Prayer to the Blessed Virgin Mary

To give thanks to her, to "commend to her care the Congregation at

Jesus and Mary, and to ask of her a good and holy death.( 1 )

0 great and most amiable Mary, most august Empress of the universe, most holy and worthy Mother of my God, behold me prostrate at thy feet to ask pardon very humbly of thee for having dared to undertake, through an excessive audacity, to record in this little book the ineffable perfections and incomprehensible excellences of thine admirable Heart. What is this compassionate Heart, save an impenetrable abyss of grace and holiness, an immense world of unrivalled wonders and an infinitely exalted heaven of incomparable glories and grandeurs? And what am I, save an infinitesimal atom, an abyss of wretchedness and darkness, the nonentity of nonentities? Is it not prodigious temerity for a puny earthworm like me to dare lift my eyes toward heaven to gaze upon the foremost, the worthiest and the most brilliant object of (1). This Prayer forms the conclusion of the Admirable Heart of Mary. It contains interesting biographical details and resembles a last will and testament. For that reason we print it here.

the infinite love of the three adorable Persons of the most Holy Trinity?

But how can I close my cars to so many millions of voices which incessantly cry out to me that I am a monster of ingratitude if I do not render the thanks I owe my sovereign Princess for the many favors that I have received and am constantly receiving from the inconceivable kindness with which her most generous Heart is filled toward the least of all men?

For, first of all, is it not true, 0 Holy Virgin, that after God I should respect and honor thee as my true Mother to whom I owe my birth, my being and my life, and without whom I should still remain in the nothingness from which I should never have emerged? For this reason I have as many obligations toward thee as there are advantages attached to existence and to the life of a reasonable and Christian creature.

Secondly, how great is my debt to thee, 0 Mother of goodness, for having given me a father and a mother who exercised great care to rear me, by the good example of their lives and their holy instructions, in the fear of God and the spirit of Christianity?

How greatly am I indebted to thee for having inspired them to place me under the-discipline and guidance of the holy Society of Jesus, in the city of Caen, and for having admitted me into thy Sodality which is truly a school of virtue and piety, under the direction of the same Society? And this, indeed, 0 Mother of grace, was one of the greatest graces I have ever received from my God through thy intercession. .

Here is another very special grace. It is that, in order to snatch me from a manifest danger which would have caused my downfall, thou didst enlist me in the Congregation of Jesus and Mary, established by thee and thy beloved Son in the holy Church for two ends of the greatest importance and usefulness to that same Church, namely: to attend to the functions of ecclesiastical seminaries and to the exercises of missions. And God has granted me the grace, through thy mediation, 0 Mother of mercy, to devote myself unceasingly for nearly forty years to the functions of these same seminaries, and for nearly sixty years to the exercises of missions, with the very abundant blessings which divine Bounty has showered upon my meager efforts through

thy sacred hands, for the saints assure us that no grace descends from heaven to earth without passing through those blessed hands.

I have no words at all to express the infinite excellence of the incomprehensible favor thou didst grant us, my brethren and me, in bestowing upon us the adorable Heart of thy beloved Son, along with thine own all-loving Heart, to be the heart, life and living rule of our Congregation.

I must not omit mention of the great favor with which the Sovereign Priest, thine only Son and my Saviour, deigned to honor me through thy intercession, when He granted me a share in His divine priesthood, which is a grace in a certain sense infinite, and which comprises an infinity of others, such as the power to consecrate on the holy altar His adorable Body and precious Blood; the power to offer Him to God as a sacrifice, as He offered Himself to the Father on Calvary; the power to give Him to the faithful in the Holy Eucharist; the power to annihilate all the sins of earth and hell if they were in one soul; the power to bind and loose, to absolve and condemn, to reconcile sinners with God, to open heaven and close hell; the power to spread the Holy Gospel, preach the divine word and propagate the admirable light of faith throughout the world; the power, finally, to confer upon Christians the divine Sacraments of the Church, which are the inexhaustible sources of the graces acquired for us by our Redeemer through His precious blood.

I do not even mention the light thou wert pleased to give me so that I might bring into existence this small undertaking, together with other similar ones preceding it, in which there is no favor which does not proceed from the Father of wisdom and from that admirable Star who for our sakes brought forth the Sun of justice.

What shall I say of an infinity of other benefits which I have received from the generosity of my God through thy intercession, 0 admirable Mother? How many sins have I committed for which thou hast obtained pardon for me? How many others should I have committed if thou hadst not preserved me from them?

How often have I seen myself on the brink of hell, in obvious danger of falling therein but for thy most benign hand which saved me?

How often would the roaring lion from hell, who prowls about un

ceasingly in all directions seeking to devour the souls redeemed by the precious blood of thy Son, have swallowed up and devoured my own soul, had not the admirable charity of thy Heart opposed it?

Alas! Without thee, my dearest and all-good Mother, where should I be today? I should be i n the fiery furnace of hell from which I should never emerge.

Oh, what a profusion of kindnesses! What an excess of mercy! What incomprehensible obligations I have toward the incredible charity of thy most benign Heard 0, what immense graces, infinite graces, eternal graced Let all the spirits, all the tongues and hearts of heaven and earth praise, glorify and love thee eternally in my name!

But the grace of graces, the favor of favors, is the great multitude of crosses which my most adorable Crucified has bestowed upon me on thy behalf, for which may He be praised and glorified for evermore.

Now are not all these graces, not to mention a million others, as so many voices continually preaching the respect, veneration and gratitude I should have for that most august Heart, of which I have infinite reason to say what St. John Chrysostom said of the heart of St. Paul-that it is for me a fountain of countless blessings: Fons innumerorum bonorum? Yes, indeed, the most kind and benign Heart of the Mother of my Jesus is for me an immense source of all sorts of inconceivable blessings, graces and favors. That is what I should and wish to proclaim openly, wherever I may be. It is what compels me to bring forth this little work, that those who take the trouble to read it may be aroused and animated to praise, bless and glorify with me this most worthy Heart as the holiest, noblest and most generous, royal, magnificent and amiable of all hearts, second only to the adorable Heart of Jesus.

Finally, my most kind Mother, I have received so many favors from thy maternal Heart that I can truthfully say that they surpass in number the hairs of my head.

But I have still two favors to ask of thee which will crown all the others. For I possess overwhelming confidence in the unrivalled charity of thine admirable Heart that my infinite unworthiness will not prevent thee from granting me these two things.

The first is that thou look with favor, my dearest Mother, upon my giving to thee, or rather, my returning to thy hands, the little Congregation of Jesus and Mary which thou wert pleased to give me through an excess of thine inexplicable goodness. Thou knowest that I have offered, given and consecrated it to thee hundreds and hundreds of times during my life; but now I wish to give it to thee incessantly and for all eternity, in union with the incomprehensible love with which the only Son of God gave Himself to thee for evermore. Avail thyself of thy sovereign God-given power in order to take full, absolute and eternal possession of it. Give it wholly to thy Son Jesus; pray Him to annihilate therein all that is displeasing to Him; to establish perfectly in it the reign of His holy love and His adorable will; to fill it with His divine spirit, His spirit of humility, submission, charity, purity, zeal for the glory of God, hatred for sin, love for the Cross, the abnegation of the aged, and a great detachment from and scorn for the world and all the things of this earth; to protect, sustain and defend it against those who would thwart it; to give it a great number of evangelical laborers who may devote themselves to the training and instruction of holy priests and good pastors through the exercises of seminaries, and who may work efficaciously for the salvation of souls through missions. Finally, may He dispose of it entirely according to His Heart, together with all His children i n general and each one individually; and may He accomplish in it all the designs of His goodness, at all costs, annihilating us rather than permitting us to place any obstacle in its way because of our sins.

I also offer thee, 0 most sacred Mother of God, all the founders, benefactors and friends of this little Congregation, beseeching thee very humbly to preserve, bless and sanctify them, to place them in the ranks of the children of thy Heart and to let them feel the effects of this holy prayer which we offer for them several times a day: Retribuere dignare, Domine, omnibus nobis bona facientibus, propter nomem" tuum, vitam aeternam. Amen. 0 Lord, be pleased to grant eternal life, for the love of Thy Holy Name, to all our friends and benefactors.

The second favor I ask of thee, 0 Mother of goodness, is to look upon me always as a true child of the ineffable goodness of thy most

Holy Heart, even though I am infinitely unworthy of my heritage. For it is not a pretended o r imaginary thing, but a real and established truth, that thou gavest me birth and life through a certain and unquestionable miracle, following the vow made to God by my father and mother, who were without children and unable to have any, that they might obtain this favor through thy intercession. When this vow was followed by the fulfillment of their desire, they took me, while I was yet in m y mother's womb, into a holy chapel dedicated to thy name under the title of Our Lady of Recovery, i n order to give thanks to thee for the favor thou hadst granted them, and to offer and consecrate me to my Creator, as well as to her through whose intercession He had called me into being. Look upon me, therefore, and treat me, 0 most amiable Mother, as the fruit and the child of the wonderful charity of thy Holy Heart, and do not allow me to degenerate from such a noble birth. Impress upon my heart and my life the likeness and resemblance of the holy virtues which reign in the Heart and life of m y heavenly Mother, from which, alas! I am infinitely removed. But above all, I implore thee, by all the mercies of thy benign Heart, to obtain for me from divine Clemency complete pardon and general remission of my numberless sins, offenses and negligences, and to help and protect me with extraordinary bounty in my last days and in my final hour.

Alas! thou knowest, 0 Mother of grace, that human weakness and wretchedness is so great that there is not a man in the world who, after having struggled with the infernal powers for eighty or a hundred years, would not be capable of succumbing to them and losing his salvation in the last hour of his life. Have pity on me, then, 0 Mother of goodness: Tu mea maxima fiducia, tu ratio spei meae. I have the greatest confidence in thee, who art, after God, the principal foundation of my hope. Do not permit the enemies of my salvation to have any advantage over thy poor son: Nequando dicat inimicus meus: praevalui adversus eum. But grant, through thy powerful intercession, that all the moments of life still remaining to me may be entirely and solely consecrated to the glory of my Saviour and the honor of my Holy Mother; that all my thoughts, words and actions, every breath,

every throb of my heart and veins, all the functions of the faculties of my soul, and every use of m y interior and exterior senses may be a perpetual exercise of praise and love for my most adorable Jesus and my most amiable Mother.

0 most kind Mother, obtain for me from my God that moriatur anima mea morte Justorum et fiant novissima mea horum similia; that I may die the death of the just, that is, the holy death of the King and Queen of the just, who are Jesus and Mary, and of those of whom the Holy Ghost says: "Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord"; and that I may die in the holy interior and exterior dispositions in which they died.

Let me die pronouncing these words which my Redeemer spoke on the Cross, and while giving myself to Him in order to say them in the holy dispositions with which He uttered them: Pater, i n manus tuas commendo spiritum meum.

Let me die in the faith of all the holy martyrs, with complete confidence in the immense mercy of my Redeemer and the unparalleled kindness of His Most Holy Mother and mine; and with perfect charity toward my neighbor.

Let me die in the spirit and in the sentiments of humiliation, contrition and penance with which my loving Savior bore my sins during His Sacred Passion and Death.

Let me die with these divine words in my heart and on my lips: "Jesus, Mary"; and let me pronounce them in union with all the love which ever has been, is now and ever shall be in all hearts which love Jesus and Mary.

Let me die in the love, through the love and for the love of my Jesus, and let my last breath be an act of purest love through which I may offer and sacrifice myself of my own accord to my God, i n union with that same love with which my Redeemer offered and immolated Himself on the Cross to His Father for love of me.

In conclusion, with all my heart do I give my soul, 0 Mother of love, in union with the same love by which my Saviour gave thee His at the moment of His Incarnation. Do thou preserve it as something which is wholly thine; receive it into thy most sacred hands when it

leaves my body; harbor it in thy maternal Heart; present and give it to thy beloved Son, that He may place it in the ranks of those who will love and bless Him for all eternity with thee and with all the angels d saints in that blessed eternity, 0 clemens, 0 pia, 0 dulcis Virgo Maria, vita, dulcedo et spes mea charissima.

Live Jesus and Mary