so dramatic,
as to strike the imagination and rest on the memory; and I know no
reason for doubting that it has been correctly reported. The book of
Deuteronomy (xvii. 15) distinctly forbids Israel to set over himself
as king any who is not a native Israelite; which appeared to be a
religious condemnation of submission to Caesar. Accordingly, since
Jesus assumed the tone of unlimited wisdom, some of Herod's party
asked him, whether it was lawful to pay tribute to Caesar. Jesus
replied: "Why tempt ye me, hypocrites? Show me the tribute money."
When one of the coins was handed to him, he asked: "Whose image and
superscription is this?" When they replied: "Caesar's," he gave his
authoritative decision: "Render _therefore_ to Caesar _the things that
are Caesar's_."

In this reply not only the poor and uneducated, but many likewise of
the rich and educated, recognize "majesty and sanctity:" yet I find it
hard to think that my strong-minded friend will defend the justness,
wisdom and honesty of it. To imagine that because a coin bears Caesar's
head, _therefore_ it is Caesar's property, and that he may demand to
have as many of such coins as he chooses paid over to him, is puerile,
and notoriously false. The circulation of foreign coin of every kind
was as common in the Mediterranean then as now; and everybody knew
that the coin was the property of the _holder_, not of him whose
head it bore. Thus the reply of Jesus, which pretended to be a moral
decision, was unsound and absurd: yet it is uttered in a tone of
dictatorial wisdom, and ushered in by a grave rebuke, "Why tempt ye
me, hypocrites?" He is generally understood to mean, "Why do you try
to implicate me in a political charge?" and it is supposed that
he prudently _evaded_ the question. I have indeed heard this
interpretation from high Trinitarians; which indicates to me how
dead is their moral sense in everything which concerns the conduct of
Jesus. No reason appears why he should not have replied, that Moses
forbade Israel _voluntarily_ to place himself under a foreign
king, but did not inculcate fanatical and useless rebellion against
overwhelming power. But such a reply, which would have satisfied a
more commonplace mind, has in it nothing brilliant and striking. I
cannot but think that Jesus shows a vain conceit in the cleverness
of his answer: I do not think it so likely to have been a conscious
evasion. But neither does his rebuke of the questioners at all commen