Woman, what
have we in common, thou and I?'

But Abbe Mouret thrust away such thoughts, prostrated himself,
endeavoured to forget the Brother's harsh attacks. His rapture in the
immaculate purity of Mary alone raised him from the depths of lowliness
in which he sought to bury himself. Whenever, alone before the tall
golden Virgin, he so deceived himself as to imagine that he could see
her bending down for him to kiss her braided locks, he once more became
very young, very good, very strong, very just, full of tenderness.

Abbe Mouret's devotion to the Virgin dated from his early youth. Already
when he was quite a child, somewhat shy and fond of shrinking into
corners, he took pleasure in the thought that a lovely lady was watching
over him: that two blue eyes, so sweet, ever followed him with their
smile. When he felt at night a breath of air glide across his hair, he
would often say that the Virgin had come to kiss him. He had grown up
beneath this womanly caress, in an atmosphere full of the rustle of
divine robes. From the age of seven he had satisfied the cravings of his
affection by expending all the pence he received as pocket money in the
purchase of pious picture-cards, which he jealously concealed that he
alone might feast on them. But never was he tempted by the pictures of
Jesus and the Lamb, of Christ on the Cross, of God the Father, with a
mighty beard, stooping over a bank of clouds; his preference was always
for the winning portraits of Mary, with her tiny smiling mouth and
delicate outstretched hands. By degrees he had made quite a collection
of them all--of Mary between a lily and a distaff, Mary carrying her
child as if she were his elder sister, Mary crowned with roses, and
Mary crowned with stars. For him they formed a family of lovely young
maidens, alike in their attractiveness, in the grace, kindliness, and
sweetness of their countenances, so youthful beneath their veils, that
although they bore the name of 'Mother of God,' he had felt no awe of
them as he had often felt for grown-up persons.

They seemed to him of his own age, little girls such as he wished to
meet with, little girls of heaven such as the little boys who die when
seven years old have for eternal playmates in some nook of Paradise. But
even at this early age he was self-contained; and full of the exquisite
bashfulness of adolescence he grew up without betraying the secret of
his religious love. Mary grew up with him, being invar