“What shall I say and how shall I speak of that glorious and Blessed Virgin? God alone excepted, she is above every other being: more beautiful than the cherubim and seraphim, and all the angelic host, it is not enough to praise her with human lips or even with the voice of angels. O Blessed Virgin, pure dove, heavenly spouse! O Mary! heaven, temple and throne of the Divinity, thou possessest the sun which shines in heaven and upon earth—Jesus Christ. Luminous cloud, to enlighten the world, thou hast drawn down from heaven the brightest of the stars—Jesus Christ. Hail, full of grace, gate of heaven, whom the prophet of the Canticles in his inspired discourse, hath clearly pointed out, crying: “Thou art a garden enclosed, my sister, my spouse, a garden enclosed, a fountain sealed up.” The Virgin is the lily without spot, which has brought forth the unfading rose—Jesus Christ. O holy Mother of God, immaculate lamb, who hast given to the world the Word incarnate of thyself, the Lamb Jesus. O Virgin most holy, who dost cause wonder in the angelic hosts! A great sign appeareth in the heavens, a woman clothed with the sun, bearing the moon in her arms. Yes, a great wonder in heaven: the nuptial couch of the Virgin, bearing the Son of God. A great wonder in heaven: the Lord of Angels has become the Child of a Virgin. The angels accused Eve, but now they glorify Mary, who hath raised up the fallen Eve, and opened heaven to Adam, chased out of Paradise. For Mary is the mediatrix between heaven and earth, uniting these two extremes. The grace of the Blessed Virgin is immense. So Gabriel begins his salutation, saying:
Hail, full of grace, resplendent heaven. Hail, full of grace, Virgin adorned with every virtue. Hail, full of grace, golden urn containing the celestial manna. Hail, full of grace, who dost satiate the thirsty with the sweetness of an inexhaustible fountain. Hail, most holy Immaculate Mother, who hast conceived Christ, existing before thee. Hail, royal purple, who hast clothed the King of heaven and earth. Hail, unknown book, who hast exposed and made known to the world, the Word, the Son of the Father.”
Whence do we borrow these words? Is it from a contemporary writer, collecting after nineteen centuries of Christianity, all that has been said in love and praise of Mary? No: he who thus speaks of the Virgin Mother belongs almost to Apostolic times, and transmits to us through so many generations, this striking testimony of the grandeur and influence of the Mother of God in the days of our first Christian fathers. It is St. Epiphanius, one of the lights and pillars of the Church in the fourth century. And as this illustrious Bishop speaks of Mary in the fourth age, before the Council of Ephesus, so speaks St. Cyril in the fifth, St. Bernard in the twelfth, and Bossuet in the seventeenth. And this page of St. Epiphanius, written at a time when, according to the heretics, the worship of Mary and its doctrinal importance, had scarcely begun, does not diminish by the side of the most enthusiastic of the forty thousand volumes since written to the praise and glory of the Virgin.
Very many women have shone in the world, many queens have ruled, many forms have been admired, many beauties have been worshipped. All disappear, all efface themselves before the Virgin Mary, whose beauty does not fade away, whose heavenly figure never loses its attraction, a Queen who ever holds the sceptre, a woman blessed above all women.
Like those pure and living works of Raphael, the painter of madonnas, the Virgin Mother of God, resplendent with an immortal youth, appears ever the more beautiful as she is more studied, ever more radiant as the generations in praising her pass away. No spot has tainted her soul, no corruption has touched her body, no stigma has clouded her name; and in spite of the unceasing attacks of the impious, in spite of the multiplied efforts of hell, in spite of hatred, deep as the love which she inspires, Mary, after nineteen centuries, in showing their faithful fulfilment, can repeat those prophetic words, which God had inspired many ages before her existence: I am black, but beautiful, nigra sum, sed formosa; in spite of my enemies, who try to blacken me, my beauty remains unchanged.
To whom shall we compare her? She has neither sister nor rival; she is one, white as the dove. It is the Holy Ghost Who thus praises her: Una est columba mea, perfecta mea, One is My dove, My perfect one. O woman, blessed above all women, more amiable, more glorious, more honoured, and more celebrated than all other women, who can ever better deserve to occupy the thoughts, to move the heart, to inspire art, literature and poetry?
Thou art the glory of Jerusalem, the ornament of the heavenly city, where thou dost ravish the angels and the saints. Thou art the joy of Israel, of the Church wandering here below like Israel in the desert, surrounded by enemies, threatened and exposed like Israel in the time of Judith. Thou art the honour of thy people, of all the human race, raised by thee after its fall, and especially of thine own sex, freed from shame, and honoured in thee.
Catholics are accused of being too lavish in their praises of Mary, preachers, of speaking too often of her privileges and exaggerating them beyond measure, the people of too often invoking her, and the Church herself of attributing to her, in the public offices and liturgy titles which only belong to Jesus Christ. Never was there a criticism more shallow, or one that displayed more levity and ignorance.
It is indeed true that Mary receives great honours; but those who know her will never find her too much honoured. Resting on an immovable foundation, as ancient and not less solid than Christianity, and incorporated into the constitution of the Church, the worship of Mary has nothing to fear from the closest investigation, and far from paling under this increase of light, it shines with even greater splendour. We do not believe that it is yet at its zenith.
Many pious and learned writers think that Mary does not yet occupy the place she merits in the piety of the faithful and in theology. Thus Father Faber says the grandeurs of Mary are too great to be revealed on earth because of our feebleness; however, even on earth she will increase, and no part of theology awaits so much development as that which treats of her.
Mary d’Agreda tells us she learnt of the Blessed Virgin, that men having known her as Mother of God, have known implicitly, as in their source, the graces and perfections which belong to her on account of that dignity; that God, leaving it to the devotion of the faithful to discourse worthily on the holiness and gifts of His Mother, has given to many saints and some writers a particular knowledge of her principal prerogatives; but that many have been too timid, and others, through indovotion, too careless to make them known.
The Ven. Grignon de Montfort, in his treatise on True Devotion to the Blessed Virgin, says at the end of his Introduction, “that the Divine Mary has been up to this time unknown, and that this is one of the reasons that Jesus Christ is not known as He ought to be. If, then, as is certain, the kingdom of Jesus Christ is to come to the world, it will be but a necessary consequence of the knowledge of the kingdom of the most holy Virgin Mary, who brought Him into the world the first time and will make His second advent full of splendour.” At page 20 he says: “Mary has produced together with the Holy Ghost, the greatest thing which has been or ever will be, which is a God-Man; and she will consequently produce the greatest things that there will be in the latter times. The formation and education of the great saints, who shall come at the end of the world, are reserved for her.”
He insists upon this idea with the conviction of a prophet. He continues, page 26: “I have said that this would come to pass particularly at the end of the world, and indeed presently, because the most High, with His holy Mother, has to form for Himself great saints, who shall surpass most of the other saints in sanctity, as much as the cedars of Lebanon outgrow the little shrubs.” He adds that Mary will be terrible to hell by means of these great servants in the latter times, and that then, especially, she will accomplish the prophecy of Eden: Inimicitias ponam inter te et mulierem.
Too many imagine that devotion to Mary has its root in the affections rather than in the intellect, but this is not true; our love for her would be still greater and more tender, if it were more thoughtful and better informed. We love her by the natural instinct with which a child loves his mother, without understanding what he owes to her; but who better appreciates later on the tenderness, the constant solicitude, and the care of her who watched day and night by his cradle.
If it be asked where are to be found the documents which entitle the Virgin to this love, to this worship, to these honours, which distinguish her from all other creatures, we answer: Mary, like Jesus Christ, from Whom she can never be separated, embraces all ages and all countries; the entire world is a book written in her praise; she fills Scripture, tradition, liturgy and history.
Mary fills Holy Scripture, the Old Testament and the New, the prophecies and the Gospels. Souls like St. Bernard, Suarez and Bossuet, which can raise themselves high enough to discern the harmony which exists in the works of God, discover Mary under every figure, under every letter of the holy books of the first Testament.
The enemies of the Blessed Virgin are not ashamed to allege that in the Gospels Mary occupies a part obscure, thrown into the shade, and almost into contempt. They ever bring forward two or three circumstances, to which they give an explanation, contradicted by the Gospel itself, such as the marriage of Cana; the answer of Jesus Christ: How is it that you sought Me? The word woman which our Saviour used upon the cross. We shall see how the doctors, interpreting these words and facts, which the enemies of the Blessed Virgin use against her, make them serve to her greater exaltation.
But what does the Gospel teach us? Do we not see a Virgin saluted by an angel in the name of God? a woman chosen among all other women, and declared full of grace? a creature treating with the most High on the salvation of the world, giving that consent wanted by heaven and earth, becoming Mother of God, after having stipulated that her virginity should not suffer any loss? Do we not see in the Gospel a Virgin Mother, a Virgin who became a Mother, a Mother who remained a Virgin, that is to say, the greatest prodigy that God has ever performed, as the prophets had foretold? Do we not learn in the Gospel how a visit of that Virgin Mother made to her relative, when she already bore Jesus within her, sanctified St. John the Baptist, His precursor, cleansing him from original sin, opened his understanding and made him to leap with joy in his mother’s womb? If, then, we affirm that Mary co-operates in the sanctification of souls, shall we be going against the Gospel?
Do we not again read in the Gospel that Jesus worked His first miracle at the request of His Mother, before His hour had come, and anticipated the eternal decrees rather than reject a prayer of Mary’s? Can we be justly accused of going against the Gospel, when we declare that the prayers of Mary are all-powerful?
Lastly, does not the Gospel tell us that during thirty years, Mary enjoyed the society of Jesus; that not only did she receive His caresses, profit by His teaching and example, and draw plentifully from the very source of grace, but also that she exercised over the Son of God a kind of authority, and gave Him commands that were always obeyed: Et erat subditus illis, And He was subject to them.
Christian reader, do you not see in the depths of the Gospel the foundation of the glory of Mary, a glory incomparable, immense, above every other? What panegyric could surpass the simple Gospel record? If we place at the feet of Mary the entire universe; if we subject to her the angels, and in some sense God Himself, has not the Gospel done so before us?
Mary fills tradition. It has been often said that the Apostles and first preachers of Christian doctrine have preserved an almost absolute silence with regard to Mary, and as a motive for this prudent reserve is adduced the danger of exalting a creature, a woman, whom the heathens might have looked upon as a divinity. Accustomed to adore the mothers of their gods, they might have rendered to the Virgin Mary those supreme honours of which God is so jealous, and which it is a most grievous crime to take away from Him.
This is but a repetition of the pretext of Nestorius, when he dared to attack the Divine Maternity of the Blessed Virgin: Do not let us call Mary Mother of God, for fear the people should adore her as a goddess.
Supposing a sage reserve with regard to Mary was useful in the first ages, the motive does not now exist, for we are no longer in the times of idolatry and paganism, and the Church has explained her doctrine clearly enough to convince her most implacable adversaries that she does not take Mary for a divinity.
But it is not true that in the early ages, they concealed the great privileges of the Mother of God. We freely avow that her worship had not then that development which afterwards awaited it, like religion itself which, unchangeable in its principles and its dogmas, is yet susceptible of increase and variation in its outward manifestation. The teaching of the Church on the subject of the Blessed Virgin has always been the same; the great lines have been traced by the Apostles, who taught that Mary was the Mother of God, that she was a Virgin before childbirth, during childbirth, and after childbirth, and that she was exempt in her Conception from original sin. If that privilege of the Immaculate Conception, defined but a short time ago, had not been contained in tradition and Scripture, if the Apostles had not known and transmitted it to their successors, the Church could not have made it an article of faith. The Church of to-day has not a single article of faith which does not reach back to the Apostles, for upon them the Church is built, and to them has been confided the whole doctrine taught from Heaven.
Putting aside for the moment the magnificent praises accorded to Mary by the great intellects of the early ages, by St. Augustine, St. Ambrose, St. Jerome, St. Ephrem, St. Epiphanius, by Origen and Tertullian, we have a monument of tradition more ancient than all these, and enjoying greater authority—the symbol of the Apostles, that immortal Credo drawn up by the Apostles themselves, as an abridgement of the Christian faith, as the doctrine which they were to preach to the whole world.
The Apostles’ Creed contains only essential dogmas, and not even all these, for some very important points are omitted. But the most holy Virgin is not forgotten. Let us recall these words, which have been used since the time of the Apostles, and which it may be we recite without giving much heed to their meaning: they suffice for establishing the worship of Mary as it exists in the Church and for raising that Virgin above all on earth or in heaven.
We find in this rule of faith, the Virgin Mary associated with the Three Persons of the Adorable Trinity in the regeneration of the world; we learn that the Eternal Son of the Father, consubstantial with His Father, is also the Son of Mary, consubstantial with His Mother, that Mary shares with God the Father, the privilege of generating the Word, for the Word, conceived eternally in the bosom of the Father, has been conceived in time in the womb of Mary by the power of the Holy Ghost: Conceptus est de Spiritu Sancto, natus ex Maria Virgine.
The Creed affirms the two privileges of Mary which are the source of all the others, and the cause of our veneration. Her divine Maternity in proclaiming that the Word had willed to be born of her and to take her flesh, natus ex Maria. Her perpetual virginity, in attesting that after childbirth Mary remained as she was before, ex Maria Virgine. These two principles of the divine Maternity and the perpetual virginity, admitted, all the glories which we see shining on the brow of Mary like a crown of diamonds are but consequences easy to be deduced.
As to ourselves, having investigated the Scriptures, listened to the fathers, studied the theologians, and gone through the most devout and enthusiastic authors; desiring to sum up in a word, all that is to be said of the most holy Virgin, we have found nothing more expressive and more complete than the enunciation of those two glories of Mary specified in the Creed, the maternity and virginity united together, the lily and the rose crossed in a golden field, and have therefore entitled our book: The Virgin Mother.
Mary fills the sacred Liturgy. We know how numerous are her feasts in the Missal and Breviary of the universal Church, and in the Proper Offices approved for particular dioceses and religious congregations; that, in the Offices of all her feasts the grandeurs of Mary are forcibly expressed and clearly explained. She is celebrated under many titles, and receives the most endearing names; here, Our Lady of the Angels, of the Lilies, of the Rocks, of the Snows; there, Our Lady of All Joy, of All Aid, of Good Counsel, of Good News, of Light, of Mercy, of Ransom, of Miracles or of Virtues; near the hospitals, Our Lady of Consolation, of Seven Dolours, of Pity; by the sea, Our Lady of Guard, of Good Succour, of Good Harbour, of Refuge, of Deliverance; on the mountain, Our Lady of Graces; in the valley, Our Lady of Peace; on the field of battle, to recall a triumph, Our Lady of Victories; for the sick, Our Lady of Remedies; for the dying, Our Lady of the Agonizing; for the holy souls in Purgatory, Our Lady of Help.
We know that the Litany of the Blessed Virgin, so much used among Christians, and formally approved of by the Church, bestows on the Mother of God the most magnificent titles: Mother of Divine Grace, Seat of Wisdom, Cause of our joy, Tower of David, Ark of the Covenant, Gate of Heaven, Morning Star, Health of the Sick, Refuge of Sinners, Consoler of the Afflicted, Help of Christians, Queen of Angels, Patriarchs, Prophets, Apostles, &c.
We know also that formerly all ecclesiastics bound to the Divine Office, were also bound to the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin; that all the Saturdays in the year are consecrated to her, that her Votive Office is recited every Saturday on which no other feast falls; and that the Church Office ends every day with a hymn to the Virgin.
But were all the feasts of Mary suppressed, and all that is proper to her cut out of the Liturgy, her worship would remain entire by reason of the feasts of our Lord, and the great mysteries of Christianity. Jesus and Mary are so closely united in the Liturgy, the exact and sensible expression of Catholic truth, that the worship of the one supposes and establishes that of the other. The feasts of our Saviour are also the feasts of His Mother. The festival of the Incarnation is celebrated under the name of a feast of Mary, the Annunciation, the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple is better known under the title of the Purification of Mary. The great solemnity of Christmas is half consecrated to her; we must say the same of the Circumcision and the Epiphany, which belong both to Jesus and His Mother. Thus the supernatural world, like the natural, rests on two poles, Jesus and Mary.
Lastly, Mary fills the history of nations. The annals of all nations strengthen and explain the Liturgy of the Church, by giving the reason of her festivals and marking the beginning and occasion of them. I shall leave here the great solemnities which have their origin in the Gospel and in the truths of faith: the Conception of Mary, her Nativity, Purification, Annunciation and Visitation; although the history of these feasts and their celebration in different countries, at different epochs of the Christian era, would furnish numerous and instructive lessons, and shall speak particularly of certain memorable events, accomplished by Mary, and which have been the origin of these new feasts.
The festival of Our Lady of the Snows, which is celebrated in the midst of summer—the fifth day of August—recalls the well-known miracle which marked the foundation of the great and rich Basilica of St. Mary the Great. The feast of Our Lady of Ransom perpetuates the memory of an institution worthy of Christian charity. Some holy men encouraged by Mary established the Religious Order of Ransom, or of the Redemption of Captives, in which the religious actively employed themselves in the deliverance of Christians enslaved among the infidels, and in case of necessity offered themselves to slavery to liberate their brethren.
The festival of the Rosary is connected with two great events: the conversion of the Albigenses in the time of St. Dominic, by the institution of the Rosary, and the celebrated victory of Lepanto, when the devastating fleet of the barbarous Turk was stopped, driven back and destroyed. The feast of the Holy Name of Mary recalls another victory, also obtained by her aid, over the same enemies of Christendom and civilization, by which Sobieski delivered the city of Vienna, and destroyed for ever the formidable power of the successors of Mahomet. Benedict XIV mentions the alarm of certain souls prompt to disquiet themselves, when the Holy See, in memory of the triumph which the Blessed Virgin brought to the Christian arms, instituted the feast of the Name of Mary; it was making, they said, the name of Mary equal to that of Jesus. But it was not making the name of Mary equal to that of Jesus, it was simply associating the Mother with the Son, as nature and grace had already done.
History makes known the graces and favours, the innumerable miracles worked by Mary for nations, for communities, for associations of all kinds, and for individuals. France justly called the kingdom of Mary, has had a large share in the favours of the Queen of heaven. Our work would not be complete without a glance at the continuous intercourse between Mary and her empire, and upon the happy influence which the worship of the Virgin has not ceased to exercise on the destiny of our country.
The study of the Blessed Virgin that we have undertaken is a subject, vast, rich and inexhaustible. It has been approached by a host of religious writers. We have too much need of indulgence ourselves to be severe in regard to others; however, we cannot deny that for the most part the books which treat of Mary have appeared to us only of middling worth, containing but little, and we have the boldness to say, tiresome; with but little of doctrine, little exactitude, little depth; and if it became us to say so, we should add, that they are of but poor style.
Apart from some very estimable works which we shall cite more than once, all the modern books which inundate us, have but one merit, the great good-will of their authors. A good intention is something in the eyes of Mary; all these books, of which we regret the inferiority, have done good we believe to some souls. But we cannot help comparing them with the solid writings of the fathers and theologians, and we can ask freely of the greater part of the pious panegyrists of the Virgin: What have you done with such great riches? Why have you left so many treasures shut up? Why, having so many resources, do you give us so little?
Our object will be to sum up in a few hundred pages and so to put into the hands of ecclesiastics and the faithful, the great teachings of the fathers of the Church and the chief theologians, whose dusty folios are rarely met with and still more rarely perused.
Our work will form two volumes. For starting-point we have taken the event which belongs not only to the life of Mary, but to the history of all peoples, and all times, the Incarnation of the Word, the appearance of God upon earth in that human nature which He came to redeem.
Mary, that world-abridged, according to the expression of the fathers, plays her part most perfectly and directly throughout all ages. This character of Mary like that of time itself, is divided into two acts. To await Jesus Christ Who was to come, to glorify Him after He had come. The first part of our work treats of the first act; the Virgin does what the forty centuries since the Creation have done: she awaits and prepares for Jesus Christ. Happiest among mothers, it is she who will conceive Him, will bear Him in her virginal womb, and will give Him to the world by a miraculous birth.
In the second volume, leaving Bethlehem, where we had rested, we shall follow Mary in her earthly life before and after the Passion of our Redeemer, through her historic life as our patroness during all time, and when she is raised from the desert of this world, we shall try to mount with her to the gate of the heavenly country. If it be not permitted us to cross the threshold, yet we shall raise a corner of the luminous veil which hides from mortal eyes the glory of our Mother, and shall endeavour to contemplate from afar her glorious countenance, to rejoice in her immense happiness, to distinguish among the crowd of angels and saints who form her court, some one of those sinful souls restored by her to the fold. It may be we shall discern on the blessed lips of our Mother a sweet smile, the hope and promise of our salvation.
Hail, full of grace, resplendent heaven. Hail, full of grace, Virgin adorned with every virtue. Hail, full of grace, golden urn containing the celestial manna. Hail, full of grace, who dost satiate the thirsty with the sweetness of an inexhaustible fountain. Hail, most holy Immaculate Mother, who hast conceived Christ, existing before thee. Hail, royal purple, who hast clothed the King of heaven and earth. Hail, unknown book, who hast exposed and made known to the world, the Word, the Son of the Father.”
Whence do we borrow these words? Is it from a contemporary writer, collecting after nineteen centuries of Christianity, all that has been said in love and praise of Mary? No: he who thus speaks of the Virgin Mother belongs almost to Apostolic times, and transmits to us through so many generations, this striking testimony of the grandeur and influence of the Mother of God in the days of our first Christian fathers. It is St. Epiphanius, one of the lights and pillars of the Church in the fourth century. And as this illustrious Bishop speaks of Mary in the fourth age, before the Council of Ephesus, so speaks St. Cyril in the fifth, St. Bernard in the twelfth, and Bossuet in the seventeenth. And this page of St. Epiphanius, written at a time when, according to the heretics, the worship of Mary and its doctrinal importance, had scarcely begun, does not diminish by the side of the most enthusiastic of the forty thousand volumes since written to the praise and glory of the Virgin.
Very many women have shone in the world, many queens have ruled, many forms have been admired, many beauties have been worshipped. All disappear, all efface themselves before the Virgin Mary, whose beauty does not fade away, whose heavenly figure never loses its attraction, a Queen who ever holds the sceptre, a woman blessed above all women.
Like those pure and living works of Raphael, the painter of madonnas, the Virgin Mother of God, resplendent with an immortal youth, appears ever the more beautiful as she is more studied, ever more radiant as the generations in praising her pass away. No spot has tainted her soul, no corruption has touched her body, no stigma has clouded her name; and in spite of the unceasing attacks of the impious, in spite of the multiplied efforts of hell, in spite of hatred, deep as the love which she inspires, Mary, after nineteen centuries, in showing their faithful fulfilment, can repeat those prophetic words, which God had inspired many ages before her existence: I am black, but beautiful, nigra sum, sed formosa; in spite of my enemies, who try to blacken me, my beauty remains unchanged.
To whom shall we compare her? She has neither sister nor rival; she is one, white as the dove. It is the Holy Ghost Who thus praises her: Una est columba mea, perfecta mea, One is My dove, My perfect one. O woman, blessed above all women, more amiable, more glorious, more honoured, and more celebrated than all other women, who can ever better deserve to occupy the thoughts, to move the heart, to inspire art, literature and poetry?
Thou art the glory of Jerusalem, the ornament of the heavenly city, where thou dost ravish the angels and the saints. Thou art the joy of Israel, of the Church wandering here below like Israel in the desert, surrounded by enemies, threatened and exposed like Israel in the time of Judith. Thou art the honour of thy people, of all the human race, raised by thee after its fall, and especially of thine own sex, freed from shame, and honoured in thee.
Catholics are accused of being too lavish in their praises of Mary, preachers, of speaking too often of her privileges and exaggerating them beyond measure, the people of too often invoking her, and the Church herself of attributing to her, in the public offices and liturgy titles which only belong to Jesus Christ. Never was there a criticism more shallow, or one that displayed more levity and ignorance.
It is indeed true that Mary receives great honours; but those who know her will never find her too much honoured. Resting on an immovable foundation, as ancient and not less solid than Christianity, and incorporated into the constitution of the Church, the worship of Mary has nothing to fear from the closest investigation, and far from paling under this increase of light, it shines with even greater splendour. We do not believe that it is yet at its zenith.
Many pious and learned writers think that Mary does not yet occupy the place she merits in the piety of the faithful and in theology. Thus Father Faber says the grandeurs of Mary are too great to be revealed on earth because of our feebleness; however, even on earth she will increase, and no part of theology awaits so much development as that which treats of her.
Mary d’Agreda tells us she learnt of the Blessed Virgin, that men having known her as Mother of God, have known implicitly, as in their source, the graces and perfections which belong to her on account of that dignity; that God, leaving it to the devotion of the faithful to discourse worthily on the holiness and gifts of His Mother, has given to many saints and some writers a particular knowledge of her principal prerogatives; but that many have been too timid, and others, through indovotion, too careless to make them known.
The Ven. Grignon de Montfort, in his treatise on True Devotion to the Blessed Virgin, says at the end of his Introduction, “that the Divine Mary has been up to this time unknown, and that this is one of the reasons that Jesus Christ is not known as He ought to be. If, then, as is certain, the kingdom of Jesus Christ is to come to the world, it will be but a necessary consequence of the knowledge of the kingdom of the most holy Virgin Mary, who brought Him into the world the first time and will make His second advent full of splendour.” At page 20 he says: “Mary has produced together with the Holy Ghost, the greatest thing which has been or ever will be, which is a God-Man; and she will consequently produce the greatest things that there will be in the latter times. The formation and education of the great saints, who shall come at the end of the world, are reserved for her.”
He insists upon this idea with the conviction of a prophet. He continues, page 26: “I have said that this would come to pass particularly at the end of the world, and indeed presently, because the most High, with His holy Mother, has to form for Himself great saints, who shall surpass most of the other saints in sanctity, as much as the cedars of Lebanon outgrow the little shrubs.” He adds that Mary will be terrible to hell by means of these great servants in the latter times, and that then, especially, she will accomplish the prophecy of Eden: Inimicitias ponam inter te et mulierem.
Too many imagine that devotion to Mary has its root in the affections rather than in the intellect, but this is not true; our love for her would be still greater and more tender, if it were more thoughtful and better informed. We love her by the natural instinct with which a child loves his mother, without understanding what he owes to her; but who better appreciates later on the tenderness, the constant solicitude, and the care of her who watched day and night by his cradle.
If it be asked where are to be found the documents which entitle the Virgin to this love, to this worship, to these honours, which distinguish her from all other creatures, we answer: Mary, like Jesus Christ, from Whom she can never be separated, embraces all ages and all countries; the entire world is a book written in her praise; she fills Scripture, tradition, liturgy and history.
Mary fills Holy Scripture, the Old Testament and the New, the prophecies and the Gospels. Souls like St. Bernard, Suarez and Bossuet, which can raise themselves high enough to discern the harmony which exists in the works of God, discover Mary under every figure, under every letter of the holy books of the first Testament.
The enemies of the Blessed Virgin are not ashamed to allege that in the Gospels Mary occupies a part obscure, thrown into the shade, and almost into contempt. They ever bring forward two or three circumstances, to which they give an explanation, contradicted by the Gospel itself, such as the marriage of Cana; the answer of Jesus Christ: How is it that you sought Me? The word woman which our Saviour used upon the cross. We shall see how the doctors, interpreting these words and facts, which the enemies of the Blessed Virgin use against her, make them serve to her greater exaltation.
But what does the Gospel teach us? Do we not see a Virgin saluted by an angel in the name of God? a woman chosen among all other women, and declared full of grace? a creature treating with the most High on the salvation of the world, giving that consent wanted by heaven and earth, becoming Mother of God, after having stipulated that her virginity should not suffer any loss? Do we not see in the Gospel a Virgin Mother, a Virgin who became a Mother, a Mother who remained a Virgin, that is to say, the greatest prodigy that God has ever performed, as the prophets had foretold? Do we not learn in the Gospel how a visit of that Virgin Mother made to her relative, when she already bore Jesus within her, sanctified St. John the Baptist, His precursor, cleansing him from original sin, opened his understanding and made him to leap with joy in his mother’s womb? If, then, we affirm that Mary co-operates in the sanctification of souls, shall we be going against the Gospel?
Do we not again read in the Gospel that Jesus worked His first miracle at the request of His Mother, before His hour had come, and anticipated the eternal decrees rather than reject a prayer of Mary’s? Can we be justly accused of going against the Gospel, when we declare that the prayers of Mary are all-powerful?
Lastly, does not the Gospel tell us that during thirty years, Mary enjoyed the society of Jesus; that not only did she receive His caresses, profit by His teaching and example, and draw plentifully from the very source of grace, but also that she exercised over the Son of God a kind of authority, and gave Him commands that were always obeyed: Et erat subditus illis, And He was subject to them.
Christian reader, do you not see in the depths of the Gospel the foundation of the glory of Mary, a glory incomparable, immense, above every other? What panegyric could surpass the simple Gospel record? If we place at the feet of Mary the entire universe; if we subject to her the angels, and in some sense God Himself, has not the Gospel done so before us?
Mary fills tradition. It has been often said that the Apostles and first preachers of Christian doctrine have preserved an almost absolute silence with regard to Mary, and as a motive for this prudent reserve is adduced the danger of exalting a creature, a woman, whom the heathens might have looked upon as a divinity. Accustomed to adore the mothers of their gods, they might have rendered to the Virgin Mary those supreme honours of which God is so jealous, and which it is a most grievous crime to take away from Him.
This is but a repetition of the pretext of Nestorius, when he dared to attack the Divine Maternity of the Blessed Virgin: Do not let us call Mary Mother of God, for fear the people should adore her as a goddess.
Supposing a sage reserve with regard to Mary was useful in the first ages, the motive does not now exist, for we are no longer in the times of idolatry and paganism, and the Church has explained her doctrine clearly enough to convince her most implacable adversaries that she does not take Mary for a divinity.
But it is not true that in the early ages, they concealed the great privileges of the Mother of God. We freely avow that her worship had not then that development which afterwards awaited it, like religion itself which, unchangeable in its principles and its dogmas, is yet susceptible of increase and variation in its outward manifestation. The teaching of the Church on the subject of the Blessed Virgin has always been the same; the great lines have been traced by the Apostles, who taught that Mary was the Mother of God, that she was a Virgin before childbirth, during childbirth, and after childbirth, and that she was exempt in her Conception from original sin. If that privilege of the Immaculate Conception, defined but a short time ago, had not been contained in tradition and Scripture, if the Apostles had not known and transmitted it to their successors, the Church could not have made it an article of faith. The Church of to-day has not a single article of faith which does not reach back to the Apostles, for upon them the Church is built, and to them has been confided the whole doctrine taught from Heaven.
Putting aside for the moment the magnificent praises accorded to Mary by the great intellects of the early ages, by St. Augustine, St. Ambrose, St. Jerome, St. Ephrem, St. Epiphanius, by Origen and Tertullian, we have a monument of tradition more ancient than all these, and enjoying greater authority—the symbol of the Apostles, that immortal Credo drawn up by the Apostles themselves, as an abridgement of the Christian faith, as the doctrine which they were to preach to the whole world.
The Apostles’ Creed contains only essential dogmas, and not even all these, for some very important points are omitted. But the most holy Virgin is not forgotten. Let us recall these words, which have been used since the time of the Apostles, and which it may be we recite without giving much heed to their meaning: they suffice for establishing the worship of Mary as it exists in the Church and for raising that Virgin above all on earth or in heaven.
We find in this rule of faith, the Virgin Mary associated with the Three Persons of the Adorable Trinity in the regeneration of the world; we learn that the Eternal Son of the Father, consubstantial with His Father, is also the Son of Mary, consubstantial with His Mother, that Mary shares with God the Father, the privilege of generating the Word, for the Word, conceived eternally in the bosom of the Father, has been conceived in time in the womb of Mary by the power of the Holy Ghost: Conceptus est de Spiritu Sancto, natus ex Maria Virgine.
The Creed affirms the two privileges of Mary which are the source of all the others, and the cause of our veneration. Her divine Maternity in proclaiming that the Word had willed to be born of her and to take her flesh, natus ex Maria. Her perpetual virginity, in attesting that after childbirth Mary remained as she was before, ex Maria Virgine. These two principles of the divine Maternity and the perpetual virginity, admitted, all the glories which we see shining on the brow of Mary like a crown of diamonds are but consequences easy to be deduced.
As to ourselves, having investigated the Scriptures, listened to the fathers, studied the theologians, and gone through the most devout and enthusiastic authors; desiring to sum up in a word, all that is to be said of the most holy Virgin, we have found nothing more expressive and more complete than the enunciation of those two glories of Mary specified in the Creed, the maternity and virginity united together, the lily and the rose crossed in a golden field, and have therefore entitled our book: The Virgin Mother.
Mary fills the sacred Liturgy. We know how numerous are her feasts in the Missal and Breviary of the universal Church, and in the Proper Offices approved for particular dioceses and religious congregations; that, in the Offices of all her feasts the grandeurs of Mary are forcibly expressed and clearly explained. She is celebrated under many titles, and receives the most endearing names; here, Our Lady of the Angels, of the Lilies, of the Rocks, of the Snows; there, Our Lady of All Joy, of All Aid, of Good Counsel, of Good News, of Light, of Mercy, of Ransom, of Miracles or of Virtues; near the hospitals, Our Lady of Consolation, of Seven Dolours, of Pity; by the sea, Our Lady of Guard, of Good Succour, of Good Harbour, of Refuge, of Deliverance; on the mountain, Our Lady of Graces; in the valley, Our Lady of Peace; on the field of battle, to recall a triumph, Our Lady of Victories; for the sick, Our Lady of Remedies; for the dying, Our Lady of the Agonizing; for the holy souls in Purgatory, Our Lady of Help.
We know that the Litany of the Blessed Virgin, so much used among Christians, and formally approved of by the Church, bestows on the Mother of God the most magnificent titles: Mother of Divine Grace, Seat of Wisdom, Cause of our joy, Tower of David, Ark of the Covenant, Gate of Heaven, Morning Star, Health of the Sick, Refuge of Sinners, Consoler of the Afflicted, Help of Christians, Queen of Angels, Patriarchs, Prophets, Apostles, &c.
We know also that formerly all ecclesiastics bound to the Divine Office, were also bound to the Little Office of the Blessed Virgin; that all the Saturdays in the year are consecrated to her, that her Votive Office is recited every Saturday on which no other feast falls; and that the Church Office ends every day with a hymn to the Virgin.
But were all the feasts of Mary suppressed, and all that is proper to her cut out of the Liturgy, her worship would remain entire by reason of the feasts of our Lord, and the great mysteries of Christianity. Jesus and Mary are so closely united in the Liturgy, the exact and sensible expression of Catholic truth, that the worship of the one supposes and establishes that of the other. The feasts of our Saviour are also the feasts of His Mother. The festival of the Incarnation is celebrated under the name of a feast of Mary, the Annunciation, the Presentation of Jesus in the Temple is better known under the title of the Purification of Mary. The great solemnity of Christmas is half consecrated to her; we must say the same of the Circumcision and the Epiphany, which belong both to Jesus and His Mother. Thus the supernatural world, like the natural, rests on two poles, Jesus and Mary.
Lastly, Mary fills the history of nations. The annals of all nations strengthen and explain the Liturgy of the Church, by giving the reason of her festivals and marking the beginning and occasion of them. I shall leave here the great solemnities which have their origin in the Gospel and in the truths of faith: the Conception of Mary, her Nativity, Purification, Annunciation and Visitation; although the history of these feasts and their celebration in different countries, at different epochs of the Christian era, would furnish numerous and instructive lessons, and shall speak particularly of certain memorable events, accomplished by Mary, and which have been the origin of these new feasts.
The festival of Our Lady of the Snows, which is celebrated in the midst of summer—the fifth day of August—recalls the well-known miracle which marked the foundation of the great and rich Basilica of St. Mary the Great. The feast of Our Lady of Ransom perpetuates the memory of an institution worthy of Christian charity. Some holy men encouraged by Mary established the Religious Order of Ransom, or of the Redemption of Captives, in which the religious actively employed themselves in the deliverance of Christians enslaved among the infidels, and in case of necessity offered themselves to slavery to liberate their brethren.
The festival of the Rosary is connected with two great events: the conversion of the Albigenses in the time of St. Dominic, by the institution of the Rosary, and the celebrated victory of Lepanto, when the devastating fleet of the barbarous Turk was stopped, driven back and destroyed. The feast of the Holy Name of Mary recalls another victory, also obtained by her aid, over the same enemies of Christendom and civilization, by which Sobieski delivered the city of Vienna, and destroyed for ever the formidable power of the successors of Mahomet. Benedict XIV mentions the alarm of certain souls prompt to disquiet themselves, when the Holy See, in memory of the triumph which the Blessed Virgin brought to the Christian arms, instituted the feast of the Name of Mary; it was making, they said, the name of Mary equal to that of Jesus. But it was not making the name of Mary equal to that of Jesus, it was simply associating the Mother with the Son, as nature and grace had already done.
History makes known the graces and favours, the innumerable miracles worked by Mary for nations, for communities, for associations of all kinds, and for individuals. France justly called the kingdom of Mary, has had a large share in the favours of the Queen of heaven. Our work would not be complete without a glance at the continuous intercourse between Mary and her empire, and upon the happy influence which the worship of the Virgin has not ceased to exercise on the destiny of our country.
The study of the Blessed Virgin that we have undertaken is a subject, vast, rich and inexhaustible. It has been approached by a host of religious writers. We have too much need of indulgence ourselves to be severe in regard to others; however, we cannot deny that for the most part the books which treat of Mary have appeared to us only of middling worth, containing but little, and we have the boldness to say, tiresome; with but little of doctrine, little exactitude, little depth; and if it became us to say so, we should add, that they are of but poor style.
Apart from some very estimable works which we shall cite more than once, all the modern books which inundate us, have but one merit, the great good-will of their authors. A good intention is something in the eyes of Mary; all these books, of which we regret the inferiority, have done good we believe to some souls. But we cannot help comparing them with the solid writings of the fathers and theologians, and we can ask freely of the greater part of the pious panegyrists of the Virgin: What have you done with such great riches? Why have you left so many treasures shut up? Why, having so many resources, do you give us so little?
Our object will be to sum up in a few hundred pages and so to put into the hands of ecclesiastics and the faithful, the great teachings of the fathers of the Church and the chief theologians, whose dusty folios are rarely met with and still more rarely perused.
Our work will form two volumes. For starting-point we have taken the event which belongs not only to the life of Mary, but to the history of all peoples, and all times, the Incarnation of the Word, the appearance of God upon earth in that human nature which He came to redeem.
Mary, that world-abridged, according to the expression of the fathers, plays her part most perfectly and directly throughout all ages. This character of Mary like that of time itself, is divided into two acts. To await Jesus Christ Who was to come, to glorify Him after He had come. The first part of our work treats of the first act; the Virgin does what the forty centuries since the Creation have done: she awaits and prepares for Jesus Christ. Happiest among mothers, it is she who will conceive Him, will bear Him in her virginal womb, and will give Him to the world by a miraculous birth.
In the second volume, leaving Bethlehem, where we had rested, we shall follow Mary in her earthly life before and after the Passion of our Redeemer, through her historic life as our patroness during all time, and when she is raised from the desert of this world, we shall try to mount with her to the gate of the heavenly country. If it be not permitted us to cross the threshold, yet we shall raise a corner of the luminous veil which hides from mortal eyes the glory of our Mother, and shall endeavour to contemplate from afar her glorious countenance, to rejoice in her immense happiness, to distinguish among the crowd of angels and saints who form her court, some one of those sinful souls restored by her to the fold. It may be we shall discern on the blessed lips of our Mother a sweet smile, the hope and promise of our salvation.
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