loose. These things were done in Bethania (22) beyond the Jordan, where John was baptizing."

"Next day John saw Jesus coming to him, and he saith: Behold the Lamb of God (23), behold him who taketh away the sin of the world. This is he of whom I said: After me there cometh a man who is preferred before me, because he was before me; and I knew him not, but that he may be made manifest in Israel, therefore am I come baptizing with water. And John gave testimony, saying: I saw the Spirit coming down as a dove from heaven, and he remained upon him. I knew him not," this he said to remove any idea of collusion; "but he who sent me to baptize with water said to me: He upon whom thou shalt see the Spirit descending and remaining upon him, he it is that baptizeth with the Holy Ghost (24).. I saw, and I gave testimony that this is the Son of God.

"The next day John and two of his disciples stood, and beholding Jesus walking, he saith: Behold the Lamb of God. And the two disciples heard him speak, and they followed Jesus (25): Jesus turning, and seeing them following him, saith to them: What seek you (26)? They said to him, Rabbi (which is interpreted master), where dwellest thou? Come, he saith to them, and see. They

(22) Different from another Bethania a short distance from Jerusalem, where Lazarus resided with his two sisters, Mary and Martha.

(23) Lamb by his meekness: Lamb of God, because the victim God gives to us, andthe only one he will accept for the remission or the expiation of sins.

(24) The Holy Ghost did not visibly descend upon Jesus Christ until after he had received baptism. John, who refused, through humility, to baptize him, therefore knew him previously by revelation; yet he does not speak of this revelation which might be contested, and he merely alleges the descent of the dove, which was the sign that God had given to himself, that thoroughly assured him of the truth thus revealed to him; a truth made so strikingly sensible, having had as many witnesses as there were men actually present, who had come to receive John's baptism.

(25) Jesus was condescending enough to be indebted for his first disciples to his precursor, whose testimony was, as it were, at once the supplement of our Saviour's miracles. This was to honor the ministry of John, for thenceforth Jesus Christ no longer required that ministry, and he made this be well understood, when at the same time he attached Philip to his person by these sole words, follow me.

(26) Jesus doth not interrogate to get instruction upon a point unknown to him, but to accommodate himself to our manner of conversing, and to give those whom he interrogates the occasion of saying what was opportune for them to say. This remark is applicable in all cases similar to the present.

came, and saw where he abode (27). It was about the tenth hour that day" (which corresponds with our four o'clock in the afternoon). "Andrew the brother of Simon Peter was one of the two who had heard of John, and followed Jesus. He findeth first his brother Simon, and saith to him: We have found the Messias (which is interpreted the Christ). He brought him to Jesus. Jesus looking upon him, said: Thou art Simon the son of Jona; thou shalt be called Cephas, which is interpreted Peter.

"On the following day Jesus would go forth into Galilee: he findeth Philip, and saith to him: Follow me. Philip was of Bethsaida, the city of Andrew and Peter: he findeth Nathaniel, and saith: We have found him of whom Moses in the law and the prophets did write; Jesus the son of Joseph of Nazareth. Nathaniel said to him: Can any thing of good come from Nazareth (28)? Come and see, saith Philip to him. Jesus saw Nathaniel coming to him, and saith of him: Behold an Israelite indeed, in whom there is no guile. Whence knowest thou me? saith Nathaniel to him." Perhaps he knew me by the report of Philip, was apparently the current of Nathaniel's thoughts; for "Jesus answered him: I saw thee when thou wast under the fig-tree, before that Philip called thee. Rabbi, replied Nathaniel to him, thou art the Son of God, thou art the King of Israel. Jesus answered him: Because I saw thee under the fig-tree, thou believest. Greater things than these shalt thou see. And he added: Amen, amen, I say to you: you shall see the heaven opened upon the Son of man (29), and the angels of God ascending and descending (30)."

(27) Jesus Christ had a retreat in the neighborhood, but he had no house which was his own; he could, therefore, say with truth: The Son of man hath not where to rest his head.

(28) Not merely on account of the smallness of the place, but also on account of the bad character of its inhabitants, which bordered on brutality, as appears by their treatment of Jesus Christ.

(29) The Son of man properly signified man, or the posterity of Adam. This expression has no other meaning in all the texts of Scripture wherein it is employed, and it would be useless to seek any other meaning for it when uttered by Jesus Christ.

(30) 'Tis hard to find out in Scripture the accomplishment of this magnificent promise, but 'tis enough to know that all is not written.

CHAPTER VI.

MARRIAGE OF CANA. SOJOURN AT CAPHARNAUM.-SECOND VOCATION OF PETER AND OF ANDREW, FOLLOWED BY THAT OF JAMES AND JOHN.-JOURNEY TO JERU SALEM FOR THE FEAST OF THE PASSOVER. SELLERS DRIVEN FROM THE TEMPLE.

(a) "THE third day after there was a marriage in Cana of Galilee, and the mother of Jesus was there (1)." Jesus, who had spent these three days coming from the shores of the Jordan, "was invited to the marriage with his disciples. The wine failing, the mother of Jesus saith to him: They have no wine. Jesus saith to her: Woman, what is that to me and to thee (2)? my hour is not yet come (3). His mother saith to the waiters: Do ye whatsoever he shall say to you. Now there were set there six water-pots of stone, according to the manner of the purifying of the Jews, containing two or three measures apiece. Jesus saith to them: Fill the water-pots with water; and they filled them up to the brim. Jesus added: Draw out

(a) St. John, ii. 1–12.

(1) Saint Joseph is no longer mentioned. The common opinion is, that he had died before Jesus Christ commenced his evangelical life; and the remark has been very judiciously made, that it was highly proper he should be no longer of this world. For, since Jesus Christ must frequently have to speak of his father as of a person living, the Jews would not have failed to refer to Joseph every thing he should say on the subject, and to substitute him in the place of the eternal Father-a perplexing ambiguity, which would extend to all the discourses of Jesus, and could not fail to confuse all the ideas of the Jews.

(2) Jesus Christ wishes to teach that he should not work miracles, from considerations of flesh and blood; I say he wishes to teach that truth, not to Mary, who was not ignorant of this, but to his disciples, to whom he was one day to communicate the power of working miracles, and perhaps to his brethren, that is to say, his kindred, who, seeing such power in the hands of a man whom they called their relative and their brother, might think he could dispose of it as family property.

Still he anticipated the time in

If the answer seems severe, an air and a tone which con

(3) The time when he had resolved to work miracles. consideration of Mary, and the exception confirms the rule. the act is obliging; perhaps, too, this answer was made with siderably softened down what appears to us rather blunt. Certain it is, that Mary, after having heard this, had no hesitation in believing that her prayer had been heard, since she said directly to the waiters: Do ye whatsoever he shall say to you.

now, and carry to the chief steward of the feast, and they carried it. When the chief steward had tasted the water made wine, and knew not whence it was (but the waiter knew who had drawn the water), he calleth the bridegroom, and saith to him: Every man at first setteth forth good wine; and when men have well drunk, then that which is worse; but thou hast kept the good wine until now. Jesus did this beginning of miracles in Cana of Galilee. He thus mani- . fested his glory, and his disciples believed in him (4). After this he and his mother, his brethren, and his disciples went down to Capharnaum; they remained there not many days."

This town was subsequently his usual dwelling-place, and, as it were, the centre of his missions. Capharnaum was a very opulent city, and thickly inhabited. It was situate upon the confines of the tribes of Zabulon and Nephthalim, at the influx of the Jordan into the sea of Galilee or of Tiberias. His coming there, and the great light which thence sprung up (Isaias ix.), fulfilled that which was said by Isaias the Prophet: (a) "The land of Zabulon and land of Nephthalim, the way of the sea beyond the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles (5). The people that sat in darkness hath seen great light; and to them that sat in the region of the shadow of death, light is sprung up." This light was announced by that truth which must ever be first presented to the eyes of sinful men, the necessity of penance, which Jesus began to preach and to say, like his precursor: (b) "The time is accomplished; the kingdom of God is at hand: repent, and believe the Gospel." This is the discourse which an Evangelist terms preaching "the Gospel of the Kingdom of God." Meantime Jesus, who was never more to cease preaching it until his death, began to seek his co-operators, and quickly found them. His disciples, who as yet were not inseparably attached to him, had left him, to return to their work. He attached them more closely to his person in the manner we are now going to state, by blending, on ac(a) St. Matthew, iv. 14-17. (b) St. Mark, i. 15.

(4) That is to say, they were confirmed in the faith they had in him; for they must have already believed, since they became his disciples.

(5) So called on account of the vicinity of the Gentiles, perhaps also on account of the amalgamation of these people with the tribes of Aser, of Zabulon, and of Nephthalim.

count of the similarity of facts, two things which some separate and others unite. It cannot well be decided whether in point of fact there were two different vocations, or whether there was but one single vocation, recorded by the sacred authors, with different circumstances, some of which are not recounted by the two other Evangelists.

(a) "Jesus passing by the sea of Galilee, saw Simon and Andrew his brother casting nets into the sea (for they were fishermen), and he said to them: Come after me, and I will make you to become fishers of men. Going on from thence a little farther, he saw James the son of Zebedee, and John his brother, who also were in the ship mending their nets, and forthwith he called them. (b) It came to pass that multitudes to hear the word of God, pressed upon him when he stood by the sea. He saw two ships standing; the fishermen were gone out of them, and were washing their nets." In order to join this circumstance with the preceding one, we must suppose these fishermen (whom Jesus had just called), after alighting from their ships, were still washing their nets either from habit or for the service of those who were afterwards to use them. "Jesus going into one of the ships that was Simon's, desired him to draw back a little from the land; and sitting, he taught the multitudes out of the ship (6). When he had ceased to speak, he said to Simon: Launch out into the deep, and let down your nets for a draught. Master, said Simon to him, we have labored all the night, and have taken nothing: but at thy word I will let down the net. When they had done this, they enclosed a very great multitude of fishes, and their net broke (7), and they beckoned to their partners, (a) St. Mark, i. 16, 17, 19.

(b) St. Luke, v. 1-11.

(6) The Ship of the Church which the Lord ascends is no other than that one of which Peter was established the pilot, when the Lord said to him: Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I shall build my Church.—Ambr. Serm. ii.

(7) This miraculous fishing is the figure, or rather the prophetic history, of what was to happen to the Church. The prophets had labored almost without any fruit under the Old Law, which was a state of shade and obscurity. At last the great day of grace having appeared, Peter, on the word of Jesus Christ, casts the net of the Gospel. All nations enter there in throngs: both ships, that is to say, the two Churches of the East and West, are filled. This gathering occasions the rupture of the net, whose integrity marks