"The Lord is with thee." With thee, certainly, as the sun is with the dawn going before it, and preceding its rise, and beginning the day by its light. Truly, indeed, Mary, the dawn of the world, prepared in a most singular manner by the Eternal Sun, being thus marvelously irradiated, prepares herself the rising of this Sun, has wonderfully inaugurated for the world the day of grace of such a Sun, as Saint Bernard says: "Like the dawn exceedingly resplendent hast thou come into the world, O Mary, when thou didst foreshow the splendor of the true Sun by such a wonderful radiance of sanctity that truly the day of salvation, the day of propitiation, the day which the Lord hath made, was worthy to be begun by thy bright light."
...note that Mary is, as it were, a happy dawn because of her place in glory; and according to this Job well says of the dawn: "Didst thou ... show the dawning of the day its place ?" (Job xxxviii, 12.) Now, certainly our dawn, Mary, elevated high in Heaven, holds the place nearest to the Eternal Sun.
We may consider that the throne of Mary in Heaven has a threefold greatness. The first is that she received Our Lord spiritually; the second, that she received Him corporeally; the third, that she received Him eternally. Behold the threefold place of Mary.
I say that the first place in which Mary received Our Lord, spiritually, is her mind, tranquil and peaceful, according to the Psalmist: "His place is in peace, and His dwelling in Zion," which, interpreted, means a mirror or contemplation. Whoever wishes to contemplate God, or to behold Him with the eyes of the mind, must make Him a place in peace in his mind; for without peace of mind no one can arrive at the knowledge of contemplation. Therefore the Apostle saith: "Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see God" (Hebrews xii, 14.) Oh, who shall relate, or who can even imagine, in what contemplations daily that Sion, that holy mind of Mary, was employed, while she fervently revolved in her mind all those mysteries known to herself above all mortals? Of this, Saint Jerome well says: "If there are in you any bowels of piety or mercy, consider with what love was crucified, with what desire this virgin burned, while she revolved in her soul all that she had heard and seen, all that she had known; with what emotions she was moved, being filled with the Holy Ghost, with the thrilling knowledge of heavenly secrets."
The place in which Mary conceived, corporeally, was her holy womb, to which may be applied the word of Genesis: "The river which came forth from the paradise of pleasure (Jesus Christ from the Virgin's womb) was to water the garden" (Genesis ii, 10.) The special paradise is Mary; the universal paradise is the Church. Happy is the watering of both these gardens by the mystic river from the womb of Mary, Jesus Christ, who has said: "I will water my garden of plants" (Ecclesiasticus xxiv, 42.)
Well, therefore, doth Saint Jerome say, commenting on these words: "I saw her coming up beautiful from the banks of the water." Well is it said, "above the rivers of water," because the Lord had nourished her on the waters of refreshment, and brought her up on them; from whom many rivers emerge, water all the land of delights, and flow over the garden of pleasure." Again, the place wherein Mary received the Lord when she was about to dwell forever in Heaven is the place of glory, of which the Lord said to Job: "Hast thou shown the dawn its place?" (xxxviii, 12), as if he said, "Not thou, but I." -- it does not belong to thee to show Mary, the dawn, her place in Heaven, but to Me. Well doth He say, her place, as it were, appropriating it to her, and discriminating it from all the other places of the Saints.
Hence we read: "The priests brought in the ark of the covenant into its place" (3 Kings viii, 6). This place is most certainly above all the choirs of angels. Finally, this place is the most worthy in Heaven, as Saint Bernard testifies saying: "Neither was there in the world a more worthy place than the bridal chamber of the virginal womb, in which Mary received the Son of God, nor in the heavens one more worthy than the royal throne to which the Son of Mary raised her."
Mary is compared to the dawn; first, because she put an end to the night of guilt, in her most full holiness; secondly, because of the advance of the light of grace in her most bright conversation; thirdly, because of the bringing forth of the Sun of justice in her wonderful generation of her Son; fourthly, because of her taking possession of her place in glory in her most glorious Assumption.
Conrad of Saxony
Speculum Beatæ Mariæ Virginis
Speculum Beatæ Mariæ Virginis
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