he is safe
and he will not swallow it. And then, adds Jesus, he swallowed a
camel. How many of us have ever pictured the process, and the series
of sensations, as the long hairy neck slid down the throat of the
Pharisee--all that amplitude of loose-hung anatomy--the hump--two
humps--both of them slid down--and he never noticed--and the
legs--all of them--with whole outfit of knees and big padded feet.
The Pharisee swallowed a camel--and never noticed it (Matt. 23:24,
25). It is the mixture of sheer realism with absurdity that makes
the irony and gives it its force. Did no one smile as the story was
told? Did no one see the scene pictured with his own mind's eye--no
one grasp the humour and the irony with delight? Could any one, on
the other hand, forget it? A modern teacher would have said, in our
jargon, that the Pharisee had no sense of proportion--and no one
would have thought the remark worth remembering. But Jesus'
treatment of the subject reveals his own mind in quite a number of
aspects.

When he bade turn the other cheek--that sentence which Celsus found
so vulgar--did no one smile, then, at the idea of anybody ever
dreaming of such an act (Matt. 5:39)? Nor at the picture of the kind
brother taking a mote from his brother's eye, with a whole baulk of
timber in his own (Matt. 7:5)? Nor at the suggestion of doing two
miles of forced labour when only one was demanded (Matt. 5:41)? Nor
when he suggested that anxiety about food and clothing was a mark of
the Gentiles (Matt. 6:32)? Did none of his disciples mark a touch of
irony when he said that among the Gentile dynasties the kings who
exercise authority are called "Benefactors" (Luke 22:25)? It was
true; Euergetes is a well-known kingly title, but the explanation
that it was the reward for strenuous use of monarchic authority was
new. Are we to think his face gave no sign of what he was doing? Was
there no smile?

We are told by his biographer that Marcus Aurelius had a face that
never changed--for joy or sorrow, "being an adherent," he adds, "of
the Stoic philosophy." The pose of superiority to e