The Lord says: Unless your justice exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter into the kingdom of heaven. How indeed can justice exceed, unless compassion rises above judgment? What is as right or as worthy as a creature, fashioned in the image and likeness of God, imitating his Creator who, by the remission of sins, brought about the reparation and sanctification of believers? With strict vengeance removed and the cessation of all punishment, the guilty man was restored to innocence, and the end of wickedness became the beginning of virtue. Can anything be more just than this?