Selected quad for the lemma: heart_n
Text snippets containing the quad
|
ID |
Title |
Author |
Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication) |
STC |
Words |
Pages |
|
A43675
|
Speculum beatae virginis a discourse of the due praise and honour of the Virgin Mary / by a true Catholick of the Church of England.
|
Hickes, George, 1642-1715.
|
1686
(1686)
|
Wing H1869; ESTC R10946
|
41,343
|
46
|
the most glorious Virgin Mother of Jesus may God the Father Son and Holy Ghost bless and keep us now and for evermore Pag. 25. And this Cantique Let us praise thee O Mother of Jesus let us acknowledge thee our Sovereign Lady let men and Angels give honour to thee the first conceived of all pure Creatures to thee the morning-Stars and highest Seraphims sing glory for thy magnificence make intercession for us O powerful Mother of Jesus for God will not refuse thee our Petitions then shall we rejoyce in the fulness of thy glory and shall sing the praises of Jesus for ever You may perceive by the stile of this Cantique that it was composed in imitation of the Te Deum of which I shall speak more hereafter From the Contemplations I pass to the Psalter of the B. Virgin Mary which was composed in the French Tongue by a Father of the Society of Jesus and translated into English and Printed with allowance in 1624 out of which I shall present you with a few Petitions to which I need not crave your attention 1. Petition O glorious Virgin grant me grace that I may receive pardon for my sins draw near unto me O blessed Virgin who art the Mother of the afflicted my Enemies are gathered together against me and I have this only refuge to cast my self under the shadow of your wings defend me against their enterprises and bring them all to shame and confusion Your Majesty and greatness together with the incredible sweetness of your infinite mercy have obliged my lips to publish the praises of no other than of your self Be you glorified O most amiable Virgin together with your sweet Son Jesus both now and evermore Give my Soul entrance into Paradise when it shall leave the Body and by your holy prayers deliver me from the dreadful pains of Hell and let all that is due unto me for my sins be cancelled by your merits You have been the cause that God took humane flesh upon him you then as a Mother can obtain for us all that which we ask of him He will pardon us for the love of you Remember our humanity and grant that we may find grace with you who art the Foundress of our grace and Salvation Stretch forth your hand to draw me out of the filthiness of my sins and let the greatness of your mercy blot out the multitude of my offences supplying by your merits what in justice I dare not demand Turn not your face away from me for I put my trust in you ‖ 2. Petition You are the Sanctuary into which I desire to retire I magnifie you as the Foundress of Grace I will never cease to beseech you with all my desires and affections until I know that you have beheld me with compassion and given ear to my prayers I will humble my heart before you for I know that the proud shall not be entertained near unto your sacred Majesty If you do not undertake our defence how shall we do to appear before Jesus put words into my mouth that I may worthily praise you since the Heavens themselves set forth your glory and that all Creatures call upon you when they are oppressed as soon as you extend your hand upon the sick they are healed and the waves of this troublesom world are soon appeased by your commandment I will never cease to praise and exalt you with Hymns Psalms and Canticles but day by day will I render you my vows Receive my Soul into your hands when it shall leave this mortal Body and take it into your protection for it will be lost with fear and will not know to what side to turn to save it self unless under the shadow of your mercy Obtain for me by your grace a place of perpetual habitation among those who be in Paradise there to enjoy the felicity which the Souls of those who have devoutly served you do eternally possess O blessed Virgin ‖ 3. Petition mother of unlimited power adored and called upon by the Universe give me strength to resist the temptations of my invisible enemies if you should have forsaken me to whom should I have then repaired that would have looked upon me with pity and compassion I will confess your name among all Nations because it is holy and will make known to all the Majesty of your greatness All the fifteen Petitions in this Psalter are full of such like devotions and the last of them concludes thus Be pleased with my prayers O sacred Virgin and may it please you not to reject this little Psalter dedicated to your Sacred Majesty a part whereof I will recite before you every day to the end you may receive my soul into your bosom when it shall depart out of this world into another life I must further acquaint you that this Author who made this Psalter in imitation of the Psalter of David adviseth his Reader to say these Psalms before an Image of the blessed Virgin Mary in some holy place or Oratory and before every Petition to say the Ave Maria in English and the Translator of it doth assure the Lady to whom he Dedicates it that it had the approbation of the better sort of Catholicks and was presented to one of the greatest Queens of Europe in its French attire The Author also tells us that he hath put the Angels Salutation before every Petition to implore the favour of the Sacred Virgin and this he did conformably to the Latin Offices which abound with Ave Maries though I profess I cannot tell why they should convert a pure Salutation which I have shewed consists of common forms of Speech into a form of Invocation Why should that which might have been spoken by the Angel to any other righteous person be esteemed such an acceptable Sacrifice of Praise to her and yet the Mystery of the holy Rosary which we are ‖ In the Advertisement before the method of saying the Rosary told the blessed Virgin revealed to Dominic I must be pardoned that I cannot add Saint consists in saying one Pater noster and ten Ave Maries at a time with one Prayer to the Virgin Mary after a Meditation upon something that happened or that they say happened to her and I must confess I cannot understand how any Office wherein there are ten or eleven Invocations of Mary for one Prayer to God ‖ Ibid. should be most efficacious for obtaining all favours from him and averting all evils from our selves Such knowledge is too wonderful for me I cannot attain unto it but I must for ever be content to be ranked ‖ 1 Serm. p 6. Serm. 6. p. 5. among those babes who are to be fed with milk and not with such strong meat My stomach will not digest it I have not been hitherto able to bear it neither yet am able nor to beg her intercession or hope to obtain the assistance of the Holy Ghost by saying
an Ave Maria to her I neither understand nor believe how the repetition of the Angels message can warrant the expectation of such blessings from God by the Mediation of the B. Virgin nor can I persuade my self to say with the Votaries of Loretto we fly to your patronage O Sacred mother of God despise not our prayers in our necessities but deliver us from all dangers O ever glorious and blessed Virgin ‖ Horolog Ascet Cardinal Bona a late and most approved Writer of the Latin Church tells us that the Rosary is so called because it is composed of 150 Ave Maries as of so many sweet-smelling Roses as if the 15 Pater nosters in it did not smell as sweet as they and though he is one of the approvers of Mr. de Meaux his Exposition which saith they only pray to Saints to pray for them yet in his ‖ Ibid. Paraphrase on the Angels Salutation he saith very extravagant things of her and in another place prays unto her as unto a Donor in the following words Protect me O sweetest Virgin Mary under the shadow of thy wings and never let thy name which flows with hony depart from my mouth and heart be not far from me O most powerful mother of God because my enemies compass me round about What can I do without thee O blessed Virgin or what would become of me if thou shouldest turn away thy face from me When wilt thou come O most sweet Virgin when wilt thou appear to thy most unworthy servant Thy breath O Mary is sweeter than honey and the possession of thy love above Gold and precious Stones Let my Soul perceive the sweetness of thy Love and be always employed in thy praises because thou art my comfort next after God Have compassion on my Soul that breaths after thee have a regard unto me and make hast to help me Grant me thy grace that I may always rejoyce in thee and after this time of exile behold thee in glory My Soul breatheth after thee as a child doth after the bosom of his mother O despise me not thou mother of mercy How vehemently do I desire to see thy face O most beautiful Virgin take me up quickly unto thee and fulfil my desire Who can forbear loving of thee O Queen of hearts and mother of holy love who can forbear loving of thee O that all creatures might serve thee and live and dy in thy love Receive my heart O most beloved mother and offer it with thy most holy hands to thy most holy Son I rejoyce and exult O blessed Virgin that God loveth thee above all his works and am delighted with it above all things and I had rather undergo the pains of hell than that thy glory and dignity should be the least diminished for a moment of time Let all that know thy name trust in thee O Glorious Virgin because thou dost not forsake those that trust in thee Let the Light of thy Countenance appear unto me in my Agony and let thy Comfort most merciful mother make glad my departing Soul I might here add his Prayers to Saints and Angels in the like strain and his Invocation of the Five wounds of Christ but my present undertaking obliges me only to take notice of the extravagant honour which the Votaries of the Blessed Virgin are wont to pay unto her From Cardinal Bona I proceed to John Peckham formerly Archbishop of Canterbury who at the end of the Preface to this Psalter of the Blessed Virgin not yet printed prays her that she would be pleased to release the sins of all those for whom he prayed Usher's Answer to a challenge c. P. 493. and cause both his name and theirs to be written in the book of life In the first Psalm of it he prayeth her to make us to meditate often on Gods Law and to be made blessed in the glory of his kingdom and all the rest are filled with Petitions of the like nature From Peckham I go on to Cardinal Bonaventure who shines in the Calender of the Latin Saints He flourished about 430 years since when Superstition was in its Zenith and darkness covered the face of the earth He wrote several Tracts in honour of the Virgin Mary one called the Blessed Virgins ‖ Speculum beatae Virginis mirrhour which is a most extravagant Paraphrase upon the Angels Salutation wherein he applies to the Blessed Virgin in the Mystery whatever is Literally said of Queen Esther and the Queen of Sheba in the holy Scriptures He observes that her Name signifies Lady and that it agrees very well to so great an Empress who is Queen of Angels Men and Devils and of things in Heaven things in Earth and things under the Earth and in the conclusion of the Prologue to his Mirrhour he thus be speaks her O most benign Lady Mary accept of this small gift which thy poor friend offers up unto thee I Salute thee with this little book upon my bended knees and with my bowed head I Salute thee with heart and mouth and say AVE MARIA He composed another Office called the Crown of the blessed Virgin where one of the Orizons prescribed to be said unto her is as follows O Empress and our most kind Lady by the authority of a mother ‖ Jure matris imperae tuo dilectissimo silio Corona B. Virginis Tom. 6. Edit Rom. 1588. command thy most beloved Son our Lord Jesus Christ that he would vouchsafe to lift up our minds from the love of earthly things unto heavenly desires The harshness of this petition is a little qualified in another * Psal Bonav edit Paris 1596. Edition thus Incline the countenance of thy Son upon us compel him by thy Prayers to have mercy upon us sinners Which puts me in mind of that sentence of Anselm in his Treatise of the excellence of the B. Virgin that more present relief is sometimes found by Commemorating the name of Mary than by calling upon the name of our Lord Jesus her only Son This extravagant saying of Anselm hath been since used by another of the Virgins Votaries ‖ Answer to a challenge p. 495. as Bishop Vsher observes But to return to Cardinal Bonaventure he hath made many other Offices in the Virgins praise of which that which he calls the Psalter of the blessed Virgin is most remarkable It consists of the Psalms of David converted into Forms of Prayer and Thanksgivings and Praises unto her by putting Lady in the place of Lord. The first verse of the 93. Psalm is this Deus ultionum Dominus sed tu mater misericordia ad miserandum inflectis God is a God of vengeance but thou O mother of mercy art inclined to shew mercy At the end of this Psalter he hath transprosed the Hymns of the Church the Benedicite the Benedictus and the Te Deum into her praise which begins thus We praise thee the mother of God we acknowledge