Part III : The Crown of Goodness : Chapter 9 : § 3.4-6

Chapter 9 : The Eighth Star or Splendour of the Crown of Goodness of the MOTHER OF GOD

She is the strong and valiant defender of her children

Continuing our translation of the 1845 reprint of Fr François Poiré’s Triple Crown of the Mother of God (1643 French edition).

Notre Dame des Grâces, Cotignac (Poggi, 2020)

§ 3. How the Holy Virgin protects her children from the assaults of their invisible enemies  

She prevents them from inflicting harm in our lives 

 4   She has incomparably more ways and means of defending our lives than the wretched demons have for attacking them.  

St William, Duke of Guyenne, had withdrawn into a bleak wilderness to do penance for his sins, whereupon demons launched an extraordinary attack upon him. After putting him to the test with various temptations, they then dragged him out of his cave and beat him so savagely that his whole body was covered in bruises. Whilst he was in this state, the Mother of mercy appeared to him and spoke words full of heavenly sweetness by which his soul was greatly consoled. At the same time, two Virgins who had accompanied the Queen of Heaven carried him back to his cell and made a fire. They rubbed his body with a precious ointment which they had with them and restored his health and strength to him. 

The Portuguese priest, who is known popularly as St. Anthony of Padua, was preaching during Lent with his customary zeal and having a great impact in the lives of his listeners. The enemy of all that is good hurled himself upon the priest one night and took him by the throat with such fury that he he was on the point of strangling him to death. The Saint, however, traced the Sign of the Cross on his throat and uttered the words of the hymn O Gloriosa Domina[1], whereupon the demon was forced to flee in shame and disgrace.  

Footnotes

[1] For the text in Latin and English along with the hymn's links to St Anthony, see: O Heaven's Glorious Mistress at Preces Latinae.

She arms us against temptations 

 5   What can we say about the way the evil one assaults our minds inasmuch as the more frequent the attacks, the more difficult they are to notice and since the loss of a person’s soul is more important than the loss of health or even of life? But what are we to say about the way Heaven sends us reinforcements in this struggle and the MOTHER OF GOD gives us her continual support? Whenever our enemies make ready to weaken us with their temptations, she places herself in front of us and casts back in their faces their wicked and pernicious plans. 

Shortly after the Seraphic St Francis had passed on from this life to a better one, several of those who had been living with him and knew him well gathered together to discuss ways of being delivered from the harassment of iniquitous temptations. One of the best informed of the Friars told them that Francis had never experienced a better remedy for these temptations than having recourse to the Virgin of Virgins, in a spirit of total trust.  

“Each time I find myself being tempted by similar thoughts,” he used to say, “I immediately kneel before an image of the MOTHER OF GOD and declare my determination not to leave until she has taken note of my tears and heard my heartfelt lamentations.”

The venerable Abbot William, a close friend of St Bernard (whose biography he was to write), tells the story of the miraculous manner in which God healed a certain gentleman who had been suffering from very dangerous temptations, making use of St Bernard’s insight and through the mediation of the Virgin Mary. The spirit of impudicity had taken such a hold on the gentleman that he found it impossible to go even one day without committing some sin. St Bernard felt a strong desire to help him overcome this problem and had tried every sort of remedy. Finally, he asked him to observe a period of respite, denying himself for only three days in honour of the most Holy Trinity. The gentleman, noting that this was such a short period of time and not wishing to disappoint someone whom he had always loved and respected, promised to do this and he was faithful to his word. At the end of the three days, St Bernard asked for three more days, out of consideration for the MOTHER OF GOD. The gentleman could not bring himself to refuse such a small thing for the Queen of Heaven and accordingly he gave his agreement once more. This proved to be greatly to his benefit, for his Mother granted him such strength and courage to resist thenceforth any similar temptation that when St Bernard came to discuss another period of respite with him, he said: 

“No, Father, the time for making these little pacts with you has now gone and I have determined to make an agreement with God Himself. Praying in aid the graces and favours of the Holy Virgin, I am going to make a vow to God of perpetual chastity, with a condition that He may cause me to die if ever I should in future cause offence to Him by sinful acts of impudicity.” 

 6   If she allows people to suffer extraordinary or even violent temptations, she never fails to make herself available for help in a proportionate manner. Our own century, as fertile in saintliness as it is in sinfulness, provides us with  the outstanding example Of Blessed Maria Maddalena de’ Pazzi, a Carmelite nun in Florence beatified by our Holy Father Urban VIII on the 23rd of April in the year 1620. 

This blessed soul suffered cruel persecution by wicked spirits and was tormented in the extreme by various sorts of temptations. Amongst others, on one occasion she was so overwhelmed by despair and by a compelling desire to take her own life (forasmuch as she felt already condemned by the enormity of her crimes), that she went straight into the kitchen and found a sharp knife. Satan had been granted permission to drive her to this extreme, but the holy Virgin quickly intervened and frustrated the plans of her enemy. Having taken the knife, Maria went straight to the Choir where, transported by a spirit of boldness, she ascended the altar of the Virgin and placed the knife in the hands of a statue of the same Virgin. At that precise moment, she was delivered from the furious turbulence and distress which had afflicted her for so long. Maria later confessed that when she was being overwhelmed by a multitude of abominable thoughts and temptations, she would have died a thousand deaths by reason of the horror they caused her if the Queen of Virgins had not provided reassurance that her purity had not been affected – any more than the clothes of the three children had been damaged in the fiery furnace of Babylon[1] or the rays of the sun are besmirched by the filth of the gutter. 

Footnotes

[1] The fire had no power on their bodies, and not a hair of their head had been singed, nor their garments altered, nor the smell of the fire had passed on them. Dan. iii. 94.

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The Virgin of Tenderness. >12th century.

SUB tuum præsidium confugimus, Sancta Dei Genitrix. Nostras deprecationes ne despicias in necessitatibus, sed a periculis cunctis libera nos semper, Virgo gloriosa et benedicta. Amen.

Totus tuus ego sum

Et omnia mea tua sunt;

Tecum semper tutus sum:

Ad Jesum per Mariam.

© Peter Bloor