We have already seen that CHRIST referred him back to the law, as revealing and enacting all that was necessary. “What is written in the law? How readest thou?” It is in his answer to this question that we see chiefly the perfection of his religious theory and his great intellectual superiority to the scribes generally. For, observe, he does not reply “We must be circumcised; we must be sprinkled with the blood of goats and heifers; we must keep the Passover; we must wait on the temple-services; we must give tithes of all that we possess.” Nor, again, does he say, “We must observe all moral precepts; we must refrain from all idolatry; we must do justice and love mercy; obeying implicitly the commandments of the two tables.” No! in theory he is wiser than that: he has no reliance on external rights and ceremonies: he is sure that GOD demands something better than a servile conformity with certain precepts and restrictions. GOD, he knows, looks to the heart, requires the spirit rather than, _i.e._, beyond the letter. The law has taught him this: Moses gave him from heaven ceremonies to perform, and moral commandments to keep; but Moses told him, that mere outward conformity with these things was not righteousness; that the law was spiritual; that the acts done and refrained from under it were only exhibitions of a principle which must reign within: “Thou shalt love the LORD thy GOD with all thy heart and with all thy soul, and with all thy strength, and with all thy mind, and thy neighbour as thyself.” Even so, “Thou hast answered right,” said CHRIST. “Thou hast learnt under the law, all that the Gospel would teach. To exhibit this is the bent of My life on earth, to enforce it will be the mission of My Church. Love is the fulfilling of the law. This do, and thou shalt live.” It appears to me, brethren, that in this conversation, carefully considered, we may find a clue to the satisfactory interpretation of those perplexing sayings about the differences between the law and the Gospel: “The letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life.” “Ye are not under the law,” “the ministration of condemnation;” “The covenant that was confirmed before of GOD in CHRIST, the law which was 430 years after cannot disannul.” “The Law and the Prophets were until John.” “I am not come to destroy the law.” “This do and thou shalt live.”