II. Christ did not disdain the sight and presence of this loathsome spectacle, nor did He defer His cure to another day, and although He might have cured him with a single word, in order to correct our vicious delicacy on similar occasions, He condescended to touch him. "Wherefore, stretching out His hands, He touched him, saying, I will, be thou made clean.' ' (Matt. viii. 3.) Ponder the words " I will," they import, it is both My wish and desire, for God "will have all men to be saved." (1 Tim. ii. 4.) Examine, therefore, if it be not your own fault that you are not purified from your spiritual leprosy of sin.
III. This leprosy of the soul, is like that of the body; both defile the subject in which they exist and make it odious, the latter in the sight of man, the former in the sight of God. The leprosy of the soul, however, is more detestable in the same proportion as it is more dangerous, and disposes its subjects not to temporal but to eternal death. Hence the virtuous St. Louis with good reason said, that he would rather incur the leprosy of the body, than the leprosy of the soul, by sin, and severely reprehended one of his nobles for making a contrary choice.
TUESDAY.
Cure of the Leper.— II.
I. After having cured the leper, " Jesus said to him, see thou tell no man." (Matt. viii. 4.) Christ knew that he would publish his miraculous cure, from a feeling of gratitude, and there was no danger of vain-glory in Christ; why then did He forbid him to divulge his cure? He did it for our instruction, and to teach us to avoid vain-glory, as one of our most dangerous enemies. " Vain-glory
