Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: tunity to use them and be a ruler. The Devil—the self —tempted Him. Then " Make the stones bread ; " again, use your power for yourself; a thing quite right to do, that you will do for others ; do it to feed yourself. Is this the thought ? So does not the narrative mean the time when genius is tempted, when it comes first to be conscious that the old law is not the true law—the time when it is tempted to break the law for itself? It appears then that we are not told of the first and second stages of Christ's life; that in which He obeyed the false law, and that in which He broke it not knowing it was right to break it, even unconsciously. Christ broke the laws the Jews cared most about; He blasphemed God by making Himself equal to Him (at least they thought so); and did not keep the Sabbath. To keep the Sabbath was not a moral law, and for that very reason it is probable that the Jews cared about it most of all. For (is it not striking ? ) the law which we care most about (that which is expressed in marriage) is ceremonial, strictly a ceremonial law ; a matter of form and arrangement, not moral in any other sense than as the Sabbath is ; not even so much so, probably ; a matter in regard to which different usages have existed, different orders been advocated by men most worthy. Is not this clearly the idea of " the Spirit" sent to us ? It is the removal from us of the necessity for restraint; for putting our powers, that is, to neutralise each other, and making them ineffective. That is giving us power indeed, but see what power it is; not any new one, but simply the use of the powers we have. And at least we may say that this is the best power to give us. (Before chapter{Section 4you give a sick man more powers than his own, first restore to him those that are natural...