On the strength of this introduction I have gone through the main teaching of the Gospel, and have made the following differentiation of how East and West have taken or emphasised or avoided the thoughts and words of the New Testament. We are somewhat tired of the comparison of the Authorised and Revised Versions, or of the English translation with the original Greek texts. Here, I fancy, is something more vital; a comparison of the way the teaching has been generally understood by the masses of the people in the Western and Eastern Churches. I am not comparing the opinions of the authorities in both Churches, but the opinions which hold sway, which make ethics. By this means it may be possible to make what would be a valuable historical record of the position of the progress of Christianity to-day. The way of the West—what may be called the way of Martha—is easier, more human than the way of the East—the way of Mary. Thus at the Transfiguration the disciple cried out, “Master, it is good for us to be here: let us build three tabernacles.” It was not at all necessary to build three tabernacles. The good part was like that of Mary—to sit at Jesus’ feet. But to take the teaching in the order it is given in St. Matthew’s Gospel: “Ye are the salt of the earth” has been printed in red ink in the Bibles of the West, and it is generally thought to refer to the just and upright, the elder brothers, the stand-by’s of the community as opposed to the prodigals. “Let your light so shine before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father which is in Heaven,” has in the West become a weekly exhortation to give a good alms at collection-time. This is an instance of materialism. The spendthrift East takes its stand more with St. Peter, who was able to say, “Silver and gold have I none; but such as I have give I to thee.” The giving of money is the least of the good works in the power of the East; “Am I so bankrupt of grace that my function is to give money?” the Eastern may exclaim. “If thine eye offend thee, pluck it out” means more to the East, where in the monastic life of the Orthodox Church the lusts of the flesh are mortified—that is, made dead; where hermits wear heavy chains and take oaths of silence, or hide themselves from mankind. It is witnessed in many sects, such as the Skoptsi, who deny the world by defunctionising the body! “Swear not at all” is a simple admonition, appealing directly to the Western mind. In Russia the swearing in ordinary conversation is thick as the weeds on a waste. A curiosity in Russian swearing is the common expression _Yay Bogu_, which means really, “Yes: I say it to God,” but which through carelessness and iteration has become equivalent to something like our “’s’truth.” In America, however, the adjective God-damn is commoner than any other unpleasant expression in any country.