The Assumption
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"Nor wilt Thou give Thy holy one to see corruption" (Ps. xv. 10). The Assumption of the Blessed Virgin's body into heaven was the last of her many earthly privileges. It was saved from the degradation of putrefaction, was raised to life, and united with her soul in glory. The Ark of the Covenant was a figure of Mary. It contained the word of God on the two tables, a portion of the bread which came from heaven, and the brazen serpent which saved the people from death, all of them emblems of Our Lord. That ark was of incorruptible wood, prefiguring her incorruption. The putrefaction of our bodies aptly punishes the corruption which we have deliberately introduced into our souls; it is fitting that all our comeliness and pride should be brought down to the awful hideousness of the tomb. Soul and body mutually act and react. The infinite sanctity of God the Son preserved His Mother from the smallest taint of spiritual corruption; and to this corresponded her preservation from bodily corruption. As "the corruptible body weigheth down the soul" (Wisd. ix. 15), so that soul which never suffered the death of sin, drew the body after it to a renewed life. Keep your soul free from the taint of sin, and its grace will overflow on your body. You will be freed from many of the physical evils of life which proceed from the degradation and foulness of the sinful soul.
