136 DISCOUESES OF FATHER HYACINTHE. 



immorality ^vhicli dishonors ns: tliat immorality of the 

 mind which is called rationalism in Europe, and in 

 America, infidelity — two diseases, unlike, it is true, but 

 equally mortal ; and that immorality of the heart which 

 corrupts the senses as the former corrupts the thought ! 

 These two immoralities are sisters; one assaults the 

 chastity of the faith, the other, the chastity of love; 

 and both have found in woman an especial enemy. To 

 the serpent which crawls on its belly and eats the dust, 

 the Lord has said from the beginning, in pointing to 

 woman, that ideal being sprung from the heart of man, 

 " I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and 

 between thy seed and her seed; she shall bruise thy 

 head, and thou shalt bruise his heel."'* 



NoAV behold tliat woman blessed among women ! 

 Mary, the young wife, Mary the young mother, passing 

 through the hill-country of Judea, to visit her kins- 

 woman stricken in years, and hopeless as it seemed in 

 sterility. She carries in her womb the infinite burden 

 of the ^Yord, but her step is light as truth and love. In 

 an ecstasy of holy transport^ she greets Elizabeth, who 

 feels, at her aj^iproach, the germ of life quicken within 

 her. " And whence is this to me, that the mother of 

 my Lord should come to me ?" The children were yet 

 mute, but their mothers prophesy — Elizabetli before 

 John the Baptist, Mary before Jesus Christ. '' Already," 

 to use the language of St. Ambrose, '' already some faint 

 movements toward man's salvation begin to make tliem- 

 selves felt,"t ii^id because sin had commenced by woman, 

 by woman, also, regeneration is to begin. 



And now I seem to see the Christian Avonian, es- 

 poused of Jesus and his mother, drawing near to this 



* Genesis, iii. 15. The Vulgate here varies from the orii^inal.— T«. 

 t " Scrpunt eniiii jajn tontaincnta ealutis humaiKP." In Luc. 



