Page:SermonsFromTheLatins.djvu/67

 eternal birth  is  celebrated  last,  with  brilliant  pomp and splendor  and  elaborate  music  as  worthy  as  may be of  the  Divinity. St. John,  in  the  first  chapter  of his  Gospel,  commemorates  all  three,  saying:  "  In  the beginning  was  the  Word;  and  the  Word  was  made flesh;  and  we  saw  His  glory,  the  glory  of  the  only-begotten  of  the  Father,  full  of  grace  and  truth."

Brethren, so  ineffable  is  the  birth  of  the  Word  of God  in  the  bosom  of  the  Divinity,  that  even  Isaias stands aghast  and  exclaims:  "Who  shall  declare His  generation? "  A  fitter  subject  for  angels'  meditation than  for  human  speech. That a  son  should be equal  in  all  things  to  his  father;  that  a  father should communicate  to  his  son  his  entire  nature  and yet lose  nothing  thereby;  that  a  son  should  be  born without a  mother;  that  an  infinitely  perfect  being should be  the  product  of  a  single  intellectual  act; these are  truths  indeed,  but  beyond  human  ken — discernible only  with  the  eye  of  faith. In the  birth of Venus  from  the  waves,  or  of  armed  Minerva from Jupiter's  head,  we  find  the  pagan  straining after the  truth — the  rise  of  the  all-beautiful  from  the illimitable Divinity  and  the  birth  of  a  God  from  a God. St. Paul's  address  to  the  Hebrews  (chap,  i.) speaks of  the  Word  as:  "The  brightness  of  His Father's  glory  and  the  figure  of  His  substance." That is  to  say  "  as  the  light  from  the  sun,  so  the Word  from  the  Father." Proceeding by  a  continuous process  of  generation  from  an  undivided source, coexistent  therewith,  emanating  from  it,  but leaving behind  no  void,  and  everywhere  bearing  and