Page:Heavenly Bridegrooms.djvu/112

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by this name; to which afterwards the Virgin Mother of God added the surname, ordering her to be thenceforth called the Rose of Mary. At the age of five she made a vow of perpetual virginity. * * *

"Having wondrously familiar intercourse, by continual apparitions with her guardian angel of St. Catherine of Sienna, and the Virgin Mother of God, she merited to hear these words from Christ—'Rose of my heart, be thou my spouse.' At last being carried to the Paradise of this her spouse and glittering with many miracles, both before and since her departure, Pope Clement X. enrolled her with solemity in the Catalogue for Holy Virgins." [From Breviary?]

The following are extracts from the Bull of her canonization:

"At this time she was favoured with the following revelation: There appeared to her in her sleep an extraordinary person, beautiful above all the sons of men, habited like a sculptor on a festival-day and he seemed to court her as a lover. Before Rose would consent to his proposal she set him a task namely, to carve a piece of marble; and she bade him return again shortly, when the sculpture should be finished. At the return of her spouse, the virgin blushed when she perceived the task she had assigned him was accomplished in a manner beyond his strength; and he opened to her his workshop, where were a number of elect virgins, working like men at carving and polishing marble. She discovered that they were his espoused, by the style and beauty of their nuptial dresses; they were moistening the stones, and preparing them for cutting by their tears, which dripped upon them. Rose perceived that she was to be dressed like one of them, and prepared to be advanced to a like espousal. * * * The mystery was disclosed to her thus: On Palm Sunday, when Rose was absorbed in meditation, in the chapel of the Blessed Virgin of the Rosary, her lover thus addressed her: 'Rose of my heart, be my love.' The virgin trembled at the sweet voice of her Divine Spouse and at the instant she heard the voice of the Mother of God, wishing her joy, and saying, 'Rose, it