Page:SermonsFromTheLatins.djvu/70

 logs for  house-building;  and  presently  the  axe-head flies from  the  handle  and  sinks  in  the  stream. Moved by his  son's  lamentations,  Eliseus  seizes  a  log  and casts it  in  and  lo! down it  sinks  to  the  bottom,  while the metal  rises  to  the  surface  and  is  restored. Brethren, such  metal  is  human  nature,  prone  of itself,  as  the  sixty-eighth  Psalm  says,  to  stick  fast  in the  mire  of  the  deep,  unable  to  do  anything  of  itself, and able  to  construct  a  mansion  for  itself  in  heaven only when  wielded  by  the  Son  of  God. And in  the words of  the  same  Psalm,  it  cried:  "  Father,  draw me  out  of  the  mire  that  I  may  not  stick  fast." And into the  muddy  stream  of  this  world  the  Father  cast the Saviour — the  Wood  of  the  root  of  Jesse — and  lo! the original  condition  of  human  nature  was  restored. Thus it  was  and  for  this  reason  that  the  Word  was made flesh  and  dwelt  amongst  us. What thoughts arise as  we  kneel  before  the  humble  little  crib! What questions! First is  wonder;  here  is  that  new thing which  Jeremias  promised  God  would  effect upon the  earth,  in  that  a  woman  should  compass  a man. With every  faculty  of  his  soul  fully  developed, a man  is  born,  the  most  venerable  of  men;  and  born for the  second  time. When Christ  spoke  to  him  of Baptism,  Nicodemus  exclaimed:  "Born again!  How am  I,  an  old  man,  to  return  to  the  womb  of  my mother  and  be  born  again?  "  But  here  is  impossibility become  a  fact. And not  a  new  thing  only, but a  new  man,  such  as  the  world  hitherto  has  never known; a  mere  man  apparently,  but  evidently  possessing a  divine  nature;  a  divine  person  and  still