It is to this house that we see S. Mary hastening, sure of finding there
a heart in which she can confide. She "entered into the house of
Zacharias and saluted Elizabeth." We are not told what the words of her
salutation were, but no doubt it was the customary Jewish salutation of
peace. There could have been no more appropriate salutation exchanged
between these two in whose souls was abiding the peace of a perfect
possession of God. The will of God to which they had been accustomed to
offer themselves all their lives was being accomplished through them in
unexpected ways; but it found them as ready of acceptance as they had
been in any of the ordinary duties of life wherein they had been
accustomed to wait upon God. We may seem sometimes to go beyond Holy
Scripture in our interpretations of feelings and thoughts which we are
sure must have been those of the actors in the drama of salvation
unfolded to us in the Scriptures; but are we not entitled to infer from
God's actions a good deal of the nature of the instruments He uses? Are
we not quite safe in the case of S. Mary in the deduction from the
nature of her vocation of the spiritual perfection to attribute to her?
Does not God's use of a person imply qualities in the person used? It is
on this ground that I feel that we are quite safe in inferring the
spiritual attitude of S. Mary and of S. Elizabeth from the choice God
made of them to be the instruments of His purpose of redemption.

But we are not inferring, we have the record with us, when we think of
the joy of the mothers transcended in the joy of the children. The
unborn Forerunner becomes conscious of the approach of Him of whom he is
to say later: "Behold the Lamb of God that taketh away the sin of the
world"; and there is an instantaneous movement that can only be that of
recognition and worship. The movement of the child is at once understood
and translated by S. Elizabeth: "And she spake out with a loud voice,