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 D &• J, *l]DIi3E]E & € ID, 
 fEW YORK. 
 
LIFE 
 
 BLESSED YIRGIN MAEY, 
 
 illotl)ct of Boh; 
 
 WITH THE 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO HER. 
 
 COMPLETED BY THE 
 
 TRADITIONS OF THE EAST, 
 
 ritings of t|e iM\txs, anb i\t |rihte fistors d l|e |cte. 
 
 TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH OF THE ABBE ORSINI, 
 BY 
 
 MRS. J. SADLIER. 
 
 PUBLISHED WITA THE APPROBATION OF THE LATE MOST REV. JOHN HUGHES, D. 2>., 
 AND THE MOST REV. J. MeCLOSKET, D. D., ARCHBISHOP OF NEW YORK. 
 
 A NE-W, ENLARGED AND REVISED EDITION. 
 
 few ftfflt: 
 
 PUBLISHED BY D. & J. SADLIER & CO., 31 BAKCLAT STREET. 
 
 MONTREAL :-CORNER OF NOTRE DAME AND ST. FRANCIS XAVIER STS. 
 
 1872. 
 
Entered according to Act of CongresB, in the year 1868, 
 Br D. & J. SADLIEB & CO., 
 In the Clerk' I Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of New ToiK. 
 
 lOAN STACK 
 
 ■Unotrpad b7 Vncrsrr Dnx, 36 A 27 Kew ChAmb«n St.. ■. f. 
 Printad Iqr Edwaxs O. Juxixs. U North WlUiun Bk, K. T 
 
P i JTiS it^^ 
 
 HIS translation, made many years ago at the suggestion of 
 an illustrious prelate, since dead, has been so well re- 
 ceived by American Catholics, that it has passed through 
 many editions. The magnificent work of the Abb^ Or- 
 sini, is confessedly the fullest and most complete life of 
 the Blessed Virgin Mary that has yet been given to the 
 Catholic world. It does not end, as others do, at the close of her mor- 
 tal life, but follows the course of the universal devotion wherewith the 
 Church has honored, and does still, and shall ever honor, the Virgin of 
 the Prophecies, the glorious Mother of God. It shows how literal has 
 been the fulfillment of her own inspired prediction that all generations should 
 call her Blessed. It shows how devotion to her has grown and prospered 
 with the growth of Catholicity, and records the shrines and churches erected 
 in every land under her invocation and to her honor and glory. Those of 
 America I have myself added to the work, as there was little or nothing in 
 the edition which I translated relating to the devotion in America. The 
 work also embodies the Eastern traditions concerning her, with the conclu- 
 sive testimony of the Fathers; the little which is related of her in Scrip 
 ture being but a very faint sketch of her life. 
 
 4:3' 
 
TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE. 
 
 It is trulj a labor of love for a Catholic to celebrate the praises and re- 
 eord the glories of Our Most Dear Mother, and it was with the filial devo- 
 tion of a child of Ifary that I translated this great work some fifteen years 
 ago. In common with all who are truly devout to Mary, I have much, very 
 much to thank her for — many a priceless favor, many a sweet consolation, many 
 a ray of light when all was dark around, and when earthly hopes had failed. 
 In thanksgiving, then, and with all reverence and affection, I have now, prob- 
 ably for the last time, revised this noble work, hoping that it may ever tend 
 to make others love and honor Our Lady the Help of Christians as I love and 
 honor her. 
 
 M. A. S. 
 
 Hew You, Mat 8, 187a 
 
 
HIS book, wMcli the public has vouchsafed to receive favor- 
 ably, is not an ambitious attempt to obtain celebrity ; it is 
 a work of patience and of faith, a flower laid on the altai 
 of Mary, with the simple sincerity of a pilgrim of the good 
 old times. The Blessed Virgin was, doubtless, deserving of 
 a better historian, but she could find none more desirous 
 of glorifying her name and propagating the devotion which 
 is her due. 
 
 The life of the Queen of Angels, of the Mystical Eose of the new law, is, of itself, 
 a theme so poetical that it naturally called forth all graceful and touching ideas, as 
 well as the noblest expressions of our language. It is an Eastern Tale, reflecting 
 the customs, the pageants, and the scenery of Asia; is it, therefore, surprising that 
 the style should be tinted with an Oriental coloring ? 
 
 We have studied the Fathers enough to know that they did not disdain the 
 graces of diction, and that, in this respect, they fought paganism with equal arms. 
 This is what the great St. Jerome called, in his figurative language, cutting off tlie 
 head of Goliath with his own sword. What can be more elevated, more poetical, 
 than certain descriptions of St. John Chrysostom ? That sacred orator often chimes 
 in with the Oriental poets, and it is in one of his homilies that we find the simili- 
 tude of the earth emhalmed with the perfume of roses, which has since been repro- 
 duced by Saadi in his Gulistan. 
 
 The letters and the homilies of St. Basil the Great, replete with agreeable pic- 
 tures, imitated but not surpassed by Fenelon, have all a poetical cast very fit to 
 frighten those timorous minds who, now-a-days, take poetry for a spectre, and 
 would fain exclude it from all manner of works. It is the same with St. Gregory 
 of Nazianzen, that sublime Christian dreamer, who questioned himself on the nature 
 
Ti PREFACE. 
 
 of his soul, under the ehade of thick fdiage^ whilst the zq>hyrs^ mingled with Hie songs 
 of the InrdSf shed from the topmost branches of the tree a s^joeet and dreamy tranquility; 
 whilst the grasshoppers^ hidden beneath the herbage, made all tJie woods resound, and 
 a limpid stream flowed past his feet, winding on in its refreshing course through the 
 wood. If that be not poetry, I know not what it is. 
 
 In order to convert the nations it is necessary, first of all, to obtain a hearing ; to 
 confirm in the Roman faith masses long agitated by the successive shocks of revo- 
 lutions, beaten by the wind of systems, indifferent from weariness, and open to the 
 attacks of an audacious sect which raises its head higher than ever, for 
 
 D^ja de sa faveur on adore le bruit ; 
 the first thing to be done is to induce them to read our works. The preacher who 
 would divest the sacred Word of all the ornaments of elocution would soon have 
 our churches deserted, and might say, like the Greek musician left alone in a public 
 place, " Ye temples, hear me ! " The religious writer who would affect a dull and 
 arid style, in the midst of a nation which prides itself on its taste and literary skill, 
 would assuredly fare no better ; he would fall, with all his weight, into that 
 oblivion where nothing floats, and his book, had it the intrinsic value of gold and 
 pearls, would be, nevertheless, the most useless thing in the world, for none would 
 touch it. St. Basil was so persuaded of this truth that he strenuously urged the 
 young orators of his time to a profound study of human letters, so as to transfer 
 their beauties to Catholic works. " Human letters," says that great doctor, " are 
 like leaves which serve to cover and to ornament the words of truth and wisdom. 
 If Moses and Daniel were the two most brilliant lights of the Synagogue, it was 
 because they had acquired all the arts of the Egyptians." St. Jerome subjected to 
 the anti-literary attacks of the priest Rufinus, who accused him of mingling the filth 
 of paganism with the word of tlie Lord, coolly sent him word that being himself 
 Uind as a mde he ought not to mock those who had tlie eyes of a goat. And, in fact, 
 when the sumptuous decoration of altars and of tabernacles was regarded, even in 
 the most austere ages of the Church, as a good and commendable practice, proper 
 to heighten the majesty of Christian worship, wherefore should we make of religious 
 literature a barren and dreary waste, whereon none would wish to enter for fear 
 of sinking on the way under a load of weariness ? Is it thus, then, that the Holy 
 Scriptures, which St. John Chrysostom declared full of pearls amd diamonds, were 
 conceived ? Are not all kinds of composition found in the Bible, from the eclogue 
 to the epic. The saints of those remote times, which we, in om* courtesy, are wont 
 
PREFACE. vii 
 
 to call harbaroiLSj were far from wishing to deprive religious works of all literary 
 merit. " Wliat ! " says an illustrious writer of tlie ninth century, " we enshrine the 
 ashes of the saints in gold and precious stones, yet their actions are clothed but in 
 rude and homely language ! We adorn our love-stories with all the graces of fiction, 
 and we describe in the driest, the dullest, and the most uninteresting manner, the 
 immortal deeds of the heroes of Christianity ! Is it, therefore, that elegance of style 
 is only to be used for glossing over the turpitude of iniquity?" 
 
 " Would," says a pious and learned author who, in 1722, dedicated the life 
 of a holy personage to the Bishop of Blois ; " would that Catholics would give 
 to the admirable achievements of the saints those ornaments wherewith sinners 
 embellish their guilty passions, and thereby show that they know better how to 
 adorn virtue than those worldlings to adorn vice." 
 
 If it be ever permitted to throw poetical flowers on a religious theme, it is, 
 assuredly, when treating of the Mystical Rose of the new law. This is so true, that 
 the gravest doctors of other ages became poets without their knowing or wishing 
 it, when they spoke of that glorious creature. St. Gregory of Neocesarea, that 
 cold, austere thaumaturgus, finds the most charming appellations for the Mother of 
 God, whom he styles source of light and immaculate flower of life. St. Ephraim, 
 that melancholy and enthusiastic solitary, compares the Blessed Virgin to the 
 golden censer exhaling the sweetest perfumes. St. Epiphanius calls the Virgin a 
 spiritual ocean containing the celestial pearl. St. Cyril of Alexandria, the inex- 
 tinguishable lamp which has brought forth the Sun of Justice. "With what marvel- 
 ous flowers of eloquence shall we weave thee a crown, O Mary ! " says St. Basil of 
 Selemia ; '■'-from thee has budded the floiver of Jesse, which embellishes us with glory and 
 honor." St. Gregory the Great compares Mary, that virgin fair and adorned with the 
 glory of her fruitfulness, to a very high mountain, towering above the angelic choirs, 
 and reaching even to the throne of the Divinity. Alcuin, that light of the court of 
 Charlemagne, accustomed as he was to dry and arid labors, became a poet for Mary : 
 " Thou art my beloved," said he, " thou art my joy and glory, Virgin I tliou art the 
 life of heaven, the flower of theflelds, the lily of the world." Pope Innocent III. com- 
 pares Mary to the dawn. St. Thomas of Aquinas to the star of the ocean which guides 
 and directs those %oho navigate the waters. " Hail ! noble daughter of Kings," cries 
 the learned and mystical Erasmus, " tliou art more brilliant tlmn the dawn, milder than 
 the silvery moon, purer than the fresh-blown lily, whiter than the mountain snow,mjOrt 
 graceful than the rose, more precious than the ruby, more chaste than the angels. .... 
 
TUl 
 
 P REFA CE. 
 
 Impressed with these counsels, encouraged by these examples, we have lightly 
 touched with the honey of Engaddi the edge of the cup which we present to the 
 people of the world— those spoiled children who reject with scorn every beverage 
 which has not, like the sherbets of the East, the perfume of the violet and the rose. 
 Some have made this a crime, and bitterly reproached us with having sacrificed to 
 false gods ; but when they set about giving quotations, the result was rather unfor- 
 tunate for them, for they have, without knowing it, found fault with Scriptural 
 idioms and phraseology ; that is to say, even the Word of God itself. " I do not 
 always quote my authority," says Montaigne, "because nothing is more amusing 
 than to see a thrust made through me at Virgil, Tacitus, Horace — in a word, at the 
 greatest writers of antiquity — by some who are scarcely able to read them." Pre- 
 cisely the same thing has happened to us, although we did not intend to lay such 
 a snare for the simplicity of certain censors, who are, alas ! in the highest degree, 
 ignorant of their own ignorance, which is the worst ignorance of all, if the Orientals 
 are to be believed. We have heard the Prophets gravely descanted on by small 
 critics, who are reputed to know the whole Bible by heart. What could we do in 
 such a case as that ? 
 
 All evil passions are up in arms against this book, and men who ought to have 
 sustained it, were it only for the sacred cause which it espouses, have stealthily 
 pursued it with a malignity truly Pharisaical. May God, who lifts the seven-fold 
 veil of malice from false hearts to penetrate to the actuating motives of their works 
 — may He forgive them, even as we do ! We have had such fair and honorable 
 suffrages to console us, that we may well afford to overlook these puny attempts. 
 
 The foreign press, namely, the Italian, the German, and the Spanish, have taken 
 much notice of this Life of the blessed Virgin. Being unable to quote all, we 
 shall confine ourselves to this extract from a learned article in Za Cruz (The 
 0?'OSSj) a Spanish journal, religious, political, and literary, which is honored 
 with the patronage of the eminently Catholic clergy of Spain: — 
 
 " The Abbd Orsini, in tracing the annals of the worship of the Blessed Virgin, which commenced 
 with Christianity, and in raking up authorities, which, but for him, might perchance have remained 
 in oblivion, presents to the reader the titles whereon hyperdulia and the worship of the Virgin are 
 founded — ^a worship which certainly occupies a golden page in the calendar of the world, and is con- 
 nected with the most glorious associations. Nor is this all that the Abbd Orsini has done. His book 
 comprises the biography of Jesus, and, in some measure, the history of the terrestrial globe, which 
 dates from the fall of man and the promise of a Redeemer. In this work we find profound theology, 
 ■vast erudition, good literary taste, and enchanting touches of poetry 
 
P REF A C E. 
 
 *' The translator, Dr. F. Y. P., has added another jewel, in the name of the Spaniards, to the 
 crown wherewith the literati of Europe have adorned the brow of the author of The Complete Life 
 of the Mother of God. This book is one of the great works of the nineteenth century, and merits a 
 place in the first rank." 
 
 We refer not to these eulogiums (wMcli are certainly somewhiit exaggerated) 
 througli a ridiculous vanity or self-laudation, but to demonstrate that the lAfe of the 
 Motlier of God has been well received by Catholics abroad, whose sympathy is 
 exceedingly precious to us. It is no less consoling to see that it is also becoming 
 popular in Germany, in England, in Russia, and in America, where it has probably 
 assisted in dispelling some unjust prejudices amongst dissenting Christians. 
 
 As for the French press, it has treated this book just as it pleased, for we have 
 never attempted to influence it either by intrigue or solicitation of any sort ; not- 
 withstanding which it has, in general, expressed itself in such a way that we have 
 only to return our best thanks. By a providential chance it has happened, that 
 most of those literary men who have taken cognizance of our work are men of 
 feeling, knowledge, and intellect, and have acted generously by us. But great 
 minds are usually indulgent and lenient towards others ; lions, conscious of their 
 own strength, often magnanimously spare the weaker prey ; it is not so with the 
 vipers who hiss and bite in the mire of their native marsh, by way of satisfying 
 their conscience. 
 
 Happy the author who falls into the hands of men able to appreciate a book, 
 to examine it without prejudice, and with the probity which becomes the magis- 
 tracy of thought. Criticism is a trade in which many meddle, but which very few 
 understand ; to do it as it should be done, there is need of learning, taste, and 
 conscience ; things which every one has not. 
 
 A learned prelate, whose name was still unknown to us when we wrote the 
 jpreface to our first edition, the late Bishop Cotteret of Beauvais, a profound theo- 
 logian and a very distinguished writer, after having justified our use of Oriental 
 traditions — " Traditions^'' says the learned Bishop, " wliich the author has not given 
 as articles of faith " — goes on to say : " The Abb6 Orsini is one of the writers of 
 our time who has the most perfectly mastered the language ; he speaks like a true 
 disciple of Chateaubriand." This was conferring a high honor upon us, although 
 it was far from being deserved; we have never had the presumption to follow, 
 even afar ofi^, in the gigantic steps of that great master ; and if our style have any, 
 even a slight resemblance to his, we can only say, as did an humble poet of Kurdis- 
 
X PREFACE. 
 
 tan, on a similar occasion, " I have come forth, like Antar, that famous poet, from 
 the garden of Nischabur ; but Antar was the rose of the garden, and I am only a 
 brier." 
 
 An observation has been made to us, to which we are now about to reply ; it 
 relates to the use which we have made of the Hebrew customs in completing our 
 Life of the Blessed Virgin. Any traveller who has visited the East, or any 
 scholar who is at all acquainted with the history and condition of Asia, will per- 
 ceive that our work is based on long and laborious researches, and not hy any 
 fMOM <m imaginatUm; we had not even presumed to invent the common forms 
 oi farewell^ or of wishing a good jmjumey ; all has been derived from respectable 
 sources, which we have scrupulously acknowledged whenever the thing was worth 
 the trouble. Our work has been read, moreover, by learned Orientalists, who 
 have found it correct, and Israelites of the highest rank have praised the exact 
 fidelity wherewith we have restored the faded splendor of Sion and the ancient 
 customs of their fathers. The historian, like the painter, now requires a profound 
 study of the local coloring. If an artist should attempt to introduce our Western 
 customs and our Northern landscapes in a painting, of which the subject was taken 
 from ancient Asia, he would by no means escape the just censure of the connois- 
 seurs, A literary work is likewise a painting, which should reproduce the hues 
 of the sky, the aspect of the country, the historical costumes, the habits and the 
 customs of the groups represented in its pages. In writing the life of the descend- 
 ant of the kings of Juda, we have studied the requirements of our theme ; we 
 remembered that it would not do to engraft the manners of the Israelites on our 
 own, or to wrap them up, as Strauss says, in a Western disguise, but to paint 
 them such as they were when Mary lived : that was the only way to adhere to 
 probability, when tracing a history of what occurred in Jewish society in the days 
 of Herod. We meet, in every page of the Gospel, the manners and customs of the. 
 Jews, to which Jesus Christ himself vouchsafed to conform; it can scarcely be 
 doubted but that the Virgin had anticipated the example of her divine Son. The 
 Hebrew customs were based upon Scripture and tradition, which made them sacred 
 things in the eyes of the whole nation ; to deviate from received usages would 
 have been regarded as a grave misdemeanor. Even the nuptial garments of the 
 bride were directed by the reminiscences of the Bible and the antediluvian tradi- 
 tions of the temple. 
 
 We have received, from quarters not connected with the press, testimonies of 
 
P REFA CE. 
 
 sympathy and good-will, wHcli have descended upon us from on high, like the 
 gifts of Providence. The Prince Orsini, who has deigned to accept the dedication 
 of our book, like a true Roman prince, and a friend of letters, has done us the 
 honor to write to us : — 
 
 " A work so remarkable and so holy as yours certainly deserved a more distinguished patron thuB 
 I am ; I am penetrated with the liveliest gratitude, and no words of mine could convey to you my 
 sense of the obligation you have conferred upon me. Eome applauds your work ; and the glory 
 which you have given to the Mother of God already reflects on yourself." 
 
 If we quote these flattering words, so characteristic of the graceful urbanity of 
 the higher Italian nobility, it is not that we deem ourselves worthy of them ; we 
 receive them as a generous encouragement to do better at another time, and we lay 
 them respectfully at the feet of the Blessed Virgin, well knowing that such kind 
 and honorable suffrage from a prince as eminent for his piety as for his intelligence, 
 proceed from her and to her belongs. 
 
 Another compliment, very precious to our heart, is from the Commander Mout- 
 tinho-Lima, Minister-Plenipotentiary from the Emperor of Brazil, who, with diplo- 
 matic talents of the highest order, has a refined and enlightened taste for letters, 
 which he has himself cultivated with much success. 
 
 " Your new edition of the Life of the Blessed Virgin, only a few months after its first appearance," 
 writes his Excellency, " is sufficiently indicative of the favor wherewith the book has been received 
 by the public. Permit me, on the occasion of this second edition, to add my humble testimony to 
 those which you may have already received. 
 
 " Your work has contributed, and doubtless will yet contribute more and more, to promote in 
 France the touching devotion to the Virgin, where of old it was so fervently propagated by St. 
 Bernard. I am persuaded that wherever the children of the Church are found, the Life of the 
 Mother of God will produce the same eflfect ; be my name the pledge." 
 
 But it is not only amongst the great ones of the earth that our Life of the 
 Blessed Virgin has found favor ; many learned doctors, both Italian and Spanish, 
 have also honored it with their approbation. His Lordship the Bishop of Sala- 
 manca, a learned prelate, well worthy of presiding over that famous university 
 which has, for many ages, shed a brilliant light on Europe, has deigned to protect 
 it in Spain. His Eminence the Cardinal Archbishop of Malines, whose fame has 
 spread far beyond the boundaries of his own country, has given his formal appro- 
 bation to the Belgian editions. I inally, our own bishop has, from the first, taken 
 it under his protection, as became a man who has no need of the opinion of others to 
 form his own, and who waits not to see how the current of public opinion will go. 
 
 We shall here insert a portion of the letter of Monser. Castanelli d'Istria, to the 
 
xii PREFACE. 
 
 end that if this book should have any protracted eidstence, it will prove, in days to 
 come, that at a time when religious literature had no sort of encouragement in 
 France, it was protected and fostered by Roman princes, ambassadors from remote 
 r^ons, and by saintly and learned prelates. 
 
 ** It is somewhat late to thank you for the present of your valuable work, and for the pleasure it 
 gave me to read a hfe doubly interesting, from the nature of the subject and the charming style 
 wherewith you have embeUished it I prize this gift the more highly as coming from the author, 
 and because that author is a countryman and one of my own priests. Nor am I alone in my appre- 
 ciation of the merits of your book. The opinion of all those readers to whom I have lent it is quite 
 in accordance with that of the journals of Paris. 
 
 " I am gratified to see that the first fruits of your literary labors are dedicated to the Queen of 
 Angels. From such a commencement there is reason to hope for a career the most distinguished." 
 
 Since these encouraging letters were addressed to us, the life of the Mother of 
 God has had (we may venture to say it, because the proof is apparent) the most 
 unbounded success, not only in France, but throughout Europe, and even beyond 
 its bounds. Three translations of it have been made in Italy ; it has been translated 
 in Spain by two Spanish doctors; in Germany by an able ecclesiastic, and there 
 has been published at Leipsic a second translation, magnificently illustrated; several 
 editions have been published in Belgium; it has even penetrated the depth of 
 Russia, and has crossed the ocean to Mexico ; finally, it has been favorably received 
 at Rome, where it is propagated by permission of the Sacred College. Thanks to the 
 powerful protection of Mary, the little grain of mustard-seed has become a great 
 tree, whose branches overspread the earth ; trifling as this book may be. She has 
 blessed it, because She knows it was written with no other intention than that of 
 promoting her glory. 
 
 Deeply grateful to that European public which has received our work so favora- 
 bly, we have done our best to merit that sympathy which we prize so highly. 
 This new edition, printed with the permission of his Grace the Archbishop of 
 Paris, has been carefully revised and considerably enlarged ; as it is for the last 
 time, we have endeavored to do our duty conscientiously. The second part, which 
 comprises the History of the Devotion to Mary, has been entirely remodeled, and 
 enriched with important facts taken from the rarest and most authentic sources. 
 Notwithstanding all our efforts, we cannot but be aware that our work is still very 
 imperfect. But such is the ordinary lot of human undertakings. Perfection is the 
 mountain of the talisman, whose summit no mortal has ever reached, and the 
 present writer least of all. 
 
GREGORIUS PP. XVI. 
 
 (Dilecte Fill, Salutem et Apostolicam (Benedictionem Jampridem Nobis 
 dono miseras opus gallica lingua a Te elucubratunt, at que inscriptum — 
 La Vierge, Histoire de la Mere de Diect et de son Culte. JJunc vero cum 
 tuis obsequentissimis Litteris alterum ejusdem operis exemplar libenter 
 accepimus, quod a Te auctum, pulcherrim^isque im^aginibus ornatum, ac 
 splendidissim,is (Parisiensibus typis editum, superiori anno rursus evulgan- 
 dum, curasii. 
 
 Tuum^ consilium ecclesiastico viro plane dignum, vehementer com^m^en^ 
 dam,tis, quod eo potissimum, special, ut pietai> erga Sanctissimam (Dei 
 Genetricem. Mariam in fidelium animis m^agis m>agisque augeatur, atque 
 excitatur, 
 
 Agim,us aulern pro dono gratias, ac paterncz nostrce in te caritatis 
 testein, et ccelestium, omnium m^unerum, auspicem Apostolicam (Benedict 
 tionem Tibi ipsi, (Dilecti Fili, intimo cordis affectu impertimur. 
 
 (Datum (komcB apud S. Mariam Major em die 23 Augusti, Anno 1843, 
 (Pontificatus nostri anno decimo quinto. 
 
 GREGORIUS PP. XVL 
 
 DiLECTO FiLlO, 
 
 Presbytero Orsini, Luteti^ Parisiorum 
 
'I'T-^L^r-sE^r^s'mis^sx:. 
 
OF 
 
 OUR MOST HOLT LORD PIUS IX., 
 
 BY DIVINE PROVIDENCE POPE, 
 
 CONCEKNING THE DOGMATIC DEFINITION OF THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION 
 
 OF THE VIEGIN MOTHER OF GOD. 
 
 [TRANSLATION.] 
 
 Pius, Bisliop, Servant of the Servants of God: for the perpetual remera- 
 brance (f the thing, 
 
 HE Ineffable God, whose ways are mercy and trath, 
 whose will is omnipotence, and whose wisdom reaches 
 powerfully from end to end, and disposes all things 
 sweetly, when he foresaw from all eternity the most 
 sorrowful ruin of the entire human race to follow 
 from the transgression of Adam, and in a mystery 
 hidden from ages determined to complete, through 
 the incarnation of the Word, in a more hidden sac- 
 rament, the first work of His goodness, so that man, led into sin by the 
 craft of diabolical iniquity, should not perish contrary to his merciful 
 design, and that what was about to befall in the first Adam, should be 
 restored more happily in the second ; from the beginning and before ages, 
 chose and ordained a mother for His only-begotten Son, of whom, made 
 flesh. He should be born in the blessed plenitude of time, and followed her 
 with so great love before all creatures that in her alone He pleased Him- 
 
xH LETTERS APOSTOLIC OF OUR 
 
 self with a most benign complacency. Wherefore, far before all the an- 
 gelic spirits, and all the Saints, He so wonderfully endowed her with the 
 abundance of all heavenly gifts, drawn from the treasure of divinity, 
 that she might be ever free froin every stain of sin, and, all fair and 
 perfect, would bear before her that plenitude of innocence and holiness 
 than which, under God, none greater is understood, and which, except 
 God, no one can reach, even in thought. And, indeed, it was most 
 becoming that she should shine, always adorned with the splendor of 
 the most perfect holiness, and, free even from the stain of original sin, 
 she should have the most complete triumph over the ancient serpent — 
 that Mother so venerable, to whom God the Father willed to give His 
 only Son, begotten of His heart, equal to Himself, and whom He loves 
 as Himself; and to give Him in such a manner that He is by nature, 
 one and the same common Son of God the Father and of the Virgin, 
 and whom the Son chose substantially to be His Mother,, and of whom 
 the Holy Ghost willed that, by His operation, He, from whom He Him- 
 self proceeds, should be conceived and born. 
 
 Which original innocence of the august Virgin agreeing completely 
 with her admirable holiness, and with the most excellent dignity of the 
 Mother of God, the Catholic Church, which, ever taught by the Holy 
 Spirit, is the pillar and ground of truth, as possessing a doctrine di- 
 vinely received, and comprehended in the deposit of heavenly revela- 
 tion, has never ceased to lay down, to cherish, and to illustrate contin- 
 ually by numerous proofs, and daily more and more by conspicuous facts. 
 For this doctrine, flourishing from the most ancient times, and implanted 
 in the minds of the faithful, and by the care and zeal of the Holy Pontiffs 
 wonderfully propagated, the Church herself has most clearly pointed out 
 when she did not hesitate to propose the conception of the same Vir- 
 gin for the public devotion and veneration of the faithful. By which 
 illustrious act she pointed out the conception of the Virgin as singular, 
 wonderful, and very different from the origin of the rest of mankind, and 
 to be venerated as entirely holy, since the Church celebrates by festi- 
 vals only that which is holy. And, therefore, the very words in which 
 the Sacred Scriptm-es speak of the uncreated Wisdom and represent His 
 eternal origin, she has been accustomed to use not only in the offices of 
 ihQ Church, but als) in the holy liturgy, and to transfer to the origin of 
 
MOST HOLY LORD PIUS IX. 
 
 XVII 
 
 that Virgin, which was pre-ordained by one and the same decree with 
 the incarnation of Divine Wisdom. 
 
 But though all those things everywhere justly received amongst the 
 faitliful, show with what zeal the Roman Church, the mother and mis- 
 tress of all churches, has supported the doctrine of the Immaculate Con- 
 ception of the Virgin, yet the illustrious acts of this Church are evidently 
 worthy that they should be reviewed in detail; since so great is the 
 dignity and authority of the same Church, so much is due to her who is 
 the centre of Catholic truth and unity, in whom alone religion has been 
 inviolably guarded, and from whom it is right that all the Churches 
 should receive the tradition of faith. 
 
 Thus the same Roman Church had nothing more at heart than to as- 
 sert, to protect, to promote, and to vindicate in the most eloquent manner 
 the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin, its devotion and doctrine, which 
 fact is attested and proclaimed by so many illustrious acts of the Ro- 
 man Pontiffs, Our predecessors, to whom, in the person of the Prince of 
 the Apostles, was divinely committed by Christ Our Lord the supreme 
 care and power of feeding lambs and sheep, of confirming the brethren, 
 and of ruling and governing the Universal Church. 
 
 Indeed, Our predecessors have ever gloried in instituting in the Roman 
 Church by their own Apostolic authority the Feast of the Conception, 
 and to augment, ennoble, and promote with all their power the devotion 
 thus instituted, by a proper Office and a proper Mass; by which the pre- 
 rogative of immunity from hereditary stain was most manifestly asserted; 
 to increase it either by indulgences granted, or by leave given to states, 
 provinces, and kingdoms, that they might choose as their patron the 
 Mother of God, under the title of the Immaculate Conception ; or by 
 approved sodalities, congregations, and religious families instituted to the 
 honor of the Immaculate Conception ; or by praises given to the piety of 
 those who have erected monasteries, hospitals, or churches, under the title 
 of the Immaculate Conception, or who have bound themselves by a relig- 
 ious vow to defend strenuously the Immaculate Conception of the Mother 
 of God. Above all, they were happy to ordain that the Feast of the 
 Conception should be celebrated through the whole Church as that of 
 the Nativity; and, in fine, that it should be celebrated with an Octave 
 in the Universal Church as it was placed in the rank of the festivals 
 
x^ux LETTERS APOSTOLIC OF OUR 
 
 which are commanded to be kept holy; also, tliat a Pontifical service 
 in Hill Patriarchal LilxMinn Basilica should be peiformed yearly on the 
 day sacred to the Conception of the Virgin; and desiring to cherish daily 
 more and more in the minds of the Faithful this doctrine of the Immac- 
 ulate Conception of the Mother of God, and to excite their piety in wor- 
 shipping and venerating the Virgin conceived without original sin, they 
 have rejoiced most fi'eely to give leave that in the Litany of Loretto, 
 and in the Preface of the Mass itself, the Immaculate Conception of the 
 same Virgin should be proclaimed, and that thus the law of faith should 
 be established by the very law of supplication. We ourselves, treading 
 in the footsteps of so many predecessors, have not only received and 
 approved what had been most wisely and piously established and ap- 
 pointed by them, but also mindful of the institution of Sixtus IV., We 
 have appointed by Our authority a proper Office for the Immaculate 
 Conception, and with a most joyful mind have granted the use of it 
 to the Universal Chm'ch. 
 
 But since those things which pertain to worship are evidently bound 
 by an intimate chord to its object, and cannot remain fixed and deter- 
 mined, if it be doubtful, and placed in uncertainty, therefore our prede- 
 cessors, the Roman Pontiffs, increasing with all their care the devotion 
 of the Conception, studied most especially to declare and inculcate its 
 object and doctrine; for they taught clearly and openly that the festival 
 was celebrated for the Conception of the Virgin, and they proscribed as 
 false and most foreign to the intention of the Church the opinion of 
 those who considered and affii-med that it was not the Conception itself, 
 but the sanctification, to which devotion was paid by the Church. 
 Nor did they think of treating more indulgently those who, in order to 
 weaken the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, drawing a distinc- 
 tion between the first and second instant and moment of the Conception, 
 asserted that the Conception was indeed celebrated, but not for the first 
 instant and moment; for Our predecessors themselves thought it their 
 duty to protect and defend with all zeal both the feast of the Concep- 
 tion of the Most Blessed Virgin, and the Conception from the first instant, 
 as the true object of devotion. Hence the words, evidently decretive, in 
 which Alexander VII. declared the true intention of the Church, saying : 
 '* Certainly, it is the ancient piety of the faithful of Christ towards His 
 
MOST HOLY LORD Pi US IX. xix 
 
 Most Blessed Mother the Virgin Mary, believing that her soul, in the 
 first instant of creation, and of infusion into the body, was by a special 
 grace and privilege of God, in virtue of the merits of Jesus Christ her 
 Son the Redeemer of mankind, preserved free from the stain of origi- 
 nal sin, and in this sense they keep and celebrate with solemn rites 
 the Festival of her Conception." 
 
 And to the same. Our predecessors, this also was most especially a 
 duty to preserve from contention the doctrine of the Immaculate Con- 
 ception of the Mother of God, guarded and protected with all care and 
 zeal. For not only have they never suffered that this doctrine should 
 ever be censured or ti'aduced in any way, or by any one, but they 
 have gone much farther, and in clear declarations on repeated occasions 
 they have proclaimed that the doctrine in which we confess the Im- 
 maculate Conception of the Virgin is, and by its own merit, held 
 evidently consistent with Ecclesiastical worship, that it is ancient and 
 nearly universal, and of the same sort as that which the Roman Church 
 has undertaken to cherish and protect, and, above all, worthy to be 
 placed in its sacred liturgy and its solemn prayers. Nor content with 
 this, in order that the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception of the 
 Virgin should remain inviolate, they have most severely prohibited the 
 opinion adverse to this doctrine to be defended either in public or in 
 private, and they have wished to crush it, as it were, by repeated 
 blows. To which reiterated and most clear declarations, lest they might 
 appear empty, they added a sanction; all which things Our illustrious 
 predecessor, Alexander VII., embraced in these words: — 
 
 " Considering that the Holy Roman Church solemnly celebrates the 
 festival of the Conception of the Immaculate and Ever-Blessed Virgin, 
 and has appointed for this a special and proper office according to 
 the pious, devout, and laudable institution which emanated from Our 
 predecessor, Sixtus IV., and wishing, after the example of the Roman 
 Pontiffs, Om^ predecessors, to favor this laudable piety, devotion, and 
 festival, and the reverence shown towards it, never changed in the Roman 
 Church since the institution of the worship itself; also in order to protect 
 the piety and devotion of venerating and celebrating the Most Blessed 
 Virgin, preserved from original sin by the preventing grace of the Holy 
 Ghost, and desiring to preserve in the flock of Chrst unity of spirit in 
 
IX 
 
 LETTERS APOSTOLIC OF OUR 
 
 the bond of peace, removing offences, and brawls, and scandals; at the 
 instance and prayers of the said Bishops, with the Chapters of their 
 churches, and of King Philip and liis kingdoms — we renew the consti- 
 tutions and decrees issued by the Roman Pontifts, Our predecessors, and 
 especially by Sixtus IV., Paul V., and Gregory XV., in favor of asserting 
 the opinion that the soul of the Blessed Virgin, in its creation and 
 infusion into the body, was endowed with the grace of the Holy Ghost, 
 and preserved from original sin ; likewise, also, in favor of the festival 
 of the same Virgin Mother of God, celebrated according to that pious 
 belief which is recited above, and We command that it shall be ob- 
 served under the censures and punishments contained in the same 
 constitutions. 
 
 "And against all and each of those who try to interpret the aforesaid 
 constitutions or decrees so that they may frustrate the favor shown 
 through these to the said belief and to the festival or worship cele- 
 brated according to it, or who try to recall into dispute the same belief, 
 festival, or worship, or against these in any manner, either directly or 
 indirectly, and on any pretext, even that of examining the grounds of 
 defining it, or of explaining or interpreting the Sacred Scriptui-es or 
 the Holy Fathers or Doctors ; in fine, who should dare under any pre- 
 text or on any occasion whatsoever, to say either in writing or in speech, 
 to preach, to treat, to dispute, by determining or asserting anything 
 against these, or by bringing arguments against them and leaving these 
 arguments unanswered, or by expressing dissent in any other possible 
 manner; besides the punishments and censures contained in the con- 
 stitutions of Sixtus IV., to which we desire to add, and by these presents 
 do add, those: We will that they should be deprived ipso fado^ and 
 without other declaration, of the faculty of preaching, of reading in 
 public, or of teaching and interpreting, and also of their voice, whether 
 active or passive, in elections ; from which censures they cannot be 
 absolved, nor obtain dispensation, unless from Us, or Our successors, 
 the Roman Pontiffs ; likewise We wish to subject, and We hereby do 
 subject, the same persons to other penalties to be inflicted at Our will, 
 and at that of the same Roman Pontiffs, Our successors, renewing 
 the constitutions or decrees of Paul IV., and Gregory XV., above re- 
 ferred to. 
 
MOST HOLY LORD PIUS IX. xxi 
 
 "And We prohibit, under the penalties and censures contained in the 
 Index of Prohibited Books, and We will and declare that they should be 
 esteemed prohibited ipso facto^ and without other declaration, books in 
 which the aforesaid belief and the festival or devotion celebrated accord- 
 ing to it is recalled into dispute, or in which anything whatever is writ- 
 ten or read against these, or lectures, sermons, treatises, and disputations 
 against the same, published after the decree of Paul V. above mentioned, 
 or to be published at any future time." 
 
 All are aware with how much zeal this doctrine of the Immaculate 
 Conception of the Mother of God has been handed down, asserted and 
 propagated by the most distinguished religious Orders, the most celebrated 
 theological academies, and the most eminent doctors of the science of 
 Divinity. All know likewise how anxious have been the Bishops openly 
 and publicly to profess, even in the Ecclesiastical assemblies themselves, 
 that the Most Holy Mother of God, the Virgin Mary, by virtue of the 
 merits of ^Christ Our Lord, the Saviour of mankind, never lay under ori- 
 ginal sin, but was preserved free from the original stain, and thus was 
 redeemed in a more sublime manner. To which, lastly, is added this 
 fact, most grave, and, in an especial manner, most important of all, that 
 the Council of Trent itself, when it promulgated the dogmatic decree 
 concerning original sin, in which, according to the testimonies of the 
 Sacred Scriptures, of the Holy Fathers, and of the most approved coun- 
 cils, it determined and defined that all mankind are born under original 
 sin ; solemnly declared, however, that it was not its intention to in- 
 clude in the decree itself, and in the amplitude of its definition, the 
 Blessed and Immaculate Virgin Mary, Mother of God. Indeed, by this 
 declaration, the Tridentine Fathers have asserted, according to the times 
 and the circumstances of affairs, that the Blessed Virgin Mary was free 
 fi'om the original stain, and thus clearly signified that nothing could be 
 justly adduced from the sacred writings, nor from the authority of the 
 Fathers, which would in any way gainsay so great a prerogative of 
 the Virgin. 
 
 And, in real truth, illustrious monuments of a venerated antiquity of 
 the Eastern and of the Western Church most powerfully testify that this 
 doctrine of the Immaculate Conception of the Most Blessed Virgin, every 
 day more and more so splendidly explained and confirmed by the high- 
 
xxii LETTERS APOSTOLIC OF OUR 
 
 est auUiority, teaching, zeal, science, and wisdom of the Church, and so 
 wonderfully propagated amongst all the nations and peoples of the Cath- 
 olic world, always existed in the Church as received by Our ancestors, 
 and stamped with the character of a divine revelation. For the Church 
 of Christ, careful guardian and defender of the dogmas deposited with 
 her, changes nothing in them, diminishes nothing, adds nothing, but, with 
 all industry, by faithfully and wisely treating ancient things, if they are 
 handed down from antiquity, so studies to eliminate, to clear them up, 
 that these ancient dogmas of heavenly faith may receive evidence, light, 
 distinction, but still may retain their fullness, integrity, propriety, and may 
 increase only in their own kind — that is, in the same dogma, the same 
 sense, and the same belief. 
 
 The Fathei*s and writers of the Church, taught by the heavenly writ- 
 mgs, had nothing more at heart, in the books written to explain the 
 Scriptures, to vindicate the dogmas, and to instruct the faithful, than 
 emulously to declare and exhibit in many and wonderful ways the Virgin's 
 most high sanctity, dignity, and freedom from all stain of original sin, 
 and her renowned victory over the most foul enemy of the human race. 
 Wherefore, repeating the words in which, at the beginning of the world, 
 the Almighty, announcing the remedies of his mercy, prepared for regen- 
 erating mankind, crushed the audacity of the lying Serpent, and wonder- 
 fully raised up the hope of our race, saying, " I will place enmity between 
 thee and the woman, thy seed and hers," they taught that in this divine 
 oracle was clearly and openly pointed out the merciful Kedeemer of the 
 human race — the only-begotten Son of God, Christ Jesus, and that his 
 Most Blessed Mother, the Virgin Mary, was designated, and at the same 
 time that the enmity of both against the Serpent was signally expressed. 
 Wherefore, as Christ, the mediator of God and men, having assumed 
 human nature, blotting out the handwriting of the decree which stood 
 against us, fastened it triumphantly to the Cross, so the Most Holy Vir- 
 gin, bound by a most close and indissoluble chain with Him, exercis- 
 ing with Him and through Him eternal enmity against the malignant 
 Serpent, and triumphing most amply over the same, has crushed his 
 head with her Immaculate foot. 
 
 This illustrious and singular triumph of the Virgin, and her most ex- 
 alted innocence, purity, and holiness, her freedom from all stain of sin, 
 
MOST HOLY LORD PIUS IX. rsiii 
 
 and ineffable abundance and greatness of all heavenly graces, ^drtues, 
 and privileges, the same Fathers beheld in that ark of Noah, which, di- 
 vinely appointed, escaped safe and sound from the common shipwreck 
 of the whole w^orld; also in that ladder which Jacob beheld reaching 
 from earth to heaven, by whose steps the Angels of God ascended and 
 descended, on whose top leaned God himself; also in that bush which, 
 in the holy place, Moses beheld blaze on every side, and amidst the 
 crackling flames neither to be consumed nor to suffer the least injury, 
 but to grow green and to blossom fairly; also in that impregnable 
 tower in front of the enemy, on which are hung a thousand bucklers 
 and all the armor of the brave ; also in that garden fenced round 
 about, which cannot be violated nor corrupted by any schemes of 
 fraud; also in that brilliant city of God, whose foundations are in the 
 holy mounts ; also in that most august temple of God, which, shining 
 with divine splendor, is filled with the glory of God ; likewise in many 
 other things of this kind which the Fathers have handed down, that 
 the exalted dignity of the Mother of God, and her spotless innocence, 
 and her holiness, obnoxious to no blemish, have been signally pre- 
 announced. 
 
 To describe the same totality, as it were, of divine gifts, and the 
 original integrity of the Virgin of whom Jesus was born, the same 
 Fathers, using the eloquence of the Prophets, celebrate the august Vir- 
 gin as the spotless dove, the holy Jerusalem, the exalted throne of 
 God, the ark and house of sanctification, which Eternal Wisdom built 
 for itself; and as that Queen who, abounding in delights and leaning 
 on her beloved, came forth entirely perfect from the mouth of the Most 
 High, fair and most dear to God, and never stained with the least 
 spot. But when the same Fathers and the writers of the Church re- 
 volved in their hearts and minds that the Most Blessed Virgin, in the 
 name and by the order of God himself, was proclaimed full of grace 
 by the Angel Gabriel, when announcing her most sublime dignity of 
 the Mother of God, they taught that, by this singular and solemn salu- 
 tation, never heard on any other occasion, is shown that the Mother 
 of God is the seat of all divine graces, and adorned with all the gifts 
 of the Holy Ghost — yea, the infinite storehouse and inexhaustible abyss 
 of the same gifts; so that, never subjected to malediction, and alono 
 
XXIT 
 
 LETTERS APOSTOLIC OF OUR 
 
 with her Son partaker of perpetual benediction, she deserved to hear 
 from Elizabeth, inspired by the Holy Ghost: "Blessed art thou amongst 
 women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb." 
 
 Hence it is the clear and unanimous opinion of the same that the Most 
 Glorious Virgin, for whom He who is powerful has done gi-eat things, 
 has shone with such a brilliancy of all heavenly gifts, such fullness of 
 grace, and such innocence, that she has been an ineffable miracle of the 
 Almighty, yea, the crown of all miracles, and worthy Mother of God ; 
 that she approaches as nearly to God as created natm-e can do, and is 
 far above the praise of men or angels. 
 
 And, therefore, to vindicate the original innocence and justice of the 
 Mother of God, they not only compared her to Eve, as yet virgin, as yet 
 innocent, as yet incorrupted, and not yet deceived by the most deadly 
 snares of the most treacherous serpent, but they have preferred her with 
 a wonderful variety of thought and expression. For Eve, miserably 
 obeying the serpent, fell from original innocence, and became his slave, 
 but the Most Blessed Virgin, ever increasing her original gift, not only 
 never leant an ear to the serpent, but by a vii'tue divinely received 
 utterly broke his power. 
 
 Wherefore they have never ceased to call the Mother of God the lily 
 amongst the thorns, earth entirely untouched, virgin, undefiled, immacu- 
 late, ever blessed, and free from all contagion of sin, from which was 
 foimed the new Adam; a reproachless, most sweet paradise of innocence, 
 immortality, and delights, planted by God himself, and fenced from all 
 snares of the malignant serpent; incorruptible branch that the worm of 
 sin has never injured; fountain ever clear, and marked by the virtue of 
 the Holy Ghost; a most divine temple, or treasure of immortality, or the 
 sole and only daughter not of death but of life, the seed not of enmity 
 but of grace, which by the singular providence of God has always flour- 
 ished, springing from a coiTupt and imperfect root, contrary to the settled 
 and common laws. But if these encomiums, though most splendid, were 
 not sufficient, they proclaimed in proper and defined opinions that when 
 sin was to be treated of, no question should be entertained concerning 
 the Holy Virgin Mary, to whom an abundance of grace was given to con- 
 quer sin completely. They also declared that the Most Glorious Virgin 
 was the reparatiix of her parents, the vivifier of posterity, chosen from 
 
the ages, prepared for Himself by the Most High, predicted by God when 
 he said to the serpent, " I will place enmity between thee and the 
 woman," who luidoubtedly has crushed the poisonous head of the same 
 serpent; and therefore they affirm that the same Blessed Virgin was 
 through grace perfectly free from every stain of sin, and from all conta- 
 gion of body and soul and mind, and always conversant with God, and 
 united with him in an eternal covenant, never was in darkness, but 
 always in light, and therefore was plainly a fit habitation for Christ, not 
 on account of her bodily state, but on account of her original grace. 
 
 To these things are added the noble words in which, speaking of the 
 Conception of the Yirgin, they have testified that nature yielded to grace 
 and stood trembling, not being able to proceed further ; for it was to be 
 that the Virgin Mother of God should not be conceived by Anna before 
 grace should bear fruit. For she ought thus to be conceived as the first 
 born, from whom should be conceived the first born of every creature. 
 They have testified that the flesh of the Virgin, taken from Adam, did not 
 admit the stains of Adam, and on this account that the Most Blessed Vir- 
 gin was the tabernacle created by God himself, formed by the Holy 
 Spirit, truly enriched with purple which that new Beseleel made, adorned 
 and woven with gold ; and that this same Virgin is, and deservedly is, 
 celebrated as she who was the first and the peculiar work of God, 
 escaped from the fiery weapons of evil; and fair by nature, and entirely 
 free from all stain, came into the world all shining like the morn in her 
 Immaculate Conception ; nor, truly, was it right that this vessel of elec- 
 tion should be assailed by common injuries, since, differing very much 
 from others, she had community with them only in their nature, not in 
 their fault. 
 
 Moreover, it was right that, as the Only Begotten had a Father in 
 heaven whom the seraphim proclaim thrice holy, so He should have a 
 Mother on the earth, who should never want the splendor of holiness. 
 And this doctrine, indeed, so filled the minds and souls of om- forefathers, 
 that a marvelous and singular form of speech prevailed with, them, in 
 which they very frequently called the Mother of God immacuiate and 
 entirely immaculate, innocent and most innocent, spotless, holy, and most 
 distant from every stain of sin, all pure, all perfect, the type and model 
 of purity and innocence, more beautiful than beauty, more gracious than 
 
xxn 
 
 LETTERS APOSTOLIC OF OUR 
 
 grace, more holy than holiness, and alone holy, and most pure in soul 
 and body, who has surpassed all perfectitude and all virginity, and has 
 become the dwelling-place of all the graces of the Most Holy Spirit, and 
 who, God alone excepted, is superior to all, and by nature fairer, more 
 beautiful, and more holy than the cherubim and seraphim ; she whom all 
 the tongues of heaven and earth do not suffice to extol. No one is 
 ignorant that these forms of speech have passed, as it were spontaneously, 
 into the monuments of the most holy Liturgy, and the Offices of the 
 Church, and that they occm- often in them and abound amply ; and 
 that the Mother of God is invoked and named in them as a spotless dove 
 of beauty, as a rose ever blooming and perfectly pure, and ever spotless 
 and ever blessed, and is celebrated as innocence which was never 
 wounded, and a second Eve who brought forth Emmanuel. 
 
 It is no wonder, then, if the Pastors of the Church and the faithful 
 people have daily more and more gloried to profess with so much piety 
 and fei*vor this doctrine of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin 
 Mother of God, pointed out in the Sacred Scriptures, according to the 
 judgment of the Fathers, handed down in so many mighty testimonies 
 of the same, expressed and celebrated in so many illustrious monuments 
 of a revered antiquity, and proposed, and with great piety confirmed, by 
 the greatest and highest judgment of the Church ; so that nothing would 
 be more dear, more pleasing to the same, than everywhere to worship, 
 venerate, invoke, and proclaim the Virgin Mother of God conceived with- 
 out original stain. Wherefore, from the ancient times, the Princes of the 
 Church, Ecclesiastics, and even emperors and kings themselves, have 
 #imestly entreated of this Apostolic See that the Immaculate Conception 
 of the Most Holy Mother of God should be defined as a dogma of Catholic 
 faith. Which entreaties were renewed also in these Our times, and espe- 
 cially were a ddress^ to Gregory XVL, Our predecessor of happy memoiy, 
 and^^^urselves, not only 1)\' Bishops, but by the secular clergy, religious 
 Ora^Pby the greatest princes, and by the faithful people. 
 
 Tlrerelnre, with singular joy of mind, well knowing all these things, 
 and seriously consIdtM-ing tl|pii, scarcely had We, though unworthy, been 
 raised 1^ a mysterious dispensation of Divine Providence to the exalted 
 Chair of Peter, and undertaken the government of the whole Church, than, 
 following the veneration, the piety, and love We had entertained for the 
 
MOST HOLY LORD PIUS IX. 
 
 XXVll 
 
 Blessed Yirgin from Our tender years, We had nothing at heart more 
 than to accomplish all these things which as yet were amongst the ardent 
 wishes of the Church, that the honor of the Most Blessed Virgin should 
 be increased, and her prerogatives should shine with a fuller light. But 
 wishing to bring to this full maturity We appointed a special congrega- 
 tion of Our Venerable Brothers, the Cardinals of the Holy Eoman Church, 
 illustrious by their piety, their wisdom, and their knowledge of the sacred 
 sciences, and We also selected Ecclesiastics, both secular and regular, 
 well trained in theological discipline, that they should most carefully 
 weigh all those things which relate to the Immaculate Conception of the 
 Virgin, and report to Us their opinion. And, although from the entreaties 
 lately received by Us for at length defining the Immaculate Conception 
 of the Virgin, the opinions of most of the Bishops of the Church were 
 understood ; however. We sent Encyclic letters, dated at Gaeta, the 2d day 
 of February, in the year 1849, to all Our Venerable Brethren, the Bishops 
 of all the Catholic world, in order that having offered prayers to God 
 they might signify to Us, in witing, what was the piety and devotion of 
 their flocks towards the Immaculate Conception of the Mother of God, 
 and especially what the Bishops themselves thought about promulgating 
 the definition, or what they desired in order that We might pronounce 
 Our supreme judgment as solemnly as possible. 
 
 Certainly we were filled with no slight consolation when the replies 
 of Our Venerable Brethren came to Us. For, with an incredible joyfulness, 
 gladness, and zeal, they not only confirmed their own singular piety, and 
 that of their clergy and faithful people, towards the Immaculate Concep- 
 tion of the Most Blessed Virgin, but they even entreated of Us with% 
 common voice that the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin should be 
 defined by Our supreme judgment and authority. Nor, indeed, were We 
 filled with less joy when- Our Venerable Brothers, ,dtiie Cardinals of the 
 Special Congregation aforesaid, and the consulting theologians chosen by 
 Us, after a diligent examination demanded fi-om Us with equal alacrity 
 and zeal this definition of the Immaculate Conception of the Mother of 
 God. '^ M 
 
 Afterwards walking in the illustrious footsteps of Our predecessors, 
 and desiring to proceed duly and properly. We proclaimed and held a 
 Consistory, in which We addressed Our Brethren, the Cardinals of the 
 
xxvui 
 
 LETTERS APOSTOLIC OF OUR 
 
 Holy Roman Churcli, and with the greatest consolation of mind We heard 
 them entreat of Us that We should promulgate the dogmatic definition 
 of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mother of God. 
 
 Therefore having full trust in the Lord that the opportune time had 
 come for defining the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary Mother 
 of God, which the Divine word, venerable tradition, the perpetual opinion 
 of the Church, the singular agreement of Catholic Prelates and Faithful, 
 and the signal acts and constitutions of Our predecessors wonderfully 
 illustrate and proclaim; having most diligently weighed all things, and 
 poured forth to God assiduous and fervent prayers. We resolved that We 
 would no longer delay to sanction and define, by Our supreme authority, 
 the Innnaculate Conception of the Virgin, and thus to satisfy the most 
 pious desires of the Catholic world and Our own piety towards the Most 
 Holy Virgin, and, at the same time, to honor more and more the cmly-begot- 
 ten Son Jesus Christ Om- Lord, since whatever honor and praise is given 
 to the Mother redounds to the Son. 
 
 Wherefore, after We had unceasingly, in humility and fasting, offered 
 Our own prayers and the public prayers of the Church to God the 
 Father, through his Son, that He would deign to direct and confirm Our 
 mind by the power of the Holy Ghost, and implored the aid of the entire 
 heavenly host, and invoked the Paraclete with sighs, and He thus inspir- 
 ing, to the honor of the Holy and undivided Trinity, to the glory and 
 ornament of the Virgin Mother of God, to the exaltation of the Catholic 
 faith and the increase of the Catholic religion, by the authority of Jesus 
 Christ Our Lord, of the Blessed Apostles, Peter and Paul, We declare, 
 .Renounce, and define that the doctrine which holds that the Blessed 
 Virgin Mary, at the first instant of her conception, by a singular privilege 
 and grace of the Omnipitent God, in virtue of the merits of Jesus Christ, 
 the Saviour of mankind, was preserved immaculate from all stain of origi- 
 nal si^h^^j^n revealed ])y God, and therefore should firmly and con- 
 staiMlpi^Wliieved by all the faithful. Wherefore, if any shall dare — 
 whicn (jJod forbid — to thiiilc otherwise than as it has been defined by 
 Us, they ipK » 111 (1 know and understand that they are condemned by their 
 own judPnent, that they have suffered shipwreck of the faith, and have 
 revolted from the unity of the Chm-ch ; and besides, by their own act they 
 subject themselves to the penalties justly established, if what they think 
 
MOST HOLY LORD PIUS IX. xxix 
 
 they should dare to signify by word, writing, or any other outward 
 means. 
 
 Our mouth is filled with joy, and Our tongue with exultation, and We 
 return, and shall ever return, the most humble and the greatest thanks 
 to Jesus Christ Our Lord, because through his singular beneficence He 
 has granted to Us, though unworthy, to offer and decree this honor, glory, 
 and praise, to His Most Holy Mother; but We rest in the most certain 
 hope and confidence that this Most Blessed Virgin, who, all fair and 
 immaculate, has bruised the poisonous head of the most malignant Ser- 
 pent, and brought salvation to the world, who is the praise of the Prophets 
 and the Apostles, the honor of the Martyrs, and the crown and joy of all 
 the Saints-^who is the safest refuge and most faithful helper of all who 
 are in danger, and the most powerful mediatrix and conciliatrix with the 
 only-begotten Son for the whole world, and the most illustrious glory and 
 ornament, and most firm guardian of the Holy Church, who has destroyed 
 all heresies, and snatched from the greatest calamities of all kinds the 
 faithful peoples and nations, and delivered Us from so many threatening 
 dangers, will effect by her most powerful patronage that, all difficulties 
 being removed, and all errors dissipated. Our Holy Mother the Catholic 
 Church may flourish daily more and more throughout all nations and 
 countries, and may reign from sea to sea to the ends of the earth, and 
 may enjoy all peace, tranquillity, and liberty; that the sinner may obtain 
 pardon, the sick healing, the weak strength of heart, the afflicted consola- 
 tion, and that all who are in error, their spiritual blindness being dissi- 
 pated, may return to the path of truth and justice, and may become one 
 flock and one shepherd. 
 
 Let all the children of the Catholic Church, most dear to Us, hear these 
 Our words, and, with a more ardent zeal of piety, religion, and love, pro- 
 ceed to worship, invoke, and pray to the Most Blessed Virgin Mary, 
 Mother of God, conceived without original sin, and let them fly with 
 entire confidence to this most sweet Mother of Mercy and Grac^ in all 
 dangers, difficulties, doubts, and fears. For nothing is to be feared, and 
 nothing is to be despaired of under her guidance, under her auspices, 
 under her favor, under her protection, who, bearing towards us a maternal 
 affection, and taking up the business of our salvation, is solicitous for the 
 whole human race, and, appointed by God the Queen of Heaven and 
 
LETTERS APOSTOLIC. 
 
 Earth, and exalted above all the choirs of Angels, and orders of Saints, 
 standing at the right hand of the only-begotten Son, Jesus Christ Our 
 Lord, intercedes most powerfully, and obtains what she asks, and cannot 
 be frusti*ated. 
 
 Finally, in order that this Our definition of the Immaculate Conception 
 of the Most Blessed Virgin Mary may be brought to the knowledge of the 
 Universal Church, We will these Letters Apostolic to stand for a perpetual 
 remembrance of the thing, commanding that to transcripts or printed- 
 copies, subscribed by the hand of some notary public, and authenticated 
 by the seal of a person of Ecclesiastical rank, appointed for the purpose, 
 the same faith shall be paid which would be paid to these presents if they 
 were exhibited or shown. 
 
 Let no man interfere with this Our declaration, pronunciation, and 
 definition, or oppose and contradict it with presumptuous rashness. If 
 any should presume to assail it, let him know that he will incur the in- 
 dignation of the Omnipotent God and of His Blessed Apostles Peter and 
 Paul. 
 
 Given at Rome, at St. Peter's, in the year of the Incarnation of Our 
 Lord 1854, the sixth of the Ides of December, in the ninth year of Our 
 Pontificate. 
 
 PIUS IX., Pope. 
 
Li I P^ E 
 
 OF THE 
 
 BLESSED VIRGIN MARY; 
 
 iH0tl)er of (^oir. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 UNIVERSAL EXPECTATION OF THE VIRGIN AND OF THE MESSIAH. 
 
 those remote 
 times when the 
 world was still 
 in its infancy, 
 when our first 
 parents, trem- 
 bling and amazed, heard, under the 
 majestic shades of Eden,* the awful 
 voice of Jehovah condemning them 
 to exile, to labor, and to death, 
 in punishment of their mad dis- 
 obedience, a mysterious prediction, 
 wherein the pitying kindness of the 
 Creator was manifested through the 
 
 * The word Eden, among the Arabs as among 
 the Hebrews, is the name of the terrestrial 
 paradise, and also of the paradise of the elect. 
 
 * wrath of the ofiended Deity, came to 
 raise the drooping spirits of those 
 two frail creatures who had, like 
 Lucifer, sinned through pride. A 
 daughter of Eve, a woman of mascu- 
 line com^age, was to crush the head 
 of the serpent beneath her feet, and 
 to regenerate for ever a guilty race ; 
 that woman was Mary. 
 
 Thenceforward, it was a tradition 
 amongst the antediluvian tribes that 
 a woman should come to repair the 
 evil which another had done; this 
 consoling tradition, which kept up 
 
 In Hebrew, it signifies a place of delight ; in 
 Arabic, a place proper for the grazing of 
 flocks. 
 
82 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 the hopes of a fallen race, had not * 
 yet been effaced from the minds of 
 men, at the time of their grand dis- 
 persion on the plains of Sennaar; 
 they carried with them, over seas 
 and mountains, that sweet, though 
 distant hope, together with the re- 
 ligion of Noah, and the wreck of art 
 and science saved from the waters 
 of the Deluge.* In after times, 
 when the primitive religion faded 
 away, and the ancient traditions 
 were shrouded in obscurity, that of 
 the Vii-gin and the Messiah resisted, 
 almost alone, the action of time, 
 and reared itself up on the ruin of 
 ancient creeds, swallowed up in 
 the fables of polytheism, like the 
 evergreen which grows amid the 
 
 * It is certain that the race of primitive men, 
 which was wild, but not savage, early attained a 
 knowledge of the arts analogous to their wants 
 and pleasures. Scarcely do the children of 
 Adam form into little communities of men, 
 when we see them establish a public worship, 
 fabricate tents, build towns, forge iron, cast 
 bronze, invent instruments of music, and follow 
 the coarse of the stars. The history of Astron- 
 omy must be traced, according to Bailly, to an 
 antediluvian people, of whom the memory is 
 lost, but of whose astronomical knowledge some 
 fragments escaped the general revolution. La- 
 lande, fearing that this assertion might prove 
 too much in favor of the Sacred Books, refers 
 to the Egyptians the origin of this science ; but 
 the Hebrews, who, as neighbors, contempo- 
 
 ruins of what once was Babylon the 
 great.f* 
 
 Let us sui-vey the various regions 
 of the globe; let us search, from 
 north to south, from east to west, the 
 religious chi-onicles of the nations, 
 we shall find the Virgin promised, 
 and her divine maternity at the 
 basis of almost all theogonies. 
 
 In Thibet, in Japan, and in a por- 
 tion of the eastern peninsula of In- 
 dia, it is the god Fo, who, to save 
 mankind, became incarnate in the 
 womb of the young betrothed of a 
 king, the nymph Lhamoghiuprul, 
 the fairest and holiest of women. 
 In China, they reckon amongst the 
 number of the sons of Heaven the 
 Emperor Hoang-Ti, whose mollier 
 
 raries, and ancient dwellers amongst the E<2fyp- 
 tians, have a right to settle this diiference, 
 decide for Bailly, against his adversary, by in- 
 forming us that the Egyptians derived their 
 first astronomical knowledge from the tradi- 
 tions saved from the Deluge. (/S'ee Joseph. Ant. 
 Jud.) 
 
 f There is but one single tree found amid 
 the ruins of Babylon ; the Persians give it the 
 name of Athele ; according to them, that tree 
 existed in the ancient city, and was miracu- 
 lously preserved, to the end that their prophet 
 Ali, the son-in-law of Mahomet, might fasten 
 his horse to it after the battle of Hilla. It is an 
 evergreen shrub, and so rare in those rej^ions 
 that there is only one other of the same kind, 
 found at Bassora. (Rich's Memoir.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 83 
 
 conceived by a flash of lightning ; ' 
 another emperor, Yao, who lived at 
 the time of the Deluge, had for his 
 mother a virgin who conceived from 
 the beam of a star ; Yu, the head of 
 the first Chinese dynasty, owed his 
 life to a pearl (the emblem of light 
 throughout all the East) ,* which fell 
 from heaven into the chaste bosom 
 of a young maiden. Heou-Tsi, chief 
 of the dynasty of Tcheou, changed 
 not, by his birth, the virginity of his 
 mother, who conceived him by di- 
 vine operation, one day as she was 
 in prayer, and brought him forth 
 without effort and without pain in a 
 deserted grotto, where lambs and 
 oxen warmed him with their breath.f 
 The most popular goddess of the 
 Celestial Empire, Sching-Mou, con- 
 ceived at the simple touch of a 
 
 * " The pearl,'' says Chardin, " has every- 
 where distinctive names : in the East, the Turks 
 and Tartars call it mardjaun, globe of light ; the 
 Persians, marvid, production of light." 
 
 f We find in the Chi-kmg two fine odes on 
 this marvellous birth of Heou-Tsi ; and the com- 
 ments and paraphrases of the learned on these 
 verses agree in explaining them in a way which 
 renders the resemblance to the divine mater- 
 Hity of Mary still more striking. " Every child 
 who is born," says Ho-sou, " rends the womb of 
 his mother, and costs her the most cruel an- 
 guish. Kiang-Yuen brought forth hers without 
 rupture, hurt, or pain. It is that Tien {Heaven) ^ 
 
 water-flower; her son, brought up 
 under the roof of a poor fisherman, 
 became a great man, and wrought 
 miracles. 
 
 The lamas say that Buddha is 
 born of the virgin Maha-Mahai. 
 Sommonokhodom, the prince, the 
 legislator, and the god of Siam, 
 likewise owes his life to a virgin 
 made fruitful by the rays of the 
 sun. Lao-Tseu took flesh in the 
 womb of a black virgin, wonderful 
 and fair as the jasper. The zodiacal 
 Isis of the Egyptians is a virgin 
 mother. The Isis of the Druids 
 was to bring forth the future Sa- 
 viour.;!; The Brahmins teach that, 
 when a god assumes human flesh, 
 he is conceived in the womb of 
 a virgin, by divine operation: so 
 also Jagrenat,§ the mutilated re- 
 
 would thus display its power, and show how the 
 Holy One differs from men. Having been con- 
 ceived by the operation of Tien," says another 
 commentator, Tsou-Tsong-Ho, " who gave him 
 life by a miracle, he must needs be born without 
 wounding the virginity of his mother." 
 
 J Hinc Druidse statuam in intimis penetrali- 
 bus erexerunt, Isidi seu virgini hanc dedicantes, 
 ex qua filius ille proditurus erat (nempe generis 
 humani Eedemptor). (Elias Schedius, de Dlis 
 Germanis, cap. 13.) 
 
 § Jagrenat, the seventh incarnation of Brah- 
 ma, is represented in the form of a pyramid, 
 without hands and without feet. "He lost 
 
u 
 
 LIFE OF TEE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 deeuier of the world; Chricbna, 
 born in a grotto, where angels and 
 shepheixls come to adore him in his 
 nadle, — each of these has a virgin 
 for his mother. 
 
 The Babylonian Dogdo sees in a 
 dream a brilliant messenger fi*om 
 Oromazes, who deposits at her feet 
 the most magnificent garments; a 
 celestial light falls upon the face of 
 the sleeper, who becomes fair as the 
 
 ibem," say the Brahmins, " trying to carry the 
 world, in order to save it." {See Kircher.) 
 
 * Zer-Ateucht signifies washed with silver; this 
 surname was given to Zoroaster, because that, 
 as the Ghebers say, he proved his mission, to a 
 Sabean prince who persecuted him, by plunging 
 into a bath of molten silver. (See Tavernier, 
 ToL iL, p. 92.) 
 
 t This Nemroud, whom Tavernier names 
 Nenbrout, is, according to some, Nimrod, the 
 famous hunter ; according to others, the tyrant 
 Zhohac, of the Persians, a king of the first dy- 
 nasty of princes, who reigned immediately after 
 ^e Deluge. According to the author of the 
 MefaiiA Aloloum, Nemroud would be identical 
 with Gaicaous, second king of the second dy- 
 nasty of Persia, named the Calanides. The 
 Persian historians give him a reign of nearly 
 two centuries, which must needs be rather long. 
 By some he is represented as an impious man, 
 who conceived the strange fancy of ascending 
 to heaven in a chest, drawn by four of those 
 monstrous birds called kerkes, mentioned by old 
 Eastern writers in their romances. After having 
 wandered some time through the air, he fell so 
 heavily on a mountain, say the ancient legends 
 of Persia, that it was shaken to its very base. 
 According to the Persians, this Nimrod caused 
 
 * day-star; Zerdhucht, Zoroaster, or 
 rather Ebraliim-Zer-Ateucht, * the 
 famous prophet of the Magi, is the 
 fruit of this nocturnal vision. The 
 tyrant Nimrod, f informed by his 
 astrologers that a child, still unborn, 
 menaces his gods and his throne, 
 causes all pregnant women to be 
 put to death; Zerdhucht, however, 
 is saved through the prudence and 
 dexterity of his mother.J The Ma- 
 
 Zerdhucht, whom they confound with Abraham, 
 to be cast into a fiery furnace ; according to 
 others, Nemroud was a Sabean in religion, and 
 it was he who first established the worship of 
 fire. (D'Herbelot, Bibliotheque Orientale, t. iii., 
 p. 32.) The Jews claim for Abraham, the father 
 and the founder of their people, this persecu- 
 tion, of which the honor is given by the Per- 
 sians to Zerdhucht, their legislator. St. Jerome 
 relates an ancient tradition of the Jews, to the 
 effect that Abraham had been cast into the fire 
 by order of the Chaldeans, because he would 
 not adore him. (Hieron., Qucest. in Genes.) This 
 tradition is confirmed by Jewish writers much 
 more modern ; R. Chain, ben Adda mentions 
 that Abraham, meeting a young girl carrying 
 an idol, broke the latter in pieces ; a complaint 
 was immediately laid before Nemroud, who 
 would have him, therefore, adore the fire. The 
 patriarch gravely answered, that it would be 
 much more natural to worship water, which 
 extinguishes fire, the clouds whence the water 
 proceeds, the wind which gathers the clouds, 
 and man who is a being much more pei'fect than 
 the "wind. Nemroud, irritated by this cutting 
 rebuke, cast Abraham into the fire, which, how- 
 ever, did not harm him. 
 
 J See Tavernier, at the place quoted. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 35 
 
 ceniques, who inhabit the shores of 
 Lake Zarayas, in Paraguay, relate 
 that at a very remote period a 
 woman of rare beauty became a 
 mother, yet remained a virgin ; her 
 son, after having wrought many ex- 
 traordinary miracles, ascended one 
 day into the open air, in presence 
 of his disciples, and transformed 
 himself into a sun. 
 
 Let all these scattered fragments 
 of corrupted seed be brought to- 
 gether, and they will make up, in 
 nearly all its details, the history of 
 the Virgin and her divine Son. The 
 Virgin, notwithstanding the royal 
 blood which flows through her veins, 
 is of obscure condition, like the 
 mother of Zoroaster; like her, too, 
 she receives the visit of an angel 
 bearing a message from Heaven. 
 The tyrant Nemroud, who was the 
 progenitor of a line of very wicked 
 princes, may pass for the type of 
 Herod, and is as anxious to compass 
 the death of the young fire-wor- 
 shipper as the sanguinary spouse of 
 Mariamne to accomplish that of the 
 infant Jesus ; both miss their prey. 
 Born of a virgin who conceives him 
 during fervent prayer, and brings 
 him forth without pain or effort in a 
 
 * poor stable, like the first-born of the 
 noble and pious Kiang-Yuen, our 
 divine Saviour dwelt amongst the 
 lower classes, like the son of the 
 Chinese goddess ; angels and shep- 
 herds come to render Him homage, 
 as to Chrichna, on the very night of 
 his birth ; then, after having stilled 
 the tempest, walked on the water, 
 expelled demons, raised the dead to 
 life, he ascends triumphantly into 
 heaven in the presence of five hun- 
 dred disciples, whose dazzled eyes 
 lose sight of him in the clouds, pre- 
 cisely as is related by the savage 
 tribes of Paraguay. 
 
 It is assuredly very strange that 
 these marvellous legends, which 
 have not been copied from the evan- 
 gelical facts, since they are incontes- 
 tably more ancient, yet form, when 
 taken together, the real life of the 
 Son of God. Can truth, then, spring 
 from error ? What are we to think 
 of these fantastic associations? Shall 
 we say, with the scoffing philoso- 
 phers of the Voltairian school, and 
 some German visionaries of a some- 
 what more recent date, that the 
 Apostles borrowed these fables from 
 the various creeds of Asia? But 
 without speaking of the jealous care 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 with which they hid the books re- 
 puted divine in the impenetiable 
 darkness of the sanctuary — not to 
 mention the profound horror where- 
 with the Jews regarded idolatrous 
 legends, and their supreme contempt 
 for foreign learning — how could poor, 
 illiterate men, the extent of whose 
 knowledge was to steer a bark over 
 the waters of Genesareth, and whose 
 nets were still dripping with its 
 living waters, when they were pro- 
 moted to the Apostleship — how 
 could laborious artizans, forced to 
 toil for their daily bread during the 
 intervals of their preaching — how 
 could such as they have ransacked 
 the sacred books of the Indias, of the 
 Chinese, the Bactrians, the Pheni- 
 cians, and the Persians ? What 
 appearance is there that Simon 
 Peter, the sons of Zebedee, or the 
 austere disciple of Gamaliel, who 
 boldly said to Corinth, that rich and 
 learned Grecian city. For myself^ I 
 kivow hut one thing ^ Jesus ^ and Him 
 crtmjied, that these should have 
 snatched from idolatry, which their 
 mission was to destroy, some of its 
 old tatters to patch upon the life of 
 Jesus Christ — a life so simple and 
 80 grand ! Still, if the question had 
 
 * only been of loans made from the 
 fabulous legends of nations border- 
 ing on Palestine, such as the Egyp- 
 tians and Phenicians, however unjust 
 might have been the accusation, it 
 w^ould have had, at least, a show of 
 probability ; but no ! these brilliant 
 pomts, which detach themselves 
 from the dark shades of idolatry to 
 form, like so many little stars, the 
 am-eola of the Yirgin's Son, come 
 from places the most distant and the 
 least known. Not to speak of that 
 Gaul, whose impenetrable forests 
 hid, at the extremity of Western Eu- 
 rope, its mysterious creed under the 
 shadow of giant oaks ; of the great 
 Indies, so imperfectly known in the 
 time of Tiberias ; of that Serica of 
 the porcelain towers, whose distant 
 provinces did not tempt even the 
 covetous Romans;* how could the 
 Apostles have contrived to commu- 
 nicate with far America, separated 
 from the old continent by her green 
 belt of waves, and lost like the pearl 
 amid the waters. 
 
 * It was under the reign of Augustus that the 
 Roman people received the first ambassador 
 from the Seres, whom we now call Chinese. 
 The ambassadors pretended that it had taken 
 ^ them three years to make the journey. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 37 
 
 But, granting that the Apostles 
 had known, no matter how, these 
 ancient myths, disseminated over 
 all the globe — nay, I will go far- 
 ther still, and, setting aside native 
 simplicity, the sealed testimony of 
 blood, the high sanctity of these 
 divine men, carried away, as Rous- 
 seau says, with zeal for their Mas- 
 ter's glory, I will suppose that the 
 idea had occurred to them to em- 
 broider some fabulous circumstances 
 on the evangelical tissue — why, the 
 thing would have passed ih^h: power. 
 With what face, for instance, could 
 they have attributed to that Herod, 
 whom all Jerusalem had known, 
 whose reign, so glorious and yet so 
 tragical, each one knew by heart, 
 an atrocious and improbable fact, 
 renewed from I know not what king 
 of Persia, who, perhaps, never ex- 
 isted save in the dreams of the 
 Magi? K the massacre of the In- 
 nocents had been a story fabricated 
 or copied by the Apostles, is it to 
 be believed that the Bethlehemites, 
 
 * The flatterers of Herod the First, dazzled 
 with the greatness and magnificence of that 
 prince, maintained that he was the Messiah. 
 Hence arose the sect of the Herodians, so often 
 mentioned in the Gospel, and even known to 
 
 * SO likely to know what was passing 
 in the Holy City, whose lofty towers 
 darkened their horizon, would not 
 have openly protested against that 
 audacious falsehood; or that those 
 cunning Pharisees, who would fain 
 have confounded Jesus himself, 
 would have let such a story become 
 current without attempting to re- 
 fute it ; or that the Herodians would 
 have tamely suffered a stain so foul 
 to be falsely imprinted on the fame 
 of a prince whom they regarded al- 
 most as a god,* and who had loaded 
 them with wealth and honors? K 
 all were silent, it is because the fact 
 was too well accredited, too public, 
 too recent, to leave any plausible 
 pretence for denial; it is because 
 that, within two hours' walk of Jeru- 
 salem, were the mothers of the mar- 
 tyrs who had purchased with their 
 young lives the honor of being born 
 with Christ ; it is because that whole 
 towns had seen the glitter of the 
 mm^derous steel, and heard the wail 
 of death ; it is because that, at the 
 
 the Pagans, since Persus and his scholiast 
 inform us that, from the days of Nero, the 
 birth of King Herod was celebrated by his 
 sectaries with the same solemnity as the Sab- 
 bath. 
 
fl8 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 tii-st denial given to the Christians, a ^ 
 whole nation would have risen and 
 shouted, But toe were there /* 
 
 So it is with tlie divine child- 
 bearing of Mary — the visit of the 
 shephei-ds sent by the angels — the 
 glorious resurrection — and, in short, 
 with all the prodigies wliich marked 
 the coming of Cluist. The Apostles 
 WTote dming the lifetime of those 
 who had figured in the scenes they 
 related ; and, even before they con- 
 signed these prodigies to writing, 
 they had openly preached them in 
 the very temple of Jehovah, before 
 that immense assemblage of Heb- 
 rews from all the provinces, who re- 
 paired thither either to offer sacri- 
 fice or to bring first-fruits ; the most 
 dangerous auditory in the world, if 
 they had promulgated falsehood. 
 
 Far fi'om fearing conti'adictions. 
 
 * " Neither Josephus nor the Rabbins speak 
 of the massacre of the Innocents," says Strauss ; 
 " Macrobus, who lived in the fourth century, is 
 the only writer who says a word of the massacre 
 decreed by Herod." Strauss is in error ; the 
 Toldos, from whom Celsus has taken some of 
 the facts prejudicial to Christianity, which he 
 has interspersed through his writings, do speak 
 positively on the subject, and the fact is in the 
 Talmud. This is the way in which Bossuet 
 answers those who deny the evangelical fact, 
 and never was answer more definitive. " Where 
 
 which in case of imposture must 
 needs have followed, St. Peter speaks 
 to that vast multitude as one sure 
 of the general assent ; he boldly ap- 
 peals to the yet recent remembrance 
 of those who hear him ; he asserts 
 the miracles which stamped as di- 
 vine the mission of the Son of Mary, 
 and that even before the great coun- 
 cil of the nation, which had exerted 
 all its power to have Jesus crucified. 
 And the senators of Israel, frighten- 
 ed and fm-ious, cause St. Peter and 
 St. John to be beaten with rods, in 
 order to make them keep silence; 
 but yet they deny not, as the Tal- 
 mud shows, those prodigies which 
 they stupidly attribute to magic. 
 Thus it is that they say not to the 
 Apostles brought before them by 
 the guards of the Temple, " Ye are 
 liars or visionaries !" they only tell 
 
 are those," says he, " who, in order to confirm 
 their faith, would wish that the profane histo- 
 rians of that age had mentioned this cruelty 
 of Herod, as well as all the others? Just as 
 though our faith ought to depend on what the 
 negligence or affected policy of worldly histo- 
 rians has made them record or omit in their 
 histories ! Far from us be such weak imagin- 
 ings ; even in a human point of view, the Evan- 
 geHst would have been very careful not to com- 
 promise the character of his narrative by record- 
 ing a fact which was not well authenticated." 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 39 
 
 them, with an agitation which plain- * 
 ly indicates their secret fears, "Be 
 silent! will ye that we be stoned 
 by the people ?" Whereupon those 
 two men, simple in heart, but great 
 in soul, made answer : " We cannot 
 be silent! God commands us to 
 speak, and Him must we obey 
 rather than men." Imposture is not 
 so bold or confident. 
 
 After having examined the acts, 
 the character, and the position of 
 the Apostles, every impartial mind 
 v/ill be forced to admit that they 
 were neither deceiving nor deceived, 
 and that they have nothing to do 
 with the analogies remarked be- 
 tween the evangelical facts and the 
 traditions, more or less fabulous, of 
 the ancient nations. 
 
 But, then, how to explain these 
 analogies ? Is it a mere game of 
 chance, a lucky coincidence ? 
 
 No, it is not by chance that the 
 mystery of the incarnation of a God 
 in the womb of a virgin is one of 
 the fundamental doctrines of Asia. 
 It is not by chance that the privi- 
 leged women who bear in their 
 womb that emanation of the Divin- 
 ity are always chaste, beautiful, and 
 holy; that they have glorious and ^ 
 
 mysterious names, which signify, in 
 all these ancient tongues, expected 
 beauty^ immaculate virgin, faithful 
 virgin, delight of mankind, polar star; 
 and that they are all so much alike 
 that one would say they were mould- 
 ed on a far-off type hidden from us 
 by the darkness of time. Finally, 
 it is not by chance that a luminous 
 ray unites the divine and human 
 nature. 
 
 These traditions, wherein the 
 stamp of a primitive time is so 
 plainly visible, evidently ascend to 
 the birth of the world. The ante- 
 diluvian patriarchs, that chain of 
 old men who lived the age of cedars, 
 wishing to form for themselves an 
 idea of the woman blessed amongst 
 all others, whose miraculous mater- 
 nity was to save mankind, repre- 
 sented her to themselves under the 
 likeness of Eve before her fall ; they 
 gave her a majestic and saintly 
 beauty, which cguld awake in the 
 minds of men no other feeling save 
 that of religious veneration ; they 
 made her a mild and veiled star, 
 whose dawn was to precede that of 
 the Sun of Justice. 
 
 The means whereby God gave 
 fecundity to that virginal womb are 
 
40 
 
 L1J:E UF IHE BLESSED VIRQIN MARY 
 
 Ktiikingly tUike, amongst the differ- 
 ent nations of the world. Cast a 
 glance over all the old religions, and 
 you will there find a sacred fire. 
 But the fire was, for the Persians, 
 the ten'cstrial emblem of the sim, 
 and the sun himself was but the 
 dwelling of the Most High, the glo- 
 rious tent of the God of Heaven.'^ 
 
 The Hebrews, wht) shared in this 
 belief, recognized the divine pres- 
 ence, or the schelmiUy in the radiant 
 cloud which overhung the cherubim 
 of the mercy-seat. They believed 
 that God clothed himself with light 
 as with a garment, when manifest- 
 ing himself to men, on solemn oc- 
 casions. It was the opinion of the 
 Synagogue, supported by the ti-adi- 
 tion of the Temple, that in the midst 
 of the wild rose-bush, which burned 
 without being consumed, when 
 Moses, that great shepherd of men, 
 was tending, on Mount Horeb, the 
 flocks of his Arab father-in-law, 
 there was seen a very lovely face, 
 resembling nothing that is seen here 
 below; and that this celestial im- 
 
 * " The Persians suppose that the throne of 
 God is in the sun," says Hanway, " and hence 
 their veneration for that star." 
 
 f PhUon, Vie de McUse {Life of Moses). 
 
 f age, clearer than the flame and 
 more brilliant than the lightning, 
 was, without doubt, the image of the 
 Eternal God.f "With this premise, 
 it is not difficult to understand the 
 drift of the opinion, so generally dif- 
 fused, that a luminous ray was to 
 impart fecundity to the womb of the 
 favored virgin who was the expec- 
 tation of all nations. 
 
 With this graceful tradition of a 
 pure virgin admitted to a divine 
 union, surrounded by impenetrable 
 mystery, was connected that of a 
 Saviour God, born of her womb, who 
 was to suffer and die for the salva- 
 tion of the world. J This tradition 
 was not perpetuated, like the other, 
 by means of brilliant and poetical 
 images, but by terror, which makes 
 an impression far more indelible 
 than poetry. The bloody sacrifice, 
 which we find established, from the 
 earliest times, amongst nearly all 
 nations, was solely intended to pre- 
 serve amongst men the remembrance 
 of the promised immolation of Cal- 
 vary. This is easily proved. 
 
 J This tradition is found in the sacred books 
 of China. {See Father Premare's work, entitled, 
 Selecta qucedam vestigia prcecipuorum Christiance 
 religionis dogmatum ex antiquis lihris eruta. ) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGLN MART. 
 
 41 
 
 Worship, that demonstration of 
 love, that homage of gratitude which 
 Adam and Eve were to render to 
 God immediately after their crea- 
 tion, was, in Eden, doubtless com- 
 posed of only innocent prayers and 
 oblations of fruits and flowers.* 
 But when they — ^ungrateful that they 
 were — had infringed upon the pre- 
 cept, so easy in observance, which 
 the Lord had imposed, like a sweet 
 yoke, upon them, merely to make 
 them feel that they had a master; 
 
 * Porphyr. de Abst., lib. ii. 
 
 •f God might annex to the plants certain nat- 
 ural virtues for the sake of our bodies, and it is 
 easy to believe that the fruit of the tree of life 
 had the virtue of restoring the body, by an ali- 
 ment so proportionate and so efficacious that 
 none could ever die while using it. (Bossuet, 
 Elev. sur les MysL, t. i. p. 231.) 
 
 I Man was never immortal, in this world, as 
 the pure spirits are, for a body formed of dust 
 must needs return to dust ; he was so only by 
 a favor, without precedent, and conditionally 
 granted, whereby he was elevated to, and main- 
 tained in, a position far above his proper sphere. 
 Immortality here below never yet belonged to 
 man as a birthright. Every earthly body is 
 to perish through the dissolution of its parts, 
 unless prevented by a special decree of the 
 Creator ; this Divine will was manifested in 
 favor of our first parents. God planted, in 
 the delicious garden where he had placed mor- 
 tal man, the tree of life, a plant of celestial 
 origin, which had the property of repelling 
 death, as the laurel, according to the ancients, 
 
 f when they had lost, with the immor- 
 talizing fruits of the tree of life,f 
 their talisman against death,J and 
 descended from the charming hills 
 of Eden to a land bristling with 
 briers and thorns, to a land whose 
 virgin bosom they must open to 
 nourish themselves; they added to 
 the fruits and wild flowers produced 
 by the land of exile^ the first fruits 
 of their flocks. This merits atten- 
 tion. Adam, who joined to the per- 
 fection of the human form an intel- 
 
 keeps off the thunder. To that mysterious tree 
 was attached the immortality of the human 
 species ; away from that protecting tree, death 
 again seized his prey, and man was hurled from 
 the height of heaven into his miserable tene- 
 ment of clay. (Aug., Quoest. Vet. et Nov. Test., 
 q. 19, p. 430.") No one will question, I fancy, 
 that God had an undoubted right to expel 
 Adam from the garden after his disobedience ; 
 but the expulsion involved the sentence of 
 death for man and his posterity; without the 
 tree of life, he was nothing more than a frail 
 and perishable creature, subject to the laws 
 which govern created bodies : when the anti- 
 dote is wanting, it is very evident that the 
 poison kills. Having again become mortal, 
 Adam begot sons mortal like himself. The 
 condition into which the father had fallen must 
 needs be that of the children. In that, God 
 did no wrong to the human race ; we are, by 
 nature, mortal ; He has left us as we were. To 
 withdraw a gratuitous favor, when the object of 
 that favor tears with his own hands the deed of 
 gift, is assuredly not severity, but only justice. 
 
 i 
 
42 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 ligent and elevated mind, wherein j 
 the Loi-d had planted the germ of 
 all virtue and of all knowledge, 
 could not be void of humanity. His 
 fatal complaisance to Eve shows 
 him loving even to weakness, and 
 therefore susceptible, in the highest 
 degree, of all kindly feelings and 
 affections. How could it, then, oc- 
 cur to him that the Creator would 
 take pleasure in the violent death 
 of His creature, or that an act of 
 destruction was an act of piety ? 
 
 The immolation of animals, which 
 has not the slightest connection 
 with the vows and prayers of man, 
 and which the purely vegetable 
 food of the first patriarchs left with- 
 out other object than that of mur- 
 der, must needs have excited a 
 
 * The time that Adam and Eve remained in 
 the terrestrial paradise is not exactly known ; 
 it must, nevertheless, have been of some dura- 
 tion, and so it "was understood by Milton, whom 
 we do not here quote as a poet, but as a pro- 
 found Oriental scholar. Moreover, if we re- 
 member that it was in Eden that Adam learned 
 to distinguish and to call by name all the birds 
 of the air, the beasts of the earth, and the fishes 
 of the water ; that he there learned the virtues 
 of plants, and what God chose to teach him 
 regarding the course of the stars ; we must 
 then conclude that all this was not the work of 
 a day. The Persians and the Chinese have it 
 that the first man was in Paradise for many 
 
 thousand feelings of disgust and 
 repugnance in the mind of our 
 common father. Long had those 
 poor, dumb creatures, devoid of rea- 
 son, but very capable of attachment, 
 composed, in Eden, the court of that 
 solitary king. He then seated him- 
 self at the same table, slept on the 
 same mossy hillock, quenched his 
 thirst at the same spring, and his 
 prayer ascended to heaven, at early 
 dawn and evening's close, with the 
 warbling of the birds, who seemed 
 to sing, in their turn, the morning 
 or evening hymn. Those compan- 
 ions of his happier days, involved 
 in his misfortune, now shared his 
 exile :* some, giving way to the fe- 
 rocious instinct which in Paradise 
 had remained undeveloped, fled to 
 
 ages. The Arabs and the Rabbins say that he 
 was there only half a day ; but, according to 
 them, that half day in Paradise was equivalent 
 to five hundred years ; for a day there was 
 equal to a thousand years. According to our 
 views, that period of time is much too long. It 
 is commonly believed that Cain, whose birth, in 
 Genesis, follows closely upon the expulsion of 
 his parents, was born in the year of the world 
 13, which would leave the stay in Paradise in or 
 about twelve years. That term, although some- 
 what short, would have, nevertheless, enabled 
 the first man to establish his supremacy over 
 the animals subject to him, and to attach him 
 J J to his humble dependants by the tie& of habit. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 43 
 
 the depth of the wilderness or the f 
 secret caverns of the mountains, 
 whence they soon waged deadly 
 warfare against their former master. 
 Others, mild and inoffensive by na- 
 ture, established themselves around 
 the grotto of their lord, to whom 
 fchey offered, to satisfy his wants 
 and soothe his cares, their milk, 
 their labor, their fleece, and their 
 melodious concerts. Well, it was 
 from the ranks — thin they were, too 
 — of these humble friends, faithful 
 in misfortune, that Adam selected, 
 counted, and marked his victims ; 
 it was into the throat of the heifer 
 who had given him milk, of the dove 
 who had flown to his bosom for 
 shelter when the vulture hovered in 
 the air, of the lamb that quitted its 
 flowery pasture to lick his hand, 
 that he had the heart to plunge his 
 knife. Ah ! when, man, yet unprac- 
 tised in killing, struck down at his 
 feet a poor, timid creature, and saw ' 
 it bleeding and struggling in the \ 
 agony of death, he must have stood 
 
 * It is in remembrance of the sin of Eve, at 
 sight of which, according to the Jews, the sun 
 hid his hght, that the Jewish women are spe- 
 cially charged to light the lamps which burn in 
 every house during the Sabbath night. " It is 
 
 pale and horror-stricken, like the 
 assassin who has just committed his 
 first murder! That thought never 
 occurred to him ; it was not an act 
 of choice, but of painful obedience. 
 Who imposed it upon him ? He to 
 whom alone it belongs to dispose 
 of life and death — God ! 
 
 Adam committed a sin so enor- 
 mous by its aggravating circum- 
 stances and its disastrous conse- 
 quences, that, in order to express 
 its full extent, the Hebrew tradition 
 relates that the sun hid his face in 
 horror.* Satan attacked him in his 
 strength, at a time when, as yet, he 
 knew nought but good, in the fair- 
 est of earth's scenes, under the re- 
 cent impression of the immense 
 benefit of creation, free, happy, 
 tranquil, immortal, and capable of 
 resisting, if he had chosen to do so. 
 It was from this height that he fell 
 into the fearful abyss of disobedi- 
 ence and ingratitude. The justice 
 of God demanded a punishment 
 proportionate? to the offence; man 
 
 just," say the Hebrew doctors, "that women 
 should rekindle the flame which they have ex- 
 tinguished, and that they be charged with that 
 trouble, in expiation of their sin." (Basn., Ub. 
 vii. ch. 13.) 
 
M 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 was condemned to die a double f 
 death, and it was all over with the 
 human species, had not a Divine 
 Being, predestined before the birth 
 of time to the work of oui* redemp- 
 tion, taken it upon himself to make 
 satisfaction for us all. Thencefor- 
 wai-d he was called the Messiah, 
 and revealed as a Saviour, at the 
 very moment when the voice of God 
 — that voice which rends the cedars — 
 pronomiced the sentence of the 
 three criminals. " Because thou 
 hast done this thing," said God to 
 the serpent, who showed himself 
 proud of our ruin, " the seed of the 
 woman" — that is to say, her off- 
 spring — " shall crush thy head." 
 
 And the Hebrew tradition adds 
 that God, touched by the repentance 
 of our tirst parents, revealed to 
 them by an angel, that from their 
 race should arise a just man who 
 would annihilate the pernicious ef- 
 fects of the ti-ee of knowledge,* by 
 means of a voluntary oblation, and 
 
 * It is generally considered, amongst Chris- 
 tians, that the tree of knowledge was an apple- 
 tree ; the Persians maintain, on the contrary, 
 that this fatal tree was a fig-tree. In our days, 
 the German Eichhorn makes it out to have 
 been a species of manchJnecL "A deduction 
 
 would be the salvation of those who 
 put their trust in Him.f On the 
 other side, we learn from the Arab 
 traditions that God, who is merciful 
 and indulgent, would vouchsafe to 
 point out to man the way to im- 
 plore his forgiveness. That wor- 
 ship, revealed by God, was un- 
 doubtedly sacrifice, a ceremony at 
 once commemorative, expiatory, and 
 symbolical, whereby man acknowl- 
 edged that he had deserved death, 
 and, substituting for himself inno- 
 cent victims, kept perpetually be- 
 fore his mind the great victim of 
 Calvary. 
 
 Thus, then, the institution of the 
 bloody sacrifice, which was not of 
 human invention, rested, at bottom, 
 on a conception of Divine mercy, 
 since it perpetuated, amongst all 
 nations, that tradition of the Mes- 
 siah, without which the work of the 
 Kedemption would have been a fa- 
 vor thi'own away. 
 
 God ripens his councils by ages, 
 
 made from the wonders attending on the fall of 
 man," says that Rationalist writer, " the fact is 
 evident that the constitution of the human body 
 has been, from the beginning, vitiated by the use 
 of a poisonous fruit" (Eichhorn's Argeschichte.) 
 f Basnage, lib. vL ch. 25, p. 417. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 45 
 
 for a thousand years are to Him but 
 as one day; but man is eager to 
 obtain, for man lasts but a short 
 time. It appears that Eve had con- 
 cluded, from the words of the angel, 
 that she was to be the mother of the 
 promised Redeemer, and that this 
 was the reason why she testified 
 such transports of joy on the birth 
 of Cain,* whom she took for her 
 Saviour. Undeceived by the devel- 
 opment of his perverse inclinations, 
 she transferred her hopes to Abel, 
 that son so fondly loved, whose 
 name recalls the mourning and tears 
 
 * Cain is called Gahel by all the Arab writers ; 
 that name, which means the first, is perhaps 
 his proper name. The surname of Cain, which 
 signifies traitor, must have been subsequently 
 given him. (Savary, note to Chapter V. of the 
 Koran. ) 
 
 f Abel, by the Arabs written Habel, is, accord- 
 ing to them, only the surname of that young 
 shepherd who was the first type of Jesus Christ. 
 In fact, it recalls the sad event which threw the 
 family of Adam into mourning, "and properly 
 signifies," says Savary (place quoted). His death 
 left a mother in tears. Josephus, too, says that 
 the name of Abel signifies mourning. (Antiq. 
 Jud., p. 4.) 
 
 \ See Basnage, lib. vi. ch. 25. 
 
 § The Arabian traditions place the terrestrial 
 paradise in that fair valley of Damascus which 
 the Eastern poets designate as the emerald of 
 the desert. This idea is justified by its admirable 
 situation, its beauty, and its fertility ; and a 
 learned commentator on Genesis has not hesi- 
 
 of his mother;! then to Seth;J but 
 all in vain, for the gates of Paradise 
 never opened again for her. The 
 just of the race of Seth, those pure, 
 solitary, and contemplative men 
 called in Scripture the children of 
 God, and in the Assyrian legends 
 genii, long flattered themselves with 
 a similar hope ; and the Jewish tra- 
 dition represents them as wandering 
 on the heights around the garden of 
 Eden,§ whose gigantic cedars they 
 wistfully admired, 1 1 and flattered 
 themselves the while that from 
 amongst themselves should arise a 
 
 tated to set down this fair site as that of the 
 garden of Eden, although the names of the 
 Euphrates and the Tigris indicate a position 
 somewhat different. In support of this Arab 
 tradition there is shown, about half a day's 
 journey from Damascus, a lofty mountain of 
 white marble, shaded with beautiful trees, and 
 therein is a cavern, pointed out as the abode of 
 Adam, of Abel, and of Cain ; there is also seen 
 the sepulchre of Abel, which is much respected 
 by the Turks. The spot whereon the fratri- 
 cide was committed is marked by four pillars. 
 (D'Herbelot, Bibliotheque Orientale, p. 772 and 
 780. — Pere Pacifique, in his Commentaries on 
 the Bible. ) 
 
 |] The lofty cedars of Eden have remained 
 traditionally in the memory of the Hebrews, who 
 have made the terrestrial paradise their heaven. 
 In most of their epitaphs we read these words : 
 "He is gone down to the garden of Eden to 
 those who are amongst the cedars." (Basnage, 
 i V. lib. vii.) 
 
46 
 
 LIFE OF TEE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 just man who would obtain admis- 
 sion for them. But it was not the 
 name of a virgin of the primitive 
 times that was written in the immu- 
 table decrees of the Eternal; and 
 the eai'th, still quivering under the 
 Divine malediction, had need of 
 being washed as by the ablution 
 of a baptism, before the foot of Him 
 who was to bring the glad tidings 
 should leave its sacred impress on 
 the mountains. 
 
 When the earth had absorbed the 
 watei-s of the Deluge, and the winds 
 had dried it up, the new human 
 family, springing into life under fa- 
 I vorable auspices, hastened to re-es- 
 ; tablish the worship of Enos. Noah 
 I joined thereto the seven precepts 
 I which bear his name, not forgetting 
 the historical and religious traditions 
 which his long existence prior to the 
 
 * All the ancient law bears an aspect of blood 
 and death in figure of the new law established 
 and confirmed by the blood of Jesus Christ. 
 (Bossuet, Elkv. sur les Myst., tip. 428. 
 
 t The Indians, the Chinese, the Peruvians, 
 and even the Hurons, acknowledge that the first 
 man was formed of clay. The Brahmins, who 
 make delightful representations of their chorcam 
 (paradise), place therein a tree whose fruit 
 would confer immortaUty if it could be eaten. 
 The Persians relate that the genius of evil, 
 Aiiriman, seduced our first parents under the 
 
 * Deluge had enabled him to gather. 
 He told how man was formed of 
 clay, his rebellion, his fall, and his 
 future reparation, which the world 
 was to owe to the miraculous mater- 
 nity of a new Eve. At sight of the 
 bloody sacrifice ofiered for the unex- 
 piated crime of their first parents, 
 he taught his descendants to raise 
 their eyes to a more august victim, 
 seated at the right hand of Jehovah, 
 in the starry depths of heaven — a 
 victim whereof the oblation of lambs 
 and heifers was but the figure.* 
 
 These primitive notions were at 
 first faithfully retained by the na- 
 tions, and are found at the base of 
 all creeds.f Altars were erected at 
 the confluence of rivers, in the shade 
 of forests, on the summits of moun- 
 tains, by the green sea-wave, and 
 on the sandy moor where the worm- 
 
 form of a snake. The story of the woman 
 seduced at the foot of a tree, the anger of God, 
 and the first fratricide, was traditionally told 
 amongst the Iroquois. The Tartars attribute 
 our fall to a plant sweet as honey and of won- 
 drous beauty ; the Thibetans, to the crime of 
 having tasted of the dangerous plant schimoe, 
 mild and sweet as sugar ; the knowledge of the 
 state of nakedness was revealed by this fruit. 
 The tradition of the woman and the serpent was 
 likewise known in Mexico, &c. (See le Christ 
 devarU le Siecle, by M. Roselly de Lorgues, ch. 9.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 47 
 
 wood-tree spreads its leaves to the f 
 desert- wind. The soft moonlight 
 illumined, from the first, those rural 
 temples which had no other bounds 
 than the horizon, no other roof than 
 the firmament with all its stars. 
 At that remote period, God was 
 worshipped in a manner worthy of 
 Him, and with ideas so clear, so 
 sublime, so uniform, and so simple, 
 that they had evidently emanated 
 from Himself. 
 
 Nevertheless, there glided, like a 
 destroying principle, into the post- 
 diluvian worship, an element of su- 
 perstitious terror founded on the 
 fresh and drear remembrance of 
 the submersion of the globe — a re- 
 membrance of which traces are 
 found in most of the religious fes- 
 tivals of antiquity.* Congregated 
 together on the lofty table-lands of 
 Caucasus, and the mountains of 
 Armenia, the descendants of Noah 
 had long refused, even at the com- 
 mand of the patriarch himself, to go 
 down again into the plains, so great 
 was their fear of a second deluge! 
 In vain did the rainbow span the 
 clouds — as it were to encourage the 
 
 * See Boulanger, Antiq. Devoilee. 
 
 children of men — with its soft, mel- 
 low hues, where the green of the 
 emerald united with the blue of the 
 sapphire. That auspicious omen, 
 that radiant sign of an appeased 
 God, lessened, but could not dispel, 
 a rooted terror. The Tower of Babel 
 is proof of this. That gigantic mon- 
 ument of human pride concealed, 
 beneath its insolent boast, an over- 
 whelming fear. It was as a fortress 
 of refuge against the contingency 
 of a new deluge which that race of 
 men, already corrupt, could not but 
 feel that they deserved. And when 
 the confusion of tongues, that terri- 
 ble stroke of Divine wrath, forced 
 the builders to disperse — when they 
 saw their precaution, injurious as it 
 was to the sworn clemency of the 
 Lord, result in their disgrace — they 
 were the more disposed to give way 
 to new fears. 
 
 It must, however, be admitted, in 
 extenuation of their fault, that the 
 spectacle then presented by the 
 earth was far from cheering. The 
 whole economy of the creation was 
 upset. The rivers, diverted from 
 their natural channels,! formed im- 
 
 i f History has preserved us proofs of this dis- 
 
48 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 mense ponds and putrid marshes 
 in those vast plains, adorned, before 
 the Deluge, with the graceful tents 
 of the shepherds. The cedars lay 
 prostrate on the sea -shore, whilst 
 the spoils of the ocean were found 
 amongst the eternal snows of the 
 loftiest mountains. On every side 
 were seen towers levelled to the 
 ground,* and cities silent and in 
 ruins. The ploughshare everywhere 
 notched on bones and rubbish. The 
 avenging hand of an angry God 
 had fallen so crushingly, that man, 
 whose heart still trembled with 
 fear, remembering the risk he had 
 run, was more disposed to fear his 
 Sovereign Master with a mighty 
 fear than to love him with confiding 
 
 placing of rivers after the Deluge. We read in 
 Strabo, book ii., that the Araxes, which waters 
 Armenia, was still without a vent, and inun- 
 dated the country, when Jason, chief of the 
 Aeronauts, opened a subterraneous channel, 
 whereby the Araxes flowed into the Caspian 
 Sea. In the famous Chou-King of Confucius, 
 the Emperor Yao says that the waters, which 
 had once risen to heaven, still bathed the feet 
 of the highest mountains, and rendered the 
 plains impassable. — (Freret, Chron. des Chinois, 
 1st part.) 
 
 * The Tower of Babel, so immediately after 
 the great Deluge, may furnish an idea of the 
 antediluvian architecture. Brick and pitch 
 were the materials used. If this immense 
 
 f love; he had learned to fear God I 
 He doubted His promises and His 
 goodness. Like the drowning mar- 
 iner, he eagerly sought, around him, 
 some helping object, which might 
 interpose between them, and ward 
 off, at need, that just but terrible 
 wrath. Noah had spoken to them 
 of an influential and Divine Being 
 whose tenderness for men was in- 
 finite, and who was to plead their 
 cause before the Eternal, and take 
 upon himself their crimes ; but who 
 was that privileged mediator, that 
 powerful advocate ? They knew 
 not. The descendants of Shem be- 
 lieved that they had found him in 
 the stars which cheered their soli- 
 tary watchjf and which they sup- 
 
 tower, as there is every reason to believe, re- 
 sembled the ancient and famous Tower of Bel 
 in Babylon, it was surrounded by an exterior 
 staircase, on a gentle slope, which wound up to 
 the flat roof, and gave the building the appear- 
 ance of seven successive towers. 
 
 f It is a very ancient notion in the East that 
 the stars are animated ; the Jewish doctors had 
 fallen into this error, although it dated much 
 earlier than their people. Philo said that the 
 stars were intelligent creatures, who had never 
 done, and were incapable of doing, barm. Ac- 
 cording to the Maimonides, the stars know 
 God, their Maker, and also themselves, and 
 their actions are always good and holy. (Philo, 
 de Mundi opificio, de Gigant., de Somniis. — 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 49 
 
 posed inhabited by celestial spirits ; 
 they engaged those spirits to pro- 
 tect them, and kindled fires in their 
 honor on the mountain-tops.* 
 
 This was the origin of Sabeism, 
 which degenerated into idolatry 
 when the accursed race of Cham, 
 attaching themselves to the mate- 
 rial object, adored the fire, the 
 water, the earth, the rustling breeze ; 
 and in scornful mockery of the 
 primitive worship, which knew not 
 the use of images, they consecrated 
 to the moon statues of silver, and to 
 the sun statues of gold.f 
 
 In the lapse of time the shades 
 thickened, religions became bur- 
 dened with rites, the worship of the 
 
 Maimonides, More nevochim, Part II., ch. 4, 
 p. 194, et de Fundam, legis, ch. 3, § 11.) The 
 modern Persians still sacrifice to the Angel of 
 the Moon. 
 
 * According to R. Bechai, the Sabeans did 
 not adore the sun ; they merely kindled fires 
 on the earth to thank God for the luminary 
 which he lit for them in the heavens ; and, 
 looking at the stars, they begged of the angels, 
 whom God had placed therein to keep them in 
 motion, that they might be favorable to them. 
 (R. Bechai, Gomm. in Genes., ch. 1.) The fires 
 which are lit in almost every country of Europe, 
 commonly called St. John's fires, or Midsummer 
 fires, are a relic of Sabeism. 
 
 f The ancient Arabs, descendants of Cham, 
 regarded Noah with contempt, because he did 
 not make use of images ; they consecrated to 
 
 * true God was gradually intermixed 
 with that of the stars and the ele- 
 ments ; the invention of hieroglyph- 
 ics completed the confusion, and the 
 few truths which escaped the over- 
 throw of creeds were mysteriously 
 buried in the depth of the idolatrous 
 fanes, like those sepulchral lamps 
 which burn but for the dead. They 
 were carefully concealed fi'om the 
 multitude, J which lavished its sense- 
 less adoration on stones, trees, riv- 
 ers, mountains, and on animals — a 
 worship more degrading still — and 
 which ended at last by deifying the 
 very vices and passions. It was 
 then that impostors, speculating on 
 human credulity, either entangled 
 
 the moon statues of silver, and others of gold 
 to the sun ; they divided metals and climates 
 amongst the stars ; and believed that they 
 have great influence on the things consigned to 
 them, and on the images consecrated to them. 
 (Maimonides, More nevochim, Part III., ch. 2, 
 p. 423.) 
 
 I Plato, speaking of the God who formed the 
 universe, says that it is forbidden to make him 
 known to the people. The books of Numa, 
 written on birch-bark, and found in his tomb 
 many ages after his death, were secretly burned 
 as dangerous to Polytheism. The Brahmins, 
 who, if some travellers are to be credited, have 
 a sublime idea of the Divinity, do, nevertheless, 
 make the Hindoos adore the most hideous idols. 
 It is only the true religion that treats men as 
 ^ rational and immortal beings. 
 
60 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 or delibcmtely broke the slight 
 thread of the patriarchal ti'aditions, 
 and, audaciously substituting mem- 
 ory for hope, grouped around the 
 ci*adles of their fabulous kings, their 
 false prophets, or theii* powerless 
 divinities, the wonders of the Incar- 
 nation of the Word, and the primi- 
 tive revelations of his high and 
 tragical destiny. 
 
 This, we think, is the explanation 
 of those analogies which are, at fii'st 
 sight, incomprehensible. 
 
 Nevertheless, all the heathen na- 
 tions did not take the mystery of 
 the Messiah as a fact accomplished. 
 The Druids, just before the Chris- 
 tian era, were still raising altars, in 
 the gloomy forests of Gaul, to the 
 Virgin wJio is to bring forth. The 
 Chinese — instructed by Confucius, 
 who had himself found that oracle 
 in old traditions — expected the 
 
 * " According to the ancient sages of China," 
 sajs the learned Schmitt, " the Holy One, the 
 miractUotus man, will renew the universe, change 
 its morals, expiate the sins of the world, die 
 oyerwhelined with sorrow and opprobrium, and 
 open the gates of heaven." (See Redemption 
 of Mankind, by that author. ) 
 
 f Abulfarages {Hintoria Dynastarium) says 
 that Zerdhucht prophesied to the Magi the 
 birth of the Messiah, sprung from a virgin. He 
 added that at the time of his birth there should 
 
 f Holy One, horn of a Virgin, and Son 
 of God, wlm was to die for the sal- 
 vation of the world j^ in the western 
 regions of Asia, and sent to seek 
 him, by solemn embassy, less than 
 half a century after the death of 
 the Man -God. The Magi, on the 
 faith of Zerdhucht, studied the con- 
 stellations in quest of the star of 
 Jacob, which was to guide them to 
 the cradle of Chiist.f The Brah- 
 mins sighed for the glorious avatar\ 
 of Him who was to purge the world 
 of sin, and begged it of Wichnou, 
 laying on his jewelled altar odorous 
 stuffs of sweet basil, a plant beloved 
 by the Indian god. The haughty 
 children of Romulus, those idola- 
 ters by excellence, who had created 
 whole legions of gods, read in the 
 books so jealously and so wisely 
 kept by the sibyl of Cumes, a con- 
 temporary of Achilles and Hector, 
 
 arise an unknown star to guide them to his 
 cradle, and he commanded them to bring pres- 
 ents with them when they went. Sharistani, a 
 Mussulman author, also relates a prediction of 
 Zerdhucht respecting a great prophet who was 
 to reform the world as well in religion as in 
 justice, and to whom kings and princes were to 
 be submissive. 
 
 I Avaiar, the fabulous incarnation of a Hindoo 
 deity. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 51 
 
 the virgin^ tlie divine infant^ the ado- 
 ration of the shepherds^ the serpent 
 crushed, and the golden age restored to 
 the earth. Finally, about the time 
 of the Messiah, all the nations of the 
 East were in expectation of a future 
 Saviour ; and Boulanger (who was 
 better inspired on his death-bed), 
 after having shown how generally 
 that hope was diffused, illogically 
 calls it a universal chimera.* 
 
 But what were those glimmering 
 rays, powerless to dispel the dark- 
 ness of idolatry, when compared with 
 the blaze of light which illumined 
 the chosen people ? We are struck 
 with amazement at sight of that 
 prophetic chain of which the first 
 link was fixed to the cradle of the 
 world, and the last settles down at 
 the sepulchre of Christ.f The threat 
 of Jehovah to the serpent contains, 
 as we have already said, the first 
 prediction of the Messiah. We have 
 further said, and the Jewish tradi- 
 tions confirm it, that this prediction 
 was more fully explained, in after 
 
 * "A unanimous testimony is of the greatest 
 weight," says Bernardine de St, Pierre, " for all 
 the earth cannot be in one universal error.'' 
 {Etudes de la Nature, etude 8, p. 398.) 
 
 f It is a tradition taught in the Synagogue, 
 and recognized by the Church, that all the 
 
 ^ times, to the exiles of Eden, when 
 they had conciliated Heaven by pen- 
 ance.J Noah, who was adopted by 
 God as inheritor of the faith, § trans- 
 mitted to Shem His revelations, and 
 Shem, whose life was nearly as long 
 as that of his ancestors, might re- 
 peat them to the father of the faith- 
 ful. Then it was that a mysterious 
 benediction, wherein the promise of 
 the Messiah was contained, made 
 it manifest that the blessed seed 
 promised to Eve should be also the 
 seed and the offspring of Abraham. 
 The primitive traditions were very 
 soon succeeded by the great predic- 
 tion of Jacob. The expiring patri- 
 arch, who has seen in spirit the 
 state of the twelve tribes, when in 
 Palestine, announces to his sons, 
 assembled round his death-bed, that 
 Juda has been chosen, from amongst 
 his brethren, to be the root of the 
 kings of Israel, and the father of 
 that Schilo so long promised, who 
 was to be the King of kings and 
 the Lord of lords. The coming of 
 
 prophets, without any exception, prophesied 
 only for the time of the Messiah." (St. Cypr., 
 de Vanit. Idol.) 
 
 X Basnage, t. iv. lib. viL 
 
 § Epist. S. P. ad ffebr., 2. 
 
62 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Christ is pointed out in a precise * 
 manner: he shall arise from amid 
 the ruins of his countiy, when the 
 Hchebet (the sceptre, the legislative 
 power) shall rest in the hand of 
 strangei*s.* 
 
 The prophet saved from the waters, 
 who was divinely called to gather 
 and consign to writing the history 
 of the first ages and the ancient 
 traditions of mankind — traditions 
 whose remembrance was still vivid 
 amongst the nations — fails not to 
 lend the weight of his imposing tes- 
 timony to the prophecy of Jacob. 
 "A prophet," says he, speaking to 
 
 * Christians apply this revelation of Jacob to 
 the Messiah, and thereby prove to the Jews 
 that he must have come long ago, seeing that 
 for upwards of eighteen hundred years their 
 tribes have been mixed up together, their sacri- 
 fice abolished, their government extinct ; that 
 they have no longer either territory or princes, 
 and that, wherever they are found, they have to 
 submit to the laws of foreign nations. To evade 
 the force of this argument, the Jews now pre- 
 tend that the word sckebet, which we translate 
 by sceptre, also signifies the rod which chastises 
 the slave ; and they take occasion from that to 
 maintain that, even if this oracle did regard the 
 Messiah, all that they could infer from it is, 
 that their chastisement was to last till his 
 eoming, which was to be the signal of their de- 
 hveiy. Finally, they deny that the word Schilo 
 can be translated by Messiah. But their old 
 books give them the lie; this prophecy is under- 
 
 the people of God, " shall the Lord 
 your God raise up unto you of your 
 brethren like unto me : him you 
 shall hear according to all things, 
 whatsoever he shall speak to you. 
 And it shall be, that even some 
 which will not hear that prophet, 
 shall be destroyed from among the 
 people."! 
 
 Then it is of the Messiah that the 
 Synagogue has always understood 
 this text so clear ; St. Philip, with- 
 out any hesitation, applied it to our 
 Redeemer, when he said to Nathan- 
 iel, "We have found Him who was 
 foretold by the prophets, and of 
 
 stood of the Messiah in the Talmud ; and here 
 is how the Paraphrase of Onkelos expounds this 
 passage: " Judas shall not be without a supreme 
 ruler, nor without scribes of the sons of her 
 children, till the Messiah come." Jonathan, to 
 whom the Jews assign the first place amongst 
 the disciples of Hillel, and whom they venerate 
 almost as they do Moses, also translates schebet 
 by principality, and Schilo by Messiah. The 
 Paraphrase of Jerusalem is hkewise on that 
 side. Thus the most ancient Commentaries, 
 the most authentic, and the most respected 
 amongst the Jews, furnish weapons for their 
 own defeat. 
 
 f Hence, comes that hope of a new law which 
 the Jews expect with the Messiah, a law which 
 they place far above that of Moses. The law 
 which man studies in this toorld is but vanity, 
 say their doctors, in comparison to that of the 
 ^ Messiah. (Medrash-Rabba, in EccL, xi. 8.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 53 
 
 whoi.1 Moses spoke in the law — 
 Jesus of Nazareth." 
 
 Towards the end of the mission of 
 Moses, and while Israel was still 
 encamped in the desert, Balaam, 
 who had been bribed by a Moabit- 
 ish prince to curse them in the Val- 
 ley of Willows,* came to strengthen, 
 in his turn, the expectation of the 
 Messiah, and to point out, in a clear 
 and precise manner, the period of 
 his coming. Standing on the pre- 
 cipitous height of Phogor, surround- 
 ed by victims slain for an oblation 
 of hate, in view of the accursed lake 
 and the barren mountains of Arabia, 
 the conjurer from the shores of the 
 Euphrates, actuated by the spirit of 
 God, perceives, as with a dream- 
 ing eye, f an admirable vision ; 
 his phrases, interrupted by solemn 
 pauses, are flung, without order or 
 art, to the mountain- wind, like frag- 
 ments of a mysterious dialogue kept 
 up in a whisper with invisible 
 
 * The plain of Babylon, intersected by rivers 
 and canals, and consequently very marshy, 
 abounded in willows. Hence it is that it is 
 called in Scripture the Valley of Willows. 
 
 ■\ Even if the prophecy of Balaam were not 
 known to be ancient, yet the manner of its de- 
 livery would be sufficient to prove its antiquity. 
 Balaam, the Chaldean astrologer, prophesies not ^ 
 
 ^ 
 
 powers. / shall see him hut not 
 
 now. I shall contemplate him hut 
 
 not near. A star shall come forth 
 
 from Jacoh a shoot shall arise from 
 
 Israel; he shall rule over many na- 
 tions. To these incoherent words 
 succeeds a magnificent, but gloomy 
 picture of the conquests of the great 
 King. It is not without a purpose 
 that the prophetic vision shows 
 Eome at the height of her colossal 
 power; it is then that Christ is to 
 visit the earth, and immolate himself 
 for us on the infamous tree. The 
 prophet gives a bold sketch of that 
 bloody period ; one would say that 
 cities and empires yet to be, arise 
 before his view on the mirage of the 
 desert. He sees the fleet of the 
 Caesars leave the ports of Italy and 
 direct their conquering prows to- 
 wards the level coasts of the Syri- 
 ans ; he beholds the ruin of that 
 Judea which was not yet in exist- 
 ence, and where the people of God 
 
 like the seers of Juda ; for him is required a 
 vast horizon, whence he discovers at once earth, 
 sea, and sky : he speaks as a man who details to 
 himself things which he sees at the moment, 
 and which impress themselves deeply on his 
 mind. This species of prophecy is somewhat 
 like that which the Scotch Highlanders call 
 second sight. 
 
64 
 
 LIFE OF TEE BLESSED VIRGIN MABY. 
 
 then possessed only a few graves; 
 finally, his eye marks the fall of the 
 Roman eagle, seven himdi-ed years 
 before the birth of the sons of Hia, 
 and whilst the wild goats of Latium 
 were still browsing in peace on the 
 woody slopes of the seven hills. 
 
 Ages and ages then roll away 
 without any fui-ther promise from 
 Jehovah ; but the prophecies are 
 either confided to tradition, which 
 faithfully preserves them, or else 
 consigned to the sacred books. Is- 
 rael maintains an obscure, but cease- 
 less and infuriate struggle against 
 the idolatrous nations which sm*- 
 round and press in upon its tribes ; 
 at times it gives way to the sti-ange 
 infatuation which attracts it to idol- 
 atry, and then the fatal sword of 
 the Amorrhean and the Moabite is 
 unwittingly drawn on behalf of the 
 Lord, and avenges, though unde- 
 signedly, the insult offered to the 
 God of Jacob. But thi-ough all 
 these vicissitudes, the people forget 
 not the coming of Christ ; they live 
 in the faith of the Messiah; in de- 
 fault of new revelations, their very 
 
 * Some Rabbins pretend that the daughter of 
 Jephta was not sacrificed, but only condemned 
 to perpetual celebacy. That assertion is nulli- 
 
 * life becomes prophetic. Political 
 and religious institutions, local cus- 
 toms and private habits, all tend to 
 the same end, all flow from the same 
 source ; all are linked to the genera- 
 tion of the Saviour born of a virgin 
 of Juda. It was the coming of the 
 Messiah that was asked by the 
 prophet Samuel, kneeling in the 
 Holy of Holies, before the Schekina, 
 its luminous and divine emblem, 
 and by all the high priests who suc- 
 ceeded him in the temple of Solo- 
 mon. It was to the expectation of 
 the Messiah that the law of Deuter- 
 onomy referred, which decreed that 
 the brother should raise up an heir 
 to his brother who died childless, to 
 the end that his name might be 
 perpetuated in Israel. It was the 
 blighting of the hope of belonging 
 one day, sooner or later, to the celes- 
 tial ambassador, that drew tears 
 from the eyes of that fair young vir- 
 gin of Galaad, who sank but with 
 that one sorrow into the bloody 
 tomb which was to close on the last 
 of her father's race.* It is to this 
 belief, so general amongst the He- 
 
 fied by the text of Scripture which saj's : Let the 
 daughters of Israel assemble once in the year to 
 mourn four days /or the daughter of Jephta of 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 55 
 
 brews, that the woman of Thecua 
 has reference, when, denouncing to 
 King David the secret intrigues 
 which were warping the mind of 
 the only son who remained to her, 
 she signalizes her fears as a mother 
 and a Jewish matron by the poeti- 
 cal complaint, ''My lord, they would 
 extinguish my last spark !" 
 
 There is nothing but the present 
 incredulity of the Jews to equal in 
 depth the faith of their fathers. 
 The grand business with the men 
 of those days was the coming of the 
 Messiah ; they who died at a period 
 remote from that which was to see 
 the fulfillment of the Divine prom- 
 ises, departed in the firm persuasion 
 that they should one day be ful- 
 filled ; standing on the threshold of 
 eternity, they hailed from afar that 
 consoling hope, even as the great 
 prophet, Moses, saluted, with a sigh, 
 that land of milk and honey which 
 the Lord did not permit him to 
 enter. 
 
 From the time of David, and un- 
 der the kings of his race, the thread 
 of prophecy is renewed, and the 
 mystery of the Virgin and the Mes- 
 
 Galaad! {Judic., ch. xi. ver. 40.) People do 
 
 * siah is made more manifest than 
 ever by magnificent predictions 
 clearer than the sun. 
 
 The holy king whom the God 
 of Israel had preferred before the 
 house of Saul, saw the virginity of 
 Mary and the extraordinary birth 
 of the Son of God. "Thy birth," 
 said he, "unsullied by sin, shall be 
 pure as the morning dew." Then, 
 raising his eyes higher, he beholds 
 Him whom God has given him for 
 a son, according to the flesh, seated 
 at the right hand of Jehovah, on a 
 throne more lasting than sky or 
 stars. 
 
 In the earlier prophecies, the 
 blessed Yirgin, though always point- 
 ed out, was yet left somewhat in 
 the shade, and, so to speak, on the 
 verge of the picture ; but, from the 
 time of David, the radiant figure of 
 Mary is no longer undefined, and 
 she who was to transfuse into the 
 veins of the Man-God the blood of 
 Abraham, of Jacob, and of Jesse 
 the Just, begins to be clearly de- 
 fined. David had spoken of her 
 virginal maternity; Solomon took 
 delight in tracing her image in col- 
 
 phus also refers to the immolation of the daughtei 
 
 not mourn for one who is living — Flavins Jose- i^ of Jephta. (Ant. Jud., t. ii. lib. v. ch. 9.) 
 
56 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 ors 80 enchanting as to far out- 
 strip the graceful descriptions of 
 tlie Eastern Peris, those smiling and 
 etliereal divinities which visit the 
 dreams of Arabian shepherds. He 
 sees her rise amid the daughters of 
 Juda like a lily among thorns; her 
 eyes are soft and mild as tlwse of the 
 dove; fi'om her lips, red as a fillet of 
 scarlet, comes a voice clear and me- 
 lodious as the sound of the harp 
 which inspires Israel in the battle; 
 her step is ethereal as the breath of 
 perjmnes; and her beauty is radi- 
 ant as that of the rising morn. Her 
 tastes are simple and poetical ; she 
 loves to wander in the jGi-esh valleys 
 when the vines are in blossom and 
 the figs hang like clusters of eme- 
 ralds from the leafless branches ; 
 her looks seek out the red roses of 
 the pomegranate, the tree of para- 
 dise,* and she hears with delight 
 the plaintive song of the turtle. 
 Silent and collected, she shrinks 
 from every eye, and conceals her- 
 
 * In the East the pomegranate is called the 
 £ruit of paradise. 
 
 t It is agreed by all the holy Fathers that the 
 Canticle of Canticles is but one continued alle- 
 gory of the Mother of God. 
 
 X When rain falls in Palestine, there is a 
 general rejoicing amongst the people ; they as- 
 
 t self within her dwelling like the 
 dove which makes her nest in tJte 
 clefts of the rock. She is chosen 
 for a mystical marriage, preferably 
 to all the virgins and queens of the 
 nations ; a crown is promised her 
 by Him whom her soul loveth ; and 
 the blissful tie whereby she is 
 united to her royal spouse is 
 stronger than death.-f 
 
 Elias, praying on Mount Carmel 
 for the cessation of that long 
 drought which, for three years, 
 parched the earth and dried up 
 every spring, discovers the prom- 
 ised virgin under the form of a 
 transparent cloud arising from the 
 bosom of the waters to announce 
 the return of rain. The acclama- 
 tions of the people salute this pro- 
 pitious omen, J and the prophet, 
 who penetrates divine things, builds 
 a chapel to the future Queen of 
 Heaven. § Isaiah declares to the 
 house of David, whose chief, Acliab, 
 trembles beneath the threats of the 
 
 semble in the streets, sing, caper, and cry 
 aloud, " O God !" " O Blessed !" (Volney, Voy- 
 age en Syrie.) 
 
 § The chapel built by Elias on Mount Carmel 
 was dedicated by him to the Virgin who was to 
 bring forth, Virgini pariturce. This chapel was 
 + called Semnceum, which means a place conse- 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 57 
 
 stranger like a forest beaten by the 
 tempest^ that God shall give it an 
 encouraging sign with regard to the 
 future of Judea — a future long and 
 glorious still. "A virgin shall con- 
 ceive ;* she shall bring forth a son 
 whose name shall be E7nmanuel, or 
 God with us That child, miracu- 
 lously given to the earth, shall be 
 a scion from the stock of Jesse, a 
 flower springing from his root.f He 
 shall be called God the mighty, the 
 Father of the world to come, the 
 
 crated to an imperiere (empress), which can 
 only refer to Mar}', empress of heaven and 
 earth. [Histoire du Mont Garmel, succession du 
 Saint Prophete, ch. 31.) 
 
 * This grand prophecy of Isaiah has been the 
 object of a long and sharp controversy between 
 the Jews and the Christians. The Eabbins, 
 who have commented on the text since the time 
 of Christ, wishing to pervert the proofs which 
 condemn them, and to mystify the words of the 
 prophet, have pretended that the word halma, 
 which is found in the Hebrew text, signifies a 
 simple young woman, although the Septuagint 
 has rendered it by virgin. The Fathers have 
 triumphantly refuted this objection. " The in- 
 terpreters of the Septuagint," says St. John 
 Chrysostom, " are the most deserving of credit ; 
 they made their version more than a century 
 before Jesus Christ ; they were many in num- 
 ber ; the time in which they wrote, their num- 
 ber and their union, render them much more 
 worthy of belief than the Jews of our days, 
 who have maliciously corrupted many passages 
 of the Sacred Scriptures." (S. Joan. Chrys., 
 Sei'm. 4, ch. 1.) St. Jerome, the most profound 
 
 Prince of peace. He shall be raised 
 as a standard before the world ; all 
 nations shall pray unto him^ and his 
 sepulchre shall be glorious." 
 
 The mystery of the Messiah is 
 clearly foreshown to the prophets. 
 Some see Bethlehem made illustri- 
 ous by his birth ; others predict his 
 triumphant entry into Jerusalem, 
 and indicate the peaceful and un- 
 pretending style thereof. They see 
 him enter into his temple, that sa- 
 cred pontiff according to the order 
 
 Hebrew scholar of all the interpreters and com- 
 mentators, asserts, without fear, he says, of 
 being contradicted by the Jews, that halma, 
 everywhere that the word occurs in the Sacred 
 Scriptures, signifies simply a virgin in all her 
 purity, and never a married woman. {Comm. 
 S. Hieron. in Is. lib. iii.) Luther, who made 
 such lamentable use of much real learning, ex- 
 claims, with chara,cteristic petulance and im- 
 patience, "If there be Jew or Hebrew scholar 
 who can show me the place where halma means 
 a looman, and not a virgin, he shall be entitled 
 to 100 florins from me — that is, providing that 
 I have them." (Luther's works, vol. viii., p. 
 129.) Mahomet himself has testified to the 
 virginity of the Mother of God. "And Mary, 
 daughter of Imram, who has preserved her 
 virginity ; and we have sent into her our 
 spirit and she has beHeved in the words of the 
 Lord and in his Scriptures." (Koran, Surate 
 66.) 
 
 f Jesse, called al&o Isaie, was son of Obed and 
 father of David. His memory is in high vener- 
 ation amongst the Hebrews, who regard him as 
 a perfectly just man. 
 
88 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VTBGIN MARY. 
 
 of Melchisedek ; they know the 
 number of the pieces of silver which 
 the persecuting " rulers of the Syna- 
 gogue shall dix)p into the hands 
 of the wretch who is to sell his 
 Master;* they see the ignominious 
 execution, the draught of vinegar 
 and gall offered in insolent mockery 
 during the agony of a God, and the 
 gaiment, woven by the hands of a 
 mother, disposed of by lot amongst 
 the rude soldiers ; they hear the 
 sound of the nails which rend the 
 bleeding hand, and sink with a dry, 
 crackling sound into the accursed 
 wood. And then the scene changes, 
 like those paintings of Raphael, 
 where the subject, begun on earth, 
 extends itself beyond the clouds. 
 The man of sorrows, the humble 
 Messiah, whom even his own kin- 
 dred despised, whom his people 
 have not known, looks down in tri- 
 umph from the highest heavens on 
 his prostrate enemies; and the na- 
 tions of the earth are all at length 
 
 * This passage, wherein God himself declares 
 the number of silver pieces given in that in- 
 famous bargain, is impressed with a bitter and 
 a dreadful irony. "And the Lord said to me, 
 Cast it to the statuary, a handsome price, that I 
 was priced at by them. And I took the thirty 
 pieces of silver," &c. {Zach. xi 13.) 
 
 mindful of their God, forgotten for 
 so many ages I The nations rally 
 round the standard of the cross, and 
 the empire of Christ shall have no 
 boimds but those of the universe. 
 Nothing is wanting to complete the 
 prophecies. Jacob pointed out the 
 coming of Schilo at the precise 
 moment when the Jews shall cease 
 to be governed by their own laws, 
 which involves, of course, the ruin 
 of a state; Balaam adds that that 
 destruction shall be effected by a 
 people from Italy, and the satrap 
 Daniel counts exactly the weeks 
 which are to elapse before the ap- 
 pointed time. 
 
 "Every thing that happens in 
 this world has its preceding sign," 
 said a man of genius, who is now 
 lonely and dreaded under his tent. 
 " When the sun is about to rise, the 
 horizon is colored with a thousand 
 hues, and the East appears all on 
 lire. When the tempest is coming, 
 there is heard on the shore a rum- 
 bling noise, and the waves are agi- 
 tated, as it were, of themselves." 
 The figures of the Old Testament, 
 according to the Fathers of the 
 Church, are the signs which an- 
 |j nounce the rising of the Sun of 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 59 
 
 Justice and of the Star of the Sea. 
 To Christ, the Son of God, belongs 
 strength and power ; to Mary, grace 
 and pitying kindness. She is the 
 tree of life planted in the abodes of 
 men by the hands of God himself, 
 and the pledge of happiness far be- 
 yond that which our first parents 
 enjoyed in Eden ; the dove from 
 the ark, bearing to earth the olive 
 branch ; the sealed fountain whose 
 waters have never been troubled 
 with aught of impurity; the fleece 
 which receives the dew of heaven ; 
 finally, the delicate and odoriferous 
 rose-bush through which Moses per- 
 ceived the Divinity — a bush which, 
 very far from being consumed by 
 the fire, which destroys all things 
 else, was in some sort preserved 
 thereby, and lost, in its contact with 
 the celestial flame, neither a leaf 
 nor a flower.* 
 
 * Philo, who has made this remark, and who 
 discovers in this burning bush a mysterious 
 allegory, falsely applies it to the Jewish nation 
 by a forced conjunction. Josephus, who also 
 tried to penetrate this mystery, has succeeded 
 no bettei". Those wild roses, emblematical of 
 modest maidens who shed their sweet perfume 
 in solitude, and who are made resplendent by 
 contact with the Deity, without having their 
 spotless white and dehcate blush anywise taint- 
 
 Like that enchanting figure which 
 an ancient painter composed by 
 borrowing a thousand detached 
 beauties from the loveliest women 
 of Greece, so the chaste spouse of 
 the Holy Ghost united, in her own 
 person, all that had been most ad- 
 mirable in the celebrated women of 
 the old law. Fair as Rachel and 
 Sarah, she united to the prudence 
 of Abigail the heroic courage of 
 Esther ; Susannah, chaste as the 
 flower whose name she bears ;f 
 Judith, whose crown of lilies was 
 sprinkled with the blood of Holo- 
 fernes ; J Axa, whose hand was the 
 ransom of a conquered city ; and 
 that mother, so illustrious in her 
 misfortunes, who beheld all her sons 
 die for the law ; these were but 
 faint images of Her who was to 
 unite within herself all the perfec- 
 tions of the woman and the angel. 
 
 ed thereby, these are the most striking image 
 of Mary, that mystical rose of the new law. 
 
 f The name Susannah signifies lily. (Fabyn. 
 ii. 2.) 
 
 X The ancients attribute to the lily the power 
 of nullifying enchantments and warding oflf 
 danger. "Judith encircled her brows," say the 
 Kabbins, "with a garland of HHes, so as to 
 make her way without fear into the tent of 
 Holofernes." (Comm. E. R. m Judith.) 
 
60 
 
 LITE OF THE BLESSED VIRQIN MART. 
 
 After an expectation of four thou- * law disappear, and Mary arises on 
 
 sand years, the time marked out by the horizon of Judea like the star 
 
 80 many prophecies at length ar- | which heralds the approach of 
 
 rives ; the shadows of the ancient * day. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION. 
 
 WOMAN des- 
 tined from all 
 eternity to save 
 the world by 
 deifying our 
 nature, and to 
 bear in her 
 chaste womb Him wliose tent is the 
 sun, and whose footsteps are on the 
 highest heavens ; a woman expected 
 from the beginning of the world, 
 revealed by God even in Paradise, 
 ' and the acknowledged end of all 
 the holy generations who succeeded 
 
 * According to Si Angustine, the issue to 
 which all the patriarchs aspired was Jesus 
 Christ, and Jesus Christ in Mary, through 
 whom alone they could expect him. "And in 
 fact," says he, " if nature, in all her efforts, tends 
 to Jesus Christ, who is the Lord of Ages, it is 
 
 * each other from the days of the 
 patriarchs ;* she can be no ordinary 
 creature, and must needs have su- 
 perhuman prerogatives. The pious 
 belief of the immaculate conception 
 of Mary is the result of that senti- 
 ment of respect. Heirs of an unfor- 
 tunate parent, degraded by our re- 
 bellious father, blighted by the . sen- 
 tence which condemns him, so far 
 from receiving from him the life of 
 grace, we have received from him 
 the death of sin, and, by a fearful 
 doom, are condemned even before 
 
 not that she flatters herself that she can reach 
 the Son of God by herself ; the extent of her 
 power stops at the humble Mary, who was to 
 engender the blessed seed, not by virtue of her 
 ancestors, but by that of the Most High." (St. 
 Augustine, 5, Gontr. Jul. 9.) 
 
LIFE OF TEE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 61 
 
 our birth. This misfortune, inher- 
 ent in the human race, accursed as 
 one man in its very origin, is com- 
 mon to all, and the Scripture makes 
 no exception in favor of any son of 
 Adam. But the piety of the faith- 
 ful cannot bear the idea that the 
 Mother of God should be submitted 
 to the scathing condemnation where- 
 by we are stamped with the seal 
 of hell even in our mother's womb ; 
 they have believed that the Sove- 
 reign Judge must have suspended 
 the general effect of his rigorous 
 law in favor of her who was brought 
 into the world only to contribute 
 to the accomplishment of the most 
 secret, the most incomprehensible 
 of the decrees of God — the Incarna- 
 tion of the Messiah. Notwithstand- 
 ing the silence of the Gospel, it has, 
 therefore, been generally supposed 
 
 * We find in the Menkes {Secret Practices), so 
 ancient in use among the Greeks, these words, 
 which clearly prove their belief in the Immac- 
 ulate Conception : " By a special dispensation, 
 the Lord decreed that the Blessed Virgin should 
 be as pure, from the first moment of her exist- 
 ence, as was suitable and becoming for her who 
 was to conceive and to bring forth Jesus Christ, 
 the Word made jflesh." 
 
 f St. Andrew, of Crete, makes mention of this 
 feast of the Immaculate Conception, the office 
 of which St. Sabas had composed, and to which 
 
 ^ that the Virgin, in anticipation of 
 her divine maternity, was withheld, 
 so to speak, on the verge of the 
 dread abyss hollowed under our feet 
 by the fatal disobedience of our first 
 parents, and that her conception is 
 immaculate as her life. 
 
 This belief, which the Greeks bor- 
 rowed from Palestine, and adopted 
 with enthusiasm,* gave rise to the 
 institution of the feast of the Im- 
 maculate Conception, which was 
 celebrated with great pomp in Con- 
 stantinople, from the sixth century.f 
 In the West, on the contrary, this 
 doctrine met opponents, and power- 
 ful opponents ; for St. Anselm, St. 
 Bernard, St. Bonaventure, St. Thomas 
 Aquinas, Albertus Magnus, and 
 many other pious and learned doc- 
 tors, all great theologians, J and, 
 moreover, devoted to the service of 
 
 St. Germanus, patriarch of Constantinople, had 
 added an anthem. 
 
 J The opponents of the Immaculate Concep- 
 tion are wont to boast of having in their ranks 
 St. Anselm, St. Bernard, St. Bonaventure, St. 
 Thomas, Albertus Magnus, &c. However great 
 these names may be, yet we must not be dazzled 
 by them ; for, confronting these doctors with 
 themselves, we find that they have positively 
 maintained the yea and nay, which shows either 
 that their opinions on this siibject were not 
 fixed, or that they had singular distractions. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 l&Bijf maintained that she was con- t 
 ceived in sin and subjected to the 
 common law, although she was 
 very soon entirely purified there- 
 fi-om by a special and excellent 
 grace which commenced her glori- 
 ous state of Mother of God. 
 
 But the belief in the Immaculate 
 Conception of the Blessed Virgin 
 prevailed, at length, over the opin- 
 ion of the great doctors of the Mid- 
 dle Ages ; what the eagles of the 
 school had not seen was revealed 
 to the simple. The writings of the 
 doctors and of the Apostles were 
 again searched ; a more careful ex- 
 amination was made of what has 
 been handed down to us regarding 
 the greatness and glory of Mary, 
 and that investigation served to 
 throw a more vivid light on this 
 doubtful point in the life of the 
 Mother of Christ. 
 
 And in fact, going back even to 
 the Apostles, we already see the 
 title of Blessed and hnmaculate ap- 
 plied to Mary.* The apostle St. 
 
 * St. James the Major, and St. Mark, in their 
 Liturgies. 
 
 t S. Hipp, in an oration on the ConsummcUion 
 of the World, | Orig. horn, in S. Matth. 
 
 § S. Den. in an epistle given in the Biblioth. 
 den PP. I S. Cypr., de Nat. Virg. 
 
 Andrew, quoted by the Babylonian 
 Abdias, expresses himself in these 
 terms : " Even as the first Adam 
 was made of the earth before it was 
 cursed, so was the second Adam 
 formed of a pure virgin who was 
 never under the ban." 
 
 The saints and martyrs who lived 
 in the third century, St. Hippolytus, 
 martyr,f Origen, J St. Denis of Alex- 
 andria, § all give to the Blessed Vir- 
 gin the qualification of pure and 
 iminaculate. St. Cyprian || is more 
 precise, and says clearly that " there 
 is a great difference between the 
 rest of mortals and the Virgin, and 
 that she has nothing in common 
 with them but nature — not sin." 
 
 In the fourth century, St. Am- 
 brose, who compares the Virgin " to 
 a bright and luminous stem, where- 
 on has never been either the knot 
 of original sin or the bark of actual 
 sin ;"^ St. John Chrysostom,** who 
 proclaims her most holy, immacu- 
 late, blessed above all creatures ; St. 
 Jerome,! f ^^^ poetically calls her 
 
 ^ " Virgo in qua nee nodus originaHs, nee 
 cortex actualis culpse fuit." S. Ambr. de Inst. 
 Virg., ch. 5. 
 
 ** S. Chrysostom, in his Liturgy. 
 
 ff St. Jerome's Commentaries on Psalm 
 Ixxvii. " Diduxit eos in nube diei : nubes est 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 63 
 
 the day -cloud which never knew f 
 darkness ; St. Basil,* whom the de- 
 fenders of the Immaculate Concep- 
 tion are proud to regard as their 
 leader ; these have never varied re- 
 garding that stainless purity which 
 so well becomes the Queen of 
 Angels. 
 
 In the fifth century, St. Augus- 
 tinef cannot endure to 'have the 
 name of Mary mentioned when there 
 is question of sin, and St. Peter 
 OhrysologusJ affirms that "in the 
 Virgin all were saved." 
 
 St. Fulgentius, who lived in the 
 beginning of the sixth century, says, 
 that " the Blessed Virgin was entire- 
 ly excluded from the first decree." § 
 " It is very wrong," says St. Ilde- 
 fonso,|| archbishop of Toledo, who 
 flourished in the same century, "It 
 is very wrong to think of subjecting 
 
 beata Virgo, quae pulchre dicitur nubes diei, 
 quia non fuit iu tenebris, sed semper in luce." 
 
 * St. Basil, in his Liturgy. 
 
 f It must be observed that St. Augustine 
 was then defending the doctrine of Original Sin 
 against the Pelagians. 
 
 J S. Peter Chrj'sol. de Annonciat., Sermon 
 140. 
 
 § S. Fulg., Sermon on the Glories of Mary. — 
 Sermon on the Two Natures in Jesus Christ. 
 
 II St. Ildefonso, in the book on the Virginity of 
 Mary. 
 
 the Mother of God to the laws of 
 nature ; it is certain that she was 
 free and exempt fi'om all original 
 sin, and that she has removed the 
 curse of Eve." St. John Damas- 
 cene,^! speaking expressly of her 
 conception, says that she was " pure 
 and immaculater In the ninth cen- 
 tury, Theophanes, Abbot of Grand- 
 champ ; in the tenth, St. Fulbert, 
 bishop of Chartres ; towards the 
 middle of the eleventh, Yves of 
 Chartres,** one of the most brilliant 
 lights of that period, and a little 
 later, St. Bruno, ff founder of the 
 Carthusians, are evidently in favor 
 of the Immaculate Conception of 
 the Blessed Virgin. 
 
 Islamism itself declares for the 
 Immaculate Conception, and the 
 Arab commentators on the Koran 
 have adopted, in their own way, 
 
 \ St. John Damascene, de Nativ. Mar., or. 1. 
 
 ** The two holy bishops of Chartres, Fulbert 
 and Yves, declared for the doctrine of the Im- 
 maculate Conception. Yves maintained it in 
 the pulpit, and Fulbert says in his paraphrase 
 on the angel's salutation to Mary : "Ave, Maria, 
 electa et insignis inter fiUas, quse immaculata 
 semper extitisti ab exordis tuse creationis, quia 
 paritura eras Creatorem totius sanctitatis." 
 
 ff St. Bruno, in his explanation of those 
 words of Psalm ci. : Dominus de codo in terram 
 aspexit, which he appHes to the Blessed "Virgin. 
 
ttll 
 
 LIF£ OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 the opinion of the Catholic theo- 
 logians who have pronounced in 
 favor of that doctrine. " Every de- 
 scendant of Adam," says Cottada, 
 "fi'om the moment that he comes 
 into the world, is touched on the 
 side by Satan ; Jesus and Mary are 
 alone excepted ; for God interposed 
 between them and Satan a veil 
 which preserved them fi-om his fatal 
 touch." 
 
 These testimonies in favor of 
 the Immaculate Conception become 
 weaker and less abundant in the 
 twelfth and thirteenth centuries ; 
 few wu-iters of any note then took 
 this view of the subject, and sever- 
 al men of eminent piety and learn- 
 ing maintained the contrary opinion. 
 On the other hand, the feast of the 
 Conception of the Virgin was es- 
 tablished in many kingdoms. 
 
 William the Conqueror establish- 
 ed this festival in Normandy as 
 eaiiy as the year 1074; and, from 
 the reign of his son, Henry the 
 First, King of England and Duke 
 of Normandy, it was celebrated at 
 Rouen with extraordinary solem- 
 nity. "It was instituted," say the 
 ancient chroniclers, "because of the 
 holy apparition seen by an eccle- 
 
 f siastic worthy of credit, who found 
 himself exposed to the perils of 
 the sea during a storm." An old 
 history of the antiquities of Kouen, 
 adds that " even at the time of the 
 institution of the feast, there was 
 founded an association of the most 
 notable persons of the city, who 
 still annually elect one of their 
 number to be prince of the confra- 
 ternity, who holding the puy (or 
 stage) open to all orators, in every 
 language, gives excellent and valu- 
 able prizes to those w^ho shall best 
 and most faithfully celebrate the 
 praises of the Virgin Mary, in her 
 holy conception, by liymjis, odes, 
 sonnets, ballads, royal songs, &c."* 
 
 Thus the Virgin full of grace pre- 
 sided at the revival of poetry, and 
 her Immaculate Conception furnish- 
 ed pious themes to the land of 
 minstrels. 
 
 J'rom Normandy, the feast of the 
 Conception passed over to the En- 
 glish. The first council of Oxford, 
 held by Stephen Langton, arch- 
 bishop of Canterbury, in the year 
 1222, placed it in the number of 
 holidays to be observed. In France, 
 
 * AntiquUes et Singularitks de la Ville de Rouen. 
 ^ By N. Taillepied, Doctor of Theology. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 65 
 
 in the year 1288, a bishop of Paris, 
 Renoul de Hombiere, bequeathed a 
 considerable sum to found the office 
 of that feast of the Blessed Virgin, 
 which was about the same time in- 
 troduced into the Lyonnais. Final- 
 ly, a manuscript niartyrology of the 
 thirteenth century, found in the li- 
 brary of the Dominicans of Dijon, 
 fixes the festival of the Conception 
 of Om* Lady on the 8th of Decem- 
 ber: "which also shows," say the 
 learned Benedictines who deciphered 
 that ancient manuscript, "that in 
 St. Dominick's time, this feast was 
 already celebrated in nearly all the 
 Church." 
 
 The doctrine of the Immaculate 
 Conception had been banished from 
 pulpits and from schools for a very 
 long period of time, when some the- 
 ologians, perceiving that this belief 
 could be traced to the highest and 
 purest sources of Christianity, un- 
 dertook to revive it. The Francis- 
 
 * Montfaucon, who journeyed through Italy 
 about the year 1698, having visited at Pavia the 
 library of the Signor Beleridus, renowned for his 
 piety, was much surprised to see that his im- 
 mense collection of books was composed solely 
 of treatises written by the Franciscans in defence 
 of the Immaculate Conception. 
 
 f This is the decree of the Sorbonne : " We 
 
 * cans, who first began to make a 
 public profession of it, in speaking,* 
 and in writing, supported it by rea- 
 sons so strong and so convincing, 
 that not only the mass of the faith- 
 ful, but the most learned body in 
 Europe, clung to it with enthusiasm. 
 The Sorbonne, which was then called 
 " the firmament of science, the prop 
 of truth and piety in the church of 
 God," decreed that all those who 
 should be promoted to the degree 
 of doctor were to engage them- 
 selves by oath to maintain this pious 
 belief.f So, in succession, did the 
 universities of Mayence, of Cologne, 
 of Yalentia, of Alcala, of Coi'mbra, 
 of Salamanca, and of Naples. 
 
 Amongst those religious orders in 
 whom France has gloried for so 
 many ages, the Dominicans alone, 
 or nearly alone, showed themselves 
 hostile to the pious doctrine of the 
 spotless Conception ; but the learn- 
 ed Benedictines, venerated even by 
 
 resolve and declare that no one shall be admit- 
 ted for the future into our Faculty, until he 
 swears to maintain all his hfe this doctrine 
 of the Immaculate Conception." "Statuentes 
 ut nemo deinceps huic nostro collegio adscri- 
 batur, nisi se hujus doctrinsB assertorum sem- 
 per pro viribus futurum, simili juramento, 
 profiteatuj*." 
 
 * 
 
66 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRQIN MARY. 
 
 Protestants for their immense sci- 
 entific labors, the Carthusians, the 
 Cai-melites, the order of St. Augus- 
 tine, in Cluny, in Citeaux, in Pr^- 
 montrtf, and a host of others whom 
 it would be superfluous to enumerate 
 here, all adhered with an enlightened 
 piety, an ardent zeal, and a profound 
 conviction, to the doctrine of the 
 Immaculate Conception. 
 
 Councils, too, have been favorable 
 to this belief. That of Bale, in its 
 
 * " There has arisen in this Council (that of 
 Bale) a difficult question on the Conception of 
 the glorious Virgin Mary, Mother of God, and 
 on the beginning of her sanctification ; some 
 saying that her soul was, for some time, or at 
 least for some moments, subjected to original 
 sin ; others maintaining, on the contrary, that 
 the love of God for her extended even to the first 
 instant of her creation ; that the Most High, who 
 created her, and the Son who formed her to be 
 his mother on earth, endowed her with singular 
 and extraordinary graces ; that Jesus Christ re- 
 deemed her in a superior and particular manner, 
 preserving her from the original stain, and sanc- 
 tifying her in the very first moment of her con- 
 ception. 
 
 "Having, therefore, carefully examined the 
 reasons and the authorities which, for several 
 years, have been brought forward, on both sides, 
 in the public acts of this holy Council ; having, 
 moreover, given our attention to many other 
 things on the same subject; all weighed and 
 maturely considered, we decide and declare that 
 the doctrine which teaches that the glorious 
 Virgin Mary, Mother of God, by a special favor, 
 and by a preventing and operating grace, has 
 
 session of 27th September, 1429, 
 declares that the doctrine which 
 teaches that the glorious Virgin 
 Mary was conceived without sin is 
 a pious doctrine, conformable to 
 ecclesiastical worship, to Catholic 
 faith, to right reason, and to Holy 
 Writ.* Tlie Council of Avignon 
 confirmed, in 1457, the decree of the 
 Council of Bale, and in their session 
 of 1564,f the Fathers of the Council 
 of Trent declared that, in their de- 
 
 never been actually subjected to original sin, but 
 that she has ever been holy, immaculate and ex- 
 eYnpt from all sin, original and actual ; we de- 
 clare that the doctrine which teaches all that, is 
 a pious doctrine, conformable to ecclesiastical 
 worship, to Catholic faith, to right reason, and 
 to Holy Writ, and that, as such, it is to be ap- 
 proved, held, and followed by all Catholics, so 
 that no one shall be hereafter permitted to 
 preach or teach the contrary. Rene\ving, be- 
 sides the institution of the feast of the holy Con- 
 ception; which, by an ancient and praiseworthy 
 custom, is solemnized on the 8th day of Decem- 
 ber, at Rome, as in all the other churches, we 
 will and ordain that this festival be celebrated 
 on the day before mentioned, under the name of 
 the Conception of the Virgin, in all the churches, 
 monasteries, and communities of the Catholic 
 religion, and that it be observed with all manner 
 of praise and gladness, and canticles of joy." 
 The Council even attaches indulgences to this 
 solemnity. 
 
 t " Declerat haec sancta synodus non esse in- 
 tentionis suse comprehendere in hoc decreto, ubi 
 de peccato originali agitur, beatam et Immacula- 
 TAM Dei Genitricem." (Cone. Trid. sex. 1564.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 67 
 
 cree of 1546, on original sin, they did ' 
 not pretend to include the Blessed 
 and Immaculate Mother of God. 
 
 Notwithstanding the prudent re- 
 serve maintained by the Holy See 
 in an affair wherein figured, for and 
 against, famous doctors and illustri- 
 ous theologians, it yet could not help 
 showing, at times, which party had 
 its sympathy. In the year 1483, 
 Pope Sixtus lY. had expressly for- 
 bidden that the subject of the Con- 
 ception of Our Lady * should be dis- 
 cussed in pulpits or in schools. This 
 might be taken for a mere act of 
 neutrality, had not this pontiff ap- 
 proved of the Office of the Con- 
 ception composed by a monk of 
 Yerona, and granted a hundred 
 days' indulgence to those who 
 should assist thereat, f The suc- 
 cessors of that great pope walked 
 uniformly in the way which he 
 had marked out and followed. In 
 1506, Cardinal Ximenes establish- 
 ed in Spain, with the consent of 
 Pope Julius II., a confraternity of 
 
 * See the constitution of Sixtus IV., whicli 
 commences with Grave nimis. 
 
 f See the constitution of Sixtus IV., which 
 begins, Cum prce excelsa . . . Extravag. Commun. 
 
 J In this order of the Immaculate Conception, 
 
 the Conception. The same pope 
 confirmed, by a brief, dated the 
 17th of September, 1511, an order 
 of nuns founded under the same title 
 by Innocent YIII.J In the hymns 
 which Zachary, bishop of Gordia, 
 composed by order of Leo X. and 
 Clement YIL, it is said that Our 
 Lady was created in the state of 
 grace. In 1569, Pope Pius Y. gave 
 the Franciscans permission to cele- 
 brate the office of the Immaculate 
 Conception, attaching thereto the 
 same indulgences as to the feast of 
 the Holy Sacrament. Paul Y., by a 
 bull of the year 1616, forbade any 
 one to maintain, in public instruc- 
 tions, the opinion contrary to the 
 Immaculate Conception ; and Greg- 
 ory XY., in 1622, extended that 
 prohibition even to discourses and 
 private conversations. It only re- 
 mained for the popes to celebrate 
 this festival in Rome itself, and this 
 was done by Alexander YIL in 
 1661. It is evident, from this uni- 
 form conduct of the Holy See, that 
 
 each Sister consecrated herself expressly to this 
 mystery by these unequivocal words, "I, Sister 
 
 N for the love and service of Jesus Christ 
 
 our Lord, and the Immaculate Conception of 
 his Blessed Mother, do promise," &c. 
 
68 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 all its sympathies were with the ^ 
 docti'ine of the spotless conception. 
 Nevei-theless, it never chose to cen- 
 mre the contraiy opinion, doubtless 
 through respect for high and holy 
 names. 
 
 ' A voice whose weight is immense, 
 the great voice of Bossuet, made 
 itself heai-d in this cause ; the sliield 
 of religion nobly took his stand 
 before, the Blessed Virgin. "The 
 opinion of the immaculate concep- 
 tion," says he, "has, I know not 
 what, force which persuades pious 
 souls. After the articles of faith, I 
 see but few things better assured. 
 Hence I am not surprised that the 
 Paris school of theology obliges all 
 its members to defend this doctrine. 
 For my own part, I am delighted 
 now to follow its intentions. After 
 having been nursed on its milk, I 
 willingly submit to its ordinance, 
 the more so as this seems to me to 
 be also the will of the Church ; she 
 has a very great veneration for the 
 conception of Mary ; she does not, it 
 is true, oblige us to believe it im- 
 maculute ; but she makes us under- 
 stand that that belief is very pleasing 
 
 ♦ Bossuet, Sermon on the Gonception, 
 
 to her. There are things which she 
 commands, and by them we manifest 
 our obedience ; there are others 
 which she insinuates, and by them 
 we may testify our aifection. It is 
 for our piety, if we are true children 
 of the Church, not only to obey the 
 commandments, but to bow to the 
 slightest indications of the will of 
 a mother so good and so holy."* 
 
 It is certain that the devotion to 
 the Blessed Virgin has been common 
 in Western Europe from the medi- 
 aeval times ; a»d, since then, it has 
 made immense progress ; but, with- 
 out meaning to disparage France 
 and Italy, those two nations so emi- 
 nently devoted to the Virgin, it must 
 be acknowledged that it is Spain 
 which has labored the most zealously 
 and ardently for the propagation of 
 that doctrine. 
 
 The Spanish Church, protesting 
 against the pretensions of the 
 Church of Normandy, which attrib- 
 utes to itself the institution of the 
 feast of the Immaculate Conception 
 of Our Lady in the West, will have it 
 that it has been observed in Spain 
 ever since the seventh century.f It 
 
 ■{• " La Iglesia espafiola fu^ la primera que eel- 
 
LIFE OF TEE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 69 
 
 is certain that, in 1394, Don Juan I. 
 of Arragon, who instituted it, in the 
 name of the king, in the several 
 provinces of Spain which had shaken 
 off the yoke of Islamism, affirms that 
 a great number of his predecessors 
 had celebrated this festival before 
 
 ebro la Immaculada Concepcion de Santisima 
 Virgen ; euya fiesta tuvo lugor eu ella desde el 
 siglio sdptims." (El maestro Villados, en el cap. 
 de los Festiv. Ecles. t. i., part ii. 
 
 * This is the decree of Don Juan I. of Arra- 
 gon : "We, Don Juan, by the grace of God, 
 King of Arragon and Valencia, &c. Why is it 
 that some persons are amazed to hear that the 
 Ever-blessed Mary, Mother of God, was con- 
 ceived without original sin, whilst they doubt 
 not that St. John the Baptist was sanctified in 
 his mother's womb by the same God,- who, 
 coming down from the highest heavens and from 
 the throne of the Most Holy Trinity, was made 
 flesh in the blessed womb of a virgin ? What 
 graces do we think could the Lord withhold 
 from the woman who brought him forth by the 
 splendid miracle of her fruitful virginity ? Lov- 
 ing his mother as he loves her, he must have 
 invested with the most glorious privileges her 
 conception, her nativity, and the other phases of 
 her holy life. 
 
 " Why raise up a doubt as to the glorious 
 conception of a Virgin so privileged, and of 
 whom we are obliged, by Catholic faith, to be- 
 lieve wonders and greatness beyond the reach 
 of our imagination? Is it not, for all Chris- 
 tians, a much greater subject of admiration to 
 see that a creature has begotten her Creator, 
 and become a mother without ceasing to be a 
 viro-in ? How, then, can the human mind give 
 adequate praise to that glorious Virgin, destined 
 by the Almighty to possess, without the slightest 
 corruption, the advantages of divine maternity, 
 
 him.* We shall not decide between 
 the two churches ; but if Spain have 
 but a doubtful claim to the institu- 
 tion of that festival of Mary, which 
 is called in France and in England 
 the feast of the Normans, she cannot 
 be deprived of the honor of having 
 
 conjointly with the glory of the purest virginity, 
 and to be placed over all the prophets, over all 
 the saints, and over all the choirs of angels, as 
 their queen ? Could the stain of original sin have 
 been imputed to her even for an instant, there 
 would then have been some deficiency of grace 
 and of purity in that excellent Virgin, to whom 
 the angel of the Lord, the ambassador of heaven, 
 addressed these words : Hail, Mary, full of grace ; 
 the Lord is with thee ; blessed art thou amongst 
 tvomen ! Let those persons who speak so unrea- 
 sonably be now silent ; let those who have only 
 vain and frivolous arguments to propose against 
 the Immaculate Conception, so privileged and 
 so pure, of the Blessed Virgin, be ashamed to 
 publish them, because it was expedient that she 
 should be endowed with so great purity, that 
 after that of God there could be none such im- 
 agined. It is likewise most fitting that she who 
 became the Mother of the Creator and Father 
 of all things should have been ever and always 
 purest, fairest, and most perfect, having been 
 chosen from the beginning and before all ages, 
 by an eternal decree of God, to bear in her 
 womb Him whom the whole world and all the 
 immensity of the heavens cannot contain. 
 
 "But we who, of all Catholic kings, have 
 received, from this Mother of mercy, so many 
 graces and benefits undeserved by us, we firmly 
 believe that the conception of this Blessed 
 Virgin, in whose womb the Son of God vouch- 
 safed to become man, was indeed holy and 
 immaculate. 
 
 "Hence, we honor with a pure heart the 
 
70 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 been the fii*st to erect cbarelies and 
 altars under the title of the Mystery 
 of the Immaculate Conception. In 
 the yeai* 1525, the Spaniards of 
 Mexico placed the splendid cathe- 
 di'al of PvMx de los Angelas under 
 the invocation of the immaculate 
 Virgin, whose sacred image stood 
 
 mystery of that Immaculate and Blessed Con- 
 ception of the most Blessed Virgin, Mother of 
 God ; and we, with all the royal house, do annu- 
 ally solemnize the feast thereof, even as our 
 most illustrious predecessors, of glorious mem- 
 ory, did celebrate the same, having established 
 a perpetual confraternity thereof. Wherefore, 
 we do hereby ordain that this festival of the Im- 
 maculate Conception be celebrated every year 
 in perpetuity, with great solemnity and respect, 
 throughout all the kingdoms subject unto us, by 
 all faithful Catholics, whether religious or secular 
 priests and laity, of whatsoever state or condition 
 they may be ; and that, henceforward, it is not 
 permitted, but expressly forbidden, to all preach- 
 ers, and to all those who publicly expound the 
 Gospel, to say, to advance, or to pubhsh any- 
 thing that might, in any way whatsoever, be 
 prejudicial or hurtful to the purity and holiness 
 of that Blessed Conception ; but, on the con- 
 trary, we ordain that preachers, and other per- 
 sons who have had opposite sentiments, shall 
 keep silent, since the Catholic faith does not in 
 any way oblige us to maintain and profess the 
 contrary opinion ; and that others, who cherish 
 in their hearts our own holy and salutary opin- 
 ion, may publish it in their discourses, and 
 hasten to manifest their devotion by celebrat- 
 ing, through the praises of the Most High, the 
 glor}- and honor of his holy mother, who is the 
 Queen of Heaven, the gate of paradise, the 
 protectress of our souls, the sure port of salva- 
 
 sparkling with jewels over an altar 
 of massive silver, surrounded by a 
 multitude of elegant pillars, with 
 plinths and capitals of burnished 
 gold. The faithful of Mexico raised 
 in her honor, in their metropolitan 
 church, an altar and a statue of 
 massive silver, adorned with a mag- 
 
 tion, and the anchor of hope for sinners who 
 have confidence in her. We now hereby ex- 
 pressly establish, in perpetuity, that if it happen 
 that any preacher, or any other of our subjects, 
 of any state or condition, fail to observe this 
 ordinance, unless exempt by reason of some of 
 our other edicts, that they be expelled from 
 their convents and houses, and, whilst they 
 retain that contrary opinion, they shall be 
 driven, as our enemies, from all parts of our 
 dominions. Commanding Hkewise, and decree- 
 ing, in our knowledge and mature deliberation, 
 that all and each of our officers, whether at 
 home or abroad, present or future, shall observe, 
 and cause to be observed, with great diligence 
 and respect, our present edict, as soon as they 
 are made cognizant thereof ; and that each, in 
 his district, shall have it published exactly, 
 solemnly, and by sound of trumpet in aU the 
 accustomed places, to the end that no one may 
 plead ignorance, and that the devotion of the 
 Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin, 
 so long preserved in the hearts of Christians, 
 may increase more and more, and that no one 
 may ever again be heard to express a contrary 
 opinion. In faith whereof we command that 
 these present acts be dispatched everywhere, 
 duly authorized by our sign and seal, hereto 
 attached. — Given at Valencia, on the 2d of 
 February, being the Feast of the Purification of 
 that Ever-blessed Virgin, the year of our Lord 
 1384, and the eighth of our reign." 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 71 
 
 nificence truly Peruvian. A little 
 later, the Mexican cathedrals of 
 Merida, Maracai'bo, and Nahana 
 were founded under the invocation 
 of the immaculate Virgin ; nor did 
 Peru remain behind. This splendid 
 accession to the doctrine of the con- 
 ception without" sin, did not sufi&ce 
 for the zeal of the nations subject to 
 the Spanish domination. In 1618, 
 the vice-king of Naples, his court 
 and his army, made a vow, in the 
 Church of Our Lady the Great, to 
 believe and to defend the immacu- 
 late conception of the Virgin. A 
 commemorative pillar, surrounded 
 by a magnificent statue of Our 
 Lady, with the symbolical emblems 
 of her victory over original sin, was 
 raised in testimony of that public 
 engagement so chivalrously con- 
 tracted. 
 
 The Spanish people, who have at 
 all times specially signalized them- 
 selves in this devotion, have adopted 
 
 * Alabado sea el santisimo Sacramento del 
 altar, y la Immaculada Concepcion de la Yirgen 
 Maria, concebida sin pecado original en el 
 primer instante de su ser natural. 
 
 I On entering a Spanish house, the first words 
 spoken by the visitor, even before wishing good 
 day, are these : " Ave, Maria purisima ;" the 
 people of the house immediately answer : " Sin 
 
 it so far that not a single preacher 
 ascends a pulpit without prefac- 
 ing his sermon by a profession of 
 faith in the spotless conception,* 
 and it has even been introduced 
 into the familiar phrases used in 
 greeting.-j- 
 
 Finally, in 1771, whilst the de- 
 stroying wind of philosophy was 
 violently shaking religious belief in 
 France and several other countries 
 of Europe, the King of Spain, 
 Charles III., instituted an order in 
 honor of the Virgin conceived with- 
 out sin, and solemnly declared her, 
 with the assembled Cortes and a 
 brief of the Holy See, Universal 
 patrona de Espana ^ Indias.\ 
 
 In France, notwithstanding the 
 license and the unbelief which the 
 flood of revolution left behind it, 
 this doctrine is gaining ground, 
 and penetrating even to the most 
 distant hamlets. The Diocese of 
 Paris is particularly distinguished 
 
 pecado concebida, santisima," (holiest, conceived 
 without sin.) 
 
 J " Por la devocion que desde nuestra in- 
 fancia hemos tenido a Maria santisima en 
 su misterio de la Immaculada Concepcion, 
 deseamos poner bajo los divinos auspicios 
 
 de esta celestial protectora la Nueva Orden, 
 
 y mandamos que sea reconocida en ella por 
 
72 
 
 UFE OF TEE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 for its zeal in propagating this * 
 pious belief^ which flourishes there 
 under the protecting shadow of 
 its archbishops,* confirmed by the 
 supernatui'al things related of the 
 miraculous medal struck in honor 
 of the mystery of the spotless 
 Conception. 
 
 K the tradition of the Apostles, 
 the inclination of the Church, the 
 authority of Councils, the adhesion 
 of universities and religious orders, 
 the assent of kings and nations, the 
 dedication of temples and altars, the 
 
 })atrona. " {Leg. 12, t. iL, 1. vi. Noviss. 
 
 Bee.) 
 
 * " It is a fact we would wish to establish, and 
 to make known in even the most remote parts 
 of the Catholic world : in our Diocese, this de- 
 votion has been rooted deeper and deeper with 
 passing time, and misfortunes have come in 
 plenty to confirm, increase, and extend it with 
 marvellous rapidity." {See the mandamus of ¥ 
 
 foundation of offices, the institution 
 of confraternities and royal orders 
 have any weight in a controversy 
 which has astonished the Pagans 
 themselves,! then the cause of the 
 Immaculate Conception of Mary, so 
 long pending before the tribunal 
 of Catholic opinion, appears to us 
 gained ; and we do not think it rash 
 to suppose that God, preserving 
 his divine Mother from the original 
 stain, said to her, as Assuerus did 
 to Esther, "This law is not made 
 for thee, but for all others." 
 
 His Grace the Archbishop of Paris on the occa- 
 sion of the consecration of the Church of Our 
 Lady of Loretto. ) 
 
 f " How !" exclaimed JuUan the Apostate, ad- 
 dressing a bishop who maintained the univer- 
 sality of original sin ; " How ! dost thou, then, 
 subject the birth of Mary to the empire of tho 
 Devil!" (St. Augustine, L iv., Op. imperf.) 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE BIRTH 
 
 BOUT the time 
 when the reli- 
 gion and the 
 prosperity of 
 the Hebrews 
 were on the 
 decline at the 
 period pointed out by the prophets, 
 and when the royal sceptre was in 
 stranger hands, according to the 
 great prediction of Jacob, there 
 was in Nazareth, a city of Lower 
 Galilee, not far from Mount Carmel, 
 a just man named Joachim,* of the 
 
 * A biographer of Mary, Christopher de 
 Castro, discovered, according to the Rabbins, 
 St. Hilary and other Fathers of the Church, 
 that the father of Mary had two names, Heli 
 and Joachim. The Arabs and the Mussulmans 
 know him under that of Amram, son of Matheus, 
 and distinguish him from another Amram, 
 father of Mary, the sister of Moses. (D'Herbe- 
 lot, Bibtiotheque Orientale, t. ii.) 
 
 f According to the proto-Gospel of St. James 
 and the Gospel of the nativity of Mary, Joachim 
 was of the race of David. Justin, who flourished 
 only fifty years after the death of St. John the 
 Apostle, who was born in Palestine, and was 
 in a position to collect traditions still quite 
 recent, likewise says that Mary was descended 
 in a^irect line from David. 
 
 I St. August., De consens. Evangel. 
 
 § The Mahometans, inheritors of the Arabian 
 
 OF MARY. 
 
 tribe of Juda and the race of Davidf 
 by Nathan ; his wife, who, according 
 to the opinion of St. Augustine, was 
 of the sacerdotal tribe,J was called 
 Anne, a name which, in Hebrew, 
 signifies graceful.^ 
 
 They were both just before Jeho- 
 vah, and walked in the way of 
 His commandments with a perfect 
 heart ;|| but the Lord seemed to 
 have turned away his face from 
 them, for a great blessing was 
 wanting unto them; they were 
 childless, and therefore sorrowful, 
 
 traditions, know the blessed mother of the 
 Virgin under her own name, which is Hannah ; 
 she was, according to them, the daughter of 
 Makhor, and wife of Amram. (D'Herbelot, 
 Bibliotheque Orientale, t. ii.) 
 
 II St. Anne and St. Joachim were publicly hon- 
 ored in the Church in the first ages. St. John 
 Damascene highly extols their virtue. The 
 Emperor Justinian I. had a church built in 
 Constantinople under the invocation of St. 
 Anne, about the year 550. The body of the 
 saint was removed, it is said, from Palestine 
 to Constantinople in 710. {See Godescard, 
 t. V. p. 319.) Luther had a great devotion for 
 St. Anne previous to his heresy ; it was 
 to that saint that he promised to embrace 
 the monastic state, in presence of the corpse 
 of a comrade killed by lightning before his 
 eyes. 
 
74 
 
 Lil 
 
 THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART, 
 
 because in Israel barrenness was a 
 (lisgmce. 
 
 Juucliim, who loved his wife for 
 her exceeding mildness and her em- 
 inent virtues, would not increase 
 her misfortune by giving her those 
 letters of divorce which the law 
 then gmnted so easily;* he kept 
 her with him, and that pious pair, 
 humbly resigned to the divine be- 
 hest, passed their days in labor, 
 prayer, and alms-deeds. 
 
 So many virtues could not go un- 
 rewarded ; after twenty years of 
 baiTcnness, Ann conceived, as it 
 were by a miracle, and brought 
 forth that favored creature who was 
 more perfect, more holy, and more 
 agreeable to the Lord than all the 
 elect taken together. 
 
 * It was the Pharisees who had introduced 
 this abuse of divorce, so loudlV censured by our 
 Lord [Matth. eh. xix. v. 8) ; they taught that a 
 wife might be put away for the most trifling 
 cause ; for instance, for having cooked her 
 master's meat over much, or even for not 
 being sufficiently handsome. This was the 
 opinion of Hillel and of Akiba. (Basnage, 1. 
 vii. ch. 22.) 
 
 f The 8th of September, according to the 
 teaching of the Church. Baronius has it that 
 Mary was born in the year of Rome 733, twenty- 
 one years before the vulgar era, on the 8th of 
 September, being Saturday, at the dawn of day. 
 Le Nain de Tillemont says that the Virgin was 
 
 It was about the beginning 
 of the month Tisri,f which is the 
 lirst of the civil year of the Jews, 
 whilst the smoke of holocausts 
 was ascending to heaven for the 
 expiation of the sins of the peo- 
 ple, that the promised Virgin was 
 born — she who was to repair the 
 primitive transgression ; J her birth 
 was humble, like that of her di- 
 vine Son ; her parents were of the 
 people, although descended from a 
 long Ime of kings, and led, to all 
 appearance, an obscure life ; that 
 mystical rose, whom St. John after- 
 wards beheld clothed with the sun as 
 with a radiant garment, was to blos- 
 som, in the scorching wind of adver- 
 sity, on a withered and leafless stem.§ 
 The cradle of the Queen of Angels 
 
 born 'in the year 734 of the Roman era. This 
 opinion is the most generally followed. 
 
 I Here is what the Turks relate regarding the 
 birth of the Blessed Virgin. The wife of Amram 
 (Joachim) said to God, " Lord, I have conse- 
 crated to thee the fruit of my womb ; vouchsafe 
 to receive it, O Thou who kuowest and hearest 
 all." When she had brought forth, she added, 
 " Lord, I have brought a daughter into the 
 world ; I have called her Miriam (Mary) ; I 
 place her under thy protection, she and her pos- 
 terity, to the end that thou mayst preserve them 
 from the snares of Satan." (Koran, ch. iii.^ 
 
 § Isaias had foretold it, saying : There shall 
 ^ come forth a rod out of the root of Jesse, and a 
 
\.^ 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 75 
 
 was neither adorned with gold nor 
 covered with the richly-embroidered 
 quilts ^of Egypt, neither perfumed 
 with spikenard, myrrh, nor aloes, 
 like those of the Hebrew princes ; 
 it was formed of flexible branches, 
 and bands of coarse linen confined 
 the little arms which were one day 
 to cradle the Saviour of the world. 
 The children of kings, whilst yet 
 wrapped up in their sumptuous 
 swaddling-clothes, behold the great 
 ones of the land humbling them- 
 selves before them, and calling them 
 by high-sounding titles. The woman 
 who was to be the Spouse and the 
 Mother of God bestowed her first 
 smile on poor humble women, who 
 perhaps said within themselves, as 
 they remembered the obscurity and 
 hardship of their lot, " Another slave 
 is born!" 
 
 It was the custom amongst the 
 Israelites to assemble the family on 
 the ninth day, in order to give the 
 new-born child its name. The 
 daughter of Joachim received from 
 
 ■flower shall rise up out of his root ; for this word 
 root signifies, in Hebrew, as St. Jerome observes 
 {in Is. c. xi.) a stena without branches and with- 
 out leaves, to denote, continues this holy doctor, 
 that the august Mary was to be born of the race 
 
 her father the name of Miriam 
 (Mary), which means in the Syriac 
 language, lady, sovereign, mistress, 
 and in Hebrew, star of the sea. 
 
 " And assuredly," says St. Ber- 
 nard, " the Mother of God could not 
 have a name more appropriate, nor 
 more expressive of her high dignity. 
 Mary is, in fact, that fair and lumin- 
 ous star which shines over the vast 
 and stormy sea of this world." 
 
 There is hidden in that divine 
 name a spell so potent, and of such 
 marvellous sweetness, that merely to 
 pronounce it softens the heart, mere- 
 ly to write it beautifies the style. 
 ''The name of Mary," says St. An- 
 thony of Padua, '' is sweeter to the 
 lips than honey,* more grateful to 
 the ear than the sweetest music, 
 more delicious to the heart than the 
 purest joy." 
 
 Eighty days after the birth of a 
 daughter, the Jewish woman was 
 solemnly purified in the temple 
 where she ofi'ered her first-born 
 child. Conformably to the law of 
 
 of David, when that family should have lost its 
 splendor and its royalty. 
 
 * Noraen Virginis Marice, mel in ore, melos in 
 aure, jubilum in corde, is the poetical expression 
 of St. Anthony of Padua. 
 
T« 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 Moses, she theu olfered to the Lord. ^ 
 a laiiib or two doves; the latter was 
 the holy offering of the poor, and 
 was that of Joachim's wife. 
 
 But the gratitude of the pious 
 mother went still farther than the 
 customary sacrifice; worthy imitator 
 of Anna, the wife of Elcana, she 
 offered to the Lord a victim more 
 pure, a dove more innocent, than 
 those which fell bleeding and palpi- 
 tating under the sacrificing knife. 
 She had no votive crown of purest 
 gold wherewith to adorn the walls 
 of the temple ; * she laid at the feet 
 of the Most High the crown of her 
 old age, the child whom He had 
 given her, and solemnly promised to 
 bring back her daughter to the Tem- 
 ple, and to consecrate her to the ser- 
 vice of the holy place as soon as her 
 mind was capable of knowing good 
 from evil. Mary's father ratified 
 
 * Mach. lib. i. cap. 4. 
 
 f There were amongst the Jews two sorts of 
 vows ; the first, neder, was a simple vow, after 
 which men could purchase a dispensation of 
 what they had vowed to the Lord (of this kind 
 was the vow of Ann, mother of Mary) ; the 
 second, cherem, was a vow indispensably bind- 
 ing, whereby all right and title to the thing 
 promised was irrevocably given up. Every Isra- 
 elite could thus consecrate whatever belonged 
 to him — houses, lands, cattle, children, slaves, ^ -, 
 
 this vow, which then became bind- 
 ing.f 
 
 The ceremony being finished, the 
 holy couple took their way back to 
 their own country, to that country so 
 barren in regard to great men that 
 Israel was far from expecting a 
 prophet to arise there, J and they 
 returned to their humble dwelling, 
 which was ever the asylum of the 
 poor and the stranger. There it was 
 that the child of benediction, the 
 child of grace and of miracle, pass- 
 ed her early years, the delight of 
 her family, growing up like one of 
 those lilies whose loveliness is prais- 
 ed by Jesus Christ himself, and 
 which have, as St. Bernard poeti- 
 cally says, " the odor of hope," hahens 
 odorem spei. Anne was herself to 
 nurse the child, according to the 
 custom of her people. § 
 
 Mary's understanding, like the 
 
 &c. ; and the things so consecrated could neither 
 be sold nor redeemed at any price whatsoever. 
 
 X " Can anything good come forth from 
 Nazareth ? " asked Nathaniel of those who 
 spoke to him of Christ. "Because the place 
 was small and contemptible," says St. John 
 Chrysostom, " and not only that particular 
 place, but the whole of Galilee." (Serm. d, in 
 S. Matth.) 
 
 § In Judea, the women did not often dispense 
 with nursing their children ; there are only three 
 
LIFE OF TEE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 T7 
 
 day in some favored regions, had 
 scarcely a dawn, and shone clearly 
 out from her earliest days. Her 
 precocious fervor and the wisdom 
 of her discourse, at a period of life 
 when other children still enjoy but 
 a purely physical existence, made 
 the parents judge that the time of 
 their separation was come ; and 
 when Joachim had offered to the 
 
 ¥ 
 
 Lord, for the third time since the 
 birth of his daughter, the first-fruits 
 of the crops and fruits of his small 
 inheritance, the husband and wife, 
 grateful and resigned, set out for 
 Jerusalem, in order to deposit 
 within the sacred precincts of 
 the temple the treasure which they 
 had received from the Holy One 
 of Israel. 
 
 CHAPTEE, IV. 
 
 THE PRESENTATION. 
 
 HE Cison rolled 
 majestically on, 
 its reddish waves 
 swelled by the e- 
 quinoctial rains, * 
 and the green 
 mountains of Gal- 
 ilee were beginning to put on their 
 snowy covering, when Mary's pa- 
 
 nurses mentioned in Scripture ; they are those 
 of Kebecca, of Miphiboseth, and of Joas ; then 
 it is to be observed that Rebecca was a foreigner, 
 and the others royal personages. 
 
 rents undertook the journey to Jeru- 
 salem. There is no knowing the 
 motive which induced them to leave 
 their native province during the 
 rainy season. It might be that they 
 wished to assist at the grand solem- 
 nities of the Feast of the Dedication ; 
 or perhaps it was that they simply 
 regulated their departure by the 
 
 * The Cison is a small river which flows be- 
 tween Nazareth and Mount Carmel ; shallow 
 and insignificant in summer, like all the water- 
 courses of Palestine, it becomes a considerable 
 
78 
 
 Lli'L ui lUL JiLESSLD VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 period of Zachary's service in the ^ 
 toinplo which only took place at 
 rc)j;ular intervals.* 
 
 Uaving before them a journey of 
 several days, in the midst of the 
 lainy seixson, with an infant child, 
 the pious and prudent travellers 
 journeyed not towards the Holy 
 City by the wild and pebbly road 
 which winds amid the arid plains, 
 the foamy torrents and deep ravines 
 of the mountains of Samaria, where 
 the frosts of winter had already set 
 in. They descended by the woody 
 slopes of Carmel, into the charming 
 plains which extend between the 
 mountains of Palestine and the 
 
 stream during the rainy season. The troops of 
 Sisara, general of the army of Jabin, were 
 drowned in the swollen waters of this rivor 
 while trying to force a passage. 
 
 * According to the ordinance of David, the 
 priests were divided into twenty-four classes 
 or courses, each of which served its week. 
 Each course was subdivided into seven parties, 
 of which each officiated in its turn ; each indi- 
 vidual of these parties had his share of the 
 service assigned to him by lot (1 Par, ch. 
 xxiv.) Zacharias belonged to the course or 
 service of Abiu. (Prid., Hint, of the JewH.) 
 
 f Volney mentions having seen, on the coasts 
 of Syria, orange-trees loaded with fruit in the 
 open air, in the month of January. " With us," 
 says he, " nature has divided the seasons by 
 months : there, it may be said, that they are 
 only divided by hours. At TripoU, we suffer 
 
 coasts of Syria, that fair and favored 
 region, whose climate is so mild that 
 the orange-trees blossom in the 
 depth of winter, and the flowers of 
 summer bloom in December.f Hav- 
 ing left behind them the rich pastur- 
 age-lands where rose of old the 
 tents of Issachar, that race of pasto- 
 ral astronomers J whom the burning 
 breath of the wrath of God had 
 scattered, like a handful of straw, 
 over the wild and mountainous re- 
 gions of Media ; having admired as 
 they passed, the groves of palms, 
 banana - trees and pomegranates 
 clothing the hills which were once 
 the fair inheritance of the children 
 
 from the excessive warmth of July : six hours' 
 journey brings us to the adjacent mountains, 
 where the air has the temperature of March. 
 On the other hand, we are chilled by the frost 
 of December in the mountain districts : a day's 
 journey brings us to the shore, where we find 
 the summer-flowers in bloom." 
 
 I St. Jerome says that the sons of Issachar 
 were the sages who made the chronological cal- 
 culations, and marked the festivals. (Hieron., 
 QucBst. in 1 Paral. 112, p. 1390, et in Gen., 49.) 
 This tradition agrees with that of the rabbins, 
 who relate that the tribe of Issachar were 
 much given to the study of astronomy. (Mai- 
 mon., in Kiddosch, hachodesch, et Zachuth, in 
 Juchasin.) Finally, the Scripture authorizes 
 this tradition, since it mentions that the sons of 
 Issachar knew all times to order what Israel should 
 do. (1 Par. xii. 32.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 79 
 
 of Joseph, that noble and warlike 
 race, renowned for their skill in 
 archery, our (Jalilean travellers sped 
 along by the small stream of Graas, 
 overhung by its graceful willows, 
 traversed the groves of Ramatha, 
 that pretty town, which resembles a 
 cameo laid in a basket of roses, and 
 at length gained the confines of the 
 ancient territory of the Jebusites. 
 There, all was changed: no more 
 flowers, no more verdure, no more 
 balmy breezes, laden with the per- 
 fumes of the citron-tree. All around 
 were sterile rocks, profound ravines 
 through which the wind swept in 
 mournful murmurs; abrupt and 
 craggy mountains, resounding with 
 the hoarse cry of the eagle; in a 
 word, a landscape the grandest, the 
 most desolate, and the most cheer- 
 less that can well be imagined. 
 
 The little party had been follow- 
 ing, for some time, a rugged path 
 which crossed the table-land of a 
 barren mountain, when Joaehim 
 suddenly stopped at an abrupt turn 
 of the road, and stretched his arm 
 
 * The exterior front of the Temple was 80 
 thickly covered with plates of gold that, when 
 the day began to appear, it was no less dazzUog 
 than the rays of the rising snn. As for the other 
 
 f towards the south with an emotion 
 of religious exultation mingled with 
 national pride. The object which 
 he thus pointed out to his compan- 
 ions was well worthy of being re- 
 marked, for Asia had then nothing 
 more magnificent or fantastic. It 
 was a city about thirty-three stadas 
 in circumference ; set in stone like 
 a ruby of Beloochistan ; a city of 
 marble, of cedar, and of gold, whose 
 splendor had in it something gloomy, 
 ferocious and suspicious, denoting 
 an unsettled jx)wer and a permanent 
 dread of the stranger; a state of 
 things abounding in strange con- 
 trasts. There were seen enormous 
 towers, magnificent as palaces, and 
 palaces fortified like citadels. Its 
 temple, radiant with gold, stood 
 glittering on a narrow table-land of 
 the highest mountain, like the fiili- 
 orbed moon when it rises over the 
 snowv heiprhts of Lebanon.* It 
 was an almost impregnable for- 
 tress, held in awe by the people of 
 (Jod, whilst the tower of Antonia, 
 with its four elegant turrets of pol- 
 
 sides, where there was no gold, their stones were 
 BO white that, at a distance, that superb pile of 
 building, looked Uke a mountain covered with 
 mow. f Joseph. De Bello, b. t. ch. xiiL) 
 
80 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 ished mtuble, kept jealous and un- * 
 ceasing watch over the precincts of 
 the temple. 
 
 A triple inclosui-e of massive stone 
 walls,* with ninety forts, encom- 
 passed that singular city, and all 
 around it lay gloomy valleys, dizzy 
 heights and inaccessible rocks. That 
 stately and warlike city, which seem- 
 ed as though it were transported 
 by magic from the fabulous regions 
 of Ginnistan,f to be placed under 
 the cloudless sky of Palestine, was 
 that Jewish Paradise [Ghangh-dix- 
 hoitcht), so poetically mourned on the 
 banks of the Euphrates, — the city of 
 David and the Maccabees ; that Je- 
 rusalem which, even in its slavish 
 abjection, is still hailed throughout 
 the East by the ancient appellation 
 then given it by the father of Mary : 
 cl Cods (the Holy City) ! 
 
 The parents of the Virgin entered 
 the capital of Judea by the gate of 
 
 ♦ " Extrema rupis abrupta : et turres, ubi 
 mons juvisset, in sexaginta pedes, inter devexa, 
 in centenos vicenosque attollebantur ; mira spe- 
 cie, ac procul intuentibus pares." (Tacit. Hist. 
 cap. v.> 
 
 f Ginnistan, which is placed by the marvel- 
 lous legends of the Arabs and Assyrians, at the 
 foot of Mount Caucacus on the shores of the 
 • Caspian Sea, was the abode of the Peris, a fair 
 
 Rama, which was shaded by a tow- 
 erj so lofty that its flat roof com- 
 manded a view of Mount Carmel, 
 the great sea, and the mountains of 
 Arabia. From its summit still float- 
 ed the green banner of Judas Mac- 
 cabeus with its sacred device; no 
 longer understood by the soldiers 
 who kept guard aroimd, for they 
 were Thracians, Galatians, Germans, 
 and the fair-haired sons of Gaul, 
 whom Herod, in his fear of the 
 Jews, kept always in pay, and who 
 were almost as odious to the people 
 as himself 
 
 The travellers then took their way 
 through some dark and winding 
 streets, bordered with heavy-looking 
 square houses, without windows, 
 their flat roofs forming long un- 
 broken lines that looked like fortifi- 
 cations, and stopped in the eastern 
 part of the city, in front of a house 
 of unpretending appearance, pointed 
 
 and fabulous race bearing much resemblance to 
 our fairies. These powerful beings, born before 
 the Deluge, were supposed to command the 
 elements, and to create whatever they wished. 
 Their capital city, which they had carefully 
 fortified in order to keep ofif the incursions of 
 the Dives, a formidable race of evil spirits, was 
 of marble, gold, rubies, and diamonds. 
 I The tower Psephina. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 81 
 
 out by tradition as the dwelling of 
 St. Ann.* 
 
 Having purified himself for seven 
 days, according to the custom of 
 those who went to offer sacrifice in 
 the temple,f Joachim provided him- 
 self with the lamb which he was to 
 present to the Lord, put on white 
 garments, J gathered together such 
 of his relations and friends as were 
 in Jerusalem, and went up with 
 them to the temple as resolutely as 
 though he were about to make an 
 assault. § 
 
 That temple of the Lord of Hosts, 
 where the Virgin then presented 
 herself like the dove with the olive 
 branch, had undergone numerous 
 vicissitudes. One of the ancestors 
 of Mary, the wise son of David, had 
 made it the glory of the East. He 
 lavished upon it the gold of Ophir, 
 the perfumes of Saba, the cedar of 
 
 * A monastery was erected on this house of 
 St. Ann, but it has since been converted into a 
 mosque. Under the Christian kings it was in- 
 habited by nuns. (See Itineraire de Paris a 
 Jerusalem, vol. 2, p, 211.) 
 
 fit was not only that they had to present 
 themselves in the temple with their victim ; the 
 law required that they should remain outside 
 for seven entire days, and that they should sol- 
 emnly purify themselves on the third and seventh 
 days with ashes and hyssop ; that done, they 
 
 t Lebanon, brass which the fleets of 
 Tyre brought fi'om far-off lands, and 
 silver, which was then so plenty 
 that it had become a base metal. 
 That splendor had passed away like 
 a vision of the night, thanks to the 
 insatiable greed of the tribes of 
 Egypt and Ohaldea, a score of times 
 had it been despoiled, and as often 
 restored to its former splendor, and 
 finally it arose from its ruins under 
 Zorobabel, who built it, sword in 
 hand, notwithstanding the active 
 opposition of many envious nations. 
 Nevertheless, the second temple, 
 with all its unheard-of magnificence, 
 was as inferior to the fii'st in grand- 
 eur as in sanctity. It was in vain 
 that the Jews poured forth upon it 
 with a liberal hand the strength of 
 wheat and the blood of the vine ; that 
 rivers of gold, flowing in from every 
 point of the compass, unceasingly 
 
 might offer their sacrifice. (Philo, Tract de 
 Sacrif., c. 3.) 
 
 J According to the Rabbins, the sacrifice was 
 null when he who offered it was not clothed in 
 white. (Basn. b. ix. ch. iv.) 
 
 § This was of obHgation ; the Hebrews were 
 to go up to the temple with as much ardor as a 
 soldier goes up to battle ; they found this precept 
 in the fifty-fifth Psalm, where David said that 
 he went to the house of Grod as to a strong city. 
 {See Basn., Histoire des Juifs, b. vii. ch. 17.) 
 
82 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 replenished its sacred treasury ; that 
 the pagan kings, recognizing the 
 awful sanctity of the God of Israel, 
 sent thither the most magnificent 
 offerings.* Nothing of all that could 
 supply the absence of the Ark, with 
 which had disappeared the tables 
 of the law, that is to say, the decrees 
 of (rod wiitten by Himself amid the 
 lightnings of Sinai ; the miraculous 
 rod, which constituted the most an- 
 cient title of the sons of Aaron to 
 the supreme priesthood; and the 
 manna of the desert, which confirm- 
 ed by the miracle of its long pres- 
 ervation, so many ancient prodigies 
 wrought for the deliverance of Israel. 
 Those precious objects were lost, to- 
 gether with the sacred fire, which 
 was only to be fanned by the breez- 
 es of the holy mountain on the 
 brazen altar of holocausts ; and the 
 oil of unction, prepared by Moses, 
 from which the priests and the kings 
 
 * Josephus g^ves a minute description of the 
 magnificent table of massive gold incrusted with 
 precious stones, and the equally splendid vases 
 given by Ptolemy Philadelphus to the Temple ; 
 nearly all the princes of Asia had enriched it 
 with thej'r gifts, and, about the time of the Pres- 
 entation )f the Virgin, the Empress Livia sent 
 there in her name and that of Augustus, some 
 superb vases of gold. (Joseph, de BeUo, b. ii 
 ch. 17.— Philo, ad Cajum.) 
 
 ^ derived their lofty title : anointed of 
 the Lord. But most mom-nful of 
 all, the ScJiekina, that radiant cloud 
 which attested the divine presence, 
 had never been seen in the sacred 
 temple, and even the jewels of the 
 breast-plate, that last and most bril- 
 liant oracle of the God of hosts, had 
 lost their prophetic lustre.f This it 
 was that filled the hearts of the sons 
 of Aaron with bitterness when they 
 compared the house of Zorobabel 
 with the temple of the son of David ; 
 and this it was that made the doc- 
 tors of the law declare that the ful- 
 fillment of the prophecy of Aggeus 
 was not to be hoped for, unless the 
 Messiah himself appeared in person 
 in the new temple. 
 
 Having passed that magnificent 
 gate of Corinthian brass which 
 twenty Levites could hardly close at 
 night, and which, to the great dis- 
 may of the Deicide people,^ opened 
 
 f God made use of the precious stones which 
 the high-priest wore on the breast-plate in order 
 to presage victory ; for, before they encamped, 
 these stones emitted so bright a lustre that the 
 people thereby recognized the presence and 
 assistance of his divine majesty ; but for two 
 hundred years past, the breast-plate has ceased 
 to emit that light. (FL Joseph. Ant. Jud., b. iii. 
 ch. 8.) 
 
 X Joseph, de Bella, 1. vL 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 83 
 
 of its own accord four years before 
 the ruin of Jerusalem, Mary and her 
 parents found themselves in a vast 
 inclosure paved with black and 
 white flags, and surrounded by lofty 
 piazzas which, in time of war, served 
 as ramparts.* A crowd of strangers 
 and of natives, whose brilliant cos- 
 tumes of glaring colors recalled the 
 idea of an immense bed of tulips, 
 walked to and fro in conversatix)n 
 in that forum of Jerusalem, which 
 was not considered sacred, and was 
 called the Gentiles' Porch, because 
 idolators could not, under pain of 
 death, advance farther. j* 
 
 At some distance from the crowd, 
 under Solomon's porch, stood the 
 proud aristocrats of Israel, clad in 
 scarlet and purple, or in those long 
 Babylonian robes embroidered with 
 gold, which cost enormous sums, 
 awaiting the hour of prayer, and de- 
 taching themselves from the strang- 
 ers with a haughty reserve that 
 savored of contempt. Joachim, 
 
 f whose birth, notwithstanding his 
 poverty, was as noble as that of 
 any of the princes of his people, 
 bent his steps in that direction, sure 
 of a cordial reception; for those 
 Jews, so disdainful towards the 
 Gentiles, J were amongst themselves 
 like brethren, especially when they 
 belonged to the same line. Scarcely 
 had they perceived him when a 
 number of illustrious ladies, warri- 
 ors, and princes of the house of 
 David, came to meet him, and, after 
 the usual salutations, they joined 
 the Galilean family, as though to 
 form a suitable train for Mary.§ 
 The Fathers, who note this circum- 
 stance, have piously supposed that 
 those great personages, the flower 
 of the Jewish nobility, were not 
 there by mere accident, but that 
 God, who would have the future 
 mother of the Messiah enter his 
 temple in triumph, had divinely 
 inspired them to be there at that 
 particular time. 
 
 * Tacit., Historiarum, 1. y. 
 
 f Joseph, de Bella, 1. v. and vi. 
 
 J Basnage remarks that at the time of Jesus 
 Christ the Jews regarded the Gentiles as dogs, 
 and mortally hated them. "If idolators are 
 drowning," taught the doctors, " no one is to take 
 them out of the water, or render them any assist- ^ 
 
 ance ; the utmost that can be done for them is not 
 to plunge them deeper into the water, or throw 
 them farther down the precipice." (Basnage, L 
 vii. ch. 25. ) 
 
 § " Primarios quoque Hierosolymitas viros et 
 mulieres interfuisse huic deductioni, succinenti- 
 bus universis angeUs." (Isid. de Tfuss.) 
 
84 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 From the middle of the Gentiles' 
 Porch arose two other inclosm'es, 
 both sacred, which composed the 
 temple. Seen fiom below, that 
 majestic and resplendent edifice pre- 
 sented a quadrangular mass, w^hose 
 walls, of alabaster whiteness, were 
 pierced with ten superb gates, cov- 
 ered with thick plates of gold and 
 silver. As the temple, properly 
 so called, crowned the summit of 
 Mount Moria, a becoming site for 
 the dwelling of the God of Moun- 
 tahis, the ground had a gradual as- 
 cent, and the walls were completely 
 sm-rounded by marble steps, which 
 somewhat concealed their height. 
 
 Having ascended the steps of the 
 temple, the purified group, in whose 
 midst was the holy child about to be 
 consecrated to God, paused a mo- 
 
 * The chel was a space of ten cubits between 
 the court of the Gentiles and that of the women. 
 
 fThe tephilim were small pieces of parchment 
 whereon they wrote four sentences of Scripture, 
 with ink made expressly for the purpose ; the 
 Jews wore them at the bend of the left arm 
 and on the middle of the forehead. These 
 tephilim, or phylacteries, were much in use 
 at the time of Jesus Christ, since they were 
 paraded as marks of distinction, and called 
 forth his censure. (Basnage, Hisloire des Jui/s, 
 b. vii. c. 17.) 
 
 J The Pharisees always walked with their 
 heads bowed down, in order to affect a more 
 
 ^ ment on the narrow platform of the 
 c/w?/.* There the Pharisees display- 
 ed their tephilim^-\ and threw back 
 over their subdued brows J a flap of 
 their taled, which was composed of 
 fine white wool,§ adorned with pur- 
 ple pomegranates and small violet 
 twists. The undaunted captains of 
 Herod half concealed their dazzling 
 breast-plates under their long cloaks, 
 and the daughters of Sion wrapped 
 themselves more closely in their 
 veils of purple, of azure, or of Syr- 
 ian gauze embroidered with gold, 
 through respect for the holy angels 
 of the sanctuary. 1 1 That done, they 
 entered the temple by the east- 
 ern gate, the most gorgeous of 
 all ; that gate which poured forth 
 streams of liquid gold when the 
 Romans, unable to force an en- 
 
 humble appearance, and sometimes even with 
 their eyes closed, so as to avoid seeing anything 
 that might be a cause of temptation ; hence it 
 often happened that, in passing along the streets 
 they knocked their head against the walls. 
 (Basn., b. iii. ch. 3.) 
 
 § Taled, a species of square cloak, which the 
 Jews wore while praying in the temple ; some 
 fastened it around their neck, others threw it 
 over their head ; this last cnstom was the 
 most generaL (Basnage, tom. v. book vii. 
 chap. 17.) 
 
 I Ideo debet mulier potestatem habere supra 
 caput propter angelos. (1 Gor. xi. IC.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 85 
 
 trance through it, opened it by f 
 means of fire.* 
 
 In our cold northern regions vast 
 edifices are required to shelter the 
 people from the inclemency of the 
 weather. Hence, we have immense 
 cathedrals, made to contain whole 
 multitudes ; but in ancient Asia the 
 temples were for little else than the 
 use of the priests ; the people prayed 
 without. In Israel, the engdah or 
 sacred assembly was usually held in 
 the women's court. The second in- 
 closure was so called because the 
 Jewish women, whom the old law, 
 in its severity, assimilated to slaves, 
 could not advance farther. Sepa- 
 rated from their sons and husbands, 
 who remained, during the religious 
 ceremonies, either in the open air 
 of the square or under the arches 
 of the peristyle, they prayed apart 
 in the upper galleries, their heads 
 humbly inclined towards the house 
 of Jehovah, whose magnificent roof 
 
 * Josephus mentions that, when Titus gave 
 orders to set fire to the gates of the second 
 inelosure of the temple, the molten gold and 
 silver ran down in streams, as water streams 
 from a fountain. {De Bello, c. xxiii.) 
 
 f This precaution had been taken in order to 
 prevent the doves and pigeons, who were very 
 numerous in Jerusalem, from resting on the 
 temple and soiling its roof. 
 
 of cedar, bristling with needles of 
 gold, they beheld at some dis- 
 tance.f 
 
 The ceremony of the presentation 
 undoubtedly took place in the wo- 
 men's court, and not in the very 
 interior of the sanctuary, as some 
 authors have said. It opened with 
 a solemn sacrifice. The gate of 
 Meaner, opening to admit the vic- 
 tim, gave a perspective view of the 
 inner inelosure, like a glimpse of 
 that lost paradise, whose golden 
 palaces, shaded by lofty cedars, 
 were, as the Pharisees taught, the 
 dwelling of the just. J Through the 
 marble columns of a stately portico, 
 overhung by the gigantic leaves and 
 fruit of a golden vine, there was 
 seen a structure which, at first sight, 
 seemed of massive gold, so dazzling 
 was the effect of its golden front of 
 a hundred cubits as it reflected the 
 rays of the Asiatic sun. An incred- 
 ible number of votive garlands, 
 
 X The Jews believed that the souls of the just 
 went to the Garden of Eden, from which the hv- 
 ing were debarred by the angel of death. They 
 are sublime in their descriptions of this place, 
 whose palaces, they say, are of precious stones, 
 and its rivers of odorous perfumes. In hell, 
 on the contrary, a river of fire flows over the 
 damned, who suffer the extremes of hea* and 
 cold. (Maimonides, Menasse, &c.) 
 
86 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY, 
 
 whose ears of corn, lilies, pome- 
 granates, and vine-leaves were com- 
 posed of emeralds, topazes, carbun- 
 cles, rubies, according to their color, 
 were attached to the walls by cords 
 of gold ; and when the wild moun- 
 tain-breeze agitated theii' leaves, 
 you would have taken them for real 
 flowei'S, so exquisite was the work- 
 manship and so perfect the imitation 
 of nature. Here and there were 
 seen tattered and blood-stained ban- 
 ners, wrested by the brave Asmo^ 
 nian princes from the Greeks of 
 Syria in the glorious wars of the 
 Independence, and consecrated to 
 the God of Hosts by their priestly 
 and warrior hands. Herod, that 
 cruel prince but valiant leader, had 
 recently added thereto the standards 
 taken in his successful expeditions 
 against the Arabs ; and the sight of 
 those warlike trophies filled with 
 patriot pride and martial ardor those 
 Jewish hearts, who regarded death 
 as a trifling thing when there was 
 question of fighting for what was 
 dearer to them than gold, family, 
 and life — ^the temple ! 
 
 The priests and the Levites assem- 
 bled in the inner inclosure received 
 from the hands of Joachim the victim 
 
 ^ of prosperity.'^ Those ministers of 
 the living God were not crowned 
 with laurel, like the Pagan priests. 
 A sort of round mitre, composed of 
 very thick linen ; a linen tmiic, long, 
 white, and without fullness, confined 
 by a broad zone embroidered with 
 sky-blue and purple ; these compos- 
 ed the sacerdotal costume, which 
 was worn only in the temple. One 
 of the sacrificers took the lamb, and, 
 after a short invocation to the God 
 of Jacob, slew him, turning his head 
 towards the north; the blood was 
 caught in a vase of brass, and 
 sprinkled around the temple. These 
 preliminary rites being gone through, 
 the priest arranged on a golden dish 
 a portion of the flesh of the victim, 
 together with part of the entrails, 
 which had been carefully washed by 
 the Levites in the hall of the spring. 
 He wrapped up the oblation in a 
 coat of fat, covered it with incense, 
 and threw upon it the salt of the 
 covenant; then, ascending barefoot 
 to the platform in front of the brazen 
 altar, he deposited the offering on 
 the sound, firm logs, which, stripped 
 
 ♦Whether they asked a, favor of God, or 
 thanked him for having bestowed one, it waa 
 ^ called the sacrifice of prosperity. 
 
LIFE OF TEE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 87 
 
 of their bark, fed the sacred lire. 
 The remainder of the host, with the 
 exception of the breast and the right 
 shoulder, which belonged to the 
 priests, was given back to Joachim, 
 in order to furnish a banquet for his 
 friends and neighbors, according to 
 custom.* 
 
 The last sounds of the priestly 
 trumpets were dying away along the 
 arched roof, and the sacrifice was 
 still burning on the brazen altar, 
 when a priest descended to the 
 women's court in order to complete 
 the ceremony. Ann, followed by 
 Joachim, and bearing Mary in her 
 
 * This festival, which was considered sacred, 
 might be kept up for two days in succession, but 
 the law expressly prohibited keeping anything 
 of it for the third. While it lasted, the poor 
 were to have their full share, and that for two 
 reasons, says Philo. Firstly, because the victim 
 belonged to God, who is bountiful by nature, 
 and wished that the needy should be relieved ; 
 secondly, for fear that avarice, which is a slavish 
 vice, might creep in and dishonor a pious prac- 
 tice. (Philo, Trad de Sacrif., c. ii.) 
 
 f According to a Mahometan tradition, when 
 St. Ann was delivered of the Blessed Virgin, 
 she presented her to the priests, saying these 
 words, which are also found in the Koran, 
 " Dhouncon hadih alne-dhirat ; " that is to say, 
 " Behold the offering which I make to thee." 
 Hossain Vaer adds to these words, in his 
 Persian paraphrase, " Kih ez an Khoddi," which 
 signifies, "For this is a gift which God has 
 
 f arms, advanced, veiled, towards the 
 minister of the Most High, and (if 
 we may believe an Arabian ti*adition 
 which Mahomet himself inserted in 
 the Koran) presented to him the 
 young servant of the Lord, saying, 
 in a tremulous voice, " I come to offer 
 you the gift which God gave to me."f 
 The priest accepted, in the name 
 of God, who fructifies the womb of 
 mothers, the precious deposit which 
 the gratitude of blessed Joachim 
 and his . pious companion confided 
 to him ; J then extending his hands 
 over the assembly who bowed to 
 receive his pontifical blessing : § "0 
 
 given me ; " or rather, word for word, " For 
 it is from this gift that God is to come." 
 (D'Herbelot, Bibliotheque Orientate, torn. ii. p. 
 620.) 
 
 I Eli blessed Elcana and his wife, and said to 
 the former, " May the Lord give you yet other 
 children by this woman, because of the deposit 
 which you have placed in his hands." And they 
 returned to their home. (Kings, b. 1 ch. ii. ver. 
 20.) See Pere Croiset on this ceremony. {Ex- 
 ercises de Piete, t. xviii. p. 48.) 
 
 § Whilst the high-priest gave his blessing, the 
 people were obliged to place their hands on their 
 eyes and to hide their face, because they were 
 not permitted to look upon the hands of the 
 priest. The Jews imagined that God was be- 
 hind the pontiff, looking at them through hia 
 outstretched hands ; they dared not raise their 
 eyes, then, to look upon him, /or no man could see 
 God and live. (Basn., 1. vii. ch. 15.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Israel," said he, " may the Lord shed 
 bis light upon thee; may He prosper 
 thee in all thy ways, and grant thee 
 peaee ! " A canticle of thanksgiving, 
 harmoniously accompanied by the 
 priestly harps, terminated the pres- 
 entation of the Virgin. 
 
 Such was the ceremony which took 
 place towards the end of November, 
 in the holy temple of Sion. Men, 
 who usually go no farther than the 
 surface, saw there only a young child 
 of marvellous beauty and precocious 
 piety, consecrated by her mother to 
 the God who had granted her to her 
 tears and mortifications ; but the 
 angels of heaven, hovering over the 
 sanctuary, beheld in that fair and 
 fragile creature the Virgin of Isaiah, 
 the spouse whose mystic hymn was 
 sung by Solomon, the celestial Eve 
 who came to restore to a fallen race 
 the hope of a glorious immortality. 
 Penetrated with joy to see the dawn 
 of the Messiah's day at last appear, 
 "they thronged," say the ancient 
 authors,* "to that earthly festival, 
 and, covering with their snowy 
 wings the youthful descendant of 
 
 * St Andrew ol Crete and St. George of Nic- 
 omedia. 
 
 * the royal David, they strewed hei 
 path with the odoriferous flowers of 
 paradise, and celebrated her entry 
 into th^ temple by melodious con- 
 certs." 
 
 Who can tell what was then pass- 
 ing in Mary's soul — that soul pre- 
 maturely matured by the breath of 
 the sanctifying Spirit, wherein al. 
 was peace, and light, and love ? By 
 what secret bonds was she united tc 
 Him who had preferred her before 
 the virgins and queens of so many 
 nations ? This is a secret between 
 her and God ; but we may reasona- 
 bly suppose that never was obla- 
 tion more favorably received; and 
 St. Evodius of Antioch, St. Epipha- 
 nius of Salamina, St. Andrew of 
 Crete, and a number of the Latin 
 fathers, agree in regarding the con- 
 secration of the Virgin as more 
 pleasing to God than any act of 
 religion that man had yet accom- 
 plished. 
 
 We know not the name of the 
 priest who received the Blessed Vir- 
 gin amongst the daughters of the 
 Lord; St. Germanus, patriarch of 
 Constantinople, and St. George of 
 Nicomedia, incline to the opinion 
 that it was the father of St. John the 
 
LIFE OF TEE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 89 
 
 Baptist. The relationship existing 
 between Zachary and the family of 
 Joachim, the high rank which he 
 then held in the priesthood,* and 
 the tender affection wherewith Mary 
 ever regarded him, as well as Eliza- 
 beth, make this supposition ex- 
 tremely probable. 
 
 Whoever it was, the blessed 
 daughter of Joachim was solemnly 
 admitted to the number of the 
 almas or young virgins who were 
 brought up in the sacred shade of 
 the altar. 
 
 That Mary spent her best years 
 in the temple, is proved by apostolic 
 tradition, the writings of the Fathers, 
 and the opinion of the Church, which 
 is not apt to sanction doubtful facts.f 
 Nevertheless, heretics have chosen 
 to treat this circumstance as fabu- 
 lous, and even some Catholic authors 
 have considered it as an obscure 
 
 * The Jews believed that John the Baptist was 
 much greater than Jesus Christ, because he was 
 the son of a high-priest. (S. J. Chrysostom, 
 Serm. 12 in Matt.) 
 
 t In 1373, Philippe de Maziere, a French 
 gentleman, chancellor of the King of Cyprus, 
 came to the court of Charles V. and informed 
 him that in the East, where he had long resided, 
 they celebrated every year the feast of the pres- 
 entation of the Blessed Virgin, in memory of her 
 having been presented in the temple at the age 
 
 * point, shi'ouded by the veil of time, 
 and very difficult to determine. The 
 denial of the former is not at all 
 surprising, but the doubt of the 
 latter is indeed wonderful; for if 
 ever Christian tradition bore the 
 stamp of authenticity, it is this. St. 
 Evodius, a contemporary of the 
 Blessed Virgin and the Apostles, 
 was the first who recorded this glori- 
 ous peculiarity of the childhood of 
 Mary, in an epistle entitled Liimen^ 
 which Mcephorus has preserved. 
 He was bishop of Antioch, a city of 
 Syria, much frequented by both 
 Jews and Christians ; and the tem- 
 ple, where the early faithful followed, 
 with profound veneration, the traces 
 of the Son of God and his divine 
 Mother, was still standing in all its 
 splendor. This tradition, which came 
 from the Church of Jerusalem, — a 
 Church which was composed of the 
 
 of three years. Philippe added, " I began to re- 
 flect that this great festival was not known in the 
 Western Church, and, when I was ambassador 
 from the King of Cyprus to the Pope, I spoke to 
 him of that festival, and presented its office to 
 him ; he had it carefully examined by cardinals, 
 bishops, and doctors of theology, and then per- 
 mitted the feast to be celebrated." The Greeks be- 
 gan early to celebrate it under the title of The En- 
 trance of the Blessed Virgin into the Temple. It is 
 mentioned in their most ancient martyrologies. 
 
90 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART, 
 
 fii-bt disciples of Jesus Christ, many * 
 of whom were relations of the Virgin 
 and St Joseph, — was very eai-ly con- 
 secrated by a religious monument, 
 a demonstrative proof even in the 
 eyes of Protestants.* Finally, the 
 majority of the Fathers,f and espe- 
 
 cially St. Jerome, who lived amidst 
 the scenes of the Redemption, and 
 while the ti-aditions were still very 
 recent, have related it and held it 
 as true. We may, therefore, place 
 this traditionar belief amongst the 
 best authenticated facts of history. 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 MARY IN THE TEMPLE. 
 
 Virgins 
 
 ITHIN the forti- 
 fied inclosure of 
 the temple rose 
 that part of the 
 sacred edifice 
 which was set 
 apart for the 
 consecrated to the Lord. 
 
 * Gibbon himself could not help admitting 
 the authenticity of the religious traditions in 
 Palestine. " The Christians point out," says he, 
 "by undoubted tradition, the scene of every 
 memorable event" (voL iv. p. 101), an admission 
 of considerable importance coming from a man 
 of such research as the English historian, and 
 at the same time so little favorable to religion. 
 — ^According to M. Chateaubriand, if there be 
 
 Thither did Zachary conduct his 
 youthful relative.^ On this site the 
 Christians of Jerusalem erected an 
 oratory, which was afterwards re- 
 placed by a church with a gilded 
 .dome, by Godfrey de Bouillon's 
 companions in arms. This church 
 the valiant knights of the temple 
 
 anything on earth clearly proved, it is the 
 authenticity of the Christian traditions of Jeru- 
 salem. 
 
 fSt. Epiphanius, St. Gregory of Nyssa, St. 
 Gregory Nazianzen, St. Germanus, patriarch of 
 Constantinople, St. George of Nicomedia, St. 
 John Damascene, &c. 
 
 X St. Germanus states that it was Zachary who 
 took charge of the Virgin, and placed her in the 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 91 
 
 took pleasure in adorning with the 
 rich spoils which they took from the 
 Saracens.* 
 
 Although virginity was, in Israel, 
 but the virtue of a season, and was 
 soon to give place to the conjugal 
 duties, it was not without its honors 
 and its special prerogatives. Jeho- 
 vah delighted in the prayers of 
 spotless children, of pure virgins; 
 and it was a virgin rather than a 
 queen whom he had chosen to co- 
 operate in the redemption of man- 
 kind. Hence, when the seers of 
 Juda disclosed to that chosen but 
 often chastised people the prophetic 
 picture of its miseries or of its tri- 
 umphs, they always painted a virgin 
 
 temple. The Arabian traditions also have it that 
 God gave the Virgin in charge to Zachary, 
 ouacqfalha Zojcharia. The Koran, in the Sural 
 which treats of the family of Amram, adds to 
 this fact a marvellous legend handed down 
 amongst the Christian tribes of the desert. It 
 says that Zachary, going now and then to visit 
 his young relative, always found near her a 
 quantity of the finest fruits of the Holy 
 Land, and that, at seasons when they were 
 not to be had, which at last induced him to ask 
 Mary where she got all those fine fruits. Mary 
 answered, Hou men and Allah 'iarroc man 'iascha 
 hegdir hissa: All that you see comes from 
 God, who provides for whosoever he will, 
 without number and without measure. (D'Her- 
 belot, Bibl. Orient., t. ii. art, Miriam.) 
 * The mosque of Omar {el AJcsa) represents for ^ 
 
 either joyous or in tears, to personi- 
 fy the cities and provinces. In the 
 wars of extermination, when the 
 broadsword of the Hebrews smote 
 the women, the children, and the 
 old men of Moab, the virgins were 
 spared; and the high-priest, who 
 was prohibited by a severe law from 
 fulfilling the last duties to a friend 
 whom he loved as Ms own sotd, and 
 even to the prince of his people, 
 could assist, without contracting 
 legal impurity, at the funeral of his 
 sister, who died a virgin.f 
 
 The virgins, or almas, figured in 
 the ceremonies of the Hebrew wor- 
 ship before that worship had a tem- 
 ple. "We see them, under the guid- 
 
 Christians the ancient temple of Solomon ; el 
 sakhra (the rock) is built on the place where 
 Mary lived from the age of three years till her 
 betrothal with Joseph. . . . This place was at that 
 time a dependency of the temple of Solomon, aa 
 el sakhra is now of the mosque of Omar. Before 
 the crusades, el sakhra was but a chapel ; the 
 Franks added thereto a church, surmounted by 
 a gilded cupola. When the victors threw down 
 the great cross which shone on the cupola of the 
 sakhra, the acclamations of the Mussulmans and 
 the lamentations of the Christians were so great, 
 says an Arab writer, that it seemed as though 
 the whole world were about to be swallowed up. 
 (Correspondence d' Orient, t. v.) According to 
 Schonah, it excited so great a tumult in the city, 
 that Saladin himself had to interfere, 
 f Levit. oh. xxi. v. 3. 
 
9-2 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 ance of Mary, the sister of Moses, * 
 celebniting by songs and dances the 
 passage of the Red Sea.* Those 
 diincing-ehoirs of young maidens, 
 transplanted fi'om Egypt to the des- 
 ei-t, were long kept up amongst the 
 Hebrews. The virgins of Silo, who 
 seem to have been, fi'om the time of 
 the Judges, more especially conse- 
 crated to the service of Adonai than 
 the other daughters of Israel, were 
 singing canticles and dancing to the 
 sound of the harp, within a short 
 distance of the holy place, during 
 a certain festival, when they were 
 carried off by the Benjamites. But 
 that event did not abolish the cus- 
 tom, which was kept up till that 
 disastrous period when the ark was 
 lost and the first temple desti'oyed.f 
 It is probable that all the almas 
 were admissible to those sacred 
 choirs, when their reputation was 
 
 * Mary and her young companions (the almas) 
 sang canticles on the passage of the Red Sea, 
 accompanying themselves with the timbrel. (R. 
 sal Tarhhi.) Exod. xv. 
 
 f These sacred dances, which commemorated 
 the passage of the Red Sea, and were accompani- 
 ed by hymns of praise, were regarded by the Jews 
 as a practice so pious as to be adopted even 
 amongst the austere therapeutae. " The sacred 
 dance of the devout therapeutce," says Philo, " was 
 
 untarnished ; but there was amongst 
 them a select number who gathered 
 around the altar with more fervor, 
 and more perseverance. Whilst the 
 ark of the Lord was yet encamped 
 under the tents, the women who watch- 
 ed and prayed at the door of the taber- 
 nacle, offered to God the brazen 
 mirrors which they had brought 
 from Egypt. These were probably 
 pious widows who had refused to 
 contract new ties, in order to apply 
 themselves more constantly to heav- 
 enly tilings, and almas devoted by 
 their parents to the service of the 
 sanctuary, who had been placed 
 under the care of those righteous 
 matrons. St. Jerome thus under- 
 stands this passage of Exodus : 
 
 As the vow of the parents was 
 usually redeemable, and the ransom, 
 fixed at a moderate sum,J always 
 took place after the expiration of a 
 
 composed of two choirs, one of men, the other of 
 women ; the effect of which was very musical and 
 harmonious, because the words that were heard 
 were very fine, and the grave and modest danc- 
 ers had only in view the honor and the service 
 of the God of Israel." (Philo, de Vita cont.) 
 
 X Moses had, by a special law, fixed the re- 
 demption of this vow at a sum of fifty shekels or 
 more. The shekel of silver was, at least, four 
 Attic drachms. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 93 
 
 few years,* these temporary vows 
 were called a loan given to the 
 Lord.f / have lent him to the Lord, 
 said Anna, as she conducted her 
 young Samuel to Silo.J 
 
 After the return from captivity, 
 the influence of the Persians oper- 
 ated against the institution of the 
 almas, as that people excluded wo- 
 men from their religious celebra- 
 tions. § They ceased to form, as it 
 were, a body in the state, and to 
 figure ostensibly in the public wor- 
 ship. Under the pontiff-kings they 
 lived shut up, and their days flowed 
 on in such profound seclusion, that 
 when they ran in terror to the high- 
 priest Onias, at the moment when 
 the sacrilegious crime of Heliodorus 
 
 * Children in this sort of bondage retained 
 their rights to the paternal inheritance, and 
 might redeem themselves, in case they were not 
 redeemed by their parents. {Ahh'e Ouenee.) 
 Josephus {Ant., h. iv.) remarks that those men 
 and women who, after having voluntarily conse- 
 crated themselves to the ministry, wished to 
 break their vows, paid the priests a certain sum, 
 and that those who were insolvent placed them- 
 selves at the disposal of the priest. 
 
 f Pere Croiset, Exerc. de Piet'e. 
 
 I Ideirco et ego commodavi eum Domino. 
 
 § In Bombay, the descendants of the Persians 
 have a temple consecrated to the fire. They 
 come in crowds to the esplanade, with their 
 snow-white garments and colored turbans, to ^j 
 
 threw all Jerusalem into confusion, 
 the fact was considered so unusual 
 and so remarkable, that the Jewish 
 historians give it a place in their 
 annals. 1 1 
 
 It appears, then, that whatever 
 may be said to the contrary, there 
 were virgins attached to the service 
 of the second temple at the time 
 of Mary's presentation. The institu- 
 tions of the first Christians certify 
 that such was the case,^] and St. Am- 
 brose, St. Jerome, and, before them, 
 the proto-gospel of St. James afiirm- 
 ed it. But what took place during 
 the Virgin's sojourn in the temple ? 
 What were, at that most interesting 
 period of her life, her tastes, her 
 habits, her practices of devotion? 
 
 salute the rising sun or to offer their homage to 
 his departing rays, humbly prostrating them- 
 selves before him. Their women do not then 
 appear, for it is at that time that they go to fetch 
 water from the wells. (Buckingham, Tableau de 
 I'Inde.) 
 
 II II. Mac. iii. 
 
 \ It is known that the first Christians, es- 
 pecially those of Jerusalem, who were of He- 
 brew origin, preserved some of the institutions 
 of the old law ; of this number was that of 
 the virgins and widows, whom we find attached 
 to the primitive chui-ches for the exercise 
 of various good works suitable to their sex. 
 {See Fleury, Mosurs des Israelites et des Chretiens, 
 p. 115.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 There remains to us, on this head, 
 but few authentic documents. These 
 details were most probably given in 
 a traditional life of the Mother of 
 God, which St. Epiphanius, in 390, 
 regarded as very ancient, but that 
 life is lost. The " Gospel of the 
 Childhood of Mary " and St. Jerome, 
 when they mention that Mary was 
 a<)mitted amongst the daughters of 
 the Lord, say very little more on the 
 subject To fill up this vacuum in 
 a life which God seems to have 
 taken pleasure in surrounding with 
 mystery, we have only some incon- 
 clusive lines, some detached pages 
 fi*om the Fathers, from which it is 
 very difficult, even with the utmost 
 care, to make a satisfactory sketch. 
 No matter; like the Indian work- 
 man who joins a broken tissue 
 thread by thread, and patiently tries 
 to tie the ends together, unweaving, 
 knotting, sending his shuttle with 
 infinite care along that worn-out and 
 attenuated woof, we are going to 
 apply ourselves assiduously to our 
 work, and gather together the scat- 
 tered fragments of the precious tissue 
 of the Virgin's life, so as to connect, 
 if possible, the broken thread. With 
 the persevering patience of the han- 
 
 ^ ian, we will endeavor not to make a 
 suppositious narrative — which our 
 profound respect for our subject for- 
 bids — but to give, with the help of 
 the best authorities, and a long study 
 of the customs of the Hebrews, the 
 most precise idea, and the nearest 
 to the truth that can possibly be 
 given, of the almost monastic life of 
 the Blessed Virgin in the temple. 
 
 Many of the old legendary writers 
 took pleasm-e in surrounding the 
 childhood of Mary with a multitude 
 of prodigies. These we pass over in 
 silence, because they are not suffi- 
 ciently authenticated. But there is 
 one thing which we cannot omit to 
 mention, viz., an inaccurate, or rath- 
 er an inadmissible assertion, which 
 has been adopted credulously and 
 without examination by some holy 
 personages and religious writers.* 
 From the fact that the Virgin was 
 always sanctity itself, which no 
 one disputes, they inferred that she 
 must have been placed in the most 
 sanctified part of the temple, which 
 is materially false. The Holy of 
 Holies, that impenetrable sanctuary 
 
 * St. Andrew of Crete, St. George of Nicome- 
 .j dia, &c 
 
1- 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 95 
 
 of the God of Hosts, was closed to 
 the whole Hebrew priesthood ex- 
 cept the high-priest, who entered it 
 but once a year, after much fasting, 
 watching, and purification. He only 
 presented himself there in the midst 
 of a thick cloud of incense, which 
 interposed between him and the 
 Divinity, "whom no man can see 
 and live," says the Scripture. Fi- 
 nally, he remained there but a few 
 minutes, while the people, prostrate 
 on the ground, sobbed and wept, 
 fearing lest he should meet his 
 death. He himself afterwards gave 
 a grand banquet to his friends, to 
 rejoice with them for having escaped 
 such imminent and fearful danger.* 
 
 From this we may judge whether 
 it be possible that Mary was brought 
 up in the Holy of Holies. 
 
 The local traditions of Jerusalem, 
 no less loudly than common sense, 
 protest against this rash opinion. 
 The sakhra^ which was first a Chris- 
 
 * Prideaux. — ^Basnage, Hidoire desSuisses, 1, v. 
 ch. 15. 
 
 ■j" The uncleanness of the woman, according to 
 the Jewish doctors, dates from the seduction of 
 Eve by the serpent, and is only to be extirpated 
 at the coming of their Messiah. Her prayer is 
 not so obhgatory as that of man, and she is not 
 8ven bound to the observance of most of the 
 
 tian church, built on the site of the 
 apartments of the Virgin, is distinct- 
 ly detached from the mosque of 
 Omar; yet the mosque of Omar is 
 built on the very ground' of the 
 temple. 
 
 Father Croiset, in his Exercises de 
 Piete, did not adopt this opinion; 
 but, unwilling to reject it altogether, 
 he attempted a sort of compromise. 
 According to him, the Mother of 
 God was not brought up in the Holy 
 OF Holies, but the priests, touched 
 by her admirable virtues, permitted 
 her to pray there from time to time. 
 The Jesuit Father, in adopting this 
 mezzo termine, has forgotten several 
 things: first, that amongst the He- 
 brews, woman was considered an 
 unclean creature, assimilated to the 
 slave, and scarcely bound to pray ; f 
 that she was banished to an inclos- 
 ure whose boundaries she might not 
 cross, and that the interior of the 
 temple was to her a forbidden place. 
 
 affirmative commandments. Finally, the Jews 
 still say, in their morning prayer. Blessed be thou, 
 Lord, King of the universe, for that thou hast 
 not made me a woman. Woman, on the other 
 hand, said, in her humility, Blessed be thou, 
 Lord, who hast made me according to thine own 
 will. (Basnage, Bistoire des Juifs, lib. vii 
 ch. 10.) 
 
96 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 even though she were a prophetess f 
 or the daughter of a king ; the sec- 
 ond is, that the priests could not 
 grant to Mary a privilege which they 
 did not themselves enjoy, and which 
 would, moreover, have exposed her 
 to certain death ; * finally, that even 
 supposing the priests of Jehovah to 
 have been without these fears and 
 prejudices, they would by no means 
 have suffered any one to penetrate 
 to the Holy of Holies, seemg that it 
 was important to conceal from the 
 ])eople the disappearance of the ark, 
 lost in some obscure grotto of the 
 mountains since the days of Jere- 
 minh.f 
 
 This second version, then, is not 
 more admissible than the first. 
 
 The education which Mary receiv- 
 
 ♦ "The sanctuary," says Philo, " is so holy a 
 place, that npne amongst us, save the high-priest, 
 is permitted to penetrate there, and even he only 
 once a year, after a solemn fast, to burn per- 
 fumes in honor of God, and humbly to beg of 
 Him that the year may be favorable for all men. 
 If any one, even a prince of our nation, dared 
 to enter, or if the high -priest himself went 
 in a second time in one year, or more than 
 once on the day that he is permitted to do 
 so, it would cost either of them his life, with- 
 out any chance of escape, so strict was the 
 ordinance of Moses, our legislator, concerning 
 the veneration of the temple. (Fhilo, ad Cajum, 
 C.16.) 
 
 ed in the temple was the best that 
 those times and the customs of the 
 Hebrews permitted. It was chiefly 
 confined to the domestic labors, from 
 which even the wife and daughter 
 of Cesar Augustus did not exempt 
 themselves in their imperial palace 
 and amid the delights of Rome.;); 
 Brought up in the strict observance 
 of the Mosaic law, and conforming 
 herself to the customs of her people, 
 Mary arose with the lark, at the 
 hour when wielded spirits are silent^ 
 and when prayers are most favorably 
 heard.^ She dressed herself with 
 the greatest modesty, through re- 
 spect for the glory of God who is 
 every where present, and beholds all 
 the actions of men, even through the 
 gloom of the darkest night. At the 
 
 fThe Jews do not agree concerning the fate 
 of the ark after the ruin of the first temple. 
 Some will have it, that Jeremiah concealed it in 
 a cavern of the mountains, the entrance to which 
 was never found ; others say that the holy king 
 Josias, warned by Holda, the prophetess, that 
 the temple should be destroyed shortly after his 
 death, caused that precious deposit to be placed 
 in a subterraneous vault, which had been con- 
 structed by Solomon. 
 
 J Augustus wore no other garments than 
 those- which were spun by his wife or daugh- 
 ter, and Alexander the Great by his mother and 
 sisters. 
 
 § Basnage, L vii, ch. 17, p. 308. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 97 
 
 same time, she gave thanks to the 
 Lord for having added another day 
 to her life, and for having preserved 
 her during her sleep from the snares 
 of the evil one.* Her toilet was ex- 
 tremely simple, and occupied but 
 little time. She wore neither brace- 
 lets of pearl, nor chains of gold inlaid 
 with silver^ nor purple tunics, such 
 as were worn by the daughters of the 
 princes of her race. A robe of 
 sky-blue, a white tunic, confined 
 at the waist by a girdle with 
 flowing ends, a long veil, simply 
 but gracefully arranged, so as 
 completely to cover the face when 
 necessary; these, with a species 
 of shoe corresponding to the robe, 
 composed the oriental costume of 
 Mary.f 
 
 *Ba.sn age, joZace quoted. 
 
 f The Annunciade of Genoa wore, in the six- 
 teenth century, the costume of the Blessed Vir- 
 gin, that is to say, white under and blue over, in 
 order that such dress might continually remind them 
 of her. The, slippers of the choristers are also com- 
 posed of blue leather. {Ride of the Annunciade of 
 Genoa, ch. 2.) M. de Lamartine found in that 
 Eastern land, where nothing seems to change, 
 that the costume of the women of Nazareth is 
 still that which was worn by Mary. " They 
 wear," says he, " a long tunic of sky-blue, con- 
 fined by a white girdle, the ends of which reach 
 the ground ; the soft folds of a white tunic fall 
 gracefully over the blue." M. de Lamartine 
 
 After the customary ablutions, the 
 Virgin and her young companions, 
 with certain pious women who were 
 answerable to the priests and to God 
 for that sacred deposit, took their 
 way towards the gallery J where the 
 almas sat in the place of honor. § 
 The sun began to gild with his 
 radiant beams the distant mountains 
 of Arabia, the eagle cut circles in 
 the clouds above, the sacrifice burn- 
 ed on the brazen altar to the sound 
 of the morning trumpets, when Mary, 
 her head bowed down beneath her 
 veil, after repeating the eighteen 
 prayers of Esdras, demanded of God, 
 with all Israel, that Christ, so long 
 promised and so tardy in appear- 
 ing— 
 
 " Let thy name, O God ! be praised and glori- 
 
 traces this costume to the time of Abraham and 
 Isaac, and his supposition is not at aU improba- 
 ble. "We see that there is but a very trifling 
 difference between the costume adopted in the 
 sixteenth century, from the traditions of Italy, 
 and that which the French traveller found in the 
 Holy Land. 
 
 I During the feast of the drawing of water, 
 the men were placed under the galleries which 
 surround the women's peristyle. 
 
 § Origen, St. Basil, St. Gregory of Nyssa, and 
 St. Cyril, have preserved to us a tradition which 
 assigns to the virgins of the temple an hon- 
 orable and distinct place in the women's peri- 
 style. 
 
96 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 fied in this world, which thoa hast created ac- 
 oording to thy good pleasure ; rouchsafe to 
 ertabliih thy reign ; let redemption flourish, and 
 th« Mewiah quickly come." * 
 
 And the people, in chorus, re- 
 sponded, "Amen I Amen!" 
 
 Then were sung the concluding 
 verses of that beautiful psalm at- 
 tributed to the prophets Aggeus and 
 Zacharias. 
 
 " The Lord unbinds those who are fettered ; 
 the Lord enlightens those who are blind. 
 
 "The Lord upraises those who are crushed 
 down ; the Lord loves those who are just. 
 
 " The Lord has care over strangers ; he will 
 protect the widow and the orphan, and the ways 
 of sinners he will destroy. 
 
 •' The Lord shall reign for ever and ever ; thy 
 God, O Sion 1 shall rule the nations." f 
 
 The reading of the schema'l and 
 the blessing of the priest termin- 
 ated this public prayer, which took 
 place every morning and evening. § 
 
 ♦ This prayer, which is called the kaddisch, is 
 the most ancient of all those which the Jews 
 have preserved, and, as it is read in the Chal- 
 dean tongue, it is thought to be one of the pray- 
 ers composed after the return from Babylon. 
 (Basn., 1. viL ch. 17, p. 314.) Prideaux affirms 
 that it was in use long before the coming of 
 Christ, and that the Apostles frequently offered 
 it up with the people in the synagogues. It was 
 often recited during the service, and the assem- 
 bly was obliged to answer Amen several times. 
 
 t Leo of Modena. — Maimonides. 
 
 X Leo of Modena, c. xL p. 29. By the schema 
 they meant three different sections of Deuter- 
 
 Having fulfilled, with indescriba- 
 ble fervor, this first religious duty, 
 Mary and her young companions 
 resumed their wonted avocations. 
 Some rapidly twirled in their agile 
 fingers spindles of cedar or of ithel ;|| 
 others embroidered the veil of the 
 temple, or the rich girdles of the 
 priests, with purple, blue, and gold ; 
 whilst groups, bent forward over a 
 Sidonian loom, applied themselves 
 to the execution of those magnificent 
 carpets which won for " the strong 
 woman" the admiration of all Israel, 
 and were extolled by Homer him- 
 self.^ The Virgin surpassed all the 
 daughters of her people in those 
 beautiful fabrications so highly priz- 
 ed by the ancients. We learn 
 from St. Epiphanius that she ex- 
 celled in embroidery and the art 
 
 onomy and Numbers. It was a sort of profes- 
 sion of faith recited morning and evening, 
 whereby they acknowledged that there is but one 
 God, who drew his people out of Egypt. 
 
 §It is certain that the Blessed Virgin must 
 have assisted very often at the morning and 
 evening service. Those prayers were considered 
 more efficacious than any others, and some of the 
 Hebrew doctors even maintain that God hears 
 none but these. 
 
 II The ithel is a species of acacia which grows in 
 Arabia ; it is of a beautiful black, resembling eb- 
 ony ; it is thought to be the setim wood of Moses. 
 
 1" See the Iliad, b. vi 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 99 
 
 of working wool, in byssus, and in 
 gold.* The proto-gospel of St. 
 James represents her seated before 
 a distaff of purple wool, which mov- 
 ed under her taper fingers like the 
 trembling leaf of the poplar ;f and 
 the Christians of the West have per- 
 petuated the traditional opinion of 
 her unrivalled skill in spinning the 
 flax of Pelusia, J by giving the name 
 of Virgin^s thread to that net-work 
 of dazzling whiteness, and of almost 
 etherial texture, which floats over 
 deep valleys in the damp mornings 
 of autumn. The chaste and mod- 
 est brides of the early Christians, 
 in memory of thes-e domestic avoca- 
 tions of the Queen of Angels, never 
 failed to consecrate to her a distaff 
 
 *In the middle ages, in commemoration of 
 the Virgin's works in flax, weavers were ranged 
 under the banner of the Annunciation. The 
 makers of gold brocade and silkeri stuffs had for 
 their patroness Notre Dame la Riche ( Our Lady 
 the Rich), and bore her image on their banner, 
 heavy with superb embroidery. (Alex. Monteil, 
 Hidoire des Frangais des divers etats.) 
 
 f The Church of Jerusalem early consecrated 
 this remembrance by ranking amongst its treas- 
 ures the spindles of Mary. Those spindles were 
 subsequently sent to the Empress Pulcneria, 
 who placed them in the Church of the Guides 
 in Constantinople. 
 
 I The garments worn in the morning by the 
 chief priests were, says the Misnah, of the fine ^ 
 
 adorned with fillets of purple, and 
 charged with spotless wool.§ 
 
 But the talents and acquirements 
 of the Virgin did not end here. St. 
 Ambrose ascribes to her a perfect 
 understanding of Holy Writ, and 
 St. Anselm will have it that she was 
 thoroughly acquainted with the old 
 Hebrew, the language of the terres- 
 trial paradise, || in which God himself 
 traced, on tables composed of pre- 
 cious stones,^ the ten precepts 
 of the Decalogue. Whether Mary, 
 studying the idiom of Anna and 
 of Deborah, became conversant, 
 during her solitary vigils, with the 
 lofty conceptions of the seers of 
 Israel, or that she received from the 
 sanctifying Spirit, who had so richly 
 
 flax of Pelusia, a city of Egypt famous for the 
 excellent quality of its flax. 
 
 § This custom is still kept up in some hamlets 
 in the north and west of France. 
 
 II According to the Rabbins and the Commen- 
 tators on the Bible, the language of Paradise 
 was the ancient Hebrew. 
 
 ^ A Hebrew tradition. (Basnage, vi. ch. 16.) 
 According to some Oriental writers, the tables 
 of the law were either of rubies or carbuncles ; 
 but the most common opinion, amongst the 
 Arabs and Mussulmans, is, that they were of 
 emeralds, within which the characters were 
 cut, so that they could be read on every 
 side. (D'Herbelot, Bibliotheque Orientale, tome 
 
 ii-) 
 
100 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 endowed her, a breath of poetic 
 inspiration, like tlie harmonious 
 breezes which swept the JEolian 
 har]> of the Koyal Prophet,* it 
 must be acknowledged that the 
 youthful prophetess, who gave to 
 the new law its finest canticle, could 
 not have been a stranger to the 
 sweetest or the most sublime inspir- 
 ations of genius. Undoubtedly, the 
 woman who composed the Magnifi- 
 aU was not a mere common girl, as 
 some Protestant authors have not 
 hesitated to assert, and must have 
 united to unequaled sanctity talents 
 of the highest order. But then this 
 brilliant aspect of her character was 
 scarcely perceptible, so carefully did 
 she cover it with her angelic modes- 
 ty. Knowing the delicate duties 
 and the real interests of her sex, she 
 shrank from all display, and passed 
 silently along the way of life, like 
 some fair star gliding through the 
 clouds. The rich treasures of her 
 mind and heart were but partially 
 revealed on earth ; they were as the 
 
 ♦Accordiug to the ancient Jewish tradition, 
 David had a harp which played by night when a 
 certain wind came to blow. Basnage ridicules 
 the idea of chords, which only echo to the night 
 wind, and plainly sets it down as an absurdity. 
 
 t roses of Yemen which the Arab 
 maiden conceals beneath her veil, 
 and whose gentle perfume is scarce- 
 ly felt. 
 
 An ancient poet said servilely to 
 Augustus that he alone was the 
 work of several centuries, and that, 
 ever since the creation, all the in- 
 dustry of natm-e had been employed 
 in producing him. That which was 
 an outrageous hyperbole in speaking 
 of the sanguinary nephew of Cesar, 
 becomes a demonstrated truth when 
 applied to the Virgin. In reality, 
 Mary is the masterpiece of Nature, 
 the flower of the ancient days, and 
 the wonder of ages. Never has the 
 earth seen, and never will it again 
 see, so many perfections re-united 
 in a mere mortal. In that blessed 
 creature all was grace, sanctity, and 
 grandeur. Conceived in the friend- 
 ship of Gpd, sanctified before her 
 birth, she knew nothing of the pas- 
 sions which agitate the soul, or the 
 sin which corrupts the heart. Hav- 
 ing a sweet and natural inclination 
 
 The invention, or rather the re-invention of 
 -Slolian harps, whose magic sounds enchant the 
 English parks, gives probability to the statement 
 of the Rabbins. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 101 
 
 to virtue, thanks to her immaculate * 
 conception, her pure and innocent 
 acts were like the wreath of snow 
 which silently falls on the mountain- 
 top, adding purity to purity and 
 whiteness to whiteness, till it rears 
 itself into a shining cone, which at- 
 tracts the rays of the sun, and daz- 
 zles the eye of man. It has not been 
 given to any other creature to pre- 
 sent such a life to the Sovereign 
 Judge of men. Jesus Christ alone 
 surpassed her ; but Jesus Christ is 
 the Son of God. 
 
 Mary entered the temple of Jeru- 
 salem like one of those unspotted 
 victims shown by the Spirit of the 
 Lord to Malachi. Young, beautiful, 
 nobly born, and qualified to aspire 
 to the highest place amongst a 
 people who often raised beauty to 
 the throne,* she bound herself to the 
 horns of the altar by a vow of vir- 
 ginity which her infant lips could 
 barely articulate, and which her 
 heart subsequently ratified, with a 
 perfect renunciation of the pomps 
 and vanities of the world. By that 
 
 * It is certain that David, Solomon, and the 
 other kings of Juda, often took to their royal bed 
 women of obscure condition ; the famous Sulam- 
 ite of Solomon was, it is said, a young country 
 
 VOW, till then unheard, Maiy crossed 
 the boundary which divides the old 
 law from the new, and plunged so 
 deep into the sea of evangelical 
 virtues, that one might think she had 
 already sounded its depths when her 
 divine Son came to reveal it to the 
 children of men. 
 
 God does not alter his course ab- 
 ruptly. He announces, he prepares 
 long beforehand the great events 
 which are to change the aspect of 
 the world. A precursor was requir- 
 ed for the Messiah, and he found one 
 in the person of St. John the Baptist. 
 A preliminary was required for the 
 new law, and the virtues of Mary 
 were to the Gospel what the fresh 
 and roseate dawn is to the risen 
 day. 
 
 St. Epiphanius, cited by Niceph- 
 orus, has left us a charming descrip- 
 tion of the Virgin. That portrait, 
 traced in the fourth century from 
 traditions now lost, and manuscripts 
 which are no longer in existence, 
 is yet the only one which remains 
 to us. 
 
 girl from the little village of Sulam, situated at a 
 short distance from Jerusalem. In the time of 
 Mary, Herod the Great espoused Mariamne, the 
 daughter of a priest, because of her beautj. 
 
102 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 The Virgin, according to this holy 
 bisliop, was not of tall stature, 
 though somewhat above the middle 
 height; her face was of that fine 
 oval which characterizes the Jewish 
 women, and her eyes were of a soft 
 hazel color. Her person was, in 
 fine, a casket worthy of the priceless 
 jewel it contained, and was like it 
 all bemUi/uL 
 
 All the Fathers agree as to the 
 admirable beauty of the Virgin. St. 
 Denis the Areopagite, who had seen 
 the divine Mary, assures us that she 
 was of dazzling beauty, and that 
 he would have worshipped her as 
 a goddess, had he not known that 
 there is but one God. 
 
 But it was not to this assemblage 
 of physical perfections that Mary 
 owed the power of her beauty; it 
 emanated from a higher source. 
 This was well understood by St. 
 Ambrose when he said that her 
 charming exterior was but a trans- 
 parent veil which disclosed all her 
 virtues ; and that her soul, the no- 
 
 * It is neither climate, nor food, nor bod- 
 ily exercise, which forms human beauty; 
 it is the moral sentiment of virtue, which 
 cannot subsist without religion. The beauty 
 of the countenance is the true index of the 
 
 ^ blest and the purest that ever was, 
 after the soul of Jesus Christ, re- 
 vealed itself fully in her look. The 
 physical beauty of Mary was but 
 the distant reflection of her intel- 
 lectual and imperishable beauty ; 
 she was the fairest, because she 
 was the purest and holiest, of the 
 daughters of Eve.* 
 
 God has incased the Green Sea 
 pearl in a mother-of-pearl shell,f 
 but it is the pearl and not its bril- 
 liant case that men set in gold and 
 place in the diadem of kings. The 
 Fathers were well aware of this, and, 
 in their glowing descriptions of 
 Mary's loveliness, they dwelt partic- 
 ularly on the charms of her mind — 
 those which belong not to the earth, 
 and perish not with the frail body. 
 We are about to collect the gems 
 scattered here and there throughout 
 their works, to form them into a 
 mosaic, which may present a second 
 portrait of her who was, as Sophro- 
 nius says, " a garden of pleasure to 
 the Lord."I 
 
 soul. ( Bernardino de St. Pierre, Mudes de la 
 Nature, dtude 10.) 
 
 \ Bahr-al-Akhdhar, one of the names of the 
 Persian Gulf. 
 
 X Vere Virgo erai hortiis deliciarum in quo con^ 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 103 
 
 The greatest decorum reigned in f 
 all the actions of the Virgin. She 
 was kind, aifable, compassionate, 
 and never tired of hearing the com- 
 plaints of the wretched. She spoke 
 little, always to the purpose, and 
 never did falsehood defile her lips. 
 Her voice was mild and penetrating, 
 and her words had in them some- 
 thing unctuous and soothing, which 
 infused peace into the soul. She 
 was the first in vigils, the most ex- 
 act in fulfilling the divine law, the 
 most profound in humility, the most 
 perfect in every virtue. She was 
 never seen in anger ; never offended, 
 annoyed, or rebuked any one. She 
 was averse to all pomp, simple in 
 her apparel, simple in her manners, 
 and never once thought of turning 
 to account either her beauty, her 
 noble birth, or the rich treasures of 
 her mind and heart. Her presence 
 seemed to sanctify all around, and 
 the very sight of her was sufficient 
 to detach the mind from earthly 
 
 aita sunt universa Jlorum genera et odoramenta 
 virtutum. (Sophro., Serm. de Ass.) 
 
 * The ancients believed that the grasshoppers 
 lived on air and dew. (Philo, de Vita cont., p. 
 831.) Homer, book third of the Iliad : "Like the 
 grasshoppers which, perched on the top of the 
 forest-trees, send forth their harmonious strains 
 
 things. Her politeness was not an 
 idle formula, consisting of empty 
 words ; it was an expansion of uni- 
 versal beneficence proceeding from 
 her inmost soul. In fine, her look 
 already denoted the Mother of Mercy, 
 the Virgin of whom it has been since 
 said, " She would even ask pardon 
 of God for Lucifer, if Lucifer would 
 ask it for himself." 
 
 Although she had but little of 
 this world's wealth, yet Mary w^as 
 bountiful towards the poor, and her 
 childish alms fell often unperceived 
 into the poor-box attached to one 
 of the pillars of the peristyle ; the 
 same into which Jesus, in after- 
 times, saw the widow drop her 
 mite. St. Ambrose reveals the pure 
 and sacred source whence Mary de- 
 rived her alms. She deprived her- 
 self of all, granted nothing to nature 
 but barely what was necessary for 
 preserving life, and seemed to live, 
 like the grasshopper, on air and 
 dew.* Her frequent and rigorous 
 
 (after having drunk a Httle dew)." " The grass- 
 hoppers feed only on dew." (Theocrit. idyl 4.) 
 "Does he feed only on dew hke the grass- 
 hopper ? " And Virgil : 
 
 Dum thymo pascentur apes, dum tore cicadse. 
 
 " Whilst the bees shall feed on thyme and the 
 
104 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART 
 
 fasts were also made profitable to f so profound, that her soul seemed to 
 
 the poor. The fasts observed by the 
 Virgin were not like our northern 
 fasts, which last but for a single 
 moniing, and are confined to the 
 abstiiining from certain ' kinds of 
 food ; it was a total abstinence from 
 all things, which began at sunset 
 and continued the whole of the next 
 day till the stars were in the sky.* 
 During that time, Mary deprived 
 herself of every thing that might 
 gratify her taste or her appetite. 
 She imposed on herself the hardest 
 labor, the most disgusting works of 
 mercy, clothed herself in her mean- 
 est garments, slept on the bare 
 ground, and allowed herself nothing 
 during this time of penace and mor- 
 tification (often prolonged for whole 
 weeks) but a light repast composed 
 of bread baked under the ashes, 
 some bitter vegetables, and a cup 
 of water from the fountain of Siloe.f 
 Her meditations were frequent, and 
 her prayer so collected, so attentive, 
 
 grasshoppers on dew." Hence it was that Cal- 
 limachus called the dew " the grasshopper's food." 
 
 * The Jews considered that no fast, on which 
 the sun did not set. 
 
 "f Basnage, 1. vii., ch. 18. Fleury, Moeurs des 
 Israelites, p. 104. 
 
 X Augustus, if we may believe Suetonius, was ^ 
 
 melt in adoration before the Eternal 
 God. The roar of the tempest and 
 the crash of the thunder, which 
 drove Cesar to the subterraneous 
 vaults of his palace,J reached not 
 the ear of the youthful Virgin; 
 completely absorbed in her religious 
 duties, her soul was at the feet of 
 the great Author of the universe, far 
 beyond the confines of the world 
 and the region of storms. " Never 
 was any one endowed," says St. 
 Ambrose, " with a more sublime 
 gift of contemplation. Her mind, 
 ever in accordance with her heart, 
 never lost sight of Him whom she 
 loved more ardently than all the 
 seraphim put together. Her whole 
 life was but a continual exercise of 
 the purest love of her God, and, 
 when sleep weighed down her eye- 
 lids, her heart still watched and 
 prayed. § 
 
 Such were the virtues, such the 
 occupations of Mary in the temple. 
 
 as much afraid of thunder and lightning as 
 any female could be. At the slightest appear- 
 ance of a storm, he went and hid himself in the 
 deepest vaults, whither the noise of the thunder 
 and the glare of the lightning could not pene- 
 trate. 
 
 § St. Ambrose, de Virg., L iu 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 105 
 
 Slie shone amongst her young com- 
 panions like a rich diamond which, 
 placed amidst other precious stones, 
 effaces them all by its splendor. 
 Hence it was that men who had 
 
 * 
 
 grown gray in the priesthood never 
 passed her without a murmured 
 blessing, and considered her as 
 the fairest ornament of the holy 
 house. 
 
 CHAPTEE YI. 
 
 MARY, AN ORPHAN, 
 
 must be admit- 
 ted — though it 
 is a strange 
 thing — that the 
 history of the 
 Virgin is bar- 
 ren of facts and 
 full of gaps. It may be likened to 
 the majestic remains of some ancient 
 city of the desert. Here, gigantic 
 columns standing firm as the moun- 
 tains ; there, porticoes which the 
 Arab, in his love of the marvelous, 
 proclaims as the work of genii; 
 farther on, temples buried in the 
 sand which the imagination delights 
 to raise again; and then, here and 
 
 * there, a bleak and sterile area, with- 
 out a single blade of grass for the 
 camel of the Bedouin. In default 
 of the Apostles, who were too 
 much occupied, it would seem, with 
 the grand figure of Christ to think 
 of his earthly relatives, the Fathers 
 have made us acquainted with the 
 virtues of St. Ann. "We follow 
 them into her humble dwelling ; we 
 behold her piety, we hear her vows 
 and her fervent prayers ; we wit- 
 ness the joys of her late maternity, 
 and the outpouring of her gratitude ; 
 but there the thread of tradition 
 becomes so frail that it incessantly 
 snaps asunder, and the remainder 
 
106 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 of St Ann's life is almost entii'ely 
 conjectural. That mother, who had 
 obtained her blessed daughter after 
 so many fasts and tears, who had so 
 lovingly watched over her infancy, 
 who had brought her in her arms to 
 the Lord,* and had laid her weeping 
 in his sanctuary, reappears but for 
 a moment on the scene, and that 
 only to die. It is, however, very 
 unlikely that the wife of Joachim 
 would have remained nine years 
 without seeing her child again. 
 The outer buildings of the temple, 
 where the consecrated children were 
 brought up, could not have been 
 closed against their mothers. The 
 rights of a mother are both sacred 
 and religious: all nations declare 
 them to be imprescriptible; and, 
 moreover, the Scripture tells us that 
 Anna, wife of Elcana, freely visited 
 her son at Silo, on solemn days, and 
 that she never failed to bring a tunic 
 spun by her own hands, to the 
 young prophet, whom she had lent 
 
 ♦Liguori, Glories of Mary, discourse iii., p. 
 59. 
 
 t It has been said that St. Ann had another 
 daughter of the name of Mary, born twenty 
 years before the Blessed Virgin ; this tradition 
 has not been accepted by the Church. 
 
 J The Jewish women spun together in the 
 
 to the Lord. Anna had had, after 
 the birth of Samuel, several children, 
 whom she beheld growing up around 
 her like olive-trees, and who shared 
 with the yomig servant of the taber- 
 nacle her maternal solicitude. St. 
 Ann had none but Mary;| that 
 dear child was, therefore, the sum 
 of her happiness, the hope of her 
 old days, and the source of her 
 earthly joy. It is, then, almost 
 certain that, in company with her 
 husband, she came to see her as 
 often as her piety drew her to the 
 temple, and that she also sat up, by 
 the light of her lamp or the silvery 
 radiance of the moon, J to spin the 
 virginal robes of her child. 
 
 It is thought that St. Joachim and 
 St. Ann retm-ned to their home 
 after the presentation of Mary, and 
 that they remained there for some 
 years before their final settlement in 
 Jerusalem. Joachim, who was not 
 an artisan like Joseph, seems to 
 have cultivated the small patrimony 
 
 summer evenings by the light of the moon, since 
 the Jewish doctors authorize a husband to put 
 away his wife when slandered by the women 
 who loere spinning by moonlight. (Sotah, cap. 
 6, p. 250.) This custom of spinning by moon- 
 light is still kept up in many southern coun- 
 tries. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 107 
 
 which he had inherited, and enjoyed 
 that happy mediocrity for which 
 sages and poets have ever sighed 
 when weary of the great world.* 
 Churches have been erected in Seph- 
 oris, in Nazareth, and in Jerusalem, 
 on sites which had formed part of 
 his inheritance. But the vineyard, 
 or farm of his fathers, must have 
 been in the vicinity of Sephoris ; 
 hence his return to Low^er Galilee. 
 Joachim was a true Israelite, sti'ongly 
 attached to the law of Moses. He 
 went to the temple on every solemn 
 festival with his wife and some of 
 their kinsfolk, according to the cus- 
 tom of the Hebrews, and it is likely 
 that the desire of seeing his daugh- 
 ter, made him still more eager to 
 visit the temple. How joyfully did 
 his good and pious spouse set out 
 for the Holy City! How endless 
 did the way appear, as she beheld 
 it winding far and away over hill 
 
 ^ and dale! Looking eagerly forward, 
 she passed a score of times in imag- 
 ination before she reached them in 
 reality, the nopal bushes, the thickets 
 of rose-bay, the clumps of oak or 
 sycamore which marked the road; 
 for, each of these points gained, she 
 was so much nearer her daughter— 
 her daughter, the gift of the Lord, 
 the child of miracle — she whom an 
 angel had announced as the glory of 
 Israel ! With what emotion did she 
 hail, from the depth of the valley, 
 that tower of Antonia rising proud 
 and menacing on its base of polished 
 marble,f to protect the house of 
 prayer ! and how her holy and ten- 
 der heart must have throbbed at the 
 sight of that temple which contained 
 her child and her God ! 
 
 When evening came, and the 
 sacerdotal trumpets summoned the 
 people to the ceremony, J Ann has- 
 tened to adore God, and catch a 
 
 * According to St. Gregory of Nyssa, the father 
 of the Blessed Virgin was an honorable citizen. 
 God-fearing, and of singular piety. Father de 
 Valverde states, on the testimony of some of the 
 Fathers of the Church, that Ann and Joachim, 
 being in easy circumstances, gave one part of 
 their savings to the temple and the other to the 
 needy. ( Vie de Jesus Christ, t. 1., p. 46.) 
 
 f The tower of Antonia might be considered ^ 
 
 as the citadel of the temple ; it was of old the 
 palace of the Asmonian princes. The rock on 
 which it was seated was fifty cubits high, and in- 
 accessible on all sides. Herod had this rock cov- 
 ered with marble from base to summit, so that no 
 one could either go up or down. (Joseph., A)it. 
 Jud^ 1. XV., ch. 14, and de Bello, 1. ii., ch. 16.) 
 
 I The rehgious festivals of the Jews began 
 always in the svening. 
 
108 
 
 UFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 glimpse of her daughter, whom she 
 had not seen for months long. The 
 comt-yai-d had no other covering 
 than the sky, and the dazzling 
 radiance of its candelabras* min- 
 gled with the glimmering light of 
 the stars. Thousands of lights were 
 gleaming beneath the porticoes, 
 garlands of fi'esh flowers were 
 wreathed around the pillars,f and 
 the chief priests walked through 
 the crowd with their splendid orna- 
 ments, brought from Indian lands 
 by the caravans of Palmyra. J Now 
 and then the chords of the harp 
 seemed to accompany the mm-murs 
 of prayer, which, like the voice of 
 many waters, § went up from that 
 multitude of Hebrews assembled 
 from the banks of the Mle, the 
 Euphrates, and the Tiber, to bend 
 the knee before the only altar of 
 their fathers' God.|| In the midst 
 
 t of this immense concourse of native 
 and foreign believers, Ann, ab- 
 sorbed in prayer, raised her head 
 but for a moment; it was wlien 
 Mary and her young companions 
 passed, veiled and robed in white, 
 with lamps in their hands, like the 
 wise virgins of the gospel. 
 
 The festival over, Ann, after hav- 
 ing blessed and embraced Mary, 
 took, with Joachim, her homeward 
 way through the mountains ; slowly 
 did she depart from Jerusalem, not 
 daring to cast a look behind, and 
 bearing with her a fund of happi- 
 ness and of joyous reminiscences 
 for all the time that was to elapse 
 before the next festival. 
 
 When years and toil had exhaust- 
 ed Joachim's strength, so that he 
 was no longer able to cultivate his 
 ground, he began to think of moving 
 nearer to his daughter. Accordingly, 
 
 * These candelabras were of gold, and fifty 
 cubits high. The light which they shed, say the 
 Babbins (who are noted for exaggeration), was 
 seen at an incredible distance from Jerusalem, 
 while within the city the houses were so well lit 
 that cooks could pick the grain for their pottage 
 without the assistance of their lamps. ( Talmud, 
 tract. Lucca., foL 3.) 
 
 f These green wreaths were used during the 
 feast of Tabernacles. (Basn., 1. vii., ch. 16.) 
 
 X The garments worn in the evening by the ^ 
 
 priests on solemn festivals came from India, and 
 cost very dear. (Basn., 1. vii., ch. 15.) 
 
 § It is well known that the Jews and the Arabs 
 pray aloud. 
 
 II So long as the temple stood, the Jews made 
 a special devotion of visiting it. More than 
 eleven hundred thousand persons perished in 
 the destruction of Jerusalem, under Titus, be- 
 cause they were assembled for the feast of the 
 Passover when the city was besieged. (Joseph., 
 de Bella, 1. vii., ch. 17.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 109 
 
 he and his spouse bade a last fare- 
 well to Lower Galilee, and took up 
 their abode in Jerusalem, in the 
 neighborhood of the temple. Ann 
 was then at the summit of her 
 wishes ; she could serve the Lord 
 in his holy house, and see her 
 daughter frequently. How often, 
 during the fine evenings of summer, 
 as she sat spinning before her door, 
 would she twirl her spindle mechan- 
 ically, whilst her maternal glance 
 was pensively fixed on the glittering 
 roof of the temple ! Where a mavUs 
 treasure is, says the Holy Scripture, 
 there is his heart. 
 
 St. Ann might have shortened 
 the duration of that painful separa- 
 tion, as the law of Moses accepted 
 compensations. This she would not 
 do; her gratitude to God spoke still 
 louder than her maternal tenderness, 
 and when the voice of religion made 
 itself heard, that of nature became 
 silent. 
 
 The Virgin had been nine years 
 shut up in the temple* when the 
 
 * Pere Croiset, Exercises de Piete, t. xviii., 
 p. 59. 
 
 f The Hebrew confession is from all antiquity; 
 the Jews made it, at the article of death, not 
 merely aloud, but before ten persons and a Rab- 
 
 * first dark cloud obscured her young 
 life. Her beloved father, Joachim 
 the Just, fell dangerously ill, and 
 the symptoms of approaching disso- 
 lution very soon appeared. Appre- 
 hensive for his life, his friends and 
 kinsfolk crowded around, with every 
 manifestation of kindness and sym- 
 pathy ; for the families of Juda were 
 closely united amongst themselves, 
 and lived in the utmost harmony. 
 The dying man smiled benignly on 
 his friends and neighbors. Like 
 Jacob, he had been long a wanderer 
 on the earth, and it gave him little 
 concern that the wind of death came 
 to beat down his tent, for, beyond 
 this earthly planet, he saw in spirit 
 those blissful regions where he was 
 going to repose for ever in Abra- 
 ham's bosom. 
 
 When his increasing wealniess 
 gave him to understand that life 
 was ebbing fast away, the holy old 
 man confessed his sins aloud, in 
 presence of all, according to the 
 custom of the Hebrews,f and offered 
 
 bin. Aaron ben Berachia, in his book entitled 
 Maavar Jobbok, treating of the art of dying well, 
 and the assistance to be rendered to the dying, 
 records the method of confessing and the pray- 
 ers for the agonizing. Abraham ben Isaao 
 
uo 
 
 LIFE OF TEE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 up his death to the Supreme Judge 
 in expiation of the faults inherent 
 in our nature, from which even the 
 just are not exempt. This duty ac- 
 complished, Joachim asked for his 
 daughter, in order to give her his 
 blessing. Mary came ; * her ardent 
 prayers for the preservation of her 
 father's life had not been heard. 
 ThQJealoris God would sever, one by 
 one, the earthly bonds of his chosen 
 Spouse, to the end that she might 
 lean on Him alone. 
 
 Some pious authors have thought 
 that, at the moment when Joachim 
 extended his hands to bless his 
 child, a revelation from on high 
 suddenly disclosed to him the glori- 
 ous destiny awaiting her; the joy 
 of the elect diffused itself over his 
 venerable countenance, his arms fell 
 by his side, he bowed down his head 
 and died. 
 
 Laniado also wrote a book, entitled !Z%e Shield 
 of Abraham, a work much esteemed by the Jews, 
 wherein he treats of the confession of sins. See 
 also Basnage, 1. vii., ch. 24. 
 
 * It was customary, from the very times of the 
 patriarchs, for the dying father to bless his chil- 
 dien. Mary had to conform to this custom. 
 Her seclusion in the temple was not monastic, 
 and St. Joachim then resided in Jerusalem. 
 
 t St. Jerome remarks that, in his time, most 
 of the Jews still slashed their skin on the 
 
 The house then resounded with 
 cries and lamentations. The women 
 hacked their breasts and tore their 
 hair;f the men covered their heads 
 with ashes and rent their garments, 
 whilst some of the matrons, moved 
 by charity and devotion, spread a 
 a thick veil over the pale calm 
 face of the just man, which was 
 never more to be seen in this world, 
 and folded the thumb within the 
 hand, which was left open to denote 
 the total abandonment of all earthly 
 things. 
 
 After having washed the body 
 in water, mingled with myrrh 
 and dried rose-leaves, those pious 
 women wrapped it up in a linen 
 shroud, which they tied round 
 with bands, after the manner of 
 Egypt. Having then opened all 
 the doors and windows of the 
 house^J they lit near the corpse 
 
 death of their friends, and made themselves 
 bald by tearing out their hair, which they sacri- 
 ficed to death. 
 
 I Dead bodies, amongst the Jews, defiled 
 those who touched them, and rendered them 
 unclean. (Misnah, Ordo puritatum.) "When 
 the doors are closed, the house of death is 
 regarded as a sepulchre, and, consequently, 
 it is defiled ; when the doors are open, on 
 the contrary, the impurity goes away." {Mair 
 monides.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Ill 
 
 I 
 
 a brazen lamp, with several sockets 
 — the lamp of the dead — which cast 
 its mournful reflection on the bed 
 of death. 
 
 On the following day, a numerous 
 train, in which the flute-players 
 fvere conspicuous,* stopped before 
 the house of death. The nearest 
 of kin ascended to the upper cham- 
 ber, wherein Joachim had been laid 
 out, and placed the corpse on a 
 bed,f which they then took upon 
 their shoulders. The funeral pro- 
 cession traversed the streets of Je- 
 rusalem chanting funeral hymns, 
 accompanied by the soft wailing 
 sound of the flutes, drowned at 
 times in the noisy lamentations of 
 the weepers. Ann and Mary were 
 present at the funeral, and walked 
 with downcast eyes amongst the 
 
 * Jesus found the flute-players making a great 
 noise at the door of a nobleman whose daughter 
 he restored to life. Maimonides says that the 
 poorest of the Jews is obliged to hire two flute- 
 players and a weeper for the burial of his wife, 
 and that the rich are to increase the number in 
 proportion to their wealth. See also Fleury, 
 Mceurs des Israelites, page 106. 
 
 f These funeral beds were used long before 
 sofiins : the latter are still unknown to the 
 Arabs, who bury their dead only in a shroud, 
 which enables the jackals, who prowl at night 
 through the cemeteries, to disinter the bodies 
 and devour them. 
 
 * 
 
 ^ matrons of their family, whose tears 
 flowed profusely. J 
 
 The procession passed through 
 the Gate of Flocks, since known to 
 Christians as the Virgin's gate. On 
 reaching the place of sepulture, the 
 sound of the flutes, the hymns, and 
 the lamentations all ceased awhile, 
 and the chief mourners thus apos- 
 trophized the dead: "Blessed be 
 God, who formed and nourished 
 thee, and has now deprived thee of 
 life. Oh, ye dead, he knows your 
 number, and will one day raise ye 
 up ! Blessed be He who taketh life 
 and restoreth it again ! " § 
 
 They then put a small bag of clay 
 on the head of the corpse, and pro- 
 ceeded to open the sepulchre — a 
 gloomy grotto, which was called the 
 hotcse of the living || — wherein the 
 
 X Women and children assisted at the funer- 
 als of their husbands and fathers. The widow 
 of Naim followed the corpse of her son ; Joseph 
 mourned for his father. This custom is still 
 observed in Judea. The Hebrew children re- 
 ceived the blessing of their parents, closed their 
 eyes, and accompanied them to their last resting- 
 place, amongst the bones of their fathers. (M. 
 Salvador, Histoire des Institutions de Mdise et du 
 peuple Hebreu, t. ii., p. 398.) 
 
 § Ldon de Modena, Gout, des Juifs. Buxtorf, 
 Syn. Hebr., p. 502. 
 
 II The sepulchre, which should be called (ha 
 house of the dead. They gave it, on the contrary, 
 
112 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 patriarch was to sleep his hist sleep, * 
 awaiting the other members of his 
 family. Xiien the most heart-rend- 
 ing cries arose on every side. Ann 
 threw hei-self on the mortal remains 
 of her husband to bid him a last 
 farewell, and was soon taken away 
 almost insensible. Having com- 
 mitted to the earth the holy remains 
 of the just man, they rolled to the 
 mouth of the sepulchral cave an 
 enormous stone, which no man was 
 to remove under pain of excommu- 
 nication. The cries of lamentation 
 began once more, and the spectators, 
 pulling three different times a tuft 
 of grass, and casting it each time 
 behind them, said, in a sorrowful 
 tone. They shall flourish like, the grass 
 of the fields! These rites terminated 
 the obsequies of the descendant of 
 the kings of Juda — the father of 
 
 the title of the house of the living, to denote that 
 the immortal soul survives its separation from 
 the body. This title is attributed to the Phari- 
 sees. (Basn., 1. vii., 24.) The Rabbins give an 
 3xact description of these sepulchres. The door 
 is usuallj made very narrow, for they are gener- 
 ally closed by a stone rolled to the entrance. A 
 large space is left in the middle of the sepulchre, 
 ■where the bearers go in and rest the coffin 
 before it is put in its place. In the sides and at 
 the end were hollowed out a certain number of 
 niches, wherein the dead bodies of each family 
 
 Mary — the grandsire of Jesus, ac- 
 cording to the flesh.* 
 
 The tender heart of the Blessed 
 Virgin was crushed by this first 
 affliction — the prelude to so many 
 others. It was ber^ apprenticeship 
 in sorrow. Misfortune greeted her 
 on the threshold of adolescence, 
 but the noble child shrank not 
 from its approach. She wept; for 
 her soul — like that of her divine 
 Son — was never cold or insensi- 
 ble; but she drained the bitter 
 chalice, saying, " Jehovah, thy will 
 be done!" The mother and daugh- 
 ter put on mourning after the 
 manner of the Hebrews ; they 
 clothed themselves in tight robes, 
 made of a coarse camlet, called 
 hair-cloth; their head and feet bare, 
 their face concealed in a fold of 
 their robes, fasting and abstain- 
 
 were placed. Tombs were held in great respect. 
 No one was allowed to cross them in making a 
 road or an aqueduct, nor to cut wood there, nor 
 bring flocks to graze. They were placed on the 
 side of the highway, in order to remind the 
 passengers of death, and to keep the dead in 
 their recollection. (Lightfoot, Cent, chorogr., c. 
 100.) We see in the Gospel that the tomb of 
 Lazarus was a cave closed by a large stone. 
 
 * Salom. ben Virgse., Hist. Jud., p. 193. 
 L^on de Modena, CotU. relig. des Juifs. Bas- 
 J5 nage, L vii., ch. 25. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 113 
 
 ing,* they remained for seven days 
 seated on the ground, weeping and 
 lamenting with their kindred, and 
 praying for the departed soul.f 
 When the seven days were ended, 
 Ann had lamps lit in the synagogue, 
 and prayers offered up for her hus- 
 band, giving alms in proportion 
 to her means. Mary, on her side, 
 fasted every week on the day of her 
 father's death, and prayed morning 
 and evening for the repose of his 
 soul. These fasts and prayers for 
 the dead lasted for the space of 
 eleven months. J 
 
 " Thou art welcome, Misfortune I 
 if thou comest alone," say the Greeks. 
 Thus, this first affliction of Mary's 
 was followed by one more poignant 
 still, and she was soon called upon 
 to renew her mourning. Scarcely 
 had the death-lamp been extinguish- 
 ed in the melancholy dwelling of St. 
 Ann when it had to be lit again; 
 
 * Fasting was very severe amongst the Jews; 
 there was nothing allowed but some vegetables, 
 beans, for instance, or lentils, which were consid- 
 ered mourning food. Eggs were permitted, for 
 the figure of the egg being round and globular, 
 is the image of an afOlicted man. Wine was no 
 less forbidden than meat. 
 
 f During the days of mourning they recited 
 the 49th Psalm. (L. de Modena, Gout, des 
 Juifs, p. 182. Lightfoot, in John., p. 1072.) 
 
 * the last tears which Mary had shed 
 for one parent were scarcely dry on 
 her cheek, when she had to bewail 
 the loss of the other. § One evening 
 Mary, accompanied by some of her 
 kindred, went down from the temple 
 to the narrow and obscure street in 
 which her mother lived. The lurid 
 glare of a lamp shone out through 
 one of the latticed windows of the 
 humble dwelling. Before the thresh- 
 old were grouped, in silence, some 
 of the women who, even now, 
 throughout all the East, make a 
 trade of weeping for the dead ; like 
 those birds of ill omen which seem 
 to foresee deaths, these sinister 
 creatures were waiting for the mo- 
 ment when an afflicted family 
 should come to engage their hired 
 lamentations. 1 1 
 
 St. Ann collected all her failing 
 strength to bless her daughter, pa- 
 thetically recommended her to her 
 
 X Basnage, 1. vii., eh. 11, p. 182. 
 
 § According to the best authorities, St. Ann 
 survived St. Joachim but a very short time. 
 
 II All over the Levant, people hire, as mourn- 
 ers for their dead, women who have no other 
 means of earning their living. They pay them 
 so much an hour, and they endeavor to earn 
 their wages by uttering the most heart-rending 
 cries. (Burkhart, Voyage en Arable, t. ii., p. 
 139.) 
 
 * 
 
114 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 friends, but especially to Him who ^ 
 is the Father of the oi'phan, and 
 then calmly slept the sleep of the 
 just* Mary bent in anguish over 
 the lifeless body of her mother ; her 
 fair tresses mingled with the snowy 
 locks of the dead. It seemed as 
 though she hoped that her tears 
 would restore her to life ; but it is 
 only the breath of God that can re- 
 animate the dead. When the first 
 paroxysm of her grief was over, 
 Mary closed the eyes of the saint, 
 and took leave of her by a long, last 
 kiss, according to the custom of her 
 people.f 
 
 The sorrow of the young orphan 
 was deep and silent, and endured 
 with heroic patience. Having now 
 no other support on earth but Prov- 
 idence, she took refuge in the bosom 
 of God. Thence, as from the depth 
 
 * Grave historians state that the Blessed 
 Virgin was present at the death of her mother, 
 which is quite conformable to the customs of 
 the Hebrews. 
 
 t This custom is very ancient; for Philo, relat- 
 ing the complaints of Jacob for the untimely 
 death of his son, makes him say that he will not 
 have the consolation of closing his eyes, and 
 giving him the parting kiss. 
 
 J Descoutures, Vie de la Sainte Vierge, page 
 27. 
 
 § A young girl might make vows amongst the ^^ 
 
 of a peaceful harbor, she overheard 
 the distant roaring of the world's 
 storms, and comprehended all the 
 vanity of earthly things ; the vanity 
 of rank, of greatness, of wealth, of 
 beauty, things which glitter and 
 pass away like the bubble on the 
 wintry torrent, which itself disap- 
 pears at the end of a season. 
 
 It is at this period of sorrow, of 
 isolation and lonely watching, that 
 a historian has judiciously fixed 
 Mary's vow of perpetual virginity ; J 
 in fact, we do not anywhere find 
 that either Ann or Joachim knew of 
 that vow, and without their knowl- 
 edge it was not valid in the eyes of 
 the law, either civil or religious. § 
 It was, therefore, after their death 
 that Mary chose the Lord for her 
 portion, and devoted herself to his 
 service without any limitation of 
 
 Jews, and she could even make a vow of vir- 
 ginity ; but such vow was annulled by paternal 
 authority, because that, being subject to her 
 father, she could not violate the law of nature by 
 disobeying him. All vows made by a young 
 maiden or a married woman, unknown or con- 
 trary to the will of a father or husband, were 
 null. {Num., ch. xxx.) Some Kabbins main- 
 tain, nevertheless, that the father or husband 
 had to annul the vow within twenty-four hours 
 after he had cognizance of it, otherwise it was 
 vahd. ^Basnage, 1. vii., ch. 19.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 115 
 
 time, says Bernadine de Busto, and 
 with the intention of remaining 
 always in the temple. Like the 
 august founder of her race, the 
 Yii'gin found that a day spent in 
 
 ik 
 
 the tabernacles of the God of Israel 
 was worth a thousand, and she also 
 would rather be the last in the holy 
 place than the first under the tents 
 of cedar. 
 
 CHAPTER YII. 
 
 MARRIAGE OF THE VIRGIN. 
 
 HETHER Jo- 
 achim, on his 
 death-bed had 
 placed the 
 Virgin under 
 the special 
 protection of 
 the priesthood; or that the magis- 
 trates who took care of orphans had 
 themselves chosen guardians for her 
 in the powerful family of Aaron, 
 to which she was related by the 
 
 *The Jews, as also Celsus, Porphyrus, and 
 Faust have taken occasion from this relationship 
 to maintain that the Blessed Virgin was of the 
 tribe of Levi. Catholic doctors combat this 
 opinion. They maintain that Mary was of the 
 tribe of Juda, and the family of David. In fact, 
 St. Matthew tells us that Jesus Christ is called 
 
 * mother's side; or that the tutelage 
 of children devoted to the service 
 of the temple belonged of right to 
 the Levites, it is certain that Mary, 
 after the death of her parents, had 
 guardians of the sacerdotal race. It 
 is probable (and the Arab traditions 
 say so) that the cares of this tutel- 
 age devolved chiefly on Zachary, 
 the holy spouse of St. EKzabeth, 
 whose high reputation and near re- 
 lationship* entitled him to that 
 
 the son of David according to the flesh. Now, 
 he can only be the son of David through Mary, 
 since he had no father amongst men. When it 
 is asked how it is that Mary, being of the tribe 
 of Juda, was the cousin of St. Elizabeth, who 
 was of the tribe of Levi, St. Augustine answers 
 that there is nothing improbable in the supposi- 
 
116 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIHUIN MARY. 
 
 office.* The alacrity wherewith the 
 Blessed Virgin traversed all Judea, 
 two or thiee years later, to assist 
 and congratulate the mother of St. 
 John the Baptist, and her prolonged 
 sojourn in the mountains of Hebron, 
 seem, indeed, to indicate a closer 
 connection than that of mere rela- 
 tionship; the roof which sheltered 
 Mary for so long a time must have 
 been, according to the rigorous pro- 
 priety of the Hebrews, as sacred to 
 her as the paternal roof 
 
 Whoever the priests might be 
 that were honored with the tutelage 
 of the blessed daughter of St. Ann, 
 they scrupulously acquitted them- 
 selves of the obligations of their 
 charge; and, when the Virgin had 
 attained her fifteenth year, they 
 began to think of providing her 
 with a suitable husband. This hy- 
 meneal project gave Mary the ut- 
 most uneasiness ; that soul, so lofty, 
 
 tion that a man of the tribe of Juda had taken 
 a wife of the tribe of Levi, and that the Blessed 
 Virgin, the issue of that marriage, was related 
 by her mother to St. Elizabeth. It is elsewhere 
 proved that the prohibition of marrying into an- 
 other tribe regarded only heiresses. 
 
 * The Koran, which contains many Arabian 
 traditions relating to Mary, says expressly that 
 Zachary took her under his protection. {Koran, 
 ch. iiL) 
 
 f SO pure, so contemplative, had an- 
 ticipated the Gospel, and regarded 
 virginity as the most perfect, the 
 most holy, and the most desirable 
 of all states. An ancient author, 
 quoted by St. Gregory of Nyssa 
 relates that she long refused, with 
 much modesty, to accede to the pro- 
 posal made her, and that she hum- 
 bly entreated her family to consent 
 to her remaining in the temple, and 
 leading a life of innocence, of seclu- 
 sion, of freedom from all ties except 
 those of the Lord. Her demand was 
 wholly unaccountable to those who 
 had care over her. They could not 
 understand her imploring as a favor 
 that barrenness which was consid- 
 ered disgraceful, and was solemnly 
 condemned by the law of Moses f — 
 the celibacy of an only child,J in- 
 volving the total extinction of her 
 father's name — a thought which was 
 almost impious amongst the Jews, 
 
 f Origen remarks that the law affixed a 
 stigma on steriUty ; for it is written, " Ac- 
 cursed be he who leaves none of his race in 
 Israel." 
 
 \ Mary was an heiress, because it was proper 
 that the line of David, whence the Messiah was 
 to spring, should end in the person of an only 
 daughter, who, bringing into the world the 
 eternal Heir to the throne of David, crowned 
 ^ and consummated his race. {Oldshausen.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 117 
 
 who considered it the greatest mis- 
 fortune if their name were not per- 
 petuated in Israel. As to the vow 
 of virginity whereby she had bound 
 herself, she could make no excuse 
 of that, since it might be annulled 
 by a decision of the family council. 
 It is known that woman was, every- 
 where and always, treated as a 
 minor before the promulgation of 
 that immortal code which has glori- 
 ously removed fi'om her the curse 
 of slavery. 
 
 Hence it was that the Virgin's 
 supplications found but little sym- 
 pathy even amongst the priests of 
 Jehovah. Such virtues were far 
 beyond their comprehension, and 
 with all their learning and penetra- 
 tion, the angelic and all-holy soul of 
 Mary was to them a seven-sealed 
 book. Her thought, which was far 
 in advance of her age, and contrary 
 to all the ancient prejudices of her 
 nation, remained incomprehensible, 
 and all that she could bring for- 
 ward, in order to excuse herself 
 A'om entering on a state so wholly 
 opposed to her dearest wishes, was 
 of no avail. Besides, how could she 
 
 * St. Aug., de Sancta Virg., c. 14. 
 
 f have succeeded, since God himself 
 was against her? It was the will 
 of God that her marriage with a just 
 man, who was to render testimony 
 to the purity of her life, should 
 screen her from the importunities 
 of the young Hebrews, who might 
 have sought her hand even in the 
 temple, as St. Augustine observes,* 
 and also to give to her and her 
 divine Son a protector in the hour 
 of peril. It was the only means of 
 hiding the mystery of the Incarna- 
 tion from the malevolent scrutiny of 
 a perverse world, which would have 
 laid hold of the miracle as a subject 
 for the most abominable conjectures, 
 and might even have been so infat- 
 uated by false zeal as to stone the 
 Mother of the Saviour, as they after- 
 wards sought to stone the woman 
 taken in adultery ; f for mercy was 
 never one of the chosen virtues of 
 the Hebrews, and God himself re- 
 proaches them, by the mouth of his 
 prophets, with having their heart as 
 hard as adamant. 
 
 In addition to these powerful 
 reasons, which were hidden in the 
 impenetrable obscurity of the coun- 
 ts f St. John Chrys., serm. 3, in Math. 
 
U8 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 6el8 of God, there was another which 
 had its source in the antediluvian 
 traditions and in national pride, and 
 that one reason, of itself, left little 
 chance of success for the timid 
 opposition of the Virgin. Perpet- 
 ual chastity, which Christians have 
 made the queen of virtues, was al- 
 most unknown amongst the disci- 
 ples of Moses, who lived for so many 
 ages in anxious expectation of the 
 Messiah-King [Melech-Hamaschiak) . 
 A young flower of the root of Jesse, 
 a daughter of David, was not at 
 liberty to reject the bonds of Hymen. 
 She owed a son to the ambitious 
 piety of her family, who would not 
 have renounced, for all the treasures 
 of the great king, the hope of one 
 day numbering amongst themselves 
 the Liberator of Israel. This hope, 
 which had sustained the Jews when 
 the Chaldeans, " mounted on horses 
 swifter than eagles," violently rent 
 asunder the embattled wall of Sion, 
 and transplanted its people to the 
 
 * The standard of Juda was of a green color. 
 {Dom Calmet.) 
 
 f This banner of the Maccabees bore the 
 ^ords : "Who is like unto thee, O Eternal? 
 Mi camocha baelim, Jehovah ? " 
 
 J Every maiden who inherited a prop- 
 
 ^ banks of the Euphrates — this hope 
 was mingled with a bitter desire of 
 revenge ever since the Romans ruled 
 in Asia. The Hebrews hoped soon 
 to see the day when the eagles 
 should fly before the emerald ban- 
 ner,* and when the device of the 
 Maccabees f should wave in tri- 
 umph over that of the Roman senate. 
 Never did the fulfillment of the Mes- 
 sianic prophecies seem so near at 
 hand, and hence the moment was 
 unfavorable for obtaining the favor 
 solicited by Mary. 
 
 According to the Gospel of the 
 Nativity of Mary and the Proto- 
 gospel of St. James, the guardians 
 of the Blessed Virgin, regardless 
 of her remonstrances, convoked a 
 meeting of her nearest relations, 
 all of the race of David and tribe 
 of Juda, like herself, J in order to 
 proceed to the choice of the hus- 
 band whom they imposed upon her. 
 Amongst those who were entitled 
 to aspire to her hand, there were 
 
 erty — and not maidens in general, as the 
 Vulgate says — was bound to marry a man 
 of her own family and tribe, and not her 
 nearest relation, as Montesquieu asserts. This 
 was in order that patrimonies might not pass 
 from one tribe to another. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIBGIN MABY. 
 
 119 
 
 a number of young Israelites, some 
 handsome and brave, others the 
 possessors of fertile lands, vine- 
 yards, flocks and groves of olives. 
 The captains of Juda would have 
 added to Mary's portion a part of 
 the spoils and slaves taken in battle ; 
 the nabobs of her tribe would have 
 covered her with the gold-embroi- 
 dered stuffs of India, and with thrice- 
 dyed Tyrian purple ; whilst the sons 
 of commerce, who traded in the 
 emeralds of Egypt, the turquoises of 
 Iran, and the pearls of the Persian 
 Gulf, would have laid at her feet 
 chains of precious stones, costly 
 bracelets and ear-rings, that were 
 worth a prince's ransom — in short. 
 
 * aU the brilliant insignia of female 
 servitude. But these were all weigh- 
 ed in the balance and found wanting-. 
 Despising the advantages of youth, 
 beauty, high rank, wealth, and mar- 
 tial glory, the priestly guardians of 
 the Blessed Virgin and the ancients 
 of her house fixed their choice on a 
 man of advanced age,* a decayed 
 patrician, whose fortune had been 
 swallowed up in the political revo- 
 lutions and religious wars of Judea 
 as the sea absorbs a drop of rain, 
 leaving him only his arms and his 
 trade. This poor, but high-bom old 
 man, who, according to the Proto- 
 gospel of St. James, was a widow- 
 er,! but according to St. Jerome had 
 
 *Tlie Proto-gospel of St. James, ch. 2, and 
 the Gospel of the Nativity of Mary, ch. 8 (books 
 whose contents have been, for the most part, 
 approved of, even by the Fathers of the Church), 
 merely say that he was already old. St. Epi- 
 phanius gives eighty years to Joseph at the 
 time of his marriage, Father Pezron fifty, and 
 FHistoire divine de La Vierge, by Marie d'Agrada, 
 thirty-three. The supposition of St. Epiphanius 
 will not bear examination ; it is, moreover, sol- 
 emnly refuted by the Hebrew law, which forbids 
 the union of a young woman and an old man, 
 and places it in the most disgraceful category. 
 (Basn., 1. vii., ch. 21.) Hist, de Institutions de 
 Mdise. Neither the priests nor Joseph would 
 have done that which was condemned by the 
 law. The age given by Marie d'Agrada to 
 Joseph does not agree with the opinion of the jj 
 
 Fathers ; there remains but that of Father Pez- 
 ron, which is altogether the most probable. 
 
 f Many of the Fathers have thought that St. 
 Joseph was a widower when he espoused the 
 Blessed Virgin. The Proto-gospel of St. James, 
 and the Gospel of the Nativity of the Virgin 
 both mention it as a fact. St. Epiphanius as- 
 serts that he had had four sons and two daugh- 
 ters. St. Hippolytus of Thebes, calls his first 
 wife Salomd. Origen, Eusebius, St. Ambrose, 
 and several other Fathers, have adopted the 
 same opinion. Yet still it is by no means gen- 
 erally received, and it is commonly thought that 
 St, Joseph led a Hfe of virginity. Such is the 
 opinion of St. Jerome, who expressly says, writ- 
 ing against Helvidius, " We nowhere read that 
 he had had any other wife than Mai-y ; aliam eum 
 uxorem habuisse non scribitur." St. Augustine 
 
XM 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 never been married — and this last f 
 is the prevailing opinion of the 
 Church — this old man was Joseph, 
 the carpenter of Nazareth. 
 
 When we think of the rare beauty 
 of Mary, the education which she 
 had received in the temple, the 
 great connections of her family, and 
 her quality of heiress, which was 
 a desirable and even brilliant lot 
 amongst the Jews, who endowed 
 their wives and received scarcely 
 anything with them,* we might be 
 astonished at this decision of her 
 family, were we not informed by the 
 Fathers that Joseph was chosen by 
 lot and by the express manifestation 
 of the divine will.f An ancient tra- 
 dition, inserted in the Proto-gospel 
 of St. James and mentioned by St. 
 Jerome, relates that the candidates, 
 after having invoked Him who de- 
 cides lots, left each his own almond- 
 tree rod in the temple in the evening, 
 
 leaves the question undecided ; but St. Peter 
 Damian declares it to be the belief of the entire 
 Church that St. Joseph, who passed for the father 
 of the Saviour, was a virgin like unto Mary. 
 
 *0n the occasion of the marriage-contract, 
 the woman only received from her friends 
 the apparel necessary for her. It was the 
 husband who gave the dowry. (M. Salva- 
 dor, Institutions de Mdise. t. ii., eh. 1.) 
 
 and that next day the dry and with- 
 ered branch of Joseph, son of Jacob, 
 son of Nathan, was found green and 
 blossomed like that which had of 
 old secured the priesthood to the 
 Aaronites. The history of Mount 
 C arm el states that, at sight of this 
 prodigy, which annihilated his hopes, 
 a young and wealthy patrician, be- 
 longing to one of the most powerful 
 families of Judea, broke his rod in 
 pieces, with every token of despair, 
 and hastened to shut himself up in 
 one of the caves of Carmel with the 
 disciples of Elias.;|; 
 
 When the guardians had made 
 their choice, they announced it to 
 Mary, and that admirable young 
 Virgin, accustomed only to works of 
 fancy — reared amid the perfumes, 
 the melodious songs, and fairy pa- 
 geants of the holy house — hesitated 
 not a moment in devoting herself to 
 an obscure life, menial occupations, 
 
 f Gospel of the Nativity of Mary, ch. 7 ; Proto- 
 gosp. St. James, ch. 8 ; St. Hier. in Dam., 1. iv., 
 ch. 5 ; St. Greg. Naz., horn, de St. Nat.; Niceph., 
 b. ii., ch. 7. 
 
 J This young candidate for the Virgin's hand, 
 who was named Agabus, afterwards became a 
 Christian, it is said, and was famous for his 
 sanctity. (See Histoire du Garmd, chaptei 
 xii.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 121 
 
 and arduous cares, with the humble 
 artisan chosen by her friends. A 
 divine revelation had, they say, made 
 known to her that this just man 
 would be to her only a protector, a 
 father, and the guardian of her chas- 
 tity.* What would she more ? The 
 Lord had heard her prayer. While 
 leaving her faithful to the vow which 
 she had made, he gave her, in addi- 
 tion, the merit of obedience. 
 
 The projected marriage of Joseph 
 and Mary must have excited surprise 
 both in Nazareth and in Jerusalem, 
 for there was little similarity of age, 
 fortune, or condition between the 
 pair. It would, however, be a great 
 mistake to think that this union, 
 apparently so disproportionate, was 
 regarded by Jewish society (whose 
 habits were simple and primitive) 
 as in any degree improper. Though 
 not holding a distinguished rank in 
 the state, the trade of a mechanic 
 
 * Vie de la Sainte Vierge, by Descoutures, p. 
 49. Viede Jesus Christ, by Valverde, t. i., p, 71. 
 
 f Mechanics are still highly respected in 
 Judea. " In Syria and Palestine," says Burck- 
 hardt, " the corporations of mechanics are 
 almost as much respected as they were during 
 the middle ages in France and Germany. A 
 master-tradesman is there considered equal 
 to a merchant of the second class. He can 
 
 I was neither abject nor degrading in 
 Israel.f We see in the genealogy 
 of the tribe of Juda a family of 
 workers in fine flax, and another of 
 potters, whose memory is held in 
 honor, and Scripture has handed 
 down to posterity the names of 
 Beleseel and Hiram. It is well 
 known that St. Paul, brought up to 
 the study of the law, the famous 
 Pharisean doctor, Hillel, and since 
 them many doctors who, according 
 to the emphatic language of the 
 Rabbins, shed light on the holy nor- 
 tion, were not ashamed to apply 
 themselves to the most common 
 mechanical arts. But what is more: 
 all the Israelites were artificers ; for 
 every father of a family, whatever 
 might be his social position, was 
 bound to make his son learn a 
 trade, unless, said the law, he would 
 make him a thief. ^ 
 
 Those Jews whose patrimony had 
 
 marry into the respectable families of the 
 city, and has usually more influence in his 
 own locality than a merchant who has three 
 times his wealth." (Burckhardt, Voyage en 
 Arabie, t. ii., p. 139. ) 
 
 X Any man who does not give his children a 
 profession, said the Pharisean school, prepares 
 
 them for a bad life "Be not burdensome 
 
 to any one Never say, I am a man of 
 
122 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 passed into the hands of sti'angers, 
 had no other alternative than to quit 
 the country or support themselves 
 by the labor of their hands, awaiting 
 the arrival of that grand epoch which 
 restored all property to its original 
 owners. They whose love of coun- 
 try induced them to adopt the latter 
 course, were in no way degraded 
 thereby, or incapacitated for any 
 office in the state. Unlike Egypt 
 and India, Israel had no castes ; her 
 pride was based on her religious 
 belief, and her descent from the 
 patriarchs. "To be the issue of 
 Abraham according to the flesh," 
 says the great Bossuet, " was a dis- 
 tinction beyond all others." In fact, 
 the lowest of the Hebrews was held 
 as a prince in comparison with 
 strangers.* There were, however, 
 amongst the Jews, as amongst the 
 Arabs, some tribes more illustrious 
 and some houses more noble than 
 others. The tribe of Juda, which 
 carried the national standard at the 
 head of the embattled thousands of 
 Israel, and with whom the sceptre 
 
 quality — that occupation does not suit me. 
 Kabbi Johanan wrought as a skinner, Na- 
 hum as a copier of books, another Johanan 
 made sandals, and Rabbi Juda knew the baking 
 
 * was to remain till the coming of 
 the Messiah, had always the preem- 
 inence; and the family of David 
 was the first and most honored 
 amongst the families of Juda. Now 
 Joseph, although poor, was of the 
 Davidical race. The blood of twen- 
 ty kings flowed in his veins, and it 
 was Zorobabel, one of his ancestors, 
 who brought back the people of 
 God from the land of exile. Since 
 that time, the splendor of his house 
 had gradually declined; his family 
 had become identified with the peo- 
 ple, like that of Moses and of Samuel, 
 but its illustrious origin was not for- 
 gotten. In our own days, the hum- 
 ble Abassides, who vegetate in the 
 depth of the Hedjaz, are still honor- 
 ed as the descendants of Haroun- 
 al-Raschid, and the highest family 
 in Arabia would not disdain their 
 alliance. 
 
 The holy daughter of Joachim did 
 not lower herself, therefore, as much 
 as might be thought by espousing 
 the CARPENTER. TMs is said in a 
 worldly sense ; for, if we regard this 
 
 trade." {Tcdmud., Tract. Kidotischim, Pessarh, 
 Aboth, Soto.) 
 
 * The Jews have not lost this opinion with 
 their nationality ; they hold it stilL 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 123 
 
 union from a higher point of view, 
 we find that it was in fact a noble 
 alliance. God gave not to his chosen 
 Virgin a man whose merit consisted 
 in his lands, his vines, or his shekels 
 of gold — things which often change 
 masters, and are not more inherent 
 in the rich than the clothes which 
 they leave off at night. He gave 
 her a just man, the most perfect of 
 his works. The Lord takes no ac- 
 count of the vain gewgaws which 
 delight mankind ; before Him there 
 is no distinction between the poor 
 creatures who crawl a moment in 
 the dust, soon to become the pasture 
 of worms. Man judges by appear- 
 ances, says the Scripture, but Jelio- 
 vah beholds the heart. If G-od chose 
 the humble Joseph to be the spouse 
 of the Queen of Angels, the adoptive 
 father of the Messiah, it was because 
 he possessed treasures of grace and 
 of sanctity which the angels them- 
 selves might envy; it was because 
 his virtues had made him first 
 amongst his people, and that his 
 
 * Hillel and Schammay warmly discuss the 
 value of this marriage-coin, mentioned by the 
 Talmud, but have come to no conclusion on the 
 subject. (Basn., 1. vii., ch. 21.) 
 
 f The following is the Uteral form of the mar- 
 
 ^ name stood far higher in the book 
 of life — the heraldic annals of eter- 
 nity — than that of the imperial 
 Cesar. The Virgin was not confided 
 to the most powerful, but to the 
 most worthy; thus the ark, which 
 the princes and captains of Israel 
 dared not touch for fear of being 
 stricken with death, drew down the 
 blessing of heaven on the house 
 of a simple Levite wherein it was 
 sheltered. 
 
 Joseph, in presence of the guar- 
 dians and some witnesses, presented 
 her with a small piece of money, 
 the value of which is not now 
 known,* saying, " K thou consentest 
 to become my wife, accept this 
 pledge." Mary, by accepting the 
 gift, was solemnly bound, and thence 
 forward nothing but a formal divorce 
 could restore her to freedom. The 
 contract was drawn up by certain 
 of the Scribes. It was concise, and 
 not overbm'dened with technical 
 terms.f The husband promised to 
 honor his wife, to provide for her 
 
 riage contract of the Hebrews. It was in use 
 from the very earliest times, and must, therefore, 
 have been employed at the marriage of Joseph 
 and Mary. "In the year . . . ., the .... day of 
 the month of ... . Benjamin, son of . . . ., said to 
 
124 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 support, accoi-ding to the custom of ^ 
 Hebrew husbands, and secured to 
 her a dowry of two hundred zuses 
 (fifty crowns), being just the same 
 for the daughter of a prince as for 
 the daughter of a mechanic, but it 
 might be increased according to the 
 wealth of the husband. After hav- 
 ing insured this dowry by pledging 
 all his possessions, and even his 
 cloak, which, nevertheless, the law 
 did not allow to be claimed until 
 after his death,* Joseph signed the 
 contract, to which Mary likewise 
 affixed her signature. A short ben- 
 ediction in honor of God terminated 
 this ceremony, which took place 
 several months before that of the 
 
 marriage. 
 
 The maiTiage of the Blessed Vir- 
 gin was solemnized in Jerusalem, 
 and the most dignified members of 
 
 Rachel, daughter of . . . ., Become my wife under 
 the law of Moses and Israel. I promise to re- 
 spect thee, to provide for thy maintenance, in 
 food and clothing, according to the custom of 
 Hebrew husbands who honor their wives and 
 maintain them in a proper manner. I give thee 
 
 at this present (the sum fixed by the 
 
 law), and I promise thee, over and above 
 thy food, clothing, and all other necessaries, 
 that conjugal love, which is common to peo- 
 ple of all nations. Rachel consents to be- 
 come the wife of Benjamin, who, of his own 
 
 lier family made it their duty to 
 appear on the occasion, with all that 
 magnificence so characteristic of the 
 East, and which excites the wonder 
 of European travellers — even the 
 common people exhibiting at such 
 times the most unheard-of splendor.f 
 Not to invite all their relatives, on 
 an occasion so solemn, would have 
 been tantamount to rejecting the 
 ancient customs of their fathers — 
 a thing which could never happen 
 amongst that traditionary people, 
 as unchanging in its customs as 
 in its religious practices, as Philo, 
 the Jew, truly said to the emperor 
 Cai'us. It would, moreover, have 
 outraged all the observances of He- 
 brew society; and the presence of 
 Mary at the wedding of Cana proves, 
 on the contrary, that she conformed 
 to them. 
 
 free will, and in order to make a dowry pro- 
 portioned to his means, adds to the dowry 
 
 aforesaid the sum of " {Institutions de 
 
 Mdise. ) 
 
 * Basnage, 1. vii., ch. 21. 
 
 f " We in Europe have no idea of the splendor 
 displayed in the East on such occasions," says 
 Baron Geramb in his Pilgrimage to Jerusalem; 
 " the nuptial garment of almost every woman is 
 of crimson velvet, embroidered with gold ; with 
 this they wear numerous diamond and pearl 
 ornaments." M. de Lamartine was likewise 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 125 
 
 It was a bright winter's day,* and 
 the new moon was slowly rising be- 
 hind the mountains,! when a long 
 train of richly-dressed women was 
 seen to approach the dwelling of 
 Mary. The light of the torches, 
 borne by a number of slaves, flashed 
 on their cinctures of gold, their 
 strings of pearl, the jeweled cres- 
 cents which they wore on their fore- 
 heads, and the diamonds of their 
 Persian tiaras. J Those daughters of 
 Sion still retained the use of paint, 
 which was known even in the days 
 of Jezabel ; their brows and eye- 
 lashes were painted black, and the 
 tips of their fingers were red as the 
 berries of the eglantine. § Being 
 ushered into the inner room, where 
 the young and holy bride was seated 
 in company with some pious matrons 
 of her family, they blessed God for 
 giving her a husband to protect her, 
 
 dazzled with the superb costumes and profusion 
 of jewels displayed by the women of Syria at 
 the weddings of their friends. 
 
 * In the middle of the sixteenth century the 
 Church authorized the celebration of this festival. 
 It is solemnized on the 22d of January, being, it 
 is said, the day on which the marriage took 
 place. The city of Arras holds this festival on 
 the 23d of January, and some of the Flemish 
 churches on the 24th of the same mouth. 
 
 and complimented her on her ap- 
 proaching marriage, the festivities 
 of which they came to share. 
 
 Belonging to Jewish society, with 
 whom the bridal adornment was a 
 Biblical reminiscence, and could not 
 be dispensed with, Mary was obliged 
 to submit for a while to the require- 
 ments of Eastern luxury, although it 
 had no charms for her. Gold, pearls, 
 and rich stuffs are not, of them- 
 selves, reprehensible ; it is only the 
 thoughts of pride and vanity which 
 they engender in weak minds that 
 are positively evil. Queen Matilda 
 was more humble under her embroi- 
 dered garments, studded with jewels, 
 than the coarsely-clad women with 
 whom she shut herself up, after her 
 glorious regency ; such is the simple 
 testimony of the chroniclers of those 
 times. 
 
 Taking care, then, to avoid that 
 
 f Amongst the Jews marriages were not cele- 
 brated indiscriminately on every day of the 
 week ; they were usually solemnized at the time 
 of a new moon, and on Wednesday rather than 
 any other day. (Basn., 1. vii., ch. 21.) 
 
 \ Isai, cap. iii. 
 
 § Throughout all the East, the women color 
 the tips of their fingers with lausonia iner- 
 rtm. (Linn.) This plant abounds in the islo 
 of Cyprus. 
 
rj6 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 (lisrt'iraitl of dres8 which would have 
 been sure to give offence, at a time 
 when custom required even of the 
 wedding-guests a certain richness 
 of costume — failing in which they 
 were expelled, as we see even by the 
 Gospel — the young descendant of 
 the kings of Juda was bound to wear, 
 on that occasion, a rich and becom- 
 ing costume, and we see by authen- 
 tic relics that such was the case.* 
 Her robe was carefully preserved in 
 Palestine, and thence conveyed to 
 Constantinople in 461 (as we learn 
 from Nicephorus). It was exceed- 
 ingly valuable both in ornament and 
 design. The ground was of a buff, or 
 nankin color, interspersed with flow- 
 ers of blue, white, violet and gold. 
 It is now the holy relic of Chartres.f 
 
 ♦There are two of the Virgin's tunics still 
 preserved, and they are made of very precious 
 stofifl Chardin saw one of these in Mingrelia ; 
 it was of a nankin color and richly embroidered. 
 
 f This tunic was given by Charles the Bald 
 to the Church of Chartres in 877. Numerous 
 miracles have been attributed to it. 
 
 ^The Christians of Damascus have retained 
 thiB custom. Some days before the nuptial 
 feast, the bridegroom sends to his betrothed a 
 pair of bracelets either of gold or of jewels, ac- 
 cording to his means, a piece of gold brocade, 
 and 160 dollars for the expenses of the bath and 
 the wedding banquet {Corres. d' Orient, lettre 
 147.) 
 
 § The bride's crown was usually of gold, and 
 
 In memory of ancient times and 
 the patriarchal customs of her fa- 
 thers, she wore, like Rebecca, ear- 
 rings and bracelets of gold — a mod- 
 est and indispensable present which 
 Joseph had to send some days be- 
 fore the ceremony, J and to which 
 the richer Hebrews added necklaces 
 of pearls, and magnificent sets of 
 jewels. Instead of the pointed gold- 
 en crown, § worn by the brides of 
 the more opulent classes, there was 
 placed on Mary's fair tresses || a 
 simple wreath of myrtle, which in 
 spring would have been intertwined 
 with roses.^ Her bridal veil covered 
 her from head to foot, and floated 
 around her like a cloud.** 
 
 A canopy of precious stuff, borne 
 by four young Hebrews, awaited the 
 
 made in the form of a tower like that of Cybella. 
 This custom was abolished during the siege of 
 Jerusalem by Titus, but the wreaths of myrtle 
 and roses were retained. (Basn., 1. vii., ch. 21.) 
 
 II Amongst the Jews, even the women's apparel 
 was within the province of tradition. "Hair- 
 dressers were called in to curl the young bride's 
 hair, because, said the Rabbins, Jehovah himself 
 arranged Eve's hair in curls, when he gave her 
 to Adam in Paradise." (Basnage, L ,vii., ch. 21, 
 p. 393.) 
 
 ^ Garlands of myrtle and roses were worn by 
 brides of the lower classes. (Basnage, 1. vii., 
 ch. 21. Misnah, Tit. Sotah, c. 9, sect. 14.) 
 
 ** These nuptial veils, embroidered in gold 
 and silver, are still in use all over Syria. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 127 
 
 bride outside her dwelling.* Mary 
 was placed under it, between two 
 matrons, the one on the right repre- 
 senting her mother; the other was 
 probably that Mary of Cleophas, 
 supposed by some authors to have 
 been the elder daughter of St. Ann, 
 but who was only the sister-in-law 
 of the Virgin.f After them came 
 all the nuptial train, waving palm 
 and myrtle branches in token of re- 
 joicing.;}; The procession moved 
 along to the sound of cymbals, harps 
 and flutes playing grave and simple 
 airs in concert ; § these were prob- 
 ably identical with the choirs of 
 David. Then came the bridegroom, 
 his brow adorned with a fantastic 
 crown, clear as crystal, and peculiar 
 
 ^ to his people. 1 1 He was surrounded 
 by a number of friends singing an 
 epithalamium, imitated from Solo- 
 mon's Canticle of Canticles, that 
 mystic and sublime marriage-song 
 whose lofty metaphors have each a 
 divine and hidden meaning. They 
 sang the beauty of the young bride, 
 whose locks were as branches of 
 palm-trees, her form light and grace- 
 ful as that of a young hart, her teeth 
 (white) as a flock of sheep, which 
 come up from the washing ; her eyes 
 as doves upon brooks of waters ; 
 they said that the odor of her re- 
 nown was as sweet as the perfume 
 that exhaled from her garments; 
 that she was the lily of virgins and 
 the object of women's praise. Pass- 
 
 * The order of this bridal pomp, which goes 
 back to the most remote ages, is still found in 
 Egypt. Niebuhr thus describes an Egyptian 
 marriage. " The bride, covered from head to 
 foot, walks between two women under a canopy 
 borne by four men. Several slaves go before, 
 some of them playing the tabor ; others carry 
 fly-flaps, ifhile others again sprinkle perfumes 
 around as they pass along. They are followed 
 by a number of women, and by musicians seated 
 on asses. The ceremony takes place by night, 
 and torches are borne by the slaves." (Niebuhr, 
 Voyage en Arahie, t. 1. ) 
 
 ■{■According to M. Peignot, a conscientious 
 historian, who made many inquiries on the sub- 
 sect, this holy woman was the wife of Cleophas, 
 brother of St. Joseph, and consequently a sister- ^ 
 
 in-law of the Blessed Virgin. (See Recherches 
 historiques sur la personne de J^us Christ et ceUe 
 de Marie, p. 249.) 
 
 I See Fleury, Mceurs des Israelites. 
 
 § The music of the East is altogether different 
 from ours. It is grave and simple, without any 
 labored modulation. All the instruments play 
 together, unless one may take the notion of keep- 
 ing up a continued bass, by repeating incessantly 
 the same note. (Niebuhr, vol. 1, p. 136.) 
 
 II This crown, which, according to the Jewish 
 doctors, contained a mysterious lesson, was 
 composed of salt and sulphur. The salt was 
 clear as crystal, and upon it were traced various 
 characters with the sulphur. {Codex, M. S. 
 apud Wagenseil in Mismam. Tit. Sotah, adult, de 
 uxore suspect, c. 9, sec. 14. ) 
 
r 
 
 198 
 
 LIFE OF TEE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 ing then to the eulogiuin of the 
 bridegroom, they praised his mien, 
 majestic and imposing as Lebanon, 
 the mildness of his voice, the gra- 
 cious urbanity of his manners, and 
 tliey added, that he was distfnguished 
 amongst men as the cedar amongst 
 trees. Then, proceeding to matters 
 of a higher and more general nature, 
 they said that the husband ought to 
 be to his wife as the bunch of myrrh 
 which she wears on her bosom ; that 
 she ought to pass through life rest- 
 ing on him, and as heedless of all 
 other men as though she were in a 
 desert, because that jealousy is in- 
 flexible as death, and its lamps are 
 lamps of fire and flame. They added, 
 that conjugal love was a thing so 
 precious that the richest of men, 
 were he to buy it at the expense of 
 all he possessed, might still reckon 
 that he had it for nothing. 
 
 Now and then the young people, 
 who brought up the rear, formed 
 dances of the same kind as the relig- 
 
 * Dancing, which, in its origin, was intended 
 to imitate the motion of the stars, mingled 
 in all the religious feasts of antiquity. It 
 was, doubtless, of antediluvian origin, and 
 must even have preceded the invention of musi- 
 cal instruments. 
 
 t See Niebuhr, hook quoted. 
 
 f ious dance, which was associated, in 
 its origin, with the religious festi- 
 vals.* Again, they would burst out 
 into those shrill and prolonged cries 
 of joy still in use amongst the 
 Arabs,f which are compared by a 
 recent traveller in Syria to the loud 
 shouts wherewith the vine-dressers 
 of southern France accost their 
 brethren on an opposite hill. The 
 whole procession, as it passed along, 
 scattered small pieces of silver;j; 
 amongst the poor, who were loud 
 in their blessings and gratulations. 
 These silver coins bore either the 
 device of a vine-leaf, or the three 
 ears of corn which were the emblem 
 of Judea.§ The women of Israel, 
 grouped along the wayside, strewed 
 palm-branches before the bride and 
 bridegroom, and now and then they 
 stopped the former to sprinkle her 
 garments with essence of roses.|| 
 Mary, too, was to have her day of 
 triumph in Jerusalem. 
 
 Arrived at the nuptial dwelling, 
 
 X Basnage, 1. vii., ch. 21 
 
 § Some of these Jewish coins have been found 
 of the time of Herod and the Maccabees. They 
 bear the effigfy of no prince, but merely ears of 
 corn and vine-leaves. 
 
 \ This custom, like many others, was borrowed 
 from Egypt. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 129 
 
 the friends of the bride and bride- 
 groom cried in chorus, Blessed he he 
 who Cometh I Joseph covered with 
 his taled, and Mary with her veil, 
 sat side by side under the canopy ; 
 Mary taking the right side — because 
 the Psalmist said, the queen (thy 
 spouse) stood on thy right hand* — 
 and turning towards the south. f 
 The bridegroom placed a ring upon 
 her finger,J saying, "Behold, thou 
 art my spouse according to the law 
 of Moses and of Israel." He took 
 off his taled and threw it over the 
 shoulders of the bride, in imitation 
 of what passed at the marriage of 
 Ruth, who said to Booz, Spread thy 
 coverlet over thy servant.^ One of 
 the nearest kinsmen then poured 
 wine into a cup, tasted of it, and 
 then presented it to the new-married 
 pair, blessing Grod for having created 
 man and woman, and instituted mar- 
 riage. "Whilst they carried to their 
 lips the sacred marriage-cup, the 
 assistants sang to the God of Israel 
 
 * Psalm xliv., 10. 
 
 f Basnage, 1. vii., ch. 21. 
 
 \ It is said that this ring is at Perouse, where 
 it is carefully preserved. (Basnage, lib. vii., 
 ch. 21.) 
 
 S See Buxtort 
 
 a hymn which contained six bless- 
 ings. Joseph then poured out the 
 remainder of the wine in token of 
 liberality, and the assembly scatter- 
 ed handfuls of wheat, as the symbol 
 of abundance; then the cup was 
 broken to pieces by a child. || 
 
 All the assembly, surrounding the 
 newly-married pair with torches, 
 blessed the Lord, and then passed 
 on to the banquet-hall, where they 
 proceeded (according to an ancient 
 bishop of Bresse,^ who traces back 
 this Hebrew tradition to the days 
 of Christ) to choose the king of the 
 feast, who was to be " of the sacer- 
 dotal race," and to preside over the 
 meats and the wines, and to see 
 that the guests did not infringe on 
 the rules of religion and propriety. 
 Joseph and Mary also arose; but, 
 before they followed their guests, 
 they exchanged a few secret words 
 in face of the firmament with all its 
 stars, which attest the glory of the 
 Most High.** " Thou shalt be as a 
 
 II Basnage, 1. vii., ch. 21. Instil, de M<me, L 
 vii., ch. i., p. 336. 
 
 T Gaudent, Serm. 9, B. P., t. ii., p. 38. 
 
 ** St. Thomas is of opinion that it was 
 immediately after the celebration of their mar^ 
 riage that St. Joseph and the Blessed Vir- 
 
130 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 mother unto me," said the patriarch 
 to the holy Virgin, " and I will re- 
 spect thee even as the altar of Jeho- 
 vah." Thenceforward they were no 
 more, in the eyes of religious law, 
 than brother and sister in marriage, 
 although their union was strictly 
 maintained.* 
 
 Those festivals, which were ac- 
 companied by the religious ceremo- 
 ny of sacrifice, lasted seven days, as 
 in the time of the patriarchs. The 
 week being ended, Joseph and Mary, 
 escorted by a brilliant cavalcade 
 of their relations, took the way to 
 Galilee. The little caravan set out 
 to the merry sound of cymbals, and 
 only broke up at the fountain of 
 Anathot,f w^here those of Jerusalem 
 took leave of the newly-married pair, 
 with tears in their eyes, blessings 
 
 gin made, by mutual consent, their vow of 
 virginity. 
 
 * This vow of chastity in married life, which 
 has given rise to so much impious sarcasm, was 
 not unknown amongst the Hebrews ; but with 
 them it was dictated by passion and anger, whilst 
 that of these holy spouses was the result of piety. 
 If a husband said to his wife, " Thou art as my 
 mother," he was never again allowed to consider 
 her in any other light ; especially if he had intro- 
 duced into his vow the altar of Jehovah, the tem- 
 ple, or the sacrifice. "Women sometimes did the 
 same thing. And although these vows were 
 
 * on their lips, and hands solemnly 
 placed on their heart. The Naza- 
 renes went on their way ; they cross- 
 ed the mountains of Samaria, where 
 the eagle watched them from his 
 eyrie on high, regardless of their 
 presence. Sichem then presented 
 itself to the eyes of the travellers, 
 with its evergreen woods, its limpid 
 streams, and its stately edifices 
 rising above the foliage. They 
 passed the reddish sides of the 
 mountain of Garizim, where stood 
 the ruins of the schismatic temple, 
 the shameless rival of the holy 
 house, which John Hircan had 
 destroyed by fire, and which was 
 afterwards replaced by a church 
 dedicated to Mary herself; then the 
 lofty heights of Mount Hebal ; then 
 Sebastes, where a new and stately 
 
 scarcely approved of, because they proceeded 
 from wrath and malediction, they were still 
 considered binding, and had to be religiously 
 fulfilled. (Basnage, lib. vii., chapter 19, page 
 352. Leo of Modena, Ceremon. d Gout, des 
 Juifs, ch. 4.) 
 
 f All the relations went on horseback to escort 
 the bride home, in case her husband's house was 
 not far oflf. This is still customary amongst the 
 Arabs. We have represented the bridal party as 
 separating at Anathot, a small town about five 
 leagues from Jerusalem, because it is the first 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 131 
 
 palace was rising up under the 
 protection of Augustus, and which 
 Herod delighted to embellish, as the 
 only altar whereon he might sacri- 
 fice to the genius of Rome. 
 
 Towards the middle of the second 
 day's journey they distinguished the 
 summit of Mount Thabor, raising its 
 verdant head towards the pale and 
 silvery sky of Galilee, and beyond, 
 the towering heights of Lebanon, 
 hiding their snowy peaks in the 
 clouds. From the woody slopes 
 of Hermon, where the goats were 
 browsing on the tender shoots of 
 the bushes, they descended into a 
 smiling plain, which lay like an 
 immense basket of flowers between 
 hills covered with green oaks and 
 myrtles, vineyards, and groves of 
 olives. Fields of barley, wheat and 
 clover, in full verdure, were gently 
 waving in the cool fresh breeze of 
 opening spring, warmer and more 
 rapid there than in our Western 
 regions. The clear, bright sunlight 
 
 *The philosophers of the last century took 
 great pains to depreciate Palestine. The im- 
 pression which they gave of it still remains, while 
 the poverty and depopulation of that country, 
 scarcely breathing under the sabre of the Mus- 
 sulman, has given them a show of reason in the 
 eyes of superficial readers. Yet there is no doubt ^ 
 
 * lay on that lovely land, vegetation 
 was rapidly progressing, an^ the 
 blue waters, soon to be dried up 
 by the scorching summer sun, were 
 running in silvery brightness through 
 that new Eden. Thriving villages 
 were seen peeping out here and there 
 between rows of stately palms, and 
 at intervals, on the summit of a rock, 
 was seated the solitary fortress whose 
 garrison, Hebrews as yet, and charg- 
 ed with a protecting mission, drew 
 their Damascus blades only against 
 nocturnal marauders, or the Arabs 
 of the desert. This delightful valley, 
 set, as it were, in the midst of high 
 and gloomy mountains, was the vale 
 of Esdrelon, and at its farther end 
 appeared a small city, picturesquely 
 seated on the declivity of a hill, 
 and shining preeminent over all 
 the neighboring hamlets; that fair 
 and smiling town was Nazareth, 
 the birth-place of Mary, the cradle 
 of the Messiah ! * 
 
 Doubtless, it was not without 
 
 that, with the exception of the environs of Jeru- 
 salem, whose sterility no one can deny, we find 
 in that country, and especiallj' that part of it 
 which formerly belonged to the Canaanites, the 
 promised land of Moses. In proof of this asser- 
 tion, we wiU give two descriptions of Galilee, 
 written eight hundred years apart " Galilee,** 
 
182 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 emotion that Mary once more be- 
 held her native town, the memory 
 of which, dimmed, but not effaced, 
 had been wont to haunt her dreams. 
 She had quitted it a child for the 
 splendid walls of the temple; she 
 retui-ned fair, young, accomplished, 
 and pure as when she left. 
 
 The travellers went into the house 
 of St. Ann, an ancient and mysteri- 
 ous dwelling, pai'tly hollowed from 
 the rock, like the prophetic grottoes 
 of former times,* and which w^as soon 
 
 says Flavius Josephus, " is divided into Upper 
 and Lower, both extremely fertile ; the soil is at 
 once rich and light, and abounds in pasturage ; 
 it is suitable for every production, and filled with 
 trees of every kind, but especially with large 
 plantations of vines and olives. It is watered by 
 the torrents which fall from the mountains, and 
 by a vast number of springs and rivulets which 
 are never exhausted, and supply the want of the 
 torrents when these last are dried up during the 
 heat of summer. The fertihty of the soil is so 
 great that it induces all men, even those who are 
 least laborious, to cultivate it. Hence it is well 
 tilled, and there is not a spot of waste land to be 
 seen. Its inhabitants are robust and warlike, 
 the cities frequent, the villages numerous, and 
 so densely peopled that the smallest can reckon 
 fifteen thousand souls. (Joseph., de Bello, lib. 
 ii, cap. ii. ) " To give an idea of the aspect of 
 Gahlee," says a modern traveller, speaking in his 
 turn, " it is not in France that one can find a 
 comparison, but in I'Agro Romano ; around Naz- 
 areth, as around Rome, it is every where the 
 same light, the same configuration of the soil, 
 Nature is there as su- lime as the Gospel itsell 
 
 * to become holier than the temple at 
 Jerusalem — the very dwelling-place 
 of Jehovah. The women of Naza- 
 reth greeted the youthful bride with 
 blessings as she modestly advanced, 
 wrapped up in her veil like Rebecca 
 of old; and Mary, amid the gratu- 
 lations of those who had seen her 
 in her early infancy, entered once 
 more that calm paternal dwelling, 
 which seemed still redolent with 
 the good odor of the virtues of Ann 
 and Joachim. 
 
 GaUlee is an abridged picture of the Holy Land, 
 and when once we have seen it under the differ- 
 ent aspects of day and night, we are able to 
 understand what it must have been in the time 
 of Christ. For the artist, Galilee is an Eden ; 
 nothing is deficient ; neither the accidents of 
 the soil of Judea, nor the luminous solitudes of 
 Palestine, nor the verdant fecundity of Samaria, 
 Garizim, and the Mount of Olives, are more sub- 
 lime than Hermon and Thabor ; nor are the 
 blueish plains of Ascalon more solemn than the 
 fragrant shores of the lake of Tiberias, where the 
 air is absorbed in light. The Galilean soil every- 
 where reminds us of history and miracles ; eve- 
 rywhere it presents traces of heroes and the 
 imprint of God ; and one feels, in contemplating 
 the land from the heights of Thabor, that it 
 was the country where dwelt the Man- God ; so 
 strangely are religious reminiscences mingled 
 with the marvels of earth and sky." {Gorres. 
 d' Orient, t. v.) 
 
 * " There are still found in Nazareth," says the 
 Baron Geramb, " houses like that of St. Joseph, 
 that is to say, very low, and communicating with 
 a cave excavated from the side of tl^e mountain." 
 
CHAPTER YIII. 
 
 THE ANNUNCIATION. 
 
 is easy to imagine 
 the blessed tran- 
 quillity in which 
 Joseph and Mary 
 passed the first 
 months of their 
 chaste union. The peace of God 
 was in and around their humble 
 dwelling, and their time was divided 
 between labor and prayer, which 
 sanctified and rendered it less rude. 
 According to an ancient custom, still 
 in use amongst the Arabs and near- 
 ly all over the East, Joseph wrought 
 at his trade, in a house apart from 
 his dwelling.* His workshop, the 
 same in which Jesus himself subse- 
 quently worked, was a low room, 
 ten or twelve feet in width by as 
 many in length. Outside the door 
 
 * This house of St. Joseph is about 130 or 140 
 paces from that of St. Ann. The place is still 
 pointed out, under the name of Joseph's Work- 
 shop. This shop had been transformed into a 
 spacious church, a part of which was destroyed 
 by the Turks. A chapel still remains, wherein 
 the Holy Sacrifice is daily offered up. {Pelerin- 
 age a Jerusalem, par le K. P. Geramb. ) 
 
 was a stone bench, whereon the 
 passer-by might rest, sheltered from 
 the burning rays of the sun by an 
 awning of palm-leaf matting.f There 
 it was that the laborious Avorkman 
 fabricated plows, yokes, and rustic 
 cars. Sometimes he put up the 
 cabins of the valley, and at times his 
 arm, still stout and strong, hewed 
 down the lofty sycamore and the 
 black turpentine-tree of Mount Car- 
 mel.J The pay which he received 
 for so much toil was very trifling, 
 and even that he shared with the 
 needy. 
 
 On her side, his gentle and holy 
 helpmate was not idle. Gifted with 
 a mind enlightened, wise, and pru- 
 dent, without regret for the past or 
 delusive speculations for the future. 
 
 f These shops are still the same all over the 
 Levant. {See Burckhardt, Voyage en Arable, t. i. ) 
 
 J St. Justin, Martyr {Dialog, cum Ti'iphone), 
 mentions that Jesus helped his adoptive father 
 to make yokes and plows. St. Ambrose {in Luc., 
 lib. iii., 2) asserts that St. Joseph worked at the 
 hewing and felling of trees, the building of 
 houses, and other works of that kind. 
 
134 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 seeing the world just as it is, and 
 hei own position in its true light, 
 Bhe piously conformed herself to it, 
 and fulfilled with religious fidelity 
 its sacred obligations. From the 
 moment she took possession of her 
 mother's dwelling, she clothed her- 
 self with poverty as with a garment 
 sent by Gjd, and became, what she 
 ought to be, in the obscure condition 
 to which Providence had reduced 
 her, an humble and unassuming 
 maiden. All the gay and brilliant 
 works of elegant life were suddenly 
 put aside, and replaced by the ar- 
 duous cares, the monotonous occu- 
 
 * The first mills that were invented were hand- 
 mills. In Egypt, in Arabia, in Palestine, and 
 even in Greece, it was the women who worked 
 them. There is still shown at Mecca, in a fine 
 house which is said to have been that of Khad- 
 idje, a cavity wherein Fatima, surnamed the daz- 
 zling, daughter of Mahomet, turned her hand-mill. 
 {See Burckhardt, Voyage en Arabie.) The wives 
 of the Arab Sheiks have still to perform this la- 
 borious duty. In the time of the sons of Clovis, 
 St Radegonde, queen of France, ground, in imi- 
 tation of the Blessed Virgin, all the grain that 
 she used during Lent. (Le Grand d'Aussy, 
 Hid. prisee des Franfais.) The invention of 
 water-mills is attributed to Mithridates. It is 
 certain that they have existed from his time. 
 Amongst other proofs of this, that pretty epi- 
 gram of Antipator of Thessalonica is quoted, and 
 we will here give a translation of it. " Ye women, 
 who have hitherto been employed in grinding 
 
 ^ pations of a poor household, whose 
 mistress has neither slaves nor 
 servants. The delicate hands of 
 Mary, accustomed to handle silken 
 tissues, plaited, with date-leaves, or 
 reeds pulled on the banks of Jordan, 
 the mat which covered the earthen 
 floor of her dwelling. Her spindle 
 was charged with the coarsest flax. 
 She had herself to grind the wheat 
 and barley,* which she kneaded into 
 round thin cakes. Wrapt in her 
 white veil, an antique urn on her 
 head,f she went to draw water from 
 a neighboring fountain, J like the 
 wives of the old patriarchs, or to 
 
 our grain, sleep in peace, and let your arms 
 rest ; it is no longer for you that the birds usher 
 in the morning by their songs. Ceres has com- 
 manded the Naiads to do your work ; they obey, 
 and swiftly turn a wheel which, in its turn, 
 moves the heavy mill-stones." The Romans did 
 not perfectly succeed in making water-mills until 
 Constantine had abolished slavery. 
 
 f These urns are enormous earthern pitchers 
 of immoderate height. The Nazarenes carry 
 them on their head ; and under such a weight, 
 and sometimes with a child in their arms, they 
 walk with astonishing lightness. (De Geramb, 
 t. ii., p. 239.) 
 
 I This fountain is called in that country Mary's 
 Fountain. Tradition says that the divine Mother 
 of Jesus went habitually thither to draw what 
 water she required ; and it is easy to believe 
 that such was the case, when we consider the 
 ^ scarcity of water in Nazareth. The path which 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 135 
 
 wash her blue robes in the run- 
 ning stream, like the princesses of 
 Homer. 
 
 Jesus, witnessing the toilsome 
 avocations of this strong woman^ 
 frequently alluded to them in his 
 parables, and these simple occu- 
 pations of Mary are preserved in 
 the Gospel tissue as a sea-flower 
 is in amber. We there see the 
 thrifty housewife putting the leaven 
 in three measures of meal,* care- 
 fully sweeping over her house in 
 search of something that she lost,f 
 and patiently mending an old 
 garment. J When Jesus seeks a 
 similitude to recommend purity of 
 heart, he draws it from the remem- 
 brance of her cleanliness who care- 
 fully washed the inside and outside 
 of the cup; § and we may guess that 
 he thought of Mary when praising 
 the offering of the widow who giveth 
 not of her abundance^ hut of her pov- 
 erty. Hence the chanter of Ohio 
 represents Justice under the likeness 
 
 leads to this fountain, where the pious mother 
 of Constantiue constructed fine basins and res- 
 ervoirs, is bordered with nopals and fruit-trees. 
 (De Geramb, place quoted.) 
 
 * St. Luke, eh. xiii., v. 21, and St. Matthew, ch. 
 xiii., 8, 33. 
 
 t lUd., ch. v., V. 36. 
 
 * of his mother, a poor humble woman, 
 carefully weighing the wool which 
 she is going to spin for her own 
 maintenance and that of her son, 
 remaining just and honest towards 
 the rich in the midst of all her 
 poverty. 
 
 At nightfall, || when the birds seek 
 their lofty nests, Mary placed on a 
 clean, bright table, the work of Jo- 
 seph's hands, the little cakes of 
 wheat and barley, the savory dates, 
 milk-meat, fruits, and dry vegeta- 
 bles, which composed the frugal 
 meal of the descendant of the Jew- 
 ish princes. These articles, plainly 
 cooked, formed the principal food of 
 the ancient Hebrews, a sober race, 
 who at need could well content 
 themselves with bread and water.^ 
 As to the Virgin, she lived on so 
 little that ancient authors — lovers 
 of the marvelous — thought she must 
 have been fed by angels. 
 
 When Joseph, tired after the la- 
 bors of the day, entered his humble 
 
 I Ibid., ch. XV., V. 8. 
 § Ibid., ch. xi., v. 39. 
 
 II In Israel, people eat after having worked, 
 and late enough too. (Fleury, Maeurs des Isra- 
 elites.) The principal meal of Joseph and Mary 
 was taken about six in the evening. 
 
 *ilbid., p. 61. 
 
18^ 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 home at sunset, he found his young 
 spouse waiting to present the water 
 which she had warmed to bathe his 
 feet, and the clear, cold water from 
 the fountain, in a vase free from 
 all unclean touch,* for the ablutions 
 necessary before meals. That grave 
 and simple man, with his fine patri- 
 archal countenance, where the pas- 
 sions had left no trace, and that 
 angelic maiden, so eager to serve 
 him with the solicitude of a tender 
 child, formed a group worthy of the 
 golden age.f 
 
 Meanwhile the hour was come-^ 
 the hour which the Eternal had 
 marked out in his divine counsels 
 for the Incarnation of his Son. The 
 angel Gabriel, one of the four J who 
 stand always before the Lord, re- 
 ceived a mysterious mission which 
 
 * Ajuongst the Jews there were numberless 
 precautions to be taken for purifying the vessels 
 in which water was drawn or food prepared. 
 They were not only careful in regard to their 
 having belonged to strangers, but they carried 
 their scruples much farther still, for a thousand 
 circumstances rendered them unclean. {Misnah, 
 Ordo Puriiaium.) 
 
 f Non dedignabar parare d ministrare qtUB erant 
 necessaria JoKt^h. Such are the words put in 
 the mouth of Mary by an ancient author, and it 
 is in perfect conformity with the still existing 
 customs. 
 
 X " There are four angels who are scarcely ever 
 
 t withdrew him for a time from the 
 heavenly court. Assuming one of 
 those radiant coverings of thick air 
 wherewith the celestial spirits clothe 
 themselves when they are to fall 
 under the gross senses of the chil- 
 dren of men,§ the angel left behind 
 him the golden palaces and emerald 
 walls of the heavenly Jerusalem, 
 whose gates are twelve pearls, || and 
 spread his vast white wings, ^ his 
 face all radiant with benignant joy ; 
 for he was bearing to earth a mes- 
 sage of peace, and the holy angels 
 take as much pleasure in the hap- 
 piness of men as the wicked spir- 
 its do in their sufferings and their 
 ruin. 
 
 Having crossed the measureless 
 wastes of heaven, in which every 
 star is an oasis, the angel w^ho had 
 
 seen on earth," say the Rabbins, " because they 
 stand around the throne of God ; these angels 
 are : Michael, who is on the right ; Gabriel, on 
 the left ; Uriel, who is before God ; and Raphael, 
 who is behind him." {Bibt. Rabbin, i., page 
 206.) 
 
 §St. Thomas Aquinas, Question unique des 
 creatures spirituelles, Art. 6. 
 
 I Apocalypse, ch. xxi., v. 21. 
 
 T The Jews represent the angels, as Chris- 
 tians do, with wings. The Koran gives the angel 
 Gabriel one hundred and forty pairs of wings, 
 and says that it takes him only an hour to come 
 from heaven to earth. {Legend of Mahomet.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 137 
 
 foretold to Daniel the coming of the f 
 Messiah, and who was now setting 
 out for the accomplishment of that 
 great promise of God, directed his 
 course with the rapidity of thought 
 towards a little planet, which his 
 piercing eye descried at an immense 
 distance, first, in the state of a 
 nebulous star; then shining with 
 a pale milky light; then, at last, 
 with the rotundity and tranquil 
 light of the moon, whose phases 
 it has. 
 
 On approaching this little globe, 
 which man has proudly divided into 
 zones and hemispheres — where he 
 toils with senseless ardor to amass 
 some treasures which he makes his 
 god — the angel began to distinguish 
 ponds of blue, shining water, sur- 
 mounted by dark peaks like little 
 submarine rocks. These were our 
 oceans and our lofty mountains. 
 The cities did not yet appear, nor 
 men. At length the earth, which 
 
 * It is commonly believed that the angel's 
 visit to the Blessed Virgin took place about the 
 close of the day. 
 
 f The people of the East turn towards a 
 certain point of the heavens when they pray ; 
 this is what they call the Kehla. The Jews 
 turn towards the temple of Jerusalem, the 
 Mahometans towards Mecca, the Sabeans to- 
 
 had first appeared under a micro- 
 scopic form, gradually expanded 
 into vast countries of many king- 
 doms, intersected with deserts, and 
 planted with forests. Arrived at the 
 zenith of Palestine, the angel cast a 
 gracious glance on the pretty town 
 of Nazareth, and, descending softly 
 through the clouds after the manner 
 of a falling star, he gracefully lower- 
 ed himself to the humble, but holy 
 dwelling of Joseph, the carpenter of 
 Galilee, whose fathers were kings. 
 
 The sun was declining towards 
 the lofty promontory of Carmel, and 
 was soon to set behind the horizon 
 of the Syrian Sea, when the angel 
 presented himself in the simple 
 oratory of the Blessed Virgin.* 
 Faithful to the religious customs of 
 her people, Mary, her head turned 
 towards the temple,f was then 
 engaged in her evening prayer to 
 the God of Jacob. % "Hail, full of 
 grace," said the heavenly messen- 
 
 wards the south, and the Ghebers towards the 
 rising sun. 
 
 :{;The Jews prayed three times a day; at 
 sunrise in the morning, at three o'clock in 
 the afternoon, when sacrifice was offered, and 
 in the evening at sunset. According to the 
 Eabbins, Abraham estabUshed the morning 
 >. prayer, Isaac that of the afternoon, and Jacob 
 
188 
 
 LIFE OF TEE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 ger, bending bis riidiant head ; " the 
 Loi*d is with thee ; blessed art thou 
 amongst women." 
 
 Maiy was alarmed at this marvel- 
 ous apparition. Perhaps she feared, 
 like Moses, to see God and die. 
 Perhaps, as St. Ambrose thought, 
 her virginal modesty was alarmed at 
 sight of that son of heaven, who in- 
 troduced himself, like a sunbeam, 
 into that solitary cell, w^here no man 
 ever entered. Perhaps it was the 
 respectful attitude and splendid eu- 
 logium of the angel that disturbed 
 her humility. However it was, the 
 Gospel mentions that she was 
 troubled within herself, and tried 
 in vain to understand the object of 
 that sui-prising visit, and the hidden 
 meaning of that mysterious saluta- 
 tion. 
 
 The angel, perceiving her alarm, 
 mildly said, "Fear not, Mary, for 
 thou hast found grace with God. 
 Behold, thou shalt conceive in thy 
 
 that of the evening. (Basnage, lib. viL, chap. 
 17.) 
 
 * Calvin, that haughty heresiarch, who burned 
 Servetus while preaching toleration, dared to 
 calumniate the Virgin, taking occasion from this 
 text to accuse her of incredulity. St. Augustine 
 had met the objection long beforehand- " The 
 Virgin does not doubt," said he, " non quasi in- 
 
 f womb, and shalt bring forth a Son, 
 and thou shalt call his name Jesus. 
 He shall be great, and shall be call- 
 ed the Son of the Most High: and 
 the Lord God shall give unto him 
 the throne of David his father : and 
 he shall reign in the house of Jacob 
 for ever." At these words, which 
 would have overwhelmed another 
 with joy, the chaste and prudent 
 Mary thought only of her virginal 
 wreath, which she was resolved 
 never to tarnish, and inquired how 
 this prediction was to be reconciled 
 with her vow of perpetual chastity.* 
 Virginal pmity is a thing so holy 
 in the eyes of the angels that Ga- 
 briel, in order to reassure Mary, 
 feared not to reveal a part of the 
 chaste mystery of the Incarnation. 
 " The power of the Most High shall 
 overshadow thee," said he, " and the 
 Holy which shall be born of thee, 
 shall be called the Son of God."f 
 Then, according to the custom of the 
 
 credula de oraculo ; she only seeks to be informed 
 as to how the miracle is to be wrought." St. 
 John Chrysostom adds that this inquiry is the 
 effect of respectful admiration, and not of vain 
 curiosity. 
 
 f This Gospel record has been received by the 
 Mussulmans themselves. Here is how the Koran 
 ^ relates the interview between the Blessed Virgin 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 139 
 
 heavenly ambassadors, he would 
 give her a sign which should confirm 
 the truth of his words. "And be- 
 hold, thy cousin Elizabeth, she hath 
 also conceived a son in her old age : 
 and this is the sixth month with 
 her that is called barren: because 
 no word shall be impossible with 
 God." 
 
 Sarah had smiled an incredulous 
 smile when the angel, seated under 
 the oaks which shaded her tent, 
 announced that she, old and barren, 
 should bear a son. Mary, to whom 
 a. new prodigy was announced, 
 a thing unprecedented under the 
 sun — in fine, a virginal maternity 
 — immediately believed the di- 
 vine promise, and humbling herself 
 before Him who exalted her above 
 all women, she answered submis- 
 sively, " Behold the handmaid of the 
 Lord, be it done unto me accord- 
 ing to thy will ! " At these words 
 the angel disappeared, and the 
 
 and the angel. " The angel said unto Mary : 
 ' God announces his Word to thee : he shall be 
 called Jesus, the Messiah, the Son of Mary, great 
 in this world and in the other, and the confidant 
 of the Most High ; men shall hear his Word 
 from infancy to old age, and he shall be num- 
 bered amongst the just.' 'Lord,* answered 
 Mary, ' how could I have a son ? I know not 
 
 f Word was made flesh to dwell 
 amongst us.* Thus it was that the 
 angel of light treated of our salva- 
 tion with the second Eve, when the 
 crime of the guilty Eve, who had 
 conspired om^ ruin with the infernal 
 angel, was gloriously repaired. Thus 
 it was that a simple mortal was 
 raised to the unequalled dignity of 
 Mother of God, and that, virgin and 
 mother both together, she united by 
 a new miracle the two most oppo- 
 site and sublime states of her sex. 
 "Let us dive no farther into this 
 mystery," says St. John Chrysostom, 
 " or seek to know how the Holy 
 Ghost could work this prodigy in 
 the Virgin ; that divine generation 
 is an unfathomable abyss which 
 no curious glance may sound."f 
 
 We have adopted the opinion of 
 the doctors and theologians who 
 maintain that Joseph was legally 
 the spouse of Mary at the time of 
 the Incarnation. Yet this opinion 
 
 man.' 'Yet so shall it be,' replied the angel; 
 ' God forms creatures as he pleases : if he wills 
 that any thing should exist, he says. Be done, 
 and it is done.' " (Ko., ch. iii.) 
 
 * The mystery of the Incarnation took place 
 on the 25th of March, on a Friday evening, ac- 
 cording to Father Drexelius. 
 
 f St. John Chrysostom, Ser. 4. 
 
140 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 is controverted ; and amongst the 
 authorities who pretend that Mary 
 was not yet the spouse, but only 
 the betrothed of Joseph, we find in 
 the first rank the great St. John 
 Chrysostom himself.* Still, Mary 
 was living in the house of Joseph, 
 according to the same Father, at 
 the moment of the Annunciation. 
 " For," says that illustrious doctor, 
 " in former times it was customary 
 for betrothed brides to reside in 
 the house of the intended husband, 
 which is still occasionally done. 
 We see that the sons-in-law of Lot 
 dwelt in the house of their future 
 father-in-law,"f 
 
 Notwithstanding her profound re- 
 spect for St. John Chrysostom, the 
 Church has not adopted his opinion. 
 The example of the sons-in-law 
 of Lot, which he brings forward 
 to prove his case, is badly chosen. 
 Scripture nowhere says that they 
 lived with Lot; and all goes to 
 prove the contrary, since the patri- 
 arch was obliged to go out, at a 
 
 t moment of terror and consteiiiation, 
 whilst the wicked city was in an 
 uproar, to warn " his sons-in-law 
 that were to have his daughters." 
 Even supposing that these young 
 men had formed a part of Lot's 
 family, since the flocks of that pa- 
 triarch covered the hills and valleys 
 of an entire province, they would 
 have been, on the banks of the 
 Jordan, precisely what Jacob was 
 in Mesopotamia, active and vigilant 
 servants, day and night parched with 
 heat, and with frost.\ We nowhere 
 see that they had their betrothed 
 in their tents ; they lived under the 
 protection of the patriarch, whose 
 chief shepherds they were ; there is 
 nothing in this contrary to the cus- 
 toms of Asia. The Blessed Virgin, 
 being an orphan and alone in the 
 world, would have been in an awk- 
 ward position, residing in the house 
 of her betrothed husband. Such a 
 supposition could only be author- 
 ized by a general custom amongst 
 the Hebrews, and we find in their 
 
 * Descoutures has erred in placing St. John 
 Chrysostom amongst those who maintain that 
 Joseph was legally the husband of Mary at the 
 time of the Incarnation; that writer, who is ^ 
 
 in general very judicious, probably quoted him 
 from supposition. 
 
 t St. John Chrysostom, Serm. 4 
 
 X Gen. ch. xxxi., v. 40. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 141 
 
 code an express law against it.* * 
 St. Chrysostom himself tells us, and 
 in this he fully agrees with the 
 ancient theologians, that God long 
 covered with an impenetrable veil 
 the miraculous maternity of Mary, 
 in order to save her from a revolt- 
 ing suspicion, which would have 
 been as hurtful to the divinity of 
 the Son as to the universal respect 
 due to the Mother. Now, marriage 
 alone could cover Avith its honored 
 mantle the mystery of the Incarna- 
 tion, for a mere betrothal would not 
 have sufficed. And then, if Joseph 
 and Mary had been only betrothed 
 at the time of the Incarnation of 
 the Word, they would have been 
 nothing more four months after, 
 since the Gospel mentions that 
 Mary, after the Annunciation, set 
 out with haste to visit St. Elizabeth, 
 and that it was only on her return 
 from Hebron, after an absence of 
 three months, that she was found 
 with child, a phrase which indicates 
 a position visible to all. Are we 
 to suppose that the marriage of the 
 Virgin was only celebrated when 
 her maternity was known and estab- 
 
 * Misnah, t. iii., de Sponsalibus. Selden, Uxor 
 Hehrdica. 
 
 * 
 
 lished ? What would the two fami- 
 lies have thought ? What would 
 the people of Nazareth have said 
 as they thronged to witness the 
 ceremony ? What insulting re- 
 marks would have been applied to 
 the most pure Virgin, amongst a 
 people with whom female chastity 
 was so sacred that its violation 
 was inevitably punished with death! 
 Would not the birth of the Messiah 
 — that birth which was to be pure 
 as the morning-dew — have been 
 tainted and defiled by this foul 
 slander ? Would not the Jews, 
 and especially those of Nazareth, 
 who were so much opposed to 
 Christ, and who called him the car- 
 penter's son — would they not have 
 taunted him with the irregularity 
 of his birth ? But this they did not 
 do, and the evident conclusion is 
 that they could not do it. 
 
 Here, then, undoubtedly, are the 
 reasons which induced many illus- 
 trious theologians to hold that 
 Mary was really married, notwith- 
 standing the support which the 
 opposite party seem to find in the 
 words of St. Matthew — words which 
 would seem to favor the other 
 interpretation — but which are far 
 
142 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 from being so precise as to resolve 
 the difficulty.* Finally, the dispute 
 has never turned on the principal 
 point Whether wife or betrothed, 
 no tine Christian has ever doubted 
 
 * The verse which has divided the doctors is 
 this : Christi autem generatio, sic erat : cum esset 
 defiponsata mater ejus Maria Joseph, antequam 
 convenirent, inveiUa est in utero habens de Spiritu 
 Sanclo. Those who dwell on the meaning of 
 these words say that the Virgin was only be- 
 trothed, because the Gi'eek verb which renders 
 the Hebrew expression of St. Matthew means 
 desponden, to be promised, and because there 
 is another term signifying to be married, just 
 as there are amongst the Latins desponderi and 
 nubere, so that St. Joseph had not yet taken 
 the Virgin to his house. This they prove by 
 that part of the 20th verse. Noli timere accipere 
 Mariam cofijugem tuam : quod enim in ea natum 
 est, de Spirilu Sancto est, which they thus ex- 
 plain : " Fear not to take Mary for thy wife, for 
 what is conceived in her is conceived by the 
 operation of the Holy Gost." But in order to 
 translate thus, there must be, in conjugem tuam. 
 The opposite party, who are sustained by 
 many of the Fathers, by respectable commen- 
 tators, and nearly all the theologians, find 
 wherewith to combat their opponents in the 
 second chapter of St. Luke, where, notwith- 
 standing that the Virgin was already married to 
 Joseph, the Evangelist employs the Greek term 
 vTTioxveiadaj,, which signifies being promised, and 
 says, Ut prqfiteretur cum Maria desponsata sibi 
 
 that the Mother of God was the 
 purest and holiest of virgins. The 
 Mussulmans themselves agree that 
 she was "the source and mine of 
 purity."f 
 
 ujcre prcegnante : to the end that he might have 
 an understanding with his betrothed wife, who 
 was with child. And in the 19th verse of the 
 first chapter of St. Matthew, St. Joseph is called 
 vir ejus (her husband) and not her betrothed. 
 Although St. Matthew calls the Blessed Virgin 
 sponsa (betrothed) and she a wife, that does not 
 prove that she had not yet contracted marriage; 
 it is merely to show, as one of the Fathers 
 remarks, that she had no closer connection with 
 her spouse than if she was only his betrothed. 
 
 f The purity of Mary is fully recognized by 
 the Mussulmans ; hence we find that Abou- 
 Ishac, ambassador from the Caliph to the court 
 of the Greek Emperor, being present at a re- 
 ligious conference with the patriarch and the 
 Greek bishops, the latter reproached the Mus- 
 sulmans with many slanderous stories which 
 had been formerly circulated against Aischah, 
 the widow of their prophet, which had occa- 
 sioned grievous disputes amongst them. Where- 
 upon Abou-Ishac replied that these disputes 
 were not to be wondered at, seeing that, 
 amongst Christians, there had been so much 
 difference of opinion regarding the glorious 
 Mary, mother of Jesus, " who may be called," 
 said he, "the mine and source of all purity," 
 genab ismet mealo kon offet. (D'Herbelot, BiJbli^ 
 oth. Orientale, t. ii., p. 620.) 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE VISITATION. 
 
 gEANWHILE, * 
 Mary, informed 
 by the angel 
 of the miracu- 
 lous pregnancy 
 of Elizabeth, 
 resolved on go- 
 ing to offer her tender congratula- 
 tions to her venerable relative. It 
 was not, as heretics have dared to 
 assert, that the Yirgin wished to 
 have ocular demonstration of the 
 reality of that extraordinary event. 
 She knew that nothing is impossi- 
 ble to God, and could not suppose 
 that an envoy from heaven would 
 bring her words of falsehood and 
 deceit from the Most High. She 
 set out, not to assure herself, but 
 because she was sure. She set out 
 with haste, because charity, says 
 St. Ambrose, admits neither hesita- 
 tion nor delay; and because, with 
 her wonted kindness and benevo- 
 lence, she longed to impart to the 
 venerable guardians of her child- 
 hood a portion of that sanctifi cation, ^ 
 
 and of those celestial graces, which 
 sprang from her soul, as from a 
 source of living water, ever since 
 she bore in her chaste womb the 
 Creator of the world. 
 
 With the consent of St. Joseph, 
 whose simple but lofty soul was in 
 perfect unison with her own, Mary 
 set out from Nazareth in the season 
 of roses, and took her way towards 
 the mountains of Judea, where 
 Zachary, the Aaronite, had his 
 dwelling. The Scripture, omitting 
 details, and barely mentioning facts, 
 does not mention whether the Vu-- 
 gin was accompanied by any one 
 on this journey. Some authors have 
 thought that she travelled alone, 
 which is altogether improbable. 
 In fact, the distance from Nazareth 
 to the city of Ain * is five days' 
 journey. There was part of Galilee 
 to be traversed, with the hostile 
 country of Samaria, and nearly aU 
 
 * Zachary lived at Ain, or Aen, two leagues 
 south of Jerusalem. St. Helen had a beautiful 
 church erected on the site of his house. 
 
144 
 
 LIFE OF TEE BLESSED TTROIN MART. 
 
 Qie lands of Joda. Then, the coon- ^ ^ 
 trr is bristling with mountains, in- 
 tereected by foaming torrents, and 
 intersp^-sed with deserts.* The 
 roads, which the Romans subse- 
 quently repaired, were at that time 
 only beaten by the heavy foot-fall 
 of the camels, and were covered 
 with round stones, so that the trav- 
 eller was at every step in danger 
 of falling. Then, when night came, 
 the wayfarer was obliged to put up 
 in some caravanserea, where there 
 was nothing to be found but a small 
 room covered with a rush-mat,f 
 and no provisions of any sort; for 
 the primitive hospitality had re- 
 trograded amongst the Hebrews in 
 proportion to the advance of civili- 
 zation. Such being the case, is it 
 at all likely that a man of years 
 and experience, like Joseph, would 
 have wantonly exposed a young 
 woman, feur, delicate, and totally 
 
 * Attlko^lli Jadnvma then &r more popoloin 
 tlisa It now is, there were atin some dtstziete so 
 bamn ttoi fliej could not be ealthralied. Tbe 
 Goipel ifwVii of deserts not far irom. flie eitiea^ 
 wliitlier JesBS retired to praj. 
 
 f "lliere is no inn in anj part of Sjiis or 
 PalesiiDe," sajs IL deYolney; "but the cities 
 sad most ci the Tillsgee hsTe each a large build- 
 ing called £emss-eend, whidi srares as an 
 Mjtem ior an farnvdOera. llieae hoetdries. 
 
 unused to the ways of the world, 
 to brave alone the thousand dan- 
 gers of such a journey? Such a 
 supposition is contrary to all the 
 customs of Asia,^ and especially 
 of the people of Grod. Xever was 
 Jewish woman allowed to under- 
 take such a journey without a 
 fitting escort 
 
 If St Joseph, as Pere Croiset 
 thinks, could not accompany the 
 Blessed Virgin, it is probable that 
 she would join some of her pious 
 relatives who were going to the 
 Holy City, and that she thus trav- 
 elled in safe company. In fact, we 
 always find her travelling with 
 some of her friends, whether in 
 going to Jerusalem to celebrate the 
 grand festivals, or with the holy 
 women, following Jesus during his 
 missions, at a much later period of 
 her life. " Although she could have 
 had no better guardian tlian her- 
 
 ahrajB pJaeed oatside the walls of the dtj car 
 town, are oonqpoeed <tf four wings sorroonding 
 a sqnare eoort, which serves as a padded ; the j 
 cont ai n neither fanutore nor pronakms." 
 
 J|;Xo <me tzarek akme in Sjiia; the j go in 
 troops and eaiBrans, and emj one must wait 
 until there are serend persons boond for the 
 same plaeei Ihese {Heeantkms are xerj neeea- 
 saxy in eoontnes open to the Arabs, sofdi as 
 Syria and Palestine. (Yolner, Vogage en &pie.'^ 
 

 <f^ 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 145 
 
 self," says St. Ambrose, "yet she 
 never went abroad without fitting 
 company."* 
 
 Arrived at the sacerdotal town 
 where the Levite dwelt with his 
 blessed wife, Mary went straight to 
 their well-known house. Elizabeth, 
 apprised by a slave of her cousin's 
 unexpected visit, came forth to 
 meet her with every demonstration 
 of joy. 
 
 Seeing her approach, the young 
 Virgin bowed down, and laying her 
 hand on her heart, Peace he with 
 you, said she, eager to give the 
 first salutation, f Elizabeth drew 
 back. The pleased and friendly 
 expression of her countenance gave 
 place to that of profound respect. 
 Her features kindled by degrees. 
 It was plain that something strange 
 and unusual was passing within 
 her. The simple formula of polite- 
 ness which the Virgin had pro- 
 nounced in her low sweet voice 
 destroyed Elizabeth's familiarity. 
 Suddenly the prophetic spirit de- 
 scended upon her, and she exclaim- 
 
 '^ ed, " Blessed art thou amongst women^ 
 and blessed is the fruit of thy womb. 
 And whence is this to me," she 
 added, " that the Mother of my Lord 
 should come to me? For behold, 
 as soon as the voice of thy saluta- 
 tion sounded in my ears, the infant 
 in my womb leaped for joy. And 
 blessed art thou that hast believed, 
 because those things shall be ac- 
 complished that were spoken to 
 thee by the Lord." 
 
 Mary's answer was the sublime 
 Magnificat, the first canticle of the 
 New Testament, and the most beau- 
 tiful in all the Scriptures. 
 
 " My soul doth magnify the Lord : and my 
 spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour : 
 
 "Because he hath regarded the humiUty of his 
 handmaid : for, behold, from henceforth all gen- 
 erations shall call me blessed. 
 
 "For he that is mighty hath done great things 
 to me : and holy is his name. 
 
 " And his mercy is from generation to genera- 
 tion, to them that fear him. 
 
 " He hath showed might in his arm : he hath 
 scattered the proud in the conceit of their heart. 
 
 " He hath put down the mighty from their 
 seat, and hath exalted the humble. 
 
 " He hath filled the hungry with good things 
 and the rich he hath sent away empty. 
 
 * St. Ambr. de Virginibus, 1. iL be with you " {salem alaicom), they lay their 
 
 f This salutation, so often used by Christ, is hand on their heart. This salutation was in 
 
 still common throughout the East. When two use in the days of Abraham. {S&7Bjrj, Note on 
 
 persons meet, after the usual greeting, "Peace ^ ^^ H'^ ^^* ^ ^ Koran."^ 
 
14S 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 "He hath reoeiyed Israel his servant, being 
 mindfal of his mercy. 
 
 **A8 he spoke to oar fathers, to Abraham and 
 to his seed for eTer." 
 
 It was thus that the Virgin sud- 
 denly saw, by a supernatural light, 
 those ancient prophecies and their 
 perfect fultillment — herself a thou- 
 sand times more enlightened and 
 more privileged than all the proph- 
 ets put together. "In that cele- 
 brated interview," says St. Ambrose, 
 "Mary and Elizabeth both prophe- 
 sied by the Holy Ghost, with whom 
 they were tilled, and by the merit 
 of their children." 
 
 The Virgin remained three months 
 in the country of the Hethites, with- 
 in a short distance of the city of 
 Ain, in the depth of a shady and 
 fertile vale, where Zachary had his 
 country-house.* It was then that 
 the daughter of David — herself, 
 too, a prophetess, and gifted with a 
 genius equal to that of the illustri- 
 ous founder of her race — could con- 
 template at her leisure the starry 
 firmament, the stately forests, and 
 
 f the vast ocean as it stretched in 
 ever-changing majesty along the 
 blueish coasts of Syria. The Bless- 
 ed Virgin never looked without 
 emotion on those magnificent scenes 
 of the creation. All the works of 
 nature spoke to her heart of their 
 great Author, and gently animated 
 her soul while charming her eyes. 
 The plain, which spread far and 
 away towards the mountains of 
 Arabia, the blue dome of heaven, 
 rising like a tent over the habita- 
 tions of men, gave her an idea of 
 the immensity of the creating God ; 
 the rich yellow of the crops, the 
 delicious fruitage, and the fresh 
 mountain-spring to her announced 
 his providence ; the voice of the 
 tempest, his power ; the order of the 
 heavenly bodies, his wisdom; and 
 his care over the birds of the air 
 and the insects of the earth, his 
 supreme goodness. 
 
 In these rural excursions, she 
 sometimes rested on the verge of 
 a gushing spring, whose sparkling 
 spray she loved to watch and to 
 
 * This country-house was within a short dis- 
 tance of Ain, in the depth of a pleasant and fer- 
 tile valley which now serves as a garden for the jf but it is now nothing more than a heap of ruins, 
 
 village of St. John. There was formerly a church 
 erected in this place in memory of the Visitation, 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 147 
 
 listen to the gurgling of its water. 
 This spring, called Kephtoa in the 
 time of Joshua, now bears the name 
 of Mary.^ 
 
 To the rear of the Hebrew pon- 
 tiff's villa lay one of those gardens, 
 called by the Persians Paradise^ 
 the arrangement of which had been 
 borrowed by the Jewish captives 
 from the people of Cyrus and of 
 Semiramis. In it were seen the 
 most beautiful trees of Palestine; 
 and the tufts of flowers thrown care- 
 lessly here and there through the 
 glades, the sweet perfume of the 
 orange -trees, the rivulet gliding 
 along beneath the drooping branch- 
 es of the willows, gave a thousand 
 charms to the shade. There it was 
 that Mary's mild persuasions made 
 Elizabeth forget her fears for the 
 issue of an event whose anticipa- 
 tion filled her with hope and joy, 
 but which was full of danger to a 
 woman of her advanced age. How 
 pure, how lofty must have been the 
 discourse of these two holy women ! 
 
 * This fountain has so great an abundance of 
 water that it irrigates and fertiUzes the whole 
 valley. Tradition says that Mary sometimes 
 "went thither. It was called Nephtoa in the 
 days of Joshua ; it now bears the name of the 
 Virgin's Fountain. ^ 
 
 * the one young, artless, and ignorant 
 of evil, like Eve when she came 
 from her Creator's hand; the other 
 full of days, and enriched with a 
 long experience of the things of 
 life ; both profoundly pious, and 
 both well-pleasing to Jehovah: the 
 one bearing in her womb — so long 
 barren — a son who was to be a 
 prophet, yea, more than a prophet; 
 the other, the blessed germ of the 
 Most High, the Chief and Liberator 
 of Israel. 
 
 In the fine evenings of summer, 
 when the silvery radiance of the 
 moon brightened the foliage, the 
 elegant meal of the family was 
 spread beneath a large fig-tree, or 
 under the green leaves of a spread- 
 ing vine.f There was lamb, fed on 
 the aromatic slopes of the moun- 
 tains; fish, taken by the Sidonian 
 fishermen ; the wild honeycomb, 
 from the hollow of some ancient 
 oak; then, in green baskets, skill- 
 fully made of palm-leaves, were the 
 dates of Jericho,J which figured 
 
 f The Hebrews made it a practice to eat 
 in gardens, under trees and arbors ; it is 
 so natural, in warm countries, to seek the 
 fresh air, (Fleury, Moeurs des Israelites, p. 
 101.) 
 
 X The dates of Syria and Judea are yellow 
 
148 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 even on the table of Caesar; the f 
 apricots of Ai-menia, the pistachio- 
 nuts of Aleppo, and the water- 
 melons of Egypt : finally, the golden 
 wine of Lebanon, the fragrant juice 
 of vineyai'ds in the far-oflf islands 
 of the Cyprian Sea, and wine from 
 the hills of Engaddi, preserved in 
 stone jai'S,* was sparkling in costly 
 cups. Maiy, temperate as ever in 
 the midst of this profusion, content- 
 ed herself with some fruit and a 
 cup of water. Frugality was not 
 in her a forced virtue, it was one 
 of choice.f 
 
 Some, with a view to enhance 
 the humility of the Virgin, which 
 requires no such aid, have pre- 
 tended that she acted as a servant 
 
 and black, round like apples, and very sweet. 
 Pliny reckons forty-nine sorts of dates. 
 
 * The Jews who are settled in Yemen still make 
 use of these jars. (5feeNiebuhr, Voyage en Arable.) 
 
 f With her, abstinence seemed no longer a 
 privation ; it was rather her custom not to 
 make use of meat, if we may so speak. (P. 
 Valverde, Vie de Jesms Christ, t. i., p. 6.) 
 
 X Zachary was descended from Abdia, father 
 of the eighth sacerdotal family. These ancient 
 families were rare, several of them having re- 
 mained in Persia after the captivity. Elizabeth 
 was descended from Aaron and from David. 
 The Jews place John the Baptist far above 
 Jesus, because he passed his life in the desert 
 and was the son of a pontiff. Jesus, on the 
 
 and almost as a slave towards St 
 Elizabeth. 
 
 This is mere folly. Elizabeth 
 would never have permitted a wo- 
 man whom she had herself pro- 
 claimed as the mother of her Lord, 
 and whom she had loudly extolled 
 beyond all the daughters of Sion, 
 thus to humble herself before her. 
 The holy spouse of ZacharyJ had no 
 want of either servants or slaves. 
 Christians and Jews all agree that 
 this family was of distinguished 
 rank, and the illustrious birth of 
 St. John the Baptist seemed even 
 to throw some discredit on that of 
 Jesus Christ, whose reputed parents 
 were much more obscure, and lived 
 the life of the common people. 
 
 contrary, was born of a poor woman, and seem- 
 ed to them only an ordinary man. (St. J. Chry- 
 sos. in Matt, Serm. 12.) The Mussulmans have 
 retained a great idea of St. John the Baptist, 
 whom they call Jahia ben Zacaria »( John son of 
 Zachary). Saadi, in his GtUistan, makes men- 
 tion of the sepulchre of St. John the Baptist, 
 venerated in the mosque of Damascus. He 
 himself had prayed there, and he mentions an 
 Arabian king who had come there on a pilgrim- 
 age. " The Caliph Abdalmalek would fain buy 
 that church from the Christians," says d'Herbe- 
 lot, "and when they refused to take four thou- 
 sand pistoles, which he had offered them for it, 
 he took it from them by force." {Bibliotheque 
 Orienlale, t. ii.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 149 
 
 The attentions which the mild t 
 and amiable Virgin lavished on 
 Elizabeth had in them nothing of 
 servility ; they were just such atten- 
 tions as she would have bestowed 
 on her mother had heaven spared 
 her to her; and we may, indeed, 
 suppose that she was often remind- 
 ed of her own parents by the sight 
 of that loving, devoted, and venera- 
 ble pair, who loved her so paternally, 
 and. who, after that first interview 
 wherein her greatness was so mar- 
 velously revealed, never failed to 
 treat her with a profound respect 
 which Mary's humility would fain 
 avert, but could never wholly de- 
 stroy. 
 
 It is easy to imagine, say the 
 Fathers, how many blessings were 
 drawn down on this excellent fam- 
 ily by the visit of the Blessed Vir- 
 gin. If the Lord blessed Obededom 
 and all that was his — even so as 
 to excite the >envy of the holy king 
 David — for having had the ark of 
 the covenant three months in his 
 house, what blessings must not 
 Zachary and his household have 
 received from the three months' so- 
 journ of Her of whom the ark of old 
 was but the figure, so holy and so 
 
 venerable was she? "The purity 
 in which St. John passed his whole 
 life," says St. Ambrose, "was the 
 effect of that unction and that grace 
 infused into his soul by the presence 
 of the Blessed Virgin." 
 
 It is not precisely known whether 
 the Mother of God assisted at the 
 delivery of Elizabeth. Origen, St. 
 Ambrose, and other grave authors, 
 both ancient and modern, pronounce 
 in the affirmative, and their opinion 
 is highly probable. It would, in- 
 deed, have been very strange if, 
 after so long a visit to her cousin, 
 Mary had suddenly left her at the 
 critical time, and without any rea- 
 sonable motive for such a hasty and 
 untimely departure. Custom re- 
 quired that all the matrons of the 
 family should be with the new 
 mother to share in her happiness. 
 "We see by the Gospel that Elizabeth 
 was surrounded by her friends on 
 that solemn occasion, and that the 
 birth of St. John the Baptist drew 
 to his father's house a great number 
 of friends and kinsfolk. It is ob- 
 jected that virgins were not usually 
 present at such times, and the objec- 
 tion is very proper ; but Mary was 
 married, and therefore bound by 
 
150 
 
 UFS OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 certain rules of decorum, which she f 
 could not violate without going in 
 expi-ess contradiction to customs 
 which had been handed down from 
 the patriarchal times. The retir- 
 ing habits of the Virgin are also 
 brought forward to prove that the 
 very rumor of the festivals which 
 were to celebrate the birth of the 
 Precursor would have driven her 
 away like a frightened dove. But 
 Mary could easily reconcile her dis- 
 taste for the world with that exqui- 
 site sense of propriety attributed to 
 her by the Fathers, and her tender 
 solicitude for her mother's niece. It 
 
 * Some theologians, embracing an opinion 
 contrary to that of Origan and St. Ambrose, 
 maintain their position by quoting that passage 
 of St. Luke which only mentions the delivery of 
 Elizabeth after having brought the Virgin back 
 to Galilee. It seems to us that the subject de- 
 manded more reflection than these writers seem 
 to have bestowed upon it. For ourselves, we 
 have carefully examined the Gospel of St. Luke, 
 and that minute investigation has convinced us 
 that the proof brought forward is anything but 
 conclusive ; for it is the manner of St. Luke to 
 make just such transpositions, as we can show 
 by two instances of a similar kind. For instance, 
 after having followed the preaching of St. John 
 the Baptist, and announced his imprisonment, 
 St Luke speaks, in the following verse, of the 
 baptism of Jesus Christ, which is well known to 
 have taken place long before the Precursor was 
 
 is, then, most probable that she 
 remained in the house of the pontiff 
 until Elizabeth was out of danger ; 
 when, withdrawing herself fi'om the 
 admiration which she never failed 
 to excite, she quitted the mountains 
 of Judea, after having embraced 
 and blessed the new Elias.* 
 
 A religious author observes that 
 the blessed daughter of Joachim 
 went with haste to visit her cousin, 
 but that she slowly and reluctantly 
 departed from those fresh valleys 
 whose oaks had sheltered angels.f 
 Perhaps, like the sea-bird, she had a 
 presentiment of the coming storm. 
 
 cast into prison. In recounting the adoration 
 of the shepherds, St. Luke enlarges on their 
 marvelous accounts of their visit to the grotto 
 of Bethlehem, and the astonishment wherewith 
 they were heard ; then, returning all at once to 
 the scene of the adoration, he speaks of their de- 
 parture from the stable. This, then, is our reason 
 for adopting the opinion of St. Ambrose, which, 
 of itself, is altogether the most probable. Father 
 Valverde, who has closely studied the Holy 
 Fathers, is also of opinion that the Blessed Vir- 
 gin did not leave her friends till she had seen 
 and blessed the young Precursor of the Messiah, 
 f In the vale of Mambre, which is but six 
 stadas from Hebron, there was still to be seen, 
 in St. Jerome's time, a tree of enormous thick- 
 ness, said to be the identical tree under which 
 Abraham received the visit of the three angels, 
 who came to announce to him the birth of Isaac. 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE RETURN FROM HEBRON. 
 
 'iN her return to 
 Nazareth, Mary 
 cheerfully re- 
 sumed her ple- 
 beian life, and 
 the toilsome oc- 
 cupations which she had to suspend 
 during her long visit. She became 
 again the active and diligent young 
 housewife, who finds time for work, 
 time for prayer, time for pious read- 
 ing ; whose whole conversation was 
 in heaven, and who seemed to have 
 applied to herself those wise and 
 beautiful words of the Psalmist, 
 " All the glory of the king's daughter 
 is within." Meantime she was ad- 
 vancing in her virginal pregnancy, 
 and Joseph began to wax jealous. 
 
 The high and upright mind of the 
 patriarch was tortured with doubt 
 and grievous perplexity. At first 
 he could not believe his eyes, and 
 thought it more just to distrust the 
 evidence of his senses than the vir- 
 tue of a woman who had always 
 appeared to him a prodigy of holi- 
 
 f ness and purity. But Mary's con- 
 dition became daily more evident 
 "She was found with child," says 
 the Gospel; which means that all 
 JS"azareth knew the fact, and that 
 Joseph's friends, in the simplicity 
 of their heart, came to offer their 
 cruel congratulations, which he had 
 to receive with a show of composure, 
 while they gave a crushing certainty 
 to what he had himself suspected. 
 According to the Proto-gospel of St. 
 James, he prostrated himself before 
 God, bathed in tears, in the first 
 paroxysm of his grief, and cried out, 
 " Who has betrayed me ? who has 
 brought evil into my house ?" Then, 
 yielding to his tenderness for the 
 young orphan, whom he had always 
 regarded as the pearl and glory of 
 her sex, he bitterly accused himself 
 for not having taken more care of 
 her. "Alas!" said he to himself, 
 " my history is that of Adam ; when 
 he rested most securely in his glory 
 and happiness, Satan suddenly be- 
 guiled Eve by deceitful words and 
 
162 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Bcduced her."* When his mind t 
 became calm enough to reflect, he 
 found himself in a most painful 
 pi*edicament 
 
 Accoi*ding to the Jewish law, 
 adultery was punished with death. 
 When there were no witnesses (even 
 one would have sufficed), and that 
 the woman denied the crime laid to 
 her charge, she was conducted, by 
 order of the Sanhedrim, to the east- 
 ern gate of the temple, and there, in 
 presence of all, her veil was torn off, 
 a cord from Egypt was put around 
 her neck to remind her of the mira- 
 cles which God had wrought in that 
 country, her long hair was spread 
 over her shoulders — because it was 
 a disgrace for a Jewish woman to 
 be seen with her hair disheveled — 
 a priest pronounced a formal male- 
 diction, to which she had to answer 
 Amen, and then presented to her the 
 famous cup of the waters of jealousy, 
 which was also called the hitter 
 waters, because they had the taste 
 of wormwood.f That accursed cup 
 was sure to kill the guilty wife, un- 
 
 * Proto-gospel of St. James, in the Apocryph 
 of Fabric, t, L, p. 97. 
 f Basnage, 1. vii., ch. 22. 
 J Wagenseil, in Sotah, p. 244 
 
 less the husband himself had been 
 unfaithful. In that case, the miracle 
 did not take place, " seeing," said 
 the doctors of Israel, " that it would 
 have been unjust if one criminal 
 were absolved, whilst God himself 
 punished the other."J A hasty, pas- 
 sionate husband would not have 
 failed to drag Mary before the priests 
 of the Lord, ho as to have her go 
 through the ordeal oUhe bitter waters; 
 but Joseph, the most moderate as 
 well as the most just of men, never 
 so much as thought of taking such a 
 step. Being unable to keep Mary 
 under his roof, since the law of 
 honor and the law of Moses both for- 
 bade it, he would, at least, take all 
 possible precautions to prevent the 
 separation from injuring her charac- 
 ter, for he was a Ju^t man, and un- 
 willing piiblicly to expose her, " I 
 will divorce her," said Joseph sadly 
 within himself, " but before God, and 
 not before the judges who would 
 condemn her to death and me to 
 throw the first stone. § I will save 
 her from the reproaches of her fami- 
 
 § It was decreed by the Jewish law that the 
 accuser should cast the first stone at the person 
 who was condemned on his accusation. (See 
 Indit. de Mdise, t. ii., p. 65.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 153 
 
 ly and the contempt of the world. 
 But how am I to get out of this 
 labyrinth where death and dishonor 
 stare me in the face at every turn?" 
 And the son of David was over- 
 Avhelmed with affliction. 
 
 Mary could not but see the gloomy 
 dejection of the just man to whom 
 God had confided her, and certainly 
 it must have cost her much to con- 
 ceal from him the glorious embassy 
 of the angel. But how was she to 
 communicate an event so strange, so 
 miraculous, as that of her divine 
 maternity, and without other proof 
 than her own assertion? Justly 
 persuaded that the mystery of the 
 Incarnation of the Word must be 
 revealed by supernatural means in 
 order to be believed, and leaving to 
 Him who had wrought such great 
 things in her the care of convincing 
 Joseph of her innocence, " the daugh- 
 ter of David," says the great bishop 
 of Meaux, " at the risk of seeing her- 
 self not only suspected and aban- 
 doned, but also lost and dishonored. 
 
 * " Undoubtedly," says Bossuet (Elev. sur 
 les MysL), "God could have abridged these 
 suflferings of Joseph by sooner revealing to 
 him the mystery of Mary's pregnancy ; but 
 his virtue would not then have been put to 
 
 * left all to God and remained in 
 peace." 
 
 The Eternal, from the height of 
 his starry throne, cast a look of com- 
 passion on the just man whom he 
 had made to undergo so hard a trial,* 
 before raising him to the supreme 
 honor of being his representative 
 on earth; and the angels, with their 
 eyes fixed on the holy house of 
 Nazareth, anxiously awaited the 
 result of that secret struggle where- 
 in humanity, duty, and the noblest 
 feelings of the soul were engaged. 
 At length, the patriarch conceived 
 an idea so generous, so heroic, as 
 almost to place him on a level with 
 the Queen of Angels. He resolved 
 to sacrifice his honor, the respect 
 which he had gained by his spotless 
 life, the means of existence which 
 furnished his daily bread, and the 
 air of his native land, so necessary 
 to the aged, in order to save the 
 reputation of a wife who did not 
 even seek to justify herself and who 
 was so cruelly condemned by ap- 
 
 the proof. We should not have seen Joseph 
 ti'iumph over the most indomitable of all pas- 
 sions, and the most rational jealousy that ever 
 was would not have been cast down at the feet 
 of virtue." 
 
r 
 
 151 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 peariinces. There was but one way 
 to leave Mary without ruining her, 
 for her family would have provoked 
 explanations which must have ended 
 fatally. It was, to expatriate him- 
 self, to go leave his bones in a for- 
 eign land, and to take upon himself 
 all the odium of such a desertion. 
 There is a species of resignation 
 which is in itself a glorious triumpli, 
 and there are sorrows which, if pa- 
 tiently endured, Heaven repays as 
 mmiiticently as martyrdom itself. 
 Of this class was the unknown sac- 
 ritice of the Virgin's spouse. In 
 order to reconcile his duty and his 
 humanity, he accepted beforehand 
 the ignominious character of a heart- 
 h ss husband, an unfeeling father, a 
 man without conscience and without 
 faith. He accepted the contempt of 
 his neighbors, the mortal hatred of 
 Mary's friends, and resolved to give 
 up his good name for the sake of her 
 whose mysterious and unaccountable 
 position filled his heart with sorrow, 
 and made his life miserable. 
 
 St. John Chrysostom delights to 
 dwell on the admirable conduct of 
 St. Joseph. "It was expedient," 
 says that great saint, " that coming 
 on to the time of our Saviom* there 
 
 ^ should appear many marks of greater 
 perfection than the world had yet 
 dreamed of. Thus, when the sun is 
 about to rise, the East assumes a 
 brilliant coloring long before the first 
 streak of day has reached the hori- 
 zon; so did Jesus Christ, about to 
 emerge from the womb of the Virgin, 
 already shed light on the world. 
 Hence it was that, even before that 
 divine birth, prophets leaped for 
 joy in their mother's womb, women 
 prophesied, and Joseph manifested 
 a superhuman degree of virtue." 
 
 We have here adopted the opinion 
 of St. John Chrysostom in preference 
 to that of St. Bernard, who supposes 
 that Joseph penetrated of himself 
 the mystery of the birth of Christ, 
 and that, seeing Mary pregnant, he 
 doubted not — in his profound vener- 
 ation for her — that she must be the 
 miraculous Virgin of Isaiah. "He 
 believed it," says the Apostle of the 
 Crusades, " and it was only from a 
 sentiment of humility and respect 
 like unto that which made St. Peter 
 afterwards say, * Depart from me, 
 Lord, for I am a sinful man,' that St. 
 Joseph, not less humble than St. 
 Peter, thought of leaving the Vir- 
 
 ^ gin, not doubting but that she 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 155 
 
 was pregnant of the Saviour of * 
 mankind." 
 
 This interpretation — a very pious 
 one, indeed, and worthy of him who 
 was honored with the title of devout 
 chaplain of Mary — is yet more in ac- 
 cordance with the ascetic notions of 
 the middle ages than with the cus- 
 toms of the ancient Hebrews, and 
 will not stand a close investigation. 
 In fact, the words of the Evangelist 
 are so clear, that it takes no small 
 industry to make them obscure. It 
 is not at all that instinctive feeling 
 of religious awe, which makes us 
 shrink from a religious object, that 
 suggests to Joseph the idea of leav- 
 ing Mary; it is the prompting of 
 conscience and of duty. "He was 
 just," says Bossuet, " and his justice 
 would not permit him to remain in 
 the company of a woman whom he 
 could no longer believe innocent. 
 As for his suspecting what had 
 happened by the operation of the 
 Holy Ghost, it was a miracle as 
 yet unexampled, and could by no 
 means present itself to the human 
 mind." 
 
 The words of the angel would no 
 longer have a meaning, and would 
 savor of falsehood — which could not 
 
 be the case — if St. Bernard's hypoth- 
 esis were carried out. " Fear not," 
 said the ambassador of God, " to 
 take unto thee Mary thy wife : for 
 that which is conceived in her is of 
 the Holy Ghost." Does Joseph pro- 
 claim his unworthiness at the mo- 
 ment when he is made certain that 
 Mary bears in her womb the very 
 Author of nature ? Does he reveal 
 to the angel those scruples which 
 must now be more urgent than ever ? 
 Does he beg that the cup of honor, 
 presented to him by the celestial 
 messenger, may pass to some wor- 
 thier mortal ? He does nothing of 
 the kind. The storm of his soul is 
 suddenly hushed, and he falls into 
 that profound calm which follows 
 great moral tempests. 
 
 Some will have it that the proph- 
 ecies relating to the Messiah were 
 familiar to Joseph, as to all the 
 Hebrews ; that he must have been 
 aware that the time of the Messiah 
 was at hand, and that he must have 
 known at first sight, considering the 
 sanctity of Mary, that she bore in 
 her womb the Saviour of the world. 
 But the understanding of those 
 prophecies was then far from being 
 as easy as may now be imagined 
 
156 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Whether it was that Isaiah's alle- 
 gorical descriptions of the glorious 
 reign of Emanuel had led the 
 synagogue into error, or that the 
 carnal mind of the Jews could not 
 raise itself above the earth and 
 earthly things, it is certain that the 
 Hebrew people — that hard-headed 
 people — had taken a wrong view of 
 the subject, and did not choose to 
 be set right. The ambassador of 
 God, the desired of the nations, was 
 to be a legislator, a great captain, a 
 monarch magnificent and powerful 
 as Solomon. The Apostles them- 
 selves were long mistaken as to the 
 humble and pacific mission of the 
 poor King, who passed silently along. 
 They were seen to flatter themselves 
 with gilded visions and kingdoms 
 in perspective, even in sight of that 
 deicide city where their Master was 
 to be put to death. It was not 
 without an effort that our Lord 
 brought them back to spirituality, 
 and rectified their ideas, ever ready 
 to return within the narrow channel 
 of material and palpable goods, 
 whither they were directed by the 
 
 * Bossuet, Elev. siir les Mysferes, t. ii., p. 135. 
 t Whence comes he (the Messiah)? From 
 the royal city, Bethlfcliem of Juda. Where are ^ salem.) 
 
 ambitious dreams of doctors and 
 traditionary Pharisees.* 
 
 If even the Apostles, then, had so 
 much trouble in divesting themselves 
 of their childish prejudices — they 
 who lived amid the miracles of the 
 Messiah, and in constant intercourse 
 with him — how could Joseph have 
 done it of himself, without assist- 
 ance from on high? The coarse 
 garments of the workman had little 
 resemblance to the purple of the 
 kings of Juda ; and of all things, it 
 was least expected that the Messiah 
 should spring from the people. Gal- 
 ilee was, besides, the last country 
 that would have been thought of. 
 " Search the Scriptures," said the 
 doctors of the law to the disciples 
 of Christ, " and see that out of Gali- 
 lee a prophet riseth not." In fact, 
 the prophets had specially mention- 
 ed Bethlehem of Juda — Bethlehem, 
 the house of bread — as the birth- 
 place of the Messiah ; and the Jew- 
 ish commentators, outstripping the 
 prophets, pretended to point out the 
 quarter of the city in which he was 
 to be born.f Joseph was too hum- 
 
 his parents? In the quarter Biral Harba of 
 Bethlehem of Juda. (See Talmud de Jeru- 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 157 
 
 ble to think that his lowly roof was ^ 
 to shelter so much greatness, and 
 Mary's silence left him nothing to 
 guess. 
 
 As for the project of sending back 
 the Virgin to her own family, through 
 pure respect, as some learned theolo- 
 gians of the Bernardino school will 
 have it, it would have been utterly 
 impracticable in a nation so jealous 
 of all that concerned female honor. 
 Mary was an orphan, and therefore 
 under the care of her relations, all 
 of whom were not of a pacific dis- 
 position, while it is probable that 
 some of them were far from being 
 pleased by the marriage of their 
 young kinswoman with the obscure 
 Nazarene. It is very improbable 
 that they would have taken Joseph's 
 word, and admitted, without further 
 information, that the Virgin was 
 pregnant of the King-Messiah. It is 
 much more likely that they would 
 have brought the husband before 
 the tribunal of the ancients, there to 
 give an account of his conduct ; for 
 the question was no longer of a sim- 
 ple divorce, but of the state of the 
 child borne by Mary, a young woman 
 of illustrious birth and unsuitably 
 married, according to the eleven 
 
 who, St. Jerome says, had been 
 themselves on the list of candidates 
 for the hand of the young and lovely 
 heiress of Joachim. . 
 
 Thence there would have resulted 
 two grave facts. Either Joseph 
 would have kept silent, and then he 
 would have been obliged to take 
 back his wife and forbidden ever to 
 put her away ; * or he would have 
 solemnly sworn that the child which 
 Mary bore was not his, in which 
 case that child became incapacitated 
 for any employment. His birth, de- 
 filed in its source, would have de- 
 barred him from the national assem- 
 blies, public schools, and entrance 
 to the temple or the synagogues. 
 His posterity, inheritors of disgrace, 
 would not be admitted to the privi- 
 leges of the Hebrews till the tenth 
 generation. He became a fugitive, 
 without rights, without country, and 
 the warrant which condemned his 
 mother to be stoned would have 
 stamped his brow and that of his 
 children with the accursed mark of 
 Cain. But such could never have 
 been the case. Rather than suffer 
 such a stain to be imprinted on their 
 
 * InstU. de Mdise, t. ii., 1. vii. 
 
168 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 royal genealogy, the proud descend- 
 ants of David would have killed the 
 Vii-gin with their own hands. Such 
 examples ai'e not rare, and are of 
 frequent occui-rence even now, in 
 Judea as well as in Arabia.* 
 
 Joseph was too wise and too hii- 
 mane to place himself in either pre- 
 dicament, and he found, as is always 
 the case, that the most generous 
 part was the best. He resolved, 
 then, to quit his native city and his "^ 
 dear, though suspected wife, who 
 had made him so supremely happy 
 ever since their chaste marriage. 
 WTiilst he was preparing for this sad 
 separation, as he slept one night on 
 his solitary couch, the angel of the 
 Lord appeared to him in a dream. 
 
 * Niebuhr relates that, " in a cofifee-house of 
 Yemen, an Arab having asked another who was 
 present if he were not the father of a young and 
 beautiful woman newly married in his tribe, the 
 father suspecting an ironical meaning in the 
 question, and thinking the honor of his family 
 compromised, coolly arose, ran to his daughter's 
 house, and, without saying a word, plunged his 
 weapon into her bosom." Father Geramb gives 
 an anecdote of the same kind. " The widow of 
 a Bethlehemite Cathohc," says he, " became an 
 object of suspicion ; not knowing where to con- 
 ceal herself from the vengeance of her family, 
 she took refuge in the convent of the Fathers of 
 the Holy Land, and put herself under the sacred 
 protection of the altar. Her asylum was disco v- 
 
 1 
 
 "Joseph, son of David," said the 
 celestial envoy, "fear not to take 
 unto thee Mary thy wife; for that 
 which is conceived in her is of the 
 Holy Ghost. And she shall bring 
 forth a son, and thou shalt call his 
 name Jesus ; for he shall save bis 
 people from their sins." 
 
 After this dream and the words 
 of the angel, Joseph found himself 
 completely changed. His humility 
 was not in the least disturbed by 
 the honor which God conferred up- 
 on him, in transferring to him the 
 guidance of his only Son ; but he 
 had become a father and a spouse 
 in aflfection, and he thought of noth- 
 ing more but the care of Mary and 
 her divine Infant. 
 
 ered, the doors of the monastery forced, and the 
 young woman dragged out, her hair all dishev- 
 eled, to the public place, amid the shouts of the 
 populace, and the supplications of the monks, 
 who demanded, in the name of the crucified God, 
 pardon and mercy for that unjiappy creature, 
 who lotidly asserted her innocence. She called, 
 in despair, on her father and brothers beseech- 
 ing them, in the most touching manner, to save 
 her from a cruel death. They advanced in 
 gloomy silence, each grasping a poignard : the 
 unfortunate woman shuddered ; a moment after, 
 the three poignards were plunged into her 
 heart, and the murderers, washing their hr.nds in 
 the blood of their daughter and sister, exulted in 
 having washed away the disgrace of their family." 
 
V/^'j!^. 
 
 '^l^ 
 
LIFE OF THE B LESSEE) VIE GIN MARY. 
 
 159 
 
 St John Chrysostom inquired why 
 the angel of the Lord appeared in a 
 dream to Joseph, and not manifestly, 
 as to the shepherds, to Zachary, and 
 the Virgin. '• It is," says he, an- 
 swering his own question, " because 
 Joseph had great faith, and required 
 no clearer revelation. As for the 
 Virgin, since there were things to 
 be told to her greater and more in- 
 credible than all that was told to 
 Zachary, it was necessary that they 
 should be revealed to her before 
 they were put into execution, and 
 that by a manifest revelation. The 
 shepherds, also, as more rude and 
 
 * simple, had need of a clear vision. 
 But Joseph having already seen the 
 pregnancy of Mary, having conceived 
 iniurious suspicions of her,* and being 
 ready to change his sorrow for joy, 
 if he only had the opportunity, re- 
 ceived with all his heart the revela- 
 tion made by the angel .... This 
 conduct of Providence was infinitely 
 wise, since it served to prove the 
 excellence of Joseph's virtue, and 
 to render the Gospel history more 
 credible, showing him actuated by 
 the same motives that would have 
 influenced any man on such an oc- 
 casion." * 
 
 CHAPTER XI 
 
 THE BIRTH OF THE MESSIAH. 
 
 impious empire-f 
 had planted its 
 eagles even on 
 the farthest 
 shores. The Ro- 
 mans had caught the Eastern world 
 as in a net. 
 
 EANWHILE, the * before them in the depths of its 
 
 deserts, and the most distant ti-ibes 
 of Asia, the peaceable Chinese, sent 
 a solemn embassy to Cassar to 
 seek his powerful alliance. Egypt 
 
 * St. John Chrysostom, Serm. 4. 
 f The Jews designated the Roman Empire by 
 Sarmatia trembled * the name of the impious empire. 
 
IGO 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 and Syria were nothing more than 
 Roman provinces. Judea, herself, 
 was tributary ; and the Jewish 
 king, paying dear for a capricious 
 protection, was no more than a 
 crowned slave. The time was come 
 — the Messianic oracles were to be 
 accomplished. The power of Rome 
 was at its height, as Balaam had pre- 
 dicted ; and, according to the famous 
 prophecy of Jacob, the sceptre had 
 departed from Juda: for the phantom 
 of royalty, which still hovered over 
 the Holy City, was not even a nation- 
 al phantom. Just then, there was 
 published in Judea an edict of Caesar 
 Augustus, ordering all the people to 
 be enrolled. This census, much more 
 complete than that which took place 
 under the sixth consulate of the 
 nephew of Julius Caesar,* comprised 
 
 * Augustus had three diflferent enrollments 
 made throughout the empire : the first, during 
 his sixth consulate with Agrippa, in the year 28 
 before the Christian era ; the second, under the 
 consulate of Caius Marius Censorinus, and of C. 
 Asinins Qallus, eight years before the same era ; 
 the third, and last, under the consulate of Sextus 
 Pompeius Nepos and Sextus Apuleius Nepos, in 
 the fourteenth year of the Christian era. It is 
 of the second census that St. Luke speaks. The 
 decree which ordained it was issued in the eighth 
 year before the Christian era. (Sueton., in Octa, 
 V. 27.) 
 
 t Augustus had a work prepared, just then. 
 
 ^ not only persons, but property, and 
 also the various qualities of the 
 lands. It was the basis on which 
 the tribute was to be levied.f 
 
 The Roman governors were charg- 
 ed with the execution of this edict, 
 each in his own department.^ Sex- 
 tius Saturninus, governor of Syria, 
 began fi.rst with Phoenicia and Celo- 
 Syria, rich and populous cantons, 
 which required long and patient toil. 
 In fact, there is nothing like it on 
 record, except the famous registry 
 taken by William the Conqueror a 
 thousand years later, and so well 
 known in England as the Domesday- 
 book. Having executed the orders 
 of Caesar in the Roman provinces, 
 with the kingdoms and principalities 
 belonging to it, at the end of three 
 years from the date of the decree, § 
 
 containing the description of the Roman empire, 
 and the countries subject to him. Tacitus, Sue- 
 tonius, and Dion Cassius refer to this book, and 
 its particular description of the provinces. From 
 the way in which they speak, it must have been 
 a most elaborate work. 
 
 % TertuUian states that such was the case with 
 Sextius Saturninus, who was governor of Syria, 
 
 §The three years which were employed in 
 making this census can make no difficulty, 
 for it certainly took that length of time to 
 enregister the whole of Syria, Celo- Syria, 
 Phoenicia, and Judea. Joab took nearly ten 
 months to number the fighting-men of the ten 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 161 
 
 they at length reached Bethlehem, 
 precisely at the memorable period 
 of our Saviour's birth. Cassar and 
 his agents thought they were per- 
 forming only an administrative oper- 
 ation, by ascertaining the population 
 and resources of the empire; but 
 God had other designs, which they 
 were made instrumental in execut- 
 ing, though they^ knew it not. His 
 Son was to be born in Bethlehem 
 of Juda, the humble birth-place of 
 King David. He had foretold it, by 
 his prophet, more than seven hun- 
 dred years before, and all the world 
 was put in motion to accomplish 
 that prophecy. 
 
 It appe-ars that, faithful to an an- 
 cient custom, the Jews still had 
 themselves enrolled by families and 
 by tribes. David was born at Beth- 
 lehem ; his descendants, therefore, 
 regarded that small city as their na- 
 tive place, and the cradle of their 
 
 tribes ; and the census of Augustus, at the time 
 of the birth of Christ, consisted of many other 
 details, since it embraced not only the individ- 
 uals, but the various qualities of their lands. It 
 took William the Conqueror six whole years to 
 make his register, although the Domesday-book 
 contained neither Ireland, Scotland, Wales, nor 
 the Channel Islands, but merely England itself. 
 ♦Never has date been more disputed than 
 
 ^ house. There it was, then, that they 
 assembled to give in their names 
 and the state of their property, con- 
 formably to the edict of Caesar. 
 
 The autumn was near its close, 
 the torrents were rushing wildly 
 down into the valleys, the north 
 wind whistled through the tall tur- 
 pentine trees, and a gray cloudy sky 
 announced the approach of the 
 winter's snow. On a dark, gloomy 
 morning, in the year of Rome 748,* 
 a Nazarene was seen busily engaged 
 in preparing for a journey, which 
 could not be one of choice, for the 
 time was unseasonable, and the 
 woman who accompanied him, and 
 whom he seated so carefully on the 
 mild and patient animal which the 
 daughters of the East prefer, was 
 very young, and far advanced in her 
 pregnancy. To the saddle of the 
 beautiful animal f on which the 
 young Galilean rode was attached a 
 
 that of the birth of Christ. We adopt that of 
 the authors of VArt de verifier les dates (the Ait 
 of verifying dates), which seems to us the most, 
 correct, and which places the birth of the Savi nu- 
 on the 25th of December, in the year of Eonie 
 748. According to Baronius, our Saviour was 
 born on a Friday. 
 
 f The asses in Palestine are remarkably beau- 
 tiful 
 
162 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 palm-leaf basket, containing provi- 
 sions for the journey; dates, figs, and 
 dried grapes, ?onie barley-cakes, and 
 an earthen pitcher for taking water 
 from the spi'ing or the cistern. A 
 leathern flask, of Egyptian manufac- 
 ture, hung on the opposite side. 
 The traveller flung over his shoulder 
 a bag containing some clothes, gird- 
 ed his loins, wrapped himself up in 
 his goat-skin cloak, and holding in 
 one hand his crooked stick, with the 
 other tie seized the bridle of the ass 
 which bore his young wife. Thus 
 they quitted their humble abode, 
 and descended the narrow streets of 
 Nazareth, amid the good wishes of 
 their friends and neighbors, who 
 cried on every side, " Go in peace ! " 
 These travellers, who thus set out on 
 that cloudy morning, were the hum- 
 ble descendants of the great kings 
 of Juda, Joseph and Mary, who were 
 going, on the order of a pagan and 
 a stranger, to inscribe their obscure 
 names beside the most illustrious 
 names in the kingdom. 
 
 This journey, undertaken at such 
 an inclement season, and in a coun- 
 try like Palestine, must have been 
 
 * Mich., ch. v., ver. 2. 
 
 * extremely painful to the Blessed 
 Virgin, in the position in which she 
 was; but yet she did not murmur. 
 That delicate and fragile creature 
 had a soul both firm and courage- 
 ous ; a lofty soul, which greatness 
 did not dazzle nor joy agitate, and 
 which bore misfortune silently and 
 calmly. Joseph, advancing by her 
 side, was meditating on the ancient 
 prophecies which promised, four 
 thousand years before, a Liberator 
 to his people. As he journeyed 
 towards Bethlehem, at the bidding 
 of a Roman, he reflected on the 
 words of the prophet Micheas, " And 
 THOU, BethlehexM Ephrata, art a little 
 one among the thousands of Juda ; 
 out of thee shall He come forth unto 
 me, that is to be the Ruler in Isra- 
 el."* Glancing, then, at his humble 
 equipage and his modest sj^ouse, in 
 her plain, unpretending apparel, he 
 revolved in his mind the great proph- 
 ecies of Isaiah, " He shall grow up 
 as a tender plant before him, and as 
 a root out of a thirsty ground ; there 
 is no beauty in him, nor comeliness: 
 .... despised and the most abject 
 of men." f And the patriarch began 
 
 •|" Isaiah, ch. liii., ver. 2. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 163 
 
 to comprehend the designs of God 
 on his Christ. 
 
 After five days of a toilsome jour- 
 ney, the travellers caught a distant 
 view of Bethlehem, the city of kings, 
 seated on a rising ground, amid 
 smiling hills planted with vines, 
 olives, and groves of verdant oaks. 
 Camels, laden with women wrapped 
 up in purple cloaks, and covered 
 with white veils ; Arab nakas, dash- 
 ing along at full speed, bearing gay 
 and brilliant cavaliers ; groups of 
 old men, mounted on white asses, 
 and chatting gravely together, like 
 the ancient judges of Israel,* were 
 all going up to the city of David, 
 already crowded with Hebrews, who 
 had arrived on the previous days. 
 Outside the city, but a short distance 
 from its walls, arose a large square 
 building, whose white walls stood 
 out in strong relief from the pale 
 green of the olive-trees which cover- 
 ed the hill. It looked like one of 
 the Persian caravansaries. Through 
 
 * The horse was used, amongst the Jews, 
 for military men ; hence it was taken as the 
 emblem of fight. Judges, on the contrary, 
 rode on asses of perfect beauty ; hence the 
 scriptural words, " Speak, you that ride upon 
 fair asses, and you that sit in judgment." — 
 (Judges, V. 10.) 
 
 its open door were seen a crowd of 
 slaves and servants coming and 
 going in its vast yard. This was 
 the inn. Joseph, hurrying the pace 
 of the animal on which the Virgin 
 rode, hastened thither in hopes of 
 arriving in time to obtain one of 
 those narrow cells, which belonged 
 of right to the first comer, and was 
 never refused to any one ;f but mer- 
 chants and ti^avellers were already 
 issuing in crowds from the cara- 
 vansary. It could accommodate no 
 more. Gold might, doubtless, have 
 procured admission, but Joseph had 
 no gold. 
 
 The patriarch returned with this 
 saddening intelligence to Mary, who 
 heard it with a smile of resignation, 
 and taking hold of the bridle to con- 
 duct the poor animal, which was 
 already sinking with fatigue, he 
 wandered about through the streets 
 of the little city, hoping, but in vain, 
 that some charitable Bethlehemite 
 might offer them a lodging for God's 
 
 f There is nothing found in these cells but 
 four walls, an abundance of dust, and sometimes 
 scorpions. The keeper is only bound to give the 
 key and a mat. The traveller has to provide the 
 rest ; hence he has to carry with him his bed, 
 his cooking apparatus, and even his provisions. 
 (Volney, Voyage en Syrie.) 
 
164 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 sake. No one offered them any- 
 thing. The evening wind fell cold 
 and piercing on the young Virgin, 
 who breathed not a word of com- 
 plaint, though her face grew paler 
 every moment, for she was scarcely 
 able to support herself. Joseph, in 
 despair, continued his fruitless at- 
 tempts ; and more than once, alas ! 
 he saw some wealthier stranger 
 admitted where he had been rudely 
 lepulsed. Surely interest, that rul- 
 ing passion of the Jews, must have 
 petrified every soul, when Mary's 
 situation excited no pity. The night 
 closed in. The lonely travellers, 
 seeing themselves rejected by all the 
 world, and despairing of obtaining 
 a shelter in the city of their fathers, 
 quitted Bethlehem, without knowing 
 which way to turn, and advanced 
 at random through the fields, still 
 partially lighted by the fading twi- 
 light, while the jackals made the 
 air resound with their shrill cries. 
 
 ♦Justin quotes the prophecy of Isaiah (xxxiii. 
 16), as applying to our Saviour's birth in a cave, 
 " The for I locations of rocks shall he his highness." 
 
 f"It is an incontestable fact," says Dupuis, 
 " and independent of all the consequences which 
 I will draw from it, that precisely at the hour of 
 midnight, on the 25th December, in those ages 
 when Christianity fiiv-it appeared, the celestial 
 
 f as they roamed in search of their 
 prey. 
 
 Southward, within a short dis- 
 tance of the inhospitable city, there 
 appeared a gloomy cavern, hollowed 
 in the rock. The entrance was to- 
 wards the north, and the cave be- 
 came narrower towards its farther 
 end. It served as a common stable 
 for the Bethlehemites, and sometimes 
 as a shelter for the shepherds on 
 stormy nights. The pious couple 
 blessed Heaven for having guided 
 their steps towards this rude asylum ; 
 and Mary, with the help of Joseph's 
 arm, made her way to a bare rock, 
 which formed a sort of seat, though 
 narrow and uncomfortable, in a hol- 
 low of the rock. 
 
 It was there, " in the fortifications - 
 of rocks," as Isaiah had predicted,* 
 just as the rising of the mysterious 
 constellation Virgo announced mid- 
 night,! that the ahna\ of the great 
 Messianic prophecy, amidst the sol- 
 
 sign which appeared on the horizon, and ushered 
 in the opening of the new solar revolution, was 
 the Virgin of the constellations. 
 
 \ The word alma, employed by Isaiah, signifies, 
 in Hebi'ew, a virgin in all her innocence. We 
 have already said, in note fifty-five of the first 
 chapter, that this word has given rise to many 
 controversies between Jews and Christians. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 165 
 
 emn stillness of nature, concealed by * 
 a luminous cloud,* brought forth 
 Him whom God himself had produced 
 before the hiUs,-f and who was begotten 
 from all eternity. He suddenly ap- 
 peared, like a sunbeam emerging 
 from a cloud, before the eyes of his 
 young, astonished mother, and came 
 to take possession of the throne of 
 his poverty, whilst the angels of 
 God, prostrate around, adored him 
 under his human form. J That vir- 
 ginal childbirth was exempt from 
 cries as from pains, and no groan 
 disturbed the sacred silence of that 
 night of wonders. Miraculously con- 
 ceived, Jesus was born more mirac- 
 ulously still. 
 
 God was preparing for the world 
 a new and grand sight, in the birth 
 of a poor King. The palace which 
 he destined for him was a deserted 
 stable, a fitting asylum for him who, 
 in the course of his life, was to say, 
 
 * Proto-gospel, St. James, ch. 17. 
 
 f According to the opinion of the Kabbins, 
 the Messiah was in the terrestrial paradise with 
 our first parents. (Sohar Chadaseh, f. 82, 4.) 
 He existed even before the world. (Nezach Is- 
 rael, ch. 35.) And before becoming man he was 
 in glory with God. (Phil., ch. ii., v. 6.) Thus, 
 immediately before the time of Christ, the idea 
 of the Messiah's pre-existence found its way into 
 the higher theology of the Jews. 
 
 " The fox has his den, the birds of 
 the air have their nests, but the Son 
 of man has not where to lay. his 
 head." Moses, proscribed at his 
 birth, had, at least, a cradle of bul- 
 rushes, when his sister, the young 
 Mary, exposed him amid the reeds 
 and the sacred lotus which at night- 
 fall dip their leaves in the Nile ; § 
 but Jesus, the divine outcast, who 
 came amongst us to suffer and to 
 die, had not even that. He was laid 
 in a manger, on a handful of damp 
 straw, providentially forgotten by 
 some camel-driver from Egypt or 
 Syria, hastening away before the 
 dawn. God had provided a couch 
 for his only Son, as he provides 
 nests for the birds of the air. 
 
 But this new Adam was to be 
 covered from the inclemency of the 
 weather, and also because modesty 
 required it. Mary tore her veil into 
 bands, wherewith she wrapped up 
 
 1 Hebrews, i. 6. Psalm xlvii. 7. 
 
 §The lotus, which was consecrated to the 
 sun, is an aquatic plant, the leaves of which 
 dip into the Nile when the sun sets, and spring 
 up again when he rises. This plant has a 
 narcotic quaUty. It was said of those who 
 made long voyages, that they had eaten of 
 the lotus; that is to say, that they had for- 
 gotten their country. (Basnage, 1. ix., ch. 15, 
 p. 450.) 
 
1G6 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 his delicate limbs; then the infant 
 God was adored, by her and her 
 lioly spouse, as Joseph of old, the 
 tinest type of Jesus Christ, was by 
 his father and mother. 
 
 St. Basil, entering into the myste- 
 ries of fervor and of rapture which 
 passed through the soul of the Vir- 
 gin, shows her divided between 
 maternal love and holy adoration. 
 •What am I to call thee?" said she, 
 
 addressing her infant God 
 
 " A mortal ? . . . not so, for I con- 
 reived thee by divine operation. 
 .... A God ? but thou hast a hu- 
 man body. Am I to approach thee 
 with incense, or to offer thee my 
 milk ? Am I to cherish thee as a 
 tender mother, or to serve thee pros- 
 trate iff* the dust? A marvelous 
 contrast! Heaven is thy dwelling- 
 place, yet I rock thee on my knee ! 
 Thou art on earth, and yet retainest 
 thy place in heaven ! The heavens 
 are witl^ thee!" 
 
 * The village of the shepherds is situated on a 
 very pleasant plain, about a quarter of a league 
 to the north of Bethlehem, and in the depth of 
 the valley is the celebrated field, where these 
 shepherds were grazing their flocks on Christ- 
 mas night. According to grave authors, both 
 sacred and profane, the appearance of the angels 
 to the shepherds was not the only prodigy that 
 
 Thus were accomplished the great 
 prophecies of Isaiah and Micheas. 
 "And there were in the same coun- 
 try shepherds watching, and keep- 
 ing the night-watches over their 
 flock. And behold, an angel of the 
 Lord stood by them, and the bright- 
 ness of God shone round about 
 them : and they feared with a great 
 fear. And the angel said to them : 
 Fear not: for behold, I bring you 
 good tidings of great joy, that shall 
 be to all the people : for this day is 
 born to you a Saviour, who is Christ 
 the Lord, in the city of David. And 
 . this shall be a sign unto you : you 
 shall find the infant wrapped in 
 swaddling-clothes, and laid in a 
 manger. And suddenly there was 
 with the angel a multitude of the 
 heavenly host, praising God and 
 saying : Glory to God in the moH- 
 
 EST ; AND ON EARTH PEACE TO MEN OF 
 GOOD WILL."* 
 
 The marvelous vision had disap- 
 
 signalized the birth of the infant God. They 
 relate that, dtiring that holy night, the vines 
 of Engaddi blossomed ; that, at Comus, the 
 Temple of Peace suddenly fell, and the ora- 
 cles of the demons were silenced for ever. 
 The mere birth of our Lord was a sentence 
 of banishment for those heathen deities, who 
 had hitherto been permitted to deliver oi-acles. 
 
"R.TJudens:nx 
 
 THE-NAnviTY OF CHRi:.! 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 167 
 
 peared, the heavenly music had 
 ceased, and the shepherds, leaning 
 on their crooks, still listened for a 
 renewal of those ravishing sounds. 
 When they could hear nothing more 
 save the night-breeze murmuring 
 through the valley, and could no 
 longer discover in the deep blue sky 
 a single radiant point which fancy 
 could convert into an angel, the 
 shepherds took counsel together, 
 and said one to another, " Let us go 
 to Betlilehem, and see this word that 
 is come to pass." Then, taking 
 baskets, w^ith such simple presents 
 as their cabins could afford, they left 
 their flocks to their own guidance 
 for a while, and set out by the 
 glimmering light of the stars for 
 the little city of David. At sight 
 of the poor stable, they felt their 
 hearts burn within them, like the 
 disciples of Emmaiis, and they said 
 to each other, ''Perhaps this is the 
 place." For they knew that the di- 
 vine child who was born to them 
 had not seen the light under gilded 
 ceilings, nor was laid in a royally- 
 
 Milton, with true poetic inspiration, thus de- 
 scribes, in one of his earher compositions, the 
 flight of these pretended divinities on Christmas 
 Eve. 
 
 f adorned cradle. The angel had 
 made no such announcement. They 
 advanced, then, with faith, hope, 
 and love, towards that deserted 
 stable, where they well deserved to 
 find the promised Saviour, since they 
 came to seek him with pure hearts 
 and single minds. 
 
 Looking into the cave, in order to 
 assure themselves that they had real- 
 ly reached the term of their noctur- 
 nal pilgrimage, these " men of good 
 will" discovered Him who came to 
 preach the Gospel to the poor, and 
 abolish the curse of slavery, under 
 the humble form of a little babe 
 peacefully slumbering in his crib. 
 
 The Virgin, bent over her new- 
 born infant, was regarding him with 
 touching humility and profound ten- 
 derness. Joseph stood close by, his 
 venerable head bowed down before 
 that adopted son, who was truly 
 God. A ray of moonlight shone on 
 the divine group, and on the reddish 
 wall of rock ; without, the earth was 
 calmly reposing in the bright, sil- 
 very light.* 
 
 * 
 
 *"The Persians call Christmas night sch^b 
 jaldai, the clear and luminous night, because of 
 the descent of the angels." (D'Herbelot, BilL 
 Orient, i, ii. p. 294.) 
 
168 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 " This is the place," said the shep- 
 hei-ds to themselves; and prostrat- 
 ing themselves, respectfully, before 
 the manger of the King of kings, 
 they offered to the infant God " the 
 mite " and the homage of the poor. 
 
 There they related the apparition 
 of the angels, their ravishing hymns, 
 and their joyful words. Joseph ad- 
 mired this divine manifestation, and 
 Mary, who heard the simple tale in 
 silence, treasured up every word 
 within her heart. This duty fulfilled, 
 and their mission ended, the Judean 
 shepherds retired praising God, and 
 published in the mountains the mar- 
 vels of that holy night. Those who 
 heard them were seized with aston- 
 ishment, and said to themselves, 
 " Can it be possible ? Are we, then, 
 gone back to the days of Abraham, 
 when angels visited shepherds?" 
 
 Perchance it was these tales, told 
 
 * " El Azraki quotes the ocular testimony of 
 many respectable persons," says Burckhardt, "in 
 proof of a remarkable fact which has not hitherto 
 been noticed, as far as I am aware. It is, that the 
 figure of the Virgin Mary, with the young Asia 
 {Jesus) on her knee, was carved as a divinity on 
 one of the pillars of the Caaba " (Burckhardt, 
 Voyage en Arable, t. i., p. 221.) 
 
 f This fact, which confirms the account of 
 the Arab historian, is mentioned in the Toldos, 
 a very ancient Jewish book, written with the 
 
 t at evening in the skirt of the woods 
 01* in the deep ravine, whilst the 
 camels drank together at the lonely 
 spring, that induced one of the Arab 
 tribes to deify Mary and the child. 
 The sweet image of the Virgin, with 
 her Son on her knee, was painted on 
 one of the pillars of the Caaba, and 
 solemnly placed amongst the three 
 hundred and sixty deities of the 
 three Arabias. In the time of Ma- 
 homet they were still seen there,* 
 as we find from grave Arab writers. 
 After the massacre of the Holy In- 
 nocents, that valiant tribe rose in a 
 body, gave a long, loud cry of re- 
 venge, and, heedless of the enemy's 
 superior numbers, attacked Herod's 
 son, protected as he was by the 
 Roraans.f 
 
 This authentic anecdote, so curi- 
 ous and so little known, serves tfi 
 confirm the supernatural fact related 
 
 most violent hatred of Christians. We there 
 see that Herod the Great and his son had to 
 maintain a war against one of the tribes of the 
 desert, who adored the image of Jesus, and Mary, 
 his mother. This tribe sought the alliance of 
 several cities of Palestine, and especially that of 
 Hai. But, since the Jews themselves place this 
 event in the lifetime of Herod, it must have been 
 because of the massacre of the Innocents, as the 
 old king lived only one year after the birth of 
 our Saviour. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 169 
 
 by St. Luke ; a fact which the scoff- 
 ing philosophers of the Yoltairian 
 school, and the, if possible, still 
 more pagan professors of panthe- 
 ism, have not failed to set down as 
 a fable. The fantastic devotion of 
 these Arabs, who commit idolatry 
 with the true God before the preach- 
 ing of the Gospel, can only be ac- 
 counted for by the miracles of the 
 holy night of Christmas. 
 
 On the eighth day after his birth 
 the Son of God was circumcised, 
 and named Jesus, according to the 
 command of his heavenly Father. 
 He must have had a godfather, like 
 all the Israelites, but there is no 
 record of the name of that favored 
 man. As to the ceremony of the 
 circumcision, which was always per- 
 formed under the patronage of Elias 
 
 * (who, according to the Hebrews, 
 never failed to assist invisibly),* it 
 took place, St. Epiphanius says, in 
 the very cavern where Jesus was 
 born; and St. Bernard presumes, 
 with much probability, that St. Jo- 
 seph was the minister on that occa- 
 sion. 
 
 Some men of the lower classes, 
 docile to the call of the angels, came 
 to adore the infant God in his 
 manger, and to share with him their 
 black bread and goat's milk. A 
 miracle of a higher order, and of 
 greater renown, brought soon after, 
 to the same crib, the first fruits of 
 converted gentilism. The shepherds 
 of Juda had led the way, it was for 
 kings and sages to follow. 
 
 * 
 
 * See Basnage, 1. vii., ch. 10. 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 THE ADORATION OF THE MAGI. 
 
 jN the course of the * 
 autumn which 
 preceded the 
 birth of Christ, 
 certain of the 
 Chaldean Ma- 
 gi, skillful in 
 the science of tho heavenly bodies, 
 discerned a star of the first magni- 
 tude, which they recognized, by its 
 extraordinary motions and other 
 unequivocal signs, as that star of 
 Jacob, foretold by Balaam so long 
 before— that star which was to rise 
 on their horizon at the coming of 
 the Messiah. According to the an- 
 cient traditions of Iran, collected by 
 Abulfarages, Zoroaster, the restorer 
 of the Magian religion, a man of 
 
 * Some have made Zoroaster a disciple of 
 Jeremiah, but the times do not agree. It is 
 much more probable that he was a pupil of 
 DanieL 
 
 f The learned are not agreed as to the country 
 of the Magi. Some make them come from the 
 depth of Arabia Felix, others from the Indies, 
 which is by no means probable. The best au- 
 thorities point out Persia as their country, and 
 that opinion seems the most correct. The 
 
 science, a great astronomer, and 
 well Tersed, moreover, in the He- 
 brew theology,* announced, under 
 the immediate successors of Cyrus, 
 and soon after the re-establi?hment 
 of the Temple, that a divine child, 
 destined to change the aspect of the 
 world, should be born of a pure and 
 immaculate Virgin in the extreme 
 west of Asia. He added, that a 
 star unknown in their hemisphere 
 should signalize that remarkable 
 event, and that, on its appearance, 
 the Magi were to set out with pres- 
 ents to the infant King. Faithful 
 and religious executors of Zoroas- 
 ter's will, three of the most illus- 
 trious sages of Babylonia,! had no 
 sooner remarked the star than they 
 
 names Gaspar, Melchior, and Balthazar, gener- 
 ally given to the Magi, are Babylonian. In fact, 
 Babylon, and after it, Seleucia, situated at a 
 short distance, were the seats of the most 
 famous astronomers of antiquity. Finally, those 
 cities are to the east of Jerusalem, and it is only 
 twenty days' journey from the banks of the 
 Euphrates to Bethlehem. Origen, who was 
 judicious and well-informed, states that the 
 Magi were addicted to astrology. Drexelius, 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIBGIN MABY. 
 
 171 
 
 gave the signal for departure. 
 Leaving behind them the city of 
 Seleucides, with its stately palm- 
 wood buildings,* and Babylon, where 
 the mournful desert -wind seemed 
 whispering to the silent ruins the 
 fatal prophecy of the son of Amos, 
 they quitted the land of dates and 
 took the sandy road to Palestine. 
 Before them, like the luminous pil- 
 lar which guided the flying cohorts 
 of Israel towards the desert strand 
 of the Red Sea, moved the star of 
 the Messiah. That new star, inde- 
 pendent of the laws which govern 
 the heavenly bodies, had no regular 
 motion peculiar to itself. Now it 
 advanced at the head of the cara- 
 van, moving in a straight line to- 
 wards the west; now it remained 
 stationary over the tents erected for 
 the night, seeming to balance itself 
 gently in the clouds like a sleeping 
 
 thereupon, takes upon him to scoff at Origen, 
 which proves that he was but httle versed in the 
 ancient history of the East, where every astron- 
 omer was an astrologer. • 
 
 * Strabo, b. xvii. 
 
 f St. John Chrysostom, Serm. 6 in Matth. 
 Chalcidius, a pagan philosopher, who lived 
 about the end of the third century, makes men- 
 tion of this star, and the Eastern sages whom it 
 guided to the birth-place of Christ. St. Augus- 
 tine, the doctor of doctors, says on this subject. 
 
 ^ albatross. At the dawn of day it 
 gave the signal for departure, as it 
 had done at night for halting.f 
 
 At length the lofty towers ol 
 Jerusalem were visible in the dis- 
 tance, amid the bare, bleak summits 
 of its mountains. The camels were 
 quenching their thirst at a wayside 
 cistern, when the Magi gave a cry 
 of surprise and alarm. The star 
 had disappeared in the far depths 
 of heaven, like a rational creature 
 who perceives impending danger. J 
 
 Thus puzzled, like the mariners 
 of ancient times when dark clouds 
 concealed the polar star, the Magi 
 consulted a moment. What meant 
 the sudden disappearance of their 
 brilliant guide ? Were they, then, 
 at the term of their long journey? 
 It was very possible, and even 
 probable, that the infant King 
 whom they came from the banks 
 
 " A new star appeared at the birth of Him 
 whose death was to obscure the ancient sun." 
 What, then, was that star which never ap- 
 peared before or since in the firmament? Was 
 it not the magnificent language of Heaven, pro- 
 claiming the glory of God and a virgin's child- 
 bearing ? 
 
 X This cistern, or well, on the highway near 
 Jerusalem, is still known as the Cistern of the 
 Three Kings, or of the Star, in memory of this 
 event. 
 
172 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 of the Tigris to adore, might be f 
 found in Jerusalem. "The God of 
 heaven," thought they, "does not 
 idly prolong his miracles; they 
 cease when human agents are suffi- 
 cient. That is the usual order of 
 things. Wliat matter though the 
 star has left us? We may easily, 
 without its assistance, find this new 
 king in the capital of his states. 
 To find out the young Messiah, we 
 have only to enter the first street 
 which we shall find strewed with 
 green branches, perfumed with es- 
 sence of roses, and tapestried with 
 cloth of gold. The sound of the 
 Hebrew harps, their dancing cho- 
 ruses, and shouts of joy, will speed- 
 ily show us which way we are to 
 go." Then, quickening their pace, 
 they passed the boundary gate, and 
 penetrated into the ancient Zion 
 between two tiles of barbarian sol- 
 diers. 
 
 The aspect of Jerusalem was 
 cheerless. Its populace, busy, yet 
 silent, had no appearance of either 
 joy or festival. Groups gathered 
 together, here and there, to stare at 
 the strangers, whom they recognized 
 by their long white robes, girt with 
 magnificent Eastern zones, by their ^ 
 
 bazuhends* enriched with precious 
 stones, and, especially, by the manly 
 beauty of their features, as satraps 
 of the great king. The Eastern 
 cavaliers, as they passed along, bent 
 over the neck of their dromedaries 
 to ask some of the numerous spec- 
 tators where they were to find the 
 new-born Bang of the Jews, whose 
 star they had seen in the East. 
 The people of Jerusalem, regarding 
 each other in surprise, knew not 
 what to answer. ... A king of 
 the Jews ! . . . What king ? They 
 knew none but Herod, whom they 
 abhorred, and he had no infant son. 
 Astonished, in their turn, that all 
 whom they interrogated declared 
 their ignorance, and, moreover, see- 
 ing no mark of festivity anywhere 
 around, the Magi, in great conster- 
 nation, ascended the populous street 
 which led to the ancient palace oi 
 David, and erected their tents amid 
 its ruinous, but shady courts. 
 
 Meanw^hile, the appearance of 
 these Persian^ nobles, w^ho seldom 
 visited the mountains of Judea, 
 
 * Bazubends, ancient bracelets adorned with 
 diamonds, turquoises, and pearls, which the 
 satraps wore above the elbow. The king of 
 Persia and his sons still wear the bazubend. 
 {See Morier, Voyage en Perse et en Armenie.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 173 
 
 their startling questions, which both 
 amazed and intimidated a people 
 who were kept in constant trepida- 
 tion by the system of espionage 
 organized by Herod,* soon excited 
 a general tumult in that seditious 
 city, the most restless in all the 
 East. The name of the Messiah- 
 king, pronounced by the Pharisees 
 — ever careful to excite the fears of 
 the aged monarch, as to the pros- 
 pects of his house and the dura- 
 tion of his own power — ^fell amid 
 the listening groups like a spark 
 amongst stubble. The King-Mes- 
 siah ! There was freedom in that 
 sound. There was conquest — there 
 was glory ! It spoke of the banner 
 of Juda, waving in triumph over a 
 conquered world. The satraps of 
 Persia were considered the first as- 
 trologers in the world.f They had, 
 doubtless, read the birth of the He- 
 brew GoelX in the stars. The heir 
 of the kings of Juda was about 
 
 * See Josephus, Ant. Jud., c. xv., ch. 13. 
 
 f All the East then believed in Astrology ; 
 and Philo tells us that the satraps of Persia 
 were esteemed as the first astrologers in the 
 world. 
 
 X Go'il (Saviour), one of the names by which 
 the Hebrews designated the Messiah. 
 
 § Herod had strictly forbidden the Jews to 
 speak of state affairs. They could not even ^ 
 
 to ascend the great throne of his 
 fathers, and to banish the race of 
 the Herods, those half Jews, who 
 were the slaves of Rome ! A sullen 
 murmur, like that which precedes 
 the ocean -storm, quickly spread 
 from street to street, from house to 
 house. Never had the people of 
 Jerusalem felt less disposed to obey 
 the royal edict which forbade them 
 ''to meddle with any thing but 
 their own afi'airs." § Vainly did the 
 fierce soldiers of Herod fringe the 
 ramparts of the towers. The peo- 
 ple were roused : they were no 
 longer afraid to talk together in the 
 open street. "All Jerusalem was 
 troubled," says the Gospel, and it 
 was soon the tyrant's turn to be 
 troubled himself. 
 
 Herod then dwelt in his palace 
 in Jerusalem ; but its flowery gar- 
 dens, peopled as they were with 
 rare birds, and intersected by lim- 
 pid sti'eams, II could not divert his 
 
 assemble to hold those great family-festivals 
 hitherto so common amongst them. His spies, 
 spread over the whole city, and even along 
 the highways, instantly arrested those who in- 
 fringed on the royal edict. They were thrown 
 secretl}^ and sometimes even openly, into the 
 fortresses, where they were severely puuished. 
 ( Joseph., Ant. Jud., c. xv., ch. 13.) 
 11 Josephus, de Bello, b. v., ch. 13. 
 
174 
 
 LTFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 mind from tlie gloomy recollections 
 and dark forebodings which ren- 
 dered life a burden to him. Ap- 
 prised by his chief spy of the arri- 
 val of the Magi, and their strange 
 discom'se, his massive brow, wrin- 
 kled with harassing thought, grew 
 dark as a stormy sky, and his 
 anxiety was visible to all. 
 
 The apprehensions of the Jewish 
 king are easily understood, and are 
 explained by his peculiar position. 
 Herod was neither the anointed of 
 the Lord nor yet the chosen of the 
 people ; a branch of laurel, gathered 
 within the pagan precincts of the 
 capitol, formed his tributary crown 
 — a crown of slavery, intertwined 
 with thorns, every leaf of which had 
 been purchased by heaps of gold 
 levied from the savings of the rich 
 and the indigence of the poor. 
 Hated by the nobles, whose heads 
 he struck off at the first suspicion ; 
 dreaded by his relatives, whose 
 lives he sacrificed without remorse, 
 on the slightest pretext ; detested 
 by the priests, whose privileges he 
 trampled under foot ; abhorred by 
 the people, for his speculative re-, 
 ligion and his foreign extraction, he 
 had nothing to depjend on but his 
 
 courtiers, his assassins, his artists, 
 and the wealthy, but by no means 
 numerous sect of the Herodians, 
 who were infatuated by his mag- 
 nificence. Often was the friend of 
 Caesar openly braved by his obsti- 
 nate subjects. The Pharisees, an 
 artful and powerful sect, had mock- 
 ingly and insultingly refused to take 
 the oath of fidelity. The Essoeans, 
 who were formidable from their 
 martial courage, had followed the 
 example of the Pharisees ; while 
 the young and impetuous disciples 
 of the doctors of the law had re- 
 cently cut down, in broad daylight, 
 the golden eagle which, in compli- 
 ment to the Romans, he had placed 
 over the gate of the Temple. 
 
 Conspiracies were going on in 
 every quarter against his life, hatch- 
 ed and fomented by his nearest and 
 dearest, so that he might fall at any 
 moment under the dagger of some 
 young enthusiast, who would deem 
 it a virtuous and patriotic act to rid 
 the earth of a prince * who reigned 
 
 * The people were so fai* from applauding the 
 discovery of this plot, or rejoicing in the king's 
 escape, that they laid hold of the informer by 
 whom it was revealed, tore him in pieces, and 
 threw his flesh to the dogs. (Joseph., Ant. Jud. 
 b. XV., eh. 11.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 175 
 
 like a madman. Ascribing this un- 
 accountable boldness to the con- 
 tempt inspired by his great age, he 
 exhausted all the secrets of art to 
 make himself young again.* He 
 would fain have persuaded both 
 himself and others that he was still 
 that young and brilliant Herod who 
 surpassed most of the Hebrews in 
 all gymnastic exercises ; Herod, the 
 bold cavalier, the skillful huntsman, 
 the proud and handsome prince, 
 who had despised the love of that 
 famous Egyptian queen for whom 
 Antony had lost the empire of the 
 world. But, alas ! the silvery hairs 
 which began to appear amid the 
 dark locks of his sons, their impa- 
 tience to reign, the spirit of revolt 
 and sedition gliding in amongst the 
 people, and the insolence of the 
 brigands, who were again begin- 
 ning their depredations in Galilee, 
 all gave him but too clearly to un- 
 derstand that his reign — hi§ dread 
 reign — was drawing to a close. 
 Harassed with suspicion, and dis- 
 trusting even his spies, he some- 
 
 * Herod painted his face, and had his hair 
 and beard dyed black, in order to appear young. 
 (Joseph., Ant. Jud., b. xvi., ch. 11.) 
 
 f He often went out at night amongst the 
 
 times wandered at night through 
 the streets and squares of his me- 
 tropolis,! and heard with his own 
 ears the deep imprecations, the bit- 
 ter reproaches, the biting sarcasms 
 heaped on the upstart^ the Ascalonite, 
 the wild beast, who had killed his 
 innocent wife — that gem of beauty 
 and pattei'u of chastity — and who 
 had afterwards caused the two sons 
 whom he had by her to be put to 
 death — those two princes, so sad, so 
 beautiful, so stately, and so dear to 
 the people because of the Asmonean 
 heroes, their ancestors, and their 
 fair, but hapless mother. The day 
 following these nocturnal rounds 
 was sure to be one of mourning and 
 death. None were spared. From 
 the highest to the lowest, eveiy 
 offender was cut off. Hence, on 
 every side, there were heard vows 
 of vengeance ; and as (5ften as the 
 delusive report of Herod's death 
 was spread, whether by accident or 
 design, through the distant prov- 
 inces, the people, greedily snatching 
 at the deceitful bait, so gratifying 
 
 people, under some disguise, in order to find 
 out the opinion entertained of him, and woe 
 betide those whom he heard censure himself or 
 his doings. (Joseph., b. xv., ch. 13.) 
 
176 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 to their hatred, hastened everywhere 
 to kindle bonfires, which Herod 
 quenched in blood. 
 
 In the midst of these elements of 
 civil discord, when the army is in 
 a state of all but open revolt, and 
 the whole nation seemed merely 
 awaiting the signal for a general 
 insm-rection, there arrives in Jeru- 
 salem certain foreigners of lofty 
 mien, who inquire, without either 
 mystery or concealment, for a new- 
 born king of the Jews, whose star 
 they have perceived. Herod is 
 astounded. He anxiously questions 
 his memory. The fatal predictions 
 concerning his dynasty, which the 
 Pharisees carefully kept afloat, the 
 oracles of the ancient seers, to which 
 he has hitherto paid but little atten- 
 tion, now recur to his mind. That 
 warrior Messiah, that prophet-son 
 of David, who was to overrun the 
 world from east to west, begins now 
 to give him some vague uneasiness. 
 
 * Some are surprised at the fears wherewith 
 Herod regarded a branch of the family of Da- 
 vid; nevertheless, Herod was not the only one 
 who persecuted that noble house, because of its 
 ancient rights and its glorious hopes. Eusebius 
 relates, from Hegesipus, that after the conquest 
 of Jerusalem, Vespasian gave orders to seek and 
 destroy all the posterity of David. Under Tra- 
 jan, the persecution btill continued. Finally, 
 
 ' It is not God who suggests these 
 thoughts to the old king's mind; 
 but the wily prince, the more he 
 thinks of it, the more he is con- 
 vinced that that mysterious event 
 is connected with a vast conspiracy, 
 tending to raise an occult and rival 
 power on the ruins of his. What! 
 he had shed like water the illustri- 
 ous blood of the Maccabees, nor 
 spared even his own wife and sons. 
 He had crushed beneath the iron 
 wheel of his despotism all that 
 offered any sort of resistance. He 
 had lost his soul, his honor, his 
 peace of mind, his rest by night, 
 w^hen his bleeding victims haunted 
 
 his dreams And why all 
 
 that? to prepare the way for the 
 race of David !*.... That scep- 
 tre, so dearly bought — that sceptre, 
 still reeking with the blood of his 
 own kindred — was it, then, but a 
 dry and accursed rod, to be broken 
 over his tomb ? Was he himself to 
 
 Domitian had two members of this illustrious 
 family brought to Rome, who were the lineal 
 descendants of the Apostle St. Jude. The em- 
 peror, having questioned them, found that they 
 possessed only thirty-nine acres of land, which 
 they tilled with their own hands. He 8ei\t them 
 back to their home, being satisfied, on account 
 of their poverty, that there was no danger from 
 ^ their ambition. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 177 
 
 pass, like the meteor-glare of a tern- ^ 
 pestuous evening, over that earth 
 whose former glory would break out 
 anew after his death ? And that 
 nation, which hated him with a ha- 
 tred so strong, so deadly, so infuri- 
 ate, which his very favors could not 
 propitiate — how it would love and 
 cherish the descendant of its an- 
 cient kings ! This last thought fell, 
 bitter as wormwood, on the dark, 
 desolate heart of the aged monarch; 
 for, amid all his deeds of cruelty, 
 he felt the desire of being loved — a 
 strange desire, truly, but yet a real 
 one, in that most extraordinary 
 nature, which seemed made up of 
 contrasts, and w^hich had devoted 
 some of the very noblest qualities 
 to the service of the most absorbing 
 and the most cruel passion which 
 can ravage the human soul — ambi- 
 tion. 
 
 " Let this child be earthly prince 
 or heaven-sent prophet," said Her- 
 od, after a pause, '' he must die ; 
 . . . yea, and he shall die, w^ere I 
 sure of extinguishing, with that fee- 
 ble breath, all the glories which our 
 seers behold in the future. Athalia, 
 that strong woman, who knew so 
 well how to reign, forgot only one ^- 
 
 infant in the massacre of the royal 
 
 family of Juda That child 
 
 lived to deprive her of her throne 
 and life. . . . For me, I shall try 
 to forget nothing. But where are 
 they hiding this 'new-born' king 
 of the Jews, whose birth the stars 
 proclaim, and whom these insolent 
 satraps come to seek at the very 
 gates of my palace ? .... Can it, 
 indeed, be that Schilo foretold by 
 Jacob ? . , . . These are, perchance, 
 only the idle dreams of astrologers. 
 .... No matter, .... we must 
 make all sure." A few hours after, 
 the doctors of the law and the chief 
 priests were assembled in council, 
 with Herod presiding, and were 
 asked that question which seemed 
 strange to them in the mouth of 
 such a prince, "In what place is 
 the Messiah to be born ?" 
 
 The answer was prompt and 
 unanimous, '' In Bethlehem of Juda." 
 And the ancients of Israel, quite 
 willing to annoy the friend of the 
 Romans, failed not to add that, as 
 the last week of Daniel was nearly 
 at an end, the coming of the Mes- 
 siah must be at hand. This infor- 
 mation, by no means satisfactory, 
 would not do for Herod, who must 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 ascertain wliere the blow was to be 
 struck. He resolved to interrogate 
 I lie Magi, and to find out, if possi- 
 ble, the precise period of the child's 
 birth, computing by the appearance 
 of the star. Too cunning to grant 
 the Persian sages a public audience, 
 which would have given notoriety 
 to a rumor that it was most impor- 
 tant to stifle, the king had them 
 brought before him, and examined 
 them closely as to the time of the 
 star's appearance. "He inquires 
 minutely, not after the child, but 
 the star," says St. John Chrysostom, 
 "in order to observe all possible 
 circumspection in laying his snare." 
 Having learned all that he wished 
 to know, the man of blood dismissed 
 the strangers in an affable and gra- 
 cious manner. "Go," said he, "and 
 diligently inquire after the young 
 child : and when you have found 
 him, bring me word again, that I 
 also may come and adore him." 
 
 * The kings of Persia administered justice in 
 quite a patriarchal manner. They had above 
 their heads a golden bell, and to the bell was 
 fastened a chain, the end 'of which hung with- 
 out the palace. Every time that the bell rang, 
 the oflBcers of the prince went forth from his 
 apartments, and introduced before the great 
 king the supphants, who demanded justice of 
 
 Now, the Magi, like all lofty- 
 minded men — sons of science and 
 contemplation — were simple, sin- 
 cere, and but little disposed to sus- 
 pect evil. They understood despot- 
 ism and cruelty in a prince, but 
 they did not understand falsehood, 
 for the first thing that the kings of 
 Persia learn in their infancy is to 
 speak the truth. They, therefore, 
 gave implicit credence to the false 
 words of the Idumean, and passing 
 again under the stately porticos of 
 the palace, which vied in magnifi- 
 cence with that of the great king, 
 but w^hich had not, with all its 
 bronzes and arcades, the golden bell 
 of the suj)pluints,'^ they quitted the 
 Betzetha,f had their tents taken up, 
 and once more traversed the Holy 
 City to repair to the supposed birth- 
 place of the Messiah. As they 
 wound along the walls, enriched by 
 trophies from the new amphitheatre, 
 whose unusual style of decoration 
 
 the prince himself, who instantly examined their 
 case, and gave his decision with equity. (Antar. 
 Translated from the Arabic by Terrick Hamilton.) 
 f The quarter named Betzetha, or the new 
 city, which Herod had joined to Jerusalem, was 
 situated to the north of the Temple ; it con- 
 tained the lower pond, the pond of probation, 
 and Herod's palace. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 179 
 
 was an inexhaustible subject of rid- 
 icule for the Pharisees, they met 
 King Herod, surrounded by a forest 
 of Thracian and German spears, 
 going in the direction of Jericho.* 
 
 The Persians quitted Jerusalem 
 by the Damascus gate ; then, turn- 
 ing to the left, they made their way 
 through some hollow ravines, inter- 
 sected with steep hillocks which 
 they had to climb. They were 
 nearly an hour's journey from the 
 capital of Judea, and had permitted 
 their camels to stop at a cistern to 
 drink, when a brilliant point ap- 
 peared in the heavens, and rapidly 
 descended towards them like a fall- 
 ing star. "The star! our star!" 
 cried the slaves, in a transport of 
 joy. "The star!" repeated their 
 masters, equally delighted ; for they 
 were now sure of being in the right 
 way, and resumed their march with 
 increased ardor. 
 
 They were preparing to enter the 
 city of David, when the star, inclin- 
 
 * We have followed the authors who state 
 that Herod set out for Jericho, where he was 
 some time sick, just when the Magi went to 
 Bethlehem : this is quite conformable to the 
 Gospel narrative ; for if Herod had been in 
 Jerusalem when the Persians returned thither, 
 they would probably have seen him j^rior to the ^i 
 
 ing towards the south, suddenly 
 stopped over a deserted cave, which 
 had the appearance of a rustic 
 stable, and down, down it went till 
 it seemed to rest, almost, on the 
 head of the infant God. The sicrht 
 of that motionless star, its soft 
 rays falling brightly on that dreary 
 grotto, filled the Magi with a lively 
 faith, and a lively faith it did re- 
 quire to discover the King-Messiah 
 in a poor, unnoticed cliild, born in 
 such a place, laid in a manger, and 
 whose mother, though fair and full 
 of grace, was evidently of very ob- 
 scure condition. 
 
 God, who would make the Jews 
 ashamed of their obduracy by con- 
 trasting it with the pious haste and 
 the docile faith of infidels, allotted 
 it so that the strange humiliation 
 of the holy family should not shake 
 the firm belief of the Magi. 
 
 The worshippers of the sun — the 
 Gentiles — who were to be saved by 
 the Cross as well as the children of 
 
 angel's warning, which was not given until the 
 night. The illness of Herod, by diverting his 
 attention from the Magi and the child, left the 
 former at Hberty to return in peace to their 
 own country, and gave the Holy Family time to 
 set out for Nazareth. 
 
180 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 tlie covenant, penetrated into the t 
 lowly abode of Christ with as much 
 venemtion as though it were one 
 of their own temples, built over 
 subterraneous fires, wherein starry 
 spheres kept ever turning.* Fol- 
 lowing the custom of theii* people, 
 they prostrated themselves as they 
 crossed the threshold, and having 
 taken off their rich sandals, they 
 adored the new-born infant as all 
 the Eastern nations then adored 
 their gods and their masters. Then, 
 opening their caskets of perfumed 
 wood, wherein were the offerings 
 intended for the Messiah, they took 
 out some of the finest gold, gathered 
 in the neighborhood of Nineveh 
 the Great, and perfumes, purchased 
 with fruits and pearls from the 
 Ai-abs of Yemen. These mysterious 
 gifts were not carnal, like the offer- 
 ings of the Jews. The cradle of 
 Him who w^as come to abolish the 
 sacrifices of the synagogue was not 
 to be sprinkled with blood; hence, 
 the Magi did not sacrifice to him 
 
 ! * These spheres, composed of golden circles, 
 
 I hollowed like our armillary spheres, turned 
 
 with a loud noise at sunrise. They are still to 
 I be seen at Oulam, where the Ghebers have a 
 
 temple. {Rabbi Benjamin.) 
 
 either spotless lambs or white heif- 
 ers. They ofiered him gold, as an 
 earthly prince — myrrh and incense, 
 as a God.f Then, bowing down to 
 the ground before Mary, whom they 
 found "fair as the nuxm and modest 
 as the pale water-lily," they invoked 
 the blessing of God upon her, and 
 prayed that " the hand of misfc^rtune 
 might never reach her." 
 
 This w^as the hist scene of splen- 
 dor in w^hich the Virgin figured. 
 The first period of her life, like a 
 sw^eet dream of Ginnestan, had 
 rolled away under roofs of cedar 
 and of gold, amid sacred perfumes 
 and the sound of harp and lyre ; the 
 second, full of mysteries and w^on- 
 ders, had brought her in connec- 
 tion w^ith the inhabitants of heaven 
 and the princes of Asia ; the third 
 w^as about to open under other aus- 
 pices : it was now her turn for per- 
 secution, anguish and unutterable 
 sorrow. 
 
 Meanwhile, the Magi prepared 
 to leave Bethlehem, having nothing 
 
 f Much praise has justly been given to these 
 verses of Juvencus — the most ancient Christian 
 poet whose works have come down to us — on 
 the gifts of the Magi kings : 
 
 Aurum, thus, myrrham, regique, Deoque, Iiominique 
 Dona fernnt .... 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 181 
 
 more to do in Jiidea. They pro- f 
 posed, according to their promise, 
 to seek the king in his palace at 
 Jericho, to let him know where the 
 Messiah was; but the angel of the 
 Lord apprised them in a dream of 
 the dark designs of that perfidious 
 prince, and commanded them to go 
 home by another way. 
 
 The sons of Ormuzd returned 
 thanks to the "Master of the sun 
 and of the morning star," attributed 
 this nocturnal revelation to their 
 good genius,* and merited by their 
 
 * Ormuzd, en zend ahurb-mezdeo (the most 
 learned king), and Ahrimen, en zend ahyro- 
 maingus (the wicked intelligence), according to 
 the Persian mythology, sprang from good and 
 bad genii, to whom ai'e ascribed divers functions 
 in the universe, whether for the diffusion of 
 good or the propagation of evil. One of the 
 good genii, named Serosch, went seven times 
 every night around all the earth, to watch over 
 the safety of the servants of Ormuzd. (See the 
 Amschaspand- Named, and the -Book of Kings of 
 Firdousi. 
 
 t Very ancient authors affirm that the Magi 
 received baptism from St. Thomas ; it is be- 
 lieyed that they suffered martyrdom in India, 
 where they preached the G-ospel. 
 
 I "The date trees of Babylon," says Diodorus 
 of Sicily, " bear exquisite fruit ; they are six 
 inches long, some yellow, others red, and others 
 of a purple color, so that they are just as pleas- 
 ing to the sight as to the taste. The trunk of 
 the tree is of a surprising height, and is per- ^ 
 
 perfect docility the gift of faith, 
 which they afterwards received.f 
 Instead of journeying by the barren 
 and dangerous shores of that ac- 
 cursed lake whose dark, stagnant 
 waters cover the reprobate cities of 
 the plain, they turned their camels' 
 heads towards the coast of the Great 
 Sea, where they could almost fancy 
 themselves in the valleys of dates 
 and roses J watered by the Euphrates 
 and the Bend-Emyr, as they wound 
 their way across the lovely strand 
 of Syria. 
 
 fectly straight and even, but the head, or tuft, 
 is not the same in all. Some date trees extend 
 their branches in a round form, and the fruit 
 of some grows out in clusters from the bark, 
 about the middle ; others have all their branches 
 on one side, and their own weight bending 
 them down towards the ground, gives them the 
 form of a hanging lamp ; others, again, divide 
 their branches into two parts, and they then 
 fall to the right and left in perfect symmetry." 
 {Diod. b. ii.) Here is a description of the 
 banks of the Euphrates, by an Arabian poet, 
 anterior to Mahomet : — " They saw populous 
 towns, plains abounding in flowing streams, 
 date trees, and warbling birds and sweet-smell- 
 ing flowers ; and the country appeared like a 
 blessing to enliven the sorrowing heart ; and 
 the camels were grazing and straying about the 
 land ; and they were of various colors, like the 
 flowers of a garden." (Antar. D-analated from 
 the Arabic by Terrick Hamilton. ) As to the fields 
 and gardens of roses so common in ancient 
 Persia, see Firdousi's Book of Kings. 
 
CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 THE PURIFICATION. 
 
 ^-ORTY days after 
 the Saviour's 
 birth, the Yir- 
 gin prepared 
 to return to 
 Jerusalera for 
 the fiillillment of the Levitical pre- 
 cept, which prescribed the purifica- 
 tion of mothers and the redemption 
 of the first-born. Undoubtedly, this 
 law did not apply to Mary ; for 
 though she was the mother of the 
 Redeemer, she was still a pure vir- 
 gin, and that immaculate concep- 
 tion had been followed by a spotless 
 maternity ; " but she willingly sub- 
 mitted, for example's sake, to a law 
 which was no way binding on her," 
 says Bossuet, " because the secret 
 of her virginal maternity was not 
 known." 
 
 Meanly attired and undistinguish- 
 ed from the crowd, in their first 
 appearance on the dusty road of 
 
 * This tree, under which Mary stopped to 
 nurse Jesus, was destroyed in the 17th century, 
 but the place where it stood is still pointed out. 
 
 * Ephrata, Joseph and Mary, having 
 attracted no observation, left behind 
 them • no remembrance to become 
 traditionary. It was far different, 
 however, on their return to Jerusa- 
 lem — thanks, we may suppose, to 
 the wondrous tale of the shei)herds, 
 and the brilliant visit of the Magi. 
 At some distance from Bethlehem, 
 Mary stopped under a spreading 
 tree to nurse her divine Infant ; and 
 that tree, according to the common 
 belief, had ever after a secret virtue, 
 which for sixteen centuries effected 
 many marvellous things, — so it is 
 said, at least, by the Christians of 
 Asia, and also by the Turks, for 
 whom that tree was, not more than 
 two hundred- years ago, an object 
 of veneration and the term of a 
 pilgrimage.* 
 
 After this memorable halt, the 
 holy couple journeyed on to the 
 tomb of Rachel, f where every He- 
 
 f According to the Jewish doctors, Jacob only 
 buried his beloved wife on the highway of Beth- 
 lehem because his prophetic knowledge enabled 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 183 
 
 brew was to pray in passing. This 
 primitive monument consisted of 
 twelve large stones, overgrown with 
 moss, on each of which was en- 
 graved the name of a tribe, and its 
 only epitaph was a white Syrian 
 rose— frail, sweet emblem of that 
 lovely woman who withered away 
 ere yet her beauty had reached its 
 prime, like the flower mentioned by 
 Job. While they stopped to say a 
 prayer for the dead over the revered 
 dust of one of the saints of their 
 people, the Virgin and Joseph little 
 thought that the wailing of the dove, 
 ascribed by Scripture to that fair 
 Assyrian, was so soon to have its 
 application, or that the mother of 
 Joseph and of Benjamin was the 
 desolate type of the mothers who, 
 some days after, in the mountains 
 of Judea, were to mourn for their 
 
 him to foresee that a number of his descendants 
 should pass that way as captives of the Assyr- 
 ians, and that he would have Eachel intercede 
 for them with Jehovah, according as they passed 
 her tomb. Protestants have loudly exclaimed 
 against this passage of the Talmud, as being too 
 favorable to the intercession of the Virgin and 
 the saints. This tomb of Rachel was so highly 
 venerated, that every Jew who passed by made 
 it a sacred duty to engrave his name on one of 
 the stones; these enormous stones were twelve 
 in number. ( Talm. of Jet. ) It is well known 
 
 children massacred in place of Je- 
 sus Christ. 
 
 Going forth from the vale of Re- 
 phai'm, whose ancient oaks shaded 
 the graves of the gigantic race of 
 Enac, the Yirgin observed a tree 
 whose sinister aspect saddened and 
 depressed her heart. It was a bar- 
 ren olive-tree, whose pale leaves 
 rustled in the evening breeze with 
 a mournful sound that seemed like 
 the wail of human sorrow. As she 
 passed under its gloomy foliage, 
 uncheered by the song of any bird, 
 Mary felt that sensation of blighting 
 cold which belongs to the fatal 
 shade of the manchineel-tree. That 
 tree, if local tradition be not mis- 
 taken, was the infamous wood to 
 which Christ was nailed.* 
 
 At the moment when Joseph and 
 Mary made their way into the sacred 
 
 that the tears of Rachel, mentioned by Jere- 
 miah, vs^ere but the figure of the tears shed by 
 the Jewish women after the Massacre of the 
 Innocents. (S. Mat. ch. ii., v. 17, 18.) 
 
 * About half a league from Jerusalem stands 
 the monastery of the Holy Cross. Inside its 
 chapel is shown the spot which was occupied by 
 the barren olive tree of which the Cross was 
 made. The place where the trunk stood is now 
 filled up by a block of marble in a niche under 
 the high altar, where there is a lamp continually 
 burning. 
 
184 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 inclosiire, with the shekels of silver f 
 for the ransom, and the two doves 
 for the sacrifice, a holy old man 
 named Simeon,* to whom it had 
 been divinely revealed that he 
 slionld not die until he had seen 
 the Christ of the Lord, entered the 
 Temple by an impulse of the Holy 
 Ghost. At sight of the Holy Fam- 
 ily, the eye of the just man became 
 inspired. Discovering the King- 
 Messiah under the poor swaddling- 
 clothes of a common child, he took 
 him in his arms, drew him close to 
 him, arid gazed upon him with de- 
 light, whilst the tears of joy rolled 
 down his venerable cheeks. " Now," 
 cried the pious old man — "now 
 thou dost dismiss thy servant, 
 Lord, according to thy word, in 
 peace; because my eyes have seen 
 thy salvation, which thou hast pre- 
 pared before the face of all people 
 — a light to the revelation of the 
 Gentiles, and the glory of thy peo- 
 ple Israel." Having uttered these 
 
 words, Simeon solemnly blessed the 
 
 — ^ ^ — 
 
 * The Arabs give Simeon the title of Siddik 
 (he who verifies), because he bore testimony to 
 the coming of the true Messiah, in the person 
 "^of Jesus, son of Mary, whom every Mussulman 
 is obliged to receive as such, (D'Herbelot, 
 BMioth. Orient., t. iii., p. 266.) 
 
 mother and her spouse; and then, 
 addressing himself to Mary, after a 
 moment's mournful silence, he added 
 that this child was born for the fall 
 and for the resurrection of many in 
 Israel, and for a sign which should 
 be contradicted, and that grief, like 
 a sharp sword, should pierce his 
 mother's soul. 
 
 By this unexpected light, which 
 partially disclosed the high destiny 
 of Christ, the ignominies, the suffer- 
 ings, and the agony of the Cross 
 were suddenly revealed to the bless- 
 ed Virgin. The ominous words of 
 Simeon, like a stormy wind, made 
 her bend her head, and her heart 
 throbbed with anguish.f But Mary 
 knew how to accept, without mur- 
 mur or complaint, whatever came 
 from God. Her pale lips touched 
 that cup of wormwood and gall, she 
 drained it to the dregs, and then, 
 restraining her teai's, she meekly 
 said, " Thy will, Lord, be done ! " 
 At that moment, the daughter of 
 Abraham rose superior to the chief 
 
 f " Mary, my sovereign," says St. Anselm, 
 speaking on this subject, " I cannot believe 
 that you could ha"ve lived a single moment 
 with such a sorrow at your heart, had not 
 God, the giver of life, given you strength to 
 bear it." 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 '185 
 
 and father of her people. She, too, 
 sacrificed her son on the altar of the 
 Lord ; but she had the sad certainty 
 that her sacrifice would be accepted, 
 and she ivas a mother ! 
 
 Slie was still revolving in her 
 mind these lofty thoughts, when 
 there came in a prophetess named 
 Anna, wife of Phanuel, of the tribe 
 of Aser, who was far advanced in 
 years. This holy widow remained 
 continually in the Temple, serving 
 God night and day in prayer and 
 fasting. Seeing the divine child, 
 she began to praise the Lord aloud, 
 and to speak of him to all those 
 who expected the redemption of 
 Israel. 
 
 "Not only," says St. Ambrose, 
 "did angels, prophets, and shep- 
 herds proclaim the birth of the 
 Saviour, but also the just, and the 
 ancients of Isi-ael. A Virgin con- 
 ceives, a barren woman brings forth, 
 a dumb man speaks, Elizabeth pro- 
 phesies, the Magi adore, the child 
 in his mother's womb leaps for joy, 
 a widow confesses that wondrous 
 event, and all the just expect it." 
 
 * Prideaux, Hidoire des Juifs. 
 f There was then, and still is, amongst the 
 Jewish doctors, a horrifying doctrine: they 
 
 As women might not enter the 
 inner court of the Temple, where 
 the child was to be offered to the 
 Lord, because of his sex, Joseph 
 himself carried him into the hall of 
 the first-born, asking himself whether 
 the scenes which had marked the 
 entrance of Jesus into the holy 
 house were to be renewed before 
 the Hebrew pontiffs. But nothing 
 revealed the Infant -God in that 
 privileged part of the Temple ; all 
 there remained dull and cold, not- 
 withstanding the radiant presence 
 of the young Sun of Justice. A 
 priest who was unknown to Joseph 
 carelessly received from the hard 
 hands of the man of labor, whom he 
 regarded as the scum of the workl,"^ 
 the timid birds prescribed by the 
 law, and did not even deign to 
 honor Christ with a look. The love 
 of gold — that shameful idolatry, 
 which conceals its unholy worship 
 when it has still the grace to be 
 ashamed of itr— had totally petrified 
 the narrow, selfish, vindictivef heart 
 of the princes of the synagogue. 
 Leaving a monopoly of the toils 
 ■ ^ ~^ ~k^ 
 
 hold that he who nourishes not his hatred, 
 and takes not revenge, is unworthy the title of 
 i Kabbi. (Basnage, 1. vi., ch. 17.) 
 
ise 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 jiiul j)i'iviitions to the simple Le- * 
 vites, whom they reduced to live on 
 herbs and dry figs,* they passed by 
 the poor man lying on their marble 
 threshold, the wounded traveller 
 stretched on the mountain - path, 
 coldly averting their head. At bot- 
 tom, they loved neither God nor 
 man. And hence it was that our 
 Lord, who Himself instituted a 
 priesthood of charity, bitterly re- 
 proached them with this in the par- 
 able ol "^he good Samaritan. Thus, 
 as Malachy had foretold, God cursed 
 their blessings, and turned away from 
 his Temple, which he was soon after 
 to deliver to the fire and sword of 
 the Romans. 
 
 The presence of the Messiah, 
 which inflamed the heart of the dis- 
 ciples of Emmaus even before they 
 had recognized him in the breaking 
 of bread, passed over the soul of the 
 Aaronites as the first ray of spring 
 passes over the eternal snows of 
 Ararat. Tliat solemn moment, which 
 suspended the angelic concerts, and 
 fixed the attention of the heavenly 
 
 * The luxury and avarice of the chief priests 
 of Jerusalem were incredible. They sent out 
 and collected the tithes through the country, 
 taking all to themselves, and leaving the inferior 
 priests wholly destitute. At the first remon- 
 
 hosts on a single point of the uni- 
 verse — that moment, foretold by Ag- 
 geus, when the gloiy of the second 
 Temple effViced that of the first — 
 that moment passed unnoticed be- 
 fore the darkened vision of the 
 priests and doctors. There was 
 none to recognize the clean offering 
 mentioned by Malachy. The De- 
 sired of all nations — Him whose 
 way the angels had prepared — the 
 great Redeemer, so long promised 
 and so long expected, w^as there, 
 bodily, in his holy house, and no 
 one thouGclit of welcomino* him with 
 palms, crying out on the watch- 
 towers of the Temple and the house- 
 tops of Jerusalem, " Hosanna to the 
 Son of David!" They knew well, 
 as the Gospel says, how to predict 
 the approach of rain by the clouds 
 that rose from the west ; they could 
 foretell heat by the blowing of the 
 south wind: but these men, so 
 clever in drawing presages from 
 the different aspects of the heavens, 
 saw not that the fig-tree of Solomon 
 was about to put forth its fruit, and 
 
 strance, the unhappy Levites, accused of revolt 
 and sedition, were given over to the Romans ; 
 and Governor Felix alone threw forty of them 
 into prison, in order to propitiate the doctors 
 and princes of the synagogue. (Joseph., Vita.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 187 
 
 they could not discover the God in 
 that humble child. Oh, poverty I 
 what a disguise thou art, even for 
 the divine nature ! The real Christ 
 was in the midst of his own, but he 
 was poor, and his own received him 
 not; hence they remained without 
 a Saviour, for no Melech-Hmnaschiak 
 ever came to justify their incredu- 
 lous contempt for the divine Son of 
 the Virgin, and they are reduced to 
 cry, with cold, yet despairing malice, 
 "Perish those who compute the time 
 of the Messiah!"* 
 
 Meanwhile, the Infant- God, who 
 had recognized, along the streets of 
 Jerusalem, the difterent stages of 
 the passion, silently distinguished 
 his futm-e executioners amid that 
 grave and glittering crowd ; among 
 the choirs who sang on the harp 
 hymns of praise to the Eternal, 
 Christ distinguished the loud, dis- 
 cordant voices that were one day ere 
 
 * Basnage, 1. vi., ch. 26. Talmud, 349. 
 
 f We have followed the opinion of St. Luke, 
 St. John Chrysostom, and some other authori- 
 ties, in making the Holy Family set out for 
 Nazareth immediately after the Purification. It 
 is the only way to reconcile St. Matthew — who 
 says nothing of the marvellous events of the 
 Presentation — ^with St; Luke, who is silent as 
 to the Massacre of the Innocents and the flight ^ 
 
 many years to cry, "Crucify liiin ! 
 crucify him!" 
 
 Race of Aaron, where art thou 
 now? The vengeful bre;;th of the 
 Crucified has scattered thee, like 
 chaff, over all the earth ; swallowed 
 up in those masses which thou didst 
 so despise, thy companions in exile 
 know thee no more! But caring 
 little, at that time, for the clouds 
 which darkened above their heads, 
 the Hebrew priests offered to that 
 God who spurned their gifts the 
 chosen victims of both high and 
 low. One of them took Joseph's 
 doves, ascended the gentle slope of 
 the altar of holocausts, and offered 
 to the Lord that simple and humble 
 sacrifice. 
 
 "After" Joseph and Mary "had 
 performed all things according to 
 the law of the Lord," says St. Luke, 
 " they returned into Galilee, to their 
 city Nazareth." f 
 
 into Egypt. "What shall we say to reconcile 
 these two evangelists," says St. John Chrysos- 
 tom, " except that the return to Nazareth pre- 
 ceded the flight into Egypt ? For God did not 
 command Joseph and Mary to go into Egypt 
 before the Purification, lest the law might be 
 left unfulfilled. But, that duty accomplished, 
 they returned of themselves to Nazareth, where 
 they received the order to fly into Egypt." 
 
CHAPTER Xiy. 
 
 THE FLIGHT INTO EGYPT. 
 
 .CARCELY were 
 they returned in- 
 to Lower Galilee, 
 when Joseph and 
 Mary had to set 
 out again on a 
 long and perilous journey, ending 
 in the land of exile. One night, 
 the angel of the Lord appeared to 
 Joseph, during his sleep. "Arise," 
 said he, '"take the child and his 
 mother, and fly into Egypt, and be 
 there until I shall tell thee. For it 
 will come to pass that Herod will 
 seek the child to destroy him." At 
 these words, Joseph rose affrighted, 
 adored the Lord, and ran to awake 
 Mary, who was sweetly sleeping be- 
 side her child. The young mother 
 quickly understood the necessity of 
 this abrupt and secret departure. 
 She casts a look of anguish on 
 her son, and hastily collects a few 
 clothes and some provisions for the 
 journey ; then, preceded by Joseph, 
 and carrying Jesus in her arms, she ^ 
 
 quits her native city reposing in 
 the calm star-light. 
 
 The prophecies of Simeon were 
 speedily accom})lislied. Scarcely 
 was Jesus born, when a tyrant's 
 persecution sought him in his cra- 
 dle, and his mother, so young, so 
 holy, was forced to fly by night like 
 a guilty creature, accompanied only 
 by an aged man who could only 
 oppose prayer and patience to the 
 Arab spears which, perchance, lay 
 in ambush in the mountain ravine, 
 or the murderous attack of Herod's 
 soldiers. It would seem as though 
 God himself abandoned that holy 
 family to its fate, for, when giving 
 the order for Joseph to set out, his 
 messenger had not promised, as 
 Raphael did of old to the young 
 Tobias, to guard them on the way. 
 But the Virgin's spouse understood 
 that the solemn moment of Christ's 
 manifestation not being yet come, 
 God would save them from the de- 
 vices of Herod by means of mere 
 
■.*i*' 
 
^.^JHIhi^i^ 
 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 189 
 
 human prudence. To Joseph, then, 
 belonged all the care, and all the 
 honor, of that arduous enterprise ; 
 it was for him — a poor, obscure old 
 man — to thwart the plans, to defeat 
 the schemes, to elude the jealous 
 watchfulness of a gloomy, politic 
 tyrant, who was served by his myr- 
 midons like an Eastern despot. 
 What was to happen, and what was 
 to be done, if any danger presented 
 itself on the Jerusalem road ? The 
 sudden departure of the Magi had 
 aroused the suspicions of Herod, 
 and those suspicions were strength- 
 ened by the words of Anna and 
 Simeon ; secret inquiries, dark in- 
 vestigations were already on foot, 
 and none might say where that san- 
 guinary prince would stop, he who 
 hlled with gold the red hand of the 
 assassin. The more Joseph pon- 
 dered, the more clearly he fore- 
 saw some horrible tragedy, the very 
 thouorht of which made the blood 
 curdle in his veins. Mary, on her 
 side, pale and silent as death, kept 
 looking forward into the depth of 
 
 * About the middle of February, when it is 
 still very cold in the mountains of the interior, 
 where the temperature, according to M. Volney, 
 is nearly like ours ; on the plains of Syria, on 
 
 the valley, the shade of the woods, 
 or along the windings of the I'ocky 
 path which Joseph had chosen as 
 the safest, and the most remote 
 from the dwellings of men. The 
 soft moonlight illumined the earth, 
 and guided the silent march of the 
 holy travellers. 
 
 "The weather was still cold,"* 
 says St. Bonaventure, " and, while 
 crossing Palestine, the Holy Family 
 had to choose the wildest and least 
 frequented roads. Where are they 
 to lodge during the night ? Wliere 
 can they venture to rest a little 
 during the day? Where are they 
 to take the frugal meal necessary 
 to sustain their strength?"! 
 
 Tradition is silent on most of the 
 details of this touching and perilous 
 pilgrimage. Doubtless, the holy 
 travellers made long and painful 
 marches through the mountains, 
 availing themselves of the lirst 
 hours of day, and often, too, await- 
 ing the rising of the moon to re- 
 sume their ■ journey. Whilst their 
 way lay through Galilee, they found 
 
 the contrary, it was already the heat of summer 
 {See note 3 of ch. vi.) 
 
 ■f St. Bonaventure, De Vita Ghridi. 
 
190 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 places of rest and shelter in its deep * 
 ca\es, with their secret branches 
 winding no one knew whither ; but 
 uMMi these had their dangers, for 
 they were often chosen as a secure 
 hiding-place by some of those jiu- 
 merous bands of robbers who had 
 long bid defiance to all the forces 
 of the kingdom, and who were now 
 emboldened by the illness of Herod.* 
 The fear of happening unawares 
 into one of these murderous dens, 
 must have made Joseph hesitate 
 many a time at the mouth of a cave 
 that would seem to ofl'er a secure 
 asylum. 
 
 At length, after a thousand dan- 
 gers, and a thousand trials of vari- 
 ous kinds, the Holy Family reached 
 the environs of Jerusalem. Here 
 caution and anxiety were increased 
 in proportion to the imminence of 
 the danger. The fugitives dared no 
 longer approach cities, nor even 
 populous villages, where a troop of 
 spies and informers had their eye 
 
 * These armed bands, ofteu two or three 
 thousand strong, were commanded by expe- 
 rienced chiefs, who gave both Herod and the 
 Romans enough to do. Some of these had a 
 political object in view, and made a guerilla 
 war ; others were simply a band of assassins, 
 who carried long daggers under their robe, ^ 
 
 on every stranger. j- They folh^wed 
 the bed of the torrents, plunged 
 into by-ways, or through the damp 
 foliage of the woods, not daring to 
 turn aside for a fresh stock of pro- 
 visions, and suffering at once from 
 fear, cold, and hunger. They had 
 passed Anathot, and were making 
 for Ramla, to descend into the low 
 country ; anxious to escape from a 
 dangerous vicinity, they had bor- 
 rowed some hours from the night, 
 when they saw winding fi'om a 
 gloomy ravine just before them a 
 number of armed men, who blocked 
 up the way. He w^ho appeared the 
 leader of this troop of brigands 
 stepped forward in front of his men 
 to take a view of the travellers. 
 Joseph and Mary stood still, look- 
 ing on each other in terror and 
 alarm ; Jesus was sleeping. The 
 bandit, who was on the look-out for 
 blood and gold, cast an astonished 
 glance on the defenceless old man, 
 with his simple, patriarchal air, and 
 
 and murdered all obnoxious persons who fell 
 in their way, even in the streets of Jerusalem. 
 {De Bello, b. ii., ch. 5.) 
 
 f Herod, who pez'fected the spy system in 
 the East, had his spies scattered along all the 
 highways of Judea. (Joseph., Ant. Jud., b. xv., 
 ch. 13.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 191 
 
 then on the young veiled woman, - 
 with her infant clasped convulsively 
 to her heart. " They are poor," said 
 the robber to himself, " and, as they 
 travel by night, they must be fugi- 
 tives!" Perhaps he, too, had an 
 infant son ; or perhaps the atmos- 
 phei-e of mildness and mercy which 
 surrounded Jesus and Mary had its 
 effect on that ferocious soul ; how- 
 ever it was, he lowered the point of 
 his lance, and, extending a friendly 
 hand to Joseph, offered him a lodg- 
 ing for the night in his rock-built 
 fortress hard by. This frank offer 
 was accepted with a holy confi- 
 dence, and the brigand's roof was 
 as hospitable, on that occasion, as 
 the Arab tent.* On the following 
 day, about noon, the Holy Family 
 stopped in the shade of a vast forest 
 of palms, nopals, and wild fig-trees, 
 which is situated at a short distance 
 
 * The site where local tradition places this 
 scene, and where the ruins of the brigand's for- 
 tress are still seen, bears even now a bad char- 
 acter. During the Cr-usades, the Franks, to 
 whom this tradition was familiar, converted the 
 bandit chief into a feudal lord; "it is, never- 
 theless, a rare thing," says Father Nau, with 
 amusing coolness, "for a great lord to turn 
 highway robber." The Crusaders knew what 
 they were about better than Father Nau. There 
 has been added to this legend — which appears 
 
 from Ramla;f a bed of amaranths, 
 narcissuses, and anemones, received 
 the Loi'd of heaven and earth ; the 
 heat of summer was abroad on the 
 plain, and the warbling of birds, 
 the odor of plants, the thick shade 
 of the fig-trees, and the distant mur- 
 mur of a rivulet, lulled the divine 
 Infant to sleep. After a short and 
 anxious halt, the travellers resumed 
 their journey. There is no knowing 
 why it was that they directed their 
 com'se towards Betlilehem; tradi- 
 tion has preserved the memory of 
 their visit, and Christians have 
 erected an altar in the cave where 
 Mary hid with her child J whilst 
 Joseph went up to the city, either 
 to inquire a,bout the departure of 
 a caravan, or to exchange Mary's 
 gentle, but slow palfry, for a camel. 
 Whatever motive it might have 
 been that drew Joseph and Mary 
 
 authentic — an embellishment for which we do 
 not vouch, viz., that the hospitable brigand was 
 no other than the good thief in person. 
 
 f It is a charming spot which tradition points 
 out as one of the resting places of the Holy 
 Family ; the ruins of a monastery are now seen 
 there. 
 
 I This cave is called " The Grotto of the Vir- 
 gin's Milk," because it is thought that some 
 di-ops of Mary's milk fell on the rock while she 
 ^ nursed her divine Infant. 
 
192 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 into the crater of tlie volcano, it is f 
 certain that they stayed but a few 
 hours, and that they thence hast- 
 ened to gain a maritime town of 
 the Philistines, there to join the first 
 caravan destined for Egypt. 
 
 According to the learned calcula- 
 tions of chronologers, who admit of 
 no interval in this long journey, the 
 holy couple must have found a car- 
 avan at once setting out from the 
 Syrian coast. This is the more like- 
 ly, inasmuch as the spring equinox 
 was drawing near, so that every 
 traveller would be anxious to out- 
 strip the season when the simoom 
 sweeps over the desert, rendering 
 its sands as treacherous as the 
 ocean -wave.* Excepting only the 
 mortal dread of Herod's pursuit, the 
 latter part of the journey was just 
 as much marked by fatigue, suffer- 
 ing, and even insecurity. On leav- 
 ing Gaza, whose dilapidated towers 
 reechoed the hoarse murmur of the 
 waves, our travellers saw before 
 them only immense wastes of sand, 
 dreary, desolate, and fearfully naked, 
 
 * The Arabs call the hot wiud of the desert 
 idmoom, or poison ; some idea of it may be con- 
 ceived by standing for a moment at the mouth 
 of a common baking-oven, when the bread is 
 taken out. These fiei-y winds are much more ^ 
 
 agitated by the scorching wind of 
 the desert, and overhung by a fiery 
 sky. Not a trace of vegetation, 
 save, perchance, an occasional patch 
 of heath stretching here and there 
 across the desolate waste ; no water, 
 except the brackish spring, which 
 the Virgin and Jose[)li, who were 
 tired, poor, and unprotected, were 
 only allowed to approach after the 
 rich merchants, their slaves and 
 their camels, had drained it dry, so 
 that they could barely take up a 
 little of the thick, muddy water, in 
 the hollow of their hand. Accoi'd- 
 ing as they receded from the fron- 
 tiers of Syria, the thirst became 
 greater, and the water inoi'e scarce. 
 At times, there was seen afar off, 
 amid the interminable plain, a large 
 lake, blue and sparkling as that of 
 Gennesaretli ; the sky was reflected 
 in its limpid waters, with one soli- 
 tary date -tree; the camels were 
 hurried on, and Mary raised her 
 head, drooping like the rose of Jeri- 
 cho when bent by the rain.f That 
 blessed lake was gained ; already 
 
 frequent during the fifty days preceding and 
 succeeding the solstice. (Volney, Voyage en 
 Syrie.) 
 
 f This rose, whose corolla opens and shuts 
 according to the changes of the atmosphere, is 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 193 
 
 was the raging thirst quenched in 
 imagination ; but, oh, misery ! some 
 mocking demon removed the lake 
 some leagues farther, and left in its 
 place only burning sand.* 
 
 Another optical illusion which 
 frequently takes place in those arid 
 and scorching regions, appears to 
 the distant travellers in gigantic 
 |)roportions. Arab horsemen, cov- 
 ered with their tloating abbas with 
 brown and golden stripes, and armed 
 with the djombie — a dagger with a 
 crooked blade, which every inhabit- 
 ant of the desert wears in his girdle 
 — appeared from afar of the height 
 of lofty towers, seeming as though 
 they moved in the air. The Virgin 
 
 consulted as a barometer by the Arabs. (Vi- 
 comte de Marcellus, Voyage en Orient, t. ii.) 
 
 * This is the phenomenon commonly known 
 as mirage. During the expedition of the French 
 to Egypt, in 1798, the soldiers crossing those 
 fiery deserts, consumed with thirst, were often 
 deceived by this cruel illusion. Every object 
 rising from the soil, amid those seas of sand, 
 appeared to them surrounded by water ; thus 
 a little mountain which they perceived afar off, 
 seemed to them to rise from the midst of a 
 lake. Dying with thirst, they hastened thither, 
 but only to find themselves grievously mis- 
 taken ; the lake had fled, and was now farther 
 than ever from their longing eyes. {See De 
 Eellens, du Mirage, Art. 6.) 
 
 f "I had occasion," says Niebuhr, "to remark 
 a phenomenon which struck me as very singu- 
 lar, but which, in time, became familiar to me. 
 
 shuddered, and drew Jesus closer 
 to her bosom ; but hei- fears were 
 calmed by the serene countenance 
 of Joseph, though even he could 
 assign no reason for the strange 
 phenomenon.f 
 
 At the approach of night, the 
 song of the camel-drivers ceased, J 
 the leader of the caravan hoisted 
 the flag which was the signal for 
 halting, and all the travellers gath- 
 ered around the spot. An ani- 
 mated scene quickly followed. The 
 camels, squatting down at the feet 
 of their masters, were freed from 
 their heavy burdens ; bales of goods 
 were heaped up pyramidically ; a 
 circle of stakes was planted around, 
 
 An Arab mounted on a camel, whom I saw at 
 a distance, appeared to me as high as a tower, 
 and seemed to move in the air ; nevertheless, 
 he was walking on the sand like ourselves. 
 This optical illusion proceeds from the stronger 
 refraction of the atmosphere in those arid re- 
 gions laden with vapors of a very different 
 nature from those which fill the air in temper- 
 ate climates." {Voyage en Arahie, t. i., p. 208.) 
 
 I It is an almost universal custom in the East 
 for people to enliven their journey or their work 
 by singing. A Mussulman pilgrim has given 
 a very picturesque description of the nightly 
 march of a caravan from Mecca, lit by the lan- 
 thoms placed on the camels, and cheered by 
 the modulated song of the drivers. {Travels 
 of Abdoul Kerim. ) The camel-drivers still sing 
 songs peculiar to themselves, in Syria and in 
 Egypt. {Gorrenp. d' Orient, t. vi.) 
 
194 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 and to these the beasts of burden * 
 were fastened : llic wealtliy travel- 
 lers had tlieir tents erected, and the 
 master of the caravan placed senti- 
 nels, who w^ere to give notice of the 
 approach of the Bedouins — those 
 ])irates of the desert — who were 
 then, and still are, plunderers like 
 Ishniael, and hospitable as Abra- 
 liani. Each merchant, after having 
 taken his repast of dates and milk, 
 lay down to sleep under his tent, 
 awaiting the rising of the moon. 
 The slaves, and the poorer travellers 
 — amongst whom were the Son of 
 God, his divine Mother, and Joseph 
 — seated themselves on a rush mat 
 spread on the ground, with no other 
 covering than the sky, w4th the cold 
 night air falling chill and moist 
 on their shivering and exhausted 
 limbs.* Now and then there was 
 heard a cry of alarm: some band 
 of Arabs was discovered prowling 
 around the sleeping caravan; dis- 
 concerted by the vigilance of the 
 watchmen, a shower of arrows an- 
 
 * Though at this season it is burning hot 
 during the day, in the desert, yet the nights are 
 extremely cold. (Voln. — Sav ) 
 
 f On the dome of the sanctuary in the prin- 
 cipal temple of Heliopolis, there was an im- 
 mense mirror of polished steel, which reflected 
 
 nounced their departure, instantly 
 followed by the groans of the 
 wounded. Then the Virgin, who 
 had bent over her divine Son, so 
 as to make a rampart of her own 
 body, raised to heaven her tearful 
 eyes and her grief- worn brow: she 
 knew but too well that her Jesus 
 was subject to death, like all the 
 children of men ! 
 
 Wlien the moon shed her mild 
 light over the shadeless and noise- 
 less desert, where no blade of grass 
 waved in the midnight air, the 
 tents were folded up, and the dreary 
 journey resumed, with all its incon- 
 veniences, all its sufferings, all its 
 terrors. 
 
 At length, the outskirts of that 
 strange and silent region were 
 gained. Egypt — that ancient nur- 
 sery of all know^ledge and of all 
 idolatry— presented itself to the 
 travellers, with its red granite obe- 
 lisks, its colossal pyramids, its tem- 
 ples crowned with burnished steel,f 
 its island-like villages, and its pro- 
 
 every ray of light. There was just such another 
 on the top of the lighthouse of Alexandria, and 
 the image of vessels coming into port was re- 
 flected in it long before they appeared on the 
 horizon. {Gorresp. d' Orient, t. v. Lettres de 
 Samry.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 195 
 
 vidential river fringed with reeds 
 and covered with boats. That conn- 
 try appeared more rich, more popu- 
 lous, more commercial, than Judea, 
 but still it was the land of exile ! 
 Beyond the desert was home^ and 
 there lay the heart of the banished 
 children of Israel. 
 
 After a journey of one hundred 
 and forty leagues,* the fugitives 
 reached Heliopolis, where there was 
 a colony of their people. In that 
 city arose the Temple of Jehovah, 
 which Onias had constructed on the 
 plan of the Holy House. The or- 
 naments of that Egyptian temple 
 almost equalled those of the other, 
 only, as a token of inferiority, a 
 massive golden lamp, suspended 
 from the roof, replaced the famous 
 
 * Vid. Bar ad., t. i., ch. 8. The authoi* of Voy- 
 ages de Jesus Christ reckons but a hundred 
 leagues, but he probably overlooks the winding 
 and turning of the roads. 
 
 f The Arabs, who had gradually forgotten 
 the God of Abraham, at that time adored a 
 multitude of idols, one more fantastic than the 
 other. " The date-tree," says Azraki, " was wor- 
 shipped by the tribe of Khozua, and the Beni- 
 Thekif venerated a rock ; a lai'ge tree, named 
 zat arouat, was adored by the Koreisch, etc. 
 The Persians contemptuously distinguished the 
 Arabs as worshippers of stones." 
 
 \ We owe this incident to Sozomeues, and it 
 is rather hazardous to bring it forward in this 
 scoffing age, though it is, after all, scarcely a 
 
 candlestick of Jerusalem with its 
 seven branches. At the gate of 
 that city, which was chiefly inhab- 
 ited by Egyptians and Arab idola- 
 ters, there was a majestic tree, of 
 the mimosa kind, to which the 
 Arabs of Yemen, settled on the 
 banks of the Mle, paid a species 
 of worship.! At the approach of 
 the Holy Family, this idol - tree 
 slowly bent its shady branches, as 
 if saluting the young Master of 
 nature, whom Mary caiiied in her 
 arms ; J and, if we may believe the 
 historian Palladius, at the moment 
 when the divine travellers passed 
 under the granite arches of the gate 
 of Heliopolis, all the idols of a 
 neighboring temple fell prostrate on 
 the ground. § 
 
 miracle. It is certain that there exists in Arabia 
 a tree of the sensitive kind, which bends its 
 branches at the approach of man. Niebuhr, 
 who is not at all suspected of credulity, found 
 that tree in Yemen ; and the Arabs, who call it 
 the hospitable tree, hold it in such high venera- 
 tion that no one is permitted to pluck a leaf. 
 If that mimosa, by a natural phenomenon, bends 
 its branches at the approach of man, how much 
 more likely is it to do so at the approach of the 
 Son of God? 
 
 § Palladius is not the only one who relates 
 this miracle : Dorothy martyr, Sozomenes, St. 
 Anselm, St. Bon.aventure, Lira, Denis the Car- 
 thusian, Testat, Ludolphus, Baradius, etc., like- 
 wise attest it. 
 
hm; 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Joseph and Mary only passed 
 tlimuirii tin' riiy of ilic sun, and 
 repaiied to Matarieh, a pretty vil- 
 hiiie shaded with sycamores, and 
 having the only fountain of fresh 
 water to be found in Egypt. There, 
 in a habitation like a bee -hive, 
 where the doves made their nest, 
 the persecuted family found rest 
 and peace, being at last free from 
 the power of Herod. 
 
 That cruel prince, having vainly 
 expected the Magi in his palace 
 of Jericho, ' his favorite residence, 
 learned, at last, that they had re- 
 passed the frontiers of his kingdom, 
 and that, regardless of his injunc- 
 tions, they had returned to Persia, 
 without letting him know the result 
 of their mission. Pale already from 
 the slow fever which was wearing 
 him away, the king of the Jews 
 became paler still with anger. He 
 was himself duped at the very 
 moment when he revelled in the 
 thought of his unrivalled dexterity 
 in deceiving others .... duped 
 by those " uncircumcised dogs" who 
 had so unexpectedly penetrated the 
 
 * This evangelical fact, which the disciples of 
 Voltaire have called in question, is proved not 
 only by our sacred books, but also by the testi- 
 
 ^ very depths of his tortuous policy! 
 .... If the Magi had not found 
 the child to whom they were led 
 by the star, they would have come 
 
 back and told him They had, 
 
 then, discovered his secret asylum, 
 which must be somewhere about 
 Bethlehem, since they had extended 
 
 their search no farther Now, 
 
 how was that dangerous child to be 
 distinguished from all others ? . . . . 
 There was but one way to make 
 sure of his destruction : to include 
 
 all in a general massacre But 
 
 the people ! .... At that thought 
 the old king paused a moment ; 
 then a strange, a contemptuous 
 smile curled his haughty lip. '' The 
 people dare nothing," said Herod, 
 " against kings who dare all ! "... . 
 "And sending, he killed all the men- 
 children that w^ere in Bethlehem, 
 and in all the borders thereof, from 
 two years old and under, accoi'ding 
 to the time which he had diligently 
 inquired of the wise men." * 
 
 According to many grave au- 
 thors, supported by tradition and 
 probability, the Holy Family re- 
 
 mony of Jews and pagans. (Macrobius, b. xi., 
 ch. 4, den Saturnale^. Orig. Contr. Celn., h. xi., 
 ch. 58. Toldos Huldr., pp. 12, 14, 20.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 197 
 
 mained seven years in Egypt.* 
 Traces of their sojourn are still 
 found there ; the fountain where 
 Mary went to wash the Child's 
 swaddling-clothes,! the bushy knoll 
 where she dried them in the sun, 
 the sycamore in whose shade she 
 loved to sit with her Son on her 
 knee, 'I are still pointed out, after 
 the lapse of eighteen hundred years. 
 The pilgrims of Europe and of Asia 
 know these objects well, and they 
 are held in reverence by the Egyp- 
 
 * Vid. Tromhel, in Vit. Deipn. — Zachariam, in 
 diss, ad hist. eccl. — Anselm. — Cantual. — Euseb. — 
 S. Tho. 
 
 f This is still called "Mary's Fouutain." 
 There is an ancient tradition to the effect that 
 the Blessed Virgin used to bathe the child 
 Jesus in its limpid waler. In the first ages of 
 Christianity, the faithful built a church there ; 
 in later times, the Mussulmans also constructed 
 a mosque ; and the disciples of both creeds went 
 to Mary's Fountain for the cure of their dis- 
 eases. The fountain is still there ; the pilgrim- 
 ages still continue ; but both the church and the 
 mosque have long since disappeared. ('Savary, 
 t. i., p. 122. Gorresp. d' Orient, t. vi., p. 3. 
 
 X "Not far from the fountain, I was shown an 
 inclosure planted with trees ; a Mussulman, who 
 acted as our guide, made us stop before a syca- 
 more, saying, " That is Jesus and Mary's Tree." 
 Vansleb, priest of Fontainebleau, relates that 
 the ancient sycamore fell, from age, ir. 1058 ; 
 the Franciscans of Cairo piously preserve in 
 their sacristy the last remains of that tree ; in 
 the garden there only remained a stump, of 
 which the tree we saw was doubtless a shoot. ^ 
 
 tians themselves. To each of these 
 clings, like the moss to the damp 
 walls of the ruined monastery, some 
 simple legend of other days.§ 
 
 In Nazareth, Mary had led an 
 humble and laborious life; but in 
 Heliopolis, she descended into the 
 depths of poverty, and saw misery 
 under every aspect. 
 
 The holy couple were left entirely 
 to their own resources, amongst a 
 people who were parcelled out into 
 national and hereditary corpora- 
 General Kleber, after his victory of Heliopolis, 
 made a pilgrimage to the Holy Family's Tree ; 
 he carved his name on the bark of one of the 
 branches, but that name has since disappeared, 
 effaced by time, or by some envious hand." 
 {Gorresp. d' Orient, t. vi., lettre 141.) 
 
 § The following is one of the legends brought 
 from Eastern climes by one of our old French 
 barons, the Seigneur d'Englure ; we give it ver- 
 batim, in all its artless grace : — " When Our 
 Lady, the Mother of God, had crossed the 
 desert, and reached this place, she laid Our 
 Lord on the ground, and went all around in 
 quest of water, but there was no water to be 
 found. She went back, sad and sorrowful, to 
 her dear Child, where he lay on the sand, but, 
 behold ! he had stuck his heels into the ground 
 until a fountain of clear, sweet water gushed 
 out. Our Lady was overjoyed at this, and 
 thanked her son. Our Lord. She then washed 
 Our Lord's clothes in the water of this foun- 
 tain, and spread them on the ground to dry, 
 and every drop of water that trickled from 
 those clothes sprang up into a bush, which 
 bushes bear balm," etc. 
 
ins 
 
 LTFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 tions^ and who were by no means * 
 favorable to strangers. " They being 
 poor," observes St. Basil, " it is clear 
 that they had to work very hard in 
 oi-der to procui-e the necessaries of 
 life, .... and even those — were 
 they always able to obtain them?" 
 . . . . "Often," says Landolph, of 
 Saxony — '' often did it happen, that 
 the child Jesus, pressed by hunger, 
 asked his mother for bread when 
 she had none to give him." .... 
 
 Meanwhile, Herod had died of 
 a horrible and nameless malady, 
 after being literally eaten alive by 
 worms. Occupied to the last with 
 thoughts of how the people would 
 rejoice at the news of his death, he 
 implored his sister Salome — a very 
 wicked woman — implored her with 
 tears to have some Jewish nobles — 
 the flower of their nation, whom he 
 
 * Joseph., Ant. Jud., h. xvii., cli. 8. The mem- 
 ory of Herod was held in such detestation by 
 the princes of the people and the priests, that 
 they instituted a festival to be celebrated on the 
 25th of September in joyful commemoration of 
 that prince's death. "There is a feast on the 
 
 had kept imprisoned for that pur- 
 pose — put to death, in order that 
 the people might be forced to wee}) 
 at his funeral.* He was borne to 
 his castle of Herodion in a golden 
 litter covered with scarlet cloth and 
 adorned with precious stones. His 
 sons and his army followed his re- 
 mains with a dejected air, whilst 
 the people, proud of their deliver- 
 ance, heaped curses upon him as 
 the procession passed along. 
 
 Apprised in a dream, by the An- 
 gel of the Lord, that Herod was 
 dead, Joseph returned with Mary 
 and the Child into the land of 
 Israel ; " but hearing that Archelaus 
 reigned in Judea in the room of 
 Herod his father, he was afraid to 
 go thither: and, being warned in 
 sleep, retired into the quarters of 
 Galilee." 
 
 7th of September," saj's the Jewish calendar, " on 
 account of the death of Herod, for he had hated 
 the wise ; and they rejoice before the Lord 
 when the impious leave this world." (Basnage, 
 t. 1, hv. ii., ch. 8.) 
 
CHAPTER Xy. 
 
 MARY IN NAZARETH. 
 
 tr^ J how mourn- 
 ful are the days 
 of exile, and 
 how sweet it is 
 to breathe once 
 i^^^^^MmS^ more the air of 
 (;ur native land ! The bread of the 
 stranger, like that of the wicked, is 
 hard to eat, and bitter to the heart ; 
 tlie streams of the foreign land mur- 
 mur not tales of our childish sports ; 
 the song of its birds wants one 
 melodious note ; its scenes, however 
 fair, have not that sweet, that sooth- 
 ing charm which endears every ob- 
 ject in our native land ! 
 
 How great must have been the 
 joy of the holy spouses on again 
 beholding that land of Chanaan, 
 whose stately hills, waving outlines, 
 harmonious scenery, and endless 
 variety, contrasted so happily and 
 so strikingly with the monotonous 
 splendors of Egypt! Here, a bold 
 and active population, martial, frank 
 and gay, with a pure and holy ; 
 
 worship ; there, slaves shackled by 
 castes, addicted to theft, mixino* 
 up the most infamous practices in 
 their senseless worship, and lavish- 
 ing their treasures in building tem- 
 ples to the ox Apis, the crocodile, 
 and the sea-onion. One must be 
 profoundly religious, like Joseph 
 and Mary, and love his country as 
 the Hebrews loved theirs, in order 
 to comprehend the deliglitful emo- 
 tions wherewith they greeted the 
 land of Jehovah and their pretty 
 town of Nazareth. 
 
 The Holy Family retiu^ned to their 
 humble home, after so long an ab- 
 sence, amid the congratulations and 
 endless questions of their friends 
 and neighbors, who celebrated their 
 return as an event of great joy. 
 But the scene was soon and sadly 
 changed. The neglected dwelling 
 of Joseph was scarcely habitable; 
 the roof, in some places broken and 
 falling in, had given free admission 
 to the winter storm and the equi- 
 
'200 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 noctial rains;* the lower cliainber f 
 was cold, (lamp, and overgrown wilh 
 weeds ; wild doves made their nests 
 in the sacred and mysteri(5us cell 
 where the "Word was made flesh; 
 the little court was overrun with 
 briers ; everything, in short, in and 
 around that time-honored dwelling 
 had assumed that ruinous and deso- 
 late aspect which rests on deserted 
 houses like the seal of the mas- 
 ter's absence. These needful re- 
 pairs were, then, to be made ; fur- 
 niture and tools, lost or broken, had 
 to be replaced ; and perhaps a debt 
 contracted in Egypt, to defray the 
 expense of the return, had to be 
 discharged. It was, doubtless, at 
 this juncture that the little patri- 
 mony of Joseph was sold till the 
 jubilee. All that remained of what 
 they had possessed before their de- 
 parture was the ruined house, the 
 workshop, and their own arms ; but 
 Jesus was there. Young as he w^as, 
 Jesus took an axe and followed his 
 foster-father to the villages, where 
 
 * The rainy season, in Judea, is that of the 
 equinoxes, and especially the autumnal equi- 
 nox ; it is also the time of storms, accompanied 
 by violent showers of rain or hail. (Volney, 
 Voyage en Syrie. ) 
 
 t St. Justin Martyr {Dialog, cum Ti'yphone) 
 
 work was procured for them;f liis 
 labor, proportioned to his age and 
 strength, was always devoted to his 
 mothef.^ Comfort had long disap- 
 peared ; but they succeeded, by 
 hard work and persevering industiy, 
 in obtaining the necessaries of life. 
 Jesus, Mary, and Joseph led a life 
 of ceaseless toil ; and He who might 
 command legions of angels, asked 
 nothing from God for himself or his 
 but their " daily bread." 
 
 The interior life of that blessed 
 family, surnamed the earthly trinity, 
 has not come to the knowledge of 
 men ; it is like the streamlet hidden 
 in the long grass, or, more properly, 
 it is the Holy of Holies, with its 
 cloud of perfumes and its double 
 veil. Nevertheless, by studying 
 minutely, and examining one by 
 one, under every point of view, the 
 evangelical facts, what w^e know 
 enables us to guess to a certain 
 extent at what we do not know, 
 and the public life of Jesus Christ 
 throws some bright rays of light on 
 
 states that Jesus Christ assisted his foster- 
 father to make yokes and plou^-^hs. And Godes- 
 card, t. xiv., p. 436, Vie de la Sainte Vierge, says : 
 — "A very ancient author asserts that, in his 
 time, there were yokes to be seen which Our 
 Saviour had made with his own hands." 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 201 
 
 his own hidden life and that of the t 
 Blessed Virgin. That sacred abyss 
 we are about to sound with all the 
 reserve, all the conscientious ap- 
 plication, that so grave a subject 
 requires, 
 
 Jesus, in whom were hidden all 
 the treasures of wisdom and of 
 knowledge,* had no need of human 
 teaching; and the contrary suppo- 
 sition is positively condemned by 
 the Church. St. John also, in his 
 Gospel, mentions that the Jews, 
 contemporaries of Jesus Christ, re- 
 garded him as a man who had 
 "never leai'ned;"f and the surprise 
 of the Nazarenes, on seeing him so 
 profoundly versed in sacred letters, 
 shows clearly enough that he had 
 not been, to their knowledge, 
 brought up, like St. Paul, at the feet 
 of a master. The Talmudists and 
 the Jewish authors of the Toldos 
 maintain, on the contrary, that a 
 celebrated rabbin initiated Jesus 
 in the mysteries of science and 
 of magic ; but, deducing from the 
 second part of the assertion, whiclj 
 is wholly absurd, and viewing the . 
 matter in a purely human light, as 
 
 * St. Paul, Ep. Golos., ch. ii., ver. 9. 
 f St. John, ch. vii., ver. 15. 
 
 do the rationalists, this is evidently 
 false, for two reasons. In the first 
 place, Jesus was neither a zealot 
 nor a traditionist, and it is every- 
 where apparent in the Gospel that 
 he openly disapproved of the nar- 
 row views, the captious distinctions, 
 and shallow subtilties of the Syna- 
 gogue. In the second place, Rabbi 
 Joshua Perachia, whom they name 
 as his preceptor, was yet unborn, 
 as he flourished an hundred years 
 later. 
 
 To place Jesus amid the Rabbins 
 in the capacity of a pupil would be 
 just about as illogical as to try to 
 support an oak by surrounding it 
 with reeds. He taught not as the 
 scribes and Pharisees, says an evan- 
 gelist, J and that is easily conceived, 
 for he derived his wisdom from him- 
 self; and his teachings, even view- 
 ing them in a natural way, seem to 
 emanate from a soul lofty, pure, up- 
 right, and from a mind so vast, and 
 so uniformly sound, that it never 
 could have been perverted by scho- 
 lastic disputes. 
 
 Strauss admits that all the wis- 
 dom and aU the science of the 
 
 X St. Matthew, ch. vii., ver. 29. 
 
iOft 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGTN MART. 
 
 perioti would have been unable to ^ 
 form such a man as Jesus Cluist. 
 " Even if Jesus had exhausted," says 
 he, "ail the soui'ces of instruction 
 then to be had, it is no less true 
 that none of these elements would 
 suffice, even remotely, to effect a 
 revolution in the world, and the 
 leaven necessary for so great a work 
 he must have drawn from the depths 
 of his own soul." 
 
 His eloquence, like his morality, 
 was peculiar* to himself. It was 
 not the emphatic exaggerations of 
 the Rabbins, nor yet the majestic, 
 overwhelming, and violently - con- 
 trasted diction of the ancient pro- 
 phets ; it was, as he himself said, a 
 source of living water, reflecting in 
 its . course the birds of the air, the 
 crops, and the flowers of the field. 
 That eloquence, so simple, pene- 
 trated to the very bottom of every 
 thing, and was easily connected 
 with high and lofty ideas. Every 
 word was a precious seed of virtue ; 
 
 * "T confess to you," says J. J. Bousseau, 
 " that the majesty of the Scriptures astonishes 
 me, and the sanctity of the Gospel speaks to 
 my heart. Behold the books of our philoso- 
 phers, with all their pretensions ; how small 
 they are, when compared with this ! Can it be 
 that a book, at once so simple and so sublime, 
 
 every lesson threw afar, over the 
 mysterious wastes of the future, a 
 long train of light, which was insen- 
 sibly to spread into the perfect day 
 of the world's regeneration. Even 
 those who have audaciously denied 
 his miracles, were yet forced to 
 acknowledge that his words were 
 those of a God.* 
 
 Jesus was endowed with a high 
 and meditative soul, which required 
 a vast space for its expansion. 
 Confined during the day at manual 
 labor, which occupied every moment 
 of his time, he made up by night 
 for his obscure toil, and was again 
 the legislator and the prophet in 
 presence of the starry heavens. 
 Standing on the lofty terrace wliich 
 commanded a view of the moun- 
 tains and forests of the land of 
 Chanaan, he poured out his soul 
 before the Author of Nature, whose 
 Ambassador, whose Son, and whose 
 equal he was. These communings 
 with God, in the silence of the 
 
 is the work of men ? Can it be that be whose 
 history it records is himself but man ? Is his . 
 *the tone of an enthusiast or of an ambitious 
 sectary? What sweetness! what purity in his 
 morals ! what touching grace in his instructions ! 
 what elevation in his precepts ! what profound 
 wisdom in his discourse 1^' [Eviile, t. iii., p. 365.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 203 
 
 night, of tlie desert, and of thought, * 
 were customary with Jesus, as we 
 see in many places of the Gospel. 
 The model-man, the incarnate Word, 
 would thus, we may suppose, in- 
 struct his own to distinguish the 
 pure gold of prayer from the mon- 
 strous alloy of ostentation and hy- 
 pocrisy wherewith the Pharisees of 
 his time were wont to mix it up. 
 
 The Virgin, who was never either 
 troublesome or exacting, placed no 
 obstacle in the way of her Son's 
 solitary habits ; she knew that he 
 was then sounding the depth of the 
 unfathomable abyss opening under 
 the feet of men, and that the world's 
 redemption was to be the fruit of 
 these silent meditations. Respect- 
 ing the workings of that mighty 
 spirit folded up within itself, and 
 ever looking forward to that glo- 
 rious future which every passing 
 moment brought more near, Mary 
 already beheld heaven opened, death 
 overcome, and the Messiah gather- 
 ing the nations around his standard. 
 .... But all of a sudden she re- 
 membered the prediction of the old 
 man in the Temple, and its image 
 
 * Tertullian said, in the third century, that 
 Mary earned her living by working ; and Cel- 
 
 arose, gloomy as a funeral-pall, at 
 the end of that enchanting pros- 
 pect; a shudder ran through every 
 vein of the poor mother, and her 
 heart, so absorbed in the love of 
 Jesus, was torn asunder with an- 
 guished forebodings. A secret voice 
 seemed to cry, '' Blood must expiate 
 sin ! Christ must die ! " Then, leav- 
 ing off the manual toil to which her 
 poverty condemned her,* the daugh- 
 ter of David went to seek her Son ; 
 she longed to see him, to assure- 
 herself, by a maternal embrace, that 
 he was still there, that he was yet 
 living ! 
 
 At her approach Jesus withdrew 
 his pensive glance from the starry 
 heavens ; his youthful brow, con- 
 tracted by a thought as vast as the 
 universe, became again the smooth, 
 fair brow of the child. Mary then, 
 driving back into her heart every 
 mournful apprehension, advised him 
 to seek repose. Strength must be 
 recruited for the morrow's fatiguing 
 
 labor The Son of God followed 
 
 his mother in silence, for he loved 
 and was svhject to her. 
 
 The entrance of Jesus into adoles- 
 
 sus, in the second century, said that Mary waa 
 a woman who lived by the labor of her hands. 
 
904 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 cence was marked by an extraor- * 
 dinary incident, which gave Mary's 
 soul a most violent shock. Joseph 
 and Mary, faithful observers of the 
 law of their fathers, went regularly 
 every year to Jerusalem to cele- 
 brate the Passover. This journey, 
 which they made in secret so long 
 as the throne of the Maccabees was 
 tilled by. the son of the enemy of 
 God, had now become more easy 
 since the banishment of Archelaus 
 •and the occupation of the Romans. 
 When Christ had attained his twelfth 
 year, his parents, having the fear of 
 Herod no longer before their eyes, 
 brought him with them to Jerusa- 
 lem. They set out from Nazareth 
 in a crowd ; and, on the way, the 
 Hebrew pilgrims formed themselves 
 into little bands, according to age 
 and sex, and the ties of family or 
 friendship.* 
 
 With the Virgin were Mary of Cle- 
 ophas, the sister-in-law of Joseph ; 
 another Mary, mentioned in the 
 Gospel as altera. Maria ; Salome, 
 
 * St. Epiphanius and St. Bernard inform us 
 that, in these journeys, the men went in troops, 
 separate from the women, and that St. Joseph 
 and the Blessed Virgin being thus one in one 
 company and one in another, gave themselves 
 at first no concern about the disappearance of ^ 
 
 wife of Zebedee, come from Beth- 
 saida with her husband and sons ; 
 Joanna, wife of Chus; and a num- 
 ber of Nazarean women, her neigh- 
 bors and friends. Joseph followed 
 at some distance, in grave conver- 
 sation with Zebedee, the fisherman, 
 and the ancients of his tribe. Jesus 
 walked with the young Galileans, 
 whom the Gospel, according to the 
 idiom of the Hebrew tongue, calls 
 his brethren, they being his nearest 
 relations. 
 
 Amongst this youthful group, who 
 went before the others, the sons of 
 Zebedee might be distinguished ; 
 James, impetuous as the sea of 
 Tiberias on a stormy day ; John, 
 still younger than Jesus, and seem- 
 ing, as he walked beside his 
 brother, the true personification of 
 the lamb of Isaiah dwelling in 
 peace with the lion of the Jordan. 
 Beside the fishermen of Bethsaida, 
 whorn Jesus afterwards surnamed 
 Boanerges (sons of thunder), were 
 the four sons of Alpheus ; James, 
 
 Jesus, and indeed knew nothing of it till the 
 evening, when all tLe travellers assembled to- 
 gether. See likewise Aelrede, abbot of Reverby, 
 Serm. sen tractatus de Jesu ditod^ni^ Dominica 
 intra octav. Epiphan. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 205 
 
 who was subsequently bishop of 
 Jerusalem, an austere and grave 
 young man, with long hair, pale 
 face, and cold, subdued manner. 
 Proud of having taken the Nazarite 
 vow, he put jn provoking airs of 
 superiority towards him whom he 
 then considered as the carpenter's 
 son. In the character of Jesus were 
 seen the virtues and the imperfec- 
 tions inherent in the soil; immov- 
 able firmness, upright and religious 
 inclinations, but, at the same time, 
 a strong contempt for all who were 
 not of the race of Abraham, and an 
 excellent opinion of himself. Jude, 
 Simon, and Jose, the other sons of 
 Alpheus, were youths of a rustic, 
 simple, and warlike mien, already 
 arrived at adolescence, and regard- 
 ing the son of the humble Mary as 
 their inferior in every way — a feel- 
 ing of which they could with difiS- 
 
 * St. John Chrvsostom, Serm. 44. 
 
 f The Rabbins have taken occasion to make 
 the most odious insinuations against Jesus on 
 account of the color of his hair ; but what is 
 most extraordinary is that they make precisely 
 the same remarks on David. He was red as 
 Eaau ; he had blood on his head ; the soul of Esau 
 had passed into him. They have only forgotten 
 the evil eye wherewith they endow the prophet- 
 king. 
 
 J Nicheph., Hist. Eccles., t. i., p. 125. His 
 portrait of Our LoVd, drawn from tradition, is 
 
 culty divest themselves in after 
 times, as we see by the Gospel.* 
 And Jesus ? Jesus affected noth- 
 ing, neither devotion, nor austerity, 
 nor wisdom, nor science, because he 
 possessed the fullness of all those 
 things, and people seldom affect 
 anything but what they have not. 
 
 To see him clad so simply — like 
 an Essenian — his long hair, of the 
 color of ancient bronze,f parted on 
 his high sun-browned forehead, and 
 floating gracefully over his shoul- 
 ders, one would have taken him for 
 David as he presented himself to 
 the prophet Samuel, small, timid, 
 attired in a shepherd's dress, to 
 receive the sacred unction. Yet 
 there was something more in the 
 soft brown eye of Jesus J than even 
 in that of his great ancestor, gleam- 
 ing as it was with the brightness of 
 poetic inspiration ; there was some- 
 
 the most authentic that we now have. The 
 Rev. Mr. Walsh, author of a recent work de- 
 voted to the rare and unpublished monuments 
 of the first age of Christianity, calls attention to 
 a very curious medal, which was known so early 
 as the 15th century. The front side represents 
 the head of Our Lord in profile ; the hair is 
 divided after the manner of- the Nazarenes, 
 smooth to the ears, and waving on the shoul- 
 ders ; the beard bushy, and not very long ; the 
 features fine, as also the bust, over which the 
 tunic falls in graceful folds. 
 
206 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 thing penetrating and divine which 
 laid bare the inmost thoughts and 
 reached the most secret recesses of 
 the soul ; but Jesus then veiled the 
 splendor of his look, as Moses did 
 his radiant brow on going forth 
 from the tabernacle. He walked, 
 then, in wise, yet appropriate con- 
 versation with his young kinsmen 
 according to the flesh, whom he 
 designed to make his apostles ; he 
 discovered, beneath their rough ex- 
 terior, the weight and the value of 
 those unpolished diamonds which 
 were one day to shine with such 
 surpassing splendor, and he loved 
 them by anticipation. He was not 
 deceived in his expectations ; those 
 men, who had had, like the rest of 
 the nation, their dreams of gold and 
 power regarding the Messiah, cast 
 away at his bidding all their preju- 
 dices, both national and religious, 
 and adopted a calumniated doc- 
 trine, whose principles and whose 
 promises, like the maledictions of 
 the old law, spoke only of suffer- 
 ings to endure and persecutions to 
 encounter. They bound themselves 
 to him by ties so strong that neither 
 the princes of the earth, nor cold, 
 nor nakedness, nor hunger, nor the 
 
 f sword could separate them from 
 his love; they walked in his foot- 
 steps, courageously trampling on 
 the thorns which the world threw 
 in their way, and allowing them- 
 selves to be treated, for his sake, 
 as the very scum of mankind. They 
 were neither ashamed of the Son of 
 man, nor of his Gospel, nor of the 
 folly of the Cross ! And why should 
 they ? It is for impostors to be 
 ashamed ; and the Apostles never 
 preached but from sincere convic- 
 tion. Those honest and simple 
 hearts enforced their testimony by 
 all that could render it credible and 
 sacred amongst men ; they aban- 
 doned all, suffered all, forgave all, 
 and sealed with their blood the 
 Gospel of their divine Master.* 
 
 But at the period of which we 
 speak, these heroic virtues were not 
 even in blossom, and those young 
 Galileans little thought that they 
 should one day maintain with their 
 life the divinity of their fellow- 
 traveller. 
 
 After a journey of four days, the 
 pilgrims reached the Holy City, 
 then filled with an immense con- 
 
 * Pascal said, " I am ready to believe any his- 
 ^ tory the ■witnesses of which Buffer death for it." 
 
L 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 207 
 
 course of Jewish strangers.* The 
 family of Joseph and Mary assem- 
 bled to eat the Paschal lamb, which 
 the priests took care to immolate 
 between the two evening prayers, f 
 in the court of the Temple ; to this 
 was added unleavened bread, wild 
 lettuce, and all that belonged of 
 right to that ancient ceremony. 
 The festival days being over, the 
 parents and kinsfolk of Jesus met 
 together, in order to return home; 
 as they went back in the same 
 order in which they came, it was 
 not, at iirst, perceived that Jesus 
 was missing. Mary thought him 
 with Joseph, or the two James's; 
 Joseph, on the other hand, thought 
 him with his young kinsmen, or 
 with Mary. At night-fall, the vari- 
 ous companies came together, and 
 the Virgin sought Jesus in vain 
 amongst the crowd of travellers who 
 arrived successively at the inn; no 
 one knew what had become of 
 him. The grief of the holy spouses 
 was inexpressible. " The deposit 
 
 * The feast of Easter gathered to Jerusalem 
 ^bout two millions, five hundred thousand per- 
 sons. {De Bello, 1. vii., ch. 17.) Cestus, wish- 
 ing to persuade Nero that the Jewish nation 
 was not so contemptible as he thought, caused 
 the people to be reckoned by the priests. At 
 
 f of heaven, the Son of God!" mur- 
 mured Joseph sadly. "My son!" 
 said the poor young mother, her 
 voice choked with sobs. All that 
 night they sought him and all the 
 following day, asking every one 
 they met along the road, calling 
 him in the woods, looking fearfully 
 down the precipices, now fearing 
 for his life, now for his liberty, and 
 not knowing what was to happen 
 if he were lost. They returned to 
 Jerusalem; ran to the houses of 
 their friends, and, tired of wander- 
 ing through every part of that large 
 city, they, at last, entered the Tem- 
 ple. In the porch, where sat the 
 doctors of the law, was a child who 
 charmed the ancients of Israel by 
 the depth of his observation and 
 the clearness of his answers to 
 questions, even the most difficult; 
 they all stood in a circle round him, 
 every one wondering within himself 
 at his marvellous and precocious 
 wisdom. "It is either Daniel, or 
 an angel," said some one within a 
 
 the feast of Easter, they killed two hundred and 
 fifty-six thousand six hundred lambs ; there was 
 a lamb for every family. 
 
 f That is to say, from noon or one o'clock, till 
 sunset. (Basnage, t. v., L vii., ch. 2.) 
 
-I 
 
 SOS 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 few paces of the sorrowful Virgin. 
 "It is Jesus!" said the young 
 mother, making her way through 
 the doctore. Then, approaching the 
 Messiah, with a look of tender re- 
 proach — "Son!" said she, mildly, 
 " why hast thou done so to us ? 
 behold thy father and I have sought 
 thee sorrowing?" 
 
 Tlie child had disappeared before 
 the God: the answer was dry and 
 mysterious. "How is it that you 
 
 sought me ? Did you not know 
 that I must be about my Father's 
 business?" The holy couple were 
 silent; they did not, at lirst, com- 
 prehend the drift of this reply. 
 
 Jesus arose and followed them 
 to Nazareth ; his perfect submission 
 to their will very soon effaced this 
 light cloud. "And his mother kept 
 all these things in her heart ; and 
 Jesus advanced in wisdom and age, 
 ¥ and grace with God and men." 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 MARY AT THE SERMONS OF JESUS. 
 
 HERE are two 
 worlds in his- 
 tory," says one 
 of the finest 
 wi'iters of our 
 time : " one be- 
 yond, the other 
 on this side, the Cross." The pri- 
 meval world, old and decrepid at 
 
 * The pagan Gauls of the 6fch aud 7th cen- 
 turies deified oaks ; they burned torches before 
 those trees, and invoked them as though they 
 could have heard them; the enormous stones 
 
 the time of Christ's regenerating 
 mission, presented a strange spec- 
 tacle, for the ridiculous went hand 
 in hand with the horrible. The 
 Arab and the Gaul, after having for 
 ages retained the primitive idea of 
 the unity of God, adored the acacia 
 and the oak;* the Hindoo deified 
 the Ganges, and sacrificed human 
 
 which were found near had their share of the 
 divine honors. (Histoire Ecclesiastique de Bre- 
 tagne, t iv., 7th century. — GapUal. Garoli Magni, 
 hb. 1, tit. 64.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 209 
 
 victims to Sactis, goddess of death;* * 
 the Egyptians — wisest of nations — 
 rendered devout worship to the gar- 
 lic, the lotus, and nearly all bul- 
 bous plants ; f the unknown tribes 
 of young America adored the 
 tiger, the vulture, the tempest, and 
 the roaring cataract; J finally, the 
 Greeks and Romans confessedly 
 filled their temples with demons, § 
 and those nations so intellectual, so 
 polished, so prolific of great men, 
 had deified vice under its most hid- 
 eous aspects, and peopled their 
 Olympus with robbers, adulterers, 
 and murderers. Their morals cor- 
 responded with their creeds ; cor- 
 ruption, descending like a vast river 
 from the height of the seven impe- 
 rial hills, overspread all the prov- 
 
 * See Tableau d'Inde (Picture of India) by 
 Buckingham. 
 
 f Juvenal's sarcasm is well known : " O sanc- 
 tas gentes, quibus hsec nascuntur in hortis nu- 
 mina." (Sat. xv., v. 10.) 
 
 J Garcilasso, 1. 1, c. 2 and 12. 
 
 § Porphyrus, who was so well acquainted 
 with the sources of polytheism, admits that 
 the devils were the objects of Gentile worship. 
 "There are," says he, "unclean spirits, mali- 
 cious and deceitful, who wish to pass for gods, 
 and be adored by men ; these must be ap- 
 peased, as otherwise they might injure us. 
 Some, being gay and playful, are propitiated by 
 games and festivals ; others, of a more gloomy 
 
 inces. Judea, which had, no more 
 than the others, escaped the conta- 
 gion of vice, was falling Avith fearful 
 rapidity ; its religion no longer con- 
 sisted in fundamental dogmas, but 
 in a multitude of parasitical super- 
 fluities, and the dreams of its Rab- 
 bins had taken the place of the 
 Mosaic law. II 
 
 And what had become of haughty 
 Reason amid all these deplorable 
 aberrations — of Reason, that queen 
 of intelligences, who takes her own 
 limited horizon for the bounds of 
 the universe, and stretches gods on 
 the bed of Procrustes ? Where did 
 she hold dominion? where had she 
 hoisted her colors, whilst her ram- 
 parts were thus universally attack- 
 ed? If she could, without foreign 
 
 turn, must have the smell of grease, and delight 
 in bloody sacrifices." 
 
 II It is a saying amongst the Jews, that the 
 Covenant was made with them on Mount Sinai, 
 not on the iSasis of the written law, but on that 
 of the oral law. They annihilate the former to 
 install the latter in its stead, and finally reduce 
 all religion to tradition. This corruption was 
 so prevalent amongst the Jews, even at the time 
 of Our Lord, that he reproaches them, in St. 
 Mark, with having nullified the word of God by 
 their traditions. But it is now much worse ; 
 they compare the sacred text to water, and the 
 Misnah, or Talmud, to the best wine ; again, the 
 written law is salt, but the Taimud is pepper, 
 cinnamon, etc 
 
210 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 assistance, reconquer the earth * 
 which she had lost, why did she 
 not do it? . . . Alas! she felt that 
 tlie torrent would sweep away her 
 frail barriers ; and, powerless to re- 
 strain it, she contented herself with 
 noting its ravages. Resting on phi- 
 losophy, she mourned over the life- 
 less remains of the social body, 
 whose fall she could not prevent; 
 Christianity came forward, and said 
 to the dead body, "Arise and walk." 
 .... And it was done according 
 to her word. 
 
 From that day forward a new 
 race, cured of all diseases, cleansed 
 from all impurity in the sacred 
 laver, gathered around the Cross 
 which the Son of Mary had set up 
 over the regenerate world, as the 
 tiiumph of God over hell. 
 
 That glorious revolution which 
 placed Charity on the throne, at- 
 tended by all the other #^'irtues — 
 that ever -memorable event which 
 changed the aspect of the world, 
 and whose results shall be felt till 
 the end of all things, had its origin 
 in Nazareth : from the hollow of 
 that nameless rock flowed the hum- 
 ble stream of Christianity. "An 
 obscure spring, an unnoticed drop 
 
 of water, in which two sparrows 
 could not drink, which one sunbeam 
 might have dried up, and which 
 now, like the great ocean of mind, 
 has filled up all the depths of hu- 
 man wisdom, and bathed with its 
 exhaustless \^ters the past, the 
 present, and the future."* 
 
 Nothing is known of the means 
 which brought about that grand 
 fact which stands pre-eminent above 
 all modern history. From the day 
 of his manifestation in the Temple, 
 the Son of God led a hidden and 
 meditative life with his mother and 
 his adoptive father. This period, 
 lost to the world, was undoubtedly 
 that in which the Virgin spent her 
 calmest and happiest days. It is 
 not when human life rolls noisily 
 on, like a wintry torrent, that it is 
 the happiest; but when it resem- 
 bles the streamlet gliding in silvery 
 ripples through the flower-bespan- 
 gled meadows. Mary, deprived of 
 all the enjoyments of luxury and all 
 the pleasures of affluence, but living 
 near her Son, working for him, 
 studying his tastes, seeing him 
 every hour, offering to him, as it 
 were, the fii'st-fruits of his sacred 
 
 * M. de Lamartine. Voyage en Orient. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 211 
 
 harvest ; the first, the humblest, and 
 the most docile of his disciples, and 
 bending her cultivated understand- 
 ing before the divinity and superior 
 mind of her Son — Mary must then 
 have been a happy mother ! If, at 
 times, whilst Jesus was explaining 
 to her the most profound meaning 
 of the prophecies, he came on some 
 passage which spoke of sufferings 
 to be endured, a dark cloud gath- 
 ered on the modest brow of the 
 Virgin, it soon passed away, and 
 that mild, benign countenance re- 
 sumed its wonted serenity. The 
 storm was still afar off, and their 
 bark was moored in a quiet harbor. 
 Her Son was there; she hung on 
 his look, on his words, on his slight- 
 est gestures. And how she loved 
 to serve that Son ! how joyfully 
 would she sit up all night to sew, or 
 weave his working tunics, his fes- 
 tival robes, and that seamless gar- 
 ment, a masterpiece of art and skill, 
 which was afterwards! .... But 
 as yet the Lord had only anointed 
 His Son with the oil of gladness. 
 The companion of the Spouse, the 
 wise Virgin of the Gospel, left the 
 morrow to provide for itself "and 
 the peace of God, which surpasseth 
 
 all understanding, dwelt in her heart 
 and mind." 
 
 Jesus was perfection itself, the 
 omniscient, the thrice holy, the 
 mighty and the wise ; as God, he 
 could owe nothing to His creatures, 
 but as man he owed something to 
 Mary. She it was who initiated 
 him, from his earliest childhood, in 
 the humble virtues appertaining to 
 humanity, and to her own dmple 
 and poetic tastes. That patient and 
 unalterable meekness which he 
 knew how to unite with the firmness 
 of the prophet and the legislator; 
 that merciful compassion which 
 tempered the wrath of an angry 
 God, and rendered Him — the model 
 man, the Just by excellence — the 
 Advocate of sinful man; that ten- 
 derness so kind, so simple, towards 
 children whom he delighted in bless- 
 ing and caressing during his divine 
 mission; a thousand imperceptible 
 shades, a thousand beams half ab- 
 sorbed in the blaze of light which 
 constitutes the mortal life of Jesus 
 Christ, all bear the seal of Mary.* 
 
 * Nel vestire il Verbo d'umana came non gli 
 diede ella (la Vergine), punto, o di potenza, o 
 di santita, o di giustizia che egli (Gesu) gia da 
 ^ se solo non possedesse ; ma gli die molto bensi 
 
212 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Tims heaven is pleased to inhale 
 the sweet scent of powers, although 
 the flowers are creatures of the 
 earth. 
 
 We caiiiiol doubt but that Jesua 
 returned, with interest, all the Vir- 
 gin's tenderness and solicitude; a 
 woman so noble in blood and in 
 heart was entitled to the respect 
 of all, and especially of a Son for 
 whose sake she had imposed on 
 hei*self, in the eaiiy spring of life, 
 so many privations, so much toil, 
 and so many sacrifices. He who 
 takes note in heaven of a glass of 
 cold water given in his name, must 
 assuredly be mindful of the obliga- 
 tions which he owed to Mary ; and, 
 if we see in the Gospel that he 
 sometimes spoke to his divine 
 mother less as her son than as her 
 Lord, it is that at such times he 
 detached himself from all earthly 
 connections in order to promote the 
 glory of his Father, whose interests 
 were ever paramount with him. 
 The Virgin knew too well the sacred 
 mission of her son to be disturbed 
 by this occasional severity; she 
 calmly awaited the moment when 
 
 di misericordia. (P. Paolo Segneri, Magnificai 
 spiegato.) 
 
 * the legislator should give place to 
 the young Galilean whom her milk 
 had nourished, and never had she 
 to wait long : the human nature 
 very soon granted what the divine 
 nature had refused. 
 
 Jesus had just attained his 
 twenty-ninth year when the angel 
 of death summoned away the ven- 
 erable head of the Holy Family. 
 Joseph — that patriarchal man — 
 whose submissive faith and simplic- 
 ity of heart recalled the memory of 
 Abraham and the era of the tent; 
 Joseph, on whom the Holy Ghost 
 himself bestowed the title of Just ; 
 Joseph slept calmly in the Loi-d, in 
 the sweet presence of his adopted 
 son and his chaste spouse. Jesus 
 and Mary mourned him, and kept 
 their melancholy watch by his cold 
 remains ; the night wind only was 
 heard to mingle in the lamenta- 
 tions of the poor family. The great 
 ones of Galilee died not thus ; their 
 death was attended by more show 
 and greater ostentation, although 
 they had not, at the linal moment, 
 the glorious prospects of the car- 
 penter of Nazareth. 
 
 The obsequies of the son of David 
 
 ^ were humble as his fortune, but 
 
l-^ 
 
 ^ 
 
 
 c^ 
 
.>)^' 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 213 
 
 Mary slied abundant tears over his 
 funeral bed, and the Son of God 
 was himself chief mourner. Wliat 
 emperor was ever so highly hon- 
 ored ? 
 
 At length, the time for preaching 
 the Gospel began to approach, and 
 He whom God ordained from all 
 eternity to be its pontiff and apos- 
 tle quitted Nazareth to repair to 
 the banks of the Jordan, where 
 John was baptizing. That parting 
 of the Blessed Virgin and her Son 
 must have been both solemn and 
 affecting. The public life of Jesus 
 was about to commence. Unfriend- 
 ed, poor, of humble origin, without 
 other* resource than his courage, his 
 patience, and that gift of miracles 
 which he never employed for his 
 own personal advantage, he was 
 going to confront an order of things 
 "not strong enough to resist him, 
 but strong enough to cause his 
 death." * The Virgin could not help 
 feeling an emotion of terror on see- 
 ing Jesus commit himself to that 
 stormy sea — the Jewish world — on 
 which so many illustrious prophets 
 had perished. She knew the insur- 
 mountable pride of the Pharisees, 
 
 * M. de Lamartine, hook quoted. 
 
 * the narrow and revengeful fanati- 
 cism of the Synagogue, the sanguin- 
 ary whims of Herod Antipas ; she 
 also knew the Messianic oracles 
 which spoke of suffering and igno- 
 miny! .... The daughter of the 
 kings of Juda, who was not of the 
 race of the feeble, and who knew 
 that her son was God, was none the 
 less overcome by that first separa- 
 tion, w^hich seemed the prelude and 
 the image of one much more cruel. 
 With a breaking heart she saw 
 Jesus set out, and when the sound 
 of his footsteps died away in the 
 distance ; when she found herself 
 alone — all alone — in that house 
 where she had passed so many 
 happy hours with her Son and her 
 holy spouse, she hid her face be- 
 tween her hands, and remained long 
 silent and motionless. 
 
 The absence of Christ was pro- 
 longed ; the Virgin learned with 
 profound admiration, but without 
 surprise, the wonders of liis bap- 
 tism, when the Holy Trinity was, 
 as it were, made palpable and re- 
 vealed to men: the white dove ex- 
 tending its divine wings over the 
 Saviour who was, at the "same time, 
 
 ^ announced as the Son of God by a 
 
214 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRQIN MARY. 
 
 voice from heaven. Her maternal 
 joy was, however, replaced by griev- 
 ous apprehension when she heard 
 that Jesus, almost immediately after 
 his baptism, had plunged alone into 
 the deep and perilous ravines of the 
 lofty Mount Quarantine,* to prepare 
 for the work of the world's redemp- 
 tion by fasting, prayer, and medita- 
 tion. What must she suffer as she 
 thought of Jesus wandering through 
 a labyrinth of naked rocks, where 
 the bird found not a particle of 
 moss to- make its nest, or a wild 
 berry to maintain life — where all 
 is rock and fire ! What anguish 
 when the tempest roared without! 
 Where was Jesus ? What was h^ 
 doing, alone and unsheltered, on the 
 high mountains of Jericho, whose 
 
 * The desert wherein Jesus fasted forty days 
 — whencse it was called the Desert of Quaran- 
 tine — is situated in the mountains of Jericho, 
 about a league from that city, and towards the 
 western bank of the Jordan. Mount Quaran- 
 tine is oue of the highest on the northern side, 
 presenting a profound chasm, hollowed out 
 below, as though to prevent all access to the 
 upper part ; from west to north it displays a 
 series of steep rocks, which open in many 
 places, and contain caverns. The fourth part 
 of the ascent is only gained by a precipitous 
 slope, strewn with stones which roll from under 
 the foot. When one has reached this fourth 
 part of the mountain's height, he finds a very 
 narrow pathway, which conducts to a flight of 
 
 * steep pathways — full of rolling 
 stones — womid amid frightful pre- 
 cipices, f Certain death awaited 
 him if he missed his foot on the 
 edge of an abyss ; and no aid was 
 near, if, during that fast — so com- 
 plete, so long, so far beyond human 
 strength — he fell fainting on the 
 way. Those forty days were, to 
 Mary, so many ages — maternal 
 anxiety making every minute thus 
 passed an eternity ; but Jesus re- 
 turned to Nazareth with his disci- 
 ples, and his loved presence was, 
 for Mary, like the balmy breath of 
 spring, after the piercing frosts of 
 winter. 
 
 Just then it was that the' wed- 
 ding took place in Cana of Galilee. 
 The bride and bridegroom, who 
 
 steps surrounded by fearful precipices ; this 
 must be climbed at the most imminent risk, 
 catching at certain stones which project here and 
 there, and to which one is obliged to cling with 
 feet and hands ; if one of these stones chanced 
 to give way, one would fall into a terrific chasm. 
 ( Voyages de Jesus Christ, Heme voyage.) 
 
 f The sacred retreat wherein the Man-God 
 spent forty days is a natural grotto, which is 
 only to be gained by cHmbing a path cut in the 
 rock. A niche has been made in one of its 
 sides as if for an altar. Therein are seen some 
 frescoes, almost effaced, representing angels. 
 A thick wall closes up this species of chapel, 
 which is lit by a window whence one cannot 
 look down without a shudder. (Ibid.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 215 
 
 were relatives of the Blessed Yir- f 
 gin,* invited Mary, with Jesus and 
 his disciples. All accepted the cor- 
 dial invitation, and the Virgin, ever 
 kind and obliging, undertook to 
 assist in making preparations for 
 the banquet, in which custom re- 
 quired a certain degree of splendor. 
 But the company was large, and 
 the family poor ; the bridegroom 
 had been mistaken in his reckon- 
 ing, and the wine-jars were almost 
 empty, when Our Lord — who would 
 raise marriage to the rank of holy 
 things, purifying it by his presence 
 — entered the banquet-hall, follow^ed 
 by Peter, Andrew, Philip, and Na- 
 thaniel^four young fishermen whom 
 he had impressed with confidence 
 in his genius and power. The wine 
 ran out in the middle of the repast, 
 and Mary, having first perceived it 
 on a sign of distress from the hosts, 
 turned to Jesus, who was sitting 
 
 * The Eastern tradition, which the Moham- 
 medans have received from the Christians, is, 
 that St. John the Evangelist was the bride- 
 groom at the wedding of Cana, and that, after 
 having witnessed the miracle which Jesus 
 wrought, he immediately quitted his wife ^ 
 follow him. (D'Hei-belot, Biblioih. Orient, t. ii.) 
 — Baronius, t. i., p. 106. — Maid, (in Johan.) 
 also adopts this opinion, for which we cannot 
 certify. 
 
 near her, and said, pointedly, " They 
 have no wine ! " 
 
 Jesus answered her in a low 
 voice, and with much emphasis, 
 " Woman, what is it to me and to 
 thee ? My hour is not yet come." f 
 
 The Virgin, anxious to save her 
 friends a most painful humiliation, 
 was yet not at all discouraged by 
 these words ; she knew that, if the 
 hour of his manifestation were not 
 come, Christ would anticipate it for 
 her sake ; and, with that faith which 
 would remove mountains, she mildly 
 said to the servants, "Whatsoever 
 he shall say to you, do ye." JSTow 
 there were there six water-pots of 
 stone used for purifications ; at the 
 bidding of Jesus, these were filled 
 to the brim with fresh water from a 
 neighboring spring, and that water 
 was changed into delicious wine. 
 
 Thus it is that the Blessed Virgin 
 had the first fruits of the miracles 
 
 f Our Lord's reply to his blessed mother 
 must have been in an under tone, as may even 
 be inferred from the Gospel narrative. It is 
 wholly impossible that Jesus Christ could have 
 given his mother such an answer aloud; the 
 guests, who were not in the secret, would have 
 considered it extremely disrespectful towards 
 her. It is clear that the servants, hearing what 
 the Blessed Virgin said, were ignorant of the 
 ^ f Saviour's a pparent refusal 
 
916 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 of her divine Son, and that her in- * 
 tercession changed the very will of 
 God. 
 
 The miracle of Cana was soon 
 followed by a number of others, 
 which stamped with the seal of the 
 Divinity the high and providential 
 mission of the Saviour. At his 
 voice, the storm was hushed, human 
 infirmities disappeared, the devils 
 were hurled back to their gloomy 
 kingdom, corpses arose from their 
 coffins, and, all over that spot of 
 earth which his blessed footsteps 
 marked, there was a great ameliora- 
 tion of both spiritual and corporal 
 suffering.* People came to him 
 from Sidon, from Tyre, from Idumea, 
 and from Arabia ; and wiiole multi- 
 tudes, gathering along his way, kiss- 
 ed the hem of his garments, and 
 humbly asked him for health and 
 life — things which only a God can 
 'give. 
 
 Mary, whom Our Lord had not as 
 
 * A Mugsulman poet has described, in graceful 
 verse, the dominion which Jesus exercised over 
 the diseases of the soul ; the following is their 
 substance : 
 
 " The heart of the afflicted man draws all its 
 consolation from thy words." 
 
 " The soul recovers life and vigor by the mere 
 bearing of thy nanw?." 
 
 yet thought proper to associate in 
 his painful and wandering life — 
 Mary heanl these extraordinary tid- 
 ings with great joy, not unmixed, 
 however, with trouble and anxiety. 
 Her fears . were well founded ; for, 
 if the people followed the Messiah, 
 loading him with blessings, the 
 Pharisees, the scribes, and the 
 l)rinces of the Synagogue began 
 to be greatly scandalized — worthy 
 souls ! — ^by the conduct of the Son 
 of God. He remitted sins — blas- 
 phemy ! he consoled and converted 
 sinners — degradation ! he healed 
 the sick on the Sabbath-day — open 
 and shameless impiety I His doc- 
 trine fell from his lips like a benefi- 
 cent dew rather than a stormy rain, 
 so that he was in every way unlike 
 the ancient prophets. He preached 
 humility, forgiveness of injuries, vol- 
 untary poverty, alms given for God's 
 
 sake alone, universal charity 
 
 What novel doctrines these were ! 
 
 "If ever the mind of man can ai*ise to the 
 contemplation of the mysteries of the Deity. 
 
 " It is from thee that it obtains the lights 
 thereby to discover them, and thee it is who 
 givest it the attraction which leads it thereto." 
 
 " A Christian," says the learned Orien- 
 
 talist, D'Herbelot, " could not express his ideas 
 ^ vith greater force. ' 
 

 jw' 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 217 
 
 A host of enemies rose up against 
 him after every sermon, whether in 
 the desert or in the city. He could 
 not attack hypocrisy without of- 
 fending the Pharisees, nor condemn 
 avarice without exciting the ire of 
 the doctors of the law ; the discon- 
 tented — ever ready to engage in 
 dark conspiracies which broke out 
 in rash and bloody revolt — were 
 scandalized because he did not 
 preach up sedition against Caesar; 
 the Hei"odians accused him of as- 
 piring to the throne ; and the Sad- 
 ducees could not bear to hear him 
 announce eternal life. These men, 
 divided in their views, their creeds, 
 and their political interests, made a 
 truce amongst themselves in hatred 
 to the Galilean ; they girt up their 
 loins to attack him, which they did 
 on every side. E^'ery word was a 
 snare, every smile one of treachery. 
 Some openly treated him as an 
 impostor and a Samaritan ; others 
 
 * The Methnevi-Manevi, speaking of the envi- 
 ous and impotent hatred of the Jews for Jesus 
 Christ, expresses its opinion in these terms con- 
 cerning these attacks — so common against all 
 that obtains success ; attacks which are, in the 
 end, hurtful only to those who make them : — 
 " The moon sheds her light, and the dog barks," 
 says the Persian author, "but the barking of 
 the dog prevents not the moon from shining. ; 
 
 gently hinted that he was mad ; the 
 whole phalanx of the envious, tired 
 of hearing the people prUise this 
 new prophet, and being unable to 
 deny his miracles, would fain give 
 the honor thereof to Satan. " If he 
 drives out devils," said they, " it is 
 through Beelzebub, the prince of 
 devils ; in Beelzebud, principe dceino- 
 niorimi, ejicit dcemonia."'^ These 
 vague rumors alarmed Mary, and 
 the evil dispositions of her neigh- 
 bors were calculated to do anvthing 
 but. reassure her. Of all the cities 
 of Galilee, Nazareth was the most 
 incredulous, and the most hardened 
 against the divine word ; and of all 
 the families of Nazareth, that of 
 Jesus was the least disposed, it 
 seems, to accept him for the King- 
 Messiah. As the divine maternity 
 of Mary had never been revealed 
 to her relatives, and the miracles 
 which had been wrought during the 
 Lord's infancy had taken place in 
 
 We throw sweepings into the running water 
 of a river, and that scum swims on the surface 
 of the water without either stopjjing its course 
 or disturbing it. The Messiah, on the one side, 
 raises the dead, and you see, on the other, the 
 Jews devoured with envj', biting their nails and 
 tearing their hair." ( Hussein- Vaez. — D'Herbe- 
 lot, Biblioth. Orient.) 
 
218 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 distant countries, so they saw in 
 the supposed son of Joseph only 
 a young- Israelite without learning, 
 brought up amongst themselves, fed 
 like them, more poorly lodged, more 
 simply clad, and living from day to 
 day by hard work, which brought 
 him chiefly in contact with the 
 lower classes. Christ, who would 
 ennoble poverty by taking it for 
 his portion, incurred the conse- 
 quences of the position he had 
 chosen. "Neither did his breth- 
 ren," says St. John, "believe in 
 him."* The report of the miracles 
 which accompanied the preaching 
 of the Gospel astonished, but could 
 n6t convince, these obstinate Naz- 
 arenes. Knowing that Jesus was 
 saluted all over Galilee by the dan- 
 gerous title of Son of David, and 
 that crowds of two or three thou- 
 sand persons gathered to hear him, 
 they feared that these numerous 
 assemblies might excite the sus- 
 picions of Herod Antipas, and that 
 themselves might be brought into 
 trouble on account of the young 
 prophet. For this reason they pub- 
 licly gave out that Jesus was mad, 
 and swore that they would bring 
 
 * St. Jobu, ch. vii., v. 5. 
 
 ^ him back to Nazareth in 'safe keep- 
 ing. Concealing this family plot 
 from Mary, they induced her to go 
 with them to Caphernaum, in order 
 that they might gain access to his 
 presence by the authority of her 
 name, f 
 
 The Messiah was teaching in the 
 synagogue, in the midst of a silent 
 and attentive audience, when tlie 
 Nazarenes arrived. Ostentatiously 
 displaying an authority which they 
 were quite willing to magnify in 
 the eyes of the crowd, as St. John 
 Chrysostom remarks, they deliber- 
 ately sent word to the Saviour that 
 his mother and his brethren were 
 without, and wished to see him ; but 
 Jesus, knowing the secret thoughts 
 of his relations according to tlie 
 flesh, and availing himself of the 
 occasion to extend the narrow limits 
 of the old law by solemnly and un- 
 reservedly adopting all the great 
 human family, gave this admirable 
 reply to the impudent message of 
 his kinsfolk — "Who is my mother 
 and my brethren?" Then, looking 
 around on his numerous disciples — ■ 
 " Whosoever," said he, " shall do the 
 will of God, he is my brother, and 
 
 t St. Mark, ch. iii., vs. 21, 31-35. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY 
 
 219 
 
 sister, and mother." After this se- 
 vere reprimand, which the sons of 
 Alpheus could well understand, the 
 Son of God immediately went out, 
 says St. John Chrysostom, to do his 
 mother all the honor that decorum 
 required. 
 
 When he had saluted Mary, and 
 stopped some time with her on the 
 sea-shore, the Saviour went up into 
 a bark, whence he began to teach 
 the people. The Virgin, lost in the 
 crowd, but profoundly attentive, 
 heard, in religious silence, the par- 
 able of the ^sower. The Nazarenes, 
 petrified by the resistless eloquence 
 and the superhuman dignity of 
 Jesus Christ, asked each other, in 
 surprise, if he were indeed the son 
 of Mary. They experienced that 
 kind of fascination which attracts 
 the snake of the American savan- 
 nahs when he hears afar in the 
 woods the sound of sweet music. 
 They had come with the swiftness 
 of fear, with the eloquence of ego- 
 tism, with the arrogance of superi- 
 ority, to withdraw Christ from his 
 perilous mission, and they quailed 
 under his very look, and could not 
 even open their lips in his presence. 
 This is clearlv indicated by the text 
 
 * of St. Matthew, which, after having 
 informed us of their hostile inten- 
 tions, gives us nowhere to under- 
 stand that they ventured even to 
 speak to Our Lord. 
 
 Some time after, Jesus returned 
 to Nazareth, and great was the joy 
 of the Virgin. To see her son 
 seated on the mat where he used 
 to sit in his childish days ; to eat 
 the bread which he had blessed 
 and broken ; to lead him silently to 
 the sick bed of some poor sufferer, 
 whom he healed, with an injunction 
 of secrecy ; to see him mighty in 
 word and work, he who had been 
 so long the man of toil and silence 
 — this was too much happiness in 
 the cup of her existence! And 
 God, who often afflicts those whom 
 he loves, soon mingled gall with its 
 sweetness. On the Sabbath-day, 
 the son and mother went together 
 to the synagogue. A great con- 
 course of people had assembled 
 there to see and hear Jesus; but 
 the curiosity of the Nazarenes had 
 not that character of confidence and 
 respectful attention that Christ had 
 so often met elsewhere. They were 
 there, scandalized beforehand by 
 
 , what the son of Mary was to do 
 
320 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 and say, and admirably disposed to ^ 
 stone him if occasion offered. 
 
 There are countries decidedly hos- 
 tile to all that does them honor, until 
 the grass of the grave grows over 
 the object of their envy. 
 
 Nevertheless, one of the ancients 
 presented the Saviour of men with 
 the book of the prophet Isaiah, and 
 Jesus, unrolling the parchment, read 
 this passage with simple grace and 
 mai-vellous dignity: "The spirit of 
 the Lord is upon me, because the 
 Lord hath anointed me ; he hath 
 sent me to preach to the meek, to 
 heal the contrite of heart, and to 
 preach a release to the captives, 
 and deliverance to them that are 
 shut up: to proclaim the accepta- 
 ble year of the Lord." 
 
 Having closed the book, he sat 
 down, and, speaking with that lively 
 and natural eloquence which so 
 strongly impressed his auditors, he 
 made to himself the application of 
 the Messianic oracle, and taught, 
 not as a disciple of the synagogue, 
 but as the very master of the syna- 
 gogue. A low murmur ran through 
 the assembly. Some were amazed 
 at the force and the grace of his 
 discom-se ; others, faithful to their ^^ 
 
 system of contemptuous calumny, 
 said aloud, " Is not this the carpen- 
 ter's son?" And Jesus, penetrating 
 their thoughts, and reading their 
 false and envious hearts, spoke to 
 them those words which have be- 
 come proverbial: "A prophet is not 
 without honor, save in his own 
 country and in his own house." 
 Knowing that they intended to ask 
 him for prodigies like unto those 
 which he had wrought in €apher- 
 naum, he told them plainly that 
 their incredulity rendered them un- 
 worthy of any such, and that, in 
 order to obtain miracles, they must 
 be asked in simplicity and with 
 faith. Thence, alluding to the prop- 
 agation of his Gospel, and to that 
 wild olive grafted on the ancient 
 tree of the synagogue, symbolical 
 of the call of the Gentiles : "In 
 truth I say to you there were many 
 widows, in the days of Elias, in 
 Israel, when heaven was shut -up 
 three years and six months, when 
 there was a great famine through- 
 out all the earth. And to none of 
 them was Elias sent but to Sarepta 
 of Sidonj to a widow woman. And 
 there were many lepers in Israel in 
 the time of Eliseus the prophet, and 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIBGIN MARY. 
 
 221 
 
 none of them was cleansed but 
 Naaman the Syrian." 
 
 These last words were the drop 
 of water which makes the cup over- 
 flow. Wounded in their national 
 pi'ide, in their hereditary hatred, in 
 their traditional hopes, the assem- 
 bly in the synagogue were filled 
 with fury, and thirsted for blood. 
 They rose up tumultuously, and 
 thrust him out of their city: and 
 they brought him to the brow of 
 the hill whereon theii- city was 
 built, that they might cast him 
 down headlono:;. 
 
 Seated amongst the humbler wo- 
 men, in a grated gallery, the Virgin 
 had observed, with intense anxiet}^, 
 the rise and progress of the storm. 
 Reading the sinister projects of the 
 Nazarenes in their fierce glances 
 and furious gestures, she hesitated 
 not to brave the danger in order to 
 make her way to her son; but her 
 
 * Between the steep mountain whence the 
 Jews intended to cast Jesus and the city of 
 Nazareth " there is seen half way," says Father 
 Geramb, "the ruins of a monastery formerly 
 inhabited by monks, and those of a very fine 
 church built by St. Helena, and dedicated to 
 the Blessed Virgin, under the name of Our Lady 
 of Terror. According to some, Mary was stand- 
 ing there when the Jews dragged her son along 
 towards the summit of the mountain to cast him 
 
 * strength was not equal to her cour- 
 age. The Jews ran swiftly — they 
 were always swift to shed blood — 
 and Mary, trembling like a leaf, 
 hardly able to support herself, walk- 
 ed slowly after them, like one in 
 a dream. She sees Jesus at the 
 summit of a steep rock which over- 
 hangs a fearful precipice ; she hears 
 from afar the death -cry ringing; 
 her knees bend under her ; a mist 
 gathers over her eyes ; her voice 
 dies away in a piteous moan ; she 
 falls like a flower stricken down by 
 the wind, and lies prostrate on the 
 ground.* 
 
 Meanwhile, the ferocious wolves 
 in pursuit of the lamb had been 
 grievously disappointed ; the horn 
 of sacrifice was not yet come for the 
 Son of man, and no one could take 
 his life until he chose to give it up. 
 Striking that murderous crowd with 
 blindness,! Jesus passed unseen 
 
 thence. According to others, she had hastened 
 thither, on hearing of the diabolical project in 
 contemplation, but had arrived too late ; over- 
 come with terror, she covUd go no farther." 
 
 f The most ancient heretics — preparing the 
 ■way for modern rationalism, which unwittingly 
 dons their tattered rags — pretended that Our 
 Lord escaped through the illusion of a mist, 
 illudere per caliginem. Tertullian strongly op- 
 poses this supposition. {Adv. Marc, 4, 8.) 
 
222 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VJRQTN MARY. 
 
 Ihmugh the midst of his enemies, f 
 and returned once more to Capher- 
 naum, where he was soon after join- 
 ed by his mother, Mary of Cleophas, 
 and the sons of Alpheus. 
 
 After having preached the Gospel 
 in the country bordering on the ftiir 
 lake of Tiberias, whose waves are 
 radiant as the light, and having 
 wrouglit the great miracle of the 
 multiplication of the loaves and 
 fishes in the desert of Bethsaida, 
 Jesus went up the Jordan again, 
 with his disciples, to Ca3sarea Phi- 
 lippi, the ancient Dan of Nephtali 
 (which name had just been changed 
 by Philip, son of Herod) , visiting all 
 the different towns and villages on 
 his way. 
 
 It was probably at this period — 
 for Euthymius,* who relates this 
 traditional fact, leaves its date 
 undecided — that the waters of the 
 Jordan, already sanctified, beheld 
 another affecting ceremony. Jesus, 
 the Virgin, and thp Apostles set out 
 one morning at sunrise, for that 
 sacred river "which flows through 
 
 * According to St. Euthymius, Our Lord bap- 
 tized none but the Blessed Virgin and St. Peter, 
 who afterwards baptized the other Apostles. 
 " Some," says this holy abbot, who flourished in 
 Palestine in the 4th century — " some have writ- ^ 
 
 two lakes," says Tacitus, " and emp- 
 ties itself into the third." f Its 
 banks were robed in a magnificent 
 vegetation ; ivslets, rising here and 
 there from its bosom, sparkled amid 
 its shining waves like baskets of 
 verdure, fruit, and flowers ; blue 
 herons hovered over those flowery 
 isles, where the wood -pigeon and 
 the white turtle still hang their 
 mossy nests on the branches of the 
 wild pomegranate. The dew glit- 
 tered on the green leaves of the 
 willows like a shower of pale dia- 
 monds, and the rushes of the Jor- 
 dan, which sometimes conceal tigers, 
 were gently bending beneath the 
 light breeze which shook the tops 
 of the tall palm-trees, with their 
 clusters of coral-colored dates. Far 
 away, on the opposite shore, troops 
 of gazelles were seen skipping 
 around on the slopes of the gray, 
 mottled mountains ; and over the 
 sandy plain flew some of the fierce 
 children of the desert, mounted on 
 coursers fleet as the wind, and 
 armed with those long spears made 
 
 ten that Jesus Christ himself baptized the Vir- 
 gin and Peter." 
 
 f Nee Jordanes pelago accipitur : sed unum 
 atque alterum lacum integer perfluit ; tertio re- 
 tinetur. {Taciti historiarum, lib. v.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 223 
 
 of reeds from tlie banks of the Eu- 
 phrates, which they used even in 
 the first ages after the Dekige, if we 
 are to believe the Persian legends.* 
 Clouds of the richest violet hue, or 
 of soft and tender rose-color, floated 
 like flowers in the deep blue sky; 
 and the nightingale, that loves to 
 sing in the lofty sycamores which 
 overhang the sacred river of Pales- 
 tine, was heard to warble its most 
 melodious sti'ains : Nature had don- 
 ned her gala dress for the baptism 
 of Mary. 
 
 The Virgin was clothed in white, 
 according to the custom of the He- 
 brews when they figured alone in 
 any religious ceremony, and she 
 stood calm and collected by the side 
 of her Saviour and her son ; they 
 both stepped into the river. Rais- 
 ing then, with his divine hand, the 
 Eastern veil worn by his chaste and 
 beautiful mother, Jesus fixed his 
 mild and penetrating eyes upon her 
 with a look of infinite tenderness ; 
 then, pouring on the Virgin's fore- 
 head the sacred water of regenera- 
 
 * There grows on the banks of the Euphrates 
 a certain kind of reed which almost equals the 
 Indian bamboo. In early times, the Arabs and 
 .Assyrians made lances of them. (Firdousi, 
 Book of Kings. ) 
 
 * tion, he baptized her in the name 
 of the most Holy Trinity, Himself 
 one of the three divine persons. 
 
 It was then that the Blessed Vir- 
 gin left off her solitary habits to 
 follow her son in his journeys. She 
 had ministered to him for thirty 
 years both abroad and at home ; 
 she had worked for him, wept over 
 him, suffered for him, and had wor- 
 shipped him, without fail, evening 
 and morning, even when he lay 
 cryinsc in his cradle, as we learn 
 from Albertus Magnus. It was nat- 
 ural that, attaching herself to his 
 persecuted lot, she should abandon 
 the peaceful roof under which he 
 was born to follow his blessed foot- 
 steps whilst he evangelized the 
 Hebrews. Amidst all the trials of 
 that troubled life, the Virgin was 
 admirable as ever. Loving Jesus 
 more than ever mother loved her 
 child, yet never did she intrude into 
 his presence when, by so doing, 
 she might interfere with the duties 
 of his regenerating mission; never 
 once did she speak to him of her 
 fatigue, her fears, her melancholy 
 forebodings, or her personal wants. 
 Mary was not only a sacred dove 
 hidins: in the cleft of a rock ; a pure 
 
224 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIROTN MARY. 
 
 vii*gin, called to nourish with her 
 milk iind to cradle in her arms a 
 celestial guest; she was also a 
 sti'ong woman, whom the Lord w^as 
 pleased to place by turns in every 
 situation of life, in order to leave 
 the daughters of Eve an example to 
 follow, and a. model to imitate. 
 
 It was not proper that the Mother 
 of God should follow Jesus and his 
 Apostles alone through all Judea; 
 hence Mary's retinue consisted of 
 Mary of Cleophas, mother of James, 
 Simon, Joseph and Jude, vulgarly 
 called the brethren of the Lord ; 
 Salome, mother of the sons of Zebe- 
 dee, whom most the Saviour loved ; 
 Susanna, wife of the tetrarch's stew- 
 ard, together with some wealthy 
 women of Galilee, who had given up 
 all for Jesus. One of these, a Jew- 
 ess, young, rich, well-born, and sur- 
 passingly beautiful, was the most 
 tenderly attentive to the divine 
 mother of her Lord. This woman — 
 whose noble heart, storm-tossed like 
 the waves of the JEgean sea, had 
 burned with an unholy flame before 
 the eyes of men, and braved public 
 opinion with mockery and disdain 
 . — had come, penitent and submis- 
 sive, to prostrate herself before 
 
 * Christ, and to ask of him, wliom 
 she acknowledged as God, a cure 
 for the wounds of her soul. And 
 the chaste love of the Lord had 
 absorbed all the vain love, all the 
 worldly attachments of the young 
 lady of Magdalum. She had tram- 
 pled under foot her pearl necklaces, 
 her jewels and chains of gold, and 
 sold her castle by the lovely sea of 
 Galilee ; and now^, without other 
 ornament than a coarse brown gar- 
 ment, and those magnificent dark 
 tresses wherewith she had dried the 
 Lord's feet, the young patrician, rich 
 in her alms, adorned with her new 
 virtues, poured out her penitent 
 tears in the pure and pitying bosom 
 of Mary. The immaculate Virgin 
 had received her with open arms, 
 and having thus won her heart, she 
 
 J^ cultivated in that fertile, but long- 
 neglected soil, the flowers that bloom 
 for heaven. 
 
 After many and divers sufferings 
 — many fears and apprehensions, 
 which it were tedious to enumerate 
 — the Virgin entered Jerusalem, 
 the fatal city, in the train of Jesus 
 Christ, to celebi-ate the last pasch 
 which the Lord made with his dis- 
 ciples. She saw the people of the 
 

 'm //l^i 
 
 //A./ .<,„,//,r, 
 
LIFE OF TEE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 225 
 
 royal city trooping out to meet the 
 son of David, who came to them 
 full of sweetness, mounted as the 
 young princes of his race were 
 wont to be, and graciously receiv- 
 ing the simple honors so eagerly 
 and so spontaneously offered by the 
 multitude, thirsting for a sight of 
 their proj)het ; for Jesus never re- 
 jected the humble testimonies of 
 love and gratitude offered by his 
 creatures. Trifling as were those 
 
 pledges of grateful affection, they 
 were yet received with divine good- 
 ness the moment they came from 
 the heart. 
 
 Magdalen, by turns regarding her 
 Xorc?, and that multitude of people 
 who made the air resound with 
 their hosannas, wept in silence be- 
 hind her veil. Mary's eyes were 
 likewise moist; but her gaze was 
 turned towards the northwest, in 
 the direction of Calvary. 
 
 CHAPTER XYII. 
 
 MARY ON OALVA RY. 
 
 HE branches of f 
 the palm, cast 
 by the HeLrews 
 under the feet 
 of their Mes- 
 siah, were still 
 lying green and 
 fresh on the steep road to Bethany ; 
 the echoes of the Valley of Cedars* 
 were still murmuring the expiring 
 
 * " Valley of Cedars," the ancient name of the 
 Valley of Josaphat. 
 
 sounds of the glad, triumphant 
 shouts wherewith the daughters of 
 Sion had welcomed the poor Icing, 
 w^hen Jerusalem was again agitated 
 by a new event of great and melan- 
 choly importance. 
 
 The chief priests, the senators, 
 and the Pharisees, sought to get 
 hold, even at a golden price, and 
 without shrinking from domestic 
 treachery, of a great criminal, who, 
 they said, was endangering both 
 
226 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 religion aiid the state. Dangerous 
 indeed must this man have been, 
 since those honorable personages had 
 imposed upon themselves an extra- 
 ordinary fast in order to get posses- 
 sion of him,* and had even distri- 
 buted certain alms through the city, 
 by sound of trumpet, with the same 
 intention. The Pharisees — those 
 conscientious Jews who robbed only 
 the uncircumcised, and who would 
 have left their neighbor at the bot- 
 tom of a well rather than draw him 
 out on the Sabbath-day, although 
 they would have quickly taken out 
 their ox or their ass — these had 
 undertaken to spread amongst the 
 people, who are so easily influenced 
 one way or the other, ominous re- 
 ports and vague rumors, which had 
 produced a sort of feverish uneasi- 
 ness that could only end in a vio- 
 lent outbreak. Things thus pre- 
 
 * This anecdote is found in the Toldos, pub- 
 lished by Huldin, pp. 56 and 60. 
 
 f This ofl&ce is known to the Gospel, which 
 often speaks of these captains of the Temple, 
 who must be distinguished from the Roman 
 officer who kept guard with his cohort around 
 that sacred edifice to prevent the tumults and 
 disorders which the multitude might cause. 
 These captains of the Temple were necessarily 
 Jews, and descended from sacerdotal families ; 
 to them was intrusted the ward and the keys of 
 
 * pared, there was seen descending, 
 one evening, from Mount Moria, a 
 well-armed troop, accompanied by 
 some senators, and commanded by 
 the captain of the Temple guards ;f 
 after them came the footmen of the 
 chief priests, and at the head of this 
 batallion marched, with a measured 
 step, by the light of those large 
 lanthorns which the Asiatics hoist 
 on long poles with some flaming 
 torches, a man with a downcast 
 brow, an unsettled look, a mean 
 and unprepossessing countenance, 
 whose belt was stuffed with gold 
 stolen from the poor, J increased, in 
 imagination, by the thirty pieces of 
 silver which he was to gain by de- 
 livering up to the wily Synagogue 
 his Master, his Friend, his God ! 
 For it was, indeed, the Son of 
 David, the Conqueror of the preced- 
 ing days, Jesus of Nazareth, the 
 
 the Temple in order to provide for the security 
 of the sacred vessels ; this officer, in right of 
 birth, was entitled to a place in all the priestly 
 councils. (Basnage, b. i., ch. 4.) 
 
 X Then Judas Iscariot, who was to betray 
 Jesus, said, " Why was not this ointment sold 
 for three hundred pence, and given to the 
 poor ? " Now he said this, not because he cared 
 for the poor, but because he was a thief, and, 
 having the purse, carried the things that were 
 ^; put therein. (St. John, ch. xii., v. 4-6.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 227 
 
 great Galilean prophet at whose 
 voice greedy Death gave up his 
 p-ey, and whose orders the winds 
 and seas obeyed ; it was he whom 
 the myrmidons of the chief priests 
 and Pharisees were going to seek 
 on the Mount of Olives, whither he 
 retired at night, after having taught 
 by day in 'the Temple, as St. Luke 
 relates. They did not dare to arrest 
 him in open day, fearing some re- 
 sistance from that multitude of dis- 
 ciples who thronged, from the dawn 
 of day, to hear him in Solomon's 
 Porch. 
 
 The armed band, led on by Isca^ 
 riot, crossed the ravine through 
 which flows the Kedron, that gloomy 
 torrent* which King David crossed 
 of old when he fled, with a hand- 
 ful of faithful servants, from the re- 
 bellious soldiers incited to revolt 
 by his son Absalom. Whilst the 
 soldiers of the Temple, fierce and 
 silent, followed the course of the 
 torrent, which reflected the light of 
 their torches, in order to .gain the 
 
 * The Kedron is a torrent which passes 
 through the Valley of Josaphat, between Jeru- 
 salem and Mount Olivet. It has been named 
 Kedron because its course lies through dark 
 and obscure places : its Hebrew name signifies 
 tenebrosus fuit. 
 
 heights of Gethsemani, and the 
 evening wind rustled in the droop- 
 ing branches of the willows, from 
 one of which Judas was soon to 
 hang — a punishment too mild for 
 such a traitor, but to which the im- 
 perishable contempt of succeeding 
 generations continually adds — a sad 
 and solemn scene was passing in 
 that same Garden of Olives, where 
 the unworthy Apostle was going to 
 seek his Master to destroy him. 
 
 After having prayed a long time, 
 prostrate on the ground, in that 
 fearful agony which bedewed his 
 divine brow with a bloody sweat, 
 Christ arose in submissive resig- 
 nation to the terrible will of his 
 Father, and ready to drain the bit- 
 ter chalice even to the dregs. He 
 raised his large soft eyes to the 
 midnight heavens, studded with bril- 
 liant constellations, and illumined 
 by the meridian moon, that fair 
 lamp of the firmament whose useful 
 light the children of Abraham bless 
 in their prayers ;f she was then at 
 
 f The day of the new moon is a festival day 
 for the Hebrews ; the women abstain from 
 work, and the devotees fast on the previous 
 day. After reciting a number of prayers in the 
 sj'nagogue, they keep the remainder of the day 
 as a joyous festival. Three days after, the Jews 
 
328 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MAliY. 
 
 her full, and cast a sheet of radiant * 
 light over that austere landscape 
 whose dark mountains, rising one 
 above the other, were traced on the 
 clear blue of the sky. Jerusalem, 
 half hid in shade, and in some 
 places brilliantly lit up by the 
 moon's rays, sent afar an aromatic 
 odor from the rare plants of its 
 gardens, and its groves of palm- 
 trees rose stately and grand, inter- 
 spersed with towers of white mar- 
 ble. Silence reigned amid the 
 mountains, but a low murmur arose 
 from the depth of the valley, and 
 Jesus shuddered. "It is they!" he 
 said within himself, and he walked 
 slowly towards the spot whei-e he 
 had left the three Apostles whom 
 he had chosen to share his lonely 
 watch. Alas! either fatigue or the 
 drowsy murmur of the wind through 
 the pale olive branches had gradu- 
 ally overcome those careless senti- 
 nels. Jesus stood looking on them 
 a moment with holy bitterness ; he 
 had told them that his death was 
 
 assemble on a platform, and fixing their eyes 
 steadfastly on the moon, they bless God in a 
 long prayer for having created, and also for re- 
 newing her, to teach the Israehtes that they 
 ought to become new creatures : " O moon ! 
 blessed be thy Creator, blessed be he who made 
 
 near at hand, that the hour of dan- 
 ger had arrived, and yet they slept 
 — they, his kinsmen, his friends, his 
 chosen disciples — apparently indif- 
 ferent to his danger and death 
 
 vanity of favors, of the ties of 
 blood and friendship! They could 
 keep awake on Thabor, at the time 
 of the glorious transfiguration, but 
 they slept in the hour of trial and 
 misfortune ! 
 
 A confused noise was heard on 
 the hollow road leading to the little 
 village of Gethsemani, and soon 
 after the light of many torches 
 flashed on the trees. Jesus then, 
 bending over his sleeping Apostles, 
 said in a low, deep voice, "Arise! 
 he who is to betray me is near 
 at hand !" He had scarcely spoken 
 these words when Judas and his 
 band arrived. Advancing to Jesus, 
 audacity in his eyes, and the false 
 smile on his lips, he pointed hini 
 out to the hostile troop who came 
 to seek him, giving him, at the same 
 time, that sacrilegious kiss which 
 
 thee ;" and then they jump three times as high 
 as they can, saying to the moon : " Even as 
 we leap towards thee, but cannot reach thee, 
 so may our enemies rise against us without 
 power to harm us ! " . . . . (Basnage, 1. vii.-, 
 ch. 16.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 229 
 
 has since taken his name. This 
 was the signal. Jesus received the 
 traitor kindly, and said to him, with 
 touching sweetness, " Friend, where- 
 to art thou come?" 
 
 Whereto was he come ! .... He 
 was come to earn the thirty pieces 
 of silver promised by the Syna- 
 gogue. Cupidity — a cold and cal- 
 culating passion — commits tenfold 
 more crimes, and crimes of a darker 
 dye, than violence. 
 
 Judas had not time to answer 
 this embarrassing question, for all 
 the others, advancing, threw them- 
 selves on Jesus and laid hold of 
 him. Then arose the hot blood of 
 Peter ben Cephas,* Prince of the 
 Apostles ; he drew his sword and 
 smote one of the servants of the 
 high -priest; but Jesus, arresting 
 the only arm that was raised in his 
 defence, commanded the sword to 
 be restored to its scabbard. " That 
 the Scriptures may be fulfilled," 
 said the sacred Victim, '' so it must 
 
 * Peter hen Cephas (Peter son of Peter). 
 This is tlie name by which the Prince of toe 
 Apostles is linown in the East. 
 
 f The Garden of Gethsemani, or Olives, at the 
 foot of the mountain of that name, is surround- 
 ed by a wall about three feet high; it is two 
 
 * be done." The Lamb of God was 
 willing to be immolated for the sins 
 of the world. 
 
 Thereupon, there was heard with- 
 in the garden a confused sound 
 
 of hasty footsteps, of breaking 
 branches, and cries of terror; and 
 men were suddenly seen scaling the 
 low fence f which surrounded the 
 garden: these were the disciples 
 making their escape ! . . . . 
 
 The hostile troop, having bound 
 Jesus like a criminal, retraced their 
 steps to the holy city, bending their 
 course towards the stone bridge 
 which the Asmonean princes had 
 thrown over the Kedron; but the 
 people of Jerusalem, coming in 
 crowds, had it already occupied; 
 and tradition relates that Jesus was 
 dragged across the stream ; where- 
 by the prophecy w^as literally ful- 
 filled, "He shall drink in the way 
 the water of the torrent." The 
 holy marks of the Saviour's feet and 
 of one of his knees are imprinted in 
 
 hundred paces long by one hundred and forty 
 wide. It contains a rock, forming a reddish 
 grotto, where it is said that the three Apostles 
 slept. ( Voyages de Jesus Christ, 44th voyage). 
 — Its name of Gethsemani is derived from the 
 richness of its soil: Gethsemani, in Hebrew, 
 signifies fertile valley. 
 
230 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 the betl and on the stone margin f 
 of the brook; so, at least, say the 
 Christians of Jerusalem, who still 
 point them out. Having climbed 
 the hill of Sion, they entered Jeru- 
 salem by the Sterquilian gate, and 
 repaired to the house of Caiaphas, 
 the high-priest, where the scribes 
 and the ancients were assembled. 
 The chief priests and the scribes 
 then demanded of Jesus whether 
 he was the Cheist. "If I tell you," 
 replied the Saviour mildly, "you 
 will not believe me." "Art thou 
 the Son of God ?" demanded Caia- 
 phas. "Thou hast said it," an- 
 swered Jesus; "I am." "He has 
 blasphemed!" cried the high-priest, 
 rending his garments. "He has 
 deserved death," said the scribes 
 and Pharisees. 
 
 Then they spat upon his face, 
 struck him with their fists, and 
 marched him to and fro, crving; out 
 in bitter mockery, "Prophesy unto 
 
 * Josephus, Ant. Jud., b. xviii., ch. 4. 
 
 ■f" Before Judea had fallen under the Roman 
 domination, the Sanhedrim had the power of 
 life and death; but the conquerors took that 
 privilege to themselves. It was the custom of 
 the Romans to leave vanquished nations their 
 temples and their gods ; but in civil matters 
 they obUged them to follow the laws and ordi- 
 nances of the Republic. At the time when 
 
 us, Christ! and tell us who it 
 was that struck thee !" 
 
 Meanwhile, Peter, who had sworn 
 rather to die than to abandon him, 
 denied him three times in the court- 
 yard of the high-priest ! 
 
 Next day, the chief priests and 
 the Pharisees dragged Jesus before 
 Pontius Pilate, who was exceedingly 
 unpopular with them since the af- 
 fair of the imperial ensigns which 
 he had introduced by night into 
 Jerusalem;* but as they hated the 
 Son of God still more, and that the 
 Romans alone could condemn him 
 to death,! they submitted to appear 
 in the pretorium of that idolater, 
 taking every precaution, however, 
 to avoid coming in contact with his 
 garments, his banners, or even his 
 judgment-seat, which would have 
 rendered them unclean for the whole 
 day. Having, therefore, done all 
 that depended on them to avert 
 such a misfortune, these scrupulous 
 
 Christ was condemned, the Romans were abso- 
 lute masters of the temporal jurisdiction, and 
 the authority of the Jewish senate was confined 
 to. matters purely religious. The Talmudists 
 admit the fact, for they acknowledge that the 
 power of judging was taken from the senate 
 forty years before the ruin of Jerusalem — that 
 is to say, three years before the death of Christ. 
 (See Basnage, liv. vii., ch. 4.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 231 
 
 men accused Jesus of having per- 
 verted the people by his doctrine, 
 of having prevented them from pay- 
 ing tribute to Caesar, and, finally, 
 of having assumed the seditious 
 
 title of King of the Jews 
 
 As many lies as words. 
 
 Jesus listened in silence to these 
 false accusations. Pilate, convinced 
 of the profound malignity of the 
 accusers, and the innocence of the 
 accused, would have wished to save 
 Jesus, but could not succeed. The 
 Pharisees, skillful in the art of rais- 
 ing popular tumults, worked upon 
 the people, who kept crying out for 
 the death of the descendent of their 
 ancient kings ; and the governor, 
 
 * They preserve in Jerusalem the sentence 
 pronounced by Pilate on Jesus Christ We 
 give it here, not as an authentic document, but 
 as a local tradition. " Jesum Nazarenum sub- 
 versorum gentis,* contemptorem Csesaris, et fal- 
 sum Messiam, ut majorum suce gentis testimonie 
 probatum est, ducite ad communis supplicii 
 locum, et cum ludibrio regise majestatis in 
 medio duoruni, latronum aflSgite. I, lictor, 
 expedi cruces." — " Conduct to the ordinary 
 place of execution, Jesus of Nazareth, the se- 
 ducer of the people, who has despised the au- 
 thority of Csesar, and falsely announced himself 
 as the Messiah, according to the testimony of 
 the ancients of his nation; crucify him between 
 two thieves, with the derisive title of King. Go, 
 lictor, prepare the crosses." (Ardicom. In 
 descript. Jesus. ) 
 
 f Pilate undertook to construct an aqueduct 
 
 * who well knew how to appease the 
 clamors of the Jews when it suited 
 himself, contented himself with 
 faintly defending, against the fury 
 of his iniquitous accusers, the in- 
 nocent man whom he should have 
 firmly protected. Tired of their 
 cries, overcome by their persever- 
 ance, the Roman washed his hands 
 of his sentence, and pronounced it* 
 He then became anxious to make 
 amends, as it were, for his display 
 of clemency towards Jesus, and to 
 regain the favor of the Jerusalemite 
 populace, whom he had recently 
 caused his lictors to cudgel because 
 of a tumult f arising from his mak- 
 ing too free with the sacred treas- 
 
 with the money of the sacred treasury, to bring 
 water into Jerusalem from a distance of two 
 hundred stadia. The people, violently excited 
 against the Roman governor, whose real inten- 
 tion they penetrated, assembled by thousands 
 in the streets and public places of Jerusalem; 
 the whole city resounded with execrations 
 against Pilate; "and some even provoked the 
 governor," says Josephus, "by violent abuse, as 
 is usual in popular outbreaks." Pilate, who 
 was not so easily intimidated, ordered his men 
 to take large sticks under their garments and 
 surround the mob; when the latter, after a 
 short respite, began again with their clamors 
 and cutcries, Pilate made a sign to his soldiers, 
 who instantly fell on the people, and even went 
 beyond their instructions, beating those who 
 said nothing as well as those who were loudest 
 X in the clamor. " Those poor people having no 
 
282 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 uiy, under pretence of constructing 
 an aqueduct, with which he had 
 nothing to do, — so he ordered the 
 son of David and of Solomon to be 
 scoui'ged, amid the accUimations of 
 the deicide people, who had dared 
 to ta)ve upon their own heads and 
 tliose of tlieir children the dread 
 responsibility of his death. That 
 done, he delivered him up, though 
 regarding him with pity and with 
 admiration,* to the taunts and in- 
 sults of a soldiery whom the princes 
 of the Synagogue, despite their 
 hatred of them, had stooped to 
 bribe, in order to secure their co- 
 operation in the execution of their 
 revengeful projects, f They well 
 
 arms," adds Josephus, with compassionate sym- 
 pathy for the Jewish riot, " were therefore in- 
 humanly treated ; some were killed, others 
 wounded, and thus the tumult was quelled." 
 (Joseph. Anl. Jud., 1. xviii., ch. 4.) 
 
 * Tiberius, acting on the report sent by 
 Pilate, proposed to the senate to deify Jesus. 
 Tertullian mentions this as a notorious fact in 
 his Apology, which he presented to the senate 
 in the name of the Church, and he would not 
 have weakened so good a cause by making any 
 statement that could not be verified. (Tert., 
 Apol. 5.) 
 
 f Salvador would fain exculpate his co-reli- 
 gionists by casting on the Roman soldiers the 
 odium of the treatment inflicted on Jesus in the 
 pretorium ; but it is clear that the Romans only 
 acted as they did on the instigation of the ene- 
 mies of Christ. The following is the opinion of 
 
 f knew how to hate — those zealots 
 of the law of Moses, who would 
 kill and mock the Christ, /or God's 
 sake ! 
 
 When Jesus had reached the 
 court of the pretorium, they seated 
 him on a fallen pillar, J and the 
 entire cohort amused themselves by 
 offering him every imaginable spe- 
 cies of insult. It was the season 
 when the dangerous rhamnus§ was 
 ill full bloom — that bush in whose 
 green thorny mass the symbolical 
 ram of Abraham's sacrifice || was, 
 of old, entangled ; one of the sol- 
 diers ran out and gathered a branch 
 to form a derisive crown for Christ ; 
 the fresh green blossoms were soon 
 
 St. John Chrysostom on this subject : " It was, 
 in reality, the Jews themselves who condemned 
 Jesus to death, although they attribute the act 
 to Pilate. They would that his blood should 
 fall on themselves and their children. It was 
 they alone who offered him all the insults that 
 he received, who tied him, led him to Pilate, 
 and had him so cruelly treated by the soldiers. 
 Pilate had ordered nothing of all this." (Ser- 
 mon 77, in Matth. ) 
 
 I This pillar, of gray marble, and not more 
 than two feet high, is in Rome, in the Church 
 of St. Praxeda. 
 
 § The detached thorns of this crown, which 
 are still preserved, are now recognized for the 
 rhamnus spina Chnsli of Linnaeus. 
 
 II St. Jerome [in Philem.) says that the ram 
 which Abraham saw entangled in the bush was 
 
 -i the fiq-ure of Jesus crowned with thorns. 
 
Xj) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 233 
 
 stained with his sacred blood, every 
 thorn making a deep and insup- 
 portable wound. Having stripped 
 him perfectly naked, they threw 
 over his shoulders a purple rag, 
 placed a reed in his hand by way 
 of sceptre, and, with irony and 
 mocking genuflexions, they saluted 
 him as king. His whole body was 
 but one gajDing wound, for the 
 sharp, pointed lashes mangled the 
 flesh, and sent it flying in pieces 
 through the hall ; his sacred face 
 was covered with spittle, and the 
 blood which flowed from his divine 
 brow, which his chained hands could 
 not wipe away ! . . . . The princes 
 of the priests, the Pharisees, and the 
 doctors of the law, regarded this 
 scene with secret satisfaction ; com- 
 passion was a degrading weakness* 
 in the eyes of those honorable men ! 
 
 When the Pharisees thought that 
 the idolatrous soldiers had suffi- 
 ciently degraded Jesus before the 
 people to destroy the idea of his 
 
 * Basnage, 1. vi., ch. 17. — The punishment of 
 scoui'ging was very ancient amongst the Jews, 
 and was not considered infamous. According 
 to the Talmud, kings themselves were punished 
 in this way on certain occasions. " Tradition 
 teaches," says Maimouides, " that the king must 
 not have more than eighteen wives ; if he mar- 
 
 ^ divinity, the approach of the Sab- 
 bath rendering expedition neces- 
 sary, they took their Victim, whom 
 the Roman procurator reluctantly 
 gave up, and, after placing the 
 enormous Cross on his bleeding 
 and mangled shoulders, they spurr- 
 ed him on with the shafts of their 
 lances in his slow and painful jour- 
 ney to Calvary, where they were to 
 crucify him. 
 
 The streets were thickly lined 
 with the multitude of spectators ; 
 some displayed a ferocious joy, and 
 loudly anathematized the son of 
 David ; others deplored the hard 
 fate of that young prophet who had 
 done nought but good to men, by 
 whom he was now abandoned and 
 betrayed. But these barren proofs 
 of sympathy were scarcely percep- 
 tible ; the good wept in silence ; 
 those whom he had fed with five 
 loaves in the desert, those whom 
 he had cured, those whom he had 
 loved, were there, lost in the crowd, 
 
 ries one above that number, he is to be scourged. 
 If he have more horses than his chariot re- 
 quires, let him be scourged. If he amass more 
 gold or silver than is required to pay his minis- 
 ters, let him be scourged." (Maimon., Hdach., 
 Malach., ch. 3.) 
 
234 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRQIN MART. 
 
 and no voice was raised to protest 
 against his execution;* the Apos- 
 tles whom he most loved had dis- 
 owned him ! the others had f1od, 
 with one single exception ! 
 
 As he painfully toiled down the 
 long street which leads to the Gate 
 of Judgment, a woman made her 
 way through the crowd; she was 
 very fair, and her mild, sweet face 
 wore the stamp of purity, but it 
 was full of unutterable sorrow ; she 
 was pale as death, and trembled in 
 every limb ; her eyes, which could 
 now weep no more, fell with a 
 glance of such mortal anguish on 
 the gaping wounds of the Saviour,. 
 that the daughters of Jerusalem 
 wept as they saw her, murmuring, 
 " Poor, poor mother ! " She silently 
 glided through the people, who 
 made way for her through an in- 
 stinct of sympathy and compassion. 
 Some hardened Pharisees were load- 
 ing Jesus with bitter taunts and 
 
 f reproaches — he who was bathed in 
 sweat, and almost expiring under 
 the weight of the Cross ; but his 
 mother heard them not : the foreign 
 soldiers who surrounded her Son 
 made threatening gestures at her; 
 she saw them not. But when a 
 number of spears, pointed against 
 her bosom, arose between her and 
 Jesus, all the fire of the blood of 
 David sparkled in her eyes, and she 
 raised her beauteous head with an 
 air of such ma;jestic sorrow, such 
 utter contempt of death, that the 
 astonished soldiers slowly lowered 
 their arms before that holy and 
 heroic woman. Fierce as their 
 martial life had made them, they 
 still remembered their mothers. 
 
 Mary turned her trembling steps 
 towards the Saviour; she fixed her 
 sorrowful eyes on that humbled 
 form moving slowly along, bleeding 
 and half naked, under a heavy load ; 
 on that imposing countenance, so 
 
 * We read in the Misnah that, in the days 
 when the Jews were governed by their own 
 laws, when a criminal was led to the place of 
 execution, a herald went before him on horse- 
 back, crying, " Such a one is condemned for 
 such a crime ; if any one has anything to say in 
 his defence, let him speak." If any one came 
 forward, the criminal was brought back, and ^ 
 
 the reasons advanced in his favor were exam- 
 ined by two judges who walked beside him ; the 
 prisoner might be thus brought back as often 
 as five times. {Misnah, Tract, de Syned., ch. vi., 
 p. 233.) Jesus Christ being condemned by the 
 Roman laws, could not profit by this national 
 custom. 
 
ST MARY MAGDALEN. 
 
 ;hK:D,& j sadlier xc" 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 23" 
 
 mild and merciful, which she had ' 
 scarcely ever dared to touch with 
 her chaste lips, and which now, 
 swollen and discolored, covered with 
 blood and spittle, scarce retained 
 the image of the Creator. She 
 passed her hand sadly over her 
 brow, as though to assure herself 
 that the whole was not a fearful 
 dream. No groan relieved her op- 
 pressed heart, no gesture of despair 
 betrayed the secret of her agony ; 
 it only seemed that she was going 
 to die, and die she must, in fact, a 
 thousand times over, during that 
 solemn and heart-rending pause, if 
 He who tempers the wind to the 
 shorn lamb had not divinely sus- 
 tained her. Jesus soon perceived 
 the presence of that mute and mo- 
 tionless figure, and bending still 
 lower his already bowed head, he 
 pronounced the name of "Mother." 
 
 * Tradition, supported by the authority of 
 St. Boniface and St. Anselm, relates that Jesus 
 saluted his mother with the words, "Hail, 
 mother ! " As the Blessed Virgin is known to 
 have been at the foot of the Cross, there is 
 nothing improbable in this tradition of the 
 Fathers. " There is nothing contrary to faith 
 in these traditions," says M. de Chateaubriand ; 
 "they serve to show how the marvellous and 
 BubUme history of the Passion was engraved 
 on the minds of men. Eighteen centuries have ^ 
 
 At that word, which fell on the 
 Virgin's ear like a funeral knell, a 
 thrill of anguish ran through her 
 heart; she was seen to totter and 
 grow pale; then, sinking beneath 
 the accumulated load of sorrow, 
 she fell prostrate on those rough 
 stones marked with the blood of 
 Jesus.* .... 
 
 A young Galilean, with a gloomy, 
 dejected countenance, and a young 
 woman bathed in tears, quickly 
 made their way to where Mary lay ; 
 thanks to their tender solicitude, 
 the sorrowful Virgin recovered her 
 senses, together with the conscious- 
 ness of that physical and moral 
 martyrdom which none, according to 
 the Fathers, ever equalled. Doubt- 
 less, John and Magdalen did all 
 they could to keep her away from 
 the bloody scene about 'to be en- 
 acted on the Golgotha; but their 
 
 rolled away ; endless persecutions and number- 
 less revolutions fail either to hide or eflface the 
 trace of a mother mourning for her sou." There 
 was built in memory of Our Lady's swoon a 
 church, which was consecrated under the name 
 of Our Lady of the Spasm. "It was there," 
 eays M. de Geramb, " that Mary, repulsed by 
 the soldiers, met her Son bending under the 
 weight of the ignominious wood on which he 
 was to die." 
 
236 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 efforts were vain, for, raising herself * 
 with difficulty, Mary began to climb, 
 under a burning sun, the steepest 
 side of Calvary, which, being the 
 shortest way, was that which they 
 had made Jesus take.* 
 
 They had reached the fatal and 
 sacred place where the Lamb of 
 God was to satisfy the justice of 
 ofiended Heaven, substituting Him- 
 self for all victims, and taking upon 
 him all our miseries. It was there 
 that he was to offer up that great 
 sacrifice, the efficacy of which goes 
 back, on the one side, to the orig- 
 inal transgression, and extends, on 
 the other, through the night of futu- 
 rity, even to the consummation of 
 the world. That little rocky plat- 
 form was the altar whereon the 
 blood of Christ was to flow in waves 
 to wash a^ay the sins of the world, 
 and annihilate for ever the compact 
 of perdition which made us over at 
 our birth to the Enemy of Souls. 
 But what had become of the sacred 
 
 * This road, which formerly led to Calvary, 
 and by which the Saviour passed, now exists no 
 longer ; it is covered with houses, in the midst 
 of which is seen a large pillar, pointing out the 
 ninth station ; Turkish fanaticism has done all 
 it could to make the place disagreeable, by 
 heaping dung around it so as to shock the sen- 
 
 Victim ? Where had his execution- 
 ers hid him from the desolate eyes 
 of his mother ? Mary cast an anx- 
 ious glance over the dreary moun- 
 tain ; she saw the expecting multi- 
 tude, the crosses laid on the ground, 
 laborers carelessly digging out the 
 deep holes that were to receive the 
 
 three instruments of torture 
 
 But where was Jesus ? 
 
 He appeared, but in what a con- 
 dition ! stripped of his garments, 
 without a rag to cover his lacerated 
 flesh and his bleeding wounds — ^lie, 
 so chaste and so pure ! His execu- 
 tioners, ignominiously dragging him 
 along, exposed him thus for some 
 time to the ridicule of the people ; 
 then, the Just One stretched him- 
 self on the Cross, that bed of honor 
 prepared for him by the gratitude 
 of men in return for his immense 
 love ! It was a sight too horrible 
 for those who loved him ; Mary 
 was taken some paces thence, to a 
 species of natural grotto,f where she 
 
 sibilities of the Christians. (De Geramb, t. ler, 
 p. 363.) 
 
 f Near the spot where Our Saviour was nailed 
 to the Cross there is a chapel dedicated to Our 
 Lady of Sorrows. It was to this jjlace that the 
 Virgin retired during the doleful preparations 
 ^ for her Son's execution. (Id. ib., p. 151.) 
 
remained standing, white and cold 
 as marble. There was heard with- 
 out a humming noise like that made 
 by the bees of Engaddi when the 
 Hebrew shepherd drives them from 
 the hollow oak. At times there 
 suddenly arose, amid that dull mur- 
 mur, a storm of shouts, mocking 
 cries, and hoarse bursts of laughter: 
 the populace of all nations has ever 
 had ferocious instincts, but that of 
 the Hebrews surpassed itself on 
 this occasion. 
 
 During an interval of profound 
 silence, accorded perhaps to some 
 new act of barbarity which capti- 
 vated the attention of the multitude, 
 there was heard the stroke of a 
 hammer, a heavy stroke falling on 
 wood and crushed flesh. Magdalen, 
 with a shudder, pressed close to 
 Mary, and the beloved disciple 
 leaned for support against the side 
 of the grotto. Then came a second 
 stroke, heavier, duller, more sinister 
 still; it was followed by two or 
 three others, falling at equal inter- 
 vals, and all was done I " They are 
 nailing him to the Cross," coolly 
 observed a Koman soldier. John 
 and Magdalen exchanged a mourn- 
 ful glance; they felt a sensation 
 
 something like that which rends 
 the heart during a nocturnal storm, 
 when the waves bring to the shore 
 the drowning mariner's piteous 
 cries, without any possibility of our 
 assisting him. But Mary ! .... a 
 cold sweat bedewed her body, a con- 
 vulsive trembling shook her limbs ; 
 she, too, was crucified — poor, feeble 
 woman ! for never did confessor on 
 the rack, or martyr amid the flames, 
 undergo such tortures both in soul 
 and body. 
 
 Soon was heard the sharp rub- 
 bing of the cords on the pulleys; 
 the Cross arose slowly in the air, 
 and the Son of Man — his face 
 turned towards those western re- 
 gions where the light was so long 
 expected — was hoisted like a stand- 
 ard before the heathen nations : 
 even so was it written. Thereupon, 
 the reprobate people raised a long, 
 hoarse shout of joy. "Hail, King 
 of the Jews! If God loves him, 
 let Him now deliver him ! If thou 
 art the Son of God, Nazarene, come 
 down from the Cross!" And the 
 robber crucified on his left cursed 
 him in the intervals of his agony; 
 the wretch would fain be a Jew to 
 the last. Jesus, maintaining with 
 
238 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 calni and sublime dignity his great 
 character of prophet and Saviour- 
 God, silently sealed with his blood 
 the high doctrines of the new law. 
 No complaint, no reproach escaped 
 him amid the infamous torture 
 which he underwent, in presence 
 of a w^hole city. He looked down 
 on that misguided people with pity 
 and forgiveness, and, seeking to 
 bend the divine justice in favor of 
 those who crucified him, "Father," 
 said he, with his dying voice — 
 "Father, forgive them, for they 
 know not what they do!" 
 
 "And yet for eighteen centuries 
 the Father has not forgiven them, 
 and they drag their punishment all 
 over the earth, and everywhere the 
 very slave has to humble himself 
 to look at them."* 
 
 The Virgin left the temporary 
 asylum where she had taken shel- 
 ter, and walked, with her head 
 bowed down, towards the place of 
 execution. At some paces from the 
 infamous tree, rude soldiers were 
 
 * M. de Lamennais. 
 
 f It is an ancient tradition that the Virgin 
 herself wove her Son's tunic. 
 
 \ The cathedral of Treves possesses one of 
 these sacred garments, and at one of its recent 
 annual expositions, the police reports announced 
 
 * casting lots for the seamless robe 
 which her own hands had spun,f 
 and clamorously contending for the 
 sacred garments which had wrought 
 so many miracles. J A slight con- 
 vulsion passed over Mary's features; 
 she thought of the time when, rich 
 only in the love of Jesus, but free 
 from immediate anxiety, she worked, 
 in the evenings, by his side, fabri- 
 cating that festal robe; now, the 
 remembrance was torture to her 
 heart, for the light which gilded 
 her past days of happiness did but 
 darken the gloom of her present 
 sorrow. She raised her eyes to 
 heaven, seeking there, as usual, the 
 strength to endure, and her eye met 
 that of the crucified God. At that 
 fearful sight, hei' feet were rooted 
 to the earth, and she stood so petri- 
 fied with horror that all she had 
 hitherto suff'ered seemed no more 
 than a dream, a half-efi'aced vision : 
 all was absorbed in the Cross. § 
 
 Jesus, casting on the Virgin a 
 sweet and mysterious look, seemed 
 
 the presence of twenty-five thousand pilgrims 
 in that cit}\ 
 
 § The Fathers and the gre.at doctors of the 
 Church place the sufferings of the Virgin on 
 Calvary above those of all the martyrs. "Virgo 
 universos martyres tantum excedit quantum sol 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 239 
 
 to say to her, as he did on the * 
 preceding evening to his Apostles, 
 "Mother, the hour is come!" 
 
 And what hour was that? 
 
 It was the most memorable and 
 eventful hour ever marked by the 
 shadow of the sun since time began 
 its course ; the hour when the Son 
 of God was to triumph over the 
 world, death, and hell, and even 
 over divine justice itself; the hour 
 of the fulfillment of prophecies, of 
 the abolition of sacrifices, of the 
 restoration of woman to her prime- 
 val dignity, of the slave's emanci- 
 pation, and of our eternal redemp- 
 tion. And the Virgin fancied she 
 could see the patriarchs, the just 
 kings, the prophets inspired by 
 God, bowing down before Christ, 
 like the sheafs of the sons of Jacob 
 before the mystical sheaf of Joseph. 
 She thought she could see Moses 
 and Aaron laying before the new 
 tree of life the ark of the covenant, 
 the ephod, the rational, the golden 
 plate and the almond-tree branch 
 — symbols of the Hebrew priest- 
 ad reliqua astra," says St. Basil; and St. Aiisehn 
 adds, " Quidquid crudelitatis inflictum est cor- 
 poribus martyrum leve fuit aut potius nihil 
 comparatione tuse passionis." {De Ex. Virg., 
 cap. 5.) . 
 
 hood whose mission was about to 
 end ; then, David placing his pro- 
 phetic harp beside the sword of 
 Phineas, the sacred knife of Abra- 
 ham, and the brazen serpent. 
 Priests and victims, rites and ordi- 
 nances, types and symbols, grouped 
 around the Cross, awaited their con- 
 summation ; and the book with the 
 seven brazen seals was opened at 
 the foot of the High-Priest accord- 
 ing to the order of Melchisedech, 
 which replaced that of Aaron. The 
 ancient world, receding like the 
 waves, gave place to other images, 
 and Mary seemed at. that moment 
 to behold all the nations of the 
 earth waiting at the foot of the 
 Cross to receive tlie Gospel. Ethio- 
 pia and the isles sti-etched out their 
 hands towards the Messiah; the 
 desert, beginning to rejoice, blos- 
 somed like the rose ; the knowledge 
 of God, filled the whole earth as the 
 great waters cover the sandy bed of 
 the ocean; and a thousand voices 
 seemed to repeat in a thousand 
 barbarous tongues, " Chiist has 
 conquered; blessed be his name!" 
 The noble and generous heart of 
 Mary forgot, for a while, its own 
 , poignant suiferings, to sympathize 
 
240 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 in the triumph of the law of grace, f 
 and in the world's regeneration ; 
 but the vision of glory quickly 
 vanished, and grief returned in all 
 its force; like Rachel, the Virgin 
 mourned for her first-born, and 
 would not be comforted. 
 
 Meanwhile, all nature seemed to 
 sympathize in the sufferings of its 
 God ; the sky was gradually ob- 
 scured, and the waning light gave 
 a mournful coloring to that grand 
 and sterile landscape so well suited 
 to the crime of which it was the 
 theatre. Every moment the dark- 
 ness increased ; the dew fell, from 
 the sudden interruption of the heat; 
 the eagles screamed as they sought 
 their nightly shelter; the jackals 
 howled on the banks of the Kedron, 
 and Calvary, already so gloomy in 
 itself, assumed the appearance of a 
 great mausoleum of black marble. 
 The people, strongly impressed by 
 this unusual occurrence, were struck 
 
 * Phlegon relates that in the two hundred 
 and second Olympiad, corresponding with the 
 33d year of our era, there was the greatest 
 eclipse of the sun ever seen, and that the stars 
 appeared at noon-day; but astronomy proving 
 that there was no echpse in that yeai', compels 
 OS to acknowledge that the cause of this un- 
 heard-of darkness was altogether supernaturaL 
 
 silent with fear, and only a few 
 voices — those of the chief priests 
 and Pharisees— continued to curse 
 the Christ. 
 
 Soon, through the gloomy veil 
 which shrouded the face of the 
 firmament, the stars shone out like 
 funeral torches burning around a 
 coffin, shedding over the scene of 
 the deicide a lurid, greenish light, 
 which gave to the mass of specta- 
 tors grouped on the sides of the 
 mountain the appearance of an 
 assembly of demons and spectres. 
 They looked at each other and grew 
 pale. Yainly did the scribes and 
 Pharisees — too far advanced in 
 crime to attempt to recede— en- 
 deavor to account for this prodigy 
 by natural means ; the longer the 
 darkness continued, the less conclu- 
 sive did their reasons appear. Old 
 men, shaking their hoary heads, 
 declared they had never beheld 
 such an eclipse;* and the learned. 
 
 " We observed," says St. Deuis, the Areopagite, 
 who was then at Heliopolis, " that the moon sud- 
 denly interposed between the sun and the earth, 
 although the time of that conjunction was not 
 in accordance with the natural order of the laws 
 to which the stars are subject," etc. (Seventh 
 Epistle to Polycarpe). 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 241 
 
 who were versed in the science of 
 the Chaldeans, maintained, on the 
 other hand, that no eclipse was 
 either foreseen or possible in the 
 then position of the moon. 
 
 This eclipse, of three hours, was 
 one of the Messianic prodigies 
 which were to signalize the wrath 
 of heaven when Christ was put to 
 death. "It shall come to pass in 
 that day, " said the prophet Amos, 
 "that the sun shall go down at 
 mid-day ; and I will make the earth 
 dark in the day of light." This 
 darkness extended even to Egypt, 
 where St. Denis, the Areopagite, 
 was studying philosophy at Heli- 
 opolis. Struck with terror, the 
 young Greek cried out, address- 
 ing his preceptor, Apollophanes, 
 "Either the world is about to be 
 destroyed, or the God of nature 
 suffers ! " * 
 
 In the midst of the general con- 
 sternation, Jesus occupied himself 
 with the faithful souls who gathered 
 around his Cross in that hour of 
 ignominy. Touched by the courage 
 of John, and the profound affliction 
 which that young and ardent dis- 
 ciple sought not to conceal, he 
 
 * Seventh Epidle to Polycarpe. 
 
 * would leave him a pledge of his 
 divine affection. He could leave 
 him no worldly wealth — he, who had 
 not had a stone whereon to lay his 
 head, and who was even about to 
 receive interment from the charity 
 of a disciple — he had nothing in 
 the world to leave but his mother ! 
 that mother who had clung to him 
 through every trial, and who was 
 now dying, as it were, with him. 
 Her he solemnly bequeathed to his 
 favorite disciple as an earnest of 
 the celestial treasures which he 
 reserved for him in the kingdom of 
 his Father. Knowing how well he 
 was loved by those two holy souls, 
 he foresaw, in his adorable good- 
 ness, the fearful vacuum which his 
 death would make in their hearts, 
 and he would strengthen these two 
 helpless shrubs by intertwining 
 their detached branches. 
 
 By this arrangement, which gave 
 her a new and dear interest in life, 
 the Virgin was to understand that 
 she was not permitted to follow her 
 Son to the grave, and that the term 
 of her earthly pilgrimage was not 
 yet arrived. She submitted to the 
 divine will through love for us, 
 whom she adopted in the person of 
 
242 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED yiJiUJN MARY. 
 
 the holy Apostle. Mary's sacrifice, 
 humanly speaking, almost equalled 
 that of Chiist. He willingly con- 
 sented to die; she to live! .... 
 Both those noble hearts were con- 
 simied with love for men, and were 
 alone able to understand each other; 
 fbr their thoughts were not as our 
 thoughts, and the gold of their vir- 
 tues was without alloy. 
 
 The manner in which Jesus be- 
 queathed Mary to the yoimg fisher- 
 man of Bethsaida was dignified and 
 simple, like all the acts of his mor- 
 tal life. "Woman, behold thy son;" 
 and to the beloved disciple, "Behold 
 thy mother." 
 
 K he used not, in speaking to 
 Mary, a more endearing appellation, 
 it was because he knew the power 
 of the name which he thought 
 proper to omit, and would not re- 
 open wounds already so deep and 
 so painful. 
 
 Then Jesus, knowing that all 
 things were now accomplished, that 
 the Scripture might be fulfilled, said, 
 " I thu-st." 
 
 "Now there was a vessel set 
 there full of vinegar. And they, put- 
 ting a &ponge full of vinegar about 
 hyssop, offered it to his mouth." 
 
 Infamous to the last! 
 
 Jesus having taken the vinegar, 
 said, "It is consummated." Then, 
 in order to prove to the world that 
 he died, not by the power of death, 
 but by a formal act of his own will, 
 he gave a loud cry, bowed down his 
 head and expired ! . . . . 
 
 At that moment the pagan idols 
 tottered on their pedestals ; the star 
 of Moses, which had shone, but for 
 one single point of the globe, and 
 that but for a season, sank then, 
 below the horizon, and the sim of 
 the Gospel, destined to light the 
 world from pole to pole, and to last 
 through all time, arose radiant from 
 the east. 
 
 But God owed prodigies to the 
 despised dignity of his Son, and 
 they were not slow in coming. 
 The supernatural darkness, as it 
 began to disappear, was succeeded 
 by the violent shocks of an earth- 
 quake, which destroyed twenty 
 cities in Asia.* At the same in- 
 stant the veil of the Temple was 
 rent asunder, rocks split, and sev- 
 eral bodies of the saints who had 
 
 * Pliny and Strabo speak of this earthquake. 
 "It was so violent," say both these authors, 
 " that it was felt even in Italy." 
 
THE CRUCIFIXION. 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 243 
 
 slept in death arose and came into 
 Jerusalem, to the great terror of the 
 inhabitants. 
 
 Then it was that there was a 
 marvellous reaction in favor of Je- 
 sus ; the centurion and his soldiers, 
 who had presided at the execution, 
 cried out with one voice that the 
 Nazarene prophet was certainly 
 more than man; and that immense 
 crowd of people who had heaped 
 blasphemies and insults, mockery 
 and derision, on Christ in his agony, 
 went down from the mountain strik- 
 ing their breasts, and repeating in 
 dismay, "Indeed Tms was the Son 
 OF God!" 
 
 In the midst of the despairing 
 cries of the people, who fled in all 
 directions without knowing where 
 to turn their steps, and whilst the 
 rocky flanks of the Golgotha were 
 bursting open, there was seen by 
 the pale, lurid light a woman stand- 
 ing completely motionless amid the 
 
 t convulsions and ruins of nature. 
 She seemed insensible to the gen- 
 eral consternation ; her htinds joined 
 in the attitude of prayer, she was 
 wholly absorbed in the sorrowful 
 contemplation of the crucified pro- 
 phet. 
 
 And the daughters of Jerusalem 
 wept again, saying with compas- 
 sion, " Poor mother !" 
 
 Towards evening the Pharisees, 
 unwilling that the sanctity of the 
 Sabbath, which commenced at night- 
 fall, should be endangered by allow- 
 ing the bodies to remain on the 
 Cross, went to ask Pilate's permis- 
 sion to have them removed. The 
 permission obtained, 'they placed 
 ladders against the gibbets whereon 
 the two thieves were still in their 
 agony, and, having rudely torn their 
 hands and feet from the Cross, dis- 
 patched them by breaking their 
 legs and arms. Jesus being quite 
 dead,* a soldier contented himself 
 
 * According to the Mussulmans, Jesus is not 
 dead. " The Jews," says Mahomet, " did not 
 kill Jesus Christ ; another body was substituted 
 for his, so as to deceive their barbarity ; they 
 did not crucify him ; God took him up to 
 heaven." {Koran, ch. 4.) The Mussulman tra- 
 dition says that when the last trumpet shall 
 sound, Aisa (Jesus Christ) shall come down 
 from heaven and announce to all the children ^ 
 
 of men the great day of general judgment ; he 
 shall then die and be interred beside Mahomet ; 
 when the dead arise from their graves, both 
 shall go forth together and ascend to heaven. 
 Burkhardt, who visited the great mosque in 
 Medina which contains the three tombs of ^I - 
 hornet, Aboubeker, and Omar, all three of black 
 stone covered with precious stuffs, and sur- 
 rounded with magnificent ex-voio, says that 
 
S44 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY: 
 
 with plunging his spear into his 
 side, whereupon the sacred blood 
 that was to piu-ify the world of its 
 crimes flowed in streams to the 
 ground. At some distance stood 
 two veiled women, one of whom 
 leaned on the other for support 
 with a helplessness that betrayed 
 the most heart-rending grief; both 
 were timidly watching the move- 
 ments of the soldiers ; it was Mary 
 and Magdalen, for Magdalen was 
 also there ; and at a distance were 
 seen the other women of Galilee 
 who had quitted all for Jesus, and 
 who had not abandoned him even 
 in his hour of death and ignominy. 
 "Honor to them!" says Abeilard, 
 "for, when the disciples and Apos- 
 tles fled like cowards over the 
 mountains, these frail but com-age- 
 ous creatures accompanied Christ 
 even to the foot of the Cross, and 
 quitted him not till he was laid in 
 the sepulchre ! " 
 
 Then came Joseph of Arimathea, 
 a wealthy senator who had ob- 
 tained from Pilate the body of 
 Jesus, — whose disciple he was in 
 
 there was left near the touib of Mahomet" a 
 vacant place, destined to receive Jesus after his 
 death. Abo »'e this space and Mahomet's tomb 
 
 f secret, — in order to give him decent 
 burial. lie took it down from the 
 Cross and prepared to wrap it up 
 in a shroud of flne Egyptian linen, 
 which he had purchased in Jerusa- 
 lem, when he saw at his feet a 
 woman pale as death, holding out 
 her arms, with all the touching and 
 sublime energy of grief, to receive 
 the crucified God. Her whole frame 
 was convulsed with anguish, and 
 her lips refused to utter the prayer 
 that arose from her heart, but every 
 feature of her beautiful face was 
 expressive of the most earnest sup- * 
 plication. The senator, recognizing 
 Mary, made a sign of compassion- 
 ate sympathy, and laid on her trem- 
 bling knees the divine burden which 
 he had respectfully borne on his 
 own shoulders. Tlius, the Blessed 
 Virgin had, at- length, the mournful 
 consolation of pressing to her bleed- 
 ing heart the disfigured body of her 
 Son, and to lay her bloodless lips 
 on the wounds made by the nails. 
 Magdalen, on her knees, bathed 
 with her scalding tears the bloody 
 feet of her Lord, and moaned like a 
 
 was hung a splendid brocade canopy, giirnished 
 with diamonds, which was stolen by Sioud when 
 he took Medina. 
 
^Vi)t '\}thfM''hnm^'^]pi^nll 
 
 t J-.Sadlf!r * C'New'V - 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 24t 
 
 woimded dove. Behind them stood 
 the weeping women of Galilee.* 
 Meanwhile, some of Joseph's ser- 
 vants prepared the perfumes on the 
 
 * Some authors hold that these holy women 
 picked up earth soaked with the precious blood 
 of Jesus, aud that this is how it came to be in 
 some French churches, such as St. Denis and 
 the Holy Chapel, in Paris. 
 
 stone of unctwn,f and others opened 
 the sepulchre, hewn in the rock, 
 which was to receive the mortal 
 remains of the Son of God. 
 
 f The "stone of unction" is now in the 
 chapel of Calvary. Those in whose keeping it 
 is have been obliged, in order to preserve it, 
 to cover it with white marble, and surround it 
 with an iron balustrade. 
 
 CHAPTER XYIII. 
 
 DEATH OF MARY. 
 
 ALM was begin- 
 ning to reappear, 
 and the signs of 
 divine wrath no 
 longer terrified 
 the Jews who 
 had just shed the Saviour's blood. 
 Like all other ferocious animals, 
 the executioners of Christ had laid 
 aside their savage instinct during 
 the hour of peril. Frightened, at 
 frst, on account of what they had 
 (^one, they feared that the riven 
 locks of Calvary might crush them 
 in their fall, and that the rending 
 earth might swallow them alive into ^ 
 
 the gloomy depths of the scJieol ; 
 but their remorse vanished with 
 their fears, and according as the 
 sky resumed its wonted serenity, 
 so did their evil nature resume its 
 sway. 
 
 Unable to deny the prodigies 
 which a whole people had seen 
 with their eyes, and which was still 
 verified by the yawning rocks, the 
 tombs scarcely closed, and the riven 
 veil of the Temple, they ascribed 
 them to magic, and maintained that 
 this Jesus, so mighty in word aud 
 work, was but a son of Belial, who 
 had infatuated the people and com- 
 
246 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 iiiaiuled the elements by the ineifa- 
 ble name of the God of Israel, which 
 he had taken by surprise from the 
 Holy of Holies.* And the people 
 allowed themselves to be caught by 
 this bait thrown out by their chiefs ; 
 for there is no slanderous absurdity 
 which finds not credulous ears to 
 receive, and nimble tongues to 
 spread it. Meanwhile, a vigilant 
 guard, chosen from amongst the sat- 
 ellites of the high-priest, watched 
 by turns around the sepulchre ; for 
 Jesus had announced that he would 
 rise on the third day, and the 
 princes of the synagogue pretend- 
 ed to fear that his disciples might 
 carry him off during the night. 
 
 The third day was beginning to 
 dawn, but the east was, as yet, 
 scarcely tinted with its roseate 
 flush, when several women of Gali- 
 lee, bearing perfumes and aromatic 
 plants to embalm Jesus, after the 
 manner of the kings of Juda,f ap- 
 peared on the fatal mountain, mov- 
 ing pensively towards the garden 
 wherein was- the tomb of Christ. 
 
 * See Basnage, 1. vi., cb. 27 and 28. 
 
 f It is clear that they intended a peculiar sort 
 of embalming for Jesus, since Nicodemus had 
 already wrapped him up in cloths perfumed 
 with mvrrh. 
 
 f Tradition has it that Mary wjis 
 amongst these holy women. Iler 
 dejected countenance resembled 
 some beautiful ruin prostrated by 
 the fierce wind of adversity; but 
 her look was expressive not only 
 of grief, but of expectation. The 
 deicide city still slept in the balmy 
 breeze of the morning ; the flowers 
 w^ere opening their cups heavy with 
 dew, the birds were singing in the 
 damp branches of the wild fig-trees, 
 and the air was gradually assuming 
 the warm coloring of the daw^n ; 
 nature seemed to assume her robe 
 of light with unwonted joy, and that 
 grand, though gloomy, landscape 
 w^liich surrounds Jerusalem, began 
 to wear a softer and gayer aspect, 
 till then unknown, as though con- 
 scious of some glorious mystery 
 passing near. 
 
 Suddenly, in the midst of that 
 smiling scene, a shock is felt; the 
 stone that closes the mouth of the 
 sepulchre rolls back as if pushed 
 by some mighty arm ; the guards 
 fall stupefied to the ground, and the 
 w^omen, who stood by Jesus during 
 his long agony on the Cross, now 
 shudder and grow pale, fearing that 
 the terrible prodigies w^hich accom- 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIROIN MART. 
 
 247 
 
 panied the death of the Son of Man * 
 are about to be renewed. 
 
 But an angel in snow-white gar- 
 ments, with a face radiant as the 
 lightning, appears sitting on the 
 stone, and reassures the servants of 
 Christ. "Fear not," said he, mild- 
 ly, " I know that you seek Jesus of 
 Nazareth, who was crucified ; he is 
 not here ; he is risen, as he told 
 you. Come and see the place 
 Tvhere the Lord was laid." Whilst 
 the pious Galileans looked timidly 
 into the sepulchre, wondering at 
 sight of the shroud and the per- 
 fumed cloths wdiich remained there, 
 the Virgin, her face radiant with a 
 holy joy, stood leaning against an 
 olive-tree at some distance. A 
 young man, in the homely garb of 
 the people, stood conversing w^th 
 her in a low voice. That young 
 man was the first-born amongst the 
 dead, the glorious conqueror of hell, 
 Jesus Christ* No one knew^ what 
 passed during that solemn inter- 
 view", but w^e may believe that 
 
 * St. Ambrose, who lived in the 4th century, 
 says that the Virgin was the first who had the 
 happiness of seeing Jesus after his resurrec- 
 tion ; and the poet Sedulius, who flourished 
 shortly after St. Ambrose, likewise introduces 
 that tradition into his poems. They both speak ^ 
 
 Mary, whose strong mind had been 
 so severely tried by affliction, felt 
 then a degree of bliss which we 
 cannot know without dying. 
 
 Our Lord, during the forty days 
 following his resmiection, frequent- 
 ly manifested himself to the Apos- 
 tles, and talked with them on mat- 
 ters appertaining to the kingdom 
 of God and the regeneration to be 
 wrought amongst men by baptism. 
 Pious authors have supposed that 
 the Virgin was the most favored 
 in these consoling apparitions, and 
 that she found in them a foretaste 
 of the joys of heaven. The bitter 
 waters of her affliction were changed 
 into sources of grace, and the Sav- 
 iour " nourished her with the hiddea 
 manna which he reserves for those 
 who practise the patience enjoined 
 by his law." 
 
 At length, the hour came when, 
 by the divine behest, the Son of 
 God was to be recalled to heaven ; 
 his redeeming mission was accom- 
 plished, and the Apostles, fully con- 
 
 of it as a belief general amongst Christians. 
 The Arab historians have preserved this tradi- 
 tion : iemael, son of AH relates that Jesus came 
 down from heaven to console Mary, his weeping 
 mother. An altar has been erected on the site 
 of this touching interview. 
 
vinced of his divinity by his resur- 
 rection, had received from him the 
 necessary instructions for convert- 
 ing the nations to his admirable 
 Gospel. 
 
 At noon, on the fortieth day, he 
 went out with them from Jerusalem 
 towards the heights of Bethany. 
 This dh-ection was not taken by 
 chance ; there was that olive-crown- 
 ed mountain whereon the Saviour, 
 detaching himself from the crowd, 
 had often prayed to his Father, 
 while the silent moon shone bright- 
 ly over the still waters of the Dead 
 Sea, the green valley of the Jordan, 
 and the gigantic palms of the plain 
 of Jericho, for in that elevated posi- 
 tion "all far things seemed near." 
 There was, also, that famous garden 
 where Christ had undergone the 
 first of his agony. It was just that 
 his glory should commence in the 
 same places that had witnessed his 
 generous sufferings, and that those 
 fields, those woods, those shady 
 wilds, where he had so often prayed 
 and meditated, should receive the 
 impression of his last footsteps be- 
 fore he again ascended to heaw3n. 
 
 Arrived on the summit of that 
 lofty mountaiif, whence he could be- 
 
 f hold a great part of Judea, and 
 make a farewell sign to those scenes 
 which he had rendered famous by 
 his miracles and his death, the 
 Saviour stopped on an open place, 
 near a grove of olives, whose pale 
 foliage w^as parched and shrivelled 
 by the scorching noonday sun. 
 There, after raising his pierced 
 hands towards his heavenly Father, 
 as though recommending to Him 
 his infant Church, he extended 
 them over his mother and his dis- 
 ciples, as Jacob did over the sons 
 of Joseph; then lifted himself up 
 by his own power and slowly as- 
 cended into heaven. This last act 
 of the Saviour w^orthily sealed his 
 divine mission. During his life, he 
 went about doing good ; on Cal- 
 vary, he prayed for his execution- 
 ers ; and he ascended to heaven 
 blessing the humble friends whom 
 he left behind him on the earth. 
 While his hands were still raised 
 over his prostrate disciples, they 
 saw him enter a white cloud, which 
 concealed him from their view. 
 
 The ascension of Our Lord had 
 not that gloomy and awful charac- 
 ter which terrified the people in 
 ancient times. The law of Moses 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 249 
 
 had been proclaimed with sound of 
 trumpet, amid the thunder's roar 
 and the lightning's flash ; Elias had 
 been taken up to heaven in a liery 
 chariot; but the world's Redeemer 
 was gently borne on a fleecy cloud, 
 with that sort of calm and serene 
 majesty which accorded with the 
 genius of the Gospel and the touch- 
 ing character of its author. 
 
 The angels — those beneficent 
 spirits who rejoice in the happi- 
 ness of men — were also seen to 
 figure in that closing scene of the 
 great drama of Redemption. Their 
 divine songs had announced to the 
 shepherds the birth of the King- 
 Messiah; their voice had proclaim- 
 ed his resurrection from the dead; 
 it was proper, then, that their 
 words should confirm his glorious 
 ascension. 
 
 Whilst the disciples were atten- 
 tively watching Jesus as he ascend- 
 ed into heaven, two men clothed in 
 white stood suddenly before them, 
 and said, "Ye men of Galilee, why 
 stand ye looking up to heaven? 
 This Jesus, who is taken up from 
 you to heaven, shall so come as you 
 have seen him goi ng into heaven." 
 
 * Apoc, ch. xxi., V. 4. 
 
 The Apostles and disciples cast 
 down their eyes, dazzled by the 
 glorious vision ; but did the Virgin 
 cast down hers ? Was she denied 
 the privilege of seeing her divine 
 Son take his place in majesty at 
 the right hand of Jehovah, amid 
 the inaccessible light of the Saints ? 
 Was she really less favored than 
 St. Stephen and the beloved dis- 
 ciple? That is scarcely possible. 
 She who was morally crucified with 
 Jesus on Calvary deserved to be 
 glorified with him ; it was her right, 
 and she had dearly purchased it! 
 Yes, Mary must have been per- 
 mitted to catch a glimpse of that 
 peaceful and happy country into 
 which Jesus obtained admission for 
 us by his blood, and where he him- 
 self wipes away the tears of the 
 just;* then the pearl gates of the 
 heavenly Jerusalem f slowly closed 
 on the conquering God, and the 
 Virgin, separated for a time from 
 him she loved, remained alone on 
 the earth. 
 
 Forty days after, we find her at 
 prayer in the "upper chamber," 
 where she received the Holy Ghost 
 with the Apostles. ^_^ 
 
 t Jbid., V. 21. 
 
'2:)0 
 
 LIFE OF TEE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Maiy was the luminous pillar t 
 that guided the march of the infant 
 Church. It was to her that the 
 Apostles did homage for the numer- 
 ous ears which they gathered from 
 the barren field of the synagogue 
 into the granary of the Lord. She 
 accepted this tribute in the name 
 of her divine Son with graceful 
 humility, and was continually seen 
 surrounded by the poor, the sinful, 
 and the unhappy; for she always 
 loved in an especial manner those 
 to whom she could do good. The 
 Evangelists came to her for light ; 
 the Apostles, for unction, courage, 
 and constancy ; the afflicted, for 
 spiritual consolation, — and all went 
 away blessing her. The Sun of 
 Justice had set on the gloomy hori- 
 zon of the Golgotha; but the Star 
 of the Sea still reflected his softest- 
 rays over the renovated world, and 
 shed a benignant influence on the 
 cradle of Christianity. 
 
 The Virgin remained in Jerusalem 
 till the terrible persecution, which 
 broke out in the year 44 of Our 
 Lord, forced her to leave it with the 
 Apostles. Her adopted son took 
 her with him to Ephesus, whither 
 she was followed by Magdalen. 
 
 Nothing is now known of Mary's 
 sojourn in Ephesus ; this is easily 
 accounted for by the engrossing 
 anxieties of the time. After the 
 resurrection of the Saviour, the 
 Apostles, solely taken up with the 
 propagation of the faith, considered 
 everything as of minor importance 
 that did not immediately bear "on 
 that all-absorbing object. Full of 
 their lofty mission, entirely devoted 
 to the salvation of souls, they forgot 
 themselves so completely, that they 
 have barely left us a few unfinished 
 records of the evangelical labors 
 which changed the face of the 
 globe, — so that their history resem- 
 bles a sublime but almost effaced 
 epitaph, having neither beginning 
 nor end. That the mother of Jesus 
 shared the fate of the Apostles may 
 well be conceived; the last years 
 of her life having passed away, far 
 from Jerusalem, in a strange land, 
 where her dwelling was signalized 
 by no striking incident, have left 
 no durable impression on the fleet- 
 ing memory of man. Neverthe- 
 less, the flourishing condition of the 
 Church of Ephesus, its tender devo- 
 tion to Mary, and the praise which 
 St. Paul bestows on its piety, suffi- 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIBGIN MARY. 
 
 251 
 
 ciently indicate the fruitful cares f 
 of the Virgin, and the divine bless- 
 ing which followed her everywhere. 
 The Eose of Jesse left a portion of 
 her perfume on the air, and that 
 vestige, however slight it be, is a 
 precious revelation of her passage. 
 
 The coasts of Asia Minor, covered 
 with opulent cities, rich in vegeta- 
 tion, and washed by a sea which 
 bore thither a multitude of vessels, 
 would have seemed, to ordinary 
 exiles, a splendid compensation for 
 the tall, bleak mountains of Pales- 
 tine. It is doubtful whether such 
 was the opinion of the Virgin of 
 Nazareth : the steps of the Man- 
 God had not hallowed that enchant- 
 ed land, and the graves of her 
 fathers were not there ! . . . . 
 
 How often did Mary and Magda- 
 len sigh for their native land, as, 
 seated under a plane-tree on the 
 margin of that fair Icarian sea 
 
 * "We read in some Greek authors of the 7th 
 and following centuries, that, after the ascen- 
 sion of Christ, St. Mary Magdalen accompanied 
 the Virgin and St. John to Ephesus, and that 
 she died and was buried in that city. Such is 
 also the opinion of Modestus, patriarch of Jeru- 
 salem, who flourished in 920 ; of St. Gregory of 
 Tours, and of St. Willebald. The latter, in his 
 account of his journey from Jerusalem, says 
 that he saw at Ephesus the tomb of St. Mary 
 
 whose waves die away amid myr- 
 tles on the narrow sandy beach, 
 they followed the course of some 
 Greek galley bound for Syria ! The 
 stainless snows of Lebanon, the 
 blueish peaks of Carmel, the spark- 
 ling waters of the Lake of Tiberias, 
 were each, in turn, the subject of 
 their discourse ; the scenes of their 
 own land, embellished by distance, 
 passed successively before them, and 
 seemed a thousand times preferable 
 to that soft, luxurious Ionia which 
 was, in fact, to the land of Jehovah 
 what the lyre of Anacreon is to the 
 harp of David. 
 
 It was during her stay at Ephe- 
 sus that the Virgin lost the faith- 
 ful companion who, in imitation of 
 Ruth, had left her home and kin- 
 dred to follow her across the sea: 
 Magdalen died, and Mary wept for 
 her, as Jesus had wept for Lazarus.* 
 
 Of all the ties of kindred and 
 
 Magdalen. The Emperor Leo, the philosopher, 
 had the reHcs of the saint translated from 
 Ephesus to Constantinople, where they were 
 placed in the church of St. Lazarus, about the 
 year 890. — Another tradition, maintained by 
 some respectable authors, will have it that St. 
 Mary Magdalen ended her days in Provence. 
 We have adopted the contrary opinion, because 
 it seemed more probable, but yet without at- 
 ^i tempting to decide the question. 
 
252 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 affection, St John alone remained | 
 to the Virgin — St. John, the kind 
 and loving disciple whom her dying 
 Son had bequeathed to her. She 
 followed him, it is thought, in his 
 travels, and it was doubtless in his 
 conversations with the Queen of 
 prophets that St. John acquired the 
 marvellous knowledge which he dis- 
 plays in his Gospel. Assisted by 
 light fi-om Her whom the Fathers 
 have compared to the golden can- 
 dlestick with seven branches, the 
 young fisherman of Bethsaida dived 
 deeper than any other into the in- 
 comprehensible mystery of the un- 
 created essence of the Word, and 
 his mind took so bold a flight amid 
 the mysterious heights of heaven, 
 that, compared with him, the other 
 Evangelists seem but to skim the 
 
 earth.*..,. ,,. 
 
 ■J » ■ 
 
 Meanwhile, the sowers of Christ 
 had sowed the good seed of the 
 word over every part of the Roman 
 world ; the evangelical harvest was 
 
 * The Abb6 Rupert {in Cant. Cant.) states 
 that the Blessed Virgin supplied by her lights 
 what the Holy Ghost, who had given Himself 
 ip proportion to the disciples, had not thought 
 proper to reveal to them ; and the Holy Fathers 
 all agree that it was from the Blessed Virgin 
 St. Luke obtained many of his marvellous and 
 minute particulars of the infancy of Jesus Christ. ^ 
 
 green, and the laborers of the Lord 
 worked with ardor in the sacred 
 field. Mary considered that her 
 mission on earth was accomplished, 
 and that the Church could hence- 
 forward maintain herself. Then, 
 like a tired workwoman who seeks 
 rest and shelter during the heat of 
 the day, she began to sigh after the 
 cool shade of the tree of life which 
 grows near the throne of God, and 
 for the living, sanctifying waters 
 which flow beneath its branches.f 
 This desire of his mother was known 
 to Him who fathoms the depths of 
 the soul, and the angel who stands 
 at his right hand came to inform 
 the future Queen of heaven that her 
 Son had granted her wish. J 
 
 At this divine revelation, to which 
 was added, as Mc^phorus tells us, 
 that of the day and hour of her 
 death, the daughter of Abraham 
 began to sigh yet more ardently 
 for her distant country ; she would 
 fain behold once more the lofty 
 
 f Apoc, ch. xxii., v. 1 and 2. 
 
 X Tradition relates that the Blessed Virgin 
 was apprised of her approaching death by the 
 ministry of an angel, who made her acquainted 
 with the day and the hour when it was to take 
 place. (Descoutures, p. 235. — Pere Croiset, 
 t. xviii., p. 138.) 
 
LIFE OF TEE BLESSED VIROIN MARY. 
 
 253 
 
 mountains of Judea, where the 
 memory of the Redemption still 
 floated on every breeze, and to die 
 in sight of Calvary. St. John, to 
 whom her wishes were at all times 
 laws, made immediate preparations 
 for returning to Palestine. 
 
 The Hebrew travellers probably 
 embarked at Miletus, which was 
 then famous as the rendezvous of all 
 ships from Europe and Asia navi- 
 gating those waters. While cross- 
 ing the Grecian seas, the Virgin and 
 the Evangelist recognized, in pass- 
 ing, the isle of Ohio, whose people, 
 long possessed of the empire of the 
 sea, were the first to introduce that 
 odious slave-trade which the Gospel 
 was gradually to abolish ; then Les- 
 bos, the land of lyric poets, where 
 the hymn to the most pure Virgin 
 was to replace the burning odes of 
 Sappho and the more masculine 
 strains of Alceus. Seeing the top 
 of the Temple of Esculapius soaring 
 into the clouds — that temple which 
 then attracted whole multitudes of 
 people to the Island of Cos — the 
 
 * The followers of Mahomet have preserved 
 the remembrance of the miracles of Christ. 
 They pretend that the breath of Our Lord, 
 which they call had Messih (the breath of the ^ 
 
 * Virgin-mother was reminded of her 
 divine Son, who, of all the children 
 of men, had power instantly to heal 
 the sick and raise the dead to life.* 
 Delos, the birth-place of Apollo, 
 Ehodes, the cradle of Jupiter, rose 
 successively from amid the waters, 
 with their green mountains and 
 their ancient temples, peopled with 
 gods who were soon to be banished 
 to the depths of hell by the God 
 who was crucified on Calvary. At 
 some distance from Cyprus there 
 was seen, far up amid the clouds, 
 a dark point traced on the blue 
 dome of heaven ; it was the mount 
 whereon the prophet Elias had of 
 old erected an altar to the future 
 mother of the Saviour, and where 
 his disciples were then about to 
 place themselves under her special 
 protection. Next day, the galley 
 entered a port of Syria — Sidon, per- 
 haps — its commercial intercoui*se 
 being frequent with Palestine, as 
 the sacred books relate. 
 
 They returned to Israel after an 
 absence of several years. Mary 
 
 Messiah), not only raised the dead, but could 
 even give life to things inanimate. (D'Herb., 
 Biblioth. Orient., t. i., p. 365.) 
 
S54 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 withdrew to the mountain of Sion, 
 within a short distance of the ruin- 
 ous and deserted palace of the 
 princes of her race, to the house 
 which had been sanctified by the 
 descent of the Holy Ghost. St. 
 John, on his side, went to seek St. 
 James, a cousin-germain of the Vir- 
 gin and the first bishop of Jerusa- 
 lem, to inform him, as well as the 
 faithful who composed his already 
 numerous church of Jerusalem, that 
 the mother of Jesus had returned to 
 die amongst them. 
 
 The day and the hour were come; 
 the saints of Jerusalem once more 
 beheld the daughter of David, still 
 poor, still fair, still humble ; for one 
 would have said that this admirable 
 and holy creature escaped the de- 
 stroying action of time, and that, 
 predestined from her birth to a 
 complete and glorious immortality, 
 nothing in her was to perish.* Se- 
 rious, but not sick, she received the 
 Apostles and disciples seated on a 
 small bed of mean appearance, suit- 
 ed to her unpretending garments. 
 
 * St. Denis, an eye-witness of the death of the 
 Blessed Virgin, affirms that, at that advanced 
 period of her Ufe, she was still strikingly beau- 
 tiful 
 
 * There was in her modest yet noble 
 mien something so solemn and so 
 touching that the whole assembly 
 burst into tears. Mary alone was 
 calm, although the vast chamber 
 was crowded with old disciples and 
 new Christians, all equally anxious 
 to see and hear her. 
 
 The night had fallen, and lamps, 
 with many branches, seemed to shed, 
 with their pale light, something 
 solemn and mysterious over that 
 sad and silent assembly. The Apos- 
 tles, deeply moved, stood close 
 around the bed of death. St. Peter, 
 who had so tenderly loved the Son 
 of God during his life, contemplated 
 the Virgin - mother with profound 
 sorrow, and his speaking glance 
 seemed to say to the bishop of Jeru- 
 salem, " How much she resembles 
 Christ!" In fact, there was a re- 
 markable likeness ;f and the bowed 
 head of Mary, recalling that of the 
 Saviour during the last Supper, com- 
 pleted the effect. St. James, who 
 had received from the Jews them- 
 selves the surname of Just, and who 
 
 f Jesus hung his head a little, which took some- 
 thing from his height ; his face had much resem- 
 blance to that of his mother, especially in the 
 lower part. (Nic, Hisl. Eccles., t. i., p. 125.) 
 
LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 255 
 
 well knew how to subdue his feel- 
 ings, sternly repressed the tears 
 which moistened his eyelids. The 
 Prince of the Apostles — a frank and 
 impulsive man — was deeply affected, 
 and strove not to conceal his emo- 
 tion ; St. John had wrapped a fold 
 of his Greek mantle around his head, 
 but his sobs betrayed him. There 
 was not, in all the crowd, a heart 
 unmoved, or an eye unmoistened by 
 a tear. Mary, sympathizing in the 
 general emotion, and almost forget- 
 ting the splendor which awaited her 
 on high, in order to wipe away the 
 tears of those who loved her, applied 
 herself to confirm the faith of her 
 children, to revive their pious hopes, 
 and to inflame their charity; she 
 told them with unequalled eloquence 
 of those mighty and sublime things 
 which people hold their breath to 
 hear, which raise man above himself, 
 and render him capable of any 
 undertaking. Her speech, so mild 
 that the Scripture has compared it 
 
 * St. John Damascene. 
 
 f Some ancient Fathers, and, amongst others, 
 St. Epiphanius, seem to doubt whether the 
 Mother of God really died, or whether she re- 
 mained immortal, being taken body and soul to 
 heaven ; but the opinion of the Church is, that 
 the Blessed Virgin did really die according to 
 
 to a honeycomb, became gradually 
 strong ; the daughter of David and 
 of Solomon, the inspired prophetess 
 who had extemporaneously com- 
 posed the triumphal hymn of the 
 Ma^nijicat, soared up to considera- 
 tions so high that the listeners forgot, 
 in their ecstasy, that death was to 
 close that mystic strain. But the 
 fatal hour approached. Mary ex- 
 tended her protecting hands over 
 the poor orphans whom she was 
 about to quit, and, raising her beau- 
 tiful eyes to the stars which shone 
 brightly in the firmament, she saw 
 the heavens open, and the Son of 
 man extending his arms towards her 
 from amidst a luminous cloud.* At 
 this sight a roseate flush overspread 
 her face, her eyes sparkled with ma- 
 ternal love, joy attained its height, 
 adoration became ecstatic, and her 
 soul, disengaging itself without an 
 effort from its fair and virginal cov- 
 ering, fell gently into the bosom of 
 God.f 
 
 the condition of the flesh, and this opinion is 
 clearly manifested in the Mass for the Feast of 
 the Assumption. The Blessed Virgin died dur- 
 ing the night which precedes the 15th of August 
 The date of her death is very uncertain. Euse- 
 bius fixes it in the year 48 of our era ; so that^ 
 according to him, Mary lived sixty-eight years ; 
 
SM 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VTROTN AfARY. 
 
 Mary was no more, but her coun- 
 tenance, which had assumed the ex- 
 pression of a tranquil slumber, was 
 80 sweet to look upon that it seemed 
 as though Death hesitated to set his 
 seal on that ti'ophy which he was 
 only to retain for a day. 
 
 The death-lamp was lit ; the win- 
 dows were all thrown open, and the 
 summer breeze made its way into 
 the room with the flickering beams 
 of the stare. One would have said 
 that a miraculous light filled the 
 room when Mary had drawn her 
 last sigh : it was, perhaps, the glory 
 of Grod which surrounded the spot- 
 less soul of the predestined Virgin. 
 When the death of Mary was no 
 longer doubtful, there was nothing 
 heard, at first, but tears and lamen- 
 
 bnt Nicephorus (b. xi., ch. 21) formally says 
 that she died in the fifth year of the reign of 
 Claudius, that is to say, in the 3'ear of Rome 798, 
 or 45 of the Christian era. Then, supposing that 
 the Blessed "Virgin was sixteen years old when 
 the Saviour was born, she would have lived sixty- 
 one years. Hippolytus of Thebes states, in his 
 chronicle, that the Blessed Virgin became a 
 mother at the age of sixteen, and died eleven 
 years after Jesus Christ. According to some 
 other authors, the Virgin was sixty-six when she 
 died. 
 
 * " All the host of heaven," says St. Jerome, 
 *' came to meet the Mother of God at the mo- 
 ment of her death, singing hymns and canticles, 
 
 t tations ; then the funeral chant 
 arose on the stillness of the night ; 
 the angels chimed in with their 
 golden harps,* and the echoes of 
 David's mouldering palace sadly 
 repeated the wail over the tombs 
 of the kings of Juda. 
 
 On the following day, the faithful 
 brought in, with pious profusion, 
 the most precious perfumes and the 
 richest stuff's for the burial of the 
 Queen of Virgins. They embalmed 
 her, according to the custom of her 
 people, but her blessed remains ex- 
 haled a sweeter odor than the per- 
 fumed bands wherewith she was 
 bound. The preparations being 
 duly completed, the sacred body of 
 the Mother of God was placed in a 
 portable litter filled with aromatics,f 
 
 which were heard by all present. Militiam 
 ccelorum, cum suis agminibus, festive obviam 
 venisse Genetrici Dei cum laudibus et canticis, 
 earaque ingenti lumine circumfulsisse et usque 
 ad tronum perduxisse." 
 
 f Coffins, amongst the Jews, in Mary's time, 
 were a species of litter so contrived that it was 
 easy to carry the dead body ; this litter was 
 filled with aromatics. Josephus, describing the 
 interment of Herod the Great, says that his 
 litter was adorned with precious stones, that 
 his body reposed on purple cloth, that he had 
 the jewelled crown upon his head, and that 
 his whole household followed the htter to the 
 ^ sepulchre. 
 
LIFE OF TEE BLESSED VIRGIHT MARY. 
 
 257 
 
 and covered with a sumptuous veil, 
 and the Apostles bore it on their 
 shoulders to the Yalley of Josaphat.* 
 The Christians of Jerusalem, bear- 
 ing lighted tapers, and chanting 
 hymns and psalms, followed sadly 
 and reverently the remains of Mary. 
 Arrived at the place of sepulture, 
 the mom-nful procession stopped. 
 Through the care of the holy women 
 of Jerusalem, the tomb was de- 
 prived of its gloomy aspect, and 
 the sepulchral cave presented to 
 the view only a flowery arbor, f 
 The Apostles gently laid down the 
 mortal remains of Mary, and, doing 
 so, they wept. Of all the pane- 
 gyrics pronounced on that occasion, 
 that of Hierotheus was the most 
 remarkable. St. Denis, the Areo- 
 pagite, who describes the scene as 
 an eye-w4tness, relates that as he 
 praised the Virgin, the orator was 
 almost beside himself. J 
 
 * Metaphrastes relates that the Apostles car- 
 ried the Blessed Virgin to the grave on their 
 shoulders. 
 
 t Greg. Tur., 1. i., de 01, ch. 4. 
 
 I Books of Divine Names, chapter 3. These 
 books of St. Denis, the Areopagite, have been 
 rejected by Protestants, but are not the less 
 authorized by a multitude of proofs from the 
 most ancient Fathers and doctors of the Church, 
 
 For three days, the Apostles and 
 the faithful watched and prayed be- 
 side the sepulchre, where they heard 
 distinctly the sacred concert kept 
 up by the heavenly spirits, § as 
 though to soothe the last sleep of 
 Mary. One of the Apostles, return- 
 ing from a distant country, and not 
 having been present at the death 
 of the Virgin, arrived just then, iv 
 was St. Thomas, the same who had 
 placed his hand in the wounds of 
 his glorified Master. He hastened 
 to take a last look, and to water 
 with his tears the cold remains of 
 the privileged woman who had 
 borne in her chaste womb the 
 Supreme Master of Nature. Over- 
 come by his tears and entreaties, 
 the Apostles removed the block of 
 stone from the door of the sepul- 
 chre ; but they saw within only the 
 still fresh flowers whereon Mary's 
 body had reposed, and her white 
 
 by the Third CEcuinenical Council of Constanti- 
 nople, and many others. 
 
 § Juvenal, patriarch of Jerusalem, who lived 
 in the 5th century, writing to the Emperor 
 Marcian and the Empress Pulcheria, says that 
 the Apostles, reUeving each othei*, passed day 
 and night with the faithful near the tomb, min- 
 ghng their canticles with those of the angels, 
 who, for three days, were constantly heard mak- 
 ing the most divine harmony. 
 
958 
 
 LIFE OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 shroud of Eg}T^)tian linen, which 
 shed a delicious fragrance. The 
 pui'e body of the Immaculate Virgin 
 was not a prey for worms. During 
 
 * A very judicious remark of Godescard 
 comes to the support of the Assumption : it is, 
 that "neither the Latins nor even the Greeks, 
 so greedy for novelty, and so easily persuaded 
 in rsgai'd to relics and legends ; no people, in a 
 word, no city, no church, ever boasted 'of pos- 
 
 her life earth and heaven had each 
 a share in that wondrous creature ; 
 after her death, heaven took all, and 
 glorified all.* 
 
 sessing the mortal remains of the Blessed Vii- 
 gin, nor any portion of her body. Hence, with- 
 out prescribing a belief in the corporal assump- 
 tion of Mary into heaven, the Church gives us 
 clearly to understand the opinion to which she 
 inclines." (Godescard, t. xiv., p. 449.) 
 
''' i:. 
 
 .4 
 
 >-?<?-V ^^^ ^ <^i^M> /U^^-t^C^y 
 
 7 _ / '- ^ 
 
 
apewElIA KJTnmpL cl 
 
 ^^~ ^f Mir^m m} Inkni f 
 
THE 
 
 HISTOEY OF THE DEVOTION 
 
 TO THS 
 
 BLESSED VIRGIN MAEY 
 
 ittotl)er of ®otr. 
 
 TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH OF THE ABBE OBSINI, 
 BY 
 
 MRS. J. SADLIER. ' 
 
 PUBLISHED WITH THE APPROBATION OF THE LATE MOST REV. JOHN HUGHES, D. D., 
 AND THE MOST REV. J. McCLOSKEY, D. D., ARCHBISHOP OF NEW YORK. 
 
 A NEW, ENLARO-ED AND REVISED EDITION. 
 
 i^w fori: 
 
 PUBLISHED BY D. & J. SADLIEK & CO., 31 BARCLAY STREET. 
 
 MONTREAL :— CORNER OF NOTRE DAME AND ST. FRANCIS XAVIER STS. 
 
 1873. 
 
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1858, 
 By D. & J. SADLIER & CO., 
 In the Clerk's Office of tlie District Court of the United States for tlie Soutliem District of New York 
 
HISTOH Y 
 
 OP THE 
 
 DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIKGIN MAKY, 
 
 Mot\}tx of (Bolt. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 ORIGIN AND ANTIQUITY OF THE DEVOTION TO MARY. 
 
 HE invocation of * 
 Saints, which 
 heretics impute 
 to us as idola- 
 try, and which 
 a Protestant 
 minister has 
 been pleased to set down as "the 
 malady of the Christians of the 
 fourth century," is so far from being 
 of modern date that it may, in truth, 
 be regarded as of Apostolical tra- 
 dition, and of Jewish origin. The 
 Hebrews sought counsel and mira- 
 culous cures of the dead, when those 
 dead had been accredited prophets 
 of the Lord. The prophets were 
 their saints, and saints who read ^ 
 
 the future clearly, from the depths 
 of the sepulchral cave where they 
 slept beside their fathers. Behold 
 Saul with the witch of Endor; the 
 ghost of Samuel, though conjured up 
 by enchantments which the law of 
 Moses condemns, appeared by God's 
 permission to terrify the reprobate 
 monarch. The prophet, shrouded in 
 his mantle, emerges slowly from the 
 earth in awful majesty ; the sor- 
 ceress utters a cry of terror at sight 
 of the illustrious shade which she 
 takes for a god. Saul, bowing down 
 before him who was so long the 
 supreme judge of Israel, questions 
 him on the issue of the battle which 
 he is going to fight with the Philis- 
 
262 
 
 HISTORY OF THE VJ^VOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 tines ; aiid the prophet answers him 
 in a voice which no breath of life 
 accompanies, f . ; his body is at 
 Kamatha, mourned by all Israel: 
 "To-morrow, thou and thy sons shall 
 be with me : and the Lord will also 
 deliver the army of Israel into the 
 hands of the Philistines 1" 
 
 The Jews believed, then, that 
 their saints knew the future. 
 
 In the fourth book of Kings, we 
 see a dead man restored to life by 
 touching the bones of Eliseus. 
 
 The saints of Israel, therefore, 
 wrought miracles. 
 
 We read in the second book of 
 Maccabees that the high -priest 
 Onias and the prophet Jeremiah 
 were seen, after their death, pray- 
 ing for the people ; and we find in 
 the Gemare that Caleb escaped 
 from the hands of his pursuers, be- 
 cause he went to the tomb of his 
 ancestors to ask them to intercede 
 for him, that he might escape.* 
 
 Hence, the Jews believed that 
 the intercession of the departed just 
 was of some avail. 
 
 From the earliest times of their 
 settlement in Palestine, the Israel- 
 
 * Wagenseil, Excerpta ex Oem. 
 f Ecdes., ch. xlix., v. 18. 
 
 * ites visited the tomb of Rachel, a 
 primitive monument composed of 
 twelve enormous stones, whereon 
 every pilgrim inscribed his name ; 
 the tomb of Joseph, the saviour of 
 his brethi'en — whose bones prophe- 
 sied-f — was likewise a place of 
 prayer. 
 
 On the dispersion of the tribes, 
 such immense crowds flocked to the 
 sepulchral cave of Ezechiel, on the 
 banks of the Chobar, where he had 
 had his divine visions, that the 
 Chaldeans, fearing lest these vast 
 assemblages might conceal under 
 the cloak of religion some political 
 project, resolved to take the pil- 
 grims by surprise, and disperse 
 them at the point of the sword. A 
 massacre would inevitably have fol- 
 lowed, if the dead prophet had not 
 wrought a miracle to save his peo- 
 ple, by dividing the waters of the 
 Chobar. J This sepulchre of a saint 
 of Israel was surrounded by a 
 superb edifice, and before it burned, 
 day and night, a golden lamp, which 
 the leaders of the captive people 
 ^vere charged to keep lit.§ It is 
 now once more a mere cavern ; but 
 
 X Benjamin of Toledo, Itinerary, p. 70-80. 
 § Epiphan., de Vitis Prophetarum, v. ii., p. 241 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 268 
 
 still it is visited by all the Jews of 
 Asia, who never pass through Bag- 
 dad without turning aside to pray 
 there. 
 
 At the foot of Orontes, whose rich 
 foliage waves over a thousand silvery 
 streams which reflect the splendor of 
 the Asiatic sun, there is a city — once 
 royal and magnificent — lying extend- 
 ed amid ruined columns, prostrate 
 temples, and mausoleums of red 
 granite with inscriptions written in 
 some language long unknown : it is 
 Ecbatana, the ancient capital of the 
 Medes, now the obscure Hamadan. 
 At one of the extremities of the fall- 
 en city rises a brick monument, the 
 door of which, according to the old 
 sepulchral style of the country, is 
 very small and made of one solid 
 stone: it is the tomb of a young 
 queen, fair and virtuous, who braved 
 
 * " He built her a mausoleum after the 
 manner of the Iranians (Iran was, before 
 Cyrus, the true name of the vast kingdom 
 which is now called Persia), filled her skull 
 with musk and amber, wrapped her body 
 in Chinese silk, placed her, as kings are placed, 
 on a throne of ivory, and hung her crown 
 above her ; then they painted the door of the 
 tomb red and blue." (Firdousi, Book of Kings, 
 Kei Khosrou. ) 
 
 •f Travels of Sir Robert Ker Porter in Per- 
 sia and Armenia. The present tomb of 
 Esther and of Mardochai occupies the same ^ 
 
 death to save her people — the noble 
 Esther, who was laid there on a bed 
 of ivory overlaid with gold, embalm- 
 ed in musk and amber, and wrapped 
 in a shroud of Chinese silk,* beside 
 the great Hebrew patriot Mardo- 
 chai. f This illustrious tomb, which 
 the Jews of Persia regard as a place 
 of peculiar sanctity, and to which 
 they repair in crowds at the time of 
 the Feast of Phurim,J is still, and 
 has been for two thousand years, the 
 term of a pilgrimage. 
 
 In the Middle Ages, under the Sar- 
 acen domination, the Arabs having 
 threatened the Jews with a general 
 massacre during a grievous drought 
 which prevailed all over Syria and 
 Palestine, if rain did not fall on a 
 day appointed, they gathered in 
 great numbers around the tomb of 
 Zachary, which is still to be seen in 
 
 place as did the old, which was destroyed by 
 Tamerlane. 
 
 \ This festival, which was instituted at Suza 
 by Mardochai and Esther, was solemnly cele- 
 brated on the 14th or 15th day of the month of 
 Ader, which is our February moon. The Jews 
 had formerly a custom of making a wooden 
 cross on which they painted Aman, and dragged 
 it through the city, so that every one might see 
 it. They afterwards burnt it, and threw the 
 ashes into the river. The emperor Theodosius 
 forbade them to play this comedy, fearing that 
 it might have reference to the death of Christ. 
 
164 
 
 BlSTOLl 
 
 lUE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 the vicinity of Jerusalem, fasted and ^ 
 piiiyed for Beveral days in sackcloth 
 and allies, in order to obtain from 
 God, through the intercession of that 
 prophet, that he might save them 
 fi-om certain death by making it rain 
 upon the earth. 
 
 The custom of applying to the liv- 
 ing the merits of the dead, is of He- 
 brew origin ; the proof of this is 
 found in a liturgy of the synagogue 
 of Venice. In the office entitled 
 Mazir nechamot (remembrance of 
 smils), we hnd a prayer conceived 
 in the following terms: "Hear us, 
 Jehovah, for the sake of those who 
 loved thee and are now no more; 
 hear us, for the sake of Abraham, 
 Isaac, Jacob, Sara, Rachel," etc. 
 
 The invocation of saints is not, 
 then, a CatJwlic invention. 
 
 Besides the saints, the Jews pray- 
 ed to the angels, whom the ancient 
 Ai*abs also invoked, and to whom 
 
 * Amongst the Persians, every month was 
 under the protection of an angel ; to the angels 
 was confided the care of seas, rivers, springs, 
 pastures, flocks, trees, herbs, fruits, flowers, and 
 seeds : they also guided the stars ; prayers were 
 oflfered to the angels soliciting their protection 
 in danger. The modem, Persians still sacrifice 
 to the angel of the moon. (Firdousi, Book of 
 Kings. — Chardin, Voyage en Perse.) 
 
 the Assyrians ofi'ered sacrifice, at- 
 tributing to them charming functions 
 on the earth.* Jacob confesses him- 
 self indebted to an angel for deliver- 
 ance from the evils which threatened 
 him, and beseeches him to bless his 
 children : Angelas qui eripuit me cle 
 cundis malis henedicat pueris istis.f 
 This prayer is addressed to an angel. 
 It is even thought that the Jews 
 carried the worship of the angels too 
 far, since they are suspected of ador- 
 ing them. J This veneration, or wor- 
 ship, never ceased amongst the 
 modern Jews till the time of the 
 pretended Reformation, when they 
 abandoned it in order to conciliate 
 the German innovators. There exists 
 in the Vatican library a Hebrew 
 manuscript, containing a litany com- 
 posed by R. Eliezer Hakalir, wherein 
 is said to the angel Actariel: " De- 
 liver Israel from all affliction, and 
 quickly procure its redemption." 
 
 t Genesis xlviii., v. 16. 
 
 X The author of the Preaching of St. Peltr, 
 which is very ancient, cited by St. Clement of 
 Alexandria, makes that Apostle say that wo 
 must not adore God with the Jews, because, 
 although they profess to acknowledge but one 
 God, they adore the angels. (Clem. Alex., 
 ^ book v.) 
 
mSTORT OF TEE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 265 
 
 Similar favors are asked of Barachiel, * 
 Wathiel, and other princes of the 
 heavenly court. The litany ended 
 by saying to Michael, "Prince of 
 mercy, pray for Israel, that it may 
 be greatly exalted." 
 
 The tombs of the martyrs were 
 early venerated by the Christians of 
 Asia ; the first to which pilgrimage 
 was made was most probably that 
 of St. John the Baptist, which, after 
 the Holy Sepulchre and the tomb of 
 the Blessed Yirgin, is the most re- 
 spected by Orientals of all creeds. 
 The body of the precursor of the 
 mau-God was at Samaria, where 
 it was visited by St. Paula in the 
 fourth century, and his head, care- 
 fully embalmed by his disciples, was 
 at Hems, whence it was transported 
 to Damascus in the reign of Theo- 
 dosius. It was placed. in a superb 
 church bearing the title of St. Zach- 
 ary, which took, thenceforward, that 
 of St. John. The caliph Abdelmelek 
 took forcible possession of this 
 
 * St. Augustine speaks of the miraculous cures 
 wrought by dust from the tomb of St. John the 
 Evangelist. There is now seen amongst the 
 ruins of Ephesus, the church of St. John, of 
 which the Turks had made a mosque. 
 
 f The history of the martyrdom of St. Poly- 
 carp, written in the form of a letter, in the name 
 
 church, and now the venerated tomb 
 of him who was a prophet and more 
 than a prophet^ is inclosed within a 
 Turkish mosque; but it is neither 
 solitary nor without honor; the Mus- 
 sulmans come there from all parts 
 on pilgrimage, and the celebrated 
 Saadi himself relates, in his Gulistan, 
 that, going to pray there, he met 
 with princes from Arabia. At the 
 close of the first centmy, the faithful 
 of Asia Minor were wont to repair 
 in great numbers to Ephesus to visit 
 the tomb of St. John the Evangelist, 
 the dust of which, carefully gather- 
 ed, was said to effect marvellous 
 cures.* 
 
 St. Stephen, the first martyr, whose 
 relics wrought so many miracles, as 
 attested by St. Augustine, and who 
 died before the Blessed Virgin, was 
 likewise very early invoked by the 
 primitive Christians, who also ven- 
 erated the blessed remains of St. Ig- 
 natius and St. Polycarp.f St. Aster 
 of Amasia has preserved to us, in a 
 
 of the church of Smyrna, by those who had them- 
 selves witnessed it, and addressed to the church 
 of Philomel, contains these words : " We took 
 from the fire his bones, more precious than gold 
 or jewels, and we put them in a suitable place, 
 where we hope to assemble every year to cele- 
 brate the festival of the Lord's martyr, to the 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 sermon on the martyrs, the prayer ^ 
 addressed by a Christian of the early 
 days to a saint whose tomb she vis- 
 ited: "Thou didst invoke the mar- 
 tjyrs before thou wert thyself a mar- 
 tyr; thou hast sought and found ; be 
 then liberal of the blessings which 
 thou hast received." 
 
 Eusebius of Caesarea, who flour- 
 ished towards the end of the third 
 century, defending our sacred dog- 
 mas against the sophisms of the idol- 
 aters, rests on the honors which they 
 paid to their ancient heroes to justify 
 the veneration of saints, and con- 
 tinues in these terms: "We honor 
 as friends of God those who have 
 fought for the true religion ; we go 
 to their tombs; we offer them our 
 vows, professing to believe that 
 through their intercession with God 
 we are powerfully succored."* 
 
 These words of Eusebius, who, in 
 his double capacity of bishop and 
 historian, must necessarily have 
 been well informed, clearly indi- 
 cate an ancient usage, a custom lap- 
 proved by the Church and generally 
 
 end that those who come after us may be en- 
 couraged to prepare for similar combats." St. 
 Poly carp consummated his- sacrifice in the year 
 166, on the 23d of January, on which day the 
 
 received. On the other hand, Vig- 
 ilantius and Arius, enemies of the 
 veneration of saints, were openly 
 treated as innovators and heretics 
 by St. Epiphanius, St. Jerome, and 
 St. Augustine. Now is it to be pre- 
 sumed that these great doctors would 
 have dared to set down as heretics 
 and innovators men who labored but 
 to establish in its native purity 
 the ancient doctrine of the Church? 
 The word innovators explains all ; 
 and it must not be forgotten that 
 Yigilantius lived at a period so near 
 the times of the Apostles that there 
 was between them and him not 
 more than three generations! 
 
 St. Cyprian, who suffered martyr- 
 dom in Carthage in the year 261, 
 shows us the Christians of Africa 
 crowding to the glorious tombs of 
 the martyrs, making a funeral re- 
 past there on the day of their anni- 
 versary, and so eager to invoke them 
 that, not even waiting for their 
 death, they went to solicit the pray- 
 ers of those imprisoned confessors 
 of the faith who had as yet survived 
 
 church of Smyrna kept his festival in the middle 
 of the third century, as we see by the acts of 
 St. Peter. 
 
 * Prapar. Evang., b. xiii, ch. 7. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 267 
 
 their torments.* St. John Chrysos- f 
 torn, on his side, asserts that in his 
 time the tombs of the martyrs con- 
 stituted the fairest ornament of royal 
 cities; that the days which were 
 consecrated to them were days of 
 joy ; that the great men of the 
 empire, and even the emperor him- 
 self, laid aside the proud insignia 
 of their power before they dared to 
 cross the threshold of the sacred 
 places which contained the revered 
 sepulchres of the servants of the 
 
 crucified God "How much 
 
 more illustrious," exclaims the great 
 Christian orator, "are the monu- 
 ments erected to old men who were 
 poor and humble while on earth, 
 than the tombs of the mightiest 
 kings ! Around the tombs of kings 
 reign silence and solitude ; here do 
 multitudes throng with prayer and 
 homage."! 
 
 Behold, then, the worship of dulia 
 (of saints), which Protestants style 
 idolatrous and detestable — behold 
 what it was in those ages which 
 they themselves call the ages by 
 excellence, the pure ages.\ 
 
 As to the worship of hyperdulia 
 
 * St. Cyprian, Epist. 28. 
 
 f St. Chrysost., Horn. 66 ad pop. Antioch. 
 
 (of the Blessed Yirgin) — which, 
 without being adoration — which 
 God forbid ! — is far superior to that 
 of the saints — it commenced, ap- 
 parently, at her very tomb. The 
 Jewish doctors have preserved to 
 us, in the Talmud, a historical fact 
 long unknown, which establishes 
 the high antiquity of this pious 
 veneration so much blasphemed. A 
 tradition of the Temple, recorded in 
 their Toldos — that book wherein 
 the Virgin is so grossly abused, and 
 which they early circulated through 
 Greece, Persia, and every place 
 where it could at all injure Chris- 
 tianity — relates that the Nazarenes 
 who came to pray at the tomb of 
 the mother of Jesus underwent a 
 violent persecution from the princes 
 of the synagogue, and that a hun- 
 dred Christians, kinsfolk of Jesus 
 Christ, were put to death for having 
 raised an oratory over her tomb.§ 
 This act of barbarous fanaticism of 
 which they boast, being quite con- 
 formable to their treatment of St. 
 Stephen, St. James, and St. Paul, 
 and the oratory erected over a ven- 
 erated tomb being in no way ob- 
 
 X Dailld, Latin Traditions, b. iv., ch. 16. 
 § Toldos Huldr., p. 115. 
 
168 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 noxious to their customs and tradi- 
 tions, this fact, it seems to us, may 
 be regaitied as authentic, even 
 without any very great stretch of 
 credulity. 
 
 Tradition, supported by religious 
 monuments, asserts that the devo- 
 tion to Mary is of Apostolic tradi- 
 tion. St. Peter, on his . way to Ah- 
 tioch, raised, it is said, in one of the 
 cities of ancient Phoenicia, an ora- 
 tory to the Blessed Virgin, and gave 
 it a solemn consecration ; St. John 
 the Apostle placed the beautiful 
 church of Lydda under the invo- 
 cation of his adoptive mother; the 
 first church of Milan was dedicated 
 to Mary by St. Barnabas the Apos- 
 tle. Our Lady of the Pillar, in 
 Spain, and Our Lady of Carmel, in 
 Syiia, dispute the priority with 
 these churches, and their claims are 
 bolder, but more contestable. Ac- 
 cording to Spanish tradition,* the 
 Blessed Virgin appeared to St. 
 James, before her death, on the 
 banks of the Ebro, and commanded 
 him to build a church on that spot. 
 According to the Syrian tradition, 
 the prophet Agabus, the same who 
 predicted the fa nine which took 
 
 * Cronologia sacra . . . cU ano 35 de Cristo. 
 
 * place under Claudius, erected also 
 in the Virgin's lifetime, that church 
 which is seen from, so far at sea, 
 and where pilgrims and travellers 
 of all religions and of every region 
 receive, in the name of Mary, such 
 affecting hospitality. Without dis- 
 puting the antiquity of these two 
 sanctuaries, very venerable indeed, 
 and justly revered by all nations, 
 we must be permitted to say that 
 it is very unlikely that the Blessed 
 Virgin, the humble&t of the daugh- 
 ters of Eve, would have solicited 
 the Apostles, during her lifetime, to 
 build churches in her honor. That 
 the gratitude of nations and the 
 piety of the Apostles may have 
 erected them after her death, is 
 both simple and natural, but that 
 she gave orders for any during her 
 life, is extremely doubtful. 
 
 As to the oratory of Carmel, 
 Flavius Josephus, who particularly 
 mentions the disciples of Elias in 
 connection with Vespasian (to whom 
 one of them promised the empire), 
 nowhere says that they were then 
 converted to Christianity, and the 
 contrary is inferred from his recital. 
 This negative authority is very im- 
 portant. 
 
Jfirst |Peri0ir d tlje §thihn k Parj. 
 
 BEFORE CONSTANTINE. 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE EAST IDOLS. 
 
 |S we have already * 
 
 observed, the 
 
 devotion to the 
 « 
 
 Mother of God 
 had its origin 
 at her very 
 tomb, and the 
 first lamp lighted in honor of Mary 
 was a sepulchral lamp, aromid 
 which the Christians of Jerusalem 
 came to pray. This, it would seem, 
 did not last long ; the Synagogue — 
 oppressive, like .all dominations be- 
 set by the fear of sudden overthrow, 
 and suspicious, like all who are con- 
 scious of evil-doing — became alarm- 
 ed at the simple homage rendered 
 to the mother of the young prophet 
 whom it had not only refused, after 
 all his miracles, to acknowledge as 
 the Messiah, but audaciously cruci- 
 fied, as a seditious man and an im- 
 postor, between two thieves. It ex- 
 tinguished the lamps, silenced the ^ 
 
 hymns, and mercilessly kiUed the 
 first servants of Mary, — so, at least, 
 we are informed by the Synagogue 
 itself, and we know that it was very 
 capable of doing it. This was done 
 a little through fanaticism, a little 
 through self-love, and a little through 
 fear. The Jewish authorities would 
 not that that Jesus of Nazareth, 
 whom they had unjustly condemned 
 to an ignominious death, should 
 arise, he and his, from the obloquy 
 of the Golgotha. It was annoying 
 to hear that the Galilean whom 
 they called a son of Belial, and 
 whose miracles they treated as vain 
 illusions, was truly God, and his 
 mother a great Saint; and then it 
 feared that this new worship, con- 
 nected with the religion of the 
 tombs, and supported by the incon- 
 testable miracles wrought by the 
 Apostles in Jerusalem, might oper- 
 ate injuriously on the fickle mind 
 
270 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 of the multitude, and provoke a f 
 dangerous reaction in favor of the 
 crucified ' prophet. In fine, as it 
 fi-ankly acknowledged to Peter and 
 John, it had no wish to be called 
 on by the people to account for the 
 blood of Jesus. 
 
 For all these reasons, the sena- 
 tors and chief priests took another 
 step on the slippery road of guilt, 
 in order to justify the abominable 
 sentence which they had wrimg 
 from the Roman .^ and they openly 
 boasted of having stifled in the bud 
 the devotion to the Blessed Virgin. 
 Their iniquitous hopes were defeat- 
 ed. The most furious tyrants, even 
 when most implicitly obeyed in 
 the gloomy caprices of their cruel- 
 ty, cannot kill remembrance — that 
 flower of the soul which blooms, 
 mysterious and consoling, in the 
 inaccessible region of ideas, and is 
 but rooted the more firmly by the 
 wind of pei'secution. The memory 
 of the Virgin -mother resisted this 
 Jewish huiiicane; people sang no 
 more in her grotto, but they went 
 there to weep, and the tears which 
 
 * Most people are familiar with the sarcastic 
 jest of that courtier of Nero, who, being scolded 
 and threatened by an old priestess for having 
 
 devotion sheds are equal to the in- 
 cense of Saba, which, itself, trickles 
 like tears from the pierced bark. 
 
 Violently uprooted by the sacri- 
 legious hands of the princes of the 
 reprobate people of God, the ven- 
 eration of Mary was transplanted 
 by the Apostles to the still idola- 
 trous land of the stranger. In their 
 own lifetime they saw it beginning 
 to appear in Syria, Mesopotamia, 
 Asia Minor, Egypt, and Spain. It 
 is true that this devotion, so ten- 
 der and so poetical, which was to 
 replace the impure and seductive 
 worship of the divinities of Olym- 
 pus, shone, at first, but like a small 
 star on the zenith of a few cities ; 
 for Christianity was, in the begin- 
 ning, only the religion of cities, and 
 of the common people in those 
 cities. Paganism, repudiated by all 
 serious minds, despised by philoso- 
 phers, ridiculed on the stage, where 
 men publicly read "The last will 
 and testament of Jupiter, deceased," 
 and scofi'ed at in the true Voltairian 
 style by the young Epicureans of 
 the imperial court,* retained, never- 
 
 killed one of her sacred geese, threw her two 
 gold pieces, saying, "There, you can buy both 
 gods and geese." 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 271 
 
 theless, an incredible number of 
 partisans; connected with numer- 
 ous interests, defended by prejudice 
 and by ancient superstitions, attrac- 
 tive from the splendor of its festi- 
 vals, and mingled with every glo- 
 rious recollection, it still dazzled, 
 though on its decline. Proud of its 
 advantages, it did not, at first, con- 
 descend to fear "the carpenter's 
 son" and the young " spinner of 
 Nazareth."* How could it fear 
 them? it saw them not. The re- 
 ligion of the poor God and his holy 
 Mother advanced, noiselessly, by 
 the rough and toilsome medium of 
 the people ; it addressed itself espe- 
 cially to the artisan, the woman, the 
 slave — to all, in fine, who were 
 weak and lowly, and oppressed by 
 pagan society — that society so pro- 
 foundly selfish, so avaricious, so ef- 
 feminate and corrupt, and withal 
 brilliant and cold as its marble 
 gods. 
 
 It was soon perceived that the 
 moral world — that old decrepit Titan 
 — was growing young again under 
 the mighty, though secret, influence 
 of a regenerating charm. What 
 magician had restored to that new 
 
 * See Celsus. 
 
 * JEson the fresh, warm blood of its 
 earlier years? What new Prome- 
 theus had scaled the heights of 
 heaven to bring down to man, fro- 
 zen to death by selfislmess, a spark 
 of the sacred fire ? For there was 
 no overlooking the fact that society 
 was pregnant of something strange 
 and grand which was to restore its 
 pristine loveliness and strength; it 
 was becoming again, to all appear- 
 ance, what it was in the days so 
 lamented by Horace, when it de- 
 spised pomp, honored the "gods, and 
 esteemed poverty as an honor. In- 
 visible, but persevering hands seem- 
 ed already to have raised from their 
 ruins, where they lay beneath the 
 grass of ages, the altar of chastity 
 and the austere temples of Faith, 
 Honor, and Virtue. Beneficence, 
 long unhonored with the smoke of 
 sacrifice, in the frantic pursuit of 
 material pleasures, began once more, 
 it seems, to be mysteriously respect- 
 ed. The old equality of the age of 
 Saturn re-appeared here and there 
 on the earth. In fine, Humanity 
 bore in her arms the children whom 
 the elegant matrons of pagan society 
 exposed on the banks of the river, 
 in the depths of the forest, and on 
 
272 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 the verge of the precipice, where 
 the eagles, dogs, and wild beasts tore 
 them to pieces.* Charity, sustain- 
 ing with one vigorous arm the old 
 man panting under his load of toil, 
 extended the other to the infirm 
 creatures abandoned on the steps 
 of the temples. gods of Greece! 
 wandering gods, who were sheltered 
 beneath the cottage-roof of Philemon 
 and Baucis, did you again traverse 
 the earth to restore thereon the fair 
 reign of virtue? Not so, for you 
 were, as • the Scriptures say, deaf 
 gods, powerless gods, blind gods, — 
 or, rather, you were nothing. 
 
 Behold I In the midst of that so- 
 ciety — luxurious, efieminate, crown- 
 ed with roses, drinking to the gods 
 of Olympus from golden cups — there 
 are seen, here and there, groups of 
 persons with noble aspect and au- 
 stere demeanor, who avert their eyes 
 from those pagan orgies with indig- 
 
 * Philo gives details of this abominable custom 
 of exposing helpless abandoned children, which 
 are enough to make one's hair stand on end. It 
 was only the Jews who then condemned this 
 barbarous practice. 
 
 fThe vestals bore the name of Amatce, in 
 memory of Amata, the first Roman virgin who 
 was consecrated to the worship of Yesta. (Aulu- 
 GelL, b. i.ch. 12.) 
 
 X The austere chastity of the Christian women 
 
 t nation mingled with ridicule 
 
 Can these be Stoic philosophers? 
 No; for they give a tear of pity to 
 the supplicating poor, while placing 
 in their hand the liberal alms, con- 
 cealing themselves as they do so. 
 Can that be a vestal, that young 
 maiden who walks, with folded 
 hands and eyes cast down, beside 
 her mother, veiled like herself? 
 No; for she has neither the em- 
 broidered zone nor the purple- 
 bordered robes of the amatce,^ and 
 modesty is her only ornament. 
 Those youthful widows who light 
 no more the hymeneal torch,J whilst 
 the great ladies of paganism reck- 
 on their divorces by consulates, § 
 whence come they? And those 
 young men who bow with reverence 
 before the aged, blush like young 
 maidens, and yet, in war, are brave 
 as lions, who are they? They are 
 not seen in the theatre, they fre- 
 
 excited the admiration of the pagans themselves. 
 St. John Chrysostom mentions that the famous 
 sophist Libauius, from whom he took lessons in 
 oratory, hearing from him that his mother had 
 been left a widow at twenty, and would never 
 take a second husband, exclaimed, turning to his 
 idolatrous audience, " O gods of Greece 1 what 
 women are found amongst these Christians ! '' 
 {Sancti Chrysosiomi vita.) 
 § Seneca, Treatise on FUvors, b. iii. 
 
HISTORY OF TEE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 273 
 
 quent not the circus, they figure not 
 in the pagan festivals with garlands 
 of flowers or baskets of sacred fruit 
 on their heads, and pass by the 
 stately temples of Greece and Rome 
 without entering. The sight of a 
 sacrifice makes them fly, and they 
 quickly shake off from their dark 
 cloaks the drops of purifying water 
 which fall on them by chance. Fi- 
 nally, they prefer to die rather than 
 touch the meats offered to the gods. 
 Can these men be impious, they 
 whose hands close with gold the 
 gaping wounds of misery, whose 
 lives are the mirror of propriety? 
 No ; for they assemble thrice in the 
 day, and sometimes in the night,* 
 to pray in common, with uplifted 
 hands, to an unknown God ; and, 
 on the altar of their ancient house- 
 hold deities, where the lamp still 
 burns,f may be seen the graceful 
 
 * The first Christians met to pray at the 
 house of Terce, Sext, and None, as mentioned in 
 the Acts of the Apostles ; they passed the night 
 in prayer on the eve of great festivals, singing 
 hymns in honor of Jesus Christ, as St. Basil jmd 
 Socrates testify. 
 
 ■f The gods that were indiscriminately named 
 Lares or Penates were the tutelary gods of 
 houses. They had their own distinct worship. 
 Wine and incense were offered to them ; they 
 were crowned with flowers, and a lamp was kept ^ ; 
 
 image of a young Asiatic woman, 
 half- veiled in a light blue drapery, J 
 holding in her arms a Divine In- 
 fant. That woman, with the calm, 
 deep eyes, is the Inspirer of chas- 
 tity, modesty, devotion, mercy; the 
 Guardian of honor, the Protectress 
 of home — in a word, that sweet 
 Virgin Mary to whom the Greeks 
 have given the beautiful name of 
 Panagia, which means all holy. 
 
 Asia claims the honor of having 
 placed the first oratory and chapel 
 under the invocation of Mary. The 
 most ancient of these shrines was 
 Our Lady of Tortosa, which St. 
 Peter himself founded, according to 
 the Eastern traditions, on the coasts 
 of Phoenicia. These early Syrian 
 churches were, at first, but very 
 simple structures, with cedar roofs 
 and latticed windows. The altar 
 was turned towards the west, like 
 
 burning before their little statues. There was 
 found, under ground, in Lyons, in 1506, a copper 
 lamp with two sockets, the chain sealed in a 
 piece of marble, bearing this inscription : 
 
 Laribus sacrum. 
 
 P. F. Eomum — 
 which signifies, Puhliccefelicitali Romanorum. 
 
 X In the oldest pictures of the Virgin, being 
 those painted on wood, whose high antiquity 
 is indisputable, she wears almost always a bhie 
 veil. 
 
274 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 that of Jerusalem, and during the f 
 day a wooden screen concealed the 
 sanctuary, in memory of the famous 
 veil of the Holy of Holies. There 
 were A'osses in those churches ; and 
 there were also, at a very early pe- 
 riod, pictures of Mary; for tradition 
 relates that her image was painted 
 on one of the pillars in the beautiful 
 church of Lydda, which had been 
 dedicated to her by her adopted son, 
 and that St. Luke presented to the 
 cathedral of Antioch a portrait of 
 the Virgin painted by himself. This 
 image, to which the Mother of God 
 was believed to have attached 
 signal graces, became so famous 
 that the Empress Pulcheria had it 
 brought to Constantinople, where 
 she built a magnificent church to 
 place it in. 
 
 Edessa, the capital city of that 
 king Abgarus who was on the point 
 of making war on the Jews to re- 
 venge the death of our Lord, and 
 who was only prevented from doing 
 so through fear of the Komans, their 
 masters, as Eusebius tells us, had 
 also, in the 1st centuiy, its church 
 of Our Lady, adorned with a mirac- 
 
 * The worship of Mithya, before it reached 
 Greece or Rome, had passed from Persia into 
 
 ulous image. Egypt boasts of hav- 
 ing had, about the same time. Our 
 Lady of Alexandria, and Saragossa, 
 in Spain, then called Caesar Augus- 
 ta, its famous shrine of Our Lady of 
 the Pillar. But nowhere was the 
 devotion to Mary canied on with 
 such enthusiastic fervor as in Asia 
 Minor. Ephesus, where the memory 
 of the Blessed Virgin was still fresh 
 and vivid, soon built in honor of 
 Mary the Miriam, a superb cathe- 
 dral, wherein was held, in the 5th 
 century, the famous council which 
 confirmed her proud title of Mother 
 of God. 
 
 This example was followed from 
 one end of the immense Roman 
 provinces to the other. Phrygia, 
 having become Christian, consigned 
 to oblivion those Trojan gods sung 
 by Homer; Cappadocia suffered 
 those sacred fii^es to die away which 
 the Persians had kindled side by 
 side with the elegant temples of the 
 Grecian deities ; and the caverns 
 whose gloomy vaults had so recently 
 witnessed the bloody mysteries of 
 Mithra* became, during the religious 
 persecutions — which nowhere broke 
 
 Cappadocia, where Strabo, who travelled there, 
 says that he saw a great number of the priests 
 
mSTORT OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 275 
 
 out with greater fury than amongst 
 those Greek colonies — a place of 
 refuge for the Christians and their 
 proscribed God. At length, the 
 gods of Greece, those indigenous 
 deities, sprung from the sparkling 
 foam of the .^gean sea, born under 
 the still-existing palms of the Cycla- 
 des, or cradled in the shade of the 
 woods which crown the lofty moun- 
 tains of Crete — were abandoned for 
 the God who died on Calvary, and 
 the humble Virgin of Nazareth ; so 
 truly, so entirely abandoned, that 
 Pliny the younger, on his arrival iu 
 Bythinia, of which province he had 
 been named governor, wrote to Tra- 
 jan that Christianity had not only 
 invaded the cities, but the rural 
 districts, so much so that he had 
 found the temples of the gods of the 
 empire completely deserted.* 
 
 Asia Minor possessed, from the 
 earliest times, miraculous images of 
 Our Lady. The two most famous 
 were that of Didynia, where St. 
 
 of Mithra. The mysteries of Mithra, ifrhich 
 were celebrated in the depth of caverns, were 
 something horrible, according to the holy- 
 Fathers, Human victims were there sacri- 
 ficed, as appears from a fact mentioned by 
 Socrates in his "Ecclesiastical History," viz., 
 that the Christians of Alexandria having ^ 
 
 * Basil, during the reign of Julian, 
 went to pray for the afflicted 
 Church, and that of Sosopoli, an 
 image painted on wood, from which 
 there oozed out a marvellous oil, 
 which effected the astonishing cures 
 referred to in the second Council of 
 Nice. 
 
 Greece, that brilliant land of arts 
 and letters, was not more tardy in 
 honoring Mary. In the time of St. 
 Paul, Corinth — where Greek liberty, 
 like an expiring lamp, had given 
 one last brilliant flash — was con- 
 verted almost entirely to Christi- 
 anity. The faithful met, at first, in 
 the spacious halls of private houses, 
 where the Virgin was solemnly in- 
 voked. By degrees the temples of 
 Paganism were deserted, and after 
 the lapse of a hundred years the 
 curious traveller made his way 
 alone up the steep sides of the 
 Acro-Ceraunes to visit the Temple 
 of Venus, whose lofty porticoes, ris- 
 ing above the smrounding sea of 
 
 discovered a den which had been long closed 
 up, and in which the Mithraic mysteries 
 were said to have been formerly celebrated, 
 they found therein human skulls and bones, 
 which they took out to show to the people of 
 that great city. 
 
 * Pliny, lib. x., Epist. 97. 
 
276 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 green foliage, were traced on the 
 Grecian sky, so deeply, darkly blue. 
 The protecting goddess of the Cor- 
 inthians had been dethroned by the 
 holy woman who re-established in 
 that effeminate country modesty, so 
 long unknown, and maternity, so 
 long despised. Thanks to her, the 
 pure pleasures of the domestic cir- 
 cle, the touching joys of home, were 
 easily substituted for the shameful 
 disorders, the gigantic orgies, the 
 depraved morals of that small re- 
 public which had ever led the van 
 in the march of corruption. Cor- 
 inth ti-anstigured became a Chris- 
 tian Sparta, and the eulogy pro- 
 nounced on its Church by St. 
 Clement, the pope, towards the end 
 of the 1st century, gives a marvel- 
 lous idea of its fervor. 
 
 Arcadia, whose forests were peo- 
 pled with rural gods — and where 
 eveiy grotto, every murmuring 
 spring had its altar — likewise ab- 
 jured, though not so promptly, the 
 worship of Pan and the Naiads for 
 the veneration of the humble Vir- 
 gin, whose divine Child was pleased 
 to receive his first homage from 
 simple shepherds. But as ancient 
 superstitions are more difficult to 
 
 t eradicate from rural districts than 
 from any other places, it was long 
 believed in the Arcadian hamlets 
 that Diana still followed the chase 
 in the depth of the great woods of 
 Menales and Lyceum. Young and 
 credulous shepherdesses, divided be- 
 tween the Christian faith and their 
 ancestral superstitions, sometimes 
 imagined that they saw, by the flick- 
 ering light of the moon, fair white 
 Dryads amongst the trees, Naiads 
 bending pensively over the springs, 
 or playful elves dancing on the but- 
 tercups and daisies in the meadows. 
 But, about the time of Constantino, 
 the Blessed Virgin had definitely 
 prevailed over deified nature; and 
 the numerous churches bearing her 
 name, which still adorn the rustic 
 scenes . of the land of the ancient 
 Pelages, attest the profound devo- 
 tion of the Arcadians to the Virgin- 
 mother. 
 
 Elida, too, very early built a 
 church in honor of the Blessed Vir- 
 gin on the banks of its romantic 
 rivei*, the Alpheus, and as it was 
 surrounded by noble vineyards, it 
 received the name of Our Lady of 
 Grapes. 
 
 Macedonia preceded Greece prop- 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 277 
 
 er in the veneration of Mary. Thes- 
 salonica had a bishopric even in the 
 time of the Apostles, and its church 
 was a superb edifice with jasper 
 cokimns, dedicated by the pious 
 Macedonians to the Blessed Virgin ; 
 this structure is still to be seen, but 
 the Turks have converted it into a 
 mosque.* 
 
 Nero, travelling in the Pelopon- 
 nesus, did not dare to cross the fron- 
 tiers of Laconia ; the stern gloom 
 of Sparta inspired him with fear. 
 The mild, sweet Virgin of Galilee 
 was more valiant than Csesar; she 
 passed the Eurotas, which hides its 
 waves under rose-bays, and pre- 
 sented herself to the people of Le- 
 onidas, whose ancient virtue was 
 preserved in the bitter but invigor- 
 ating waters of poverty. She was 
 welcomed with enthusiasm, and that 
 brave people hastened to build the 
 fairest church of Greece in honor of 
 that young foreign Virgin who came 
 to teach the daughters of Sparta to 
 cast down their eyes. 
 
 Ever since that time Mary rei§ns 
 in Sparta with absolute power ; for 
 her are culled the earliest violets 
 that bloom by the Eurotas' stream ; 
 
 * Wheeler's Travels. 
 
 * it is before her image, rudely painted 
 in red and blue on the walls of their 
 dwellings, that the young Lacede- 
 monians nightly light a lamp of clay 
 or bronze ; a pious act which is duly 
 noticed when the Grecian women 
 pronounce the funeral eulogium of 
 the dead. Finally, the inhabitants 
 of Laconia substituted the name of 
 Christ and the Virgin wherever their 
 ancestors introduced the name of 
 Jupiter in affirmation, and this oath 
 has become of such common use that 
 even the Turks of Misistra, prior to 
 the Greek revolution, instead of 
 swearing by Allah and by Mahomet, 
 like the other Mussulmans, swore, 
 like the Greeks of Sparta, by the 
 Blessed Virgin.f 
 
 Athens, the elegant and learned, 
 celebrated for its monuments, the 
 finest in the world, and its schools, 
 which were frequented by the flower 
 of the studious youth of Europe and 
 Asia — Athens was slower in being 
 converted to Christianity than the 
 other countries of Greece. From 
 the earliest times, however, it had 
 had a bishop and a church dedicated 
 to Mary, Our Lady Spiliotissa, or 
 Our Lady of the Grotto ; but Poly- 
 
 t Pouqueville, Voyage en Moree, t. ler. 
 
278 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 theism was sheltered under the bril- * 
 liant aBg's of Minerva, and Athens 
 was at the same time full of Chris- 
 tian churches and of idols. It was 
 in one of these churches that Julian 
 filled the office of Lector, by com- 
 mand of the Emperor Constantius ; 
 but it was in the Parthenon that he 
 was to plan the revival of idolatry, 
 while reading Homer. 
 
 That the devotion to the Blessed 
 Virgin had a powerful influence on 
 the spread of the Gospel in Greece 
 and in Asia, is a fact which the 
 habits and tastes of the Levantines 
 would have rendered probable even 
 were it not attested, before all the 
 bishops of the East, by St. Cyril, 
 at the first Council of Ephesus, in 
 a discourse which is still extant. 
 "Hail, Mary, Mother of God !" said 
 that holy and learned bishop ; " it 
 is through you that, in the cities^ 
 the towns, and the islands of those 
 who have received the true faith, 
 
 * S. Cyr. Alex. Oper., t. v., p. 2. 
 
 f Whilst the sun is above the horizon, 
 and as the heat is excessive in their climate, 
 the Arabs most generally prefer to remain 
 under their tents. They go out at the ap- 
 proach of sunset, and then enjoy the charms of 
 a lovelier sky and cooler air. The night is partly 
 for them what the day is for us. Hence their 
 
 numerous churches have been found- 
 ed!"* 
 
 Beyond the great sea, several 
 tribes of Arabs were converted to 
 Christianity, and greatly honored 
 Mary, the Sultana of Heaven, as 
 they still call her. Seated in the 
 shade of the date-trees or tamarinds, 
 which flourish best on the margin 
 of brackish streams, and inhaling 
 with delight the freshness which the 
 night brings in those burning re- 
 gions,! the story-tellers of the Chris- 
 tian ti-ibes, by the light of those 
 eternal lamps of God which they 
 suppose fastened by chains of gold 
 to the vault of the firmament, J re- 
 lated the principal facts in the life 
 of the Blessed Virgin, coloring them 
 with that marvellous tint so pleas- 
 ing to the sons of Ishmael. They 
 told, according to the Arab gospel 
 of the holy childhood and the tradi- 
 tions of the desert, how the holy 
 angels came to bring to the Virgin, 
 
 poets never extol the charms of a fine day ; but 
 the Words, "Leili! leiU! O night ! O night !"aro 
 repeate(f in all their songs. (Sav., note on the 
 7th eh. of the Koran. ) 
 
 \ The first sky is of pure silver ; it is from its 
 beautiful vault that the stars are suspended with 
 strong chains of gold. {Koran, the Legend of 
 ^ Mahomet, by Savary, p. 15.) 
 
EISTOBY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 279 
 
 in the temple where Zachary, her 
 guardian, had placed her, delicious 
 dates, amber grapes, figs sweeter 
 than honey, and odorous flowers 
 gathered in the celestial gardens 
 where limpid streams and green 
 trees abound ; for Paradise, in warm 
 climates, is always composed of 
 fresh waters and cool shades. And 
 there, they recite, in their own pecu- 
 liar style, the prodigies of the birth 
 of Jesus, which they still call (Mus- 
 sulmans as they have since become) 
 al Milad — the hirth by excellence. 
 They placed the scene in the desert, 
 on the banks of a stream and at the 
 foot of a withered palm-tree, which 
 was suddenly covered with leaves 
 and fruit at the bidding of the angel 
 Gabriel, whom God had sent to con- 
 sole Mary. These marvellous tales 
 increasing their veneration for the 
 Blessed Yirgin, they believed, in 
 time, that they might adore in heav- 
 en her whom angels had served on 
 earth, and they offered her, in fact, 
 oblations of cakes made of flour and 
 
 * Geladeddin, note on the 16th ch. of the 
 Koran. 
 
 •\ The idolatrous Arabs had several she-camels 
 consecrated to the gods of the Caaba ; the 
 cream of their milk served to make libations. 
 
 * honey ; hence their name of coUyri- 
 dians, from the Greek word coUyre 
 (cake). St. Epiphanius warmly re- 
 bukes them for this worship, which 
 exceeded the prescribed limits, ex- 
 plaining to them that oblation and 
 sacrifice are only to be offered to 
 God. 
 
 On the other hand, the idolatrous 
 Arabs had placed the image of 
 Mary in the Caaba, amongst the 
 angels, whom they represented un- 
 der the figure of young women, and 
 called the daughters of God.^ Mary, 
 whom they had made the sister of 
 those pure spkits, came in for a 
 share of the divine honors paid to 
 them. They sacrificed to her vic- 
 tims adorned with leaves and flow- 
 ers ; thay offered to her the first of 
 their crops, together with the first 
 dates from their trees, and, in gold- 
 en vases, the frothy milk of the 
 sacred camels.f The image of the 
 Blessed Yirgin with the Divine 
 Child in her arms remained in the 
 Temple of Mecca till the time of 
 
 (Savary, in a note on the 5th ch. of the Koran.) 
 The inhabitants of Mecca oflfered one portion 
 of their fruits and of their flocks to God, an- 
 other to their idols. (Geladeddin, note on the 
 6th ch. of the Koran.) 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Mahomet, who had it removed with 
 the genii and the angels. 
 
 The holy name of Mary began 
 to be invoked amongst the nations 
 who dwell between the Caspian and 
 the Euxine seas; but the shrines 
 of Judea and the scenes of the 
 Redemption were, alas! profaned 
 
 * by Greek and Syi-ian idols which 
 were only overthrown mider Con- 
 stantino. The statue of Jupiter 
 was sacrilegiously raised on the 
 spot where the weeping Maiy saw 
 Jesus crucified, and it was to 
 Adonis that sacrifice was offered 
 
 ¥ in the cave of Bethlehem. 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE WEST THE CATACOMBS. 
 
 HE sacred vine 
 of Christianity 
 ah-eady flour- 
 ished in Asia 
 so as to extend 
 its branches 
 over a multi- 
 tude of nations;* but it did not' 
 take root so quickly in the West. 
 Rome, thoroughly idolatrous — Rome, 
 drunk with the blood of martyrs, 
 which she shed like water — Rome 
 
 * protected Polytheism with all her 
 power, and her power extended 
 over an entire world ! In the East, 
 a mysterious sign, which made 
 
 Satan tremble in the depth of the 
 fiery abyss, announced that the 
 kingdom of God was near; but in 
 Italy and the regions beyond the 
 Alps, Christianity was, as yet, in 
 the condition of a secret society; 
 people were received into its ranks 
 wi% aU manner of caution and 
 
 * We learn from Arnobus and Eusebius that 
 the Gospel, during the three first centuries, had 
 spread far beyond the limits of the Roman em- 
 pire, amongst the Persians, the Parthian s, the 
 
 Scythians, and many other nations whom they 
 do not name. (Arnob., Adv. Gentes, lib. ii., 
 chapter 12. — Euseb., Demonstr. Evang. L lii., 
 ch. 5. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 281 
 
 even mystery; its members recog- 
 nized each other by certain signs; 
 and, doubtless, the sign of the Cross, 
 the origin of which is unknown, 
 was one of those mysterious signs, 
 which revealed an unknown Chris- 
 tian to his brethren scattered 
 through the crowd. It was not that 
 the Christians were so few in the 
 regions of the West ; they were al- 
 ready sufficiently numerous to form 
 armies; but persecuted by idola- 
 trous governors, tracked like wild 
 beasts, and finding no protection in 
 the Roman laws, which recognized 
 only to punish them, they lived iso- 
 lated "as drops upon the grass, as 
 a dew from the Lord, which waiteth 
 not for man, nor tarrieth for the 
 children of men."* 
 
 The first Latin churches were 
 domestic chapels, and the first al- 
 tars, portable wooden chests like 
 
 * Micheas, ch. v., v. 7. 
 
 f One of these altars, whereon St. Peter was 
 thought to have celebrated the divine mysteries, 
 and which Pope St.. Sylvester inclosed under 
 the high altar of St. John of Lateran. ivaS ex- 
 amined on the 29th of March, 165.8, under Alex- 
 ander VII., by the Chevalier Baromini, in con- 
 cert with the chief sacristan of the church; it 
 is four palms long, by eight wide. Its form is 
 that of a chest. The altar was moved from 
 place to place by means of several ringfs. 
 
 * the Ark, having the same form and 
 the same kon rings.f Those primi- 
 tive churches of Rome, which were 
 in existence before the an-ival of 
 St. Paul, were composed chiefly of 
 Greeks and converted Jews; but 
 the Roman people soon heard speak 
 of that new law which said that 
 all men are brethi-en, that they are 
 all equals, and ought to love each 
 other. They fomid this holy law 
 both fair and good; they wished 
 to follow it, and came in crowds to 
 receive the regenerating waters of 
 baptism. " It was then perceived," 
 says Tacitus, "that Rome contain- 
 ed an incredible number of Chi-is- 
 tians."J The pagan priests were 
 troubled ; Nero, emperor and su- 
 preme pontifi", took the alarm, and 
 the persecutions commenced. § 
 
 They assembled, at first, where- 
 ^ver they could, as St. Justin the 
 
 I Tacitus, Anncd., lib. xv., ch. 44. 
 § This first persecution had for a pretext the 
 burning of Rome, of which Nero accused the 
 « Christians, though it was his own act; it was 
 extremely cruel ; they clothed the Christians 
 ' with garments soaked in pitch, or some other 
 combustible matter; they then set fire to them, 
 so that they served as torches during the night, 
 Nero had a festival on the occasion, in his gar- 
 dens, where he drove his chariots by the light of 
 i those fatal flames. (See .fibc/es. 5w<., v. i., p. 98.) 
 
282 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Martyr said when asked by the pre- * 
 feet of Rome where the Christians 
 were accustomed to meet; but the 
 halls and upper chambers of private 
 houses becoming too small, and the 
 scrutiny of. the senate daily more 
 rigorous, it became necessary 'to 
 seek a ,temple vast enough to con- 
 tain a great multitude of people, 
 and so hidden as to escape the eyes 
 of that host of spies wliich then, in- 
 fested the empire, not unlike on6 of 
 the plagues of Egypt. Somerbold,- 
 hearted Christians proposed the 
 Catacombs, ^'''herein were found ^ 
 vast and gloomy halls, interminable 
 avenues, "where the darkness was 
 so profound," says St. Jerome, " that 
 it seemed as though one went down 
 alive into the, sepulchre, and the 
 walls around • were -- sheeted with 
 mouldering bodies," This labyrinth 
 of cofi&ns, from which there appeare^ 
 ^ no egress, .and where any one ven- 
 tm-ing in without a guide Was sure 
 to perish — those di-ea'ry vaults, 
 where all was silence, fear and ^ 
 death, had no terrors for the first 
 Chiistians of Rome. On the sabbath- 
 day, then fii'st called Sunday, they 
 assembled in that dismal metropoli- 
 tan church to read the writings of | 
 
 the Apostles or the Prophets ; then, 
 they offered up, on an altar of un- 
 hewn stone, the sacrifice of bread 
 and wine, which was preceded by a 
 sermon, and followed by a collection 
 for the poor." * Some rude frescoes, 
 representing the Saviour or Mary, 
 which are still to be seen, half ef- 
 faced, jn the Catacombs of Naples 
 and of Rome, were the sole decora- 
 tion of this place of prayer, whose 
 congregation consisted of ten dead 
 and one living generation. What a 
 temple! Instead of golden vases, 
 there were wooden cups ! instead of 
 the Roman lamps of massive silver, 
 th^ were fiafiiig torches ! instead 
 of martial spoils, there were the 
 fearful trophies of the angel of 
 death! Behind, before, and all 
 around the spot where the faithful 
 assembled, were endless subterrane- 
 ous avenues, where distant torches 
 gleamed from time to time, and 
 veiled figures were seen moving, 
 looking more like spectres than hu-* 
 man beings ! Beneath was the dust 
 o^^'fgpublic which had carried off 
 its^.virtues in the folds of its great 
 shroud : terror within ; and without, 
 in case of discovery, was the amphi- 
 
 *Apolog. S. Just. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 283 
 
 theatre, red with the blood of mar- 
 tyred Christians! 
 
 When we come to reflect on these 
 things, we ask ourselves in amaze- 
 ment, what intrepid heroes wei-e 
 they who braved these horrors ? . . . 
 Those heroes, who thus braved death 
 and terror, were ignorant men who 
 had grown up* amid the auguries, 
 the signs, and the thousand super- 
 stitious fears of paganism ; they 
 were timid virgins, wo7}t to hloomfar 
 from the world like solitary roses ; *' 
 fair and rich patricians, s^ved by 
 legions of slaves, who slept on beds 
 of massive gold, eat from tables ^- 
 citron-wood, inhabited apartments 
 ceiled with ivory, and trod but on 
 flags of marble strewed with gold or 
 silver dust ; young men, wrapt up in 
 rich scarlet cloaks, and bearing%uch 
 names as Anicius, Olib7'ius, Probus, 
 Gracchus ^ — in a word, the flower 
 of the lloman patricians ; knight, 
 
 * S. Ambr., de Virg., lib. i., ch. 6. 
 
 f See Prudentius jn his two books against 
 Symmachus, According to that author, the 
 family of Anicius was the first patrician family 
 that embraced Christianity in Rome. 
 
 I Fiavius Clement, cousin-germain of Domi- 
 tian, whose two sons had been appointed 
 by the Emperor himself as his successors^ 
 was put to death as a Christian shortly after 
 
 ^ who might be known by their eques- 
 ti'ian ring, great ofl&cers of the pal- 
 ace, tribunes of the people, favorites 
 and kinsmen of Caesar, whose sons 
 were appointed to succeed him in 
 the empire. J • • • . Who else? Im- 
 perial princesses who traversed by 
 night, escorted by some feithful 
 slaves, the ati^iuin of their «gilded 
 palace on Mount Palatine, and glid- 
 ed like spirits out of the city of 
 Komulus, to go worship the Galilean 
 in the Catacombs — the Galilean 
 so d.€spised arid ridiculed py the 
 haughty pagan arisfeicracy-^^and to 
 
 i^ invoke that sweet Virgin Mary for 
 whom the noble descendants of the 
 Gracchi and the Scipios abandoned 
 their favorite temple of Juno Lu- 
 cina. § 
 
 V If the Tiber overflowed, or the 
 rain failed, or ^ an earthquake hap- 
 frened, and^ the -Koi^an people, to 
 avert these disasters,' cried out, ac- 
 
 the expiration of his consulate. The princess 
 Domitilla, his wife, a Christian like himself, 
 was banished to an island. (Hist. Eccles., t. i., 
 p. 105.) 
 
 § The temple of Juno Lucina was frequented 
 in preference to any other by the great ladies of 
 Rome ; prostitutes were forbidden to enter ; it 
 was in -this temple that mothers prayed especially 
 for the advantageous marriage of their daughters. 
 
264 
 
 BlSTOlil 01' TUK DEVQTKm TO THE BLESSED VIRQIN MARY. 
 
 cording to ci stom, " The Christians f 
 to the lions I ' * they brought before 
 the altar coffins filled with bones 
 gathered in the amphitheatre. There- 
 upon, a song of tiiumph, softly chant- 
 ed, arising from the bosom of the 
 earth, went up to mingle with the 
 continued noise of the waters brought 
 in by the aqueducts over the walls 
 of Rome, and the low, sweet murmur 
 of the tall Italian poplars, which 
 sounds like the rippling of streams. 
 Often would the bishop, a saintly 
 old man, leaning on a crooked stick 
 — true emblem of his pastoral charge 
 — rebuke the deserters who came 
 over from the camp of wealth to 
 worship the poor King, for a linger- 
 ing attachment to Roman luxury. He 
 told the great ladies, who stood pen- 
 sively listening, that it became not 
 Christian women to wear in rings 
 and in bracelets " the substamja 
 of a thousand poor." Some days 
 after, a daughter of the Anicii was 
 asked what had become of her j^- 
 els; tTie poor of her neighborhood, 
 both pagan and Christian, might 
 have answered, showing bread and 
 gold! Or perchance he spoke of 
 Blaveiy; and, on the morrow, it 
 
 * Apolog, Tertullian. 
 
 was everywhere told in wonder 
 that a prefect of the palace had 
 just set free fifteen hundred slaves. 
 There it was that charity was taught; 
 and what charity that was ! " Alms- 
 giving is a mystery," said the priest 
 of Jesus Christ ;*" when you do it, 
 close your doors." 
 
 And then, on going forth from 
 these assemblies where fervor was 
 renewed, poor toiling women went 
 and took up from off the banks of 
 the Tiber the helpless infants left 
 there by pagan ladies of rank ; the 
 patriciahs set apart a portion of 
 their palaces tor hospitals ; and the 
 young Christian nobles undertook 
 distant voyages to succor their breth- 
 ren in Africa or Asia. These acts of 
 charity, of abnegation, of devotion, 
 a^t()nished the pagans, to whom they 
 were wholly unaccountable.f 
 
 The noble matrons of Rome then 
 wore images of Mary engraved on 
 emeralds, cornelians, or sapphires, 
 and, dying, bequeathed them to 
 their daughters as symbols of their 
 faith. Galla, the widow of Syinma- 
 chus, had a superb church erected, 
 long after, to deposit therein one of 
 these precious stones, the relic of a 
 
 * Lucianus, de Morle Peregrini. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 283 
 
 persecuted faith; the workmanship 
 of this stone was so fine that it Avas 
 thought to have come from a hand 
 more than human, and was vener- 
 ated as a gift from heaven.* 
 
 Besides these religious ornaments 
 which served those Christian women 
 as distinctive marks, they exposed, 
 amid flowers, on the domestic altar 
 where the lares had so long reigned, 
 miniature figures in gold or silver, 
 representing Jesus Christ, the Vir- 
 gin, and the Apostles. These statu- 
 ettes, the discovery of which brought 
 a whole family to the ampBitheatre, 
 were usually so small that they could 
 be put out of sight on the first alarm, 
 and even concealed on the person.f 
 
 A little later, private chapels re- 
 ceived the bodies of martyrs, which 
 were clothed in costly white gar- 
 
 * Astolfi, Delle Imagini Miracolose. 
 
 f M. Kaoul-Kochette attributes the invention 
 of these little statues to the Gnostics ; but the 
 Gnostics themselves make them go back much 
 farther than their sect. According to all appear- 
 ance, this custom was established amougst the 
 patricians of Rome first converted to Christian- 
 ity. The images of Jesus Christ, of the Virgin, 
 and the Apostles, were substituted for those 
 of Fortune and several other divinities, which 
 were placed, crowned with flowers, on the altar 
 of the Lares ; they were small enough to be con- 
 cealed about the person in case of necessity. 
 One of these statuettes, representing Harpoc- 
 
 ^ ments and inclosed in magnificent 
 marble tombs. During the last 
 persecutions, Aglad, a fair and 
 wealthy Roman matron, sent for 
 these holy relics as far as Bithynia, 
 where the Roman governors — who 
 traded in every thing, even dead 
 bodies — sold them at a high price. J 
 In the interval between one per- 
 secution and another, the Christians 
 gathered their dead into cemeteries 
 outside the walls of Rome, and 
 went thither frequently to pray. 
 The walls of these cemeteries paint- 
 ed in fi'esco, represented Jesus 
 Christ on his tribmial, in the ma- 
 jestic and severe attitude which 
 becomes the -sovereign Judge of 
 men; near him, Mary, veiled in 
 the Roman style, stood ready to 
 implore his mercy for sinners. § 
 
 rates, god of Silence, has been found in Bro; 
 tagne ; it was of gold, an(f':about two inches in 
 height. — (See Hist. Eccles. de Bretagne, t. iif,, 
 page 358.) We know, moreover, that the 
 ancients hung around their neck, or fastened to 
 their clothes, little imag-es of Fortune. Hence came 
 the custom of wearing madonnas, crosses, and 
 other sacred images in gold or precious stones. 
 Being unable to destroy this ancient cuotom, the 
 Church, in her wisdom, changed its object. 
 
 I Simplician, governor of Cilicia, sold to the 
 servants of the martyr Bonifaciii*, the body of 
 their master for five hundred gold crowns. 
 
 § A very ancient painting in the cemetery ol 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO TUE BLESSED VJliGlN MARY 
 
 During the halcyoi. days of the ^ 
 iciuu of Alexander Severus, the 
 Christians of Home, Imowing that 
 that prince honored Jesus Christ, 
 whose image he had placed in his 
 laraHum, amongst the holy souls,* 
 and counting on the support of his 
 mother, the Empress Mamea, who 
 was a Christian, demanded and ob- 
 tained, notwithstanding the clamor- 
 ous opposition of the pagan priests, 
 permission to erect a church on a 
 waste spot which had long been 
 encumbered with mouldering ruins. 
 This was the first that reared its 
 cross beside the marble fanes of the 
 gods of the empire; it was dedi- 
 cated to Mary, and 'took the name 
 of Om- Lady beyond the Tiber. 
 
 Christianity, violently oppressed 
 in Italy, was cruelly persecuted in 
 the Gauls, where it progressed but 
 very slowly, according to Sulpicius 
 Severus, who wrote in the 4th cen- 
 tury. Nevertheless, there were a few 
 bishoprics established so early as the 
 3d century, amongst others that of 
 Lyons, where St. Pothin had intro- 
 duced the veneration of Mary ; and 
 
 St. Calixtus, in Borne, still represents the Bless- 
 ed Virgin in this costume. 
 
 * Lamprid., in Alex Sev., ch. 29-31. 
 
 missionaries, amongst whom were 
 even Roman knights, went all over 
 the Gauls. But these sowers of the 
 Gospel often fell beneath the impi- 
 ous sword of the idolatrous govern- 
 ors — who hmited them like wild 
 beasts f — before their task was lully 
 accomplished. Their labors, how- 
 ever, though unfinished, were not 
 lost; their generous blood fertiliz- 
 ed the soil which they had cleared, 
 and in after times other laborers 
 came in to reap what they had 
 sowed. 
 
 The fsland of Britain boasts of 
 having preceded the Gauls in its 
 conversion to Christianity, and, if 
 we may believe its most ancient 
 chronicles, it had the first Christian 
 king. Venerable Bede relates that, 
 in the time of the emperors Marcus 
 Aurelius and Commodus, a prince 
 named Lucius asked of Pope Eleu- 
 tlierus two Italian missionaries to 
 evangelize the little kingdom which 
 he governed for the Romans. His 
 request was graciously received, 
 and two apostolic men, to whom 
 the Gauls subsequently erected al- 
 
 f " You have escaped us, then, if yo ii be a 
 Christian," said HeracUus to St. Sj'mphoiiau, 
 " for but few of them now remain." 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 287 
 
 tars,* went to preach the Gospel to 
 the native tribes of Great Britain, 
 then divided between Druid ism — 
 still in its prime — and the gods of 
 the Ccesars. God blessed their ef- 
 forts : the Britons, still in a semi-bar- 
 barous state, went forth in crowds 
 from their bee-hive-like huts to hear 
 them. Sometimes, in the midst of 
 the desert and stony heath where 
 they went to seek the sectaries of 
 Esus, collected by the pale moon- 
 light f for some secret sacrifice, a 
 young priestess of the Celts having 
 listened attentively to the divine 
 doctrine, leaning against an aged 
 oak, suddenly let fall the golden 
 sickle that was to have cut the mis- 
 tletoe — that sacred plant which 
 grew out of the furrowed bark of 
 the oak — and bowing down before 
 the minister of Christ, her fair 
 tresses still bound with the sacer- 
 dotal wreath, she cried out in trem- 
 bling accents, " I am a Christian ! " 
 whereupon, the priest, taking water 
 from the still worshiped spring, ad- 
 
 * Harpisfield, Hist., lib. i., ch. 3. 
 
 f The Gauls and the insular Britons assem- 
 bled only by night in their temples, when the 
 moon was in her first quarter, or at her full ; 
 this traditional custom dates from the most re- 
 
 ^ ministered the regenerating sacra- 
 ment of Baptism to the young and 
 stately neophyte, who gave up her 
 proud title of Uheldeda (sublimity) 
 for the sweet strange name of 
 Mary.+ 
 
 During the persecution of DIocIq- 
 sian, according to the best authori- 
 ties, Christianity crossed the double 
 wall which separated the Britons, 
 politically enervated by their con- 
 querors, from their wild and restless 
 neighbors of the North. The island 
 of Britain, where Roman civiUzation 
 flourished like a pale and forced ex- 
 otic, had cities adorned with baths, 
 palaces of marble, temples radiant 
 with gold, side by side with dreary- 
 wastes of sand and rock, and thick 
 primeval woods; but Caledonia, 
 whither the eagle of the Caesars had 
 not yet penetrated, was still the 
 land of foam and flood, of rock and 
 torrent, having no other worship 
 than a half-efi'aced Druidism, min- 
 gled with German superstitions. 
 All was hazy and indistinct, like 
 
 mote antiquity. {Hist. Eccles. de Bret., i' iv., p. 
 540.) 
 
 \ The Venerable Bede asserts in his Ecclesias- 
 tical History, that, at this remote period, a great 
 number of Druids became Christians. 
 
Bluiuiii OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 a landscape veiled in mist. The 
 Druids, having had a misiinder* 
 standing with the great chiefs, had 
 been expelled in the 4th century,* 
 and their notions relating to the one 
 God were gradually almost forgot- 
 ten ; but the people believed in the 
 spirit of the waters, and the spirit 
 of the mountains, and in a certain 
 aerial dwelling where the shades of 
 their ancestors, wandering by night 
 on their cloudy chariots, their white 
 drapery glittering in the moon- 
 beams, and their transparent hands, 
 holding by way of sword, a half- 
 extinguished meteor.f The Chris- 
 tian apostles of these regions, then 
 almost unknown, took possession of 
 the caves which the Druids had 
 abandoned, J and established them- 
 selves on the margin of stieams, in 
 the depth of forests, or on the steep 
 hill -side. It sometimes chanced 
 that the Highland hunter, careless 
 of pui"suing farther over the moor 
 the red deer or the roe, came to seat 
 himself on the gray, mossy stone 
 which marked the grave of a war- 
 rior, in order to converse with the 
 
 ♦ Poems of Ossian. Dissertation on the Era of 
 t See Ossian. 
 
 old man of the cave, the Christian 
 Cnldee,^ who told him of Christ and 
 his Mother. With one aim thrown 
 over his unbent bow, and the other 
 resting on the head of his favorite 
 hound lying at his feet, the Scottish 
 chief listened, with respect and at- 
 tention, to the grave discourse of the 
 solitary ; then, when the sanctity of 
 the Gospel had, at length, touched 
 his heart ; when, with clasped hands 
 and kindling eyes, lie said, "I be- 
 lieve ! " his entire clan repeated like 
 a faithful echo, " We also believe 1 " 
 Not content with having spread 
 their doctrine over hill and dale, the 
 priests of Christ would fain pursue 
 the old idolatiy even to its most an- 
 cient and remote sanctuaiies. The 
 isle of lona, one of the islands of the 
 Scottish archipelago, surrounded by 
 a green and turbulent sea, was a 
 sacred place for the lords of the isles 
 and the mountain chiefs, who came 
 to swear peace on an ancient block, 
 which they called the stone of power. 
 The stone quickly disappeared, and 
 in its stead arose, amid the pictur- 
 esque rocks, the most ancient and 
 
 ♦ 
 
 X Ibid. 
 
 § Gxildee, in G-elic, Culdich, a hermit, a soli- 
 tary. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 289 
 
 the most venerated abbey in Scot- f 
 land : alas ! its cloisters are now, 
 and have long been, roofless, though 
 they cover the ashes of a race of 
 kings. 
 
 Four centuries had passed away, 
 and Christianity had already spread 
 from east to west. " We are but of 
 yesterday," said TertuUian to the 
 senate of pagan Rome, " and yet we 
 fill your palaces, your cities, your 
 fortresses, your armies, both by land 
 and sea; we leave you only your 
 temples ! " It was true ; but what 
 torrents of blood had, during all that 
 time, reddened the great standard of 
 the Cross ! The last persecution was 
 meant to eradicate Christianity : 
 Dioclesian either levelled or closed 
 up all the churches, and put Chris- 
 tian cities to the sword,* promising 
 the most magnificent rewards to 
 
 apostacy, which, however, was very 
 uncommon, notwithstanding the im- 
 perial encouragement, the Christians 
 of those times generally preferring 
 martyrdom. Men thought that it 
 was all over with Christianity : the 
 idolaters clapped their hands in ex- 
 ultation over its approaching down- 
 fall, and hell was heard to bellow 
 out its shouts of triumph ; but the 
 holy angels, looking on with a smile, 
 said amongst themselves : " Christ 
 is about to gain the victory ; bless- 
 ed be His name !".... A young 
 maiden of Bithynia, named Helena, 
 whom the Emperor Constantius 
 Chloris had married for her rare 
 beauty and virtue, had just given 
 birth to a son, who was named Con- 
 stantine. 
 
 ^ * Eusebius, Eccles. Hist. — Sulpicius Severus. 
 
 Mr-^. 
 
'tronlr ^nioi of tjjt gthtion U P^arj. 
 
 FROM CONSTANTINE TO THE MIDDLE AGES. 
 
 CHAPTER lY. 
 
 THE EAST THE ICONOCLASTS. 
 
 N the delightful 
 banks of the 
 Bosphorus, in 
 Thrace, within 
 sight of the dis- 
 tant mountains 
 of Abia Minor, whose lofty summits 
 are at evening tinged with the 
 richest gold and crimson, the coast 
 of Europe is indented by a large 
 bay of incomparable beauty, and 
 over its sheet of bright blue waters 
 rises a vast city, all white and all 
 Christian;* it is Constantinople, 
 which the son of Helena and of 
 Constantius Chloris has just dedi- 
 cated solemnly to Mary; for the 
 master of the world, still treated 
 as a god in idolatrous Rome, be- 
 longs himself to Jesus Christ ; and 
 the cross whereby he has conquered 
 decorates his banners, glitters on 
 
 * CoDstautine would have it so that there was 
 not a single idolater in Constantinople; he left 
 
 * his coin, and surmounts the sump- 
 tuous basilica which he has placed 
 under the invocation of St. Sophia, 
 the Virgin, and the twelve Apos- 
 tles. 
 
 Idolatry is still erect, but it is 
 a withered palm-tree, whose lofty 
 branches are ah-eady lifeless. 
 Nought is seen but deserted altars, 
 over whose steps reptiles crawl; 
 birds begin to nestle in the arches 
 of the temples where spiders spin 
 their webs ; the wild vine spreads 
 its green branches over their walls 
 of polished marble, and the travel- 
 ler profanely cuts a walking-stick 
 in those sacred groves from which 
 it was, formerly, death to pull a 
 single branch. The ceremonies of 
 pagarj worship have ceased in 
 Greece; the most venerated idols 
 serve only for ornament in the pub- 
 idols only in profane places, to serve as orna- 
 ments. • {Eecles. Hist., vol. i., p. 523.) 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 291 
 
 lie places of Constantinople; but 
 no one is forced to enter the church; 
 for, though Polytheism be a relig- 
 ion essentially bad and supremely 
 absm'd, yet the emperor respects 
 that liberty of conscience which the 
 pagans so badly understood when 
 they abused the dread right of the 
 strongest. Lactantius, one of the 
 brightest luminaries of Christianity, 
 lays down as a principle, in a fam- 
 ous contemporary work, that nihil 
 est tarn voluntarium quam religio.^ 
 It is such moderation as this that 
 gains success for a holy cause. 
 
 It was not merely by dedicating 
 to her the new Rome that Constan- 
 tine testified his respect for Mary; 
 at his request, the Empress Helena, 
 converted by him, set out for Pal- 
 estine, and covered that holy land 
 with sacred monuments, in which 
 Mary had her full share. The 
 grotto of the Nativity, sheeted with 
 marble and lit up with golden 
 lamps, was surrounded by a mag- 
 nificent chm*ch, which bore the 
 name of St. Mary of Bethlehem. 
 St. Mary of Nazareth, erected on 
 the site of the humble dwelling of 
 the Holy Family, was long consid- 
 ered one of the finest chm-ches in 
 
 * Asia. The sepulchral cave in tlie 
 valley of Josaphat was consider- 
 ably enlarged, and adoraed with a 
 superb staircase of marble; silver 
 lamps were suspended around the 
 Virgin's tomb. Finally, two sump- 
 tuous churches commemorated the 
 Visitation of Mary and her swoon 
 near the rock from which the Naz- 
 arenes would have cast Jesus. 
 
 The successors of the first By- 
 zantine emperor showed themselves 
 in general very devout towards 
 the Blessed Virgin. Theodosius the 
 Younger, having learned that a 
 great concourse of Christians from 
 all parts of Europe and Asia, flock- 
 ed to the tomb of the Blessed Vir- 
 gin, had a stately Byzantine church 
 erected there, which was called by 
 the Arabs la Giasmaniah (the church 
 of the body) , Kosrou-Paviz (Cosroes 
 11.) tluew down this church at the 
 instigation of the Jews, in his in- 
 vasion of Syria and Palestine ; but 
 subsequently repenting of that act 
 of violence, for which he was tear- 
 fully reproached by Sira, his Chris- 
 tian wife, the follower of Zoroaster 
 built a church himself to the Bless- 
 ed Virgin, in his city of Miafarc- 
 
 * Lactantius, InatiiiU., v. 20. 
 
m 
 
 mSTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO TEE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 kin.* The Empress Piilclieiia, 
 daughter of Theodosius and wife 
 of the Emperor Marcian, had her- 
 self no less than three -churches 
 constructed, under the invocation 
 of the Panagia, within the limits 
 of Constantinople. Being unable 
 to enrich them with relics of the 
 Mother of God, since the body of 
 Mary is in heaven, she tried to 
 make up the deficiency by some of 
 her garments, sent by the faithful 
 of Jerusalem. The beautiful church 
 of the Blaquernes had her robe, 
 that of Chalcopratee, her girdle ; 
 but that of the Guides obtained the 
 best of all. Therein was placed on 
 an altar glittering with gold and 
 embellished with columns of jasper, 
 a portrait of Mary sent from An- 
 tioch, said to have been painted by 
 St. Luke during the life-time of the 
 Virgin, and to which she had at- 
 tached graces.f 
 
 This portrait was considered as 
 the palladium of the empire ; and 
 the emperors — amongst others John 
 Zimisces and the Comneni— con- 
 veyed it to the army, whence it 
 was brought back on a ti'iumphal 
 car drawn by magnificent white 
 
 * D'Herbelot, Bibliotheque Orientate. 
 
 * horses. In great solemnities, this 
 miraculous image was taken from 
 the church of the Guides, where it 
 was usually kept with the most 
 reverential care. The people al- 
 ways hailed its presence with 
 shouts of joy and canticles of 
 praise. The fate of this image re- 
 mains doubtful. Some hold that it 
 was this image which, after the 
 taking of Constantinople by the 
 Latins in 1204, was brought to 
 Venice by the doge, Henry Dandolo; 
 others maintain that it was the one 
 found by the Turks when sacking 
 the city of Constantino, and by 
 them contemptuously trampled un- 
 der foot, after being stripped of the 
 jewels and gold wherein it was set. 
 Leo the First built, in 460, a 
 superb basilica, which he dedicated 
 to Our Lady of the Fountain, in 
 gratitude for that the Holy Virgin 
 had appeared to him on the mar- 
 gin of a lonely spring, whither he 
 had led a blind old man, and prom 
 ised him the empire, though he was 
 then but a young Thracian soldier. 
 The diadem of the Caesars no sooner 
 encircled his brow, than he set 
 about perpetuatino- by this monu- 
 
 f Niceph., Mist. Eccles., 1. xiv. and xv. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 293 
 
 nient, the remembrance of Mary's 
 protection "•= 
 
 The Emperor Zeno, son-in-law of 
 Leo L, was not less devoted to Mary 
 than his father-in-law had been ; he 
 built her a church on Mount Gari- 
 zim — the sacred mountain of the 
 Samaritans — and as that restless 
 people, then in open rebellion, had 
 spoiled some images of Mary, he 
 surrounded the mountain with a 
 wall, whereon he placed a garrison 
 of soldiers to prevent the renewal 
 of these sacrileges. 
 
 The Emperor Justin rebuilt, with 
 increased splendor, in Constanti- 
 nople, the church of Our Lady of 
 Chalcopratee, overthrown by an 
 earthquake. Two churches built at 
 Jerusalem in honor of the Blessed 
 Virgin, St. Mary the New, and 
 another on the Mount of Olives, 
 with a monastery erected on a shelf 
 of Mount Sinai, and in Africa, a 
 sumptuous basilica, with the name 
 
 * Niceph., 1. XV., ch. 25. This church, built 
 with much magnificence, had windows of stained 
 glass, but not representing historical subjects. 
 At the end of the 5th century, painting on 
 glass was still a new art. 
 
 ■j" Leo rV., son of Constantine Copronymus, 
 having taken from the church of St. Sophia one 
 of the crowns of gold which the Emperor Mau- 
 rice had consecrated to the Virgin, his death, 
 
 * of Our Lady of Carthage, were last- 
 ing testimonies of the devotion of 
 the Emperor Justinian to the Mother 
 of our Lord. Not content with 
 building temples to her, the Caesars 
 of Constantinople piously venerated 
 Mary in their private chapels ; they 
 offered her splendid crowns of gold,f 
 and wore on their persons a little 
 figure of her carved in the same pre- 
 cious metal.| . They brought from 
 the monastery Hodegium, to the 
 imperial palace of Constantinople, 
 the celebrated image of the Virgin 
 HocUgetrie (conductress), during the 
 last days of Lent, and it remained 
 there till the second Easter-holiday. 
 It was to the Virgin, too, that 
 Michael Paleologus did homage, 
 when he -had succeeded in expelling 
 the race of Courtenay from Con- 
 stantinople. § 
 
 The Greek people were not slow 
 in following the example of their 
 emperors ; the lares and the Olympic 
 
 which occurred soon after, was attributed to 
 that sacrilege. (Blond., 1. xxi., decad. 2.) 
 
 I The Emperor Andronicus II. usually wore 
 round his neck one of these statuettes of the 
 Blessed Virgin ; it was of gold, and so small 
 that he put it in his mouth, in liexi of other 
 viaticum, at the moment of death. 
 
 § Antiquities of the chapel, &c., of the King 
 of France. 
 
894 
 
 HISTORY OF THE JJEyuiiON TO THE BLESSED VIHUIN MAHl. 
 
 idols were almost everywhere re- 
 placed by the Paimgia, The altars 
 of Bacchus were overthrown with 
 their green garlands of ivy, and Our 
 Lady of Grnpes received amid the 
 vineyards the homage of the vinta- 
 gers; Ceres herself began to be 
 forgotten in the ruins of her myste- 
 rious shrine at Eleusis, destroyed 
 by the Goths in the third century, 
 together with the temples of Del- 
 phos, Corinth, and Ephesus; finally, 
 Mount Athos, the mountain of Ju- 
 piter, had become, since the time 
 of Constantine, a little colony of 
 hermits and solitaries, of which 
 Mary was proclaimed the queen. 
 The Gospel facts of her life were 
 reproduced in frescoes, grounded on 
 gold, on the ceilings of an infinite 
 number of chapels built in her 
 honor amongst the vines and olives 
 wliich clothe the sides of that lofty 
 mountain, whose shadow extends 
 across the sea to the distant isle 
 of Lemnos. 
 
 Who would believe that it was 
 amongst those very Greeks, so de- 
 
 * Lfto the Isauriau was exceedingly cruel. 
 Having failed in imparting his own hatred of 
 images to the learned men charged with the 
 care of the public library, he had them shut up 
 within it, surrounded the building with wood 
 
 * vout to the Blessed Virgin, that the 
 ideas most opposed to her personal 
 dignity and the perpetuity of her 
 reign had their rise. It was with- 
 in the walls of Constantinople that 
 the heresy of Nestorius was first 
 broached, disputing her right to be 
 called the Mother of God ; and also 
 that of the Iconoclasts, who dragged 
 her images through the mire, and 
 burned them in the streets. Under 
 Leo the Isaurian, who had acquired, 
 it is said, amongst the Jews, a furi- 
 ous hatred for all religious painting 
 and statuary, faithful Catholics were 
 seen thrown in heaps into the Bos- 
 phorus, or beaten to death with 
 rods, for having lit lamps before a 
 domestic Madonna, prayed at the 
 foot of a crucifix, or bent the knee 
 in passing the statue of a saint* 
 Constantine Copronymus, successor 
 of this wicked prince, even surpass- 
 ed him in cruelty, and Leo, his son, 
 walked in the ways of both; but 
 Irene, sincerely attached to Catho- 
 licity, had the second council of 
 Nice convoked, when the veneration 
 
 and combustible matters, and then set fire to it. 
 Medals, numberless pictures, and more than 
 three thousand manuscripts wore consumed in 
 that conflagration. 
 
■ .*■ 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 295 
 
 of images was solemnly reestablish- 
 ed,* and the Empress Theodora, 
 aided by the patriarch Methodus, 
 consolidated the pious work of 
 Irene. 
 
 If the insult had been great, 
 the reparation was complete ; the 
 Greeks, thenceforward, endeavored 
 to honor Mary by every imaginable 
 means. They decreed her crowns 
 of gold ; they ever after represented 
 her with the imperial purple, the 
 tiara of pearls, and the diadem of 
 the empresses ; f they stamped her 
 image on their coins ; they struck 
 medals in her honor, and fought 
 under her auspices. " Eomans," 
 said Narses, when about to offer 
 battle to the Goths at Taginas, 
 " Eomans, fight bravely, the Virgin 
 is with us ; fail not to invoke her 
 during the combat ; for she beholds 
 our cohorts, and will deliver to us 
 the wretches who dispute her title 
 of Mother of Godr \ It was quickly 
 rumored through the ranks that the 
 Paiia^ia^ to whom JSTarses was very 
 
 * Protestants have protested loudly against 
 this council, which explains so clearly the vene- 
 ration of images. In the 16th century, they 
 had quite a horror of the Empress Irene, whom 
 they surnamed the furioun, aiRrming that she 
 had established the worship of images. {Letter 
 
 devout, had promised him victory, 
 and appointed the hour for the 
 attack. Persuaded that Heaven 
 favored their cause, the Greeks dis- 
 played an energy foreign to their 
 character. Totilla was slain ; his 
 army fled, leaving the plain covered 
 with dead, and Italy, delivered in 
 the name of Our Lady of Victory, 
 loudly blessed the Virgin and Par- 
 ses. 
 
 Mcetes records a historical fact, 
 which proves how highly Mary was 
 honored by the princes of the Low- 
 er Empire. ^' John Comnenus, after 
 gaining a battle," says that histo- 
 rian, "was to enter Constantinople 
 in triumph, as he was entitled to 
 do; all was prepared for the gor- 
 geous ceremony; the streets were 
 hung with silk and cloth of gold, 
 and numerous scaffolds were erected 
 through the streets for the accom- 
 modation of th'e multitudes of spec- 
 tators who had come from all parts 
 of the empire to see that glorious 
 sight. 
 
 to the Bishop of Angers on the Miracles of Our 
 Lady of Ardilliers, in 1594.) 
 
 ■{■ It is under this costume that the Blessed 
 Virgin is represented on the medals of Zimisces 
 and Theophanes. 
 
 I Hist. Arianism, by Father Maimbourg, voL ii, 
 
996 
 
 lii.>iuhY OF THE JjrAuLlvN TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 "The trumpeters crowned with 
 laui'el walked in front of the pro- 
 cession; then appeared representa- 
 tions of the conquered cities, to- 
 gether with the vanquished princes, 
 in painting, in sculptuie, in marble, 
 and in ivory, all of the most exqui- 
 site workmanship ; * then the spoils 
 of the enemy — arms, precious robes, 
 vases of gold enriched with jewels, 
 so as to dazzle the eyes of the be- 
 holders ; after these came the cap- 
 tives, barbarian princes of majestic 
 statm'e and of haughty bearmg, 
 walking in chains according to cus- 
 tom, their eyes cast down, and their 
 heads, now bowed in shame, now 
 raised in a sudden fit of fury and 
 despair. After them came the tri- 
 umphal car, drawn by four white 
 horses ; all expected to see the em- 
 peror seated on this car, clothed in 
 a robe of purple or scarlet, richly 
 embroidered, and his lordly brow 
 encircled with laurel; but in his 
 stead there w^as seen an image of 
 the Blessed Virgin, to whom, and 
 not to himself, he considered the 
 triumph due. The emperor on 
 horseback, followed by his brilliant 
 court, closed this Christian proces- 
 sion, happier in the triumph of 
 
 ^ Mary than if he had triumphed 
 liimself" 
 
 In order to show how far the 
 Virgin was revered in Asia Minor, 
 it will sufiice to relate, as briefly as 
 possible, what passed in Ephesus 
 during the sitting of the council 
 which condemned the heresy of 
 Nestorius, in 431. 
 
 The day on which the council was 
 to decide on the divine maternity of 
 Mary, the people, anxious and dis- 
 turbed, blocked up the streets and 
 crowded around the magnificent 
 temple which the piety of the in- 
 habitants had built under the invo- 
 cation of the Virgin. There it was 
 that two hundred bishops were exam- 
 ining the propositions of Nestorius, 
 who dared not come to defend them, 
 so little confidence had he in the 
 justice of his cause or the sound- 
 ness of his arguments. Profound 
 silence reigned amongst the vast 
 multitude who thronged the vicinity 
 of the basilica, and anxiety was 
 painted on every countenance ; the 
 fine expressive features of the Greeks 
 manifesting, as in a glass, every in- 
 
 * Josephus gives a magnificent description of 
 the representations of cities which adorned the 
 ^ triumphs, 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 297 
 
 ward emotion of the soul. A bishop 
 at length appears ; he announces 
 to the mute and attentive crowd 
 that the anathema of the council is 
 launched against the innovator, and 
 that the Most Holy Virgin is glo- 
 riously maintained in her august 
 prerogative. Thereupon, the most 
 deafening shouts of joy burst forth 
 on every side. The Ephesians and 
 the strangers gathered together from 
 all the cities of Asia, surrounding 
 the Fathers of the council, kissed 
 their hands and their garments, and 
 
 * burned odoriferous perfumes in the 
 streets through which they were to 
 pass. The city was spontaneously 
 and suddenly illuminated, and never 
 was joy more universal. It is thought 
 to have been in this council of Eph- 
 esus that St. Cyril, in concert with 
 the holy assembly over which he 
 presided, composed that beautiful 
 and touching prayer to the Mother 
 of God, which has been adopted by 
 the Church : — " Holy Mary, Mother 
 of God, pray for us sinners, now and 
 at the hour of om- death. Amen ! " 
 
 CHAPTER Y. 
 
 THE EAST THE HOLY WARS. 
 
 HE Christians of 
 Asia were no 
 less active than 
 the Greeks in 
 manifesting 
 their devotion 
 to Mary. Be- 
 fore the time of Constantine, a 
 chm-ch bearing the name of the 
 Blessed Virgin arose like a light- 
 
 house on the lofty promontory of 
 Mount Carmel. Tyre, the deposed 
 but still mighty queen of the Le- 
 vantine seas, was distinguished for 
 her church of Our Lady, composed 
 principally of cedar and marble, 
 and I'ivaling the Byzantine basil- 
 ica of the Cgesars. Damascus, the 
 emerald of the desert, willingly ex- 
 pended two hundred thousand di- 
 
^8 
 
 mSTORT OF TEE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VTJIGTN MARY. 
 
 nai*s of gold in building its splendid 
 church of Mart-Miriam (St. Mary), 
 which was buined by the Mohame- 
 tans during the caliphate of Moc- 
 tader, in the year of the Hegira, 
 312.*. Antioch had, likewise, a 
 superb basilica of Our Lady, and 
 hung golden lamps before that im- 
 age of her which was soon to be 
 given up at the pious desire of the 
 Empress Pulcheria; for this sacred 
 image the good Christians of Anti- 
 och substituted a small cedar statue 
 of the Mother of God, miraculously 
 found in the time-hollowed trunk 
 of an enormous cypress which over- 
 hung the Orontes.f Lebanon, that 
 lovely mountain, which, "beneath 
 a tiery sky remains faithful," says 
 Tacitus, " to snow and shade ; \ 
 Lebanon, whose cedars were plant- 
 ed by the hand of the Lord, shel- 
 tered in its rocky caverns a crowd 
 of solitaries who had devoted their 
 labor to Mary. Seated on the 
 banks of that river which took, 
 from their vicinity, the name of 
 JToly^ which it still bears, and 
 which flows between two mossy 
 banks picturesquely shaded, those 
 
 * D'Herbelot, Biblioth. Orient. 
 f istolfi, delle Imagini miraculose. 
 
 ^ men of toil, of contemplation, and 
 of prayer, carved, in the majestic 
 shade of the cedars — which let fall 
 on them, through their rich foliage, 
 a light like that which comes down 
 tinged with pmple, blue, .and gold, 
 through the stained windows of 
 our cathedrals, — those little statu- 
 ettes of the Blessed Virgin, called 
 block virgins, which the western 
 pilgrims, who visited the Holy 
 Land during the first ages of Chris- 
 tianity, brought back to Europe to 
 place them either in the domestic 
 chapels, or in chiu'ches which they 
 have rendered famous by their 
 miracles. 
 
 Mary had also shrines in the 
 rocky solitudes of Mount Sinai. In 
 the depth of a grassy ravine, so 
 profoundly set amongst enormous 
 rocks that the top of its loftiest 
 cedars is never shaken by the wind, 
 there arose, in the midst of a little 
 grove of olives, poplars, and date- 
 trees, a convent placed under the 
 invocation of the Virgin. There 
 was nothing to disturb the gloomy 
 silence of that oasis ; even the 
 storm that shook the aged cedars 
 
 I Taciti Historiarum, lib. v. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN 3IARY. 
 
 299 
 
 of tlie moimtain was scarcely heard 
 there ; that peaceful tomb of the 
 living was only animated when 
 there arose from it songs of praise 
 to " Him who was before the moun- 
 tains," and to "Her in whom he 
 hath done great things." 
 
 In Persia, where the ruins of nu- 
 merous churches and monasteries 
 dedicated to Mary are still seen, the 
 Christians were early distinguished 
 by their zeal in building those 
 places of prayer. Eliseus Yertabed, 
 a highly-esteemed Armenian author 
 who flourished in the 5th century, 
 has preser^^ed for us, in his religious 
 history of the Armenian wars, a dis- 
 course of the king of kings Jesgird 
 — in the west, Isdigerdes : — " I have 
 learned from my fathers," said that 
 prince in a great council composed 
 of satraps and magi, wherein the 
 question of an approaching persecu- 
 tion of the Christians was discussed, 
 "I have learned from my fathers 
 that, in the time of King Chabouh 
 II. (in 319), when the religion of 
 Christ began to spread in Persia, 
 and other Eastern countries, our 
 principal moheds (doctors) advised 
 the king to abolish Christianity in 
 his states ; he tried to do so, but in 
 
 * vain, for the more he exerted him- 
 self to arrest the progress of that 
 religion, the more it seemed to flour- 
 ish. The Christians of Persia were 
 so bold that they built, in all the 
 cities, churches which surpassed the 
 royal dwellings in magnificence ; 
 they also raised oratories over the 
 graves of their martyrs ; and there 
 was no place, whether inhabited or 
 waste, where they did not put up 
 convents."* 
 
 The extinction of Christianity was 
 decided on in this council, where the 
 Magi were all-powerful ; but the 
 king resolved to try bribery before 
 he had recourse to violence ; he 
 tried, as the Persians have it, " to 
 infuse deadly poison into the cup 
 of milk." Calling around him the 
 nakarars or nobles of Armenia, who 
 governed by feudal tenure the small 
 principalities hereditary in their 
 families, under the authority of a 
 marzhan or vice-king named by Per- 
 sia, he loaded them with praise, with 
 sweet words, and alluring promises, 
 to obtain from them the sacrifice 
 of their religion. Those who yielded 
 were rewarded with governments, 
 
 * HtHtory of the Rising of Christian Armenia^ 
 ^ by Eliseus Vertabed, ch. iii. 
 
300 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 honorary titles, fair and fertile lord- | 
 shii>s, or Arab horses superbly ca- 
 parisoned. Never had there gone 
 forth from the royal treasury so 
 manv bracelets of emeralds, so 
 many girdles of beaten gold, stud- 
 ded with rubies and pearls; so 
 many pieces of brocade, grounded 
 on red and gold, and spangled with 
 precious stones — for no cost was 
 spared to gain the desired end. 
 But, alas! the deserters from the 
 true faith to the camp of the Magi 
 were so few in number, and the 
 " king of kings " was so urged to 
 put an end to Christianity, that, 
 suddenly throwing off the mask of 
 moderation which he had at first 
 assumed, he issued a very curious 
 proclamation, wherein, after having 
 praised, according to the ancient 
 formulas of the Persian court, the 
 holy God, " master of the moon and 
 stars," whose power nothing escapes, 
 
 * " Trust not your chiefs whom you call Naz- 
 arenes," said he to the Armenians, in this royal 
 edict mentioned by Eliseus Vertabed, " they are 
 liars and impostors. What they teach by word, 
 they belie by their deeds. To eat meat, say 
 they, is no sin, and yet they eat it not! It is 
 lawful to marry, they tell you, and yet they will 
 not so much as look on a woman ! They will tell 
 you that it is no sin to gather riches honestly, 
 and yet they are forever preaching up poverty. 
 
 "from the sun to the darkness of 
 night, from the little sprhig to the 
 blue sea-wave," he went on to ex- 
 pose the fundamental points of his 
 own false doctrine, and to slander 
 that of the Christians.* This royal 
 edict was promptly followed by an- 
 other commanding the Armenians to 
 embrace without delay the worship 
 of fire; to contract marriage with 
 their nearest relations, contrary to 
 the laws of Jesus Chi'ist, which de- 
 clares such marriages criminal, and 
 ending by ordering sacrifice to the 
 siin, consisting of goats and white 
 bulls. 
 
 The Apostle said, " Be ye subject 
 to the powers that be ; " but God 
 has commanded us to prefer death 
 to idolatry. Hence, the Armenians, 
 instead of conforming to the impious 
 edict of the Persian court, continu- 
 ed to celebrate the divine service in 
 their horse-camps, and to listen to 
 
 They extol affliction and condemn prosperity ; 
 they despise glory of every kind ; they love to 
 clothe themselves in homely garments, like poor 
 beggars, preferring worthless things to those 
 that are of value ; they praise death and despise 
 life; finally, they have even gone so far as to make 
 a virtue of chastity, so that if their advice were 
 followed, the world would speedily come to 
 an end ! " {Rising of Christian Armenia, chap- 
 ter ii.) 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 301 
 
 the preaching of the priests who, in 
 imitation of the ancient Jewish 
 Levites, accompanied the army. In 
 vain did Isdigerdes, separating them 
 into small bodies, station them at 
 the most distant and dangerous 
 points along the frontiers ; in vain 
 did he give them for winter-quarters 
 the most unsheltered mountain pass- 
 es, and the most unhealthy localities; 
 in vain did he seek to reduce them 
 by the extremities of hunger and 
 thirst, whilst, on the other hand, poor 
 Armenia, squeezed like the grape in 
 the wine-press, gave to the Persian 
 treasury its last drops of gold. The 
 tree of the faith, amidst all these 
 miseries, remained " green as a 
 stately cypress surmounted by the 
 full-orbed moon." The Christians 
 of Armenia had endured all ; but 
 their patience failed when the " king 
 of kings" madly undertook to destroy 
 the monasteries placed under the 
 invocation of the Saints, and to 
 convert the churches into Temples 
 of the Sun. They rose from one end 
 of the kingdom to the other, and, 
 making up in enthusiasm what they 
 wanted in numbers, all the Persian 
 fortresses were taken, and the tem- 
 ples of the sun burned to the ground. 
 
 ^ A great battle, in which the Persians 
 were ten to one, was fought on the 
 frontiers of Georgia, on the banks 
 of a small river which flows into 
 the Gour [Cyrus). The Persian army 
 presented the most splendid and im- 
 posing sight; its war-elephants — 
 loaded with towers from whose top 
 the skillful archers darted their long 
 poplar arrows — extended over the 
 wings, and in the centre was the 
 terrible phalanx of the immortals. 
 These numerous squadrons, resplen- 
 dent with gold, moved to the sound 
 of clarions, trumpets, cymbals, and 
 little Hindoo bells ; flags of yellow, 
 red, and violet flaunted like tulips 
 at the end of the spears ; the cap- 
 tains and the satraps drew their In- 
 dian swords from their golden scab- 
 bards, and pushed on their swift 
 Arabian horses with golden bridles 
 and brilliant housings. Clothed in 
 dark-colored garments, and with the 
 cross displayed on their banners — 
 dark like their garments— the Ar- 
 menians, a handful of heroes, hav- 
 ing raised their hands and hearts 
 to heaven, marched to meet the 
 enemy singing a canticle from the 
 psalms. '^ Judge between us and 
 our enemies, Lord ! " sang the 
 
802 
 
 HISTORY OF TUE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 insurgent Chiistiiuis ; " take up bow 
 and buckler for us, for our cause is 
 thine; spread terror through the 
 countless hosts of the wicked. Let 
 them fly and be dispersed before 
 the august sign of the holy cross. 
 We ai'e willing to die for thy sake, 
 and if we slay these infidels we shall 
 be martyrs to the truth."* 
 
 Excited by this prayer, the Arme- 
 nians bm'st with fury on the Persians, 
 and shattered their right wing at the 
 first shock. The conflict was terri- 
 ble ; the air, bristling with arrows, 
 resembled " the ^^lture's wing," and 
 blue swords flashed like heaven's 
 lightning. Enthusiasm, exalted by 
 faith, prevailed ; the Persians were 
 completely routed, and the bodies 
 of nine great sati'aps lay on the field 
 of battle. The waters of the Lomeki 
 were changed into blood, and only 
 a single horseman escaped on his 
 dromedary to bear these disastrous 
 tidings to the Persian court. 
 
 But this victory, great and un- 
 hoped for as it was, could not be 
 decisive ; the Christians of Armenia 
 had neither gold nor allies; Mar- 
 cian, the Greek emperor, whom they 
 had besought, in the name of Christ 
 and his Blessed Mother, to assist 
 
 them, basely sent an express ambas- 
 sador to the com't of Persia to pro- 
 test to the " king of kings " that he 
 had nothing whatever to do with 
 the rebellion in Armenia, and was 
 resolved not to interfere. Isigerdes 
 imderstood that Caesar was afraid; 
 and, trusting to his cowardice, he 
 resolved to pursue the extermination 
 of Christianity in Armenia; happily, 
 he did not succeed. The Christians, 
 overwhelmed by numbers, lost a 
 great battle, together with the hero 
 who commanded them, Yartan the 
 Mamigonian, a prince of Chinese 
 origin, who fell after performing 
 prodigies of valor. The Armenians, 
 reduced to the last extremity, would 
 not declare themselves conquered ; 
 they deserted the cities for the for- 
 ests and mountains ; they celebrat- 
 ed the divine office in the caverns 
 of the rocks. The Armenian bishops 
 suffered martyrdom with unshaken 
 firnmess ; the princes, accustomed 
 to the fresh, bracing air of their high 
 mountains, were taken in chains to 
 Korassan, where the sky is fire and 
 the wind is the dread Simoom, which 
 kills like thunder, while the soil is 
 
 * Eliseus Vertabed, ch. iiL 
 
HTSTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO TUE BLESSED TIBGTN MABY. 
 
 303 
 
 a sea of flaming sand.* There they 
 would have perished miserably had 
 not two confessors, mutilated by the 
 Persian sabre, undertaken to collect 
 alms amongst the Christians of the 
 neighboring provinces for the relief 
 of the captive nobles : this lasted 
 about seven years. One of these 
 angels of charity died of fatigue in 
 the burning deserts of Kohistan, the 
 heat of which has been compared 
 by a modern traveller to that of a 
 plate of red-hot iron ; the other con- 
 tinued alone the same work of mercy. 
 Isdigerdes, overcome by so much 
 constancy and devotion, at length 
 put an end to this hard captivity ; 
 but it was only after fifty years of 
 negotiations, treaties, and fighting, 
 that Yahan the Mamigonian, neph- 
 ew of the great Vartan, terminated 
 this bloody war, commenced in 430.f 
 
 * The Simoom is a deadly wind which stifles 
 travellers and all sorts of animals, unless they 
 fall prostrate on the ground. Curious details 
 relating to the Simoom are found in Niebuhr's 
 description, pp. 6, 7, and 8, Copenhagen edition. 
 This wind rises between the 15th of June and 
 the 15th of August. It blows with great vio- 
 lence, appears red and inflamed, and kills every 
 living thing that it strikes. But the death 
 which it causes is not its most surprising effec-t : 
 the bodies of those who die by it are, as it were, 
 dissolved, without losing, however, either their 
 
 If the Christian churches of Persia 
 deserved to be compared to the pal- 
 aces of its kings, of whose magnifi- 
 cence the Arab poets have left such 
 glowing descriptions, J those of the 
 nations who dwelt between the 
 Euxine and the Caspian seas were 
 very poor in comparison. These 
 were, at first, wooden buildings, to 
 which the faithful were summoned, 
 on festival days, by striking two 
 planks, one against the other ; bells 
 were then unknown. The first stone 
 church of the Armenians, built near 
 the sources of the Tigris, was placed 
 under the invocation of Mary ; it 
 possessed, like many of the shrines 
 of Syria and Asia Minor, a mirac- 
 ulous image of the Virgin, which 
 was intrusted to the care of pious 
 w^omen. § 
 
 The cathedral of Mtzkhetha, the 
 
 shape or color, so that it would seem as though 
 they were asleep. If one touch these bodies, the 
 part which is touched remains in the hand. 
 
 f Continuation of Eliseus Yertabed, by Laz- 
 arus Parbe, ch. iii. 
 
 % Antar's description of the palace of Cosroes 
 resembles that of the Thousand and One Nights : 
 he gives it halls of marble and of red cornelian, 
 fountains of rose-water, basins from which arise 
 emerald pillars surmounted by birds of bur- 
 nished gold, with topaz eyes, &c. 
 
 § Ancient Geography of Armenia, Venice, 1822 
 
804 
 
 SISI\J.^1 
 
 HIE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 ancient capital of Georgia, was the 
 first Christian church of that coun- 
 II \ : the Georgians dedicated it to 
 the Virgin. In it was formerly kept 
 the famous khiton^ one of the torn 
 garments of Jesus Christ. Often 
 thrown down, but as often elegantly 
 reconstructed in the highest Geor- 
 gian style, it is still rich in marble 
 and green jasper. An inscription, 
 written on one of the pillars in let- 
 ters of gold, announces that this di- 
 vine and venerable temple of Mary, 
 Qneeii of the Georgians, Mother of 
 God, and ever Yirgm, was rebuilt 
 at the expense and by the care of a 
 princess of Georgia, named Peban- 
 pato. 
 
 The metropolis of the Mingrelians 
 was likewise dedicated to the Vir- 
 gin ; one of her robes was venerated 
 there, and was kept in a casket of 
 ebony, adorned with silver flowers. 
 This robe, composed of a precious 
 stuff, of a buff color, ornamented 
 with embroidery of various colors, 
 was exhibited in Chardin when it 
 was taken through Mingrelia on its 
 way to Persia. 
 
 In the Caucasian regions, which 
 abound in convents dedicated to 
 Mary, it wa^ always on the loftiest 
 
 * heights that the most beautiful mon- 
 asteries were seen : they were often 
 even defended by strong castles. 
 That of Miriam-Nischin, in Georgia, 
 was built on a rock of the Cauca- 
 sian chain, in the midst of a lovely 
 mountain lake, which rendered it 
 inaccessible by land ; it was protect- 
 ed by a fortress that was considered 
 impregnable. The castle and the 
 monastery were besieged by Melik- 
 Scliah, in the reign of Alp-Arslan, 
 his father, second sultan of the 
 Seljoucides line. Just as the army 
 of the Mussulman prince was pre- 
 paring to embark to commence the 
 siege, and the garrison, decimated 
 by hunger, regarded the approach- 
 ing attack with fear and sad fore- 
 bodings, a terrible earthquake took 
 place, and the monastery of St. 
 Mary fell shattered into the lake.* 
 This strange catastrophe was con- 
 sidered miraculous. "The Virgin," 
 said the Georgians, " would rather 
 see her sanctuary destroyed than 
 desecrated." 
 
 Before the principal gate of 
 Djoulfa, an ancient and commercial 
 city of Armenia, situated near one 
 of the most convenient fords of the 
 
 * D'Herbelot, BiOlioth. Orient. 
 
r/:, 
 
 cxi; 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 305 
 
 Araxes, there stands a solitary peak, 
 on whose narrow platform there was 
 built, in the first ages of Christian- 
 ity, a monastery in honor of the 
 Blessed Virgin. The declivities of 
 this steep rock, still adorned with 
 the pretty blue hyacinth and the 
 fragrant marjoram, are covered with 
 rich tombs and ancient tumuli ; but 
 the living — where are they? One 
 day it came into the head of a cer- 
 tain Asiatic despot* to erase Djoulfa, 
 a city of forty thousand inhabit- 
 ants, from amongst the cities of the 
 globe, and he sent Thamas-Kouli- 
 Beg with an order for the citizens 
 to evacuate it in three days' time : 
 he was obeyed. The inhabitants 
 hastily concealed their treasures in 
 secret places, hoping — vain hope! 
 — that Schah- Abbas,' when the 
 storm of his wrath had blown over, 
 would permit them to return to 
 their city. At the end of the third 
 day, when they were forced to set 
 out, and the last moment of respite 
 had passed, each one, taking the 
 keys of his house, followed the 
 priests, who carried those of the 
 churches. Arrived at the foot of 
 
 * Schali-Abbas totally depopulated the city 
 of Djoulfa, in 1605. 
 
 the rock where Mary's shrine still 
 overlooks the ancient tombs of their 
 fathers, their despair broke forth in 
 heart-rending sobs. Forced to con- 
 tinue their journey, the unhappy 
 exiles cast a parting glance on 
 their poor deserted city ; and, after 
 placing their churches and dwell- 
 ings under the special care of the 
 Blessed Yirgin, they threw their 
 keys into the river. 
 
 The Egyptians, who had never 
 bent the knee to strange gods, and 
 who seemed inclosed, as it were, 
 in their beastly region (as Jose- 
 phus called it while still flourish- 
 ing), had abandoned their grazing 
 divinities^ and giving back to the 
 waters of the Nile the hideous 
 crocodiles which had had their 
 devotees for food,f they had come 
 to adore the God of Calvary. The 
 descendants of the ancient people 
 of the Pharaohs had built, at an 
 early period, a beautiful church in 
 the small Egyptian village where 
 the Holy Family had taken refuge 
 from the fell designs of Herod, and 
 they had given it the name of Our 
 Lady of Matarieh; a pretty foun- 
 
 t Josephus against Appio, b. ii. 
 
^06 
 
 HISTkRY of the devotion to the blessed virgin MARY. 
 
 tain, where of old the Blessed Vir- f 
 gin used to wash the clothes of the 
 infant-God, had received the name 
 of Mary's Fountain, and that foun- 
 tain, together with a gigantic syca- 
 more which had often shaded the 
 Mother and Child, was the object 
 of numerous pilgrimages. The me- 
 tropolis of Egypt was also dedi- 
 cated to Our Lady; 
 
 The church of Alexandria, which 
 shone amongst all the churches of 
 the Christian world like a beacon 
 on a lofty eminence, had attached 
 to its patriarchal see, in the fourth 
 century, a kingdom almost unknown 
 to the Romans, and of which Pliny 
 related the strangest things ; * this 
 was Abyssinia, whose people, Jews, 
 Sabeans, or fetichists, according as 
 they pleased, were governed by 
 kings descended from Makeda, the 
 beautiful black queen who filled 
 Jerusalem w- ith jewels and perfumes, 
 and who had a son by King Solo- 
 mon. A young Tyrian merchant, 
 a trader in jewels, having been 
 shipwrecked on the African coasts 
 
 * According to Pliny and some other ancient 
 geographers, Abyssinia was peopled with men 
 who had neither nose nor mouth to their face, 
 and whos-e eyes were placed in the pit of their 
 stomach ; men were seen there without a head, ^ 
 
 of the Red Sea, was first plundered 
 and then conducted , to Axoum, the 
 ancient capital of the Queen of 
 Saba, where he was presented as 
 a prisoner of note to the Neguz 
 (emperor), that prince "at w^hose 
 name the lions bow down;" he 
 succeeded so far in conciliating the 
 Neguz that he made him his treas- 
 m-er. After the death of the black 
 prince, the education of his young 
 son, Abreka, w^as confided to the 
 Tyrian, who secretly instructed his 
 pupil in his own belief, and con- 
 ceived the magnificent hope of be- 
 coming the apostle of those half- 
 savage regions. In order to succeed 
 in this, he repaired to Alexandria, 
 where St. Athanasius consecrated 
 him bishop of Axoum. On his 
 return, Frumentius, who was sur- 
 named Ahha Salama (the father of 
 salvation), baptized Abreka, with 
 the principal personages of his 
 court; a great part of the nation 
 followed the example of its chiefs. 
 This religious revolution was effect- 
 ed, as all religious revolutions 
 
 and others with asses' heads, &c. Pliny, who 
 relates (b, vi. eh. 30, and b. v. ch. 8) these pro 
 digious things, leaves the subject unfinished, 
 and modestly stops, for fear, he says, of not 
 being believed. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 307 
 
 should be effected, without shed- 
 ding a single drop of blood. Ab- 
 reka and his brother Atzbeka, who 
 reigned together in edifying har- 
 mony, preached the Gospel them- 
 selves to their subjects,* and built 
 a great number of churches in hon- 
 or of the true God, under the invo- 
 cation of Mariam [Mary). One of 
 these ancient churches took, from 
 the woods by which it was sur- 
 rounded, the pretty name of Mari- 
 am- Chaoiiitou, Our Lady the Green. 
 Christianity then spread over the 
 opposite coast of the Eed Sea, into 
 Yemen, the inhabitants of which 
 adored the stars and the trees ; 
 amongst them there were a good 
 number of Jews ; a prince of that 
 nation, who had usurped the su- 
 preme power in Arabia, persecuted 
 the Christians, and, in 520, ban- 
 ished St. Gregentius, an Arab by 
 birth and Archbishop of Taphar, 
 
 * " Hail, Abreka and Atzbeka, who reigned 
 together with the greatest harmony, who preach- 
 ed the rehgion of Christ to the children of the 
 Mosaic law, and erected temples to the honor 
 of God." {Abyssinian Liturgy, Commemoration 
 of the dead.) 
 
 f The following is a prayer addressed to the 
 martyrs of Nagran by the Abyssinian Church : — 
 
 " Saluto pulchritudinem vestram amoenam, 
 
 bidera Nagrani ! gemmae qui illimiiaatis muudum, 
 
 metropolis of that country. St. 
 Aritas, Governor of ]N"agran, the an- 
 cient capital of Yemen, would not 
 give up his faith; he was taken 
 and conducted out of the city, 
 where he was put to death on the 
 banks of a rivulet. His wife and 
 daughter likewise perished in the 
 midst of- torments, together with 
 three hundred and forty Christians ; f 
 and as Dunaan continued to sacri- 
 fice all those who would not apos- 
 tatize, Caleb, King of Abyssinia, 
 marched against him, in 530, and 
 gained a complete victory over him. 
 Some time after, the same Caleb, 
 disgusted with the throne, sent his 
 crown to Jerusalem, J abdicated in 
 favor of his son, and shut himself 
 up in a monastery, taking with him 
 only a cup and a mat. The African 
 troops whom he had sent to the 
 assistance of the Christians of Asia, 
 seduced by the beauty and fertility 
 
 Conciliatrix sit mihi ilia pulchritude, et pacificatrix. 
 Coram Deo judice si steterit peccatum meum, 
 Ostendite ei sanguinem quem effudistis propter pulchritudi- 
 nem ejus.'' 
 
 (Abyssinian Liturgy.} 
 
 X " Hail, Caleb ! who gave up the sign of your 
 power when you sent your crown as an offering 
 to the temple of Jerusalem : you did not abuse 
 your victory when you destroyed the army of 
 the Sabeans." {Abyssinian Liturgy.) 
 
808 
 
 nrsTOii ) 
 
 ITE DEVOTION TO THE ^LESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 < >f that tutjtpy land, resolved to settle * 
 till re. These were the black Chris- 
 tians, who, commanded by the Gov- 
 ernor of Yemen, carried on, against 
 the Arabs of Mecca, that war known 
 as the elephant-war, Arabia Felix, 
 however, did not long remain in 
 their hands; it was wrested from 
 them in 590, by the Persians, who 
 weie themselves conquered, and ex- 
 pelled by Mahomet's captains. 
 
 At the time of the conversion of 
 Abyssinia, the doctrine of Nestorius 
 was agitating the Church. It is 
 generally known that the opinions 
 of that bishop, who refused to Mary 
 the title of Mother of God, were con- 
 demned by the Council of Ephesus. 
 The Abyssinians, in their exagger- 
 ated enthusiasm for the Blessed Vir- 
 gin, did not content themselves with 
 rejecting the heresy of Nestorius ; to 
 the title of Mother of God, they add- 
 ed that of Mundi Creatrix, to testify 
 their boundless veneration for Mary. 
 Nothing, in fact, can exceed the love 
 and respect of which she is the 
 object all along the Blue Nile, and 
 
 * The first day of the mouth of August 
 was called in the Syrian calendar saum Miri- 
 am, Our Lady's Fast, because the Christians 
 
 even as far as the Mountains of the 
 Moon. The errors of Dioscorus and 
 Eutyches, which the Abyssinians 
 have unhappily adopted, have made 
 no change in this respect. 
 
 The old East seemed to grow 
 young again through its devotion 
 to Mary ; it loved to do her honor, 
 and pompously solemnized her fes- 
 tivals, which were, -for the most 
 part, of apostolic origin. The Feast 
 of the Annunciation was regarded, 
 in the time of St. Athanasius, as he 
 himself tells us, as one of the great- 
 est festivals of the year, and for that 
 of the Assumption — which was cel- 
 ebrated with splendor from the Nile 
 to Mount Caucasus, under the name 
 of Our Lady's Easter — the people 
 prepared themselves by a fast of 
 fifteen days.* 
 
 All seemed to promise that the 
 Gospel was about to spread from 
 one end of Asia to the other, and 
 it was already beginning te be 
 announced to the idolatrous people 
 of the Celestial Empire, w^lio heard 
 without surprise of that Holy One, 
 
 teenth, which they named Jithr Miriam, that 
 is to say, the end of the fast, or our Lady's 
 Pasch. (D'Herbelot, Bihliolheque Orientale, t. 
 
 of the East fasted from that day till the fif- ^ ler, p. 2.) 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 309 
 
 born of a Virgin, whom the earth f 
 expected, according to the disciples 
 of Confucius, " as drooping plants 
 expect the dew ; " but, alas ! a storm 
 more furious, more destructive, more 
 irresistible than the burning wind 
 of the desert, and born, like it, amid 
 the sandy wastes of Arabia, came 
 to trample down Christianity with a 
 force derived, doubtless, from Satan 
 himself. 
 
 At first, there was heard but a 
 confused clashing of arms along 
 the sea of reeds ; Arab fought. Arab 
 with savage fury, and the idol-trees 
 fell to the ground as well as the 
 Christian temples ; then, all was 
 silent in that region, and myriads 
 of horsemen wearing abhas striped 
 in black and white, cast themselves 
 
 * The ancient Romans had bound up the fate 
 of their empire with that of the temple of Jupi- 
 ter Capitohnus, which was burned precisely on 
 the first appearance of Christianity ; the Per- 
 sians had ancient traditions which announced 
 the fall of the Magian empire when their famous 
 standard should fall into the hands of the enemy. 
 The empire did, indeed, fall at the same time that 
 its standard feU into the power of the Mussul- 
 mans, in the battle of Kadesia. This banner 
 was at first a blacksmith's apron, which was 
 hoisted in a war of independence against the 
 tyrant Zohak, and accepted as an omen of suc- 
 cess by Feridoun, one of the greatest kings of 
 Iran (ancient Persia) ; it was covered with 
 brocade and adorned with a magnificent image ^ 
 
 on Syria like clouds of locusts, de- 
 stroying with the back of their scim- 
 itars fourteen hundred Christian 
 churches ! Thence they swept on 
 to Persia, which gave way before 
 them, leaving in their hands the 
 famous banner of Kawed, on which 
 the fate of the empire of the Magi 
 was thought to depend ; * the flames 
 of the superb library of Alexandria 
 lit them on their devastating course 
 through Egypt; a little time and 
 they leaped on the African coast, 
 where Carthage ruled of old, and 
 conquered all before them. Arrived 
 at the place where the ancients had 
 planted the pillars of Hercules, the 
 haughty conquerors pushed on their 
 stately coursers into the waters of 
 the Straits of Gibraltar, crying out, 
 
 of the sun, wrought with jewels ; a globe of 
 gold, representing the moou's orb, surmounted 
 this image, and around it floated broad bands of 
 red, yellow, and violet-color. This standard was 
 called Kaweiani direfsh (the standard of Kawed). 
 From the time of Feridoun, the kings of Persia 
 made it a point to adorn it with precious stones, 
 and. in order to make room for them, they had 
 been obliged to enlarge this famous banner be- 
 yond all proportion, so that it had obtained a 
 dimension of twenty-two feet by fifteen, when 
 it fell into the hands of the Arabs, who tore 
 it in pieces and divided it with the mass of the 
 booty. (Price, Mohamm. History, volume i., 
 page 116 ; and Hvft Kalkoum, volume iv., page 
 126. ^ 
 
liU) 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 us 
 
 they proudly waved their flashing * dejected heads beneath the brutal 
 
 scimitars, "God of Mahomet, thou 
 seest it is the land that fails the 
 conquests of the true believers / " * 
 
 and ferocious yoke of Islamism, and 
 the shades of ignorance soon thick- 
 ened and settled down over the 
 
 Africa and Asia had to bow their ^ splendid regions of the East. 
 
 CHAPTER YI. 
 
 THE WEST THE MADONNAS. 
 
 ONSTANTINE, af- 
 ter having raised 
 within the very 
 walls of Rome — 
 that goddess city 
 which Paganism 
 placed amid the stany heavens f 
 — the superb Lateran basilica, had 
 closed the Pagan temples ; but his 
 hand was not strong enough to 
 pluck up the deep roots of idolatry. 
 It is certain that the greater num- 
 ber of the Roman patricians re- 
 mained obstinately faithful to the 
 ancient idols of the empire; the 
 
 * riorian. Precis hintorique sur les Maures. 
 
 f " Hear ine, O magnificent queen of the uni- 
 verse — Rome, admitted into the starry skies," 
 said Rutilius, a famous heathen poet of the last 
 
 * senate itself was divided into two 
 parties, the one Pagan and the 
 other Christian, which made St. 
 Ambrose say that there was, as it 
 were, two senates. It was of the 
 idolatrous senators that Prudentius 
 said : " The successors of the Catos, 
 sunk in shameful error, still invoke 
 the Trojan gods, and in the privacy 
 of their homes venerate the exiled 
 lares of Phrygia ; the senate — I 
 shame to say — the senate still hon- 
 oi's two-faced Janus, and celebrates 
 the feasts of Saturn." 
 
 As to the great mass of the peo- 
 
 age of Roman letters. " Thanks to thy temples, 
 I am not far from the heavens." Rome was, in 
 fact, a deified city, and had its priests and its 
 temples. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 311 
 
 pie, by far the greater number were 
 sincerely devoted to Christ, and, 
 despising the altars of Jupiter, 
 thronged around the tomb of the 
 Apostles.* 
 
 The Italian peninsula was divid- 
 ed, like its capital, between Jupiter 
 and Jesus, Juno and Mary; the 
 darkness of error struggled with all 
 its might against the increasing 
 light of truth. The heathen priests 
 ascribed to the desertion of their 
 gods the calamities which befell the 
 empire. If the famine were unu- 
 sually great in Latium, it was be- 
 cause Caesar, ill-advised by the 
 Christians around him, had sup- 
 pressed the privileges of the Ves- 
 tals ; if the frontiers were ravaged 
 with impunity by the Barbarians, 
 or if the Goths penetrated to the 
 very heart of the empire, it was 
 because the altar of Victory had 
 been destroyed. "We demand back 
 the religious state which has so 
 long served to maintain the repub- 
 lic," said Symmachus, prefect of 
 Rome, to the Emperor Yalentinian 
 II. ; " we demand peace for the gods 
 
 * "All this populace, inhabiting the upper sto- 
 ries of the houses and living on the bread of the 
 rich, visits, at the foot of the Vatican mount, 
 
 * of our country; our religion subju- 
 gated the world, it repulsed Hanni- 
 bal from our walls, and drove the 
 Gauls from the capital. Whatl 
 would Rome reform in her old days 
 what has all along been her safety ? 
 The reform of age is tardy and de- 
 grading ! " 
 
 Paganism was vanquished by St. 
 Ambrose in this struggle, but it 
 continued, notwithstanding, to rear 
 itself up against the new religion, 
 which it overwhelmed with sarcasm, 
 calumny, and haughty contempt. It 
 was with transports of joy that 
 Rome restored, under Julian, the 
 altar of Victory, which, neverthe- 
 less, did not prevent the Barbarians 
 from sacking the city several times. 
 Panic-struck to see the enemy at 
 its gates, it became again more 
 than half Pagan ; ceremonies for- 
 bidden by the laws of Gratian and 
 Theodosius were publicly perfoi'med ; 
 the prefect of Rome called in the 
 aid of Tuscan diviners, and the last 
 of the consuls revived the augurial 
 rites by another parody on the day 
 of his installation. "It was too 
 
 the tomb which contains that precious pledge, 
 the ashes of St. Peter, our father." (Pruden- 
 tius contra Symmachum.) 
 
i- 
 
 812 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 much," says Bt^ssuet ; " God remem- 
 bered, at last, all the bloody decrees 
 of the senate against the faithful, 
 and the furious shouts wherewith 
 the Roman people, in their thirst 
 for Christian blood, had so often 
 filled the amphitheatre ; he gave up 
 to the Barbarians that city which 
 was drunk with the blood of the 
 martyre. . . . That new Babylon, 
 the imitator of the old; like her, 
 inflated with her victories, glorying 
 in her riches, defiled with idolatry, 
 and persecuting the people of God, 
 falls, like her, with a great fall ; the 
 glory of her conquests, which she 
 attributed to her gods, is taken 
 ft-om her; she is the prey of the 
 Barbarians, taken three, four times, 
 pillaged, sacked, destroyed : the 
 sword of the Barbarians spares 
 only the Christians. Another Rome 
 — entirely Christian — rises from the 
 ashes of the former, and it is only 
 after the inundation of the Barba- 
 rians that Christ finally triumphs 
 over the Roman g)ds, who are not 
 only destroyed, but wholly forgot- 
 ten." 
 
 Idolal ly was dead at last ; its 
 marble fanes were rc-opened and 
 purified, and the most beautiful 
 
 * were dedicated to the Blessed Vir- 
 gin, before whom all Italy bent tlie 
 knee with a faith and a fervor 
 which, thank God, still remains un- 
 shaken. The i)atricians built innu- 
 merable churches or chapels, and 
 ornamented them with a munificence 
 which testified their piety; the al- 
 tars of Mary were incrusted with 
 gold, silver, and precious stones ; * 
 lamps no less splendid gave them 
 light ; nothing was spared to have 
 the splendor of religious decorati(m 
 commensurate with the dignity of 
 the Saint. 
 
 The people, having no gold at 
 their disposal, paid her a homage 
 more touching, more tender, and 
 move picturesque. On the smiling 
 sea-side hills, in the fertile fields 
 of the Campagna^ amid the gorges 
 of the Apennines, in the glaciers 
 of the Alps, and amongst the arid 
 heaths of the Abruzzas, humble 
 altars were here and there raised 
 to the Madonna. These little prim- 
 itive chapels, shaded with a net- 
 work of ivy or green vine-leaves, 
 
 * The counter-tables of some <jf the altars of 
 Venice were of solid gold ; that of the Virgin's 
 altar, iu the Church of St. Sophia, in Constanti- 
 nople, was composed of jewels and gold, cast 
 tosfether in the same crucible. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 313 
 
 were sheltered by the old forest 
 boughs, and their shade was cast 
 over many a stream in the fervid 
 heat of noon. This devotion, so 
 fresh, so simple, so appropriate to 
 the gentle heart and simple habits 
 of Her who is its object, exists even 
 now in all its religious poetry. Vic- 
 torious over time and political com- 
 motions, the Madonna still shades 
 her little mystic lamp beneath a 
 canopy of foliage or of creeping 
 jasmine. Still at evening does the 
 shepherd of the hills, the laborer 
 of the valley, and even the fierce 
 brigand, devoutly light the flicker- 
 ing lamp, which shines like a pro- 
 tecting star far up on the moun- 
 tains, and serves as a beacon amid 
 the woods. The little nook wherein 
 it stands is sacred ground : there 
 the most ferocious bandit of Cala- 
 bria would not dare to draw his dag- 
 ger ; and there even he goes to pray 
 when the distant bells chime forth 
 the Ave Maria ; it is the last link 
 which binds him to humanity, and 
 rarely, indeed, is that link broken.* 
 
 * The respect entertained by the Italian 
 banditti for the Madonna is a well-known 
 fact ; one of them allowed himself to be taten 
 without offering any resistance, because the 
 
 These little solitary chapels, lost 
 amid the rocks or in the depth of 
 the woods, awake in the soul of the 
 traveller, be he ever so reckless, a 
 thousand delightful emotions, like 
 the long-forgotten perfume of home- 
 flowers, suddenly greeting us in a 
 strange land. A modern author, 
 who is anything but partial to Cath- 
 olicity, gives a charming account of 
 the emotions which he felt on see- 
 ing one of these Madonnas, hidden 
 in the mountains of the Tyrol. " At 
 a turn of the path," says he, " I 
 found a small niche hollowed in the 
 rock, with its Madonna and the 
 lamp, which the pious mountaineers 
 light every evening, in the most re- 
 mote solitudes ; there was, at the 
 foot of the rustic altar, a bunch of 
 fresh garden-flowers ; that lighted 
 lamp, those blooming flowers, miles 
 and miles in amongst the bleak 
 mountains, were the offerings of a 
 devotion more simple and more 
 touching than anything I have ever 
 seen of the kind. Not more than 
 two paces fi'om the Madonna was a 
 
 sbirri attacked him on a Saturday, and he had 
 vowed before the Virgin's altar never to make 
 use of arms on that day, even in defence of his 
 Hfe. {See Father de Barry.) 
 
mSTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 precipice, along the verge of which ^ 
 \x\\ the only path out of the defile ; 
 the Virgin's lamp must tlms be of 
 great service to the nightly trav- 
 eller." 
 
 During the revolution of 1793, 
 and when the French had just taken 
 possession of the kingdom of Naples, 
 there was a report circulated that 
 they were about to close the church- 
 es and " abolish the worship of the 
 Blessed Virgin." On hearing this 
 the Calabrian peasants seized their 
 long muskets ; all the bells of that 
 wild region rang out the alarm, and 
 the brigands themselves, bearing 
 the image of the Madonna, sus- 
 pended by a red ribbon, enrolled 
 themselves in the regular army, and 
 fought like lions. These Calabrian 
 troops were the last to lay down 
 their anns.* 
 
 From Italy the veneration of the 
 Mother of the Saviour passed into 
 Gaul. The Olympian gods had 
 found their way thither in the train 
 of Caesar's conquering legions, and 
 the temples of Augustus and of Ju- 
 piter arose beside the dolmens^ the 
 menhirs., and the more modern altars 
 
 * Italy, by Lady Morgan, voL iii., ch. 24. 
 Travels m Italy, by M. E. C. 
 
 of Belenus. The idols of the empe- 
 rors, basely accepted by the Gallic- 
 Roman population of the large cities, 
 failed not to disappear after the con- 
 version of Constantine; but it re- 
 quired ages to destroy the Druidical 
 worship of trees, rocks, and springs.f 
 In vain did the active virtues, the 
 unctuous meekness, the angelic ab- 
 stinence of the hermits excite the 
 admiration of the Gallic tribes ; in 
 vain did the ingenious charity, the 
 spotless integrity, the mild, compas- 
 sionate religion of the bishops at- 
 tract their souls to the crucified 
 God ; the sight of the gigantic men- 
 hirs^ standing like dark spectres 
 amid the arid heaths, the aspect of 
 a mossy oak, or of a deified fountain, 
 destroyed in some moments the 
 tedious work of the Christian pas- 
 tors. 
 
 In this state of things, so calcu- 
 lated to wear out the most tried 
 patience, the clergy of Gaul showed 
 themselves worthy of the religious 
 and civilizing mission which they 
 had received from their divine Mas- 
 ter. They were by nature charita- 
 ble and humble of heart; necessity 
 
 f See Histoire Ecclesiastique de Bretagne, In- 
 troduction. 
 
HISTORY OF THE 
 
 IVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 315 
 
 rendered them skillful. l^»t)le to 
 break the superstitious habilwvhich 
 were closely intermingled wfth the 
 deep roots of the old Celtic tree, 
 they sanctified what they could not 
 abolish, and turned the very prac- 
 tices of heathenism to the glory of 
 God. The menhirs of the heath, 
 where the children of Teutates went 
 often to pray by the silvery light of 
 the moon, which they called the fair 
 mute^^ were surmounted by a gigan- 
 tic cross, which suggested a Chris- 
 tian thought amid the dark rites 
 of Paganism. The oaks of eight 
 centuries, where the Druids cut 
 down with their golden sickles '' the 
 spirits' branch,"! received in their 
 hollow trunks the sweet image 
 of Mary ; and it was also Mary 
 and the saints whom the heathens 
 found on the naargin of their " fairy 
 springs." % 
 
 This change, which manifests, 
 in those who made it, a profound 
 knowledge of the human heart, took 
 place not only in the Gauls, but also 
 among the Belgians, the Spaniards, 
 and the Britons : everywhere it was 
 crowned with success. In time the 
 
 * Bensozia, Ben. bel, sos, mute or silent. Hist. 
 Ecdes. de Bret., t. iv., p. 496. 
 
 ¥ 
 
 mysterious superstitions of Druidisni 
 descended from the songs of bards 
 to popular legends ; the daisies of 
 the meadow, the lilies of the valley, 
 the odorous stems of the honey- 
 suckle, were no longer stripped of 
 their leaves over the stream in honor 
 of the deified fountain ; they were 
 laid on the rustic altar of Mary, and 
 the little lamj) of her chapel replac- 
 ed the torches of resinous wood 
 burned by the Gauls around those 
 aged oaks, which they then called 
 the oaks of the Lord. 
 
 In the invasion of the Barbarians 
 the Christians, in order to hide from 
 the profanation of those fierce war- 
 riors the cherished objects of their 
 veneration, carefully concealed the 
 little statues of the Blessed Yirgin 
 in the wildest and most inaccessible 
 parts of their forests. There those 
 sacred images remained, not be- 
 cause they were forgotten, but be- 
 cause the sword of the Goths, Huns, 
 and Yandals cut down the native 
 tribes, as the mower does the grass 
 of the meadows, so that, in the most 
 fertile and populous countries of the 
 Roman world, the traveller might 
 
 f Le gui. Hist. Ecdes. de Bret., t. iv., p. 564. 
 X Id. ib., t. iv., p. 561, and i i., p. 293. 
 
»c 
 
 MART. 
 
 tlKfl j 
 
 witbix 
 
 appeared wiA i^ple: jlh^a, a«s 
 
 o^rdm^ to tiK old ck.v»^^««:r% Span- 
 ish. Bc^iaii, and VnaA, tibeir di^ 
 eoveiy was aBwipairied bj wr- 
 acks Al one timer a biig^ 1^1 
 atteacled bj m^ m. SptauA kanter 
 or a Pfrenean ^^herd to m bash, 
 where tiie Imds warbled sveedr aQ 
 tbe daj long; al anotber, Acre was 
 an ni^ of Mary ioiiiid bidden 
 amongst tiie iowos of a IhoniT 
 ^hmb, nsdoient witb the perfinaes 
 of Ae wild wood. Xow it was tihat 
 <f ^me sbephcrds^ seeio^ Aeir dieep 
 b»id tiie knee bcfive a ^ras^ 
 knoll, eiyrered witih wbite Tioieis^ 
 dog abont die spot, and foond, to 
 &eir mexpresaUe sarpriae^ m small 
 slatner md^ carred in wood, bat 
 in a pofeet slate of pieaaia tiop, 
 rqvesenln^ tte Bfessed Tiigin. 
 Again, it was fidfin^-stars. ilimMiiMr 
 
 le n%ht with a lo^ train of radi- 
 ance^ and an eoneeaAntii^ tiieii 
 raTs on Ae same sfti^ tiiat pointed 
 oat to the ^panidi troops^ enooqied 
 onder the waDs of some Moqr^ 
 cit«v the place wkere^ in tiie time of 
 Sodrjgov sflrie hofy monks had con- 
 eealed, on a ni^ht of fear and fiigbt. 
 a miracoloas imager in order to save 
 it finom tbe sacril^ioas hands of die 
 At anoiher time^ it 
 Takraos kni^ls or iilBsbnos^ 
 dames wbo^ ndin^ with &leon on 
 arm, fliraag^ die green fiiresis of 
 France or of Lnsitania^ disoofered. 
 in die hollow of some old, moe&- 
 grown oak, or in tiie bricr-liidden 
 creTiee of a ro^ a litde hidii^ 
 Mndonna-t AldBsag^lheproad 
 baron or flie noble ladv crasBed 
 thiwfcsilfe^i deiuati!^, descended in 
 haste from dieir palfr^^ km^ on 
 die grass beiore the Madonna^ and 
 Towed to boild her m chapeL 
 
 Oar Ladf of tte Hossomed Thorns 
 was foond on a bnshj rodk, nnder 
 marrelloas c ii e aofci ancegL Thefol- 
 
 t 
 
 em. of Fntti^gil, 
 •ff Omc Jjmir d (be Fcma. 
 
 l-i) 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIBOIN MARY. 
 
 317 
 
 lowing is the nari-ative, as told by a f 
 simple legend of the past : 
 
 "Xot far from the highest peak 
 of Jm^, but a little downwards on 
 its western slope, there was still to 
 be seen, about half a centmy ago, 
 a heap of ruins which had once 
 formed part of the monastery of Our 
 Lady of the Blossomed Thorns, built 
 by the widow of a knight, the last 
 of his race, who fell lighting for the 
 Holy Sepulchi-e. The noble lady, 
 walking one winter evening in the 
 long avenue of her ancient castle, 
 her mind occupied in pious medita- 
 tion, reached the thorny bush which 
 subsequently marked the site of the 
 monastery, and was no little sur- 
 prised to see that one of those 
 shrubs was ah*eady adorned with 
 the garb of spring; a calm, clear 
 light, like that of the rising day, 
 displayed the bush in full flower, 
 and beneath its verdant screen, 
 spangled with little white 'shining 
 stars, was a statue of the Virgin, 
 simply sculptured in rough wood, 
 painted by no very skillful hand, 
 but clad in robes of some value ; 
 it was from this image that the mi- 
 raculous light proceeded. The sa- 
 cred image was conveyed with great u. 
 
 pomp to the castle chapel ; but the 
 next day it was not to be ft and. 
 The Queen of Angels preferred the 
 modest shade of her favorite shrubs 
 to the splendor of the baronial 
 chapel; she had returned to the 
 fi*eshiiess and solitude of the woods. 
 In the evening all the inmates of 
 the castle went thither and found 
 her still more radiant than before. 
 They fell on their knees in respect- 
 ful silence. "Mighty Queen," said 
 the lady, "blessed and holy Mary, 
 this is thy chosen dwelling; thy 
 will shall be done." And a short 
 time after a stately Gothic abbey 
 arose on the spot where the mirac- 
 ulous Madonna had been foimd. 
 The nobles of the kingdom enriched 
 it with their gifts, and the kings 
 endowed it with a tabernacle of 
 pure gold. 
 
 Bretagne abounded in oaks con- 
 secrated to the honor of Mary ; the 
 most famous of these flourished by 
 the sea-side, on a hill which rises at 
 some distance from Lesneven. Our 
 Lady of the Gates was there honor- 
 ed, and her silver statue was, from 
 time immemorial, an object of pro- 
 found veneration for the faithful of 
 Armorica. The shrine is now bereft 
 
318 
 
 EISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 of its Madonna, which was stolen f 
 by the incorruptible agents of the 
 Republic; but it is still frequented 
 by numerous pilgrims, with long, 
 flowing hair, and goat-skin gar- 
 ments, who come to ask the Mother 
 of God for fine weather, abundant 
 crops, or the recovery of some sick 
 relative. To see them in this primi- 
 tive costume, anterior to the Roman 
 conquest, kneeling devoutly in the 
 shade of the woods, in view of the 
 green, restless ocean, and the dol- 
 mens of ancient heroes who marched 
 to the conquest of the Capitol, you 
 would fancy yom'self transported to 
 the Gallia Comata of Pliny, and the 
 illusion would be complete if they 
 chanted a hymn to the Virgin in 
 the ancient and sonorous idiom of 
 the Celts, their own peculiar lan- 
 guage. 
 
 Le Berry had also its celebrated 
 Madonna of the Oak, whom a Sire 
 du Bouchet, seeking his hawk amid 
 the woods, had found in the hollow 
 of one of those old trees, sacred 
 amongst the Gauls, on which the 
 hunter-bird had perched, as if to 
 attract his master thither. The oak 
 that spread its branches over the 
 fair statue of Mary, around which 
 
 the ivy entwined like a Gothic 
 frame, stood on a small islet covered 
 with fine, thick grass, and surround- 
 ed by a small lake, which had been 
 named — I know not why — the Bed 
 Sea. This oak became the terminus 
 of so many pilgrimages, that a 
 causeway was made to give access 
 to it, and it was subsequently en- 
 circled by a religious edifice. The 
 image, too richly adorned by the 
 piety of the faithful, was stolen by 
 the Protestants during the civil 
 wars ; but the Count de Maur had 
 another carved from the wood of the 
 oak which had so long sheltered the 
 Madonna, and this new one might 
 say, like the perfumed earth of the 
 Persian poet : " I am not the rose, 
 but I have lived near it."* 
 
 In Picardy, a small Madonna was 
 deposited in the hollow of an aged 
 oak, on the high-road from Abbe- 
 ville to Hesdin ; this miraculous 
 image, shaded by the fragrant hon- 
 eysuckle, overlooked a patch of 
 soft verdure on the side of the dusty 
 road, which offered a pleasant shel- 
 ter to the passing traveller and the 
 high-born pilgrim, who went bare- 
 foot, like St. Louis and the Sire de 
 
 * Saadi, Gulistan. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 319 
 
 Joinville, to some sacred place, in 
 fulfillment of a vow made by himself 
 or some one whom he loved. The 
 bandit of the feudal times muttered 
 an Ave to himself as he took off his 
 coarse woollen hat before Our Lady 
 of Faith ; and the noble dame, after 
 praying at the feet of the Madonna, 
 opened her alms -purse, adorned 
 with heraldric devices, and dropped 
 her alms into the trunk of the old 
 oak, where the Christian modesty 
 of the faithful of those days secretly 
 deposited, for the poor, the funds 
 which the latter took without the 
 shame of asking, and which no 
 other ever touched.* The traveller, 
 his devotions ended, sat down, with 
 his feet stretched out in the soft, 
 cool grass, which refreshed him after 
 his long journey ; he inhaled the 
 perfume of the flowers, listened to 
 the murmur of the neighboring 
 spring, and enjoyed the exquisite 
 sense of repose, so precious when 
 contrasted with his late fatigue. 
 But, alas ! he was at length forced 
 to depart, and how reluctantly he 
 turned away I The shade was so 
 
 * These trees, wherein travellers deposited 
 the alms which the poor came at dusk to take 
 away unseen, were so venerable, says M. de ^ 
 
 refreshing, the grass so soft, the 
 gurgling of the fountain so sweet- 
 ly soothing ! Crossing himself, he 
 murmured a parting prayer to the 
 Virgin, slipped an alms into the 
 hand of the poor invalid who knelt 
 hard by, and whose blessing follow- 
 ed him on his way : " Worthy trav- 
 eller, may Our Lady save you from 
 hurt or harm ! " At the bend of the 
 road he turned his head to take a 
 last look at Our Lady's Oak. 
 
 Anjou, where the pilgrimages m 
 honor of Mary are of so old a date, 
 had, near the village of SabM, its 
 oak, contemporary with the Plan- 
 tagenets, furnished with a Madonna 
 no less ancient. At the foot of the 
 Yosges, on the borders of Lorraine, 
 a huge old Gallic oak, which the 
 peasants still call, through custom, 
 the fairy tree^ had, in its mossy bos- 
 om, a white and mysterious image 
 of the Virgin, before which Joan 
 of Arc, that pious maiden, went to 
 pray with all her heart against the 
 English, who were so soon after to 
 fly before her victorious banner. 
 Hainault had also its old oaks and 
 
 Marchangy, that none, save those who really 
 required it, would dare to take a farthing. 
 
820 
 
 HISTOBT OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIROIN MARY. 
 
 miraculous images ; Spain and Por- * 
 tugal were not without theirs ; and 
 England, so late as the reign of 
 Charles the Fii*st, saw her Catholic 
 children still kneeling to invoke the 
 absent Madonna. Evelyn tells us 
 that these trees were known by the 
 name of procession-oaks.* 
 
 But of all the monmnents of the 
 vegetable kingdom ever consecrated 
 to Mary, there is none to be com- 
 pared to the oak of AUouville, in 
 the District of Caux. The circum- 
 ference of this ancient tree is thirty- 
 four feet at its base, and twenty-six 
 at a man's height from the ground. 
 It has the broad, open top of the 
 cedar, and its vast branches, which 
 spring from the trunk, about eight 
 feet from its base, extend horizon- 
 tally, so as to cover an immense 
 space. The interior of the tree is 
 hollow throughout ; the central part 
 being destroyed many years ago, it 
 is only by its bark and the inner 
 coats of sap that it still subsists ; 
 and yet it is every year covered 
 with acorns and adorned with an 
 abundant foliage. In the hollow of 
 
 * So late as the reign of Charles the Second, 
 there were found in many counties of England, 
 sertain old oaks which were commonly called 
 
 this oak, Avhich is, at least, nine 
 hundred years old, and has seen 
 the fall of the Druid-groves, pious 
 hands have constructed a charming 
 little chapel, lined with marble, and 
 decorated with an image of Mary. 
 A grating closes the front of the 
 shrine, without concealing the sa- 
 cred image from the eyes of the 
 pilgrim or the traveller. Over the 
 chapel is a cell, a fitting habitation 
 for some new stylite ; it is reached 
 by a spiral ladder which winds 
 around the trunk. This aerial 
 dwelling, covered with a pointed 
 roof, forms a steeple surmounted by 
 an iron cross, which rises in a pic- 
 turesque manner above the branch- 
 es of the oak.f 
 
 On certain festivals of the year, 
 and especially on the patronal feast, 
 the chapel serves for the religious 
 ceremonies of the day, and the 
 people of the neighboi-ing villages 
 repair in crowds to the feet of the 
 Gallic Virgin, who seems to wrap 
 them with maternal tenderness in 
 her fresh, green mantle. These good 
 people love their Madonna, and 
 
 jjrocHHuion-oakH. (Evelyn's Memoir.) 
 
 f See Ducatel's Norman AnliquUien {Antiquit'es 
 Normandes.) 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 321 
 
 have proved it well. In those dis- 
 astrous days when all that belonged 
 to religion was proscribed, when 
 the slightest manifestation of Cath- 
 olicism was punished with death, a 
 band of revolutionary bravos from 
 Rouen marched towards Allouville, 
 with the avowed purpose of burn- 
 ing the venerable oak, with the 
 Madonna whom it sheltered. The 
 peasants of Normandy, though much 
 less susceptible of enthusiasm than 
 the Bretons, assembled in arms 
 around the oak, and defended it 
 so valiantly that the republicans 
 were completely foiled in their de- 
 sign, and had to retire in disgrace. 
 When the Reign of Terror was at 
 its height, and the sound of hymn 
 or psalm was no longer to be heard 
 in . France ; when a misguided peo- 
 ple, worshipping Marat on the altar 
 of Christ,* vociferated, " There are 
 no longer Saints^ nor God^ nor im- 
 mortal soul!'' the iron cross of the 
 hermitage was still seen tapering 
 above the branches of the oak of 
 Allouville, and on the front of its 
 little chapel was still read the calm 
 
 * "It was during the festivals of Reason," says 
 Laharpe, " that the bust of Marat was placed on 
 the altar, when all who were suspected of fanati- 
 
 and touching inscription: "To Our 
 Lady of Peace." 
 
 Under the successors of Constan 
 tine the Great, Gaul, where Pagan- 
 ism daily lost ground, became almost 
 entirely Christian. In the time of 
 Theodosius, it contained seventeen 
 archbishop's sees, nearly all dedi- 
 cated to Mary, and one hundred and 
 fifteen bishoprics governed by men 
 of great learning, of rare piety, of 
 boundless charity, and of illustrious 
 birth, which added much to their 
 influence. Christianity was then 
 seeking to restore the primitive 
 gravity of manner and austerity of 
 morals amongst those Gallic tribes 
 so wholly given up to the sports of 
 the circus, their chariot-races, and. 
 the seductive pleasures of the the- 
 atre — enervating and pernicious 
 amusements which heathen Rome, 
 in her corruption, had cast, like 
 flowery chains, over the primitive 
 nations whom she could hardly sub- 
 due — undermining, by these means, 
 their martial courage. The bishops, 
 who havd been too rashly accused 
 of tampering with Paganism, be- 
 
 cism — that is to say, of believing in God — were 
 forced to bend the knee before Marat." (See Du 
 Fanaticisme dans la lanque revolutionnaire, p. 51.) 
 
822 
 
 HTSTOnr OF THE DEVOTION TO THE .'dLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 cause they were unable to eradicate 
 these noxious Pagan practices, used 
 every endeavor, on the contrary, to 
 extirpate them, and flattered them- 
 selves that they were succeeding, 
 when, all at once, amid profound 
 peace, and whilst Gaul lived from 
 day to day, careless of the morrow, 
 secure in the legions who occupied 
 her great cities, and the sixty for- 
 tresses which protected her frontiers 
 against the barbarians, behold ! the 
 sound of trumpets is heard beyond 
 the river which divides it from Ger- 
 many Hostile battalions 
 
 suddenly precipitate themselves on 
 the plains whose echoes are still 
 murmuring the Gallic songs ; fire 
 and sword devastate the country; 
 rivers tinged with blood, cities giv- 
 en up to pillage, the marble temples 
 of the old imperial gods laid pros- 
 trate on the ground, Christian 
 churches desecrated, announce the 
 dread approach of those ferocious 
 wan-iors of the North, whose' gods 
 bear the ominous titles of depopu- 
 laters and fathers of carnage ; they 
 
 burst on Gaul like a mighty ava- 
 lanche ; the warrior has no time to 
 seize his arms, fear deprives him 
 even of the power of thinking ; 
 wealth and poverty share the same 
 
 fate A thick, gloomy cloud 
 
 overcasts the fair Roman province, 
 and nought is to be seen save the 
 flow of blood and the flash of steel ; 
 from the Rhine to the Pyrenees, 
 from the Mediterranean to the 
 ocean, Gaul, lately so flourishing, is 
 but one vast scene of carnage and 
 desolation. This disastrous period, 
 which witnessed the final over- 
 throw of the Roman colossus, and 
 changed the form of Western Eu- 
 rope, was the gulf which swal- 
 lowed up the ancient civilization ; 
 and Robertson, the great English 
 historian, hesitates not to say that, 
 were he asked to point out the 
 most deplorable period of the 
 world's history, he would name that 
 which elapsed between the death 
 of Theodosius the Great and the 
 establishment of the Lombards in 
 Italy. 
 
 + 
 
C^irb |Peri0lr d t\t Jehtion U 
 
 THE MIDDLE AGES. 
 
 CHAPTER YII. 
 
 THE BARBAROUS TIMES. " 
 
 HE invasion of 
 the Barbarians 
 was, for relig- 
 ion, as for the 
 nations who 
 lived enervated 
 and civilized 
 under the shadow of the Roman 
 eagles, a period of mourning, of 
 terror, and of tears — a night of 
 blood, illumined by the distant glare 
 of conflagrations, resounding with 
 the clash of arms, and crossed by 
 warlike chiefs who took to them- 
 selves the fearful title of Scourges of 
 God. When the sound of this great 
 passage of men had ceased, and 
 it became possible to distinguish 
 objects through the smoke of con- 
 flagrations and the dust of battle- 
 fields, it was found that Europe had 
 changed its face. The Saxons oc- 
 cupied fertile England, the Franks 
 had taken possession of Gaul, the 
 
 Goths of Spain, and the Lombards 
 of Italy. There remained not a 
 single vestige of the sciences, the 
 arts, or institutions of the mighty 
 people of Romulus ; barbarism had 
 invaded all and swept away all 
 before it. New forms of govern- 
 ment, new laws, new customs were 
 everywhere observed ; one thing 
 only had resisted the general trans- 
 formation — Christianity, which was 
 to console the conquered and hu- 
 manize the conquerors. 
 
 The devotion to Mary, impeded 
 for a while by Arianism, which was 
 fatally predominant for some time 
 after the invasion of the Goths and 
 Yandals, flourished again under the 
 victorious banners of the Franks. 
 Clovis, the only Catholic king of 
 his time, conceived the design of 
 building, at the eastern extremity 
 of the city, under the invocation of 
 Our Lady, a metropolitan church, of 
 
324 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 which he himself laid the first stone, * 
 and which was completed by his 
 son Childebert.* Tliis church, built 
 on the site of an ancient Druid tem- 
 ple, was adorned with marble col- 
 umns, frescoes on a golden ground, 
 and a mosaic pavement. The poet- 
 bishop Fortunatus gives special 
 praise to its windows, which filled 
 the interior with a flood of light; 
 these windows were a luxury im- 
 poa^ted from Greece and Italy, and 
 were then first introduced into the 
 Gauls.f 
 
 Clovis the First also founded Our 
 Lady of Argenteuil, where the Prin- 
 cess Theodrade, daughter of the 
 Emperor Chai-lemagne, took the veil 
 after having accompanied her father 
 to Italy; this abbey, which was 
 then in the midst of the woods, was 
 destroyed by the Normans, and 
 magnificently rebuilt by the pious 
 Queen Adelaide, wife of Hugh Ca- 
 pet, who delighted to adorn its 
 altars with the finest works of her 
 hands. 
 
 * Felibien, Hisl. de Paris, t. i. 
 
 f The most ancient author who speaks of 
 stained glass windows is St. Jerome, in his Com- 
 mentary on Ezechiel, quoted by Ducange, verho 
 vUrce. After St. Jerome it is Gregory of Tours, 
 then Fortunatus. Paul the Silent, a contempo- 
 
 Tlie other Merovingian pi'inces, 
 not even excepting Chilpcric, the 
 sanguinary spouse of Fredegonde, 
 dedicated many chapels and abbeys 
 to the Virgin. Radegonde, daugh- 
 ter of Berthaire, king of Thuringia, 
 the holy and deserted wife of King 
 Clotaire, requested witli tears, in 
 her last moments, that they would 
 bury her in the unfinished Abbey 
 of St. Mary, which she was then 
 building at Poictiers. This same 
 pious princess, who refused to ac- 
 cept the regal crown offered to her 
 by her fierce and inconstant hus- 
 band, founded in Neustria, near a 
 Druid spring which the Gauls of 
 that time still obstinately perse- 
 vered in secretly worshipping, the 
 church of Our Lady of Cailliouville, 
 which was adorned with so many 
 sacred images that it was often 
 compared to Paradise. Of the Me- 
 rovingian church nothing now re- 
 mains, but the fountain still pours 
 forth its limpid stream, and people 
 come from afar to seek health in its 
 
 rary of Fortunatus, to whom we are indebted 
 for a minute description of the church of St. 
 Sophia, such as it then was, has also described 
 the beautiful windows of colored glass which 
 ornamented the dome of the Byzantine basilica. 
 (See VHist. de Byzance by Ducange.) 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO TEE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 325 
 
 waters. When the water is calm * 
 and undisturbed, the image of St. 
 Radegonde may still be seen ooa the 
 flag at the bottom, with the legend, 
 " Pray for us!" 
 
 Another wife of Clotaire the First, 
 Queen Waltrade, with the Princess 
 Engeltrude, a daughter of that king, 
 founded at Tours, about the year 
 600, a noble abbey, with the title 
 of Om- Lady of the Casket, prob- 
 ably because those princesses em- 
 ployed their jewels in forwarding 
 the work.* Several ladies of high 
 birth shut themselves up with them 
 in this monastery, which was de- 
 stroyed by the Normans. 
 
 Gregory of Tours mentions that 
 there was then in the capital of 
 Touraine a church of Our Lady 
 which was held in profound ven- 
 eration. On solemn occasions, oaths 
 were taken by placing the hand on 
 the Virgin's altar, and those who 
 perjured themselves were supposed 
 to die within the year.f 
 
 The royal' spouse of Clovis II., 
 Bathilda, that fair and holy prin- 
 cess, who was the pearl of those 
 barbarous times, founded the su- 
 perb abbey of Chelles, whither she 
 
 * Gallia Christiana, t. iv. 
 
 retired when her glorious regency 
 was at an end. This abbey was 
 placed under the invocation of the 
 Blessed Virgin, and was situated in 
 the midst of the dense forest where 
 Chilperic had met his death. A 
 great lady of the Merovingian court, 
 Lutruda, wife of Ebroin, that fam- 
 ous mayor of the palace who was 
 surnamed the Marius of the Franks, 
 founded, after the death of her 
 dreaded spouse, the splendid abbey 
 of Our Lady of Soissons, which 
 was inaugurated by St. Dronsin. 
 Six Carlovingian princesses gov- 
 erned this abbey in succession, for 
 a period of an hundred and forty- 
 five years. During all that time 
 Om' Lady of Soissons was regarded 
 as the flower of Frankish monaster- 
 ies, and the daughters of the high- 
 est houses took the veil there. Its 
 affluence became so great that it 
 was, at length, necessary to place 
 it within bounds ; on the prayer of 
 the Abbess Imma, Charles the Bald 
 fixed the number of nuns at 216. 
 That prince also prescribed the es- 
 tablishment of an hostelry for trav- 
 ellers and an alms-house in front of 
 the abbey gate. All was redolent 
 
 t Gregory of Tours, de Gl. M., c. 19. 
 
826 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 of piety ill this opulent house ; the f 
 divine office was uninterruptedly 
 kept up, and the nuns watched by 
 tui'ns, night and day, before the 
 Blessed Sacrauient. When the king 
 was with the army, or his life ex- 
 posed to any dangei:, a large num- 
 ber of the holy sisters passed the 
 night in prayer. According to the 
 custom of the feudal times, this 
 monastery was bound to send to 
 the army its quota of men-at-arms. 
 Its importance declined with that 
 of the Frankish empire ; but nu- 
 merous pilgrims were attracted 
 thither from all countries during 
 the Middle Ages by two relics of 
 the Blessed Virgin. Now, there is 
 nothing to be seen of this Mero- 
 vingian cloister but a few broken 
 arches. 
 
 An Austrasian princess, Plec- 
 truda, wife of Pepin of Heristal, 
 likew^ise built, under the first dy- 
 nasty, the church of Our Lady of 
 Colfgne, which still exists. 
 
 But of all the pious foundations 
 in honor of the Blessed Virgin, 
 which date from these remote times, 
 there is none more worthy of note 
 than that of Our Lady of Treves, in 
 the ancient country of Tongres, the 
 
 fatherland of the Franks, which 
 then made part of the duchy of 
 Austrasia. Who does not remem- 
 ber t'he popular legend of Genevieve 
 of Brabant? That moving tale, 
 sung by so many troubadours and 
 minstrels in the baronial halls of 
 the feudal times, and told by the 
 cottage hearth for a thousand years 
 and more — this story of the Barbar- 
 ous Ages, attested by a monument, 
 commemorates a most tragical event 
 — a true drama from which Shaks- 
 peare perhaps drew (for he loved to 
 draw from ancient chronicles) the 
 two most powerful characters that 
 his fancy ever produced — lago, the 
 traitor and calumniator, and Othello, 
 the hero with the credulous mind 
 and jealous heart. Sigfred, palatine 
 of Treves, reluctantly tears himself 
 from the arms of a beloved w^ife 
 to go fight the Moors under the 
 glorious banner of Charles Martel. 
 Golo, the master of the prince's 
 household, to whom he had con- 
 fided the care of his ' young wife, 
 a model of virtue and a pearl of 
 beauty, conceived a shameful pas- 
 sion for the princess, and was not 
 slow in declarir g it. Repulsed with 
 the contempt which his treason 
 
mSTORT OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 327 
 
 merited, the unworthy favorite, who 
 had deliberately planned his lord's 
 disgrace, hesitated not to calumni- 
 ate the woman whom he could not 
 seduce : for all vices are sisters. 
 Sigfred believed him; he was far 
 away from home, he loved his wife 
 madly, and was jealous ; in the first 
 burst of what he considered his just 
 indignation, he condemned Gene- 
 vieve to die, together with her 
 child ; but the servants charged to 
 execute this fatal sentence, in the 
 depth of a dark forest, had not the 
 heart to do it, and the Belgian 
 princess was left, with her new-born 
 infant, in that gloomy forest, peo- 
 pled only with wild beasts ; the 
 child was suckled by a wild doe. 
 For six long years did the innocent 
 and injm-ed wife live on roots and 
 wild fruits, constantly begging of 
 God that her innocence might be 
 recognized. The compassionate Vir- 
 gin, touched by so many tears and 
 so much misery, came to her one 
 day, as she sat by a spring, and 
 promised her that her wishes should 
 be accomplished. S-oon after, Sig- 
 fred, who still loved his wife, and 
 was inconsolable for her loss, being 
 Dn a hunting-party, found Gene- 
 
 * vieve in a cave, covered with rags, 
 her long hair hanging over her 
 shoulders like a veil. Golo con- 
 fessed his crime, and was torn 
 asunder by four wild bulls from the 
 Black Forest. This act of stern 
 justice being done, Genevieve had a 
 church built in honor of Mary amid 
 the woods where she had so long 
 wandered, and on the very spot 
 where the Mother of God had ap- 
 peared to her. Hydolphus, arch- 
 bishop of Treves, consecrated this 
 church in the year 746.* 
 
 Notwithstanding these marks of 
 respect bestowed on the Blessed 
 Virgin, it would be falsifying his- 
 tory to represent the devotion to 
 her as having attained its highest 
 pitch under the first French dy- 
 nasty ; the truth is, that it was then 
 only in its dawn. Local devotions 
 absorbed both the nobles and the 
 people : St. Martin of Tours, St. 
 Denis, St. Germain, and St. Hilary, 
 were each the object of such exclu- 
 sive veneration that, excepting only 
 Our Lord himself, all else was in 
 the shade. It was the altars of 
 those saints that were plated with 
 gold ; it was their tombs that were 
 
 * Add. ad Molan de Belgic. 
 
^838 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 covered with beaten silver; it was f 
 under the arches of their Roman 
 churches that robes of golden tis- 
 sue, embroidered with pearls, were 
 hung, ex voto,*^ The fair image of 
 Mary, the grand figures of the Apos- 
 tles, the army of martyrs, all fade 
 away before the first Gallic bishops. 
 Thus, an impostor of the name of 
 Didier, who would fain found a sect 
 in the sixth century, announced him- 
 self, with cool eff'rontery, greater 
 than the Apostles, and almost as 
 great as St. Martin.f This distorted 
 vision, which causes us some sur- 
 prise, proceeded from the gradual 
 extinction of light; legends began 
 to take precedence of the Gospel, 
 and ignorance, ever more produc- 
 tive of evil, did not always stop at 
 the threshold of the Christian tem- 
 ple; the successors of the Basils, 
 of the Ambroses, the Chrysostoms, 
 unhappily deserved what Alfred the 
 Great said of them, wuth sadness 
 of heart : " From the Thames to the 
 Humber, they no longer understand 
 the Pater, and in other parts of the 
 island it is still worse." J 
 
 Gaul was not entirely converted 
 
 * See Life of Dagob"t, by the Monk of St. 
 Denis. f Gregory of Tours. 
 
 to the Gospel under the Merovin- 
 gian kings; the Franks had com- 
 pletely abjured their fierce German 
 deities, but there were still some 
 vestiges of polytheism amongst the 
 Romans of the cities, who continued 
 to draw omens from the flight and 
 singing of birds, to feast on Thurs- 
 day in honor of Jupiter, to swear by 
 Neptune, Pluto, Diana, or the genii ; 
 in fine, who dared to light lamps 
 and hang up offerings in the de- 
 serted temples of the idols, for 
 which St. Eloi reproaches them in 
 his Homilies. These frail shoots of 
 Greek and Roman idolatry soon 
 withered of themselves on an ad- 
 verse soil; but the religion of the 
 Celts, as we have already said in 
 a preceding chapter, stoutly resisted 
 the sacerdotal axe, and it was ages 
 before it died away. So late as the 
 fourth century the image of the 
 goddess Berecynthia, representing 
 cultivated ground, was borne through 
 the fields. In the fifth, it is decreed 
 by a canon of the Second Coimcil 
 of Aries, that if a baron permits 
 lamps to be lit before trees, rocks, 
 or fountains, he shall be cut off 
 
 J Robertson's History of the Emperor Charles V., 
 voL I, p. 186. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED YIROIN MARY. 
 
 329 
 
 ii'om the communion of the faithful, 
 after being first admonished and 
 solemnly warned. At the end of 
 the sixth century, the Council of 
 Auxerre forbids vows being made 
 to bushes, trees, or fountains.* In 
 a Council of Nantes, the date of 
 which is fixed by Flodoard at the 
 year 658, the bishops are advised 
 to uproot the trees which the Bre- 
 tons still persist in worshipping, 
 and from which they would not, on 
 any account, cut a single branch. 
 The priest Paulinus represents these 
 same Gauls as having relapsed into 
 their former idolatry, placing meats 
 on the sacred stones at the foot of 
 these trees, and beseeching a ven- 
 erable oak (which was probably the 
 sepulchre of some old chief Druid), 
 with the humble funeral offering of 
 a handful of beech-nuts,f to protect 
 their wives, their children, their ser- 
 vants, and their houses.J The bish- 
 ops of Charlemagne's time likewise 
 pronounced severe penalties against 
 
 * This canon is conceived in these terms: 
 " Non licet inter sentes, ant ad arbores sarcivos, 
 vel ad fontes vota exolvere." 
 
 f They first raised the bark and then made a 
 square hollow in the trunk, wherein they placed 
 the body of the Druid; the aperture was closed 
 with a block of green wood, and then the bark 
 
 ^ these superstitions which had out- 
 lived the Merovingian dynasty, § 
 and they must have been still of 
 some account when the church 
 passed laws against them, so late 
 as the opening years of the ninth 
 century. It was especially in the 
 two Armoricas, east and west, where 
 the Gospel was late sown and of 
 slow growth, that the native wor- 
 ship, favored by forests as old as 
 the world itself, long held its ground 
 despite of councils and bishops, 
 who, nevertheless, strained every 
 nerve to root it out. The desert 
 of Scycy, in the Cotentine penin- 
 sula, was peopled, even in the sev- 
 enth century, by Pagan Gauls, who 
 lived there, as we learn from the 
 canons of some of the councils of 
 those times, positively like wild 
 beasts. But if idolatry was obsti- 
 nately sustained by the scalds and 
 bards, and some Druids wandering 
 in the woods, the zealous Christian 
 had the ardor which secures victory, 
 
 was restored to its place. The sepulchral tree 
 still lived on. In some of these trees bones 
 have been found almost reduced to ashes, and 
 with them some beech-nuts, in good preserva- 
 tion. 
 
 X Paulinus, lib. i. Paschdis Operis, oh. 2. 
 
 § Capitul. Caroli Magni, lib. i., tit. 64. 
 
830 
 
 BISTORT OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VTROm MART. 
 
 and pi*oved it well. In the depth f 
 of those remote solitudes, said to be 
 the haunts of demons, where sti-ange 
 things were indeed revealed, — when 
 the torches of the Gauls, who re- 
 paired by night to some forbidden 
 rite, flashed on the foliage of the 
 mighty oaks, or formed a fiery cir- 
 cle aroimd some dark dolmen plant- 
 ed on the moonlit heath,* — hermits, 
 often of high birth, took up their 
 dwelling in clay huts, covered with 
 brambles, some hidden by a coat of 
 mingled moss and ivy. Their beds 
 were of dry leaves, sometimes the 
 bark of trees ; then* food consisted 
 of fruits, berries, and wild roots; 
 their garment, a toga or gown of 
 white, coai*se wool.f Makinir their 
 way through the tall, tangled ferns 
 of those primeval forests, whose 
 secret ways they knew not, these 
 
 * The most solemn assemblies of the Druids 
 were those of the new and full moon; that of 
 the new moon commenced when that planet 
 gave sufficient light to iUximine the country on 
 the sixth day; the moonlight did not prevent 
 the worshippers from bearing torches, (See 
 Hist. Ecdes. de Bretagne, In trod., p. 184.) 
 
 ■fEven in the sixth century the clergy still 
 wore the white toga of the Roman people. In 
 d28 Pope Celestine blamed the ecclesiastics of 
 Vienne and Narbonne, who, instead of the toga, 
 began to wear a cloak and girdle. He shows 
 them that it is only the love of chastity which 
 
 good shepherds sought out in every 
 direction the sti*ay sheep of Christ 
 ^Tien the good odor of the sanctity 
 of one of these solitaries spread 
 abroad through the old Neustrian 
 woods, other hermits hastened to 
 place themselves under his guid- 
 ance. Then they set about clearing 
 the hard, dry earth, choked up for 
 ages with briers and brambles; 
 then the yellow crops began to 
 wave on the fair hill-side ; then, at 
 the calm evening hour, when the 
 bii-ds sat warbling on the trees, the 
 hymns of Sedulius, in honor of the 
 Virgin Mary, arose in grave, sweet 
 tones, from the very places where 
 the victim doomed to die under the 
 stone-knife of the sacrifices, to ap- 
 pease the Gallic gods, had of old 
 chanted his death-song.J 
 
 Woman — ever ready, notwith- 
 
 is recommended when the Gk)spel tells us to 
 gird our loins; that the discipline sanctioned by 
 so many holy bishops must not be corrupted by 
 superstition; that the clergy are not to be dis- 
 tinguished from the faithful by their garments, 
 but by their knowledge and the pui-ity of their 
 liyes. (Fleury, MoBun des Chretiens, eh. 4L 
 Ibid., t. iL, p. 185.) 
 
 X M. Pitre-Chevalier has inserted in his inter- 
 esting and patriotic work on Brittany, a very 
 curious bardic song attributed to the victim on 
 the dolmen. — " Hail, thou whose wings pierce 
 ^c the air, thou whose son was the protector oi 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 331 
 
 standing her natiu'al timidity, to 
 brave all dangers, when occasion 
 requires — woman would fain con- 
 tribute her share to the overthrow 
 of Paganism, and bravely advance 
 to attack it, even in its ancient 
 strongholds, under the protection of 
 Mary. St. Fremond, a nobleman 
 who had grown disgusted with the 
 world, and who was forced to re- 
 ceive the episcopal crown in his 
 humble cell, founded a monastery 
 of nuns in his beloved solitude, and 
 this convent is one of the first in 
 Neustrian Armorica of which there 
 is any record ; the holy bishop 
 added to it a handsome church 
 which he dedicated to the Mother 
 of God. This monastery, built about 
 the year 674, was destroyed by the 
 idolatrous Romans, but was rebuilt 
 with increased splendor by then' 
 Christian descendants. 
 
 The proximity of the British Isle, 
 which the Anglo-Saxons, the con- 
 querors of the native Britons, had 
 
 great privileges, the bardic herald, the minister, 
 O father of the abyss ! — My tongue shall sing 
 my death-song within the rocky circle which 
 incloses the world. — Trust of Brittany, He 
 whose brow beams forth light, support me ! 
 There is joy around the two lakes; a lake sur- 
 rounds me and the circle; the circle is sur- 
 
 ^ plunged back again into idolatry, 
 was fatal to the Neustrian pastors ; 
 for the idolators of Great Britain, 
 making common cause with the 
 Gauls, strengthened them in their 
 resistance. The Gospel, favored by 
 a Merovingian princess, once more 
 penetrated into the island of Britain 
 about the end of the sixth century, 
 and obtained a permanent footing 
 there, thanks to the wise measures 
 of Gregory the Great ; but this dis- 
 puted triumph was only partial ; 
 Edwin, one of the most powerful 
 princes of the Saxon heptarchy, 
 had the glory of making it secure. 
 
 Having, like Clovis, made a vow 
 
 * 
 to embrace Christianity if he ob- 
 tained a victory over the perfidious 
 kings of Wessex, who had tried to 
 assassinate him, and, having gain- 
 ed it, he convoked the Wittena- 
 gemote, or great council of the sages, 
 lords, and warriors of his little 
 kingdom, and, having explained 
 to them his reasons for abjuring 
 
 rounded by another marked by strong planks. 
 A fair asylum is before; high rocks hang over 
 it ; the serpent approaches on the outside, 
 creeping towards the sacrificer's vases with 
 the golden horns. These golden horns in hia 
 hand, his hand on the knife, the knife on my 
 head." 
 
 * 
 
382 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRQIN MARY. 
 
 his ancient gods, he demanded their * 
 opinion. 
 
 It was a strangely-imposing sight 
 tc see that Anglo-Saxon senate de- 
 liberating on the proposed change 
 of religion. The king, young, hand- 
 some, and of noble presence, pre- 
 sided over the assembly, his crown 
 on his head, a naked sword in his 
 hand, according to the custom of 
 those times, and clothed in a long 
 cloak fastened at the shoulder; 
 ranged on either side were the sages 
 of the nation, old men without aims, 
 wearing long robes and cloaks, with 
 Phrygian caps on their heads ; then 
 the warriors, in short, tight-fitting 
 garments, their round helmets, with- 
 out visors, adorned with a drooping 
 plume; on their arms shone heavy 
 golden bracelets; from a narrow 
 belt, which passed over their shoul- 
 dei, hung their sword and battle- 
 axe ; in one hand they held a lance, 
 and in the other a round shield 
 studded with golden nails; in the 
 background were the Christian 
 priests and the high- priest of the 
 idols. 
 
 The result of this national confer- 
 ence exceeded the hopes of the 
 bishops. The Pagan pontiff was 
 
 the first to declare that his gods 
 were utterly impotent. A warrior 
 noble, a thane, compared the life of 
 man to the wing of a little bird as 
 it flies across a room (perhaps he 
 saw one at the moment). " We see 
 the door by which it enters," said 
 the Saxon chief, " the window by 
 which it goes out ; but whence did 
 it come, and whither does it go? 
 This is the emblem of om' existence. 
 If the new faith removes this uncer- 
 tainty, let us hasten to adopt it."* 
 
 Thereupon, the king declared him- 
 self a Christian ; the entire assem- 
 bly solemnly renounced the worship 
 of idols, and the people soon fol- 
 lowed the example of the senate 
 and the king. This religious revolu- 
 tion took place in the year 620. 
 
 The German gods were over- 
 thrown in Great Britain, but not 
 so Druidism ; it lived in the old 
 insular forests where the Britons 
 still tattooed themselves, like the 
 savages of America, even in the 
 middle of the eighth century, al- 
 though it had been decreed by 
 councils that this strange custom, 
 which gave to the Scots or. North 
 Britons the name of Picts or painted 
 
 * Hist. d'Anglet., by M. de Roujoux, t. ler. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN 2IARY. 
 
 333 
 
 warriors, was of diabolical inven- 
 tion.* King Edgar prohibited, by 
 an ordinance dated 967, the super- 
 stitious assemblies called frithgear^ 
 held around the Druid stones which 
 were still adored in Northumber- 
 land, Cumberland, Yorkshire, Devon- 
 shire, Somersetshire, and especially 
 on Salisbury Plain, f w^here stood 
 the famous stone-henge (the chorea 
 giganteum of the ancients). This 
 prohibition was not strictly adhered 
 to, it would seem, since Canute, or 
 Cnut the Great, a celebrated sea- 
 king, was obliged, so late as the 
 eleventh century, to forbid the wor- 
 ship of trees, rocks, and fountains. 
 As to the Anglo-Saxons, they were 
 absolutely converted, so that not 
 a trace of their ancient worship 
 remained, and no sooner had they 
 exchanged the white horse of Hen- 
 gist on their banners for the Cross 
 of Christ, than there arose simulta- 
 neously, all over the country, con- 
 
 * This tattooing was condemned in 787 by 
 a Northumbrian Council, as a Pagan supersti- 
 tion and a diabolical rite. (See Goncil. Labbe, 
 t. vi.^ 
 
 f See Camden's Britannia. 
 
 I Hist. d'Anglet., by M. de Koujoux, t. ler. 
 
 § Sir James Hall, in his Esmy on Gothic Archi- 
 tecture, traces up the stone mullions, so light 
 and so elegant, of the great pointed windows, 
 
 f vents, cathedrals, churches, hermi- 
 tages, and chapels in lienor of the 
 Blessed Mary, sometimes alone, 
 sometimes associated with one of 
 the Apostles or the Saxon saints, 
 when they came ti) Lave any. 
 Nothing could be more simple than 
 the greater part of these first Anglo- 
 Saxon chapels. Their walls were 
 formed of huge trunks of trees, 
 taken from the neighboring forests 
 and cemented with moss or green 
 sods mixed with clay; the interior 
 of the walls was rough-cast with a 
 slaty earth which took a kind of 
 polish, and on this were traced col- 
 ored figures, in barbarous designs.^ 
 At the farther end of the little 
 building, where wind, rain and light 
 were all admitted through the osier 
 lattice which served for glass, § there 
 stood over a tomb -shaped altar, 
 covered with a red cloth with a 
 deep fringe, || an image of the 
 Blessed Virgin in the costume of 
 
 to the imitation of these osier lattices. (See 
 Edinburgh Phil. Trans.) 
 
 II It must be remembered that the ancient 
 altars of Christianity were the tombs of martyrs; 
 the stuffs, often very rich, which covered the 
 altars, were red, in imitation of the color of 
 blood ; covers were sometimes brought from 
 the tomb of SS. Peter and Paul in Rome. ( Hist. 
 ^ Eccles. de Bretagne.) 
 
83i 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 a Saxon lady. The straw roof of 
 the chapel was surmounted by a 
 little bell. In front of this primi- 
 tive monument, there was seen a 
 cross formed of tsvo trees fastened 
 together by branches of willow, 
 and crowned with a wreath of box 
 or ivy ; this was the sign of the 
 change of worship, and the trophy 
 of Christ's victory over Zernebock 
 and Hertha. A little later, the 
 Anglo-Saxon bishops brought fi*om 
 Rome painters, glaziers and build- 
 ers ;* but the cathedrals and abbeys, 
 which they built under the invoca- 
 tion of Mary and the Saints, were all 
 in the heavy, cumbrous style which 
 prevailed at that time. 
 
 When William of Normandy made 
 the conquest of England, the. Anglo- 
 Norman churches, with their bold 
 steeples, their splendid belfries, and 
 their lofty towers, suddenly started 
 up, in the pride of their fairy archi- 
 tecture, by the side of the heavy 
 churches and rude chapels of the 
 Saxons. But the latter, notwith- 
 standing their want of elegance, 
 still retained a charm which exer- 
 
 ♦ "Misit legataries in Galliam, qui vitri fac- 
 tores, artifices videlicet Britanniis ea tenus in- 
 3ognitos, ad cancellandos ecclesiae porticus 
 
 f cised a powerful influence over the 
 conquered nation : it was there that 
 the vanquished came to weep and 
 pray. The Virgin, whom they had 
 venerated in happier days — the Vir- 
 gin who, according to the custom 
 of those times, wore their national 
 costume — seemed to them more at- 
 tentive, more indulgent, more dis- 
 posed to help them, in those places 
 where she reigned over the graves 
 of their fathers and the sculptured 
 saints of Old England. 
 
 Christianity, which, according to 
 old Spanish tradition, was brought 
 into Spain by St. James, four years 
 after the death of Our Lord, made 
 rapid progress in that country, and 
 flourished there, mixed up, it is true, 
 with the tares of Arianism, from the 
 invasion of the Goths and Vandals ; 
 the veneration of Mary was already 
 common, though somewhat eclipsed 
 by that of St. Vincent, the great 
 martyr of Caesar- Augusta, now Sar- 
 agossa, whom Prudentius has cele- 
 brated in his hymns. Our Lady of 
 the Pillar, which was at first, it 
 seems, but a poor chapel, built of 
 
 et ccenacularum ejus fenestras, abducerent." 
 (Ven. Bede, Lib. de WiremiUhensi monasterio, 
 c. 5.) 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 335 
 
 clay and round stones, was already 
 a Roman church, frequented by nu- 
 merous pilgrims, where the statue 
 of the Blessed Virgin seemed to 
 smile on the kneeling Spaniards 
 from the height of her rich marble 
 column. Our Lady of Toledo, the 
 metropolitan church of Spain, the 
 foundation of which is referred by 
 some Spanish historians to the 
 first ages of Christianity, was au- 
 thentically consecrated in the year 
 630, under the Gothic king Recar- 
 edo, the first king of Spain who 
 merited the title of Catholic, since 
 he expelled the Arians from his 
 kingdom, after having their errors 
 condemned by a council held in 
 Toledo. But the shrine of Mary 
 most frequented by the Spanish 
 people, in those remote ages to 
 which we now refer, was that of 
 Our Lady of Covadonga, in the 
 xisturias. The reason was, that, 
 under the natural arches of this 
 Asturian cave, consecrated to Mary 
 by the ancient hermits when they 
 were waging war against Druidism* 
 in the depth of the Spanish forests, 
 
 * The twelfth and sixteenth Council of Toledo, 
 of which one was held in the year 681, and the 
 other in the year 693, teach, by their eleventh 
 
 where it long manitained itself, the 
 flag of independence — the sacred 
 banner of the Cross — had taken 
 refuge, as a last resource, after the 
 battle of Xeres, which delivered 
 Spain to the Caliphs. Abandoning 
 forest after forest, mountain after 
 mountain, and retiring with heroic 
 slowness to Mount Autiba, which 
 commands a view of the Cantabrian 
 Sea, the last boundary of Spain, 
 Pelago, a young man of the royal 
 blood, the only hope of his country, 
 found shelter for a short time, with 
 a handful of brave followers, in this 
 inaccessible cavern, which the piety 
 of the Asturian mountaineers had 
 consecrated to the Blessed Virgin, 
 whose sweet image was placed on a 
 rock that served for an altar. On 
 entering this rude temple, the Span- 
 ish hero conceived all sorts of hopes, 
 and, kneeling with his companions 
 before the sacred image, he solemn- 
 ly placed himself and the shattered 
 fortunes of Spain under the protec- 
 tion of Our Lady of Covadonga, 
 took the Vu'gin's name for his war- 
 cry, and fortified himself on her 
 
 and twelfth canons, that those who pay religious 
 worship to stones or trees, or other inanimate 
 objects, sacrifice to Satan. 
 
 / 
 
886 
 
 mSTORT OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIROIN MARY. 
 
 mountain. The Mother of God gra- f 
 ciously heard the Gotliic prince, 
 and was pleased to manifest her 
 protection by giving the Spaniards 
 a great victory over the Moors com- 
 manded by the Mussulman governor, 
 Alcama.* 
 
 Atti-ibuting this unhoped-for vic- 
 tory to the Blessed Virgin, Pelago, 
 to show his gratitude, founded near 
 the natural grotto, which was in the 
 side of a steep rock, at whose base 
 flowed the Auseba, a fair church 
 with the title of Oiu' Lady of Cova- 
 donga [of the cave), where all Spain 
 went to pray.f 
 
 The descendants of Clovis the 
 Handsome — le chevelu, as he is styled 
 in the introduction to the Salic law 
 — had sadly degenerated from the 
 valor and prudence of that prince. 
 The lamp of the Merovingians, al- 
 most consumed, was wasting away 
 without emitting a single flash of 
 light ; the sluggish kings, who were 
 no more than empty shows, were 
 scarcely seen by the people more 
 
 * According to Father Mariana, this army- 
 consisted of sixty thousand men. Sebastian, 
 bishop of Salamanca, and Ambrosio de Morales, 
 represent it as still larger. 
 
 f The church of Oui Lady of Covadonga was 
 preserved till the year 1775, when it was con- 
 
 than once a year, and then they 
 appeared seated on a chariot be- 
 decked with flowers and green 
 branches, drawn by four oxen, who 
 moved with a slow and heavy gait 
 towai'ds the Champ de Mai, there 
 to exliibit to the public gaze those 
 phantoms of princes whom the 
 breath of Charles Martel could de- 
 stroy if it deigned to do so. Yet 
 they were pious, and built monas- 
 teries ; but piety alone will not 
 sufflce to sustain a sceptre ; that 
 of France is heavy, and requires a 
 sti'ong arm, a fearless heart, a clear 
 head, and a prudent mind. The 
 mayors of the palace had all that, 
 happily for Christian Europe, which 
 was soon to be confronted with 
 Islamism.J 
 
 The Moors, being masters of 
 Spain, had looked with a longing 
 eye from the top of the Pyrenees 
 over the land of France, the fairest 
 kingdom of the West ; it seemed to 
 them good to introduce Islamism 
 there, and to change its churches 
 
 sumed by fire; the pious Charles III. wished to 
 rebuild it with great splendor, and had the work 
 actually commenced, though it is not yet finished. 
 This shrii)e is situate in the province of Oviedo. 
 I The word Islamism signifies consecration to 
 God. 
 
 i 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 337 
 
 into mosques. The project was no 
 sooner conceived than executed. 
 The rich plains of the South were 
 quickly covered with a numerous 
 army, which pillaged the shrines as 
 it passed along, and dashed from 
 their ancient pedestals the statues 
 of the Virgin and the Saints, con- 
 temptuously treating them as idols. 
 All France quaked with fear, from 
 the Pyrenees to the Rhine ; the 
 churches could scarcely contain the 
 multitudes who came to implore the 
 assistance of God and the Blessed 
 Virgin ; the bishops took up arms ; 
 the mitred abbots marched to battle 
 under the flag of their abbey; the 
 abbot of St. Denis hoisted the ori- 
 flamme^ which was then peculiar 
 to his own convent ; Aquitaine dis- 
 played the image of St. Martial, 
 and Charles Martel the cloak of St. 
 Martin of Tours, which was then 
 the royal standard of France. It 
 was truly a holy war ; and we 
 consequently see that those who 
 fell in this contest were numbered 
 amongst the martyrs. 
 
 The battle wherein the Moorish 
 scimitar and the Frankish battle- 
 axe were to decide the destinies of 
 the world, and secure the ti'iumph 
 
 f either of the Koran or the Gospel, 
 was fought on the plain of Poic- 
 tiers. The two armies viewed each 
 other at first with equal surprise. 
 The French could not help admiring 
 the brilliant Eastern cavalry, proud 
 of so many victories, and laden with 
 the spoils of Africa and Asia. The 
 ground shook beneath the fiery 
 tread of their Arab coursers as they 
 impatiently pawed and pranced, 
 seeming as though they would cry 
 " Forward ! " like their type im- 
 mortalized in the sublime descrip- 
 tion of Job ; the eye was dazzled 
 by the gorgeous flowing robes of 
 the Saracens, the splendor of their 
 jewelled turbans, and the meteor 
 glare of their breastplates and scim- 
 itars. 
 
 The army of the Franks, ranged 
 in angular form for the battle, pre- 
 sented to the sons of Ishmael a 
 sight no less sti-ange or imposing. 
 Those agile warriors, clothed in 
 short garments, and exceeding the 
 swiftest horses in the celerity of 
 their movements, — -that formidable 
 infantry, which united in its man- 
 oeuvres the ancient tactics of the 
 Eoman legions and the wild ferocity 
 of the Germanic races, — that brist- 
 
M8 
 
 mSTORT OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VTRGIN MARY. 
 
 ling triiuigle of spears and axes, * 
 advancing eagerly but steadily to 
 pierce the Moorish squadrons, struck 
 the Arabs with surpiise, and soon 
 convinced them, say the ancient 
 chronicles, that they had no longer 
 to deal with the degenei-ate Goths, 
 and that Charles was a different 
 person from Rodriguez. 
 
 The battle of Xeres, which deliv- 
 ered Spain to the Moors, had lasted 
 eight whole days; the battle of 
 Tours, which delivered France from 
 them, lasted but a single day. The 
 Arabs charged the Christian army 
 several times, pouring in one bat- 
 talion after another, like the over- 
 whelming billows of the ocean ; but 
 their insatiate fury broke in vain 
 against the solid phalanx of the 
 Franks, whom a Portuguese bishop, 
 Isidore, their contemporary, com- 
 
 pares to a wall of ice, against 
 which the Arab host dashed itself 
 to pieces. At length the ferocious 
 Abderama, lieutenant of the Caliph 
 of Bagdad, whose authority extend- 
 ed even to Spain, fell under tlie 
 crushing axe of Charles. The 
 shades of night separated the com- 
 batants, and next day, when the 
 Christian troops rushed on the Afri- 
 can camp, in order to complete the 
 ruin of their enemies, they found it 
 empty — the Moors had fled! Then, 
 each of the victorious battalions, as 
 they marched into the grateful city, 
 was greeted with the merry sound 
 of bells and the music of jo}'ful an- 
 thems ; and the whole city resound- 
 ed with the cry of " Praises be to 
 Christ, who loves the Franks, pro- 
 tects their armies, and watches over 
 their kingdom I " 
 
CHAPTER YIII. 
 
 THE NORTHMEN. 
 
 HE last of the 
 Merovingians 
 had exchanged 
 the white and 
 blue dalmatic, 
 the tiara of gold 
 adorned with 
 jewels, and the golden wand bent 
 in the form of a crozier, which 
 formed the sceptre of those princes, 
 for the brown habit of a monk; it 
 was a phantom the less. For many 
 a long year the mayors of the pal- 
 ace had been the real kings, and 
 the disappearance of the last de- 
 scendant of Clovis made so little 
 noise in the world, that the chroni- 
 cles of the time merely state, so 
 very concisely that contempt ap- 
 pears through indifference, that the 
 Franks assembled at Soissons de- 
 posed Childeric, and transferred the 
 crown to Pepin. This Austrasian 
 prince, who so boldly assumed the 
 crown of France, violating, by the 
 consent of the nobles, all the laws 
 of monarchy, had a sword able to 
 
 * defend it, and a head strong enough 
 to wear it. His valor was un- 
 doubted, his prudence proverbial, 
 and he showed himself more pious 
 than his father, Charles Martel, of 
 glorious memory, who pillaged the 
 church after having saved it. Pepin, 
 who • was remarkable for his devo- 
 tion to the Blessed Yirgin, was con- 
 secrated by Boniface, archbishop of 
 Mayence, in the famous abbey - 
 church of Om* Lady of Soissons, 
 where Gisele, one of his daughters, 
 the beloved sister of Charlemagne, 
 afterwards took the veil. It was 
 this prince who granted to the 
 Merovingian monastery of Our Lady 
 of Argenteuil a part of the immense 
 forest which lay near it. Pepin the 
 Short also founded, in the old Ger- 
 man forest, since so famous and so 
 dreaded as the Black Forest, a 
 charming rustic chapel in honor 
 of Mary. This he did on the fol- 
 lowing occasion: One day, as he 
 was hunting with his lords in those 
 immense woods, he heedlessly de- 
 
340 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 tached himself from his suite, and 
 lost his way. Not knowing what 
 to do, he stood hesitating which 
 path to follow, when the soft sound 
 of a hermitage-bell was wafted to 
 his ear on the autumn breeze. 
 Turning his horse's head in the 
 direction of the sound, the prince 
 soon reached a sequestered spot, 
 where a poor Scottish monk had 
 built himself a cell and a small 
 oratory by the side of a limpid 
 brook. This lowly edifice, • con- 
 structed without the aid of art or 
 the mason's trowel, was yet not 
 without its own magnificence: the 
 brier had interlaced its rich brown 
 branches through the narrow open- 
 ings, adorned with dark green leaves, 
 whilst the gold and purple foliage 
 of the wild vine seemed to fix on 
 the ruined wall the rich tints of the 
 setting sun. 
 
 The kings of that time, though 
 arrogant by nature, everywhere di- 
 vested themselves of pride in pres- 
 ence of a Christian emblem. On 
 seeing the black cross of the her- 
 mitage, the Frankish prince bent 
 his head as humbly as the poorest 
 shepherd would have done ; then, 
 
 * Astolfi, Dtlle Imagini miracolose. 
 
 f tying his horse to a tree, he entered 
 the humble sanctuary. The utter 
 nakedness of the holy place, through 
 whose broken roof were seen the 
 waving pine and the passing clouds, 
 cooled in no degree the simple piety 
 of the valiant prince. Having pray- 
 ed for a little time before a Ma- 
 donna, so rudely sculptured that 
 it would now frighten a child and 
 make an artist shudder, the king, 
 w^hoUy unprovided, yet unwilling to 
 leave the little chapel without some 
 token of his visit, laid before the 
 altar his jewelled cap. Returned 
 to his palace of Heristal, Pepin did 
 not forget, amid the cares and 
 pleasm-es of royalty, the little her- 
 mitage of Mary, which he rebuilt 
 with splendor, and richly endowed.* 
 Charlemagne, or Karl the Great, 
 as he is styled in the old Frankish 
 chi-onicles, rejected not the religious 
 inheritance of his father's piety. 
 There is on record one of his pious 
 visits to Our Lady of Marillais, in 
 Anjou — a pilgrimage which dates, 
 it is said, from the fourth century, 
 and which was then one of the most 
 popular of the Christian world, f 
 During his stay in Italy, his rich 
 
 * 
 
 f Grandet, Hist. Eccles. d' Anjou. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 341 
 
 gifts to St. Mary Major dazzled the 
 Roman people, accustomed as they 
 were to splendor and magnificence ; 
 Germany was enriched by him with 
 three clmrches bearing Our Lady's 
 name ; nor was this all. 
 
 Having exhumed the mineral city 
 of Granus, the remains of which he 
 accidentally found beneath the moss 
 and weeds of the fair valley which 
 skirts the Rhine and the Meuse, 
 Charles, having chosen it for the 
 seat of the Frankish empire, erected 
 there, by the side of his vast pal- 
 ace, under the invocation of the 
 Virgin, a chapel or oratory of octag- 
 onal form, ornamented with Italian 
 marble, lighted by windows incrust- 
 ed with gold, and secured by brazen 
 doors. This chapel, which equal- 
 led the basilica in extent, and sub- 
 sequently afforded a magnificent 
 asylum to the mortal remains of 
 the great emperor, soon became so 
 famous, that the German city, whose 
 glory it was, esteemed it a high 
 honor to bear its name. From the 
 Emperor Louis the First, till the 
 year 1556, thirty-six kings and ten 
 queens were crowned in this sanc- 
 tuary of Our Lady. This shrine 
 was so much frequented, that in 
 
 f 1496 there were reckoned, in one 
 day, an hundred and forty-two thou- 
 sand pilgrims. 
 
 The court of Charlemagne imi- 
 tated him in his tender and pro- 
 found devotion to the Blessed Virgin. 
 When he declared war against the 
 Mussulman king of Cordova, and 
 summoned the lords of southern 
 France to fight under the victorious 
 banners whereon was emblazoned 
 the figure of the Archangel Michael, 
 the great patron of the French of 
 that time, the famous paladin Ro- 
 land, his nephew, before crossing 
 the Pyrenees, which were to be so 
 fatal to him, made a pilgrimage, 
 in company with many high and 
 mighty lords, to Our Lady of Roc- 
 Amadom*. The Carlovingian prince, 
 after having piously invoked Mary, 
 offered her the weight of his hrac- 
 mar (sword) of silver, and conse- 
 crated to her that sword which had 
 already acquired so much renown. 
 As he was returning to France, 
 covered with glory, the vanguard 
 of the French army, commanded by 
 him, was surrounded and attacked 
 on all sides in the valley of Ronce- 
 vaux. In vain did the French 
 brave the danger with unflinching 
 
r 
 
 842 
 
 mSTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 courage; they were cut to pieces; * 
 not one would surrender; all per- 
 ished, both chiefs and soldiers. To 
 perpetuate the memory of this dis- 
 astrous event, there was erected on 
 the spot, over the collected bones 
 of those chivalrous warriors, a 
 chapel dedicated to Mary, in which 
 was placed an inscription bearing 
 the names of Thierry of Ardennes, 
 Rioles du Mas, Guy of Bourgogne, 
 Ogier the Dane, Olivier, and Ro- 
 land. This chapel, situated near 
 the abbey of Roncevaux, was 
 adorned with frescoes representing 
 a combat, and for six centm-ies 
 none but Frenchmen were buried 
 there. The last thought of the pal- 
 adin Roland, ere he expired on the 
 field of battle, was an act of respect 
 towards the Blessed Virgin ; he de- 
 sired that his sword might be borne 
 to Our Lady of Roc-Amadour, and 
 it was done as he had commanded. 
 
 Louis the Pious, or the Good, son 
 of Charlemagne, always wore the 
 image of Mary about his person 
 whether in the chase or on a jour- 
 ney. When, straying a little from 
 his com-t, he found himself alone in 
 the woods, he hastily unfastened his 
 gauntlets studded with golden nails, ,, 
 
 and, drawing from his bosom the 
 venerated image, he placed it at 
 the foot of an oak and knelt to oifer 
 up a prayer. He afterwards depos- 
 ited it in the superb abbey of Hil- 
 desheim, which he founded in honor 
 of the Blessed Virgin,* and where 
 he planted a rose-bush with his own 
 hand, which lasted nearly as long 
 as his noble monastery. 
 
 Under Charles the Fat, a craven 
 and deceitful monarch, whose dis- 
 turbed and unhappy reign prepared 
 the fall of the race of Charlemagne, 
 the Normans, conducted by Sigefroy, 
 came to lay siege to Paris. That 
 ancient capital of the Parisii was 
 no larger then than it had been in 
 the time of Caesar: the cathedral 
 of Notre-Dame, built by king Chil- 
 debert, to the east ; two large tow- 
 ers to the north and south ; and to 
 the west, the king's palace, formed 
 the four points of its circumference. 
 The Seine encircled it with its blue 
 waves. The river-side, towards the 
 north, was covered with wood, and 
 the octagonal tower which stood at 
 the corner of the Cemetery of the 
 Innocents served as a watch-tower 
 to keep off the incursions of the 
 
 * Triple Or., No. 75. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 343 
 
 robbers from the forest. In the 
 present quartier des Halles, in the 
 neighborhood of St. Opportune, was 
 a hermitage called the Hermitage of 
 Our Lady of the Woods, because it 
 stood at the entrance of the forest. 
 The mountain of St. Genevieve, was 
 thickly covered with vines, and the 
 faubourg St. Germain, noted for its 
 beautiful meadows, was a small ab- 
 batial village. 
 
 Sigefroy at first demanded per- 
 mission for the troops whom he was 
 leading to Burgundy to enter Paris 
 as they passed ; the Parisians re- 
 fused to open their gates to him, 
 and the Norman swore that his 
 sword should break them open. 
 
 Eudes, son of Robert the Strong, 
 shut himself up in Paris, and re- 
 solved to defend it against these 
 barbarians, who, not content with 
 pillaging the houses and churches, 
 robbed even the venerated bodies 
 of the Saints.* The siege was long 
 and bloody. Seven hundred N'or- 
 man barks blockaded the Seine ; 
 battering-rams, balistas, and cata- 
 pults were employed on both sides, 
 and either party darted against the 
 other fiery arrows and burning 
 
 * See Antiq. de Rouen, p. 102. 
 
 * brands. The Norman towers were 
 placed over against the towers of 
 the besieged ramparts, and the 
 enemy approached the walls under 
 covered galleries, which the Paris- 
 ians often succeeded in burning, 
 or crushing beneath the weight of 
 beams and stones. 
 
 From the very beginning of this 
 desperate and heroic conflict, Paris 
 had placed itself under the special 
 protection of the Blessed Yirgin. 
 It was her statue that the clergy 
 bore in procession around the ram- 
 parts during the siege, and many 
 a Norman arrow was aimed at it 
 in vain ; it was Mary whom the 
 archers invoked aloud as they hurl- 
 ed stones and other missiles fi'om 
 the height of the towers ; it was in 
 her honor that, as often as they 
 repulsed the Northern pirates, the 
 city was splendidly illuminated with 
 white wax tapers. " It is she who 
 saves us," said Abbon; "it is she 
 who deigns to support us ; it is by 
 her help that we still enjoy life. 
 Amiable Mother of our Saviour, 
 bright Queen of Heaven, it is thou 
 who hast vouchsafed to shield us 
 from the threatening sword of the 
 Danes!" 
 
844 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Some yeai's after, the Blessed Vir- f 
 gill assisted by a miracle in recover- 
 ing the city of Nantes from the 
 Normans, and expelling them from 
 Bretagne, which they had invaded. 
 Alain, afterwards surnamed Baihe- 
 Torte (Twisted Beard), who had 
 taken refuge in England with the 
 flower of the young Breton nobility, 
 then undertook to regain his coun- 
 try; he was but twenty years old, 
 an exile, and had little else than his 
 sword and the protection of Mary ; 
 but a sword is something in the 
 hands of a brave man, and Mary's 
 protection is worth whole squad- 
 rons. He landed with some Bre- 
 tons at Cancale, and, from stage to 
 stage, tracking his way w^ith Nor- 
 man corpses, the Breton hero at 
 length arrived under the walls of 
 Nantes, where the plundering North- 
 men had taken refuge, as a last 
 resource. Repulsed with loss by 
 the Normans, who had collected 
 niunerous bands around the city, 
 Alain, driven to the extremity of the 
 mountain with his troops, stretched 
 himself on the ground, "grievously 
 tired," says an old Breton chronicle, 
 "and tormented with thirst. He, 
 thereupon, began to moan pite- 
 
 ously, and, with humble supplica- 
 tion, to implore the help of the 
 Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of Our 
 Lord, beseeching her to open a 
 fountain of water, so that he and 
 his exhausted knights might quench 
 their grievous thirst. Which pray- 
 ers being heard by the Virgin Mary, 
 she did graciously open a fountain, 
 which is still called St. Mary's 
 Fountain, from which he and his 
 did drink, and being sufficiently 
 strengthened and refreshed, did mar- 
 vellously recover their vigor, and 
 returned as valiant as ever to the 
 battle. Falling again on the Nor- 
 mans, they slew them and cut them 
 to pieces, excepting only those who 
 lied with their booty to their ships." 
 Alain found the city of Nantes 
 sacked and burned. All covered 
 wdth dust and blood, the young lib- 
 erator had long looked in vain 
 amid the piles of smouldering ruins 
 for the stately chm-ch of St. Felix, 
 the roof of which, covered with fine 
 tin, was so clear, says a contempo- 
 rary work, that, when shone upon 
 by the sun or moon, it resembled 
 burnished silver. Alas ! that roof 
 had disappeared, and the sky was 
 the only covering of the ancient 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 345 
 
 church, whose altars were broken 
 and its tombs laid waste. In order 
 to reach the place where the high 
 altar had been, Alain was obliged 
 to clear away the briers with his 
 sword. Yet the Te Deum of victory 
 and the canticles of praise to the 
 Virgin were chanted with no less 
 fervor amid the ruins of that tem- 
 ple; and, before he arose from his 
 knees, the young Breton duke, recog- 
 nizing the tutelary support of the 
 Blessed Virgin, promised to dedicate 
 to her that cathedral which now 
 bears the name of Our Lady of 
 Nantes. 
 
 It was in the reign of Charles the 
 Simple that a whole army of the 
 bold Northern pirates who had so 
 long ravaged the western coast of 
 Europe was converted to the faith, 
 though at the expense of the fairest 
 jewel in the Frankish crown. Neus- 
 tria, a rich and fertile province, 
 
 * "For seventy-four years," says Eouault, 
 "the Cotentine had the misfortune to be pro- 
 faned by the pagan ceremonies of the North- 
 men and the idolatrous sacrifices offered to their 
 idols even in the city of Coutances." {Ahridg. 
 Lives of the Bishops of Coutances, p. 151. ) 
 
 f A Danish army, which had landed on the 
 coast of Brittany to pillage the rich and famous 
 abbey of Rhedon, was so terrified by a storm 
 which burst on the camp, that, instead of sack- 
 
 which they had overrun for nearly 
 a century, and had even forced to 
 conform to the savage worship of 
 their gods,* was made over to them 
 with the sovereignty of Bretagne, 
 on condition that Rollo, their chief, 
 whose progress through France had 
 been marked by fire and blood, 
 should become a Christian. The 
 condition was accepted; the Nor- 
 man pirate married a Carlo vingian 
 princess (who lived but a short 
 time), and was thoroughly con- 
 verted. Strangely enough, the re- 
 ligious element had been always 
 strong amongst these fierce North- 
 men, who several times sent pres- 
 ents and tapers to the very abbeys 
 which they had come to pillage, 
 when a storm rising at sea, in sight 
 of the holy place, induced them t(3 
 believe that the Christian sanc- 
 tuary was guarded by some celes- 
 tial power.f The first question put 
 
 ing and burning the abbey, the pirates, con- 
 sidering that it was forbidden by a God worthy 
 of their respect, gave rich presents to the abbey, 
 illuminated it with tapers, and placed sentinels 
 around it to prevent pillage. Sixteen soldiers 
 having infringed on the commands of Gode- 
 froy, their chief, and taken something from the 
 abbey, were punished with death the same day. 
 (Mabillonius, in Adis S. S. Ord. S. Bened., sect, 
 iv., 2d part.) 
 
846 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 by the new Duke of Normandy to f 
 Franco, archbishop of Rouen, who 
 was instructing him in the mys- 
 teries of Christianity, was to ascer- 
 tain who were the most renowned 
 saints of France and Neustria. The 
 prelate immediately named Our 
 Lady, and enlarged upon her great 
 power. "Well," said the Norman 
 prince, after a moment's pause, " as 
 she is so powerful, we must do 
 something for her." And he there- 
 upon made a large concession of 
 lands to Our Lady of Bayeux. The 
 city of Rouen had dedicated to 
 Mary its metropolitan church, burn- 
 ed by the Normans of Hastings, 
 and repaired as well as possible 
 some time after; the Duke was 
 baptized therein with most of his 
 Danish captains, and set on foot 
 to enlarge and beautify it — works 
 which his successors magnificently 
 continued.* Our Lady of Evreux, 
 one of the most ancient churches 
 of Normandy — if we believe the 
 
 * This prince was interred in the cathedral 
 of Notre Dame, which he had then rebuilt. 
 " He ended his days at Rouen, as a good Catho- 
 lic," says Taillepied, " and was inhumed with 
 g^eat pomp and funeral state in the great 
 church of Notre Dame, towards the south side." 
 {AniiquUks de la vUle de Rouen, p. 107.) 
 
 annals which relate that St. Taurin, 
 first bishop of Evreux, founded it 
 about the year 250, and consecrated 
 it to the worship of the true God, 
 under the invocation of the Blessed 
 Virgin — likewise received rich gifts 
 from Rollo, who gave, even to his 
 last moments, the most signal marks 
 of sincere devotion towards Madame 
 Sainte Marie, as she was respect- 
 fully called by the princes and no- 
 bles of that period. 
 
 These Norman dukes, by nature 
 gay, generous, and brave, were in 
 general very devout to the Virgin ; 
 it was before her altar that they 
 were invested with the regalia of 
 that fair duchy which they proudly 
 styled their kingdom of Normandy. 
 There it was, too, that they slept 
 their last sleep, under the gray flags 
 of her chapel, hung with tapestry 
 of silk and gold, representing the 
 principal events in the life of the 
 Mother of God, and wrought by the 
 duchesses of Normandy, f Robert 
 
 f " The Duchess Gonnor, second wife of Rich- 
 ard Sans-Peur, duke of Normandy, gave great 
 wealth to the churches," says Taillepied, " and 
 especially to Our Lady of Rouen, to which she 
 gave many splendid ornaments made by skillful 
 artists and embroiderers ; she likewise made 
 ^ tapestries of embroidered silk, representing 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 347 
 
 the Magnificent had, himself, no less 
 than three churches built in lionor 
 of Mary, and bearing her name: 
 Our Lady of Deliverance, to accom- 
 plish a vow made during a storm 
 whilst his bark was tossed about in 
 the dangerous waters of the Norman 
 Archipelago; Our Lady of Grace, 
 near Honfleur ; and finally. Our 
 Lady of Pity, under the ducal castle 
 which defended Honfleur. 
 
 This prince, so devoted to Mary, 
 resolved on going to Jerusalem to 
 visit her tomb and the Holy Sep- 
 ulchre; he set out on horseback, 
 accompanied by the richest and no- 
 blest lords of his court, all radiant 
 with gold, sparkling with jewels, 
 and surrounded by a crowd of var- 
 lets, squires and pages, as though 
 they were going to some great tour- 
 nament. As they passed along, the 
 people came forth in crowds to see 
 them, and their entry into Rome 
 was something remarkable. The 
 Romans regarded with admiration 
 those Northern barbarians who had 
 made even Italy itseK tremble, and 
 
 sacred histories, with pictures of the Virgin and 
 the Saints, to decorate the church of Our Lady 
 of Kouen." {Antiq. de Rouen, p. 112.) 
 
 * See La Normandie, by M. Jules Janin. ch. 2. 
 
 * whose tall statm-e and noble mien 
 reminded them of their ancient he- 
 roes. Seeing their lordly bearing, 
 their brilliant armor, their long 
 gold-hilted swords, and their point- 
 ed helmets, whence their fair tresses 
 escaped, they asked each other who 
 were these princes from the North 
 who came thus as humble pilgrims 
 to visit the tombs of the Apostles ? 
 The Pope gave them a distinguished 
 reception, bestowed on them his 
 pastoral blessing, and with his own 
 hands placed the pilgrim's staff on 
 the shoulder of their princely chief. 
 Thence they continued their route 
 to Constantinople, the city of Mary, 
 which they dazzled with their mag- 
 nificence. They scattered gold and 
 pearls through the streets as they 
 passed along; Robert's mule was 
 shod with gold, and when a nail 
 fell out, not a Norman deigned to 
 stoop in search of it; it was for 
 the Greeks to gather from the dust 
 the golden nails lost by the Nor- 
 man's horse.* 
 
 On approaching the holy places, 
 the Christian spirit made itself felt ; 
 those same travellers who had 
 crossed or braved, without acknowl- 
 
 ^ edging any right of toll, so many 
 
848 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVijTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 well defended rivei's, and so many * 
 embattled walls, those bold com- | 
 panions who always took care to | 
 let the point of their swords be seen 
 underneath the pilgrim's robe, they 
 who were so lately proud even to 
 insolence, could now be scarcely 
 recognized, so humble, so modest, 
 so collected were they made by the 
 mere proximity of that Holy Land 
 whose arid, rocky soil they trod 
 barefoot. Robert, so justly styled 
 the Magnificent, visited, with the 
 most edifying devotion, the holy 
 sepulchres of Jesus and Maiy. 
 Christians and Mussulmans alike 
 received from him such munificent 
 alms that the Emir of Jerusalem, 
 excited to emulation, refused to ac- 
 cept the ti'ibute due to him by these 
 splendid pilgrims. Robert left a 
 liberal donation at the Holy Sepul- 
 chre ; Richard 11., duke of Norman- 
 dy, had already made an offering 
 there of an hundred pounds of gold. 
 The pilgrimage accomplished, the 
 Duke set out by land on his return 
 to his fair duchy, which he was 
 
 * A Norman pilgrim, having met the Duke, 
 whom some Arabs were carryii^ in a litter, 
 Badly approached the dying prince, and said, 
 " What tidings shall I bring home of your lord- 
 
 never more to seel He died at 
 Nice, in Bithynia, jesting on the 
 aspect of death, like the sea-kings 
 bis fathers,* and commending him- 
 self to Madame Sainte Marie, as his 
 Christian predecessors had done. 
 
 The Norman nobles, who began 
 to dream of kingdoms under the 
 radiant sun of Italy, were no less 
 devoted to the Virgin than their 
 princes. The famous Tancred and 
 Robert Guiscard were lords of the 
 small maritime village of Hauteville, 
 where not a stone remains of their 
 castles, but where the old church in 
 which these Norman lions received 
 baptism is still seen, without a 
 spire, all covered with moss and 
 weeds; — they sent from the depth 
 of Puglia, where, with five hundred 
 Norman lances, they drove back 
 sixty thousand Saracens, the half 
 of a treasure which they had found, 
 to Geoffrey de Monbray, bishop of 
 Coutances, to build, under the invo- 
 cation of Holy Mary, the beautiful 
 fairy fabric which forced even from 
 Vauban himself that cry of wonder 
 
 ship ? " * Say," replied Robert with a smile, aa 
 he pointed to his bearers, "that you saw me 
 taken to heaven by four devUs." 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 349 
 
 and admiration, "Wliat sublime 
 madman was it that reared this 
 noble building to the clouds?" 
 
 Precisely at the same period, a 
 brother of Robert Guiscard, Count 
 Roger de Hauteville, founded in 
 conquered Sicily the famous cathe- 
 iral of Messina, which he failed not 
 to dedicate to the Virgin, according 
 to the custom of his house. This 
 sumptuous building, which was con- 
 secrated in the year 1097, partook 
 a little of all the styles of architec- 
 ture then known; the Byzantine 
 mosaic was there joined with the 
 arabesque of the Saracens, and the 
 graceful gothic spires adorned with 
 
 * This letter, which was first translated from 
 the Greek by Lascari, who was suspected of 
 having invented it, was subsequently found also 
 in Syriac in the old manuscripts of the bishop of 
 Mardin, in Syria, and was translated into Latin 
 by D, Joseph Allemani, a noble Maronite, in- 
 terpreter of Oriental languages for the Vatican 
 library. We do not pretend to examine the 
 value of this document, which is placed amongst 
 the apocryphal writings, notwithstanding many 
 protests ; we give it here as a curious and an- 
 cient document. 
 
 *' Maria virgo, Joachim et Annse filia, humilis 
 ancilla Domini, Mater Jesu Christi, qui est ex 
 tribu Juda, et de stirpe David, Messanensibus 
 omnibus salutem, et a Deo Patre omnipotente 
 benedictionem. 
 
 " Per publicum documentum constat vos mis- 
 isse ad nos nuncios, fide magna ; vos scilicet 
 credere Filium nostrum a nobis genitum esse # 
 
 statues of saints and angels wonder- 
 fully well gilt. In the sumptuous 
 treasury of this cathedral is pre- 
 served a letter of the Blessed Vir- 
 gin, in which the devout inhabit- 
 ants of Messina take no small 
 pride,* and on which several Sicil- 
 ian bishops have written volumes, 
 in order to prove its authenticity, 
 which is somewhat doubtful. In 
 the same cathedral is celebrated 
 every year the feast of the Farm, 
 destined to perpetuate the memory 
 of the Saracen defeat by the Nor- 
 man heroes. The Virgin, repre- 
 sented by a young maiden, figures 
 in this festival, seated on a magnifi- 
 
 Deum et hominem, et post resurrectionem suam 
 ad coelum ascendisse ; vosque, mediante Paulo, 
 apostolo electo, viam veritatis agnovisse. Prop- 
 terea vos vestramque civitatem benedicimus et 
 protegimus, et defendimus eam in ssecula sgecu- 
 lorum. 
 
 " Data fuit hsec epistola die quinto, in urbe 
 Hierusalem, a Maria virgine, cujus nomen supra, 
 anno xlii. a Filio ejus, ssecnlo primo, die 3 junii, 
 luna xxvii 
 
 "La chiesa metropolitana de Messina fu 
 dedicata alia beatissima V. M. della Sacra 
 Lettera e vi si celebra tutti gli anni una grande 
 festa. 
 
 " L'antica e pia tradizione della sacra lettera 
 della gran Madre di Dio sempre Vergine Maria, 
 scritta alia nobili ad exemplare cita di Messina, 
 illustrata con nuovi documenti, ragioni e veri- 
 simili congetture, dal P. Maestro D. Pietro 
 Menniti, abbate generale di S. Basilio Magno." 
 
850 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 cent triumphal car, "w Mist the Mus- f 
 sulmans vanquished by Count Roger 
 are represented by hideous colossal 
 figures. 
 
 From Normandy came the relig- 
 ious light which dispelled the hea- 
 then darkness of the North, and it 
 was Mary who received in her fair 
 cathedral of Rouen the first-fruits 
 of that sacred harvest. Harold II., 
 king of Denmark, who came with 
 an hundred galleys to the succor of 
 Richard Sans-Peur, abjured Pagan- 
 ism there ; and Olaiis, king of Nor- 
 way, who had joined his forces with 
 those of Normandy in a war which 
 Duke Richard 11. maintained against 
 Eudes, king of Blois, was converted 
 by Robert, archbishop of Rouen, to 
 Christianity, which he soon after- 
 wards introduced into his states. 
 This holy king had the courage to 
 throw down with his own hands the 
 statue of Thor, tutelary divinity of 
 Norway, in the ancient temple of 
 Drontheim; this statue had been 
 
 * The Scandinavians sacrificed prisoners to 
 Odin in time of war, and criminals in time of 
 peace ; but they did not always confine them- 
 selves to these classes, and in great calamities 
 even kings were sacrificed to appease the 
 gods. It was thus that the first king of Vermi- 
 land was burned in honor of Odin in the time 
 
 encircled by the Norwegian pirates 
 with a golden chain, and hence they 
 were wont to swear by the armlets 
 of that warrior-god whose club was 
 so dreaded by the giants of tJie frost. 
 Olaiis sent into Sweden Christian 
 missionaries, who were well receiv- 
 ed, and the gilded walls of the tem- 
 ple of Upsal, disencumbered of their 
 idols, cleansed from their human 
 sacrifices,* were adorned with the 
 blessed images of Chi-ist and his 
 Mother. 
 
 It was not the fault of the princes 
 of Christendom that the sun of the 
 Gospel rose so late on the horizon 
 of the Northern kingdoms; in the 
 middle of the seventh century, the 
 Saxon Willibord had labored in vain 
 to convert Jutland ; renewed efibrts 
 were made with as little success, in 
 the course of the eighth century, by 
 missionaries sent by "Witikind, the 
 convert of Charlemagne ; the ninth, 
 opened under more favorable auspi- 
 ces. Driven from his states, Harold 
 
 of a great famine ; and we learn from the history 
 of Norway, that kings spared not even their own 
 children. Haquin, king of Norway, offered his 
 in sacrifice to obtain a victory ; and a king of 
 Sweden sacrificed his sons to Odin in order that 
 that god might prolong his life. (See Wormius, 
 ^ Monument. Danic. et Sax. Grammat., 1. x.) 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 351 
 
 Klack, king )f a part of Jutland, 
 came to take refuge at the court of 
 Louis the Gcod, where he embraced 
 Christianity. A contemporary an- 
 nalist, Ermold the Black, abbot of 
 a Frankish monastery, gives a pic- 
 turesque description of the sea-king 
 and his Danish fleet. " What do I 
 see," says he, " shining in the morn- 
 ing ray, and covering the waves 
 afar ? What ships ascend the proud 
 Rhine in warlike pomp ? How those 
 white sails glance in the sunlight 
 over the mirror of the waters and 
 the dancing waves ! " This conver- 
 sion of the Jutland prince was 
 almost alone, notwithstanding the 
 exertions of Anschar, the apostle 
 of the North;- and those glittering 
 ships, so admired by the brave and 
 simple Franks, remembered but too 
 well the way to Western Europe. 
 
 The conversion of King Harold 
 did more for the Christian religion 
 than that of the Jutland prince. 
 On his return to his own country, 
 he forbade sacrifices, shut up the 
 temples of the false gods, built 
 Christian churches, and did all in 
 his power to promote the propaga- 
 tion of the Gospel. 
 
 His son, Sueno, a cruel and fero- 
 
 cious prince, declaring himself the 
 champion of idolatry, treacherously 
 killed his father, re-opened the tem- 
 ples of Odin and Thor, and destroyed 
 the Christian churches. After his 
 death, which happened in 1014, 
 Christianity again raised its head 
 and resumed its onward career. 
 Still the transition from one worship 
 to the other was not sudden, as 
 amongst the young and impetuous 
 conquerors of England and Gaul; 
 the Christian churches of Denmark 
 arose for a century side by side with 
 the stone of sacrifice. If Christ and 
 his Mother were venerated, the gods 
 of Walhalla were not forgotten ; 
 Thor still kept his place on the 
 altar, with his club in his mailed 
 hand, and if a hymn wxre sung to 
 Mary in her chapel, the hymn of 
 Odin was still chanted in the battle, 
 and to Odin were thanks returned 
 for victory, by a sacrifice of birds 
 of prey. It seemed hard for the 
 warriors of the North to abandon all 
 at once those warlike deities whose 
 tombs they possessed, and who had 
 made their fathers so mighty in 
 battle. They admitted that Christ 
 was God, and were willing to adore 
 him as such; but how could they 
 
852 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 dethrone the ancsent gods of their f 
 countiy, to make place for the God 
 of the stranger? Could not all 
 reign together ? The Walhalla was 
 full of virtuous women, it might 
 receive the Virgin Mary. Under 
 favor of this last exception, Pagan- 
 ism was more formidable than ever, 
 and the first Christian neophytes 
 made a monsti'ous mixture of both 
 worships by way of reconciliation.* 
 This state of things continued till 
 the reign of Canute the Great, who 
 established the supremacy of the 
 Christian religion. 
 
 The devotion to the Blessed Vir- 
 gin contributed much to the estab- 
 lishment of the Gospel amongst the 
 Scandinavians. From time imme- 
 morial they had deified virginity 
 in the person of Falla, whose fair 
 tresses were bound with a golden 
 band, and Gesione, who, after their 
 death, admitted virgins into her 
 
 Muntev. Muntev., Hid. Denmark. — Mallet, 
 Hisi. Denmark. 
 
 f "When Rogwald was killed," says the 
 famous Northern Scald, Regnier Lodbrog, in 
 his Epicedium or Dirge, " all the crows of the 
 air mourned for him." Apparently because 
 he gave them many sumptuous feasts of dead 
 bodies. 
 
 J The religion of the Scandinavians was whoUy 
 corrupt ; it no longer insisted on the worship 
 
 heavenly train. Three virgins, seat- 
 ed under the sacred oak, disposed 
 of the fate of men, and those white 
 ladies were also virgins who glided 
 over the lakes like a pillar of mist, 
 sat at midnight in the freezing 
 shadow of the pines, and sang with 
 a soft, low voice the Runic hymns 
 which the Scalds had engraved with 
 the point of their swords on the 
 rocks that overhung the sepulchral 
 mound of the heroes whom the 
 ravens of the air mourned.f It was 
 hard to set aside those charming 
 Northern fairies, who introduced 
 themselves invisibly into the peas- 
 ant's cot and the Jarrs (earl's) for- 
 tress, and whose coming was sure 
 to bring good fortune. These super- 
 stitions, equally cherished by the 
 high and the low, J could never, 
 perhaps, be totally eradicated with- 
 out the Blessed Virgin, who became 
 the protectress of cabin and pal- 
 
 of one Supremie God ; the intelligences who had 
 emanated from him seemed no longer to depend 
 on him, and, as a consequence of that almost in- 
 vincible inclination which has ever prompted 
 men to multiply the objects of their adoration, 
 they had acquired an equal right to the govern- 
 ment of this world. The belief in fairies and 
 genii, omens and divinations, had gradually be- 
 come an essential part of the Northern religion. 
 ^ (Mallet, Hist, de Danemark.) 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 353 
 
 ace. The influence of the Queen of * 
 Heaven on the conversion of the 
 Scandinavians, is proved by a fact 
 which none can dispute: it is, that 
 Christianity owed its success among 
 those nations to the mothers of fam- 
 ilies who afterwards gained over the 
 warriors. * 
 
 The first Christian kings of Den- 
 mark were faithful servants of Mary. 
 St. Canute, duke of Sleswick, dedi- 
 cated to her three superb churches. 
 Waldemar 11. placed her image on 
 his shield, and having learned that 
 the Kussians, leagued with the 
 Esthonians, threatened the rising 
 church of Riga, he solemnly pledged 
 himself to pass the following year 
 in Esthonia, as well for the honor 
 of the Blessed Virgin as for the 
 remission of his sins.f It was in 
 this war, commenced under the 
 patronage of Mary, that the Danes, 
 surprised in their camp, lost their 
 national banner. As they began to 
 give way before the Pagans, the 
 Blessed Virgin, whom they had 
 piously invoked before leaving Es- 
 
 * Mallet, Hist, de Danemark. 
 ■f Livonian Chronicle, p. 122. 
 I Mallet, who disputes this legend, acknowl- 
 edges, nevertheless, that no Danish historian 
 
 thonia, gave them, it is said, a sen- 
 sible mark of her powerful protec- 
 tion ; a red flag with a white cross 
 fell from heaven, according to an- 
 cient chronicles, and with that flag 
 victory returned. J The devotion to 
 Mary flourished long in the three 
 kingdoms of the North, as is proved 
 by the great number of cathedrals, 
 hermitages, and monasteries which 
 they dedicated to her. When the 
 scorching wind of the Reformation 
 had blighted that fair flower of 
 Catholicity, this devotion was still 
 secretly maintained ; and fifty years 
 after Luther, Mary was still vener- 
 ated in the subterraneous chapel 
 of the cathedral of Upsal.§ This 
 consoling devotion ended in those 
 far northern regions as it began in 
 Rome, amongst the tombs. 
 
 It was under the influence of 
 Mary that Prussia, with all the 
 coast of the Baltic Sea, received the 
 light of the Gospel. The Knights 
 Hospitallers of the Blessed Vii'gin, 
 better known as the Teutonic 
 Kiaights, civilized those barbarous 
 
 he has consulted explains in a satisfactory man- 
 ner the origin of this banner, apart from the 
 prodigy. 
 
 § M. Marmier, Ldtre a M. Salmndy. 
 
854 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 countries whose principal deities 
 were Hell (Poklus) and the thun- 
 der-god [Perlcon las) . 
 
 Amongst the nations of Sclavonic 
 origin, who substituted Chiistianity 
 for their bloody rites, and polished 
 their manners under its civilizing 
 influence, no people were so devout 
 to the Virgin as the Hungarians. 
 
 Towards the beginning of the 
 eleventh century, St. Stephen, first 
 Christian king of the Huns or Hun- 
 garians, founded Om' Lady of Albe- 
 Royale, in thanksgiving for a vic- 
 tory obtained over the prince of 
 Transylvania. This fair Sclavonic 
 basilica vied in magnificence with 
 the most sumptuous churches of the 
 East. Its walls adorned with su- 
 perb sculptures, its marble pave- 
 ments, its altars overlaid with gold 
 and incrusted with fine jewels, its 
 vases of silver, gold, and onyx, were 
 marvellous to behold. Over the 
 Virgin's altar were perfuming-pans 
 of silver, in which two old men, 
 whose cradles had been rocked to 
 the exploits of Attila, had the rarest 
 perfumes of Asia burned. Proces- 
 sions came several times in the day 
 to honor the Mother of God in her 
 sanctuary. 
 
 All this splendor was not suffi- 
 cient for the piety of the Hungarian 
 prince; descended though he was 
 from the Scourge of God, it was his 
 pleasure to hold his crown in sub- 
 jection to the Virgin, whom he de- 
 clared sovereign of his states. Thus, 
 as often as the name of Mary was 
 pronounced thi'oughout the extent 
 of that vast kingdom, there was not 
 a Hungarian noble, no matter how 
 high his lineage, who did not bend 
 the knee and bow down, as a vas- 
 sal, before his liege lady.* Within 
 the fortified walls of every castle, 
 there was a small chapel lit by sev- 
 eral brass or silver lamps, which 
 burned night and day before Mary's 
 image. The prince-palatines even 
 carried that same image to battle, 
 and raised an altar for it in their 
 tents. 
 
 The devotion to Mary was kept 
 up with no less fervor on the banks 
 of the Vistula. Dating from the 
 day when Dumbrowka, the fair 
 Bohemian princess, converted King 
 Micislas, and made him break the 
 idols which his fathers had raised 
 to Pagoda {calm air), to Poehwist 
 (the cloudy sky), and to the gloomy 
 
 * Bonifacius, Hist. Virg., b. iL, ch. ii. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 355 
 
 deities of the abyss, the Poles be- 
 came essentially Catholic, and built 
 numberless chapels of larch-wood 
 in honor of the Mother of God. 
 Pagan banners, taken on twenty 
 battle-fields, were the only orna- 
 ment of these primitive churches, 
 nestling amongst the ever-green 
 pines of the Sclavonic forests ; but 
 when, during the celebration of 
 mass, the minister of Jesus Christ 
 read the Gospel to those Northern 
 heroes, kneeling before an altar as 
 poor as the crib of Bethlehem, every 
 sword was seen haK drawn from 
 the scabbard, in token of protec- 
 tion and defence.* Nor was this 
 
 * This custom is traced to the time of Micis- 
 las, the first king of Poland. {Hist, de Pologne, 
 par M. L. S., t. ler, p. 43.) 
 
 ■f The Virgin Mary was Queen of Poland; 
 hence, whenever the Poles marched against the 
 Tartars, her image adorned the national banner. 
 {La Pologne Historique et LUteraire, t. ler, p. 
 396.) 
 
 * an idle show : Poland was long the 
 bulwark of Christianity; were it 
 not for John Sobieski, the Crescent 
 would, perchance, have crowned the 
 battlements of the cities beyond the 
 Khine. 
 
 Poland was early consecrated to 
 the Blessed Virgin ; Mary was sol- 
 emnly invoked under the title of 
 Queen of Poland long before John 
 Casimir renewed that consecration. 
 As often as the Polish army moved 
 against the Tartars, it was Mary's 
 banner that led its stately cohorts ;f 
 the name of Jesus twice repeated 
 was their battle-cry, and a hymn to 
 the Virgin their war-song.J 
 
 J In the tenth century we see St. Adalbert, 
 bishop of Guezne, composing sacred songs for 
 the Polish troops, who were fighting the paga.n 
 Prussians and Pomeranians. A hymn of St. 
 Adalbert, Boga-Rodziga (Mother of God), was 
 long the war-song of the Poles. (Alb. Sowin- 
 ski, A Historical Survey of Religious and Popxdai 
 Music in Poland.) 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 CHIVALRY. 
 
 [HE gigantic em- f 
 pire of Char- 
 lemagne had 
 vanished like a 
 brilliant phan- 
 tom; the last 
 of the Carlo- 
 vingians had been stripped of his 
 kingdom, already reduced to noth- 
 ing by the thoughtless extravagance 
 of his fathers, and the dukes of 
 France, who were also pretending 
 to the throne, as descendants of 
 Charlemagne, having twice tried 
 on the royal mantle, had at length 
 taken possession of it. Before they 
 appended the impoverished crown 
 to the great fief wherewith they en- 
 riched it, the counts of Paris had 
 given striking proofs of their devo- 
 tion to the Blessed Virgin. When 
 that mysterious and dreadful mal- 
 ady called feu des ardents, after 
 ravaging the southern pai-ts of 
 the kingdom, reached the Isle of 
 France, Hugh the Great supported 
 at his own expense the poor sick ^ 
 
 pilgrims who sought (and never 
 failed to obtain) their cure from Our 
 Lady of Paris.* Hugh Capet, foun- 
 der of the third dynasty, had a sin- 
 cere devotion for the Blessed Vir- 
 gin ; and Queen Adelaide of Aqui- 
 taine, his pious spouse, enriched 
 with her gifts the fair Abbey of Our 
 Lady of Argenteuil, which thence- 
 forward possessed the sacred relic 
 which is still exposed there to the 
 veneration of the faithful, Robert, 
 who proclaimed Mary the Star of his 
 kingdom, built monasteries in her 
 honor at Poissy, Melun, Etampes, 
 and Orleans, as we learn from Hel- 
 gaud. The church of Orleans was 
 called Our Lady of Good Tidings, 
 and was built on the spot where 
 Robert, when heir-presumptive to 
 the throne, was informed that his 
 father, Hugh Capet, had escaped 
 death. Worthy son of a king ! 
 
 In the reign of Philippe the First, 
 grandson of Robert, a prince who 
 showed himself more disposed to 
 
 * Felibien, Hist, de Paris, t. ler. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 357 
 
 pillage the churcli than to enrich ^ 
 it, a great event took place, which 
 gave the kings of France those of 
 England for vassals. William the 
 Bastard, son of that Robert the 
 Magnificent who died returning from 
 a pilgrimage to the Holy Land, con- 
 quered England in a single battle, 
 and established the Norman rule 
 in that country. "William, like his 
 father Robert, held Mary in the ut- 
 most reverence ; that conqueror, so 
 brave, so politic, at whose frown 
 all England quaked, was no sooner 
 attacked by fever than he humbly 
 clasped his hands and recommended 
 himself to the Blessed Virgin. Hav- 
 ing fallen sick at the Castle of Cher- 
 bourg, a small town then defended 
 by moats and towers, he made a 
 vow to build a fair chapel to the 
 Virgin, if by her powerful inter- 
 cession he quickly recovered his 
 health. He was cured, and relig- 
 iously kept his vow. He recon- 
 sti'ucted at his own expense the 
 superb Abbey of Jumieges, where 
 the student found learning and the 
 
 * This precious tapestry, contemporary with 
 the conquest of England, remained in some 
 degree unknown for six centuries. Exposed 
 only on certain days in the nave of the cathe- 
 dral, tradition had given it the name of Duke ^ 
 
 poor bread, on condition that its 
 church, dedicated by Queen Bath- 
 ilda to St. Peter, should be placed 
 under the invocation of the Mother 
 of God. He assisted in person, 
 with the Duchess Matilda and all 
 his great Norman barons, on the 
 1st of July, A. D. 1068, at the dedi- 
 cation of this church, and some 
 years after he crossed the sea to 
 be present at that of Our Lady of 
 Bayeux, with his sons William and 
 Robert, Lanfranc, archbishop of 
 Canterbury, and Thomas, arch- 
 bishop of York, on the invitation 
 of Bishop Philippe d'Harcourt, who 
 had rebuilt it. It was doubtless 
 on that occasion that the Duchess 
 Matilda made an offering to Our 
 Lady of Bayeux of that famous his- 
 torical tapestry on which her pa- 
 tient needle had wrought the great 
 epic of the conquest of England.* 
 "This tapestry, embroidered with 
 images and Scriptural scenes," was 
 hung throughout the whole extent 
 " of the nave on the day of the ex- 
 position of relics and during their 
 
 William's Toilet. It was Montfaujon who found 
 out that it was at Bayeux, and enriched his 
 Monumens de la Monarchie Frangaise with de- 
 signs from this tapestry, till then so little 
 known. 
 
858 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 octaves," says an inventory of the f 
 treasui'es of Our Lady of Bayeux, 
 drawn up in 1476. But this monu- 
 mental tapestry was not the only 
 mark of her devotion to the Blessed 
 Virgin left by this fair and pious 
 princess, whose memory was so re- 
 vered that the Saxon wife of her 
 son, Henry the First of England, 
 changed her pretty name of Edith 
 for that of Matilda, "in order to 
 please the Norman chivalry." 
 
 She w^as walking, towards the end 
 of October, in one of those beauti- 
 ful Norman meadows, the grass of 
 which resembles an immense car- 
 pet of green velvet, painted with 
 flowers. She was accompanied by 
 her two young sons — two future 
 heroes, the eldest of whom was to 
 immortalize himself by his chival- 
 rous exploits in the taking of Jeru- 
 salem — and some ladies of her court, 
 when a courier from Duke William, 
 riding with all speed towards Rouen, 
 drew up on perceiving her, and 
 bounded into the meadow. " What 
 news from my lord and the Norman 
 ai-my?" cried Matilda, pale with 
 
 emotion "The battle?" 
 
 " — Is gained, noble lady," replied 
 the cornier, as, bending his knee, 
 he placed in the trembling hand 
 of the young duchess the letter with 
 its pendant seal, which confirmed 
 the truth of his words — "The per- 
 fidious Harold is defeated ; his body, 
 which ought to have no other tomb 
 than the sand of the sea-shore, now 
 rests in the choir of the Saxon 
 abbey of Waltham ; England is the 
 vassal of Normandy." The Norman 
 princess joyfully blessed herself, and 
 made a vow to raise on the spot 
 where she had heard these good 
 news, a commemorative church, un- 
 der the name of Our Lady of the 
 Meadow, since changed into that 
 of Our Lady of Good Tidings. She 
 commenced it some years after, and 
 her son, Henry the First, having 
 had it finished, endowed it munifi- 
 cently.* 
 
 In his last war with France, 
 William the Conqueror delivei-ed 
 Mantes to the flames ; but that fire 
 which destroyed the church of Our 
 Lady shed such a lurid and terrific 
 
 * In the time of the Archbishop Godefroy, Good Tidings, near Eouen, which his deceased 
 
 Bling Henry (first of the name) of England built mother, Matilda, had commenced with the 
 the Priory of the Meadow, called Our Lady of y, bridge of Rouen. {Antiq. de Rouen, p. 136.) 
 
HISTORY OF TEE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 359 
 
 light, that the king of England's 
 horse took fright, began to rear and 
 prance, and threw his rider, who 
 was mortally wounded. Attribut- 
 ing the fatal accident to the burn- 
 ing of the Virgin's beautiful church, 
 he bequeathed a considerable sum 
 for the purpose of rebuilding it. 
 Being conveyed to an abbey near 
 Rouen, the conqueror of England 
 was roused at the dawn of day, on 
 the 7th of September, 1087, by the 
 sound of a matin-bell. "What is 
 that ? " he asked, raising his head 
 with difficulty, his face pale and 
 emaciated, though still retaining a 
 portion of that proud, masculine 
 beauty which even the Saxon chron- 
 iclers ascribe to him. Being told 
 that it was the bells of St. Mary's 
 church ringing Prime^ " Blessed 
 Lady Mary I " said the Norman hero, 
 raising his hands, "to thee I com- 
 mend my soul ; mayst thou recon- 
 cile me to thy Son, my Lord Jesus ! " 
 and with these words he expired. 
 
 Henry the First, his son, who 
 usurped the crown from Robert, his 
 elder brother, whose eyes he caused 
 to be put out, was devout only in 
 theory. Although he affected much 
 piety, and made many splendid 
 
 f foundations in England, where he 
 introduced the Norman architecture, 
 yet he burned several churches in 
 Normandy. For instance, he burn- 
 ed, in 1120 (the date is memorable), 
 the cathedral of Lisieux, with the 
 city itself. This ancient cathedral, 
 which dated from the first ages of 
 Christianity, was dedicated to the 
 Virgin, like most of the Norman 
 cathedrals. The punishment of this 
 sacrilegious offence quickly fol- 
 lowed ; at the end of the same year, 
 the vessel which carried Henry's 
 only son. Prince William of Eng- 
 land, with two of the king's ille- 
 gitimate children, foundered at sea, 
 during a calm moonlight night, not 
 far from Barfleur. From that time 
 forward, Henry was never seen to 
 smile. 
 
 The Empress Matilda, daughter of 
 this prince, had a signal proof of the 
 Virgin's protection, and her power 
 over the elements. Whilst at war 
 with Stephen of Blois, she was 
 forced to embark for Normandy in 
 unsettled weather, which very soon 
 became stormy, and was overtaken 
 in the very shoals where her brother 
 William had perished, by one of 
 
 ^ those frightful tempests which are 
 
860 
 
 HISTORY' OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 only seen on the angry ocean. The * 
 horizon was sheeted with a vast 
 black cloud, which reached from sea 
 to sky like a funeral pall ; the 
 mountain billows reared themselves 
 up with ominous slowness, to dash 
 with terrific crash against the, sides 
 of the royal bark, which they raised 
 high in the air at one moment, to 
 hmi it, the next, into the yawning 
 abyss. The sailors shook their 
 heads despondingly, whilst the En- 
 glish lords, crossing themselves de- 
 voutly, recommended themselves to 
 God and the Blessed Virgin, and to 
 St. George, the patron of chivalry. 
 Matilda was standing on the deck, 
 and her composed countenance, 
 though pale, belied not the race of 
 heroes from whom she sprung. " Be 
 of good cheer, my lords," said she, 
 turning to her faithful nobles, " Our 
 Lady is kind and powerful; she 
 will save us. I will sing her a 
 hymn of thanksgiving as soon as 
 we desciy the coast; and I pledge 
 myself to build her an abbey wher- 
 ever we shall land." Scarcely had 
 the Anglo-Norman princess spoken 
 these words, when the waves were 
 seen to grow smooth, the winds 
 were suddenly hushed, and the ves- 
 
 sel flew swiftly over a calm sea. A 
 dark speck was soon discerned on 
 the blue sky, as the clouds cleared 
 away ; it grew larger and larger 
 still ; it was a lofty hill, whose bare 
 summit was crowned with a hermi- 
 tage, and a vast forest was seen 
 stretching far and away in the 
 backgroimd of the picture. Then 
 was heard the hoarse cry, so im- 
 patiently expected from the man 
 at the mast-head, " Cante, Keyne I 
 vechi terrel" (Sing, Queen I here 
 is the land !) and Matilda instantly 
 began to sing her hymn to the Vir- 
 gin, which was joyfully repeated by 
 the English barons, with clasped 
 hands and bare heads. 
 
 The bark, miraculously preserved 
 from shipwreck, soon cast anchor in 
 
 r 
 
 the little bay of Equeurdreville, in 
 Lower Normandy. Matilda's first 
 care on landing was to point out 
 the site of her monastery, which 
 she named the Abbey of the Vow, 
 and before quitting the neighbor- 
 hood, she herself laid the first stone. 
 Matilda did not live to see the 
 Church and Abbey of the Vow fin- 
 ished; it was her son, Henry IL 
 of England, who accomplished the 
 work. We read in the necrology 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 361 
 
 of this abbey : " On the fourth 
 day of the ides of September died 
 the Empress Matilda, foundress of 
 this monastery; a Libera is to be 
 said for her, as for a canons 
 
 Let not our age, so cold in all 
 that relates to God and the Saints, 
 scoff at those vows made to Our 
 Lady during a storm; the most 
 incredulous believe in something 
 when in danger of perishing at 
 sea, as is proved in the case of 
 Volney. He was out on a pleasure- 
 party with some friends in Balti- 
 more, when the wind suddenly 
 arose, and the small American 
 craft, freighted with the flower 
 of the unbelievers of both hemi- 
 spheres, seemed twenty times on 
 the point of being lost. Every 
 one on board was already praying, 
 Volney as well as the rest, when 
 the storm began to subside. Some 
 one who had seen Yolney during 
 the danger lay hold of a rosary and 
 recite his Ave-Marias with edifying 
 fervor, approached him when the 
 calm had returned. " My dear Sir," 
 said he, with an arch smile, " to 
 whom were you praying, just now ?" 
 — " Oh ! " replied Yolney, somewhat 
 embarrassed by the question, "one 
 
 * may be a philosopher in his study, 
 but not during a storm." 
 
 The Empress Matilda desired that 
 her mortal remains should be in- 
 terred in the most famous of the 
 Norman abbeys, Ste. Marie du Bee ; 
 her son Henry, who was as yet only 
 duke of Anjou and Normandy, had 
 a tomb raised to her memory, which 
 he covered with plates of silver. 
 When he became king of England, 
 he continued to protect and to hon- 
 or, in reverence to the Virgin and 
 his mother, that abbey which was 
 partly erected by his royal munifi- 
 cence. In 1178, it was consecrated 
 anew by Rotrou, bishop of Rouen ; 
 Henry the Second assisted at that 
 pious ceremony, with his son Henry. 
 
 Richard the Lion-hearted, son and 
 successor of Henry H., built before 
 his departure for the Crusades, Our 
 Lady of Good-Haven, in the diocese 
 of Evreux, and assisted with his 
 brilliant chivalry at the dedication 
 of that monastery, which took place 
 in 1190.* When his eventful life 
 was drawing to a close, being mor- 
 tally wounded by an arrow at the 
 inglorious siege of a fortress, he dic- 
 tated his last will, and decreed that 
 
 * Gallia Christiana, t. iv. 
 
862 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 his heart should be borne to Our * 
 Lady of Rouen, on account of the 
 great devotion which he had for 
 said place, and that heart, the ; 
 bravest, perhaps, that ever beat 
 under knightly cuirass, was decent- 
 ly placed in the side of the choir, 
 towards the revestiary, in a silver 
 case, which was afterwards taken 
 f( r the ransom of St. Louis, king of 
 France, who was taken prisoner by 
 the Saracens, and in place thereof 
 was made one of stone.* 
 
 This mighty champion of the 
 Cross, whose name is never pro- 
 nounced by the Saracens without a 
 pious anathema, was, by his own 
 orders, interred beside his father, in 
 the abbey-church of Fontevi-ault. 
 By his side reposes his wife, Be- 
 rangeria of Navarre; their statues, 
 painted and gilt, were laid on their 
 tombs, and amongst the ornaments 
 of Queen Berangeria is a large 
 square medal, whereon is seen the 
 Blessed Virgin, surrounded by many 
 tapers. The famous Eleanor of 
 Aquitaine, mother of King Kichard, 
 retired to this abbey some years 
 after, and her tomb is one of those 
 
 * Antiquum de la Ville de Rouen, p. 137. 
 
 t According to the Saxon annalists, King John ^ ale, in a Bernardine priory at Swineshead. 
 
 royal monuments which adorn the 
 fair abbey-church of Our Lady. 
 
 John Lackland, who died of indi- 
 gestion in a Saxon abbey f — (what 
 an English death 1) — was buried, 
 by his own request, with great 
 pomp, in the beautiful Anglo- 
 Norman cathedral of Our Lady of 
 Worcester; but if we may believe 
 the ancient chronicles, the body of 
 that base and cruel prince, who had 
 steeped his hands in the innocent 
 blood of his lawful king, Arthur of 
 Bretagne, and who had had a mind 
 to turn Tm'k in order to conciliate 
 the Moors of Spain, did not long 
 pollute the sacred dwelling of Mary. 
 They relate that strange noises were 
 heard by night in that dishonored 
 tomb — blasphemies, fearful shouts 
 of laughter, revelry, and all manner 
 of terrifying sounds — which caused 
 the monks of "Worcester secretly to 
 exhume the body of the reprobate 
 prince, and transfer it to some less 
 holy place. 
 
 The Plantagenets distinguished 
 themselves by their devotion to the 
 Virgin, and covered England with 
 those fair gothic churches of Maiy 
 
 died of indigestion, after a feast of peaches and 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 363 
 
 which still exist in every county, 
 and constitute its chief archaeolo- 
 gical treasure : Oui* Lady of York, 
 3ompared to a vessel under full sail, 
 because of the stately beauty and 
 lightness of its aerial architecture ; 
 Our Lady of Salisbury, another ar- 
 chitectural gem, fashioned in the 
 noblest style, which was covered 
 with Flemish tapestry, and filled 
 with light and flowers on the solemn 
 festivals of Mary ; Our Lady of West- 
 minster, " where there was an image 
 of Mary," says Froissart, " in which 
 the English kings had great faith, 
 and by which many miracles were 
 wrought;" the superb gothic abbey 
 of Our Lady of "Walsingham, the 
 favorite pilgrimage of Edward L 
 and his chivalrous court; the fair 
 cathedral of Wells, the Lady-chapel 
 of which is, according to connois- 
 seurs, the pearl of the gothic monu- 
 ments of Great Britain : these are 
 all there to prove the devotion of 
 those princes towards the holy 
 Mother of Our Lord. 
 
 The Anglo-Saxons, who formed 
 
 * The custom of dressing the statues of the 
 Blessed Virgin, which still exists in France, 
 Spain, and Italy, was likewise practised in En- 
 gland in former times. The countess of War- ^ wore rings of great price, 
 
 the poorer classes, with the mer- 
 chants and burghers of England, 
 were no less devout to the Virgin 
 Mary than the continental princes, 
 who ruled them by right of con- 
 quest. Differing from their con- 
 querors on almost every point, they 
 were in perfect harmony on that of 
 religion, and both races went like 
 brethi'en, staff' in hand, on their pil- 
 grimage to Our Lady of Radcliff, a 
 fine old abbey, full of Saxon monu- 
 ments, and to Our Lady of Wor- 
 cester, where Lady Warwick, wife 
 of the king-maker, offered sumptu- 
 ous robes for the use of the Blessed 
 Yirgin, after praying at one time 
 for the Red Rose, at another for the 
 White, according to the party with 
 which her valiant spouse was con- 
 nected at the time.* 
 
 The fast of Saturday, in honor of 
 the Blessed Yirgin, was observed by 
 the English people from the time 
 of William Rufus. There was in 
 those days a certain famous robber 
 — a Saxon, without doubt, since St. 
 Anselm, the Norman prelate who 
 
 wick frequently presented her richest veils and 
 robes to Our Lady of Worcester, and we see, in 
 Leland's History of Ireland, that those statues 
 
864 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRG N MARY. 
 
 relates the anecdote, calls him a f 
 robber without any circumlocution 
 — and he, one morning, entered the 
 cottage of a poor widow with intent 
 to rob her. Finding nothing to his 
 taste, he coolly seated himself on 
 the only spare stool in the little 
 dark room, with its earthen floor, 
 where the widow was sitting at her 
 wheel, and addressed her with a 
 winning smile : " Well, Gossip, have 
 you had your breakfast?" — "Is it I, 
 good Sir," replied the poor woman, 
 pausing a moment in her work; 
 "God forbid! Is it not Satm-day? 
 I fast every Saturday throughout 
 the year." — "Every Saturday!" re- 
 peated the astonished robber ; " and 
 why?" — "Why, in honor of the 
 Blessed Virgin, to be sure. Do you 
 not know that that is the reason 
 why she prevents you, and others 
 like you, from dying unshriven ? " — 
 " K that be so," said the robber, " I 
 am very glad to know it, and from 
 henceforward I make a vow to fast 
 myself." He kept his word ; and 
 the Blessed Virgin, on her side, 
 did not fail him at the hour of 
 his death. Being mortally wounded 
 on a perilous expedition, she miia- 
 culously prolonged his life until he 
 
 had time to make his peace with 
 God. 
 
 St. Anselm also informs us that 
 the bold and haughty Norman 
 knights piously honored Mary, 
 whilst oppressing, with all their 
 might, the conquered Saxons. One 
 of them, a great lord, had for var- 
 lets and pages a troop of vaga- 
 bonds always ready for mischief, 
 and for steward an incarnate devil, 
 who constantly persuaded the poor 
 baron now to outrage one, now to 
 plunder another, and again to kill 
 that other, so that not a day passed 
 without some detestable crime. In 
 the midst of all this wickedness, he 
 kept praying devoutly to the Virgin 
 night and morning, saluting her 
 with seven Aves and as many pro- 
 found genuflections, for which rea- 
 son his infernal steward could not 
 strangle him as he intended, and 
 he finally obtained the grace of a 
 sincere conversion.* 
 
 The Saxon outlaws who took 
 refuge in the depth of the forests 
 (where they became the most skill- 
 ful archers in England), in order 
 to escape the capital punishment 
 
 * St. Anselm, in his book of The Miracles of 
 Our Lady. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 365 
 
 decreed by the Norman law for * 
 crimes appertaining to the chase, 
 regretted but one thing in their 
 wild retreats, their being unable to 
 pray at Mary's altar, when the bell 
 of an old Saxon abbey rang through 
 the woods "where the lark gaily 
 sang and the king's deer ran." 
 Those ancient English ballads in 
 black letter, " which are now worth 
 their weight in gold," says an En- 
 glish antiquary, represent Eobin 
 Hood, " the forest-king," risking his 
 head, after recommending himself 
 to the Yirgin, in order to perform 
 his devotions in the monastery, 
 whose distant bells seemed to sum- 
 mon him thither.* 
 
 Ir. summer when the shaws be sheyne, 
 
 And leaves be large and long, 
 It is full merry in fayre foriste 
 
 To here the fouly's song. 
 
 To see the dere draw to the dale, 
 
 And leave the hilles hee, 
 And shadow hem in the leves so grene 
 
 Under the green wood tree. 
 
 It befel on Whitsuntide, 
 
 All on a May morning, 
 The sun up fayre did shine, 
 
 And the birddis merry did sing. 
 
 * See Robin Hood : Ballads and Songs relat- 
 ing to that celebrated Outlaw, with Anecdotes 
 of his Life. From Kitson and others. 
 
 This is a merry morning, sayd Little John, 
 'Fore Him that died on the tree. 
 
 A more merry man than I am one 
 Lives not in Christiente. 
 
 Pluck up thi hert, my dere mayster. 
 
 Little John did say, 
 And thynk it is a full fayre time, 
 
 In a morning of May. 
 
 Now, one thynge grieves me, sayd Eobyne, 
 
 And does my hert myche wo. 
 That I may not so solemn day 
 
 To mass nor matins go. 
 
 It is a fourtnet and more, sayd hee, 
 
 Syn I my Saviour see ; 
 To-day I'll go to Notyngham, 
 
 With the might of myld Mary. 
 
 Then Robyne goes to Notyngham, 
 
 Himself moiinynge allone ; 
 And Little John to merry Scherewode, 
 
 The paths he knowe alkone. 
 
 Whan Robyne came to Notyngham, 
 
 Sertenly withouten layne. 
 He pray'd to God and myld Mary 
 
 To bryng him out safe agayne. 
 
 He goes into Seynt Mary's Chirche, 
 And kneyled down before the Rood, 
 
 AU that ever were the chirche within 
 Beheld wel Robyne Hood. 
 
 Spain, no less devout to Mary 
 than the Island of Britain, had 
 raised numerous shrines to her, 
 and fought under her standard. In 
 1212, Alphonso IX. having obtain- 
 ed, under the banner of Our Lady 
 of the Seven Sorrows, his great vie- 
 
3GC 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 tory of Las Navas, where the Moors 
 experienced one of their most signal 
 defeats, built Our Lady of Victory 
 in Toledo, to deposit therein that 
 sacred banner of Mary. St. Ferdi- 
 nand, that holy prince who could 
 not endure to increase the taxes 
 of his people, and who was more 
 afi-aid, he said, of the curses of one 
 poor woman than of all the Moorish 
 host, attributed to the protection 
 of the Blessed Virgin his conquests 
 of Cordova, Jaen, and Murcia. 
 Finally, Alphonso the Wise com- 
 posed canticles to the Mother of 
 God, and founded an order of 
 knighthood in her honor.* 
 
 Portugal walked in the same way, 
 with an ardor no less great. In 
 1142, after having defeated, through 
 the protection of Mary (to whom he 
 had recommended himself before 
 the battle), five Moorish princes, 
 whose five standards he captured 
 on the plains of Alentejo, Alphonso 
 I. founded, in honor of the Blessed 
 Virgin, the superb monastery of Al- 
 
 * El rey don Alonso el Sabio dedico varies 
 libros de poesias a la Madi*e de Dios ; y con 
 respect© a algunas ordino en su testamento 
 que se cantasen en sus Estados. (See Poetica 
 EspaSiola, p. 162.) 
 
 ^ cobaga; deeming that insufficient, 
 he did homage for his kingdom to 
 Our Lady of Clairvaux, and ordain- 
 ed that every year, at the Feast of 
 the Annunciation, a rent of fifty 
 maravedis of gold should be paid, in 
 token o£ vassalage, to the Suzeraine, 
 in the person of the abbots of Clair- 
 vaux.f One of the successors of 
 this prince, Don Juan I., after a 
 victory, offered to Our Lady of the 
 Olive the weight of himself (armed 
 cap-k-pie) of silver, and hung from 
 the roof of Mary's chapel, as ex voto, 
 his lance and his brilliant suit of 
 armor. J 
 
 About the same time, the kings 
 of Denmark undertook crusades 
 against the Pagans of the North, in 
 honor of the Blessed Virgin ; and the 
 Poles fought those of Prussia and 
 Pomerania, singing the famous Boga 
 Rodziga (Mother of God), a battle- 
 hymn addressed to Mary, composed 
 in the tenth centmy by St. Adal- 
 bert, bishop of Guezne.§ 
 
 The kings of France had no mind 
 
 f Angelus Manrique, Annal. Cisierc, ch. 5, ad 
 ann. 1142. 
 
 X Pere Paul de Barry, Paradis Ouvert, etc 
 
 § See last note of chap. viii. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 367 
 
 to give way to other princes in 
 devotion to the Queen of Angels. 
 Louis the Young and Philip Augus- 
 tus, of glorious memory, contributed 
 liberally to the rebuilding of Our 
 Lady of Paris, which Maurice de 
 Sully, a very great bishop of ple- 
 beian extraction, was reconstructing 
 on the site of King Childebert's old 
 Merovingian cathedral. 
 
 Attributing to the Blessed Virgin 
 his splendid victory of Bouvines, 
 Philip Augustus founded on the 
 skirt of the forest of Chantilly, and 
 on the banks of the deep Oise, a 
 magnificent royal abbey. Guerin, 
 bishop of Senlis, minister of the 
 king, and his companion in arms, 
 who had ably filled the office of 
 adjutant-general during the battle; 
 Mathieu de Montmorency, who im- 
 mortalized himself by taking full 
 sixteen of the enemy's banners ; 
 Enguerrand de Coucy and Guil- 
 laume de Barres, who had formed a 
 rampart around the king that day 
 which the whole Anglo - German 
 army could not force, would all have 
 their share in this commemorative 
 foundation, made in reverence to the 
 Sacred Virgin Mary, as she is called 
 in the Cartularies. 
 
 Blanche of Castile, the celebrated 
 regent of France, founded two fair 
 abbeys in honor of the Blessed 
 Virgin : the abbey of Maubuisson, 
 which she called Notre Dame la 
 Royale (Our Lady the Royal), and 
 JSTotre Dame du Lys (Our Lady of 
 the Lily). These two royal monas- 
 teries has each a share of her mor- 
 tal remains, according to her last 
 behest. 
 
 King Louis the Ninth, the holiest 
 and most righteous prince that ever 
 wore the crown of France, the best 
 of kings and the model of knights, 
 distinguished himself by his tender 
 devotion to the Blessed Virgin. He 
 contributed to the completion of 
 Our Lady of Paris, and, after hav- 
 ing that exquisite gem of art — the 
 Holy Chapel — built by Pierre de 
 Montereau, the most famous archi- 
 tect of his time, as a shrine for the 
 sacred crown of thorns, he solemnly 
 dedicated the lower part of it to 
 Our Lady, whose statue, placed 
 under the porch, wrought a charm- 
 ing miracle, one day, in behalf of a 
 little girl who was very wise, if we' 
 may believe the tradition. As the 
 pious child, mounted on a stone 
 bench, destined for the use of the 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO TEE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 poor, stretched herself up on her 
 little feet and reached her arms as 
 high as she could, to place a wreath 
 of white roses on the head of the 
 Madonna, the kind Virgin gra- 
 ciously bent her fair marble brow 
 towards the little earth - angel ; 
 " wherefore it is," says a monk of 
 the time of Louis XTLL, " that she 
 has still her head bent forward." 
 
 St. Louis recited every day with 
 his chaplain the Office of the Bless- 
 ed Virgin, even in his travels, and 
 forbade any one to interrupt him ; 
 he fasted on bread and water on 
 the eve of Our Lady's festivals, and 
 gave great alms on Saturday in her 
 honor. "When he thought of under- 
 taking his cmsade, he came to Our 
 Lady of Paris," says an ancient 
 chronicle, " accompanied by his 
 barons, all barefoot, with scrip and 
 staff, and there heard mass wath 
 great devotion." 
 
 On his arrival in Egypt, the king 
 found a Mussulman army drawn up 
 on the shore to oppose his land- 
 ing. The air was darkened with 
 the clouds of arrows aimed at the 
 French barks by the Saracens, 
 whose lances gleamed through the 
 clouds of dust raised by their horees, 
 
 * like lire behind a dark curtain. 
 Their chief bore " arms of fine gold, 
 so dazzling," says Joinville, in his 
 simple style, " that it seemed, when 
 the sun struck thereon, as though 
 it were actually that star himself." 
 Their standards were surmounted 
 by that ancient golden crescent 
 which had been the emblem of the 
 Turkish kings long before the days 
 of Cyrus,* and their war- music 
 "was terrible to hear, and very 
 strange unto French ears." But 
 Louis IX. and his warriors were 
 not easily frightened. Having come 
 within a short distance of the shore, 
 the holy king, after commending 
 himself to God and the Blessed Vii'- 
 gin, throws himself first into the 
 sea; the foaming wave covers him 
 even to the shoulders ; a shower 
 of arrows falls around him ; neither 
 wave nor dart arrests his course ; 
 buckler on arm, casque on head, 
 sword in hand, he makes for the 
 Saracens with fiery haste ; the whole 
 army hastens after him, and the 
 Africans are quickly routed to the 
 thrilling cries of "Mont-Joie, St. 
 Denis!" When the Egyptians had 
 disappeared on the wings of fear, 
 
 * See Firdousi, Moeurs den Rois. 
 
>HE SHALL CRUSH THY HEAD AND THOU 
 ^"/^'•y LIE IN WAIT FOR HER HEEL'. 
 
 Lrrrt.. //?. /o 
 
 1..&-. J. SADLIh:H &; Cc 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 369 
 
 the gates of Damietta, the key of 
 the Delta, had to open to the cru- 
 saders, whose first care was to chant 
 the Te Deum of victory in the Mus- 
 sulman mosque, which was conse- 
 crated by the Roman legate under 
 the title of Our Lady of Damietta. 
 
 The rumor of this glorious event 
 soon reached Syria, w^here the honor 
 was attributed to the protection of 
 Our Lady of Tortosa, a famous Syr- 
 ian Madonna, which the Mohamme- 
 dans themselves came to invoke ; 
 she was said to have left her shrine 
 in order to protect the descent of 
 the French crusaders.* 
 
 The disastrous end of the Egyp- 
 tian crusade — so brilliantly com- 
 menced — is but too well known. 
 After paying an enormous ransom, 
 St. Louis turned the prow of his 
 vessels towards Syria. The Chris- 
 tians, who had taken possession of 
 Palestine in 1099, had at that time 
 only a few strong places there ; 
 
 * Sire de Joinville, who repaired, while in 
 Asia, to Our Lady of Tortosa, relates that, in 
 his time, that famous Syrian Madonna wrought 
 a miracle in favor of a poor man who was pos- 
 sessed of an evil spirit. This man was brought, 
 one day, before the altar of Our Lady of Tor- 
 tosa ; " and so," proceeds the Sire de Joinville, 
 " whilst they were petitioning Our Lady for his 
 
 f amongst which was Nazareth, the 
 birth-place of Mary, which they had 
 ti'ansformed into a feudal fortress, 
 its first French lord being the hero 
 of heroes, Tancred, immortalized in 
 the deathless lay of Tasso. St. 
 Louis rebuilt the walls of the Ga- 
 lilean fortress, and, happening to be 
 there on the Feast of the Assump- 
 tion, he had the offices of the day 
 sung with an instrumental accom- 
 paniment in the church of St. Mary, 
 where he solemnly communicated. 
 
 As King Louis IX. was leaving 
 the Holy Land with Queen Mar- 
 garet, the vessel which bore them 
 was driven by a sudden squall un- 
 der a lofty promontory which cast 
 its shadow far out on the sea. The 
 tempest having subsided, they cast 
 anchor before that Syrian mountain, 
 which was crowned by a monastery, 
 and in the silence of the night, 
 scarce broken by the murmur of the 
 hushed waves, the sound of a dis- 
 
 cure, the devil answered from within his body, 
 ' Our Lady is not here ; she is in Egypt, assist- 
 ing the king of France and the Christians, who 
 are now entering the Holy Land on foot, against 
 the infidels, who are mounted on horses.' " The 
 Seneschal adds that, on the very day when the 
 devil pronounced these words, the French army 
 landed in Egypt. 
 
870 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 taiit bell came over the waters with f 
 the sweet perfume of marjoram and 
 thyme fi*om the woods. "What is 
 that?" demanded the king, quickly. 
 He was told by some Thoenician 
 sailoi's, who were on board, that it 
 was the convent of Our Lady of 
 Mount Carmel. The holy king went 
 ashore at the first dawn of day to 
 hear mass in Mary's monastery, the 
 monks of which, clothed in Arab 
 costume, lived on fruits and vege- 
 tables, fasted half the year, kept a 
 rigorous silence, and lived by man- 
 ual labor ; the fervent and cenobitic 
 spuit of the ancient solitaries still 
 reigned there. Penetrated with re- 
 spect for their austere piety, St. 
 Louis brought with him six of 
 these monks, who were named the 
 Brothers of the Order of Our Lady 
 of Mount Carmel, and established 
 them in Paris, on the banks of the 
 Seine. They subsequently removed 
 to the Place Maubert, and their 
 new church, consecrated under the 
 title of Our Lady of CaiTaelites, 
 was chiefly built by the mimiticent 
 donations of Joan of Evreux, third 
 wife and widow of Charles IL, sur- 
 named the Fair. This princess pre- 
 
 * Felibien, Hid. de Paris. 
 
 sented to the Virgin of Mount Car- 
 mel her crown of jewels, together 
 with her zone, embroidered with 
 pearls, and the bouquet of golden 
 lilies studded with precious stones, 
 which the king had given her on 
 the day of her coronation. Fifteen 
 hundred gold florins accompanied 
 this royal gift.* 
 
 The kings of France, no way 
 sparing of their person in the bat- 
 tle, placed themselves habitually 
 under the protection of the Blessed 
 Virgin, when danger became immi- 
 nent. Philip the Fair having " in- 
 voked Mary at a moment of exti'cme 
 peril, during the bloody battle of 
 Mons-en-Puelle (where he displayed 
 the valor of a paladin) , made splen- 
 did offerings to Our Lady of Paris, 
 after his brilliant victory, and grant- 
 ed to Our Lady of Chartres, in per- 
 petuity, the territory and lordship 
 of Barres,f with the rent of an hun- 
 dred livres. 
 
 After the taking of Cassel, Philip 
 of Valois, say the Great Chronicles 
 of St. Denis, came to this abbey to 
 return the oriflamine which he had 
 taken thence to march against the 
 Flemings, and then proceeded to 
 
 f Sebastian Rouillard, c. 6. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 371 
 
 Our Lady of Paris ; arriving there, 
 he resumed the arms which he had 
 worn at the battle of Cassel, mount- 
 ed his charger, and thus entered 
 the church of Notre-dame, thanked 
 the Blessed Virgin most devoutly, 
 and presented to her the charger 
 on which he sat, with all his own 
 equipments.* The king redeemed 
 his horse and armor, from the chap- 
 ter of Notre-Dame, for the sum of 
 one thousand livres, and had an 
 equestrian statue of himself erect- 
 ed in front of Mary's altar. It is 
 worthy of remark that these two 
 great victories of Cassel and Mons- 
 en-Puelle were gained between the 
 Feast of the Assumption and its 
 octave. After having fought the 
 Flemings at Rosbecq, Charles VL, 
 who was then but fourteen years 
 old, and was called the little king^ 
 likewise sent to Our Lady of Char- 
 tres his richly- ornamented armor 
 and his royal sword.f The queens 
 of France, on their side, on their 
 
 * We read in the old Pariff breviaries {lectio 
 quinta) : " Quod intelligens gloriosae meniorise 
 rex Philippus Valesius, cum opitulante Deo per 
 merita Beatse Virginia Matris, insignem victo- 
 riam de rebellibus Flandris obtinuisset, qu8B 
 contigit anno 1328, acturus Deo et sanctas Vir- 
 gini gratias, triumphans et equitans ecclesiam 
 
 f first entrance into the capital of the 
 kingdom, transferred to Our Lady 
 the magnificent crown which they 
 received from the city of Paris. 
 That offered by Isabella of Bavaria 
 was of gold and jewels.^ 
 
 It was under Philip of Yalois 
 that the English wars commenced. 
 King Edward III. of England de- 
 clared himself the rightful heir to 
 the throne, in right of his mother 
 Isabel, sister of Philip the Fair, as 
 the latter died without heirs, and he 
 was his nephew, whereas Philip of 
 Yalois was only his cousin-germ an. 
 The French peers and barons de- 
 clared for Philip of Yalois rather 
 than the princess Isabel, not be- 
 cause of the Salic law, which speaks 
 not of the exclusion of women, but 
 by the authority of existing cus- 
 toms, which had acquired the force 
 of law. Edward, in reply, advanced 
 a most singular argument, which is 
 found in a letter written by him to 
 the Pope. "K the son," said he, 
 
 Beatse Mariae Parisiis, ingressus est, non vana os- 
 tentatione elatus, sed Deo, per quern de ancipit 
 bello evaserat, profunda humilitate subjectus." 
 {Brev. Ecdesice Paris., festa Augusti, anno 1584.) 
 
 •}• Essais Hist, sur Paris, par M. de Sainte 
 Foix, t. iv., p. 162. 
 
 J Froissart, t. n. 
 
872 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 "be debxrred from ascending the 
 throne because his mother could 
 not, Jesus Christ had no right to 
 the inheritance of David, seeing 
 that he was only descended from 
 that king by Madam St. Mary^ his 
 imther" 
 
 This unhappy notion of reigning 
 over France, which in an evil hour 
 crossed the minds of the English 
 monarchs, and which deluged the 
 kingdom of the lily with blood, was 
 firet aroused by a chivalrous ap- 
 peal, made in the name of the sweet 
 Virgin Mary^ who showed herself, 
 in the sequel, no way disposed to 
 favor it. A " false traitor," Robert 
 of Artois, whom the king of France 
 had " disobliged " (says an English 
 historian), revenged himself by re- 
 kindling the all but extinguished 
 flame of resentment in the mind of 
 the young English king, who then 
 thought of little else than feasts and 
 tournaments. He presents himself 
 one day with a heron in the hall 
 where Edward was entertaining the 
 great barons and noble dames of 
 his court. Walking to the upper 
 end of the hall, where sat the king 
 under a white canopy fringed with 
 silver, " I bring," said he, " the most 
 
 ^ cowardly of all birds, and I will 
 give him to the greatest poltroon 
 amongst you. In my mind it is 
 thou, Edward, who permittest thy- 
 self to be wronged of the noble 
 kingdom of France, to which thou 
 art lawfully entitled." The king's 
 eyes sparkled with anger. The idea 
 of any one suspecting his courage 
 was worse than death : he blushed 
 with shame, and swore a tremen- 
 dous oath, that before six months 
 he would declare war ao:ainst that 
 count's son who wrongfully as- 
 sumed the title of King of France. 
 When the king had thus pledged 
 himself, the Count d' Artois present- 
 ed the heron to the English lords, 
 who, each in his turn, swore to 
 make war on the French, calling 
 on the "honored Virgin, who bore 
 a God in her chaste womb," to 
 bear witness to their rash oath. 
 
 The first exploit of the English 
 was the naval battle of Eel use. 
 Sea-fights then had little or no re- 
 semblance to what they are now ; 
 the combatants were hand to hand ; 
 the crews of the hostile ships 
 endeavored to shatter the enemy's 
 sails with arrows and long sickles, 
 whilst divers pierced the hulls under 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 373 
 
 water in order to make them sink, t 
 The ne 2)lus ultra of skillful manoeu- 
 vre consisted in driving the enemy 
 on shore, or dashing him against 
 the rocks. Edward, who commanded 
 his fleet in person, was wounded by 
 an arrow at the beginning of the 
 action, and yet continued to tight, 
 prefacing every thrust of his lance 
 with one of his favorite ejaculations, 
 " Ah, St. Edward !— Ah, St. George ! 
 Ah, St. Mary ! " and around his 
 blood-red banner, whereon was em- 
 blazoned a golden dragon,* the En- 
 glish nobles shouted their piercing 
 war-cries. Our Lady of Arundel! — 
 Our Lady of Arleton ! — St. George I 
 for at that chivalrous period every 
 warrior of note had a patron saint, 
 whom he invoked aloud during the 
 contest. Edward disgraced his vic- 
 tory by hanging from the yard-arm 
 one of the French admirals who had 
 bravely defended himself ; the other, 
 who died arms in hand, found a 
 grave beneath the waters. In the 
 midst of that scene of blood and 
 tumult, some fair ladies from En- 
 gland, who came in the royal bark 
 in search of pleasurable excite- 
 ment, were heard applauding their 
 
 *■ Stowe's Chronicle. 
 
 * 
 
 knights; — not one asked mercy for 
 the vanquished! and twenty thou- 
 sand French corpses reddened the 
 blue waves of the German Sea. 
 The king of England, who did not 
 forget to invoke Mary during the 
 combat, had no sooner landed in 
 Flanders than he went on foot to 
 thank her (says Froissart) , with the 
 flower of his chivalry, in her shiine 
 of Ardenburg. Tliis, then, was the 
 opening of that famous war which 
 lasted for a century, during which 
 time the English carried their victo- 
 rious banner from the Garcmne to 
 the Rhine, and from the Ocean to 
 the Mediterranean. 
 
 During this long struggle, inter- 
 rupted only by some truces when 
 the combatants paused for breath — • 
 their hand on the dirk, and their 
 feet in blood — the Blessed Virgin, 
 whose abbeys were often unscru- 
 pulously plundered by the English, 
 was still the object of their pro- 
 found veneration. After having de- 
 stroyed an entire city, and retired 
 loaded with booty, they sometimes 
 left one of her statues perfectly safe 
 on its pedestal ; and when the in- 
 habitants, finding them gone, ven- 
 tured to return in search of their 
 
374 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 ruined dwellings, they crossed them- 
 selves devoutly, and cried, "A mira- 
 cle!"* It was indeed a miracle to 
 see such an act of respect amid a 
 scene of frightful devastation. 
 
 The shrines wherein it had 
 pleased the Queen of Heaven to 
 manifest her power, were held as 
 neutral and sacred ground ; each of 
 them was, as it were, an oasis 
 of peace, towards which jom-neyed 
 knights and soldiers, from every 
 country, who were nothing more 
 than pious pilgrims from the mo- 
 ment they fastened a little image 
 of the Madonna to their steel hel- 
 met or serge hood. We read in the 
 manuscript chronicles of Quercy, 
 that certain English soldiers, having 
 been arrested by those of Cahors, 
 were restored to liberty, with kind 
 and encouraging words, as soon as 
 they were found to be pilgrims of 
 Our Lady. 
 
 The feasts of the Blessed Virgin 
 were scrupulously observed by the 
 English troops, who even stopped 
 
 * Our Lady of Vassiviere was thus respected 
 amid the ruins of that strong city "vhich the 
 English had pillaged and destroyed. (See Du 
 Chesne, ch. 9, § 10, nomb. 6.) 
 
 t See Froissart, voL ii., p. 112. 
 
 t on their march to celebrate them 
 In 1380, Buckingham, who made his 
 way through the heart of France, 
 sweeping all before him, halted 
 with his army in the Forest of Mar- 
 chenoir to celebrate the September 
 Feast of Our Lady. The English 
 knights heard mass devoutly in an 
 abbey which they found in the 
 w^oods; and their long Bordeaux 
 blades were innocent of French 
 blood that day.f 
 
 An English captain, named Nor- 
 wick, whom Prince John, duke of 
 Normandy and heir-presumptive to 
 the throne, had suddenly besieged 
 in Angouleme, where provisions 
 failed him, skillfully availed him- 
 self of that devotion to the Virgin, 
 which was common to both nations, 
 in order to escape the necessity of 
 suiTcndering at discretion. On the 
 eve of the Purification (one of the 
 great festivals of Our Lady, kept in 
 France from the time of Pepin the 
 Short), he goes forth from the walls 
 and demands speech of the prince. 
 The latter, coming forward, asks, 
 "Do you come to capitulate?" — 
 "No!" replies the Englishman; 
 "you and I are both devoted to 
 
 i the Blessed Virgin ; I crave, then, 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 375 
 
 of your courtesy, a suspension of 
 hostilities, and that, during the 
 twenty -four hours consecrated to 
 this festival, the soldiers on both 
 sides be forbidden to use their arms 
 on any pretence whatsoever." — " Be 
 it so," said the prince ; " I am well 
 content." 
 
 Next morning, by the earliest 
 daw^n, Norwick marches out with 
 the garrison and all its stores ; the 
 French sentries, stopping him, ask 
 what he means by this sally. "I 
 mean to profit by the truce," he 
 replies, "to let my soldiers take a 
 walk." 
 
 When Prince John was informed 
 of the fact, he said, " I vow to God, 
 the stratagem was a good one ! Let 
 them go and welcome, since we 
 have the city."* 
 
 Notwithstanding all the testimo- 
 nies of respect which she received 
 from the invaders, the Blessed Vir- 
 gin turned from them to protect the 
 invaded. As an oppressed country, 
 France had found favor before her, 
 as was proved by more than one 
 miracle. In Poictiers, the mayor's 
 servant, who had sold the city to 
 the English, and promised to admit 
 
 * See Froiasart, vol. ii., p. 112. 
 
 them on a dark, moonless night, 
 could nowhere find the keys, which 
 he was astonished to see next day 
 in the hands of an ancient statue 
 of the Virgin, in her own cathedral 
 of Notre-Dame. At Rennes, which 
 the duke of Lancaster had long 
 besieged in vain, the English, de- 
 spairing of taking the brave city 
 by storm, made a mine in order to 
 blow it up. The Breton city sleeps 
 calmly over a volcano, unconscious 
 of its danger ; but Our Lady 
 watches. When the mine has 
 reached the cathedral of St. Mary, 
 and the enemy is about to set fire 
 to it, the tapers in the chapel of 
 Our Lady of St. Saviour are seen to 
 light of themselves in the midst of 
 a dark night ; the bells, put in mo- 
 tion by invisible hands, suddenly 
 peal out; and when the inhabit- 
 ants, awoke from sleep and has- 
 tily clothed, come flocking to the 
 strangely - lighted church, asking, 
 "What is the matter?" the Virgin 
 slowly extends her stony arm from 
 the side of the gothic nave, and 
 points to the place where the mine 
 is about to explode. The city, 
 warned in time, was saved. Many 
 other examples might be given, 
 
S76 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MA BY. 
 
 showing how Mary protected France * 
 during that disastrous period. "We 
 sliall content ourselves with giving, 
 on the authority of contemporary 
 writers worthy of credit, the most 
 striking of these numerous prodi- 
 gies. 
 
 It was after those two lamentable 
 days which France will never cease 
 to mourn — Crecy, where the flower 
 of the French chivalry fell, and 
 Poictiers, where King John was 
 made prisoner, with eight hundred 
 of his barons, by the Black Prince. 
 The nobles were ruined ; the young 
 Regent without troops ; the most 
 fertile fields were overrun with 
 briers ; the cities, threatened with 
 the horrors of a siege by the stran- 
 ger, who camped at their gates, 
 were internally rent asunder by 
 factions. When man has nothing 
 more to expect on earth, he kneels 
 and raises his suppliant hands to 
 heaven. This is w^hat was done by 
 all good people in town and coun- 
 try, in the cities and the villages. 
 They boldly demanded a miracle 
 from God, through the intercession 
 of Mary, so that these calamities 
 might have an end. Their faith 
 was great, and their woes inexpres- 
 
 sible their prayer was therefore 
 heard. Abusing his powder, and 
 taking advantage of the utter pros- 
 tration of France, Edward III., when 
 in treaty with the young Regent, 
 aftei'wards Charles the Wise, pro- 
 posed conditions so hard, so dis- 
 graceful, so intolerable, that France, 
 exhausted as she was, raised her 
 head with generous indignation, 
 and said " No ! " At this unexpect- 
 ed refusal, Edward crosses the sea 
 and lays siege to Chartres. 
 
 The English army pitched their 
 tents a short distance from the 
 walls, and in front of that splendid 
 cathedral so magnificently rebuilt 
 by Fulbert with the gifts of the 
 faithful, high and low. Placed on 
 a height which commands the city, 
 the fair gothic church — with its 
 lofty spires, which may be seen at 
 a distance of ten leagues — looked 
 like a sacred citadel, with the city 
 reposing in its shade. In that sanc- 
 tuary, so universally revered, there 
 was a reliquary of precious w^ood, 
 overlaid with thick plates of gold, 
 and incnisted with diamonds, ru- 
 bies, and pearls ; in it was kept 
 one of Mary's precious garments — 
 her wedding -robe of Babylonian 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 377 
 
 stuff, flowered with bxue, violet, 
 white, and gold. One day, the Nor- 
 mans were besieging Ohartres, and 
 the inhabitants, well disposed to de- 
 fend their temple, took this sacred 
 relic for their standard. The Nor- 
 mans, beholding it, instantly fled. 
 It was then customary to touch 
 with this reliquary the doublet of 
 fine Breton linen worn by the no- 
 bles on the day of their receiv- 
 ing knighthood. Eichard Coeur de 
 Lion, to whom it was brought all 
 the way to England, offered in re- 
 turn to Our Lady of Chartres a rich 
 jewel of gold and precious stones, 
 containing relics of St. Edward. 
 The Madonna of Chartres was, 
 therefore, held in high veneration 
 by the English knights, and, doubt- 
 less, there were many of them who 
 secretly blamed the king for expos- 
 ing to sacrilege and pillage the holy 
 things of Mary's cathedral. 
 
 The city, summoned by the En- 
 glish king to surrender, simply re- 
 plied that it would not; and Ed- 
 ward's messengers saw nothing but 
 the massive gate, strongly plated 
 and studded with iron, above which, 
 in a charming gothic niche, deco- 
 rated with carved foliage, was a 
 
 white Madonna, with this inscrip- 
 tion engraved on stone — "Tutela 
 Oarnutum ! " 
 
 The siege of the ancient capital 
 of the Carnuti was of long dm-ation, 
 and the fertile fields of France were 
 bristling with English swords in- 
 stead of ears of grain. The Dau- 
 phin tried, by negotiation, to save 
 the favorite city of Mary; but Ed- 
 ward was deaf to his offers and 
 representations. The French en- 
 voys, rudely repulsed, had no longer 
 the shadow of a hope, and the city 
 seemed all but lost, "when there 
 took place," says Froissart, " a mira- 
 cle which much humbled and broke 
 down the courage of the English 
 king. A thunderbolt, a storm so 
 great and so horrible, descended 
 from heaven on the king of En- 
 gland's army, that it seemed as 
 though the end of the world had 
 indeed come ; for there fell from the 
 sky stones so large that they killed 
 both men and horses, and even the 
 boldest were struck with fear." 
 
 "If thou sowest in the garden 
 of life the seed of wrath," said the 
 ancient sages of Iran,* "thy star 
 
 * Iran was the name of Persia before the time 
 of Cyrus. 
 
878 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 shall have to mourn." The king f 
 of England must have had some 
 such thoughts, when the sun arose 
 like a golden lamp to show him the 
 disasters of the previous evening. 
 His whole camp was devastated; 
 the canvass of the tents hung in 
 tatters, and, all over that immense 
 plain where the green grain had 
 been trodden down by the English 
 cavalry, seven thousand horses lay 
 dead beside their masters. There 
 is no historical fact better attested 
 than this extraordinary event. Ed- 
 ward was so awed by it, that he 
 was long before he recovered the 
 shock, as he himself confessed t.) 
 the continuator of Nangis. 
 
 Some time after, conformably to 
 the promise which he had made, 
 in his fright, to the powerful pa- 
 troness of Chartres, he signed the 
 peace concluded at Bretigny, a 
 small town of the Chartresian dis- 
 trict; and his haughty nobles, lay- 
 ing aside their arrogance for the 
 time, came as peaceful and humble 
 pilgrims to kneel before the Virgin's 
 shrine. 
 
 But Mary's intervention in the 
 despcn-ate affaii's of France did not 
 stop here ; she raised up one of 
 
 those strong men whose iron arm 
 is alone sufficient to sustain a fall- 
 ing kingdom ; she inspired with, a 
 hatred of the British, a young Bre- 
 ton, who made his first achieve- 
 ments in arms under her auspices, 
 and took her name for his war-cry. 
 The troops that followed the red 
 flag of Albion were scattered like 
 straw before the wind at the cry 
 of "Our Lady of Guesclin!" 
 
 When the insanity of the unfortu- 
 nate Charles YIL — that prince so 
 brave, so beloved by the people, 
 and so devoted to Mary — had re- 
 vived the failing hopes of the Eng- 
 lish kings, and Henry of Monmouth, 
 yielding to the temptation of uniting 
 the diadem of France to his own ill- 
 acquired crown, crossed the sea to 
 do a hundred times worse than ever 
 Edward had done, the Virgin op- 
 posed to him only a pure-hearted 
 young maiden, who dropped the 
 shepherd's crook to assume the 
 sword of battle. It was while light- 
 ing mystic tapers before the vener- 
 ated image of Our Lady of Bermont, 
 and dressing with flowers the her- 
 mitage of St. Mary,* that Joan of 
 
 * Deposition of the witnesses in the investiga- 
 tion of Vaucouleurs on the habits of Joan of Arc. 
 
HISTORY OF TEE DEVOTION TO TEE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 379 
 
 Arc, hearkening to the interior 
 voice that prompted her, conceived 
 the bold project of ridding France 
 of the " English people," and of 
 having the young Dauphin, Charles, 
 consecrated at Rheims. Thus did 
 the Virgin decree, and the inspired 
 shepherdess announce. St. Mary 
 of Rheims, whither the kings of 
 France of that time went to make 
 the vigil of arms with the young 
 lords of their court,* before they re- 
 ceived the knightly spurs, joyfully 
 opened its ponderous gates to admit 
 the true king of France — he who 
 
 * could alone be anointed as the 
 chosen of the Lord. A flight of 
 birds was sentf to tell the angels 
 these happy tidings; and near the 
 kneeling prince, at the altar where 
 Clovis bent his haughty head be- 
 neath the baptismal water, " the 
 daughter of God, the high-hearted 
 maiden," the chaste heroine sent by 
 the Virgin, unfurled, with a counte- 
 nance at once modest and joyful, 
 her banner of white mohair, where- 
 on were emblazoned, in letters of 
 gold, the two sweet names — the 
 saving names — "Jesus! Mary!" 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE ORDERS . 
 
 HE star of chival- 
 ry, which shone 
 from the time 
 of the Crusades 
 over the zenith 
 of Europe, be- 
 gan at length to 
 descend towards the horizon; but, 
 
 * Froissart. 
 
 t At. the consecration of our kings, from time 
 immemorial, two or three hundred dozens of 
 
 majestic even in its decline, it con- 
 tinued to shed a brilliant light, 
 religious as well as martial. Those 
 were, indeed, better and happier 
 days than ours, when religion was 
 respected, and its holy laws obeyed, 
 from the palace to the cottage, and 
 the veneration of Mary was at its 
 
 birds were set at liberty. (Essais lEstoriques 
 sur Paris, par M. de Sainte-Foix tome v., 
 page 26.) 
 
;;so 
 
 HISTORY OF TEE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 height — when all was done through 
 her and for her. " It is very natu- 
 ral for all to invoke her," said the 
 warlike ti'oubadours of Germany, 
 " since her bidding is done in heav- 
 en." And so she was universally 
 invoked ; and although each paladin 
 took for his patron either St. James, 
 St. George, St. Michael, or St. Mar- 
 tin (whom, in their simple respect 
 for the inhabitants of the heavenly 
 kingdom, the feudal lords distin- 
 guished by honorary titles), yet the 
 honored Virgin, who contained with- 
 in herself all the beauty, the sweet- 
 ness, and the angelic purity which 
 became a sovereign lady, was the 
 object of a homage far superior to 
 that paid the baron St. James, or 
 the good knight St. George. Tour- 
 naments were proclaimed and feasts 
 performed in honor of Madam St. 
 Mary ; kings and knights made the 
 vigil of arms in her chapels ; her 
 name, translated into every Euro- 
 pean language, was the war-cry of 
 the Norman, the Danish, and the 
 English barons, as well as of Du 
 Guesclin. In the battle of Trente 
 (the site of which is still pointed 
 out amid the heath of Lower Bre- 
 tagne by a mutilated piUar), Beau- 
 
 t manois recommends himself to God, 
 Om- Lady, and St. Yves. Seeing 
 that his companions redden the 
 grass with then* blood, and that the 
 English have the advantage, he 
 knights a squire of noble birth, 
 named Jean de la Hoche, in Our 
 Lady's name, and fortune, quickly 
 changing sides, declared for the 
 Bretons.* 
 
 Having commended themselves 
 to Mary, they fought one to ten 
 with that conlidence in the support 
 of heaven which trebles the strength 
 of man ; a good cause, a clean con- 
 science, and the Virgin's aid, suf- 
 ficed to effect a marvellous featj and 
 to obtain the most signal victories. 
 In 1388, an army from Brabant 
 entered the duchy of Gueldre, and 
 destroyed all with fire and sword. 
 The duke had neither men nor 
 money to repulse the invaders. His 
 counsellors were of opinion that he 
 should shut himself up in one of 
 his fortresses ; but he rejected their 
 advice with indignant contempt. 
 " Neither in town nor castle will I 
 enclose myself," he exclaimed, "and 
 leave my country to be burned ; I 
 would rather die manfuUv on the 
 
 * Froissart, vol. xiii 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 381 
 
 open field." Having made this chiv- 
 alrous answer, the young duke arm- 
 ed himself for the fight ; but before 
 he left Mmegue, he went and pray- 
 ed devoutly before the image of 
 Our Lady, in whom he had great 
 trust, and consecrated himself and 
 his knights to her. This done, he 
 mounted his horse, and set out, at 
 the head of four hundred lancers, 
 to fight an army of forty thousand 
 men. At sight of the enemy, the 
 advisers of the Flemish prince, 
 frightened by the fearful odds, 
 sought again to dissuade him from 
 coming to an engagement ; but the 
 duke, laying his hand on his heart, 
 replied, " Something tells me that 
 the day is mine. On, then; unfurl 
 my banner quickly, and let all who 
 are true knights advance ! I will 
 do it in honor of God and Madam 
 St. Mary, of whom I took leave on 
 my departure ; to her care I commit 
 all my affairs. Forward! forward!" 
 And the brave young duke charg- 
 ed the enemy at full gallop, crying, 
 "Our Lady of Gueldre !" The army 
 of Brabant was completely routed, 
 and lost seventeen banners, " which 
 may be found," says Froissart, " be- 
 fore the image of Our Lady of Mm- 
 
 * egue, to the end that the victory 
 may be kept in perpetual remem- 
 brance." After the battle, the 
 Flemish knights held a council on 
 the field. Some proposed to enter 
 a neighboring city, to place their 
 prisoners in safety, and to dress the 
 wounded. " Not so," said the duke ; 
 "• I gave and pledged myself to the 
 department of Nimegue, and to-day 
 I consecrated myself, at the begin- 
 ning of the battle,, to Our Lady of 
 Nimegue ; I will and ordain, there- 
 fore, that we go back thither to see 
 and to thank the Royal Lady who 
 has helped us to obtain the victory." 
 So saying, he galloped back with 
 his knights to return thanks to Our 
 Lady, and to hang up his spoiled 
 and broken arms, as ex voto, in her 
 chapel.* 
 
 In 1363, King Louis L of Hun- 
 gary, finding himself, with only 
 twenty thousand men, in presence 
 of eighty thousand infidels, conse- 
 crated himself with all his army to 
 the Queen of Angels, whose image 
 he always wore. In order to thank 
 Our Lady for the brilliant victory 
 which he gained, he built around 
 the chapel of Afiieuz, in Carinthia, 
 
 * Froissart, vol. i., p. 112. 
 
382 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 a very beautiful church, wherein * 
 he deposited the sacred image to 
 which he attributed his victory, 
 and the sword wherewith he had 
 fought* 
 
 In the fourteenth century, Louis, 
 duke of Bourbon, surnamed the 
 Great, resolved on quitting France 
 for a time (it was then in a most 
 disturbed state, owing to the minor- 
 ity of Charles VI.), in order to put 
 down the audacious piracy of the 
 Saracens of Africa, which totally 
 impeded the commerce of Europe. 
 Genoa and the French ports de- 
 manded an expedition against these 
 robbers. Louis of Bourbon heard 
 the appeal, and resolved to make a 
 crusade on that side, in honor of 
 the Blessed Virgin, whom he held 
 in supreme veneration. He sum- 
 moned his chivalry, and was . soon 
 joined by the Dauphin of Auvergne, 
 John of Beaufort, son of the duke 
 of Lancaster, the Count d'Harcourt, 
 Walter of Chatillon, William of Hai- 
 nault, Philip of Artois, Count d'Bu, 
 tlie Sire de la Tremouille, and Philip 
 
 * This Carinthian church, now known by the 
 name of Maria-Zell, is still one of the most fa- 
 mous pilgrimages of Catholic Germany. The 
 Emperor Mathias went thither to return thanks 
 for a victory obtained over the Turks in 1601. 
 
 de Bar. All these warriors, before 
 they set sail, solemnly pledged 
 themselves to the Blessed Virgin, 
 and took for their flag the duke of 
 Bourbon's banner, " which was then 
 emblazoned with the fleur de lys of 
 France, a white image of Our Lady, 
 the mother of Jesus Christ, repre- 
 sented as sitting in the midst ; un- 
 derneath the feet of said image was 
 the escutcheon of Bourbon." f 
 
 The duke of Bourbon put to sea 
 with a fleet of eighty vessels "under 
 the keeping of God, Our Lady, and 
 St. George." They arrived about 
 midsummer, in front of a city to 
 which Froissart and others give 
 the name of Africa, and which is 
 thought to be Tunis. The crusaders 
 of the Blessed Virgin laid siege to 
 this place, which they tried four 
 times to take by assault, but could 
 not succeed, the Turks making a 
 vigorous resistance. The arrival of 
 the Christians had been the signal 
 of a holy war for the Mussulmans 
 of Africa ; the kings of Tripoli, Mo- 
 rocco, and others, sent their troops 
 
 Ferdinand III. had the church finished, such as 
 we now see it; and Maria Theresa, we are cred- 
 ibly informed, made her first communion there, 
 A. D. 1728. 
 
 f Froissart, vol xi. p. 266. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 383 
 
 to succor the besieged city, and the 
 Christians had to guard against the 
 ambuscades and nocturnal assaults 
 of the barbarians. But their strat- 
 agems were all defeated without 
 the aid of sentinels or lights, in a 
 manner which excited the gratitude 
 of the crusaders for their divine 
 protectors. A large dog, which had 
 no known master, kept watch every 
 night around the Christian camp, so 
 that it was impossible for the Turks 
 to elude his vigilance. The soldiers, 
 seeing something extraordinary in 
 the unfailing instinct of this animal, 
 called him Our Lady^s dog. 
 
 This African expedition, com- 
 menced under the auspices of the 
 Blessed Virgin, was accompanied 
 by prodigies, according to Frois- 
 sart. He relates that "the Saracens, 
 thinking to surprise the French by 
 a nocturnal attack, stealthily ap- 
 proached the Christian camp, when 
 they perceived before them a com- 
 pany of ladies, robed in white, and, 
 especially, one at the head who was 
 fairer than all the others, and car- 
 ried in her hand a snow-white flag 
 with a red cross. The Saracens 
 were so amazed and confounded at 
 the sight, that they had, for the 
 
 f time, neither the power nor the 
 courage to advance."* 
 
 Whether it was that Mary wished 
 to protect the chivalry of France, 
 trusting in her protection, by plac- 
 ing herself and her heavenly train 
 between the Christians and the 
 Mussulmans, or that a hallucination 
 caused by the doubtful light of the 
 stars and the waving banners of the 
 knights was the sole cause of the 
 prodigy, the camp was none the 
 less saved from a night attack. 
 
 Owing to the excessive warmth 
 of the climate, an epidemic broke 
 out amongst the Christians, which 
 decimated their army, and forced 
 them to raise the siege of Tunis, 
 after nine weeks of unavailing ef- 
 forts ; but, before they retired, they 
 twice gave battle to the Saracens, 
 and defeated them, notwithstanding 
 their numbers. The banner of Mary 
 was gloriously borne by the chiv- 
 alry of France ; and the Christians 
 achieved under that flag such prodi- 
 gies of valor, that the king of Tunis, 
 thoroughly frightened, was but too 
 happy to conclude a treaty, where- 
 by he engaged to give up the Chris- 
 tian slaves, to leave the navigation 
 
 * Froissart, t. xi., p. 266. 
 
884 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 of the Mediterranean undistiu-bed, 
 and, finally, to pay ten thousand 
 gold pieces to defray the expenses 
 of the war. 
 
 The good cities of the kingdom, 
 in times of calamity, placed them- 
 selves under the special protection 
 of the Blessed Virgin, as well as the 
 sovereigns. In 1357, after that fatal 
 battle of Poictiers, which mowed 
 down the flower of the French no- 
 bility, and in which the king was 
 taken by the English, the merchant- 
 provost then made a vow, in the 
 name of the city of Paris, to offer 
 eveiy year to the Mother of God, in 
 the cathedral church, a taper whose 
 length should equal the circumfer- 
 ence of the city walls. This offer- 
 ing was actually made down to the 
 time of the League, when it was in- 
 terrupted for twenty -five or thirty 
 years. In 1605, the city substitu- 
 ted for this immense taper a silver 
 lamp with a large wax taper, which 
 burned continually before the altar 
 of Our Lady till the year 1789 * 
 
 * Sauval, Mem. MS. There is found in the ac- 
 counts of receipts and expenses for the corpora^ 
 tion of Paris, k. d. 1488, an item concerning this 
 taper : " To the Widow Gerbelot, the sum of 27 
 livres, 19 sols, 8 deniers ; to her likewise due by 
 said city, for 11 7^ lbs. of wax, made into a large 
 
 Rouen, where the image of Mary 
 formerly adorned every street and 
 square, the foimtains and the public 
 monuments, placed itself by solemn 
 vow under her protection in 1348, 
 on the appearance of that famous 
 black plague which ravaged the 
 whole earth, and which struck its 
 victims so fiercely that they died, 
 say the chronicles of the time, while 
 looking at each other. When the 
 intercession of the Virgin had put 
 an end to this frightful pestilence, 
 there was founded in the Norman 
 cathedral one of the most maa:nifi- 
 cent chapels in the world, imder the 
 title of Our Lady of the Yow. The 
 istatue of Mary, in white marble, 
 crowned with white roses, sur- 
 mounted the altar erected to her 
 by public gratitude, and over this 
 sacred image the magistrates of 
 Rouen suspended a massive golden 
 lamp, which was kept lit, night 
 and day, tiU the sixteenth century, 
 when it was extinguished by the 
 Protestants.f 
 
 taper, and placed on a wooden tower by said 
 ■widow, duly delivered on the 12th February, at 
 the price of 4 sols, 8 deniers per lb. ; amount 
 for Our Lady's candle, 53 livres, 11 sols, 8 
 deniers." 
 
 f Amiot, Hist, de la Ville de Rouen, t. ii. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 385 
 
 Tlie cities of France were not 
 then alone in consecrating them- 
 selves to the Blessed Virgin. Ge- 
 noa the Proud had inscribed on 
 each of her gates, " Citta di Maria" 
 (the City of Mar}^) ; and Venice the 
 Beautiful had adorned her grand 
 Council Hall, in 1385, with a mag- 
 nificent work of Guariotto, a disci- 
 ple of Giotto, representing Chi'ist 
 crowning his mother Queen of 
 Venice. Underneath this painting, 
 which has perished in the lapse 
 of ages, were written these four 
 lines from Dante: 
 
 L' amor che mosse gia I'eterno Padre 
 Per figlia aver di sua Delta trina, 
 Costei che fa del Figlio siio poi Madre 
 Deir universo qui la fa regina. 
 
 The doges of Venice were obliged 
 to leave in the ducal palace a pic- 
 ture in which they were painted 
 kneeling before the Blessed Virgin, 
 so as to make them remember that 
 she was their sovereign, and that 
 of the republic* 
 
 This devotion of Genoa and Ven- 
 ice to the Mother of God was, how- 
 ever, eclipsed by the fervent hom- 
 age rendered to her by the small 
 republic of Parma, which was also 
 
 * Delices de Vltalie, t. 1, p. 60. 
 
 * consecrated to Mary. There was 
 no day more solemn amongst the 
 citizens of Parma than the 15th of 
 August, the Feast of the Assump- 
 tion of the Virgin, patroness of their 
 cathedral, and sovereign of their 
 republic. This festival stood on a 
 par amongst them with that of 
 Easter, and was so respected that 
 the Holy See, when placing Parma 
 under an interdict, always exempt- 
 ed the day of the Assumption from 
 the excommunication. On that day 
 the heads of families, with all the 
 members of their household, re- 
 paired to the splendid cathedral of 
 Mary (the roof of which was subse- 
 quently painted by Corregio), with 
 banners flying and the singing of 
 hymns, and laid flowers and rich 
 offerings on her altar. " An inhab- 
 itant of Parma, who failed to ap- 
 pear in the cathedral, would have 
 been disgraced," says Turchi, "and 
 held up to public scorn." At this 
 solemn festival, in which all ranks 
 were mingled, there were neither 
 grades nor distinctions ; it seemed 
 as though the members of one fam- 
 ily had joyously met to do honor to 
 their mother. 
 
 Truly it is a fervent and sincere 
 
886 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 devotion that can stifle party feuds ! 
 Such was that of the Parmesans for 
 the Mother of God. In the year 
 1323, on the day of the Assump- 
 tion, the Guelphs, exiled from Par- 
 ma, laying aside their old animos- 
 ity, presented themselves under the 
 walls of the city, and, with clasped 
 hands, begged to be admitted, for 
 the Holy Virgin's sake. The peo- 
 ple within the city, hearing Mai7's 
 name thus humbly invoked on the 
 day of her solemn festival, were 
 moved with compassion, and, by a 
 spontaneous movement, each ran to 
 open the gates. Guelphs and Ghi- 
 belines embraced each other with 
 tears of joy, and the exiles were 
 conducted, amid the vivas of the 
 citizens, to the famous cathedral of 
 Our Lady, where peace was sworn 
 at the Virgin's altar. That peace 
 lasted fifty years.* 
 
 To appease these fiery factions of 
 the Guelphs and Ghibelines, which 
 divided each of the Italian cities 
 into two camps, and made their 
 streets and pubUc places fields of 
 battle, it was thought best to create 
 
 * Chronic. Farm, in med. ann. 1323. — Chronic. 
 Parm. apud Muratori, 10, Ber. 
 f In 1191 the Pope approved of the institu- 
 
 an order of knighthood of a purely 
 pacific nature — the Frati Gaudenti, 
 or Knights of the Virgin, who, with- 
 out renouncing the world, applied 
 themselves to restore peace and 
 concord in the Italian peninsula, in 
 the name and for the sake of the 
 Mother of God. 
 
 This devotion to Mary, which re- 
 stored the peace of cities and in- 
 spired waiTiors with courage, was 
 the soul of the military orders— 
 those great, aU- conquering. Mediae- 
 val armies, which were generally 
 founded on faith in the Mother 
 of God, and achieved their heroic 
 deeds in her name. In that austere 
 and religious section of chivalry, 
 the love and honor of absent ladies 
 was represented by a particular de- 
 votion to the Blessed Virgin. Thus, 
 the Knights of St. John of Jerusa- 
 lem invoked Mary when receiving 
 their sword — an invocation which 
 is still practised by the Knights of 
 Malta, the last phase of that cele- 
 brated order. The Teutonic knights 
 took the name of Knights of the 
 Virgin.f The territories which they 
 
 tion of these knights, under the title of Brothers 
 Hospitallers of the Blessed Virgin, and placed 
 them under the rule of St. Augustine. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 387 
 
 wrested from the Pagans of North- 
 ern Europe they called "Mary's 
 lands." The Virgin was their heav- 
 enly Lady, as she was, in fact, " the 
 Lady of the world," according to 
 the simple legends of the Middle 
 Ages. 
 
 These orders — subject to a mighty 
 organization, which participated in 
 the discipline of a camp and the 
 severity of a rule — conquered, in 
 Mary's name, provinces which they 
 collected into kingdoms. The order 
 of Teutonic Knights became, as 
 every one knows, the Prussian mon- 
 archy; and under the name of the 
 Knights of Rhodes, the Hospitallers 
 governed one of the fairest islands 
 of the Levant. To these religious 
 and chivalrous orders, who extended 
 the devotion to Mary by prodigies 
 of valor, were added the Royal Or- 
 ders, which were like them, in gen- 
 eral, under the patronage of Mary. 
 It was in her honor that King John 
 founded the knightly order of Our 
 Lady of the Noble House, better 
 known as the Knights of the Star. 
 Those knights fasted every Satur- 
 day when they could, and, when 
 they could not, they were to give 
 fifteen pence to the poor, in mem- 
 
 ory of the fifteen joys of Om* Lady. 
 They were allowed to carry a 
 banner, spangled with stars, with 
 an image of the Blessed Virgin, 
 whether in making war on the en- 
 emies of the faith or in the service 
 of their liege lord. They were 
 sworn to die rather than surrender, 
 and not to retreat more than four 
 acres, when forced by superior num- 
 bers to retire. • 
 
 Charles VI., that poor prince 
 whose precocious valor gained, 
 when he was but fourteen, the 
 famous victory of Rosbecq, likewise 
 instituted, in the first years of his 
 reign, an order of knighthood in 
 honor of the Blessed Virgin, in con- 
 sequence of a vow made by him in 
 Languedoc, During his stay at 
 Toulouse, he frequently went hunt- 
 ing with Olivier de Clisson, Pierre 
 de Navarre, and a number of other 
 lords, in the ancient forest of Bou- 
 conne. Having one day separated 
 from his suite while too ardently 
 chasing a wild deer, night surprised 
 him alone in the wildest recesses 
 of the old Druid forest ; to increase 
 the dangers of his situation, the 
 shades gathered deeper and deeper 
 J around him, so that not a single 
 
S8S 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Btar was visible. Terrified by the * 
 dread loneliness of the place, and 
 not knowing whither to tui'n, the 
 prince made a solemn vow to Our 
 Lady of Hope, and humbly put 
 himself under her protection. Im- 
 mediately a light wind dispersed 
 the clouds, and a brilliant star shed 
 its trembling light on a beaten 
 track, which conducted the young 
 monarch aout ot the woods. Next 
 day, Charles, followed by his lords 
 in complete armor, except their 
 head, went to accomplish his vow 
 in Mary's chapel. To perpetuate 
 the memory of his perilous adven- 
 ture, he founded, shortly after, the 
 order of Our Lady of Hope, and 
 ordained that its emblem should be 
 a star.* 
 
 In the year 1370, Louis H., duke 
 of Bourbon, instituted the order of 
 the Knights of Our Lady's Thistle. 
 This order consisted of twenty-six 
 
 * The institution of Oui- Lady of Good Hope 
 is proved by an ancient painting which is seen 
 on the walls of the Carmehte cloister in Tou- 
 louse, near the chapel of Our Lady of Hope, 
 where the king of France is represented on 
 horseback, tending before an image of the Vir- 
 gin. Some lords are also painted there, all 
 armed, except the head. Their names, written 
 below, are almost effaced; but those of the duke 
 of Tooraine, the duke of Bourbon, Pierre de 
 
 knights, who wore a girdle of sky- 
 blue velvet, embroidered with gold, 
 and having the word Hope embla- 
 zoned thereon ; tlie buckle was of 
 fine gold, enamelled with green, 
 and represented the head of a this- 
 tle. On the day of Our Lady's Con- 
 ception, which was the grand fes- 
 tival of the order, the Knights of 
 the Thistle wore a sumptuous robe 
 of flesh-color damask, and a sky- 
 blue cloak embroidered with gold, 
 whereon they wore the grand collar 
 of the order, composed of golden 
 lozenges and fleurs de lys, with the 
 word liope on every lozenge. From 
 the end of the collar hung an oval 
 medallion bearing the image of 
 Mary, under which was seen a this- 
 tle's head, enamelled with gi-een 
 and eUilied with wJiite.f 
 
 Devout and chivalrous Spain had 
 also, in the Middle Ages, royal or- 
 ders founded in honor of Mary. Al- 
 
 Navarre, Henri de Bar, and Olivier de Clisson, 
 may still be distinguished. All these figures 
 are of full length. The background of this 
 painting is filled with bears, wol' es, boars, etc 
 At the top, on a sort of fi-ieze, angels bear 
 streamers, whereon is thrice written the word 
 "Hope." (Dom. Vaissette, Hist, de Languedcc, 
 t. iv., p. 396.) 
 
 ^ f Pavin, Hist, de Navarre, 1. viiL 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 889 
 
 plionso, or rather Don Alonzo the 
 Wise, founded an order of chivahy, 
 which he placed under the patron- 
 age of the Virgin ; and Don James 
 11. , king of Arragon — to reward the 
 valor of the inhabitants of Montesa, 
 whose castle, built on the top of a 
 high mountain, had several times 
 repulsed the Moors — founded, in 
 1319, an order of knighthood, under 
 the title of Santa Maria de Montesa, 
 to which he generously gave, with 
 the Pope's consent, the property 
 which the suppressed order of the 
 Templars had possessed in the king- 
 dom of Valencia. 
 
 A little later, about the middle of 
 the fifteenth century, Christian the 
 First, king of Denmark, founded, in 
 honor of the Holy Trinity and the 
 Blessed Virgin, the royal order of 
 the Elephant, the members of which 
 entered into divers pious engage- 
 ments ; for instance, that of defend- 
 ing the Catholic faith at the peril 
 of their life ; the elephant was sym- 
 bolical of the virtues of the order. 
 
 But it was not only the royal and 
 military orders that took Mary for 
 their patroness ; the religious mili- 
 tia, which gains its battles by pray- 
 er under the shield of Faith, would 
 
 ^ also move forward under the Vir- 
 gin's banner, and distinguished it- 
 self by another kind of heroism. In 
 the West, the first religious order 
 founded especially in honor of Mary, 
 was that of Citeaux, the founder of 
 which was St. Robert, a young Nor- 
 man gentleman who had been des- 
 tined by his family for the profession 
 of arms, but who chose rather to 
 gain the kingdom of heaven than 
 any of this world's gifts or honors. 
 In the year 1098 he founded, in a 
 desert place, given him by the duke 
 of Burgundy, the famous abbey of 
 Citeaux, and caused the twenty 
 monks who accompanied him thith- 
 er to assume the white habit, in 
 honor of the Blessed Virgin, and, 
 according to the annalists of Ci- 
 teaux, on a special revelation from 
 her. In order to merit the protec- 
 tion of Mary, Robert and his monks 
 condemned themselves to a life the 
 most detached, the most laborious, 
 the poorest, and the most austere 
 that it is possible to imagine ; they 
 banished from their cloisters all that 
 had the least appearance of luxury. 
 Their abbatial church had but one 
 wooden cross ; the censers and can- 
 
 ^ dlesticks were of iron, and the chal- 
 
390 
 
 niSTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 ices of gilt copper ; the ornaments 
 were of coarse stuff; the abbot's 
 crozier was merely the wooden 
 crutch then used by old men. In 
 oi-der to avoid all that might dis- 
 turb retreat and recollection, it was 
 agreed that no prince or noble 
 should henceforward keep his court 
 in their church or in their monas- 
 tery, as had been hitherto the case 
 on high festivals. These rules were 
 made by degrees; most of them 
 were enacted by Abbot Stephen, 
 who succeeded Alberic, the suc- 
 cessor of Robert, in 1109. There 
 was so great scarcity of provisions 
 in the abbey during the following 
 year, that the abbot was obliged 
 to mount an ass and go out to beg 
 with one of the brothers. The 
 rigorous austerity practised in the 
 abbey caused Citeaux to be desert- 
 ed ; no one presented himself to re- 
 place the monks who died, and the 
 abbot began seriously to fear that 
 this new institute must perish in 
 its cradle ; but Mary, its patroness, 
 would not permit it to fall to the 
 ground, and made it a magnificent 
 present in the person of St. Ber- 
 nard, who retired thither, with sev- 
 eral of his kinsmen, in 1113. He 
 
 * was then scarcely seventeen; at 
 nineteen he was sent to Clairvaux, 
 in the capacity of abbot, and ap- 
 plied himself to clear that place, 
 then overgrown with brushwood. 
 
 Whilst St. Bernard was laying 
 the foimdations of Clairvaux, La 
 Fert^, Pontigny, and Morimond — 
 the three other daughters of Ci- 
 teaux — were being peopled under 
 favor of the Blessed Virgin. The 
 wild, dreary spot whereon arose 
 the abbey of Morimond, the most 
 austere of all the Cistercian abbeys, 
 was a pious donation from Olderic 
 de Grammont, and Adeline, his 
 wife.* These fom' abbeys were the 
 first and the mothers of several 
 others, which we need not mention 
 in detail, all equally austere and 
 regular, all worthy of their heavenly 
 patroness. The monks went to work 
 in the woods and fields, sowed and 
 reaped grain, mowed hay, felled 
 trees and carried them on their 
 back. On returning to the convent, 
 they thankfully received what was 
 given them to eat — that is to say, 
 a pound of coarse black bread, with 
 a potage of beech - leaves. Their 
 
 * Annales Cisterciennes, a R. P. Manrique, 
 ^ aun. 1115, ch. 1. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 391 
 
 bed was of straw, their bolster a * 
 bag of oats, and, after having slept 
 some hours, they rose in the middle 
 of the night to sing the praises of 
 the Lord. 
 
 Such was the life of these monks 
 of the Virgin, whom their conduct 
 honored according to the expres- 
 sion of God himself in the sacred 
 books ; hence she was pleased to 
 give them the most striking proofs 
 of her approbation. The annals of 
 Citeaux relate that, when these 
 good monks, whose life was so 
 austere, whose heart so pure, and 
 whose hands so occupied, were toil- 
 ing and sweating in the heat of 
 a harvest day, without daring to 
 quench their thirst in the neighbor- 
 ing stream, or to refresh their ex- 
 hausted frame by a few moments' 
 rest in the cool shade of the woods 
 hard by, the Virgin wiped away 
 with her white veil the sweat that 
 bathed the pale and fmTowed brow 
 of the brothers.* 
 
 Men of high birth thronged to 
 Citeaux: Prince Henry, brother of 
 Louis the Young, became a monk 
 of Clairvaux in 1149. St. Malachy, 
 
 * Annates Cisterciennes, a. d. 1199, ch. 5, and 
 1228, ch. 6 J ann. 1121, ch. 6. * 
 
 who was descended from the kings 
 of Ireland, and was himself primate 
 of that island, exchanged his ponti- 
 fical robes for the serge and fustian 
 of these austere monks. One of the 
 first lords of the Scottish court, and 
 much beloved by the king, who was 
 his relative, abandoned the world 
 and its glories to shut himself up 
 in a Cistercian monastery. The 
 king had often noticed that the 
 young nobleman withdrew from the 
 exciting pleasures of the chase to 
 read and pray amongst the tall 
 ferns or the blooming hawthorn 
 bushes. "We must make him a 
 bishop," said the pious monarch, 
 one day, with a thoughtful air. 
 The young man anticipated him, 
 and became a monk at Wardon. 
 
 In 1129, Everard, count du Mans, 
 gave up his princely coronet for 
 the Cistercian cowl. He presented 
 himself in disguise at one of the 
 houses of the order, and was en- 
 trusted with the care of one of the 
 flocks. He might have remained 
 unknown had not some lords of his 
 acquaintance met him while mind- 
 ing his sheep on the border of a 
 wild heath. Another young noble- 
 man, of very high bu'th, having 
 
1 
 
 892 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Uiken the Cistercian habit,* wajs 
 charged to conduct a flock of swine 
 every day to feed in a neighboring 
 forest, where they fared sumptu- 
 ously on the acorns and beech-nuts. 
 One evening, when the novice neg- 
 lected to pray as usual, he heard 
 the voice of Satan, the father of 
 Pride, whispering in his ear that 
 his was certainly a strange trade 
 for the son of a powerful baron. 
 The young lord, hitherto so pious, 
 bit his lip, and all his fervor fled 
 like a dream. Night came ; he re- 
 gained his monastery, and retired 
 to the chapel. Any one who saw 
 him kneeling before Our Lady's 
 altar, buried in profound medita- 
 tion, would have said, "There is a 
 saint whose thoughts are in heav- 
 en." Yet his thoughts did not take 
 so lofty a flight; for he was think- 
 ing of his father's castle, and be- 
 gan to entertain the idea of flight. 
 "The night is dark," thought the 
 novice, as he looked through the 
 open door of the chapel ; " the wind 
 is high ; it is just the time to make 
 
 my escape Herding swine, 
 
 indeed ! and I the son of one of the 
 first lords of the court ! Why, it is 
 
 ♦ AnTiales Cisterciennes, a. d. 1207, ch. 4. 
 
 f a shame ! " He arose, and crossed 
 the nave with a firm step. He was 
 about to pass the threshold, when, 
 lo ! a woman stood before him ! At 
 first he thought it was but a dream. 
 But no ; there she was I a woman 
 of majestic mien, and beautiful as 
 an angel. With a graceful motion 
 of her hand, and a sweet smile of 
 compassion, she made a sign for 
 him to follow, and was mechanic- 
 ally obeyed. The unknown direct- 
 ed her steps towards the cemetery, 
 as it lay ghastly and cold in the 
 light of the half- veiled moon ; the 
 huge yew-trees, agitated by the 
 wind, seemed to mourn for the 
 dead, and the night-birds mingled 
 their doleful cries with the tumul- 
 tuous voice of the tempest. A cold 
 shudder began to creep over the 
 young monk. His fair and calm 
 conductress extended her hand, and, 
 behold ! the turf coverings of the 
 graves began slowly to open, and 
 the dead arose, cold and pale, in 
 their shrouds. The novice was 
 sinking to the ground with teiror; 
 but the unknown, regarding him 
 with an eye of tender compassion, 
 said, in a sweet and penetrating 
 voice, " Yet a little while, and thou 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIBGIN MAEY. 
 
 393 
 
 glialt be dead like these ! Whither, * 
 then, would st thou go, and of what 
 art thou thinking ? This is the end 
 of all earthly glory !" Saying these 
 words, the Virgin — for she it was — 
 vanished from his sight ; the graves 
 closed again, and the young novice, 
 who thought no more of quitting 
 the convent, became a model of 
 humility and virtue. 
 
 The order of Citeaux, which ex- 
 tended itself into every country of 
 Christendom, was suppressed in 
 France at the beginning of the 
 Revolution. 
 
 The order of Fontevrault, founded 
 in 1100 by Robert d'Arbricelle to 
 honor the holy obedience of Jesus 
 Christ to the orders of his mother, 
 and the filiation of John with re- 
 gard to Mary, could only have its 
 origin in the chivalrous Middle 
 Ages. In that order — whose nuns 
 were high and noble ladies, and its 
 abbesses princesses of the blood 
 royal — the women governed the 
 men, and the abbots dared not 
 treat the abbess as a sister, but 
 were bound, in all humility, to call 
 her mother,* she being absolute 
 
 * The monks of the abbey of Fontevrault 
 were commanded by an act of Parliament to 4 
 
 sovereign of the order. The foun- 
 dation of this order raised some 
 storms at the outset. Marbode, 
 bishop of Rennes, and Godefroi, 
 bishop of Vendome, alarmed by 
 the strangeness of this reversed 
 obedience, declared against Fonte- 
 vrault ; but the order, nevertheless, 
 existed till the time of the Revolu- 
 tion. It was in this abbey that 
 the princesses of the royal family 
 were brought up. 
 
 Seven merchants of Florence also 
 founded, in the second period of the 
 Middle Ages, the order of Servantes, 
 or Serfs of Mary, which gave to the 
 church St. Philip Benizzi, author of 
 the touching devotion of the Seven 
 Dolors of the Virgin. Finally, the 
 sweet name of Mary was given to 
 the order of Om- Lady of Mercy, 
 destined to redeem Christian cap- 
 tives from the hands of the infidels. 
 This order, founded on the 10th of 
 August, 1218, is one of those holy 
 works which do honor to humanity ; 
 its rules were extremely severe, and 
 it formed the most perfect link be- 
 tween the military orders and those 
 that were purely monastic. 
 
 call the abbess their mother, and not their sis- 
 ter, {^ee ih.& Anncds of Fontevrault.) 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 If the other religif)iis orders of t 
 ehivah'ous times were placed less 
 directly than those of which we 
 have spoken, under the immediate 
 patronage of the Blessed Virgin, all 
 united in honoring her, and were 
 founded under her influence. The 
 ancient Carthusians dedicated to 
 Mary their first chapel, which still 
 exists amongst the rocks where it 
 was first built, and it retains the 
 commemorative name of Om* Lady 
 of Cottages.* 
 
 The cradle of the Franciscan or- 
 
 Sacellum beatce Marioe de Casalibus. This 
 chapel, which the Carthusians have preserved 
 with all respect as the cradle of their order, is 
 
 der was a small chapel, very old. 
 and in bad repair, built originally 
 by four hermits of Palestine, who 
 gave it the name of St. Mary of 
 Josaphat, because they had in it 
 some relics from the tomb of the 
 Blessed Virgin. 
 
 The Dominican order had its ori- 
 gin in Our Lady of Prouille. 
 
 St. Norbert reformed the Premon- 
 stratensions by order of the Mother 
 of God, and he obliged his monks 
 to recite the office of the Virgin 
 every day, under pain of mortal sin. 
 
 still in existence. Tastefully ornamented, and 
 hidden in the depth of the woods, it has a very 
 pleasing effect. 
 
Jfourtlj iperioir d tlje §tiidm\ U Parj. 
 
 PROM THE MIDDLE AGES TO OUR OWN TIMES. 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 THE REVIVAL. 
 
 |T the opening of 
 the 15th cen- 
 tury, Catholic 
 Europe was still 
 kneeling before 
 Mary, Avhose 
 cathedrals, al- 
 ready secularized, were being fin- 
 ished with admirable constancy. At 
 that time " Poor Companions," made 
 their tour of France, offering their 
 hammers and trowels wherever the 
 piety of the faithful was raising 
 churches ; most of them asked no 
 payment ; they got bread and roots 
 to eat, and slept on the bare ground. 
 One hundred thousand men were 
 seen working in this way for two 
 centuries, at the cathedral of Stras- 
 burg, which Bishop Werner had 
 dedicated to Mary. 
 
 Some of these workmen were 
 wholly devoted to the construction 
 of chapels in honor of the Blessed 
 
 Virgin ; they wrought for the love 
 of God, and refused all other em- 
 ployment. Amongst these were 
 some who imposed on themselves 
 the daily fabrication of a certain 
 number of oak leaves, trefoil or ara- 
 besques ; this pious task was called 
 the stone-cutter^ s beads. The enthu- 
 siasm reached even the weaker sex ; 
 women were seen taking up the 
 chisel to carve Madonnas ; the 
 statue of the Blessed Virgin, which 
 may be observed over the portal of 
 the cathedral of Strasburg, with a 
 crown on the head and a chalice in 
 the right hand, is the work of Sabi- 
 na, daughter of Ervin, herself a 
 famous architect, like her father 
 and brother, whose great work she 
 continued when they had worn 
 away their lives. 
 
 Those artists who wrestled like 
 giants with the idea of the infinite 
 to translate it into stone, acquired 
 
896 
 
 mSTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 no wealth by their colossal under- 
 takings; they would have deemed 
 it a disgrace. Their labor was 
 more suitably rewarded ; after their 
 death, the stately basilica which 
 tlioy had built, raising its flags of 
 black marble, took them respect- 
 fully to its bosom, and one might 
 fancy that its tall, tapering steeples, 
 piercing the clouds like the just 
 man's prayer, went up to plead 
 their cause before the Eternal. 
 
 The carvers of wood likewise 
 consecrated their work to the Vir- 
 gin ; the choir-stalls of the ancient 
 churches were adorned, for the most 
 part, with those sculptures where 
 the artist delighted to concentrate, 
 in a narrow space, some graceful 
 scene from the life of the Blessed 
 Virgin. The cathedrals of Auch and 
 Evreux, both dedicated to Mary, are 
 so fortunate as to have preserved 
 many of these carvings, whose loss 
 would be irreparable. 
 
 Under the vaulted roof of the 
 cathedral of Paris, that dread peri- 
 odical press which does so much 
 good and so much evil, according to 
 the passions which set it in motion, 
 was then springing into life like a 
 timid dove that feai's to venture 
 
 * from the parent nest. A great iron 
 branch, with tubes running hither 
 and thither, as far up as the eye 
 could reach, was fastened to one of 
 the walls of Notre Dame, close by 
 one of those side-doors which are 
 master - pieces of the locksmith's 
 craft. On a level with these tubes, 
 garnished with tapers of yellow 
 wax, was hung by a flexible fast- 
 ening, a hollow tablet, coated with 
 wax. There, every morning, on the 
 advice and responsibility of the di- 
 rectors or chief editors of the period, 
 the bishop, the mayor, or the sheriff, 
 the printer in wax inscribed with 
 his pen the official announcement 
 of whatever was most interesting to 
 the people of the good old times, 
 the arrival of a bull, the gaining of 
 a battle, etc. Every lettered indi- 
 vidual was then free to come, by 
 the light of the tapers (which the 
 stained glass windows rendered 
 necessary, even in daylight), and 
 read to the assembled crowds that 
 daily gazette — daily in the fullest 
 sense of the word, since the news of 
 the morrow effaced that of the day 
 before. 
 
 Confraternities in honor of the 
 Virgin were then founded all over 
 

 
 i 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 397 
 
 Europe — still Catholic fi-om one 
 end to the other. The princes of 
 Germany gloried in wearing her 
 scapular, and the English kings of 
 the Lancastrian line were conse- 
 crated with a miraculous oil " more 
 radiant than fine gold, which the 
 Blessed Virgin had given expressly 
 for them — the Lancastrians — to 
 St. Thomas a Becket during his 
 exile." * 
 
 In France, the students of the 
 great colleges (where so many gra- 
 tuitous burses were given in Our 
 Lady's name) arose at the dawn 
 of day to say the office of the Vir- 
 gin in common. Princes recited it 
 also, at regular hours, with some 
 other offices of the Church. A 
 small space, something like the do- 
 mestic chapels of the Romans, was 
 reserved in their apartments for 
 these morning devotions. The duke 
 of Orleans, uncle of Charles YL, 
 though his life was far from being 
 
 * Boucher, Annates de V Aquitaine, t. iv., p. 3. 
 
 f Felibien, t. ler, p. 654. — Sauval, Mem. 
 MS 
 
 J The rosary was instituted in 1208, by St. 
 Dominick, but he was not precisely the in- 
 ventor of it. In the year 1094, Peter the Her- 
 mit devised wooden beads, whereon the sol- 
 diers of the Crusade, for the most part unable 
 
 * edifying, had nevertheless, in the 
 Hotel St. Paul, an oratory, adorned 
 with gothic sculptures in Irish oak, 
 on the door of which was read, 
 "Eetreat where Monsieur Louis ol 
 France says his offices." f 
 
 The beads J were the favorite or- 
 naments of great and small, the 
 magistrate and the warrior. Kings 
 of France substituted them for the 
 knightly collar, the fashion of which 
 had been brought by the crusaders 
 from Eastern lands, famous for their 
 gorgeous costumes. A costly rosary 
 was put in every wedding casket; 
 and the great ladies of the period 
 of the Revival, as well as those of 
 the Middle Ages, were often repre- 
 sented on their stone monuments 
 with a rosary in their hand. This 
 prayer, originally invented for the 
 poor, had become the prayer of all 
 classes. Burgesses and gentlemen 
 said their rosary going out to the 
 country or returning to the city, 
 
 to read, might recite a certain number of Paters 
 and Aves, accordingjfcb the solemnity of the 
 feasts. Even before his time, some ancient 
 historians relate that devout persons said a 
 aeries of Paters and Aves on knotted cords, per 
 cordulam nodis distinciam. {Regies de la Gonfr. 
 du Rosaire. Astolfi. — Gabriel Pennotus, in Hist. 
 ^ Tripart.) 
 
"OS 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 clients in coui-t while awaiting their 
 lawyei-s, and Christians of every 
 grade when going to churches at 
 a distance to gain indulgences. 
 Kings themselves set the example. 
 Blanche of Castile said her rosary 
 every day. Edward III., king of 
 England, gave his beads, enriched 
 with pearls, to Eustace de Ribeau- 
 mont, a French knight, who had 
 twice defeated him. In the inven- 
 tory taken after the death of Charles 
 v., there were, as La Sage tells us, 
 ten gold rosaries. The Swiss, at 
 Grandson, found in the ducal tent 
 of Charles of Burgundy his Pater 
 . (beads) , whereon the Apostles were 
 represented in solid gold.* It is 
 weU known that the famous con- 
 stable, Anne de Montmorenci, was 
 accustomed to say his beads while 
 riding at the head of his men-at- 
 arms. " Sometimes, leaving a Pater 
 unfinished, he commanded some mil- 
 itary expedition, or gave the signal 
 for attack ; then " he carefully re- 
 sumed his Pater or Ave," says a 
 
 * History of Louis 
 f The chaplet ow 
 
 
 kM. Lisken, p. 91. 
 
 origin to a young 
 monk of the order of St. Francis. Before taking 
 the habit of the Friars Minors, this young man 
 made it a practice to crown an image of Our 
 Lady e\erj iay with a wreath of flowers. Be- 
 
 * contemporary historian, "so devout 
 was he." 
 
 The chaplet, which takes its name 
 from the crowns of flowers called 
 in the Middle Ages chapels or cha- 
 peaux, was the spiritual crown of 
 Mary. People said then — and it 
 was a graceful and poetical idea — 
 that there was beside every person 
 who recited it devoutly, an angel, 
 sometimes visible, who strung on 
 a golden thread a rose for every 
 Ave, and a golden lily for every 
 Pater, and that after laying this 
 garland on the brow of the devout 
 servant of Mary, the angel disap- 
 peared, leaving behind him the 
 sweet perfume of roses.f 
 
 The kings of Scotland and their 
 great vassals wore chaplets of 
 golden beads " to preserve them- 
 selves from all evil." The bold 
 troopers of the borders provided 
 themselves with others, simpler and 
 less costly, consisting of filberts 
 browned by the autumn sun ; " and 
 never did they recite them with 
 
 ing unable to continue this pious practice in 
 the convent, he was on the point of giving up 
 the habit ; but Our Lady appeared to him, and 
 ordered him to substitute the spiritual crown 
 of the chaplet for the wreath of flowers, (P. 
 Alex. Salo, Meth. ad. pour hon. la V. M., p. 672.) 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 399 
 
 more fervor," says Leslie, "than in * 
 their expeditions against the En- 
 glish." The golden chaplets disap- 
 peared with poor Queen Mary, the 
 last of the Catholic sovereigns ; but 
 those which the borderers gathered 
 in the woods long withstood the 
 shock of the Eeformation. It was 
 the last Catholic practice kept up 
 in Caledonia ; with it fell the an- 
 cient religion of Bruce, of Wallace, 
 and of David I. — the religion to 
 which England and Scotland both 
 owe, according to Cobbett, all that 
 they have of greatness both in men 
 and things. 
 
 The Georgians and the nations of 
 Italy fabricated beads for them- 
 selves with as little expense as the 
 Scotch : they made them of the nuts 
 of the azedarah, still known among 
 the Italians as Valhero dei paternostri 
 (the paternoster tree). 
 
 The tender and sincere piety of 
 our ancestors for the Blessed Virgin 
 then manifested itself in forms the 
 sweetest and most touching. Ber- 
 ries from the shrubs and fruit from 
 the bushes sufficed to form a reli- 
 gious garland ; flowers, heath, the 
 plants of Europe and of Asia, were 
 honored with her name, and kept 
 
 her memory alive amid the woods 
 and fields. The narcissus, with its 
 purple - tinted bell, received tlie 
 name of Mary^s lily ; the rose of 
 Jericho, the seal of Solomon, be- 
 came her rose and her seal; the 
 lung-wort, spotted with white, was 
 Our Lady's milk; the Scotch toolv 
 for their emblem her blessed thistle ; 
 the Christian Arab gave the name 
 of St.. Mary^s smoke to a sort of 
 wormwood, with a white flower, 
 which grows on his sandy wastes ; 
 the mountain shepherd designated 
 as St. Mary's grass the Alpine mint, 
 the rosemary, and the persicaria ; 
 the Mussulmans of the East call the 
 fragrant cyclamen hokour Miriam 
 (Mary's perfume), and the same 
 plant bears in Persia the name of 
 tchenk Miriam (Mary's hand) ; a 
 vernal plant of Europe received the 
 name of Our Lady's cloak: the plant 
 that bears the blue sweet wortle- 
 berry was her signet, the sherbets 
 of the Alps her pears ; and the 
 bed of wild thyme, whereon the 
 wearied bee reposes, had likewise 
 her name. 
 
 In some northern countries, on 
 the other hand, they scrupulously 
 avoided giving the Virgin's name, 
 
100 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 not only to things but to persons, 
 fearing lest that name might event- 
 ually be ti'eated with irreverence, 
 or unworthily borne. Amongst the 
 Poles, no \s'oman was called Mary, 
 and this prohibition extended so 
 far, that Ladislaus lY., when marry- 
 ing Marie Louise of Nevers, would 
 have a clause inserted in the mar- 
 riage contract to the eifect that the 
 new queen should give up her name 
 of Marie, which was displeasing to 
 the Poles, because of their respect 
 for the Mother of God, and that she 
 should retain only the simple name 
 of Louise.* 
 
 bi the first years of the fourteenth 
 centm-y, Pope Innocent XXII., justly 
 alarmed by the conquests of the 
 Mussulmans, instituted a prayer to 
 the Blessed Virgin, under the name 
 of Hail, Mary! This prayer, for 
 which the sweetest and most mys- 
 terious hour of the day had been 
 chosen, that is, the close of day,f 
 was said in France and England 
 at the first toll of the curfew-bell. 
 All Catholics thenp^said three Hail 
 
 * Dovendo Ladislao IV. prendere per moglie la 
 figliuoladel duca di Nevers, chiamata Maria Alo- 
 isa, messe questa special condizione che la reina, 
 per riverenza della Vergine, si chiaraasse nell' ave- 
 nire solamente Aloisa. {IIP. Pao.Seg.t.\ii. p. 571.) 
 
 * Marys for the success of the Chris- 
 tian arms, and besought the Blesseil 
 Virgin that peace, union, and pros- 
 perity might prevail in every Chris- 
 tian kingdom. Louis XL, in 1475, 
 instituted the Angelus, as it now is, 
 in honor of the mystery of the In- 
 carnation, and desired that, to the 
 evening prayer offered up for the 
 general peace of Christendom, one 
 might be added at noon for the 
 particular peace of his kingdom. 
 His decree is thus conceived : " It 
 is hereby ordained, that all French- 
 men, knights, men-at-arms, and 
 clowns, do kneel on their two knees 
 at the stroke of noon, cross them- 
 selves devoutly, and ofier a prayer 
 to Our Lady for the maintenance of 
 peace." 
 
 The decree was executed with an 
 exactness which proves how popu- 
 lar was the devotion to Mary. 
 During the fifteenth century, at the 
 first stroke of the Angelus, there 
 was not a single Frenchman in the 
 houses, in the streets, in the fields, 
 or on the highways, who did not 
 
 t Polidorus Virgil attributes the institution of 
 the evening Ave Maria to Pope John XXIL, and 
 that of the morning to Theodoric, archbishop of 
 Cologne. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 401 
 
 prostrate himself to invoke the ' 
 Blessed Virgin. That duty dis- 
 charged, the wayfarer and trav- 
 eller arose and went on his way.* 
 
 In those immense processions, the 
 head of which was at St. Denis 
 when the end was still on the steps 
 of Notre Dame,f the Virgin's ban- 
 ner of mohair, embroidered with 
 gold, was borne high over all the 
 other sacred ensigns, and was car- 
 ried immediately after the Cross. 
 Kings, queens, bishops, and bur- 
 gesses of high degree, were all 
 members of Our Lady's confrater- 
 nity, J and in pious assemblies the 
 gold embroidered hoods of princes 
 were seen side by side with thfe 
 blue and red hoods of the Parisian 
 citizens. 
 
 At every corner of the streets, a 
 little statue of Mary, rudely carved 
 in oak, blackened by time, and cov- 
 ered with a veil of antique lace, 
 raised its guardian head above a 
 pile of flowers, which the good peo- 
 
 * Alex. Monteil, Vie privee des Frangais, t. 1. 
 
 f Capef., Hist, de la Ref. 
 
 I This confraternity, the most ancient belong- 
 ing to Our Lady in Paris, was established in 
 1168. It was named the Grand Confraternity 
 of Our Lady of the Lords, Priests, and Citizens 
 of Paris. The king, the queen, and the bishop ^ 
 
 pie renewed every morning when 
 the trumpets announced the dawn 
 from the towers of the Chatelet.§ 
 Sometimes these flowers, placed 
 there secretly before daybreak, were 
 taken for the gifts of angels, who 
 came, it was said, to teach Chris- 
 tians to honor their Queen. During 
 the night lamps burned continually 
 in these little grayish niches, which 
 on Saturday were illuminated all 
 day long. II This was the first light- 
 ing of streets ; and though it was 
 less brilliant than that now in use, 
 it had, at least, one great advantage 
 — it was connected with a pious 
 thought, calculated to excite reflec- 
 tion amongst a believing people. 
 The mystic lamps of the Madonnas, 
 shining here and there like a light 
 chain of stars, through the perfumed 
 stems of flowers, seemed to say to 
 the nightly wanderer, intent on 
 crime, " There is on this slumber- 
 ing city an eye which never closes, 
 but watches for ever over those 
 
 of Paris, were members, and none but the most 
 exemplary persons were received into any of the 
 three orders of the confraternity. (Le Maire, 
 t. ii., p. 19.—Traii. de la Police, t i., p. 372.) 
 
 § Alex. Monteil, t. i. 
 
 ]1 Hist, de Notre Dame de la Pair, par le P. 
 Medard, Capucin. 
 
402 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIROIN MARY. 
 
 silent and doserted stref^ts — the eye 
 of God!"* 
 
 These little corner - Madonnas, 
 though not so richly adorned as 
 those which figured in massive sil- 
 ver over altars of marble and gold, 
 were none the less dear to the peo- 
 ple. Young men and women came 
 there from all sides — in procession, 
 barefoot, and crowned with flowers 
 — singing the Litanies of the Bless- 
 ed Virgin ; every one followed them, 
 let the time be what it might, and 
 the crowd was sometimes so dense 
 that the street was completely 
 blocked up. A little cedar statue, 
 about a foot high, which had be- 
 longed to the house of Joyeuse, and 
 which stood between two pointed 
 turrets over the gate of the rever- 
 end Capuchin fathers in the Rue St. 
 •Honor^, came near being the cause 
 of a civil war, on a small scale, 
 between two of the wards of Paris. 
 Some persons of more zeal than 
 j)rudence would fain carry oif the 
 miracle-working Madonna, to enrich 
 
 * It is still the only lighting of several towns 
 in. Italy. The following are the words of an 
 author who wrote in 1803 : " II popolo e divoto 
 alle Madonne, per cui ve ne sono in ogni an- 
 gollo delle strade con fanali accessi di notte. 
 
 ^ their own parish. The people of 
 the neighborhood came to hear of 
 their intention, and forthwith took 
 up arms, mounted guard day and 
 night before the tutelary Virgin 
 and made up their minds to chain 
 the street across. Tranquillity was 
 only restored by the formal trans- 
 lation of the sacred image to the 
 very church of the convent. f 
 
 The Queen of Heaven, who in- 
 spired the armies of the Middle 
 Ages with the confidence of vic- 
 tory, reigned over the fleets and 
 merchant vessels of that fifteenth 
 century, which was justly styled 
 the age of discoveries. Christopher 
 Columbus undertook the discovery 
 of the New World, under the aus- 
 pices of the Virgin, whose office he 
 read on board his ship, from a pre- 
 cious manuscript given him at his 
 departure by Pope Alexander VI., 
 and which he bequeathed at his 
 death to the republic of Genoa, his 
 native country. Don Henry of Por- 
 tugal, who presided over and pro- 
 
 Essi tengono illuminate le strade, e cosi la 
 divozione supplisce alia polizia." (Descrizione di 
 Napoli, p. 269.) 
 
 * See Hint, de Notre Dame de la Paix. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 403 
 
 moted the discovery of the East 
 Indies, raised a church at Belem in 
 honor of Our Lady, accompanied by 
 an hospital for Portuguese sailors. 
 John Gonsalvo Zares, his first and 
 ablest navigator, had a church built 
 to Our Lady in Madeira. When the 
 Portuguese, under the direction of 
 Yasco de Gama, landed for the first 
 time on the coast of Coromandel, 
 where they expected, on the faith 
 of some old tradition, to find some 
 of St. Thomas' Christians, they were 
 conducted by the natives to the 
 temple of an Indian goddess, whom 
 they had the simplicity, notwith- 
 standing her four arms and her long 
 golden ears, to take for the Blessed 
 Virgin, and prayed to her accord- 
 ingly. One of them, however, be- 
 gan to have some doubts, and cried 
 out, as he looked at the hideous- 
 features of the idol, resembling 
 nothing less than the fair, sweet 
 Virgin of the Christians, " If the 
 devil be worsliipped here, which is 
 very possible, it is well understood 
 that we are only addressing our 
 prayers to the Mother of God!" 
 
 After establishing themselves in 
 the Indies, the Portuguese, faithful 
 in their devotion to Mary, dedicated 
 
 '^ to her in Goa, a superb church, 
 wholly gilt in the inside, styled Our 
 Lady of Asara, or Mercy. Several 
 other churches, such as Our Lady 
 of Cranganor and of Meliapour, 
 arose, by their means, in several 
 parts of India, even to the mouth 
 of the Ganges, the sacred river of 
 Hindostan. There was then among 
 them a pious practice of offering to 
 Mary the tenth part of the booty 
 obtained from the heathen, and thai 
 custom caused the construction of 
 many private chapels in her honor. 
 Even in our days their vessels never 
 pass in sight of the Virgin's chap- 
 els, situated along the coast of their 
 superb Macao, without saluting 
 them with discharges of all their 
 guns.* The Spaniards, no less de- 
 vout than the Portuguese to the 
 divine Mother of the Saviour, bore 
 on their gold- laden galloons her 
 statue in massive silver, before 
 which the brave Castilian mariners 
 of Isabella the Catholic said their 
 morning and evening prayers. At 
 a somewhat more recent period, the 
 buccaneers of the Island of Tortua, 
 having taken one of these images 
 in a naval engagement, the Span- 
 
 * Annals of the Propagation of the Faith. 
 
404 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 iards, robbed of all they possessed, 
 thought only of recovering their 
 revered Madonna. The governor- 
 geneiul opened a negotiation with 
 the pii'ates, solely to save the Santa 
 Senora from the profanations to 
 which she was exposed amongst 
 those lawless men, who gloried in 
 living without any religion, but 
 they refused to give it up. 
 
 Italy — then conspicuous amongst 
 all Catholic kingdoms by the revi- 
 val of the arts — consecrated the 
 pallet of her painters, the chisel of 
 her sculptors, and the pen of her 
 poets, to celebrate the greatness of 
 Mary. 
 
 From Cimabue, who founded the 
 Italian school about the year 1240, 
 to Carlo Maratti and Salvator Rosa 
 (who are considered its last mas- 
 ters)— that is to say, for a period 
 of five centuries — religious painting 
 produced a series of master-pieces 
 to which the history of the Blessed 
 Virgin contributed the largest share. 
 Raphael, then fine, poetical, and 
 pious as an angel, was the first to 
 divine, in bis admirable sposalizio, 
 the noble jet simple bearing, the 
 
 * There are still to be seen in the domestic 
 chapel of ]VIichael Angelo, in Florence, large 
 
 * fair and serious countenance, the 
 celestial attitude of the Mother of 
 divine Love and of holy Mercy. 
 One would say, that on a day of 
 fervent prayer Mary appeared to 
 him seated on the clouds, with her 
 angelic train, and that he painted 
 her in her glory, such as he saw 
 her. How many men of genius fol- 
 lowed in the footsteps of that great 
 master! Michael Angelo, Corregio, 
 Titian, the Carraclii, Spagnoletto, 
 Dominichini, that austere Carlo 
 Dolchi who consecrated his pencil 
 to the Blessed Virgin, and the fierce 
 Salvator who made pilgrimages to 
 Our Lady of Loretto. What rich- 
 ness of imagination ! What super- 
 human conceptions ! What a pro- 
 found sentiment of the holiness of 
 their art amongst those great Ital- 
 ian masters ! Those wondrous men, 
 who disinherited the future and ef- 
 faced the past, feared not to show 
 themselves faithful servants of the 
 Blessed Virgin ; they lit tapers 
 before her images, took ofi" their 
 beretta as they passed before them, 
 said their beads like every one 
 else,* and their greatest ambition 
 
 rosaries which belonged to him, and which he 
 took with him on his travels. 
 
HISTORY OF TEE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 405 
 
 was to adorn a Christian church 
 with some sacred painting, for 
 w^hich they prepared themselves as 
 a holy work. "Sound the trum- 
 pets, ring the bells," wrote Salvator 
 Rosa to Dr. Ricciardi ; "after thirty 
 years' residence in Rome, after six 
 whole lustres of blighted hopes and 
 a life of continual tribulation both 
 from man and heaven, I am at last 
 called on, for once, to paint a pic- 
 ture for a high-altar!"* This, we 
 see, is downright ecstasy. But, on 
 the other hand, how Catholicity 
 loved, encouraged, and protected 
 the art which enriched its temples 
 with so many master-pieces! — how 
 the Holy See honored and exalted 
 the man of genius ! — how it levelled 
 heights and effaced social distinc- 
 tions, to honor illustrious talents 
 and to raise their possessors to a 
 level with the rich and nobly born ! 
 Giotto, the peasant who left his 
 flock in a romantic valley of Tus- 
 cany, to work in the school of Cim- 
 abue, was the jiTotege, of Pope 
 Clement Y.; and it was the suc- 
 cessor of St. Peter who first sought 
 out the artist. Michael Angelo, in- 
 
 * Leitere di Salvator Rosa al dott. Giov. Batista 
 Ricciardi, Lettera 20. 
 
 * tended by his father for a weaver 
 of w^ool, w^as honored with some- 
 thing more than the favor, he pos- 
 sessed the confidence and the 
 friendship of Julius II. To Ra- 
 phael, the son of a poor and obscure 
 painter, there was offered on the one 
 hand a cardinal's hat, and on the 
 other, the hand of a cardinal's niece. 
 Lanfranco, that Parmegiano so pop- 
 ular in the eighteenth century, was 
 the intimate friend of cardinals, a 
 knight of the Holy Roman Empire, 
 and the special ^rofe^e of the Pope. 
 Caravaggio, the son of a mason, 
 received the cross of the order of 
 Malta, a superb gold chain, which 
 the grand -master himself hung 
 around his neck, and two slaves to 
 wait upon him. Claude Lorraine, 
 who was first a cook and then a 
 grinder of colors, was the friend of 
 the elegant Cardinal Bentivoglio, and 
 the distinguished favorite ol Urban 
 YIIL The Roman cardinals expend- 
 ed part of their fortune on master- 
 pieces of art which are still the or- 
 nament of the churches or of their 
 splendid galleries, and, following 
 their example, the Catholic princes 
 all encouraged the arts, and adorned 
 the altars with religious paintings. / 
 
i06 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VTROTN START. 
 
 Behold what Catholicity has done 
 for painting! ' Protestants acted in 
 a very different manner. Calvin, 
 who despised poetry, and even set 
 down church-organs as foolish van- 
 ttiesy^ protested with no less bitter- 
 ness and vehemence against idol- 
 atrous painting ; hence, religious 
 pictures were unmercifully lacerated 
 l)y his ferocious followers, and this 
 aversion for that most noble art 
 lasted so long that, in the acts 
 passed by the British Parliament 
 in 1636, it is ordained that all the 
 pictures in the Royal Gallery which 
 represent the Virgin, or the second 
 person of tlie Trinity^ shall be pub- 
 licly bm-ned.f What more could 
 the Caliph Omar have done ? 
 
 It is worthy of remark, that the 
 two chiefs of the Protestant sects, 
 whilst exclaiming against Catholic 
 pictures, were quite willing to sit 
 for their own portraits, as often as 
 theii' partisans desired to have them. 
 " Luther," says an English writer, 
 
 * The Scotch Covenanters despised poetry, 
 which they deemed a profane and useless art. 
 This rough fanaticism lasted • so long in some 
 parts of Scotland, that Wilson, author of a poem 
 called The Clyde, being appointed, some thirty 
 years ago, to teach a school in Greenock, was 
 obliged to give a written promise that he would 
 
 * "was always well pleased to nnil- 
 tiply his portrait and that of his 
 homely rib. J His statue, erected 
 at Wittenberg, is exposed to the 
 veneration of the Lutherans of Ger- 
 many, and M. Lerminier himself 
 compares this veneration to that 
 which Catholics bear to Our Lady 
 of Loretto. Calvin, possessed by 
 the same strange mania, drew on 
 the Huguenots of France that judi- 
 cious question of Saconay : " Why 
 are ye so much opposed to paint- 
 ings and images? Does not your 
 own Calvin take pleasure in having 
 his likeness multiplied, carved in 
 Geneva with so much skill that his 
 hollow eyes and countenance are 
 vividly represented, and he is show^n 
 to the life, ungainly as he is."§ 
 
 Statuary also arose, grand and 
 majestic, under the inspiration of 
 Mary. Greece had seated, erected, 
 and reclined her statues; but she 
 had not devised the suppliant pos- 
 ture of Our Lady of Dolors; she 
 
 renounce poetry. The Scotch Puritans gave 
 organs the contemptuous name of whistling 
 chests. (Sir Walter Scott, Border Minstrelsy.) 
 
 f Journal of the House of Commons. 
 
 \ Memoirs of Salvator Bosa, By Lady Mor- 
 gan, 
 
 § Archives Curieuses. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 407 
 
 had not placed innocence and purity 
 kneeling before God; she confided 
 to Bacchantes, or to old Silenus, her 
 fair marble children. Mary, bearing 
 the infant Jesus in her arms, came 
 to reveal both to art and to society 
 the religion of maternity, and open- 
 ed to sculpture tlie unexplored 
 career of moral things. Sculpture 
 revived, like her sister, in the classic 
 land of art — fair, sunny Italy ; like 
 her sister, she was protected there 
 by the princes of the Roman Church, 
 who had preserved the noble pro- 
 ductions of the great masters of an- 
 cient Greece. A bull had been 
 issued by the Yicar of Jesus Christ, 
 forbidding the mutilation of ancient 
 statues ; and if the modern sculptor 
 can yet study those master -pieces, 
 he owes it to Martin Y. 
 
 Benvenuto Cellini, one of the 
 greatest artists of the time of Leo 
 X., and one of the most dangerous 
 bravos of Italy, had, nevertheless, a 
 profound faith in the Virgin ; vin- 
 dictive as he was — and there was 
 no one more so — he would not dare 
 to draw his richly- chased stiletto 
 from his silken sleeve in presence 
 of a Madonna. One day, when he 
 had been cast into prison for his 
 
 * misdeeds, he thought he saw the 
 Virgin, in the midst of the sun's 
 disc, holding her divine Son on her 
 knee, and looking down on him 
 with the sweetest smile. "I saw 
 her," says he, in a letter which is 
 still extant — "I saw her clearly 
 and distinctly, and I glorified God 
 aloud." 
 
 Amongst the great Italian poets 
 of the Revival, the most illustrious 
 were distinguished by their devo- 
 tion to Mary. Dante sang her 
 praise in the magnificent verse of 
 his Paradiso. ''0 woman!" he ex- 
 claims, " thou art so great, thou hast 
 so much power, that he who solicits 
 a favor without having recourse to 
 thee, sends up his aspirations with- 
 out wings."* In the romantic sol- 
 itudes of Vaucluse, Lintenno, and 
 Arqua, where Petrarch shut himself 
 up to await the poetic inspiration 
 which is repelled by the tumult of 
 cities, we still behold the spire of 
 his little domestic chapels adorned 
 with a superb Madonna of Peru- 
 gino's. It was at the feet of this 
 fair Madonna that he composed his 
 Invocation to Mary, his last can- 
 zona, so humble, so tender, so 
 
 * Dante, II Paradiso, c. 33. 
 
408 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIROIN MART. 
 
 Christian, wherein "he prostrates f 
 his heart" before the "sweet and 
 pious Virgin," to the end that she 
 may guide him back to the way 
 from which he had wandered, and 
 recommend him to her divine Son 
 at his last moment* Tasso, being 
 on his way from Mantua to Rome, 
 turned aside to acquit himself of a 
 vow to Om* Lady of Loretto; he 
 arrived, overpowered with fatigue, 
 and without money to finish his 
 jom-ney; but happily one of the 
 Gonzagua princes, who was much 
 attached to him, happened to be 
 there at the same time, and amply 
 provided for all his wants. Recov- 
 ered fi'om his fatigue, he fultilled 
 with the most feiTent devotion all 
 the duties of his pilgrimage, and 
 composed the finest canticle ever 
 written in honor of Our Lady of 
 Loretto.f 
 
 Stretched on his bed of death, in 
 the convent of St. Onuphre, Tasso 
 asked of the yoimg Rubens — who 
 had taken him from the dungeons 
 of the duke of Ferrara — a small 
 silver Madonna, which he had him- 
 self given long before to the father 
 of that great painter. "Thou wilt 
 
 * Le Rime 'id Petrarca (Fireuze), t. iii., c. 8. 
 
 take it back," said he, " when I am 
 dead." Rubens instantly obeyed, 
 and the author of Jerusalem Deliv- 
 ered, after having burned some 
 poetical sketches written during 
 the delirious hours of his crael and 
 unjust captivity, began to say his 
 prayers in a low voice, clasping in 
 his convulsed hands the sacred im- 
 age which encouraged him to hope 
 till the last. When the body of the 
 great poet, so cruelly neglected dur- 
 ing his life, was borne triumphantly 
 to its last resting-place, Rubens 
 could not bring himself to join the 
 funeral procession ; he hastened to 
 take shelter in the most obscure 
 corner of St. Peter's, in Rome, 
 where, prostrate before the Virgin's 
 altar, he prayed with great fervor, 
 holding in his hands the little 
 silver Madonna which he had taken 
 from the icy hands of Tasso. 
 
 Music, purified by the tender and 
 inspiring breatli of the Blessed Vir- 
 gin, was then beginning to revive 
 under her auspices. In the fifth 
 century, Sedulius, whose verses were 
 considered very pleasing to her, had 
 sung her praise in his Carmen Pas- 
 cliale. In the twelfth, a monk oi 
 
 f Such is the opinion of Ginguend. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 409 
 
 St. Victor composed the Litanies, 
 which accorded so well with the 
 lofty arches of the cathedrals, the 
 majestic tones of the organ, the 
 white veils and scarfs of gold-bro- 
 cade, and the roses scattered by 
 the hands of innocent children. 
 These Litanies were sung, during 
 the Middle Ages and those which 
 immediately followed, by the pil- 
 grims as they journeyed to some 
 shrine built on the sandy beach, or 
 far amid the granite and basalt of 
 the mountains. That long series 
 of divine titles and graceful appel- 
 lations, broken only by the simple 
 and most touching words, "pray 
 for us," went floating on the wind 
 to awake the slumbering echoes of 
 the valleys, or to die away on the 
 distant wave in many a plaintive 
 cadence. One would have thought 
 that the angels of God, who, when 
 Mary lived on earth, kissed her 
 shadow as they passed her by, 
 as the Spaniard, Zorilla, poetically 
 says, 'sowed her praises in the 
 fields of air." 
 
 The Christmas carols — those joy- 
 ous hymns so full of the memory 
 of the Virgin of Bethlehem — sung 
 by torch-light through the snowy 
 
 fields, or by the antique cribs 
 adorned with verdure and winter- 
 flowers, were then the favorite song 
 of all the French provinces. Our 
 church -hymns have impressed on 
 the music a noble and severe char- 
 acter, which fills the soul to over- 
 flowing, and plunges it into the in- 
 finite. The Christmas carols, more 
 simple in their effect, gave it a 
 tinge quite Arcadian. It is a bird- 
 like" song, which goes up gaily to 
 God to celebrate a joyous mystery ; 
 it is a woodland perfume, which 
 embalms the altar of the Saviour's 
 youthful mother. The fresh and 
 simple lays connected with these 
 charming airs, all breathe the cool- 
 ness of the woods, the smell of the 
 white -thorn, the perfume of the 
 hive, and the bleating of lambs. It 
 is the song of the people, the song 
 of the shepherds, the song of Nature 
 itself. 
 
 In the carols, Mary is always rep- 
 resented as a youthful Virgin, fair 
 and pure, wrapping up in her linen 
 veil the King of Angels, and too 
 much absorbed in her joy to heed 
 the bareness of the stable or the 
 straw in the crib. The people, in- 
 ured to privations of every kind, 
 
CIO 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 dwell not on the poverty, but on * 
 the happiness of the Mother of 
 Christ; it is like one of Claude 
 Lorraine's paintings — all light. In 
 the Stahaf^ — that hymn of the thir- 
 teenth century which the Italians 
 have so poetically styled II pianto 
 di Maria (Mary's wail) — there is 
 no longer aught of the joys of the 
 Nativitv, but all the terrors of the 
 Golgotha. It is a strain burdened 
 with the deepest sorrow, and break- 
 ing forth at times into heart-rend- 
 ing cries of anguish ; it is the pierc- 
 ing recital of the sufferings of a 
 mother, who sees an adored son ex- 
 piring before her eyes. To under- 
 stand the inconceivable sadness of 
 that hymn, and the mournful mys- 
 teries Avhich it reveals, it must be 
 heard, as we have heard it, in one 
 of those vast Italian churches where 
 people pray with faith and sing 
 with soul; one would say that the 
 majestic voice of the organ is choked 
 with sobs, and that the angels are 
 weeping for their Queen. No re- 
 ligion, since the world began, ever 
 
 * It is thought that the Stahat Mater Dolorosa 
 was composed by Innocent IIL, one of the 
 greatest Popes that ever ruled the Church, and 
 the founder of two great orders, the Dominicans 
 
 furnished such a theme for poetry 
 and music as the Stahat. The sor- 
 rows of Mary at the foot of the 
 Cross call forth all the power of 
 harmony and all the inspiration of 
 poetry. That theme, although most 
 effective as it now stands, is still 
 far from perfection ; to give it as it 
 onglit to be, or 7m(/ht be, w^ould be 
 the last and most sublime reach of 
 art. 
 
 At the period of the Revival, 
 those competitions in poetry found- 
 ed in honor of the Blessed Virgin 
 during the ages of chivalry, were 
 still kept up with great pomp and 
 splendor, in Rouen, Dieppe, and 
 Caen, under the name of puys or 
 palinods. The meeting w^as held in 
 one of Mary's churches, and the suc- 
 cessful competitor received from the 
 prince of the puy a golden palm.f 
 This was the germ of the French 
 Academy. A little later, that of the 
 Floral Games, w^hich aw^arded a sil- 
 ver lily to the best piece of poetry 
 on the Virgin, was established in 
 Toulouse, where it still exists. 
 
 and the Franciscans; others attribute it to Ja- 
 copone de Todi, St. Gregory, and some to St. 
 Bernard. 
 
 f Antiq'dit'es de la Ville de Rouen. 
 
HISTORY OF TEE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 411 
 
 In the fifth century, it was said 
 of Mary that she was honorum poeta- 
 rum magistram ; in the fifteenth, 
 she was still the queen of all the 
 poets of the Christian woi-ld. The 
 Britons, who had substituted the 
 dialogue- ballad for the dread and 
 mystic songs of the Druids, almost 
 invariably introduced an invocation 
 to Mary. The cantadours of Gui- 
 enne, the bards of Provence, never 
 passed a shrine of hers without go- 
 ing in to sing there (accompanying 
 themselves with the lute or hand- 
 organ) some pretty hymn composed 
 in her honor, and it was said by 
 those wandering sons of song tha-t 
 the Madonna sometimes rewarded 
 their simple strain by a smile or a 
 graceful inclination of the head, 
 which made them happier than the 
 golden cups given them as guer- 
 dons by princes whose victories 
 they sang. The descendants of the 
 English bards — who sang, like the 
 birds of the air, now in the shadow 
 of the cloister, anon in the shade 
 of the woods, to the sound of the 
 Saxon harp — had no song sweeter 
 or more admired than the ballads 
 wherein they related some miracle 
 of the Blessed Virgin. Italian song, 
 
 * so highly extolled, began with the 
 raadriale^ the hymn to Mary which 
 the gondolier of Venice sang on his 
 lagoons, the Neapolitan contadino in 
 the shade of his vine, and the Sicil- 
 ian fisherman in his light bark. 
 Spanish poetry had, even in the 
 Middle Ages, signalized its awak- 
 ing by songs consecrated to Mary. 
 In the thirteenth centmy, Gonzalo 
 de Berceo, the first Spanish poet on 
 record, styled himself the Blessed 
 Virgin's poet ; and Louis of Leon 
 soon after created Spanish lyric 
 poetry, the better to celebrate her 
 name. In Germany, the Tudescan 
 poets early softened their rude 
 idiom for Maiy, whom they sang, 
 even in the sixteenth century, with 
 admirable faith and charming sim- 
 plicity. " Thou canst not choose 
 but hear us," sang the most popular 
 poet of Germany, Walter de Wol- 
 gelweide ; " we delight so much in 
 honoring thee!" Conrad de Wurz- 
 burg was no less devout to Mary. 
 In the northern kingdoms, the Vir- 
 gin's hymns superseded the fierce 
 and warlike songs of the Scalds, of 
 which .none now remain except the 
 funeral hymn of Regnier Lodbrog, 
 that wild sea-king, who wrote, on 
 
412 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 tlio dark walls of his dungeon, the 
 sanguinary exploits which he had 
 committed on the gloomy shores of 
 the Baltic and the stormy German 
 Sea, whose waves he had made "red 
 as the fresh wound of a warrior." 
 In Lithuania, with difficulty con- 
 verted to Christianity, the hymn 
 to Mary replaced the canticles of 
 Milda, the goddess of beauty, spring 
 and roses ; and the bartinilcas, those 
 roving minstrels of White Russia, 
 who were regarded as inspired, and 
 who presided at the musical cho- 
 mses of the feast of crops and the 
 still more joyous feast of flowers, 
 abandoned, in the fifteenth century, 
 the god Sotwaros, their eastern 
 Apollo, to seek their poetic inspira- 
 tion from Mary, who was proclaim- 
 ed Grand Duchess of the Lithuan- 
 ians.* 
 
 The Virgin, who vivified the arts, 
 watched ever and always over the 
 preservation of empires, and the 
 sweet Queen of Heaven had still 
 for her vassals the kings of Cath- 
 olic Europe in general, and those 
 of France in particular. In 1478, 
 
 * Sketch of Ihe Pagan Religion and tfie Popular 
 Traditions of the Lithuanians, by Felix Wrot- 
 nowski. 
 
 f King Louis XL detached the earl- 
 dom of Boulogne from Artois, and 
 transferred it to the Virgin Mary, 
 whom he declared Countess of Bou- 
 logne. In payment of his feudal 
 debt, he laid on her altar a golden 
 heart of the weight of thirteen 
 marks, and engaged that his suc- 
 cessors on the throne should be 
 bound to renew the homage and 
 the off'ering to the Virgin suzeraine. 
 It is well known that this cruel, 
 but politic prince, disdaining pomp 
 even so as to fall into the opposite 
 extreme, wore no other ornament 
 in his public audiences than a small 
 leaden Madonna in his royal hat. 
 He was accustomed to say that he 
 thought more of that little bit of 
 lead than of all the gold in his 
 kingdom. 
 
 He was buried, according to his 
 orders, in the church of Our Lady 
 of Clery. So particular was he 
 about the execution of this com- 
 mand, that Pope Sixtus IV., at his 
 request, forbade any one, under 
 pain of excommunication, to re- 
 move the body of Louis to any 
 other place. 
 
 Anne of Brittany, who was twice 
 queen of France, built chapels to 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 413 
 
 the Blessed Virgin, and wished that ^ 
 her scapular might be placed in 
 the golden box wherein her heart 
 was to be sent to the Bretons. The 
 tomb of Francis IL, last duke of 
 Bretagne, having been opened in 
 the year 1727, there was found in 
 the vaults, between the coffin of that 
 prince and that of Marguerite de 
 Foix, a small leaden chest contain- 
 ing a golden box shaped like a 
 heart, surmounted by a royal crown, 
 and encircled by the cord of the 
 Franciscan Order, all of exquisite 
 workmanship. This box, which had 
 inclosed the heart of Queen Anne, 
 then contained only a little water, 
 and the remains of the scapular 
 which the pious princess had worn 
 in honor of Mary. 
 
 Francis L, having learned that a 
 certain Huguenot had had the au- 
 dacity to strike off, in the very 
 heart of Paris, the head of an image 
 of Our Lady, made a solemn act of 
 
 reparation to the Mother of God, 
 walking barefoot and bareheaded, 
 with a taper in his hand. The 
 lords of the court and the members 
 of Parliament walked in procession 
 after the monarch, who replaced 
 with his own hands, on the altar 
 where the mutilation had taken 
 place, a magnificent statue of the 
 Virgin.* 
 
 In Spain, the work commenced 
 by Prince Pelagius, under the ausr 
 pices of Mary, to deliver the penin- 
 sula from the Moors, was consum- 
 mated by the taking of Grenada. 
 The first war-cry of Spanish inde- 
 pendence was " Mary ! " in the cave 
 of Covadonga. This victory was 
 gained under her banner, by Fer- 
 dinand the Catholic, who had en- 
 graved in gold, on his good Toledo 
 blade, the guardian image of Our 
 Lady; and on his banners was in- 
 scribed, "Ave Maria." 
 
 * p. de Barry, Paradis, etc. 
 
CHAPTER KII. 
 
 THE LATER HERESIES. 
 
 HERE is; in the 
 Caramanian des- 
 ert, towards the 
 Pci-sian Gulf, a 
 shrub which the 
 Persians call^?/Z 
 Md samoun (tVe 
 flower that poisons the wind) . Her- 
 esy sprang up in cold Germany, like 
 the poisonous plant that impreg- 
 nates the warm breeze of the Per- 
 sian summer with a quality so dead- 
 ly that it kills those who inhale it; 
 the only difference is, that the fatal 
 breath which went forth from the 
 Germanic countries commenced by 
 killing souls, which it did by thou- 
 sands ! Then it was that the cheer- 
 ing rays of the fair star which re- 
 flected the uncreated Sun so benign- 
 ly on the zenith of the Christian 
 worli were lost amid the thick fogs 
 
 * Those who follow the Confession of Augs- 
 burg honor the saints by hymns, images, and 
 festivals ; but they do not think themselves 
 bound to invoke them. Stuyter, minister of 
 Eibergen, wrote a very beautiful poem on the vir- 
 
 * of error which obscured the North- 
 ern sky, while its light was sensibly 
 diminished even in the faithful coun- 
 tries which it continued to illumine. 
 
 The sectaries of the sixteenth cen- 
 tury were outrageous against the 
 images of Mary and the Saints ; the 
 patrician sect of Luther, it must be 
 confessed, showed somewhat more 
 moderation in this respect;* but 
 the fury of the Calvinists exceeded 
 all belief. 
 
 Opposed to arts and letters as 
 much as to Catholicity, concealing 
 a destructive radicalism under the 
 mask of religion, assailing by in- 
 flammatory pamphlets, now the 
 pope, now the prince, that small 
 minority, laboring with all its might 
 to impose its doct^'ine and belief on 
 the vast majority of the people, by 
 whom it was held in abhorrence, 
 
 tues and prerogatives of the Mother of God. It 
 is not so with the other sectaries, who despise the 
 Blessed Virgin, or look upon her as no more than 
 any other woman. {Du Culte des Saints et de la 
 St. Vierge, par I'^veque de Castorie, pp. 2 and 3 ) 
 
SIS TORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 415 
 
 covered France with ruin and 
 mourning. " These good reformers," 
 says a Count of Lyons, an eye- 
 witness of their atrocities, " began 
 by reforming public peace and 
 tranquillity." In Tours, in Blois, 
 in Poictiers, in Bourges, in Rouen, 
 they completely sacked the church- 
 es, mutilated the statues of the 
 Saints, and dragged the images 
 of Christ and his Blessed Mother 
 through the mire, singing the Lit- 
 anies in derision.* Li Gasoony they 
 buried Catholics alive, cut infants 
 in two, ripped priests open and tore 
 out their bowels. The dead them- 
 selves were not respected in their 
 dusty sepulchres ; the Huguenots 
 tore Louis XI. from his tomb, burn- 
 ed what decay had spared, and 
 audaciously flimg to the winds the 
 ashes of a king of France whose 
 race still occupied the throne. The 
 ancestors of the kings of Navarre 
 and the princes of Conde were no 
 better treated than Louis XI. ; the 
 tombs of the house of Angouleme 
 (the reigning house) shared the 
 same fate. The lords of Longue- 
 ville were taken but half decayed 
 
 * Archives Curieuses de I'Histoire de France, — 
 Capefigue. — Astolfi, 
 
 f from their coffins, and thrown to the 
 dogs.f 
 
 The Count-Canon Saconay, who 
 lived near the time of the Hugue- 
 nots, of whom little good was then 
 to be told, has left us the relation 
 of their doings in the churches of 
 Lyons. "Ruffi, one of their prin- 
 cipal preachers," says he, " with a 
 two-handled sword, which he wore 
 while preaching, like a painted St. 
 Paul, entered with his satellites into 
 the great church of St. John, where 
 he beat down and demolished a 
 cnicifix of great height, which was 
 in the middle of said church, partly 
 of solid silver, and the rest overlaid 
 with the same precious metal. Hav- 
 ing thrown it down, Ruffi fell on it 
 with great fury, setting his feet on 
 its head ; and seeing some of his 
 soldiers and ministers drawing near- 
 
 ' er than he wished, fearing lest they 
 might secure (lie silver^ he drew his 
 huge sword, and brandished it five 
 or six times. ' What ! ' said he, ' am 
 I not to be respected? shall any 
 other have the honor of smiting this 
 great idol before me?' So say- 
 ing, he struck off the head of said 
 
 f Archives Curieuses, etc — Capefigue, Hid. de 
 laBef. 
 
416 
 
 BISTORT OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 likeness of Jesus crucified, and 
 
 held it up, sa}ing, 'Behold the 
 
 head of the idol.' But what was 
 
 not of solid silver, he left to the 
 
 others. 
 
 " The lesser thieves must needs 
 
 have then* share of the plunder: 
 they scraped the gold or silver im- 
 ages so as to get a mouthful for 
 themselves before they handed them 
 over to the greater thieves. From 
 an angel they took a wing, from a 
 saint an arm, from a virgin the 
 head, etc. They melted 'down a 
 massive silver cmcilix which was in 
 the church of St. Stephen, saying in 
 derision that the poor crucifix had 
 been a long time cold, being naked, 
 but that they would give it such 
 a warming that it should never be 
 cold again. They likewise melted 
 the copes, and other ornaments of 
 the altars, which were of knapped 
 cloth of gold, and could not but 
 make great profit of the same, which 
 were of the value of ten thousand 
 crowns. Truly theirs was a hot and 
 a fiery gospel " 
 
 * Archives Curieuseii. 
 
 fThe chapel of Our I/ady of Beth- Aram, 
 which had been destroyed by the Huguenot!-', 
 was rebuilt in 1615, by John de Salette, bishop 
 of Lescar ; but the miraculous image is wanting. 
 
 * The hermitages, whose little round 
 spires invited the belated traveller 
 to turn aside, promising him, in the 
 A^ii'gin's name, a lodging for the 
 night, a frugal meal, and a kindly 
 welcome ; these were demolished by 
 the Calvinists, who had the cruelty 
 to shoe, as they did their horses, the 
 pious old men who inhabited those 
 calm retreats.* 
 
 The priests fled with the relics, 
 the crucifixes and the statues of Our 
 Lady, as in the time of the Norman 
 invasion ; one of them went all the 
 way to Gallicia (where it still re- 
 mains) to hide the image of Our 
 Lady of Beth -Aram, which shep- 
 herds of the olden time had miracu- 
 lously found in the woods.f 
 
 In Paris, under the very eyes of 
 the court which then protected them, 
 they massacred in St. Medard, dur- 
 ing the sermon, a crowd of imaimed 
 Catholics. The parishes, frightened 
 by the insolence of these sectaries, 
 • who went to their conventicles dag- 
 ger in hand and harquebuss on 
 shoulder,J petitioned to have artil- 
 
 J The Calvinists went to meeting armed to the 
 teeth ; they were met journeying thus in hostile 
 array, twelve cavaliers, accompanied by twenty 
 footmen. — (Archives Gurieuses.) These evan- 
 # gelical people, who came forth from their con- 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 ■iV. 
 
 lery placed at the entrance of the 
 churches as a means of defence, and 
 the day was seen when the ceremo- 
 nies of Catholic worship could no 
 longer be celebrated, in the most 
 Christian kingdom, without the pro- 
 tection of a row of cannon.* " It 
 was then that they commenced in 
 Paris," says M. Capefigue, " a war 
 of popular pamphlets destined to 
 annihilate all the old belief; they 
 posted placards against the Eu- 
 charist, and especially against the 
 Mass, even in the palace of the 
 Louvre. The walls of the chm'ches 
 and posts in the squares, displayed 
 every morning that thirst for pros- 
 elytism which distinguished the 
 Reformers.:|- 
 
 After having gone to the most 
 unheard-of excesses, so as to exas- 
 perate the Catholic population to 
 the last degree, the Huguenots pub- 
 lished a number of hypocritical 
 apologies, wherein they set them- 
 selves forth as martyrs. '^Protest- 
 
 venticles with fierce looks and threatening 
 gestures, according to the testimony of Eras- 
 mns, were always ready to take up arms, and as 
 ready to fight as to dispute. 
 
 * Arch. Cur., etc. 
 
 fOapefigue. 
 
 X M. de Chateaubriand, Ess. sur la Lift. Ang. t. i. 
 
 antism," says M. de Chateaubriand, 
 " cried out against the intolerance 
 of Rome whilst slaughtering Catho- 
 lics in England and France, throw- 
 ing to the winds the ashes of the 
 dead, kindling funeral-piles in Ge- 
 neva, perpetrating all manner of 
 atrocities in Munster (Germany), 
 and dictating the vile penal laws 
 which oppressed the Irish, and do, 
 in great measure, oppress them 
 still, after three centm-ies of perse- 
 cution ! '.' \ 
 
 Kings were not more quiet than 
 the people, and the throne was no 
 less menaced than the altar. ^' These 
 people are disturbers of the public 
 peace, " said Henry YIE., sending 
 them to the stake with the i:jnglish 
 Catholics. " I see anarchy through 
 their banner," said Francis 1. In 
 fact, Luther established the prin- 
 ciple that it is lawful to make war 
 on sovereigns for the propagation of 
 Protestantism ; § and the Calvinist 
 preacher, Des Hosiers, laid down in 
 
 §This was also the opinion of Calvin, who 
 added : " The powers of the earth give in their 
 resignation when they oppose the progress of 
 
 our doctrine It is better to spit in their 
 
 face than obey them." The Huguenots under- 
 stood their apostles so well, that Catherine de 
 Medici found, in her very chamber, a notice 
 
as 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO Till: BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 his pamphlets this maxim, which he ^ 
 subsequently applied to Catherine 
 de Medici : " It is lawful to kill a 
 king- (i- (jiui'ii who opposes the 
 reformation of the Church." * 
 
 This insolence and these subver- 
 sive theories, duly caiTied out, drew 
 down on the authors of our civil dis- 
 cord, the heaviest and most severe 
 reprisals ; the policy of a prince ex- 
 asperated to the last degree by an 
 
 that she should be stabbed if she did not dis- 
 miss all Catholics from about her pereon. — (Ca- 
 pefigue. Hid. de la Ref.) 
 
 *Ibid. 
 
 f It must be acknowledged that if Charles, 
 our king, was cruel to the Huguenots, it was 
 not without just cause. The affair of Meaux, in 
 particular, gave him great offence: the others 
 might all be excused by some covering of rehg- 
 ion ; but that one might be truly called an at- 
 tempt on the person of the king, his brother and 
 the queen, whom they would gladly have put to 
 death, if they could. Hence, the king often said 
 that he could never forgive them for that, and 
 well for him, he said, that he made a good show 
 of defence amongst his Swiss, to whom he often 
 said that he would rather die a king than live a 
 captive and a slave. The transactions of Shrove- 
 Tuesday likewise touched him to the heart, and 
 excited him still more against the Huguenots 
 for having corrupted Monsieur his brother, and 
 the King of Navarre, and inducing them to 
 make war on him while he lay dangerously ill 
 "They might at least," said he, "have waited for 
 my death; this was the worst of all." — {Vie de 
 Charles IX., par Br., p. 16.) It is to be remark- 
 ed that the author was a cotemporary of Charles 
 IX., that he lived at his court, that he boldly 
 
 attempt of the Protestants on his 
 person,f threw the court into an 
 extreme party; it believed, what 
 was really true, that the question 
 was whether the kingdom was to be 
 or not to be, and hence it was that 
 a bloody page was added to our 
 history. St. Bartholomew's day 
 saved the house of Valois from the 
 fate of the Stuarts, J and Catholicity 
 from imminent danger. Still, it 
 
 called the affair of St. Bartholomew a base 
 slaughter, and that he nowhere assigned religion 
 as its motive. 
 
 I Hear how Swift, a great politician and a 
 distingfuished member of the English Church, 
 judged the Calvinists in 1732: "The Puritans, 
 who had, almost from the beginning of Queen 
 Elizabeth's reign, been a perpetual thorn in the 
 Church's side, joining with the Scotch enthu- 
 siasts in the time of King Charles I., were the 
 principal cause of the Irish rebellion and mas- 
 sacre, by distressing that prince, and making it 
 impossible for him to send over timely succors. 
 And after that prince had satisfied his parlia- 
 ment in every single point to be complained of, 
 the same sectaries, by poisoning the minds and 
 affections of the people, with the most false and 
 wicked representations of their king, were able, 
 in the compass of a few years, to embroil the 
 three nations in a bloody rebeUion, at the ex- 
 peiise of many thousand lives; to turn the 
 kingly power into anarchy; to murder their 
 prince in the face of the world; and (in their 
 own style) to destroy the Church, root and 
 branch." — (Swift's Works, Queries relating to the 
 Sacramental Test.) At the battle of Phillip- 
 haugh, in Scotland, when Leslie, the chief of the 
 J J Coven anters, defeated the Marquis of Montrose, 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 419 
 
 was an inhuman step, which the 
 religion of Christ must ever con- 
 demn, and the guilt of which she 
 indignantly denies. Catherine and 
 Charles dealt themselves with her- 
 esy; they annihilated the conspir- 
 ing faction. The Catholic bishops 
 protested against that act of intim- 
 idation and violence by sheltering 
 the Calvinists in their palaces.* 
 This is the only fact omitted by these 
 sectaries, who took good care to 
 
 the Presbyterians massacred many of their pris- 
 oners in cold blood; others, as Wishart relates, 
 "were cast from a bridge into the Tweed," 
 whilst a Presbyterian minister, who presided at 
 the execution, rubbed his hands and cried : 
 " Bravely done !" — {Border Minstrelsy.) Under 
 Cromwell the Church of England was declared 
 malignant, and the Puritans, who had so loudly 
 demanded freedom of conscience for themselves, 
 shut up all the Anghcan churches when they 
 came into power. It is related by Evelyn that 
 they went on Christmas Day, armed with mus- 
 kets, into the English cathedrals, and insulted 
 the Anglicans who were preparing to take the 
 Supper. Hence Swift said of them: "There is 
 one small doubt I would be willingly satisfied in 
 before I agree to the repeahng of the Test; that 
 is, whether these same Protestants, when they 
 have by their dexterity made themselves the 
 national reUgion, and disposed of the Church 
 revenues among their pastors or themselves, will 
 be so kind as to allow us dissenters, I do not 
 say a share in employments, but a bare tolera- 
 tion by law ? ^ The reason of my doubt is, be- 
 cause I have been so very idle as to read above 
 fifty pamphlets, written by as many Presbyte- 
 rian divincSj loudly disclaiming this idol tolera- 
 
 * 
 
 magnify and exaggerate their losses 
 in every possible way. 
 
 Ferdinand the Catholic, unwilling 
 that the pernicious weed of heresy 
 should make its way into the fair 
 land of Spain, or dry up that truly 
 Christian soil, debarred its entrance 
 from the very outset by raising up 
 the Inquisition, which arrested its 
 audacious march at the foot of the 
 Pyrenees. 
 
 Italy, then torn asunder by civil 
 
 tion: some of them calling it (I know not how 
 properly) a rag of Popery, and all agreeing it 
 was to establish iniquity by law. Now, I would 
 be glad to know when and where their success- 
 ors have renounced this doctrine, and before 
 what witnesses." Under the first Hanoverian 
 princes, they began once more to cry out against 
 Anglican persecution, and were answered with 
 cutting sarcasm: "If the dissenters will be sat- 
 isfied with such a toleration by law as has been 
 granted them in England, I believe the majority 
 of both houses will fall readily in with it; far- 
 ther, it will be hard to persuade this House of 
 Commons, and perhaps much harder the next 
 For, to say the truth, we make a mighty differ- 
 ence here between suffering thistles to grow 
 among us, and wearing them for posies." — 
 {Ibid.) 
 
 * The bishop of Lizieux, Jean Hennuyer, 
 boldly prevented the execution of the king's or- 
 der, by opening the doors of his palace to those 
 Calvinists who insulted and outraged the Nor- 
 man bishops. Several other prelates, and es- 
 pecially those of Bayonne, Valence, Vienne, 
 Oleron, and Uzes, incurred the displeasure of 
 the court by extending their protection to the 
 Calvinists. 
 
420 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 wars, was not so fortunate as Spain, * 
 and Protestantism there manifested 
 all its horroi-s in the sack of Rome. 
 The Constable de Bourbon had 
 pointed out to his heretic soldiers 
 the capital of the Christian world 
 as a rich and defenceless prey, 
 which they might plunder almost 
 without a blow. From the spirit 
 which animated the leaders of these 
 disorderly hordes, we may form an 
 idea of that of the soldiers : the 
 Lutheran Colonel Frunsberg, who 
 accompanied the constable to the 
 siege of Rome, had a chain made 
 of solid gold, taken from the 
 churches, " for the express purpose," 
 he said, "of strangling the Pope 
 with his own hand."* 
 
 Rome, without a single ally, and 
 attacked unawares, still defended 
 itself bravely, and, at the first as- 
 sault, the Constable de Bom-bon 
 was mortally wounded by an arque- 
 busade. He had scarcely time to 
 order that his body should be cov- 
 ered with a cloak in order to con- 
 ceal his death from his troops. But 
 the precaution was useless. The 
 ominous news quickly spread; "and 
 the heretic soldiers," says a co- 
 
 * Brantome, Capilaines etrangers, t. ii. 
 
 temporary historian, who gathered 
 his materials on the very spot — 
 " the heretic soldiers thenceforward 
 fought only in the diabolical spirit 
 of revenge, to the furious cries of 
 " Sangre ! sangre ! Bourbon ! Bour- 
 bon!" Nothing could resist these 
 imperial bands, mad with rage and 
 thirsting for blood ; the ramparts 
 were scaled ; the Romans gave way, 
 and the fatal victory of impiety 
 went on from street to street with 
 so great fury, that it seemed as 
 though hell loere undud'iied and 
 fought under the banners of the 
 Prince of Orange, who had the mel- 
 ancholy glory of accomplishing this 
 criminal enterprise. "The arque- 
 busades," says Brantome, in his 
 Life of Constable de Bourbon, " the 
 shouts of the combatants, the cries 
 of the wounded, the clashing of 
 arms, the shrill sound of the trum- 
 pets, the incessant roll of the drum 
 urging the soldiers to the fight, kept 
 up such a noise that the very thun- 
 der itself could not have been 
 heard." So hotly did the victors 
 pursue the vanquished that the lat- 
 ter had barely time to lower the' 
 gates of the castle of San Angelo, 
 the stronghold of modern Rome, 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 421 
 
 where the pope had hastily taken * 
 refuge with some of the cardinals. 
 Even that could not have been done 
 but for the chivalrous devotion of 
 three young Roman nobles, descend- 
 ants of one of those rare patrician 
 families which authentically date 
 from the time of Augustus. When 
 all Rome lay at the mercy of the 
 ruthless marauders, and the princes 
 of the Church rode for life or death 
 towards the citadel, pursued by the 
 lansquenets, three of the Orsini, 
 Juannino, Antonio, and Yalerio, 
 'brave and valiant lords," says 
 Brantome, and Jerome Mathei, ral- 
 lied with "two hundred chosen 
 men" at the head of the Sixtine 
 Bridge, to keep back the Imperials 
 and leave the passage free. The 
 Prince of Orange, at the head of his 
 heretic battalions, set upon them, 
 " and the contest was right valiant- 
 ly sustained on both sides. But, at 
 length, the prince made such a furi- 
 ous charge that the Romans were 
 forced tg abandon the bridge which 
 they had defended so bravely," yet 
 not before they had seen the iron 
 gate of the citadel close behind the 
 illustrious fugitives. "Rome being 
 thus vanquished," pursues the same ^ 
 
 historian, "the lansquenets, who 
 w^ere recently imbued with the new 
 religion, began to rob and massacre, 
 not sparing even the sacred relics 
 in the temples, the convents, or the 
 ornaments of the Madonnas; their 
 cruelty extended itself even to mar- 
 bles and ancient statues. Accord- 
 ing to the usual practice of the Hu- 
 guenots of those days, they mingled 
 sacrilegious buffoonery with those 
 scenes of blood and pillage. Robed 
 as cardinals, they made sham pro- 
 cessions through the city, reciting 
 the Litany of the Blessed Virgin 
 in derision. After having polluted 
 themselves with crimes shameful 
 either to tell, or to hear, these mis- 
 creants," observes Brantome, "went, 
 nearly all to die at the siege of Na- 
 ples a short time after, having pre- 
 viously lost, in one way or another, 
 the gold sacrilegiously taken from 
 temples and altars; which made the 
 Spaniards say that el diablo los avia 
 dado, y el diablo los avia llevado — 
 that is to say, the devil gave and the 
 devil tooky 
 
 In Great Britain, where the ven- 
 eration of Mary, once so popular, 
 was abolished by Henry YIII. and 
 the fratricide Somerset, the people 
 
■[•12 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 long regretted the Mother of Mercy, 
 and often went back to pray, by 
 tlie glimmering light of the stars, 
 aiiiid the desolate ruins of her plun- 
 dered shrines. The Welsh peasants 
 — the Armoricans of England — who 
 had embraced Christianity before 
 the invasion of the Saxons, could 
 by no means reconcile themselves 
 to the absence of the saints with 
 whom they had adorned their an- 
 cient oaks, their Druid stones * and 
 fountains. "Watched and harassed 
 as they were by the last Tudors, 
 and afterwards by Cromwell, they 
 could not profess Catholicity, and 
 gradually returned to a state bor- 
 dering on paganism. Not many 
 years have passed since the Angli- 
 cans talked of going to convert 
 these gross idolaters who, for want 
 of sympathy with arid and multi- 
 form f*rotestantism, had fallen back 
 on the worship of trees and brooks, 
 as practised by the ancient Britons 
 in the time of Caesar.f 
 
 * In Brecknockshire, there is still to be seen 
 a menhir of gigantic size which bears the name 
 of Mayen y Marynnion, or the Virgin Mary's 
 stone. — (Camden's Britannia.) 
 
 f Gor Ion's Modern Geography, p. 217. 
 
 X The beautiful lake of St. Mary (situated at 
 the rise of the river Yarrow, on the Scottish 
 
 The people who dwelt along the 
 Scottish frontier were just as un- 
 willing as the Welsh to embrace 
 the new doctrines. The border was, 
 more than any other part of the 
 kingdom, under the immediate pro- 
 tection of Mary, whose name was 
 given to the clearest lake,|* the 
 most sparkling fountains, and the 
 most picturesque sites. There stood 
 Jedburgh and Melrose, two stately 
 abbeys dedicated to the Blessed 
 Yirgin, and raised by the faith that 
 worketh miracles, in a poor country 
 continually torn by foreign and in- 
 ternal warfare. Who, of all the 
 border troopers, had not asked and 
 freely obtained hospitality at Jed- 
 burgh, in the Virgin's name ? Was 
 there a highland chief who did not 
 doff his blue bonnet with its eagle's 
 feather before the Yirgin of Melrose, 
 the most famous and the most fre- 
 quented of the four great shrines 
 of Scotland ? The flags of its vast 
 chapel covered all that the land 
 
 border), which is often covered with numerous 
 flocks of wild swans, took its name from a pretty 
 chapel of Our Lady, which was formerly a fa- 
 vorite pilgrimage of the Scottish nobles of the 
 border. The chapel has been destroyed, but 
 the lake has still its sweet name and its snow- 
 white birds. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 423 
 
 had ever owned of brave and noble ; 
 lieroes whose effigies reposed on 
 their tombs, with their hands de- 
 voutly joined as though still invok- 
 ing Jesus and Mary, two names 
 which Catholics always unite. The 
 Blessed Virgin reigned there over 
 the living and the dead. By day, 
 the place resounded with sacred 
 songs, and by night, when the tem- 
 pest roared and the flickering light 
 of the moon illumined at intervals 
 the richly-stained glass, set, as it 
 were, in the light stone tracery of 
 the windows, it seemed as though 
 all the petrified wreaths and all 
 the knightly banners which adorned 
 the church quivered in the blast, 
 and that the old Scottish lords, 
 rising armed from their tombs, 
 
 * Who knows not Sir Walter Scott's charm- 
 ing description of the ruins of Meh-ose Abbey — 
 a description marked by the exquisite taste of a 
 painter arid the research of an antiquarian: — 
 
 If thou would' st view fair Melrose aright, 
 
 Go visit it by the pale raoonlight ; 
 
 For the gay beams of lightsome day 
 
 Gild but to flout the ruins gray. 
 
 When the brokea arches are black in night, 
 
 And each shafted oriel glimmers white ; 
 
 When the cold light's uHcertain shower 
 
 Streams on the ruin'd central tower ; 
 
 When buttress and buttress, alternately, 
 
 Seem framed of ebon and ivory; 
 
 When silver edges the imagery, 
 
 And the scrolls that teach thee to live and die ; 
 
 When distant Tweed is heard to rave, 
 
 And the owlet to hoot o'er the dead man's grave ; 
 
 Then go — but go alone the while — 
 
 saluted the Blessed Mother of the 
 Eedeemer.* 
 
 Before the revered altar of Our 
 Lady of Melrose, the English and 
 Scotch, laying aside their hereditary 
 hatred, were nothing more than 
 humble and peaceable pilgrims. 
 Chiefs of dans came there to pray 
 for the souls of those who had fallen 
 beneath their dirk or claymore in 
 the course of a mountain-war or 
 foray.f Sinners there bewailed 
 their crimes before the Comfort of 
 the Afliicted; and, rising full of con- 
 fidence in her merciful intercession, 
 went thence to found expiatory 
 monuments whose name perpetu- 
 ated the memory of their remorse. J 
 
 The Calvinist preachers, enemies 
 of the arts as they were of the 
 
 To view St. David's ruin'd pile ; 
 And home returning, soothlj' swear, 
 Was never scene so sad and fair ! 
 
 {Lay of the Last Minstrel, Canto II.) 
 ■f There is still extant a treaty of peace be- 
 tween two hostile clans, whereby the chiefs of 
 both bind themselves to make the four pilgi-im- 
 ages of Scotland, for the repose of the souls of 
 those who had- fallen on either side. These four 
 pilgrimages were Scone, Dundee, Paisley, and 
 Melrose. — (Introduction to Border Minntrelsy.) 
 
 I These monumental penances were frequent 
 along the borders; some of the buildings still 
 remain, for instance, the Tower of Repentance in 
 Dumfriesshire, and, according to vulgar tradi- 
 tion, the church of Linton, in Roxburghshire. — 
 {Border Minstrelsy, Introd.) 
 
A24 
 
 mSTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 saints, destroyed Melrose and Jed- 
 burgh, with a considenible number 
 of shrines of lesser note. Of all 
 the splendor that once surrounded 
 the Virgin of Melrose, there was 
 left but one shattered fragment of 
 an altar, which was soon overgrown 
 by the rank grass and the wild 
 shrub, springing up amid the ruins. 
 For some time after the destruction 
 of the abbey, a dark shadow might 
 be seen by night gliding beneath 
 the broken arches of the chapel, 
 and a murmur of human voices was 
 heard to mingle with the voice of 
 waters from the neighboring Tweed. 
 It was a monk stealing back to cel- 
 ebrate the divine mysteries for the 
 few who were yet faithful to the old 
 religion. These visits became at 
 length so hazardous that the clergy 
 were forced to give them up; but 
 
 * See Dr. Johnson's Tour in the Hebrides. 
 The Highlanders of Scothind even now bury 
 their dead in the old Catholic cemeteries. One 
 of the most picturesque islands in Loch Lo- 
 mond, called Nun's Island, is the buritd-place of 
 several clans ; the tombs of the MacGregor 
 chiefs, and some other noble families, who 
 claimed kindred with the ancient kings of Scot- 
 land, are still to be seen around the ruins of the 
 abbey-church, destroyed by the ferocious follow- 
 ers of Calvin and Knox. 
 
 t This policy was not only put in practice, 
 but openly avowed by the Anglicans themselves. 
 
 nothing could prevent the people 
 from burying their dead in the lone- 
 ly cemeteries of the old abbeys, and 
 through a sense of propriety highly 
 honorable to the Scotch, none but 
 women were interred, for a long 
 course of time, within the precincts 
 of those grounds where the virgins 
 of the Lord reposed.* 
 
 The first attempt of the Calvin- 
 ists on the Scottish Highlanders 
 was so discouraging in its result 
 that they resolved on leaving the 
 clans to their fate, hoping that the 
 want of instruction, the privation 
 of the Sacraments, and the total 
 absence of all religious ceremonies, 
 would eventually throw them into 
 the net of Protestantism; which 
 really came to pass in the course 
 of time.f 
 
 Even in the reign of James VL, 
 
 Swift recommends it as the best course to pur- 
 sue, in his celebrated pamphlets on Ireland : 
 " Their lands," he says, " are almost entirely 
 taken from them, and they are rendered inca- 
 pable of j)urchasing any more ; and for the little 
 that remains, provision is made by the late act 
 against Popery, that it will daily crumble away : 
 to prevent which, some of the most considera-ble 
 among them are already turned Protestants. 
 Then the Popish priests are all registered, and 
 without permission they can have no successors : 
 so that the Protestant clergy will, perhaps, find 
 ^ it no difficult matter to bring great numbers 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 425 
 
 the Highlanders were so cool to- 
 wards the doctrine of Geneva, that 
 it was on their warlike clans the 
 king chiefly relied in his numer- 
 ous disputes with his democratic 
 Church.* A hundred years after, 
 they still prayed at times near the 
 fountains that gushed out before 
 the ruined chapels of Mary and the 
 Saints, and the water from those 
 springs was carried far and near to 
 restore health to the sick.f 
 
 The associations connected with 
 the veneration of Mary still live in 
 the valleys and glens of the High- 
 lands, and are found in the histori- 
 
 over to the Church." — (Swift's Works, Letter con- 
 cerning the Sacramental Test. ) The Scottish 
 borders were Hkewise subjected to this negative 
 system, and if the people came not forth victori- 
 ous like the Irish, they, at least, did not yield 
 without a struggle ; and if Protestantism finally 
 prevailed, it was only after having destroyed the 
 churches, and extinguishing, one by one, the 
 lights of the ancient faith. 
 
 * " Never," says a Scotch writer, " could the 
 Calvinist clergy forget that they owed their ele- 
 vation to the fall, or at least to the depression 
 of royalty. In Scotland, the Eefoi-med Church 
 was, for nearly two centuries, either the declared 
 enemy or the ambitious rival of its prince. The 
 disciples of Calvin could hardly divest them- 
 selves of a tendency to democracy, and the re- 
 publican forms of their ecclesiastical administra- 
 tion were often held up as a model for the state 
 to follow. The theocracy, haughtily proclaimed, 
 was rigorously exercised ; the offences commit- 
 
 cal ballads sung by the peasantry. 
 At one time it is a knight treacher- 
 ously slain on some lonely moor, 
 whose wounds are washed at Our 
 Lady's fountain, and his corpse 
 waked in Our Lady's chapel ; again 
 it is a noble baron who is buried 
 at the foot of St. Mary's Cross, 
 and at whose tomb Christians shall 
 come to pray, whilst Scotland invokes 
 Our Lady^s name. The bard who 
 thus sang, doubtless meant forever ! 
 At another time, knights are de- 
 scribed as leaving their golden ro- 
 saries as a pledge of their faith, etc. 
 In every danger, God and Our Lady 
 
 ted in the king's household fell under the inso- 
 lent jurisdiction of the ministers. The prince 
 was formally reprimanded for having neglected 
 to say grace before or after meals, and for tol- 
 erating the amusements of the queen. A solemn 
 malediction was pronounced against man, horse, 
 or lance, that should assist the king in his quar- 
 rel with the Earl of Gowrie, a conspirator. The 
 monarch's courtiers, present at the sermon, were 
 compared to Aman, the queen to Heiodias, and 
 the prince himself to Achab, Herod, and Jero- 
 boam. This excessive zeal was far from being 
 agreeable to James VL — (Sir W. Scott, Hist, of 
 Scot, and Border Minstrelsy.) Charles II. often 
 said to his courtiers in confidence that Calvin- 
 ism was not the rehgion of a gentleman. 
 
 t A Calvinist physician of the seventeenth cen- 
 tury bitterly censured the people along the bor- 
 ders for having recourse, even in his time, to sev- 
 eral consecrated fountains, to procure water for 
 ^ the sick. — {Account of the Presbytery of Pentfoni. ) 
 
426 
 
 mSTOHY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 are invoked : never one without the t 
 othtM*. 
 
 The scattered remains of Catho- 
 licity took refuge in the north of 
 Scotland, and there, protected by 
 interminable heaths and ramparts 
 of wild barren mountains, they 
 maintained themselves in some soli- 
 tary castles along the shores of the 
 North Sea. There they prayed for 
 many a long year for the restoration 
 of the Stuarts, invoking that Virgin 
 whom the Stuarts honored. Cardi- 
 nal York, the last branch of that 
 unfortimate family, had followed his 
 brother to the tomb, and yet they 
 l)rayed on, nay, there is little doubt 
 but some of the simple mountaineers 
 are praying still, unable to believe 
 in the total extinction of that an- 
 cient race.* 
 
 Ireland, thoroughly Catholic, re- 
 mained faithful in its devotion to 
 the Blessed Virgin amid persecu- 
 tion the longest and most oppres- 
 sive that the world ever saw. Un- 
 der pain of losing house and home 
 and the means of subsistence, the 
 
 * It is related by a famous Scotch writer, that, 
 long after the death of Cardinal York, the res- 
 toration of the Stuarts was prayed for in the 
 Catholic castles of Scotland. Many of the Scot- 
 tish Highlanders cannot yet persuade them- 
 
 poor Irish were forced to pay the 
 ministers of a religion which they 
 did not profess, while every means 
 w^ere tried to induce or compel 
 them to embrace its doctrines. Yet 
 still they remained heart and soul 
 attached to the faith of their fathers. 
 Disinherited of their churches, they 
 went stealthily to assist at the di- 
 vine ofl&ce in the secret vaults of 
 their old castles, amongst the ruins 
 of the monasteries, or in the gloomy 
 caverns where the Druids had, of 
 old, celebrated their bloody rites. 
 They planted sentinels on the 
 heights to protect the proscribed 
 prayers and the priced head of the 
 priest; for Protestant bloodhounds, 
 who were known by the name of 
 priest-hunters, attracted by the bait 
 of the twenty pounds sterling given 
 for the head of any ecclesiastic be- 
 longing to the communion of the 
 Church of Rome, tracked the papists 
 through the woods and mountains 
 as though they had been wild 
 beasts. Happily those fearful times 
 are past, and the faithful Ii'ish peo- 
 
 selves that the race of their ancient kings ia 
 extinct, "It is not that the Stuarts are dead," 
 said one of them to a French traveller, "but 
 that loyalty is dead." 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 427 
 
 pie now freely invoke Our Blessed * 
 Lady in that Green Isle of the 
 ocean, so well deserving of its glo- 
 rious title : The Island of Samts. 
 
 It was not in Britain alone that 
 the devotion to Mary, swept away 
 by the tempest of Protestantism, 
 left numerous traces of its exist- 
 ence. The mournful and pictur- 
 esque ruins of monasteries dedicat- 
 ed to Mary still occupy the fairest 
 sites of Germany; many cities of 
 the North still bear her name ; so 
 too with some of the gulfs of Den- 
 mark; and Styria, Austria, Illyria, 
 Switzerland, the Tyrol and the 
 Grand Duchy of Baden still possess 
 shrines whither the Catholic people 
 from beyond the Rhine come to 
 invoke Our Lady. By these ruins 
 — still so majestic — of a devotion 
 once so general, we may judge the 
 extent of its former influence, even 
 as we estimate the greatness of the 
 shipwreck by the number of broken 
 masts and tattered sails that float 
 on the water. 
 
 The devotion to Mary regained in 
 the New World what it had lost in 
 the Old. Spanish and French mis- 
 sionaries, embarking with an image 
 of Our Lady, whom they invoked 
 
 during their perilous voyage, under- 
 took, with the assistance of Mary — 
 who rendered them strong, the} 
 said, as an army in battle array — to 
 civilize and convert the two Amer- 
 icas. . Landing on the unexplored 
 coasts of the Western continent, they 
 placed their Madonna beneath some 
 arching canopy of palm-branches. 
 
 Warriors, when undertaking the 
 conquest of foreign countries, take 
 with them all that is necessary for 
 the work of blood and destruction : 
 arins, soldiers, parks of artillery; 
 devastation precedes, and mourning 
 follows them on their way. The 
 Catholic missionaries marched to 
 the conquest of the New World 
 with an image of Mary, a rosary, 
 and a cross. Thanks to their al- 
 most superhuman labors, whole 
 tribes came forth from the caves 
 of the mountains and the shade of 
 the great woods, and formed little 
 colonies wherein Christianity was 
 once more seen to flourish pure and 
 fresh as in the first ages of the 
 Church. 
 
 These religious, who enriched 
 botany, history and geography with 
 numberless valuable discoveries, 
 became artists, and even mechan- 
 
i2S 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIIiOIN MARY. 
 
 ic8, in oixier to instruct their neo- 
 pliytes, and led them on in the way 
 of ai*t and science as well as in that 
 of salvation. Savages, who but a 
 short time before feasted on human 
 Mesh, might then be seen t^^king 
 hold of the architect's compass, the 
 sculptor's chisel, the painter's pal- 
 let, and raising with their own 
 hands temples to God and chapels 
 to Mary. The saying of the ro- 
 sary was the most suitable practice 
 of piety for a hunting people ; thus, 
 at evening, when the shade of the 
 tulip-tree and the magnolia length- 
 ened over the glade or along the 
 savannah, you heard the Angelical 
 Salutation, repeated in every sav- 
 age tongue, throughout the Amer- 
 can wilds. Mary was the mother 
 of the Indian as well as of the 
 European, and she was not more 
 piously invoked in the temples, glit- 
 tering with gold which the first 
 Spanish conquerors built in her 
 honor in Mexico and Peru, than in 
 the rustic chapels, dedicated to her 
 by the pious missionaries under the 
 title of Our Lady of Loretto and 
 Om* Lady of Sorrows, on the banks 
 of the great Amazon river and the 
 river of the Hurons. 
 
 ♦ But the conquests of these faith- 
 ful servants of God and of Mary did 
 not end here : they explored . the 
 burning regions of Africa and con- 
 verted the black princes of Guinea 
 and Monomotapa. At the same 
 time they penetrated to Ceylon, the 
 Indian peninsula, Japan, and China; 
 and wherever they went, Our Lady's 
 image was treated with respect and 
 veneration. The Mongolese ladies, 
 bowing down before the Mother of 
 Jesus, called her the holy, the glori- 
 ous Mary ; the Prince of Cashmere 
 sent her tapers and other gifts, 
 and the Grand Lama had a temple 
 raised to her under the title of the 
 Annunciation. The ladies of China 
 offered her flowers and perfumes, 
 and the Japanese, who, alas! paid 
 dearly for their energetic devotion 
 to the true faith, said the rosary on 
 their long crystal beads, while 
 walking through the streets of the 
 idolatrous cities full of bonzes and 
 pagans.* 
 
 These triumphs gained in far-off 
 lands were not, however, the only 
 consolations of Mary's faitliful serv- 
 ants for the outrages of Protestant- 
 
 * Leltres Edijiantes. — Anncdes de la Propagation 
 ^ de la Foi. 
 
J_ 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 429 
 
 ism. Scarcely had Calvin gone 
 down to the grave when the naval 
 battle of Lepanto was gained by 
 the Spaniards, under the banner of 
 the Blessed Virgin.* John Sobieski 
 likewise did homage to the Mother 
 of God for his famous victory over 
 the Turks at the siege of Vienna, 
 and his first care, on entering the 
 delivered city, was to throw himself, 
 ^'prostrate on the ground," before 
 the altar of Our Lady, where he 
 chanted aloud a Te Deum of thanks- 
 giving. The magnificent standard 
 of the Mahometans was sent to Our 
 Lady of Loretto,f and the Polish 
 hero reserved to himself a trophy 
 which he said touched him more 
 than all the others : it was an old 
 picture — apparently very old — 
 which had been found in the ruins 
 of the village of Wishau. It repre- 
 sented Our Lady with two angels 
 supporting her crown, and in their 
 hands were scrolls bearing the 
 Latin inscriptions : " //i hoc imagine 
 
 * The pope sent this blessed banner to Don 
 Juan, who had it hoisted on his own ship. 
 
 f The length of this banner was twelve feet by 
 eight in width. The border was green and the 
 centre red. It was of cloth, the ornaments being 
 embroidered in silver, and the Arabic inscription 
 in letters of gold. In the middle of this Mussul- 
 
 ¥ 
 
 MaricBj vinces, Johannes. — In hoc 
 imagine Marice, vidoi^ ero., Johannes, 
 By this image of Mary, thou, John, 
 shalt conquer. — By this image of 
 Mary, I, John, shall be the victor." 
 
 This image was regarded as mi- 
 raculous ; John Sobieski intended it 
 for his royal chapel at Zolkiew, and 
 in the mean time it followed him 
 through all his campaigns. 
 
 Li the year 1647, the Emperor 
 Ferdinand III. solemnly consecrated 
 himself, his family, and his empire, 
 to the Queen of Heaven. A lofty 
 column was erected in the grand 
 square of Vienna in honor of the 
 Immaculate Conception of the Bless- 
 ed Virgin Mary, and her statue was 
 placed on the top, with the moon 
 under her feet, and her heel on the 
 serpent's head. 
 
 Calvinism still agitated France, 
 and its freezing influence, penetrat- 
 ing the masses, slowly but fatally 
 cooled the religious sentiment ; pro- 
 fane speech and impious scoffing 
 
 man flag, laid by the Polish hero at the Virgin's 
 feet, vpas seen these words, strikingfly contra- 
 dicted by the Christian banners whereon the 
 Crescent fell before the Cross : " There is 
 no God but one, and Mahomet is his prophet." 
 — (See History of Poland, by Leonard Chadz^ 
 ko.) 
 
130 
 
 mSTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 have at all times a bad effect on the t 
 people, who cannot reason on their 
 faith, and therefore lose or recover 
 it according to the arguments which 
 captivate their attention. The bare 
 altars and devastated churches had 
 no longer that holy prestige impart- 
 ed by splendor and long traditions 
 of homage. The Madonnas, stript 
 and cast down from their pedestals, 
 arose so poor and naked, that the 
 heart and the feet turned away from 
 their shrine. The clergy, calumni- 
 ated, ruined, diparaged, had fallen 
 into disrepute amongst the people, 
 who, at heart impressed with a rev- 
 erence for high birth, never respect 
 their own equals. Finally, the ab- 
 beys having passed into the hands 
 of military owners, they took care 
 to give them superiors who would 
 merely act in the capacity of stew- 
 ards over a community whose sav- 
 ings were no longer applied to the 
 use of the poor, but to that of the 
 officer or courtier who was the legal 
 proprietor. This vile system, which 
 would, of itself, have been sufficient, 
 without the aid of revolutions, to 
 ruin all the monasteries of France, 
 continued even through the reign of 
 Henri lY.,* notwithstanding the just ^ 
 
 complaints of the clergy, and was 
 only abolished under Louis XIII. 
 From the reign of Louis XL to that 
 time, the historian must glean one 
 by one the facts which attest the 
 devotion of the kings towards the 
 Blessed Virgin. Louis XIL, never- 
 theless, made a pilgrimage to Our 
 Lady of Loretto, and Henri HI 
 sent the Duke de Joyeuse there in 
 1585, with a magnificent equipage, 
 to offer gifts and pay homage to the 
 holy Madonna. The same prince, 
 having founded the order of the 
 Holy Ghost, made it one of the 
 statutes that every knight should 
 recite daily a decade of the heads. 
 
 The beads were then the distinc- 
 tive mark of Catholics. One of the 
 conditions imposed by the Holy See 
 on Henri lY., after his abjuration, 
 was to say the rosary every Satm- 
 day, and the beads every Sunday. 
 
 Even in the end of the sixteenth 
 century, people fasted, all over 
 Catholic Europe, on the eve of the 
 feasts of the Blessed Yirgin, and 
 no one failed to observe that pious 
 practice. The profligate generals of 
 Charles IX. and Henri EL took 
 great pains to excuse themselves 
 
 * See the Memoirs of James Sobieski. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 431 
 
 for having broken the abstinence 
 on the vigil of the Assumption ; 
 some having done it, by mistake, 
 going through Italy. One of the 
 boldest and least scrupulous histori- 
 ans of the time deems it necessary 
 to suppress their names, in order to 
 save their credit, and protests that 
 those gentlemen were wholly for- 
 getful of the feast of the morrow. 
 
 The devotion to Mary — -for some 
 time on the decline — revived in all 
 its splendor under Louis XIII. That 
 prince, in order to thank the Bless- 
 ed Virgin for the advantages he had 
 gained over the Protestants, and 
 hoping to obtain, through her inter- 
 cession, an honorable peace with 
 the European powers who then 
 made war upon him, declares, in an 
 edict dated from St. Germain-en- 
 Laye (February 10th, 1633), that 
 " taking the most holy and glorious 
 Virgin for the special protectress of 
 his kingdom, he consecrates to her 
 his person, his States, his crown, 
 and his subjects, beseeching her to 
 defend France against the power of 
 her enemies, whether in war or 
 peace." And, as a memento of this 
 consecration, Louis promised to 
 have the hi.2:h altar of the cathedral 
 
 of Paris reconstructed, and to place 
 thereon an image of the Virgin, 
 holding in her arms her precious Son 
 taken down from the Cross, having 
 himself represented kneeling at the 
 feet of the Mother and Son, offering 
 to them his crown and sceptre. 
 
 He also decreed, that every year, 
 on the day of the Assumption, there 
 should be a commemoration of his 
 edict, at high mass, in all the 
 churches of France ; and, after ves- 
 pers, a solemn procession, in which 
 the magistrates and other function- 
 aries of the different cities were to 
 join. 
 
 Louis XIV. inherited his father's 
 devotion to the Blessed Virgin. It 
 was he who engaged Custou in 
 1723 to execute the group known 
 as the Vow of Louis XIIL, together 
 with the two figures in marble 
 placed on either side, representing 
 Louis XIII. and Louis XIV. offering 
 their crown to the Virgin. That 
 prince presented to the Church of 
 Boulogne a sum of 12,000 livres, in 
 place of the ex voto of gold which 
 the kings of France, from Louis XL, 
 offered as a tribute to the Blessed 
 Virgin. He did his utmost to prop- 
 agate the doctrine of the Immac- 
 
432 
 
 mSTOIiV OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 ulate Conception, and obtained, in * 
 1657, from Pope Alexander VU., a 
 bull, which was conlirmed by Clem- 
 ent XI., in 1668, ordaining the cele- 
 bration of that festival throughout 
 the realm of France. It was also 
 at his solicitation that, in 1670, the 
 Pope granted indulgences for the 
 recital of the Angclus. 
 
 It was his wish to receive confir- 
 mation on the feast of the Immac- 
 ulate Conception. This fact is at- 
 tested by that inscription in the 
 chapel of the Louvre : — 
 
 Hac Sacra Die Immaculat^e Con- 
 CEPTiONis, LuDOVicus XTV., Rex, 
 
 SUSCEPIT HIC SANCTISS. 
 CONFIRMATIONIS SaCR AMENTUM. 
 
 Beneath is the following : — 
 Immaculata Domina, Salvum fac 
 
 REGEM. 
 
 Louis XIY. inherited from his 
 mother, Anne of Austria, a great 
 veneration for Our Lady of Liesse ; 
 he went there in 1652 and 1673, 
 and twice with the queen in 1680. 
 The pious Spanish princess, Maria 
 Theresa, who never gave her royal 
 husband other grief than that of Iwr 
 death, went thither also in 1677 and 
 1678. After the death of Anne of 
 
 Austria, her son vowed fifty thou- 
 sand masses for the repose of her 
 soul in the principal places of de- 
 votion specially dedicated to the 
 Blessed Virgin. 
 
 After the treaty of the Pyrenees, 
 he sent his thanksgivings, together 
 with rich gifts, to Om' Lady of 
 Chartres, Our Lady of Loretto, and 
 Our Lady of Grace. 
 
 Louis the Great belonged, like 
 his father, Louis XIIL, to the con- 
 fraternity of the Scapular, and ha- 
 bitually said his beads. Father de 
 la Rue being one day admitted to 
 a private audience, found the king 
 piously engaged saying his rosary 
 on large beads. The good fatlier 
 was surprised, and could not help 
 expressing his admiration : " Be not 
 surprised, father," said the monarch, 
 " I glory in telling my beads ; 1 
 inherit the practice from the queen, 
 my mother, and sorry would I be 
 to let one day pass without fulfill- 
 ing that duty." 
 
 The Spanish ambassador present- 
 ed himself at the brilliant court of 
 the great monarch, his beads in his 
 hand, and no one found fault with 
 him for so doing. 
 
 It was then, too, and had long 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 433 
 
 been, customary to put beads and ^ 
 a superb copy of the Offices of 'the 
 Virgin in the marriage-casket. This 
 custom was continued till the time 
 of Louis XY. 
 
 Louis XIII. had taken Rochelle, 
 the last bulwark of Calvinism in 
 France ; Louis XIY., annihilated 
 that turbulent heresy by his revo- 
 cation of the Edict of Nantes. That 
 measure, which secured the tran- 
 quillity of the kingdom, has been i 
 
 most severely censured, but those 
 who do so must lose sight of the 
 fact, that the Calvinists were then 
 incorrigible insurgents, who were 
 not ashamed to call in the English. 
 
 Louis XIY., the greatest mon- 
 arch of his age, expired murmuring 
 with his dying lips, the Hail Mary, 
 which he had repeated several 
 times, in a firm voice, whilst the 
 prayers for the dying were said 
 near him. 
 
 CHAPTEE XIIL 
 
 MODERN TIMES. 
 
 ROM the bosom * 
 of the Mediter- 
 ranean, whose 
 blue waters are 
 perfumed ten 
 leagues from 
 land with the sweet odor of the 
 orange -tree, there rises a rocky 
 island, whose snow-crowned moun- 
 tains, woods of pine, and groves of 
 enormous chestnut-trees, would re- 
 mind us of Switzerland, were it not 
 
 that clumps of myrtle, of orange, 
 and of citron-trees, forests of gigan- 
 tic olives, pomegranate-trees, with 
 their pretty red blossoms, and the 
 ruins of Roman towers, all proclaim 
 an Italian land. This island is the 
 birth-place of the great patriot, 
 Paoli, and of Napoleon, the great 
 emperor : it is Corsica, an Italian 
 isle, which now forms one of the 
 departments of France. 
 
 This island, at once fertile and 
 
484 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 uncultivated, is inliabited by a * 
 primitive race, poor, warlike, and 
 hospitable, like the Highlanders of 
 Scotland, and the mountaineers of 
 Caucasus. Attached to Catholicity, 
 and at all times free from heresy, 
 they are yet extremely jealous in 
 regard to honor ; and, forgetting the 
 divine precept which prescribes the 
 forgiveness of injuries, they take 
 justice into their own hands, and 
 keep up for ages the memory of an 
 offence till it is fully and fearfully 
 revenged. 
 
 Civilized though the country be, 
 it yet retains a certain air of wild- 
 ness, and one sees at a glance that 
 its people are essentially devout 
 towards the Blessed Virgin. Her 
 image stands at the entrance of 
 every village, in the squares and 
 public places, on the margin of 
 fountains, on the highest point of 
 the promontories, and amid the 
 orange-woods that clothe the hill- 
 sides. The environs of Bastia are 
 covered with charming little Italian 
 chapels, dedicated to the Annunci- 
 ation, or Our Lady of Good Counsel. 
 On the day of these festivals, which 
 happens in spring or summer, peo- 
 ple desert the city to go visit these 
 
 Madonnas, which are reached by 
 flowery and odorous pathways. Af- 
 ter saying their prayers to the 
 Virgin, each family sits down to a 
 rural collation in the cool shade of 
 the trees, and give themselves up 
 for a time to innocent amusement 
 and social enjoyment. 
 
 In former times, Corsica had sev- 
 eral cathedrals ; most of them were 
 built under the title of the Assump- 
 tion ; now, the most solemn feast of 
 Mary is that of the Immaculate Con- 
 ception. It is preceded by a no- 
 vena, and is ushered in by the ring- 
 ing of bells ; the vessels hoist their 
 flags, and the streets are strewn 
 with myrtle. A solemn procession 
 is formed, wherein the Brothers of 
 the Conception, in penitential gar- 
 ments, and with lighted torches in 
 their hands, precede the statue of 
 the Virgin, adorned with a crow^n of 
 silver, necklaces, and bracelets of 
 jewels. The procession makes the 
 circuit of the city to the sound of 
 martial music, while Mary's altars, 
 profusely adorned with flowers, illu- 
 mine the holy place with the light of 
 their thousand tapers. It is a true 
 Italian festival, radiant with light and 
 joy, and full of religious enthusiasm. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 435 
 
 In the country, the priest, or, per- 
 haps, some venerable old man, re- 
 cites the rosary every evening, just 
 as the village bell " tolls the knell 
 of parting day." * Sometimes there 
 is seen in the haze of distance, on 
 the point of a steep rock, a dark 
 figure, leaning on his carabine ; it 
 is an outlaw, who risks his life to 
 join in the common prayer : for the 
 Madonna is the last hope of these 
 fierce yet believing men, who wear 
 her image round their necks, and 
 ask the shepherds in her name for 
 a little milk and some black bread 
 to sustain their miserable existence. 
 Very recently, a young Corsican, 
 a companion of the famous brigand, 
 Santa Lucia, defending himself, 
 though wounded and alone, against 
 a whole regiment of the line and a 
 posse of police, invoked the Virgin 
 during that desperate struggle, whilst 
 his friends, kneeling at the foot of 
 the rock which was his last refuge, 
 recited for him the prayers for the 
 dying. " There is every reason to 
 believe," says the record of this af- 
 
 * Squilla di Contano 
 
 Che paila '1 giorno pianger, che si muore. 
 
 (Dante, Purgat, 1. viii.) 
 Gray's "Elegy in a Country Churchyard." 
 
 fecting scene, " that the last thoughts 
 of this unhappy young man were 
 raised to God, for there was found 
 on his body a small medal of the 
 Blessed Virgin, which he held in his 
 hands while his parents and friends 
 prayed for him." 
 
 On the 30th of January, 1735, 
 the nation assembled in general 
 council at Corte to form a national 
 government, after having thrown off 
 the yoke of the republic of Genoa, 
 elected the Blessed Virgin as queen 
 of Corsica, and bore her banner 
 during the last struggles of their 
 expiring liberty. The two Paoli, 
 Pascal and Clement, made this ban- 
 ner respected, being both devoted 
 servants of Mary.f Clement, of 
 whose history little is said, except 
 by local tradition, made his soldiers 
 recite the rosary on their knees be- 
 fore every engagement. Some En- 
 glishmen, amazed at this custom, 
 reminded him on several occasions, 
 that the enemy was before them, 
 and that his kneeling soldiers could 
 not defend themselves. " Let them 
 
 f Pascal Paoli heard mass every day when in 
 Corsica, and subsequently in England, in a 
 chapel built by him in honor of the Holy 
 Virgin. 
 
436 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 pray, gentlemen," responded Paoli 
 in his deep, martial voice. The 
 p layer being ended, the Corsieans 
 lose like lions, and not one moved 
 an inch from his post, for soldiers 
 who pray know not how to fly. The 
 Vend^ans taught the French repub- 
 lic that lesson. 
 
 Pascal Paoli had two chapels 
 built in honor of the Blessed Vir- 
 gin: one at Pastoreccia, near Ponte- 
 Nuovo, the theatre of that bloody 
 battle which destroyed the nation- 
 ality of Corsica, and where many 
 of his friends lost their lives; the 
 other at Morosaglia, near his own 
 family mansion. During his exile, 
 he built a third in England. 
 
 In the time of King Theodore, 
 the national council had the words 
 Monstra te esse Matrem stamped on 
 their issue of gold and copper coins. 
 
 Napoleon took pleasure in saying 
 that the Holy Yirgin was queen of 
 his native country. Whilst he was 
 yet but a simple officer, he testified 
 much devotion for a French Ma- 
 donna in the chapel of the Ursuline 
 Convent at Auxonne, and went 
 often to pray before it. This statue 
 was since removed to the parish 
 church, where it is still seen. 
 
 The saturnalia of the Regency, 
 and the corrupt reign of Louis XV. 
 bring us to the last years of the 
 eighteenth century, when religion 
 was blighted by the pestiferous 
 breath of false philosophy. The 
 revolution of 1793 drove the Virgin 
 from her altars and God from his 
 temples. The order was given to 
 close the churches and demolish 
 every thing that resembled a Chris- 
 tian shrine. Alas I it was mournful 
 to see the Calvaries thrown down, 
 and the poor little Madonnas shat- 
 tered to pieces where they modestly 
 took shelter beneath the green fo- 
 liage of the woods. It was especial- 
 ly in Lower Brittany that devasta- 
 tion reached its height. " We may 
 say, without exaggeration," says M. 
 Emile Souvestre in his interesting 
 work on the Bretons, "that, in cer- 
 tain places, our highways are paved 
 with saints — regularly macadamized 
 with heads, bodies, and limbs of 
 Christian statues." Those unhappy 
 days saw grievous profanations, but 
 they likewise witnessed instances of 
 self-devotion that w^oiild have done 
 honor to ancient times. Bretagne, 
 in particular, offered a resistance, 
 passive indeed, yet firm and perse- 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 437 
 
 vering, so as to tire out persecution 
 itself. It gave way neither to fear 
 nor anger. The Breton peasant, as 
 he passed the empty niches where 
 the Madonnas were wont to stand, 
 took off his broad felt hat piously 
 and reverently, and went his way 
 sadly, murmuring a Hail Mary. On 
 Sunday, he sat down with his fami- 
 ly at the door of their dwelling, and 
 remained in profound silence, with 
 his eyes fixed on the village church* 
 where he had so often invoked Je- 
 sus and Mary. "I will pull down 
 your steeples," said Jean-Bon St. 
 Andre to the mayor of a village, 
 " so that you may have nothing to 
 remind you of your former supersti- 
 tions." "You must leave us the 
 stars, though," rejoined the peasant, 
 " and they are seen farther off than 
 our steeple." Their devotion, sur- 
 viving their altars, acquired some- 
 thing lofty and melancholy, connect- 
 ed by sympathy with the religious 
 ruins which covered the land. The 
 Virgin, who had disappeared from 
 their country churches, took refuge 
 under their cottage roofs; and be- 
 
 * Voyage dans le Finistere. 
 f " A chapel, dedicated to Our Lady of Ha- 
 tred, still exists near Trdguier, and the people 
 
 * neath the little earthenware statues, 
 an hundred times more respected 
 than the lares of the ancients, was 
 seen the inscription — " Holy Mother 
 of God, vouchsafe to protect this 
 dwelling." And I know not wheth- 
 er a blue would have dared to break 
 that image thus sheltered in the 
 household sanctuary ; for there was 
 often an old carabine under the 
 green serge curtains of the Breton 
 farmer ; and if Bretagne is the land 
 of religious sentiments, it is also 
 that of strong and lasting hatred. 
 The sterling virtues of these people 
 are still somewhat tarnished by the 
 Celtic rust : for instance, the Bretons 
 are the only people in Christendom 
 who have conceived the idea of as- 
 sociating the name of the merciful 
 Virgin with the thought of venge- 
 ance, and of raising chapels to 
 her under the strange and rather 
 Druidical title of Our Lady of Ha- 
 ir ed.\ 
 
 The pilgrimages to the Blessed 
 Virgin were not discontinued in 
 Bretagne during the reign of terror 
 — they merely assumed old Gaulic 
 
 still continue to believe in the efficacy of the 
 prayers there offered up." {Les Derniers Bre- 
 tons, by M. Souvestre, t. ii.) 
 
488 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 forms. They took place by night, 
 through dreary wastes, where the 
 menhirs and dolmens of the name- 
 less God rose gray and mossy and 
 spectral -looking. Every pilgrim 
 held in the right hand a rosary — in 
 the left, a torch ; and all these pale 
 figures, half seen through their long 
 hair, or the hanging lappets of their 
 white caps, passed slowly along 
 through the mists of night, singing 
 a hymn to the Virgin. Sometimes 
 it happened that a party of repub- 
 licans, concealed in the skirt of a 
 wood, or behind a hedge, would fire 
 upon the little rustic procession. 
 Yet this did not deter the Breton 
 peasant from renewing his perilous 
 devotions some days after. In a 
 neighboring province, the villagers 
 who went by night to pray to God 
 and Our Lady in the depth of some 
 lonely ravine, passed through the 
 hamlets occupied by the revolution- 
 ary soldiers singing hymns to the 
 Virgin set to republican airs. 
 
 During all this time, the churches 
 in the cities were everywhere pil- 
 jaged. Gold, silver, iron, marble, 
 gratings, and wood-work, were all 
 carried ofif. The works of art were 
 torn from the walls, the pictm-es 
 
 * destroyed, and workmen were paid 
 high wages to deface the sculptures 
 from the walls and arches. Even 
 the clocks were pulled down and 
 converted into coin, and this jxitriot- 
 ic work cost the State (by its own 
 admission) full twenty millions.* 
 
 "Fools!" said La Harpe, ad- 
 dressing the perpetrators of these 
 sacrilegious crimes ; " Fools ! is 
 faith engraved on walls? is reli- 
 gion painted on canvas? No, it 
 is in the heart, which you cannot 
 reach ; in the conscience, which 
 condemns you; in the sight of the 
 whole world, speaking to all men; 
 in heaven, where it shall be your 
 judge. Poor imbecile destroyers, 
 you have cried 'victory!' — where 
 is now your victory ? Day by day 
 you are convulsed with rage, see- 
 ing the multitudes who throng our 
 temples: they are no longer rich, 
 but they are still sacred ; they are 
 bare and naked, but they are fall. 
 Pomp has disappeared, but worship 
 remains ; men ti-ead there no longer 
 on marble, and costly carpets, but 
 they kneel on the cold pavement 
 and weep over the ruins." f 
 
 * La Hai-pe, du Fanaticisme dans la langue 
 X revolutionn, p. 49. "flbid, p. 41. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIROm MARY. 
 
 439 
 
 That beautiful hymn to Mary, be- * 
 ginning with 
 
 "Je mets ma conflance, Vierge, en votre se- 
 cours," * 
 
 was the lay of the scaffold. In 
 1793, two carts full of poor Royalist 
 women, for whom the guillotine was 
 preparing, passed through a civic 
 banquet served up in the street 
 by the elect of the Revolution. 
 Madame de Montmorency - Laval, 
 venerable from her virtue, and re- 
 spectable because of her illustrious 
 name, was in one of these carts, her 
 hands tied behind her back, and 
 with her sixteen of her nuns — for 
 she was abbess of the Carmelites 
 of Montmartre, a religious order 
 founded in the East under the 
 patronage of Mary, as we have 
 elsewhere mentioned. These holy 
 daughters of the Virgin, whom the 
 revolutionary tempest had cast on 
 the stormy sea of the world, to 
 perish there, were singing the pray- 
 er of the Venddans, the hymn of 
 their patroness, as calmly as though 
 they were still hidden beneath their 
 snowy veils in the choir of their 
 beautiful church. Could they not 
 be permitted to sing it in peace — 
 and they about to die ? The hide- ^ 
 
 ous fiuy of the wretches who dis- 
 graced the republic is aroused by 
 the hearing of that pious chant ; an 
 hundred ruffians in red caps rush 
 towards the carts, brandishing their 
 sticks, and crying, "Silence the 
 nuns ! Let them sing the Marseil- 
 laise ! Let them obey the peo- 
 ple ! Come ! the Marseillaise, in- 
 stantly ! " The daughters of Mary 
 continued their sweet canticle as 
 though they heard not these fierce 
 vociferations. Exasperated by this 
 passive resistance, which they did 
 not at all expect, these ferocious 
 bandits stopped the horses, with 
 the most fearful oaths and impre- 
 cations, and would have struck 
 down these poor defenceless females 
 who were so soon to die ; but there 
 is still so much honor and chivalry 
 in the French people, even when 
 going astray, that others of the 
 republicans pressed forward, cry- 
 ing, "No murder! Would you kill 
 women ? " Then a terrible struggle 
 took place around the carts. A 
 young patriot in a Phrygian bonnet 
 snatched a sabre from one of the 
 archers, and planting himself close 
 to the cart wherein the terrified 
 
 * " Vii'gin ! in thee I place my trust ! " 
 
L.. 
 
 440 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Carmelites pressed around their 
 venemble abbess, he succeeded in 
 parrying the blows destined for 
 them, defending himself and them 
 with as much courage as coolness. 
 Yet, notwithstanding all his efforts, 
 one of the nuns received a sabre- 
 wound in the breast. Her life was 
 ebbing fast away, the blood flowed 
 profusely over her black robe, and 
 the paleness of death soon over- 
 spread her mild, sweet features. 
 " Bless me, oh holy saint, who will 
 soon be in heaven ! " cried a woman 
 from the crowd, throwing herself on 
 her knees before the expiring nun. 
 '• May you be blessed ! " replied the 
 daughter of Carmel in a failing 
 voice. " And you, w^ho have de- 
 fended us on our way to death," 
 she continued, presenting her val- 
 uable rosary to the softened repub- 
 lican, " accei)t this token of grati- 
 tude." 
 
 The carts moved forward once 
 more, and the pious chant was re- 
 sumed ; when it ceased, the hearts 
 of the martyrs had ceased to beat, 
 and Mary had taken her faithful 
 servants to her bosom. 
 
 The revolutionary vortex swallow- 
 ed up the religious orders conse- 
 
 f crated to Mary, as the stormy wind 
 sweeps away many useful plants 
 But that of the Carmelites left De- 
 hind something like the perfume 
 of the withered rose, a fragi-ant and 
 balsamic water which bears its 
 name. 
 
 Of seventeen hundred thousand 
 sacred buildings which covered 
 the soil of France, each of which 
 had an altar to the Blessed Virgin, 
 there remained barely two thousand 
 churches worthy the attention of 
 the artist or the antiquary; the 
 others — sold, bought, pillaged, de- 
 stroyed, cast into the oven to make 
 quick-lime — left only some mourn- 
 ful ruins, sad subjects for contem- 
 plation ! " Behold, then," exclaims 
 M. Jules Janin, with generous in- 
 dignation, " behold, then, the result 
 of so much money, so much pa- 
 tience, so much genius, heaps of 
 mouldering ruins ! They have dis- 
 graced the cities. Deprived of 
 these master-pieces of art, what 
 does a community of men resemble ? 
 it is no longer a city — it is an ant- 
 hill. They have disfigured the 
 landscape which was so adorned by 
 those turrets, and spires, and lofty 
 
 I walls. What they could not de- 
 
stroy, they have marred and defaced. * 
 Of the noblest Gothic towers they 
 have made shops, and stables of 
 the pm-est ogival churches. That 
 fabulous period was so perverse, 
 and so infinite in its genius of 
 universal destruction, that one can 
 hardly realize it." * 
 
 The devotion to Mary, which had 
 slumbered for a while in France, 
 soon began to awake, and insensi- 
 bly resumed its soothing influence 
 on the souls of men. Napoleon, 
 faithful to his early impressions, 
 chose the day of the Assumption 
 for his own patronal feast, and 
 made it the greatest festival of 
 the empire. The processions, the 
 crosses, the white banners, and the 
 sacred songs, soon reappeared in 
 those fair Gothic churches whose 
 bare walls and poor altars recalled 
 the days of the primitive Church; 
 whilst their dazzling lights and 
 slender pillars and cloud - piercing 
 spires spoke of the chivalrous pe- 
 riod of the ages of faith. All who 
 had suffered, all who had groaned 
 or trembled, under the fearful Reign 
 of Terror, came to kneel at Mary's 
 feet : the religious reaction was en- 
 
 * M. Jules Janin, la Normandie. 
 
 ergetic, immense, and was felt alike 
 in the city and the hamlet. The 
 Virgin had again her rustic altars 
 in the depth of the woods. Her 
 shrines, where for long years nought 
 had been heard save the singing of 
 birds or the humming of bees, again 
 resounded with the pilgrim's hymn. 
 The Restoration, by reestablishing 
 the processions of the'Yow of Louis 
 Xni., placed France once more un- 
 der the dominion of Mary. A gi- 
 gantic stride was made in the devo- 
 tion to the Immaculate Conception, 
 and all France consecrated to the 
 Yirgin the month of flowers, now 
 piously and poetically named the 
 Month of Mary. The higher classes 
 gave the example of devotion to the 
 Yii'gin ; the descendants of the val- 
 orous knights and stately nobles, 
 who of old built so many chapels 
 and monasteries for her, delight to 
 honor her now as she was honored 
 in the good old times. First in this 
 pious work is the virtuous queen, 
 Marie-Amelie. 
 
 In France, the devotion to Mary 
 is tender but respectful ; the French 
 always behold the Yirgin as she is 
 in heaven, and honor her according- 
 ly. In Italy, the devotion to the 
 
442 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Miidonna has something more ar- * 
 (lent, and at the same time more 
 familiar. From his cradle, the Ital- 
 ian has before his eyes those grace- 
 ful images which remind him only 
 of Mary's goodness and mercy ; she 
 is the protectress of childhood, the 
 dream of youth, the last refuge of 
 the sinner ; the thought of her is 
 uppermost in all the religious fes- 
 tivals, like aquatic flowers over 
 the deep waters ; the ardent Italian 
 sees her everywhere, blesses her for 
 eveiy good, and when his prayer is 
 not granted, far from blaming Mary, 
 he says, striking his breast, " It is 
 my fault! The Madonna will not 
 hear me because I am so great a 
 sinner ! " What admirable faith is 
 that ! what truly Christian faith ! 
 for in such a case the heathens 
 would drag their gods through the 
 mire. 
 
 The devotion to the Virgin is still 
 as fervent in modem Italy as when 
 it brought forth the Duomo of Pisa, 
 that beautiful cathedral of Mary, 
 the bronze gates of which, executed 
 on the design of John of Bologna, 
 represent the principal scenes of 
 the life of Our Lord and the Blessed 
 Virgin; Our Lady of Flowers the 
 
 * 
 
 sumptuous metropolitan church of 
 Florence, resembling a mountain of 
 marble of various colors, cut in the 
 form of a Latin cross ; and many 
 other master-pieces of Christian art 
 — a period the most illustrious in 
 Italian history I 
 
 Landing at Genoa, so justly called 
 the Superb, "seeming," says Ma- 
 dame de Stael, " as though it were 
 built for a congress of kings," the 
 first thing that strikes the eye is 
 the devotion of the Genoese to the 
 Holy Virgin. At every angle of 
 those "streets of palaces," filled 
 with men in their picturesque cos- 
 tume, and women in long white 
 veils, there stands a graceful Ma- 
 donna painted or sculptured, pro- 
 tecting all the neighborhood. All 
 day it is perfumed with the sweet 
 scent of myrtle or jessamine ; in 
 the evening it is illumined by a 
 lamp, and numerous groups kneel 
 before it reciting the Litany. It i« 
 still as in the days when Andrea 
 Doria said his Office on board his 
 galleys, and on the gates of the 
 stately city may still be read, Citta 
 di Maria. There are even now no 
 less than fifty chapels in Genoa 
 consecrated to the Blessed Virgin. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 443 
 
 Venice, the now crownless queen 
 of the Adriatic, never sent a bark 
 out to sea without decorating it 
 with the sacred image of Mar}^ 
 During the cholera she took refuge 
 in the merciful bosom of Our Lady 
 of Safety, whom she invokes, in 
 great calamities, even in preference 
 to her patron St. Mark, and offered 
 to her, on that occasion, a superb 
 silver lamp weighing one hundred 
 and sixteen pounds, richly chased 
 and ornamented. The beautiful 
 church of Mary, where this offer- 
 ing was hung up, owes its origin to 
 a favor of a similar kind. It was 
 erected in 1531, on the site of a 
 house wherein the plague had first 
 broken out, the city being then de- 
 livered from that terrible scourge 
 by the all-powerful intercession of 
 Mary. In the centre of the cupola 
 was the noble inscription — noble 
 in its simplicity : Unde origo, inde 
 salus. 
 
 The Tuscans have a most tender 
 veneration for the Madonna. On 
 the roads and bridges, in the streets 
 and in the houses, her sweet image 
 is everywhere found smiling on the 
 passer-by as he bows his head be- 
 fore her, and seeming to participate 
 
 * in every joyful domestic event. The 
 contadini around the charming city 
 of Florence come down from the 
 woody heights which surround it 
 in a semi-circle, on every feast of 
 the Virgin, leading a mule elegantly 
 harnessed, and carrying a basket 
 full of the finest grapes, some small 
 sheaves of wheat, and some branches 
 of the orange-tree and pomegranate 
 laden with fruit or flowers. Dressed 
 in their holiday garb, they traverse 
 the city in procession, and come to 
 deposit their fruits and flowers at 
 the foot of the Virgin's altar. 
 
 When the Grand Duke of Tus- 
 cany, a model sovereign, returned 
 to his states, on the fall of Napo- 
 leon, his first care was to repair to 
 the church Santa Maria della Nun- 
 ziata^ where numbers of people go 
 every day to visit an image of the 
 Virgin, said to have been finished 
 by an angel. In gratitude for his 
 unhoped-for restoration, the excel- 
 lent prince suspended a lamp of 
 the rarest workmanship in Mary's 
 chapel. 
 
 Kome is no less devout to the Ma- 
 donna than Florence. Pass when 
 you will through the city, you will 
 find groups of Romans kneeling 
 
444 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 before the Madonna, praying with * 
 a fervor and an earnestness truly 
 remarkable. In the streets, in the 
 scj^uares, and in the houses, her im- 
 age is seen with a lamp of the 
 purest oil burning before it ; the 
 poor, as well as the rich, go to this 
 expense, and would deprive them- 
 selves of bread to provide the oil. 
 It is both edifying and picturesque 
 to see a street in Rome lit up by 
 thousands of luminous points like 
 the lucioli of Italy, and resounding 
 with the simple music of the Cala- 
 brian or Abruzzian pifferari. These 
 mountain-minstrels attract a great 
 concourse of the faithful around the 
 Madonnas at all times, but espe- 
 cially in Advent; for it seems as 
 though they wished to introduce, by 
 their pastoral strains, the feast of 
 the shepherds, the holy night of 
 Christmas. 
 
 It is especially on the day of the 
 Assumption that the ardent devo- 
 tion of the Romans for Mary is 
 manifested. On that day all the 
 chm-ches are deserted for that of 
 St. Mary Major, the royal church, 
 with walls of Parian marble. The 
 villa of the noble is abandoned, 
 with its healthful air and refreshing ^ 
 
 shades ; Varia cattiva prevails in 
 Rome, and with it fever ; but what 
 of that? They would go even 
 though the plague were there. Is 
 not the Madonna more powerful to 
 save than either fever or plague is 
 to, destroy? What pious confidence, 
 and how truly wonderful is such 
 faith in these days of ours! The 
 Roman people are assembled en 
 masse on the streets and squares 
 around the superb church, which is 
 adorned with all possible splendor 
 for this festival. The men are 
 clothed in their picturesque cos- 
 tume of blue velvet; the women are 
 bedecked with their coral neck- 
 laces, and their jet black hair is 
 fastened up with a gold or silver 
 pin under a graceful white drapery. 
 Every one carries a large bunch of 
 the most beautiful flowers as an 
 offering to the Madonna. That im- 
 mense crowd of believers kneels in 
 the hot dust, parched by the fervid 
 sun of Italy, or stand in the shade 
 of the adjacent houses. The Ital- 
 ians, naturally noisy, and given to 
 gesticulation, forget on those occa- 
 sions their wonted habits : one 
 thought engrosses their mind, and 
 that is prayer ; and how well they 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 445 
 
 do understand prayer! They pray 
 with look, gesture, heart, and do 
 indeed pour out their soul at Mary's 
 feet. 
 
 When the Pope has finished the 
 holy sacrifice, and solemnly blessed 
 the kneeling multitude, the immense 
 doors of the church are thrown open 
 to admit the crowd, who fill it with 
 sweet music and fragrant flowers. 
 When evening comes, the whole city 
 is illuminated, and all Rome prays 
 in the street. All the people crowd, 
 without distinction, without privi- 
 lege, with a fraternity worthy of the 
 golden age, around their own Ma- 
 donna — the Madonna of the district. 
 For this purpose, the prince leaves 
 his marble palace, the artisan his 
 workshop, and the maiden her fa- 
 ther's roof, all to join in prayer with 
 touching fervor. The women say 
 the rosary, the men chant the lita- 
 ny; sometimes one of those fine 
 Italian voices, of heavenly sweet- 
 ness, sings a hymn to Mary, and all 
 are silent to hear ; but that silence 
 is itself a mental prayer to the 
 \^irgin. 
 
 " I shall remember all my life," 
 says a modern traveller, " the beau- 
 teous festival of the Nativity of the 
 
 Virgin, and the evening of the 8th 
 of September on the Place de Na- 
 vona, where from ten to twenty 
 thousand persons were congregated. 
 The image of the Madonna, splen- 
 didly illuminated, presided over the 
 popular festivities, as was manifest 
 from the decency, the reserve, and 
 the half-seriousness everywhere seen; 
 the dwelling of a numerous family, 
 submissive all to the paternal con- 
 trol, can alone give the idea of such 
 serenity amid the excitement of 
 public rejoicing ; this was apparent 
 even at the moment when the crowd 
 dispersed after the fire -works. I 
 thought it afforded a fair proof of 
 the wisdom and mildness of the 
 pontifical government." 
 
 In Naples, the devotion to the 
 Virgin blooms ever with the fresh- 
 ness and the beauty of a full-blown 
 lily. The feasts of the Madonna 
 are popular festivals, full of joyful 
 enthusiasm ; her churches, of which 
 there are no less than fourteen in 
 the city of Naples alone, unite 
 within themselves all that is grand- 
 est and most luxurious in painting, 
 sculpture, and architecture ; the 
 chapels of Mary, all rich and beau- 
 tiful, are adorned with lapis-lazuli, 
 
topazes, jasper, and other precious 
 stones. In the church of SaiUa 
 Maria Ntuyva, the miraculous im- 
 age of the Madonna delle Gimzie 
 is placed under a canopy of silver 
 all covered with jewels. On Mount 
 Pausilippo the church of Santa 
 Maria Fortunata replaces an an- 
 cient temple of Fortune, where the 
 heathens were wont to hang theii* 
 offerings. Mount Rulignano is 
 crowned by one of the most beau- 
 tiful of Mary's churches. Five of 
 the suburbs of Naples bear the 
 name of the Blessed Virgin. To 
 her the Neapolitans have also con- 
 secrated Vesuvius, whose base re- 
 sembles the gardens of Armida, 
 and its summit one of hell's gates, 
 opening on a dreary chaos. When 
 the crater vomits forth its torrents 
 of burning lava, and the whole bay 
 is illuminated in the middle of a 
 dark night, as though the last fire 
 foretold by the sibyls were about to 
 destroy our little planet, the terri- 
 fied Neapolitan prays to Mary and 
 forgets his alarm, and the inhabit- 
 ants of the neighboring hamlets run 
 to meet the fiery stream of lava 
 with images of the Madonna, which 
 they hold out to bar its progress. 
 
 Sicily is still, as well as Sardinia, 
 a land essentially Catholic. The 
 devotion to Mary is particularly 
 popular in Palermo and Messina, 
 in the latter city, the noble cathe- 
 dral dedicated to the Virgin by the 
 Norman kings, is still in existence ; 
 only that the campanile and the 
 spire of the principal tower were 
 destroyed by the great earthquake 
 of 1753, and the Sicilians have 
 never set about rebuilding them. 
 
 In Piedmont and Savoy, Our 
 Lady is still religiously honored. 
 In 1669 King Charles Emmanuel 
 declared the Mother of God prin- 
 cipal patroness of his house and 
 of his states, and this declaration 
 has been frequently renewed by the 
 pious successors of that prince. 
 
 Even at the close of the eight- 
 eenth century, the veneration of 
 Mary was universal in Spain. In 
 the cathedral of Toledo, placed un- 
 der the invocation of the Blessed 
 Virgin, the chapel of Our Lady of 
 the Sanctuary [del Sagrario) was of 
 wonderful richness and beauty. It 
 was of octagonal form; its pillars 
 and pavements were of marble; in 
 the niches were seen golden vases 
 enriched with diamonds, and other 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 447 
 
 gems of great value. The statue 
 of the Blessed Virgin was of solid 
 silver, and she was seated on a 
 throne of tke same metal, with an 
 Infant Jesus in her arms twelve 
 inches high, formed of massive gold, 
 incrusted with diamonds. The ca- 
 thedral of Seville had its famous 
 chapel, Our Lady of Kings, built 
 by St. Ferdinand, the splendor of 
 which was so great that it was reck- 
 oned the most magnificent chapel in 
 the world. The chapel of the Pres- 
 entation, in Burgos, was almost as 
 celebrated. In Madrid, the church 
 of Our Lady of Almemada is one 
 of the most splendid in the city ; 
 to this Madonna is ascribed the 
 discovery of a quantity of corn found 
 by a providential chance in the 
 vaults of a tower, just as the city, 
 besieged by the Moors, was about 
 to surrender for want of provisions. 
 The miraculous fact is still painted 
 in fresco on the walls of Our Lady's 
 chapel, but we doubt whether the 
 altar, and the balustrade of solid 
 silver, are still there. 
 
 Abotit a quarter of a league from 
 Madrid, in a vast Dominican con- 
 vent (now doubtless deserted, like 
 many others), was the miraculous 
 
 * image of Our Lady of the Bush 
 [d'Atorha), a black Madonna, usual- 
 ly dressed in weeds ; this is a cus- 
 tom peculiar to the place, as far as 
 we know, but on solemn feasts the 
 statue was arrayed in queenly gar- 
 ments, studded with large jewels. 
 Her chapel, gloomy in its structure, 
 was lit by an hundred lamps of 
 massive gold and silver. The Cath- 
 olic kings had their gallery in this 
 chapel, with a screen in front. It 
 was there, too, that the Te Deum 
 of victory was sung. 
 
 Charles III., king of Spain, found- 
 ed an order of knighthood in honor 
 of the Blessed Virgin, whom he 
 declared universal patrona de Es- 
 paria e Indias (universal patroness 
 of Spain and the Indies) . 
 
 At present, the fair moon of Chris- 
 tianity is somewhat obscured in 
 Spain, but the cloud will pass away, 
 and the Blessed Virgin shall speed- 
 ily recover her rights of supremacy 
 over that most Catholic and most 
 chivalrous nation. We hope, with 
 the Spanish doctor who has done us 
 the honor of translating this work, 
 that posterity will add many a lum- 
 inous page to the Spanish portion 
 
 i of this history. 
 
448 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 In Poi*tugal, where Mary has 
 reigned as queen from the time of 
 Alphonso the First, the devotion to 
 her is still national and flourishing ; 
 she is the first godmother of all 
 female children, and her images are 
 venerated in rich and beautiful 
 chapels. 
 
 England, that land of hydra- 
 headed heresy, begins at last to 
 turn her head towards Rome; nu- 
 merous Catholic churches are being 
 erected in every county, under the 
 title of chapels. In Ireland, bon- 
 fires have been recently kindled on 
 every hill to celebrate, in the an- 
 cient manner, a miracle obtained 
 after a novena to the Virgin — the 
 marvellous liberation of O'Connell. 
 
 The Belgians are still, as they 
 have ever been, preeminently de- 
 vout to Mary; they make pilgrim- 
 ages to her shrines, and consecrate 
 to her the most beautiful chapels of 
 their noble Gothic cathedrals. 
 
 The Tyrolese adorn the walls of 
 their houses with scenes taken fiom 
 the life of the Blessed Virgin. 
 
 Bohemia, rich and tranquil, mul- 
 tiplies images of the Mother of God 
 on its highways and in its towns. 
 Here and there through the coun- 
 
 '^ try, a modest chapel, dedicated to 
 Mary (and serving at once as a 
 house of prayer and a place of 
 rest), rears its pointed roof, sur- 
 mounted by a cross, as if to notify 
 the traveller that he will there find 
 shelter from sun or rain, and the 
 call is always religiously heard. 
 
 Austria, with its pure and simple 
 morals, its religious and poetical 
 tendencies, remains ever faithful to 
 Mary, and nowhere have the sacred 
 ceremonies of her devotion a more 
 serious or touching character. 
 
 Poland is still and always the 
 kingdom of the Blessed Virgin, 
 whom the Poles, since 1655, invoke 
 in their litanies as Regina Coeli et 
 Polonice. Her image is hung around 
 the necks of their children, and Po- 
 lish warriors formerly wore it as a 
 precious preservative against dan- 
 ger. Ladies of rank have, in their 
 apartments an oratory adorned with 
 the portrait of the Virgin, and the 
 proud Polish nobles, the proudest 
 in all Europe, fail not at Christmas 
 times, to hang in a conspicuous part 
 of the sumptuous banquet-hall a 
 sheaf of straw, in memory of the 
 utter destitution of Jesus and Mary 
 in the stable of Bethlehem. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 449 
 
 The Lithuanians are the youngest 
 nation of Mary's children in Europe, 
 according to the order of time, as 
 they were only converted in the 
 fifteenth century; but they, too, 
 have remained faithful to her, not- 
 withstanding all the efforts of Prot- 
 estantism, which fell to the ground 
 amongst them as soon as it spoke 
 of suppressing the popular devotion 
 to Mary. Faithful to the ancient 
 customs of their country, the Lithu- 
 anian women still celebrate the re- 
 turn of spring and the close of 
 autumn under the auspices of Mary; 
 it is on her altars that they deposit 
 the violets which they go far and 
 near to gather the first morning of 
 spring, before sunrise ; and it is 
 also her whom they invoke, seated 
 around the last sheaf, while their 
 dextrous fingers weave floral hiero- 
 glyphics, giving, as in the East, a 
 thought to every leaf and a symbol 
 to every plant. These simple Lith- 
 uanians are passionately fond of 
 their woods and fields, and especi- 
 ally of the fair flowers which the 
 poorest of them cultivate, but they 
 love the Blessed Virgin better than 
 ail these. 
 
 The Russians, who follow the 
 
 rites of the Greek Church, profess 
 the greatest veneration for the Vir- 
 gin ; as far off as they can see her 
 image they prostrate themselves 
 several times, crossing themselves 
 with extreme rapidity. In Moscow, 
 one of the gates of the Kremlin is 
 decorated with a statue of the Vir- 
 gin, to which miracles are ascribed ; 
 it is guarded by two sentinels night 
 and day, and the people never fail 
 to uncover their heads in passing 
 this sacred image. 
 
 The Czars were formerly crowned 
 in the splendid Muscovite cathedral 
 of the Assumption, where the bodies 
 of the Russian patriarchs are laid. 
 The wall around the sanctuary was 
 sheeted with gold and silver. The 
 sacred vessels and the episcopal 
 vestments of this cathedral are still 
 wonderfully rich ; the image of the 
 Blessed Virgin, placed in a heavy 
 gilt frame at the end of this church, 
 figures in the processions, mounted 
 on a superb coach all covered with 
 mirrors, like the carriages formerly 
 seen in France at the consecration 
 of the kings. This modern car of 
 triumph is drawn slowly along by 
 four horses richly caparisoned. 
 
 The Greeks, although schisma,tic, 
 
460 
 
 HISTORY OF TEE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 have still the same respect for the 
 Panagia ; in the Morea there are 
 several convents dedicated to Mary; 
 the most famous is that of the As- 
 sumption, on Moimt Cylene, a few 
 houi-s' jom-ney fi'om the famous cas- 
 cade of the Styx, nov^ called Mav- 
 ronero. This convent has a mirac- 
 ulous image of Mary, which was 
 given it in the eighth century by 
 an imperial princess of Constanti- 
 nople, named Euphrosyne; it is 
 nearly all built within a large cav- 
 ern one hundred and twenty feet 
 high, and as many wide. The en- 
 trance is reached by a steep and 
 nan'ow path winding along the side 
 of the mountain, and, like a fortress 
 of the Middle Ages, it is defended 
 by a gate and an iron portcullis, 
 together with a lateral wall pierced 
 with numerous loop-holes and fur- 
 nished with four pieces of cannon. 
 This narrow path, in which the 
 winter torrents make large breaches 
 every, year, is yet the only way of 
 reaching the convent; hence this 
 sacred asylum, where the Panagia 
 has been invoked for ages by the 
 Hellenes, is considered impregnable. 
 In the last war of independence, the 
 famous Ibrahim tried to take it, but 
 
 t in vain. The three hundred monk« 
 who dwell in it, becoming soldiers 
 from necessity, were well able to 
 defend the altar of their patroness. 
 
 The life of these cahyers, as they 
 are called by the Mussulmans, is 
 simple and pure as in the time of 
 their ancient foundation. They en- 
 joy a complete independence ; they 
 are laborious and robust, and, as 
 worthy servants of the compassion- 
 ate Virgin, they have ever extended 
 a helping hand to the suffering or 
 the oppressed. In the fourteenth 
 century the monks of Thessalia and 
 Phocida found an asylum in the 
 convent of the Assumption, when, 
 pursued by the Turks, they fled 
 from their beloved country without 
 a hope of seeing it again. Again, 
 in the seventeenth centmy, the 
 poor monks who escaped the mas- 
 sacre of Constantinople, took refuge 
 in this convent. Finally, in the 
 eighteenth century, when the ruin- 
 ous war which followed the insur- 
 rection of the Morea had destroyed 
 all around them, it was the Chris- 
 tian conduct of these religious to- 
 wards the Tm'ks of Calavrita, their 
 prayers and the sacrifice which 
 they made of a portion of their 
 
mSTOBY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 451 
 
 wealth, that enabled them to save 
 from apostacy or death a great 
 mimber of the Greeks of Achaia. 
 
 The Klephts, those bold moun- 
 taineers who have so long kept the 
 Turks at bay, are no less devout to 
 the Panagia than the people of the 
 Morea. For ages long they have 
 had no other places of prayer than 
 some ruined chapels which they be- 
 lieve haunted by vampires, or some 
 rock-hewn oratory under the patron- 
 age of the Virgin. They are some- 
 times seen, at the dawn of day, 
 climbing the loftiest crest of their 
 steep mountains, with their crooked 
 poignard in their belt, and their 
 long gun slung over their shoidder, 
 going to hear mass, or perhaps sim- 
 ply to pray in some lonely chapel 
 overhanging frightful precipices, the 
 very sight of which would make a 
 Turkish soldier shudder. There it 
 was that they went to hang the 
 offerings promised to the Panagia 
 in the hour of danger, and always 
 faithfully given. These gifts were 
 often articles of value wrested from 
 the Tm-k with sword and steel, and 
 were regarded wi^h the most re- 
 ligious reverence ; public devotion 
 was their safeguard, and no matter 
 
 * how great might be his distress, 
 no Klepht would ever think of pur- 
 loining the least of these things, 
 which became sacred in his eyes. 
 M. de Pouqueville, in his Travels 
 in Greece^ relates an incident of a 
 brigand chief who, having taken 
 some of these ex voto from a chapel 
 dedicated to the Virgin, near Vonit- 
 za, was given up by his own band 
 to Ali Pacha, by whose order he 
 was hung. The practice of making 
 distant pilgrimages, difficult as it 
 was for men placed in the position 
 of the Klephts, was still far from 
 being unknown to them. The fa- 
 mous partisan, Blachavas, at the 
 age of seventy-six, set out on foot 
 for Jerusalem, his musket on his 
 shoulder, followed by his lieutenant, 
 and died, as he seems to have 
 wished, in the Holy Land.* 
 
 Mount Athos, named by the mod- 
 ern Greeks Hagion Oros (the holy 
 mountain), still belongs to Mary, as 
 it did in the time of the first Caesars 
 of Byzantium. 
 
 The islands of the Bosphorus and 
 the Archipelago contain numerous, 
 though poor, convents of Mary ; the 
 bells of these Greek monasteries 
 
 * Fauriel, Popular Songs of Greece. 
 
«62 
 
 mSTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 are suspended from the trunk of 
 some huge cypress, which stands in 
 spectral gloom near a church or 
 cemeteiy. In Scio, the fairest of 
 those islands, nearly all the inhabit- 
 ants were Catholic. Being mildly 
 governed, thanks to the powerful 
 protection of the Sultana Yalida, 
 that charming island kept its re- 
 ligion, its gaiety, and its refreshing 
 shades. The stranger was wel- 
 comed there with branches laden 
 with fruits, and when he departed 
 they offered him flowers in re- 
 membrance of hospitality. Nothing 
 could equal the pomp of its festi- 
 vals : it had its Catholic archons, 
 like Athens of old ; its maidens 
 were pure and fair as the smile 
 of Mary, their beloved Panagia. . . . 
 The revolution broke out ... all 
 this peace, all this joy, ended in a 
 massacre . . . three hundred young 
 girls, the fairest in the island, were 
 mercilessly slaughtered on the sea- 
 shore by the fierce Osman sol- 
 diers. They fell, one after the 
 other, their hands joined and their 
 eyes raised to heaven, invoking that 
 Vii'gin- mother who failed not to 
 avenge them. Ali Pacha, the tiger 
 who ordered this brutal massacre, 
 
 "f was burned soon after by the in- 
 trepid Canaris, he and his vessels, 
 and died soon after on that very 
 strand which he had crimsoned 
 with blood, while the conqueror did 
 public homage to the Virgin for 
 his victory. 
 
 In Anatolia and the adjacent 
 isles, in Cyprus and in Tenedos, 
 the Greek race have maintained in 
 all its fervor their devotion to the 
 Virgin. Mahomet prevailed in the 
 cities ; but high on the mountain- 
 tops, in the region of clouds, the 
 sacred banner of the Panagia waves 
 over many a convent. Some of the 
 Hellenes have forgotten the lan- 
 guage of Demosthenes and Iso- 
 crates, but not the Gospel, nor their 
 devotion to Mary, and they repeat 
 in the Turkish language the Apos- 
 tles' Creed and the Angelical Salu- 
 tation.* There the illuminations of 
 the Courban-Ba'iram are opposed 
 by the bonfires known by the name 
 of St. John's, and the feast of Ma- 
 homet by that of Our Lady of Mount 
 Olympus. 
 
 The Georgians, who bear on their 
 standard the image of St. George, 
 won for themselves in the MidfUe 
 
 * Occident et Orient, par M. Barrault. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 453 
 
 Ages the privilege of entering Jeru- 
 salem with banners flying, to per- 
 form their devotions, without pay- 
 ing the tribute imposed on other 
 Christians ;* they are still the faith- 
 ful subjects of the Holy Virgin, the 
 heavenly Queen of their mountain- 
 land. The highest peaks of their 
 mountains are everywhere crowned 
 with a church or chapel dedicated 
 to Mary, placed so high that they 
 cannot reach it themselves, and are 
 forced to content themselves, says 
 Chardin, with profoundly saluting it 
 from the depth of their valleys, 
 which they never fail to do. 
 
 The Mingrelian, who sleeps with 
 his head on his carbine and his 
 cimetar by his side, venerates in his 
 churches certain relics of the Bless- 
 ed Yirgin,f kept therein with pro- 
 found respect since the first ages of 
 Christianity. 
 
 Armenia, shut in amongst Mussul- 
 man nations, has no more yielded 
 to the Koran than to Zend-Avesta, 
 and remains nearly as it was in the 
 fifth century, after the Holy Wars, 
 were it not that it is divided into 
 
 * De Belief orest, 1. ii., ch. 5, of his Hist. Univers. 
 — Chalcondyle, Hist, des Tiircs. 
 fBy relics of the Blessed Virgin, we, of 
 
 two camps, one professing Christi- 
 anity with Rome, and the other with 
 Nestorius. The Virgin is devoutly 
 honored by both. Every Armenian 
 fasts fifteen days before the Feast 
 of the Assumption, which was in- 
 troduced very early into the Cauca- 
 sian regions, and as that people has 
 kept from the Jews the immolation 
 of animals, there is no good Arme- 
 nian family that does not sacrifice a 
 lamb in honor of Mary. 
 
 Lebanon, that beautiful mountain 
 an hundred leagues in circumfer- 
 ence, is entirely peopled with Cath- 
 olics. On one of its highest table- 
 lands is the village of Eden, full of 
 limpid streams and cool shades, 
 it is topped by an archiepiscopal 
 church, in which there is an altar 
 to Mary, and at the right of that 
 altar rises (in a truly marvellous 
 manner) the Nakar-Rossena (chief 
 river), which descends from an im- 
 mense rock clothed with cypress. 
 The Nakar-Kadislia (holy river), the 
 offspring of eternal snows, on whose 
 banks so many solitaries were once 
 engaged in carving images of Mary, 
 
 course, understand certain articles which were 
 used by her during her mortal Hfe. — Tran8« 
 
454 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Btill retains the name which it 
 owed, in the fii-st ages of the Chui'ch, 
 to the piety of the hermits who 
 dwelt amid its rocks. An hom-'s 
 journey from the spot where the 
 Holy River collects its rapid and 
 noisy waters, Tyre, the ancient ruler 
 of the seas, displays the mournful 
 wreck of greatness past; her famous 
 cathedral of Our Lady, destroyed in 
 the last crusades, a short time after 
 its reconstruction, is now but a mag- 
 nificent ruin, whose stately vaults 
 and arches are still traced on the 
 blue sky of Syria, but there is 
 another church, less conspicuous, 
 wherein the four or five hundred 
 Catholic families who people Tyre 
 still fervently invoke Mary. The 
 pretty town of Nazareth, approach- 
 ed by an avenue of olive-trees, is 
 inhabited solely by Catholics; its 
 church, built on the site of St. Hel- 
 ena's, has three naves, and is al- 
 ways full of pilgrims, and others of 
 the faithful, in prayer. The sweet 
 name of Mary is everywhere read 
 on the walls, and everywhere one 
 sees her image, profusely adorned 
 with the fairest flowers by the piety 
 of the Eastern Christians. 
 
 Modern Jerusalem, whose popula- 
 
 t tion seems formed of the wreck of 
 nations, presents within its bosom 
 the strange sight of the Jewish syn- 
 agogue side by side with the Mus- 
 sulman mosque and the Christian 
 church, yet, thank Heaven I it is not 
 without its altars to Mary. The 
 descendant of the kings of Juda is 
 still prayerfully invoked in the cap- 
 ital of the holy King David, and all 
 religious differences disappear at 
 her tomb, where the Armenian, the 
 Georgian, the Arab, the Tyrian, and 
 the Western Christian meet togeth- 
 er, and where even Turkish women 
 are seen kneeling in prayer, wrap- 
 ped up in their veils. A Greek 
 caloyer sprinkles some drops of 
 otto of roses on the head of ^ach 
 one who comes to honor Mary. 
 
 In the Levant, the veneration of 
 the Virgin has reached even the in- 
 fidels. The Turks and Persians, 
 who speak of her with all rever- 
 ence, consider her as the purest and 
 most perfect of women. Hence, 
 they are often known to hang vo- 
 tive lamps before her images, to 
 conduct their sick children to her 
 churches, to pray devoutly at her 
 tomb, and what is still more ex- 
 traordinary amongst the worship- 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 455 
 
 ers of Allah, to build temples in her 
 honor.* 
 
 In Abyssinia, the devotion to the 
 Virgin is still as popular as it ever 
 was: churches bearing her Eastern 
 name of Mariam are met in great 
 numbers in the cities, on the moun- 
 tains, and on the banks of the riv- 
 ers ; they are covered with straw, 
 surrounded by an exterior gallery, 
 and surmounted by an iron cross, 
 whose numerous branches are term- 
 inated with ostrich-eggs; they stand 
 in the midst of a cemetery, which 
 is an inviolable sanctuary, and 
 are magnificently shaded by dark 
 sabines and gigantic olive-trees. 
 Within, the walls are adorned with 
 garish frescoes representing the Vir- 
 gin, St. Michael, or St. George, who 
 is very popular amongst the East- 
 ern nations ; the floor is sometimes 
 covered with Persian carpet, which 
 the Mussulmans bring from Massa- 
 ouah and sell at an exorbitant price 
 to the Christians. A gallery runs 
 all around these churches, and in 
 
 * the centre there is a square sanc- 
 tuary which none but the priests 
 may enter ; there is kept the sacred 
 ark containing the bread and wine 
 intended for communion. The Abys- 
 sinians hold the Virgin in so great 
 veneration that, according to them, 
 the world was created for her and 
 by her ; they precede the feast of 
 the Assumption by a fast of fifteen 
 days, like the Copts and Syrians ; 
 their kings style themselves sons of 
 Mariam^ s hand^ and many of them 
 assume her name. Finally, we 
 learn from travellers who visited 
 Abyssinia in 1837, that, when the 
 Abyssinians ask a favor or give an 
 invitation, it is always in the name 
 of Mary; they swear only by Mary 
 {be Mariam)^ and her name is ever 
 in their mouth.f 
 
 This ardent devotion of the Abys- 
 sinians to the Mother of God has 
 sometimes broken out into real acts 
 of fanaticism. In 1714, when Ger- 
 man missionaries of the order of 
 St. Francis, sent by Pope Clement 
 
 * A pacha of Mossoul, besieged by the famous 
 Thamas-Kouli-Khan, made a vow to build two 
 churches to the Blessed Virgin, in case 'he pre- 
 served his city. Thamas raised the siege, and 
 the Pacha, faithful to his promise, caused two 
 churches to be erected ; their magnificence, un- »- 
 
 exampled in those regions, bespeaks at once the 
 peril, the alarm, and the gratitude of the Mus- 
 sulman. — (See the Bishop of Babylon's letter in 
 the Annals of the Propagation of the Faith.) 
 
 f Voyage en Abyssinie, par MM. Combes et 
 Tamisier, 1835-37. 
 
iS6 
 
 BISTORT OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 XL, ti'ied to bring them back to 
 the unity of faith, the schismatic 
 monks defeated their efforts by cir- 
 ciihiting the report that these Euro- 
 pean monks were avowedly hostile 
 to the Blessed Virgin. This false- 
 hood of theirs had frightful conse- 
 quences; the people revolted; the 
 emperor, who protected the mis- 
 sionaries, was poisoned, and Fathers 
 Liberat, Veis, Pi^ de Zerbe, and 
 Samuel Bienno were stoned to death 
 by an infuriate mob. An Ethiopian 
 monk cast the ftrst stone, exclaim- 
 ing: "Accursed and excommuni- 
 cated by the Virgin be he who 
 will not cast five stones at her ene- 
 mies!"* Alas! these poor Fran- 
 ciscans were the most faithful and 
 devoted servants of Mary! 
 
 The devotion to the Virgin is now 
 spreading gradually over all the In- 
 dies. The chaplet is recited among 
 the Hindoos of the Malabar coast, 
 among the Chinese, the Siamese, 
 the Thibetians, the tribes of Ton- 
 quin and of Cochin-China ; it is the 
 only prayer-book possessed by the 
 Catholics of those remote countries, 
 and it is the first thing they ask on 
 seeing a priest from Europe.f The 
 
 * Annals of the Fropagation of the Faith. 
 
 churches of India often bear the 
 name of Mary ; that of the Nativity 
 of the Virgin, at PondicheiTy, is one 
 of the most remarkable. A novena 
 has been founded in this Malabar 
 church which procures a number 
 of conversions, though conversions 
 are there so difficult ; it opens with 
 a procession which takes place by 
 night, and is conducted with much 
 pomp. The sacred image of Mary 
 is borne on a triumphal car, and is 
 placed, from time to time, on altars 
 which the pious Christians of that 
 country adorn with flowers and gold 
 muslin; these altars are lit up by 
 overhanging globes of fire. The 
 procession moves slowly, to the 
 sound of crashing music, between 
 two lines of torches. At each rest- 
 ing-place, the noise ceases while a 
 childish voice sings the praises of 
 the holy mother of Our Lord ; after 
 which the image of the Virgin is 
 solemnly brought back to the 
 church, and replaced over her altar, 
 magnificently illuminated. J 
 
 South America is ever remark- 
 able for its devotion to the Blessed 
 Viigin. Brazil has built many 
 churches in her honor in modern 
 
 f/Wd. 
 
 Xlbid. 
 
times, and adorned them to the * 
 utmost of her power. Peru dedi- 
 cated to her, from the first, its 
 splendid cathedral of Lima, under 
 the title of the Assumption, and 
 paved it with silver instead of mar- 
 ble. Cusco, the city of the Incas, 
 consecrated to Mary its Temple of 
 the Sun, the walls of which were 
 coated with thick plates of gold. 
 The Dominicans, to whom this 
 church now belongs, raised a chap- 
 el in it for Our Lady, and adorned 
 it with true Peruvian splendor: 
 flags of silver, an altar of the same 
 metal, a statue radiant with gold 
 and pearl, golden lamps, and mag- 
 nificent ex voto, notHing was want- 
 ing to complete its grandeur. Mary 
 has altars no less rich in the an- 
 cient temple of Zuilla [the moon), 
 also a very splendid building, in 
 that of Tllaper {the thunder), and of 
 Chasca [the evening-star). In Mex- 
 ico, the cathedrals and altars dedi- 
 cated to the Virgin are of rare mag- 
 nificence. The cathedral of the As- 
 sumption, in the city of Mexico, 
 commenced in the sixteenth century 
 and finished in the seventeenth, has 
 two statues of Mary which exceed 
 all European ideas of splendor ; the i 
 
 first is an Assumption of massive 
 gold incrusted with precious stones 
 of considerable weight ; the second, 
 a Conception in solid silver. The 
 cathedral of Pueblo d' Angeles, bear- 
 ing the title of the Conception, has a 
 high altar dedicated to Mary which 
 is itself worth a whole basilica ; the 
 altar is of massive silver, and the 
 balustrading around it has plinths 
 and capitals of burnished gold. 
 
 In San Domingo, in the time of 
 the French domination, the proces- 
 sion of the Vow of Louis XIII. was 
 every year made with all possible 
 pomp. Since Hayti declared itself 
 a republic, this custom is dis- 
 continued, but not the devotion 
 to Mary, whom the blacks of that 
 island still invoke with boundless 
 confidence. The Haytians have two 
 pilgrimages to the Blessed Virgin, 
 one in the part that formerly be- 
 longed to Spain, and the other in 
 the old French district. They often 
 make these pilgrimages by proxy: 
 a black pilgrim who sets out on 
 this pious jom-ney, visits all his ac- 
 quaintances and collects the offer- 
 ings which they wish to send to 
 the Virgin. The negresses of dis- 
 tinction imported from Africa a 
 
458 
 
 mSTOBT OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIBGIN MARY. 
 
 heathen custom which they made 
 a Christian one in the Antilles. 
 When they wish to ascertain wheth- 
 ci- they possess the affection of their 
 husbands, they take to the sea- 
 shore a thin plank of native wood 
 pierced with holes, wherein they 
 place lighted tapers of white wax ; 
 after invoking Mary, they carefully 
 and timidly commit their little il- 
 luminated raft to the waves of their 
 sunny gulf, and if it floats a little 
 time on the water without sinking, 
 they bless the Virgin, persuaded 
 that they may rest content. 
 
 Numismatics, which has pre- 
 served to us the effigy of sover- 
 eigns lost to history, has also helped 
 to perpetuate the remembrance of 
 the devotion to Mary. Nearly all 
 Christian nations have struck med- 
 als in honor of the Virgin, and 
 stamped her image on coins. 
 
 The Empress Theophania, who 
 married Romanus the Younger in 
 959, is the first whose coin bears 
 the image of Mary. She is placed 
 on the reverse ; her head, surround- 
 ed by the aureola, is covered with a 
 veil, and her two hands are raised 
 to the height of the chest : around, 
 is the Greek inscription signifying 
 
 t Mother of God. The second hus- 
 band of that princess, John Zimis- 
 ces, who ascended the imperial 
 throne in 969, also had a medal 
 struck, bearing on one side the 
 figure of Christ Emmanyha {Em- 
 mamiel), and on the other, the Vir- 
 gin seated on a throne with the 
 Infant Jesus on her knee. Before 
 her are the three magi offering their 
 gifts ; above her head is a star, and 
 beneath her two doves. The first 
 emperor who placed the effigy of 
 Mary on the front side of his coins, 
 was Romanus IV., styled Diogenes, 
 who ascended the imperial throne 
 A. D. 1068. On his medals is seen 
 the Blessed Vifgin with the head 
 of the divine Infant reclining on 
 her bosom, according to the decree 
 of the Council of Ephesus. The 
 Virgin is there attired as an em- 
 press. Several strings of pearls are 
 seen around her head and twined 
 amid her hair, and her brow is 
 encircled by the imperial diadem. 
 She also retains the glory or au- 
 reola, but has no veil. On the re- 
 verse of the medal is the Greek in- 
 scription meaning, "May the Mother 
 of God be propitious to the Emperor 
 
 ^ Romanus Diogenes." Many of the 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 459 
 
 succeeding emperors also stamped 
 the image of the Virgin on their 
 coins; but from the time of John 
 Zimisces till the taking of Constan- 
 tinople, the letter M is no longer 
 found on the coins of the Lower 
 Empire. 
 
 The Greeks were not the only 
 nation who gave Mary this mark 
 of respect; many modern states 
 still bear on their coins the effigy 
 of the holy Virgin. 
 
 In the States of the Church, the 
 new silver crown has on it the Vir- 
 gin borne on clouds, holding the 
 keys in one hand, and in the other 
 an ark, with this inscription, " Supra 
 firmam petram." The city of Genoa 
 also presents, on some of its gold 
 coins, the Virgin borne on clouds, 
 and holding the Infant Jesus on 
 one arm. The inscription is, "Efc 
 rege eos." Austria has gold ducats 
 
 * whereon is seen the Virgin, in like 
 manner, borne on clouds, holding 
 the Infant Jesus on one arm, with 
 the globe in his hand. The inscrip- 
 tion is, "Maria Mater Dei." The 
 same state has also gold maxi- 
 milians, on the reverse of which is 
 seen the Virgin and Child, the latter 
 holding the globe in his hand. The 
 legend is, " Salus in te sperantibus." 
 The three-florin gold pieces of the 
 same empire have also on the re- 
 verse the Virgin and Child, with the 
 same legend as the maximilians. 
 Bavaria, too, strikes gold maxi- 
 milians and caroluses with the same 
 effigy and inscription. Portugal 
 stamps on her gold cruzades the 
 name of Mary: Maria^ surmounted 
 by a crown, and encircled by two 
 branches of laurel ; on the other 
 side is seen a cross with this in- 
 
 ^ scription, "In hoc signo vinces." 
 
CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 ADDED BY THE TRANSLATOR. 
 
 [We have, in the preceding chapters, a most interesting chronicle of the rise and progress of the 
 devotion to the Blessed Virgin. The learned author has collected much valuable information on this 
 subject He has glanced over many lands, giving a brief space to each, and, as far as he has gone, 
 his work leaves nothing unnoticed that could throw light on the fair picture of filial love and 
 reverence. But we could wish that he had devoted more space to this New World, where he had 
 assuredly an ample field before him — where the devotion to Mary is, and has been, for ages, 
 steadily on the increase, till, like the grain of mustard-seed mentioned in the Gospel, it has become 
 a stately tree, overshadowing with its branches all the land. It is with some hesitation that I attempt 
 to " take up the wondrous tale," but, as I have endeavored to give it an English form, and make it 
 accessible to those who know not the French language, I should be sorry to present it to them 
 without adding a few pages on the history of the devotion to Mary in these countries.] 
 
 HE countries of 
 the New Worid 
 were neariy all 
 settled by Cath- 
 olics, and by 
 Catholics who 
 loved and hon- 
 ored Mary, as we see by the names 
 of many of the older settlements. 
 Columbus was a faithful servant of 
 Mary, and Jacques Cartier, the dis- 
 coverer of Canada, or New France, 
 was equally devoted to her service. 
 The latter brought with him from 
 old Catholic France that zeal for 
 religion which then characterized 
 
 * " The salvation ov a sotji. is worth mobk 
 
 THAN THE CONQUEST OF AN EMPIBE." Such WaS the 
 
 golden maxim of Champlain, the founder of New 
 
 * all the navigators of that great 
 country. The beads and crucifix 
 were his most trusty weapons, and 
 when he succeeded in effecting a 
 landing, or making a treaty with 
 the Indians, it was to God and the 
 Virgin that he returned thanks. 
 The first tree felled by Europeans 
 was hailed as a triumph for religion 
 — as the first step towards the foun- 
 dation of a new empire for Jesus 
 and Mary.* Those sacred names 
 were the watchword of all the 
 French and Spanish Christians who 
 led the van in civilizing America, 
 and strong in the strength of those 
 
 France (Canada) ; a maxim which was adopted 
 and acted on by aU the Catholic pioneers of the 
 New World.— (Life of Bishop Flaget, p. 179.) 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 461 
 
 mighty names they triumphed over 
 every obstacle which the powers 
 of earth and hell raised up to bar 
 their progress. These northern re- 
 gions of America were especially 
 placed under the protection of Mary 
 from their first settlement by Euro- 
 peans. Jacques Cartier's grim old 
 followers, with hand of iron and 
 heart of faith, had passed away; 
 several voyages had been made by 
 successive companies from France, 
 but none of them succeeded in 
 effecting a permanent settlement; 
 all designs that were of a purely 
 worldly nature failed, and it was 
 only the faithful sons of Loyola who 
 braved and at length surmounted 
 every difficulty. They it was who 
 explored the interminable woods of 
 Canada, seeking, through incredible 
 toils and hardships, to gather in the 
 harvest, already ripe for the sickle ; 
 martyrdom itself had no terrors for 
 these valiant soldiers of Christ, and, 
 armed only with the cross and 
 beads, they boldly advanced, re- 
 gardless of the tomahawk and 
 scalping -knife, intent on conquer- 
 ing the land for Him who sent 
 them, and making his name known 
 to the heathen. Well and aptly 
 
 have they been called the pioneers 
 of civilization, for where the foot of 
 European never trod, never dared 
 to tread, they planted the standard 
 of the Cross. God and the Virgin 
 were with them wherever they went. 
 It may well be may said that Mary 
 presided over the opening of Amer- 
 ican civilization, since they who 
 laid its earliest foundations were 
 her own faithful servants, her de- 
 voted clients. Thus, in the cruel 
 torments inflicted on them by their 
 savage captors, we find them con- 
 soled by the thought of Mary's ma- 
 ternal care and protection. " It was 
 my consolation," wrote one of these 
 fervent missionaries, addressing the 
 Superior -General of his order: "It 
 was my consolation to know that I 
 was doing the will of God, since I 
 undertook this journey only through 
 obedience. I was full of confidence 
 in the intercession of the Blessed 
 Virgin, and in the assistance of the 
 many souls who were praying for 
 me."* And again, describing an- 
 other of his grievous trials : " I de- 
 sired and expected death, but was 
 not without a certain dread of the 
 
 * Bressani's Relation de la Nouvelle-France, 
 abridged by the Eev. Pere Martin, S. J., p. 118. 
 
462 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 fire. I, nevertheless, prepared for * 
 it as well as I could, commending 
 myself to the Mother of Mercy^ who 
 is truly the Amiable Mother^ the Ad- 
 mirable Mother^ the Powerful and 
 Clement Virgin^ the Comfort of the 
 Afflicted. She was, after God, the 
 only refuge of a poor sinner, forsa- 
 ken by all creatures on a foreign 
 soil, in that place of horror and of 
 waste wilderness,* without a tongue 
 to make himself understood, or 
 friends to console, or sacraments to 
 strengthen him, or any human rem- 
 edy to alleviate his sufferings."! 
 
 Father de None, one of the first 
 missionaries, was frozen to death 
 while wandering alone in the track- 
 less forest, and was found in a 
 kneeling posture, his head uncov- 
 ered, his eyes wide open and raised 
 to heaven, and his arms crossed on 
 his bosom. He was quite dead. 
 "Father de None died, it is thought, 
 on the day of the Purification of the 
 Blessed Virgin, for whom he had a 
 great devotion. Every Saturday he 
 fasted in her honor, and, every day, 
 he recited the office of the Immac- 
 
 * Dent xxxii, 10. 
 
 f Bressani's Relation de la Nouvelle- France, 
 abridged by the Rev. Pere Martin, S. J., p. 126. ^ 
 
 ulate Conception. When he spoke 
 of her, every word was from his 
 heart." J 
 
 Father Jogues, the illustrious 
 champion of the faith, who lived 
 through torments that would have 
 killed an hundred ordinary men, 
 giving an account of his capture by 
 the Iroquois, says : " At length we 
 reached the first Iroquois village; 
 it was on the eve of the Assump- 
 tion of the Blessed Virgin, and I 
 thanked Our Lord Jesus Christ for 
 that he was pleased to call us to 
 share his cross and sufferings, on 
 the day whereon the Christian world 
 celebrates the triumph of his divine 
 mother ascending to heaven." § On 
 another occasion, when he and his 
 companion had retired from this 
 Iroquois village, during a tumult, 
 to pray on a little neighboring hill : 
 "Returning to the village, we were 
 reciting the chaplet of the Blessed 
 Virgin, and had already said four 
 decades, when we met two young 
 men who ordered us to return to the 
 village. 'Brother,' said I to Rend, 
 * we know not what these men in- 
 
 X Relation Abreg'ee, pp. 178, 179. 
 § Md., p. 198. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 463 
 
 tend to do with us, now that they 
 are all so much excited. Let us rec- 
 ommend ourselves with the greater 
 fervor to God and the Blessed Vir- 
 gin, our good mother."* 
 
 Of Father Charles Garnier, an- 
 other of the martyrs of Canada, it 
 is related that from his childhood 
 he had a great inclination for vir- 
 tue, and especially a great devo- 
 tion to the Blessed Yirgin, whom 
 he always trailed his mother. He 
 had bound himself by a solemn 
 vow, to defend, till death, the doc- 
 trine of her Immaculate Conception, 
 and he loved to honor her under 
 that title. His death took place 
 on the eve of that festival, which 
 he went to celebrate with greater 
 solemnity in heaven.f 
 
 Such were the first missionaries 
 — the first civilizers of the Cana- 
 dian savages, — and such their de- 
 votion to the Blessed Mother of 
 God, a devotion which must neces- 
 sarily have communicated to their 
 neophytes at least a portion of its 
 fervor, and made the name of Mary 
 a household word amongst the sim- 
 ple denizens of the forest. But 
 whilst the Jesuit fathers were toil- 
 
 * Relation Abregee, p. 212. f Ibid., p. 266. 
 
 * ing and bleeding, preaching and 
 baptizing, amongst the savage 
 tribes of Canada, far away in the 
 sunny realm of France the Al- 
 mighty was carrying out his mer- 
 ciful designs for the permanent set- 
 tlement of these remote countries, 
 and the foundation of a new empire 
 for the Queen of heaven : his omnis- 
 cient wisdom was preparing an 
 asylum for the Catholic Church of 
 North America, and raising up a 
 barrier against heresy in the noble 
 provinces of JS'ew France.J 
 
 The Island of Montreal was still 
 covered with primeval woods : its 
 existence scarcely known to Euro- 
 peans, when God made known, by 
 a special revelation, to some pious 
 persons in France, that such a place 
 was to be colonized, and that they 
 were the instruments chosen to 
 carry out the design. Neither of 
 these individuals was eitlier rich 
 or powerful, yet never doubting — 
 never pausing to inquire " how this 
 could be done," they at once set 
 about forming a society for the pur- 
 pose, assured that God was with 
 them. Their object was to build a 
 city in Canada in honor of Mary, 
 
 I Life of Sister Bourgeoys, Introduction. 
 
464 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 and under her especial patronage, * 
 to serve as the stronghold and 
 nucleus of religion in those (then) 
 remote regions. The city was to be 
 called Villemarie (the City of Mary). 
 The principal movers in this proj- 
 ect were the inspired persons above 
 mentioned: M. de Maisonneuve, a 
 virtuous and pious layman, M. 
 Olier, afterwards founder of the 
 illustrious Order of St. Sulpice, and 
 sister Marguerite Bourgeoys, an 
 humble maiden of Troyes. Each 
 of these, but especially the two 
 latter, were favored, all through, 
 with the most singular graces, and 
 guided by light and knowledge from 
 above, clearly showing that they 
 were chosen instruments of the 
 divine will. When all things were 
 prepared for the voyage, the good 
 sister Bourgeoys began to shrink 
 from the prospect of embarking 
 alone on such an undertaking, as 
 she was to have no female com- 
 panion. She had taken all possible 
 pains to ascertain whether she was 
 really called to this perilous enter- 
 prise; she had consulted the most 
 pious and the most enlightened ec- 
 clesiastics of the time, and was, 
 through them, assm-ed of her voca- 
 
 tion, yet still she feared to go alone 
 to Canada. Her historian tells up 
 " that the project of such a voyage 
 for a woman of thirty -three, the 
 prospect of being unaccompanied 
 by any of her own sex, amidst a 
 company of soldiers; the idea of 
 having no female to assist her at 
 Villemarie in the education of chil- 
 dren, and of being constantly ex- 
 posed to the danger of being taken 
 and burned by the Iit)quois; all 
 these considerations were very lit 
 to inspire her with fear, and pru- 
 dence seemed to render it necessary 
 that she should have some more 
 convincing proof of the divine will. 
 Even this was granted to her, 
 though she asked it not. The 
 Blessed Virgin, for whose honor 
 and glory she was resolved to sac- 
 rifice her life, by going to Canada 
 to procm-e faithful servants for her, 
 vouchsafed to assure her with her 
 own lips, that the design was well- 
 pleasing to her, and that she would 
 herself protect her amidst so many 
 dangers. The good nun being in 
 her own chamber, thinking at the 
 moment of anything but her voy- 
 age: *I saw before me,' says she, 
 'a tall lady, clad in a robe, as it 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 465 
 
 were of white serge, who said to 
 me : Go ; I will not desert thee. And 
 I knew it was the Blessed Virgin, 
 though I saw not her face. This 
 reassured me, and gave me courage 
 to undertake the voyage.' After 
 this vision, Sister Margaret no longer 
 hesitated to set out. Yet still her 
 great prudence made her fear that 
 it might be an illusion; knowing 
 that God conducts his children by 
 the common rules of faith, and not 
 by extraordinary means. ' After 
 this apparition,' says she, ' being 
 fearful of illusions, I considered that 
 if this one were from God, I had 
 nothing to provide for my voyage. 
 I said to myself, K it be the will 
 of God that I should go to Yille- 
 mario, I have no need of anything ; 
 whereupon I set out without a 
 penny or a box of any kind, having 
 with me only a small bundle which 
 I could carry under my arm.' 
 
 " We cannot suflQ,ciently admire 
 the heroism of such perfect confi- 
 dence in God, unexampled, per- 
 haps, except by that of the holy 
 Apostles whose spirit was still man- 
 ifested in this admirable woman. 
 Instead of laying in money and 
 
 * Life of Sister Bourgeoys, pp. 41-43. 
 
 clothes, so necessary in a new coun- 
 try which as yet produced nothing 
 of itself for the sustenance of life, 
 but had to import all from Europe, 
 she strips herself, on the contrary, 
 of all she has, and distributes 
 amongst the poor even the little 
 money she possesses, placing her 
 trust in God alone."* 
 
 While journeying to and fro, pre- 
 paring for her embarkation. Sister 
 Bourgeoys took her passage in a 
 boat from Orleans to Nantes. There 
 were twelve or thirteen passengers 
 on board besides the crew, and 
 amongst these there was only one 
 woman; yet Sister Bourgeoys con- 
 trived to make all those men sanc- 
 tify the voyage by many pious 
 practices. Every day they said the 
 beads, recited the of&ce of the 
 Blessed Virgin, and read a portion 
 of some pious book.f 
 
 All this time M. de Maisonneuve 
 was hurrying on his preparations 
 under the direction of M. Olier: 
 they had secured the assistance of 
 another pious lady. Mademoiselle 
 Manse, who was to take charge of 
 the sick in the new colony. It was 
 the intention of M. Olier to conse- 
 
 f Vie de la Soeur Bourgeoys, tome i., p. 52. 
 
466 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 crate the island of Montreal to the 
 Holy Family, and for that purpose he 
 proposed to establish three different 
 institutes : that of his own order of 
 St Sulpice, for the forming and main- 
 tenance of the priesthood, in honor 
 of Our Lord and Saviour, Jesus 
 Christ ; that of the Congregation of 
 Om* Lady, for the education of 
 females, in honor of Our Blessed 
 Lady; and that of the Hospital 
 Nuns, lor the care of the sick and 
 diseased, in honor of her illustri- 
 ous spouse, St. Joseph. Come we 
 now to the actual foundation of 
 the city, which I will give in the 
 simple, graphic words of M. Olier's 
 biographer. 
 
 " In the month of February, 1642, 
 he assembled in the chm^ch of Notre 
 Dame all the members of the com- 
 pany of Montreal, celebrated the 
 Holy Mass at the Virgin's altar, 
 where he gave communion to those 
 who were not priests, whilst the 
 latter celebrated at the neighbor- 
 ing altars; and all consecrated the 
 island to the Holy Family, under 
 the special protection of the Blessed 
 Virgin, and consecrated themselves 
 to that pious intention. On leaving 
 the church, they repaired to the 
 
 f Hotel de Loson, to concert the 
 means of consolidating the good 
 work. It was resolved that they 
 should freight at least three vessels, 
 to convey to Montreal as many de- 
 cent families of different states as 
 they could find willing to emigrate ; 
 that they should take possession of 
 the island in the name of the Bless- 
 ed Virgin, who was always to be 
 regarded as its first and true mis- 
 tress, and that, with the king's per- 
 mission, they would build a city on 
 it, to be called Villemarie. 
 
 " On the 17th of May following, 
 the little troop (having passed the 
 winter in Quebec) at length arrived 
 at Montreal. Immediately on land- 
 ing, they prostrated themselves on 
 the shore, and, in the transports of 
 their holy enthusiasm, they sang 
 . several psalms, to testify their grati- 
 tude to God. In the place destined 
 for the new city, they erected tents 
 for their own accommodation, and 
 then proceeded to raise an altar, 
 where, next day, Father Vimont, 
 after the Veni Q-eator, first cele- 
 brated the holy sacrifice, and ex- 
 posed the Blessed Sacrament, to 
 obtain from heaven an auspicious 
 commencement to that pious work. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 467 
 
 It was in a chapel constructed of 
 bark that the Ble&sed Sacrament 
 was first placed, and it has ever 
 since been preserved in Yille-Marie. 
 As the country furnished neither oil 
 nor wax, they placed before the 
 tabernacle which they brought from 
 France, instead of a lamp, a glass 
 vial containing a number of fireflies, 
 insects which, when there are sev- 
 eral of them put together, produce 
 a li2;ht like that of numerous wax 
 tapers.* 
 
 "Such was the beginning of 
 Yille-Marie," adds the biographer, 
 and it will at once be seen from his 
 description, that the foundation of 
 the city of Montreal was essentially 
 a religious one, resembling that of 
 a monastery rather than a city. We 
 are inclined to think that no other 
 city was ever founded under cir- 
 cumstances so interesting or so edi- 
 fying. The motives of its founders 
 were of a purely religious nature ; 
 they had no thoughts of aggrandiz- 
 ing themselves or even their nation ; 
 they desired not to enrich them- 
 selves by drawing forth the natural 
 resources of the country; its wealth 
 of woods, and waters, and minerals, 
 
 * Vie de M. Olier, abregee. 
 
 gave them no concern; their sole 
 ambition was to promote the glory 
 of God and the salvation of men, 
 and to do honor to their sovereign 
 lady and mistress, the Blessed Mo-- 
 ther of God. Assured of her pro- 
 tection, they calmly prosecuted their 
 work of building habitations for 
 themselves, fearing neither the sav- 
 age Iroquois of the surrounding 
 woods, nor the severity of the cli- 
 mate, nor the privations of every 
 kind yet to be endured. They were 
 doing the will of God, and working 
 for Mary, their beloved queen, and 
 all considerations of a purely per- 
 sonal or selfish nature were forgot- 
 ten. 
 
 During the first days of the col- 
 ony's existence, the river St. Law- 
 rence rose in fury one Christmas 
 eve, threatening to sweep away the 
 little inclosure of stakes which then 
 contained the whole of Montreal. 
 M. de Maisonneuve, the pious gov- 
 ernor of the island, made a vow 
 that if the fort were preserved, he 
 would plant a wooden cross on the 
 summit of the mountain which over- 
 hung the infant city. The waters 
 retired after some time, without do- 
 ing any injury, and the grateful gov- 
 
ids 
 
 History of the devotion to the blessed virgin mart. 
 
 ernor planted the cross as he had * 
 promised. This cross was desti-oyed 
 soon after by the Iroquois, but when 
 Sister Bourgeoys amved in the col- 
 ony, she prevailed upon M. de Mai- 
 sonneuve to have it put up again, 
 and it continued to be a place of 
 pilgrimage for several years, not- 
 withstanding that the woods around 
 it were infested by the ferocious 
 Iroquois, who took every opportu- 
 nity of attacking those who went to 
 pray there. Yet many did go for 
 some time after the replanting of 
 the cro^s, to perform novenas and 
 other devotions for the conversion 
 of the savages. In the lapse of 
 time there was a mission estab- 
 lished on the mountain, and the 
 savages began to gather to the 
 place: hitherto they could never 
 be induced to settle on the island. 
 A school-house and a small chapel 
 were built ; the latter dedicated to 
 Our Lady of Snow — Notre Bame des 
 NeigeSj around which a pretty vil- 
 lage has since sprung up. 
 
 The good Sister Bourgeoys suc- 
 ceeded, after some years, in forming 
 her admirable institute under the 
 title of the Congregation of Our 
 Lady, but not without having her 
 
 full share of the sufferings and pri- 
 vations of the infant colony. At 
 first, she went from house to house 
 teaching, but her strength soon be- 
 gan to fail under this excessive 
 fatigue ; she was then presented by 
 the governor (in the name of the 
 company) with a stone building 
 which had been used as a stable ; * 
 here she commenced her school, her- 
 self and her four assistants sleeping 
 in a sort of loft to which they as- 
 cended by a ladder. This humble 
 building, cleaned and ornamented 
 by the pious sister as well as her 
 poverty would permit, was convert- 
 ed into a school-house, and formed 
 the foundation of the stately con- 
 vent now known as the Congrega- 
 tion Nunnery. After considerable 
 delay and many disappointments. 
 Sister Bourgeoys was so happy as 
 to see a chapel erected near her 
 school-house, in honor of Our Lady 
 of Good Aid — Notre Dame de Bon 
 Secours. 
 
 "Nothing could be more touch- 
 ing," says the reverend biographer 
 of Sister Bourgeoys, " than ^he dis- 
 interested and courageous charity 
 of these fervent colonists for each 
 
 * Vie de la Soeur Bourgeoys, t. i., p. 93. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 469 
 
 other. M. de Maisonneuve had f 
 formed amongst them a company of 
 soldiers styled the Blessed Ykgin's 
 Company, who were to be ready at 
 any time to sacrifice their lives to 
 preserve those of the other colo- 
 nists, and kept guard night and day 
 around the houses and fields, where 
 the savages were accustomed to con- 
 ceal themselves in order to surprise 
 the colony. 'M. de Maisonneuve,' 
 says Sister Bourgeoys, ' had enrolled 
 sixty-three of these soldiers, in hon- 
 or of the number of years which 
 the Blessed Virgin is thought to 
 have passed on earth. Every Sun- 
 day he appointed certain of their 
 number to receive daily during the 
 ensuing week, and gave them a 
 pious exhortation. When these sol- 
 diers mounted guard, it was always 
 with prayer; and when they had 
 any religious duty to fulfill, they 
 were taken to the church, where 
 they said their prayers and per- 
 formed their other devotions in 
 common, with every appearance of 
 satisfaction.' " * 
 
 Meanwhile, Mademoiselle Manse 
 had her hospital already in opera- 
 tion, under the title of the Hotel 
 
 * Vie de la Soeur Bourgeoys, t. i., p. 77, 78. ^ 
 
 BieiL M. Olier being unable to 
 come himself to Montreal as he had 
 desired, the governor prevailed upon 
 him to send four of his ecclesiastics 
 to establish a seminary there for the 
 education of priests and to minister 
 to the spiritual wants 6f the rising 
 colony, the Jesuit Fathers having 
 no permanent settlement there, and 
 being desirous of devoting them- 
 selves in a particular manner to 
 their missions amongst the Indians. 
 From this time the colony pro- 
 gressed rapidly under the pastoral 
 and paternal care of the pious Sul- 
 picians, who, in the course of some 
 years, became seigneurs or proprie- 
 tors of the island of Montreal, which 
 was transferred to them by the com- 
 pany. 
 
 During the whole period of her 
 long life, Sister Bourgeoys continued 
 to labor, under the patronage of 
 Mary, for the spiritual and tempo- 
 ral welfare of the colony. Not con- 
 tent with training up her pupils in 
 the way of godliness and virtue, 
 she instituted an External Congre- 
 gation, consisting of those young 
 women who had been brought up 
 in her schools. This excellent con- 
 fraternity is still kept up in Mont- 
 
A70 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 real under the title of the Confra- 
 ternity of Our Lady of Victory. 
 
 About the same time was formed 
 the pious confraternity of the Holy 
 Family, which grew out of the three 
 religious comnumities already in 
 existence. The object of this asso- 
 ciation was to place before Chris- 
 tian families the example of Jesus, 
 Mary, and Joseph ; the men to form 
 their conduct on that of St. Joseph, 
 the women on that of the Blessed 
 Virgin, and the children on that of 
 the child Jesus.* This confrater- 
 nity is also in existence at the 
 present time. 
 
 In 1673, the wooden chapel of 
 Our Lady of Good Aid was replaced 
 by one of stone on the following 
 occasion. Amongst the members 
 of the company of Montreal, before 
 it made over the island to the Sul- 
 picians, there were two brothers 
 named Le Pretre, lords of Fleury, 
 in France. They were both very 
 pious, and having a peculiar devo- 
 tion to the Blessed Virgin, they 
 were exceedingly anxious to pro- 
 mote the prosperity of her new city. 
 For this purpose they made a sac- 
 rifice highly honorable to them- 
 
 * Vie de la Sceur Bourgeoys, t. i., p. 170. 
 
 ^ selves, and well calculated to prove 
 their generous devotion. They had, 
 in the chapel of their castle, a small 
 statue of the Blessed Virgin, which 
 had been an object of particular 
 veneration for more than a century. 
 The desire of promoting the devo- 
 tion to Mary in a colony specially 
 consecrated to her, induced them to 
 send this precious treasure to Mont- 
 real, with a request that it might 
 be placed in a chapel dedicated 
 to the Mother of God. Sister Bour- 
 geoys happened just then to be in 
 France on some important business 
 for the colony, and to her care the 
 statue was confided. It was but 
 six or eight inches in height, skill- 
 fully carved in brown wood. The 
 niche wherein it stood was of gilt 
 wood, adorned with sculpture and 
 with precious stones. This statue 
 was at first deposited in the little 
 wooden chapel, but the piety of the 
 colonists did not permit it to re- 
 main long in that humble abode. 
 They resolved to erect a stone build- 
 ing; and on the 30th of January, 
 1673, the first stone was solemnly 
 blessed by the Superior of the sem- 
 inary, amidst a general assembly of 
 aU the inhabitants of the island. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 471 
 
 This church was consecrated on the 
 25th of August, 1675, and was the 
 first stone church erected on the 
 island of Montreal.* Every day a 
 priest went there to say mass ; and 
 when Mary's festivals came round, 
 they were celebrated with so much 
 pomp and solemnity, that the peo- 
 ple gathered from all parts, and the 
 place became a famous pilgrimage. 
 It became the term of public pro- 
 cessions, and in times of danger 
 or calamity, the faithful hastened 
 thither to offer up their supplica- 
 tions. 
 
 In 1754, the church of Bon Se- 
 cours was burned in a conflagra- 
 tion which destroyed a considerable 
 portion of the city ; but " great was 
 the astonishment of all the world, 
 and great the consolation of vir- 
 tuous souls, when, on searching 
 amongst the ruins, the venerated 
 image of Our Lady of Good Aid 
 was found in a state of perfect 
 preservation." f 
 
 War and famine visited the land, 
 so as to keep the public mind in an 
 unsettled and anxious state, and it 
 
 * Manuel du Pelerin de Notre Dame de Bon 
 Secours a Montreal, pp. 14, 15. 
 t Ibid., p. 21. 
 
 * was many years before the project 
 of rebuilding the church could be 
 carried into execution. On the 30th 
 of June, 1771, the first stone of the 
 new building was laid. This stone 
 bore the inscription : 
 
 ET 
 
 Beat^ Mari^ Auxiliatrici 
 sub titulo assumptionis. 
 
 High up in the wall of the church, 
 overlooking the St. Lawrence, there 
 was a figure of the Blessed Virgin 
 placed in a niche, inviting all those 
 who sailed up or down the river to 
 invoke the Star of the Sea. Time, 
 and the action of the elements, have 
 long since destroyed this venerable 
 image. 
 
 There was in Montreal another 
 interesting monument of past times, 
 also dedicated to Our Lady ; a church 
 which formerly belonged to the 
 R^collet Fathers, and from them 
 popularly named the Church of the 
 R^collets. It subsequently belong- 
 ed to a congregation of men piously 
 associated together under the pat- 
 ronage of Our Blessed Lady. It 
 bore on its fi-ont the date, 1725. 
 This venerable structure is now no 
 longer in existence. 
 
47S 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIHOIN MART. 
 
 But we have yet to speak of the 
 noblest monument of piety ever 
 erected in these northern regions — 
 the parish church of Montreal, dedi- 
 cated to Almighty God, under the 
 invocation of Our Lady. This mag- 
 nificent structure is built in that 
 stately style of architecture which 
 characterized the old French and 
 Flemish cathedrals of the Middle 
 Ages, and though, perhaps, not 
 quite so florid as most of them, its 
 exterior is of rare beauty. Two 
 lofty towei-s rise on either side of 
 the portal ; * in one of these there 
 is a bell which weighs 29,400 lbs., 
 and in the other a very good chime 
 of bells ; the bourdon^ or great bell, 
 is only rung on solemn occasions, 
 and when it is, its deep, booming 
 sound, is heard reverberating for 
 miles along the river. The interior 
 is divided by two rows of lofty 
 pillars into a nave, and two lateral 
 aisles, with a spacious choir, sur- 
 rounded by the stalls of the rever- 
 end Sulpicians to whom the church 
 belongs. The roof is groined and 
 arched. There are two ranges of 
 
 * The height of the principal towers is 220 
 feet, and of the others 115 feet each ; the great 
 window behind the high altar is 64 feet in height, 
 
 f galleries running around three sides 
 of the walls, and opposite the choir, 
 just over the principal entrance, is 
 the organ-loft. Over the high altar 
 is a niche containing a statue of 
 Our Lady, nearly of life-size. In 
 the side aisles there are several 
 chapels, with altars and balustrad- 
 ing of dark wood, handsomely orna- 
 mented. One of these is dedicated 
 to the Infant Jesus, another to St. 
 Amable. These two are on either 
 side of the high altar. There is 
 also one bearing the name of St. 
 Joseph, and another that of St. 
 Anne. Each of these has a hand- 
 some altar-piece. The nave is lit 
 by chandeliers of the most costly 
 kind, and the aisles by oil-lamps. 
 Before each of the altars where the 
 Blessed Sacrament is kept, there 
 hangs a heavy silver lamp of an- 
 tique style and workmanship. Take 
 it for all in all, it is a superb me- 
 mento of Catholic piety and devo- 
 tion to the Blessed Virgin. 
 
 Quebec is scarcely behind Mont- 
 real in devotion to the Mother of 
 God. One of the first churches 
 
 by 32 in width. The total number of pews is 
 1,244, capable of seating between six and seven 
 thousand persons. ( Guide to the Cities of Canada. ) 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 473 
 
 founded in the city was that of Our ' 
 Lady of Victory, where the faithful 
 still go to invoke the aid of her who 
 is truly the Help of Christians. The 
 Sisters of the Congregation have an 
 establishment in Quebec, as they 
 have in various parts of the coun- 
 try, and wherever they have charge 
 of the rising generation of women, 
 Mary is sure to be loved and hon- 
 ored. 
 
 Space will not permit me to par- 
 ticularize all the churches and 
 chapels dedicated to Our Blessed 
 Lady in Canada ; suffice it to say, 
 that many of the parish churches 
 bear her name, and that, in all the 
 cities and toAvns, there is one altar 
 dedicated to her wherever there is a 
 second one in the church. Through- 
 out the rural districts Mary reigns 
 supreme : her festivals are cele- 
 brated with all possible solenmity, 
 and her altars adorned as richly as 
 the means of the people will allow. 
 There is scarcely a family all the 
 country over without a Mary, and it 
 is no unfrequent thing, amongst the 
 French Canadians, to find several 
 
 * There are also wooden crosses erected, at 
 short intervals, to remind the people of Christ's 
 passion and death ; they are generally accom- 
 
 ^ daughters of the same family bear- 
 ing the name of Mary in addition to 
 their distinctive appellations. La 
 Sainte Vierge is still the chosen 
 patroness of all Lower Canada, and 
 it may with truth be said that the 
 wives and mothers of that province 
 are entirely devoted to that great 
 Queen, and live, for the most part, 
 as becomes her servants. Lower 
 Canada is essentially Catholic — a 
 fact which stares the traveller in 
 the face as he journeys along the 
 peaceful highways. At every few 
 miles he will perceive a pretty 
 parish church raising its cross- 
 crowned steeple, and over its por- 
 tal, perhaps, a small statue of the 
 Blessed Virgin set in a niche. The 
 exterior of these churches is simple 
 enough, but within they are, in 
 general, well finished and tastefully 
 decorated.* 
 
 And the sweet Mother of Chris- 
 tians is not insensible to all this 
 homage : many and many a time 
 has she manifested her gratitude 
 and her protecting care on behalf 
 of these good Canadians. Passing 
 
 panied by some of the instruments of Our Sa- 
 viour's torture — the ladder, the spear, the crown 
 of thorns, etc., and inclosed by a wooden railing. 
 
474 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 over the numerous instances on rec- 
 ord, we will only mention two which 
 occurred within the last few years 
 in view of the whole province. 
 
 In 1847, when the terrible typhus 
 fever raged in Monti*eal and in all 
 the ports of the St. Lawrence, many 
 of the priests had already fallen vic- 
 tims to the dreadful pestilence ; the 
 devoted daughters of St. Vincent de 
 Paul, the heroic Sisters of Charity, 
 had suffered severely, no less than 
 thirteen of their number having 
 died within a few weeks ; the wor- 
 thy bishop of Montreal was at 
 length attacked by the fever and 
 the whole city was thrown into con- 
 sternation. Then it was, when all 
 human succor was vain, that the 
 faithful had recourse to the Mother 
 of Mercy. A novena was made in 
 the chm'ch of Bon Secours for the 
 recovery of the bishop ; the good 
 prelate himself made a vow that if 
 the Blessed Virgin would be pleased 
 to arrest the progress of the pesti- 
 lence by her powerful intercession, 
 and relieve his suffering people, he 
 would have the event recorded on 
 canvas. The prayers were heard; 
 the vow was accepted; the fever 
 stopped its ravages almost immedi- 
 
 ately; the bishop recovered, con- 
 trary to all expectation, and a hand- 
 some painting was executed by his 
 orders, representing the Emigrant 
 Sheds, the chief scene of the pesti- 
 lence, the Sisters of Charity, and 
 some ecclesiastics in attendance on 
 the sick, with the Blessed Virgin 
 seated on a cloud, looking down on 
 the sufferings and the charitable la- 
 bors of her faithful servants. The 
 picture was placed over one of the 
 side altars in the church of Bon 
 Secours. 
 
 The other instance referred to oc- 
 curred during the visitation of the 
 cholera to Montreal in 1849. The 
 disease was making fearful ravages 
 amongst the people, and was daily 
 on the increase, when the same 
 pious prelate* had again recourse 
 to the maternal heart of Mary. The 
 statue of the Blessed Virgin was 
 borne in triumph around the city, 
 followed by a vast concourse of peo- 
 ple, amounting, it was thought, to 
 twenty thousand, walking in pro- 
 cession with banners flying; some 
 of the pious confraternities reciting 
 the rosary and litany, and others 
 
 * The Eight Rev. Ignatius Bourget, titular 
 ^ bishop of Montreal. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 475 
 
 singing hymns. After visiting some 
 others of the churches, the proces- 
 sion returned to that of Our Lady 
 of Secour, and the scene at that mo- 
 ment was one which the mind can- 
 not easily forget. It was a lovely 
 evening, and a lovely sight, when 
 the gray, soft, summer twilight faded 
 into night, and the vast multitude 
 knelt in front of the quaint old 
 church, lighted up and wreathed 
 with flowers as for a joyous festival. 
 Above was the cloudless sky, where 
 Mary sits enthroned beside her di- 
 vine Son, and below, at the end of 
 a long vista of glittering lights and 
 over-arching boughs, was seen the 
 statue of that amiable Virgin, re- 
 minding the thousand, thousand 
 supplicants, of her many claims on 
 their confidence and affection. Dur- 
 ing the solemn Benediction of the 
 Blessed Sacrament, the multitude 
 without and within the church 
 joined in fervent prayer. Our Lady 
 of Bon Secours again extended her 
 protecting arm over her own city, 
 and in a few days the cholera dis- 
 appeared from Montreal. 
 
 In gratitude for this last favor, 
 the good bishop replaced the statue 
 of Our Lady by one larger and more 
 
 richly adorned, which was borne in 
 solemn procession to the favorite 
 shrine, and there placed over the 
 high altar in regal state. A crown- 
 ed queen, with her maternal arms 
 extended to embrace her humble 
 clients. Our Lady stands, as we see 
 her in the pictures of the Immacu- 
 late Conception. 
 
 In the cities of Lower Canada, 
 the devotion to Mary is carried on 
 with pious fervor. The different 
 confraternities belonging to her are 
 all in a flourishing condition. That 
 of the Holy Scapular is diffused all 
 over the country, and the society 
 of the Living Rosary is daily gain- 
 ing ground. The arch-confraternity 
 of the Sacred Heart of Mary for the 
 Conversion of Sinners was estab- 
 lished several years ago in Mont- 
 real, and it has borne good fruit in 
 the numerous souls reclaimed from 
 a life of sin through the prayers 
 of its members and the compas- 
 sionate goodness of the ever-Blessed 
 Virgin. 
 
 Upper, or Western Canada, is still 
 far behind the sister province in re- 
 ligion, owing to the comparatively 
 small number of Catholics settled 
 there. Indeed, the interior of the 
 
476 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY, 
 
 country is even yet but thinly peo- 
 pled, but its population is rapidly 
 on the increase, and the zealous 
 missionaries of the Cross are lo- 
 cated here and there at regular in- 
 tervals, like sentinels at their post. 
 The Chui'ch of Upper Canada is 
 growing fast under the watchful 
 care of the bishops. These eminent 
 prelates are all fervently devoted 
 to Mary, and are using their best 
 endeavors, in concert with their 
 respective clergy, to promote her 
 honor and glory ; to enrol the faith- 
 ful in her confraternities, and to 
 place churches under her invoca- 
 tion. Convents are already estab- 
 lished in each of the cities, and 
 both Kingston and Toronto have 
 magnificent cathedrals ; Ottawa, too, 
 has a large and handsome cathe- 
 dral, erected within the last few 
 years. 
 
 In the lower provinces of British 
 America religion begins to raise her 
 head. Nova Scotia, New Bruns- 
 wick, Prince Edward Island, and the 
 island of Newfoundland, have now 
 their titular bishops, sufiragans of 
 the archiepiscopal see of Halifax. 
 A good bishop of St. John's, N. F.,* 
 undertook to prosecute the building 
 
 f of a spacious cathedral, commenced 
 many years before by his predeces- 
 sor,! and nothing could equal the 
 enthusiasm with which the honest 
 fishermen of Newfoundland second- 
 ed his pious undertaking. The peo- 
 ple not only furnished great part 
 of the building materials, but drew 
 them to the spot, and the church 
 being placed on a steep hill, it was 
 no easy matter to draw heavy loads 
 to the top. But this was no obsta- 
 cle, or at least it was one which 
 the piety of the people easily over- 
 came; it was no uncommon thing 
 to see several fishermen drawing a 
 cart up the hill loaded with w^ood 
 or stone, and all seemed vieing with 
 each other who should do most to 
 forward the work. Every one gave 
 what he could: those who had noth- 
 ing else, freely gave their manual 
 labor. It has been justly observed 
 that never, in modern times, was 
 the faith of Catholics, and its all- 
 powerful efficacy, so strikingly dis- 
 played as in the building of a su- 
 perb cathedral by the poor fisher- 
 men of Newfoundland. 
 
 * The late lamented Bishop Mullock, an Irish 
 Franciscan. 
 
 t Right Rev. Dr. Fleming. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 477 
 
 In August, 1852, there was a pro- 
 vincial synod held in Quebec, on 
 which occasion nearly all the pre- 
 lates of British America were pres- 
 ent either in person or by proxy. 
 The bishops of Upper Canada were 
 met in Montreal by some of the 
 prelates of the lower provinces, 
 and, after vespers on a Sunday 
 evening, a procession was formed 
 consisting of the greater part of the 
 Catholic population of the city, to 
 visit Our Blessed Lady in her shrine 
 of Bon Secours, and to implore her 
 blessing on the council about to 
 open dm'ing the following week ; at 
 the head of the procession walked 
 six bishops with the reverend Su- 
 perior of the seminary, followed 
 by the countless multitude of the 
 faithful. A solemn benediction was 
 given at the altar of Bon Secours, 
 and one of the prelates* addressed 
 die people from the steps of the 
 church, announcing the object of 
 the approaching assembly in Que- 
 bec, and soliciting the prayers of 
 the people on behalf of their pas- 
 
 * The Right Rev. Armand de Charbonnel, 
 then bishop of Toronto. 
 
 f The Chapel of Loretto was founded by the i^ 
 
 * tors during the sitting of the coun- 
 cil, that the Holy Ghost might pre- 
 side over their deliberations, and 
 that Mary might be with them as 
 she was of old with the Apostles 
 when they met together. This scene 
 is one of tlje proudest and most 
 cherished reminiscences in the an- 
 nals of Montreal, and will, we doubt 
 not, be related with pride and pleas- 
 ure by generations yet unborn. 
 
 It may be well to mention here 
 that the Indian tribes of Canada 
 are for the most part firmly at- 
 tached to the Catholic faith. They 
 have a large settlement near Que- 
 bec, named Loretto ; f one near the 
 southern shore of the St. Lawrence, 
 named Caughnawaga, some miles 
 above Montreal, and another on the 
 Lake of the Two Mountains, an ex- 
 pansion of the river Ottawa. These 
 people are extremely simple and 
 well-disposed, and are remarkable 
 for their piety and reverence for 
 religion. 
 
 When Bishop Flaget visited Can- 
 ada, a few years before his death. 
 
 Jesuit Father Chaumonot, in fulfillment of a 
 vow made by him in France ; it was opened for 
 service in 1674, and is an exact counterpart of 
 the famous Santa Gasa. 
 
478 
 
 mSTORT OF "'HE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 ho was taken by the Sulpicians of 
 Montreal to visit the Indian village 
 on the Lake of the Two Mountains, 
 where an old schoolmate of his was 
 their pastor. Here a large band of 
 Algonquins came to visit him and 
 to receive his blessing. They bore 
 before them a crimson banner, in- 
 scribed with the Ave Maria of the 
 Sulpicians; and falling upon their 
 knees, appeared full of humility and 
 faith. They conducted him to their 
 village, and on his arrival, he was 
 saluted with firing of cannon, while 
 all the inhabitants were on their 
 knees to receive his benediction. 
 At this mass the Indians chanted 
 canticles in two responding choirs, 
 and the bishop was moved even to 
 
 * tears. He next visited their superb 
 Calvary carved in wood.* This 
 representation of Calvary is a work 
 of great ingenuity : it is situated on 
 a sand-hill behind the village, and 
 is used by the Indians as a sort of 
 pilgrimage. "What a beautiful proof 
 is here of the maternal tenderness 
 of the Catholic Church, and her 
 wonderful power as a conservator 
 of the human race. Had not these 
 Algonquins and Ottawas been con- 
 verted to Catholicity, and remained 
 faithful to its precepts, they would 
 in all probability have disappear- 
 ed long ago from the face of the 
 earth, like many of their kindred 
 tribes. 
 
 * lAfe of Bishop Flaget, p. 19L 
 
CHAPTER XV. 
 
 DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN IN THE UNITED STATES. 
 
 Canada and the f 
 other British 
 provinces were 
 discovered and 
 settled under 
 the auspices of 
 Mary, the same 
 may be truly said of the Great 
 West. Father Marquette, the illus- 
 trious Jesuit missionary, who, in 
 pursuit of " the lost sheep " through 
 the pathless forests of the West, dis- 
 covered the great river since known 
 as the Mississippi, tells us himself 
 that he had " always invoked Mary 
 since he had been in the Ottawa 
 country, to obtain of God the grace 
 to be able to visit the nations on 
 the river Mississippi."* His biog- 
 rapher tells us that " from his pious 
 mother the youthful Marquette im- 
 bibed that warm, generous, and un- 
 wavering devotion to the Mother of 
 God, which m.akes him so conspic- 
 uous among her servants." f Mar- 
 quette was, in relation to the Mis- 
 
 * Life of Father Marquette, by J. G. Shea, 
 
 sissippi, what Jacques C artier was 
 to the St. Lawrence : each disclosed 
 to the civilized world a vast region 
 before unknown, and both were ser- 
 vants of Mary. No other discoverer, 
 in ancient or modern times, occupies 
 so grand a position in history as the 
 Jesuit Marquette. Others labored 
 and explored at the bidding of 
 earthly princes, for the advance- 
 ment of human science, or, perhaps, 
 even for self-aggrandizement, but 
 Marquette did all, undertook all, for 
 the greater glory of God, according to 
 the well-known motto of his order : 
 no earthly prince or princess gave 
 him his commission — Jesus Christ 
 was his sovereign, and Mary "the 
 patroness of his mission." Thus we 
 find him having recourse to her in 
 all his doubts and dangers. "De- 
 spairing now of being able to reach 
 his destined goal without the inter- 
 position of Heaven, the missionary 
 turned to the patroness of his mis- 
 sion, the Blessed Virgin Immaculate, 
 
 f Narrative of Father Marquette, p. 6. 
 
480 
 
 BISTORT OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 and with his two companions began f 
 a novena in her honor. Nor was his 
 trust betrayed," adds the biogra- 
 pher; "God heard his prayer, and 
 his illness ceased. During this 
 painful wintering, which, for all his 
 expressions of comfort, was one of 
 great hardship and suffering, his 
 hoiu*s were chiefly spent in prayer. 
 Convinced that the term of his ex- 
 istence was drawing rapidly to a 
 close, he consecrated this period of 
 quiet to the exercises of a spiritual 
 retreat, in which his soul overflowed 
 
 * lAfe of Father Marquette, p. 69. 
 
 ^ Ihid. 
 
 X The account of the death of this famous 
 missionary is so very beautiful that we cannot 
 forbear giving it here. " Calmly and cheerfully 
 he saw the approach of death, for which he pre- 
 pared by assiduous prayer; his oflSlce he regu- 
 larly recited to the last day of his life; a medita- 
 tion on death, which he had long since prepared 
 for this hour, he now made the subject of his 
 thoughts; and as his kind but simple compan- 
 ions seemed overwhelmed at the prospect of 
 their approaching loss, he blessed some water 
 with the usual ceremonies, gave his companions 
 directions how to act in his last moments, how 
 to arrange his body when dead, and to commit 
 it to the earth with the ceremonies he pre- 
 scribed. He now seemed but to seek a grave. 
 At last perceiving the mouth of a river which 
 still bears his name, he pointed to an eminence 
 as the place of his buriaL . . . His companions 
 then erected a Uttle bark cabin, and stretched 
 the dying missionary beneath it as comfortably 
 as their want permitted them. Still a priest, 
 
 with heavenly consolation, as rising 
 above its frail and now totterins; 
 tenement, it soared towards that 
 glorious home it was so soon to 
 enter." * Wlien opening a new mis- 
 sion amongst the savages, we find 
 him adorning the rustic altar which 
 he had raised with pictures of the 
 Blessed Virgin, under whose invo- 
 cation he had placed his new mis- 
 sion ; f and when he felt his end 
 approaching, the names of Jesus 
 and Mary were ever on his lips.J 
 He died as he had lived, devoted to 
 
 rather than a man, he thousjht of his ministry, 
 and, for the last time, heard the confessions of 
 his companions, and encouraged them to rely 
 with confidence on the protection of God, then 
 sent them to take the repose they so much 
 needed. When he felt his agony approaching, 
 he called them, and taking his crucifix from 
 around his neck," he placed it in their hands, 
 and thanked the Almighty for the favor of per- 
 mitting him to die a Jesuit, a missionary, and 
 alone. Ilien he relapsed into silence, inter- 
 rupted only by his pious aspirations, till at last, 
 with the names of Jesus and Mary on his lips, 
 with his eyes raised as if in ecstasy above his 
 crucifix, with his face all radiant with joy, he 
 passed from the scene of his labors to the God 
 who was to be his rev/ard. Obedient to his 
 directions, his companions, when the first out- 
 bursts of grief were over, laid out the body for 
 burial, and to the sound of his little chapel-bell, 
 bore it slowly to the spot which he had pointed 
 out. Here they committed his body to the 
 earth, and raising a cross above it, returned to 
 their now desolate cabin. Such was the edify- 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 481 
 
 the Mother of God, who had ever 
 been the especial object of his love 
 and veneration. " The privilege," 
 says his biographer, " which the 
 Church honors under the title of 
 the Immaculate Conception, was the 
 constant object of his thoughts; 
 from his earliest youth, he daily re- 
 cited the little office of the Immac- 
 ulate Conception, and fasted every 
 Saturday in Our Lady's honor. As 
 a missionary, a variety of devotions 
 directed to the same end, still show 
 his love for her, and to her he 
 turned in all his trials. When he 
 discovered the great river, when he 
 founded his new mission, he gave it 
 the name of the Conception, and no 
 letter, it is said, ever came from his 
 hand that did not contain the words, 
 '' Blessed Yirgin Immaculate." The 
 smile that lighted up his dying face, 
 induced his companions to believe 
 that she had appeared before the 
 eyes of her devoted client.* 
 
 That the Blessed Virgin took an 
 active part in the discovery of the 
 Mississippi, no candid mind can 
 doubt. Marquette himself tells us 
 
 ing and holy death of the illustrious explorer of 
 the Mississippi, on Saturday, 18th May, 1675." 
 r-Lif^ of Father Marquette, p. Ixxi. 
 
 * in his narrative that "he put his 
 voyage under her protection, prom- 
 ising her, that if she did them the 
 favor to discover the great river, he 
 would give it the name of Concep- 
 tion, and that he would also give 
 that name to the first mission which 
 he should establish among those 
 new nations, as he actually did 
 among the Illinois."! . . . The name 
 which the pious missionary gave to 
 the Mississippi is found only in his 
 own narrative, and on the map 
 which accompanies it. The name 
 of the Immaculate Conception, which 
 he gave to the mission among the 
 Kaskaskias, was retained as long as 
 that mission lasted, and is now the 
 title of the church in the present 
 town of Kaskaskia. Although his 
 wish was not realized in the name 
 of the great river, it has been ful- 
 filled in the fact that the Blessed 
 Yirgin, under the title of the Im- 
 maculate Conception, has been cho- 
 sen by the prelates of the United 
 States assembled in a national coun- 
 cil, as the patroness of the whole 
 country, so that not only in the vast 
 
 * Life of Father Marquette, p. Ixxii 
 •f Narrative, see. L p. 8. 
 
482 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 valley of the Mississippi, but from * 
 the Atlantic to the Pacific, the 
 Blessed Virgin Immaculate is as 
 deal* to every American Catholic as 
 IS Our Lady of Guadaloupe to our 
 Mexican neighbors." * 
 
 The immediate successors of Mar- 
 quette in the evangelization of the 
 western regions were scarcely less 
 devoted to Mary than he was him- 
 self. Thus we find Father Henne- 
 pin, a R^collet friar, during his 
 missions on the Upper Mississippi, 
 chanting the Litany of the Blessed 
 Vii-gin as he journeyed with his 
 Indians in a canoe on the great 
 river. The name of Mary, and the 
 glorious titles wherewith the Church 
 delights to honor her, were among 
 the first sounds that awoke the 
 slumbering echoes of the Father of 
 Waters after its discovery by Euro- 
 peans. 
 
 When the great valley of the Mis- 
 sissippi became partially peopled 
 by settlers from the different nations 
 of Europe, religion continued to 
 progress until the fatal breaking up 
 of the Jesuit missions, when those 
 zealous champions of the Cross were 
 
 * NarrcUive of Father Marquette, sec. i., p. 8, 
 note. 
 
 forced to leave the rich harvest of 
 their toil to be gathered in by 
 others; then the scattered flock, 
 being deprived of pastoral care, 
 and surrounded by a half-heathen 
 population, began to lose the fervor 
 and simplicity of that faith which 
 they had received in happier days. 
 Coldness and indifference prevailed 
 among them ; and how could it be 
 otherwise, when they had neither 
 bishop, nor priest, nor sacrament? 
 The Catholic regions of the West 
 and South, the conquests of the 
 Jesuits and Recollets, were fast fall- 
 ing away from their high vocation. 
 The Eastern and Middle States were 
 meanwhile peopled with an active, 
 bustling population, professing ei- 
 ther some Protestant fam^y, which 
 they called religion, or otherwise no 
 religion save that of expediency and 
 worldly prosperity. The immense 
 countries now constituting the Unit- 
 ed States were on the point of being 
 lost to the Universal Church, but 
 God in his own good time raised up 
 the means of defence. A branch of 
 the order of St. Sulpice was founded 
 at Baltimore, in the Catholic State 
 of Maryland, about the year 1791, 
 and their establishment was a tower 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 483 
 
 of strength for Catholicity. The 
 priests whom they trained for the 
 mission were men of rare prudence 
 and of fervent zeal, devoted to the 
 Blessed Mother of God, and ready to 
 sacrifice all for the honor and glory 
 of God. Baltimore had already a 
 bishop, the only one south of the St. 
 Lawrence, east or west of the Alle- 
 ghanies. The venerable Bishop Car- 
 roll bore on his own shoulders the 
 whole episcopal burden of all those 
 infant churches founded by the early 
 missionaries, and none but a man 
 endowed with the rarest qualities, 
 and the most vigorous intellect, 
 could have borne as he did, for 
 many years, this heavy weight of 
 care and responsibility, or fulfilled 
 the arduous duties of his sacred 
 office. 
 
 In 1792 pious missionaries ar- 
 rived from France, and among them 
 was M. Flaget, afterwards bishop of 
 Louisville. " Having unreservedly 
 offered his services to Bishop Car- 
 roll, he cheerfully accepted from the 
 latter the distant mission of Yin- 
 cennes, where there was a consider- 
 able number of French settlers, who 
 had been long deprived of the ser- 
 vices of a clergyman. . . . M. Flaget 
 
 * arrived at Yincennes a few days 
 before Christmas, 1792. He found 
 the church in a sadly dilapidated 
 state. It was a very poor log build- 
 ing, open to the weather, neglect- 
 ed, and almost tottering. The altar 
 was a temporary structure of boards 
 badly put together. . . . The congre- 
 gation was, if possible, in a still 
 more miserable condition than the 
 church. Out of nearly seven hun- 
 dred souls of whom it was com- 
 posed, the missionary was able, with 
 all his zealous efforts, to induce only 
 twelve to approach the Holy Com- 
 munion during the Christmas fes- 
 tivities. His heart was filled with 
 anguish at the spiritual desolation 
 which brooded over the place."* 
 But things were soon changed: the 
 zealous efforts of the pious mission- 
 ary, through the grace of God, soon 
 fructified, and a manifest change 
 took place in the congregation, so 
 that, at his departure from Yin- 
 cennes, he might say with truth, 
 says his biographer, " that if but 
 twelve adults could be found, on his 
 first arrival, to approach the Holy 
 Communion, there was then prob- 
 ably not more than that number 
 
 ^5 * Life of Bishop Flaget, ch. i., pp. 30, 33, 35. 
 
48-4 
 
 HISTOu^i ox ^ilE DEVOTIO:, j.u TEE BLESSED VIBGIN MART. 
 
 of persons who were not pious com- 
 municants." 
 
 In 1811 the excellent pastor of 
 Yincennes was made bishop of 
 Bardstown, in Kentucky, the first 
 bishopric erected in the West. It 
 was much against his will that he 
 accepted the appointment, but he 
 could not disobey the positive in- 
 junction of the Holy See, and cheer- 
 fully gave up his own will for the 
 good of religion and the salvation 
 of souls. He tells us himself, in a 
 letter to the directors of the Asso- 
 ciation for the Propagation of the 
 Faith, that it was six months after- 
 wards before he was enabled to 
 reach Bardstown, his episcopal see, 
 and that through a subscription 
 made by his friends in Baltimore.* 
 
 There was, as yet, no church in 
 Bardstown — a poor prospect for a 
 bishop ; but M. Flaget was not the 
 man to be easily discouraged where 
 there was question of doing good, 
 or advancing the interests of re- 
 ligion. The ceremony of his in- 
 stallation must, we think, be inter- 
 esting to our readers. " The bishop 
 there found the faithful kneeling on 
 the grass, and singing canticles in 
 
 * Annais of the Propagation, voL iii, p. 189. 
 
 f English: the counti-y women were 
 nearly all dressed in white, and 
 many of them were still fasting, 
 though it was then four o'clock 
 in the evening; they ha^^ng enter- 
 tained a hope to be able on that 
 day to assist at his mass, and to 
 receive the Holy Communion from 
 his hands. An altar had been pre- 
 pared at the entrance of the fii-st 
 court, under a bower composed of 
 four small trees which overshadow- 
 ed it with their foliage. Here the 
 bishop put on his pontifical robes. 
 After the aspersion of the holy wa- 
 ter, he was conducted to the chapel 
 in procession, with tlie singing of the 
 Litany of the Blessed Virgin, and the 
 whole closed with the prayers and 
 ceremonies prescribed for the occa- 
 sion in the Roman Pontifical."! 
 
 Here again we see Mary presid- 
 ing over the installation of the first 
 bishop of the West; and that the 
 new prelate considered her protec- 
 tion as of the last importance to 
 religion is clearly proved by the 
 interesting memoir from which we 
 have already quoted. In passing 
 thi'ough Lancaster, a village on his 
 way, he found some Catholic fam- 
 
 f Life of Bishop Flaget, ch. iv., p. 72. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION^ TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 485 
 
 ilies of good standing in society, 
 and baptized their children. He 
 had hopes that a good congregation 
 would, in time, be formed there ; 
 but he remarked with regret that 
 "the devotion to the Holy Virgin 
 see-med unknown in those parts."* 
 At another station where the 
 good Bishop remained some days, 
 he found the church in such a mis- 
 erable condition that he could not 
 say mass. Not much more than a 
 quarter of a century has since pass- 
 ed away, yet these poor villages, 
 so utterly destitute of religious ac- 
 commodation, have many of them 
 become large cities and episcopal 
 sees, so rapidly do things progress 
 in the West. The biographer of 
 Bishop Flaget quotes in this con- 
 nection an interesting passage from 
 the Annals of the Propagation: 
 "Following the traces of this jour- 
 ney of seven hundred leagues, one 
 would say, that wherever Bishop 
 Flaget pitched his tent, he there 
 laid the foundations of a new 
 church, and that each one of his 
 principal halts was destined to be- 
 I come a bishopric. There is Yin- 
 I cennes, in Indiana ; there is Detroit, 
 
 * Ldfe of Bishop Flaget, p. 109. ^ 
 
 * in Michigan ; there is Cincinnati, 
 the principal city of Ohio ; there is 
 Buffalo, on the borders of the lakes ; 
 there is Pittsburgh, which he evan- 
 gelized in returning to Louisville, 
 after thirteen months' absence, after 
 having given missions ;wherever, on 
 his route, there was a colony of 
 whites, a plantation of slaves, or a 
 village of Indians." 
 
 In 1799 the Russian prince Gal- 
 litzin, a convert to the Catholic 
 faith, who might well be called one 
 of the apostles of North America, 
 established in western Pennsylvania 
 a mission under the title of LorettOj 
 doubtless under the invocation of 
 the Blessed Virgin. 
 
 In 1812 a convent was founded 
 in Kentucky, by the Rev. Charles 
 Nerinkx, for the education of young 
 females, " and was called Loretlo, 
 after the famous asylum of the Holy 
 Virgin in Italy. Besides the object 
 alluded to above, the sisterhood was 
 to take charge of destitute orphans, 
 and its members were taught to 
 love poverty, and to earn their own 
 livelihood by manual labor. They 
 were to cherish a special devotion 
 towards that model and pride of her 
 
 ^ sex, the pm'e and holy One, — - 
 
€80 
 
 msTonr of the devotion to the blessed virgin mart. 
 
 ' Our tainted nature's solitary boast,' 
 
 the Immaculate Mary, Mother of 
 God made man. They were styled, 
 ' The Lovers of Mary at the foot of 
 the Cross.' Standing with her near 
 the Cross, they were daily to sym- 
 patliize with the dying Son and the 
 afflicted Mother, with the pious ejac- 
 ulations: * suffering Jesus I sor- 
 rowful Mary!' Such was the idea 
 of the sainted founder, and God be- 
 stowed an abundant blessing on his 
 enterprise. The society grew apace, 
 and the most edifying fervor reigned 
 throughout the establishment of Lo- 
 retto. The mother house was soon 
 able to send out colonies to other 
 parts of Kentucky, and subse- 
 quently to found houses in Missouri 
 and Arkansas."* 
 
 "These women sought for pov- 
 erty in every thing : in their monas- 
 teries, and in the plain neatness of 
 their chapels. . . . They were the 
 edification of all who knew them, 
 and their singular piety and pen- 
 itential lives reminded one of all 
 that we have read of the ancient 
 monasteries of Palestine and The- 
 bais."t 
 
 ''The same year (1812) which 
 
 * Life cf Bishop Flaget, p. 289-90. 
 
 * gave birth to the Loretto Society, 
 likewise witnessed the commence- 
 ment of another sisterhood, destined 
 also to do much for promoting the 
 cause of religion and education." J 
 The mother house of this community 
 is named Nazareth, in commemora- 
 tion of the humble abode of Mary. 
 The members are known as the Sis- 
 ters of Charity, and they are devot- 
 ed to the twofold object of teaching 
 and exercising the corporeal and 
 spiritual works of mercy. The in- 
 stitution has attained a high rep- 
 utation for sanctity and usefulness, 
 and has extended itself far and near 
 over the country. 
 
 In 1819, when, in consequence of 
 the increasing age and the numer- 
 ous infirmities of the venerable 
 Bishop Flaget, a coadjutor was 
 given him, the new prelate was 
 consecrated on the Feast of the 
 Assumption, in the newly -erected 
 cathedral of Louisville. " This was 
 the first episcopal consecration 
 which took place beyond (or west 
 of) the Alleghany mountains," and 
 we see that the ceremony was per- 
 formed under the auspices of Our 
 Blessed Lady. 
 
 ■\ Ibid. 
 
 X Ibid., 291, 293. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 487 
 
 In 1820 the college of St. Joseph 
 was founded, and in 1821 that of 
 St. Mary's ; both in Kentucky. Thus 
 did the pious bishop, who was main- 
 ly instrumental in founding both, 
 place the education of the rising 
 generation under the tutelary care 
 of Mary and her blessed spouse. 
 
 This holy patriarch of the West 
 went to Rome about the year 1837, 
 and having business to transact at 
 Vienna, he made it a point to visit 
 the sanctuary of Loretto, "to sat- 
 isfy that tender devotion he had 
 from childhood cherished towards 
 the Immaculate Virgin, Mother of 
 God. He made a retreat there, 
 under the direction of the Jesuit 
 Father.* God was pleased to at- 
 test the sanctity of this holy pre- 
 late, even by the gift of miracles, 
 as w^e see from his Memoirs. The 
 young lady thus miraculously cured 
 was a Miss Olympia de Monti ; she 
 vras attacked by a fever, which 
 finally became of the most malig- 
 nant kind, and she was reduced to 
 the very point of death. She re- 
 ceived the Holy Viaticum with sen- 
 timents of the greatest fervor, and 
 made up her mind that she was to 
 
 * Life of Bishop Flaget, p. 315. 
 
 die. Just then Bishop Flaget was 
 induced to pay her a visit. When 
 Madame de Monti had conducted 
 him to her daughter's room, she re- 
 tired. The bishop remained fifteen 
 or twenty minutes with Miss de 
 Monti. She afterwards related to 
 her parents that he gave her his 
 blessing twice, and made the sign 
 of the cross on her forehead. More- 
 over, the holy prelate promised to 
 pray for her intention during nine 
 consecutive days, and recommended 
 to her to recite the Litany of the 
 Holy Name of Jesus, and a prayer 
 to the Blessed Virgin. The prayers 
 were heard, and the young lady was 
 restored to health. This miracle is 
 so well authenticated that no ra- 
 tional mind can doubt it."f Jesus 
 and Mary, never invoked in vain, 
 were pleased to honor their faithful 
 servant by this miraculous cure. 
 
 " He had always cherished a most 
 tender devotion to the Virgin Mother 
 of God ; he had imbibed this feeling 
 at the same pure fountain of living 
 waters from which all the saints of 
 God, from St. John, the beloved dis- 
 ciple, down to St. Alphonso Liguori, 
 drank it in so abundantly. He had 
 
 t Ibid., p. 318-323. 
 
488 
 
 mSTORT OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN 3TARY. 
 
 made it a practice through life to 
 recite a part of the Rosary daily; 
 and now, while unable to perform 
 other devotions which required read- 
 ing, he gladly availed himself of the 
 occasion to multiply this simple, but 
 touching form of supplication." * 
 
 Following the march of civiliza- 
 tion to the Far "West, we find in the 
 van the stalwart champion of the 
 Cross, the Rev. Father de Smet, 
 S. J., and M. Blanchet, now the ven- 
 erable archbishop of Walla -Walla. 
 The former may truly be called the 
 Apostle of Oregon, the greatest ex- 
 plorer of the Western wilderness 
 since the days of Father Marquette. 
 
 We find this illustrious mission- 
 ary planting the devotion to Mary 
 wherever he went, side by side with 
 the worship of God. At each of 
 his principal missions he gave her 
 name to either a church, a school, 
 or some other charitable institution. 
 Thus, when a convent of the sisters 
 of Notre Danie was established in 
 Willamette, its chapel received the 
 name of St. Mary's ; when a chm*ch 
 was erected amongst the Flathead 
 Indians, it was named St. Mary's 
 
 * Ufe of Bishop Flaget, p. 350. 
 f Oregon Misaions, p. 60. 
 
 Church; that established amongst 
 the Flatbows was dedicated to 
 Mary, under the title of the As- 
 sumption, and that of the Koetensis 
 was called the Church of the Holy 
 Heart of Mary.f "Nowhere," says 
 Father de Smet himself — " nowhere 
 does religion make greater progress 
 or present brighter prospects for 
 the future than in Oregon." J We 
 have every reason to hope that this 
 remark will be verified, for the foun- 
 dations of those infant churches 
 were well laid. "On the Feast of 
 the Holy Heart of Mary," says the 
 missionary again, " I sang High 
 Mass, thus taking spiritual posses- 
 sion of this land, which was now for 
 the first time trodden by a minister 
 of the Most High. This station 
 bears the name of the Holy Heart 
 of Mary." § Speaking of another 
 tribe amongst whom he celebrated 
 the Feast of the Assumption, he 
 says : " Since my arrival among the 
 Indians, the feast of the glorious 
 Assumption of the Blessed Viigin 
 Mary has ever been to me a day 
 of great consolation. . . . The Cross 
 was elevated on the border of a 
 
 J Oregon Missions, p. 98. 
 § nid., p. 126. 
 
EISTOBY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 489 
 
 lake, and the station received the 
 beautiful name of the Assumption. 
 Under the auspices of this good 
 Mother, in whose honor they have 
 for many years sung canticles, we 
 hope that religion will take deep 
 root and flourish amidst this tribe, 
 where union, innocence, and sim- 
 plicity reign in full vigor."* A 
 Canadian, settled in those parts, 
 had been many years without see- 
 ing a priest, and on hearing of the 
 arrival of the missionaries at the 
 source of the Columbia (near which 
 he resided), he hastened thither 
 with his wife and children in order 
 to have them baptized. '' The Feast 
 of the Nativity of the Blessed Vir- 
 gin, this favor was conferred on 
 them. . . . This was a solemn day 
 for the desert! The august sacri- 
 fice of Mass was offered ; Morigeau 
 devoutly approached the holy table. 
 At the foot of the humble altar he 
 received the nuptial benediction, 
 and the mother, surrounded by her 
 children and six little Indians, was 
 regenerated in the holy waters of 
 baptism. In memory of so many 
 benefits, a large cross was erected 
 
 * Oregon Missions, p. 135. 
 t Ibid., p. 121. 
 
 in the plain, which, from that time, 
 is caUed the Plain of the Nativity.^' ■\ 
 The name of St. Mary's river was 
 also given to one of the principal 
 streams in those remote regions, J so 
 that woods and wilds, and waters 
 were alike consecrated to her, and 
 her name impressed on every strik- 
 ing object. When the good Indians 
 prayed for their benefactors, it was 
 the rosary they recited for them, ^ 
 invoking the tender heart of Mary 
 on their behalf. " How happy 
 should I be," writes Father de Smet 
 to one of these benefactors; "how 
 happy should I be, could I give you 
 to understand how great, how sweet, 
 how enrapturing is their devotion 
 to the august Mother of God I The 
 name of Mary, w^hich pronounced in 
 the Indian language, is something 
 so sweet and endearing, delights 
 and charms them. The hearts of 
 these good children of the forest 
 melt, and seem to overflow, when 
 they sing the praises of her whom 
 they, as well as we, call their Moth- 
 er." || In another place, the whole 
 week preceding the Conception of 
 the Blessed Virgin Mary was devoted 
 
 X Ibid., p. 218. 
 II Hid. p. 284. 
 
 § Ibid., pp. 245, 246. 
 
490 
 
 EISTOJiY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIROIN MARY. 
 
 to the preparation for receiving the 
 Holy Communion on that festival. 
 And again, we find the hunting- 
 party who travelled with the mis- 
 sionary, stopping under the shade 
 of a majestic tree to celebrate the 
 Feast of the Divine Maternity. "The 
 sun's last rays had long disappeared 
 beneath the horizon, ere all was 
 ready for the evening prayer. After 
 which, notwithstanding the fatigues 
 of the day, a fire was kindled before 
 the missionary's tent, and the great- 
 er part of the night consecrated by 
 these fervent children of the woods, 
 to the reconciliation of their souls 
 with God."* 
 
 How beautiful is the fervor of 
 these guileless Christians ; how edi- 
 fying their example ! Religious 
 confraternities had been formed 
 amongst them at St. Maiy's, and 
 when their spiritual father was 
 forced to leave them, to bear the 
 tidings of salvation to others of 
 their brethren, we find them adding 
 some short ejaculations to their 
 morning and evening prayers; "first, 
 to the Heart of Jesus, as protector 
 of the men's Confraternity ; second, 
 to the Blessed Virgin, patroness of 
 
 * OregonJdUsions, pp. 389, 390. 
 
 f the women's Sodality ; third, to St. 
 Michael, model of the brave; fourth, 
 to St. Raphael, the guide of travel- 
 lers ; fifth, to St. Hubert, the patron 
 of hunters; sixth, to St. Francis 
 Xavier, for the conversion of idola- 
 ters. We shall see," adds the zeal- 
 ous missionary, " that these pious 
 aspirations were not addressed to 
 Heaven in vain." Let us hope that 
 such may be the case, and that the 
 vast regions thus happily evangel- 
 ized, may continue to progress in 
 civilization — that true civilization 
 founded on religion — and that 
 Mary, the Mother of God, may ever 
 reign over the hearts of its people, 
 of what origin soever they may be. 
 Thus we see that the holy Mother 
 of God presided over the discovery 
 and the evangelization of all the 
 northern, southern, and western re- 
 gions of the American continent. 
 If her influence was not so apparent 
 in the discovery or settlement of 
 the Middle and Eastern countries of 
 North America, she has since ob- 
 tained the supreme honor of being 
 chosen patroness of all the United 
 States. Owing to the wonderful 
 increase of Catholicity in that coun- 
 try, there is no city within its vast 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 493 
 
 extent, that has not one or more * 
 churches dedicated to the Mother 
 of God, under her numerous titles, 
 while churches and chapels, con- 
 vents, schools, hospitals, and insti- 
 tutions of various kinds, bearing her 
 name, are everywhere met. Some 
 of the largest and grandest cathe- 
 drals either are, or will be, placed 
 under her gracious patronage. From 
 the stormy coast of Maine to the 
 sunny shores of Alabama, and Flor- 
 ida, and Louisiana, and from St. 
 Louis, Dubuque, Chicago, and Mil- 
 waukee, to New York and Boston, 
 monumental churches and charities 
 in honor of Mary Immaculate, cover 
 the land. On the highest point of 
 the Alleghanies is seated Zoretto, 
 the thriving Catholic settlement, 
 with its handsome church, founded 
 by the Eussian prince, Demetrius 
 de Gallitzin, in honor of the ever- 
 Blessed Virgin ; and where the 
 mighty cataract of the North pours 
 the waters of one region into the 
 lap of another, over that sublime 
 scene Our Lady of the Angels now 
 presides in a college of the Lazarist 
 Fathers, and Our Lady of Loretto in 
 a convent of the Sisters of Loretto. 
 Each new diocese, as it springs 
 
 into existence, adds its quota of 
 churches, chapels, convents and 
 schools to swell the long list of 
 Mary's foundations in America. 
 Confraternities and sodalities in her 
 honor, are numerous in all the 
 cities and towns, and even in the 
 rural districts. The Society of the 
 Holy Rosary, those of the Scapular, 
 the Immaculate Heart of Mary for 
 the Conversion of Sinners, the So- 
 dality of the Children of Mary, etc., 
 are everywhere established. Pro- 
 cessions in honoi' of the Mother of 
 God take place regularly in the 
 churches, and the devotion of the 
 Month of Mary is faithfuUy practised 
 in all parts of America. Even in 
 the land of the Pilgrim Fathers, 
 Puritan New England, churches in 
 honor of the Mother of God raise 
 their spires to heaven all the coun- 
 try over. In Boston, the chief of 
 the New England cities. Our Lady 
 has three stately temples dedicated 
 to her, under her titles of the Im- 
 maculate Conception, Gate of Heav- 
 en, and Star of the Sea; so, in New 
 York, Brooklyn, Philadelphia, and, 
 indeed, all the cities of the Union. 
 True, the w^ayside Madonnas are 
 nowhere to be seen in the United 
 
492 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 States, the gracious image of the 
 Vii'gin-Mother smiles not down on 
 her children in the streets or squares 
 of our cities; nevertheless, the de- 
 votion to Mary is seated deep in 
 the hearts of American Catholics in 
 every section of the country. 
 
 Canada, and especially Lower 
 Canada, has, as we have seen, been 
 devoted from the first to the Blessed 
 Vu-gin. The fervor of the early set- 
 tlers has scarcely, if at all, dimin- 
 ished, and Mary is now, in the nine- 
 teenth century, as loved and honored 
 by the great mass of the French 
 Canadians as she was two hundred 
 years ago, when Champlain and de 
 Maisonneuve, Sister Bourgeoys, and 
 Madame de la Pelletrie vied with 
 each other in promoting her glory. 
 Nor is this devotion of Mary con- 
 fined to the descendants of the 
 French settlers ; the Iiish emi- 
 grants are gradually spreading 
 abroad over all the country, and 
 wherever they go, they bring with 
 them at least the germ of that de- 
 votion, and readily fall in with the 
 French ceremonies and religious 
 exercises, in honor of her who is es- 
 pecially dear to them as the most 
 afflicted of Catholic nations. In 
 
 f fact, no people are more sincerely 
 devout to Mary than the Irish. 
 From their earliest youth they are 
 trained up in love and reverence 
 for her ; the devotion of the llosary 
 and that of the Holy Scapular are 
 popular in every part of Ireland, 
 and in the cities there are various 
 other confraternities established in 
 honor of Mary. Hence it is that 
 they propagate, with the Catholic 
 faith, that reverence for the Blessed 
 Virgin which has raised so many 
 noble churches and convents in her 
 honor throughout the United States. 
 The German Catholics have also 
 contributed largely to spread this 
 devotion; many of their churches 
 in the American cities are dedi- 
 cated to Mary, while the Spanish 
 element, so strong in the South and 
 Southwest, has done much to pro-, 
 mote the public veneration of the 
 Mother of God. 
 
 America, then, from north to 
 south, fi'om Hudson's Bay to the 
 Gulf of Mexico, and from Chili to 
 Massachusetts, is deeply imbued 
 with devotion to Mary. Montreal, 
 lately the capital of the British prov- 
 inces, is still, and will, we trust, 
 ever be the city of Mary, seated like 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 493 
 
 a queen on her own majestic river, * 
 and watching with anxious interest 
 the increasing homage offered to her 
 divine Mistress in the less favored 
 countries around. Even in the Uni- 
 ted States the prospect is cheering. 
 Religious communities are spring- 
 ing up everywhere under the aus- 
 pices of the bishops, and the masses 
 of the people are beginning to catch 
 some of the holy fervor of their 
 prelates. 
 
 In Ireland, the Apostle-nation of 
 the world, a great revival has been 
 going on for many years. Religious 
 institutions are being founded and 
 revived all the country over; the 
 ancient churches and monasteries, ^ 
 
 so long ruined and deserted, are 
 now being restored ; some of them 
 with renovated splendor, and the 
 National University, some years ago 
 founded in Dublin, will be, as it 
 were, an impregnable bulwark for 
 the Irish Church — a wall of brass 
 rearing itself up against the furious 
 attacks of heiesy and infidelity. 
 And Mary will reign as a queen 
 within those honored walls, presid- 
 ing over the education of the gen- 
 erations who are yet to come, and 
 of the faithful missionaries who are 
 to perpetuate the faith of Christ 
 and the devotion to her through all 
 the nations of the earth, who in her 
 are blessed. 
 
pilgrimages. 
 
 CHAPTER XYI. 
 
 PILGRIMAGES OF FRANCE. 
 
 HE practice of f 
 making pilgrim- 
 ages," says M. 
 Michaud, * " has 
 been encouraged 
 in all religions ; 
 it is, moreover, 
 based on a sentiment natural to 
 man." 
 
 This remark is just and true ; all 
 nations have had consecrated places 
 whither they made it a duty to re- 
 pair, at certain commemorative pe- 
 riods, to obtain favors more easily 
 from the divinity, by visiting the 
 isites which they believed sanctified 
 by his presence or by his miracles. 
 
 Pilgrimages are as ancient as so- 
 ciety itself; those of the East are, 
 nearly all, connected with diluvian 
 memories; indeed, those pilgrim- 
 ages, whose institution is lost in 
 the obscurity of time, have gener- 
 ally, for their object, the lofty moun- 
 
 * Hint, des Crois., t. L 
 
 tains whereon was formed the ker- 
 nel of the great nations of Asia, 
 who choose to descend, like their 
 rivers, from the rocky bosom of 
 their mountains. The Chinese, who 
 style themselves Sons of the Moun- 
 tains, climb on their knees the 
 steep sides of Kicou-hou-chan ; the 
 eastern Tartars go to venerate the 
 mountain of Chan-pa-chan, as the 
 root of their tribes, and some of 
 the Gentile Hindoos, that, of Pyr- 
 pan-jal; the Japanese undertake, 
 at least, once in their life, the peril- 
 ous pilgrimage of Jsje, a mountain 
 from which their ancestors descend- 
 ed: the Apalachites, or Floridian 
 savages, repair, on the return of 
 every season, to sacrifice on Mount 
 Ola'imi, in thanksgiving to the sun, 
 who, they say, saved their fathers 
 from a deluge, etc. These pilgrim- 
 ages are founded on traditions cor- 
 rupted by time, but undoubtedly 
 historical ; in them are perceived 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 490 
 
 the traces and the effects of the 
 terror which prompted the build- 
 ing of the famous Tower of Babel. 
 Discouraged by the confusion of 
 tongues, the post-diluvian tribes, 
 finding that they could not take 
 refuge in towers reaching to the 
 clouds, took up their abode on high 
 mountains, to preserve themselves, 
 if possible, from the disastrous con- 
 sequences of another deluge. It 
 was only when pasturage failed on 
 the mountains, and the soil would 
 not yield sufficient produce to sup- 
 port the rising colonies, that they 
 were forced to settle on the plains, 
 which they had often to drain 
 before they were fit for tillage. 
 Hence comes the respect enter- 
 tained by the Eastern nations for 
 their sacred mountains — a respect 
 which they testify by annual visits, 
 accompanied by vows, offerings, and 
 prayers. 
 
 After having venerated the cradle 
 of nations, men venerated that of 
 creeds ; then the sites which re- 
 called great remembrances ; then 
 persons who made themselves illus- 
 trious by heroic or religious acts. 
 Thus it is that the gratitude of 
 the Jewish people preserves, from 
 
 f age to age, the tomb of Esther and 
 of Mardocha'i, whither the Hebrews, 
 from every part of Asia, have gone 
 on pilgrimage for two thousand 
 years. Strange it is that the tomb 
 of two exiles, erected by the grati- 
 tude of some captives, has survived 
 the great Assyrian empire, and that 
 it alone saves the ruins of Ecbatana 
 from utter oblivion ! 
 
 Man is like the ivy ; he must rest 
 somewhere, and cling to something, 
 that he may have courage to live. 
 When he finds neither sympathy 
 nor consolation among his fellows, 
 he instinctively conjures up the 
 beings of a better world, and seeks 
 from them that succor which society 
 either will not or cannot give. Of 
 this we have a remarkable proof in 
 the conduct of the Indians, when 
 oppressed by the first Portuguese 
 viceroys ; these unarmed and inof- 
 fensive people, finding neither pro- 
 tection nor support from the suc- 
 cessors of Alfonso d'Albuquerque, 
 sat down, as suppliants, before the 
 tomb of that great man, to demand 
 from the illustrious dead that jus- 
 tice which the living would not 
 grant either to their rights or their 
 prayers. 
 
196 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 Protestantivsm, which discolors f 
 and pulverizes all it touches, did 
 not fail to do away with the pious 
 visits which Christians made in 
 eveiy age to places sanctified by 
 the sufferings of Chiist, or those 
 which his Mother made famous by 
 her favoi-s. Turks, the infuriate 
 enemies of images, have lighted 
 golden lamps before the altars of 
 Mary ; but what Protestant has ever 
 placed a lamp in the Holy Sepul- 
 chre; what Protestant has prayed 
 before the manger of Bethlehem, as 
 did Saladin and the Caliph Omar? 
 "These local devotions," say they, 
 "are superstitions: God is every- 
 where." Doubtless God is every- 
 where, and Catholics know it well ; 
 they have not yet to learn the first 
 question of their catechism. They 
 knew, fifteen centuries before the 
 
 * It was over the threshing-floor of Areuna 
 that the destroying angel ceased his ravages, 
 after the prayer of David. "From all time," 
 says a great ecclesiastical writer, " God has par- 
 ticularly marked out certain places for receiving 
 the prayers and vows of men. One must be 
 more incredulous as to the history of the Church 
 than to any other, not to believe that God 
 wishes his saints to be specially honored in cer- 
 tain places, where He bestows graces not given 
 elsewhere, and this in order to attract the 
 nations. 
 
 time of the apostate monk, Luther, 
 and they know it now, that God 
 hears in all places the prayer of the 
 faithful soul; but what is there to 
 prevent God from attaching some 
 particular graces to those ancient 
 shrines where he has often vouch- 
 safed to manifest his power by 
 prodigies ? There was many a ver- 
 dant hill in Judea which he might 
 have pointed out to David for the 
 place of his temple, yet he chose 
 the rocky threshing-fioor of Areuna, 
 the Jebusite, because he had there 
 once before displayed his mercy ; * 
 and also, if we may believe a 
 charming tradition, preserved like 
 a desert-tlower amid the dark tents 
 of Arabia, because the place was 
 sanctified of old by a noble instance 
 of fraternal love.f Man is, by na- 
 ture, so imperfect and so prone to 
 
 f Jerusalem was a ploughed field ; two broth- 
 ers owned the lot of ground on which the Tem- 
 ple was subsequently built ; one of these brotli- 
 ers was married, and had several children ; the 
 other lived alone ; but they farmed toirelher the 
 piece of ground left them by their father. Tne 
 harvest- time being come, the two brothers 
 bound up their sheaves, of which the}' made 
 two equal shai'es, and left them on the field. 
 During the night there came a happy thought 
 into the mind of the unmarried brother. He 
 said to himself, "My brother has a wife and 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 497 
 
 evil, that he has always some ex- 
 piation to make before approach- 
 ing the source of all sanctity ; when 
 that expiation seems to him in 
 some measure proportionate to the 
 fault, he feels a more sensible trust 
 in the assistance of Heaven ; hence 
 came the generous confidence of 
 the martyrs, who hoped in propor- 
 tion to their sufferings. The pil- 
 grim acts on the same principle ; 
 to prayer he adds fatigue, priva- 
 tion, and the toil of travel, and he 
 hopes, in virtue of the sufferings he 
 imposes on himself, that he may 
 find favor with God, who himself 
 suffered so much ! How can such 
 a hope be vain ? 
 
 The eminent historian Eobertson, 
 unblinded by the narrow privileges 
 of his sect, candidly acknowledges 
 
 children to feed, and it is not meet that my 
 share should be a-s large as his ; I will go then 
 and put some of my sheaves with his secretly ; 
 knowing nothing of it, he cannot refuse them." 
 And he did accordingly. The same night, the 
 other brother awoke, and said to his wife, " My 
 brother is young ; he lives alone, and has no 
 one to comfort him in his toil and fatigue ; it is 
 not just that we should take from the common 
 field as much as he ; let us arise and add some 
 of our sheaves to his without his knowledge, 
 so that he cannot refuse to take the sheaves." 
 And it was done as he said. Next day, each of 
 the brothers was surprised to see that the heaps 
 
 the benefits for which Europe is in- 
 debted to foreign pilgrimages. In 
 the first place, the enfranchisement 
 of the commons, the creation of 
 commerce and shipping, the propa- 
 gation of knowledge, the improve- 
 ment of agriculture, and the intro- 
 duction of numberless plants and 
 trees, with various kinds of grain, 
 which now contribute to the main- 
 tenance of the Western nations ; 
 then, the emancipation of the serfs 
 to which the pilgrimages contribu- 
 ted more than any thing else ; for 
 the feudal lord who mingled, bare- 
 foot,* with the pilgrims of all con- 
 ditions who set out with him on 
 some holy journey [v^age), more 
 easily understood, in those hours of 
 penance and humility, that those 
 despised slaves, whom antiquity 
 
 were still equal ; neither could account for the 
 prodigy. So it went on for several nights ; but 
 as each carried to his brother's heap just the 
 same number of sheaves, the heap always re- 
 mained the same, till, one night, both having sat 
 up to watch for the cause of this miracle, they 
 both met with their load of sheaves. Now, the 
 place where so good a thought came at once 
 into the minds of two men, and was so per^ 
 severingly carried out, must be a place agree- 
 able to God, and the men blessed it, and chose 
 it for the site of a house of prayer. 
 
 ^4 * See Memoirs of the Sire de Joinville. 
 
488 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 placed in the rank of things^ were 
 his brethren before God, and, when 
 he obtained the grace which he 
 came to seek, far away from his 
 castle, in some ancient shrine, it 
 often came into his mind to free 
 a certain number of his vassals, in 
 honor of Christ, the enemy of sla- 
 very, and of the Blessed Virgin 
 Mary, who is nought but meekness 
 and mercy.* 
 
 Pilgrimages, which date from the 
 Deluge, f and have been adopted 
 by all nations, strengthen the re- 
 ligious sentiment amongst Catho- 
 lics, opening the soul to many a 
 generous and sanctifying emotion ; J 
 let Protestants, then, in their utter 
 ignorance of the human heart, say 
 what they may, pilgrimages are 
 good, and useful, and praiseworthy, 
 and well-pleasing to the Divinity. 
 We see this pious practice in use 
 from the first ages of the Church ; 
 Mary, the holy women, and the 
 
 * Many old acts of emancipation still bear the 
 pious formula, "We transfer and give up to Our 
 Lord and the Blessed Virgin Mary all our rights 
 over such a one," etc. 
 
 f If credit may be given to the old traditions 
 of Asia, pilgrimages are of still more ancient 
 origin. According to the Rabbins, the children 
 of Adam returned more than once to contem- 
 
 * Apostles, were the first pilgrims, 
 and the faithful of Europe and Asia 
 quickly followed their example. 
 
 " People throng hither," wrote St. 
 Jerome, in the fourth century, "from 
 every part of the world : Jerusalem 
 is full of men from every nation. 
 Every Gaul of distinction comes to 
 Jerusalem. The Breton, beyond the 
 range of our knowledge, if he have 
 made any progress in religion, 
 leaves his wild home to visit a land 
 which he knows only by name and 
 on the testimony of the Scriptures 
 Need I speak of Armenians, Per- 
 sians, the people of India, of Ethio- 
 pia, of Egypt fertile in solitaries, of 
 Pontus, of Cappadocia, of the two 
 Syrias, of Mesopotamia, and the 
 swarms of Christians that the East 
 pours forth. According to the Sa- 
 viour's own words, where the body 
 is there shall the eagles gather. 
 They come in crowds to these 
 places, and edify us by the lustre 
 
 plate from afar the inclosure of the terrestrial 
 paradise, and some of the sons of Seth took 
 up their abode on the summit of a mountain 
 whence they could behold it, always hoping that 
 the promised Liberator would soon restore them 
 to it. 
 
 \ Doctor Johnson, a zealous Protestant and 
 a profound thinker, himself acknowledges that. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 499 
 
 of their virtues. Their language is * 
 different, but their religion is the 
 same." * 
 
 The Mussulmans say, with great 
 reason, that it is a pious and salu- 
 tary practice to visit the tombs of 
 the holy deadj and have often knelt 
 side by side with Christians in 
 places where the latter went on pil- 
 grimage. After the taking of Jeru- 
 salem, the Caliph Omar repaired to 
 Bethlehem ; he entered the church, 
 and prayed before the crib wherein 
 the Lord-Messiah [Aisa Resold) was 
 born. He commanded the Mussul- 
 mans to pray only one by one, lest 
 there might arise in the crowd some 
 confusion incompatible with the 
 sanctity of the place ; he also for- 
 bade them to go there for any other 
 purpose than that of prayer. Saadi 
 himself relates this fact,f and the 
 local tradition of Jerusalem adds 
 that the same prince went to pray 
 at the tomb of Mary. 
 
 Besides the scenes of the Re- 
 demption, there are several famous 
 pilgrimages in the Holy Land : Our 
 
 * St. Jerome, Ep. 17. 
 
 f Omar must needs go to Bethlehem; he en- 
 tered the church and said his prayers at the 
 crib where the Lord-Messiah was born. He 
 commanded his Mussuhnans to pray there only ^ 
 
 Lady of Edessa, in Mesopotamia, 
 whither the first Christians repaired 
 in great numbers ; Our Lady of 
 Seydnai, where a Sultan of Damas- 
 cus founded a perpetual lamp, in 
 gratitude for a favor which he had 
 obtained through the intercession of 
 Mary; Om* Lady of Belment, within 
 two hours' march of Tripoli ; finally, 
 Our Lady of Tortosa, famous in me- 
 diaeval times, throughout Christen- 
 dom, and where the Mussulmans 
 themselves sometimes brought their 
 children to have them baptized, per- 
 suaded as they were that that cere- 
 mony, through the protection of the 
 Blessed Virgin, would preserve them 
 from all evil. J 
 
 We read in the Memoirs of the 
 Sire de Joinville that he went on a 
 pilgrimage to Our Lady of Tortouse, 
 whence he brought relics and some 
 camlets which gave rise to a droll 
 mistake. The seneschal, who had 
 himself brought the relics to the 
 king, sent by one of his officers 
 some parcels of rich stuffs to the 
 pious Queen Margaret, to whom he 
 
 one by one, and forbade them to assemble there 
 or make any noise. — Gvlistan, des Moeurs des 
 Rois, p. 301. 
 
 X Tortosa is now Tripoli of Syria. 
 
600 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 was very willing to pay his court. 
 The queen, knowing that the Sire 
 de Joinville was returned, and had 
 brought relics from Tortosa, no 
 sooner saw his knight enter her 
 presence with a parcel in his hand, 
 than she fell on her knees before 
 the package, supposing it to con- 
 tain the relics in question. The 
 knight, ignorant of the queen's mo- 
 tive, knelt in his turn, and kept 
 looking at Margaret in mute sur- 
 prise. The princess, perceiving this, 
 told him to rise, adding, with pious 
 condescension, " that it was not for 
 him to kneel, having the honor of 
 bearing holy relics." " Relics, your 
 highness," replied the knight, "I 
 have no relics. This is a package 
 of camlets which the Sire de Join- 
 ville sends you." Then the queen 
 and her ladies began to laugh, 
 "^/ic?," said the queen to the knight, 
 ''''your lord has played me a pretty 
 trick to make me kneel to his cam- 
 
 Usr-^ 
 
 Pilgrimages in honor of the Moth- 
 
 * Hisl. de St. Louis, by the Sire de Joinville. 
 
 f Occident et Orient, by M. Barrault. 
 
 J All the East, with the exception of the Jews, 
 is fiiU of respect for the Virgin, whom Mahomet 
 placed in the Koran as one of the four just wo- 
 men. Chardin relates that the Jews of Persia, 
 
 t er of God have lost nothing of their 
 fervor in Asia, and Europeans are 
 sometimes surprised to meet Turk- 
 ish women praying devoutly at the 
 Virgin's tomb,f with the daughters 
 of Sion, wealthy Armenians, Greeks 
 from beyond the sea, and Catholics 
 from Arabia. The devotion to the 
 Virgin amongst the Christian na- 
 tions of the East is sure to strike all 
 travellers; they consider it worthy 
 of note that this devotion submits 
 all human destinies to the power of 
 a woman, in countries where women 
 rank so low.J 
 
 Amongst the Gauls pilgrimages 
 were made long before the intro- 
 duction of Christianity; one of the 
 most famous shrines of western 
 Gaul was a gloomy cavern, conse- 
 crated to the god Belenus, on the 
 rock — then surrounded by woods — 
 where now rises, amid moving 
 sands, the. amphibious fortress of 
 Mount St. Michael. § There it was 
 that the pilots of Armorica went to 
 buy of the Druids of Mount Belen, 
 
 having taken it into their heads to speak ill of 
 her before some of the followers of Ali, were 
 near being killed for their pains, and had to 
 leave the city where it happened. 
 
 § The vast forest which surrounds Moun St. 
 Michael was submerged about the year 709. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 501 
 
 enchanted arrow> to which they * 
 foolishly ascribed the power of 
 changing the winJs and averting 
 storms. When this steep mountain, 
 the last stronghold of Druidism, re- 
 ceived a Christian abbey, solemnly 
 dedicated to the archangel Michael, 
 the grotto of Belenus was trans- 
 formed into a charming marine 
 chapel, dedicated to the Star of the 
 Sea, to Mary, protectress of sailors. 
 This chapel was built of pebbles 
 polished by the waves, and thrown 
 up by the ocean ; inside, the walls 
 and roof were adorned with coral 
 branches, amber, and shining shells, 
 brought there from every shore by 
 pious mariners ; the altar was a 
 portion of rock still retaining the 
 roughness of a shoal, and all around 
 were hung up, as ex-voto^ anchors 
 saved from the ocean, and the chains 
 of captives. Before the Revolution, 
 this chapel was often visited by 
 long tiles of mariners saved from 
 shipwreck ; those sons of the ocean, 
 with a fervor by no means uncom- 
 mon amongst them, chanted in a 
 voice hoarse as that of the waves 
 the Ave maris stella, or the sweet 
 Salve regina. Nearly all the kings 
 of France, down to Louis XY., vis- 
 
 ited this shrine; and there is said to 
 be an ancient prophecy preserved 
 in the archives of the abbey, threat- 
 ening great misfortunes, even to the 
 third generation, on the posterity of 
 that king who should fail to make 
 a pilgrimage to Our Lady and St. 
 Michael. If the prophecy really 
 exists, it has been but too truly 
 verified ! 
 
 The pilgrimages of France pre- 
 sent themselves to us surrounded 
 by marvels which conceal their ori- 
 gin ; we will speak of them as our 
 worthy fathers spoke before us. 
 These wonders, handed down by 
 tradition from age to age, are not 
 an article of Catholic faith, and 
 criticism may attack them without 
 wounding the Church ; nevertheless, 
 it is our opinion that we should 
 gain little by rejecting them: the 
 marvellous belongs to Gothic le- 
 gends, like moss to aged oaks, or 
 ivy to mouldering walls. 
 
 According to certain Lyonese tra- 
 ditions, based on a bull of Innocent 
 lY., St. Pothin erected the first 
 chapel wherein Mary was invoked 
 in the Gauls. It is said that he 
 brought from Asia a little statue 
 of the Yirgin, which he placed in 
 
503 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRQIN MARY. 
 
 a solitary and shaded crypt on the 
 banks of the Saone, in front of the 
 hill of Fourviere. In that wild and 
 retired place he raised an altar to 
 the true God, and there placed the 
 image, which was afterwards re- 
 moved to a temple built on the 
 same hill, and called from it Our 
 Lady of Fourviere. This church 
 was famous as a pilgrimage, in the 
 Middle Ages, through all the Lyon- 
 ese country ; but the Calvinists, 
 who pillaged and destroyed so 
 many rich shrines, spared not that 
 of Lyons. The church of Fourviere, 
 where every generation from the 
 birth of Christianity, had marked 
 its passage by gifts which would 
 be now as precious to the anti- 
 quary, the sculptor, and the painter, 
 as to the pilgrim, was stripped of 
 all but its four bare walls ; these 
 could not well be melted in the cru- 
 cible that had swallowed up so 
 many gems of art, because they 
 had the misfortune of being gold or 
 silver. 
 
 The chapter of St. John could not 
 think of restoring that of Fourviere 
 till long after the ravages of the 
 Protestants. It was done, however, 
 as soon as the cathedral and clois- 
 
 f ter were completed. Mary's altar 
 was at length consecrated on the 
 21st of August, 1586. From that 
 moment the confidence of the peo- 
 ple turned towards that beacon of 
 salvation. " The source of miracles 
 seemed dried up," says an ancient 
 historian, " but they began again at 
 the close of the eighteenth century, 
 to the great joy and satisfaction of 
 the whole country."* 
 
 During the Revolution of 1793, 
 the church of Fourviere was sold; 
 but when tranquillity was restored, 
 the zealous prelate who governed 
 the ancient church of Pothin and 
 of Ireneus recovered the shrine for 
 religion. The inauguration was 
 performed on the 19 th of April, 
 1805, by the sovereign pontiff 
 Pius VILf 
 
 In 1832 and 1835, Lyons, threat- 
 ened with cholera, raised its eyes 
 to the holy mountain, and the Vir- 
 gin said to the plague, " Thou shalt 
 go no farther!" The city escaped, 
 contrary to all expectations : the 
 cries of terror were changed into 
 canticles of joy, anc public thanks- 
 
 * Hid. de Notre Dame dt Fourviere, ou Richer* 
 ches histo'-iqites 8ur I'atUel tutelaire des Lyonnais. 
 ■[Ibid. 
 
givings were solemnly offered to * 
 Mary in her favorite shrine. 
 
 Ever since the auspicious period 
 when this sanctuary was restored 
 to religion, the devotion to Our 
 Lady has steadily increased, and 
 Fourviere is, as it were, its foun- 
 tain-head. The people who inhabit 
 Lyons and the surrounding country 
 crowd the paths of Mary's hill, and 
 no matter at what hour you go 
 there, you are sure to find yourself 
 amidst a crowd of pious persons 
 of every rank, age, and condition. 
 One day, in the year 1815, a pil- 
 grim of no ordinary mien, having 
 first taken a view of Lyons from 
 the top of the hill, like one who 
 studied its strong and weak points, 
 at length entered Our Lady's church, 
 and the faithful, raising their down- 
 cast eyes a moment, said to them- 
 selves, "It is Marshal Suchet!" It 
 was indeed he — the marshal of the 
 empire, the son of Lyons, to whom 
 the defence of his native city was 
 entrusted. He slowly paced up the 
 aisle of Mary's church, with a sub- 
 dued and respectful countenance ; 
 entering the sacristy, he sent to 
 request that one of the chaplains 
 would come to him. "Reverend 
 
 sir," said the marshal, advancing 
 towards the priest, " when I was 
 quite a child, my good and pious 
 mother often brought me here, to 
 Our Lady's feet, and that remem- 
 brance is still before me. ... I will 
 say more, that remembrance is dear 
 to me, and I have willingly cher- 
 ished it. Will you have the good- 
 ness to say some masses for my 
 intention ? " And having placed 
 three Napoleons on the table where 
 the offerings are registered, the bril- 
 liant hero of that wondrous period 
 knelt some time at Mary's altar in 
 fervent prayer. Marshal Suchet, as 
 might be expected, ended his loyal 
 and noble career by a Christian 
 death, as is recorded on his tomb. 
 The pilgrimage of Notre Dame 
 du Puy, in Velay, is also considered 
 as one of the oldest in France. It 
 is said that, during the occupation 
 of Gaul by the Romans, a Gallic 
 lady who had been baptized by St. 
 George, first bishop of Puy, finding 
 herself in danger of death, was ap- 
 prised that she should recover her 
 health on the top of Mount Ani- 
 cium, not far from her own dwell- 
 ing. She had herself conveyed 
 thither accordingly, and was scarce- 
 
604 
 
 BISTORT OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 ly seated on a volcanic rock of the 
 Puy,* when she fell into a gentle 
 slumber. She then saw in a dream 
 a celestial woman clothed in white 
 flowing robes, with a crown of jewels 
 on her head; she was of dazzling 
 beauty, and surrounded by a train 
 of heavenly spirits. " Who is she ? " 
 demanded the Gallic lady, address- 
 ing one of the attendant spirits; 
 " who is this queen so lovely and 
 so noble, who comes to visit a poor 
 sick woman in her affliction ?" "It 
 is the Mother of God," replied the 
 angel ; " she has chosen this rock 
 for a shrine, and commands thee 
 to make it known to her servant 
 Geoi-ge. Lest thou shouldst take 
 this behest of Heaven for an idle 
 dream, awake, woman, thou art 
 healed!" She awoke, accordingly, 
 without fever, pain, or even languor. 
 Penetrated with gratitude, she has- 
 tened to the bishop, and gave him, 
 word for word, the message of the 
 angel. 
 
 Having listened in silence to the 
 orders of Her whom he revered next 
 to God, St. Geoi-ge bowed down, 
 
 * In Languedoc and Auvergne the name of 
 puy is giVen to a high mountain, from the 
 Italian word poggio. 
 
 f as though the Virgin herself had 
 spoken, and went without delay to 
 visit the miraculous rock, followed 
 by some servants and the Gallic 
 convert. How great was his sur- 
 prise to find the spot covered with 
 snow, although it was then ifuly! 
 Whilst he yet stood, lost in aston- 
 ishment, a deer was seen running 
 over the snow, marking out with 
 its light feet the site for a vast 
 building. The holy bishop, still 
 more amazed, had the ground thus 
 marked fenced in with a hedge, 
 and on that favored spot there soon 
 arose a cathedral, around which the 
 city of Puy was soon formed. This 
 town was considered impregnable — 
 thanks to the protection of Mary. 
 
 The little statue which people 
 come from Spain and all the south- 
 ern provinces of France to vener- 
 ate, dates from the time of the Cru- 
 sades ; it is two feet in height, and 
 is seated after the manner of the 
 Egyptian deities, with the Infant 
 Jesus on the knee. What is most 
 remarkable is, that this statue is 
 wrapped, from h^d to foot, in sev- 
 eral bandages of fine linen, carefully 
 and solidly fastened to the wood, 
 
 I much in the same way as an Egyp- 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 505 
 
 tian mummy. The appearance of 
 this statue, the cedar of which it 
 is composed, and the bandages in 
 which it is swathed, give reason to 
 suppose that it is the work of the 
 hermits of Lebanon, who fashioned 
 it on the model of the Egyptian 
 statues. This image of Our Lady 
 was brought by St. Louis from the 
 Holy Land. 
 
 The sovereign pontiffs have en- 
 couraged this pilgrimage by their 
 favors and by their example : sev- 
 eral popes went there as simple 
 pilgrims. 
 
 The bishops of Puy received great 
 privileges from the court of Eome 
 on account of Our Lady, amongst 
 others, that of immediate depend- 
 ence on the Holy See, and the Pal- 
 lium. Many of the kings of France 
 went likewise to honor Mary on 
 the mountain of Anicium. In 1422, 
 Charles VH., while yet but Dau- 
 phin, went there to recommend his 
 almost desperate cause to Notre 
 Dame du Puy, and it was in that 
 very church that he was afterwards 
 proclaimed king. 
 
 King Ren^ also made this pil- 
 grimage with a great train of men 
 and horses ; a crowd of Moors, 
 
 probably converted to the Chris- 
 tian faith, followed in their Oriental 
 costume. 
 
 The Chapel of Our Lady of the 
 Mountains, or of Ceignac, seated on 
 a hill surrounded by others, in the 
 ancient forest of Cayrac, between 
 the Yiaour and the Aveyron, is 
 famous through the pilgrimage of 
 a Hungarian palatine, who, in 1150, 
 miraculously recovered his sight, 
 through the intercession of Our 
 Lady. This nobleman, afflicted in 
 the very prime of life with total 
 blindness, left the banks of the 
 Danube with an hundred men-at- 
 arms, to ask Our Lady of the Moun- 
 tain to put an end to his long- 
 protracted sufferings. 
 
 He embarked on the Adriatic 
 Sea, and, after coasting along the 
 Italian shore, entered the Gulf of 
 Lyons ; but there, a terrible storm 
 dispersed his ships, and it was with 
 great difficulty that his squire saved 
 him in a long boat, which succeed- 
 ed in reaching the shore. Shocked 
 by this sad catastrophe, and deplor- 
 ing the fate of his followers, the 
 blind prince, accompanied by his 
 faithful servant, plunged into the 
 -jp mountains of Languedoc, journeying 
 
by short stages towards the Chapel f 
 of Our Lady of the Mountains, 
 where he arrived in 1150. A hunts- 
 man, watching his snares on the 
 verdant shores of the Yiaour, point- 
 ed out the ford to the two pil- 
 grims, and conducted them to a 
 rising ground commanding a view 
 of the little church. The palatine, 
 for years deprived of the sweet light 
 of heaven, could not behold the wel- 
 come sight ; but he heard the merry 
 chime of the morning bells, and, 
 prostrating himself on the dewy 
 grass, he blessed God and Our Lady 
 for that he had reached the end of 
 his long journey. Full of faith, he 
 entered the sanctuary which he 
 came so far to seek, and had a 
 solemn Mass said at Mary's altar. 
 The Mass ended, the blind prince 
 was praying in tears before the 
 image of the Virgin, when his at- 
 tention was attracted by a clang 
 of arms, as if caused by many pil- 
 grims entering the church together. 
 He instinctively raises his sightless 
 eyes, and, behold! he sees his own 
 banner, and those prostrate pilgrims 
 whose Eastern costume contrasts so 
 strongly with the brown capes of 
 the Languedoceans, they are his | 
 
 own faithful Hungarians ! A cry 
 of joy and gratitude escapes him ; 
 he has recovered his sight, and his 
 men-at-arms are there before him! 
 Our Lady treated her vassal with 
 royal generosity, and favored him 
 beyond his most sanguine hopes. 
 
 Seven lamps of massive silver 
 were the gift offered by the Hun- 
 garian noble to the Virgin ; by his 
 orders, a cross was raised on the 
 hill where he had prayed, and on it 
 was inscribed, in Gothic characters, 
 the history of his cure. A group 
 in relievo was placed in Mary's 
 shrine, representing the prince pal- 
 atine and his squire on their knees 
 before the image of the Virgin ; 
 above was a Latin inscription, con- 
 ceived as follows: 
 
 Ecce palatinus privatus lumine princeps, 
 Munera magna ferens, sed meliora refert. 
 Virginis auspiciis, divino in lumine, lumen 
 Cernit, et exultat, dum pia perficerent. 
 Insuper et centum famulos in littore fractos 
 Invenit incolumes ; dicitur inde locus. 
 
 Amongst the benefactors of the 
 Chapel of Our Lady of Ceignac are 
 reckoned the Dukes d'Arpajon, Car- 
 dinal de la Pelagrua, nephew of 
 Pope Clement V., with a great num- 
 ber of bishops and other eminent 
 personages. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 507 
 
 The pilgrimage of Our Lady of 
 Roc Amadour, not far from Cahors, 
 is situated in the most barren and 
 mountainous part of Quercy. A 
 saint, whom local tradition would 
 fain set down as the Zaccheus of 
 the Gospel, retired about the middle 
 of the third century to a maze of 
 rocks which rear their lofty heads 
 above the narrow and deep ravine, 
 ^ thi'ough which the Lauzon rolls its 
 waters ; this ravine, now known as 
 the Glen of Roc Amadour, was then 
 called the Dark Valley [vol tene- 
 breux), and was infested with wild 
 beasts. 
 
 This gloomy, yet somewhat grand 
 landscape, having some resemblance 
 to the Theban desert, had doubtless 
 some analogy with the lofty and 
 austere thoughts of the anchoret ; 
 he made himself a cell on one of the 
 culminating points of the mountain, 
 and hoUoAved in the rock, on a level 
 with the eyrie, an oratory to the 
 Mother of God. The Gallo- Roman 
 inhabitants of the fair valleys of 
 Figeac and St. Cerd, seeing him 
 sometimes from a distance on the 
 crest of those bare, wild moun- 
 tains, surnamed him Amator rupis ; 
 this name, the only one which has 
 
 f come down to us, was changed into 
 that of Amador, and then Amadour^ 
 which is more conformable to the 
 genius of the dialect spoken there. 
 
 The little statue of the Virgin, 
 like those which the early Chris- 
 tians of Gaul venerated in the hol- 
 low of oaks, wrought miracles in 
 behalf of the fervent pilgrims who 
 went to visit it in its rocky shrine. 
 Pilgrimages were multiplied, and 
 they soon became so frequent that 
 a city was built at the foot of the 
 holy place ; that city, though situa- 
 ted in a desolate region, on a bar- 
 ren soil, and in a place difficult of 
 access, nevertheless became, through 
 the devotion of our fathers, one of 
 the principal towns of Quercy; it 
 had its towers, its consuls, and its 
 coat of arms — thi-ee silver rocks 
 with golden lilies on a field gules. 
 
 Just over the steeple of the an- 
 cient church of Roc Amadour, at a 
 prodigious height, was a citadel 
 intended to protect the rich shrine 
 of Mary ; but those lofty walls, tow- 
 ering proudly in the air, were not 
 sufficient to save the holy mountain 
 from the fierce followers of Calvin, 
 who would have braved hell itself 
 for the sake of gold. Our Lady's 
 
608 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRQIN MART. 
 
 Chapel has now a surer protection 
 in its poverty. 
 
 This pilgrimage was famous even 
 in the time of Charlemagne ; Count 
 Koland, nephew of that emperor, 
 visited Roc Amadour in 778; he 
 made an offering to the Blessed 
 Virgin of the weight of his sword 
 of silver, and when he fell on the 
 field of lloncevaux, that sword was 
 carried to Roc Amadour.* In the 
 yeai* 1170, according to Roger de 
 Hoveden, Henry IL, king of Eng- 
 land and duke of Guyenne (in right 
 of his wife Eleanor), made a pil- 
 grimage to Roc Amadour, in fulfill- 
 ment of a vow made by him during 
 a long illness which he had had. As 
 the people of Quercy had no great 
 love for the English, Henry had to 
 make this pious journey under the 
 escort of a strong guard. The Eng- 
 lish prince left marks of his mu- 
 nificence in Our Lady's Chapel, and 
 amongst the poor of Roc Amadour. 
 
 Amongst the illustrious pilgrims 
 who went to honor Mary in her 
 mountain -shrine were Simon de 
 Montfort, the pope's legate ; Arnaud 
 Amalric, afterwards bishop of Nar- 
 
 * Dupleix, Hist, de France, Charlemagne, ch. 8. 
 —This bracmar (sword) having been stolen or 
 
 * bonne; St. Louis, accompanied by 
 his three brothers ; Blanche of Cas- 
 tile, and Alphonso, Count of Bou- 
 logne, who subsequently ascended 
 the throne of Portugal ; Charles the 
 Fair, King John, Louis XL, and 
 many powerful lords. 
 
 Of the great bishops who, at va- 
 rious times, visited the miraculous 
 Chapel of Our Lady, there is one 
 whose name is so dear to humanity, 
 to Catholicity, that we cannot omit 
 to mention it : that name, so honor- 
 able to France, so imposing even 
 to unbelievers, is that of the Swan 
 of Cambrai. Consecrated from his 
 birth to Our Lady of Roc Amadour 
 by his pious mother, Fenelon went 
 more than once to invoke, in her 
 favorite shrine, her who gave him 
 that courageous wisdom which he 
 turned to such good advantage. 
 Two pictures, hung as ex-voto in 
 Mary's sanctuary, represent two 
 solemn phases of his existence. In 
 the first, he is lying in his cradle, 
 a new-born infant; in the second, 
 a young man, and already a doctor 
 of divinity, he is returning thanks 
 to his divine protectress for the first 
 
 lost, was replaced by a club, which retained the 
 name of Boland's sword. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 509 
 
 step in his brilliant career. At a * 
 little distance there is a tomb, at 
 which he often wept and prayed ; 
 it is that of his mother, who would 
 sleep her last sleep in the shade of 
 Mary's altar. 
 
 Sometimes it was not only in- 
 dividuals, but whole towns and 
 provinces, that repaired to Roc 
 Amadour. "In 1546," says M. de 
 Malleville, in his Chronicles of 
 Quercy, " the 24th of June, the 
 Feast of St. John and of the Blessed 
 Sacrament, was the great pardon 
 of Roc Amadour ; to which place 
 the concourse of people, both na- 
 tives and foreigners, was so great, 
 that several persons were smoth- 
 ered in the crowd, and tents were 
 spread over all the adjoining coun- 
 try like a great camp." 
 
 The offerings made at the shrine 
 of Roc Amadour were truly mag- 
 nificent ; amongst them was the 
 forest of Mont Salvy, given in 1119, 
 by Odon, Count de la Marche, to 
 the Blessed Mary of Roc Amadour ; 
 and the lands of Fornellas and 
 Orbanella, given in 1181, by Al- 
 phonso IX., king of Castile and 
 Toledo, for the benefit of tlie souls of 
 Ms parents. 
 
 In the year 1202, Sancho YIL, 
 king of Navarre, gave an annuity 
 of forty-eight gold pieces for the 
 lighting of Our Lady's Chapel ; and 
 in 1208, Savaric, prince of Mau- 
 leon, a great captain and a famous 
 troubadour, gave, as a free and 
 perpetual donation, to the Blessed 
 Mary of Roc Amadour, his estate 
 of Lisleau, with a full exemption 
 from tax or charge of any kind. 
 Pope Clement Y., in 1314, left a 
 legacy to the same church, " to 
 keep a taper perpetually burning 
 in a silver vase or basin in the 
 Chapel of the Blessed Virgin Mary 
 of Roc Amadour, in honor of that 
 ever-Blessed Mother, and for the 
 salvation of his soul." 
 
 It would be too long to enumer- 
 ate all the benefactors of Mary's 
 Chapel ; its interior was radiant 
 with offerings of gold, pearls, and 
 precious stones ; Spanish princesses 
 wrought rich hangings for it with 
 their own hands, and it was lit, 
 both night and day, by fourteen 
 lamps of solid silver, whose chains 
 were intertwined into a magnificent 
 net-work. By a contrast, peculiar 
 to Chiistianity, the Madonna's altar 
 was of wood, as in the days of St. 
 
no 
 
 mSTORT OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Amadour, and the miraculous im- 
 age was a little statue of rough 
 black oak. High in the dome 
 of the chapel, where windows of 
 rich stained glass surrounded the 
 steeple, there was a little bell with- 
 out rope, which rung, of its own 
 accoi"d, when it pleased the Star of 
 the Sea to manifest her power in 
 behalf of distressed mariners who 
 called upon her from the wastes of 
 Ocean. 
 
 The Virgin of Quercy was too 
 rich a prey to escape Protestantism. 
 On the 3d of September, 1592, 
 Dm-as took possession of Roc Ama- 
 dour ; the crosses were broken, the 
 pictures defaced, the rich ornaments 
 burned and torn to pieces, the bells 
 melted down, and the body of St. 
 Amadour was smashed with the 
 hammer, and then consigned to the 
 flames.* The atheists of 1793 gave 
 the finishing stroke to this work of 
 destruction. 
 
 Now the towers of the city are 
 prostrate and overgrown with grass; 
 shrubs are growing amid the ruins 
 of the citadel ; tall weeds are wav- 
 ing over the disjointed stones of the 
 immense flight of two hundred and 
 seventy-eight steps which led from 
 
 f the city to the aerial shrine of 
 Mary; the lute of the Languedocian 
 cantadour no longer celebrates Our 
 Lady's miracles, and the niglit-wind 
 alone is heard whistling through 
 that ancient chapel, where the or- 
 gan once pealed its solemn music. 
 The Virgin of Roc Amadour might 
 now be called the Virgin of EuinSj 
 and yet she still works miracles 
 there. 
 
 The pilgrimage of Our Lady of 
 Liesse, in Picardy, is not so ancient 
 as those of southern France, since it 
 only dates from the twelfth century; 
 but it is even more famous than 
 they are. The origin of the statue 
 which decorates the sanctuary is 
 truly mai*vellous ; tradition has pre- 
 served the wondrous tale not only 
 in the French province where it 
 is located, but even in the Holy 
 Land ;f nay, it is even said to exist 
 in the archives of the Knights of 
 Malta.J The following is the story, 
 and it bears a decidedly Eastern 
 character. 
 
 Foulques of Anjou, king of Jeru- 
 
 * Odo de Gissey, Hist, de Roc Amadour. 
 f See Hist, de Notre Dame de Liesse, par I'AbW 
 Villette, Addit. au disc, prelim, p. 100. 
 t Ibid., pp. 10, 11, et 12. 
 
galem, having rebuilt the fortreSvS of 
 Bersabee, within fonr leagues of 
 Ascalon, to protect the frontier of 
 flis kingdom from the incursions of 
 the Saracen>s, entrusted its defence 
 to the brave and pious Knights of 
 St John of JerusaleuL This val- 
 iant garrison had often to combat 
 the infidels who held the ancient 
 country of the PhilLsiines for the 
 Sultan of Egypt One day, the 
 Knights of St John, including three 
 brothers of the ancient and noble 
 house of Eppes, in Picardy, fell into 
 an ambascade, and, notwiths-tand- 
 ing that they performed prodigies 
 of valor, they were taken and load- 
 ed with chains by the Mnssnlmana, 
 who sent them to ]^yi>t. The 
 brothers d^ppes had the majestic 
 mien and krfty stature of the an- 
 cient knights of the north of 
 France. The Sultan quickly distin- 
 guished them from the others, and 
 hoping to gain them for his false 
 prophet, he commenced by casting 
 them into a dungeon in order to 
 bre^ down their courage, and then 
 proceeded to spread before their 
 eyes the most eedndng prospect, 
 making them all manner of fEur 
 promises if they would only give op 
 
 t their religion. The three valoron^ 
 knights, as they were before inac- 
 cessible to fear, were now also deaf 
 to the voice of ambition, and not to 
 be lured by gold. The Sultan, thus 
 disappointed, sent some of the most 
 famous dervises to argue* religion 
 with them, whereupon the good 
 knights, in their hatred of Moham- 
 medanism, became, all at once, sub- 
 tle theologians, and defended Chris- 
 tianity as well in discussion as they 
 had often done with shield on arm 
 and lance in rest The Sultan made 
 it a point of honor to overcome the 
 captives, and his obstinacy incTcas- 
 ing with their resistance, he swore 
 that these knights c^ St J<rfm 
 should foUow the prophet's stand- 
 ard were it to cost him the half 
 of Egypt He had one daughter, 
 beautiful and accomplished, and so 
 virtuous that she deserved to have 
 a betta" creed ; her lie sent into the 
 dungeon where the French knights 
 languished in chaiiis, and charged 
 her to give them a terrifying ac- 
 count of the tortures awaiting them 
 if they still continued to hold out 
 The knights received the lady with 
 an the hi^bred courtesy of tiiat 
 
 I cfaivalroos age; but they rejected 
 
 J 
 
612 
 
 mSTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO TEE BLESSED VTROTN ^TARY. 
 
 her insinuations with the firmness f 
 of men who willingly accepted mar- 
 tji*dom, and explained their own 
 faith in a manner so clear and con- 
 vincing, that the young princess be- 
 gan to reflect on the truths laid be- 
 fore her. A miraculous and radiant 
 image of Mary, brought by angels, it 
 was said, to the pious champions of 
 the faith, completed the conversion 
 of the young Mohammedan. Hav- 
 ing one night bribed the guards of 
 the prison, she made her way, with 
 a casket of jewels, to the French 
 knights, and escaped with them 
 from her father's palace. 
 
 Having crossed the Nile in a 
 bark prepared to receive them, the 
 fugitives bent their course towards 
 Alexandria, hoping, perhaps, to ob- 
 tain a temporary asylum in one of 
 the Coptish monasteries of the soli- 
 tude of St. Macarius; but, after 
 some hours' march, the princess, 
 exhausted with fatigue, stood in 
 need of some repose, and, notwith- 
 standing the imminence of the dan- 
 ger, the three knights of St. John 
 resolved to keep watch, and let her 
 sleep for a while. 
 
 They accordingly seated her in a 
 field of soft, long grasy, and sat 
 
 down themselves at a respectful 
 distance. The princess slept, and 
 her companions, after struggling in 
 vain against the drowsiness which 
 came upon them, at last fell asleep 
 in their turn. 
 
 No one knows how long their 
 sleep lasted. The eldest of the 
 brothers was the first to awake ; 
 the sun was already far above the 
 horizon, and the birds were war- 
 bling on every tree. The crusader 
 looked around in amazement ; he fell 
 asleep within sight of the Nile and 
 the pyramids, under the fan -like 
 branches of a palm-tree, and he 
 awoke under a venerable oak, on 
 the margin of a purling stream, in 
 a fresh green meadow spangled 
 with daisies. At a little distance 
 rose the dark, round turrets of an 
 old baronial castle, very much re- 
 sembling that in which he left his 
 soiTowing mother, when setting out 
 for the Holy Land. His doubts 
 were dispelled by a shepherd who 
 was leading his flock to the pas- 
 ture : the castle before him was his 
 own good castle of Marchais, and 
 he found himself in Picardy, under 
 one of the old ancestral trees which 
 his fathers had planted. He blessed 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 513 
 
 the Holy Yirgin, and awoke his com- * 
 panions, whose surprise equalled 
 his own. 
 
 The image of the Eastern Ma- 
 donna was still in their possession ; 
 so they built a fair church wherein 
 to place it, and the Mohammedan 
 princess was baptized in the cathe- 
 dral of Laon. 
 
 That this statuette of Mary 
 reached France by means more 
 natural, we may well believe ; but 
 it is quite certain that it was 
 brought from the Holy Land by 
 three brothers of the house of 
 Eppe, knights of St. John of Jeru- 
 salem. 
 
 Some of the most illustrious 
 names of the French monarch}^ are 
 found on the list of the pilgrims 
 to Our Lady of Liesse. Amongst 
 them are the Duke of Burgundy, 
 Louis n. of Bourbon, Prince of 
 Conde, the Duke de Mercoeur, 
 Prince Albert Henry of Ligne, 
 Madame Henrietta, Frances of 
 France, Queen of England, some 
 of the Princes de Longueville, 
 Marshal d'Ancre, Mademoiselle de 
 Guise, the Count of Egmont, Louis, 
 duke of Orleans, brother of Charles 
 VL, Charles YH., King Ken^, Louis , 
 
 XL, Francis the First, Henry H., 
 Charles IX., Queen Mary de Medici, 
 Louis XIIL, Ann of Austria, Louis 
 XIY., etc. 
 
 Many of these great personages, 
 not content with leaving rich do- 
 nations at JSTotre Dame de Liesse, 
 also placed their statue there ; that 
 of Louis n. of Bourbon, prince of 
 Cond^, was of gold. 
 
 Mary of Arquin, who was after- 
 wards queen of Poland, visited Our 
 Lady's chapel in 1671 ; she offered 
 to the Blessed Yirgin a silver child, 
 representing Prince Alexander So- 
 bieski, her son, together with a 
 chain of gold enriched with jewels, 
 denoting that she devoted him to 
 the Mother of God, as her slave.* 
 
 This shrine, like the others, was 
 plundered by the Huguenots, and 
 the Kevolution completed the work; 
 yet still the chapel of Our Lady of 
 Liesse is frequented by a concourse 
 of pilgrims. 
 
 In the legend of St. Liphard of 
 Meung, who lived in 550, there is 
 mention made of the town of Clery, 
 and an oratory therein dedicated 
 to the Blessed Yirgin. In 1280, 
 some laborers placed there a small 
 
 * Hist, de Notre Dame de Liesse. 
 
614 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIROIN MART. 
 
 statue of Our Lady which had 
 been turned up by their plough- 
 share. This discovery was rumored 
 abroad, and attracted the attention 
 of the most powerful nobles of the 
 time. Amongst these was Simon 
 de Melun, a nobleman who had 
 accompanied St. Louis to Africa, 
 and was raised by Philip the Fair 
 to the dignity of Marshal of France; 
 he formed the design of founding 
 a college there, but, dying glori- 
 ously soon after at the siege of 
 Courtray, he was prevented from 
 executing his pious intention, which 
 was, however, carried out by his 
 wife and son. Philip the Fair, 
 after his victories in Flanders, was 
 deeply sensible of what he owed 
 to Mary; struck with the vast 
 numbers of the faithful who visited 
 Our Lady of Clery, he increased 
 the number of its canons, and 
 resolved to rebuild the church ; but 
 death came suddenly upon him, 
 too, in the midst of so many proj- 
 ects, religious and otherwise, and 
 left him little more than the merit 
 of a good intention. The church 
 was, nevertheless, commenced in 
 his reign, and was duly continued, 
 thanks to the munificence of his 
 
 * third son, Charles, duke of Orleans, 
 The completion of the church was 
 reserved for Philip of Valois, that 
 noble prince who charged his sol- 
 diers, in a conquered countiy, to 
 respect the churches. This mag- 
 nificent temple was pillaged by 
 the English during the famous 
 siege of Orleans. Louis XL, who 
 had new sleeves put to his old 
 doublets so as to wear them thread- 
 bare, knew well how to act as be- 
 came a sovereign prince, when he 
 felt so inclined; he had the church 
 of Clery rebuilt, made it a donation 
 of 2,330 crowns, endowed it with 
 great revenues, erected it into a 
 royal chapel, and richly provided 
 for its canons. 
 
 This monument, the object of so 
 much care and expense, was de- 
 stroyed by fire in 1472, whilst the 
 workmen were engaged in covering 
 it. The whole was consumed by 
 fire, says the chronicle of Louis XL, 
 but the church was constructed 
 anew, under the inspection of the 
 king's secretary. 
 
 Louis XL having recovered his 
 health at Clery, and attributing his 
 cure to the Blessed Virgin, enriched 
 her college with new gifts, and 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 515 
 
 caused his tomb to be constructed 
 there. "He placed himself in it 
 several times," says one of his his- 
 torians, "in order to see whether it 
 fitted his body well, and was ready 
 to receive him after his death." He 
 was buried there according to his 
 desire. His wife, Charlotte of Sa- 
 voy, was soon after laid beside him. 
 
 The Calvinists, who had as little 
 respect for the sepulchres of kings 
 as for the altars of saints, demol- 
 ished the statue of Louis XI., and 
 broke open his royal tomb for the 
 sake of pillage. This tomb, recon- 
 structed by Louis XIH., was again 
 broken and mutilated during the 
 Revolution, and repaired by Louis 
 XYIII. The devotion to the Virgin 
 is still kept up with pious fervor 
 in the old church of Louis XI. 
 
 The pilgrimage of Our Lady of 
 the Thorn [Notre Dame de rapine), 
 near Chalons-sur-Marne, commenced 
 in the first years of the fifteenth 
 century. On the eve of the Feast 
 of the Annunciation, a. d. 1419, two 
 young shepherds leading their flocks 
 by the side of a little chapel dedi- 
 cated to St. John the Baptist, per- 
 ceived a bright light in the midst 
 of a thorny bush which grew near 
 
 * it. The first sheep of the flock 
 being frightened by the light, took 
 flight ; but the young lambs ap- 
 proached the bush ; the shepherds 
 followed their example, and discov- 
 ered a small statue of the Blessed 
 Virgin, with the Infant Jesus in her 
 arms. The miraculous light increas- 
 ing when night came, people ran 
 from all parts to see it, and as the 
 place where the prodigy occurred 
 was very high, the light could be 
 seen for ten leagues around. The 
 bishop of Chalons came in proces- 
 sion with all his chapter and many 
 of the neighboring priests to visit 
 the place. They found the bush as 
 green as though it were summer; 
 and they took the little statue of 
 the Madonna and conveyed it to the 
 neighboring chapel of St. John. 
 
 This remarkable prodigy attract 
 ed all the faithful of Champagne 
 to the chapel, which speedily be- 
 came a famous pilgrimage. With 
 the offerings of the pilgrims a su- 
 perb church was constructed on the 
 plan of an Irish architect ; the work 
 was steadily prosecuted; notwith- 
 standing the war then being carried 
 on against the English, the inhabit- 
 ants, though plundered and impov- 
 
616 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 erished, cheerfully left their plough 
 to draw stones all the way from 
 Lorraine. The building went on 
 with renewed activity when Charles 
 Vn. sent a considerable sum to- 
 wai'ds the completion of the church. 
 It took a century to build it, and 
 during all that time the fervor of 
 the people continued through war, 
 and pestilence, and famine, and all 
 imaginable plagues, the worst of 
 which was certainly the harassing 
 presence of the English. The cities 
 of Chalon and Verdun would fain 
 contiibute their share towards the 
 decoration of this building, which 
 was to perpetuate the memory of 
 the miraculous bush. The one gave 
 it superb stained glass windows, 
 representing the history of the mir- 
 acle; the other, magnificent bells; 
 the liberality of the faithful, great 
 and small, rich and poor, did the 
 rest 
 
 During the religious wars the 
 English Protestants, who were mas- 
 ters of Champagne, having heard 
 of the great riches contained in the 
 sanctuary of Our Lady of the Thorn, 
 formed the project of pillaging and 
 destroying it ; but the lord of the 
 soil, a man full of faith and courage, 
 
 t had the noble church surrounded 
 with stakes, and putting himself at 
 tl e head of a band of brave young 
 men, drawn together by patriotism 
 and devotion to Mary, they succeed- 
 ed in repulsing the enemy and sav- 
 ing the Virgin's altar. Forced to 
 beat a retreat, the English acted 
 like Vandals; they fired a parting 
 volley through the beautiful win- 
 dows, which were nearly all de- 
 stroyed. Nevertheless, by a sort of 
 prodigy, the famous pane of glass 
 on which is represented the finding 
 of the miraculous statue remained 
 uninjured. In memory of that hap- 
 py day, the fabric (or trustees) of 
 the church of Notre Dame dc 
 I'Epine, down to the time of the 
 Revolution, gave to the descend- 
 ants of the gentleman who saved 
 the shrine from profanation and pil- 
 lage two blessed swords, which they 
 received on the Feast of the As- 
 sumption before the Virgin's altar. 
 A solemn procession took place 
 every year in this church. A num- 
 ber of delicate children, bound to 
 wear white perpetually in honor of 
 the Blessed Virgin, assisted in the 
 procession on the 15th of August, 
 with tapers in their hands: these 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 517 
 
 were the petitioners of Mary. The 
 verdict of death seemed pronounced 
 against them on their entrance into 
 the world: their mothers piously 
 called on the Yirgin, and hope, 
 through her powerful aid, to pre- 
 serve those fragile plants which 
 thus grow up under her sacred pro- 
 tection, and depend on her for their 
 very existence. It was an affecting 
 sight to see those little angels, 
 clothed in white, and pale as the 
 flowers wreathed around their heads, 
 kneeling at Mary's feet, and repeat- 
 ing the prayer which they were 
 not able to understand, asking that 
 their life might be spared, that life 
 so precious to their tender mothers. 
 . . . When the rose of health begins 
 to bloom on their childish features, 
 when the seventh year is past, and 
 they at length leave off the white 
 livery of the Virgin, how joyfully 
 do their mothers hasten to return 
 thanks to Mary! What heartfelt 
 prayers are then poured forth at 
 the altar of Our Lady of the Thorn! 
 There is in the Yosges a pilgrim- 
 age which perpetuates, amongst the 
 humble matrons of the country, a 
 beautiful superstition wherein the 
 Christian and the maternal senti- 
 
 ment are somewhat closely commin- 
 gled. About the year 1070, a monk 
 of Senones built on the margin of 
 a lonely torrent a hermitage and 
 chapel, whither the people went to 
 honor Our Lady of Meix. This pil- 
 grimage was afterwards either dis- 
 continued or suppressed. The chap- 
 el is now in ruins, and a shattered 
 stone cross is the only thing yet 
 standing; but under these ruins 
 there are subterraneous vaults, and 
 an altar of rough stone, whereon 
 children who die unbaptized are 
 still laid. " They are hardly placed 
 on that stone," says the moun- 
 taineer who serves as a guide 
 through the gloomy cavern, " when 
 their eyes open, a slight breath 
 escapes from their little icy lips, 
 the water of baptism falls on their 
 brow, and they sleep again to go 
 up to heaven." A little grave is 
 made near the altar, and the mortal 
 remains of the faded floweret are 
 left under the protection of Mary: 
 the ignorant, but exalted tender- 
 ness which induced the parents to 
 ask a miracle of the Virgin, makes 
 them bury them within the pre- 
 cincts of her ancient shrine, in or- 
 der that she may not forget them! 
 
518 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Let incredulity blame as it may f 
 this superstition of the heart, to the 
 tender and pious soul it is full of 
 melancholy beauty, and deserving 
 only of pity. Doubtless, more than 
 one mother may have been mis- 
 taken in fancying that she saw the 
 pale lips of her infant quiver with 
 momentary life as it received the 
 water of baptism ; but no one will 
 dare to say that Mary has not power 
 to work miracles as great as this, at 
 her pleasure. 
 
 Even amongst the wild recesses 
 of the Pyrenees there are sanctua- 
 ries dedicated to Mary. The most 
 ancient and the most famous of 
 these is Our Lady of Heas, fre- 
 quented by all the people of the 
 neighboring valleys. Amongst the 
 precipitous rocks of Heas there is 
 an altar raised where the goatherd 
 would not dare to hang up a tem- 
 porary shelter against the storm: 
 the Romans would have dedicated 
 this altar to the Spirit of the Storm, 
 but Christians have erected it in 
 honor of Her who stills the winds 
 and waves. On the 8th of Septem- 
 ber, the Feast of the Nativity of 
 Mary, and on the 15th of August, 
 the day of her glorious Assump- 
 
 tion, an immense concourse of peo- 
 ple repairs to the shrine of Our 
 Lady of Heas ; each one, on going 
 away, detaches a small fragment of 
 the blessed rock, which is taken 
 home respectfully to their cabins, 
 as a relic of some value. 
 
 Mountain pilgrimages are pictur- 
 esque ; but how touching are those 
 of the coasts I What a pleasing ob- 
 ject is a sanctuary of Mary, with 
 its tapering spire standing on the 
 point of a promontory, whence it 
 may be seen from afar over the 
 deep sea! The mariner salutes it 
 with a heavy heart on quitting the 
 land where he leaves his wife and 
 children, and hails it with delight 
 on his return ; that spire is to him 
 the emblem of hope, and amid all 
 the anxious perturbation of his 
 heart, as he approaches his home 
 after months, perhaps years of ab- 
 sence, he feels a certain religious 
 confidence, a certain assurance that 
 all goes well — thanks to the protec- 
 tion of the good Virgin. . . . And 
 then, who knows but it was Our 
 Lady that saved him from ship- 
 wreck, he and his vessel; and the 
 first care of these poor people, on 
 reaching land is to go barefoot, as 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 519 
 
 in the Middle Ages, to hang up in * 
 the maritime chapel the offering 
 promised when the tempest shiv- 
 ered the masts and rent the sails. 
 One of the Dieppe papers recently 
 published an account of one of these 
 touching scenes, which made a deep 
 impression on the public mind, 
 notwithstanding the impiety of 
 the times. " A ceremony of a most 
 affecting kind took place yester- 
 day in St. James's church," said the 
 writer. "The crew of the lugger 
 Automne (which encountered so vio- 
 lent a storm on the 3d of Septem- 
 ber) gave themselves up for lost, 
 when the mate, Louis Coreteur, 
 thought of making a vow, in the 
 name of his companions, to Our 
 Lady of Succor, the patroness of 
 sailors. Scarcely had he made the 
 vow, when a golden sunbeam, dart- 
 ing through the mass of heavy 
 clouds which obscured the sky, 
 cheered the drooping hearts of the 
 mariners with renewed hope. This 
 vow was yesterday accomplished by 
 these good sailors in the chapel of 
 Om- Lady of Succor. The whole 
 crew of the vessel walked in pro- 
 cession to Our Lady's chapel bare- 
 footed and bareheaded, in their sea 
 
 costume, bearing on their robust 
 shoulders the promised offering, 
 placed on a litter, and ornamented 
 with blue streamers ; they were 
 accompanied by their parents and 
 friends, and followed by a numerous 
 concourse of people. The parish 
 priest addressed them in an affect- 
 ing discourse, and after the mass 
 of thanksgiving, he recited the De 
 Profundis for the captain and four 
 of the crew who perished during 
 the storm." 
 
 Our Lady of Grace is one of the 
 most ancient maritime chapels of 
 Normandy. This sanctuary was 
 built, as we have already said, in 
 consequence of a vow made, dur- 
 ing a tempest, by a Norman duke, 
 who was very devout to the Bless- 
 ed Virgin. The site of this pretty 
 chapel, shaded by tall trees, and 
 surrounded with flowery turf, is 
 calm and beautiful as the • rich, 
 fresh landscapes of the magnificent 
 province to which it belongs. Our 
 Lady of Grace seems to be the for- 
 tress of Honfleur ; the hill on which 
 it stands • commands a view of the 
 mouth of the Seine, with the distant 
 line of the dark green sea and the 
 bright blue river gliding into its 
 
sto 
 
 BISTORT OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 bosom. There are two roads lead- f 
 ing to this chapel— one rough and 
 rocky, the other smooth and level. 
 In former times, the inhabitants of 
 Hontleur took a pleasure in keep- 
 ing the road clean and covering 
 it with fine sand, in order that a 
 fair and gentle princess, much be- 
 loved by the people, might climb 
 the ascent to the Virgin's shrine 
 without fatigue. The revolutionary 
 storm drifted the noble lady to 
 other climes, but the memoiT of her 
 beneficence still remains. 
 
 One day, not long ago, great 
 crowds of people were assembled 
 on the little green esplanade which 
 extends in front of Notre Dame de 
 Grace ; they were clinging to the 
 sides of the rock, hanging from the 
 bushes, mounted on the tops of the 
 trees, and every eye was turned to- 
 wards the ocean in search of some 
 expected object. The enthusiasm 
 of the people was great, but some- 
 what grave and religious in its 
 character ; prayers ascended to 
 heaven, and tears were in every 
 eye : a ship passed under Our 
 Lady's hill — a ship with a black 
 flag and a cofiin on the deck: the 
 priests blessed it as it passed be- ^ 
 
 neath, and the people wept in 
 silence. . . . There was not a chapel 
 of the Virgin on either bank of the 
 Seine wherein prayers were not of- 
 fered up that day for the soul of 
 the great emperor; and Our Lady 
 of Grace was fervently invoked for 
 that illustrious exile who died far 
 away from France, and — saddest 
 of all — where the flag of England 
 waved above him ! 
 
 "Within half a league of Pornic, 
 a small seaport about ten leagues 
 from Nantes, on a height which 
 overhangs the ocean, stands the 
 maritime village and church of St. 
 Mary ; this church bears the marks 
 of great antiquity, and in its small 
 cemetery lie the mortal remains of 
 a crusader ; it is held in great ven- 
 eration amongst the Breton sailors, 
 who often go there to accomplish 
 vows. When a Breton ship passes 
 under the church of St. Mary, the 
 mariners take off their hats and 
 say the Ave Maria. Not a peasant 
 along the coast thinks of going into 
 the sea to bathe without dipping 
 his hand in the water and making 
 the sign of the cross, turning his 
 head towards the patronal sanc- 
 tuary ; and the fishermen, tossed 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 521 
 
 about by the storm, which is more * 
 dangerojs along the coast than on 
 the high sea, never lose hope so 
 long as they can behold the pictur- 
 esque spire of St. Mary's church: 
 the Virgin sees them. That thought 
 sustains their courage, and is, even 
 in itself, a chance of safety. 
 
 When the stormy waves of the 
 Atlantic rush madly into the sandy 
 bays of Guienne, and recede from 
 the shore with a hoarse and terrific 
 sound, if a dismasted vessel be seen 
 struggling with the tempest, it is 
 Our Lady of Arcachon whom the 
 anxious wives and mothers of the 
 Aquitaine sailors invoke on their 
 behalf This chapel, around which 
 whole flocks of sea-mews take re- 
 fuge, stands in a wild and lonely 
 place, amid clumps of gloomy pines. 
 Many sailors, and poor, grateful 
 women, arrive there barefoot from 
 time to time, telling their beads 
 with their rough, horny fingers, and 
 many an ex-voto hangs in the vener- 
 able chapel, denoting that so many 
 prayers have been heard and grant- 
 ed by Mary. 
 
 Our Lady of the Watch (Notre 
 Dame de la Garde) is the last ob- 
 ject seen or noticed by the Pro- 
 
 vencal sailor as he leaves his native 
 land : its chapel, built in the thir- 
 teenth century, is of blueish-gray 
 limestone, and stands on the summit 
 of a lofty mountain commanding a 
 view of the Mediterranean, with its 
 numerous isles, its castle of If, and 
 its changeful billows. Thither does 
 the sea-worn mariner first bend his 
 steps when his vessel reaches the 
 port, after a voyage to the distant 
 countries of the Levant ; it is no 
 uncommon sight to see these sea- 
 faring people going on their knees 
 up the mountain -path to this an- 
 cient chapel to thank Her whom 
 they name, with true Italian famil- 
 iarity, the good Mother of the Watch, 
 for having saved them from the 
 manifold dangers of sea, wind, and 
 plague. 
 
 But it is not to sailors alone that 
 the Madonna of Marseilles is kind 
 and propitious ; she is the guardian 
 angel of the city, which has re- 
 course to her in all public calami- 
 ties. When the cholera, raging all 
 over France, first broke out on the 
 Provengal soil, the fair old Phocian 
 city knelt as one man at the feet 
 of its beloved patroness, who failed 
 it not in its hour of peril. In tes- 
 
622 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 timony of its gratitude, Marseilles 
 has consecrated to the Blessed Vir- 
 gin a superb statue of solid silver, 
 admirably executed. That is as it 
 should be. 
 
 In Corsica, Our Lady of Lava- 
 sina, looking down on the blue 
 waves of the Mediterranean, re- 
 freshes the way-worn pilgrim, and 
 even the sailor, passing in his ves- 
 sel, with the perfume of its orange- 
 trees. This sanctuary, dedicated to 
 the Nativity of the Virgin, was long 
 left in obscurity, visited only by 
 the coral fishers who frequent that 
 lovely coast, when, about the middle 
 of the seventeenth century, miracles 
 were wrought by the Corsican Ma- 
 donna, which were noised abroad, 
 even through Italy. The church 
 was then enlarged and beautified ; 
 great numbers of the faithful went 
 there, on the patronal feast, with 
 bare feet and tapers in their hands. 
 This pious practice is still kept up 
 with as much devotion as in any 
 foimer time. The painting which 
 decorates this chapel, the work of 
 an Italian artist, represents Mary 
 when a child, with St. Anne throw- 
 ing a transparent veil gracefully 
 over her head. 
 
 SWITZERLAND. 
 
 The origin of the famous pilgrim- 
 age of Our Lady of Hermits, the 
 Loretto of Helvetia, dates from the 
 heroic times of Charlemagne. The 
 saint who first inhabited the her- 
 mitage of Einsiedeln was a young 
 Suabian lord named Meinrad, be- 
 longing to the illustrious house of 
 Hohenzollem. Being of that con- 
 templative turn of mind so common 
 among the Germans, Meinrad, even 
 in his early days, loved to wander 
 through the woods which then over- 
 spread his native land, and to com- 
 mune with the Deity face to face, 
 where no sound broke in on the 
 silence of the place save the mur- 
 mur of streams or the rustling of 
 leaves. Night often surprised him 
 poring over an old book clasped 
 with gold, which he had inherited 
 from his fathers, or meditating pro- 
 foundly on the miracles and favors 
 of the Blessed Virgin. His soul 
 soared aloft in solitude ; pitying the 
 world and its fleeting goods, Mein- 
 rad made his vows in the abbey 
 of Reichenau, which he afterwards 
 quitted for a small hermitage built 
 on the brow of Mount Etzel. There 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 523 
 
 he passed seven years ; but the 
 fame of his virtue descended to the 
 valleys ; the shepherds and wood- 
 men first went to visit him, then 
 lords, then noble ladies, humbly so- 
 liciting his prayers and counsels. 
 This public homage was torture to 
 the young hermit, who sighed only 
 for meditation amid the deep silence 
 of the woods. One night he stealth- 
 ily quitted his hermitage, taking 
 with him only the statue of the 
 Virgin, the sole ornament of his 
 chapel, and took refuge in a forest 
 of the canton of Schwytz, which 
 bore the characteristic name of the 
 Dark Forest. 
 
 Thirty- two years after, he was 
 assassinated by ruffians with whom 
 he had shared the water of his 
 spring and the wild fruits of his 
 forest. The birds of heaven pur- 
 sued the murderers till they suf- 
 fered the penalty of their crime.* 
 
 For nearly half a century after 
 the tragical death of Meinrad, his 
 cell, wherein he had wrought mir- 
 acles, remained uninhabited; at the 
 
 * The murderers were betrayed by two ra- 
 vens, who followed them all the way to Zurich ; 
 they even made their way through the windows 
 of the inn where the assassins took refuge on 
 
 * 
 
 end of that time, a little society of 
 hermits settled there under St. Ben- 
 non, of the ducal house of Burgundy. 
 Hence the surname of Our Lady of 
 Hermits given to the chapel of Ein- 
 siedeln. St. Eberhard consecrated 
 his wealth, which was considerable, 
 to the erection of a monastery there, 
 and he himself was the first abbot. 
 
 The Virgin's chapel, such as it 
 was in the time of St. Bennon, was 
 placed in the vast church of the 
 convent, of which Meinrad's cell 
 formed the choir. The French de- 
 stroyed this chapel, which had 
 withstood the furious attacks of 
 Protestantism ; but God permitted 
 the statue of the Virgin to be 
 saved. It was replaced in the 
 church of Einsiedeln in 1803, with 
 much solemnity, and in 1817 this 
 ancient shrine recovered a portion 
 of its former splendor, thanks to 
 the concurrence of some distin- 
 guished artists and the abundant 
 alms of the faithful. 
 
 The convent of Einsiedeln is not 
 situated in the mildest climate : its 
 
 entering the town, and never left them till they 
 witnessed their execution. It is in memory of 
 this event that the abbey of Reichenau bears 
 two ravens on its arms. 
 
6S4 
 
 HISIVRY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 steeple, covered with snow the f 
 greater part of the year, pierces 
 the dull, heavy clouds secreted by 
 the long frost ; at its base stretches 
 a barren waste, yielding with re- 
 luctance a scanty crop ; the fruits 
 are few and tasteless, and the fields 
 ai*e only adorned by the pretty lilac 
 blossom of the potato ; but still Our 
 Lady is pleased to manifest her 
 power there, and the rugged path 
 of the holy mountain is often mois- 
 tened with the noblest blood of 
 Germany. More than one count 
 of the empire, and noble German 
 ladies not a few, make it their duty 
 to ascend barefoot to Einsiedeln: 
 there is still some of the ancient 
 fervor of Frederick's knights re- 
 maining in old Germany. As for 
 the Catholic population of Switzer- 
 land, nothing can equal their con- 
 fidence in Our Lady of Hermits ; 
 and there are few families, even in 
 the more distant cantons, who do 
 not keep up the pious practice of 
 making this pilgrimage. 
 
 "The first thing which strikes 
 the eye, in the beautiful church of 
 Einsiedeln," says a French trav- 
 eller, who visited it in 1839, " is 
 the miraculous chapel where the 
 
 modest image of the Virgin is ex- 
 posed. Mass was being said there, 
 and a great crowd of the faithful, 
 men, women, and children, of every 
 age and station, were assisting at 
 the holy sacrifice, piously awaiting 
 the time for communion ; others 
 were gathered around the confes- 
 sionals ; others, after having re- 
 ceived the Holy Eucharist, were 
 hearing a mass of thanksgiving at 
 some of the side-altars. Neaiiy all 
 the Swiss cantons were represented 
 there. In a group from which the 
 other pilgrims seemed to keep re- 
 spectfully aloof, we recognized the 
 graceful mien and elegant costume 
 of the w^omen of France. The men, 
 less numerous, and more uniformly 
 clad, still betrayed their origin by 
 a certain diversity of countenance. 
 Amongst them we could distinguish 
 French, Germans, and Italians ; but 
 all were equally pious and col- 
 lected." 
 
 In a visit of devotion to the 
 abbey of Einsiedeln, Queen Hor- 
 tense, that fair, unhappy princess, 
 once the brightest ornament of Na- 
 poleon's court, placed on the altar 
 of the Swiss Madonna a superb 
 branch of hortensia, composed of 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 525 
 
 large diamonds. This ex-voto was 
 the offering of a mother who had 
 but one son to love, and who be- 
 sought the Mother of Christ to 
 protect and save from all evil the 
 noble-hearted youth, who remem- 
 bered but too well that he was born 
 within hearing of the cannon of 
 Wagram, and amid the fabulous 
 exploits of the imperial epoch. 
 
 Many volumes have been writ- 
 ten in Switzerland on the miracles 
 wrought by the Madonna of Ein- 
 siedeln. We shall give but one 
 of these, a little fanciful legend of 
 the seventeenth century, which we 
 found in a book of devotion pub- 
 lished in Fribourg, but now some- 
 what scarce. The Swiss piously 
 believe in the authenticity of this 
 strange fact; but others are not 
 bound to follow their example. 
 
 In a vast mediaeval hall, whose 
 walls were adorned with paintings 
 in fresco of the most terrific sub- 
 jects, and around which were seen 
 those stone benches only found in 
 the feudal castles of Germany, were 
 seated some Helvetian gentlemen 
 quaffing deep draughts of Rhenish 
 wine, from large, old-fashioned gob- 
 lets. In the midst of this Teutonic 
 
 f banquet, whilst a young officer 
 named Berthold was uttering some 
 of the most extravagant nonsense, 
 a pilgrim was ushered in ; he was 
 going alone and barefooted to visit 
 Our Lady of Hermits, when the 
 approach of a violent storm forced 
 him to ask hospitality at the castle. 
 The noble host arose from his seat, 
 and com'teously conducted his new 
 guest to the corner of a vast Gothic 
 fireplace, where whole oaks were 
 burning. This duty accomplished, 
 Berthold, without any respect for 
 the austere presence of the pilgrim, 
 resimied the silly and impious dis- 
 course which his entrance had for 
 a moment interrupted, casting from 
 time to time a furtive glance at the 
 stranger to see what effect his 
 words produced on him ; but the 
 pale, emaciated face of the holy 
 man remained perfectly calm and 
 motionless. The banquet over, the 
 guests ordered their horses, and 
 prepared to go to their several 
 homes. "The night is dark," said 
 the host to the young miscreant, 
 Berthold, who was a relative of his 
 own ; " thou hast to pass through a 
 glen haunted by evil spirits. Some- 
 
 ^ thing bad might happen to thee. 
 
686 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Be advised by me, and stay here to- f 
 night" 
 
 " Pshaw I " laughed the officer, 
 vN'ho was in the service of France, 
 " I fear neither God nor devil I " 
 
 "Are you quite sure of that?" 
 demanded the pilgrim, in a tone of 
 gloomy raillery, which made all the 
 others afraid. 
 
 "So sure, honest pilgrim, that I 
 now drink to Lucifer, and beg the 
 favor of his company to escort me 
 home to-night, if it be convenient." 
 
 "And thou wouldst deserve it 
 well," cried the host, turning pale. 
 
 "We will petition Our Lady for 
 you," said the immovable pilgrim; 
 "you will need her help." 
 
 " Oh, pray do not trouble your- 
 self — I can dispense with your 
 prayers;" .and he bowed ironically 
 to the holy man. Some minutes 
 after, he was in the stirrups, and 
 dashing down the hill on which the 
 castle stands, singing the chorus of 
 a bacchanalian song. 
 
 The night was far advanced, the 
 silence profound, and the solitude 
 unbroken ; the full-orbed moon, fair 
 and lonely, shone out at times 
 through thick, dark clouds, in a 
 starless sky, and flashes of lightning I 
 
 darted at intervals along the hori- 
 zon. For some reason best known 
 to himself, the young man left off 
 singing, but kept swearing occa- 
 sionally. He at last reached the 
 dangerous place mentioned by his 
 friend, which was known by a name 
 very common in Helvetia, The Dev- 
 ils Road. It was a deep gorge, hol- 
 lowed between the reddish flanks of 
 two mountains — a wild and gloomy 
 spot, where the Alpine goat would 
 have scarcely ventured even in the 
 light of day. At that dead hour of 
 the night, when the deep stillness 
 and the fearful gloom called forth 
 every superstitious feeling latent in 
 the mind, the young Swiss, becom- 
 ing somewhat uneasy, mechanically 
 placed his hand on his sword ; then, 
 ashamed of himself, he began to 
 laugh at his own fears. 
 
 " I have specially invited Lucifer 
 to see me home," said the miscreant, 
 willing to indulge his pride by an 
 idle boast; "but he is deaf, it seems 
 — or hell is empty." 
 
 The thunder growled in the dis- 
 tance, and a flash of lightning illu- 
 mined the woods and mountains, 
 showing him two hideous dwarfs at 
 his horse's head. " Ha I " cried the 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 627 
 
 officer, with a shudder ; but quickly 
 resuming his wonted insolence, 
 "Avaunt, ye fiends!" he cried, 
 proudly waving his sword ; " two 
 wretched dwarfs would be only a 
 fitting escort for some Alpine cow- 
 herd!" 
 
 The dwarfs disappeared, and the 
 gallop of two horses rapidly de- 
 scending the almost perpendicular 
 face of the mountain made Berthold 
 turn his head. The horsemen were 
 two knights, in black armor, mount- 
 ed on steeds of the same color. 
 Their eyes shone like blazing coals 
 through the bars of their closed hel- 
 mets ; to the arm of each was fas- 
 tened the morgenstern of ancient 
 Germany, a club studded with long 
 iron points, apparently reeking with 
 human gore, and streams of fire 
 waved above their helmets instead 
 of plumes. 
 
 The gloomy knights drew up in 
 silence on either side of the terrified 
 officer, snatched the reins from his 
 trembling hands, and the three 
 horses dashed along at lightning 
 speed; mountain after mountain 
 disappeared; sparks of fire darted 
 from the stones of the road, and dis- 
 tance was no sooner perceived than 
 
 * passed. Frail bridges of flexible 
 branches, spanning cataracts so 
 fearful that even the boldest hun- 
 ter of the Alps would scarce set 
 foot upon them, were crossed with 
 the swiftness of the wind. The re- 
 gions of eternal snow were quickly 
 gained, and the horses, redoubling 
 their fury, made straight for a tre- 
 mendous gulf, where, far down as 
 the eye could see, rolled a mountain 
 stream, its noise hardly perceptible 
 from the immense height above. 
 Suddenly, from amidst those gloomy 
 waters, reddened at times by sub- 
 terranean fires, a multitude of 
 hoarse, hollow voices were heard. 
 " Kevenge ! revenge ! " they cried ; 
 "give us the seducer, the false 
 friend, the duellist!" 
 
 "We bring him!" replied the 
 knights, brandishing their ponder- 
 ous clubs. 
 
 A cold sweat bedewed Berthold's 
 brow; his hair stood on end, and 
 his features were convulsed with 
 mortal terror; for amongst those 
 accusing voices there were many 
 that he well knew — voices that 
 pierced his very soul: remorse be 
 gan to speak as loud as fear within 
 his wretched soul. 
 
niSTORT OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VJRGTN MART. 
 
 " Give us the gambler, the slan- * 
 derer, the blasphemer, the perjured!" 
 cried the voices from the abyss; 
 and Berthold's gloomy companions, 
 laughing within their helmets, with 
 a clanking, horrible laugh, answered 
 the voices from below : " We bring 
 him! we bring him I" 
 
 " Give us the impious I " 
 
 "We bring him!" was still the 
 answer of the black knights, and 
 Berthold well nigh lost his senses. 
 
 Already were the three horsemen 
 on the edge of a steep rock over- 
 hanging the dread abyss. . . Another 
 moment, and all were over. . . . But 
 suddenly the two black knights 
 stopped in the midst of a furious 
 gallop, and stood still and mute 
 as statues. The light tinkle of a 
 bell was heard from afar: it was 
 the midnight office ringing in Our 
 Lady's Chapel at Einsiedeln. Ber- 
 thold understood that Mary's influ- 
 ence had paralyzed the fearful 
 power which was dragging him 
 down to hell, and, hastily making 
 the sign of the cross, he fervently 
 recommended himself to the pro- 
 tecting Virgin, who seemed to inter- 
 pose between him and the condign 
 punishment which his conscience 
 
 told him he so well deserved. The 
 bell ceased ringing, and the youn^i 
 officer felt his heart sink as he saw 
 the two knights once more moving 
 on their black coursers. But the 
 voice of repentance had ascended 
 to the starry throne of Mary; and 
 the demons, with an impotent ges- 
 ture of rage and despair, plunged 
 headlong into the chasm, leaving 
 Berthold alone on the brink. The 
 moon, just then emerging from a 
 mass of dark clouds, shone brightly 
 down from her meridian height, and 
 the officer discovered, to his great 
 surprise, that he was on the highest 
 ridge of the mountains, and would 
 find it extremely difficult to descend. 
 Some days after, the young noble- 
 man went barefooted to Our Lady 
 of Hermits^ to the great amazement 
 of his boon companions, and made 
 a vow, in expiation of his sinful 
 orgies, never to drink any other 
 beverage than the pure water from 
 the spring. 
 
 In a remote corner of the canton 
 of Underwald, on the edge of a path 
 which winds in a serpentine form 
 amongst the rocky knolls which 
 cover the mountain-side, at the nar- 
 rowest part of the pass, where the 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 529 
 
 traveller sees below the most fright- 
 ful precipices, and above overhang- 
 ing masses of rock, where death 
 seems threatening on either hand, 
 there stands a small open chapel, 
 adorned with simple pictures of the 
 Blessed Yirgin. That gracious im- 
 age, placed thus so far from any 
 habitation, and from all human suc- 
 cor, has received the name of Our 
 Lady of the Traveller. This place, 
 often accursed, was long ago called 
 the DeviVs CuUender. After trying 
 in vain to make it more secure, peo- 
 ple conceived the idea of building a 
 chapel, and placing in it a sacred 
 image, so that no one might forget, 
 how great soever was his danger, 
 to invoke the holy name of God, 
 and make the sign of the cross. 
 But where were workmen to be 
 found bold enough to undertake the 
 work ? This obstacle was speedily 
 got over, for several came forward 
 and repaired to the spot, after 
 renewing their fervor bv hearing: 
 Mass. And the Mother of God, will- 
 ing to show these pious workmen 
 that their heroic devotion was pleas- 
 ing to her, made fast the tottering 
 rocks by virgin^ s threads^ fastened to 
 the grass and moss. " Ever since," 
 
 * say the Swiss of Underwald, "the 
 passage is safe; no accident hap- 
 pens there either day or night. Our 
 Lady is so good as to protect all 
 the passers by, even those who do 
 not see, or will not honor her." * 
 
 The pilgrimage of Maria Zell, in 
 Austria, is almost as famous as that 
 of Einsiedeln. Its founder, whose 
 name is no longer known, was a 
 monk of the abbey of St. Lambert, 
 who took up his abode, about the 
 middle of the twelfth century, in the 
 vale of Affleuz, for the purpose of 
 converting some Carinthian tribes 
 who were still idolaters. This pious 
 German missionary brought with 
 him a small wooden statue of the 
 Blessed Yirgin, which he exposed 
 to the veneration of his neophytes' 
 on the trunk of a fallen tree, for 
 want of other pedestal. The Carin- 
 thian shepherds sheltered their Ma- 
 donna as well as they could, in a 
 sort of hut erected by them for the 
 purpose, and went in crowds tc 
 invoke her in that humble shed, 
 where their simple demands were 
 often heard and granted by the 
 powerful Virgin. 
 
 Such was the commencement of 
 
 * See M. Veuillofc, Voyage en Suisse, 1829. 
 
530 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 this famous pilgrimage, now fre- 
 quented by emperore and princes. 
 In 1220, Henry, margrave of Mo- 
 ravia, and his wife Agnes, in grati- 
 tude for a marvellous cure obtained 
 through the intercession of Mary, 
 built the stone chapel which is now 
 seen in the middle of the church ; 
 on its altar was placed the sacred 
 image, which had till then remained 
 on the stump. Louis I., king of 
 Hungary, after gaining an unhoped- 
 for victory over the Turks, erected 
 the church which surrounds the 
 chapel. The Mussulmans Bun-ound- 
 ed Maria Zell, in 1530 ; but, at the 
 moment when the chief was direct- 
 ing the point of his lance against 
 the miraculous statue of the Virgin, 
 he was struck with blindness, and 
 his soldiers, seized with terror, took 
 flight. The emperors Mathias, Ferdi- 
 nand n., Ferdinand III., and Leopold 
 L, made the pilgrimage of Maria Zell. 
 In 1728, Maria Theresa made her 
 lirst communion there ; in 1814, the 
 Emperor Francis went thither him- 
 self; and the late emperor,^ no less 
 devout to Mary than his great an- 
 cestors, made that pilgrimage with 
 the empress and a part of his court. 
 A. magnificent offering of precious 
 
 stones signalized the munificence 
 of the two illustrious pilgrims who 
 went to solicit the aid of the Queen 
 of Heaven in governing their peo- 
 ple wisely and paternally, as their 
 pious and glorious ancestors did 
 before them. 
 
 On the shores of the lUyrian Sea 
 there rises, about two thousand feet 
 above the level of the sea, a moun- 
 tain, which bears the name of 
 Monte- Santo ; on the top of this 
 mountain there is a Franciscan 
 monastery, which possesses the 
 miraculous image of St. Mary of 
 Castagnavizza. King Charles X., 
 a good prince and a pious mon- 
 arch, reposes there under the 
 guardian care of the heavenly 
 patroness of France ; one day, per- 
 haps, when the stormy passions 
 of men have subsided, six feet of 
 French earth will be granted to 
 the descendants of St. Louis, of 
 Henry IV., and of Louis XIV. 
 
 In the palatinate of Kalish, in 
 Poland, there is a small town, 
 seated advantageously on a height, 
 and praised for the strength of its 
 fortifications even in 1750. This 
 town, named Czenstochowa, was al- 
 ways garrisoned by companies of 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 531 
 
 artillery; but it was best known 
 through its abbey of the Fathers of 
 Death, or the congregation of St. 
 Paul, which contained a miracu- 
 lous image of Mary ; both natives 
 and foreigners flocked to this sanc- 
 tuary, where every wealthy pilgrim 
 left magnificent offerings. Besides 
 the image of the Madonna, which, 
 according to the monks, is the 
 identical poftrait of the Virgin 
 painted by St. Luke (an opinion 
 somewhat questionable), they ex- 
 pose to the veneration of the faith- 
 ful a more authentic relic : the table 
 at which the Holy Family took 
 their meals. Polish sentinels were 
 stationed at the gate of Our Lady 
 of Czenstochowa, and in different 
 parts of the monastery ; fresh- 
 blown flowers were every morning 
 laid at the Virgin's feet ; but not 
 all the sweet and simple grace of 
 Mary's worship could exclude from, 
 that chapel a sort of religious 
 horror which froze one's very blood. 
 The catacombs, with their mournful 
 ornaments of human bones, were 
 scarcely more frightful than those 
 spectral-looking monks, who wore 
 on their drapery the death's-head 
 and cross-bones, such as we see on 
 
 * funeral-palls,* and had similar de- 
 vices painted in a hundred differ- 
 ent places through the church. 
 This devotion to the Virgin of 
 Czenstochowa has been transplant- 
 ed into France by the Poles of our 
 own times. A pious Polish family, 
 residing in the neighborhood of 
 Paris, conceived the idea of inau- 
 gurating the image of the tutelary 
 Madonna of Poland in an ancient 
 oak of the Forest of St. Germain. 
 On the 13th of August, 1840, a 
 Polish ecclesiastic, in the presence 
 of a multitude of Poles of both 
 sexes, consecrated the sacred image 
 in the beautiful tree chosen for its 
 temple (doubtless, for want of 
 means to build one) ; then, all the 
 assembly, kneeling on the grass, 
 began to recite aloud the Litany 
 of the Blessed Virgin ; they then 
 prayed for the dead, and for their 
 beloved country; they besought 
 Heaven for happier days, and dis- 
 persed with their souls strength- 
 ened and encouraged by that re- 
 ligious sentiment which gives men 
 patience and fortitude. 
 
 Belgium has been always dis- 
 tinguished amongst the nations of 
 
 * Hint, des Ordres Monastiques, t. iii., ch. 44. 
 
Europe for its teodet devotioa to * 
 Marj ; of the noinerDiis pilgrimages 
 which it had, and stiU has, we will 
 only mentioii that of Oar Ladj of 
 Hall, of which an interesting de- 
 scription was left OS by one of the 
 most learned writes of the seven- 
 te^ith centory, Jostos Iipsi& 
 
 Oor Lady of Hall is situated in 
 a pretty town sarroonded by a fine 
 and fertile country, watered by the 
 Senne; it is considered a beaatifiil 
 chorch even in that old Cathc^ic 
 land, where the chorches are truly 
 magnificent Hie Tirgin^ chapel 
 is on the left-hand side. The statae 
 is of gilt wood, and is crowned with 
 fine g(M. With 'one hand the Vir- 
 gin supports her drrine Son, and 
 with the other she presents a lily, 
 that charming flower, the emblem 
 of chastity, poetically named by the 
 inhabitants of the Pyrenees, An- 
 dredotta Maria arrosa (the Virgin 
 Mary's rose). In former times, she 
 wore on her breast six large pearls, 
 with a beautiful ruby in their 
 midst Twelve towns or cities, who 
 had experienced the effects of her 
 protection, undertook the charge of 
 her adornment Every year, on the 
 first Sunday of September, their ^ 
 
 deputies bron^it her twelve mag- 
 nificent robes, in token of gratitude 
 and dcFotioiL On that day a sol- 
 emn proees^on toc^ place, and the 
 image of the Virgin was borne in 
 triumph by the twdve deputies 
 through the city of Hall and its 
 suborbs. The people of Liege are 
 also in the habit df going there 
 every year, in procession, on the 
 Feast of Pentecost* • 
 
 SevCTal princes have contributed 
 to enrich this sanctuary. Over the 
 altar, according to Justus Lipsis, 
 were seen the twelve Apostles^ and 
 on either side, an angel with a 
 lamp; the whole of solid silver. 
 So altar could bosst so great a 
 numb^ (^ lamps, coats -of -arms, 
 banners, croBBes, chalices, and \2^ 
 rioos figures in gold and silvo". 
 Philip the Good, duke of Burgundy, 
 gave, among other rich presents, a 
 seocmd statue of the Virgin, with a 
 cavalry soldier and a foot-soldier, 
 fully accoutred, all of silver; Charies, 
 his son, gave a silver £Edcon ; the 
 Emperor Maximilian enriched this 
 shrine with a golden tree; Charies 
 V. with a coat- of- arms ; Pope Ju- 
 
 * Dtm Fir^o AiOouu.— Millot, Bid. da Trom- 
 AmU, t l, p. 467. 
 
HISTOBT OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIBOm MABT. 
 
 533 
 
 lias n. with a silver lamp. To the 
 right were seen the statnes of the 
 Emperor Maximilian, Albert, duke 
 of Saxony, and one of their conr- 
 tiers, in a kneeling posture. Ova* 
 their heads were hung the banners 
 sent by conquerors as offerings to 
 Mary. There was also a jRemon^ 
 stromoe of silT^ gilt^ of consider- 
 able weight, given by Henry VilL 
 of England. Justus lipsis him- 
 seH not content with having care- 
 fiilly written the history of Oar 
 Lady of Hall, hong up his silv^ 
 pen before Mary's image. 
 
 After the Holy Sepolehre and 
 St. Peter's in Rome, there is not in 
 all Christendom a pilgrimage more 
 £amoas than that of ihe Holy House 
 of Loretto, — ScmUssmia casa di Lo- 
 reto. The Holy House of N^azareth 
 was venerated by Christians even 
 in the lifetime of the Apostles, and 
 St. Helen surrounded it by a temple 
 which received the name of St 
 Mary. Und^ the domination of the 
 Arabian caliphs, crowds of Euro- 
 pean pilgrims went to adore €rod 
 and honor his Mother in that sim- 
 ple, holy dwelling where Jesus and 
 Mary led, for so many years, a \a^ 
 borious and hidden life; but when 
 
 ■^ the Turks had subjugated their for- 
 mer masters, the Christian pilgrims 
 who ventured into Syria to visit 
 Jerusalem and Nazareth, were so 
 barbarously treated, that the West 
 became thoroughly exasperated, and 
 rushed fordi as one man to do battle 
 against the infidels. 
 
 Whai Godfrey de Bouillon was 
 proclaimed king of Jerusalem, Tan- 
 cred (whose valorous deeds have 
 be^i sung by Tasso) was named 
 governor of Galilee: that prince, 
 who was very devout to Mary, en- 
 riched the Church of Kazaretfa with 
 sumptuous gifts. 
 
 Alter the disastrous expedition 
 of St. Louis, tMs comer of the earth, 
 which was r^arded as the cradle 
 of Christianity, was defended, foot 
 by foot, by the brave Knights of the 
 Temple, who shed tears of rage and 
 blood, seeing the holy places pro- 
 faned by the Saracens. 
 
 Galilee having &llen under the 
 Mohsmunedan yoke, though whiten- 
 ed with the bcmes of Christian war- 
 riOTS, " God would not p^mit Mary's 
 hsAj house," says Father Torsellini,* 
 ** to remain exposed to the profana- 
 tion of the Barbarians; he had it 
 
 * Mstanm LmmrdrnKA, eh. 2, p. 6L 
 
534 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 conveyed by angels to Sclavonia, * 
 and thence to the March of Ancona, 
 where it was placed in the midst of 
 a laurel grove belonging to a pious 
 and noble widow named Lauretta. 
 It was rumored abroad," he adds, 
 "that on the arrival of the Holy 
 House, the tall trees of the Italian 
 forest bowed down in token of re- 
 spect, and further, that they retained 
 that inclination till the winds or the 
 woodman's axe laid them prostrate 
 on the ground." 
 
 The Church of Loretto, one of the 
 most beautiful in Italy, 4as been 
 tastefully and munificently adorned 
 by the popes, who often went there 
 as pilgrims ; three doors of chased 
 bronze give admission to the holy 
 temple, in the centre of which 
 stands the Holy House, with its 
 covering of white marble, adorned 
 with magnificent basso -relievo, de- 
 signed by Bramante, and executed 
 by Sansovino, Sangallo, and Bandi- 
 nelli. 
 
 The miraculous statue of the Vir- 
 gin is thirty-three inches in height ; 
 it is carved in cedar-wood, covered 
 
 * The altar of the Madonna is radiant with 
 gold and jewels. {.Italy, by Lady Morgan, voL 
 iii., ch. 25.) 
 
 with the richest drapery, and placed 
 on an altar sparkling with jewels.* 
 It is said that the niche in which it 
 stands is overlaid with gold.f Nu- 
 merous lamps of massive silver are 
 constantly burning before it. 
 
 La sola del tesoro (the treasure- 
 room) no longer displays the bound- 
 less wealth that it did in former 
 times ; but even in our days it has 
 received some splendid gifts from 
 popes and princes. Amongst these 
 pious offerings is seen an ostensory 
 of gold enriched with diamonds, a 
 chalice and a censer, offered to the 
 Madonna by the Emperor Napoleon; 
 a chalice of silver gilt adorned with 
 rubies and beryls, presented in 
 1819 by Prince Eugene Beauhar- 
 nais ; another chalice ornamented 
 with brilliants, by the Princess of 
 Bavaria, his w^ife ; a large cross of 
 gold and diamonds, and a crown of 
 amethysts, rubies, and diamonds, 
 offered, in 1816, by the King and 
 Queen of Spain, then on their pil- 
 grimage to Loretto; a bouquet of 
 diamonds, offered, in 1815, by Ma- 
 ria-Louisa, sister of the King of 
 
 f La vaga nicchia e ricoperta di lame d'oro, 
 (Don Vincenzo Murri, Storia deUa Santa Gasa.) ' 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 586 
 
 Spain, Queen of Etruria, and Duch- 
 ess of Lucca ; an immense heart of 
 the purest gold, with a jewel in the 
 centre, suspended by a chain of em- 
 eralds and amethysts, the Emperor 
 of Austria's gift to the Madonna. 
 It would be impossible to enume- 
 rate all the precious stones and rich 
 presents of every kind offered by 
 kings and princes, under the simple 
 title of dono di una pia persona (the 
 gift of a pious person) on the regis- 
 ter which contains the names of the 
 benefactors of the Holy House. 
 
 The music of the beautiful Litany 
 of Our Lady of Loretto was the 
 offering wherewith a famous Flor- 
 entine composer repaid a miracle 
 of the Virgin in the beginning of 
 the eighteenth century. This com- 
 poser, named Barroni, suddenly lost 
 his hearing, like Beethoven; after 
 exhausting all the efforts of art, he 
 besought the assistance of Mary, 
 and made a pilgrimage to Our Lady 
 of Loretto. There he was cured, 
 after having prayed with fervor and 
 devotion ; in his gratitude to the 
 Holy Madonna he composed a cho- 
 rus of praise in her honor, which, 
 under the title of the Litany of Lo- 
 retto, was executed for the first time 
 
 * on the 15th of August, 1737. This 
 Litany is since sung every year on 
 the Feast of the Madonna ; Rossini, 
 passing by Our Lady of Loretto, 
 was struck with the beauty of the 
 music, and is said to have intro- 
 duced it into his TamirediJ^ 
 
 The popes have taken pleasure in 
 showing their respect for Mary by 
 their tender solicitude for her mirac- 
 ulous shrine at Loretto. Pope Pius 
 Y. offered to the Holy House two 
 silver statues of St. Peter and St. 
 Paul ; he did still better by turning 
 from its natural channel a river 
 whose waters, sluggish and partly 
 stagnant, sent up the most unwhole- 
 some exhalations to the top of the 
 hill, where a small town was formed 
 in the shade of Mary's magnificent 
 church. Gregory XHL founded a 
 college for the Illyrian youth within 
 the very bounds of Loretto, as if to 
 console the Dalmatians for the loss 
 of the Madonna, who stopped but a 
 moment amongst them ere she took 
 her flight to the lovely shores of 
 Italy. Sixtus V. founded the Order 
 of the Knights of Loretto, specially 
 intended to protect the coast of the 
 Mediterranean from the incursions 
 
 * Gazette Musicale. 
 
686 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 of the Barbarians. Benedict XIV. t 
 embellished this sanctuary with per- 
 sistent generosity ; and Pius VII., on 
 being liberated, went to kneel be- 
 fore Our Lady's altar before he re- 
 turned to Rome, and left, as a mark 
 of his passage, a superb golden 
 chalice with this inscription : " The 
 sovereign pontiff, Pius VII., restored 
 to liberty on the Feast of the Annun- 
 ciation, being on his return from 
 France to Rome, left at Loretto this 
 token of his gratitude and devo- 
 tion." His Holiness, Gregory XVL, 
 likewise made the pilgplnmge to 
 Loretto. 
 
 The Spaniards have conseci-ated 
 to Mary the lofty mountain of Mont- 
 serrat, ten leagues from Barcelona, 
 which was, according to the cele- 
 brated naturalist Humboldt, the 
 great Atlas of the ancients ; spread 
 out beneath lies the fair kingdom of 
 Valencia, the ancient garden of the 
 Hesperides. This mountain, whose 
 singular form gave rise to its name 
 of Monte-Serrats (the cut mountain), 
 seems composed of detached pieces, 
 which make it appear divided, and 
 covered with spiral cones, so that at 
 a distance it would be taken for the 
 work of man. Seen from afar, it is 
 
 a pile of grottoes and gothic pyra- 
 mids ; on a nearer view, each par- 
 ticular cone appears a mountain, 
 and all these cones, terminated by 
 miniature spires, forms an enormous 
 mass about live leagues in circum- 
 ference. It was probably this 
 strange configuration that gave rise 
 to the fable of the giants heaping 
 mountain on mountain in order to 
 scale the heavens. 
 
 On a platform of this famous 
 mountain was built the superb con- 
 vent dedicated to the Blessed Vir- 
 gin, one of the most renowned pil- 
 grimages in the Christian world. 
 The foundation of this noble monas- 
 tery is recorded as follows, in an 
 inscription over a large picture of 
 the same time (1239): In the year 
 808, under the government of Geof- 
 fry the Bearded, count of Barcelona, 
 three young shepherds having, one 
 evening, seen a great light coming 
 down from heaven, and heard melo- 
 dious music in the air, went and 
 told their friends. The bishop of 
 Manresa repaired to the spot, ac- 
 companied by a magistrate and a 
 great number of the people ; they 
 also beheld the heavenly light, and 
 after searching for some time, they 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 537 
 
 discovered the image of the Virgin, 
 which they resolved to take to Man- 
 resa; but, on reaching the place 
 where the monastery now is, be- 
 hold! they could go no farther. 
 This prodigy induced the Count of 
 Barcelona to build a convent there 
 for nuns, whom he procured from 
 the royal abbey of las Fttellas, in 
 Barcelona ; the first abbess of Our 
 Lady of Montserrat was his daugh- 
 ter Richilda, who took possession of 
 it about the year 895. This com- 
 munity of nuns existed till 976, 
 when Borrell, count of Barcelona, 
 with the pope's consent, established 
 the Benedictines on Montserrat. 
 
 The convent of Montserrat is a 
 grand and noble building, situated 
 on a narrow table-land of the moun- 
 tain, known by the name of St. 
 Mary's Platform ; it is overhung by 
 enormous rocks, which seem ever on 
 the point of falling ; it is defended 
 by the declivities of the mountain, 
 like natural fortifications, and, on 
 the side where it is accessible, by 
 six strong towers. Besides the con- 
 vent and church of Our Lady, the 
 fortified inclosure contains a lodg- 
 ing-house for travellers, an hospital, 
 and an infirmary. The Church of 
 
 * Our Lady of Montserrat, though 
 having but one nave, is yet very 
 spacious; the choir -stalls are of 
 remarkable workmanship. The face 
 of the Virgin's image is almost 
 black, like that of Toledo, Guada- 
 loupe, and many others in Spain ; 
 it represents Our Blessed Lady of 
 a matronly figure, and advanced in 
 age ; although very dark, her face 
 is beautiful ; she is seated on a sort 
 of throne, and holds in her right 
 hand a globe, from which springs a 
 fleur de lys, while with the other 
 she supports the Divine Child, sit- 
 ting on her knee, giving benediction 
 with his right hand, and holding in 
 the other a globe surmounted by a 
 cross. . 
 
 The inhabitants of the mountain 
 are divided into four classes, namely, 
 monks, hermits, choristers, and lay- 
 brothers, who regularly and unin- 
 terruptedly succeed each other at 
 prayer. The place is so arranged, 
 that the singing in the monastery is 
 heard in the different hermitages; 
 and the bells of the latter, repeated 
 by the echoes, is conveyed from one 
 station to another round the whole 
 mountain. The top of Montserrat 
 commands one of the finest pros- 
 
588 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 pects in the world, consisting of the * 
 kingdoms of Valencia and Murcia, 
 and* even the Balearic Isles. 
 
 Spanish kings and princes often 
 ascended on foot the mountain-path 
 which leads to Mary's altar; and 
 numberless captives went thither, 
 in the old times, to hang up the 
 chaiife, which they had worn among 
 the Mooi*s. St. Ignatius Loyola, 
 before he devoted his life to relig- 
 ion, went there to Inake his vigil of 
 armsy according to ^Ihe custom of 
 ancient chivalry, with whose spirit 
 
 he was strongly,. imbued^V "After 
 having passed the nigh^ in prayer," 
 says Father Bouhoui-s, fiis biogra- 
 pher, "and solemnly consecrated 
 himself to the Yirgin,, as her, knight, 
 in conformity with those martial 
 ideas in which he conceived the 
 things of God, he hung his sword 
 on a pillar near the altar, as a sign 
 that he renounced the secular ser- 
 vice ; then, after receiving the Holy 
 Communion very early in the morn- 
 ings he left Montserrat." 
 
 Our Lady of the Pillar, at Sara- 
 gossa, is one of the oldest and most 
 magnificent pilgrimages in Spain. 
 King Ferdinand went there with 
 Queen Christina a short time before 
 
 his death; and both, after praying 
 devoutly, like true Catholic princes, 
 before the venerated image of the 
 Virgin of Saragossa, left her, at their 
 departure, munificent proofs of their 
 devotion. 
 
 The cathedral dedicated to Mary 
 is a vast building, five hundred feet 
 in length, with three spacious naves, 
 and a multitude of chapels. Mod- 
 ern travellers speak with admira- 
 tion of these chapels of marble and 
 of jasper, hung round with offerings 
 of gold, silver, and precious stones ; 
 its silver lamps shed such a daz- 
 zling radiance on those walls, cov- 
 ered with bright and precious ob- 
 jects, that it produces around the 
 statue, itself\sparkling with jewels, 
 such an overpowering brightness 
 that the eye can scarcely bear to 
 rest upon it ; the whole like a splen- 
 did vision, with the glitter of gold 
 and the flash of rubies and dia- 
 monds. The Virgin's statue stands 
 on a jasper column about three feet 
 high ; her garments and jewels were 
 valued at several millions of pounds. 
 
 A pilgrimage, still very famous in 
 Spain, is that of Our Lady of Gua- 
 daloupe. Father Mariana assures 
 us that this image, which was re- 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 539 
 
 nowned so early as the fourth cen- 
 tury, was sent by Pope Gregory the 
 Great to St. Leander, bishop of 
 Seville. King Alfonso endowed this 
 shrine in 1340, and annexed it to 
 his private domains. Forty-nine 
 years after, Don Juan I. gave it to 
 some Jeromite monks, together with 
 the lordship of a large town formed 
 in the neighborhood. The convent, 
 which took the name of . Santa 
 Maria^ is situated in the midst of 
 the present town ; and, as times 
 were very unsettled when it was 
 first founded, it has rather the ap- 
 pearance of a stately fortress than 
 of a peaceful monastery. It has an 
 infirmary for the sick -poor, a cara- 
 vanserai for strangers, two colleges, 
 and some fine cloisters. 
 
 In 1389, the famous Spanish arch- 
 itect, Juan Alfonso, commenced the 
 church, which has three naves, and 
 its walls are hung round with mag- 
 nificent offerings, acknowledging, as 
 the Spaniards say, more than three 
 thousand authentic miracles wrought 
 by the Blessed Yirgin. Her image 
 is over the high altar, and was lit, 
 some years ago, by more than one 
 hundred lamps of massive silver ; 
 she is clothed in white, and has the 
 
 * Divine Infant in her arms. Queen 
 Donua Maria, wife of Juan 11., her 
 son, Don Henrico, and many other 
 princes, chose their burial-place in 
 this church, which is adorned with 
 good paintings by Zurbaran and 
 Jordans. 
 
 The devotion to Our Lady of Gua- 
 daloupe crossed the ocean, and was 
 establishda 'by miracles in Mexico, 
 a country entirely devoted to the 
 Mother of God. It is recorded, in a 
 narrative published at Rome in 
 1786, that a converted Indian, who 
 went every Saturday to Mexico — 
 eight miles from his own village — 
 to hear mass in honor of the Blessed 
 Yirgin, had a miraculous vision on 
 a hill formerly very famous among 
 the Mexican idolaters, who named 
 it Tepijacac, and consecrated it to 
 Tonantim, the mother of the gods. 
 One Saturday, being the 9th of De- 
 cember, A. D. 1531, the pious Diego, 
 passing the foot of this hill, heard a 
 soft strain of music, which he took 
 at first for the singing of birds ; but 
 on listening more attentively, he 
 was inclined to attribute it rather 
 to the angels. Over the Tepijacac 
 hovered a variegated cloud of the 
 loveliest hues imaginable, and from 
 
140 
 
 RISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 it came forth a sweet voice, call- 
 ing the pious Mexican by name. 
 Amazed, and unable to account for 
 this strange adventure, Diego climb- 
 ed the hill, on the summit of which 
 he perceived a woman of the most 
 majestic beauty : from her white 
 drapery issued rays of light, w^hich, 
 reflected on the surrounding rocks, 
 seemed to have transformed them 
 into precious stones. The Blessed 
 Virgin, for she it was, told Diego 
 that she wished to have a temple 
 built to her on that hill, under the 
 name of Our Lady of Guadaloupe, 
 and commanded him to acquaint 
 Juan de Zumarraga, who was then 
 bishop of Mexico. The prelate lis- 
 tened in silence to this strange 
 recital, and dismissed the Indian, 
 telling him that he would need to 
 be assured of the truth of his state- 
 ment, and to have a more convinc- 
 ing sign of the will of Heaven. 
 Apprised by her messenger of the 
 ill success of his mission, the Virgin 
 ordered him to ascend the hill and 
 gather a bunch of flowers. Now, it 
 was not the season for flowers, and, 
 moreover, the top of the rock had 
 as yet produced only briers and 
 thorns ; but Diego obeyed, never- 
 
 f theless, and his submission was re- 
 warded, for he quickly found him- 
 self in the midst of flowers, balmy 
 and beautiful ; he proceeded to cull 
 a nosegay, which Mary told him tc 
 present to the bishop. " He will 
 believe this time," said the Virgin, 
 with a smile. 
 
 Diego repairs to the episcopal 
 palace, where the fragrance of the 
 flowers hid under his cloak attracts 
 the attention of the officers of the 
 household ; they force Diego to let 
 them see them, and stretch out their 
 hands to take them. Astonishment ! 
 the flowers are imprinted on the 
 cloth, and are nothing more, as it 
 were, than painted roses and lilies I 
 The bishop appears, and Diego, 
 opening the folds of his garment, 
 now exhaling a celestial odor, finds, 
 to his extreme surprise, that the 
 flowers had shaded themselves into 
 a beautiful image of Mary. The 
 prelate, after prostrating himself, 
 takes the cloak from off the Mexi- 
 can's shoulders, and exposes it in 
 his chapel until another could be 
 built on the spot pointed out by the 
 Virgin. The church was erected as 
 soon as possible, and when it was 
 completed, the image was conveyed 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VntGIN MARY. 
 
 541 
 
 thither : ever after it performed 
 many miracles, and became the 
 most famous Madonna in America. 
 
 This new sanctuary being unable 
 to contain the crowds who flocked 
 thither, people thought of building 
 another, about the year 1695. The 
 archbishop of Mexico, Francisco de 
 Aquiar e Seixas, laid the first stone. 
 This is the splendid church now so 
 much admired. It cost 2,270,000 
 pounds. On the 1st of May, 1709, 
 the sacred image was transported 
 thither, and placed on a silver 
 throne valued at 400,000 francs. 
 The gifts increasing from day to 
 day, altars were constructed of the 
 finest marble, and the treasury was 
 enriched with precious vessels. The 
 great silver-gilt lamp alone weighs 
 more than six hundred and twenty 
 marks, and is still more valuable 
 from its workmanship. Around the 
 sanctuary runs a grand balustrade 
 of silver, continued as far as the 
 choir, which, according to the Span- 
 ish custom, occupies the lower end 
 of the church. This first railing is 
 protected by a second of precious 
 wood, adorned with an infinite num- 
 ber of silver figures of exquisite 
 workmanship. A vice-king of Mex- 
 
 * ico, Don Antonio-Maria Buccarelli, 
 surrounded the image with a cornice 
 of massive gold, and enriched the 
 altar with twelve golden candle- 
 sticks. In 1749, a chapter was 
 founded for the service of this sanc- 
 tuary. 
 
 Mexico was solemnly consecrated 
 to Our Lady of Guadaloupe, and her 
 feast was fixed on the 12th of De- 
 cember, with an octave, as a festi- 
 val of the first class. Benedict XIV. 
 extended this festival to all the do- 
 minions of the Catholic king. A 
 town has since sprung up around 
 the sanctuary. Guadaloupe is the 
 Loretto of America. The image 
 represents an Immaculate Concep- 
 tion, with the inscription : Non fecit 
 taliter omni nationi.* 
 
 We will content ourselves with 
 the pilgrimages already described, 
 as they are the most famous in 
 Christendom : it would be tedious 
 to enumerate all those which still 
 exist in Catholic countries. We 
 will merely mention, then. Our Lady 
 of Lampadouze, placed, like a bea- 
 con, on a desert isle, between Malta 
 
 * The Mexicans, to show their respect for Our 
 Lady of Guadaloupe, gave her name to their 
 first steamboat. 
 
Ml mSTORT OF THE DEVOTIOK TO THE BLESSED VTROTN MART. 
 
 ftnd the African coast, whose lamp, f 
 kept up alternately by Christians 
 and Mussulmans, burned uninter- 
 ruptedly for ages ; Our Lady of 
 Monte-Nero, overiooking Livoume, 
 whose church is frequented by an 
 innumerable crowd of pilgrims, and 
 its walls covered with ex-wlo; it 
 commands a view of that fair Tus- 
 can sea into which the ItaUan maid- 
 ens cast, on the eve of the Virgin's 
 festivals, those garlands of flowers 
 which they once offered to the 
 nymphs of Amphytrion ; Our Lady 
 of Jftrcy, near Savona, in the valley 
 of St Bernard, the fairest sanctuary 
 constructed by the piety of the (xen- 
 oese people in honor of Mary ; Our 
 Lady of Consolation, in Turin ; Our 
 Lady of Charme, in Mamienne; Our 
 Lady of Chasms, near Chambery; 
 and Our Lady of Passaw, where the 
 French priests, driven from home 
 by the Revolutionary bayonets, went 
 to pray for a happy return to their 
 coimtiy — sighing for the limpid 
 streams of France on the banks of 
 
 the majestic Danube, the king of 
 German rivers. 
 
 As to the other sanctuaries of 
 Mary scattered all over the world, 
 the greater part will be found in 
 the annexed Historical Calendar. 
 This calendar, published during the 
 minority of Louis XTV., contains 
 all the pilgrimages of the Virgin 
 throughout Christendom, with a 
 number of pious foundations, which 
 render it extremely valuable ; it is, 
 moreover, a very rare work, only to 
 be found in libraries. It is needless 
 to say that things have changed 
 since then, and that many religious 
 edifices consecrated to the Mother 
 of Grod, and then in a flourishing 
 condition, are now but a heap of 
 ruins — thanks to the " march of in- 
 tellect " and the " age of progress." 
 This calendar, which completes our 
 notice of the pilgrimages, is given 
 without other authority than that 
 of the writere quoted, t(^ther with 
 the dates and miracles as they 
 stand from age to age. 
 
HISTORICAL CALENDAR 
 
 (£>f tl)e ScastB of tl)£ Blcsscb Virgin, 
 
 WITH THF FOUNDATIONS AND CHURCHES DEDICATED TO HER. 
 
 JANUABY. 
 
 1. Dedication of Our Lady of the Annuncia- 
 tion, in Florence, by Cardinal Guillaume d'Es- 
 tonville, a. d. 1452. In this church is preserved 
 a picture of the Annunciation, which was found 
 miraculously finished when the painter came to 
 give it the last touches. Archangel. Janius. 
 
 2. Foundation of the Abbey of Dunes, in 
 Flanders, in honor of the Virgin, a. d. 1128, by 
 Foulques, a Benedictine monk. Chronic. Ber- 
 tinense. 
 
 3. Our Lady of Sichem, near Louvain, in the 
 duchy of Brabant. This image is said to have 
 sweat four drops of blood in the year 1306. 
 Just. Lips, in Hist. Sichem, cap. 5. 
 
 4 Dedication of Our Lady of Treves, in Ger- 
 many, A. D. 746, by Hydolph, Archbishop of 
 Treves. The Princess Genevieve, wife of Sy- 
 fred, palatine of Treves, and daughter of the 
 Duke of Brabant, had this church built in a 
 wood on the very spot where Our Lady ap- 
 peared to her, and assured her that her inno- 
 cence should be recognized. Additiones ad Mo- 
 lanum de Sanctis Belgicis. 
 
 5. It is stated that on this day a paralytic 
 man was miraculously cured in the church of 
 Our Lady of Sichem, in Brabant. Just. Lips, in 
 Hist. Sichem, cap. 24. 
 
 6. Our Lady being on this day at the wed- 
 ding of Canaan, prevailed upon her Son, then 
 thirty years of age, to change water into wine ; 
 
 this was his first public miracle. 8. Epipn. 
 hceres. 51. 
 
 7. Our Lady's return from Egypt to Judea 
 with Jesus and St. Joseph. Martyrolog. Rom., 
 7 Januar. 
 
 8. Our Lady of the Beginning, in Naples. 
 This chapel was built by St. Helen, and^ons«- 
 crated by St. Sylvester, a. d. 320. Pet. Stephanus, 
 de Locis Sacris Neapolit. 
 
 9. Our Lady beyond the Tiber, in Rome. 
 This church was built by Calixtus L, A. r. 224. 
 Baronius in apparatu ad Annal. et in Annal. ad 
 ann. 224. 
 
 10. Our Lady of Guides, in Constantinople, 
 where there were some of Our Lady's spindles 
 to be seen, with some of the swaddling-clothes 
 of the Divine Infant, given by St. Pule-heria to 
 that church. Niceph., Tract. 3, cap. 7. 
 
 11. Our Lady of Bessiere, in Limousin. A 
 heretic who had scoflfed at the devotion testified 
 to this image, saw his house burned before his 
 eyes without any visible cause. Triple Couronne, 
 1. i., Trait. 2, S. 10, nomb. 6. 
 
 12. Our Lady of the Broad Street, in Rome, 
 built on the spot where St. Paul languished 
 for two years in chains, while he preached the 
 Gospel and wrote several of his Epistles. Trip. 
 Gout., place quoted, nomb. 6. 
 
 13. Pius Y. revises the Little Office of the 
 Blessed Yirgin, a. d. 1571. Balinghem in Calend. 
 
 14. Oi» Lady of Speech, near Montserrat, in 
 Spain; so called because she is said to have 
 
restored speeoh to a dumb man, a. d. 1514. s^ 
 BaHnghem in Calend. 
 
 15. Our Lady of the Porch, in Rome, where 
 may be seen an image said to have been brought 
 from heaven by an angel to the blessed Golla, 
 widow of the Consul Symmachus. Ex monv^ 
 ment. S. Maries in Portic. 
 
 16. Our Lady of Montserrat, in Spain, on 
 this day, miraculously delivers several captives 
 from the tyranny of the Turks. Hist. Montiaer. 
 
 17. Our Lady of Peace, in Rome. In the 
 year 1483, the Duke of Calabria having be- 
 sieged Rome to revenge himself on Sixtus IV. 
 for having prevented him from assisting the 
 Duke of Ferrara against the Venetians, the 
 Pontiff had recourse to the Queen of Heaven, 
 and engaged by vow to build her a church 
 under the title of Our Lady of Peace, if she 
 would vouchsafe to deliver the city from the 
 siege, and restore peace to Italy. His prayer 
 being heard, he accomplished his vow, and com- 
 menced a church, which was finished by his 
 successor, Innocent VIII. Gabriel Pennotus in 
 hint, tripartita Canon. reguL, 1. iii., cap. 33. 
 
 18. Our Lady of Dijon, in Burgundy. This 
 image, formerly called Our Lady of Hope, de- 
 livered the city from the fury of the Swiss, 
 A. D. 1513 ; in gratitude for this favor, a general 
 procession takes place every year. Trip. Cour., 
 nomb. 42. 
 
 19. Our Lady of Gimont, near Toulouse. 
 This Cistercian church is celebrated in that 
 part of the country for its miracles. Trip. Cour., 
 nomb. 34. 
 
 20. Our Lady of Tables, in Montpellier ; an 
 ancient and very famous church. In the arms 
 of the city the Virgin is seen holding her Divine 
 Son in her arms. Trip. Cour., nomb. 38. 
 
 21. Our Lady of Consolation, in Rome, at the 
 foot of the Capitol. This Madonna commenced 
 to work miracles in 1471. Trip. Cour., nomb. 38. 
 
 22. Espousals of Our Lady. This feast, long 
 celebrated in France by pious persons, was ap- 
 proved of by Pope Paul III,, in 154% Petrus 
 Aurattis, lib. de Imag. Virt., c. 10. ¥ 
 
 23. Espousals of Our Lady, according to the 
 custom of Arras. This feast was first celebrated 
 in the year 1556. Monutn. Eccles. Attrebat. 
 
 24. Our Lady of Damascus. There is said 
 to proceed from this image, painted on wood, a 
 miraculous oil, which restored sight, a. d. 1203, 
 to the Sultan of Damascus, infidel as he was. 
 In gratitude for this favor, he founded a lamp 
 to be kept constantly burning before the image. 
 Spond. in Annal., ad ann. 1203. 
 
 25. Translation of Our Lady's shroud and 
 tomb to Constantinople, by Juvenal, Bishop of 
 Jerusalem, in the reign of the Emperor Marcian, 
 A. D. 455. Ferreol, Locrius in Ghron. anacephal. 
 
 26. Our Lady of Long- Fields, founded in 
 1261, by Elizabeth, sister of St. Louis. OaUia 
 Christ., t. iv. 
 
 27. Our Lady of Life, at Venasque, in Prov- 
 ence. Chronicles say that this image frequently 
 restored life to unbaptized children, in order 
 that they might receive baptism. IHp. Cour., 
 nomb. 89. 
 
 28. Our Lady of Succor, near Rouen. This 
 image is famous throughout the country. Ex 
 archiv. hums ecclesia. 
 
 29. Our Lady of Chatillon-sur-Seine. Ber- 
 nard had a great devotion for this image, be- 
 cause of a miracle which it wrought in his 
 favor. Trip. Cour., nomb. 43. 
 
 30. Our Lady of the Rose, at Lucca, in Italy. 
 Three roses were found in the month of Jan- 
 uary in the arms of this image, according tc 
 a Latin chronicle. Ccesar Franciot. in hist. 
 Litcensi. 
 
 31. Apparition of Our Lady to Sister Angela 
 de Foligny. In e/'us vita. 
 
 FEBKUABY. 
 
 1. The Vigil of the Feast of the Purification. 
 Locrius in Calend. 
 
 2. The Purification of Uur Lady. This festi- 
 val was instituted in 544, under the Emperor 
 Justinian, on occasion of the plague which rav- 
 aged ConstantiQople, where ten thousand per- 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 545 
 
 sons somefemes died in one day. In the year 
 701, Pope Sergius added to this feast the so- 
 lemnity of the Tapers. Baronius in Annal. ad 
 ann. 544. 
 
 3. Our Lady of Seidaneida, near Damascus. 
 From this image, painted on wood, there flowed 
 an oil which was never exhausted, no matter 
 what quantity was taken. The virtue of this 
 oil was so great that it cured even the infidels 
 themselves. Arnold, abbas Lubec. ajpud Baron, ad 
 ann. 870, et apud Spondan. ad ann. 1203. 
 
 4. Our Lady of the Pillar, at Saragossa, in 
 Spain. So named because, according to the 
 ti'adition, the Blessed Virgin appeared to St. 
 James the Major on a pillar of jasper, a. d. 36, 
 and commanded him to build her a church, 
 which the Spaniards hold to have been the 
 first dedicated to Our Lady. Beutereus, 1. i., 
 c. 2 et 3. 
 
 5. Dedication of the first temple to Our Lady 
 by St. Peter, in Tripoli, now Tortosa. Ganisius, 
 I v.. de B. Virg., c. 32. 
 
 6. Our Lady of Louvain, in the Netherlands. 
 This Madonna, highly venerated in the country, 
 began to work miracles in 1444. Balinghem in 
 Galend. 
 
 7. Our Lady of Grace, in the Abbey of St. 
 Sauve, at Montreuil-sur-Mer. Ghronic S. Salvi. 
 
 8. Our Lady of the Lily, near Melun. This 
 abbey of Cistercian nuns was founded by Queen 
 Blanche, mother of St. Louis. Gall. Christ, t. 4. 
 
 9. Octave of the Purification of Our Lady, 
 established in the Cathedral of Saintes, because 
 it was said that on the night of the Octave the 
 bells were heard to ring harmoniously of their 
 own accord. The sacristans having hastened to 
 the church, beheld a number of strange men 
 with tapers in their hands, singing hymns of 
 honor to the Virgin, venerated in that church 
 under the title of Our Lady of Miracles, and, 
 entering softly, they begged the nearest of the 
 august band to give them his taper, in proof 
 of the prodigy. This taper is religiously pre- 
 served in that church. Sausseyus Martyr. Gall, 
 died. 
 
 * 
 
 10. Our Lady of the Dove, near Bologna, in 
 Italy, built, it is said, in the place marked out 
 by a dove, who kept for two days flying round 
 some masons who were at work, seeming to 
 them k) indicate a certain spot. Trip. Gour., 
 nomb, 107. 
 
 11. St. Mary of Liques, near Calais. This 
 monastery, of the Premonstratensian Order, was 
 founded in 1131, by Robert, lord of Liques. 
 Gall. Christ., t. iv. 
 
 12. Our Lady of Argenteuil, near Paris, built 
 by Clovis I., A. D. 101. This priory possesses a 
 part of Our Saviour's seamless garment. Thomas 
 Bosius, 1. ix., de Sig. eccl., c. 9. 
 
 13. Our Lady of the Hot Oven, in Bourges ; 
 so called because, in the year 526, a certain Jew, 
 it is said, shut up his son in a heated oven be- 
 cause he had received Baptism and the Holy 
 Communion ; he was taken out safe and sound, 
 thanks to the protection of Our Lady. A 
 church was built to the Blessed Virgin in mem- 
 ory of this event. Annales de France en Childe- 
 hert. 
 
 14. Our Lady of Bourburg, in Flanders. It 
 is said that this image having been struck by an 
 impious man, a. d. 1383, the sacrilegious offender 
 fell dead on the spot. Bzovius, ex Archiv. eccles. 
 Burburg. 
 
 15. Our Lady of Paris, built first by King 
 Childebert, a. d. 522. About the year 1257, St. 
 Louis had a more spacious one erected on the 
 same site, on the foundations laid by Philip 
 Augustus in 1191. Du Breuil, Theatre des Antiq. 
 de Paris, 1. i. 
 
 16. Our Lady of the Thorn, near Chalon, in 
 Champagne ; so famed because this image was 
 found in a hawthorn bush. Trip. Gour., nomb. 
 54. 
 
 17. Our Lady of Constantinople, formerly the 
 Jewish synagogue, which was converted into a 
 Christian church by the Emperor Justin the 
 Younger, a. d. 566. Locrius. 
 
 18. Our Lady of Laon, erected into a cathe- 
 dral, and founded by St. Remi, Archbishop of 
 
 ^ Rheims, about the year 500 ; this prelate also 
 
646 
 
 mSTORT OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 oonseorated St Geneband, his nephew, its first f 
 bishop. Miracles were often wrought there, 
 and, amongst others, we read that in 1395 there 
 was seen on tlie spire a crucifix, whose stigmata 
 shed blood. Thomas Walsingham, JHist. Ang. in 
 Richardo I. rege. 
 
 19. Our Lady of Good-Tidings, near Rouen, 
 visited by a vast concourse of people, especially 
 on Saturdays. Trip. Cour., nomb. 52. 
 
 20. Our Lady of Boulogne-sur-Mer. In this 
 church there is seen an image said to have been 
 brought in a ship by the ministry of angels, 
 A. V. 633. Louis XL gave this church a massive 
 golden heart, weighing as much as two thousand 
 crowns, a. d. 1479, and ordained that all the 
 kings of France, his successors, should make a 
 similar offering on their accession to the crown. 
 Trip. Cour., nomb. 53. 
 
 21. Our Lady of Good Haven, in Dol, propi- 
 tious to mariners. Trip. Cour., nomb. 61. 
 
 22. Our Lady of Help, at Rennes, in Brittany. 
 Idem. 
 
 23. Our Lady of the Rocks, near Salamanca, 
 in Spain. There is an image venerated in this 
 chui-ch which was miraculously found, a. d. 434, 
 by Simon Vela, who built a church there. Ba- 
 Hnghem in Calend. 
 
 24. On this day, in the year 591, St. Gregory 
 the Great, having the image of the Virgin which 
 St Luke painted, borne in procession, the 
 plague ceased in Rome. Balinghem in Calend. 
 
 25. Our Lady of Victory, in Constantinople. 
 The city was delivered from the siege of the 
 Saracens by the aid of the Blessed Virgin, a. d. 
 621. Fereolus Locrius. 
 
 26. Our Lady of the Fields, in Paris, formerly 
 dedicated to Ceres. St. Denis, after having cast 
 out the demons, consecrated it to Our Lady. 
 In it is seen an image of the Virgin, on a small 
 square stone, about a foot in diameter, made 
 after that which St Denis brought to France. 
 This house, a Benedictine priory, was occupied 
 by the Carmelites, who were received into it, 
 A. D. 604, and founded by Catherine, Princess de 
 Longueville. It was the first settlement of those 
 
 nuns in France. Mother Anne of Jesus, a com- 
 panion of St. Theresa, was the first superior. 
 Du Breuil, Theatre des Anliq., L ii. 
 
 27. Our Lady of Lights, near Lisbon, in Por- 
 tugal. A light was long seen shining in this 
 place, without any one being able to account for 
 the phenomenon, when Our Lady, appearing to 
 a prisoner, promised him liberty on condition 
 that he would build her a church on the place 
 thus pointed out by her. Anton. Voisconcell., in 
 descript. reg. Lusitan., c. 7, § 5. 
 
 28. Institution of the Monastery of the An- 
 nunciation, at Bethune, in Artois, by Franfois 
 de Melun and Louise de Foix, his wife, a.d. 
 1519. Fereolus Locritis. 
 
 MARCH. 
 
 1. Establishment of the Feast of the Imma- 
 culate Conception of Our Lady, by Sixtus IV., 
 A. D. 1476, and grants of indulgences to those 
 who assist at mass or Divine service. T. IV. 
 Conciliorum. 
 
 2. Our Lady of Apparitions, in Madrid ; so 
 named because, in 1449, the Virgin appeared 
 on eight successive days to a young girl named 
 Yves, and commanded her to build a church 
 on the spot where she should find a cross in 
 honor of Our Lady. In vita B. Joan. 
 
 3. Our Lady of Longpont, in Valois. This 
 abbey, of the Cistercian Order, was founded in 
 the year 1131, by Josselin, Bishop of Soissons. 
 Oall. Christ., t. iv. 
 
 4. Our Lady of Guard, in Arragon ; so named 
 for having saved the life of a child who fell into 
 a well, A. D. 1221. Bzovius, ad ann. 1221. 
 
 5. Our Lady of Good Aid, at Nancy, in Lor- 
 raine. This image is believed to have obtained 
 the victory for Rend, Duke of Lorraine, over 
 Charles the Bold, the last Duke of Burgundy. 
 Trip. Cour., nomb. 65. 
 
 6. Our Lady of Nazareth, at Pierre-Noire, in 
 Portugal. This image was honored in Naz- 
 areth from the time of the Apostles, if v/e may 
 beUeve a document which was found by a 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 547 
 
 hunter fastened to the image, a. d. 1150. Trip. 
 Cour., nomb. 13. 
 
 7. Our Lady of the Star, at Villa- Vicioza, in 
 Portugal ; so called because of a star which a 
 shepherd saw shining where the church is built. 
 T^ip. Cour., nomb. 17. 
 
 8. Our Lady of Virtues, at Lisbon, in Portu- 
 gal. Anton. VasconcelL, in descripL reg. Lusitan., 
 c. 7, § 5. 
 
 9. Foundation of Savigny, in the diocese of 
 Avranche, in Normandy, in honor of the Blessed 
 Virgin, about the year 11] 2, by the Blessed 
 Vital, hermit, who was its first abbot. Gall. 
 Christ., t. iv. 
 
 10. Our Lady of the Vine, near Viterbo, in 
 Tuscany. A handsome church now occupied 
 by the monks of St. Dominick. Bzovius, ad 
 ann. 1487. 
 
 11. Our Lady of Forests, at Porto, in Portu- 
 gal. This image was discovered in a forest, 
 where it had been hid by Queen Malfada, wife 
 of Alphonso I. Joan. Barrius, lib. de reb. inter- 
 amnensib., c. 12. 
 
 12. Our Lady of Miracles, in the cloister of 
 St. Maur-des-Foss^s, near Paris. It is said that 
 this image was found already made, when the 
 sculptor, named Rumoldi, thought of working 
 on it. Du Breuil, Theatre des Antiq., 1. iv. 
 
 13. Our Lady of the Empress, in Rome. 
 There is a tradition that this image spoke to St. 
 Gregory the Great, a. d. 593. Anton. Yepez. ad 
 ann. 84, divi Benedicti. 
 
 14. Our Lady of the Breach, in Chartres, 
 where a general procession is held every year, 
 in gratitude to Our Lady for having delivered 
 the city, when besieged by the heretics, a. d. 
 1568. It was during this siege that the image 
 of Our Lady, standing over the Porte-Drouaise, 
 remained uninjured by the cannonading or mus- 
 ketry of the besiegers, the marks of which are 
 still seen on two or three of the fingers. Sebas- 
 tien Rouillard, Parthenie, c. 3. 
 
 15. In the year 911, the city of Chartres was 
 miraculously delivered from the siege main- 
 tained by Hollo or Ralph, Duke of the Nor- 
 
 * mans ; as he was on the point of taking the 
 town, Gaucelin, forty-seventh bishop of Char- 
 tres, ascended the ramparts, holding a relic of 
 Our Lady by way of a banner ; * this raised 
 such a commotion in the enemy's camp, that 
 they were forced to retire in disorder ; in mem- 
 ory of this event, the fields of the Porte-Drou- 
 aise are still called the Field of Retreat. Sebas- 
 tien Rouillard, Parthenie, c. 7, nom. 5. 
 
 16. Our Lady of the Fountain, in Constanti- 
 nople, built by the Emperor Leo, a. d. 460, in 
 gratitude for the Blessed Virgin having ap- 
 peared to him on the margin of a stream where 
 he had charitably led a blind man, and promised 
 him that he should become an emperor, though 
 he was yet only a simple soldier. Niceph^ 1. xv., 
 cap. 15. 
 
 17. A. D. 1095, under Urban II., there was a 
 council held at Clermont, in Auvergne, and the 
 Office of Our Lady was instituted. Goncil. 
 Glarom. — Foundation of the Abbey of Baumont- 
 lez-Tours, by Ingeltrude, in the year 600. Gall. 
 Ghrist., t. iv. 
 
 18. In the year 1586, Our Lady of Loretto 
 was erected into a cathedral by Sixtus V. Tur- 
 sel. Hist. Lauetana, 5, 10. 
 
 19. Our Lady Fair (La Belle Dame) at No- 
 gent-sur-Seine. It is said to be impossible to 
 convey this famous image from its little chapel, 
 which is no more than four or five feet square. 
 Ex monument. Novigent. 
 
 20. Our Lady of Calevoirt, at Uckelen, near 
 Brussels. This image began to work miracles 
 in 1454, whereupon a magnificent chapel was 
 built there in honor of Oar Lady, a. d. 1623 ; 
 the shrine was piously visited that same year by 
 the Infanta of Spain, Isabella Clara Eugenia. 
 Aub. Miroeus, in Annal. Belg. 
 
 21. Our Lady of Bruges, in Flanders, where 
 there is a tress of the Blessed Virgin's hair, 
 given by a Syrian bishop named Moses. Hugo 
 Farcitus, 1. i., miracul. B. Virg. 
 
 22. On Palm Sunday, in the year 1098, St. 
 
 » This relic (so called) is the wedding garment of the 
 Blessed Virgin. — Teams. 
 
Robert, Abbot of Muldme, retired, with twenty- 
 one of his monks, to the diocese of Chalons-sur- 
 Saone, where he built, in honor of Our Lady, 
 the famous monastery of Citeaux, the muther- 
 hoose of the order. Arnofd Vionus, 1. i., Ligni 
 viicB, c. 47. 
 
 23. Our Lady of Victory. This image bears 
 that name, because the French, having happily 
 taken it from the Greeks, in a bloody battle 
 fought near Constantinople, a. d. 1204, it ob- 
 tained a complete victory for them. Spondanus 
 iri Annal., ad ann. 1204. 
 
 24. Vigil of the Annunciation of Our Lady, 
 instituted by Gregory IL On that day Our 
 Lady made the Pasch in Jerusalem, a. d. 49. 
 Balingh. Metaphrastes. 
 
 25. The Annunciation of Our Lady. This 
 festival was instituted by the Apostles, and is 
 the most ancient of all. Joan. Boni/aciua, L ii., 
 HisL Virg., c. 5. 
 
 26. Our Lady of Soissons, occupied by nuns 
 of the Benedictine Order. This abbey possesses 
 one of the Blessed Virgin's shoes. J3. FarcUus. 
 
 27. Apparition of Our Lord to his Blessed 
 Mother, after his resurrection. Alphonsus a 
 Castro, c 17. 
 
 28. Our Lady of Castelbruedo, at Olian, in 
 Catalonia. It is said that every year, on the 
 Feast of the Annunciation, three lights of an 
 azure color are seen to penetrate the windows 
 of this church, hght the lamps and tapers, go 
 out by the way they came, and disappear imme- 
 diately. Ludo MarincBus, 1. v., de reb. Hisp., c. 
 ultimo. 
 
 29. Apparition of Our Lady to St. Bonet, 
 Bishop of Clermont, in Auvergne, whom she 
 commanded to say mass one night when he had 
 remained in the church to say his prayers. The 
 saint, pressing against a pillar as if to conceal 
 himself, the stone became soft, and made him 
 the place which is still seen there. But the 
 Blessed Virgin having compelled him to offici- 
 ate, left him, when the ceremony was over, the 
 chasuble brought by angels from heaven. This 
 celestial gift is still shown at Clermont, where ^ 
 
 it is rohgiously preserved. In ejus '9Ua, apud 
 Surium, die 15 Jan. 
 
 30. Restoration of the Chapel of Our Lady of 
 Boulogue-sui'-Mer, by Claude Dormy, bishop of 
 that city. Trip. Cour., nomb. 53, 
 
 31. Our Lady of Holy Cross, in Jerusalem, 
 where there is seen a portion of Our Lady's 
 veil, given by St, Helen. Onuphrius, 1. vii,, EccL 
 
 APEIL. 
 
 1. Octave of the Annunciation of Our Lady, 
 in the Carmelite Order. Balinghem in Galend. 
 
 2. Our Lady the Great, at Poictiers. There 
 is in this church an image of the Blessed Vir- 
 gin, in whose bands were miraculously found 
 the keys of the city, whilst a servant of the 
 Mayor sought them everywhere, in order to 
 open the gates to the English, to whom he had 
 promised to deUver the city. Jean Boucher, 
 Annals d'Aquitaine. 
 
 3. Apparition of Our Lord to his Blessed 
 Mother and the Apostles, eight days after his 
 resurrection. Balinghem in Galend. 
 
 4. Our Lady of Grace, in Normandy. This 
 image is famous all over the country, and peo- 
 ple come from all parts to venerate it. Ex. 
 Archiv. hujus eccl. 
 
 5. Apparition of Our Lady to Pope Honorius 
 IV., in confirmation of the Order of Our Lady 
 of Mount Carmel. Balinghem in Galend. 
 
 6. Our Lady of the Conception, attached to 
 the Capuchin Convent of Douai, in Flanders. 
 There is in this church a picture of the Im- 
 maculate Conception, which was miraculously 
 preserved from fire, a, d. 1553. Amatus Francisc. 
 in libello M. S. 
 
 7. Our Lady of the Forsaken, at Valencia, in 
 Spain, This image is in a chapel where there 
 is said to be a loud noise made when any one is 
 drowned or murdered in the neighborhood of 
 the city. Trip. Gour., nomb. 28. 
 
 8. Feast of the Miracles of Our Lady, at 
 Cambron, near Mons, in the Low Countries. 
 Locrius. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 549 
 
 9. Our Lady of Myans, near Chambery, in 
 Savoy. It is thought that this image arrested 
 the devastating progress of the lightning which 
 had already consumed the town of St. Andrew, 
 with sixteen villages, and prevented it from de- 
 stroying Myaus, a. d. 1249. Trip. Gour., n. 114. 
 
 10. Our Lady of Laval, in Vivarais. This 
 church is much frequented, in order to obtain 
 rain for the preservation of the goods of the 
 earth. Trip. Gour., nomb. 41. 
 
 11. It is said that on this day a blind man 
 recovered his sight in the church of Our Lady 
 of Montserrat, a. d. 1538. Balinghem in Galend. 
 
 12. Our Lady of Charity, in the Abbey of the 
 Bernardines, seven leagues from Toulouse. It 
 is said that this image has several times shed 
 tears. Trip. Gour., nomb. 34. 
 
 13. Apparition of Our Lady to the Blessed 
 Jane of Mantua. In ejun vita. 
 
 14. Apparition of Our Lady to St. Ludivina, 
 A. D. 1433. Joan Bruchman. 
 
 15. In the year 1101, the Holy Virgin gave 
 the Blessed Alberic the white habit, instead of 
 the black one which he then wore. In ejus vita. 
 
 16. Our Lady of Victory, in the Church of St. 
 Mark, in Venice. This is the famous image 
 which the Emperors John Zimisces and John 
 Comnenus caused to be borne on a triumphal 
 car ; it is now borne in procession by the Vene- 
 tians when they wish to obtain rain or fine 
 weather. In ejus i^ta. 
 
 17. Our Lady of Arabida, in Portugal, where 
 there is an image which 'an English merchant 
 was accustomed to wear on his person. Being 
 one day in danger of shipwreck, he beheld his 
 image surrounded by a great light, on the top 
 of the rock of Arabida, where he then built him- 
 self a small hermitage, and in it spent the re- 
 mainder of his days. IVip. Gour., nomb. 16. 
 
 18. Grant of Plenary Indulgences, by Urban 
 VI., to those who visit the Church of Our Lady 
 of Loretto. Balinghem in Galend. 
 
 19. Confirmation of the Feast of the Concep- 
 tion of Our Lady, by the Council of Trent, a. d. 
 1545. Goncil. Trident. 
 
 * 20. Our Lady of Scheir, in Bavaria. This 
 church was built on the site of the castle, volun- 
 tarily made over to Our Lady by all the mem- 
 bers of the house of Scheir, with the exception 
 of Arnold, who, in punishment of his obstinacy, 
 was drowned in a neighboring lake. Thrith. de 
 Orig. gentis et princ. Bav. 
 
 21. Institution of the Confraternity of the 
 Immaculate Conception, in Toledo, a. d. 1506, 
 by Cardinal Francis Ximenes, archbishop of that 
 city. Gomesius, in ejus vita. 
 
 22. Our Lady of Betharam, in the diocese of 
 Lescar, country of Beam. This image was 
 found in 1503 by shepherds who, seeing an ex- 
 traordinary light in the place now occupied by 
 the high altar of the chapel, approached and 
 found there an image of Our Lady, to whom a 
 chapel was immediately built. Trip. Gour., n. 32. 
 
 23. Concession of Indulgences, by Pope Ca- 
 lixtus III., A. D. 1455, to those who visited the 
 Cathedral of Arras, where there are preserved a 
 veil and a cincture of Our Lady. Andreas Her- 
 hy, ex codice MS. Eccles. Attreh. 
 
 24. Dedication of Our Lady of Reparation, at 
 Florence, by Eugenius IV., a. d. 1436. Balingh. 
 in Galend. 
 
 25. Dedication of the Lower Holy Chapel of 
 Paris, in honor of Our Lady, by Phillip, Arch- 
 bishop of Bourges, A. n. 1248. Du Breuil, Thea- 
 tre des Antiq. 
 
 26. Our Lady of Naiera, in Navarre. This 
 image was miraculously found 1048. Don Gar- 
 cias de Naiera, King of Navarre, built a church 
 for it, which was visited by several of the kings 
 of Navarre. Andre Favin, 1. iii.. Hist, de Navarre. 
 
 27. It is said that in the year 1419, Our Lady 
 of Haut, in Hainaut, restored life to a child who 
 had been three days dead. Just. Lips, in Hist. 
 D. Virg. Hallens, c. 19. 
 
 28. Our Lady of the Oak, near the town of 
 Sabld, in Anjou. This image has wrought so 
 many miracles that it is now very famous in 
 that country. Marshal de Bois Dauphin built 
 it a handsome church and an hospital for pil- 
 
 ^ grims. Trip. Gour,, nomb. 50. 
 
660 
 
 EISTORr OF TEE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 29. Our Lady of Faith, in the Augustinian 
 Gharoh of Amiens. This image remained a long 
 time in the oratory of a young lady, who gave it 
 to the Augustiuians, and in theii* church it has 
 since wrought many miracles. Ex. MS. Atig» 
 Aminer. 
 
 30. Our Lady of Nantes, in Bretague. This 
 church, which was dedicated to the Apostles St. 
 Peter and St. Paul, by Felix, Bishop of Nantes, 
 was thrown down by the Normans, a.d. 937, 
 and rebuilt by Alain, Duke of Bretagne. For- 
 tunaL, L iii, Carm., c. 1, 2, 3 et 4. 
 
 MAY. 
 
 1. In the year 1449, some of the principal 
 goldsmiths of Paris began to give the May-pole 
 to the Church of Notre -Dame. Du Breuil, 
 Antiq. de Parisi, 1. i. 
 
 2. Our Lady of Oviedo, in Spain, where there 
 is some of the Blessed Virgin's hair. Balinghem 
 in Calend. 
 
 3. Apparition of Our Lady to the Blessed 
 Mary Bazzi, of the Order of St Dominick, a. v. 
 1597. Balinghem in Calend. 
 
 4. Our Lady the Helper, three leagues from 
 Caen, in Normandy. There is a solemn pro- 
 cession held every year at this chapel. Trip. 
 Cour., nomb. 51. 
 
 5. Our Lady is present on Mount Olivet, at 
 the Ascension of Our Lord, and then returns to 
 Jerusalem to retire with the Apostles. Ads of 
 the Apostles, c. i. 
 
 6. Our Lady of Miracles, in the Church of 
 Our Lady of Peace, in Rome. It is said that in 
 1483, a man who had lost his money at play, 
 having blasphemed this image, stabbed it four 
 times with his poignard, when it shed so much 
 blood that the miracle was noised abroad all 
 through the city. This image is still preserved 
 in the Church of Our Lady of Peace, where it is 
 seen over the high altar, enshrined in marble. 
 Oabr. Pen. in Hist. Triple Canon. Regvl., 1, iiL, 
 -^ 33, § 2. 
 
 7. Our Lady of Haut, in Hainaut, where there 
 
 ^ is one of the three little statues of the Blessed 
 Virgin which St. Elizabeth, daughter of Andrew 
 II. of Hungary, honored religiously, and be- 
 queathed by will to her daughter, St. Sophia, 
 who gave it, in 1267, to the Church of Haut, 
 where several miracles have since been wrought. 
 Jiist. Lips. Hint. D. Virg. Hallens, c. 3. 
 
 8. A. D. 1202, the learned Justus Lipsius gave 
 his silver pen to the Church of Our Lady of 
 Haut, in Hainaut, where it still hangs before 
 the high altar. In ejus vita. 
 
 9. Our Lady of Loretto, in the March of An- 
 cona, in Italy. This chapel is the House of 
 Nazareth, where the mystery of the Redemption 
 was announced. Turselin, in Hist. Lauretana, 
 1. i., c. 1, 2, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10. 
 
 10. Dedication of the City of Constantinople 
 to Our Lady, by Constantine the Great, under 
 the Patriarch Alexander. Niceph., 1. viii., c. 26. 
 — Our Lady of La Saussaie, near Paris. The 
 church of this Benedictine priory was dedicated 
 to Our Lady a. d. 1305, by Pope Clement V. 
 
 11. Apparition of Our Lady to St. Philip of 
 Neri, whom she cured of a grievous malady, 
 A. D. 1594, In ejus vita. 
 
 12. Our Lady of Virtues, at Aubervillers, near 
 Paris. This image has wrought so many mira- 
 cles in this church, that it is called Our Lady of 
 Virtues, although it is dedicated to St. Christo- 
 pher. Du Breuil, 1. iv. 
 
 13. Dedication of Our Lady of Martyrs, called 
 the Rotunda, in Rome, by Boniface IV., a.d. 
 608. This temple was styled the Pantheon, be- 
 cause it was dedicated to all the gods of the 
 Gentiles. Bede, Hist. Eng., b. ii, ch. 4. 
 
 14. Dedication of Our Lady of Noyon, by 
 Hardouin, thirty-seventh bishop of that city, 
 A. D. 998. Chronic. Annonice, t. iii. 
 
 15. Descent of the Holy Ghost on Our Lady 
 and the Apostles, a. d. 34, being the forty-eighth 
 year of the Blessed Virgin's age. Christoph. a 
 Castro, in Hist. Virg. 
 
 16. Apparition of Our Lady to St. Catherine 
 of Alexandria, whose body was found on the 
 
 ^ 13th of this month, on Mount Sinai, by a special 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIBGIN MARY. 
 
 551 
 
 revelation from the Queen of Heaven. In ejus 
 vita. 
 
 17. Our Lady of Tears, in the Duchy of Spo- 
 letto, in Italy. It is said that this image, paint- 
 ed on a wall, shed abundance of tears, a. d. 1494. 
 Gabriel Pennotus, 1. iii., Hist. Tripartita, c. 34. 
 
 18. Dedication of Our Lady of Bonport, be- 
 longing to the Order of Citeaux, near Pont de 
 I'Arche, in the diocese of Evreux. This abbey 
 was founded by Richard CcBur de Lion, 11th 
 March, a. d. 1190. Gall. Ghriat., t. iv. 
 
 19. Dedication of Our Lady of Flines, near 
 Douai, by Peter, Archbishop of Rheims, a. d. 
 1279. This abbey of Cistercian nuns was given 
 to St. Bernard by Marguerite de Dampierre, 
 A. D. 1234. Chronic. Flinens. 
 
 20. Dedication of the Church of La Fertd, 
 diocese of Chalons, in Burgundy, in honor of 
 Our Lady. This abbey, the first-born of Ci- 
 teaux, was founded in 1113, by Savaric and 
 Guillaume, counts of Chalons. Ex Archiviis 
 Ahhat. Firmitatis. 
 
 21. Our Lady of Sweat, at Salerno, in Italy. 
 It is said that this Madonna sweat blood and 
 water in 1611, foreshowing a great conflagration 
 which took place next day. P. Spinelli Tract, de 
 exempt, et miractU., cap. ultim. 
 
 22. Our Lady of the Virgin's Mount, near 
 Naples. This image preserved from the flames 
 the monastery and church consecrated to it. 
 Idem, loco citato. 
 
 23. Our Lady of Miracles, at St. Omer, where 
 there is one of the Blessed Virgin's gloves, and 
 some of her hair. Chronic. Bertinens. 
 
 24. Gregory XV., a. d. 1622, issued a decree 
 forbidding any one to maintain the opinion con- 
 trary to the Immaculate Conception. It is also 
 forbidden by the same decree to employ any 
 other term than that of Conception in the mass 
 or office of the day. Balinghem m Calend. 
 
 Patronal Feast of Our Lady of Succor, Mont- 
 real, Lower Canada. This shrine is famous 
 throughout the country, and is much frequented 
 by pilgrims. It formerly contained aSn image 
 which had been venerated for more than a cen- 
 
 * tury in a domestic chapel in France, and was 
 sent to Montreal — or Villemarie — by the pious 
 nobleman to whom it belonged. It was mir- 
 aculously preserved from fire in 1754, but was 
 stolen (or otherwise disappeared) in 1831. It 
 was replaced by another in 1847. Marvellous 
 effects have followed the invocation of Our Lady 
 of Bon Secours. Manuel du Pelerin de Notre- 
 Dame de Bon Secours. 
 
 25. Our Lady the New, in Jerusalem, built by 
 the Emperor Justinian, a. d. 530. Procopius, de 
 JEdific. imperat. Justiniani. 
 
 26. Dedication of Our Lady of Vaucelles, in 
 the diocese of Cambrai, by Samson, Archbishop 
 of Eheims. This abbey, of the Cistercian Order, 
 was founded in 1132. In Chronic. Cisterc. 
 
 27. Dedication of Our Lady of Naples, styled 
 St. Mary Major, by Pope John II., a. d. 553. 
 There is an image of the Virgin preserved in 
 this church which was said to have been painted 
 by St. Luke. Schraderus, I. ii. 
 
 28. Feast of the Relics of Our Lady, in Ven- 
 ice, when there are exposed to the veneration of 
 the faithful some pieces of the Virgin's robe, her 
 cloak, veil, and girdle. Ex hist, ea de re, impressa 
 Venitiis. 
 
 29. Feast of Notre -Dame des Ardents, at 
 Arras ; there is a taper in the Cathedral of 
 Arras said to have been brought there by Our 
 Lady, a. d. 1095. Jacob. Meyerus, in annal. Fland. 
 ad ann. 1095. 
 
 30. Dedication of the Church of the Virgin's 
 Mountain, near Naples, built a. d. 1126, by St. 
 William, founder of the Order of the Virgin's 
 Mountain, and repaired in 1519. Jean Juvenal, 
 1. vii., de Antiq., c. 3. 
 
 31. Our Lady of Suffering, in the Church of 
 St. Gervase, in Paris. This image, which stood 
 at the corner of the Rue des Rosiers, was mu-< 
 tilated by a Jew in 1528 ; Francis the First had 
 it solemnly conveyed to St. Gervase, and caused 
 a statue of the Virgin to be made of gilt silver, 
 which he himself put up in place of the former. 
 This statue was stolen in 1545, and was replaced 
 
 ijc by one of stone, which still bears the name of 
 
652 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Our Lady of Silver. Du Breuil, Theatre des 
 Antiq.t L iii 
 
 JUNE. 
 
 1. Oar Lad} of the Star, at Aqailea, in Italy. 
 This church is so named because it is said that 
 a star was seen in daylight over the head of 
 St Bernardino, when, preaching at Aquilea, he 
 applied to the Blessed Virgin that passage of 
 the Apocalypse where mention is made of the 
 woman with a crown of twelve stars on her 
 head. Surius, in ejus vita, 
 
 2. Our Lady of Edessa, in Asia Minor. It is 
 said that this image, placed under the portal of 
 a church, spoke to St. Alexis, and made known 
 to the people the merit of that saint. Thence 
 it was transported to Rome, where it is highly 
 honored. Thomas Bosiics, 1. ix., c 9. 
 
 3. Our Lady of Sosopoli, in Pisidia. There 
 proceeded from this image a miraculous oil, as 
 testified by Germanus, patriai-ch of Constanti- 
 nople, in a letter read at the second Council of 
 Nice, assembled for the defence of sacred im- 
 ages. Act. 4 Condi. Nicceni. 
 
 4. Our Lady of the Hill, at Fribourg, where 
 many miracles are wrought. Trip. Cour., n. 85. 
 
 5. Chronicles tell that in the year 1428, Our 
 Lady of Haut, in Hainan t, restored hfe to a 
 child who had been dead for several days, in 
 order that it. might receive Baptism ; that it 
 lived five hours after being baptized, then grad- 
 ually melted away like a snow-ball, in presence 
 of seventy persons. Juatus Lipsius, de Virg. 
 Hallens., c. 21. 
 
 6. Institution of the Nuns of the Visitation of 
 Our Lady, founded at Annecy, in Savoy, a. d. 
 1610, by St. Francis de Sales, Bishop of Geneva, 
 and Jane Frances Fremiot de Chantal, who was 
 the first member of that order. Henri de Mau- 
 pas du Tour, 2d partie, chap. i. 
 
 7. Dedication of Our Lady of the Valley, of 
 the Cistercian Order, seven leagues from Paris, 
 under Louis XHL, April 18th, a. d. 1G16. Ex- 
 codice MS. 
 
 8. Our Lady ol Alexandria, in Egypt, built by 
 
 * St. Peter, patriarch of that city. BaroniuK, ad 
 ann. 310. 
 
 9. Our Lady of Ligny, near Bar-le-Duc, in 
 Lorraine. This image is much celebrated be- 
 cause of the numerous miracles which it oper- 
 ates. Dnp. Cour., nomb. 57. 
 
 10. Our Lady of Cranganor, in the East In- 
 dies. This church is said to have been built by 
 one of the three Magi. Oaorins, t. i., de Oestis 
 Emmam. 
 
 11. Our Lady of Esquernes, half a league 
 from Lille, in Flanders. This image began to 
 work miracles about the year 11G2. Buzelinus, 
 in Annal. Gall. 1. ii. 
 
 12. The Chronicle mentions that on this day 
 Our Lady appeared to St. Herman of the Pre- 
 monstratensian Order, and gave him a tress of 
 her hair. Surius, in ejus vita. 
 
 13. Dedication of Our Lady of Sichem, near 
 Louvain, a. d. 1604, by Mathias Hovius, Arch- 
 bishop of Maliues. The image of the Blessed 
 Virgin seen in this church was first placed in 
 the hollow of an oak. Justus Lipsius, de Virg. 
 Aspricol., c. 4. 
 
 14. A. D. 371, there fell from heaven a white 
 fleecy substance mixed with a thick rain ; the 
 fact is mentioned by St. Jerome, who holds that, 
 the famine being great in the country, the in- 
 habitants of Arras had recourse to the Virgin, 
 who sent them that heavenly gift, commonly 
 called manna, some remains of which are still to 
 be seen in the church dedicated to her honor. 
 Ex arch. Alb. Truliense. 
 
 15. Foundation of Our Lady of the Bernar- 
 dines, in the diocese of Toulouse and Rieux, 
 A. D. 1145. 
 
 16. Our Lady of Aix - la - Chapelle, built by 
 Charlemagne, and consecrated by Leo III., a. d. 
 804; there were present on this occasion no 
 less than three hundred and fifty prelates. 
 Charlemagne gave to this church two of Our 
 Lady's tunics, a. d. 810 ; but Charles the Bald 
 took one of them, sixty-five years after, and 
 gave it to the Church of Chartres. Ferreolua 
 
 ^ Locrius, L v., Marioe Aug., c. 17. 
 
17. Our Lady of the Forest, near Boulogne- 
 Bur-Mer. This little chapel is famous all over 
 the country. Trip. Cour., nomb. 53. 
 
 18. Apparition of Our Lady to St. Agnes of 
 Mount Politian, to whom she gave, it is said, a 
 small cross, which is now exhibited, with great 
 solemnity, on the first day of May. Chronio. S. 
 Dominici, part, i., 1. i., c. 72. 
 
 19. At Treves, in Germany, in the Church of 
 St. John the Evangelist, built in 333, there is 
 seen Our Lady's comb, given by Agritius, arch- 
 bishop of that city. 
 
 20. Our Lady of Blaquernes, on the wharf of 
 Constantinople. In this church is Our Lady's 
 shroud, given by the Empress St. Pulcheria, 
 who received it from Juvenal, Bishop of Jeru- 
 salem. Niceph., 1. XV., c. 14. 
 
 21. Our Lady of Matarieh, at Grand Cairo, in 
 Egypt, where there is a miraculous fountain ob- 
 tained by the prayers of Our Lady, when she 
 retired thither with the Holy Family ; tradition 
 says that she washed the clothes of the Infant 
 Jesus at this spring. Trip. Cour., nomb. 5. 
 
 22. Our Lady of Narni, in Italy. It is said 
 that this image spoke to the Blessed Lucy, to 
 whom she gave the Infant Jesus to hold. Trip. 
 Cour., trait. 3. 
 
 23. Our Lady Justiniana, at Carthage. This 
 church was built by the Emperor Justinian, in 
 honor of the Blessed Virgin, to whom he as- 
 cribed his victories over the Vandals. Baron., 
 ad aim. 534. 
 
 24. Our Lady of the Clos-Evrard, near Tre- 
 ves. This image was fastened to an oak by a 
 vine-dresser who wished to honor it ; but Our 
 Lady ordered him to build a little hut in her 
 honor. The miracles there wrought became so 
 numerous that the hut was speedily converted 
 into a small chapel, and fiu9,lly a church was 
 erected on the spst, and dedicated to the Bless- 
 ed Virgin, a. d. 1449, by Jacques de Rircq, Arch- 
 bishop of Treves. Trip. Cour., nomb. 82. 
 
 25. A. D. 431, the Council of Ephesus, wherein 
 it was declared that the Virgin was entitled to 
 be called the Mother of God. Concil. Ephes. 
 
 26. Our Lady of Meliapour, in the East In- 
 dies, where St. Francis Xavier often went to 
 pray. In vita S. Franc. Xaverii. 
 
 27. Our Lady of La Dorade, near Toulouse. 
 This place, formerly dedicated to the goddess 
 Pallas, was changed into a church for Our Lady 
 when the inhabitants received the faith. ForcaL, 
 1. i., de Gall. Imperia. 
 
 28. Dedication of the Church of the Carthu- 
 sians, in Paris, under the title of Notre Dame, by 
 Jean D'Aubigny, Bishop of Troyes, in Cham- 
 pagne, A. D. 1325. Du Breuil, Theatre des Antiq., 
 1. ii. 
 
 29. Our Lady of Buglose, two leagues from 
 Acqs, in Gascony. This image was miracu- 
 lously found, A. D. 1634, and conveyed to the 
 parish church of Buglose. Trip. Cour., nomb. 36. 
 
 30. Our Lady of Calais, built by the English 
 while in possession of that city, which they oc- 
 cupied for about two hundred and ten years ; a 
 magnificent chapel was added to it in 1631, by 
 Jacques de Bolloye, Vicar of Calais. Davila, t. ii. 
 
 JULY. 
 
 1. Dedication of the Church of Jumieges, in 
 Normandy, a. d. 1067, by Maurice, Archbishop 
 of Rouen, at the request of King William. Thos. 
 Wahingham. 
 
 2. Visitation of the Blessed Virgin. This fes- 
 tival was instituted by Urban IV., a. d. 1385, and 
 confirmed by Boniface IX., a. d. 1389. S. Ante- 
 nin, iv. part., tit. xv., chap. 24. 
 
 3. Our Lady of La Carolle, in Paris. It is 
 said that this image, placed at the corner of the 
 Rue aux Ours, being struck with a knife, a. d. 
 1418, shed a quantity of blood. In commemo- 
 ration of this event, a great fire is made every 
 year, and a wax figure burned in it, represent- 
 ing the person who gave the sacrilegious blow. 
 Du Breuil, 1. ii. 
 
 4. Our Lady of Miracles, at Avignon, built by 
 Pope John XXIL, on the following occasion : 
 Two criminals were condemned to bt burned, 
 and one of them having invoked the Blessed 
 
654 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Virjfin, was respected by the flames, whilst his 
 ooiupauion was wholly consumed. Richard Clu- 
 niacin Joan. xxii. 
 
 5. Dedication of Our Lady of Cambrai, a. d. 
 1472, by Peter de Ranchicourt, Bishop of Arras. 
 This church was built in honor of Our Lady in 
 624 ; destroyed by the Normans in 882 ; rebuilt 
 by Dossillon, twenty-first Bishop of Arras, a. d. 
 890 ; and finally, after being burned down in 
 1064, and again in 1148, was restored, as we 
 now see it, in 1261. Chronic. Hannon., t. iii., 
 L ii., chap. 23. 
 
 • 6. Our Lady of Iron, near Blois, district of 
 Dunois. It was in this chapel that, about the 
 year 1631, a child who had been smothered 
 while struggling in its cradle, was restored im- 
 mediately to life as soon as its parents conse- 
 crated it to Our Lady of Iron. Ex archiv. hujus 
 loci. 
 
 7. Dedication of Our Lady of Arras, a. d. 1484, 
 by Pierre de Ranchicourt, bishop of that city. 
 This church was built by St. Vaast, Bishop of 
 Arras, a. d. 542, with the donations of the first 
 kings of France, according to Baronius. The 
 Normans destroyed it in 583, and, after being 
 rebuilt, it was consumed by Ughtning, a. d. 1030, 
 and rebuilt in 1040. Locrius, 1. ii. 
 
 It is said that in 1410, Our Lady of Haut, in 
 Hainaut, restored life to a child belonging to 
 Brussels, who was drowned in a welL The 
 child being taken dead from the well, was con- 
 secrated to Our Lady, and it was instantly re- 
 stored to life. Justus Lipsiv^ de Virg. Hcdlens., 
 c. 16. 
 
 8. Our Lady of Peace, in the Capuchin 
 Church, Rue St. Honord, in Paris. 
 
 9. Dedication of Our Lady of Coutances, by 
 GeoflFroy de Mowbray, in 1056. 
 
 10. Dedication of Our Lady of Boulogne, near 
 Paris, a. d. 1469, by Chartier, Bishop of Paris. 
 The confraternity of Our Lady of Boulogne is 
 so famous that six of our kings were amongst 
 its members. Dy, Breuil, Antiq., 1. iv. 
 
 11. Our Lady of Cl^ry, four leagues from Or- 
 leans; this church was rebuilt by King Louis ^ 
 
 XL, who was buried there in 1483. Locrius, M. 
 Aug., 1. iv., ch. 68. 
 
 12. Dedication of Our Lady of All Graces, in 
 the church of the Friars Minors, at Nigeon, 
 near Paris, a. d. 1578. This house was given, in 
 1476, by Anne of Brittany, wife of Louis XII., 
 to St. Francis of Paula, who had instituted his 
 order a. d. 1436. Du Breuil, Antiq. de Parin. 
 
 13. One hundred years before the birth of 
 Our Lord, the image of Our Lady of Chartres 
 was carved in a forest, on the plains of Beance, 
 by command of Priscus, king of the Chartrains, 
 and then placed, with the inscription, Virgini 
 parUurce ^that is to say, to the Virgin who is to 
 bring forth), on the spot where it now stands, 
 which was then a Druid cave. St. Potentian, 
 second bishop of Sens, whom the Apostle St. 
 Peter had sent into France, stopped at Char- 
 tres, where he blessed this image, and dedicated 
 the grotto for a church, a. d. 46. Seba.4. RouU- 
 lard, Parthen., ch. 4, nomb. 1. 
 
 14. Our Lady of the Bush, in Portugal. This 
 image was discovered by a shepherd in the 
 midst of a burning bush. Vasquez Perdigon, 
 Bishop of Evora, built in this place, a. d. 1403, a 
 church and a monastery, which was given to the 
 monks of St. Jerome. VasconcelL, in Descript. 
 regni Lusitanice, ch. 7, § 5. 
 
 15. A. D. 1099, the Turks were defeated by 
 Godfrey de Bouillon, who, on this day, took 
 Jerusalem, of which he was declared king, and 
 its festival was formerly celebrated every year, 
 with a double office and an octave. Molanus, ad 
 hanc diem. 
 
 16. The Feast of the Scapular. Tradition 
 says that she gave it herself, about the year 
 1251, to the Blessed Simon Stock, of England. 
 This devotion has spread all over the world. 
 Popes John XXII., Gregory XIIL, Sixtus V., 
 Gregory XIV., and Clement VIII., granted in- 
 dulgences to the members of the confraternity. 
 Cartagena, de Ortu ordinis Carmelitarum. 
 
 17. In the year 1565, Pius V. approves of the 
 reform of the barefooted Carmelites, instituted 
 by St. Theresa at Avila, in Spain. 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 555 
 
 18. Our Lady of Victory, at Toledo ; so named 
 because of a signal victory gained by Alphonso 
 IX. over the Moors, a. d. 1202, after having 
 hoisted a flag on which was the image of Our 
 Lady. In Hist. Alphonsi ad Innocent III. 
 
 19. Our Lady of Moyen-Pont, near Peronne. 
 This image was found by a shepherd near some 
 ponds, where are now the meadows of Amele ; 
 a church was built there, and was repaired in 
 1612. Trip. Gour., nomb. 53. 
 
 20. Our Lady of Grace, at Picpus, Faubourg 
 St. Antoine, in Paris. This image, which is in 
 a little wooden vessel with two angels at the 
 end, was made in 1629, of a splinter taken from 
 the famous image of Our Lady of Boulogne-sur- 
 Mer. Trip. Gour., nomb. 47. 
 
 21. Our Lady of Verdun, in Lorraine, re- 
 nowned for its numerous miracles. St. Polich- 
 rainus, fifth bishop of Verdun, dedicated this 
 church on his return from the Council of Chal- 
 cedon. E.r archiv. eccles. Virod. 
 
 22. Our Lady of Safety, near Marseilles. The 
 Queen of Heaven is highly honored in this 
 church, where, every Saturday, the Blessed Sac- 
 rament is exposed from midnight till noon. 
 There are in it more than thirty large silver 
 lamps, with many branches of coi'al of extraor- 
 dinary size. Ex Ghronic. Massiliens. 
 
 23. Institution of the Premonstratensian Or- 
 der, by St. Norbert, a. d. 1120, on a revelation 
 from Our Lad3^ Bihlioth. Frcemonstr., 1. i., c. 2. 
 
 24. Foundation of Our Lady of Cambron, 
 near Mons, in Hainaut, by Anselm de Trasigny, 
 lord of Peronne. . In MS. a. d. 1148. Hannon 
 Ghronic. 
 
 25. Our Lady of Bouchet, two and a half 
 leagues from Blanc, in Berry. A shrine which 
 attracts a great number of pilgrims. The image 
 of the Virgin is made of the wood of an old oak, 
 where the first image was found. Ex monumen- 
 tis hujvi loci. 
 
 26. Our Lady of Faith, at Cancy, near Abbe- 
 ville. This image having been removed from 
 the oak where it now is to a chapel built for 
 it about fifty paces distant, was miraculously 
 
 ^ found again in its former place. Des Archives 
 de Gancy. 
 
 27. In the year 1480, the Knights of Ehodes 
 gained a signal victory over the Turks by the 
 assistance of the Blessed Virgin, who appeared 
 on the walls of that city with a lance in her 
 hand ; the enemy, frightened, retired in dis- 
 order, with the loss of the greater part of his 
 forces. Jacob. Bosius, in hist, equitum Rhod. 
 
 28. Our Lady of Faith, at Gravelines. This 
 image is renowned throughout all the country. 
 Hist. Domince Foyens. Gravel. 
 
 29. A. D. 1546, it was regulated by the Council 
 of Trent, that, regarding the immaculate con- 
 ception of the Blessed Virgin, the decree of 
 Sixtus IV. should be observed, under the penal- 
 ties therein mentioned. Balingh. in Galend. 
 
 80. Our Lady of Gray, near Besan9on, in 
 Franche-Comtd. This image, made of the oak 
 of Montaigu, was much honored in the country. 
 Trip. Gour., nomb, 58. 
 
 31. Our Lady of the Slain, at Ceica, near Lor- 
 ban, a Cistercian monastery, in Portugal. It is 
 said that this image was brought from heaven 
 to the Abbd John, uncle of King Alphonso, and 
 that it resuscitated a few persons who had been 
 killed ; that, in memory of this miracle, they had 
 ever after a red mark round their neck, like that 
 which is still seen on the neck of the imaga 
 Ghronic. Gisterc, 1. vi., c. 27 et 28. 
 
 AUGUST. 
 
 1. A. D. 1218, Our Lady appearing on this day 
 to St. Raymond, of the Order of St. Dominic, to 
 James, King of Arragon, and to St. Peter of 
 Nolasquez, made known to all three separately, 
 that she wished them to establish a religious 
 order for the redemption of captives. Surius, 
 in vita S. Raymondi. 
 
 2. Our Lady of the Angels, or the Portionctde, 
 six hundred paces from the town of Assissium, 
 in Italy. The monks of St. Benedict gave this 
 chapel to St. Francis, at his own request, and it 
 was his wish that the convent which he built 
 
556 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 there should be the chief house of his order. It 
 was there that the first general chapter met, on 
 which occasion five thousand mouks were pres- 
 ent In this chapter he i ^stored the spirit of 
 Hie order, a. d. 122G, being the twentieth after 
 his conversion, and the forty-fifth of his age. 
 Chr. Ord., part i., 1. ii., c. 1. 
 
 3. Our Lady of Arches, in London. It is on 
 record that this image, having been carried off 
 in a storm, with more than six hundred houses, 
 A^ D. 1071, fell uninjured to the ground with so 
 much force that it went through the pavement, 
 more than twenty feet into the earth, whence it 
 could never be raised. William of Malmesbury, 
 1. iv., in WUleL, 2. 
 
 4. Our Lady of Dordrecht, in Holland, erect- 
 ed by St. Sauterus on the spot, it is said, which 
 an angel, sent by the Virgin, pointed out ; the 
 saint afterwards won the crown of martyrdom 
 in that same church, and, in order to honor her 
 memory, God was pleased after her death to 
 make a spring shoot up there, which cured 
 fevers of all kinds. Molan. in SS. Belg. 
 
 5. Dedication of Our Lady of Snow, in Rome, 
 called St. Mary Major, formerly of the Crib, be- 
 cause Our Saviour's crib is kept there. It was 
 built by John Patricius and his wife, on the 
 place which they found covered with snow, on 
 the 5th of August, 367, and rebuilt by Sixtus 
 IIL, about the year 432. Baron., in Not. ad 
 ann. 367. 
 
 Dedication of the Church of Our Lady of the 
 Angels, in Rome, by Pope Pius IV., a. d. 1561. 
 This church, which was formerly a part of the 
 baths of Dioclesian, was erected into a cardinal- 
 ate, endowed with several iiidulgences, and 
 given by the same pope to the Carthusians. 
 Balinghem in Gal&id. 
 
 Our Lady of ^Protection, in the Church of the 
 Bernardines, Rue St. Honore, Paria It was so 
 named by the Queen, Ann of Austria, a. d. 1561, 
 in gratitude for the favors she had received 
 from the Queen of Heaven. Du Breuil, Antiq., 
 L iii. 
 
 6. In the year 963, Our Lady of Chartres was ^ ( 
 
 entirely burned, with the exception of the Vir- 
 gin's tunic, which is still kept there. Seba.^t. 
 Buuillard, Parthen., c. 7. 
 
 7. Our Lady of Schiedem, in Holland. Chron- 
 icles relate that a merchant who stole this im- 
 age, having embarked with the intention of sell- 
 ing it at the Fair of Anvers, could never get 
 clear of the port. Frightened by this prodigy, 
 he replaced the stolen image, which was solemn- 
 ly conveyed to the Church of St. John the Bap- 
 tist, where St. Ludivine passed whole nights in 
 prayer. Joan. Bruchman, Minorita. 
 
 8. Our Lady of La Kuen, near Brussels. This 
 church was built by order of Our Lady, who is 
 said to have marked out its dimensions with a 
 cord, which is still shown. Auctar. ad Molan. 
 
 9. Our Lady of CEguies, in Brabant, the birth- 
 place of Mary of CEgnies, who visited this holy 
 image barefoot, once a year, in the depth of 
 winter. Jacob, de Vitriaco, in ejus vita. 
 
 10. Institution of the Order of Our Lady of 
 Mercy, at Barcelona, a. d. 1218. Surius, in vita 
 Sancti Raimondi. 
 
 11. A. D. 810, the Emperor Nicephorus and 
 the Empress Irene sent to Charlemagne two 
 of the Blessed Virgin's robes ; he placed them 
 in his church of Aix-la-Chapelle, from which 
 Charles the Bald took one, and gave it to the 
 Cathedral of Chartres. Locrius Anaceph., p. 3. 
 
 12. Our Lady of Rouen, built by Robert, Duke 
 of Normandy. Richard the First, King of Eng- 
 land, made great gifts to this church, and tho 
 kings of France endowed it with many privi- 
 leges. Merula, Gosmogr., part ii., 1. Hi. 
 
 13. Death of Our Lady in presence of all the 
 Apostles, except St. Thomas. Like her Divine 
 Son, she rose from the dead and ascended to 
 heaven the third day after her death. Suarez, 
 t. ii., in p. Disp. 21 sect., in fine. 
 
 14. Vigil of the Assumption, with a fast, men- 
 tioned by Nicholas I., who was Pope in 858. It 
 is said that on this day the angels were heard, 
 near the city of Soissons, singing the anthem : 
 "FeUx namque es, sacra Virgo Maria, et omni 
 laude dignissima quia ex te ortus est Sol justi- 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 557 
 
 tise, Christus Deus noster." Thorn. Goncep., 1. ii., 
 part 7. 
 
 15. The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin. 
 This feast was instituted, according to Stu Ber- 
 nard, in the very times of the Apostles. St. 
 Bernard, epist. 174. 
 
 16. On this day the Virgin's sepulchre was 
 opened, and as a proof that Our Lady had 
 already ascended to heaven, there was seen in 
 it only her shroud, which shed a delicious per- 
 fume. Sauiiseyua, in Martyr. Gallic, die Assumpt. 
 
 17. Philip the Fair gained, on this day, a 
 Bignal victory over the Flemings, a. d. 1304, 
 after commending himself to Our Lady of Char- 
 tres ; in gratitude for this favor, he gave her in 
 perpetuity the land and lordship of Barres, to- 
 gether with a perpetual annuity, and all the ac- 
 coutrements which he wore on that memorable 
 day. This feast is celebrated, in the Church of 
 Notre-Dame, in Paris, on the following day, the 
 18th, and has a double office. Sebast. Rouillard, 
 chap. 6. 
 
 18. A. D. 1022, King Kobert founded a chapel 
 in honor of Our Lady in the court-yard of the 
 palace, in Paris, on the spot now occupied by 
 the Holy Chapel. Du Breuil, Antiq. de Paris. 
 
 19. Our Lady of Jerusalem, near Montecorvo, 
 in Portugal. There is here a chapel built in 
 imitation of that of Jerusalem ; it is said that 
 the Virgin herself gave the plan. Vasconcell. in 
 Descript. regni Lusit. 
 
 20. In the famous church of the Benedictines 
 of Affighem, in Brabant, there is seen an image 
 of the Blessed Virgin, which is said to have 
 spoken to St. Bernard ; when the saint saluted 
 her with, " Salve, Maria," she answered, " Salve, 
 Bernard." Just. Lips., t. ii., c. 4, § 4. 
 
 21. In the year 1022 was instituted the Order 
 of the Thirty Knights of Our Lady of the Star, 
 at Paris, by King Robert, who said that the 
 Blessed Virgin was the star of his kingdom. A. 
 Favin, Hist, de Navarre, 
 
 22. Octave of the Assumption of the Blessed 
 Virgin, instituted by Pope Leo IV., a. d. 847. 
 Jacob. Bosius, num. 2. 
 
 * 23. On this day, in the yeaf 1328, Philip of 
 Valois, being surrounded by the Flemings near 
 Mount Cassel, had recourse to the Blessed Vir- 
 gin, who immediately delivered him from the 
 danger to which he was exposed. In gratitude 
 for this service, on entering Paris he went 
 straight to the Church of Notre-Dame, and, 
 going in mounted as he was, he rode up the 
 nave till he came in front of the crucifix, where 
 he laid down his arms. The picture of the mon- 
 arch on horseback was long seen in this church, 
 to which he assigned a pension of an hundred 
 livres, to be paid from his domain of Gatinais. 
 Trip. Cour., trait 4, c. 7, nomb. 7. 
 
 24. Dedication of Our Lady of Benoiste- 
 Vaux, within a league of Verdun, in Lorraine. 
 In this chapel there is an image of the Virgin 
 which is famous for working miracles ; there is 
 also a miraculous fountain, the water of which 
 cures many diseases. Hist, de Notre-Dame de 
 Benoiste- Vaux, chap. i. et ix. 
 
 25. Our Lady of Rossano, in Calabria. It is 
 said that the Saracens, wishing to surprise the 
 town of Rossano, and having already planted 
 their ladders against the walls, were repulsed 
 by Our Lady, who appeared clothed in purple 
 with a lighted taper in her hand ; this appari- 
 tion frightened them so that they fled precipi- 
 tately. Gabriel de Barry. 
 
 26. Our Lady of the Arbor, at Douai. It is 
 on record that when some children were play- 
 ing disrespectfully before this image, it made a 
 sign of displeasure with its hands. This mira- 
 cle induced the people of Douai to build a 
 chapel for it, a. d. 1543. Buzelin, in Annul. 
 Gallo-Flandr. 
 
 27. Our Lady of Monstier, eight or ten 
 leagues from Sisteron, on the way to Marseilles, 
 There is an old tradition that a nobleman of the 
 country, being made pi-isoner by the Turks, 
 made a vow to build a chapel in honor of the 
 Virgin, if she would please to deliver him. The 
 Virgin heard his prayer ; an angel took him on 
 his wings and conveyed him to his home. The 
 
 ^ nobleman erected a magnificent chapel to Cm 
 
658 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 Ladv, where muny miracles nere wrought Ex 
 MS. eade re cowicript. 
 
 28. Our Lady of Kiovia, in Poland, metropol- 
 itan of Russia ; there is in this church a large 
 alabaster figure of the Yirgiii, which spoke to 
 St. Hyacinth, a.d. 1241, and told him not to 
 abandon it to the enemy who was besieging the 
 city, but to take it with him, which he did 
 without any trouble, the image having lost its 
 weight In vita sancti ffyacinthL 
 
 29. Our Lady of Clermont, ten leagues from 
 Cracovia, where there is an image made by St 
 Luke, and sent to the Empress Pulcberia ; that 
 princess placed it in the Church of Our Lady of 
 Guides, in Constantinople, whence it was taken 
 by Leo, Duke of Russia ; the Duke of Opolia 
 wished to remove it to his ^uchy, iu 1380 ; but 
 when it reached the mountain of Clermont it 
 became so heavy that it could be carried no far- 
 ther ; seeing by this miracle that the Virgin had 
 chosen that mountain for a dwelling-place, a 
 church was built there for her^ Bzovius, ad 
 ann. 1383. 
 
 30. Our Lady of Carquera, on the river 
 Douro, in Portugal. Egas de Monis, guardian 
 of King Alphonso I., had that young prince car- 
 ried to this ancient church that the Virgin, by 
 her intercession, might straighten his feet, which 
 was immediately done. Vasconcell. in Regib. 
 Lttait. Anacephat. 1 et 2. 
 
 31. Dedication of Our Lady of Founders, in 
 Constantinople. The Empress St Pulcheria 
 had this church built, and enriched it with .Our 
 Lady's girdle. A festival was instituted in Con- 
 stantinople for this relic, under the title of the 
 Deposition of Our Lady's Girdle. The iVench 
 having taken the city, this precious treasure 
 was taken by Nivellon, Bishop of Soissons, and 
 placed in the famous Abbey of Our Lady, with a 
 part of the Virgin's veil. Niceph,, L iv., c 8. 
 
 SEPTEMBER. 
 
 1. On the first Sunday of this month there is 
 a festival celebrated in the Church of St. Peter, 
 
 ^ at Louvain, in honor of the Virgin, called the 
 Collection of the Feasts of Our Liuly. Molanus, 
 ad Usuard. Martyrolog. 
 
 2. Our Lady of Helbron, or Nettles, in Fran- 
 con ia, Germany. This image ))egan to work 
 miracles in 1441. Trip. Cour., nomb. 73. 
 
 3. Dedication of the Abbey of Corneville, in 
 honor of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin, 
 A. D. 1147, by Hugh, Archbishop of Rouen. OaU. 
 Christ., t. iv. 
 
 4 A.D. 1419, Our Lady of Haut, in Hainaut, 
 restored life to a girl named Jeanne Maillard, 
 who, in taking water from a well, fell in, and 
 was drawn out quite dead ; her mother having 
 devoted her to Our Lady of Haut, she imme- 
 diately gave signs of life. Just. Lips, de Virgin, 
 Hdlens., c. 19. 
 
 5. Our Lady of the Woods, near Arras. A 
 horseman having a mind to make a stable of 
 this chapel, a. d. 1478, was instantly killed by 
 his horse. 2Vip. Cour., nomb. 62. 
 
 6. Our Lady of the Fountain, half a league 
 from Valenciennes. Tradition says that the 
 Virgin appeared to a certain hermit in this 
 place when the plague was ravaging the city, 
 and commanded him to tell the inhabitants 
 that they should fast next day and spend the 
 night in prayer. That being done, she was 
 seen coming down from heaven and encircling 
 the whole city with a cord ; this cord is still 
 kept at Valenciennes. Ex libdlo de ea re scripto. 
 
 7. Vigil of the Nativity of Our Lady, insti- 
 tuted by Gregory II., about the year 722. Ba- 
 lingh. in Galend. 
 
 8. The Nativity of Our Lady, which hap- 
 pened, according to Baronius, in the year of the 
 world 4007, on a Saturday, about the dawn of 
 day, fifteen years before the birth of Our 
 Saviour. This feast was instituted on the 8th 
 of September in the Greek and Latin Churches, 
 A. D. 436, according to the same writer, and ia 
 France by St Maurillus, Bishop of Angers. 
 
 Dedication of the Church of Our Lady of 
 Liesse, in the diocese of Laon, ten leagues from 
 Rheims. 
 
Dedication of Our Lady of Montserrat, in * 
 Catalonia. 
 
 9. Our Lady of the Puy, in Velay. St. 
 Georges, who was the first bishop, marked the 
 site for this church, which was not built till 
 about the year 221. The Virgin herself gave it 
 in charge to St. Evodus, or Vosius, seventh 
 bishop of the same place, whom she ordered to 
 transfer his episcopal see to Puy. St. Evodus 
 obeyed the Virgin ; but when he came to conse- 
 crate his new church, he perceived that it was 
 already consecrated by angels ; the doors open- 
 ed of themselves, the bells rang of their own ac- 
 cord, the tapers were burning, and the holy 
 chrism, which the angels had used, appeared 
 still fresh on the altar and on the walls. Odo 
 GisHcus, de Virg. Aniciens., 1. ii., c. 7, 8 et 9. 
 
 10. Our Lady of Tru, near Cologne. This 
 church was built, under Otho L, by St. Heri- 
 bert, Archbishop of Cologne, on the very spot 
 where idols were formerly worshipped. 
 
 11. Our Lady of Hildesheim, in the duchy of 
 Brunswick, in Germany. The image here ven- 
 erated is the same which Louis the Good was 
 accustomed to wear on his person. One day 
 when he chanced to forget it in a wood, it be- 
 came so hea,vy that it was impossible to move it, 
 which induced the king to build a church for it 
 in that place. Trip. Cour., nomb. 75. 
 
 12. Our Lady of Healing, in Lower Nor- 
 mandy. Many miraculous cures have been ef- 
 fected in this church. Ex archiv. hujus eccles. 
 
 13. Our Lady of Guadalupa, in Spain. This 
 image, sent by Pope Gregory to St. Leander, 
 Bishop of Seville, was concealed, at the time of 
 the Moorish invasion, with the body of St. Ful- 
 gentius, in the cave of Guadalupa, where it re- 
 mained for nearly six hundred years, till Our 
 Lady revealed it to a shepherd. Joann. Mari- 
 ana, 1. vi., de ReK Hispan. 
 
 14. Dedication of Our Lady of Fontevrault, 
 in Poitou, by Pope Calixtus II., a. d. 1129. Gall. 
 Christ. 
 
 15. Octave of the Nativity of the Blessed Vir- 
 gin, instituted on the occasion of some differ- j)s 
 
 ence which occurred at the election of the suc- 
 cessor of Celestine IV., through the intrigues of 
 the Emperor Frederick II., the cardinals had 
 recourse to Our Lady, binding themselves by 
 vow to add an octave to the Feast of her Na- 
 tivity, if she would vouchsafe to give them a 
 pope. Innocent IV. having been elected, he in- 
 stituted this octave, a. d. 1243, the first year of 
 his pontificate. Arnoldus Wionius., 1. v., Ligni 
 vitce, c. 22. 
 
 16. Our Lady of Good News, at Orleans, built 
 by King Eobert, a. d. 996, on the spot where he 
 received the glad tidings that his father, Hugh 
 Capet, had escaped death. Locrius, Marion Au- 
 gustce, 1. iv., c. 62. 
 
 17. The placing of the image of Our Lady of 
 Puy, in Velay. The holy king St. Louis gave 
 this image to the Church of Puy, a. d. 1254, on 
 his return from foreign parts. 
 
 18. Our Lady of Smelcem, in Flanders. 
 Chronicles tell that certain shepherds remarked 
 that their sheep bent the knee before this im- 
 age. It was for this reason that Baldwin, sur- 
 named Fairbeard, chose this place as the site for 
 a church, in gratitude to Our Lady for having 
 cured him of a disease which he had had for 
 seventeen years. Trip. Cour., nomb. 63. 
 
 19. Our Lady of Healing, near Mount Leon, 
 in Gascony, Geoffroy, Hist, de la Vierge de 
 Guerison. 
 
 20. Our Lady of the Silver-Foot, at Toul, in 
 Lorraine ; where there is an image which, ac- 
 cording to an ancient tradition, apprised a cer- 
 tain woman, in 1284, of treachery meditated 
 against the city, and as a sign, the image ex- 
 tended its foot, which was changed into silver. 
 Trip. Cour., nomb. 57. 
 
 21. Our Lady of Pucha, in the kingdom of 
 Valencia. This image was found a. d. 1223, by 
 means of seven stars shining over the place, 
 whereupon the people dug into the ground, and 
 found an image of the Virgin. Bernard. Comes., 
 Hist. Hispan., 1. x. 
 
 22. The name of Mary given to Our Lady, by 
 her mother, St. Ann. Fet. a Castro, Hist. Virg. c. 2. 
 
660 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 23. Our Lady of Vulvancre, in Spain. This 
 image was found in an onk, in the place now oc- 
 cupied by the magnificent church rebuilt by 
 Alphonso IV., King of Castile. Anton. Yt^pez, in 
 Chronic. 
 
 24. Our Lady of Roc-Amadour, or Roche- 
 d'Amateur, in the diocese of Cahors, Quercy. 
 This pilgrimage is so named because St. Ama- 
 teur, vulgarly called St. Aniant, remained some 
 time on this rock, which became famous about 
 the year 1140. Hugo Fardlus, de MiraciU. B. 
 Virg. Rupiramal. 
 
 25. Our Lady of Passage, at Rhodes. This 
 image being often removed was always found 
 again in the same place, which caused a church 
 to be built there. Trip. Cour., nomb. 53. 
 
 26. Our Lady of Victory, at Tournay. The 
 inhabitants carried the keys of the city to the 
 Church of Our Lady, a. d. 1340, because they 
 knew that it was only the Queen of Heaven who 
 could deliver them from the English, who were 
 forty days besieging the city. No sooner had 
 they manifested this confidence in the Blessed 
 Virgin than the siege was raised ; the inhabit- 
 ants at the time had scarcely three days' provi- 
 sions. Ex Archiv. Tornncens. 
 
 27. Our Lady of Happy Meeting, half a 
 league from Agde. This earthen image was 
 discovered miraculously, a. d. 1523. Trip. Cour., 
 nomb. 34. 
 
 28. Our Lady of Cambron, of the Order of 
 Citeaux, near Mons, in Hainaut. It is said that 
 this image, being struck by a rufiian, shed blood 
 profusely. Hist. Camberon., edita Duaci, ann. 
 1602. 
 
 29. Our Lady of Tongres, in the diocese of 
 Cambrai. This image was taken in 1081 to a 
 garden, where the Bishop of Cambrai had a 
 church built. Trip. Cour., nomb. 1602. 
 
 30. Our Lady of Beaumont, in Lorraine, be- 
 tween Domremy and Vaucouleut. Joan of Arc 
 often retired to this church to recommend the 
 affairs of France to the Queen of heaven and 
 earth, who ordered her to take up arms to de- 
 liver that kingdom. Trip. Cour., traite 3. ch. 7. 
 
 OCTOBER. 
 
 1. Foundation of Crown Abbey,* of the Au- 
 gustinian Order, in the diocese of Angouleme, 
 under the title of Our Lady, by Lambert, who 
 was its first abbot, a. d. 1122. Gall. Christ, t. iv. 
 
 2. Our Lady of the Assumption, in Naples ; 
 built by the regular canonesses of St. Augustine, 
 in gratitude for the Mother of God having 
 warned them to leave a house which fell imme- 
 diately after they had quitted it. Trip. Cour., 
 nomb. 42. 
 
 3. Our Lady of the Place, in Rome. This 
 image having fallen into a well near the house 
 of the Cardinal Capoci, a. d. 1250, the water 
 rose miraculously, and cast out the image, which 
 the cardinal then placed in his chapel. But 
 Pope Innocent IV. obliged him to build another 
 on the spot where the miracle tooii place. This 
 chapel being given to the Servites, they built a 
 handsome church, inclosing the well within its 
 walls. Trip. Cour., nomb. 100. 
 
 4 Our Lady of Vaussivieres, in the moun- 
 tain's of Auvergne, near Mount d'Or, where 
 there was an image which was miraculously 
 saved from the general wreck when the English 
 ravaged Vaussivieres, about the year 1374. This 
 image being removed to the Church of Besse, 
 was found again in its former place. Duchene, 
 ch. 9. 
 
 5. Our Lady of Buch, in the Pine Moun- 
 tains, f in Guienne. The sea threw this image 
 on shore, whilst St. Thomas, the Franciscan, 
 was praying for two vessels which he saw in 
 danger of perishing. He received the image 
 with respect, and enshrined it in that place, in 
 a little chapel built for it. Florimond Rayraon, 
 Hid. des Heres., 1. i. 
 
 St. Mary of Jersey, consecrated a. d. 1320, on 
 one of the Channel Islands. Chartrier de Cou- 
 tance.% dit le Livre-Noir. ( The Black Book. ) 
 
 6. Our Lady of La Plebe, in the marsh of 
 Venice, built a. d. 1480. 
 
 i> '^ Ahbaye de la Couronne. 
 
 f Moutagnes des Pms. 
 
B 
 
 © 
 
 0} 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEV0T102^ TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 561 
 
 7. Feast of the Rosary, instituted by Pope 
 Gregory XIII., a. d. 1673, after the famous vic- 
 tory of Lepanto, obtained by the Christians over 
 the Turks. Joseph Stephan., Tract, de Indulg. 
 Rosarii. 
 
 8. Our Lady of Gifts, at Avignon. Tradition 
 assigns the foundation of this church to St. 
 Martha, and adds that it was consecrated by 
 Our Lord himself. Being sacked by the Sara- 
 cens, it was repaired by the Emperor Charle- 
 magne. Trip. Gour., nomb, 40. 
 
 9. A. D. 723, on the night of that day on which 
 the Prince of the Saracens had St. John Da- 
 mascene's hand unjustly cut off. Our Lady mir- 
 aculously united the severed hand to the wrist, 
 that faithful servant having begged her to do 
 so, that he might continue to write in favor of 
 sacred images. Joan. Patriarch. Jerosolimtt., in 
 vita sancti. Joann. Damasc. apud Surium. 
 
 10. Our Lady of the Cloister, at Besan9on. 
 Our Lady's image, placed in the cloister of the 
 Magdalen, was preserved from a fire, a. d. 1624, 
 although the niche in which it stood was re- 
 duced to ashes. 2^ip. Gour., nomb. 58. 
 
 11. Our Lady the White, in the church of the 
 Bernardine monastery, at Ouville, district of 
 Caux. This image is much honored in that 
 country. Ecc Archiv. hujus Monast. 
 
 12. Our Lady of Faith, in the district of 
 Li^ge. This image was found, a. d. 1609, by a 
 carpenter named Gilles de Wanlin, who, cutting 
 down a tree for the purpose of making a boat, 
 found in it, behind an iron grating, an image of 
 Our Lady, made of whitish clay, and about a 
 foot in height. It was removed to another oak, 
 and thence again to a church built on the spot 
 where the former tree had stood. Trip. Gour., 
 nomb. 60. 
 
 13. Dedication of Clairvaux, in the diocese of 
 Langres, in honor of the Blessed Virgin. St. 
 Bernard was the first abbot of this famous mon- 
 astery, where he died in 1153, at the age of 
 sixty-three years. Alphonso I., King of Portu- 
 gal, in 1142, bound himself and his successors 
 to pay a tribute of fifty maravedia of gold every 
 
 ^ year to Our Lady of Clairvaux. Ghronic. Gis- 
 tercians. 
 
 14. Our Lady of La Eochette, near Geneva. 
 A shepherd having approached a bush where 
 he heard a plaintive voice, found in it an image 
 of the Blessed Virgin, which caused a church to 
 be built there. Astolph. Hist, univers. B. Marioe 
 Virg. 
 
 15. Dedication of Our Lady of Terouenne, 
 A. D. 1133, by Milon, its thirtieth bishop. Jacob 
 Meyerus, 1. ii., Annal. Flandrice. 
 
 16. Dedication of Our Lady of Milan by Pope 
 Martin V., a. d. 1417. This church was built in 
 1388 by John Galeas, Duke of Milan. Philip. 
 Bergom., L iv., Suplic. ann. 1388. 
 
 17. Dedication of the Grotto of Our Lady of 
 Chartres, by St. Pontian, a. d. 46. — Dedication 
 of the Church of Citeaux, in the diocese of 
 Chalons, under the invocation of Our Lady. 
 Sebast. Rouillard, c. 4, n. 4. 
 
 18. Dedication of Our Lady of Rheims, built 
 by St. Nicaise, archbishop of that city, a. d. 405. 
 This church being ruined, was rebuilt by Ebon 
 and Hincmar. It was finished in 845. Flodo- 
 ardus, 1. i., ch. 6. 
 
 19. Dedication of the Abbey of Royaumont, 
 under the title of the Holy Cross and Our Lady, 
 by John, Archbishop of Mitylene, a. d. 1235. 
 This monastery was founded by St. Louis, in 
 the year 1227. Gall. Ghrist., t. iv. 
 
 20. Dedication of the Church of Pontigny, 
 four leagues from Auxerre, under the title of 
 Our Lady. This abbey was founded in 1114 by 
 Thibaud, Count of Champagne. Angel. Mauriq. 
 
 21. Our Lady of Talan, near Dijon. Ex 
 monumentis Divion. 
 
 22. Our Lady of the Vault, half a league from 
 Grand Cairo. Tradition has it that the Blessed 
 Virgin remained some years in this subterra- 
 nean chapel. Trip. Gour., nomb. 9. 
 
 23. Our Lady of Comfort, near Honfleur. 
 This chapel is much frequented. Two children 
 were in it restored to Hfe, in memory of which 
 their images are there in silver. Ex archiv. 
 
 ^ hujus loci. 
 
662 
 
 HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 %L Onr Lady of Hermits, in Switzerland, 
 where there was former 1} a little hermitage in 
 the midst of the woods, occupied by St. Mein- 
 rad, till the Emperor Otho built a church there, 
 accordiug to an order which he had received 
 &*om heaven. This church contains a little 
 Lady-chapel, consecrated, it is said, in 1418 by 
 Our Lord himself, accompanied by angels and 
 saints, who performed the functions of the or- 
 dinary officers of the church, in presence of the 
 Blessed Virgin. Trip. Cour., nomb. 84. 
 
 25. Dedication of Our Lady of Toledo, in 
 Spain, about the year 1075, by Bernard, arch- 
 bishop of that city. This cathedral has a rev- 
 enue of more than 300,000 livres. Joann. Mari- 
 ana^ 1. ix., ch. 18. 
 
 26. Dedication of Our Lady of Victory, near 
 SenUs, A. D. 1225, by Guarin, Bishop of Senlis 
 and Chancellor of France. This abbey was 
 built by Philip Augustus, in gratitude for the 
 victory which he gained at Bouvines over the 
 Emperor Otho, a. d. 1214. Carta Tabular, de Vict. 
 
 27. Our Lady of La Basilla, in Lombardy, 
 beyond the Po. This church was built by the 
 express command of Our Lady. Albert. Lean- 
 der, in Descriptione Ilaliae. 
 
 28. Our Lady of Vivonne, in Savoy, where 
 there is an image which was miraculously found 
 by a laborer. This statue, having been thrice 
 removed to the village church, always returned 
 to its original place ; a church was consequently 
 built there, and given to the Carmehtes. AdoU 
 phus, in Hist, univers. imag. B. Virg. 
 
 29. Our Lady of Orope, near Bielle, in Savoy. 
 This image, made of cedar wood, and about six 
 feet high, is in a chapel built by St Eusebius, 
 Bishop of Verceil, about the year 380 ; the saint 
 often retired thither during the troubles of the 
 Arians. Trip. Cour., nomb. 112. 
 
 30. Our Lady of Mondevi, at Vic, in Pied- 
 mont, where there is an image painted by a tiler 
 on a pillar of brick built by him for that pur- 
 pose. This pillar has been surrounded by a 
 church, where numberless miracles are wrought. 
 Hist, de Mondevi, c. 2. 
 
 31. In the year 1116, a choir boy having fallen 
 into the well of Saint Fort, which is in the 
 Church of Chiirtres, was saved by Our Lady. 
 All the time that he was in the well, he heard 
 the angels answering the public prayers recited 
 in the church ; this gave rise to that custom in 
 the Church of Chartres, of the choir never sing- 
 ing the response to the Dominus Vobiscum, 
 chanted at high mass and in the canonical 
 hours. Sebast. Rouillard. Farthen., c. 6, n. 14. 
 
 NOVEMBER. 
 
 1. The Feast of All Saints, instituted art 
 Rome, in honor of Our Lady and all the Saints, 
 by Pope Boniface IV., about the year 608, and 
 afterwards in all the churches in Christendom, 
 by Pope Gregory IV., about the year 829, at 
 the request of Louis the Good, who issued a 
 proclamation commanding it to be observed 
 throughout all his dominions. Baron, ad Mar- 
 tyrolog. Roman. 
 
 2. Our Lady of Emmimont, near Abbeville. 
 This church is much frequented by pilgrims. 
 Antiq. d'Abbev., 1. i. 
 
 3. Our Lady of Rennes, in Bretagne. The 
 EngUsh having undermined the town to blow it 
 up, it is said that the tapers in this chapel were 
 miraculously lighted, the bells rang of their own 
 accord, and the image of the Blessed Virgin was 
 seen to extend its arm towards the middle of 
 the church, where the train was laid ; the dan- 
 ger was thus discovered, and measures success- 
 fully taken to avert it. Trip. Cour., tract 3. 
 c. 7 et 8. 
 
 4 Our Lady of Port Louise, in Milan. Tra- 
 dition teUs that this image one day received the 
 homage of two angels, who were seen by several 
 persons bending the knee before it. Astolphus, 
 ex hist, univers. imag. B. Virg. 
 
 5. Our Lady of Damietta, in Egypt. This 
 church was consecrated in honor of the Blessed 
 Virgin, a. d. 1220, by Pelagius, the Apostolic 
 legate, ^^hnilius, in Fhilippo. 
 
 6. Our Lady of Valfleurie, seven leagues from 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 563 
 
 Lyons. This church is so called because the 
 image of the Virgin over the high altar was 
 found by shepherds in some broom which was 
 in full blossom, though the season was mid- 
 winter. Trip. Cour., nomb. 47. 
 
 7. Our Lady of the Pond, near Dijon. This 
 image, of baked clay, was discovered in 1531, by 
 means of an ox which always stopped at that 
 spot, and although he kept grazing there con- 
 tinually, the grass grew thicker and thicker 
 every day. Trip. Cour., nomb. 42. 
 
 8. Our Lady of Fair-Fountain, in the diocese 
 of La Rochelle. This image has been honored 
 from time immemorial. Ea: archiv. hujus Abbatce. 
 
 9. Our Lady of Good Aid, in Perche, near 
 Roumalard. This church is mach frequented 
 by persons in affliction. Trip. Cour., nomb. 52. 
 
 10. A. D. 1552, Our Lady of Loretto cured a 
 Turkish pacha of an incurable disease ; he had 
 been persuaded by one of his slaves, who was a 
 Christian, to have recourse to the Blessed Vir- 
 gin ; the infidel believed him, and promised to 
 set him free if . Our Lady cured him. Having 
 recovered his health, he sent many pi'esents 
 to the' Church of Our Lady of Loretto, and, 
 amongst others, his bow and quiver. Tursel., 
 Hist. Laurel., 1. iii., c. 18. 
 
 11. On this day, about the year 1546, the Por- 
 tuguese gained a great victoiy over the infidels, 
 who were before the Castle of Die, in the East 
 Indies, for seven months, and would have taken 
 it if Our Lady had not appeared on the walls ; 
 this apparition so terrified the enemy that the 
 siege was immediately raised. Balinghem in 
 Galend. 
 
 12. Our Lady of the Tower, in Fri?bourg, 
 built in a heretic country, on the very spot 
 where an image of Our Lady was found. Trip. 
 Cour., nomb. 85. 
 
 13. Dedication of the Abbey of Bee, in Nor- 
 mandy, A. D. 1077, by Lanfranc, Archbishop 
 of Canterbury. This Benedictine abbey was 
 founded about the year 1045, by Herluin, who 
 was its first abbot. Guillelm. Gemiticensis, 1. vi., 
 de due. Norman., cap. 9. 
 
 14. Our Lady of the Grotto, in the diocese of 
 Lamego, in Portugal. This chapel was hol- 
 lowed in the rock, on the spot where an image 
 of the Virgin was found. VasconcelL, in De- 
 script, regni Lusitan. 
 
 15. Our Lady of Pignerol, built in honor of 
 the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin, about the 
 year 1098, by Adelaide, Countess of Savoy. Ex 
 archiv. hujxis loci. 
 
 16. Our Lady of Chieves, in Hainault, where, 
 in 1130, the lady of the place, named Ida, built 
 a chapel near a fountain where an image of Our 
 Lady was found ; many miracles have since 
 been wrought there. Trip. Cour., nomb. 62. 
 
 17. Institution of the Confraternity of Our 
 Lady of Sion, at Nancy, in Lorraine, a. d. 1393, 
 by Ferri de Lorraine, Count of Vaud^mont. 
 Trip. Cour., nomb. 66. 
 
 18. Our Lady of Bourdieux, near Bourges. 
 This Benedictine abbey was built, in 928, by 
 Ebbon, Lord of Berry. Bzovius, ad ann. 928. 
 
 19. Our Lady of Good News, in the Abbey of 
 St. Victor, which Mary de Medici visited every 
 Saturday. The abbey was founded in 1113 by 
 Louis the Fat. Ex archiv. S. Victoris Paris. 
 
 20. Our Lady of Guard, near Bologna, in 
 Italy. This image was in the Church of St 
 Sophia, in Constantinople, with the inscription : 
 "This picture, painted by St. Luke, is to be 
 taken to Mount Guard, and placed over the 
 altar of the church." A Greek monk set out for 
 Italy towards the year 433, with the image en- 
 trusted to him, and placed it on Mount Guard. 
 Bzovius, ad ann. 1433, n. 379. 
 
 21. The Presentation of Our Lady. This 
 feast was instituted, in the Greek Church, more 
 than nine hundred years ago, since St. Ger- 
 manus, who held th«e see of Constantinopie, in 
 715, composed a sermon on it.* Baron, in Notis 
 ad Martyrolog. 
 
 22. Institution of the Confraternity of the 
 Presentation of Our Lady, at St. Omer, a. d. 
 1481. Adalardus Tassart,in Chronic., ad ann. 1481. 
 
 "■ It will be remembered that this Calendar was drawn 
 ^ up in the "eign of Louis XIV. 
 
664 
 
 BISTORT OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 28. Oar Lady of the Yaalt, near the town of 
 St Anastasia, in the neighborhood of Florence. 
 Ttnp, Cour., nomb. 102. 
 
 24 A. D. 1535, Oar Lady of Montserrat re- 
 stored speech to a Savoyard who had been 
 damb. HisL Montiss. 
 
 25. Oar Lady of the Bock, in the territory of 
 Fiezoli, in Tascany. This image is placed in a 
 rock, where two shepherds once retired to pray, 
 when Our Lady commanded them to baild her 
 a charch in that place. Archangd. Janius, in 
 .AnnaL PP. Servitarum. 
 
 26. Oar Lady of the Mountains, between 
 Moant Esqoilin and Mount Yiminal, in Italy. 
 This image was miraculously found, a. d. 1500. 
 Trip. Cour., nomb. 99. 
 
 27. Dedication of the town of Lesina, in the 
 Gampagna of Borne. This town was given to 
 Our Lady, a. d. 1400, by Margaret, Queen of 
 Poland, and mother of Ladislas. Bzovius, L ix., 
 de Sign, eccles. 
 
 28. Oar Lady of Walsingham, in England, 
 much honored by Edward L, who, playing one 
 day at chequers, instinctively rose from his 
 seat, and at the same moment a large stone 
 fell from the roof of the vault on the seat 
 which he had occupied. Ever after, he had 
 a particular devotion for Our Lady of Wal- 
 singham. Thomas Waltsingham, in Hist. Ang. in 
 Ed.L 
 
 29. Our Lady of the Crown, at Palermo ; so 
 named because it was there the kings of Sicily 
 received the royal crown, as holding it from the 
 Mother of God, and being only to wear it for 
 her. Thorn. Fazellus, L viiL, prions decad. de reb. 
 Siulis. 
 
 30. Our Lady of Genesta, on the coast of 
 Genoa, in Italy. A poor woman, named Pe- 
 traccia, undertook to build this church, which 
 appeared utterly impossible ; she, nevertheless, 
 laid the first stone, saying she was sure she 
 should not die till Our Lady and St. Augustine 
 had finished the work. The result was, that in 
 a little time after the church was foimd miracu- 
 lously finished. Signinus, in Chronic. 
 
 DECEMBEB. 
 
 L Oar Lady of Batisbon, in Bavaria, founded 
 ■ by Duke Theodore, after being baptized by St 
 Bupert, Bishop of Salisbury, and Apostle of 
 Bavaria ; the same saint subsequently conse- 
 crated this church. Canisitis, 1. v., de B. Virg., 
 cap. 25. 
 
 2. Our Lady of Didynia, in Cappadocia, be- 
 fore which St Basil besought the Blessed Virgin 
 to remedy the disorders caused by Julian the 
 Apostate ; he was favored there with a vision 
 foreshowing the emperor's death. Baroniun, ad 
 ann. 303. 
 
 3. Our Lady of Filermo, in Bhodes. This 
 image remaining amongst the ruins of the 
 Church of St Mark, of Bhodes, was removed 
 to St Catherine's Charch, and, at length, the 
 knights having quitted Bhodes, it was placed in 
 the Church of St Lawrence. This church was 
 afterwards entirely burned, but the image re- 
 mained uninjured. Trip. Cour., nomb. 91. 
 
 4. Our liady of the Chapel, at Abbeville. 
 This church was built about the year 1400, on a 
 little hill where idols were formerly worshipped. 
 Antiq. d'Abbev., L L 
 
 5. In the year 1584 was instituted the first 
 congregation of Our Lady in the Jesuit College 
 in Bome, and hence the company's pious custom 
 of establishing it in all their houses. Balinghem 
 in Calend. 
 
 6. Our Lady of Fonrviere, at Lyons, famous 
 for miracles, and for the extraordinary con- 
 course of people who go there from the city, es- 
 pecially on Saturdays. 
 
 7. On this day, being a Sunday, in the year 
 1550, the canons of Our Lady of Paris, walking 
 in procession before the image of the Virgin, 
 which stands near the door of the choir, a 
 Lorraine heretic, forcing his way through the 
 crowd, sword in hand, attempted to strike the 
 image ; he wa? prevented by the assistants, and 
 on the following Thursday he was executed in 
 front of Notre -Dame. Du Breuil, Antiq. de 
 Paris, L L 
 
HISTORY OF THE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MART. 
 
 565 
 
 8. The Conception of the Blessed Virgin. 
 This feast commenced in the East about the 
 seventh or eighth century, for St. John Damas- 
 cene, who hved in 721, makes mention of it. It 
 was instituted in England, a. d. 1100, by St. 
 Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury, then in the 
 diocese of Lyons, a. d. 1145, and finally Sixtus 
 rV. decreed, a. d. 1576, that it should be cele- 
 brated throughout Christendom. Joann. Molaru, 
 in Annot. i., ad Usuard, 
 
 9. Our Lady of the Conception, in Naples ; 
 so named because, in 1618, the Viceroy, with all 
 his court and the Neapolitan militia, made a 
 vow in the Church of Our Lady the Great, to 
 believe in and defend the Immaculate Concep- 
 tion of the Blessed Virgin. Trip. Gour., n. 43. 
 
 10. Institution of the nuns of the Conception 
 of Oar Lady, by Beatrice de Sylva, to whom 
 Our Lady is said to have appeared in 1484, 
 clothed in white, with a scapular of the same 
 color, and a blue mantle. Beatrice, sister of the 
 Blessed Amadeus, took this costume for the 
 habit of her order, approved by Innocent VIII., 
 according to the Cistercian rule. Vasconcell. in 
 DescripL regni Lusit. 
 
 11. Our Lady of Angels, in the forest of 
 Livry, four leagues from Paris. Three Anjou 
 merchants having been abused in this forest, 
 A. D. 1212, by robbers, who left them fastened to 
 trees, so that they might starve to death, had 
 recourse to the Blessed Virgin, who imme- 
 diately sent three angels to liberate them. In 
 the course of time several other miracles were 
 wrought there, which made the chapel very 
 famous. Des registres de I'Abbaye de Livry. 
 
 12. Our Lady of Good News, at Abbeville. 
 This little chapel, in St. Peter's Priory, has 
 always been much frequented. Antiq. d'Abhev. 
 
 13. Our Lady' of the Holy Chapel, in Paris. 
 This image, under the portal of the lower Holy 
 Chapel, has wrought many miracles. 
 
 14. Our Lady of Albe la Royale, in Hungary, 
 was built by St. Stephen, King of Hungary, who 
 gave his kingdom to the Blessed Virgin. Joann. 
 Bonifacius, Hid. Virg., 1. ii., c. 1. 
 
 * 15. Octave of the Conception of Our Lady, 
 instituted by Pope Sixtus IV. Bullarium. 
 
 16. Institution of the famous confraternity of 
 Our Lady of Deliverance, in the Church of St. 
 Etienne des Gres, in Paris, about the year 1533, 
 to which Gregory XIII. granted great indul- 
 gences, A. D. 1518. 
 
 17. Cathedral Church of Our Lady of Amiens. 
 The first bishop of this church was St. Firmin, 
 ^o received the crown of martyrdom during 
 the persecution under Dioclesian. There is in 
 this church a portion of the head of St. John 
 the Baptist, brought from Constantinople by 
 a traveller named Galon, a. d. 1205. Locrius, 
 Marice Augustoe, 1. iv., c. 59. 
 
 18. Dedication of Our Lady of Marseilles, by 
 St. Lazarus, in presence of his two sisters, Mary 
 Magdalen and Martha, and three holy prelates, 
 Maximus, Trophimus, and Eutropus. Ganisius, 
 1. v.. Moral. 
 
 19. In the year 657, while St. Ildefonso, Arch- 
 bishop of Toledo, was saying matins. Our Lady, 
 it is said, appeared to him, accompanied by a 
 vast number of blessed spirits, holding in her 
 hand the book he had composed in her honor. 
 She thanked him for it, and, in gratitude, gave 
 him a white chasuble. This celestial present is 
 still preserved at Oviedo, where Alphonso the 
 Chaste, King of Castile, had it solemnly removed 
 to the Church of St. Saviour, which he had 
 built. Baron, ad ann. 657. 
 
 Our Lady of Etalem, in Bavaria, built by the 
 Emperor Louis IV. Albert, Krantzius, L i., Me' 
 tropol. 
 
 20. The Abbey of Our Lady of Moleme, order 
 of St, Benedict, in the diocese of Langres, was 
 founded on this day, a. d. 1075, by St. Eobert, 
 who was its abbot. Gall. Ghrist, t. iv. 
 
 21. Foundation of St. Acheul, near Amiens, 
 under the title of Our Lady, by St. Firmin, first 
 bishop of that city. Ex archiv. S. Achioli. 
 
 22. Our Lady of Chartres, in Beauce. This 
 church, which was built in the times of the 
 Apostles, after being several times destroyed, 
 
 ^ was put in its present state by Si Fulbert, fifty- 
 
566 
 
 HTSTORT OF TEE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. 
 
 fifth bishop of Chartres. Sdxist. Rouillard, Par- ^ 
 then., o. 5. 
 
 23. Our Lady of Ardilliers, at Saiimur, in 
 Anjou. The name of this church is illustrious 
 all over France, because of the vast concourse 
 of people drawn thither by a miraculous foun- 
 tain which cured many diseases. The image 
 represents Our Lady of Pity, holding in her 
 arms her dead son, whose head is supported by 
 an angel. Locrius, MarUe AugvMce, 1. iv., ch. 60. 
 
 24. Celebration of the Chaste Nuptials of Our 
 Lady and Si. Joseph, long solemnized as a fes- 
 tival in Sens, and several other churches of 
 France. Savusseyua, in Martyrol. Oallic. 
 
 25. On this day, at the hour of midnight, the 
 Blessed Virgin brought forth the Saviour of the 
 world, in the stable of Bethlehem, where a foun- 
 tain sprang up miraculously on the same day. 
 Baron., in Apparal. ad Annal. 
 
 26. Institution of the Confraternity of the 
 Conception of Our Lady, at the Augustines of 
 the grand convent, in Paris, a. d. 1443, to which 
 many indulgences were subsequently granted 
 by Linocent IIL Du BreuU, Aniiq., L ii. 
 
 27. Institution of the order of the Knights 
 of Our Lady, a. d. 1370, by Louis II., Duke of 
 Bourbon. Andr. Favin, 1. viii.. Hist, de Navarre, 
 et L iii., du Theatre d'Honneur. 
 
 28. Our Lady of Pontoise, seven leagues from 
 Paris. This image, standing in the portal of 
 the suburban church of that city, on the road 
 to Kouen, is famous for the miracles wrought 
 therein. Ex archiv. hujus ecdes. 
 
 29. Our Lady of Spire, in Germany. St. Ber- 
 nard, entering this church on the 29th of De- 
 cember, 1146, was honorably received by the 
 canons, who conducted him to the choir, singing 
 the anthem, " Salve, Regina ;" the anthem fin- 
 ished, St. Bernard saluted the image of the Vir- 
 gin in these terms, "O clemens! O pia! O dul- 
 cis Virgo Maria ! " and the image is said to have 
 answered, "Salve, Bernarde." The words of 
 the saint to the image are engraved in a circle 
 on the pavement of the church, on the spot 
 where he pronounced them, and subsequently 
 the "Salve, Regina" was added; this anthem 
 was composed in 1040, by Herman, surnamed 
 Contract, a Benedictine monk. Angel. Manri- 
 que, Annal. Gist., ad ann. 1146, c. 10, etc. 
 
 30. St. Mary of Boulogne, in Picardy. This 
 church was founded by the monks of St. Augus- 
 tine, A. D. 1159 ; it was destroyed by Henry 
 VIII., King of England, a. d. 1444, secularized 
 and made a cathedral, 1559, according to Lo- 
 crius. Gall. Christ., t. iv. 
 
 31. About a hundred years before the birth 
 of Our Saviour, the image of Our Lady of Char- 
 tres, consecrated by the Druids to the Virgin 
 who was to bring forth, restored to life the son of 
 GeoJBfrey, king or prince of Montlh^ry, who, 
 having fallen into a well, was found dead ; in 
 gratitude for this favor, he made several pres- 
 ents to the image, as is recorded in the his- 
 tory of this miracle, represerted on the windows 
 of the church. Sebastien .Aouillard, Farthenie, 
 c. 3. 
 

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 N-Y.D ScJ.SATLIER. 
 
A MONUMENT TO THE GLOEY OF MAEY. 
 
 MEDITATIONS 
 
 OS THB 
 
 LITANY OP THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH OF THE ABB!^ EDOUARD BARTHE, 
 
 BY 
 
 MRS. J. SADLIER. 
 
 PUBLISHED WITH THE APPROBATION OF THE LATE MOST REV. JOHN HUGHES, D. D., 
 AND THE MOST REV. J. McCLOSKET, D. D., ARCHBISHOP OF NEW TOBK. 
 
 ▲ NEW, ENLARGED AND REVISED EDITION. 
 
 PUBLISHED BY D. & J. SADLIER & CO., 31 BARCLAY STREET. 
 
 MONTREAL :— CORNER OF NOTRE DAME AND ST. FRANCIS XAVIER STS. 
 
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1858, 
 Bt D. & J. SADUER & CO., 
 b the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for tbe Southern District of New Torik 
 
APPKOBATION OF HIS GEACE THE AECHBISHOP OF PAEIS. 
 
 Makie — Dominique — Auguste Sibour, by the grace of God and the favor of the Holy Apostolic 
 See, Archbishop of Paris, on the report of the examiner by us appointed, and the favorable opinion 
 of our Commission des tltudes, have approved, and do hereby approve, of a book entitled " Monument 
 to the Glory of Mary, The Litany of the Blessed Virgin," illustrated, accompanied by Meditations by 
 the Abbe Edouard Barthe, Honorary Canon of Rodez, published by P. J. Camus, Paris. 
 
 Given at Paris, under our seal, the signature of our Vicar-General, president, and the countersign 
 of the Secretary of our Commission des Mudes, July 2d, 1851. 
 
 Sec. Com. 
 
 Jul. Flandrin, Can. Hon. 
 
 Pres. Com. 
 
 L. Batjtain, Vic. Gen. 
 
 APPROBATION OF HIS LOEDSHIP THE BISHOP OF EODEZ. 
 
 It is with as much pleasure as attention that we have read, according as they appeared, all the 
 numbers of Abbe Barthe's Meditations on the Litany of Loretto. We have everywhere found in that 
 work the most exact orthodoxy, with the utmost beauty and elegance of style, a rare and profound 
 knowledge of the Sacred Scriptures, with the charm and the unction of lively faith and tender piety. 
 All these numerous merits, to which we have already borne testimony, are based on the solid foun- 
 dation of Catholic teaching, and the pure doctrine of the Church, and hence it is that we think it 
 our duty, once more, to recommend this beautiful and excellent work, which is solely for the glory of 
 the Immaculate Mother of God, and must therefore be dear and precious to the faithful children 
 and devoted clients of that Queen of the Church and Mother of Christians. 
 
 Given at our residence in Vabres, on the Feast of All Saints, in the year of grace, 1850. 
 
 John, Bishop of Sodex 
 
THE TRANSLATOR TO THE READER. 
 
 ^ EADER, if you are a Catholic Christian, you are a child 
 of Mary, and as such will kindly welcome this Monument 
 TO THE Gloey of Maey. It comes to us, as you see, with 
 high recommendations ; and, even allo\dng for what it loses 
 in the translation, I trust you will find it fully deserving of 
 all that has been said of it. The distinguished French pre- 
 lates who so warmly recommend it to the Faithful, seem fully convinced that it is 
 calculated to promote devotion to the Blessea Virgin — one of the strongest 
 bulwarks of our holy faith — and, if so, your time and my time will not be lost. 
 If the perusal of this work makes you in any degree more devout to Mary, our 
 sovereign lady and mistress, — if it induces you to have recourse to her in all your 
 trials, temptations, and dangers, it will help to promote both your temporal and 
 eternal happiness, and Mary will give you a portion of the reward which she never 
 fails to confer on those who love and honor her. Hoping that you will receive it 
 well, for Her sake, I now beg leave to present it to your notice. 
 MoMTBEAL, August, 1854 
 
674 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 And behold how faithfully all generations have accomplished this prediction I Hear how 
 the echoes of Gathoho history for eighteen hundred years repeat the matchless name of Mary, 
 and proclaim, as " with the noise of a great trumpet,"' the grandeur, the merits, the power 
 of that divine Mother. 
 
 Going back to the primitive Church, we find, from the very beginning, the glory of Mary 
 celebrated by the arts. Not to speak of the picture attributed to the Evangelist, St. Luke, — 
 a picture formerly so highly honored in the East, and whose authenticity is not altogether des- 
 titute of scientific proof,* — we have, from the second century, or at least from the third, a 
 painted likeness of Mary, on which the antiquarian may still feast his eyes in the catacombs 
 of Rome. This ancient monument of CathoUo devotion clearly proves that, no sooner was the 
 Church, in the midst of persecutions, established in the world, than Christian artists began to 
 consecrate their pencil to the Blessed Virgin. In the fourth century we find, on many sar- 
 cophagi or Christian tombs, a group of the Virgin and Child, the countenance of the Mother 
 breathing at once a radiant youth and a divine purity. This it was that caused a learned 
 writer of our day, M. Baoul Bochette, to make that important remark, founded on his knowl- 
 edge of arts and monuments: "It is incorrect to say, as did the Protestant historian Basnage, 
 that it was not till after the Council of Ephesus that the Virgin began to be represented; 
 for," he adds, " amongst the Christian sarcophagi of the Vatican, where she is seen, there is 
 certainly more than one anterior to that period."' The fifth century presents, in the reign of 
 the Greek emperor Anastasius, imperial coins, whose reverse bears the monogram of Mary, 
 surrounded by stars. This mark of respect was continued by a great number of his succes- 
 sors; amongst others, the empress Theophania had the figure of Mary stamped on her money, 
 her head encircled with the nimbo, with the inscription : QeoToxog, Mother of God. From the 
 fifth century to our own times, it is well known how the arts have multiplied testimonials of 
 devotion to the Blessed Virgin. It is true that, at one time, they fell into singular aberrations 
 — for instance, inventing black statues of the Mother of God — but these specimens of bad taste 
 are still so many proofs of the faith and piety of those times, now called the Dark Ages, which, 
 nevertheless, produced, in their incomparable stained windows, and their wonderful churches 
 dedicated to God under the invocation of Mary, things which our modern civilization has no 
 longer the secret of fabricating, and has hardly the courage to undertake. 
 
 Still, we are not to suppose that churches dedicated to Mary date only from the Middle 
 Ages : if we would ascertain their origin, we must go back to Pope Calixtus I., who built a 
 chapel, under the title of Our Lady, beyond the Tiber, in the most populous part of Rome, in 
 the year 224; nay, we must ascend still higher, for, even prior to that time, there was at Sara- 
 
 » Isaias xxvii. 13. « Annaks de Fldlos. Chret., t. ix., p. 74 et suiv. a Ditcours sur I' art du Chrinlianisme, p. 34, note 1. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 575 
 
 gossa, in Spain, the church of Our Lady of the Pillar, and in Syria several other churches, 
 likewise dedicated to the divine Virgin. Thus it is that, by an uninterrupted chain of monu- 
 ments, reaching from the first ages of Christianity tiU the present time, ai-chitecture, inspired 
 by faith and piety, has united its powerful voice with that of the other arts to exalt the glo- 
 rious name of Mary. What a magnificent sight would it be, were it given to man to contem- 
 plate, in one stupendous whole, all the wealth of stone and marble, of wood and precious 
 metals, of gold and azure, offered by the arts to God, throughout the CathoHc world, for 
 eighteen centuries, to bless and glorify Him for the graces, the virtues, the power wherewith 
 he endowed it on behalf of men 1 . . . . What eye could gaze on that ravishing spectacle ! what 
 heart consider it without emotion! what lips would not cry out, with transport — "Glory be to 
 God, who has made every age so faithful in fulfilling that prophecy of his divine Mother — 
 'Behold, henceforth all generations shall call me blessed 1'" 
 
 But there is a voice as superior to that of all the arts as the moral order is to the phys- 
 ical — the voice of science, of eloquence, of genius by word and pen; and, assuredly, it has not 
 been wanting in the fulfillment of the Virgin's prophecy. There remains to us but very few 
 writings of the first two Christian centuries, and yet, even in the second century, we read in 
 the words of the illustrious martyr St. Irenseus, bishop of Lyons, an eulogy of Mary, most 
 expressive in its conciseness. "Eve," says he, "allowing herself to be seduced by the words 
 of the tempter, disobeyed God and sought to flee from his presence; the Virgin Mary, acced- 
 ing to the words of the Angel Gabriel, and obeying the orders of God, consented to bear 
 Christ in her womb, so that by that submission, she became the pattern of Eve."' After him 
 St. Athanasius, St. Basil, St. Ephraim, St. Gregory Nazianzen, St. Jerome, St. Chrysostom, St. 
 Ambrose, St. Augustine, St. Cyril, St. Epiphanius, St. John Damescene, then St. Bernard, St. 
 Anselm, and that great genius who is called the last of the Fathers of the Church, the immor- 
 tal Bossuet, — in a word, all the most eminent writers of Eastern and Western Christendom have, 
 in turn, celebrated the glory of Mary, her dignity, her virtues, her privileges, and the wonder* 
 ful efficacy of her intercession. 
 
 The Litany of Loretto forms, as we have said, a full and complete abridgment of all these 
 praises, of all these marks of veneration and love, of devotion and confidence; it is, therefore, 
 one of the best acts of homage we can render to that divine Mother. Hence, Pope Clement 
 VIII., in 1601, forbade any other to be recited in her honor in the public prayers; in 1606, 
 Paul v., in his turn, granted sixty days' indulgence to all those persons who would assist 
 on Saturdays at the solemn chanting of those pious invocations in the Dominican churches ; 
 Sixtus V. and Benedict XIIL, two hundred days to all the faithful who would recite them 
 
 • Omlra hares., lib. v., c. 19. 
 
878 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 devoatly; and Pius VII. extended this last indulgence to three hundred days. "We thereby see 
 how this Litany became so dear to Catholic piety, which has delighted to multiply its repeti- 
 tion, to vary its mosio, and to embellish it with all the charms of melody and of the sweetest 
 harmony. The art of engraving, which speaks to the eye as singing does to the ear, could 
 not fail to lend its valuable aid to this pious tribute of musical art In fact, towards the end 
 of the eighteenth century some famous German engravers published a series of figures and 
 symbolical images, as ingenious as significant, intended to explain to the eye, in succession, all 
 the titles which the Church bestows on Mary in the Litany of Loretto. 
 
 May the author of these Meditations, O Mary, be successful in the mission which circum- 
 stances, in some way providential, have given him! Undoubtedly it will be sweet, and very 
 sweet, to me, to pour forth my soul before thee and in thy honor, and to exert myself to 
 make known the holiness, the goodness, the tenderness, and the glory of the divine Mother of 
 my Saviour. But how can I speak of thee in adequate terms, after all that has been already 
 written by others so much more competent? How can I even attempt it, when St. Bernard 
 said that " nothing frightened him more than having to speak of thy greatness and glory ?" » 
 I will, nevertheless, attempt it, O Mary, O thou whom I delight to call my good and amiable 
 mother; I will attempt it for the sake of thy divine Son, who is glorified through thee; I will 
 attempt it for thy sake, O masterpiece of Almighty power 1 brightest image of his adorable 
 perfections! I will attempt it with the confidence of a child who works for his mother and 
 before her eyes, and who looks to her for help and encouragement. To thee, then, O divine 
 Mary, I give up my mind, my heart, and my pen, and to thee do I dedicate this feeble testi- 
 mony of ray respect, and confidence, and filial devotion. 
 
MEDITATIONS 
 
 ON THE 
 
 LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIEGIN. 
 
 MEDITATION I. 
 
 LORD, HAVE MERCY ON US. . 
 
 HY is it that the 
 Church makes 
 us send up to 
 God the humble 
 sigh of prayer, 
 before commen- 
 cing the different invocations which 
 she afterwards makes us address to 
 Mary ? It is to remind us of that 
 truth of faith so forcibly expressed 
 by the Apostle St. Paul : "Of him, 
 and by him, and in him are all 
 things: to him be glory forever."^ 
 Yes, truly, the creature, even the 
 most august, the most adorned 
 with virtue, the most resplendent 
 in power and in glory, is nothing 
 before him, nothing without him, 
 nothing but by him. K the Bless- 
 
 • Romans xi. 36. 
 
 * Exod. iii. 14. 
 
 ed Virgin can marvellously assist us 
 by her protection, it is to him that 
 we owe that inestimable advantage: 
 from him alone comes that power, 
 from him alone come all the graces 
 that flow on us. 
 
 The object of the Church is to 
 inspire us with a high idea of the 
 supreme greatness of God, a deep 
 and lively sentiment of respect, of 
 religious fear, of pious prostration 
 of all our faculties before " Him who 
 is."^ He alone owes nothing to any 
 one; all that thinks and wills, all 
 that breathes, all that lives, all 
 that exists, owes to him alone 
 thought, will, breath, life, being, 
 and the preservation of being. He 
 alone, existing by himself, "blessed 
 and only mighty,^ who only hath 
 immortality,* who alone doeth won- 
 derful things,^ who is alone immor- 
 al Tim. vi. 15. * 1 Tim. vi. 16. »Ps. Ixxi. 18. 
 
r 
 
 578 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 tal hy Ms own essence,^ alone the be- 
 ginning and the end of all;^ than 
 whom there is no other God;"' He 
 alone merits the title of Lord by 
 excellence ; and by that title the 
 Church wishes to excite our faith in 
 the infinite majesty of Him whom 
 we have the immense honor of ad- 
 dressing. Oh! let us be sensible 
 of our extreme inferiority to him, 
 our inexpressible littleness as crea- 
 tures before his infinite greatness as 
 Creator; and, imploring his mercy, 
 let us remain as supplicants at the 
 feet of his supreme majesty, pros- 
 ti'ate in profound respect and adora- 
 tion. Let us acknowledge, with all 
 the powers of our soul, that we are 
 but dust and ashes;* that in his 
 presence we are nothing;^ that we 
 do not deserve to address Him even 
 with the mute worship of the heart. 
 Why, once more, does the Church, 
 in this first invocation of the Lord, 
 make us say, as though crying out 
 in distress, Lord, have mercy on us I 
 .... It is because we are, indeed, 
 much to be pitied ; that our misery 
 is great, profound, and almost im- 
 measurable. In the body, weak- 
 ness, infirmity, pain, sufiering — at 
 
 f times, almost intolerable. In the 
 soul, weariness, sadness, poignant 
 grief, devouring passions ; darkness 
 in the understanding, inordinate af- 
 fections in the heart ; dangers, de- 
 grading inclinations, and ignomin- 
 ious disorders in the senses. Within 
 and around us, numerous enemies 
 of our eternal salvation. In our 
 will, weakness, indecision ; often, 
 and very often, cowardice, indo- 
 lence, and even mortal lethargy. 
 Oh, yes, assuredly we are much to 
 be pitied. Our misery is inexpres- 
 sible. At every moment, we run 
 the risk of losing all, irrecoverably ; 
 of incurring an endless and ir- 
 retrievable misfortune. We have, 
 then, but too much reason to ex- 
 claim, with St. Theresa, " Alas I 
 Lord, so long as this mortal life 
 endures, the eternal is always in 
 danger ! life, so opposed to my 
 happiness, why am I not permitted 
 to end thee? I bear with thee, 
 because my God bears with thee ; I 
 take care of thee, because thou art 
 His. But do not betray me, and be 
 not ungrateful to me. Alas ! Lord, 
 but my exile is long ! .... It is true 
 that all time is short to gain thy 
 
 • 2 Mach. L 24, 25. 
 
 * Apoc. xxii. 13. ^ ' Deut, xxxii. 39. * Gen. xviii. 27. * Ps. xjcxviii. 7. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 579 
 
 eternity ; but a single day, a single 
 hour, is too long for those who fear 
 to offend thee, and who even know 
 not whether they do offend thee!"^ 
 We have but too much reason to 
 3ry out with the Apostles, beaten 
 by the tempest, "Lord, save us, or 
 we perish ;"^ and with the Churcli, 
 our mother, Lord, have mercy on us ! 
 It is for us ever to pronounce these 
 words with a lively sentiment of 
 our immense need of Divine com- 
 miseration, of infinite mercy, ex- 
 ceeding the vast extent, the pro- 
 found depth of our misery. Pros- 
 trate here, before the infinite majesty 
 of the Lord, let us say to him, as 
 humble and most wretched petition- 
 ers, as sick persons groaning in 
 mortal anguish, as mariners who 
 have death before their eyes : — 
 
 Supreme Being, Being by excel- 
 lence. Being of beings, from the 
 height of thy supreme greatness, 
 deign to hear our voice. It is the 
 cry of nakedness, the cry of infir- 
 mity, of pain, of peril ; it is the cry 
 of the heart which invokes, which 
 beseeches thy omnipotence and thy 
 infinite goodness ; it is the cry of 
 
 » Elevation a Dieu. »Matt. viii. 26. 
 
 3 2 Esd. ix. 31. 
 
 faith, which shows us in thee the 
 "God of mercy," ^ at the same time 
 that it makes us say. Lord, have 
 mercy on us. It is the cry of faith, 
 which shows us also in heaven, near 
 the throne of thy eternal glory, a 
 mother whom thy Church makes us 
 call Mother of mercy ;^ a mother 
 whose praises thou wouldst have 
 "the whole earth" proclaim as it 
 proclaims thine own ;^ a mother to 
 whom it is so sweet to send up our 
 accents " of benediction," which fall 
 back on our heads as a dew of grace 
 and of divine blessing;^ a mother 
 who prays for us, and with whom 
 we unite in saying to thee — 
 
 Lord, have mercy on us I 
 
 Kyrie eleison I 
 
 MEDITATION E. 
 
 CHRIST, HAVE MERCY ON US. 
 
 THE soul that is deeply sensible 
 of its misery, and impressed 
 with the majesty of the Lord, from 
 whom alone it can expect relief, 
 strength, and salvation, implores 
 
 * Salve Begina, etc. » Habac. iii. 3. 
 
 • Numb. xxiv. 9. 
 
580 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 \ him but with fear and ti-embling. 
 It remains, as it were, annihilated 
 in presence of his infinite greatness. 
 The Church encourages it in the 
 second invocation, where she veils, 
 in some degree, the infinite distance 
 between God and the creature, and 
 makes it consider Him to whom the 
 invocation is addressed under the 
 most accessible point of view, and 
 in the way best calculated to excite 
 hope. And what does the name of 
 Jesus Christ say to the ear of Catho- 
 lic faith ? " The Word made flesh," 
 which " dwelt among us, fujl of 
 grace and truth ;"^ the one Mediator 
 of God and men ; ^ the Lamb of God, 
 who taketh away the sins of the 
 world,^ who was tempted in all 
 things like as we are, yet wdthout 
 sin,* who was in all things made 
 like unto us,^ so that he might com- 
 passionate us as a brother, having 
 compassion on our sad state, having 
 been man's companion in misfor- 
 tune ; " the great High-priest, who 
 hath penetrated the heavens, who 
 hath the key of David ;° He that 
 openeth, and no man shutteth."^ 
 
 ' St. John i. 14. 
 • 1 Tim. ii 5, 6. 
 
 » St. John i. 29. 
 * Heb. iv. 15. 
 
 » Heb. iL 17. 
 
 In placing on our lips the name 
 of that divine Pontiff, the Church, 
 then, proposes to us the motive most 
 proper to dilate our hearts, com- 
 pressed with fear ; she invites them, 
 in the most effectual manner, to give 
 themselves up to the sentiment of 
 Christian hope, which holds the soul 
 duly balanced between despair and 
 presumption. How^ can we presume 
 on the goodness of God, when we 
 believe that, to " blot out the hand- 
 writing of the decree which was 
 against us," it w^as necessary that 
 Christ should "fasten it to the 
 Cross ?"^ How can we despair of 
 obtaining strength, or the forgive- 
 ness of our sins, how enormous so- 
 ever they may be, when we believe 
 that " God so loved the world as 
 to give his only-begotten Son, that 
 whosoever believeth in him may not 
 perish, but may have life everlast- 
 ing?"^ Ah! we do not justly ap- 
 preciate this faith in Jesus Christ ; 
 we are not sufficiently sensible of its 
 advantages. It is a supernatural 
 gift, which surpasses not only all 
 human strength, but all human un- 
 
 « Heb. iv. 14 
 "> Apoc. iiL 7. 
 
 ' Colos. ii. 14. 
 » St. John iii. 16, 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 581 
 
 derstanding, and all the desires 
 which our nature is capable of 
 forming. It is a gift, without which 
 it is impossible to obtain everlast- 
 ing happiness ; for, " without faith, 
 it is impossible to please God,"^ and 
 how can any one who is not pleas- 
 ing to God be judged worthy of a 
 share in his eternal bliss ? It is a 
 gift worth nothing less than eternal 
 life, the eternal possession of the 
 sovereign good ; for the divine Mas- 
 ter has said, "This is life everlast- 
 ing," to "know thee, the only true 
 God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou 
 hast sent."^ .... And even in this 
 world, is it not the only true happi- 
 ness ? "He that heareth my word, 
 and believeth him that sent me," 
 says the Man-God once again, " is 
 passed from death to life."^ It fol- 
 lows that the life of those who have 
 not faith in Christ is death. In fact, 
 to be a slave of "the Prince of Dark- 
 ness ;" * to be destitute of infallible 
 light, amid the cruel uncertainty of 
 the understanding as to the duties 
 of man and his destiny ; to be with- 
 out a guide, without a pilot amid 
 the shoals of life, without consola- 
 
 • Heb. xi. 6. 
 
 « St. John xvii. 3. 
 
 s St. John V. 24 
 * Ephes. vi. 12. 
 
 tion amid the sorrows of this world, 
 without strength against the assault 
 of the passions, misfortune, and 
 afflictions ; to be deprived of the 
 calm, pure truth of the teachings of 
 the Incarnate Word, the incompar- 
 able force of his example, the inex- 
 haustible resources of his merits, the 
 magnificent hopes founded on his 
 word, what a fate would that be ! 
 what a deplorable condition! and 
 what obligation do we not owe to 
 the Saviour, who has endowed us 
 with the priceless treasure of 
 faith ! 
 
 Jesus ! eternal Priest ! ador- 
 able Pontiff! divine victim of our 
 salvation, it is thou who hast given 
 us our faith in thee ; be thou for- 
 ever blessed by every pulsation of 
 our hearts! What thanksgivings 
 can ever equal the favors he has 
 conferred upon us, for " he hath not 
 done in like manner to every na- 
 tion,^ many of whom are still seated 
 in the darkness and shadow of 
 death !"^ .... Ah! vouchsafe to 
 " confirm what thou hast wrought in 
 us ;^ deign to fructify the gift which 
 we have received from thy infinite 
 
 <* Ps. cxlviL 20. « St. Luke i. 79. 
 
 » Ps. Ixvii. 29. 
 
6» 
 
 KKDirATTONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 libeiulity." Help; "increase our 
 faith,"* 80 that it may "work by 
 charity."* It is true, we are very 
 ungrateful, very culpable; but are 
 we not "thy brethren/" for whom 
 thou hast shed all thy blood ? Be- 
 hold, moreover, between thee and 
 us, thy divine Mother, " under whose 
 protection we take refuge"* in our 
 distress. Is not the voice of Mary 
 still more powerful over thy heart 
 than was that of Bethsabee over 
 the heart of King Solomon? And 
 if that prince said to his mother, 
 " Ask, for I must not turn away my 
 face,"* how much more wilt thou 
 grant to the entreaties of her at 
 whose request thou didst work thy 
 first miracle ?® She here interposes 
 her prayer to defend us from those 
 "dreadful arrows"^ which thine 
 adorable heart desires so much to 
 see changed, by our compunction, 
 into the bm-ning dai-ts of divine 
 love, as she formerly, in her appari- 
 tion to St. Dominick, showed you 
 that faithful servant uniting his zeal 
 with that of St. Francis of Assis- 
 sium, and thus appeased thine out- 
 raged justice. Full of confidence 
 
 • St. Mark ix. 23 ; St Lake xviL 5. * Gal. v. 6. 
 » St John XX- 17. * Sub tuum. » 3 Kings ii 20. 
 
 * in her maternal intercession, we 
 venture to say to thee, "from the 
 depths"* of our nothingness — 
 
 Christ, have mercy on us I 
 
 Christe eleison I 
 
 MEDITATION in. 
 
 lord, have mercy on us. 
 
 AFTER having penetrated our 
 hearts with the sentiment of 
 Christian hope, exciting our faith 
 in the divine Mediator, the Church 
 makes us repeat, Lord^ have mercy 
 on us! It is that, the adorable 
 name of Jesus, once piously in- 
 voked, the name of Lord given to 
 God need no longer inspire us with 
 terror. K the Man-God vouchsafes 
 to cover us with his infinite merits 
 as with a shield, why should we 
 henceforth tremble before the su- 
 preme Majesty? Why should we 
 imitate Adam, when, after his fall, 
 he was so afraid of God that he 
 became, in some degree, senseless ? 
 for he sought to hide himself from 
 his presence,^ as though he knew 
 
 « St. John ii. 3, 4 
 ' Job vi 4. 
 
 • Ps. cxxix. 1. 
 
 • Gen. iii. 10. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 583 
 
 not that " there is no creature invis- 
 ible in his sight; but all things 
 are naked and open to His eyes,^ 
 to whom darkness is not dark, and 
 night as the light of day."^ .... Ah, 
 why should we not, rather, speak to 
 the Sovereign Master, in the name 
 of that sweet Saviour, with filial 
 confidence, since it was he who 
 " sent his Son, that we might re- 
 ceive the adoption of sons, and 
 who sent the Spirit of his Son into 
 our hearts, crying, Abba, Father?"^ 
 Prodigious honor, prodigious favor 
 conferred on guilty man! That 
 God, from whom we deserved only 
 condemnation, is not content with 
 redeeming us, with restoring us by 
 his only Son; he would, moreover, 
 " that we should be named, and 
 should be the sons of God."* .... 
 "Behold," then, "what manner of 
 charity the Father hath bestowed 
 upon us;"^ behold what we owe to 
 the merits of Jesus Christ. They 
 have so admirably " reconciled all 
 things"'^ that they have made man, 
 reprobate man, doomed to hell by 
 the infinite justice of God, the be- 
 loved child of God himself. 
 
 > Heb. iv. 13. 
 * Ps. cxxxviii. 12. 
 
 ' Gal. iv. 4, 5, 6. 
 * 1 John iii. L 
 
 It is true, we have lost sight of 
 that high dignity conferred upon us 
 by baptism; it is true we have 
 diminished, by faults "which are 
 not unto death,"^ or have even for- 
 feited, by mortal sin, the rights 
 appertaining to that fair title. But, 
 however that may be, we are still 
 entitled to rely on the merits of the 
 Saviour, to recover, by the means 
 which himself has provided for us, 
 the high position from which we 
 may have fallen. Yes, that infinite 
 treasure of his mortal life, his suffer- 
 ings and his immolation on Calvary, 
 Jesus Chi'ist has irrevocably placed 
 in our hands. He has given it to 
 us ; he has made it, as it were, our 
 inalienable property; and, till our 
 latest moment, we may use it to im- 
 plore the Lordy and to obtain the 
 graces of which we stand in need. 
 For Jesus himself has said, " If you 
 ask the Father anything in my 
 name, he will give it to you."^ Oh, 
 with what honor, riches, and power, 
 it has pleased God to endow the 
 Christian soul! And what faithful 
 heart will not be happy to borrow 
 here the sublime words of the holy 
 
 » 1 John iii 1. 
 « Colos. i. 20. 
 
 ' 1 John V. 16. 
 • St John xvi. 23. 
 
6S4 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 man Job, " Wliat is man, that tliou f 
 shouldst magnify kjm ?"^ 
 
 In repeating to God, Lord^ have 
 mercy on us I let us then internally 
 prostrate ourselves before him ; let 
 us be seized with admiration and 
 motionless surprise, that we may, 
 at any moment, speak to a God so 
 great, and that a God so great 
 should deign to lend an ear to creat- 
 ures so degraded by sin. But at 
 the same time let us expand our 
 hearts, and pour them forth, as it 
 were, into the bosom of a father who 
 cannot help cherishing a tender love 
 for his children. For when we unite 
 with Jesus, and appear before God 
 in the adorable person of his Son, 
 it is impossible that this cry of 
 the heart calling on him for mercy 
 should not be graciously heard. 
 Om* voice, united with that of our 
 divine Mediator, changes its nature, 
 if we may say so; it loses its hu- 
 man qualities, its weakness and 
 unworthiness, and its great defile- 
 ment, to participate in the strength, 
 the purity, the divine sanctity, the 
 divine efficacy of the voice of Jesus. 
 
 Lord, it is in the name, and 
 
 • Job vii. 17. 
 » Ps. cxli. 3. 
 
 3 Gal. iv. 7. 
 * Heb. X. 19 
 
 through the infinite merits of the 
 Mediator whom thou hast had the 
 ineifablc charity to give us ; it is in 
 him and by him that we pour out 
 our prayer in thy sight, and before 
 thee declare our trouble,^ crying, 
 Have inercy on us ! " We are no 
 more servants, but sons, and if sons, 
 heirs also,"^ "through Christ, by 
 whose blood we have a confidence 
 in the entering into the sanctuary."* 
 We are " his brethren, he is the 
 first-born amongst us,^ but we are 
 joint heirs with him.'"* "We go, 
 then, with confidence to the throne 
 of grace, that we may obtain 
 mercy," ^ and that we may entreat 
 thee to have mercy on us as thou 
 wouldst have mercy on himself, if 
 it were possible that he could be in 
 the state of necessity and of danger 
 in which we are. Ah, Lord, it is 
 no longer we who address thee ; it 
 is He himself, our divine brother, 
 who says to thee, by our heart and 
 tongue. Have mercy on us I and, 
 with him, his august Mother, that 
 cherished daughter of heaven, who 
 tells thee she is "our sister;"^ that 
 she is "our kinswoman according 
 
 • Rom. viii. 29. 
 
 * Eom. viiL 17. 
 
 ' Heb. iv. 16. 
 • Gea. xii. 13. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 585 
 
 to the flesh ^ in which Jesus Christ 
 came"^ — Jesus Christ, "the lion of 
 the tribe of Juda,"^ who triumphed 
 over death by his resurrection, over 
 the corruption of the world by his 
 admirable purity and infinite sanc- 
 tity, over the devil by the glory and 
 power of the Cross. In* the name 
 of that divine Saviour, and in union 
 with Mary, we once more cry out to 
 thee — 
 
 Lord, have mercy on us I 
 
 Kyrie eleison ! 
 
 MEDITATION lY. 
 
 CHRIST, HEAR US I 
 
 THE more we unite our heart 
 and voice with the heart and 
 voice of Jesus, to implore the divine 
 goodness and mercy, the more our 
 prayer ascends towards the throne 
 of the Eternal as "an odor of sweet- 
 ness."^ Here, then, in order to ex- 
 cite a more lively faith and confi- 
 dence in that " Mediator of the New 
 Testament,^ who is able also to save 
 forever them that come unto God 
 
 ' Rom. ix. 3. 
 ^ 1 John iv. 2 
 
 3 Apoc. V. 5. 
 * Ephes. V. 2. 
 
 * 
 
 by himself;"^ in order to enter in- 
 timately into the admirable disposi- 
 tions of his adorable heart, praying 
 solemnly, on the eve of his death, 
 "for those who should believe in 
 him," ^ let us once more address our- 
 selves to Him, beseeching him to 
 liear us. Not that his ear is ever 
 closed against us, or that his heart 
 is not ever disposed to hear those 
 whom he loved more than himself ; 
 but we entreat him to hear us, as a 
 good father hears his poor children^ 
 or a kind mother the cherished fruit 
 of her womb, however ungrateful we 
 may have hitherto been. We ask 
 him to hear us with that ear of the 
 heart which listens with tender in- 
 terest to a beloved voice, which 
 answers that voice with overflowing 
 kindness and affection, and estab- 
 lishes between himself and the 
 Christian soul an ineffable com- 
 munion of sentiments worthy the 
 admiration of the angels themselves. 
 Ah, blessed is the soul which, pos- 
 sessing the inestimable gift of sanc- 
 tifying grace, can speak thus to 
 Jesus as friend to friend, as the 
 Spouse in the Canticles to her be- 
 
 » Heb. ix. 15. « Heb. vii. 26. 
 
 » St. John xvii. 20. 
 
686 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 loved, her adorable Spouse! Blessed 
 are they who can say, with a just 
 confidence, " My beloved to me, and 
 I to him,"^ and who deserve to hear, 
 in their intimate connection with 
 the divine Jesus, those words so 
 consoling, so full of heavenly sweet- 
 ness, "Let thy voice sound in my 
 ears, my love, for thy voice is 
 sweet^ . . . ." 
 
 But, alas! our want of fidelity, 
 our want of zeal, our want of faith 
 and charity, often deprive us of 
 these delightful communings with 
 God. We admit a third party be- 
 tween him and us; we divide a 
 heart which is his by so many 
 titles. We persist in fostering in- 
 clinations, passions, small, it is true, 
 but still displeasing to him, and in- 
 fringing on the absolute right which 
 he has to be preferred to all with- 
 out reserve; and he punishes us 
 but too justly by the privation of 
 those favors whose value neither 
 men nor angels can estimate, or 
 describe in adequate terms. 
 
 Yet we must not be discouraged, 
 though our infirmity leaves us little 
 hope of always maintaining with 
 Jesus this inefiable connection, the 
 
 ' Cant. u. 16. 
 
 lot of predestined souls. Wliatever 
 we are, we may and should aspire 
 to go far enough into the privacy 
 of his adorable heart to enjoy his 
 friendship, to persevere in his grace, 
 to live and die in his holy love. . . . 
 Ah, let us studiously avoid all that 
 might break or even loosen the sa- 
 cred bond which unites us to that 
 divine Saviour. Let us, on the con- 
 trary, do all we can to strengthen it 
 every day, every hour, so that we 
 may die in that holy exercise of the 
 truly Christian heart. 
 
 Jesus ! thou who " knowest 
 so well how to be a friend,"^ who 
 art so admirable in thine efi'usions 
 of love to hearts that thou findest 
 void of creatures and of self, be glo- 
 rified on earth as in heaven, for that 
 thou vouchsafest to cherish in so 
 marvellous a manner souls so little 
 worthy of thee. Let those, espe- 
 cially, who have the happiness of 
 " tasting and seeing how sweet thou 
 art"^ in thy divine favors, unite to 
 sing with transport the name and 
 heart of their adorable Spouse. . . . 
 But let those who can only admire 
 from afar the ineffable mysteries of 
 thy love, celebrate, at least, with 
 
 » Cant. ii. 14. ^ ' Life of St. Theresa, ch. xxv. * Ps. xxxiii. 9. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 687 
 
 a lively sentiment of gratitude, 
 the incomparable goodness which 
 prompts thee to hear the voice of 
 their supplication. good and 
 gracious Jesus, it seems as though 
 we heard thee say from the highest 
 heavens, "I have heard the groan- 
 ing of the children of" the new "Is- 
 rael ; ^ I will hear them, and forgive 
 their sins."^ We entreat thee, with 
 all the fervor of our hearts, to pre- 
 serve us from ever displeasing thee, 
 especially so as to lose thy grace. 
 And if we had that misfortune, we 
 beseech thee beforehand to save us 
 from the fatal consequences which 
 so often follow the loss of thy divine 
 love. How great is the favor which 
 we thus ask of thee ! But it is 
 Mary, our mother, who bears to the 
 throne of Thy mercy the humble 
 supplications of her children, pre- 
 sented by our angels to her who 
 is their Queen. Oh, preserve us, 
 through her, from all sin ; preserve 
 us from the just severity of thy 
 slighted and outraged love; pre- 
 serve us from the unclean spirit, 
 from all that dishonors man in thy 
 sight ; preserve us from all the dis- 
 eases of the soul, and from all the 
 
 * bodily ills that might injure the 
 soul ; preserve us from the bolts of 
 thy justice, from a sudden and un- 
 provided death. Vouchsafe to grant 
 us the grace of "being always thine, 
 whether we live or whether we 
 die."^ Sweet Lord Jesus, we be- 
 seech thee hear us. 
 
 Christ, hear us I 
 Christe, avdi nos. 
 
 > Exod. vi. 5. 
 
 » 2 Paral. vii. 14. 
 
 MEDITATION Y. 
 
 CHRIST, GRACIOUSLY HEAR US I 
 
 IT is not enough to have said to 
 Jesus, Hear us ; the Church re- 
 peats the adorable name of Christ, 
 and adds, Graciously hear us. And 
 why do we repeat a name which has 
 been just pronounced ? It is that a 
 name so sweet and precious, a name 
 of help and consolation, a name of 
 benediction and of salvation, can 
 be uttered again and again, with- 
 out danger of weariness or disgust. 
 On the contrary, the oftener it 
 reaches the ear and the heart, the 
 more unction, the more sweetness 
 does it bring wiv/h it. It is, more- 
 
 » Eom. xiv. 8. 
 
688 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 over, that wretched degraded chil- 
 dren, as we all are from the fall 
 of our first father, unhappy exiles, 
 voyagere on an ocean so exposed to 
 tempests, so full of quicksands, so 
 fruitful in shipwrecks, we can never 
 have recourse too often to a name 
 BO powerful. Ah, when we know 
 and believe that "■ there is no other 
 name given to men whereby they 
 may be saved ;"^ that "in that 
 name every knee should bow of 
 those that are in heaven, on earth, 
 and in hell;"^ that by that name 
 the Apostles wrought the most stu- 
 pendous miracles;^ that even yet, 
 in the name of Jesus Christ, the 
 most marvellous effects are every 
 day produced by the sacraments, 
 effects which, though invisible, are 
 none the less admirable prodigies — 
 knowing and believing all this, we 
 must find happiness in pronouncing 
 and invoking that divine name. We 
 derive from that invocation a pro- 
 found sentiment of joy and relief, a 
 mild light which guides us securely 
 through the shades of this life, a 
 firm courage, a persevering energy 
 in defending ourselves from the en- 
 
 ' Acts iv. 12. 
 
 » PhU. ii. 10. 
 
 3 Acts iii. 6. 
 
 t emies of our salvation. For the 
 name of the Spouse in the Canticles 
 "is as oil poured out;"* "it lights," 
 says St. Bernard, " it nourishes and 
 softens, it strengthens, it even saves 
 the soul from despair."* 
 
 But why say to Jesus Christ, 
 Graciously hear us ? Had not Hear 
 us, as we have seen, its sweetness 
 and its charm? "Would it lose, 
 then, in being repeated? . . . Un- 
 doubtedly not; but the Church 
 hereby insinuates to us that Jesus 
 may sometimes hear us, without 
 being disposed to answer our pray- 
 ers. In fact, he defers, in certain 
 circumstances, granting us the ob- 
 ject of our petitions, how humble 
 and fervent soever they may be, in 
 order to excite our faith more and 
 more, to inflame our ardor and our 
 zeal, and to procure for us the great 
 merit of perseverance. And as we 
 are tempted too often to be discour- 
 aged by such trials, we entreat 
 Jesus to free us from that danger. 
 Ah, let us, then, earnestly beseech 
 that Mediator, so good, so benefi- 
 cent, so devoted to oui interest, to 
 "make haste iq, help us."® Yet, 
 
 * Cant. i. 2. * Serm. xv. super Gantica. 
 
 e Ps. Ixix. 2. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED YIROIN. 
 
 589 
 
 nevertheless, if it please his ador- 
 able Providence to subject us to the 
 holy probation of delay, in regard 
 to our demands, let us entreat him 
 no less earnestly to grant us the 
 precious grace of perseverance in 
 prayer. Discouragement is, in fact, 
 injurious to the infinite goodness 
 and mercy of God, the truth of his 
 promises, the infinite merits of Je- 
 sus, the efiicacy of which we seem 
 to doubt when we cease to implore 
 the Lord if we do not immediately 
 obtain what we ask. Perseverance, 
 on the contrary, in fidelity to prayer, 
 even when it pleases God to appear 
 deaf to the groaning of our hearts, 
 is a beautiful homage rendered to 
 his perfections. It makes us adore 
 his goodness, his mercy, his infalli- 
 bility, even when they seem to hide 
 from us — his wisdom, his provi- 
 dence, when their ways are the 
 most inscrutable — with as much 
 faith as though they were clearly 
 visible in the success of our de- 
 mands. It makes us, besides, place 
 all our hopes in the infinite merits 
 of the Saviour, even when they 
 seem to have lost their efiicacy in 
 our behalf, with as much firmness 
 
 ' 1 John ii. 1. 
 
 « 1 Cor. xiL 3. 
 
 as though we felt their powerful 
 effects. 
 
 Jesus, who, to manifest the 
 plenitude of thy mercy, made thy- 
 self "our advocate with the Fa- 
 ther,"^ permit not that we should 
 ever cease to implore thy love, al- 
 though our prayers appear useless. 
 Grant, rather, through thine all- 
 powerful grace, without which we 
 cannot even "pronounce thy name,"^ 
 that we may redouble our confidence 
 and fervor, when thou seemest not 
 to hear our voice. thou whose 
 tenderness has vouchsafed to rep- 
 resent itself to us under the touch- 
 ing figure of " the hen gathering her 
 chickens under her wings," ^ our filial 
 confidence makes us pour forth into 
 thine adorable heart our pains and 
 our sorrows, our woes and our sup- 
 plications. Oh ! that we may ever 
 persevere in that holy confidence, 
 through the intercession of thy di- 
 vine Mother ! It is by her sacred 
 hands that we present all our de- 
 mands ; it is through her that we 
 hope to obtain grace to pray with- 
 out ceasing, till she is moved to say 
 to our angels : " The Lord has heard 
 me"* on behalf of my faithful sup- 
 
 3 St. Matt, xxiii. 37. 
 
 * Deut. ix. 19. 
 
690 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 plicants; "go, ye swift angels,"^ con- 
 vey the blessing of my Son to those 
 who unceasingly say to him : 
 
 Christ, graciously hear us. 
 
 ChristBj eocavdi nos. 
 
 MEDITATION YI. 
 
 GOD, THE FATHER OP HEAVEN, HAVE 
 MERCY ON us. 
 
 RESTING on the infinite merits 
 of Jesus Christ, and closely 
 united with him, as our divine Me- 
 diator, by the preceding supplica- 
 tion, we may and ought to implore, 
 with new confidence, the most Holy 
 and most August Trinity. 
 
 The Church makes us successively 
 invoke the three divine persons, and 
 first of all she teaches us to say: 
 Gody the Father of Heaven, have mercy 
 (must 
 
 God, the Father of Heaven .... Is 
 not the Deity on earth, then, as well 
 as in heaven ? Does he not fill the 
 universe with the majesty of his 
 presence? Did not the prophet- 
 king, soaring on the wings of faith 
 and love, find him equally present, 
 
 ' Is. xviiL 2. 
 
 * equally adorable, "in heaven, in 
 hell, in the uttermost parts of the 
 sea, in the light of day, and in the 
 darkness of night ? " ^ . . . . Ah I un- 
 doubtedly, God is everywhere. He 
 is everywhere by his knowledge, for 
 he knows and sees all things; by 
 his power, for in any place what- 
 soever he has but to will, and his 
 will is instantly done : even nothing 
 itself hastens to obey him. He is 
 everywhere by his essence, for he is 
 infinite, and the infinite knows nei- 
 ther measure nor distance, nor any 
 bounds. " In him we live, and we 
 move, and we are."^ He surrounds 
 us, he penetrates us with his knowl- 
 edge, his power, his invisible es- 
 sence, as the sun surrounds and 
 penetrates the crystal with his im- 
 palpable rays. "Wo, then, to us, if 
 we banish him, in thought, to heav- 
 en, as to a distant palace, far away 
 from the voice of our supplication I 
 "We should, thereby, commit a griev- 
 ous mistake, and, by detaching God 
 from this sad world, render our un- 
 happy lot, as children of Adam, 
 worse than it really is. 
 
 No, truly, God is not far from us : 
 he is in us, and we are in him. It 
 
 • Ps. cxxxviii. 8, 9, 12. 
 
 3 Acts xvii. 28. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 59] 
 
 needs no effort to send up to him 
 the sighs and supplications of our 
 exile : he whose mercy we solicit is 
 more present to us than we are to 
 ourselves. May we never forget 
 that saving truth ! 
 
 Why, then, once more, the words 
 Father of heaven f . . . . Ah ! it is 
 that in heaven God has prepared 
 for his elect a delightful dwelling, 
 an everlasting home, an eternal 
 kingdom, where, without being any 
 more present than he is elsewhere, 
 he manifests his adorable presence 
 to the angels and saints. There he 
 shows himself to them, for it is writ- 
 ten, "We shall see him as he is,"^ 
 that is to say, in his beauty, in his 
 truth, in his goodness, in his power, 
 in his love, in all his perfections. 
 Here below nothing could satisfy 
 our desires, however fortunate our 
 life might be, according to the 
 world ; however multiplied, however 
 varied might be our enjoyments, 
 still the banishment made itself felt 
 in one way or another. And, more- 
 over, is not the whole life long, for 
 the greater part of mankind, but one 
 tissue of fatigue, weariness, disgust, 
 grief, suffering of every kind .... 
 
 » 1 John iii. 2. 
 
 * Hence, we all sigh, more or less, 
 and all eat the bread of bitterness, 
 moistened even with tears. Were, 
 then, the gratuitous goodness of 
 God to offer us only a natural hap- 
 piness in the world to come, we 
 ought to praise and bless him for- 
 ever, and to seek that happiness 
 with the greatest eagerness. To be 
 eternally exempt from the ills of 
 this world, to be eternally sheltered 
 from indigence, disease, pain, mourn- 
 ing, from all trouble, from all sad- 
 ness, would not even that be too 
 much for such miserable, guilty 
 creatures ? . . . . But, prodigy of 
 goodness I God is so generous as 
 to call us to a supernatural bliss, to 
 a bliss with which our nature has 
 no proportion, which is immeasur- 
 ably beyond all the aspirations of 
 our heart, all the dreams of our 
 imagination, to a bliss which is 
 nothing less than a participation in 
 the divine nature.^ How can we 
 but esteem and ardently desire such 
 happiness ? how can we esteem and 
 desire it without the liveliest appre- 
 hension of not fultilling as faithfully 
 as we should the conditions neces- 
 sary to obtain it? Let us, then, 
 
 » 2 Peter i. 4. 
 
592 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LIT ANT OF TEE BLESSED VIIiOIN. 
 
 beseech God, with all the fervor of f 
 our soul, to have mercy on us I 
 
 God, t/ie Father of IveaveUy have 
 mercy on us, Father, " who hath 
 predestined us unto the adoption of 
 children, through Jesus Christ," ^ and 
 who hast loved us so as to make us 
 thy " heirs and co-heii's," ^ vouchsafe 
 " to enlighten the eyes of our heart, 
 that we may know what is the hope 
 of thy calling, and what are the 
 riches of the glory of thine inherit- 
 ance in the saints."^ May the sight 
 of that inheritance wherein ''thou 
 shalt make them drink of the tor- 
 rent of thy pleasure,"* inspire us 
 with the ardor, the courage, the 
 strength required "to run in the list 
 so that we may obtain the prize," ^ 
 and " the crown of life, promised to 
 those who love thee."^ And thou, 
 Mary I show, by the effects of thy 
 protection, "whose daughter thou 
 art." ^ We delight to offer thee that 
 homage of the faithful heart ! Hail, 
 daiighter of God the Father! Such 
 thou art by a title infinitely more 
 precious than the other daughters 
 of Eve, thou! mother of the 
 ^'Word made flesh;"® and whilst 
 
 > Ephes. i. 5. « Rom. viii. 17. » Ephes. i. 18. 
 * Ps. 3JU.V. 9. • 1 Cor. ix. 24. 
 
 thou wert still on earth thou couldsl 
 say to him, with a thousand times 
 more confidence than we, his adopt- 
 ed children : Our Fatlier who art in 
 heaven. Grant, then, Mary 1 that, 
 by thy powerful intercession, we may 
 address him in this humble prayer: 
 God, the Father of h^javen, have 
 
 MERCY ON us. 
 
 Pater de coelis, Dens, miserere nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION YII. 
 
 GOD, THE SON, REDEEMER OF THE WORLD, 
 have MERCY ON US. 
 
 THIS invocation of the Son of 
 God, " consubstantial to the 
 Father, true God of true God,"^ re- 
 minds the Christian soul of the 
 great, the ineffable mystery of the 
 world's redemption : a mystery in- 
 effable in itself, ineffable in its mar- 
 vellous effects. 
 
 It is, then, true that, from the 
 Redemption wrought on Calvary, 
 the salvation of man is purchased 
 by the death of a God. He who 
 feared not to humble himself by 
 
 « St. James L 12. 
 ' Gen. xxiv. 23. 
 
 8 St. John i. 14. 
 • Nicene Creed. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIBGIN 
 
 593 
 
 being " made flesh,"^ thought not that * 
 he made too great a sacrifice by 
 suffering and dying for us the most 
 ignominious and cruel death. Oh! 
 but we " are bought," then, " with a 
 great price !"^ and what a high 
 vahie we should set on our souls! 
 How important we should consider 
 all that can increase its dignity 
 before God, and contribute to adorn 
 its immortal crown ! and how care- 
 ftilly, how anxiously should we avoid 
 all that may impede its salvation ! 
 
 We were lost, lost forever: in 
 consequence of the guilty fall of the 
 first man, we were all struck with 
 an eternal anathema. An expia- 
 tion was required, and an expiation 
 of infinite value, to satisfy the in- 
 finite majesty of God outraged by 
 sin. But who was capable of mak- 
 ing this atonement ? Was it men ? 
 Certainly not. Was it angels ? No ; 
 they are pure, elevated, sublime ; 
 but there is between them and the 
 Infinite an infinite distance. Our 
 misfortune was, therefore, without 
 remedy, without hope .... Yes, if 
 the eternal Son of God became not 
 "our victim of propitiation."^ He 
 
 ' St. John i. 14. 
 » 1 Cor. vi. 20. 
 
 » 1 John ii. 2. 
 * Is. liii. 6. 
 
 i» 
 
 clothed himself with our nature, 
 and, entering into the world, said to 
 the Most High: Behold me ready 
 for the sacrifice ; he took " upon 
 himself all our iniquities;"* he gave 
 himself up to be " wounded for our 
 iniquities, and bruised for our sins,"^ 
 in order that justice and peace 
 might kiss^ "in his person." He 
 even went so far as to desire, with 
 unequalled ardor, to suffer and to 
 die for us ; ^ and that burning desire 
 was accomplished in his passion. 
 Oh ! yes, accomplished : what is the 
 Saviour's passion but one continued 
 series of suffering of mind and heart 
 — a succession of unheard-of pains 
 and sacrifices for worthless and un- 
 grateful sinners ? . . . . 
 
 In presence of a devotion so ca- 
 pable of exciting our devotion, and 
 of making our hearts throb with the 
 liveliest gratitude and the most ten- 
 der affection, let us first pause a 
 moment, while we adore, in the si- 
 lence of admiration, that mystery 
 which entrances the angels. Let 
 us, then, contemplate that "great 
 mystery ;"^ let us study and fathom, 
 as far as our limited reason can, the 
 
 * Is. liii. 5. 
 
 « Ps. Ixxxiv. 11. 
 
 » St. Luke xii. 50. 
 8 Tim. iii. 16. 
 
69i 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 Becret depths of the love and mercy f 
 of our God. Immei*sed in that bot- 
 tomless and shoreless ocean, let us 
 give up our hearts to the pious 
 transports wherewith it may please 
 
 God to animate them And 
 
 then we shall admire "the abundant 
 riches of his grace," ^ of which re- 
 demption is the source. 
 
 Sanctifying grace ! sublime and 
 supernatural gift I It marvellously 
 unites our soul to God, communi- 
 cates to it a divine life, a life which 
 is the beginning of the life of heav- 
 en, for St. Paul says that " the grace 
 of God is life everlasting."^ And 
 this divine life of our soul, which 
 the sacraments are intended to give, 
 to maintain, to increase, to restore, 
 when we have had the misfortune 
 of losing it, this divine life imparts 
 to all our acts an admirable power, 
 that of meriting an eternal reward, 
 and of constantly increasing our 
 eternal happiness and glory. Yes, 
 by sanctifying grace we may make 
 of our smallest actions works so 
 precious that each of them is pre- 
 ferable to all the treasures of the 
 earth ; we may, in one moment, do 
 
 » Ephes. ii. 7. 
 
 » Eom. vL 23. 
 
 • Ps. xci. 6. 
 
 more, by a single secret act of the 
 will which loves God, than all men 
 together could do, in thousands of 
 ages, by all their natural force. 
 
 " Wonderful ! wonderful ! " is all 
 that we can say, adorable Son of 
 the eternal Father, when we con- 
 sider the ineffable work of our re- 
 demption by thy blood, and the 
 precious fruits that we daily gather 
 from it. Oh! how justly does the 
 apostle St. Paul tell us that thon 
 hast loved us to excess! and how 
 well may we exclaim : " The 
 thoughts " of thy love " are exceed- 
 ing deep;"^ too deep for our lim- 
 ited understanding; thy greatness 
 is far beyond our praise ; thou art 
 greater than our imagination can 
 conceive, "greater than our heart!"* 
 it cannot repay such love as thine, 
 even by giving all its love. ""We 
 know that thou livest, divine Re- 
 deemer, and this, our hope, is laid 
 up in our bosom,^ for thou livest to 
 make intercession for us."^ Let not 
 thy blood, the merits of which flow 
 incessantly on the earth, become 
 useless through our fault. The 
 voice of that precious blood says 
 
 * 1 John iii. 20. " Job xix. 25, 27. 
 
 •Heb. vii. 25. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 595 
 
 to thy Father : " Save my people," ^ 
 my "pm-chased people ;"^ and Mary 
 says with thee : ^' My people for 
 which I request."^ Ah! suffer us 
 not, by the abuse of thy grace, to 
 paralyze the efficacy of thy media- 
 tion and the intercession of her 
 whom we happily hail as " Mother 
 of tJie Son of God!'' 
 
 God, the Son, Redeemer of the 
 World, have mercy on us. 
 
 Fili Redemptor, Mundi Deus, mis- 
 erere nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION YEI. 
 
 god, the holy ghost, have mercy 
 on us. 
 
 GOD is love," says St. John,* 
 The Father, then, is love, the 
 Son is love, the Holy Ghost is love. 
 But the works of divine love, con- 
 sequently the operations of grace, 
 whether on the mind or on the 
 heart, are attributed to the Holy 
 Ghost, although they belong equally 
 to the three persons. The reason is 
 
 » Esther vii. 3. 
 » 1 Peter ii. 9. 
 3 Esther vii. 3. 
 
 « 1 John iv. 16. 
 » St. John iii. 5. 
 « St. John Tii. 38, 39. 
 
 * that the Holy Ghost proceeds from 
 the Father and from the Son by 
 love, and that he is the substantial 
 and reciprocal love of both. 
 
 Hence Jesus told his disciples 
 that " unless a man be born again 
 of water and the Holy Ghost, he 
 cannot enter into the kingdom of 
 God;"^ that the graces of that di- 
 vine Spirit should be like unto "riv- 
 ers of living water "^ flowing from 
 the hearts of the faithful. And the 
 great Apostle teaches that "the 
 charity of God is poured out into 
 our hearts by the Holy Ghost, who 
 is given to us;"^ that he "is the 
 Spirit of wisdom and of revelation f 
 that it is he who renews us,^ who 
 helpeth our infirmity," and "asketh 
 for us, with unspeakable groan- 
 
 "10 
 
 mgs 
 
 Ignorant and impotent as we are, 
 how ardently should w^e beg of the 
 Holy Ghost that "burning and shin- 
 ing lamp " ^^ which dispels the dark- 
 ness of the understanding, and in- 
 flames and enlivens the heart. How 
 fervently should we beseech him to 
 make us judge all things "not in 
 
 ' Kom. V. 5. 
 » Ephes. i. 17. 
 
 » Titus iii. 5. 
 «> Eom. viii. 26. 
 
 " St. John V. 35. 
 
696 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN 
 
 carnal wisdom,"^ but in the wisdom 
 of the Gospel ; to direct and sup- 
 port our will ; to render our whole 
 conduct supernatuial. For this is 
 the distinctive character of the true 
 child of God, the true Christian; 
 and this it is that places the dis- 
 tance from heaven to earth between 
 his thoughts, his affections, his 
 views, his desires, his actions, and 
 the thoughts, the affections, the 
 views, the desires, the actions of 
 the worldling. 
 
 The true Christian, in fact, thinks 
 of God as his centre ; of heaven, as 
 his home ; of salvation, as " the one 
 thing necessary."^ If he regard 
 creatures, it is in God and for God ; 
 to Him alone he attaches himself as 
 his sovereign good, as the rock 
 which can alone withstand the tem- 
 pestuous waves of time. The world- 
 ling, on the contrary, thinks of 
 creatures, forgets heaven and salva- 
 tion; he seeks his interest or his 
 pleasure in all the various attach- 
 ments which divide his heart. He 
 desires, he covets that which disap- 
 pears in the twinkling of an eye ; 
 he madly pursues fragile goods, 
 
 > 2 Cor. L 12. * St. Luke x. 42. 
 
 » Fun. o7at. on Anne de Gonzague, by Bossuet. 
 
 * " which elude his grasp like frozen 
 water, melting away, and leaving 
 only defilement on the hand that 
 held it."^ 
 
 The true Christian and the slave 
 of the world often do the same 
 works, transact the same business, 
 meet with the same accidents, but 
 with intentions and dispositions so 
 dissimilar, and in a manner so dif- 
 ferent, nay, so opposite, that in the 
 hand of one they are pure gold for 
 eternity, in that of the other vile 
 lead, which; far from enabling him 
 "to lay up treasure in heaven,"* 
 can only "drown him in perdi- 
 tion."^ 
 
 The one " lives in the Spirit, and 
 walks by the Spirit;"'' his whole 
 life has something noble, elevated, 
 grand, pertaining to heaven, to God. 
 The other lives but in his own low, 
 corrupt nature, in connection with 
 the spirit of evil and his dreary 
 doom. 
 
 Ah! then, let us once more en- 
 treat the Holy Ghost to make us act 
 in all things in a supernatural man- 
 ner, and never to permit us to be sc 
 unfortunate as to "extinguish the 
 
 * St. Matt. vL 20. » 1 Tim. vi 9. 
 
 •Gal. V. 25. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 697 
 
 Spirit''^ within us, or even "to 
 grieve Him."^ Let us say, with a 
 sincere resolution of faithfully cor- 
 responding to His grace: 
 
 " Oh ! Holy Spirit, 
 Fount of life, and fire of love, 
 And sweet anointing from above ; "' 
 
 "lead us into the right land, and 
 quicken us in thy justice ;"'^ main- 
 tain us even in that charity which 
 is " from a pure heart, a good con- 
 science, and an unfeigned faith." ^ 
 "We even venture to beg of thee that 
 our charity "may more and more 
 abound in knowledge, and in all 
 understanding, that we may be re- 
 plenished with the fruit of justice,*^ 
 going from "virtue to virtue," till 
 " the God of gods shall be seen in 
 the heavenly Sion."^ Vouchsafe to 
 grant us this grace through Mary, 
 whom we honor and respect as thy 
 divine spouse. She could say at 
 the accomplishment of the august 
 mystery of the Incarnation, " God 
 hath endowed me with a good dow- 
 
 "8 
 
 ry."" Thou couldst say of her: 
 Thou art "full of grace ;^ one is 
 my dove, my perfect one ; ^^ how 
 
 ' 1 Thes. V. 19. 
 '^ Ephes. iv. 30. 
 3 Hymn, Veni Creator. 
 
 * Ps. cxlii 10, 11. 
 » 1 Tim. i. 5. 
 « Phil. i. 9, 11. 
 
 beautiful art thou," " and how justly 
 did her mother call her " blessed of 
 the Lord!"^^ In the name of that 
 favored Virgin, we beseech thee, 
 
 God, the Holy Ghost, have mercy 
 ON us. 
 
 Spiritus SanctCj Detis, miserere 
 nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION IX. 
 
 holy trinity, one god, have mercy 
 
 ON us. 
 
 rr^HE adorable mystery of the 
 J- Holy Trinity, "one and indi- 
 visible,"^^ is the foundation of our 
 religion, the source of all the other 
 mysteries, and of all the divine mer- 
 cies. Hence it is that the Church, 
 after making us successively invoke 
 the Father, the Son, and the Holy 
 Ghost, makes us say. Holy Trinity, 
 one God, have mercy on us. 
 
 A day shall Gome, if we remain 
 faithful, when we shall see, without 
 obscurity, what we now believe, 
 and the adorable Trinity will reveal 
 
 'Ps. Ixxxiii. 8. 
 8 Gen. XXX. 20. 
 •St. Luke i. 28, 
 
 ' Cant. vi. 8. 
 
 » Cant. iv. 1. 
 '« Kuth iii. 10. 
 " Brev. Bom. 
 
S08 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE UTANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 to US its ineffable secrets. We * 
 shall tbeu comprehend how the 
 Father, knowing himself from all 
 eternity, necessarily begets " his 
 own image," ^ who is the Son; 
 how, this knowledge being absolute 
 and indivisible as well as his sub- 
 stance, he communicates the latter 
 to the Son unreservedly and undi- 
 videdly. We shall understand how 
 it is that from the eternal union of 
 the Father and the Son necessarily 
 proceeds their mutual love, who is 
 the Holy Ghost; how, that union 
 being equally absolute and indivisi- 
 ble, " the Holy Ghost proceeds from 
 it with the same perfection that the 
 Son receives from his Father."* 
 
 But the light of heaven is not 
 made for earth : home can never be 
 found in the land of exile. "Till 
 the day" of eternal happiness 
 "breaks, and the shadows retire,"* 
 till a holy death comes to rend the 
 veil of faith, and " we shall know 
 God even as he knows us,"* let us 
 humbly adore, with our whole mind, 
 the mystery which he has been 
 pleased to reveal to us; let us 
 praise and bless him with all our 
 
 ' 2 Cor. iv. 4. * Cant iv. 6. 
 
 ' Sermon on the Hdy Trinity, by BossoeL 
 
 hearts, for that he has vouchsafed 
 to make us sharers in the divine 
 knowledge, and to admit our poor 
 understanding even to the eternal 
 sanctuary of his " light inaccessi- 
 ble."* What an inlinite honor has 
 he conferred upon us by imparting 
 to us, in this place of probation, in 
 the darkness of our exile, a truth 
 which dazzles the angels, and gives 
 us reason to pine for " the courts of 
 the Lord,"^ where we shall enjoy 
 a spectacle so glorious ! Unity in 
 trinity. Trinity in unity: how mar- 
 vellous ! how incomprehensible ! 
 Unity of nature in a tiinity of per- 
 sons, trinity of persons in a unity 
 of nature, what admirable concord, 
 what ravishing harmony! "Yes," 
 says St Augustine, " in God there 
 is number, in God there is no num- 
 ber: when you reckon the three 
 persons, you behold a number; when 
 you ask what it is, you find no num- 
 ber : the answer is, that it is one 
 only God. Because they are three, 
 there is number; when you seek 
 to examine their nature, the num- 
 ber escapes; you find only simple 
 unity."^ 
 
 * 1 Cor. liiL 12. 
 » 1 Tim. vL 16. 
 
 •Ps. IxxTciii. 3. 
 
 ^In Joan. IhicL xzix. No. 4. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 599 
 
 0, unity so inviolable that num- 
 ber cannot divide it! 0, number 
 so well arranged that unity cannot 
 confuse it ! How magnificent is the 
 hope of one day seeing thee " face 
 to face!"^ And, meanwhile, it is 
 sweet to be able to adore thee with 
 the divine certitude of faith, and to 
 bless thee for the supernatural con- 
 nection with thyself which thou 
 givest us in Christianity ! 
 
 The Father, by his adoption, 
 raises us to the sublime quality of 
 children of God ; the Son, by the 
 Incarnation and Redemption, mar- 
 vellously associates us^ with the 
 divine nature; the Holy Ghost, by 
 the efi'usion of his charity into our 
 hearts,^ establishes an admirable 
 communication* between God and 
 us. Ah ! may we estimate, at their 
 just value, these divine revelations, 
 and esteem ourselves according to 
 the nobility and grandeur of our 
 dignity! May we well understand 
 that, God having raised us so high, 
 all that is not God is beneath us ; 
 that, having the inestimable honor 
 
 ' 1 Cor. xiii. 12. 
 » 1 John i. 3. 
 » Eom. V. 5. 
 
 * 2 Cor. xiii. 13. 
 ' 1 John iii. 1. 
 « St. John XX. 17. 
 
 f of being the sons of God,® the 
 brethren of the Son,^ the temples of 
 the Holy Ghost,^ we should ever 
 respect ourselves as belonging to a 
 chosen generation, a royal priest- 
 hood, that we may declare his 
 virtues, who hath called " us out of 
 darkness into his admirable light! "^ 
 " Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, 
 who art but one and the same sub- 
 stance,"^ to thee, "the only God, be 
 glory and magnificence, both now 
 and forever ; " ^° to thee who hast 
 honored us with the revelation of 
 thine eternal essence, to thee who 
 hast raised us to a superhuman dig- 
 nity, the completion of which shall 
 be, in heaven, a transformation into 
 thy Divine image.^^ Ah! before 
 "the breadth, and length, and 
 height, and depth "^^ of thy love for 
 us, what can we do but stammer 
 like the prophet ^^ the accents of 
 praise and admiration, in union 
 with Mary, who, astonished herself 
 at the great things thou hast done 
 in her,^* contemplates thee in trans- 
 ports of gratitude and love. We 
 
 ' 1 Cor. vi. 19. 
 
 8 1 Peter ii. 9. 
 « 1 John T. 7. 
 » St. Jude 25. 
 
 » 2 Cor. iii. 18. 
 » Ephes. iii. 18. 
 " Jerem. i 6. 
 
 M St. Luke i. 19. 
 
600 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 adore thee as "the Alpha," ^ the 
 eternal origin of all ; we reverence 
 her as the fii-st of thy creatures, and 
 the nearest to thee by the perfec- 
 tions thou gavest her, and by the 
 sublime ties of daughter, mother, 
 and spouse, wherewith thou hast 
 honored her. Grant that, beseech- 
 ing thee, by her pure lips, to keep 
 us always faitliful, always worthy 
 of thee and of our magnilicent title 
 of Christians, we may say to thee : 
 
 Holy Trinity, one God, have mer- 
 cy ON us. 
 
 Sancta TrinitaSy unus DeuSj mis- 
 erere nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION X. 
 
 HOLY MARY, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 THE first title of honor which 
 we give to the Blessed Virgin, 
 when invoking her, is her own 
 name of Mary — a name which, 
 after that of Jesus, is the delight 
 of pious souls. 
 
 What more sweet than the name 
 of a mother, and of a mother as ten- 
 der, as august! A mother ! Is there 
 
 > Apoc i 8. 
 
 » St. Luke i. 42. 
 
 any thing so precious in nature, any 
 thing which dilates the heart like 
 her presence, any thing so moving 
 as her memory ? A mother I Ah ! 
 God has created nothing in this 
 world to be compared to her in 
 kindness, in pure and sweet affec- 
 tion, in devotion, in sublime hero- 
 ism of heart. When we have the 
 happiness, then, of being animated 
 by a lively faith, when we firmly 
 believe that Jesus is our divine 
 brother, that Mary his mother is 
 also ours, that she necessarily ex- 
 tends to us that inexpressible ten- 
 derness with which she is filled for 
 the "blessed fruit of her womb,"^ 
 for that Jesus who has so loved us, 
 what pious emotions, what exqui- 
 site feelings, should not the name of 
 such a mother excite within us. 
 
 But what joyful admiration should 
 the mysterious meaning of that 
 blessed name inspire. It signifies 
 at once Sovereign, Radiant Star, 
 Queen of the Sea^ . . . and to whom 
 could these touching titles apply 
 but to Mary? Sovereign, has she 
 not the honor of having brought 
 forth "the King of kings, and the 
 Lord of lords,"* to whom belongs 
 
 » Lexic. bibl. Weitenader. 
 
 * 1 Tim. vi. 15. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIBGIN. 
 
 601 
 
 "magnificence, power, glory, and * 
 victory,"^ and who, by glorifying 
 lier in heaven, gave her a power 
 of intercession like to none other? 
 Radiant Star, is it not she who has 
 given to the world "the true Light"^ 
 of men, "the Sun of justice,"^ whose 
 divine disk, without dawn or twi- 
 light, east or west, unceasingly dis- 
 plays the fullness of his inexhausti- 
 ble rays ? Is it not she who shines 
 in the splendor of the purest, the 
 most perfect virtue — in the splen- 
 dor of a miraculous virginity, and 
 of a glory which eclipses that of the 
 angels and saints ? Queen of the 
 Sea, is it not she whose admirable 
 example, like a heavenly beacon, 
 surmounts the troubled waters of 
 this life, and guides into the port of 
 eternal bliss those who keep its be- 
 neficent light in view? Is it not 
 she whoJias received from God, so 
 to say, the power of appeasing at 
 will the storms and tempests which 
 so often beat on our frail bark, 
 when the invocation of her all-pow- 
 erful name stills the winds and the 
 waves ? 
 
 Undoubtedly, the name of Mary 
 
 » 1 Paral. xxix. 11, 12. » St. John i. 9. 
 
 » Mai. iv. 2. 
 
 is not "strong and mighty"* in com- 
 parison with that of Jesus, except 
 in that inferior degree which neces- 
 sarily distinguishes the creature, 
 even the most perfect, from its Cre- 
 ator and its God ; moreover, it has 
 no virtue except through Jesus him- 
 self. But it has pleased that divine 
 Son to manifest his glory by his 
 august mother, and to communicate 
 the admirable efficacy of his own 
 name to that of Mary. Like that 
 of Jesus, the name of this divine 
 Virgin consoles and strengthens. 
 " Invoke it," says St. Bernard, " in 
 your dangers, your doubts, your an- 
 guish, let it be incessantly on your 
 lips and in your heart. Then there 
 will be no more wandering, no more 
 despair, no more error, no more fall- 
 ing, no more fear, no more fatigue, 
 but a sweet experience of the pro- 
 found meaning of those words of 
 the Gospel, ' The name of the Virgin 
 was Maryy^ Like that of Jesus, 
 this name, so dear to our hearts, 
 puts the spirit of darkness to flight. 
 "If the wind of temptation assail 
 yoii," says the same holy doctor, 
 "call Mary to your aid."^ It was 
 
 * Ps. xxiii. 8. * Rom. ii. sxiper Mvisus est, 
 
 « Kom, ii. super Missus esi. 
 
601 
 
 MEVii.iii^.y-' ^'A I HE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 of her that, in the beginning, God * 
 said to the tempter of Adam and 
 Eve those energetic wonis, "She 
 bhall crush thy head,"^ and that 
 prediction resoonds anew, like a 
 cmsh of thunder for Satan, as often 
 as the Christian soul invokes the 
 name of the Blessed Virgin. 
 
 Mary! blessed be the Lord 
 who " hath so magnified thy name 
 that thy praise shall not depart out 
 of the mouth of men."' Ah, tell 
 us by what name thou art called ; ' 
 make us feel and comprehend its 
 dignity, its sweetness, and its pow- 
 er; penetrate us with the respect, 
 the confidence, and the love which 
 it merits. It is to the pious heart 
 " a plentiful olive-tree, fair, fruitful, 
 and beautiful;"^ it is precious as a 
 vase exhaling sweet perfumes. So 
 powerful do we esteem it^ that when 
 invoking it, we think we see the 
 fallen angel taking flight with the 
 forced cr}*, '* Terrible is the name of 
 the Virgin!" Mary! may that 
 sacred name be ever terrible to hell 
 in our behalf^ may it be "terrible as 
 an army set in array"* to all the 
 
 > Q«a. iiL la. 
 *Q«a. zxziL 29. 
 
 * Judith xiiL 25. 
 
 * Jar. xL 16. 
 
 •Cant via 
 
 enemies of our salvation. May we 
 never separate it in our heart from 
 the adorable name of thy divine 
 Son, and may it be, after that of 
 Jesus, our refuge and our shield, our 
 strength and our consolation. It is 
 with the hope of obtaining this 
 grace that we say to thee with the 
 Church — 
 
 Holy Maet, prat for us. 
 
 Samda Maria, ora pro nobis. 
 
 MEDITATIOX XL 
 
 HOLT MOTHER OF GOD, PRAT FOR US. 
 
 A SIMPLE virgin of the tribe 
 
 J\. of Juda, Motker of God! 
 
 How wonderftd! What greatness 
 and majesty is contained in that 
 title, what honor and glory, what 
 incomparable magnificence I 
 
 In the general opinion of men. 
 the disnitv of the mother is com- 
 puted by that of her son. What 
 must then be the dignity of Mary, 
 who brought forth the adorable 
 humanity of the eternal Son of 
 God! 
 
 K she had given birth to an illus- 
 trious saint, even that would make 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 603 
 
 her very honorable in our eyes ; she 
 would be still more honorable if 
 she had brought into the world an 
 incarnate angel ; and much more so 
 had it pleased God that " one of the 
 chief princes"^ of heaven "was made 
 flesh "^ in her chaste womb. But, 
 Mary, Mother of God ! who can ever 
 estimate, or comprehend, or express 
 the dignity, the elevation of the 
 Blessed Virgin ? And who is there 
 that, penetrated with a lively faith, 
 will not cry out with the Angel of 
 the Schools, that "this title has 
 made her something infinite, be- 
 cause of the infinite good which is 
 in her Son,"^ and with the blessed 
 Peter Damian : " But we have rea- 
 son to remain mute with astonish- 
 ment and admiration, nor dare to 
 raise our eyes before the immense 
 glory of such a dignity !"* 
 
 God is infinitely powerful : what 
 wonders soever he may produce, he 
 can always produce others greater 
 still. And yet we need not fear to 
 say that, all-powerful as he is, he 
 could not make Mary either greater 
 or more noble than he has made her 
 in her dignity of Mother of God. 
 
 ' Dan. X. 13. * S. Thomas, 3 p. q. 25, a. 6, ad L 
 
 2 St. John i. 14. ■• Serm. de NcUiv. B. M. V. 
 
 f Could he, in fact, give her a Son 
 greater or more noble than he who, 
 " without robbery, is equal to God,"^ 
 and who says, "I and the Father 
 are one?"^ Could he give her a 
 Son superior to himself? Mary en- 
 joys, then, by her divine maternity, 
 all the dignity possible for a mother 
 to have ; and even as the Creator 
 could not make a man greater than 
 the Man-God, so neither could he 
 make a mother more august or hon- 
 orable than her who can say to that 
 Man-God, "Thou art my Son."^ 
 
 0, let us admire, praise, exalt this 
 masterpiece of the Almighty power, 
 of the adorable wisdom of the Most 
 High. He could bring about the 
 ineffable mysteiy of the Incarnation 
 without giving a mother to the hu- 
 manity of his Son. But was it not 
 fitting that the Divine Repairer of 
 man's fall should be " the Son of 
 man,"® at least by his mother, so 
 that it might be one of ourselves 
 who made for us all the infinite 
 satisfaction due to eternal justice? 
 And then, Adam and Eve having 
 both transgressed, and having both, 
 by their fall, involved their whole 
 
 » Phil. ii. 6. 
 
 « St. John X. 30. 
 
 1 Heb. L 5. 
 
 • St. Luke xix. 10. 
 
604 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 posterity in the same ruin, does it | 
 not seem that each sex ought to 
 liave its share in the restoration and 
 salvation of mankind ? Divine "Wis- 
 dom, then, admirably provided for 
 the work of redemption by creating 
 a Mother of God. By Mary, Eve's 
 sex has given to the world its Sa- 
 viour, and by that Saviour, that of 
 Adam has redeemed the world. 
 
 But God has done still more. He 
 has favored us all "with a continual 
 and perpetual extension of the mys- 
 tery of the Incarnation. Thus speak 
 the Fathers of the Church." * By our 
 participation in the mystery which 
 supposes all others, the adorable 
 Eucharist, have we not the infinite 
 honor of contracting that union 
 with God which approaches the 
 nearest to that of Mary with her 
 Son Jesus, and that of the Word 
 with his humanity, since "we are 
 therein really incorporated with the 
 divine flesh of Christ."^ And Jesus 
 himself has said, "He that eateth 
 my flesh and drinketh my blood, 
 abideth in me, and I in him."^ Ah ! 
 let us here humble ourselves before 
 
 ■ Bourdalone, sur le Tres- Saint Sacrament. 
 • S. Chrys., Homil. 63, ad popvil. Antioch. 
 > St. John vi. 57. 
 
 the Lord, for that a favor so pro- 
 digious leaves us cold, tepid, in- 
 different, instead of inflaming our 
 hearts, and filling us with a bound 
 less zeal and devotion ! 
 
 Mary! we are happy to pro- 
 claim, with the Church, that thou 
 art truly the Mother of God. We 
 joyfully acknowledge that it was 
 thou who "brought forth"* the first- 
 born by excellence, called by St. 
 Paul "the first-born amongst those 
 who are conformable to his image ;"^ 
 that it is thou, and thou alone, who 
 art entitled to the literal applica- 
 tion of those sacred words, " He that 
 made me rested in my tabernacle ;"*' 
 and that, as the Eternal Father says 
 to his Son, "Before the day-star" of 
 time " I begot thee," ^ as thou canst 
 thyself say to him, "And I also be- 
 got thee, in tiTne ! " We venerate, 
 then, and honor with all our heart 
 thy divine maternity ; we offer thee 
 all the homage due to thine incom- 
 parable dignity. Obtain for us, 
 Mary ! to appreciate the admirable 
 participation in thy glory and the 
 glory of his adorable humanity, 
 
 * St. Matt. i. 25. 
 » Kom. viii. 29. 
 
 * Eccles. xxiv. 12. 
 1 Ps. cix. 3. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 605 
 
 which thy divine Son, in the sacra- * 
 ment of his love, vouchsafes to give 
 us : 
 
 Holy Mother of God, pray for 
 us. 
 
 Sancta Dei Genitrix^ ora pro nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION XII. 
 
 holy virgin of virgins, pray for us. 
 
 VIRGIN" OF Virgins I what title 
 could be more suitable to her 
 who hrst consecrated the love of 
 holy virtue by the seal of a perfect 
 vow ! A vow so precious in the 
 eyes of Mary, that she only accept- 
 ed the ineffable glory of the divine 
 maternity, after the Angel had as- 
 sured her, on the part of God, that 
 this glory should be nowise incom- 
 patible with the sacred engagement 
 she had contracted with the Most 
 High ! Virgiii of Virgins ! what 
 title could better express the pious 
 admiration of the Church for her 
 miraculously perpetual virginity ! 
 So, also, what emblem could be 
 more illustrative of Mary's favorite 
 virtue and this magnificent privi- 
 lege than that lily-stem, whose triple 
 
 flower tells us so well that she was 
 a virgin while bearing the divine 
 Jesus, a virgin before and after that 
 august mystery. 
 
 The lily ! What flower is there 
 of sweeter perfume, of purer beauty, 
 of more delicate white? There is, 
 therefore, no more perfect symbol 
 of the fairest, the most exquisite 
 virtues ; of that angelic virtue, 
 whose triumph is manifested in 
 the Virgin of Virgins on the day of 
 the Incarnation of the Word, when 
 the angel said, to reassure her: 
 " The Holy Ghost shall come upon 
 thee, and the power of the Most 
 High shall overshadow thee!"^ 
 Hence, the Scripture represents to 
 us, under the figure of a girdle of 
 lilies,^ the inviolable chastity of the 
 Spouse of the Canticles, and the 
 predilection of the heavenly Bride- 
 groom for virginal purity, by telling 
 us that he is " the lily of the val- 
 leys," and goes to his garden "to 
 gather lilies."^ 
 
 These charming figures have each 
 a sweet and expressive lesson for 
 us. It is, that Jesus loves to rest 
 with "the clean of heart ;"'^ that he 
 
 'St. Lukei. 35. 
 « Cant. vii. 2. 
 
 3 Cant, ii 1 ; vi. 1 
 «St. Matt. V. 8. 
 
€oe 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF TEE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 loves to abide in liearts whose pure 
 thoughts, pure desires, pure affec- 
 tions, pure emotions, are for him 
 like " a bed of aromatical spices."^ 
 And, consequently, we may perceive 
 what delight our divine Saviour 
 must take in Mary, whose spiritual 
 purity, truly perfect, was enhanced 
 by another miraculous purity, so 
 that the very name of this twofold 
 virtue has become her own name, 
 and she alone is, by excellence, 
 called the Virgin ! 
 
 But let us sound our own hearts, 
 and are we a holy object of compla- 
 cency to the divine Lamb who is 
 followed by virgins "whithersoever 
 he goeth?"^ Alas! even without 
 falling into the slough of vice, do 
 we never permit ourselves to do 
 aught that might displease him? 
 How many imprudent or even dan- 
 gerous looks ! How many liberties 
 which, without exceeding the strict 
 bounds of virtue, are yet incom- 
 patible with the holy integrity 
 of a chaste delicacy! How many 
 thoughts, how many remembrances, 
 perhaps even regrets, how many de- 
 sires, how many projects, how many 
 
 • Cant. vL 1. • Apoc. xiv. 4. 
 
 » 2 Cor. ii 16. 
 
 * dreams of the imagination, which 
 are far from having for their em- 
 blem the dazzling whiteness of the 
 lily! How many words which are 
 far from breathing " the good odor 
 of Christ,"^ the Son of a virgin, and 
 the tender, intimate friend of St. 
 John, because, as the Church tells 
 us, the latter " wore the spotless 
 crown of virginity ?"* Finally, how 
 many affections, of which God is 
 neither the beginning nor the 
 end ; how many attachments formed 
 (though we will hardly acknowledge 
 it to ourselves) , not so much by the 
 spirit as by the flesh ! . . . Ah ! let 
 us courageously banish from our 
 hearts, not merely anything that 
 might offend the divine Son of 
 Mary, but anything that might not 
 be pleasing to him. Let us respect 
 our bodies as being " the members 
 of Christ,"^ and never convert them 
 to any but a holy use. Let us re- 
 member that where the eye of man 
 cannot penetrate, the eye of God 
 sees and judges ! for " hell itself is 
 naked before him, and there is no 
 covering for destruction!"^ Let us 
 remember that his eyes, sweet " as 
 
 * Brev. Bom. * 1 Cor. vi. 15. 
 
 • Job xxvi. 6. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGLN. 
 
 607 
 
 those of the dove"^ for virgin souls, 
 are " as a flame of fire " ^ for those 
 who attempt before their Creator 
 what the mere look of a mortal 
 would make them avoid as repre- 
 hensible. Ah! would that we un- 
 derstood this better, and would 
 always keep it in mind ! 
 
 Virgin of Virgins ! living mir- 
 acle of purity! who wast on earth 
 Christ's " dove," his perfect one ; 
 the daughters of Sion saw thee and 
 declared thee most blessed. Num- 
 berless are the "young maidens"^ 
 whom thy powerful example has in- 
 duced to renounce the world and 
 all its most seductive charms, to 
 consecrate themselves to God in 
 solitude, to serve Jesus with inex- 
 pressible love in the person of the 
 poor, or to follow thy footsteps, 
 even amid the cares of the world ! 
 " Queens " themselves, amid the 
 splendor of their courts, have 
 "praised thee"* by the sublime 
 virtues which they practised after 
 thine example, and under thine 
 auspices 1 
 
 Glory be to thee, Mary! incom- 
 parable model of that virtue which 
 
 * makes man's life like to that of the 
 angels, as though his soul were not 
 connected with corruptible organs. 
 Ah! make us, by thy protection, 
 thy faithful imitators, and zealous 
 lovers of the holy virtue of purity. 
 It is that we may always resemble 
 thee, and thus merit the favor of 
 thy divine Son, that we may say to 
 thee. 
 
 Holy Virgin of Virgins, pray for 
 us. 
 
 Sancta Virgo Virginum^ ora pro 
 nobis. 
 
 ■ Cant. V. 12. 
 ' Atdoc. i. 14. 
 
 3 Cant. vi. 7, 
 * Cant. vi. 8. 
 
 MEDITATION XIE. 
 
 MOTHER OF CHRIST, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 TO say of Mary that she is the 
 Mother of God, is to reveal to 
 us, all at once, the full extent of her 
 greatness and glory. But this the 
 human mind could not comprehend 
 unless it could embrace infinite maj- 
 esty. Hence it is that the Church, 
 after making us invoke Mary under 
 that title, here presents her to us 
 in a way that we can more easily 
 understand. 
 
 Is it not ti'ue that a mother ap- 
 
pears to us the more honorable in 
 proportion as her son is distin- 
 guished by more eminent qualities, 
 and does greater things for the 
 haopiness of his fellow-creatures? 
 What admirable glory reverts, then, 
 to the Blessed Virgin as the Mother 
 of Christ? Does not Jesus pos- 
 sess, even as man, all the peifec- 
 tions suitable to our nature ? " God 
 anointed him with the Holy Ghost," ^ 
 who is personally united to him. 
 "In him are all the treasures of 
 wisdom and knowledge;"^ in him 
 all the treasures of goodness, meek- 
 ness, humility, patience, compas- 
 sion, charity the purest and most 
 devoted; in him the plenitude of 
 feelings, the noblest, the most ele- 
 vated, the most delicate, the most 
 generous, the most captivating to 
 the human heart. . . . But who may 
 tell what he has done for the happi- 
 ness of those whom he was pleased 
 to make his brethren?^ Not to 
 speak of the salvation which he 
 prepared for us with his own life, 
 how numerous are the blessings 
 which he has otherwise conferred 
 upon us? What improvement both 
 moral and intellectual, has he not | 
 
 ^ Acta X. 38. * Colos. ii 3. » Heb. ii. 17. i 
 
 brought into the world ! What a 
 prodigious transfo-i-mation has he not 
 wrought in it! Even now Chris- 
 tianity prevents more evil in one 
 day than all human laws could re- 
 press; it produces, in one day, more 
 acts of virtue, often sublime, than 
 the pompous maxims of philosophy 
 could ever achieve. 
 
 To whom is due the restoration 
 of woman, who was in olden times 
 considei'cd and treated as a mere 
 thinff in the family — is it not to the 
 Son of Mary ? . . . To whom is due 
 th© respect for childhood, the mod- 
 eration of paternal authority, for- 
 merly so arbitrary and tyrannical — • 
 is it not to the Son of Mary ? From 
 whom came the abolition of sla- 
 very ? who has invested the servant 
 with a sacred and august character 
 in the eyes of the Christian master, 
 and taught us to regard all men as 
 our brethren — is it not the Son of 
 Mary? . . . Whence proceed all the 
 helps, all the consolations, all the 
 good and admirable works of which 
 our holy religion is the soul and the 
 inexhaustible source — is it not from 
 the Son of Mary ? . . . 
 
 Ah! even if the Blessed Virgin 
 were not the Mother of God, were 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN 
 
 609 
 
 Christ, lier adorable Son, nothing 
 more than the greatest of men, the 
 most signal benefactor of humanity, 
 his Mother would be the noblest, 
 the most august, the most honor- 
 able of mothers. 
 
 And, in the supernatural order, 
 where is the good of which Jesus 
 is not the author? Without him, 
 fallen man would have neither sanc- 
 tifying grace, nor merit for heaven, 
 nor any of those actual graces so 
 necessary to our weakness. With- 
 out him, either before or since his 
 appearance on earth, there would 
 be no connection of love, of favor, 
 between God and man, none of the 
 consolations of piety, none of the 
 guiding lights of faith, no beacon 
 of hope for eternity. 
 
 But how blind and ungrateful we 
 are to enjoy all these blessings, and 
 yet love their author so little ! Each 
 step of ours is marked by some fa- 
 vor of Christianity, and we heed it 
 not. At the sight of these precious 
 gifts our hearts should b'e more and 
 more inflamed with love for the 
 divine Son of Mary, but far from 
 that being the case, we refuse him 
 that time which so justly belongs 
 to him, we employ it in violating 
 
 * his holy laws, in gainsaying his 
 example, in wilfully offending him. 
 What ingratitude is ours ! . . . Ah ! 
 if we have ever so little tenderness 
 of heart, let us endeavor to repair 
 by our own repentance this base 
 ingratitude, and henceforward to 
 live unceasingly for him who un- 
 ceasingly pours down his blessings 
 upon us. 
 
 Mary! who could say to this 
 adorable benefactor, "Thou art my 
 Son,"^ I bore thee in my womb, I 
 gave thee suck, and nourished thee."^ 
 What must have been thy feelings 
 when thou hadst " to wrap up " the 
 delicate limbs " of that divine child," 
 the "first-born"^ of all those who 
 by their divine adoption were to be- 
 come "his brethren."^ Ah! doubt- 
 less thou didst pour forth thy heart 
 in expressions of love and admira- 
 tion, thou wert happy to give him 
 continual proofs of devotion, of con- 
 secration, of entire self-abandon- 
 ment. The most amorous words of 
 the Spouse in the Canticles hardly 
 sufficed to express the sacred trans- 
 ports of thy love while thou saidst, 
 " My beloved is mine, he shall abide 
 
 > Heb. i. 5. 
 
 » 2 Mach. vii. 27. 
 
 ' St. Matt. i. 25. 
 * Eom. viiL 29. 
 
610 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 between my breasts."^ Obtain for 
 us, then,*0 Mary! a share in thy 
 admiration, thy gratitude, thy love 
 for Jesus, who never ceases to load 
 us with favors. Permit us not to 
 remain ungrateful, at least so far as 
 to deliberately offend so liberal a 
 benefactor. Yes, we beseech thee 
 with all the fervor of our souls, 
 repeating with the Church — 
 
 MoTUER OF Christ, pray for us. 
 
 Mater Christi, ora pro nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION XIV. 
 
 MOTHER OF DIVINE GRACE, PRAT FOR 
 
 us. 
 
 HAIL, full of grace !^ said the 
 heavenly ambassador sent by 
 the Most High to announce to Mary 
 the sublime mystery of the Incar- 
 nation. These are words of such 
 profound meaning, that no human 
 intellect could understand, no hu- 
 man lips explain it. Full of grace I 
 Who, then, can estimate the quan- 
 tity, or appreciate the value of this 
 treasure? K it be true that more or 
 less grace is the effect of the great- 
 
 t er or lesser love which the Lord has 
 for a soul, what soul could ever 
 receive as much as Mary, the spe- 
 cially beloved of God ? . . . . Full of 
 grace! "Perfect expressions," says 
 St. Sophronius, " for grace is given 
 to others as it were by shares; to 
 Mary, it is given in its plenitude."' 
 Mary alone, of all mankind, was 
 called to the triple dignity of be- 
 loved Daughter of the Father, be- 
 loved Mother of the Son, beloved 
 Spouse of the Holy Ghost; and it 
 also required an incomparable sanc- 
 tity to correspond with that incom- 
 parable dignity; to produce that 
 unprecedented sanctity an unpre- 
 cedented supply of grace was requi- 
 site, nay, even the plenitude of grace. 
 Hence, the angel, willing to express 
 this marvellous sanctity which dis- 
 tinguishes Mary amongst all creat- 
 ures, called her not by her name, 
 although that name is, as we have 
 seen, rich in admirable significa- 
 tion; he saluted her with the very 
 title of "full of grace,"* as it were 
 to designate her by that which is 
 her special characteristic before the 
 Most High. 
 
 But she is, moreover, the Mother 
 
 > Cant L 12. 
 
 » St. Luke i. 2& 
 
 ' Serm. de Assump. V. 
 
 * St. Luke i. 28. 
 
N >': I )<H-.I.S;i.lliciH C... 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE Bi^ESSED VIRGIN 
 
 611 
 
 of him who is " the God of all * 
 grace," ^ and of whom St. Paul says 
 that, in his person, "the grace of 
 God hath appeared visibly to all 
 nien."^ Why should not she who 
 gave birth to such a Son be called 
 the Mother of Divine grace, especial- 
 ly she to whom that same Son has, 
 if we may say so, confided the dis- 
 tribution of his favors ? For Jesus, 
 from the Cross, gave his mother to 
 us in the person of St. John, who, as 
 the only disciple present, represent- 
 ed all the faithful;^ and what the 
 great Apostle said of the gift made 
 us by the Eternal Father of his own 
 Son, we may, in due proportion, say 
 of the gift which the ^njassi^iff^B 
 of his divine Mother. ▼How hath 
 he not also, with her, given us all 
 things."* Thus it is that the holy 
 doctors of the Church are prodigal 
 in their expressions of praise and 
 homage towards this favored creat- 
 ure. " Be mindful of us, blessed 
 Virgin !" exclaims St. Athanasius, 
 " and in return for the feeble praise 
 we offer thee, grant us rich gifts 
 
 > 1 Peter v. 10. * Titus ii. 11. 
 
 ^Bossuet, Sermon for the Feast of the Holy 
 Rosary. 
 
 * Rom. viii. 32. " Serm. in Annuntiat. 
 
 from the treasury of thy graces."^ 
 " In thee, our patroness and media 
 trix with the God who was born of 
 thee," cries St. Ephraim, "in thee 
 the human race places all its joy ; 
 in thee alone is found the refuge 
 and the surety of those who trust in 
 God;"^ and in another prayer, he 
 says: "After the Trinity, thou art 
 mistress of all ; after the Paraclete, 
 another Paraclete ; after the Media- 
 tor, mediatrix of the entire world." ^ 
 "Because thou art the only hope 
 of sinners," says St. Augustine, 
 "through thee we hope for pardon 
 of our crimes ; through thee, 
 
 jssed one! we expect the heav- 
 enly reward."^ " Mary is the ocean 
 of grace," says St. Peter Chrysolo- 
 gus,'-* St. John Damascene/" and St. 
 Bonaventure.^^ 
 
 She is the fountain through which 
 all graces are poured forth on the 
 world like a spring of living water : 
 "the fountain of gardens," ^^ destined 
 to "water the torrent of thorns," ^^ 
 that is to say, to change our hearts, 
 to make all virtues grow in them ; a 
 
 « Op. groeco-lai., t. iiL >" Oral. i. de Nativit. 
 
 ^ Op. grceco-lat., t. iii. " In specul v. 
 
 « Serm. de Annuntiat. "^ Cant. iv. 15. 
 
 » Serm. cxlvi. " Joel iii 18. 
 
612 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 fountain so full of grace, that this 
 sweet Virgin, according to the an- 
 gelic doctor, has enough to bestow 
 on all mankind."^ 
 
 Let us, then, approach, how gi-eat 
 soever our misery may be, let 
 us approach, with an overflowing 
 heart, to that "throne of grace," ^ 
 established for himself in the bosom 
 of the divine Virgin by the Son of 
 the Eternal King. Let us evei* im- 
 plore her assistance; even when 
 our affairs appear to be in the most 
 desperate condition, let us beseech 
 her from the bottom of our hearts, 
 " assured," says St. Bernard, " that 
 we are thereby entering into the de- 
 signs of Him whose w^ill it is that all 
 should come to us through Mary."^ 
 
 Mother of " the Word made 
 flesh," who hast vouchsafed to 
 " dwell amongst us, full of grace and 
 truth,"* with the angel we salute 
 thee, "full of grace!" Thy divine 
 Son is the source, the inexhaustible, 
 the infinite source of grace ; and in 
 taking up his abode in thee first of 
 all mankind, he gave thee the right 
 to say, "In me is all grace." ^ Thy 
 blessed hands are, as it were, the 
 
 > p. iii. qusest. xxviL art 5. * Heb. iv. 16. 
 • Serm. iL de Aasumpt. B. M. V. 
 
 f favored channel whereby this divine 
 treasure overflows the entire w^orld, 
 refreshes all that is dry and arid, 
 and " maketh tlie wilderness evevi as 
 the garden of the Lord."*^ To thee, 
 then, wiU we have recourse in all 
 our wants ; in thee, after Jesus, do 
 w^e place all our confidence; through 
 thee, do we expect from him, un- 
 worthy as we are of his mercy and 
 goodness, the pardon of our num- 
 berless transgressions, the assist- 
 ance so necessary to our weakness, 
 and the crowning grace of final per- 
 severance. 
 
 Mother of Divine Grace, pray 
 FOR us. 
 
 Mater divince gratice, ora pro nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION XV. 
 
 mother most pure, pray for us. 
 
 IT was fitting," says St. Anselm, 
 " that the sanctity of the Virgin- 
 Mother should be such, that no 
 greater could be conceived after 
 that of God."^ For otherwise it 
 w^ould have been manifest that God 
 
 * St. John i. 14. • Is. li. 3. 
 
 " Eccles. xxiv. 25. ^ De Concept., c. xyiii 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF TEE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 613 
 
 did not raise her for whom he had 
 reserved the intinite dignity of be- 
 ing his Mother, so as to place her 
 on a level with that high honor, 
 and that he did not create her 
 worthy of a rank which never had 
 or never can have an equal in the 
 world. This gave St. Thomas occa- 
 sion to write those remarkable 
 words: "It is possible for a creat- 
 ure to exist so pure as that noth- 
 ing purer could emanate from the 
 hand of the Creator, and such was 
 the purity of the Blessed Yirgin, of 
 her who never knew either original 
 or actual sin."^ 
 
 God and sin are irreconcileable ; 
 the opposition between these two 
 terms is absolute, infinite. Where- 
 fore it is, that we can only approach 
 God by removing from evil, from 
 which we also remove the farther 
 the more we approach the " Holy 
 of holies." ^ But how can we imag- 
 ine a creature having such an inti- 
 mate connection with God as the 
 Mother of God ? How then can we 
 conceive one who has attained, or 
 can attain a purity of heart like 
 that of the Blessed Yirgin ? 
 
 ' I. Sent. disc. xliv. q. unica, art. Ill, ad, 3. 
 Condi. Trid. Sess. v. et vi. • Dan. ix. 24. 
 
 * Hence the Angel of the Schools 
 teaches that " in her the effusion of 
 grace was so abundant, so complete, 
 that she enjoyed the closest possible 
 union with the divine Author of 
 grace, and thus deserved to receive 
 into her bosom Him who is the 
 source thereof."^ 
 
 It would not be sufficient, then, to 
 give Mary the first place in the hie- 
 rarchy of creatures, even the holiest. 
 She who approaches God as nearly 
 as possible, is superior to them by 
 the full height of her incomparable 
 dignity ; she is distinguished as 
 " the lily among thorns ;"* her sanc- 
 tity overtops that of all the elect, of 
 all the blessed spirits, as " going up 
 by the desert, as a pillar of smoke 
 of aromatical spices, of myrrh and 
 frankincense, and of all the powders 
 of the perfumer."^ 
 
 While admiring, in this august 
 Mother, the privilege of special 
 sanctity wherewith the Lord en- 
 dowed her, let us endeavor to com- 
 prehend the necessary hatred of God 
 for all that is offensive to his divine 
 Majesty. Sin, whatever it may be 
 in its object and in its circum- 
 
 * 
 
 ' III. part., quaest. xxvii., art. v., ad. 1. 
 
 * Cant. ii. 2. » Cant, iii. 6. 
 
614 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 stances, is always a violation of the * 
 moral oi-der — a real disorder which 
 God must necessarily abhor, because 
 he is himself order by his essence, 
 order substantial, necessary, immut- 
 able. Sin is a revolt against God, 
 tliat sovereign power, that supreme 
 power, that eternal power who for- 
 bids it, and who cannot, in justice 
 to himself, leave unpunished, in his 
 universal empire, one single act of 
 rebellion. Sin is an ingratitude 
 towai'ds the first, the greatest of 
 benefactors ; an ingratitude so much 
 the blacker, in that we voluntarily 
 ojBfend Him who preserves our life, 
 at the very moment we are employ- 
 ing it against himself, and that it is 
 impossible to offend him without 
 turning one of his own blessings 
 against him. How could it be that 
 God would not hate ingratitude 
 with an infinite hatred, since even 
 men brand it as odious and dis- 
 graceful ? 
 
 Ah I let us not pass lightly over 
 truths so proper to inspire us with 
 a holy horror for all, even the slight- 
 est violations of the adorable will 
 
 • Ps. XXXV. 4. 
 » Ps. XXXV. 13. 
 
 ' Prov. L 7. 
 *Eocle8. vii 14. 
 
 » Eccles. vii. 19. 
 
 of God, 80 capable of exciting our 
 zeal, our vigilance, our endeavora to 
 shun even the smallest evil. Like 
 him who " would not understand 
 that he might do well," ^ we should 
 be in danger of being " cast out " ^ 
 by the Lord; or like those fools who 
 "despise wisdom,"^ we should de- 
 serve to be ourselves despised by 
 the Most High, and given up to a 
 reprobate sense.* Let us rather 
 reflect seriously on these saving 
 truths, and try to derive therefrom 
 " that pious fear which neglecteth 
 nothing,"^ having always in view 
 that great maxim of the divine 
 Master : " He that is faithful in that 
 which is least, is faithful also in 
 that which is greater."^ 
 
 thou whose admirable sanctity 
 renders thee "fair as the moon,"^ 
 from the depth of our hearts do we 
 say to thee: "Thou art all fair, 
 Mary, and there is not a spot in 
 thee,"^ thou house of the Lord 
 which holiness becometh,^ and thou 
 tabernacle of the Most High which 
 himself hath sanctified."^" Yes, we, 
 thy cherished children, are rejoiced 
 
 • St. Luke xvi. 10. • Cant. iv. 7. 
 
 'Cant. vL 9. »Ps. xciL 6. 
 
 *Pb. xlv. 5. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 615 
 
 to contemplate in our august and 
 tender Mother, that glorious privi- 
 lege before which the Church, ever 
 guided by the Holy Spirit, has sol- 
 emnly bowed down, proclaiming to 
 the Catholic world that she did not 
 include thee amongst sinners.^ Ob- 
 tain for us, Mary, a sensible feel- 
 ing of the hatred which God neces- 
 sarily has for sin, whose disorder 
 never troubled the repose or marred 
 the beauty of thy spotless soul; 
 what horror we should feel for that 
 act of rebellion and ingratitude, 
 even though it did not go so far as 
 to produce that deadly division be- 
 twixt God and us which it effects, 
 alas ! too often. Vouchsafe, by thy 
 intercession, to preserve us from it ; 
 deign to hear those who address 
 thee in that pious invocation : 
 
 Mother most pure, pray for us. 
 
 Mater purissima, ora pro iwhis. 
 
 MEDITATIOJSr XYI. 
 
 mother most chaste, pray for us. 
 
 Is there anything greater or more 
 noble than the virtue which 
 leaves the mind its freedom for 
 
 * good, disengaging it from the sla- 
 very, and, as it were, from the weight 
 of the body, which it constantly 
 maintains in the path of duty ? So 
 it is that, in all ages, and amongst 
 all nations, the most civilized and 
 the most debased by Paganism, 
 chastity has been honored.^ One 
 would say that, by a sort of instinct, 
 Memphis, Athens, Rome, and the 
 savage tribes of America, were sen- 
 sible of the pre-eminence of that 
 virtue which raises man above his 
 own nature, almost to a level with 
 the pure spirits. 
 
 But see the marvellous splendor 
 of chastity in the divine Mother of 
 Jesus. Although connected, like 
 all the children of Adam, with a 
 passible and mortal body, Mary, 
 who had been preserved from orig- 
 inal sin, was also preserved from the 
 humiliating consequences of that 
 birth-stain. Would it have been 
 expedient or proper that the Lord, 
 excepting her from the transmission 
 of the sin of Eve, should still leave 
 her that unhappy concupiscence 
 which was unknown to Eve herself 
 in her state of innocence He 
 
 ' Con. Trid. Sess. v. et vi. 
 
 « The Pope, by de Maistre, v. ii. ch. 3. 
 
616 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON TEE LIT ANT OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 would, then, have made Mary a 
 creature inferior to the companion 
 of the fii-st man in her primitive 
 condition, and the Mother of God 
 would have had to send up to heav- 
 en that comphiint of the Christian 
 soul : " Unhappy that I am, who 
 will deliver me from this* body of 
 death ?"^ Ah! what truly pious 
 heart would not reject such thoughts 
 as injurious alike to the Son and 
 the Mother. " I would be horrified 
 to say," says St. Augustine, "that 
 that sacred flesh which had furnish- 
 ed the virginal body of Christ was 
 delivered to worms after death." ^ 
 But if it were freed from the cor- 
 ruption of the grave, which, after 
 all, is not out of order, how much 
 more must it have been preserved 
 by the Lord from all tendency to 
 moral disorder. 
 
 Mary was, therefore, in her body, 
 as far as matter can be compared 
 to spirit, what she was in her soul, 
 all pure and all holy. Of her may 
 be said, literally, what St. Augus- 
 tine said figuratively of virginity, 
 that "she had in her flesh some- 
 thing not of the flesh," ^ something 
 
 ' Bom. viL 24. * De Assumpt. t. ix., n. 23. 
 • De Sancta Virginit. n. 12, t. vL 
 
 which belonged to the angelic na- 
 ture rather than to ours, something 
 superhuman, which caused the King 
 of glory to " not abhor the Virgin's 
 womb."* 
 
 But we must beware of thinking 
 that, altliougli Mary had no combat 
 to sustain, the glory of her chastity 
 was at all diminished. How honor- 
 able soever danger may be when 
 crowned by victory, whatever glory 
 there may be in succeeding in a 
 struggle of which God is the wit- 
 ness, the prize and the crown, it 
 w^as assuredly much more honorable 
 to be respected by that unclean 
 spirit w^hose assaults have harassed 
 the greatest saints, so that he never 
 dared to make even the slightest 
 attempt. Such was, by nature, the 
 prerogative of the adorable Jesus; 
 such was, by grace, the privilege of 
 his Mother, whose " eye hath always 
 been able to look down upon"^ the 
 infernal powers overcome by the 
 Cross of her divine Son.^ 
 
 For us who experience but too 
 ofen "the evil which is present with 
 us,"^ and the combats arising from 
 it, let us apply with filial confidence 
 
 * Hymn Te Deunu 
 » Ps. liii. 9. 
 
 « Col. ii. 15. 
 ' Bom. vii. 21. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 617 
 
 to the maternal protection of Mary. 
 Let us remember that how weak 
 soever we may be, " we can do all 
 things hy the grace of God that 
 strengtheneth us,"^ and that, by the 
 intermediation of his Mother, we 
 may hope never to want that grace. 
 But let us not count on her protec- 
 tion without using the means and 
 taking the precautions pointed out 
 by faitli ; that would be attempt- 
 ing to render Mary the accomplice 
 of our presumption and of our cul- 
 pable imprudence. Let us " watch 
 and pray." ^ Let us watch narrow- 
 ly over our senses, our imagination, 
 and the motions of our heart; let 
 us shun even the appearance of dan- 
 ger ; it is only by flight that chas- 
 tity secures the victory. Let us pray 
 " at all times," ^ let us pray espe- 
 cially at the moment of danger, "that 
 we enter not into temptation."* 
 
 Mary, we bless the Lord for 
 that, from the moment of thy con- 
 ception, " thy heart and thy flesh 
 rejoiced in the living God;"^ we 
 bless him for that in thee are re- 
 alized, in an admirable manner, 
 
 ^ those words of the great Apostle, 
 that " the fruit of the spirit is con- 
 tinency and chastity."^ What con- 
 tinency can ever be compared to 
 thine ? Where is the chastity that 
 is not eclipsed before that which 
 God preserved from all the attacks 
 of concupiscence, and to which, by 
 the power of " the lion of * the tribe 
 of Juda,"^ he gave the glory of a 
 perpetual triumph ? ^ Alas ! but 
 our lot is very different; and how 
 inimical to us and to our eternal 
 welfare are " the carnal desires 
 which war against the soul,"^ and 
 "the spirits of wickedness "^"^ by 
 whom we are surrounded. In the 
 name of thy glory, Mary, suffer 
 not those who implore thine assist- 
 ance, and who fight in the shadow 
 of thy tutelary power, even to fail 
 in the combat. Pray for us that 
 " the God of Peace may crush Satan 
 under our feet," ^^ and that " by 
 the Spirit we may mortify the deeds 
 of the flesh." ^^ Once more, then, we 
 beseech thee — 
 
 Mother most chaste, pray for us. 
 Mater castissiTna, ora pro nobis. 
 
 • Phil. iv. 13. 
 
 * St. Mark xiv. 38. 
 » Ephes. vi. 18. 
 
 * St. Mark xiv. 38. 
 
 * Ps. Ixxx. iii. 3. 
 « Gal. V. 23. 
 
 "> Apoc. V. 5. 
 8 2 Cor. ii. 14 
 9 1 Peter ii 11. 
 
 » Ephes. vi. 12. 
 >' Rom. xvi. 20. 
 » Rom. viii. 13. 
 
618 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 MEDITATION XVII. 
 
 MOTHER INVIOLATE, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 WHEN God revealed to the 
 prophet of old, seven centu- 
 ries before its accomplishment, the 
 miracle of the Virgin-Mother, Isaiah 
 said to Mary's ancestors : " Hear ye, 
 therefore^ house of David ; .... a 
 virgin shall conceive and bear a 
 Son. and his name shall be called 
 Emmanuel."^ This is, in fact, one 
 of those prodigies which God draws 
 from the treasures of his power 
 when he wishes to strike men with 
 awe and admiration, and this is also 
 what the Church wishes us to praise 
 and honor by the invocation, " Moth- 
 er inviolate, prai/for tcs /" 
 
 "0 prodigy! ineffable wonder!" 
 exclaims St. Augustine, "a Virgin 
 has become a Mother ! ' Yes, she is 
 a Mother, but still a Virgin ! She 
 has a son, but he has no father ac- 
 cording to the flesh ; she has brought 
 forth, but her purity remains un- 
 touched."^ St. Bernard outdoes the 
 immortal bishop of Hippo : " If," 
 says he, " I wish to extol her virgin- 
 ity, many virgins present themselves 
 
 ' Is. vii. 13, 14 * Serm. xiii. de tempore. 
 
 * Serm. iv. de Assumpt. B. M. V. 
 
 to my mind as partakers in the 
 glory of that virtue. If I set about 
 praising her humility, I find many 
 of the faithful who, at the bidding 
 of her divine Son, became meek and 
 humble of heart. If I undertake to 
 laud the abundance of her mercy, 
 are there not men of great mercy, 
 and women who are models of 
 compassionate goodness? But in 
 this no one either before or after 
 could ever be compared with her I 
 In this she stands alone, viz., in the 
 union of the joys of motherhood with 
 the glory of virginity. Yes, this is 
 Mary's exclusive privilege; no other 
 creature can ever be so honored."^ 
 
 Doubtless, this prodigy is beyond 
 all the laws of nature. But if our 
 first father came into the world by 
 a simple act of the will of God, was 
 it any more difficult for that omnip- 
 otent will to unite, in a mortal, the 
 flower of virginity and the divine 
 fruit " of the Holy Ghost?"* And; 
 moreover, does not the image re- 
 ceived and reflected by "the un- 
 spotted mirror"^ give us a suffi- 
 ciently clear idea of how " the 
 splendor of the glory of God "^ could 
 
 * St. Matt. i. 20. • Wisdom vii. 26. 
 
 « Heb. i. 3. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 619 
 
 come and manifest itself in the 
 world in a manner as admirable 
 as it is astonishing ? . . . For the 
 rest, it would seem that the Lord 
 wished gradually to prepare the 
 human mind for believing this 
 prodigy, the object of our faith; 
 for the solemn prophecy which 
 announced it so long beforehand 
 amongst God's own people, found an 
 echo amongst nearly all the pagan 
 nations of antiquity ; their religious 
 traditions all agreed in expecting a 
 liberator in the Son of a Virgin.^ 
 It would also seem that the mystery 
 of a Man-God being in itself an un- 
 paralleled miracle, its glory was to 
 be manifested in his birth, as well 
 as in his conception. 
 
 Let us here praise the Lord for 
 the admirable prodigies wherewith 
 he dignified the mystery of his anni- 
 hilation in human nature ; let us 
 bless him for the glorious favors 
 which he bestowed on the Blessed 
 Virgin, and endeavor to penetrate 
 ourselves more and more with a 
 high esteem, a generous love for 
 the virtue which he honored in Mary 
 Dy such great marvels. Ah ! if we 
 only knew how pleasing this virtue 
 
 * is to that God who " is a spirit," 
 and who " must be adored in spir- 
 it,"^ and how our flesh participates, 
 in its own way, as far as it possibly 
 can, in the elevation, the dignity, 
 the purity of that adoration ! . . . . 
 What tmceasing efforts should we 
 make to practise that chastity of 
 the senses which refrains even 
 from that which is permitted, for 
 fear of exceeding the prescribed 
 limits ; that chastity of the heart 
 which excludes all excessive affec- 
 tion, even when legitimate; that 
 chastity of the imagination, which 
 repels even the passing thought of 
 any irregularity or of any dangerous 
 object! And how carefully should 
 we regulate our whole exterior so 
 as to inspire others, by our modesty 
 and reserve, with love and esteem 
 for a virtue which can alone render 
 our homage worthy of the Blessed 
 Virgin. 
 
 Mother inviolate, styled by the 
 Apostle St. John "a great wonder,"^ 
 we love to contemplate thee, with 
 him, " clothed with the sun, having 
 the moon under thy feet, and on 
 thy head a crown of twelve stars." * 
 The sun surrounds thee with his 
 
 ' JLetter of M. Drach. 
 
 ^ St. John iv. 23. 
 
 ' Apoc. xiL 1. 
 
 ♦ md. 
 
620 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN 
 
 dazzling radiance — a figure of the 
 divine "Sun of justice,"^ whom 
 thou didst bear in thy chaste 
 womb, and who rendered thy purity 
 as unalterable as his brilliant rays. 
 Twelve stars compose thy diadem, 
 their living splendor an image of 
 thy miraculous purity. Thou hast 
 the moon under thy feet, emblem- 
 atical of the triumph of thy virgin- 
 ity over all inconstancy, all imper- 
 fection, represented by that ever- 
 changing planet. Let us join in 
 the pious transports of St. Ambrose, 
 who, on the feast of Christmas, 
 made all his people sing, "The 
 whole world admires the miracu- 
 lous childbearing of the Blessed 
 Virgin. Such must be the birth of 
 aGod!"2 
 
 We ardently desire to honor in 
 thee, Mary ! the wonderful works 
 of the Lord, by our fidelity in im- 
 itating thy superhuman purity, as 
 far as is consistent with our weak- 
 ness. That we may obtain that 
 grace. 
 
 Mother inviolate, pray for us. 
 
 Mater inviokUaj ora pro nobis. 
 
 ■ Malac. iy. 2. 
 
 * Quoted by Pope St. Celestine, Epist. decretal. 
 Roman. Fonlif. 
 
 MEDITATION XVm. 
 
 MOTHER UNDEFILED, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 TflO be worthy of God, the splen- 
 J- dor of the miracle of the Vir- 
 gin-Mother must necessarily be 
 unalterable, and the chaste womb 
 wherein "the Word was made flesh" 
 must remain forever incorruptible, 
 as a sanctuary " shut for the Prince 
 of Peaces ^ So it is of faith that 
 Mary was always a virgin, that 
 nothing ever tarnished "the flower 
 of purity in her so admirably united 
 with the fruit of honor and riches,"^ 
 and that this same flower, at the 
 close of its mortal existence, was 
 as fair and spotless as at its first 
 opening. Furthermore, the Church 
 tells us in her sacred liturgy that, 
 far from losing aught of its perfec- 
 tion, the virginity of Mary "received 
 through the miraculous birth of the 
 ^ Saviour, as it were, a divine conse- 
 cration."^ 
 
 This, then, is the "fountain 
 sealed up,"^ this is truly that 
 "garden enclosed,"^ which is the 
 inaccessible dwelling of the divine 
 
 » Ezec. xliv. 2. • Cant. iv. 12. 
 
 * Eccles. xxiv. 23. ' Cant. iv. 12. 
 
 ; * Miss. Eom. in Concept. B. M. V, 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 621 
 
 Majesty, guarded " by the cherubim - 
 ^\ith a flaming sword." ^ 
 
 Even if we had not on this head 
 the certainty given by the infallible 
 teaching of the Church, where is 
 the Christian who does not under- 
 stand that Mary, by her divine ma- 
 ternity, became the true temple of 
 the eternal Son ; that the uncreated 
 Word, having dwelt for nine months 
 in her virginal womb, it thereby 
 became the purest and most august 
 of sanctuaries ; that if " the place 
 where his feet stood "^ was of old 
 considered worthy of solemn vener- 
 ation, this living sanctuary of the 
 Divinity was incomparably more 
 so ? . . . But, on the contrary, who 
 could suppose without horror, that 
 God would have permitted the prof- 
 anation of that dwelling which he 
 had chosen for his Son,^ that Mary 
 could for a single moment cease to 
 respect what God had made so 
 venerable, or that she could ever 
 have forgotten that sacred contract 
 which she mentioned to the Angel 
 Gabriel as "a treasure which she 
 would not have resigned even for 
 
 ' Gen. iii. 24. * Ps. cxxxi. 7. 
 
 » Ps. cxxxi. 13. 
 
 * St. Greg. Nys., horn, in Nativ. Ghr. 
 
 the sublime maternity announced 
 to her?"* 
 
 Ah ! far, very far from us be such 
 thoughts — thoughts which would be 
 not only contrary to faith, but 
 which would accuse Mary " of a 
 sacrilege degrading to her, and a 
 profanation degrading to Jesus 
 Christ himself."^ Let us rather 
 unite with the holy doctors who 
 have celebrated the untouched pu- 
 rity of the Virgin by excellence. 
 Let us say with St. Jerome, "She 
 remained ever holy both in soul 
 and body, eternally a virgin ; " ^ and 
 with St. Ambrose, "Mary is the mis- 
 tress of virginity, whose glory was 
 never eclipsed in her ; " ^ and with 
 St. Peter Chrysologus, "By her 
 bearing of the Man-God her purity 
 did but increase, her chastity as- 
 sumed a new lustre, her virginity 
 became but the more inviolable."^ 
 
 But from this truth let us draw a 
 useful lesson for our soul. The holy 
 and adorable Eucharist, as we have 
 already seen, gives us a connection 
 with Jesus so close, so honorable, 
 as to have a wonderful similitude 
 
 * Elev. sur les mysv^res, par Bossuet. 
 
 « Ep. X. ad Eus. de ass. In Ezech. 1. xiii. 
 
 "> De Instit. Virg. » Serm. cxlii. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 with that which existed between 
 Mary and the Eternal Son of the 
 Most High. "Why, then, is it that 
 we do not gather from that ineffa- 
 ble union, from that immense honor, 
 a steady and persevering love of 
 virtue, an invincible strength against 
 the seduction of the senses? . . . Ah I 
 it is that before communion we do 
 not sufficiently estimate the value 
 of the grace conferred upon us by 
 God, and that, after communion, we 
 too soon forget the incomparable 
 favor we have received. When be- 
 lieving " with the heart," ^ how can 
 any one, before participating in the 
 sacred banquet, say to himself with- 
 out emotion, " A house is prepared 
 not for man, not for an angel, but for 
 God?"^ And after being so closely 
 united with the Man-God, how is it 
 that w^e do not " live in God, par- 
 ticipating in the divine feelings ? " ^ 
 After being nourished "with that 
 virginal body, that body conceived 
 and born of a Virgin,"* how can 
 we consent, with the remembrance 
 of such a favor before our minds, 
 ever to be other than pure and 
 
 • Rom. X. 10. * 1 Paral. zxiz. 1. 
 
 ' Medit. sur I'Eu., by BosBuet. 
 
 *]lnd. 
 
 * spotless, even for a single moment ? 
 Mary I " new paradise where pu- 
 rity puts forth her fairest flowers,"^ 
 in what terms shall we praise the 
 glory of thine inviolate and per- 
 petual virginity ?...." Unheard-of 
 miracle," shall we say with St. Eph- 
 raim, " inexplicable prodigy, incom- 
 bustible bush, golden censer exhal- 
 ing a delicious perfume, alone pure 
 in soul and body, alone above all 
 integrity, all innocence, and all vir- 
 ginity?"^ Ah! let us, hencefor- 
 ward, through thy protection, de- 
 light in that virtue which was so 
 precious in thy sight, let us "love 
 that chastity" for which "thou shalt 
 be blessed forever."^ " As the hart 
 panteth after the fountains of wa- 
 ter,"^ so may we sigh after that ado- 
 rable mystery wherein we taste 
 "the corn of the elect, and wine 
 springing forth virgins."^ Above 
 all, when we have had the infinite, 
 the inexpressible happiness of par- 
 ticipating therein, may we ever pre- 
 serve the remembrance of it, and 
 lead a "holy and a blameless" life, 
 under the patronage of her to whom 
 
 » St. Basil, Orat. xxx. 
 
 • Sancti Eph., Opera grceco-lat., t. iii., p. 524-552 
 
 ' Judith XV. 11. « Ps. xlL 2. » Zach. ix. 17 
 
MEDITATIONS ON TEE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 623 
 
 we address this supplication, weak 
 and helpless as we are : 
 
 Mother undefiled, pray for us. 
 
 Mater intemerata, ora pro nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION XIX. 
 
 mother most amiable, pray for us. 
 
 THE sacred canticle wherein the 
 Holy Ghost typifies the union 
 of the Incarnate Word with his 
 Church, is also a magnificent paint- 
 ing of all the qualities which secure 
 to Mary the title of Amiable Mother. 
 In that divine picture the heavenly 
 Spouse represents her in the most 
 varied colors, and under the bright- 
 est and most captivating figures: 
 flowers and fruits, and the rarest 
 plants ; perfumes the most precious 
 that art or nature can produce ; 
 comparisons fuU of grace and sweet- 
 ness ; delicate and graceful orna- 
 ments of the rarest beauty. But all 
 that belongs to earth is too much 
 beneath the Ainiahle Mother; and 
 hence it is that she is saluted by 
 the mouth of the virgins of Jerusa- 
 
 • Cant. vi. 9. 
 
 • Serm. de laudib. Virg. 
 
 * lem with that cry of admiration: 
 " Who, then, is she that cometh forth 
 as the morning rising, fair as the 
 moon, bright as the sun?"^ Yes, 
 her loveliness has the brilliant hues 
 of the early dawn, the mild radiance 
 of the moon, the gorgeous splendor 
 of the orb of day ; and justly did St. 
 Epiphanius say to her with pious 
 enthusiasm: "After God, thou art 
 the first beauty : that of the cheru- 
 bim, that of the seraphim, and of 
 all the angelic choirs, is effaced be- 
 fore thine." ^ How much more, then, 
 does it exceed the charms of Rachel 
 and Rebecca, the winning grace of 
 Esther, the stately beauty of Judith, 
 all honorably mentioned in Holy 
 Writ!^ 
 
 But let us not stop at the terres- 
 trial ideas conveyed by the senses ; 
 this beauty, this loveliness of the 
 favored daughter of the King of 
 kings, "is entirely from within,"^ 
 and from the inestimable gifts 
 wherewith the Lord has adorned 
 her. If men were capable of seeing 
 a soul in possession of sanctifying 
 grace, they would find it of ravish- 
 ing beauty; and if it be so with 
 
 3 Gen. xxiv. 16 ; Gen. xxix. 17 ; Esth. ii. 7 ; 
 ^ Jud. viii. 7. * Ps. xliv. 14 
 
624 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 any soul which enjoys that precious 
 treasure, how great must be the 
 beauty of those who, by their fidel- 
 ity, their zeal, their fervor, merit 
 every day, and, if one might say 
 so, eveiy hour, an increase of that 
 celestial gift, that magnificent, that 
 divine adornment of the Christian 
 soul ! What an idea must we then 
 have of the interior beauty, the su- 
 pernatural loveliness of Mary ! In 
 her conception, she had received the 
 efi'usion of grace in a degree far su- 
 perior to that with which any other 
 creature could be favored. The 
 Lord having chosen her in his eter- 
 nal counsels to be his Mother, she 
 must, necessarily, be more pleasing 
 to him than all others, even from 
 her very origin ; and to remain wor- 
 thy of her incomparable destiny, she 
 must also be pre-eminently assidu- 
 ous, united with God in mind and 
 heart, and ever eager to increase her 
 treasure by new acts of divine love. 
 No other was enriched, like her, 
 every moment, with new traits of 
 supernatural beauty ; no other ever 
 possessed, like her, the virtues in- 
 separable from such an abundance 
 of grace. Never, therefore, was 
 creature so humble, so patient, so 
 
 f charitable, so compassionate, so 
 considei-ate ; never was heart so 
 generous, so devoted, so pure, so 
 noble, so great, so nearly resembling 
 the adorable heart of her divine 
 Son. 
 
 Let us here learn to love, like 
 Mary, before all else, that which is 
 truly amiable — God, and the means 
 of pleasing and being united to him. 
 Let us learn to despise, like her, 
 that frail external beauty which 
 fades and withers away, and falls at 
 length under the stroke of death, to 
 give place to something hideous 
 and disgusting. Let us fix our 
 hearts on that interior loveliness, 
 that spiritual beauty which renders 
 us so amiable before God, that 
 every Christian dying in the state 
 of grace is by him associated in his 
 glory and happiness. Finally, let 
 us remember that while meriting 
 for our soul the felicity .of heaven, 
 we merit it also for our body ; and 
 that, consequently, all that we do, 
 in time, for the supernatural beauty 
 of the soul, we do it, not merely to 
 promote its eternal blessedness, but 
 also to secure the glorification of 
 our body for all eternity. 
 
 ^ Mary ! masterpiece of Almighty 
 
C'tOtZc^ J^eni ptn 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LIT ANT OF TEE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 625 
 
 power, how dazzling is thy beauty 
 to the eyes of faith ! Yes, thou art 
 worthy " of being called," by excel- 
 lence, "Amiable to the Lord;"^ for 
 thou art adorned with all the per- 
 fections which can make a creature 
 amiable. How sweet it is, beloved 
 Mother, to cry out with one of thy 
 devout servants, that " thou dost 
 ravish the hearts of those who con- 
 template thee!"^ How sweet it is 
 to assure thee of our sincere desire 
 ever to love thee according to thy 
 merit, to prefer, like thee, the beauty 
 of the soul before all else, and to 
 labor incessantly to increase it by 
 the fervor of our charity ! Bless this 
 desire, divine Mary ; and that we 
 may obtain its accomplishment. 
 
 Mother most amiable, pray for 
 
 us. 
 
 Mater amabilis, ora pro nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION XX. 
 
 MOTHER MOST ADMIRABLE, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 MAN has made use of what God 
 gave up to his patient indus- 
 try, and has produced admirable 
 
 * things. He has, by his inventive 
 genius, mastered the most rebel- 
 lious of the elements ; even light 
 itself he has made subservient to 
 his will ; he has made astonishing 
 achievements, worthy the admiration 
 of all who can appreciate the beau- 
 tiful and the sublime in art. But 
 what are all the works of man com- 
 pared with what God has produced 
 by a single act of his all-powerful 
 will ? And what are all the works 
 of creation in comparison with the 
 admirable Mother f 
 
 God, it is true, has drawn forth 
 from the infinite treasury of his 
 power wonders the greatest and 
 most varied ; he has strewn them 
 over illimitable space like the dust 
 of our fields; he has adorned the 
 earth with creatures of amazing 
 strength and of enchanting beauty ; 
 he has bedecked the heavens with 
 azure, gold, and silver; he has es- 
 tablished throughout the universe 
 the most profound combinations of 
 opposing elements, the most skillful 
 harmony of laws, sublime in their 
 diversity, in their unity, in their 
 
 ' 2 Kings xii. 25. 
 
 « Medit. in Antiph. Sdve Beg., attributed to 
 ^ St. Bernard. 
 
6S6 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 stability ; he has created man, who f 
 is the king of nature, the living 
 abridgment of all the wonders of 
 creation. And yet he has done still 
 more : he has created Mary, the ad- 
 mirable Mother ; admirable in her 
 grandeur and in her privileges ; ad- 
 mirable in the incomparable prodigy 
 of her d ivine maternity ; admirable 
 in the august influence given her to 
 exercise on the fate of men, denot- 
 ing her co-operation in our salvation, 
 as well as the immense efficacy of 
 her intercession. All the elements 
 seem to be submissive to her: at 
 her voice the pestilential air loses 
 its malignity, fire suspends its rav- 
 ages, the swollen wave sinks again 
 into its bed, the sterile earth re- 
 sumes its fruitfulness. 
 
 Mary is at once virgin and moth- 
 er, the marvel of nature confounded 
 by grace ; the creature of the Most 
 High, and yet his Mother ; " the 
 handmaid," ^ and the " Mother of 
 God;" the daughter of fallen Eve, 
 and yet the true Eve, the "true 
 Mother of all the living."^ Mary I 
 the epitome of all the goodness, the 
 charity, the mercy, the power of the 
 
 « St. Luke i. 48. 
 » Gen. iiL 20. 
 
 * Serm. ii. de Assumpt. 
 
 * St. Luke i. 49. 
 
 Creator, "the abridgment of his 
 incomprehensible perfections," says 
 St. Andrew of Crete.' She is, after 
 God, the centre of the prayer and 
 praise of the Catholic world ; she 
 is, to faith, the Holy by excellence, 
 inseparable from the Man -God ; 
 their names are repeated every day 
 by every mouth ; in their honor, the 
 East and the West have united, and 
 will always unite, their songs of 
 praise and homage. 
 
 " He that is mighty hath " there- 
 fore "done ma/z?/ great things"* for 
 this incomparable virgin ; he has so 
 prodigiously glorified her in heaven 
 and on earth, that, according to St. 
 Cyril and St. Bernard, "the most 
 eloquent tongue can hardly describe 
 her glory and her greatness."^ 
 
 But are we to content ourselves 
 with a profound sentiment of ad- 
 miration for this most perfect of 
 
 God's works ? Let us enter 
 
 into ourselves ; let us examine with 
 the eyes of faith. Is there nothing 
 wonderful in ourselves? Has not 
 God made us truly admirable ? 
 " We were by nature the children 
 of wrath ; " ^ and we have become 
 
 * St. Cyril, Homil. habita in Nestor. ; St. Ber- 
 nard, in deprecat. ad B. Virg. « Ephes. iL 3. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 627 
 
 the "most dear children"^ of God, 
 the objects of his tenderest love and 
 most watchful solicitude. Moreover, 
 we poor mortals, so mean and so 
 contemptible, are raised, by grace 
 and the Holy Eucharist, to the sub- 
 lime life of the angels, to the divine 
 life of heaven. We are destined to 
 the everlasting enjoyment of the 
 highest glory, even the glory of 
 God, for it is written, that "we 
 shall be like him,"^ and that we 
 shall reign with him for ever and 
 ever."^ Ah! if we were deeply 
 penetrated with these magnificent 
 teachings of faith, how great and 
 how generous would be our devo- 
 tion to God! how much better 
 would our conduct correspond with 
 his favors and the sublimity of our 
 hopes ! 
 
 Thou art, Mary, and shalt ever 
 be, worthy of admiration, not only 
 because of thy perpetual and mirac- 
 ulous virginity, prefigured bj- the 
 prodigy which appeared to Moses 
 on "the mountain of God,"* but 
 
 • Ephes. V. 1. « 1 John iii. 2. ^ Apoc. xxii. 5. 
 
 * Exod. iii. 1 ; Brev. Rom. Office of the Circum- 
 cision, 
 
 because of the sublimity of all thy 
 privileges, the superabundance of 
 grace wherewith thou wert filled, the 
 incomparable power given to thee, 
 and the unequalled glory where- 
 with thou art invested. "Wonder- 
 ful"^ is the name by which the 
 Heavenly Father would have his 
 divine Son called ; the Church gives 
 to thee the name of Admirable, as 
 approaching the nearest to the ador- 
 able greatness of the Man-God, and 
 giving the most perfect reflection 
 of his glory. August object of " the 
 wonder of princes,"^ thou whose 
 "magnificence is wonderful,"^ ah! 
 render us sensible of the great dig- 
 nity to which it has pleased God to 
 raise ourselves in this land of exile 
 and probation, and to the still more 
 wonderful height of glory which he 
 is pleased to promise us hereafter ; 
 render us worthy, through thy inter- 
 cession, of a destiny so high and so 
 magnificent ! 
 
 Mother most admirable, pray for us. 
 Mater admirahilis^ ora pro nobis, 
 
 » Isaiah ix. 6. • Wisdom viii. 11. 
 
 ' Eccles. zliiL 32. 
 
ft28 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 MEDITATION XXI. 
 
 MOTHER OF OUR CREATOR, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 THE divine act of the Creator is 
 the grandest, the most aston- 
 ishing to our understanding; in it 
 we have to contemplate, to fathom, 
 as it were, the grand transition from 
 nothing to being, a secret which 
 G(xl has reserved for himself, and 
 which can never come under the 
 cognizance of human reason. Hence 
 it is that God, who is so great in 
 other respects, manifests himself to 
 us, if we may say so, in all his 
 power as Creator of the universe ; 
 and the Church, penetrated with 
 this truth, makes us here invoke 
 Mary, under the title of Motlier of 
 our Creator, in order to give us the 
 highest possible idea of her dignity 
 and greatness. 
 
 Mother of our Creator! Is there 
 not an apparent contradiction be- 
 tween these two terms? What! 
 can the stream produce its source ? 
 the work its author? Who ever 
 saw, who ever heard the like ? . . . . 
 Undoubtedly, if there were in Jesus 
 Chi'ist only the divine nature, this 
 title could not belong to the Blessed 
 Virgin : the Divinity exists by itself 
 
 f from all eternity, and has no other 
 principle than itself. But " the 
 Word was made flesh," ^ and Mary, 
 by an unequalled miracle, became 
 the mother of his human nature. 
 And the Word is Creator as well as 
 the Father and the Holy Ghost, 
 these three adorable persons having 
 together produced all creatures by 
 the indivisible act of their will. 
 
 Let us then exclaim, with St. 
 Peter Chrysologus, "Yes, truly, 
 Mary brought into the world Him 
 who created the world and her- 
 self!"^ Let us offer to her our 
 fervent congratulations, saying, with 
 the same holy doctor, " For ever 
 blessed art thou! thy Creator vouch- 
 safed to be conceived in thy chaste 
 womb ; thy first beginning was 
 pleased to owe his birth to thee ; 
 thy Heavenly Father deigned to be- 
 come thy son ; thy God vouchsafed 
 to become incarnate in thy flesh." ^ 
 
 But for whom did the Creator of 
 all things raise Mary to so high 
 a degree of glory? It is for all 
 of us ; by her he came into the 
 world, came to effect a change in 
 each of us more wonderful, perhaps, 
 than the creation itself. In the 
 
 ^ » St. John L 14 * Serm. 143. Serm. 142. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 629 
 
 beginning " God spal^e, and all was 
 made." ^ What could resist the 
 omnipotent power of his word? 
 But in the admirable operations of 
 " the grace which is given us by 
 Jesus Christ," ^ God permits our 
 free will to oppose an obstacle, in 
 order to give us an occasion of 
 merit ; and hence it is that grace, 
 triumphing over our will, while re- 
 specting it and allowing it to act in 
 a meritorious manner, presents some- 
 thing greater, we might almost say, 
 in some respects, than the primitive 
 act of creation. This is what St. 
 Paul appears to imply when he 
 makes use of the words new creature 
 to express the transformation of 
 man by the grace of Christianity. 
 " If then any be in Christ," wrote he 
 to the Corinthians, *' a new creat- 
 ure:"^ and to the Galatians, "In 
 Christ Jesus neither circumcision 
 availeth any thing, nor uncircum- 
 cision, but a new creature."* Alas ! 
 we see not this new creature, and 
 hence it is that we are little im- 
 pressed by the admirable act of 
 divine power whereby it is pro- 
 duced. Accustomed as we are, 
 
 ' Ps. cxlviii. 5. « St. John L 17. 
 
 » 2 Cor. V. 17. 
 
 * moreover, to behold human nature 
 when, in some degree, transformed 
 by baptism in its earliest infancy, 
 we are less sensible of the favor, 
 because we know not, by experi- 
 ence, what it is to grow up and ad- 
 vance in life under the fatal influ- 
 ence of original degradation, without 
 remedy and without supernatural 
 assistance. Ah ! it was well under- 
 stood by those converted pagans, 
 to whom the great Apostle said, 
 after describing the most humiliat- 
 ing fruits of corrupt nature, " Such 
 some of you were: but you are 
 washed, but you are sanctified, but 
 you are justified, in the name of our 
 Lord Jesus Christ."^ 
 
 Let us, then, think often of what 
 we should be without baptism, 
 and all the marvellous helps of 
 which it is, as it were, the sluice ; 
 let us compare ourselves with the 
 unbelievers to whom God " hath 
 not done in like manner,"^ and we 
 shall give up our hearts, without 
 reserve, to all the sentiments which 
 the liveliest gratitude can inspire. 
 
 Vouchsafe to make us understand, 
 Mary, what gratitude and love 
 
 * GaL yL 15. » 1 Cor. vi. 11. 
 
 • Ps. cxlvii. 20. 
 
630 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 we owe for the prodigious change 
 wrought in us by the grace of thy 
 divine Son — an ineffable favor, 
 which makes us pass from the nar- 
 row limits of our nature to a super- 
 human order, incomparably more 
 elevated than the fairest moral or- 
 der I Considering " the renovation 
 of the Holy Ghost," ^ and its blessed 
 effects, with their inestimable value, 
 our " heart should he inflamed, we 
 should be brought to nothing"^ with 
 wonder and admiration; but, alas I 
 we are cold, ungrateful, and deliber- 
 ately sinful. Permit us not, Mary, 
 longer to delay in " giving to God 
 the things that are God's,"' in offer- 
 ing to the Creator, whose majesty 
 " rested in thy tabernacle," * the sen- 
 timents so justly due to him; and, 
 in order that we may henceforward 
 be grateful and always faithful, 
 Mother of our Creator, pray for us. 
 Mater Creatoris, ova pro nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION XXTT. 
 mother of our redeemer, pray for us. 
 
 f the one dearest to Christian piety. 
 Mother of our Redeemer ! that is to 
 say, thou who, by thy co-operation 
 in the divine incarnation, hast given 
 us Him whose name of Jesus was re- 
 vealed by the Angel Gabriel to thy 
 chaste spouse, Him who was to 
 " save his people from their sins!"* 
 Mother of our Redeemer! thou 
 to whom we are indebted for him 
 whose adorable name should be un- 
 ceasingly on our lips and in our 
 heart, if we were only impressed 
 with a lively sense of what we owe 
 him ! In order to understand what 
 Mary is to us, let us try to under- 
 stand the nature of our obligations 
 to that sweet Saviour whom she 
 brought into the world. 
 
 Two things give value to a favor, 
 its own intrinsic importance, and 
 the generosity with which it is con- 
 ferred. Oh I how precious, then, 
 how truly inestimable, is that which 
 we owe to the adorable Son of 
 Mary I 
 
 What a fate should we have had 
 for all eternity were it not for that 
 divine Saviour! The Holy Ghost 
 
 H 
 
 ERE we have the most touch- 
 ing of Mary's maternal titles ; 
 
 ' Titus iii 5. 
 t Ps. Ixxii 22. 
 
 ' St. Luke XX. 25. 
 * Eccles. xxiv. 12. 
 
 » St. Matt, i 21. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 631 
 
 describes it as "eternal death :"^ * 
 that is to say, a state without end, 
 wherein the horrors of death are 
 every moment renewed ; a life, im- 
 perishable indeed, but deprived of 
 the sovereign good, with a ceaseless 
 and intense desire to possess it, and 
 the fatal certainty of never obtain- 
 ing it ; an eternal life of " eternal 
 
 pains "^ But, as though it 
 
 were a small thing to save us from 
 such a fearful destiny, Jesus has 
 merited for us the inestimable privi- 
 lege of being one day seated with 
 him " in the heavenly places,"^ of 
 being "glorified with him,"* of liv- 
 ing and reigning eternally with 
 him,^ of being eternally "like to 
 him ; " ^ that is to say, to be happy 
 forever, happy beyond all human 
 expression, happy beyond all con- 
 ception or desire. And this two- 
 fold service he has rendered to us 
 with the most disinterested, the 
 most magnanimous devotion. 
 
 What were we to Jesus that his 
 heart should inspire him with the 
 thought of saving us by his own 
 blood? Were we as dear friends, 
 excellent brethren, for whom it is 
 
 ' 2 Thess. i. 9. 
 * 2 Thess. i. 9. 
 
 3 Ephes. ii. 6. 
 * Rom. viii. 17. 
 
 sweet to make a sacrifice, and whose 
 fate inspires the liveliest interest? 
 Not yet As strangers, deserv- 
 ing of pity because of their virtue 
 as well as their misfortunes ? Alas ! 
 no: we were only wretched, sinful 
 creatures, unworthy of a single 
 glance from him, and from whom 
 he had not even common gratitude 
 to expect. What do I say? from 
 whom he well knew he should re- 
 ceive no other return than lament- 
 able indifference, cold tepidity, or 
 even a multiplicity of offences, often, 
 alas! willful. Nevertheless, he loved 
 us "unto death, even the death of 
 the cross." ^ To love, to love even 
 to excess, him who deserves not 
 even sympathy ; to love him who 
 loves not in return, nor will ever 
 testify a just gratitude — what won- 
 drous love ! . . . . But to die for him 
 in whom there is nought but mis- 
 ery, insensibility, from whom there 
 is scarcely anything to be expected 
 save base and obstinate ingratitude, 
 what love could be purer, stronger, 
 or more generous ? 
 
 When shall we repay even a por- 
 tion of our Kedeemer's love, of the 
 
 » 2 Tim. ii. 12. 
 
 « 1 John iii 2. 
 
 7 Phil. ii. 8. 
 
689 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 gratitude we owe him? We who 
 detest ingratitude in others, when 
 shall we cease to be ungrateful ? . . . 
 We would love a man who, at the 
 risk of his life, had saved this cor- 
 poral life, this life so frail, so mis- 
 erable, so full of tears and bitter- 
 ness; we would shrink from even 
 the appearance of ingratitude, we 
 would be horrified at the thoughts 
 of doing him an injury. How un- 
 grateful, then, are we to the adora- 
 ble Son of Mary, who, by the most 
 cruel and ignominious death, has 
 delivered us from an eternity of 
 wretchedness, and merited for us an 
 eternity of happiness! And how 
 much more ungrateful should we 
 be, if, after having meditated on 
 truths so capable of touching our 
 hearts, we should still refuse to pay 
 him a debt so every way sacred. 
 Let us, therefore, belong, hencefor- 
 ward, not to om-selves, for " we are 
 not our own,"^ but His who pur- 
 chased, "with a great price," '^ our 
 love, our fidelity, our devotion. 
 
 Mary, thy quality of Mother of 
 the Redeemer associates thee in 
 the work of man's Redemption, 
 
 ' 1 Cor. vi. 19. 
 
 • Ibid. 20. 
 
 accomplished by his Passion, the 
 torturing instruments of which, re- 
 calling his sufferings and thine, 
 speak eloquently to every feeling 
 heart. Love, ardent, inviolable, eter- 
 nal love to Jesus I After Jesus, to 
 thee, most holy Virgin, fervent and 
 faithful and unceasing love ! Be- 
 loved and august Mother of that di- 
 vine Son, whose name oi ^^ Saviour" ^ 
 was revealed by an angel to the 
 shepherds invited to visit his crib 
 and adore his birth, how much more 
 applicable to him is the title of 
 " Saviour of the world," than to Jo- 
 seph that of the Saviour of Egypt !* 
 Joseph acquired the title by a ser- 
 vice rendered to the people of 
 Egypt, without any personal sacri- 
 fice on his part; but Jesus bears 
 the name, if we may say so, written 
 on his adorable brow with his own 
 blood. Obtain for us, Mary, that 
 our hearts may return him, if not 
 blood for blood, at least love for 
 love — that true and perfect love 
 which manifests itself by works I 
 
 Mother op our Redeemer, pray 
 FOR us. 
 
 Mater Salvatoris, ora pro nobis. 
 
 » Si Luke ii 11. 
 
 * Gen. xli. 45. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIBGIN. 
 
 633 
 
 MEDITATION XXin. 
 
 VIRGIN MOST PRUDENT, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 HAYING made us honor Mary 
 in all the glories of her ma- 
 ternity, the Church makes us cele- 
 brate her as a Virgin, and presents 
 at once for our homage the pru- 
 dence which distinguishes her from 
 all the daughters of Eve, even the 
 most perfect. 
 
 From her childhood, she flies the 
 corrupt atmosphere of the world to 
 go breathe the pure air of the sanc- 
 tuary; she hedges round with the 
 most watchful prudence a heart 
 which yet has nothing to fear from 
 the seductions of the world, for 
 the Lord possesses it from its very 
 conception, and permits it not to 
 know either the dangers or the at- 
 tacks of concupiscence. 
 
 When a prince of heaven appears 
 before her with the most glorious 
 message, Mary is troubled. She is 
 accustomed to a life so solitary, so 
 full of reserve, that "the presence 
 of the angel in mortal form suf- 
 ficed," says St. Ambrose, " to in- 
 spire her with a holy fear;"^ and 
 that fear increases, when she hears 
 
 > De Offidis, lib. i., ch. 8. 
 
 f from his mouth the announcement 
 of a dignity naturally incompatible 
 with the vow she has taken, that 
 vow so dear to her heart. Then, 
 prudence, truly admirable ! far 
 from suffering her mind to dwell on 
 the gloiy of the divine maternity, 
 Mary thinks only of enlightening 
 her conscience before she gives her 
 consent. She states her perplexity 
 to the angel with modest simplicity. 
 The heavenly messenger gives her a 
 satisfactory explanation, and imme- 
 diately, without any further delay, 
 she consents with a humility, a re- 
 signation truly sublime : " Behold 
 the handmaid of the Lord, be it 
 done unto me according to thy 
 word." ^ 
 
 Now, what does she proceed to 
 do? Does she not hasten to an- 
 nounce the great mystery to her 
 worthy spouse? No, she is silent, 
 guided by superhuman prudence. 
 But surely, when Joseph, that "just 
 man,"^ is, soon after, a prey to the 
 most cruel anxiety on her account, 
 anxiety which she cannot fail to 
 perceive, Mary will speak the truth : 
 is she not bound to defend her own 
 reputation? .... 0! let us here 
 
 » St. Luke i. 38. 
 
 » St. Matt, i. 19. 
 
634 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 renew our adiiiiration of that trwst 
 prudent Virgin. She understands 
 that, to reassure her husband, some- 
 thing more is wanted than the word 
 of a mortal, especially one who 
 would seem to be actuated only by 
 her own interest ; she knows, on 
 the other hand, that they who hope 
 in the Lord are never confounded ; ^ 
 she is, therefore, silent, aw^aiting 
 the moment appointed by Divine 
 Providence, and her confidence is 
 speedily justified. 
 
 Afterward, when she hears mar- 
 vellous things said of her new-born 
 Son, far from joining in the conver- 
 sation going on, she restrains her 
 inexpressible love, she keeps the 
 words, " pondering them in her 
 heart," '^ knowing that Jesus is not 
 yet to be manifested to the world. 
 When the day of purification ar- 
 rives, she faithfully accomplishes 
 the Mosaic law, "although there 
 was no taint of impurity," says St. 
 Bernard, " in the bearing of him 
 who is the source of all purity;"' 
 in that, she would, doubtless, give 
 the example of an obedience which 
 goes beyond duty; but she would, 
 
 ' Ps. XXX. 2. 
 • St. Luke ii. 19. 
 
 ' Serm. de PuritcUe. 
 * Ap. xix. 9. 
 
 moreover, wish to conceal a miracle 
 which it would not, as yet, be pru 
 dent to reveal. For the same rea- 
 son it is that, when she finds Jesus 
 in the Temple amongst the doctors, 
 she speaks to him in such a way as 
 to conceal both the divinity of her 
 Son and her own miraculous vir- 
 ginity. 
 
 But who knows not that, under 
 another point of view, Mary was al- 
 ways incomparably prudent ? That 
 she was always the perfect model 
 of those wise virgins mentioned in 
 the Gospel, who are ever waiting to 
 be admitted " to the marriage sup- 
 per of the Lamb,"* keeping always 
 in their lamps ^ the precious oil of 
 the love of God and good works? 
 " Yes," says St. Bernard, " the lamp 
 of that glorious Virgin never lost its 
 brightness, and its light was always 
 so brilliant that the angels them- 
 selves admired it as a prodigy."" 
 
 And we also are invited to that 
 divine banquet, and it is " at what 
 hour we think not"^ that we shall 
 hear the cry, "Behold, the Bride- 
 groom Cometh, go ye forth to meet 
 him."^ Do we, in good faith, en- 
 
 « St. Matt. XXV. 4, 10. ' St. Luke xii. 40. 
 
 «Serm. ii. in Assumpt. B. M. V. ' St. Matt. xxv. 6. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON TEE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 636 
 
 deavor to prepare as we ought for 
 that hour, so uncertain ? We may 
 be called " at even, or at midnight, 
 or at the cock-crowing;"^ in short, 
 at any moment ; are we ready ? . . . 
 Alas ! Mary, we, " the children of 
 light," have been hitherto " less wise 
 tlian the children of this world." ^ 
 Furthermore, the Lord has given 
 " understanding"^ to the bird whose 
 song heralds the dawn, " wisdom to 
 the" industrious insect who "pro- 
 videth her meat for herself in the 
 summer,"* and cunning to the ser- 
 pent ; to us he has given that pierc- 
 ing intellect which can observe, cal- 
 culate, foresee misfortune, and bring 
 about success ; we employ it skill- 
 fully and well in conducting the 
 affairs of time, but for the eternal 
 interests we act as blind men, ''ene- 
 mies to our own soul."^ Vouchsafe 
 to ask for us the grace of making 
 our salvation paramount over all, 
 thou in whom we admire a pru- 
 dence much more eminent than that 
 of Abigail, praised in Scripture for 
 having, by a generous sacrifice, 
 gained the favor and good -will of 
 one who was justly angry.^ Obtain 
 
 ' St. Mark xiii. 35. " St. Luke xvi. 8. 
 
 3 Job xxxviiL 36. 
 
 * for US that we may use the wisest 
 precautions in all that concerns our 
 soul and life everlasting: 
 
 YlRGIN MOST PRUDENT, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 Virgo prudentissima, ora pro no- 
 bis. 
 
 MEDITATION XXIY. 
 
 VIRGIN MOST VENERABLE, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 ALL that is great and noble, 
 learning, virtue, a fair char- 
 acter, makes an impression upon us 
 more or less lively, tending to make 
 us bow down and render homage ; 
 and when that learning, that virtue, 
 that character, are found united in 
 one single person with exalted dig- 
 nity, our respect is still more pro- 
 found. 
 
 Let us contemplate Mary with 
 the eyes of faith. Never could hu- 
 man science be compared to the 
 sublime communications wherewith 
 the Lord was pleased to favor her. 
 To judge of them it is unnecessary 
 to revert to the fact that, in her 
 private life with Jesus at Nazareth, 
 she drew at will, if one may say 
 
 * Prov. vL 6. * Tobias xii. 10, 
 
 1 Kings XXV. 3. 
 
686 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 80, from the " treasures of divine 
 wisdom and knowledge;"^ it suf- 
 fices to think of that supernatui-al 
 ghince of her soul which, even be- 
 fore the Saviour's birth, saw through- 
 out the lapse of ages her God glori- 
 fied in her by the perpetual homage 
 which she was to receive from all 
 the nations of the earth.^ 
 
 Where else amongst all creatures 
 ^an be found virtue so lofty, so pure, 
 so sweet, so heroic ? To point out 
 but a few instances ; what amazing 
 chastity was that which, in early 
 youth, made a vow w^hose accom- 
 plishment naturally precluded the 
 honor of giving birth to the Messiah, 
 an honor, nevertheless, so coveted 
 by the Jews, that amongst them 
 barrenness was considered a dis- 
 grace. "What sublime humility," 
 says St. Bernard, " was that which 
 maintained itself at the summit 
 of greatness, nor failed under the 
 weight of the greatest glory ! Mary 
 is the Mother of her God, yet she 
 styles herself his handmaid."^ And 
 what considerate, delicate charity, 
 when she requests her divine Son to 
 work a miracle, in order to spare 
 
 » Colos. ii. 8. « St Luke L 48. 
 
 ■ » Bom. iv. super Missus est. 
 
 * the feelings of the bride and bride- 
 groom of Cana, at the humble ban- 
 quet whereat he was pleased to 
 assist!* Then, what incomparable 
 fortitude, what strength of mind, 
 when she witnesses the sacrifice of 
 Calvary!" "The disciples have 
 fled," says St. Ambrose, " the Moth- 
 er is there standing at the foot of 
 the Cross; she contemplates with 
 inexpressible tenderness, but with 
 superhuman courage, the bleeding 
 wounds of her beloved Son; she 
 thinks, not that he is going to die, 
 but that by dying he is going to 
 redeem the world." ^ 
 
 Finally, what shall we say of her 
 all but divine glory, crowned in 
 heaven with a glory inferior only 
 to that of God? "What is most 
 respectable on earth," says the holy 
 abbot of Clairvaux, " is the virginal 
 womb wherein the Son of God was 
 made flesh ; what is most eminent 
 in neaven after the throne of Jesus, 
 is that of his holy Mother, whose 
 glory is in proportion to the incom- 
 parable grace given her, in this 
 world, above all other creatures."^ 
 The Blessed Virgin is, therefore, 
 
 * St. John ii. 3. » Serm. i, in Assumpt 
 
 • S. Bern. Serm. de Nativ. B. M, V. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF. THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 637 
 
 most worthy of our humble homage: 
 she is entitled to a profound vener- 
 ation for her august name, for her 
 festivals, her altars, the shrines 
 dedicated to her, for all, in short, 
 that is comprised in the boundless 
 honor and affection which belong to 
 her! Ah! let us faithfully fulfill 
 this sacred duty to Mary, a duty 
 founded on the respect due to God, 
 and promoting it in an admirable 
 manner. For, if it be ti'ue that the 
 Catholic Church is the greatest 
 school of respect which the world 
 ever saw, first, for God, and conse- 
 quently for all that is more or less 
 like to him, it may also be said that 
 in our holy religion the devotion to 
 Mary gives a consoling sweetness to 
 this sentiment of respect for God. 
 When a pious mother instills into 
 the mind of her child the veneration 
 and love of the Blessed Virgin, she 
 speaks of her by the sweet name of 
 the Mother of God — a name which in- 
 dicates, in a daughter of Eve, in a 
 nature like to ours, her by whom that 
 God, so great, vouchsafed to lower 
 himself to us, in order to save us: 
 does she not thus impress on that 
 young heart a respectful and sooth- 
 ing confidence in the Most High, 
 
 * steering mid vvay between fear, prop- 
 erly so called, and presumptuous 
 familiarity ? 
 
 King Solomon of old, wishing to 
 honor his mother, arose from his 
 throne, advanced to meet her, and 
 having respectfully saluted her, seat- 
 ed her on a throne on his right 
 hand.^ This is to us, august and 
 most blessed Virgin, a feeble image 
 of the respect with which Jesus 
 honored thee during his mortal life, 
 and the glory wherewith he crowned 
 thee on thine assumption into heav- 
 en. Happy in rendering homage to 
 her whom our divine Saviour so hon- 
 ored, " we offer thee from the depth 
 of our heart, and with the most de- 
 voted affection, the tribute of our 
 veneration," ^ which is, in the lan- 
 guage of men, the highest expres- 
 sion of respect. " Keep forever 
 this will of our heart," ^ and for that 
 end, obtain for us a boundless re- 
 spect for God, and a corresponding 
 reverence for all that is holy in 
 heaven and on earth. 
 
 Virgin most venerable, pray for 
 us. 
 
 Virgo veneranda, ora pro nobis. 
 
 > 3 Kings ii. 19. » 1 Paral. xxix, 13. 
 
 » S. Bern., Serm. deNativ. B. M. V. ' 
 
638 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THEl LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 MEDITATION XXV. 
 
 VIRGIN MOST RENOWNED, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 1)I10PERLY speaking, God alone 
 is worthy of praise. Still, 
 meiit has a right to our praise, 
 provided that praise reverts to Him 
 from whom proceeds every good 
 and peifect gift,^ and that it be 
 kept within the bounds of truth. 
 But where, on earth, is that merit 
 to be found which can be praised 
 without fear of error or exaggera- 
 tion ? Alas I " God alone knoweth 
 the heart ; and very often that which 
 is high to men is an abomination 
 before God."^ 
 
 In eulogizing Mary, and proclaim- 
 ing her worthy of all praise, cer- 
 tainlv, we need not fear that we are 
 mistaken, or praising her above 
 her deserts ; for the Lord himself 
 " weighed her merit in a just bal- 
 ance,"' and she was saluted with 
 incomparable praise. Have we ever 
 duly considered how great and how 
 gloi'ious to Mary w^as the salutation 
 of the Angel Gabriel? We see in 
 the holy Scripture many privileged 
 persons honored with the visit of an 
 
 f angel ; but nowhere do we find 
 them saluted by a heavenly messen- 
 ger in pompous and magnillcent 
 terms. "Hail, full of grace, the 
 Lord is with thee : blessed art thou 
 amongst women."* Could anything 
 be said more honorable to a human 
 being ? And is it not, according to 
 St. Ambrose and St. Peter Chrysolo- 
 gus, an unheard-of salutation, for 
 which we can find no example ?** 
 Nevertheless, nothing can exceed 
 the merit of her to whom these sur- 
 prising words are addressed : they 
 are spoken by an angel, the faithful 
 organ of "the God of truth," ^ who, 
 soon after, passes a similar encomi- 
 um on Mary, by the mouth of St. 
 Elizabeth, the holy mother of St. 
 John the Baptist. 
 
 The Gospel, indeed, tells us that 
 it was not of her own accord, but 
 after being "filled with the Holy 
 Ghost," that she " cried out with a 
 loud voice and " repeated the words 
 of the angel, " Blessed art thou 
 amongst women," adding " Blessed 
 is the fruit of thy womb."^ Words 
 which wonderfully enhance the 
 greatness of Mary by the ineffable 
 
 ' St. James i. 17. 
 » St. Luke xvi. 15. 
 
 ' Job xxxi. 6. 
 St. Luke L 28. 
 
 * S. Am. in Luc. c. vi. ; S. Pet. Chrys , Ser. 140. 
 « Ps. XXX. 6. ' St. Luke i. 41, 42. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 639 
 
 greatness of Him whose Mother, she * 
 is! Elizabeth says of the Blessed 
 Virgin that she is " blessed amongst 
 women," and of her offspring, in an 
 absolute manner, that he is "bless- 
 ed." " Mary," exclaims St. Ber- 
 nard, speaking on this subject, "that 
 precious fruit of thy womb is not 
 blessed because thou art thyself 
 blessed amongst all the daughters of 
 Eve, but thou art so blessed because 
 He has himself re-endowed thee 
 with his blessings. Whilst thou art 
 blessed amongst women, he is not 
 blessed amongst men or amongst 
 angels : he is, according to the 
 Apostle,^ over all things, God bless- 
 ed forever."^ 
 
 But has Jesus himself said noth- 
 ing in praise of his divine Mother ? 
 . . . Coming to teach men to be, like 
 him, "humble of heart," ^ the Sav- 
 iour took care to exalt before them 
 her whose Son he was. Once, when 
 a Jewish woman, delighted to hear 
 him, cried out from amongst the 
 crQwd : " Blessed is the womb that 
 bore thee, and the paps that gave 
 thee suck!" — But he said, "Yea, 
 rather, blessed are they who hear 
 
 ' Bom. ix. 5. « Serm. in Assumpt. B. M. V, 
 ^ St. Matt. xi. 29. 
 
 the "Word of God and keep it."* 
 Thereby, according to the idea of 
 the Venerable Bede, " He delicately 
 stamped with his divine approba- 
 tion that magnificent eulogy of his 
 divine Mother, giving to under- 
 stand that, if Mary was too happy 
 in being the Mother of Incarnate 
 Wisdom, she was still more so in 
 faithfully observing its adorable 
 precepts."^ 
 
 And we also, let us give the 
 Blessed Virgin all manner of praise, 
 and say to her honor, with St. Basil 
 of Seleucia, that " we need never 
 fear to violate truth, whatever praise 
 we give her, because no words of 
 ours could ever compass her grand 
 eur."^ Let us make up for our im- 
 potence by our devotion to her ; let 
 us avail ourselves of every oppor- 
 tunity to speak of her greatness and 
 glory, and to inspire others with a 
 filial confidence in her protection; 
 let us honor her, especially by the 
 imitation of her virtues, so that see- 
 ing and hearing us, men may have 
 cause to glorify our divine Mother 
 in her children. 
 
 " Mary, how can we sufficiently 
 
 ' * St. Luke xi. 27, 28. » Liv. iv., c. 40, in Luc. xL 
 « Serm. de Incarnat. Verb. 
 
640 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRQIK 
 
 honor thee, who didst bear in thy f 
 womb Him whose immensity the 
 heavens cannot contain!"^ "The 
 God of majesty " ' alone merits infi- 
 nite praise; but, after God, thou 
 alone art " above all praise." ^ " 
 thou whom the Apostles loaded with 
 praise, afterwards repeated through- 
 out the earth;"* thou whom all 
 pi'eachers of the divine Word, and 
 all faithful Christian hearts, have 
 ever delighted to "call blessed;"* 
 thou whose " praise shall not depart 
 out of the mouth of men;"^ ah! 
 since we are not able to give thee 
 fitting praise, grant that we may, at 
 least, endeavor to do our duty to 
 thee by zealously promoting thy 
 glory, and faithfully walking in thy 
 holy traces ! 
 
 Virgin most renowned, pray for us. 
 Virgo prcedidandoj ora pro nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION XXVI. 
 virgin most powerful, pray for us. 
 
 I 
 
 F Jesus Christ, as God, possessed 
 omnipotence by natm-e; if, as 
 
 • Brev. Rom. in Festis B. M. V. 
 
 » Ps. xxviiL 3. 
 
 » Eccl. xliii. 33. 
 
 man, he held it from his personal 
 union with the Deity, from the mo- 
 ment of his incarnation, its splendid 
 manifestation to the world after his 
 resurrection, became the price of 
 his sufferings and death : this he 
 indicated to his disciples, when he 
 told them "All power is given to 
 me in heaven and in earth."' This 
 sovereign power, the divine Son of 
 Mary communicated to his august 
 and blessed Mother in marvellous 
 abundance. 
 
 And did not Mary's co-operation 
 in the mysteries of the Man-God, 
 and her intimate participation in his 
 suflferings and his sacrifice on Cal- 
 vary, merit for her the privilege of 
 being associated in Christ's domin- 
 ion over all creatures? Moreover, 
 was it not fitting that she who had 
 so long exercised, in this world, the 
 rights of a mother, and so admirably 
 discharged the pious duties of that 
 high ofiice, should retain, in heaven, 
 that influence which the most per- 
 fect of mothers should natur^ly 
 have over the heart of the most 
 affectionate of sons, so that " for 
 her to be heard was to have her 
 
 * St. Cyr. Alex., Serm. de Virg. contra Nestor. 
 
 • Prov. xxxi. 28. « Jud. xiii. 25. ^ Matt, xxviii. 18. 
 
 .^^9- 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 641 
 
 request granted ? " ^ Was it not fit- 
 ting, in fine, that m such a mother, 
 this incomparable power of inter- 
 cession should have a character of 
 grandeur and universality worthy of 
 Him whom she brought into the 
 world? . 
 
 And that the Blessed Virgin has 
 such power is attested in the Cath- 
 olic world by the most striking 
 proofs. Is there question of the 
 greatest interests of kings and na- 
 tions ? Glorious memory of Lepanto, 
 you prove to all generations the ad- 
 mirable power of Mary's interces- 
 sion, the victory which went forth 
 from Mary's throne, to break, terri^ 
 ble and crushing, on the formidable 
 fleet of the infidels, to save Christen- 
 dom, and, with it, the civilization of 
 all Europe! And you, magnanimous 
 hero, who cried out, at the head of 
 your warlike columns, in. the strong 
 inspiration of faith, " Onward, the 
 Mother of Grod is our guide," did you 
 not. thereby show, illustrious So- 
 bieski, to whom you owed your vic- 
 tory over that fierce belt of hostile 
 armies which encircled the walls of 
 Vienna ? 
 
 And you, also, inveterate enemies 
 
 ' St, Bern., Serm. de Aquad. 
 
 * of Catholic trath, are not you your- 
 selves forced to become the trophies 
 of the Virgin's power and glory ? . . . 
 The Church solemnly felicitates her 
 on having "crushed all heresies 
 throughout the world ; " ^ and it 
 pleased God, especially in the 
 twelfth century, to give the most 
 splendid manifestations of Mary's 
 power against error. A dreadful 
 heresy then overspread the south 
 of France, overthrew temples and 
 altars, slaughtered the ministers of 
 the L(5rd, and committed everything 
 sacred to the flames. Against this 
 impious, this all-destroying devas- 
 tation, rose up the humble St. Dom- 
 inick. "Wherewith shall this new 
 David arm himself; at least, with 
 the shepherd's sling ? . . . . Not so ; 
 it is with his rosary in his hand 
 that he stops, subdues, gains over 
 the blindest and most infuriate en- 
 emies of the Church. 
 
 And who could enumerate the 
 signal instances of Mary's power in 
 favor of all those who have piously 
 sought her protection ? Ah ! how 
 many sorrows has she consoled I 
 how many sudden deaths has she 
 prevented ! how many violent temp- 
 
 « Brev. Rom. in Festis B. M. V. 
 
 \ 
 
642 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 tations has she enabled pei*sons to 
 overcome ! how many graces of all 
 kinds has she obtained for those 
 who have asked her assistance on 
 land or sea! Witness, in answer, 
 the countless monuments erected to 
 her honor, monuments so famous 
 through the enduring remembrances 
 which faith and gratitude attach to 
 them. 
 
 How many facts, too, admirable 
 facts, have remained, and do every 
 day remain, hidden in the hearts 
 of men ? Amiable and holy bishop 
 of Geneva, we well know that you 
 owed to Mary your victory over a 
 frightful temptation of despair; you, 
 St. Andrew Corsini, your conversion 
 and your eminent virtues ; and you, 
 immortal Nepomucenes, noble mar- 
 tyr of the seal of confession, the 
 courage and the fortitude which 
 gained you so much glory. In 
 heaven only shall we be enabled to 
 see and admire the innumerable 
 eifects of that prodigious power 
 given her by God to guide, to en- 
 lighten, to heal the souls ransomed 
 by the blood of her divine Son, ajid 
 to overthrow the dominion of that 
 infernal spirit whose head she was 
 destined to crush.^ 
 
 Let us, then, have recourse to 
 that Blessed Virgin in all our trou- 
 bles, in all our dangers, in all our 
 wants, and let us always make it 
 our pious duty to extol her power. 
 
 Yes, august queen of the uni- 
 verse, we will ever joyfully proclaim 
 that in you the Lord " hath showed 
 might in his arm;"^ that "in thy 
 hand is power and might ;"^ that 
 through you we "can do all things;"* 
 that the glory of Jahel and of Ju- 
 dith,^ victorious over the enemies of 
 the people of God, is not even the 
 shadow of that wherewith you are 
 invested. Ah ! vouchsafe constant- 
 ly to shelter under thy protection 
 those who never cease to invoke 
 thee. Above all, when the final 
 moment shall arrive, when our trem- 
 bling soul is about to appear before 
 its Judge, vouchsafe to defend it 
 against its enemies, strengthen and 
 encourage it, and, on its entrance 
 into eternity, receive it into thy 
 maternal hands, and present it, to 
 thy divine Son. 
 
 YlRGIN MOST POWERFUL, PRAY FOR 
 
 us. 
 
 Virgo potens, "ora pro nobis. 
 
 ' G en. iii. 15. * St. Luke i. 51. » 1 ParaL xxix. 12. 
 * PhiL iv. 13. * Judges iv. ; Jud. xiii. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 643 
 
 MEDITATION XXVn. 
 
 VIRGIN MOST MERCIFUL, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 WHY does the Church make 
 us implore the mercy rather 
 than the goodness of Mary? Kind- 
 ness has in it something so sweet, 
 so affecting ; and in Mary that qual- 
 ity is so amiable, so perfect ! Does 
 she not unite in her immaculate 
 heart all the kindness of the most 
 tender mother, all the compassion, 
 all the charity of those souls most 
 eminent for their inclination to do 
 good to all who mourn, to all who 
 suffer, to all who groan under the 
 weight of misery? .... 
 
 Ah ! yes, undoubtedly. Mary is 
 good, immeasurably good: she has 
 a heart so tender as only to be sur- 
 passed by that of her divine Son. 
 But the Church, by making us in- 
 voke her clemency, would remind 
 us that our profound wretchedness 
 as sinful creatures, our detestable 
 ingratitude towards God, naturally 
 render us unworthy the benign pro- 
 tection of this august Mother. Be- 
 ing identified with Jesus, towards 
 w^hom we are so criminal, has she 
 not much to pardon before she can 
 interest herself in us? And, be- 
 
 * sides, were it only our carelessness 
 in imitating the virtues we contem- 
 plate in her, it would be sufficient 
 to prevent her from pouring down 
 upon us the favors we expect from 
 her, were she not the Virgin full of 
 clemency and of sweet compassion, 
 the Virgin most merciful ? 
 
 Tes, that grand characteristic of 
 noble hearts is admirably manifest- 
 ed in that of Mary. "It is indeed 
 of her," says St. Bernard, " that we 
 may understand that magnificent 
 image of a woman clothed with the 
 sun, seen of old by the prophet of 
 Patmos : for even as that orb of day 
 sheds his light indiscriminately on 
 the good and the bad, so is Mary 
 regardless whether the person in- 
 voking her has been more or less 
 guilty in times past ; she shows her- 
 self mild, merciful, clement to all 
 who seek he** aid ; she clasps, as it 
 were, in tho embrace of extreme 
 charity, all their wants and all their 
 miseries."^ And how could we con- 
 ceive it otherwise? Has she not 
 " brought us forth to the Church by 
 her charity ? " says St. Augustine, ^ 
 and must not that ineffable charity 
 
 • Serm. de Assumpt. B. M. V. 
 
 • De Sanctd Virginitate, No. 6, i vL 
 
644 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 constantly inspire her with the feel- 
 ings of a mother, but of a mother 
 "whose heart is become," as it 
 were, "like wax, melting" with com- 
 passion "before the flame?" ^ "Yes, 
 truly," says the immortal bishop of 
 Meaux, speaking on this subject, 
 " yes, truly, she is always the same 
 to us ; always kind, always mother- 
 ly. The love of our salvation lives 
 always in her, and is neither less 
 faitliful nor less efficacious than it 
 was when she gave her consent to 
 the august mystery of the Incarna- 
 tion."^ 
 
 It is not, then, without good rea- 
 son that piety delights in represent- 
 ing Mary, as well as Jesus, under 
 the figure of the pelican who, to 
 satisfy the hunger of hei' little ones, 
 nomishes them, in some way, with 
 her own substance ; and under that 
 of the hen, who tenderly covers 
 her young brood beneath her mater- 
 nal wings. In giving us her Son 
 for a Saviour, did she not give her 
 own blood for all of us, whom Jesus 
 honors with the title of brethren,' 
 and whom she herself cherishes as 
 members of the body of that divine 
 
 ' Ps. xxi. 15. * Serm. pour la fete de VAnnonciat. 
 ' St. John XX. 17. 
 
 * Son?* And like that mother who 
 aflfectionately runs at the cry of her 
 chickens, to shelter them from all 
 danger, does not Mary, when she 
 hears our sighs and lamentations, 
 cover us with her protection to save 
 us from all that might become 
 fatal? .... Hence, however un- 
 grateful we may have hitherto been 
 towards the Son, let us never de- 
 spair of the Mother's mercy, but, 
 joining confidence to repentance, 
 cast ourselves fearlessly into her 
 arms, sure of being well received. 
 After having formerly experienced 
 the sw^eet effects of that same clem- 
 ency, if we are so happy as to re- 
 main faithful, how much more may 
 we reasonably count on the unfail- 
 ing assistance of her who so ten- 
 derly loves " them that are beloved 
 in God the Father, and preserved in 
 Jesus Christ!"^ 
 
 "0 clement, pious, sweet 
 Virgin Mary,"^ it may well be said 
 of thee, as of the Lord, " that power 
 belongeth to thee, and mercy ! " ^ If, 
 on earth, an exquisite kindness, far 
 exceeding that wherewith Eebecca 
 treated Eliezer,^ induced thee to 
 
 * Ephes. V. 30 
 ^ •St.Judei.l 
 
 • Solve Be; 
 
 'Ps. Ixi. 12, 13 
 ' Gen. xxiv. 19. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIROIN. 
 
 645 
 
 request of thy divine Son the mir- 
 acle of changing water into wine/ 
 how prodigious must that kindness 
 be in heaven, when " from this val- 
 ley of tears "^ we humbly beseech 
 thee to come to the assistance of 
 unhappy creatures ransomed by the 
 adorable blood of Jesus ! thou, 
 on whose sacred " tongue is the law 
 of clemency,"^ thou in whom that 
 noble virtue is for us " like the lat- 
 ter rain,"* which falls to refresh the 
 earth, thou who art " nigh unto all 
 them that call upon thee^''^ be pro- 
 pitious to us, notwithstanding our 
 ingratitude, till the last moment of 
 our lives ! 
 
 Virgin most merciful, pray for 
 us. 
 
 Virgo clemens, ora pro nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION XXYIH. 
 
 VIRGIN MOST FAITHFUL, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 OH! how well does the title of 
 Faithful Virgin characterize her 
 who was always so faithful to the 
 
 > St. John ii. 3. 
 
 ' Salve Beg. 
 
 » Prov. xxxi. 26. 
 
 ■• Prov. xvi. 15. 
 » Ps. cxliv. 18. 
 • Apoc. xix. 11. 
 
 Lord, so faithful to every duty, so 
 faithful to grace, so faithful to the 
 will of heaven, even in one of those 
 extreme cases when it would be 
 excusable for a mother's heart to 
 give way to sorrow! 
 
 Fidelity must be a thing fair and 
 noble before God, since he calls him- 
 self " Faithful and True,"^ and gives, 
 by the mouth of the royal prophet, 
 as a title of honor and distinction, 
 the name of "the faithful of the 
 earth "^ to the "just, upon whom his 
 eyes are" fixed with pleasure.^ But 
 if it be so of all the just, with what 
 pleasure must the Lord regard that 
 Yirgin, in whom fidelity, far from 
 ever suffering the slightest injury, 
 was, on the contrary, increasing from 
 day to day, "going from virtue to 
 virtue,"^ till the glorious moment 
 when "the Lord, the just judge," 
 rendered to her " the crown of jus- 
 tice!"^" Conceived, not "in sin,"" 
 like the rest of mankind, but " in 
 holiness and justice,"^^ by a peculiar 
 and inestimable privilege, she be- 
 longed to God from the first mo- 
 ment of her existence, and not only 
 
 ' Ps. c. 6. 
 
 * Ps. xxxiiL 16. 
 
 * Ps. Ixxxiii. 8. 
 
 w> 2 Tim. iv. 8. 
 " Ps. 1. 7. 
 
 " St.-iuke i. 75. 
 
646 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 did she never relax that precious 
 bond by the least fault, but she 
 ceiised not to draw it closer and 
 closer till the day of her translation 
 from this land of exile to the celes- 
 tial country. Hence it is that St. 
 Anschn exclaims, in his admiration 
 of her, "When I consider the im- 
 mensity of grace which is in thee, 
 Blessed Virgin, my mind is lost, 
 my tongue is struck dumb ! " ^ " Oh ! 
 how beautiful were thy steps," ^ we 
 may add, with the spouse in the 
 Canticles, how sublime were they in 
 the ways of grace, beloved daughter 
 of the King of kings. Virgin ever 
 faithful, in all " faithful in the sight 
 of God!"^ The little of it that it 
 has pleased God to reveal to us is 
 charming : what, then, must that be 
 "which is hid within"* that sacred 
 sanctuary which His eye alone can 
 penetrate ! 
 
 The Gospel, indeed, tells us of 
 thee, Mary, that thou didst carry 
 the love of duty so far as to decline 
 accepting the dazzling honor of the 
 divine maternity, till assured by the 
 ambassador of the Most High that 
 that inconceivable glory was com- 
 patible with the vow which conse- 
 
 ' Lib. de exceUent. Virg. 
 
 » Cant, vii 1. 
 
 t crated thee forever to the Lord. It 
 also tells us that thou wert so faith- 
 ful to the law as to submit to the 
 humiliating ceremony of purifica- 
 tion, thou who wert, on so many 
 accounts, exempted from that which 
 is obligatory on other mothers. And 
 we admire thee, and bless God, who 
 shows us in thee so fair and so 
 noble an example. But when we 
 consider thee on Calvary, when we 
 there see thee so faithful to the 
 adorable designs of Providence as to 
 overcome the feelings of a mother, 
 at the foot of the Redeemer's cross ; 
 ah! then we are deeply moved, we 
 are enchanted by thy sublime resig- 
 nation and thy superhuman devo- 
 tion. What a son was Jesus ! What 
 a mother wert thou, Mary ! What 
 inexpressible tenderness on both 
 sides I ... Oh I how true, then, is 
 it of thee, how emphatically true, 
 that thou wert "faithful even unto 
 death ;"^ yes, even to assist, even to 
 join, with all the power of thy will, 
 in the painful and humiliating death 
 of thy only Son, that son the most 
 amiable and most beloved! 
 
 After this unexampled act of de- 
 votion to God for men, need we be 
 
 » EccL xlviiL 25. * Cant iv. 1. » Apoc. ii 10. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED ViRGm. 
 
 647 
 
 surprised that " it was never known, 
 in any age, that any one who fled 
 to Mary's protection, implored her 
 help, or sought her intercession, was 
 left unaided ?" ^ . ... Ah! this ad- 
 mirable constancy of her merciful 
 kindness to those who invoke her, 
 IS it not sufficiently manifested by 
 the sacrifice which her magnani- 
 mous heart had the courage to 
 make in our behalf? But if such 
 be her goodness to all "poor ban- 
 ished children of Eve, who send up 
 to her, from this valley of tears, 
 their sighs, mournings, and weep- 
 ings,"^ how great must be her zeal 
 for the interests of those who pro- 
 fess a particular devotion to her, 
 and who desire to be her " good 
 and faithful servants."^ May we be 
 of that happy number, and succeed 
 in pleasing both the Son and the 
 Mother ! 
 
 Mary, thou didst prove thy- 
 self, while on earth, " faithful before 
 God."* And so, in heaven, hast 
 thou also proved to men who, for 
 more than eighteen hundred years, 
 have constantly found in thee, after 
 Grod, their safest and sweetest ref- 
 
 ' Memorare. * Salve Regina. 
 
 » Si Matt. XXV. 21. 
 
 uge. Yes, thou art faithful to them 
 in a way far superior to all human 
 fealty, all human devotion : in com- 
 parison with thy fidelity we can 
 hardly reckon that of Kahab, who 
 saved the messengers of Israel,^ or 
 that of Michol, who, to save her 
 husband, feared not to brave her 
 father's anger.^ Ah! vouchsafe to 
 obtain for us that we ourselves may 
 be always faithful to Jesils and to 
 thee, so that we may deserve con- 
 stantly to experience the happy 
 effects of thy special protection! 
 
 YlRGIN MOST FAITHFUL, PRAY FOR 
 
 US. 
 
 Virgo fidelis, ora pro nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION XXIX. 
 
 MIRROR OF JUSTICE, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 TSE Church, having, as it were, 
 exhausted all the titles which 
 could serve to honor Mary as Moth- 
 er and Yirgin, goes on to another 
 order of ideas in search of new 
 themes for praise. 
 
 And first she invokes her under 
 
 * 2 Esd. ix. 8. » Joshua ii. 
 
 • 1 Kings xix. 
 
648 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 the image of a mirror, which ad- 
 mirably reflects "the brightness of 
 eternal light." ^ If it be true, in 
 fact, of the Eternal Word that he is 
 the splendor of his Father's " glory, 
 and the figure of his substance,"^ 
 is it not Mary who reflects with 
 all possible fidelity the adorable 
 attributes of that " Word made 
 flesh? "^ Does she not resemble 
 him more than any other rational 
 creature? The Lord intended her 
 to hold the first rank amongst all 
 " the works of his hands ; "* to be, as 
 St. Anselni has it, " above all that 
 is not God;"" could he not adorn 
 her with gifts and with merits the 
 nearest to his own infinite perfec- 
 tions ? . . . . Hence it was said by 
 St. Peter Chrysologus, that " he who 
 contemplates Mary without being 
 ravished and amazed, is regardless 
 of Grod himself, who has made her 
 his most perfect mirror!"^ 
 
 But wherefore does the Church 
 call her Mirror of Justice? . . . First, 
 because Mary is the faithful mirror 
 of Him who is named the " Sun of 
 Justice,"^ whose divine rays warm 
 
 » Wisdom vii. 26. » St. John i. 14. 
 
 « Heb. L 3. * Ps. cxxxvii. 8. 
 
 • Lib. de exord., humance vitas, c. 7. 
 
 f and fructify souls, until they bud 
 and blossom into every Christian 
 virtue. Jesus himself gives us the 
 sum of these virtues when he tells 
 us: "Blessed are they that hunger 
 and thirst after justice;"^ they who 
 ardently desire to be perfect, and 
 who labor with constancy and zeal 
 to become so I ... . But there is in 
 this word, as here used by the 
 Church, another meaning, calculated 
 to arrest the attention of every pious 
 soul. 
 
 The Apostle St. Paul gives the 
 name of "justice"^ to the state of 
 sanctifying grace which entitles the 
 possessor to eternal bliss. This 
 supernatural state, so honorable, so 
 precious, man, by his disobedience; 
 had forfeited for himself and all his 
 posterity. But soon after his fall 
 the Lord announces to him that a 
 woman shall crush the head of him 
 who made him fall : hence, he may 
 contemplate in this daughter of Eve, 
 as in a mirror, both the depth of his 
 misery, which nothing less than the 
 death of a Man-God could cure, and 
 the necessity of penance, without 
 
 « Serm. 104. 
 ' Malach. iv. 2. 
 
 « St. Matt. V. 6. 
 • Eom. L 17. 
 
 ■^»- 
 
MEDITATIONS ON TEE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 649 
 
 which he cannot profit by the re- 
 demption to be effected by the Son 
 of Mary. On the other hand, the 
 faithful angels behold in this priv- 
 ileged creature the Mother of Him 
 who is the origin and the source of 
 their perseverance and of their con- 
 firmation in grace; for it may be 
 said, on the authority of St. PauV 
 and several holy doctors of the 
 Church,^ that it is to Christ the 
 good angels are indebted for the 
 merit and the reward of their fidel- 
 ity. Finallv, is not the fallen angel 
 condemned to behold in Mary, con- 
 ceived in grace, exalted on account 
 of her humility,^ so profound even 
 in the divine maternity, the folly of 
 his pride, his immense misfortune 
 in losing his supernatural beauty, 
 and, by contrast, the hideous ugli- 
 ness to which he is consigned? 
 Does he not there see, at the same 
 time, the enormity of his sin, for 
 which there was no redemption, 
 because he voluntarily fell from a 
 state much higher than that of man, 
 
 ' Ephes. i. 10 ; Col. i. 17, 20. 
 
 * S. Jerome, in cap. i. ad Ephes.; S. Greg. 1. i. 
 ch. 2, in lib. i. Reg.; S. Bern. Serm. 22 in Cant; 
 S. Thorn., lect. 10, in cap. i. Joan., et quoest. 7, 
 prceced., art. 9. 
 
 * through pure malice, and without 
 being exposed to the seduction of 
 the senses ? And is he not forced 
 to cry out with all heaven and 
 earth, that " God is just, * and ren- 
 ders to every one according to his 
 works ?"« 
 
 While considering in the Blessed 
 Yirgin the inestimable favor of our 
 deliverance from sin,^ ah! let us 
 beware of imitating " a man who, 
 beholding his natural countenance 
 in a glass, went his way, and pres- 
 ently forgot what manner of man he 
 was!"^ Let us rather penetrate 
 our whole minds with the thought 
 that, " being made free from sin, we 
 are become the happy servants of 
 justice,"^ and that " as we have 
 yielded our faculties to serve un- 
 cleanness and iniquity," so let us 
 "now yield them to serve justice 
 unto sanctification."^ 
 
 Thou, in whom "we see, as in a 
 mirror," ^*^ the adorable perfection of 
 the Most High, deign to shed on our 
 souls some salutary rays from the 
 
 ' St. Luke i. 48. * Apoc. xvi. 5. 
 
 • St. Matt, xvi. 27 ; Rom. ii. 6 ; Apoc. xxii. 12, 
 « Rom. vi. 18. « Rom. vi. 18. 
 
 ' St. James i 24. " Rom. vi 19. 
 
 » 1 Cor. xiii. 12. 
 
660 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 dazzling radiance of thy sublime f 
 virtues. Vouchsafe, by thy mild- 
 ness, to correct our peevishness and 
 impatience ; by thy humility, our 
 pride and our vain pretensions; by 
 thy purity, our sensual appetites ; 
 by thy charity, our coldness towards 
 God, our want of fraternal love for 
 our neighbor! Deign, above all, by 
 thy holy protection to restore us to 
 the grace of God, if we have had 
 the incomparable misfortune of fall- 
 ing from it ; if we are so happy as 
 to possess the friendship of God, 
 that infinite treasure, deign to pre- 
 serve it to us, and help us to be- 
 come more and more " conformable 
 to the image of thy Son,"^ by imita- 
 ting thee, who art " his. living im- 
 age."^ 
 
 Mirror of justice, pray for us. 
 
 Speculum justitice, ora pro nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION XXX. 
 
 SEAT OF WISDOM, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 SON of the Eternal Father, ado- 
 rable Word, "interior word, 
 
 > Rom. viii. 29. 
 
 ' S. Joan Damasc Orat. de Nativ. B. V. 
 
 ' Bossuet, vii. Elev sur les myst., xii. semaine, 
 
 thought, reason, uncreated substan- 
 tial intelligence of God,"'' thou art 
 the source of wisdom.* Yes, it was 
 thou who " came out of the mouth 
 of the Most High, the first-born 
 before all creatures;"* that Wisdom 
 " who sendeth knowledge as the 
 light, whose thoughts are more vast 
 than the sea, and her counsels more 
 deep than the great ocean ; " ^ that 
 Wisdom " that reacheth from end to 
 end mightily, and ordereth all things 
 sweetly."^ Thou art that infinite 
 Wisdom that " rested " in the womb 
 of the Blessed Virgin as in "a taber- 
 nacle,"^ and whom Christian faith 
 loves to contemplate on that divine 
 Mother's knee, under the appear- 
 ance of " the most beautiful of 
 the sons of men!"^ 
 
 And thou, Mary! thou art for 
 that incarnate Wisdom a magnifi- 
 cent throne, far more precious and 
 more valuable than anything we 
 can know or imagine of created 
 beauty, or glory, or splendor! .... 
 Sacred History, describing the mar- 
 vellous grandeur of King Solomon's 
 ivory throne, tells us that "there 
 
 * Eccl. i. 5. 
 
 » Eccl. xxiv. 5. 
 
 * Eccl. xxiv. 37, 39. 
 
 ^ Wisd. viii. 1. 
 8 Eccl. xxiv. 12. 
 • Ps. xliv. 3. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 651 
 
 was no such work made in any * 
 kingdom."^ Ah I let us not fear, 
 then, to say that the Lord, in his 
 Almighty power, never created any- 
 thing to equal Her whom he made 
 the living throne of his divine 
 Son : " the incomparably excellent 
 throne," says the blessed Peter Da- 
 mian, " whereon the great God was 
 pleased to rest ; " ^ " the august 
 dwelling of the Supreme Euler of 
 the world," says St. Peter Chrys- 
 ologus ; the sacred " house which 
 Wisdom hath built for herself; " the 
 noble and magnificent sanctuary 
 which she decorated with " seven 
 pillars,"^ emblematical " of the sev- 
 en gifts which the Holy Ghost pour- 
 ed into the soul of Mary in such 
 admirable abundance ! "* 
 
 What heart was ever so wholly 
 penetrated with that religious fear 
 of displeasing the Lord, which is 
 careful to weigh and consider even 
 the most trifling actions of life ? Or 
 what heart was ever so eminently 
 endowed with that tender piety 
 which inspires the soul with a 
 boundless devotion to God, and 
 
 > 3 Kings X. 20. * Serm. 140, de Annunc, 
 
 » Serm. de Annunc. * Ps. cxi. 1. 
 
 3 Prov. ix. i. « Prov. ix. 10. » CoL iii. 3. 
 
 makes it to " delight exceedingly in 
 his commandments?"^ What hu- 
 man creature ever received so rich 
 an effusion of that " knowledge of 
 the holy,"^ which enlightens man on 
 all his duties, and marks out the 
 road he has to follow in order to 
 reach his last end ? The retreat of 
 Mary in the temple while still a 
 child, her entire consecration to the 
 Lord, her words to the angel in the 
 mystery of the Annunciation, her 
 life at Nazareth, "hidden in God,"' 
 all clearly manifest how highly that 
 privileged soul was endowed with 
 these precious gifts. And in what 
 other but Mary on Calvary was the 
 gift of fortitude ever fully displayed 
 —that fortitude which soars above 
 every trial? In what other than 
 Mary, the most prudent Virgin, was 
 ever manifested the gift of counsel, 
 which directs and governs in the 
 most delicate circumstances ; or the 
 gift of understanding, which pene- 
 trates the most elevated ways of 
 grace, as in her " whose very re- 
 pose," say the holy doctors,® " did in 
 no wise interrupt sublime contem- 
 
 « S. Amb., Lib. de Virg. ; 8. Antonin., t. 2, 
 Serm. 5, art. 1, c. 2 ; S. Bernardin, t. 2, Serm. 
 51, p. 4, tit. 15, c. 2. 
 
662 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF TEE BLESSED VIRGIN 
 
 plation?" What other creature, in 
 short, ever possessed in so high a 
 degree the gift of wisdom, which 
 cro\yns all others, and which con- 
 sists in knowing well the Author 
 and the end of all things — act- 
 ing, living, breathing but for Him 
 alone? And did not Mary always 
 live for GcJd alone, and was not 
 her sweet and glorious death "the 
 effect of a last effort of divine 
 love?"i 
 
 Let us here, then, offer our hum- 
 blest homage " to that royal throne,^ 
 that divine throne^ of Eternal Wis- 
 dom ; " and let us beseech her who 
 has been raised to such immense 
 dignity, to obtain for us, with an 
 abundant participation in the pre- 
 cious gifts which adorned her fair 
 soul, the grace to value as we ought 
 that Christian wisdom taught us by 
 her divine Son ; the grace to make 
 it the exclusive rule of our conduct, 
 " seeking first the kingdom of God 
 and his justice,"* and securing for 
 ourselves, by our good works, "treas- 
 ures that neither the rust nor the 
 
 • Boss., 1st Serm. on the Assumpt. 
 
 • S. Greg. Thaum., Serm. de Annunc. 
 » S. Ephr., de Laudib. Deip. 
 
 * moth doth consume, nor thieves 
 steal."* 
 
 Mary I let us never permit our- 
 selves to be deceived by the false 
 wisdom of the flesh which is the 
 enemy of God, or by "the wisdom 
 of this world, which is foolishness 
 with God ! " ^ Obtain for us, rather, 
 by thy powerful intercession, that 
 we may be the faithful disciples of 
 " the wisdom which is from above, 
 which is chaste, peaceable, modest, 
 full of good fruits;"^ which keeps 
 the mind in evangelical calmness 
 and moderation ; which represses 
 the inordinate motions of the pas- 
 sions; which inspires reserve and 
 circumspection in judgment ; which 
 teaches indulgence towards others, 
 and severity towards one's self. 
 Thou who wert the temple of Incar- 
 nate "Wisdom, of that divine Jesus 
 through whom "was made known 
 the manifold wisdom of God,"^ beg 
 of him a plentiful effusion for our 
 souls. 
 
 Seat of Wisdom, pray for us. 
 
 Sedes Sapientioe^ ova pro nobis. 
 
 * St. Matt. vi. 33. 
 
 • St. Matt vL 20. 
 
 « 1 Cor. iii. 19. 
 ' St. James iii. 17. 
 
 * 
 
 Ephes. iii 10. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 65S 
 
 MEDITATION XXXI. 
 
 CAUSE OP OUR JOY, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 WHEN the world was plunged 
 in the thickest darkness, 
 when no ray of Christian hope illu- 
 mined humanity beyond the tomb, 
 when the unhappy children of Adam 
 were sunk in the triple degradation 
 of the senses, the heart, and the 
 understanding, true joy was not 
 known on earth. Mary comes into 
 the world ; God ordains that she 
 shall co-operate in our salvation; 
 she gives birth to the Eedeemer. 
 Soon all is changed ! Man, restored 
 to his primary condition, receives 
 the surest and most consoling rev- 
 elations on the nobility of his na- 
 ture, the magnificence of his des- 
 tiny, and the means of attaining it, 
 the most abundant helps for the 
 cure of his moral wounds and the 
 alleviation of all the miseries of life. 
 He may, henceforward, experience 
 here below joys the purest and most 
 delicious, which are, as it were, the 
 pledge and foretaste of the divine 
 and everlasting joys which the Sa- 
 viour promises to bestow in the 
 other world. 
 
 Where were ye before the coming 
 
 * of that good and kind Saviour^ 
 given us by Mary, — where were, 
 ye, holy joys of charity, chastity, 
 modesty, humility — holy joys of the 
 devotions inspired by faith — holy 
 and sweet joys of Catholic piety, 
 ineffable delights of the adorable 
 Eucharist ? . . . . Yes, it is to Mary, 
 after God, that we are indebted for 
 aU that moves, expands, elevates 
 the heart in the religion of Christ. 
 It was she who secured to us so 
 many precious gifts, so much hap- 
 piness, even in this world, by her 
 acquiescence with the words of the 
 angel whom the Most High "com- 
 missioned to ask her consent, before 
 giving himself to us by his inter- 
 position." ^ 
 
 Hence, the illustrious martyr, St. 
 Irenaeus, almost a contemporary of 
 the Apostles, calls this acquiescence 
 of the Blessed Virgin "the cause 
 of the salvation of all mankind."^ 
 "She has procured," says St. Au- 
 gustine, after him, "the redemption 
 of man, who, left to himself, were 
 irretrievably lost."* "By Mary," 
 
 * Titus iii. 4 
 
 * Bossuet, Deuxieme Serm. sur I'Annonciaiion. 
 ' Lib. V. Contra Hoeres, c. 19. 
 
 * Serm. 55, de Sanctis. 
 
664 
 
 MEDITATIOXS ON TEE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 adds the blessed Peter Damian, f 
 " in Mary, and with Mary, the Son 
 of God would regenerate human- 
 ity: without her nothing had been 
 done;^ nothing reinstated, nothing 
 restored."' 
 
 It is, therefore, in this Virgin, 
 ever worthy of our gratitude and 
 love, that all the members of the 
 Church find their happiness and 
 joy. She was the object of the 
 most fervent wishes of the primitive 
 just, who, from afar, saluted in her 
 person the mother of the divine 
 Liberator, and in limbo awaited her 
 biith as the dawn of that happy 
 day which was to introduce them 
 into the kingdom of God. She was 
 on earth, after our Lord's ascension, 
 the " support and consolation of all 
 the faithful."^ She is, in the heav- 
 enly country, the joy and pride of 
 the elect ; for, in ascending to 
 heaven, " she increased," says St. 
 Bemardine, of Sienna, " the joy of 
 its blessed inhabitants;"* "and 
 their greatest glory, after the vision 
 of God," says St. Bonaventure, "is 
 to behold herself"^ She is also, 
 
 • St. John i 3. 
 
 • Serin, de Annuneiat. 
 » Bossuet, 2 Serm. sur I'Assompt. 
 
 according to the pious belief of the 
 Church, the joy and consolation of 
 the suffering souls in purgatory: 
 " thou art their zealous advocate,'' 
 says St. Andrew of Crete ;^ "I am 
 their mother," said Mary herself to 
 St. Bridget, " and I never cease to 
 relieve them by my intercession."' 
 She is, finally, the joy of all Chris- 
 tians in this world. 
 
 In all ages, in all situations, is 
 not thy holy name, Mary! full 
 of hope and sweetness, strength 
 and comfort, to those who ti-ust in 
 thee? 
 
 Let us bless God for having 
 given us in Mary a cause of joy ^o 
 pure, so true, so lasting ; let us 
 bless Mary for having given us the 
 source of all joy. 
 
 Ah! if the Jews of old testified 
 their admiration and gratitude to 
 Judith and Esther by public accla- 
 mations and rejoicings,^ what should 
 we not do to honor this divine Vir- 
 gin, to whom our obligations are 
 incomparably greater ! What devo- 
 tion should we not have for her 
 august person, what fervor in celc' 
 
 * Serm. de Assumpt. « Orat. 1, de Dort ,. 
 » In Spec. Lect. vL ' Lib. iv. EevelJ. c. 13S 
 
 ■ Judith xvi. ; Esther xvi 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 655 
 
 brating her festivals with as much f 
 joy as tender piety! 
 
 thou good and tender Mary, 
 whose simple salutation alone suf- 
 ficed to make the holy Precursor 
 leap for joy in his mother's womb,^ 
 thou who canst " turn into joy^ all 
 the sorrows" of the true believer, 
 thou who, • after Jesus, art " our 
 hope,"^ oh ! until we can enjoy with 
 the angels and saints the happiness 
 of contemplating thee, we will un- 
 ceasingly bear in mind the charm of 
 thy virtues, and repeat thy praises 
 over and over. Yes, we love to cry 
 out in the fullness of our gratitude 
 and love : " If I foi'get thee, sweet 
 Virgin ! let my right hand be for- 
 gotten ! Let my tongue cleave to 
 my jaws if I do not remember" all 
 the claims thou hast on my affec- 
 tion, and " if I make thee not," after 
 thy divine Son, "the beginning of 
 
 my joy 
 
 |"4 
 
 May we, then, in perpetual re- 
 membrance of thy benefits, Mary ! 
 unceasingly repeat with increasing 
 fervor — 
 
 Cause of our joy, prat for us. 
 
 Causa nostrce letitice, ora pro nobis. 
 
 > St. Luke i. 44. 
 « St. John xvi. 20. 
 
 » Salve Begina. 
 * Ps. cxxxvi. 5, 6. 
 
 MEDITATION XXXH. 
 
 SPIRITUAL VESSEL, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 INASMUCH as mind is superior 
 to matter, even so is the body 
 ennobled while raising itself by the 
 purity and righteousness of its acts 
 towards the dignity, the natural 
 sublimity of the soul. In like man- 
 ner, by as much as the order of 
 grace prevails over all that is most 
 eminent in the order of nature, even 
 so it is with the body of the Chris- 
 tian who endeavors, on supernatural 
 motives, to sanctify the use of all 
 his faculties — it assumes a charac- 
 ter of admirable greatness and no- 
 bility. It is to honor, in Mary, this 
 nobility, this greatness, that the 
 Church here invokes her under the 
 emblem of a precious vessel, a fig- 
 ure so often used in the sacred 
 writings,^ and it is in order to make 
 us understand the sublime degree of 
 that same greatness that she calls 
 her Spiritttal Vessel. 
 
 Does not that tell us in fact that 
 this Virgin of virgins enjoyed be- 
 forehand, if one may say so, a sort 
 of transformation approaching that 
 
 * Prov. XX. 15 ; Acts ix. 15 ; Rom. ix. 23 ; 
 1 Thess. iv. 4 ; 2 Tim. ii. 21. 
 
656 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 which shall take place in the elect ^ 
 on the great day of the general re- 
 surrection ; that her sacred body 
 possessing by anticipation some of 
 the qualities of "a spiritual body,"^ 
 her soul felt neither weight nor 
 shackle in its intercourse with God, 
 but could soar at will towards its 
 Creator, and nourish itself with his 
 adorable presence as though it were 
 enslaved by no action of the senses. 
 Mary had been preserved from 
 original sin and the concupiscence 
 which is its deplorable consequence.^ 
 " She enjoyed," says Louis of Blois, 
 " some of the privileges of our first 
 parents in the terrestrial Paradise, 
 when, during their state of inno- 
 cence, the faculties of their soul 
 were united to God, and all their 
 senses in perfect subjection to the 
 spirit."^ But, moreover, was it not 
 fitting that that flesh which was to 
 become the " divine flesh of Jesus," * 
 should be made worthy of that im- 
 mense honor by qualities analogous 
 to the beauty of the soul which 
 dwelt within it? The latter be- 
 
 • 1 Cor. XV. 44 ' Medit. xvi priced. 
 ' InstUut. Spirit , append, i., c. 2. 
 
 * Serm. 8 de Assumpt. B. V. 
 
 » Serm. 35 de Sanctis. • In Epist. ad S. Paul. 
 
 longed wholly to God : " it was, as 
 it were, transformed into God,"'' 
 says the same Father, after St. Dio- 
 nysius;^ how could it be supposed 
 that her body, created by the Lord 
 to have so great a share in the mys- 
 tery of the Incarnate Word, could in 
 any way impede the flight of that 
 fair soul, or be but in perfect har- 
 mony with its sublime destination ? 
 Let us then joyfully adopt the 
 sentiment transmitted to us by 
 Richard de Saint -Victor from sev- 
 eral Fathers of the Church, that 
 " her exterior as well as her interior 
 was wholly angelic,"^ and admir- 
 ably reflected the marvellous- com- 
 munion of her soul with God. If, 
 in fact, " the eyes of John the Bap- 
 tist, destined to see the Christ an- 
 nounced by the other prophets, dis- 
 dained to look on any creature,"^ no 
 one can doubt but that Mary con- 
 centrated in her divine Son the use 
 of all her senses, and that all in her 
 showed the life of a pure intelli- 
 gence, rather than that of a human 
 being. 
 
 » In Cant., cap. 26 ; S. Amb., de Institut. Tirg., 
 c. 7, 2 de Virgin ; S. Thomas, Sent., dist. 3, q. 1, 
 art. 2 ad 4 ; S. Bonav., dist. 3, part. 1, art. 2. 
 
 • S. Jerome, Epist. iv. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 657 
 
 Alas ! but we are far removed 
 from such a model ; we who attach 
 ourselves so strongly to vain idols, 
 which time disfigures and bears 
 away with the rest; we who gaze 
 with longing eyes on the fragile 
 things of this world, and foolishly 
 put forth all our energy and activity 
 in pursuit of their deceitful enjoy- 
 ment ; we who seem to have but a 
 doubtful faith in " the things which 
 are not seen,"^ the things of eter- 
 nity ; we who too often permit our- 
 selves to be overcome by that body 
 whose troublesome weight impedes 
 our communion with Cod in prayer, 
 and prevents us from walking joy- 
 ously onward in the service of our 
 divine Master. Ah! henceforward, 
 let us generously endeavor to be- 
 come "spiritual men,"^ remember- 
 ing that "he that soweth in the 
 spirit of the Spirit shall reap life 
 everlasting."^ If we can in any 
 way resemble Mary, that divinely 
 privileged creature, let us, at least, 
 restrain "with fervor of spirit"* the 
 fatal influence of "the corruptible 
 body which is a load upon the 
 
 • 2 Cor. iv. 18. 
 « 1 Cor. iii. 1. 
 
 * Gal. vi. 8. 
 
 * Bom. xii. 11. 
 
 * Wisdom ix. 15. 
 
 * soul,"^ and obstructs it in its sub- 
 lime flight towards its Author. 
 
 Mary, the Lord had made thee, 
 from the first, " a most pure vessel."^ 
 But when the Holy Ghost came 
 upon thee,^ to operate in thy chaste 
 womb "the great mystery of piety 
 manifested in the flesh," ^ and to 
 raise thee at the same time to the 
 most august dignity amongst creat- 
 ures, he rendered thee still more 
 pure and holy, he filled thee more 
 and more with that "perfect spirit"^ 
 which makes man live for God and 
 for the goods of eternity. We honor 
 in thee that superhuman life so per- 
 fect, and all the privileges where- 
 with it pleased the Most High to 
 invest thee. May we imitate thee 
 as far as is compatible with our 
 weakness, fi-eeing ourselves in all 
 things from the captivity of the 
 senses, " walking " towards the other 
 world "as children of the light, in 
 justice and truth," and in all "that 
 is acceptable to God."^'' Oh ! do not 
 refuse to ask this grace for us. 
 
 Spiritual Vessel, pray for us. 
 
 Vas Spirttuale, ora pro nobis. 
 
 « Prov. XXV. 4 * 1 Tim. iii. 16. 
 
 ' St. Luke i. 35. • » Ps. 1. 14. 
 
 " Ephes. V. 8, 9, 10. 
 
U3 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LIT ANT OF THE BLESSED VIRQIN. 
 
 MEDITATION XXXffl. 
 
 VESSEL OP HONOR, PRAT FOR US. 
 
 IT is a great honor for a body to 
 be united to a soul which is the 
 image of Grod ; and the more beau- 
 tiful that soul i8) and the more 
 enriched with the gifts of the Lord, 
 the greater the dignity to which 
 that intimate union raises the body; 
 it becomes thereby a vessel which 
 is so much the more precious in 
 proportion as the i)erfume it con- 
 tains is rarer and more exquisite in 
 the eyes of faith. What an honor 
 is it, then, for Mary's body to be 
 united to a soul which, after that of 
 Jesus, is the noblest, the purest, the 
 holiest, the most adorned with the 
 favors of Heaven ! 
 
 But how much more honorable is 
 Uiat sacred body on account of the 
 divine maternity ! It was, undoubt- 
 edly, a high honor for Abraham of 
 old to receive the Lord in the form 
 of an angel ; ^ but God did not sub- 
 stantially unite himself to that holy 
 patriarch. It was a great honor for 
 Moses to penetrate the awful cloud 
 which covered the summit of Mount 
 
 • Gen. rviiL 
 '£xod.xix. ao. 
 
 * 3 Kings TIT 
 « St Luke xix. 
 
 f Sinai, and to be enabled, in the 
 midst of thunder and lightning, to 
 converse face to face with the Most 
 High ;* but God did not substan- 
 tially unite himself to that immortal 
 legislator. It was a great honor for 
 Elias to hear and to see striking 
 marks of the infinite greatness of 
 the Supreme Being ;' but God, while 
 manifesting to him his^ adorable 
 presence, did not substantially unite 
 himself to that faithful prophet It 
 was a great honor for Zacheus to 
 receive Christ at his table;* for 
 Lazarus and his sisters to entertain 
 him in their house, and even to en- 
 joy the signal favor of his divine 
 fiiendship ;^ but what are all these 
 relations, precious and honorable as 
 they are, to the intimate, the incom- 
 parable connection between the 
 Man -God and his Mother! . . . 
 
 Ah ! let us not be surprised that 
 the holy doctors, struck with admi- 
 ration of that divine Mother, saluted 
 in her, in the most expressive terms, 
 that august womb wherein the Son 
 of God assumed human nature. 
 " Mary's flesh," says St. Augustine, 
 " is the very flesh of Jesus.'"^ 'Her 
 
 * St. Lake x. ; St John sL 
 
 • Senn- de Asaumpt. B. M. V., cap. r. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF TBE liLEHHED VinOIN. 
 
 669 
 
 body is a living heaven," gays the 
 Messed Peter Damian ; "it is the 
 coipoial sanctuary of the fullness of 
 the Divinity.'" "The Lord," says 
 St. Thomas of Villanova, " the Lord, 
 in making the daughter of Abraham 
 his Mother, raised her to such a 
 height, that neither man nor angel 
 can look up to her."^ 
 
 We justly honor the precious ves- 
 sels wherein the Church presei*ve8 
 the holy and adoiable Eucharist 
 But is there any propoition between 
 that gold 01- that silver, magnificent- 
 ly adorned, and thu august and ever 
 ^ cnerable body which furnished for 
 our divine Saviour the adorable 
 blood wherewith he redeemed us? 
 .... Yes, that is, by excellence, 
 " the vessel of election,"' infinitely 
 more valuable than "a massy vessel 
 of gold adorned with eveiy precious 
 stone;"* that is the pure and sacied 
 body which, having so worthily 
 borae God,"^ knew not the coiTUp- 
 tion of the t^^mb, but, on the con- 
 trary, according to the pious tradi- 
 tion of the Church, was glorified by 
 resurrection like the body of the 
 divine Jesus. 
 
 ' Orat de Naliv. B. V. 
 • Senu. 3 de Nalio. B. IL 
 
 ' Acid ir. 15. 
 <£oelM.L10. 
 
 Let us here reanimate our faith ; 
 let us remember that, by the inefl'ji- 
 ble mystery of the Eucharist, oui- 
 body, corruptible as it is, is raised 
 to a. sublime union, which makes it, 
 too, a vessel of honor, and that we 
 should always fear to defile it by 
 
 the slightest stain Ah ! we do 
 
 not meditate as we should on this 
 adorable mystery in all its bearings. 
 By communion, we become the tem- 
 ples of Jesus; and not only that, 
 not only sanctuaries of Jesus, taber- 
 nacles of Jesus, but more still — ^we 
 become sacred vessels, real living 
 
 vessels, wherein Jesus rests 
 
 What do I say ? we become living 
 vessels, with whom he unites him- 
 self in a manner so intimate, " that 
 he and they are but one," says St 
 Cyril.* We, then, who "are in 
 honor," let us not be so unfortunate 
 . as " not to understand," lest we " be 
 compared to senseless beasts, and 
 become like unto them."' We who 
 have a just veneration for the sa- 
 cred vessels of our altars, ah I let an 
 learn, in all places, and at all times, 
 to respect ourselves ; let us learn to 
 keep our thoughts, oar afiectknifl^ 
 
 • 1 Cor. vi 20. * Lib. ir. in Joan., etp. 11, 
 ' Fa. zhiti. 13. 
 
eeo 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 our desires, our views, and all our 
 actions, on a par with the nobility, 
 the greatness, the admirable glory 
 to which we are raised by a single 
 communion I 
 
 Mary, thou who, after God, art 
 woi'thy of all praise, thou didst bear 
 for nine months in thy chaste womb 
 Him whose awful majesty the angels 
 adore covered with their wings.^ 
 How can we express our admiration 
 of the honor he has done thee in 
 borrowing from thy substance the 
 body which he assumed, thus giv- 
 ing thee a sort of "inefiable iden- 
 tity with himself?"^ Receive here 
 the humble expression of all the 
 sentiments which so much great- 
 ness and honor ought to inspire in 
 the hearts of all the faithful. Make 
 us feel how high the divine Eu- 
 charist places ourselves amongst 
 creatures, and how, becoming by it 
 more august than the sacred vessels 
 in which it is contained, we may 
 conduct ourselves, always and in 
 all things, as " vessels of honor pre- 
 pared unto gloiy."^ 
 
 Vessel of Honor, pray for us. 
 
 Vas Jlonorttbile, ora pro nobis, 
 
 la. vL 2. * B. Peter Damian, de NoMv. Virg. 
 ' Eom. ix. 21, 23. 
 
 MEDITATION XXXIV. • 
 
 VESSEL OF SINGULAR DEVOTION, PRAT 
 
 FOR us. 
 
 PIETY, devotion, fervor! words 
 wholly inadequate to express 
 the burning zeal of Mary for the 
 service of the Lord. Who could 
 describe the lively ardor of her 
 prayer, her intimate union with God, 
 her ecstatic silence, her peaee, her 
 spiritual joy, so sweet, so delicious, 
 her continual aspirations to her be- 
 loved, the holiness of her thoughts, 
 the purity of her desires and affec- 
 tions, her devotion, so generous, so 
 magnanimous, so absolute, for the 
 glory of her Creator ? 
 
 Temple of Jerusalem, where she 
 passed so piously the first years of 
 her life, oh I what admirable secrets 
 were concealed within thy sacred 
 walls! August house of Nazareth, 
 where she lived so long in the pres- 
 ence and in the continual contem- 
 plation of her God, become her Son; 
 thou whose venerable walls speak 
 so eloquently to the heart of the 
 pilgrim of Loretto, tell us, then, 
 something of all those wonders of 
 adoration, praise, and love — those 
 ^ superhuman communings of Mary's 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 661 
 
 Boul with the divine heart of Jesus ! - 
 And thou, sacred abode, where she 
 dwelt with the beloved Apostle, 
 after the death of our Lord,^ ah ! 
 what bursts of inoniparable devo- 
 tion thou didst hide from the knowl- 
 edge of men ! what transports, what 
 ineffable sighs, when Jesus had as- 
 cended, to heaven! "what impetu- 
 osity of love, concurring with all 
 that is tender in nature, all tJiat is 
 efficacious in divine grace !"^ 
 
 If Queen Esther could say to God, 
 "Thou knowest that thy handmaid 
 hath never rejoiced but in thee;"^ 
 if the holy king David could bear 
 testimony of himself that the praise 
 of the Lord "was always in his 
 mouth ;"^ if he exclaimed in the 
 fervor of his soul, " Oh ! when shall 
 I come and appear before the face 
 of God ?"^ if the Apostle St. Paul 
 could say, "I live, now not I, but 
 Christ liveth in me," and my desire 
 is " to be dissolved, and to be with 
 Christ" forever ;« finally, if the il- 
 lustrious missionary of the Indies, 
 amid the enervating emotions of 
 
 • St. John xix. 27. 
 
 * Bossuet, 1 Serm. sur I'Assompt. 
 
 3 Esther xiv. 18. » Ps. xlL 3. 
 
 *Ps. xxxiii. 2. » Gal. ii. 20 ; Phil. i. 23. 
 
 his tender piety, feeling himself 
 fainting away with love^ begged of 
 God to moderate his favors, "Enough, 
 Lord! enough!" what must we 
 think of the august Mother of the 
 Saviour, she whom the Saints called 
 " a furnace of divine love," ^ and 
 whom the Spouse in the Canticles 
 compares to "a lamp of fire and 
 flames?"^ Was there for her a day, 
 an hour, a 'moment, in which her 
 thought, her speech, her will, every 
 act of her being, had not God for 
 its sole object ? a moment in which 
 she did not "do the things that 
 please Him,"^ and that with an 
 eagerness, a purity of intention, a 
 devotion hardly to be conceived? 
 Rather let us ask the Angels and 
 the Seraphim, "ravished," says St. 
 Bernard, " with the warmth and the 
 brightness of the sacred flame of 
 her devotion."^" And who could tell 
 the joys, the sweetness, the marvel- 
 lous delight with which that devo- 
 tion overflowed her heart? Thou 
 thyself, Mary ! givest us some 
 idea of it by that joyful e'xclama- 
 
 ' S. John Damas, de Dormit. B. V. ; S. Bern, 
 of Sienna, Serm. 9 de Visit. 
 ' Cant. viii. 6. 
 » St. John. viii. 29. 'o Serm. 2, in Assumpt. 
 
662 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 tion of tliy holy canticle, " My spirit 
 doth rejoice in God ray Saviour."^ 
 
 piety I sweet and tender 
 Christiiin piety, the origin and the 
 support of all the magnificent works 
 of charity I thou, that givest resig- 
 nation to the grief -fraught heart, 
 and strength to the soul assailed by 
 despair; thou, that drawest forth 
 from the eyes of repentance tears 
 of sweetest consolation, and excitest 
 heavenly rapture in the pure heart 
 intlamed with divine love, come, oh I 
 come to penetrate us with thy pre- 
 cious unction; come and make us 
 "vessels unto honor, sanctified and 
 profitable to the Lord, prepared 
 unto every good work!"'^ that by 
 thy celestial influence all our mem- 
 bers may be in the hand of God 
 " instruments unto justice,"^ to fight 
 and overcome sin ! that our bodies 
 may become "a living sacrifice, holy 
 cmd pleasing to God!"* 
 
 Vouchsafe, Mary I "admirable 
 vessel^ work of the Most High,"^ 
 vouchsafe to obtain for us the grace 
 to be pious, and to show ourselves 
 both sweet and firm in our piety. 
 In ancient days, when, at the bid- 
 
 ^ ding of the prophet Eliseus, a poor 
 widow, oppressed by a merciless 
 creditor, made her sons procure a 
 great number of empty vessels, she 
 poured into each a small portion 
 of the little oil she had; suddenly 
 and miraculously the vases were all 
 filled, so that she had not only 
 wherewith to pay her creditor, but 
 the means of supporting her fam- 
 ily.* To thee, likewise, holy Vir- 
 gin I at the bidding of the Angel 
 who saluted thee as "full of grace,"' 
 at the bidding of the Church, who 
 calls thee Vessel of Singular Devo- 
 tion^ we present our hearts, alas ! 
 too void of Christian piety and the 
 good works of which it is the source. 
 Do not refuse to give us of thy su- 
 perabundance, so that we may not 
 only satisfy the divine justice by 
 our fervor, but acquire precious 
 merits for heaven. It is written 
 that " piety has promise of the life 
 that now is, and of that which is to 
 come;"® that this consoling prom- 
 ise may be fulfilled in our favor. 
 
 Vessel of Singular Devotion, 
 PRAY for us. 
 
 Vas insigne devotionis^ora pro nMs, 
 
 ' St. Luke i. 47. 
 » 2 Tim. ii. 2L 
 
 * Rom. vi. 13. 
 
 * Rom. xii 1. 
 
 » Eccles. xliii. 2. 
 • 4 Kings iv.* 
 
 ' St. Luke i. 28. 
 • 1 Tim. iv. a 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 663 
 
 MEDITATION XXXy. 
 
 MYSTICAL ROSE, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 IN the Sacred Books we hear the 
 voice of the celestial Bridegroom 
 comparing his spouse to a garden 
 redolent " with all the chief per- 
 fumes."^ "Arise," says he, "arise, 
 north wind, and come, south 
 wind, blow through my garden, and 
 let the aromatical spices thereof 
 flow."^ Christian piety loves to 
 recognize the Blessed Virgin under 
 the figure of all the plants and 
 odoriferous flowers of that garden 
 mentioned by the Spouse in the 
 Canticles. It is Mary whom we 
 delight to call, with St. Sophronius, 
 "the true pleasure-garden, abound- 
 ing in the sweetest flowers, and the 
 celestial odor of all the virtues."^ 
 Amongst these flowers the Church 
 chose the Rose to give a name to 
 that Beloved of the Lord, thus giv- 
 ing her the most delicate and grace- 
 ful praise, the fittest to -captivate 
 our mind and heart. 
 
 Rose, whom the Creator has 
 made so sweet and so fair, so rich 
 in beauty and in perfume ; Queen 
 
 » Cant. iv. 14. « Cant. iv. 16. 
 
 ' Serm. de Assumpt. 
 
 f of all those earthly flowers, so mag- 
 nificent in their matchless attire, 
 and yet so varied in the shades 
 oi their colors and in their odorous 
 exhalations, how joyfully do I hail 
 thee as the emblem of Mary, my 
 divine Mother ; that Queen of all 
 intelligences, even the most adorned 
 with grace ; that Queen of all the 
 spiritual flowers which form and 
 shall fonn the ornament of the 
 Church of heaven and on earth; 
 that Queen, in fine, of all creatures. 
 Like thee, but in a manner infi- 
 nitely superior, Mary is radiant in 
 beauty and charming in the sweet- 
 ness and perfume of her divine vir- 
 tues ! . . . . 
 
 Never did the fair soul of the 
 Blessed Virgin undergo any, even 
 the slightest alteration ; never did 
 the lightest breath of evil tarnish 
 the freshness, the lustre of that Mi/s- 
 tical Rose; never did the calix of 
 that marvellous flower, so truly the 
 Beloved of God, cease to exhale the 
 sweet incense of love and praise — 
 of love the most ardent, and praise 
 the most pious. Although planted, 
 like her sisters, in a soil where so 
 many storms bend and blight their 
 stems and wither their briUiant 
 
684 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 petals, never did she lose aught t 
 either of her original beauty, the 
 sweetness or the excellence of her 
 perfume. ^ 
 
 Thou hadst thy thorns, it is true, 
 Mystical Rose, sharp and piercing 
 thorns, but they were only for thy- 
 self. Thou couldst not but resem- 
 ble, Mary, the divine Head of the 
 elect, that adorable Saviour who, 
 through sufferings, was to enter into 
 his glory I " ^ 
 
 And, moreover, was it not expe- 
 dient that, like thy divine Son, thou 
 shouldst learn by experience . to 
 " have compassion on our infirmi- 
 ties,"^ and to feel for us that lively 
 sympathy attendant on the endur- 
 ance of the same sufferings 
 
 But to us, thy brethren according 
 to the flesh, thy beloved children 
 according to grace, to us thou art 
 "a rose without a thorn." .... 
 " Thou hast nothing hurtful," says 
 St Ambrose, "nothing but what is 
 the very expression of universal 
 benevolence."^ "What is there in 
 thee," says St. Bernard, "to excite 
 fear or distrust? Thou hast noth- 
 ing stern, nothing austere ; to us 
 
 « St Luke xxiv. 26. » Heb. iv. 15. 
 
 ' Lib. de Virginit., cap. 2. 
 
 thou art all sweetness Peruse 
 
 attentively the whole Gospel his- 
 tory," adds this holy doctor, "care- 
 fully examine its sacred pages ; if 
 thou findest in Mary the least trait 
 savoring of reproach or severity, 
 the slightest indication contrary to 
 meekness, I will agree to speak no 
 more of that divine Mother."* 
 
 Ah ! let us " run to the celestial 
 odor" of that immortal rose which 
 embalms the innocent heart, and 
 constitutes its joy and its delight; 
 "let us run after her."^ Let us be- 
 ware of being seduced by the ephe- 
 meral perfumes of the earth, the 
 foolish incense of worldly flattery, 
 or of suffering ourselves to be daz- 
 zled by the deceitful beauty of creat- 
 ures which "in the morning grow 
 up like grass, in the evening fall, 
 grow dry, and wither."^ Let us re- 
 member that every thing in this 
 world was given us to raise our 
 souls to God, and that, far from fix- 
 ing our hearts on sublunary things, 
 as though they were our last end, 
 we should employ them to excite in 
 us the desire and the eager pursuit 
 of that true country where there 
 
 * Serm. 1 de Assumpt 
 
 « Ps. Ixxxix. 6. 
 
 » Cant. i. 3. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 665 
 
 are none but immortal flowers, and 
 where the Mystical Rose is the ad- 
 miration of saints and angels. 
 
 Maiy, thou art "exalted as a 
 rose -plant in Jericho/ thou hast 
 budded forth as the rose planted 
 by the brooks of waters,^ thou art 
 fair as the lily,'' and as the flower 
 of roses in the days of the spring."* 
 But who shall give us an idea of 
 "the good odor of Christ."" so sweet- 
 ly exhaled by thee. Who shall tell 
 us how much the perfume of thy 
 virtues exceeds " the sweet odor of 
 the best myrrh and the purest 
 balm?"^ Yes, thou art that chosen 
 flower which alone,* in the arid vale 
 of this world, "drew down the di- 
 vine dew, the just by excellence."^ 
 blessed Flower ! marvellous 
 Flower ! Flower of heaven ! it is 
 there only that it will be given us 
 to know thee well, and to praise 
 thee as thou deservest. Grant that 
 we may walk "to the odor of thy 
 ointments,^ in the unspotted way"^ 
 of the true children of God, so as, 
 one day, to have the happiness of 
 seeing thee and glorifying thy Son 
 
 » Eccl. xxiv. 18. 
 « Eccl. xxxix. 17. 
 
 ' Is. XXXT. 1. 
 
 * Eccl. L a 
 
 * for all the favors so lavishly be- 
 stowed upon thee! 
 
 Mystical Rose, pray for us. 
 Rosa Mystica^ ora pro nobis. 
 
 » 2 Cor. u, 1& 
 
 MEDITATION XXXYI. 
 
 TOWER OF DAVID, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 IF the pride and the strength 
 of Jerusalem was the tower of 
 David, built with bulwarks, a thou- 
 sand bucklers " hanging upon it, all 
 the armor of valiant men," ^^ is not 
 Mary the glory and the invincible 
 fortress of the Church? And, be- 
 sides, does not the blood of David 
 flow in her veins — the blood of that 
 holy king who, before he reached 
 the throne, knew how to unite the 
 modest bearing of the shepherd 
 with the heroic valor that overcame 
 the Philistine giant? How justly, 
 then, may Mary be called the Tower 
 of David, she in whom we admire 
 so much humility with so much 
 greatness and so much glory ! . . . 
 But in what sense should we 
 
 • Eccl. xxiv. 20, 21. 
 » Is. xlv. 8. 
 
 8 Cant. i. 3. 
 » Ps. c. 2. 
 
 •" Cant. iv. 4. 
 
866 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 specially apply to the Blessed Vir- 
 gin the image of a " great tower," ^ 
 tlefending a beleaguered city? It 
 is especially on account of her pro- 
 tecting, from the incessant assaults 
 of Satan, the Church, who is the 
 depositary of the truth brought from 
 heaven by our Lord Jesus Christ. 
 " Oh I but she is powerful against 
 hell, that august Queen!" exclaims 
 St. Bonaventure. " She is more ter- 
 rible than an army in battle array." ^ 
 .... So it is that the Evil Spirit 
 has never failed, when attacking the 
 Church, to attack, at the same time, 
 that glorious Virgin who is, as it 
 were, its impregnable fortress. 
 
 Ever since the second century, 
 when the impious Cerinthus dared 
 to dispute one of the prerogatives 
 "secured by the Catholic faith to 
 Mary, there has scarcely been a 
 heresiarch whose tongue or pen did 
 not, either directly or indirectly, as- 
 sail her; not one whose audacious 
 folly Mary did not confound by the 
 dread authority of the Church, ever 
 ready to defend Jesus Christ at- 
 tacked through his august Mother. 
 Hence it is that that faithful guar- 
 dian of the divine doctrine is pleased 
 
 f to represent "the old serpent"' as 
 always trying to life his head from 
 under the conquering foot of the di- 
 vine Virgin, whose wondious power 
 against error it pleases the Lord to. 
 manifest, in an especial manner, in 
 these latter ages. 
 
 It is worthy of remark, that those 
 nations who are the most devout to 
 Mary have been preserved, either 
 wholly or in a great measure, from 
 the ravages of the heresy of the 
 sixteenth century. Look at Italy, 
 Spain, Belgium ; Ipok at France, . . . 
 France, where the protection of the 
 Queen of Heaven was manifested 
 anew, and in a striking manner, at 
 the end of the eighteenth century. 
 It was then worse than heresy — it 
 was impiety, infidelity, armed with 
 political power, reigning with abso- 
 lute sway. No more temples, no 
 more altars, no more priests ; faith 
 itself was a crime deserving of death 
 .... Mary ! canst thou, then, for- 
 get that France has ever been thy 
 favored country ; that it was conse- 
 crated to thee by one of its kings, 
 of pious memory?* Wilt thou not 
 hear the fervent sighs of thy ser- 
 vants, still so numerous amidst all 
 
 » 2 Esd. iii. 27. 
 
 * Cant, vi 3. ^ » Apoc xii. 9. 
 
 ♦ Louis XIIL 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 667 
 
 this grievous apostacy ? and do not ^ 
 our pastors, in the land of exile, 
 unite their pious supplications with 
 those of the faithful flocks from 
 whom they have been compelled to 
 fly ? .... Oh ! that good and tender 
 Mother will not forsake her own 
 people ; all the assaults of exulting 
 infidelity shall at last fail before this 
 new Tower of David. A little while, 
 and the temples are re-opened, the 
 altars are raised again, the pastors 
 are restored to their hearers; and it 
 is on the very day of the Assump- 
 tion of the Blessed Virgin that the 
 Sovereign Pontiff signs the famous 
 concordat which secures the restora- 
 tion of the Church of France. 
 
 Let us here felicitate ourselves, 
 before God, on our happiness in 
 being born in a land which belongs 
 to Mary by solemn consecration,^ a 
 consoling pledge of the preservation 
 of the precious treasure of faith in 
 our beloved country. But, let us 
 never forget that the Apostles of 
 old, although assured by the prom- 
 ise of their divine Master that the 
 . persecution of the Synagogue should 
 
 ' It will be remembered that this work was 
 originally written in French. — Tbans. 
 
 • Acts iv. 24. ' St. John xiv. 6. 
 
 be powerless against the infant 
 Church, did, nevertheless, " with 
 one accord lift up their voice to 
 God," ^ to ask of him victory. Let 
 us also beg of the Lord that the 
 faith of Mary's chosen people may 
 never fail ; and in all our tempta- 
 tions, especially those which are 
 contrary to that fundamental virtue 
 of Christianity, let us fly to her, and 
 take refuge in that Tower of David 
 where the darts of the enemy cannot 
 reach us. 
 
 divine Mother of Him who calls 
 himself "the Truth," ^ it is to thee 
 that thine adorable Son seems to 
 have confided the care of his 
 Church; for it is to thee that that 
 same Church* refers the glory of hei 
 triumph over all the errors that 
 have assailed the true doctrine, and 
 sought to shake the foundations of 
 "the city of God."^ Thou art for 
 her " a tower of strength against 
 the face of the enemy ;"^ thou art 
 the "strong tower "^ which saves 
 her children " in the day of tribula- 
 tion."^ Ah! protect us, holy Vir- 
 gin, against any danger that might 
 
 * Brev. Kom. in Festis B. M. V. 
 
 * Ps. Ixxxvi. 3. ' Prov. xviii. 10. 
 « Ps. Ix. 4. • Ps. xix. 2. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 assail our faith ; shield us, especial- 
 ly at the hour of our death, and pre- 
 pare us for that final struggle which 
 is to insure our eternal triumph. 
 Obtain for us, from God, a lively 
 and unshaken faith. 
 
 Tower of David, pray for us. 
 
 Turris Davidica^ ora pro nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION XXXVIL 
 
 TOWER OF IVORY, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 IVORY has a dazzling whiteness, 
 a remarkable polish, pleasing to 
 the eye, and at the same time a so- 
 lidity, a strength analogous to the 
 gigantic animal which furnishes it 
 for the use of man : a double figure, 
 equally applicable to the Blessed 
 Virgin. In what other human 
 being could we find, as in her, that 
 innocence, that purity of soul which 
 the angels themselves admire, that 
 lustre of virginity which, during 
 the time of her mortal pilgrimage, 
 was diff'used over her whole per- 
 son, and penetrated all hearts with 
 
 • S. Den. Areop., Ep. ad Paid apvd Carthus., 
 Sent in 1 dist. 16, q. 2. 
 
 * Cant viL 4. 
 
 ♦ an indescribable feeling of re- 
 spect?^ 
 
 But, without dwelling here on 
 that amazing purity which has al- 
 ready been several times the object 
 of our meditations, let us apply 
 ourselves to consider the mystical 
 "Tower of Ivory "^ as the model 
 and the support of our perseverance 
 in the service of the Lord. 
 
 What was the perpetual devotion 
 of Mary to her God, amid all the 
 sacrifices which filled up her holy 
 life in this world I From the part- 
 ing with her family, which the Most 
 High demanded of her at so tender 
 an age, what tribulation, what an- 
 guish, what certain and heart-rend- 
 ing anticipations, what excruciating 
 sorrows raised even to sublimity her 
 constancy in the path of duty! The 
 perplexity of St. Joseph on account 
 of a mystery which prudence forbade 
 her to reveal to her chaste spouse ; 
 the journey to Bethlehem, so painful 
 in every respect; the poverty and 
 desolation of the stable, the only 
 shelter left the infant God; the 
 double prophecy of the holy old man 
 Simeon, regarding the unjust perse- 
 cution which the Saviour was to 
 
 ^ undergo, and " the sword which was 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 669 
 
 to pierce his mother's heart ;"^ the 
 flight into Egypt, with all the hard- 
 ships and privations of exile ; the 
 losing of Jesns for three days after 
 the feast of the Passover; the humil- 
 iating labors to which she saw him 
 subjected in the poor workshop of 
 Nazareth ; all the fatigues, all the 
 troubles of his public life ; the in- 
 trigues, the persecutions, the atro- 
 cious calumnies of his enemies, 
 whereby she was so deeply affected ; 
 all the ignominy, all the unheard- 
 of sufferings of his passion ; finally, 
 the cross standing before her mater- 
 nal eyes, and she at the foot of that 
 cross. Oh ! what an unbroken series 
 of hard trials, very fit to shake and 
 to subdue the courage of a daughter 
 of Eve! But in the midst of all 
 these trials we see Mary always 
 calm and serene, Mary always sub- 
 missive, always inseparably united 
 to the will of her God, Mary always 
 strong and self-devoted, Mary always 
 the same ! What an example ! what 
 an eloquent lesson for us who are so 
 infirm, so inconstant in good ! 
 
 So long as the dangerous occasion 
 is far from us, or temptation leaves 
 us at rest, or the world is not dis- 
 
 ' St. Luke ii. 35. 
 
 f posed to quarrel with us for dis- 
 charging our duty to God, so long 
 do " our feet stand in the direct 
 way;"^ they even run after salva- 
 tion. But no sooner do obstacles 
 arise in our path, no sooner is it 
 necessary to do violence to our own 
 inclinations, to break the deceitful 
 spell of the heart or of the senses, 
 or to withstand the foolish laughter 
 of "the children of the world,"' than 
 we feel ourselves fail at once. Ah I 
 if we imitated Mary, far from being 
 discouraged by the tempests which 
 Providence permits us to encounter, 
 we would consider them as precious 
 means of expiating the past, of ac- 
 quiring a holy distrust of ourselves, 
 and an entire confidence in God 
 alone, of confirming us in good by 
 resisting evil, of gaining inestimable 
 merits for eternal life. And you, 
 also, pious souls, if you walked in 
 the footsteps of her whom you love 
 to call your good Mother, would you 
 not bear with more courage and 
 confidence the weight of the interior 
 troubles which may assail you ? . . . 
 Ah ! never forget, then, that one day 
 of fidelity to God in dryness or dark- 
 ness of mind, in weariness or dis- 
 
 ^ Ps. XXT. 12. 
 
 » St. Luke xvi. 8. 
 
870 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 gust, is worth more than a thousand 
 days passed in the holy joys of 
 devotion. There are two ways, ac- 
 coi-ding to St Augustine, one of 
 which depends on the other : " that 
 of trial, which we have to undergo ; 
 that of beatitude, which we are to 
 expect"^ In the second life, every 
 one of your sighs and tears, every 
 act of resignation, will be available 
 before God; and you shall find 
 them at the feet of " the just Judge," ^ 
 transformed into so many precious 
 pearls, whose celestial brightness 
 shall enhance the beauty of your 
 immortal crown. 
 
 Mary, incomparably more beau- 
 tiful in the eyes of God by thy 
 virtues, thy merits, than were ever, 
 in the eyes of men, " the house of 
 ivory," ^ built by the seventh king 
 of Israel, or King Solomon's " great 
 throne of ivory,"* we will always 
 " lift up our eyes " to thee, as the 
 tower of help, " from whence help 
 shall come to ils''^ against the world 
 and the devil, the evil inclinations 
 of our own nature, the darkness of 
 our undei-standing, and the feeble- 
 ness of our will. Considering the 
 
 ' Lib. 2, de Act. cum Fd. Munic., c. 10. 
 • 2 Tim. iv. a 
 
 f temptations of every kind, of which 
 our life is but one continued series," 
 perseverance in virtue is a blessing 
 above all price, and we cannot ask 
 it too earnestly or too frequently. 
 It is through thy gracious interces- 
 sion that we hope to obtain it ; and 
 it is in thine immaculate heart that 
 we will henceforward take refuge, as 
 a safe and sure asylum. thou, 
 whom we here invoke with the full- 
 est confidence, 
 
 Tower of Ivory, pray for us. 
 Turris Ebwmea, ora pro nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION XXXYEI. 
 
 HOUSE OF GOLD, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 HOW marvellous was the Tem- 
 ple of Jerusalem raised by 
 King Solomon I Not to speak of 
 the rare stones of which its walls 
 and foundations were composed, 
 how admirable were the ceilings 
 of cedar sculptured with so much 
 art, the cherubim, the palms in 
 relievo, the golden flowers, the very 
 pavement covered with plates of 
 
 * 8 Kings xxii. 39. 
 
 * 3 Kings X. 18. 
 
 * Ps. cxx. 1. 
 
 • Job vii. 1. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 671 
 
 that precious metal, which was 
 lavished in such profusion that 
 " there was nothing in the temple 
 that was not covered with gold,"^ 
 so that it might be literally styled 
 a house of gold ! 
 
 But how much more does that 
 name apply to the Blessed Virgin, 
 the living sanctuary whom the Lord 
 made for himself ; " the august and 
 sacred dwelling which he hath cho- 
 sen for himself;"^ or rather, with 
 whom he united himself by sancti- 
 fying grace more closely than with 
 any other creature, and by the 
 divine maternity, in a manner the 
 most approximate to the mystical 
 tie which makes the Eternal Word 
 and the . Son of Mary one and the 
 same person! Even before the 
 Incarnation, thou wert, incompar- 
 able Virgin, in a marvellous sense, 
 " the house of the Lord," his House 
 of Gold; thou whom he had adorned 
 with so many prerogatives, infinite- 
 ly more precious than all the gold 
 of this world; thou whose every 
 thought, desire, word and action 
 were, in his eyes, far more valuable 
 than gold is to men, who seek with 
 ceaseless ardor that seductive metal, 
 
 ' 3 Kings vi. 22. 
 
 2 Ps. cxxxi. 13. 
 
 * too often the mainspring and the 
 idol of their entire life I But on the 
 ever-memorable day of the -Annun- 
 ciation, thou didst become, in a still 
 more admirable sense, his House of 
 Gold; for of thy most pure sub- 
 stance the Word then and forever 
 formed his own; he dwelt within 
 thee the first nine months of his 
 expiatory life on earth, living with 
 thine own life ; and that sublime 
 connection, that ineifable union, 
 " made thee worthy of being called 
 blessed by all generations, blessed 
 by all the. prophets, by all the 
 heavenly powers; yes, blessed in 
 thy mind, in thy heart, blessed by 
 the common voice of our praise."^ 
 And besides, how justly is the 
 title. House of Gold., bestowed on 
 that Virgin endowed with perfect 
 purity, a quality of which gold is 
 the best symbol ; that Virgin in- 
 flamed with divine love, of which 
 gold, from its fiery color, is also the 
 emblem. Is not her perpetual in- 
 tegrity, in reality, one of the great- 
 est miracles of the Lord ? " Does 
 not the excellence of her purity," 
 says St. Anselm, "incomparably 
 surpass the purity of all creatures ? 
 
 » S. Ildefonso, Lib. de Virginit. B. M 
 
679 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 And was it not that which rendered f 
 her worthy of becoming the reno- 
 vator of the world, plunged in the 
 deepest abyss of perdition?"^ No 
 less surprising is her love of God. 
 " Who can doubt," exclaims St. Au- 
 gustine, " that Mary's womb, where- 
 in the God of charity reposed cor- 
 porally for nine months, was wholly 
 transformed into charity?"^ Where- 
 fore it is that St. Bernardino said 
 of this Blessed Virgin : " So great 
 was her love that she would will- 
 ingly have died for her Son, not 
 once, nor a thousand times, but an 
 infinite number of times, if it had 
 been possible."^ 
 
 Alas! that it is not so with us, 
 at least as far as our frail nature 
 would permit! Why is it that we 
 who, by baptism, by confirmation, 
 by the eucharist, have been con- 
 secrated to God " as his temples,"* 
 show ourselves so little worthy of 
 the Holy of holies,'' who has vouch- 
 safed to make us his living temples? 
 Why are we so eager to adorn our 
 dwelling when it is to have the 
 honor of receiving a distinguished 
 
 • De excd. B. V., c. 9. 
 
 • Quot by S. Bonav. in Spec., c. 14. 
 » Serm. de Nat. B.V. *2 Cor. vL 16. 
 
 guest, yet so negligent in making 
 our soul and body a Bouse of Gold 
 for the reception of the Lord ? Why, 
 once more, instead of being in- 
 flamed with love of the divine good, 
 do we suffer our hearts to be en- 
 snared by the " bewitching of van- 
 ity,"^ and are coldly indifferent to 
 that God so entrancing in beauty 
 and in love ? Shame and confusion 
 for us ? But also repentance, and, 
 henceforward, frequent acts, as fre- 
 quent as possible, of piety, of devo- 
 tion, of ardent love for him whose 
 temples we are, by a special favor, 
 permitted to become ! 
 
 It is through thee, Mary, 
 through thy powerful intercession, 
 that we hope to have accomplished 
 in us that saying of thy divine Son : 
 " If any one love me he will keep 
 my Word ; and my Father will love 
 him, and he will come to him, and 
 will make an abode with him."^ In 
 thee the Lord chose to dwell in a 
 wonderful manner,^ and he filled 
 thee with his glory ^ in a more mar- 
 vellous way than he formerly filled 
 Solomon's temple. Oh ! if we Dould 
 
 • Dan. iii 24 ' St. John xiv. 23. 
 
 « Wisdom iv. 12. « Ps, cxxxi. 14. 
 
 • 3 Kings viii. 10 ; 2 Paral. v. 8. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 673 
 
 but comprehend the dignity to 
 which he raises us by making us 
 his living temples, how faithful we 
 would be in preserving ourselves 
 pure and holy ; faithful in immolat- 
 ing nature to duty on the altar of 
 our heart, and the transitory joys 
 of the present for the future and 
 permanent joys of eternity ; faithful 
 in keeping the fire of holy love con- 
 stantly burning there ! Pray for us, 
 that w^e may have that inestimable 
 happiness. It is with all our heart 
 that we beseech thee, 
 
 House of Gold, pray for us. 
 
 Domus Aurea, ora pro Tiobis. 
 
 MEDITATION XXXIX. 
 
 ARK OF THE COVENANT, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 IF the magnificent temple of Solo- 
 ' mon, where, we may say, all 
 was gold, be an emblem of Mary, 
 what was most august in that 
 "house of the Lord,"^ the ark of 
 the covenant, is a still more strik- 
 ing figure of this divine Virgin. 
 
 The ark was made of incorrupt- 
 ible wood,^ although it grew from 
 
 ' 3 Kings viii. 11. ' Exod. xxv. 10. » Exod. xxv. 
 
 * a corruptible stem. And thou, 
 Mary, although the offspring of a 
 guilty race, thou wert preserved 
 from the original stain, and beyond 
 the reach of corruption. 
 
 The ark was overlaid within and 
 without with pure gold ; it was 
 surmounted by a golden crown, and 
 closed with the mercy-seat, which 
 was likewise made of that precious 
 metal ; two cherubim, also of gold, 
 with their wings outspread, shaded 
 the mercy-seat, from which the ma- 
 jesty of God gave directions to the 
 children of Israel.^ And thou, 
 Mary, "full of grace," ^ how dazzling, 
 how pure, how priceless is the gold 
 wherewith thou art clothed ! What 
 a throne thou didst offer in thyself 
 to the Lord! May we not say of 
 thee, with St. Andrew of Crete, that 
 " thou art the universal propitiatory 
 of the world," ^ the living sanctuary 
 whence the Incarnate Word pro- 
 nounced the words of salvation for 
 the whole world? 
 
 In the ark were deposited "the 
 golden urn that had manna, the rod 
 of Aaron that had blossomed wdrac- 
 ulously, and the two tables of the 
 Testament,"^ given to Mount Sinai. 
 
 * St. Luke i. 28. » De Dormit. Virg. • Heb. ix. 4 
 
GU 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON TEE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIIiOIN. 
 
 And thou, august Virgin, thou ^ 
 hast had the happiness of conceiv- 
 ing and bringing forth Him who 
 was made for us the true celestial 
 manna, "the living bread which 
 came down from heaven."^ Thou 
 hast had the infinite honor of be- 
 coming the Mother of a Son who 
 was formed in thee and born of thee 
 by a prodigy much greater than 
 that which struck the twelve tribes 
 with admii'ation when they saw the 
 withered rod of the high-priest cov- 
 ered with fruit and flowers.^ Thou 
 hast borne within thee, by an un- 
 paralleled favor, the very Author of 
 the two tables of the law ; thou art 
 become, as it were, " the depository 
 of the sacred titles of the Old and 
 New Testaments,^ the abridgment 
 of all the divine oracles,* the book 
 of the divine Word, whose sacred 
 pages are opened by the Eternal 
 Father himself to the eyes of all 
 the world.'"^ 
 
 In ancient times God inspired his 
 people, sometimes even the Gen- 
 tiles, with a profound respect for 
 
 ' St. John vi. 51. • Numb. xviL 
 
 * Rupert., in Cap. 4 carU. 
 
 * Andr. of Crete, Serm. de Assumpt. 
 
 * Serm. de laudib. Virg., attributed to St. Epiph. ^ 
 
 the ark of the covenant, by means 
 of divers prodigies of which it was 
 the occasion ;^ before it the Israel- 
 ites prostrated themselves to render 
 heaven propitious,^ and its sojourn 
 in the house of Obededom drew 
 down on him and his household the 
 blessing of the Lord.^ Before thee, 
 Mary, do the faithful prostrate 
 themselves to obtain from thy di- 
 vine Son the favors of which they 
 stand in need, knowing that it is 
 through thee he is pleased to pour 
 out his gifts on men, and that " all 
 grace flows from thy hands."^ Thou- 
 sands and thousands of miracles, 
 both in the temporal order and in 
 that of salvation, are wrought by 
 thee to the great admiration of the 
 faithful ; and does not thy holy 
 image, piously venerated in Chris- 
 tian families, draw down upon them 
 innumerable blessings ? • 
 
 Finally, who does not see in Da- 
 vid's solemn introduction of the ark 
 into Jerusalem, the figure of thy 
 glorious and triumphant assump- 
 tion, Thou ! Ark of sanctity, raised 
 
 ^ Exod. XXV. ; Josh. iii. vi. ; 1 Kings v. vii 
 ' Josh. vii. 6. 
 
 * 2 Kings vi. 11. 
 
 • Bern., serm. 3, de nomine Mariae. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 67S 
 
 from earth to "thy resting place" 
 in heaven/ to sit at the right hand 
 of God,^ there to show thyself a 
 Mother^ to all who have recourse 
 to thee ? 
 
 Ah ! may we show ourselves true 
 children of Mary, and find in that 
 august Ark of the new covenant a 
 continual safeguard and a source 
 of celestial blessings. " Whosoever 
 neglects the service of the Blessed 
 Virgin," says St. Bonaventure, " runs 
 the risk of dying in his sins, but 
 whosoever honors her worthily shall 
 be justified, shall be saved ;"'^ for she 
 is, according to St. Peter Chrysolo- 
 gus, " the gracious Mediatrix be- 
 tween man and the Man - God ;" ^ 
 " and if the merits of the supplicant 
 are insufficient," adds St. Anselm, 
 " those of the divine Mother who in- 
 tercedes for him are accepted in his 
 behalf."^ 
 
 As the ark, going before the He- 
 brews across the Jordan, introduced 
 them into the promised land, even 
 so dost thou, Mary, conduct us in 
 safety through the perilous waters 
 
 ' Ps. cxxxi. 8. < In Fsalt 
 
 * St. M ark xvi. 19. * Serm. de Annunc. 
 
 * Hymn Ave 3Iaris Stella. * De excellent. Virg. 
 
 of this life; thou art "the living 
 Ark of the covenant of the Lord of 
 all the earth." '^ Ah! undoubtedly, 
 the covenant wherewith " the God 
 of Majesty"^ was formerly pleased 
 to honor Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, 
 and their children, was very pre- 
 cious. But yet it was only a figure, 
 a sha*dow of that wherewith the 
 Eternal Son favored us by becoming 
 man in thy womb, regenerating us 
 by his adorable blood, the merits 
 of which he applies to us by sacred 
 rites, which sanctify us at our birth, 
 aid, strengthen, and console us dur- 
 ing life, and at our last hour encour- 
 age and prepare us for the dreadful 
 passage to eternity. Thou, by 
 whom all these blessings come to 
 us, "paradise of the new Adam,*^ 
 living palace of the Most High,"^*^ 
 obtain for us the grace to make a 
 holy use of them, and always to say 
 to thee with the fervor of a faithful 
 heart, 
 
 Ark of the Covenant, pray for 
 us. 
 
 Foederis Area., ora 'pro nobis. 
 
 ^ Josh. iii. 11. * Ps. xxviii. 3. 
 
 » S. John Damas., Orat. de Dormii. B. M. 
 '« S. J. Chrys., Homit. 2, in Fest. S. Joan. 
 
676 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 MEDITATION XL. 
 
 GATE OP HEAVEN, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 I AM the door,"^ says Jesus Christ; 
 "no man cometh to the Father 
 but by me."* In calling Mary the 
 Gate of Heaven^ do we not, therefore, 
 attribute to her what belongs solely 
 to the Man-God ? do we not trans- 
 fer to the Mother some of the in- 
 alienable rights of the Son ? 
 
 Ah ! assuredly, the Church, " who 
 is the pillar and the ground of 
 truth," ^ does not forget the saying 
 of St. Paul, that as "there is hut 
 one God, so there is but one Media- 
 tor, between God and man, the Man 
 Christ Jesus." ^ But she teaches, 
 with St. Jerome, that " all honor 
 paid to Mary, tends to the glory of 
 Jesus as its end;"^ and with St. 
 Anselm, that " if Mary hath so much 
 power, it is from Jesus she holds it, 
 and with him she exercises it."^ 
 
 It is, therefore, to the greater 
 glory of the Man -God that the 
 Church here invokes the Blessed 
 Virgin as the Gate of Heaveii^ a title 
 
 ' St. John X. 9. *1 Tim. ii. 5, 6. 
 
 » St. John xiv. 6. » Ad Eustach. 
 * 1 Tim. iiL 15. « De excell. Virg., o. 12. 
 
 ' St. Matt. i. 23. 
 
 admirably adapted to that divine 
 Mother. Was it not through Mary 
 that heaven was, as it were, trans- 
 ported to earth, when she brought 
 amongst men him whose name sig- 
 nifies "God with U8?"^ for she had 
 " conceived him in her heart," says 
 St. Leo, " before she conceived him 
 in her womb."® Was it not by her 
 that "the goodness and kindness 
 of our Saviour God appeared"* in 
 human form, " Him who is the res- 
 urrection and the life,"^" and whose 
 triumphant ascension could alone 
 introduce into the mansions of bliss 
 even the holiest souls of those who 
 died before he " entered into his 
 glory?"" "Was it not for Mary," 
 says St. Augustine, " that God came 
 visibly on earth, so that by her men 
 might merit heaven ? " ^^ 
 
 And art thou not, " sweet Vir- 
 gin Mary,"^^ an all-powerful help to 
 those who seek thine aid, who hum- 
 bly entreat thee to help them to 
 procure admission into the regions 
 of bliss ? How justly did St. An- 
 selm say," that " it is by thee poor 
 
 * Serm; 1. de Nativ. Dom. " St. Luke xxiv. 26. 
 " Titus iii. 4. " Serm. 18 de tempore. 
 
 " St. John xi. 25. " Salve Begina. 
 
 " In medit. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 677 
 
 exiles are called to their eternal * 
 home ! " Thou dost enlighten, en- 
 courage, support them ; for thou art, 
 according to the immortal bishop 
 of Hippo, "the Mother of all the 
 faithful who are the members of 
 Jesus Christ, since thou by thy 
 charity hast co-operated in their 
 spiritual birth ;" ^ and if they did 
 not counteract, by their malice, the 
 powerful influence of thy benign 
 protection, thou wouldst happily 
 conduct them to the port of sal- 
 vation. It was this thought that 
 drew from St. Antoninus, after St. 
 Anselm, those remarkable words, 
 "As it is impossible that he from 
 whom thou turnest away thy merci- 
 ful eyes should be saved, so is it 
 certain that he for whom thou dost 
 intercede, shall obtain justification 
 and glory." ^ 
 
 If, then, we have hitherto endea- 
 vored to render ourselves pleasing 
 to the Blessed Virgin, let us rejoice 
 and bless the Lord " who inspires," 
 says St. John Damascene, "with a 
 tender devotion to Mary those whom 
 he predestines for salvation."^ Let 
 us joyfully raise our eyes to the 
 
 ' Lib. de sancta Virginit., c. 6. 
 ' De excellent. Virg., c. 11. 
 
 eternal paradise of pleasure : there 
 we shall see, not a cherub armed 
 with a fiery sword, forbidding our 
 approach, as of old at the gate of 
 Eden, but we shall have the conso- 
 lation to see a Mother, the sweetest, 
 the most tender, the most consider- 
 ate of mothers, constantly watching 
 us w^ith eyes of love, as we wend 
 our weary way through this same 
 valley of tears once marked by her 
 own blessed footsteps ; we shall see 
 her, with her hands stretched out 
 towards this place of exile and pro- 
 bation, inviting us to trust in her 
 protection, to do violence to our- 
 selves in order to gain that king- 
 dom^ which the blood of her divine 
 Son opened to our hopes and wishes. 
 If, hitherto, we have had the mis- 
 fortune either to forget Mary, or to 
 have for her only a feeble devotion, 
 too often belied by our works, let us 
 deplore our ungrateful coldness, and 
 tear the veil from our illusions. A 
 mother's mercy is great ; what, then, 
 must be the mercy of such a Mother 
 as Mary ! But let us, henceforward, 
 have a devotion for her worthy of 
 Jesus, whom we ought to love and 
 
 3 IV. Part., tit. 13, c. 14 
 * Oral, de Assumpt. 
 
678 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 glorify in Mary; worthy of Mary, * 
 whom our bretliren should learn to 
 love and glorify after "^he example 
 of those who call themselves her 
 servants. 
 
 The patriarch Jacob, seeing in a 
 dream a mysterious lad<ler, from the 
 top of which the Lord announced to 
 him the sublime destiny of his pos- 
 terity, cried out, in an ecstasy of 
 holy fear, " How terrible is this 
 place I this is no other but the 
 house of God and the gate of 
 heaven!"^ What shall we say of 
 thee, holy Virgin, with whom that 
 same God vouchsafed to contract 
 the ties of nature and of blood, 
 the closest and the sweetest! Ah I 
 thou art ever worthy of our respect- 
 ful fear, because of thine admirable 
 greatness. But the motherly ten- 
 derness with which thou dost " open 
 the doors of heaven, and rain down 
 in marvellous abundance the manna 
 of every grace,"' can only inspire 
 us with tilial confidence. It is with 
 that sweet feeling that we recognize 
 thee as " the true gate of the Lord, 
 by which the just enter ^ their eter- 
 nal rest,"* and by which we our- 
 
 ' Gen. xxviii. 17. 
 » Ps. Ixxvii 23 21 
 
 » Ps. cxvii. 20. 
 * Heb. iv. 10. 
 
 selves hope to enter. Pray, then, 
 for us, unworthy as we are. 
 
 Gate of Heaven, pray for us. 
 
 Janua Cod% ora pro nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION XLL 
 
 MORNING STAR, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 IMMORTKL Mornhig Star! divine 
 Mary ! thou art as grateful to 
 our eyes as thou art radiant and 
 sparkling. If thou dost not, like 
 the sun, shed torrents of light which 
 illumine, warm and fructify all na- 
 ture, thou shinest, at least, like the 
 star which heralds the approach of 
 that giant of the heavens ! ^ 
 
 But who can tell the beauty of 
 that new day which thou didst 
 announce to the earth, glorious 
 star of Jacob,^ who appeared on the 
 horizon of idolatrous humanity, " to 
 enlighten them who sat in the 
 shadow of death ? ^ "Who can paint 
 the happiness of the world in being 
 able to salute thee as the herald of 
 its deliverance, the august and holy 
 dawn of that adorable " sun of jus- 
 
 » Ps. xviii 6. « Numb. xxiv. 17. 
 
 ' St Luke L 79. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 679 
 
 tice,"^ who, after having, as it were, * 
 veiled his splendor in thy chaste 
 womb, manifested himself gloriously 
 to the eyes of men, diffusing on all 
 sides his radiant beams, giving to 
 those who were misled by error the 
 light of truth, communicating to the 
 unhappy " sons of death "^ the only 
 true life, that is, life everlasting ? 
 Star of salvation, thou didst shine 
 "as the sun when it shineth;"^ 
 thou art truly " the bright and 
 mornii*g star"* of that blessed day 
 when the w^orld beheld the rise of 
 the divine orb of its redemption and 
 ineffable regeneration! be thou 
 forever blessed by every heart and 
 by every tongue! for thou wert, 
 as it were, the inestimable pledge 
 of the reconciliation of earth and 
 heaven,^ of our sanctitication through 
 Christ,^ of our eternal salvation,^ of 
 our vocation to the kingdom and 
 glory of God.^ 
 
 And even now, is not that mys- 
 tical Morning Star the pledge of 
 our hopes, and of our salvation? 
 " Without Mary," says St. Bonaven- 
 ture, " what should we be, unfor- 
 tunate as we are ? what should 
 
 » Mai. iv. 2. 
 
 • 1 Kings xxvi. 16. 
 
 » Eccles. 1. 7. 
 * Apoc. xxii. 16. 
 
 become of us amid the darkness of 
 this world, w^ere we deprived of 
 her mild light?"* Alas! who knows 
 but there are perilous moments 
 when the light of faith appears 
 eclipsed by thoughts contrary to 
 her divine teachings ; moments 
 when we feel strongly inclined 
 towards what our will hates and 
 despises ; when the imagination 
 takes lire, and is induced to delight 
 in things which the soul abhors 
 when once the false charm is dis- 
 pelled and tranquillity returns ? 
 But if we then raise our suppliant 
 voice to that Star of Benediction, 
 she fails not to show her consoling 
 rays, and all is again quiet. Who 
 knows not, too, by sad experience, 
 that there are hours of bitter dis- 
 gust, of consuming weariness, of 
 dark and gloomy dejection, of pro- 
 found sadness, when the heart 
 seems ready to fail, if it be not 
 sustained by a supernatural pow- 
 er? But if, in those hours of 
 gloom and despondency, our fer- 
 vent sighs ascend to Mary, her 
 radiant brow speedily dispels the 
 storm, and restores us to ourselves ; 
 
 " Col. i. 20. « 1 Cor. i. 30. ■> Heb. v. 9. 
 
 « 1 Thess. ii. 12. » In Spec. B. M. V 
 
€80 
 
 MEDITATl NS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIIiOIN. 
 
 for " in all the tempests that assail 
 us hei*e below," says St Bernard, 
 "it suffices to regard that tutelary 
 Star, and we ai*e saved from ship- 
 wreck."» 
 
 Let us, then, fervently implore 
 the assistance of Mary; let us 
 entreat her to disperse " the powers 
 of darkness,'" as the first rays of 
 the orb of day drive back the wild 
 beaists to their dens f let us beseech 
 her to guide us safely over the 
 stormy sea of this life to the shore 
 of a happy eternity. She takes 
 pleasure in saving the mariner who 
 trusts in her protection ; and the 
 grateful mariner takes pleasure in 
 repeating to the winds and waves 
 the praises of "the Star of the 
 Sea." and singing, with enthusiasm, 
 the name of the Virgin of Safety, 
 the Virgin of the Watch, the Virgin 
 of Good Aid. Ah ! how much more 
 does the sweet Mary love to sus- 
 tain, to direct, to save, the pious 
 Christian who invokes her amid the 
 storms of the heart, the storms of 
 the mind, the storms of the senses ! 
 And we who have, perhaps very 
 often, been consoled by the cheer- 
 
 • HomiL guper Missus. * Ephes. vi. 12. 
 
 » Ps. dii. 22. 
 
 ing rays of that beloved Star, 
 how grateful and how faithful 
 should we be to our celestial bene- 
 factress, honoring her by a life pure 
 as the changeless beams of her 
 light I 
 
 Thou, sure refuge of the tem- 
 pest-tost mariner, Virgin ever help- 
 ing, shield us from the storms and 
 quicksands of this peiilous ocean 
 on which is launched the frail bark 
 that bears our eternity, happy or un- 
 happy. Heavy clouds, surcharged 
 with calamity, may lower above 
 us, but they shall never hide thee 
 from our loving eyes ! " Star ever 
 radiant, ever consoling, ever pro- 
 tecting ! following thy mild light, 
 we never go astray ; imploring 
 thee, we never lose hope ; with 
 thy support, we cannot fail ; under 
 thy shield, no more fear ; under 
 thy guidance, no more fatigue; 
 under thine auspices, we are sure 
 to gain the wished-for haven ;'^ and 
 as the sea-star guides the mariner 
 to the port, so dost thou conduct 
 Christians to glory." ^ Deign, then, 
 to work all these wonders, Mary, 
 on behalf of those who, in calm and 
 
 * S. Bernard. Horn. 2, sup. Misswi. 
 » S. Thomas, op. 8. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED, VIRGIN. 
 
 681 
 
 in storm, will always say to thee, 
 with tenderest love, 
 
 Morning Star, pray for us. 
 
 StMa Matutma, ora pro 7iobis, 
 
 MEDITATION XLH. 
 
 HEALTH OF THE WEAK, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 SUFFERINGS! they are the lot 
 of humanity. For one child of 
 Adam who advances lightly and 
 cheerily on the road of life, there 
 are a thousand w^ho drag their 
 lingering steps along, a prey to 
 disease or infirmity, more or less 
 painful, now sighing in sadness or 
 dejection, and again groaning aloud 
 in anguish. 
 
 But in the midst of this mournful 
 concert of human lamentations, 
 there is heard one name — a name 
 of sweetness and of majesty — a 
 name of strength and consolation 
 to the suffering Christian : and 
 that name, piously invoked, soothes 
 pain, restores strength, relieves and 
 even cures the most inveterate 
 evils, the most incurable maladies; 
 that name is the divine name of 
 Mary. And to whom, after Jesus, 
 
 f could the suffering Christian so fitly 
 apply ? Ah ! did not Mary learn to 
 pity while contemplating the long 
 and bitter sufferings of her adorable 
 Son on the ignominious tree? Did 
 she not, at the foot of the cross, 
 receive from his divine lips, as 
 an inalienable inheritance, all the 
 faithful, in the person of the be- 
 loved disciple?^ Has she not, ever 
 since, gathered us all, with ineffable 
 tenderness, into the sweet embrace 
 of her incomparable charity? . . . 
 And they who invoke that heavenly 
 Mother in their weakness, do they 
 not know that her power equals 
 her love? .... 
 
 It is only in certain places that 
 the devotion of nations has raised 
 monuments of gratitude and devo- 
 tion to other saints; but to Mary 
 it is all over the Christian world. 
 Who has not heard of those famous 
 shrines dedicated to that divine 
 Mother, and who has had the hap- 
 piness of visiting any of them, 
 without being piously moved by 
 the sight of the innumerable testi- 
 monials of corporal favors obtained 
 through her intercession ? . . . . In- 
 scriptions dictated by gratitude; 
 
 > St. John xix. 26. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 divers gifts offered at her altar; 
 buinau liuibs of gold or silver, laid 
 at her feet as ti'ophies of her power 
 over diseases which defeated the 
 ai*t of man ; wooden crutches which 
 had supported her supplicants as 
 they dragged their helpless limbs 
 to the holy place where they were 
 healed by her intercession, hung up 
 around the sacred walls, as a sim- 
 ple and touching homage to her 
 glory : oh I how eloquently do these 
 speak to faith! what lively confi- 
 dence they excite in her whom the 
 Church justly styles. Health of the 
 Weak! 
 
 Doubtless, she does not always 
 obtain for us what we ask, because 
 the accomplishment of our wishes, 
 far from being conducive to our 
 true happiness, which is that of the 
 other world, would be often preju- 
 dicial to it. But still that Mother of 
 grace becomes our health in infir- 
 mity ; still, if the suppliant heart 
 interposes no voluntary obstacle, 
 she obtains for it the grace to make 
 its sufferings available to salvation ; 
 she clothes it with patience and 
 fortitude, fills it with resignation 
 and tranquillity, duiing the long, 
 sleepless nights and wearisome 
 
 f days ; still does she penetrate it 
 with the sentiment which animated 
 the holy man Job when he exclaim- 
 ed, " That this may be my comfort, 
 that, afflicting me with sorrow, he 
 spare me not in this place of proba- 
 tion, nor I contradict the words of 
 the Holy One I " ^ And when, at the 
 appointed time, the last hour ar- 
 rives, to them who suffer under the 
 auspices of Mary, it is neither ter- 
 rifying nor torturing, but peaceful 
 and serene, like the joyful transition 
 from the toil of battle to the reward 
 of victory, from " this valley of 
 tears "^ to that magnificent kingdom 
 where " God himself shall wipe 
 away all tears from their eyes."'' 
 
 Let us, then, apply, with entire 
 confidence, to the Blessed Virgin, 
 in all the corporal ailments where- 
 with God permits us to be afflicted ; 
 and let us never fail to solicit her 
 intercession with the adorable Jesus, 
 remembering those words of St. Ber- 
 nard : " God has given her absolute 
 power in heaven and on earth ; he 
 has placed in her hands our life and 
 death."* Let us specially implore 
 her for our last moments, and, hi 
 
 • Job vL 10. 
 » Sdv. Beg. 
 
 * Apoc. vii. 17. 
 
 * Serm. 1, sup. salve. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 683 
 
 order to make sure of her powerful 
 succor at that decisive moment, let 
 us " die daily," ^ that is to say, let 
 us spend every day as though it 
 were to be our last. 
 
 Thou whose tender heart might 
 say with still more justice than the 
 great Apostle, " "Who is weak, and I 
 am not weak ? " ^ praises be to thee 
 for that thou dost so often, arid in 
 such an admirable manner, display 
 thy power for the relief or the cure 
 of our corporal sufferings. Ah! thou 
 art for all of us a never-failing re- 
 source, whilst the pool of Bethesda 
 healed only at times, and none but 
 the one favored person who first 
 went into it after its waters had 
 been troubled by the Angel of the 
 Lord.^ "We bless thy divine Son 
 for that " a virtue goes out from 
 thee^ and heals all;"^ and we be- 
 seech thee to manifest it especially 
 for us at that dread and final hour 
 when we are about to enter upon 
 eternity. 
 
 sweet Virgin, who " vouchsafes 
 to receive with maternal kindness 
 the last sigh of him who confidently 
 commends himself to thee,"^ grant 
 
 ^ 1 Cor. XV. 31. « 2 Cor. xL 29. 
 
 » St. John V. 4. 
 
 that, at our last moment, we may 
 experience, in all its extent, the 
 efiicacy of that pious invocation of 
 the Church: 
 
 Health of the "Weak, pray for 
 us. 
 
 Salus Infirmorum, ora pro nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION XLHI. 
 
 REFUGE OF SINNERS, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 IT is in the natui'e of man to have 
 a great apprehension of appear- 
 ing before him whom he knows he 
 has offended, even were it to tes- 
 tify his repentance and solicit for- 
 giveness ; this is especially the case 
 if the ofi'ender be much inferior, and 
 has shown himself very ungrateful 
 towards a generous benefactor. Ah! 
 what relief, what consolation for 
 him, when a common friend, a de- 
 voted, influential friend, comes for- 
 ward to mediate and to facilitate 
 the reconciliation. 
 
 But if it be the mother of the 
 injured benefactor who presents her- 
 self as a mediatrix, who deigns to 
 
 « St. Luke vL 19 
 
 ' S. Jerome, ep. 2 ad Eustoch. 
 
684 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE lATANY OF THE BLESSED VIROTN. 
 
 intercede with a son full of tender- 
 ness for her, what joy 1 what hap- 
 piness ! 
 
 Sinners, whosoever you be, ble'ss 
 the divine Mary, who comes, with 
 marvellous goodness, to place her- 
 self between you and her adorable 
 Son. whose incomparable blessings, 
 whose infinite love you have over- 
 looked, whose supreme majesty you 
 have audaciously offended. Ah I 
 undoubtedly you are but too guilty 
 towards him. Were you only to 
 regard the Saviour-God whom you 
 have, alas I so grievously offended, 
 would you not be tempted to fly 
 "from the wrath of the Lamb,"^ 
 from " the avenging lion of the tribe 
 of Juda,"^ and cast yourself head- 
 long into the gulf of despair ? But 
 behold ! his august Mother looks 
 tpon you with eyes of sweetness 
 and compassion ; she recalls, on 
 your behalf, the days when the 
 Man-God lay a babe in her arms, 
 thereby rendering her, as it were, 
 the depository of the infinite treas- 
 ure of his graces. Take courage, 
 then, were you a thousand times 
 more guilty; she is powerful enough 
 
 ' Apoc. vi 16. 
 * Apoc Y. 6. 
 
 f to obtain your pardon, and she is 
 well disposed to ask it. 
 
 Can she be ignorant of all the 
 ineffable compassion of her divine 
 Son for the helpless children of 
 Adam, the wretched slaves of sin? 
 Ah ! no one on earth ever manifest- 
 ed so tender an interest in them as 
 Jesus : he even went so far with it 
 that his enemies made it a subject 
 of reproach and accusation.^ But 
 dM not his sweet Mother participate 
 his sentiments more intimately than 
 any other creature ? and, ascending 
 to heaven, did she not carry with 
 her to that blessed abode that heart 
 always so good, so sensibly inter- 
 ested for the salvation of souls, re- 
 deemed by blood which she knows 
 to be beyond all price ? " Her 
 mercy," says St. Bonaventure, " did 
 but increase with her glory; now 
 that she reigns with Jesus, that 
 compassion of hers is so much the 
 greater, as she sees more clearly the 
 unhappy state of men"* who dis- 
 regard the admirable mystery of 
 redemption. 
 
 Hence it is that the holy doctors, 
 speaking of her compassionate kind- 
 
 » St. Matt. ix. 11 ; St. Luke vii 34 
 < In SpecuL. B. V., c. 5. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 685 
 
 ness to sinners, extol it beyond 
 measure. St. Ephraim calls her 
 ''the most powerful resource of all 
 sinners, the sure haven of all who 
 have suffered shipwreck."^ "Thou 
 art their only hope, Mary!" ex- 
 claims St. Augustine.^ "I consent to 
 speak no more of thy mercy," says 
 St. Bernard, " if ever any one could 
 say that he asked it in vain ! "^ 
 " Mary I " cries St. Bonaventure, 
 " the sinner, were he even the out- 
 cast of the world, is never reject- 
 ed by thee ; but thou dost welcome 
 him with maternal kindness, and 
 quittest him not till thou hast recon- 
 ciled him to his dreadful Judge!"* 
 Admiration, praise, eternal bene- 
 diction to that God who has left 
 such an asylum for the miserable 
 transgressor of his laws ! Confi- 
 dence, boundless, unfailing confi- 
 dence in Mary, whether we beseech 
 her to obtain forgiveness for our 
 sins, the conversion of our brethren, 
 or the cure of our spiritual infir- 
 mities. Confidence, once more, in 
 Mary, when discouragement or even 
 despair threatens to destroy our good 
 
 > De Laudib. B. V. 
 
 « Serm. de Annunciat. 
 
 » Serm. de Assumpt. * In Psalt. 
 
 resolutions and our virtuous incli- 
 nations ; let us, therefore, exclaim 
 with the Church, "Hail, holy Queen ! 
 Mother of mercy ! our life ! our 
 sweetness! and our hope!"^ 
 
 As the Apostle St. Peter saw, in 
 a vision, a vast number of unclean 
 creatures purified by the power of 
 God and taken up to heaven,® so 
 do we see, Mary, with admira- 
 tion, a multitude of souls defiled by 
 sin, converted through thy interces- 
 sion, cleansed from their sins, and 
 "brought to the haven of eternal 
 salvation." ^ Ah ! thou art truly, for 
 the greatest sinners, a more secure 
 asylum than was the fortress of 
 Bethsura for the Jews of old " who 
 had forsaken the law ;" ^ surer than 
 the altar of which Adonias " took 
 hold" in order to escape the ven- 
 geance of King Solomon.^ Many 
 and many a time might the just 
 Judge, appeased by thy mediation, 
 say to thee as David said to Abi- 
 gail : " Thou hast kept me to-day 
 from coming to blood, and reveng- 
 ing me with my own hand."^° How 
 often hast thou deigned to " be 
 
 * Scdv. Beg. 
 ' Acts X. 
 ' Ps. cvi. 30. 
 
 » 1 Mac. X. 14. 
 » 3 Kings i. 50. 
 "> 1 Kings XXV. 3a 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIROIN. 
 
 mindful of" the little acts of hom- 
 age done thee by those who might 
 well be likened to the sinful "Ra- 
 hab, or the children of Babylon,"^ 
 and saved them from the gulf of 
 perdition. Multiply, Mary! mul- 
 tiply unceasingly these instances of 
 thine admirable goodness to so 
 many poor, misguided sinners, who 
 are hastening to everlasting destruc- 
 tion; they are, by the close bonds 
 of Christian charity, as it were, 
 " members of ourselves," ' and hence 
 it is that we say to thee. 
 
 Refuge of Sinners, pray for us. 
 
 Refugium peccatorum, orapro Twbis. 
 
 MEDITATION XLIV. 
 
 COMFORT OF THE AFFLICTED, PRAY 
 FOR US. 
 
 WHERE are the souls without 
 affliction, hearts without an- 
 guish, or eyes without tears ? This 
 world is for man but a school of 
 misfortune, where he must learn to 
 rise to God, to humble himself be- 
 fore him, to pray to him, and to 
 aspire to a better world, to the 
 
 Ps. IxxxvL 4. 
 
 » 1 Cor. xii. 27. 
 
 * felicity of heaven ; and to all the 
 many sorrows of life is added the 
 natural horror of death, which is, 
 nevertheless, inevitable, and, meet- 
 ing us at every turn under divers 
 forms, seems to say, "Your turn 
 shall soon come." Ah I if we only 
 considered the griefs, the cruel de- 
 ceptions, the profound sorrows, the 
 inconsolable mournings, the heart- 
 rending cares, known to God alone, 
 should we not be tempted to ex- 
 claim, in the words of Bossuet, " Sad 
 it is that we must live ! " 
 
 But for us. Christians, God, in his 
 admirable goodness, has deigned to 
 prepare, side by side with these 
 troubles, an inexhaustible source of 
 ineffable consolation : it is the heart 
 of Mary — a heart full of compas- 
 sion ; the heart of a Mother, such as 
 never was or never shall be here 
 below; the heart of a Mother who 
 identifies herself with her children, 
 who in some measure forgets herself 
 to "weep with them that weep,"^ 
 and to relieve, by the most tender 
 attentions, the various ills where- 
 with they are afflicted. 
 
 Mary ! what a precious gift art 
 thou from God to us, who mourn 
 
 * Bom. xii. 15. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON TEE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 687 
 
 and weep in this valley of tears.^ 
 Beloved Mother, the very remem- 
 brance of thee is enough to lighten 
 the load of sori'ow which oppresses 
 the heart, to assuage the bitterness 
 with which it is filled to overflow- 
 ing, to heal its most inveterate and 
 most painful wounds ! Thou wert 
 thyself so grievously afflicted, thou 
 so holy, thou the august Mother of 
 our God ; thou hadst to drain a 
 chalice far beyond all human power 
 to bear ; thou wert plunged into an 
 ocean of inconceivable affliction I 
 And yet, even in thy greatest ex- 
 tremity, thou wert so calm, so re- 
 signed, so entirely given up to the 
 divine will. Where is the sinner 
 (and wo are all sinners) that does 
 not feel relieved in his affliction, 
 seeing that thou, notwithstanding 
 thine innocence, hadst to bear the 
 full measure of human grief, and to 
 undergo the most excruciating tor- 
 tures ? Who is there, besides, that 
 does not feel a sentiment of pious 
 consolation, thinking of all thy ma- 
 ternal tenderness for us, thy lively 
 sympathy, thy devotion, thine ever- 
 active and compassionate charity? 
 
 ' Lamentations of Jeremias, ii. 18. 
 
 » Cant. iv. 11. » Cant. ii. 13, 14. 
 
 Yes, our divine Mother has fot 
 us, unhappy as we are, an expan- 
 sive and benevolent tenderness be- 
 yond our reach of comprehension. 
 The celestial Spouse compares the 
 sweetness, the gentleness expressed 
 in all her words while on earth, 
 to every thing sweetest in nature. 
 " Thy lips," says he, " are as a drop- 
 ping honeycomb, honey and milk 
 are under thy tongue." ^ And, else- 
 where, wishing to excite our admi- 
 ration of Mary's ravishing sweet- 
 ness, he is, as it were, captivated 
 by it himself. "Arise, my love, my 
 beautiful one, and come, let thy 
 voice sound in my ears, for thy 
 voice is sweet." ^ Hence St. Ber- 
 nard might well say that " she was 
 all benignity, all goodness, that she 
 made herself all to all, and showed 
 unto all a superabundant charity."* 
 " Mary ! " exclaims that holy doc- 
 tor, "0 Mother, inexpressibly ami- 
 able, still and always does thy 
 name penetrate the heart with a 
 holy emanation of that divine sweet- 
 ness wherewith the Loxd enriched 
 thy fair soul !"' " No, no," adds St. 
 Antoninus, " there is not one among 
 
 ♦ Serm. de Verbis Apoc. Signum magnum. 
 
 • Serm. Paneg. B M. V. 
 
688 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 the saints in heaven who compas- 
 sionates our miseries like that bless- 
 ed Virgin Mary."^ 
 
 Let us then apply to that heaven- 
 ly comfoi-ter in all our troubles, es- 
 j)eciaHy our spiritual troubles; let 
 us pour them forth into her mater- 
 nal heart; she will not betray our 
 confidence, for " she is the sweetest 
 relief for anguish," says St. John 
 Damascene, "the surest remedy for 
 moral sufferings." ' 
 
 Who could measure, blessed 
 Virgin, "the breadth, and length, 
 and height, and depth"' of thy mer- 
 ciful goodness ! " From thine in- 
 fancy mercy grew up with thee, and 
 it came out with thee from thy 
 Mother's womb ;" * it was for men, 
 he/ore the foundation of the Church, 
 like the morning-star in, the clouds ; 
 after^ like the full-orbed moon ; and 
 since thou hast ascended to heaven, 
 it has shone with all the splendor 
 of the glorious sun. Thou whom 
 we love to call, after God, " the com- 
 fort of our life,'* our hope in the day 
 of affliction,"^ thou whom the Lord 
 employs to change our grief and 
 mourning into joy, as he formerly 
 
 » p. 4, t. 15, c 2. » Orat 2 de Dormit. Deip. 
 » Ephes. iii. 18. 
 
 f made use of the pious Esther to 
 succor and console his people, be 
 also our support in our sufferings 
 and our desolation ! "We will ap- 
 proach thee, Mary, with that lively 
 faith, that sincere piety, which ought 
 to distinguish thy true servants. 
 Grant always that sighs and tears, 
 sorrow, and suffering, and tribula- 
 tion, may be profitable to all who 
 say to thee, in the fullness of their 
 filial affection. 
 
 Comfort of the Afflicted, pray 
 FOR us. 
 
 Consolatrix Affllctorum, ora pro 
 nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION XLV. 
 
 HELP OF CHRISTIANS, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 THOU wert, in every age, 
 Mary, the succor, the protect- 
 ing arm of thy Son's disciples, and 
 the Church their mother; but this 
 was especially the case on certain 
 memorable occasions when all seem- 
 ed to conspire for the annihilation 
 of the admirable work of the divine 
 Jesus ! 
 
 * Job xxxi. 18. » Tobias x. 4. 
 
 « Jerem. xviL 17. 
 

 ITliWYOKK, D. k J SAiLIER A CO 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 689 
 
 Islamism, in the sixteenth cen- 
 tury, threatened to invade Europe 
 and destroy Christianity. A for- 
 midable fleet sailed proudly into 
 the Gulf of Lepanto, under the 
 ensign of the Crescent; the ships 
 of the faithful, though inferior in 
 number, hesitated not to range 
 themselves before them in battle 
 array, trusting in thy protection, 
 and Juan of Austria, their chief, 
 made a vow to visit, in person, 
 thine august sanctuary of Loretto. 
 Meanwhile, the city of Rome re- 
 sounded with the solemn and public 
 singing of the Rosary, intended to 
 propitiate thee on behalf of the 
 Catholic arms. On a sudden, the 
 holy Pope, Pius Y., cries out, under 
 thine inspiration, "The Christian 
 fleet has conquered !".... And so 
 it had ; ofiicial news speedily ar- 
 rived announcing the entire defeat 
 of the Mussulmans ; and, in memory 
 of such a magnificent testimony of 
 thy protection, the same holy Pon- 
 tiff added to the Litany which we 
 all so love to repeat in thy honor, 
 that new invocation. Help of Chris- 
 tians^ pray for us ! . . . . Often since 
 then, glorious Queen, hast thou 
 vouchsafed to manifest thy protect- 
 
 * ing care of thy people in a manner 
 equally striking. 
 
 Under the walls of Vienna, in the 
 seventeenth century, two hundred 
 and thirty thousand Turkish soldiers 
 were put to flight by a Christian 
 army incomparably less numerous. 
 This took place within the octave 
 of thy Nativity, and on the very 
 day when solemn supplications 
 were offered up, in the city of 
 Munich, to Mary the Help of Chris- 
 tians. The honor of that brilliant 
 victory was referred to thee by the 
 conqueror himself, who, on the 
 morning of the action, having as- 
 sisted at the holy sacrifice and 
 participated in the divine myste- 
 ries, had encouraged his officers by 
 promising them the assistance of 
 Heaven through thine intercession. 
 Thirty years after, the Emperor 
 Charles YL obtains a signal victory 
 over the same enemies of the Chris- 
 tian name, on the day when thy 
 protection, divine Yirgin, was 
 solemnly invoked for him in Rome I 
 and, very soon after, on the octave- 
 day of thy glorious Assumption, 
 Corfu hails thee with joyful accla- 
 mations for having put to flight the 
 infidels by whom it was besieged. 
 
690 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 Admirable series of victories gain- 
 ed over the Crescent by Mary's 
 assistance! They shall live for- 
 ever in the grateful hearts of the 
 faithful, who owe her the conso- 
 lation of celebrating, every year, 
 the solemnity of the holy Rosary 
 throughout the whole extent of the 
 Catholic world! 
 
 But that was not enough for the 
 glory of tlie Blessed Virgin I Provi- 
 dence had oi*dained that her title 
 of Help of Christians should be con- 
 secrated by a special festival. Dur- 
 ing his long and arduous struggle 
 against the most formidable prince 
 and captain of modern times, Pius 
 VII. had never ceased to invoke 
 that heavenly Help, His confidence 
 was not betrayed. Napoleon, that 
 mighty Colossus, fell ; the venerable 
 old man returned in triumph to the 
 Eternal City, and he decreed that 
 the annivei-sary of that joyful day 
 should be solemnized by the special 
 feast of Our Lady, the Help of Chris- 
 tians. 
 
 Yes, the constant, the powerful, 
 the universal Help of Christians! 
 Help against the might of armies ; 
 help against the oppression of polit- 
 ical power; help against persecu- 
 
 * tions; help against all the storms 
 that hell can raise around the 
 Church of God on earth, and which 
 tend to retard her precious con- 
 quests, to diminish the number of 
 the faithful, to draw multitudes of 
 souls to destruction. Let us every 
 day invoke, with new fervor, the 
 Help of Christians^ that she may 
 vouchsafe to avert all these dan- 
 gers. But let us also supplicate 
 her for ourselves, that we may be 
 confirmed in faith and in virtue; 
 that we may prevail over the scan- 
 dals of every kind by which we are 
 surrounded ; for it is written, " Let 
 him who stands, take heed lest he 
 fall."^ Let us, then, have recourse 
 to her with all the confidence she 
 deserves. "All is subject to her 
 control," says St. Antoninus.^ " Thy 
 name alone is omnipotent, after 
 God," exclaims St. Bonaventurel^ 
 Mary I " invincible shield " * of 
 Christians, who hast so wonderfully 
 manifested thy protection, to thee, 
 still more than to Judith, it belongs 
 to say, " Wo be to the nation that 
 riseth up against my people : for 
 the Lord Almighty will take revenge 
 
 • 1 Cor. X. 12, 
 » Serm. 6L 
 
 ' In Can.. 4. 
 * Wisdom V. 20. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 691 
 
 on them."^ Eternal glory be to 
 thee for having " broken," in our 
 behalf, "the powers of bows, the 
 shield, the sword, and the battle," ^ 
 and for having given us such con- 
 soling motives for trusting in thee 
 against all the enemies of God's 
 children and of his holy Church. 
 With her we love to say, " Vouch- 
 safe to assist those who groan under 
 the weight of their misery; deign to 
 animate the slothful, to strengthen 
 the weak, to console the afflicted. 
 Vouchsafe to pray for all Christian 
 people, to intercede for the clergy, 
 and for the devout female sex. Let 
 all the faithful feel the effects of 
 th}^ powerful succor, but especially 
 those who are mindful of thee,"^ 
 and implore thee with a sweet and 
 filial confidence. 
 
 Help of Christians, pray for us. 
 
 Auxilium Christianorum^ ora pro 
 nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION XLYL 
 
 QUEEN OF ANGELS, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 L 
 
 ET US rise on the wings of faith 
 to that immortal country where 
 
 t God himself is the infinite reward of 
 the just,* and renders to every man 
 according to his works.^ What 
 shall we see there ? The thrones 
 of pontiffs, martyrs, apostles, proph- 
 ets, patriarchs, and @ur eyes will 
 contemplate with delight, with ec- 
 stacy, that vision of grandeur and 
 glory. But in vain would we look 
 for Mary there. Let us go still 
 higher, even up to the choirs of 
 angels ; the cherubim, the sera- 
 phim, all those " thousands of thou- 
 sands"^ of pure spirits who shine 
 before "the holy of holies"^ like 
 changeless suns ; is it there that 
 the Virgin by excellence enjoys her 
 beatitude? No, no, higher, higher 
 still. Above angels and archangels, 
 near the throne of the glorified 
 Man-God, another throne will meet 
 our dazzled eyes, another throne 
 only lower than that of Jesus, and 
 loftier than those of all the heav- 
 enly powers ; and on that throne 
 sits a daughter of Eve invested with 
 glory only less than that of Jesus, 
 but richer, more entrancing than 
 that of even the highest angels of 
 the heavenly hierarchy ; it is the 
 
 » Judith xvi. 20. » Ps. Ixxv. 4. 
 
 * Sancta Maria, Succurre miseris, etc. 
 
 * Gen. XV. 1. 
 
 » St. Matt. xvi. 27. 
 
 * Dan. vii. 10. 
 ' Dan. ix. 24 
 
692 
 
 ME.)ITJTIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 most Blessed Virgin, the Creator's 
 masterpiece, the Queen of Angels. 
 
 "She is, in fact," says St. Epi- 
 phanius, "above all beings, except 
 God alone." * " Her dignity as 
 Mother of the Creator," says St. John 
 Damascene, "makes her the Queen 
 of all creatures."^ "She who is en- 
 titled to call God her Son," exclaims 
 St Bernaixi, "must necessarily be 
 superior to all the choirs of angels. 
 Ah! do homage, ye heavenly spir- 
 its, to the Mother of your divine 
 King, ye who adore the blessed fruit 
 of our beloved Virgin's womb!"' 
 •• Jesus," says St. Antoninus, " has 
 placed on her head a diadem of 
 glory and magnificence, which makes 
 the angels themselves subject to this 
 divine Queen."* 
 
 And was it not this future great- 
 ness and glory of the Blessed Virgin 
 that the Archangel Gabriel honored 
 beforehand, when he saluted her 
 with so much veneration, and in 
 terms so pompous and magnificent ? 
 Veneration and honor lawfully due 
 to her who was to be invested with 
 the admirable quality of beloved 
 
 * De Landib. Virg. 
 
 * Lib. 4 Fidei orthod., c. 15. 
 
 * HoiL.il. super Missus est. 
 
 Daughter of the Eternal Father, be- 
 loved Mother of the Son, beloved 
 Spouse of the Holy Ghost, and who 
 was to be raised by her divine 
 maternity above all the powers of 
 earth and heaven. Moreover, how 
 could the celestial messenger fail to 
 recognize " his Queen in her whom 
 he saluted as Mother of his divine 
 King ?"^ And if the angels are in- 
 finitely inferior to the human nature 
 of the Incarnate Word, for St. Paul 
 says, " To which of the angels hath 
 God said at any time, Thou art 
 my Son, this day have I begotten 
 thee?"^ why should they not be in- 
 ferior to lier who could likewise say 
 to that same Jesus, Thou art my 
 Son,^ I bore thee in my " womb, and 
 nourished thee?"® 
 
 But who then is this creature of 
 such exalted dignity, before whom 
 the angels bow down penetrated 
 with respect and admiration, this 
 creature whom they hasten to serve, 
 repeating in a transport of holy joy, 
 " Rule thou eternally over us and thy 
 
 Son ?"^ Ah ! it is the humble 
 
 daughter of Anne and Joachim, it 
 
 * Serm. de Assumpt. 
 
 » St Athan., Serm. de Deip. 
 
 • Heb. i. 5. 
 
 ' Heb. i. 5. 
 
 » 2 Mac. vii. 27. 
 
 » Judg. viii. 22 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 693 
 
 is the obscure Virgin once betrothed * 
 to a poor mechanic ; it is the piti- 
 able young Mother who found in 
 Bethlehem only a stable, a crib, a 
 little straw whereon to place her 
 new-born infant, who was forced to 
 fly her native land and take refuge 
 in a strange country to save the 
 precious life of her adorable child, 
 who lived always simple, always 
 hidden, even after the glorious re- 
 surrection and ascension of her di- 
 vine Son. The way to glory, solid 
 glory, the only glory worthy the 
 name, eternal glory, is, then, the 
 way of humility in this world. To 
 be little in the eyes of others, little 
 in one's own eyes, and great before 
 the Lord, by a simple, unostenta- 
 tious virtue, this is the precious 
 secret which Mary teaches us by 
 her life, as Jesus teaches it by his 
 divine precepts and his divine ex- 
 ample, as he remains ever before 
 our eyes in the ineffable mystery of 
 the Eucharist. Let us imitate him, 
 let us imitate his divine Mother, 
 and humble ourselves that we may 
 be eternally exalted.^ 
 
 > St. Matt, xxiii. 12. 
 
 "Hail, O Queen of Heaven enthroned, 
 Hail, by angels mistress own'd ! " * 
 
 What is there, after God, so great 
 as thee, who received infinite ma- 
 jesty into thy womb, thee whom 
 that infinite majesty vouchsafed to 
 obey ! " Miracle on both sides," 
 justly observes St. Bernard. "In 
 the Son a miracle of humility, in 
 the Mother a miracle of greatness 
 and elevation!"^ Mary! Queen 
 of Angels, vouchsafe to be mindful 
 of thy servants on earth, look down 
 on them with pitying love and kind- 
 ness, as .afflicted brethren, unfortu- 
 nate children. Deign to assist us, 
 to keep us ever in the way of sal- 
 vation, till the moment of our final 
 departure from this world of trial ; 
 vouchsafe to send our angels to visit 
 and console us if we aj-e condemned 
 by divine justice to the temporary 
 fire of expiation, and plead for us 
 that we may be speedily admitted 
 into heaven. May we merit these 
 inestimable favors by constantly 
 saying with sincere devotion: 
 
 Queen of Angels, pray for us. 
 
 Regina Angelorum, ora pro nobis 
 
 * Hymn Ave, Beg. cad. ' Homil. 1 sup. Missus est. 
 
eM 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIBOIN. 
 
 MEDITATION XLYH. 
 
 QUEKN OP PATRliUlCHS, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 ON earth, the holy patriarchs 
 had "saluted from afar"* with 
 a lively faith, a sweet and firm 
 hope, that wondrous woman whom 
 the Loi"d had announced, in the be- 
 ginning, as about to bring forth the 
 Saviour of the world. In heaven 
 they offered her, with unequalled 
 joy, the tribute of their love and 
 veneration, as having, through Our 
 Lord Jesus Christ, introduced them 
 "into the everlasting dwellings."^ 
 
 Fii-st, it is Adam who admires 
 and blesses in Mary the new Eve, 
 the true "Mother of all the living,"' 
 whose heel has crushed the head of 
 the infernal serpent,* the seducer of 
 the first Eve; she whose divine Son 
 came to repair the primitive fall in 
 80 marvellous a manner that the 
 Church cries out in the fervor of her 
 gratitude, " happy transgression ! 
 which obtained for us a Redeemer 
 so great and so admirable!"^ 
 
 After Adam, Noah, chosen to be 
 the second fathw of mankind, doom- 
 
 * ed to perish' in the Deluge, contem- 
 plates with delight her whom the 
 Church calls " our life and our 
 hope ;"* Abraham, who did not hesi- 
 tate to sacrifice to God his only son, 
 on whose life naturally depended 
 the existence of the people destined 
 to bring forth the Messiah, Abra- 
 ham honors and praises with trans- 
 port the Mother of the adorable only 
 Son of whom Isaac was the symbol,^ 
 and in whom " all the nations of the 
 earth have been blessed,"^ accord- 
 ing to the promises of God. Then 
 it is Jacob who celebrates the glory 
 of that excellent Virgin, of whom 
 was born on earth "the salvation 
 of the Lord,"^ the object of his most 
 ardent wishes. Again, it is Joseph, 
 the Saviour of Egypt,^" who renders 
 solemn homage to the Mother of 
 " the Saviour of the world," " whose 
 sanctity, sufferings, and glory were 
 so admirably prefigured by his own 
 innocence, misfortunes, and subse- 
 quent elevation ; Moses, too, admires 
 and extols her who has since given 
 to the world " the divine Prophet, 
 like unto him;"^'^ like him, legislator, 
 
 ' Heb. xi 13. 
 
 • St Luko xvL 9. 
 
 * Gen. iii 20. 
 
 * Gen. iii. 15. 
 
 » Rom. Miss., Holy Sat 
 
 • Salv. Reg. 
 
 •> Heb. xi. 19. 
 
 • Gen. xxii. 17, 18. 
 
 » Gen. xlix. 18. 
 
 " Gen. xli. 45. 
 »' St John iv. 42. 
 " Deut xviii 15, 18. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 695 
 
 miracle-worker, and liberator; in a 
 word, all " the chief fathers and 
 heads " of the elect of the Lord, now 
 happy inhabitants of the heavenly 
 Jerusalem,^ all delight to acknowl- 
 edge that it is through her the im- 
 mortal diadem encircles their radi- 
 ant brow, crying to her forever : 
 " Thy dominion is of truth, and 
 meekness, and justice ; and thy 
 right hand shall conduct thee won- 
 derfully I "^ 
 
 But what was it that merited 
 for them this inestimable crown ? 
 Their fidelity to God, their faith in 
 the future Redeemer, and their de- 
 sire to "see his day,"^ — fidelity, 
 faith, desire, which had attained the 
 highest degree of perfection in the 
 soul of the Blessed Virgin before 
 she was favored with the blissful 
 embassy from above. If, for in- 
 stance, the faith and fidelity of 
 Abraham were little less than mir- 
 aculous, how must it be with Mary, 
 elevated so high in heaven above 
 that holy patriarch, in heaven where 
 each takes precedence according to 
 his merit ! If Abraham so longed 
 to see the coming of Christ, how 
 
 ' 1 Paral. viii. 28. 
 « Ps. xliv. 5 
 
 ' St. John viii. 56. 
 * Orat. 6, in S. Deip. 
 
 intense must have been that same 
 desire in the soul of her of whom 
 St. Proclus said, that " no patriarch 
 could in any way be compared to 
 her!'"^ 
 
 For us, ineffable happmess I 
 we have not to desire, we have but 
 to enjoy ; we have not only the 
 sweet consolation of hope, but the 
 delicious fruit of reality. Jesus 
 came "from heaven;^ he hath visited 
 the earth f^^ he hath enlightened, 
 sanctified, and saved it, endowed it 
 with gifts the most magnificent, and 
 spiritual resources the most pre- 
 cious. Still more, he has fixed his 
 dwelling "in this valley of tears," ^ 
 which would have been but too 
 highly favored by possessing him 
 
 for some years, nay, moments 
 
 Alas ! and we are regardless of his 
 continual and adorable presence ; 
 and we neglect to visit that divine 
 guest, who seems to forget himself, 
 and to make it "to delight to be 
 with the children of men!"^ Oh I 
 might it not be truly said of us 
 what John the Baptist said of the 
 Jews, contemporaries of the divine 
 Jesus: "There standeth one in the 
 
 « St. John iii. 13. 
 « St. Luke i. 78. 
 
 ' Salv. Reg. 
 
 « Prov. viii. 31. 
 
me 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 midst of you, whom you know not ; 
 the latchet of whose shoe I am not 
 worthy to loose I" ^ 
 
 Mary I " sweet hope of the pa- 
 triarchs,"^ who didst possess in a 
 manner so intimate Him who was 
 their "desire," make us appreciate 
 the infinite happiness that we en- 
 joy in possessing Him ourselves, 
 together with all the graces of 
 which he is the inexhaustible 
 source. As the Messiah to come 
 had been the centre of thy most 
 ardent wishes, so the Messiah, when 
 he did come, was the centre of all 
 thine afifections; and he has been, 
 under thine auspices, the only ob- 
 ject of the love and devotion of 
 those illustrious founders of religious 
 ordei"s known in the Church as the 
 Patriarchs of the New Testament. 
 May it be so with us, divine 
 Mother! May our faith especially 
 become so lively, that we may 
 clearly see and sensibly feel that, 
 by the adorable mystery of the con- 
 tinual presence of Jesus on our 
 altai-s, "earth becomes a heaven,"* 
 and that the holy Eucharist ought 
 to be the chief object of our 
 
 • St John i. 26, 27. 
 
 • St Ephraim, de Laudib. B. V. 
 
 * thoughts, desires, and affections! 
 In order that we may faithfully dis- 
 charge this pious duty to the glory 
 of thy divine Son, 
 
 Queen of Patriarchs, pray for 
 us. 
 
 Regina Patriarcharum, ora pro 
 nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION" XLYIH. 
 
 QUEEN OF PROPHETS, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 LIVING prodigies of supernatu- 
 ral knowledge, the prophets of 
 old drew the most perfect picture 
 of the Messiah, many ages before- 
 hand. "The most ancient made, 
 as it were, the first sketch; those 
 who came after them successively 
 finished the imperfect work of their 
 predecessors. The nearer they came 
 to the event, the more lively became 
 their colors ; " and when the picture 
 was completed, the last, as he with- 
 drew, pointed out the holy Precur- 
 sor who was to say, 'Behold the 
 Lamb of God who taketh away the 
 sins of the world!'"* 
 
 » S. Chrys., Homil. 24, in 1 Cor. 
 
 * Letters of M. Drack, a converted Babbin. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 697 
 
 But while painting the several * 
 stages of the Saviour's mortal life, 
 the divers characters of his person 
 and ministry, the marvellous fruits 
 of his mission, could they not per- 
 ceive the august Mother of the Man- 
 God, that admirable daughter of 
 Eve, whose glorious co-operation in 
 the salvation of the world had been 
 announced by the Lord himself at 
 the very beginning?^ 
 
 Ah ! undoubtedly the sweet and 
 majestic figure of Mary must often 
 have made their hearts throb as 
 they wrote the prophetic history of 
 her divine Son ; how often must this 
 have been the case with David,^ 
 with Ezechiel,^ with Isaiah,^ who 
 were favored with special revela- 
 tions of the greatness of the Virgin- 
 Mother I 
 
 Now that they behold her glory 
 unveiled, in the mansions of eternal 
 bliss, now that they see her crowned 
 " as universal sovereign of every 
 creature,"^ how joyfully do they 
 render homage to their heavenly 
 Queen ! how profoundly do they 
 venerate the excellence of the di- 
 
 » Gen. iii. 15. » Ezech. xliv. 2. 
 
 * Ps. xliv. * Is. vii 14. 
 
 * S. J. Damascene, Lib. 4, de Fide Orthod. 
 
 vine lights wherewith she herself 
 was favored by the Lord! 
 
 It was only on certain phases of , 
 the Redeemer's life that each of the 
 prophets was enlightened : but thou, 
 Queen of Prophets, thou didst em- 
 brace the whole course of their pre- 
 dictions, thou didst penetrate their 
 whole meaning, according to the 
 thought of St. Liguori;*' thou hast 
 seen and heard what they desired 
 to see and hear ! ^ The prophets, 
 animated by the sacred fire of in- 
 spiration, reached an elevation of 
 thought and tone which charms and 
 astonishes us in their writings ; and 
 thou, filled with the Holy Ghost,^ 
 transported with joy in God thy Sa- 
 viour,^ thou hast composed, in his 
 honor, a hymn of gratitude, in which 
 we find a fullness of fueling, a sub- 
 limity of expression, a divine enthu- 
 siasm far exceeding these ancient 
 oracles of the Most High ! Thou 
 didst predict, thou, the poor and 
 humble daughter of the tribe of 
 Juda, that "all generations should 
 call thee blessed;"^*' an astontshing 
 prophecy which all ages and all 
 
 * Sermon on the Sorrows of Mary. 
 
 » St. Luke X. 24. • St. Luke i. 47. 
 
 « St. Luke i. 35. " St. Luke i. 48. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRQIN. 
 
 nations have constantly fulfilled for 
 eighteen centuries! Thou didst like- 
 wise foretell the future destiny of 
 the Church, the true people of Grod, 
 the ti'ue Israel which the Lord 
 "hath received, being mindful of 
 his mercy ; as he spoke to our fa- 
 thers, to Abraham and to his seed," 
 which is to last "forever;"^ and the 
 perpetual combats, the perpetual 
 triumphs of the Church have ever 
 since testified the divinity of the 
 inspiration which dictated the 
 words I 
 
 "How happy are we," says the 
 great bishop of Meaux, speaking in 
 this connection; "how happy are 
 we, in that God has vouchsafed to 
 bind himself to us by promise ! He 
 might have given us what he 
 would ; but "why promise it to us, 
 if not, as Mary said, to transmit his 
 mercy from age to age ;"^ that mer- 
 cy so admiiably manifested by the 
 coming of the Messiah, who himself 
 promises to preserve his work "even 
 to the consummation of the world." ^ 
 Let us rest, with unshaken faith, on 
 his divine word: "heaven and earth 
 shall pass away, but it shall not 
 
 * pass away."* Let us profit by the 
 faithful accomplishment of Mary's 
 prophecy and her Son's promise, 
 from the dawn of Christianity to 
 the present day, in order to revive 
 our confidence in the other words 
 of the Holy Gospel ; and let us give 
 ourselves wholly up to the blessed 
 hopes of faith, wherein we ought 
 "to drown all the false hopes with 
 which this world seeks to amuse 
 
 ' St Luke i. 54, 55. 
 • Elev. sur le* llyst. 
 
 * St. Matt, xxviii. 20. 
 
 * St. Matt. xxiv. 35. 
 
 "5 
 
 US. 
 
 In the ecstasy of thy gratitude to 
 the Lord, the future was opened to 
 thine eyes, Mary, and thou didst 
 announce the pious and solemn 
 worship wherewith " all genera- 
 tions" were to honor thee, together 
 v^ith the perpetuity of the Church, 
 which is to live, and struggle, and 
 triumph, "even to the consumma- 
 tion of the world." Ah ! it is with 
 sweet consolation that we behold 
 the marvellous fulfillment of thy 
 words, through the lapse of so many 
 ages; it is with heartfelt joy that 
 we recognize in thee, with St. Basil, 
 her whom Isaiah had designated 
 under the title of "prophetess,"^ 
 and to whom " the seers of IsraeV 
 
 * Bossuet, Elev. sur les Myst. 
 
 • In. Is. proph., c. 8. 
 
 » Is. XXX. 10. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 699 
 
 give testimony"^ in their predic- 
 tions regarding the divine Redeem- 
 er. thou whom David calls " the 
 glorious daughter of the king, clothed 
 round about with varieties ! " ^ vouch- 
 safe to obtain for us that we may 
 always join our feeble voices in the 
 universal concert which proclaims 
 thee " blessed ; " to rest always on 
 the infallible oracles of the Gospel ; 
 never to let ourselves be shaken 
 either by scandals or by persecu- 
 tions, but to " persevere faithfully to 
 the end,"^ in the faith and works 
 which she alone inspires. 
 
 Queen of Prophets, pray for us. 
 
 Regina Prophetarum, ora pro no- 
 bis. 
 
 MEDITATION XLIX. 
 
 QUEEN OF APOSTLES, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 TT/^HAT the most learned phi- 
 ' » losophers, the most eloquent 
 orators, the ablest and most power- 
 ful men never thought of undertak- 
 ing; nay, what they could never 
 have accomplished, even if they had 
 dared to attempt it, twelve poor 
 
 ' Acts X. 43. « Ps. xliv. 15. 
 
 » St. Matt. X. 22. 
 
 * fishermen of Galilee, without any 
 human resource, not only undertook, 
 but happily accomplished. The 
 Apostles divided the world amongst 
 themselves for conquest, to establish 
 " all over the earth a new worship, 
 a new sacrifice, a new law, promul- 
 gated by Jesus, crucified in Jeru- 
 salem. All the inducement they had 
 to offer was this : Come and serve 
 Jesus ; whosoever gives himself to 
 Him shall be happy after his death ; 
 but in the mean time he must 
 undergo all manner of suffering."* 
 And, to preach this doctrine, they 
 brave torments, nay, death itself; 
 and they " draw all things to thein- 
 selves"^ and soon the whole heathen 
 world adores Jesus and follows his 
 Gospel. 
 
 Divine zeal, divine devotion, and, 
 undoubtedly, divine success ! But 
 what part had Mary in this gieat 
 work, to merit the title of Queen of 
 Apostles ? Ah ! that august Virgin, 
 who had a right to that title from 
 the very pre-eminence of her divine 
 maternity, contributed wondeifully 
 to the formation, increase, and sup- 
 port of the infant Church. 
 
 * Bossuet, Panegyric on St. Andrew. 
 » St. John xii. 32. 
 
ATtoas or 
 
 UTJLXT OF ZBE BiEvam wmRiw 
 
 J^wmkwet Inr, mtke lMgi»- » of vhoM StAwAi ui StBosi. 
 
 ini^ tlHf^ pMB idfoift br 1 i uiImu did Bot ht MUIe. to a j 
 
 d»A|piiliespnpMittaft> I "&at tef were tke disc^ln of Her 
 
 I fill, to As SiTioH^ \ wko bffo^ghl Him falkJ^ 
 
 fMOHHMBdttlin, to "^reoeif^ tte I AaA, m tet, H was Wuy wbo 
 
 «f tke HoIt Gkoet,"' do we | ■»! kave lemled totteApasOn 
 
 irst^ *Jk^ wk» csoM ; tones whick ecnld sol toive 
 
 saiTs St Aatoaton^ *ttat I id» toeer nigmianc e: ud wUch 
 
 feel icccite wttk tiMs. en f ^h^ woe jet to ■■ke kaown to 
 
 Ike ^ rf lVjrtmjfet tte mmiiI | the wokU: it was Aewto Ind to 
 
 ■kufifl b tter were aD londsii fhon witk Ike predous end 
 
 hw Ike Hoir Gkost m eoBsofii^ detoOs ef tiw kiddoi fife 
 
 be waMt- of JJesae : fer. a cc oidu ^ to Ike 
 
 : wxuds of tbe Gospel, ''eke kepi all 
 
 Yeis torihi;* uhmiiui SL TWwm l X Ikei&e iSkemm, pu ade iia g Ikeai in ker 
 
 »X m\ 
 
 tte 
 
 to&e 
 
 ApoeOeB a^ BfaBgeEsto.** Aad 
 doiiii ibai ske was 
 
 St A^braee said Ikal ""It 
 of God; 1 ker Ikat St Jbk^ tbat saUEne 
 
 LM. 
 
 
 of Ike diviatt^ of Ike 
 
 Worf?^ 
 
 firy,e.SI:& 
 
 *aL]i^»a.]9L 
 
 «.T; .^rs^ ■* 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LIT ANT OF TEE BLESSED VTRGIN. 
 
 im 
 
 be called Queen of Aposdles from ho* 
 benign influence on the spread of 
 the GospeL Her example was an 
 effective lesson: was she not, in a 
 woitL the most faithfiil image of the 
 divine Jesus, ''the most strikii^ 
 reflex of his life?"* says St Law- 
 rence Justinian. Her disocmrae had 
 a marvellous efficacy: it is writtai 
 that *- from the fuUness of the heart 
 the mouth speaketk"' and the ^beaat 
 of Mary was," says St BCTnardine, 
 "a furnace erf divine love."* Ho* 
 prayers were at once the poresl^ 
 the most humble, the most fervent; 
 and who can tell with what zeal 
 and fervor that divine Mother begged 
 of Heaven the development of her 
 Son's great work? 
 
 In imitation of Mary, let us ever 
 concur, as far as we are able, in 
 promotii^ the interests of the 
 Church, and assisting the pious 
 missionaries who still carry on the 
 work of the first apostles. Let us 
 be apostles ourselves, by our ex- 
 ample, our discoorse, our co-opera- 
 tion in good works, so that " the 
 
 * name of our Lord Jesus Christ may 
 be gl<HTfied in ns"* 
 
 O Mary, whom Jesus left on earth, 
 after his glorious ascension, to exer- 
 dse a zeal more than ^xistolic, ^ to 
 be the strength and support of his 
 Church;"* thou who didst not only 
 partidpate in all the giflbs whidi 
 the Apostles received from Heaven, 
 but wast also their light and th^ 
 model, oh! how justly art fliou 
 called the Queen of those tw^e 
 heroef whose names are written in 
 the foundati(His of "the holy dty.*** 
 May thy heart, so zealous for die 
 glory of Jesus, conununicate to oars 
 some sparks of tlmt saered fire 
 which pioiK souls always seek to 
 diffuse aroond them! Grant, at 
 least, that by a good and bdy life. 
 "mar light may so shine before men, 
 that they may see amr good woiks, 
 and glorifr our Fatiier who is in 
 heaven."' 
 
 Qama cm Afobtlss, 
 US. 
 
 Regima Apotkiormm, arm pro 
 bis. 
 
 De trimmpk agom, Ckrid. 
 > SL JUtL si. 31. 
 
 «S 
 
 iz.de Fiae. 
 
 ^tAT POE 
 
 * Boa., Serm. mr T twwjrf 
 
 • Apo& zzL 10^ 14. 
 
 «aL]fitt.^l6. 
 
702 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 MEPITATION L. 
 
 QUEEN OF MARTYRS, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 TT7H0 will give us to describe 
 the sorrows of the Virgin- 
 Mother in suitable terms ? Mary I 
 how well mightest thou say that 
 thy affliction was "great as the 
 sea."^ Attend and see if there be 
 any sorrow "like unto my sorrow!"^ 
 
 We are moved by the sight of 
 blood, we cannot view with indiffer- 
 ence that of one of our fellow-creat- 
 ures shed by violence; we suffer 
 cruelly if it be that of a friend, still 
 more if it be that of a brother; 
 more, ah! much more, if it be that 
 of a loving and beloved son. But, 
 if it be the most tender of mothers 
 who has to witness that sad spec- 
 tacle, how much deeper and more 
 acute is the feeling ! And, if the 
 son whom she sees immolated be 
 an only son, endowed with the 
 rarest qualities, ah I no human 
 tongue could express the extremity 
 of that moral suffering. 
 
 Thou wert that Mother, Mary! 
 Jesus was that only Son, that in- 
 comparable Son at whose execution 
 
 • Lament, ii 13. 
 < Lament ii. 12. 
 
 * Stahat. 
 
 * St. Luke ii. 35. 
 
 t thou hadst to assist. thou whom 
 the Church so aptly styles " the 
 Mother of sorrow,"' tell us — for we 
 can neither feel nor describe it — 
 tell us how sharp the sword was 
 which pierced thy heart,* at every 
 stroke of the hammer when Jesus 
 was nailed to the Cross; tell us 
 how great was thine anguish, what 
 a long and fearful agony was thine, 
 w^hen, for three hours, thou wert 
 forced to contemplate that most 
 amiable Son so cruelly suspended 
 on an infamous gibbet. Or rather 
 be silent, divine Mary! keep up 
 that silence, so heroic, so eloquent, 
 so sublime, which thine immense 
 grief imposed on itself on Calvary ; 
 that superhuman silence tells us 
 more, infinitely more, than all the 
 cries, all the groans, all the sobs of 
 a desolate mother! .... Oh! how 
 willingly wouldst thou have given 
 thy life for his ; what a consolation 
 it would have been for thee at 
 least to mingle thy blood with his. 
 But no ; it was necessary that thou 
 shouldst be "more than martyr," 
 according to St. Bernard^ and St. 
 Bonaventure,^ by suffering all that 
 
 » Serm. 12, de Prcerogativis B. M. V. 
 • In Spec., lect. 4. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 703 
 
 must naturally have killed thee, 
 with the certainty that death would 
 not come to terminate thy inex- 
 pressible torments. Thus it was 
 that thou wert to win the glorious 
 title of Queen of Martyrs by the 
 unheard-of excess of thy sufferings, 
 compared with which St. Anselm 
 "estimates lightly all the sufferings 
 of all the heroes of Christianity,"^ 
 who, nevertheless, "endured scourg- 
 ing, chains, and imprisonment, were 
 stoned, sawed asunder, tortured in 
 every possible way, they of whom 
 the world was not worthy."^ 
 
 But Calvary was not the only 
 scene of the Virgin's martyrdom. 
 When the sacred body of our Lord 
 had been taken down from the 
 Cross, tradition says that it was 
 laid in her arms before being con- 
 signed to the tomb. Who, then, 
 can conceive w^hat was passing in 
 the heart of such a mother at such 
 a moment? To hold in her arms 
 the inanimate body of her beloved 
 San, that body so cruelly torn and 
 mangled ; to regard with her lov- 
 ing eyes the deep wounds through 
 which had flowed the precious blood 
 
 • De excellent. Virg., c. 5. 
 » Heb. xL 36, 37, 38. 
 
 f that was to regenerate the worl'^ ; 
 to retrace in her mind all the fright- 
 ful scenes of the passion — oh, what 
 torture ! St. Augustine says that 
 " all the sorrows of Jesus had been 
 the sorrows of Mary, that the Son's 
 cross and nails had been also th6 
 Mother's."^ Hence, all that she had 
 before felt, all that had crushed and 
 torn her tender heart, was renewed, 
 but with still increased bitterness, 
 with extreme desolation, with un- 
 equalled and inexpressible suffer- 
 ings. 
 
 What a lesson for us all, children 
 of the Gospel! Jesus and Mary 
 entered upon eternal glory by the 
 way of suffering and pain. Jesus, 
 the Holy One, by excellence ! 
 Mary, the holiest of creatures ! And 
 we, sinners by nature, sinners by 
 inclination, would we pretend to 
 gain it by any other way ? The 
 Cross is the earthly portion left us 
 by the Man-God— the Cross, which 
 is, as it were, the sure pledge of 
 the "inheritance incorruptible and 
 undeiiled,"* which he promises to 
 our patience, to our resignation, to 
 our tried fidelity, for it is written, 
 
 * Serm. de Pass. Dom. 
 
 * 1 Pet i 4 
 
704 
 
 MEDITATIONS CA' THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 "If we Buflfer we shall also reign 
 with him."* 
 
 tender Mother, who didst en- 
 dure, at the foot of the Cross, suffer- 
 ings much more excruciating than 
 the martyrdom of the body; Thou 
 whose prayer and example must 
 have greatly encouraged all those 
 '' who overcame by the blood of the 
 Lamb, and by the word of their 
 testimony,"^ in whose name the glo- 
 rious St. Stephen offers thee his 
 palm and his crown, deign to com- 
 passionate our troubles and sus- 
 tain our weakness. Turn away the 
 chalice from us if it become too 
 bitter for om- feeble virtue, or, other- 
 wise, obtain for us strength to say 
 boldly with the Saviour, " Thy will 
 be done I" ^ Make us well under- 
 stand that saying of the divine 
 Master, that "whosoever doth not 
 carry his Cross and go after him^ 
 cannot be his disciple;"* and that 
 we may have the happiness "in 
 our patience always to possess our 
 souls." '^ 
 
 Queen of Martyrs, pray for us. 
 
 Regiiia Martyrum, ora pro nobis. 
 
 ' 2 Tim. ii. 12. » St. Matt. xxvL 42. 
 
 • Apoa xii 11. * St. Luke xiv. 27. 
 
 ' St Luke xxi. 19. 
 
 MEDITATION LI. 
 
 QUEEN OF CONFESSORS, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 GLORY to you, noble confessors 
 of the faith, who counted it as 
 precious " gain " to brave the wrath 
 of the enemies of Christ, and boldly 
 proclaim yourselves his disciples at 
 the peril of your lives! Glory to 
 you, who, when Providence did not 
 call you to such trials, still pro- 
 fessed your subjection to that divine 
 Master by the practice of every 
 evangelical virtue, by the eminent 
 sanctity of your life! But still 
 greater glory to Mary, by so many 
 titles your august Queen! 
 
 You proved yourselves ever and 
 always the devoted servants of the 
 divine Saviour ; but was not Mary 
 still more, more courageously de- 
 voted to her divine Son? Your 
 heart was penetrated with an ar- 
 dent and generous love for him; 
 but was not Mary's heart a furnace 
 of incomparable love ? You braved, 
 for him, outrages, dangers, obstacles 
 of every kind; but did not Mary 
 participate in all the sufferings and 
 privations of his mortal life, and in 
 all the persecutions which he had 
 to undergo? How many times was 
 
%f/>*\^\^ 
 
 V-^l# 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF TEE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 705 
 
 he calumniated, reviled by his ene- f 
 mies ! How many times did the 
 contumely heaped on the Son revert 
 to the Mother ! Consider the scoff- 
 ing tone in which those who refused 
 to believe in Jesus said, " Is not his 
 mother called Mary?"^ how, even 
 in the extremity of his torment, his 
 enemies loaded him with derision, 
 contempt, and bitter reproach ; and 
 Mary, standing beneath the in- 
 famous gibbet, must she not have 
 had her share of their hatred and 
 vituperation ? 
 
 In the midst of all the ribaldry, 
 all the blasphemous sarcasms ut- 
 tered by the persecutors of Jesus, 
 Mary, "0 woman, by excellence, 
 the pride and glory of thy sex, how 
 gi'eat is thy faith," ^ how admirable 
 are thy love and thy devotion ! All 
 the Apostles of Jesus deserted him, 
 with the single exception of St. 
 John; even Peter, their chief, who 
 had so boldly protested that he 
 would be faithful even unto death, 
 denied him three times publicly and 
 on oath ; and thou, in presence of 
 the furious Jews, in presence of the 
 executioners reeking with the blood 
 of Jesus, thou display est the heroism 
 
 • St. Matt. xiii. 55. 
 
 * St. Matt. XV. 28. i » Serm. 146, 
 
 of thy great soul, thou regardest 
 the bleeding Victim with adoration, 
 love, and tender devotion, when 
 Heaven itself seems to abandon 
 him ! Who, then, can ever be com- 
 pared with thee, Mary! thou 
 whose faith in the divine Redeemer 
 was so magnanimous! 
 
 And who, moreover, ever equalled 
 this divine Virgin in the sublime 
 practice of all the virtues which 
 distinguish a holy soul and make 
 its life an eloquent Gospel lesson, 
 or in the possession of the precious 
 gifts which secure an eminent rank 
 in heaven? Purity, modesty, hu- 
 mility, meekness, detachment, pov- 
 erty, obedience, piety, fervent love 
 of God, inexhaustible charity for her 
 neighbor, burning zeal for the glory 
 of God, perfect submission to his 
 adorable will, absolute abandon- 
 ment to his providence, patience in 
 every trial; in a word, all the vir- 
 tues shine in Mary, in the very 
 highest degree. Hence it is that 
 St. Peter Chrysologus calls her " the 
 living assemblage of all the treas- 
 ures of sanctity;"^ St. John Da- 
 mascene, " the sanctuary of all 
 virtues." * 
 
 * Lib. iv. de Fide Orthod. 
 
706 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 Let US learn of this aduiirable 
 Queen of all confessors to despise 
 human respect, and to live as wor- 
 thy disciples of Jesus Christ. Amid 
 all the sarcasms of the world let us 
 proudly raise our heads, marked 
 with the noble sign of the Cross in 
 baptism and in confirmation ; let us 
 bi*ave, with a holy courage, the 
 threats and scoffs of "the children 
 of this world," ^ remembering that 
 infallible saying of Him who will 
 judge them as well as us: "Who- 
 ever shall confess me before men, 
 I will also confess him before my 
 Father who is in heaven ; but who- 
 soever shall deny me before men, 
 I will also deny him before my 
 Father who is in heaven."^ Let us 
 not forget that earnest admonition 
 of the divine Master : " Let your 
 light so shine before men, that 
 they may see your good works, 
 and glorify your Father who is in 
 heaven !"^ 
 
 Most august Virgin, before whose 
 throne the confessors of the faith 
 of Christ prostrate themselves, and 
 
 ' St Luke xvi 8. » St Matt. v. 16, 
 
 • St Matt X- 32, 33. * Apoc. iv. 10. 
 
 » Deat TTTiii 3, 
 
 f render homage, Mome for the 
 "crowns"* which they have worn, 
 under thine auspices, to his greater 
 glory; others for the heavenly "doc- 
 trine" which shone in their lives 
 and in their writings, and which 
 they had, as it were, "received"'* 
 through thy benign protection. 
 thou who • didst always and in all 
 things confess the name of "the 
 Holy One,"^ obtain for us grace to 
 " tight the good tight of faith,"^ amid 
 the impious and corrupt world in 
 which we are placed. Thou who 
 wast always the perfect created 
 model of every evangelical virtue, 
 obtain for us grace to make our 
 faith honorable by our works, " lest 
 the name and doctrine of the Lord 
 be blasphemed ;"^ and that " by do- 
 ing well, we may silence the ignor- 
 . anee of foolish men,"^ and induce 
 them by our example to "glorify 
 God,"^° whom we beseech thee to 
 propitiate by thy powerful interces- 
 sion. 
 
 Queen of Confessors, pray for us. 
 
 Regina Confessorum^ ora pro nobis. 
 
 • Eccl. xlvii. 9. 
 » 1 Tim. vi. 12. 
 
 • 1 Tim. vi. 1. 
 
 • 1 Pet ii. 15. 
 
 » 1 Pet ii 12. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 707 
 
 MEDITATION LE. 
 
 QUEEN OF VIRGINS, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 YES, thou art the Qimen of Vir- 
 gins, admirable Mary, who, 
 first amongst the daughters of Eve, 
 and contrary to the prejudices of 
 thy nation, " promised to the Lord a 
 perpetual chastity!"^ If was thou 
 who, according to St. Ambrose, 
 " raised the standard of virginity," ^ 
 thou who didst carry the angelic 
 virtue to such perfection, that St. 
 John Damascene calls thee " the 
 treasure of virginal purity."^ 
 
 And certainly it required all that 
 in her who was destined for an in- 
 comprehensible greatness. "Incor- 
 ruption bringeth near to God," says 
 the Holy Ghost himself, in the book 
 of Wisdom.* It must, then, have 
 been sufficiently perfect in Mary to 
 render her as worthy as possible 
 of " the closest union with a person 
 of infinite majesty;"^ "a union so 
 admirable," says Albertus Magnus, 
 "that Mary could not have been 
 more closely united to the Deity, 
 
 ' S. Augustine, Serm. 20 de tempore; Tract. 10 
 in Joan; S. Gregory of Nyssa, Grot, de Nativ. 
 Dom.; Ven. Bede, in cap. i. Luc.; S. Anselm, de 
 excel. Virg., c. 4 ; S. Bern., Serm. 2, sup. Missus, 
 etc. 
 
 unless she were identified with 
 him!"« 
 
 But it is not solely on account 
 of this marvellous privilege that all 
 virgins salute Mary, in heaven, as 
 their queen : Was she not for them, 
 on earth, a safeguard, as well as an 
 encouragement and a model ? Ah ! 
 they felt the value of purity, seeing 
 that for a virgin was reserved the 
 ineffable prerogative of the divine 
 maternity ; they understood the pro- 
 digious honor done their sex, in 
 Mary's person, and the immense 
 blessing of restoration which the 
 Christian woman has received 
 through her ; their hearts yearned 
 to testify their gratitude to' the 
 Lord, by devoting themselves "to 
 please Him,''"^ and to love him alone 
 in the world, either contemplating 
 and praising him in solitude, or 
 serving him in the person of the 
 poor and unhappy. And who could 
 enumerate the myriads of admirable 
 acts of virtue which have illustrated 
 these countless generations of vir- 
 gins, from the beginning of the 
 
 * Lib. de Institut. Virg. 
 
 ' Horn, vi., contra Nestor. 
 
 * Wisdom vi. 20. 
 
 » S. Thomas, i. p., q. 25. 
 
 * Super Missus, c. 180. ' 1 Cor. vii. 32. 
 
708 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 Church I How many times has the ^ 
 astonished world beheld young and 
 timid daughters of Mary fearlessly 
 braving every danger, every obsta- 
 cle, every plague, every threat, every 
 torment I Every day do we still 
 behold religious communities say- 
 ing, often at the peril of their life, 
 to all human ills, "Be my father 
 and my brethren ;" to all the infir- 
 mities, to all the necessities of mind 
 and body, "Be my mother and my 
 sistei-s!" Sublime spiritual prog- 
 eny of the divine Virgin, ah! it is 
 she who protects, who sustains you 
 as " chaste virgins," reserved for 
 "Christ,"^ and against the weak- 
 ness of your sex, the seductions of 
 the world, the assaults of hell, and, 
 when necessary, against persecutors 
 and all the instruments of their 
 cruelty ! The Church puts in her 
 mouth those words of "Wisdom: "I 
 love them that love me.'"^ But the 
 greatest proof of love that can be 
 given her, is it not the imitation 
 of the vii-tue by which she was most 
 distinguished, and which is, to our 
 fallen nature, the most difficult; is 
 it not the vow which you made, like 
 
 ' 2 Cor. xi. 2. 
 
 « Brev. Rom. in Festis B. M. V.; Prov. viii. 17. - ; 
 
 her, to live "as angels'" in a mortal 
 body? 
 
 It is from this same vow that the 
 spirit of devotion and of sacrifice 
 derives its origin and its strength ; 
 for, by disengaging the heart from 
 family ties, it leaves it free to con- 
 secrate all its energies to the ser- 
 vice of God and good works. She 
 who has no other spouse than Jesus 
 " thinketh on the things of the Lord, 
 that she may be holy both in body 
 and in spirit."* Let us admire that 
 truly celestial spirit which produces, 
 in the true Church, such marvellous 
 fruits as to excite the envy of the 
 numerous sects, sterile because they 
 are separated from her. Let us beg 
 of the divine Jesus that we may 
 each have a share, according Xo our 
 special' vocation, in that zeal for 
 voluntary immolation to his glory, 
 and to practise, also, according to 
 our state, that sublime virtue which, 
 according to St. Ambrose, "makes 
 the heroes of martyrdom, and makes 
 us brethren of the angels ;" ^ which 
 even raises our merit above that 
 of the celestial spirits ; " for," says 
 St. Jerome, "to gain angelic glory 
 
 » St. Mark xii. 25. * 1 Cor. vii. 34 
 
 * Lib. 1 de Virg, circa initium. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 709 
 
 in a mortal body, is much more f 
 than to possess it by nature."^ 
 
 divine Queen of Virgins, who 
 come, triumphant, to lay before thee 
 the lily of their purity, the palm of 
 their victory, august Mother of that 
 divine Lamb who is " the guide of 
 virginity,"^ how joyfully do we glo- 
 rify thee for having, by thine exam- 
 ple and assistance, called forth and 
 fostered so many wondrous virtues 
 on this earth. Ah! vouchsafe to 
 multiply, more and more, the num- 
 ber of thy beloved daughters, who 
 adorn the Church like blooming 
 flowers, and embalm it with a per- 
 fume whose sweetness is not of this 
 world. 
 
 Deign to inspire us, Queen, with 
 love and respect for a virtue which 
 does so much honor to humanity, 
 which "took its rise in heaven,"^ 
 where it enjoys, as its reward, the 
 privilege of forming the train of the 
 Lamb.* thou under whose aus- 
 pices so many thousands of virgins 
 have gained everlasting glory, grant 
 that, attracted by the celestial " odor 
 of thy virtues,^ we may be brought 
 to the King of kings,'" ^ following in 
 
 ' Serm. de Assumpt, 
 * Jerem. iii. 4. 
 
 ' S. Ambrose, Ibid. 
 * Apoc. xiv. 4 
 
 the pure way which thou hast mark- 
 ed out for us ! 
 
 Queen of Yirgins, pray for us. 
 
 Regina Virginum, ora pro nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION LIIL 
 
 QUEEN OF ALL SAINTS, PRAY FOR US. 
 
 THE Saints have illustrated the 
 Church by fair and admirable 
 virtues; they have astonished the 
 world by the heroism of their zeal, 
 their courage, their devotion, the 
 prodigies of their humility, their 
 patience, their charity; they enter- 
 ed this everlasting dwelling with an 
 abundant harvest of merits, which 
 the Lord "weighed," even to the 
 least, " in a just balance," ^ and en- 
 dowed with " a great reward." ® 
 
 Mary ! thou art their queen : if 
 the Saints have been, amongst the 
 faithful, as so many rare flowers 
 adorning the garden of the militant 
 Spouse of Christ, thou didst shine, 
 in that mystical garden, as the 
 queen of all flowers; thou didst 
 show forth, by thine incomparable 
 
 * Cant. i. 3. 
 « Ps. xliv. 15. 
 
 ^ Job xxxi 6. 
 • Heb. X. 35. 
 
710 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRQIN. 
 
 example, " that immense treasure of ^ 
 grace wherewith thou wert endow- 
 ed, a treasure incomprehensible to 
 man or angel I" ^ 
 
 The Saints manifested in them- 
 selves, more or less sensibly, some 
 traits of the life of their divine 
 Master ; in each of them there 
 shone some particular virtue, and 
 "in the Father's house," where 
 "there are many mansions,"^ each 
 receives that share of special glory 
 which he gained during his time of 
 probation. 
 
 Mary! thou art their queen: 
 what each had of particular merit 
 thou hadst whole and entire ; every 
 characteristic of Jesus, thine ador- 
 able Son, was retraced in thee as 
 clearly as it could be in a creature : 
 all his virtues were practised by 
 thee, and in a degree so high, so 
 perfect, that St. Anselm said of 
 thee, that " after the sanctity of the 
 Holy of holies, there is not, nor can- 
 not be, any like to thine !"^ And 
 now, in the celestial regions, thou 
 art invested with a glory commen- 
 surate to thy sublime merit ; thy 
 
 • S. Bernardine, Serm. 5, de Nativ. B. F., 
 c 12. 
 
 • St John xiv. 2. 
 
 crown is composed of the united 
 splendor of the crowns of all the 
 Saints ; yet that is not enough : thy 
 glory surpasses theirs, even as all 
 their virtues are inferior to thine, 
 and that it is through the merits of 
 Him whom thou didst bring into 
 the world, that they obtained grace 
 to practise those same virtues. 
 
 The Saints have wonderful influ- 
 ence with God on our behalf: " The 
 Lord," says St. Leo, "is truly admir- 
 able in giving them to us, not only 
 for models, but also for most power- 
 ful protectors. " * Innumerable facts 
 proclaim to the world that "they 
 reign for ever and ever*^ in the city 
 of God,"® and that, from the height 
 of their sublime thrones, they also 
 reign over the earth by a mysterious 
 influence. 
 
 Mary! of all these powerful 
 intercessors, of all these immortal 
 kings, thou art still the Queen. 
 Thou prayest not as they do, but 
 " commandest in some way : for 
 how could it be, Blessed Virgin ! 
 that He who was born of thee, al- 
 though omnipotent, could resist that 
 
 » De excel. Virg. 
 
 * In Natcdi 8. LaurenL 
 
 » Apoc xxii. 5. 
 • Ibid. iii. 12. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 711 
 
 maternal authority which He him- 
 self gave thee." ^ Yes, " thy re- 
 quests are almost orders," says St. 
 Antoninus,^ " and what thou wili- 
 est," says St. Anselm, " is sure to be 
 done ! " ^ 
 
 Ah I may that admirable Virgin, 
 to whom all Saints do homage for 
 their crowns, be one day our Queen I 
 And for that end, what have we to 
 do? To be holy while on earth. 
 Now, to be holy is to live " the life 
 of God,"* according to the magnili- 
 cent idea of the great Apostle of 
 nations; it is to possess his grace, 
 and to labor constantly to preserve 
 and increase it in one's self; it is 
 to love the Creator sincerely, " with 
 our whole heart, and with our whole 
 soul, and with all our strength :"* 
 for he who loves him so is • united 
 to him in an ineffable manner ; and 
 " he that shall persevere to the end, 
 he shall be saved," ^ he shall become 
 eternally, in heaven, a "partaker of 
 the divine nature,"^ of the glory and 
 beatitude of God. " Oh ! let us 
 raise," says St. Augustine, "let us 
 
 ' S. p. Damiau, Serm. de NcUiv. B. V. 
 
 « T. II., in 3 part. 
 
 » De excellent. Virg. c. 12. 
 
 * Ephes. iv. 18. 
 
 * raise our hopes and direct all our 
 desires to that eternal possession 
 of God, who is the sovereign good 
 and the source of all true goods." ^ 
 Let us beware of incurring the an- 
 athema reserved for those who " set 
 at nought the trim desirable land,"^ 
 so worthy of all our most fervent 
 aspirations. 
 
 Mary! who admirably united 
 in thine own person all the merits 
 of all the Saints ; thou who didst 
 surpass them all, in this world, by 
 thy virtues as well as privileges, 
 and who, in heaven, art so superior 
 to them in power and glory — with 
 them, with all the happy inhabit- 
 ants of the heavenly Jerusalem, we 
 bow before thee, august Mother of 
 our Eedeemer, who " standest on his 
 right hand, in gilded clothing ! " ^® 
 Thou rulest all the elect, living 
 "habitation j^f God;"" placed, as it 
 were, *^on the top of mountains, and 
 high above the hills ! " ^^ If we con- 
 sidered only thy marvellous great- 
 ness we would not dare to raise our 
 eyes to thee, heavenly Queen ; but 
 
 " St. Luke X. 27. 
 « St. Matt. xxiv. 13. 
 » 2 Peter i. 4. 
 • In Psalm. 102. 
 
 » Ps. cv. 24. 
 '• Ps. xliv. 10. 
 " Ephes. ii 22. 
 " Mich. iv. 1. 
 
m 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 we know all thy charity, all thy 
 goodness, all thy mercy, and our 
 confidence in thee is unbounded ; 
 by thine assistance we hope to lead 
 a holy life, and to gain a share of 
 that kingdom of God where we shall 
 ever rejoice for having said to thee, 
 here below, with a piety worthy of 
 thy sweet majesty: 
 
 Queen of all Saints, pray for us. 
 
 Ragina Sanctorum omnium^ ora pro 
 nobis. 
 
 MEDITATION LIY. 
 
 QUEEN CONCECVED WITHOUT SIN, PRAY 
 FOR us. 
 
 IF we have now the sweet* con- 
 solation of being able to salute 
 Mary as Queen conceived without 
 Sin, we owe it to the piety of our 
 bishops, who petitioned the Holy 
 See to that effect. The Scripture 
 calls God, in an absolute manner, 
 "the King,"^ to express the excel- 
 lence of his supreme Majesty ; is it 
 not fitting, then, to honor the sover- 
 eignty of her who is "above all, 
 except God,"^ by calling her the 
 
 • Pa. iliv.: cxliv. * S. Bern., Serm. 6, c. 6. 
 » Acts of the Martyr St. Andrew. 
 
 Queen f And after the invocation 
 which implores her as Queen of All 
 Saints, what other could be more 
 appropriate than that which honors 
 at the same time her regal grandeur 
 and the privilege of her exemp- 
 tion from original sin ? — a privilege 
 which w^ould, of itself, distinguish 
 her from all the elect, even though 
 she were not, by so many other 
 titles, superior to them — a privilege 
 constantly proclaimed by the tra- 
 ditions of the Church, the faithful 
 echo of the Apostolic teaching. 
 
 In his discourse to the proconsul 
 Egius, St. Andrew hiuiself gives 
 Mary the title of " Immaculate ;" he 
 compares her to " that earth where- 
 of the first man was formed, which 
 had not received the malediction 
 of the- Lord, the consequence and 
 punishment of the primitive fall."^ 
 Origen, who lived, very near the 
 time of the Apostles, speaks of her 
 as "formed in grace, free from the 
 pestilential breath of Satan;"'' St. 
 Amphilocus, as " without spot or 
 stain ;"^ St. Epiphanius, as "fairer 
 by nature than all the angelic host, 
 the immaculate sheep who brought 
 
 * Homil. vi. in Luc. 
 » IV. Disc, in S. Deip. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 713 
 
 forth tbe divine Lamb ;"^ St. Ephra- * 
 im, as " Virgin without spot, or stain, 
 or corruption, an absolute stranger 
 to all sin, to all imperfection ;" ^ St. 
 Cyril, as "preserved from the orig- 
 inal stain." ^ 
 
 Is it necessary to quote other 
 organs for the transmission of the 
 primitive belief? Who does not 
 know that St. Jerome,* St. Augus- 
 tine,^ St. Fulgentius,^ St. Ildefonso,^ 
 St. John Damascene,^ St. Peter 
 Damian,^ St. Anslem,^" St. Bonaven- 
 ture," and even St. Thomas,^^ likewise 
 bear witness to this uninterrupted 
 tradition of the Church ; that the 
 testimony of the holy doctors is 
 supported by the monuments of both 
 the Greek and Latin churches, the 
 words of the sacred liturgy, the 
 customs of dioceses, and those of 
 religious orders ; finally, that on 
 the invitation of the illustrious Pius 
 IX.,^^ the several bishops of the Cath- 
 olic Church have attested, in an au- 
 
 ' De Laudib. Virg. 
 
 » Orat. in S. Dei Oen. 
 
 » In Evang. Joan. I., vL c. 15, 
 
 < In Fs. 77. 
 
 » De natura et gratia, c. 36. 
 
 «• Serm. de Laudib. M. 
 
 » Dispul. de V. M. 
 
 « Orat. de not. B. V. M. 
 
 thentic manner, the attachment of 
 the faithful to this belief. So that 
 this truth is recommended by its 
 antiquity, universality, perpetuity, 
 which are the principal foundations 
 for the dogmas of Christianity. 
 
 Moreover, who does not under- 
 stand, that, if the personal union of 
 the divine nature and the human 
 nature in Jesus Christ rendered ab- 
 solutely necessary the conception of 
 the Man-God in the state of grace, 
 the divine maternity, "the nearest 
 possible approach to that union," ^* 
 would have been totally incompati- 
 ble with the conception of Mary in 
 a state of sin? What! she whom 
 God had announced from the begin- 
 ning of the world as one who was 
 to escape the bite of the infernal 
 serpent, as one destined even " to 
 crush his head,"^^ could she ever 
 have been struck by his dart, or be 
 for one moment "under his pow- 
 er?"^^ Could she who was to be 
 
 9 Or. 12 de nat. M. 
 
 " De concept. V., c. 18. 
 
 » Serm. 11 de B. V. 
 
 " In Lib. I. Sent. disc. 44, q. 1, art 3. 
 
 " Encyc. Let. 2d Febr. 1849. 
 
 " Dionys. Garth. 1. 2 de laud. V. 
 
 •* Gen. iii. 15. 
 
 •« lOid. 16. 
 
n4 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 the repairer of Eve's transgression, 
 be left inferior to Eve, who was 
 created in the state of grace ? She, 
 in fine, who was to live for nine 
 months the same corpoi*al life with 
 the Incarnate Woi*d, could she have 
 been, at the first moment of her 
 existence, struck with the divine 
 malediction, odious to the Lord, " a 
 child of wrath ?"^ 
 
 Oh ! no, no ; such could never be 
 the case. Virgin so tenderly beloved 
 by God and man ! Ah ! the latter 
 well understands and feels it, thanks 
 to the ideas of sin, of grace, and of 
 the infinite sanctity of God given us 
 by Christianity; the latter loves to 
 proclaim, in the face of heaven and 
 earth, that it would be neither just 
 nor possible that the Son of God 
 would have to turn away in disgust, 
 even for one moment, from her who 
 was to be his mother. But man 
 also attaches a measureless import- 
 ance to the shunning of sin ; he con- 
 sidei-s it, as Mary did, the greatest 
 of all happiness to be in favor with 
 God; man "watches and prays "^ 
 assiduously, in order to preserve 
 the treasure of divine grace; man 
 
 « Ephes. ii. 3. 
 
 • St, Mark xiii. 33. 
 
 tries, by his good works, daily to 
 strengthen its sacred bonds, daily 
 to increase its inestimable fruits. 
 
 Mary ! blessed Queen ! 
 Queen of queens I Queen conceived 
 without Sin I this is the last flight 
 of our hearts to thee ; this is the 
 last ray of glory which, on earth, 
 we add to thy crown I What a 
 happiness for us to be able to say 
 to thee, that "the Lord possessed 
 thee in the beginning;"^ that " thou 
 art undeflled, and fair, and without 
 spot or stain!"* Ah! be always 
 the Queen of our hearts, thou 
 who hast the signal honor of being 
 exempt from the original anathema 
 pronounced on all men ; and, that 
 this dominion may be pleasing to 
 thee, grant that we may apply our- 
 selves more and more to serve God 
 with purity, with fervor. Hoping 
 to obtain that grace, we say to thee, 
 with all possible humility, confi- 
 dence, and love. 
 
 Queen conceived without Sin, 
 
 PRAY FOR us. 
 
 Regina sine Lobe concepta, ora pro 
 nobis, 
 
 » Prov. viii. 22. • 
 * Cant V. 2 ; iv. 7 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 715 
 
 MEDITATION IN. 
 
 9 
 
 LAMB OF GOD, WHO TAKEST AWAY THE 
 SINS OF THE WORLD, SPARE US, O 
 LORD. 
 
 THE Church terminates all her 
 invocations in honor of the Vir- 
 gin by a passionate appeal to her 
 adorable Son, under the touching 
 emblem of "the Lamb who taketh 
 away the sins of the world." ^ And 
 first, she makes us consider him as 
 the Judge whose mercy we have to 
 implore ; the Lamb who sitteth on 
 a lightning throne;^ he who is to 
 judge us by his Cross, " the sign of 
 the Son of Man,"^ the sign of "ruin 
 and of resurrection"* to all of us, 
 according as our works have been 
 contrary or conformable to the sa- 
 cred maxims which proceed from it. 
 Alas I we do not, as often as we 
 should, consider Jesus in his char- 
 acter of Judge. We love to con- 
 sider him under the figure of a good 
 Shepherd,^ a good Father,^ a tender 
 Mother,^ and that is only what we 
 are bound to do, since he seems to 
 delight in representing himself un- 
 
 « St. John L 29. 
 * Apoc. iv. 5 ; v. 6. 
 » St. Matt. xxiv. 30. 
 
 * St. Luke ii. 34. 
 » St. Luke XV. 
 'Ibid. 
 
 der these similitudes in the holy 
 Gospel, in order to make us sensi- 
 ble of the inefi"able treasures of his 
 goodness and his love for us. But 
 we forget that if we do not worthily 
 correspond to so much love and so 
 much goodness, we are but the more 
 criminal for having " detained the 
 truth of God in our hearts ;"^ we for- 
 get that, the greater that goodness, 
 the more ardent and the more gen- 
 erous that love, we are the more 
 bound to be sensible of it ; we for- 
 get, in fine, that, if we are so un- 
 grateful to that " Lamb of God," ^ 
 so mild, so amiable, so tender to us, 
 as to violate his absolute right to 
 our will, our affections, the use of 
 all our faculties, we expose our- 
 selves to find only in him, in the 
 other world, " the terrible lion of the 
 fold of Juda,"^** before whom the 
 reprobate shall one day cry out " to 
 the mountains and to the rocks : 
 Fall upon us, and hide us from the 
 face of him that sitteth upon the 
 throne, and from the wrath of the 
 Lamb."^^ 
 
 But what! is not that Lamb all 
 
 ' St Matt. xxiu. 37. ' St. John L 29. 
 
 • Rom. L 18. '" Apoc. v. 5. 
 
 " Apoc. vi 16. 
 
716 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 goodness, all meekness, all charity ?^ * 
 Oh yes ! Jesus has well proved it to 
 us; he did for us things that men 
 do not even for those they tenderly 
 love. But then he is as just as he 
 is good, all his perfections being 
 equally infinite ; and if we reject 
 the mild reign of his incomparable 
 love, must not his justice reign in 
 its turn at the end of this life, which 
 is given us to choose one or the 
 other? Now, let us sincerely "judge 
 oui*selves :" ^ is it not true that we 
 have but little gratitude? What 
 do I say ? is it not true that we are 
 ungrateful, that we treat Jesus as 
 though we owed him nothing, and 
 sometimes even as if we were anx- 
 ious to irritate his justice against 
 us? Is it not true that whosoever 
 it stiikes has well deserved eternal 
 punishment ? . . . . Yes, if, on the 
 subject of the ineffable mystery of 
 the Eucharist, we may truly say, 
 considering the mystery of the 
 Cross, Love explains love! so, re- 
 gai-ding on one «iide the prodigies 
 of the goodness and tenderness of 
 Jesus for men, on the other, the in- 
 difference, the odious and obstinate 
 
 ' 1 John iv. 8. « 1 Cor. xi. 31. 
 
 » Ps. L 19. 
 
 ingratitude of so many sinners, we 
 may well exclaim. The Incarnation, 
 the Redemption, the Eucharist, 
 Heaven, sufficiently account for 
 Hell I . . . . And even Hell itself, 
 is it not, in the adorable designs 
 of Providence, as it were, the last 
 means of forcing men to work out 
 their salvation when all nobler mo- 
 tives have failed to effect it. 
 
 But we who have, perhaps, often 
 deserved that Hell, we who have 
 perhaps too long overlooked the 
 claims of the Lamb of God, we who 
 have abused his blessings, outraged 
 his love, ah! let us ask pardon of 
 him for our unworthy conduct; let 
 us excite ourselves to a profound 
 sentiment of sorrow, thinking of the 
 grievous wrongs wherewith he has 
 to reproach us ; let us pi-ostrate 
 ourselves before him, with a truly 
 " contrite and humbled heart," ^ say- 
 ing to him still more by feeling than 
 by word : 
 
 " Lamb of God, who takest away 
 the sins of the world," ^ spare us, 
 Lord! Spare us, sovereign Mas- 
 ter of all things, sovereign "Judge 
 of the living and of the dead,"^ 
 
 * St. John L 29. 
 
 • Acts X. 42. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 717 
 
 spare us! It is true we are but 
 ungrateful sinners, who have slight- 
 ed thy ineffable love, foolishly 
 despised thy rewards, as though 
 heaven were not worth some exer- 
 tion, and who have braved thy 
 justice, as though the threat of its 
 chastisements were not serious ! . . . 
 1 how culpable we are! .... But 
 treat us not according to our merits, 
 treat us, rather, according to thine 
 infinite mercy, which we now im- 
 plore, striking our breast like the 
 humble publican,^ and crying with 
 all our heart, " Spare, Lord, spare 
 thy people ; " ^ that, by the interces- 
 sion of thy divine Mother, thy clem- 
 ency may be glorified in us ; ^ that 
 in us may be fulfilled the saying of 
 the Prophet Joel, "The Lord hath 
 spared his people."* 
 
 Lamb of God, who takest away 
 the sins of the world, spare us, 
 Lord. 
 
 Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mun- 
 di, parce nobis, Domine. 
 
 ' St. Luke xviii. 13. 
 
 » Joel ii. 17. 
 
 ' Isaiah xxx. 18. 
 
 * Joel ii. 18. 
 
 » Apoc. i. 18. 
 
 MEDITATION LVI. 
 
 LAMB OF GOD, WHO TAKEST AWAY THE 
 SINS OF THE WORLD. GRACIOUSLY 
 HEAR US, LORD. 
 
 AFTER having asked the divine 
 Lamb to forgive us, we urge 
 and beseech him to vouchsafe to hear 
 our request. The first cry of our 
 heart was one of lively repentance, 
 of profound and bitter sorrow. The 
 second is a cry of humble supplica- 
 tion, imploring Infinite Goodness for 
 a great and signal favor, on which 
 depends our eternal salvation : Gra- 
 ciously hear us, Lord ! 
 
 The Church makes us here repeat 
 the title of Lord to " the Lamb who 
 taketh away the sins of the world," 
 in order to penetrate us more and 
 more with the infinite greatness and 
 majesty of that incomparable bene- 
 factor whom we have had the mis- 
 fortune to offend, and to render us 
 more and more contrite for our of- 
 fences. But it is also to remind us 
 that He to whom we pray is the 
 absolute master of all things; that 
 he has " the keys of death and of 
 hell;"^ and that, consequently, our 
 prayer cannot be too humble, too 
 fervent I Ah ! let it be then with 
 
rl8 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 all our hearts that we ejaculate, 
 Graciously hear us^ Lord I For 
 we know too well, alas! that we 
 are very guilty, but we know not, 
 and can never know with certain- 
 ty, whether God has forgiven us. 
 AMierefore it is that we should 
 every day bewail our sins, every 
 day endeavor to repair them before 
 the Loi-d, and every day, with new 
 ardor, beseech our good God to for- 
 get "our former iniquities."^ David, 
 though assured of his pardon by the 
 mouth of the prophet Nathan, who 
 said, "the Lord hath taken away 
 thy sin,"^ had still his crime con- 
 stantly before his eyes;' he be- 
 sought the Most High to "wash 
 him yet naore from his iniquity;"* 
 even in the night he watered his 
 couch with his tears.* Ah! what, 
 then, should we do, we who "have 
 wrought iniquity,"^ alas! too often, 
 and have not received from the 
 infallible lips of a prophet the as- 
 surance of our reconciliation with 
 
 God! 
 
 St. Paul, that great Apostle, who 
 merited to be taken up to the third 
 
 • Ps. IxxviiL 8. 
 
 • 2 Kings liL 13. 
 
 » Ps. L 6. 
 «Ps.L4. 
 
 » Ps. tL 7. 
 
 f heaven, has not he also said, " I am 
 not conscious to myself in anything; 
 yet in this I am not justified?"^ 
 What then ? that admirable servant 
 and minister of God, who had re- 
 ceived so many marks of his good- 
 ness and love ; that illustrious saint, 
 who had performed numberless 
 achievements for the glory of his 
 divine Master,^ in a word, the in- 
 comparable St. Paul dares not be- 
 lieve himself justified ! And we 
 whose life has been so far from 
 resembling his, we who, after com- 
 mitting many and grievous sins, 
 have done little or nothing to ex- 
 piate them, we live as though we 
 were sure of going straight to 
 heaven. Ah ! rather, how great 
 should be our humility, how un- 
 ceasing our contrition! "The no- 
 bler the victim," says Bossuet, " the 
 more acceptable the oifering : there 
 is no doubt, then, that it is incom- 
 parably more meritorious to humble 
 our heart before God than to mor- 
 tify our body for his sake."^ But 
 while humbling our soul before the 
 Lord, let us at the same time bewail 
 
 • Ps. cv. 6. » 1 Cor. iv. 4. 
 
 • 2 Cor. xi 
 
 • n. Panegyric on St. Francis of Paula, p. 203. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 719 
 
 unceasingly our misfortune in having 
 defiled our baptismal robe of inno- 
 cence, and in some sort "trodden 
 under foot"^ the adorable blood of 
 that divine Lamb who became our 
 victim. " The more we deplore the 
 misery into which we have fallen, 
 the more do we approach the good 
 we have lost. Let us, then, never 
 cease to pour forth tears so effec- 
 tive, that our sorrow, substituted 
 for an eternal punishment, may, in 
 some measure, iiftitate that intoler- 
 able perpetuity by continuing at 
 least till our last agony.'-' ^ 
 
 Lamb of God, adorable victim, 
 " slain in figure from the beginning 
 of the world," ^ in every oblation 
 offered under the Mosaic law ; slain 
 in dread reality on the rock of Cal- 
 vary, on the very spot where Adam 
 of old was buried,'^ "so that as all die 
 in Adam, in thee all may receive 
 life;"^ immolated, ever since, in a 
 mystical, but not less real manner, 
 on our altars, where thou art always, 
 " as it were, slain ;"® when we pray. 
 
 • Heb. X. 29. 
 
 ' Bos., II. Panegyric on St. Francis of Paula, 
 p. 196. ' Apoc. xiii. 8. 
 
 * S. Ambrose, Origen, Tertullian, S. Athana- 
 
 * entreat thee to be propitious to us, 
 do we not correspond with the de- 
 sire of the heart which loved us 
 even to excess ? ^ No, no, it belongs 
 not to the designs of thy justice to 
 treat us without mercy, since it is 
 thou who givest us the grace to re- 
 pent, to implore thee with our whole 
 heart, and to wish to efface the sins 
 of the past by penance. It is, then, 
 thy will that, uniting with the au- 
 gust Pontiffs, and other ministers 
 of the Church, who pray unceas- 
 ingly for all its members, with the 
 Blessed Virgin ever pleading for us 
 all, we should say to thee, with the 
 deepest soitow and humiliation, but 
 also with the most firm confidence, 
 that " so having prayed, we shall 
 be heard." ^ God our Saviour, 
 graciously hear our supplication : 
 
 Lamb of God, who takest away 
 the sins of the world, graciously 
 HEAR US, Lord. 
 
 Agnus Dei^ qui Mis peccata mundi^ 
 exaiidi nos, Domine. 
 
 sius, S. Epiphanius, S. Cyril of Jerusalem : See 
 Biblioth. Choisie des Peres, par Guillon, t. ix. 
 * Origen, in Maith. ' Ephes. ii. 4 
 
 J, « Apoc. V. 6. • Eccles. xxxiii. 4. 
 
720 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 MEDITATION LVU. 
 
 LAMB OF GOD, WHO TAKEST AWAY THE 
 SINS OF THE WORLD, UAVE MERCY 
 ON US. 
 
 HERE we still peiisist in asking 
 pardon for our sins, and be- 
 seech the divine Lamb to have mercy 
 wi us. This time we do not add the 
 title of Lord; we wish so to speak 
 that the divine Jesus may forget his 
 greatness and his majesty so out- 
 raged by us, to remember only his 
 infinite mercy, that adorable com- 
 passion which he himself made so 
 lively and so tender by deigning to 
 be "tempted in all things like as 
 we are."^ Thus we make a last 
 appeal to the adorable heart of our 
 Saviour — an appeal which cannot 
 fail to be efficacious. Is it not, in 
 fact, as if we said to him, Thou 
 " who delivered thyself for us,"^ who 
 art "the propitiation for our sins,"' 
 ah ! doubtless we do not deserve to 
 be heard when we ask thy forgive- 
 ness for those we have had the 
 misfortune to commit, but we ap- 
 peal to that ineffable pity which 
 thou feelest for us; save us, save 
 us, divine Lamb, save us, at least, 
 
 ' Heb. iv. 15. » Ephes. v. 2. '1 John il 2. 
 
 f through pure compassion, through 
 pure mercy I . . . . 
 
 If David formerly said to God 
 with a sublime confidence, based 
 on a sublime sentiment of his in- 
 finite mercy, " Thou wilt pardon my 
 sin, for it is great;"* if, before the 
 Incarnation or Redemption (mys- 
 teries wherein that same mercy was 
 so fully manifested), he had so high, 
 so enlarged an idea of that abyss 
 of goodness which loves to pour 
 itself forth, on th6 penitent sinner 
 in a dew of grace and pardon ; what 
 an idea, what sentiments should we 
 ourselves have when we address 
 ourselves to that infinite goodness 
 manifested to us in the divine na- 
 ture of a God become our victim! 
 .... Ah ! if we would know how 
 deeply the tender and loving heart 
 of that divine Lamb is moved by 
 any appeal to his compassion, let 
 us open the Gospel. During the 
 whole course of his mortal life, who 
 ever said, Have mercy on its ! with- 
 out obtaining his request? Two 
 blind men follow him crying, Son 
 of David, "have mercy on us!"' 
 He touches their eyes, and they are 
 opened to the light. A Chananean 
 
 * Ps. xxiv. IL 
 
 • St. Matt. ix. 27. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN 
 
 721 
 
 woman, whose daughter is torment- ^ 
 ed by the devil, cries out in her 
 turn, " Son of David, have mercy on 
 nie ! " " Be it done to thee as thou 
 wilt," says Jesus answering,^ and 
 her daughter is cured that very mo- 
 ment. " Have pity on my son," 
 said an afflicted father to him ; " he 
 suffereth much."^ Jesus instantly 
 cures him. Near Jericho, a blind 
 man, named Bartimeus, also im- 
 plores his compassion — " Son of 
 David, have mercy on me ! " ' Jesus 
 speaks, and the blind man recovers 
 his sight. Ten lepers cry out from 
 afar off, " Jesus, Master, have mercy 
 on us!"'^ and they obtain their cure. 
 That admirable sympathy for all 
 human miseries, that tender pity 
 which made St. Peter say of him 
 that he ''went about doing good,"^ 
 can it be that Jesus, glorified, has 
 ceased to feel it ? Ah ! see, rather, 
 how he delights to manifest it more 
 and more by the continual prodigy 
 of the adorable Eucharist ! Does 
 he not in that mystery place his 
 blood and his merits at our dis- 
 posal ? Does he not offer himself 
 every day and every hour as a vic- 
 
 ' St. Matt. XV. 22, 28. * St. Matt. xvii. 14 
 '^ St. Mark x. 4.7. 
 
 tim of propitiation for our sins, and 
 of impetration for all the graces of 
 which we stand in need ? Does he 
 not therein make a continual sac- 
 rifice of his glory, which is, as it 
 were, annihilated under humble spe- 
 cies ; the sacrifice of his liberty, 
 bound in some way to the will of 
 his ministers ; the sacrifice of the 
 operation of his justice, so often 
 provoked by the crimes of sinners, 
 and suspended by the marvellous 
 mildness of his mercy ? For nearly 
 two thousand years has this Lamb 
 of God unceasingly manifestcid in 
 this stupendous miracle his incom- 
 parable devotion to our salvatiijn ; 
 how then could we doubt the liveli- 
 ness, the tenderness, the generosity 
 of his compassion for hearts touched 
 with repentance and desirous of his 
 love? Let us, then, wholly give 
 ourselves up to the sweetest confi- 
 dence, and say to him: 
 
 " Lamb of God, who takest away 
 the sins of the world," have mercy on 
 us, who are much to be pitied, and 
 so utterly unworthy of thy goodness. 
 Ah ! if thou didst but consider 
 thine infinite justice, thou wouldst 
 
 * St. Luke xvii. 13. 
 » Acts X. 3a 
 
T2'2 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGTN. 
 
 strike the ungrateful wretches who 
 have returned thee evil for good, 
 coldness or insult for tlie tenderest 
 love. But we implore tliat pity, 
 that inexhaustible mercy wherewith 
 thy heart overflows for penitent sin- 
 nei*8 ; we implore that adorable 
 blood which quenches the fire of 
 "the wrath of God,"^ and effects 
 " the remission of sins ;" '^ and that 
 our prayers may be more effectual 
 
 Apoc. XV. 7. 
 
 « Col. i. 14. 
 
 with thee, we unite them with those 
 of the Blessed Virgin, our good and 
 sweet Mother, and by her sacred 
 lips wo offer thee this pious sup- 
 plication which the Church places 
 on those of her children, w^hatsoever 
 their condition may be — 
 
 Lamb of God, who takest away 
 the sins of the world, have mercy 
 
 ON US. 
 
 Agnus Dei., qui toUis peccata mundi, 
 <f miserere nobis. 
 
LITANY OF 
 
 THE 
 
 BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 O UB tuum prsesidium confugimus, 
 ^ Genitrix, nostras deprecationes r 
 
 sancta Dei 
 
 y ITE fly to thy patronage, holy Mother 
 " ^ of God, despise not our petitions in our 
 
 le despicias 
 
 in necessitatibus njDstris ; sed a periculis cunctis 
 
 necessities ; but deliver us always from all dan- 
 
 libera nos semper, Virgo gloriosa et benedicta. 
 
 gers, glorious and blessed Virgin. 
 
 Kyrie eleison. 
 
 
 Lord, have mercy. 
 
 Kyrie eleison. 
 
 
 Lord, have mercy. 
 
 Christe eleison. 
 
 
 Christ, have mercy. 
 
 Ghriste eleison. 
 
 
 Christ, have mercy. 
 
 Kyrie eleison. 
 
 
 Lord, have mercy. 
 
 Kyrie eleison. 
 
 
 Lord, have mercy. 
 
 Christe audi nos. 
 
 
 Christ, hear us. 
 
 Christe exavdi nos. 
 
 
 Christ, graciously hear us. 
 
 Pater de coelis Deus, 
 
 Fili Redemptor mundi Deus, 
 
 »l 
 
 God the Father of heaven, H| 
 God the Son, Redeemer of the world, § § 
 
 Spiritus Sancte Deus, 
 
 i*'! 
 
 God the Holy Ghost, § | 
 
 Sancta Trinitas, unus Deus, 
 
 3 
 
 Holy Trinity, one God, ^ 
 
 Sancta Maria, Ora pro nobis. 
 
 
 Holy Mary, Pray /or us 
 
 Sancta Dei Genitrix, 
 
 
 Holy Mother of God, 
 
 Sancta Virgo virginum, 
 
 
 Holy Virgin of virgins. 
 
 Mater Christi, 
 
 
 Mother of Christ, 
 
 Mater divinge gratise, 
 
 
 Mother of divine grace. 
 
 Mater purissima. 
 
 
 Mother most pure. 
 
 Mater castissima, 
 
 ? 
 
 Mother most chaste, 
 
 Mater inviolata. 
 
 Mother inviolate, ^ 
 
 Mater intemerata 
 
 "S 
 
 Mother undefiled, **i 
 
 Mater amabilis, 
 
 1 
 
 Mother most amiable, ^ 
 
 Mater admirabilis, 
 
 1 
 
 Mother most admirable, g 
 
 Mater Creatoris, 
 
 Mother of our Creator, 
 
 Mater Redemptoris, 
 
 
 Mother of our Redeemer, 
 
 Virgo prudentissima, 
 
 
 Virgin most prudent. 
 
 Virgo veneranda. 
 
 
 Virgin most venerable. 
 
 Virgo prsedicanda. 
 
 
 Virgin most renowned. 
 
 Virgo potens, 
 
 
 Virgin most powerful, 
 
 Virgo Clemens, 
 
 
 Virgin most merciful, 
 
1 
 
 Yirgo fidelU, 
 
 Speoulam jastituB, 
 
 Sedes npientiaB, 
 
 Causa nostne laetitia, 
 
 Yas spirituale, 
 
 Yas honorabile, 
 
 Yas insigne deTotiom% 
 
 Bosa m jstioa, 
 
 Turris Davidioa, 
 
 Turris ebnmea, 
 
 Domas anrea, 
 
 Foederis area, 
 
 Janna cceli, 
 
 Stella matatina, 
 
 Solus infirmorum, 
 
 Befuginm peccatomm, 
 
 Consolatrix afflictorum, 
 
 Auxilium Christianomm, 
 
 Regina Angelorum, 
 
 Regioa Patriarchamm, 
 
 Regina Prophetamm, 
 
 Rf^na Apostolomm, 
 
 Regina Martyrnm, 
 
 Regina Confessorum, 
 
 Regina Yirginnm, « 
 
 Regina Sanctorum omnium, 
 
 Regina sine labe originali concepta, 
 
 Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi. 
 
 Farce nobis, Domine. 
 
 Agnus Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi, 
 
 Exaudi nos, Domine. 
 
 Ag^us Dei, qui tollis peccata mundi. 
 
 Minerere nobis. 
 Chrisie audi noa 
 Ckrixte exaudi nos. 
 Ant. Sub taum prsesidium confugimus, sancta 
 Dei Genitrix, nostras deprecation es ne despicias 
 in neoessitatibus nostris ; sed a periculis cunctis 
 libera nos semper. Viri»o gloriosa et benedicta. 
 V. Ora pro nobis, sancta Dei Genitrix. 
 B. Ut digni efficiamur promissionibus Christi. 
 
 I 
 
 f 
 
 Yii'gin most faithful, 
 
 Mirror of justice, 
 
 Seat of wisdom, 
 
 Cause of our joy. 
 
 Spiritual Vessel, 
 
 Vessel of honor, 
 
 Vessel of Singular devotion, 
 
 Mystical Rose, 
 
 Tower of David, 
 
 Tower of ivory. 
 
 House of gold, 
 
 Ark of the covenant, 
 
 Gate of heaven, 
 
 Morning star, 
 
 Health of the sick, 
 
 Refuge of sinners, 
 
 Comforter of the afiiicted. 
 
 Help of Christians, 
 
 Queen of Angels, 
 
 Queen of Patriarchs, 
 
 Queen of Prophets, 
 
 Queen of Apostles, 
 
 Queen of Martyrs, 
 
 Queen of Confessors, 
 
 Queen of Virgins, 
 
 Queen of all Saints, 
 
 Queen conceived without original sin, 
 
 Lamb of God, who takest away the sins of 
 the world, 
 
 Spare us, Lord. 
 
 Lamb of God, who takest away the sins ol 
 the world, 
 
 Graciously hear us, Lord. 
 
 Lamb of God, who takest away the sins o^ 
 the world. 
 
 Have mercy on us. 
 
 Christ, hear us. 
 
 Christ, graciously hear u.% 
 Ant. We fly to thy patronage, O holy Mother 
 of God, despise not our petitions in our neces- 
 sities ; but deliver us always from all dangers, 
 O glorious and blessed Virgin. 
 
 V. Pray for us, O holy Mother of God. 
 B. That we may be made worthy of the pro- 
 mises of Christ. 
 
1 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 725 
 
 Oremus. 
 
 Let us pray. 
 
 Gratiam tuam, qusesumus, Domine, menti- 
 
 Pour forth, we beseech thee, Lord, thy 
 
 bua nostris infunde : ut qui, Angelo nuntiante, 
 
 grace into our hearts ; that we to whom the In- 
 
 Christi Filii tui Incarnationem cognovimus, per 
 
 carnation of Christ, thy Son, was made known 
 
 Passionem »J« ejus et Crucem ad Resurrectionis 
 
 by the message of an angel, may, by his Pas- 
 
 gloriam perducamur. Per eundem Christum 
 
 sion *J« and Cross, be brought to the glory of 
 
 Dominum nostrum. 
 
 his resurrection. Through the same Christ our 
 
 
 Lord. 
 
 R. Amen. 
 
 R. Amen. 
 
 V. Divinum auxilium maneat semper nobis- 
 
 V. May the divine assistance remain always 
 
 cum. 
 
 with us. 
 
 R. Amen. 
 
 R, Amen. 
 
 Saluc 
 
 E eg in a. 
 
 O ALVE, Regina, Mater misericordiae ; 
 *^ Vita, dulcedo, et spes nostra, salve. 
 
 TTAIL. holy Queen, Mother of mercy ; 
 
 -*--■- Our life, our sweetness, and our hope, all 
 
 
 hail. 
 
 Ad te clamamus, exules filii Hevse ; 
 
 To thee we cry, poor banished sons of Eve ; 
 
 Ad te suspiramus, gementes et flentes in hac 
 
 To thee we sigh, weeping and mourning in 
 
 lacrymarum valle. 
 
 this vale of tears. 
 
 Eia ergo, Advocata nostra, 
 
 Therefore, our Advocate, 
 
 Illos tuos misericordes oculos ad nos con- 
 
 Turn thou on us those merciful eyes of 
 
 verte ; 
 
 thine ; 
 
 Et Jesum, benedictum fructum ventris tui 
 
 And after this our exile, show us 
 
 Nobis post hoc exilium ostende, 
 
 The blessed fruit of thy womb, Jesus, 
 
 Clemens, pia, dulcis Virgo Maria. 
 
 merciful, O kind, sweet Virgin Mary. 
 
 V. Ora pro nobis, sancta Dei Genitrix. 
 
 V. Pray for us, holy Mother of God. 
 
 R. Ut digni efficiamur promissionibus ChristL 
 
 R. That we may be made worthy of the pro- 
 
 
 mises of Christ 
 
 IHcmorarc. 
 
 J^TEMORARE, piissima Virgo Maria, non 
 •^'^ esse aiiditum a sseculo, quemquam ad tua 
 
 "O EMEMBER, most gracious Virgin Mary, 
 -*-^ that never was it known, that any one 
 
 currentem prsesidia, tua implorantem auxilia, 
 
 who fled to thy protection, implored thy help, 
 
 tua petentem suffragia, esse derelictum. Ego, 
 
 and sought thy intercession, was left unaided. 
 
 tali animatus confidentia, ad te, Virgo virginum, 
 
 Lispired with this confidence, I fly unto thee, 
 
Hater, oarro. Ad te veuiu ; coram te gemens 
 peooaior asaiaia Noli, Mater Yerbi, verba 
 mea despioere, sed audi propitia et exaudi. 
 Amen. 
 
 Virgin of virgins, my Mother. To thee I come ; 
 before thee I stand, sinful and sorrowful.* O 
 Mother of the Word Incarnate, despise not my 
 petitions, but in thy mercy hear and answer me. 
 Amen. 
 
 * Here you may make your request 
 
 For taying the "Salre Begin* " in the morning, and the "Idtany of the Blessed Virgin" in the evening, adding to 
 «adi the following Tersicle : 
 
 V. Dignare me laadare te, Virgo sacrata. 
 
 B, Da mihi virtutem contra hostes tuos. 
 V. Benedictus Deus in Sanctis suis. 
 R. Amen. 
 
 V. Vouchsafe that I may praise thee, O sacred 
 Virgin. 
 
 a. Give me strength against thy enemies. 
 V. Blessed be God in his Saints. 
 S. Amen. 
 
 Ist An indulgence of 100 days every day. 2d. An indulgence of 7 years and 7 quadragentB every Sunday. 3d. A 
 plenary indulgence on any two Simdays in every month, on all the Feasts of the Blessed Virgin, on the Feast of All Saints, 
 to thow who repeat the above-mentioned prayers every day, with the usual conditions ; and also at the hour of death. 
 
 An indulgence of 800 days every time the three following ejaculatory prayers are said, to obtain a happy death : 
 
 Jesus, Joseph, and Mary, I give you my heart and my life. 
 
 Jescs, Joseph, and Mary, assist me in my last agony. 
 
 Jesus, Joseph, and Mary, may I die in peace in your blessed company. 
 For saying any one of them, 100 days. 
 
 Sixtns v., anxious to propagate more and more the devotion to Mary, and to induce the Faithful to have recourse to 
 her intercession, granted by the Bull "Reddituri," of the 11th July, 1687, two hundred days' indulgence to those who 
 should redte, with a contrite heart, the "Litany of the Blessed Virgin," with the versicle "Ora pro nobis," etc., and the 
 prayer "Qratiam tuam," etc. Benedict XIII. confirmed this grant, approving of a decree of the Congregation of Indul- 
 gences of the 12th of January. 1728. Pius VII., by his decree "Urbis et Orbis." of the 30th September, 1817, extended 
 the indulgence to 300 days, made it applicable to the souls in purgatory, and added a Plenary Indulgence, which may be 
 gained on the Feasts of the Conception, the Nativity, the Annunciation, the Purification, and the Assumption, by those 
 who say this Litany every day, provided that they go to confession with due contrition, receive the Holy Commimion, visit 
 a church oi public chapel, and pray there according to the intention of the sovereign pontiff. ' 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 727 
 
 MEDITATION UPON THE ANGELICAL SALUTATION. 
 
 After the TiOrd's Prayer, tlie use of the Antrelical Salutation has now become ever3'where more general among the 
 pious Faithful ; how rightly and justly, has been very often shown, and is proved by the fact itself. Be it that the 
 envious gna^li their teeth, tliat the -'Scourge uf Mary.'" and infidels cavil; yet the custom of saluting, and tlie form of 
 praying to the Virgin cannot be otherwise than strongly approved by us. since it was brought from heaven by a messenger 
 of God ; for who is there who can doubt that he came an ambiissador taught by God ? 
 
 So. therefore, will it be just and right, even at this day, to honor the Virgin now. whom it has been the will of God 
 BO Ui honor of old. What, then, we now propose to do is, to point out the use and object of the Angelical Salutation. For 
 terse as it is in expression, yet fruitful in mysteries, its frequent repetition, with the aid of a little attentive reflection, will 
 cause it to be relished the more. 
 
 Assuredly, notliing is so becoming and suitable to a Christian, as frequently and devoutly to call to mind his Redemp- 
 tion : but becau.se the Incarnation of the Son of God is its first and chief mystery, and it was ordered by the Divine 
 Wisdom that this should be accomplished by means of an embassage sent from heaven to a Virgin, how can it be denied 
 that it is a pious duty, both becoming and well-pleasing to God, often to reflect upon the very words with which it was his 
 will that the angel should announce so great a mystery, expected during so many ages, and longed for with sighs so many 
 and so great ; and so to take delight in the Salutation with which the heaven-sent ambassador first accosted the Virgin who 
 was destined to so great a work ? And when this is done with the special oi)ject of saluting a Virgin who was so highly 
 beloved and chosen of all by God to be his Mother, we may, with feelings of the utmost gratitude recall the benefit of our 
 Eedemption, and the work of our Lord's Incarnation. 
 
 Now. when we salute the Virgin, what kind of salutation may we expect from her in return ? To thost. >yl".o salute her, 
 undoubtedly she will on her part render her good wishes for, or rather her aid towards, their salvation. For how can it be 
 that a Mother would ever refrain from pouring out a heart so tender, so maternal as hers, upon those who are destined to 
 be co-heirs with her Son, especially when we bear within us the grateful recollection of so great a mystery that of old was 
 accomplished in herself? Surely, then, she will rejoice in addressing her Son with suppliant prayers for the promotion of 
 its beneficial effects tipon ourselves. 
 
 For what can be more pleasing to so merciful a Mother than to obtain for us the very thing for the sake of which she 
 became the Mother of God. or for which God in herself was made man? But in vain is she God's Mother, and God man, if 
 man become not partaker of the divine nature, and attain salvation. That God may avert this from us, let us beseech him 
 through his Mother, in saluting her from our hearts. 
 
 Hail Mary. 
 
 TTAIL. and rejoice, O most blessed, most 
 -*— *- pure, and most worthy Virgin Mary! O 
 most illustrious Star of the sea! who shinest 
 more brightly than all the rest over the dark- 
 ness of this world ! who art so honorably saluted 
 by the Archangel sent to thee from heaven, and 
 by thy kinswoman, Elizabeth, by the teaching 
 of the Holy Ghost ; and now, too, by all the 
 congregation of the faithful from the desire of 
 thy honor and love ! Behold, I praise thee and 
 salute thee, and gratulate thee, O most holy 
 Virgin and Mother ! and I praise in thee God 
 the Father, who made his only Son to be thine 
 
 * 
 
 also, and to be at the same time the Brother of 
 us all. I praise God the Son, who has chosen 
 thee to be his Mother, that by thee he might 
 show himself our Saviour ; I praise God the 
 Holy Ghostj who, by his own wonderful power, 
 has accomplished that unspeakable work in thy 
 womb! 
 
 Full of grace. 
 
 ■^RATH 
 
 and malediction is on all the 
 children of Adam ; but thou hast found 
 grace with God ; nay, thou art full of grace, 
 free from everj' fault, and filled with all virtues 
 and endowments of gractf. What marvel is it if 
 
•2S 
 
 MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 thoa Art fall of grace, when the fiiUneRS of the 
 Qodhead has dwelt corporeally > in thee I when 
 tilt very Fountain of grace and salvatiun has 
 pDined himself entirely into thee alonu ; and by 
 thee, as by a river or channel, has willed him- 
 Ki-lf to be poured out upon us all! In less 
 uieiuiure has grace been given to the rest uf the 
 Saints ; but the very fullness of grace has pour- 
 ed itself into thee. For even though we do 
 read uf some who were full of grace, yet thou 
 art so in a manner exceedingly and pre-emi- 
 nently different from those. For when vessels 
 are tilled, both great and small, all are full ; but 
 tht! vessel which holds the most has the grt-utest 
 quantity of liquid. How great, then, must be 
 the grace that is in thee, to enable thee to con- 
 tain God, whom not the whole world is able to 
 contain ! to* enable thee, I say, to be the Mother 
 of God, the Queen of Heaven, the Mistress of 
 the Angels, the Mediatress and the Advocate 
 of men ! 
 
 But to what purpose art thou fvdl, if not to 
 overflow to us also ? O that thy fountains may 
 be conveyed abroad,* that those sweet odors, 
 those gifts of graces, may flow forth upon us, 
 that we may, all of us, receive of a fullness so 
 great ! 
 
 Let thy goodness, O Blessed Virgin, diffuse 
 abroad that very grace of which thou art full, 
 that from the overflowing stream of thy bounty 
 the guilty may receive pardon, the sick cure, 
 the faint-hearted strength, the afflicted consola- 
 tion, the endangered aid and deliverance. O 
 that I may merit to obtain even one small drop 
 out of a fullness so great, to water my dry and 
 thirsty heart ! 
 
 The Lord is with thee. 
 
 TTOW rich and blessed must be the posses- 
 -^-^ sion of her who possesses the Lord her 
 God ! What good must there not be there, 
 where is present the Lord, who himself is the 
 
 CoLa.9. 
 
 « Prov. V. 16. 
 
 Fountain of all goodness 1 Doubtless when all 
 things are God's, nothing is lacking to him who 
 possesses God. True, the Lord is with thee, as 
 he is with all just persons ; but far more pre- 
 eminently, by special grace, and by a particular 
 providence, is he with thee ; with thee in thy 
 heart, with thee in thy womb ; Ihe. Power of the 
 Most High {Qod the Father) ahall overxhadovb 
 thee. The Holy Ghost has come upon thee. 
 The Word made flesh has come forth of thee. 
 The Lord is with thee and in thee, as a king 
 upon his throne, as a bridegroom in his bridal 
 chamber, as dear, nay, far more dearly and 
 closely than is a friend in a friend. Obtain, 
 O Lady, that my Lord may be with me by 
 grace, who was with thee by the closest union 
 of love and corporal presence 1 Doubtless all 
 blessings will be with him in whose company is 
 the Lord, neither shall I fear any evils, if the 
 Lord is with me. 
 
 Blessed art thou among women. 
 
 "OLESSED indeed among women, since thou 
 -*-' alone of so many thousands hast pleased 
 the King most high. Justly blessed, who hast 
 been the object of so many prayers and sighs, 
 expected for so many ages, foretold by so many 
 oracles ! Truly blessed among women, who art 
 exempt from the common curse and condition 
 of women, so as neither to continue barren, nor 
 to lose thy virginity, nor to bring forth with 
 pain! 
 
 There lies, moreover, a hard necessity and a 
 heavy burden upon all the other daughters of 
 Eve. If they are fruitful, they suffer pain and 
 defilement ;' if barren, they are cursed.^ Thou 
 art at once both fruitful and pure ; and, by 
 being devoid of pain, hast turned into a blessing 
 the curse of Eve. 
 
 Cursed of old was the earth in the work of 
 the sinner, which, even when cultivated, sprouts 
 forth thorns and briers to the heirs of maledic- 
 
 * Gen. iii. 16. 
 
 * Eiod. xxiii. 26. 
 
MEDITATIONS ON THE LITANY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN. 
 
 729 
 
 tion. But blessed is the earth now in the work 
 of the Eedeemer, which brings forth to all men 
 remission of sins, and the fruit of Life, and has 
 destroyed the sentence of the original curse 
 upon the sons of Adam. 
 
 O Blessed One, in that thou art the Mother 
 of a Son, in whom all nations shall be blessed I 
 Therefore shall all generations call thee blessed, 
 because he that is mighty has done to thee great 
 things. For thou conceivest, but without con- 
 cupiscence ; thou art heavy with child, but not 
 overburdened. Thou bringest forth, but with- 
 out travail. Thou knowest not a man, and yet 
 thou bearest a Son. O what a Son is he ! 
 Thou becomest the true mother of him, whose 
 true Father is God : thou bearest God, and 
 conceivest of God : a fruitful Virgin, a chaste 
 and inviolate Mother. How can it then be that 
 thou art not blessed among women ? 
 
 And blessed is the fruit of thy wombj 
 Jesus. 
 
 "pijESSED, I say, because he in whom all 
 -*-^ nations are blessed is the Author of grace 
 and the foiintain of all blessing. Him do we 
 bless and praise in thee, O Blessed Virgin, 
 whom likewise thy soul praises and magnifies 
 
 alone above all, because he has done to thee 
 those great and wonderful things which we 
 admire and venerate in thee, who is mighty 
 over all things, God blessed forever ! 
 
 Eve ate the fruit of death, and, with herself, 
 brought us to ruin. Thou hast brought forth 
 to the world the Fruit of Life, and, behold ! we 
 have lived again. O how blessed is the womb 
 that has borne and produced for us such fruit ! 
 
 Thou rejoicest, O holy Parent! and feastest 
 now, but in another form, upon the Fruit of thy 
 womb. Be satisfied, then, O Mother ! with the 
 glory of thy Son, but scatter to thy little ones 
 thy crumbs ! Now thou art Mistress at the 
 table ; we, the dogs, under the table. As the 
 eyes of the handmaid are on the hands of her 
 mistress, so do our attendant souls expect of 
 thee the Sustenance of life. By thee have we 
 partaken of the Fruit of Life at the Table of the 
 Mysteries that are thereon ; by thee let us par- 
 take of Jesus, the blessed fruit of thy womb, at 
 the table of everlasting joys ! Amen.' 
 
 ' Thus much more has been written than our purpose 
 required, for the benefit of those who dislike the frequent 
 repetitions of the " Hail Mary." 
 
 Pope Paul V. has granted an indulgence of a hundred 
 days to those who recite the "Hail Mary " at the stroke of 
 the clock. 
 
>s*' 
 
 /■ 
 
 THE J^^^ SHALL BUD LIKE THE LILY, AND 
 BLOSSnw VTFPNALLT BEFORE THE LORD. 
 
THE 
 
 ADMIEABLE LIFE 
 
 OF THE GLORIOUS 
 
 PATRIARCH SAINT JOSEPH: 
 
 TO WHICH IB ADDED THX 
 
 LIVES OF ST. JOACHIM AND ST. ANNE 
 
 TAKEN FROM 
 
 THE CITE MYSTIQUE DE DIEU, 
 
 (ths utstical citt ov aoD.) 
 
 TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH OF THE ABBIJ J. A. BOULLAN, DOCTOR IN THEOLOGY, 
 
 BY 
 
 MRS. J. SADLIER. 
 
 PUBLISHED WITH THE APPROBATION OF THE LATE MOST REV. JOHN HUGHES, D. D., 
 AND THE MOST REV. J. McCLOSKET, D. D., ARCHBISHOP OF NEW YORK. 
 
 ▲ NSW, ENLABQED AND BSYISSD SDITION. 
 
 PUBLISHED BY D. & J. SADLIER & CO., 31 BARCLAY STREET. 
 ' MONTREAL :— CORNER OF NOTRE DAME AND ST. FRANCIS X.iVIER STS. 
 
 1873. 
 
TO THE DIVINE HEART OF JESUS, AND TO MARY IMMACULATE. 
 
 JESUS I Son of the Eternal Father! Divine Eedeemer of our souls, whom Thou hast 
 redeemed by the effusion of Thy precious blood ! Thou hast deigned, during Thy mortal life, 
 to call by the sweet name of father, the glorious St. Joseph, and Thou hast chosen to be named 
 by men the son of Joseph. Word of God 1 Master of eternal wisdom 1 to whom, unless it be to 
 Thy Sacred Heart, can I more worthily make the offering of this Uttle book, in honor of the incom- 
 parable Patriarch? Deign, I implore Thee, to bless it, and its author. All unworthy and miserable 
 as I am, I beseech thee that this life of Thine adopted father may bear fruits of grace to many soula 
 — that it may become a blessing to the dwellings which receive it — that the sinner may be converted, 
 and the just encouraged to become holy, by meditating upon it. O Sacred Heart of Jesus 1 vouch- 
 safe to grant that grace, and these favors, in memory of Thy complaisance in the fidelity and love 
 of Thy glorious servant. Saint Joseph I 
 
 Mother of Jesus 1 Immaculate Virgin 1 Spouse of St. Joseph, thou who hast deigned to com- 
 municate to us by means of thy beloved daughter, Mary of Agreda, all that forms the subject of 
 this volume, disdain not. Queen of Mercy, to bless it. I place it in thy hands. Thou knowest, 
 that, overwhelmed by the weight of my miseries, I have had recourse to thy glorious spouse, whom 
 thou hast permitted me to call my father; and that in acknowledgment of his miraculous benefits, 
 I have applied myself, by thy consent, to this work. May this Life serve as an instrument to aug- 
 ment the devotion to St. Joseph among the children of the Church. Thou hast warned us, O 
 Mother of Pity, that lh& damned shall weep bitterly for not having knoton this means, so powerful and 
 90 efficacums, for their salvation, and for not having availed themselves of it. (Book V., ch. XVI.) 
 May those who yet live on earth, know and profit by it, to forsake the ways of sin, and to recover 
 the grace of the just 
 
 Worthy father of the Queen of Heaven, St. Joachim, thou whom the blessed Mother, and the 
 Sacred Heart of Jesus, have given me for my patron in the new vocation to which I have been so 
 freely predestined and called, deign to present the humble offering of my book to the great Patri- 
 arch St Joseph, and obtain for me, by your efficacious intercession, that I may be worthy to per- 
 severe to the end in the way which his mediation with Jesus and Mary has opened for me. 
 
 JesnsI Mary! Joseph 1 all hail! 
 
 Thb Abbe J. A. BOULLAN. 
 Pabu, Norember, 1856. 
 
THE ADMIRABLE LIFE 
 
 OF THE 
 
 GLOKIOUS PATRIAECH, ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 CHAPTER L 
 
 ESPOUSALS OF THE CHASTE ST. JOSEPH 
 
 WITH THE BLESSED VIRGEST VARIOUS 
 
 CIRCUMSTANCES WHICH ACCOMPANIED 
 THIS MYSTERIOUS MAERIAGE. 
 
 HE Blessed Virgin 
 Mary, after her 
 entrance into the 
 Temple, had 
 made, in the pres- 
 ence of all the 
 angelic hosts, a 
 vow of chastity. 
 This most chaste dove had renounced 
 earthly attachments, and the love of 
 all creatures, that she might have no 
 other spouse than God himself;' but at 
 the age of thirteen years and a half, it 
 was manifested to our sweet Lady in 
 a vision, that she should enter into the 
 marriage state. "The Lord tempted 
 Abraham," said Moses, — and the Lord 
 also tempted our august Mistress ; in 
 which we discovw the truth of these 
 words: "The judgments of the Lord ^- 
 
 are incomprehensible, and His ways 
 are above our ways." The thoughts 
 of the pure Mary were far removed 
 from those of the Most High, for she 
 had desired and resolved to have no 
 husband, so far as it depended upon 
 her own will. 
 
 The Lord spoke in a dream to the 
 high-priest, who was St. Simeon, and 
 commanded him to make preparations 
 for the marriage of Mary, daughter of 
 Joachim and Anne, of Nazareth, and 
 to convoke an assemblage of the other 
 priests to deliberate upon the subject. 
 St. Simeon obeyed the divine behest, 
 and the assembled doctors, inspired by 
 a celestial impulse, resolved, that in 
 an affair upon which the Lord had de- 
 clared His good pleasure, they ought to 
 consult His holy will by praying, that 
 He would manifest, by a sign, him who 
 should be the husband of Mary, and 
 that he should be of the house and lin- 
 eage of David, that the law might be 
 fulfilled. They therefore resolved to 
 appoint a day when all the young men 
 of that family, present in Jerusalem, 
 
should be invited to assemble in the 
 Temple. It was precisely the day on 
 which our blessed Lady had attained 
 her fourteenth year. 
 
 The priest Simeon summoned the 
 chaste Mary, in order to make known 
 to her this resolution. It was nine 
 days before that on which their designs 
 were to be put into execution. During 
 this time the most blessed Virgin re- 
 doubled her prayers, her tears, and 
 sighs, for the accomplishment of the 
 will of God in an event which caused 
 her the greatest pain. The Lord con- 
 soled her, saying: "I will give you a 
 spouse who will not oppose your holy 
 desires, but who will rather, by the 
 help of my grace, confirm them. I will 
 choose him for you perfect, and accord- 
 ing to my own heart, and I will elect 
 him for you from among my servants." 
 The holy angels also consoled her, say- 
 ing: "The Most High will guide you 
 in the way which is the best, the most 
 perfect, the most holy." 
 
 Joseph was born at Nazareth ; nev- 
 ertheless, by the disposition of the 
 Most High, he had come to dwell in 
 Jerusalem, because of certain reverses 
 of fortune, which resulted so favorably 
 for him that he had the happiness to 
 become the spouse of her whom God 
 had chosen to be His own Mother, 
 under the circumstances that we are 
 about to relate. 
 
 The day aj)pointed by the priests 
 arrived. Our blessed Lady had com- 
 
 f pleted the fourteenth year of her age. 
 The young men of the tribe of Judah, 
 and of the family of David, from whom 
 the august Mary was descended, who 
 were in the city of Jerusalem, were 
 assembled. Joseph, originally of Naz- 
 areth, but now an inhabitant of the 
 holy city, was invited to be with them, 
 l)ecause he, too, was of that I'oyal race. 
 He was then thirty-three years of age, 
 well-made, and possessed of an agree- 
 able physiognomy, which expressed an 
 incomparable modesty. He was indeed 
 as chaste in his thoughts and deeds, as 
 in his inclinations ; and having made a 
 vow of chastity when but twelve years 
 old, his life was pure and irreproach- 
 able before God and man. He was re- 
 lated to the Virgin Mary in the third 
 degree. 
 
 Inspired by the Most High, the chief 
 priest placed in the hands of each of 
 these young men a dry rod, in order 
 that by this means the Lord should 
 manifest him whom He had chosen to 
 be the husband of Maiy. All united 
 their prayers to those of the priests, for 
 none were ignorant of the virtues and 
 modesty of this holy maiden, nor of the 
 reputation of her beauty, and her pos- 
 sessions, as an only child ; and each de- 
 sired to make her his wife. Joseph 
 alone, the most humble, the most pious 
 among them, deemed himself unAvorthy 
 of so great a boon ; and, calling to 
 mind his vow of chastity, he resolved 
 anew to observe it, resigning himself 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 737 
 
 to the divine will even to the end of Ms 
 life. But this did not prevent him from 
 entertaining for the virtuous maiden 
 veneration and esteem beyond any of 
 his compeers. 
 
 All were engaged in pi-ayer, when 
 they saw blossoms burst forth from the 
 rod borne by Joseph, and at the same 
 instant a beautiful dove was seen to 
 descend, which alighted on the head of 
 the saint. The Lord, at the same mo- 
 ment, spoke to him interiorly, and said : 
 "Joseph, my servant, Mary shall be- 
 come your spouse; receive her with 
 assiduity and respect, for she is very 
 agreeable in my eyes ; she is good and 
 most pure in body and mind, and you 
 will do all that she will tell you." The 
 priests, upon this sign from heaven, 
 determined to give St. Joseph to Mary 
 for her husband. They then called for 
 her, who was more excellent than the 
 sun, more beautiful than the moon, and 
 she appeared with a majesty more than 
 angelic; with a loveliness, modesty, and 
 grace incomparable ; and the priests es- 
 poused her to Joseph, the most chaste 
 and the most holy of men. The august 
 Mary, with mingled modesty and ten- 
 derness, took leave of the priests and 
 of her mistress, — asking pardon of her 
 companions, and expressing her grateful 
 •sense of all the kindness she had receiv- 
 ed from them; then, accompanied by 
 many of the most distinguished minis- 
 ters of the Temple, she departed with 
 her saintly spouse for Nazareth, tlie 
 
 * country of the newly married pair, 
 where lay the possessions of the blessed 
 parents of our sweet Lady. 
 
 On their arrival they were received 
 and visited by all their relatives and 
 friends, with the rejoicings usual on 
 similar occasions ; and having religious- 
 ly acquitted themselves of all those 
 duties which custom commanded in 
 their intercourse with the world, our 
 holy spouses at length found them- 
 selves alone in their house. It was a 
 custom among the Jews, that tke newly 
 espoused, during the first days of their 
 union, sbould study together their nat- 
 ural inclinations, in order to promote 
 their future peace. 
 
 On one of these days, St. Joseph said 
 to his spouse Mary ; " I give thanks to 
 tbe Most High God for having granted 
 me the favor to choose me for your hus- 
 band, when I did not in the least merit 
 this honor, and when I believed myself 
 unworthy to bear you company. But 
 His Divine Majesty, who can, when He 
 will, uplift the poor, has shown His 
 Mercy towards me. I desire that you 
 will aid me with your goodness and 
 your virtues in offering Him my thanks- 
 givings. In all that regards His service, 
 I will be your servant. I pray you to 
 supply my deficiencies in those qualities 
 which I have not, but which, as your 
 husband, I ought to possess. Only 
 make your wishes known to me, that I 
 may fulfil them." 
 
 His most holy consort replied to the 
 
T» 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 fj^nt : " I am well pleased that the Most f 
 High, having destined me for marriage, 
 has had the goodness to choose you for 
 my husband and my master, and, with 
 your permission, I will now express the 
 thoughts and intentions which I wish 
 to impart to you on this subject." 
 
 The grace of the Most High inflamed 
 anew the heart of St. Joseph wdth His 
 divine love, " Speak," he said, " for 
 tiiy servant heareth." The Queen of 
 the universe was attended by her thou- 
 sand angels; for the most pure Mary 
 comprehended the respect and attention 
 to be observed in conversation with 
 her spouse; and that she might have 
 more abundant grace and merits, the 
 Lord had continued in her the reserve 
 and fear that she had in speaking alone 
 with a man, which had never before 
 happened to her, except it might be in 
 some casual encounter with the chief 
 priest The august Virgin then said to 
 St Joseph: "It is just that we offer 
 thanks, and give glory and praise to 
 our God and Creator, who has made His 
 mercy to shine upon us, in choosing us 
 for His service. In my most tender 
 youth, I consecrated myself to God by 
 a vow which I made, to be, during all 
 my life, chaste -in body and mind, and 
 my desire to preserve my faith to Him 
 is unchangeable. I trust that you will 
 help me to fulfil this vow, and in all 
 things else I will be your servant. 
 Accept, my husband, this holy resolu- 
 tion, and confirm it by your own, so 
 
 that we may obtain the eternal joys to 
 which we aspire." 
 
 The chaste Joseph, filled with joy, 
 replied : " In declaring to me your 
 chaste thoughts and holy resolutions, 
 you have penetrated and opened my 
 heart, which, until you li;id revealed 
 your own, I was unwilling to uncover. 
 The Lord called me, also, at an early 
 age, that I should love Him with an 
 upright mind. Know, then, thai in my 
 twelfth year I, too, made a promise to 
 serve God in perpetual chastity. I now 
 renew this vow, and, with His grace, I 
 will be your faithful servant, and I 
 pray you to receive my chaste affections, 
 and to regard me as your brother." 
 
 During this conversation the Most 
 High confirmed anew in the heart of St. 
 Joseph the virtue of chastity, and the 
 pure and holy love which he should 
 bear to the blessed Virgin, his spouse. 
 Thus he was possessed by this love 
 in an eminent degree, and our august 
 Queen augmented it, and enraptured 
 his heart by her conversation. By this 
 divine assistance the holy spouses en- 
 joyed inexpressible consolation. The 
 august Queen promised to second the 
 desires of St Joseph, and the Most 
 High imbued him with such an exalted 
 purity, and such an absolute control of 
 his passions, that he served his consort * 
 without obstacle, and with a grace as 
 admirable as it was extraordinary. In 
 serving her, he followed the will and 
 the good pleasure of the Lord. 
 
{Snx Laiii of tk jUjotshti]. 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 739 
 
 They made a division of the eifects 
 which St. Joachim and St. Anne had 
 left to their blessed child. One part 
 was offered to the Temple, where she 
 had been educated ; the second was de- 
 voted to the service of the poor; and 
 the third was placed at the disposal of 
 St. Josej)h. For herself, our Queen re- 
 served only the care to serve and em- 
 ploy herself within the house, for she 
 dispensed herself always from the affairs 
 of buying and selling. 
 
 In his youth St. Joseph had learned 
 the carpenter's trade, as being one of 
 the most useful to gain a livelihood, for 
 he was without property. He inquired 
 of his saintly spouse if she would con- 
 sent that he should practice this trade 
 to gain something for the poor, and also 
 as a means to avoid idleness. The most 
 prudent Virgin consented, and reminded 
 St. Joseph that it was not the will of 
 God they should be rich, but poor, and 
 protectors of the poor, so far as their 
 means permitted. After this, the two 
 holy spouses had an humble dispute, in 
 which each wished to obey the other as 
 superior. But the most humble Mary, 
 who was the humblest of the humble, 
 was victorious in her humility, and the 
 man being the head, she would not per- 
 mit the order of nature to be reversed. 
 She therefore obtained the consent of 
 her husband to receive her obedience in 
 all things. She asked only permission 
 to give alms to the poor, to which the 
 saint conseited. 
 
 ^ 
 
 During these first days, St. Joseph, 
 by a new light from above, had pene- 
 trated the character of his spouse. Her 
 rare prudence, her profound humility, 
 her incomparable purity, and her pos- 
 session of every virtue beyond all that 
 he could have hoped, enraptured him 
 with admiration. With a spirit full of 
 joy, and his heart inflamed with ardent 
 affection, he ceased not to praise the 
 Lord, and to offer Him thanks for hav- 
 ing bestowed on him so unmerited a 
 treasure. The Lord had also so ordered, 
 that the Queen of Heaven, by her mien 
 and by her presence, inspired her spouse 
 with such mingled sentiments of rever- 
 ence and respect, that we find no terms 
 to express them. To the eyes of St. 
 Joseph a radiant splendor shone from 
 the features of our Lady, like that of 
 Moses when he descended from the 
 mount. 
 
 Afterwards, in a vision, the Blessed 
 Virgin heard these words : " You per- 
 ceive how faithful I am in my promises : 
 the companionship of my servant Joseph 
 will aid you to preserve the laws of my 
 spouse; obey him as you ought, and be 
 careful of his happiness." She replied : 
 " With the divine favor and helj), I will 
 obey Thy servant Joseph, and serve 
 him." 
 
 Their marriage had been celebrated 
 on the 8th of September, and until the 
 25th of March, when the Word became 
 Incarnate, the two spouses had lived in 
 such wise that the Most High prepared 
 
them for the work for which they had 
 been chosen. 
 
 But let U8 pause to express our joy 
 on witnessing the fortunate destiny of 
 the happiest among nioi-tals, St. Joseph. 
 Whence comes to thee, O man of God, 
 so eminent a benediction, that among 
 all the children of Adam it can be said 
 of thee alone, that God has been so 
 entirely thine that He was taken for 
 thy Son? The eternal Father gives 
 thee His daughter ; the Son places His 
 own Mother in thy charge; the Holy 
 Spirit confides to thee His spouse, and 
 places thee in His stead, and the Holy 
 Trinity gives thee its elect, its only 
 one, for thy lawful spouse. Great 
 saint, dost thou then comprehend all 
 thy dignity? Dost thou fathom all 
 thy greatness? Dost thou know that 
 she whom thou hast just received as 
 thy wife is Queen and Mistress of heav- 
 en and earth, and that thou art the 
 depositary of the inestimable treasures 
 of God himself? Behold, O man of 
 God, the precious pledge thou hast, 
 and know that if thou dost not render 
 the angels and the seraphim envious, 
 thy happiness, and the wonderful mys- 
 tery of thine espousals excite their 
 wondering admiration. For such joys 
 and favors receive congratulations in 
 the name of the whole human race. 
 For thou art the spouse of her who has 
 only God above her. Thou shalt be 
 powerful and happy among men and 
 angels. Be mindful of our poverty 
 
 f and wretchedness, and of me, miserable 
 worm of the earth, for I desire to be 
 thy faithful servant, and to be enriched 
 and favored by thy powerful protec- 
 tion. 
 
 CHAPTER H. 
 
 THE GLORIOUS ST. JOSEPH, CONSIDERED IN 
 ALL THE CIRCUMSTANCES THAT CONCERN 
 THE MYSTERY OF THE VISITATION OF 
 THE BLESSED VIRGIN, HIS WIFE. 
 
 IT is recorded in the Holy Scriptures 
 (Prov. xxxi. 11), in reference to Mary: 
 " The heart of her husband trusteth in 
 her, and he shall have no need of spoils." 
 Certain it is that the holy Joseph was 
 called the husband of Mary, because 
 she was his lawful wife. It is equally 
 evident that he trusted in her, hoping 
 that through her incomparable virtue, 
 all things to be desired would follow 
 her. But he trusted in her, most of 
 all, a little later, when, still in ignorance 
 of the mystery, he saw her with child ; 
 because, then he believed, and trusted 
 in hope against hope, for, from the evi- 
 dence which appeared, he could find no 
 satisfaction but in his confidence in the 
 holiness of such a woman. And although 
 he resolved to leave her, because he 
 saw the effect before his eyes, knowing 
 nothing of the cause, still he dared not 
 doubt either her modesty or her discre- 
 tion, neither could he separate himself 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 741 
 
 from tlie pure and holy love witli which 
 the most chaste heart of such a wife 
 had inspired him. 
 
 Thus he neither considered himself 
 deceived nor poor in spoils — for if all 
 be termed spoils which is above what is 
 necessary, all was in superabundance for 
 this happy husband, when he was made 
 acquainted with the dignity of his wife, 
 and of that which was inclosed within 
 her bosom. In fact, the truly chaste 
 and faithful Joseph (who took the ut- 
 most care of all that concerned our holy 
 Esther, and who influenced her continu- 
 ally to pray for the freedom of his peo- 
 ple, for this was the ordinary occupation 
 of our incomparable saint and his most 
 pure spouse) was elevated by her means 
 to such an extraordinary sanctity and 
 so excellent a dignity, that the Supreme 
 Majesty gave him His seal-ring, so that 
 by this mark of honor he should com- 
 mand the same God made man, who 
 was submitted to him, as it is said by 
 the Evangelist, Luke ii. 51. 
 
 Let us not forget to record that the 
 Word made man, as soon as He had been 
 conceived in the chaste womb of the 
 most pure Mary, having first performed 
 His duties towards God, prayed for His 
 Mother and for St. Joseph, supplicating 
 for them eternal blessedness. 
 
 The august Mary, aged fourteen years, 
 six months, and seventeen days, had 
 conceived in her blessed womb the 
 Word made man under the miraculous 
 circumstances which may be seen in her 
 
 * Life. Now she learned from the dis- 
 course of the celestial ambassador, St. 
 Gabriel, that her cousin Elizabeth had 
 conceived six months before. The Most 
 High had revealed to her that the. son 
 of Elizabeth should be great before the 
 Lord, that he should be a prophet and 
 the precursor of the Incarnate Word. 
 At the same time, our blessed Lady 
 knew that it would be pleasing to the 
 Lord if she should visit her cousin, in 
 order that the son, whom she bore in 
 her womb, might be sanctified by the 
 presence of their Saviour. 
 
 The Most High said to her : " I will 
 that you go and visit Elizabeth, because 
 We choose her son for great things, 
 which are of Our good pleasure." The 
 prudent Mary replied : " My heart and 
 my desires are entirely consecrated to 
 Thy divine will, and I will execute with 
 diligence all that Thou shalt command 
 Thy most humble handmaid to perform. 
 Allow me to ask permission of Joseph, 
 my husband, that I may make this jour- 
 ney with his consent." 
 
 After this vision, the humble Mary 
 resolved to ask the permission of St. 
 Joseph; and, without revealing to him 
 the command of God, but with rare pru- 
 dence, she said: "I know, by a divine 
 illumination, that the goodness of the 
 Most High has favored my cousin Eliza- 
 beth, wife of Zachariah, in giving her a 
 son, whom she had so greatly desired. 
 I think I am obliged by customary 
 usage to go and visit her, to offer my 
 
lii 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 sympatliy, and to promote her spiritual 
 welfare. If this journey be agreeable 
 to you, I will make it, with your per- 
 mission, being entirely submissive to 
 your wilL Consider what will be for 
 the best, and tell me what I shall do." 
 The discreet silence and humble sub- 
 mission of Mary were pleasing to the 
 Ijord. He therefore disposed the heart 
 of Joseph by a divine light to do as she 
 desired. Guided by this celestial light, 
 the holy husband replied : " I confide as 
 I ought in your great virtue, because 
 I know that your well-regulated will 
 would undertake nothing which is not 
 for the greater glory of God, as this 
 journey must be. And that no one 
 may be surprised to see you go with- 
 out your husband, I will, with the 
 greatest pleasure, accompany and serve 
 you. Determine, then, the day of de- 
 parture." 
 
 The Blessed Virgin thanked her pru- 
 dent spouse for the affection which he 
 manifested for her, and they decided 
 to set out immediately for the house 
 of Elizabeth. St. Joseph prepared pro- 
 visions for the journey, — some fruit, 
 bread, and a few small fishes, which 
 he purchased. He had also a little 
 beast of burden, which was lent him 
 to carry his provisions, and his spouse, 
 the Queen of all that is created. With 
 this equipage they set out for Judea. 
 Tliey had scarcely left their house, 
 when our Queen, kneeling before St. 
 Joseph, asked his blessing, in order to 
 
 ♦ begin the day in the name of the Lord. 
 The saint hesitated, for, by long expe- 
 rience, he knew the excellence of his 
 spouse, but the holy and sweet impor- 
 tunities of the august Mary conquered, 
 and he blessed her in the name of the 
 Most High. 
 
 " At that time," saith the sacred text, 
 "Mary, rising up, went into the hill 
 country with haste, into a city of Ju- 
 dea." Now the chaste spouses, Mary 
 and Joseph, having left their father's 
 house, and forgotten their people, took 
 their way towards the house of Zacha- 
 riah, among the hills of Judea, distant 
 twenty- seven leagues from Nazareth. 
 The roads were rough, and they pos- 
 sessed no means of transport except 
 such as were afforded by their little 
 animal; nevertheless the most humble 
 and modest of creatures, Mary, prayed 
 St. Joseph to use it for himself. The 
 discreet spouse would not, by any 
 means, consent to this ; but in com- 
 plaisance, he allowed her from time to 
 time to go on foot with him, requesting 
 her with great respect not to refuse 
 him this gi'atification ; and the Queen 
 of heaven obeyed. 
 
 They continued their journey in these 
 humble debates, and thus they so well 
 employed their time, that there was 
 not a moment which was not filled by 
 some act of virtue. They walked alone, 
 but the angels assisted them in all 
 things; yet they were visible only to 
 the august Mary. Occasionally she 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 743 
 
 conversed with tliese angels, and the 
 most pure heart of our sweet Lady was 
 kindled anew with divine love. St. 
 Joseph contributed to all this by his dis- 
 creet silence, concentrating his thoughts 
 within, and yielding himself to sublime 
 contemplation. At other times the 
 spouses conversed together upon many 
 things regarding the salvation of their 
 souls, the coming of the Messiah, the 
 prophecies which the ancient fathers 
 had received on this point, and other 
 mysteries and secrets of the Most High. 
 During this journey there happened 
 to St. Joseph something which excited 
 his wonder. Inspired by a special 
 grace, he bore to his spouse a most 
 tender and holy love, and the saint, 
 being of a noble nature, amiable, agree- 
 able, and obliging, was inclined to an 
 ever watchful care for her. Now, as 
 the Queen of heaven carried in her 
 virginal bosom the Incarnate Word, 
 the saint was sensible that, through the 
 words and conversation of his spouse, 
 new impressions were made upon his 
 soul, but of the cause he was ignorant. 
 He found himself more and more in- 
 flamed by divine love, and in a higher 
 knowledge of those mysteries which 
 formed the subjects of their conversa- 
 tion; and the further they advanced 
 on their way and in their discussions, 
 the more these favors were augmented. 
 He felt also that the words of his 
 spouse served as the organ, by means 
 of which these favors were comrauni- 
 
 * cated to him. It was not possible that 
 the discreet St. Joseph should not re- 
 flect upon this new and wondeiful in- 
 fluence. But although it would have 
 afforded him, filled as he was with 
 wonder, the greatest gratification, with- 
 out curiosity, to have been informed 
 of the cause of it, his modesty was 
 such that he could not venture to ask 
 to be enlightened. 
 
 Our blessed Lady penetrated the 
 thought of her spouse, but, ignorant 
 of the way by which God would con- 
 duct this mystery, her great prudence 
 and her own discretion taught her, al- 
 though she had no command from the 
 Lord to conceal it, how good it was to 
 guard the secret of the most sublime 
 of all mysteries. She therefore con- 
 cealed it, without making it known to 
 her spouse, either on this occasion, or 
 afterwards, during the interior pains 
 which St. Joseph suffered on this ac- 
 count. What admirable prudence ! 
 Our sweet Lady prayed to God for the 
 saint, imploring the divine assistance, 
 of which she foresaw he would have 
 need, and of which we shall treat in 
 the following chapter. 
 
 This was the first journey which the 
 Incarnate Word made in this world, 
 four days after his entrance into it. 
 Our blessed Lady thus served as a car 
 for the true Solomon (Cant. iii. 9). 
 This journey lasted four days, during 
 which our holy travellers, besides those 
 interior virtues which have God for 
 
Hi 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 their object^ peiformed many acts of 
 charity towards their neighbors. The 
 Blessed Virgin cured, among othera, 
 a poor sick girl, in a village through 
 which she passed, on the first day after 
 her departure. 
 
 At length the august Mary and her 
 spouse, Joseph, arrived at the city of 
 Judea, where Elizabeth and Zachariah 
 then dwelt. This city was distant, as 
 I have said, twenty-seven leagues from 
 Nazareth, and about two leagues from 
 Jerusalem, near the spot where the tor- 
 rent of Sorec has its source. It was 
 afterwards entirely ruined, but the Lord 
 does not permit the memory of places 
 so venerable to be altogether lost. The 
 Visitation was made at the same place 
 where these divine mysteries are now 
 honored by the faithful who dwell in 
 Palestine, and by pilgrims who go 
 there to offer their devotions. 
 
 St Joseph went on before to give 
 notice to the inmates of the house, and, 
 having knocked at the door, he saluted 
 them, saying : " May the Lord be with 
 you, and fill your souls with His divine 
 grace." St. Elizabeth had been already 
 warned of their coming, for the same 
 Lord had revealed to her that her 
 cousin Mary of Nazareth was on her 
 way to visit her. Now, having heard 
 of her arrival, she came forth quickly, 
 with others of her family, to receive 
 the holy Virgin, who saluted her first, 
 saying: "The Lord be with you, my 
 dear cousin." "And may the same 
 
 Lord," replied Elizabeth, "reward you 
 for having taken the trouble to give 
 me this consolation. 
 
 The two cousins having retired to- 
 gether, it was then that the great mys- 
 tery of the sanctification of John the 
 Baptist was operated ; but those facts 
 do not belong to this history. Coming 
 out of their retreat in the dusk of the 
 evening, St. Elizabeth, who was in- 
 formed of the happiness of the chaste 
 St. Joseph, of which he was himself 
 ignorant, bestowed upon him every 
 mark of esteem and veneration. 
 
 After the saint had passed three days 
 in the house of Zachariah, he asked per- 
 mission of his blessed spouse to return 
 to Nazareth. He took leave, with the 
 promise to come and conduct our sweet 
 Lady home when she wished to return. 
 St.. Elizabeth offered him presents, pray- 
 ing him to accept them, but he received 
 only a few things, because this man of 
 God was not only a lover of poverty 
 but he had also a magnanimous and 
 generous heart. He then took the road 
 to Nazareth with the little beast that 
 he had borrowed. Having arrived at 
 his house, he was served there, in the 
 absence of his spouse, by a relative who 
 lived near, — the same who had been 
 accustomed to bring them supplies from 
 without, when the holy Lady was there. 
 
 After having passed three months, less 
 two days,* in the house of Zachariah, 
 
 * In counting eight days after the Word was 
 incarnate, the holy Virgin and St. Joseph arriv- 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 745 
 
 in the midst of events and prodigies 
 which do not belong to this histor}'^,* 
 the august Mary thought of departure. 
 St. Joseph, having been notified by St. 
 Elizabeth, left Nazareth to re-conduct 
 his spouse to her home. On his arrival 
 at the house of Zachaiiah, he was re- 
 ceived with the highest marks of respect, 
 for the holy priest already knew that 
 the great patriarch was the depositary 
 of the mysteries and the treasures of 
 heaven. The Blessed Virgin received 
 him with discreet demonstrations of 
 joy, and having placed herself on her 
 knees before him, according to her cus- 
 tom, she asked his benediction. After 
 he had taken some repose, they fixed 
 on the day of departure. Having taken 
 their leave, the happy patriarch, rejoiced 
 to possess his treasure again, although 
 he knew not as yet its full value, set 
 out for Nazareth. The Blessed Virgin, 
 as usual, asked his blessing, and, pursu- 
 ing their way, in four days they reached 
 their place of destination. During their 
 route, the same effects attended their 
 divine colloquies as those which have 
 been already indicated. 
 
 The discreet Mary perceived that she 
 could not long conceal her condition 
 from her chaste and faithful spouse. 
 But the Lord guided all by means the 
 most conducive to His glory, and to 
 
 ed on the 2d of April, towards evening, at the 
 house of Zachariah. If we add three months, 
 less two days, which should commence the 3d 
 of April, we come to the 1st of July inclusively, 
 
 * obtain merits for St. Joseph and the 
 Virgin Mother. For this reason He 
 did not make known to them His good 
 pleasure. On their journey, the august 
 Queen met with a woman who had 
 once been virtuous, but who, tempted 
 by the devil, was led into sin, and after- 
 wards possessed by him. As soon as 
 our blessed Lady saw her, she discov- 
 ered her malady, and, using her queenly 
 power, commanded the evil spirit to 
 depart from the woman, and, having 
 delivered her from the consequences 
 of her sin, she obtained for her the gift 
 of perseverance. 
 
 Our holy travellers arrived one day 
 at an hostelry, the master of which was 
 of a vicious disposition, and led a dis- 
 orderly life. The Lord ordained, as 
 the preparation for his coming happi- 
 ness, that he should receive the august 
 Mary and St. Joseph with marks of 
 benevolence and consideration. He 
 bestowed attentions and rendered them 
 services beyond those he was accustom- 
 ed to offer to other strangers. Our 
 Queen, who knew the depraved state 
 of his conscience, offered prayers for her 
 host, and procured the justification of 
 his soul, and the amendment of his life. 
 
 At length they reached Nazareth, 
 when the Queen of heaven, assisted by 
 the holy angels, put her house in order. 
 
 which is the eighth day after the birth of John 
 the Baptist, and that of his circumcision. 
 
 * All these details will be found in the Gitk 
 Mystique of Maria d'Agreda. 
 
746 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 St Joseph occupied himself, as usual, 
 for the subsistence of our Lady, and she 
 did nothing to damp the hopes of her 
 spouse. After her return home, Lucifer 
 tempted the august Mary in every way, 
 but he was vanquished with all his 
 infernal legions, and precipitated into 
 the depths of hell. While the Lord 
 had permitted Lucifer to show himself, 
 this enemy had contrived to sow discord 
 among the neighbors of St. Joseph. 
 They came together, and, having called 
 for the innocent Mary, they accused her 
 in the presence of her husband, and in 
 the bitterest terms, of troubling the 
 peace of their families. This reproach 
 was keenly felt by our Queen, because 
 of the pain which it caused to her 
 spouse, for he had begun to remark 
 something of her condition ; and already 
 suffered anxiety and trouble on this ac- 
 count, as we shall see in the following 
 chapter. Now, the demon, ignorant of 
 the real cause of this trouble, strove to 
 plant the seeds of discontent within the 
 bosom of St. Joseph, so as to make him 
 impatient of his poverty ; representing 
 to him at the same time that his spouse 
 Mary remained too long in her retreat 
 and devotions, and that she was idle. 
 But St. Joseph being of an upright and 
 magnanimous heart, and of great perfec- 
 tion, despised these diabolical inventions, 
 and utterly rejected them. Besides, his 
 internal suffering regarding the state 
 of his spouse, occupied him so exclu- 
 sively, that it obliged him to forget 
 
 every other. The Lord delivered him 
 from this temptation by the intercession 
 of the holy Virgin, leaving only that 
 of which we are about to speak in the 
 following chapter. 
 
 CHAPTER IIL 
 
 ST. JOSEPH DISCOVERS THAT MARY IS 
 ABOUT TO BECOME A MOTHER, WITHOUT 
 BEING ABLE TO PENETRATE THE MYS- 
 TERY HE ENDURES GREAT SUFFER- 
 
 INGS ON THIS ACCOUNT. 
 
 TT was about five months since the 
 -^ eternal Word had become incar- 
 nate in the chaste bosom of the Virgin 
 Mary, when St. Joseph began to ob- 
 serve indications of it, and to entertain 
 suspicions. It was the more apparent, 
 because the proportions of her pure 
 form were so perfect, that the least 
 change was percetible. Deeply concern- 
 ed and anxious, St. Joseph, as he one 
 day observed her coming forth from 
 her oratory, perceived that it was no 
 longer possible to doubt the testimony 
 of his own eyes. The heart of the man 
 of God was penetrated with profound 
 sorrow, and he was unable to resist 
 the harrowing reflections that torment- 
 ed his spirit. 
 
 It may not be without utility or in- 
 terest to notice some of these reflec- 
 tions, which increased the violence of 
 his gi'eat affliction. In the first place 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 747 
 
 he entertained a most cliaste and sin- 
 cere love for his faithful spouse, to 
 whom, since the commencement of their 
 union, he had devoted all the tender- 
 ness of his heart. Besides, his desire 
 to serve her was augmented from day 
 to day by the unequalled holiness and 
 attractive manners of our blessed Lady. 
 Our saint, therefore, was impelled, by 
 a desire natural to his love, to find a 
 response to it on her part. The Lord 
 so ordered it, that, from this same 
 desire, the holy Joseph was still more 
 careful to serve and respect our blessed 
 mistress. 
 
 Thus St. Joseph fulfilled with great 
 zeal his obligations as a most faithful 
 husband and guardian of the mystery 
 which, as yet, was hidden from him. 
 But the more assiduous he was to 
 serve, to honor his spouse while bear- 
 ing for her a love, so pure, chaste, holy, 
 and just, the more eager w^as his desire 
 that she should reciprocate his aifection. 
 Nevertheless he did not disclose this 
 internal conflict; either because of the 
 respect produced by the humble maj- 
 esty of his spouse, or because in wit- 
 nessing the discreet deportment of Mary 
 — her sweet converse, and her more 
 than angelic purity — the revelation 
 would have been too painful. 
 
 At the view of what had become so 
 evident, he was lost in amazement. 
 Still, though convinced, he would not 
 allow his imagination to go beyond 
 appearances. Being a just and holy 
 
 * man, and seeing the fact, he suspended 
 his judgment without entering into the 
 cause. What an example for us ! It 
 is most probable that if he had been 
 convinced of the culpability of his wife, 
 the violence of his grief would have 
 put an end to his existence. In the 
 second place, his reflections reminded 
 him that he had had no agency in this 
 condition which was but too apparent. 
 Dishonor was inevitable when it should 
 become known ; and, as St. Joseph was 
 of a generous and noble heart, this 
 apprehension gave him great pain. Be- 
 sides, he considered, with rare pru- 
 dence, the affliction which their own 
 infamy would bring upon them if the 
 matter came to be divulged. 
 
 But that which caused the greatest 
 grief of all to the holy spouse, was the 
 fear that his wife would be stoned, 
 according to the law which ordered this 
 punishment ; for he could not make 
 himself an accomplice to hide the crime, 
 if it existed. All these considerations 
 pierced the heart of St. Joseph with the 
 deepest grief, in which he found no 
 consolation except in the irreproachable 
 conduct of his spouse. Still, on the 
 other hand, though appearances con- 
 vinced him, he could neither find means 
 of excuse, nor even dare to communi- 
 cate the subject of his grief to any 
 human being. Our saint was then like 
 one environed by the sorrows of death, 
 and he felt the force of the words, 
 " Jealouay is as cruel as TielV 
 
He would have sought some allevi- 
 atioQ for his pains in spiritual consola- 
 tion, but grief suspended the powers of 
 his soul. If his i*eason inclined to fol- 
 low the suspicions suggested by his 
 senses, the reflections that he made on 
 the tried holiness of his most wise and 
 prudent spouse caused them to vanish 
 like ice in the heat of the sun, or smoke 
 before the wind. If he strove to check 
 the affections of his chaste love, it was 
 impossible, since he found his spouse 
 always more worthy of being loved. 
 And although the truth was concealed 
 from him, she had more power »to 
 attract, than the seeming deception of 
 her infidelity to repel him. The sacred 
 ties of love could not be rent asunder, 
 because they reposed on the solid foun- 
 dations of truth, reason, and justice. 
 
 Our saint did not then judge it expe- 
 dient to declare his grief to his blessed 
 spouse : added to this, the gravity, ever 
 equal and divinely humble, which he 
 saw in her, did not permit him to take 
 this liberty; for, although he saw marks 
 so unequivocal, a conduct so pure and 
 holy as hers could ill accord with infi- 
 delity. Such a fault could not in any 
 manner be compatible with so much 
 purity, holiness, and discretion; nor 
 with that assemblage of graces whose 
 growth was each day more visible in 
 the august Mary. 
 
 In these perplexities the saintly hus- 
 band addressed himself to God in 
 prayer. Placing himself in His pres- 
 
 ence, "Eternal God and my Lord," he 
 said, " my desires and my groanings 
 are not hidden from Thy divine Maj- 
 esty. I find myself struggling with 
 violent agitations, I have given my 
 heart to the spouse whom I received 
 from Thy hands, I have trusted in her 
 purity, but the strange appearances 
 which I discover in her cast me into 
 the most afflicting perplexity. It would 
 be rash to think that she had been 
 unfaithful and had offended Thee, see- 
 ing in her such gi-eat purity and so 
 eminent a holiness. It is, nevertheless, 
 impossible to deny the evidence of my 
 senses, and sorrow must destroy me 
 unless there be here some mystery that 
 I have not discovered. Reason excul- 
 pates, but the senses condemn her. I 
 see plainly that she conceals from me 
 the cause of her condition. What shall 
 I do ? I suspend my judgment, igno- 
 rant of the cause of what I see. Re- 
 ceive, O God of Abraham, of Isaac, and 
 of Jacob, my sighs and my tears, as an 
 acceptable sacrifice. I cannot believe 
 that Maiy has ofi'ended Thee ; but, 
 being her husband, I cannot presume 
 the existence of any mystery of which 
 I can be unworthy." 
 
 Saint Joseph persevered in his sup- 
 plications and united with them many 
 other affections and prayers. He 
 thought there must be in all this some 
 mystery, but his humility hindered him 
 from being assured on this point. All 
 the reasons that presented themselves 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 749 
 
 in favor of tlie holiness of our most 
 sweet Lady, contributed only to per- 
 suade him that she had committed no 
 fault. At the same time the saint 
 nev^er thought of her being the mother 
 of the Messiah, for he could not have 
 believed himself worthy to be her 
 spouse. 
 
 Sometimes he suspended his suspic- 
 ions ; at others appearances augmented 
 them. Sometimes he was overwhelmed 
 by agitation; sometimes in an aching 
 calm, without power to resolve or to 
 believe any thing. He could neither 
 vanquish his doubts nor appease his 
 heart, nor find that certitude of which 
 he had so much need, to regulate his 
 conduct and to calm his mind. And 
 thus it was that the sufferings of the 
 holy Patriarch were so cruel. They 
 serve as evident proofs of his incom- 
 parable prudence and sanctity, and they 
 gained him such merits before God as 
 to render him worthy of the favors he 
 was about to receive. 
 
 Throuo^h the knowledo;e and infused 
 light which she possessed, our blessed 
 Lady saw all that passed in the breast 
 of St. Joseph. But, though filled with 
 tenderness and compassion for the suf- 
 ferings of her spouse, she spoke not 
 on the subject of his pain, but content- 
 ed herself to serve him with submis- 
 sion and exactitude, because it was not 
 proper to disclose the secret of the 
 great King, without an express com- 
 mand from the Lord. 
 
 * During this period, while he was in 
 ignorance of the mystery of his spouse, 
 St. Joseph thought it his duty to main- 
 tain his superiority, yet with great mod- 
 eration. In this he imitated the an- 
 cient Patriarchs, from whom he would 
 not degenerate, whose wives were very 
 submissive. Although just and good, 
 he therefore allowed himself to be 
 served and honored by the Blessed 
 Virgin after their espousals, preserving 
 in all things his authority as chief, 
 which he sweetened by his rare humil- 
 ity and great prudence. And he would 
 have had cause for this if our Lady 
 had been like other women. On her 
 part, the august Mary was most sub- 
 missive and obedient to her husband, 
 and, although she was above all, none 
 ever equalled her in these qualities. 
 She served her spouse with an incom- 
 parable respect and promptitude, and 
 thus she gave opportunities to our 
 saint, while she served him at table, 
 or occupied herself in other domestic 
 affairs, to observe her closely, and, to 
 the great affliction of his soul, assure 
 himself more positively of the truth. 
 It was impossible that in her actions 
 the signs of her condition should not 
 be more evident, but this did not hin- 
 der her in her tasks. She desired nei- 
 ther to excuse nor to justify herself, 
 because this would not have accorded 
 with the truth, nor with her angelical 
 candor, nor with the grandeur and gen- 
 erosity of her most noble heart; and 
 
750 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 the pains of St Joseph found no alle- | 
 viation. The Queen of heaven could 
 easily have alleged the truth of her 
 irreproachable innocence — having excul- 
 pated herself, and relieved St. Joseph 
 of his pain by disclosing the mystery, 
 but she would not hazard the justifica- 
 tion of so mysterious a truth upon her 
 own testimony, and, with great wis- 
 dom, she abandoned hei*self to the di- 
 vine Providence. She strove to console 
 and please him in all things, often ask- 
 ing what he would have her to do. 
 Many times she served him on her 
 kne6«, and although these loving ways 
 might in some sort console the saintly 
 spouse, they gave him, also, additional 
 causes of aiBiction in considering the 
 many motives to love and esteem her 
 who plunged him in such perplexity. 
 
 St. Joseph could not entirely conceal 
 his grief: thus he often found himself 
 pensive, sad, and thoughtful. Preoc- 
 cupied by his sorrows, he sometimes 
 spoke to his spouse with more harsh- 
 ness than formerly. But this was nei- 
 ther fi'om anger nor revenge, for he had 
 no such thought — it was merely the ef- 
 fect inseparable from a wounded heart. 
 Our most prudent Lady, on her part, 
 changed nothing in her sweet manners ; 
 on the contrary, she took greater pains 
 than ever to comfort her spouse. She 
 served him at table, or offered him a 
 seat Without doubt, this painful sea- 
 son was one of those which most exer- 
 cised not only St. Joseph but our bless- 
 
 ed Lady. Our incomparable Queen 
 offered continual supplications for her 
 spouse to the Most High, that He 
 would vouchsafe to regard and console 
 him. In order better to understand 
 the profound humility and the sublime 
 vrisdom of the august Mary in these 
 circumstances, it should be understood 
 that the Lord had not commanded her 
 to keep the secret of the mystery of 
 the incarnation. He did not even dis- 
 close His will on this point with as 
 much clearness as in other matters. It 
 seemed that the Lord left all to the 
 wisdom and to the divine virtues of 
 His chosen one. 
 
 Thus the divine Providence gave oc- 
 casion to the most pure Mary, and to 
 her most . faithful spouse, to exercise by 
 heroic actions, each according to their 
 capacity, the virtues and gifts which 
 He had allotted them. He was pleased, 
 as one might say, to witness the faith, 
 the hope, the love, the humility of 
 these upright hearts in the midst of so 
 poignant an affliction. The Lord seem- 
 ed deaf, accoi-ding to our manner of 
 speaking, for His greater glory, in or- 
 der to give to the world this example 
 of sanctity and prudence. He waited 
 until the proper time, to speak was 
 come. Let us understand from this the 
 designs of God, and His secret ways 
 with the souls whom He cherishes, and 
 whom He would render capable of 
 receiving His favors and His gifts. We 
 ought to use every effort, and employ 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 751 
 
 all our care to acquire efficaciously a 
 true resignation, to this divine Provi- 
 dence. If men only knew tlie loving 
 care of this Father of mercy, they would 
 be happy to forget themselves, and 
 cease to plunge into cares at once bur- 
 densome, useless, and dangerous. It is 
 of the utmost importance to the crea- 
 ture to let himself be guided by the 
 hand of the Lord, because men are igno- 
 rant of His operations, and the ends 
 to which they are to be led by them. 
 
 If God were susceptible of being 
 touched like men, by pain or jealousy, 
 He would suffer, in perceiving that His 
 own creatures desire to seek the least 
 thing in any other than Himself. The 
 Lord regards the actions of men ; He 
 lovingly corrects their faults ; He fore- 
 sees their desires ; He protects them in 
 danger ; He fortifies them in their trials ; 
 He assists them in their afflictions. 
 None can resist Him, or hinder His will. 
 He executes what He can ; He can exe- 
 cute all that He wills, and He will give 
 himself entirely to the just who are in 
 His grace and confide in Him alone. 
 Who can conceive the greatness and 
 the nature of the gifts which He pours 
 into hearts disposed to receive them ! 
 
 Let us leave all to His providence, 
 for the Most High will give us what- 
 ever is most sure and necessary for our 
 salvation. Except the pains which the 
 august Mary endured from those which 
 were suffered by her most holy Son, the 
 most severe of all her life were caused 
 
 f by the afflictions and perplexities of St. 
 Joseph in the circumstances which we 
 have just related. 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE SUSPICIONS OF ST. JOSEPH INCREASE, 
 AND HE RESOLVES TO LEAVE HIS SPOUSE 
 
 THE ANGEL OF THE LORD DECLARES 
 
 TO HIM THE MYSTERY OF THE INCAR- 
 NATION. 
 
 ST. JOSEPH endeavored to calm the 
 painful agitation of his heart by 
 doing his utmost to remove the convic- 
 tion of his mind respecting the condi- 
 tion of his wife. But the indications 
 which became every day more visible 
 in her holy person served only to con- 
 firm it. The further our Lady advanced, 
 the more amiable, vigorous, active, and 
 beautiful she became; and her invincible 
 charms attracted his chaste love, with- 
 out entirely allaying these conflicting 
 passions. At length all hesitation was 
 at an end ; he could no longer entertain 
 a doubt of the evidence. His heart 
 was conformed to the will of God ; nev- 
 ertheless, through the weakness of the 
 flesh, his spirit was exceedingly sorrow- 
 ful, and nothing remained to dissipate 
 his sadness. He felt his bodily strength 
 diminish — and, although no particular 
 malady manifested itself, he grew thin, 
 and his countenance bore the marks of 
 deep affliction. And as he preserved 
 
m 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 sUenoe, not seeking consolation else- 
 where (as men usually do), the suffer- 
 ings of the saint were naturally more 
 intense. 
 
 The heart of the gentle Mary was 
 penetrated by a sorrow not less pro- 
 found ; but she resolved to redouble 
 her cares for the health of her spouse. 
 She continued to conceal the mystery 
 which she had no command to dis- 
 close, in order to honor and to pre- 
 serve the secret of the celestial King. 
 So far as regarded herself, she left 
 nothing undone to promote his comfort 
 — entreating him to remind her of any 
 thing which might contribute to re- 
 store his declining health. She be- 
 sought him to repose himself, and to 
 partake of some little refreshment ; for 
 it was but right to supply the wants 
 of the body, in order to obtain strength 
 to labor for the Lord. 
 
 St Joseph, attentive to every move- 
 ment of his spouse, and sensible of 
 the holy effects of her conversation and 
 presence, said within himself: "Is it 
 possible that a woman so holy, in 
 whom the grace of God is so percepti- 
 ble, can cast me into such perplexity ? 
 Who can I find to equal her, if I leave 
 her? Where find consolation, if she 
 fail me ? But all these trouble me even 
 less than the infamy that may result 
 fix)m this unhappy affair; or that I 
 should give cause to believe that I have 
 been the accomplice of a crime. If I 
 make myself the author of her condi- 
 
 ^ tion, it will be a falsehood unworthy an 
 honorable man, and opposed to my con- 
 science and my reputation. In such a 
 state of embarrassment, what shall I 
 do ? The least evil that can happen is 
 to absent myself — to leave the house." 
 
 Our blessed Lady being sincerely 
 afflicted by the .resolution, which her 
 spouse had just taken, addressed her- 
 self to the angels of her guard : " You," 
 she said, " who obey with promptitude 
 all the commands of the Lord, listen 
 now to my prayers. Prevent my 
 spouse, I conjure you, from executing 
 this intention which he has formed of 
 absenting himself from me." The angels 
 obeyed their Queen, and silently con- 
 veyed many holy inspirations to the 
 heart of St. Joseph. They persuaded 
 him anew of the sanctity and perfection 
 of his spouse — that God was incompre- 
 hensible in His works, and impene- 
 trable in His judgments, and that He 
 is most faithful to those who trust in 
 Him. 
 
 The troubled mind of St. Joseph was 
 somewhat soothed by these inspirations, 
 although he knew not from whence 
 they came, nor by what order he re- 
 ceived them. Yet as the cause of his 
 grief remained, he always sank again 
 into sadness, and returned to his first 
 resolution to desert his spouse. Then 
 our blessed Lady addressed herself 
 directly to her Son whom she bore in 
 her virginal bosom. " It would not 
 
 I be becoming," said she, " that thy ser- 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 753 
 
 vant should be without a husband who 
 assists and shelters her from calumny: 
 do not permit him to execute his design 
 of abandoning me." The Most High 
 I'eplied : " I will speedily console my 
 servant Joseph, and after I shall have 
 declared to him, through my angel, the 
 mystery of which he is ignorant, you 
 may speak with him concerning it. I 
 will fill him with my spirit, and enable 
 him to accomplish all that he should do 
 in these mysteries. He shall aid and 
 assist you under all circumstances." 
 
 The august Mary comprehended how 
 important it was that St. Joseph should 
 have to endure this affliction, by which 
 his spirit was exercised and prepared 
 for the great charge that was to be 
 confided to him. He had now passed 
 two months of suffering, and, overcome 
 by his apprehensions, he exclaimed : 
 " I find no remedy for my grief but 
 absence. I acknowledge that my spouse 
 is perfect, but it is not possible for me 
 to penetrate the mystery of her con- 
 dition, and I will not insult her virtue 
 by subjecting her to the penalties of 
 the law. I will depart forthwith." 
 The saint resolved to set out during 
 the night. He therefore prepared a 
 small packet of clothing. Having re- 
 ceived a trifling sum of money which 
 was due to him for work, he deter- 
 mined to leave the house after mid- 
 night. But as he was accustomed to 
 meditate, he reflected on the importance 
 of the undertaking. "Great God, of 
 
 * our fathers Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob," 
 he exclaimed, " the sorrow which breaks 
 my heart is not hidden from Thy divine 
 clemency. Thou knowest, besides, O 
 Lord (though in other things I am not 
 free from sin), my innocence touching 
 the subject of my grief. I choose the 
 lesser evil in quitting my spouse, and 
 go to end my days in some desert, 
 there to abandon myself entirely to the 
 care of Thy providence. Forsake me 
 not, for I desire only what is for 
 Thy glory." 
 
 St. Joseph prostrated himself, and 
 made a vow to ofifer in the Temple of 
 Jerusalem a part of the small sum 
 which he had reserved for his journey, 
 praying the Lord to defend his spouse 
 from calumny, and preserve her from 
 all evil. Such was the great rectitude 
 of this man of God, and such the 
 esteem which he preserved for our 
 blessed Lady. After this prayer, he 
 took a little repose, intending to depart 
 without seeing her. Our blessed Lady, 
 from her oratory, observed all that St. 
 Joseph did, or proposed to do ; for the 
 Most High revealed it to her. 
 
 The divine Majesty permitted that 
 the Blessed Virgin and her holy spouse 
 should endure these interior sufferings, 
 in order that, besides the merits which 
 so long a martyrdom would procure 
 for them, the succor of the divine con- 
 solations should be to them more ad- 
 mirable and more remarkable. The 
 august Mary practised many virtues 
 
754 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 during this period, whereby she teaches ^ 
 U8 to hope for relief from the Most 
 High in the greatest afflictions. And 
 what an example is not that of St. 
 Joseph I No one had ever stronger 
 grounds of suspicion, nor more of dis- 
 cretion to control his judgment than 
 
 he. 
 
 The passion of jealousy produces 
 sharp wounds in him who is attacked 
 by it, and no one ever felt its effects 
 so sensibly as St. Joseph, though, in 
 fact, there was no foundation for it, if 
 he had but known the truth. He was 
 endowed with a singular intelligence 
 to penetrate the sanctity and the lovely 
 character of his spouse. But this, in 
 augmenting his esteem for her whom 
 he was about to lose, augmented his 
 sorrow to find himself necessitated to 
 abandon her. 
 
 St. Joseph was not subject to the 
 disorders of common jealousy, in which 
 the passions of concupiscence are en- 
 gaged, which neither reason nor pru- 
 dence can vanquish. The jealousy of 
 the saint arose only from the depth of 
 his love and a conditional suspicion, 
 viz.: whether his chaste spouse recip- 
 rocated his affection ; for a pledge so 
 dear as the affection of a wife must 
 not be shared by any other. When 
 love is so well founded, the chains that 
 cement it are very strong, and the more 
 so because there are fewer imperfections 
 to weaken them. There was nothing 
 in our sweet Lady which could dimin- 
 
 ish the love of her spouse. On the 
 contrary, all that she had received from 
 grace and from nature gave him new 
 subjects every day to strengthen his 
 affection. 
 
 After the saint had offered the prayer, 
 of which we have already made men- 
 tion, he fell asleep in this sadness, 
 which had sunk into despondency. He 
 was sure that he should awake in time 
 to depart at midnight, without being 
 seen, as he thought, by his spouse. 
 Our Lady, on her part, awaited the 
 remedy, and earnestly sought it by 
 her humble prayers. She was con- 
 soled by an assurance that the pains 
 of her spouse had now reached their 
 highest degree — the hour of mercy and 
 consolation for that sorrowing heart 
 could not long tarry, and her desires 
 would soon be accomplished. And 
 now the Lord sent the archangel Ga- 
 briel, to disclose, by a divine revela- 
 tion to St. Joseph, while he slept, the 
 mystery which was to be accomplished 
 in his spouse. The archangel acquitted 
 himself this embassy, appeared iu a 
 dream, as related by St. Matthew, and 
 declared to him, in the terms quoted 
 by that evangelist, the whole mystery 
 of the incarnation and redemption. 
 
 There are various reasons why the 
 archangel spoke to St. Joseph in a 
 dream, and not in his waking hours, 
 although the mystery had been mani- 
 fested to others when awake. In the 
 first place, St. Joseph was' so prudent 
 
LIFE OF ST, JOSEPH. 
 
 755 
 
 and so filled with esteem for tlie Bless- 
 ed Virgin, that stronger proofs were 
 unnecessary to convince him of the 
 dignity of Mary, and of the mystery 
 of the incarnation ; for the divine in- 
 spiration penetrates easily into well- 
 disposed hearts. In the second place, 
 his trouble had begun with his senses, 
 and it was but just that they should 
 bQ mortified and deprived of the angelic 
 vision, since they had permitted the 
 entrance of illusions and suspicions; 
 therefore the truth ought not to enter 
 by their means. The third reason is, 
 that although St. Joseph committed 
 no sin in these circumstances, yet his 
 senses had undoubtedly contracted a 
 species of stain, and it was proper that 
 t:ie angel should fulfil his embassy at 
 a time when these senses, which had 
 been scandalized, were interdicted by 
 the suspension of their operations. Be- 
 sides these, there was the reason which 
 should overrule all others, that such 
 was the will of the Lord, who is just 
 and holy, and perfect in all His works. 
 St. Joseph saw not the angel through 
 any image or form — he heard only the 
 internal voice, and understood the mys- 
 tery. He heard what St. Gabriel said, 
 " that he should not fear to remain 
 with Mary his wife, because her con- 
 dition was the work of the Holy Ghost. 
 That she should bring forth a son, 
 whom he should call Jesus; that He 
 should deliver His people from their 
 sins ; and that in this mystery would 
 
 ^ be accomplished the prophecy of Isaiah 
 — ' A Virgin shall conceive and bring 
 forth a son, who shall be called Em- 
 manuel, which means, God with us.'" 
 We perceive from the words of the 
 celestial ambassador, that the saint had 
 separated from the pure Mary in in- 
 tention, since he was commanded to 
 receive her without fear. 
 
 St. Joseph awoke, informed of the 
 mystery which had been revealed to 
 him, and instructed that his spouse 
 was the Mother of God. He found 
 himself divided between the joy of his 
 happiness, and his unhoped-for dignity, 
 and sorrow for what he had been 
 about to do. He prostrated himself 
 instantly on the ground, and made, 
 with humble fear and inconceivable 
 contentment, heroic acts of humility 
 and gratitude. He gave thanks to 
 God for the mystery whidi had been 
 disclosed to him, and for having made 
 him the spouse of her whom He had 
 chosen to be His mother — him, who 
 did not deserve to be her servant. 
 The doubts and uncertainty which St. 
 Joseph had suffered, laid in him the 
 foundations of the most profound hu- 
 mility, necessary for him to whom 
 was confided the dispensation of the 
 most holy counsels of the Lord. The 
 remembrance of what had passed served 
 as a lesson for his future life. 
 
 Having rendered thanks to the divine 
 Majesty, the holy man began to re- 
 proach himself. " O my divine spouse," 
 
said he, "most sweet dove, chosen by 
 the Most High to he His own mother, 
 how hath thy unworthy servant dared 
 to call in question thy fidelity! How 
 could he, who is only dust and ashes, 
 suffer her who is Queen of heaven to 
 serve him ? Why have I not kissed 
 the earth thy steps have trod, and 
 served thee kneeling? How shall I 
 dare to raise my eyes in thy presence, 
 or open my lips to speak with thee? 
 Lord, give me grace, grant me strength 
 to pray for pardon ! Inspire her to 
 show me mercy, so that she may not 
 reject her unworthy servant as he 
 deserves. Alas ! how clearly she must 
 have penetrated all my thoughts : how 
 can I have the boldness to appear in 
 her presence ? I see now the grossness 
 of my conduct, and my stupid mistake ; 
 and if Thy justice for my chastisement 
 had permitted me to execute my impru- 
 dent intention, what wretcheness would 
 now be mine! Thanks to Thee, my 
 God, throughout eternity, for so great 
 a blessing. I will present myself to 
 my princess, my spouse, confiding in 
 the sweetness of her clemency, and, 
 prostrate at her feet, I will beseech 
 her pardon, so that for her sake, Lord, 
 Thou wilt regard me with pity, and 
 pardon my fault." 
 
 St. Joseph went forth from his hum- 
 ble chamber very unlike what he was 
 before his recent slumber. Now he 
 was happy: yet he dared not disturb 
 our blessed Lady, who was still absorb- 
 
 ^k ed in the S"jveets of her contemplation. 
 While awaiting the favorable moment, 
 the man of God, with tearful eyes, un- 
 bound the little packet that he had 
 prepared — but with sentiments far dif- 
 ferent from those which had previously 
 occupied him. Having learned the 
 honor due to our blessed Lady, our 
 saint watered the house with his tears ; 
 he swept it and prepared other little 
 household work, which, while ignorant 
 of her dignity, he had intrusted to the 
 care of his blessed spouse. 
 
 He now resolved to change his de- 
 portment towards her, by appropriating 
 to himself the office of servant, reserv- 
 ing that of mistress for her majesty. 
 Further on we shall relate the loving 
 disputes which he had with our queen 
 to decide which of the two should serve 
 and take the humbler place. At the 
 proper time the saint presented himself 
 at the chamber of our blessed Lady, 
 who awaited his coming with the sweet- 
 ness and complacency which we shall 
 recount in the following chapter. Let 
 us take an example from St. Joseph, 
 who believed, without delay and with- 
 out doubting, that which the angel 
 revealed to him, in such wise that he 
 merited to be elevated to a great bai-d, 
 and to a sublime dignity. And if he 
 abased himself with so much humility, 
 not having committed any sin in what 
 he did, but only in having been greatly 
 troubled under circumstances which 
 seemed to give so much occasion for 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 757 
 
 anxiety, consider how mucli we ought * 
 to humiliate ourselves — we, who are 
 nothing but miserable worms of the 
 dust — by weeping over our negligence 
 and our sins, so that the Most High 
 may regard us as father and spouse. 
 
 CHAPTER y. 
 
 ST. JOSEPH ASKS PARDON OF THE HOLY 
 
 MARY HIS SPOUSE HE RESOLVES TO 
 
 SERVE HER IN ALL THINGS WITH PRO- 
 FOUND RESPECT. 
 
 ST. JOSEPH, after the discovery of 
 his error. Waited until our blessed 
 Lady should come forth from her re- 
 treat. As soon as he thouo-ht it was 
 time, he opened the door of the little 
 chamber occupied by the mother of 
 the heavenly King, and, throwing him- 
 self at her feet, he exclaimed, with 
 humility and profound veneration : " My 
 spouse. Mother of the Eternal Word, 
 behold your servant prostrate before 
 you. By the same Lord whom you 
 bear in your most chaste bosom, I pray 
 you to pardon my presumption. Sure 
 I am that none of my thoughts can be 
 hidden from your wisdom, nor from the 
 divine light which you have received. 
 Great was my blindness to think of 
 deserting you ; but you know that I 
 did it in ignorance, because neither the 
 secret of the great King had been re- 
 vealed to me, nor the greatness of your 
 
 dignity. Forget, I ei treat you, the 
 many deficiencies of a vile creature who 
 offers his heart and his life to your ser- 
 vice ; I will not rise from your feet until 
 you have pardoned my folly — until I 
 have received your forgiveness and your 
 benediction." 
 
 The august Mary listened with min- 
 gled feelings to the humble words of 
 her spouse. She rejoiced in the Lord 
 to learn that St. Joseph was informed 
 of the mysteries of the incarnation, and 
 that he revered them with such pro- 
 found faith and humility. But she was 
 troubled by the resolution he had taken 
 to change his conduct towards her, and 
 with the respect and submission with 
 which he addressed her. Knowing how 
 much she ought to esteem humility, 
 she was disturbed by the apprehen- 
 sion that St. Joseph, recognizing in her 
 the mother of the Lord, would deport 
 himself in all things as her inferior. 
 Insisting that he should rise, she pros- 
 trated herself at his feet, although he 
 made every effort to hinder this, but it 
 was not possible ; for in humility she 
 was invincible. Then she said to the 
 saint : " It is I, my spouse, who ought 
 to beseech your pardon for the pain 
 and sorrow that you have had to en- 
 dure on my account, therefore I beg 
 you will forget them." 
 
 Our blessed Lady, for the consolation 
 of her husband, continued : " I could 
 not reveal to you the hidden mystery 
 which the Most High had inclosed 
 
758 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 within me, because it was my duty to 
 await the expression of the will of the 
 Lord. Thus my silence should not be 
 considered as arising from any want of 
 esteem for you, for in all things I regard 
 you as my master and my husband. I 
 am, and always will be, your faithful 
 servant; but do not make any change 
 in the demeanor which you have al- 
 ways preserved towards me. The Lord 
 has not elevated me to the dignity of 
 being His own Mother to be served, 
 but to be the servant of all, and of you 
 especially. This is my office : it is but 
 just that you should leave it to me, 
 since the Most High has so ordained in 
 giving me your protection." 
 
 St. Joseph, by these reasons and 
 many others, sweetly efficacious, found 
 his spirit enlightened in a singular man- 
 ner. He received, through this purest 
 of creatures, extraordinary divine influ- 
 ences, and, entirely renewed in heart, 
 he replied: "Thou art blessed among 
 women ; thou art blessed among all 
 nations. May the Creator of heaven 
 and earth be glorified by eternal praises, 
 for that He has chosen thee for His 
 dwelling. In thee alone He has accom- 
 plished the promises that He made to 
 our fathers and to the prophets. Let 
 all generations bless Him that He has 
 not exalted Himself in any creature as 
 in thee, and that He has chosen me, the 
 vilest of men, to be thy servant." The 
 saint was enlightened by thd divine 
 Spirit after ^ the manner of St. Eliza- 
 
 + beth ; but the light and knowledge 
 which St. Joseph received were, in a 
 certain sense, more admirable, because 
 of his dignity and ministry. 
 
 The august Mary replied by the Mag- 
 nificat and other new canticles ; and 
 while chanting them, inflamed by the 
 divine fire, she was rapt in a sublime 
 ecstasy, and, lifted up from the eai-th 
 in a globe of brilliant light which en- 
 circled her, she was transformed as in 
 a glory. St. Joseph was filled with 
 admiration and joy inconceivable at this 
 view of his holy spouse, for he had 
 never yet seen her surrounded with 
 such glory and excellence. She appear- 
 ed to him quite transparent, and, at the 
 same time, he discovered the integi-ity 
 and virginal purity ot our queen and 
 the mystery of her dignity. He saw, 
 also, and recognized in the chaste bosom 
 of Mary the holy humanity of the In- 
 fant God and the union of the two na- 
 tures in the person of the Word. He 
 adored the Infant God with a profound 
 humility, acknowledged his true Re- 
 deemer, and offered himself to His ser- 
 vice with fervent acts of divine love. 
 
 The Lord regarded him with great 
 favor, and distinguished him among all 
 men, for He accepted him as His re- 
 puted father, and gave him the title. 
 And to render him conformable to this 
 new and honorable name, He imparted 
 to him all the knowledge and divine 
 gifts to which Christian purity can oi 
 ought to aspire. 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 759 
 
 If it were a proof of the magnan- 
 imity of the glorious St. Joseph that 
 he did not die of jealousy, it is also a 
 subject of admiration that he was not 
 overwhelmed by the joy which he felt 
 on this occasion. In the first case his 
 holiness appears, but in the second he 
 received such augmentations of graces 
 and gifts from the Lord, that, if His 
 divine Majesty had not dilated his 
 heart, he could not have been able to 
 receive them. He was entirely renewed 
 and enlightened so as to converse wor- 
 thily with her who was the Mother of 
 God, and, conjointly with her, to dis- 
 pense all that concerned the incarna- 
 tion and the charge of the Word made 
 man. It was also manifested to him, 
 in order that he should recognize the 
 obligation imposed on him to serve his 
 holy spouse, that all the gifts he had 
 received from the Most High were re- 
 ceived through her and for her. He 
 knew that the gifts he had received 
 before his espousals were bestowed 
 because the Lord had chosen him for 
 this office, and that those which he now 
 received were because she had merited 
 them for him. And as our blessed Lady 
 had been the instrument by which the 
 Lord had wrought the sanctiiication of 
 John the Baptist, and his mother, St. 
 Elizabeth, she was the organ, also, by 
 whom St. Joseph received the pleni- 
 tude of grace. This most happy spouse 
 knew all this, and he responded to it 
 like a faithful and grateful servant. 
 
 The holy evangelists make no men- 
 tion of these great mysteries, nor of 
 many others which were known to our 
 blessed Lady and St. Joseph, because, 
 for many reasons, they were not suit- 
 able to be made known to the Gentiles 
 on their first conversion. These thincrs 
 were reserved, by the impenetrable 
 judgments of Providence, for times 
 which the divine wisdom judged more 
 suitable,* or when the Church should 
 have need of the intercession and sup- 
 port of our holy Queen. The faithful 
 St. Joseph, after having been made 
 aware of the dignity of his spouse, and 
 the mystery of the incarnation, con- 
 ceived so lofty an esteem for her, that, 
 although he had been always pure and 
 perfect in his life, he now became as a 
 new man. He resolved henceforth to 
 change his conduct, and to redouble his 
 veneration towards our blessed Lady. 
 This was in conformity with the wis- 
 dom of the saint, and due to the excel- 
 lence of his spouse, for he was servant, 
 and she mistress of the universe. St. 
 Joseph knew all this by divine illumi- 
 nation. Now, to satisfy the desire he 
 had to honor her in whom he recog- 
 nized the Mother of God, when he 
 spoke to her, or passed before her, if 
 alone together, he bent the knee. He 
 would not suffer her to wait on him, 
 nor that she should occupy herself in 
 
 * Jesus said, " I have yet many things to say 
 to you : but you cannot hear them now." — SL 
 John, xvi. 12. 
 
no 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 Other bumble offices, such as sweeping ^ 
 the house, cleansing the vessels, and 
 many other things which he thought 
 ilerogatory from tlie (liofiiity of our 
 queen. 
 
 But our saintly Lady, who was the 
 humblest of the humble, and whose hu- 
 mility wa.s not to be overcome, prayed 
 St Joseph not to pay her such honors 
 as to bow the knee to her. This ven- 
 eration, she said, was doubtless due to 
 the Loi*d, whom she bore in her bosom ; 
 but while He remained there, the per- 
 son of Christ could not be distin- 
 guished from her own. The saint, 
 yielding to her humble desires, render- 
 ed this worship to the Lord, who was 
 in the bosom of Mary, and to her as 
 His mother, only when unperceived by 
 her. 
 
 They had also humble disputes re- 
 specting their servile employments. St. 
 Joseph could not consent to allow our 
 amiable mistress to perform them, and 
 strove to prevent it. On her part, she 
 did what she could, but while she was 
 retired in her oratoiy the saint found 
 time to do many things, and thus our 
 sweet Lady was frustrated in her de- 
 sires to be the servant. At these times 
 she addressed her meek complaints to 
 the Lord, and prayed Him to oldige 
 her spouse not to hinrler her in the 
 exercise of humility. 
 
 This virtue is so agreeable at the 
 tribimal of God, that we ask for no 
 common grace when we pray for it; 
 
 for humility imparts a certain great- 
 ness to all things, and inclines God to 
 clemency. The divine Majesty heark- 
 ened to the request of our blessed 
 Lady, and his guardian angel, said, 
 interiorly, to the blessed St. Joseph, 
 *'Do not frustrate the humble desires 
 of her who is above all creatures in 
 heaven or on earth. Permit her to 
 serve you in external things, and pre- 
 serve for her in your interior the great- 
 est reverence. Render to the Word 
 made man, in all times and in all 
 places, the homage that is due to Him. 
 You can, meanwhile, assist His mother, 
 and honor always the Lord of the 
 universe who is within her." 
 
 Having received these orders from 
 the Most High, St. Joseph no longer 
 refused her humble exercises to our 
 sweet Lady. Thus both offered to 
 God the sacrifice of their will. The 
 most pure Mary, in practising her pro- 
 found humility, and faithful obedience 
 to her spouse ; and St. Joseph, by obe- 
 dience to the Most High, with a holy 
 confusion to see himself served by her 
 whom he recognized as mistress of the 
 universe and mother of the Creator. 
 
 Thus our saint was compensated for 
 the humility which he could not exer- 
 cise ; for, to see himself served as he 
 was, humiliated him far more, and 
 obliged him to abase himself still more 
 profoundly in contempt of himself. In 
 these dispositions St. Joseph meditated 
 upon the Lord, whom the august Mary 
 
^■<fili)if <&!(^4ii|)' S 
 
 fJ ^D ^^p 'Y A- - y' 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 761 
 
 bore in lier chaste bosom, adoring and 
 rendering to Him honor and glory. 
 Then, in recompense for his sanctity 
 and his respect, mingled with fear, 
 the Infant God, made man, sometimes 
 manifested Himself in an admirable 
 manner. He saw Him in the bosom 
 of His most pure mother, as through 
 a luminous crystal. Afterwards, our 
 incomparable Lady conversed more 
 familiarly with her blessed spouse 
 upon the mysteries of the incarnation, 
 for she knew that he was now inform- 
 ed of the secrets of the hypostatic 
 union of the two natures, divine and 
 human, within her virginal bosom. 
 
 No tongue can relate the celestial 
 discourses that were held between the 
 Blessed Virgin and St. Joseph. And 
 who can describe the effects produced 
 on the gentle and pious heart of this 
 holy man, on finding himself the spouse 
 of her who was the true mother of his 
 Creator, and to see her performing for 
 him the duties of a simple servant ? 
 
 If the Almighty enriched the house 
 and the person of Oben-Edom with 
 such plenteous benedictions for having 
 received the ark of the Old Testament, 
 what benedictions would He not be- 
 stow upon St. Joseph, to whom He 
 had confided the true Ark, and the 
 Legislator Himself who was inclosed 
 within it? 
 
 The happiness and the fidelity of 
 this saint were incomparable, not only 
 because the living Ark of the New 
 
 f Testament abode in his house, but be- 
 cause he guarded it like a faithful and 
 prudent servant. The Lord placed him 
 over His family, also, that he should 
 provide for it according to its neces 
 sities as a faithful administrator. Let 
 all nations acknowledge him, bless 
 him, and publish his praises, since the 
 Most High has never done for any 
 other what He has done for this in- 
 comparable saint. In view of mys- 
 teries so august, I will glorify this 
 adorable Lord, and confess Him as holy, 
 just, merciful, wise, and admirable in 
 all His wondrous works. 
 
 CHAPTER VL 
 
 MODE OF LIFE OF THE AUGUST MARY AIS^D 
 
 ST. JOSEPH. CONVERSATIONS BETWEEN 
 
 THEM, AND OTHER REMARKABLE CIR- 
 CUMSTANCES. 
 
 THE humble house of Joseph, which 
 our saints made their dwelling- 
 place, consisted of three chambers only. 
 St. Joseph slept in one of these, and 
 used another as a workshop, where 
 the tools were deposited which served 
 for use in his trade of carpenter. The 
 third, which contained a small bed, 
 the work of our saint, was appropri- 
 ated to the Queen of heaven, who slej)t 
 there, and made it her ordinary abode. 
 This order was established from the- 
 date of their marriage. 
 
78S 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 3«fore he was informed of her dignity, 
 the saintly husband rarely, except 
 when some affair obliged him to ask 
 her advice, visited his wife, because 
 he was engaged with his work, and 
 she remained in her retreat. But after 
 his happiness was made known to 
 him, the holy man became more as- 
 siduous, and went very often to seek 
 our blessed Lady, to renew the offer 
 of his services. Yet he never ap- 
 proached her but with great humility 
 and reverent respect. Before speaking 
 to her he was careful to observe how 
 she was occupied. Thus, many times 
 he saw her rapt in ecstacy, and sur- 
 rounded by a radiant light ; at others, 
 he found her discoursing with angels. 
 Often she was prostrate, in the form of 
 a cross, and speaking with the Lord. 
 In these circumstances our saint con- 
 tented himself with the liberty of gaz- 
 ing upon her with the most profound 
 reverence. It was granted to his merits 
 to hear the harmony of the angelic 
 chants, and to inhale a delicious fra- 
 grance that strengthened him and filled 
 his whole being with spiritual joy and 
 consolation. 
 
 The holy spouses were alone in their 
 house, for they kept no servant — not 
 only because of their great humility, 
 but also that they found it most con- 
 venient to have no witnesses of the 
 prodigies that were of such frequent 
 occuiTence with them. 
 
 Our Lady never left the house, unless 
 
 ^ obliged by some pressing circumstance; 
 but a woman, their neighbor and rela- 
 tive, she who had served St. Joseph 
 (luring the sojourn of the Blessed Vir- 
 gin at the house of Zachariah, took 
 charge of their extei'nal affairs. She 
 was abundantly recompensed for these 
 services, not only in her own advance- 
 ment in perfection, but her family also 
 felt the beneficent efiects of the protec- 
 tion of the Holy Family. The august 
 Mary many times healed their maladies, 
 and filled them with heavenly bene- 
 dictions. 
 
 Their nourishment was very frugal ; 
 but they partook of it every day, and 
 together. St. Joseph sometimes ate 
 flesh meat, but the holy Virgin never 
 although she prepared it for her spouse 
 Their ordinary diet consisted of fruits 
 fish, bread, and cooked vegetables. But 
 this was always taken with great mod- 
 eration, and only so much as was need 
 ful, but the quality varied according to 
 circumstances. 
 
 St. Joseph never saw his holy spouse 
 asleep. He did not know, from his 
 own experience, whether she slept at 
 all. Her place of rest was the little 
 bed made by the saint. It had two 
 coverings, between which she was ac- 
 customed to place herself to take a 
 brief and light repose. The under-gar- 
 ment of the august Mary was a tunic 
 or chemise, but little softer than wool- 
 len stufi; She never left it ofl*, except 
 when it was worn, nor soiled it, and no 
 
 _i 
 
'■9 
 
 '■^^ 
 
 .^ 
 
^^. 
 
 Z^%,jfM.^. 
 
 >*it>flfii^%?«sr 
 
 ■ -' ' ' --•^^*^5)P-i^H^'^'' 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 763 
 
 one in the world saw it, not even St. * 
 Joseph. In all her works, and in what- 
 ever she did for St. Joseph, the greatest 
 cleanliness was observed. 
 
 Before St. Joseph was informed of 
 the mystery of . the incarnation, our 
 blessed Lady, at certain times when he 
 was not occupied, used to read to him 
 from the Holy Scriptures, particularly 
 from David and the Prophets. She 
 explained them like an experienced 
 instructress, and her holy spouse ques- 
 tioned her on many points, her replies 
 to which gave him such cause for admi- 
 ration, that both united in praising and 
 blessing the Lord. But after the saint 
 had discovered the grand secret, our 
 Lady addressed him as the chosen of 
 God, to be the coadjutor of the works 
 and mysteries of the Redemption. They 
 discoursed then openly together, and 
 with a more clear understanding, of 
 the prophecies which referred to the 
 conception of the Word by a Virgin 
 Mother, His birth, and His most holy 
 life. 
 
 Our august Lady explained all ; and 
 then they spoke of what they should 
 do when the day, so much desired, 
 should come — when the Child should 
 be born, when He should be in her 
 arms, and she should nourish Him from 
 her virginal breast, and when, alone 
 among mortals, her holy spouse would 
 be the only one who should participate 
 in this inconceivable happiness ! But 
 she said little of the death and the 
 
 passion, for she was unwilling to afflict 
 the tender heart of her spouse. 
 
 The faithful and happy St. Joseph 
 was all enkindled by divine love in 
 these gracious conversations, and, shed- 
 ding tears of joy, he cried out : " Is it 
 indeed possible that I shall see my God 
 and Redeemer within thy chaste arms ? 
 — that I shall adore Him there? — that 
 I shall hear His sweet voice? — that I 
 shall touch Him? — that my eyes shall 
 see His divine face? — that the sweat 
 of my brow shall be employed in His 
 service, and for His support? — that we 
 shall speak and converse with Him? 
 Whence comes to me such bliss as none 
 could ever have deserved ? Why have 
 I not rich treasures, that I may lay 
 them at His feet ? " 
 
 Our august Lady replied : " The great 
 God comes not into the world to find 
 riches, for He needs them not ; for them 
 would He not descend from heaven. 
 He comes on earth only to repair the 
 disorders of the world, and by sure 
 ways to conduct it to eternal life ; and 
 these ways are none other than humility 
 and poverty. For this He has chosen 
 our poor habitation. He wills not that 
 we be rich in worldly goods, which are 
 but vanity and vexation of spirit." 
 
 The saint often besought the holy 
 Virgin to instruct him in the character 
 of the virtues, especially that of the 
 divine love, in order that he might 
 understand how to conduct himself in a 
 suitable manner towards the God man, 
 
7«4 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 ■o as not to be rejected as an unprofit- * 
 able servant The Mistress of the Vir- 
 tues condescended to his request, and 
 explained to her spouse the properties 
 of the virtues, and the manner of prac- 
 tising them with all possible perfection. 
 Nevertheless she deported herself in 
 these instructions with such great dis- 
 cretion, that she appeared in no wise 
 the mistress of her spouse, for she inter- 
 rupted the saint and insti-ucted him 
 by her questions. 
 
 They mingled these conversations, or 
 readings from the Scriptures, sometimes 
 with manual labor, when the saint was 
 obliged to continue at his work. Our 
 most amiable Lady added to them the 
 consolations of the celestial doctrines ; 
 and thus the happy husband made 
 greater advancement in virtue than 
 with the work of his hands. She show- 
 ed to him the great fruit that may be 
 drawn from labor. Believing herself 
 unworthy to be maintained by her 
 spouse, she was humbled, in thinking 
 how much she was indebted to him. 
 She felt herself as much obliged as if 
 she had been the most useless of all 
 creatures, and, being unable to assist 
 our saint, she served him whenever it 
 was possible. About this time St. Jo- 
 seph saw, one day, a great number of 
 birds come to entertain the queen of 
 creatures. They fluttered around her, 
 as if to form a choir, and sang with a 
 delicious melody. St Joseph had not 
 before witnessed this marvel, and, over- 
 
 flowing with joy and wonder, he ex- 
 claimed : " Is it possible that unreason- 
 ing creatures acquit themselves of their 
 obligations better than I? It is just 
 that if they recognize, serve, and honor 
 thee, so far as they are capable, that 
 thou shouldst pennit me also, to acquit 
 myself of what is justly thy right." 
 But the most prudent Virgin replied: 
 " I am but a simple creature, yet I 
 ought to induce all creatures to praise 
 the Most High." 
 
 It often happened that they found 
 themselves in want of necessaries, for 
 they were very liberal to the poor, nor 
 were they careful, like worldly people, 
 to provide for their wants beforehand. 
 Now the Lord so ordered it, that the 
 faith and patience of His holy Mother 
 and St. Joseph should not be idle. 
 These privations were an inexpressible 
 consolation to the august Mary, not 
 only because of her love of poverty, 
 but also of her humility, through which 
 she considered herself undeserving of 
 the necessary aliments of life. She 
 prayed the Most High only to supply 
 the wants of St. Joseph. 
 
 The All-Powerful forgot not His 
 poor, and, while giving them occasion 
 to augment their merits and to exercise 
 their virtues, He gave them also food 
 in season. Sometimes He inspired their 
 neighbors or acquaintances to assist 
 them by a gift Oftener St Elizabeth 
 sent them help from her own house • 
 for, since the visit of the Queen of 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 765 
 
 heaven, she had resolved to assist them, 
 and our sweet Lady sent in return 
 some work of her own hands. Our 
 holy Mistress sometimes exercised the 
 power with which she was endowed 
 over creatures, and the birds brought 
 fruits or bread. Her happy spouse was 
 frequently a witness of these events. 
 
 They were also sometimes assisted, 
 in a wonderful manner, by the minis- 
 try of angels. But before recounting 
 these, it is well to remark that the 
 nobleness of heart, the faith, and the 
 generosity of the saint were so exalted, 
 that his soul was free from every taint 
 of avarice, or sordid care for the future. 
 And although the holy spouses devo- 
 ted themselves to labor, they never 
 demanded the price of their work, nor 
 would they enter into bargains, for 
 they did not labor from motives of in- 
 terest, but to exercise charity towards 
 those who had need of it, leaving the 
 acknowledgment of it to their discre- 
 tion. 
 
 When any payment was made to 
 them, they received it not as a price 
 or recompense, but as an alms. It often 
 happened that no recompense was offer- 
 ed for their work, and that they found 
 themselves entirely destitute of food, 
 and then the Lord provided it. One 
 day, when their usual dinner-hour was 
 passed, and no morsel of food was to 
 be found in the house, they remained 
 a long time in prayer and thanksgiving 
 to the divine Majesty, for this affliction. 
 
 t During this time the hoi}' angels pre- 
 pared a repast. They arranged the 
 table, and placed thereon fruits, bread 
 of a very delicate kind, fish, and a sort 
 of conserve of wonderful sweetness and 
 excellence ; and then some of these 
 blessed spirits went to call their Queen 
 — others, St. Joseph. Each of them 
 recognized the heavenly gifts, and, with 
 holy tears of joy, renewed their thanks 
 giving to the Most High. At length 
 they partook of the repast, which, be- 
 ing finished, they united in chanting 
 praises, truly sublime, to the beneficent 
 giver of every good gift. The august 
 Mary and her spouse often experienced 
 wonders of this character, for there 
 were no witnesses from whom it was 
 necessary they should be concealed. 
 The Lord was very liberal towards 
 them, whom He had appointed admin- 
 istrators of the most wonderful prodi- 
 gies which had ever been wrought. 
 It is necessary to remark, that when 
 our blessed Lady composed canticles 
 of praise, either alone, or with St. Jo- 
 seph or the angels, we are to understand 
 that they were always new, like those 
 composed by Anna, mother of Samuel ; 
 Moses; Hezekiah, and other prophets. 
 If they had been written, they would 
 form a large volume, which would have 
 been the adnairation of all the world. 
 
 The providence of the Most High 
 declares Himself protector of the hum- 
 ble who confide in Him, because the 
 divine Majesty regards them with love. 
 
786 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 He is pleased with them — He bears 
 them iu His bosom — He is attentive 
 to all their desires and all their pains. 
 The august Mary and St. Joseph were 
 very pt>or, and often found themselves 
 iu great want, but never did they al- 
 low the poison of avarice or cupidity 
 to enter their hearts. They sought the 
 glory of God alone, abandoning them- 
 selves entirely to His most loving care. 
 We ought to be content with what 
 is necessary, and to be convinced that 
 the providence of our Creator can never 
 fail. If He be slow sometimes to send 
 us His help, we should not be afflicted 
 nor lose hope. He who has abundance 
 ought not to fix his heart upon it. 
 We should attribute to God both abun- 
 dance and poverty, and make a holy 
 use of both. Let us practise this doc- 
 trine, and abandon ourselves to Provi- 
 dence, and nothing that is needful for 
 us can ever be wanting. 
 
 CHAPTER Vn. 
 
 PREPARATIONS FOR THE BIRTH OF THE 
 
 INFANT JESUS EDICT OP AUGUSTUS 
 
 THE BLESSED MARY AND ST. JOSEPH 
 GO TO BETHLEHEM. 
 
 rpHE Mother of the Eternal Word, 
 -*- the holy Mary, seeing the period of 
 the birth of the Infant God approach, 
 would not undertake to make the neces- 
 sary preparations for it, without the 
 
 f command of her husband, and the will 
 of God. Although she was able to 
 decide for herself in whatever concern- 
 ed the maternal office, she preferred to 
 practise the duties of an obedient and 
 most faithful servant. She therefore con- 
 sulted her holy spouse, St. Joseph. "It 
 is time," she said, " to begin the prepa- 
 rations for the birth of my most blessed 
 Son. With your permission, I will 
 provide the swaddling-clothes to receive 
 Him. I have some linen, spun by my- 
 self, which will serve for a part, if you 
 will seek for the finest and softest that 
 can be found for the rest. And that 
 all may be well done, let us ofier a 
 special prayer to His divine Majesty 
 that we may do whatever is most agree- 
 able to Him." 
 
 St. Joseph replied : " If it were neces* 
 sary to give the purest of my blood to 
 testify my readiness to render service to 
 my God, and to do what you request, 
 I should esteem myself happy to pour 
 it out in the cruellest torments. Order 
 all as it seems best, for I desire to obey 
 thee as thy servant." While they were 
 engaged in prayer, the Most High re- 
 plied to each in particular by the same 
 voice. " I have descended from heaven 
 to earth to elevate humility, and to 
 debase pride — to honor poverty, and 
 to make riches contemptible. For this 
 reason, it is my will that you treat me 
 in the humanity which I have assumed, 
 in all things exterior, as if I were the 
 child of both of you — and interiorly 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 767 
 
 you will recognize in me the Son of my * 
 eternal Father, and true God, with the 
 veneration and love due to me, being 
 man and God at the same time." 
 
 The august Mary and St. Joseph 
 were confirmed by this divine voice in 
 the wisdom that should guide their 
 actions in all the services which they 
 were to render to the Infant God. They 
 resolved to practise the most sublime 
 and perfect mode of honoring their true 
 God, and never among mere creatures 
 was He so perfectly honored. But before 
 the eyes of the world they treated Him 
 as if they were conjointly His parents, 
 because it was the Lord's will that men 
 should so believe. The celestial inhab- 
 itants were in admiration at the conduct 
 of the holy spouses, as we shall relate 
 further on. They resolved also to de- 
 vote to the Infant God all the services 
 which their condition admitted, without 
 attracting observation, so that the secret 
 of the great King should be concealed ; 
 neither should he want for any thing, 
 for, in ministering to Him, they could 
 manifest their ardent love, so far as it 
 was possible. 
 
 St. Joseph, having received payment 
 for some of his work, purchased, accord- 
 ing to the wishes of his spouse, two 
 pieces of cloth, one white, and the other 
 nearer violet than gray — the best that 
 could be found. Our lovely Lady made 
 of them swaddling-clothes -for her most 
 holy child. She made little shirts of 
 the linin that she had spun during the j 
 
 early period of her marriage, with the 
 intention of offering it at the Temple. 
 Happily her intention was changed ; 
 nevertheless she made an offering of 
 what was left. The Blessed Virgin 
 had woven this linen on her knees, with 
 tears of inexpressible devotion. St. 
 Joseph also purchased flowers and aro- 
 matics, from which the holy Mother 
 composed the most delicious perfume 
 that ever was made. With this she 
 sprinkled the swaddling-clothes con- 
 secrated to the Victim, and, folding 
 them, she placed them in a case which 
 she and St. Joseph carried with them to 
 Bethlehem, as we shall see. 
 
 It is hardly necessary to remark, 
 that all these works recounted here, 
 ought not to be regarded simply as 
 facts. Their objects, and the intentions 
 which inspired them, redolent of sanc- 
 tity, and enriched with the highest per- 
 fection, must be taken into view. The 
 divine Mother, her heart all glowing 
 with love, offered all the sacrifices 
 which the ancient law contained in 
 figure. She realized, in truth, the an- 
 cient figures, by the exercise of virtues 
 and acts both interior and exterior. 
 Her happy spouse, on his part, accom- 
 panied her in many of them. 
 
 If the smallest portion of grace that 
 a creature, whoever he may be, receives, 
 by means of a virtue that he has prac- 
 tised, is worth more than all the uni- 
 verse, who can estimate its gi'eatnesa 
 in her who surpassed the merits of the 
 
768 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 highest Seraphim! Our holy Lady ^ 
 saw the humanity united to the Divin- 
 ity in the person of the Word, saw all 
 the interior acts of the most holy soul 
 of her divine Son, and the prayers that 
 He offered for her, for St. Joseph, for 
 the whole human race, and especially 
 for the elect 
 
 The Most High had determined, by 
 His immutable will, that the only Son 
 of the Father should be born at Beth- 
 lehem. The ancient prophets had long 
 since announced it. The Lord disposed 
 all things for the accomplishment of 
 His divine decree; and it was by an 
 edict of Caesar Augustus, who com- 
 manded, as it is recorded by St. Luke, 
 a census to be made of the whole 
 world. It consisted in acknowledging 
 the authority of the Emperor of Rome, 
 and paying a certain tribute. To effect 
 this, every one was obliged to inscribe 
 himself on the register of his native 
 city. 
 
 This edict being published at Naz- 
 areth, St Joseph was informed of it. 
 Returning home, in much trouble, he 
 related to his blessed spouse what had 
 happened. The most prudent Virgin 
 replied : " The edict of an earthly po- 
 tentate ought not to disturb you in 
 this manner, since the Sovereign of 
 heaven and earth takes care of all 
 things that belong to us. His Provi- 
 dence will assist us. Let us abandon 
 ourselves with confidence to His guid- 
 ance.' 
 
 The holy Virgin was instructed in 
 all the mysteries of her divine Son, 
 and she knew that He was to be born 
 in Bethlehem, poor, and a stranger; 
 but she said nothing of this to St. Jo- 
 seph. They conferred together upon 
 what they ought to do, for the period 
 of the birth of the Infant God ap- 
 proached. At length St. Joseph said 
 to his spouse: "It seems to me that I 
 cannot be dispensed from executing this 
 edict of the emperor. And although 
 it would suffice to go alone, I dare not 
 leave you, for I should not have a mo- 
 ment's rest — my heart would be in per- 
 petual alarm. It would be risking too 
 much to propose to you to accompany 
 me to Bethlehem ; it would expose you, 
 too evidently, to danger. This appre- 
 hension gives me great pain. Present, 
 I entreat you, my supplications to the 
 Most High, that He may not separate 
 me from you." 
 
 The humble Mary obeyed the re- 
 quest of St. Joseph, only to prove her 
 obedience, for she was not ignorant of 
 the divine will. She therefore laid the 
 desires of her faithful, spouse before 
 the Lord, who replied to her : " Obey 
 my servant Joseph in what he has pro- 
 posed and desires. Bear him company 
 in this journey. I will be with you, 
 for it is my will that you should go." 
 The Lord ordered nine thousand angels 
 to join the thousand who formed hei 
 guard. 
 
 Our blessed Lady confided to St. 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 769 
 
 Josepli this response, and declared that 
 it was the will of the Most High that 
 she should accompany him to Bethle- 
 hem. The saintly man was full of joy, 
 and expressed his humble gratitude for 
 this favor. He said to his spouse : " I 
 have no other anxiety in this journey 
 except the pain which it will cause to 
 you. But I hope to find relations and 
 friends who will receive us with kind- 
 ness." The kind heart of the good 
 man induced him to believe this, but 
 the Lord had disposed otherwise. The 
 saint was mistaken in his expectations, 
 and suffered much from the disappoint- 
 ment. 
 
 Our sweet Lady forebore to reveal 
 to St. Joseph what was already known 
 to her touching the event to be accom- 
 plished. They appointed the day of 
 departure, and St. Joseph went to en- 
 gage a beast of burden. It was very 
 difiicult to find one, because of the 
 great number of persons who were go- 
 ing to their different cities to be enroll- 
 ed, in obedience to the imperial edict. 
 At length he found a little ass, which, 
 if he could have known it, was the 
 happiest of all his race, since he car- 
 ried the Queen of the Universe, and 
 the King of kings, and was present at 
 the birth of the Infant God. During 
 five days the august Mary and St. Jo- 
 seph were engaged in preparations for 
 the journey. Their provisions consist- 
 ed of bread, fruits, and fish, as in go- 
 ing to the house of Zachariah. And 
 
 ' as the most prudent Virgin knew that 
 she would be long absent from the 
 house, she secretly arranged her affairs 
 according to the will of God. Finally, 
 they recommended it to a person who 
 was to take charge of it until their 
 return. 
 
 The hour of departure arrived. The 
 blessed Joseph, who treated his be- 
 loved spouse with renewed respect, 
 sought, like a vigilant and faithful ser- 
 vant, to find reasons to serve and please 
 her. He entreated her, with much af- 
 fection, to make known to him all that 
 she desired for her comfort, and for 
 the good pleasure of the Lord whom 
 she bore in her virginal bosom. Our 
 Queen meekly accepted the holy affec- 
 tion of her spouse: she even consoled 
 and animated him to endure the fatigue 
 of the road, for His divine Majesty 
 willed that they should accept the in- 
 conveniences of the journey with an 
 equable and joyous heart. 
 
 Before setting out, our blessed Lady 
 knelt to ask St. Joseph's blessing. The 
 man of God excused himself because 
 of her dignity, but the ever invincible 
 humility of the august Virgin con- 
 quered, and obliged him to give it. 
 She then prayed him to offer himself 
 anew to her most holy Son, and to ob- 
 tain for her His divine grace. After 
 these holy preparations they set out 
 for Bethlehem, in the depth of winter, 
 which made the journey more painful 
 and more inconvenient. 
 
770 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 The august Mary and the glorious 
 St Joseph left Nazareth to go to Beth- 
 lehem I Poor and humble travellers 
 they were, in the eyes of the world, 
 which had no more esteem for them 
 than it had for humility and poverty. 
 But, oh ! wonderful secrets of the Most 
 High ! hidden from the proud and im- 
 penetrable, from the wisdom of the 
 flesh, our travellers were not alone, nor 
 poor, nor despised. They had a mag- 
 nificent suite, inestimable riches, and a 
 glory unparalleled. They were the 
 highest objects of the care of the eter- 
 nal Father, and of His immense love. 
 They bore with them the treasures of 
 heaven, and the Divinity itself. 
 
 All the celestial court revered them. 
 The insensible creatures recognized the 
 living ark of the Testament far better 
 tnan the waters of the Jordan recog- 
 nized that which was only the type 
 of Her With them were the ten thou- 
 sand angels, appointed for His divine 
 Majesty and His holy Mother. The 
 incomparable Mary and her saintly 
 spouse marched with this regal train, 
 unseen by the eyes of mortals. The 
 angels chanted canticles to the Lord, 
 and to His blessed Mother, acknowledg- 
 ing her sometimes as a car, incorrupti- 
 ble and living — sometimes as the fertile 
 ear, which contains the living wheat — 
 sometimes as a richly freighted vessel. 
 
 The holy travellers were five days 
 on the way; for the careful husband 
 would not make long journeys. There 
 
 was no night for our Queen during 
 this time, for the angels threw so bright 
 a radiance around her that the lij^ht 
 was equal to the most serene day. St. 
 Joseph enjoyed this favor, and also 
 the view of the angels. They formed 
 a celestial choir, in which our august 
 Lady and her spouse responded to the 
 blessed spirits by caniicles and hymns 
 of praise. 
 
 The Lord united to these favors 
 some sufferings. The great number of 
 persons who thronged the hostelries to 
 obey the imperial edict, were causes 
 of much pain to the modesty of the 
 saintly Mary and her spouse. They 
 were thrust aside as sordid poor, and 
 received less attention than others who 
 seemed richer. Thus our holy travel- 
 lers, weary and worn, were often re- 
 ceived with harsh words at these hos- 
 telries. Sometimes they were even sent 
 away as troublesome, and unworthy of 
 consideration ; at others, the mistress 
 of heaven and earth was put into a 
 corner of the vestibule, — and even this 
 could not always be secured, and she 
 and St. Joseph retired to places still 
 less proper or decent in the world's 
 estimation. 
 
 The troop of angels followed them 
 everywhere, so that the couch of the 
 true Solomon was guarded from the 
 alarms or surprises of the night. The 
 faithful spouse, seeing the mistress of 
 the universe so well cared for, reposed 
 in peace, so as to recover a little from 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 771 
 
 the fatigues of tlie day; for it fre- 
 quently happened that, being in the 
 most rigorous season of the year, and 
 arriving at the hostelries half frozen by 
 the snow and rain, they were obliged 
 to take refuge among the animals, be- 
 cause men gave them nothing more 
 commodious. 
 
 The mistress of creatures might easily 
 have commanded the winds and snows, 
 but she forebore, that she might imi- 
 tate her divine Son in His sufferings. 
 The faithful St. Joseph, nevertheless, 
 took great care to put her under shel- 
 ter, and also the holy angels; in par- 
 ticular the prince St. Michael, who al- 
 ways assisted on the right of the queen. 
 Knowing that it was the will of the 
 Lord, they sometimes protected her 
 from the rigor of the weather, and ren- 
 dered other services to our sweet Lady, 
 and to the blessed fruit of her womb, 
 Jesus. 
 
 CHAPTER VIH. 
 
 ARRIVAL AT BETHLEHEM BIRTH OF JE- 
 SUS IN A GROTTO ST. JOSEPH IS PRES- 
 ENT AT THIS MYSTERY. 
 
 OUR holy travellers, the blessed 
 Mary and St. Joseph, reached 
 Bethlehem on the fifth day of their 
 journey, on Saturday, about four 
 o'clock in the afternoon — the hour 
 when, at the winter solstice, the sun 
 
 * is near his setting, and the night ap- 
 proaches. They entered the town to 
 seek a shelter, and having made in- 
 quiries, not only at the inns, but among 
 their relations and friends, they were 
 refused with rudeness and contempt. 
 Our august Lady followed her spouse, 
 who went from house to house — from 
 door to door, in the midst of the crowds 
 who arrived. And, although she knew 
 that the houses of men, like their hearts, 
 were closed against them, she willingly 
 endured all this mortification in obe- 
 dience to St. Joseph. At the same time 
 it was more painful to find herself in 
 the midst of such a crowd, than to be 
 disappointed in finding a lodging. In 
 wandering about the city, they found 
 the house where the register was kept, 
 and, to avoid the necessity of returning 
 there, they inserted their names, and 
 paid the tribute. Then, pursuing their 
 way ' to find a place of refuge, they 
 applied at more than fifty houses, and 
 were everywhere refused. The holy 
 angels admired the wonderful mysteries 
 of the Lord, the patience and sweetness 
 of the Virgin Mother, and the insen- 
 sibility of men. 
 
 It was nearly nine o'clock in the 
 evening when the faithful St. Joseph, 
 deeply grieved, turning towards his 
 prudent spouse : " My courage fails 
 me," he said, "to find not only that I 
 cannot lodge thee according to thy mer- 
 its, but that I cannot even secure for 
 thee such a shelter as is rarely or never 
 
772 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 refused to the poorest and most con- ^ 
 teroptible applicant. Doubtless some 
 mystery underlies this. I remember to 
 have seen, without the city walls, a 
 grotto where the shepherds ai'e accus- 
 tomed to fold their flocks. Let us go 
 there, for if the place is not occupied, 
 we shall there receive from heaven the 
 hospitality which men reftise to us." 
 
 The most prudent Virgin replied : 
 " Do not afflict thyself, my spouse. The 
 place thou speakest of is quite conform- 
 able to my desires. Change thy tears 
 into joy, for we love and we possess 
 poverty, which is the inestimable treas- 
 ure of my holy Son. He comes from 
 heaven to seek it. Let us go with 
 pleasure whither the Lord conducts us." 
 Lumediutely the holy angels guided 
 the saintly pair towards this place ; 
 they found it unoccupied, and, full of 
 celestial joy, they praised the Lord. 
 
 The palace which the King of kings 
 and Lord of lords had prepared in this 
 world to receive His only Son, incarnate 
 for men, was the lowly and humble 
 grotto to which the most pure Mary 
 and St. Joseph had retired, after having 
 been repulsed by all, as has been re- 
 lated. This place was so unpromising, 
 that, in spite of the extraordinary con- 
 course of strangers at Bethlehem, no 
 one had deigned to occupy it. In fact, 
 it was suitable only to the masters of 
 humility and poverty, and the wisdom 
 of the eternal Father had reserved it 
 for them. 
 
 The august Mary and Joseph entered 
 the place, and, by the radiance of the 
 angels, they saw that it was as poor 
 and solitary as they could have wished. 
 They then fell upon their knees, prais- 
 ing the Lord with thanksgivings for 
 this blessing. The grotto was formed 
 out of the natural rock, and was so 
 rough and uneven, that it was fitted 
 only for the lodging of animals. 
 
 The angelic spirits assumed a corpo- 
 real and human form. St. Joseph saw 
 them, for it was proper that, on this 
 occasion, he should enjoy this favor, 
 either to diminish his pain, or to ani- 
 mate his spirit and elevate it for the 
 events which the Lord had prepared for 
 this same night. Our blessed Lady, 
 informed of the mystery which was 
 about to be accomplished, resolved her- 
 self to cleanse the grotto. The holy 
 Joseph, attentive to the dignity of his 
 admirable spouse, entreated her to leave 
 that care to him. He therefore began 
 to sweep and purify every part of it, 
 and our humble Lady seconded him to 
 the best of her power. The angels also 
 assisted them, until in a short time the 
 grotto was brought into a decent con- 
 dition, and they filled it with a delight- 
 ful perfume. 
 
 St. Joseph kindled a fire, of which 
 there was much need, for the weather 
 was very cold. They afterwards supped 
 from the scraps of food still left ; but 
 our sweet Lady ate only on the press- 
 ing solicitations- of her spouse, whom 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 773 
 
 slie desired to o.bey in all things. At * 
 tlie close of their repast, they returned 
 thanks to God as was their custom, and 
 afterwards discoursed together concern- 
 ing the mystery of the incarnate Word. 
 The most prudent Virgin knew that 
 the hour approached. She entreated 
 St. Joseph to seek repose, for the night 
 was far advanced. The man of God 
 yielded to her solicitations, praying her 
 to follow his example. In order to 
 provide for her the means of rest, he 
 arranged their luggage in such a way 
 as to make up a species of crib, on 
 the floor of the grotto, and, leaving to 
 the august Mary this sort of bed, he 
 withdrew into an angle at the entrance 
 to engage in meditation and prayer. 
 The Holy Spirit came to visit him, and 
 he felt himself drawn by a gentle force 
 that rapt him in ecstacy, during which 
 the events of this night were manifest- 
 ed to him. He remained in this ecstasy 
 until called by his holy spouse. This 
 mysterious slumber of Joseph was more 
 sublime and more fortunate than that 
 of Adam in paradise. 
 
 [This would be the place to speak of 
 the wonderful birth of the Infant God, 
 and to admire the prodigies of every 
 kind that accompanied it; but since it 
 is impossible to relate all, we prefer to 
 confine ourselves to what regards St. 
 Joseph exclusively. The reader who 
 desires to be informed of all these cir- 
 cumstances, is referred to the great 
 
 work of Maria d'Agreda. It is not 
 without lively regret that we omit here 
 the narration of those facts which have 
 commanded the admiration of heaven 
 and earth.] 
 
 The evangelist St. Luke relates that 
 the Virgin Mother, having brought 
 forth her first-born Son, wrapped Him 
 in swaddling clothes, and laid Him in 
 a manger. He does not mention who 
 placed Him in her arms. But the two 
 princes, St. Michael and St. Gabriel, 
 were the ministers on this occasion, and 
 they presented Him to her with as 
 great a reverence as when the priest 
 exposes the holy host. The holy Moth- 
 er received the Infant God into her 
 arms from these two celestial princes. 
 She served as the altar and sanctuary, 
 which the angels of her guard ap- 
 proached to adore their Creator, and 
 venerate that youthful virgin of fifteen, 
 so worthy to dispense these great mys- 
 teries. It was time for the prudent 
 Lady to call her faithful spouse, then 
 in a state of divine ecstasy, in which he 
 knew, by revelation, all the mysteries 
 of the sacred birth of that night. It 
 was but just, that, before any othel 
 mortal, he should enjoy the honor of 
 seeing, and the consolation of adoring, 
 by means of his senses, the Word. made 
 man, since he had been chosen to be 
 the faithful guardian of this sublime 
 mystery. 
 
 The saint returned from his ecstasy, 
 
m 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 and, having recovered the use of his 
 senses, the first object that met his view 
 was the Infant God, in the arms of His 
 N'irgin Mother, and leaning upon her sa- 
 cred face and chaste bosom. He adored 
 Hmi, on this living altar, with the most 
 profound humility, and with warm tears 
 of tendei'ness. He kissed His feet with 
 new joy, and with such rapturous affec- 
 tion, that, but for the divine assistance, 
 he could not have survived it Cer- 
 tainly, but for the help of God, he must 
 have lost his senses upon this occasion. 
 
 After St. Joseph had adored the In- 
 fant, the most discreet Mother asked 
 permission of her Son to seat herself, 
 for she had, until then, remained kneel- 
 ing. The saint gave her the swaddling- 
 clothes which they had brought, and 
 she wrapt the Infant in them with the 
 highest possible reverence, devotion, 
 and neatness. Afterwards, as it is re- 
 corded by St. Luke the evangelist, she 
 laid Him in the manger, carefully plac- 
 ing therein a little straw and hay, to 
 sei-ve for the first bed of the Incarnate 
 Word on earth. It was then that, 
 guided by the Divine will, an ox came 
 from the field, and joining the ass which 
 they had brought with them, they 
 warmed, by their breath, the Infant 
 God whom men had refused to receive. 
 And thus was miraculously accomplish- 
 ed the prophecy of Isaiah : " 27ie ox 
 hnoweth hie owner ^ and the a-ss his mas- 
 tei'^a C7'ib, hU larad hath not hnown me." 
 —la. L a. 
 
 The heavenly courtiers, having cele- 
 brated, in the grotto of Bethlehem, the 
 birth of their Incarnate God, and our 
 Redeemer, many of them were sent to 
 different places to announce the happy 
 tidings to those who were prepared to 
 hear them. The prince, St. Michael, 
 was directed to the fathers in Limbo, 
 to inform them that the only Son of 
 the Eternal Father, who was made man, 
 had just been bom. He bore messages, 
 on the part of the blessed Mother, to 
 St. Joachim and St. Anna. For this 
 numerous assembly of the just it was 
 the day of great consolation. 
 
 Another, angel was sent to St. Eliza- 
 beth and her son John, who adored 
 their Incarnate God. As soon as St: 
 Elizabeth heard of it, she instantly dis- 
 patched a messenger to Bethlehem with 
 presents to the Mother of the Infant 
 God, consisting of a small sum of 
 money, linen, and other things, to sup- 
 ply the wants of the poor Mother and 
 her saintly spouse. But the messenger 
 had no orders but to visit her cousin 
 and St. Joseph, to leave her gifts, to 
 infoi-m himself of their necessities, and 
 quickly to bring her news of them. On 
 his return, he recounted to St. Elizabeth 
 the poverty of her relative, of the Child 
 and Joseph, and the strange feelings 
 that he had experienced while with 
 them. 
 
 Other angels also went to announce 
 the same glad tidings to Zachariah, to 
 Simeon and to Ajina the prophetess, 
 
because the Lord found eacli prepared 
 to receive them with advantage. All 
 the just then living on the earth, al- 
 though unacquainted with this mystery, 
 were, nevertheless, sensible of its divine 
 effects when the Saviour was born. To 
 some, indeed, the Lord revealed it, and 
 of this number were the Magi, who 
 were inspired with renewed desires to 
 seek Him. 
 
 The neighboring shepherds were blest 
 above all others. They were of those 
 who waited for and desired the coming 
 of the Messiah ; and, humble and poor, 
 they were engaged in watching their 
 flocks at the time of the birth. Hence 
 they were in a state of holy prepara- 
 tion : they merited to be the first-called. 
 The archangel St. Gabriel was sent to 
 them. They were troubled at seeing 
 him, but the celestial prince reassured 
 them. Illuminiited by the divine wis- 
 dom, they set off for Bethlehem, to wit- 
 ness the miracle of which they had just 
 heard. On entering the grotto, they 
 found, as it is said by St. Luke, Mary 
 and Joseph, and the Infant laid in a 
 manger. 
 
 The divine Infant looked upon them, 
 and, prostrate, they adored the incar- 
 nate Word. The blessed Mother was 
 attentive to all. She spoke with the 
 shepherds, and instructed them. They 
 made, afterwards, several other visits, 
 during the sojourn of the holy family 
 in the grotto, and brought them pres- 
 ents proportioned to their poverty. 
 
 * They did not speak of what they had 
 seen until after the blessed Mary, the 
 Infant, and St. Joseph had departed 
 from Bethlehem. Their testimony was 
 not believed by all ; but Herod believ- 
 ed, only not with a holy faith. They 
 were, nevertheless, saints, and filled 
 with divine science, even to their death. 
 The coming of the incarnate Word 
 was terrible only for hell. Many things 
 were concealed from Lucifer and his 
 agents, which he might naturally have 
 known ; but he considered it an idle 
 fancy to believe that the Word would 
 come and establish His power in so 
 obscure and humble a manner. The 
 Mother of wisdom penetrated all the 
 deceit of Lucifer. She glorified the 
 Lord, and offered prayers for all of the 
 human race, who, by their sins, had 
 made themselves unworthy to recognize 
 the Light, who had just been born to 
 redeem them. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 SENTIMENTS OF THE AUGUST MOTHER AND 
 
 ST. JOSEPH FOR THE INFANT GOD 
 
 THE CIRCUMCISION THE SPOUSES GIVE 
 
 HIM THE NAME OF JESUS. 
 
 TOURING the time that our august 
 '-'^ Lady abode in the grotto, which 
 was a dreary place, and exposed to the 
 inclemency of the weather, she took 
 the greatest care to protect her tender 
 
779 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 and sweet Child. She had brought 
 coverings with her for this purpose, 
 and she held him almost constantly in 
 her arras, except when she left Him 
 in those of St Joseph. She wished to 
 afford him the gratification to aid her 
 in this service, and that he should 
 serve the Incarnate God in the office 
 of father. 
 
 The first time the saint received the 
 Infant God, our blessed Lady said to 
 him, "Receive within your anus, my 
 spouse, the Creator of heaven and 
 earth. Enjoy His sweet companion- 
 ship, so that my Lord and my God 
 may take delight in thee." And speak- 
 ing interiorly with the divine Infant 
 she said, ''Rest in the arms of thy 
 servant and friend Joseph, my spouse. 
 It pains me to be without thee for a 
 single instant, but I wish to share my 
 blessing with him who is worthy of 
 it." The faithful St. Joseph, conscious 
 of this new happiness, humbled himself 
 profoundly. "Queen of the universe," 
 he replied, " how can I dare, I who am 
 80 unworthy, to hold in my arms the 
 same God in whose presence the pillars 
 of heaven tremble. Supply my defi- 
 ciencies, my baseness, and pray His 
 divine Majesty to regard me with clem- 
 ency." The holy man, hesitating be- 
 tween his desire to receive the Infant 
 God and the respectful fear that held 
 him back, offered to Him acts of love, 
 faith, humility, and respect. He fell 
 on his knees, and received Him with 
 
 a holy trembling and inconceivable 
 veneration from the hands of His bless- 
 ed mother, shedding gentle tears of 
 joy. The Infant God regarded him 
 with a caressing air; and at the same 
 time renovated his soul by His divine 
 influence. The faithful Joseph, finding 
 himself enriched by so many and such 
 magnificent favors, gave utterance to 
 new canticles of praise. After enjoy- 
 ing for a time the ineffable delight of 
 folding the Lord in his arms, he re- 
 stored Him to His blessed mother. 
 They both placed themselves on their 
 knees to give or to receive Him, and 
 at all times with the same veneration. 
 They made three genuflexions before 
 approaching His divine Majesty, kiss- 
 ing the earth with the greatest humil- 
 ity and adoration. 
 
 Much more might be said of the 
 veneration observed by the blessed 
 Virgin, St. Joseph, and the angelic 
 spirits towards the Infant God. When 
 the saint was occupied, St. Michael or 
 St. Gabriel bore Him in their arms. 
 No tongue can do justice to the can- 
 ticles of praise and glory which the 
 Queen of heaven chanted with the 
 angels and St. Joseph, who, of all mor- 
 tals was most happy and most favored 
 in this respect. Besides these favors, 
 he received another, most precious to 
 his soul. His most gentle spouse, in 
 speaking with him of the Infant, called 
 Him often, thy son: not that He 
 was really the Son of St. Joseph, for 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 777 
 
 He was the Son only of tlie Eternal Fa- 
 ther, and of His Virgin Mother. This 
 favor was an unspeakable joy to the 
 Saint, and his spouse often renewed it. 
 
 In regard to the circumcision of her 
 Son, the wise Mary had no express 
 order from the Eternal Father. She 
 considered, on the one hand, that her 
 holy Son came to confirm the law in 
 fulfilling it Himself, and more than 
 this, to sufler for mankind : hence He 
 would not refuse the pain of circum- 
 cision. But, on the other hand, ma- 
 ternal love and compassion led her to 
 desire the exemption of her beloved Son 
 from the sufferings consequent upon it. 
 She confided her sentiments regarding 
 this mystery to her chaste spouse, who 
 so tenderly sympathized in these min- 
 gled feelings, that he was moved to 
 tears. 
 
 Before the eight days after His 
 birth were accomplished, the Queen of 
 heaven addressed herself in prayer to 
 the divine Majesty, who thus respond- 
 ed: "Thou knowest well that thou 
 must offer me thy Son and mine to 
 endure this, and other far greater suf- 
 ferings. Let Him then shed His blood, 
 and give me the first-fruits of the 
 eternal salvation of men." 
 
 The august Mary then explained to 
 St. Joseph, with rare prudence, the 
 reasons why he should prepare himself 
 for the circumcision of the Infant God. 
 She reminded him that the time pre- 
 scribed by the law approached, and 
 
 ^ that they must submit to it, having no 
 order to ' the contrary. Her saintly 
 spouse replied, that " he would conform 
 himself to the divine pleasure in all 
 things made manifest by the common 
 law." He then inquired how the cir- 
 cumcision should be performed. 
 
 The blessed Virgin said, that, in fat- 
 filling the law, she would not be sep- 
 arated from the Infant, nor place Him 
 in charge of any other person, but that 
 she would support Him in her own 
 arms. Yet since, from His tempera- 
 ment. His pain would be greater than 
 that of ordinary children, it would be 
 necessary to be prepared with remedies 
 for the wound. The careful mother 
 prayed St. Joseph also to seek a vial 
 of crystal in which to gather the pre- 
 cious blood, which she wished to pre- 
 serve; and she had linen cloths also 
 ready, so that not a drop should fall 
 on the ground. St. Joseph then went 
 to call a priest, whom he begged to 
 come to the grotto to perform the rite 
 of circumcision, as being the legitimate 
 minister for that ofiice. 
 
 The august Mary and St. Joseph dis- 
 coursed together respecting the name 
 which they should give to the Infant 
 God in the circumcision. " When the 
 angel," said St. Joseph, " declared to 
 me the great mystery of the incarna- 
 tion, he commanded me to call thy di- 
 vine Son Jesus." The Virgin Mother 
 replied : " He made the same declara- 
 tion to me when the Word was made 
 
778 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 jflesh in my bosom. ITierefore we will 
 reqticst the priest to give Him this 
 nnine on the register of circumcised 
 cljildren. 
 
 While the Queen of heaven and St. 
 Joseph held this discourse, innumerable 
 troops of angels descended from heaven 
 in human form, and of incomparable 
 beauty. They bore a device, upon 
 which was engraved the name of Jesus. 
 The two archangels, St. Michael and St. 
 Gabriel, each held in their hands a lu- 
 minous globe of wondrous beauty and 
 splender, within which was written the 
 most holy name of Jesus. They thus 
 addressed their Queen : " This name 
 which thou seest is that of thy Son. 
 The Most Holy Trinity have given it 
 to thy only Son our lord, with power 
 to save the human race. He will chas- 
 tise His enemies, and reduce them to 
 serve as His footstool. He will exalt 
 His friends, and place them in gjory at 
 His right hand. But all this must be 
 purchased by His sufferings and His 
 blood." 
 
 The most happy St. Joseph saw and 
 heard all. He was unable to penetrate 
 the mysteries of the redemption like 
 the mother of wisdom, but he discov- 
 ered some of them. The holy spouses 
 were filled with joy and admiration: 
 in brief, there passed between them, or 
 in their presence, at various times, so 
 many wondenul things, that it would 
 be impossible to convey any just idea 
 of them 
 
 There was at Bethlehem a synagogue, 
 not for offering sacrifices, Avhich could 
 be oft'ered only at Jerusalem, but for 
 the reading of the Law of Moses. The 
 priest, who was minister of the law, 
 was also of the rite of circumcision. 
 Nevertheless, any one could circumcise. 
 Our august Mother desired, because of 
 the dignity of the Infant, that the priest 
 should be the minister, and for this rea- 
 son it was that the happy St. Joseph 
 summoned him. The priest came to 
 the grotto. At the view of the Mother 
 and the Child his heart was sensibly 
 touched with singular devotion and 
 tenderness. The happiness which he 
 enjoyed in touching the flesh of the 
 Infant God renewed him by a secret 
 power, and rendered him holy and 
 agreeable to the Supreme Lord of the 
 universe. 
 
 In order to perform the circumcision 
 with all the respect that was possible 
 in such a place, St. Joseph lighted can- 
 dles. The priest requested the Virgin 
 Mother to withdraw for a little space, 
 to avoid the pain of witnessing the sac- 
 rifice, but she prayed the minister of 
 God to permit her to assist at the sac- 
 rament. The priest then consented that 
 she should support the Infant in her 
 arms. Thus she was the consecrated 
 altar upon which the realities repre- 
 sented by the ancient sacrifices began 
 to be accomplished. 
 
 The blessed Mother unswathed her 
 divine Child, and, drawing from her 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 779 
 
 bosom a linen cloth, slie placed it un- * 
 der the Infant, so that it should receive 
 the blood and the relics of the circum- 
 cision. The priest accomplished his 
 office, and the Infant God offered to the 
 Eternal Father three things of such infi- 
 nite value, that each would suffice for 
 the redemption of a thousand worlds : 
 the first was the form of a sinner ; the 
 second, the pain He suffered as man; 
 the third, His most ardent love, with 
 which He began to shed His blood for 
 the redemption of men. The tender 
 and affectionate Mother gathered the 
 sacred relics and the blood shed upon 
 the linen, and placed the whole in the 
 care of St. Joseph. 
 
 The priest inquired of the holy 
 spouses what name they intended to 
 give to th^ circumcised child. Our 
 sweet Lady, always attentive to the 
 respect which she bore to St. Joseph, 
 requested him to declare it. The saint, 
 turning towards her with veneration, 
 intimated that so sweet a name should 
 be pronounced by her lips — when, by 
 a divine disposition, Mary and Joseph 
 said, at the same moment: ^^ Jesus is 
 His namey The priest replied : '' You 
 are of one mind in this, the name you 
 give to the Infant is great." In writing 
 it he was touched by a great interior 
 tenderness, saying to them : " I assure 
 you that I believe this Child will be a 
 great prophet of the Lord." The august 
 spouses replied to the priest, by an 
 humble acknowledgment, and, having 
 
 given him the wax lights, and some 
 other trifles as offerings, he departed. 
 
 The holy Virgin and her spouse re- 
 mained alone with the Infant. They 
 celebrated anew the mystery of the cir- 
 cumcision by canticles, which they com- 
 posed in honor of the most sweet name 
 of Jesus. The careful Mother dressed 
 the wound of the Infant God with the 
 usual remedies. Slie invited the angels 
 to sing. The ministers of the Most 
 High obeyed their Queen, and with 
 heavenly melody they chanted the same 
 canticles which she and St. Joseph had 
 composed in praise of the sweet name 
 of Jesus. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE EOYAL MAGI COME TO ADORE THE 
 INFANT GOD IN THE GROTTO OF THE 
 
 NATIVITY ST. JOSEPH IS PRESENT AT 
 
 THIS MYSTERY. 
 
 OUE. blessed Lady knew, by infused 
 science from the Holy Scriptures, 
 that the Magi would come from the 
 East, to acknowledge and adore her 
 most holy Son. She had been informed 
 of this approaching mystery by the 
 angel who had been sent to these kings 
 to announce the birth of the incarnate 
 "Word. St. Joseph had received no 
 intelligence of this mystery, because it 
 had not been revealed to him : there- 
 fore, the circumcision having been cele- 
 
brated, the holy man proposed to our 
 sweet Lady to quit their poor abode, 
 for now they could easily find some 
 hostelry in Bethlehem to which they 
 could retire, until the time should come 
 to present the Infant in the Temple of 
 Jerusalem. 
 
 This most faithful and careful spouse 
 was in continual distress at not being 
 able to procure for the Son and His 
 mother the comforts which they had 
 need of, yet he refeiTed all to the wishes 
 of his spouse. The humble Mary re- 
 plied, without revealing the mystery : 
 " I am ready to do all that you com- 
 mand; do whatever you judge to be 
 best." This virtuous indifference threw 
 St Joseph into greater perplexity, for 
 he had hoped that his spouse would 
 decide what should be done. 
 
 While they conferred together, the 
 Lord answered by the ministiy of the 
 princes St. Michael and St. Gabriel : 
 " The Divine will ordains that the three 
 kings who come from the East to seek 
 the King of heaven shall adore in this 
 same place the Word made man. It is 
 ten days since they began their journey, 
 and they will very soon be here." By 
 this new information, St. Joseph was 
 consoled and informed of the will of the 
 Lord. The Blessed Virgin remarked 
 that, " Although this place may be poor 
 and uncomfortable to the eyes of the 
 world, it is, nevertheless, precious, since 
 the Lord is content with it." These 
 words of our prudent Lady afforded a 
 
 * sensible joy to St Joseph, who replied, 
 that "they could, perhaps, remain in 
 that holy place until the day of the 
 presentation in the Temple, without 
 returning first to Nazareth, because of 
 the distance and the severity of the 
 season ; and if they should be obliged 
 by stress of weather to leave it, they 
 might easily find a shelter in Jerusalem, 
 since it was only two leagues distant 
 from Bethlehem." 
 
 The august Mary conformed in all 
 things to the wishes of her husband. 
 She prepai'ed the grotto for the recep- 
 tion of the Magi, as well as the poverty 
 of the place admitted, and used her 
 power over creatures to protect her Son 
 from the rigor of the winter; Neither 
 the wind, the snow, nor the rain dared 
 to approach Him, but paused at a safe 
 distance. The Mother, nevertheless, suf 
 fered from the cold ; while St. Joseph 
 enjoyed, with the Infant God, the be- 
 nign effects of that privilege; but he 
 knew not that this exemption was 
 owing to the command of his blessed 
 spouse. 
 
 It often happened that while our 
 sweet Lady held the Infant God in her 
 arms, she knelt to adore Him. She 
 intrusted Him to St. Joseph with the 
 respect which we have already men- 
 tioned. She embraced His feet, and 
 when she desired to kiss Him on the 
 face, she requested, in an interior voice. 
 His consent. In all she was most pm- 
 dent, most perfect, without deficiency 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 781 
 
 or excess. But there were between the 
 Infant God and His Virgin Mother, 
 other caresses far more sublime. She 
 was made acquainted with the interior 
 acts of the most holy soul of her Son. 
 His humanity was manifested to her as 
 in. a luminous crystal, and the Blessed 
 Virgin beheld the hypostatic union, the 
 soul of the divine Child and all its 
 operations. Then our humble Lady 
 imitated Him in His works and in His 
 prayers. 
 
 The most happy St. Joseph enjoyed 
 not only the favors and caresses of the 
 Infant God, as an ocular witness of those 
 which passed between the Son and the 
 Mother, but he was found worthy to 
 receive them from Jesus himself. When 
 our blessed Lady was engaged in pre- 
 paring their food, or in other household 
 occupations, she placed the Infant God 
 in his hands. While St. Joseph held 
 Him, his pious soul thrilled with divine 
 emotions, for the Infant Jesus regarded 
 him with satisfaction ; He reclined on 
 his bosom, and bestowed on him marks 
 of infantile affection. 
 
 Whenever the august Mary separated 
 herself from the Infant God, she took 
 with her the relics of the circumcision, 
 which St. Joseph usually carried about 
 him for his own consolation. Thus the 
 two spouses were always enriched — the 
 sacred Virgin by her divine Son, and 
 the happy Joseph by the precious blood 
 that had been shed, and the deified 
 flesh. They preserved these holy relics 
 
 * in the little vial of crystal, which the 
 saint had purchased. Our blessed Lady 
 placed in it the flesh that was removed, 
 and the blood that was shed in the cir- 
 cumcision, for she had cut out all those 
 places of the linen which had received 
 it. She afterwards placed this precious 
 deposit in charge of the Apostles, and 
 left it to them as the property of the 
 holy Church. 
 
 The Magi kings, who came to seek 
 the new-born Infant God, were natives 
 of a country east of Palestine. David, 
 and Balaam also, had prophesied their 
 coming. They were very learned in the 
 natural sciences, and in the Scriptures 
 of the people of God. They had some 
 belief in the advent of the Messiah. 
 For the rest, they were men of great 
 probity, loving truth and practising jus- 
 tice. They were neighbors, and lived 
 in intimate friendship and faithful cor- 
 respondence. They had noble, great, 
 and generous souls, free from the avarice 
 which too frequently degrades the 
 hearts of princes. They were warned, 
 by the ministry of angels, of the bii'th 
 of the incarnate Word. With clear and 
 abundant instructions, the guardian an- 
 gel of each declared to them in a dream, 
 and at the same time, the mystery of 
 the Incarnation and the birth of the 
 Redeemer. They knew that this new- 
 born Infant was true God and true 
 man, whom they ought to adore as 
 their Creator and Redeemer, and that 
 the star, which Balaam had predicted, 
 
Bhould be given as tlieir guide to con- * 
 • luct them to the place where He would 
 )'(• found. 
 
 Tlie Magi kings awoke, and in spirit 
 they adoi*ed tlie immutable being of 
 God, and glorified His mercy for that 
 the Word liad taken human flesh in the 
 womb of a Virgin, to redeem the world, 
 and they prepared to depart, that they 
 might find Him. At the same time, the 
 holy angel formed a star which was 
 suspended in the air, to conduct the 
 kings to the grotto. In leaving their 
 homes they saw it, and followed the 
 I'oute which it indicated. Thus guided, 
 tliey arrived at Jerusalem, when it dis- 
 appeared. They then inquired where 
 was the King of the Jews, who had just 
 been born. 
 
 Herod, as it is recorded by St. Mat- 
 thew, assembled the chief priests and 
 scribes, who replied : " According to 
 the prophecy of Micheas, the Messiah 
 is to be born at Bethlehem." Herod 
 called the Magi, and inquired of them 
 the time when they had first observed 
 the appearance of the star. He then 
 said to them: "When you shall have 
 found this Child, inform me of it, so 
 that I, too, may go and adore Him." 
 On passing out of Jerusalem, the Magi 
 again saw the star, which stood over 
 the grotto of the Nativity. 
 
 The Lord had made known to the 
 august Mother the coming of the Magi, 
 and when she heard they were near 
 the grotto, she mentioned it to St. Jo- 
 
 seph, in order that he might remain 
 at her side, which he did. Although 
 the Evangelists make no mention of 
 it, it is nevertheless certain that St. 
 Joseph w^as present when the kings 
 adored the Infant Jesus. The Maij^i 
 already knew that St. Joseph was not 
 His real father, and that His mother 
 was a Virgin. The admirable Mother 
 awaited these pious kings with the 
 Infant God in her arms. An extraor- 
 dinary splendor shone forth from the 
 Infant, and our sweet Lady was ex- 
 ceedingly beautiful. They were lost 
 in admiration, adoring the Infant, and 
 acknowledging Him as true God and 
 true man. Then rising up, they bent 
 the knee before the Mother in testi- 
 mony of their veneration, and offered 
 their felicitations on the happiness she 
 enjoyed in being the Mother of the Son 
 of the Eternal Father. 
 
 The three kings prostrated them- 
 selves anew, and adored the Infant 
 Jesus. Afterwards they addressed 
 tiiemselves to St. Joseph, and con- 
 gratulated him on his happiness in 
 being the spouse of the Mother of God. 
 Having passed three hours in the 
 grotto, the kings requested permission 
 to go and seek ,a lodging in the city, 
 to sojourn there. Several persons ac- 
 companied the Magi, but they alone 
 participated in the effects of grace and 
 knowledge. The holy Mary and Jo- 
 seph remained with God, and glorified 
 the divine Majesty in new canticles of 
 
praise, because His holy name began to * 
 be known and adored among the nations. 
 
 The three kings left the grotto to 
 seek repose in an hostelry of Bethle- 
 hem. They passed a great part of the 
 night in discourse, intermingled with 
 many tears and sighs, respecting what 
 they had seen in the Infant God and 
 His holy Mother. They ceased not to 
 admire the splendor that shone from 
 the Infant Jesus, the modesty of the 
 blessed Mother, the holiness of the. 
 happy St. Joseph. 
 
 During this conference, the Magi 
 were not unmindful of the great desti- 
 tution of Jesus, Mary, and St. Joseph, 
 in the grotto, and they therefore sent to 
 them, by their servants, liberal supplies 
 of provisions. The august Mary and 
 Joseph received them with gratitude, 
 nor did they reply by empty thanks, 
 but by efficacious benedictions. The 
 Magi disposed themselves to sleep, and 
 the angel warned them of the way in 
 which they should proceed. 
 
 As soon as it was day they returned 
 to the grotto of the nativity, to offer 
 the gifts they had brought. They pros- 
 trated themselves before the celestial 
 King, and adored Him with profound 
 humility : afterwards, opening their 
 treasures, as it is related in the Gos- 
 pels, they offered to Him gold and 
 frankincense and myrrh. Our blessed 
 Mother received these gifts of the kings, 
 and presented them to the Infant Jesus 
 in their name. They also offered to the 
 
 sweet Mother their services, their re- 
 sources, and all that they possessed. 
 Our prudent Lady thanked them for all 
 these offers, but she would accept noth- 
 ing. The kings then besought her not 
 to forget them, which she promised. 
 They asked the same of St. Joseph. 
 Having received the benediction of Je- 
 sus, Mary, and Joseph, they took leave, 
 with such an effusion of tenderness and 
 affection, that it seemed as if their 
 hearts would melt. To avoid meeting 
 Herod, they resolved not to pass 
 through Jerusalem. All the remaining 
 lives of these blessed kimrs were in 
 harmony with their divine vocation. 
 
 After their departure, our Lady and 
 St. Joseph chanted new canticles of 
 praise. They compared these wonder- 
 ful incidents with the Holy Scriptures, 
 and with the prophecies of the Proph- 
 ets and Patriarchs, and they saw, with 
 unspeakable joy, that their predictions 
 began to be accomplished in the Infant 
 Jesus. 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 OUR LADY AND ST. JOSEPH LEAVE THE 
 GROTTO OF THE NATIVITY, AND REMAIN 
 AT BETHLEHEM UNTIL THE PRESENTA- 
 TION OF THE INFANT JESUS IN THE 
 TEMPLE. 
 
 AFTER the adoration of the Infant 
 Jesus by the Magi, our saints r> 
 solved to quit the grotto, since nothing 
 
more was expected there. The prudent 
 Mother said to St. Joseph : " My spouse, 
 these presents, vhich the Magi have 
 left for our God, ought not to be use- 
 less. I must not occupy myself with 
 temjwralities, therefore I pray thee dis- 
 pose of all as belonging to my Son and 
 to thee. 
 
 The faithful spouse replied, with his 
 accustomed humility and meekness, that 
 " it was but right she should distribute 
 them herself." The Blessed Virgin per- 
 sisted, saying: "You ought to do it, to 
 exercise charity towards the poor, who 
 claim the part that belongs to them." 
 After this humble contest, the august 
 Mary and St Joseph decided to divide 
 the gifts into three parts: one for the 
 Temple at Jerusalem, another for the 
 priest who had circumcised the Infant, 
 the remainder for the poor. 
 
 The Almighty, to induce them to 
 leave the grotto, inspired a poor woman, 
 who was honest and charitable, to visit 
 our Queen. She lived in a house that 
 stood against the wall of the city, quite 
 near the holy place. Having heard of 
 the coming of the Magi, she inquired of 
 the Blessed Virgin if she knew that 
 certain wise men, who were said to be 
 three kings, were come to seek for the 
 Messiah. Our princess took occasion 
 from this to instruct her, without de- 
 claring the mystery of her Son ; where- 
 upon this woman offered them her 
 house, pressing her strongly to accept 
 the invitation, seeing the inconvenience 
 
 ♦ of the grotto for our Lady, her spouse, 
 and the Child. 
 
 Our Queen did not refuse the oiler. 
 A little time afterwards she spoke of it 
 to St. Joseph, and they detennined to 
 . make their abode iu that house until 
 the time should come for the purifica- 
 tion and the presentation in the Temple. 
 That which decided them was, that a 
 crowd of people began to come to the 
 grotto. Our sweet Lady, St. Joseph, 
 ,and the Infant left it with much regret, 
 because of their veneration for it, and 
 directed their steps to the house of the 
 poor woman, who received them with 
 the greatest cordiality. After they had 
 quitted it, the Lord sent an angel to 
 guard the grotto, and this angel still 
 guards it with a flaming sword, so that 
 no animal has entered it since that time. 
 K he does not hinder the entrance, of 
 the enemies of the faith, it is by the 
 secret judgment of the Most High. 
 Christian princes could aid in this mir- 
 acle if they set themselves with ardor 
 to recover the holy places. It has been 
 declared to me, that veneration for the 
 Holy Land is one of the most powerful 
 and efficacious means to establish and 
 confirm the Catholic monarchies. 
 
 The august Mary prepared herself, 
 by fervent desires, to offer in the Tem- 
 ple her adorable Infant to the Eternal 
 Father. She embellished her soul by 
 the practice of the highest virtues. The 
 Infant Jesus conversed with His Mother, 
 but in an intelligible voice only when 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 785 
 
 she was alone. Her lioly spouse did 
 not enjoy this happiness until a year 
 after His birth. 
 
 During the time which our august 
 Queen passed at Bethlehem, she was 
 visited by many persons, who were 
 nearly all of the poorest class. They 
 Sjioke of the arrival of the Magi, and of 
 the coming of the Messiah. By a dis- 
 position of divine Providence, the ap- 
 proaching birth was a subject of public 
 conversation among the Jews. The pru- 
 dent Mother had various occasions to 
 practise great virtues. Those good peo- 
 ple held such fabulous discussions upon 
 matters of religion, that the ingenuous 
 St. Joseph smiled at them, but, at the 
 same time, admired the impressive re- 
 plies of our great Lady, and the divine 
 wisdom with which she instructed them. 
 
 The Blessed Virgin and St. Joseph 
 remained with the divine Infant, in 
 their humble dwelling at Bethlehem, 
 until the close of the forty days pre- 
 scribed for presenting Him- in the Tem- 
 ple. This period being fulfilled, our 
 Lady and St. Joseph prepared for the 
 journey. They resolved to ofi*er the 
 only Son of the Eternal Father accord- 
 ing to the law, knowing His desire to 
 be submissive to the law, and to be 
 offered to His divine Father. Having 
 fixed the day of departure, they took 
 leave of their pious hostess, whom they 
 left crowned with celestial benedictions. 
 
 They went first to visit the grotto of 
 the nativity. The blessed Mother gave 
 
 * the Infant to St. Joseph, and, prostrate 
 on the earth, she venerated this holy 
 place. Her holy spouse did the same, 
 with inexpressible devotion. Then the 
 Blessed Virgin requested leave of St. 
 Joseph to make the journey barefooted, 
 and to carry the holy Infant in her 
 arms. Our august Lady usually wore 
 a kind of shoes which covered the feet. 
 The thread was taken from a plant 
 resembling hemp, which was suitable 
 for the poor. 
 
 St. Joseph, having requested her to 
 rise, thus replied : " The Son of the 
 Eternal Father, whom I have within 
 my, arms, gives you His benediction. I 
 am well pleased that you should go on 
 foot, carrying Him, but not barefooted. 
 Be content with your pious desire, 
 which will be agreeable to the Lord, 
 who has inspired it." St. Joseph some- 
 times used authority towards the august 
 Mary, but it was always with great 
 respect. He used this authority as 
 head, only that she might not be de- 
 prived of the consolation she enjoyed in 
 the practice of humility and obedience ; 
 and as the saint obeyed her in so doing, 
 he mortified and humbled himself in 
 commanding her, and thus both were 
 obedient and humble. 
 
 St. Joseph refused to allow her to go 
 to Jerusalem barefooted, because he 
 feared the cold might injure her health ; 
 but his fears arose from his ignorance 
 of the admirable nature of her virginal 
 constitution. Our blessed Lady, im- 
 
166 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 plicitly obedient to her spouse, did not 
 iii.ikf the journey barefooted. They 
 Ift't the grotto, after having asked the 
 benediction of the Infant God, who be- 
 stowed it, perceptibly, upon them. St. 
 Joseph loaded the ass with the package 
 of swaddling-clothes, and that portion 
 of the gifts of the Magi which they had 
 reserved as an offering at the Temple. 
 All the celestial court accompanied 
 tlhiii, in visible forma. Our blessed 
 Lady and her spouse enjoyed their vis- 
 ion. These heavenly spirits celebrated 
 the mystery by new and admirable can- 
 ticles, and, thus disposed, they traversed 
 the two leagues which separated Beth- 
 lehem from Jerusalem. The weather 
 was severe — nor did this happen with- 
 out the particular providence of God. 
 Nothing was to be seen but frost and 
 ice, so that the Creator made man trem- 
 bled with cold, like one of mere human 
 birth. He wept in the arms of His 
 loving Mother. Our potent Queen ad- 
 dressed herself to the winds and ele- 
 ments, and commanded them, authorita- 
 tively, to become milder. They obeyed 
 the order of their legitimate mistress for 
 the Infant, without changing towards 
 her. 
 
 During this time, and while our bless- 
 ed Lady was on the way with the Infant 
 Jesus, the chief priest, Simeon, had a 
 revelation that the incarnate Word was 
 coming to the Temple, in his Mother's 
 ai-ms, to offer Himself to God. The same 
 i-evelation was made to the holy widow 
 
 Anna, and it was revealed to her, and 
 the high-priest also, that St. Joseph was 
 with his most pure spouse. And hav- 
 ing communicated to each other what 
 had just been revealed to them, they 
 agreed to send the steward of the Tem- 
 ple to meet them, after having instruct- 
 ed him how to recognize our holy trav- 
 ellers. The steward executed the order 
 he had received, which proved a great 
 consolation to our august Queen and 
 St. Joseph. The fortunate host left them 
 in his house, and went to give an account 
 of his mission to the high-priest. 
 
 The saintly spouses formed their plana 
 the same evening. Our ever-prudent 
 Lady advised St. Joseph to go at once 
 and present the gifts of the kings at the 
 Temple, so as to avoid attracting public 
 attention. She also prayed him to bring, 
 on his return, the turtle doves, wiiich 
 they intended to offer publicly the fol- 
 lowing day. St. Joseph executed all in 
 such a manner that he seemed only an 
 ordinary stranger, who offered myrrh, 
 incense, and gold to the receiver of the 
 gifts at the Temple. He did not use 
 any portion of them to purchase a lamb, 
 because this would not have accorded 
 with their poor and humble condition. 
 Neither did they depart, in the least 
 particular, from the poverty and humil- 
 ity which they held in such high esteem, 
 even though it might have tended to- 
 wards good and pious ends. 
 
 Simeon was, accorded to St. Luke, a 
 just man, fearing God, and awaiting the 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 787 
 
 consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit 
 had revealed to him that he should see 
 Christ the Lord before his death. On 
 that night he was instructed by divine 
 illumination, and discovered, by great 
 clearness, all the mysteries of the incar- 
 nation and redemption of the human 
 race. By the knowledge of these sub- 
 lime revelations he was elevated above 
 himself. The same night St. Anna had 
 also a revelation of many of these mys- 
 teries, from which she received unspeak- 
 able consolation. 
 
 The day having come when the Sun 
 of Justice was to appear, our ble'ssed 
 Lady prepared the turtle-doves and two 
 lights. She then wrapped the Infant 
 Jesus in His swaddling-clothes, and set 
 out, with her saintly spouse, for the 
 Temple. Arrived at the gates, the 
 happy Mother adorSd the Lord in spirit 
 and in truth, and made an offering to 
 the divine Majesty of herself with her 
 Son whom she held in her arms. The 
 most fortunate of men, St. Joseph, felt 
 at the same moment a new and sweet 
 effusion of the Holy Spirit, which filled 
 him with joy and divine light. 
 
 Conducted by the same Spirit, the 
 high-priest Simeon came to the Temple, 
 and, approaching the place where Mary 
 stood with J*esus, he beheld them all 
 radiant with light. Anna approached 
 and saw it, also, Simeon took the In- 
 fant in his arms, and offering Him to 
 the Eternal Father, intoned the cele- 
 brated canticle : " JSfoiu Tltoti dost dis- 
 
 * miss Th/y servant., O Lord, according to 
 Thy word., in peaceP Afterwards he 
 announced the cruel passion which the 
 heart of Mary must suffer at the sight 
 of the sufferings of Jesus. 
 
 The blessed Mary and St. Joseph 
 admired the sublimity of the Spirit 
 which had inspired Simeon. The holy 
 old man gave his benediction to the 
 happy parents and to the Infant. When 
 the holy priest prophesied the passion^ 
 the Infant humbly inclined His head, 
 in testimony that He accepted the proph- 
 ecy, and would fulfil it. The tender 
 mother comprehended all the mysteries 
 included in this prophecy. On his 
 part, the holy St. Joseph also penetrated 
 many things concerning the redemption 
 and the sufi^erings of Jesus, but his 
 knowledge was less comprehensive than 
 that of his spouse, because he was not 
 to witness their accorriplishment on 
 earth. 
 
 The Blessed Virgin and St. Joseph 
 took leave of the high -priest, after hav- 
 ing received his benediction, and that 
 of St. Anna, and returned to the house 
 which had been prepared for them. 
 Here they resolved to remain nine days 
 longer, to visit the Temple, and to re- 
 new there, each day, the offering of the 
 most holy Host, with devout thanks- 
 givings. The number nine had always 
 been dear to the holy family. They 
 began their novena and remained in the 
 Temple from before the hour of tierce 
 to the evening, choosing the most hum 
 
788 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 Me and retire«l quarter. It was at this * 
 time the divine Majesty promised that 
 the auffust Mother should obtain all 
 that she would ask for those who were 
 devoted to her, as long as the world 
 should last, and even for great sinners, 
 if they would avail themselves of her 
 intercession. 
 
 CHAPTER Xn. 
 
 THE LORD PREPARES OUR BLESSED LADY 
 
 FOR THE FLIGHT INTO EGYPT THE 
 
 ANGEL REVEALS IT TO ST. JOSEPH — 
 JESUS, MARY, AND JOSEPH COMMENCE 
 THE JOURNEY. 
 
 ON the fifth day of the novena, after 
 the Presentation, the Blessed Vir- 
 gin had a vision of the Divinity, in 
 which she was warned to fly into Egypt, 
 because Herod sought to destroy the 
 new-born Messiah. The Lord referred 
 her to St. Joseph, to be guided by him 
 in all things relating to this journey. 
 But the exceeding affection of our Lady 
 for her most holy Son grieved her heart, 
 on considering the pain which so young 
 a child must suffer in executing this 
 command. She was touched with com- 
 passion, and could not restrain her 
 tears. 
 
 The faithful St. Joseph observed the 
 affliction of his spouse, and supposed it 
 to be the effect of the prophecy of St 
 Simeon. But as he had a tender affec- 
 
 tion for our Queen, and was also of a 
 most compassionate temper, he was 
 troubled at the affliction of his spouse ; 
 and it was for this reason that the an- 
 gel appeared to him in a dream. Dur- 
 ing this same night, as it is related by 
 St. Matthew, the angel of the Lord said 
 to him, " Arise, and take the Child and 
 His Mother, and fly into Egypt, and be 
 there until I shall tell thee. For it will 
 come to pass, that Herod will seek the 
 Child to destroy Him." 
 
 Filled with zeal and anxiety, St. 
 Joseph arose on the instant, and, ap- 
 proaching the place whither his Jbelov- 
 ed spouse had retired, he said to her: 
 " It is the will of the Most High, that 
 we shall be afflicted, for His angel has 
 declared to me the command of His 
 Majesty, that we shall fly with the In- 
 fant into Egypt, becfiuse Herod designs 
 to destroy His life. Prepare, then, for 
 the fatigues of this journey, and tell me 
 what I can do for your comfort, and for 
 the service of our most sweet Infant." 
 " My spouse," replied our Queen, " If 
 we receive so much good at the liberal 
 hands of the Most High, it is but just 
 that we should receive from Him tem- 
 poral pains and afflictions." 
 
 The blessed Mother and St. Joseph 
 approached the cradle where the Infant 
 Jesus slept ; nor was this slumber with- 
 out mysteiy. The holy Mother thus 
 addressed Him: "Flee away, O my 
 beloved, and be like to the roe, and to 
 the young hart ; come, let us go to the 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 789 
 
 fields." St. Joseph added: "Thy power 
 cannot be limited by that of the kings 
 of the earth, but Thine exalted wisdom 
 would conceal it. Who can fathom the 
 impenetrable secrets of Thy Provi- 
 dence ? " Our august iady then awak- 
 ened the Infant. Our loving Saviour, 
 willing to show, by certain marks, that 
 He was of true human nature, and to 
 affect His parents, wept a little, but 
 soon He became quiet. 
 
 The holy Virgin and St. Joseph ask- 
 ed a benediction of the divine Infant, 
 which He bestowed in a manner not 
 to be mistaken. Then gathering their 
 humble garments, they departed, with- 
 out further delay, a little after mid- 
 night, making use of the same beast of 
 burden which they had brought from 
 Nazareth to Bethlehem. They travelled 
 with all diligence towards Egypt, quit- 
 ting Jerusalem to go to another country, 
 concealed by the silence and obscurity 
 of the night. 
 
 It is not possible to find faith and 
 hope more firm than that of our Queen 
 and her faithful spouse, but they were 
 pained because of the Infant Jesus. 
 They knew not what might happen to 
 them on this long journey, nor where 
 it was to terminate, nor how they would 
 be received in Egypt, nor how they 
 could educate the Child. But the an- 
 gels strengthened them in such wise, 
 that, issuing from Jerusalem by the 
 gate towards Nazareth, they began their 
 journey with great ardor. 
 
 The Blessed Virgin could have wish- 
 ed to pass through Hebron, where St. 
 Elizabeth then tarried, and because it 
 was but little out of their way ; but 
 the prudent St. Joseph, who was in 
 great apprehension of Herod, could not 
 consent to the least delay. " I think," 
 said he, " that it is of the greatest im- 
 portance not to retard our journey for 
 even a moment, but to hasten it as 
 much as possible, so as to be removed 
 from danger. For this reason we ought 
 not to pause at Hebron, where we 
 should, perhaps, be sought after sooner 
 than elsewhere." The Blessed Virgin 
 obeyed St. Joseph, not only in that 
 which he commanded, but she would 
 not even send an angel to her cousin 
 without his consent. What an admira- 
 ble example to teach us to renounce our 
 own will, which is often so prejudicial 
 to us ! 
 
 The angel having instructed St. Eliza- 
 beth, she desired to come and adore the 
 Infant Jesus, but the celestial ambas- 
 sador prevented her. She then sent a 
 person to convey, in all haste, food and 
 money to the holy family, with clothing 
 for the Child. This messenfjer found 
 them at the city of Gaza, distant twenty 
 hours from Jerusalem, by the road that 
 leads from Palestine to Egypt. 
 
 Our holy travellers remained two 
 days in this town, on account of the 
 fatigue of St. Joseph, and to give rest 
 to the ass, which carried our Queen. 
 They dismissed the servant of Elizabeth, 
 
r 
 
 790 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 aud St Joseph charged him to reveal to 
 no one the place where he had found 
 them. The Loi*d appointed a better 
 means of securing this silence. He de- 
 8ti\)}'ed liis memory of the fact. 
 
 The charitable Mary shared the pres- 
 ents of Elizabeth with the poor, whom 
 she never forgot. Of the cloth she 
 made a covering for the Infant, and a 
 mantle for St Joseph, capable of pro- 
 tecting them from the severity of the 
 weather. She also prepared such of the 
 provisions as could be preserved, to 
 provide for the necessities of her Son 
 and St. Joseph, without having recourse 
 to miraculous assistance. 
 
 The happy St Joseph was a witness 
 of the mysteries which passed between 
 the blessed Mother and the Infant Jesus. 
 The holy Mary understood, through 
 intellectual visions, the unity of the 
 divine Essence with the Trinity of per- 
 sons ; the eternal generation of the 
 Word, and the procession of the Holy 
 Ghost without priority or posteriority. 
 Finally, the august Mother contemplated 
 all the interior acts of her only Son, and 
 imitated them. The happy Joseph was 
 often a witness of these divine mj'steries, 
 and received illumination from them 
 which smoothed the difficulties of the 
 road. 
 
 From time to time our saint took care 
 to inquire of his spouse how she found 
 herself, and if she had need of any thing 
 for the Infant or herself. He approached 
 Him and adored: he kissed His feet 
 
 t and asked His benediction. Sometimes 
 he took Him in his anns. Thus our 
 great patriarch overcame gently all the 
 fatigues of the journey. His holy spouse 
 encouraged him ; yet external things 
 never interfered with her sublime 
 thoughts and affections. 
 
 Three days after their arrival at Gaza, 
 our saintly travellers set out for Egypt. 
 They then entered the sandy desert 
 called Beei'sheba, which has an extent 
 of sixty leagues befoi-e reaching Ileli- 
 opolis, near Cairo. They made short 
 journeys, because of the sand. Many 
 events happened to the holy family. 
 The Most High allowed them to suffer 
 from the hardships of the desert. Our 
 blessed Lady was much distressed, but 
 she supported them with patience for 
 the sake of her Son and husband. St. 
 Joseph, on his part, suffered greatly from 
 his inability to protect the Infant and 
 Mother, notwithstanding all his cares. 
 
 In traversing the desert, it was abso- 
 lutely necessary that they should pass 
 the nights in the open air, and without 
 shelter; and it was in winter, and the 
 month of February. The first night which 
 overtook them, obliged them to stop at 
 the foot of a hill. The Queen of heaven 
 seated herself on the sand with her Son 
 in her arms, and they supped on what 
 they had brought from Gaza. The 
 Blessed Virgin gave milk to her Infant 
 Jesus, and His Majesty consoled them 
 in many pleasing and caressing ways. 
 The saint raised a sort of little tent 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 791 
 
 witli liis mantle and some sticks, so 
 that the Incarnate Word and His holy- 
 Mother should not be exposed to the 
 night air. Our great Lady knew that 
 her most holy Son offered this affliction 
 to the Eternal Father, together with His 
 sufferings, and those of herself and St. 
 Joseph. She united with Him in prayer. 
 St. Joseph slept on the ground, his head 
 supported by the little box of swad- 
 dling-clothes and their other poor ap- 
 parel. The following day they con- 
 tinued their route, and then their pro- 
 vision of bread and fruits failed them, 
 so that the Mistress of the universe and 
 her holy spouse, feeling the pressure of 
 hunger, found themselves in the direst 
 distress, and, although that of the saint 
 was the most severe, both were in the 
 greatest affliction. Thus they passed 
 one of the first days of their journey, 
 until nine in the eveninof, without nour- 
 ishment. Our blessed Lady then ad- 
 dressed herself to the Most High. "Eter- 
 nal and Almighty God," said she, " I 
 offer Thee thanks, and I bless Thee. 
 How, being only a poor useless creature, 
 how shall I dare to ask any thing for 
 myself. But have regard to Thine only- 
 Son, and grant the means to sustain His 
 natural life, and to preserve that of my 
 spouse ! " The Most High permitted 
 that to the rigors of the elements should 
 be join'^d those of hunger, exhaustion, 
 and this sort of abandonment — and 
 then came a tempest of wind and rain, 
 which we<*ried them extremely. 
 
 The careful Mother, exercising her 
 power as Queen of creatures, command' 
 ed the elements not to offend their Cre- 
 ator, and to reserve for her their rude 
 attacks. The Infant Jesus, to recom- 
 pense this loving care, gave commands 
 to His angels, and they formed a lumin- 
 ous globe, impenetrable to the weather, 
 which inclosed their God made man, 
 the Blessed Virgin, and her spouse. 
 This protection was bestowed on other 
 occasions, also, while crossing the des- 
 ert. 
 
 But food was wanting, and this want, 
 which could not be supplied by any 
 human industry, was most pressing. 
 The Lord then helped them by the min- 
 istry of angels, who furnished them 
 with bread and excellent fruits, and 
 brought them, besides, a beverage of 
 delicious flavor. Upon this, they sang 
 canticles of praise to the Lord, who 
 feeds all flesh, at a convenient season. 
 Such was the repast which the Lord 
 made for His three travellers in the 
 same desert, where Elias, flying from 
 Jezabel, was strengthened by bread 
 baked in the ashes which the angel of 
 the Lord brought him. 
 
 None of the miracles wrought in fa- 
 vor of the Jewish people are worthy to 
 be compared with those which the Lord 
 wrought during this journey for His 
 Son made man, and the august Mary 
 and St. Joseph, to preserve the natural 
 life on which depended the salvation of 
 the human race. But tlie Lord'alwaya 
 
7d2 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 waited until the necessity was moat ^ 
 urgent Let the poor rejoice in this 
 example — let not the hungry be cast 
 down — let those who sufter persecution 
 t'.\j)ect help in season, and let none com- 
 plain of divine Providence ! When was 
 it ever that the Ijord failed to help 
 those who put their trust in Him? 
 Come ! come to Ilim with humility 
 and confidence! The eyes of your 
 Father regard you with fixed atten- 
 tion. 
 
 The Most High not only took care to 
 nourish our pilgrims, but He also offer- 
 ed them sensible recreations, to soothe 
 the weariness of the way. It often hap- 
 pened that the blessed Mother, pausing 
 with the Infant God, was speedily sur- 
 rounded by large numbers of birds. 
 The blessed Queen received them, and 
 commanded them to praise their Crea- 
 tor: the birds obeyed, and the devoted 
 Mother amused the Infant Jesus by the 
 sweetest canticles. The holy angels 
 joined their voices to that of our lovely 
 Lady. 
 
 The Son and the Mother sometimes 
 held interior communications, so sub- 
 lime, that words are inadequate to ex- 
 press them. The holy St. Joseph par- 
 ticipated in some of these mysteries, 
 and their divine consolations made him 
 forget his fatigue while he enjoyed the 
 delights of such society ; but he knew 
 not that the Infnut conversed with His 
 Mother. 
 
 CHAl^ER XIIL 
 
 THE HOLT FAMILY ARRIVE AT HELI0P0LI8 
 
 THEY FIX THEIB RESIDENCE IN THAT 
 
 CITY. 
 
 milE flight of the Incarnate Word 
 -■- had other mysteries, and other 
 ends, besides that of withdrawing from 
 the effects of Herod's anger. It was 
 rather the means employed by the Lord 
 to visit Egypt, and there to operate the 
 wonders of which the Prophets had 
 spoken — Isaiah, in particular, ch. xix. 1: 
 " The Loi'd will enter into E<jypt^ and 
 the idols of Egypt shall he moved at His 
 presence^'* etc. But we will not here 
 pursue this point. 
 
 Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, continuing 
 their journey, arrived at the inhabited 
 portion of Egypt, and before reaching 
 Heliopolis, where they were to sojourn, 
 the angels led them through many other 
 places. From this cause they employed 
 more than fifty days in the journey, 
 passing over two hundred leagues, al- 
 though they might have arrived much 
 sooner at Heliopolis if they had follow- 
 ed the direct road. 
 
 The Egyptians were strongly inclined 
 to idolatry and superstition, and idols 
 were placed everywhere. There wei-e 
 many temples where devils made their 
 abode, and they were so given to the 
 worship of demons, and so blinded by 
 their delusions, that nothing short of 
 the omnipotent arm of the Lord had 
 power to reform this misguided country. 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 793 
 
 Now, the Infant Jesus, with His Mother 
 and St. Joseph, entered the habitations 
 of the Egyptians. And when He en- 
 tered, in the arms of the angust Mary, 
 raising His eyes towards heaven, and 
 joining His hands, He prayed for the 
 salvation of the poor people enslaved 
 by the devil. Then exercising His pow- 
 er over these evil spirits, He precipi- 
 tated them into the abyss. The idols 
 fell at the same moment with a loud 
 noise, the temples sank into ruins, and 
 the altars were overthrown. 
 
 The cause of these prodigies was 
 known to our Lady, who united her 
 prayers to those of her divine Son. St. 
 Joseph also discovered that all these 
 wonders proceeded from the Incarnate 
 Word, and filled with holy admiration, 
 he praised and blessed Him. The de- 
 mons failed to discover the cause. The 
 Egyptians were amazed, although the 
 most learned still preserved certain tra- 
 ditions of prophecies of Jeremiah, when 
 he was in Egypt, that a King of the 
 Jews should come into their kingdom, 
 and the temples of their idols should 
 be destroyed. 
 
 In their trouble, some of the people 
 came to vi&it our blessed Lady and St. 
 Joseph, and discoursed with them on 
 the ruin of their temples. The Queen 
 of wisdom availed herself of the occa- 
 sion to instruct them. Her words were 
 so sweet and so forcible, that the rumor 
 of the arrival of our holy travellers was 
 spread abroad. Jesus and Mary passed 
 
 t through many towns of Egypt, chasing 
 the demons not only from the temples, 
 but from the bodies of the people. Our 
 Princess and St. Joseph instructed many 
 persons in the path to virtue and to 
 eternal life. 
 
 They arrived at Heliopolis. Many 
 idols were possessed by demons ot great 
 power, particularly one which dwelt in 
 a tree at the entrance of the city. 
 When the Word made man passed it, 
 the demon was cast into the depths of 
 the abyss, and the tree bowed itself to 
 the earth. Several authors have record- 
 ed this miracle, for the leaves and fruits 
 of this same tree, afterwards, cured 
 many maladies. 
 
 Various writers have recorded this 
 sojourn of the Holy Family in Egypt. 
 Some mention their residence in one 
 city, some in another. All may be true 
 in referring to different epochs, for the 
 Holy Family were at Hermopolis, Mem- 
 phis, Mataria, and other towns, but they 
 fixed their abode at Heliopolis, because 
 the angels had said to our blessed Lady 
 and St. Joseph, that they were to stop 
 at this place. Thus this city of the sun, 
 according to its name, saw the Sun of 
 justice and of grace. 
 
 Immediately upon their arrival, St. 
 Joseph sought a lodging, offering a fair 
 price. The Lord guided him to a poor 
 habitation, a little out of the town, as 
 the Queen of heaven had wished, and 
 they took possession of it at once. On 
 entering it with her Son and St. Joseph, 
 
794 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 our blessed Lady prostrated liereelf and 
 kissed the earth with profound liumil- 
 ity. She then Ix'gan the lowly tavsk of 
 cleansing her huml)le abode, and, so 
 indigent were their circumstances, that 
 she was obliged to borrow the broom 
 with which she swept the house. 
 
 Although our holy strangers were 
 content to be lodsjed within the bare 
 walls of this poor tenement, food and 
 furniture were still wanting. The mi- 
 raculous succor, which they had been 
 accustomed to receive by the ministry 
 of angels, had ceased since they had 
 entered inhabited regions. The Lord 
 placed them at the table of the poorest 
 poor, which is to have recourse to alms ; 
 and, while suffering from hunger, St. 
 Joseph went to ask for food for the Son 
 of God. By this example he teaches 
 the poor never to complain of their 
 wants, nor to be ashamed to beg, when 
 all other legitimate means have failed, 
 since it was necessary to beg at so early 
 a period to support the life of the 
 Lord of all created things. During the 
 three first days, after their arrival at 
 Heliopolis, our blessed Lady had no 
 other food for herself and her adorable 
 Son than that which St. Joseph received 
 as alms, nor until he began to gain some- 
 thing by his labor. (The same thing 
 happened in divers places of Egypt.) 
 Having received payment for certain 
 work, he made a little bedstead, entirely 
 of wood for the Mother, and a cradle 
 for the Infant For himself he prepared 
 
 ^ no other bed than the earth. Nor was 
 there any furniture in the house, until, 
 by the sweat of his brow, he acquired 
 money to purchase some indispensable 
 articles. 
 
 In this extreme poverty, Mary and 
 Joseph never spoke of their house at 
 Nazareth, nor of their parents and 
 friends, nor of the presents of the wise 
 men. They regretted none of these 
 things, and supported their indigence 
 without uttering the least complaint, 
 ■ or without dwelling on the past, with- 
 out fear of the future. On the contrary, 
 they were always joyous — abandoning 
 themselves entirely to divine Providence 
 in the hour of their greatest need. 
 
 Oh, the baseness of our infidel hearts I 
 With how many troubles, cares, and 
 pains are they not possessed, at the 
 smallest inconveniences ! The example 
 of our blessed strangers should serve as 
 a grave rebuke for our pusillanimity in 
 times of trial and afiliction. Our pru- 
 dent Lady and her spouse, deprived of 
 all temporal goods, lodged, with joy, in 
 their destitute habitation. Of the three 
 chambers it contained, one was con- 
 secrated as a sanctuary for the Infant 
 Jesus and His most holy Mother. In it 
 were placed the cradle and her little 
 bed. The second was appropriated to 
 St. Joseph for prayer and repose, and 
 the third served as a shop, where he 
 worked at his trade. Our august Lady, 
 seeing their extreme indigence, and that 
 her spouse was obliged to increase his 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 795 
 
 ordinary toil to enable them to live, 
 resolved to aid him by her own labor. 
 She judged it best to employ the day in 
 work, so as to gain what was necessary 
 for their food, fbi* the clothing of St. 
 Joseph, and to furnish their house, re- 
 serving only the night for her spiritual 
 exercises. The Infant God approved 
 this prudent decision of His Mother, 
 and regulated the order of her life and 
 her manual labor. But when the holy 
 Mother saw that it was time to relieve 
 St. Joseph, by procuring for him the 
 society of her Son, she said to Him: 
 " My Son and my Lord, regard your 
 faithful servant with the love of a son 
 for his father." And, addressing the 
 saint : " Receive, my spouse, within your 
 arms, the Lord, who holds within His 
 hands the heavens and earth, and who 
 will sweeten the fatigues of your toil." 
 
 The saint was accustomed to receive 
 this favor with great humility and grati- 
 tude, asking his holy spouse if he might 
 take the liberty to caress the Infant. 
 Reassured by the pradent Lady, the 
 consolation he received in these caresses 
 made him forget all his pains, so that 
 they seemed easy and most sweet. When 
 the holy spouses took their repast, the 
 Blessed Virgin held the Infant. Hav- 
 ing placed whatever was necessary on 
 the table, she took Him again from the 
 arms of St. Joseph. All that I can say 
 of any thing that our saints did, is, that 
 they were the admiration of the angels, 
 and that they were according to the 
 
 * good pleasure of the Lord. When Isaiah 
 prophesied that the Lord would enter 
 Egypt on a light cloud, to make His won- 
 ders shine there — by this cloud he meant 
 His most holy Mother. After the Sun 
 of Justice had enlightened Egypt, and 
 the cloud, free from every taint of sin, 
 the august Mary, had fertilized it, this 
 land brought forth abundant fruits dur- 
 ing many ages, as we have seen in the 
 great number of saints and anchorites 
 whom, in the sequel, it produced. 
 
 The Lord sojourned at Heliopolis, 
 and when He entered the temples, the 
 idols and altars were overthrown, with 
 a frightful noise. The whole city was 
 in the greatest terror, and many persons 
 of both sexes went to visit the strangers, 
 and spoke of it to our blessed Lady and 
 St. Joseph. Our blessed Mother con- 
 versed with them with much prudence, 
 wisdom, and sweetness. She withdrew 
 them from their errors, and at the same 
 time healed some diseased persons. The 
 rumor of these miracles spread abroad 
 to such a degree that our blessed Lady, 
 seeing herself approached by multitudes 
 of people, inquired of her divine Son 
 what He would have her to do. The 
 Infant God replied, that she should im- 
 part to them the knowledge of the true 
 God, and instruct them in His worship 
 and of the means to wipe away their 
 sins. 
 
 The blessings which these souls thus 
 obtained, were so abundant, that it 
 would require many volumes to record 
 
T96 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 the wonders that were manifested dur- 
 ing these seven years. Two years later, 
 St Joseph also began to heal the sick. 
 Our blessed Lady devoted herself chief- 
 ly to the cure of women; she herself 
 dressed their wounds ; but for men, she 
 healed them by her words only. 
 
 During the period of their sojourn, 
 lleliopolis was infected by the plague. 
 This misfortune, and the report of the 
 wonders which they wrought, brought 
 tliem great numbers of sick people, who 
 went away healed in body and soul. 
 But the Lord wishing to extend His 
 grace, determined, at the request of our 
 blessed Lady, that St. Joseph should 
 instruct and cure the sick. And she 
 o})tained for him a new interior light, 
 and a singular grace of holiness for the 
 exercise of this ministry, so that, in the 
 third year after their arrival, St. Joseph 
 began the exercise of these gifts from 
 heaven. He usually instructed and 
 cured the men, and our blessed Lady 
 the women.* We can easily conceive the 
 good they wrought, but it is impossible 
 to give the details of it. 
 
 King Herod was much disappointed 
 when he heard that the Magi had visit- 
 ed Bethlehem — had seen the august 
 Mary and St. Joseph, and had already 
 left Palestine. He was also informed 
 of what had passed in the Temple. He 
 then gave orders to make a strict search 
 for our Queen, her Infant, and St. Jo- 
 seph. But the Lord, who had com- 
 manded their departure from Jerusalem 
 
 by night, concealed their journey. And 
 now it was that the demon inspired 
 Herod to murder all the children of 
 that region who were under two years 
 old. 
 
 Herod promulgated this diabolical 
 command in the sixth month after the 
 birth of our Redeemer. Her most sweet 
 Son, and the august Mother, prayed 
 to the Almighty for the holy inno- 
 cents. The divine Providence was most 
 gracious towards these infant martyrs, 
 and they all received, some more, some 
 less, the use of reason, and a sublime 
 knowledge of the being of God. They 
 exercised heroic acts of faith, adoration, 
 respect, and love of God. They will- 
 ingly received martyrdom, and the 
 angels who assisted them bore their 
 souls to Limbo. 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 THE INFANT JESUS SPEAKS TO ST. JOSEPH 
 
 A YEAR AFTER HIS BIRTH ACCORDING 
 
 TO THE WILL OF THE MOST HIGH, THE 
 HOLY FAMILY RETURN FROM EGYPT TO 
 NAZARETH. 
 
 ONE day, while the blessed Mary 
 and St. Joseph discoursed togeth- 
 er upon the mysteries of the Lord, the 
 Infant Jesus, having completed His first 
 year, desired to break silence, and to 
 speak, in a distinct voice, with His 
 faithful foster-father. The two spouses 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 797 
 
 spoke of the Infinite Being of God, and 
 His goodness in sending His only Son 
 to be the Master and Redeemer of men 
 — to converse with them, and suffer the 
 pains which their depraved nature had 
 deserved. 
 
 St. Joseph, in this meditation, ad- 
 mired the works of the Lord, and re- 
 doubled his grateful thanksgivings for 
 His love. The Infant God, who was in 
 the arms of His Mother, used them as a 
 pulpit, from which He thus addressed 
 the saint : " My father, I am come from 
 heaven to be the light of the world, 
 and as a good shepherd, to seek and to 
 know my sheep, and to give them the 
 food of eternal life. I desire that you 
 may both become children of the light, 
 since you are so near to its source." 
 These words of the Infant Jesus, full 
 of life and force, poured into the heart 
 of the holy patriarch a new love — a 
 profound respect — an inexpressible joy. 
 He cast himself at the feet of the Infant 
 God and offered devout thanks that the 
 first word which he had heard Him pro- 
 nounce was father. With many tears, 
 he prayed His divine Majesty to illu- 
 minate him with celestial light, to enable 
 him to do whatsoever should be most 
 agreeable to Him, and to thank Him 
 for the manifold blessings he had re- 
 ceived from His liberal hand. 
 
 Fathers, who naturally love their chil- 
 dren, feel great consolation when they 
 perceive that' they give promise of be- 
 coming wise and distinguished in the 
 
 f world ; and even when they are not so, 
 their natural affection induces them to 
 praise whatever their children may say 
 or do. Now, although St. Joseph was 
 not the real father of the Infant, but 
 only His foster-father, the love which 
 he bore Him surpassed, beyond com- 
 parison, all that fathers have ever had 
 for their children ; because grace, and 
 even nature, were more powerful in him 
 than in others, or in all fathers united. 
 It is, therefore, by this love, and by the 
 delight he felt in being the reputed 
 father of the Infant Jesus, that we are 
 to measure the joy of his pure soul, 
 when he heard the Son of the Eternal 
 Father call him father, in beginning to 
 speak with him so graciously. 
 
 This first year having been passed in 
 swaddling-clothes, the prudent Mother 
 judged the time had come when He 
 should be put upon His feet. The In- 
 fant Jesus said to her: ''My Mother, 
 you will clothe me in a tunic, of a plain 
 color. I will wear none but this. It 
 shall grow with me, and it shall be for 
 this that they will cast lots after my 
 death. I ought to have only one coat 
 in this world, in order to instruct men 
 to esteem and to love poverty. I con- 
 sent that you give me some common 
 sandals, which I will wear until the 
 time comes for my public preaching, 
 when I must go barefooted." The 
 Queen of heaven employed herself im- 
 mediately to accomplish the will of her 
 most holy Son. She provided wool of 
 
.I_ 
 
 id8 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 the natural color, of whieli she spun * 
 and made a little tunic, all of one piece. 
 She wove it on a frame. There was a 
 mystery in making this tunic without 
 seam On the prayer of our blessed 
 Lady, it changed its natural hue into 
 another, which was between violet .and 
 silver color, very perfect, so that the 
 shade could not be distinguished. Be- 
 sides this, she made a half tunic of linen, 
 for an under garment, in which He was 
 crucified. The holy Mother, having thus 
 clothed the Infant Jesus, put sandals 
 upon Him, and set Him on His feet. 
 The tunic proved to be exactly fitted 
 to Him, and He never quitted it until 
 the executioners despoiled Him of His 
 clothing, to flagellate and crucify Him, 
 because it grew with His sacred body 
 as much as was necessary. The same 
 thing happened with the sandals, and 
 the other garment, which served as 
 drawers. The Infant Jesus found Him- 
 self afoot. There appeared in Him a 
 grace quite wondei-fiil, for He surpassed, 
 in beauty, all the children of men. The 
 angels were surprised that He had 
 chosen so humble a vesture. 
 
 Our blessed Lady and her holy spouse 
 \vere filled with joy on seeing their 
 Infaiit walk with so much giace, and 
 possessing such rare beauty. When He 
 had reached eighteen months. He was 
 weaned: afterwards He ate meat, but 
 always veiy sparingly. When He was 
 grown up, He took His food at the same 
 hour with our blessed spouses, and noth- 
 
 ing more ; and when at the table with 
 His parents, they waited always for 
 Him to give the benediction at the 
 beginning, and to return thanks at the 
 end of the repast. 
 
 The Infant Jesus grew in the admira- 
 tion of all who knew Him. Having 
 attained His sixth year. He began, some- 
 times, to go out to visit the sick in the 
 hospitals. From every quarter they 
 came to felicitate and bless the parents 
 for having such a Child. Many chil- 
 dren of Heliopolis, as is usual, accom- 
 panied our amiable Jesus. He instiiict- 
 ed them in the knowledge of the Di- 
 vinity and of the virtues, and taught 
 them the way to eternal life. 
 
 This sweet, beautiful Child, in pro- 
 portion as He advanced in age, assumed 
 a graver demeanor towards His parents; 
 and some time after the swaddlinsr- 
 clothes were laid aside, the most tender 
 caresses, which had always been made 
 with a certain reserve, ceased. The cir- 
 cumspection of His parents in this re- 
 gard, arose from their perception in 
 Him of so much of the majesty of the 
 hidden Divinity, which, if He had not 
 tempered it, would often have produced 
 a fear so full of respect, that they could 
 not have dared even to speak to Him. 
 But His presence never ceased to in- 
 spire them with sentiments altogether 
 divine afid inefiable. 
 
 In this majestic grandeur, He was 
 dutiful towards His most holy Mother, 
 fyid treated St. Joseph as the one who 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 799 
 
 held the name and office of His father, 
 obeying both as their humble Child. 
 It is impossible to enumerate the souls 
 who were converted and saved in Heli- 
 opolis, and in all Egypt — the sick 
 whom they cured, and the wonders they 
 wrought, in the seven years of their 
 abode there. During this time the In- 
 fant Jesus attained the age of seven 
 years, and this was the term of that 
 mysterious exile which the Eternal Wis- 
 dom had fixed. To fulfil the prophecies, 
 it was necessary that He should return 
 to Nazareth. The Eternal Father, one 
 day, declared His will to the humanity 
 of His divine Son, in the presence of 
 His holy Mother. The Son and the 
 Mother disclosed nothing of the new 
 order from heaven to St. Joseph, but 
 the angel of the Lord appeared to him 
 the same night in a dream, as it is re- 
 lated by St. Matthew, and instructed 
 him " to take the Child and His Mother, 
 and return into the land of Israel." 
 The Most High so eminently esteems 
 good order, that the Infant Jesus being 
 God, and His Mother so superior in sanc- 
 tity to St. Joseph, nevertheless, he would 
 not that the undertaking of the return 
 to Galilee should depend either upon 
 the Son or the Mother, but that it should 
 be conducted by St. Joseph, who filled 
 the office of head to that divine family. 
 This example teaches all mortals how 
 agreeable it is to God, that they who 
 are inferiors in the mystical body, al- 
 though more worthy by other qualities. 
 
 ^ should obey and submit themselves to 
 those who, by their office, are their supe- 
 riors. 
 
 St. Joseph went instantly to commu- 
 nicate the commandment of the Lord to 
 the Infant Jesus and His Mother, who 
 replied, that "the will of the heavenly 
 Father should be fulfilled. Upon which 
 they prepared with all possible dili- 
 gence for their departure. They distrib- 
 uted among the poor the little furniture 
 they possessed, and this was done by 
 the agency of the Infant God. 
 
 They left Heliopolis for Palestine, 
 with the same angels who had accompa- 
 nied them to Egypt. Our Queen rode a 
 little ass, with the Infant God in her lap, 
 and St. Joseph walked near them. All 
 their acquaintances sensibly felt their 
 departure, and took leave of them with 
 many tears. They passed several of the 
 inhabited places of Egypt before arriv- 
 ing at the desert, and left marks of their 
 chai'ity everywhere. They cured many 
 sick persons, and drove away a multi- 
 tude of demons, who knew not by what 
 power they were cast into the abyss. 
 
 I will not pause to record the various 
 circumstances that attended the Infant 
 Jesus and His blessed Mother in their 
 departure from Egypt. It may suffice 
 to say, that they who approached them 
 with any pious affection were enlighten- 
 ed in the truth, assisted b)'' grace, and 
 penetrated by divine love. At length, 
 our holy travellers left behind them 
 the inhabited country, and entered the 
 
800 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 desert by which they had come. There 
 they again suffei*ed hai'dships similar to 
 those they had endured after leaving 
 Palestine. In these extremities the 
 Lord himself pmvided for them by the 
 ministry of the angels. Sometimes the 
 Infant Jesus ordered these spirits to 
 bring food for His holy Mother and her 
 sj>ouse. 
 
 This consoled the holy Patriarch, see- 
 ing that he was altogether unable of 
 himself to find support for the King and 
 Queen of heaven. On other occasions 
 the Infant God exercised His divine 
 power in multiplying some morsel of 
 bread into as much as they had need 
 o£ For the rest, this journey passed off 
 as the preceding one. But when, on 
 approaching Palestine, the cautious St. 
 Joseph heard that Archelaus reigned in 
 Judea, in the place of Herod, his father, 
 he took another road, without entering 
 Judea, and they came to Nazareth, their 
 country, because the Infant was to be 
 called a Nazarene. There they found 
 their old abode, under the guardianship 
 of that pious woman, the relative of St. 
 Joseph, to whom he had written on 
 their departure for Egypt, requesting 
 her to take charge of it and whatever it 
 contained ; and they found all in good 
 condition. 
 
 When our blessed Lady entered it 
 with her divine Son and holy spouse, 
 she prostrated herself to return thanks. 
 The happy Mother then regulated her 
 aflhirs according to the intentions of the 
 
 Infant God, and St. Joseph did the same, 
 in whatever regarded his employment 
 for the support of the Infant, the Motlicr 
 and himself. The happiness of the holy 
 Patriarch was immense; for it was a 
 favor and an unutterable joy to have 
 been chosen to gain by the labor of his 
 hands wherewithal to sustain the Inftmt 
 God and His Mother, to whom belonged 
 heaven, earth, and all that they contain. 
 The Queen of heaven desired to re- 
 quite the labors of the saint. She served 
 him and prepared his simple food with 
 the most affectionate gratitude, and obey- 
 ing him in all things, she regarded her- 
 self more as his servant than his spouse. 
 She considered herself unworthy that 
 even the earth should sustain her, and 
 she established her rare humility on 
 such solid foundations, that she was 
 always plunged in an abyss of annihila- 
 tion, and still lower in her own esteem. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 SOJOURN AT NAZARETH THE BLESSED 
 
 MARY AND ST. JOSEPH GO EVERY YEAR 
 TO JERUSALEM-^AT THE AGE OF TWt:LVE, 
 JESUS REMAINS AT THE TEMPLE, Wn'H- 
 OUT THE KNOWLEDGE OF HIS PARENTS. 
 
 JESUS, Maiy, and Joseph had finally 
 reached Nazareth, and their poor 
 dwelling was changed into a new heaven. 
 If it were necessary to relate all the 
 wonders that happened there before the 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 801 
 
 Infant God liad reached His twelfth year, 
 many volumes would be required. 
 
 Soon after their return to Nazareth, 
 the Lord tried His most blessed Mother, 
 The Most High determined that our 
 holy Lady should be the first disciple 
 of her Son. The Incarnate Word and 
 His blessed Mother occupied themselves 
 in these profound mysteries during the 
 twenty -three years of their abode at 
 Nazareth. The Lord caused her to feel 
 His absence internally. Besides this, 
 the Infant God, without making known 
 any cause for it, was more grave than 
 usual. We omit here many admirable 
 things, that we may not withdraw our- 
 selves too much from the life of our 
 holy Patriarch. The prudent Mother 
 never neglected any thing that regarded 
 the corporeal service of her Son, taking 
 great care of His diet as well as that of 
 St. Joseph. She also obtained that the 
 Infant Jesus consoled His foster-father 
 by His presence, as much* as if he had 
 been His natural father. 
 
 The Infant God obeyed His Mother, 
 and was often with St. Joseph while at 
 the work in which he was continually 
 occupied, so that thus, by the sweat of 
 his brow, he might maintain those so 
 dear to him. In proportion as He grew 
 in stature. He assisted the holy Patri- 
 arch, as far as it was possible at His 
 age, and sometimes He wrought mira- 
 cles to produce results which surpassed 
 His natural strength, thereby to relieve 
 the saint of his labor ; but these marvels 
 
 * occurred only in the presence of the 
 three. 
 
 Some time after the return of our 
 saints to Nazareth, the period arrived 
 when the precept of the law of Moses 
 obliged the Israelites to appear before 
 the Lord at Jerusalem. This command- 
 ment was obligatory three times a-year, 
 but it was binding only on the men — 
 women might present themselves for 
 devotion, if they pleased. Our blessed 
 Lady conferred with her spouse as to 
 what they should do on this occasion. 
 The saint wished to conduct thither the 
 Queen of heaven and her holy Child, to 
 oifer them anew to the Eternal Father. 
 The holy Mother was inclined to go 
 from devotion, but she undertook noth- 
 ing without the consent of her Master, 
 the Incarnate Word. Having consulted 
 Him, it was resolved that St. Joseph 
 should present himself there alone, twice 
 in the year, and the third time they 
 should all go together; It was at the 
 festival of the Passover that the sweet 
 Jesus and His blessed Mother accompa- 
 nied St. Joseph. When he went alone, 
 the saint made the journey on behalf of 
 all, and, as deputy for the Son and the 
 Mother (who prayed for him at Naza- 
 reth), he made mysterious prayers in 
 the Temple at Jerusalem, offering the 
 sacrifice of his lips. And as he offered 
 Jesus and Mary there, this offering was 
 more agreeable to the Eternal Father 
 than any which all the rest of the people 
 of Israel could offer. 
 
802 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 When the Incarnate Word and the f 
 Virgin Mary accompanied St. Joseph to 
 the festival of the Passover, this pil- 
 grimage was more admirable for him, 
 because the ten thousand angels accom- 
 panied our divine travellers. They made 
 short journeys on these occasions, be- 
 cause, after the return from Egypt, the 
 Infant Jesus desired to go on foot, 
 which obliged them to move slowly. 
 The fii*st time they travelled in this 
 manner, our blessed Lady a*id St. Jo- 
 seph were careful to assist Him, by 
 taking Him sometimes in their arms, but 
 afterwards He went entirely on foot. 
 The prudent Mother offered no opposi- 
 tion, but led Him by the hand, and the 
 glorious Patriarch sometimes enjoyed 
 that consolation. 
 
 Every time the Son and the Mother 
 made this journey, they operated won- 
 ders for the good of souls. When they 
 stopped for the night, in some hostelry, 
 the Infant God and His Mother were 
 never separated. She often saw Him 
 engaged in prayer for the whole human 
 race, and united her prayers to His. 
 Many times, as in a mirror, she beheld 
 all the affronts, all the ignominy, and 
 all the sufferings which her most sweet 
 Cliild was to suffer in the city of Jerusa- 
 lem, and she was transpierced by the 
 sword of grief which Simeon had pre- 
 dicted. But the Infant God, to allevi- 
 ate her son-ow, prayed her to offer these 
 pains, which regarded them mutually, 
 for the salvation of men. 
 
 Our holy family, as I have said, con- 
 tinued to go every year to the Temple, 
 to celebrate the Passover. The Infant 
 God had attained His twelfth year, the 
 epoch at which he was to make manifest 
 the splendors of His inaccessible light. 
 Our holy pilgrims I'emained an entire 
 w^ek at Jerusalem. The happy Mother 
 and St. Joseph received, each in propor- 
 tion to their dispositions, such great 
 favors from the liberal hand of the Lord, 
 that the human understanding is not 
 able to conceive them. 
 
 The seventh day past, they took the 
 road towards Nazareth. But as they is- 
 sued forth from the city of Jerusalem, 
 the Infant God left His parents unper- 
 ceived, and remained behind, while they 
 pursued their journey, not knowing 
 what had happened. The Lord availed 
 himself of the customs of the people ; for 
 the troops of strangers divided them- 
 selves, and for the better observance of 
 propriety, the women went together. 
 The children accompanied, indifferently, 
 their father or their mother. St. Joseph 
 had reason to believe that the Child 
 Jesus went with His blessed Mother, nor 
 could he imagine that she w^ould have 
 set out without Him. Our blessed Lady 
 had less strong reasons to persuade her- 
 self that our adorable Saviour was with 
 the Patriarch St. Joseph, but the Lord 
 diverted her mind by other divine 
 thoughts at the beginning, so that when 
 she found herself alone without her best 
 beloved, she believed that the glorious 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 803 
 
 St. Joseph had taken Him with him, and 
 that the supreme Lord had willed to 
 give him that consolation. 
 
 Our holy spouses travelled on with 
 this idea throughout the day, as St. Luke 
 informs us, and, having left the city by 
 different gates, rejoined each other after- 
 wards. The holy Mary and her spouse 
 met at the place where they were to 
 pass the first night after their departure 
 from Jerusalem. But our blessed Lady, 
 seeing that the Infant God was not with 
 St. Joseph, as she supposed, and the holy 
 Patriarch not finding Him with His 
 Mother, both were thrown into such con- 
 sternation that they nearly lost the power 
 of speech, and remained some time with- 
 out uttering a word. Both, from humil- 
 ity, attributed the fault to themselves, 
 of allowing the divine Infant to be sep- 
 arated from them. Recovering a little 
 from their amazement, they conferred 
 together, in extreme grief, respecting 
 what was to be done. The tender 
 Mother spoke first : " My spouse, my 
 heart can find no repose, unless we go at 
 once to seek my holy Child." They in- 
 stantly commenced their researches, by 
 inquiries among their relatives and ac- 
 quaintances, but none could give them 
 tidings of Him, nor mitigate their sor- 
 row ; on the contrary, it was augmented, 
 for no one had seen Him since they had 
 come out of Jerusalem. 
 
 The Mother of wisdom formed various 
 conjectures in her mind, and the first 
 thought was, that Archelaus, having had 
 
 ^ some knowledge of* the Infant Jesus, 
 might have caused Him to be appre- 
 hended. She feared that He had been 
 cast into prison and maltreated. Her 
 deep humility induced her, also, to fear 
 that, unhappily, her services might not 
 have been pleasing to Him. This inno- 
 cent dove passed the three days, during 
 which she sought the Saviour, in tears 
 and groanings, without repose — without 
 food or sleep. The celestial spirits of 
 her guard were not ignorant of where 
 He was, but she was so reserved and so 
 humble, that she did not inquire of 
 them where she could find Him. 
 
 The grief of our blessed Lady on this 
 occasion surpassed all that all the mar- 
 tyrs united have suffered ; and in it she 
 exercised a patience and resignation un-* 
 paralleled. For oh ! prodigy of holiness 
 — of prudence — of perfection ! in such an 
 unheard-of affliction, and in such absorb- 
 ing sorrow, she was neither troubled, 
 nor lost her interior nor exterior peace 
 — she gave way to no movement of im- 
 patience, nor of inordinate tenderness. 
 She sought her Child with a divine wis- 
 dom, inquiring of many persons if they 
 had not seen Him, and giving marks by 
 which He might be recognized. Among 
 others, a woman replied to her inquiries: 
 " A child having the same features that 
 you describe, presented himself yester- 
 day at my door, asking alms, which I 
 gave him. His charming manners and 
 exceeding beauty won my heart." These 
 were the first tidings the afflicted Mother 
 
804 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 had obtained of her Son in Jerusalem, 
 and she forthwith proceeded to the hos- 
 pital of the city, hoping to find the 
 Master of poverty among the poor; there 
 she was informed that the child she de- 
 scribed had visited them during three 
 days, bringing them alms, and had left 
 them much consoled in their afflictions. 
 Having failed to find Him among the 
 poor, she doubted not that He would be 
 in the Temple. The holy angels now 
 said to her: "Queen of the universe, 
 you will soon behold the light of your 
 eyes. Hasten to the Temple." The 
 glorious patriarch St. Joseph advanced 
 towards her at this moment, for, to gain 
 time, he had sought the Infant God 
 in another direction, and he also had 
 been directed, by an angel, to the 
 Temple. 
 
 He sufl\3red extremely from fatigue 
 during these three days, going some- 
 times in one direction, sometimes in an- 
 other, occasionally with his blessed 
 spouse, oftener alone, and always with 
 inconceivable care and solicitude; for 
 his life would have been endangered if 
 the hand of the Lord had not sustained 
 him, and if our precious Lady had not 
 taken care to alleviate his extreme af- 
 fliction, besides obliging him to take 
 some little food and rest. The tender 
 and -devoted love which he cherished 
 for the Infant God imparted such an 
 exceeding desire to find Him, that he 
 forgot all besides. Following the coun- 
 sel of the celestial princes, our holy 
 
 spouses hastened to the Temple. In 
 the next chapter we shall relate what 
 happened there. 
 
 CHAPTER XVL 
 
 THE AUGUST MARY AND ST. JOSEPH DIS- 
 COVER THE INFANT IN THE TEMPLE 
 AMONG THE DOCTORS RETURN TO NAZ- 
 ARETH, 
 
 OUR blessed Lady, ever so assiduous 
 in the service of her divine Son, 
 had, nevertheless, lost sight of Him, and 
 left Him to wander away from her at 
 Jerusalem. Although it might sufiice 
 to say that the same Lord so ordained 
 it, we may also perceive how this sepa- 
 ration was eflPected. It is certain that, 
 besides taking advantage of the multi- 
 tudes of people, the Infant God used, 
 also, supernatural means, and while the 
 men and women were separating from 
 each other, the Omnipotent Lord gave 
 to His blessed Mother an intellectual 
 vision, which so possessed all her facul- 
 ties, and so elevated her above all things 
 of sense, that she was unable to do more 
 than mechanically to follow tbe path 
 she travelled. St. Joseph had the rea- 
 sons we have already adverted to, but 
 he, also, was elevated to a most sublime 
 contemplation, which induced a more 
 ready acquiescence in the idea that the 
 Infant had accompanied His Mother, 
 and by this means the adorable Child 
 
separated himself from His parents and 
 remained at Jerusalem. He withdrew 
 himself when near the gates of the city, 
 and, returning, He trav(»rsed the streets, 
 meditating, by His divine science, on 
 the events of the future, and offering 
 himself to His Father for the salvation 
 of souls. 
 
 In order to inaugurate the honor of 
 humble mendicity, as the eldest son of 
 holy poverty,. He employed three days 
 in asking alms. He visited the hospi- 
 tals, consoled all the poor whom He 
 found there, and shared with them the 
 alms He had received. He secretly re- 
 stored to several sick persons health of 
 body, and to many that of the soul. 
 He wrought these miracles in favor of 
 some who had showed Him kindness, 
 wishing to ftccomplish, in advance, the 
 promise that He would afterwards make 
 to His Church. 
 
 Having occupied himself with these 
 and many other works, according to the 
 will of God, He went to the Temple, 
 where, on the day mentioned by St. 
 Luke, the Rabbis, or doctors of the law, 
 were assembled in an apartment, where 
 they disputed whether the Messiah was 
 not already born. They were installed 
 in their seats with that authority which 
 usually accompanies those who pass for 
 learned men. The Infant Jesus ap- 
 proached the assembly. The opinions 
 of the doctors upon this subject were 
 widely different, for some asserted the 
 fact, while others denied it; and those 
 
 ^ who supported the negative, alleged the 
 testimony of the Scriptures and the 
 prophecies, understood by them in the 
 gross manner which the Apostle men- 
 tions. 
 
 Now, these sages, as they deemed 
 themselves, advanced the opinion that 
 the Messiah was to come with all the 
 majesty and pomp of a monarch, but, as 
 yet, they saw no indications of this pow- 
 er and freedom. 
 
 The Master of Truth, Jesus, perceived 
 that the discussion was about to termi- 
 nate in this error, for, although there 
 were men who held the contrary opin- 
 ion, their number was small. His im- 
 mense charity could not endure this 
 ignorance of His works, and their sub- 
 lime ends, in these interpreters of the 
 law. The Infant God drew nearer. 
 He entered into the midst of the assem- 
 bly with admirable beauty and majesty, 
 and excited in these doctors the desire 
 to hear Him with attention. 
 
 He opened His discourse, saying : " I 
 have heard all that has been said touch- 
 ing the coming of the Messiah, and the 
 conclusion respecting it. In offering an 
 objection to this decision, I presuppose 
 what the prophets have said, viz. : That 
 His coming should be with great power, 
 and with glorious majesty; for Isaiah 
 declares that He shall be our lei^isla- 
 tor, our king, who shall save His people. 
 Daniel assures us that all tribes and all 
 people shall serve Him. The Scriptures 
 are filled with similar promises. But 
 
KOG 
 
 LIFE OF 8T. JOSEPH. 
 
 ray doul>t is founded on these passages 
 and divers othera The same Isaiah 
 says tiiat lie shall be satiated with op- 
 probrium, and led like a sheep to the 
 slaut^hter. Jei*eraiah tells us that His 
 enemies should assemble to ei'ase His 
 name from the land of the living; and 
 David, that He would be the refuse of 
 the people. How will it be possible to 
 harmonize these prophecies? We can- 
 not deny that the Messiah must come 
 twice — ^^the first time, to redeem the 
 world ; the second, to judge it. The 
 prophecies should, then, be applied to 
 these two events, giving to each what 
 belongs to it. Following these obser. 
 vations, if we conclude that the first 
 advent will be with power and majesty, 
 this must not be understood in a mate- 
 rial sense, but of a new spiritual king- 
 dom. And with this just interpretation, 
 all the Scriptures, which cannot be har- 
 monized in any other sense, will be 
 found uniform." 
 
 To these the Infant God joined many 
 other reasons. The scribes and doctors, 
 who had listened to Him, remained 
 silent. At length, " What wonder is 
 this?" said they. " Whence comes this 
 marvellous child ? " The august Mary 
 and St. Joseph arrived in time to hear 
 the conclusion of the discourse. The 
 doctors of the law arose, and our blessed 
 Lady, overwhelmed with joy to have 
 found her treasure, approached her di- 
 vine Child, and said, as it is related by 
 St Luke : " Son, why hast Thou done 
 
 so to us? Behold, Thy father and I 
 have sought Tliee, sorrowing." His 
 Majesty replied to her : " How is it that 
 you sought me? Did you not know 
 that I must be about my Father's busi- 
 ness ? " 
 
 Tlie Evangelist relates that the bless- 
 ed Mary and St. Joseph did not under- 
 stand the mystery of these words. It 
 was because of their interior joy, which 
 they had sowed in tears. The prudent 
 Mother said to her divine Son: "Do 
 not separate me from thy presence. Ke- 
 ceive me for thy servant, and if through 
 my own fault I have lost thee, I entreat 
 thy pardon." The Infant God received 
 her with affection, and they again set 
 out for Nazareth. After they had gone 
 a short distance from Jerusalem, our 
 blessed Lady prostrating herself, adored 
 her holy Son, and asked His benedic- 
 tion. The divine Jesus raised her from 
 the ground, and spoke to her with great 
 sweetness. Afterwards He lifted the 
 veil, and, with greater clearness than 
 ever before, revealed to her His most 
 holy soul and its operations. 
 
 The blessed Mother conversed with 
 her most sweet Child respecting the 
 mysteries that He had opened to her. 
 The celestial Master informed her that 
 these doctors and scribes knew not that 
 His majesty was the Messiah, because 
 of their presumption and confidence in 
 their own wisdom. Our Redeemer con- 
 verted many souls during this journey, 
 and, as His holy Mother was present, 
 
He made her tlae instrument of these 
 miracles. He restored many sick per- 
 sons to health, He comforted the afflict- 
 ed, and wrought other wonders which I 
 do not pause to recount. 
 
 They arrived at Nazareth. The Evan- 
 gelist St. Luke includes, in a few brief 
 words, the mysteries of their history : 
 "The Infant Jesus was subject to His 
 parents," i. e,, to His holy Mother and 
 St. Joseph. " His Mother kept all these 
 words in her heart, and Jesus advanced 
 in wisdom and age and grace with God 
 and man." We shall speak of this fur- 
 ther on, adding, only, at this time, that 
 the humility and obedience of our Lord 
 towards His parents offered new sub- 
 jects of admiration to the angels, as did 
 also the dignity of His pure Mother, to 
 whom the God Incarnate was confided, 
 in order that, by the help of St. Joseph, 
 she misrht minister to His wants. 
 
 Although the obedience of the Son 
 was onl}^ a consequence of the natural 
 maternity, still, to exercise the rights of 
 a Mother over her Son, a different grace 
 was necessary from that which she had 
 received to conceive and bring Him 
 forth. The august Mary possessed all 
 these needful graces, proportioned to 
 this ministry and office, and with such 
 abundance, that they were reflected 
 upon her happy spouse, so that he 
 was also the worthy foster-father of 
 Jesus Christ, and head of this most holy 
 family. ^ 
 
 CHAPTER XVH. 
 
 ST. JOSEPH IS NO LONGER ABLE TO WORK 
 
 CONDUCT OF THE AUGUST MARY AND 
 
 THE DIVINE JESUS, DURING MORE THAN 
 EIGHT TEARS THAT THE HOLY PATRI- 
 ARCH LIVED IN SICKNESS AND INFIRMI- 
 TIES. 
 
 THE Queen of heaven completed her 
 thirty -third year, and her chaste 
 form retained all its natural perfections 
 so beautifully and well proportioned, 
 that it was the admiration of the angelic 
 choirs. Her sacred body had reached 
 its full development, so that this august 
 Princess resembled the holy humanity 
 of her Son. The pure Mary preserved 
 this admirable complexion at thirty- 
 three, without the least change, and at 
 the age of seventy, she had lost nothing 
 of her strength and beauty. Our bless- 
 ed Lady understood this privilege. She 
 knew that the resemblance of the hu- 
 manity of her divine Son was to be 
 always preserved in her. St. Joseph 
 was not aged when this lovely Queen 
 had attained her thirty-third year, never- 
 theless his strength was much exhausted, 
 because the cares, travels, and continued 
 pains he had taken for the support of 
 his spouse and the Lord of the universe, 
 had worn away his health more than hia 
 years. The Lord, who desired to ad- 
 vance him in the exercise of patience and 
 the other virtue, permitted him to suf- 
 fer from certain maladies, that hindered 
 him much from application to manual 
 
808 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 labor. His piudeut spouse, who had 
 always a})preciated, loved, and served 
 him beyoud jUI that other women have 
 done in regaixi to their husbands, per- 
 ceiving his indisposition, said to him, 
 " My s{K)use, I am under extreme obli- 
 gations for your fidelity, and the increas- 
 ing care and fatigue you have imposed 
 upon yourself, in order, by the sweat of 
 your brow, to maintain me, your servant, 
 and my adorable Son. You will receive 
 from the liberal hand of the Most High 
 the reward of your pains, and the 
 precious benedictions which you have 
 merited. I beg you to cease from this 
 incessant labor, and repose yourself. I 
 will now labor for you, in testimony of 
 my gratitude, as long as the Lord shall 
 give us life." 
 
 The saint listened to the reasonings of 
 his sweet spouse with many tears ; and, 
 although he assured her that he desired 
 to continue his toil, he yielded to her 
 solicitations, believing it his duty to 
 obey her, and discontinued his labors. 
 In order to have nothing supei-fluous in 
 this holy family, they gave away his 
 tools in alms. 
 
 St, Joseph being thus relieved from 
 labor, gave himself entirely for the rest 
 of his days to the contemplation of the 
 mysteries which he had nourished in his 
 breast, and to the practice of virtue. 
 He was happy in these occupations to 
 find himself in the presence and enjoy- 
 ment of the conversation of the Incar- 
 nate Wisdom and of her who was His 
 
 * Mother- With such helps, he arrived 
 at so high a degree of sanctity, that next 
 to his blessed spouse, who was always 
 unique among mere creatures, lie sv/r- 
 
 passed all meti, and will neve?' be incr- 
 
 passed by any* 
 
 Our august Queen and her divine Son 
 assisted, served, and consoled him in his 
 maladies with the most assiduous care. 
 It is impossible to describe the humility, 
 respect, and love which these charitable 
 cares produced in the sincere and grate- 
 ful heart of the servant of God. The 
 Blessed Virgin charged herself with the 
 support of her most holy Son and her 
 spouse, by her own work. The Eternal 
 Wisdom so disposed it, in order that 
 her merits and virtues might reach the 
 highest degree, and serve as an example 
 to put the children of Adam to shame. 
 
 The Lord offers this strong woman to 
 us as an example. The heart of her hus- 
 band trusted in her, and not only that 
 of her spouse Joseph, but also that of 
 her Son, at once true God and man, as 
 Solomon declares in the thirty-first chap- 
 ter of Proverbs. Means were not want- 
 ing to the Lord to support the corporeal 
 life of His blessed Mother and St. Jo- 
 seph, since man lives not by bread alone. 
 He could have miraculously provided 
 for them every day, but the world would 
 have been deprived of the privilege of 
 witnessing the industry of the most pure 
 Mother of God, and if our blessed Lady 
 
 * "arez maintains this same doctrine ex- 
 professo. 
 
 -\ 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 809 
 
 had not acquired tliese merits, slie would 
 have failed to obtain much of her reward. 
 "With prudent diligence she provided 
 for all. Neither our adorable Saviour 
 nor His Mother, ate flesh-meat — their 
 food consisted of fish, fruits, and herbs, 
 and they partook of these with great 
 moderation. Our august Lady, never- 
 theless, prepared meat for St. Joseph, 
 and served it in the manner most agree- 
 able to him. It happened sometimes, 
 that her labor was insufficient, because 
 St. Joseph had need of more than hereto- 
 fore. On these occasions, our Lord ex- 
 ercised His power. He often so ordered 
 that His blessed Mother accomplished 
 much in a short time, so that her work 
 multiplied itself in her hands. 
 
 CHAPTER XVm. • 
 
 OF THE CARE WHICH THE AUGUST MARY 
 AND THE DrvnSTE JESUS BESTOWED UPON 
 ST. JOSEPH IN THE INFIRMITIES OF HIS 
 LATTER DAYS. 
 
 IT is a common mistake to regard the 
 Lord Jesus only as Redeemer, and 
 not as a master, who by His example 
 instructs us to suifer afflictions. And, 
 although Catholics do not fall into the 
 insensate errors of the heretics, for they 
 all admit that without good works, and 
 without afflictions, there is neither rec- 
 ompense nor crown ; yet we find many 
 children of the Holy Church who are 
 
 scarcely to be distinguished from those 
 who are in darkness, since they avoid 
 works which are painful to them: 
 
 Let us reject this manifest error, and 
 be assured that sufferings were not for 
 our Lord Jesus Christ alone, but for us 
 also. The most beloved of our divine 
 Master have received the greatest share 
 of the cross. Let us not be so bold as 
 to say, that if the Saviour suffered as 
 man. He is, at the same time, God, and 
 hence He is, to human weakness, rather 
 a subject for admiration than of imita- 
 tion. The Saviour of our souls over- 
 turns this excuse by the example of His 
 most innocent Mother and St. Joseph, 
 and that of many men and feeble women 
 also. 
 
 The Lord conducted by this royal 
 road of suffering the spouse of his 
 blessed Mother, St. Joseph, whom His 
 majesty loved above all the children of 
 men. To increase his merits and his 
 crown, before his power of gaining mer- 
 its had ceased, the Lord bestowed on 
 him, in the last years of his life, certain 
 exceedingly acute maladies, which caus- 
 ed excessive pain throughout his body, 
 and great debility. Besides these, there 
 was another mode of suffering, more 
 gentle, yet very distinct, which resulted 
 from the force of his burning love. This 
 love was so vehement, and at times his 
 transports were so impetuous, that his 
 pure spirit must have broken the chains 
 that bound it to the body, if the same 
 Lord had not given him the power of 
 
810 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 resisting it His majesty made him suf- + 
 fer this sweet violence, because, from the 
 natural feebleness of a body so attenu- 
 ated this painful exei-cise was a great 
 merit for the saint, not only from the 
 effects of the pain that he suffered, but 
 from the cause, which wjis love ; hence 
 he acquired iucouiparuble merits. Our 
 blessed Lady had knowledge of all 
 these mysteries. She penetrated the 
 interior of the saint, so that she might 
 not be deprived of the joy she derived 
 from the conviction of having a spouse 
 so holy and so beloved of the Lord. 
 She observed the candor and purity of 
 his soul — his ardent affection, his lofty 
 and divine thoughts, his patience and 
 sweetness in his maladies, the great suf- 
 ferings which he bore without a com- 
 plaint or sigh, or asking any solace. 
 Our great patriarch supported all his 
 pains with an incomparable patience 
 and magnanimity. All this his faithful 
 spouse remarked, as well as the value 
 and the merits of the many virtues 
 which the saint practised, and she con- 
 ceived so high a reverence for him that 
 we will not attempt to express it. She 
 applied herself, with the greatest joy, 
 to sustain and console him. As she had 
 little esteem for what she did herself to 
 relieve the great sufferings of her spouse, 
 and because of the love she bore him, 
 she commanded the viands that she 
 prepared for her holy patient to give 
 him strength and re-establish his appe- 
 tite, since this was to preserve the life 
 
 of the saint — the just — the elect of the 
 Most Hinjh. 
 
 When St. Joseph partook of this food, 
 he was sensible of the sweet benedic- 
 tions and the genial effects of the viands, 
 and inquired of his spouse : " What 
 aliments of life are these which vivify 
 me, restoring my appetite and my 
 strength, and filling me w^ith new con- 
 solation ? " The Queen of heaven served 
 him on her knees, and, when his pjjins 
 were violent, she removed his sandals, 
 and supported and assisted him with 
 the tenderest affection. Although the 
 humble saint made every effort to hin- 
 der his spouse from taking such un- 
 wearied pains, it was alvvays in vain, 
 for our sweet Lady understood the 
 maladies of her patient, and when he 
 most needed help, and she therefore 
 hastened to assist him, in all his wants, 
 with the greatest affection. She often 
 said things 'v\iiich exceedingly consoled 
 him. During the three last years of his 
 life, which were those of his greatest 
 suffering, she i^ever quitted him, day or 
 nisrht. If for a moment she withdrew, 
 it was only to serve her divine Son, who 
 united with His Mother to assist the 
 holy patriarch, except when He was 
 necessarily occupied in other works ; so 
 we may say that never was patient so 
 well served. From hence we may learn 
 how great were the happiness and the 
 merits of St. Joseph, for he alone has 
 merited to have her for his spouse, who 
 was also the spouse of the Holy Spirit. 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 811 
 
 The charity of our blessed Lady towards 
 St. Joseph was not satisfied by these 
 services of which we have spoken. She 
 strove to console him by still other 
 means. Sometimes she prayed the Lord, 
 with the most ardent charity, to deliver 
 her spouse from his suiferings, and to 
 inflict them upon herself In making 
 this request, she believed herself to 
 deserve the pains of all creatures, re- 
 garding herself as the least of all. She 
 alleged, also, the holiness of St. Joseph, 
 and the delight which the Lord took in 
 that heart, so conformed to that of His 
 majesty. She witnessed the suflferings 
 of her blessed spouse, and had compas- 
 sion for them ; she knew his merits, 
 and the pleasure which her adorable Son 
 had in him. She rejoiced in the pa- 
 tience of the saint, and magnified the 
 Lord. Sometimes, the Queen of pity, 
 touched by the excruciating pains of 
 her spouse, and melted by tenderest 
 sympathy, having obtained permission 
 from her divine Son commanded his 
 sufferings, and their natural causes, to 
 suspend their activity, and cease so 
 cruelly to afflict the just and the well- 
 beloved of the Lord. 
 
 At other times, she prayed the saints 
 and angels to console her spouse, and to 
 strengthen him in his troubles, when 
 the weakness of the fragile flesh de- 
 manded it. By this species of com- 
 mandment, the blessed spirits appeared 
 to the holy patient in the human form, 
 all radiant with beauty and splendor. 
 
 and conversing with each other of God 
 and His infin te perfections. Occasion- 
 ally they chanted celestial music, with 
 a sweetness that suspended his bodily 
 pains, and inflamed his pure soul with 
 divine love. The man of God had, 
 besides, for his greater consolation, a 
 particular knowledge, not only of all 
 these favors, but also of the holiness of 
 his most holy spouse, of the love she 
 bore to him, of the interior charity with 
 which she served him, and others of the 
 excellences of this great Queen of the 
 Universe. All these united produced 
 such effects upon St. Joseph, and enabled 
 him to acquire so many merits, that, in 
 this life, it is not possible to conceive 
 them.* 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 PRECIOUS DEATH OF THE GLORIOUS ST. JO- 
 SEPH, CAUSED PRINCIPALLY BY DIVINE 
 
 LOVE HE EXPIRES IN THE ARMS OF THE 
 
 DIVINE JESUS, ASSISTED BY HIS BLESSED 
 SPOUSE, THE QUEEN OF HEAVEN. 
 
 T~\URING eight years St. Joseph had 
 -*-^ been exercised by pains and suf- 
 ferings, and his generous spirit was 
 ever more and more purified in the cru- 
 
 * M. Olier, who has written such sublime pages 
 on St. Joseph, affirms that we cannot know, here 
 below, the merits of the glorious St. Joseph, and 
 that we are incapable of conceiving them. What 
 a eulogy ! — Manuscripts of M. Olier. 
 
819 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 cU)le of patience and divine love. With 
 ^ c.'irs his tortures increased, his strength 
 <liminished. The inevitable term of 
 life, at which we pay the universal tri- 
 bute of death, approached. His bless- 
 ed spouse increased her devotion and 
 lier cares to serve him with inviolable 
 fidelity. 
 
 This most holy Lady, knowing, through 
 her infused science that the last hour of 
 her chaste spouse in this place of exile 
 was very near, went to find her adorable 
 Son, and said to Him : " My Lord and 
 my God, the time for the death of your 
 servant Joseph, which you have deterin- 
 ined by an eternal will, approaches. I 
 beseech, you, Lord, by your infinite 
 goodness, to assist him in this hour, so 
 that his death may be as precious to 
 you, as his life has been agreeable. Re- 
 member, my Son, the love and humility 
 of your servant — his m.erits — his virtues, 
 and the pains he has taken to preserve 
 your life and mine." 
 
 Our Saviour replied to her : " My 
 Mother, your requests are pleasing to me, 
 and the merits of Joseph are in my 
 thoughts. I will now assist him, and I 
 will give him so eminent a place among 
 the pnnces of my people, that it will be 
 a subject of admiration for the angels, 
 and a motive for praise to them and to 
 men. I will not do for any nation that 
 which I will do for your spouse." Our 
 august Lady returned thanks to her most 
 sweet Son for this promise. 
 
 During the nine days that preceded 
 
 ^ the death of St. Joseph, the Son and 
 the Mother watched by him day and 
 niglit. They so arranged it that one or 
 the other was always with him. During 
 these nine days, the angels chanted, 
 three times each day, by the command- 
 ment of the Lord, celestial music for the 
 holy patient. It was composed of can- 
 ticles of praise to the Most High, and 
 of benedictions for the saint himself; 
 and, besides, so delicious a fragrance 
 pervaded all this poor habitation, tliat 
 not only the man of God was fortified 
 and cheered by it, but many persons on 
 the outside. 
 
 A day before his death, all inflamed 
 with divine love for so many benefits, 
 he was elevated into a sublime ecstasy 
 which continued twenty-four hours, the 
 Lord preserving his strength and life 
 by a miraculous interposition. In this 
 ecstatic state Le clearly beheld the divine 
 Essence, and discovered in it, without a 
 veil, that which he had believed by 
 faith, either in the incomprehensible 
 Divinity, or in the mysteries of the In- 
 carnation and Redemption — the Church 
 Militant and the sacraments with which 
 she is enriched. The Holy Trinity des- 
 tined him to be the precursor of our 
 Saviour Jesus Christ to the saints who 
 were in Limbo, and commanded him to 
 announce to them anew their redemp- 
 tion, and to prepare them for the visit 
 which the same Lord was to make them 
 
 ito conduct them to eternal felicity. St. 
 Joseph returned froiu this ecstasy radiant 
 
LIFE OF ST. J08EP3. 
 
 813 
 
 in beauty, his soul divinized from tlie 
 view of the being of God. He addressed 
 himself to his spouse, and requested her 
 ])enediction ; but she prayed her most 
 holy Son to give it, which His divine 
 Majesty was pleased to do. Our blessed 
 Lady, having knelt, besought St. Joseph 
 to bless her as her spouse .and head. 
 The man of God, not without a divine 
 impulse, gave his benediction to his be- 
 loved spouse before their separation. 
 She afterwai'ds kissed the hand with 
 which he had blessed her, and requested 
 him to salute for her the saints in Limbo. 
 The most humble Joseph, wishing to 
 close his life by the seal of humility, 
 asked pardon of his holy spouse for the 
 faults which he might have committed 
 in her service as a feeble man of earthly 
 mould. He entreated her to assist him 
 in this last hour, and to intercede for 
 him. He testified, above all, his grati- 
 tude to our adorable Saviour, for the 
 benefits which he had received from His 
 most liberal hand during all his life, and 
 particularly in this sickness. Then tak- 
 ing leave of his blessed spouse, he said 
 to her: "Thou art blessed among all 
 women, and chosen above all creatures. 
 Let angels and men praise thee. Let all 
 nations know and exalt thy dignity. 
 Let the name of the Most High through 
 thee be known, adored, and glorified in 
 all future ages, and eternally pi-aised by 
 all the blessed spirits, for having created 
 thee so pleasing in His eyes. I trust to 
 meet thee in the heavenly land." 
 
 * After this, the man of Grod addressed 
 our Lord Jesus Christ, and, wishing to 
 speak to His Majesty with profound 
 respect, he made every eifort to kneel 
 on the ground. But the sweet Jesus 
 approaching, received him in His arms, 
 and the saint, supporting his head upon 
 His bosom, said : " My Lord and my 
 God, Son of the Eternal Father, Creator 
 and Redeemer of the world, give Thine 
 eternal benediction to Thy servant, who 
 is the work of Thy hands. Pardon the 
 faults I have committed in Thy service 
 and in Thy company. I confess Thee, 
 I glorify Thee, I render to Thee, with 
 a contrite and humble heart, eternal 
 thanks for having chosen me, by Thine 
 ineffable goodness, from among men to 
 be the spouse of Thine own Mother. 
 Grant, Lord, that Thine own glory may 
 be the theme of my gratitude through 
 all eternity." 
 
 The Redeemer of the world gave him 
 His benediction : " Rest in peace," He 
 said : "the grace of my heavenly Father, 
 and mine, be with thee. Proclaim the 
 good tidings to my prophets and saints, 
 who await thee in Paradise, and tell 
 them that their redemption is nigh." 
 As our beloved Redeemer pronounced 
 these words, the most happy Joseph 
 expired in His arms, and His divine 
 Majesty closed his eyes. The angels 
 chanted the sweetest hymns of praise, 
 and, by order of the supreme King, they 
 conducted this most holy soul into Para- 
 dise, where the saints recognized him as 
 
814 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 tlie reputed father of the Redeemer of 
 the world, and His greatly beloved one, 
 who merited singular veneration, lie 
 impai'ted a new joy to this innumer- 
 able assembly, by announcing to them, 
 according to the coniinaudraent of the 
 Lord, that their redemption should not 
 long be delayed. We must not omit 
 to mention, that although the precious 
 death of St, Joseph was preceded by so 
 long a sickness, and such severe sufter- 
 iugs, these were not the chief causes of 
 it He might have lived longer, not- 
 withstanding these maladies, if the ef- 
 fects of the ardent love that burned in 
 his cha.ste bosom had not been super- 
 added ; for this happy death was rather 
 a triumph of love than the penalty of 
 sin. The Lord suspended the supernat- 
 ural aid by which He had preserved the 
 strength of His servant, and hindered 
 the violence of his love from destroying 
 him; and this help failing, nature was 
 vanquished. This victoiy severed the 
 ties that detained his holy soul in the 
 piison of the body, in which consists 
 our death. Thus, love was the last of 
 his maladies, and it was also the great- 
 est and most glorious, since, by it, death 
 is the sleep of the body, and the prin- 
 ciple of life. 
 
 Our blessed Lady, seeing that her 
 spouse had ceased to live, prepared his 
 body for sepultu e, according to the 
 customary usages. No other hands than 
 her^s, and those of the angels who assist- 
 ed her, touched him. In order that all 
 
 ♦ should be conformable to the incompar 
 able modesty of the Virgin Mother, the 
 Lord clothed the body of St. Joseph in 
 a celestial splendor, which covered it 
 in such a manner that the face only was 
 visible, and thus the pure spouse saw 
 not the rest of the body which she pre- 
 pared for. interment. Several persons 
 were attracted to the house by the 
 sweet fi'agrance that exhaled from the 
 holy corpse, and, seeing it so beautiful, 
 and as flexible as if it had been living, 
 they were greatly astonished. 
 
 The body of St. Joseph was carried to 
 the common cemetery, followed by rela- 
 tives, friends, and others, and by the 
 Redeemer of the world and His holy 
 Mother, and a great multitude of angels. 
 Our prudent Lady preserved an unal- 
 terable dignity, nor did she permit her 
 interior affliction to hinder her in order- 
 ing all things necessary for the inter- 
 ment of her spouse, or the service of her 
 Son. She acquitted herself in all with 
 a regal magnanimity, and, at the close, 
 she gave thanks to her adorable Son 
 for the favors He had bestow^ed on St. 
 Joseph. Our august saint was one of 
 those who enjoyed the privilege of ex- 
 emption from the sight of the demons 
 at his death, because these spirits of 
 darkness, wishing to approach him, were 
 sensible that a poweiful force restrain- 
 ed them, and the angels hurled them 
 into hell. 
 
_L 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 815 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 PRIVILEGES GRANTED TO ST. JOSEPH — HIS 
 
 BIRTH ACCOMPANIED BY MIRACLES HIS 
 
 ADMIRABLE VIRTUES THE VIRTUES 
 
 WHICH THE MOST HIGH HAS PROMISED 
 TO THOSE DEVOTED TO HIM JESUS RE- 
 SUSCITATES ST. JOSEPH AFTER HIS PAS- 
 SION OUR BLESSED LADY CELEBRATES 
 
 THE FESTIVAL OP HER ESPOUSALS. 
 
 THE duration of the life of this hap- 
 piest of men, St. Joseph, was sixty 
 years and some days. He espoused the 
 Blessed Mary in his thirty-third year, 
 and he lived a little more than twenty- 
 seven years in her society. At the death 
 of her holy spouse, our Lady was nearly, 
 forty-one years and six months old. She 
 felt a natural grief at his death, because 
 she had loved him as her spouse, as a 
 very great saint, and her protector and 
 benefactor; and, although the well- 
 regulated mind of our admirable Lady 
 controlled her sorrow, it was not the 
 less profound. The more she knew of 
 the high degree of sanctity which her 
 spouse had attained among the great 
 saints-, whose names are inscribed in the 
 Book of Life, the greater was her affec- 
 tion for him. And, since we cannot lose 
 without sorrow that which we tenderly 
 love, we cannot doubt that the grief of 
 the Blessed Virgin was very great, when 
 we measure it by the love she bore to 
 the holy patriarch. 
 
 This is not the place to treat, particu- 
 larly, of the excellence of the holiness of 
 
 ^ St. Joseph, for I have no order to impart, 
 more than what will serve generally to 
 make manifest the dignity of his spouse, 
 to whose merits (after those of her divine 
 Son) we must attribute the gifts and 
 graces with which the Most High favor- 
 ed the glorious patriarch. And, even 
 if our blessed Lady had not been the 
 meritorious cause, or the instrument of 
 the sanctity of her spouse, she was, at 
 least, the immediate end to which that 
 sanctity referred. The virtues and graces 
 which the Lord communicated to His 
 servant Joseph, were conferred to render 
 him more worthy of her whom he had 
 chosen to be His Mother. It is by this 
 rule, and by the esteem and love which 
 this adorable Lord bore to His most 
 pure Mother, that the sanctity of St. Jo- 
 seph is to be measured. Doubtless, if 
 there had been found in the world an- 
 other man more perfect and more excel- 
 lent. His Majesty would have made him 
 the spouse of His own Mother ; and since 
 He conferred this dignity upon St. Jo- 
 seph, it must be granted, without contra- 
 diction, that he was the greatest saint of 
 God on earth. As he had been created 
 for such an exalted purpose, it is certain 
 that it was with the design to render 
 him worthy of the august Mary, and to 
 proportion him, by her powerful right, 
 to these same ends. This proportion 
 was to be found in the holiness, the vir- 
 tues, the gifts and graces, natural or in- 
 fused, which he so eminently possessed. 
 I observe a difference between this 
 
616 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 u^i. ;it Niint and the other saints, in the 
 ' u^race which they received. There 
 »...,^ ; con many Siiints who have been 
 gifted with privileges, all of which were 
 not connected with their own sanctifica- 
 tion, but had regard to other objects for 
 the service of the Most High. They 
 were gratuitous gifts, or apai't from sanc- 
 tity, l^ut for those of our holy Patri- 
 arch, all the gifts that he received, aug- 
 mented in him the virtues, and his 
 interior sanctification. The ministry 
 with which they were connected was a 
 consequence of his holiness and his good 
 works, for the more holy he was, the 
 more worthy was he to be the spouse 
 of the august Mary, and the depositary 
 of the treasure and the mystery of heav- 
 en. He ought to have been, as he was, 
 in reality, a prodigy of holiness, and, by 
 the special providence of God, he was 
 sanctified at his birth. His nature was 
 in just proportions — his qualities excel- 
 lent — his complexion perfect, and to 
 these were superadded purity of soul 
 and right inclinations. In him the con- 
 cupiscence of the flesh found itself en- 
 chained, so that no ordinate inclinations 
 could gain the mastery. Although he 
 had not the use of reason at his first 
 sanctification, in which he was justified 
 only from original sin, his Mother was 
 sensible of a new joy in the Holy Spirit, 
 and, without fully penetrating the mys- 
 tery, she performed great acts of virtue, 
 and believed that her child would be- 
 come great before God and man. 
 
 * St. Joseph, as we have said, was born 
 beautiful and most perfect by nature. 
 He brought to his parents an extraor- 
 dinary joy' like that at the birth of the 
 little Baptist, although the cause of it 
 was less manifest. The Lord advanced 
 him in the use of reason, and gave it to 
 him in all its perfection, in the third 
 year of his age. He communicated to 
 him, also, an infused science, and a new 
 augmentation of grace and virtue. The 
 holy child began, henceforth, to know 
 God by faith; he knew Him also by 
 natural reason, as the primal cause and 
 author of all creatures, and he compre- 
 hended, with a most sublime conception, 
 all that was said of God and His works. 
 He had, at the same time, the power 
 of elevated contemplation, and he prac- 
 tised the virtues admirably, in propor- 
 tion to his tender years. The use of 
 reason dates with children usually about 
 or after their seventh year. St. Joseph, 
 in his third year, was already in his 
 reasoning faculty, a perfect man, and in 
 holiness also. He was of a sweet dis- 
 position, charitable, kind, and sincere. 
 In all things he gave evidence of holy 
 and angelic inclinations, and, growing 
 in age and in perfection, he attained, by 
 a most holy life, the age at which he 
 espoused the most Blessed Mary. 
 
 Then to augment for him the gift's of 
 grace, and to confirm him in these gifts, 
 our blessed Lady aided him by her 
 prayers. She earnestly supplicated the 
 Most High, that if He commanded her 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 817 
 
 to enter the marriage state, He would 
 sanctify lier spouse Joseph, so that he 
 should conform himself to her chaste 
 desires. This august Lady knew that 
 God would be gracious to her prayers, 
 and that He would operate in the soul 
 of the holy Patriarch effects divine and 
 beyond expression. He imbued him 
 with the perfect fulness of all the vir- 
 tues and all the gifts. 
 
 His divine Majesty perfected anew 
 all his faculties. In the virtue of chas- 
 tity he was more elevated than the 
 highest seraphim, because, inhabiting a 
 body, mortal and earthly, he possessed 
 a purity equal to theirs — they being 
 diseno;ao:ed from matter. There never 
 even entered into his thoughts any image 
 in the slightest degree impure, or of an 
 animal or sensual nature. By this per- 
 fection, and by his angelic integrity, he 
 was prepared to be the spouse of the 
 purest of creatures, and to live in her 
 society. Without this privilege he could 
 not have been capable of arriving at so 
 great and excellent a dignity. 
 
 Equally admirable in the other vir- 
 tues, especially in divine love, he was 
 like one who finds himself at the foun- 
 tain, and replenishes himself with that 
 living water which conducts to eternal 
 life, or as an inflammable substance near 
 the sphere of the sacred fire, that kin- 
 dles without resistance. All that can 
 be said in the most exalted praise of 
 this loving spouse, has been already 
 expressed, when it was recorded that 
 
 * the love of God was the cause of his 
 sickness, and the instrument of his death. 
 The sweet pains of love surpassed those 
 of nature, and these were less active 
 than the first. As the objects of his 
 love, our Lord Jesus Christ and His 
 Mother, were present, and since the 
 saint possessed them in a closer union 
 than any other mortal could approach, it 
 was inevitable that this most faithful 
 and candid heart must exhale itself in 
 the affections of a love so constituted. 
 
 Blessed be the author of such great 
 wonders, and blessed be the happiest of 
 men, St. Joseph, in whom they were all 
 most worthily wrought ! He merits 
 that all nations should know and bless 
 him, since the Lord has not honored any 
 other among mortals, nor ever maijifest- 
 ed so much love for any as for him. 
 
 In the course of this history, I have 
 said something of the visions and i-eve- 
 lations with which our saint was favored. 
 It is certain that he had many more than 
 we can relate; but we may. imagine 
 great things if we consider that he was 
 made acquainted with the mysteries of 
 cur Lord Jesus Christ and of His most 
 holy Mother — that he lived so long in 
 close association with them, that he was 
 regarded as the Father of this divine 
 Saviour, and was truly the spouse of 
 our blessed Lady. 
 
 Besides all this, I have discovered 
 that the Most High accorded to him, 
 because of his great sanctit}", certain 
 privileges in favor of those who choose 
 
818 
 
 LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 him for their intercessor, and who in- 
 voke him with devotion. The fir8t is, 
 to obtain the virtue of chastity, and to 
 he withdrawn from the danger of losing 
 it; the second, to receive powerful as- 
 sistance to be freed from sin and to 
 recover the grace of God ; the third, to 
 acquire, by his means, devotion for our 
 blessed Lady, and dispositions to receive 
 her favors ; the fourth, to obtain a happy 
 death and a special protection against 
 the demons at that last hour ; the fifth, 
 to intimidate the enemies of our salva- 
 tion by pronouncing the name of St. 
 Joseph ; the sixth, to obtain health of 
 body and consolation in affliction ; the 
 seventh privilege, to have, by his inter- 
 cession, successors in families. 
 
 God grants all these favors, and many 
 more, to those who ask for them as they 
 ought, in the name of St. Joseph, spouse 
 of the Blessed Virgin ; and I entreat all 
 the faithful children of the Holy Church 
 to have a great devotion for this great 
 saint, and to be persuaded that they 
 will become sensible of the favorable 
 effects of his protection, if they will dis- 
 pose themselves worthily to merit and 
 to receive them. 
 
 Our Lord arose from the sepulchre 
 after His passion and death, invested 
 with beauty and glory, as the prophets 
 had announced. Finding himself with 
 the saints and prophets whom He had 
 
 relieved from prison. He promised to all 
 the human race, the universal resuiTec- 
 tion of the dead as a consequence of His 
 own glorious resurrection, in the same 
 flesh and in the same body, each in his 
 own ; and, as a pledge of this promise, 
 His divine Majesty commanded the souls 
 of many saints to reunite with their 
 bodies, and be raised to an immortal 
 life. These bodies arose, as Saint Mat- 
 thew records in his Gospel, and among 
 them were those of St. Anne, St. Joseph, 
 and jSt. Joachim : the others were an- 
 cient Fathers and Patriarchs. 
 
 Our blessed Lady was careful every 
 year on the festival of her most holy 
 and chaste spouse St. Joseph, to cele- 
 brate the espousals, through which the 
 Lord had given him to be her faithful 
 companion, in order to conceal the mys- 
 teries of the Incarnation of the Word, 
 and to execute with the highest wisdom 
 the secrets and the works of- the re- 
 demption of the human race. And as 
 all these works of the Most Hio^h were 
 as a deposit in the most prudent heart 
 of Mary, and as she kept this festival as 
 a mark of her high esteem for hira, the 
 joy and gratitude with which she cele- 
 brated his memory were ineffable. 
 
 Her most holy spouse Joseph de- 
 scended at the festival all radiant with 
 glory, accompanied by innumei'able an- 
 gels, who solemnized it with great joy, 
 chanting new hymns, which were com- 
 posed by our most blessed Lady, in 
 I gratitude for the benefits which her 
 
LIFE OF ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 819 
 
 spouse and herself had received from 
 the hand of the Most High. 
 
 After having thus employed several 
 liours, she discoursed a part of the day 
 with her glorious spouse, on the divine 
 attributes and perfections ; for, in the 
 absence of the Lord, these were the oc- 
 cupations that best pleased His gentle 
 Mother. A little before taking leave 
 of the holy spouse, she entreated him to 
 pray for her, in the presence of God, 
 
 and to praise Him in her name ; she also 
 requested him to offer prayers for the 
 Holy Church and the Apostles. She 
 asked his benediction, and the glorious 
 saint returned to heaven. 
 
 GLORY 
 
 TO THE DIVINE HEART OF JESUS, 
 
 TO MARY IMMACULATE, 
 
 AND 
 
 TO ST. JOSEPH. 
 
 L 
 
 
 ■MtMMMMMHWaa 
 
LIVES OF ST. JOACHIM AND ST. ANNE. 
 
 .1- 
 
 UT little is known 
 in this age of the 
 world concern- 
 ing the parents 
 of Maiy, the 
 , Mother of God. 
 It has pleased 
 Almighty God 
 to leave the lives of those illustrious 
 persons shrouded in an impenetrable 
 veil of mystery. Nor is this to be won- 
 dered at, when we remember that the 
 same silence, or nearly so, is observed 
 in the Sacred Scriptures with regard to 
 their immaculate daughter, the Mother 
 of the God-man. All of Mary's life that 
 the inspired writers have left on record 
 only serves to indicate rather than de- 
 scribe the miraculous character which 
 distinguished it from all other biogra- 
 phies of the children of men. So it is 
 with the lives of her holy parents, St. 
 Joachim and St. Anne. Little more is 
 found in Scripture concerning them than 
 the mention of their names in the gene- 
 alogy of our divine Saviour, and the 
 simple record of the eminent dignity 
 to which they were called. And yet 
 how clearly they stand before us, en- 
 shrouded as they are in the sublime 
 mystery of their exalted state! How 
 
 clearly do they stand out from all the 
 other sons and daughters of the patri- 
 archs, illumined with the reflected light 
 of the divine maternity that was to form 
 their daughter's crown in time and in 
 eternity ! 
 
 The posterity of Adam spread abroad 
 in great numbers, and, going out, the 
 just and the unjust multiplied exceed- 
 ingly; and the saints redoubled their 
 cries and supplications for the coming 
 of the Redeemer, while the wicked, by 
 their crimes, rendered themselves unfit 
 for receiving such a favor. The people 
 of God, and the triumph of the Word 
 who was to become incarnate, had al- 
 ready reached the term decreed by the 
 divine will for the coming of the Messi- 
 ah ; the reign of sin had so enslaved the 
 children of wrath that their wickedness 
 knew no bounds, and hence it was that 
 the fitting time for the remedy had 
 come. The just by increasing their 
 merits had increased the glory of their 
 crowns ; the prophets and patriarchs 
 knew, by the extraordinary joy arising 
 from the divine light, that the salvation 
 of their Deliverer and His awful pres- 
 ence were at hand ; and redoubling the 
 fervor of their prayers, begged of God 
 that the prophecies, and the promises He 
 
LIVES OF ST. JOACHIM AND ST. ANNE. 
 
 821 
 
 liad made to His people, might be ac- 
 complished. And they represented be- 
 fore the throne of divine mercy the long 
 and heavy night of sin in which they had 
 lived from the fall of our first parents, 
 and the darkness of idolatry in which 
 all the rest of mankind lay buried.* 
 
 When the old serpent had infected all 
 the universe by his poisonous breath, 
 and seemed to enjoy undisputed posses- 
 sion of mortals; when themselves, de- 
 parting from the natural light of reason, 
 and that which the old law had written 
 on their hearts,f instead of seeking the 
 true Divinity, set up many false ones, 
 without reflecting that the confusion 
 arising from so many gods was contrary 
 to perfection, good order, and tranquil- 
 lity of soul ; when by these errors, 
 malice, ignorance, and forgetfulness of 
 the true God had already prevailed, and 
 that mortal languor or lethargy which 
 Ijenumbed the world was so much neg- 
 lected, that the blind and miserable vic- 
 tims did not even oj^en their mouth to 
 ask for a remedy ; when pride sat en- 
 throned, and the number of fools was 
 infinite,^ and the proud Lucifer would 
 fain drink up the purest waters of the 
 Jordan ; § when God was most oifended 
 by all these insults and least honored 
 by men, and when the attribute of His 
 justice had most cause to reduce all cre- 
 ated things to their original nothing : 
 
 Such was the moment when the Most 
 
 * Wisdom, xvii. 20. 
 t Rom i. 20. 
 
 I Eccles. i. 15. 
 § Job, xi. 18. 
 
 ^ High (according to our ideas) turned 
 His eyes on the attribute of His mercy, 
 and made the law of clemency weigh 
 down the balance of His incomprehensi- 
 ble justice, choosing to be more softened 
 by His own goodness, and by the cries 
 and the faithful service of the just and 
 the prophets of His people, than exas- 
 perated by the manifold offences and 
 perverse ways of all sinners. He de- 
 termined then to give, even in that 
 dreary night of the old law, some assured 
 pledges of the day of grace, sending into 
 the world two radiant lights, to announce 
 the coming dawn of the Sun of Justice, 
 Christ our Saviour. These two lights 
 were St. Joachim and St. Anne, whom 
 the divine will had prepared and created 
 that they might be according to His own 
 heart. St. Joachim had his house, his 
 family, and his parents, at Nazareth, a 
 small town of Galilee. He was always 
 just and holy, guided by a special grace 
 and a heavenly light. He penetrated 
 several mysteries of H0I3- Writ and pre- 
 dictions of the ancient prophets, and by 
 fervent and unceasing prayer begged of 
 God the fulfilment of his promises; and 
 his faith and his charity penetrated the 
 heavens. He was very humble in him- 
 self, pure, and of great candor and sim- 
 plicity, and holy in all his ways; a 
 grave and serious man, of incomparable 
 meekness and modesty. 
 
 St. Anne had her home in Bethlehem. 
 She was a maiden fair, chaste, and hum- 
 ble ; and from her childhood, holy , mod- 
 
822 
 
 LIVES OF ST. JOACHIM AND ST. ANNE. 
 
 est, and endowed with every virtue. She 
 was also favored with frequent inspira- 
 tions from on high; she was ever occu- 
 pied in the contemplation of things 
 divine, without neglecting her household 
 affaii-s, in which she was most assiduous. 
 By these holy occupations she attained 
 the highest perfection of both the active 
 and contemplative life. She had an in- 
 fused knowledge of the Holy Scriptui'es, 
 and a profound understanding of their 
 hidden mysteries ; she was incomparable 
 in the infused virtues of faith, hope, and 
 charity. Filled with these gifts, she 
 prayed continually for the speedy coming 
 of the Messiah ; and her prayers were so 
 agreeable to the Lord, that, like the 
 spouse in the Canticle, she merited the 
 response of having wounded His heart,* 
 and hastened that happy time ; for with- 
 out doubt, the merits of St. Anne con- 
 tributed no little to anticipate the advent 
 of the Word, holding, as she did, the 
 highest place among the saints of the 
 Old Testament. 
 
 This strong woman also prayed fer- 
 v'ently that the Most High would vouch- 
 safe to give her in marriage a spouse 
 who would assist her to keep the divine 
 law and become more perfect in the 
 observance of its precepts. While St. 
 Anne was thus supplicating the Lord, 
 His divine providence decreed that St. 
 Joachim prayed in like manner, to the 
 end that both petitions might be pre- 
 
 * Canticle of Canticles, iv. 9. 
 
 * sented together before the tribunal of 
 the Holy Trinity, where they were heard 
 and accepted. It was forthwith appoint- 
 ed by a divine ordinance, that Joachim 
 and Anne should be united in marriaire, 
 and become the parents of her who was 
 to be the Mother of the Incarnate God. 
 For the execution of this decree the holy 
 ai'changel Gabriel was sent to make it 
 known to each. Pie appeared in corpo- 
 ral form to St. Anne when she was in 
 fervent prayer, petitioning for the coming 
 of the world's Redeemer, the Salvation 
 of mankin(J. She saw this celestial 
 prince sp radiant in glory and in beauty 
 that she was troubled with a holy fear, 
 accompanied, however, by an interior 
 joy which his presence caused her by 
 reason of the lights which he communi- 
 cated to her soul. The saint prostrated 
 herself with profound humility to honor 
 the ambassador of heaven ; but he pre- 
 vented her from so humbling herself, 
 and encouraged her as one who was to 
 be the ark of the tnie manna, the thrice- 
 blessed Mary, Mother of the Eternal 
 Word ; for the Lord had revealed that 
 hidden mystery to the holy archangel, 
 when he sent Him on this embassy ; al 
 thougb the other angels of heaven did 
 not yet penetrate it, because this revela- 
 tion or illumination was made immedi- 
 ately by the Lord himself to the arch- 
 angel Gabriel only, and neither did the 
 archan<]:el reveal it then to St. Anne: 
 but having demanded her attention, he 
 said to her: "Handmaid of the Lord, 
 
LIVES OF ST. JOACHIM AND ST. ANNE. 
 
 823 
 
 may the Most High bless you and be 
 your salvation. His divine Majesty hath 
 heard your prayers, it is His will that 
 you should persevere in asking the com- 
 ing of the Redeemer, and He decrees 
 that you should receive Joachim for 
 your spouse ; he is a just man, and hath 
 found favor before God, and you may 
 go on with him in the observance of His 
 divi'ne law and His holy service. Con- 
 tinue your prayers and supplications, 
 and have no other care, for the same 
 Lord will decree the accomplishment of 
 your desire. Walk in the narrow way 
 of justice, raise your heart and mind to 
 the things of heaven, pray always for 
 the coming of the Messiah, and rejoice 
 in the Lord, who is thy salvation." 
 Thereupon, the angel disappeared, hav- 
 ing left St. Anne much inward light for 
 the penetration of various mysteries of 
 the Sacred Scriptures, filled her soul 
 with consolation, and renewed the fervor 
 of her spirit. 
 
 The archangel neither appeared nor 
 spoke to St. Joachim in corporal form 
 as he did to St. Anne ; but the man of 
 God heard himself thus addressed in 
 a dream : " Joachim, blessed be thou 
 among men ; persevere in thy desires, 
 and practise justice and perfection. It 
 is the will of God that thou receive 
 Anne for thy spouse, for the Almighty 
 hath filled her soul with benedictions. 
 Have care of her, and regard her as a 
 precious gift from His bountiful hand, 
 and thank His divine Majesty for hav- 
 
 ^ ing confided her to thee." In virtue of 
 this divine embassy, Joachim demanded 
 the most chaste Anne for a wife, and 
 the marriage was celebrated, in accord- 
 ance with the will of God, but yet with- 
 out either party disclosing their secret 
 to the other, until some years had pass- 
 ed, as will be seen in its own place. 
 The holy spouses dwelt at Nazareth, 
 and there walked in the wa}s of God. 
 They rendereti themselves pleasing to 
 the Most High, and were irreproachable 
 in His sight, because of the plenitude 
 of grace that made all their works per- 
 tect. They, every year, dl\ided their 
 revenue into three parts. Tlie first they 
 offered in the Temple of Jerusalem, for 
 the worship of the Lord ; the second 
 they distributed to the poor, reserving 
 the third for the proper maintenance of 
 their family. God increased their tem- 
 poral goods, because they employed 
 them with much charity and liberality. 
 Peace was inviolable between them ; 
 they lived in perfect conformity one 
 with the other, without noise or disturb- 
 ance of any kind. The most humble 
 Anne was submissive in all things to 
 the will of Joachim; and the man of 
 God was ever eager to anticipate the 
 wishes of St. Anne, nor was it in vain 
 that he trusted himself entirely to her 
 guidance.* In such perfect charity did 
 they live, that all their life long they 
 had but one and the same will. Being 
 united in the name of the Lord,f Hia 
 
 * frov. xxi. 11. 
 
 t Matt, xviii. 20, 
 
824 
 
 LIVES OF ST. JOACHIM AND ST. ANNE. 
 
 holy Vii never abandoned them: St. f 
 Joachim never failing to obey the com- 
 mand of the anp'l \o lioiidr and cherish 
 his wife. 
 
 The Lord prevented the venerable St. 
 Anne with blessings of sweetness,* 
 communicatins: to her the most sublime 
 gifts of grace and of infused science, to 
 prepare her for the great hapj)iness she 
 was to enjoy, in being the mother of 
 her who was to bring foijth that same 
 Lord. And as the works of the Most 
 High are perfect and complete, He, con- 
 sequently, made her the worthy mother 
 of the most perfect of creatures, who 
 was to be inferior to God alone in sanc- 
 tity, and superior to all pure creat- 
 ures. 
 
 These holy spouses passed twenty 
 yeai*8 without having a child, which at 
 that time, and among that people, was 
 considered a great shame ; thence it 
 happened that they were often assailed 
 by the taunts and reproaches of their 
 neighbors; for it was thought that those 
 who had no children had no part in the 
 coming of the expected Messiah. But 
 the Most High chose to afflict them in 
 this way in order to dispose them by so 
 great a humiliation for the extraordi- 
 naiy grace he meant to bestow upon 
 them, and gave them the patience neces- 
 sary to confomi implicitly to His divine 
 will to the end, that they might sow 
 in tears and in prayers the blessed fruit 
 they were one day to reap.f They 
 
 * Psalm XX. 4 
 
 t Psalm cxxv. 5. 
 
 begged it from the depths of their 
 hearts, agreeably to the express com- 
 mand of Heaven ; and they made a par- 
 ticular vow to the Lord, that, if He 
 gave them a child, they would offer it 
 in the Temple, and consecrate it to His 
 service as the fruit of His benediction. 
 
 This vow was made by the particular 
 inspiration of the Holy Ghost, who or- 
 dained it so that she who was to serve 
 as a dwelling for the only Son of the 
 Father, should be offered, and as it 
 were, made over by her own parents, to 
 the same Lord before she received being. 
 For if they had not bound themselves 
 by a special vow to offer her in the 
 Temple before they had yet known her, 
 they would afterwards have suffered 
 inexpressible pain in separating from a 
 child so sweet and so lovely, and would 
 have offered her perhaps with reluc- 
 tance, because of the great love they 
 bore to her. By this offering, the Lord 
 not only satisfied, according to our ideas, 
 that species of jealousy which He al- 
 ready had, that none other but He 
 should have any claim on His blessed 
 Mother; but His love was also in some 
 sort compensated for the delay in His 
 coming. 
 
 Having persevered for a whole year 
 in these earnest supplications, according 
 to the order they had received from the 
 Lord, it came to pass that St. Joachim 
 went to the Temple of Jerusalem by a 
 divine inspiration and an express com- 
 mand, there to offer prayers and sacri 
 
LIVES OF ST. JOACHIM AND ST. ANNE. 
 
 825 
 
 fices for the coming of the Messiah, and 
 to obtain the desired fruit. Being come 
 with others from his own neiirhborhood, 
 to offer, in presence of the high-priest, 
 the customary gifts, a priest called Issa- 
 char sharply rebuked the venerable old 
 man for offering his gifts with the 
 others, being barren. Among other 
 things, he told him: "Joachim, why 
 dost thou present thyself to offer sacri- 
 fice, being a useless man ? Separate 
 thyself from the others, and go thy way 
 hence ; anger not the Lord by thy offer- 
 ings and thy sacrifices, for they are not 
 pleasing in his eyes." The holy old 
 man, confused and ashamed, humbly 
 and lovingly besought the Lord, saying: 
 " My sovereign Lord and my eternal 
 God, Thy command and Thy will 
 brought me to the Temple ; he who 
 holds Thy place therein hath despised 
 me ; my sins have merited this affront ; 
 I receive it then for Thy sake ; despise 
 not, O Lord, the work of Thy hands."* 
 Thereupon the afflicted Joachim going 
 forth from the Temple (to outward ap- 
 pearance calm and tranquil), went to a 
 country house which he had; and for 
 some days, which he passed in solitude, 
 addressed his sighs to the Lord, and 
 prayed to Him as follows : 
 
 " God of eternal majesty, from whom 
 is all being, and the entire reparation 
 of the human race, prostrate in Thy 
 divine presence, I beseech Thine infinite 
 goodness to look with pity on the afflic- 
 
 * Psalm, cxxxvii. 8. 
 
 # tion of my soul, and hear my prayers 
 dnd those of Thy servant Anne. Thine 
 eyes penetrate all oui- wishes; but if I 
 deserve not to be heard, I'eject not my 
 humble spouse. Lord God of our fathers 
 Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob ; turn not 
 away Thy clemency from us, and per- 
 mit not, since Thou art Father, that I 
 be numbered with the reprobate and 
 the outcast in my offerings, as being 
 useless, because Thou givest me no 
 progeny. Remember, O Lord, the sac- 
 rifices and oblations of Thy servants 
 and Thy prophets the fathers of my 
 race;f and be mindful of those works 
 of theirs which found favor in Thy sight. 
 And since Thou command est me. Lord, 
 to supplicate Thee with confidence, as 
 the almighty and all-bountiful God, 
 grant me what according to Thy good 
 pleasure I desire ; for in beseeching 
 Thee I obey Thy holy will, in that Thou 
 hast promised to hear my prayer. But 
 if my sins impede Thy mercy, remove 
 from me whatever is displeasing to 
 Thee. Mighty art thou, O Lord God of 
 Israel, and canst do whatsoever Thou 
 wilt.;}; Hear my prayers, poor and mis- 
 erable as I am, for Thou art infinite and 
 wont to have compassion on the hum- 
 ble. Where shall I find a refuge, if not 
 in Thee, who art the King of kings, the 
 Lord of lords, and the great Omnipo- 
 tent! Thou hast loaded Thy children 
 and Thy servants with blessings in their 
 generations, and Thou leadest me to 
 
 t Deut. ix. 27. 
 
 X Esth. xiii. 9. 
 
826 
 
 l]\ 
 
 iJF ST. JOACHIM AND ST. ANNE. 
 
 desiro and to hope from Thy bounty ^ 
 that which Thon hast done for my 
 brethren. If it be Thy gracious will to 
 grant my petition, I will otter in Thy 
 holy Temple, and consecrate to Thy ser- 
 vice, the fruit of succession that I may 
 receive fvom Thy bountiful hand. I 
 give up my heai-t and soul to Thy divine 
 will, and I have always desired to turn 
 mine eyes away from vanity. Do with 
 roe whatsoever Thou wilt, and comfort 
 our souls, O LdVd, by the fulfilment of 
 our hope. From the throne of Thy 
 Majesty regard this miserable dust, and 
 deign to raise it up, that it may adore 
 and glorify Thee, and may Thy holy 
 will, not mine, be done in all things." 
 
 Thus did Joachim pray in his soli- 
 tude. Meanwhile the holy ambassador 
 declared to St. Anne that it would be 
 pleasing to the divine Majesty for her 
 to ask a succession of children with that 
 pious intention and that fervent desire 
 to obtain it. And the holy lady, find- 
 ing that it was the will of God, and of 
 Joachim her husband, prostrated herself 
 before God in humble submission and 
 confidence, and prayed in this manner: 
 "Most high Majesty, Lord, creator and 
 preserver of all things, whom my soul 
 honors and adores as the true God, infi- 
 nite, holy, and bountiful, I will speak 
 and make manifest in Thy royal pres- 
 ence my necessity and my afliiction, al- 
 though I am but dust and ashes.* Lord 
 God eternal, make us worthy of Thy 
 
 * Genesis, xviii. 27. 
 
 benediction, giving us a pure and holy 
 offspring whon\ we may present in Thy 
 Temple. Remember, Lord, that Thy 
 servant Anna, mother of Samuel, was 
 barren, yet, through Thine infinite 
 bounty she received the fruition of her 
 de.sires.f I feel an inward motion which 
 incites me to ask a like favor at Thy 
 hands. Hear then, most sweet Lord, 
 mine humble prayer, being mindful of 
 the service, the oblations, and the sac- 
 rifices of my fathers, and the favors 
 wrought in and for them by the might 
 of Thy omnipotent arm. I would pre- 
 sent Thee, O Lord, with an oblation 
 that would be pleasing in Thy sight; 
 but the best I can offer Thee is ray soul, 
 my powers, my senses, and the being 
 Thou hast given me. And if, vouch- 
 safing to regard me from Thy eternal 
 throne. Thou givest me a child, I con- 
 secrate it to Thy service from the first 
 moment of its existence. Cast Thine 
 eyes, O Lord God of Israel, on this vile 
 and poor creature, comfort Thy servant, 
 Joachim, hear our humble supplication, 
 and be Thy holy will in all things 
 accomplished." 
 
 These vt^ere the prayers offered up by 
 St. Joachim and St. Anne, but it is not 
 possible for me to describe the exalted 
 idea which I have of the sanctity of these 
 blessed parents ; neither is it necessary, 
 for what I have said will give some con- 
 ception of it. If we would rightly esti- 
 mate the perfect holiness of those great 
 
 f 1 Kings, L 
 
LIVES OF ST. JOACHIM, AND ST. ANNE. 
 
 827 
 
 saints, we must consider the high destiny 
 and the sublime ministry for which God 
 designed them, who were to be the im- 
 mediate progenitors of our Lord Jesus 
 Christ, and the parents of His most 
 holy Mother. 
 
 The prayers of St. Joachim and St. 
 Anne reached the throne of the Most 
 Blessed Trinity, where, being heard and 
 accepted, the divine will was manifested 
 to the holy angels, and these celestial 
 spii'its having learned the decree of the 
 Most Higli, the archangel Gabriel, ador- 
 ing and honoring the divine Majesty 
 after the manner of those pure and spir- 
 itual substances, bowed down before the 
 throne of the Most Holy Trinity, whence 
 came forth a voice intelligible to him, 
 and it said: "Gabriel, illuminate, vivify, 
 and console Joachim and Anne, our 
 servants, and tell them that their pray- 
 ers have reached our presence, and our 
 clemency hath heard them. Promise 
 them that they shall receive a fruit of 
 benediction by favor of our right hand, 
 and that Anne shall conceive and bring 
 forth a daughter, to whom we give the 
 name of Mary." 
 
 Several mysteries and secrets which 
 belonged to this embassy were revealed 
 to the archangel St. Gabriel, receiving 
 the commands of the Most High, pursu- 
 ant to which he descended from the em- 
 pyi-ean sky to perform his mission. He 
 appeared to St. Joachim while the latter 
 was at prayer, and told him, that his 
 prayers and his alms and sacrifices hav- 
 
 * ing found favor with God, his wife should 
 conceive and bring forth a child of ben- 
 ediction, whose name was to be M .?y-; 
 that she was to be from her infancy con- 
 secrated to God in His holy Temple. 
 "Thou wilt go up to Jerusalem," said 
 the heavenly messenger, " and in testi- 
 mony of the truth of these good tidings 
 that I now bring to thee, thou wilt meet 
 thy sister Anne at the Golden Gate, as 
 she will go to the Temple for a purpose 
 similar to thine." 
 
 St. Anne was in like manner apprised 
 by the archangel of the great favor that 
 was to be bestowed upon her. Filled 
 with a holy joy, she went by divine In- 
 spiration to the Temple to return thanks, 
 and at the Golden Gate she met her 
 holy spouse, St. Joachim, as the angel 
 had foretold. They both returned 
 thanks to the Author of all grace, e^nd 
 offered gifts and particular sacrifices with 
 that intention. They then returned to 
 their home full of heavenly consolation, 
 discoursing, on the way, of the miracu- 
 lous favors they had received, and ^he 
 great things foretold by the angel of the 
 daughter that was to be born to them. 
 It was on that occasion that they reveal- 
 ed one to the other the order they liad 
 separately received from the same angel 
 to espouse each other for the greater 
 glory of God. For twenty years they 
 had kept this secret one from the otner, 
 and only revealed it when the angel 
 promised them the succession of such a 
 daughter. They afterwards renewed 
 
LIVES OF ST. JUAUHIM AND ST. ANNE. 
 
 their offerings in the Temple, whither 
 they went up every yeai* on a certain 
 day, with spet'ial ofl'erings, further sanc- 
 tifying tlie day l)y prayer, by alms-deeds, 
 and l»y thanksgivings. 
 
 St Anne's pi-udence made her keep 
 the secret, even fi"om St. Joachim, that 
 her daughter was to be the Mother of 
 the Messiah. And the holy father knew 
 nothius; more about her all his life, 
 except that she was to be a great and 
 mysterious woman ; but the Most High 
 failed not to make the great mystery 
 known to him a few moments before his 
 death. 
 
 The divine Wisdom had prepared all 
 things to separate from the corrupt mass 
 of human nature the Mother of all grace. 
 The allotted number of the patriarchs 
 and prophets was already complete, and 
 the mountains raised whereon that mys- 
 tical City of God was to be placed.* 
 Mis right hand had prepared the incom- 
 parable treasures of His divinity, to 
 portion and endow her. A thousand 
 angels were ready to guard and protect 
 her, and to serve her as their lady and 
 royal jnistress. He prepared for her a 
 royal line of ancestors; He gave her 
 parents holy and perfect beyond all the 
 men and women of that age, for had 
 there been any greater saints or more fit 
 to be the parents of her whom He chose 
 for his own Mother, there is no doubt 
 but the divine Majesty would have 
 chosen them. 
 
 * Psalm, Ixxxvi, 2. 
 
 He disposed them for their office by 
 numberless graces and blessings, enrich- 
 ed them with all virtues, and illumined 
 their minds by divine wisdom and the 
 various gifts of the Holy Ghost. They 
 having been apprised of the admirable 
 daughter who was to be given them, the 
 work of the first conception, which was 
 that of the pure body of Mary, was exe- 
 cuted. The age/ of her parents, when 
 they were married, was, that of St. Joa- 
 chim forty-six, and that of St. Anne 
 twenty-four. Twenty )'ears had passed 
 since their marriage without their hav- 
 ing any children, so that the mother was 
 forty-four at the time of her daughter's 
 conception, and the father sixty-six. The 
 conception was according to the common 
 order, but owing to St. Anne's sterility, 
 might be considered miraculous, l)eing 
 also free from every species of imperfec- 
 tion. 
 
 At the moment when the soul was in- 
 fused into the body of our divine Lady, 
 it was so appointed that St. Anne, made 
 suddenly sensible of the presence of the 
 Holy Ghost, was moved with such an 
 interior joy, that she fell into a sublime 
 ecstasy, during which she received a 
 knowledge of the highest mysteries, and 
 praised the Lord by new canticles of joy. 
 These blessed effects remained all her 
 lifetime, but they were greater during 
 the nine months of her holy pregnancy, 
 when she bore in her womb the treasure 
 of heaven. 
 
 The auspicious day at length arrived 
 
LIVES OF ST. JOACHIM AND ST. ANNE. 
 
 829 
 
 when St. Anne was to rejoice the world 
 with the birth of her who was sanctified 
 and consecrated to be the Mother of God. 
 Ihis delivery took place on the eighth 
 day of September, the nine months 
 after the conception of the most holy 
 soul of our queen and mistress having 
 been accomplished. She was born pure, 
 fair, and full of grace, clearly indicating 
 her entire exemption from the law of sin. 
 St. Anne received her divinely-endowed 
 daughter into her arms, and offered her 
 to the Lord with tears of joy and fervent 
 thanksgivings. And the angels of our 
 Lady's guard, with myriads of others, 
 adored their queen, and paid their hom- 
 age to her as she lay in her mother's 
 arms, and chanted a celestial hymn, 
 which St. Anne heard in part. At the 
 same moment the archangel Gabriel was 
 sent by the Most High to announce the 
 glad tidings to the holy fathers in Limbo. 
 It was a precept of the Law in the 
 twelfth chapter of Leviticus, that if a 
 w^oman brought forth a daughter, she 
 was considered unclean for two weeks, 
 and remained sixty-six days in a state of 
 purification (but only thirty-three if she 
 had given birth to a male child); which 
 having accomplished, she was to offer as 
 a holocaust, at the door of the taberna- 
 cle, a yearling lamb for males or females, 
 and a pigeon or a dove for sin, consign- 
 ing the same to the priest, that he might 
 offer it to the Lord and pray for her; by 
 which offering she was purified. The 
 delivery of the blessed Anne was as 
 
 * privileged as became tlie dignity of her 
 divine daughter, whose purity was re- 
 flected on her mother. Hence she had 
 no need of conforming to the law of puri- 
 fication, yet she obeyed it to the letter. . 
 The sixty-six days of the purification 
 being passed, St. Anne went to the 
 Temple inflamed with divine ardor, and 
 bearing her beloved daughter in her 
 arms ; she presented her at the door of 
 the tabernacle with the offerinnr which 
 
 o 
 
 the Law required, being accompanied 
 by an innumerable multitude of angels, 
 and had some discourse with the hisrh- 
 priest, the venerable Simeon, who, being 
 always most assiduous in the Temple, 
 enjoyed the singular privilege of re- 
 ceiving the Blessed Mary as often as 
 she was presented there ; although the 
 holy pontiff did not always perceive the 
 dignity of that divine queen, still he felt 
 inwardly convinced that the child was 
 to be great before God. 
 
 St. Anne offered the lamb and the 
 dove, with some other gifts, with great 
 humility, beseeching the high-priest to 
 pray for her and for her daughter. His 
 divine Majesty had nothing to forgive 
 either mother or daughter, in whom 
 grace was so abundant ; but He rather 
 saw new merits in their profound hu- 
 mility, since, being both holy, they 
 believed themselves sinners, and as 
 such presented themselves before Him. 
 And thus the holy St. Anne entered 
 the Temple with her daughter in her 
 arms, and offered her to the Most Hisrh 
 
630 
 
 LIVES OF ST. JOACHIM AND ST. ANNE. 
 
 with tears of joy and tenderness, being 
 the only one in all the world that knew 
 the valuta of tlio treasure deposited in 
 her cart , 
 
 The three yeai*s that the Blessed Mary 
 was to remain with her holy parents 
 having elapsed, St. Anne was admonish- 
 vd in a vision that the time appointed 
 for her being taken to the Temple was 
 now at hand, and that Joachim and she 
 were to conduct her thither. Tender 
 mother as she was, this news filled her 
 pure soul with joyful emotion, and she 
 thanked God with all the fervor of her 
 heart 
 
 On the day appointed, the holy pa- 
 rents, Joachim and Anne, accompanied 
 by some of their relatives, departed 
 from Nazareth, bearing with them the 
 true ark of the covenant, the most pure 
 Mary, to consecrate her in the holy 
 Temple of Jerusalem. They arrived at 
 the Temple, and going in, St. Anne and 
 St. Joachim took their daughter and 
 mistress by the hand, and aft^r praying, 
 all three, with great fervor and devo- 
 tion, the pious parents presented their 
 beloved daughter, who also made an 
 offering of herself at the same time. 
 Before ascending the steps which con- 
 ducted to the apartment where the royal 
 daughters of Juda dwelt in the shadow 
 of the altar, Mary asked permission to 
 take leave of her parents ; which having 
 obtained, she turned to St. Joachim and 
 St. Anne, and kneeling down asked 
 their blessing, kissing their hands and 
 
 + requesting the favor of their prayers. 
 The two saints blessed her with many 
 tears, and she walked all alone up the 
 steps without turning her head or giv- 
 ing any further indication of sorrow on 
 pju'tiug from her j)arents. 
 
 St. Joachim and St. Anne returned to 
 Nazareth much poorer than they came, 
 and penetrated with sorrow for being 
 deprived of their treasure ; but the 
 Lord indemnified them for her absence 
 by many signal consolations. 
 
 Little more is known w'ith certainty 
 concerning the illustrious parents of our 
 blessed Lady. Some writers affirm that 
 they were still in the flesh at the time 
 of her betrothal to St. Joseph, but 
 others of as great celebrity and as great 
 authority in the Church hold the con- 
 trary opinion. Those who maintain 
 that the blessed Joachim and Anne 
 lived till after the birth of the Messiah, 
 base their opinion on the fact that the 
 Church, according to St. Bernard, cele- 
 brated the feast of no saint (with the 
 single exception of the Machabees) who 
 had departed this life before the com 
 mencement of the Christian Era. St 
 Joachim died on the 9th of March, it is 
 generally supposed, and St. Anne on the 
 26th of July. But even these dates are 
 by no means certain. 
 
 It so happened, that, l)y the mys- 
 terious decrees of God, the feast of the 
 blessed St. Anne Avas celebrated in the 
 Church many years before that of St. 
 Joachim her holy spouse. In fact, the 
 
LIVES OF ST. JOACHIM AND ST. ANNE. 
 
 831 
 
 primitive Christians cherished a special 
 devotion to the mother of Mary, which 
 devotion has ever since been perpet- 
 uated and greatly encouraged among 
 the children of the Church who love 
 and honor her august daughter. Vari- 
 ous cities and countries glory in possess- 
 ing portions of her sacred body. The 
 ring with which St. Joachim espoused 
 her is preserved in a church in the 
 Eternal City dedicated to the blessed 
 mother of Mary. Innumerable miracles 
 have been wrought by the intercession 
 of St, Anne in every part of Christen- 
 dom, and shrines and pilgrimages estab- 
 lished in her honor both in Eastern and 
 Western countries. In all the Chris- 
 tianized countries of America, the name 
 of St. Anne is held in honor, not by 
 Catholics alone, but even by some sects 
 of Protestants. The Episcopalians have 
 churches beaiing her name in many of 
 
 * the principal cities of British America 
 and the United States. In Lower Can- 
 ada there are several shrines and pil- 
 grimages consecrated to St. Anne,* and 
 societies established in her honor. 
 
 The feast of St. Joachim is now cele- 
 brated on the Sunday within the Octave 
 of the Assumption. His relics are still 
 preserved in the Church, most of them 
 in various cities of Italy. His head is 
 said to be in the church of the Macha-- 
 bees at Cologne. 
 
 Much might be here said in praise of 
 these glorious saints, so highly favored 
 in the mysterious decrees of Providence, 
 but what we have related of them suf- 
 ficiently establishes the fact of their 
 pre-eminent holiness. 
 
 * One of these, on the Ottawa river, is the 
 " Anne's " of Moore's Canadian Boat Song : 
 
 " As soon as the woods on shore grow dim, 
 We'll sing at St. Anne's our parting hymn." 
 
 THI END. 
 
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