25. What worthy return can we make for so great a condescension? The One Only-begotten God, ineffably born of God, entered the Virgin’s womb and grew and took the frame of poor humanity. He Who upholds the universe, within Whom and through Whom are all things, was brought forth by common childbirth; He at Whose voice Archangels and Angels tremble, and heaven and earth and all the elements of this world are melted, was heard in childish wailing. The Invisible and Incomprehensible, Whom sight and feeling and touch cannot gauge, was wrapped in a cradle. If any man deem all this unworthy of God, the greater must he own his debt for the benefit conferred the less such condescension befits the majesty of God. He by Whom man was made had nothing to gain by becoming Man; it was our gain that God was incarnate and dwelt among us, making all flesh His home by taking upon Him the flesh of One. We were raised because He was lowered; shame to Him was glory to us. He, being God, made flesh His residence, and we in return are lifted anew from the flesh to God.

41 25. Quod nihil dignum rependere valeamus.---Quid tandem dignum a nobis tantae dignationis affectui rependetur? Inenarrabilis a Deo originis unus 0066C unigenitus Deus, in corpusculi humani formam sanctae Virginis utero insertus accrescit. Qui omnia continet, et intra quem et per quem cuncta sunt, humani partus lege profertur, et ad cujus vocem Archangeli atque Angeli tremunt, coelum et terra et omnia mundi hujus resolvuntur elementa, vagitu infantiae auditur. Qui invisibilis et incomprehensibilis est, non visu, sensu, tactuque moderandus, cunis est obvolutus. Haec si quis indigna Deo recolet, tanto se majoris beneficii obnoxium 0067A confitebitur, quanto minus haec Dei convenerint majestati. Non ille eguit homo effici, per quem homo factus est: sed nos eguimus ut Deus caro fieret, et habitaret in nobis, id est, assumptione carnis unius interna universae carnis incoleret. Humilitas ejus nostra nobilitas est, contumelia ejus honor noster est: quod ille Deus in carne consistens, hoc nos vicissim in Deum ex carne renovati.