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***                    THE SECRET OF MARY
                       ==================   
    
                         INTRODUCTION    
    
1.   Here is a secret, chosen soul, which the most High God    
taught me and which I have not found in any book, ancient or    
modern.  Inspired by the Holy Spirit, I am confiding it to    
you, with these conditions:    
     (1) That you share it only with people who deserve to    
know it because they are prayerful, give alms to the poor, do    
penance, suffer persecution, are unworldly, and work seriously    
for the salvation of souls.    
     (2) That you use this secret to become holy and worthy of    
heaven, for the more you make use of it the more benefit you    
will derive from it.  Under no circumstances must you let this    
secret make you idle and inactive.  It would then become    
harmful and lead to your ruin.    
     (3) That you thank God every day of your life for the    
grace he has given you in letting you into a secret that you    
do not deserve  to know.    
     As you go on using this secret in the ordinary actions of    
your life, you will come to understand its value and its    
excellent quality.  At the beginning, however, your    
understanding of it will be clouded because of the seriousness    
and number of your sins, and your unconscious love of self.    
    
2.   Before you read any further, in an understandable    
impatience to learn this truth, kneel down and say devoutly    
the Ave Maris Stella ("Hail, thou star of ocean"), and the    
"Come, Holy Spirit", to ask God to help you understand and    
appreciate this secret given by him.  As I have not much time    
for writing and you have little time for reading, I will be    
brief in what I have to say.    
    
       [1. NECESSITY OF HAVING A TRUE DEVOTION TO MARY]    
    
[A. THE GRACE OF GOD IS ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY]    
    
3.   Chosen soul, living image of God and redeemed by the    
precious blood of Jesus Christ, God wants you to become holy    
like him in this life, and glorious like him in the next .    
     It is certain that growth in the holiness of God is your    
vocation.  All your thoughts, words, actions, everything you    
suffer or undertake must lead you towards that end.  Otherwise    
you are resisting God in not doing the work for which he    
created you and for which he is even now keeping you in being.     
What a marvellous transformation is possible!  Dust into    
light, uncleanness into purity, sinfulness into holiness,    
creature into Creator, man into God!  A marvellous work, I    
repeat, so difficult in itself, and even impossible for a mere    
creature to bring about, for only God can accomplish it by    
giving his grace abundantly and in an extraordinary manner.     
The very creation of the universe is not as great an    
achievement as this.    
    
4.   Chosen soul, how will you bring this about?  What steps    
will you take to reach the high level to which God is calling    
you?  The means of holiness and salvation are known to    
everybody, since they are found in the gospel;  the masters of    
the spiritual life have explained them; the saints have    
practised them and shown how essential they are for those who    
wish to be saved and attain perfection.  These means are:    
sincere humility, unceasing prayer, complete self-denial,    
abandonment to divine Providence, and obedience to the will of    
God.    
    
5.   The grace and help of God are absolutely necessary for us    
to practise all these, but we are sure that grace will be    
given to all, though not in the same measure.  I say "not in    
the same measure", because God does not give his graces in    
equal measure to everyone , although in his infinite goodness    
he always gives sufficient grace to each.  A person who    
corresponds to great graces performs great works, and one who    
corresponds to lesser graces performs lesser works.  The value    
and high standard of our actions corresponds to the value and    
perfection of the grace given by God and responded to by the    
faithful soul.  No one can contest these principles.    
    
[B. TO FIND THE GRACE OF GOD, WE MUST DISCOVER MARY]    
    
6.   It all comes to this, then.  We must discover a simple    
means to obtain from God the grace needed to become holy.  It    
is precisely this I wish to teach you.  My contention is that    
you must first discover Mary if you would obtain this grace    
from God.    
    
7.   Let me explain:    
     (1)  Mary alone found grace with God for herself and for    
every individual person .  No patriarch or prophet or any    
other holy person of the Old Law could manage to find this    
grace.    
    
8.   (2)  It was Mary who gave existence and life to the    
author of all grace, and because of this she is called the    
"Mother of Grace".    
    
9.   (3)  God the Father, from whom, as from its essential    
source, every perfect gift and every grace come down to us ,    
gave her every grace when he gave her his Son.  Thus, as St    
Bernard says, the will of God is manifested to her in Jesus    
and with Jesus.    
    
10.  (4) God chose her to be the treasurer, the administrator    
and the dispenser of all his graces, so that all his graces    
and gifts pass through her hands.  Such is the power that she    
has received from him that, according to St Bernardine, she    
gives the graces of the eternal Father, the virtues of Jesus    
Christ, and the gifts of the Holy Spirit to whom she wills, as    
and when she wills, and as much as she wills.    
    
11.  (5) As in the natural life a child must have a father and    
a mother, so in the supernatural life of grace a true child of    
the Church must have God for his Father and Mary for his    
mother.  If he prides himself on having God for his Father but    
does not give to Mary the tender affection of a true child, he    
is an impostor and his father is the devil.    
    
12.  (6) Since Mary produced the head of the elect, Jesus    
Christ, she must also produce the members of that head, that    
is, all true Christians.  A mother does not conceive a head    
without members, nor members without a head.  If anyone, then,    
wishes to become a member of Jesus Christ, and consequently be    
filled with grace and truth , he must be formed in Mary    
through the grace of Jesus Christ, which she possesses with a    
fullness enabling her to communicate it abundantly to true    
members of Jesus Christ, her true children.    
    
13.  (7) The Holy Spirit espoused Mary and produced his    
greatest work, the incarnate Word, in her, by her and through    
her.  He has never disowned her and so he continues to produce    
every day, in a mysterious but very real manner, the souls of    
the elect in her and through her.    
    
14.  (8) Mary received from God a unique dominion over souls    
enabling her to nourish them and make them more and more    
godlike.  St Augustine went so far as to say that even in this    
world all the elect are enclosed in the womb of Mary, and that    
their real birthday is when this good mother brings them forth    
to eternal life.  Consequently, just as an infant draws all    
its nourishment from its mother, who gives according to its    
needs, so the elect draw their spiritual nourishment and all    
their strength from Mary.    
    
15.  (9) It was to Mary that God the Father said, "Dwell in    
Jacob", that is, dwell in my elect who are typified by Jacob.     
It was to Mary that God the Son said, "My dear Mother, your    
inheritance is in Israel", that is, in the elect.  It was to    
Mary that the Holy Spirit said,"Place your roots in my elect".     
Whoever, then, is of the chosen and predestinate will have the    
Blessed Virgin living within him, and he will let her plant in    
his very soul  the roots of every virtue, but especially deep    
humility and ardent charity.    
    
16.  (10) Mary is called by St Augustine, and is indeed, the    
"living mould of God" .  In her alone the God-man was formed    
in his human nature without losing any feature of the Godhead.     
In her alone, by the grace of Jesus Christ, man is made    
godlike as far as human nature is capable of it.    
     A sculptor can make a statue or a life-like model in two    
ways: (i) By using his skill, strength, experience and good    
tools to produce a statue out of hard, shapeless matter; (ii)    
By making a cast of it in a mould.  The first way is long and    
involved and open to all sorts of accidents.  It only needs a    
faulty stroke of the chisel or hammer to ruin the whole work.     
The second is quick, easy, straightforward, almost effortless    
and inexpensive, but the mould must be perfect and true to    
life and the material must be easy to handle and offer no    
resistance.    
    
17.  Mary is the great mould of God, fashioned by the Holy    
Spirit to give human nature to a Man who is God by the    
hypostatic union, and to fashion through grace men who are    
like to God.  No godly feature is missing from this mould.     
Everyone who casts himself into it and allows himself to be    
moulded will acquire every feature of Jesus Christ, true God,    
with little pain or effort, as befits his weak human    
condition.  He will take on a faithful likeness to Jesus with    
no possibility of distortion, for the devil has never had and    
never will have any access to Mary, the holy and immaculate    
Virgin, in whom there is not the least suspicion of a stain of    
sin.    
    
18.  Dear friend, what a difference there is between a soul    
brought up in the ordinary way to resemble Jesus Christ by    
people who, like sculptors, rely on their own skill and    
industry, and a soul thoroughly tractable, entirely detached,    
most ready to be moulded in her by the working of the Holy    
Spirit.  What blemishes and defects, what shadows and    
distortions, what natural and human imperfections are found in    
the first soul, and what a faithful and divine likeness to    
Jesus is found in the second!    
    
19.  There is not and there will never be, either in God's    
creation or in his mind, a creature in whom he is so honoured    
as in the most Blessed Virgin Mary, not excepting even the    
saints, the cherubim or the highest seraphim in heaven.    
     Mary is God's garden of Paradise, his own unspeakable    
world, into which his Son entered to do wonderful things, to    
tend it and to take his delight in it.  He created a world for    
the wayfarer, that is, the one we are living in.  He created a    
second world - Paradise - for the Blessed.  He created a third    
for himself, which he named Mary.  She is a world unknown to    
most mortals here on earth.  Even the angels and saints in    
heaven find her incomprehensible, and are lost in admiration    
of a God who is so exalted and so far above them, so distant    
from them, and so enclosed in Mary, his chosen world, that    
they exclaim: "Holy, holy, holy" unceasingly.    
    
20.  Happy, indeed sublimely happy, is the person to whom the    
Holy Spirit reveals the secret of Mary, thus imparting to him    
true knowledge of her.  Happy the person to whom the Holy    
Spirit opens this enclosed garden for him to enter, and to    
whom the Holy Spirit gives access to this sealed fountain    
where he can draw water and drink deep draughts of the living    
waters of grace.  That person will find only grace and no    
creature in the most lovable Virgin Mary.  But he will find    
that the infinitely holy and exalted God is at the same time    
infinitely solicitous for him and understands his weaknesses.     
Since God is everywhere, he can be found everywhere, even in    
hell.  But there is no place where God can be more present to    
his creature and more sympathetic to human weakness than in    
Mary.  It was indeed for this very purpose that he came down    
from heaven.  Everywhere else he is the Bread of the strong    
and the Bread of angels, but living in Mary he is the Bread of    
children.    
    
21.  Let us not imagine, then, as some misguided teachers do,    
that Mary being simply a creature would be a hindrance to    
union with the Creator.  Far from it, for it is no longer Mary    
who lives but Jesus Christ himself, God alone, who lives in    
her.  Her transformation into God far surpasses that    
experienced by St Paul and other saints, more than heaven    
surpasses the earth.    
     Mary was created only for God, and it is unthinkable that    
she should reserve even one soul for herself.  On the contrary    
she leads every soul to God and to union with him.  Mary is    
the wonderful echo of God.  The more a person joins himself to    
her, the more effectively she unites him to God.  When we say    
"Mary", she re-echoes "God".    
     When, like St Elizabeth, we call her blessed, she gives    
the honour to God.  If those misguided ones who were so sadly    
led astray by the devil, even in their prayer-life, had known    
how to discover Mary, and Jesus through her, and God through    
Jesus,they would not have had such terrible falls.  The saints    
tell us that when we have once found Mary, and through Mary    
Jesus, and through Jesus God the Father, then we have    
discovered every good.  When we say "every good", we except    
nothing.  "Every good" includes every grace, continuous    
friendship with God, every protection against the enemies of    
God, possession of truth to counter every falsehood, endless    
benefits and unfailing headway against the hazards we meet on    
the way to salvation, and finally every consolation and joy    
amid the bitter afflictions of life.    
    
22.  This does not mean that one who has discovered Mary    
through a genuine devotion is exempt from crosses and    
sufferings.  Far from it!  One is tried even more than others,    
because Mary, as Mother of the living, gives to all her    
children splinters of the tree of life, which is the Cross of    
Jesus.  But while meting out crosses to them she gives the    
grace to bear them with patience, and even with joy.  In this    
way, the crosses she sends to those who trust themselves to    
her are rather like sweetmeats, i.e. "sweetened" crosses    
rather than "bitter" ones.  If from time to time they do taste    
the bitterness of the chalice from which we must drink to    
become proven friends of God, the consolation and joy which    
their Mother sends in the wake of their sorrows creates in    
them a strong desire to carry even heavier and still more    
bitter crosses.    
    
[C. A TRUE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN IS INDISPENSABLE]    
    
23.  The difficulty, then, is how to arrive at the true    
knowledge of the most holy Virgin and so find grace in    
abundance through her.  God, as the absolute Master, can give    
directly what he ordinarily dispenses only through Mary, and    
it would be rash to deny that he sometimes does so.  However,    
St Thomas assures us that, following the order established by    
his divine Wisdom, God ordinarily imparts his graces to men    
through Mary.  Therefore, if we wish to go to him, seeking    
union with him, we must use the same means which he used in    
coming down from heaven to assume our human nature and to    
impart his graces to us.  That means was a complete dependence    
on Mary his Mother, which is true devotion to her.    
    
        [2. WHAT PERFECT DEVOTION TO MARY CONSISTS IN]    
    
[A. SOME TRUE DEVOTIONS TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY]    
    
24.  There are indeed several true devotions to our Lady.  I    
do not intend treating of those which are false.    
    
25.  The first consists in fulfilling the duties of our    
Christian state, avoiding all mortal sin, performing our    
actions for God more through love than through fear, praying    
to our Lady occasionally, and honouring her as the Mother of    
God, but without our devotion to her being exceptional.    
    
26.  The second consists in entertaining for our Lady deeper    
feelings of esteem and love, of confidence and veneration.     
This devotion inspires us to join the confraternities of the    
Holy Rosary and the Scapular, to say the five or fifteen    
decades of the Rosary, to venerate our Lady's pictures and    
shrines, to make her known to others, and to enrol in her    
sodalities.  This devotion, in keeping us from sin, is good,    
holy and praiseworthy, but it is not as perfect as the third,    
nor as effective in detaching us from creatures, or in    
practising that self-denial necessary for union with Jesus    
Christ.    
    
27.  The third devotion to our Lady is one which is unknown to    
many and practised by very few.  This is the one I am about to    
present to you.    
    
[B. THE PERFECT PRACTICE OF DEVOTION TO MARY]    
    
[1.  What it consists in]    
    
28.  Chosen soul, this devotion consists in surrendering    
oneself in the manner of a slave to Mary, and to Jesus through    
her, and then performing all our actions with Mary, in Mary,    
through Mary, and for Mary.    
     Let me explain this statement further.    
    
29.  We should choose a special feast-day on which to give    
ourselves.  Then, willingly and lovingly and under no    
constraint, we consecrate and sacrifice to her unreservedly    
our body and soul.  We give to her our material possessions,    
such as house, family, income, and even the inner possessions    
of our soul, namely, our merits, graces, virtues and    
atonements.    
     Notice that in this devotion we sacrifice to Jesus    
through Mary all that is most dear to us, that is, the right    
to dispose of ourselves, of the value of our prayers and alms,    
of our acts of self-denial and atonements.  This is a    
sacrifice which no religious order would require of its    
members.  We leave everything to the free disposal of our    
Lady, for her to use as she wills for the greater glory of    
God, of which she alone is perfectly aware.    
    
30.  We leave to her the right to dispose of all the    
satisfactory and prayer value of our good deeds, so that,    
after having done so and without going so far as making a vow,    
we cease to be master over any good we do.  Our Lady may use    
our good deeds either to bring relief or deliverance to a soul    
in purgatory, or perhaps to bring a change of heart to a poor    
sinner.    
    
31.  By this devotion we place our merits in the hands of our    
Lady, but only that she may preserve, increase and embellish    
them, since merit for increase of grace and glory cannot be    
handed over to any other person.  But we give to her all our    
prayers and good works, inasmuch as they have intercessory and    
atonement value, for her to distribute and apply to whom she    
pleases.  If, after having thus consecrated ourselves to our    
Lady, we wish to help a soul in purgatory, rescue a sinner, or    
assist a friend by a prayer, an alms, an act of self-denial or    
an act of self-sacrifice, we must humbly request it of our    
Lady, abiding always by her decision, which of course remains    
unknown to us.  We can be fully convinced that the value of    
our actions, being dispensed by that same hand which God    
himself uses to distribute his gifts and graces to us, cannot    
fail to be applied for his greatest glory.    
    
32.  I have said that this devotion consists in adopting the    
status of a slave with regard to Mary.  We must remember that    
there are three kinds of slavery.    
     There is, first, a slavery based on nature.  All men,    
good and bad alike, are slaves of God in this sense.    
     The second is a slavery of compulsion.  The devils and    
the damned are slaves of God in this second sense.    
     The third is a slavery of love and free choice.  This is    
the kind chosen by one who consecrates himself to God through    
Mary, and this is the most perfect way for us human beings to    
give ourselves to God, our Creator.    
    
33.  Note that there is a vast difference between a servant    
and a slave.  A servant claims wages for his services, but a    
slave can claim no reward.  A servant is free to leave his    
employer when he likes and serves him only for a time, but a    
slave belongs to his master for life and has no right to leave    
him.  A servant does not give his employer a right of life and    
death over him, but a slave is so totally committed that his    
master can put him to death without fearing any action by the    
law.    
     It is easy to see, then, that no dependence is so    
absolute as that of a person who is a slave by compulsion.     
Strictly speaking, no man should be dependent to this extent    
on anyone except his Creator.  We therefore do not find this    
kind of slavery among Christians, but only among Muslims and    
pagans.    
    
34.  But happy, very happy indeed, will the generous person be    
who, prompted by love, consecrates himself entirely to Jesus    
through Mary as their slave, after having shaken off by    
baptism the tyrannical slavery of the devil.    
    
[2.  The excellence of this practice of devotion]    
    
35.  I would need much more enlightenment from heaven to    
describe adequately the surpassing merit of this devotional    
practice.  I shall limit myself to these few remarks:    
     1. In giving ourselves to Jesus through Mary's hands, we    
imitate God the Father, who gave us his only Son through Mary,    
and who imparts his graces to us only through Mary.  Likewise    
we imitate God the Son, who by giving us his example for us to    
follow, inspires us to go to him using the same means he used    
in coming to us, that is, through Mary.  Again, we imitate the    
Holy Spirit, who bestows his graces and gifts upon us through    
Mary.  "Is it not fitting," remarks St Bernard, "that grace    
should return to its author by the same channel that conveyed    
it to us?"    
    
36.  2. In going to Jesus through Mary, we are really paying    
honour to our Lord, for we are showing that, because of our    
sins, we are unworthy to approach his infinite holiness    
directly on our own.  We are showing that we need Mary, his    
holy Mother, to be our advocate and mediatrix with him who is    
our Mediator.  We are going to Jesus as Mediator and Brother,    
and at the same time humbling ourselves before him who is our    
God and our Judge.  In short, we are practising humility,    
something which always gladdens the heart of God.    
    
37.  3. Consecrating ourselves in this way to Jesus through    
Mary implies placing our good deeds in Mary's hands.  Now,    
although these deeds may appear good to us, they are often    
defective, and not worthy to be considered and accepted by    
God, before whom even the stars lack brightness.    
     Let us pray, then, to our dear Mother and Queen that    
having accepted our poor present, she may purify it, sanctify    
it, beautify it, and so make it worthy of God.  Any good our    
soul could produce is of less value to God our Father, in    
winning his friendship and favour, than a worm-eaten apple    
would be in the sight of a king, when presented by a poor    
peasant to his royal master as payment for the rent of his    
farm.  But what would the peasant do if he were wise and if he    
enjoyed the esteem of the queen?  Would he not present his    
apple first to her, and would she not, out of kindness to the    
poor man and out of respect for the king, remove from the    
apple all that was maggoty and spoilt, place it on a golden    
dish, and surround it with flowers?  Could the king then    
refuse the apple?  Would he not accept it most willingly from    
the hands of his queen who showed such loving concern for that    
poor man?  "If you wish to present something to God, no matter    
how small it may be," says St Bernard, "place it in the hands    
of Mary to ensure its certain acceptance."    
    
38.  Dear God, how everything we do comes to so very little!     
But let us adopt this devotion and place everything in Mary's    
hands.  When we have given her all we possibly can, emptying    
ourselves completely to do her honour, she far surpasses our    
generosity and gives us very much for very little.  She    
enriches us with her own merits and virtues.  She places our    
gift on the golden dish of her charity and clothes us, as    
Rebecca clothed Jacob, in the beautiful garments of her first-    
born and only Son, Jesus Christ, which are his merits, and    
which are at her disposal.  Thus, as her servants and slaves,    
stripping ourselves of everything to do her honour, we are    
clad by her in double garments - namely, the garments,    
adornments, perfumes, merits and virtues of Jesus and Mary.    
These are imparted to the soul of the slave who has emptied    
himself and is resolved to remain in that state.    
    
39.  4. Giving ourselves in this way to our Lady is a practice    
of charity towards our neighbour of the highest possible    
degree, because in making ourselves over to Mary, we give her    
all that we hold most dear and we let her dispose of it as she    
wishes in favour of the living and the dead.    
    
40.  5. In adopting this devotion, we put our graces, merits    
and virtues into safe keeping by making Mary the depositary of    
them.  It is as if we said to her,"See, my dear Mother, here    
is the good that I have done through the grace of your dear    
Son.  I am not capable of keeping it, because of my weakness    
and inconstancy, and also because so many wicked enemies are    
assailing me day and night.  Alas, every day we see cedars of    
Lebanon fall into the mire, and eagles which had soared    
towards the sun become birds of darkness, a thousand of the    
just falling to the left and ten thousand to the right.  But,    
most powerful Queen, hold me fast lest I fall.  Keep a guard    
on all my possessions lest I be robbed of them.  I entrust all    
I have to you, for I know well who you are, and that is why I    
confide myself entirely to you.  You are faithful to God and    
man, and you will not suffer anything I entrust to you to    
perish.  You are powerful, and nothing can harm you or rob you    
of anything you hold."    
     "When you follow Mary you will not go astray; when you    
pray to her, you will not despair; when your mind is on her,    
you will not wander; when she holds you up, you will not fall;    
when she protects you, you will have no fear; when she guides    
you, you will feel no fatigue; when she is on your side, you    
will arrive safely home" (Saint Bernard).  And again, "She    
keeps her Son from striking us; she prevents the devil from    
harming us; she preserves virtue in us; she prevents our    
merits from being lost and our graces from receding."  These    
words of St Bernard explain in substance all that I have said.     
Had I but this one motive to impel me to choose this devotion,    
namely, that of keeping me in the grace of God and increasing    
that grace in me, my heart would burn with longing for it.    
    
41.  This devotion makes the soul truly free by imbuing it    
with the liberty of the children of God.  Since we lower    
ourselves willingly to a state of slavery out of love for    
Mary, our dear Mother, she out of gratitude opens wide our    
hearts enabling us to walk with giant strides in the way of    
God's commandments.  She delivers our souls from weariness,    
sadness and scruples.  It was this devotion that our Lord    
taught to Mother Agnes de Langeac, a religious who died in the    
odour of sanctity, as a sure way of being freed from the    
severe suffering and confusion of mind which afflicted her.     
"Make yourself," she said, "my Mother's slave and wear her    
little chain."  She did so, and from that time onwards her    
troubles ceased.    
    
42.  To prove that this devotion is authoritatively    
sanctioned, we need only recall the bulls of the popes and the    
pastoral letters of bishops recommending it, as well as the    
indulgences accorded to it, the confraternities founded to    
promote it, and the examples of many saints and illustrious    
people who have practised it.  But I do not see any necessity    
to record them here.    
    
[3.  The interior constituents of this consecration and its    
spirit]    
    
43.  I have already said that this devotion consists in    
performing all our actions with Mary, in Mary, through Mary,    
and for Mary.    
    
44.  It is not enough to give ourselves just once as a slave    
to Jesus through Mary; nor is it enough to renew that    
consecration once a month or once a week.  That alone would    
make it just a passing devotion and would not raise the soul    
to the level of holiness which it is capable of reaching.  It    
is easy to enrol in a confraternity; easy to undertake this    
devotion, and say every day the few vocal prayers prescribed.     
The chief difficulty is to enter into its spirit, which    
requires an interior dependence on Mary, and effectively    
becoming her slave and the slave of Jesus through her.  I have    
met many people who with admirable zeal have set about    
practising exteriorly this holy slavery of Jesus and Mary, but    
I have met only a few who have caught its interior spirit, and    
fewer still who have persevered in it.    
    
                                                 Act with Mary    
    
45.  1. The essential practice of this devotion is to perform    
all our actions with Mary.  This means that we must take her    
as the accomplished model for all we have to do.    
    
46.  Before undertaking anything, we must forget self and    
abandon our own views.  We must consider ourselves as a mere    
nothing before God, as being personally incapable of doing    
anything supernaturally worthwhile or anything conducive to    
our salvation.  We must have habitual recourse to our Lady,    
becoming one with her and adopting her intentions, even though    
they are unknown to us.  Through Mary we must adopt the    
intentions of Jesus.  In other words, we must become an    
instrument in Mary's hands for her to act in us and do with us    
what she pleases, for the greater glory of her Son; and    
through Jesus for the greater glory of the Father.  In this    
way , we pursue our interior life and make spiritual progress    
only in dependence on Mary.    
    
                                                   Act in Mary    
    
47.  2. We must always act in Mary, that is to say, we must    
gradually acquire the habit of recollecting ourselves    
interiorly and so form within us an idea or a spiritual image    
of Mary.  She must become, as it were, an Oratory for the soul    
where we offer up our prayers to God without fear of being    
ignored.  She will be as a Tower of David for us where we can    
seek safety from all our enemies.  She will be a burning lamp    
lighting up our inmost soul and inflaming us with love for    
God.  She will be a sacred place of repose where we can    
contemplate God in her company.  Finally Mary will be the only    
means we will use in going to God, and she will become our    
intercessor for everything we need.  When we pray we will pray    
in Mary.  When we receive Jesus in Holy Communion we will    
place him in Mary for him to take his delight in her.  If we    
do anything at all, it will be in Mary, and in this way Mary    
will help us to forget self everywhere and in all things.      
    
                                              Act through Mary    
    
48.  3. We must never go to our Lord except through Mary,    
using her intercession and good standing with him.  We must    
never be without her when praying to Jesus.    
    
                                                  Act for Mary    
    
49.  4. We must perform all our actions for Mary, which means    
that as slaves of this noble Queen we will work only for her,    
promoting her interests and her high renown, and making this    
the first aim in all our acts, while the glory of God will    
always be our final end.  In everything we must renounce self-    
love because more often than not, without our being aware of    
it, selfishness sets itself up as the end of all we work for.     
We should often repeat from the depths of our heart: "Dear    
Mother, it is to please you that I go here or there, that I do    
this or that, that I suffer this pain or this injury."      
    
50.  Beware, chosen soul, of thinking that it is more perfect    
to direct your work and intention straight to Jesus or    
straight to God.  Without Mary, your work and your intention    
will be of little value.  But if you go to God through Mary,    
your work will become Mary's work, and consequently will be    
most noble and most worthy of God.    
    
51.  Again, beware of doing violence to yourself, endeavouring    
to experience pleasure in your prayers and good deeds.  Pray    
and act always with something of that pure faith which Mary    
showed when on earth, and which she will share with you as    
time goes on.  Poor little slave, let your sovereign Queen    
enjoy the clear sight of God, the raptures, delights,    
satisfactions and riches of heaven.  Content yourself with a    
pure faith, which is accompanied by repugnance, distractions,    
weariness and dryness.  Let your prayer be: "To whatever Mary    
my Queen does in heaven, I say Amen, so be it."  We cannot do    
better than this for the time being.    
    
52.  Should you not savour immediately the sweet presence of    
the Blessed Virgin within you, take great care not to torment    
yourself.  For this is a grace not given to everyone, and even    
when God in his great mercy favours a soul with this grace, it    
remains none the less very easy to lose it, except when the    
soul has become permanently aware of it through the habit of    
recollection.  But should this misfortune happen to you, go    
back calmly to your sovereign Queen and make amends to her.    
    
[4. The effects that this devotion produces in a faithful    
soul]    
    
53   Experience will teach you much more about this devotion    
than I can tell you, but, if you remain faithful to the little    
I have taught you, you will acquire a great richness of grace    
that will surprise you and fill you with delight.    
    
54.  Let us set to work, then, dear soul, through perseverance    
in the living of this devotion, in order that Mary's soul may    
glorify the Lord in us and her spirit be within us to rejoice    
in God her Saviour.  Let us not think that there was more    
glory and happiness in dwelling in Abraham's bosom - which is    
another name for Paradise - than in dwelling in the bosom of    
Mary where God has set up his throne. (Abbot Guerric)    
    
55.  This devotion faithfully practised produces countless    
happy effects in the soul.  The most important of them is that     
it establishes, even here on earth, Mary's life in the soul,    
so that it is no longer the soul that lives, but Mary who    
lives in it.  In a manner of speaking, Mary's soul becomes    
identified with the soul of her servant.  Indeed when by an    
unspeakable but real grace Mary most holy becomes Queen of a    
soul, she works untold wonders in it.  She is a great wonder-    
worker especially in the interior of souls.  She works there    
in secret, unsuspected by the soul, as knowledge of it might    
destroy the beauty of her work.    
    
56.  As Mary is everywhere the fruitful Virgin, she produces    
in the depths of the soul where she dwells a purity of heart    
and body, a singleness of intention and purpose, and a    
fruitfulness in good works.  Do not think, dear soul, that    
Mary, the most faithful of all God's creatures, who went as    
far as to give birth to a God-man, remains idle in a docile    
soul.  She causes Jesus to live continuously in that soul and    
that soul to live in continuous union with Jesus.  If Jesus is    
equally the fruit of Mary for each individual soul as for all    
souls in general, he is even more especially her fruit and her    
masterpiece in the soul where she is present.    
    
57.  To sum up, Mary becomes all things for the soul that    
wishes to serve Jesus Christ.  She enlightens his mind with    
her pure faith.  She deepens his heart with her humility.  She    
enlarges and inflames his heart with her charity, makes it    
pure with her purity, makes it noble and great through her    
motherly care.  But why dwell any longer on this?  Experience    
alone will teach us the wonders wrought by Mary in the soul,    
wonders so great that the wise and the proud, and even a great    
number of devout people find it hard to credit them.    
    
58.  As it was through Mary that God came into the world the    
first time in a state of self-abasement and privation, may we    
not say that it will be again through Mary that he will come    
the second time?  For does not the whole Church expect him to    
come and reign over all the earth and to judge the living and    
the dead?  No one knows how and when this will come to pass,    
but we do know that God, whose thoughts are further from ours    
than heaven is from earth, will come at a time and in a manner    
least expected, even by the most scholarly of men and those    
most versed in Holy Scripture, which gives no clear guidance    
on this subject.    
    
59.  We are given reason to believe that, towards the end of    
time and perhaps sooner than we expect, God will raise up    
great men filled with the Holy Spirit and imbued with the    
spirit of Mary.  Through them Mary, Queen most powerful, will    
work great wonders in the world, destroying sin and setting up    
the kingdom of Jesus her Son upon the ruins of the corrupt    
kingdom of the world.  These holy men will accomplish this by    
means of the devotion of which I only trace the main outlines    
and which suffers from my incompetence.    
    
[5. Exterior practices]    
    
60.  Besides interior practices, which we have just mentioned,    
this devotion has certain exterior practices which must not be    
omitted or neglected.    
    
                                [Consecration and its renewal]    
    
61.  The first is to choose a special feast-day to consecrate    
ourselves through Mary to Jesus, whose slaves we are making    
ourselves.  This is an occasion for receiving Holy Communion    
and spending the day in prayer.  At least once a year on the    
same day, we should renew the act of consecration.    
    
   [Offering of a tribute in submission to the Blessed Virgin]    
    
62.  The second is to give our Lady every year on that same    
day some little tribute as a token of our servitude and    
dependence.  This has always been the customary homage paid by    
slaves to their master.  This tribute could consist of an act    
of self-denial or an alms, or a pilgrimage, or a few prayers.     
St Peter Damian tells us that his brother, Blessed Marino,    
used to give himself the discipline in public on the same day    
every year before the altar of our Lady.  This kind of zeal is    
not required, nor would we counsel it.  But what little we    
give to our Lady we should at least offer with a heart that is    
humble and grateful.    
    
      [A Special Celebration of the Feast of the Annunciation]    
    
63.  The third practice is to celebrate every year with    
special fervour the feast of the Annunciation of our Lord.     
This is the distinctive feast of this devotion and was chosen    
so that we might honour  and imitate that dependence which the    
eternal Word accepted on this day out of love for us.    
    
           [The Saying of the Little Crown and the Magnificat]    
    
64.  The fourth practice is to say every day, without the    
obligation of sin, the prayer entitled "The Little Crown of    
the Blessed Virgin", which comprises three Our Fathers and    
twelve Hail Marys, and to say frequently the Magnificat, which    
is the only hymn composed by our Lady.  In the Magnificat we    
thank God for favouring us in the past, and we beg further    
blessings from him in the future.  One special time when we    
should not fail to say it is during thanksgiving after Holy    
Communion.  A person so scholarly as Gerson informs us that    
our Lady herself used to recite it in thanksgiving after Holy    
Communion.    
    
                               [The wearing of a little chain]    
    
65.  The fifth is the wearing of a small blessed chain either    
around the neck, on the arm, on the foot, or about the body.     
Strictly speaking, this practice can be omitted without    
affecting the essential nature of the devotion , but just the    
same it would be wrong to despise or condemn it, and foolhardy    
to neglect it.    
     Here are the reasons for wearing this external sign:    
     (1)  It signifies that we are free from the baneful    
chains of original and actual sin which held us in bondage.    
     (2)  By it we show our esteem for the cords and bonds of    
love with which our Lord let himself be bound that we might be    
truly free.    
     (3)  As these bonds are bonds of love, they remind us    
that we should do nothing except under the influence of love.    
     (4)  Finally, wearing this chain recalls to us once more    
that we are dependent on Jesus and Mary as their slaves.     
Eminent people who had become slaves of Jesus and Mary valued    
these little chains so much that they were unhappy at not    
being allowed to trail them publicly like the slaves of the    
Muslims.    
     These chains of love are more valuable and  more glorious    
than the necklaces of gold and precious stones worn by    
emperors, because they are the illustrious insignia of Jesus    
and Mary, and signify the bonds uniting us to them.    
     It should be noted that if the chains are not of silver,    
they should for convenience' sake at least be made of iron.    
     They should never be laid aside at any time, so that they    
may be with us even to the day of judgement.  Great will be    
the joy , glory and triumph of the faithful slave on that day    
when, at the sound of the trumpet, his bones rise from the    
earth still bound by the chain of holy bondage, which to all    
appearance has not decayed.  This thought alone should    
convince a devout slave never to take off his chain, however    
inconvenient it may be.    
    
                         [SUPPLEMENT]    
    
                      A. PRAYER TO JESUS    
    
66.  Most loving Jesus, permit me to express my heartfelt    
gratitude to you for your kindness in giving me to your holy    
Mother through the devotion of holy bondage, and so making her    
my advocate to plead with your Majesty on my behalf, and make    
up for all that I lack through my inadequacy.    
     Alas, O Lord, I am so wretched that without my dear    
Mother I would certainly be lost.  Yes, I always need Mary    
when I am approaching you.  I need her to calm your    
indignation at the many offences I have committed every day.     
I need her to save me from the just sentence of eternal    
punishment I have deservedly incurred.  I need her to turn to    
you, speak to you, pray to you, approach you and please you.     
I need her to help me save my soul and the souls of others.     
In a word, I need her so that I may always do your holy will    
and seek your greater glory in everything I do.    
     Would that I could publish throughout the whole world the    
mercy which you have shown to me!  Would that the whole world    
could know that without Mary I would now be doomed!  If only I    
could offer adequate thanks for such a great benefit as Mary!     
She is within me.  What a precious possession and what a    
consolation for me!  Should I not in return be all hers?  If I    
were not , how ungrateful would I be!  My dear Saviour, send    
me death rather than I should be guilty of such a lapse, for I    
would rather die than not belong to Mary.    
     Like St. John the Evangelist at the foot of the Cross, I    
have taken her times without number as my total good and as    
often have I given myself to her.  But if I have not done so    
as perfectly as you, dear Jesus, would wish, I now do so    
according to your desire.  If you still see in my soul or body    
anything that does not belong to this noble Queen, please    
pluck it out and cast it far from me, because anything of mine    
which does not belong to Mary is unworthy of you.    
    
67.  Holy Spirit, grant me all these graces.  Implant in my    
soul the tree of true life, which is Mary.  Foster it and    
cultivate it so that it grows and blossoms and brings forth    
the fruit of life in abundance.  Holy Spirit, give me a great    
love and longing for Mary, your exalted spouse.  Give me a    
great trust in her maternal heart and a continuous access to    
her compassion, so that with her you may truly form Jesus,    
great and powerful, in me until I attain the fullness of his    
perfect age.  Amen.    
    
                       B. PRAYER TO MARY    
                   [FOR HER FAITHFUL SLAVES]    
    
68.  Hail, Mary, most beloved daughter of the eternal Father;    
hail, Mary, most admirable mother of the Son; hail, Mary, most    
faithful spouse of the Holy Spirit; hail, Mary, Mother most    
dear, Lady most lovable, Queen most powerful!  Hail, Mary, my    
joy, my glory, my heart and soul.  You are all mine through    
God's mercy, but I am all yours in justice.  Yet I do not    
belong sufficiently to you, and so once again, as a slave who    
always belongs to his master, I give myself wholly to you,    
reserving nothing for myself or for others.    
     If you still see anything in me which is not given to    
you, please take it now.  Make yourself completely owner of    
all my capabilities.  Destroy in me everything that is    
displeasing to God.  Uproot it and bring it to nothing.     
Implant in me all that you deem to be good; improve it and    
make it increase in me.    
     May the light of your faith dispel the darkness of my    
mind.  May your deep humility take the place of my pride.  May    
your heavenly contemplation put an end to the distractions of    
my wandering imagination.  May your continuous vision of God    
fill my memory with his presence.  May the burning love of    
your heart inflame the coldness of mine.  May your virtues    
take the place of my sins.  May your merits be my adornment    
and make up for my unworthiness before God.  Finally, most    
dearly beloved Mother, grant, if it be possible, that I may    
have no other spirit but yours to know Jesus and his divine    
will.  May I have no soul but yours to praise and glorify the    
Lord.  May I have no heart but yours to love God purely and    
ardently as you love him.    
    
69.  I do not ask for visions or revelations, for sensible    
devotion or even spiritual pleasures.  It is your privilege to    
see God clearly in perpetual light.  It is your privilege to    
savour the delights of heaven where nothing is without    
sweetness.  It is your privilege to triumph gloriously in    
heaven at the right hand of your Son without further    
humiliation, and to command angels, men, and demons, without    
resistance on their part.  It is your privilege to dispose at    
your own choice of all the good gifts of God without any    
exception.    
     Such, most holy Mary, is the excellent portion which the    
Lord has given you, and which will never be taken from you,    
and which gives me great joy.  As for my portion here on    
earth, I wish only to have a share in yours, that is, to have    
simple faith without seeing or tasting, to suffer joyfully    
without the consolation of men, to die daily to myself without    
flinching, to work gallantly for you even until death without    
any self-interest, as the most worthless of your slaves.  The    
only grace I beg you in your kindness to obtain for me is that    
every day and moment of my life I may say this threefold Amen:    
Amen, so be it, to all you did upon earth; Amen, so be it, to    
all you are doing now in heaven; Amen, so be it, to all you    
are doing in my soul.  In that way, you and you alone will    
fully glorify Jesus in me during all my life and throughout    
eternity.  Amen.    
    
         IV. THE CARE AND GROWTH OF THE TREE OF LIFE,    
                      or, in other words,    
                    HOW BEST TO CAUSE MARY    
                TO LIVE AND REIGN IN OUR SOULS    
    
[A. The holy slavery of love.  The Tree of life.]    
    
70.  Have you understood with the help of the Holy Spirit what    
I have tried to explain in the preceding pages?  If so, be    
thankful to God.  It is a secret of which very few people are    
aware.  If you have discovered this treasure in the field of    
Mary, this pearl of great price, you should sell all you have    
to purchase it.  You must offer yourself to Mary, happily lose    
yourself in her, only to find God in her.    
     If the Holy Spirit has planted in your soul the true Tree    
of Life, which is the devotion that I have just explained, you    
should see carefully to its cultivation, so that it will yield    
its fruit in due season.  This devotion is like the mustard    
seed of the Gospel, which is indeed the smallest of all seeds,    
but nevertheless it grows into a big plant, shooting up so    
high that the birds of the air, that is, the elect, come and    
make their nest in its branches.  They repose there, shaded    
from the heat of the sun, and safely hidden from beasts of    
prey.    
    
[B. How to cultivate it]    
    
     Here is the best way, chosen soul, to cultivate it:    
    
71.  (1)  This tree, once planted in a docile heart, requires    
fresh air and no human support.  Being of heavenly origin, it    
must be uninfluenced by any creature, since a creature might    
hinder it from rising up towards God who created it.  Hence    
you must not rely on your own endeavours or your natural    
talents or your personal standing or the guidance of men.  You    
must resort to Mary, relying solely on her help.    
    
72.  (2)  The person in whose soul this tree has taken root    
must, like a good gardener, watch over it and protect it.  For    
this tree, having life and capable of producing the fruit of    
life, should be raised and tended with enduring care and    
attention of soul.  A soul that desires to be holy will make    
this its chief aim and occupation.    
    
73.  Whatever is likely to choke the tree or in the course of    
time prevent its yielding fruit, such as thorns and thistles,    
must be cut away and rooted out.  This means that by self-    
denial and self-discipline you must sedulously cut short and    
even give up all empty pleasures and useless dealings with    
other creatures.  In other words, you must crucify the flesh,    
keep a guard over the tongue, and mortify the bodily senses.    
    
74.  (3)  You must guard against grubs doing harm to the tree.     
These parasites are love of self and love of comfort, and they    
eat away the green foliage of the Tree and frustrate the fair    
hope it offered of yielding good fruit; for love of self is    
incompatible with love of Mary.    
    
75.  (4) You must not allow this tree to be damaged by    
destructive animals, that is, by sins, for they may cause its    
death simply by their contact.  They must not be allowed even    
to breathe upon the Tree, because their mere breath, that is,    
venial sins, which are most dangerous when we do not trouble    
ourselves about them.    
    
76.  (5) It is also necessary to water this Tree regularly    
with your Communions, Masses and other public and private    
prayers.  Otherwise it will not continue bearing fruit.    
    
77.  (6) Yet you need not be alarmed when the winds blow and    
shake this tree, for it must happen that the storm-winds of    
temptation will threaten to bring it down, and snow and frost    
tend to smother it.  By this we mean that this devotion to our    
Blessed Lady will surely be called into question and attacked.     
But as long as we continue steadfastly in tending it, we have    
nothing to fear.    
    
[C. Its lasting fruit: Jesus Christ]    
    
78.  Chosen soul, provided you thus carefully cultivate the    
Tree of Life, which has been freshly planted in your soul by    
the Holy Spirit, I can assure you that in a short time it will    
grow so tall that the birds of the air will make their home in    
it.  It will become such a good tree that it will yield in due    
season the sweet and adorable Fruit of honour and grace, which    
is Jesus, who has always been and will always be the only    
fruit of Mary.    
     Happy is that soul in which Mary, the Tree of Life, is    
planted.  Happier still is the soul in which she has been able    
to grow and blossom.  Happier again is the soul in which she    
brings forth her fruit.  But happiest of all is the soul which    
savours the sweetness of Mary's fruit and preserves it up till    
death and then beyond to all eternity.  Amen.    
     "Let him who possesses it, hold fast to it."    
    
*** TREATISE ON TRUE DEVOTION TO THE BLESSED VIRGIN
    ===============================================    
    
               INTRODUCTION OF SAINT LOUIS MARIE    
    
1.   It was through the Blessed Virgin Mary that Jesus came    
into the world, and it is also through her that he must reign    
in the world.    
    
2.   Because Mary remained hidden during her life she is    
called by the Holy Spirit and the Church "Alma Mater", Mother    
hidden and unknown. So great was her humility that she desired    
nothing more upon earth than to remain unknown to herself and    
to others, and to be known only to God.    
    
3.   In answer to her prayers to remain hidden, poor and    
lowly, God was pleased to conceal her from nearly every other    
human creature in her conception, her birth, her life, her    
mysteries, her resurrection and assumption. Her own parents    
did not really know her; and the angels would often ask one    
another, "Who can she possibly be?", for God had hidden her    
from them, or if he did reveal anything to them, it was    
nothing compared with what he withheld.    
    
4.   God the Father willed that she should perform no miracle    
during her life, at least no public one, although he had given    
her the power to do so. God the Son willed that she should    
speak very little although he had imparted his wisdom to her.    
     Even though Mary was his faithful spouse, God the Holy    
Spirit willed that his apostles and evangelists should say    
very little about her and then only as much as was necessary    
to make Jesus known.    
    
5.   Mary is the supreme masterpiece of Almighty God and he    
has reserved the knowledge and possession of her for himself.    
She is the glorious Mother of God the Son who chose to humble    
and conceal her during her lifetime in order to foster her    
humility. He called her "Woman" as if she were a stranger,    
although in his heart he esteemed and loved her above all men    
and angels. Mary is the sealed fountain and the faithful    
spouse of the Holy Spirit where only he may enter. She is the    
sanctuary and resting-place of the Blessed Trinity where God    
dwells in greater and more divine splendour than anywhere else    
in the universe, not excluding his dwelling above the cherubim    
and seraphim. No creature, however pure, may enter there    
without being specially privileged.    
    
6.   I declare with the saints: Mary is the earthly paradise    
of Jesus Christ the new Adam, where he became man by the power    
of the Holy Spirit, in order to accomplish in her wonders    
beyond our understanding. She is the vast and divine world of    
God where unutterable marvels and beauties are to be found.    
She is the magnificence of the Almighty where he hid his only    
Son, as in his own bosom, and with him everything that is most    
excellent and precious. What great and hidden things the all-    
powerful God has done for this wonderful creature, as she    
herself had to confess in spite of her great humility, "The    
Almighty has done great things for me." The world does not    
know these things because it is incapable and unworthy of    
knowing them.    
    
7.   The saints have said wonderful things of Mary, the holy    
City of God, and, as they themselves admit, they were never    
more eloquent and more pleased than when they spoke of her.    
And yet they maintain that the height of her merits rising up    
to the throne of the Godhead cannot be perceived; the breadth    
of her love which is wider than the earth cannot be measured;    
the greatness of the power which she wields over one who is    
God cannot be conceived; and the depths of her profound    
humility and all her virtues and graces cannot be sounded.    
What incomprehensible height! What indescribable breadth! What    
immeasurable greatness! What an impenetrable abyss!    
    
8.   Every day, from one end of the earth to the other, in the    
highest heaven and in the lowest abyss, all things preach, all    
things proclaim the wondrous Virgin Mary. The nine choirs of    
angels, men and women of every age, rank and religion, both    
good and evil, even the very devils themselves are compelled    
by the force of truth, willingly or unwillingly, to call her    
blessed.    
     According to St. Bonaventure, all the angels in heaven    
unceasingly call out to her: "Holy, holy, holy Mary, Virgin    
Mother of God." They greet her countless times each day with    
the angelic greeting, "Hail, Mary", while prostrating    
themselves before her, begging her as a favour to honour them    
with one of her requests. According to St. Augustine, even St.    
Michael, though prince of all the heavenly court, is the most    
eager of all the angels to honour her and lead others to    
honour her. At all times he awaits the privilege of going at    
her word to the aid of one of her servants.    
    
9.   The whole world is filled with her glory, and this is    
especially true of Christian peoples, who have chosen her as    
guardian and protectress of kingdoms, provinces, dioceses, and    
towns. Many cathedrals are consecrated to God in her name.    
There is no church without an altar dedicated to her, no    
country or region without at least one of her miraculous    
images where all kinds of afflictions are cured and all sorts    
of benefits received. Many are the confraternities and    
associations honouring her as patron; many are the orders    
under her name and protection; many are the members of    
sodalities and religious of all congregations who voice her    
praises and make known her compassion. There is not a child    
who does not praise her by lisping a Hail Mary. There is    
scarcely a sinner, however hardened, who does not possess some    
spark of confidence in her. The very devils in hell, while    
fearing her, show her respect.    
    
10.  And yet in truth we must still say with the saints: De    
Maria numquam satis : We have still not praised, exalted,    
honoured, loved and served Mary adequately. She is worthy of    
even more praise, respect, love and service.    
    
11.  Moreover, we should repeat after the Holy Spirit, "All    
the glory of the king's daughter is within", meaning that all    
the external glory which heaven and earth vie with each other    
to give her is nothing compared to what she has received    
interiorly from her Creator, namely, a glory unknown to    
insignificant creatures like us, who cannot penetrate into the    
secrets of the king.    
    
12.  Finally, we must say in the words of the apostle Paul,    
"Eye has not seen, nor ear heard, nor has the heart of man    
understood" the beauty, the grandeur, the excellence of Mary,    
who is indeed a miracle of miracles of grace, nature and    
glory. "If you wish to understand the Mother," says a saint,    
"then understand the Son. She is a worthy Mother of God." Hic    
taceat omnis lingua : Here let every tongue be silent.    
    
13.  My heart has dictated with special joy all that I have    
written to show that Mary has been unknown up till now, and    
that that is one of the reasons why Jesus Christ is not known    
as he should be.    
     If then, as is certain, the knowledge and the kingdom of    
Jesus Christ must come into the world, it can only be as a    
necessary consequence of the knowledge and reign of Mary. She    
who first gave him to the world will establish his kingdom in    
the world.    
    
         PART I: TRUE DEVOTION TO OUR LADY IN GENERAL    
    
                          CHAPTER ONE    
               NECESSITY OF DEVOTION TO OUR LADY    
    
               1. Mary's part in the Incarnation    
    
14.  With the whole Church I acknowledge that Mary, being a    
mere creature fashioned by the hands of God is, compared to    
his infinite majesty, less than an atom, or rather is simply    
nothing, since he alone can say, "I am he who is".    
Consequently, this great Lord, who is ever independent and    
self-sufficient, never had and does not now have any absolute    
need of the Blessed Virgin for the accomplishment of his will    
and the manifestation of his glory. To do all things he has    
only to will them.    
    
15.  However, I declare that, considering things as they are,    
because God has decided to begin and accomplish his greatest    
works through the Blessed Virgin ever since he created her, we    
can safely believe that he will not change his plan in the    
time to come, for he is God and therefore does not change in    
his thoughts or his way of acting.    
    
16.  God the Father gave his only Son to the world only    
through Mary. Whatever desires the patriarchs may have    
cherished, whatever entreaties the prophets and saints of the    
Old Law may have had for 4,000 years to obtain that treasure,    
it was Mary alone who merited it and found grace before God by    
the power of her prayers and the perfection of her virtues.    
"The world being unworthy," said Saint Augustine, "to receive    
the Son of God directly from the hands of the Father, he gave    
his Son to Mary for the world to receive him from her."     
     The Son of God became man for our salvation but only in    
Mary and through Mary.    
     God the Holy Spirit formed Jesus Christ in Mary but only    
after having asked her consent through one of the chief    
ministers of his court.    
    
17.  God the Father imparted to Mary his fruitfulness as far    
as a mere creature was capable of receiving it, to enable her    
to bring forth his Son and all the members of his mystical    
body.    
    
18.  God the Son came into her virginal womb as a new Adam    
into his earthly paradise, to take his delight there and    
produce hidden wonders of grace.    
     God-made-man found freedom in imprisoning himself in her    
womb. He displayed power in allowing himself to be borne by    
this young maiden. He found his glory and that of his Father    
in hiding his splendours from all creatures here below and    
revealing them only to Mary. He glorified his independence and    
his majesty in depending upon this lovable virgin in his    
conception, his birth, his presentation in the temple, and in    
the thirty years of his hidden life. Even at his death she had    
to be present so that he might be united with her in one    
sacrifice and be immolated with her consent to the eternal    
Father, just as formerly Isaac was offered in sacrifice by    
Abraham when he accepted the will of God. It was Mary who    
nursed him, fed him, cared for him, reared him, and sacrificed    
him for us.    
     The Holy Spirit could not leave such wonderful and    
inconceivable dependence of God unmentioned in the Gospel,    
though he concealed almost all the wonderful things that    
Wisdom Incarnate did during his hidden life in order to bring    
home to us its infinite value and glory. Jesus gave more glory    
to God his Father by submitting to his Mother for thirty years    
than he would have given him had he converted the whole world    
by working the greatest miracles. How highly then do we    
glorify God when to please him we submit ourselves to Mary,    
taking Jesus as our sole model.    
    
19.  If we examine closely the remainder of the life of Jesus    
Christ, we see that he chose to begin his miracles through    
Mary. It was by her word that he sanctified Saint John the    
Baptist in the womb of his mother, Saint Elizabeth; no sooner    
had Mary spoken than John was sanctified. This was his first    
and greatest miracle of grace. At the wedding in Cana he    
changed water into wine at her humble prayer, and this was his    
first miracle in the order of nature. He began and continued    
his miracles through Mary and he will continue them through    
her until the end of time.    
    
20.  God the Holy Spirit, who does not produce any divine    
person, became fruitful through Mary whom he espoused. It was    
with her, in her and of her that he produced his masterpiece,    
God-made-man, and that he produces every day until the end of    
the world the members of the body of this adorable Head. For    
this reason the more he finds Mary his dear and inseparable    
spouse in a soul the more powerful and effective he becomes in    
producing Jesus Christ in that soul and that soul in Jesus    
Christ.    
    
21.  This does not mean that the Blessed Virgin confers on the    
Holy Spirit a fruitfulness which he does not already possess.    
Being God, he has the ability to produce just like the Father    
and the Son, although he does not use this power and so does    
not produce another divine person. But it does mean that the    
Holy Spirit chose to make use of our Blessed Lady, although he    
had no absolute need of her, in order to become actively    
fruitful in producing Jesus Christ and his members in her and    
by her. This is a mystery of grace unknown even to many of the    
most learned and spiritual of Christians.    
    
         2. Mary's part in the sanctification of souls    
    
22.  The plan adopted by the three persons of the Blessed    
Trinity in the Incarnation, the first coming of Jesus Christ,    
is adhered to each day in an invisible manner throughout the    
Church and they will pursue it to the end of time until the    
last coming of Jesus Christ.     
    
23.  God the Father gathered all the waters together and    
called them the seas (maria). He gathered all his graces    
together and called them Mary (Maria). The great God has a    
treasury or storehouse full of riches in which he has enclosed    
all that is beautiful, resplendent, rare, and precious, even    
his own Son. This immense treasury is none other than Mary    
whom the saints call the "treasury of the Lord". From her    
fullness all men are made rich.    
    
24.  God the Son imparted to his mother all that he gained by    
his life and death, namely, his infinite merits and his    
eminent virtues. He made her the treasurer of all his Father    
had given him as heritage. Through her he applies his merits    
to his members and through her he transmits his virtues and    
distributes his graces. She is his mystical channel, his    
aqueduct, through which he causes his mercies to flow gently    
and abundantly.    
    
25.  God the Holy Spirit entrusted his wondrous gifts to Mary,    
his faithful spouse, and chose her as the dispenser of all he    
possesses, so that she distributes all his gifts and graces to    
whom she wills, as much as she wills, how she wills and when    
she wills. No heavenly gift is given to men which does not    
pass through her virginal hands. Such indeed is the will of    
God, who has decreed that we should have all things through    
Mary, so that, making herself poor and lowly,, and hiding    
herself in the depths of nothingness during her whole life,    
she might be enriched, exalted and honoured by almighty God.    
Such are the views of the Church and the early Fathers.    
    
26.  Were I speaking to the so-called intellectuals of today,    
I would prove at great length by quoting Latin texts taken    
from Scripture and the Fathers of the Church all that I am now    
stating so simply. I could also instance solid proofs which    
can be read in full in Fr. Poir‚'s book "The Triple Crown of    
the Blessed Virgin". But I am speaking mainly for the poor and    
simple who have more good will and faith than the common run    
of scholars. As they believe more simply and more    
meritoriously, let me merely state the truth to them quite    
plainly without bothering to quote Latin passages which they    
would not understand. Nevertheless, I shall quote some texts    
as they occur to my mind as I go along.    
    
27.  Since grace enhances our human nature and glory adds a    
still greater perfection to grace, it is certain that our Lord    
remains in heaven just as much the Son of Mary as he was on    
earth. Consequently he has retained the submissiveness and    
obedience of the most perfect of all children towards the best    
of all mothers.    
     We must take care, however, not to consider this    
dependence as an abasement or imperfection in Jesus Christ.    
For Mary, infinitely inferior to her Son, who is God, does not    
command him in the same way as an earthly mother would command    
her child who is beneath her. Since she is completely    
transformed in God by that grace and glory which transforms    
all the saints in him, she does not ask or wish or do anything    
which is contrary to the eternal and changeless will of God.    
When therefore we read in the writings of Saint Bernard, Saint    
Bernardine, Saint Bonaventure, and others that all in heaven    
and on earth, even God himself, is subject to the Blessed    
Virgin, they mean that the authority which God was pleased to    
give her is so great that she seems to have the same power as    
God. Her prayers and requests are so powerful with him that he    
accepts them as commands in the sense that he never resists    
his dear mother's prayer because it is always humble and    
conformed to his will.    
     Moses by the power of his prayer curbed God's anger    
against the Israelites so effectively that the infinitely    
great and merciful Lord was unable to withstand him and asked    
Moses to let him be angry and punish that rebellious people.    
How much greater, then, will be the prayer of the humble    
Virgin Mary, worthy Mother of God, which is more powerful with    
the King of heaven than the prayers and intercession of all    
the angels and saints in heaven and on earth.    
    
28.  Mary has authority over the angels and the blessed in    
heaven. As a reward for her great humility, God gave her the    
power and the mission of assigning to saints the thrones made    
vacant by the apostate angels who fell away through pride.    
     Such is the will of almighty God who exalts the humble,    
that the powers of heaven, earth and hell, willingly or    
unwillingly, must obey the commands of the humble Virgin Mary.    
For God has made her queen of heaven and earth, leader of his    
armies, keeper of his treasures, dispenser of his graces,    
worker of his wonders, restorer of the human race, mediatrix    
on behalf of men, destroyer of his enemies, and faithful    
associate in his great works and triumphs.    
    
29.  God the Father wishes Mary to be the mother of his    
children until the end of time and so he says to her, "Dwell    
in Jacob", that is to say, take up your abode permanently in    
my children, in my holy ones represented by Jacob, and not in    
the children of the devil and sinners represented by Esau.    
    
30.  Just as in natural and bodily generation there is a    
father and a mother, so in the supernatural and spiritual    
generation there is a father who is God and a mother who is    
Mary. All true children of God have God for their father and    
Mary for their mother; anyone who does not have Mary for his    
mother, does not have God for his father. This is why the    
reprobate, such as heretics and schismatics, who hate, despise    
or ignore the Blessed Virgin, do not have God for their father    
though they arrogantly claim they have, because they do not    
have Mary for their mother. Indeed if they had her for their    
mother they would love and honour her as good and true    
children naturally love and honour the mother who gave them    
life.    
     An infallible and unmistakable sign by which we can    
distinguish a heretic, a man of false doctrine, an enemy of    
God, from one of God's true friends is that the heretic and    
the hardened sinner show nothing but contempt and indifference    
for our Lady. He endeavours by word and example, openly or    
insidiously - sometimes under specious pretexts - to belittle    
the love and veneration shown to her. God the Father has not    
told Mary to dwell in them because they are, alas, other    
Esaus.    
    
31.  God the Son wishes to form himself, and, in a manner of    
speaking, become incarnate every day in his members through    
his dear Mother. To her he said: "Take Israel for your    
inheritance." It is as if he said, God the Father has given me    
as heritage all the nations of the earth, all men good and    
evil, predestinate and reprobate. To the good I shall be    
father and advocate, to the bad a just avenger, but to all I    
shall be a judge. But you, my dear Mother, will have for your    
heritage and possession only the predestinate represented by    
Israel. As their loving mother, you will give them birth, feed    
them and rear them. As their queen, you will lead, govern and    
defend them.    
    
32.  "This one and that one were born in her." According to    
the explanation of some of the Fathers, the first man born of    
Mary is the God-man, Jesus Christ. If Jesus Christ, the head    
of mankind, is born of her, the predestinate, who are members    
of this head, must also as a necessary consequence be born of    
her. One and the same mother does not give birth to the head    
without the members nor to the members without the head, for    
these would be monsters in the order of nature. In the order    
of grace likewise the head and the members are born of the    
same mother. If a member of the mystical body of Christ, that    
is, one of the predestinate, were born of a mother other than    
Mary who gave birth to the head, he would not be one of the    
predestinate, nor a member of Jesus Christ, but a monster in    
the order of grace.    
    
33.  Moreover, Jesus is still as much as ever the fruit of    
Mary, as heaven and earth repeat thousands of times a day:    
"Blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus." It is therefore    
certain that Jesus is the fruit and gift of Mary for every    
single man who possesses him, just as truly as he is for all    
mankind. Consequently, if any of the faithful have Jesus    
formed in their heart they can boldly say, "It is thanks to    
Mary that what I possess is Jesus her fruit, and without her I    
would not have him." We can attribute more truly to her what    
Saint Paul said of himself, "I am in labour again with all the    
children of God until Jesus Christ, my Son, is formed in them    
to the fullness of his age." Saint Augustine, surpassing    
himself as well as all that I have said so far, affirms that    
in order to be conformed to the image of the Son of God all    
the predestinate, while in the world, are hidden in the womb    
of the Blessed Virgin where they are protected, nourished,    
cared for and developed by this good Mother, until the day she    
brings them forth to a life of glory after death, which the    
Church calls the birthday of the just. This is indeed a    
mystery of grace unknown to the reprobate and little known    
even to the predestinate!    
    
34.  God the Holy Spirit wishes to fashion his chosen ones in    
and through Mary. He tells her, "My well-beloved, my spouse,    
let all your virtues take root in my chosen ones that they may    
grow from strength to strength and from grace to grace. When    
you were living on earth, practising the most sublime virtues,    
I was so pleased with you that I still desire to find you on    
earth without your ceasing to be in heaven. Reproduce yourself    
then in my chosen ones, so that I may have the joy of seeing    
in them the roots of your invincible faith, profound humility,    
total mortification, sublime prayer, ardent charity, your firm    
hope and all your virtues. You are always my spouse, as    
faithful, pure, and fruitful as ever. May your faith give me    
believers; your purity, virgins; your fruitfulness, elect and    
living temples."    
    
35.  When Mary has taken root in a soul she produces in it    
wonders of grace which only she can produce; for she alone is    
the fruitful virgin who never had and never will have her    
equal in purity and fruitfulness. Together with the Holy    
Spirit Mary produced the greatest thing that ever was or ever    
will be: a God-man. She will consequently produce the marvels    
which will be seen in the latter times. The formation and the    
education of the great saints who will come at the end of the    
world are reserved to her, for only this singular and wondrous    
virgin can produce in union with the Holy Spirit singular and    
wondrous things.    
    
36.  When the Holy Spirit, her spouse, finds Mary in a soul,    
he hastens there and enters fully into it. He gives himself    
generously to that soul according to the place it has given to    
his spouse. One of the main reasons why the Holy Spirit does    
not work striking wonders in souls is that he fails to find in    
them a sufficiently close union with his faithful and    
inseparable spouse. I say "inseparable spouse", for from the    
moment the substantial love of the Father and the Son espoused    
Mary to form Jesus, the head of the elect, and Jesus in the    
elect, he has never disowned her, for she has always been    
faithful and fruitful.    
    
                        3. Consequences    
    
37.  We must obviously conclude from what I have just said:    
     First, that Mary received from God a far-reaching    
dominion over the souls of the elect. Otherwise she could not    
make her dwelling-place in them as God the Father has ordered    
her to do, and she could not conceive them, nourish them, and    
bring them forth to eternal life as their mother. She could    
not have them for her inheritance and her possession and form    
them in Jesus and Jesus in them. She could not implant in    
their heart the roots of her virtues, nor be the inseparable    
associate of the Holy Spirit in all these works of grace. None    
of these things, I repeat, could she do unless she had    
received from the Almighty rights and authority over their    
souls. For God, having given her power over his only-begotten    
and natural Son, also gave her power over his adopted children    
- not only in what concerns their body - which would be of    
little account - but also in what concerns their soul.    
    
38.  Mary is the Queen of heaven and earth by grace as Jesus    
is king by nature and by conquest. But as the kingdom of Jesus    
Christ exists primarily in the heart or interior of man,    
according to the words of the Gospel, "The kingdom of God is    
within you", so the kingdom of the Blessed Virgin is    
principally in the interior of man, that is, in his soul. It    
is principally in souls that she is glorified with her Son    
more than in any visible creature. So we may call her, as the    
saints do, Queen of our hearts.    
    
39.  Secondly, we must conclude that, being necessary to God    
by a necessity which is called "hypothetical", (that is,    
because God so willed it), the Blessed Virgin is all the more    
necessary for men to attain their final end. Consequently we    
must not place devotion to her on the same level as devotion    
to the other saints as if it were merely something optional.     
    
40.  The pious and learned Jesuit, Suarez, Justus Lipsius, a    
devout and erudite theologian of Louvain, and many others have    
proved incontestably that devotion to our Blessed Lady is    
necessary to attain salvation. This they show from the    
teaching of the Fathers, notably St. Augustine, St. Ephrem,    
deacon of Edessa, St. Cyril of Jerusalem, St. Germanus of    
Constantinople, St. John Demascene, St. Anselm, St. Bernard,    
St. Bernardine, St. Thomas and St. Bonaventure. Even according    
to Oecolampadius and other heretics, lack of esteem and love    
for the Virgin Mary is an infallible sign of God's    
disapproval. On the other hand, to be entirely and genuinely    
devoted to her is a sure sign of God's approval.    
    
41.  The types and texts of the Old and New Testaments prove    
the truth of this, the opinions and examples of the saints    
confirm it, and reason and experience teach and demonstrate    
it. Even the devil and his followers, forced by the evidence    
of the truth, were frequently obliged against their will to    
admit it. For brevity's sake, I shall quote one only of the    
many passages which I have collected from the Fathers and    
Doctors of the Church to support this truth. "Devotion to you,    
O Blessed Virgin, is a means of salvation which God gives to    
those whom he wishes to save" (St. John Damascene).    
    
42.  I could tell many stories in evidence of what I have just    
said.    
     (1) One is recorded in the chronicles of St. Francis. The    
saint saw in ecstasy an immense ladder reaching to heaven, at    
the top of which stood the Blessed Virgin. This is the ladder,    
he was told, by which we must all go to heaven.    
     (2) There is another related in the Chronicles of St.    
Dominic. Near Carcassonne, where St. Dominic was preaching the    
Rosary, there was an unfortunate heretic who was possessed by    
a multitude of devils. These evil spirits to their confusion    
were compelled at the command of our Lady to confess many    
great and consoling truths concerning devotion to her. They    
did this so clearly and forcibly that, however weak our    
devotion to our Lady may be, we cannot read this authentic    
story containing such an unwilling tribute paid by the devils    
to devotion to our Lady without shedding tears of joy.     
    
43.  If devotion to the Blessed Virgin is necessary for all    
men simply to work out their salvation, it is even more    
necessary for those who are called to a special perfection. I    
do not believe that anyone can acquire intimate union with our    
Lord and perfect fidelity to the Holy Spirit without a very    
close union with the most Blessed Virgin and an absolute    
dependence on her support.    
    
44.  Mary alone found grace before God without the help of any    
other creature. All those who have since found grace before    
God have found it only through her. She was full of grace when    
she was greeted by the Archangel Gabriel and was filled with    
grace to overflowing by the Holy Spirit when he so    
mysteriously overshadowed her. From day to day, from moment to    
moment, she increased so much this twofold plenitude that she    
attained an immense and inconceivable degree of grace. So much    
so, that the Almighty made her the sole custodian of his    
treasures and the sole dispenser of his graces. She can now    
ennoble, exalt and enrich all she chooses. She can lead them    
along the narrow path to heaven and guide them through the    
narrow gate to life. She can give a royal throne, sceptre and    
crown to whom she wishes. Jesus is always and everywhere the    
fruit and Son of Mary and Mary is everywhere the genuine tree    
that bears that Fruit of life, the true Mother who bears that    
Son.    
    
45.  To Mary alone God gave the keys of the cellars of divine    
love and the ability to enter the most sublime and secret ways    
of perfection, and lead others along them. Mary alone gives to    
the unfortunate children of unfaithful Eve entry into that    
earthly paradise where they may walk pleasantly with God and    
be safely hidden from their enemies. There they can feed    
without fear of death on the delicious fruit of the tree of    
life and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. They can    
drink copiously the heavenly waters of that beauteous fountain    
which gushes forth in such abundance. As she is herself the    
earthly paradise, that virgin and blessed land from which    
sinful Adam and Eve were expelled she lets only those whom she    
chooses enter her domain in order to make them saints.    
    
46.  All the rich among the people, to use an expression of    
the Holy Spirit as explained by St. Bernard, all the rich    
among the people will look pleadingly upon her countenance    
throughout all ages and particularly as the world draws to its    
end. This means that the greatest saints, those richest in    
grace and virtue will be the most assiduous in praying to the    
most Blessed Virgin, looking up to her as the perfect model to    
imitate and as a powerful helper to assist them.     
    
47.  I said that this will happen especially towards the end    
of the world, and indeed soon, because Almighty God and his    
holy Mother are to raise up great saints who will surpass in    
holiness most other saints as much as the cedars of Lebanon    
tower above little shrubs. This has been revealed to a holy    
soul whose life has been written by M. de Renty.    
    
48.  These great souls filled with grace and zeal will be    
chosen to oppose the enemies of God who are raging on all    
sides. They will be exceptionally devoted to the Blessed    
Virgin. Illumined by her light, strengthened by her food,    
guided by her spirit, supported by her arm, sheltered under    
her protection, they will fight with one hand and build with    
the other. With one hand they will give battle, overthrowing    
and crushing heretics and their heresies, schismatics and    
their schisms, idolaters and their idolatries, sinners and    
their wickedness. With the other hand they will build the    
temple of the true Solomon and the mystical city of God,    
namely, the Blessed Virgin, who is called by the Fathers of    
the Church the Temple of Solomon  and the City of God . By    
word and example they will draw all men to a true devotion to    
her and though this will make many enemies, it will also bring    
about many victories and much glory to God alone. This is what    
God revealed to St. Vincent Ferrer, that outstanding apostle    
of his day, as he has amply shown in one of his works.    
     This seems to have been foretold by the Holy Spirit in    
Psalm 58: "The Lord will reign in Jacob and all the ends of    
the earth. They will be converted towards evening and they    
will be as hungry as dogs and they will go around the city to    
find something to eat." This city around which men will roam    
at the end of the world seeking conversion and the appeasement    
of the hunger they have for justice is the most Blessed    
Virgin, who is called by the Holy Spirit the City of God .    
    
              4. Mary's part in the latter times    
    
49.  The salvation of the world began through Mary and through    
her it must be accomplished. Mary scarcely appeared in the    
first coming of Jesus Christ so that men, as yet    
insufficiently instructed and enlightened concerning the    
person of her Son, might not wander from the truth by becoming    
too strongly attached to her. This would apparently have    
happened if she had been known, on account of the wondrous    
charms with which Almighty God had endowed even her outward    
appearance. So true is this that St. Denis the Areopagite    
tells us in his writings that when he saw her he would have    
taken her for a goddess, because of her incomparable beauty,    
had not his well-grounded faith taught him otherwise. But in    
the second coming of Jesus Christ, Mary must be known and    
openly revealed by the Holy Spirit so that Jesus may be known,    
loved and served through her. The reasons which moved the Holy    
Spirit to hide his spouse during her life and to reveal but    
very little of her since the first preaching of the gospel    
exist no longer.    
    
1) God wishes to make Mary better known in the latter times.    
    
50. God wishes therefore to reveal Mary, his masterpiece, and    
make her more known in these latter times:    
     (1) Because she kept herself hidden in this world and in    
her great humility considered herself lower than dust, having    
obtained from God, his apostles and evangelists the favour of    
being made known.    
     (2) Because, as Mary is not only God's masterpiece of    
glory in heaven, but also his masterpiece of grace on earth,    
he wishes to be glorified and praised because of her by those    
living upon earth.    
     (3) Since she is the dawn which precedes and discloses    
the Sun of Justice Jesus Christ, she must be known and    
acknowledged so that Jesus may be known and acknowledged.    
     (4) As she was the way by which Jesus first came to us,    
she will again be the way by which he will come to us the    
second time though not in the same manner.    
     (5) Since she is the sure means, the direct and    
immaculate way to Jesus and the perfect guide to him, it is    
through her that souls who are to shine forth in sanctity must    
find him. He who finds Mary finds life, that is, Jesus Christ    
who is the way, the truth and the life. But no one can find    
Mary who does not look for her. No one can look for her who    
does not know her, for no one seeks or desires something    
unknown. Mary then must be better known than ever for the    
deeper understanding and the greater glory of the Blessed    
Trinity.    
     (6) In these latter times Mary must shine forth more than    
ever in mercy, power and grace; in mercy, to bring back and    
welcome lovingly the poor sinners and wanderers who are to be    
converted and return to the Catholic Church; in power, to    
combat the enemies of God who will rise up menacingly to    
seduce and crush by promises and threats all those who oppose    
them; finally, she must shine forth in grace to inspire and    
support the valiant soldiers and loyal servants of Jesus    
Christ who are fighting for his cause.    
     (7) Lastly, Mary must become as terrible as an army in    
battle array to the devil and his followers, especially in    
these latter times. For Satan, knowing that he has little time    
- even less now than ever - to destroy souls, intensifies his    
efforts and his onslaughts every day. He will not hesitate to    
stir up savage persecutions and set treacherous snares for    
Mary's faithful servants and children whom he finds more    
difficult to overcome than others.    
    
51.  It is chiefly in reference to these last wicked    
persecutions of the devil, daily increasing until the advent    
of the reign of anti-Christ, that we should understand that    
first and well-known prophecy and curse of God uttered against    
the serpent in the garden of paradise. It is opportune to    
explain it here for the glory of the Blessed Virgin, the    
salvation of her children and the confusion of the devil. "I    
will place enmities between you and the woman, between your    
race and her race; she will crush your head and you will lie    
in wait for her heel" (Gen. 3:15).    
    
52.  God has established only one enmity - but it is an    
irreconcilable one - which will last and even go on increasing    
to the end of time. That enmity is between Mary, his worthy    
Mother, and the devil, between the children and the servants    
of the Blessed Virgin and the children and followers of    
Lucifer.    
     Thus the most fearful enemy that God has set up against    
the devil is Mary, his holy Mother. From the time of the    
earthly paradise, although she existed then only in his mind,    
he gave her such a hatred for his accursed enemy, such    
ingenuity in exposing the wickedness of the ancient serpent    
and such power to defeat, overthrow and crush this proud    
rebel, that Satan fears her not only more than angels and men    
but in a certain sense more than God himself. This does not    
mean that the anger, hatred and power of God are not    
infinitely greater than the Blessed Virgin's, since her    
attributes are limited. It simply means that Satan, being so    
proud, suffers infinitely more in being vanquished and    
punished by a lowly and humble servant of God, for her    
humility humiliates him more than the power of God. Moreover,    
God has given Mary such great power over the evil spirits    
that, as they have often been forced unwillingly to admit    
through the lips of possessed persons, they fear one of her    
pleadings for a soul more than the prayers of all the saints,    
and one of her threats more than all their other torments.    
    
53.  What Lucifer lost by pride Mary won by humility. What Eve    
ruined and lost by disobedience Mary saved by obedience. By    
obeying the serpent, Eve ruined her children as well as    
herself and delivered them up to him. Mary by her perfect    
fidelity to God saved her children with herself and    
consecrated them to his divine majesty.    
    
54.  God has established not just one enmity but "enmities",    
and not only between Mary and Satan but between her race and    
his race. That is, God has put enmities, antipathies and    
hatreds between the true children and servants of the Blessed    
Virgin and the children and slaves of the devil. They have no    
love and no sympathy for each other. The children of Belial,    
the slaves of Satan, the friends of the world, - for they are    
all one and the same - have always persecuted and will    
persecute more than ever in the future those who belong to the    
Blessed Virgin, just as Cain of old persecuted his brother    
Abel, and Esau his brother Jacob. These are the types of the    
wicked and of the just. But the humble Mary will always    
triumph over Satan, the proud one, and so great will be her    
victory that she will crush his head, the very seat of his    
pride. She will unmask his serpent's cunning and expose his    
wicked plots. She will scatter to the winds his devilish plans    
and to the end of time will keep her faithful servants safe    
from his cruel claws.    
     But Mary's power over the evil spirits will especially    
shine forth in the latter times, when Satan will lie in wait    
for her heel, that is, for her humble servants and her poor    
children whom she will rouse to fight against him. In the eyes    
of the world they will be little and poor and, like the heel,    
lowly in the eyes of all, down-trodden and crushed as is the    
heel by the other parts of the body. But in compensation for    
this they will be rich in God's graces, which will be    
abundantly bestowed on them by Mary. They will be great and    
exalted before God in holiness. They will be superior to all    
creatures by their great zeal and so strongly will they be    
supported by divine assistance that, in union with Mary, they    
will crush the head of Satan with their heel, that is, their    
humility, and bring victory to Jesus Christ.    
    
2) Devotion to Mary is especially necessary in the latter    
times.    
    
55.  Finally, God in these times wishes his Blessed Mother to    
be more known, loved and honoured than she has ever been. This    
will certainly come about if the elect, by the grace and light    
of the Holy Spirit, adopt the interior and perfect practice of    
the devotion which I shall later unfold. Then they will    
clearly see that beautiful Star of the Sea, as much as faith    
allows. Under her guidance they will perceive the splendours    
of this Queen and will consecrate themselves entirely to her    
service as subjects and slaves of love. They will experience    
her motherly kindness and affection for her children. They    
will love her tenderly and will appreciate how full of    
compassion she is and how much they stand in need of her help.    
In all circumstances they will have recourse to her as their    
advocate and mediatrix with Jesus Christ. They will see    
clearly that she is the safest, easiest, shortest and most    
perfect way of approaching Jesus and will surrender themselves    
to her, body and soul, without reserve in order to belong    
entirely to Jesus.    
    
56.  But what will they be like, these servants, these slaves,    
these children of Mary?    
     They will be ministers of the Lord who, like a flaming    
fire, will enkindle everywhere the fires of divine love. They    
will become, in Mary's powerful hands, like sharp arrows, with    
which she will transfix her enemies.    
     They will be as the children of Levi, thoroughly purified    
by the fire of great tribulations and closely joined to God.    
They will carry the gold of love in their heart, the    
frankincense of prayer in their mind and the myrrh of    
mortification in their body. They will bring to the poor and    
lowly everywhere the sweet fragrance of Jesus, but they will    
bring the odour of death to the great, the rich and the proud    
of this world.    
    
57.  They will be like thunder-clouds flying through the air    
at the slightest breath of the Holy Spirit. Attached to    
nothing, surprised at nothing, troubled at nothing, they will    
shower down the rain of God's word and of eternal life. They    
will thunder against sin, they will storm against the world,    
they will strike down the devil and his followers and for life    
and for death, they will pierce through and through with the    
two-edged sword of God's word all those against whom they are    
sent by Almighty God.    
    
58.  They will be true apostles of the latter times to whom    
the Lord of Hosts will give eloquence and strength to work    
wonders and carry off glorious spoils from his enemies. They    
will sleep without gold or silver and, more important still,    
without concern in the midst of other priests, ecclesiastics    
and clerics. Yet they will have the silver wings of the dove    
enabling them to go wherever the Holy Spirit calls them,    
filled as they are with the resolve to seek the glory of God    
and the salvation of souls. Wherever they preach, they will    
leave behind them nothing but the gold of love, which is the    
fulfilment of the whole law.    
    
59.  Lastly, we know they will be true disciples of Jesus    
Christ, imitating his poverty, his humility, his contempt of    
the world and his love. They will point out the narrow way to    
God in pure truth according to the holy Gospel, and not    
according to the maxims of the world. Their hearts will not be    
troubled, nor will they show favour to anyone; they will not    
spare or heed or fear any man, however powerful he may be.    
They will have the two-edged sword of the word of God in their    
mouths and the blood-stained standard of the Cross on their    
shoulders. They will carry the crucifix in their right hand    
and the rosary in their left, and the holy names of Jesus and    
Mary on their heart. The simplicity and self-sacrifice of    
Jesus will be reflected in their whole behaviour.    
     Such are the great men who are to come. By the will of    
God Mary is to prepare them to extend his rule over the    
impious and unbelievers. But when and how will this come    
about? Only God knows. For our part we must yearn and wait for    
it in silence and in prayer: "I have waited and waited."    
    
                          CHAPTER TWO    
               IN WHAT DEVOTION TO MARY CONSISTS    
    
            1. Basic principles of devotion to Mary    
    
60.  Having spoken briefly of the necessity of devotion to the    
Blessed Virgin, I must now explain what this devotion consists    
in. This I will do with God's help after I have laid down    
certain basic truths which throw light on the remarkable and    
sound devotion which I propose to unfold.    
    
       First principle: Christ must be the ultimate end    
                       of all devotions    
    
61.  Jesus, our Saviour, true God and true man must be the    
ultimate end of all our other devotions; otherwise they would    
be false and misleading. He is the Alpha and the Omega, the    
beginning and end of everything. "We labour," says St. Paul,    
"only to make all men perfect in Jesus Christ."    
     For in him alone dwells the entire fullness of the    
divinity and the complete fullness of grace, virtue and    
perfection. In him alone we have been blessed with every    
spiritual blessing; he is the only teacher from whom we must    
learn; the only Lord on whom we should depend; the only Head    
to whom we should be united and the only model that we should    
imitate. He is the only Physician that can heal us; the only    
Shepherd that can feed us; the only Way that can lead us; the    
only Truth that we can believe; the only Life that can animate    
us. He alone is everything to us and he alone can satisfy all    
our desires.    
     We are given no other name under heaven by which we can    
be saved. God has laid no other foundation for our salvation,    
perfection and glory than Jesus. Every edifice which is not    
built on that firm rock, is founded upon shifting sands and    
will certainly fall sooner or later. Every one of the faithful    
who is not united to him is like a branch broken from the stem    
of the vine. It falls and withers and is fit only to be burnt.    
If we live in Jesus and Jesus lives in us, we need not fear    
damnation. Neither angels in heaven nor men on earth, nor    
devils in hell, no creature whatever can harm us, for no    
creature can separate us from the love of God which is in    
Christ Jesus. Through him, with him and in him, we can do all    
things and render all honour and glory to the Father in the    
unity of the Holy Spirit; we can make ourselves perfect and be    
for our neighbour a fragrance of eternal life.    
    
62.  If then we are establishing sound devotion to our Blessed    
Lady, it is only in order to establish devotion to our Lord    
more perfectly, by providing a smooth but certain way of    
reaching Jesus Christ. If devotion to our Lady distracted us    
from our Lord, we would have to reject it as an illusion of    
the devil. But this is far from being the case. As I have    
already shown and will show again later on, this devotion is    
necessary, simply and solely because it is a way of reaching    
Jesus perfectly, loving him tenderly, and serving him    
faithfully.    
    
63.  Here I turn to you for a moment, dear Jesus, to complain    
lovingly to your divine Majesty that the majority of    
Christians, and even some of the most learned among them, do    
not recognise the necessary bond that unites you and your    
Blessed Mother. Lord, you are always with Mary and Mary is    
always with you. She can never be without you because then she    
would cease to be what she is. She is so completely    
transformed into you by grace that she no longer lives, she no    
longer exists, because you alone, dear Jesus, live and reign    
in her more perfectly than in all the angels and saints. If we    
only knew the glory and the love given to you by this    
wonderful creature, our feelings for you and for her would be    
far different from those we have now. So intimately is she    
united to you that it would be easier to separate light from    
the sun, and heat from the fire. I go further, it would even    
be easier to separate all the angels and saints from you than    
Mary; for she loves you ardently, and glorifies you more    
perfectly than all your other creatures put together.    
    
64.  In view of this, my dear Master, is it not astonishing    
and pitiful to see the ignorance and short-sightedness of men    
with regard to your holy Mother? I am not speaking so much of    
idolaters and pagans who do not know you and consequently have    
no knowledge of her. I am not even speaking of heretics and    
schismatics who have left you and your holy Church and    
therefore are not interested in your holy Mother. I am    
speaking of Catholics, and even of educated Catholics, who    
profess to teach the faith to others but do not know you or    
your Mother except speculatively, in a dry, cold and sterile    
way.    
     These people seldom speak of your Mother or devotion to    
her. They say they are afraid that devotion to her will be    
abused and that you will be offended by excessive honour paid    
to her. They protest loudly when they see or hear a devout    
servant of Mary speak frequently with feeling, conviction and    
vigour of devotion to her. When he speaks of devotion to her    
as a sure means of finding and loving you without fear or    
illusion, or when he says this devotion is a short road free    
from danger, or an immaculate way free from imperfection, or a    
wondrous secret of finding you, they put before him a thousand    
specious reasons to show him how wrong he is to speak so much    
of Mary. There are, they say, great abuses in this devotion    
which we should try to stamp out and we should refer people to    
you rather than exhort them to have devotion to your Mother,    
whom they already love adequately.    
     If they are sometimes heard speaking of devotion to your    
Mother, it is not for the purpose of promoting it or    
convincing people of it but only to destroy the abuses made of    
it. Yet all the while these persons are devoid of piety or    
genuine devotion to you, for they have no devotion to Mary.    
They consider the Rosary and the Scapular as devotions    
suitable only for simple women or ignorant people. After all,    
they say, we do not need them to be saved. If they come across    
one who loves our Lady, who says the rosary or shows any    
devotion towards her, they soon move him to a change of mind    
and heart. They advise him to say the seven penitential psalms    
instead of the Rosary, and to show devotion to Jesus instead    
of to Mary.    
     Dear Jesus, do these people possess your spirit? Do they    
please you by acting in this way? Would it please you if we    
were to make no effort to give pleasure to your Mother because    
we are afraid of offending you? Does devotion to your holy    
Mother hinder devotion to you? Does Mary keep for herself any    
honour we pay her? Is she a rival of yours? Is she a stranger    
having no kinship with you? Does pleasing her imply    
displeasing you? Does the gift of oneself to her constitute a    
deprivation for you? Is love for her a lessening of our love    
for you?    
    
65.  Nevertheless, my dear Master, the majority of learned    
scholars could not be further from devotion to your Mother, or    
show more indifference to it even if all I have just said were    
true. Keep me from their way of thinking and acting and let me    
share your feelings of gratitude, esteem, respect and love for    
your holy Mother. I can then love and glorify you all the    
more, because I will be imitating and following you more    
closely.    
    
66.  As though I had said nothing so far to further her    
honour, grant me now the grace to praise her more worthily, in    
spite of all her enemies who are also yours. I can then say to    
them boldly with the saints, "Let no one presume to expect    
mercy from God, who offends his holy Mother."    
    
67.  So that I may obtain from your mercy a genuine devotion    
to your blessed Mother and spread it throughout the whole    
world, help me to love you wholeheartedly, and for this    
intention accept the earnest prayer I offer with St. Augustine    
and all who truly love you.    
    
Prayer of Saint Augustine    
    
     O Jesus Christ, you are my Father, my merciful God, my    
great King, my good Shepherd, my only Master, my best helper,    
my beloved friend of overwhelming beauty, my living Bread, my    
eternal priest. You are my guide to my heavenly home, my one    
true light, my holy joy, my true way, my shining wisdom, my    
unfeigned simplicity, the peace and harmony of my soul, my    
perfect safeguard, my bounteous inheritance, my everlasting    
salvation.     
     My loving Lord, Jesus Christ, why have I ever loved or    
desired anything else in my life but you, my God? Where was I    
when I was not in communion with you? From now on, I direct    
all my desires to be inspired by you and centred on you. I    
direct them to press forward for they have tarried long    
enough, to hasten towards their goal, to seek the one they    
yearn for.    
     O Jesus, let him who does not love you be accursed, and    
filled with bitterness. O gentle Jesus, let every worthy    
feeling of mine show you love, take delight in you and admire    
you. O God of my heart and my inheritance, Christ Jesus, may    
my heart mellow before the influence of your spirit and may    
you live in me. May the flame of your love burn in my soul.    
May it burn incessantly on the altar of my heart. May it glow    
in my innermost being. May it spread its heat into the hidden    
recesses of my soul and on the day of my consummation may I    
appear before you consumed in your love. Amen.    
    
         Second principle: We belong to Jesus and Mary    
                        as their slaves    
    
68.  From what Jesus Christ is in regard to us we must    
conclude, as St. Paul says, that we belong not to ourselves    
but entirely to him as his members and his slaves, for he    
bought us at an infinite price - the shedding of his Precious    
Blood. Before baptism, we belonged to the devil as slaves, but    
baptism made us in very truth slaves of Jesus.    
     We must therefore live, work and die for the sole purpose    
of bringing forth fruit for him, glorifying him in our body    
and letting him reign in our soul. We are his conquest, the    
people he has won, his heritage.    
     It is for this reason that the Holy Spirit compares us:    
1) to trees that are planted along the waters of grace in the    
field of the Church and which must bear their fruit when the    
time comes; 2) to branches of the vine of which Jesus is the    
stem, which must yield good grapes; 3) to a flock of sheep of    
which Jesus is the Shepherd, which must increase and give    
milk; 4) to good soil cultivated by God, where the seed will    
spread and produce crops up to thirty-fold, sixty-fold, or a    
hundred-fold. Our Lord cursed the barren fig-tree and    
condemned the slothful servant who wasted his talent.    
     All this proves that he wishes to receive some fruit from    
our wretched selves, namely, our good works, which by right    
belong to him alone, "created in Jesus Christ for good works".    
These words of the Holy Spirit show that Jesus is the sole    
source and must be the sole end of all our good works, and    
that we must serve him not just as paid servants but as slaves    
of love. Let me explain what I mean.    
    
69.  There are two ways of belonging to another person and    
being subject to his authority. One is by ordinary service and    
the other is by slavery. And so we must use the terms    
"servant" and "slave". Ordinary service in Christian countries    
is when a man is employed to serve another for a certain    
length of time at a wage which is fixed or agreed upon. When a    
man is totally dependent on another for life, and must serve    
his master without expecting any wages or recompense, when he    
is treated just like a beast of the field over which the owner    
has the right of life and death, then it is slavery.     
    
70.  Now there are three kinds of slavery; natural slavery,    
enforced slavery, and voluntary slavery. All creatures are    
slaves of God in the first sense, for "the earth and its    
fullness belong to the Lord". The devils and the damned are    
slaves in the second sense. The saints in heaven and the just    
on earth are slaves in the third sense. Voluntary slavery is    
the most perfect of all three states, for by it we give the    
greatest glory to God, who looks into the heart and wants it    
to be given to him. Is he not indeed called the God of the    
heart or of the loving will? For by this slavery we freely    
choose God and his service before all things, even if we were    
not by our very nature obliged to do so.    
    
71.  There is a world of difference between a servant and a    
slave. 1) A servant does not give his employer all he is, all    
he has, and all he can acquire by himself or through others. A    
slave, however, gives himself to his master completely and    
exclusively with all he has and all he can acquire. 2) A    
servant demands wages for the services rendered to his    
employer. A slave, on the other hand, can expect nothing, no    
matter what skill, attention or energy he may have put into    
his work. 3) A servant can leave his employer whenever he    
pleases, or at least when the term of his service expires,    
whereas the slave has no such right. 4) An employer has no    
right of life and death over a servant. Were he to kill him as    
he would a beast of burden, he would commit murder. But the    
master of a slave has by law the right of life and death over    
him, so that he can sell him to anyone he chooses or - if you    
will pardon the comparison - kill him as he would kill his    
horse. 5) Finally, a servant is in his employer's service only    
for a time; a slave for always.    
    
72.  No other human state involves belonging  more completely    
to another than slavery. Among Christian peoples, nothing    
makes a person belong more completely to Jesus and his holy    
Mother than voluntary slavery. Our Lord himself gave us the    
example of this when out of love for us he "took the form of a    
slave". Our Lady gave us the same example when she called    
herself the handmaid or slave of the Lord. The Apostle    
considered it an honour to be called "slave of Christ".    
Several times in Holy Scripture, Christians are referred to as    
"slaves of Christ".    
     The Latin word "servus" at one time signified only a    
slave because servants as we know them did not exist. Masters    
were served either by slaves or by freedmen. The Catechism of    
the Council of Trent leaves no doubt about our being slaves of    
Jesus Christ, using the unequivocal term "Mancipia Christi",    
which plainly means: slaves of Christ.    
    
73.  Granting this, I say that we must belong to Jesus and    
serve him not just as hired servants but as willing slaves    
who, moved by generous love, commit themselves to his service    
after the manner of slaves for the honour of belonging to him.    
Before we were baptised we were the slaves of the devil, but     
baptism made us the slaves of Jesus. Christians can only be    
slaves of the devil or slaves of Christ.     
    
74.  What I say in an absolute sense of our Lord, I say in a    
relative sense of our Blessed Lady. Jesus, in choosing her as    
his inseparable associate in his life, glory and power in    
heaven and on earth, has given her by grace in his kingdom all    
the same rights and privileges that he possesses by nature.    
"All that belongs to God by nature belongs to Mary by grace",    
say the saints, and, according to them, just as Jesus and Mary    
have the same will and the same power, they have also the same    
subjects, servants and slaves.    
    
75.  Following therefore the teaching of the saints and of    
many great men we can call ourselves, and become, the loving    
slaves of our Blessed Lady in order to become more perfect    
slaves of Jesus. Mary is the means our Lord chose to come to    
us and she is also the means we should choose to go to him,    
for she is not like other creatures who tend rather to lead us    
away from God than towards him, if we are over-attached to    
them. Mary's strongest inclination is to unite us to Jesus,    
her Son, and her Son's strongest wish is that we come to him    
through his Blessed Mother. He is pleased and honoured just as    
a king would be pleased and honoured if a citizen, wanting to    
become a better subject and slave of the king, made himself    
the slave of the queen. That is why the Fathers of the Church,    
and St. Bonaventure after them, assert that the Blessed Virgin    
is the way which leads to our Lord.    
    
76.  Moreover, if, as I have said, the Blessed Virgin is the    
Queen and Sovereign of heaven and earth, does she not then    
have as many subjects and slaves as there are creatures? "All    
things, including Mary herself, are subject to the power of    
God. All things, God included, are subject to the Virgin's    
power", so we are told by St. Anselm, St. Bernard, St.    
Bernardine and St. Bonaventure. Is it not reasonable to find    
that among so many slaves there should be some slaves of love,    
who freely choose Mary as their Queen? Should men and demons    
have willing slaves, and Mary have none? A king makes it a    
point of honour that the queen, his consort, should have her    
own slaves, over whom she has right of life and death, for    
honour and power given to the queen is honour and power given    
to the king. Could we possibly believe that Jesus, the best of    
all sons, who shared his power with his Blessed Mother, would    
resent her having her own slaves? Has he less esteem and love    
for his Mother than Ahasuerus had for Esther, or Solomon for    
Bathsheba? Who could say or even think such a thing?    
    
77.  But where is my pen leading me? Why am I wasting my time    
proving something so obvious? If people are unwilling to call    
themselves slaves of Mary, what does it matter? Let them    
become and call themselves slaves of Jesus Christ, for this is    
the same as being slaves of Mary, since Jesus is the fruit and    
glory of Mary. This is what we do perfectly in the devotion we    
shall discuss later.    
    
            Third principle: We must rid ourselves    
                     of what is evil in us    
    
78.  Our best actions are usually tainted and spoiled by the    
evil that is rooted in us. When pure, clear water is poured    
into a foul-smelling jug, or wine into an unwashed cask that    
previously contained another wine, the clear water and the    
good wine are tainted and readily acquire an unpleasant odour.    
In the same way when God pours into our soul, infected by    
original and actual sin, the heavenly waters of his grace or    
the delicious wines of his love, his gifts are usually spoiled    
and tainted by the evil sediment left in us by sin. Our    
actions, even those of the highest virtue, show the effects of    
it. It is therefore of the utmost importance that, in seeking    
the perfection that can be attained only by union with Jesus,    
we rid ourselves of all that is evil in us. Otherwise our    
infinitely pure Lord, who has an infinite hatred for the    
slightest stain in our soul, will refuse to unite us to    
himself and will drive us from his presence.    
    
79.  To rid ourselves of selfishness, we must first become    
thoroughly aware, by the light of the Holy Spirit, of our    
tainted nature. Of ourselves we are unable to do anything    
conducive to our salvation. Our human weakness is evident in    
everything we do and we are habitually unreliable. We do not    
deserve any grace from God. Our tendency to sin is always    
present. The sin of Adam has almost entirely spoiled and    
soured us, filling us with pride and corrupting every one of    
us, just as leaven sours, swells and corrupts the dough in    
which it is placed. The actual sins we have committed, whether    
mortal or venial, even though forgiven, have intensified our    
base desires, our weakness, our inconstancy and our evil    
tendencies, and have left a sediment of evil in our soul.    
     Our bodies are so corrupt that they are referred to by    
the Holy Spirit as bodies of sin, as conceived and nourished    
in sin, and capable of any kind of sin. They are subject to a    
thousand ills, deteriorating from day to day and harbouring    
only disease, vermin and corruption.    
     Our soul, being united to our body, has become so carnal    
that it has been called flesh. "All flesh had corrupted its    
way". Pride and blindness of spirit, hardness of heart,    
weakness and inconstancy of soul, evil inclinations,    
rebellious passions, ailments of the body, - these are all we    
can call our own. By nature we are prouder than peacocks, we    
cling to the earth more than toads, we are more base than    
goats, more envious than serpents, greedier than pigs, fiercer    
than tigers, lazier than tortoises, weaker than reeds, and    
more changeable than weather-cocks. We have in us nothing but    
sin, and deserve only the wrath of God and the eternity of    
hell.    
    
80.  Is it any wonder then that our Lord laid down that anyone    
who aspires to be his follower must deny himself and hate his    
very life? He makes it clear that anyone who loves his life    
shall lose it and anyone who hates his life shall save it.    
Now, our Lord, who is infinite Wisdom, and does not give    
commandments without a reason, bids us hate ourselves only    
because we richly deserve to be hated. Nothing is more worthy    
of love than God and nothing is more deserving of hatred than    
self.    
    
81.  Secondly, in order to empty ourselves of self, we must    
die daily to ourselves. This involves our renouncing what the    
powers of the soul and the senses of the body incline us to    
do. We must see as if we did not see, hear as if we did not    
hear and use the things of this world as if we did not use    
them. This is what St. Paul calls "dying daily". Unless the    
grain of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a    
single grain and does not bear any good fruit. If we do not    
die to self and if our holiest devotions do not lead us to    
this necessary and fruitful death, we shall not bear fruit of    
any worth and our devotions will cease to be profitable. All    
our good works will be tainted by self-love and self-will so    
that our greatest sacrifices and our best actions will be    
unacceptable to God. Consequently when we come to die we shall    
find ourselves devoid of virtue and merit and discover that we    
do not possess even one spark of that pure love which God    
shares only with those who have died to themselves and whose    
life is hidden with Jesus Christ in him.    
    
82.  Thirdly, we must choose among all the devotions to the    
Blessed Virgin the one which will lead us more surely to this    
dying to self. This devotion will be the best and the most    
sanctifying for us. For we must not believe that all that    
glitters is gold, all that is sweet is honey, or all that is    
easy to do and is done by the majority of people is the most    
sanctifying. Just as in nature there are secrets enabling us    
to do certain natural things quickly, easily and at little    
cost, so in the spiritual life there are secrets which enable    
us to perform works rapidly, smoothly and with facility. Such    
works are, for example, emptying ourselves of self-love,    
filling ourselves with God, and attaining perfection.    
     The devotion that I propose to explain is one of these    
secrets of grace, for it is unknown to most Christians. Only a    
few devout people know of it and it is practised and    
appreciated by fewer still. To begin the explanation of this    
devotion here is a fourth truth which is a consequence of the    
third.    
    
        Fourth principle: It is more humble to have an    
                   intermediary with Christ    
    
83.  It is more perfect because it supposes greater humility    
to approach God through a mediator rather than directly by    
ourselves. Our human nature, as I have just shown, is so    
spoilt that if we rely on our own work, effort and    
preparedness to reach God and please him, it is certain that    
our good works will be tainted and carry little weight with    
him. They will not induce him to unite himself to us or answer    
our prayers. God had his reasons for giving us mediators with    
him. He saw our unworthiness and helplessness and had pity on    
us. To give us access to his mercies he provided us with    
powerful advocates, so that to neglect these mediators and to    
approach his infinite holiness directly and without help from    
any one of them, is to be lacking in humility and respect    
towards God who is so great and holy. It would mean that we    
have less esteem for the King of kings than for an earthly    
king or ruler, for we would not dare approach an earthly king    
without a friend to speak