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THE name Rosary signifies a crown of roses; and well does this
devotion deserve, by just right, a name so beautiful. The rose
is the most beautiful of flowers and ravishes our senses with
its beauty and perfume; and there is no delight that can equal
the heavenly enchantment of the spiritual sweetness which is
exhaled from this beautiful prayer.
The Rosary is a spiritual garland of mystic roses with which we
deck the brow of Mary--a diadem which reflects the joy and
brilliance, the purity and fecundity of the glorious _Queen of
Heaven_.
The flowers which we weave are not of this earth, but are
indigenous to Paradise, and were transplanted by an angel's hand
from their native soil to bloom and flourish among the weeds and
thistles of this miserable and sinful world.
There is no form of prayer more efficacious, or more excellent
and acceptable before Heaven than Mary's own devotion, the
Rosary. There is nothing that the great Holy Father, Pope Leo
XIII, urged more upon the Church than the devout practice of
reciting the beads in her honor.
The devotion of the Holy Rosary was revealed to St. Dominic by
the Blessed Virgin Mary, who commanded him to preach it
throughout the world; and hence the Rosary has ever been the
spiritual heritage and distinct property of the Dominican Order.
The Rosary is adapted to the learned and the ignorant, and to
every capacity. The form and matter are intelligible to the most
illiterate, and yet so sublime as to be matter of contemplation
worthy of the highest intellect. Moreover, the Rosary is not
only a most sublime and perfect devotion, but there is no
devotion in the Church which is enriched with more precious and
valuable helps to salvation; and there is nothing, outside the
Holy Sacrifice, that can profit the living and the dead equal to
the pious recitation of the Rosary.