When, therefore, the thought of the Church began to follow out what was
involved in its belief in the actual sinlessness of blessed Mary, in its
holding to the fact that her relation to God was of such a close and
indeed unique character that her actual sinfulness would be
incomprehensible; it was at length compelled to ask, What, in that case
are we to think of original sin? If the first Eve was created in
innocence and endowed with supernatural gifts, are we to think that she
whom the Fathers of the Church from the earliest times have constantly
called the second Eve, she whom God chose to be the Mother of His Son,
should be less endowed? Is it a fact any more conceivable that the
virgin Mother of God should be born in original sin than that she should
be the victim of actual sin? If by the special grace of God she was kept
from sin from the time that she was able to know good and evil, is it
not probable that the freedom from sin goes further back than that, and
is a freedom from original as well as from actual sin? What is the
meaning of the Angelic Salutation, "Hail, thou that art _full of
grace_," unless it refer to a superadded grace, to such _donum
supernaturale_ as the first Eve received? There is indeed no precedent
to guide in the case: the prophet Jeremiah and S. John Baptist had been
preserved from sin from the womb, but this did not involve freedom from
original sin. Still the fact that there was no precedent was not in
anywise fatal; the point of the situation was just that there was no
precedent for the relation to God into which Blessed Mary had been
called. It was precisely this uniqueness of vocation which was leading
theological thought to the conclusion of the uniqueness of her
privilege: and this uniqueness of privilege seemed to call for nothing
less than an exemption from sin in any and all forms. So a belief in the
Immaculate Conception grew up despite a good deal of opposition while
its implications were being thought out, but was found more and more
congenial to the mind of the Church. She whose wonderful title for