For from within, out of the heart of men, proceed evil thoughts, adulteries, fornications, murders,
Ver. 21. Evil thoughts, adulteries, &c.] Even all sorts of sins against both the tables of the law, as is well observed by Grotius in loc. Here is pride and folly against the first commandment; blasphemy against the second and third; of sins against the fifth commandment he had spoken before; and here are murders against the sixth; adultery and fornication against the seventh; thefts and covetousness against the eighth; guilt against the ninth; evil thoughts against the tenth. See what a foul fountain, what a seminary of sin, man's heart is. If his tongue be not a city, or a country, but a world of wickedness, James 3:6, what then is the heart!