On the Virtues of Most Holy Mary
St. Augustine says that, to gain more surely and abundantly the favor of the saints, we must imitate them; for when they see us practice the virtues they themselves exercised, they are the more moved to pray for us. Mary, the Queen of the saints and our first advocate, when she has rescued some soul from the claws of Lucifer and united it to God, desires that this soul should set itself to imitate her; otherwise she cannot enrich it with her graces as she would, seeing it unlike her in its ways. Therefore Mary calls those blessed who diligently imitate her life: “Now, therefore, ye children, hear me: Blessed are they that keep my ways” (Prov. 8:32). Whoever loves either is already like, or seeks to become like, the person loved, according to the well-known proverb: love either finds its objects equal, or makes them so. And so St. Jerome exhorts us that, if we love Mary, we must strive to imitate her, for this is the greatest homage we can offer her. Richard says that those are, and may call themselves, true children of Mary who strive to imitate her life. Let the child, then, concludes St. Bernard, endeavor to imitate his Mother if he desires her favor; for when Mary sees herself honored as a mother, she will treat and favor him as a child.
Speaking, then, of the virtues of this Mother—although we read few particulars of them recorded in the Gospels—nevertheless, since it is there said that she was full of grace, we are well assured that she had all the virtues, and all in a heroic degree. So much so, says St. Thomas, that whereas each of the other saints excelled in some particular virtue, the Blessed Virgin excelled in all, and in all the virtues was given to us as an example: “Some of the saints exercised special works—one was chaste, another humble, another merciful; but the Blessed Virgin is given as the example of all the virtues” (Opusc. 8). And likewise St. Ambrose said: “Such was Mary, that her life alone is a discipline for all” (De Virg., l. 2). And so he afterward wrote: “Let the virginity and the life of Mary be set before you as in a picture, in which the very form of virtue shines forth. From this take your examples of living… what you ought to correct, what to flee, what to hold fast.” And because, as the holy Fathers teach, humility is the foundation of all the virtues, let us first consider how great was the humility of the Mother of God.
The Humility of Mary
“Humility,” says St. Bernard, “is the foundation and the guardian of the virtues.” And with reason, for without humility a soul can possess no other virtue. Let her possess them all—they will all depart when humility departs. On the other hand, as St. Francis de Sales wrote to St. Jane de Chantal, God so loves humility that he instantly hastens to the soul in which he sees it (Life, l. 6, ch. 2, §11). This virtue, so lovely and so necessary, was unknown in the world; but the Son of God himself came on earth to teach it by his example, and he desired that in this above all we should strive to imitate him: “Learn of me, because I am meek and humble of heart” (Matt. 11:29). And Mary, as she was the first and most perfect disciple of Jesus Christ in all the virtues, was so in humility also, by which she merited to be exalted above all creatures. It was revealed to St. Matilda that the first virtue the Blessed Mother especially practiced from childhood was humility.
The first act of humility of heart is to have a lowly opinion of ourselves; and Mary always thought so humbly of herself—as was revealed to the same St. Matilda—that although she saw so many more graces bestowed upon her than upon others, she preferred all others before herself. Rupert the Abbot, explaining that passage, “Thou hast wounded my heart, my sister, my spouse… with one hair of thy neck” (Cant. 4:9), says that this hair of the spouse’s neck was precisely the humble opinion that Mary had of herself, with which she wounded the heart of God: “With one hair, that is, with the exceeding humility of thy heart. This is the hair of the neck, the humble thought… What is finer than a single hair?” Not that the holy Virgin esteemed herself a sinner—for humility is truth, as St. Teresa says, and Mary knew she had never offended God—nor that she failed to confess having received greater graces from God than any other creature, for a humble heart always acknowledges the special favors of the Lord, that it may humble itself the more; but the divine Mother, by the greater light she had to see the infinite greatness and goodness of her God, saw still more her own littleness, and therefore more than all others did she humble herself, and say with the spouse of the Canticles: “Do not consider that I am brown, because the sun hath altered my color” (Cant. 1:5). Approaching him, says St. Bernard, “I find myself black.” Yes, adds St. Bernardine, for the Virgin had always present before her eyes the divine majesty and her own nothingness. As a beggar, when she is clothed with a costly garment that has been given her, is not made proud by it, but humbles herself the more before the giver, because she is reminded then of her own poverty—so Mary, the more she saw herself enriched, the more humble she became, remembering that all was the gift of God. And so she herself said to St. Elizabeth, a Benedictine nun: “Know for certain that I esteemed myself most abject and unworthy of the grace of God.” And therefore, says St. Bernardine, no creature in the world has been more exalted, because no creature has ever humbled herself more than Mary: “As no creature after the Son of God has risen so high in the dignity of grace, so none has descended so deep into the abyss of humility.”
Moreover, it is an act of humility to conceal the gifts of heaven. Mary wished to conceal from St. Joseph the grace of having been made the Mother of God, although it seemed necessary to make it known to him—at least to remove from the mind of her poor spouse the suspicions he might have of her virtue when he saw her with child, or at least his perplexity. For St. Joseph, on the one hand unwilling to doubt the chastity of Mary, and on the other ignorant of the mystery, in order to free himself from his perplexity, “was minded to put her away privately” (Matt. 1:19); and had the angel not revealed to him that his spouse had conceived by the operation of the Holy Spirit, he would really have left her. Furthermore, a humble soul refuses praise and gives it all to God. Behold Mary disturbed at hearing herself praised by St. Gabriel. And when St. Elizabeth said to her, “Blessed art thou among women… And whence is this to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?… And blessed art thou that hast believed” (Luke 1:42–45), Mary, referring all these praises to God, answered with that humble canticle: “My soul doth magnify the Lord.” As if she had said: You praise me, O Elizabeth, but I praise the Lord, to whom alone honor is due; you wonder that I come to you, and I wonder at the divine goodness, in which alone my spirit exults: “And my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Savior.” You praise me because I have believed; I praise my God, who has willed to exalt my nothingness, “because he hath regarded the humility of his handmaid.” Hence Mary said to St. Bridget: “Why did I humble myself so far, or whence did I merit so much grace, unless because I thought and knew that of and from myself I was nothing and had nothing? Therefore I would have no praise for myself, but only for the Giver and Creator.” And so, speaking of the humility of Mary, St. Augustine says: “O truly blessed humility, which has brought forth God to men, opened paradise, and delivered souls from hell!”
It belongs also to humility to serve others; and Mary did not refuse to go and serve Elizabeth for three months. Whence St. Bernard says: Elizabeth wondered that Mary should come to visit her, but she should wonder still more that she came not to be ministered unto, but to minister. The humble keep retired and choose the lowest place; and therefore, as St. Bernard remarks, Mary, when her Son was preaching in a certain house, as St. Matthew relates (ch. 12), wished to speak with him, but would not enter the house unbidden: “She stood without,” says St. Bernard, “and neither by a mother’s authority interrupted his discourse, nor entered the house where her Son was speaking.” Therefore also, when she was in the upper room with the apostles, she wished to take the lowest place; and so St. Luke wrote: “All these were persevering with one mind in prayer, with the women and Mary the mother of Jesus” (Acts 1:14). Not that St. Luke did not know the merit of the divine Mother, for which he should have named her in the first place; but because she had taken the lowest place after the apostles and the other women, St. Luke described them all, as a certain author remarks, in the order they occupied. Hence St. Bernard says: “Justly has the last become first, who, when she was first of all, made herself the last.” Finally, the humble love contempt; and so we do not read that Mary appeared in Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, when her Son was received by the people with so much honor; yet at the time of his death she did not shrink from appearing in public on Calvary, bearing the dishonor of being known as the mother of one condemned to die an infamous death as a criminal. And so she said to St. Bridget: “What is more contemptible than to be called a fool, to be in want of all things, to believe oneself the most unworthy of all? Such, O daughter, was my humility; this was my joy, this my whole will, with which I thought of nothing but to please my Son.”
The venerable Sister Paula of Foligno was given to understand in an ecstasy how great was the humility of the holy Virgin. Relating afterward to her confessor what she had seen, she said—scarcely able to utter the words for astonishment: “The humility of the Blessed Virgin! O father, the humility of our blessed Lady! In the world there is no humility—not even the lowest degree of it—to be compared with the humility of Mary.” And our Lord, at another time, showed St. Bridget two women: one all pomp and vanity. “This one,” he said, “is Pride; but the other, whom you see with her head bowed down, respectful to all, having God alone in her mind, and esteeming herself as nothing, is Humility, and is called Mary” (Rev. l. 1, ch. 29). By this God wished to make known to us that his blessed Mother was so humble that she was humility itself.
It is not to be doubted, as St. Gregory of Nyssa says, that for our nature, corrupted by sin, there is perhaps no virtue more difficult to practice than humility. But there is no escape: we can never be true children of Mary if we are not humble. “If you cannot imitate the virginity of the humble Virgin,” says St. Bernard, “imitate her humility.” She abhors the proud; she invites none to come to her but the humble: “Whosoever is a little one, let him come to me” (Prov. 9:4). Mary, says Richard, protects us under the mantle of humility. The Mother of God herself explained this to St. Bridget, saying: “Come, then, O my daughter, and hide yourself under my mantle; this mantle is my humility.” And she then added that the contemplation of her humility is a good mantle that keeps us warm; but, as she went on to say: “The mantle warms only him who wears it—and that not in thought alone but in deed; thus my humility profits no one unless he strives to imitate it. Therefore, my daughter, clothe yourself with this humility.” Oh, how dear to Mary is the humble soul! St. Bernard writes: The Virgin recognizes and loves those who love her, and is near to all who invoke her, especially to those whom she sees made like herself in chastity and humility. And so the saint then exhorts all who love Mary to be humble: “Emulate this virtue, if you love Mary.” Marino—or rather Martino—d’Alberro, of the Society of Jesus, out of love for the Virgin, was accustomed to sweep the house and gather up the refuse. The divine Mother once appeared to him, as Father Nieremberg relates in his Life, and, as if to thank him, said: “How dear to me is this humble action done for love of me!”
Then, O my Queen, I shall never be a true child of yours if I am not humble. But do you not see that my sins, after rendering me ungrateful to my Lord, have also made me proud? O my Mother, cure me; by the merits of your humility obtain for me that I may be humble, and thus become a child of yours. Amen.
The Love of Mary toward God
St. Anselm says that where there is the greatest purity, there is the greatest charity: “Where the purity is greater, there the charity is greater.” The purer and the more emptied of self a heart is, the more it will be filled with charity toward God. Most holy Mary, because she was all humility and entirely emptied of self, was entirely filled with the divine love, so that she surpassed all men and all angels in love to God, as St. Bernardine teaches. Therefore St. Francis de Sales justly called her the Queen of love. The Lord has indeed given to men the precept to love him with their whole heart: “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart” (Matt. 22:37); but, as St. Thomas declares, this precept will never be perfectly fulfilled by men on this earth—only in heaven. And here Blessed Albert the Great remarks that, in a certain sense, it would be unbecoming for God to give a commandment that none could perfectly fulfill, had the divine Mother not perfectly fulfilled it. These are the words of Albert: “Either someone fulfills this precept, or no one does; if anyone, it is the most Blessed Virgin.” And this is confirmed by Richard of St. Victor, who says: The Mother of our Emmanuel was perfect in all virtues. Who has ever fulfilled as she did that first commandment, “Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart”? In her the divine love was so ardent that there could be no defect of any kind in her. Divine love, says St. Bernard, so penetrated and pervaded the soul of Mary that no part was left untouched by it; so that she loved with her whole heart, her whole soul, and her whole strength, and was full of grace. And so Mary might well have said: My beloved has given himself wholly to me, and I have given myself wholly to him: “My beloved to me, and I to him” (Cant. 2:16). Indeed, says Richard, the seraphim might well have descended from heaven to learn from the heart of the Virgin how to love God.
God, who is love—“God is charity” (1 John 4:16)—came on earth to kindle in all men the flames of his holy love; but he inflamed no heart so much as the heart of his Mother, who, being entirely pure from every earthly affection, was perfectly ready to be enkindled by this blessed flame. So St. Jerome teaches. Hence the heart of Mary became all fire and flame, as we read of her in the sacred Canticles: “The lamps thereof are fire and flames” (Cant. 8:6)—fire burning within through love, as St. Anselm explains, and flames shining forth upon all by the practice of virtue. Mary, therefore, when she bore Jesus in her arms, might indeed have called herself “fire carrying fire,” more properly than that woman carrying fire in her hand who was so called by Hippocrates. Yes, for St. Ildephonsus said: As fire heats iron, so the Holy Spirit so wholly inflamed Mary that nothing was seen in her but the flame of the Holy Ghost, nothing was felt but the fire of the love of God. St. Thomas of Villanova says that the bush which Moses saw all in flames yet not consumed was truly a symbol of the heart of the Virgin. With reason, then, as St. Bernard says, was she seen by St. John clothed with the sun: “And a great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun” (Apoc. 12:1). For, says the saint, she was so united to God by love that it seems as if no creature could be more united to him. Mary, then, is justly described as clothed with the sun, for she has penetrated to an incredible depth the abyss of the divine wisdom, so that, as far as is permitted to a creature not personally united with God, she appears immersed in that inaccessible light.
Therefore St. Bonaventure asserts that the holy Virgin was never tempted by the spirits of hell: for as flies, he says, are driven away by a great fire, so from the heart of Mary, which was one flame of love, the devils fled, and did not even dare to approach her. And Richard also says: The Virgin was terrible to the princes of darkness, so that they did not presume to draw near and tempt her, for the flame of her charity deterred them. Mary herself revealed to St. Bridget that in this world she had no other thought, no other desire, no other joy, than God: “I thought of nothing but God; nothing pleased me but God.” So that her blessed soul, being as it were in continual contemplation of God upon this earth, the acts of love she made were innumerable, as Father Suarez declared: The acts of perfect love which the Blessed Virgin made in this life were innumerable, for she passed almost her whole life in contemplation, and very frequently repeated an act of love. But Bernardine de Bustis pleases me more when he says that Mary did not so much repeat acts of love in succession, as other saints do, but by a singular privilege always actually loved God with one continued act. Like the royal eagle she kept her eyes ever fixed upon the divine Sun, so that, as St. Peter Damian says, neither did the actions of life prevent her from loving, nor love prevent her from acting. Thus, says St. Germanus, Mary was prefigured by the altar of propitiation, on which the fire was never extinguished by day or by night.
Neither did sleep interrupt the love of Mary for her God. For if such a privilege was granted to our first parents in the state of innocence, as St. Augustine asserts—saying, “Their dreams while sleeping were as happy as their life when waking”—it certainly could not be denied to the divine Mother, as Suarez and Rupert the Abbot believe, with St. Bernardine and St. Ambrose, who wrote concerning Mary: “While her body rested, her soul kept watch.” Thus were verified in her the words of the wise man: “Her lamp shall not be put out in the night” (Prov. 31:18). Yes, for while her blessed body, in a light sleep, took its needed rest, her soul, says St. Bernardine, freely rose to God, so that at that time her contemplation was more perfect than is that of any other person when awake. She might therefore well say with the spouse in the Canticles: “I sleep, and my heart watcheth” (Cant. 5:2)—as happy in sleep as in waking, as Suarez says. In a word, St. Bernardine asserts that Mary, while she lived on earth, was continually loving God: “The heart of the Virgin was held ever in the ardor of love.” And he adds further that she never did anything that she did not know was pleasing to God, and that she loved him as much as she knew he ought to be loved. Hence, according to Blessed Albert the Great, it may be said that Mary was filled with so great a charity that a greater was not possible in any pure creature on this earth. For this reason St. Thomas of Villanova said that the Virgin, by her ardent charity, became so beautiful and so enamored her God that, captivated as it were by love of her, he descended into her womb to become man. And so St. Bernardine exclaims: Behold a Virgin who by her virtue has wounded and taken captive the heart of God!
But since Mary loves her God so much, she certainly requires of her servants nothing else so much as that they should love God as much as they can. And this is exactly what she said to the blessed Angela of Foligno one day after Communion: “Angela, may you be blessed by my Son; seek to love him as much as you can.” And the Blessed Virgin herself said to St. Bridget: “Daughter, if you wish to bind me to you, love my Son.” Mary desires nothing more than to see her beloved, who is God, loved by all. Novarino asks why the holy Virgin, with the spouse of the Canticles, begged the angels to make known to her Lord the great love she bore him, saying: “I adjure you, O daughters of Jerusalem, if you find my beloved, that you tell him that I languish with love” (Cant. 5:8). Did God not know how much she loved him? Why does she desire to show her wound to the beloved who gave it? The same author answers that the divine Mother did not wish by this to make known her love to God, but to us; that, having herself been wounded, she might be able to wound us also with divine love: “that, being wounded, she might wound.” And because she was wholly inflamed with the love of God, she inflames all those who love and approach her, and makes them like herself. For this reason St. Catherine of Siena called Mary the bearer of the flame of divine love.
If we too wish to burn with this blessed flame, let us always endeavor to draw near to our Mother with prayers and affections. O Queen of love, Mary—the most lovely, the most beloved, and the most loving of all creatures, as St. Francis de Sales called you—ah, my Mother, you were always wholly inflamed with love for God; deign to bestow on me at least one spark of it. You did pray your Son for that family whose wine had failed: “They have no wine” (John 2:3); and will you not pray for us, who are wanting in love for God, whom we are under such obligation to love? Say to Jesus: “They have no love.” Obtain for us this love. We ask of you no other favor than this. O Mother, by the great love you bear to Jesus, graciously hear us and pray for us. Amen.
The Love of Mary for Her Neighbor
Love of God and of our neighbor is commanded by the same precept: “And this commandment we have from God, that he who loveth God love also his brother” (1 John 4:21). And St. Thomas gives as the reason for this, that he who loves God loves all things which God loves. St. Catherine of Genoa one day said to God: “O Lord, it is your will that I love my neighbor, and I can love none but you.” God answered her in these words: “He who loves me loves all things loved by me.” But as there never has been, and never will be, one who loves God more than Mary, so there never has been, and never will be, one who loves her neighbor more than Mary. Cornelius a Lapide, commenting on the words, “King Solomon hath made him a litter of the wood of Libanus… the midst he covered with charity for the daughters of Jerusalem” (Cant. 3:9–10), says that this litter was the womb of Mary, in which the incarnate Word dwelt, filling the Mother with charity, that she might succor all who had recourse to her. Mary was so full of charity while she was on earth that she assisted, unasked, those who were in need—just as she did at the marriage of Cana, when she told her Son of the trouble of the family, “They have no wine” (John 2:3), and begged him to give them wine by a miracle. Oh, how she hastened to the relief of her neighbor when she went to the house of Elizabeth on an errand of charity: “She went into the hill country with haste” (Luke 1:39). She could in no way show greater charity than by offering her Son for our salvation; so that St. Bonaventure says: Mary so loved the world as to give her only-begotten Son. Therefore St. Anselm addresses her in these words: O blessed among women, who surpass the angels in purity and the saints in mercy! Nor does the charity of Mary for us fail now that she is in heaven, says St. Bonaventure; rather it is much increased there, because she now sees more clearly the miseries of men. Hence the saint said: Great was the mercy of Mary toward the wretched while she was still an exile on earth; but far greater is it now that she reigns in heaven. And the angel told St. Bridget that there is no one who prays that does not receive graces through the charity of the Virgin. Miserable should we be were Mary not to pray for us! Jesus Christ himself also said to the same saint: “If the prayers of my Mother did not intervene, there would be no hope of mercy.”
Blessed, says the divine Mother, is he who hears my teachings and considers my charity, in order to practice it toward others in imitation of me: “Blessed is the man that heareth me, and that watcheth daily at my gates, and waiteth at the posts of my doors” (Prov. 8:34). St. Gregory Nazianzen says there is nothing by which we may more surely gain the love of Mary than by the practice of charity toward our neighbor. Hence, as God commands us, saying, “Be ye merciful, as your Father also is merciful” (Luke 6:36), so Mary seems to say to all her children: Be ye merciful, as your Mother also is merciful. It is certain that God and Mary will show mercy to us according to the charity we practice toward our neighbor: “Give, and it shall be given to you… For with the same measure that you shall mete withal, it shall be measured to you again” (Luke 6:38). St. Methodius said: “Give to the poor, and receive paradise.” For, according to the Apostle, charity toward our neighbor renders us happy in this life and the next: “But piety is profitable to all things, having promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come” (1 Tim. 4:8). St. John Chrysostom, remarking on the words of Proverbs, “He that hath mercy on the poor lendeth to the Lord” (Prov. 19:17), says that he who assists the needy makes God his debtor. O Mother of mercy, you are full of charity for all. Do not forget my miseries; even now you see them. Recommend me to that God who denies you nothing. Obtain for me the grace of being able to imitate you in holy charity toward God and toward my neighbor. Amen.
The Faith of Mary
As the Blessed Virgin is the Mother of love and of hope, so also is she the Mother of faith: “I am the mother of fair love, and of fear, and of knowledge, and of holy hope” (Ecclus. 24:24). And justly, says St. Irenaeus, since Mary repaired by her faith the loss that Eve had caused by her unbelief. Eve, says Tertullian, because she chose to believe the serpent rather than the word of God, brought death into the world; but our Queen, believing the words of the angel—that, remaining a virgin, she was to become the Mother of the Lord—brought salvation to the world. For St. Augustine says that Mary, in giving her consent to the incarnation of the Word, by means of her faith opened paradise to men. Richard too, commenting on the words of St. Paul, “The unbelieving husband is sanctified by the believing wife” (1 Cor. 7:14), says: This is the believing woman by whose faith the unbelieving Adam and all his posterity are saved. Hence, on account of her faith, Elizabeth pronounced the Virgin blessed: “Blessed art thou that hast believed, because those things shall be accomplished that were spoken to thee by the Lord” (Luke 1:45). And St. Augustine added: Mary is more blessed in receiving the faith of Christ than in conceiving the flesh of Christ.
Father Suarez says that the holy Virgin had more faith than all men and all the angels. She saw her Son in the stable of Bethlehem, and believed him the Creator of the world. She saw him fleeing from Herod, and yet believed him the King of kings. She saw him born, and believed him eternal. She saw him poor and in need of food, and believed him the Lord of the universe; laid on straw, and she believed him omnipotent. She observed that he did not speak, and she believed him the infinite Wisdom. She heard him weeping, and she believed him the joy of paradise. Finally, she saw him in death, despised and crucified; and though the faith of others might have wavered, Mary remained firm in the belief that he was God. St. Antoninus, remarking on the words, “There stood by the cross of Jesus his mother” (John 19:25), says: Mary stood, supported by her faith, which she held firm in the divinity of Christ. And it is for this reason, says the saint, that in the office of Tenebrae only one candle is left lighted. St. Leo, treating of this subject, applies to the Virgin this passage of Proverbs: “Her lamp shall not be put out in the night.” On the words of Isaias, “I have trodden the wine-press alone, and of the Gentiles there is not a man with me” (Isa. 63:3), St. Thomas remarks: He says a man on account of the Virgin, in whom faith never failed. Whence Blessed Albert the Great says that Mary then practiced a most perfect faith. She had faith in the most excellent degree, who, even when the disciples were doubting, did not doubt. Mary, therefore, by her great faith merited to become the light of all the faithful, as St. Methodius calls her: “the torch of the faithful”; and St. Cyril of Alexandria: “the scepter of the orthodox faith.” And the holy Church herself attributes to the Virgin, by the merit of her faith, the destruction of all heresies: “Rejoice, O Virgin Mary, for you alone have destroyed all heresies throughout the world.” St. Thomas of Villanova also says, explaining the words of the Holy Spirit, “Thou hast wounded my heart, my sister, my spouse… with one of thy eyes” (Cant. 4:9), that the eyes signify faith, by which the Virgin gave the greatest pleasure to the Son of God.
St. Ildephonsus exhorts us to imitate the faith of Mary: “Imitate the seal of Mary’s faith.” But how are we to imitate this faith of Mary? Faith is at once a gift and a virtue. It is a gift of God, insofar as it is a light that God infuses into the soul; and it is also a virtue, insofar as it is exercised by the soul. Hence faith is given us to serve not only as a rule of belief, but also as a rule of action. Therefore St. Gregory says: He truly believes who, by his works, practices what he believes. And St. Augustine: You say, “I believe”; do what you say, and that is faith. And this is to have a living faith—namely, to live according to what we believe: “My just man liveth by faith” (Heb. 10:38). It was thus the Blessed Virgin lived—very differently from those who do not live according to what they believe, whose faith is dead, as St. James says: “Faith without works is dead” (James 2:20). Diogenes went about seeking a man upon earth, “I seek a man”; but God seems to seek a Christian among the many faithful, “I seek a Christian.” For very few are they who have the works; the greater part have only the name. But to these should be said what Alexander said to that cowardly soldier who was also named Alexander: “Change either your name or your conduct.” Indeed, as Father Avila used to say, it would be better if these miserable creatures were shut up as madmen: believing as they do that a happy eternity is prepared for him who lives well, and an unhappy eternity for him who lives ill, and yet living as if they did not believe it. St. Augustine therefore exhorts us to see things with Christian eyes—that is, to see according to faith: “Have the eyes of Christians.” For St. Teresa was accustomed to say that all sins arise from a want of faith. Let us, then, implore the holy Virgin that, by the merit of her faith, she may obtain for us a living faith. O Lady, increase our faith.
The Hope of Mary
From faith springs hope; for God enlightens us by faith with a knowledge of his goodness and his promises, that we may be raised by hope to the desire of possessing him. Mary, then, having the virtue of an extraordinary faith, had also the virtue of an extraordinary hope, which made her say with David: “But it is good for me to adhere to my God, and to put my hope in the Lord God” (Ps. 72:28). Mary was indeed that faithful spouse of the Holy Spirit of whom it was said: “Who is this that cometh up from the desert, flowing with delights, leaning upon her beloved?” (Cant. 8:5). For she was always perfectly detached from all affection for the world, which to her seemed a desert; and placing no confidence either in creatures or in her own merits, but relying entirely on the divine grace in which alone she trusted, she always advanced in the divine love. And so Hailgrin said of her: She ascended from the desert—that is, from the world, which she so forsook and esteemed such a desert that she turned away from it all her affection—leaning upon her beloved; for she trusted not in her own merits, but in the grace of him who bestows grace.
The holy Virgin plainly showed how great was her confidence in God: first, when she saw the trouble of her holy spouse Joseph, who, not knowing the manner of her miraculous pregnancy, thought of leaving her—“But Joseph… was minded to put her away privately” (Matt. 1:19). It seemed necessary then, as we have already said, that she should disclose to Joseph the hidden mystery; but no—she would not herself reveal the grace she had received. She thought it better to abandon herself to divine providence, trusting that God himself would protect her innocence and her reputation. Cornelius a Lapide makes precisely the same remark, commenting on these very words of the Gospel: The Blessed Virgin was unwilling to make this secret known to Joseph, lest she should seem to boast of her gifts; but resigned herself, in perfect confidence, to the care of God, trusting that he would protect her innocence and her good name. Moreover, she showed her confidence in God when, as the time for the birth of Christ drew near, she saw herself in Bethlehem shut out even from the lodgings of the poor and obliged to bring forth her Son in a stable: “And she laid him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn” (Luke 2:7). She did not then utter a single word of complaint, but, abandoning herself to God, trusted that he would assist her in her need. The divine Mother showed also how much she trusted in divine providence when, warned by Joseph that they must flee into Egypt, she set out that same night on so long a journey to a foreign and unknown country, without preparation, without money, with no other company than that of her infant Jesus and her poor spouse: “Who arose, and took the child and his mother by night, and retired into Egypt” (Matt. 2:14). But Mary made known her confidence still more when she asked of her Son the favor of the miracle of the wine at the marriage of Cana. For when she had said, “They have no wine,” Jesus answered her, “Woman, what is that to me and to thee? My hour is not yet come” (John 2:4). Yet after this answer, by which he seemed clearly to refuse her request, she, trusting in the divine goodness, directed the servants of the house to do whatever the Son should order, because the grace was assured: “Whatsoever he shall say to you, do ye” (John 2:5). And Jesus Christ did indeed order that the vessels should be filled with water, and then changed it into wine.
Let us, then, learn from Mary to trust in God as we ought—but chiefly in what concerns our eternal salvation; in which, though our cooperation is necessary, we ought nevertheless to hope for the grace to obtain it from God alone, entirely distrusting our own strength, and saying with the Apostle: “I can do all things in him who strengtheneth me” (Phil. 4:13).
Ah, my most holy Lady, of you Ecclesiasticus says that you are the Mother of holy hope: “Mother of holy hope” (Ecclus. 24:24). The holy Church says of you that you are hope itself: “Hail, our hope.” What other hope, then, am I seeking? You, after Christ, are all my hope; thus St. Bernard called you, and thus I too wish to call you: “the whole ground of my hope.” And I will always say to you with St. Bonaventure: O salvation of those who invoke you, save me!
The Chastity of Mary
Since the fall of Adam, the flesh being rebellious against reason, the virtue of chastity is the most difficult of all for men to practice. Of all combats, says St. Augustine, those of chastity are the most severe, for the battle is daily and the victory rare. But eternal praise be to the Lord, who has given us in Mary a great example of this virtue. With justice, says Blessed Albert the Great, is Mary called the Virgin of virgins; for she, being the first who offered her virginity to God without the counsel or example of others, has brought to him all the virgins who imitate her. As David had already foretold: “After her shall virgins be brought to the king” (Ps. 44:15). Without counsel or example—yes; for St. Bernard exclaims: O Virgin, who taught you to please God by virginity, and to lead on earth the life of an angel? Ah, answers Sophronius, it is for this that God chose this most pure Virgin to be his Mother: that she might be an example of chastity to all. Hence St. Ambrose has called Mary the standard-bearer of chastity: “who raised aloft the standard of virginity.” By reason of this her purity, the Blessed Virgin was also called by the Holy Spirit beautiful as the turtle-dove: “Thy cheeks are beautiful as the turtle-dove’s” (Cant. 1:9). Mary, says St. Aponius, is a most chaste turtle-dove. And therefore she has also been called a lily: “As the lily among thorns, so is my love among the daughters” (Cant. 2:2). St. Denis the Carthusian, commenting on this passage, says that she has been called a lily among thorns because all other virgins were thorns, either to themselves or to others; but the Blessed Virgin was never a thorn to herself or to others. For by her very presence alone she infused into all thoughts and affections of purity. And this is confirmed by St. Thomas, who says that the beauty of the Blessed Virgin encouraged chastity in all who beheld her. St. Jerome holds the opinion that St. Joseph preserved his virginity through his companionship with Mary; for the saint writes thus against the heretic Helvidius, who denied the virginity of Mary: You say that Mary did not remain a virgin; I take it upon myself to maintain still more—that Joseph himself preserved his virginity through Mary. A certain author says that the Blessed Virgin so loved this virtue that, to preserve it, she would have been ready to renounce even the dignity of Mother of God. This we may gather from her own answer to the archangel, “How shall this be done, because I know not man?” (Luke 1:34), and from the words she afterward added, “Be it done to me according to thy word” (Luke 1:38)—signifying by this that she gave her consent on the condition the angel had assured her of: namely, that she should become a Mother by the operation of the Holy Spirit alone.
St. Ambrose says: He who has preserved chastity is an angel; he who has lost it is a devil. According to the words of our Lord: “They shall be as the angels of God in heaven” (Matt. 22:30). But the unchaste become odious to God like the devils. And St. Remigius said that the greater number of adults are lost through this vice. The victory over it is rare, as we have said in the words of St. Augustine at the beginning of this section; but why is it rare? Because the means of conquering it are not employed. The means are three, according to Bellarmine and the masters of the spiritual life: fasting, the avoidance of dangerous occasions, and prayer. By fasting is meant mortification, particularly of the eyes and of the appetite. Most holy Mary, although she was full of divine grace, was so mortified in her eyes that she kept them always cast down and never fixed them on anyone, as St. Epiphanius and St. John Damascene inform us; and they say that from her childhood she was so modest that she was the wonder of all. Hence St. Luke remarks that, in going to visit St. Elizabeth, “she went with haste”—that she might not be long seen in public. Philibert relates, regarding her food, that it was revealed to a hermit named Felix that the infant Mary took milk only once a day. And St. Gregory of Tours asserts that throughout her whole life she always fasted: “At no time did Mary fail to fast.” And St. Bonaventure adds that Mary would never have found so much grace had she not been temperate in food, for grace and gluttony cannot dwell together. In a word, Mary practiced mortification in everything, so that of her it was said: “My hands dropped with myrrh” (Cant. 5:5).
The second means is to flee the occasions of sin. “He that is aware of the snares shall be secure” (Prov. 11:15). Hence St. Philip Neri said that in this warfare the cowards conquer—that is, those who avoid the dangerous occasions. Mary shunned as much as possible the sight of men; and therefore St. Luke says that on her visit to St. Elizabeth she “went into the hill country with haste.” And a certain author remarks that the Virgin left Elizabeth before the birth of the Baptist, as we learn from the Gospel itself, in which it is said: “And Mary abode with her about three months, and she returned to her own house. Now Elizabeth’s full time of being delivered was come, and she brought forth a son” (Luke 1:56–57). And why did she not wait until his birth? In order to avoid the gatherings and visits that would follow that event. The third means is prayer. “And as I knew,” said the wise man, “that I could not otherwise be continent except God gave it… I went to the Lord and besought him” (Wisd. 8:21). And the Blessed Virgin revealed to St. Elizabeth, a Benedictine nun, that she had not acquired any virtue without effort and continual prayer. St. John Damascene says that Mary is pure and a lover of purity, and therefore cannot endure the impure; but whoever has recourse to her will certainly be delivered from this vice merely by pronouncing her name with confidence. And the venerable John of Avila says that many temptations against chastity have been overcome solely by devotion to the immaculate Virgin. O Mary, O most pure dove, how many are in hell through the vice of impurity! O Lady, obtain for us that in our temptations we may always have recourse to you, and invoke you, saying: Mary, Mary, help us. Amen.
The Poverty of Mary
Our loving Redeemer chose to be poor on this earth, in order to teach us to despise the goods of this world: “Being rich,” says St. Paul, “he became poor for your sakes, that through his poverty you might be rich” (2 Cor. 8:9). For this reason Jesus Christ says to everyone who wishes to be his disciple: “If thou wilt be perfect, go, sell what thou hast, and give to the poor… and come, follow me” (Matt. 19:21). Behold his most perfect disciple Mary, who indeed imitated his example. Father Canisius proves that the holy Virgin could have lived in comfort on the inheritance left her by her parents, but she was content to remain poor, reserving to herself only a small portion and giving the rest in alms to the temple and to the poor. Many are of the opinion that Mary also made a vow of poverty; and it is known that she herself said to St. Bridget: “From the beginning I vowed in my heart never to possess anything in the world.” The gifts received from the holy Magi were certainly not of small value, but St. Bernard attests that she distributed them all to the poor. And we learn that the divine Mother at once gave away to others the presents just mentioned, from the fact that when she went to the temple she did not offer a lamb—the oblation made by those who were able, as we read in Leviticus, “For a son she shall bring a lamb” (Lev. 12:6)—but offered two turtle-doves or two young pigeons, the oblation of the poor: “And to offer a sacrifice, according as it is written in the law of the Lord, a pair of turtle-doves or two young pigeons” (Luke 2:24). Mary herself said to St. Bridget: “All that I had I gave to the poor, and kept nothing for myself but poor food and clothing.”
Through love of poverty she did not disdain to marry a poor carpenter, St. Joseph, and afterward, as St. Bonaventure relates, to support herself by the work of her hands, sewing or spinning. An angel revealed to St. Bridget concerning Mary that worldly riches were in her eyes as vile as dirt. In a word, she always lived in poverty, and she died in poverty; for as Metaphrastes and Nicephorus relate, she left behind her at her death nothing but two poor garments, to two women who had assisted her during life.
He who loves riches, said St. Philip Neri, will never become a saint; and St. Teresa too said: It justly follows that he who goes in search of what is lost is himself lost. On the other hand, the same saint said that this virtue of poverty is a good that comprises all other goods. I have said the virtue of poverty, which, according to St. Bernard, does not consist in being poor alone, but in loving poverty: “Not poverty, but the love of poverty, is the virtue.” Therefore Jesus Christ has said: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” (Matt. 5:3)—blessed, because they who desire nothing but God find every good in God, and find in poverty their paradise on earth, as St. Francis found it in saying, “My God and my all.” Let us, then, according to the exhortation of St. Augustine, love that one good in which is every good: “Love the one good, in which are all good things.” And let us pray to our Lord with St. Ignatius: Give me only your love together with your grace, and I am rich enough. And when poverty afflicts us, let us console ourselves with the thought that Jesus and his Mother were also poor like us.
Ah, my most holy Mother, you had indeed reason to say that in God was your joy: “And my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Savior”; for in this world you desired and loved no other good than God. “Draw me after you.” O Lady, detach me from the world, and draw me after you, to love the one who alone deserves to be loved. Amen.
The Obedience of Mary
It was through the love that Mary bore to the virtue of obedience that, when the annunciation was made to her by St. Gabriel, she would not call herself by any other name than that of handmaid: “Behold the handmaid of the Lord” (Luke 1:38). Indeed, says St. Thomas of Villanova, this faithful handmaid never, in act, word, or thought, disobeyed the Lord; but, divested of all self-will, she lived always and in all things obedient to the divine will. She herself declared that God was pleased with her obedience when she said, “He hath regarded the humility of his handmaid” (Luke 1:48); for this is the humility of a servant: to be always prompt to obey. St. Augustine says that the divine Mother remedied by her obedience the evil that Eve had caused by her disobedience. The obedience of Mary was far more perfect than that of all the other saints; for since all men, through original sin, are inclined to evil, they all feel difficulty in doing right. Not so the Blessed Virgin; for as St. Bernardine says: Because she was free from original sin, there was in her no hindrance to obeying God, but she was like a wheel readily turned at every divine breath. Hence her only occupation on this earth, as the same saint expresses it, was to discover and do what was pleasing to God. Of her it was said: “My soul melted when he spoke” (Cant. 5:6). Commenting on this passage, Richard says that the soul of Mary was like metal in a state of fusion, ready to take whatever form was pleasing to God.
Mary indeed proved the readiness of her obedience, first, when, in order to please God, she was willing even to obey the Roman emperor and made the journey of ninety miles to Bethlehem, in winter, with child, and so poor that she was obliged to bring forth her Son in a stable. She was ready also, at the notice of St. Joseph, to set out immediately, that very night, on the longer and more difficult journey into Egypt. And Silveira asks why the command to flee into Egypt was given to St. Joseph and not to the Blessed Virgin, who was to suffer most from the journey; and he answers: Lest the Virgin should be deprived of an opportunity of performing an act of obedience, for which she was most ready. But above all, she showed her heroic obedience when, in order to obey the divine will, she offered her Son to death with such firmness that, as St. Ildephonsus says, she would have been ready to crucify him herself, had executioners been wanting. Hence the venerable Bede, commenting on those words of the Redeemer to the woman in the Gospel who exclaimed, “Blessed is the womb that bore thee”—“Yea, rather, blessed are they who hear the word of God and keep it” (Luke 11:27–28)—says that Mary was more happy through her obedience to the divine will than in being the Mother of God himself.
For this reason, those who love obedience are very pleasing to the Virgin. She once appeared in his cell to a Franciscan religious named Accorso who, being called by obedience to go and hear the confession of a sick person, went out; but when he returned he found Mary waiting for him, and she greatly praised his obedience. As, on the other hand, she greatly blamed another religious who, when the bell had summoned him to the refectory, delayed in order to finish certain devotions. The Virgin, speaking to St. Bridget of the security found in obeying a spiritual father, said: “Obedience has brought all the saints to glory.” St. Philip Neri also says that God requires no account of things done in obedience, having himself declared: “He that heareth you heareth me, and he that despiseth you despiseth me” (Luke 10:16). The Mother of God herself revealed to St. Bridget that, through the merit of her obedience, she had obtained from the Lord that all penitent sinners who have recourse to her should be pardoned. Ah, our Queen and Mother, pray to Jesus for us; obtain for us, through the merit of your obedience, that we may be faithful in obeying his will and the commands of our spiritual fathers. Amen.
The Patience of Mary
Since this earth is a place of merit, it is justly called a valley of tears; for we are all placed here to suffer, and by patience to obtain eternal life for our souls: “In your patience you shall possess your souls” (Luke 21:19), said our Lord. God gave us the Virgin Mary as an example of all the virtues, but especially as an example of patience. St. Francis de Sales, among other things, remarks that at the marriage of Cana Jesus Christ gave the most holy Virgin an answer by which he seemed to pay but little regard to her prayer—“Woman, what is that to me and to thee?”—precisely for this reason: that he might give us an example of the patience of his holy Mother. But why seek further? The whole life of Mary was a continual exercise of patience; for, as an angel revealed to St. Bridget, the Blessed Virgin lived always in the midst of sufferings. Her compassion alone for the sufferings of the Redeemer was enough to make her a martyr of patience; wherefore St. Bonaventure says: “The crucified conceived the crucified.” When we spoke of her sorrows, we considered all she suffered, both in her journey and her life in Egypt, and during the whole time she lived with her Son in the workshop of Nazareth. But the presence of Mary on Calvary, with her dying Jesus, is alone enough to show us how constant and sublime was her patience: “There stood by the cross of Jesus his mother.” Then, by the merit of this her patience, as Blessed Albert the Great remarks, she became our Mother, and brought us forth to the life of grace.
If, then, we desire to be the children of Mary, we must seek to imitate her patience. And what, says St. Cyprian, can enrich us more with merit in this life, and with glory in the next, than the bearing of sufferings with patience? God said by the mouth of the prophet Osee: “I will hedge up thy way with thorns” (Osee 2:6). St. Gregory remarks on this passage that the ways of the elect are hedged with thorns; for as a hedge of thorns protects the vine, so God encompasses his servants with tribulation, that they may not become attached to the earth. Therefore St. Cyprian concludes that patience delivers us from sin and from hell. And it is patience that makes the saints: “Patience hath a perfect work” (James 1:4)—the bearing in peace both of the crosses that come to us directly from God, such as sickness and poverty, and of those that come to us from men, such as persecutions and injuries. St. John saw all the saints with palms, the emblem of martyrdom, in their hands: “After this I saw a great multitude… and palms were in their hands” (Apoc. 7:9); signifying by this that all men must be martyrs, either by the sword or by patience. Be joyful, then, exclaims St. Gregory: we can be martyrs without blood, if we preserve our patience. If we suffer the afflictions of this life patiently and joyfully, as St. Bernard says, oh, how much will every pain endured for God obtain for us in heaven! Hence the Apostle encourages us in these words: “That which is at present momentary and light of our tribulation worketh for us… an eternal weight of glory” (2 Cor. 4:17). Beautiful are the instructions of St. Teresa on this subject: “He who embraces the cross,” she says, “does not feel it.” And again: “When a person resolves to suffer, the pain is over.” And if we feel our crosses heavy, let us have recourse to Mary, who is called by the Church the comforter of the afflicted, and by St. John Damascene the remedy for all sorrows of the heart. Ah, my most sweet Lady, you, though innocent, suffered with so much patience; and shall I, who deserve hell, refuse to suffer? My Mother, today I ask of you the grace, not to be exempt from crosses, but to bear them with patience. For the love of Jesus I pray you to obtain for me nothing less than this grace from God; through you I hope for it.
The Spirit of Prayer of Mary
No soul on this earth has ever followed so perfectly as the Blessed Virgin that great lesson of our Savior: “We ought always to pray, and not to faint” (Luke 18:1). From no other, says St. Bonaventure, can we better take example, and learn the necessity of persevering in prayer, than from Mary: Mary gave an example that we ought to follow, and not to faint. For Blessed Albert the Great asserts that, after Jesus Christ, the divine Mother was the most perfect in the virtue of prayer of all who ever have lived or ever will live: “The virtue of prayer in the Blessed Virgin was most excellent.” First, because her prayer was continual and persevering. From the first moment in which she had life, and with life the perfect use of reason—as we said above in the discourse on her Nativity—she began to pray. And moreover, that she might devote herself more to prayer, she wished, when only three years of age, to shut herself up in the retirement of the temple, where, as she herself revealed to St. Elizabeth, the Benedictine nun, among the other hours she allotted to prayer, she was accustomed to rise at midnight and go to pray before the altar of the temple. And, in order to meditate on the sufferings of Jesus, according to Odilo, she also frequently visited the places of our Lord’s nativity, passion, and burial. Moreover, her prayer, as St. Denis the Carthusian has written, was wholly recollected, free from all distractions and from every disordered inclination.
Therefore the Blessed Virgin, through her love of prayer, had so great a love of solitude that, as she said to St. Bridget, when she lived in the temple she even refrained from the company of her holy parents. St. Jerome, meditating on the words of Isaias—“Behold a virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and his name shall be called Emmanuel” (Isa. 7:14)—says that in Hebrew the word virgin properly signifies a secluded virgin; so that Mary’s love of solitude was already foretold by the prophet. Richard says that the angel addressed her with the words “The Lord is with thee” on account of her great love of solitude. And St. Vincent Ferrer asserts that the divine Mother never went out from home except to go to the temple, and then she went wholly recollected, having her eyes always cast down. When she went to visit St. Elizabeth, “she went with haste”; and from this, St. Ambrose says, virgins should learn to shun the public eye. St. Bernard teaches that Mary, through her love of prayer and solitude, was always careful to avoid conversation with men. Hence she is called by the Holy Spirit the turtle-dove: “Thy cheeks are beautiful as the turtle-dove’s” (Cant. 1:9). Which words Vergellus thus explains: The turtle-dove is a lover of solitude, and is an emblem of the unitive power of the soul. So the Virgin always lived solitary in this world, as in a desert; and therefore it was said of her: “Who is she that goeth up by the desert, as a pillar of smoke?” (Cant. 3:6). On which words Rupert the Abbot says: Thus did you ascend by the desert, having a solitary soul.
Philo said that God speaks to souls only in solitude: “The word of God loves the desert places.” And God himself declared this by the prophet Osee when he said: “I will lead her into the wilderness, and I will speak to her heart” (Osee 2:14). And hence St. Jerome exclaims: O solitude, in which God familiarly converses with his servants! Yes, says St. Bernard, because the quiet and the silence enjoyed in solitude force the soul to leave the earth in thought and to meditate on the things of heaven. O most holy Virgin, obtain for us a love of prayer and of solitude, that, detaching ourselves from the love of creatures, we may aspire only after God and heaven, where we hope one day to see you, to praise and love you, with your Son Jesus, forever and ever. Amen.
“Come over to me, all ye that desire me, and be filled with my fruits” (Ecclus. 24:26). The fruits of Mary are her virtues.
None has appeared like to you, in all the ages before you or after you. You alone, O woman without equal, have been pleasing to Christ.
Points for Reflection
1. “As no creature after the Son of God has risen so high in the dignity of grace, so none has descended so deep into the abyss of humility.”
2. “The purer and the more emptied of self a heart is, the more it will be filled with charity toward God.”
3. “We can be martyrs without blood, if we preserve our patience.”