and God is not vengeance; but, apparently, the Lord would not give the
word a place in his announcement of his mission: his hearers would not
recognize it as a form of the Father's love, but as vengeance on their
enemies, not vengeance on the selfishness of those who would not be
their brother's keeper.

He had not begun with Nazareth, neither with Galilee. 'A prophet has no
honour in his own country,' he said, and began to teach where it was
more likely he would be heard. It is true that he wrought his first
miracle in Cana, but that was at his mother's request, not of his own
intent, and he did not begin his teaching there. He went first to
Jerusalem, there cast out the buyers and sellers from the temple, and
did other notable things alluded to by St John; then went back to
Galilee, where, having seen the things he did in Jerusalem, his former
neighbours were now prepared to listen to him. Of these the Nazarenes,
to whom the sight of him was more familiar, retained the most prejudice
against him: he belonged to their very city! they had known him from a
child!--and low indeed are they in whom familiarity with the high and
true breeds contempt! they are judged already. Yet such was the fame of
the new prophet, that even they were willing to hear in the synagogue
what he had to say to them--thence to determine for themselves what
claim he had to an honourable reception. But the eye of their judgment
was not single, therefore was their body full of darkness. Should
Nazareth indeed prove, to their self-glorifying satisfaction, the city
of the great Prophet, they were more than ready to grasp at the renown
of having produced him: he was indeed the great Prophet, and within a
few minutes they would have slain him for the honour of Israel. In the
ignoble even the love of their country partakes largely of the ignoble.

There was a shadow of the hateless vengeance of God in the expulsion of