71. Cf. 1 Pt 2.6, quoting Is 28.16. 72. Cf. 2 Cor 12.2-4. (continued)
TRACTATE 7 177 could not speak to you as spiritual men but only as carnal, as to little ones in Christ. I gave you milk to drink, not solid food."^' Look, he who had ascended descended. Seek where he had ascended: "Up to the third heaven." Seek where he had descended: To giving milk to little ones. Hear that he descended: "I became a little one," he says, "in your midst, as if a nurse were fondling her own children."'* (5) For we see both nurses and mothers descend to little ones; and though they know how to speak Latin, they clip their words and somehow switch their speech so that they may be able to compose childish cajoleries from eloquent language; for if they should speak correctly, the infant does not hear with understanding but neither does he benefit. And some eloquent father, if he should be so great an orator that his tongue thunders through the forum and rattles the magistrates' platforms, if he should have a son, when he returns home, he puts aside the forensic eloquence by which he had ascended and with childish tongue he descends to his little one.
(6) Hear in one passage the Apostle himself ascending and descending, in one sentence: "For if," he says, "we were transported in mind, [it was] for God; if we are in control of ourselves, [it is] for you."'^ What does it mean, "We were transported in mind, [it was] for God"? That we might see "words which it is not granted to man to speak." What does it mean, "we are in control of ourselves for you"? "Have I judged myself to know anything among you, but Jesus Christ, and him crucified?" If the Lord himself ascended and descended, it is clear that his preachers also ascend by imitation and descend by preaching.
24. And if we have kept you a little too long, it was our intention that the troublesome hours pass by. For we think that those men" have now finished their vanity. We, however, brothers, when we have been fed by healthful banquets, let us do what remains that we might fulfill the Lord's day solemnly
73. Cf. 1 Cor 3.1-2. 74. Cf. 1 Thes 2.7. 75. Cf. 2 Cor 5.13. 76. Cf. 1 Cor 2.2. 77. Some codices have "those women."