MATER CHRISTI.
Mother of Christ—then mother of us all:
Mother of God made man, of man made God:[97]
The thornless garden, the immaculate sod,
Whence sprang the Adam that reversed the fall.
Mother of Christ the Body Mystical;
Of us the members, as of him the Head:
Of him our life, the first-born from the dead;[98]
Of us baptized into his burial.[99]
Yes, Mother, we were truly born of thee
On Calvary's second Eden—thou its Eve:
Thy dolors were our birth-pangs by the tree
Whereon the second Adam died to live—
To live in us, thy promised seed to be,
Who then his death-wound to the snake didst give.