... Right lovely art
Thou, oh, perfect One! A bed of heavenly spices and precious flowers of
all virtues, filling the house of the Lord with sweet perfume! Oh! Mary,
Thou violet of humility! Thou lily of chastity! Thou rose of love!" etc.
St. Bernard inaugurated that extraordinary blending of eroticism with
half-crazy, inconceivable allegories and fantasies, which lasted for
centuries. Here, again, we perceive the ideal of metaphysical eroticism,
which in the case of a loyal son of the Church could only refer to the
official Queen of Heaven, and consisted partly of the genuine emotion of
love, partly of allegorically constructed connections with the Church
dogma.
St. Bernard's emotional outbursts were comprehended and admired. His
authority was sufficient to override all scruples that might have stood
in the way of this downright description of Mary's charms. He became the
model for all her later worshippers; Suso, for instance, often quotes
him, and Brother Hans called him _the harpist and fiddler of her
praise_.
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