And can we for a moment think that the years of intercourse with our Lady meant nothing in the spiritual development of S. John?  On the contrary, may we not think that much of the spiritual richness which is the outstanding feature of his writings was the outcome of his association with the blessed Mother?  No one has ever shown the sympathetic understanding of our Lord, has been so well able convincingly to interpret Him, as the beloved disciple.  I myself have no doubt that much of his understanding came by way of S. Mary.  Her interpretative insight would have been deeper than any one else’s, not only because of her long association with Jesus, but because of her sinlessness.  No two lives ever touched so closely; and there was not between them the bar that so blocks our spiritual understanding and clouds our spiritual vision, the bar of sin.  I suppose it is almost impossible for us to appreciate the effect of sin in clouding vision and dulling sympathy.  Our every day familiarity with venial sin, our easy tolerance of it, the adjustment of our lives to habits that involve it, have resulted in a lack of spiritual sensitiveness.  Much of the meaning of our Lord’s life and words passes over us just because of this dimness of vision, this insensitiveness to suggestion.  And therefore we find it difficult to imagine what would be the understanding, the insight, the response to our Lord, of one between whom and Him there was no shadow of sin.  And such an one was the blessed Mother.  With unclouded vision she looked into the face of her Son.  As His life expanded she followed with perfect sympathy; indeed, sometimes, as at Cana, her understanding of what He was made her precipitate in concluding as to His necessary action.  When He became a public teacher and unfolded largely in parable His doctrine, it was her sinless soul which would see clearest and deepest, and with the most ready response.  And therefore I am sure that we cannot go astray in thinking that S. John’s relation to S. Mary was not simply that of a guardian of her from the pressure of the world, but was indeed that of a son who listened and learned from the experience of his Mother.  No doubt S. John himself was of a very subtle spiritual understanding; notwithstanding that, and notwithstanding his exceptional opportunities of learning, we may still believe that there are many touches in his Gospel which are the result of his association with his Lord’s Mother.

Is it not possible for us to have our share in that pure insight of blessed Mary?  When we try to think out the lines of our own spiritual development and the influences that have contributed to shape it, do we not find that the presence or absence of devotion to our Lady has been a factor of considerable importance?  Devotion to her injected an element into our religion which is of vast moment, an element of sympathy, of gentleness, of purity.  You can if you like, in condemnatory accents, call that element sentimentalism,