Oh adorable Face, who didst wound with a dart of love in the temple the holy old man Simeon and Anna the prophetess, have mercy on us.

Let us adore Jesus, borne to the temple by Mary and accompanied by St Joseph; let us venture to enter the sacred precincts in their company that we may understand and imitate the great example of humility given us by the Son of God, born in a stable, and who wills to be presented to God, his Father, as one of the poor, he the King of heaven and earth.

1st POINT. — JOY OF THE HOLY OLD COUPLE.

The time of the Purification of Mary, according to the law of Moses, being ended, the holy Family presented itself at the temple. Two doves are the ransom of the Creator of worlds and of the Redeemer of humanity.

“Now, St Luke tells us, there was a man in Jerusalem named Simeon, and this man was just and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel, and the Holy Ghost, which was in him, had revealed to him that he should not see death before he had seen Christ the Lord(1).

“There was also in the temple one Anna, a prophetess, the daughter of Phanuel, who was far advanced in years, who departed not from the temple, by fasting and prayers serving God night and day. Now at the same hour coming in, she confessed to the Lord and spoke of him to all who looked for the redemption of Israel(2)”.

How beautiful must have been the ray which escaped from the Holy Face, thus to penetrate the mind and heart of these venerable and aged persons, and to warm them and animate them with its divine light! Simeon was the first to feel the effects of it. He could not contain himself, and in his joy he ventured to approach Mary, to take Jesus in his feeble arms, to press him against his aged breast, and then with his eyes bathed in tears, inspired by the Spirit from on high, he chanted the Nunc dimittis, which was to become the loveliest expression of the ecstasy of love felt by a soul detaching itself from the earth to aspire thenceforth only to heaven.

May this prayer be in my heart and on my lips at my last hour, oh Jesus, in order that it may soften the anguish of that tenable moment, and that, after having often contemplated thy Holy Face, I may repeat with the holy old man Simeon— “Now thou dost dismiss thy servant, oh Lord, according to thy word, in peace;

“Because my eyes have seen thy salvation”,

“Which thou hast prepared before the face of all peoples:

“A light to the revelation of the Gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel.”

2nd POINT. — JESUS CHRIST THE PRINCIPLE OF RUIN AND OF RESURRECTION.

And Simeon, having blest the child, continues the Evangelist, gave it back to its mother, and, still continuing to he inspired by a prophetic light, he added— “This child is set for the fall and resurrection of many in Israel, and for a sign which shall not be contradicted. And thine own soul, oh Mary, a sword shall pierce(3).”

Jesus Christ, the principle of resurrection, but also of ruin, what a subject for meditation! It is the pacific King who comes to us, full of sweetness; he desires to found a vast empire, to create an immense fold; but he desires also to have no one in it except men of good will; he calls us all to him, but he leaves us free to follow him or not.

Happiness and an eternal recompense are the portion of his faithful sheep; ruin and eternal reprobation, that of the impious, the indifferent and the unbelieving.

And as regards Mary, the sword of grief is predicted to fall upon her, to make us all understand that here below joy is only a ray of light shed upon us in our exile and sorrow, and that it is a gloomy sky which most generally hangs over us. God tries those whom he loves; and the privileged ones whom he admits to his most tender intimacy are also those whom he overwhelms with sufferings, that having taken part in his cup of suffering, they may share in his glory; and that, after having followed him along the royal road of the Cross, they may accompany him along the path of glory; lastly that having had their soul transpierced with the sword of grief, they may be inundated with delights in the true Paradise.

Oh adorable Face of Jesus, may I comprehend these mysteries whilst uniting myself to the sentiments of venerable Simeon, of pious Anna, of St Joseph and of the Virgin of the Dolors.

SPIRITUAL BOUQUET.

Positus est hic in ruinam et resurrectionem multorum.

Jesus Christ is set for the fell and for the resurrection of many. (Luc. ii, 34.)

THE CONFRATERNITY OF THE VERONICA AT NANTES.

The worship of the Holy Face is not new to the Church, it dates as far back as Calvary, and we know what honors have always been paid to the veil of Veronica at Rome. In the middle ages, celebrated confraternities existed under the title of confraternities of the Holy Face. The one established at Nantes merits special attention.

It was founded in that city in 1413, at the request of John V of Brittany, and as a result of his journey to the eternal city, whence he brought back a copy of the veil of St Veronica. Having built, at his own expense, a part of the church belonging to the Dominican convent, he begged the Religious to superintend the confraternity, which was almost exclusively composed of notable personages, prelates, princes, barons, noblemen, citizens and gentlemen. The confraternity permitted only one woman ever to be a member of it, and she was the Sovereign. Anne of Brittany was the last person who had this honor conferred upon her. Approved by the Holy See and enriched with numerous indulgences, the confraternity was not subjected to the fall of many other, like associations which after a time were condemned to disappear. It flourished down to the period of the Revolution.

In 1514, the Duchess, when on her death bed at Blois, had requested to be buried at Nantes. According to what the Abbe Travers states, the King wished her to be buried at Saint Denis, but her heart was taken to Nantes in a golden coffer, and laid in the tomb of Francis II, her father, with a great deal of solemnity. The town defrayed all the expenses, which amounted to the sum of seven hundred and ninety-four livres, exclusive of eighty pounds of wax, which was furnished by the brethren of the confraternity, because, as they said, the Queen was their sister and a member of their confraternity(4).

The famine of corn, continues the same author, attracted many beggars to Nantes in 1532. The town borrowed money for the relief of the poor, and the Confraternity of the Veronica contributed to the public needs by giving a hundred livres to the chaplainship of All Saints and of Saint Antony of Padua.

The confraternity of the Veronica was the richest and most flourishing of any, because the object it had in view was to honor the Holy Face. This is what the Rev. Father Antonin Thomas shows to the Veronicans in the letter prefixed to his little work entitled— The Devotion to the Holy Face, recently discovered at Nantes, and which title priests of the Holy Face have lately edited.

INVOCATION.

Oh Savior Jesus, who, to repair the offences which we commit against the divine Majesty, didst will to suffer all kinds of ignominies and torments inflicted upon thy august Face during the Passion, permit me to follow in the train of the numerous and pious associates of the confraternity, to offer thee our homage of reparation, and the expression of our grief for our own sins and for those of our brethren.

(1) Luke, ii, 26.

(2) Luke, ii, 37-38.

(3) Luke. ii. 34-35.

(4) Travers, op. cit, vol. ii, p. 271.