These things I believe to be true of the Pharisees; not of every individual, just as one would not say of every Christian that the full glory of his religion was realised either _in_ him or _by_ him, but true as the full expression of what Pharisaism meant, and true in a larger measure as the experience of those who professed it. Beneath all that outward guise of unfamiliar phrase and uncongenial method, so far removed from all that to Christians seems the natural expression of religion, there was nevertheless the communion of living souls with the living God; and however different was the way in which they felt called to walk, from that in which other men walk, in that way they steadfastly continued; and, knowing in their hearts that God was with them, they "trusted in Him and were not ashamed." CHAPTER III PHARISAISM AND JESUS It is from the New Testament that the ordinary Christian reader gets his ideas about the Pharisees. There is mention in the Gospels of frequent encounters between Jesus and the Pharisees; and the Epistles of Paul contain much severe comment on the Pharisaic conception of religion. No one, who desires to understand what the Pharisees themselves meant by their religion, can afford to pass by, without careful examination, these records of unfavourable criticism; and he must enter upon such examination not by any means with the preconceived intention of confuting the critics or of agreeing with them, but simply for the purpose of getting to know why there was such criticism, and what truth lay on each side in the controversy. With this object, I shall devote one chapter to the study of the opposition between the Pharisees and Jesus, and another to that between Pharisaism and the teaching of Paul. Incidentally, it will be possible to find room for various points which bear upon what has been said in the foregoing chapters.