Was the problem of the highest possible variety and the highest possible unity and communication in the person of the Theanthropos resolved? It was, so far only as nature and substance were concerned; because the hypostatic union only wedded human nature, and through it all inferior natures, to the person of the Word. But this unity and communication excluded, and had to exclude, all human personalities. It excluded them in the fact; it had to exclude them, otherwise human personality would have ceased to exist. Here the problem must be resolved anew—how to raise human personality to the highest possible union and communication with the Theanthropos. Another moment was effected to initiate the solution of the problem; and this was the supernatural moment. By it human personality, by being endowed with a higher similitude of the Trinity and the Theanthropos, and by receiving higher faculties, is brought into a real and particular union with the Word, and through him the other persons of the Trinity. But the supernatural moment does not resolve the problem yet; because the union which results thereby is union between human persons and the Word as God, not a union between human
persons and the Theanthropos, the Word made man.
A real and efficient union between two terms requires a real relation between them. Now, the supernatural term establishes a relation between human persons and the Word, but not a relation between them and the Theanthropos, because it is wholly spiritual and incorporeal. A true relation between persons composed of body and soul must be a contact, not spiritual only, but also corporeal.
Hence, if we exclude the real substantial presence of the Theanthropos as such, we have a union of human persons united to the Word, but not a real efficacious union of human persons united to the Theanthropos. On this supposition, the cosmos would lack the highest possible unity and communication, and would fail to realize the end of that external action. But, admit the corporal presence of the Theanthropos in time and space, admit that presence incorporating and individualizing itself in human persons, and the whole wisdom and beauty of the design flashes at once upon your mind—the whole cosmos, as abridged in the human nature of Christ, made infinite by the hypostatic union with the Word; all human persons incorporated body and soul into the body and soul of the Theanthropos, built up into his body and soul, transformed, as it were, in them and through them, and in them coming in the closest possible communication with the divinity which a person can attain. In this plan only everything holds together and presents order, harmony, and beauty.
But, if the real substantial presence of the Theanthropos was necessary in order to bring human personality to the highest possible union and communication with the infinite, and thus realize the end of the external
action, it was also required that the being and actions of human personality might be elevated to the dignity, excellence, and value of theanthropic being and acts. In the hypostatic union, human nature and all the inferior natures which it eminently contains, as connected in the person of the Word, are deified, and their acts have the value and dignity of divine acts.
Hence, so far, the end of the external action which is to raise the cosmos in its nature and acts to an infinite dignity by union and communication, is attained. But human personality, not being an element of the hypostatic union, could not acquire in its being and in its acts the dignity and excellence of divine being and acts, and consequently the end of the external action could not by the hypostatic moment be realized as regards the same personality. Here another problem arose in the divine mind—how to raise human personality to such a union with the Theanthropos as, without infringing upon its nature, to raise its being and its acts to the value, excellence, and dignity of theanthropic being and acts, and thus to exhibit in it the most perfect image of the infinite. This problem was resolved by the incorporation of the Theanthropos, under the modifications of bread and wine, in human persons. This plan does not imply an hypostatic union, which would do away with human personality, but a union so strict, so close, and so intimate, as merely to fall short of the hypostatic. For, in it and by it, the Theanthropos, the God made man, in his whole person, composed of body, soul, and divinity, is incorporated in human personalities by the act of eating, and his body pervades their bodies, his blood circulates in their blood, his soul inheres upon and clings to their soul,
his divinity purifies, sanctifies, ennobles, exalts their whole being, and, like food, results in a transformation—a transformation not indeed of the Theanthropos into the flesh and blood of the human person, as it happens with ordinary food, but a transformation of the human person into the body, blood, soul, and almost divinity of the Theanthropos. “Cresce et manducabis me, nec tu me mutabis in te sed tu mutaberis in me.”[87] The fathers have endeavored to express the intimacy of the union by adopting various similitudes. Some have likened it to a piece of glass when impregnated by the rays of the sun, and appearing like a smaller sun. Others have compared it to the action of fire upon iron, which, when heated and become red hot, looks exactly like fire, and could fulfil the functions of fire. St. Cyril of Alexandria has chosen the similitude of two distinct pieces of wax, which when melted and mingled together are so intimately united as to form one single piece, defying every possible recognition of their former separation. But all these similitudes, possible as they may be, can never express the mysterious intimacy and closeness between human personalities and the Theanthropos in the eucharistic banquet.
Now, how does this resolve the problem? Most perfectly. The infinite intends to exhibit in human personalities an image, an expression of himself as pure and as perfect as possible—an image of his being and of his life or action in obedience to the end of the external action, always preserving the conditions of human personalities. Now, what does the cosmos of personalities when united to the Theanthropos in the mystery of the Eucharist, when pervaded
by him, when so closely and so intimately united to him as to feel his flesh come in contact with their flesh, his blood glowing in their blood, his heart beating against their hearts, his mind illumining and guiding their minds, his will captivating and mastering their will, his divinity ennobling and exalting their whole being and faculties—I say, when the cosmos of personality is thus united to the Theanthropos, does it not represent most vividly the infinite being of God? Does the infinite in looking at such a cosmos see anything but as it were one Theanthropos filling and pervading all?