So the successful passing of one test cannot be expected to relieve us
from all tests in the future. It is the dream of the child that manhood
will set it free; and he reaches manhood only to find that it imposes
obligations which are so pressing that he reverses his dream and speaks
of his childhood as the time of his true freedom. The meeting of
spiritual tests is but the proving of spiritual capacity to meet other
tests. To our Lady it might well seem that the acceptance of the
conditions of the Incarnation was the severest test that God could
assign her; that in the light of the promise she could look on to joy.
But the future concealed a sword which should pierce her very heart. The
promise contained no doubt wonderful things--this wonder of God's
blessing that she was now experiencing in the coming of the Holy Ghost,
in the very embrace of God Himself: this is but the first of the Joyful
Mysteries which were God's great gifts to her. But her life was not to
be a succession of Joyful Mysteries, ultimately crowned with the
Mysteries of Glory. There were the Sorrowful Mysteries as well. They
were as true, and shall we not say, as necessary, as valuable, a part of
her spiritual training as the others. She, our Mother, was now near God,
with a nearness that was possible for no other human being, and it is
one of the traditional sayings of our Lord: "He that is near Me is near
fire." And fire burns as well as warms and lights. She is wonderful, the
Virgin of Nazareth, in this moment when she becomes Mother of God: and
we share in the rapture of the moment when in the fulness of her joy she
hardly notices S. Gabriel's departure: but we feel, too, a great pity
for her as we think of the coming days. So we kneel to her who is our
Mother, as well as Mother of God, and say our _Ave_, and ask her
priceless intercession.

Gabriel, that angel bright,