Of all the personages who figure in history, in poetry, in art, Mary Magdalene is at once the most unreal and the most real:—the most _unreal_, if we attempt to fix her identity, which has been a subject of dispute for ages; the most _real_, if we consider her as having been, for ages, recognised and accepted in every Christian heart as the impersonation of the penitent sinner absolved through faith and love. In this, her mythic character, she has been surrounded by associations which have become fixed in the imagination, and which no reasoning, no array of facts, can dispel. This is not the place to enter into disputed points of biblical criticism; they are quite beside our present purpose. Whether Mary Magdalene, ‘out of whom Jesus cast seven devils,’ Mary of Bethany, and the ‘woman who was a sinner,’ be, as some authorities assert, three distinct persons, or, as others affirm, one and the same individual under different designations, remains a question open to dispute, nothing having been demonstrated on either side, from Scripture or from tradition; and I cannot presume even to give an opinion where doctors—and doctors of the Church, too—disagree; Origen and St. Chrysostom taking one side of the question, St. Clement and St. Gregory the other. Fleury, after citing the opinions of both sides, thus beautifully sums up the whole question:—‘Il importe de ne pas croire témérairement ce que l’Évangile ne dit point, et de ne pas mettre la religion à suivre aveuglement toutes les opinions populaires: _la foi est trop précieuse pour la prodiguer ainsi_; mais la charité l’est encore plus; et ce qui est le plus important, c’est d’éviter les disputes qui peuvent l’altérer tant soit peu.’ And this is most true;—in his time the fast hold which the Magdalene had taken of the affections of the people was not to be shaken by theological researches and doubts. Here critical accuracy was nothing less than profanation and scepticism, and to have attacked the sanctity of the Blessed Mary Magdalene would have embittered and alienated many kindly and many believing spirits. It is difficult to treat of Mary Magdalene; and this difficulty would be increased infinitely if it were absolutely necessary to enter on the much-vexed question of her scriptural character and identity: one thing only appeals certain,—that such a person, whatever might have been her veritable appellation, did exist. The woman who, under the name of Mary Magdalene,—whether that name be rightfully or wrongfully bestowed,—stands before us, sanctified in the imagination and in the faith of the people in her combined character of Sinner and of Saint, as the first-fruits of Christian penitence,—is a reality, and not a fiction. Even if we would, we cannot do away with the associations inseparably connected with her name and her image. Of all those to whom much has been forgiven, she was the first: of all the tears since ruefully shed at the foot of the cross of suffering,