Page:Ninety-nine homilies of S. Thomas Aquinas upon the epistles and gospels for forty-nine Sundays of the Christian year (IA ninetyninehomili00thom).pdf/153

 is its sweetness: “My brethren, count it all joy when ye fall into divers temptations ; knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience. But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing,” S. James i. 2-4.

Three points are characteristically noticed in this Gospel. Firstly, the number of the sinners, “ ten men.” Secondly, the remedy for their healing, “ there met Him.” Thirdly, the remedies which are necessary to those who are cured of sin, “ one of them when he saw that he was healed.” To consider, now, the difference and number of the sinners it is to be noted that the ten lepers may signify ten kinds of sins. (1) The first leper is an infidel and a heretic who is separated from the society of the faithful and the holy: “ The Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Command the children of Israel, that they put out of the camp every leper .... and the children of Israel did so, and put them without the camp,” &c., Num. v. 24. (2) The second leper is a blasphemer and detractor: “ And Miriam and Aaron spake against Moses because of the Ethiopian woman whom he had married .... and they said, Hath the Lord spoken only by Moses ? Hath He not also spoken by us ? And the Lord heard it.Wherefore, then, were ye not afraid to speak against My servant Moses? .... And Aaron looked upon Miriam, and behold she was leprous,” Num. xii. 1, 2, 8, 10. (3) The third leper is gluttonous, who taints the air with fetid exhalations, proceeding from excessive repletion: “ He is a leprous man, he is unclean. . . . . He shall put a covering upon his upper lip, and shall cry, Unclean, unclean,” Levit. xiii. 44, 45. (4) The