Then said Mary to the angel, "How may that be that I have a child, for I have known no man? I had resolved to end my life in maidenhood: how can it then be that I, without connexion with man, shall bring forth?" Then answered the angel to the virgin, "The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee." Through the efficacy of the Holy Ghost, as we before said, Christ was born in human nature; and Mary his mother was overshadowed by the power of the Holy Ghost. How was she overshadowed? She was so overshadowed that she was purified from, and shielded against all {201} sins, by the power of the Holy Ghost, and with heavenly grace filled and hallowed. The angel said, "The holy thing that shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God." Verily all men are, as the prophet said, conceived in iniquity and born in sins, but our Saviour alone was conceived without iniquity, and born without sins; and he was holy as soon as he became man, and perfect God, the Son of the Almighty God, in one person man and God. Then said Mary to the angel, "I am God's handmaid; let it betide me according to thy word." Great humility dwelt in her mind, when she thus cried. She said not, I am the mother of God, or, I am queen of the whole world, but said, "I am God's handmaid;" as the holy writ admonishes us, thus saying, "When thou art great, humble thyself in all things, and thou shalt find grace and reward with God." She said to the angel, "Let it betide me according to thy word:" that is, Be it as thou sayst, that the Son of the Almighty God enter my womb, and receive human substance from me, and proceed from me, for the redemption of the world, as a bridegroom from his bride-bed. Thus did our Saviour enter the womb of Mary on this day, which is called Annunciatio Sanctæ Mariæ, which is interpreted, THE ANNUNCIATION-DAY OF MARY; on which day the archangel Gabriel announced to the pure virgin the advent of God to men through her, and she believed the angel's announcement, and so with faith received God into her womb, and bare him until midwinter's mass-day, and then brought him forth in true human nature, who was ever dwelling in divine nature with his Father and the Holy Ghost, those three one God indivisible.