Scotus Academicus, Tomus septimus: De Incarnatione Verbi Divini

A twofold convenience can be distinguished. One indeed intrinsic to the thing, according to which something is said to be convenient, insofar as it is ordered by God. For, says the Apostle to the Romans 13: Those things that are of God are ordained. The other, however, extrinsic, whereby it consists in a certain relation, or bearing, of the thing itself toward those things to which it is fitting. Now since the Incarnation can be considered with respect either to God its author, or to human nature as its terminus, or to the whole orb of the earth, and like unto an encyclopedia of lands: therefore the convenience thereof must be treated with respect to those three things: namely, whether the Incarnation was convenient, both with respect to God, and with respect to man, and with respect to the other creatures.

Note 2. Since every good is diffusive and communicative of itself: and since God is the most excellent of all goods; diffusion of Himself and communication belong most of all to Him. Now the communication of God is twofold: one indeed ad intra, either through the fecundity of light and knowledge, whereby the eternal Father communicates Himself to the Son, who is God of God, light from light, true God from true God; or through the fecundity of love, whereby the Father and the Son, burning with divine love toward themselves, produce the Holy Spirit, who is the fruit and terminus of the mutual love of the Father and the Son. The other communication, however, is ad extra, whereby those three adorable persons communicate themselves to creatures in the order of nature, grace, glory, and divinity. In the order indeed of nature, by bestowing upon them all natural goods owed to them connaturally for their integrity and perfection. In the order truly of grace, by conferring upon the rational creature those gratuitous gifts by which it can be promoted to the supernatural order and end. In the order of glory, by exhibiting all His excellencies and delights of divinity to be beheld and enjoyed by the purest and most blessed minds. Finally, in the order of divinity, through hypostatic union; whereby one of those adorable persons communicates Himself substantially to human nature through His own proper subsistence, whereby it comes about that God becomes man, and in turn man God: taking upon Himself body and soul in the unity of person, so that in man there dwells the whole fullness of divinity corporally.

Note 3. That this last communication is the most excellent and greatest of all. For some communication can be judged greater than another in two ways: namely, either intensively, or extensively. It is said to be greater indeed in the prior way, when something more noble and more perfect is communicated: but in the second, when it extends itself to more subjects or supposits; by which reasoning the communication of natural goods is greater extensively; but the communication of supernatural goods is greater intensively, inasmuch as supernatural goods excel natural ones. But the communication which comes about through the Incarnation is without doubt the greatest of all communications, not only intensively, because the very uncreated substance of the Word, which is of infinite dignity and perfection, and thereupon surpasses all goods of the order of nature, grace, and glory, communicates itself to humanity: but also extensively; since it contributes not only to the honor and ornament of men and Angels, but also of the other creatures, as will be evident in the following Conclusions.

First Conclusion. — The Incarnation of the Word was most convenient to God.

Proof. That thing is most fitting to God which contributes to manifesting His divine excellencies: but through the Incarnation the perfections and excellency of God shine forth most greatly: therefore it was most convenient to God. The reason of this stands firm; for it is convenient to God to demonstrate His invisible perfections through visible effects. For this purpose indeed He founded the universe, that the invisible things of God may be understood through those things which have been made; His eternal power also, and divinity, says Saint Paul to the Romans 1. But the minor is proved: although the divine excellencies and divine gifts be innumerable, yet especially with respect to God, and to creatures, before all others there shine Goodness,

Goodness, I say, whereby He wills to communicate Himself to them and to bestow on them participation in His being: Power, whereby He performs and executes the same: Wisdom, whereby He weighs, orders, and establishes creatures in due and decent order, and directs them to their convenient end: Justice, whereby He distributes to each what accords with perfection: finally Mercy, whereby He supplies and restores the defects of the rational creature: and all those five divine perfections shine forth most greatly in the Mystery of the Incarnation.

First indeed the divine Goodness shines forth supremely in that mystery: for the divine Word, by bestowing His own person upon humanity, bestows at the same time divinity itself, and pours out upon man as it were all His divine excellencies. Hence that divine communication is called the measure of the divine love toward men; whence Christ Himself, from this ineffable Mystery, commends above all the goodness and charity of God toward men, saying John 3: So God loved the world, as to give His only begotten Son: and the Apostle judges that love so supreme and excellent that he did not blush to call it superexcellent and exceeding, to the Ephesians 2, saying: God, who is rich in mercy, for His exceeding charity wherewith He loved us, even when we were dead in sins, hath quickened us together in Christ (by whose grace you are saved), and hath raised us up together, and hath made us sit together in the heavenly places, in Christ Jesus: that He might show in the ages to come the abundant riches of His grace, in goodness towards us in Christ Jesus. Hence the same Apostle, commending that divine goodness toward us, to the Romans 8, says: If God be for us, who is against us? who spared not even His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all: how hath He not also, with Him, given us all things? Wherefore to Titus 3 he says: The benignity and humanity of our Savior God appeared. Which Saint Bernard expounds thus, Sermon 1 on the Nativity of the Lord:

There had appeared before, he says, power in the creation of things: wisdom was appearing in their governance: but now the benignity of mercy appeared above all in His humanity. Power had been made known to the Jews in signs and wonders; whence also in the Gospel you will often find: I am the Lord, I am God: to the Philosophers also, abounding in their own sense, majesty was made known, since according to the words of the Apostle, what is known of God is manifest to them. Yet nevertheless the Jews were oppressed by that very power, and the Philosophers, searchers into majesty, were weighed down by the glory. Power exacts subjection, majesty demands admiration, neither imitation. Appear, Lord, O goodness, wherewith man, created to Thine image, may be conformed: for majesty, power, wisdom, we can neither imitate, nor does it profit to emulate.

Omnipotence likewise shines forth in wondrous manner in the Mystery of the Incarnation; whence the Prophet Jeremias 31, to commend this most excellent work, calls it new. New, He says, hath the Lord created upon the earth: a woman shall compass a man. These words Saint Bernard expounds thus, homily 2 super Missus est: There was, he says, a man in Jesus, born not only of wisdom, not of age: of vigor of mind, not strength of body: of maturity of senses, not corpulence of limbs. And a little before: In this new and unheard-of prodigy is recognized length that is brief, breadth that is narrow, height that is subject, depth that is full. There is recognized light not shining, the Word an infant, water thirsting, bread hungering. You may see, if you attend, > power ruled, wisdom instructed, virtue sustained: God at last nursing at the breast, yet refreshing the Angels, groaning, yet consoling the miserable. You may see, if you attend, sadness joyous, the poor confident, salvation given over to pestilence, life dying, fortitude weakened. But what is no less to be wondered at, sadness itself is there seen rejoicing, comforting the poor, passion saving, death vivifying, infirmity strengthening.

Wherefore the Incarnation on account of its excellence is called the Work of God in Habacuc 3: Lord, Thy work, in the midst of the years make it live: and the most Blessed Virgin in her Canticle says it is the work of the omnipotent arm of God: He hath wrought power in His arm. Which truth Saint Bernard commends thus, in Sermon 3 for the Vigil of the Nativity of the Lord:

Three works, he says, three mixtures did that omnipotent Majesty make in the assumption of our flesh; so singularly marvelous, and marvelously singular, that such things neither have been done, nor are ever again to be done upon the earth. For there were conjoined one to another God and man, Mother and Virgin, faith and the human heart.

And He commends that first mixture thus:

He wished, He says, to exalt our weaker parts with more abundant glory, and majesty contracted itself, that what it had of better, namely itself, it might join to our mire; so that in one person God and mud might be united to each other, majesty and infirmity, such vileness and sublimity; for nothing is more sublime than God, nothing viler than mud, and yet with such condescension God descended into the mud, and with such dignity the mud ascended unto God, that whatever God did in Him, the mud is believed to have done, whatever the mud endured, God is said to have endured in Him: a sacrament as ineffable as it is incomprehensible. And attend to this: just as in that singularity there is Trinity in persons, unity in substance; so in this special commingling, there is Trinity in substance, unity in persons: and as there the persons do not divide the unity, nor does the unity diminish the Trinity, so here also the person does not confuse the substances, nor do the substances themselves dissipate the unity of the person. That supreme Trinity exhibited to us this trinity, a marvelous work, a singular work among all things, and above all His works. For the Word, and the soul, and the flesh came together into one person, and these three are one, and this one is three, not by confusion of substance, but by unity of person; this is the first and superexcellent mixture, and this the first among the three.

The divine Wisdom is celebrated equally, especially in the manner of reconciling divine Justice with His mercy. For St. Augustine says in his book, Cur, quando, et quomodo Deus, etc. chapter 6.

God had required from man justice, so that he who had offended by sin should make satisfaction through justice. For this the diversity of natures, and the unity of person in Christ availed, and was necessary for the human race, so that what human nature could not do, the divine nature would accomplish, and would exhibit even what in no way befitted human nature: and not one being and another, but that the same self should exist, perfect from both, who through the human nature might pay what He Himself owed, and through the divine nature could accomplish what was expedient. The debt of Adam was such that he ought not to pay it unless he were man, but he could not unless he were God: hence it was necessary that He should be the same man who was God. Wherefore it was necessary, in the unity of person, that God should assume man, so that man, who ought by his nature to pay and could not, might be in the person of Him who could, because satisfaction for sin could not be made except by God; but it was not owed except by man: therefore it stands that, for the restoration of that supernal city to be wrought in men (which could not be brought about unless the aforesaid satisfaction for sins had been made, which none could render unless he were God, nor ought he unless he were man) it was necessary that God made man should accomplish it.

Which reason St. Leo lucidly expounds in Sermon 1. on the Nativity, saying among other things: But by the property of both substances, converging into one person, infirmity is received from power, humility from majesty, mortality from eternity, as befitted the remedy for our body, that one and the same mediator of God and men might be able both to die from the one and to rise again from the other. It shines forth therein especially, that the adversary of the human race, who had conquered our First Parents together with their whole posterity, should be conquered and overcome by God through man. For, says Hugh of St. Victor, book 1. De Sacramentis p. 8. chapter 6: He who had cast out by justice, it was fitting that he be conquered not by fortitude, but by prudence, so that in the very thing wherein he had raised himself up as victor, he should be laid low as vanquished, according to that of Job 26: And his prudence struck down the proud one. Which reason St. Augustine likewise expounds thus, in the book Cur, quando, et quomodo Deus, etc. c. 6.

Subtly God wished to assail the subtle enemy, concealing beneath the bait of humanity the hook of divinity, so that he might find one who owed him nothing: which nature when he unlawfully touched it, he deservedly lost that which in a certain manner he possessed: for thus was the ancient serpent to be deluded, that he who had deluded men should himself be deluded by the God-man. And as he had cunningly subjected unguarded man to himself, so through man divinely guarded he should be subjected, not cunningly, but wisely. Here truly appears the highest wisdom, when that is set before the enemy which is first cast down by the enemy: and as it were, that which had fallen should recover its strength, and assailed by the enemy, should again presume to fight against the enemy. The enemy is therefore provoked again to battle, that he who before rejoiced that he had conquered might afterwards, vanquished, succumb entirely, and thus man would become far more glorious by his resumption than if he had never chanced to fall.

To this St. Leo accords his voice, saying:

According to the fullness of time, which the inscrutable depth of the divine counsel disposed, humanity took upon itself its nature to be reconciled to its leader, and the author of death, the devil, was to be conquered through the very one whom he had cast out: in which conflict undertaken on our behalf he was prostrated by a great and marvelous law of equity, while the omnipotent Lord engages with the most savage enemy not in His own majesty, but in our humility, setting against him a fallible form, and a fallible nature: partaker indeed of our mortality, but wholly without experience of sin.

Hence the Church sings: The order of our salvation required: that the manifold art of the traitor might be deceived by art, and the remedy borne thence whence the enemy had wounded. Finally, the divine wisdom excels chiefly in this, that this Mystery contributes above all to establishing the glory of God; nay, even to increasing it. For, says St. Bernard, Sermon 2. on the Ascension: Christ, since by the nature of His divinity He had nothing whereby He might grow or ascend, because beyond God there is nothing, found how He might grow by descending: coming to be incarnate, to suffer, to die, lest we should die for eternity. Wherefore St. Gregory of Nyssa in his Catechetical Oration chapter 14 calls that descent of the divine Word an overflowing abundance of power: That, he says, which is the abasement of descent, is a certain signal and overflowing abundance of power. To which fits that verse of the Psalm: He ascended above the setting sun; the Lord His name. Whence St. Gregory, Homily 17. on the Gospels: Above the setting sun the Lord ascends, because whence He lay down in His Passion, thence He manifested His greater glory by rising again: namely, above the setting sun He ascends, because the death which He endured He trod underfoot by rising again.

Equally the divine Justice shines forth excellently in this adorable Mystery: since through the passion and death of Christ the Lord He accepted a condign satisfaction for the sins and offenses of men: inasmuch as the God-man offered Himself not only as victim and expiation upon the altar of the cross to the eternal Father, but also exposed Himself like a target to the arrow, and to the most severe vengeance of the divine justice. Hence St. Paul to the Romans 3, expounding most brilliantly the satisfaction and redemption of Christ the Lord, says: Justified freely by His grace: through the redemption, of the preeminent offenses, in the forbearance of God. The divine Justice is commended also especially from this, that it displayed its rigid and exact severity in avenging sins in the Passion and Death of Christ. For if the eternal Father chastised with such severity His most loving Son, who had constituted Himself surety for the sins of men, and who had only put on the likeness of the flesh of sin, what terror and dread must abide in each sinner obstinate in so many and so great crimes, when they stand before that divine justice to judge and to punish? For, says the Savior Himself Luke 23: If in the green wood they do these things, what shall be done in the dry? Finally the bitterness of the divine justice appears in that infinite price which He willed to be paid for our redemption. For St. Peter says, 1. Epistle chapter 1: Not with corruptible gold or silver are you redeemed from your vain conversation of the tradition of your fathers, but with the precious blood as of a lamb immaculate.

Finally, the divine Mercy shines forth supremely in this Mystery. Although it be proper to God always to have mercy and to spare, and all the ways of the Lord are mercy and truth, whereby He sustains in much patience the vessels of wrath fitted for destruction, that He may show the riches of His glory; nevertheless that divine mercy did not so shine forth before as after the Incarnation. Indeed, for complete and perfect mercy two acts are chiefly desired: namely, to repel the misery of another, and to be affected by the miseries of another as if they were one's own: for one is called merciful as it were having a miserable heart, because he is affected by the misery of another as if it were his own misery. The first indeed of those acts befitted God by reason of His goodness and infinite power; but the second was most alien to Him, inasmuch as He is immutable, and enjoys infinite and unchangeable felicity. Wherefore, that the divine mercy might be absolute in every respect, it was necessary that God become man, that He might be able to compassionate our infirmities, or as the Apostle says to the Hebrews 2: In all things He ought to be made like unto His brethren, that He might become merciful. Hence chapter 4 he says: We have not a high priest who cannot have compassion on our infirmities, tempted in all things like as we are, without sin. The divine mercy shines forth also especially in this, that the Son of God assumed a mortal body, and suffered death itself, that He might deliver us from death. Hence the Apostle to the Romans 5: God commendeth His charity towards us: because when as yet we were sinners, according to the time, Christ died for us. Commendeth, I say. For St. Anselm says in book 2. Cur Deus homo: what can be understood as more merciful than that, for a sinner destined to eternal punishments and having nothing wherewith he might redeem himself, God the Father should say, receive my only-begotten, and give him for thee: and the Son Himself, take me, and redeem thyself? Which superabundant divine mercy towards us St. Bernard elegantly expounds thus, Sermon 3. on the Nativity of the Lord:

I was playing outside in the street, he says, and in the royal secrecy of the royal bedchamber judgment of death was being passed upon me. His only-begotten heard this, and went forth with little haste, clothed in sackcloth, sprinkled with ashes on His head, bare of foot. Weeping and wailing, because His poor servant had been condemned to death... By consideration of the remedy for my peril I estimate the magnitude. I knew it not; I seemed to myself sound, and behold the Son of the Virgin is sent, the Son of the Most High God, and commanded to be slain, that He might heal my wounds with the balsam of His precious blood. Know, O man, how grievous are the wounds for which it was necessary that the Lord Christ be wounded. If these wounds were not unto death, and unto death everlasting, never for their remedy would the Son of God die. Therefore it is shameful, most beloved, negligently to dissemble our own passion, for which I see such great compassion shown by so great a Majesty.

You will say 1. Whatever is unbecoming to the supreme majesty of God cannot be judged fitting and expedient: but to assume flesh is unbecoming to the supreme majesty of God: therefore, etc.

I answer: The Seraphic Doctor, distinguishing the major: whatsoever is unbecoming to the majesty of God, both by reason of itself and by reason of what is united to it, neither befits nor is expedient: this he grants; by reason only of what is united to it, he denies. Indeed it is unbecoming to the majesty of God in itself to be humbled, since, the divinity being altogether immutable, in itself it covets neither exaltation nor humiliation. But by reason of what is united to it, it can be humbled unto the greater manifestation of its own height: for in this, that God assumed humble and infirm flesh, he crushed the most mighty adversary and strengthened infirm man: and therefore although the work of the Incarnation in itself may not seem to conduce to the honor of the divine majesty, yet it conduces to it most of all when the end and effect, unto which it is ordered, is considered: since it is the highest glory to God that he chose the weak things of this world, that he might confound the strong, and exalt the humble.

You will say 2. As excessive exaltation is blameworthy, so excessive abasement is to be blamed: but just as the exaltation was excessive, when a creature desired to be God: so the abasement is excessive, that God should become man, who is a creature; therefore as that exaltation is to be blamed, so also would the abasement appear blameworthy, whereby God became man: but nothing blameworthy can befit God: therefore etc.

I answer: The same Seraphic Doctor replies that there is no parity: both because the divine nature was not humbled by any abasement of itself, seeing that the Divine Word, in assuming the human, lost nothing of the divine; whereas when the creature desired to be God, it was inflated with some elation, whereby it wished to be carried beyond its natural lot and its own state, and therefore on this side that excess and overflowing of elation tended into vice: and because the emptying, which was wrought in the assumption of humanity, proceeded from an excess of love and charity: but the elation, whereby man wished to be like unto God, was from an excess of presumption. Now every presumption is confessedly to be blamed, not so love and charity: and thereupon the emptying of Christ was not blameworthy, but praiseworthy, even as the elation of the first parent was blameworthy.

You will say 3. Injury is done to God when he is thought to have some created effigy. For, saith St. Paul, Acts 17: We ought not to think that gold, or silver, or stone, the graving of art and thought of man, is to be likened to the divine: therefore the greatest injury would be done to God, if a human effigy were attributed to him: but this would have to be attributed to him, if he were truly man: therefore, etc.

I answer: The same Seraphic Doctor replies that it is true and must be maintained when one believes that God truly has, according to his deity, some bodily effigy, as the idolatrous Gentiles thought: but otherwise when one judges that God indeed has not in himself any created effigy, but only by reason of the assumed humanity, as comes about through the Mystery of the Incarnation.

You will say 4. That rather conduces to the glory of God which more illustriously commends his mercy alone. For, as St. James saith, ch. 2: Mercy exalteth itself above judgment: and the Church testifies on the 10th Sunday after Pentecost: O God, who dost manifest thine omnipotence chiefly by pardoning and showing mercy: but far greater would have been the mercy in freely remitting to man his debt, than in exacting satisfaction: therefore it would have been more fitting for God freely to forgive the offense of men, than to exact satisfaction for it through the Incarnation of his Son.

I deny the major: for that work is more perfect in which, together with the highest mercy, the highest justice also shines forth, than that in which mercy alone is chiefly commended; because all the ways of the Lord are mercy and truth, since he himself is supremely just and merciful:

And therefore, saith the Seraphic Doctor, in the reparation of mankind, which is the most excellent of the ways of the Lord, it is fitting that mercy and justice run together, and therefore it was seemly that God should exact satisfaction for the injury done to him: which if man could not render, then mercy would give a Mediator, who should pay the debt: for if God had not remitted the fault, but had exercised vengeance alone, mercy would not appear: if truly he had not exacted satisfaction, justice would not be manifested: therefore it was fitting that out of mercy a Mediator should be furnished, who should pay the debt out of justice, for thus Mercy and Truth met each other, Justice and Peace kissed.

You will say 5. It seems unjust to punish the innocent for the guilty: but that takes place in the Mystery of the Incarnation: therefore it befits not the divine justice.

I distinguish the major: if that be done by way of punishment and vengeance, I grant it: if by way of satisfaction and reparation, I deny it. For although in punishing sin he must be chastised who sinned, nevertheless in making satisfaction one can bear the punishment for another; for in vengeance the iniquity of the sinner is regarded: but in satisfaction for another the charity of him who satisfies is beheld.

You will say 6. Whatsoever offends the divine equity is unbecoming to God: but it conflicts with the divine equity that the life of the Son of God, since it is most precious, should be exposed to be poured out for a thing most vile, such as the redemption of sinful men: therefore, etc.

I deny the minor: both because Christ subjected himself not to death, that he should be swallowed up by it, but that, death being cast down, he should rise again immortal: and because the salvation of man is only an effect of the death of Christ, but not its end: and moreover because both the life of Christ and of men is ordered to the glory of God, which is more excellent than the life of Christ.

Second Conclusion. — The Incarnation of the Word is most fitting for human nature.

Proof. That thing is most fitting for human nature which conduces in an eminent degree to its being recalled from evil and advanced toward good: but the Incarnation serves both purposes to the highest degree.

First indeed, that man be recalled from evil; for every fount and origin of evil arises either from the devil instigating, or from the flesh alluring, or from the spirit growing proud: but this threefold fount and root of all transgression is removed and torn up by the Incarnation. Indeed through it the devil has been cast down from his authority: for 1 John 3. the Son of God appeared, that he might destroy the works of the devil, and Christ our God says that the prince of this world would be cast out, and the Apostle says to the Colossians 1. He has delivered us from the power of darkness, and has translated us into the kingdom of the Son of his love, in whom we have redemption through his blood, the remission of sins: seeing that, as St. Augustine adds, book 18. On the Trinity, chapter 15, for this redemption the blood of Christ was given as the price for us: upon receiving which price, the devil was not loosed, but bound, that we might be loosed from our sins. He adds in chapter 17 that by this mystery the pride of the demons was dragged down and the abjection of men raised up. It was shown to man, he says, what place he held among the things which God created: since human nature could be so joined to God as to become one person out of two substances: and thereby the same out of three, namely God, soul, and flesh; so that those proud wicked spirits, who interpose themselves as a middle term for suspending, as it were for adjuring, should not dare to propose themselves to man on the ground that they have no flesh: and especially because the Son of God deigned even to die in that same flesh, lest those same spirits, who are believed to be immortal, persuade themselves to be adored as gods. Likewise the flesh, vitiated in its origin, was healed and consecrated through the assumption and union with the Word. For since in Christ dwelt the whole fullness of the Godhead bodily, as the Apostle says, whence it came about that our bodies were made members of Christ, and temples of the Holy Spirit: therefore that flesh, which was an incentive to sin, became a stimulus to salvation and justice: for, as Tertullian says in the book On the Resurrection of the Flesh, chapter 8, The flesh is the hinge of salvation; for the flesh is washed, that the soul may be made spotless; the flesh is signed, and the soul is illuminated; the flesh is shadowed over by the imposition of hands, that the soul may be preserved; the flesh feeds on the Body and Blood of the Lord, that the soul may be fattened on God. Finally the exaltation and pride of mind is broken; for, as St. Augustine says above, The pride of man, which is the greatest hindrance to clinging to God, can by so great a humility of God be reproved and healed: and let man learn how far he has departed from God, and what is owed him for medicinal sorrow, when for our salvation there came a Mediator, who as God aids men by his divinity, as man suits them by his infirmity. Hence St. Bernard, in Sermon 3. on the Nativity of Christ, says: What is more unworthy, what more detestable, what more deserving of punishment, than that man, seeing the little one who is God of heaven, should still go on to magnify himself above the earth? Intolerable impudence it is, that where Majesty has emptied itself, a little worm should puff himself up and swell.

Secondly, this mystery also conduced most greatly to the advancing of man toward good. For first human nature is raised up in the supreme degree; for, as St. Augustine says in the book On the Predestination of the Saints chapter 15.

This is that singular assumption of man by God the Word, effected ineffably, that he might at once be called Son of God and Son of man: Son of man on account of the assumed man, and Son of God improperly, and properly on account of the assuming, the only-begotten God; lest not a Trinity but a quaternity be believed. There was predestinated for this human nature so great, and so lofty, and so supreme an elevation, that it had nothing higher to which it might be raised, just as for our sakes the divinity itself had nothing lower to which it might humble itself, than the assumed nature of man with the infirmity of the flesh even unto the death of the cross.

Whence it is no wonder if the Angels, who before that divine exaltation of human nature suffered themselves to be adored by men, as Abraham and Loth adored them, Genesis 18. and 19., afterward refused such honor to be paid them by a man; for St. John the Evangelist, when he wished to adore the Angel who was speaking to him, immediately heard him saying, Apocalypse 19. See thou do it not: I am thy fellow servant, and of thy brethren who hold the name of Jesus. Hence St. Leo admirably admonishes in Sermon 1. on the Nativity, Know, O Christian, thy dignity, and having been made a sharer of the divine nature, do not return to thy former baseness by a degenerate manner of life, etc.

Thirdly, through the Incarnation man had the most excellent exemplar of all virtues whatsoever, which before he lacked. For, as St. Augustine says in Sermon 52. on Diverse Subjects: Man was not to be followed who could be seen. God was to be followed, who could not be seen: that therefore there might be exhibited to man one who could be seen by man, and whom man might follow, God was made man. For an exemplar, that it be complete in every respect, ought to be at once upright and perceptible to sense. Indeed God was upright by reason of holiness; but invisible by reason of his infinite majesty: man truly, who was visible, on account of the many defects with which he was stained, deflected from the upright rule of virtue: wherefore it was necessary that a union intervene between both, that thence a perfect exemplar of virtue might be granted to man. Wherefore Christ also admonished, John 13. I have given you an example, that as I have done, so you also may do. For he who was invisible in the majesty of his divinity presented himself visible in the infirmity of his humanity: as Paul speaks most excellently in 1. to Timothy 3., where he calls the Incarnation a great sacrament of piety, which was manifested in the flesh. For all the actions of Christ were truly the acts of the God-man, or, as St. Ambrose speaks, the acts of the Lord's flesh are an exemplar of the divinity, and things invisible concerning him are shown to us through those things which are visible. Hence he names himself, John 11. the way, the truth, and the life: indeed the way in example, the truth in promise, the life in reward, as St. Bernard says in Sermon 2. on the Ascension.

Fourthly, it was most fitting that God become incarnate, that man might be made perfectly blessed. For therefore, says the Author of the book On the Spirit and the Soul, chapter 9. (among the works of St. Augustine), God was made man, that he might beatify the whole man in himself, and that the whole conversion of man might be toward him, and the whole deferral of man might be in him, since with the ascent of the flesh he would be seen through the flesh, and with the ascent of the mind seen through the contemplation of the divinity. Whence each of the Blessed can say with Job, chapter 19. In my flesh I shall see

my God: whom I myself shall see, and my eyes shall behold; or with the same Seer: My heart and my flesh have rejoiced in the living God.

Finally, to this end did the Incarnation of the divine Word conduce most greatly, that we might have whatsoever we need, both for the health of the body and of the soul. For, as St. Bernard says most excellently in Sermon 3. on the Circumcision: He was given whole to me, he was spent whole for my uses. Indeed he says in Sermon 24. on the Passion: What do you seek in him that you may not find? If you are sick, he is the physician: if you faint, he is the fountain: if you are assailed, he is the champion: if you thirst, he is drink: if you are cold, he is a garment: if you are sad, he is joy: if you are darkened, he is light: if you are an orphan, he is Father. In one word, as Ambrose says in book 3. On Virgins: Christ is all things to us, and he has given all things to us. To these add, that through the Incarnation the faith of man is especially illustrated, hope is strengthened, charity enkindled.

Faith, I say, is illustrated: for, as St. Augustine says in book 11. Of the City of God, chapter 2. ⟦uncertain⟧ That man might walk more confidently in faith toward the truth, the Truth itself, the Son of God, assuming man, joined us to God, and strengthened faith, that the way to God might be for man through the God-man. Hope also is raised up and strengthened: for, as the same St. Augustine says in book 13. of the City of God chapter 10.

What was so necessary for the raising up of our hope, as that, weighed down by the condition of mortals through the abjection of mortality itself, in order to deliver us unto immortality from despair, there should be shown to us how much God loved us, and how dearly he loved?

Finally, Charity is kindled in a wondrous manner: for, as Saint Augustine says in book 1 of his de Catechizandis Rudibus, cap. 1: What greater cause is there of the coming of the Lord, than that God might show forth His love toward us? And further on: If it grieved us to be loved, at least let it not grieve us to be loved in return.

You will say 1. It seems unfitting that by so great a price as is Christ so few men are saved: and it seems more fitting that God should have assumed some other means whereby all men would be saved: therefore the Incarnation of the Word was not most fitting for human nature.

I answer 1, the salvation of each elect soul is of such worth that God judged it not unworthy to be wrought at the expense of His own Son: whence, although few attain salvation, this ought not on that account to be judged incongruous to the divine wisdom. I add that if all men had been saved, this would redound less to the glory of God: since He would not have displayed His Justice and Mercy so perfectly toward us: whence Saint Augustine, Epist. 105: If both were delivered, it would be hidden to whom the punishment of sin was due; if no one, what would grace have to bestow?

I answer 2. The failure of salvation in the reprobate is not to be charged against the Incarnation itself, but against the perverse will of men: since the Incarnation of Christ was a means all-sufficient for the salvation of all men; for Christ the Lord is the true light which enlighteneth every man coming into this world: He is also the mediator of God and of men, who wills all men to be saved, and to come to the knowledge of the truth.

You will say 2. That manner of repairing human nature is more fitting by reason of which nature itself is the more bound to God, and owes Him ampler thanks: but man would be more bound to God if He had freely forgiven him his offence; for he owes greater thanks to one whose debt a judge freely remits than to one from whom satisfaction is exacted: therefore etc.

I deny the minor, and in proof I say that the ground of the disparity is that God, in exacting satisfaction from us, gave us His own Son, who might satisfy for us, and thereby merited and bestowed most abundant thanks, whereby we also, after our measure, could make satisfaction together with Him, our adored Redeemer. But it seems more honorable to be able to pay one's own debt than to ascribe its remission solely to the clemency of the judge.

Third Conclusion. — The Incarnation of the Word was fitting also for the whole universe.

First, indeed, whatsoever creatures there are in the universe have received something of sublimity in the very promotion of man to fellowship with the divine: for since man is a microcosm, and the epitome of the whole universe, his dignity and excellence overflow upon the other creatures. Hence the Apostle, Ephes. 1, says: The eternal Father, namely, purposed in the dispensation of the fulness of times to renew all things in Christ, which are in the heavens, and which are on the earth, in Him.

Next, the supreme perfection of the whole universe was that there should be in it the greatest and most perfect grade of being, which should unite God and creature together: for the more excellent and the more numerous the grades of being throughout the whole world, the more excellent and perfect is it accounted: and this has been granted through the mystery of the Incarnation, wherein we have God and man subsisting in one person.

Finally, it was fitting that all the differences of things be found in the universe, so that just as in us there is one nature in one person, and in God one nature in several persons, so likewise there should be several natures in one person: which indeed came to pass through the Incarnation, for three natures, namely, the Divine, the Spiritual, and the Corporal, are united in the one person of Christ.