23 For if any be a hearer of the word, and not a doer, he is like unto a man beholding his natural face in a glass:



Ver. 23. His natural face] Gr. the face of his nativity, that wherewith he was born into the world. Pythagoras wished his scholars often to view themselves in a glass, that if they were well-favoured, they might likewise be well-conditioned; as if otherwise, they might make it up in virtue.



" Si mihi difficilis formam natura negavit,



Ingenio formae damna rependo meae."



Ovid. Epist.



The law is a crystal glass, wherein a man may soon see his spiritual deformities, and be advertised of his duty. {See Trapp on "Jam_1:25"}