and, in doing it, we must avoid ostentation as the curse of good works.
By ‘fasting' must here be understood all other austerities that are used to mortify the body. They must be carefully hidden. ‘Be not, like the hypocrites, sad.' ‘Anoint thy head and wash thy face.’ That is, we are to show meekness and joy to everyone; we are not to be like people who bear austerities impatiently, and who seem, by treating all those they come across harshly and irritably, as if they laid the blame of their sufferings on them. Austerity to ourselves ought to make us gentler and more docile: — to correct, and not to increase, bad temper. This is the meaning of ‘anointing the head and washing the face': they are acts typical of meekness and joy.
