The graces of the saints were different in each, as St. Paul said: There are diversities of graces: “Divisiones gratiarum sunt.” So that each of them corresponding with the grace received, has rendered himself excellent in some virtue; one in saving souls, one in leading a life of penance, one in suffering torments, one in contemplation; hence the holy Church, when celebrating their festivals, says of each: And there was not found the like to him: “Non est inventus similis illi.” And as in their merits, so are they in heaven different in glory: For star differeth from star in glory: “Stella enim a stella differt.”[1329] The Apostles differ from the martyrs, confessors from virgins, the innocents from penitents. The holy Virgin being full of all graces, excelled each saint in every kind of virtue; she was the apostle of the apostles; she was queen of the martyrs, for she suffered more than all of them; she was the standard-bearer of the virgins, the model of spouses; she united in herself a perfect innocence with a perfect mortification; in a word, she united in her heart all the most heroic virtues which any saint has ever practised. Hence it was said of her: “The queen stood on thy right hand in gilded clothing, surrounded with variety;”[1330] for all the graces, privileges, and merits of the other saints were found united in Mary, as the Abbot of Celles says: The prerogatives of all the saints, oh Virgin, thou hast united in thyself.[1331] Thus as the splendor of the sun exceeds the splendor of all the stars united, so, says St. Basil, the glory of the divine mother exceeds that of all the blessed.[1332] And St. Peter Damian adds, that as the light of the stars and of the moon disappears as if they were not, at the rising of the sun, thus Mary so far obscures in glory the splendor of men and of angels, that, as it were, these do not appear in heaven.[1333] Whence St. Bernardine of Sienna agrees with St. Bernard in asserting that the blessed participate in part in the divine glory, but that the Virgin, in a certain manner, has been so enriched with it, that it seems no creature could be more united with God than is Mary.[1334] Which is confirmed by the blessed Albertus Magnus, when he says that our queen contemplates God very near, incomparably more so than all the other celestial spirits.[1335] And the above-named St. Bernardine says, moreover, that as the other planets are illuminated by the sun, so all the blessed receive greater light and joy from the sight of Mary.[1336] And in another place he likewise asserts, that the mother of God, ascending to heaven, increased the joy of all its inhabitants.[1337] Hence St. Peter Damian says, that the blessed have no greater glory in heaven, after God, than to enjoy the presence of that most beautiful queen: “Summa gloria est post Deum te videre.”[1338] And St. Bonaventure: Next to God, our greatest glory and our greatest joy is from Mary.[1339]