ing is the cause of our ingratitude and opposition. We cannot comprehend, that, to work out our salvation, is to distinguish ourselves from the rest of men; is to live single amidst the multitude; is to be an individual supporter of our own cause, in the midst of a world which either condemns or despises us; is, in a word, to count examples as nothing, and to be affected by our duty alone. We cannot comprehend, that, to devote ourselves to destruction, it requires only to live as others do; to conform to the multitude; to form with it only one body and one world; seeing the world is already judged; that it is that body of the antichrist which shall perish with its head and members; that criminal city, accursed and condemned to an eternal anathema. Yes, my brethren, the greatest obstacle in our hearts, to grace and truth, is the public opinion. How many timid souls, who have not the courage to adopt the righteous side, merely because the world, to whose view they are exposed, would join against them! Thus, the king of Assyria durst not declare himself for the God of Daniel, because the grandees of his court would have reprobated such a step. How many weak souls, who, disgusted with pleasures, only continue to pursue them through a false honour, and that they may not distinguish themselves from those who set an example of them! Thus, Aaron, in the midst of the Israelites, danced around the golden calf, and joined them in offering up incense to the idol which he detested, because he had not the courage, singly, to resist the public error and blindness. Fools that we are! it is the sole example of the public which confirms us against truth; as if men were our truth, or that it were upon the earth, and not in heaven, that we ought, like the magi, to search for that rule and that light which are to guide us.
It is true, that, frequently, it is not respect for the world's opinion, but the sufferings and self-denials it holds out to us, which extinguish truth in our heart: thus, it makes us sorrowful, like that young man of the Gospel, and we do not receive it with that delight testified by the magi on seeing the miraculous star. They had beheld the magnificence of Jerusalem, the pomp of its buildings, the majesty of its temple, the splendour and grandeur of Herod's court; but the Gospel makes no mention of their having been affected by that vain display of human pomp: they behold all these grand objects of desire without attention, pleasure, or any exterior marks of admiration or surprise; they express no wish to view the treasures and the riches of the temple, as those ambassadors from Babylon formerly did to Hezekiah: solely taken up with the light of Heaven manifested to them, they have no eyes for any earthly object; feeling to the truth alone which has enlightened them, every thing else is an object of indifference, or a burden to them; and their heart, viewing all things in their proper light, no longer acknowledges either delight, interest, or consolation to be found in any thing but the truth.
On our part, my brethren, the first rays of truth which the goodness of God shed on our heart, probably excited a sensible delight.
