At length, on the distant horizon, can be discerned the dawn of the Sun that has been so long desired to enlighten the world. The happy Mother of the Messias was to be born before He could come. This is the eve of the feast of the Immaculate Conception; the earth has now a pledge that the coming of the Messias will no longer be delayed, the Son of man is near at hand. The conception of Mary takes place under the direct providence of God; she receives the breath of life from God, without any stain of sin. The feast of the Blessed Virgin’s Immaculate Conception is the most solemn of all those which the Church celebrates during the holy season of Advent. We will, then, honor the feast of the Blessed Virgin with joy. The intention of the feast is not only to celebrate the anniversary of the happy moment in which began, in the womb of the pious Ann, the life of the ever glorious Virgin Mary: but also to honor the sublime privilege by which Mary was preserved from the stain of original sin—which, by the curse of God on our first parents, darkened the souls of all the descendants of Adam and Eve at the very first moment of their conception. Prayer. O Lord Jesus, Who didst, for the love of us, etc., etc. Eighth Day. The faith of the Catholic Church on the conception of Mary, is this: that, at the very instant when God united the soul of Mary, which He had created with a special regard to the Mother of His divine Son, to the body which it was to animate, this ever blessed soul not only did not contract the stain of that curse which defiles every human soul, but was filled with an immeasurable grace, which rendered it from that moment the mirror of sanctity of God Himself, as far as this is possible to a creature. It was due to His own infinite sanctity that God should suspend, in this instance, the law which His divine justice had passed upon all the children of Adam. The relations which Mary was to bear to the divinity could not be reconciled with her undergoing the humiliations of man’s punishment. She was not only the Daughter of the eternal Father: she was destined also to become the very Mother of the Son, and the Bride of the Holy Ghost. Nothing defiled could be permitted to enter, even for the shortest time, that sacred structure. Prayer. O Lord Jesus, Who didst, for the love of us, etc., etc. Ninth Day.