Quesnel: Moral Reflections on the Gospels Vol 1

40 ST. MATTHEW.
and yet acts as if he was not so. We are nothing
but darkness, and yet will needs be our own light.
" 23. And he came and dwelt in a city called Na-
zareth : that it might be fulfilled which was spoken
by the prophets, He shall be called a Nazarene."
Jesus Christ a true Nazarene, that is, holy,
separate from all impurity, and consecrated to God.
A Christian ought to be such in proportion. Let
us learn to conceal ourselves, and to keep silence,
until our time to act and to speak is come. If
Christ go up to Jerusalem, it is only to worship God
according to the law, to carry on the work which he
gave hira to perform, and to finish his sacrifice.
Except on these occasions, he lives private and con-
cealed, retired from the world, aiid shut up in the
solitude of Nazareth : this is the pattern of a priest.
CHAPTER HI.
Sect. I.— The Mortified Life and Preaching of
St. John.
" 1. In those days came John the Baptist,
preaching in the wilderness of Judea,"
After a retirement of thirty years, to begin the
exercise of his ministry in the wilderness; to prefer
the country to the city, the poor to the rich, the
ignorant to the learned, is that wherein St. John
will have but few imitators. The forwardness and
usual aims of preachers are here condemned, in the
very beginning of the Gospel. This is what hin-
ders the fruit of it.
** 2. And saying, Repent ye: for the kingdom of
heaven is at hand."