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| Chapter I.
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Chapter I.
How great blessedness,
among heavenly gifts, belongs to holy virginity, besides the
testimonies of the Scriptures, we learn also from the practice of the
Church, by which we are taught that a peculiar merit belongs to those
who have devoted themselves to it by special consecration. For while
the whole multitude of those that believe receive equal gifts of grace,
and all rejoice in the same blessings of the sacraments, those who are
virgins possess something above the rest, since, out of the holy and
unstained company of the Church, they are chosen by the Holy Spirit,
and are presented by the bishop162
| 162 “per summum
sacerdotem.” | at the altar of
God, as if being more holy and pure sacrifices, on account of the
merits of their voluntary dedication. This is truly a sacrifice worthy
of God, inasmuch as it is the offering of so precious a being, and none
will please him more than the sacrifice of his own image. For I think
that the Apostle especially referred to a sacrifice of this kind, when
he said, “Now, I beseech you, brethren, by the mercy of God, that
you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy and
acceptable163
to God.”
Virginity, therefore, possesses both that which others have, and that
which others have not; while it obtains both common and special grace,
and rejoices (so to speak) in its own peculiar privilege of
consecration. For ecclesiastical authority permits us to style virgins
also the brides of Christ; while, after the manner of brides, it veils
those whom it consecrates to the Lord, openly exhibiting those as very
especially about to possess spiritual marriage who have fled away from
carnal fellowship. And those are worthily united, after a spiritual
manner, to God, in accordance with the analogy of marriage, who, from
love to him, have set at nought human alliances. In their case, that
saying of the apostle finds its fullest possible fulfillment, “He
who is joined to the Lord,164
is one
spirit.”E.C.F. INDEX & SEARCH
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