In fact Christ’s private life was not distinguished from the common lives of men by unusual bodily hardships. Millions of men and women in our day, and in civilized lands, toil harder and enjoy fewer material comforts than did the Holy Family. See how hard is the lot of vast numbers of our laboring classes. See them going to their work at early morning, carrying their cold lunches in their baskets, their only support for the toils of the day. Their labor is fatiguing and protracted, often quite exhausting, as is manifested by the bent forms and wasted frames of so many of them. All day they hear rebukes, harsh and gross language; and with their best efforts very many can scarcely earn enough to keep up their strength. And when they return at night, exhausted and begrimed with dirt, they have no comfortable cottage to rest their wearied limbs; only some room in a tenement house, or in a garret or cellar, crowded together with their wives and children, amidst a rude and often vicious crowd of associates. Compared to their life that of the Holy Family was one of decent comfort. II _What then made the life of Christ so very holy and so very meritorious? Especially two qualities._ 1. Of course His Divine Person gave infinite merit to every act performed by Him in His human nature. Now it is a great consolation for us to remember that, by the gracious dispensation of the Lord, we too are children of God, adopted brothers of Christ, as long as we live in the state of grace; and, by the aid of the Holy spirit, who is diffused in our hearts, we can make our acts worthy of supernatural reward. And all this merit keeps on accumulating throughout our conscious life, unless it be lost by mortal sin. Our principal fear ought ever to be lest we thus foolishly lose it, and our bitterest regret if we have done so. 2. The second source of holiness in Christ was _the perfection of his intention_, ever aiming purely at the glory of His Heavenly Father. This also we can and we ought to imitate, with the help of grace offered us for this purpose. Here lies in fact the principal means of improving our resemblance to Christ. And we can do so constantly, even in our commonest actions, as the Apostle teaches us saying: “Whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God” (I Cor. x, 31).