"Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled. "Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy. "Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God. "Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God. "Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake: for theirs is the kingdom of heaven."[1] [Footnote 1: Matt. v. 3-10; Luke vi. 20-25.] His preaching was gentle and pleasing, breathing Nature and the perfume of the fields. He loved the flowers, and took from them his most charming lessons. The birds of heaven, the sea, the mountains, and the games of children, furnished in turn the subject of his instructions. His style had nothing of the Grecian in it, but approached much more to that of the Hebrew parabolists, and especially of sentences from the Jewish doctors, his contemporaries, such as we read them in the "_Pirke Aboth_." His teachings were not very extended, and formed a species of sorites in the style of the Koran, which, joined together, afterward composed those long discourses which were written by Matthew.[1] No transition united these diverse pieces; generally, however, the same inspiration penetrated them and made them one. It was, above all, in parable that the master excelled. Nothing in Judaism had given him the model of this delightful style.[2] He created it. It is true that we find in the Buddhist books parables of exactly the same tone and the same character as the Gospel parables;[3] but it is difficult to admit that a Buddhist influence has been exercised in these. The spirit of gentleness and the depth of feeling which equally animate infant Christianity and Buddhism, suffice perhaps to explain these analogies. [Footnote 1: This is what the [Greek: Logia kuriaka] were called. Papias, in Eusebius, _H.E._, iii. 39.] [Footnote 2: The apologue, as we find it in _Judges_ ix. 8, and following, 2 _Sam._ xii. 1, and following, only resembles the Gospel parable in form. The profound originality of the latter is in the thought with which it is filled.] [Footnote 3: See especially the _Lotus of the Good Law_, chap. iii. and iv.]