those
forest patriarchs in tropical America which constitute the mahogany of
commerce. The diminutive proportions of our mustard-plant prove nothing
regarding the magnitude of the herb which bears the corresponding name
in Syria. We know, in point of fact, that it grows there to a great size
at the present day. "I have seen it," says Dr. Thomson, "on the rich
plain of Akkar as tall as the horse and his rider."[17] Irby and Mangles
found a tree growing in great abundance near the Dead Sea possessing
many of the properties of mustard, which they suppose must be the
mustard of the parable; but this suggestion seems incompatible with the
main scope of the representation, for its turning-point lies in this,
that a culinary herb became great like a tree. That a forest tree should
be large enough to afford shelter to the birds, is nothing wonderful;
the parable is hinged on the fact that the garden herb ([Greek:
lachanon]) became a tree ([Greek: dendron]).

[17] _The Land and the Book_, p. 64.

But in this case an investigation exact and minute into the natural
history of the plant is by no means necessary to the appreciation and
explanation of the parable. It is not needful to determine what amount
of credit is due to the witness who declared that he had seen a man
climbing into the branches of a mustard-plant, or how far the fact, if
real, was uncommon and exceptional. This plant obviously was chosen by
the Lord, not on account of its absolute magnitude, but because it was,
and was recognised to be, a striking instance of increase from very
small to very great. It seems to have been in Palestine, at that time,
the smallest seed from which so large a plant was known to grow. There
were, perhaps, smaller seeds, but the plants which sprung from them were
not so great; and there were greater plants, but the seeds from which
they sprung were not so small.

But the circumstance that most clearly exhibits and indicates the
appropriateness of the choice, is the fact that the magnitude of the
mustard-plant, in connection with the minuteness of its seed, was
employed at that day among the Jews as a proverbial similitude, to
indicate that great results may spring from causes that are apparently
diminutive, but secretly powerful. The expression, "If ye had faith as a
grain of mustard-seed," employed by the Lord on another occasion, is
sufficient to show that both the conception and its use were familiar to
his audience.

The spi