2. The Presentation of our Lady in the Temple[570] (Præsentatio B.M.V., 21st November). The story that Mary at the age of three years was brought by her parents to the temple in fulfilment of their vow, there to be educated, appears only in apocryphal writings,[571] but it fell in so completely with the ideas of religious, both in ancient and modern times in East and West, that it was not long before it asserted its influence on the cycle of our Lady’s Feasts. The commemoration appears officially for the first time in the constitution of Manuel Comnenus, published in 1166, as a fully recognised festival on which the law courts did not sit. The date is the same as at the present day.[572] The feast was introduced into the West by a French nobleman, Philip de Maizières, who spent some time at the Court of Gregory XI. at Avignon in 1371 as representative of the King of Cyprus. He represented the manner in which the day was celebrated in the East in such a way as to move Gregory to ordain it as one of the festivals of the Papal Court. It soon made its way in other places also—in Navarre in 1374, in Treves in 1381, in Metz in 1420, in Cologne and elsewhere. In Rome it was introduced by Sixtus IV., and an office for it was added to the Roman breviary without its recitation being imposed (inter festa ad libitum and pro quibusdam locis). It was only Sixtus V. who, in 1585, ordained it for the whole Church after it had been for a time suppressed by Pius V. The original office was altered under Clement VIII. Although the feast at first was regarded as unimportant, it attained in Prussia to the rank of a feast in foro, and this in an unexpected way, in 1893. It falls in Prussia on the third Wednesday in November, and occupies a position midway between the movable and immovable feasts.
3. The Visitation (Visitatio B.M.V.) was formerly included among the lesser feasts of our Lady, although the most prominent and popular of them. At the present day it has a higher rank (duplex II. cl.), and, in certain localities, it has an octave. It used to be kept as an entire holiday. It is not only grounded upon Scripture, but the event it commemorates is one of the most important related in the New Testament, both on account of the sanctification of St John the Baptist in his mother’s womb, and because of its being the occasion on which the Magnificat was first uttered. Nevertheless this feast does not exist among the Greeks, but, on the 2nd July, they celebrate the translation of the Holy Virgin’s garment in the church of the suburb of Constantinople called Blachernæ, which took place under the Emperor Leo I. in 469.[573]
The earliest traces of the feast are found in the thirteenth century. They appear in different localities at about the same date, which may be due to the fact that the newly founded order of the Franciscans had adopted the feast and promoted its celebration. It appears among the Franciscans as early as 1263, and received official recognition during the great schism from Urban VI., and Boniface IX. in 1389. After the schism was healed, the Council of Basel was compelled in its forty-third session, on 1st July 1441, to issue a decree authorising the feast, and granting indulgences to those who assisted at divine service on the day. They felt obliged to adopt this measure, the feast not having been adopted within the obedience of the anti-pope.
There is nothing to show why the 2nd July was chosen for this feast, and one must needs have recourse to surmise. There seem to be indications that it is connected with the date of the Annunciation on the one hand, and, on the other, with the Nativity of St John the Baptist, the octave of which it immediately follows. It was regarded as probable that Mary had chosen the time of Elizabeth’s confinement for her visit, and had remained some time with her afterwards.[574] Perhaps, however, the real reason was that the Greek Church had already for some time kept this festival of our Lady on the 2nd July. The feast was, moreover, kept on different days in different countries. In Paris, for example, it was kept on the 27th June; Archbishop John II. of Prague, who introduced it into his province in 1385, placed it on the 28th April. Its proper place, if the main idea of the ecclesiastical year were carried out, would be in Advent.
4. The Feast of the Holy Rosary (Sollemnitas SS. Rosarii B.M.V.). Towards the end of the twelfth century we find it had become usual to use the angelic salutation (St Luke i. 28), along with the salutation of Elizabeth (St Luke i. 41), as a prayer. This prayer was authorised and imposed by many councils. We have evidence to this effect from a synod of Paris under Bishop Odo de Sully (1196-1208),[575] and, in the period immediately following, from the synods of Orleans, Durham (1217), Treves (1237), and elsewhere.[576] The new prayer was joined to the “Our Father” in such a way that ten “Hail Marys” were recited after one “Our Father” fifteen times, each prayer being counted on a string of beads. The originator of this form of prayer, called the Rosary, is generally, but without foundation, considered to have been St Dominic. The custom of using a string of beads on which to count a stated number of prayers had already been in existence for a long time, and only became general when the custom grew up of reciting one hundred and fifty “Hail Marys” to correspond to the number of the psalms. This was called the “Mary Psalter,” the Rosary, or the “Psalter of the Laity.”[577] When this form of prayer took shape is not exactly known, but it has quite recently been maintained that St Dominic did not originate it, as is often affirmed. His biographer and other contemporaries do not ascribe the invention of the rosary to him. It is only at the end of the fifteenth century that a Dominican, Alanus de Rupe (de la Roche), produced this story,[578] which unfortunately has found its way into the breviary. A notable improvement was made in this devotion in the fifteenth century, by adding after the name Jesus in each Hail Mary the mention of some event in the lives of Jesus and Mary bearing on the work of salvation, beginning with the message of the angel and concluding with the descent of the Holy Ghost and the Assumption. Among these, the five points taken from the Passion of Christ—the so-called “sorrowful Mysteries”—form the centre, and thus the entire rosary now falls into three parts, each complete in itself.[579]
By this means the devotion gained a more definite meaning. The mere recitation of the prayers is closely connected with meditation, and each mystery has more or less reference to some feast of our Lord or of our Lady, and so is brought into relation with the different liturgical seasons. It can thus to a certain extent be connected with the whole cycle of festivals of which indeed it was a sort of summary.
In its completed form the Rosary became the favourite devotion of all, high and low, clerical and lay, and a special confraternity, favoured by the popes and endowed with indulgences, was formed for its spread and encouragement.[580] The Rosary was a source of innumerable graces not only to individual believers, but even Christendom as a whole had recourse to its assistance in times of general distress and danger, especially when pressed by the Turks. Remarkable answers to prayer, among which was numbered the victory of Lepanto (7th October 1571), first moved Pius V. to institute a feast in thanksgiving. Gregory XIII. gave stability to this feast by ordering in 1573 that in every church possessing a chapel, or at least an altar of the Rosary, it should be celebrated as “the Feast of the Holy Rosary” on the first Sunday in October. Clement X. granted the feast to the whole of Spain without this proviso. Clement XI. extended the feast to all Christendom in consequence of the victory gained at Peterwardein by Prince Eugene on the 5th August 1716.[581]
A commemoration much beloved by the people, is that of the Seven Dolors of Our Blessed Lady, which cannot be regarded as a festival in the usual sense of the term. It takes place on the Friday after Passion Sunday. Its introduction was prepared by the ascetic literature of the twelfth century, in which also its roots are to be sought. The pious monk Eadmer in his treatise “On the Excellencies of the Virgin Mary” chapter v. (see [App. x., page 446]) deals with the share taken by Our Lady in the sufferings of her Son. The writing of an unknown author (De Passione Christi et Doloribus et Planctibus Matris Ejus, Migne, Patr. Lat., clii.), attributed to St Bernard, while full of deep piety, is yet rather effeminate and sentimental. The third treatise belonging to this subject is composed by Amadeus, a disciple of St Bernard, Abbot and afterwards Bishop of Lausanne († 1159), whose fifth homily is entitled De Mentis Dolore et Martyrio B.M.V. (Migne, Patr. Lat., clxxxviii., 1325-1331). He deals with Our Lady’s share in her Son’s sufferings in a merely general way and in outline. At a later date, the matter was treated in more detail and with additions, so that the Seven Dolors of Our Lady were the result. In this form, the matter was taken up by the Servites, whose order came into existence in 1240, and to whom Innocent IX. in 1688 granted a second feast of the same name to be celebrated out of Lent on the third Sunday in September.