1 Pet. iii. 18-21. Footnote 208: Ezek. xvi. 55, cf. 53. Footnote 209: Isa. xlvii. 14, 15. The Septuagint here differs from the Hebrew: ἔχεις ἄνθρακας πυρός, κάθισαι ἐπ’ αὐτούς, οὗτοι ἔσονται σοι βοήθεια. Footnote 210: Ps. lxxviii. 34. Footnote 211: Matt. vii. 18, cf. xii. 33. Footnote 212: Rom. vii. 12. Footnote 213: Rom. vii. 13. Footnote 214: Matt. xii. 35. Footnote 215: Matt. xix. 17. Footnote 216: Ps. lxxiii. 1. Footnote 217: Ps. cxviii. 2. Footnote 218: Lam. iii. 25. Footnote 219: John xvii. 25: Juste Pater. CHAPTER VI. ON THE INCARNATION OF CHRIST. 1. It is now time, after this cursory notice of these points, to resume our investigation of the incarnation of our Lord and Saviour, viz. how or why He became man. Having therefore, to the best of our feeble ability, considered His divine nature from the contemplation of His own works rather than from our own feelings, and having nevertheless beheld (with the eye) His visible creation while the invisible creation is seen by faith, because human frailty can neither see all things with the bodily eye nor comprehend them by reason, seeing we men are weaker and frailer than any other rational beings (for those which are in heaven, or are supposed to exist above the heaven, are superior), it remains that we seek a being intermediate between all created things and God, _i.e._ a Mediator, whom the Apostle Paul styles the “first-born of every creature.”[220] Seeing, moreover, those declarations regarding His majesty which are contained in holy Scripture, that He is called the “image of the invisible God, and the first-born of every creature,” and that “in Him were all things created, visible and invisible, whether they be thrones, or dominions, or principalities, or powers, all things were created by Him, and in Him: and He is before all things, and by Him all things consist,”[221] who is the head of all things, alone having as head God the Father; for it is written, “The head of Christ is God;”[222] seeing clearly also that it is written, “No one knoweth the Father, save the Son, nor doth any one know the Son, save the Father”[223] (for who can know what wisdom is, save He who called it into being? Or who can understand clearly what truth is, save the Father of truth? Who can investigate with certainty the universal nature of His Word, and of God Himself, which nature proceeds from God, except God alone, with whom the Word was), we ought to regard it as certain that this Word, or Reason (if it is to be so termed), this Wisdom, this Truth, is known to no other than the Father only; and of Him it is written, that “I do not think that the world itself could contain the books which might be written,”[224] regarding, viz., the glory and majesty of the Son of God. For it is impossible to commit to writing [all] those particulars which belong to the glory of the Saviour. After