gelical trumpet, that which St. John, filled with the Holy Ghost, thundered out, is true,-'In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. All things were made by him, and without him nothing was 'made.' And what the same Preacher adds, is likewise true : The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us; and we have seen his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father.' In both natures, therefore, is one and the same Son of God, who, whilst he assumes our nature, does not lose his own; and who, whilst he renews man in man, perseveres unchangeable in himself. For the Godhead, which he possesses in common with the Father, suffered no disparagement of his omnipotence, nor did the form of a servant alter the form of God. For the supreme and everlasting essence, which has stooped down to the salvation of mankind, has indeed transferred us into his glory, but has not ceased to be what it was. Hence, when the only begotten of the Father acknowledged himself to be less than the Father, to whom also he declares himself to be equal, he shews the truth of both forms in himself; in so much that the inequality in him shews his human, and the equality his divine nature. The corporeal birth, therefore, detracted nothing from the majesty of the Son of God, and added nothing to it, because an incomprehensible substance can neither be lessened nor increased. For, when we say, that the Word was made flesh, we do not mean to signify that the Divine nature has been changed into flesh, but that the flesh has been taken up into the unity of person, by which flesh, no doubt, the whole man is understood, with whom,

within the womb of a Virgin, which was made fruitful by the Holy Ghost, and which was never to be deprived of its Virginity, the Son of God is so inseparably united, that he, who was before all times begotten of the essence of the Father, is one and the same who is begotten in time from the womb of a virgin. For we could not possibly be loosened otherwise from the fetters of eternal death, unless he had debased himself in our nature, who remained omnipotent in his own."

Extract from the Epistle of St. Leo the Great to St. Flavian, Bishop of Constantinople, on the mystery of the Incarnation, against the impiety of Eutyches:

"Leo, Bishop, to his most beloved brother, Flavian, Bishop of Constantinople.

"The Son of God, therefore, enters into this low world, coming down from his heavenly throne, but not departing from the glory of the Father, begotten after a new order, a new birth. After a new order, because being invisible in his own essence, he was made visible in our nature. He that cannot be contained, would be contained: he that existed before all times, began to exist in time. The Lord of the Universe, overshadowing the immensity of his Majesty, took the form of a servant. The impassible God did not disdain to be a passible man, and the immortal to be subject to the laws of death. But begotten by a new birth, because the undefiled virginity furnished, indeed, the matter for the body, The nature, but was an utter stranger to concupiscence.

therefore, was taken from the Mother of the Lord, but not the guilt; neither is this nature in the Lord Jesus Christ, born of the womb of a Virgin, different from ours, because his birth is wonderful; for he who is true God, the same is true man. And there is no fiction in this unity, since the lowness of man and the sublimity of the Godhead are united together; for, as God is not altered by mercy, so man is not consumed by dignity; for each form acts in communion with that other which is proper to it, that is to say, the Word works what belongs to the Word, and the flesh executes what belongs to the flesh. One of these natures flashes with miracles, whilst the other is smarting under injuries. And as the Word did not recede from an equality with the Father's glory, so neither did the flesh abandon the nature of our race. For one and the same is (what must be often said) truly the Son of God and truly the Son of Man: God, because in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God'; Man, because the word was made flesh and dwelt amongst us';—God, because all things were made by him, and without him nothing was made'; Man, because born of a woman, made under the law; the birth of the flesh is the manifestation of the human nature; the bringing forth of a Virgin is the indication of Divine power. The infancy of a little one is shown by the lowness of the cradle; the greatness of the Most High is declared by the concert of Angels. He whom ungodly Herod seeks to kill, is like to other men as to his first beginnings, but he is the Lord of all, whom the wise men adore with joy on their knees. When he came to

the baptism of John, his precursor, in order that that which was covered under the veil of the flesh, may not be hidden, the voice of the Father, thundering forth from the heavens, said, 'This is my Beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased.' Whom, therefore, the craftiness of the devil tempted as man, to the same as to God the angels minister. To hunger, to thirst, to be fatigued, manifestly belong to human nature; but to feed five thousand men with five loaves of bread, to give to the Samaritan woman living water, the effect of which is to cause her who has drunk of it not to thirst any longer, to walk on the surface of the sea without sinking, and to awe the swelling of the waves in rebuking the tempest, is unquestionably Divine. As, therefore, (to pass over in silence many other instances,) it does not belong to the same nature, to weep from a feeling of commiseration over a departed friend, and to restore the same to life at the command of his voice after having been buried for full four days, or to hang on the cross, and, by turning the day into night, cause all the elements to tremble, or to be pierced with nails, and to open the gates of Paradise to the 'faith of the thief'; so likewise does it not belong to the same nature to say, 'I and the Father are one,' and to say, 'The Father is greater than I.' For although in the Lord Jesus Christ there is but one person of both God and man, another, however, is the nature from which contumely is common to both, and another, the nature from which glory is common to each. From our nature it comes that his humanity is less than the Father; from the Father he has it that his divinity is equal to the Father."

St. Irenæus says (Lib. iii. adv. hæres. cap. vii.), “Neither, "therefore, the Lord, nor the Holy Ghost, nor the Apostles, "would ever have called him (Jesus Christ) God, unless he

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were true God. Neither would they have called any one personally Lord, unless him who is Lord of all things, God "the Father and his Son. As therefore the Father is truly

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'Lord, and the Son is truly Lord, it is with reason that the

Holy Ghost has designated them by the appellation of "Lord."

The whole book of Tertullian against Praxeas is nothing less than a professed vindication of the mystery of the Trinity, and of the distinction of the Three Divine Persons, as is most evident to any one who will give himself but the trouble to peruse this book. Tertullian, against Praxeas, says (c. viii.): "The Word, therefore, is always in the Father, as he himself says, I and the Father; and with God always, according to what is written, And the Word was with God; and at no time separated from the Father, for, I and the Father are one."

In fine, if Jesus Christ be simply man, he is an inexplicable enigma, for it is evident that he has spoken and acted as God. If Christ be God only, he is again an inexplicable enigma, for he has spoken and acted, obeyed and suffered as man. But if I suppose that Jesus Christ be God and man together, from that moment everything in him explains itself, every thing is adjusted, the apparent contradictions of his character are reconciled. I see that Jesus Christ might have said with truth, that his Father was greater than he, and that he was equal; that he was his God, and that he was the same God