John the Evangelist, who is praised for his charity, once induced his mother to use political influence, and on another occasion, when the city of the Samaritans rejected our Lord, he and his brother, James, asked our Lord to rain down fire from the heaven and destroy the city. This was not charity. In fact, there must have been a tendency to hate in John, for not without aptness did his master call him who wanted to send down lightening, a Son of Thunder. But some time or other in John's life, he seized upon the weak spot in his character, namely, want of kindness to fellow man, and through cooperation with grace, he became the great apostle of charity.

The Temptations of the saints were for them opportunities of self-discovery. They revealed the breaches in the fortress of their souls that needed to be fortified, until they became the strongest points. This explains the curious fact about many saintly people, that they often become the opposite of what they seemed to be. When we hear of the holiness of certain souls, our first reaction is: "I knew him when...." Between the "then" and the "now" has intervened a battle, in which selfishness lost and faith won.