Why, then, these emblems of joy in presence of this torch? What are the memories it brings to the heart of the Spouse thus to make gladness take the place of grief? Let us ask the author of the blessing of the Paschal Candle, St. Ambrose, for the explanation of this mysterious symbol. Let us question, too, the faith of the Middle Ages. Let us listen to the symbolic language so familiar to our fathers, and with which we are so little acquainted. Perhaps, even, we have sometimes surprised a smile on our lips at the sight of that candle, and of certain other exterior practices of worship, whose significance we did not understand; for, in our days, how great, generally, is the ignorance of the faithful in the matter of liturgy and symbolism. Now, we see how magnificent is the meaning of that ceremony of the blessing of the Paschal Candle which was extended by St. Zozimus in the middle of the fifth century to the other churches of the city of Rome, although baptism was conferred only at the baptistery of Lutran, and later on by other popes to all the churches, even to those which have no baptismal fonts: so holy and salutary did the sovereign pontiffs consider the impressions which this great rite should produce. In this candle, superior in weight and in size to the candles which are generally lighted on other solemnities, in this unique candle, the princes of liturgy show us the image of Jesus Christ, a precious symbol which is impressed on it by the virtue of the blessing. This blessing is reserved for the deacon. To him belongs this prerogative when the priest, and even when the bishop is present. This is because the deacon represents on this occasion the holy women, who, notwithstanding the inferiority of their sex, were commissioned by the Saviour to announce His resurrection to His Apostles, and that, by a disposition of Providence, woman, in the first days of the world, sent by the demon to man, brought him death; woman was to be sent by the risen Christ to man to proclaim life to him. The Apostles were still in tears, when, in transports of gladness, Mary Magdalene and her companions announced to them the mystery of the resurrection. The priest and the bishop, too, still wear the color of mourning, when, clothed in white, the deacon freely and loudly chants the beautiful prayers of the blessing, and is thus the herald of the resurrection's joys. In consequence of the deacon's blessing, the candle then becomes the symbol of Christ. "Before it is lighted," says Dom Guéranger, summing up on this point the interpretations of the olden liturgists, "its type is in the pillar of cloud which covered the departure of the Hebrews as they went forth from Egypt; under this first form, it is a figure of Christ in the tomb, inanimate, lifeless. When it will have received the flame, we shall see in it the pillar of fire which gave light to the holy people's feet, and also the figure of Christ, all radiant with the splendors of His resurrection."