Going out about the third hour, he saw others standing in the market-place idle. And he said to them: Go you also into my vineyard and I will give you what shall be just. Matthew 20:3.
In these words we may notice four things:
3. The necessity of working in the vineyard of the Lord. Go you also into my vineyard. The vineyard into which the men are sent to work is the life of goodness, in which there are as many trees as there are virtues. We are to work in this vineyard in five ways : Planting in it good works and virtues ; rooting up and destroying the thorns, that is, our vices ; cutting down the superfluous branches, Every branch in me, that beareth fruit, he will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit (John xv. 2) ; keeping off the little foxes, that is, the devils ; and guarding it from the thieves, that is, keeping ourselves indifferent to the praise and the blame of mankind.
4. The usefulness of labour. The wage of those who labour in the vineyard is a penny that outvalues thousands of silver crowns. And this is what we are told in Holy Scripture, The peaceable had a vineyard, every man bringeth for the fruit thereof a thousandpieces of silver (Cant. viii. 1 1). The thousand crowns are the thousand joys of eternity, and these are signified by the penny.
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