brightness if you yourselves are leading strict lives, and thus are preparing to convert the whole world. Show forth, therefore, a life worthy of grace, that, as the truth is preached everywhere, so your life may harmonise with it. And, again, He holds out another advantage besides the salvation of men, which is capable of firing them with courage and making all zealous. Not only will you reform the world, He says, by living upright lives, but you will also prepare the glory of God; just as by the contrary course you destroy men, and cause the name of God to be blasphemed. ‘And how,’ you ask, ‘is God to be glorified through us if men are to slander us?’ Not all men are to do this; but those who do so hypocritically will wonder and admire you in secret, just as outward flatterers of those who are living in wickedness despise them in their own minds. ‘How, then, would you have us live for show and vainglory? No, indeed, I said nothing of the kind. I did not say, Make haste to bring forth your good deeds before men; nor did I say, Point them out; but, _Let your light shine_; that is, let your virtue be solid, and the fire plentiful, and the light undimmed.’ Whenever virtue is thus great, it cannot possibly be hidden, even if he who pursues it conceal it in a thousand ways. Show forth a spotless life and let them have no real ground of accusation, and then, even if accusers be numbered by hundreds, no man shall have power to overcloud you. And His expression, _the light_, was pertinent. For nothing distinguishes a man so much, even if he wish to be hidden a thousand times over, as an example of goodness. Just as physical light envelops a man, so does he shine forth with greater brightness, not letting his rays sink into the earth, but directing them beyond heaven itself. So He encourages them the more. ‘If,’ He says, ‘you are grieved at being reviled, many men through you will be in admiration of God.’ He lays both wages to your account—God’s glorification through you, and your being blasphemed for God’s sake. In order, therefore, that we should not give heed to evil speaking, knowing that it procures us a reward, He did not simply mention the thing itself, but made two distinctions—that of calumny and that of calumny for God’s sake; and He shows, moreover, that patience under it bears much fruit, by referring the glory back to God; and He holds out pleasant hopes to them. The accusation of the wicked, He says, is in nothing so powerful as in helping others to see your light. When you act foolishly, then only it is that they will trample you down, not when, doing what is right, you are cast aside. Then many will be in astonishment, not at you alone, but, through you, at our common Father. He said the Father, not God, laying already the seeds of the spiritual birth which He was to give them. Then, showing His equality with the Father, He said higher up, ‘Grieve not for evil report; for it is sufficient for you that it is on My account’.