THE main purport of the King, in the period covered by this last division of Matthew, was not that of presenting His Kingdom to the outside world as He had done before, nor that of demonstrating His power to the outside world; it was rather that of gathering His disciples about Himself, and instructing them carefully, in view of His coming Passion. His public ministry continued. The multitudes came to Him with need, and He always turned to them graciously. He never refused to respond to the approach of the multitude even though He was devoting Himself to this training of His own.

This chapter records instructions which our Lord gave to these disciples in view of the work that lay before them. It falls into two parts; the Master's instruction, first concerning greatness, and secondly concerning forgiveness. The first part was His answer to their question-"Who then is greatest in the Kingdom of heaven?" Then He merged His teaching concerning greatness, into His teaching concerning forgiveness, the attitude of His people towards wrongdoing. Our present study is concerned with the first of these teachings, that concerning greatness.

Now, in order that we may understand our Lord's teaching, let us consider it; first, by the examination of its method; secondly, and principally, by the consideration of the teaching itself. Our Lord made His answer clear and definite, precise and immediate; but He recognized that in the question asked there were many other matters involved, and He dealt with them, leading these men a great deal farther than they expected He would lead them, when they asked their question.

We will first notice the method of this section, and the method of our Lord's answer to His disciples' question. "In that hour came the disciples unto Jesus, saying, Who then is greatest in the Kingdom of heaven?" What did this question mean? First let us notice the little word, "then." In the Authorized Version this word does not occur, but it is of great importance. It is perfectly evident that the word then has no time-value here. They were not thinking of that time, or time past, nor of time to come. The "then" is an indication of the fact that these people were thinking about our Lord's teaching, and they were greatly puzzled by all the new things He was saying to them about the Kingdom. It is the then of contrast between their ideas and His ideas. They had looked for the Kingdom, with its gradations from King, through officers of State, down to the common level of the people; the ordinary human ideal of a kingdom, which is so utterly and absolutely false. They had looked for a King and a Kingdom upon the pattern of material purposes and ideals. They had expected Him presently to assert Himself in the midst of the age in which He lived, to break the power of Rome, and to re-establish the throne of David in Jerusalem; to appoint Peter in all probability as Prime Minister-that was the natural order of things and the other apostles to all the other offices of State. He had said to them, Your King is going to Jerusalem to suffer, to be murdered, and to rise again. They said, "Who then is greatest?" All the hopes of Himself that they had been cherishing, had turned into dust, and they stood in the midst of the wreckage of their own ideals, and hopes, and aspirations. They may not have been personally seeking for office, although there evidently was a consciousness that they had lost the chance of office. This is a greater question than it appears, for as a matter of fact the actual word is, "Who then is the greater of them in the Kingdom?" What they really asked was, What is the condition of greatness in Thy Kingdom? They said in effect; Greatness in our kingdom is manifested by some high office, dignity issues in notoriety. If you rob us of our ideals, what is Thy ideal of greatness? In consequence of His strange prediction of the Cross they were completely baffled and perplexed.

Let us now consider Christ's answer, observing carefully His method.

We have first of all the action; "He called to Him a little child, and set him in the midst of them." We miss all the poetry of this if we do not see the actual scene in Galilee. Behold the King! We should never have taken Him for the King if we had been tourists through that district, and passed by while He was talking to those men. There was no beauty that material eyes, seeing, should desire Him. He wore a plain seamless robe woven from the top throughout; a home-made garment. But home-made garments are very beautiful when love's fingers have made them; and love made that robe for Jesus. It was perfectly evident that He was a Man of the people, a carpenter. Round about Him we see these men, for the most part young fishermen. They were men of infinite capacity, men capable of splendid daring, yet frail, fickle, feeble, and often fainthearted. These men asked this Man this question, a perfectly proper and pertinent question. In all likelihood some Hebrew lad was playing near, and Christ called him, and he came, and Jesus put him in the midst of these men. That is the first fact of His answer.

Then, after this action, came the answer direct. There was a kindly satire about the speech of Jesus, but His satire never wounded men. He said, You want to know what is the law of greatness. You must get down there, to the level of that boy, before you get in at all; "Except ye turn, and become as little children, ye shall in no wise enter into the Kingdom of heaven." But if you be as little as the child, "the same is the greatest." He meant first that everybody is great inside; there are no little souls inside the Kingdom. Thus He swept away any incipient desire for caste, and class, and gradation, that lurked in their question. He had said on another occasion, "Among them that are born of women there hath not arisen a greater than John the Baptist: yet he that is but little in the Kingdom of heaven is greater than he." Christ had a majestic conception of His own Kingdom. That was His answer direct.

Now notice that He proceeded from that point to bring out of His answer involved truths, and to apply them. First, He applied practical tests to these men. "And whoso shall receive one such little child in My name receiveth Me: but whoso shall cause one of these little ones that believe on Me to stumble, it is profitable for him that a great millstone should be hanged about his neck, and that he should be sunk in the depth of the sea." There seems at first sight to be a lack of continuity in these words, but as a matter of fact there is a most intimate connection. If we are like the child we shall receive the child. A man to be successful in the Sunday school or the day-school, must have the child-heart. Only those who lack the child-heart themselves could cause the child to stumble. Of such the King declared, "It is profitable for him that a great millstone should be hanged about his neck, and that he should be sunk in the depth of the sea." The thick millstone, not the millstone at which the two women ground, but the great upper millstone that had to be turned by a beast of burden. They knew what He meant. Put that round about his neck, and drown him in the depth of the sea. "It is profitable for him;" he will make more in the economy of God out of such drowning, than out of being a stumbling-block in the way of a child.

Then followed His resulting warning. "Woe unto the world. . . . Woe to that man through whom the occasion cometh!" Here was a curious change of application. He was talking about offences coming to some one else, and then He said, "If thy hand or thy foot causeth thee to stumble, cut it off, and cast it from thee," by which He meant to say that the man who causes the stumbling-block becomes a stumbling block to himself, and if we destroy a child we destroy ourselves. So He solemnly warned them.

Then He gave them the final instruction, beginning thus, "Despise not one of these little ones."

Now let us more particularly examine this, in order that we may have the teaching of it for ourselves. What was this that Jesus said and did when He took the child and set it in their midst? He gave us the type of character in His Kingdom, and of such as may enter that Kingdom. No man has ever entered the Kingdom of God who has not taken up this place, and come to the level of a little child, which is the level of imperfection, of simplicity, of submissiveness.

It is the level of imperfection. Perhaps that is where most men stumble. The little child is the emblem of imperfection, waiting for correction and instruction, in order to development. No man can enter the Kingdom except upon this level. Jesus Christ did not say, in order to enter My Kingdom you must be perfect. When we have entered He will say as one of the severest things, "Ye shall be perfect, as your Father ... is perfect." But the condition for entrance is imperfection. That does not mean that the condition for coming in is hopeless imperfection. A little child is not for evermore troubling about imperfection. The child subconsciously knows it, and in the knowledge of its imperfection yields itself to instruction, and correction, if it have a true child nature.

It is the level of simplicity. In the child we have all the things that are elemental. Complexity is not yet. All the powers of its being express themselves freely, readily, naturally; there is no guile.

But the final thing is that the child is plastic, submissive. It was a Roman Catholic Prelate who said, Give me the children until they are seven, I care not what you do after. It is perfectly true. A little child is always plastic. There may be a good deal of inherited sin in the child, but give the child its opportunity, it is submissive, and yields to the touch of our hand. All this is for us, and it is fearfully solemn and searching for any who have children in the home, or who teach them in the schools. The little children will bear our impress to the end of their lives, and through eternity.

What, then, did He say to these men who wanted to know what was the condition of greatness in His Kingdom? "Except ye turn and become as little children." He was stating a general principle, that a man must turn back to that. Mark the recognition that when the child leaves childhood, and enters upon its youth and manhood, these very things pass and fail; and therefore He said, You must get back again to that condition of imperfection, and simplicity and submissiveness; if you will humble yourself to that, then you will realize the ideal of greatness.

But now, following along this line of application, let us look at the practical tests. The child-heart receives the child, and the being who has lost the child-heart will offend the child. Now while our Lord makes these statements and they become tests, they are not tests only; they are words of terrific meaning and importance, words full of comfort and encouragement. Do you know what it is to receive a little child? Do you know what it is to take a child into your heart and life in Christian sympathy? In the moment you of the child-heart receive a little child, you receive to yourself the Christ Himself. "Whoso shall receive one such little child in My name, receiveth Me." Offend that little child and you offend Him. By comparison "it is profitable for him that a great millstone should be hanged about his neck, and that he should be sunk in the depth of the sea." He was teaching His disciples by that which is dear to God's heart, a child; and He was teaching them that they could test their own spirit by their relation to the child.

And then it seems as though the eyes of the Master, from that moment, looked on down the centuries-"Woe unto the world"-and the first woe of that verse, by its setting, is evidently not the woe of a curse, but the woe of a great lamentation-"Woe unto the world because of occasions of stumbling! for it must needs be that the occasions come; but woe to that man through whom the occasion cometh!" The second woe is the same, but it has taken on the nature of a curse. First Christ's pity for the world, and then Christ's pronouncement of punishment upon men by whom the offences come. He traced the woes of the world to those from whom they proceed, such as cause stumbling and offence; and gathering up the world's sorrow, He fastened it upon the head of the man that causes it. In it we see the infinite equity and justice of Christ. That is His attitude to-day. Woe to the city where the offences come! That is a lamentation. But woe to the men from whom they come! That is a fiery word, burning with anger. Thus He gathered up into the economy of His ultimate dealings with men, all the woes of the race, and fixed them upon the men that have been the cause of them. The spirit that receives a child and will not offend it, is the spirit that will not put a stumbling-block in the way of the world. The man who offends a child is the man who wounds the world. Let there be no softening of these words of Jesus. He talks about the age-abiding fire, the Gehenna of fire, always burning, where refuse is flung. That is the place for the man who lacks the child-heart. He will be treated in the economy of God as outside the city, fit only for the rubbish heap. So there rings through this great speech of Jesus His tenderness and His thunder.

What is the ultimate instruction? He came back again to the child. Maybe he looked once again on the boy who stood there wondering at the words which, perhaps, he did not understand at all-more occupied with the loveliness of the face of the One Who was uttering them-and He said, " See that ye despise not one of these little ones." He gave them three reasons. First of all, "In heaven their angels do always behold the face of My Father Who is in heaven." The children have angels who behold the face of the Father, and who minister to them, and Jesus said, to these men who were going to be in His Kingdom, and who wanted to know about greatness; Do not forget that the angels do not despise the children. They watch them and guard them, and stand in heaven's Court for them. The angels are all ministering spirits, sent forth to do service for the sake of them that shall inherit salvation. And if you have wandered from the tender Fatherhood of God, your angel is still following you, and if, without sound or sigh, you turn back again to God, all the angels will join in the joy of that angel who announces your turning, because he has watched you so long. The little ones have angels waiting.

But that is not the highest reason for not despising them. He moved on to a higher level. In the Revised Version verse eleven is omitted, but the truth is not omitted. Our revisers felt it was out of place here, and ought to be omitted-"The Son of Man has come to seek and to save that which was lost." Even though we miss that, the next statement is the same thing; "How think ye? If any man have a hundred sheep, and one of them be gone astray, doth He not leave the ninety and nine, and go unto the mountains, and seek that which goeth astray? And if so be that He find it ... he rejoiceth over it more than over the ninety and nine which have not gone astray." So if we ask, What about the inherited sin of the child? The Shepherd came to seek such. He was still talking about a child, so that another reason we are not to despise a child, is the fact that He has come to find the little child.

Once again, there is yet a mightier reason than the reason of angel ministry, and the reason of the Son's interest and mission; "Even so"-as angels are interested, as the Son is interested-"Even so, it is not the will of My Father . . . that one of these little ones should perish." If you despise a little child, then you are against the angels, you are against the Son of God, you are against the Eternal Father.

Oh the false measurements of greatness! A man is sometimes thought great because of his notoriety. It is often a more unpleasant word but a truer word than popularity. Men sometimes measure greatness by a man's power to manage other men and reign over them. But there is another word for that-tyranny. What is Christ's standard? Begin with the last thing and move backwards. Despise not a child, offend not a child, receive a child. What is the condition for all that? Be like a child, and when you become like a child, you become great.

To despise a child is to be out of harmony with the angels, the Son, and the Father. To offend a child is to make it profitable not to be. To receive a child is to entertain Jesus Christ. To be like a child is to be great.

As we listen to the King talking to His disciples and to us, we see how close heaven and hell are to each other! In the words of His lips He illuminates for us the infinite spaces, and we see the glories of God's own heaven; and in another moment, He lights for us the lurid depths of the underworld, and of judgment and punishment! May God give us the heart of a child! May God help us to put upon our own ambition the measurement of the little child.

IN this whole paragraph we have practically one discourse of our Lord to His own disciples. There are two great subjects with which He dealt. The first is that of greatness; the second, that of forgiveness. In our last section we considered the King's teaching concerning greatness. Here we have another side of the same truth, that namely, of the attitude of the subjects of the King towards a man who offends. The theme therefore is that of forgiveness. We should hardly relate these two things, greatness and forgiveness; and yet they are intimately related, for the final proof of greatness is ability to forgive. This is true of God, and therefore it must be true of men.

In words that seem to scorch us, He warned His disciples not to offend. But, supposing that some man has offended, has been a stumbling-block to some one else, what shall we do with him? We cannot study this teaching of Jesus without being startled at the way in which the thunder merges into the love-song, and the lightning into the sunlight. This Teacher, so severe, so terrible, Who makes one tremble lest one should offend, when a man has offended, summons us by the compassion of God's heart, to go after him, to bring him back. That is the whole story of the relationship between greatness and forgiveness. We put them far apart in these days, and speak of the man who forgives as a weak man. But Christ shows the greatness of the man who forgives.

This passage divides itself quite naturally into two parts. We have in verses fifteen to twenty the King's definite instruction concerning forgiveness, commencing with the words, "If thy brother sin against thee." The words "against thee" are open to question. In some manuscripts they are not found; while in others they are. In the margin of the Revision it is written, "Some ancient authorities omit against thee." Nothing dogmatic can be said as to whether these words ought to be retained or not, and yet the whole context suggests that the word of Christ here had a wider application than that of dealing with sin against us personally. Our responsibility against our sinning brother is not created by the fact that he has wronged us, but by the fact that he has sinned and harmed himself. Then in verses twenty-one to thirty-five (Mat 18:21-35) we have an account of how the disciples misunderstood Him; and of the King's correction.

Now let us, first of all, look at the King's instructions. Before looking at some of the things particularly, let us observe the spirit and purpose of them. The underlying purpose of Jesus concerning the sinning brother is expressed in the words, "Thou hast gained thy brother." In considering our Lord's use of the word "gained" here, it is very interesting to trace it through the New Testament. It is a commercial word, a word of the market place. It is a word which is used to characterize the processes by which a man accumulates wealth. The use of the word in this connection, so far as the sinning brother is concerned, recognizes loss. A man who has sinned is in certain senses lost; when he is restored he is gained, and the gain is interpreted by the context.

We are personally to attempt to gain our brother, because we have lost him as a brother through his sin. If he will not hear us, we are to take two or three with us, because by persisting in sin, his friends have lost him, he is lost to comradeship. If he will not hear them we are to go to the Church, because the Church has lost him; by his sin. The Church is to take the matter to heaven, because heaven has lost him by his sin. It is the great tragedy of a man lost which colours all this instruction; and the purpose that is to be in our heart when we deal with a sinning brother, is that of gaining him.

This word "gain" suggests, not merely the effect on the one lost, but the value it creates for those who seek him. When presently we have done with the shadows and the mists of the little while, we shall understand in the light of the undying ages that if we have gained one man we shall be richer than if we have piled up all the wealth of the world, and never won a human soul. What a blessed thing to gain a man, to possess him for oneself, for the fellowship of friends, for the enterprises of the Church, for the programme of high heaven.

But now how is this to be done? Our Lord was very careful in His revelation of the method. We are to begin by personal effort. "If thy brother sin against thee, go, show him his fault between thee and him alone." This is not gentle permission. It is definite instruction. Any Church of Jesus Christ is weak in the proportion in which its members allow false pity or sentiment to prevent their being faithful to this great work of attempting to show an erring brother his fault, in order that he may be restored. Jesus said, "If thy brother sin, go, show him his fault," declare it unto him. Charge him with it. By no means in the spirit of jealousy or judgment, but bring him to realize it as a fault, as sin. It is not enough to convince him that we count it as sin. Our business is to bring the man to see that he has sinned. And if an erring brother shall say to us when we go to him, I know it in the depths of my soul, then we begin the ministry of restoration. There may be a great many things necessary with regard to the man's relationship to the Kingdom and the Church, but so far as his relationship to us is concerned, we have gained him when he confesses his sin. Out of such conviction contrition comes, and out of such contrition, the face is set back again towards God, and right, and purity. That is the first method.

But supposing he will not hear, then the Lord says, our responsibility is not over, for the interest is a larger one than personal, in any man who has sinned. There is the interest of the comradeship. And so we must take with us one or two; and we are still going on the same business; to show him his fault, in order to bring him to contrition and return.

But supposing this man will neither hear us nor those whom we take with us, does not realize his sin, will not confess his sin, or is rebellious in his sin, continuing therein, what then? Then we are to tell it to the Church. Here we must be very careful to notice what our Lord really meant, for He clearly declared the alternative that is before the Church, when, lastly, the case is brought to it. The one side o the alternative is, that he will hear the Church. If the Church can restore this man, when one has failed, when two or three have failed, to contrition and conviction and consciousness of sin, then the Church has gained the man. But if he will not, what then? The other side of the alternative on the part of the Church is that then the man is to be as a Gentile and a publican.

Now before we examine that, let us notice what follows, because what follows explains the meaning of this power of the Church, "Verily, I say unto you what things so ever ye shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and what things so ever ye shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven. Again I say. unto you, that if two of you shall agree on earth as touching anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of My Father which is in heaven. For where two or three are gathered together in My name there am I in the midst of them."

These are some of the most remarkable things that our Lord said about His Church. They have much wider application than the application Jesus made of them at this point We are perfectly justified in lifting them out of their setting, and using them over a wider area of thought. But sometimes the danger is that we take these great words of Jesus and use them in the wider application, and so lose the immediate first-hand application which He Himself made of. them. All these great words have to do with the Church's attitude towards the sinning man, to which we will return.

Yet they have to do with a much wider area which we cannot altogether pass over now. For some of us this is the whole ground of truth concerning the constitution and power of the Christian Church. "Where two or three are gathered together, there am I in the midst" That is the charter of the Church. How spacious, and gracious, and wonderful it is! First of all it breaks down all idea of a localized meeting-place with God. We have gained a temple everywhere by the loss of the temple in a locality. Mark the magnificence of it. It is not the temple that makes the place of worship, but the gathering "in My name." There are worshipping souls in the great cathedrals, but they are not all there. On the mountain height, in some shepherd hut, far away from church, chapel, or conventicle, two shepherds are gathered in the name of Jesus. There is the Church. "Where two or three are gathered together, there am I in the midst." May God deliver us from putting limits upon His "where." All that is necessary, is that two or three should be gathered in His name.

Again, "If two of you shall agree on earth as touching anything that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of My Father Who is in heaven." That is the authority for collective praying. And yet once more, "What things so ever ye shall bind on earth, shall be bound in heaven." That is the Church's ethical authority in the world. The Church teaches the standard of morality, and what the Church says is binding, is binding; and what the Church says is not, is not. But that is only true when we link it with what follows-he Church gathering in the name of Christ.

So the great passage is the charter of Church authority, of Church method, of Church foundation. The Church authority-she binds and looses-in the old ethical sense of the words in which the scribes perpetually made use of them. The Church is the authority in the world, which sets up the moral standards; and it has always been so, for the last nineteen centuries; the true standards obtaining in the common consciousness of this hour are those which the Church has established. How does the Church gain this authority? By asking the Father, seeking from Him the light. But upon what basis does the Church gather to ask the Father for the light which shall make her message authoritative? "Where two or three are gathered together in My name, there am I in the midst." These are some of the wider applications of this teaching.

Now mark this fact, that Jesus used these tremendous truths in this matter of how we should deal with our brother who has sinned. If the Church has consulted the will of God concerning him, because the Church has gathered in the name of Jesus, then her decision is binding, authoritative, final. Heaven ratifies it The Church, consisting of only two or three units, or of tens, scores, hundreds, gathered waiting before God in the name and nature of God's Son, her conclusions are binding conclusions, and Heaven seals them. The Church, so gathered, is to deal with the case of this man, and if this man will not hear her, will not accept her ruling, will not be submissive to her authority, what then is she to do? If he will hear, she will fold him to her bosom; if this sinning man, who has offended, and ought to have had a millstone about his neck, is won back by the individual, or the two or three, or the Church, then mother Church is to fold him, and as the father kissed repeatedly the home-coming boy, mother Church, Bride of the Son of God, is to receive him, and smother him with her kisses. God give us hearts like that!

But if not, what then? Then the pity of the Church is to be more than false pity for the individual, and the holiness of the assembly is to be of greater importance than the sheltering of a man that has done wrong, and is unrepentant. "Let him be unto thee as the Gentile and the publican." It is a terrific sentence. It is first, that the Church must put that man outside her fellowship, that the Church must exercise her authority on the side of Heaven's unsullied purity.

But is that all? If we have so read it, we nave misread it. We may take these words of Jesus Christ and make them blasphemous by the very tone in which we read them. There is a hymn we often sing,

He never put the tone of thunder and denunciation into those words. He never put into them the tone of an unholy and unchristian excommunication. That is what we have too often done. What did He say? This man you have been after, and could not gain, this man that two or three of you saw and could not gain, this man that the Church would fain have folded to her motherly bosom, and could not gain, "Let him be unto thee as the Gentile and the publican." You must put him outside the fellowship, and you must put him outside the shadow of the Church. He must not have the shelter of the Church for impurity. But the moment he is there, he is the man I came to win, he is the man for whom I came to die. "The Son of Man is come to seek and to save that which was lost." You must keep him from the privilege and the shelter of the Church, in order to bring him to consciousness, first of his need, and then of My exceeding grace and free forgiveness.

Now let us glance at the misunderstanding of the disciples, because we are in succession to them, and are liable to make the same mistakes. Peter said, "Lord, how oft shall my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? until seven times?" Observe Peter's magnanimity and Peter's meanness; and whether you count it magnanimity or meanness will depend upon that with which you put his proposition into contrast. Now there is no doubt whatever that when Peter came to Jesus with that question, and that suggested answer, How oft shall I forgive my brother, "until seven times?" he thought he had climbed to the seventh heaven of greatness; he thought he had tittered the last word of magnanimity, "Until seven times?" The teaching of all the scribes and Rabbis was, forgive once, forgive twice, but the third offence merits no forgiveness. We find it scattered throughout all the Rabbinical teaching. Peter had been told that he was one of the new scribes, and so he borrowed the language of the scribes to show how graciously he went beyond it. The scribes had said thrice, Peter said, I know more than those men; I am prepared to go beyond that; "seven times." It was magnanimity by the side of the teaching of the scribes. How some things perpetuate themselves through the centuries. There are some things that never die until submerged in the life of God. The proverb of to-day says, "The third time pays for all." The world at its best forgives a man twice, and damns him at the third time. Peter said, Master, I am beyond that, "until seven times." John Wesley makes a very caustic comment on this story. He said, "If this be Christianity, where do Christians live?"

Now note the Master's answer. May there not have been a smile of love or pity for the meanness of this conception of His own Spirit? "I say not unto thee, Until seven times; but, Until seventy times seven."

Then He gave a parabolic illustration, which is a picture fair and wonderful. It was a picture for Peter. How much did this man owe the king? Ten thousand talents. Translate it into the coinage of England, and it was at least two million pounds; or of the United States, roughly ten million dollars. This man had involved the whole State, and he owed the king at least ten thousand talents, and the king loosed him from all his bondage, and set him free. And then he went out and found a fellow servant who owed him a hundred pence. Let us take a penny as the Roman denarius, and say this man owed him less than five pounds, or twenty-five dollars. I owed the king two millions sterling, and he let me go; and I got my brother by the throat for five pounds! What did Christ mean? You have been forgiven a debt immeasurable. You have no right to exact a hundred pence from a man who, if you will give him three months, will pay you.

Mark carefully Christ's last word, "So shall also My heavenly Father do unto you, if ye forgive not every one his brother from your hearts." The arrest of the man that had been released, and his imprisonment, not for the debt which he had been forgiven, but for the brutality against his brother conveys its own teaching.

The two sections of this chapter as they reveal the two sides of the one attitude toward the subjects of the King, are very remarkable. Absolute absence of pity towards sin in oneself which may cause a brother to offend; and unceasing pity toward a sinning brother with never-failing attempts to gain him. To fail in the first is to make the millstone a profitable investment; and to fail in the second is to be dealt with in severe and dire punishment by God Himself, for the one thing God will not forgive is an unforgiving heart.