all the glories of His Mother are essentially His
own. And yet we daily see ministers of the Gospel ignoring Mary's exalted
virtues and unexampled privileges and parading her alleged imperfections;
nay, sinfulness, as if her Son were dishonored by the piety, and took
delight in the defamation of His Mother.

Such defamers might learn a lesson from one who made little profession of
Christianity.

"Is thy name Mary, maiden fair?
Such should, methinks, its music be.
The sweetest name that mortals bear,
Were best befitting thee.
And she to whom it once was given
_Was half of earth and half of heaven_."(248)

Once more the title of _blessed_, is given to Mary. On one occasion a
certain woman, lifting up her voice, said to Jesus: "Blessed is the womb
that bore thee and the paps that gave thee suck."(249) It is true that our
Lord replied: "Yea, rather (or yea, likewise), blessed are they who hear
the word of God and keep it." It would be an unwarrantable perversion of
the sacred text to infer from this reply that Jesus intended to detract
from the praise bestowed on His Mother. His words may be thus correctly
paraphrased: She is blessed indeed in being the chosen instrument of My
incarnation, but more blessed in keeping My word. Let others be comforted
in knowing that though they cannot share with My Mother in the privilege
of her maternity, they can participate with her in the blessed reward of
them who hear My word and keep it.

In the preceding passages we have seen Mary declared blessed on four
different occasions, and hence, in proclaiming her blessedness, far from
paying her unmerited honor, we are but re-echoing the Gospel verdict of
saint and angel and of the Spirit of God Himself.

Wordsworth, though not nurtured within the bosom of the Catholic Church,
conceives a true appreciation of Mary's incomparable holiness in the
following beautiful lines:

"Mother! whose virgin bosom was uncrossed
With the least shade of thought to sin allied;
Woman! above all women glorified,
Our tainted nature's solitary boast;
Purer than foam on central ocean tost,
Brighter than eastern skies at daybreak strewn
With fancied roses, than the unblemished moon
Before her wane begins on heaven's blue coast,
Thy image falls to earth. Yet some, I ween,
Not unforgiven, the suppliant knee might bend
As to a visible power, in which did blend
All that was mi