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Lorsque le document est trop grand pour Strs reproduit en un seul cliche, il est film* S partir da Tangle sup*rieur gauche, de gauche * droite. et de haut en bas. en prenant le nombre d'imegea necessaire. Les diagrammcs suivants illustrent le methode. 1 2 3 1 2 3 4 5 6 MICROCOPY RtSOlUTION TBT CHART (ANSI and ISO TEST CHART No. 2) 1.0 I.I ^ ■ 2.8 \iO *^* |d3 ■ 12 ■ 3.6 m I u 1 4.0 1 2.2 12.0 1.8 A /1PPLIED IIVMGE Inc ^s t653 Eoit Main StrM« S Rochester, New York 14609 USA (716) 482 -0300 -Phone (716) 288-5989 - Fok J^ m PP iK^'. :^^ «i m %^. m c t: ■M •■' m TORONTO PUBUC LffiRARIES REFERENCE LIBRARY _ **--»« ^^t VIRGIN BY R«v. Q. M. Go> ^-^yx^ on IS ■^.. THE VIR.GIN. ir4.f I Why Do Protestants NOT Invoke the Virgin? By Rev. G. M. GODTS. C.SS.R. New Edition. 5th Thousand. BRANDOM, MANITOBA: E. I.. Christie, Fine Book and Job Printer. 1901 , ry L— TO INVOKE THE VIRGIN MARY THEY DEEM UNLAWFUL, OPPOSED TO SCRIP- TURE, NAY, EVEN IDOLATROUS. II.— THEY CAN DO WITHOUT HER ASSIS- TANCE, FOR THERE IS ONE GODy AND ONE MEDIATOR BETWEEN GOO AND MEN, THE MAN CHRIS! JESUS— {I Tim. IL 5.) III.— THEY ARE AFRAID TO PLACE THE VIRGIN TOO HIGH. impkimati'k: ADEL. I.ANCiKVIN, Archb. of St. Boniface, JOS. STKYBOL, Sup. Prov. WHY DO PROTESTANTS NOT Invoke i he Virgin ? Man as a rational being, should follow the dictates of his reason, be guided in his actions by his reason, and not be led by mere feeling or blind passion. Whenever he acts wilfully and with reflection, he should know the reason for doing so. Above all, in reli-ious matters, which are of the highest moment, he should not act incouf derately. One is the way, the TRUTH and the light. He who follows him does not walk in the dark. Our reason, sound and rignt, enlightened by faith, should alone direct our steps, whereas faith is for the eyes of the soul what light is for the eyes of the body. . ^ Why do not Protestants invoke the Blessed Virgin . They believe in saints, give the names of saints to their churches, to their obJdren, but still live quite 6 THE VIRGIN. .11! independent of those powerful creatures of God. Far less homage still do they render the Virgin Mary, and even hold as Pagans and Idolators those who honor the Mother of God. What is their ground for doin^ so ? Catholics say for their part: We adore God alone, but we beg of the saints to intercede for us that our prayers more humble and more favorable may rise to the throne of the Most High. To prove this assertion let us open any Catholic Prayer- Book, take the Litany of the Blesstd Virgin, for instance, and you will read: "Lord, Aave mercy on us; Christ, have mercy on us, etc.. Holy Mary, pray for us;" because it is only in the Lord's power to have mercy on us, but the saints can implore that mercy for us. All prayers to the saints and even to the Blessed Virgin conclude with the words: through Christy our Lord—through the same Jesus Christy Thy Soh^ our Lord. ^ I Are Catholics, therefore, right or wrong ? I.— Can we not implore the help of the saints in THE VIRGIN. ♦ heaven as we do that of the living here on earth ? Is one to be called a heathen or an idolator if he be- seeches a pious neighbor to pray for him? Does not St. Paul say in his Epistle to the Romans (XV. 30.) : I beseech you, brethren, for the Lord Jesus Christ's sake, and for the love of the Spirit, that ye strive together with me in your prayers to God for me\ and to the Ephesians (VI. 18.): praying at' all times in spirit and for me, that I may open my mouth with confidence to make known the mystery of the Gospel P To the Colossians he writes (IV. 2-3): Be in- stant in prayer . . . .praying withal for me also. He thus finishes his first letter to the Thessalonians (V. 25.): Brethren pray for us; and like supplications may be found in many other places. Did not Almighty God Himself order the friends of Job to beg that holy man to pray for them? He even promised to hear his prayer: and my servant Job shall pray for you, for him will I accept, but I deal with you of ter your folly . (Job, XLII. 8.) This needs no proof ; it is practised every day and everywhere. St. Paul says to Timothy (I. Cor. 11^ 5.): There is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus. Yes, indeed, our dear Redeemer, as St. Paul adds: Who gave himself a ransom for all, first of all for Mary, the masterpiece of this redemp- tion, and for the saints. The saints themselves have to obtain favors for us through Jesus Christ, through Him and through Him alone. Jesus is the only media- 8 THE VIRGIN. tor; the Blessed Virgin, the angels and saints are secondary ones. If Jesus alone was strictly the only mediator to intercede for us, then no living one could even pray for us. Is the child less recommended to God because it prays through its mother and with her? And were the Jews less united to God when they were united to Him through Moses? If, according to Scripture, to common sense and to the daily practice of Protestants, we can beg of a living person to pray for us, why can we not also beg of the saints in heaven to do so? This ought to be for one of the three following reasons: The saints do not know of our prayers; they do not pray for us; or God does not heed their prayers. Now, the Holy Scriptures show us just the contrary. lo. The saints DO KNOW about our prayers and our wishes. We are sure by divine revelation that the saints and angels know of them at least by a manifestation of Almighty God. Did not Jesus say: (Luke XV. 7, 10.) joy shall be in heaven .... There is joy in the presence of the angels of God over one sinner that repenteth. Did not the Angel Raphael say to Tobias (XII. 12.) : When thou didst pray -with tears^ and didst bury the dead^ I- THE VIRGIN. 9 and didst leave thy dinner, and hide the dead by day in thy house, and bury them by night, I OFFERED THY PRAYER TO THE LORD? And did not St. John in the Revelation see the angel offering up to God the prayers of all saints upon the golden altar which was before the throne P (VIII. 3.) 2o. The Spirits of Heaven DO intercede for us. We see by the Prophecy of Zacharias ( I. 12.) how the angel interceded for the people of Israel, and in the Prophecy of Daniel we read of the solicitude of the angels that each should intercede for his own people. (Dan. X.) 3o. God DOES LISTEN to their prayers. Onias and Jeremias, not being then in heaven, but only in limbo, prayed for the people in Israel, took care of them and obtained for them graces. Again, we read in the second book of Machabees (XV. 12.) that Judas Machabee received from Jeremias a golden sword with which he (Machabee) obtained the victory. The vision was in this manner: Onias holding np his hands, prayed for all the people of the Jews. After this there reappeared also another mav, admirable for age, and glory, and environed with great beauty and majesty. Then Onias .. said: ....this is he that prayeth much for the people and for all the holy city, Jeremias the Prophet of God. Whereupon Jeremias stretched forth his right hand and gave to Judas a sword of gold saying : Take 10 THE VIRGIN. this holy szvord, a gift from God, where-with thou shalt overt hrozu the adversaries of my people Israel. (1). St. Peter (II. Pet. I. 15 ) promises to pray for his people after his death. How could he do so if he was not sure he ?ould know about them, pray for them and God would listen to his prayer ? St. John in the Revelation (V. 8.) saw not only the prayers offered, but the spirits of heaven praying, four and twenty elders fell down before the Lamb . . having- . .golden vials full of odors, which are the prayers of saints. When the Patriarch Jacob solemnly blessed Joseph's sons, Manasseh and Ephraim, did he not say. The angel which redeemed me from all evil, bless the lads! (Gen. XLVIII. 16.) In St. Matthew the angels are mentioned as taking care of the little ones, etc. The heavenly citizens know then what is going on upon earth; they pray for those who travel through life; and whilst we, passengers in this world, must pray for one another, and recommend ourselves to one another's prayers, (as the Bible tells us in a hundred different places, and the Apostles taught by their example), can we not recommend ourselves to our brethern who love us in heaven ! '* If a saint on earth, " according to the incontestable assertion of John Huss, "can benefit another believer and the whole church by his intercession, how foolish it would be to say that one who is with Christ in glory could not do the (i) 'I'he Book of Tobias and of the Machabees can be admitted at le.ast as historical records of the usaifes and prevalent traditions among the Jews, even by Protestants. THE VIRGIN. 11 same!" (1). And Luther: *«You may ask then, what shai: we do with the saints? You shall do with them as you do with your neighbor. Just as you say to your neighbor, pray to God for me; in like manner you may say here, dear St. Peter, pray for me. You commit nc sin by invoking this or any other saints" (2). Therefore, it was the common practice from the beginning to invoke the intercession of the angels and sahits. In the creed it is said every day: / believe in the communion of saints. Not to call on the saints is to deny the communion of the militant, laboring church here on earth with the gloricus triumphant church in heaven, both under the one Head Christ Jesus and in communication with one another. This life-union, this COMMUNION OF SAINTS, the Apostles preached to the world, was believed and practiced in all centurie s engraven on the stones of the catacombs and on all the monuments of the Apostolic churches. II.— Do Catholics adore images? Certainly not. Any little child studying catechism knows that. There is not a Christian who adores images; if he did so he would no longer be a Christian and, if a Catholic, he would be expelled from the church. But must one be styled a heathen for having images to recall to his mind angels or saints? No more than when a statue of Queen Victoria or Washington is placed in a House of Parliament, or one (i) Neander "Hist, of the Christ. Hel." Vol. V. )1 irchen PostillJ. B. raR, Ih. II., p. i^, Wilte.iberjr. 12 THE VIRGIN. keeps the portraits of his forefathers, or has those of a dear friend. We are not pure spirits, and since we are so often distracted by our senses, by our senses also we mu.«t be helped. St. Stephen of Auxence, when brou«:ht before the wicked Emperor Copronymus, wha reproached him with the use of ima.ires, said, "Sire, we give honor to the name the statue wears; who among the faithful thinks of worshipping the material, gold, brass or wood V But, " added he, "why do you insult Christ and his blessed mother, breaking and burning their images ?"—" Do we insult God?" replied the Emperor, ' ' when we despise image? ? God forbid !" Then, to confound him, the saint took a coin: "Whose figure and whose inscription':"' said he, "is this y"- "The Emperor's," replied all the bystanders. The saint threw the coin on the ground and walked on it. The officers in fury fell upon him. If the Emperor pretended not to insult Christ in his image, why did. he pretend that Ste]ihen insulted him in his coin. The martyr was put to death, a. d. 767. Goif Himself commands Moses (Ex. XXV. 18, 19) : Thoti shall make ln'o ehcruhim of beaten work, on the tivo ends of the mcrcyseat and make one cherub of gold on the one end and the other cherub on the other end — TV, O STATUES. — Then he enters into the most minute details about the propitiatory wherewith the ark is to be covered. Now, this ark was only a figure of the Virgin Mary who had to bear God become man, and who is. called: ark of the covenant. THE VIRGIN. i:i Again (Numb. XXI. 8.) : And the Lord said unto Moses: Make thee a Jiery serpent, and set it upon a pole: whosoeve. being- struck, and shall look on it, shall live. Moses, therefore, made a brazen serpent and set it Jor a sign at -which when they that were bitten lookrd upon, they were healed. Now this brazen serpent was only a fkjure of the Saviour Crucified, as Our Lord himself said : (John III 14 ) as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the son of man be lifted up. And why could we not have a sign of gratitude for the greatest benefit ever bestowed upon us, our Redemption 1 — In St. Paul's, London, England, among the statues and images of great men, after more than three centuries of destruction of images and statues -was placed the crucified Lord between the mjther of sorrows and the beloved disciple St. John. After the Israelites had entered the promised land, when Solomon built the Temple, he also caused two cherubs to be placed over the Ark in the Holy of Holies and others to be carved on the wall. (III. Kings VI. 23, 29.) "The images of the saints are incensitives to virtue in the same way as edifying discourses are; a picture is a compressed history, which directs our thought towards our Heavenly Father." (1) Therefore the Roman Catechism says : '' As Christ the Lord and His most holy and pure mother, and all the other saints have been endued with human natur.., and have borne the human (i) St. (Jerinaniis, 14 THE VIRGIN. form, it is not only not forbidden by the first command- ment to paint and honor their images, but it has always been decreed a holy practice, and a most certain proof of a grateful mind; a position which is confirmed by the monuments of the apostolic age, general councils, and the writings of so many holy and very learned Fathers, who are of one mind upon the subject. " Luther reasons: "Now I know positively that God wishes we should hear and read his works, especially the Passion of Christ. But if I shall hear it or think on it, it is impossible chat I do not make a picture of it IN MY HEART. Whether I wish or do not wish, when I hear of Christ, a picture of a man presents itself to my heart, hanging on a cross; just as my face reflects in water, if I look into it. If it is no sin, but praiseworthy, that I have the picture of Christ in my heart, why should it be a sin if I have it in my eye ?" (1). Thanks to God, there is a church to show us the right way. Behold: the saints lived in the same world where you live, they had to fight against the same demon as you have, they had to struggle against a more wicked world than you have, they lived in the same frail flesh as you ; do as they did, call them to your aid, they will understand you, feel for you and help you. Besides, to obtain graces and favors from the Lord, we must go by the way He Himself has appointed. From all this, it follows that the invocation of the (i) Bucher vincl Schriften, m. Thcil, p. «. THE VIRGIN. 15 saints is far from being: unlawful or opposed to Scripture. Listen to Dr Quigley on invocation of the saints. (1). "God has bestowed upon His heavenly spirits the honor to minister to Him. " " It is His love for His saints, His friends, that leads Him to employ them in His service, that gives them the high honor of being intercessors for us." «'The fact, thatGod does employ the saints and angels as agents and ministers in carrying on His mediatorial work, is indisputable. If any thing is clear and certain from the Holy Scriptures, it is this. It is implied m the very fact of the Incarnation, which makes the ^ creature one with the Creator. It is only the universal extension of the sacerdotal principle which under- Ues all religion, and cannot be denied without denying the very principle of the Christian order. Even Protestants when they send a note to their minister asking him to pray, and the congregation to pray for a sick or dying friend, or for a family, or an individual in great affliction, recognize, whether they know or not, the sacerdotal principle, the very principle on which rests the invocation of saints. We can, of course, ask God directly for whatever we think we have need of ; but when we ask also the saints to ask a) lately appeared the learned dissertation : IPSE. IPSA..IPSLM. by Richard QU 2Ze? lT B.. B.rrister.at.Law. In th.s beautiful work the Ooct-e o our Lady ,s so full of interest and force that many pass.ges have been borrowed w.llmut undergoing any change. 16 THE VIRGIN. Him for us, we are in accordance with His love for tliem, and unite with Him in honoring them, by engag- ing them in working out His design. We honor God in honoring with our love and confidence those whom He de- lights to love and honor; and in invoking their prayers, we enlist, in aid of our own prayers, the prayers of those whose sanctity renders them dear to our Lord and God." .'« In Theology, as in Philosophy, in order to under- stand any specific doctrine, ii is necessary, first to have mastered, at least in the way of clear apprehension, (that is to have understood) the great main idea which constitutes its intellectual basis. Now,— what is the dogmatic teaching of the Catholic Church with regard to the saints y — We find it embodied in the solemn de- clarations of her highest tribunal. The Council of Trent declares that the saints, reigning with Christ, offer up their prayers to God, for men ; that it is good AND USEFUL suppliantly to invoke them, and to have recourse to their prayers, help and assistance, in order to gain favor from God through His son Jesus Christ, our Lord, w^lio is our only Redeemer and Saviour." "Our whole doctrine and practice, in this particular, as fully understood by every child, is expressed in the three following propositions:" lo. "We give to God alone, on account of his infinite perfection, the supreme homage of adoration, which is due to Him alone. "With this kind of service properly THE vmr.iN. 17 due to the Divinity, we neither worship, nor teacli to worship, other than the one God. " (St. Augustine). 2o. 'We honor angels and saints as God's servants and friends, with a homage which they receive as such, and which is altogether different from that .vhich we pay to God. " 3o. "We honor in an especial manner AMON(i the SAINTS, the Virgin Mother, Queen of angels and saints, ON ACCOUNT OF HEK EMINENT SANCTITY and HER SUB- LIME AND MOST INTIMATE RELATIONSHIP WITH THE ADORABLE TRINITY. This special honor which we pay to the Virgin Mother of God is the homage paid to the most highly privileged creature, but as a creature, and therefore never to be compared with the worship which we give to God. " St. Alphonsus, the great Jurist, Philosopher and Theologian of the last century, sums it up in this man- ner: **It is not only lawful but useful to invoke the saints and pray to them and more especially to the Queen of saints, the most holy and ever Blessed Virgin Mary, in order that they may obtain for us divine grace;— this is an article of faith, and has been defined by general Councils against heretics who condemned it as injurious to Jesus Christ, our only mediator;— but, if a Jeremias after his death prayed for Jerusalem ; iC the ancients of the Apocalypse presented the prayers of the saints to God; if a St. Peter promises his disciples that after his death he will be mindful of them : if a 18 THE VIRGIN. holy Stephen prays for his persecutors; if a St. Paul prays for his companions; if, in line, the saints can pray for us, why cannot we beseech the saints to inter- cede for us? St. Paul recommends himself to the prayers of his disciples: Brethren pray for us. St. James exhorts us: /Voyowc/orawoMfr. (V. 16.) Then, we can do the same. " Again; Moses interposed between God and His people, and obtained their pardon; another time Aaron was spared; Moses* interposing anew with God, his prayer disarms God's wrath, and no pestilence is sent. Now, if God granted so many graces in consideration of the intercessory office of Moses, yet a pilgrim on earth, and being only his servant, will he not grant graces to us in consideration of the interposition of Mary, His Mother in heaven V S II And indeed, if invoking the saints' assistance is law- ful and useful, why would it not be for the Queen of a'l angels and saints? Does not God Himself point her out to us? Read the first page of the Holy Scriptures, the history of the fall of man and the promise of Redemption ; and there you will find the first sin of man, first mercy, first promise of a Redeemer and first mention of Mary. THE VIRGIN. 19 God speaks to the serpent: (Gen. III. 15.) / ^vtll put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy heaJ, and thou shall bruise his heel. Whether you read // shall bruise, or, she shall bruise, refering to the woman or her son, who is that chosen woman? Behold, the great Mother of God, the pure immaculate Blessed Virgin Maryl For centuries before, God sends his prophets to pro- claim the glory of the great mother of the Messiah, the God-man and Saviour of mankind. In those times, why was sterility in a woman looked upon as a misfortune i nd a shameV It made her lose the hope to be one of the ancestors of that promised Messiah. When the fulness of time was comc^ as St. Paul says, (Gal. IV.), a heavenly messenger is sent by the Blessed Trinity, he goes to that lumble maiden and salutes her: Hail full of ^race, the Lord is with thee. Grace was lost for sinful mankind. Thou hast found graec. says the angel. Mother of Jesus, spouse of the Holy Ghost, Mary brings forth the infant Josus in a stable at Bethlehem. Angels from heaven carry the joyful tidings; poor shepherds come and adore Jesus: the Magi, called from the East by the Star, come with their presents and also adore Jesus, but wherer— on what throne?— on the knees, in tho lap of Mnryl Mary speaks coutideutly to Jesus, when she Hnds 20 THE VIKGIN. Him in the temple, she calls Him Son; Jesus was obedient to her and to his foster-father, St. Joseph, and was subject unto them. (Luke II. 51.) Mary obtains the first miracle at the wedding-feast of Cana. Apparently rebuked, Mary obtains, and, for her, Jesus anticipates his time to work miracles. Jesus saith unto her. Woman, zvhat have I to do with thee? Mine hour is not yet come. His mother saith unto the servants : Whatsoever he says unto you, do it, (John II. 45.) Actions speak louder than words. While our Lord said that His hour had not yet come, still His mother knew that He would perform the miracle she suggested, and His first miracle, the changing of water into wine, was then and there performed at her suggestion (1). Then Jesus was on earth: now His hour is come; now He glorifies His Mother in heaven: what now! When one'calls upon Her, she will say in heaven: they have no wine; "they are in need of divine love." If by working that miracle, at the intercession of Mary, the conversion of men occurred, as is related in the Gospel, will He not now, through the same Holy Virgin, con- vert men from sin to righteousness, from vice to virtue? iVnd, one of the last words Jesus spoke, dying on tiie Cross, looking upon the disciple, was: behold thy Mother. Woman, behold thy Son; Woman!] the WOMAN foretold from the beginning of the world, (1) Thhlint rei.mik i»of Ilev. D. Stuarl Moore, D.D., Presbyterian Minister, South Church, PhiUtlcl|ihia. THE VIllGIN. 21 who had to come and crush the serpent s head; the ..Oman who, as a new Eve, had with the new Adam to contribute to the restoration of mankind; the v;oma„ the type of womanly perfection; the powerful u^o,nan the great woman, who had to repair the damage caused by the fallen woman; the woma,,, above all women and men, most holy, powerful, and privileged; the woma« deserving above all, of all the favors and graces on the part of her beloved Son; the ^voman of the prnneval prophecy, new Eve, true mother of the living. When any one reads these rapturous words, the be- ginning of the Gospel of St. John: In thebcgnunug was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the W ord was God All things were made by him.. In hnn "^^''^'^fj and further on: And the J^Wtt-a.v ,W. //c.v//, should he not fall down on his knees in admiration and thanks- ^' An^Anglican gentleman traveled in the Holy Land; putting his foot on this sanctified ground, he could not help kneeling down to kiss that soil whereupon the Redeemer left his footstep. And shall we not lift up our voice to that Redeemer: Blessed is the xvomb that bare thee! Jesus declared (Luke XL 27.) : J^a rather, blessed are they that hear the word God, and keep it and pray, whoever heard it better than Mary V As St. Luke says (II. 5L) : his mother kept all these sayings in her heart. Indeed the Virgin herself was more blessed by conceiving Christ in her heart by faith, than by conceiving Him in her womb alone. Therefore ! S2 THE VIRGIN. Venerable Bede says: "She is blessed because she ministered to the Incarnate Word in the time, but hence far more blessed because she remained the eternal watch woman always to love Him." St Luke begins the preface of his Gospel, saying : he relates the facts even as they delivered them unto us which from the beginning were eye-witnesses^ and ministers of the Word. Mark that significent phrase, so emphatically repeated, from the beginning. Who was such an eye- witness from the beginning? None but Mary. The learned Protestant commentator Grotius has observed "that St. Luke seems to have mentioned this fact of Mary 's habit of thoughtful meditation upon the words and deeds of her Divine Son and others in His regard, precisely because she was the authority from whom he had received the narrative that he was recording. Mary was the only witness who could speak to the very foundation of the Christian Faith. Her pure heart is thus our Lord's first Gospel. In that virginal and maternal heart, now consecrated by a whole life of silence, of humility, and of holy reserve, we read transcribed by St. Luke, the account of the Incarnation of the Son of God. To that event as to their basis, all the other events and all the other evangelical mysteries refer. Whence the beautiful saying of St. Ildephonsus, when he calls the Blessed Mother: "God's Evangelist, under whose discipline the Word made a child was brought up. ' ' ii THE VIRGIN. 28 Liet us pass over these facts just mentioned from the Gospel. Bethlehem had witnessed the accomplishment of the most tender and loving mystery of Christ's religion. The shepherds of Bethlehem came with haste, and found Mary and Joseph, and the babe lying in a manger^ (Luke II. 16). And the Magi, "when they were come into the ^ house, they saw the young child with Mary his mother, and fell down and zvorshipped Him. (Matthew II. 11). •'Behold," says St. Ambrose, "behold the beginning of the rising Church." Through whom is the manifestation of the Son of God made? Through whom does the Church of Christ commence its exist- ence? It was through Mary the Mother of the Infant Son of God. He had taken upon Himself our infirm- ity, and adopted our weakness ; He could not either .stand or speak : Mary therefore was obliged to support Him, to be his interpreter, explain to others His will, and become the voice of the eternal Word. If the Shepherds returned, glorifying and praising God for all the thing that they had heard and seen, (Luke II. 20), from whom did they hear them? Was it not from Mary? Therefore it was through the ministry of Mary that her Divine Son was presented first to the Jewish nation and afterwards to the Gentiles in the adoration of the Magi, and Jesus was acknowledged as true man and true God, the long expected Redeemer, the Savioiir of man- kind, through Mary, and Mary being the first evan- 24 THE VIRGIN. gelist and the first apostle of her Divine Son, was de- servingly entitled to be called : * 'Queen of the Apostles. ' ' Again when Jesus manifested himself by his first miracle, was it not through Mary? Jesus manifested forth his glory : and his disciples believed in him (John II. 11.) And in the Acts of the Apostles we read that the apostles and disciples of Jesus Christ, after the^JAscen- sion of our Saviour, were persevering in prayer with Mary, the Mother Jesus (Acts I. 14). Now, whereis Jesus worshipped? Where, indeed, do you find the Blessed Sacrament, the Stations, the devotions to the Holy Cross, with an especial feast for all the mysteries, nay, the very instruments of the passion, the precious blood, the Sacred Heart?— In the Roman Catholic Church. Outside of it is there what is called devotion to Jesus? An Anglican minister on board a steam-boat very unfairly argued with a respectable Catholic young lady. He had intruded upon the company of this lady as she was sitting alone, on the deck, reading: '* You don 't realize Jesus, ' ' said he. The lady calmly answer- ed: "I think we do," pointing out what is done for Jesus in the Church. Protestants boast of calling upon the Lord ; tell us what YOU do for the Lord ; compare your devotion to Catholic devotion, and you shall learn that the Lord is almost forgotten by you. Take for instance daily Mass alone. Count the THE VI KG IN. 25 crowds who fro daily to early Mass. " Public worship among Catholics has never been confined to one day of each week as among Protestant. Taking the Protestant religion as a whole in the various countries where it prevails, and through the three centuries of its existence, it has been remarked that the buildings set apart for public worship have generally been closed from Sunday to Sunday (1)." But precisely because Catholics adore Jesus, they do not act indifferently towards his mother. Because they honor Him, they honor He)-, and because they love Him, they love Her, and the more they honor and love Her, and the nearer they come to Her, the closer they are united to Him. But to say : I call on the Lord and despise his mother, is blindness and profanation. I know only one Lord. He was. He is and remains the Son of Mary for ever (2). I) The Ritual of the New lesia.nent. T. E. Bridsett. C. SS. R. Part ., c. ., V *^)- ,z) "lean understina Catholic .hurche. h.\.^ called " Mary Churches" hy some extern or Ritualist, who knows nolhins about the presence of the RIessed Sacrament, and who seesalar^re in.a^^e of onr Blessed I.ady surrounde.l bv ea^^er -PI' '^ " ^J engaired: rand meditation to their .nestin.able spiritual advantage . M.t by what po^ iication he couM be led to call an Anglican edihce a "Jesus I hurch it utterly I .ers one to co,. . >re. Is it in an An^lica,, edifice, then, that he would see a colossal iinajje .£ Christ crucif.e.l, and a ci ucitix placed conspicuous v over eacu of the numerous altars (like in every Catholic Church)! I-ook at the c.is, raceful scene enacted in England. It was simply a quesiio,. .vhether an imasie of our D.v.ne i.or« on the cross shall he tolerated on the altar or in the sanctuary. The Hishop of I.ondon refused to interfere, and the Dean and Chapter of St. Paul's have been compelled to appeal to the Attorney -(General. This is perfectly proper. The Royal arms or a bust othersracious Majesty, the Queen, who is the head of the KnKlish Rstabl.shme»t. instead of the crucifix; Of course; and the first law officer in the State is the proper person to look after the Sovereigns . ijihts in this regard, and to help the Bishon to dec.de the question. Giv< to Cesar ivAat hehnirs to C>.-r<*r-and eyervthinK "belongs to Cesar 26 THE VIRGIN. M- '•The Incarnation casts off two rays of light; on the one side, the mystery of the Holy Sacrifice of the Altar: on the other, the devotion due to the blessed mother of Jesus. The Shepherds of Bethlehem from the hill-sides, the Magi from the East, come to adore the newly-born God. Tiny found the young child with Mary, His Mother; they found him resting in His mother's arms, on his appointed throne. They antici- pate that very form of worship which Catholics have retained and Protestants rejected. It was, indeed, one of Mary's greatnesses and benedictions, that her Divine Son thought lit to manifest Himself in an age and con- dition which obliged Him to manifest her with Him. Thus it is a right belief about the Divine Maternity of Mary which is the most perfect safeguard and security of the doctrine of the Incarnation. The whole of the Christian religion depends upon this doctrine, and the one true and only sovereign remedy against the decomposition of this fundamental truth is to be found in the dogma of the Divine Maternity— Mary, of xvhoni ',vas horn fesus^ in the Enjrlisli State Church. Ajr:,in: at the so-c.illed Reformation, alUirs were every- where converted into co.n.nunion tables. The very word "alfcir" is not to be found in the autli.vi/ed Book of Common Prayer, l,ii| a "convenient and decent U.ble" \» providec. by the State Canon. The Privy Council, which is above the Lambeth Conference, decided that in the Church of Englind there was "no lonRer an alUr of sacrihce, but merely a table at which the communicants were to partake of the Lord's Sup,,er ; that the term a//ar is never used to describe it, and there is an express declaration at the end of the service ajjainst the doctrine of transubstantiation, wiUi which the ideas of an altar and sacrifice are closelv connected." In a word, take ou» of an Anglican Church, wh.' is there contrary to "lawful authority" i;i tht Church of Kn^land, and one might a.-, well give the appellation "Jesus Church" to a Mohatn medan Mosque «(> far as visible emblems are concerned." THE VIRGIN. 27 Cardinal Newman writes: •*If the continual prayer of a just mar. .vaileth much, if faithful Abraham was required to pray for Abimelech, if patient Job was to pray for his friends , if meek Moses, by lifting up his hands, turned the battle in favor of Israel, against Amalek, why should we wonder at hearing that Mary, the only spotless child of Adam's seed, has a transcendent influence with the God of grace! If the Gentiles at Jerusalem sought Philip, because he was an apostle, when they desired access to Jesus, and Philip spok»; to Andrew, who was still more highly favored with our Lord's confidence, is it strange that the mother should have power with the Son distinct in kind from that of the purest angel and the most triumphant saint! If we have faith to admit the Incarnation itself, we must admit it in its fulness: if the Creator comes on earth in the form of a servant and a creature, why may not His mother on the other hand rise to be the Queen of Heaven, and be clothed with the snu, and have the moon under her feet r (Revel. XII. 1.) If you believe that Jesus Christ has becoms man you must believe that Mary is the Mother of God; if you deny practically that she is the Mother of God, you refuse to honor her as the Mother of God, you deny the Incarnation. There is no middle course possible. We should not dissolve Christ as the Ai>ostle says. Jesus is God and man in one person and Mary is as much His mother as any woman is the mother of 28 THE VIRGIN. her own son. "How God can descend to take human nature is a mystery which none but He Himself can fully comprehend. All we know or can pretend to know, is the fact that He '^^,s done so, and thus, al- though our Creator, has become our bkother, flesh of our flesh, that we might be made partakers of His Divine nature, and live forever in a true society with Him. " "Now, Mary, as the Mother of God, is something more than an ordinary woman... If God has distin- guished her from all other women, shall not we distin- guish her from all other women and honor her as His mother! What higher honor could God confer on a creature than he has conferred on ^laryy We are to love and honor the Son as we love and honor the Father, and we are to love and honor Him in His Sacred Humanity no less than in His Divinity. We cannot worship Jesus in His Divine nature only, and refuse to worship Him in His human nature. He is one Christ, not two — one human, the other Divine. He is two forever dis- tinct natures in one person, to be loved and honored alike in both natures, and therefore in her from whom He took His human nature. We cannot honor Him without honoring her, nor honor her as His mother, WITHOUT honoring HIM. The two cannot be separat- ed, for the flesh of the Son is of the flesh of the Mother, and both have one and the same nature, and impossible it is to honor the nature of the one without honoring it in the other. We are redeemed only by God... IN THAT VERY NATURE which He took from THF VIRGIN. 20 Mary. Mary is thus called, and rightly called, "thk MOTHER OF GRACE, " for She is that, inasmuch as she is the Mother of whom He took the Sacred Flesh through which grace has been purchased and is com- municated to us." "Let us turn to St. Luke (I. 2ij-iiS). We find that the Incarnation did not take place without Mary's free and voluntary consent. It was asked and given, though not given till an explanation had been demand- ed from God's messenger to Mary and received. There was then a moment when the salvation of the world DEPENDED on the consent of Mary. Man could not be redeemed, satisfaction could not be made for sin, and grace obtained, without the Incarnation, and the Incarnation could not take place without the free, voluntary consent of this humble Jewish maiden. While, then, we are lost in admiration at the infinite condescension of God, that would do such honor to human nature, as in some sort to place Himself in de- pendence on the will of one of our race, to carry into effect His own purpose of infinite love and mercy, we cannot help feeling deep gratitude to Mary for the con- sent she gave. We call her blessed for the ^rm/ things He that is mighty has done to her, and we bless her also for her own consent to the work of redemption. She gave to that work all she had ; she gave her will : she gave her own and only Son to one long passion of thirty -three years, to the agony in the garden, and to the death on the cross. It is true, God had selected I N 80 THE VIRGIN. her from all eternity to be His mother, and had filled her with grace, but neither the election nor the grace took away her free will, or diminished the merit of her voluntary consent. ' ' "She could have refused ; and deserves she no love and gratitude from us, who have hope only throngh her Son, the Son of God, that she did not refuse ? Can we say that she has no peculiar relation to our Re- demption, no share in the work of our Salvation? There- fore TO UEFL^SE TO HONOR Mary as Connected with and sharing in that work of our Redemption is either IMPIETY, IGNORANCE OR INGRATITUDE ; it is to deny redemption and salvation altogether, or to be thorough- ly ignorant of it, or to be ungrateful for it. " "The Incarnation established between Mary and Jesus the real relation o^ Mother and Son. This relation is a subsisting relation, and subsists as really in Heaven as it did when both were on earth. " "Mary is also our mother, the mother of all true Christians. They who never reflect on the Mystery of the Incarnation, and who have no faith in redemp- tion through the Cross, laugh at us when we call Mary Our mother. Yet, she is our mother, and, to say the least, as truly our mother as was Eve herself. By assuming our nature, the Son of God has made Him.self our BROTHER. Hence He is not ashamed to call us BRETHREN. Mary is the mother of Christ, we were raised to brotherhood with Christ her son THE VIHCilN. 31 '*That which we know of God's servants is their work. The work allotted to Mary was the Divine Maternity. Those who admit that this immeasurable gift was hers, yet see nothing in it, who speak as if it was hers by accident, and might have equally been another's — whereas it was hers by an original predes- tination, with her solemn consent, and in concurrence with the plenary grace which prepr^red her for it, — those who believe that not a sparrow falls to the ground without God's will, yet who find nothing note- worthy in the highest elevation to which God has ever advanced the creature formed in His own image, such persons have eyes and see not.'''' Rev. Dr. Moore, quoted above, goes on to say : ' *If we place the relations between Christ and His mother thus, we may ask : Does this relation extend beyond the graved We have seen them together at the cradle, at the temple, at Nazareth and at the cross. We have seen them together for thirty-three years. Now what (j.od has joined together who shall separate or put asunder? When Jesus appeared to Saul He said, 'I am Jpi^'s of Nazareth.' As long as he is Jesus of Nazareth, so long is she Mary of Nazareth, so long is she the mother of Jesus. The title is a God-given one and she must not be robbed of it. The relationship must exist throughout all eternity. " Consequently, "that it is most useful and holy to have recourse to the intercossion of Mary can be doubted only by those who have not faith," as St. Alphonsus [il 32 THE VIUfJiN. says. "Modern heretics cannot bear us to salute and call Mary our Hope. They say that God alone is our hope: and that He curses those who put their trust in creatures: Cursed be the man that trusteth in wan. (Jer. XVII. 5.) Mary, they exclaim, is a creature: and how can a creature be a hope to us':"' If this was the meaning of Jeremiau, m. lovinw- child could call its mother its hope; and all who being in trouble or in distress would go to a protector, or one who calls a member of Parliament, an influential friend, hi.s only hope, or even a sick person whose hope is in a clever doctor, would be accursed, which interpretation is more ban absurd. The Angelical Doctor, St. Thomas, explains the right meaning: "We can place our hope in a person in two ways : as a principal cause, and as a mediate one. Those who hope for a favor from a king, hope for it from him as lord; they hope for it from his minister or favorite as an intercessor. If the favor is granted, it comes prim- arily from the king, but it comes through the instru- mentality of the favorite; and in this case he who seeks the favor is right in calling his intercessor his hope. The King of Heaven, being infinite goodness, desires in the highest degree to enrich us with His graces; but because confidence is requisite on our part, and in order to increase it in us, he has given us His own Mother to be our mother and advocate, and to her He ^f-!:--:^---;i^E*i^ W7 THK VIRGIN. 88 has Riven all power to help us; and therefore He wills that we should repose our hope of salvation and of every blessing in her. Sinners who place their hope in creatures alone, independently of God, and, in order to obtain the friendship and favor of a man, fear not to outrage His divine Majesty, are most certainly accurs- ed by God: but the just who hope in Mary, as Mother of God. in Her who is able to obtain graces and eternal life for them, are truly blessed and acceptable to the heart of God. " (1). Of course, as already observed, Mary has no grace of her own to give us —the only source of grace being from God. The moon being between the sun and tlie earth, reflects to the latter what it receives from the former; in like manner Mary receives the celestial etfu- sions of graces from the Divine Son in order to trans- fer them to us who are on this earth. Bishop Hurst, a Methodist writer remarks: "It should be remembered tliat, according to Roman Catholic theology, the worship paid to Mary is not divine worship, and that all her powers of intercession are due solely to her unique relation to Jesus Christ. "(2). '• Is there any idolatry, apostasy, infidelity or im- piety, in all this? I appeal to even the smouldering spark of that tenderness implanted by God in every man's breast and still more in every woman's. If the (i) "Short Mist, of the Chtiith, (i) The Glories of Miiry. p. lis. 84 THE VIRGIN. 1 Incarnation is the sole fountain of life, grace, and benediction to all God's intelligent creatures, and some receive more and some less from that Divine Treasury, —is it IDOLATRY to hold that she in whom the stupend- ous mystery was actually accomplished, with her own consent, received a fuller measure than others, whose consent was never asked, who approach it from afar, and only accept it by faith? If to touch even the garment of her Creator and Son was to feel the might of His Divinity, so that virtue -went out of Him^ and the weak became strong,— is it idolatry to say that she, who bore Him in her womb, who nourished Him at her breasts, who enfolded Him in her arms, and who caress- ed Him with her lips, was transfigured by a union with the Living God which The Seven Spirits before the Throne would not have been able to endure, and re- ceived from the Almighty the filial embraces which the Seraphim would not have dared to accept? If at the sound of His voice the dead stood up, the winds were hushed, and the demons fled away,— is it idolatry to believe that she, who listened to that voice for thirty years, speaking as it never spoke to man or angel, and revealing unimaginable abysses of light which no other creature could have seen and lived, that she derived some special benefit from what she saw and heard, and that her wisdom transcended all that human thoughts can conceive, because she alone had for her teacher the Uncreated Wisdom of God? If to look, for one brief moment, on His Adorable Face, which is the lio-ht of THE VIRGIN. 35 ? rif- t Heaven, would seem to us the most transporting joy which a creature could ask or obtain ; what is it to have watched that Face with worshipful love day after day and year after year — to have dwelt for weeks and months together in the same house, and sat at the same table — to have touched at one .time His Omnipotent Hand, at another His Sacred Head, to have looked into the eyes of the God-Man and seen the movement of His divine lips, and to have done all this with an unceasing adoration, by day and by night, more perfect than ever was offered to their Almighty King by the greatest princes of the heavenly court':"' "Again: if the share which He assigned to this In- comparable Creature in the work of our Salv'ation was present to His thoughts even at the supreme hour of His agony, so that His last words from the Cross to each of His elect were these: Behold thy Mother? — is it IDOLATRY to rocognize an office to set forth, as to call her our Mother because she was His, and to tremble lest we forfeit the protection which He wills her to ex- tend to all His children and hers y If the Divine Word, by whom all things were made -vas s/t/)Jeet to His own creature, as a child is subject to his mother, and Mary ruled Him who rules the universe,- is it idolatry to suppose that she has any influence over Him now, that He continues to treat her as a Mother, or that He grants requests which she presents to Him in heaven, because He obeyed so promptly those which she ad- dressed to Him on earth r If He wrought His first 36 THE VIRGIN. miracle to give pleasure to her, and to relieve a tran- sient pang which had moved her gentle pity, and if He did this, as she evidently knew He would do, though the hour -Lvas not yet come,, — is it IDOLATRY to suppose that she still continues to call His r ttention to the wants of her clients, or that He continues to supply them at her wordi* If His Sacred Passion was the ex- piation of our guilt, who were not consulted about it. and neither approved nor dissuaded it, but are con- stantly renewing it by our sins, — is it idol\try to praise and exalt her who generously acquiesced, for the love of us, in the death of that dear Son to whom she had given birth y If the Precious Blood which was shed on the cross cancelled death, and satisfied the justice of God,— is it idolatry to assert, as one of the titles to our reverence, that this life-giving Blood, by which we are saved, first flowed in Mary's veins?" "Once more: If to have been only a servant of God shall win such a recompense as it hath not entered into the heart of man to CDnceivc,, — is it IDOLATRY to imagine that auytiiing higher was reserved for her whom H«i chose to be Kis mother? If Catholics have never ceased to adore the Divinity of her Son, and to worship the sacred mysteries of the Trinity and the Incarnation; and if heretics, after professing to refuse devotion to her, only out of reverence for God, have come in every land, to doubt or deny the highest truths of Revelation is it inoTvATiiY to hold that the former proves devo- tion to her TO be the 8afe(u:ard of faith, and to THE VIRGIN. 37 see, in the latter, evidence that men who begin by de- clining to honor the mother are sure to end by blas- pheming the Son?" "Lastly: If Anglicans and Ritualists are distinguish- ed, first, by indiiterence, and then by dislike to the Blessed Mary,— is it idolatry to find in this a verifica- tion of the words which were spoken from the beginn- ing: I -^'U I put enmities between thee and the wo/nan^ and thy seed and her seed, and to remind them of the lessons for them in the peaceful stability of Catholics who honor Mary, compared with the dismal apostasy of those who condemn her!" The Anglo-ritualist Union Review, a publication of the very highest authority, among Protestants themselves, proves this. It says: "Nestorianism" that is the denial of Christ's humanity, "prevails to a very great extent among English Churchmen, and its withering effects are very difficult to shake otf even by those who have long become orthodox in their theoretical creed." Terrible and fearful confes- sion! "It is also true," the Review adds, "iind deserves consideration, that there has been hitherto no marked tendency to heresy on the subject of the Incarnation among Roman Catholics, while where the dignity of the Blessed Virgin has been underrated, heretics have speedily crept in." ' If we look through Europe, " says Newman, ' 'we shall find on the whole, that just those nations and countries 38 THE VIRGIN. have lost their faith in the Divinity of Christ, who have given up devotion to His Mother, and that those on the other hand, who have been foremost in her honor, have retained the true faith. " '■'■Come unto Mc is the consoling invitation of our dear Lord, And surely we do not go less directly to our Redeemer for grace and salvation by g3ing in company with His Blessed Mother. I need not dwell longer on this glaring truth. The subtlest minds have confessed its incomparable beauty, as the purest hearts have done homage to its irresistible attraction. To say nothing of countless saints, in all the long ages of the past, nor of myriads of pure and bright souls known only to God, Mary has counted in modern times among her noblest children and most loving clients such mighty intellects and luminous thinkers as Suarez, Bellarmine, Schlegel, Bossuet, Penelon, Lacordaire. Monsabre, Ward, Harper, Paber, Manning, Newman, Brownson, Marshall, and Leo XIII." If, '"for more than a thousand years, " says the Pro- testant Dr. Mozley, (1) "saints, theologians, martyrs-- the salt of the earth, the men that had held fast the faith and preserved it for us, and that had continually rescued tlie civilized world from relapsing into pre- historic savagery -have done what the simple folk do, " invoke the Mother of God: if "it cannot be doubt ed, " says another protestant author— Dr. Porbes,— "that the great Pathers, who secured and transmitted (i) "I{eiititii:.cc!i.scs" vol. If. p, :;o. THE VIRGIN. 89 •I m our faith, practiced and taught this devotion;" (1) if ' 'what has been for so many centuries esteen^ed by all Christians as a great help in leading a Christian life, ' ' is the frank avowal of another Protestant theologian; "what has been so praised by the saints, what has been so urged upon the faithful by the great Doctors of the Church, what was the comfort and succor of our fathers during the bitter days of persecution;" (2) if devotion to the Mother of God is invariably accompanied by loyalty to the divinity of Jesus Christ, so that "wher- ever the Blessed Virgin is venerated, " to use the words of a fearless and devout Anglican, "there the doctrine of the Incarnation is believed in, wherever her service is neglected, a door is open to all evil and heresy;" (3) if all the great apostles who first planted the seed of the Gospel of Jesus Christ — a St. Augustine in Eng- land, a St. Boni-dce in Germany, a St. Remigius in Gaul, a St. Patrick in Ireland, — with one unanimous accord inculcated it; if the most sainted spiritual writ- ers from St. Augustineof Hippo, to Thomas a Kempis, from St. Francis de Sale; who, Wesley doubts not, "is in Abraham's bosom") to Father Fabre (whose hymns are found in every Protestant hymnal), without a tlitting doubt advocate it; if all the learned theologians and philosophers, the masterminds of their a St. Thomas of Aqu , St. Anselm of Canter- age (i) "Expl;in;iti()iis of llic 39 Articles" :iit. XXII. (.*) " riu Invocation o' .he Saints," II. U. IVicival. (3) Ilev. I. (i. I.ee, D.L). 40 THE VIRGIN. bury, Roger Bacon, Thomas More, and Descartes- uniformly vindicated it; if to-day many of the most luminous intellects in every field of science, literature and art, from Newman to Pasteur, publicly practised It; if, finally, all the countless millions who during the last nineteen hundred years have lived and died hope fully in this faith, and four hundred million Christians to-day in every inhabitable part of the globe subscribe to It (1)- is he not safe who follows it— is he not wrong! who opposes ity Shall any, so-called minister of the Gospel, come then and say it is wrong to call upon the mother of God:- In one of the West Indian Islands an Anglican minister happened to see a sick woman, "Jesus and Mary!" she exclaimed. Noticing by this she was a Catholic, "all right, my dear, said he, call upon the Lord, but Mary! "-excuse the blasphemy, for blas- phemy it was— "Mary is an ordinary woman. " An ordinary woman! God the Father will protest for the glory of His Daughter; God the Son will protest for the honor o! His Mother; God the Holy Ghost will protest for the love of His Spouse; the Prophets of old will stand i p- the angel Gabriel will protest; St. Elizabeth, the poor shepherds and the Magi will raise their voices: Blessed art Thou amongst -vomcn ; All Catholic ages will pro- test: All generations call Thee blessed! Mary reflects (5) ir. (;. Cmmss. THE VIRGIN. 41 upon us the magnificence of God. Her dignity is the highest that can be, as St. Thomas tells us. She is a trophy of Divine love, whereon the Three Blessed Persons have hung all their gifts and prerogatives which a mere creature is capable of receiving. She is clad from head to foot in the beauty of God. He has communicated Himself to her in a manner which words are not able to express. Oh! if so many could but experience tl • power of the divine Mother whom they do not know! Let us pray for them, and let them also pray, and pray earnestly to know Mary. Leave therefore heresy with its abolition of all piety, with its destruction of all that is sweet and tender for a human heart; listen to all generations of men. Did they not experience true consolation and comfort in having recourse to Mary^ III Even while the Blessed Virgin was still alive, l)eople, we are told, came from all around to behold the one who had given birth to that Redeemer ^ ho had died, risen, and sent the Holy Ghost. And therefore the Gospel, which, bear in mind, was partly written whilst the mother of Jesus was still 42 THE VIRGIN, alive, says no more about the Blessed Virgin, of xvJiok /csiis is born. If everything is not written, as the Scriptures ex- pressly testify, do these Scriptures not say enough of Mary from the lirst prediction of the Messiah to the completion of His work, the descent of the Holy Ghost y What more? Mother of God! When the poet describes a picturesque landscape in the bright sunshine, or in the silver beams of the moonlight, does he give a long description of the sun and moon! And when one reads an interesting news wherein there is question of electric light, wire and telephone, are these expressions not sufficient! Mother of fesns, that uloiie tells all, besides all the rest that is said and written. This the first Christians thoroughly under- stood. In the catacombs, where the first Christians foi-i nearly 400 years were hidden from persecution, there' are representations of the Mother of God: the most i frequent is the adoration of the Magi, the figure of the calling of the gentiles; then for instance, Mary in prayer; Mary surrounded by the Apostles, the Annun- ciation, the Visitation, th3 figures of the Old Testa- ment fulfilled in the Ble rl Virgin; allusions to her,! like the Cedar-tree in Lioanus, the Cypress-tree or ' Mount Sion, the Rose of Jericho, the Lily amon- thorns. In the catacombs was preached and taught the| THE VIUOIX. 43 doctrine of the Apostles; would to (Jod that all those who boast now about the Gospel-doctriiio would do the same! In the whole of antiquity there is no trace or indica- tion of any introdnction of Mary's invocation into the Church. Now, it is a rule admitted by all, that when a point of faith or discipline is found in antiquity as admitted by all in all ages, and no beginning of its introduction may be traced, such a thing ought to be admitted, without hesitation, as coming from the Apostles. Jesus, who gave his word to remain with his Church, cannot induce us to error, nor allow His Church to full into error at large. Lately, when Henry Lisserre stated the fact of the prayers of people being heard by the Virgin, at Lourdes, in France, he defied all Europe to deny it, and nobody could do so. Neither can anyone deny the fact of the constant devotion to Mary in the Church, and facts are God's dominion. He can no more deceive than be deceived. Ancient pilgrimages, magniticent cathedrals, gifts of every kind, tokens of grateful hearts there are to testi- fy that, like now, Mary was always looked and called upon as "HELP OF CHRISTIANS, COMFORT OF THH AFFLICTED." The so-called Reformation in its sway of destruction could not take all away, and the traveller in Scotland, 44 THE VIRGIN. England or Ireland, may yet see so many ruins of shrines and churches of St. Mary. These stones are there to speak still: All generations call her blessed. The ^^nights of old consecrated their swords to the Blehsc Virgin, and the Catholic soldier would not go to war before kneeling at the shrine of the "powerful MOTHER," nor wt)uld the sailor expose himself to the waves before invoking the "star of the sea. " On the top of rocks, on how many cliffs, do you find even still the chapel wiiere the fisherman came to thank Our Lady after being saved frv m the perils of the sea? By the way-side, at the crossing of the high road, the traveller came to relieve his weariness and anxiety in the rustic chapel, whilst in the old cathedral, like in the country church, youths and virgins^ old people and youngs pray and mix the smoke of their candles and tapers with the glittering of the thanks-offering before the old time- blackened figure of the -'faithful, MOTHER, " and dry up a tear or foster a hope before the "CAUSE of our joy." All generations call HER blessed. The maiden go JS to the "MOTHER MOST PURE;" the mother consecrates her offsprings to the "Mother of Christ;" the earnest youth, in his struggle of life, goes to the "mother of divine grace." — Hail full of grace ^ is the cry of a hopeful, sinful race, "pray for us, sinners, now and in the hour of our death." All generations call HER blessed. "This, " said a young minister of the Church of Eng- THE VIROIN. 45 land whilst reading the Gospel, -this, however, is not true" He had always been in earnest and sincere: and who is the one with a sincere and unprejudiced heart who prays and seeks, that the Lord will not assist-' "It is not true," said he, "in the Episcopal Church, and though, the Scripture should be veritied" -He found it verified in the Catholic Church of which he became a member. Every Christian, if really he does believe in Christ, should have devotion to the Mother of Christ, and this devotion should be a real one a sound one, and therefore he should master the irrounds of this devotion, ponder and realise them. All the Saints gained their sanctity by their devotion to Mary, or at least with it, and none without it. Another young minister of the Episcopal Church, in Liverpool, attracted by his love for the poor, followed some of them one evening into a chapel. He did not know himself what kind of worship was going on, but heard a minister reciting a prayer, he recognised the words of the Gospel; it was a Priest saying the beads: Hail MarvfulloJ grace, etc. ' 'There is nothing wrong, ' ' said he, '^n the prayer of the people: Holy Mary, y [other of God, pray for its sinncrs'\ .^Q said it, with the poor . . his friends— '/'<^ pf^or are evangelized— blessed arc the poor in spirit! He died a sainted Redemptorist- Father. Whilst he was yet in his convent of Bishop-eton, Wav- ertree one of his former fellows of Cambridge, came to see'him. Showing him the chapel, this Father in- vited his friend to say that earnest prayer before Our 46 THE VIRGIN. :|f Lady's shrine.— See now what good and bad faith is: — "No," said he, "I will not pray, I could take the same stcj) that you have taken. " Let us hear another convert, Father Newman, who bi'came Cardinal: "It was the creation of a new idea, and of a new sympathy, of a new faith and worship when the holy Apostles announced that God had become Incarnate: then a supreme love and devotion to Him became possible, which seemed hopeless before that revelation. This was the first consequence of their preaching. But, besides this, a second range of thoughts was opened on mankind, unknown before, and unlike any other, as soon as it was understood that Incarnate God had a mother. The second idea is perfectly distinct from the former, and does not interfere with it. He is God made low, she is a woman made high... He who charges rs with MAKING Mary a divinity and thereby denying the divinity of Jesus, such a man does not know WHAT DIVINITY IS. To Mary belongs, as being a crea- ture, a natural claim on our sympathy and familiarity. ..We look to her without any fear, any remorse, any consciousness that she is able to read us, judge us, punish us. Our hearts yearn towards that pure Virgin, that gentle M.nier, and our congratulations follow her as she rises. . through the choirs of angels, to her throne on higl;, :su weak, yet so strong; so delicate, yet so glorious: so modest, and yet so mighty. She has sketched for us her own portrait in the Magnificat: THF VIKdIN. 47 Luk' I. 4, fJ^ hath regarded the loiv estate of His hand- maiden', for ^ behold^ frott ,, ''fceforth all generations shall eall her blessed. He haiL j 'J do'jcn the mighty from their seats, and hath exalted them of low degree. lie hath jll led the hungry with good things ; and the rieh lie hath sent empty aicav.'^ "And did not the All- wise know the hunuiu heart when he took to Himself a mother^ If He had not meant her to exert that wonderful intiueuee in His church, which she has in the event exerted, I will use a bold word, He it is who has perverted us. If she is not to attract our homage, why did He make her soli- tary in her greatness amid His vast creation y If it be idolatry in us to let our affections respond to our faith, He would not have made her what she is, or He would not have told us that He has so made her; but, far from this. He has sent His prophet to announce to us: Is. VII. 14, A virgin shall conceive^ and dear a son, and shall eall his name Immanuel, AND WE HAVE THE SAME WAK- KAN'P FOR HAILING HER AS God'S MOTHER, AS WE HAVE FOR ADORTNG HiM AS GOD. " "Almighty and everlasting God, who, by the co- operation of the Holy Ghost didst prepare the body and soul of Mary, glorious virgin and mother, to be- come the w^orthy dwelling of Thy Son; grant that by her gracious intercession, we may be delivered from instant evils and from everlasting death, through the same Christ Our Lord!" 4 i 48 THE VIRGIN. II. ■imt Why do Protestants not invoke the Virgin? If the invocation of the Blessed Virgin is blameless, lawful and useful, — is it also necessary? A Protestant lady was present one day in a Catholic Church whilst the doctrine on the Blessed Virgin and the grounds of devotion to her were explained; when asked what she thought of it, having heard the quota- tions from the Bible, and what invoking the Blessed Virgin means, "Yes," she said, «'I believe all this is true, but we can do without it." No importance would be given to the answer of this lady, were it not the expression of a wide-spread delusion. But first, what is true for one is true for another, what belongs to faith is true in itself, and for everyone, or it is not truth at all. Leaving this aside, "we can do without it!" Is that a fact concerning the intercession and the invocation of the Mother of God, the mother of our Redeemer? Can we do without her, and consequently— is the devo- tion to her, I mean practically, praying to her and through her, something supererogatory that we can do THE VIRGIN. 49 or not; or, on the other hand, is it something, in the dispositions of Almighty God, — actually essential, in- dispensible and obligatory? "We can do without iti" Are you quite sure of this? It is easy to say, but where is the proof? In like man- ner the godless man says: God, I can do without Him; the unbeliever says he can do without faith, the im- pious man without prayer. They can equally say: we can do without the Blessed Sacrament, and as a matter of fact they did away with it. In England, for instance, Henry made some changes; some more were made by acts of Parliament; the Blessed Sacrament was no longer exposed for public adoration as it had been therefor centuries; and under Edward, a ten-year-old boy, the ten-century-old Catholic Eng- land changed faith and practices. For ten centuries they believed, like Catholics always and everywhere did and do believe, that in the Blessed Sacrament is really and substantially the body and blood of Jesus Christ, but now by the authority of this boy-king, the working of the interested Somerset and the vile Cranmer, the most Holy Sacrifice was offered no long- er, the Blessed Sacrament removed from its altars. This reminds us of an old picture in which the Saviour is represented in the middle; from his mouth you read th« words: "This is my blood." On the one side stands Luther with the words: "This becomes my blood;" on the other side Calvin saying: "This recalls my blood;" beneath: "Which of these three is right?" % I, K 1 50 THE VIRGIN. -' . Luther, Calvin or the Saviour, whom shall you believe? The essence, the spirit of Protestantism, as Cardinal Dechamps notices, is not a positive doctrine; it is a negative one. What doctrine there is comes from the Roman Catholic Church; all the rest is denial: "I can do without it. " By degrees a free-thinker will say the same of every revealed truth. As a matter of fact, some ministers of the Church of England denied the divinity of our Lord; they do without the Church, its doctrine and authority; a minister preached on a Christ- mas morning that the Baby of Bethlehem is not God. It is the same argument: "We can do without it— I think so." But what can they do? Save their soul? Please t — Yes, if there was a Protestant God. How long has God been man's servant, to submit his divine revelation to the fancy of a man or to a Parlia- ment even of Great Britain? We are bound to believe what God has revealed as we are bound to keep the commandments He has im- posed, and a man has no more a right to believe what he likes than to do what he likes; and a free-thinker, to be consequent, has to be a free-doer; and this is absurd. Can we be saved without Mary? Can we do without the glorious Mother of God? Is the worship of the Blessed Virgin necessary for Salvation ? THE VIRGIN. 51 Yes, I say; and why? We cannot do without her. For according to the natural law, we are obliged tc follow the order estab- lished for Salvation by Almighty God. Now this divinely instituted order is that those who are the most remote from God, must reach Him by means of all those less remote in succession, who form the unbroken chain leading from God to His creatures. (1) Consequently as the saints are very near God, and -while ivc arc in thcjlesh ive are absent from the Lord (2), necessarily we must be brought to Him, and so obtain our salvation, through the medium of the saints, and principally through the Mother of God, who of all creatures is the nearest to God. lo Since God did not do without her, we cannot do without her. Could God have redeemed us, become man in any other way, as He could have created other stars, other heavens? This is out of the question. As a matter of fact, God became man through Mary and sufficiently showed the ordinary disposition of His dispensation of divine grace. He -p Ishes us to be saved through Mary, by Jesus the fountain, but through Mary, the channel, as St. Bernard says, to have a mediatrix even between us and the mediator, that like a child afraid to beg l)ardon of an angered father, or even better to obtain a (i) Dionys. Cap. V*. Ca'l. Mierar, Ki) i Cor. v. 6. 52 THE VIRGIN. §1 favor from a kind father, may go to a loving an( always pitiful mother. As God came to us through Mary, we must go t( Him by the same way; Mary is the Mother of God, th« Mother of men, the channel of divine grace. 2o God, as we have seen, foreshowed Mary to th* world, (Gal. IV. 4) IV/ieu the fullness of the time wa: rome, God sent his Son, made of a woman. God required her consent; the angel, in the name of God, declarer her/«// of fr race; through Mary God sanctifies St. John the Baptist; dying on the Cross Jesus left her as our Mother; He only completed what took place when Mary conceived her Son, as from the moment she pro nounced the Fiat, Be it done, she was already our Mother. As a man and a woman under the tree concurred iu tlie fall of mankind, so God wished under the tree of the Cross, a man and a woman to concur in our regen- eration and redemption. We cannot do without the grace of God, and this grace God wishes to give through Mary. "God wishes us to have all through Mary. " (1). The great vindicator of the Glories of Mary in the hist century is clear in this matter. "No one denies," says he, ''that Jesus Christ is our only mediator of justice, and that He, by His merits, has obtained our reconciliation with God. But, on the (i) St. Rernaril. , * THE VIRGIN. 58 other hand, it is impious to assert that God is not pleased to grant graces at the intercession of His saints and more especially of Mary His mother, whom Jesus desires so much to see loved and honored by all . . The intercession of Mary is even necessary TO SALVATION; we say necessary, not absolutely, but morally. This necessity proceeds from the will ITSELF OF God." As no one can be saved except through the merits of Jesus' sufferings and death, so these merits will not be applied to any one except through the intercession of Mary. Mediation of justice by way of merits is one thing; and mediation of grace by way of prayer is another. Because the Incarnate Word can alone be our media- tor of justice, does it follow that I ought not to ask you to pray for me— along with me and for me? Well! what we all tell one another on earth can we not tell to our friends in heaven V What we reciprocally ask is the mediation ot intercession or prayer, and it is the same we ask, but with a greater and more legitimate contidence, of the angels and saints, our friends in heaven, the well-beloved of God Himself, and especially of the one who loves us the most after God and is the most loved by Him. (1). Again; it is one thing to say that God cannot, and another that he will not grant graces without the (i) C:iriHii:ti Dfchainpi-, v. xi. i 54 THE VIRGIN. intercession of Mary. "We willingly admit that Grod is the source of every good and the absolute master of all graces; and that Mary is only a pure creature, who receives whatever she obtains as a pure favor fl'om God . . . but we assert that God, in order to exalt this great creature, who more than all others honored and loved Him during her life, and whom, moreover, he had chosen to be the Mother of His son, our common Redeemer, wills that all graces granted to those whom He has redeemed should pass through and be dispens- ed by the hands of Mary. " Thus the great theologian, Suarez, concludes that it is the sentiment of the universal Church "that the intercession and prayers of Mary are, above these of all others, not only useful, but necessaiiy. " And, this indeed has been the belief of all ages. 3o The words of Holy Writ have always been under- stood in this way by the Fathers. This explanation of the Holy Fathers was approved of by the Church in her practices, that Cliurch with which Our Lord pro- mised to remain till the end of time, that the Holy Ghost watches, against which the gates of hell shall never prevail^ which if one docs not believe^ he is -yVorse than an heathen man or a publican. If that Church can err, we are left in unceasing doubt, and God left us tossed about on the waves of uncertainty. The Church calls Mary: Gate of //cave n^ Door of our Lord, Our Life, and other titles. It was always the practice of the THE VIRGIN. u Church to ask other saints to pray to Mary for us, Mary their Queen, Queen of Angels and Saints. Conse- quently by God's own will, we cannot do without His mother; her invocation is necessary, and this, far from carrying us away from God, brings us nearer to Him. "Mary is the MARVELLOUS ECHO of God," beauti- fully writes Montfort . . . Devotion to her . . . will assuredly issue in a loving contemplation of her history —of those mysteries (as Catholics call them), Joyful, Sorrowful, Glorious, which are commemorated in the Rosary. Now, there is no history of her current in the Church except in closest connection with her Divine Son. On the details of her life during those periods when her life was led apart from His — before the an- nunciation and after the ascension— Scripture pre- serves a deep silenr'e; nor has there been any beyond the most sparing supplement of Scripture from the stores of tradition. Her joys, as contemplated by Catholics, were in His presence; He u sorrows in His Passion; Her exaltation in His Resurrection and Ascension. To dwell on her mysteries, then, is to think of Him in the most affecting and impressive way in which that thought can possibly be i)resented. Most remarkable has been the increase of devotion to the Blessed Mother of God during the last quarter of a century, and its FmiiT is an increase of the wor- ship OF HER Son. But it is in the wants of our times that we find the special reason for this devotion. During the month of October, our illustrious Pontiff, 56 THE VIRGIN. Leo XIII, haa directed the recital of the Rosary in every church throughout the world, and he urges us to recite the Rosary without ceasing and to never ABANDON THAT HOLY EXERCISE . . . to render homage to our Blessed Mother, and to commemorate the Incar- nation, Passion, Resurrection and Ascension of Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. It is these scenes of the Divine Drama that the Rosary recalls and puts be- fore us each time we iCcite it. It is simply an abridg- ment or compendium of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It compels us, so to speak, to fix our minds on the various details of the history summed up in the words of the Evangelist: And the word was made Jlcsh. ... It is an easy and appropriate, yet the sublimest series of Bible lessons. How far more real and vivid the im- pression made by such a pious exercise as this is than by that merely verbal study of the New Testament which prevails outside the Church I Contrast the intel- ligent knowledge of Our Lord s Life and Death and Resurrection possessed by a Catholic child who has been taught the Rosary, with that of a mere Protestant Bible reader, and there will be no doubt which of the two better appreciates the meaning of the value of the Gospel story. And so, Bishops, Cardinals and Popes, rulers of men and leaders of thought, statesmen, poli- ticians, generals and kings recite tfaeir beads, and find in the Devotion of the Rosary a holy and wholesome practice of prayer, well suited to raise the mind to God and do honor to His Divine Majesty. >» THE VIRGIN. 57 __««0 God, whose only begotten Son, by His life, death and resurrection has purchased for us the reward of eternal life, grant, we beseech Thee, that in meditating on these mysteries of the most holy Rosary of the Blessed Virgin Mary, we may imitate what they con- tain, and obtain ^ hat they promise through the same Christ Our Lord!"— Those who criticise the Rosary for its numerous repetition of prayers to Mary, do not consider that it is not a prayer like others in the Church, but an especial prayer to Mary; they overlook the many other prayers of the Rosary, and mostly the mysteries com- memorated and meditated that Mary is connected with, which refer first of all to Jesus Christ and to God. Protestants pretend to do without the Virgin! By a very strange contradiction— but contradiction very usual-the Church of England on St. Michael's Day uses this prayer: "O everlasting God who has ordained and constituted the services of angels and men in a wonderful order; mercifully grant, that as thy holy angels always do Thee service in heaven, so by thy appointment they may help and defend us on EARTH, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen." If angels and men, according to the Protestiut Ritual, are ordained and constituted to help and defend us, will not Mary be also! The Protestant bishop Montagne, in his book '*0n the invocation of saints, " approving of these invoca- tions, concludes: «'Such is the opinion, the common 58 THC VIRGIN. h voice, the general consent, without the least doubt of venerable and learned antiquity,... and I do not see any cau.se for thinking otherwise. Indeed, I admit that there is nothing in this which could injure the mediation of Jesus Christ. Therk ls no impiety in saying, as those of the Roman Church do: "HolyMarv pray for mo; St. Peter, pray for me. " Let us appeal to two witnesses whom Protestantism "iv 'V^^ "';^"-bingers" of the so-called Reformation --^VychtTe and Savonarola. "It seems to me impo.ssi- ble, says Wycliffe, -that we can be rewarded without the assistance of Mary.. She was in a manner the cause of the Incarnation and Passion of Christ, and hence of the salvation of the world... Mary always intercedes before the merits of our sins, because she obtains for sinners that they repent. Hence there is no sex, age, .state or condition in the human race that needs not to implore the aid of the Virgin " (1) Savonarola wrote an entire treati.se on the /1-^.J/«,Vouse, mother and tabernaele, should be held in great honor by all creatures. " (I). And Luther, himself, years after his defection from the Church, wrote of the Blessed Virg^in: "w'k shoilp INVOKE HER, that God may do and grant through her what we ask for. " (2). The devotion to the Mother of God — "We can do without it." No! nothing but err, stray from the faith of all ages. What was believed always and every- where, at all times and in all places, by all good people, is Catholic, is the truth, and he who denies or rejects it is out of the right way, and if condemned by the watchful keeper of the truth, which is the Church of God (and r.r>t any civil power nor gov<'rnm^nt), he is a heretic, not in his heart alon^^, but he has to be held as such, as fallen from the faith, as a member out of the Church wherein alone there is salvation. Such was, for instance, Nestorius, in the beginning ol the fifth century. He pretended there were two persons in Jesus Christ, ;ind consequently that Mary was not the Mother of God. A general coinicil assembled at Ephesus, and his doctrine was thoroughly discussed. A grand manifestation took place. Ephesus was a small city, but crowds gathered from all around, wait- ing at the last session for the whole day. At night the news was announced: "Nestorius condemned, and the Mother of God glorified;" the people cheered the (a) Procter, "Savonarola and the Keforniatioti." (t) "Deutsclie Schriften," vol. 4^. pp. 2^3. 60 THE VIRGIN. bl8hop^ and piaift. d aloud Mary, the Mother of God they went to till the churches to glorify God, and t light up their hoi es. It was a demonstratior o universal joy. Was it not a grand sight also when Engl .nd, comin. back from a tirst error, or rath, r from a terror, of Henn VIIL, all the member of Parliament on their knee^^ were absolved by Cardinal Pole. Soon, however ^^ belonged to Elizabeth, who f.r from being a virUii usurped the name of "Virgin Queen, "to depr e Our Lady of her dowry of Old England. But. ^vher^ j«.^^ was not separated from His mother, thi iE th. ^rue faith remained. A Christian who grows diffe his fervor and devotion to Mary soon becomes warm and nearly loses his faith. No, Hoij Mary, wh cani t do without TLoel All generations of faithful , all Thee blesseu "Judged by the Book of Common Prayer no taries have surpassed, law 1 tve equalled the \i,u, Church m ingratitude and . i reverence i -is H. whom the Afost High became Incarnate '. and Russians, in spite of htir exrle i Unity, hav- not so far d urted from Chn in this respec; England « lone k -m - not n to know, the mother of the orld R^ '-.^mer. "Jesus chose Mary, what ore . , said: t to ike- in in 'ieks aolic ^lief >sires it is said, not concealed in .* iriif>d \eyed in warm and loving woids When ige, but con- out the length '\i ; f K VIR' IN. 81 '^OKIPTIRES In every Shk, the , AND HElt reproach till then r reunion with the rest of C unstendom. " will England return to that faithful and b»-eadth of El g^l w vve ill be 8atistit«d. " -This vvs* ewi- the aioti Re\ w" expressod for F,ng- laci^ .a 18fV). 'Th people are being tautr it to l»"tievo in if us ley learn to link her nami with his in th*^ir me lit "ies, as it is in the Sacrei and a« i is in the Divine Decr K'urt I vvhich the cross is set .lofhfcf- cH the Crucified, must find a ow PLAct^:. Then, and not till then wi be i n 'd aw from England, then anri niii\ W' lope Wb 1 again ievotion to Mary of the Anglo-Saxon Church, of Ven-. ♦-rable T^edt', of Alcuin! A. id what is said for England h< Is good for all nations where its tongue is spoken, aw i*H iioctrines are spread. When shall this great nation at last overcome its pride and prejudice, be thoroughly English but thoroughly Catholic! O Mary, thou hast crushed all heresies, intercede for those who know Thee no lon^'erl Shall we be still alive when that nation will throw otf its blindfolding veil! O Queen of Heaven grant it! Let us say the prayer from the Book of Cerne, which belonged to Bishop Ethalward, A. D. 760. ••Holy mother of God, virgin ever blest, glorious and noble, chaste and inviolate, chosen and beloved of God, endowed with singular sanctity, worthy of all praise, thou who art the advocate for all the sins of the whole 62 THE VIIU.IN. world. O, listen, listen, listen to us: O, Mary, pray for us, intercede for us, disdain not to help us, for we are confident, and know for certain that thou canst obtain all thou wiliest from thy Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, God Almighty, the King of Ages, who liveth with the Father and the Holy Ghost for ever and ever. Amen. (1). (I) From Manuscript in the Iniversily Ubmry, CambridKc THE VIRGIN. 63 III. But now, why are Protestants always afraid to raise the Blessed Virgin too high? Reverend Drinkwater, an Episcopal clerjryiuan in Antigua, West Indies, and school inspector in tlie Lee- ward Islands, some years ago, passed through St. Thomas, and visited the Catholic Church. Later on he manifested his surprise that, whilst behind the main altar, conspicuous on the wall, hung a large picture of Our Lady of Perpetual Help, the tabernacle with the Blessed Sacrament was lower down. This reverend gentleman had too much good sense to remain under that impression, and was quite satisfied with the ex- planation a priest gave him, the prominent place on the altar is not physically the highest, no more than when a king is seated on a throne, the officer or foot- man standing behind him would be looked upon as of a higher rank than Hie Majesty. "I see," said he, "people know the central place of the Altar, the taber- nacle, is the principal place, all the rest are surround- ings. " When the Infant Jesus is represented on the V. 64 THE VIRGIN. knees of his mother, no one mistakes about rank ar dignity, no more than the Shepherds and the Mac^i di when they adored the Messiah in the lap of Man although she was higher. Is the Blessed Virgin honored too muchy First, there is no occasion for discussion. Si \ incent de Paul, the apostle of charity, used to say that m hyely discussions the opposing party feels a first that the opponent would like ^o gain the advan tageover him. therefore he prepa.... not to recog NiZE TRUTH, but to combat it: these debates, instead o reJl'drtHn: '^' "^*'^"* ^"^'"'^^^' ^ "°^-«*-^ '^^ The least we can solicit of Protestant teachers is a knowledge of the Catholic doctrines whicn they atteck let them first learn exactly what these doctrinesare' The .ess a man knows about the Catholic religion the better qualified he seems to be te discuss it, and the more peremptory are his judgments. The Church, guardian of the truth, having the Spirit whom Jesus promised, and left in her, has nothing to fear from the close.st and most minute investTgaMo^ on the contrary, always and everywhere, invites all to It. It IS Ignorance which is the great anti-Christ and .n^re inquiry and honest resea.h are the'o^y ^l THK VIRGIN. 65 The Church i.s continually attacked on doctrines which are not hers at ail, by assertions a thousand times re- pudiated and always repeated without even an allusion to the defence and to the real doctrine. What, for instance, has the Church been more care- ful about, at all times, than idolatry? Read her his- tory, and you will find that one can safely sav: The Church teaches this, practices that, conse(,uently tht-re is no danufer of idolatry. Concerning the Blessed Virgin, the doctrine of the Church is very different from what Protestants imaj,nue, and in this point like all others, the relitrjon aifainst which so many inveiofh, under the name of C^athoric, is A UELKilON WHICH THK CATHOLICS THKMSKLVKS WOULD MOST CORDIALLY DKTKST IF SI CH A KKLKilON ItKALLY E.XISTKD. Do those who inveigh against devotion to the Blessed Virgin understand the real doctrine as exposed above; do they realize the mystery of the Incarnation and the' relations of the Blessed Virgin therewith; do they ap- preciate what the highest worship due to Ciod alone is? Is not Mary the Masterpiece of Creation and Re tleinotion! She herself proclaims she is all from God and for God, all for Jesus. She began her immortal praise to the Most High: A/y soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced in GoD MY Savioi'r " (Luke I. 46). —"We open the Church's catalogue of saints, and we 86 THE VIRGIN. find that they belong to every clime, and we remember who said: Many shall come from the east and west, and sit down., in the kingdom of heaven. (Matt. VIIL 11.) We note among those saints one whose name is held in benediction above the rest. We remark how devotion to the Virgin, Mother of Jesus Christ, has struck its roots deep into the hearts of all the children of the Catholic Church. We do not lament or criticise, nor do we grow anxious lest the worship of her Son should suffer. We remember how, when God foreshowed to Mary this very devotion that we now see in historical FULFILMENT, Mary's spirit exulted in God her Savtour.. . We remember that Mary foretold her own glories, as a part of tl: accomplishment of the prom- ise that had been made to her: Thy Son shall be ^reaf and shall be called the Son of the ///>•//../, (Luke L 32 ) and we too magnify the Lord, while we bless her who 18 all blessed. " (1). S I The pretence of Protestants, that, in honoring the saints, we are robbing God of the honor that is His due, <■) T. K. Bridgett. C. SS. R "The Ritu.l of the New TesU.nent." p. ^^. %m^w^»d. THE VIRGIN. 67 and putting the creature in the place of the Creator, shows, if not absolute want of faith in Christ, an absolute ignorance of the Christian system, or of the theological principles revealed in the Holy Scriptures. Their doubts or difficulties on this subject originate in their rejection or ignorance of the Incarnation, and their never having considered the Christian system as a whole. They liave but the perception of the relation of the several points to th(> whole; and fail to recognize this inter-depondance and strict logical consistency one with another and with the whole of which they arc integral parts. The Protestant Bishop Bull says that the Litany of our Lady, is "too big for any creature. " We ask him respectfully to tell us which is bigger, -all the Litany or the few words of the angel: llail^fnll of grace ; all the Litany or the name of Mother of (iod'i If all the Litany were put in one side of Ww balance, and in the other side the words just mentioned, these last would be found much heavier than all the Litany. Consider- ing the qualifications inherent to the dignity of Mother of God, the Litany, far from being too big, is rather insufficient to express the imuiniug oij'idl of grace and Mot Iter of God, Protestants pretend that not a word should be whis- pered about Mary lest we should lessen the honor due to God, as if all the honor bestowed upon Mary did not redound upon God. 68 TiiK vrK(;iN. -U^i '•T!)e worship of the saiuls neither excludes nor en croachos ou the worsliip of God. It is part of it, and ;i very important part. Tlie people who orea//y fearc-J the Lord ami Samuel (1), and who asked Samuel to pray for them to the Lord his God, practised the only kind of worshi}) of the saints which ever found encourage- ment iu the Catholic Church. And Samuel at least saw no contradiction between such worship and serv- intf God in truth and with tiie whole heart. " So thr people feared (^od and Samuel and asKed Samuel to ])ray. The more the people a.sked Moses to {)ray and the better they followed Moses, the better they served (iod. It is written in the Book of Exodus (XIV. 31): The people feared the Lord and Relieved the Lord and His servant \fnses. And in another place (I Chronicles XXIX. 20): All the cono-renatlon hoived doivn their heads^ and worshipped the L.ord, and the Ji'injr ^' and again (Judges VII. '10): They eried out: The sword of the *}.ord and of iiideon. "We read (II. Kings II. 9, 10) that Elijah said to Elisha: "Ask what I SEJALL do FOU thee, before / be taken away from thee;" and Elisha said, ''J pray thee let a double portion of thy spirit be upon me:' And he said: '-''Thou hast asked a hard thing: nevertheless, if thou see me when L am taken from thee, it shall be so unto thee; but if not, it shall not be so.'' Elisha here asked what Elijah (I) I .'^iiiii. XII. iS. THE VIRGIN. 69 could not possibly j^ive him of his own power, yet the latter promises that he shall have it on the fultilment of a certain condition. Elisha asked a petition of Elijah which none but God could ^rant: in like munu^T we often call upon the saints to do what belongs only to the power of God. If the words of Elishu do not attribute omnipotence to Elijah, no more do our prayers ascribe omnipotence to the saints." God manifests His glory in His saints. Protestants see no communication with the heavenly hosts; for them the spiritual world is practically come to naught; they call this serving God in SiMitiT and in TRUTH, WHEN THERE IS TO BE FOUND in it NEITHER SPIRIT NOR TRUTH. You would not have me to say a //"// '/ Even Luther himself does not hesitate to say in strong terms: "What do you think would be more agreeable to her (the Mother of God) than that through her you should come to God, and learn from her to trust and hope in God y.. , She does not wish you to come to her, but through her to God." (1) Listen again to the recent words of the Philadelphia Presbyteriiin minister, before quoted: "The woman who raises a child for God is great, but how r . ch more so she whose child is the Son of God I No oth« • mother ever occupi.-l or can occupy the place that was occupied by Mary, the Mother of Jesus. Some may ask if this exaltation of the mother is not inclined to level the dignity of the Son. We might reply that the sun is not jealous of the rose. We admire the beauty of the latter, but the sun's heat and light have made it beauti- ful. We go to Mount Vernon and our reverence for the Father of his Country is awakened, but who shall say because of this we love our country less? Who shall be suspected of loving (rod less because He re- veres the name of Mary, the mother trf Jesusi"' ( ) I.illiti's "DeiUsclie Sihriftcn," V.)l. XIW p. jj;;. THE VIRGIN. 71 Hence the learned Suarez justly remarks that if we implore our Blessed Lady to obtain us a favor, it is not because we distrust the divine mercy, but rather that we fear our own unworthiness and the absence of proper disposition; and we recommend ourselves to Mary that her dignity may supply for our loneliness. How! "While Protestant Churches resound with the praises of Sarah, and Rebecca and Rachel, of Miriam and Ruth, of Esther and Judith of the Old Testament, and of Elizabeth and Anna, of Magdalen and Martha of the New, the name of Mary, the Mother of Christ, is uttered with bated breath, lest the sound of her name should make the preacher liable to the charge of Superstition. Catholics do not forget the Blessed Virgin's own prediction of that honor which the Church in all ages should pay to her: All generations shall call me blessed, and we believe with St. Epiphanius that it is no less criminal to vilify the Blessed Virgin than to exalt her above measure." This measure is the supreme honor due to God alone; and how jealous has the Church been at all times to keep within those strict boundaries? Luther himself said: "Mary does not wish to be an idol. We should invoke her, that God, through her intercession, may grant our requests. " This is precisely what the Catholic Church teaches, and what Luther himself was taught from his infancy by his Catholic preceptors. Indeed the Blessed Virgin Mary did not claim to be adored as an idol, a t^oddess or a deity, she was too humble and pious to 72 THE VIRGIN. give grounds for entertaining herself with any such thoughts. On the contrary she wished to be over re- garded as God's creature, nay as the /lamitnaid of the Lord. According to this unchanged principle, the Catholic Church as soon as she heard that the sect of Collyridians for instance, had made an idol of the Blessed Virgin, condemned them as heretics. That indeed no one should adore Mary, has always been the belief and teaching of the Universal Church. Not long ago, in a parish of the Archdiocese of Ottawa, a Catholic had given up all practices of religion for over twenty years. A Missionary Father went to see him, and found the chief objection was the invoca- tion of the Blessed Virgin. "I will never believe," said the man, "but that the Blessed Virgin has nothing except from God, and that God can bestow Himself graces upon us, for I look upon her as a creature." How astonished was the poor man, when told that this was exactly the teaching of the Church. Like so many more, he saw all prejudices fade away, the moment he looked at the trui: doctrine. Of course, Catholic writers as well as Catholic ex- pressions and Catholic doctrino must be understood in the sense of that doctrine. Aident love bursts out into ai'dent expres.sions. and does not even think of such strict, cold and dry logic. As sui^ernatural charity is ba.sed on faith, it evidently presupposes not to go be- yond what it believes, aud less to go against it. St. Alphonsus himself, a Doctor of the Church, warns us in ^t ■ ii fs^^'r^:. THE VIRGIN. 7;i the Preface of the Glokiks of Mauy: "I l)t»j? that yi>n will uuderstand (my propositions) Atvoui)iN<; to tmk lil'I.ES OF SOrND THKOLOCY AM) TIIK 1)(M THINK OF THK HOLY Roman Catholu; Cihiu'H." "A Protestant has learned from his t-hildhood to believe that the devotion which Catholichs pay to the Mother of (iod, if not absolutely idolatrous, has at least an idolatrous tendency. This early training' is more and more contirmed in proportion as he becomes familiar with Protestant literature in which Catholic doctrine is almost invariably misrepresentealances every phrase by the inicomiHomisiu^' rules of grammar and logic. " ^ "Now, far different is the tone of mind in which a Catholic takes up his book of devotions. Prom the time that his infant lips hive been able to lisp the name of Mary, ho has been taught that, though she is tlio peerless Queen of angels and saints, she is yet. . a creature, and th(;refore, in nature and dignity, infinite- ly inferior to the Creator. It is consequently to him a first principle that the honor which is due to the Blessed Virgin is not only very different in degree but nl.so wholly different in kind, from the honor which is due to God. If then he meets with phrases and e.xpre.ssious which to Protestants might .seem ambiguous or exaggerated, he is not di.sturbed. He, mstinctively, under.stands these according to the accu- rate Catholic doctrine in which he has been taught from his Mother's knee. He holds the key of the true mtor])retation. Such language, on account of preju- <^ biting sarcasm, fierce declamation, scathing inveciives against such a blasphemy, such a deification of royalty; do not forget to cite page and volume, and impress upon tlu' horror-stricken hearers that Blackston*' was one of th« m(»st popular and voluminous of English writers -and Avhat will be the etfecf:' But, of course, every briefiess barrister, or mt^nial office- b<,v' knows the plain and technical meaning and interpretation of these quotations just as every ordinar- ily intelligent CaMiolic layman knows the interpretatitm and meaning of the terms employed by Holy Fatliers and Catholic writers. (I) Of course, there is an enormous difference, with re- gard to the Catholic Church, her doatrine, life and practices, between the view of outsiders and the results of experience on those who have lived in church membership. This difference has been aptly compared, (l) New Phases of mi Old K:ill;icy. Kev. II. ii. G:tn<^-. 76 THE VIRGIN, by the i;?i<'at Cardiuul Wiseman, to looking at a beauti- ful stained glass window fhom without and from WITHIN the building it adorns. "Outsiders have never experienced, or come near to exjierienciug, the state of mind engendered by a con- stant and loving devotion to the Blessed Mother of Jesus: they fancy what that state of mind must be, against tlie unanimous testimony of those who know these doctrines on which they descant in ignorance." When, for instance, they tell a Catholic, on purely imaginary grounds, "that his daily, yes hourly, aves to Mary les.sen his simple trust in Jesus, such a state- ment can her is in no n'spec.'t inconsistent with the most jealous- ly exclusive devotiou of heart to God and to Christ, but on the contrary, that the love of the Mother is among his most erticacious helps for growing in the knowledge and the love of the Son, that it intensities that love, and gives to il an otherwise untasted quality of tenderness and piissionati' affection." "With Protestants then, who know nothing jiracti- fajlyofthe fuvtK'ation of .saints, and who approach the subject with their minds warped by fal.se represen- tations, it is a nalural eiror to suppose that *he alK)liti()u of prayiM' to tlie saints would throw into snar])er prominence tlu' prayers addressed to God. Ir. their minds the saints are like so many hills which 5sJL' THK VIRGIN. 77 rear their heads around the iiiountiiiu of God. To ox- alt the hill is to make a rival to the mountain and to obscure the view of it. But with Catholics, if God in His infinite, uncreated, iiidepeudf^nt excellence is a mountain, the saints are valleys at its foot, and the MOST MAdN'iFiCKNT of these valleys and that which by its very depth exalts the heijfht of the mountain is the Blessed Virj^in Mary." (1) •'In these days, as F. Faber notic«>s, tho Church Triumphant in Heaven, coUectin;;' its fresh multitudes in every a»re. and constantly beautifyin«f itself with new saints, must necessarily far exceelenitude of their charity, in their vast power with the Sacred Heart of Jesus, to obtain jfrace and blessing day and night for the poor dwellers up