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Grace is the Christian's new nature, and hypocrisy is the art that counterfeits it. The hypocrite affects the innocence of the dove to hide the cunning of the serpent. By the hypocrite good men are oft deceived, for "Goodness thinks no ill where no ill seems." The hypocrite, like Judas, may salute Christ, but it is to betray Him. The hypocrite's life is a falsehood to heaven and to earth. The hypocrite gives his tongue to virtue, but his heart to vice. If there be "the head of gold," there are also "the feet of miry clay." Hypocrisy is the homage which vice pays to virtue. The more plausible hypocrisy is before men, the more detestable it is to God. The hypocrite serves Satan, and from Satan receives his reward. The religious hypocrite is at best a man of dark deeds, though clad in garments of light. He may approach the portals of heaven, but he does not enter. A hypocrite was discovered at a royal supper, but the king rejected him from the banquet. Man esteems him hateful, because he seems not what he is; and God hates him, because he is not what he seems. The Christian's heart oft speaks without the tongue, but the hypocrite's tongue always speaks without the heart. The hypocrite, like a bird of prey, although his course be towards heaven, yet is always looking and longing for something upon earth. The Christian gives to God the fruit of his labours; the hypocrite gives to God the fruit of his lips. The hypocrite is led by ostentation, and not by a sanctified conscience. Hypocrites may be "Christians in the skin, but they are demons in the core"; "their rhetoric may be pretty, their logic witty, but their practice is naughty." Hypocrisy is insulting to the virtuous, and cruel to the poor and afflicted. For he who hides his vices by hypocrisy, suspects the virtues of others to be hypocrisy. And the poor and afflicted remain poor and afflicted, because the sin of the hypocrite closed the hand of charity, and in consequence thereof genuine sorrow is oft suspected in place of being relieved. An impostor who asks for alms is a hypocrite in the lower grade. Hypocrisy may prevail in morals as well as in creed. Some men are hypocritical in both. Hypocrisy shall be detected, as in the case of Saul (1 Samuel 15:14), Gehazi (2 Kings 5:26), Judas (Matthew 26:50), Ananias (Acts 5:3), Simon Magus (Acts 8:20, 21). Hypocrisy may be seen in the history of Jacob (Genesis 27:20), Pharaoh (Exodus 8:28, 29), Balaam (Numbers 23:10), Absalom (2 Samuel 15:7), Hazael (2 Kings 8:12, 13). Samaritans (Ezra 4:2), Herod (Matthew 2:8), High Priest (Matthew 26:65), Pilate (Matthew 27:24). Let the hypocrite tremble lest he perish by his own hypocrisy, for God is the God of Truth, Christ is the Word of Truth, and the Holy Ghost is the Spirit of Truth. "The hope of the hypocrite shall be as the spider's web" (Job 8:13, 14). He is unwise who decries religion because some professing to be religious are hypocrites. None would take the pains to counterfeit pearls, if true ones were not of value. Men would not personate piety were it not of itself a noble quality. We best show our abhorrence of hypocrisy by holding the truth free from hypocrisy.

(Van Doren.)

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KJV: In the mean time, when there were gathered together an innumerable multitude of people, insomuch that they trode one upon another, he began to say unto his disciples first of all, Beware ye of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy.

WEB: Meanwhile, when a multitude of many thousands had gathered together, so much so that they trampled on each other, he began to tell his disciples first of all, "Beware of the yeast of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy.