of the heart the mouth speaketh" (Matt. 12:34; Luke 6:45).
What a heart, then, his words reveal! How easy and straightforward
his language is! To-day we all use abstract nouns to convey our
meaning; we cannot do without words ending in -ality and -anon. But
there is no recorded saying of Jesus where he uses even
"personality." He does not use abstract nouns. He sticks to plain
words. When he speaks about God he does not say "the Great First
Cause," or "Providence," or any other vague abstract. Still less
does he use an adverb from the abstract, like "providentially." He
says, "your heavenly Father." He does not talk of "humanity"; he
says, "your brethren." He has no jargon, no technical terms, no
scholastic vocabulary. He urges men not to over-study language;
their speech must be simple, the natural, spontaneous overflow of
the heart.[20] Jesus told his disciples not to think out beforehand
what they would say when on trial (Mark 13:11)--it would be "given"
to them. He was perfectly right; and when Christians obeyed him,
they always spoke much better than when they thought out speeches
beforehand. They said much less for one thing, and they said it much
better. Take the case of the martyr--an early and historical
one--whose two speeches were during her trial "Christiana sum" and,
on her condemnation, "Deo gratias".

With this, remark his own gift of arresting phrase; the freshness of
his language, how free it is from quotation, how natural and how
extraordinarily simple. Everything worthwhile can be put in simple
language; and, if the speech is complicated, it is a call to think
again. "As a woman, over-curiously trimmed, is to be mistrusted, so
is a speech," said John Robinson of Leyden, the minister of the
Pilgrim Fathers. The language of Jesus is simple and direct, the
inevitable expression of a rich nature and a habit of truth. You
feel he does not strain after effect--epigram, antithesis, or
alliteration. Of course he uses such things--like all real
speakers--but he does not go out of his way for them. No, and so
much the more significant are such characteristic antitheses as: "Ye
cannot serve God and mammon" (Luke 16:13), and "Whosoever will save
his life shall lose it" (Matt. 16:25), coming with a spontaneous
flash, and answering in their sharpness to the sharp edges of fact.
His words caught the attention, and lived in the memory; they
revealed such a nature; they were so living and unforgettable.

Remark on