It may strike some person as a very strange thing that this illustrious convert and great saint, as he really was and appeared to be, should be shut up in a poor hamlet whose name does not appear even on railway maps, and not located in some resort of pride and fashion. But the Honourable and Reverend George Spencer had seen enough of fashion and gentility to be thoroughly disgusted with both the one and the other. He understood no way of going to heaven except that which Our Lord pointed out to us and went Himself first for us to follow, the way of the cross in poverty and humility. Hence he applied to Bishop Walsh for the poorest and worst mission in the diocese. If one will not be inclined to give this good Bishop credit for forwarding the apostolical intentions of his young priest, let him know that there might be also a more inferior motive why he should accede to his request. Priests with private incomes can better subsist in poor missions than those who depend on the charity of their flocks; and we find at present that many, who have property of their own, are appointed, notwithstanding the honourable and creditable prefixes to their names, to missions which are not able to support a priest from their internal resources. These two reasons put together will account for the placing of the Hon. and Rev. George Spencer in the mission of West Bromwich. St. Thomas defines zeal, "an intense love by which one is moved against and repels whatever is detrimental to the good of his friend, and does his best to prevent whatever is against the honour or the will of God." Alphonsus Rodrigues says: "It is the love of God on fire, and a vehement desire that He should be loved, honoured, and adored by all; and so intense is it, that he who burns therewith tries to communicate its heat to every one." This effect of zeal is the special gleam by which the shining of great saints can be distinguished from ordinary servants of God. They are filled with the love of God, they overflow with it, and dash off floods that sweep down vice and sin by their impetuosity. When obstacles occur to show that the time is not opportune, or that the sluices should not yet be drawn, the saints are far from languishing into ordinary ways. No; the springs are open afresh, their hearts are filling the more {228} they are pent up, and seek avenues on every side and in every way in which they may possibly allow some heavenly water to escape. Such was the zeal of St. Chrysostom, who would be blind if his audience could but see. Such was the love of St. Francis Xavier, who went through unknown and almost inaccessible regions to convert the heathen. Such was the love of St. Teresa, who sighed that she was not a man, because her sex and state forbade her to be an apostle. Such was the Psalmist, when he said, "The zeal of Thy house has eaten me up."