IV.  This is our present Festival; it is this which we are celebrating to-day, the Coming of God to Man, that we might go forth,12    Ephes. iv. 22, 24. or rather (for this is the more proper expression) that we might go back to God—that putting off the old man, we might put on the New; and that as we died in Adam, so we might live in Christ,13    1 Cor. xv. 22. being born with Christ and crucified with Him and buried with Him and rising with Him.14    Col. ii. 11.  For I must undergo the beautiful conversion, and as the painful succeeded the more blissful, so must the more blissful come out of the painful.  For where sin abounded Grace did much more abound;15    Rom. v. 20. and if a taste condemned us, how much more doth the Passion of Christ justify us?  Therefore let us keep the Feast, not after the manner of a heathen festival, but after a godly sort; not after the way of the world, but in a fashion above the world; not as our own but as belonging to Him Who is ours, or rather as our Master’s; not as of weakness, but as of healing; not as of creation, but of re-creation.

Δʹ. Τοῦτό ἐστιν ἡμῖν ἡ πανήγυρις, τοῦτο ἑορτάζομεν σήμερον, ἐπιδημίαν Θεοῦ πρὸς ἀνθρώπους, ἵνα πρὸς Θεὸν ἐνδημήσωμεν, ἢ ἐπανέλθωμεν (οὕτω γὰρ εἰπεῖν οἰκειότερον), ἵνα τὸν παλαιὸν ἄνθρωπον ἀποθέμενοι, τὸν νέον ἐνδυσώμεθα: καὶ ὥσπερ ἐν τῷ Ἀδὰμ ἀπεθάνομεν, οὕτως ἐν τῷ Χριστῷ ζήσωμεν, Χριστῷ καὶ συγγεννώμενοι, καὶ συσταυρούμενοι, καὶ συνθαπτόμενοι, καὶ συνανιστάμενοι. Δεῖ γάρ με παθεῖν τὴν καλὴν ἀντιστροφήν: καὶ ὥσπερ ἐκ τῶν χρηστοτέρων, ἦλθε τὰ λυπηρὰ, οὕτως ἐκ τῶν λυπηρῶν, ἐπανελθεῖν τὰ χρηστότερα. Οὗ γὰρ ἐπλεόνασεν ἡ ἁμαρτία, ὑπερεπερίσσευσεν ἡ χάρις: καὶ εἰ ἡ γεῦσις κατέκρινε, πόσῳ μᾶλλον τὸ Χριστὸν παθεῖν ἐδικαίωσεν; Τοιγαροῦν ἑορτάζωμεν, μὴ πανηγυρικῶς, ἀλλὰ θεϊκῶς: μὴ κοσμικῶς, ἀλλ' ὑπερκοσμίως: μὴ τὰ ἡμέτερα, ἀλλὰ τὰ τοῦ ἡμετέρου, μᾶλλον δὲ τὰ τοῦ Δεσπότου: μὴ τὰ τῆς ἀσθενείας, ἀλλὰ τὰ τῆς ἰατρείας: μὴ τὰ τῆς πλάσεως, ἀλλὰ τὰ τῆς ἀναπλάσεως.