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love, is called by St. John " a consuming fire "; the Holy Ghost came in tongues of fire; and we often beg Him to enkindle in us the fire of divine love. Christ came to cast fire on the earth, and He shows us how, in the two disciples of Emmaus who exclaimed: "Were not our hearts burning within us whilst He expounded the Scriptures! " A good heart is heat not only to the dead but also to the sinfrozen, thawing out the Lord's vineyard and starting up the fonts of human sympathy. Its tendency, like fire, is ever upwards, drawing all things with it. Human nature clings to the earth like the mists before the dawn, but when the incarnate love of the Son of Justice rises, shines on them and is exalted from the earth, He draws all to Himself. This explains the wondrous constancy of the early saints and martyrs, whose onward march after Christ was as invincible as a mighty conflagration. This explains that fire that so filled the heart of St. Francis of Assisi that it burst through his hands and feet and side. This explains the patience of all good Christians under cold and hunger and privations, because they have the heat of the love of Christ in their hearts. For, mind you, love and fire differ in this that whereas fire is fomented by oil and extinguished by water, love on the contrary is diminished by oil, that is, luxury, and augmented by water, that is, privation, according to the Psalmist: "Many waters could not extinguish charity." And as fire separates the rust from the metal, so love removes sin from the sinner and the just from the wicked, according to Christ's words: