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 3. How great is the value that most precious treasure possesses in the sight of God I "And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us." Yes, in order to atone for our sins, the Son of God submitted to all human infirmities; to hunger and thirst, to heat and cold, to weariness, and the need of sleep, but He did not will to enter the world in the same manner as the rest of mankind, but He chose to set aside the laws of nature, and through a miracle of His omnipotence He was "conceived by the Holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary."

And what a love she had for virginal purity! According to the opinion expressed by holy men, she would have been willing to renounce the sublime dignity of becoming the Mother of God rather than to lose the dignity of virginity, by exchanging it for the dignity of motherhood.

4. And we may go yet farther! The Redeemer permitted the devil to tempt Him in the wilderness, to tempt Him to ambition, even to idolatry, but not to a sin against holy purity. In order to atone for our sins He allowed the Jews to blaspheme and revile Him; but He did not permit them to cast upon Him the merest shadow of an accusation of the sin of impurity.

Fire is opposed to water, and on this account does a flame sputter if a candle is ever so little moistened with water. In the same way does God detest the impure, and