Page:TheParadiseOfTheChristianSoul.djvu/661

 to come with all the Saints and Elect of God, and hasten to me with help and counsel in all my prayers and supplications, in all my distresses and necessities, and in all those circumstances in which I am to do, or speak, or think anything, all the days, and nights, and hours, and moments of my life.

And to obtain for me, thy servant, of thy beloved Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, the fulness of all virtues, with all mercy and consolation, all counsel and aid, all blessing and sanctification, all salvation, peace, and prosperity, all joy and cheerfulness ; also the abundance of all spiritual, and the sufficiency of corporal blessings, and the grace of the Holy Ghost, to order me well in all things, to guard my soul, to govern and protect my body, to elevate my mind, to settle my conduct, to prove my actions, to suggest to me holy thoughts, to pardon me the ill that is past, amend the present and overrule the future; to give me a chaste and a good life ; to bestow on me Faith, Hope, and Charity ; to make me firmly to believe the Articles of the Holy Faith, and to keep the Precepts of the Law; to govern and protect my bodily senses, and evermore to deliver and defend me from mortal sins, even to my life’s end.

May he graciously hear and receive this my prayer, and grant to me Life everlasting. Hearken and intercede for me, O most Sweet Virgin Mary, Mother of God and of all mercy. Amen.

 Of all holy exercises, the Rosary of the Blessed Virgin is in most frequent use. It consists, altogether, of the Lord’s Prayer repeated fifteen times, and the Angelical Salutation repeated one hundred and fifty times; but is usually recited according to its threefold division into the Joyful, the Sorrowful, and the Glorious; to each of which belong five corresponding Mysteries, viz. :

To the Joyful belong, 1. The Incarnation of Christ. 2.. The Visitation. 3. The Nativity. 4. The Presentation. 5. The Finding in the Temple.

To the Sorrowful, 1. The Prayer in the Garden. 2.