water[581] 'in an earthen vessel[582]'? Did He not
further charge them with an oath of cursing, saying, 'If ye have not
gone aside to uncleanness, be ye free from this bitter water: but if ye
be defiled'--On being presented with which alternative, did they not,
self-convicted, go out one by one? And what else was this but their own
acquittal of the sinful woman, for whose condemnation they shewed
themselves so impatient? Surely it was 'the water of conviction'
([Greek: to hydor tou elegmou]) as it is six times called, which _they_
had been compelled to drink; whereupon, 'convicted ([Greek:
elegchomenoi]) by their own conscience,' as St. John relates, they had
pronounced the other's acquittal. Finally, note that by Himself
declining to 'condemn' the accused woman, our Lord also did in effect
blot out those curses which He had already written against her in the
dust,--when He made the floor of the sanctuary His 'book.'

Whatever may be thought of the foregoing exposition--and I am not
concerned to defend it in every detail,--on turning to the opposite
contention, we are struck with the slender amount of actual proof with
which the assailants of this passage seem to be furnished. Their
evidence is mostly negative--a proceeding which is constantly observed
to attend a bad cause: and they are prone to make up for the feebleness
of their facts by the strength of their assertions. But my experience,
as one who has given a considerable amount of attention to such
subjects, tells me that the narrative before us carries on its front the
impress of Divine origin. I venture to think that it vindicates for
itself a high, unearthly meaning. It seems to me that it cannot be the
work of a fabricator. The more I study it, the more I am impressed with
its Divinity. And in what goes before I have been trying to make the
reader a partaker of my own conviction.

To come now to particulars, we may readily see from its very texture
that it must needs have been woven in a heavenly loom. Only too obvious
is the remark that the very subject-matter of the chief transaction
recorded in these twelve verses, would be sufficient in and by itself to
preclude the suspicion that these twelve verses are a spurious addition
to the genuine Gospel. And then we note how entirely in St. John's
manner is the little explanatory clause in ver. 6,--'This they said,
tempting Him, that they might have to accuse Him[583].' We are struck
besides by the prominence g