us run in the odor of Thy ointments." Incense, in the words of holy David, has be come a symbol of prayer: "Let my prayer ascend like incense in Thy sight." Men regard those who live soberly, justly, and piously as diffusing around them, by holiness of life, a sweet odor, just as fragrant flowers fill the surrounding atmosphere with perfume. Hence, St. Paul says of those who lead holy lives: "They are the good odor of Christ unto God." And men say of them at death: "They died in the odor of sanctity."
Christians were accustomed to decorate the altars of the Blessed Virgin, and to crown her statues with flowers, because these were emblematic of Mary's virtues. Hence, they hoped their prayers and devotions would be as acceptable to the holy Virgin as the sweet-smelling flowers they offered her were agreeable to men, and that their contemplation of these flowers would lead to the cultivation in their own hearts of those virtues which found in flowers such beautiful emblems. The Rosary is then fittingly called Mary's chaplet or wreath.
The Rosary is a string of one hundred and fifty small beads, divided by fifteen larger ones into tens or decades, as they are commonly called. The string of beads ordinarily used has but five decades, and is but a third part of the Rosary.
The arrangement of beads in this manner for the purpose of telling prayers shows that
