The Lord Jesus returned, therefore, from the Temple and from Jerusalem with His parents to the city of Nazareth, and was subject unto them, and dwelt with them from that date to the beginning of His thirtieth year. Nor is there anything in Holy Scripture recorded of His doings during the whole of that time, which is in itself very wonderful. What, then, shall call out our admiration in Him, or what shall we conceive that He did during that period ? Did the Lord Jesus remain idle for so long a time, so that nothing was done worthy of record in Scripture? But if He performed actions, why are they not related as His other deeds are? It seems very remarkable. But particularly notice this, that His doing nothing wonderful was itself a wonder. For nothing which concerns His life is devoid of mystery ; and, as there was virtue in His actions, so was there in His silence, in His inaction, and in His retirement. Thus this Sovereign Master, who was about to teach all virtues and the path of life, began from His youth to practise virtues, but in a wondrous, hidden, and till then unheard-of way; namely, by making Himself appear in the eyes of men, useless, contemptible, and simple, as we may devoutly conceive, without any risk of presumption. But in these meditations I do not wish to affirm anything which may not be proved by the authority ot Holy Scripture, or of the Doctors of the Church, as I said in the beginning.
Christ, then, withdrew Himself from the companionship and conversation of men. He went, we may be sure, to the synagogue, which was then the Church. He stayed a long time there in prayer, having taken the lowest place. Then He would return home and remain with His mother, and sometimes help His foster-father. He would pass through the crowd, going and returning, as if He did not see any one. All marvelled that so fair a youth should achieve nothing worthy of renown. For they expected that He would do great deeds, and become a noted man. For, while a boy, “He increased in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man .” 1 But as He grew up, and reached from His twelfth to His thirtieth year, He nevertheless did no work worthy of renown, or which bore the appearance of manly worth, and therefore, being greatly disappointed, they might have laughed at Him, saying, “He is an useless fellow ; He is an idiot, nothing of a man, a fool, a stupid creature.” Neither did He give Himself to any learning, so that it is said to have been a proverbial remark that He was, though grown, still a child. And He persisted so long in this way of living, and so clung to it, that He was commonly regarded by all as a person of no account, and beneath their notice ; which the prophet had well declared long before in his person, “lama worm, and no man,” 2 eta
You see, then, what Christ did, in doing nothing. He rendered Himself mean and contemptible to all, as I have said. But does this appear of small moment to you ? Such a line of conduct was not necessary to Him, but it is to me. Certainly, in all which we do I know nothing which presents greater difficulties. He seems to me to have reached the very highest state, who has advanced so far as to have overcome and brought into subjection his own mind and the proud arrogance of his flesh, choosing not to be considered v 1 S. Luke ii. 52. * Ps. xxii. 6. of any account, but rather to be despised as one insignificant and vile. Greater is this, according to Solomon, than the conquest of cities. “The patient man is better than the mighty, and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city.” 1 Until you reach this point, do not think that you have done anything. For, seeing that we are truly unprofitable servants, even when we have done all, according to the words of our Lord 3 till we attain to this degree of abjection, we do not abide in truth, but in vanity, and walk therein. This also the Apostle plainly declares when he says, “If any man think himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceiveth himself.” a If, then, you inquire why the Lord Jesus acted thus, I answer you, that it was not necessary for His own sake, but for our instruction. Therefore, if we do not learn to do the same, we are inexcusable. Abominable indeed is it if the worm, and he who is soon to be the food of worms, exalt himself 3 when the Lord of Majesty, humbling Himself, descended so low.
But if any one should deem it incredulous that our Lord should have lived so long uselessly, and be rather disposed to attribute deficiency to the narrative of the Evangelists, it can be replied that, to offer practically an example of such great virtue was, far from being useless, a most useful expenditure of time, and the true and stable foundation of all virtues. And from our Lord Himself we have the words recorded, in the Gospel of S. John, “When the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the Spirit of truth, which proceedeth from the Father, He shall testify of Me 3 and ye also shall bear witness, because ye have been with Me from the beginning” 8 (that is, as preachers). And Peter, at the election of S. Matthias the Apostle, says, “Of these men, which have companied with us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us, beginning from the baptism of John,”1 etc. But then Jesus “began to be about thirty years of age .”2 If the Lord Jesus had begun to preach before him, John would not have been His forerunner. And, moreover, if He commenced His ministry sooner, how came it to pass that He was not known to His neighbours after so many years, so that they asked, “Is not this the carpenter’s Son ?”3 whilst, after He had but a short time come forth, He was called, even by His companions, the Son of David? If, then, He had commenced His ministry sooner, or had done any remarkable actions, they would have been recorded, or at least some of them, nor would all the Evangelists be wholly silent about them. This also accords with the opinion of S. Bernard, as you will see in the following chapter, and has the support of his authority. But whatever may be the truth on this subject, I cannot but think it affords matter for devout meditation. Thus did the Lord Jesus form the sword of lowliness, by this manner of life, as by the prophet it was said to Him, “Gird Thee with Thy sword upon Thy thigh, O Thou most mighty .”4 With no more fitting sword, forsooth, than that of lowliness, did it become Him to slay the proud adversary. For we do not read that He ever employed the sword of His greatness, but rather the contrary one, even at a time when it was most needed — the time of His Passion. The same prophet complains to God the Father in behalf of His Son, saying, “Thou hast taken away the edge of His sword ; and givest Him not victory in the battle.”5 You observe, then, how the Lord Jesus “began first to do, then to teach;” for He was soon to say, “Learn of Me, for I am meek and lowly in heart”6 It was this which He first would practise, and that unfeignedly, doing it from the heart, for He was truly and from the heart lowly and meek. There could be no dissimulation in Him ; but He rather abased Himself more and more deeply in lowliness, vileness, and abjection ; yea, made Himself of no account in the sight of all men, so that even after that He began to preach and to reveal high and divine truths, and also to do actual miracles and mighty works, they still held Him in no reputation, but vilified and derided Him, saying, “Who is this ? Is not this the carpenter’s Son ?”7 and used similar derisive and reproachful expressions. In this sense were indeed verified the words of the Apostle, when he said of our Lord, “He emptied Himself, and took upon Him the form of a servant ;”8 and not only of a servant, by His Incarnation, but of a seemingly unprofitable servant by His lowly and abject mode of life.