134 DISCOURSES OF FATHER HYACINTHE. 



the will of my Father which is in heaven, the same is 

 my brother, and sister, and mother."* Saint Gregory 

 the Great, explaining this teaching of the Master in 

 one of his homilies,! found some difficulty in this word, 

 "my mother.-' AVe are without doubt his brethren and 

 sisters, in that we fulfil his Father's will ; but how can 

 any being other than Mary be called his " mother ?" 

 But the great pope remarks immediately, that whenever 

 one soul, by word or example or any spiritual influence 

 whatsoever, produces and develops in another soul the 

 Word of God, the actual and living Truth and Right- 

 eousness and Love, in one word, Jesus Christ (for Je- 

 sus Christ is all these), it becomes, with a higher reality 

 than that of maternal conception, the mother of Jesus in 

 that soul, and the mother of that soul in Jesus. 



And now. Madam, God, if I mistake not, reserves for 

 you some chosen part in this gift of spiritual mother- 

 hood. There are beloved ones of whom I may not speak, 

 — respect and emotion forbid me ; but you shall be their 

 mother in Jesus, their mother in the integrity of their 

 liberty, as you were his spouse in the fulness of your 

 own. Then there are other souls, numberless and with- 

 out name, at least to our feeble thought, who are count- 

 ed and inscribed in the book of the divine election, and 

 wiiom the mysterious power of your apostlcship will 

 gather from the four winds of lieaven. For not in vain 

 the Lord has spoken : " Many shall come from the East 

 and from the West, and shall sit down with Abraham, 

 and Isaac, and Jacob, in the kiugdom of heaven ; but 

 the children of the kingdom shall ])e cast out into outer 

 darkness." | Yes, many born, like you, in heresy with- 

 out having been heretics, ignorant without having been 

 guilty, shall hasten to the feast of Catholic truth, to the 



• Matthew, xii. 49, 50. t Ilomil. iii. in Evanj?. î Matthew, viii. 11, 12. 



