devil, than by charitable mercifulness either to come unto Christ, or to suffer Christ to come unto them[1]?" God forbid! Let us rather lift up our hearts and eyes to Him who has gone before us, and as "our forerunner is entered in for us within the veil;" and then surely we shall have neither thought nor sight for the paltry treasures of this fleeting world. For when He calls us to deny ourselves for our brethren, when He bids us take up the cross, and forsake the world, He but bids us follow in His own steps, and go where He has gone before us. "It is reported in the Bohemian story, that St. Winceslaus, their king, one winter night going to his devotions in a remote church, barefooted in the snow, and sharpness of unequal and pointed ice, his servant, who waited upon his master's piety, and endeavoured to imitate his affections, began to faint through the violence of the snow and cold; till the king commanded him to follow him, and set his feet in the same footsteps which his feet should mark for him. The servant did so, and either fancied a cure or found one, for he followed his prince; helped forward, with shame and zeal to his imitation, and by the forming footsteps for him in the snow. In the same manner does the blessed Jesus; for since our way is troublesome, obscure, full of objection and danger, apt to be
- ↑ Homily of Alms-Deeds. Part III.
