[p. 501]

...and [for] the festival of intelligible beings, having abated the flood of sins, having multiplied the ranks of the righteous; among whom also the greatest born of women, the mediator of grace and the Law: Give ineffable blessing! Soldier of the King of heaven, herald of the kingdom: ask that an ascent be set in the heart [to go] from this vale of sorrow to the vowed dominical place promised to the children of men: Give blessing! Servant of the Father’s Heir and worshipper from the womb; Forerunner and Baptist of Him who is the expiator of our sins: be an intercessor before the same Compassionate One, to blot out the record of our transgressions: Give blessing! You dawned [as] light from the Father, the quickener of this our dead nature; You sent as forerunner Saint John, the preacher of life: through his supplication, Almighty One, receive our entreaties: Give blessing! A luminous path ascended to heaven for the holy, earth-formed angel; make us worthy of his narrow and strait way, that, being followers of him, [we may see] the Father...