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[1] St. Francis de Sales is alluding to the account read in the Office for this feast, a summary of which he now gives.
[2] Cf. St. Francis de Sales, Introduction to the Devout Life, Part IV, chapter 13.
[3] The New American Bible speaks here of love, rather than breasts.
[4] St. Francis is preaching this sermon at the ceremony in which three of the early Visitation Sisters took the religious habit; he moves between the theme of Mary and that of religious life, no doubt underscoring thereby his appreciation of Mary as the perfect model for all states of Christian life.