t, without doing extreme violence to the
analogy, find a sense in which the divine Redeemer does not help and
does not know the growth of his own grace in believing hearts. The
germination and increase of vegetation without the intervention of the
sower and beyond his ken, represent a helplessness and an ignorance so
definite and complete, that we cannot, on any rule of sober
interpretation, apply it to the omniscient and omnipotent Redeemer.

The impossibility of accepting the first suggestion throws us
necessarily back on the only other supposition that remains;--the sower
in the parable must represent the earthen vessel to which the ministry
of the Gospel has been entrusted,--the human agent employed in the work
of the Lord. This will, of course, accord perfectly with the
representation in the heart of the parable that he who sows the seed
neither helps the growth nor understands its secrets; but does it accord
also with the representation, in the end of the parable, that he who in
spring sowed the seed, thrusts in his sickle and reaps the ripened
harvest? Some, assuming that the reaping means the closing of all
accounts in the great day,[55] conclude that to represent the sowing as
the ministry of men is incongruous with the reaping, which must, as
they suppose, be the work of the Lord at his second coming. In this way
they become involved between two impossibilities. If the Lord himself is
represented as the sower the representation is inconsistent with the
middle of the parable, in which it is declared that he neither aids nor
understands the growth of the grain; if, on the other hand, men are
represented as the sowers, the representation is inconsistent with the
end of the parable, in which it is declared that they thrust in the
sickle at the close of the dispensation and reap the harvest of the
world.

[55] Dr. Trench takes for granted, without a word of proof, or any
evidence that he has even considered the question, that the reaping
is the consummation of all things, the exclusive prerogative of the
Lord.

Now in order to escape from this double difficulty it is not necessary
to put to the rack either the words or the thoughts of the parable. The
path out of the difficulty is broad and straight; it is the path into it
that is crooked and narrow.

The question which demands solution here, and which, when solved, will
solve all the rest, is, What is meant by thrusting in the sickle and
reaping the r