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 for whom? A child is born to us: for us He is born. And wherefore? St. Ambrose gives us the answer: "He is a little One, that you might be a perfect man; He is bound in swaddling-clothes, that you might be unbound from the fetters of death; He is on earth, that you might be in Heaven."

Behold, then, the Immensity become an Infant, Whom the heavens cannot contain: see Him imprisoned in poor rags, and laid in a narrow vile manger on a bundle of straw, which was at once His only bed and pillow. "See," says St. Bernard---" see power is ruled, wisdom instructed, virtue sustained. God taking milk and weeping, but comforting the afflicted!" A God Almighty so tightly wrapped in swathing-bands that He cannot stir! A God Who knows all things, made mute and speechless! A God Who rules Heaven and earth needing to be carried in the arms! A God Who feeds all men and animals, Himself having need of a little milk to support Him! A God Who consoles the afflicted, and is the joy of paradise, Himself weeps and moans and has to be comforted by another!

In fine, St. Paul says that the Son of God, coming on earth, emptied Himself. [Phil. 2:7] He annihilated Himself, so to say. And why? To save man and to be loved by man. "Where Thou didst empty Thyself," says St. Bernard, "there did mercy, there did charity, more brilliantly appear." Yes, my dear Redeemer, in proportion as Thy