desirest to retain Him Who came down from Heaven to seek thee?"
Let not, then, the sinner be afraid, provided he will be no more a sinner, but will love Jesus Christ; let him not be dismayed, but have a full trust; if he abhor sin, and seek after God, let him not be sad, but full of joy: Let the heart of them rejoice that seek the Lord. [Ps. 104:3] The Lord has sworn to forget all injuries done to Him, if the sinner is sorry for them: If the wicked do penance ... I will not remember all his iniquities. [Ezech. 18:21] And that we might have every motive for confidence, our Saviour became an Infant: Who is afraid to approach a child?" asks the same St. Thomas of Villanova.
"Children do not inspire terror or aversion, but attachment and love," says St. Peter Chrysologus. It seems that children know not how to be angry; and if perchance at odd times they should be irritated, they are easily soothed; one has only to give them a fruit, a flower, or bestow on them a caress, or utter a kind word to them, and they have already forgiven and forgotten very offence.
A tear of repentance, one act of heart-felt contrition, is enough to appease the Infant Jesus. "You know the tempers of children," pursues St. Thomas of Villanova; "a single tear pacifies them, the offence is forgotten. Approach, then, to Him while He is a little One, while He would seem to have forgotten His majesty." He has
