Right as the sun shineth in glass,
     So Jesus in His Mother was,
     And thereby wit men that she was
     Redemptoris Mater.

     Now is born that Babe of bliss,
     And Queen of Heaven His Mother is,
     And therefore think me that she is
     Redemptoris Mater.

     After to heaven He took His flight,
     And there He sits with His Father of might,
     With Him is crowned that Lady bright,
     Redemptoris Mater.

     English, Fifteenth Century.

PART TWO

CHAPTER V

THE VISITATION II

And Mary said, My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour.

S. Luke I. 46, 47.

Forasmuch as we have no excuse, because of the multitude of our sins, we plead through thee, O Virgin Mother of God, with Him whom thou didst bear.

Lo, great is thine intercession, strong and acceptable with our Saviour.

O Stainless Mother, reject not us sinners in thine intercession with Him Whom thou didst bear.

COPTIC.

Wonderful was this day in the little town of Judah where these two women, each in her way an instrument of God in the upbuilding of His Kingdom, met and rejoiced together.  There is revealed to us something of the possibilities of our religion when we try to follow the thought of these two women.  They are so utterly devoted to God that God can speak to them.  I think that it is well for us to dwell on this fact for a moment.  We are apt to look upon inspiration, what is described as being filled with the Holy Ghost, as somewhat of a mechanical mode of God’s operation.  Our mistaken view is that God takes control of the faculties of a human being and uses them for His own purposes.

But that is quite to misunderstand God’s method.  God uses the faculties of a man in proportion as the man yields himself to Him; and one who is living a sincere religion becomes in a degree the medium of God’s self-expression.  This possibility of expressing God increases as we increase in sanctity.  Those who have completely yielded themselves to God in a life of sanctity become in a deep sense the representatives of God:  they have, in S. Paul’s phraseology, His mind.  To be capable of so becoming the divine instrument it is necessary, not only to offer no opposition to God’s purposes, but to make ourselves the active executants of them.  Our Christian vocation is thus to be the instrument of God, to be the visible demonstrations of His power and presence.  There is a true inspiration, a true speaking for God to-day, no doubt, as true as at any time in the Church’s history, wherever there is sanctity.  What is lacking to present day utterances of sanctity is not the action of the Holy Spirit, but authentication by the Church:  that is given only under certain special circumstances and for special purposes.  But there is no need to limit the inspiring action of the Holy Spirit to such utterances as for special reasons have received official recognition.