Scotus Academicus, Tomus septimus: De Incarnatione Verbi Divini

NOTE 1. A threefold Conception of the Virgin Mother of God can be distinguished: namely, corporeal, spiritual, and divine. The first is that by which her most holy Parents, coming together in the marital act, furnished those things which chiefly pertained to the formation, organization, and disposition of her body for receiving the rational soul to be infused by God, which conception the Doctors are wont to call active. The second is the very infusion of the soul and its union with the duly organized body, which is commonly called passive conception, whereby it takes place in that very instant in which the rational soul is united to the body consisting of all its members and organs. The third finally is that by which the Virgin herself, blessed, through a singular operation of the Holy Spirit in her supplied her most pure blood for forming and organizing the body of Christ the Lord. But we do not speak here of this latter conception, that it is most holy and altogether immaculate no Catholic doubts. And although the present controversy could be raised concerning corporeal conception, namely whether before the infusion of the rational soul the body of the Blessed Virgin was entirely free from every stain and was conspicuous for cleanness and purity, that it might become the more fittingly and more perfectly the sanctuary of her most holy soul; nevertheless the hinge of the present controversy turns chiefly on the spiritual Conception, or taken passively; namely whether in that instant in which the soul of the Blessed Virgin was united to the body she was wholly without that hereditary stain by which all men whatsoever, conceived and born of the marital act, are wont to be undermined through corrupted propagation and origin.

NOTE 2. Various and most weighty controversies were long ago agitated concerning the unviolated and altogether immaculate spiritual and passive Conception of the Virgin Mother of God, especially around the year 1112; for when the Church of Lyons had decreed that the festive day of the eighth of December should be celebrated in honor of the immaculate Conception of the most Blessed Virgin, St. Bernard hearing this took it ill, and wrote to the Canons of that same Church that celebrated letter (if indeed it be truly his genuine offspring) in which among other things he thus assails them: We marvel greatly what chance has wrought at this time for some of you, to change the best color, introducing a new solemnity, which the rites of the Church know not, reason does not approve, ancient tradition does not commend. Are we more learned or more devout than the Fathers? But when, notwithstanding this reproof of St. Bernard, the most ardent zeal toward the unviolated Conception of the Virgin Mother of God had grown strong, and men otherwise religious and celebrated for devotion to the Virgin Mother of God had begun to assail it anew, the Subtle Doctor took up its defense and patronage. For he in 3. d. 3. q. 1. n. 1., where he first treats of the Immaculate Conception, indeed defends it there not assertively, but merely dissolves all the arguments by which the unviolated Conception of the Virgin seemed to be assailed. For when he had said: That God could have done that the Blessed Virgin herself never would have been in original sin: it could also come about that for a time she were at some time in sin, and in the last instant of that time be purged. Finally with every submission, according to his customary modesty and humility, he puts forward his opinion not assertively but dubitatively, in these words: But which of these three things, which have been shown possible, has been done, God knows: if it does not conflict with the authority of the Church, or the authority of Scripture, it will be judged probable that what is more excellent be attributed to Mary: namely, that God preserved her unhurt from original sin. But afterward, having grown bolder, dist. 15. n. 18., he pronounces absolutely and openly that the Blessed Virgin Mother of God never was unclean actually, by reason of actual sin, nor by reason of original sin: yet she would have been, had she not been preserved. And this opinion he so happily defended in solemn disputations and constant contests that he drew to it all the more celebrated doctors, especially the Parisians.

For (as Cavellus relates in the Rosary of the 11th century, a solemn disputation held by command of the supreme Pontiff before the Parisian Faculty, the Legates of the Apostolic See present, on the Immaculate Conception, with such subtlety of genius, such facility and perspicuity of solutions did he break and repel all the adverse arguments, and relying on the help of Mary herself confirmed and fortified his own pious opinion on the Marian Conception with the weight of arguments, with so many and so urgent reasons, that he drew that most celebrated faculty, mother of Universities, to his pious opinion: which in gratitude honored him with the title of Subtle Doctor: and led on by his keenest disputations enacted that sacred and celebrated Marian decree, namely that hereafter no one should be admitted to the grade of magistry who did not bind himself by oath that he would defend throughout his whole life the Immaculate Conception. Afterward Scotus set out for Cologne and bore away the victory for the Immaculate Conception from the disciples of Albert the Great: and the name of Subtle Doctor was there again solemnly acclaimed. He is said also to have received from the Pontiff a reward.)

So far Cavellus. Bosius confirms the same thing, On the Signs of the Church, tom. 1. fig. 2. lib. 1. cap. 8, where he says: Moreover I perceived that that most illustrious feast was confirmed by the doctrine concerning Mary of the acutest Theologian, &c. Salazar, cap. 42, century 12: John Duns Scotus the principal and greatest champion of the pure Conception, who won for this doctrine by his authority as great a faith as no other before or after him. And cap. 13. n. 1: The most subtle Doctor, just as he established by his authority the first schools for defending the Immaculate Conception, so omitted nothing which could conduce in this matter to the greater glory of the Virgin. As to the Parisian disputation Bernardinus de Bustis writes thus in the Office of the Immaculate Conception approved by Sixtus IV, lesson 1: Our Lord Jesus Christ, to protect the dignity of his beloved Mother, straightway dispatched to that city an outstanding Doctor of the Order of Minors, who, the foundations and all the arguments of the adversaries confuted with irrefragable speech, so luminously proved the innocence of his Lady's Conception, that all those brothers admiring greatly its sublimity fell silent, failing in disputation. Whereupon the opinion of the Minors was forthwith approved by Parisian study. Nor ought it seem wonderful that they called the pious opinion on the Immaculate Conception the opinion of the Minors: for it was first circulated under this name, as is evident from Abbot Panormitanus, cap. perquestus de feris, and John Varson on 3. dist. 3, and Salazar, cap. 12. sect. 15. Whence Jerome Hormachea on the Canticle, Proleg. B, cap. 180: By most excellent right can we call the religious of the Seraphic Order the standard-bearer in this pious opinion on the Immaculate Conception, &c. Since after the Subtle Doctor the whole Seraphic Order conspired to defend that opinion, until, the authority of the whole sacred Faculty of Paris lending fire, by study and indefatigable labor it came about that this pious opinion was propagated through all the regions of the Christian world, and so prevailed that it seems to be now not the opinion of the Order of Minors alone, but of all the faithful of Christ. Here I do not recount other controversies afterward arisen on this matter, which we shall open in the course of this Question.

NOTE 3. Under the name Immaculate Conception nothing else ought to be understood (according to the opinion of all the Doctors who wrote since the controversy arisen about it in the schools) than the absence of the stain of original sin in the Blessed Virgin herself in that first instant in which her soul was united to the body, and when it could truly be affirmed, Mary is conceived: so that all these propositions, which you will everywhere find among Authors who have written on that Immaculate Conception, are altogether equivalent and obtain entirely the same signification, for instance, The Conception of the Blessed Virgin is immaculate: or The Blessed Virgin in the first instant of her animation was clean and immune from original sin: or The Blessed Virgin, divine grace preventing and operating, never actually lay under original sin: or The Blessed Virgin did not contract original sin: or The Blessed Virgin in the first instant of her being had sanctifying grace: or The Blessed Virgin was preserved from original sin: and many other similar propositions, which are employed indiscriminately by the Doctors, with only the words varied but the same sense prevailing, to expound this pious opinion; so much so that whoever uttered any one of them would thereby openly enunciate the immaculate Conception, as if he used all the aforesaid propositions and modes of speaking at once. The reason of this is, that although the word "immaculate" has a wider extension than purity from original sin; nevertheless when it is added to "Conception," it is determined and restricted to signify only the absence of original guilt; for in the instant of Conception no other stain can either be contracted, nor formally be impeded and eliminated by preserving grace, than that which by hereditary propagation from the corrupted stock of humankind assails all men.

These things premised, let there be

One single Conclusion. — THE VIRGIN MOTHER OF GOD WAS TRULY IMMUNE FROM ORIGINAL SIN, AND PRESERVED FROM IT BY SANCTIFYING GRACE DIVINELY INFUSED INTO HER IN THE FIRST INSTANT OF HER CONCEPTION AND ANIMATION. This Conclusion can be fortified by most weighty considerations, which, for greater clarity and methodical disputation, we shall propose and weigh in the following paragraphs.

§ I. — That the immaculate conception and animation of the Virgin Mother of God is gathered not obscurely from Sacred Scripture.

Rightly did Christ the Lord say, John 5: Search the scriptures… and the same are they that give testimony of me, obliquely to touch the ignorance and blindness of the Jews, because although they thought themselves most expert in the sacred letters, they did not discover him to be the true Messiah promised by so many oracles: for although the adorable Savior pronounced those words of himself only, nevertheless the Blessed Virgin may use the same by accommodated sense. For although, as St. Thomas teaches 3. part. q. 27. art. 1., On her sanctification in the womb, nothing is handed down in Canonical Scripture, nevertheless since St. Paul says 2. Timoth. 3: All scripture inspired of God is profitable to teach, to reprove, to correct, to instruct in justice: that the man of God may be perfect, furnished to every good work. And as the Subtle Doctor teaches excellently, quest. 2. of the Prologue, on the first principal argument:

No science (that is, in Scripture itself) will have expounded all things to be known; but those from which others can sufficiently be elicited: whence many necessary truths are not expressed in Sacred Scripture, and are contained there virtually: as conclusions in principles, for the investigation of which the labor of Expositors and Doctors was useful:

Hence if we search the divine oracles of the Scriptures, that is, ponder and consider them with deep attention of mind especially according to the interpretation of the holy Fathers and the more celebrated Doctors of the Church, we shall find many things which patronize the immaculate and most pure Conception of the Virgin Mother of God. Now out of the innumerable Oracles of this kind which bear witness to this truth, I shall propose certain choicer ones.

Let the first be that Genes. 3, where God addressing the serpent, the assailant of the woman, says v. 15: I will put enmities between thee and the woman, and thy seed and her seed: she shall crush thy head, and thou shalt lie in wait for her heel. By which words he signified, Not that Eve, says our Lyranus, but another descending from her, namely the Virgin Mary, who is hostile to demons; whence Canticles 3: terrible as an army set in array. St. Jerome, or whoever is the author of the letter To a sick friend on the perfect man, gives a perspicuous reason of this thing: The Mother of the Lord, he says, was promised already in that woman: she is set opposed to the enmities of the serpent. And lest this seem to pertain to Eve, he did not say "I put" but "I will put," indicating that woman who should bring forth the Savior, not one who should generate a fratricide. St. Cyprian had shone forth before him, lib. 2. Testimonies against the Jews, cap. 9: It is a word of promise, he says, which is sent forward into futurity. He did not say "I put," lest it seem to pertain to Eve; but "I will put," that is, I will raise up against thee a woman. St. Epiphanius sets forth another reason of the same signification, lib. 3. against heresies, which he gathers from these words, between thy seed, and her seed: Nowhere, he says, is the seed of the woman alone found except in Mary: therefore the whole cannot be fulfilled in Eve. Rupertus subscribes to him lib. 3. De Trinitate, cap. 19, where he says: This is the seed, or son of the woman (Christ), so that he is not also the seed of the man, and therefore not without mystery he took his designation from her alone.

From this Oracle, moreover, a threefold argument can be drawn forth, by which the immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mother of God may be proved. First indeed, there was perpetual enmity, and that most bitter, between Mary and the daemon serpent: but if she had also been stained for any instant with original sin, for that instant she would not have been his enemy, but his friend, inasmuch as consenting and subject to him; and to God threatening, I will put enmities between thee, and Mary, the serpent could answer: but I will first join friendships with her through the bond of original guilt, I will enter into a closer relation with her, I will overcome her, cast her down, and number her among my captives; we shall be alike in iniquity, we shall stand against thee enraged and injured, etc.; all which things militate directly not only against the glory of God, but even against the truth of that divine oracle: therefore since Mary always held hostile enmities with the daemon serpent, no one of sound mind will judge that she entered into friendships and a covenant with him through original sin. It is confirmed: For as friendship either supposes or produces likeness and parity, so enmity produces unlikeness and contrariety: For this, (says Rupertus just praised) Friendships differ, that friends at peace extend the surface of anything of whatever speech: but enmities have a manifest intention of contrariety: therefore Mary is said to be the enemy of the serpent insofar as she is unlike him: but unless in the first instant of her conception she had been preserved by God from the stain of original guilt, she could not be said to be absolutely unlike the serpent: therefore that the truth of that divine Oracle may stand, nor let any vestige of likeness and love ever be thought to have intervened, it is necessary that even in the first instant of her conception she herself was unlike the serpent, and adversarial. — The second argument is sought from those words, She shall crush thy head; for, (says St. Augustine, or whoever is the author of the Commentary on Genesis) since the subjection of original sin is the head of the devil: such a head Mary crushed: for original sin is the head of all sins, and their beginning, which, after the manner of the serpentine head, derives its body and influx into all others, and little by little introduces them: but Mary crushed this serpentine head: therefore from his pestilential breath and bite she was altogether immune and free. — A third argument finally can be gathered from those words, Thou shalt lie in wait for her heel, that is, in vain shalt thou attempt to undermine and assail the beginning of her life; from which I argue thus: if the daemon had stolen and defiled by original sin the Conception of the blessed Virgin, and that first instant of her animation, by his wiles and frauds, her heel could be called defiled, nor would the Virgin Mother of God thence vindicate to herself any beauty and dignity: but she is commended above all on account of her shoes, for this is appropriated to her Cant. 7: How beautiful are thy steps in shoes, O prince's daughter! as if he said: the beauty of thy steps, and the rectitude of thy ways, from when thou first movedst thy foot, is thence especially celebrated, because thou art always daughter of the Prince, first-born of his love, and elect mother. Eve indeed the handmaid of sin, the rest sons of vengeance, sons of gehenna, while they are being formed and make their first step toward life, rush into death: but thou in the passage of thy Conception makest thy step no less beautifully than confidently. — And this interpretation Rupertus so excellently expounds, when he says:

Of the shoes here therefore not of the body, but of the spirit, in which to go unshod is the highest ignobility, and more than servile poverty: therefore the serpent bit the heel of the handmaid, but thou, daughter of the Prince, well shod, hast crushed the head of the serpent. Thou especially, o Prince, and singular Lady beloved, etc.

The second Testimony demonstrating the immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mother of God is sought from those words Numer. 21 (24): There shall rise a star out of Jacob, and a sceptre shall spring up from Israel: and shall strike the princes of Moab, etc. From which words a threefold argument is gathered for evincing that purity of the Mother of God's Conception. First indeed, Mary is called a star, for, as St. Bernardine of Siena says most splendidly, Sermon on the glorious name of the Virgin art. 1. cap. 3: Before the advent of this Virgin, the fog of sin had darkened the whole world, so that there was none who could see the true light: for all the gentiles were fogs agitated by whirlwinds, as is said 2. Peter 2. Therefore they dwelt in darkness, whence concerning such it is written Nahum 1: darkness shall pursue his enemies. Yet the Blessed Virgin came forth like a shining star, so that of her may be said that Eccles. 50: As the morning star in the midst of a cloud, etc.; but a star is nowhere obscured by darkness and gloom: therefore it must be concluded with our Mayronis, Serm. on the Conception of B. Mary, that as the golden light at the rising of the sun glows red in the morning without clouds, so the soul of the Virgin ever resplended without clouds of sins. Indeed all the posterity of Adam, overshadowed by the original sacrifice, are conceived; Mary alone among all innocent and immaculate shone forth from afar. Concerning the rest Job says, cap. 3: Let the stars be darkened with the mist thereof. Let it look for light and not see it, neither the rising of the dawning day. Which words our Lyranus expounds thus, as Pelbartus relates lib. 4. part. 1. art. 3: There Job speaks of the guilt of original sin: and he says the same: let the stars be darkened, that is, the Saints, with its mist: let it look for light, that is, Christ: and not see him: because Christ conceived supernaturally of the Virgin could not contract original sin. It follows: neither the rising of the dawning Day, that is, the Conception of Mary, which is figured by the dawn. Canticle 6. To these add that the most Blessed Virgin is celebrated not only under the name of star, but also of moon and sun: for the Church is wont to attribute to her the words of Cant. 6: Who is this that cometh forth as the morning rising, fair as the moon, bright as the sun: whereby it signifies that every splendor of innocence whatsoever, and light of purity and virtue, which God could confer on any creature, he abundantly derived into her. Wherefore we can not unreasonably hold that God inaugurated the same thing in the order of grace which he had previously wrought in the order of nature: for just as he formed three kinds of bodies, namely the sun, moon, and stars, glittering with splendor, so that in the first beginning of their formation they were surrounded and overlaid with light, so too he willed to bring forth Christ the Lord the true sun of justice, the Virgin his mother, that wonderful moon, and likewise the Angels as so many stars shining in the firmament of eternal beatitude, coruscating with the divine light of grace and illuminated, in the first instant of their formation.

From these therefore it stands that the most Blessed Virgin was never obscured by any shadows of sin, and consequently was wholly without experience of original stain. — The second argument is deduced from the following

words of the same Oracle: And a sceptre shall spring up from Israel; for Isaias had prophesied cap. 11: And there shall come forth a rod out of the root of Jesse, and a flower shall rise up out of his root: which words St. Jerome expounds thus in the same place: But let us understand the rod out of the root of Jesse to be the holy Virgin Mary, who had no shoot adhering to her: but if the Blessed Virgin had been stained by any sin, doubtless she would have had not only a shoot, but an adhering knottiness: therefore it must be concluded with St. Anselm lib. 2. On the Virginal Conception, cap. 9:

I believe and confess, most pious Lady, whatever little servant I am, that from the root of Jesse, most beautiful, and therefore alien from the wound of sin, everything that disfigures thee, remaining most whole, thou didst bring forth the most precious flower, not any sort whatever, but one upon which the sevenfold Spirit shall rest.

Or as St. Ambrose has it more clearly in the Sermon On the Gabaonites, expounding the same words of Isaias: This is the rod in which there was neither knot of original sin, nor bark of venial fault. Nor does it matter that this sermon is not found among the printed works of St. Ambrose; for very many whom our de Aula praises in the Trituration pag. 133, together with Michael de Carchano in the Sermon On Penance printed in the year 1496, give faith that they read that sermon among the works of St. Ambrose: whence also the aforesaid words were inserted into the Office of the Conception, which is recited by the Seraphic Order with Apostolic approval. — A third argument finally can be asked from those words of the same prophecy: And shall strike the princes of Moab: for it is known that daemons are not obscurely designated by the name Moab: for just as the Moabites were always hostile to the Israelites, so daemons denounce perpetual and harassing war against men, especially the faithful and endowed with virtue. But the Virgin Mother of God, that mystical rod, struck them all down not only during the time of her most whole life, dissolving their frauds and making their temptations void; but also broke their power at the beginning of her Conception and Nativity. Which Rupertus explains excellently lib. 1. On the Canticles, cap. 1, where comparing this mystical rod with the Rod of Moses, he says:

As that rod devoured the rods of the magicians and enchanters, and crushed all Egyptian pride, and then budded, flourished, leafed, and bore fruit, not planted, not animated by the sap of earth, but advanced by heavenly virtue beyond the use of nature: so thou, most beautiful of women, my beloved, hast slain all heretical depravity, cast down the pride of the devil, flowering in conception, fruitful in birth, etc.

St. Bernard illustrates the same truth most splendidly tom. 1. In the Deprecation to the glory of the Virgin, after he had said:

Thou terrible as an army set in array. What then? Did not the princes of darkness shudder, when they saw, contrary to custom, a woman strong and most learned for battles proceed against them, equipped with armor mightier than all, whose sword is upon her thigh because of night fears! Around her a strong line of spiritual virtues, guarding themselves mutually each in its order. etc.

Thus did Mary advance in her Conception. This sufficiently indicates what follows: namely, that they (the Angels namely) might guard the most pleasing couch of Solomon, and provide lest an alien guest invade the lodging prepared for the eternal King.

Very many oracles confirming the same truth the Psalmist King supplies to us: but lest I be longer, I bring forward only one or two. Let the first be Psal. 15: The Most High hath sanctified his own tabernacle: God is in the midst thereof, it shall not be moved: God will help it in the morning early. For no one can deny that the Virgin Mother of God is truly the tabernacle of the Most High, because him whom the heavens could not contain she embraced in her womb. The Most High sanctified this tabernacle in a manner utterly ineffable and far more excellent than any other souls preeminent in holiness, in which also he is said to dwell. For there are very many whom he sanctifies only in the evening of death, as the penitent thief: others whom in advanced age, and as it were in the meridian of life, he calls from vices to the state of holiness, as St. Paul, Magdalene, etc. There are also whom he prevents in the morning with the blessings of sweetness, namely those whom he sanctifies before they come forth into open light by nativity, as had been prophesied of Jeremias and John the Baptist Jeremiae 1: Before I formed thee in the bowels of the womb, I knew thee: and before thou camest forth out of the womb, I sanctified thee. But the most Blessed Virgin God helped and protected in the morning early, that is, from the very first beginning of her life, namely preserving her from all inquination of sin whatsoever, inasmuch as he chose her for his tabernacle: for how would God have helped her in the morning early if he had first banished her into the tyranny of the daemon through original sin? — The same thing Psal. 86 intimates more exactly and openly, where he says: The foundations thereof are in the holy mountains: The Lord loveth the gates of Sion above all the tabernacles of Jacob… man is born in her, and the Highest himself hath founded her. By which words he signifies that the holiness of the most Blessed Virgin arising attained far that summit of loftiness and dignity which the perfected holiness of the rest could attain. Hence St. Gregory in Exposition 1. on the book of Kings says:

By the name of the mountain of Ephraim can be designated the most Blessed ever Virgin Mary Mother of God. For she was a mountain, who surpassed all the height of elect creature by the dignity of her election. Is not Mary a lofty Mountain, who that she might extend toward the conception of the eternal Word raised the summit of her merits above all the choirs of Angels even to the throne of the Deity? Of this mountain Isaias prophesying its most excellent dignity says: in the last days shall be prepared the mountain of the house of the Lord upon the top of mountains. For she was a mountain on the top of mountains, because the height of Mary shone forth above all Saints:

By no reason could it be said that at the beginning of her sanctity she had equaled, indeed surpassed, the dignity of any other of the Saints, unless she had truly been immune from every sin in the first instant of her life; for if only she had been sanctified before being born, she would have this in common with those who were sanctified in the womb, as we said just now. Therefore it must be concluded with St. Anselm Hom. on the Conception of the Virgin: If Jeremias, he says, who was to prophesy amid groans, was sanctified in the womb, and John the Precursor of the Lord was filled with the Holy Spirit from his mother's womb, who would dare dispute that the propitiatory of the whole age was deprived of the illumination of the Holy Spirit at the very beginning of her Conception! — It is confirmed from the following words: A man is born in her, etc. By that man he signified Christ, of whom Isaias had prophesied writing: A woman shall encompass a man: but (says St. Anselm lib. On the Virginal Conception) it was fitting that the conception of Christ should come about of a Mother most pure: namely, it was becoming that that Virgin shine with that purity, than which a greater cannot be understood under God; to whom God the Father disposed to give his only Son, whom he loved as himself, having come equal to him from his heart, so that he might naturally be heir, and both common Son of God the Father and of the Virgin. Hence St. Peter Damian says most splendidly Serm. 2. On Virginity: The flesh of the Virgin conceived of Adam admitted no stains of Adam, but the purity of her singular continence was converted into the whiteness of eternal light, so that Christ, who is the brightness of eternal light, mirror without stain, and image of most pure paternal goodness, might assume for himself a body formed from most pure flesh: For it must not be believed (says St. Bernardine tom. 2. Serm. 19.) that the Son of God himself willed to be born of the Virgin, and to take her flesh which was stained by any original sin; rather it must be believed that he willed to take flesh from most pure flesh, and that his Mother was more than Eve, and Adam, who were created without original sin. — Which thing indeed will easily be brought to mind by whoever has heard Ecclesiasticus admonishing cap. 3: That the glory of man is from the honor of his father, and a father without honor is the disgrace of the son. And in the same place: The mother's curse rooteth up the foundations. Whence if ever the Virgin Mother of God had received anything of disgrace and curse by reason of original sin, Christ her son certainly would not have been immune from this shameful ignominy, and if not blamed, yet he would have been disgraced by the disgrace of his parent: for as Tertullian said with sententiousness, Christ reckoned of the stock of Jesse, namely through Mary, and hence must be judged as though the honor of Christ God were reckoned from the Virgin; whence if the Mother of God had been guilty of most infamous transgression, and tributary to the tartarean tyrant, not so much glory as some disgrace of the Son would thence be reckoned: seeing that, as Arnoldus Carnotensis said most splendidly in the Treatise On the Praises of Mary: That Mary is preached full of grace, it is manifest that the glory of Mother and Son is indivisible, the proclamation of both is common: for, as he says in the same place, one is the flesh of Mary and Christ, one spirit, whence it was said to her: The Lord is with thee. Whereby let it be known that the glory of each is indivisible, and thus in a certain way the ignominy common, which would be derived from the disgrace of the Mother into the Son: for Christ is reckoned of the Virgin. I pass over various testimonies of this kind, which both in the books of Solomon, especially in the Canticle of Canticles, where the beauty of the extraordinary purity and sanctity of the Virgin Mother of God is splendidly celebrated and commended, and in the oracles of the Prophets, which aim at the assertion of the same most pure Conception of the Mother of God; so that I may bring forward some from the New Testament, in which this truth is delineated more perspicaciously.

It comes forth first of all that Angelic salutation, whereby namely the Angel, an Orator destined by God to the Virgin that he might announce the sacrament of the Incarnation, thus addressed her: Hail full of grace: significantly he said: Hail, that is, without "va," as the Angelic Doctor explains excellently in the elucidation of the Angelic salutation, (as may be seen in the first edition of the same works, and older manuscripts.) From sin, he says, followed a threefold va: va of guilt: va of punishment: va of ignorance. The va of guilt is threefold: original, actual, and venial. From all this threefold va the Blessed Virgin was free. — To her concurs the Seraphic Doctor in the Mirror of the Virgin, cap. 2, where he says: Hail Mary without va. Threefold is the va from which Mary was most immune: the va of actual guilt, the va of original misery, and the va of gehennal punishment. — The same St. Bernardine commends most splendidly Tom. 4. Sermon 1. On the Annunciation, art. 1. cap. 1: Hail, he says, Blessed Virgin, without the first va, that is, without sin, tyrant of original sin, nay without it thou wast conceived. But he used that formula of salutation that with the name of Eve inverted he might signify, says St. Jerome: That whatever malediction was inflicted through Eve, the blessing of Mary took away entirely. Whence also the Church sings most splendidly: Taking that Hail, from Gabriel's mouth, establish us in peace, changing the name of Eve. Nor did he happily change only the name, but also the lot; because as St. Augustine writes excellently Serm. 2. On the Annunciation, Eve the authoress of sin, Mary the authoress of merit; Eve by killing harmed, Mary by vivifying profited: that one struck, this one healed, etc. But how would all these things rightly fit the Virgin Mother of God, if she herself had lain under the curse of the miseries of original sin in the same way as the posterity of Eve? — The same truth the Angel confirms more fully, when he says: Full of grace. For truly by what reason would the most worthy Mother of God be called full of grace, if place for original sin had been left in her, and the grace of preservation, which was granted to the Angels lest they rush down with the enemies, had been wanting to herself? It must be said therefore with the Seraphic Doctor Sermon 2. On the Virgin, that our Lady was full of grace preventing in her sanctification: grace namely preservative, against the filthiness of the fault of original sin, which she would have contracted from the corruption of nature, unless by a special privilege of grace she had been preserved. This truth no one will deny, who with the sacred Doctors perceives that by those words, full of grace, is signified that the Virgin Mother of God was adorned with every plenitude and perfection of grace. Well is she called full, (says the author of the sermon under the name of St. Jerome to Eustochium) because to the rest it is supplied by parts. But into Mary the plenitude of grace poured itself whole at once. Whence Richard a S. Laurentio lib. 1. On the Praises of the Virgin, cap. 4, says thus: Every other creature has something of emptiness, because it could receive greater grace; but she herself was everywhere so full of grace, because she could not have greater grace: unless she were united to the Divinity, that is, unless she herself were God. This is that plenitude concerning which the Angel here specially says: Hail full of grace. — Such is the opinion of the Princes of Theology: since our Alensis 1. p. his Summa pronounces expressly: The Blessed Virgin had such grace that in fact she could not receive more, and as much as pure creature could receive. To him concurs B. Albert the Great in his Mariale, cap. 177: In the Blessed Virgin Mary, he says, with respect to all creatures not united to God, there was grace supreme, grace in the highest: therefore she approaches the first light in the highest; therefore purity in the highest: for purity follows the nature of light, and luminous. By which he signifies, that from the summit of her grace Mary not only had the culmination and excellence of all purity, but moreover more closely and more perspicuously was partaker of the light and vision of the eternal divine essence. Which truth our St. Bernardine of Siena expounds no less piously than elegantly, Tom. 4. Serm. 18. On the Exaltation of B. Mary, art. 1. cap. 10, where he says: According to Bernard the Virgin Mary penetrated beyond what can be believed the abyss of divine wisdom, so that as far as the condition of creature suffers without personal union, she seems immersed in that inaccessible light. And lest you think he speaks only of the wisdom of the Virgin, he adds: So great grace has been given by the Lord to the Virgin, as would be possible to be given to one pure creature. So great therefore an abundance and sublimity of grace ought to leave no place in the Virgin Mother of God for sin, and thence from this plenitude of her grace her immunity from the original stain is rightly gathered. — The Angel adds a new argument of the same truth to be confirmed, when he says: The Lord is with thee. For who will presume to limit the most singular presence, assistance, and protection of the Lord to the Virgin to that time only after she was conceived? Since the Angel pronounces absolutely: The Lord is with thee, whereby he signifies that she was not only at all time, but also from eternity chosen by the Lord not merely peculiarly, that she might become the Mother of his only-begotten Son, but also perpetually possessed by him; whence deservedly does the Church attribute to her this Oracle of the Wise Man Prov. 8: The Lord possessed me in the beginning of his ways, before he made anything from the beginning. From eternity I was ordained, and of old before the earth was made: the abysses (of sin) were not yet, and I had already been conceived. — More evidently do the following words of the Angelic salutation indicate this: Blessed art thou amongst women. For that blessing not only among women (for Elisabeth said thus), but "in" or "amidst" women, indicates preceding times, in which all blessings conferred from Heaven on all women (nay even on men) slipped away through the intervention of Mary. Beautifully indeed Elisabeth says to the Virgin her kinswoman: Blessed art thou amongst women, as if he said: more blessed than all women; but Gabriel the Angel said cleverly and more sententiously: Blessed art thou amidst women, for he expresses that she herself was blessed in all women; nay, says Eusebius Emissenus: Through her blessing is given to women, and the world is freed from malediction: for as the most expert Idiota adds piously lib. Of Contemplation On the Virgin, cap. 1: Through thee, o super-blessed Mary, angelic life is recovered, innocence repaired, the devil conquered and crushed, etc. Therefore it must be concluded with St. Lawrence Justinian Serm. On the Annunciation, that the most Blessed Virgin from her very Conception was prevented with blessings of sweetness, and alien from the handwriting of damnation. Or as Richard a S. Laurentio explains more clearly cap. 106: It stands that she was immune from all original sin, through whom not only the malediction of mother Eve was dissolved, but even the blessing is bestowed on all. — The Angel confirms the same truth when he says: Fear not, Mary, for thou hast found grace with God: for as the same most wise Idiota says cap. 6: Thou hast found grace with God singular, o sweetest Virgin, because there were preserved in thee from the original stain, the Angelic salutation, and the over-shadowing of the Holy Spirit. Andrew of Jerusalem had preceded him on these words, Fear not Mary, saying: For grace was found with God, whereas Eve had lost it. Hugo Cardinalis adds on 8. Canticles: Thou hast found peace, whereas the first parents had lost it: and consequently the most Blessed Virgin found that grace of integrity, and peace, enriched with which the first parents had lost by their warfare against God. — Finally the appendage and supreme strength of this proof the Angel supplies, when he says: Behold thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a Son, etc. For as we said above, pag. 775, so great and so close is the society of the Incarnate Word with his Mother of integrity and glory, that Christ himself, says Tertullian, is to be reckoned of the Virgin.

The second testimony from the New Testament, and that, as it seems to me, sufficiently openly signifying the truth of the Conception of the Virgin Mother of God, can be sought from that Rom. 5 v. 15: Not as the offense, so also the gift: for if by the offense of one many died, much more the grace of God, and the gift in the grace of one man Jesus Christ hath abounded unto many. From which I am pleased to argue thus: The grace of Christ the Lord abounded unto more than the offense of Adam; and consequently it is necessary that the grace of Christ the Lord have been derived to some whom the offense of Adam had not stained: otherwise it appears not how the unshaken truth of the Apostolic Oracle would stand: but if this grace of Christ the Lord Mediator ought to be derived to anyone without experience of the Adamic offense, chiefly to his most beloved Genitrix, as the Doctor signifies most splendidly 3. dist. 3. qu. 1., where he says: The most perfect Mediator has the most perfect act of mediating with respect to some person for whom he mediates: but Christ is the most perfect Mediator: therefore Christ had the most perfect degree of mediating possible, with respect to some creature, or person, with respect to whom he was mediator: but with respect to no person did he have a more excellent degree than with respect to Mary: therefore, etc. — To this tends the argument which Franciscus Mayron draws from this same chapter 3. dist. 3., where after he had said: If the Mother of the Lord had contracted original sin for however little time, or for a single instant, it would have been worse for her than if she had been eternally damned, as to the pain of loss, and sense; he immediately adds: The privileges of the New Testament exceed the old ones, according to the doctrine of Paul Rom. 5. cap.: There however was one woman without sin in the state of innocence. Likewise, As Christ is compared to Adam according to humanity 1. Cor. 15, so the Mother of Christ to Eve in the character of one simply exceeding, as to all innocence. I pass over various divine Oracles of this kind, which could be elicited from the New Testament for confirming the most pure Conception of the unviolated Virgin, so that I may make enough against certain persons from the aforesaid objections.

You will object. 1. That Matthaei 19: They that are in health need not a physician, but they that are ill: but the adversaries say Christ was a physician necessary to the Virgin: therefore she labored under the infirmity of sin, especially original. They confirm from Luke 19: The Son of man came to seek and to save that which was lost: but he came to seek the Blessed Virgin; far be it that he did not seek her: therefore she like the others whom he sought had perished through original sin. Moreover they add that 1. Timoth. 1: Christ Jesus came into this world to save sinners: but he came to save the Virgin Mary: therefore she was stained with original stain, and held sinful. — I answer: that to expiate sin, and to establish salvation from sins, was indeed one of the principal motives of the Incarnation as it was made; although, as we said, Christ would have come no less even if no sin, whether actual or original, had existed; and consequently his advent was not only that he might save sinners, but also that he might endow and enrich the just with ampler holiness and abundance of graces: therefore although the Virgin Mother of God was immune from every original stain, nevertheless for that reason Christ is to be judged to have come into this world on account of her grace, just as of other men. To these add, that Christ could no less be called both seeker and physician with respect to the most Blessed Virgin, because he preserved her from fall and infirmity of sin by a more abundant and efficacious medicine of grace: nor indeed should only that skilled physician be accounted such who restores lost health, but also he who preserves health already acquired.

You will object. 2. All the oracles of Sacred Scripture by which it is asserted that all men are shaken by sin, and stand in need of the grace of Christ the Mediator for aid and cleansing. Thus that Psal. 13 and 52: All are gone aside, they are become unprofitable together, there is none that doth good, there is not so much as one. Thus also 2. Cor. 5: If one died for all: then all were dead; and Christ died for all. Whence thus argue the adversaries: for whomever Christ underwent bodily death, he had incurred spiritual death: but Christ died bodily for the Blessed Virgin, otherwise he would not have died for all: therefore the Blessed Virgin was spiritually dead: and consequently she incurred at least original sin. Similarly that 1. Timoth. 2: One is the mediator of God and men, Christ, who gave himself redemption for all. From which they thus argue: Christ is Mediator only of those who at some time were divided from God by sin: but Christ is Mediator of all men: therefore all men (even the Blessed Virgin) are divided from God. Likewise that Rom. 5: As by one man sin entered into this world, and by sin death: and so death passed upon all men, in whom all have sinned. From which they thus infer: all men propagated from Adam in the seminal way sinned in him: but the Blessed Virgin was propagated from Adam in the seminal way: therefore she sinned in him. — I answer first, that universal propositions in Sacred Scripture do not embrace the generality of things so but that they mostly suffer limitation and exception; very many examples of this kind can be brought forward; for thus we read Genes. 6: For all flesh had corrupted its way: and yet of that universal dictum the exception is read there in these words: Noe was a just and perfect man in his generations. Similarly Exodus 11, while every first-born of the Egyptian people was slain by the destroying Angel, Scripture says: For there was not any house wherein there lay not one dead; which proposition is equivalent to this general one: no house was, in which someone dead of the first-born did not lie: nevertheless as St. Augustine observes on this passage, there could be some house which had no first-born: therefore the truth of the universal proposition stands with due exception. The same St. Augustine observes on those words Judg. 9: And Abimelech slew his brethren the sons of Jerobaal, seventy men upon one stone: and there remained Joathan the youngest son of Jerobaal: the universal proposition is true, says St. Augustine, namely that he killed all the sons of Jerobaal, although two of them were not killed. — More celebrated than all is the passage from the book of Esther, cap. 15, where Assuerus addressing her says: What aileth thee Esther? I am thy brother, fear not, thou shalt not die: not for thee, but for all men was this law constituted. Where to the universal particle an exception is added. — The same can be confirmed by very many examples from the New Testament. Thus Ioan. 10: I am the door of the sheep: all as many as have come are thieves and robbers. Unless these words be limited by exception, it will follow that all Prophets were thieves and robbers: whence, as Maldonatus observes from Cyril and Leontius, those words are to be taken thus: all as many as have come, and entered not by the door, are thieves and robbers. For he concludes that the Prophets indeed came before him, but entered through him as through the door. And he hands on to us the rule that often propositions of this kind general in the sacred Scriptures must be restricted from the circumstances of place, time, and the things treated of. It stands therefore from these universal propositions, by which it is asserted that all men are held by sin, and sinned in Adam, that they are not so universally to be taken but that they suffer exception. For neither do I judge that from the fact that Jeremias says c. 15: All study avarice; and St. James cap. 3: In many things we offend all, anyone would rightly conclude that all absolutely signified by the name of man, none excepted, study avarice and offend in many things; otherwise Christ the Lord who is true man would have studied avarice and offended in many things. Therefore if from the fact that St. Paul said: All sinned in Adam, it were consequent that even the Blessed Virgin sinned in him and contracted original sin, equally while the truth of these general propositions stands: All are gone aside, together become unprofitable; and all study avarice: and in many things we offend all, it would have to be inferred that the Blessed Virgin went aside together with the rest, became useless, and did no good: similarly that she studied avarice, and offended God in many things: but Catholic ears do not bear this absurd, nay impious inference: therefore neither ought they to bear the aforesaid conclusion of the adversaries. If then the Blessed Virgin is to be excepted from those general propositions, why should she not likewise be judged free from that one, in whom all have sinned? is that sign, all, less canonical, less universal in one proposition than in another? Since therefore in those passages the particle, all, ought not distributively to be taken for all absolutely, but for most, much more are those testimonies of St. Paul to be tempered and limited with respect to the Virgin, insofar as they legislate not of her but of all the other posterity of Adam. — I answer second, that the oracles of the Scriptures ought not otherwise to be taken than the Church judged them to be used: but the universal Church congregated in the Council of Trent, after allegating all the aforesaid texts of Scripture from which it deduces the Catholic dogma, namely that all absolutely propagated from Adam are infected by his sin and made guilty, Session five, and definition on original sin, thus concludes:

Nevertheless this same holy Synod declares that it is not its intention to comprehend in this decree, where original sin is treated of, the blessed and immaculate Virgin Mary Mother of God: but that the constitutions of Sixtus Pope IV of happy memory are to be observed under the penalties contained in those constitutions, which it renews.

From which it ought to seem wonderful that even some Catholic Doctors say so assertively that the doctrine of all the Fathers was that the Blessed Virgin Mary was conceived in sin. For as James of Granada noted beautifully lib. On the Immaculate Conception, disp. 3. cap. 8. num. 6, if all the Fathers had so sensed, the Oecumenical Synod congregated in the Holy Spirit would certainly have perceived it; and if it had perceived it, it would have conformed itself to them, as in other decrees it conforms; for never do General Councils not approve what they see approved by the common opinion of the Fathers. Hardly therefore can I wonder enough that there should be someone among Catholics who detracts more, either by his own judgment or that of whatever other author, than from the authority of the most holy Council of Trent: so that what the Council is unwilling to assert, he himself fears not to affirm with full mouth (with what faculty or permission, I know not). — It is confirmed from the same Apostle: since when he said, in Adam all have sinned, that term "all" denotes entirely the same as "many," when he says there, by the offense of one many died. Either therefore the one term is to be restricted by the other, or the other amplified by the one. Since therefore Paul first used that term "all," and immediately that term "many," the first ought rather to be limited by the second than conversely: therefore the universal sign, all, is modified by the term "many," through which as it were deliberately the Apostle declares himself entirely in this opinion; so that it seems sufficiently to give place to the exception of the Blessed Virgin; for when again he said not "all" but "many," he designated that somehow someone out of all is to be excepted: which exception surely can fit in no title greater than in the Mother of God: deservedly therefore Turrianus in Epist. to the Bishop of Auxerre says: I ask therefore those men, why from the fact that Paul said, In whom all have sinned, they think rather that exception was given to none; than from the fact that the same afterward in the same chapter, at a small interval, said: By the offense of one many died, let us think it given to us.

§ II. — That the immaculate conception of the Mother of God is proved from Councils.

Councils declare and signify the unviolated Conception of B. Mary the Virgin quite openly, while they pronounce her altogether immaculate absolutely. But the sixth Synod celebrates her with this title of honor and glory, Action 11 and 13, while it approves the Letter of Sophronius, in which Mary the Virgin is called holy, and liberated from every contagion, both of body, and soul, and intellect. The seventh Synod illustrates her with the same appellation Act. 3, approving the Synodal Letter of Tarasius, in which these things are had: We venerate also, and adore the image of the Mother of God, and our Lady irreprehensible, immaculate, etc. And in the definition of faith of the same Council, among other things these are had: We confess two natures incarnate for us of the immaculate Virgin Mary. But that epithet excludes every stain whatsoever properly speaking, and that for any time whatsoever. Otherwise, considering the present state of beatitude, any Saint whatever could equally be called immaculate, which is foreign to the mind of the Councils, which establish that title as proper to the Mother of God. — The Council of Basle declares this truth most evidently Sess. 36, where after very much controversy on this matter, it thus decreed:

Hitherto indeed a difficult question has been made in diverse places, and before this holy Synod, concerning the Conception of the glorious Virgin Mary Mother of God herself, and the beginning of her sanctification, some saying that the Virgin herself, and her soul for some time, or instant of time, lay actually under original guilt; others however saying conversely, that from the beginning of her creation God loving her conferred grace upon her, through which liberating and preserving that most blessed person from original stain, he redeemed her by a sublimer kind of sanctification, when the Most High himself founded her, and the Son of God the Father fashioned her, that she might be his Mother on earth. We truly, diligently inspecting the authorities, and reasons, which already for several years have been alleged on public relations on the part of either doctrine before this holy Synod > and also very many others seen on this matter, and weighed with mature consideration; define and declare that doctrine asserting that the glorious Virgin Mother of God Mary, by the preventing and operating grace of the divine Numen singular, never actually lay under original sin, but always was immune from all original and actual guilt, and holy and immaculate, as pious and consonant to Ecclesiastical cult, Catholic faith, right reason, and sacred Scripture, is to be approved by all Catholics, held, embraced; and that hereafter it be licit to none to preach or teach to the contrary. Renewing moreover the constitution on celebrating her holy Conception, which is celebrated by the Roman as well as by other Churches on the sixth of the ides of December by ancient and laudable custom, we statute and ordain that the same celebration on the aforesaid day in all Churches, Monasteries, and Convents of Christian religion under the name of Conception is to be honored with festive praises, and to all the faithful truly penitent and confessed, on that day the solemn celebrations of Masses, a hundred; at first vespers however, or second, as many; to the sermon truly of the divine Word on that feast... celebrated meanwhile on the 15th of the Kalends of October in the year of the nativity of the Lord 1439.

Which sanction indeed ought to be of so much the greater authority, that in that Synod the most holy Prelates were present, especially Louis Alemanus Cardinal and Archbishop of Arles president of that Synod, illustrious by very many miracles after death, as Aeneas Sylvius relates, who afterward was supreme Pontiff by the name Pius II, and who had sat very many years in the Basle assembly, and had keenly defended it against Eugene IV the supreme Pontiff opposing the Synod, and afterward having changed his opinion had assailed it with the greatest zeal. Thus however he speaks in the book Description of Europe, c. 42, which when he was Pontiff, to the sepulcher of Louis Cardinal Bishop of holy Caecilia of that city, he says: whom we saw presiding at Basle in the assembly of the Fathers, a great opinion of miracles arose, and frequent concourse of the infirm from everywhere was made in hope of health. Wherefore Clement Pope VII enrolled him in the album of Beati, as Spondanus relates to the year 1438. Add that not without mature counsel, and not without the judgment of the grave Theologians and Canonists of that time prehad, was that decree published; for we have very many tracts written at that time on this celebrated controversy, published by sanction of that Council, especially the immense volume of John of Segovia, then Canon of the Toletan Church, finally Bishop of Caesarina, and also (as some relate) Cardinal of the holy Roman Church, who, commanding the Fathers of the same Synod, especially Louis Aleman, as he testifies in his preface to the Fathers of the Council, wrote seven allegations, and as many advisements, for the information of the Fathers of the Council of Basle concerning the Immaculate Conception of the most sacred Virgin Mary, her preservation from original sin in the first instant of her animation; to all which responds the book published by Master John de Montenigro Provincial of the Order of Preachers of Lombardy, most famous Theologian of that time. But this especially is to be noted, that the Fathers of that Synod attest that the feast of the Immaculate Conception on the sixth ides of December through the Churches is celebrated by ancient and laudable custom; which surely they would not affirm with such certitude, especially since at that time still prevailed the grave controversy on this matter, and the opposite opinion had very many celebrated champions, unless that had been most constant and ascertained to all; from which it is to be gathered that the feast of the Immaculate Conception was celebrated in the Church not in these last times (as some wish), but from ancient and laudable custom, as the Synod affirms.

You will object. You will reply that Porsena with Cembello, therefore the Council decreed these things because it was embittered against the Dominican Fathers defending the assailed opinion, because their whole Order opposed that Council and was in no wise willing to take part in it or adhere to it. — Truly whoever has read Aeneas Sylvius will laugh at these fictions; who as eyewitness of almost all the deeds done in the Council of Basle relates among other things: And by these very remains also they approved, chiefly by the zeal and diligence of brother Virolai Gullici of the Order of Preachers, a man most outstanding both in genius and solicitude, to whom I attribute of course the dispatching of this matter. To him concurs St. Antoninus 3. part. of the History, tit. 22. cap. 10. fol. 525. col. 1, speaking of the Council of Basle and Felix the Antipope:

Amedeus (he says) they named Felix. Who enthroned not in the see of Peter, but of Lucifer, who placed his seat in the north, instituted some Cardinals, and among them Master John Professor of sacred Theology of the Order of Preachers, who had labored much in sermons and disputations for confirming the conciliabulum, but was quickly taken away by death, etc.

To these add the decree of the Provincial Council of Avignon held an. 1457¹ by D. Peter de Fluxu the elder, a Frenchman of the Order of Minors distinguished by Martin V with the Cardinalitial honor, who attended the Council of Constance. For among the other decrees of that Provincial Synod, it has this:

We statute that the decree made in the Council of Basle concerning the Conception of the Most Blessed Virgin Mary be observed inviolably, strictly forbidding all under pain of excommunication lest anyone presume to preach or publicly dispute anything to the contrary: which if anyone do otherwise, we will that he incur the said sentence ipso facto, and in the first Synod to be celebrated by each one through the Dioceses, we statute that the aforesaid be preached, and enjoined on the Curates of Churches, that they manifest these things to the people. Given in the Cathedral Church of Avignon on day 7 of the Month of September of the year of the Lord's Incarnation 1457. In the Pontificate of D. V. Calixtus Pope III year 3.

There subscribed to this statute not only Peter himself, who presided over that Synod, but also Alanus Cotinus Cardinal of S. R. E., Robert Bishop of Aquae, Peter Bishop of Aptae, George of Cenecensis, Gavacherius of Vapiensis, Nicholas of Massiliensis, Peter of Digniensis, Peter of Glandavensis, Pontius of Vasionensis, John of Regiensis, Stephen of Tricastinensis, Michael of Carpenteroratensis, and John of Aurasiensis. But although the rest of the Councils should fail, for confirming the same truth there would suffice the decree of the Council of Trent Sess. 5, where after it had statuted in faith that all the posterity of Adam whatsoever come forth into light stained by his sin and original stain; at the end of the decrees and canons it declares that it is not its intention to comprehend the Blessed and

Immaculate Virgin under this decree: and moreover commands that the constitutions of Sixtus IV of happy memory be observed. This supreme Pontiff moreover gave three constitutions on this controversy, which we shall relate in what follows, in which although he left indefinite the principal controversy on the immunity of the Blessed Virgin from original sin, nevertheless he expressly condemned censure of the pious opinion, and celebration of the feast of the Conception. — But that the Council approved the three memoranda constitutions, and not only a single one, as some wish, is gathered quite openly from these words, "the constitutions of Sixtus Pope IV of happy memory are to be observed," where he says not constitution but constitutions, whereby he designates that he approves and renews not one but all the constitutions published on this controversy by the same Pontiff; because whenever the Council alleges or refers some Pontifical diploma containing more heads or parts, it always calls it in the singular number constitution, as is evident Sess. 21. on reformation, and Sess. 20. as well on reform. as on regulars, and in many other sessions where Reformation is treated; which passages, because they are obvious and the matter lacks difficulty, it has been enough to indicate; therefore the Council cannot be expounded of a single extravagante of Sixtus IV, since it names his constitutions in the plural.

The adversaries object various Councils, especially the African, in which it was determined against the Pelagians that absolutely all men are infected by the sin of Adam; nay they prove the very same thing from the Florentine under Eugene IV, in which among other things (they say) for the instruction and union of the Jacobites is decreed: Most firmly believes, professes, and teaches the sacrosanct Roman Church, that no one ever conceived from the womb of a woman was free from the dominion of the devil, except through the faith of the Mediator Jesus Christ our Lord, who without sin conceived, born, and dead, blotting out the sins of humankind, alone by his death prostrated, and reserved the entrance of the heavenly kingdom which the first man with all his posterity had lost by his own sin. Hence Caietanus cap. 5 speaking of the Council of Basle says thus: Then since to the said conciliabulum is opposed on the opposite side, that of those, for repairing the Council transferred from Ferrara into Florence, of Greeks, and Latins, under the aforesaid Eugene IV., where among dogmas of faith are handed down these words: Firmly believes, and professes, etc. — Truly I answer, that the same must be replied to the decreta of the African Councils as we replied to the authorities of Sacred Scripture, namely that universal enunciations and those general propositions do not so universally comprehend all men absolutely but that they suffer some exception: and consequently although the Councils statuted that all men whatsoever are stained by Adam's sin, it may tacitly be gathered that those Fathers had the same mind which the Tridentine Fathers had, who although they statuted absolutely that all men whatsoever are infected by Adam's sin, nevertheless declare that it is not their intention to comprehend in this decree the blessed and immaculate Virgin Mary. Nor does it stand in the way that the African Fathers prescribed no similar modification and exception; for that ought not seem wonderful, since at that time no controversy was being raised about the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mother of God. As to the Council of Florence it could be said that that decree is altogether fictitious, First, because among the acts of that Council no mention of it is made, although we have three decrees inserted there, the first of which begins: Great indeed are they to us, given at Ferrara 9 April in the year 1438, and it is for the translation of the Council to Florence. The second begins: Consentiente ad infrascripta, or: Let the heavens rejoice, etc., given on the pridie of the Nones of July in the year 1439, and it is the concord with the Greeks on the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Father and the Son. The third begins Exult in God, etc. given on the 10th day before the Kalends of December in the same year 1439, and it treats of the sacraments of the Church, and testimonies to be observed by the Armenians: and it treats of the sacraments of the Church, and testimonies to be observed by the Armenians: but of the Jacobites neither does any word exist, nor is this decree in the Regestum Vaticanum, where there are 210 manuscript books of Bulls of this supreme Pontiff. Nor does it exist either in the collection of Bulls and decrees of the same Pontiff of the first impression of the year 1579, nor second, nor third Roman, although after two whole centuries Laertius Cherubinus inserted it in his Bullarium tom. 1. Constitution 23. of Eugene IV. — Second, that that decree is supposititious appears from its Conclusion; for it has: given at Florence in public Synodal session solemnly in the Church of the house of S. Maria Novella, near which we now reside, celebrated in the year of the Lord's Incarnation 1441, pridie Nonas Februarii, of our Pontificate year VI. In which subscription the reader ought to note, that in that Council no session was held in the Church of the house of S. Maria Novella, which belongs to the Friars Preachers, but all in the greater Church, as appears from the acts themselves; likewise that clause, near which we now reside, was set down in no Bull, or decree of the supreme Pontiff from the days of St. Peter up to the present. Perhaps whatever he was, that Pseudo-Dataire desired that the whole world know the residence of the supreme Pontiff Eugene in the house of the Fathers Preachers. — Third, that: year of the Lord's Incarnation 1441, pridie Nonas Februarii, of our Pontificate year eleventh, do not cohere: for Eugene was created in the year 1431, fifth nones of March, with no Chronologer dissenting; but in the year 1441 up to 5. March was the tenth year of the Pontificate of Eugene: how therefore could pridie nonas Februarii be the eleventh year? In the eleventh year were expedited the bulls of year 1441 from day 5 of March onward: those truly expedited in the month of February were not of the eleventh year: and consequently that Dataire was neither a Courtier, nor an Arithmetician, says de Alva. — Fourth finally false is it that that decree was published by the Council of Florence: because the Council of Florence was finished in the year 1439, pridie nonas Julii, as appears from its acts; how therefore in year 1441 could that solemn Synodal session be held in S. Maria Novella, that it might publish that decree? — To these add, that even if that decree were true, nothing whatsoever would patronize the adversaries; for P. de Alva says mun. 292: The first determination is this: no one is freed from the domination of the devil, except through the merit of the Mediator: therefore, say the Adversaries, all men except Christ contracted original sin: but who will judge this consequence legitimate? Second determination: Christ is conceived without sin, born, and died: therefore, they say, all men except Christ contracted original sin. If this consequence were legitimate: then also this: therefore all men except Christ were born and died with sin. Third determination: the enemy of humankind Christ alone by his death prostrated: therefore, they say, all men except Christ contracted original sin: what kind of inference! Fourth is this: the first man by his own sin lost the entrance of the heavenly kingdom with all his succession: therefore all men except Christ contracted original sin. This indeed seems probable on account of that, with all his succession. Truly it can signify nothing else than that even if in the whole succession of Adam there were no original sin: nevertheless from that sole proper sin of the first man the entrance of the heavenly kingdom was closed, not only to Adam himself, but also to all his succession; for he who shuts the door shuts not only for himself, but also for all others wishing to enter, whether they belong to that house or another, friends or enemies. Therefore that determination, whosever it be, does not patronize the adversaries, nor is the inference legitimate which the adversaries draw: therefore all men except Christ contracted original sin. Nay rather they ought to infer: therefore although there were no other sin than the first and proper one of Adam, neither he himself, nor anyone of his posterity would enter the kingdom of heaven, unless it had previously been unsealed through the death of Christ the mediator.

§ III. — The third proof is sought from the decrees of the supreme Pontiffs of the Church. — First of all for Sixtus IV, who began to sit in the year 1471, on the 9th of August, perceiving that the controversy on the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mother of God excited the greatest tumults among the faithful and various commotions of minds, summoning to Rome most learned men out of every order secular and Regular, in the year 1475 proclaimed a most celebrated and public disputation, agitated through several days, which he himself often honored with his presence and Pontifical authority. In it excelled among all R. P. F. Franciscus Insuber Brixianus of our family of Minors, who also exercised its general prefecture: whom the Pontiff honorably calling him contending most vigorously for the preservation of the Virgin, and plainly victor, said: Thou art, he says, a true Samson: which surname thenceforth adhered to him, nor otherwise in the mouth and writings of men is he called than Franciscus Samson. The outcome of this contestation and disputation was the Bull which begins, Cum praexcelsa, etc. which the same supreme Pontiff published in the year of the Lord 1476, the Kalends of May, of his Pontificate year 6, in which he statuted:

that all and singular the faithful of Christ, of both sexes, who shall have devoutly celebrated and said the Mass and Office of the Conception of the same glorious Virgin, according to the pious, devout, and laudable ordinance of the beloved son Master Leonard de Nogarolis, Cleric of Verona, Notary of Ours, and that which emanated from you thereon, the Mass and institution of this office on the feast day of the Conception of the same Virgin Mary, and through its octaves, or have been present at those Canonical hours, as often as they have done it, let them obtain thence entirely the same indulgence and remission of sins which according to the approvals of Urban V of happy memory in the Council of Vienna, and the constitutions of Martin V and other Roman Pontiffs our predecessors obtain those who celebrate, or say, or are present at the Mass, and office, and Canonical hours on the feast of the Body of Christ, and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ from first Vespers and through its octaves, according to the institution of the Roman Church, valid for present and future times. Which Constititution and Bull is inserted in the Councils of the Surian edition, Cologne 1567, and in the last of Severinus Binius Tom. 4. p. 1. fol. 713, nay also in Canon law among the commons On relics and veneration of saints. — Truly when the adversaries of the Immaculate Conception did not rightly acquiesce in this most equitable judgment of the Apostolic see, nay very many of them condemned as heresy the assertors of that unviolated Conception, especially in Lombardy, another constitution published the same Pontiff in the year 1482, and of his Pontificate year 11, which begins, Grave nimis gerimus, in which under pain of excommunication reserved to the supreme Pontiff he statutes: that those who should presume to affirm that the holy Roman Church celebrates the feast of the same glorious Virgin only of spiritual Conception and sanctification, and that those who believe and hold the same ⟦illegible in OCR — raw garble: «оо ат riйт. pорen alcцus шсreis tahe рolluos pe, ирrое-»; likely further Latin words of the Bull, lost by OCR⟧ are false, and erroneous, and alien from truth, and the books published thereon containing these things, by Apostolic authority with the tenor of these presents we reprove and condemn, and by motion, and authority prodicted we statute and ordain, that Preachers of the Word of God, and whoever others of whatever grade, order, and condition they may be, shall henceforth with rash audacity presume in their predicationes to the people, or elsewhere in whatever way to affirm, that assertions and opinions such as reproved and condemned by Us thus are true, or read, hold, or have the said books as true, after they have had knowledge of these presents, may they incur the sentence of excommunication, and eternal penalty of malediction by that very fact, etc.

— But when notwithstanding this Apostolic constitution certain impugnators of the same Immaculate Conception, judging this Bull to touch only those dwelling in Lombardy, innovated accusations and declamations of that kind against the assertors of the Immaculate Conception in other kingdoms, the same Pontiff two years after publishing the aforesaid Constitution published the same, or another like it, which likewise begins, Grave nimis, etc., in which under the same intermination he generally prohibits accusations of this kind. This Constitution too is inserted in the aforesaid Councils, and Canon law, and with the two prior constitutions the Council of Trent approved it Session 5, as was said above. They approved equally Alexander VI by the Bull which begins, Illius qui, etc. and Pius V in the Bull Super specula, in which moreover this Pontiff prohibits with gravest penalties lest anyone in popular sermons, or wherever a promiscuous multitude of men and women is wont to convene, presume to dispute with reasons or the authority of Doctors either side of this controversy, asserting his own opinion and refuting or assailing the contrary, or under any pretext whatever of piety to write or dictate in the vulgar tongue on this question. Here understand the same clause, refuting or assailing the contrary opinion. Otherwise simply to persuade the truth, even writing in the vulgar tongue, was not prohibited. — Moreover Paul V in the year 1617, on the 31st of August, considering that on occasion of the affirmative assertion, namely that the Blessed Virgin was conceived with sin, grave scandals and dissensions arose in the Christian people, significantly in Spain, interdicted the same opinion under the same penalties from public sermons, lectures, conclusions, and other public acts whatsoever: willing nevertheless under the same penalties that those asserting the pious opinion in the aforesaid public acts not assail the other opinion, nor treat of it or handle it in any way. Although therefore (as the best custom teaches, interpreter of laws, letters consonant to the end) it not be illicit in books easily for arguments of the other opinion to occur, especially to propose them, that they may be solved: for this is not in public acts to impugn the contrary opinion, or treat of it; but rather outside similar acts to treat of the pious opinion, that its truth may shine more clearly with the contrary arguments solved. — Afterward Gregory XV in the year 1622, on the 24th of May, confirming the Constitutions of his Predecessors, and for the same causes of avoiding scandals and discords in the Christian people, which can arise by equal reason, and, as we have heard, already have arisen in some regions from private sermons, on occasion of the affirmative assertion extends the decree of Paul V even to colloquies and private writings, commanding all and singular that even in private sermons and writings they dare not assert that the same most Blessed Virgin was conceived with original sin, nor in any way treat of or handle this affirmative opinion. Except however those to whom it has been specially indulted by the Holy Apostolic See on this matter, and that under the intermination of the penalties contained in the constitutions of his Predecessors. — Further the same Pontiff in the same year on the 27th of July indulted to the Fathers Preachers that in private colloquies, among themselves only, they may dispute and treat of the affirmative opinion. Whether however it is granted to the same there also privately to assert the affirmative opinion among themselves is not sufficiently proven from those words: since it is one thing to discuss and treat, another to assert. For Paul V speaking

It is confirmed first from this, that the supreme Pontiffs approved and confirmed the religious order of Nuns under the title Immaculate Conception, which same order even to this day not only perseveres but is propagated through various regions of the world: and this Order above all Innocent VIII. (who was created in the year of the Lord 1484.) approved in year 5. of his Pontificate, pridie Kalends of May, by the Bull which begins: Inter innumera, etc. in which among other things he concedes:

That Abbesses existing for the time being, and professed Nuns, ought to wear white cloth with scapular also white, and over it mantle of celestial color, on which indeed mantle and scapular the image of the same blessed Mary is affixed, and to be girt with a girdle of hemp in the manner of the Friars Minor, and in saying the Canonical hours according to the manner of the Roman Church in this mode, namely that on Sundays, in which some history is begun, or the office of the Sunday must of necessity be said, and on which duplex, semiduplex, and solemn feasts are celebrated, on feria days also, on which the ferial office cannot be omitted, and at vespers of those feasts only, excepting all other days throughout the whole year, they should say the greater Canonical hours, and the divine office of that Conception; and on the aforesaid excepted days, in which > the greater hours of Sunday, or feria, or feast ought to be said, they should say the lesser hours, and little office of the same blessed Mary with Antiphons, versicles, chapters, and prayers of the same Conception, etc.

The original of this Bull is preserved in the Monastery of Nuns of Toledo; preserved I say, with so much the greater piety, because, as Franciscus Bibarius Cisterciensis narrates in the history of the Conception p. 1. ss. 1. Torres, cap. 11. Aegidius de praesentatione l. 4. q. 6. art. 3. etc., this Bull was preserved by a great miracle. For it happened that the ship in which these Apostolic letters were being carried from Rome to Toledo was submerged by the violence of a storm into the depths of the sea, together with all the other things that were in it, together with the Apostolic letters themselves, which nevertheless after two months were found unhurt, and were received by the venerable Lady Beatrice de Sylva, who had requested those letters. — Julius II., who was assumed to the Pontificate in the year 1503, approved the same order together with the rule by the Bull which begins, Ad statum prosperum, where cap. 2. of the same rule it is had: Whosoever illuminated and invoked by God shall wish to desert the vanity of the world, and assuming the habit of this rule shall wish to be espoused to Jesus Christ our redeemer, venerating the Immaculate Conception of his Genitrix, let them vow always to live without property, and in chastity, with perpetual enclosure. Then truly there is subjoined there the form of Profession which the Sisters ought to emit in these words: I sister N. for the love and service of our Lord, and the Immaculate Conception of the same Genitrix, vow and promise to God, and Blessed Mary Virgin, and blessed Francis, and all Saints, and thee Mother, through the whole time of my life to live in obedience, without property, and in chastity, and in perpetual enclosure under the rule granted and confirmed by the most holy Pope Julius II to our Order. — Leo X approved the same Order in year I. of his Pontificate by the Bull which begins, Quia nuper accepimus, etc. whereby he concedes to those Nuns the same spiritual as temporal graces conceded by the Apostolic See to all Orders of St. Francis. Which approval thereafter the rest of the supreme Pontiffs his successors confirmed, especially Alexander VII, who at the instance of the most Christian Queen Mary Theresa granted the faculty to the Nuns of holy Clare dwelling in the suburb commonly called Sancti Germani a Pratis, insofar as they would clothe themselves in and assume the rule and dress of the Order under the title Immaculate Conception of Blessed Mary.

It is confirmed again from this, that the supreme Pontiffs approved various confraternities erected in the Christian world under the title Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mother of God; of which our most eminent and most pious Franciscus Ximenius Cardinal of S. R. E. erected one distinguished one in the Toletan Church; which institution Adrian VI approved under the same title by the Bull which begins, Sicut Salvatore nostro, etc. in which he grants plenary indulgence to all who should be enrolled in such confraternity, to be obtained on the days of the Conception, or Nativity, or Assumption of the same Virgin Mother of God.

It is confirmed thirdly from all the spiritual favors and indulgences which the supreme Pontiffs have granted on account of the devotion of the faithful toward the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mother of God: since indeed those spiritual graces are not granted except on account of acts of religion and devotion proven and received by the Church, it follows, says Valentia Tom. 4. dist. 2. q. 1. puncto 2, that the supreme Pontiffs in this very thing, that they invited all the faithful to the celebration of this Immaculate Conception, also judged re ipsa that this opinion on the Immaculate Conception be held. The same John Serrarius infers lib. 2. cap. 8, where having related the indulgences of Sixtus IV and other special ones granted by Julius II to those bearing the image of the Conception, he subjoins: Which they would by no means do, if they had doubted about the preservation of the Conception. For it would be a sacrilege to bestow indulgences or graces on a doubtful or not pious matter. And pag. 141, after commemorated indulgences of Leo X.: Surely such and so great concessions no Pontiff here would have made in any way, if he had had any doubt about the Immaculate Conception of the ever Virgin. These indulgences however conceded by all the supreme Pontiffs and spiritual favors you have collectively in the authentic Regestum for defending the title of the Immaculate Conception pag. 599 et seqq.

It is confirmed finally from this, that very many supreme Pontiffs approved the office composed by Leonardo Nogarolo Apostolic Protonotary, and Doctor of sacred Theology most celebrated, in honor of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mother of God: especially Sixtus IV, to whom that office was directed, who moreover granted plenary indulgences to those reciting that office, as appears from the aforesaid Bull, Cum praexcelsa, etc. Who also had commanded that office to be inserted in the Roman Breviary.

Nor does it stand in the way, that Pius V ordered this Office of Nogarolo to be erased from the Roman Breviary; for thence it does not follow that he disapproved the unviolated Conception of the Virgin, as the Adversaries contend. For truly the same supreme Pontiff willed that Office, deposited almost as proper, always be preserved in our family of Minors, and recited by all Religious of the Seraphic Order, as appears from all the editions of that Roman Breviary, at whose end are inserted the proper Offices of the saints of the Order of Minors, with this addition, which Pius V Pont. Max. granted viva voce both for brothers and Nuns of the same Order. These words are had in the Antwerp editions an. 1622. 1627. 1631. 16c6. 1611. 1613. Venice, ann. 1615 and 1636. Madrid editions, an. 1611. 1619. 1623. 1631. Parisian, an. 1630. Roman, ann. 1614. at the types of Bernardinus Tani, and very many others approved by the faculty and subscription of P. Vincentius Martinelli companion of R. P. F. Nicolaus Radulphi Sac. Palat. Apost. Master. — Gregory XIII also approved the offices of Masses of the Order of Minors by oracle of living voice. Similarly Sixtus V and Paul V approved the same offices and granted them to be recited, without any mention of the prohibition of Pius V. It is a sign therefore that Pius V did not prohibit, nay permitted to the Order of Minors the recitation of that Office, in which the Blessed Virgin many times is asserted altogether immaculate, and preserved from all original sin.

The Adversaries object the pretensed decree of the holy Roman and general Inquisition, by which the title Immaculate Conception is prohibited, emanated feria 7 on day 20 of January 1644 conceived in these words:

In the General congregation of the holy Roman and universal Inquisition, held in the Convent S. Mariae super Minervam, before the Most Eminent and Most Reverend Lords Cardinals against heretical depravity Inquisitors general, deputed by the Holy See: The Most Eminent and Most Reverend Lords Cardinals Inquisitors General aforesaid decreed, that when it is a question of conferring the title "Immaculate" on the Conception of B. Virgin, in no way may it be permitted: but only let it be said, "Conception immaculate of the Virgin," and they commanded it thus to be observed. In place of the seal. John Anthony Thomassinus Notary of the holy Roman Inquisition.

Truly that decree being fictitious, and elaborated by the Adversaries, appears First, because Pontifical decrees, and those of the H. Inquisition, as soon as they were published, are promulgated, as appears from practice; but this is supposed to have emanated an. 1644, 20. January, that is six whole months before the death of Urban VIII.; yet it became known to the world only two years after the election of Innocent X; but if it was true, and a legitimate decree on so grave a matter, concerning which it had excited such mobs and tumults because of opposing Adversaries, what necessity was there for it to be hidden so long? Nothing does truth blush at, except only to be hidden, says Tertull. lib. Against the Valentinians, cap. 3. — Second, if that decree had been true, why should it flee the presence of the supreme Pontiff, that it might be published in that place, namely in the Coenobium S. Maria super Minervam? Whence was so great an urgent necessity of intempestively elaborating that decree, that its founders could not await the time of celebrating the general Congregation of Cardinals in the Apostolic Palace, which is wont to be done each week before the supreme Pontiff? Certainly that business was of sufficient weight, that nothing whatsoever should be decided about it without consulting the supreme Pontiff; especially since by that decree not only so many Pontifical decrees ought to be proscribed, but even authentic Bulls, in which the title Immaculate Conception is declared and fortified expressly and perspicuously. — Third, there is no greater defect than of power: but that Congregation in which that decree is supposed to have been drawn up possessed utterly no authority for statuting and deciding matters of such weight; since indeed only this Congregation was instituted and deputed, for deciding Ecclesiastical and contentious causes, as appears from Constitution 3. of Paul III beginning Licet, 12. Kal. Augusti ann. 1542, and of Pius IV 79. beginning Cum nos, ann. 1564, not truly those which pertain to matters of religion and divine cult, and morals of the faithful to be informed properly and justly: certain it is however, that that title of the Immaculate Conception, which if it should hold that decree, it would be necessary that by it derogation be made specifically from all the Apostolic Constitutions by which that title Immaculate Conception is conferred and approved; for so long indeed do the Apostolic Constitutions stand until they be revoked expressly and by name: but that this happens by no means appears from the aforesaid decree, and consequently all those Apostolic Constitutions patronizing the Immaculate Conception still obtain full and entire force. — Therefore because Pontifical Constitutions are revoked only by other opposite Constitutions, for the same authority and solemnity is desired in the revocation of law which intervened in its constitution. But who should judge that most prudent and most clear-sighted Cardinals published a decree, of which they could easily conjecture it would be of no force, and of no efficacy, and which openly militated against so many Pontifical Constitutions? — Fifth, if the sacred Congregation constituted that decree motu proprio, and only for preventing or removing some abuse, what necessity was there for the adversaries to offer two public libelli supplices to the Most Eminent Cardinals of the holy Inquisition, for defending the aforesaid decree? For truly if it emanated from true and legitimate Ecclesiastical authority, it did not need the help of adversaries, that it might obtain effect and be committed to execution: these two libelli of theirs, one indeed briefer, the other truly longer, you have in the Seraphic Armamentarium pag. s. with the refutation most learned and erudite of all that they wrongly allege.

§ IV. — The fourth proof drawn from the feast of the Conception celebrated by the universal Church. — For truly the Church celebrates the feast of no one, except on account of his extraordinary sanctity and dignity: but now for many years and centuries the Church has celebrated the feast of the Conception of the Virgin Mother of God: therefore the Church judges that Conception to be holy and immaculate. The major stands, and is admitted by all the SS. Fathers and princes of Theology. For the Angelic Doctor 3. par. qu. 27. art. 1. gathers from this principle that the Nativity of B. Virgin shines with extraordinary sanctity; for after he had ventilated, on either side according to his usual custom, the proposed question, and proposed the arguments assailing the sanctification of the Virgin in the maternal womb, he objects this reason, which he thought most robust for establishing the truth on the contrary side: But on the contrary, he says, is that the Church celebrates the Nativity of B. Virgin: for no feast is celebrated in the Church except for some Saint: therefore the Blessed Virgin in her very Nativity was holy: therefore she was sanctified in the womb. St. Bernard had preceded him Epist. 171. where on the same argument he writes thus:

Holy Church errs not at all in reckoning the very day of his Nativity holy: and each year receiving it with the exultation of the whole earth with all celebration. I think that a more copious blessing of sanctification descended into her, which sanctified not only her origin, but guarded her life thenceforth immune from every sin, which is believed to have been given to none born of women.

Similarly concludes St. Augustine Serm. 113. on St. Cyprian saying: When he (Cyprian) was born we know not, and because today he suffered, today we celebrate his birth-day; but we would not celebrate that day even if we knew it: for on that day he drew original sin: but on this day he conquered every sin. And a little below he concludes: Thence we would celebrate his natalitia, unless precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of Saints. The same has Serm. 95. which is on St. Stephen. Since therefore the Church, as we shall prove presently, has celebrated the festal day of the Conception of B. Virgin already from many centuries, it follows that it confesses and acknowledges that Conception immaculate and preeminent in holiness. — Therefore the minor is proved, namely that the Church celebrated the feast of that Conception, not only from the time of Sixtus IV but also many centuries before: for above all, as

P. Oieda proves with many arguments in his Ecclesiastical Information, cap. 2.), in the Churches of Egypt the feast of the Conception has always been celebrated, which institution they received from St. Mark Evangelist. And in the Syriac New Testament handed down from St. Mark, as Burgensis proves tractatu 1. On the use of the Chaldaic Paraphrase, Salmeron prolog. 35. etc. ad caput 11. Lucae v. 27, is set the title On the Conception of the Mother of God Virgin; just as for the other five feasts of the same. For this peculiarity the Syriac New Testament has, that it be distributed into certain titles designating Gospels and Epistles, which are chanted on the individual feasts; which distribution indeed was made by the most ancient successors of St. Mark, as Fabricius Boderianus affirms in the proemial letter before the Syriac version. — The same Fabricius proves that festivity to be celebrated from antiquity in the Church of the Abyssinians, who relates them asserting that they received their testimonies from the Apostles. — It can be confirmed from St. Thesiphone disciple of St. James, who as is had in one of the books found on the Sacred Mount of Granada in year 1595, relates that the Apostles taught in Council that B. Virgin was conceived without original, in these words: O Virgin, that Mary, that holy one was preserved from original sin in the first instant of her Conception, and free from all guilt. In another book from the aforesaid St. Thesiphon says: Mary the first sin did not touch. And again: By no means full, if she had been conceived in original. Of these books and Granadan plates treats Doctor Luzerus discursu 2. On the Conception; James of Granada De Concept., d. 3. cap. 6.; Madera in the History on the same books; Aegid. De Praesentatione, lib. 3. De Concept., quaest. 3. art. 1. sect. 1. who satisfy the difficulties against the said books and plates, in which they were included; and the University of Complutum noted proposition 11 of Gaspar Ram. Doctor of sacred Theology, by which he asserted the said books to be of no authority, thus: This proposition is manifestly false, since there are many reasons fighting and urging, which affirm that which is said about the sacred Mount of Granata. Aegyd also reports sup. and others that book, plates, relics, and other things found on the sacred mount of Granata were approved by a Provincial Council. Hence our Galatinus lib. 1. cap. 5., when he had praised various Greek Fathers as assertors and champions of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mother of God, adds: As a sign of which thing, they celebrated the feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin herself for nearly a thousand years: And in the Martyrology, which is read on the morrow of the feast itself, and which was published by St. John Damascene, among the other things which are pronounced about the most Blessed Virgin herself, it is said: The clean Conception of B. Anna of God, and our Lord, Grandmother. By which words is signified the active Conception, by which St. Anna conceived the most Blessed Virgin in her womb. In the edition truly of the Martyrology by the labor of Henry Canisius, it is had thus: Commemoration of St. Anna mother of the Virgin Mother of God. Some add, as Bivarius ad Chronicum dextri an. 308. comment. 1.: Clean Conception of B. Anna. Whence all experts in Greek history confess that the feast of the passive Conception of B. Virgin was celebrated by the Greeks more than 500 years ago, as Baronius observes in notes to Martyrol. Rom. day 8. December. Although among the Greeks it is celebrated on the following day, that is the ninth of the same month; which certainly openly stands from the constitution of Emperor Emmanuel inserted by Theodore Balsamon in commentary on the Nomocanon of Photius, tract. 1. cap. 1., where among days to be solemnly honored it reads thus: 9th of December, seeing that on it is performed the Conception of the most chaste Mother of our God. Emmanuel moreover began to reign in year 1143. Of the antiquity therefore of the feast of the Conception in the Greek Churches there is no controversy; nay rather it can be said most probably that about the year 900 already the feast of the Conception was celebrated among the Greeks, since the same Baronius testifies that in the Manuscript of the Stortian Library n. 65. is found a sermon of Emperor Leo on the Conception of B. Mary, who entirely is Leo VI surnamed the wise, whose other writings of the same kind Baron. Tom. 10. Annal. an. 911 recounts, into which the death of Leo fell; but the beginning of his reign into year 886. Thence it ought not seem wonderful that Bartholomaeus Bishop Brixiensis in his Repertory p. 2. in verbo feast, says the Church is wont to celebrate a solemn feast on the day of the Conception of the Blessed Virgin. And he narrates moreover that he himself on such a day solemnly celebrated in the chapel of the supreme Pontiff in his presence, and of several Cardinals, as Bernardinus de Bustis relates Serm. 2. On the Conception: but this Bartholomaeus lived around year 1227. Therefore two centuries before Sixtus IV the Roman Church already kept the festal day of the immaculate Conception of the Mother of God Virgin. To these add that in year 1263, day 20 May, on the feast of Pentecost were held at Pisa the General Comities of our Seraphic Order, approving and presiding St. Bonaventure then General Minister, where among the other things which were piously and religiously statuted and decreed, as Wadingus Tom. 2. in Chronicle IV. an. 2. n. 16. and Michael Angelus in Chronology of the 12. General Chapters relate, this decree is read: Then it was ordained, that this strophe Gloria tibi Domine, qui natus es de Virgine, etc. close all Hymns from nativity of Lord unto Epiphany, and similarly at Prime be said: Qui natus es de Maria Virgine. Likewise commanded, that these feasts be admitted in the order, namely of the Conception of B. Mary, of her Visitation, of B. Anna his Genitrix, and of Martha the Virgin, etc. Therefore long before Sixtus IV the feast of the Conception was sacred in the Church.

The Adversaries reply: if truly this feast had long since been celebrated in the Church, it would not have been hidden from St. Bernard: but he Epist. 174. to the Canons of Lyons keenly assails them because they celebrated the feast of the Immaculate Conception of B. Mary rashly and without consulting the Apostolic See, and there with very many reasons demonstrates that the Conception of B. Virgin was not immune from original sin: We marvel greatly what seemed good at this time to some of you, to wish to change the best color, introducing a new celebration, which the rite of the Church knows not, reason does not approve, ancient tradition does not commend.

Whence after certain reasons alleged by which he impugns the Immaculate Conception, he concludes:

Wherefore although to some few sons of men it is given to be born with holiness, not however also conceived: that surely for one alone might be reserved the prerogative of holy conception, who would sanctify all, and he alone coming without sin would make purification of sins. Therefore the Lord Jesus alone conceived of the Holy Spirit, because he alone, and before conception holy. This excepted, as to the rest it regards all born of Adam, which one humbly of himself confesses truthfully. Saying, In iniquities was I conceived, and in sins my mother conceived me.

Since these things so stand, > what now will be the festive reason of the Conception? In what way, I say, will either be asserted a conceptus who is not of the Holy Spirit, nay let me say of sin, or be held festal one who is not at all sanctus? Willingly will the Glorious One be without this honor, whereby either sin seems honored, or false sanctity introduced. Otherwise no reason will please her of novelty presumed against the rite of the Church, mother of temerity, sister of superstition, daughter of levity.

These things St. Bernard. — I answer first that it does not seem improbable to me the opinion of those who judge that letter of St. Bernard supposititious, and not the genuine whole of him; which indeed many not light reasons intimate. First, because St. Bernard expressly pronounces in several places that the Conception of B. Virgin was entirely immaculate. Thus Serm. 13. On the Nativity of the Lord: There is not among the sons of men greater, or lesser, who was not conceived in sins, except the Mother of the Immaculate, who does not make sin, but takes away the sin of the world: concerning whom when sins are treated, I wish to have no question whatsoever. And Ser. 1. super Salve regina: Thou wast innocent from original and actual sins, none thus except thee. And the authority of Aug. is brought in, when pure ones are treated, etc. Although it may be doubted whether these sermons are St. Bernard's, and Horstius even replaced them among the false supposititious ones of that mellifluous Doctor; nevertheless the Lyonnese edition of the works of St. Bernard at John Clein anno 1515 ranks them as genuine, in which it is related that edition was made after collation made of such works by the Religious of Clairvaux with the Archetypes of the same Monastery. Be that as it may, certain it is they were published by a man most learned of that time, who also praises St. Augustine as assertor of this opinion. The same P. Oieda in his information cap. 14., as Cavellus relates in the Rosary, who draws also no light argument that this letter is supposititious, from the fact that Bernard himself Epist. 281. to Eugene complains of falsification of his letters: We have been imperiled, he says, by false brothers, and many letters of ours falsified under our falsified seal went out into the hands of many: and Epistle 298. to the same he complains of Nicholas, who falsified his hand and seal, which previously he had been forced to change on account of preceding falsifications: Who can say (he says) to how many persons under my name, unknown to me, wrote what he wished? who will give me, that your Curia itself be purged clean of the filth of his lies? who will give me, that the innocence itself of those who are with me suffice to be excused before those circumvented by his most shameless lies? He too confessed himself several times to have written in the same falsity, and not once, partly convicted, partly confessing. This Nicholas was Monk and Secretary of St. Bernard from Epistle 351. added, and knew how to imitate his style to the life, as Baronius shows ad an. 1146. n. 22. from Epistle 31 lib. 6. of Letters of Peter of Cluny, which is in his own and Bernard's manner, almost wholly written with the words of Scripture. This foundation supposed, namely that innumerable letters were given falsely under the name of St. Bernard, it does not seem improbable that the said Letter to the Canons of Lyons is one of the falsified ones.

Second, because the Letter says the feast of the Conception was unheard of; but Bernard well knew that it was kept in the Martyrologies of Adon, Bede, and Usuard.

Third, it was then being celebrated in the Church of Narbonne, and other primary Churches of France, as P. Oieda shows cap. 11; why therefore does the Letter reprehend

the Lyonnese, and not others?

Fourth, in the life of St. Bernard by Guliel. Bernard, and Gaufrid, there is not even a word about that litigation with the Lyonnese, though they write far more minute matters which Bernard handled with other Churches, and Epistles given to them.

Fifth, nowhere is had the response of the Lyonnese: and certain it is they would have responded, if they had received such a letter from St. Bernard. If you say the response perished; how does no memory of it remain? And where St. Bernard's replica?

Sixth, flourished in that century in letters and holiness in France Algerius Cluniacensis Monk, Hildebertus Archbishop of Tours, Peter of Cluny, Hugo Victorinus (these three familiarly corresponding with St. Bernard), Petrus Blesensis, and others: none of whom even apparently assailed or reprehended the feast of the Conception. And if they had seen Bernard assailing it, either they would follow, or resist, or at least make some mention of this matter: but nothing of these happened. Many other reasons and conjectures P. Oieda brings forward above, by which the said Letter to the Canons of Lyons is rendered most suspect of falsification. From which it stands that the said letter is no less, perhaps more doubtful than the aforesaid sermons, which the Adversaries deny are Bernard's, because they declare the Virgin immune from original sin.

Nor does it stand in the way some diversity of style; because perhaps while he himself spoke, others took down from his mouth, but in their own style, which certainly mostly happened, as he notes himself Epist. 18.: Certain brothers, he says, of those hearing me speak to them, took down in their own style, and retain with themselves. — I answer second, that even if this letter be genuine St. Bernard's, yet in it he neither disapproves nor impugns the mystery and feast of the Immaculate Conception, in that sense in which both are now celebrated in the Church. For when he contends that the Blessed Virgin was conceived in sin, there he does not take the word "Conception" for animation of the foetus, or union of soul with body, but for the active conception of the parents themselves. For refuting the reasons for celebrating the Conception, which the Canons of Lyons put forward; especially that the conceptus ought to be honored, who preceded the partus worthy of honor: since if that had not preceded, neither would that be which is honored, he says:

What has it of consequence: that since the sanctus preceded the birth, therefore the conceptus be reckoned, and this sanctus? Surely because it preceded him, did it also make him holy? Because if it preceded that he might be, yet not that he might be holy. Or that holiness itself would he transmit to one about to follow? Or not rather because he preceded conceived without holiness, it was needful doubtless that she be sanctified conceived, that already the partus following might be holy? Or perhaps has the prior borrowed holiness from the posterior? Indeed that which, already conceived in the womb, was made a sanctification could pass to the natalis which followed, but to return backward to the conceptus which had preceded it by no means could. Whence then the holiness of the Conception? Or is it said prevented by sanctification, insofar as she would already be conceived sancta, and thence both conceptus was sanctus who in the womb is said to be so that as sanctus also ortus would follow? But she had no strength to be sancta before being. Seeing that she was not before she was conceived. Or perhaps amid marital embraces holiness mixed itself with the Conception itself; so that at once both sanctified and conceived? Nor does reason admit even this. For how either > holiness without the Spirit sanctifying, or society of the holy Spirit with sin, or surely how did sin not flee where libido was not absent? Unless perhaps someone say that she was conceived of the Holy Spirit, and not of man. But hitherto unheard of.

Thus St. Bernard. — By which it openly stands that he speaks only of active and corporeal Conception, whence deservedly concludes (as was said above) only Christ the Lord to have been conceived with holiness, because he was conceived of the Holy Spirit, and because he alone was before conception holy. — I answer third with Horstius in annotations on this letter, that although St. Bernard truly spoke of the passive Conception, whose feast he wished celebrated, nevertheless for this reason he did it, because it had not yet been prescribed by authentic decree of the Roman Church; whence he says: The authority of the Apostolic See ought first to be consulted. And he closes the letter in these words: But what I have said was said without prejudice to a saner old wise man, especially the authority and examination of the Roman Church; I reserve all this whole matter just as the rest which are of such kind: if I think otherwise than itself, ready to amend by its judgment. But now St. Bernard securely holds what he desired; for he sets no other condition for judging the feast of the Conception to be celebrated, except decree and authority of the Roman Church: but this condition has been fulfilled now since the time of Sixtus IV.: therefore from that time Bernard is secure about the sanctity of this festivity and mystery, and stands and subscribes for it; and consequently it is wrongly brought forward by the Adversaries in defense of their opinion.

Others reply that the Conception of B. Mary Virgin is celebrated, not indeed because she was holy, but because it was the beginning of our sanctification and redemption, so that that celebration is rather an act of thanksgiving, that God on that day granted us the Virgin from whom Christ would be born, than special commemoration of any sanctity wherewith the Conception of the Mother of God Virgin was gifted and illuminated. — Truly, says Vazquez disp. 197. n. 63, this response is easily refuted by the very decree of Sixtus IV, because the Pontiff decreed not only in it that the feast of the Conception of B. Virgin should be celebrated in the Church; but also approved the office of Leonard de Nogarolis Cleric of Verona and Apostolic Protonotary, for the celebration of the same feast; in which however the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin everywhere was called. Moreover the same Pontiff there exhorts the faithful to render thanks to God for the wonderful Conception of the same Immaculate Virgin: but he would not call that Conception wonderful unless the Virgin were conceived beyond the usual manner in grace and holiness; for her Conception would have nothing else wonderful, since she was conceived in the manner of other men as regards nature.

The rest reply with Caietano Opuscul. De Concept., cap. 2., that the feast of the Conception is celebrated, not indeed respectively to the instant of animation and passive Conception, but with respect to the sanctification in the womb, which followed animation a little after. — Truly this response is precluded in the bull of Sixtus IV which begins, Grave nimis, etc. in which he says: Certain Professors of diverse Orders, deputed to preach the Word of God in diverse cities, and places, and parts of Lombardy, have not blushed hitherto publicly to affirm, and cease not daily to preach, that the Roman Church celebrates only spiritual Conception- > "or sanctification of the Virgin Mary." And below: We therefore wishing to oppose these rash audacities, and perverse assertions, motu proprio, and from our mere deliberation, we reprove and condemn by Apostolic authority assertions such of whomsoever, who should presume to affirm that the same Roman Church celebrates the feast of the same glorious Virgin only of spiritual Conception, and sanctification, etc. seeing they are false, erroneous, and alien from truth. This Constitution Alexander VI confirmed in the bull which begins, Illius qua se, etc. in which when he had premised the aforesaid bull of Sixtus IV he subjoins: With the tenor of these presents we decree and declare the praeinserted letters, and all and singular things contained in them, ought to be observed inviolably for perpetual and future times, until otherwise decided and ordained by the Apostolic See.

Therefore under Apostolic intermination each of the faithful is bound to celebrate the feast of the natural Conception of B. Virgin, and consequently to venerate that Conception as holy and Immaculate.

Therefore it must be concluded with Peter Buro, who flourished around year 1500, in the Poem on B. Virgin:

Who now may doubt to celebrate Mary's conception? Who refuse yearly incense to give at feasts? This the see of Peter, head, and glory of city, and world, Both honors, and commands through pious temples to be honored. No religion is, no temple religious There where honor of the conception, let it now be silent. Equal to me a miracle it seems these feasts dedicated Among Christ-loving climes however many have. I doubt indeed nothing, this done by supreme Numen, That the Argive honors what Ausonian honors. And what Gaul honors, Dace honors, and Bohemia, And Germany, Iberia, England, and Illyria.

§ V. — The fifth proof is led from the authority of SS. Fathers, who by constant tradition propagated this truth down to us. — Innumerable are the oracles of SS. Fathers and Doctors of the Church existing in whatever age, which expressly pronounce the Virgin either absolutely altogether immaculate, or free from every sin, or potent above all creatures in purity. For although few before Augustine's times be (since not yet had the grave controversy about original sin broken forth) who distinctly put forward that she was not stained by original stain; nevertheless they sufficiently signify this openly, while they affirm her every sanctity, or purity, or cleansing and immunity from all sin. Out of those however so many and so great oracles, which our de Alva brings forth even to six thousand, and out of very many which our Cavellus collects and reviews in his Rosary, my mind is here to attach only choicer ones. — It comes forth first of all St. Andrew Apostle, who, as the Presbyters of Achaia relate in his life, used to say: As the first Adam was formed of earth before it was cursed; so the second Adam was formed of virginal earth never cursed. Surius gives this life of St. Andrew, and Bellarminus testifies lib. On Ecclesiastical Writers that it is not to be doubted; whence

The Roman Breviary too, recognized and approved by Pontifical authority, it was inserted, after concerning it dispute had been keenly had among learned men, and approved by consent of all. — St. James intimated the same in his liturgy, in which after consecration is had: Mind especially most holy, immaculate, blessed above all, our glorious Lady Mother of God ever Virgin Mary. And the Chorus responds: It is worthy that we call thee truly blessed, Mother of God, irreprehensible in all ways: but if she had been stained with original sin she could not be called immaculate, nor irreprehensible in all ways: therefore St. James judged her immune from original sin. Hence it is, that Flavius Dexter praeses Barcinonensis A Consiliis to Emperor Theodosius, in book of History Omnimodae, of which Marcus Castella writes broadly in preface to the History of St. James, which book he dedicated to St. Jerome, relates that by St. James aforesaid was celebrated in Spain the feast of the Immaculate and Unviolated Conception of the Genitrix of God. To these add what we said about celebration of the feast of the Conception in the Churches of Egypt, from ordination of St. Mark, that thence thou understandest the opinion defending the Immaculate Conception of the Mother of God Virgin to have been derived from the Apostles down to us. — Whence also patronize this truth those who wrote in first, second, and third century: for St. Ignatius Epist. to St. John: In Mary human, he says, nature is joined to Angelic sanctity: but how would nature be joined to Angelic purity and sanctity, if Mary had been stained by original guilt? Hence Justin Martyr q. 136. ad Orthod., said Mary to be of pure soul, which wholly looks toward God. By what reason truly would she wholly look toward God, if previously through original sin she had been enslaved under the tyranny of the devil? Others very many subscribe to these, especially St. Hippolytus Martyr, prayer On the Consummation of the world: Christ, he says, came from a holy and immaculate Virgin. Similarly Origenes Homil. 1. ex variis making sermon on the Virgin, says: Neither deceived by the persuasion of the serpent, nor infected by his poisonous breath. But how would she not have been infected by the poisonous breath of the devil, if truly she had contracted original sin? The same also most excellently teaches the author of the Sermon On the Nativity of Christ, among the works of St. Cyprian, where treating of the Virgin Mother of God says: Nothing in her does he require further, nor does preceding pleasure ask any usury of punishments. The Holy Spirit overshadowing, original fire was extinguished, and therefore it was not fitting that she unharmed be afflicted: nor did justice sustain that vessel of election be injured with common injuries, since differing much from the rest, he communicated to nature, not guilt. By which words, says Vazquez disp. 117. num. 33, although he seems only therefore to assert Mary gave birth without pain, because she conceived without carnal pleasure, whence what we contend could by no means be proved; nevertheless if rightly weighed, he rather thinks Mary gave birth without pain because she contracted no original guilt, when he says: He communicated to nature, not guilt. For neither do women bear sons in pain because they conceive with pleasure; seeing that a woman who conceived without pleasure, in sleep or by art of daemon elsewhere human seed conveyed, would nevertheless bring forth in pain: but because through original sin they become partakers of Eve's malediction. For to Eve on account of sin it was said Genes. 3.: In sorrow shalt thou bring forth children: which tradition of misery passed together with original sin to posterity.

The third and fourth century supplies more assertors of the same truth. Especially truly St. Ambrose, explicating Serm. 22. in Psal. 118. that I have gone astray like a sheep, writes thus:

Thou therefore, seek thy sheep, now not through servants, not through hirelings, but through thyself take me up in flesh, which fell in Adam: take me up not from Sara, but from Maria, that incorrupt be the Virgin, but Virgin through grace whole from every stain of sin.

He says whole from every stain of sin, and therefore from stain of original guilt. Add that in the Office of Immaculate Conception approved by Pius V from the same are inserted these words: In which there was neither knot of original, nor bark of actual fault. Which words are thought taken from Commentaries on Isaias, or from Serm. De Nabuthae. Similarly St. Ephrem, whose works by testimony of Hieron. De Script. Eccles., were wont to be read in Churches after sacred Scripture, Orat. on the Genetrix of God, tom. 5: Immaculate, undefiled, incorrupt, and most alien from every stain of sin.

— St. Jerome in Psalm. 77. explicating that: And he brought them out in the cloud of the day, says: Or certainly we ought to take the light cloud for holy Mary weighed down by no human seed. Wherefore however she is called cloud of day, he expounds with these words: For that cloud was not in darkness, but always in light. But if B. Virgin had contracted original sin, and had lacked justice and sanctity, doubtless she would have been in night rather than in day.

— In the same century flourished St. Augustine, who lib. On Nature and grace, cap. 36., when Pelagius contended that man could live not only without sin, but also justly, and had recalled examples of very many who are said to have lived justly and without sin in sacred Letters; after Augustine related his words in that chapter, subjoins:

Except therefore holy Virgin Mary, concerning whom, on account of honor of Lord, I wish to have no question whatsoever when sins are treated: whence, or rather thence we know that more grace was conferred upon her to conquer sin from every side, she who merited to conceive and bring forth him whom it is established had no sin? This Virgin excepted therefore, if we were able to gather together all those Saints both men and women while they lived here, and interrogate them, etc.

By which words although perhaps St. Augustine institutes discourse only of actual sins, nevertheless sufficiently signifies that he excludes original sin equally from the Virgin Mother of God. For indeed this general reason why he would not include B. Virgin under that universal proposition, namely on account of honor of the Lord, and because she merited to conceive and bring forth him whom it is established had no sin, equally concludes of exclusion of original as actual sin. Add that absence of actual sin in adult age is an infallible sign of immunity from original sin at the beginnings of life, according to doctrine of the same most holy Doctor: for lib. 5. Against Julian, c. 15., where proving it to be the same to have sin as to have done it, concludes concerning Christ: certainly sin even greater it would have been if the little one had had it.

— In sixth and seventh century come forth, especially Gregory lib. 1. cap. 1.: Lofty Mary, that she might extend toward conception of eternal Word, by contest of merits advanced above all choirs of Angels even to throne of Divinity. Therefore since good Angels never were polluted, the same must be said a fortiori of Mary, that she might be disposed worthily for conception of Word.

— Similarly Andreas Cretensis, Homil. 1. On Virg. Dormition: she since she was immaculate, unpolluted, etc. And below: The Seraph itself fleshly nature by miracle of divine generation, of first nature closely approaching God. And Homil. 2.: alone beyond nature was she elected, alone served Artificer of all nature. Therefore otherwise than others sanctified in womb was she elected.

— To the same S. Eligius, Homil. 2. On Purification: Never is judged unclean she who overshadowed by Holy Spirit is proved to have generated author of all cleanness.

— Sophronius in Epist. of which in 6th Synod tom. 3 p. 307 says: Virgin therefore called immaculate, because corrupted in nothing. And Orat. in Christi natalitia: Christ into most manifest judgment of omnipotent Divinity of himself preserved Virgin from whom he came forth whole, incorrupt.

— Ildephonsus Archbishop against those disputing virginity and parturition of Mary (is had the proposition concerning), for thus he says: When filled by Holy Spirit, was she not without original sin! And below: Nor did she sanctified in womb contract original sin. And in same book: It stands she was immune from original sin. And there: She sanctified in womb did not contract original sin. Likewise: Wholly foreign from curse of first damnation.

— In eighth century distinctly professed this truth St. Damascenus, Orat. 1. On Nativity of Mary, after beginning, where he says: Nature dared not at all to anticipate grace being made, but awaited so long until grace produced its fruit. Likewise: O blessed loins of Joachim, whence flowed immaculate seed! O precious couch of Anna, in which formed was fruit most holy of all incorrupt! Last words seem evident for immaculate Conception, because fruit is not formed most holy if it was formed enemy of God, infected by sin. And there: O most holy one, who deceived principalities and powers, extinguished with fiery darts the wicked one's both kinds, who turned in bridal chamber of spirit and preserved immaculate for bride of God! And Orat. 1. On Assumption: Grace found abyss, which had preserved safe ship of twofold virginity, and guarded innermost no less than virginal body. And there Orat. 2.: To this paradise serpent Mary had no access.

— Holy Germanus Constantinop., Serm. de Festis, conc. B. Virg., ex Suppl. 13. on same Psal. 86. Glorious things are spoken, etc. I judge manifestly, and without contradiction, that she who is above all, in magnitude and purity of divine and lofty virtues excelling all, Mary is bound to no guilt.

— In ninth and tenth century a man most learned and most holy, who on account of signal humility willed to be called Idiota, lib. On Contemplation of Virgin, cap. 2.: All fair, Virgin most glorious, not in part but in whole, and stain of sin whether mortal, venial, or original is not in thee, nor ever was. And cap. 6.: Thou wast preserved from original stain. And cap. 3.: O preblessed, conblessed, and postblessed Virgin Mary! Haymo disciple of Alcuin, Epist. De Assumpt.: In the very inheritance of Lord dies Mary, who by sinning departed not from possession of Lord. Fulbertus lib. 1. De Maria, cap. 7. Orat. on Salutation of Angel: Immaculate thou didst ever stand from beginning of thy creation, because thou wast about to bear Creator of all holiness. Related by Canisio lib. De Deipara, cap. 1. Coccino, and others.

— In the eleventh century flourished St. Anselm, and in the book

On the Virginal Conception, among other things he has: The beginnings of thy Conception deservedly ought to be venerated by the sons of holy Church, if they be believed to be set apart from the yoke of sin, since to believe otherwise is lawful to no one, etc. And cap. 18.: It was fitting that the conception of that man come about of a Mother most pure, it was too becoming that that Virgin shine with that purity, than which a greater cannot be understood under heaven, etc. The same Anselm in the Epistle to the Bishops of England relates three miracles, by which through holy apparitions and revelations the feast of the Conception was commanded to be celebrated. Of whose letter as authentic Gerson makes mention Serm. De Conceptione, and Bacconius English Doctor, who flourished almost 100 years before, 4. dist. 2. quaest. 3. art. 1., and several others whom Cavellus cites. Hence St. Anselm instituted that the feast of the Conception should be celebrated in England, as is had in the Council of Canterbury, witness Bacconius Quolibet 13. and several others.

Peter Damian, Serm. On the Assumption of the Virgin: The flesh of the Virgin taken from Adam admitted not his stains. And Serm. On the Nativity of the Virgin: Nothing of vice could vindicate for itself a place in her body or mind, she who merited to be the sacrarium of the whole Trinity: therefore as her body never was corrupted, so also her mind never was stained. St. Bruno on Psal. 101 on: The Lord looked down from heaven upon earth, says: This is that incorrupt earth which the Lord blessed, free therefore from all contagion of sin, through which we have known the way of life: which because it was worthy, the Lord looked upon from heaven upon earth. Those words are to be weighed, free from all contagion of sin, which are understood both of actual as of original sin; otherwise the Virgin could not be called incorrupt earth, upon which the Lord would look from heaven. And Serm. On the Nativity of the Virgin: Death was made by Eve, life restored through Mary: she was conquered by the devil, this one bound and conquered the devil. She conquered not as regards death of body: therefore as regards death of soul. Ivo Bishop of Chartres, Serm. On the Nativity of the Lord, ex Coccio in Thesauro tom. 1 lib. 3.: For one alone he blotted out both original and actual guilt in her: not by removing but by preserving; because in the same manner he blotted out both guilts in her, and certain it is that he blotted out actual guilt by preserving her from it.

— In the same and following century there openly militated for the Immaculate Conception not only the Canons of Lyons but also Peter Comestor in the book On the Immaculate Conception: In all things the Mother of God sought rest, and found it: in Conception did she rest, and did she not diminish? Trithemius and Possevinus mention this book. Nicolaus Monk of St. Alban in England, a most learned man and most versed in Scriptures, contemporary of St. Bernard, lib. 9. Letters of Peter Cellensis Epist. 9. (had tom. 2. Bibl. PP.), responding to a certain letter of the same Peter, which is Epist. 23. lib. 6., by which he keenly reprehends him because St. Bernard put off due veneration when he said: The soul of the Virgin herself a sword pierced, not only in the Passion of her Son; but also lately in the commendation of her own Conception — which Peter calls a stone of offense and rock of scandal — thus says:

Concerning the stone of scandal to be removed from your heart, somewhat longer must we linger, because the matter requires that I make manifest what I proposed to conceal. That holy Bernard whom you say once put off due veneration (inscribed in the catalog of SS.) lately was canonized in the Church, and exempted from human judgment. Exempted I say is he, lest we doubt his glory, but not that we dispute less concerning his sayings. Concerning the glory of B. Martyr Cyprian he did long ago not doubt: nevertheless that he erred in the gifts of the Holy Spirit is proved most truly; error deleted by martyrdom he writes, and thus taught the Church to venerate the glory of the Martyr, yet not imitate his error. I however although with not like science yet with like conscience thus venerate B. Confessor Bernard, that I praise and love his sanctity, yet neither praise nor love his presumption regarding the Conception of the Mother of God.

Thence gather that the celebration of the feast of the Conception at that time was common, at least in England, because not long before Anselm flourished who introduced it: otherwise Nicolaus would not so boldly reprehend Bernard. Richard à S. Victore 39. on Canticles: Mary is above men, in that never did she commit sin as men do: among us none is found who does good and sins not. And cap. 26.: All fair was she, whom grace possessed wholly, because no sin had place in her. And below: Stars are darkened, that is the saints, with the mist of human guilt: but B. Virgin all fair was, whom the sun of justice illustrated wholly, that she had neither stain nor darkness of guilt. And de Emmanuele lib. 2 cap. 31 he says: That in her corruptibility in things pertaining to punishment, and incorruptibility not only were abysses... he says: It befitted not that Mary whatever guilt liable. Cited by Busti Serm. 1 de Conceptione.

— In the thirteenth century flourished the most illustrious and most holy Patriarch Dominic, founder of the most flourishing Order of Preachers, famous for all piety and wisdom, who in the treatise On the Body of Christ which he wrote against the heretical Albigenses says: As the first Adam was formed of virgin earth never cursed, so it behooved it to become in the second Adam, namely Christ, whose earth, that is the Virgin Mother, never was cursed. Very many Authors mention this book, as seen in Carellum century 13. of his Rosary, and Alva in Sole veritatis num. 307., who equally assert that said book cast into fire once and again by the heretic Albigenses rebound unhurt and untouched; which Vincentius Bellovacensis also narrates, who died 35 years after his most holy Patriarch Dominic, lib. 29 cap. 96 of his Speculum Historiale. The same has holy Antoninus 3 part tit. 19 cap. 2 § 4 and several other writers of the life and miracles of St. Dominic.

The Adversaries reply that the aforesaid book was published not by St. Dominic but by a certain Dominic de Pantaleonibus Florentine of the Order of Preachers, who up to year 1262 is said to have written On the Body of Christ and against the Immaculate Conception. — Truly, as De Alva excellently replies trist. num. 2., this author seems altogether fictitious: First, because no ancient Writers or Nomenclators write his name: only some Recent writers of the Order of Preachers mention him. Second, at the time of the Council of Basle the PP. Preachers scrutinized all Libraries and Authors who militate for the purest Conception of B. Virgin, that they might supply arms to Turrecremata whereby he might impugn that immaculate Conception: but among the 28 Authors numbered by him for his opinion out of the Order of Preachers, none Dominic de Pantaleonibus is found: nay not even any praised by that name by the Anonymous who numbers for the same opinion out of the same Order 52 authors, nor by Peter de Vincentia who relates 69, nor Bandello who relates 72, nor other older writers of the same Order, who make not even the least mention of this Author. Third, false is it that in year 1262, wherein St. Thomas was born 31 years and St. Bonaventure 10, so grave a controversy broke forth between PP. Dominicans and Minors, that Dominic de Pantaleonibus needed to write a book on the defiled Conception of the Virgin against the Minors, as Michael Pocciantus Florentine relates in his Catalogue of Florentine writers fol. 47., where he says: Dominicus Panthaleonus Father of Order St. Dominic, perpetual cultivator of philosophy, etc. composed on the Conception by dialogue against Friars Minor. Likewise another treatise on the same matter, etc. But all these remain in the Library of Cenolii s. Mariae Vozellae, of which he was alumnus: died Florence 1376 day 28 August. All which are fictitious: for St. Antoninus Florentine in the same city and convent S. Mariae Novellae composed his catalog of all Authors who militated for the Conception of the Blessed Virgin, and makes no mention of this author. Our Lucas Wadingus indeed in the Catalogue of Seraphic Religious Writers pag. 101. brings forward this Dominic Pantaleone Florentine among Minors, with the same treatises on the Conception of B. Mary: dialogue on the same: substance of Orbis; form of consecration blood Christ, etc. Another thing is to write treatise on the Conception blessed Mary Virgin, another truly to inveigh against her and against Minors. Wherefore the aforesaid book On Body of Christ acknowledges no author other than the most holy Patriarch Dominic.

In the same century flourished our Alexander Alensis, Doctor and Master in Theology of the Angelic and Seraphic Doctor, who although 3. part. quaest. 9. memb. 2. he may seem to assert that the Conception of the Virgin Mother of God was vitiated by original sin; nevertheless such was not his mind: for he speaks only of the active Conception, and on the part of the parents, not truly of the passive, and on the part of the Virgin, as De Alva proves excellently in Sole veritatis num. 12. Thence it appears that his mind and opinion he clearly signified in the book which he wrote on the life of B. Virgin divided into six books, where near the end of the third he treats of the Conception which he teaches immaculate and immune from original sin: as very many grave Authors related, and as is seen in Cavellus and De Alva just praised; among whom excels Goschalcus Hollen of Order S. Augustine in sermon Conception, where from book published by Alensis he relates:

Not yet were the abysses, that is, he says, the depths of original sin. I had already been conceived; for abyss is said from a, which is "without," and byssus, which is a certain luminous, fine, and clean thing made by weaver's work, whose contraries are in original sin, which is darksome through privation of the light of grace, and gross through perpetual loss, and foul through lack of divine love. Not yet therefore were the abyssi, that is, the depths of original sin, and I had already been conceived, namely with the grace of God preventing, etc.

Hence Michael de Carchano Mediolanensis Doctor, ancient and of most proven life, in his Quadragesimale on penance, sermon on the Conception p. 3., speaking of Alexander de Ales and his liberation from a most grave infirmity by the merits of the Virgin Mary, says thus:

He himself truly not ungrateful for so great a benefit repays what he promised: and composed one beautiful book, in which are contained all the deeds of that mellifluous Conception of the Virgin, which is divided into six books; and at the end of the third book, chapter penultimate, he asks whether the blessed Virgin was conceived in original sin: and at the head of the question he sets forth the whole miracle wrought by the Virgin upon himself, and thus determines that the Virgin was conceived without original sin: he teaches and preaches her conception to be celebrated, and venerates and retracts whatever he had said in his sentences, etc.

And there subscribe many of the ancient writers, especially Daniel Agricola in his Corona on the Conception, John Vitalis Cardinal in his Defensorium, and Alanus Parisiensis, who wrote before the year 1500 the same concerning Alensis, narrating: therefore whatever he sensed here in his Summa, certain it is that he militated for the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin.

Flourished at the same time Seraph. Bonaventure, who although in 3. dist. 3. art. 1. qu. 2. he timidly asserted that B. Virgin was conceived in original sin: nevertheless, the matter more maturely weighed and deliberated, he clearly signified the opinion which he held Serm. 2. on the Assumption, where most clearly and most learnedly he proved the Immaculate Conception saying:

Our Lady was full of grace preventing her sanctification: grace namely preventing against the filthiness of original guilt, which she would have contracted by corruption of nature, unless by special grace preventing and preserving she had been preserved. For no Son of the Virgin was immune from original guilt, and she herself his Virgin Mother. For it must be believed that under the name of sanctification in the beginning of her Conception the Holy Spirit redeemed her from original sin (not that it had infused itself, but that it would have infused itself), and preserved her with singular grace.

And in Sermo 1. among other words he says: Our Lady was most pure, wholly lacking every stain both in body and soul. Nor does it avail to reply with the adversaries that that sermon is not St. Bonaventure's, or that the aforesaid words were added; for it stands from an ancient book set forth in print before 150 years ago that this sermon is entirely of the same Seraphic Doctor; since among the sermons expressed there it is read whole, and at the end of that book is read: Here end the general sermons on the common of Saints, as also those on B. Virgin, on Angels, and on the triple dedication, of St. Bonaventure Doctor Seraphic, Cardinal, Bishop, of the Order of Minors, amended and corrected from errors most diligently, at expense and labor of provident man lord James Pfortzenii citizen Basel year of salvation 1502.

— Nor does it stand in the way that Angelus Rocca Augustinian sacristan of the Apostolic Palace placed in the margin that this sermon is not St. Bonaventure's (if indeed that addition be his, which De Alva denies n. 19.), because, says Rocca there: in many other places holy Bonaventure taught the contrary opinion. As though the Seraphic Doctor could not amend in more advanced age, with the matter better found out, what when younger he had written in the books of Sentences.

— Nor does it matter that he seems to defend the same opinion in his opuscula, especially p. 3. and 1. On Ecclesiastical Hierarchy cap. 7.: for there constantly he defends not the affirmative opinion but rather inclines to the negative. To these add what we said above, namely that while he was acting it was statuted in the General Chapter celebrated at Pisa that the feast of the Immaculate Conception should be celebrated through the whole Seraphic Order, as already by very many it was being celebrated, as he testifies 3 dist 3 art 1 quest 1:

There are however certain who from special devotion celebrate the Conception of B. Virgin: neither dare we wholly praise, nor simply reprehend... We dare not wholly reprehend, because as certain say this solemnity is celebrated not by human institution but by divine revelation: which if true without doubt good is it to solemnize her Conception: but that this be authentic we are not compelled to believe: since what against faith right is not, we are not compelled to deny etc.

By which words it is evident that even there he did not so firmly adhere to the opposite opinion, but only timidly, while still younger, was inclined toward it.

To this pious opinion the Angelic Doctor also subscribes; for although in part 3, question 27, article 2, he seems to signify that the Blessed Virgin was first conceived according to the flesh, and as such contracted original sin, and was afterwards sanctified in the womb and cleansed from that very original sin; nevertheless, as Pintus learnedly observes at the beginning of his book De Conceptione Virginis, the Angelic Doctor there supplies most weighty arguments by which, were he now living, he would openly perceive and conclude that the Virgin Mother of God was immune from every stain of original sin. For it is precisely because the Church celebrates her Nativity that he concludes she was sanctified in the womb: A feast, he says, is not celebrated in the Church except for some saint; therefore the Blessed Virgin was holy in her very Nativity: she was therefore sanctified in the womb. But the Church has long since celebrated the Conception of the Blessed Virgin; therefore, according to the principles of St. Thomas, it must necessarily be concluded that that Conception was altogether holy and immaculate. Furthermore, he says there: We rationally believe that she who brought forth the Only-begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth, received a greater benefit of grace above all others. Yet, as he subjoins there, we find that this privilege was conceded to certain others in a special manner, that they should be sanctified in the womb, as Jeremias, to whom it was said, chapter 2: Before thou camest forth out of the womb I sanctified thee; and as John the Baptist, of whom it was said, Luke 1: He shall be filled with the Holy Ghost even from his mother's womb; from which he concludes that the Blessed Virgin was sanctified before she came forth from the womb. But surely this inference does not seem legitimate; for it ought rather to be drawn thus: because greater privileges were granted to Mary than to all the other saints, therefore Mary ought to be sanctified not only before her nativity, like certain other saints, but even in her Conception. For whoever argued would argue illegitimately: The sun owes a greater light than the stars; but the stars shine fourfold; therefore the sun ought to shine fourfold. Whence also Bromiardus of the Order of Preachers, who lived shortly after St. Thomas, in his Summa Praedicantium, treating of the Crown of the Virgin and of the twelve stars, that is, the singular gifts or privileges of Mary, speaks thus:

In her Crown she had the second star, or an honor raised up after the manner of a royal crown, in that she was sanctified more eminently and more specially than the rest. For of the others indeed it is well read that they were sanctified in the womb, as of Jeremias and John the Baptist. Yet they were not at once so sanctified but that they could still sin venially. She herself, however, was sanctified so eminently that she sinned neither mortally nor venially, as appears through St. Thomas in part 3, on Christ, question 27, article 6. In the same question also, article 2, on account of the excellence of her sanctification as regards priority of time, namely that she was sanctified in her animation, that is, in the union of her soul with her body in her mother's womb, and not before — which sanctification and cleansing is wrought through grace, whose subject is the soul; for nothing is capable of grace except a rational soul: thus then the Most High sanctified his tabernacle, in Psalm 15, etc.

Thus far John Bromiardus. Wherefore Peter à Valleclausa, in his Disputations 6, treating of this question 27 and article 2 of the third part, speaks thus:

Therefore that text was touched by a falsifying hand, and in John Bromiardus, who flourished in the year 1260, as the Chronicle of the Order of Preachers records, that passage is read as it ought to be. See Bromiardus in the Summa Praedicantium, under the word Varia, article 2: for Bromiardus there adduces St. Thomas saying in that place that the Blessed Virgin was sanctified not before animation, but in her very first animation, from which is inferred the exclusion of original sin from the Mother of God. Moreover the Brethren would not have St. Thomas saying this there, and contradicting himself in part 1-2: they adulterated the text, etc.

— But that this was the genuine opinion of the Angelic Doctor can be gathered from very many passages of his works, and especially in Book I of the Sentences, distinction 41, question 3, ad 3, where, inquiring whether God could make things nobler and more excellent than those He has made, and objecting to Himself the authority of St. Anselm — namely, that the Blessed Virgin shone forth with such purity — he responds as follows:

To the third it must be said that purity is intensified by withdrawal from its contrary; and the same created thing can be found to which nothing purer could possibly be found among created things, if it be stained by no contagion of sin: and such was the purity of the Blessed Virgin, who was immune from both original and actual sin; yet she was subject to God, inasmuch as in her there lay the power to sin.

Likewise, on the Epistle to the Galatians, chapter 3, lecture 6, adducing that text of Ecclesiasticus 7, One man among a thousand have I found — namely Christ, who would be without all sin — but a woman among them all have I not found, one who would be entirely immune from sin, at least from original or venial sin, he makes an exception for the most pure Virgin, worthy of all praise. So it stands in all the ancient manuscript exemplars, as may be seen at Paris both in the Library of the Sorbonne and in that of St. Victor, as I myself read with my own eyes; and likewise in the Parisian edition made in the year 1511. But in later editions, for example the Tenetiana of the year 1593, the enemies of the Immaculate Conception struck out those exceptions from the Angelic Doctor.

— Moreover, Nurembergius, in his annotations upon the decrees of the Council of Trent concerning the altogether pure Mother of God the Virgin, relates that at Rome, in the library of Cardinal Storsae, in the year 1625, a most ancient exemplar of St. Thomas upon the Epistles of Paul was seen, and that in it, upon that text of Romans 5, in whom all have sinned, there stood this commentary: One alone excepted, the Blessed Virgin, who contracted no stain of original sin; and he adds that it was shortly thereafter shown to Cardinal Treio, and through him to Urban VIII, the Supreme Pontiff. The same judgment must be formed concerning the exposition of the same Angelic Doctor upon the Angelic Salutation, where he had these words: Mary was preeminent with respect to guilt, because she incurred neither original, nor mortal, nor venial sin. Although these opinions are no longer found in modern editions, they are nevertheless so authentic that not even John de Turrecremata, the most ardent impugner of the Immaculate Conception, dared to deny it, as Catherinus and Salmeron relate. Nevertheless, even so, the enemies of the Immaculate Conception did not lay furtive hands upon the pious words of the Angelic Doctor without leaving still intact these words in the same place:

She exceeds the Angels with respect to purity, which indeed would not be true if the most Blessed Virgin had been stained by original sin and handed over to it.

— I pass over the innumerable others who, from this century down to our own times, have been assertors and champions of the Immaculate Conception; since this pious opinion, says Vazquez (Book 3 of his Commentary on the Summa, disp. 117, cap. 2), spread abroad after the time of Scotus not only among all Scholastic theologians but also among all the faithful of Christ, and has grown together with the ages of men to such a degree that no one can now be drawn away from it or shaken out of it. He had said before: At that time, not only among all the Professors and Doctors of theology (excepting the Dominicans, who have always persevered in their opinion), but also among all who profess the faith in the name of Christ, there is such a concurrence of mind and affection toward this opinion that, without great scandal to the people — as Corduba rightly observed — no one can now any longer propose the contrary view to the people in sermons. All this Vazquez wrote most truly, long before Paul V, under gravest penalties, imposed silence upon the adversaries, forbidding them to teach and defend the contrary opinion in public conclusions, sermons, lectures, or any public acts whatsoever. There must be excepted, however, those words in which he excludes the Dominican Fathers from the defense of the Immaculate Conception; for Turrecremata alone counts twenty-eight Doctors of the Angelic Order in favor of the contrary opinion. We find that he who wrote after him, in the third part, section 2 of his work, enlarged their number up to fifty-two; Peter de Vincentia, alphabet 6, numbers sixty-nine; Vincentius Bandellus, chapter 23, enumerates seventy-two; Paulus Grysaldus, in Catalogue 5, numbers eighty-two. But our De Alva, clearer-sighted than them all, computes ninety-two in his Trituration; and against these, in his Ventilabrum he sets an equal number of most strenuous defenders and assertors of the Immaculate Conception of the Mother of God drawn from that same Order. And upon all these patronages of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin the sacred Faculty of Paris will impose a most illustrious crown, since for three hundred years now it has devoted itself most strenuously and most successfully to the propagation and defense of that doctrine, as will appear from its celebrated decree and its formula of oath.

Statute of the sacred Faculty of Theology of the University of Paris concerning the matter of the Immaculate Conception of the most glorious Virgin Mary, Mother of our Lord and Redeemer Jesus Christ.

Whereas many of our forefathers, bravest and most strenuous soldiers of the Catholic faith, crushed by their sacred disputations the heresies springing up in various times, never wearied by labors or perils: against those errors nevertheless which strive to violate the praise and dignity of the Immaculate and most glorious Mother of God, the perpetual Virgin Mary, they ever judged that one must rise up more vehemently with a certain special, holy, and perfect hatred, and must fight more sharply. Inasmuch as they judged that insult to pertain chiefly to our Lord Jesus Christ and to His most loving parents. For what is written in Ecclesiasticus, chapter 3, concerning the Father is also most true of the Mother, and of either parent: Glory not, he says, in the dishonor of thy father, for his confusion is no glory to thee; for the glory of a man is the honor of his father, and a father without honor is the disgrace of the son. Therefore, when in the last century the question concerning the purity of the Conception of Mary, the heavenly Mother of God and of our Lord Jesus Christ, began to be agitated more frequently than usual — the Holy Spirit, namely, willing that the truth of this matter should at length be brought to light — having weighed more carefully the arguments of both parties, they prudently suspended their judgment for a time; finally they inclined to that side which seemed to support the glory and purity of the Virgin, and thus, by disputation, they refuted the vainest rashness of those who obstinately contended, without efficacious proof, that the Virgin was conceived in original sin; so that they might decree the contrary part of the question — which affirms that the Virgin, while she was being conceived, was immune from the original stain by a special gift of God — to be greatly consonant with piety, faith, right reason, and the divine Scriptures. Which opinion, a few years later, the sacred plenary Council of Basle, after a long disputation of this question and a most weighty deliberation under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, at length defined — teaching that doctrine which asserts that the blessed Mother of God, Mary, when she was conceived, was freed from every stain of original sin by a special and singular grace of God, and that it is to be approved, embraced, and held by all Catholics as pious and consonant with ecclesiastical worship, the Catholic faith, right reason, and Sacred Scripture; and it forbade the contrary assertion to be taught or defended henceforth, under threat of divine judgment. Since we see this holy decree of the Synod approved and confirmed by the judgment, consent, and religious devotion of all the Churches, and likewise of the whole Christian people, we cannot but admire — and cannot bear without indignation and grief — the vain, proud, rash, and insane obstinacy of certain men, who even in our own day do not fear to assail or call into doubt this pious and religious doctrine approved by the judgment and authority of the universal Synod and of the Church, which according to the promise cannot err, waging implacable and most impious war against the eminent dignity of the most loving Mother of God. That we may meet and resist their fury the more eagerly and firmly, following in the footsteps of our forefathers according to our profession, order, and degree, we have assembled together for the third time, and after much, grave, and mature deliberation we have bound ourselves by a special oath and devoted ourselves to the defense and protection of that most pious doctrine which asserts that the blessed Mother of God was preserved from original sin by the singular gift of God, which we believed long ago to be true, and believe now. Enacting that no one be henceforth enrolled in this sacred college of ours unless he professes by a similar oath that he will always be, according to his powers, an assertor and strenuous defender of this religious doctrine. But if anyone of ours — which God forbid — like a deserter to the enemies of the Virgin, should dare to take up the patronage of the contrary assertion, which we judge false, impious, and erroneous, in contempt not only of our authority but of that of the Synod and of the Church, which is beyond doubt supreme, we decree that he be deprived of all our honors, deposed and cast forth from us and from our fellowship like a heathen and a publican, to be driven far away. We therefore appeal to you and summon you, O holiest Mother of God: believe that you, worthy of all praise, were preserved from original sin by the singular gift of God, and preach it, preaching with your blessing and your resources. Help us; and through the tender mercies of the mercy of Jesus Christ and through the charity of His undefiled Virgin Mother we beseech you: resist valiantly, for your office and by the divine authority given us, the enemies rather of the Blessed Mary herself; drive them from your territories, and expel them punished, so that the religious devotion, piety, and charity of the Christian people toward the most glorious Mother of God, the one hope, patroness, and mother of the human race, may be fostered, increased, and kindled more and more each day — a deed doubtless most grateful and most pleasing to her most loving Son, our Lord and Redeemer Jesus Christ, and most fruitful also for this people whose care you bear. Given at Paris at St. Mathurin's, for the first Congregation, on the third day of the month of March, in the year of the Lord 1496. At the second Congregation on the 6th day of the same month; and for the third Congregation, at the Augustinians, in the chapter house, on Thursday the 9th of the same month of March, after the Mass of the Conception celebrated with the oath; and published on the 21st day of the month of August, 1494, at St. Mathurin's in a Congregation specially convoked for the oath made upon this matter, and at the Sorbonnic disputation of the same month on the 26th, with the Lord Rector of the university assisting, the Most Reverend Father in Christ the Archbishop of Bourges, three Bishops, with many Abbots, Royal Counsellors, and very many Doctors both in Decrees and Bachelors, with a great multitude of students. By command of the same Dean, read and pronounced by me, Henry Bertrand, Priest, Master of Arts, public Notary, and Bedel of the same Faculty. And there swore, both in the preceding and in other Congregations of the same Faculty, one hundred and twelve Doctors of the same Faculty, standing firm in the said determination and statute.

Formula of the Oath. — You shall swear that you will hold the determination of the Faculty concerning the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary, namely, that in her Conception she was preserved from original guilt? R. We swear.

Indeed, the same sacred Faculty was so tenacious and zealous an observer of this statute and oath that none of its clients and sons ever dared to depart even a little from that pious opinion without being immediately compelled publicly to abjure what he had presumed to assert to the contrary. Hence, long ago, even before the aforementioned decree — namely, in the year 1387 — it issued a celebrated censure against fourteen propositions of John de Montesono, which censure was afterwards confirmed by Apostolic authority. Wherefore in the year 1388 a revocation of the contrary opinion was made before the King and the deputies of the university by Master William, Bishop of Évreux. In the same year, on the 21st of March, a similar revocation was made before the church of St. Germain of Auxerre by Friar John Thomas of the Order of Preachers. In the same year, on the 16th of May, Friar Adam of Soissons, Preacher, revoked the same publicly in the cemetery of the Holy Innocents. In the following year, on the feast of St. John the Baptist, the same Friar Claudefridus of St. Martin, Preacher, revoked it publicly in the church of our greater convent of Paris. In the same year, on the 20th of August, Friar John Adea, Preacher, revoked it in the church of St. Bernard. In the same year, on the 10th of October, Friar Peter de Chanchevo, Preacher, revoked it also in our church of Paris. There are very many other such public revocations, whose acts I possess entire; they splendidly attest the perpetual observance of the sacred Faculty of Paris toward the Unspotted Conception of the Blessed Virgin; and lest I be longer than needful, I refrain from further instances here.

— Now, when after the Council of Trent, about the year 1575, some men attacked keenly this decree and oath of the sacred Faculty and Academy of Paris — Maldonatus goading them on and taking their side — after grave contentions and controversies back and forth, at length the patronage of the sacred Faculty was taken up not only by the Parliament of Paris but also by the Supreme Pontiff, to whom an appeal had been made from the sentence of the Bishop of Paris pronounced against the Dean and Syndic. There is extant a most illustrious letter addressed to him, as well as a most learned theological treatise circulated publicly concerning the preservation of the Virgin Mother from original sin; wherein, responding to the arguments and objections of Maldonatus, among other things it contains the following:

Nor did the Faculty invent the article of faith concerning the Conception, but it proposed what had been set forth by the Council of Basle, and believed with Sirtinis; if it gave authority to these, the Council of Trent detracts from them, and the Roman See prefers the opinion of the Tridentines to that of the Basleans; let the Faculty itself conform itself and give assent now according to the Council of Trent: the affirmation that the conception is not an article of Catholic faith, and that whoever thinks otherwise is not to be marked as a heretic, etc.

The Adversaries object various authorities of the holy Fathers and Doctors of the Church, by which they judge our assertion to be altogether overthrown. Since all of which would be long and tedious to recount, here we shall bring forward and examine only those which seem to patronize the opposing opinion most of all. First indeed they summon to their side Origen, Homily 8 on Leviticus, where, expounding those words: Whatsoever woman shall have received seed, he speaks thus:

If a woman conceive seed and bear a son: but there is a mystical conception which would set Mary alone apart from the rest of women, whose bringing forth was not from the conception of seed but from the presence of the Holy Spirit and the power of the Most High, etc. And a little within: But even he who is born, whether he be of male or of female sex, Scripture pronounces concerning him that he is not clean from stain, unless he be of one day of his life. And below: whence, if it please you to hear what also other Saints thought of that nativity, hear David saying: In iniquities, he says, was I conceived, and in sins my mother conceived me; showing that whatsoever soul is born in flesh is polluted with the filth of uncleanness and sin; and therefore that was said which we mentioned above, that no one is clean from stain, no not though his life be but of one day.

Then in Homily 12, which is on the great Priest, he says:

Everyone who enters this world is said to be made in a certain contamination. Wherefore also Scripture says: No one is clean from stain, not even if his life were of one day. By this very thing therefore, that he is placed in the womb of the mother, and that he takes mortal flesh from the origin of paternal seed, he can be said to be contaminated in father and in mother. Or do you not know that when a male child has been made ten days old, it is offered at the altar that it may be purified there, as if it had been polluted in the very conception, whether of paternal or maternal seed? Every man therefore is polluted in father and mother. But Jesus my Lord alone entered this generation clean; he was not polluted in the mother: for he entered the body uncontaminated, etc.

Finally, in Homily 5 upon the book of Numbers, he says: Because Christ alone is without sin, who did no sin, therefore in Him alone the Spirit dwelt and > remained. For if He is He of whom something singular and excellent is said, namely what we said above: Because he did no sin, it is established that all the rest were under sin: if all, necessarily also the Prophets, etc.

— Truly I answer, that by these and similar sayings our assertion is by no means assailed. Not indeed by the first, seeing that in it Origen treats of the law of purification, to which all women were subjected who had conceived from received male seed, and from which the Virgin Mother of God was altogether immune, since she conceived by the operation of the Holy Spirit; whence Origen speaks only of active, not passive Conception. By the second I say, that Origen intends only that Christ the Lord was not contaminated through maternal conception; because since He Himself was conceived of the Virgin by the power of the Holy Spirit, He alone by the force and manner of His generation was clean from every stain and iniquity, wherewith others are infected by reason of the first carnal generation, or of the active conception of parents, of which only Origen speaks, not of conception properly so called, or of animation, of which this discourse is. — To the third I say, that Origen there treats of actual sin; not of original; for he does not say: who had no sin, as the adversaries will, but who did no sin; but there is none, I think, of the adversaries who affirms that the blessed Virgin actually sinned, seeing they wish her to have been pronounced free from all actual sin by the Council of Trent, not that original sin is to be understood.

They object 2. Various authorities of Saint Ambrose. First indeed in Sermon 7, expounding those words: And take not the word of truth utterly out of my mouth, he says:

All were within the nets, nay we are still within the nets; because no one is without sin except Jesus alone, whom not knowing sin, the Father made sin for us. For he delivered him up bound with cords, delivered him up with nets, sending him not into sin, in which all men were, but into the likeness of the flesh of sin, that he might condemn sin in the flesh: sin was the flesh according to that text, because the hereditary curse was condemned. Sin was the enticement and minister of sin: the Lord Jesus came, and in flesh subject to sin exercised the warfare of virtue.

Then in the Commentary upon Luke ch. 2 he says:

For not conjugal intercourse kept reserved the secret chambers of the virginal womb, but the Holy Spirit poured in an immaculate seed into an inviolate womb: and He alone through all things out of all born of woman is the holy Lord Jesus, who by the heavenly Majesty both felt not the earthly contagion of corruption in the novelty of an immaculate birth, and drove it away.

Likewise on Isaiah, as alleged by blessed Augustine book 1 contra Iulianum, and in the first book de Nuptiis et Concupiscentiis:

Every man, he says, is a liar, and no one is without sin, save one God alone. It is preserved therefore that of man and woman, by that mixture of bodies, no one conceived should be without fault; but whoever is without fault is without fault also of this kind of conception.

— I answer, that from these and similar sayings of S. Ambrose nothing can be deduced against our assertion; since it is openly evident that in the first cited authority the discourse is only concerning actual sins, whereto flesh vitiated by original sin is wont to entice; which enticement of sin Christ had not, just as neither had the Mother of God, because each was immune from the original stain. Meanwhile I warn that this authority, ob> jected by the adversaries, is to be received with caution; for they are accustomed in many places to interpolate it, adding some things and taking away others, that they may drag holy Ambrose even against his will into their opinion.

— To the second authority I say, that the word "alone" does not signify exclusion of anyone; for it is established that very many were sanctified in the womb of their mothers, and felt not in birth the earthly contagions of corruption: but it only indicates that Christ the Lord drove away all that corruption by His own heavenly Majesty, which the others, endowed with the same prerogative, attained only through divine aid shining upon them and His benefit. Likewise I say that in the aforesaid words Saint Ambrose intends only that Christ the Lord is alone among those born of woman who did not feel the earthly contagions of corruption in the novelty of an immaculate birth, because He was born of a Virgin altogether unspotted and most pure. I warn moreover that the adversaries corrupt even this authority; for they add: Holy was the Lord Jesus in Conception; but those words in Conception are found neither in S. Ambrose nor in S. Augustine, who brings forward the same authority lib. 1 Contra Iulianum.

— To the third authority I say, that from its words it sufficiently appears that S. Ambrose is to be understood only of actual sin, not of original; or of active, not passive Conception. Nor does it matter that S. Augustine adduces that authority lib. 1 Nuptiis et concupiscentiis, c. 8, that he might prove from it original sin; for first it is certain that that authority as brought forward by S. Augustine is now not found in S. Ambrose. Moreover the adversaries are accustomed to corrupt even it: first indeed they add the particle "alone" in place of the particle "one God". Second they add the word "conceived". Third they omit the word "seems", so that they elicit an absolute and affirmative proposition out of a dubitative one.

They object 3. Many sayings of S. Augustine by which there seems to be signified first that Christ alone was immune from original sin. Thus lib. 2 De Baptismo parvulorum, cap. 21:

There is not, he says, among the sons of men, nor was there, nor will there be, one who was ever bound with no sin, or who has not that justice whereby one comes from sin, except the one Mediator, through whom, the enmities of sins being finished, we are reconciled to God. He alone therefore also made man, remaining God, had never any sin, nor took on the flesh of sin, although from a mother of the flesh of sin. For what He took thence, that truly He cleansed by taking.

These are his words. The same has lib. 1 De Nuptiis, cap. 11, and lib. 2 De peccatorum meritis et remissione. Then they bring forth from the holy Doctor those authorities by which there is signified that the Blessed Virgin died on account of Adam's sin. Thus in the second Sermon on Ps. 34: Mary from Adam died on account of that sin: Adam died on account of sin: and the flesh of the Lord from Mary died for the blotting out of sins. Finally they heap up various sayings of the same, by which the holy Doctor signifies that all born from the commixtion of man and woman draw original sin, and likewise that they who are born of any parents whatever remain so long under the devil unless they be reborn in Christ, who willed not to be born of the same commixtion of both sexes, that by His grace they plucked from the power of darkness may be translated into that kingdom: thus he speaks lib. 2 De Nuptiis et Concupiscentiis.

— I answer to the first, that the aforesaid authority is variously interpolated by the adversaries: for Saint Augustine there opposes the holiness of Christ to the > corruption of men: since when he had said: And indeed we should have been born in the flesh of sin; but He in the likeness of the flesh of sin — we not only of flesh and blood but also of the will of man and of the will of the flesh; but He only of flesh and blood, and not of the will of man nor of the will of the flesh, but born of God: and therefore we unto death with sin, He for us unto death without sin. He subjoins: He alone therefore also made man, remaining God, had never any sin, nor took the flesh of sin, although of the nature of the flesh of sin: for what He took thence, that truly either cleansing He took, or took cleansing. Therefore He chose the Virgin Mother conceiving not by the law of the flesh of sin, that is, not by the motion of carnal concupiscence, but deserving by pious faith that she become the holy germ, whom He would elect, create, chose from whom He would be created, etc.

From which it lucidly appears that the aforesaid authority of Saint Augustine is not reported entire and sincere. For they add the four first lines fabricated out of their own head. Then, where S. Augustine has "although of the nature of the flesh of sin", these interpolators write "although of maternal flesh of sin". Add that S. Augustine speaks of active, not passive Conception, or of concupiscence existing in the will of the man and arising from the pleasure of the flesh, when man is generated, from which no one besides Christ was immune. Wherefore S. Augustine subjoins: Therefore the Virgin Mother, not by the law of the flesh of sin, etc., that he might designate that Christ supposed sin in no way either in Himself or in His parent. But here there is discourse not of active but of passive Conception. To the second I say that the holy Doctor wishes nothing else than that the Virgin Mother of God died on account of Adam's sin, admonishing lest we judge men propagated by seminal way immune from being rendered free of original sin, who would lie under death no less because they are propagated from Adam. Or to say that S. Augustine by these words signifies that the Blessed Virgin by the mode of her generation was liable to sin, and so ought to have died of necessity, although through the benefit and privilege of God she was immune from actual contraction of sin. To the third kind of authority I say first that such authorities vitiated in all respects are accustomed to be objected by the adversaries, as is evident from the aforesaid one, wherein very many things are omitted and things distant from each other connected. I say second that the holy Doctor there institutes discourse only of active Conception on the part of the parents, which since it always has libido admixed, thence it is that it has some sin joined to it, by which reason the Conception of the Virgin Mother of God was not immune from sin.

They object 4. S. Leo the First in the Epistle to Flavian, where he says: Otherwise human captivity could not have been loosed unless He took up our cause without damage of His Majesty, that He become true man, and alone have not the contagion of sin. Then Sermon 1 De Nativitate, says: No one is severed from participation of such alacrity, one common reason of joy belongs to all, because our Lord, destroyer of sin and death, as He found none free from vice, so came to loose all. And Sermon 1 De resurrectione: What in all men was transfused of damnation, this in Christ is the sacrament of piety. But, say the adversaries, Christ made the blessed Virgin partaker of the sacrament of His redemption: therefore she also was partaker of transfused damnation. I answer to the first, that that authority is altogether fictitious and supposititious, as will openly appear to anyone reading the aforesaid epistle. To the second I say, that this authority is not to be understood thus, as if S. Leo truly judged that He loosed only those whom He found conquered in guilt when He came into the world: for He found all free and loosed from the bonds of sin who were already illumined by sanctifying grace: but his mind is, that no one was truly free from captivity of sin unless either anticipated by the benefit of grace itself he guarded himself lest he fall, as befell in the Blessed Virgin; or already entangled in the bonds of sin he was loosed by the intervening grace. To the third I say that S. Leo speaks not of damnation of fault but of penalty, for he says: Infirmity indeed and mortality, which shall be not sin but the penalty of sin, were received from the Redeemer of the world for punishment, that they might be spent for price. Why then in all, etc.

They object 5. All those holy Fathers who distinctly and precisely seem to assert the Blessed Virgin to have been infected with original guilt: chiefly Rupertus lib. 1 In Cantica, where concerning the Blessed Virgin he says: And thou indeed certainly couldst have said, behold for in iniquities was I conceived, and in sins my mother conceived me; since thou wert of that mass which was corrupted in Adam, thou lackedst not the hereditary stain of original sin. Into the same opinion they bring S. Anselm lib. 2 Cur Deus homo, cap. 16, where he says: Although the conception of Christ Himself be clean, and without the sin of carnal delectation. Yet the Virgin herself whence He was assumed was conceived in iniquities, and in sins His mother conceived Him, and was born with original sin, since she herself sinned in Adam, in whom all sinned. They bring also S. Anthony of Padua in a certain Sermon On the B. Virgin, where he says: The blessed Virgin was sanctified in the womb of her mother from sin by grace, and born without sin. Nay they add S. Bernardine of Senis, Sermon on S. John Baptist, which begins: As the sun rising upon the world, where distinguishing a threefold sanctification, he says: The third was maternal sanctification, and this removes original fault, and confers grace, and removes pronity to sinning as well mortally as venially, and this was in the Virgin Mother, etc. — I answer to Rupertus, that he wishes only that the Blessed Virgin in that instant in which she conceived Christ was not made drunk with the wine of luxury wherewith other women are made drunk: Thou hadst not, he says, experienced the vice of this age, the wine of carnal pleasure, without whose drunkenness no woman ever besides thee could conceive, or can conceive; and yet thou knowest to judge how much better, more clement, sweeter, and stronger was the pleasure, or love of God, in which thou didst conceive; without doubt thou hast drunk of that torrent of pleasure. Then he subjoins the words praised in the objection, after which he adds: But before the face of this love sin, neither that nor any other, could stand; before the face of this fire every stub perished, that the whole dwelling might become holy, in which God would dwell nine whole months. By which words Rupertus signifies that he speaks only of the active Conception of the Blessed Virgin, namely that she conceived Christ without any pleasure, which other women experience on account of the hereditary blemish, and which also the Blessed Virgin would have experienced, had she not been divinely preserved. Whence this was this singular privilege of the Virgin Mother of God, that her Son alone could not say Behold in iniquities was I conceived, namely because the Virgin conceived Him only through the supervening Holy Spirit and the overshadowing power of the Most High: which indeed this Virgin Mother of God could not say, because her mother drank that wine of pleasure when she conceived her in her womb: whence she could say, Behold in the iniquities of my parents was I conceived. Which things being so, she would have conceived Christ even amid that iniquity of pleasure, seeing she was of that mass corrupted in Adam, unless she had been divinely overshadowed and preserved from that drunkenness of pleasure. From which it appears that Rupertus speaks only of the active Conception of the Virgin's parents, not of the passive, or her animation. To S. Anselm I say, that the words placed in the objection are not his, but only Boson his disciple's asking in what manner God assumed from a sinful mass, that is, from mankind wholly infected with sin, a man without sin, like a grape from leavened dough; for although the conception of the same man be clean and without the sin of carnal delectation: Yet the Virgin herself whence He was assumed, etc. But who would call the words of the questioning disciple the resolution of the Master? Add that if all things Boson says were to be judged genuine S. Anselm's opinion, he would labor under many absurdities, for he asks many things and supposes them as true, when nevertheless they are most absurd. — To S. Anthony of Padua, I say the aforesaid sermon is altogether fictitious, nor was it ever found among his works: for so far is that most holy man from having thought the Virgin Mother of God defiled with any sin, that he openly teaches the contrary, as is seen in the sermon of Parasceve, where he says Christ was clothed in a white garment, that is, he says, flesh clean from every stain of sin, assumed from an immaculate Virgin, etc. And Sermon 2, 5th Sunday after Pentecost, he says Mary was a throne of cloud, because immune from sin. De Alva has other authorities of the same in Militia Immaculatae Conceptionis against the malice of original sin. Hence in Sole veritatis n. 28 he observes that the aforesaid words are not S. Anthony the Paduan's, but S. Antoninus the Florentine's p. 1 summae, tit. 25, cap. 6, wrongly affixed by the adversaries to S. Anthony of Padua. — To S. Bernardine I say, that his words praised in the objection do not favor the adversaries; for to remove original fault is not only to take it away and wipe it off when it already existed, but also to prevent lest it infect. For truly to remove someone from laws is the same as not to compel him to keep the laws. That however the opinion of that most holy man is otherwise is clear from the same sermon, for at its beginning he thus says: The sacrament of the glorious Virgin Mother of God, most sublime to venerate, most devout to treat of, sweetest to contemplate. Today, most beloved, is set before us this day indeed glorious, which offers us the ray of solar light, while it proclaims the Mother of God conceived, etc. If therefore the day of Mary's Conception was glorious, which inflamed, illumined, and strengthened pious minds by its splendor, and sublime, venerable, most devout, sweetest sacrament: therefore that Conception was not with fault and sin. Likewise within he insinuates more saying: In which words the wisdom of the Lord describes a threefold gracious state of the Blessed Virgin: First, of Conception: second, of Nativity: Third, of Annunciation. The first, namely her Conception, he calls like the Sun, etc. If therefore Bernardine commends the Conception as the Nativity and Annunciation, in which there was no stain or fault, and calls the Conception like the Sun and gracious, that is illustrious with grace and clarity of holiness: the consequence is that so far is he from opposing the Immaculate Conception, that rather he patronizes it, if you weigh and ponder his words with equal balance. — Finally he answers with the Doctor in 3 dist. 3 q. 1 n. 14 that all the authorities of Saints whatsoever that can be objected signify nothing else than that the blessed Virgin, propagated from Adam by seminal way, had a debt of contracting original sin, and by the force of her Conception would have contracted it, unless by special privilege of God her soul, in that same instant in which it was formed, was illumined by sanctifying grace. For as our Pitigianus teaches most gloriously here art. 2, the Blessed Virgin was threefoldly liable to sin: First, in the loins of Adam and other parents: second, in the womb before animation, for then the body already existed to be sinned, and so it was to be infected with sin, unless prevented: third, in the very instant of animation, because although in that same real instant of time she was gifted with grace, yet her soul prior in nature can be conceived without grace, and in a state indifferent to grace or to sin.

You insist: Naturally first the Blessed Virgin was daughter of Adam before she was sanctified: but in that prior state she had a debt of contracting original sin: therefore in fact she previously had original sin, before she was freed from it. — The Doctor distinguishes the minor ibidem num. 15: that she had that debt positively in that prior instant, he denies; for what belongs to someone positively prior in nature than something else can be affirmed of him simply for the instant of time in which he exists, and in which that instant of nature is included; and thus it could be said that the blessed Virgin had original sin and sanctifying grace in the same instant of time, which is absurd: in that prior instant she had that debt negatively, inasmuch as she is not conceived to have had anything for that instant of nature by reason of which she ought not contract original sin, because for that instant she was not yet conceived as having sanctifying grace, he concedes. Which solution certainly appears legitimate even in the opinion of the adversaries, who do not deny that God of absolute power could preserve the Virgin from original sin.

They press: The Blessed Virgin in that prior state of nature, in which she is pre-understood toward grace, has not justice, nor is conceived as just: therefore she must necessarily be conceived as unjust, or as not just, and consequently as having original sin. — The Doctor denies the inference num. 17. Nay, he says, there is no falsehood in those abstracting, 2 Physics; for one not understanding does not understand not this; as one not understanding man to be animal does not understand him non-animal, because then abstraction could scarcely be without falsehood, abstracting from something essentially inherent in it.

They object 1. If the Blessed Virgin had been conceived without original sin, she would have had no need of Christ the Redeemer and Mediator: but this is absurd: therefore, etc. — The Doctor denies the major, n. 15. For she herself, he says, would have contracted original sin by the reason of common propagation, had she not been anticipated through the grace of the Mediator: whence as others needed Christ that sin already contracted might be remitted to them by His merit, so she more needed a Mediator arising from sin, lest it should ever be contracted by her; and in fact she would have contracted it.

You will urge: None (says S. Zosimus Pope, Epist. 155, in Augustine) is made free except one who is servant of sin; nor can he be called redeemed unless he was truly before a captive through sin: therefore if the Blessed Virgin did not contract original sin, she truly and properly had no need of Christ the Redeemer. It is confirmed by a like case, because although Christ (as many Theologians teach) merited for the good Angels the grace whereby they were preserved from falling, yet for that reason He cannot be called their Redeemer: therefore by a like case He will not be judged properly Redeemer with respect to the Virgin, if He truly freed her not from sin. — I distinguish the antecedent: none can be said to be redeemed unless he was before captive through sin, by debt, I concede; in fact only, I deny. For properly is anyone said to redeem someone from captivity and prison while, when he is already about to be cast into prison on account of debts, he makes satisfaction to the creditor for him and pays his debt: but the blessed Virgin, as the Doctor teaches expressly, had a debt of contracting the captivity of original sin; and by the force of her conception and propagation from Adam by way of seminal transmission she would have contracted it, had she not been divinely preserved. Hence it is that that preservation can truly and properly be called redemption: but otherwise is it of the Angels, who had no debt in themselves of incurring a fall, had they not been prevented; whence their preservation cannot be called redemption so properly as the preservation of the Blessed Virgin.

They object 2. The Blessed Virgin was subject to all the penalties prescribed on account of original sin, namely hardships and sorrows, nay even death itself: therefore she contracted that sin. — I answer, indeed the Virgin Mother of God endured all these things, not indeed under puncture and necessity, but unto merit and ampler grace; for it was fitting that she be assimilated to her Son, who willed to suffer temporal hardships and labors, nay death itself, that redemption might be copious with Him: for the Mediator can, says the Doctor n. 8, reconcile someone so that there be taken away from him penalties useless to him, and there remain in him penalties useful to him: original guilt would have been useless to Mary; temporal penalties however were useful, because in them she merited: therefore, etc.

Finally they object: If the Blessed Virgin had not contracted original sin, and had died before the Ascension of Christ, she ought to have entered the kingdom of heaven: but no man before the Ascension of Christ could be received into heaven; since only through the triumphal entry of Christ into heaven was its entrance opened to men: therefore, etc. — The Doctor denies the inference of the major: for absence of original sin does not necessarily infer entrance into the kingdom of heaven; for the holy Fathers long ago, dying before Christ's birth, were absolved from original sin, yet were not endowed with the clear vision of God; for this was reserved for men in that Ascension of Christ, namely that ascending into heaven He should lead captivity captive and give gifts to men: For so God decreed, says the Doctor n. 19, *that although He accepted the foreseen Passion of Christ for remitting original guilt to every believer and future believer in that Passion; nevertheless He did not remit the penalty due to that sin, namely the want of the divine vision, on account of the Passion foreseen, but on account of the same exhibited: and therefore as the door was not opened to those Fathers until the Passion of Christ was exhibited, so it is probable that neither would it have been unlocked for the Blessed Virgin, had she died before the Ascension of our Lord Christ into heaven.

WHETHER THE B. VIRGIN WAS IMMUNE FROM ALL ACTUAL SIN.

Note 1. Actual sin is distinguished in the usual way into a twofold kind, namely mortal and venial. Mortal is the deliberate transgression of the divine law gravely obliging, by reason of which the friendship of man with God is dissolved, and grace and charity are removed from man, in whose presence the soul lived, by whose loss and absence it incurs spiritual death. Venial is the transgression of a light precept, or not perfectly deliberate and free, which neither dissolves friendship with God, nor removes grace or charity from the soul: but only diminishes its fervor, nor removes from the ultimate end, but only delays from its attainment. But it is called venial either because it is light offense in comparison with mortal sin, or chiefly because it is worthy of pardon.

Note 2. From the Seraphic Doctor in 2 dist. 29, art. 3, quaest. 2, there can be distinguished a threefold genus of venial sin; for one befalls man from the surreption of sensuality: another from some sudden and undeliberate motion of reason: finally a third is called venial on account of imperfection of act and levity of matter, such as an idle word and a lie whether jocose or officious; which genus of sin indeed is found for the most part even in men illustrious for surpassing piety. We ask therefore whether the Virgin Mother of God sinned venially in any of these ways.

Note 3. From the Subtle Doctor in 2 dist. 20, quest. 1, there is distinguished a twofold confirmation in grace: one whereby the ability to sin is taken away, even venially; another, whereby de facto sinning is taken away. The first belongs only to comprehensors and the Blessed: For to be unable to sin, he says, cannot belong to a wayfarer, otherwise it would be a contradiction, because certainty of beatitude is the greatest part of beatitude: but inability to sin would then be knowable by anyone, as now the ability to sin is certain to us. But this infallible certainty of beatitude can belong only to the comprehensor. Moreover, so long as in the object of the will of the wayfarer there is defect of good, the will of the wayfarer can fail from rectitude by willing that, not according to due circumstance; but so long as man is a wayfarer, his own will cannot be conjoined with an object in which is the whole reason of good; therefore so long as he is a wayfarer, he can fail from rectitude; and consequently could sin, and accordingly no wayfarer can be so confirmed in grace as to exclude infallibly the power of sinning. But the second confirmation in grace does indeed not exclude the power of sinning, but only the act of sin, into which man cannot rush headlong on account of the special assistance of God, His protection, and special helps, which are so tempered to free choice that they infallibly remove every sinful act. The prior impeccability is called intrinsic and as it were antecedent; the latter extrinsic and consequent. It is certain however that the B. Virgin, so long as she lived in this world, had not impeccability from within and antecedent, because no habitual grace of this life, however perfect, so determines the will that antecedently it is not still indifferent to sinning. Nor surely did such antecedent impeccability befit the B. Virgin in this life: then because she was purely a wayfareress: then because although liberty to sin be a defect, yet it conduces to merit, according to Ecclesiasticus 31: He that could transgress and hath not transgressed.

But it is asked whether she had the second genus of impeccability.

One Conclusion. — THE MOST BLESSED VIRGIN WAS IMMUNE FROM EVERY SIN WHATEVER OF ACTUAL KIND. This is common among all the faithful of Christ against the heretics the Lutherans and Calvinists.

The Conclusion could be proved by very many texts of Sacred Scripture: namely those, by which above it was proved that perpetual enmities and hostilities were between Mary and the demon: but such a battle would not have intervened had the blessed Virgin fallen into any sin: therefore, etc. — Similarly it could be proved chiefly from the book of Canticles, where the Virgin Mother of God is preached not only all fair and without stain, but ch. 2 it is said of her: As the lily among the thorns, so is my love among the daughters. Which oracle Sedulius lib. 2 De Paschate excellently weighs thus:

And as the soft rose rises amid sharp thorns, Having naught that wounds, outshining the Mother in honor; So Light come from sacred stem through Mary, The new Virgin expiates the deed of the ancient Virgin.

And Hugh of S. Victor:

Hail holy parent of the Word, Flower from thorn, lacking thorn, Flower, glory of the thornbrake: We are the thornbrake, we are the thorn Of sin bloodstained, But thou knowest no thorn.

It is proved secondly from the Council of Trent session 6, Can. 23: If any one shall say that a man once justified cannot sin more, nor lose grace, and therefore that he who falls and sins was never truly justified; or contrariwise that he can avoid throughout life all sins, even venial ones, without a special privilege of God, as the Church holds concerning the B. Virgin: let him be anathema.

The same opinion very many of the holy Fathers defend, chiefly indeed S. Augustine, who in the book De Natura et gratia, cap. 36, frees utterly from actual sin the Virgin Mother of God. For when Pelagius, to prove his dogma — namely that men can be without all sin — had brought forward examples of many of both sexes who are reported in Scripture not only not to have sinned but even to have lived justly, such as were Abel, Enoch, Melchisedech, Abraham, etc., and had added also women, Debbora, Anna mother of Samuel, etc., and even the Mother herself of our Lord and Savior, whom he says piety compels to confess was without sin: when Pelagius had affirmed these things, I say, concerning the impeccability of the B. Virgin, Augustine assents to him and speaks thus: Except therefore holy Virgin Mary, concerning whom, out of honor to the Lord, I wish no question at all when sins are treated of; whence do we know that more grace was conferred upon her for overcoming sin on every side, who merited to conceive of a sinner Him whom we know had no sin. Hence therefore except the Virgin, if we could gather together all those saints and saintly women while they lived here, and ask whether they were without sin, what do we think they would answer? whether this which is said here, or that of John the Apostle? etc. From which it appears that S. Augustine openly teaches that the most blessed Virgin was stained with no proper and actual sin. — He teaches the same truth when he says that if she draws the original stain from her parents she is nevertheless sanctified less than Jeremias in the womb, as Christian piety forbids believing her less filled with the Holy Spirit than John; for she is honored with festal praises being born. Lastly, since it altogether stands that Mary was cleansed from original contagion by grace alone, etc., as it is wholly pious to believe, she had not her own fault. The same he teaches also in Epist. 171, where although he does not suffer her to be held pure from defect of origin, he doubts not that she was sanctified in the womb; and indeed that a more copious blessing of sanctification descended into her, which both sanctified her body and also kept her thereafter immune from all sin, which is believed to have been granted to no other among women by nature.

Wherefore Proclus of Constantinople deservedly in Oration 6 calls the most blessed Mother of God, among all things besides, an impeccable sanctuary. Rightly also Ildephonsus in the Sermon On the Assumption, when he compares her to the ark of the Old Testament. Above which the propitiatory and Cherubim overshadowing on this side and that are figured, because no contagion of sin crept into Mary inwardly: but within was all the custody of the Law, and the Manna. In which similitude Proclus also used it, adding that this Ark was within and

For this assertion and truth S. Thomas brings forth this excellent reason Opusc. 60, art. 3, where having premised the aforesaid authority of S. Augustine for the innocence of the B. Virgin, he subjoins:

For she would not have been a fit Mother of Christ, had she ever sinned: then because the honor of parents > redounds to the offspring, according to Prov. 18: The glory of children are their parents; whence contrariwise the ignominy of the mother would have redounded to the son: then also because he had singular affinity to Christ, because from her he took flesh: and it is said 1 ad Corinth. 6: What concord hath Christ with Belial! Then also because Christ, who is the wisdom of the Father, dwelt in a singular manner, not only in her soul, but also in her womb. And it is said Wisdom 1: Into a malicious soul wisdom shall not enter, nor dwell in the body subject to sins. And therefore it is simply to be held that the blessed Virgin committed no actual sin, neither mortal nor venial, so that may be fulfilled what is said Cant. 4: Thou art all fair, O my love,* etc.

They object 1. That heretics say the B. Virgin sinned the sin of infidelity, when Luke 1 to the Angel announcing the Incarnation, as if incredulous she said:

How shall this be done, because I know not man? Whence Luther in the postilla on the Gospel of the Annunciation: He himself, he says, truly felt within himself a sense of incredulity. And Calvin on the aforesaid words of Luke says she was no less doubtful of the omnipotence of God than Zachary: therefore she committed some actual sin. — I deny the consequence, and to the antecedent I say with S. Augustine Hom. 1 ch. 5 ex 50: While she asked, she doubted not of the promise. Or, as S. Bernard gloriously says Homil. 1 super Missus est: She doubts not of the fact, but asks the mode and order of the thing; for it is not asked whether this shall be done, but how. S. Ambrose confirms all these excellently in the same words, where he notes there was not the same affection of mind in Mary and in Zachary concerning the Angelic oracle; Zachary was presently reprehended and punished for incredulity, but not the Virgin Mother of God. Because therefore, he says, it could come about that Zacharias, who had not believed, be condemned to silence: would Mary however, if she had not believed, celebrate the infusion of the Holy Spirit? But neither did Mary not believe; nor yet ought she rashly to usurp: not to believe the angel, to usurp divine things: for she does not make herself know the mystery hidden from eternity in God: which neither the higher Powers could know. And yet did she not hold faith? she refused not the office but accommodated her affection, promised her service: for indeed when she said: How shall this be done? she doubted not of the effect, but asked the quality of the effect itself. How much more temperate is that answer than the words of the Priest! She says: how shall this be done? he answered: whereby shall I know this? She already treats of the business: he still doubts of the message. He denies that he believes what he denies that he knows, and as if seeking another author of faith: she professes that she will do, nor doubts it must be done, but inquires how it can be done.

They object 2. That she sinned the sin of negligence when she lost her Son for three days, and the sin of impatience when she rebuked him with these words: Son, why hast thou done so to us? Therefore, etc. — I deny the antecedent; and to the first I say, that since the Virgin Mother of God and her most holy spouse Joseph knew Jesus to be true God, they left Him to His own will; whence they could easily be induced to believe He was with their kinsfolk and acquaintances, and accordingly no negligence of theirs appears there: seeing they knew He needed not their guidance and presence to return home safe. Equally there was no impatience; for the aforesaid words of Mary are not signs of rebuke but of sorrow, and testify only the immense love and grief of the Virgin over the absence of her most loving Son.

They object 3. She seems to have sinned the sin of ambition, when at the wedding feast she required a miracle of her Son saying: They have no wine. For by these words, says Luther on ch. 2 of John, she seems out of ambition and vainglory to have sought a miracle for ostentation. — Truly I answer with S. Augustine tr. 8 in Ioan., that those words were not a token of vainglory but of the surpassing faith of the B. Virgin concerning the divinity and omnipotence of her Son, as well as a sign of the burningest charity wherewith she burned toward the poor, whom she willed not to be overwhelmed with shame for want of wine. Nor when Christ said: What is it to me and to thee, woman? My hour is not yet come: did He reject the petition of His mother as too importunate, but showed the fullness of wisdom and power communicating itself at its pleasure. Not rejecting (says S. Augustine lib. 4 De Consensu Evangelistarum, cap. 10.) her of whom He took flesh, but then chiefly insinuating His Divinity: acting conversant in the flesh, which Divinity had made that woman also, not made in her. But that Christ subjoins: My hour is not yet come, the same S. Augustine expounds thus tr. 19 in Ioan.: He had foretold therefore this hour, he says, which then had not yet come, in which dying He ought to acknowledge the Mother of whom He had been born mortal. Therefore about to work divine things, not the Mother of Divinity but of infirmity, He repelled her as unknown: but now suffering human things, from whom He had been made man, He commended her with human affection. For then He who had been nourished by Mary made Himself known in power: now He whom Mary had brought forth hung upon the Cross.

They object 4. S. Chrysostom, who wishes even that sin of vainglory and a certain pride to be detected in her: for expounding that Matth. 27 where certain ones saying to Christ: Behold thy mother, and thy brethren stand without seeking thee, to which Christ answers: Who is my mother, and who are my brethren? sets forth the reason of this answer thus: Such, he says, words He spoke, not that he was ashamed of His Mother, or cast off her from whom He had come: for if he were ashamed of her, He would by no means have gone forth through her womb into light: but that He might show nothing did that avail her unless that it was her office to profit in all things. For what she had undertaken to do was of a certain proud ambition, since she was wont to show forth to the people that she ruled over her Son and exercised authority over Him, when as yet she had proposed to herself nothing great concerning Him in her imagination. Therefore she came unseasonably. Of faith, I pray you, is the pride both of her and of them. Since equal it was for those entering to hear Him with the crowd, or if they would not this, to wait until He made an end of speaking, and then approach, they against the doors go forth before Him. Whence Calvin says on this passage, there is no doubt that by these words He carps at the importunity of Mary, that she attempted preposterously to break off the course of His doctrine. — I answer with S. Ambrose on this passage, that Christ answered thus that He might teach the hearers that the bond of minds is more religious than of bodies: Nor, he says, are parents injuriously refused, but the bonds of minds are taught to be more religious than of bodies. Therefore here (as some catch at snares) not the Mother is denied, who even from the cross is acknowledged: but the form of the precepts preferred before bodily kinship. Nor does it repugn to understand that by figure of parents He points out to the Jews, from whom is Christ according to the flesh, the Church, to be preferred to credulity. To S. Chrysostom I say, either that he exceeded in oratorical manner in this expression, or that he deviated ever so little from the truth herein, as S. Thomas ingenuously confesses.

Finally they object certain ones of the holy Fathers asserting that the B. Virgin wavered in faith at the time of the Passion. Thus chiefly Basil Epist. 318 asserts she fluctuated with a certain doubt, and tossed with scandal, when she saw her Son afflicted with punishment: In excess, he says, at the time of the Passion she was subjected to a certain doubt, according to the answer of the Lord, who had said: All you shall be scandalized in me. So likewise S. Cyril of Alexandria plainly hands down the same in his Commentaries on John, saying that blessed Virgin in the Passion of her Son not only suffered scandal but was well-nigh bereft of her state of mind. But less tolerable are those things which he narrates presently, that Christ commended the Mother to the disciple John, in what way, since she had fallen into her own thoughts and been filled with perturbations of thoughts, provision must be made for her. Therefore since He knew with what thoughts she was then agitated, He uttered this excellent mystagogy to His disciple, who could rightly and fitly explain the height of that mystery. The same Origen teaches Hom. 17 in Lucam, where among other things he says: What think we, that from scandalizing the Apostles the Mother of the Lord was immune in herself? If she suffered not scandal in the Passion of the Lord, Jesus died not for her sins. But if all have sinned and need the glory of the justification of His grace and redemption, certainly also Mary at that time was scandalized. — I answer first to Origen, that in this matter as in very many others he fell gravely, and accordingly is by no means to be heard. As to the other Fathers I say they somewhat exceeded in homiletic manner: or by doubt they understand great admiration and as it were stupor of the B. Virgin at the time of the Passion of Christ. For S. Ambrose declares her surpassing patience and unconquered constancy of soul in that immense grief wherewith she was pressed, Epist. 25, where he thus writes: Mary the Mother of the Lord stood before the cross of her Son: none taught me this but the holy Evangelist. And a little within: The Apostles fleeing, she stood before the cross, and with pious eyes beheld the wounds of Christ, because she awaited not the death of her pledge but the salvation of the world: or perhaps because she might recognize from the death of her Son the redemption of the world, etc. And in the Sermon on the death of Valentinian: She stood, he says, as holy Mary beside the cross of her Son, and the Virgin beheld the Passion of her Only-begotten; beholding her I read her, standing I read her: weeping I read her not.

WHETHER THE BLESSED VIRGIN IS TRULY AND PROPERLY TO BE CALLED MOTHER OF CHRIST.

Note 1. That Theodorus of Mopsuestia preceded the Nestorian heresy and as it were shone before it, disciple of Diodorus of Tarsus, fellow-student of S. John Chrysostom, as Theodoret narrates lib. 5 Historiae cap. 30; whom moreover, born of a most ample family and in the highest riches, was drawn at Antioch by that same John Chrysostom to the institute of Monks, as Hesychius Presbyter of Jerusalem reports in the Ecclesiastical History. Nay the same asserts with Nicephorus lib. 13 c. 2 that he was that Theodore to whom S. Chrysostom wrote two books, to call him back fallen again from the more sacred purpose of living into the common life: and this one finally obtained the Episcopate of Mopsuestia, which is a city of Cilicia, which he ruled happily for 36 whole years with unwearied labor contending against any Heretics whatever, chiefly Arians and Eunomians, as also Origenists and Apollinarists, as Facundus reports lib. 3 cap. 3, and Theodoret lib. 5 cap. 39; who for this reason wonderfully commends this Theodore; nay Facundus remembers lib. 5 cap. 4 an honorable testimony concerning him even from Cyril, although he is reported later to have noted him in his writings, because after Nestorius was condemned in the Ephesine Synod together with his heresy, his books proscribed by edict of the Emperors, the writings of that master and of certain Bishops his disciples, in which the poisons of Nestorian error had been sprinkled, were disseminated abroad, especially those of Diodorus of Tarsus and of Theodorus of Mopsuestia, who was held pestilentest of all, and who was reported to have been author of that dogma to Nestorius. Wherefore Proclus of Constantinople forbade such books to be read by the faithful, and Cyril himself published books against Theodorus, which are referred to in the fifth Synod coll. 5, and of which Liberatus Diaconus makes mention in the Breviary in these words: Four, he says, were written by him (Cyril), three against Theodorus and Diodorus pious authors of the Nestorian dogma, and another book de Incarnatione, in which he demonstrates among others the testimonies of Dionysius the Areopagite placed therein. Nor does it matter that they ought to be called so by very many, as Rabbulla Bishop of Edessa teaches in the Epistle to Cyril, where he recites the heretical opinions of Theodorus, plainly the same which the Ephesine Synod had condemned in Nestorius: First he exposed, he says, that it is not to be believed that the holy Virgin is Mother of God; as if God the Word did not receive nourishment according to us. Nevertheless John of Antioch took up his parts; for a Synod having been gathered whereby he might curb certain instant ones, that Theodorus be condemned on account of certain depraved and heretical heads noted in the excerpts which were circulated, he wrote to Cyril persuading him by many reasons not to permit an illustrious man, who had performed glorious labors for the Church, to be condemned as heretic; rescribing to whom Cyril has these things: Dialogues, he says, and the depraved and unpraiseworthy opinions of Theodorus, or of certain others, whom it were better not praised lest I say anything harsh, because they bore in full manner as it were words against the glory of Christ — let no one, I beseech, ascribe to the holy and orthodox Fathers. Whence the same Cyril Epist. to Acatius Bishop of Melitene wrote that this Theodore had a blasphemous tongue and a pen ministering to it. Wherefore he complains that he is esteemed so great by the Orientals that acclamations such as these about him were made by the people in the Churches: The faith of Theodorus shall be followed: So we believe as Theodore believes: when nevertheless the same daring once to speak some small thing wrongly in the Church, they assailed him with stones. But as it pleases the shepherd, thus feels the flock, adds Cyril twitching John silently. Scarce therefore can we sufficiently wonder that Facundus lib. 3 cap. 3 asserts Theodore to have been praised by Cyril, nor blamed by anyone; for from S. Cyril he reports these written things of thine: There were written by the great Theodore against the heresies of the Arians and Eunomians perhaps twenty and yet more books, and other besides these Gospel and Apostolic writings he interpreted. And these labors indeed no one dared to rebuke, but with right decree to honor the study of right dogmas which is in them. These things however cohere not at all with the writings of S. Cyril just praised.

Note 2. That the Nestorians agreed with Catholics that the Word truly was made flesh or man: but whether this assumption of human nature, or incarnation, was to be called properly and truly generation, the Nestorians did not so consent: since Nestorius confessed indeed that the Son and Word of God passed through the Virgin; but obstinately denied Him to have been begotten of the B. Virgin, as S. Cyril reports lib. 1 Contra Nestorium: fearing indeed lest the people understand that passage as true generation, before whom he had said: he does not envy that voice to Christ's genetrix the Virgin, but knows her to be reverenced who received God, through whom the omnipotent Lord made His passage, presently he corrected his saying thus: In what mode at last did you understand that passing of the Word? he says: I did not say He passed, in place of what He is, He was begotten: for my opinion was not so quickly obscured? that God passed from Christ's genetrix the Virgin, I am taught from Sacred Letters: That God Himself was begotten of her, nowhere did I learn. Truly against the impious and nefarious opinion of the archheretic there was outcry from all Catholics, and the blasphemous error of that man was proscribed not only by contemporaries and posteriors but also by primary and anterior holy Fathers.

For all these with one voice testify that the divine Word was truly begotten of the B. Virgin, and that she is properly to be called genetrix of God, as will appear below.

Note 3. That certain Nestorians, that they might the more easily cover their nefarious dogma under a masked species of Catholic doctrine and similitude of words, did not refuse to call the B. Virgin Θεοτόκον. For when they saw themselves traduced into odium and held for heretics because they refused to admit that little word, as if this one appellation sundered them from Catholics: for certainly all contention of faith between Catholics and Nestorians consisted in constituting this one appellation, as testifies S. Cyril Epist. 1 to John of Antioch, and Ephraemius Patriarch of Antioch writing in Photius. That faith might be made certain of Catholic piety sur omnimoda, to hold and profess that the most holy Virgin is genetrix of God: that the Nestorians might repel this mark of heresy from themselves, they admitted this appellation upon this plan, that they might signify prior and separately to have been man in the womb of the Virgin, then assumed by the Word into communion of the same dignity and name: and thus by that plan they admitted the Virgin to be genetrix of God because she had begotten Him who was raised up to society and fellowship with God, as Vincentius Lirinensis lucidly expounds in these words:

It is to be confessed with singular gift, veriest and most blessedly Θεοτόκος, of the Lord and our God, and His Son: but not in that mode Θεοτόκος which a certain impious heresy suspects, which asserts her to be called Mother of God in mere appellation, who namely brought forth the man who afterwards was made God: as we say the mother of a Presbyter, or mother of a Bishop, no longer begetting a Presbyter or Bishop, but truly generating the man who afterwards was made Presbyter or Bishop.

These things thus premised, two things chiefly remain to be determined in this Question: The first, that truly the Virgin is to be called genetrix of God: second, how she concurred toward that generation, whether through purest blood, or through some cut-off little portion of her virginal flesh.

First Conclusion. — THE MOST BLESSED VIRGIN IS TRULY TO BE CALLED DEIPARA. This is of faith determined in various Councils, chiefly indeed the Ephesine, in which against Nestorius the B. Virgin Θεοτόκος, that is, genetrix of God, was proclaimed. The Angel Gabriel had signified the same denouncing the mystery of the Incarnation to Mary in these words: That which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God, Luke 2. Hence ibidem blessed Elisabeth at the visitation of Mary exclaimed: Whence is this to me, that the Mother of my Lord should come to me?

With the same title of divine dignity and glory all the holy Fathers celebrated her from the very beginnings of the nascent Church, who either called God truly born of the Virgin, or the Virgin herself genetrix of God. Thus, to commemorate some out of very many, speaks Justin Martyr in dialogue with Trypho, where he says: Christ previously existed son of the Maker of all things, and God, who was born man through the Virgin, etc. Whence to Trypho the Jew objecting that he wished to demonstrate a thing incredible and nearly impossible, that he sustained God to be begotten and to become man: he answers that He willed to be begotten and lifted upon the cross for humankind. Ignatius Martyr subscribes, not indeed in the Epistle to the Romans, as Theodoret reports in Dialogue 1, but in that which is to the Smyrnenses, he says: Thoroughly persuaded concerning our Lord, who is of the race of David according to flesh, Son of God according to Deity, born of a Virgin. So Petavius reports from the apograph of the Florentine codex in the Library of the Grand Duke lib. 5 cap. 11. Irenaeus assents lib. 3 Adversus Haereses, cap. 31, where among other things he has:

If Adam was taken indeed from earth, of the Virgin and word of God he was formed: it behoved the same Word making recapitulation of Adam in Himself, to have similitude of the same generation. Why then did not God take again clay, but worked from Mary the formation, that not another formation should be made, nor another be the formation which should be saved, but the very same should be recapitulated, similitude preserved.

The same has Dionysius of Alexandria in the epistle against Paulus of Samosata: For already, he says, He dwelt (the Word, in those in whom more mothers were found: but one only Virgin daughter of life begot the living Word. — S. Athanasius also subscribes in the book De Salutari Adventu Iesu Christi: Who existed before ages God, he says, from Nazareth was seen man, born of Mary the Virgin, and the Holy Spirit. And presently, that God, he says, the Only-begotten decreed, by fullness of His Divinity, that the formation of that first and exemplar man, and a new work, be raised out of the womb of a virgin to Himself by natural generation. More distinctly declares this truth in Oration 1, where making discourse concerning the Word, splendor and wisdom of the Father, he says: Then afterwards for us that same one having taken flesh from the Virgin genetrix of God, Mary, was made man. S. Basil teaches the same lib. De Spiritu Sancto, cap. 5, and Hom. 25 on the human generation of Christ, in which he distinctly calls the most blessed Virgin genetrix of God. Gregory Nazianzen also consents Orat. 5, as also in the former Epistle to Cledonius, where likewise he constantly affirms blessed Mary genetrix of God.

The same is the unanimous opinion of the ancient Theologians and Latin Fathers: for Tertullian in Apologetic chapter 21 De Christo writes: That beam of God therefore, as it was ever preached before, let down into a certain Virgin, and in her womb flesh figured, is born man mixed with God. And lib. De Carne Christi, cap. 17: But before all things the reason will have to be commended which presided, that the Son of God should be born of a Virgin. S. Cyprian subscribes lib. 12 against the Jews: This, he says, was to be the sign of His nativity, that of a Virgin should be born man and God, Son of man and Son of God. — Hilary lib. 9: God therefore was born of a Virgin man, and according to the fullness of times about to proceed in Himself into God man. Ambrose lib. De Incarnat. cap. 5: Not otherwise of the Father, otherwise of the Virgin: but the same otherwise of the Father, otherwise of the Virgin in generation? Jerome lib. Contra Helvidium: We believe God to be known of a Virgin, because we read it. Augustine is wholly engaged in expounding this truth, chiefly Sermon 15 De Tempore: How, he says, in the rule of faith we confess that we believe in the Son of God, who was born of the Virgin Mary, if not the Son of God but the son of man had been born of the Virgin Mary? For what Christian denies that of that woman was born son of man, yet God made man, and thus man made God? Whence deservedly S. Cyril lib. De Recta Fide, concludes: Behold, he says, all best and wise Fathers who existed at divers times before us name the holy Virgin genetrix of God: and since they asserted the divine Word to be joined to flesh with natural union, they teach both that He was begotten in the womb of the Virgin, and proceeded from her according to flesh: although He who is without beginning and every prior age submitted generation from the Father. — Hence also appears Ephraemius Patriarch of Antioch to have written less truly in the work which he wrote against the Monophysites for the authority of the Synod of Chalcedon and of Pope Leo, when he says Leo first among Fathers with express words uttered this thing. For witness is John of Antioch in the Epistle to Nestorius, wherein he exhorts him, contention laid aside, to cease attacking that appellation, which by very many Fathers has been composed, written, and pronounced. Then he thus proceeds: For this name no one of Ecclesiastical Sayings repudiated. For many used it, and they celebrated: and who used it not, reproved not its users. Theodoret likewise in the Nestorian heresy writes, that the most ancient heralds of Catholic faith, from Apostolic tradition, taught the Mother of the Lord to be named and believed genetrix of God. Behold, Theodoret affirms that B. Mary of old was named genetrix of God from Apostolic tradition.

The Nestorians objected: The Blessed Virgin cannot be called Mother of God unless she have begotten Divinity: but it is false that she begat Divinity: since this is ungenerateable and unproducible: therefore false likewise that she is genetrix of God. They proved the major, as S. Cyril reports lib. 1 Contra Nestorium, by this example: As a woman indeed begets body: but God infuses soul: nor can the woman be called genetrix of soul because she begat the animated; rather she must be called genetrix of man: so the B. Virgin although she brought forth man — passing over together with Him this Word of God, for with this voice she used it — is judged not therefore to be called genetrix of God. Hence their voice was, as Maxentius reports Tomo 1 of the Library of the PP.: If by nature the Virgin Mary begat God, now she is not genitrix of flesh but of Divinity: and how do you preach not the Word God serum Divinitatis, which is common to Him with the Father; according to flesh, Him born of the Virgin. — I distinguish the minor: That B. Mary begat not Divinity as if Divinity through that generation had received anew to be, and had obtained new existence, I concede: thus that that man who was begotten of the most blessed Virgin was not truly and properly God, I deny. For as mothers are properly called genetrices of those whom consisting of body and soul they begat in their wombs and brought forth into light, although God alone produced the soul, because man begotten consists of body and soul; so the most holy Virgin even if she begat not Divinity nor gave it beginning, no less for that reason is to be called genetrix of God; since she begat that man who was not man before He existed God, that is, whose soul and body did not previously exist in nature than joined among themselves and hypostatically coupled with the Word. Which distinction and solution S. Cyril weighs gloriously lib. 1 Contra Nestorium, as also in the Epistle to Monks concerning true maternality of the B. Virgin, where he has:

The mystery of the Word. For the mothers of earthly men serving nature to beget, hold flesh in the womb, which little by little compacted, and advanced by certain inexplicable efficacies of God into human species is absolved. God moreover breathes animal spirit in ways He knows how. For He fashions the spirit of man in him, as the Prophet speaks: But there is another reason of flesh, another likewise of soul. Truly although these women are mothers only of earthly bodies; nevertheless when they have brought forth the whole animal composed of soul and body, they are said not to have brought forth only its part. Nor would anyone say, for example, Elisabeth mother of John, to be genetrix of flesh, not however of soul. For she brought forth the animated Baptist, and thus as one something out of both, man namely with soul and body. Something of this kind we shall confess to have been done also in the generation of Emmanuel. Since indeed there was born, as I said, of the substance of God the Father the Only-begotten His Word. But when He took flesh and made it proper to Himself, that He might be son of man and become like unto us, then it is by no means absurd to say, nay necessarily to be professed, that He was begotten of woman according to flesh: just as the soul of man is begotten together with its own body, and is reckoned one with it: although understood in nature, and diverse from it according to its proper reason.

They urged: Of him only whom she truly and properly begat is the B. Virgin to be called genetrix: but truly and properly she begat only the man who was united to God: therefore she is to be called genetrix of man alone. — I distinguish the major: whom she truly and properly begat as well according to nature as according to person, I deny: whom she properly begat according to nature through divine person subsisting, I concede. Similarly I distinguish the minor: truly and properly she begat man alone, that is, begat him who was only man as well according to nature as according to person, I deny: that he was man according to human nature, but God by reason of Divinity united hypostatically to Himself through the personality of the Word which sustained human nature, no otherwise than as if it were its own personality, I concede. Therefore since generation per se and properly terminates in person, or hypostasis, as in terminus, that is, in subsistent nature; thence properly is the B. Virgin to be called genetrix of God, seeing she begat nature which subsisted with the divine subsistence of the Word: for, as Ferrandus teaches gloriously, Epist. Ad

In both: Purely Divine is born of the Father, the same Incarnate Divinity properly born of mother. And this is the difference between the two generations of the one Son of God, that in divine generation there was no humanity, in human generation Divinity was joined to humanity properly being born.

For if I said, or wished to say, that Mary ever Virgin properly begat humanity, not properly begat Divinity, it would be conceded under some mode that she begat pure man, whom in no mode she so begat, that the Word made flesh properly begat. — By this reason therefore is the B. Virgin to be judged genetrix of God, that from her cut-off substance and formative and nutritive virtue the foetus contributed to the compagination and organization of Christ's body, which in that instant in which it was informed with rational soul and living, both the very body and soul united were united to Divinity by hypostatic union through the person of the Word; so that the very human nature, as personated and subsisting with the subsistence of the Word, was the total and adequate terminus of that fecundity of the B. Virgin. But whether the Deipara Virgin contributed toward formation of Christ's body by furnishing some cut-off particle of her flesh or blood or seed, is now to be determined.

Second Conclusion. — ALTHOUGH VERY MANY FATHERS SEEM TO TESTIFY THAT THE BODY OF CHRIST OUR LORD WAS FORMED FROM THE FLESH OF THAT MOST BLESSED VIRGIN HERSELF, YET IT APPEARS MOST PROBABLE THAT IT WAS FRAMED OF HER PUREST BLOOD. This consists of two parts, whereof

The first is persuaded. First indeed by the authority of S. Jerome (if however he be author of the Epistola De libro perfecto, which very many attribute to Thesiphon), where he says: I receive absolutely no seed, except that which the Apostle says: made of woman, made of flesh: by which words he admits blood not toward formation of Christ's body, makes no mention of seed, signifies expressly that the flesh of the Virgin was the matter for compaging that most sacred body. S. August. consents Psalm. 98, where making brief discourse concerning either mystery of Incarnation ⟦strictim?⟧, he says: From the flesh of Mary He took flesh, and that flesh itself of Mary He gave us to eat unto salvation. Which opinion certainly Serm. 30 corroborates saying: Therefore Mary was elected fertilized with all graces, filled in womb with all virtue and holiness, that of most clean flesh the cleanest Son should be born. — In the same manner speaks S. Bernard, Homilia 2 super Missus est, for expounding those words, Fiat mihi secundum verbum tuum, he says: Fiat mihi de Verbo secundum verbum tuum: The Word which was in the beginning with God, let it be made flesh of my flesh according to thy word. And about the middle declaring no intellect can seize how the splendor of the divine Word poured Himself into the bowels of the Virgin, he says: So could Mary bear that inaccessible light drawing near to herself, that from a little portion of the same body to which He tempered Himself to her soul, the rest became shadow of the mass. Saint Anselm subscribes, lib. De Excellentia Virginis, cap. 12, where addressing the Virgin he says: Surely God who assumed man, of thy most chaste flesh did this for thy salvation and ours all. — In the same manner speaks S. Ildephonsus, lib. De Perpetua virginitate et parturitione Virginis, where among other things he says: Most glorious Virgin Mary nim**nimirum, because it was not by common law of nature: neither from the first origin of nature a Son, nor from seed of man, but of the Holy Spirit divinely procreated from her flesh, without any defilement of parents she brought forth God and man. — The same has venerable Bede, lib. 1 cap. 19 in Lucam, where concerning the incarnate Word he writes: Body from virginal womb drew flesh not from nothing, not elsewhere, but maternal from flesh. Similar things Rupertus writes, lib. 7 De Divinis officiis, cap. 25, where weighing the joy of B. Virgin over resurrection of Christ, among other things he says: Sweet wounds of her flesh she offered to be kissed, whom she bore living flesh conceived from her own bowels. — But most clearly of all posterior Doctors expound this truth, chiefly S. Bernardine, Serm. 61 art. 1 cap. 10: In a part, he says, cut off of the virginal body consists, is perfected and terminated the whole God, and the weight of the Sacraments of the Church. Richard of S. Laurentio consents, lib. 1 De Laud. Virg., cap. 2: Of the flesh of the Virgin, he says, a particle was taken, from which, by artifice of the Holy Spirit, the body of Christ was formed. — But our Alensis teaches this of all most clearly 2 par. qu. 27 memb. 3 art. 1, where he says: When it is said, that Christ was made according to body from the purest bloods of B. Virgin, as Dumascenus says, and the Master recites (in 3 d. 3) it is not understood of blood, which is one of four humors, but blood is there taken for flesh. The common consent of the Church also seems to favor, while in the Collect of the feast of Incarnation or Annunciation it is thus prayed: O God, who from the womb of blessed Mary the Virgin didst will Thy Word announcing by the Angel to take flesh, etc. It says not blood but flesh, that it may seem to signify the body of Christ to be taken not from seed or blood but from flesh of the Virgin itself. — To these accedes our Galatinus, who lib. 1 c. 1 reports the opinion of ancient Hebrews to have been, that a particle of flesh in Adam still innocent was preserved uninjured from contagion of sin, and derived to the Virgin, that from her purest flesh the body of Christ our Lord should be formed. Which opinion certainly the Doctor reports also in 3 dist. 3 q. 2 in these words: It is said according to the Master (in 2 d. 80) that some portion was in Adam of which all his sons were propagated: and some place that something of that portion was not infected in Adam, but preserved clean until the generation of Christ. Which opinion although the Doctor approve not, nevertheless, for his wonted modesty, he willed not to note it with censure. Hence some of his disciples, chiefly the most illustrious Ioannes Baptista a Campanea once General Minister of our whole Seraphic Order, afterwards Bishop of Puteoli, held as certain that the body of Christ our Lord was formed not from blood of Virgin but flesh, and defended that opinion most strongly in public disputations, as the most illustrious Franciscus Belligerus Bishop of Cadiz of our Order reported in encomio of B. Mary Virgin Tom. 1 disp. 13 fragm. 2 punct. 2, who equally adheres to this opinion, and confirms it with very many authorities and some reasons.

Nevertheless I prefer to subscribe then to the Subtle Doctor, with other Theologians affirming the body of Christ our Lord to have been formed not from flesh itself of the most blessed Virgin, but from purest blood. For the Doctor supposes this as indubitable in the place soon praised, saying: From blood of the Virgin, of which the body of Christ was formed according to Damascenus, cap. 15, since they were never animated with soul of any man, consequently never contracted stain from an animating soul. — Whence to the holy Fathers and praised authors I answer with S. Thomas, in 3 d. 3 q. 1 art. 5 ad 1. Therefore it is said Christ took flesh from the Virgin, not that the matter of His body was actually flesh, but blood, which is flesh in potency: for what is such in potency can be said absolutely such.

NOTE 1. That although the most blessed Mother of God shone more brightly with a prerogative of singular purity, so that so great was the purity of her Virginity that by usage of all she was called by the appellation of Virgin, and unspotted, whereby it is permitted to infer that she was sufficiently most pure and most remote from every corruption; For who ever, says S. Epiphanius, Haeresi 78, dared to name in what generation Mary's name was written, who would not forthwith have adored the Virgin of heaven questioning him? For in those epithets straightway shine the arguments of virtue: nevertheless various were the heretics who assailed her unspotted Virginity. For chiefly Carpocrates, Cerinthus, and the Ebionites, and others like them were versed in that error that they denied Christ to have been born of a woman wholly and completely a virgin, but they asserted His Mother begat Him by the work of a man for this reason, because she is called woman in the sacred Scriptures, as Tertullian reports in the book De Virginibus velandis, cap. 3: They usurp the name of woman, he says, that they may think it befit not her alone who has suffered a man. Whence there were also some who denied that the Virgin stood after she brought forth the Lord. So above all taught Apollinaris and others, whom Epiphanius calls Antidicomarianitas Haeresi 78. And this also among various errors Eunomius, Helvidius, Jovinianus, Bonosus asserted, who all, casting about with notable error, proclaimed that Joseph, after the divine parturition published by his wife, had had intercourse with the same, and thence sons were begotten, who are often called the brethren of the Lord in the Gospel. Tertullian also is accused of this error, as may be read lib. De Monogamia, cap. 5, and lib. De Carne Christi, cap. 7, where he seems to affirm that those whom the Gospel calls brethren of the Lord were truly uterine brothers and begotten of Joseph and blessed Mary: whence Helvidius would bring forward Tertullian as vindicator of his opinion; thus answers S. Jerome: Concerning Tertullian indeed I will say nothing more, who was not a man of the Church. But this opinion, which detracts from the perpetual Virginity of the most holy Parent of God, has always been repudiated by all the faithful of Christ as execrable and sacrilegious, as will appear below.

NOTE 2. Virginity is defined in the usual way thus, that it be integrity of mind, soul, and body free from all conjugal union of libido: which that it may be perceived, Petavius observes most learnedly, lib. 1 c. 5, from S. Thomas, 2. 2. q. 152, that three things are to be distinguished in violation of Virginity: The first is, he says, that which happens in the body, the violation of the virginal seal. For there is in Virgins a certain integrity of members, which slips away and is plucked by the nuptial work. Of which thing I shall discourse a little later. The second is that in which the motion of soul and body concur together: namely the resolution of seed causing sensible delectation, to use the words of S. Thomas. The third is that which consists in the action of the soul alone: the purpose of arriving at such delectation. Of these the first pertains to moral action accidentally: for it can happen without voluntary corruption of the Virgin. The second is the matter of that action which is called moral, such as are passions which affect the sense. Lastly it is as it were the form completing the moral action. From these S. Thomas gathers thus: that to the nature and essence of Virginity does not pertain any bodily integrity whatsoever: which unless the third accede, suffers no loss of itself, and perseveres intact. Hence S. Augustine, lib. 1. De Civit. Dei, c. 18, proves that the virtue of Virginity and chastity can be preserved unspotted even if the body be polluted unwillingly through another's libido. Whence he concludes: Wherefore with one purpose abiding, whereby even the body merited to be sanctified, nor does violence of another's libido take away sanctity from the body itself, which the perseverance of its continency sows. Nay William of Paris adds, libr. De Virtutibus, cap. 13, that Virginity can not be lost inasmuch as it is virtue, since the Virgin loses naught of fleshly integrity if only she always preserves the purpose and desire of keeping virginity. These things however I should judge said somewhat too freely.

NOTE 3. That there is no light controversy among Professors of medicine concerning the seal of virginity; for there are some who contend that a certain little membrane is superinduced in the mouth of the womb of a virginal body, which so long as it perseveres whole, virginity stands unspotted; but where it is broken by the act of libido, altogether the corporeal virginity of the woman perishes. Others indeed with Francisco Vallesio, lib. De Sacra Philosophia, c. 25 — whose opinion is approved chiefly by very many recent Medics — flatly deny there is any membrane that is the seal of virginity, which they confirm chiefly from Galen, who being most diligent in sections of the human body nowhere makes mention of such a little membrane. There are also some who teach a middle between both extremes fighting, namely that this seal is not in all virgins, but in some only, in others truly none is found. Truly far more Anatomists, especially most scientific, establish such a sign and character of virginity, as Andreas Vesalius, Fallopius, Picolominus, and many others whom Riolanus, Medicus of the Parisian Academy most learned, praises, who testifies he observed it in many virgins dissected after death. To which opinion S. Augustine also gives suffrage, lib. 1. De Civit. Dei, c. 18, where he proves that holiness and virginity of body consist not in sole integrity of members: For the midwife, he says, exploring as it were with hand the integrity of a certain virgin without malice, without ignorance, without accident, while she inspects, lost it.* Nay even that some sign exists whereby intact or violated virginity can be detected Sacred Scripture teaches Deuteronomii v. 15, where it is established that if anyone taking a wife entering to her say that he found her not a Virgin. Let her Father and Mother take her and carry with them signs of her virginity to the elders of the city, who are in the gate: and let the Father say: I gave my daughter to this man for wife, whom because he hates he imposes upon her a worst name, and he shall say: I did not find thy daughter a virgin: and behold these are the signs of my daughter's virginity. Spreading out the garment before the elders of the city; namely a cloth or linen dyed with blood emitted from the virginal body, from first male congress: which cloth, as Abulensis reports on that question 7, was wont to be handed thus dyed with virginal blood to the parents of the girl before witnesses and scribe, otherwise no faith was to be given her.

These things therefore perceived and noted, at present it is asked whether the Virgin before she bore Christ, or in the very birth, or even after birth preserved that seal of Virginity and that cloister unspotted; in one word, whether she constantly was not only Virgin but also perpetually Virgin.

First Conclusion. — THE MOTHER OF GOD MARY WAS MOST PURE VIRGIN BEFORE BIRTH. This is determined in the fifth Constantinopolitan Council consultation 8, Canon 6, where B. Mary is called ever Virgin: by which name also she is called by Tharasius Patriarch in the Epistle which is in the VI Synod, Action 3, in the Confession of faith which himself there relates. And also in the Lateran Council under Martin V, consultation 5, Can. 3, where generally it is defined that Mary the Mother of God was not only in conception of Christ and birth, but also after birth an unspotted Virgin, in these words:

If anyone according to the holy Fathers confesses not properly and according to truth the holy Mother of God, ever Virgin and Immaculate Mary, as having conceived specially and truly of the Holy Spirit the very God Word Himself, who was born of God the Father before all ages, in the last times without seed, and having incorruptibly brought Him forth, her virginity remaining indissoluble even after birth: let him be condemned.

Where not only is this truth defined by those words: ever Virgin, but also by those, indissoluble, etc.; for if in the very birth she had lost virginity, after birth it would not remain indissoluble, since virginity once lost cannot be restored and renewed.

It is proved also from Sacred Scripture, chiefly indeed from that prophecy of Isaiah c. 7: Behold a Virgin shall conceive and bear a son, and his name shall be called Emmanuel. Which Oracle certainly not only the ancient Fathers of the Church but also Saint Matthew testifies to have been foretold of Mary ch. 1; for after the Angel persuaded Joseph not to dismiss his pregnant wife, affirming that what was born in her was of the Holy Spirit, and how that Son whom she contained in her womb should redeem his people from sins, he subjoins: Now all this was done that it might be fulfilled which the Lord spoke by the Prophet saying: Behold a Virgin shall be with child, and bring forth a Son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel.

THE JEWS ANSWER. First that it is not credible that a sign was given to King Achaz by Isaiah which he could not see: but Achaz could not see the Virgin conceiving and bearing, since not until long time after the death of Achaz did the Virgin Mary bear Christ: therefore that prophecy was not to be understood of the blessed Virgin Mary.— Truly I answer that the Jews hallucinate shamefully: since that sign was not given to Achaz but to the house of David; for when Achaz refused to ask a sign from the Lord according to the warning of the Prophet, and had said: I will not ask, and I will not tempt the Lord, he subjoins: Hear therefore O house of David... therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign: Behold a Virgin shall conceive, etc. Thence that prophecy was not directed to Achaz but to the house of David, which was to remain until Christ.

It is proved moreover from the common opinion of the holy Fathers and Doctors, judging that the B. Virgin as a maiden issued a vow of virginity; which indeed may be seen from the answer of that Virgin to the Angel: for when the Angel Luke 1 had announced to her that she was about to conceive a son, she answered: How shall this be done, because I know not man? where the word "know" signifies not act but custom and purpose of not knowing; for it was manifest then when she said this that she knew not man: therefore it denotes custom; just as if an abstainer should say I drink no wine, and a Carthusian I eat no meats, they would designate not only act but also custom of drinking wine and eating meat; and in this manner interprets those words S. Gregory Nyssenus in oration on Christ's Nativity after the middle: She forbade me (he says) the custom of man; how shall this be to me, since I know not man? Then he calls the flesh of the Virgin consecrated to God, and finally subjoins concerning her that it is impious to know man. To Nyssenus accord Augustine lib. De sancta Virginitate, cap. 1, Beda upon him, Sedulius, and Bonaventura in 1 d. 30 q. 2 art. 2. Tertullian proves the same in book De carne Christi from the oracle of Ezechiel the prophet, which however is not found in the book of his prophecies which remains. We read, he says, in Ezechiel of that cow which brought forth and did not bring forth: but beware lest the Holy Spirit foreseeing even then marked you, that with this voice you would dispute concerning the womb of Mary. The same passage exists in Epiphanius haeresi 78 num. 33. For who easily understands not Joseph to have been by no means its parent but held in place of parent? Behold, he says, a virgin shall conceive and bear a son. He said not woman. And again in another place, and shall bear a son, and they shall say, she brought not forth. For since certain ones of Manichaeans and Marcionists deny him brought forth into light by birth, for this reason, he says, she shall bear, and they shall say she brought not forth. But those madmen prate falsely that she brought forth from seed of man. Therefore the heifer — that same one who is man and God truly she brought forth. Two centuries before Epiphanius Clement of Alexandria had observed the same Stromat. 7 p. 756 edit. Heins.: But as it seems to many unto this day Mary is a childbearer on account of the rising of the Son, although she be not a childbearer; for some say that after she had brought forth she was inspected by a midwife, and found to be a Virgin; thus such are the Scriptures of the Lord, bearing truth and remaining virgins, with concealment of mysteries. She brought forth and did not bring forth, says Scripture, as she who of herself not of union brought forth. Wherefore those who are endowed with knowledge conceived Scripture; which because heretics understood not, as if they had not conceived it, they remove and cast off.— Whence the aforesaid Fathers drew this saying attributed to the prophet Ezechiel is difficult to disclose, seeing it exists not among the oracles of the same prophet which survive. Some judge these words to have been transcribed from the second book of the visions of Ezechiel; for Josephus lib. 10 antiquitatum cap. 5 mentions two books of Ezechiel in express words: Jeremias, he says, prophesying captivity of Babylonians to the city, and foretold calamities of our age also, committed them to letters. Nor did he alone prophecy this to the multitude, but also the prophet Ezechiel, who first left two books of this argument in writings. To these accords ⟦Theodoretus?⟧ who does not fear to attribute two books also to Ezechiel. Which some reconcile thus, saying Ezechiel truly wrote two books, whereof one has perished, while the other is handled by all hands in Sacred Scripture: and certainly certain things cited by the Fathers seem from prophet Ezechiel, which since they are now not found in that book which survives, one might judge those things taken from a second book of Ezechiel, which perished at some time through negligence of men and iniquity of times.— S. Athanasius is cited also for this matter near the end of the synopsis, where recounting several sacred books which he says perished through madness and carelessness of impious Jews, he commemorates among them the second book of Ezechiel.— Truly I should judge more probable that these words were drawn from the book which Jews call pirche aboth, that is chapters of fathers or sayings and proverbs uttered by living voice by prophets at time of Babylonian captivity, among which was read also this passage of the cow which brought forth and brought not forth.

You will say. She could not vow that she would keep what was forbidden by Mosaic law: but Virginity was forbidden by Mosaic law. It is proved both from Genes. 1 where God commands offspring to be begotten in these words: Increase ye and multiply: then Deuteronomii 25, where there is prescribed taking to wife the brother of the dead, and raising up seed by the surviving brother, which if she would not, she herself before elders took off his shoe and spat in his face and said: so shall it be done to the man who buildeth not up his brother's house. Which passage Faustus Manichee objected to Augustine lib. 14 cap. 3 contra Faustum under these words: Cursed is everyone who raiseth not up seed in Israel. Then Exodi 28: There shall not be with thee barren of either sex: but Virginity implied a kind of mark of sterility. Therefore it is forbidden. But wrongly, because nowhere such words are found in Scripture.

I deny the minor. Nay Virginity was in great price among the Jews, as holy Jerome proves lib. 1 Contra Iovinianum num. 30, after examples of Elias, Eliseus, and John Baptist; nay also Daniel and the three boys, who are certain to have been virgins. Ambrose affirms the same lib. 1 De Virginibus, Damascenus lib. 1 De Fide cap. 21. It stands likewise from the Essenes, who as Josephus testifies lib. 2 De bello Iudaico cap. 7, and lib. 18 Antiquitatum Iudaicarum cap. 2, without women, all Venus renounced, lived in highest society with praise and veneration. The oracles prove the same 1 Sapientiae ch. 3: For blessed is the barren that is undefiled, who hath not known a sinful bed: and she shall have fruit in the visitation of holy souls: and the eunuch, who hath not wrought wickedness with his hand. Second is Isaiae 56: Because thus saith the Lord to the eunuchs, that keep my sabbaths, and choose things pleasing to me, and hold fast my covenant: I will give them place in my house, within my walls, and a name better than sons and daughters: I will give them an everlasting name, etc. Both which places holy Jerome interprets of eunuchs who voluntarily castrated themselves, that is, renounced every Venus for the kingdom of heaven. For confirmation of the minor I say nothing can be wrung out of the aforesaid texts. Not from the first, because those words indicate not precept but blessing; for the sacred text premised: And God blessed them, and said: Increase and multiply, and fill the earth, and subdue it, and rule over it. For in that manner are the preceding words to be understood, how the following: but these are to be understood only of blessing, not of precept. Moreover He speaks in the same manner to fishes ibidem: Increase and multiply, and fill the waters of the sea, etc. But He imposed no precept upon them: therefore neither upon men. Finally, although there were precept, yet not absolutely was it to be observed by all: for the end of law ceasing, its obligation ceases: but it concerned very many...

Second Conclusion. — TRULY THE DEIPARA MARY BROUGHT FORTH CHRIST OUR LORD WITH HER VIRGINITY UNSHAMED. This follows from the preceding, and

The same is proved by authority of Councils; chiefly indeed of the Calcedonian Council in allocution to Emperor Martian, where in name of Council these words are uttered: God raised Fathers as lights for those dwelling in error, who set forth to all intelligence of faith and accurately preached benefit of Incarnation: how from beginning of it perfect Mystery might be from womb, how genetrix of God, on account of Him who preserved virginity to her even after conception, and sealed her womb as worthy of God. But that they say the womb of the Virgin sealed and guarded with seal after conception openly signifies that obligation persevered in the very birth. It is confirmed likewise from the aforesaid prophecy of Isaiah: For not (says S. Ambrose Epist.) a Virgin only conceiving but also bearing did he say. Whence unanimous is the sentence of the holy PP. that Christ came forth with womb of Mother unharmed and unspotted. So S. Gregory Nyss. in Oration De natali Domini: A boy, he says, wrapped in swaddling clothes and resting in manger: and she after birth incorrupt Mother Virgin bore the Son. And in Oration De Occursu: He alone, he says, conceived in inexplicable mode and ineffably born, opened not before the virginal womb laid open by nuptials, keeping seals of virginity inviolate even after admirable process. Amphilochius p. 26 teaches the same. S. Ephrem in Oration De

Pearl most precious, Sophronius in Epistola Synodica: Damascenus lib. 1 cap. 15 and more other Greek Fathers.— All Latins equally subscribe to these, chiefly S. Ambrosius Epist. 7 Ad Siricium Papam, which he proves by mystery of gate of which Ezechiel makes mention ch. 44 in vision. Behold this gate. Mary, he says, of whom it is written, because the Lord will pass through it: and it shall be shut after birth: because Virgin she conceived and begat. But what incredible, if against natural mode of origin Maria brought forth and remains Virgin, when against use of nature sea saw Him and fled, etc. The same he teaches and uses same prophetic similitude of gate in lib. De institutione Virginis cap. 7; concludes: What is this gate except Mary? Therefore shut, because Virgin. Gate therefore Mary, through which Christ entered into this world when He was poured forth in virginal birth, nor loosed cloisters of Virgin's genitals. She came bringing forth through unspotted barrier, and seals of integrity remained inviolate when she went forth from Virgin whose height world could not sustain.— Jerome expounding that mystery of prophetic gate in ch. 1 Ezechielis through which God Israël is said to enter notes these: Beautifully indeed closed gate, through which alone Lord God of Israel enters, and of whom gate closed, understand Mary Virgin, who both before birth and after birth remained Virgin.— Augustine affirms this too in several places: as in Sermone 21: Virgin she begat, because Virgin she conceived, inviolate she brought forth, because in concept there was no libido. Everywhere miracle: and without corruption pregnant, and in birth Virgin mother. Likewise in Sermone 28: Behold miracle of the Lord's Mother. Virgin conceived, Virgin brought forth, Virgin remained after birth, etc. For it was worthy that merit of chastity grow with God being born: nor be violated whole by His advent, who had come to heal corrupted, nor bodily pudicity be injured by Him by whom spiritual chastity is given. Gaudencius Bishop of Brixia of the same age subscribes to him, who permits her after his passing to remain Virgin. For He who could restore broken members of bodies in others by touching, how much more in His own Mother what He found whole could He not violate by being born? By His birth rather grows integrity of body than decreased: and Virginity amplified rather than put to flight*.— I should make a number if I wished to commemorate all other holy Fathers assertors of this truth. Chrysologus teaches it expressly Serm. 142. Eucherius Homil. De Virginis Conceptione. Ildephonsus published five treatises and sermons on unspotted B. Virginity, whose most strenuous assertor and defender he was, Bernard Serm. 33 In Cantica. Petrus Damianus Opusc. 86 c. 10 etc. From which it plainly stands universal is doctrine of Church, that most blessed Mary Deipara Virgin not only before birth but even in birth was.

HERETICS OBJECT certain texts of holy Fathers and ancient Theologians by which they seem to signify that B. Virgin in her birth had naught peculiar from other human women bearing, and the same was not Virgin in birth. Thus Origen Hom. 11 in Lucam: Whomsoever you say poured forth from womb of mothers, none but opens the womb of his mother. Lord Jesus, because not birth of infant but conjugal act of man opens womb of all women: but of Mother of Lord womb was opened at that time when also birth was brought forth: because holy womb, and most worthily (of veneration) to be revered, before Nativity male altogether touched not. Very many Fathers as well Greek as Latin seem to subscribe to these, who say womb of Virgin was opened in birth. Thus Athanasius Epist. ad Epictetum, Ambrose in chapter 2 Lucae: This, he says, who opened womb of His Mother, that immaculate He might go forth. And Basil, who in oration on Nativity of Lord says Christ is called first-begotten, who first opens womb, not who has other brothers after himself, etc. But of all most plainly Tertullian lib. De carne Christi c. 23 clearly asserts B. Virgin lost virginity in birth and passed into woman: for among other things he says: who properly opened womb, than he who opened what was closed? Otherwise to all nuptials they open: therefore more opened because it was more closed: certainly more to be called not-Virgin than Virgin, at least mother before nuptial. And what further need recall? since by this reason Apostle pronounced son brought forth not from Virgin but from woman, and openly acknowledged nuptial passion of womb. Similar things he has in several, to which fits that of Lucae 2 by which is signified to fit Christ that assumed from ch. 13 Exodi: Every male opening womb shall be called holy to the Lord.— I answer that all those holy Fathers or ancient Theologians by opening of womb signify not drawn forth, interrupted in Deipara Virgin seal of integrity, but only that truly from womb of Virgin He went forth. Nor surely other was their mind, if you except Tertullian and Origen who laboring with heretical spirit in very many, ought seem not marvelous to have deviated even in this head from Catholic truth. As to S. Luke I say by circumlocution of first-begotten opening womb he wished only to signify Christ took origin from Virgin, whether meanwhile He exited from her in usual mode with re-opening of cloister, or not. Wherefore to open womb properly signifies naught else than to be born and come forth from maternal womb; in which mode of speaking certainly the aforesaid holy Fathers used it for this reason, that so it bears common and natural mode of pouring forth foetus, that with womb opened it go forth into light.

THEY OBJECT 2. That of Lucae 2 by which is signified B. Mary stood in need of purification, and accordingly was subjected to law of nature with other women in bearing, and perhaps emitted through opening of womb with effusion of blood and pain.— Truly answers S. Ildephonsus lib. against those who dispute of perpetual virginity of Mary, for this reason Evangelist says, After days of her purification were fulfilled, of Mary; not because she needed any fault or stain of that purification, but because she wished to observe custom toward Son, who from the very fact that He was made of woman willed to fulfill law of Presentation. And law, he says, is completion of days according to custom of law and not according to necessity of Purification: because blessed and unspotted and incorrupt she remained, stained by no filths, vexed by no of their torments; whence appears diverse was purification of Mary and other women; for other women observed rites and ceremonies of purification for this reason that they might wash filths of body and soul; but most blessed Virgin from no necessity but only from humility and her special observance toward God subjected herself to law of purification.

Third Conclusion. — MARY THE MOTHER OF GOD REMAINED ALWAYS UNSPOTTED VIRGIN AFTER BIRTH. This likewise is of faith, as stands from Councils praised in prior Conclusion, which openly pronounce most blessed Mary always to have been Virgin. It is proved similarly and confirmed not only from praised authorities of holy Fathers, as also from vow of keeping perpetually Virginity issued by most blessed Virgin; but also from this, that very many judge indubitable from holy Fathers, that S. Joseph also issued vow of Virginity and was virgin when he married Mary. For indeed very many Greek authors were in that opinion that they asserted Joseph begat other sons by former wife, whom therefore they wish called in Gospel Brethren and Sisters of Lord, because they were begotten by Joseph, who was thought Father of Christ, before he led B. Virgin to wife; as asserted Origen on that Matth. 12 Is not his mother called Mary? Chrysostom Homil. De Annuntiatione in Lipomanum. Eusebius lib. 2 cap. 1. Epiphanius haeresi 5, 28, 78. Nicephorus lib. 1 cap. 21. Theophilactus in Matth. 13. Euthimius in Matth. 11. etc.; to whom some Latins seem to consent, Hilarius Can. 1 in Matth., Ambrose lib. De institutione Virg., cap. etc.; nevertheless Jerome proves most sharply Joseph was virgin, who in tractate against Helvidius says: Thou sayest Mary remained not virgin: I claim for myself more, that even Joseph himself was virgin through Mary, that from virginal marriage virgin Son might be born. For if into that holy one fell no fornication, and it is not written he had another wife: but Mary whom he was thought to have had, guardian rather than husband: there remains that he remained virgin with Mary, who merited to be called Father of Lord. Similar things he has on that Matth. 12 v. 19: Behold my mother and my brethren. Augustine Serm. 11 on Nativity of Lord: Have, Joseph, with Mary thy wife common virginity of members, because of virginal members virtue is born of Angels, etc. To this opinion all the rest of the Latin Fathers who lived consented, so that Petrus Damianus Epist. 11 ad Nicolaum summum Pontificem says with great confidence, faith of Church to be in this, that not only Deipara but also putative Father and nourisher be held Virgin. Certainly indeed as far as probability and conjectures permit: how would not God to virgin man have handed Virgin, from whom He was about to take flesh, if he himself man about to depart from this world to Father commended the same now aging to none but a Virgin? How would Christ true Lamb, who admits only virgines into His fellowship, admitted putative Father already tried by so many sons? How would Christ, who feeds among lilies, not been delighted between Mary and Joseph virgins?

But this opinion of the Latin Fathers can in general be confirmed by this single argument, upon which alone the Greeks rely. For if Joseph had taken another wife, then Mary, who is called of Jacob, and of Joses, because she was their Mother — for these among others are often called the brethren of the Lord — could not have been that other wife; for she would first have had to die before it would have been lawful for Joseph to contract marriage with another. But she was not dead when Joseph entered into matrimony with the Virgin: for at the time when Christ died, women were looking on from afar, among whom was Mary of Jacob, and of Joses, etc., Matthew 27, and Mark 15. This single alternative could be proposed by the Greeks: either that Joseph had two wives at once: or else, with Chrysostom, to assert that after putting away his former wife he married the Virgin.

Again, neither can be said. Not indeed the first; for how would the Evangelists have made no mention whatsoever of that wife? How would Christ never at any time have held conversation with her, as being of His household and intimate? Nor even the second; for who could believe that she whom Joseph had repudiated should wish to stand beside the cross? He would not without displeasure have endured the presence of her who had succeeded to his bed.

THE HERETICS OBJECT certain testimonies of Scripture, from which it seems to be inferred that Joseph begot other sons by Mary after Christ. First, this seems to be signified by these words of Matthew: When his mother, that is, of Christ, Mary the wife of Joseph, was espoused, before they came together, she was found with child of the Holy Ghost. From these words Helvidius argued, as St. Jerome testifies, that unless they were at some time to come together, the Evangelist would not have said, before they came together: for of those not going to come together such words could by no means be used, just as of one who will never dine it cannot be said, before he dined: the consequence therefore follows that he at some time knew her. Secondly, in the same place, concerning Joseph the spouse of Mary it is said: He knew her not till she brought forth her firstborn Son. Thirdly, Christ is there called the firstborn son of Mary: but firstborn is not said except by comparison with others begotten afterward; since, therefore, Mary is said to have brought forth her firstborn, it must be that she afterward brought forth others.— Truly I answer that the aforesaid texts of Scripture in no way favor the heretics. Not indeed the first: for, as Blessed Jerome excellently replies in his little work against Helvidius, and in his commentary on Matthew chapter 1, what is said, before they came together, does not imply that they came together afterward, but Scripture shows that it did not happen: for that particle, before, does not always import something to be done afterward; for from the fact that Helvidius is said to have been overtaken by death before he did penance, it does not follow that he did penance afterward: thus a ship is said to have perished before it reached port, although it never afterward arrived there. So likewise the adverb, till, in the second saying, serves only to express what might have been doubtful, leaving what is certain to be understood all the more firmly. The Evangelist therefore wished to signify that Joseph did not know Mary before the birth, about which doubt could especially have arisen, thereby hinting how much less afterward would a just man have wished to touch her, and as it were to defile the temple of God, the sanctuary of the Holy Spirit, the Mother of God and of his Lord. Moreover, similar locutions are frequent in Holy Scripture: thus Genesis 8 says of the raven in the ark of Noah: It did not return till the waters were dried up, whence it is by no means licit to infer that after the dryness had come he returned again to the ark. Thus Daniel 6, concerning the accusers of that Prophet cast into the den of lions: They did not reach the bottom before Daniel was taken out, where it is not signified that they afterward reached the bottom. Thus likewise Psalm 109 says: Sit thou at my right hand until I make thy enemies thy footstool, etc. And 1 Corinthians 15: He must reign until he hath put all his enemies under his feet, etc. But who would infer from this that Christ would no longer sit at the right hand of God and reign once all the assailants of His name and religion have been overcome! All the more strongly do I say that firstborn there signifies the same thing as first-born, or one before whom no other was born, even though He be only-begotten, as St. Jerome explains in his little work against Helvidius n. s.: so that every only-begotten is a firstborn; yet not every firstborn is an only-begotten. He proves this explanation from Numbers 18: Whatsoever shall first open the womb of flesh, which they offer to the Lord, whether of men or of beasts, shall be thine: but only so far that a price be accepted in place of the firstborn of man. And he argues beautifully in this manner: if the firstborn of man were only he whom other brothers follow, then the firstborn of man would not be owed to the Priests so long as no other brother had been begotten.

THEY OBJECT, 2. All those texts of Scripture in which certain ones are called the brethren of the Lord: thus Matthew 12: Behold thy mother and thy brethren stand without, seeking thee. And John 2: After this he went down to Capharnaum, he and his mother, and his brethren, etc.— I answer with St. Jerome in his book against Helvidius that certain ones are indeed called the brethren of the Lord, not because they were begotten of the same mother as He, but because they were kinsmen. For in four ways are some called brothers in Sacred Scripture: First indeed by nature, because they are from the same parent, as Jacob and Esau. Secondly by race and nation: thus all Israelites are called brethren, as Deuteronomy 15: But if thou buy thy brother, who is an Hebrew, etc. Romans 9: For I wished myself to be an anathema from Christ for my brethren. Thirdly by kinship, namely those who spring from the same family, by which reason Abraham and Lot are called brethren, Genesis 13, as also Jacob and Laban, Genesis 29. Fourthly finally by affection: thus Christ the Lord in John 20 called His Apostles His brethren. Now it is certain that those mentioned in the objection are not called brethren of the Lord by the first reason of brotherhood, nor even by merely the second and fourth: otherwise any disciple whatever, nay even anyone of the Jewish people, might be called a brother of the Lord. There remains, therefore, that they are called the Lord's brethren by reason of kinship.

You ask: who, and of what degree of consanguinity, those called the brethren of the Lord were?— To the first I answer that only four men in Sacred Scripture were so called, namely James, Joses, Simon, and Jude, as we read Matthew 13: Is not this the carpenter's son? Is not his mother called Mary, and his brethren James, and Joses, and Simon, and Jude? And his sisters, are not they all with us? Again, at Galatians 1, James is called the brother of the Lord. And in Acts 1, James, Simon, and Jude are mentioned again, though there they are not called the Lord's brethren, but are only said to have persevered in prayer with

Mary the Mother of Jesus, and with His brethren, namely the disciples, who were brethren by affection: whence immediately it is subjoined: In those days Peter rising up in the midst of the brethren said: Men, brethren, etc. Nor does it matter that St. Chrysostom, homily ⟦?⟧ on Matthew, asserts that John the Evangelist was also called a brother of the Lord: for I do not see on what ground he could assert that, since nowhere in Scripture is he found so named, although he could have been so named.— To the second I answer that the common opinion of the sacred Interpreters, with St. Jerome, holds all those brethren and sisters named of Christ to have sprung from the same marriage and to have been born of the same parents; which I thus prove against Baronius in the Apparatus num. 6: if they were said to be born of a different father and a different mother — especially since, says Baronius, James surnamed the brother of the Lord is called the son of Alphaeus, Matthew 10, Mark 3, and Acts 1 — now it is established that Joses was the brother of James, for Mark 15 says Mary was the mother of James the Less and of Joses: hence both were sons of Alphaeus: for Scripture is accustomed to name the sons after the name of the father, thus e.g. the other James is usually called the son of Zebedee: whence it follows, says Baronius, that Simon and Jude were not brothers of James, because they are not recorded together with the two sons of Mary.— It is confirmed from Hegesippus, who in Eusebius book 3, chapters 10 and 16, affirms that Sts. Simon and Jude were the sons of Cleophas, not however of Alphai: moreover the wives of Cleophas and of Alphai were both named Mary, and one was called by her husband Mary of Cleophas, the other was named by her sons Mary of James, and Salome: but that Mary of James and Mary of Cleopas are entirely different persons seems to be inferred from this, that in John 19 Mary of Cleophas is said to have stood near the cross of Jesus; whereas Mary of James is said in Matthew 27 and Mark 15 to have stood afar off together with the other women; which two things cannot fall upon the same woman; hence, says Baronius, it is certain that those four who are called the Lord's brethren sprang from a different father and a different mother. James indeed, and Joses, from Alphaeus and Mary of James: but Jude and Simon from Cleophas and Mary of Cleophas. So Baronius. Truly this reasoning is nothing, and that foundation of Baronius is null: therefore, etc. The minor is proved: for it is established that Jude and Simon are the own brothers of James, for Jude at the beginning of his canonical epistle names himself the brother of James: Jude the servant of Jesus Christ, and brother of James — not indeed of James of Zebedee: therefore of Alphai. Nor does it avail to say that he names himself brother only in the general sense, on account of the kinship of the family: this, I say, does not avail: First, because it is said without foundation. Secondly, because no special reason appears why, passing over in silence his natural brother Simon, he should have usurped the title of brother of another on a merely general ground. Thirdly, by this reason he ought rather to have been called the brother of Peter, as being the Prince of the Apostles: therefore, since he names himself the brother of James, it must be held that he speaks of his own brother germane. And the reason, I judge, why he mentions James alone is that James the Greater was older in age, and therefore he expressed his name out of honor, no otherwise than when someone wishes to be recognized through one of his brothers, he names him who is the first and head in the family.— To the confirmation I say that no credit is due to Hegesippus: for if here Hegesippus were to be heard regarding one matter, why should he not equally be heard, when in the same place he says that Joseph begat sons by another wife? For just as Eusebius gave credence to him in both matters, so Baronius ought either to give credence to him in both alike, or in neither: but he denies him faith concerning the two marriages of Joseph: therefore he ought to deny it concerning Alphaeus and Cleophas as diverse men. For what hinders us if we set forth Cleophas and Alphaeus as one single man, but with two names?— Nor indeed ought it to disturb us that the wife of Alphai seems to be distinguished from Mary of James, for the reason that the one is read to have stood near the cross, the other afar off: for this reason is utterly null. Otherwise it would have to be said equally that there were two Mary Magdalenes: for Matthew and Mark say of her: Among whom was Mary Magdalene, etc., namely among those women who were looking from afar: but John says: There stood by the cross of Jesus his Mother, and his mother's sister, Mary of Cleophas, and Mary Magdalene. But how these things can be said of the same person, I judge it to be reconciled thus: that first those women stood with the Virgin near the cross, to hear the last words of Christ dying: but when He had commended His Mother to John, and breathed forth His soul, they withdrew somewhat from there, either urged by excessive grief, or driven back by the soldiers, and watched from there what befell. I should wish likewise that what Luke writes be understood in this way: And all his acquaintance, and the women that had followed him from Galilee stood afar off, beholding these things. Not that they saw everything from afar, but only those things which happened after their withdrawal. It must be said, therefore, that Mary of Cleophas was so named either because she was born of Cleopas her father, or because she was given in marriage to her husband Alphaeus, who bore the double name Cleopas, or because she was called Cleophas by her proper name while Alphaeus was her surname. Hence the opinion of St. Jerome, in his book Against Helvidius and on chapter 12 of Matthew, is proved to me rather than that of Baronius. Therefore it must be inferred that those men are called the Lord's brethren as cousins-german, namely begotten of Mary, daughter of Cleophas, sister — or rather cousin — of the Blessed Virgin, as Hippolytus the Martyr relates, who in Nicephorus book 2, chapter 3 sets forth these words: There were three sisters of Bethlehem, daughters of Mathan the priest, and of Mary his wife, under ⟦Cleopatra?⟧, and ⟦Asopis?⟧ in the kingdom of the Persians, and before the reign of Herod the son of Antipater. The first was called Mary: the second Soba: the third Anna. First Mary married in Bethlehem, and brought forth Salome the midwife: second Soba likewise married in Bethlehem, and begot Elizabeth: lastly third Anna married in the land of Galilee, and brought forth Mary the Mother of God. But that these may be unfolded in due order, I judge this genealogy must thus be woven. Mary married Cleophas, of whom she begat the other Mary, who in John chapter 19 is called Mary of Cleophas, and the sister, that is, the cousin of the Blessed Virgin; from her and Alphaeus her husband came forth James the Less, Joses, and Simon, and Jude, who are called the Lord's brethren: and his sisters, Mary, and Salome. For Mary is plainly declared to be the mother of James, Joses, and Salome, Matthew 27 v. 56, and Mark 15 v. 40, where we read that there stood by the cross of the Lord the women looking from afar, among whom was Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James the Less, and of Joses, and Salome. But Soba, joined in wedlock to one of the priests, begot Elizabeth, who therefore in Luke chapter 1 v. 5 is said to be of the daughters of Aaron: and she begot John the Baptist by Zachary. Anna, however, was of the tribe of David according to the maternal line, as I conjecture from St. Damascene, Orat. 2, On the Nativity of Blessed Mary, where addressing St. Anne he says: O blessed house of David, from which thou didst come forth! not according to the paternal line, as I said above: therefore according to the maternal: she, I say, begat the Blessed Virgin by St. Joachim

Mary. By these things is refuted the opinion of those who say that St. Anne was married to three husbands, and received three daughters from them; for which of them, wedded to a more certain husband, and therefore less chaste, would be judged to have brought forth the most pure Virgin?

NOTE 1. It is doubted by no one of the Catholics that the Virgin Mother of God is gifted with eternal blessedness, and that her most holy soul has been exalted above all the Orders of the blessed Minds; for that truth Holy Mother Church publicly confesses, which not only celebrates the solemn day of the Virgin assumed into heaven as a witness, but also in the divine office, which she on that very day religiously renders to the glory of God and in honor of the assumed Virgin, among other encomia of her triumphal Assumption brings forth this: The holy Mother of God has been exalted above the Choirs of Angels and the heavenly kingdoms. This same truth the SS. Fathers, all who have celebrated the praises of the assumed Virgin Mother of God, most openly attest, as may be read in their Oracles and sermons, especially in Bernard in his sermons on the Assumption of Blessed Mary; for there, to pass over the rest, Sermon 1 he pronounces distinctly: Neither on earth is there a worthier place than the temple of the virginal womb, in which Mary received the Son of God, nor in heaven a royal throne, in which today the Son of Mary has exalted Mary, etc. Whence Epist. 174, which is to the Canons of Lyons, he piously no less than elegantly admonishes: Exalt finally her who is exalted above the Choirs of Angels, to the heavenly kingdoms. This the Church sings to me concerning her, and it taught me to sing the same. What I have received, I securely both hold and hand on; what I have not, I confess I would admit with some scruple. Certainly I received from the Church that day to be kept with the highest veneration, on which the assumed one, passing from this wicked world, brought also to the heavens the joys of the most famous feasts. Whence there remains alone to be opened and declared the truth, whether the Virgin Mother of God has been assumed on high not only in soul, but also in body, and exalted above all the Orders of Angels.

NOTE 2. With Duval, quaest. On the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin, art. 6, there are various, but chiefly three, degrees of certitude in matters of faith. The first is when a thing is absolutely to be believed by divine faith, as that God is the Creator of Heaven and Earth, etc. The second, when a thing closely approaches faith, as what is believed by all the faithful. The third truly, when it is consonant with faith. But the more common opinion is that the bodily Assumption of the Virgin Mother of God is not certain with the certainty of faith of the first kind. Whether, however, it obtains one of the two other degrees of certitude, the prudent reader will judge from what is to be said.

NOTE 3. There is a distinction between believing something with pious faith, and believing with Catholic faith: for Catholic faith has every kind of certitude; but pious faith does not obtain such great certitude, but has it so probable that it expels fear of the contrary, and is far greater than what can be had through the knowledge of any natural science. But that pious faith may claim this certitude to itself, three conditions are required, as Gerson teaches, Tract. On the Girl of Orleans: First: that the thing pertain to piety and devotion, such as those things which are proposed in commendation of God and the Saints. Second, that it be highly probable, from the common narration or attestation of the faithful. Third, that this relation and attestation be known to the Prelates of the Church, and not disapproved by them, but rather tolerated. Now it is certain that the opinion of the bodily Assumption of the Virgin Mother of God is affected by these three conditions, and moreover has not only very many Fathers and SS. Doctors in its patronage and assertion, but also is confirmed by the common sense and consent of the Church, as Peter Aurelius teaches in his assertion of the Epistle of the Bishops of Gaul, where having said: Whatever is opposed to the consent of the Church is always erroneous or contrary to the word of God, because every consent of the Church is contained in a certain word of God and scripture, or contains the Catholic faith entirely: although it have a certitude greater than every human one, therefore to contradict it is erroneous; immediately he subjoins: That the Blessed Virgin Mother of God went into Heaven in body and soul is a most true doctrine, upheld by the consent of the Church; nor will he who denies it be guilty of error; it will not be heresy, nor does it withstand the word of God, in which nothing about it exists. By which words he signifies that the doctrine of the bodily Assumption obtains that degree of certitude which is not only greater than every human faith, but also which no one can oppose without the note of error. These things thus premised, let

One Conclusion. — THE BODILY ASSUMPTION OF THE VIRGIN MOTHER OF GOD INTO HEAVEN IS PIOUSLY AND RELIGIOUSLY BELIEVED AND ASSERTED BY THE FAITHFUL. This Conclusion is most received among all Catholics, and is confirmed by most valid reasons and considerations, which for the sake of greater clarity and facility it helps to propose and weigh under the distinct following paragraphs.

§ 1. — THE ASSUMPTION OF THE VIRGIN MOTHER OF GOD IS PROVED FROM THE INSTITUTION OF AN ANNUAL FESTAL DAY IN HER HONOR AND UNDER THAT TITLE. — The Church does not celebrate a festal day in assertion of any Mystery, or in veneration of sanctity, without holding that mystery, or that sanctity, in whose honor she keeps the feast, as confessed and undoubted: but now for very many past centuries the Church has kept a festal day in honor of the Assumption of the soul and body of the Virgin Mother of God: therefore the sentiment of the Church is that the Virgin Mother of God has been assumed and received into Heaven in soul together with body. The major is clear from St. Bernard Ep. 174, where from the feast of the Nativity of the Virgin Mother of God he gathers that she was sanctified in the womb: I learned of the birth of the Virgin, he says, in the Church, and from the Church to hold its festal and holy day undoubted, feeling most firmly with the Church that she received it in the womb, that she might come forth holy, etc. And below: Nor does Holy Church at all err, esteeming that very day of her Nativity holy, and receiving it every year with votive celebration amid the exultation of the whole earth. It is also established from what we said pag. 792. The minor, upon which chiefly the hinge of difficulty turns, is proved first by the authority of the SS. Fathers, who derived by tradition handed down from the very Apostles even to us that solemnity was accustomed to be celebrated by the Church in the assumption of the Virgin Mother of God, for, as St. Augustine most beautifully says, book 4 On Baptism, chapter 21, What the whole Church holds, and was not instituted by Councils, but was always retained, is most rightly believed to have been instituted and handed down by no less than apostolical authority — but that the feast of the Assumption of the Virgin Mother of God was accustomed to be celebrated by the Church, St. Bernard signifies in the letter just praised, where he says: I received from the Church that day to be kept with the highest veneration, on which the assumed one, passing from this wicked world, brought also to the heavens the joys of the most famous feasts; as if he said: there are festal days whose beginning we know well at what time they began: but concerning the feast of the Assumption of Blessed Mary nothing else appears to us than the very origin of the nascent Church itself, how Marius Victorinus Bishop of Rieti weighs the words of St. Bernard in his Scholia on Jerome; for thus he writes: That the Virgin was assumed together with her body from the monument in which she had been laid down, the whole Church believes and celebrates: the feast of the third day was everywhere to be celebrated — the Apostles, as Bernard is authority, decreed. Yet I confess that this feast was celebrated by the entire Church absolutely only after long succession of time, for Andrew of Crete, Orat. 2, On the Dormition of Blessed Virgin, says: It is a mystery, hitherto such as was celebrated by few, yet now held by all in love and desire. Moreover, that the solemnity of the Assumption of the Mother of God was celebrated in the times of the very Apostles is no light indication that it began to be kept from her death, and that daily commemoration of her was made in the sacrifice of the Mass, as the Liturgy of St. James teaches, in which these words are read; Commemorating the most holy, immaculate, most glorious Mother of God and ever Virgin Mary, our Lady, with all Saints and Just ones. If then from then her cult took its rise, one may easily bring oneself to believe her Assumption was celebrated on a festal and solemn day. For if among the decrees of Clement, book 8 of the Apostolic Constitutions, chapter 39, the faithful are commanded to rest from servile works on the feasts of the Apostles, and on the day of St. Stephen Protomartyr, who doubts that the same was sanctioned and constituted by them on the very day of the transmigration of the Blessed Virgin, whom all the faithful while she dwelt on earth venerated with so great affection and veneration? Add that from the very origins of the nascent Church the solemn memory of the Saints, especially Martyrs, was celebrated on the very day on which they passed from the living, as appears from the Epistle of the Church of Smyrna in Eusebius book 4 of the History c. 15, where of St. Polycarp, disciple of the Apostles, it is thus written: In which place, and even now by the favor of the Lord we keep solemn and frequented gatherings, indeed especially on the day of his Passion, but also we celebrate the memories of those who suffered before, that the minds of those following may be roused by the way and examples of their predecessors. But who would deny that the same was done in celebrating the memory of the death and Assumption of Blessed Mary? which perhaps because they were open to all men, were therefore consigned to letters by none of those whose writings have come down to our times. Nevertheless, that the feast of the Assumption of the Virgin Mother of God was celebrated in the times of St. Jerome and Augustine, James Pamelius asserts in his Liturgical works, and this is established above all from the Comes, or Lectionary of Jerome, in which the Mass office to be celebrated is described in this order: In the Assumption of Mary. Lesson of the book of Wisdom. In all things rest is sought. Continuation of the holy Gospel according to Luke. Jesus entered into a certain town. Which are read in the Church in the same manner even to the present day. — It is established also from the Office and Prefaces Ambrosian, both on the Vigil and on the feast of the Assumption.

And indeed this is the Preface of the feast: pleasant, and salutary: that we, O Mother, praise thee with most sacred songs with exulting souls, bless, and preach thee. Among whom the blessed Mother of God, the undefiled Virgin Mary, shines forth most gloriously, whose day of Assumption, to be kept with all devotion, let us celebrate with the present sacrifice. Through Christ. — This very thing appears chiefly from the Martyrology published under the name of St. Hieron. Eusebius, for the reason that he himself is believed to have made it Latin from the Greek: for therein we read 1° Kalends of September: The Assumption of the holy Mother of our Lord. It is established from Nicephorus, who writes that a law concerning the feast of the Assumption was enacted by the Emperor Maurice. Now Maurice lived in the year 583. Moreover, with how great solemnity that same feast was kept in the first times of the Church appears not only from the statute of Leo IV., by which he commands that the Octaves of the feast of the Assumption be celebrated through the whole Church: for Octaves are not usually assigned except to the more solemn feasts. The same is established from the response of Nicholas I. to the inquiries of the Bulgarians, for there among the fasts anciently accustomed to be observed by the faithful he recounts the fast before the solemnity of the Assumption of the holy Mother of God, and ever Virgin, and our Lady.

You will say, that it is not likely that the feast of the Assumption was celebrated throughout the whole Church from the very origins of the nascent Church, and was most known to the faithful: since in the time of Charlemagne this was called into doubt, whether that feast ought to be celebrated, as appears from his Capitularies lib. 1. c. 116, where treating of the feasts to be celebrated he says: Concerning the Assumption of Saint Mary we leave it to inquiry, that is, whether it is to be celebrated or not: therefore at that time the feast was not everywhere, especially in Gaul, celebrated.

I answer, that that is not the sense of Charles's words: for plainly it is established that before the times of that Emperor the festal day of the Assumption of Saint Mary was not only celebrated in Gaul, but also that on it one was to cease from every servile and forensic work, and that by ecclesiastical precept; for it had already been decreed by Chrodegang Bishop of Metz in the rules published by him, which he prescribed for his own Church, in the reign of Charles the Great's father Pepin, who lived before the year 750; for we read chapter 86: It has pleased us to intimate, that we and our Clergy keep the feasts of God, and of Saint Mary, and of the 12 Apostles, whose use is in that Province: insofar as God shall have given possibility, let us attend to the divine office by day and by night. And chapter 17 he commemorates that very feast of the Assumption among the chief solemnities accustomed to be celebrated. For he writes: On the chief solemnities, that is, the Nativity and octave, and on the Epiphany of the Lord, and Easter, and on the Ascension of the Lord, and at Pentecost, and on the feasts of saints, that is, of St. Stephen, and St. John Evangelist, and on the solemnity of the Infants, and on the Purification, and on the Assumption of Saint Mary: likewise on the feasts of the blessed Apostles, and of St. John the Baptist, and St. Laurence, and St. Martin, or on the votive of any saint whose honor is specially celebrated in each Parish, let the full Office be celebrated, and let them be refreshed with these. Nay rather the same solemnity is proved to be older still from the Synodal Statutes of the Church of Rheims under Lord Sonnatius Archbishop of Rheims in the year 633. For chapter 20 these things are held: *Feasts to be cut off from all forensic work, and to be celebrated with due veneration. These are: the Nativi-ty of the Lord, Circumcision, Epiphany, etc. The Assumption of Blessed Mary and her Nativity, etc. The same appears from this, that before Pepin King of Gaul the Gallican Churches rendered the divine offices according to the custom, form, and rite of the Roman Church, as Hugh Menardus relates in the preface of the book of the Sacramentary of St. Gregory; for the confirmation of which matter he adduces these things, from the epistle of Charles the Bald to the clergy of Ravenna, where Charles speaks thus: For even up to the time of our father Pepin, the Gallican Churches celebrate no otherwise than the Roman and Milanese Churches do. And the same thing both Hilduin in his Areopagitica, and also Walafrid Strabo, and Sigebert in the Chronicles, and many others testify. Since these things are so, the consequence follows that the Gallican Churches used no other Missal than that very Roman one, namely the Sacramentary of St. Gregory, which indeed can be proved by several arguments; but chiefly by the authority of the Council of Rheims, as read in Burchard chapter 97 of the third book, where it stands thus: The Mass being finished, let the Chalice with paten, and the book of the sacraments with the priestly vestments, be stored away in a clean place under lock. It appears also from Amalarius, who acting as legate to Constantinople is said to have died there around the year 818; for he often makes mention of Sacramentaries and Antiphonaries, etc. But in that book of the Sacramentary of St. Gregory the bodily Assumption of the most blessed Virgin is most plainly set forth: therefore from then that feast was being kept among the Gallican Churches. — Whence, regarding the aforesaid words from the Capitularies of Charlemagne, I say that nothing else is there signified than that the Bishops were to be consulted whether, as was accustomed to be done, the corporal feast of the Assumption of the Virgin Mother of God ought to be celebrated with solemn rite. For since at that time a question had arisen concerning the body of the Virgin assumed into Heaven, he did not wish, in enumerating the yearly celebrations which he commanded to be observed throughout his whole dominion, to define by his own authority the noted controversy concerning the bodily Assumption of Blessed Virgin by decreeing that the feast of that Assumption was to be celebrated: but since he knew well that causes of this kind pertained to Episcopal judgment, he judged the Bishops were to be consulted and asked concerning this matter; for he says: These are the festivals in hand, which must be venerated in all things. The Nativity of the Lord, St. Stephen, John Evangelist, the Innocents, the octave of the Lord, Epiphany, octave of Epiphany, Purification, the days of holy Easter, the Greater Litany, Ascension of the Lord, Pentecost, St. John Baptist, SS. Peter and Paul, St. Martin, St. Andrew: Concerning the Assumption of Saint Mary we leave to inquiry. That is, the Bishops are to be consulted whether, judging the feast of the Assumption to have been introduced by the ignorance or superstition of the people, as a fourth, they thought it ought to be rejected; or rather whether, that controversy settled and those little clouds of doubt dispersed, they judged (to whom perhaps at that time, gathered in synod as was the custom, he was transmitting those chapters and sanctions for approval) that the feast of the Assumption ought to be kept with celebrated rite, as was accustomed. Moreover, the occasion of this controversy raised concerning the assumed body of the Virgin seems to have been supplied by a certain Gallican Bishop named Arculfus, who out of piety and devotion, having visited Palestine to salute the sacred places, since he was skilled neither in Greek nor Latin, made use of the service and interpretation of a certain Monk, by whom he suffered many things to be imposed upon him. But when, returning home, a storm having arisen, the ship in which he was carried put ashore at the British coast, he betook himself to a Priest named Adomnanus, certainly a man of good desert in letters, who, the occasion offering itself while Arculf related his whole pilgrimage and the delineation of the sacred places, described it in three books, as Bede testifies in the book On the Holy Places, where he has these words: These things, joined to the places, as far as I could, following with faithful history I have set down, chiefly the dictation of Arculfus, Bishop of the Gauls; which the Priest Adamnanus most erudite in the Scriptures, describing in lucid speech, comprised in three little books. Indeed the aforesaid Prelate, leaving his homeland out of desire for the holy places, came to the Land of promise; lingering some months at Jerusalem he made use of a certain Monk named Peter as leader and interpreter alike; he surveyed with curious intentness everything round about that he desired, and traversed Alexandria, Damascus, Constantinople, and Cilicia too. But wishing to revisit his homeland, the ship was lifted, and after many windings, the wind contrary, he was carried to our island, that is, of the Britons. And at length he himself, after not a few perils returning to the aforesaid venerable man Adomnanus, taught him to be the writer of that most beautiful history, explaining his journey alike and the things he had seen; from which plucking some things, relating and comparing books, we transmit to you to be read. But since Beda, treating in the same book chapter 6 On the Sepulchre of the Virgin, sets forth things similar to those narrated in the Sermon of Pseudo-Jerome, namely that it is unknown by whom, or how, the body of the Virgin was taken away, nor where it awaits resurrection, it is established that this was borrowed from that false narrative of Arculfus received from that Monk. Which same narrative, when Arculfus himself, Gaul already revisited, recited along with other things which he had heard and seen, thence among the Gauls the bodily Assumption of the Mother of God was called into disputation, which indeed was ended in the Council of Mainz held in the year 813, a few months before the death of Charlemagne, to which were present very many Bishops and Abbots of Gaul and Germany; for in that Council it was decreed that the feast of the Assumption of Blessed Virgin was to be celebrated: and immediately that which Charles had determined should be inquired concerning that feast was in that Council enacted and defined.

You will say 2. That even if the festal day in honor of the Blessed Virgin migrating from this mortal life to Heaven was instituted and celebrated by the Church, nevertheless from this it is not consequent that the sense and sentiment of the Church is that the Virgin Mother of God was received into Heaven in body together with soul: otherwise by equal reason it would have to be inferred that all those whose migration to blessed eternity and natalitia she celebrates were also carried up into Heaven in soul and body, which how absurd it is there is no one who does not see.

Truly, on the contrary, the Church could not have opened more perspicaciously and distinctly her sentiment concerning the Mother of God elevated in soul and body than by celebrating the festal day of her migration from this life under the title of Assumption: for why, I pray, when the Church speaks of the Saints and keeps their festal day — whose souls enjoy eternal beatitude while meanwhile their bodies lie in earth awaiting resurrection — does she call theirs either natale, or dormition, or transitus, or passio: whereas when she makes mention of the death of the Virgin Mother of God, she designates it by the illustrious and peculiar name of Assumption? Certainly no other cause can be brought forward than that, since the Church has always acknowledged that the unique Virgin was carried up into Heaven in body together with soul, she wished to use that name by which she might designate this special gift and privilege: for those things are commonly said to be assumed which, consisting with some mass or body, are carried from one place to another. Thus Matthew 4 it is said that the devil took Christ up, first into the holy city, then into an exceeding high mountain. Which indeed is confirmed from the triumphal migration of Christ from earth into Heaven, whose festal day is called indeed by the Latins Ascension, to denote that Christ penetrated the Heavens in soul and body by His own power, and not by alien aid: but by the Greeks it is called Assumption: which name they borrowed from Sacred Scripture: for Mark, last chapter v. 19, we read: And the Lord Jesus, after he had spoken to them, was taken up into Heaven. And Luke 9: And it came to pass, when the days of his assumption were fulfilled. Similarly Acts 1 and 1 Timothy 3 Christ is said to be assumed. And Sacred Scripture employed this formula of speaking, that it might signify more expressly that Christ, as true man, was clothed with a true, and not a fantastic body, and that together with it His soul was carried up into Heaven by the divine virtue inherent in Him. Hence St. Chrysostom, Homil. 1 on the Acts of the Apostles, expounding these words: was taken up, says: He did not say ascended: for he still speaks as of a man. And Homil. 2, expounding these words: as you saw him going into Heaven, says: It was not said, whom you saw assumed, but taken up into Heaven, namely that you understand this Assumption to be the Ascension: for it belongs to flesh to be assumed. All these things John Belethus, Theologian of Paris, most beautifully confirms in his explanation of the divine offices, chapter 41. It must be known, he says, that the passage of the Saints is called in many ways. For it is called exit, transit, obit, natale, nativity, birthday, dormition, deposition, just as also the passion, and assumption of John the Evangelist: but this name, quasi by antonomasia, is said only of Blessed Mary.

I would not however wish you to take all these terms as synonyms, that is, differing only in sound of syllables, but the same in sense and signification: for although they are used to signify the same migration from among the living, nevertheless there inheres in them this peculiar force of signifying, that the obitus of a Martyr e.g. precisely only intimates the solution of his soul from the body: but passion declares not only separation from the body, but that it was touched by the violence of torments: but deposition signifies the sacred remains of the Martyr, committed indeed to earth, but to be rendered back at some time: transit denotes generically migration from this mortal and temporal life to the blessed and eternal one: but dormition represents the death of the Saints like sleep, from which they shall sometime awake: but Assumption, or taking up, signifies not only the carrying up of the soul, but of the body into Heaven, which death or dormition preceded.

You will urge. The term Assumption is very often employed by the SS. Fathers and Ecclesiastical Writers and Orators to signify not indeed the migration of the body, but only of the soul of the Saints into heaven: therefore although the Church has used this term to denote the felicity of the Blessed Virgin, it is not consequent from this that she believes her received into heaven in soul together with body. The antecedent is proved from St. Cyprian Epist. 1 to the Martyrs where, relating the words of St. Paul Epist. 2 to Timoth. For I am even now a sacrifice, he sets them forth thus: I am already a sacrifice, and the time of my Assumption is at hand. Thus Gregory Nazianzen in the funeral oration for Gorgonia his sister affirms that her assumption took place. St. Augustine in the book On Pastors, chapter 11: Now, he says, Peter has been assumed into the rest of Apostles and Martyrs. Paulinus, Letter to Amandus Bishop: Whom, although we know my brother to have been assumed temporally, to be quickly followed in that cloud, let us nevertheless praise him as having died more happily for that cause. Maximus Bishop of Turin in Homil. 1 On St. Laurence: Therefore when he perceived by the mouth of Priest and Martyr that he too was to be assumed by every manner of death, gathering the crowds of the poor, he divided the ecclesiastical wealth with religious liberality. Remigius Bishop of Rheims in the consolatory letter to Clodoreus: It anguishes me and wears me down, the sadness of your voice, that your sister of glorious memory has passed away assumed; but we may be consoled, because such a one departed from this light that she ought rather to be regarded with remembrance than mourned. For it belonged to her life that she be believed assumed by the Lord, who elected by God migrated to the heavens. Boniface Bishop of Mainz in the Life of Saint Livin Martyr, or rather Livin himself in the prayer, which he has thus: And especially, O Lord, may those who shall have devoutly kept the memory of the day of my Assumption hold the whole year most safe through my presence of grace. St. Bernard in the Life of St. Malachy Bishop: In the place and time which he had chosen and foretold, Valochius Bishop, and legate of the apostolic see, as if assumed from our hands by Angels, happily fell asleep in the Lord. Likewise the Church of Sens on the feast of St. Augustine says in the antiphon at the Magnificat: Here is the celebrated day on which, loosed from the burden of flesh, Prelate Augustine was assumed with the Angels.

I answer, that by these and similar formulas of speaking the public faith of the Church concerning the bodily assumption of the Virgin Mother of God into heaven is neither shaken nor diminished: for although certain Writers and Ecclesiastical Orators sometimes employ the word Assumption to signify the migration of holy souls from this mortal life into heaven, no detriment whatsoever or prejudice accrues from it to the judgment of the Church, which constantly uses the term Assumption, and under that word celebrates the festal day in honor of that bodily migration of the Blessed Virgin. For who does not know that Christian Orators and historians do not always employ words in that sense in which the Church employs them? Thus it is not infrequent with them to transfer the word Ascension, consecrated by the Church to designating the triumphal mystery of Christ migrating into heaven, to indicating the passage of Saints from this life into heaven: which manner of speaking St. Bernard very often uses Sermon 1 On the Assumption of Blessed Virgin: Virgin, he says, fruitful of womb, ascending the heavens, thou didst begin without doubt to heap up the joys of things above with the augmentations of Christ. And below: For thither ascends the sublime fruit of the earth, whence descend given gifts so perfected best: the Virgin ascending on high, O blessed Virgin, herself also owes gifts to men, etc. But who will judge that St. Bernard there employs the word Ascension in that propriety in which by usage the Church signifies the mystery of Christ the Lord penetrating the heavens by His own power? Therefore by equal reason it must be concluded that although sometimes Writers and Ecclesiastical Orators explain the migration of holy souls from this life by the word Assumption, it does not follow from this that they use that word in its proper signification, in which the Church uses it, when she celebrates and sanctifies under the special title of Assumption the triumphal and bodily reception of the Virgin Mother of God into heaven.

You will say 3. When the Church treats of the death of Blessed Virgin she uses not only the word assumption but also of dormition: therefore nothing else is intended by her in the term assumption than that Blessed Virgin truly died, and her soul, like the other Saints — whose death very often is called sleep even in Scripture — flew forth to eternal felicity; while meanwhile her most holy body rested in the tomb and as it were slumbered. The truth of the antecedent appears from the formula of speaking of all the Ecclesiastical Writers, especially truly of the Greek Fathers: for hardly one of them is there who, when he institutes discourse on the death of the Mother of God, does not designate it by the term dormition, namely in that way in which the death of the faithful is called not death but sleep and slumber. Hence all the sermons which the SS. Fathers delivered to the people on the death and beatitude of the Mother of God we have consigned in their writings under this title: Sermon, or Oration on the Dormition of the Mother of God. Thus, besides others, St. Damascene, St. Andrew Archbishop Hierosolymitan of Crete, Saint Germanus Archbishop of Constantinople, etc. This same thing all the published acts, or monuments of the old Church confirm, namely Martyrologies, Calendars, and Ecclesiastical offices. Martyrologies indeed, for the old Roman Martyrology desired by Cardinal Baronius, and at length found and published by Heribert Rosweyde, theologian of Utrecht of the Society of Jesus, and inscribed to Paul V. Supreme Pontiff, stands thus 18 Kal. The dormition of Saint Mary. Besides the Roman Calendar older by nine hundred years, written in golden characters, and likewise published by domno Frontone Canon Regular of St. Augustine, from the Monastery of Saint Genevieve of Paris in the year 1632. On day 1 of August. Solemnly on the Pausation of Saint Mary. Similarly the Martyrology of Usuard, which the Roman Church, and very many others use, composed at the command of Charlemagne, edited through the labors of John Molanus, Professor of sacred Theology at Louvain. 18 Kalends of September, the Dormition of the holy Mother of God Mary. The same has the Martyrology of Ado Archbishop of Vienne: therefore by the name of Assumption nothing else is designated than the death of the Mother of God, and migration from among the living.

I answer, denying the antecedent, whose falsity appears from the unanimous and constant sentiment of the Roman Church and of the Latin SS. Fathers, to whom the term Assumption, not however dormition, was familiar whenever they institute discourse on the passing of the Virgin Mother of God into heaven, as will evidently appear from the following paragraphs. But that the consequence is false will not be doubted by anyone who with a Catholic mind penetrates the sense of the Greek SS. Fathers concerning the migration of the most Blessed Virgin, which they indicate by the word dormition; for they intend to signify by this term nothing else than what is declared by Assumption: which indeed appears most openly not only from St. John Damascene but from the others who instituted sermons or orations on the dormition of B. Virgin; for they constantly affirm that she was assumed into heaven with her body. Hence St. Damascene uses not only the word dormition but also of assumption to attest the same truth.

Not without reason nevertheless the Greek Fathers rather used the word dormition than assumption, that they might proscribe the error — truer to say delirium — of the Collyridians, and likewise the invention of the Antidicomarianites: of whom the former thought the Virgin Mother of God was not like us a partaker of human nature, but divine, and thus as being God entirely unacquainted with death: whom St. Epiphanius refutes abundantly, haeresi 79. But the Antidicomarianites, whom he likewise assails in haeresi 78, so that they might satisfy their unrestrained voluptuousness the more boldly, had certain devout virgins in their houses with them, abusing them to the occasion of sin, following the example of the most holy Mother of God, whom, commended by Christ to John, they wished ever to have remained with him, and to have set out with him into Asia: which invention Epiphanius certainly assails, declaring that Blessed John, when he undertook the journey into Asia, did not bring the Holy Virgin with him, but left her asleep at Jerusalem. To these add that perhaps therefore the Greek Fathers sometimes used the names of Dormition, Rest, Pausation, Deposition, namely because on different days they were accustomed to celebrate the feast of the death, and of the Assumption of Saint Mary. Which is plainly gathered from the most approved Codices of the Martyrology of Eusebius, of which we shall treat presently. For just as therein these words are read: 15 Kal. February: The Depositio of the holy and glorious B. Mary Mother of our Lord Jesus Christ; so also these others: 18 kalends of September: The Assumption of Saint Mary mother of our Lord; which not obscurely signify without doubt different days assigned for celebrating the death and the Assumption of the Virgin Mary: therefore the term dormition was accepted by the Greek Fathers in no other way than for a brief sleep, from which shortly after the Virgin Mother of God awoke.

To the confirmation, however, sought from the pretended Roman Martyrology, I answer, that mention of this Martyrology was first made by Ado Archbishop of Vienne, who lived near the end of the IX century, of whom Baronius thus speaks in the treatise On the Roman Martyrology, chapter 3.

This itself, simple, without other addition, Roman Martyrology, and the same brief one, in which only the name, and place of the Martyrs, and day of passion were placed, is that very one of which Ado makes mention in the preface of his Martyrology, in these words: That for this work the days of the Martyrs might be noted most truly, which are found sufficiently recorded in the Calendars, helped us a venerable and most ancient Martyrology, directed by a Roman Pontiff to a certain holy Bishop from the city Aquileia, and lent to me afterward for some days by a certain Religious Brother; which I transcribed with diligent care, placed at Ravenna, I judged should be put at the head of this work. So Ado. Baronius subjoins: Moreover in all those Martyrologies of Ado which I have seen printed, that very one accepted at Rome is wanting. Monsander certainly would have performed an illustrious work worthy of learned men and longed-for, if he had published together with the Martyrology of Ado itself that illustrious monument of antiquity, which Ado testifies himself to have had in his manuscript.

Truly, that Martyrology of which Ado makes mention can by no means be judged the Roman Martyrology, and that Ado gravely fell, and was deceived, by the Monk who handed over that Martyrology to him, affirming it to be Roman, many and most weighty considerations persuade. First indeed, because those who wrote concerning the authors of Martyrologies related Eusebius of Caesarea as their standard-bearer

who first of all exerted labor in composing a Martyrology, no mention being made of a Roman Martyrology, as is asserted: thus Walafrid Strabo lib. Of Ecclesiastical Things, chapter 25. Beda in his retractions on the Acts chapter 1. To the same point the more recent writers affirm, especially Molanus in the dissertation prefixed to the Martyrology of Usuard. Secondly, Usuard himself, weaving an index of all Martyrologies, by no means makes mention of a Roman Martyrology, concerning which nevertheless he would not have been silent on account of the authority of the Roman Church, if truly some Roman Martyrology had existed. Thirdly, those who contend for some principal Martyrology of the old Roman Church rely chiefly on the authority of St. Gregory the Great, who in the Letter to Eulogius the Alexandrian Bishop has thus: For we have the names of all the Martyrs gathered in one codex, distributed through the single days of their passions, and every day we celebrate the solemnities of Masses in their veneration. Nevertheless in that volume it is not indicated how each one suffered: but only the place of the passion is put. Whence it comes about that many out of diverse lands and provinces are recognized daily as crowned with martyrdom; but we believe you have these things. But besides that St. Gregory the Great in his book of the Sacramentary used the customary voice of Assumption, which certainly he would not have done if at that time the Roman Church otherwise spoke in her Martyrology and was accustomed frequently to use the word Dormition, every difficulty which could arise from those words Valesius explains so well that I do not grudge to copy his words here. Therefore thus he says: From which words it is clear that St. Gregory speaks not of the particular Church of Rome, or of any Roman Martyrology, which he does not even name; but of the Martyrology which then was common to the whole Latin Church: now that this was the Martyrology inscribed under the name of the divine Jerome is clear from this, because that very thing was in use in Italy, and in the parts of the West, Cassiodorus teaches, lib. On Divine Readings, chapter 2. So Valesius, whose conjecture becomes the more probable because St. Gregory wrote this letter not to some Bishop of the Latin Church, but to the Patriarch of the Alexandrian Church; and thus significantly inserted these words, We have not the names of all the Martyrs, namely in all the Churches of the West, but we believe you have these things, in the Church namely of the East: since indeed the Martyrology of Eusebius, a Greek man, written in Greek, ought to be no less familiar among the Orientals than that rendered into latinity by St. Jerome was worn in use among the Western Churches. Add that St. Gregory testifies that on single days several saints are inscribed in the Martyrology of which he makes mention, for he says: And many out of diverse lands and provinces are known daily as crowned with martyrdom: but they cannot square with the Martyrology brought to light by Rosweyde: since on single days only the name of one Saint is inscribed in that Martyrology: therefore that Martyrology of Rosweyde is not that of which St. Gregory makes mention. By similar reason I say the Calendar published by John Frontone can by no means be judged Roman: which certainly many things demonstrate. First indeed, that it relates neither the names nor the feasts of many Saints: whom nevertheless the Roman Church has always venerated; for in it neither the names and festal days of SS. Matthew, and Luke, nor of St. Thomas Apostle are inscribed: but who will judge

that the Roman Church did not keep the solemnities of the Apostles and Evangelists, while meanwhile she kept with great celebration the feast of SS. Agapius, Chrysanthus, Euplius, and Felicula, and of very many others, who are related in that Calendar? Secondly St. Gregory just praised affirms in the Roman Church on single days the memory of several Saints is celebrated, in whose honor the solemnities of Masses would be carried out: but in that little booklet the greatest part of days appears uncelebrated and unnmarked without any name of Martyr or Saint. Thirdly finally, John Fronto himself published the supposititious little booklet under the name of Roman Calendar, signifies quite plainly in the preface to the Reader, when he says: Moreover, to call this little booklet a Calendar, although it does not enumerate days by Kal.; yet since it was not a convenient name to me I used that one. To these add that even if truly that little booklet were held as a Roman Calendar, nevertheless nothing whatsoever of prejudice to our sentiment would happen from its testimony: since that term Pausation not obscurely signifies the mystery of the Virgin assumed into heaven; for in Latin he is called Pausarius who designates a pause by voice: thus he who presides over the symphony, and gives the sign of pauses, whereby the musical concord may be produced according to the rules of art with quicker or slower modulation, can be called Pausarius: whence pausation, in the present matter, would not incongruously designate a brief delay of time during which the Most Blessed Virgin lay in the sepulchre, having lost and again received life, and as it were made a kind of pause: so much so that the other Saints are said to sleep in the Lord, but she herself (as Bede hints) only to have paused in the sepulchre.

But as regards the Martyrologies of Usuard and Ado, that their authority is not sufficiently to be proved will be shown below.

§ 2. — IT IS PROVED SECONDLY THAT THE BLESSED VIRGIN WAS CARRIED UP INTO HEAVEN IN BODY AND SOUL FROM ECCLESIASTICAL TRADITION. — Ecclesiastical tradition I call that which although it flowed from the Apostles was nevertheless not divinely revealed to them immediately: for Theologians distinguish traditions of twofold kind, of which some are divine, which were revealed immediately to the Apostles, the Holy Spirit inspiring, and these subsequently obtain the certitude of divine faith, as the baptism of children, which although it be not handed down expressly in Scripture, yet he who denies it truly incurs the note of heresy. But others are called Ecclesiastical and Apostolic together, which indeed flowed from the Apostles; yet proceeded from them as from Bishops or Rectors of Churches, upon whom it lay to establish very many things in the government of the Church and for illustrating and confirming the faith of Christians, which they did not receive dictated or inspired immediately by Christ. For the Apostles, as Tertullian relates lib. On the Soldier's Crown, chapter 3, established many things by their own authority for the common good and governance of the Church, which Christ the Lord had not expressly dictated to them: About to approach the water, he says there, but also sometimes beforehand in the Church under the hand of the Prelate we attest that we renounce the devil, and his pomp, and his Angels. Then we are thrice immersed, answering somewhat more than the Lord determined in the Gospel. Thence, having been received, we taste a foretaste of the union of milk and honey. And from that day we abstain for the whole week from the daily bath. The sacrament of the Eucharist, both in time of fast and commanded by the Lord in all things, we receive at gatherings before dawn, nor from the hand of others than the pre- siding ones. We make oblations for the dead, on the birthday, on the yearly day. On the Lord's day we hold fasting unlawful, or to adore on bended knees. We extend the same immunity from the day of Easter until Pentecost. Anything shaken down to earth of our chalice or bread we anxiously endure, or every progress and advance, at every entrance and exit, at clothing and footwear, at baths, at tables, at lights, at couches, at seats, whatever conversation exercises us, we bear on our forehead the sign-mark of the cross. If you demand a law of the Scriptures for these and other disciplines of this kind, you will find none: tradition is set before you as authoress, custom as confirmress, and faith as observer. Of this kind of tradition is that which the Church, as received from the Apostles, has derived to faithful peoples from the very origins of the nascent Church even to us with happy success, namely that Blessed Virgin was received into heaven in body together with soul. Which tradition St. Damascene most beautifully delineates thus, and weighs as handed down from the elders, Orat. 2 On the Dormition of Blessed Virgin, where having related how the Virgin Mother of God closed her last day, and was buried by the Apostles, and carried up into heaven after three days, he says:

Do you see then, Most dear Fathers and Brothers, with what words he uses that most famous sepulchre toward us? But that these things stand thus is clear from the Euthymiaca History, wherein lib. 3. cap. 10. it is written most distinctly: It was commemorated above how holy Pulcheria built several Churches to Christ in the city of Constantinople. One of these is that which was built at Blachernae in the first years of the Empire of Marcian of divine memory. When therefore they had built there a venerable temple to the most famous and most holy Mother of God, the ever Virgin Mary, and adorned it with all ornaments, they sought the most sacred body which had borne God: and having summoned Juvenal Archbishop of Jerusalem, and the Bishops of Palestine, who at that time were dwelling in the Imperial city because the Council of Chalcedon had been convened, she addresses them thus: We have heard that there is at Jerusalem the chief Church of the excellent Mother of God and perpetual Virgin Mary, in that place which is called Gethsemane, where her body, which bore life, was laid away in a coffin. It pleases therefore that relics be brought hither from there, that they may be a protection to this imperial city. But Juvenal, receiving this discourse, answered in these words: Although the things which befell in the death of Saint Mary the Mother of God have been by no means handed down in monuments by Scripture divinely inspired, nevertheless from ancient and most venerable tradition we have received this, that at the time of her glorious death all the holy Apostles, who were traversing the round of lands for the salvation of the Gentiles, were snatched up through the deep in a moment of time and gathered at Jerusalem. And while they were there an Angelic vision befell them, and a divine song of pre-eminent virtues was heard: and thus with divine and heavenly glory she commended her holy soul into the hands of God: but her body, which had borne God, borne forth to burial with Angelic and Apostolic song was laid away in a coffin at Gethsemane: in which place indeed the Angels ceased not for three whole days to form choirs and sing. But when they themselves after three days accomplished had made an end of singing, the Apostles who were present opened the tomb for this reason, because one of them, namely Thomas, who had then not been present, desired to adore. But > they could by no means find her most sacred body: but when they had found only her lying cloths, and had been suffused from them with a certain ineffable sweetness, they closed the coffin. And stricken with admiration of that mystery, they could reckon with themselves only this, that God the Word and Lord of glory, who had willed to put on flesh from her and become man in His own person, willed likewise after her departure from life to honor her body immaculate and devoid of all filthiness with incorruptibility and translation before the common general resurrection. There were present moreover together with Apostle Timothy also Dionysius the Areopagite, just as Great Dionysius himself concerning blessed Hierotheus, who himself was then present, testifies in those books which he elaborated to the aforesaid Apostle Timothy, in these words: Since even among our own holy Prelates initiated in the divine name, at what time we too, as known, and very many of our holy brethren, came together to behold that body which had begun life, and had borne God (there was present also James the brother of God, and Peter, the supreme and most pre-eminent summit of the Apostles), where after the spectacle it pleased that all the sacred Prelates should each according to his powers extol with praises the goodness of divine imbecility of infinite virtue, the Theologians excepted, he surpassed all the other sacred Heralds, as does not escape thee, wholly exceeding, wholly rapt outside himself, and so it seemed he was: and by all who heard him, and beheld him, and recognized him, he was judged seized by divine numen, and plainly a divine praiser. But why need I hold discourse with thee concerning those things which were divinely spoken there? since unless oblivion of myself has seized me too, I know that I have often heard from thee some parts also of those divine canticles. When the Emperors had heard these things, they contended with Archbishop Juvenal that that holy coffin together with the things placed therein of the glorious and most holy Mother of God might safely be sent to them. And when this had happened they laid him away in the venerable temple of the holy Mother of God, which had been erected at Blachernae. And these things stood in this manner.

These words of St. Damascene. — It is confirmed. however, this narrative and Ecclesiastical tradition, not only by the praised testimony of St. Dionysius, and Juvenal, but also by S. Sabba Hierosolymitanus, and the most famous Monk of the Monastery at that time in Laura, and Abbot, equal of Juvenalis, who in the Menaea, of which we shall speak in the following, whose author or restorer he himself was, just as in the typical, or ritual books of Jerusalem, openly patronizes this narrative; for making Sermon from Men. 15 August On the Dormition, and Assumption of the Virgin: It belonged to the reason of decorum, he says, that they who had been Ministers, as Spectators of the divine Word, should also be present beholders of the dormition of the Mother, from whom that Word had been made incarnate, as it were the last Mystery which remained for them to accomplish: in which namely they might not only behold before their eyes the Savior ascending from earth into heaven: but even exist ocular witnesses of His Genetrix translated to the skies. Wherefore transported through all spaces of lands from every place, by a certain divine instinct, they came together into Sion, and led as it were the Virgin hastening to enter heaven. False therefore is that which some thrust forward, that many Writers exist equals of Juvenal and superiors to Damascene, who have openly commemorated the same tradition of the Church of Jerusalem concerning the assumed body of the Virgin. Gregory of Tours subscribes, who lived in century VI., for book 1 Of Miracles, in narrating the death of the Virgin, he relates almost the same as Juvenal: Fulfilled, he says, by St. Mary the course of this life, when now she was about to be released from the world, all the Apostles were gathered together from single regions to her house. And when they had kept vigil, because she was to be assumed from the world, they groaned together with her: and behold the Lord Jesus came with His Angels, and seizing her soul delivered it to Michael the Angel, and departed: moreover at dawn the Apostles came with the bier her body, and placed it in the monument, and kept it awaiting the coming of the Lord: and again once more the Lord stood by them, and the holy body taken up He commanded to be carried in a cloud into Paradise, where now its soul resumed, exulting with His Elect, it enjoys the goods of eternity about to cut off no end. All the Greeks also openly teach the Apostles were present at the funeral of B. Virgin, etc. This narration of Gregory Notkerus confirms thus in the Martyrology at 18 Kalends of September, where having premised: What the venerable Father Gregory Bishop of Tours thinks in the book of Miracles concerning the same Assumption, it pleases to bring forth for the utility of nations by commemorating. Not yet will anyone say this narration of Gregory fabricated, which Notkerus testifies himself to relate for the utility of nations. With which words thus premised by him, he copies out the whole of Gregory intact, and at length subjoins these: But if anyone be moved how the same Gregory, placed at the setting of the Sun, had learned the things done in the east, let them recognize from his other writings, because to Saint Martin, as to Philosophers, men used to run together from the whole globe, and from parts of the western world the holy places in Jerusalem were frequented, which also used continually to happen even to these times of the Normans. But lest the same Catholic and venerable Father seem to have thought against the Apostle, where he says: Christ rose again until the advent of Him: it must be known, because either this special Assumption of the body of the venerable Mother of God Mary, or of those who are read to have risen with the Lord adjures rather than assails Apostolic authority, since both that body of His, which God willed to incorporate to Himself, it befitted to be raised into heaven the sooner, and those witnesses of our true Resurrection and Ascension went forth without doubt established. From which appears most false written by some that the narration of Gregory was corrected and reprehended by Notker.

There subscribes also St. Andrew Archbishop of Crete, who lived in century 7. as Genebrardus relates, and Gualtherius in the Chronicles, though others make him earlier. This one, I say, in the first Oration which he published in praise of the Assumption of the Virgin, where he narrated that B. Virgin truly died, and that her death befell in manner of ecstatic sleep and Adamic slumber, relates that she was at length buried by the Apostles, and proves it by the words above praised of St. Dionysius; afterward concludes: Therefore it agrees that that divine man, to whom he speaks, say that almost the whole sacred Senate of Apostles came together to that venerable and great spectacle of the Mother of God: of which number he himself was one, together with the most religious ones, thus elegantly weighs Oration 2. where he says: *And so there was a new spec>tacle of the state, inaccessible to reasons of mind; a woman >

passing beyond the nature of heavens in purity, to penetrate the holy fires of celestial beings; the Virgin, surpassing by the miracle of the divine birth the Seraphim themselves, to draw nearer first to that nature, to God Creator of all; the Mother, illustrious by the birth of life itself, born like the Offspring in the issue of life, a miracle worthy of God and of faith. For as the womb of her bearing was uncorrupted, so neither was the flesh of her dying dissipated. O marvelous thing! the birth devoid of corruption, neither did the sepulchre admit corruption. Nor indeed did it touch the Saints: do you wish I should tell the proof of the thing? But let no hearer mock, I pray. How the empty monument? I shall ask indeed abundantly. How the body of her deceased obscure? Why are lacking the burial coffins, unless the corpse laid in the tomb escaped corruption? unless the treasure was translated? But if otherwise it stands thus, that is not true translation, when others also existed? namely separation of the soul from the body, deposition of flesh, solution of composition, disjunction of parts, resolution, conjunction, compaction, and withdrawal into obscurity: for thus far the empty sepulchre remains, itself bearing testimony, itself witness that she was translated.

Nor does it hinder that he subjoins:

Not to me explored, whether to the parts coalescing into one composition out of one concretion, perhaps by the hidden author of things willing with counsel of more propitious will of Himself to honor the Mother: or certainly the one eminent over the other, and thus as from that mutual disjunction the one obtained a seat superior to the world, the other bordering on it: or finally some new and diverse reason of order fell to her, so that all things in her were new in very deed, suitably receiving an exceptional reason, or exceeding every reason and knowledge.

These things, I say, do not hinder, since easily can they be reconciled with the preceding, if we shall have said Andrew of Crete wished the body of the Mother of God to have been translated shortly after her death into some heavenly place, and deposited there, until according to the ordinance of God shortly after it was again united to the soul. Which indeed seems also the mind of Leo the Emperor in the Oration On the Dormition of the Virgin, who borrowed this sentiment from Andrew of Crete, when he says: The soul of the Virgin was received into heaven, but the body was stored away. Nor does Peter Abelard seem to have departed from that sentiment in the unique Sermon On the Assumption, where he says:

For three days the body of the Lord lay in the sepulchre, and from the day of resurrection He deferred it until the day of His Ascension, which deferral or not, as was said, He endured in the Mother. Finally He took up the sacred body secretly before into Paradise, than He raised it, that the Assumption of the lifeless body might be more wonderful, and resurrection, He by no means raised it again judging it unworthy of earthly contact.

Another also stands present to us witness of the same narrative and tradition not ignoble, S. Cosmas by nation Hierosolymitan, whom John Patriarch of the same city says in the life of St. Damascene was Damascene's spur to labors, and companion in letters and religious education and exercise, nor not Bishop of Maiuma. Now this one, as Guy Abbot of Saint Denis relates in the Sanctilogium at 18 Kalends September, which exists in manuscript in the Bibliotheca Victoriana, writes:

And the Lord said to Peter: Bury the body of my Mother with reverence, and keep it those three days with diligence. For I myself then shall come, > and transfer it to incorruption, and clothe it with clarity like mine, that what has been received, what it accepted, may shine purely, and accord.

Cosmas also relates the terrible and marvelous mystery, which needs not natural discussion, nor curious investigation, since all things which are said of the Genetrix of God are supernatural, to be admired, and tremendous rather than investigated. Gone forth, as he says, from her body, her soul, the body uttered these words: I give thanks to thee, Lord, because I am worthy of thy glory, remember me, because I am thy fashioning, and thy deposit to be kept. Roused therefore the rest falling upon the body of the virgin lifeless, grieved exceedingly began to moan. Lifting therefore the holy body to the monument they were carrying it, Peter beginning Psalm, In exitu Israel de Aegypto. The Choirs also of Angels praise the Trinity, so that Jerusalem shaken by so great glory, then the chief Priests send a multitude with swords and clubs. But Jephonias raging with violence approached the bier, desiring to drag to earth the body of the Genetrix Mary: who because he strives unworthily to drag it, by his touch is deservedly deprived: for both hands torn from the elbows are cut off, hanging from the bier, tortured with horrible pain. But he implores pardon, and promises amendment. To whom Peter: By no means shalt thou be able to obtain pardon, unless thou kiss the body of the perpetual virgin, and confess Christ propagated from her to be the Son of God. When he had done this, the hands whence they had been torn were joined to the elbows. Which if they be true, as Guy relates, they confirm by no light testimony the aforesaid Ecclesiastical tradition. Yet I would wish you take these things reported by Guy, as that regarding the graces exhibited to God from the Virgin's body, you judge not the body itself, but the soul of the Virgin reverently; so that the sense be, the soul of the Virgin already loosed from the body burst forth in thanksgiving for her body: in which certainly nothing whatsoever absurd, nor open to mockery may be observed, as some pretend. Nor ought those things disturb, which he adds of the severed hand of him who had attempted to cast down the body of the Blessed Virgin from the bier. For similar things narrates S. Germanus of Constantinople in the Oration praised above, where he says:

Timid moreover who then even among the incredulous Hebrews, and vain (for they are vanity of vanities, as being always scandals, nor do they ever cease to menace more contentiously, and to give forth trifles), with hand stretched out and hastening (for in whose hands, he says, is always iniquity) shakes the couch-bier of the bed, daring to assail the body of the undefiled one, nor fearing to crush and dash in pieces the fleshly throne of the Most High: and he is so punished forthwith with excision of his hands, made an example, and terror to the Jews ever forward against Christ. Now the sacred corpse was near perishing in the tomb. But truly the Apostles dared not (with what reverence, and religious fear were they held) to touch the body of the Virgin. And indeed the disciples, on account of what pre-eminent honor they held her, and because they knew well that her most chaste body was a vessel of God, they preferred a fear worthy of all praise, lest they should indulge to themselves contact with her. But those who were of the common people faithful strove even to snatch some of the relics, whereby they might procure for themselves sanctification: yet none laid hands upon it: since the Hebrews punished by the calmer example had before their eyes above all her petulance.

These words St. Andrew. From these therefore appears how some more recent writers hallucinate when they will that narrative and tradition commemorated by Ss. Juvenal and Damascene be reckoned among old wives' tales, and trifles, and assail it according to their powers.

They answer first, that that very narrative of the Dormition of B. Virgin, and of the Apostles gathered to her funeral is held for apocryphal by Baronius, who likewise, they say, mocks the testimony of St. Dionysius in this matter. Truly this response falls in every part of it, for Baronius to the year 48. n. 14. relates indeed the circumstances from an apocryphal little book on the transit and Assumption of the Virgin published under the feigned name of Melito Bishop of Sardis, refuted not only by Beda in his retract. on Act. cap. 8.; but also numbered among apocrypha by the authority of the Roman Council, over which Pope Gelasius presided: yet Baronius does not omit those things which the annals relate concerning the resurrection and Assumption of the Virgin. For Baronius says:

But those things which Nicephorus himself lib. 2. c. 21. and lib. 15. c. 14., and formerly, as he himself relates, are handed down by Juvenal Bishop of Jerusalem concerning the Apostles gathered in the same moment from diverse regions of the Globe to Jerusalem for her death, carried aloft through the air, are contained most certainly in the same apocryphon of Melito; which Beda also knew: again also, the things which are related concerning the miracle wrought upon the Jew, who attempted to overturn the bier in which she was being borne to burial, are read in the same apocryphon likewise. But when we say these things, we do not assail them thus, as if they could not at all be true, since no word is impossible with God: just as neither on that account, that there it is related she rose again, and was assumed together with body into heaven, do we deny it or call it into doubt: but that they handed down, which especially Juvenal Bishop of Jerusalem testified himself to have received not from any written commentary, but rather from the ancient and venerable tradition of the Ancients.

From which words it plainly stands that Baronius does not disapprove that history and narrative, but only warns that certain circumstances of this narrative are also held in the apocryphal little book published under the name of Melito. The same must be said of the testimony of St. Dionysius, by which this history is supported: for Baronius did not, as certain ones invent, doubt the author of those books, or deny those writings truly to be Dionysius's, but only asserts that the sentiment cannot stand of those who think B. Virgin died before the year of Christ 59. otherwise Dionysius converted by Paul in the year of the Lord 52. would not have come to Jerusalem with the Apostles, nor then been present at the Mother of God. For Baronius writes:

If therefore we say the Genetrix of God died in any of the aforesaid years, Dionysius could by no means have been present at her funeral: for he was converted to the faith not only in that year, or the following, but not even by the year 52 of the Lord (as will stand established from these things which we have said, and which we shall say in their place, exact account of times having been taken), when Paul came to Athens: nay from Luke, who with wonderful diligence rereads from that time all the places to which Paul came, and the seasons during which he remained in them, until his coming to Jerusalem, it clearly appears he could not come to Jerusalem before the year of the Lord 57., to which age if you add 14 or 15 years, during which, as was said, the most holy Virgin lived after she brought forth the Savior, you will gather manifestly that she in that year, in which Paul came last to Jerusalem, passed > the year of age 72. because Epiphanius Presbyter, and Cedrenus, whom we have cited, affirmed that she migrated from this life: if we shall have consented to which, and the things which Dionysius writes can be fitted to the same, as wishing it to be understood of the most sacred body of the Genetrix of God, in which sense indeed all the Greeks are known to have accepted those words. These words Baronius; by which considerations it stands that he does not assail the aforesaid narrative, nor call into doubt the truth of the assumed Virgin; although he rejects certain little parts of that narration which the proscribed book on the transit of the Virgin records.

They answer 2. That narration wavers in very many things: First namely if all these things had happened as they are related, without doubt St. Luke in the Acts of the Apostles would have related something of them: but he makes mention of none of those things: therefore they are to be judged less true. Secondly, very many things are related in this narration which crept in from the proscribed and apocryphal book on the transit of the Virgin, and which therefore venerable Beda rejects and assails: therefore they merit no faith. Thirdly, it is not established that B. Virgin died and was buried at Jerusalem: nay it is probable that she set out with John Evangelist to Ephesus, there likewise closed her last day, and was buried: for the Ephesine Synod writes thus to the Clergy and People of Constantinople: Wherefore also Nestorius, when he had gone into the city of the Ephesians, in which John the Theologian, and the Virgin Mother of God Saint Mary fell asleep, by the gathering of Ss. Fathers and Bishops, alienating himself spontaneously … was condemned. For the words, in which signify, as that John, so also the Mother of God fell asleep at Ephesus. which Modestus Bishop of Jerusalem also confirms in the Homily on the ointment-bearing Virgins. Fourthly, less true appear those things which are narrated of Pulcheria, and Marcian, since no Greek historian makes mention of those things, just as neither does anyone make mention of the Euthymiaca history, from which alone St. Damascene drew out this narrative. Fifthly, it is not established that that second oration on Assumption, where this narrative is read and the Euthymiaca history praised, is a genuine work of St. Damascene, since Billius, who made and published these Orations of Damascene in Latin, did not join the Greek text of the author to the Latin version: which nevertheless had been done in other orations made by him. To these add that Damascene does not seem an accurate writer, but mostly writes uncertain things as true, as is established from that narration in which he relates the soul of Trajan was liberated from hell by the prayers of Gregory the Great. Therefore by all these considerations appears that the aforesaid narration concerning the Assumption of the Virgin merits no faith among the prudent.

Truly I deny both antecedent and consequence. And to the first reason of doubting I say that by hidden judgment of God, and by special ordination of divine providence it befell that all things concerning the life of the most sacred Virgin, after Christ's ascension into heaven, in the very origin of the nascent Church, and the following centuries remained more obscure, and buried as it were in silence: which certainly long ago noted St. Andrew of Crete in the first Oration on the dormition of the Virgin, where he writes thus:

Nor are there lacking things, he says, from these entirely, who may be more studious of discussion and who doubt and inquire, what cause it be, why of the Theologians, that is, of Apostles and Evangelists, we know no one, beholding so undefiled, and venerable a transit of the holy Mother of God, wrote, left any treatise in this argument, as surely those divine pillars composed the Gospels, and handed on to us Theological Expositions. Of which certainly sentiment he relates this reason: Moreover we say this to be in the cause, that long after, in times long past, a dormition inspired of God befell her: for they say that she, when she had come to extreme old age, migrated from human things. Or because those times did not yet permit the explication of these things, when the Gospel began first to be written, whereby the discourse of dispensation might be sown, assuming these straightway while expounding them. For there were going to be heretics, who were about to assert B. Virgin to have been partaker not of human nature but divine; whence if anything had befallen concerning her triumphal Assumption, someone of Apostles or Evangelists had narrated it, thence perhaps those heretics would have pre-texted a cause for their error. Add that not even the Canonical Writers themselves relate B. Virgin dying from this life, nor did they publish that to be propagated by constant and universal tradition: for Epiphanius seems to have been ignorant of that tradition, when he writes haeresi 78.: Moreover after that thing was done thus, and he received him to himself (he speaks of St. John) B. Virgin no longer remained with him), which if anyone think to be falsely boasted by us, let him wish to follow the traces of the sacred Scriptures, in which he shall find no mention of the death of Mary, whether she died, or not, whether buried or not buried. And a little below: therefore whether Mary died we know not, or was buried together.

The same thing leaves not only in doubt Timothy Presbyter Ierosolymitanus, who is placed among the Fathers of the fifth century in the Library of SS. Fathers of the Greeks; nay even seems to intimate the blessed Virgin did not die; for he writes: Hence it happened that some thought the Mother of the Lord slain by the sword, and affected with bloody death, such as Martyrs had the issue of life, for this reason that Simeon said: because thine own soul a sword shall transpierce: but the matter does not stand thus; for a sword hammered by the smith divides the body, cuts not the soul: whence also above all blameless, and holy by every mode the Virgin through Him, who translated her assumed into the supernal places, even until now is immortal. S. Isidorus likewise seems to have been in the same sentiment, who flourished around the end of the sixth century, for he writes: Specially no history teaches Mary to have been slain by the animadversion of the sword, because neither is her death anywhere read, while nevertheless neither is her burial found. Nothing therefore concerning the death of the Virgin at that time from Scripture, or that tradition which always and among all and everywhere prevails, was explored: whence if it be licit to call into doubt those things which they relate concerning her funeral, because no Apostle committed it to writings, or narrated it to be published by general tradition, it will be licit likewise to turn into doubt whether B. Virgin died or not. Similarly who could licitly doubt whether she was immune from every actual sin through the whole life, and very many others of this kind, which from the Apostles were neither written, nor dictated to be written by another?

To solve they say all things related in the apocryphal book are not false: for truly in 3 book Esdrae, certainly apocryphal e.g. it is written nothing is falser than truth: but who will judge that false, because it is written in an apocryphal book? Similarly lest I run out farther, in the same Canon of Gelasius, by which is proscribed the book on the transit of the Virgin published under the feigned name of Melito Bishop of Sardenensis, also among apocryphal books are related the works of Tertullian, and likewise the book of histories of Eusebius of Caesarea; may one therefore assert all things in those books to be fictitious, and mere fables? And that I touch the matter more closely, the book itself On the transit of B. Virgin asserts her to have died, and been committed to the sepulchre; but who will assert that false? Therefore although the aforesaid narrative relate some things which the apocryphal book on the transit of the Virgin likewise commemorates, it is not consequent from this that therefore it is false, or uncertain. Nor does it hinder that Beda proscribes that narration in those things in which it militates against Apostolic truth, namely, that the Apostles in the second year after the death of Christ already dispersed through the globe to announce the grace of the Gospel, flew back again to Jerusalem, stirred up by reports, to celebrate the funeral of B. Virgin; for this manifestly fights with the Acts of the Apostles, from which it is most certain that for the whole two years from the death of Christ the Apostles had not yet journeyed through the globe. It is most certain also from the same Acts that Paul the Apostle and Barnabas, long after two years elapsed from the death of Christ, were sent forth to sow the Gospel among the Gentiles. Which certainly do not cohere with the apocryphal book On the transit of the Virgin, in which it is asserted the Apostles in the second year after the Ascension of the Lord, from remote parts of the globe flew down to Jerusalem for the funeral of the Virgin. Deservedly therefore Beda damns the narration of that book in those things which manifestly fight with Sacred Scripture: but against it fights not the bodily Assumption of the Virgin, and immediately Beda does not assail it. But that such is not another sentiment of Beda, appears from his words: for he writes cap. 3. retract. on the Acts:

If dispersed, he says, the Church, the Apostles remained in Jerusalem, as Luke writes ⟦OCR illegible: "coiteat elea nentncium ei de tilte bi cxperneza"⟧ in the second year after the Ascension of the Lord, the Apostles were all divided through the whole globe each into his own Province to preach, who all, the death of B. Mary approaching, from the places in which they preached the word of God, lifted up on clouds, were snatched to Jerusalem, and deposited before the door of her house … which words plainly contradict B. Luke, by which he narrates the Apostles, driven out from Jerusalem with the other faithful, remained there, and preached through everything, until the Church had peace through all Judea, and Samaria, and Galilee, that this could not be accomplished in one year is doubtful to none.

To the third I say, it is certain that the Virgin Mother of God did not die at Ephesus, but at Jerusalem: for this openly testify St. Sabba, Juvenal, S. Germanus, S. Damascene, nor even St. Andrew of Crete, who in Oration 2 On the dormition of the Virgin, says: It was made a most sacred mention, that in it especially this mystery of the holy Genetrix of God was accomplished: in it was spread the pavement of the temple of the knees' bending of the most chaste sacred body, crying with clear voice: for as long as her womb remains incorrupt, so long it had its dwelling there, and there obeying the laws of nature received the end of life. Nor does Modestus oppose this truth, if anyone weigh his words rightly, for he says: *Historically they hand down Magdalene, of whom the Lord cast out seven demons, to have been this virgin. After the dormition of our most holy Lady the Mother of God she set out to Ephesus to the beloved disciple, where she perfected the Apostolic course by Martyrdom curia unguentifera > perfected. From which appears the contrary, which is intended Modestus

to assert;

for truly if B. Virgin had died at Ephesus, what need would there have been of Magdalene, who as believed had adhered as inseparable companion to B. Virgin, to go on after her death to Ephesus? Who would not laugh at Modestus speaking not of the Virgin Mother of God, but of Magdalene, when he says she set out to Ephesus? But neither do the Ephesine Fathers signify anything about that matter, but only that with special cult, as John, so also Mary they honored at Ephesus, whence the particle (in which) denotes that the Virgin Mother of God, and John above all were venerated there. To these add that Polycrates Bishop of the city of Ephesus, not long from the time of the Apostles wrote, as Saint Jerome relates in the Catalogue Of Illustrious Men: In Asia, he says, great luminaries have fallen asleep, who shall rise again in the day of the Lord, when He shall come from Heaven in His Majesty about to raise again all Saints: I speak of Philip of the 12. Apostles, who sleeps at Hierapolis, and his two daughters, who grew old Virgins, and another daughter of his, who full of the Holy Spirit fell asleep at Ephesus: but also John, who reclined above the breast of the Lord, and a Pontiff bearing on his forehead a golden plate, Martyr, and Doctor sleeps at Ephesus. Where, as appears, he makes no mention of the Virgin, certainly not going to pass over it, if truly she lay at Ephesus.

To the fourth I say, those things related by Juvenal by no means deflect from truth: for who would deny Marcian the Emperor and Pulcheria built at Blachernae? Who calls into doubt they were present in the Imperial city at the time of the Council of Chalcedon? Did not Juvenal attend that same Council? Nor does it hinder that the acts of the Council of Chalcedon produce nothing of that matter, nor does anyone relate of those things among Greek Writers; for truly the Acts of Councils relate only those things which aim at the end of the assembled Council, such as was not that interrogation of Juvenal by Marcian, and Pulcheria: very often also it happens that things most known, and sung abroad among the common people no Writer collects, since it would be ungrateful to consign to letters what are carried in the mouth of all: thus perhaps then Philo, then Josephus, although most studious of their own affairs, and of their Nation, wrote nothing of the continual miracle of the probatic pool, which nevertheless no one will deny without grave error, since St. John relates it cap. 5.

To the fifth I say, it is most certain that second Oration to be as much a genuine offspring of St. Damascene as all the others, for it altogether breathes his style, and Billius professes himself to have received these Greek orations from Cardinal Sirleto, which long ago had translated, but badly, Volaterranus. Nor does it matter that Billius did not add the Greek of the Author to his version, for he did not furnish it perhaps because Cardinal Sirletus willed not, who had lent the Greek text to him to translate; perhaps also because something was wanting in the Greek text. Add that Billius in very many other little works of St. Damascene edited by himself did not join the Greek text of Damascene; since he nowhere placed Greek except to the oration On Transfiguration, and three Orations On the Nativity B. Virgin: because, as he says there, then the Greek text together with the Latin version first came forth into light; nevertheless there is no prudent man who therefore detracts these Opuscula from St. Damascene.

Nor is St. Damascene less worthy of faith, that perchance he wrote the soul of Trajan was liberated from hell by the prayers of Gregory the Great.

For does the fact that he wrote this and erred in these things make him therefore unworthy of belief in other matters? But if it be so, scarcely should anyone of the SS. Fathers be believed, since, Augustine being witness, to none besides Canonical Writers has it ever been given not to err in some thing.

§ 3. — THE BODILY ASSUMPTION OF THE VIRGIN MOTHER OF GOD IS PROVED FROM THE DIVINE OFFICE OF THE SAME DAY OF GOD.

Luculently and perspicuously appears what is the sentiment of the Church concerning the assumed Virgin in soul and body, from the prayers and rites composed to the glory of the assumed Virgin; for whence more evidently can anyone gather what was the sentiment of the Church concerning the death of the Virgin, and her bodily reception into Heaven, than from prayers of this kind? That indeed the Church plainly believes which she openly professes herself to believe in her public prayers: but from prayers of this kind of the Church and divine offices accustomed to be celebrated in honor of the assumed Virgin, the Church long ago testified that the Virgin assumed was in soul together with body; which certainly we prove: First from the book of Sacramentary of Saint Gregory, from which three things are gathered plainly: First indeed that in Gregory's time, that is in century 6., it was received and published among the faithful B. Virgin to be assumed in soul together with body; since St. Gregory uses the name of Assumption not once but twice. Second, that the vigil also of the feast of the Assumption at that time was celebrated, and hence the feast instituted. Third finally, that the Virgin Mother of God was received into Heaven in soul together with body.

The first indeed and second becomes known from these words of the same book of Sacramentary, by which are designated the Vigil together with the feast of the assumed Virgin: For we read 19 Kal. September, Nat. S. Eusebii Priest, etc. On the same day the Vigil of the Assumption of S. Mary, 18 Kal. September. The Assumption of Saint Mary Virgin. The same stands established from the preface of the Mass of the same day, in which these things are held: Dignified and just it is, equitable and salutary, that we give thanks to thee always and everywhere, Holy Lord, omnipotent Father, eternal God, and thee amid the veneration of preserved virgins praise with exulting souls, bless, and preach. Among whom the undefiled Genetrix of God Virgin Mary shone forth gloriously, whose day of Assumption we celebrate, etc. But that at that time it was known in the Church that B. Virgin in body together with soul was assumed into Heaven, appears from the Oration or collect which on this very day was recited in the same Sacramentary in these words: Venerable to us, Lord, is the festivity of this day, in which the holy Genetrix of God underwent temporal death: yet could not be depressed by the bonds of death, who begot from herself thy Son our Lord Incarnate. For these words, yet could not be depressed by the bonds of death, signify nothing else than that the body of B. Virgin could not lie under the laws of death, namely be held by the sepulchre, nor be subjected to corruption or dissolution. That certain Neoterics interpret those words of the nerves of sin, appears most absurd, from this that the Virgin Mother of God never lay under the death of the soul, which is sin. Nor surely did Peter Abelard understand by another reason the words of that Collect, who in the Sermon On Assumption, already almost five hundred years ago wrote thus:

To which indeed attests the sepulchre found wholly empty, just as before it had been the Lord's, that she too B. Virgin may be believed to have attained the glory of resurrection, and the twofold stole, as manifestly the festivity of this day contains in the Oration these words: in which the holy Genetrix of God underwent temporal death, yet could not be depressed by the bonds of death: for since there is premised temporal death, it is patently shown that what is subjoined concerning the bonds of death must be referred to that death, not to the death of the soul, not to be held by whose bonds is common to all Elect.

Similarly these words, yet could not be depressed by the bonds of death, Albertus Magnus explains in q. 130. super Missus est, where he says:

Now it is asked, what is called the nexus of death. Either it is a good, or an evil. Not evil, because it was capable of every good. Likewise good does not depress, but elevates: therefore nexus does not name there anything of good. But if it is evil, either it is evil of fault, or evil of punishment, because death is not a nexus to fault, because after death there is not a state of fault, but of punishment. Likewise nothing would be said, that after death she could not sin, because she would be Mother of God, since after death no one sins. But if it is evil of punishment, I ask what punishment does it import? Not gehenna, because death does not bind to that, because many die who do not go to gehenna. By same reason nor to purgatory: because many die who do not go to purgatory: nor even can it say temporal punishment, because death binds not to that, but absolves from it. For it cannot say the punishment of death, because B. Virgin truly died; therefore it remains that it can signify nothing except incineration: therefore says the sense, could not be depressed by bonds of death, that is, could not be incinerated; and unless she had risen again immediately, she would have been incinerated, as other bodies.

To these subscribes Dominic Soto in t. 4. d. 43. q. 2. art. 1. On the most sacred Virgin, he says: if she rose again, it is not doubtful that she rose again into life sempiternal, in which in Heavens she enjoys it with her Son. But this Jerome in the same sermon left under doubt. Now truly through the course of times this opinion, or credulity, that in body and soul she was assumed into Heaven, has prevailed very much. Not yet however has it been related among articles of faith necessary to be believed, although it be most piously to be believed, for in the Collect of that feast the Church says that she could not be depressed by bonds of death. Nor does it avail to answer that the Roman Sacramentary seems not a genuine work of St. Gregory, but only perhaps approved by him. For this response rests on no foundation whatsoever, since the contrary affirm Cassiodorus, John Deacon, Berno of Augia, and all who have written on divine Offices. This above all Walafrid Strabo affirms, declaring the Sacramentary gathered by Gregory out of preceding books, which embraced the rites of Sacraments to be performed, which Saint Gregory himself reduced into better form and order. The same confirm the Fathers of Frankfort. For when Elipandus and other Bishops of Spain had published a little book writing to them, that in divine Offices, and Prayers at Masses, which they had received from the tradition of Eugenius, Ildephonsus, Julian Bishops of the Toletan City, Christ the Son of God is named adoptive; they answered in this manner: *It is better to believe the testimony of God the Father concerning His Son, than Ildephonsus our own, who composed such prayers for us in Vesper solemnities as the universal and holy Church of God has not, nor do we think ourselves heard in them. Although Ildephonsus our own in his prayers named Christ adoptive, our Gregory indeed Pontiff of the Roman Sed, and most illustrious > true Doctor in his Prayers always did not

doubt to name Him unigenitus.

By which words without doubt they signify the Sacramentary of Saint Gregory: for at the end of very many Orations or Collects of the same Sacramentary Christ is called Unigenitus Son of God.

This same truth appears from the remaining parts of the divine Office on the festal day Assumption of the Mother of God Virgin; since the Antiphons resound, Verses are sung, responsories cry out, Petitions set forth that B. Virgin was assumed into Heaven. That stands established both from the Breviary and from the Missal: but assumption, as we said in the first §., signifies the reception not only of the soul but of the body of the Mother of God into Heaven. Nor indeed here did the Western Church alone use this: for also the Eastern observes the same rite in its prayers and rites, which they call Menaologia or rather Menaea. There are moreover of this kind 12 codices of the Greek Church, wherein are contained through each single day various praises to be sung in honor of the most holy Mother of God and of Saints: of which Menaea the first Collector is said to be S. Sabbas Archimandrite of Monastery Laura, as Simeon Thessalonicensis testifies in Leo Allatius, dissertation

1. On the Ecclesiastical Books of the Greeks: but by injury of times, nor even the irruption of Barbarians, when almost the Menaea had perished, by Sophronius first, then by John Damascene were restored to pristine polish, with added by each very many Odes in praise of Saints, who shone forth after the time of Saint Sabba, as the same Simeon testifies. In the Menaea themselves moreover most plainly is declared that the Virgin Mother of God was assumed in soul and body into Heaven: for Men. 15 August in Greater Vespers these things are held:

It belonged to the reason of decorum that they who had been Ministers and Spectators of the divine Word should also be present beholders of the dormition of the Mother, from whom that Word had been incarnate: as it were the last of Mysteries that remained for them to accomplish, whereby namely they might behold before their eyes not only the Savior ascending from earth into Heaven, but even exist ocular witnesses of their Genetrix translated to the skies. Wherefore transported through all spaces of lands by a certain divine force from every place they came together into Sion, and led in a certain way the Virgin hastening to enter into Heaven.

Similarly from Men. 18.:

O prodigy full of most sacred horror! She who carried in her womb the King incomprehensible to all, now just now is carried to the sepulchre, and the multitude of Angels with the Apostles watch reverently her sacred body, which received God in itself, and that body Jesus her Son lifted up into Heaven, and Savior of our souls.

Similarly from Men. 17 August:

Thy Son, and our God, that He might establish faith of the two natures He has, died indeed as man, but rose again as God. Thee too to die, O Genetrix of God, pleased God well according to the prescription of nature; lest the Incarnation of Christ seem alien from faith, as a phantasm, if its mother were not mortal. But thou didst migrate from earth into the Heavens, as a bride from thy bridal chamber, or having gone forth from a kind of tabernacle. And as thou didst illuminate the earth by bearing, so thou didst sanctify the ether by ascending. Meanwhile the Apostles cared for thy funeral untouched: and amid the exequies saw thy body gone up on high. These words are altogether spoken with fear: this is the change of the right hand of the Most High.

But how great force the argument sought from > sacred prayers of the Church has for establishing faith of any thing.

Luculently explains Celestine Supreme Pontiff in chapter 11 of the Epistle to Prosper, and Hilarion, where among other things he has these: On account of the inviolable constants of the most blessed and apostolic see, whereby insisting on the footsteps of the most pious Father, the error of pestiferous novelty laid down, we wash out the whole heresy, and in faith we look for perseverance in the end that we may return again to the grace of Christ: let us also regard the sacrament of sacerdotal Sacraments, which handed to Apostles are celebrated in the whole world, and in every Catholic Church uniformly, that the law of praying may establish the law of believing.

§ 4. — THE BODILY ASSUMPTION OF THE VIRGIN MOTHER OF GOD IS PROVED BY THE AUTHORITY OF THE SS. FATHERS.

Besides the praised authorities of SS. Fathers in preceding §§. very many others, either of the same or of others, favor this truth: above all truly St. John Damascene besides the praised second oration, of which above, even in the prior oration On the Dormition of B. Virgin speaks thus: Of whom in parturition her virginity remained intact, the same migrating from life, her body was so preserved that not dissolved, but translated unto a more excellent and more divine death, which is no longer interrupted by death, but endures into infinite ages of ages. And below: Nor was that body of thine immaculate, devoid of all stain left on earth, but translated into Heaven and royal seats, thou Queen, Lady, mistress, and true mother, and genetrix. And afterward:

Just as if anyone should apply an unguent of immense price to garments, or some place, and then remove it, the remains of sweetness remain even upon what the unguent sprinkled: in the same manner now also thy divine and sacred body, devoid again of every stain, replete with divine fragrance: that fount, I say, of perennial grace placed in the sepulchre, and then snatched up again to a more excellent and loftier region, by no means so left the sepulchre as it would be devoid of honor, but then it imparted divine benediction and grace, then left to those who come with faith a monument of Saints, and the memory of all their fount.

There subscribes Peter Damianus, who in sermon On Assumption speaks thus:

This is that day which has filled the gates of Heaven with sublimer joy, annual to the world, continuous to Angels, joining men to Angels and Angels to men with felic federation. Behold with eyes of mind the Son ascending, and the Mother assumed: do you see anything more excellent exhibited in the Ascension of the Son, and anything more glorious shown in the Assumption of the Virgin? For the Savior ascended into Heaven by the command of potestative virtue as Lord and Creator, accompanied by the obedience of Angels, supported not by aid: Mary was assumed into Heaven, but especially by the indication of Him who raised her, with Angels accompanying and ministering, while she was sustained by grace, not nature. That day this Assumption, that Ascension differ: since one thing is power, another mercy, and only to the Creator alone is it privilege, having surpassed the nature of things by proper power.

Nor say you that Peter Damian in these words does not say the bodily Assumption of Mary into Heaven, tacitly going to say if he had believed Assumption to have been of such kind. For this response is accused of falsity, not only from the aforesaid words, but also from those which Peter Damian has there:

The whole multitude of Angels is gathered together, that they may see the Queen sitting at the right hand of the Lord > of virtues, on a gilded throne, in body ever immaculate, surrounded with variety, distinguished by multiplicity of virtues.

S. Bernardus most openly supports this truth, for besides the praises in 1 Sermon 1 On the Assumption of Virgin, he has these:

Who would suffice to think how gloriously today the Queen of the world came forth, and with what affection of devotion the whole multitude of heavenly regions went forth to her meeting, whereby to the throne of glory she was led with Canticle, with how placid countenance, how serene face, received with divine embraces by the Son, and exulted over every creature, with that honor wherewith so great Mother was worthy, with that glory which became so great a Son? Quite a little kiss such impressed upon the suckling, to whom the Mother applauded in virginal bosom. Truly, has she not attained happier things, which today from the mouth of Him Sitting at the right hand of the Father in blessed solution received, while she ascended to the throne of glory? etc.

And Sermon 1.: It is time for speaking to every flesh, when the Mother of incorrupt Word is assumed into Heaven, nor ought human mortality cease from praises, when the alone human nature is exalted above immortal Spirits in the Virgin. But to what purpose would Bernard say it time to speak to every flesh, unless he believed the flesh of the Mother of the Lord assumed into Heaven? Why would he assert only human nature exalted in the Virgin, unless because previously in Christ not only human nature, but insofar as joined hypostatically with the divine had been elevated into Heaven? But concerning the mind of S. Bernard there can be no doubt, from this that he noted and touched all at least the errors of Peter Abelard up to that one: nowhere however does he carp at the sentiment of Abelard concerning the bodily Assumption of Virgin into Heaven, which he thus expounds in Sermon On Assumption:

If diligently, he says, we compare the meeting of Angels, and triumphal pomp exhibited to Christ with the pleasantness of today's festivity, we shall see something more given to the Mother in her Assumption than was exhibited to Him in the Ascension of the Son: and the course of this pomp much more worthy than that; for Angels alone could meet Christ ascending; He truly together with the whole supernal Court as much of Angels as of souls of the faithful received her soul, whose flesh He had before received; nor her soul only, but also her body is believed today to have carried up into Heaven, that by glorification of soul and flesh alike He might reward her, in which, as was said, He decreed at once to assume soul and flesh. To which indeed attests very much the sepulchre found wholly empty, just as before it had been the Lord's, that she too may be believed to have attained the glory of Resurrection and genuine stole.

Equal to Bernard was Hugh Victorine, who lib. 3. Of Theological Erudition, c. 125. writes thus:

The seventh (Privilege of Virgin Mother of God) is that with her body, as much as we believe, she lives in Heaven: for although B. Jerome (he speaks of the Sermon of Pseudo-Jerome, concerning which below) here puts opinions, he nevertheless does not disown the fact, but submitted the necks of our whole faith to astute reason, in which we say it is not impossible to God that that singular habitation of divinity should not lie under corruption, or not in all things. For He who preserved the three garments of the boys unharmed in the fiery furnace was able, and willed, to preserve incorrupt the body of His Mother.

To these can be added Fulbert of Chartres, who in Sermon On the Nativity of B. Virgin writes thus:

John ministered to her after the passion and resurrection of the Lord until > the end: but she most holy was in the valley of Josaphat, where is built up a Church in honor of her, and St. John was buried at Ephesus: afterward truly when religious Christians wished to regard the relics of his Mother, namely of the Lord, they found the sepulchre empty. But also looking into the sepulchre of B. John they found nothing except manna. Christian piety believes therefore that Christ God Son of God gloriously raised again His Mother, and exalted her above the Heavens.

Here I make no mention of very many others equal to S. Bernard, who subscribe to the same sentiment, namely Honorius Augustodunensis, Rupert of Tuy, Adam of S. Victor, etc. who in that century subscribed to the Assumption of the Virgin Mother of God. I cannot however pass over in silence the sentiment of the illustrious chief of Theologians, namely Albertus Magnus, who in the questions super Missus est, q. 132. by very many arguments proves B. Virgin to be assumed into Heaven with body and soul. The same sentiment the Angelic Doctor defends: for from the feast of the bodily Assumption as from an indubitated principle he gathers the Virgin was sanctified in maternal womb, because the Church likewise celebrates the feast of her Nativity: for thus he writes 3 p. q. 27. art. 1.: We answer that it must be said, that concerning the sanctification of B. Mary, namely that she was sanctified in the womb, nothing is handed down in Canonical Scripture, which also makes no mention even of her Nativity. As however Augustine reasonably argues in the sermon on the Assumption of the Virgin herself, that she was assumed with body into Heaven (which however Scripture does not hand down), so also we can reasonably argue that she was sanctified in the womb. Nor does it matter that in assertion of this truth he brings forward the testimony of a sermon of Saint Augustine, which however later we shall prove not to be his but perhaps of Fulbert of Chartres: for from this appears there was no controversy in the time of S. Thomas concerning the bodily reception of the Virgin into Heaven, since there was no disputation about that sermon. He hands down the same truth Opusc. 8., where he says: The earth (supple malediction) was common among women, namely that they be reduced to dust, and from this B. Virgin was immune, because she was assumed with body into Heaven: for we believe that after death she rose again, and was carried into Heaven. And subscribes Doctor Seraphicus in the Sermon on B. Mary, where he has these: O how far from that vice of incineration was (as we believe) the most holy body of Mary! For that body is the most sacred Ark of God, which befitted not to putrefy, but to be raised after the likeness of her Son before all putrefaction: whence of both Son and Mother notably says the Prophet: Surge Domine in requiem tuam, tu et arca sanctificationis tuae. The same afterward was the sentiment of Gerson Chancellor of Paris, for 4 p. operum Sermon on Conception:

The Holy Spirit, he says, sometimes reveals to the Church or Doctors of later times certain truths, or expositions of Sacred Scripture, which He revealed not to their predecessors. Thus Gregory says Danieli 12. Many shall pass over, and knowledge shall be manifold of the Lord. Therefore Moses knew more than Abraham, Prophet than Moses, Apostles than Prophets, and Doctors have added many truths beyond Apostles. Wherefore we can say this truth, that B. Mary was not conceived in original sin, from those truths which newly are revealed or declared as well through miracles which are read, as through the greater part of Eccle> sic sancta, which holds in this manner. There was some time in which it was not generally held that Virgin Mary was in Paradise with body and soul, as now is held, and similarly after institution of feast of Nativity S. Joannis. The Nativity of our Lady was ordained through revelation of one only virgin, and many similar things.

To these — that I may omit others presently of whatever century down to us of this most certainly discovered truth, and most received Assertor by the Church — it pleases to praise one alone S. Bernardino, who not only preaches B. Virgin assumed into Heaven in soul and body, but also proves by most valid reasons, which I judged must be written here for the reader's gratification. For he says Sermon 12. which is On Assumption B. Virgin, art. 3. cap. 1.: Although, he says, concerning this (namely bodily Assumption) the authority of sacred Scripture be not found express: yet it repugns not Sacred Scripture, but rather sounds consonantly and harmonizes with it, and also manifold reason persuades most efficaciously; for according to Augustine none doubts that Jesus could do this: surely less ought he doubt that He Himself willed, because filial reverence befitted this. That moreover B. Virgin reigns glorious in the Heavens both in body and soul is shown by sevenfold reason.

§ 5. — THE SAME TRUTH IS PROVED BY REASON BY S. BERNARDINE.

First on account of unity of substance of flesh in mother and offspring. For since the flesh of offspring is drawn naturally from the flesh of mother, the same proper substance of flesh belongs to each. Therefore from the general sentence of death, although Christ Son of God did not exempt His Mother, because from it He willed neither Himself nor anyone to be alien, and hence died the Son, the Mother died; nevertheless as the flesh of offspring was not corrupted: Ps. Nec dabis sanctum tuum videre corruptionem so neither ought the most holy flesh of the Mother, from whom the flesh of Son was assumed, to be corrupted, or incinerated, or reduced to dust. Therefore the soul is reunited to the flesh, and B. Virgin Mary is simultaneously in soul and body glorified. Secondly on account of incorruptibility. For manifold indeed was sentence pronounced against woman. First against other women. Whence Gen. 3 cap. the Lord says: Multiplicabo aerumnas tuas, et conceptus tuos, in dolore paries filios, et sub viri potestate eris. Mary indeed multiplied sorrows: when, as said Luke 2., in the passion of the Son the sword of sorrow transpierced her soul: but she multiplied not conceptions, nor lived under power of man, because with most intact viscera, and integrity of virginity remaining she conceived of Spirit S.; which because she received without pollution of sin and detriment of virile admixture, without pain she bore, and without violation of integrity remained with entire modesty of virginity. Since truly He could and willed to keep the Mother immune from corruption of integrity, and violation of modesty in conception and parturition, beyond sentence pronounced against whatsoever women, it befitted Him to be able and willing to keep her from corruption of dissolution and incineration, beyond, nay above general condition of human nature. Thus therefore we say, the Mother of the Lord underwent mortality of human lot, yet such that by bonds of death she could not be held, whereby the Lord willed without corruption to be conceived and born.

Thirdly, on account of honorableness, that is, that He might conserve the honor of His Mother. Exodus the same chapter 20. it is written: Honora Patrem tuum, et Matrem tuam. If therefore Christ refused not to keep the law but fulfilled it, > as said Matth. 5., in what manner He could He honored the Father,

as said Ioan. 8.: Ego honorifico Patrem meum: so He owed the Mother to honor in what manner He could. If therefore opprobrium of human condition and vituperation is rottenness and worm, as from that opprobrium He Himself existed alien, so He owed to conserve the Mother immune, since the same flesh is of mother and offspring. As therefore in life He honored her by grace of conception and parturition especially above others, so undoubtedly it must be felt that in death He honored her with special grace.

Fourthly, on account of dignity and sanctity. For so great was Mary's dignity and sanctity, that she merited to be Mother of the Holy of Holies of God: but as the Son is Sanctus Sanctorum, so it stands established that the Mother, who bore Him, is Sancta Sanctorum, in whom was that precious treasure, tabernacle of God, throne of God, and bridal chamber. But so great sanctity, so great dignity ought no corruption of rottenness to follow, no incineration of dissolution. In no way therefore does it seem worthy or consonant to reason that that most sacred body, from which Christ received flesh, and in which He united the divine person to human nature, that the Word be made flesh and dwell in us, should become food for worms themselves, and after worms cast-off dust be cast out.

Fifthly, on account of conformity namely of mother and offspring. For the Mother was perfectly conformed to her Son, and chief imitator. If therefore Ioan. 12 cap. He Himself says: Si quis mihi ministrat, me sequatur: et ubi sum ego, illic et minister meus erit: Mary indeed Christ's chief imitator followed not only the steps of His feet but also out of reverence followed the Lord Himself with affection of piety, faith, religion, and ardent love of charity, so that she could never be torn from His faith and love, Him whom she conceived by the Holy Spirit, an Angel announcing. For she conceived Him, bore Him, nursed Him, carried Him about, hid Him from the face of Herod: therefore she ought not to be anywhere except where Christ is. And not only as other Saints are, but with a certain special prerogative. Since, as Matth. 16 cap. it is written: Ipse reddet unicuique iuxta opera sua. If therefore the death of all Saints is precious, the death of Mary is most precious, attended by so great grace. If therefore in life Mary was gifted with grace before all, in death surely it must not be diminished: but where Christ Son of God reigns in mind and body she was placed. Again if Mary was most conformable to Christ as Mother in purity, and nobility, or royal dignity, surely the Mother ought not to be separated from Son, Queen from King, not only mentally but not even bodily. Therefore Mary Queen of heaven of Christ ought together with Himself to have been placed glorified in soul and body among celestial things.

Sixthly, on account of equity: for as Ambrose says: Christ our Lord came healing both. Accordingly He took man, born however of woman. But perfect cure and perfect liberation is manifested in resurrection: therefore resurrection in each sex ought to be manifested in testimony of perfect cure. As therefore as regards the male sex it was manifested and appeared in Christ, so also it ought to appear in a female. But in no other female could or ought more fitly be manifested, and befitted than in sweetest Mother of Christ, who in life existed free from all corruption. And this is what the Prophet in person of Lord says: *Thalamus eius sicut sol in conspectu meo, et sicut Luna perfecta ⟦OCR illegible: "in atrinum"⟧ et testis in epulo fidelis. The throne indeed of the Son of God is His Mother, who in His sight shining like sun is as regards glory of soul; and like perfect moon forever as regards glory of body without defect: hence faithful witness of glory of resurrection. Seventhly, on account of integrity, that is on account of complement of beatitude. For, as Augustine says sup. Genesis to letter, and Bernard On loving God, because of appetite of administering body souls are retarded, lest they bear themselves totally into God, as into highest good, alone excepted soul of Christ, which was united to Word by unity of person, which because of personal union was retarded in nothing nor suffered detriment of glory. Since therefore complement of glory is in reassumption of second stole⟦?⟧, unfitting and indecent seems that Mother of God, Queen of heaven suffered some detriment of glory. Therefore it was necessary that her body, although because of condition of flesh soul had been separated from body, nevertheless together with body afterward existed glorified. In same book also he adduces examples of Sacred Scripture; for he says: One firm will amid crackling fires preserved not only bodies of three boys unharmed but even garments unscorched, Dan. iii. Why therefore should it not effect in His own Mother what He did in another's? He preserved Jonas in belly of Whale incorrupt beyond usual course of nature, Ion. 2 cap., and will He not preserve the Mother incorrupt beyond nature? Daniel was preserved in most ardent or most unrestrained lake of Lions, Dan. xiv. Why therefore must not Mary, endowed with such great merits of dignities, be preserved?

§ 6. — OBJECTIONS WILL BE PROPOSED AND SOLVED.

They object therefore first that sermon noted above under name of S. Hieronymi, which begins: Cogitis me, Paula, et Eustochium, etc. Where that masked Writer under usurped name and feigned title of S. Hieronymi assails doctrine of Church concerning bodily Assumption of Virgin, and strives to shake it by authority of so great man: for among other things, when he had said Virgin's Mausoleum in Valley Iosaphat shown empty in middle⟦?⟧, he subjoins:

These things I would say therefore, because many of ours doubt whether she was assumed at once with body, or died leaving her body. But how, or at what time, or by what persons her most sacred body was taken away thence, or whither transferred, whether she resumed it, is unknown. And within: Nevertheless what of these is judged truer we are uncertain: yet we commit all to God, to whom nothing impossible, rather than we should wish rashly to define anything by our authority which we prove not: just as concerning those whom we believe rose again with Lord, Gospel witness, but whether they returned into dust of earth we have no certainty.

Therefore in time of S. Hieronymi it was altogether uncertain that B. Virgin had been assumed into heaven simultaneously in soul and body.

I deny the consequence. and reason rendered I say with Baronius to year of Christ 43. n. 13. that Sermon not only is not Jerome's, but not even of any sincere and true writer, but of certain other Author, who craftily usurped names of Jerome, Paula, and Eustochium to merit faith. Which certainly is demonstrated with easy labor by gravest considerations. First for same one supposes himself compelled by prayers of Paula, and Eustochius to write this sermon; whereas at time he wrote, Paula had already migrated from life at least 44 years before: since in that sermon he exhorts Paula to beware error of Nestorius and Eutyches. Nestorian heresy, as S. Prosper writes in Chronicle, arose and began to be published in year of Christ 429. Eutychian truly is consigned to year 451, as gathered from Acts of Council of Constantinople related in Council of Chalcedon. But Paula closed last day in year of Christ 404. for S. Hieronymus in epitaph of Paula herself writes thus: Slept holy, B. Paula 7 Kal Feb. third Sabbath, after sixth ⟦erubitum?⟧ buried 5 Kal same, Consuls Honorio August six times, and ⟦Ardabure?⟧, ⟦Aristeneto?⟧ to be restored. This Era falls in year of Christ 404. To these add that this masked Writer under name of S. Hieronymi wrote this sermon around year 448, whereas from Chronicle S. Prosperi it stands that S. Hieronymus died in year of Christ 420. That however he touches both heresies of Nestorius and Eutychis sufficiently stands from these words: Hence also Theotocon her hyperetice we confess, namely genetrix of God: and likewise Christotocon: neither why Word put off flesh late, nor because prefated flesh was joined: but then when Word was made flesh from flesh of Virgin, substance of Divinity and humanity is joined in womb so unconvulsed that that person is God, and not Christ. With these words, I say, he assails both heresies, namely Nestorii, who denied Virgin to be Theotocon: and Eutychis affirming two natures in Christ did not remain unconfused and unmixed after union.

Secondly, says Baronius n. 18., how, I ask, that author, who counterfeited himself Jerome, says sepulcher of Genetrix of God at time when Jerome lived to have been perspicuous to all from earth above? By what reason Epiphanius often dwelling at Jerusalem (as Jerome hands down concerning him) says himself uncertain whether she died, if her sepulchre set before eyes of all were immediately perspicuous to all? Or how could Jerome omit mention of it, who rereading all places of Palestine which S. Paula coming from Rome visited, and — to pass over sepulchre of Christ — recounts all other monuments there worthy of memory, as 12 Patriarchs, Iosue, Eleazar son of Aaron, Elisaeus, Abdias, Michaea, John Baptist, Lazarus, and likewise Mausoleum of Helena Queen of Adiabeni, who in time of Claudii fed people laboring with famine? Who can be brought to believe that sepulcher alone of Genetrix of God spurned by Paula, so she did not visit it? or Jerome thus fallen from mind as not remember it? since especially treating of Gethsemani in book Of Hebrew Places, he attests only one Church erected there, where Lord prayed in garden, nor makes even word concerning sepulchre of Genetrix of God contiguous to same place?

From these therefore imposture of man becomes more manifest, who under name of same Hieronymi > wrote said epistle to Paulam, while he says: Moreover his sepulchre is shown to us beholding until present in valley of Iosaphat in middle, situated which is path between mount Sion, and mount Oliveti, which thou, o Paula, hast seen with eyes, where Church fabricated in honor of him of wonderful stone storied, in which buried to have been, as you can know, preached by all, but now empty mausoleum is shown to those going. These things that egregious composer of falsehoods, who is convicted of patent falsehood not only from these things we said but also from Eusebius lib. 3. Life Constantini, cap. 24. and others, who treated of holy places found in times of Constantini and buildings adorned, since none of them made even light mention of sepulcher of Virgin.

These words Baronius. It stands therefore that sepulcher of Virgin lay hid long, and perhaps became known only around times of Juvenal Ierosolymitan Prelate: whence it happened that upon its discovery published through globe, Marcian Emperor, and Pulcheria moved to summon same Juvenal, entreating him⟦?⟧, that if he had any relics of sacratissime Virgin, he transmit them to them, to be replaced in augustissime temple which they had cared to build in honor of B. Virgin at Blachernis, as said pag. 766⟦?⟧. — Thirdly, that Author, whoever he be, invents trifles and fables far alien from gravity of speech S. Hieronymi; for he fabricates to Paula ludic and fictitious visions which he openly publishes, whereas he asserts they were consigned to him sub secreto by Paula, as when he says, around beginning, addressing Paulam:

To manger also, o Paula, thee witness, boy born, thou heardest multitude of Angels amid cradle-games of newborn partus, and plaints of unknowing weeping for fescennines, singing Gloria in excelsis Deo, and in terra pax hominibus bonae voluntatis, and sawest radiant star. Shepherds moreover evangelizing thou didst believe; Magi besides bearing three munera in vision with blessed eyes thou didst behold, she herself those same munera well understanding, with all things of faith offered to God⟦?⟧. For even with same Magi God-boy in manger thou didst adore. But perhaps complaining, me detractor, that I betrayed thee, thou wilt cry: yet what⟦?⟧ I, if thou wished to be hidden, conscience witness, oughtest not to narrate to me before manger, where thou weptst very much: which that I confess true, with praises of Christ, although I wish, adjured, nor can thy praises altogether be silent. Therefore thee only I shall ask, daughter, whom milk thou dost nurse: thou wilt better unlock those things which I know not some form, or certainly in spirit thou sawest.

By which words that author whoever he be brings forth very many things which savor not even a hair of weighty eloquence S. Hieronymi. For who would endure Canticle of Angel likened to obscene fescennine verses? Who will judge S. Hieronymum, studying above all christian humility, to have wished to subject goads of vain glory to S. Paulam, into whose ears he chiefly instilled his own demission, by publishing while she lived divine revelations made to her? Who will bring himself to believe most prudent man wished to publish committed to his ear secrets? Nor certainly less appear false those things he subjoins when he says: All deeds of Salvatoris, and obsequia B. Mariae, likewise acts of her ye learned from Evangelio. For I would wish he brought forth from which Evangelista he drew out acts of life B. Virginis. Truly, as sometimes truth compels even its own opponents to its tutela and patrocinium, thence it came about that Pseudo-Hieronymus himself who had taken parts of corporalis Assumptionis to be impugned was assertor of it: truly feast in honor of assumptae Virginis accustomed to be celebrated by Ecclesia under name Assumptionis he testifies when he says around beginning: Concerning Assumptione however of her, because beautifully assumed⟦?⟧, because intention of your devotion demands⟦?⟧, present absent I cared to write to you, which devoted I offered present in absence: as holds your holy collegium on day of so great solemnity munus of Latini sermonis, in which tender infantia may learn to perceive sweetness from ubere of milk, and concerning eximia to think egregia: how, God bidding⟦?⟧, through single hours this whole day be spent in praise, and celebrated with joy: he subjoins however that sentiment concerning bodily Assumption had grown strong among very many also at his time. Although, he says, certain ones may wish to affirm her already resuscitated, and blessed with immortalitate with Christ to be clothed in caelestibus.

Adversaries urge: That Sermon the Church long held for genuine treatise of S. Hieronymi, which inserted part of it into Breviarium for lessons to be recited on that very festal day of Assumptionis; as seen in ancient Breviaries not only of particular Churches and Orders but even in Roman Breviaries, in which from that time when feast of Assumptionis began to be celebrated also began to be read lessons taken from that sermon under name S. Hieronymi. — Then, when in time of Charlemagne some controversy had arisen concerning body of Virgin assumed into heaven, and certain ones denied Virgin assumed in body, relying on authority of that sermon itself which circulated under name S. Hieronymi, and when certain Monk Corbeiensis had begun to assail sermon S. Hieronymi, Hinemarus opposed himself to him: for Flodoardus Remensis writes Hist. lib. 3. cap. 8.: Likewise wrote in behalf of little book of history concerning birth sanctae Mariae, and hom. B. Hieronymi concerning Assumption of Genitricis herself, which certain Micaelmarus Corbeiensis⟦?⟧ contended were not to be received. To which same Lord answered profectam⟦?⟧ history to have us for edification, not for producing authority: but homilia same asserts dictated catholice by Hieronymo, as style, caution of sense and intellect, and other certain indications demonstrate. And certainly persons through whom from oriental parts at certain time carried to our Regions arrived make faith.

Nor Hinemarus only, but very many others testified aforesaid sermon to be S. Hieronymi. Thus Odilo Abbas Cluniacensis in Sermon On Assumption Virginis manuscript, which Cluniacensis Bibliotheca has: Of her, he says, merits and gloriosissima hodierna Assumptione Interpretes of divine law S. Hieronymus, and other egregii Doctores so great and such things could and wished to say, to which we owe to add nothing. — Similarly Durandus Bishop Mimatensis lib. 1. On Divine Offices, cap. 21. writes thus:

Hieronymus says: In what manner B. Virgo was assumed, whether in body or beyond body I know not; Deus scit: Augustinus truly says, that in body. Truth however is, that first assumed in anima: whether corpus remained in terra uncertain we hold: and better is piously to doubt than rashly define anything: piously nevertheless must be believed her to have been totally assumed.

To these is joined Ado Episcopus Viennensis, who in little book Concerning feasts toward end at VII Ides September writes thus:

Of whom (San> ctissimae Genitricis Dei) dormitionem XVIII Kal Septembris every Ecclesia celebrates, whose sacred body likewise is not found above earth, just as neither sepulchre B. Moysis, whom sacred Scripture says buried by Lord: nevertheless pious mother Ecclesia, which founded in integerrima faith stands in its observations, keeps venerable memory festive thus of her, that she doubt not she migrated according to condition of flesh; that⟦?⟧ venerable templum Spiritus sancti that, namely flesh itself beatissimae Virginis Mariae hidden by divine nutu and consilio, sobrietas Ecclesiae rather chose with piety to be ignorant than teaching holding something frivolous and apocryphal thence.

Nearly similar has Usuardus, whom Vossius lib. 2. De Hist. Latinis says to be Monk of coenobium Fuldense of Order D. Benedicti, hearer of Alcuini. Philippus Labbe, in Bibliotheca Chronologica, asserts him to have been Monk of Order S. Benedicti, and Abbot of S. Salvatoris Vicecomitis in lower Normannia: others truly think him to have been Monk of coenobium S. Germani near Parisios⟦?⟧, resting on this foundation, that in perantiquum Martyrologium Manuscriptum donated by Petro Pithoeo to Fathers of Monastery S. Germani these are read at end of prologue: Here ends prologue Usuardi Monk S. Germani Parisiensis. He, I say, in Martyrologio his has these: Eighteenth Kalends Septembris. Dormitio sanctae Genitricis Dei Mariae, whose sacratissimum corpus, though not found super terram, tamen pia mater Ecclesiae keeps venerable memory festive thus of her, that doubt not she migrated pro conditione carnis. But that venerable templum Spiritus sancti hidden nutu and consilio divino, more chose sobrietas Ecclesiae cum pietate nescire than aliquid frivolous and apocryphum thence tenendo docere. Therefore by all these considerations stands both aforesaid sermon to be S. Hieronymi, and Church not to hold certain B. Virginem in body simultaneously and soul received into caelo.

I deny the consequence, and to first head say it would not be wonder that very many authors praised this sermon, and several Churches inscribed lessons from it in their Breviaries, since long it was thought this sermon truly to be S. Hieronymi, and hence very many things in commendation and glory of Virgin Mother of God are held written in it not only elegantly but piously; whence not wonder that Church Romana sometimes drew lessons from that sermon, for, as Pius V. observes in his constitution prefixed to Breviary edited by him and purged of many errors with which it abounded, in ancient Breviaries very many things were alien and uncertain, which altogether were expuncta: just as long ago already rescinded from Roman Breviary was that Sermon of Pseudo-Hieronymi: and immediately no authority or commendation is applied to it because some part of it was once inserted in Breviaries or because it had very many laudatores. Whose care and study⟦?⟧ was not to investigate and search out whether truly that sermon circulating under name S. Hieronymi was his or not; since concerning it then no controversy was moved. For that Hinemarus undertook defense of that sermon against Monk Corbiensem, he did not do for that reason, as if he called into doubt bodily Assumption Virginis Deiparae: with what faith would he have undertaken that, when few years before by Fathers of Council Moguntinus had been asserted bodily Assumption, which could not escape Hinemarum? Nothing therefore else accomplished Hincmarus than kindly interpret that sermon which he judged to be S. Hieronymi, lest on its account S. Hieronymus should be heard ill among Catholics; this seems Flodoardus to intimate when he says: Immo vero eumdem⟦?⟧ assert (Hinemarum) said catholice ab Hieronymo, as style, caution, sense and intellect and other certain indication demonstrate. — But as regards Adonem, and Usuardum, deservedly Baronius carps them ad an. 48. n. 15. these words:

Usuardus, and Ado in their Martyrologies, thinking writing that concerning transit B. Mariae germana Hieronymi, and again that to be only in Ecclesia which he felt, judging; quasi ex sententia Ecclesiae described in hunc modum placed 18 Kal Septemb Dormitio sanctae Genitricis Dei Mariae, cuius sacratissimum corpus, etsi non inveniatur super terram, tamen pia mater Ecclesia eius venerabilem memoriam sic festivam agit, ut pro conditione carnis eam migrasse non dubitet. Quod autem venerabile illud Spiritus sancti templum nutu et consilio divino collocatum sit, plus elegit sobrietas Ecclesiae cum pietate nescire, quam aliquid frivolum et apocryphum inde tenendo docere. These themselves⟦?⟧. But while they think to avoid apocryphon, fallen they are into worse. But whence finally these accepted by them, whence deduced? Certainly from nowhere else than from that, I say not only apocrypho libro but impostura, pervulgata nomine Hieronymi, or recently by certain ones, ut Erasmo, same ascribed Sophronio: there indeed nearly these same words are held, or which render entirely same sententiam: propter cautelam, salva fide, pio magis desiderio opinari oporteat, quam inconsulte definire quod sine periculo nescitur. These there, and many more to same sentiment, as that above: what of these judged truer, ambigimus, whether soul alone, or joined to body received into caelum. Laudanda perhaps modestia, unless labefactata mendacio. If indeed sententia Domini, who speaks from Himself, mendax est; quanto magis, qui falsely, quo might hunt some fidem, simulated himself Hieronymum; so that whom stands to have lived after times Nestorii, so familiarly seems to address Paulam, and Eustochium? From these therefore you see what sort are its merces, which only smeared with these tenebris it was licit to venditare, since sincera veritas gaudeat luce.

Shortly after:

But Usuardum, and Adonem to instituted once oration let us call back again. Whence, I ask, to you this nomenclature newly usurped, that ye say Dormitionem not Assumptionem, since especially on eve of that day both said you, Vigilia Assumptionis? Why rather according to your sentiment Vigilia dormitionis? Why this inconstantia of sermon? Forced indeed with Apostle say: Currebatis bene; quis vos impedivit? Or perhaps moved by example of Graecorum, who likewise said Dormitionem? But neither aids you such example: since otherwise Ioannes Damascenus and others who said dormitionem nevertheless plainly testified her assumed into caelum one with body; nor, as you, hesitated affirming it. But certainly (as clearly appears) nothing drove you to these unless authority of Hieronymi, which you thought. Hence worthy of some excuse, that deceived by name Hieronymi, if example Romanae Ecclesiae which ye should follow ye had brought forward. Did they not precede traces which > ye should have followed of Martyrologii Romani most ancient, in which not Dormitio but Assumptio is said? Which voce always used Ecclesia Romana, as seen in Ordine Romano, Sacramentario Sancti Gregorii, other ancient Ritualibus and Missalibus books. What, I ask you, means it that while recollecting Nativitatis of all others Sanctorum, namely celebritatem of migration from this life, Church accustomed to name natalem diem, or migrationem, or sometimes dormitionem, this she calls neither migrationem but names Assumptionem except because willed to signify transitus to God not only animae but also simul evectionem corporis? For as when Christi anima una cum carne ascended caelos propria non aliena virtute He calls Ascensionem; so migrationem Genitricis Dei, because not suapte virtute but Filii gratia rose again a mortuis and was evecta in caelum, proprietate loquendi Ecclesia maluit appellare Assumptionem. Moreover not only these epistola commentitia nomine Hieronymi scripta vel Sophronio falso attributa deceive, sed et alii complures eorumdem auctoritate decepti sunt, who said: Plus elegit sobrietas Ecclesiae nescire cum pietate, quam aliquid frivolum et apocryphum inde tenendo docere; as among others author ille sermonis, who hitherto lurked under name Augustini (est autem trigesimus quintus de Sanctis), sed etiam⟦?⟧: since cited by him Isidorus, another ab Augustino to be author certain est: he, I say, struck by same Hieronymi auctoritate nec verbum proferre de Assumptione cum corpore ausus est. But let them say, I wish, ubinam, aut quando, or quo saltem levi signo, what they say, Ecclesia professa sit se nescire, since otherwise though edicted no decree of that matter, in ipsis sacris Ecclesiasticis precibus, quas ea die publice recitare consuevit, id affirmasse saepius videatur, Versibus, Responsoriis, Antiphonis, and Lectionibus; to quam sententiam while Patres omnes who treated of matter unice⟦?⟧ conspirent, and class Scholasticorum, procacis sit animi indicium, usui universalis Ecclesiae and tot Patrum sententiis not acquiescere, maximamque omnium esse temeritatem contradicere his omnibus, since especially quae⟦?⟧ Hieronymi, vel Sophronii nomine scripta est epistola, quam refellimus, ac proinde Sermones de Assumptione falso adscripti Augustino, quos merito Lovaniensis Schola reiicit in angulum, or which are of such kind other apocryphorum quisquiliae, quae potius detrahunt quam probent veritatem, we confess all these same things still other ratione, ut manifestae arguantur falsitatis.

These words Baronius, which therefore, although somewhat longer, we wished here to insert, since compendiously it touches nearly everything, which more fully hitherto we discussed.

You ask: At what time the aforesaid concluded⟦?⟧ sermon of Pseudo-Hieronymi is judged? — I answer to me not improbable seems that little book published and circulated after year 680. in which sixth Oecumenica Synodus was celebrated, in which damned was haeresis Monothelitarum, since keenly it fights for two operationibus Christi, for he says: Stands therefore one, same Christ secundum utrasque formas operatum, humanitatis namely, ac Divinitatis, hence two exercised operationes: operated indeed each forma seu natura cum > alterius communione, id quod proprium habuit: Verbo siquidem operante, quod divinum est⟦?⟧, and carne quod proprium habuit.

These words seem borrowed ex sexta Synodo. Add that if libellus that had been circulated sub nomine S. Hieronymi before praefatam Synodum; without doubt omnes sacri Praesules, and Doctores, who fought most keenly congestis SS. Patrum Oraculis adversus Monothelitas, someone would have praised praefatum libellum S. Hieronymi: at nullus, whom I saw, Scriptores of that age make mention of it; and immediately seems libellus then not edited in lucem: therefore licet conicere him fuisse vulgatum circa finem saeculi septimi: since evidently Arculphus reversus in Gallias began narrare ea, quae audiverat a Monacho de sublato corpore Virginis: occasione indeed illius narrationis someone novitate huius sententiae delighted published istum sermonem, to whom ut fidem aliquam conciliaret, sub nomine S. Hieronymi illum evulgavit.

§ 7. — THE SENTIMENT OF SACRA FACULTATIS PARISIENSIS PRO ASSUMPTIONE CORPOREA B. VIRGINIS.

To all these accedes sacra Facultatis Parisiensis sentiment concerning Assumptione corporali Virginis Deiparae, ac doctrina, which certainly shone most openly circa annum Christi 1497⟦?⟧, gravi edita censura adversus F. Ioannem Morcellum Dominicanum, qui cum inter concionandum quatuor in Ecclesia S. Benedicti sacras propositiones de B. Maria Virgine insulse protulisset, when that reported ad sacram Parisiensem Facultatem, duo statim praestitit: Primum, Comitiis habitis die 23 mensis Augusti, iussit propositiones revocari ab eodem fratre Morcello, quem sibi eo consilio sisti voluit. Deinde habito consensu D. Ioannis Simonis, who tunc praeerat Parisiensi Ecclesiae Episcopus, mandavit eidem Morcello, that in Concione, quam habiturus erat eadem in Basilica festo die Nativitatis S. Mariae, tum propositiones a se temere editas revocaret, tum censuram coram populo legeret, qua sacra Facultas singulas ex illis propositionibus notaverat. Quod utrumque a Morcello praestitum. Tenor however censurae sacrae Facultatis Parisiensis follows:

Anno Domini 1497. Augusti 26. qualificavit Facultas approbando novem Deputatorum sententiam, propositiones Fratris Ioannis Morcelli Praedicatoris modo, qui sequitur. Prima propositio: Deus potest producere creaturam puram in maiori gloria, quam sit Virgo Maria de potentia absoluta, licet non de potentia ordinaria. Censura: Quoad primam partem, licet sit vera, tamen inepte, indiscrete, infructuose, and sine aedificatione populi taliter praedicanda. Quoad secundam partem, si comparare intendat Virginem ad humanitatem Christi, vel animam eius quoad gloriam, falsa est, erronea in fide, and sic revocanda. — Secunda propositio: Problema est Virginem Mariam pulchriorem esse corporaliter Eva. Censura: Est temeraria, laudis and dignitatis Virginis detractiva, falsa, dictis Sanctorum dissona, Scripturae sacrae verisimiliter contraria, de haeresi suspecta: ideo revocanda. — Tertia propositio: Christum occurrisse Virgini Mariae in sua Assumptione apocryphum est. Censura: Falsa est, contra scripta Doctorum, impietati favens, piarum aurium offensiva, retractiva populi a devotione, quam habet ad Virginem Genitricem Dei: ideo revocanda. — Quarta propositio: Nos non tenemur credere sub poena peccati mortalis, quod Virgo fuit assumpta in corpore et anima, quia non est Articulus Fidei. Censura: Ita patet⟦?⟧, temeraria, scandalosa, impia, devotionis populi diminutiva ad Virginem, falsa and haeretica; ideo publice revocanda. Revocatae sunt 23 per Praedicatorem Fratrem Ioannem Morcellum, in praesentia Facultatis, revocabitque coram populo die Nativitatis Virginis Mariae proxime ventura in Ecclesia S. Benedicti, ubi propositiones praedicaverat die Assumptionis, cuius revocationis copia, and schedulae per Facultatem Theologiae confectae, consensu Reverendi in Christo Patris, and Domini Episcopi Parisiensis, datae per praedictam Facultatem Fratri Ioanni Morcello ad pronuntiandum in suo sermone, quem fecit die Nativitatis B. Mariae in Ecclesia S. Benedicti bene versae. Parisisiis anno, die, mense praedictis.

From which appears how religious is sacra Facultas Parisiensis toward cultum and observantiam Virginis Deiparae; truly far from only immaculatam Conceptionem eius, sed etiam Assumptionem in caelum corporalem strenuissime propugnat.

I answer, that censura seems supposititia. Primo quia supposed facta 7 Kal Sept an 1497⟦?⟧, at Robertus Gaguinus Ordinis SS Trinitatis de Redemptione Captivorum Minister generalis, ac Pontificii iuris Interpres, who same year Kal Octob concertationem habuit de puritate Conceptionis Virginis Mariae adversus Vincentium Castrenovanum, in qua nomine Theologorum Parisiensium apparere voluit; in qua autem refert omnes gloria Deiparae Virginis detractores, quos sacra Facultas suis censuris mulctaverat ac proscripserat: at nec verbum quidem in narratione accusatoria illa pronuntiat de damnato Ioanne Morcello. Sign est igitur censuram illam supposititiam esse; nam si qua veritate niteretur, illam procul dubio, ut egregium suae narrationis argumentum, non siluisset. Ait enim:

quandoquidem tota studii atque certaminis haec disceptatio est, vestrum examen iure subibit, quo permulti olim aut steterunt, aut reciderunt: quod enim vestro liberatum est scrutinio, id sine dubietate verum, iustumque a fidelissimis quibusque suscipitur. Christianae nempe religioni non minus firmamento, quam arrogantiae plurimorum formidini semper fuistis. Nam sapientiae Theologicae, and vestra laudis est Maiorum vestrorum gravis quondam definitio in Ioannem de Montesono, cuius defensorem Ebroicanum Pontificem Guillermum poena similis complexa est. Quod secutus ad parem errorem Ioannes Thomas, vestro examine damnationem accepit. Eodem exemplo plexus est Adam Suessionaeus, nec Guatridus de Sancto Martino vestram evasit censuram. Temeritas Ioannis Adae erroris sui perfidiam vobis insequentibus abnegavit. Sed numquid Petrus de Canchero, Ioannes Vicolai, Petrus quoque de Cheriaco superati vestris disputationibus⟦?⟧, diffamatione publica retractationis se reddiderunt insignes, et famosos?

Secundo, censura ridetur nimis festinanter lata; siquidem intra praedicationem propositionum, and notationem earundem intercedunt dies tantum 11, quo sane modico tempore potuerunt non deputati investigare, ac revolvere Concilia, ac SS Patres, ut iuxta placita eorum de propositionibus praedictis ferrent sententiam. Adde quod revocatae sunt propositiones per Fr Ioannem Morcellum die 23 Augusti, cum tamen supposed notatae, ac damnatae, ac censura proscripta die 26⟦?⟧ Augusti. Tertio, quarta damnatur propositio ut haeretica, cum tamen non sit articulus fidei, Virginem assumptam esse in caelum in corpore and anima, ac proinde negare id non haereticum est. — Verum quam futilia, quamque levia sint haec momenta, quibus impetitur censura sacrae Facultatis, facile apparet. Primum quidem, quia significat Gaguinus sibi propositum fuisse in medium adducere, non quidem actum esset heri vel nudius tertius; sed olim, and a maioribus decreta a sacra Facultate adversus Novatores, ut apparet verbis eius: ad quod certe institutum nil conferebat recens censura adversus Morcellum lata; quippe quae adhuc vulgabatur ore omnium. Ad secundum dico non diu laborandum fuisse Facultati, ut deprehenderet quibus notis proscriberet praefatas propositiones, maxime vero quartam, quippe cum receptissimum tunc temporis esset in Ecclesia, Deiparam Virginem assumptam esse in caelum corpore simul and anima. Quod utique fit veri similius⟦?⟧, quia illae propositiones Morcelli F. ita offenderant probos omnes, ut non expectata sollemni Facultatis censura, qua tantum 26 Augusti edita est, easdem ipse privatim die 28 eiusdem mensis coram Facultate revocare coactus fuerit, donec videlicet per Facultatem sigillatim notatas eas revocaret in publica Concione, and eiuraret. Id tertium dico, quartam illam propositionem damnari non idcirco ut haereticam, quod Morcellus negaret Mariam Virginem evectam in caelum corpore, sed quod doceret ideo nos non teneri sub poena peccati mortalis id credere, quia non est articulus fidei: plurima enim sunt, quae inter articulos fidei non censentur, puta quadragesimale ieunium servandum esse, and similia innumera, quae si quis negaret, mortalis labem peccati incurreret; ac proinde haereticum est asserere posse citra mortale peccatum negari id quod inter Articulos fidei non censetur.

NOTE 1. Whereas the Virgin Mother of God, by the surpassing integrity and holiness of her life, crushed not only the head but also the body of the serpent: hence that most ancient serpent employed all the arts of death he could, either to prohibit or to destroy the due cult and veneration to be rendered to her. For besides the fact that at times there have arisen heretics — and especially certain women, as St. Epiphanius relates in his heresies 78 and 79 — who venerated the Virgin Mother of God as if she were some divinity, and offered libations and sacrifices to her; there have been various heretics in almost every century who were enemies and assailers of Marian cult. For since of the most blessed Virgin the Church rightly sings: You alone have destroyed all heresies in the whole world, no one ought wonder if all the heresies that arise cease not to rage and do battle against her glory. For, to pass over others, the Lutherans and Calvinists have burned with the most bitter hatred against the cultivators of the cult of the Blessed Virgin.

Hence Luther in his Postilla on the Nativity and Annunciation of Mary writes, no less mendaciously than impudently: The Papists have made Mary a Goddess, and have recourse to her more than to Christ, and ask and expect more from her. Melanchthon in his Apology of the Confession says that it is cried out among the Papists that Mary has succeeded in the place of Christ, because they place more confidence in her than in Christ, and pray more to her than to Christ, as if Christ were only Judge and not Propitiator. Calvin in his Harmony, chapter 2 of John, says: We have adorned Mary with the spoils of Christ, and do not think her sufficiently honored unless she be made a Goddess.

NOTE 2. That the intercession of the Blessed Virgin is far more excellent and efficacious than any intercession of the Saints, and this for a manifold cause. First indeed, because she is the Mother of God, and therefore her petition before God is most efficacious: whence the Seraphic Doctor Bonaventure, in The Mirror of the Blessed Virgin Mary, chapter 8, says no less devoutly than splendidly: Because the Lord most powerful is with you, therefore you too are most powerful with him; you are most powerful through him, most powerful before him: so that she can truly say that word of Ecclesiasticus 21: My power is in Jerusalem. And in chapter 5 he says that it is an abyss calling upon an abyss when the Mother of God calls upon her Son for us: and he reports there that Augustine spoke of her thus: As you are more powerful with God, so are you more solicitous than all the Saints for us. Second, because she is holier than all the other Saints, not only men but also Angels, as St. Ephrem teaches in his Praises of the Virgin, writing: Holier than the Cherubim, holier than the Seraphim, and without any comparison more glorious than all the rest of the supernal hosts. Whence Peter Damian in his sermon On the Annunciation says: Consider the Seraphim, and soar above the dignity of that higher nature; behold and see that whatever is greater is less than the Virgin, and that only the Maker surpasses this work. Third, because although she prays to God through Christ, just as the other Saints do, nevertheless it is not improbable that other Saints also pray to Christ through the mediation of the Blessed Virgin herself: whence St. Bernard in his sermon On the Nativity of Mary says: If you would have recourse to the Father, he gave you a Mediator, namely Christ: but perhaps even in him you fear to approach the divine Majesty, and wish to have an advocate with him? Have recourse to Mary, etc. Many other reasons could be directed toward establishing the same truth, whereby it may be found that the most blessed Virgin is deservedly and by right celebrated by the faithful with a special devotion, inasmuch as she has with God a far more excellent affinity than the rest of the Saints.

NOTE 3. Since most of the holy Fathers write that the Blessed Virgin is omnipotent with God, a mediatrix, the restorer of the human race, and things of this kind; these are to be taken according to the sense of accommodation, so that she is called omnipotent in a qualified sense, or by a certain divine assistance, whereby a creature can indeed accomplish something on account of a special assistance and concurrence of God operating and producing those things which are asked and implored from that creature: which manner of omnipotence some of the holy Fathers attribute to the Blessed Virgin; especially St. Anselm, book On the Praises of the Virgin, chapter 12: God so exalted you, that he endowed you with all things possible with himself. And further below, praying to the Blessed Virgin: You will it, he says, and in no way can it fail to come to pass. Peter Damian, sermon 2 On the Nativity of Mary: He who is mighty has done great things for you, and there has been given to you all power in heaven and in earth, and nothing is impossible to you, to whom it is possible to raise up even the desperate unto the hope of beatitude; for how could any power oppress you? etc. And immediately after: For you depart to that golden altar of reconciliation, not only asking, but even commanding. A Lady, not a handmaid. By a similar reasoning she is called mediatrix and restorer of the human race: not indeed immediately, but mediately through Christ the Lord, because indeed by his benefit we have had this most mighty Mediator and Redeemer.

NOTE 4. In the year 375⟦?⟧ there arose in Arabia the heresy of the Collyridians, who worshipped the Virgin Mother of God as God, and offered in her name a cake of bread by the hands of women. For to that sex that sect entrusted the duties of the priesthood: nay rather, women were accustomed to constitute this sect. St. Epiphanius refutes it in heresy 78, showing first that no woman, from the time the world was founded, has been anointed to the priesthood: which when he had proved from the Old Testament, he adds this from the New: If the priesthood were commanded to women, or if it were permitted them to perform some ceremonial office in the Church, to none rather than to Mary ought the office of priest to have been committed in the New Testament: she to whom such honor was given, that with her lap and bosom she received the King of all⟦?⟧ and the heavenly God, and the Son of God. Whose eternal temple and dwelling, as it were, was prepared by the singular benignity of God for the incarnation of the divine Word, assuredly by a great and stupendous mystery. The third thing was deemed far more useful to God: nor was the power even of baptizing granted to her: since otherwise Christ might rather have been baptized by her than by John. He then shows that the Blessed Virgin is not to be adored: Holy was the body of Mary, he says, I confess; yet she was not God. She was both virgin and goddess-like; yet by no means set forth to us for adoration, but piously adoring him who, born of her own flesh, had descended from heaven and from the paternal bosom. This the holy Gospel also wished to warn us of, in which Christ speaks thus: What is it to me and to you, woman? my hour is not yet come. He called her woman for this reason, lest anyone believe the Blessed Virgin to be of some more excellent nature. And further below: Although she be a certain chosen and surpassing being⟦?⟧, nevertheless she is a woman, and of the same nature as the rest: although she has been honored in mind and feeling with the amplest honors: even as the bodies of the rest of the saints, or whatever they brought that was more illustrious unto glory and splendor. He adds below: She was granted to the prayers of Joachim and Anna, yet so that she had no other condition of being born than the rest of mortals, but that she came forth from the common seed and from the womb of her mother. Finally he establishes this rule of religious cult: Let one Mary be honored⟦?⟧: but let the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit be adored: let no one wish to adore Mary. And below: Let Mary be in honor, let the Lord be adored. By which words of St. Epiphanius the religious cult of the Virgin Mother of God is affirmed, and superstition condemned. The honor of Mary loves judgment. Wherefore she is never to be compared with God, nor celebrated together with Christ in praise, nor are those things to be attributed to her which belong to God alone or to the God-Man. Thus must the Mother of the Lord be honored, says St. Bernard; he admonishes well:

but the honor of the Queen loves judgment. The royal Virgin needs not a tawny⟦?⟧ honor, heaped up with titles of gold⟦?⟧ and dignified with mitres. Honor indeed the integrity of her flesh, the sanctity⟦?⟧ of her life, the wondrous⟦?⟧ fruitfulness in the Virgin; reverence her divine offspring. Extol her ignorant of concupiscence in conceiving and of pain in bringing forth... Magnify her, the finder of grace, the mediatrix of salvation, the restorer of the ages. Rejoice finally in her exaltation above the choirs of Angels unto the celestial realms. This the Church sings to me of her, and taught me to chant the same.

These things having been premised, two remain to be determined: First, that the Virgin Mother of God is to be venerated with a cult far more noble than all the other Saints: Second, that her intercession with God is far more potent and efficacious than that of the other Saints; which two things we shall weigh in one single Conclusion by the authority of the holy Fathers.

Last Conclusion. — THE MOST BLESSED VIRGIN IS TO BE HONORED WITH THE CULT OF HYPERDULIA, AND TO BE INVOKED BEFORE ALL OTHER SAINTS.

Proof of the first part: the adoration and cult of hyperdulia is that which is rendered to a rational creature on account of its preeminent dignity and sanctity, inferior indeed to the divine, but raised above the sanctity of the other creatures: but such is the dignity and sanctity of the most blessed Virgin: for, says St. Anselm, On the Praises of Mary, chapter 9: For the pure holiness and most holy purity of her most pious heart, transcending with incomparable sublimity all the purity or holiness of every creature, merited this, that she should most benignly become the Restorer of those more lost. — The same is had from Germanus, Patriarch of Constantinople, in his Epistle to John, Bishop of Synada, which was approved in the seventh Council, act 1, where among other things he writes: her we venerate and magnify as properly and truly the Mother of the true God, and we judge her superior to the whole visible and invisible creation. — Similar things were written by Theodore, Patriarch of Jerusalem, in his Synodal Epistle, which the same seventh Council approved in act 3. For in that Epistle he says: She who is the true⟦?⟧ Mother of God, and remained a Virgin as much before as after childbirth; and has been made in glory and splendor more excellent than every nature both intelligible and sensible. — Hence Basil of Seleucia, Orat. 33, says: If Paul said of other Saints that the world was not worthy of them, what shall we say of the Mother of God, who shines so much more splendidly than the Martyrs, as the Sun surpasses all the stars in brightness? Wherefore deservedly in the Collectanea of Anastasius the Librarian, p. 73, we read this profession: Whoever honors not, and adores not, the blessed one above every creature and above human nature — except him who was born of her — ever a Virgin, namely the Mother of our Lord, let him be anathema.

The second part is also proved; namely, that the holy Fathers vie with one another in proclaiming that the Virgin Mother of God is not only to be venerated before all the other Saints, but also to be invoked and entreated, since they call her the Mother of mercy, the hope and consolation of the wretched and afflicted, and likewise the restorer of salvation, the most powerful mediatrix with God. Thus before all others Basil of Seleucia, in his Oration on the Annunciation: Hail full of grace, he says, mediatrix between God and men, that the wall of enmity may be torn down, and earthly things joined to heavenly. — The same writes Germanus, Patriarch of Constantinople, in his Sermon on the Dormition of the Blessed Virgin, where among other things he says: No one filled with the knowledge of God except through you, O most holy one: no one saved except through you, O Mother of God: no one delivered from dangers except through you, beloved⟦?⟧ Mother of God. Then he subjoins: Since you obtain maternal favor with God, you procure pardon beyond measure for those who sin beyond measure. Nor can it be that you are not heard, since toward you God obeys in all things, and through all things, and in all things, as to his true and immaculate Mother. Whence the afflicted rightly flees to you for refuge; the weak clings to you; he who is assailed by war opposes you to his enemies. Your moving of indignation, wrath, and affliction, the sending forth of many Angels: you turn away just threatening and the sentence of due condemnation, greatly loving that people who are called by the name of your Son. — To these Arnold of Chartres gives most excellent assent, On the Praises of the Virgin, where among other passages, in which he treats especially of the mediation of the Virgin and her most powerful intercession, he has this: Mother and Son exchange before the Father among themselves the offices of piety, and fortify with wondrous pleas the business of man's redemption: and establish between themselves an inviolable testament of our reconciliation. Mary immolates herself to Christ in spirit, and beseeches for the salvation of the world; the Son obtains it, the Father grants it.

Hence St. Augustine, Sermon 18 On the Saints, which is On the Annunciation, which some attribute to St. Fulgentius, thus invokes the Virgin Mother of God:

Receive our prayers within the sanctuary of your hearing, and carry back to us the antidote of reconciliation. May that be excusable through you which we press upon you through you: may that become obtainable which we ask with faithful mind. Accept what we offer: restore again what we ask: because you are the only hope of sinners. Through you we hope for pardon of offenses, and in you, most blessed one, is our expectation of rewards.

To all these the Seraphic Doctor will add a splendid crown in his Mirror of the Blessed Virgin Mary; especially in lesson 5, where among other things he has this:

Who can measure the immensity of Mary? Behold what is said in Ecclesiasticus: The height of heaven, the breadth of the earth, and the depth of the abyss, who has measured them? Heaven is Mary, both because she abounded in celestial purity, celestial clarity, and other celestial virtues; and because she was the most lofty seat of God, as the Prophet testifies, who says: The Lord has prepared his seat in heaven. Earth also was Mary, by which she brought forth for us that fruit, of which the same Prophet says: The earth has yielded her fruits. Mary is also an abyss in her most profound goodness and mercy. Whence also, while she intercedes with her Son for us his most profound mercy, she calls as it were abyss upon abyss. Therefore heaven is Mary, earth is Mary, the abyss is Mary. Who has measured the height of this heaven, who the breadth of this earth, who the depth of this abyss; who, I say, has measured the immensity of Mary, except that One alone who wrought her, not only in grace and in glory, but also in mercy, so lofty, so holy, so profound? Whence Blessed Bernard speaks especially of her mercy: Who can investigate the length, and breadth, and height, and depth of your mercy, O blessed one? For its length assists all who invoke her even unto the last day: its breadth fills the whole world, that all the earth may be full even of her mercy: but its sublimity found the restoration of the supernal city; and its depth obtained redemption for those sitting in darkness and the shadow of death.

And further below, when he had said that the grace of the Blessed Virgin was most useful to herself, because it was delightful to her in mind, miraculous in her Son, glorious in her kingdom: delightful in her spiritual soul, miraculous in her virginal offspring, glorious in her eternal⟦?⟧ diadem; he adds:

but certainly, most dear ones, the grace of Mary was not only most useful to herself, but also to us; nay rather, to the whole human race: for the grace of Mary gathers the wicked, fattens the good, liberates all: gathers from fault, fattens with grace, liberates from eternal death. I say therefore, that the grace of Mary gathers unto mercy, gathers the wicked unto the Church... O truly great is the grace of Mary! whereby many of those > are gathered unto mercy who are left by Doctors and Rectors as incorrigible; and therefore Blessed Bernard says well: Mary, you embrace with maternal affection the sinner despised by the whole world, you cherish him, nor do you forsake him, until you reconcile the wretch to the dreadful Judge.... By the suffrage of the grace of Mary (the good) are fattened with the unctions of grace; they are fattened, I say, with the fatness of the Holy Spirit, whereby even he desired to be fattened who said: Let my soul be filled as with marrow and fatness. O who could estimate how many souls, by the help of the grace of Mary, have been fattened through grace; nay certainly who could estimate how great was the fattening of graces in Mary herself, by whose grace so many thousands of souls have been fattened? Likewise the grace of Mary liberates from eternal death all who are liberated... Whence Anselm says: What, he says, shall I worthily render back to the Mother of God and of my Lord? Through whose fruitfulness I, a captive, was redeemed; through whose childbearing I was exempted from eternal death; through whose offspring, though lost, I was restored, and from the exile of misery led back to the fatherland of eternal beatitude? O then, Mother of grace, make us sons of grace: grant that through your most true grace we may be gathered unto the pardon of remission, be fattened through the grace of devotion, and be liberated from the death of damnation. Through our Lord, etc.