The Crown of Excellence : Chapter 8 : § 1. 53-54

Chapter 8 : The Seventh Star or Splendour in the Crown of Excellence of the Mother of God

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)

Mary’s soul was unique in being totally free of any sin

§ 1. The MOTHER OF GOD was exempt from original sin

The sixth proof, based on the doctrine that the Mother of God was not only free from original sin but was not under any obligation to contract it

 53   These considerations occasioned the noble poet Sedulius to follow the imagery of the Spouse in the Canticles[1].  He compares Mary to a beautiful lily, or to a rose which although growing amidst thorns has nothing in common with them for she is all beauty and gentleness. 

Here is what he writes[2]:

As we see from a stem with thorns bristling and bedecked

The Rose puts forth the beauty and the charm

Of crimson petals, incapable of harm,

Honouring the stem where she may be select'd.

Perhaps you will find that Adam of St Victor expressed this no less nobly some eleven centuries after Christ. He addresses the Holy Virgin as follows[3]:

    On rose-tree stem are we the bristling thorns,

To hell's own fires eternal we’ve been born,

Like spines and barbs all trapped in barbs and spines.

    But thou midst all of these wast born alone

On high and free from all these bristling groans 

– The sweetest essence of all grace divine!

    Ave! Thou art the fragrant, mystic rose

That on the ruined tree of sorrow grows,

All holy, pure and fragrant wast thou born.

    To fallen thorns a Daughter God preferred

As sinless Mother of His glorious Word,

His Daughter, Mother – flower with no thorn!

St Anselm[4] sees a comparison with the chestnut which is hidden in its fleecy casing or later in a spiky shell – just as though it were inside an impregnable citadel safe from all harm. Peter of Blois[5], a bright luminary from England in the time of St Bernard, compares her to the first fruits, referring to the handful of ears that were not taken to the threshing floor to be beaten along with the sheaves, but were taken to the Temple to be presented to God.

Peter Damian[6] likens her unto the Heavens, beyond the reach of clouds, freezing fog and bad weather of any kind. St Justin Martyr[7] makes her the mediatrix in our disputes, placing her with the Saviour between God and those who become offenders as a result of the first sin of disobedience. Dionysius of Alexandria[8], who flourished in the third century, calls her the Daughter of life: 

unknown to the death of the soul which strikes right to the heart of all the other children of Adam from the instant they are conceived in their mothers’ womb. 

St Gregory Thaumaturgus said[9]: 

 

she was chosen through grace never to go anywhere near the filth and contamination common to others.

St John Damascene[10], the pious servant of the Virgin, observes that:

 

in her creation nature and grace encountered one another but nature’s wish was never to go before grace.

This is not to be understood as referring to the sanctifying grace that was poured into Our Lady’s soul at the instant of her Conception, for it was then indeed necessary for nature to go before grace so that it might be received in her. It should be taken as referring rather to the grace of our redemption, neither more nor less than were St John to have said that the MOTHER OF GOD could not put herself forward when, in that time of darkness, original sin was ravaging and contaminating all nature. She came after the devastation just as the Sun was rising and she received His first rays. Would you not say that this Doctor is speaking here as of certain flowers that Pliny[11] calls wise flowers, because they do not appear until after the cold season has gone on its way, having received a safe conduct from nature so as not to be surprised by frosts and harsh weather in Spring?

Footnotes

[1] Sicut lilium inter spinas, sic amica mea inter filias. As the lily among thorns, so is my love among the daughters. Cant. ii.2.

[2] Lib. II.

[3] Prosa de Assumpt.

[4] Lib. de Concept., c. 4. 

[5] Petrus Blesensis, Serm. 44.

[6] Serm. de Nativit. B. Virg.

[7] In expositione fidei de Trinitate.

[8] Epist. adversus Paulum Samosat., t. II Biblioth. veterum Patrum. 

[9] Serm. 1 de Annuntiat.

[10] Serm. 1 de Nativit. B. Virg.

[11] Lib. IV, c. 28.

 54   It would not be possible to bring forward everything the Holy Fathers have said on this question. What we have seen, however, seems enough to show that the proposition I have put forward not only for the approval of the Church, but also for the judgement of those better informed than I am, is by no means a novelty.  In fact, it receives the support of many hoary heads in antiquity who signal to modern-day Doctors that they should accept this immunity of the Queen of Heaven and that they can be assured of this in every respect. 

Blessed art thou, Holy Virgin, for having been like Mount Olympus, so far above the hurly-burly and dreadful condition of the world; or perhaps better to say thou hast no part in the dead-weight of our sin, subject as we are to the wrath and fury of its author. It is indeed enough for us to have the honour of belonging to thee and to consider thee as our sister by nature. As for the enslavement of sin, may He be blessed for ever who deigned to deliver thee from all sin and who by thy mediation raised and ennobled our race for ever. 

 

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The Vladimirskaya Icon. >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 2024