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Mat 24:12. Τήν ἀνομίαν, unrighteousness) Unrighteousness and love are opposites; for love is the fulfilling of the law. Unrighteousness involves compulsion, love, as it were, something natural.-ψυγήσεται, shall wax cold) It is the character of love to burn.-ἡ ἀγάπη, love) sc. towards God, mankind, our neighbour, and ourself; of a spiritual and also natural kind; love, which is the sum of the law.-στοργὴ (natural affection) makes parents rejoice in the birth of their offspring: when iniquity has made times hard, they rejoice in losing their offspring or having none. Love is the ornament and very life of Christians, and of their whole condition and conduct, Php 1:9; 2Pe 1:7; Rev 2:4. It is also the foundation of that ὑπομονὴ, patience or endurance, mentioned in the next verse.-τῶν πολλῶν, of the many) i.e. of the majority, sc. of those who do not excel in love. Unrighteousness is especially practised by those who are exceedingly powerful or excessively poor: whence also the love of the rest waxes cold.[1037] That justice which is called particular, being violated, that which is called universal, languishes.[1038]
[1037] Since their power and means of doing good are taken violently from them by unrighteousness or injustice.-V. g.
[1038] Universal justice comprehends the whole of our duty to our neighbour; particular justice is that strictly so called. See Aristotle’s Nicomachæan Ethics, Book V. passim.-(I. B.)