MUSTARD. 



(Common Uacl- mustard.} 

 CRUCIFER^E. Sinapis Nigra. 



N XTO what is the kingdom of God like? It is like a 

 grain of mustard-seed, which a man took and cast into 

 his garden ; and it grew, and waxed a great tree, and 

 the fowls of the air lodged in the branches of it.&quot; 

 Objection has been raised to this simile, on the ground 

 that the mustard is not a tree, and that it is not sufficiently 

 large to bear the weight of birds. But there are several facts 

 to be noticed in connection with this passage, which occurs in 

 St. Luke xiii. 19, and with slight variation in Matt. xiii. and 

 Mark iv. The trees upon which birds rest are frequently low, 

 and the terms of the simile are such that it is very evidently 

 intended as figurative. But, though a shrub would be large 

 enough to answer the purposes of the figure, some former 

 growths were evidently greater than at present. Sir Thomas 

 Browne says that if we accept of but half the story noticed by 

 Tremellius, from the Jerusalem Talmud, of a mustard-tree that 

 could be climbed like a fig-tree, and of another under whose 

 shade a potter daily wrought, the expression may be literally 

 understood. We have frequently passed mustard-trees, during 

 our travels in the Holy Land, in which small birds lodged, and 

 which, in contrast with the seeds from which they had sprung, 



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