late in a great degree transformed by the introduction of what is known as the case-system. Instead of lectures on the fundamental principles of jurisprudence, the learner is now confronted with detached and genuine cases, from scrutinizing which, in their likeness and variations, he is encouraged to deduce the principles which they combine to illustrate. Something like this is the method in which are communicated the principles of the teaching of Jesus. They are not unfolded in a philosophical system, but are involved in the treatment of specific cases; and to the observant student this occasionalism of the teaching of Jesus is precisely what gives it a perennial freshness, vitality and force.1

Here, then, are two characteristics of the gospel which would seem in some degree to obscure its social teaching, an evident subordination of social problems, and an equally evident limitation of instruction to specific instances and occasions. Jesus speaks chiefly of God, and speaks chiefly to the individual. It would seem, then, as if we must have been misled in anticipating from him a clear and impressive teaching concerning the social world. If Jesus was not primarily devoted to the social question, and if again his teachsystem. Systems pass away, .. but great poems are as eternal as their subject-human life itself."

1 Compare also the interesting proposition to apply the same method to the study of medicine: W. B. Cannon, "The Casemethod of teaching Systematic Medicine," Boston Medical and Surgical Journal, January 11, 1900.

ing was chiefly personal and occasional instead of systematic and universal, is it not difficult to derive from it any general principles which shall be applicable to the problems of modern social life? On the contrary, one must answer, it is precisely these two characteristics, his relation to God and his relation to the individual, the loftiness of his Theism and the precision of his occasionalism, which open, as we consider them, into the social principles of the teaching of Jesus.

On the one hand, this tranquil elevation of mind above the social issues of his day is what gives to Jesus his wisdom and insight concerning them. He only truly sees things who sees round them and beyond them. Breadth of wisdom requires a large horizon of the mind. The man of details is shut in by them, so that they obstruct rather than enlarge his view. The wise physician deals best with the sick man, not by being a participator in the emotion and distress involved in the single case, but by detaching himself from them and examining the single case with the tranquillity and self-control of a broader view. The wise general does not throw himself into the smoke of battle, but stands apart from it and above it, where he can survey and direct the whole. The wise counsellor is he who stands above the issue which calls for judgment and sees it in the perspective of a wide experience. Sometimes it happens that the highest wisdom in affairs of the practical world is an endowment of the most unworldly men. They

see into life by seeing over it, and men of business turn to such advisers for counsel because of the horizon which their judgments survey.1

This quality of wisdom is not the trait most commonly associated with the life of Jesus. His tenderness of heart has obscured from observation his sagacity of mind. Yet one cannot approach his dealings with the questions which were brought to him without being impressed by this quality of insight, foresight, comprehensiveness, wisdom. The traditions of the Church ascribe to Jesus almost every other virtue rather than that of sagacity. He is the type of submission and resignation. His features, as portrayed by Christian art, represent, almost invariably, a feminine, spiritual, patient personality, not one that is virile, commanding and strong. He has become the ideal of the monastic and ascetic character, and in many minds would have no consideration as a wise guide in practical affairs. A more careful study of the teaching of Jesus leads to quite an opposite impression. He was indeed a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief, but he was none the less truly a man of wisdom and acquainted with human nature. His sanity of judgment is as extraordinary as his depth of sym

1 Compare also Seneca, "De Clementia," II, 6, "He will dry another's tears, but will not weep with him. . . . This he will do with calmness of mind, and with an unchanged countenance." (Succuret alienis lacrimis, non accedet. . . . Faciet ista tranquillâ mente, voltu suo.) And the saying of Neander (Preface to Vinet's "Socialisme"), "Um sich hinzugeben, muss man sich angehören."

pathy. The first impression made by the boy Jesus on those who met him was of his budding wisdom; he "advanced in wisdom and stature."1 The first comment of many hearers upon his teaching concerned its sagacity: "Whence hath this man this wisdom?" 2 Christian art and reverence, in remembering the prophecy fulfilled in him, "In all their affliction he was afflicted," has forgotten that other hope of a just and discriminating guide, which was equally fulfilled in him: "The government shall be upon his shoulder: and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor; "4 "and the spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding.”5 The picture of Jesus which Christian art has yet to paint is that of the masculine Christ, a personality who teaches with authority, and whose large horizon, gives him comprehensiveness of view.

Jesus himself testified whence this wisdom came. It was, he said, his detachment from the world which gave him insight concerning the things of the world. "And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto myself.” 6 His leadership in the affairs of earth comes of his being lifted up from it; his religious mission created his social authority. At the end of his ministry he promises to his disciples that their power for social service shall be enriched by the continuity of relationship which he was to bear to the life of

1 Luke ii. 52.
2 Matt. xiii. 54.

8 Is. lxiii. 9.
4 Is. ix. 6.

5 Is. xi. 2.

6

• John xii. 32.

God: "Greater works than these shall he do, because I go unto the Father." 1 It is said of Count Zinzendorf, the pious nobleman who welcomed the exiled Moravians to his home, that as a young man he could ride the wildest horse in his father's stables; and on being asked how it could happen that one could be at the same time a pietist and an athlete, he answered, "Only he to whom earthly things are indifferent becomes their master."2 There was this masterly quality in the social teaching of Jesus. Instead of being entangled by social questions, he moved through them with a quiet authority and even a delicate irony. His conversation was in heaven; therefore the world was at his feet.

Here is one of the most striking contrasts between the teaching of Jesus and that of the prophets of the Old Testament. They threw themselves into the midst of the struggle for national righteousness, exhorting, rebuking, upbraiding their people as they wavered or retreated into wrong; Jesus surveys this struggle, as it were, from above, as an incident of the great campaign of God. The prophets wrestled with the waves of social agitation; Jesus walked upon them. The difference was not so much one of social intention as of social horizon. The work of a reformer is for his own age; that of a revealer for all ages. The social teaching of Jesus is universal, precisely because it was a byproduct, issuing from his universal teaching of the 1 John xiv. 12.

2 Nathusius (op. cit.), s. 317, note.