_POINT II._ Consider the example set us by the Son of God to accomplish this purpose: 1. He left His Blessed Mother, and we do not read that He ever returned to her home. This ought to encourage us to make similar sacrifices. 2. He so humbled Himself as to be baptized among sinners; and, to call down the blessings of Heaven upon His sacred ministry, He spent forty days in fasting and prayer. By all this He taught us that the supernatural work of saving souls is to be accomplished by the supernatural means of humiliations and penance and prayer; mere eloquence and logic are not sufficient. 3. He endured many privations. For during those three years He and His Apostles had not the comforts of a home: “The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air nests, but the son of man hath not where to lay his head” (St. Matth. viii, 20). They often spent the night in the open air, for instance in the Garden of Olives. They had no regular supply of food, and must often have endured bitter hunger. St. Matthew narrates an instance: “At that time Jesus went through the corn on the Sabbath; and His disciples being hungry began to pluck the ears and to eat them” (xii, 1). He travelled and taught the people all day and received visitors during the night, like Nicodemus and Joseph of Arithmathea, who were His disciples secretly for fear of the Jews. The history of the Saints is full of similar hardships; for they had learned to follow His example. Am I a worthy follower of my King? Do I make generous sacrifices in His service? Frequently the salvation or the loss of a soul depends on the zeal of a priest or religious. Neglect in this matter is often irreparable. _POINT III._ During His public life Jesus also gave us the example of earnest prayer, in which He would at times spend the entire night. St. Luke writes: “He (Jesus) went out into a mountain to pray, and he passed the whole night in the prayer of God” (vi, 12). He did not need to pray for His own sake, but He wished to show us by His example the necessity of fervent prayer for those employed in the active duty of saving souls. They need it for themselves and for the good of others. For themselves, because the sacred ministry is full of dangers; it is like striving to save drowning men, in which task those who lend assistance often perish themselves. Sad experience teaches that many priests, employed in constant labors, neglect their own souls, and come to a miserable fall. And as far as the neighbor is concerned, it is the man of prayer, the man of God, that does the work of God, and not the priest of a worldly mind who neglects his prayer. With what devotion do I offer the holy sacrifice of the Mass? receive Holy Communion? make my meditation? recite the Divine Office? The annual retreat is the time to consider all these things and to provide for improvements. _Colloquy_ with our Dear Lord, praying for an increase of fervor in prayer, of zeal for souls, of generosity in the labors of the ministry.