--
The origin of all things is the Son of God: ‘All things came into being through Him.' That is why he is also the original Model which all other creatures imitate, because he is the authentic and perfect Image of the Father. According to the Epistle to the Colossians: ‘He is the Image of the invisible God, the First-born of every creature, for by Him were all things created.' However, in a special way, he is also the original Model of all the graces which glow in spiritual beings, according to what is said to the Son in Psalm 110: ‘in the beauties of holiness from the womb of the morning: thou hast the dew of thy youth.' Because he was engendered before any other creature by the ultimate grace, he innately possesses the splendours of all the saints to perfection. Because this divine Model was very distant from us, he wished to become Man in order to offer human beings a model they might imitate.