The morning star and Catholic messenger. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1868-1881, 1868-05-31

come for the purpose from Civita Vecchia,
occupied reserved seats.
sT. BRIDGET OF SWEDEN.
We find in the Ave Maria for May 3Oth, a
sketch of the life of St. Bridget of Sweden,
which must be new to most of our readers.
We append the first part:
The life of st. Bridget is one of those
that are perfectly incOmprehensible to per-
sons imbued with a worldly spirit. On the
one hand the frequent apparitions to her of
our dear Lord; the revelations made to her !;
her intercourse with angels and saints, es-
pecially with the Blessed Virgin I; on the
other, the great austerities she practiced !;
her love of poverty and her charity to the
poor /; her great humility and her zeal for
the glory Of God all these graces continu-
ally received, all these and many more, vir-
tues continually practised from her early
childhood to her last moment-that is, con-
stantly. unremittingly practised for three
score and ten years by lady of high rank,
married to prince of the royal amily-all
this is utterly incomprehensible to worldly
persons; and many Catholic maidens, too, of
stand it if they have dipped never SO lightly
in the tasteless literature of the times, and
formed their estimate of what is lovely,
what is commendable in lady, from the
heroines- they have read about. Neverthe-
less, the life of St. Bridget is a fact,-it is
well known at the time by the whole Chris
tan world, a lady who moved in the " first
circles" of society all the events of whose
life therefore were we'll known by the con-
temporary writer's who wrote her life.
st. Bridget was the daughter of Birger
and Sigrida, both of whom were of royal
families, the former belonging to the royal
fovr Of md 1o%k
descendant of the Gothic kings; they were
as illustrious for their piety as by their ele-
waited rank. Bridget was born in 1902, and
at an early age having lost her pious
mother she was confided to the care of her
aunt, pious lady, from whom she received
q mothers care. Until she was three years
old she never spoke a word, but at that age
she began to speak, not stammering out a
o few words like other children usually do,
but with all the ease and influency of per-
sons of maturer years.
Her devotion to the Blessed Virgin from
and she, like St. Teresa afterwards, chose
Mary to be her mother. When she was
only seven years old she was rewarded for
her pure, candid, sincere, and enlightened
devotion to our Blessed Lady, who even at
that early day began to bless her with the
extraordinary graces which illustrated her
whole life. One day she saw in her room
an altar, upon which the Blessed Virgin,
appeared clothed in respondent garments,
who holding a precious crown in her hands
invited the child-saint to draw near and re-
ceive it. Bridget eagerly approached and
received the crown from the hands of the
Blessed Virgin the consolation she felt was
so great that she ever retained the memory
of that moment during her whole life, and
from that day she practised all Christian
virtues with admirable perfection she des-
pissed earthly things and cherished in her
heart the thought of God and things celestial.
She preserved the purity Of her soul and
body as the most precious treasure she pos
sessed; she was sober, modest, candid,
humble, and obedient, and it is not surpris-
ing that she possessed marvellous tran
quillity of conscience. She always pre-
served the tender love for the Blessed Vir-
gin that distinguished her early years, and
though little stress is laid on her devotion
to our Blessed Lady in the short Lives"
eXtant in English, ON account of her great
devotion to the most sacred Passion of
Jesus,-yet we may reasonably infer that
this great grace of sympathizing so keenly
with our suffering Redeemer was the conse-
qucnce of her devotion to Mary, the SORROW
full Mother mourning over her suffering
Son: for it was true of st. Bridget as of
all other saints the graces sire received
came through Mary.
When ten years old, she heard sermon
the, Passion, by which she was greatly
moved, and the following night she saw our
Lord appear, hanging on the cross, and
heard Him say :. See, my daughter how |
have been treated !" She cried out, % Who,
q my God, has inflicted those wounds upon
YOU! ," And she heard Him reply: Those
who despise my commandments, and who
do not correspond to the tenderness of my
love" She was deeply impressed by this
most sorrowtul sight, and never aitcrward
could she think of the Passion of our Lord
without weeping bitterly and it may be