3^ 
 
 /2 ■ /^. '^^^~ 
 
 /
 
 SISTER AND SAINT. 
 
 A. SK: E T O K 
 
 OF THE LIFE OF 
 
 JACQUELINE PASCAL 
 
 BY 
 SOPHY WINTHROP WEITZEL. 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 ANSON D. F. RANDOLPH & COMPANY, 
 
 900 Broadway, corner 20TI1 Street.
 
 Copyright, 1880, by 
 
 Anson D. F. Randolph & Company. 
 
 Edward O Jenkins, Printer, 
 so North William Street.
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 A Home in Auvergne, --------3 
 
 CHAPTER 11. 
 Poetry and Geometry, ._..--- 15 
 
 CHAPTER HI. 
 The Cardinal frowns ; the Cardinal smiles, - - 29 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 Into Normandy, _-.-_-. .41 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 A Flemish Bishop, ..--..--55 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 The Director of Consciences, ----- 65 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 "The Obstacle becomes the Instrument," - - - 79 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 A Happy Year, ---.----.95 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 Climbing, --. -. 113 
 
 (V)
 
 vi CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 Port Royal and the Mere Angelique, _ - . 133 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 At the Convent Gates, _.----- 151 
 
 CHAPTER Xn. 
 Waiting, 167 
 
 CHAPTER XHI. 
 The Lord Opens the Way, - - - - - ' - 189 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 Fresh Trials, -..-.---- 205 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 A Bundle of Letters, ..-..-- 221 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 Teaching the Convent School, ----- 239 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 The Masterpiece and the Miracle, - - - - 253 
 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 Sorrowful Days, 275 
 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 Those Left Behind, 295 
 
 CHAPTER XX, 
 (Supplementary). Fragments gathered up, - - 309
 
 INTRODUCTORY NOTE. 
 
 As good Bishop Jansen's ponderous book is said to have 
 been " a tissue of texts from St. Augustine," so the web of 
 this brief biography is woven of many threads from various 
 authorities. 
 
 Much of it is translation, some portions are adapted from 
 previous translations. Every important item has been verified 
 by reference to the best sources, especially to Sainte-Beuve, 
 the acknowledged chief of Port Royal historians. Thus, though 
 slight, the little history claims to be accurate. Its only 
 aim is to lead to further acquaintance with the books on 
 which it is founded and the noble group of characters it 
 intJ-oduces. 
 
 The following authorities may be consulted with profit and 
 pleasure by any intelligent reader : 
 
 FRENCH. 
 
 Jacqueline Pascal. Premieres etudes sur les femmes il- 
 lustres de XVIIe siecle. V. Cousin. 
 
 La jeunesse de Madame de Longueville. V. Cousin. 
 
 Mme. de Longueville pendant la Fronde. V. Cousin. 
 
 Vie de Jacqueline Pascal par Mme. Perier, sa soeur. 
 
 Vie de Blaise Pascal par Mme. Perier, sa soeur. 
 
 Lettres, opuscules et m^moires de Gilberte et de Jacque- 
 line, soeurs de Pascal. Faugere. 
 
 Memoires de Marguerite Perier sur sa famille. Scenes 
 d'histoire et de famille. Mme. De Wiit^ nee Guizot. 
 
 (vu)
 
 INTRODUCTORY NOTE. 
 
 ENGLISH. 
 
 Select Memoirs of Port Royal. 2 vols. By M. A. Schim- 
 nielpenninck. 
 
 Life of Angelique Arnauld. By Frances Martin, 
 Life of Pascal, by Principal Tiilloch. 
 
 The other books to which I refer will be chiefly interesting 
 to those who are making a special study of the subject. 
 
 Port Royal. Par C. A. Sainte-Beuve. 7 vols. 
 
 Memoires pour servir a I'histoire de Port Royal. Par M. 
 Fontaine. 
 
 Memoires touchant la Vie de M. de St. Cyran. Par Lan- 
 celot. 
 
 Vies intdressantes et edifiantes des Religieuses de Port 
 Royal. 
 
 Faugere's introduction to Pe?tsees de Pascal. 
 
 Leben Jacquehne Pascal. Nonne von Port Royal. Dr. 
 Reuchlin, 
 
 I mention also a Life of Jacqueline Pascal, published 
 by Carter & Brothers, 1854, from which I have taken some 
 translations of poems. 
 
 June, 1880. S. W. W.
 
 C^rtat Umvts aXone wuxTevstaitd Tiotu 
 tnncU qXovx\ tlxjevje is in hcinci rjooxX, 
 
 MiCHELET.
 
 A HOME IN AUVERGNE
 
 I. 
 
 A HOME IN AUVERGNE. 
 
 vISTORY gives us some charming glimpses. A 
 distant city, a cluster of village dwellings, 
 perhaps a solitary abbey catches the mind's 
 eye, just as in a hasty journey roofs peep out here 
 and there beneath which we would gladly linger, or 
 a ruin flashes on us for an instant whose story we 
 wish we could stop to hear. 
 
 A wonderful picturesque charm gathers about 
 certain names of places — it is the charm of vivid cir- 
 cumstance, of dramatic event, of lofty character — 
 all this under the enchantment of distance in time 
 and difference in manners. 
 
 Whenever we hear these names, though we may 
 have little actual knowledge of the history connected 
 with them, a picture rises to the eye and an interest 
 stirs in the mind. 
 
 Clermont, in the province of Auvergne, just south 
 of the heart of sunny France, is one of these names. 
 
 (3)
 
 Sister and Saint. 
 
 The very word is breezy and suggestive. And from 
 all we can learn of the surrounding country — mount- 
 ainous and bold, yet rich and smiling — it seems fully 
 to merit the affectionate praise with which Jacqueline 
 Pascal celebrates it in these lines : 
 
 " A climate, fertile in unnumbered charms, 
 Though ornaments, save Nature's, it has none ; 
 In stern simplicity, untouched by art. 
 It yields a picture of its Maker's power. 
 There, — in Auvergne, — from those proud peaks afar, 
 Whose gloomy heights nor fruit nor harvests know, 
 But in their stead dark precipices yawn — 
 Rises a little hill, so fresh and fair, 
 So favored by the Sun's celestial ray. 
 That Clazrmont seems its most appropriate name." 
 
 Our first glimpse of Clermont is an exceedingly 
 striking one. Thither in 1095 came the pope, Urban 
 II., with a great retinue of bishops, priests, and car- 
 dinals, to hold a solemn council and preach the first 
 crusade. 
 
 Mellowed but not dimmed by the far mediseval 
 light, we see the picture ; — the broad open Place 
 before the already noble cathedral, densely packed 
 with a swaying, shouting, excited, expectant multitude 
 — Rembrandt-like old men leaning on their staves, 
 oddly-dressed women holding aloft oddly-dressed ba- 
 bies, pious, humble peasants from the remotest hamlets 
 of the province, come up to look once, before they die, 
 on the representative of their Lord upon the earth, 
 and to receive from him a blessing.
 
 A Home in Auvergne. 
 
 Gay silken banners and festoons of gorgeous arra& 
 adorn the tall, steep-gabled houses that front the 
 square. Ladies and children in costume the most 
 brilliant and bizarre appear at the quaint, small, un- 
 glazed windows. 
 
 White hands (oh, how long ago turned to dust!) 
 wave greetings answered by the gleam of knightly 
 helmets in the square below. 
 
 In the distance is heard the stirring sound of trump- 
 ets, then the solemn chants of the Church. Then 
 slowly comes into view the long procession of priestly 
 dignitaries. Last of all, the pope himself, seated on 
 a white mule, solemnly advances through the now 
 hushed and kneeling multitude. He is conducted up 
 the carpeted platform prepared for him, and pointed 
 to the throne. But he turns his back upon it. His 
 message can not wait. '' II fait un geste de grande 
 impatience," says the old chronicler, and turns toward 
 the people. 
 
 Then follow those burning words which, kindling 
 on this ready populace — springing from low to high, 
 from high back again to low — seizing with equal vio- 
 lence ignorant peasant boys and girls and the great 
 Count Raymond of Toulouse with Elvira, his beau- 
 tiful wife — spread from this center over all France, 
 from France over all Europe, and resulted in the 
 sublime madness of the crusades. 
 
 As the pope's voice ceased, it is said, a solemn cry
 
 Sister and Saint. 
 
 burst from the multitude, " It is the will of God ! It 
 is the will of God !" 
 
 A knight tore in pieces his scarlet mantle, and 
 pinning the bits together in the form of a cross, fixed 
 them on the shoulders of those near him. The crowd 
 pressed eagerly around him to obtain the fragments. 
 The booths of the merchants surrounding the Place 
 were entered and rifled of their scarlet stuffs, and 
 soon the inspiring emblem blazed on every side. 
 
 A few weeks later the fountain plashed to a silent 
 and deserted square. The knights were gone. The 
 ladies and children lingered no longer at the windows 
 in holiday attire, and we shall never again see Cler- 
 mont in so picturesque a light as on that November 
 afternoon. 
 
 Six centuries after this we know of Clermont, or 
 rather of its overhanging mountain, Puy-de-D6me, 
 as one of the centers of scientific experiment on the 
 weight of the atmosphere, of which experiments the 
 barometer is the result. 
 
 Again we read of the finding of the codex claro- 
 montanus — an early copy of St. Paul's epistles — in 
 the monastery on the side of the mountain. This is 
 a manuscript highly valued by scholars, and Tischen- 
 dorf published it in fac-simile not many years ago. 
 
 To-day Clermont is a noisy, humdrum, manufac- 
 turing city. A railway connects it with Paris, but ter- 
 minates here, so that the city stands, as of old, portal
 
 A Home in Auvergjte. 
 
 and fortress to the wild, rich province of Auvergne. 
 It is quite out of the way of tourists, and even the 
 " commercial traveler," intent on his purchases of 
 linen or woolen fabrics, hosiery or paper, scarcely 
 lingers long enough in the old Place to feel its quaint, 
 peculiar charm. 
 
 To us, in this little book, Clermont will be chiefly 
 interesting as the early home of the Pascals. 
 
 In the city's best days perhaps — the early part of 
 the seventeenth century — this family lived here. The 
 father, Etienne (or anglicd Stephen), was President of 
 the Court of Excise. This was a high position, open 
 to him as member of a wealthy and influential family 
 of long standing in the province. It had not been a 
 titled race till, in 1478, Louis XL, in recognition of 
 faithful service, bestowed upon it that honor, and 
 thus our friends became possessed of that best patent 
 of nobility which comes of good works. 
 
 They lived, of course, in some stateliness — this 
 father and his little family of one son and two daugh- 
 ters — yet in much less than our modern American 
 notions of elegance would lead us to suppose. For 
 nowhere is the simplicity of true dignity more con- 
 spicuous than in the daily life of the high families of 
 France. The furnishing of those lofty, airy rooms, 
 the quiet menage and simple diet would surprise us 
 by their plainness. 
 
 The eldest daughter, Gilberte, was obliged early to
 
 Sister and Saint, 
 
 "look well to the ways of her household," for her 
 mother died when she was but seven years old. But 
 while practicing her various domestic arts and learning 
 that delicate craft of cookery in which every French 
 lady is trained, she was not idle mentally. Her father 
 taught her history, Latin, and mathematics, and with 
 such success that she is mentioned by her brother's 
 biographers as " une femme tr^s-instruite." She be- 
 came a vigorous thinker — and in those days there was 
 a deal of profound and practical thinking to be done 
 — and in the specimens of her writing left to us in 
 sketches of her brother and sister, her style is remark- 
 ably clear, graceful, and pleasing. 
 
 Blaise, the son, carne next tp Gilberte on the family 
 record, and then the little Jacqueline, born in 1625, 
 and a baby of a year old when her mother died. 
 Blaise is the central figure of this family group. But 
 for him we should have known next to nothing of 
 Jacqueline, and nothing, probably, of Gilberte and 
 their father. 
 
 Blaise Pascal was first a thinker, then a saint. A 
 wonderful combination of scientific acuteness and 
 child-like faith, a shining example of great mental 
 and great spiritual qualities, and one whose name 
 will be always honored by men as diverse as the mate- 
 rialist and the mystic, j 
 
 We could easily linger over his story. But seen 
 in the side lights of family life, perhaps we shall
 
 A Home in Auvergne. 
 
 find him quite as interesting as if more directly stud- 
 ied. 
 
 And, indeed, so intimate is his kinship with his 
 sister JacqueHne, so closely interwoven the web of 
 their deepest experiences, that, in reading of her, we 
 must of necessity come very near him. 
 
 This brother and sister were only about two years 
 separated in age. They were companions in study 
 and in play. His thoughts were her thoughts, not 
 only in childhood, but throughout life, and so great 
 was their sympathy in all respects that they have 
 been spoken of as " spiritual twins." Her mind in 
 youth was more versatile than his, and, while climb- 
 ing with him to all his heights, she carried with her a 
 feminine lightness and charm, " to cheat the toil and 
 cheer the way," which must have been invaluable to 
 him. 
 
 Both these sisters, Gilberte and Jacqueline, are 
 said to have been " parfaitement belles," which is 
 certainly strong language. '' Gilberte, as soon as she 
 was old enough, mingled in society suited to her 
 rank, and was much admired, being beautiful, grace- 
 ful, and very witty. And when Jacqueline, six years 
 younger than Gilberte, in her turn grew to woman- 
 hood, her charms were not unrecognized, as we shall 
 see. 
 
 And now, from this home in Clermont, let us look 
 out for a moment over France and over Europe, and
 
 lo Sister and Saint. 
 
 see what kind of a world it is in which the Pascals 
 pass their childhood. 
 
 On the throne of France sits Louis XIII. But on 
 the throne behind the throne, ruling with a rod of 
 iron over king and people, is Richelieu, prime minis- 
 ter and cardinal. Just at this time he is building for 
 himself a new house — the Palais Royal. The large 
 court-yard of this palace, now surrounded by brilliant 
 shops and caf6s, is familiar to every American who 
 visits Paris. Almost everybody has taken a cup of 
 coffee under the horse-chestnut trees, and bought a bit 
 of clever imitation jewelry in one of the arcades. 
 This is all that is left to-day of the glory of Richelieu's 
 residence. The spacious halls and galleries, which ex- 
 tended in all directions from this central court, have 
 more than once suffered from violence and fire since 
 his time. 
 
 At the time of which we write, the Reformation 
 had taken thorough hold of Germany, and Protest- 
 ants in France had becom? so numerous and powerful 
 as to be worthy of Richelieu's hatred. His wars 
 against them, and against England, as friendly to 
 French Protestantism, came to a successful end in 
 1628, when Jacqueline Pascal was three years old. 
 
 Louis XIII. 's queen was Anne of Austria. She 
 seems to have been chiefly remarkable for two per- 
 sonal peculiarities. One of these was an exceedingly 
 delicate sense of feeling in all parts of the surface of
 
 A Home in Aiivergne. ii 
 
 her body, so that all ordinary linen and cambric was 
 rough to her, and it was exceedingly difficult to find 
 fabrics fine enough for her use. How fortunate that 
 she was a queen, and not a peasant woman, doomed 
 to die of homespun ! 
 
 Her other distinguishing peculiarity was such an 
 aversion to roses that she could not even look upon 
 a painted one. 
 
 Altogether she seems an uninteresting, indeed 
 rather a disagreeable woman, and we do not much 
 wonder that her husband was content to live the 
 greater part of their married life in complete separa- 
 tion from her. 
 
 Louis himself was a respectable and honest man, 
 and that is saying a good deal for a king. He was 
 not fond of ruling, and, indeed, had little chance for 
 it, but he was full of bravery and self-possession in 
 war, and much honored and admired by the soldiery. 
 His morals were not corrupt, and for purity and true 
 nobility his court was a happy contrast to that of his 
 more brilliant son, Louis XIV. When, after twenty- 
 two years of married life, this son and heir was born, 
 there was the greatest rejoicing throughout the 
 kingdom. 
 
 Thus matters stood in France. Across the Chan- 
 nel Charles L was on the throne, and Archbishop Laud 
 endeavoring to act in England something correspond- 
 ing to the part which Richelieu was acting in France.
 
 12 Sister and Saint, 
 
 The Puritans were stirring. Every day they grew 
 more powerful, and were soon to break into open re- 
 beUion. Already some had left the country, for as 
 we well know, the Mayflower had anchored off Plym- 
 outh Rock in 1620, five years before Jacqueline Pas- 
 cal was born. 
 
 There were no daily newspapers in those days. 
 But we may well believe that the table-talk of an in- 
 telligent family like the Pascals would now and then 
 fall upon these themes. Their father would, perhaps, 
 tell them some fresh report from the Dutch colony at 
 New Amsterdam, or the English in Massachusetts or 
 Virginia, or their own French settlements in Lou- 
 isiana. They were faithful little Catholics and all 
 Puritan proceedings would be sure to strike them with 
 abhorrence, but we can imagine their delight, never- 
 theless, in some of the strange, wild stories, and alto- 
 gether it rhust have been an interesting world out 
 at which they looked from their quiet home in 
 Clermont.
 
 POETRY AND GEOMETRY.
 
 
 •&/^fe- 
 
 II. 
 
 POETRY AND GEOMETRY. 
 
 ^ Jk y^E have a record of Jacqueline's early years 
 ^^^ in Gilberte's little book, entitled "A 
 Sketch of the Life of Sister Jacqueline de 
 Sainte Euphemie, by birth Jacqueline Pascal." 
 
 " I was six years older than she," says the writer, 
 " and can remember that as soon as she began to 
 speak, she gave signs of great intelligence, besides 
 being very beautiful and of a kindly and sweet tem- 
 per, the most winning in the world. She was, there- 
 fore, as much loved and caressed as a child could pos- 
 sibly be. At seven years old she began to learn to 
 read, and, by my father's wish, I became her teacher. 
 This was a troublesome task, on account of her great 
 aversion to it, and do what I would, I could not coax 
 her to come and say her lesson. One day, however, 
 I chanced to be reading poetry aloud, and the rhythm 
 pleased her so much that she said to me : * If you 
 want me to read, teach me out of a verse-book, and I 
 
 (15)
 
 1 6 Sister a7id Saint. 
 
 will say my lesson as often as you like.' This surprised 
 me, for I did not think that a child of her age could 
 distinguish verse from prose. I did as she wished, 
 and after that time she was always talking about 
 verses, and learned many by heart, for she had an 
 excellent memory. She wanted to know the rules of 
 poetry, and at eight years old, before knowing how 
 to read, she began to compose lines that were really 
 not bad." 
 
 Before this time the family had moved to Paris. 
 In 163 1, when Jacqueline was six years old, Blaise 
 eight, and Gilberte twelve, their father made this 
 change of residence on account of the greater facilities 
 for education in the capital. Since the death of his 
 wife he had considered himself especially responsible 
 for the rearing of his children, and devoted himself to 
 them with almost a mother's tenderness. He taught 
 them not only language, science, and belles lettrcs, but 
 grounded them thoroughly and systematically in re- 
 ligious truth, as he understood it. His son's educa- 
 tion he took entirely into his own hands, Pascal never 
 entering any college or having any other master than 
 his father. 
 
 In order to attend thus particularly to his children, 
 Etienne Pascal was obliged to give up business, and 
 on leaving Clermont he sold his office of President of 
 the Excise Court, and invested largely in stocks of 
 the Hotel de Ville in Paris, one of Cardinal Riche-
 
 Poetry and Geometry. 17 
 
 lieu's speculations. He did not, however, give up his 
 house and other property in Clermont, and the fam- 
 ily returned occasionally to their native place. 
 
 In Paris the children entered at once upon a pleas- 
 ant and busy life. 
 
 Gilberte says of Jacqueline at this time, " She was 
 so pretty a child, and so agreeable, that she became 
 a general favorite, in request with all our friends, and 
 spent but little of her time at home. 
 
 " She had, in particular, two playmates who con- 
 tributed not a little to her enjoyment. They were 
 the daughters of Madame de Saintot, and themselves 
 made verses, though not much older than Jacqueline ; 
 so that in the year 1636, when my father took me 
 with him on a journey to Auvergne, and Madame de 
 Saintot begged that she might keep my sister with 
 her while we were gone, the three little girls took it 
 into their heads to act a play, and composed plot and 
 verses, without the least aid from any one eke. It 
 was, however, a coherent piece, and had five acts, di- 
 vided by scenes regularly arranged. They performed 
 it themselves twice, with some other actors whom 
 they invited, before a large company. Everybody 
 wondered that such children should be capable of 
 constructing a complete work, and many pretty things 
 were discovered in it, so that it became the talk of all 
 Paris for a long time." 
 
 The story goes on, rfnd though we may suspect it
 
 Sister and Saint. 
 
 of a little pardonable sisterly partiality, it is so fresh 
 and natural that we can but quote : 
 
 " My sister continued to make verses about any- 
 thing that came into her head, as well as on all extra- 
 ordinary occurrences. 
 
 " When the Queen was expecting an heir, she did 
 not fail to write on so fine a subject, and these verses 
 were better than any of her previous efforts. We 
 lived at that time very near Monsieur and Madame 
 de Morangis (a gentleman and lady of the court), 
 who took so much delight in the child's pretty ways 
 that she was with them nearly every day. 
 
 " Madame de Morangis, charmed with the idea of 
 Jacqueline's having written verses on the Queen's situ- 
 ation, said that she would take her to St. Germain and 
 present her. She kept her word, and on their arrival, 
 the queen being at the moment engaged, every one 
 surrounded the little girl, in order to question her 
 and see her verses." 
 
 Jacqueline was so small and so simple in her ways 
 that the ladies felt a little suspicious as to her being 
 the actual author of the lines. Mademoiselle de 
 Montpensier, niece of the king, then a young girl, 
 afterward " the great Mademoiselle," was one of the 
 company. 
 
 " If you can make verses so well," she said to 
 Jacqueline, " make some for me." 
 
 The little girl went quietly into a corner and wrote
 
 Poetry and Geometry. 19 
 
 the following, evidently composed on the spur of the 
 moment : 
 
 " It is our noble princess' will, 
 That thou, my Muse, exert thy skill 
 To celebrate her charms to-day : 
 Hopeless our task ! — the only way 
 To praise her well is to avow 
 The simple truth — we know not how ! " 
 
 " Now make one for Madame de Hautefort," said 
 Mademoiselle, and Jacqueline in a few minutes read 
 them this impromptu effort : 
 
 " Oh, marvel not, bright masterpiece of earth, 
 At the prompt tribute by your charms called forth. 
 Your glance that roves the world around 
 In every clime hath captives found. 
 That ray which charms my youthful heart. 
 May well arouse my fancy's art." 
 
 The child, we see, has already caught the courtly 
 trick of flattery, and the lines, to us, seemed stilted 
 and artificial. But we must remember that they are 
 French poetry, and French poetry of the seventeenth 
 century as well as the production of a little girl. 
 
 " Soon after this incident," goes on Gilberte's 
 story, " permission was given to enter the queen's 
 apartment, and Madame de Morangis led my sister 
 in. The Queen was surprised at her poetry, but fan- 
 cied at first that it .was either not her own, or that 
 she had been greatly aided. All present thought the
 
 20 Sister and Saint. 
 
 same, but Mademoiselle removed their doubts by 
 showing them the two epigrams that Jacqueline had 
 just made in her presence and by her own orders. 
 This circumstance increased the general admiration, 
 and from that day forward my sister was often at 
 court, and much caressed by the King, the Queen, 
 Mademoiselle, and all who saw her. She even had 
 the honor of waiting on her Majesty when she dined 
 in private, Mademoiselle taking the place of chief 
 butler." 
 
 Jacqueline was not the only member of the family 
 admitted to the presence of the great. Soon after 
 they came to Paris, M. Pascal had taken all his chil- 
 dren to see the cardinal. Cousin tells us of this in- 
 terview that " Richelieu's eagle glance at once selected 
 these children from among the waiting crowd in his 
 audience -chamber. Struck with their remarkable 
 youthful beauty, he did not wait for the father to 
 introduce them to his notice. He himself, after ad- 
 dressing them, commended them to their father's 
 special care, and said, * I intend to make something 
 great of them.' " 
 
 Richelieu was a good promiser. Something great 
 was made of them, but it was by no means he who 
 did it. 
 
 In 1638, when Jacqueline was thirteen years old, a 
 little collection of her poems was published, dedi- 
 cated to the Queen, Anne of Austria. Several of the
 
 Poetry aitd Geometry. 21 
 
 pieces are addressed to this royal patroness ; some 
 are odes in honor of the Virgin and of St. Cecilia, 
 and there is quite an array of short epigrams and 
 love-songs, which seem strangely unnatural for a 
 child of that age, and utterly unlike herself as we 
 afterward know her. But that the little creature 
 took a serious view of her gift, and exercised it with 
 that conscientiousness which later became so strong 
 a characteristic, is evident from these 
 
 "Stanzas thanking God for the power of writing 
 
 Poetry." 
 
 " Lord of the universe, 
 
 If the strong chains of verse 
 Round my delighted soul their links entwine, 
 
 Here let me humbly own 
 
 The gift is Thine alone, 
 And comes, great God, from no desert of mine. 
 
 " Yea, Lord, how many long 
 
 For the sweet power of song. 
 Which Thou hast placed in my young feeble heart ; 
 
 Thy bounties string my lyre, 
 
 And, with celestial fire. 
 To my dull soul a hidden light impart. 
 
 '' O Lord, a thankless mind 
 
 Will not acquittal find 
 In Thy pure presence. Therefore it is just 
 
 That, touched with godlike flame, 
 
 I should Thy love proclaim, 
 And chant the glories of Thy Name august. 
 
 " As waterfalls, and rills. 
 And streams wind past the hills 
 In steady progress toward their parent sea,
 
 2 2 Sister and Saint. 
 
 Thus, Lord, my simple lays, 
 Heedless of this world's praise, 
 Find their way home, O Source Divine, to Thee ! " 
 
 Dear little girl ! " Heedless of this world's praise ! " 
 That was the secret of her charm and the key-note 
 of her character. Many a child has been ruined by 
 less flattering attentions than she received. But she 
 took all with a simple unconsciousness, that reminds 
 one of the " little child set in the midst," from whom 
 as a text the Great Teacher preached so grand a ser- 
 mon. She did not ignore her gift — " the sweet power 
 of song " — perhaps even valued it more highly than 
 it merited, but it did not fill her soul with vanity. 
 It was not hers — it was a "gift." 
 
 " Though she wrote so much," says Gilberte, '* and 
 received so much attention, she did not lose in the 
 least her gay good-humor. She amused herself most 
 heartily with her playmates in all childish games, and 
 when alone, played with her dolls." 
 
 All this tirne Blaise was keeping up his studies, and 
 distinguishing himself as much in science as Jacque- 
 line in verse. 
 
 A girl as bright as she could not have been an 
 uninterested looker-on at her brother's investigations 
 and achievements. 
 
 We may safely conclude that the favorite little 
 sister was not far away, during his experiments on 
 the nature of sound when he was about eleven years
 
 Poetry and Geo77tetry. 23 
 
 old. One day at table some one struck a china plate 
 with a knife, producing, of course, a resonant vibra- 
 tion. But when a hand was placed on the plate the 
 vibration suddenly ceased. " Why is this ? " asks the 
 youthful philosopher, for " his earliest search," says 
 his sister Gilberte, " is for tj'utJi. He must always 
 .have a reason that will satisfy his mind, and if none 
 such is given him, he will not rest till he finds one for 
 himself." 
 
 The answers of his elders, in the matter of the 
 plate, did not satisfy him, and henceforth began a 
 series of experfments on the laws *of sound more 
 systematic, if not less tuneful, than those of most 
 boys of elever!, on the same subject. In the course 
 of a few weeks he had noticed so many interesting 
 facts that he wrote a treatise on the subject, which 
 has been found by scientific men to be tout a fait biert 
 raissojind. 
 
 A year later the boy was engaged in his famous 
 geometrical investigations. 
 
 The story is,' that seeing his strong bent toward 
 mathematics, his father had purposely led his mind 
 to other subjects, and, in fact, at last prohibited the 
 study of geometry till after he had perfected himself 
 in Latin and Greek. He gave him, however, in 
 answer to repeated questions, the bare definition of 
 the science as one that treated of " forms and their 
 proportions and relations one to another."
 
 24 Sister and Saint. 
 
 On that hint Blaise went to work. In his hours of 
 recreation he meditated on forms, and began to draw 
 figures in charcoal on the walls of a large empty 
 hall which had been given the children as a play- 
 room. He made, at first, perfect circles, exact squares, 
 and then a triangle whose sides and whose angles were 
 equal, proving each step as he went along. All thi* 
 was without a hint from any one, and he did not 
 even know the names of the figures he drew. He 
 called a circle "a round," and a line "a bar." 
 
 From his definitions sprang axioms, and from these 
 demonstrations, and going from step to step, he had 
 pushed his researches as far as the thirty-second 
 proposition of the first book of Euclid before he was 
 discovered. When his father found him proving that 
 " the three angles of a triangle are together equal to 
 two right angles," his question was, What had made 
 him think of that? Oh, it followed from that ether, 
 said the boy ; and the same question being asked in 
 regard to that other, it was found that that followed 
 from another earlier discovered truth. And, in this 
 way, tracing his way back to first principles, his 
 father saw how he had actually built up the science 
 for himself out of a single definition. 
 
 As might be supposed, M. Pascal after this thought 
 it right to remove the restriction on geometry, and 
 gave his son a copy of Euclid's " Elements" for light 
 reading. He insisted still, however, on the languages
 
 Poetry and Geometry. 25 
 
 as the principal and most serious work. But such 
 was the boy's delight in mathematics that he con- 
 tinued to prove and even to compose propositions for 
 his own amusement. 
 
 After a time his father occasionally took him to 
 the weekly meeting of scientific friends, out of which 
 association the celebrated " Academy of Sciences " 
 afterward grew. Descartes, Roberval, Pailleur, and 
 others whose names are familiar to the scientist were 
 members of this circle and habitues of M. Pascal's 
 house. At these meetings the boy Pascal is said to 
 have held his own in solving problems sent from 
 similar associations in Italy, Germany, Holland, and 
 other countries, and in offering original problems for 
 solution, and so clear and quick was his intellect that 
 he often discovered mistakes which no one else had 
 noticed. Sometimes he read short essays of his own, 
 and about the time Jacqueline's verses were pub- 
 lished, he wrote in Latin a treatise on Conic Sec- 
 tions, which was considered very remarkable. Gil- 
 berte reports : " It was said that since the time of 
 Archimedes, nothing of such strength had appeared. 
 People skilled in such things said that it was a con- 
 tribution of permanent value to science, and thought 
 it should certainly be published. But my brother had 
 no desire for reputation. He took no interest in the 
 matter, and it was never printed." 
 2
 
 THE CARDINAL FROWNS ; THE 
 CARDINAL SMILES.
 
 III. 
 
 THE CARDINAL FROWNS; THE CARDINAL SMILES. 
 
 THE Pascals, one would say, were now at the 
 very highest point of prosperity. They had 
 wealth and position. They had the friend- 
 ship of Royalty. They had the most congenial in- 
 'timate friends, and a wide circle of distinguished ac- 
 quaintance in the most brilliant city of the world. 
 The son and heir was already giving extraordinary 
 promise of remarkable and varied capacities — fairly 
 on his way to the place Sir William Hamilton gives 
 him as " a miracle of universal genius.'.' The daugh- 
 ters seem endowed with loveliness and talent in 
 equal parts. Surely M. Pascal ought to have been a 
 proud and happy man ! 
 
 This prosperity, moreover, was accompanied by 
 that which alone makes other good things worth 
 having. The glitter of the world seems never to 
 have dazzled these wise people, even when they en- 
 joyed it most. They saw about them many false and 
 
 (29)
 
 2,0 Sister and Saint. 
 
 hollow lives, many low ambitions, many weak, if 
 not evil characters. And these all were surrounded 
 by that bewildering halo — worldly success. But the 
 Pascals looked calmly on ! They had before their 
 eyes a vastly higher ideal of life and of success. 
 They walked in the world, but, to a wonderful de- 
 gree, they "kept unspotted." They were, in fact, 
 possessed of true nobility, and baseness, although 
 they touched it, could not cling to them. 
 
 Later, religious devotion became their most prom- 
 inent characteristic. Now, great mental activity was 
 predominant. Yet, even at this time, a writer of the 
 day tells us that they were always regarded as " un- 
 usually religious people. In this respect they took 
 the lead of the society in which they moved." But 
 the Pascals were going on — still higher ! and great 
 heights are not scaled without difficulty. 
 
 France just now was at war with Spain, and the 
 cardinal was in need of money. No easier way to 
 get it than to take it from the pockets of loyal Paris- 
 ians ! And where this could not be done with a show 
 of legality it could be done, and was done, by arbi- 
 trary seizure of private property. 
 
 M. Pascal was one of many who suffered in this 
 way. His property, at this time, consisted largely of 
 shares in the Hotel de Ville, and his income, of 
 course, was much reduced when Richelieu seized 
 these bonds. He was not a man to take injustice
 
 The Cardinal Frowns ; the Cardinal Smiles. 31 
 
 without an attempt at setting himself right. With 
 others among the principal stockholders he remon- 
 strated, appearing before the Chancellor of the city to 
 make complaint, in March, 1638. The Chancellor, 
 frightened, went to Richelieu, and Richelieu ordered 
 the malcontents arrested and sent to the Bastile. 
 
 M. Pascal escaped this fate, but only by flight. He 
 traveled incognito to his old home in Auvergne, and 
 shortly after he left Paris the halberdiers came to 
 look for him and were shown by Gilberte all over the 
 house. " He had been much comforted," writes Gil- 
 berte, " under this afifliction by Jacqueline's endearing 
 ways. He loved her with unusual tenderness." 
 
 The father remained away through the whole sum- 
 mer, but in September he forgot all fear and hastened 
 home again. His little daughter, Jacqueline, was 
 seized with small-pox. 
 
 " Let the risk be what it might," says the family 
 chronicler, " my father said he must then be at home 
 in order to watch with his own eyes the course of her 
 illness. And in reality he never left her for a mo- 
 ment, not even sleeping out of her room." 
 
 It was a long and serious case, and though the little 
 girl recovered after many anxious weeks, " her coun- 
 tenance w^as quite disfigured, and she did not leave 
 the house during the whole winter, not being fit to 
 appear in company. She was then thirteen, old 
 enough to value beauty, and to regret its loss. And
 
 32 Sister a7id Saint. 
 
 yet, this mischance did not in the least trouble her ; on 
 the contrary, she considered it a mercy, and in some 
 verses composed as a thank-offering for recovery, she 
 said that her pitted face seemed to her the guardian 
 of her innocence, and these traces of disease certain 
 signs that God would keep her from evil. Though 
 she was confined to the house, her time did not hang 
 heavily, for she was busy with her trinkets and 
 dolls." 
 
 The stanzas alluded to — " thanking God for recov- 
 ery from the small-pox" — are rather sad for a little 
 girl of thirteen, and not remarkably pretty. But their 
 spirit is very sweet. These three verses will serve as 
 a sample : 
 
 " All men, great God, may see 
 Thy pure benignity 
 
 To one so weak and worn ; 
 Without Thy loving aid 
 Thus wondrously displayed. 
 My life had faded in its April morn. 
 
 " When, in the mirror, I 
 Scars of mine illness spy, 
 
 Those hollow marks attest 
 The heart-rejoicing truth. 
 That I am Thine, in sooth, 
 For Thou dost chasten whom Thou lovest best. 
 
 " I take them for a brand 
 That, Master, Thy kind hand 
 
 Would on my forehead leave.
 
 The Cardinal 'Frowns ; the Cardinal Smiles. 33 
 
 Mine innocence to show : — 
 And shall I murmur? No. 
 While Thy rod comforts me I will not grieve." 
 
 As soon as Jacqueline's recovery was secure, M. 
 Pascal was obliged to exile himself once more. 
 Whether the cardinal had been aware of his return, 
 and with a little softening remembrance of the pretty- 
 children he had noticed in his audience-chamber, had 
 winked at the fact, or whether the Pascals had suc- 
 ceeded in eluding his vigilance, we do not know. At 
 any rate, they seem to have been entirely unmolested, 
 and, in spite of Jacqueline's sad illness, to have passed 
 many happy moments together. 
 
 But as soon as danger was over their father left 
 them and spent the winter in Clermont. Some of 
 the letters that passed between him and the children 
 have been preserved, and toward spring there was 
 truly something worth writing about. 
 
 The cardinal had taken a fancy to have a little play 
 acted before him, and Jacqueline had been invited to 
 take part in it ! 
 
 From this it would seem that the little girl must 
 have been getting better fast, and that she was not 
 so seriously disfigured by her illness as was appre- 
 hended at first. Gilberte objects to her taking part 
 in the play, not on the ground of health, but from a 
 very natural unwillingness to favor Richelieu. 
 
 " The cardinal has not been so kind to us as to 
 2*
 
 34 Sister and Saint. 
 
 lead us to take any pains for his pleasure," she an- 
 swered proudly, when the Duchess d'Aiguillon came 
 to ask for Jacqueline's services. 
 
 The Duchess 'd'Aiguillon was Richelieu's, niece. 
 She was a kind-hearted woman, and to her kindness 
 she added a ready tact in humoring her uncle, which 
 often enabled her to procure favors for those who 
 had suffered by him. She knew, of course, all about 
 the Pascals, and she saw a possible chance of M. 
 Pascal's forgiveness and recall, if his little daughter 
 should succeed in pleasing the cardinal. 
 
 On that ground she urged Gilberte to give her con- 
 sent, and promised, meanwhile, to use every oppor- 
 tunity that presented itself of speaking a good word 
 for her father. Gilberte still hesitated, but after ask- 
 ing the advice of some of her father's best friends 
 she yielded, and Jacqueline forthwith began to study 
 her part. It is mentioned, as a proof of the cardi- 
 nal's false taste, that this play was not one of the 
 masterpieces of French art, but a second-rate epheme- 
 ral tragi-comedy. What part Jacqueline took we do 
 not know, but whatever it was, with so much at stake, 
 she would be sure to enter into it with all her heart ; 
 moreover, she conceived the idea of playing a little 
 private role of her own, and at once set her wits to 
 work as to the best way of presenting that. 
 
 Her weU-beloved talent for verse-making came to 
 her aid, a.id she composed and committed to memory 
 the following lines :
 
 The Cardinal Frowns ; the Cardinal Smiles. 35 
 
 " O mangel not, Armand*, the great, the wise. 
 If I have slightly pleased thine ear — thine eyes ; 
 My sorrowing spirit torn by countless fears, 
 Each sound forbiddeth save the voice of tears ; 
 With power to please thee, wouldst thou me inspire — 
 Recall from exile, now, my hapless sire." 
 
 The play came off on the evening of the third of 
 April, 1639, in Richelieu's palace at Ruel. 
 
 "Jacqueline put into her action," says the Abbe 
 Bossut, " a grace and a finesse which ' carried away ' 
 all the spectators, especially the cardinal himself, and 
 she had the adroitness to profit by this moment of 
 enthusiasm." 
 
 The rest of the story we will let Jacqueline herself 
 tell in a letter she wrote her father the next day : 
 
 " M. le cardinal appeared to take great pleasure in 
 the representation, especially when I spoke. He 
 laughed very much and so did the whole company. 
 When the play was finished, I came down from the 
 stage to speak to Madame dAiguillon. 
 
 " But as the cardinal seemed about to leave, I went 
 up to him at once, and recited to him the verses I 
 send you. He received them with extraordinary 
 affection and caresses, more than you can imagine. 
 At first, when he saw me coming, he called out, 
 * Voila la petite Pascal ! ' Then he embraced me 
 and kissed me, and" while I said my verses, he con- 
 tinued to hold me in his arms, and kissed me almost 
 
 *Armand is Richelieu's family name.
 
 36 Sister and Saint. 
 
 every minute with great satisfaction. And then, 
 when I was done, he said, ' Yes, I grant to you all that 
 you ask ; write to your father that he can return with 
 safety.' 
 
 " Thereupon Madame d'Aiguillon approached, and 
 spoke to the cardinal. ' Truly it would be well, sir, 
 that you should do something for this gentleman. I 
 have heard him spoken of as a thoroughly honorable 
 and learned man, and it is a pity he should be useless 
 to the government. Then he has a son who is very 
 learned in mathematics, though only fifteen years old.' 
 
 " The cardinal again assured me that I might tell 
 you to return in all safety ; and as he seemed in such 
 good humor, I asked him further, if you might come 
 yourself to pay your thanks and respects to his emi- 
 nence. He said you would be welcome ; and after- 
 wards, while talking of something else, he repeated, 
 * Tell your father when he returns, to come and see 
 me. ' This he said three or four times. 
 
 " After this, as Madame d'Aiguillon was going 
 away, my sister went forward to take leave of her. 
 She received her with many caresses, and inquired 
 for our brofclier, whom she said she wished to know. 
 So he was introduced to the duchess, and she paid 
 him many compliments on his scientific attainments. 
 
 " We were then conducted to a room where we had 
 a magnificent collation of dried sweetmeats, lemon- 
 ade, fruits, and such things.
 
 The Car dmal Frowns ; the Cardinal S7niles. t,j 
 
 " Here the duchess renewed her caresses in a manner 
 you will hardly believe. In short, I can not tell you 
 how much honor I received, for I am obliged to write 
 
 as briefly as possible As for me, I feel myself 
 
 extremely happy to have in any way assisted in a re- 
 sult which must give you satisfaction. It is what has 
 always been the passionate wish of, M. my father, 
 your very humble and obedient daughter and servant 
 
 " Pascal." 
 
 After a long winter of convalescence in the house, 
 more or less tedious even with trinkets and dolls to 
 beguile the time, this evening of brilliant success, of 
 " sweetmeats and lemonade," above all, of the accom- 
 plishment of her dearest hopes, must have been a 
 wonderful thing to the little girl. 
 
 Gilberte tells the story a little differently, and ac- 
 cepting Cousin's opinion that " nothing should be 
 neglected which will help us to become acquainted 
 with this remarkable family," we give her version 
 also : 
 
 "After the play Jacqueline came down to go with 
 Madame de Saintot to the duchess, who was going to 
 present her to the cardinal ; but Madame de Saintot 
 loitered, and seeing M. le cardinal rise as if to retire, 
 Jacqueline ran up to him all alone. When he saw 
 her coming he sat down again, took her on his 
 knees, and when he kissed her again and again, she
 
 38 Sister and Saint. 
 
 began to weep. He asked her what was the matter. 
 Then she said her verse which Madame d'Aiguillon 
 followed with many obliging words ; upon which M. 
 le cardinal said that he would grant the return of her 
 father. Then this little one, all of herself, without 
 any one knowing that she had thought of it, said : 
 * My lord, I have still one favor to ask of your emi- 
 nence.' M. le cardinal was so captivated with the 
 delicacy of this little liberty that he answered : 'Ask 
 anything you wish, I will give it you.' She said to 
 him : ' I beg, your eminence, that my father may 
 have the honor of doing you reverence when he re- 
 turns, and of thanking you for the favor you have 
 done us to-night.' The cardinal said : ' I not only 
 grant it, I wish it. Tell him to come with all assur- 
 ance, and to bring his family with him.' " 
 
 Gilberte simply adds that on her father's return he 
 did go to thank the cardinal, and took them all with 
 him. But another account tells us that he went first 
 without his family, and when his name was an- 
 nounced Richelieu inquired if the gentleman was 
 alone. Hearing that he was, the servant was in- 
 . structed to tell him that he could not have an audi- 
 ence till he came accompanied by his family. The 
 next day M. Pascal took all the children and was 
 most graciously received. 
 
 The cardinal after this treated him " handsomely," 
 but he never gave liim back his bonds.
 
 INTO NORMANDY.
 
 IV. 
 
 INTO NORMANDY. 
 
 a YEAR of which we have no record now 
 passed — a year, probably, of quiet happiness 
 with our friends. There were the studies to 
 be gone on with, and the good father was at home to 
 be once more their teacher, and, though they were 
 not so rich as they once had been, there were plenty 
 of pleasures left. 
 
 But " in 1640," writes Gilberte, "my father, having 
 been made colleague of M. de Paris, in the Intend- 
 ancy of Normandy, was obliged to go to Rouen, and 
 soon took us all there to live with him." 
 
 The office of Intendant was much like that of coU 
 lector of customs with us. It was an honorable posi- 
 tion, and a proof of Richelieu's continued friendliness. 
 But in this case it was rather a difficult post, for 
 Normandy was in a state of agitation and, in some 
 parts, of open revolt. A new system of taxation had 
 caused an insurrection of the peasantry in the neigh-
 
 42 Sister a7id Saint. 
 
 borhood of Rouen, the rebels had defied the local 
 authorities, destroyed the custom-house, and murdered 
 some of the collectors. 
 
 M. Pascal and his colleague set out from Paris at- 
 tended by a body of troops under Gassion, who is 
 mentioned as a fierce man and a noted Calvinist.' 
 On their entrance into Rouen they were met by an 
 excited mob, through which they forced their way in 
 the narrow winding streets, not without some blood- 
 shed. 
 
 It was not an easy task to set to rights the public 
 records and accounts, and the wide-awake Blaise con- 
 ceived the idea of coming to his father's aid by the 
 invention of a calculating machine. The notion was 
 timely though the execution was not ; for it was 
 several years before he succeeded. The inventor's 
 enthusiasm, however, never flagged, and in 1649, long 
 after the necessity which had originally suggested it 
 was past, the wonderful little instrument was pat- 
 ented. It was the parent of all the " adders " the 
 world has since seen, and about as useful, practically, 
 as the rest of them have proved. " The construction 
 of such a machine," says a writer in the North British 
 Review, " was a much more troublesome task than its 
 contrivance, and Pascal not only injured his constitu- 
 tion, but wasted the most valuable portion of his 
 life in his attempts to bring it to perfection." 
 
 The father's work, meanwhile, as we have said,
 
 Into Normandy. 43 
 
 was done. And it was well done. M. Pascal's ac- 
 curacy and, above all, his strict integrity in this diffi- 
 cult business is matter of comment on the part of 
 more than one writer. He forbade his subordinates 
 to accept the smallest gratuity, and discharged his 
 secretary, a relative, for receiving a louis d'or. 
 
 As soon as Rouen was reduced to order, the family 
 came to join their father, and here, in the same year, 
 Gilberte was married to Florin Perier, a distant 
 cousin of her father's. After her marriage she re- 
 mained two years in Rouen, and then returned to the 
 old home at Clermont. The other lived seven or 
 eight years in Rouen ; and for Jacqueline, opening 
 womanhood here seems as full of brilliant promise as 
 childhood in Paris, 
 
 Rouen was, and is, a most interesting city. Every- 
 body stops there a few hours in making the journey 
 between London and Paris. Everybody knows it as 
 the most accessible clustering point of many fine 
 specimens of rich mediaeval Norman architecture. 
 But when the city's five hundred bells pealed out 
 on festival mornings in 1640, and Jacqueline Pascal 
 threaded her way among churches and towers through 
 the narrow streets to early Mass, a charm more sa- 
 cred possessed her heart than that which can thrill 
 the modern tourist at the same sound. The beauti- 
 ful cathedral, with its glowing windows and spring- 
 mg arches, was to her not merely a sight to be seen, —
 
 44 Sister and Saint. 
 
 it was '' none other than the house of God — the gate 
 of heaven." 
 
 Sometimes Jacqueline must have crossed the old 
 fish-market, and stopped, perhaps, for a moment be- 
 side the dripping fountain. The spot had already its 
 history, though it was without its commemorative 
 statue and its present inspiring name of " Place de 
 la Pucelle." And there must have come to Jacque- 
 line a nearer and more vivid thought than we can. 
 ever have, of the brave, pure girl who, two hundred 
 years before, had there suffered at the stake because 
 she would not swear to what she did not believe. 
 Did a hint of what would one day be asked of her- 
 self ever cross Jacqueline's mind? And did a subtle 
 inspiration of candor, enthusiasm, and courage come 
 to her from the speaking stones of that dingy square ? 
 Undoubtedly; — for of such unsuspected influences are 
 molded all our lives. 
 
 Rouen in 1640 was interesting not only from asso- 
 ciations of the past. Its condition at that time was 
 flourishing, its business good, its social advantages 
 next, perhaps, to those of Paris. Corneille was living 
 there, " and did not fail to visit us soon," says Gil- 
 berte. 
 
 To many modern readers, the name of Corneille is 
 associated with school days — with dictionar}^ and 
 foot-notes blurring, rather than making clear, the 
 b<=^auties of his style. It is a little hard for such read-
 
 Into Normandy. 45 
 
 ers to realize that he was a great poet — the Shake- 
 speare of France — the father of the French classical 
 drama. His greatest work, " The Cid," had been 
 published in 1638, and he was at the height of his 
 fame when the Pascals went to Rouen. 
 
 The rather peculiar, " hasty-tempered and blunt " 
 genius conceived a great liking for the poetess of 
 fifteen whose youthful fame had probably preceded 
 her. "He was ravished," says Gilberte, "with the 
 things which my sister wrote," and by his advice she 
 undertook a prize poem. ~ The city, according to 
 time-honored custom, awarded a prize every year to 
 the writer of the best poem on " The Conception of 
 the Virgin."- Probably Corneille had received it so 
 often that he was thankful to find a possible succes- 
 sor. At any rate, he urged Jacqueline to compete, 
 ^nd her effort, with others, was read to a great crowd 
 in the market-place, on the festival celebrating the 
 dogma in question. But " heedless," as in her child- 
 hood, "of this world's praise," when the President of 
 Ceremonies announced the awarding of the prize to 
 Mdlle. Jacqueline Pascal, the successful competitor 
 was not to be found, nor had she sent any repre- 
 sentative to learn the decision. Her friend, Corneille, 
 however, rose and gave a graceful and flattering ad- 
 dress of thanks in her name. The next day the prize 
 was brought to her house with drums, trumpets, and 
 a grand procession, "Yet," says Gilberte, "she re-
 
 46 Sister and Saint. 
 
 ceived it with remarkable indifference. She was so 
 very simple that, though she was then fifteen years 
 old, she always kept dolls, which she dressed and un- 
 dressed with as much pleasure as if she had been only 
 ten. We used to reproach her with this childishness, 
 and we did so so much that at last she was obliged to 
 give them up, though not without pain ; for she 
 loved this diversion better than to take part in the 
 grandest fetes in the city." 
 
 After Gilberte and her husband left Rouen, Jac- 
 queline took up her position as head of the family, 
 and from that time till her twenty-first year led a life 
 of cheerful activity which is pleasant to think of. 
 Her brother's health now became delicate, bringing 
 out sisterly carefulness, not, as yet, exciting grave 
 anxiety. She studied with her father and brother, 
 and read more history and philosophy than most girls 
 of the seventeenth or of any century. And under 
 the advice of her friend Corneille, she continued to 
 write poetry. Some fugitive pieces of this period 
 were collected after her death by her niece, Margaret 
 Perier, and preserved among the annals of Port Royal, 
 and Cousin has given us a few others. But no pub- 
 lished collection of her poems during her lifetime 
 followed the little volume of her thirteenth year. 
 
 We give two or three short specimens of verses 
 written at Rouen :
 
 Into Normandy. 47 
 
 SERENADE. 
 
 O pure and lovely Clarice, rise, 
 
 Bid sleep depart from those sweet eyes ! 
 
 We blame thee not, that through the day 
 Thy charms should drive our peace away, 
 Then is it just for thee to sleep 
 While they who love thee vigil keep ? 
 
 O mark the sorrows of my soul ! 
 List to my sighs, and then console ; 
 Or if thy heart I can not gain. 
 Lend me thine ear while I complain, 
 And since thy frowns forbid my sleep. 
 Share thou the weary watch I keep ! 
 
 DEVOTIONAL SONNET. 
 
 O glorious Architect of earth and sea, 
 
 Yet of frail man the Maker and the stay. 
 Here at Thine altar's foot I humbly pray. 
 
 Let Thy world-sheltering love encircle me. 
 
 Well may my every hope be built on Thee, 
 
 For I can hear, unmoved, the thunder's growl, 
 Can brave e'en demons and their whispers foul 
 
 When my heart trusteth in Thy sure decree. 
 
 But, ah ! the power of sin o'erwhelms my frame. 
 Frustrates my wishes, makes my spirit tame, 
 And dims the lustre of its zealous flame. 
 Its languor pardon. Lord ! my strength uphold, 
 Make my weak nature in Thy service bold, 
 Let not Thy love in my faint heart wax cold ! 
 
 The following is interesting, as showing that some 
 of Jacqueline's associates must have been Protestants.
 
 48 Sister and Saint. 
 
 Poor girl ! It is touching to see how she struggles 
 between a natural affection for a lovely character and 
 a horror of heretical doctrine : 
 
 ON THE DEATH OF A HUGUENOT LADY. 
 
 Friendly tears were never shed 
 O'er a lovelier lady dead : 
 Chloris was, in form and face, 
 Gifted with angelic grace ; 
 But in youth's enchanting bloom, 
 Fate has laid her in the tomb. 
 
 We have deeper cause to groan 
 O'er her state a shade is thrown ; 
 Anxious doubts our spirits chafe 
 As we ask, " Can she be safe ? — 
 She who died, remaining still 
 A heretic in act and will ? " 
 
 Doubt not, in the dying hour. 
 
 That her strengthened soul had power, 
 
 By afHictions purified, 
 
 Every weight to cast aside, — ■ 
 
 Light celestial entering in. 
 
 That she meekly owned her sin. 
 
 And, O Lord, if earthly love 
 
 Can Thy tender pity move, 
 
 Hear the prayers we'll henceforth make 
 
 In Thy temple for her sake 
 
 Whom Thou didst create so fair, 
 
 But who never worshiped there. 
 
 Her ill-fated birth alone 
 Caused the errors we bemoan ; 
 Blinded by her zeal's excess. 
 And her filial tenderness.
 
 Into Normandy. 49 
 
 Td the last she persevered 
 In the faith her sire revered. 
 
 Thou didst on her spirit shower 
 Heavenly gifts, the precious dower 
 Of the souls that love Thee best ; — 
 Calm devotion filled her breast, 
 And the flame of sacred love 
 Raised her hopes to Thee above. 
 
 Day by day her dearest care 
 Was to serve her Lord by prayer. 
 Could her faith so fruitful be 
 If it were not given of Thee ? 
 Shall the zeal Thou didst bestow 
 Sink her in eternal woe-? 
 
 In my dim and sinful state, 
 Lord, I dare not penetrate 
 Secrets that Thy wisdom hides. 
 But Thy goodness yet abides ; — 
 And Thine equitable will 
 Is with mercy tempered still. 
 
 Doubtless Jacqueline already took a lively interest 
 in the great religious questions which then agitated 
 France and, indeed, all Europe. She could not have 
 failed often to hear them discussed. At that time, 
 and for about twenty years afterward, the Huguenots 
 were tolerated, and many of the noblest families of 
 the land openly avowed the reformed faith. Yet 
 though treated with an outward show of respect they 
 were never cordially regarded or fairly dealt with by 
 either Church or Court. At the bottom of all politi- 
 3
 
 50 Sister and Saint. 
 
 cal turbulence boiled always these fierce religious 
 disputes, and now and then all other issues would be 
 forgotten and overwhelmed in their fury. Catholic 
 and Huguenot armies had, for a century, in turn dev- 
 astated the land. And even when times were most 
 peaceful the great questions, in one shape or other, 
 were working in men's minds. With Luther on one 
 side and Calvin on the other, France could not escape 
 these questions. Even the Church could not remain 
 uninfluenced, and consciously or unconsciously, in 
 small or in great degree, and with a thousand vary- 
 ing shades of understanding, faithful Catholics were 
 weighing the new thoughts, looking at truth in the 
 new ways. Little did Jacqueline Pascal guess how 
 near her the leaven was working ! 
 
 Cousin, referring to these years in Rouen, says of 
 our heroine : '■'■ Her personal attractions, her charming 
 character, her modesty, her sprightliness, her talents, 
 her reputation, made her the ornament of all the most 
 elegant and distinguished society. She lived there 
 till the middle of 1646, that is to say, till she was 
 twenty years old, pious and regular, but without any 
 exaggeration of these traits, far from the thought of 
 becoming a nun, more than once sought in marriage, 
 increasing in grace and in talent under the fostering 
 wings of an incomparable family, among the friends 
 of her father and her brother, and under the imme- 
 diate guidance of the great Corneille, who was then
 
 Into Normajidy. 51 
 
 in all the force of his genius and in the full brilliancy 
 of his glory." 
 
 Gilberte affectionately reviews the same period in 
 these words : 
 
 *'The reputation which she had acquired by the 
 * gentillesses ' of her childhood did not diminish as she 
 grew older ; on the contrary, it went on always aug- 
 menting. She had the great qualities of every period 
 of life. She was popular with all sorts of people, 
 and those who were not intimate with her sought her 
 acquaintance most eagerly. When she appeared in 
 any company, you could see how every one rejoiced 
 at her coming, and a little murmur of pleasure would 
 rise ; atid she always satisfied those who expected some- 
 thing pleasant of her."
 
 A FLEMISH BISHOP.
 
 V. 
 
 A FLEMISH BISHOP. 
 
 aND now let us turn away from Rouen for a 
 time and look across low-lying fields and slow, 
 broad streams, into a quiet bishop's study in 
 Flanders. A little backward in time our glance must 
 go, for, in 1638, that spring after Jacqueline Pascal 
 had played her part so well before Richelieu, this 
 bishop, Cornelius Jansen, died. Probably she had never 
 heard of him at that time ; but two years afterward 
 all Europe began to ring with his name, for his great 
 book, the work of his life — the " Augustinus " — was 
 then published. Twenty years the patient scholar 
 had labored on this work, till the very life and 
 essence of his being seemed absorbed into it, and the 
 day he wrote the final page was the day of his death. 
 Jansen was born in 1585, and educated for the 
 priesthood at the Jesuit college of Louvain. There, 
 when nineteen years old, he stood " first scholar of 
 the university," and always and everywhere scholar- 
 
 (55)
 
 56 Sister mid Saint. 
 
 ship was his most prominent characteristic. He was 
 one of those men who never look Hke themselves 
 unless they have a book under their arm. His ''dear 
 delight " was patient investigation, comparison, criti- 
 cism. His mind was not eager and grasping like 
 Blaise Pascal's, but careful, searching, microscopic. 
 
 In youth Jansen formed a lifelong friendship with 
 a young Frenchman from Bayonne — Jean du Verger 
 de Hauranne, afterward Abbe de St. Cyran, and 
 known in history by that name. 
 
 At Paris the friends studied theology together , 
 and, to their surprise, they found theology to mean, 
 not the science of God, but the writings of the school- 
 men, endless and fruitless disputations, subtle casuis- 
 tries, all sorts of intellectual puzzles and paradoxes. 
 Both of the young men were fond of such mental 
 gymnastics, and we have specimens of disquisitions 
 written by each at about this time which seem to any 
 straightforward, clear-thinking person the sheerest 
 waste of the reasoning powers. But the minds of 
 Jansen and St. Cyran were not only acute; they 
 were earnest, sincere, devout. They soon saw that all 
 this tilting and tourneying was but a sorry mockery 
 of true Christian warfare. They longed for some- 
 thing that went deeper ; and Jansen, walking in his 
 garden, was often observed to lift his eyes to heaven 
 and murmur, " Oh, truth ! truth ! " 
 
 The friends made up their minds that pure doctrine
 
 A Flemish Bishop. 57 
 
 could only be obtained by going back to the Fathers 
 of the Church. And they went back — as far as St. 
 Augustine ! If only it had occurred to them to go 
 a little farther ! If only they had reached the purer 
 streams fed more directly from the Fountain ! If 
 only they had pushed their way to the ''well of 
 water " itself, and there drunk of the Truth for which 
 they thirsted ! 
 
 However, they went back to St. Augustine, and 
 after leaving Paris, Jansen made a six years' visit to 
 his friend at Bayonne, where they pursued together 
 the study of their chosen author, Jansen's health was 
 most delicate and precarious, but he would pay no at- 
 tention to his poor body. He studied almost without 
 ceasing, seldom going to bed, his biographers tell us, 
 but passing day and night in a large chair, fitted up 
 with cushions and writing-desk. Here, when fatigue 
 overcame him, he would rest and sleep for a time. 
 His maximum of sleep was four hours out of the 
 twenty-four. 
 
 " My son," complained St. Cyran's careful mother, 
 "you will certainly kill your good Fleming if you let 
 him work so hard." But neither St. Cyran nor his 
 mother could help it. 
 
 The student's only answer to remonstrance was 
 that he wished he had lived in the time of Joshua, 
 when " the sun stood still in the midst of heaven," 
 or that he could " follow the cranes in their north-
 
 58 Sister and Saint. 
 
 ward flight and find places where the day should be 
 nineteen or twenty hours long." 
 
 It is a comfort to know that, between the chapters 
 of St. Augustine, he allowed himself a game of bat- 
 tledore and shuttlecock with St. Cyran, and that they 
 attained great proficiency, sometimes scoring three or 
 four thousand. 
 
 At the end of six years the friends separated. Jan- 
 sen went home to Flanders to take a professorship at 
 Louvain, and aftenvard the bishopric of Ypres. At 
 the same time he worked constantly on his beloved 
 " Augustinus." Ten times, we are told, he carefully 
 read through the whole body of St. Augustine's 
 works. Thirty times he read certain parts, sifting, 
 comparing, nicely weighing every word. Besides all 
 this, he thoroughly studied every passage throughout 
 the voluminous works of the other Fathers which 
 bore in the least on the doctrines of St. Augustine. 
 Truly, as the annalist of Port Royal temperately re- 
 marks, " when we consider that Jansenius digested 
 and arranged in twenty years the whole mass of sa- 
 cred literature accumulated in thirteen centuries, it 
 excites astonishment ! " 
 
 At last, at the end of the twenty years, the schol- 
 ar's meagre face begins to shine. For some days his 
 servants notice that his countenance is illumined as 
 with a great joy. He is putting the finishing touches 
 to the work of his life. He is crowning the idol of
 
 A Flemish Bishop. 59 
 
 his heart. " The burning joy consumes him," says 
 Sainte-Beuve. He writes the final word. He is 
 seized with the plague and dies in less than twenty- 
 four hours.* 
 
 His will, written half an hour before his death, 
 thus disposes of his sole treasure, his precious book : 
 " I now lay my work at the feet of his Holiness. I 
 submit its contents to his decision, approving, con- 
 demning, advancing, or retracting whatever shall be 
 prescribed by the thunders of the Apostolic See." 
 And so Cornelius Jansen left his work to follow him, 
 and went on, we feel sure, to study more glorious 
 truth than his heart had yet conceived. 
 
 The world will always, and very justly, look at 
 Jansen chiefly as a scholar. But he somewhat touch- 
 ingly deprecates being thought *' a mere pedant of 
 the schools," and it is pleasant to see, by occasional 
 flashes, that he is something more. Like many an- 
 other silent, bookish man, he could show upon occa- 
 sion great personal bravery. In his many disputes 
 with the Jesuits he displayed an address and sagacity 
 that surprised his best friends. What is more, he 
 usually gained his point — a fact which the Jesuits 
 never forgot and never forgave. 
 
 * One account eulogizes Jansen's courage and devotion to the 
 poor during the prevalence of the plague just before he died. But 
 Sainte-Beuve declares his to have been an isolated instance of the 
 disease, and suggests that it may have been communicated by some 
 of the old manuscripts over which he pored.
 
 6o Sister and Saint. 
 
 As bishop he was kind and accessible, always drop 
 ping his pen with a beautiful alacrity at the call of 
 the poor or distressed. 
 
 His intimacy with St. Cyran reveals beneath the 
 scholar's quiet breast another unsuspected thing — a 
 well of simple tenderness, pure and deep. After the 
 long stay together at Bayonne, Jansen writes to his 
 friend that when the first letter came he was not 
 alone, and was forced to imitate the patriarch Joseph 
 and "go out and seek where to weep." After another 
 visit, he alludes to the tears each shed at parting; 
 and again, speaking of an expected meeting, he joy- 
 fully says that he is traveling toward his friend, and 
 has arranged to " enter France with the month of 
 May." 
 
 An earnestness was given to this friendship by their 
 common choice of Abraham as their model character. 
 During their studies at Paris, they had been struck 
 by the sublimity of Abraham's faith. They felt hum- 
 bled before the man who, without the Church, with- 
 out the saints and Mary, without the full knowledge 
 of the Lord Jesus Christ, without even the Mosaic 
 law, had so nearly attained obedience to the divine 
 command, " Walk before me, and be thou perfect!' 
 
 This command they resolved to take for their own, 
 
 and thus 
 
 " Aiming at a star, 
 Shot higher far than he that means a tree."
 
 A Flemish Bishop. 6i 
 
 And now about this great book of Cornelius Jan- 
 sen's — this " Augustinus." How many of us have ever 
 seen it, or, indeed, heard of it before ? Sainte-Beuve 
 says of it, that " no book of its calibre ever became so 
 famous, while remaining so little known." Another 
 writer speaks of it as " celebrated almost alone for the 
 evils it occasioned." The great majority of those who 
 bore the name of Jansenist — gladly bore it to prison 
 and to death — never read the ponderous tomes. 
 Fewer still ever saw the man who wrote them. 
 . The "Augustinus" was written in Latin, and was, in 
 short, a "tissue of texts from St. Augustine." These 
 were arranged with consummate nicety and skill, so 
 as to bring out the complete system of the Augustinian 
 doctrines. 
 
 It is not for this little book of ours to unfold these 
 doctrines. Enough for us to know that they are, in 
 effect, the system known to us as Calvinism. Enough 
 for us to see, as we shall see in going on with this 
 story, that the Jansenists, whatever their beliefs, were 
 " a fountain of sweet waters in the midst of the brack- 
 ish sea" — a " learned and religious society in the bo- 
 som of the Catholic Church, who distinctly taught 
 justification by faith, and were assiduously occupied 
 in the dissemination of the Scriptures." Just a step 
 more, and a very short step, too, and every one of 
 them would have become that accursed thing, a 
 Huguenot !
 
 62 Sister and Saint. 
 
 Indeed, as we shall see, they did come near enough 
 this point to take their share of persecution. The 
 Jesuits, with artifice all their own, distorted and ren- 
 dered ambiguous certain parts of the " Augustinus," 
 and then secured their condemnation by the pope. 
 They dishonored and destroyed the author's tomb. 
 They tortured and imprisoned his friends. 
 
 Jansen's was, indeed, a singular destiny ! To give 
 his name to, and be condemned for, a system of doc- 
 trines not his own, but that of a recognized, canonized 
 saint, and to be the exciting cause of bitter strife in 
 which he took no part ! His own life, as we have 
 seen, flowed still as the streams of his native land, 
 and when the billows rose he was safe beyond their 
 power in his eternal Home.
 
 THE DIRECTOR OF CONSCIENCES.
 
 
 rr^^'^^^^v 
 
 VI. 
 
 THE DIRECTOR OF CONSCIENCES. 
 
 • 
 T. CYRAN was a very different man from 
 
 Jansen. He was charged to the full with 
 that personal magnetism which his friend ut- 
 terly lacked. He was a man of commanding pres- 
 ence, "tall and majestic in form," his biogt-aphers tell 
 us, and of a very" noble countenance. 
 
 His " firm, penetrating eye," his gentleness and 
 courtesy, and a certain elevation in his manners, com- 
 bined to render him almost irresistible. His friends 
 and followers were full of admiring enthusiasm for 
 him, and, as they admired, he " silently, but cer- 
 tainly" governed them. 
 
 When Jansen went back to Flanders after their six 
 years' visit together at Bayonne, St. Cyran went to 
 Poitiers, where he was appointed canon of the 
 cathedral. He passed rapidly from one honorable 
 position to another, the last being the abbacy of the 
 monastery which gives him his name. But in five 
 
 (65)
 
 66 Sister and Saint. 
 
 years from the time he left Bayonne, we find him in 
 Paris Hving the life of a simple priest. He was a 
 man of wealth and could live as he chose, and he 
 chose retirement and simplicity. But greatness pur- 
 sued him and would not let him go. He soon ac- 
 quired reputation and influence as a confessor, or, as 
 he much preferred to be called, " a director of con- 
 sciences." 
 
 Cardinal Richelieu had known St. Cyran in his 
 youth, and he was keen enough to recognize now all 
 the man's power. At the same time he did not love 
 him any too well. For one thing, they did not agree 
 on doctrinal points. Did not St. Cyran teach that 
 love of God was essential to true faith, while Riche- 
 lieu held that fear of punishment was all that was 
 needed ? And was he not known to have declared 
 that absolution and remission of sins belong to God 
 alone ? 
 
 Moreover, it is said that St. Cyran knew some dis- 
 reputable secrets in regard to the cardinal's life, 
 which that prelate might well prefer not to have 
 remembered by such a man. Under these circum- 
 stances, Richelieu did just what we should have 
 expected him to do. He tried St. Cyran first with 
 craftiness, then with cruelty. 
 
 St. Cyran was promptly introduced by the cardinal 
 at court, as " the most learned man in Europe." 
 This was a polite fiction, as both parties knew. It
 
 The Director of Consciences. 67 
 
 would have been much nearer the truth if spoken of 
 Jansen. 
 
 Next, Richelieu offered him the position of first 
 almoner to Henrietta of England, the French prin- 
 cess who had married Charles the First. This was a 
 most politic move. The office was honorable enough 
 to satisfy almost any man's ambition, and, at the 
 same time, it would remove St. Cyran — secrets and 
 all — from the society where he was beginning to have 
 such remarkable influence. But St. Cyran calmly 
 declined the honor and thus avoided the snare. 
 
 Eight bishoprics were then successively offered 
 him, among them the very desirable ones of Cler- 
 mont and Bayonne. After each of these offers, St. 
 Cyran attended the cardinal's levee, and courteously 
 thanked him for his kind intentions. But he never 
 attended courtly festivities on other occasions, and 
 withdrew himself more and more from the fashion- 
 able society which had been so ready to welcome him. 
 
 He took an humble lodging opposite the Carthusian 
 convent and devoted himself to prayer, study, and 
 charity. But it was like the leaven hidden in the 
 meal. Obscurity only seemed to widen his influence. 
 He was not seen among the guests of the wealthy, 
 but here, in this modest retreat, he daily received 
 visits from those who were wont to be found in the 
 audience-chambers of the Palais Royal and the 
 Louvre.
 
 6S Sister mid Saint. 
 
 He was a physician of souls, and many a pained 
 and weary heart, half unconscious, perhaps, of its 
 own ailment, and ignorant of the remedy, came here 
 to him for help. With wonderful patience, tender- 
 ness, and skill, though sometimes with a keen and 
 painful probing, he laid bare the hidden disease and 
 showed the way to the Healer. 
 
 It was not only by the wealthy and fashionable 
 that he was sought. The greatest thinkers of his 
 time, lawyers, statesmen, scientists, priests, came to 
 be directed by him, and, one by one, he led them 
 away from their errors into the truth. 
 
 Devout and thoughtful women who had been 
 praying for years under the silent convent roof, and 
 whose hearts God had been slowly opening, now 
 heard of this new teacher, sent, as it seemed to them, 
 from God, and came to put themselves under his 
 guidance. 
 
 Angelique and Agnes Arnauld, the celebrated 
 sister abbesses of Port Royal (with whom through 
 our friends, the Pascals, we are soon to become fa- 
 miliar), early sought for themselves and their nuns St. 
 Cyran's influence, and he became the regular spirit- 
 ual director of their convent. 
 
 Long ago, in their own Bibles and through their 
 own enlightened consciences, partly, perhaps, though 
 they never guessed it, through the influence of 
 Huguenot relatives, these sisters had found out for
 
 The Director oj L-onsciences. 09 
 
 themselves something of this more excellent way. 
 Now, how good it was to be confirmed and strength- 
 ened by this holy man ! How wisely he instructed 
 all these nuns, and helped them make of the dull 
 routine of the convent a happy service for the Mas- 
 ter's sake ! How he smoothed away intellectual 
 doubts and difficulties for the more thoughtful ones ! 
 How he helped and advised them in every way, and 
 how warmly and womanly they all loved him ! 
 
 But he was very sharp with them sometimes, so 
 much so that Angelique (who, as we shall see, had 
 some spirit of her own) one day said to him, *' My 
 father, it seems to me you are only gentle toward 
 those who abuse your confidence and deceive you." 
 
 When Marie-Claire, another of the Arnauld sisters, 
 who had been very unjust to St. Cyran in a certain 
 matter, cam^, at last, almost broken-hearted in her 
 penitence, to make her humble confession, he stop- 
 ped her. 
 
 '' We must find out," he said, " whether you exag- 
 gerate your faults, and whether in the sight of God they 
 are as great as you think them. We must look care- 
 fully into this matter God is a Spirit, and 
 
 spiritual sins grieve Him more than any others. 
 Beware of exaggeration. We do not need any close 
 scrutiny to remind us of our sins. Kneel before God 
 without words, without anxious self-scrutiny. He 
 will understand you."
 
 70 Sister and Samt. 
 
 Another day when she was mourning over her sins, 
 he said : " You must forget the past. If we were 
 always obHged to think of our past sins, no one 
 could be happy. He who has commanded us not to 
 look back when we have put our hand to the plow, 
 knows what is for our good." 
 
 When Marie-Claire begged that she might as a 
 penance, and in proof of her humility, be made a lay 
 sister* for life, St Cyran sharply rebuked her. 
 
 " You wish the future to be settled for you," he 
 said. " I do not like that request. Those who be- 
 long to God ought to have nothing absolutely settled 
 
 and decided For myself, I do not want to 
 
 know what I shall do when I leave this place. We 
 are told to ask God for our bread (that is, for His 
 grace), day by day ; but I should like to ask for it 
 
 hour by hour It is contrary to the spirit of 
 
 true humility to seek to do extraordinary things. 
 There is no greater pride than in seeking to humil- 
 iate ourselves beyond measure ; and sometimes there 
 is no truer humility than to attempt great works for 
 God." 
 
 Many a word of wisdom taken direct from the 
 good man's lips, and many a delightful anecdote of 
 him or his distinguished friends, is recorded for us in 
 Lancelot's charming " Memoires de St. Cyran." The 
 
 * A lay-sister is one who performs the menial services of the 
 convent.
 
 The Director of Consciences. 71 
 
 pen is tempted to linger over them, but we must 
 content ourselves with a very few. 
 
 Notwithstanding his ordinarily cool and dignified 
 demeanor, the good father had a very tender spot in 
 his heart, especially toward the little ones. One day 
 he bought a pot of preserved quinces for a little girl 
 among the novices at Port Royal, a daughter of his 
 particular friend, d'Andilly. But on the way to the 
 convent, scruples overcame him lest " the sweets of 
 earth should destroy her taste for the sweets of 
 heaven." He resolved not to offer the gift, and hid 
 it under the folds of his mantle. But when he 
 reached the house and was told that the little girl , 
 was not feeling well that day, love overcame his 
 caution, and the quinces were sent to her room at 
 once. 
 
 A conscientious nun once came to him very much 
 exercised in regard to the faults of a certain sister 
 nun. Surely these were very wrong proceedings. 
 Should she speak of them ? " Be silent for three 
 months," said the director of consciences. At the 
 end of three months she reminded him that the time 
 had elapsed. Might she tell now? "No," said he, 
 " be silent for the rest of your life." 
 
 De Sericourt, who had been a military man, after 
 his conversion asked St. Cyran to teach him how to 
 pray. " You know soldiers are not much instructed 
 on this point," he said.
 
 72 Sister and Saint. 
 
 St. Cyran placed his hands together, bowed his 
 head, and then Hfted his eyes to heaven. " This, sir, 
 is all we have to do," he said. " We have only to 
 appear humbly before God, and remember that He 
 is looking down upon us." De Sericourt says that 
 his master's devout look and these simple words were 
 better than all the books of devotion in the world. 
 
 To his learned body of " Recluses," all of them, in 
 spite of their religious ardor, more or less ambitious 
 of literary fame, St. Cyran one day said: "Jesus 
 Christ has written nothing ; and He shows us there- 
 by that the sublimity of godliness can only be 
 worthily represented by living acts. " 
 
 As may easily be seen, a man teaching such pure 
 and undefiled religion as this, and exercising such a 
 powerful and wide-spread influence, was an element 
 not very desirable to a corrupt Church. 
 
 The Jesuits hated him as heartily as Richelieu did, 
 and that not merely on doctrinal grounds, but also 
 from a very natural feeling of jealousy and envy. 
 
 Up to this time the schools of the Jesuits had 
 enjoyed great celebrity. The education of the higher 
 classes had been almost entirely in their hands. But 
 now, among St. Cyran's friends there were many per- 
 sons of rank and fortune who wished equal advan- 
 tages for their children without the contamination of 
 Jesuitical principles. 
 
 They consulted St. Cyran, and, under his personal
 
 The Director of Consciences. 73 
 
 direction, a number of little schools in and about 
 Paris were opened. 
 
 There were plenty of men of talent among his 
 disciples to take the place of teachers. Nicole, 
 Lancelot, and Fontaine, all of whom have written 
 long and intensely interesting histories of these 
 times, were among them. " The great Arnauld," 
 foremost of a remarkable family, was a writer of 
 text-books for these schools, and so was De Saci, the 
 author of that beautiful, " pure, limpid translation 
 of the Bible " still in use among French Protestant 
 churches. 
 
 A few years later we shall find Blaise Pascal adding 
 to the fame of these schools by his novel and suc- 
 cessful theories of education, and Racine, the poet, 
 entering one of them as a pupil. 
 
 The " Port Royal Grammars " (Greek and Latin), 
 the " Greek Primitives," and the ** Elements of Logic 
 and of Geometry," were soon famous, not only 
 throughout France, but throughout Europe. 
 
 Learned treatises on many subjects, but chiefly on 
 theology, were published by those connected with 
 these schools, and "//j sont marquh au coin de Port 
 RoyaV"^ came to be the fashionable phrase of condem- 
 nation, or favor, as the case might be. 
 
 * From the fact that a large number of St. Cyran's followers who 
 called themselves "the recluses," but were bound by no vows, 
 established themselves at the gates of the convent of Port Royal 
 4
 
 74 Sister and Samt. 
 
 Clearly, as we have said, this state of things was no 
 longer to be borne, and we are not surprised to learn 
 that after seventeen years in Paris, St. Cyran was one 
 day arrested by order of the cardinal. Nineteen 
 separate charges Richelieu averred that he found 
 against this seditious priest, but the charges were 
 never specified, for there was no trial, and, until he 
 had been a year in prison, no show even of examina- 
 tion. At midnight, May 14, 1638, twenty-two arch- 
 ers surrounded St. Cyran's little dwelling and waited 
 until morning, hoping to find some pretext for attack- 
 ing the house ; but nothing of the kind occurring, at 
 six o'clock they knocked and demanded admission. 
 St. Cyran was reading St. Augustine with his nephew, 
 and they had just come to a passage on humility. 
 " That is just what we want," he said. " Here is 
 something to defend ourselves with." The ofificer 
 then coming into his room informed him that he had 
 orders to conduct him to a carriage standing at the 
 gate. " Sir," said St. Cyran, kindly taking his hand, 
 " it is my duty and my pleasure to obey the King." 
 
 They drove at once to the fortress of Vincennes. 
 Many a traveler of our day has taken the same road 
 through the grand old park and forest to the chateau, 
 and climbed the x\\vs\&6i ^donjon for the magnificent 
 
 des Champs, eighteen miles from Paris, the whole party were often 
 called Port Royalists, though after the death of Jansen, from their 
 defense of his book, they were frequently called Jansenists.
 
 The Director of Consciences, 75 
 
 view of the surrounding country and the distant city. 
 As they went through the park they met M. 
 d'Andilly, that friend whom St. Cyran called his 
 " friend par excellence^ Lancelot tells us that the 
 guard had received orders to turn back the facings of 
 their regimentals so as to excite no suspicion. Con- 
 sequently d'Andilly, with no thought of trouble, rode 
 gaily up to the side of the coach and said : " My 
 father, where are you taking all these people ? " "It 
 is not I who take them ; they take me," answered St. 
 Cyran. " But," he added, " I look upon myself as 
 the prisoner of God, not of man." 
 
 The friends were allowed a few moments' conversa- 
 tion, when St. Cyran mentioned his regret that he 
 could not have had time to bring a book with him. 
 D'Andilly had with him a copy of the confessions of 
 St. Augustine. " You first taught me the value of 
 this book," he said. " Now I am thankful to give it 
 back to you." " They then embraced," says the 
 touching story, " as those who expect to see each 
 other's face no more till the resurrection of the just." 
 
 The same morning Richelieu called to him one of 
 his attendant ecclesiastics. ** Beaumont," said he, " I 
 have done a thing which will raise a great outcry. I 
 have had the Abbot of St. Cyran arrested. Learned 
 people and pious people, too, will make a great piece 
 of work about it. But I am sure I have done a good 
 thing. A great many calamities would have been
 
 76 
 
 Sister and Saint. 
 
 averted if Luther and Calvin had been shut up as 
 soon as they began to dogmatize." 
 
 And some time later, when Prince Henry of Bour- 
 bon ventured to plead for St. Cyran, the cardinal an- 
 swered, " You don't know the man for whom you are 
 • interceding. He is more dangerous than six armies. ' 
 
 %
 
 "THE OBSTACLE BECOMES THE 
 INSTRUMENT."
 
 VII. 
 
 "THE OBSTACLE BECOMES THE INSTRUMENT." 
 
 IN the prison of Vincennes, at the time of St. 
 Cyran's arrest, was a certain learned priest named 
 Guillebert. He was released soon afterward, but 
 not till he had heartily adopted St. Cyran's views and 
 begun to seek the truth in his spirit. 
 
 When he was set free he was appointed to the 
 parish of Rouville, a suburb of Rouen, And thus 
 we come around — the circle of circumstance and in- 
 fluence being complete — to the Pascals once more. 
 
 For as soon as Guillebert began to preach he be- 
 came famous in all the region round about. "A great 
 religious awakening " — the phrase has an oddly con- 
 strained and " not at home " look in the French — 
 took place throughout the whole diocese of Rouen. 
 
 Father Guillebert was eloquent as well as learned, 
 and this fact, added to the novelty and force of his 
 teachings, brought all sorts of people, from far and 
 from near, to hear him. Rouville was crowded with 
 
 (79)
 
 8o Sister and Saint, 
 
 guests, and members of the parliament of Rouen were 
 accustomed to hire lodgings in the village of a Satur- 
 day so as to be ready for the Sabbath services. Sun- 
 day travehng was, apparently, not so fashionable then 
 as it has since become. 
 
 The new doctrines became the town talk of Rouen, 
 and, whatever their opinion concerning them, the 
 Pascals must have shared in the general interest, and 
 very possibly were sometimes among Guillebert's 
 hearers. But, for a year or two after Madame Perier's 
 marriage, we lose her graphic family narrative, and 
 have no record of the details of their life. 
 
 Sainte-Beuve thinks he can trace in Corneille's 
 writings after this time the influence of the truths 
 preached at Rouville, though the poet, educated by 
 the Jesuits, and closely connected with them in many 
 ways, remained through life attached to that party. 
 However this may be, no intelligent person living at 
 this time in Rouen could have failed to be more or 
 less affected by these things, and the Pascals had 
 doubtless before this watched with interest the cardi- 
 nal's proceedings against St. Cyran. 
 
 It was at last, however, by one of those seeming 
 accidents on which so often human destinies are 
 hinged, that these solemn questions of truth and 
 duty became vital realities to our friends. Up to this 
 time they had been upright, conscientious, devout, 
 but not, as they expressed it, " eclaire."
 
 ''The Obstacle becomes the Ijistrtimcntl'' 8i 
 
 One day, in the winter of 1646, M. Pascal slipped 
 and fell on the ice, seriously spraining or dislocating 
 his thigh. One account mentions that it was " while 
 absent from home on a charitable errand " that the 
 accident took place. 
 
 Now there were living in the neighborhood of 
 Rouen two wealthy gentlemen, brothers, named 
 Deslandes and De la Bouteillerie,* who seem to 
 have been surgeons by nature, and who were often 
 called upon to remedy such accidents. 
 
 These gentlemen had become, under the preaching 
 of Guillebert, humble and active Christians. Each of 
 them had erected a small hospital in his own park, 
 Deslandes, who had ten children, furnishing his 
 building with ten beds and De la Bouteillerie, who 
 •was childless, providing for twice that number of 
 patients. Both spent most of their time in attend- 
 ance on the sick, and they were always ready at any 
 call to exercise their remarkable skill in setting broken 
 or dislocated bones. 
 
 M. Pascal " placed no confidence in any one else," 
 his daughter tells us, and sent at once for these good 
 brothers, who not only came, but, both of them, re- 
 mained in the family three months in order to insure 
 complete recovery. 
 
 This was the turning point in Jacqueline Pascal's 
 
 * Brothers in French families are often known by different names 
 according to their estates. 
 4*
 
 82 Sister and Saiiit. 
 
 life. These three months were the quick, warm sum- 
 mer sent to ripen the character we have seen already 
 in its fragrant flower. True, conscientious, enthusias- 
 tic — much that was right and lovely and pure — she 
 had been before. She now becomes (and recognizes 
 herself as such) a loving child of God. She now 
 seeks first His kingdom and His righteousness, and 
 all these other things are added unto her. 
 Just when the change came we can not know. 
 
 " Who ever saw the earliest rose 
 First open her sweet breast ? 
 Or, when the summer sun goes down, 
 The first soft star in evening's crown 
 Light up her gleaming Erest 1 " 
 
 But at some time during this period the influences 
 of all her past life, gracious and merciful, and leading 
 always up to this point, culminated in the influences 
 of the moment, and she stepped into a larger life — ■ 
 she became partaker of the Eternal Life. 
 
 "Toward the end of the year 1646, about ten 
 months after the accident," writes Gilbertej "when 
 M. Bellay, the bishop of the diocese, was holding an 
 ordination at Rouen, my sister, who had not yet been 
 confirmed, wished to receive this sacrament. She 
 prepared for it according to instructions which she 
 found in some little treatises of M. de St. Cyran, and 
 we have reason to believe that she then truly received
 
 "The Obstacle becomes the Instrumenty 2>t, 
 
 the Holy Spirit, for, from that time, she was greatly 
 changed." 
 
 The residence of these two physicians with the 
 Pascals did not affect Jacqueline alone. The whole 
 household p'rofited by their presence. Their improv- 
 ing conversation and the simple goodness of their 
 lives, we are told, first attracted the hearts of all, and 
 then there came the natiiral curiosity to see the books 
 which they mentioned as having been helpful and in- 
 spiring to them. 
 
 " Thus they became acquainted," says Madame 
 Perier, "with the works of M. Jansen, M. de St. 
 Cyran, M. Arnauld, and with other writings by which 
 they were greatly edified." 
 
 Blaise, with his eager, searching mind, was not long 
 in investigating the truths now brought so near to 
 him. And, once carefully considered, he honestly 
 and heartily adopted them, and gave up his life to the 
 service of God. " He comprehended perfectly," says 
 his sister, " that the Christian religion obliges us to 
 live for God alone, and to have no other object, and 
 this truth appeared to him so evident, so necessary, 
 and so practical, that he brought to an end all his re- 
 searches, and from that time renounced all other 
 knowledge to apply himself alone to that ' one thing ' 
 which Jesus Christ calls needful." 
 
 In " giving up all other knowledge and terminating 
 all his researches," Blaise Pascal went through, as we
 
 84 Sister a7id Saini. 
 
 shall see, a terrible struggle — it may seem to us a 
 needlessly violent one. But one temptation he did 
 not have. Skepticism, which has troubled so many 
 minds before his day and since, seems never to have 
 attacked him. He had no doubts in regard to the 
 vital and eternal truths of Christianity. His grasp of 
 mind was so large and his intellect so clear that he 
 did not confuse, as so many have done, the different 
 realms of truth. He recognized that spiritual things 
 can not be discerned as material things are discerned, 
 or judged as material things are judged. His wise 
 father had "taught him from infancy that .that 
 which is the object of faith can not be the object 
 of reason, much less can it be submitted to reason." 
 "This maxim, often reiterated by a father for whom 
 he had great respect, and in whom he saw great 
 knowledge, accompanied with a very clear and 
 powerful reason, made so great an impression on his 
 mind that, whatever discourse he may have heard 
 which tended to free-thinking, he was in no way 
 moved by it ; and even when he was very young, he 
 regarded skeptics as men who were acting on a false 
 principle, viz, that the human reason is above every- 
 thing else, and as men who did not understand the 
 nature of faith." 
 
 " Thus," continues Madame Perier, " this mind, so 
 large, so grasping, and so full of curiosity, which 
 searched with so much care for the cause and the
 
 " The Obstacle becomes' the Instrument." 85 
 
 reason of everything, was, at the same time, in mat- 
 ters of religion, trustful as a little child. 
 
 "This simplicity governed his whole life, so that, in 
 after-years, when his whole heart was engrossed with 
 spiritual realities, he never busied himself with curi- 
 ous questions of theology, but applied the full 
 strength of his mind to understand and to practice 
 Christian holiness, dedicating to this all his talents, 
 and meditating day and night on the law of his God." 
 
 What a Christian character was that ! Happy Jac- 
 queline, who could walk hand in hand with such a 
 brother in the way which, though they found it nar- 
 row, they also found a way of exceeding pleasant- 
 ness ! Happy father, who now, " not ashamed to 
 become the child of his children," followed after them 
 in this way of life ! 
 
 In the course of the winter M. and Madame Perier 
 visited Rouen and became the subjects of a like 
 change. And thus the whole family rejoiced together 
 in the love of God, and entered with enthusiastic de- 
 votion on the highest service possible to human souls. 
 
 During the years immediately preceding the con- 
 version of the Pascals, great changes had taken place 
 in France. 
 
 In December, 1642, Cardinal Richelieu died, and a 
 few months afterward, the king, Louis XIIL, leav- 
 ing the kingdom in the hands of Anne of Austria as 
 Regent, with Cardinal Ma^arin for Prime Minister.
 
 86 Sister and Saint. 
 
 The young king, Louis XIV., was but five years of 
 age at the time of his father's death. 
 
 When Richeheu died, many a prison-door was 
 opened, and among those hberated was St. Cyran. 
 His years in prison had been fruitful ones. As is 
 so often the case in the Hves of good men, ''the 
 obstacle became the instrument," and the letters 
 written from his cell and circulated with enthusiastic 
 industry by his friends and disciples, probably did 
 more good than he, in his own person, could have 
 effected. Especially was religious interest quickened 
 among the nobility by Richelieu's violent measure. 
 
 The Duchess d'Aiguillon interceded with her uncle 
 for St. Cyran, but without the success which had at- 
 tended her efforts for M. Pascal during Jacqueline's 
 childhood. She obtained permission, however, to 
 visit the prisoner and to take d'Andilly with her, and 
 through this latter faithful friend St. Cyran was kept 
 supplied with pencils and paper. The duchess also 
 visited Port Royal, and the convent became, we are 
 told, " a fashionable resort of the court," much to the 
 discomfort of the good abbesses Angelique and 
 Agnes. They were willing, however, to do what they 
 could for human souls, whatever their station in this 
 life. They showed infinite patience, tenderness, and 
 charity toward the Princess de Guemene, for exam- 
 ple, who was one of their most constant visitors, but 
 a woman of light and frivolous character. Her fre-
 
 ''The Obstacle becomes the Btstrument!' 87 
 
 quent '* retreats " to the convent, and her long con- 
 versations with them on spiritual matters gave them 
 great hope of her. But St. Cyran, to whom all these 
 things were faithfully reported, knew the world better 
 than they did. " The grace of God in that woman's 
 soul," he wrote, "is like a spark kindled on an icy 
 pavement with the winds blowing on it from every 
 quarter." And so it proved. 
 
 But in some seemingly unpromising spots the well- 
 tended spark increased to a flame both warm and 
 bright. Among the " illustrious women of the seven- 
 teenth century " (of whom Cousin has given us some 
 delightful studies, and first of whom, by the way, he 
 places our own Jacqueline Pascal), we find many 
 whose hearts have caught, in greater or less degree, 
 the gracious warmth and light. 
 
 A beautiful example of thorough and sincere con- 
 version was Madame de St. Ange, a member of the 
 household of Anne of Austria. This lady, we are 
 told, " was soon promoted by St. Cyran from the 
 rank of disciple to that of friend," and she became 
 one of the most faithful of his agents in the distribu- 
 tion of charity. 
 
 Pleasant stories are told of St. Cyran's thoughtful 
 kindness for others while in prison. At one time he 
 bestows a wedding dowry on a poor maiden. Again, 
 he sends for a black coat for a poor mad prisoner who 
 can not endure the sight of the gray clothes he wears.
 
 88 Sister and Saint. 
 
 Among the prisoners were a Baron and Baroness de 
 Beausoleil, who were very destitute and poorly clad. 
 St. Cyran sent directions to have clothing bought for 
 them, and added : " Pray let the cloth be good and 
 fine, such as befits their rank. I do not know what is 
 proper, but I think I have heard somewhere that 
 gentlemen and ladies of their condition can not ap- 
 pear without gold lace for the men and black lace for 
 the women. If so, pray get the best, and, in short, 
 let all be done modestly, but yet handsomely, that, in 
 looking at each other, they may for a few minutes 
 forget that they are captives." 
 
 Against this waste his almoner remonstrated. 
 ("Why was not this ointment sold for three hundred 
 pence and given to the poor?") But St. Cyran an- 
 swered : "I do not believe that the Lord, who com- 
 mands me to give unto Csesar that which is Caesar's, 
 will account me a bad steward for giving modestly to 
 each according to that rank in which He placed them." 
 Let us ponder this lesson — all of us active philan- 
 thropists who are so much inclined to give to the 
 needy not what they wish, but what we think they 
 ought to wish — who willingly " bestow our goods to 
 feed the poor, and have not charity." 
 
 As we have seen in the case of Guillebert, St. Cy- 
 ran's influence on his fellow-prisoners often produced 
 wide-spread results. All were, at least, impressed by 
 his character, if not convinced by his teachings.
 
 ''The Obstacle becomes the Instrument^ 89 
 
 John de Wert, a Spanish nobleman and prisoner of 
 war, who was also at Vincennes, was once released 
 for a few days on parole, and invited to a magnifi- 
 cent ballet given by Richelieu for the express purpose 
 of impressing the foreign ministers and prisoners with 
 French wealth and magnificence. The cardinal 
 seated his noble guest next to him, and, somewhat 
 chagrined by his unbroken silence through the entire 
 spectacle, at last asked what had most impressed him 
 of all the remarkable things he had seen in France. 
 "My lord," answered John de Wert at once, "noth- 
 ing has so much astonished me in the dominion of his 
 Most Christian Majesty, as to see ecclesiastics amusing 
 themselves at theaters while saints languish in prison." 
 
 Great and general was the joy when, shortly after 
 Richelieu's death, St. Cyran obtained his release. 
 
 D'Andilly went to bring him away in his carriage, 
 and they drove once more through the forest of Vin- 
 cennes. " No captive," says Mrs. Schimmelpen- 
 ninck, " had ever received such demonstrations of 
 esteem. His guards and fellow-prisoners threw them- 
 selves at his feet, to implore his parting benediction, 
 and they mingled tears of joy at his release, with 
 those of sorrow for his departure. His guards espec- 
 ially mourned his loss, and all the garrison, wishing 
 to shov/ their respect, spontaneously arranged them- 
 selves in two rows to let him pass out, to the sound 
 of fifes and drums and discharges of musketry."
 
 QO Sister and Saint. 
 
 After a brief stop in Paris, they drove to Port 
 Royal dcs CJiamps. But the good news was swallow- 
 winged, and had reached the convent before them. 
 It was the hour of silence when the announcement 
 came — an hour strictly and solemnly observed by 
 every member of the household. But Angelique 
 could not keep her joy to herself. She hastened to 
 the conference room, where the nuns w'cre assembled, 
 and her radiant face partly told the story. Then she 
 snatched off the girdle which bound her robe, and 
 held it out. The sisters guessed the parable, and 
 tears of joy sprang to many eyes, and heads were 
 bowed in thankfulness, though not a word was 
 spoken. When d'Andilly and St. Cyran arrived, 
 they went at once to the chapel, and the nuns, hastily 
 assembled, sang a joyful Tc Dcwn while their be- 
 loved father knelt at the altar to give thanks. 
 
 But the years of imprisonment and deprivation 
 had produced their natural effect, and St. Cyran'g 
 health was permanently broken. He lived but a few 
 months after his release. Through his illness he 
 showed a sweetness of spirit worthy of his life. He 
 was obliged to submit to a surgical operation, and, it 
 is said, suffered much from the surgeon's unskillful- 
 ness. But he refused to call in another for three 
 reasons. First, his life was in the hands of God and 
 not of man, therefore it was no matter whether the 
 surgeon was skillful or not. Second, the poor man
 
 ''The Obstacle becomes the Instrument^ 91 
 
 was doing his best, and it would be unjust to punish 
 him for what was not his fault. In the third place, 
 the physician suggested was a personal friend of his 
 own, whom it would be a great pleasure to see, and 
 he wished to deny himself that gratification. 
 
 These three reasons are a good epitome of the 
 man's character : Implicit faith in God ; careful jus- 
 tice to his neighbor ; no tenderness to himself.
 
 A HAPPY YEAR.
 
 VIII. 
 
 A HAPPY YEAR. 
 
 THE "spiritual twinship " between Jacqueline 
 Pascal and her brother had never been so 
 strong as now. 
 
 They read the same books, they thought the same 
 thoughts, they prayed the same prayers. They often 
 wrote their letters to their sister in concert, using the 
 " we " as naturally and freely as the habitual singular 
 pronoun, and subscribing either both their names, or 
 one or other of them, as it happened, apparently, and 
 without any reference to the actual writer. 
 
 Some ideas and phrases found in the letters of this 
 time are repeated in Pascal's celebrated " Thoughts," 
 published twenty years later, while, by their side, like 
 daisies growing in some temple porch, are the fresh, 
 simple expressions of a young girl's feelings. 
 
 They were very free with one another and with 
 their sister in speaking of their religious experiences.
 
 96 Sister a7id Samt. 
 
 Aftei'ward they became much less so, owing to the 
 extreme reserve recommended by the Jansenist 
 writers as a safeguard against spiritual pride. " It 
 seems to us," says one letter, " that, far from being 
 forbidden, we are actually bound to make known to 
 each other our joy over God's goodness to us as a 
 family. We have a right now to consider our rela- 
 tionship as perfected ; having before been united by 
 the tie of flesh, we are now united in soul." 
 
 Their ardor in these early days is beautiful and in- 
 spiring to see. " There is no point," closes the same 
 letter, " where it is not perilous for us to halt. We 
 can only escape a fall by continually climbing higher." 
 
 The increasing feebleness of young Pascal's health 
 must have deepened the tenderness of the intimacy 
 between brother and sister. After he was eighteen 
 years of age, he used to say, he never passed a day 
 without pain. At times his maladies took on most 
 distressing and alarming forms. 
 
 " Besides other annoyances," says Madame Perier, 
 " he was unable to swallow any liquid unless it was 
 lukewarm, and then only when it was trickled drop 
 by drop down his throat." This was owing to a 
 spasmodic action or partial paralysis of the throat. 
 
 " In order to relieve his intolerable headaches, his 
 raging internal fever, and other ailments to which he 
 was subject, his physicians ordered him to take cer- 
 tain medicines every alternate day for three months.
 
 A Happy Year. 97 
 
 These all had to be swallowed in this tedious, luke- 
 warm way. It was a veritable penance and pitiful to 
 see, but he never once complained." 
 
 Sometimes his limbs were paralyzed and he could 
 not move without crutches. His feet were cold and 
 heavy as marble, and in order to produce any circu- 
 lation in them, he was obliged to wear stockings 
 dipped in brandy. 
 
 Jacqueline during these days was housekeeper, 
 nufte, companion, friend — all that is meant by that 
 large word, sister. 
 
 Altogether, this year of her father's convalescence, 
 her brother's increasing need of her, of cheerful letters 
 back and forth between home and Clermont, and a 
 long visit from Gilberte and her husband at one time, 
 of household cares and activities — so many to the 
 mistress of a French family of the Pascals' station — 
 of growing interest in new lines of thought, and of 
 making acquaintance with new books to read — this 
 last year in quaint, bright, historic, inspiring Rouen — 
 seems to us the happiest year of Jacqueline Pascal's 
 life. Perplexing questions had not yet arisen. Life 
 was simple. Duty was plain. Sacrifice, if she was 
 conscious of any, brought with it, day by day, its own 
 reward. Her father, who, as Gilberte more than once 
 tells us, loved Jacqueline with " an extraordinary ten- 
 derness," was happy in the home she made for him. 
 Her brother was relieved by her ministries, soothed 
 5
 
 98 Sister and Saint. 
 
 by her sympathy, practically helped by her ready and 
 interested assistance in his scientific pursuits. 
 
 Blaise was still at work on that vexatious little 
 calculating machine. For though in theory it had 
 long been perfect, its workmanship was so delicate 
 and its principle so far above the comprehension of 
 all the artificers he could find, that he had endless 
 trouble in getting it into actual operation. He had 
 not lost his childhood's love for geometry, and there 
 are among his papers one or two undated fragments 
 on mathematical subjects which were very likely writ- 
 ten about this time. 
 
 But the principal subject of his investigations just 
 now was the mechanical properties of the atmosphere, . 
 and he was considering with his usual keen and search- 
 ing interest a series of experiments lately made in 
 Italy on this subject. 
 
 We can not do more in this little book than stand 
 on the border of that great region of physics in which 
 Blaise Pascal delighted to roam. But, perhaps, if we 
 linger there a moment we may, in some degree, share 
 Jacqueline's sympathy with him. 
 
 It was the old theory of the "vacuum" which exer- 
 cised his mind — a theory so old and so respectable 
 that nobody for years had thought of calling it in 
 question any more than we do that of gravitation. 
 But it was an age of speculation and original investi- 
 gation in science as well as in theology. And this,
 
 A Happy Year. 99 
 
 by the way, the historians of science inform us, is 
 owing to Descarfes, as great a revolutionist in his do- 
 main as Luther or Calvin had been in theirs. 
 
 When, therefore, it was found by the fountain- 
 makers of Cosmo di Medici in Florence that water 
 could be forced up in a tube only thirty-two feet, they 
 began to inquire the reason of its refusal to go further, 
 and consulted the aged philosopher, Galileo, on the 
 subject. Antiquity had said : Water follows the 
 piston up the tube of a pump because " nature abhors 
 a vacuum." But why, asked the workmen, will it fol- 
 low the piston only thirty-two feet ? 
 
 For the honor of philosophy some answer must be 
 given, and so Galileo answered that thirty-two feet 
 was the limit of nature's abhorrence of a vacuum ! 
 Beyond that she did not abhor one. 
 
 Laughable as such an explanation may seem to us, 
 it was received in all seriousness by those interested 
 in the question then, and was, indeed, no more absurd 
 than many an article of common faith in those days. 
 But Galileo himself, it appears, felt somewhat uneasy 
 as to the reasonableness of this dictum of his, and 
 began to make experiments to prove it either true or 
 false. He was an old man, however, and died before 
 he had settled the point, leaving an earnest injunction 
 to his pupil and successor, Torricelli, to carry on his 
 investigations. 
 
 Torricelli did so, and published in 1645 an account
 
 loo Sister and Saint. 
 
 of his experiments, with the hint (for it was scarcely 
 more than that) that it was the weight of the atmos- 
 phere, and not the horror of a vacuum, which regulated 
 the height of a column of fluid in a tube. But he, in 
 his turn, died very soon after the publication of his 
 paper, and before his opinion was proved to be cor- 
 rect — ** his suspicion really a secret of nature's" — kept 
 so well till now ! 
 
 Our young philosopher at Rouen heard of these 
 things through Father Mersenne, a priest of scien- 
 tific tastes, and an intimate friend of the great Des- 
 cartes. And it was not long before Pascal's exper- 
 iments ^^ tonchaiit le Vide'' were as well known in 
 the world of science as Torricelli's. 
 
 He conducted them, as Torricelli had done, with 
 mercury, the heaviest known fluid, instead of water, 
 and the conclusion in his mind, also, was that the old 
 doctrine of nature's abhorrence of a vacuum had no 
 foundation to rest upon, and that all the phenomena 
 formerly explained by that were better explained by 
 the pressure of the atmosphere. 
 
 Early in this year, 1647, Blaise published a little 
 book giving an account of his experiments. The 
 Abbe Bossut assures us that not till after its publica- 
 tion did Pascal know that Torricelli's conclusions had 
 been the same as his own, though he had been in- 
 formed in detail of the latter's experiments. How- 
 ever that may be, he simply makes in his book a plain
 
 A Happy Year. loi 
 
 statement of his own observations and the natural 
 inferences from them, and distinctly says that he 
 makes no mention of what h?^ been done in Italy, 
 because, though he has rej)eated those experiments 
 " in every sort of fashion," this is only an account of 
 his own proceedings. 
 
 The Jesuits did not Hke this little book. And there 
 were others who did not like it. " All the false sci- 
 ence of the time," says Bossut, "arrayed itself against 
 Pascal." He was accused of borrowing his ideas from 
 the Italians, and (what was worse) of unsettling long- 
 established beliefs. He was soon in the midst of a 
 lively shower of controversial pamphlets. But he 
 took wonderfully little interest in them. He was 
 bent on discovering the truth, and proceeded calmly 
 to devise some simple and final experiments which 
 should forever settle the disputed point. 
 
 M. Pascal, the elder, however, thought it worth 
 while to answer his son's most conspicuous antago- 
 nist, a certain Father Noel, Rector of the Jesuit Col- 
 lege in Paris. He did so in a very strong and sarcas- 
 tic letter — '' une lettre de bonne encre," Sainte-Beuve 
 calls it. Father Noel, in addition to several long 
 letters of objections, had gone out of his way to 
 write a poor burlesque, entitled " Le Plein du Vide." 
 
 M. Pascal makes unmerciful sport of the reverend 
 gentleman's " figures of rhetoric which are not within 
 the rules of grammar," but, above all, gives him to
 
 102 Sister and Saint. 
 
 understand that, in dealing with his son, he is deahng 
 with no common fee. " He is able to defend himself," 
 closes the father's lett-er, " in terms capable of causing 
 you an eternal repentance." This is strong language. 
 But when Blaise himself began calmly to answer 
 Father Noel's objections, taking them up one by one, 
 and completely disposing of them, that gentleman, as 
 we shall see, apparently thought there was a grain of 
 truth mixed with paternal pride. 
 
 All these excitements, labors, and experiments, we 
 are to remember, were carried on in the intervals of 
 (or in the midst of) such distressing attacks of illness 
 as Gilberte has described to us ; in the midst, also, 
 of constantly increasing attention to Church observ- 
 ances and religious duties, and of much reading of de- 
 votional books. • 
 
 Certainly every moment must have been fully oc- 
 cupied. 
 
 We can not help suspecting, with Sainte-Beuve, 
 that Pascal's ill-health at this time^-the tormenting 
 headaches from which he suffered, and the terribly 
 shattered condition of his nervous system — was partly 
 owing to the mental struggle which began soon after 
 his conversion. This was a conflict between his con- 
 science and his thirst for knowledge — the two most 
 powerful forces of his nature — and it would have 
 been strange indeed if it had not made some impres- 
 sion on the sensitive physical frame.
 
 A Happy Year. 103 
 
 One of the books which the good brother physi- 
 cians had lent the Pascals during that winter of 1646, 
 was a little discourse of Jansen's on the " Reforma- 
 tion of the Interior Man," and in it the ardent 
 student read these cruel words : 
 
 " There is another desire worse than that of the 
 senses ; more misleading because it appears more 
 honest. This is that always restless curiosity .... 
 which has been palliated by the name of science. This 
 makes the intellect its seat of empire, .... and the 
 world is all the more corrupted by this malady of the 
 soul because it is concealed under the veil of health, 
 that is to say, of science From this evil princi- 
 ple comes research into the secrets of nature which 
 do not concern us, which it is useless to know, and 
 which men wish to know only for the sake of know- 
 ing." 
 
 There are several pages more in the same strain, 
 and we wonder if the good bishop did not mentally 
 condemn himself, as he wrote them, for his own de- 
 light in digging out Hebrew and Latin roots ! 
 
 But whatever the protests from Pascal's conscience, 
 he, as yet, kept up his investigations with ardor and, 
 as we have seen, with success. 
 
 In September of this year (1647) the brother and 
 sister went to Paris, partly, it would seem, to seek 
 medical advice for Blaise, and partly in search of 
 recreation for him.
 
 I04 Sister aiid Saint. 
 
 The young scientist's reputation brought him polile 
 attention from many distinguished men, and Jacque- 
 line mentions some of them in the following letter to 
 Gilberte : 
 
 " My very dear Sister : — I have deferred writ- 
 ing to you because I wished to send a full account of 
 my brother's interview with M. Descartes, and had 
 not leisure yesterday to tell you that M. Habert 
 called here on Sunday evening, accompanied by M. 
 de Montigny, a gentleman of Brittany, and as my 
 brother was at church, the latter informed me that 
 his fellow-townsman and intimate friend, M. Des- 
 cartes, had expressed a great desire to see my brother 
 for the sake of the great esteem in which he and my 
 father were everywhere held, and had requested him 
 to come and see if it would be inconvenient to my 
 brother (whom he knew to be an invalid) to receive a 
 visit from M. Descartes the next morning at nine 
 o'clock. 
 
 "When M, de Montigny made this proposal I was 
 puzzled what to say, knowing the difficulty which 
 Blaise finds in exerting himself or talking in the 
 morning, and yet not thinking it right to decline the 
 call. Finally it was agreed that M. Descartes should 
 delay coming till half-past ten, and accordingly he 
 came at that hour, in company vv^ith M. Habert, M. 
 de Montigny, a young ecclesiastic whom I do not 
 know, M. de Montigny's son, and two or three other
 
 A Happy Year. 105 
 
 youths. M. de Roberval, to whom my brother had 
 sent word, was also there. 
 
 " After the usual civilities, the calculating machine 
 was mentioned, and being displayed by M. de Rober- 
 val, was very much admired. They then began to 
 discuss the theory of the vacuum, and M. Descartes, 
 on being told of an experiment and asked what force 
 he thought it was which expelled water from a syringe, 
 said with perfect seriousness that it was subtle matter; 
 to which my brother made what answer he could ; 
 and M. de Roberval, thinking that it hurt him to talk, 
 took up the reply to Descartes with some warmth, 
 though with perfect civility. But the latter told him, 
 somewhat sharply, that he was willing to talk with 
 my brother as long as they liked, because he spoke 
 rationally, but not with him (M. de Roberval), for he 
 was prejudiced. 
 
 " Then, perceiving t^ his watch that it was noon, 
 and having an invitation to dine in the Faubourg St. 
 Germain, he took leave ; and so did M. de Roberval, 
 who rode back with M, Descartes in a carriage, 
 where, being quite alone, they sang merry songs and 
 were rather wild ; that is, according to M. de Rober- 
 val's account, who returned after dinner and found 
 M. d'Alibrai here. I had almost forgotten to say 
 that M. Descartes, sorry that he could only stay so 
 short a time, promised my brother to come back at 
 eight o'clock the next morning
 
 io6 Sister and Saint. 
 
 " M. Descartes made this second call, partly to ad- 
 vise my brother in regard to his illness, concerning 
 which, however, he said but little, merely recom- 
 mending him to remain in bed every day as long as he 
 could do so without weariness, and to take strong 
 broths. They conversed on many other subjects, for 
 he stayed till eleven ; but I can not tell you what 
 they were, for I was not present and could not in- 
 quire, having been very busy the rest of the day in 
 superintending his first bath. He thought the bath 
 made his head ache, but the water being too warm 
 perhaps caused this. I think having his feet bled 
 Sunday night did him good, for he was able to speak 
 Monday quite forcibly, in the morning to M. Des- 
 cartes, and in the afternoon to M. de Roberval, with 
 whom he held a long argument on many points in 
 theology and physics without any further inconveni- 
 ence than a profuse night-s\\*at and wakefulness. I 
 had feared a severe headache after so much exer- 
 tion." .... 
 
 Another pleasant letter from Paris begins thus : 
 "We can not tell whether this letter is destined, 
 like the other, to have no formal close, but we do 
 know that when writing to you we never wish to leave 
 off. We are now reading M. de St. Cyran's letter, 
 De la Vocation, which was printed a short time since, 
 and has gi\-en great offense. You shall have it as 
 soon as we have finished, and we shall be glad to
 
 A Happy Year. 107 
 
 know your opinion of it and my father's also. Its 
 tone is very high." .... 
 
 Descartes was not their only distinguished visitor. 
 The Reverend Father Noel one day sent one of his 
 Jesuit confreres to inquire kindly after his young ad- 
 versary's health. He very much feared that the an- 
 swer to his first objection (which had lately been 
 published and widely read) might have been injurious 
 to the writer. He begged him not to risk his precious 
 health again ; in short, not to answer him any more ! 
 It would be better to wait till they could argue face 
 to face. 
 
 " I avow," writes Pascal to a friend, " I avow to you 
 that if this proposition had been made to me by any- 
 body but these good Fathers I should have suspected 
 it ! But I doubted their sincerity so little that I gave 
 them my promise without reserve." 
 
 And after this the Jesuits accused him of having 
 nothing more to say for himself against Pere Noel ! 
 
 The experiments went on, however, and told their 
 own story. From the top of the Tour St. Jacques 
 young Pascal conducted them in person, and tri- 
 umphantly proved the theory of atmospheric^ pres- 
 sure.* You may see his statue to-day in the vaulted 
 
 * Pascal's reasoning was this : If atmospheric pressure is the 
 force supporting the column of mercury, then that column will 
 diminish as you leave "behind it successive layers of that weight. 
 The column gradually fell in ascending the tower, and as gradually 
 rose in descending, and thus proved his hypothesis correct. This
 
 io8 Sister and Saint. 
 
 chamber at the foot of the beautiful tower, and many 
 a reader of this page, doubtless> has seen it. This 
 achievement alone would have made Pascal famous. 
 Yet it is not for this that the world to-day chiefly 
 does him honor. 
 
 To make assurance doubly sure, Blaise sent to his 
 brother-in-law, M. Perier, to repeat these experiments 
 at Clermont upon the Puy de Dome, that being three 
 thousand feet high, whereas the Tour St. Jacques 
 was only a hundred and fifty. Here, also, they were 
 brilliantly successful. 
 
 Bigotry and prejudice had nothing more to say, 
 and the old doctrine of nature's abhorrence of a 
 vacuum was dropped from the creed of science. 
 
 Among the choicest of their pleasures in Paris, 
 Blaise and Jacqueline Pascal regarded the preaching 
 of M. Singlin, whom they often heard at the church 
 of Port Royal de Paris. Singlin was St. Cyran's suc- 
 . cessor as chaplain and confessor of the convent. He 
 was a man of great goodness and wisdom, and one of 
 the most distinguished preachers of the reformed or 
 reforming party in the Church. 
 
 Through their own pastor, Guillebert, they ob- 
 tained an introduction to M. Singlin and, in due time, 
 
 is simply the principle of the barometer, now so familiar. Full ac- 
 counts of these experiments and their results are given in many 
 lives of Pascal, and a very clear and interesting one in an article by 
 Sir David Bre\vster in the North British Review for August, 1844.
 
 A Happy Year. 109 
 
 to the Abbess Angelique and the other Port Royal 
 celebrities. 
 
 And so this happy year draws to its close. We 
 like to linger over it. It is a beautiful picture, and it 
 ought to have lasted longer. We can not help regret- 
 ting that what seem to us mistaken notions of duty 
 should have so soon destroyed it. We can not help 
 wishing that the idea of becoming a nun, which now 
 presented itself to Jacqueline, had never entered her 
 head. We wish she had thought it right — had seen 
 it right — to let her light shine at home, and, how- 
 eVer she might have treated the offers of marriage 
 now coming frequently, we are told, had, at least, de- 
 voted her life to making a " sunshine in a shady 
 place " for the father and brother who had been, and 
 still were, so much to her. 
 
 What such a girl might have been, at home, to her 
 own immediate family, to her nephews and nieces, to 
 her servants and her poor, to the noble society which 
 opened its doors so freely to her — how broadcast she 
 might have sown her precious seed — how widely dif- 
 fused the leaven of her sweet, pure life — it is impos- 
 sible to estimate. And no student of her character 
 can fail to feel that at this point Jacqueline Pascal 
 made the mistake of her life. She sought too high 
 the way of duty and missed the narrow, sweetly- 
 shaded path at her feet. 
 
 Yet, even in our regret, we are met by another
 
 no Sister and Saint. 
 
 thought : — that, rwhatever the mistakes of a consci \ 
 entious soul, through those very mistakes, sometimes 
 by direct means of them, that soul is led into a higher) 
 place. 
 
 Jacqueline Pascal had entered on a course of end- 
 less progress. She was going on. There was no 
 such thing for her as turning back. 
 
 As the brother and sister have shown us in that 
 happy letter of theirs quoted at the beginning of 
 this chapter, they had made up their minds "to 
 escape falls by continually climbing higher." They 
 chose a way to climb which certainly does not seem 
 to us the best way. But it brought them up ! Was 
 the Lord going to let them fall because, out of love 
 for Him, they chose the steepest path? 
 
 They were entering into life. And if they must 
 pluck out the right eye or cut off the right hand and 
 enter into life maimed — so be it ! Nevertheless, 
 they would enter in ! It would have been nobler and 
 better to our thinking if they could have entered in 
 whole — a natural, beautiful, well-rounded man and 
 woman, as God created them to be. 
 
 A rose is at its best when, rich in all its crimson 
 beauty, it sends up its breath to heaven. But 
 crushed and beaten out of all its comeliness, a rose 
 still yields a rare perfume.
 
 CLIMBING.
 
 IX. 
 
 CLIMBING. 
 
 SOME notion of the religious training of the 
 Pascal family under Pastor Guillebert is 
 given us in this passage from the " Memoirs 
 of Margaret Perier," Gilberte's daughter : 
 
 " My father and mother, while at Rouen, were under 
 the ministry of M. Guillebert, Doctor of the Sorbonne, 
 a very holy and discreet man. He counseled my 
 mother, who was then twenty-six years old, to lay 
 aside all her ornaments and wear no trimmings on 
 her dresses, which she cheerfully did. When she was 
 obliged to return to Clermont, M. Guillebert told her 
 that he had an important piece of advice to give her, 
 and it was this : That ladies whose piety prevented 
 them from wearing ornaments often took pleasure in 
 decorating their children, and that she must be care- 
 ful to avoid doing so, gay dress being far more inju- 
 rious to children, who are naturally fond of it, than to 
 grown persons, who, knowing its frivolity, care nothing 
 
 (IT3)
 
 114 Sister and Saint. 
 
 for it. Accordingly, on her return to Clermont, where 
 she had left my sister, then a little over four years 
 old, and myself, then not quite three, she found that 
 my grandmother, who had charge of us in her absence, 
 had dressed us both in frocks embroidered with silver 
 and fully trimmed with ribbons and laces, as was then 
 the fashion. My mother took everything off and 
 clad us in gray camlet without lace or ribbon. She 
 forbade our nurse to let us play with two little girls 
 of our own age in the neighborhood, whom we had 
 been in the habit of seeing every day, lest we should 
 acquire a love for the gay garments they usually wore. 
 She was so particular on this point that, in 165 1, when 
 my grandfather Pascal died, and she was obliged to 
 be present in Paris at the settlement of the estate, 
 she chose to incur the expense of taking us with her 
 for fear that my grandmother would make us dress 
 in finer clothes, if we were left under her care. She 
 always taught us to wear the most simple and modest 
 clothing, and I can say with truth, that since I was 
 between two and three years old I have never worn 
 either gold, silver, colored ribbons, curls, or laces." 
 
 " Which she cheerfully did ! " That is the key-note. 
 Madame Perier, and, as we know quite well, Jacque- 
 line and the whole family, are far too much in earnest 
 to mind such trifles as these. 
 
 It is expected of them that they shall lay aside 
 their ornaments, and they do so, as naturally and eas-
 
 Climbing. 115 
 
 ilyas some simple-hearted princess puts on her jewels, 
 because that is expected of her. In either case the 
 ornaments or the want of them are nothing. 
 
 Neither Gilberte nor Jacqueline ever allude to 
 anything they have given up or write in a way that 
 suggests sacrifice. It was not sacrifice to them. As 
 Mrs. Charles has so well said in regard to another 
 noble woman : " Not that she painfully denied herself 
 luxuries. In the coinage of the kingdom where she 
 dwelt they were simply valueless," 
 
 But when the question of giving up came to Blaise, 
 then, indeed, it became a vital and a painful thing. 
 
 Those words of Jansen's which we have quoted are 
 but a sample of what was to be found in many 6ther 
 of the best books of the day, and the young disciple 
 heard on all sides the call to sacrifice mind and heart 
 and soul and strength for Christ's sake and the Gos- 
 pel's. The Roman Catholic Church has always re- 
 garded human nature not as a servant to be trained 
 for the Master's use, but as a foe, to be subdued and 
 crushed. There are other Christians who act upon 
 the same theory. It is a terribly dangerous theory, 
 for it results in the majority of men and women 
 living in opposition to conscience, and nothing can be 
 so blighting as that to all true growth of soul. 
 
 The struggle in Pascal's mind is evident in many 
 A^ays. About this time he composed fifteen prayers 
 for use in sickness. " Lord," he cries out in one of
 
 ii6 Sister and Samt. 
 
 them, " I know myself to be certain of but this one 
 thing. It is good to follow Thee. It is evil to offend 
 Thee. Beyond this I am ignorant of what is best or 
 worst for me." It is a glimpse into his secret heart — 
 perplexed and troubled, yet making sure of the one 
 main truth in which alone is safety. 
 
 The account of the atmospherical experiments was 
 followed quickly by two treatises on hydrostatics. 
 Then the physicians took sides with conscience and 
 forbade all scientific studies — forbade, indeed, all men- 
 tal exertion — and there followed an effort at self- 
 annihilation more painful than all the struggles. 
 Surely, at this time, if ever, Blaise Pascal needed his 
 twin sister ! 
 
 The brother and sister, apparently, never returned 
 to Rouen, for in May, 1648, M. Pascal was appointed 
 Councillor of State, and returned to make his home 
 in Paris. 
 
 During the winter they became better acquainted 
 with their new friends, and regularly attended church 
 at the convent chapel of Port Royal. 
 
 Port Royal was no common convent, as all of us 
 know who have read the lives of that noble band of 
 v/omen who worked and worshiped within its walls. 
 " My sister came to the conclusion," says Madame 
 Perier, " that here, to use her own expression, one 
 might reasonably be a nun. 
 
 " She perceived from M. Singlin's preaching that
 
 Climbing: 117 
 
 his ideas of a Christian's Hfe were in accordance with 
 those she had formed since God .first touched her 
 heart. 
 
 " She imparted her thoughts to my brother, who, 
 far from dissuading her, encouraged her, for he was 
 imbued with similar views. His approbation so 
 strengthened lief that thenceforth she never wavered 
 in the design of devoting herself to God." 
 
 " My brother," Gilberte says again, '' who loved her 
 with especial tenderness, was delighted with her proj- 
 ect, and thought of nothing but how he should aid 
 
 her to accomplish it My sister visited Port 
 
 Royal as often as the great distance of her dwelling 
 would permit, and the Abbesses told her to place 
 herself under the charge of M. Singlin, in order that 
 he might judge if she were truly called to a cloFstered 
 life. She did not fail to obey, and from the very first 
 time that M. Singlin saw her, he told my brother that 
 he had never known so strongly-marked a vocation. 
 This testimony was a great comfort to my brother, 
 and it made him doubly anxious for the success of a 
 design which he had every reason to believe was of 
 God. All this occurred in the early part of the year 
 1648, when my brother and sister were at Paris and 
 my father at Rouen." 
 
 The brother's unselfish love comes out nobly here, 
 and his genuine sympathy with the highest and best 
 in his sister. True unity of spirit is that when each
 
 Ii8 Sister and Saint. 
 
 can rejoice in the sacrifice the other makes ! True 
 love is that which can allow the beloved one to re- 
 nounce ! 
 
 Because "he loved her with an especial tender- 
 ness," therefore " he was delighted with her project " 
 of dying to the world, to her home, to her youth, to 
 her fame, to himself forever. He was, in fact, one 
 with her in the matter ; he saw it through her eyes 
 and felt it through her heart. 
 
 And Jacqueline herself? How was it with her? 
 Was there no conflict in her heart ? Was there no 
 pain to her in this wrench from a life which had been 
 so pleasant and a home which had been so dear ? It 
 can scarcely have been otherwise with such a girl as 
 she ; yet we have no hint of any such thing. From 
 the first she seems to have thrown into this project 
 the same enthusiasm which she threw into her childish 
 play-acting and versifying. 
 
 It seems to have been Pleasure that beckoned, not 
 Duty that called. Her letters are full of it. She can 
 speak of little else, and she prays for grace to restrain 
 her ardor, not for grace to endure the trial. The 
 whole current of her desires, in fact, has changed its 
 course. She is filled, as Cousin says, with " an in- 
 vincible passion for solitude and the monastic life." 
 
 We have said there was no hint of a regret. There 
 is, among Jacqueline Pascal's collected verses, a little 
 poem, without date, which Reuchlin (her German
 
 ^ Climbing, 119 
 
 Diographer) thinks must have been written about 
 this time. He calls it the " Swan-song of the poetess 
 ere she laid her gift on the altar of her God." 
 Here are the verses : 
 
 ' O, ye dark forests, in whose sombre shades 
 Night finds a noonday lair. 
 Silence a sacred refuge ! to your glades 
 
 A stranger, worn with care 
 And weary of life's jostle, would repair. 
 He asks no medicine for his fond heart's pain ; 
 He breaks j^our stillness with no piercing cry; 
 He comes not to complain, 
 He only comes to die ! 
 
 * To die among the busy haunts of men 
 Were to betray his woe ; 
 But these thick woods and this sequester'd glen 
 
 No trace of suffering show. 
 Here would he die that none his wound may know. 
 Ye need not dread his weeping — tears are vain — 
 Here let him perish and unheeded lie ; 
 He comes not to complain. 
 He only comes to die ! " 
 
 It is one of the prettiest poems she ever wrote, 
 but it must always be a matter of mere conjecture 
 whether Reuchlin's theory is correct. If this is an 
 expression of her own feelings, certainly not another 
 line of all she ever wrote, not a word of her brother's 
 letters, or her sister's *' Memoirs," or Margaret 
 Perier's " Recollections," gives us any reason to think 
 of her as, at any time, "worn with care," or "weary 
 of life's jostle." Moreover, after the " Stanzas thank-
 
 I20 Sister and Sqmt. 
 
 ing God for recovery from the Small-pox," written 
 in her childhood, there are none of her verses which 
 have a personal bearing. They are all Sonnets, Songs, 
 Serenades, To a Lady, To the Queen, to St. Cecilia, 
 For an Album, etc., etc., according to the fashion of 
 the day. 
 
 Many a girl of poetic temperament might easily 
 find herself in the mood to write such a song as this, 
 who yet would not wish to have it regarded .as an 
 expression of personal feeling. And more than all, 
 Cousin, who is probably Jacqueline Pascal's most 
 thorough student and critic, makes no allusion to 
 such a theory, and places the poem among those of 
 earlier date. 
 
 In a nature like hers, it seems to us the internal 
 strife would not have been heralded in verse ; and if 
 it had been, something like this would more likely 
 have been her song : 
 
 " Sweet is the smile of home : the mutual look 
 
 When hearts are of each other sure ; 
 Sweet all the joys that crowd the household nook, 
 
 The haunt of all affections pure ; 
 Yet in the world even these abide, and we 
 
 Above the %vorld our calling boast ; 
 Once gain the mountain-top and thou art free, 
 
 Till then, who rest, presume ; who turn to look are lost." ♦ 
 
 Whatever the conflict that did go on in Jacqueline 
 
 * " Keble's Christian Year." First Sunday in Lent.
 
 Climbing. 121 
 
 Pascal's heart, it was almost immediately forgotten — 
 swallowed up — in victory. 
 
 Vinet, in a fine essay on her character, compares 
 her Christian course to the military life of the great 
 Prince of Conde, who leaped at once to fame by in- 
 sisting on his own plans, against the advice of older 
 generals, and carrying them out successfully in his 
 first battle, Rocroy. " It is not the fate," says Vinet, 
 " of ever^' gallant spirit to begin its career with a 
 Rocroy that shall at once put its greatness beyond 
 the pale of doubt forever. What was Jacqueline 
 Pascal's Rocroy ? An internal victory witnessed by 
 God alone, and owing more than half its grandeur to 
 the clouds in which it was enshrouded. To annihi- 
 late self, and then to efface the most minute traces 
 of that very annihilation — that was the task of this 
 heroic girl." 
 
 And because her enthusiasm was the enthusiasm 
 of victory, we see it lasting through her whole life 
 and rising superior to every discouragement and 
 obstacle. It was no mere short-lived ardor, the 
 first warm outflow of a loving nature, gradually quiet- 
 ing and cooling as time went on. She had abun- 
 dance of time to reconsider, as we shall see, and she 
 had every encouragement to do so. But there is 
 no evidence of a moment's shrinking from the life 
 she had chosen. From her brother we have mournful 
 
 confessions of a relapse into what he considered world- 
 6
 
 122 Sister and Saint. 
 
 liness, and Madame Perier's letters in later years 
 show an occasional interest in earthly and secular 
 matters. But in Jacqueline there is, from beginning 
 to end, the same calm, equable flow of assurance of 
 her high vocation and sacred joy in it. 
 
 In May M. Pascal arrived in Paris, and now it be- 
 came necessary to inform him of Jacqueline's resolu- 
 tion. 
 
 Evidently everybody dreaded this duty. " M. 
 Singlin thought he ought to be told," says Gilberte, 
 and again, " My brother undertook to tell him. There 
 was no one else who could." " The proposal," she 
 continues, " surprised and strangely agitated my 
 father. On the one hand, having begun to love the 
 principles of a pure Christianity, he was glad to have 
 his children like-minded ; but, on the other, his affection 
 for my sister was so deep and tender that he could 
 not resolve to give her up forever. These conflicting 
 thoughts made him at first, answer that he would see 
 and think about it. But finally, after some vacilla- 
 tions, he said plainly that he would never give his 
 consent, and even complained that my brother had 
 encouraged the plan without knowing v/hether it 
 would meet his approval. This consideration made 
 him so angry with my brother and sister, that he lost 
 his confidence in thcni, and ordered an old waiting- 
 woman who had brought them both up, to watch 
 their movements. This was a great restraint upon
 
 Climbing. 123 
 
 my sister, for she could not go to Port Royal except 
 by stealth, nor see M. Singlin without some contriv- 
 ance or dexterous excuse." 
 
 Here, then, was a sad state of things between this 
 daughter, hitherto so faithful, and the father who 
 " loved her v/ith unusual tenderness." 
 
 But Jacqueline thought herself justified in secretly 
 evading his will, though she would not openly dis- 
 obey him. " Though under many restrictions she 
 did not give up her occasional visits to Port Royal, 
 nor her correspondence with its inmates, ivJiich she 
 managed zvith much tact ! " 
 
 Our fancy follows the plainly-robed figure, quickly 
 threading the narrow streets of the old *' Latin 
 Quarter " for some brief appointment with her con- 
 fessor, fearful, perhaps, at every corner, of meeting 
 her father or seeing the face of the old waiting- 
 woman peering at her from behind some little shop- 
 window. She passes the Hotel Cluny, where a few 
 years before she might have found the M^re Angel- 
 ique and some of her nuns. She passes the Sor- 
 bonne, and it frowns upon her. At last she is " quite 
 in the country" and stops before "a noble house with 
 magnificent gardens." Church, school-house, infirm- 
 aries, storehouses, and offices cluster about it. This 
 is Port Royal de Paris, now " La Maternite," one of 
 the largest hospitals of Paris. 
 
 The dear Mothers Ang61ique and Agnes loved verv
 
 124 Sister and Saini. 
 
 tenderly this warm-hearted young disciple. Yet they 
 were far too true and upright to urge her coming to 
 them till she could obtain her father's full permis- 
 sion. 
 
 " I am as truly, dear child, your spiritual mother," 
 says Angelique, '' as if you were already within the 
 convent walls." And Agnes writes to her: "You are 
 already a nun, my dear sister, because you have de- 
 termined to obey the call which God has given you ; 
 but you will cease to be one. if you wish to forestall 
 the precise moment of your profession which God 
 has put in His own power." " It is your duty to fol- 
 low God's guidance and to endure with meekness the 
 delays occasioned by His providence. There is quite 
 as much sin in wishing to anticipate the will of God 
 as there would be in not obeying it at the proper 
 time." 
 
 Toward the end of this year, 1648, we find the last 
 of the joint letters from Blaise and Jacqueline to 
 their sister. It is much too long to give entire, but 
 some extracts will serve to show its tenor : 
 
 "And now we have a little private scolding for 
 yourself. What made you say that you had learned 
 everything in your letter from me ? For I have no 
 recollection of having spoken to you on the subject. 
 And were what you say true, I should fear that you 
 had learned the lesson in a wrong spirit, or you would 
 have lost the thought of the human teacher in think-
 
 Climbing. 125 
 
 ing of God, who alone who can make the truth 
 
 effectual Not that we are to be ungrateful or 
 
 forgetful of those who have instructed us when 
 duly authorized, as priests, bishops, and confessors 
 are. They are teachers and other men are their 
 disciples. But it is very different in our case, and 
 as the angel refused to be worshiped by one who 
 was his fellow-servant, so we must beg you not to 
 pay us such compliments again, nor to use expres- 
 sions of human gratitude, since we are but learners 
 like yourself." .... 
 
 " The perseverance of the saints is neither more 
 nor less than God's grace perpetually imparted, and 
 not given once for all, in a mass that is to last for- 
 ever. This teaches us how completely we are de- 
 pendent on God's mercy ; for if He should for a 
 moment withhold the sap of His grace we should 
 wither away." .... 
 
 " Fear not to remind us of things we already know. 
 They need to sink deeper into our hearts, and your 
 discourse will be more likely to fix them there. And 
 besides, divine grace is given in answer to prayer, 
 and your love for us is one of those prayers ivJiicJi go 
 up without ceasing before the Throned 
 
 M. Perier was at that time building a country- 
 seat, which still stands at Bienassis, near the gates of 
 Clermont. The brother and sister refer to it in this 
 way:
 
 126 Sister and Saint. 
 
 " We have nothing special to say to you unless 
 about the plan of your house. We know that M. 
 Perier is too earnest in what he undertakes to be able 
 to give full attention to two things at once ; and the 
 whole plan is so extensive that if he carry it out it 
 
 must engross his thoughts for a long time So 
 
 we have advised him to build on a more moderate 
 scale, and only that which is absolutely necessary. 
 .... We beg you to think seriously of this and to 
 second our advice, lest he should be more prudent 
 and take more pains in the erection of a house which 
 he is not obliged to rear than in the building of that 
 mystic tower whereof St. Augustine speaks in one of 
 his letters, which he is solemnly pledged to finish. 
 Adieu. B. P. J. P." 
 
 Then follows a postscript by Jacqueline : 
 
 " I hope soon to write about my own concerns, and 
 give you full particulars ; meantime, pray to God for 
 my success." And after that a line in her brother's, 
 handwriting: ''If you know any charitable souls, be- 
 speak their prayers for me, too." Poor Blaise ! An- 
 other glimpse into his troubled heart ! 
 
 By her " own concerns," Jacqueline, of course, 
 means her plan of going into the convent. She let 
 slip no opportunity of announcing her determination 
 to take the veil, and, though yielding literal obedi- 
 ence to her father in not leaving his house, she 
 thought it right to prove to him by her manner of
 
 Climbijig. 127 
 
 life that she was immovable in her decision. If she 
 could not be a nun at Port Royal, she would be a 
 nun at home. Her sister says : 
 
 " The difficulties she met with did not lessen her 
 zeal, and having renounced the world in heart, she 
 no longer took the same delight as formerly in 
 amusements. So that, although for a while she con- 
 cealed her intention of devoting herself to God, it 
 was easily perceived, and she then withdrew from 
 society and broke off suddenly from all her acquaint- 
 ance. For this a favorable opportunity was offered 
 by my father's changing his residence. She made no 
 acquaintances in her new neighborhood, and escaped 
 from her old ones by never visiting them. Thus she 
 found herself at liberty to live in solitude, which be- 
 came so pleasant to her that she gradually retired 
 even from the family circle, and sometimes spent the 
 whole day alone in her chamber. It is impossible to 
 say how she employed herself in this perfect soli- 
 tude, but each day it could be perceived that she was 
 visibly growing in grace." 
 
 Her determination was not without its effect on 
 her father. Madame Perier says again : 
 
 " My father was well persuaded that she ,had 
 chosen the better part, and parental tenderness alone 
 made him oppose her project. Finding, therefore, 
 that each day only strengthened her resolve, he told 
 her that he saw plainly the world had no interest for 
 %
 
 128 Sister and Saint. 
 
 her, that he fully approved her design and would 
 promise never to listen to any proposals for her set- 
 tlement in marriage, however advantageous, but that 
 he begged of her not to leave him, that his life would 
 not be very long, and that if she would only be 
 patient till its close, he would allow her to live as she 
 chose at home. She thanked him, but made no posi- 
 tive answer to his entreaty that she would not leave 
 him, promising, however, that he should never have 
 any reason to complain of her disobedience." 
 
 Some time after she had entered on this way of 
 life, the father, brother, and sister made a visit to- 
 gether at Clermont. 
 
 " She greatly dreaded this journey," says Madame 
 Perier, "because of the influx of relatives and com- 
 pany to which one is exposed in a little country 
 town, and accordingly she wrote me that in order to 
 avoid this probable embarrassment, she thought I 
 had better publicly announce her determination, to 
 take the veil, and that her profession was only de- 
 ferred out of respect for my father's wishes. I did 
 not fail to fulfill my commission, and it succeeded so 
 well that on her arrival no one was surprised to see 
 her dressed like an old woman, with great simplicity, 
 nor that after having returned the first calls of civil- 
 ity, she shut herself up, not merely in the house, but 
 in her room, which she left only to go to church or 
 to take her meals, and into which none ever intruded. 
 
 if
 
 Climbing. 129 
 
 So that even in my own case, if I had anything to 
 tell her, I used to make a little memorandum or some 
 kind of mark, that I might remember it when she 
 came to table or on our way to church, whither we 
 always went together. This was my best opportunity 
 of speaking to her, though very short, as we had not 
 far to go. Not that she forbade me or any one else 
 to enter her room, nor that she refused to listen, but 
 that we saw whenever her thoughts were called off 
 in order to talk on subjects not absolutely necessary, 
 it evidently tired and wearied her so much that we 
 tried to avoid giving her the annoyance." 
 
 This was the state of things in the family for the 
 next three years, while M. Pascal appears to have 
 been vibrating between Paris, Rouen, and Clermont, 
 and Blaise was fulfilling, as best he could, that wise 
 prescription of the doctors, to think of nothing, have 
 no cares, and lead a" happy life. 
 
 6*
 
 PORT ROYAL AND THE MfeRE 
 ANGfiLIQUE.
 
 X. 
 
 PORT ROYAL AND THE M^RE ANG^LIQUE. 
 
 .^P^ORT ROYAL is another of those charmed 
 I ^ names of history. And it is worth noticing 
 that its charm is simply the pure halo of good- 
 ness — goodness so thorough and direct that the world 
 has called it heroism. 
 
 No famous battles, visible to the eye of flesh, were 
 ever fought in that narrow valley of Chevreuse, and 
 few stirring events took place there till the very last 
 years of the convent's five centuries of life. 
 
 Neither is tljere anything imposing or strikingly 
 beautiful in the natural features of the place. The 
 nuns came to love it as we all love our homes, and 
 some c'f them, in their letters affectionately refer to 
 the peaceful, church-like vale, with its walls of wooded 
 hills and its high, blue, starry roof. 
 
 But Madame de Sevigne, who looked at it through 
 quite other, though not unfriendly, eyes, speaks of it 
 as " un desert .affreux." And in reality it was an ill- 
 
 (133)
 
 T34 Sister and Saint. 
 
 drained (rather an un-drained), marshy spot, full of 
 confined and noxious airs, and owing its very name to 
 the corrupt Latin word porra, which means " a hol- 
 low, overgrown with brambles, containing stagnant 
 water." 
 
 This valley, the site of the original convent, known 
 as Port Royal des Champs, lies about eighteen miles 
 from Paris, on the road between Versailles and Chev- 
 reuse. From the restored splendors of Louis Four- 
 teenth's court one may drive in about an hour to this 
 neglected spot. There, a recent visitor tells us, " noth- 
 ing of interest remains to-day but a ruined fragment 
 of wall to which has been built a rough, shed-like 
 structure, surmounted by a wooden cross." Under 
 this shelter there have been collected a few portraits, 
 among them those of Agnes Arnauld, Jansen, St. 
 Cyran, Racine, and Pascal. 
 
 The history of Port Royal, from its foundation in 
 1208 till the close of the sixteenth century, does not 
 concern us. It is but the common and painful stoiy 
 of many so-called " religious houses." 
 
 A convent in theory was a beautiful thing, a place 
 where humility, chastity, poverty, obedience, self-de- 
 nial, and charity prevailed. A convent in reality was 
 often a place where unmarriageable women led lives 
 as easy and, in many cases, as sinful as a very lax 
 discipline would permit. 
 
 Under Angelique Arnauld the theory became the
 
 Port Royal and the Mere A^tgelique. 135 
 
 reality, and if we first glance at her life and character 
 we shall best read the true story of Port Royal. 
 
 The story of this noble and charming woman is 
 more fascinating than many a romance. At seven 
 years of age she finds herself a nun, at eleven years 
 an abbess, while her little sister Agnes, six years old, 
 takes the same office in the neighboring convent of 
 St. Cyr. For the Arnaulds are a large family — 
 twenty children in all — and something must be done 
 with these little girls or there will not be marriage 
 dowries enough for all. 
 
 Only ten of the twenty children lived to grow up ; 
 but of these — six daughters and four sons — every one 
 was famous. And as we shall meet some of them occa- 
 sionally at Port Royal, a few words of introduction, 
 just here, may not come amiss. 
 
 First in age came d'Andilly, so named from his es- 
 tate, whom we may remember as the " friend par ex- 
 cellence'' of St. Cyran. He was a noble, generous, 
 talented man, full of winning qualities. He was very 
 popular at court, and it was through his influence that 
 many of the royal and noble converts to the truth 
 were made. It was through him that the Duchess 
 d'Aiguillon became interested in St. Cyran and visited 
 him at Vincennes. 
 
 Next to d'Andilly came the eldest sister, Madame 
 le Maitre, in reference to whom Angclique, when a 
 little girl, exclaimed, " Oh, how unlucky I am to be
 
 136 Sister aiid Saint. 
 
 the second daughter, for if I had been the eldest, I 
 should have been the one to be married ! " 
 
 Madame le Maitre's " luck," however, was but poor. 
 Her marriage was anything but happy, and years 
 afterward she came, only too gladly, to seek refuge in 
 her sister's convent. She brought with her a humble, 
 tender heart and a practical head, and was a great 
 favorite in the house. Before she took the veil, and 
 thus gave up all claim to her property, she obtained 
 permission to visit all the offices of the convent and 
 ascertain what was wanting in them. " My sisters," 
 she said to the nuns, " tell me all your little wants, 
 for before long I shall have nothing to give away." 
 And then, like a good housewife, she set everything 
 in order, and provided whatever seemed necessary for 
 the comfort and convenience of the household. 
 
 Next on the family list come Angelique and Agnes, 
 who were early disposed of as we have seen. Their 
 grandfather, M. Marion, was a friend of the king, 
 who conferred ecclesiastical dignities, and the pope's 
 sanction was easily obtained by sending to Rome 
 false certificates of the children's age. Nobody seems 
 to have regarded this step as a particularly dishonor- 
 able one. " The king only laughed," we are told, 
 *' to think how his Holiness had been tricked." The 
 children themselves, however, took the matter more 
 seriously. When their grandfather informed them of 
 their fate, Angelique •' ran off into a long gallery, cry- 
 ing with vexation anc anger."
 
 Port Royal and the Mere Angelique. 137 
 
 " But," explained her grandfather, " I shall make 
 you an abbess, tJie mistress of all the others." 
 
 This promise consoled her a little, and she finally 
 said : " Grandpapa, if you wish me to be a nun, I will 
 be a nun ; but not unless you make me an abbess." 
 
 'And I," said Agnes, " I am willing to be a nun 
 too ; but I don't want t^ be an abbess." 
 
 A few days later they \/ere again in their grand- 
 father's study, and the little Agnes spoke up : 
 " Grandpapa, I have quite made up my mind not to 
 be an abbess, for they say an abbess has to answer to 
 God for the souls of her nuns, and I am sure I shall 
 have quite enough to do to save my own." 
 
 *' But / want to be an abbess," said Angelique 
 eagerly, " and I shall take good care that my nuns do 
 their duty and behave well." 
 
 The characteristics shown in this childish conversa- 
 tion remained with the sisters through life. Angelique 
 was born to command — to lead other souls with her 
 own " to glory and virtue." Agnes was timid, shrink- 
 ing, and though full of charity and good works, 
 much occupied with her own growth in grace. 
 
 Henri Arnauld was the next child, and he became 
 famous as bishop of Angers and Cardinal Mazarin's 
 ambassador at the Papal Court. 
 
 Then comes '' Sister Anne," of whom we shall see 
 more as Jacqueline Pascal's predecessor in teaching 
 the convent school, and after her, Marie Claire, the
 
 Sister and Saint. 
 
 one whose struggle against St. Cyran's influence we 
 have recorded. 
 
 A valiant soldier, Simon Arnauld, is the next child, 
 and next to him the pretty Madeleine, of whom St. 
 Francis de Sales predicted when she was a child tTiat 
 she would become a nun if her mirror did not stand 
 in the way. It did not stand in the way. At fifteen 
 she became a novice, and in due time entered the sis- 
 terhood at Port Royal. 
 
 The tAventieth and last child was Antoine, known 
 as the "great Arnauld." He was twenty-four years 
 younger than his eldest brother, dAndilly, and his 
 nephew Le Maitre was some years older than he. 
 It would take a volume merely to mention all that 
 this great man did and all that he wrote in the cause 
 of Jansenism and of theological truth as he viewed it. 
 He worked hand in hand with Blaise Pascal, and the 
 two were devoted friends, though not agreeing on all 
 points. 
 
 Let us notice, in passing, that the paternal grand- 
 father of all these Arnaulds — not the one who ob- 
 tained the abbacies — was at one time a Huguenot. 
 " He was led away into the error of Calvinism," say 
 the annals, " but after a time God opened his eyes, 
 though this can not be said with regard to several 
 members of his family." 
 
 And now we must come back to our young An- 
 gelique. Very pretty are the legends of the child-
 
 Port Royal and the Mere Angeliqtie. 139 
 
 abbess, marching with white robe and uphfted crozier 
 at the head of her nuns, receiving in the convent gar- 
 den the homage of the king, Henry Fourth, rebuking 
 the famiharity of the courtiers, and altogether making 
 an edifying exhibition of infant piety. 
 
 More touching, because more true, is the tale of 
 her girlhood, when she awoke to the reality of her 
 position — the bitter irksomeness of her duties — the 
 longing for freedom — the conscientious chafing under 
 false vows. At one time, in despair, she nightly 
 studied over her chances of escaping to her Huguenot 
 aunts at Rochelle, and talking over the whole subject 
 with them. " Oh, if she had only done that," we are 
 inclined to exclaim, " what a new light might have 
 been shed upon her path ! " Yet, if she Jiad 6.o\\q. that, 
 what a beautiful chapter of faith and love and cour- 
 age and purity in the midst of corruption would have 
 been lost to history ! The Lord who was leading 
 her led her aright ! 
 
 After giving up this plan of escape, there came a 
 strong-willed effort to make her life endurable by the 
 study of Greek and Roman history, " Plutarch's 
 Lives," and other not too secular subjects ; then a 
 long illness, brought on by mental conflict, and at 
 last, one summer evening, after listening to the 
 preaching of an itinerant Capuchin friar (who soon 
 after became a Huguenot), she suddenly found, in 
 complete surrender to her Lord and to His work, a
 
 140 Sister and Saint. 
 
 fuller and a sweeter liberty than she had ever sighed 
 for. Henceforth she becomes the M^re Angelique 
 indeed, and at seventeen begins her career as reform-, 
 er ; first of her own convent, and afterward, by order 
 of her ecclesiastical superiors, of many others through- 
 out France. 
 
 Angelique's life, as gi\ren in the " Memoirs of Port 
 Royal," is a series of delightful anecdotes. It is al- 
 most impossible to classify them, fot is she not a 
 woman? — a bundle of contrarieties? — but each one 
 reveals some brave or tender trait. How high-spir- 
 ited she is, — how independent, — how unyielding 
 when her will is fully set to do that which she 
 thinks right ! In the early days of her reforms there 
 was abundant need for this strength of will. 
 
 Her hardest task was probably her very first. 
 
 The original rules of her convent allowed inter- 
 course with visitors only through the grating of the 
 convent parlor, and so the father, mother, brothers 
 and sisters who had regarded Port Royal almost as a 
 second home, must be excluded. A whole long day 
 the contest went on between a father indignant and 
 argumentative by turns, a grieved and weeping 
 mother, d'Andilly angry and sarcastic, and Anne 
 and Marie Claire astonished and speechless — all these 
 on the one side, and this pale, slender girl of eighteen 
 on the other. She carried her point, but she fell 
 fainting the moment it ivas gained.
 
 Po7't Royal a7id tin Mere A7igelique. 141 
 
 Through life the same strength and decision were 
 hers, and in her seventieth year she speaks with 
 compunction of her " brusque, imperious nature and 
 habit of command." One day a visiting nun from 
 Poissy told how in her convent they had cut off part 
 of the chants as a mortification. " Much better have 
 cut off the tails of your gowns," was the quick retort 
 from the aged abbess, who had always hated nonsense. 
 And in her very last days a box on the ear was not 
 too severe a punishment for a foolish nun who tried 
 to make out that the reverend mother had miracu- 
 lously caused some heavy bread to become light. 
 
 Yet how tender she was ! — how thoughtful in her 
 tenderness ! There was a certain Sister Marguerite, 
 who caused the abbess much trouble, and in the end 
 proved incorrigible. After a violent outbreak of 
 temper, Angelique would not allow her to partake of 
 the Holy Communion, and, in anger at this. Sister 
 Marguerite ran away. The abbess and her nuns 
 fasted many days, and prayed that the Lord would 
 have mercy on the wanderer and restore her to them, 
 and at length she was sent to them from a convent 
 in Paris. It was evening when she arrived, and when 
 Angelique heard the carriage wheels, she had all the 
 lights put out, so that no one might see the penitent 
 in her humiliation. She stood alone at the open door, 
 took "Sister Marguerite in her arms and kissed her, 
 and " Oh, my dear child ! " were all the words she said. .
 
 142 Sister and Saint. 
 
 Though strict in requiring renunciation where she 
 thought it a duty, the Mere Angelique would not 
 allow unnecessary discomfort. On chilly mornings, 
 after matins (at four o'clock), she would with her own 
 hands make a fire and insist on every one going to 
 warm herself. She often visited the kitchen and 
 tasted the food, to be sure that it was palatable. The 
 cook, at one time, was a lay-sister of another order of 
 nuns, and ate no meat. The consequence was that 
 her own dinner, unless she prepared one especially 
 for herself, was apt to be poor, and the abbess, sus- 
 pecting this, followed her one day to the refectory 
 and saw what she was about to eat — the scraps left 
 from the last convent fast-day. Angelique brought 
 some eggs, beat them up and made an omelette, say- 
 ing to her lay-sister, as she set it before her, that 
 whenever she neglected to provide a dinner for her- 
 self, the thing would be repeated. The cook was 
 filled with confusion at being waited on by her Lady 
 Superior, but she could not help laughing as she de- 
 clared it was the best omelette she had ever eaten. 
 
 Great was this woman's faith ! At one time she 
 wanted three hundred francs to send to the farm at 
 Fort Royal dcs Champs, six hundred for another con- 
 vent, a hundred and fifty to pay a debt, and two 
 hundred for the butcher. " I had not a single sou," 
 she writes, " so I went to my room and prayed to God 
 for the money, and when my prayer was ended, a
 
 Port Royal and the Mh'e Angelique. 143 
 
 widow lady came to me, and said she had changed 
 her mind as to the disposal of two thousand three 
 hundred francs sh^ had laid by, and instead of keep- 
 ing them herself, she wished to give them to me for 
 our immediate use. And after this, people tell me to 
 ask alms of man and not of God I Indeed I shall 
 ask God ! I shall always beg from Gj)d and not from 
 man ! 
 
 During the civil wars in 1652, manufactures were 
 suspended, and the common serge worn by the nuns 
 of Port Royal became very difficult to procure, h 
 few pieces of greatly inferior quality had remained 
 unsold from previous years, and these were now 
 offered for sale at war prices — nearly double the 
 former price of the good article. 
 
 M. Guais, who acted as the Mere Angelique's agent 
 in such matters, had been asked to try to find some 
 serge, but he was unwilling to buy so poor an article 
 at so high a price, especially as the convent was just 
 now low in funds. He was, therefore, delighted one 
 day at finding some Ras dc N'ord, a very beautiful and 
 durable material, which, by some chance, he could get 
 at a very low price. He bought a piece at once and 
 sent it to Port Royal, confidently expecting an order 
 for more. But Angelique wrote back, " I would much 
 rather buy the common stuffs, at double the price, 
 than suffer these fine ones to enter the community. 
 I consider the money I shall pay not in the light of
 
 144 Sister and Saint. 
 
 a dear price paid for an article of dress, but as a 
 cheap price to keep vanity and finery out of a re- 
 ligious house." " Things are not 'always to be esti- 
 mated at the money they cost. That must ever be 
 a dear purchase which is at the price of Christian sim- 
 plicity." Since, however, the unlucky M. Guais had 
 bought one piece, she decided to keep it, but it was 
 all cut up into stockings, where its beauty could do no 
 harm ! 
 
 Dear saint ! Notwithstanding her precautions the 
 annals of the convent show now and then a loophole 
 for feminine vanity. Even the reverend Mother her- 
 self is said to have had one weakness — a large yellow 
 patch on her white gown, which she contemplated 
 with immens.e satisfaction. " Patches," she used to 
 say, " are a nun's jewels." 
 
 This genuine love of '■'■ sacred poverty " is one of 
 Angelique's strongest characteristics. Money, to her 
 mind, was simply and absolutely a means to an end. 
 Millions of francs passed through her hands, for at 
 one time Port Royal was very much the fashion, and 
 court and nobility lavished gifts upon it. But the 
 wish to possess any of this money — the desire to own 
 even a book or a relic, seems to have been unknown 
 to her. Everything was absolutely in common, and 
 even St. Francis' letters, her greatest treasures, she 
 regarded as the property of the convent. Avarice 
 she speaks of as a '' curious " passion. She can not 
 understand it.
 
 Port Royal and the Mere Afigelique. 145 
 
 " It is scarcely credible," say the " Memoirs," " how 
 many families, both of the poor and of the reduced 
 gentry, were relieved during the civil wars by the 
 bounty of Port Royal." 
 
 The embroidery and fancy-work common among 
 nuns were an abomination to Angelique, but the 
 sisters were taught, with infinite patience, economy 
 and neatness, to repair their own garments, and to 
 make up into clothing for the «poor every available 
 remnant and scrap. Nothing was too sacred for use 
 in charity. The gold and silver candlesticks of the 
 church service were more than once sold for the 
 benefit of the poor, and the very napkins off the altar 
 torn into bandages for the wounded. 
 
 There was a permanent infirmary within, the con- 
 vent gates where women and children were nursed 
 and medicines were dispensed. With her own hands 
 the reverend Mother would strip off their rags, wash, 
 clothe, and tend them. She was by nature skillful in 
 all v/oman's work, and had the cheerfulness, tact, and 
 presence of mind in the sick-room that are the sure 
 signs of a good nurse. No disease, however loath- 
 some or infectious, dismayed her, and she learned to 
 use the lancet as well as a surgeon. 
 
 It was in such service as this that Angelique and 
 her nuns passed their days, and in this way they man- 
 ifested their piety. " Perfection," the dear Mother 
 often said, "consists not in doing extraordinary 
 7
 
 146 Sister and Saint. 
 
 things, but in doing ordinary things extraordinarily 
 well." " Neglect nothing," again she would say. 
 " The most trivial action may be performed to God. 
 Even in rising to matins, be careful to make no noise, 
 lest you disturb invalids ; if Christian charity be in 
 your heart your whole life may be a continual exer- 
 cise of it." " Oh, if we did but love others how easily 
 the least thing, the shutting a door gently, the walk- 
 ing softly, speaking low, not making a noise, or the 
 choice of a seat so as to leave the most convenient to 
 others, might become occasions of its exercise." 
 Truly, we are inclined to say with Jacqueline 
 Pascal, " at Port Royal one might reasonably be a 
 nun." 
 
 One secret of the Mere Angelique's success was her 
 quick insight into character. One day four candi- 
 dates were ushered into the convent parlor. The 
 abbess, as they entered, watched them closely, and 
 whispered to the nun who sat by her, ** That little 
 one at the back .is the only one that will stay." And 
 she did stay, while the others, after due probation, 
 were sent home. 
 
 Another secret of her success was her fine tact. A 
 querulous and troublesome nun was once confined by 
 illness to the infirmary where the abbess herself, on 
 account of some indisposition, was also spending a 
 few days. They were once left quite alone and unat- 
 tended for some time, and the nun took occasion to
 
 Port Royal and the Mere A7igelique. 147 
 
 remark that it was very provoking of the sisters to 
 leave their reverend mother so long. " Oh, no," said 
 the abbess, cheerfully. " It is good for me to be left. 
 You know sick persons so easily slide into self-indul- 
 gence. Think how many single ladies, of rank and 
 expectations far above mine, are, perhaps, through 
 misfortune, at this moment destitute of any attend- 
 ance. Many are thankful and happy in having only 
 one little maid to do everything for them, and while 
 she is out on business they must be left alone. So, 
 my dear daughter, when we call and nobody answers, 
 let us fancy that the little maid is gone to market, 
 and wait patiently till she returns." The pleasant 
 words were not forgotten, and when the sister after- 
 ward felt inclined to complain, she would say, laugh- 
 ingly, '' My mother, the little maid is gone to market." 
 It is impossible in a chapter to do anything like 
 justice to Angelique Arnauld. The records of her in 
 the various Memoirs of Port Royal are an " embar- 
 ras du richesse," and we can but gather up a few frag- 
 ments. We can give but a line to her well-trained 
 
 intellect — to the wisdom of her counsels to the Tan- 
 
 « -' 
 
 senist leaders — her clear-sightedness in regard to the 
 movements of their Jesuit persecutors — the force of 
 her few published writings — the charm of her familiar 
 letters. Altogether, her character is like some many- 
 sided crystal — sparkling, whichever way we turn it. 
 She is one of the Lord's own jewels. And through 
 each clear-cut facet shines the same pure Light.
 
 AT THE CONVENT GATES.
 
 XI. 
 
 AT THE CONVENT GATES. 
 
 T is easy to see how with such a woman at its head, 
 or rather, at its heart, Port Royal became the nu- 
 cleus of the reforming party in the Church. An- 
 gelique Arnauld was, indeed, in its early days, the 
 leading spirit of that noble band — that " fountain 
 of sweet waters in the midst of the brackish sea," 
 Gladly enough, however, she gave place to her re- 
 vered spiritual father, St. Cyran, and when he was 
 gone and she was beginning to feel the burden of 
 years, her young brother and Pascal, her nephews, 
 and hosts of friends were ready to step into the front 
 ranks. 
 
 While Jacqueline Pascal was still a little girl, the 
 nuns had moved from the valley of Chevreuse to 
 Paris. Port Royal had become so popular that the 
 house was too small for the many applicants for pro- 
 bation. '* Besides," say the chronicles, " the situation 
 became exceedinglj- damp and unhealthy. The whole 
 
 (151)
 
 152 Sister and Saint, 
 
 monastery was continually enveloped in a thick fog. 
 The house at length became a complete infirmary. 
 Deaths constantly succeeded each other ; yet num- 
 bers of fresh postulants were perpetually offering." 
 
 Madame Arnauld was now a widow, and her six 
 daughters urq:ed her to come and be a nun with them. 
 She was a woman of lovely Christian spirit, but up to 
 this time had naturally not felt herself called to the 
 life of the cloister, having been married at fourteen 
 and occupied with the care of her twenty children. 
 She laughed when the proposition was first made to 
 her, and said : " How can I begin to learn obedience 
 at fifty, when I have been exercising authority^ since 
 I was fifteen?" But she finally decided on the step ; 
 first, however, buying " a noble house with magnifi- 
 cent gardens " in the Faubourg St. Jacques, employ- 
 ing one of the first architects of the day to build a 
 church attached to it, and bearing the expenses of 
 the removal from Port Royal des Champs to Paris. 
 
 It was a few years after this that some of St. Cy- 
 ran's disciples, prominent among them Ang61ique's 
 nephews, the Le Maitres, withdrew from the world 
 into profound retirement, gave up their lives to wor- 
 ship and charity, and became known as Recluses. 
 The little house which they took in Paris soon proving 
 too small for their increasing numbers, " they deter- 
 mined to go to Port Royal dcs CJiamps and take pos- 
 session of the convent the nuns had abandoned.
 
 At the Convent Gates. 153 
 
 There they found everything bearing marks of the 
 most complete desolation. The lakes, for want of 
 draining, were converted into noxious marshes, over- 
 grown with reeds and other aquatic plants ; they con- 
 tinually exhaled the most pestilential vapors. The 
 grounds were in many parts completely overflowed. 
 The gardens were not only overgrown with weeds and 
 brushwood, but the very walks were infected with 
 venomous serpents." 
 
 " The hermits, however, were not to be deterred by 
 trivial inconveniences. Many of them were young 
 men of the first families in France, yet they did not 
 disdain to labor with their own hands. The little com- 
 pany set joyfully to work, and the aspect of the valley 
 was soon transformed. The surface of the swampy 
 morass soon exhibited a clear lake, whose waters re- 
 flected the hills around, crowned with thick forests of 
 oak. The tangled brushwood was felled. The spa- 
 cious gardens blossomed as the rose, and the (rebuilt) 
 walls of Port Royal arose from the ground amidst 
 hymns of prayer and shouts of praise. 
 
 " New associates were continually quitting the world 
 and joining themselves to this little band. After a 
 short period it became a numerous and flourishing 
 society. Regular plans and an orderly distribution of 
 employments were soon found necessary." 
 
 " The Recluses of Port Royal, unlike religious 
 
 orders, were not bound by any vows. Each, never- 
 1* . "
 
 154 Sister and Saint. 
 
 theless, sought to imitate his Lord, and follow His 
 steps, by a life of voluntary poverty, penance, and 
 self-denial. They assumed the dress of no particular 
 order; yet they were easily distinguished by their 
 coarse and plain, but clean clothing. Their time was 
 divided betv/een their devotions to God and their 
 services to men. They all met together several times, 
 both in the day and night, in the church. Twice 
 each day, also, the whole company met in the refec- 
 tory. Some hours were occupied by each in his own 
 cell, in meditation, in private prayer, and in dili- 
 gently reading and comparing the Holy Scriptures, 
 which they always did in the attitude, as well as in 
 the spirit of prayer, and to which exercise they de- 
 voted a portion of time every day. Their directors 
 always advised them to begin by studying the Holy 
 Scripture itself, without any commentary, seeking 
 only for edification." 
 
 But as years went on over these recluses and over 
 Angelique's sisterhood in the city, that " noble 
 house " in turn became too strait for its occupants. 
 It became necessary to divide them, and send part of 
 the number back to the valley of Chevreuse. How 
 they came back we will learn by again quoting from 
 the " Select Memoirs." 
 
 " The news of the nuns' intended return M'as soon 
 spread at Port Royal. The whole neighborhood 
 evinced the greatest joy. It was delightful again to 
 see them after so many years of absence.
 
 At the Convent Gates. 155 
 
 " The recluses made every exertion to prepare the 
 house and gardens. They put them in the best order 
 for their friends. Their own books and furniture 
 were soon packed up. On the morning of the very 
 day the nuns v/ere expected, they removed from the 
 monastery. They took possession of a farm-house 
 (Les Granges) which was situated at the top of the 
 hill." " The Mere AngeHque came in person to 
 estabhsh the nuns in their former habitation. On the 
 day she was expected all the poor flocked to the 
 monastery in their best clothes. As soon as the long 
 file of carriages appeared through the woods at the 
 top of the hill, they went to meet her. The bells 
 were immediately rung ; shouts of joy and exclama- 
 tions of pleasure resounded on all sides. The pro- 
 cession stopped ; then the poor with tears implored 
 their good mother's benediction. She tendefly em- 
 braced them. At the church door she was met by 
 all the recluses. They led the nuns into the choir, 
 and after service, left them in possession of the con- 
 vent and retired to their new habitation." 
 
 "The nuns and recluses never saw each other but 
 at church ; even there a grate separated them ; nor 
 had they any intercourse, though so nearly related, 
 
 except by letter The recluses continued all 
 
 their former occupations ; they conducted the farms 
 and gardens and performed every other laborious 
 office."
 
 156 Sister and Saint. 
 
 Under the wise care of these kind friends and 
 brothers, and by means of the princely gifts which 
 about this time flowed into the convent treasury, 
 Port Royal des Champs became a very different place 
 from the malarious valley we have seen it. The 
 farms were much improved and became very pro- 
 ductive. "The stagnant waters were drained and 
 formed into clear lakes abounding with fish. The 
 fields, gardens, and orchards were assiduously cul- 
 tivated and enlarged." The fruit of Port Royal, in- 
 deed, was celebrated for its extraordinary size and 
 fine flavor, so much so, that when M. d'Andilly an- 
 nually sent presents to the Queen Mother, Anne of 
 Austria, Cardinal Mazarin used to call it " fruit 
 benit." 
 
 Such were the two houses of Port Royal when Jac- 
 quelitie Pascal first became interested in the convent. 
 
 The Mere Angelique was not perpetual abbess of 
 . either house. One of her early acts of humility had 
 been the securing of triennial elections for this office. 
 But she was very frequently elected to it, as was also 
 her sister Agnes. While they were still young girls, 
 by the request of both sisters, Agnes had been al- 
 lowed to give up the abbacy of her convent of St. 
 Cyr and become a simple nun of Port Royal under 
 Angelique. She had not lost her childish dread of 
 the dignity, yet, after all, as we have said, she could 
 altogether escape it.
 
 At the Convent Gates. 157 
 
 The M^re Agnes is a very interesting character, 
 though differing greatly from her sister. She was 
 something of a mystic by nature, and would gladly 
 have spent her life in perpetual adoration. Her fav- 
 orite book in her youth was the Life of St. Theresa. 
 She pored devotedly over its pages while Angelique 
 was reading Plutarch's Lives. 
 
 One day while she was a novice she was carrying a 
 can of oil to clean the choir lamps, and spilled it over 
 her dress and on the steps of the church. Any other 
 novice would have been greatly troubled at such an 
 accident, but to the lips of Agnes rose the words, 
 " Thy name is as oil poured forth." She meditated 
 a few moments on her loving thought, but then hum- 
 bly wiped up the oil and went to her sister, the 
 young abbess, to confess her fault. 
 
 Angelique, though she had a great admiration for 
 her younger sister, thought she was in danger of 
 being led away by prayer and fasting from the prac- 
 tical work of life. One day as a " mortification " she 
 sent for Agnes to come otft of church, and she came 
 "weeping bitterly." Many years afterward, when 
 Agnes was abbess, Angelique said to her one day, 
 ** Ah, mother abbess, do you remember the day when 
 I fetched you weeping from the choir, because you 
 cared for nothing but prayer? It is forty years ago, 
 but I am sure that if I were to keep you away from 
 church now, you would weep as bitterly as you did 
 then. Truly there is no cure for our old diseases."
 
 158 Sister and Saint. 
 
 Nothing is told us of the Mere Ang^lique's per- 
 sonal appearance, but Agnes' sweet face is often 
 spoken of. Among the few ornaments allowed at 
 Port Royal was a large painting on the refectory 
 wall, by Philip de Champagne, representing the Mere 
 Agnes on her knees by the bedside of a sick nun, 
 praying for her recovery. The prayer was granted, 
 and the event gratefully commemorated in this way.* 
 
 Agnes Arnauld was the author of several little devo- 
 tional books. One of these, " Le Chapelet Secret," had 
 the honor of being condemned by the doctors of the 
 Sorbonne and suppressed by the Pope. Another, 
 the " Portrait of a Perfect and an Imperfect Nun," has 
 been said to *' display so much spiritual acumen, that 
 if entitled, ' The Portrait of a Consistent and a Half- 
 hearted Christian,' it would not be unworthy of a 
 place beside the soul-searching treatises of her Puritan 
 contemporaries." 
 
 It was the Mere Agnes who, for the most part, 
 kept up the correspondence with Jacqueline Pascal 
 during the latter's years of waiting outside the con- 
 vent gates. Regularly every month a letter came, 
 always full of affection, and usually of sound advice. 
 
 "Yesterday," runs one of them, "we had an ad- 
 mirable sermon from M. Singlin ; I could have 
 wished you had been there, but for the fear that it 
 
 * Mrs. Jameson gives a sketch of this picture in her " Legends of 
 the Monastic Orders."
 
 At the Convent Gates. 159 
 
 might have excited your desire of taking the veil, 
 and made your present state of suspense more 
 painful." 
 
 Again, " If you do not possess your soul in peace 
 and perfect submission, you must cease the repetition 
 of the Lord's Prayer, for the phrase, ' Thy will be 
 done on earth as it is in heaven,' includes the renun- 
 ciation of every possible wish which does not har- 
 monize with God's will. I do' not believe, dear sister, 
 that you can desire to have things arranged in any 
 other way than as God chooses ; for a conventual life« 
 will not make you what He designs to have you be- 
 come, unless you enter upon it in accordance with 
 Plis will, and at the hour of His appointment." 
 
 And yet once more, " You are bound to accept the 
 answer given you by your father as a decree of God, 
 who sees fit to reserve some other season for th? 
 gracious fulfillment of those desires He has inspired 
 within you." 
 
 Some of Angelique's wise instructions, taken down 
 from her lips (by stealth, for the abbess would never 
 allow it to be done with her knowledge), were copied 
 and sent to Jacqueline. We must quote one passage, 
 even at the risk of becoming v/earisome : 
 
 " It may be said with equal advantage, both to the 
 novice who has her profession to make and to the 
 nun who has already made it on the best grounds, 
 examine your oivn hearts. There is an indolent re-
 
 i6o Sister and Saint. 
 
 tirement from the world which arises from sloth ; 
 there is a selfish retirement, which originates in a 
 misanthropic absorption in our own concerns ; there 
 is a melancholy retirement, which is grounded on dis- 
 appointed self-love ; and there is a philosophic re- 
 tirement which has its basis in pride and contempt 
 of others. Far different from all these is a genuine 
 religious retirement. The Christian's seclusion is 
 founded on a deep experience of the deceitfulness of 
 his own heart ; nor is it deserving of that holy name 
 unless while he comes out from the world to wait in 
 silence upon God, he also diligently labors, by his 
 industry and talents, as well as in his prayers, to serve 
 to the very uttermost even that secular society con- 
 science has obliged him to quit." 
 
 All these counsels, and especially Agnes* exhorta- 
 tions to patience, were needed, for Jacqueline's great 
 temptation during these years seems to have been to 
 restlessness and chafing under her delay. Her enthu- 
 siastic temperament and her strong will submitted 
 with difficulty to the hard duty of waiting. Probably 
 the first great lesson of obedience, so strongly insisted 
 on by Angelique in her government, was better learn- 
 ed by Jacqueline Pascal in that solitary room in her 
 father's house than it could have been amid the con- 
 genial activities of Port Royal life. 
 
 Poor child ! The picture of her in these days 
 looks dull and colorless enough b.eside the pleasant
 
 At the Convent Gates. i6i 
 
 scenes we have been considering. Madame Perier 
 speaks of her " strict soHtude, which she never quit- 
 ted, unless necessity obhged her." "And to all this," 
 she continues, " she added great bodily austerities. 
 As we had but scanty lodging-room (she was then at 
 Clermont), a partition had to be put up for her ac- 
 commodation in a place where there was no chimney, 
 at some distance from the other rooms. There she 
 passed a whole winter, without allowing us to do the 
 least thing for her comfort, nor would she be per- 
 suaded to come near the fire at meal-times, which 
 made us all very uneasy. Her abstinence also troub- 
 led us ; for though she partook of our ordinary food, 
 yet it was in such small portions, that, being natu- 
 rally very delicate, she lessened her strength and ruin- 
 ed her digestion, till when, at last, we insisted on her 
 taking more nourishment, she was unable. Her vigils, 
 too, were extraordinary ; not that we knew their 
 exact length, except as we perceived by the number 
 of candles she burned, and by similar circumstances. 
 Her admirable foresight led her to prepare for a con- 
 ventual dress, which, differing as it does from the 
 dress worn generally, troubles the body and so clogs 
 the soul ; and to guard against this, she accustomed 
 herself as much as possible to its inconveniences. 
 Her shoes were made very low in the heel ; she wore 
 no corsets, cut off her hair, and put on head-dresses 
 that were larger and more embarrassing than a veil 
 would have been."
 
 1 62 Sister and Saint. 
 
 It is very probable that if Jacqueline had been, at 
 this time, under the direct care of the Mere Angel- 
 ique, these practices would have been less rigid, for 
 Angclique did " not approve of austerities and severe 
 penance." She thought they tended to develop 
 spiritual pride. We have already quoted her very 
 frequent saying, " Perfection does not consist in do- 
 ing extraordinary things, but in doing ordinary things 
 extraordinarily well." And the words of St. Francis 
 de Sales were often on her lips — that " piety is not 
 self-mortification, but doing the will of God ; " and 
 that " fasting, in accordance with one's own will, is 
 often a temptation of the devil." 
 
 But Jacqueline Pascal wasyoung and ardent. " She 
 loved much." And doubtless, when she fell at the 
 Master's feet and broke there her " alabaster box of 
 very precious ointment," though she may have done 
 it mistakenly and blindly, the service was accepted 
 and blessed of Him. That it was indeed so, seems 
 evident from the effect of this life upon her own 
 heart. There is no trace of spiritual pride, nor does 
 her breaking of home ties* and neglect of home duties 
 produce so narrow and selfish a habit of mind as we 
 might fear. She was not idle or forgetful of others 
 in her solitude. " After regularly reciting her offices," 
 says her sister, " and after reading, which employed 
 her closely, as she made extracts from the books she 
 read, she spent the rest of her time in working for
 
 At the Co7ivent Gates^ 163 
 
 the poor. She made them thick woolen stockings, 
 under-Hnen, and other small comforts, which, when 
 finished, she carried herself to the hospital. It was 
 occasion of wonder and edification that this entire 
 separation from the world did not make her sour in 
 manners and temper, but on the contrary, she was aU 
 ways charmingly affable, and ever ready to go out of 
 doors on any charitable errand, as we many times on 
 trial found. 
 
 " During this time I was often indisposed, and she 
 would sit with me all day, without seeming in the 
 least disconcerted. Several of my children had vio- 
 lent illnesses, and she nursed them with admirable 
 kindness. Even when one of my little girls died of 
 confluent small-pox, my sister attended her to the 
 last, and though the illness continued a fortnight, 
 she only went into her own room to repeat her 
 offices, choosing for that purpose the child's intervals 
 of ease, watching over her night and day with the 
 tenderest care, and passing many nights without once 
 lying down. When there was no more need of her 
 charitable services in this case, she returned to her 
 
 usual course in her chamber Jacqueline took 
 
 great pleasure in visits to poor sick people about the 
 town, accompanying an excellent young lady who 
 devoted herself entirely to the poor." 
 
 By their fruits ye shall know them ! When vigils, 
 fastings, and coarse, uncomfortable garments produce
 
 164 Sister and Saint. 
 
 " charming affability," kindness, and tenderness, we 
 need not be afraid of them. It is easy to cry out 
 against the austerities and the restrictions practiced 
 by many Roman Catholic Christians. It is easy for 
 us to see the harm they do. But let us make sure 
 that in throwing away these things we are putting 
 something better in their place. Let us not omit 
 these and also leave the other undone. 
 
 It is a pity to force the fruits of the Spirit by these 
 unnatural, painful processes. But it is a greater pity 
 still not to cultivate the fruits of the Spirit at all, 
 and in our liberty to forget the very object of that 
 liberty. 
 
 " The religion of gloom suppresses human nature," 
 says Cousin with much force and justice. " But the 
 religion of mere pleasure does worse. It degrades 
 it."
 
 WAITING,
 
 ^^M 
 
 >/^^-oj 
 
 
 XII. 
 
 WAITING. 
 
 .HESE years were stormy ones for the nation, 
 and perhaps the vacillations of the Pascals 
 between Clermont and Paris may have been 
 owing to the unquiet state of things in the capital. 
 
 The new cardinal (Mazarin) was even less popular 
 than Richelieu had been. Those who had admired 
 that royal maneuverer saw in Mazarin only a feeble 
 and unworthy imitator of him. The nobles hated 
 him because he was a foreigner, and the people be- 
 cause his taxes were extortionate. 
 
 It is scarcely necessary to say that Anne of 
 Austria, though nominally Regent, was a cipher in 
 the government. She was completely under the in- 
 fluence of the cardinal, and it was thought that a 
 secret marriage existed between them. 
 
 Meantime Louis Fourteenth was receiving an edu- 
 cation which has been thus described : " The infant 
 king's amusements v/ere all of a military kind. He 
 
 (iC7)
 
 1 68 Sister and Saint. 
 
 delighted in handling arms and in beating drums. 
 His intellectual education was neglected, but much 
 attention was paid to his physical development, and 
 his natural vanity, egotism, and haughtiness were 
 encouraged rather than checked by his mother and 
 his tutors. The avarice of Cardinal Mazarin induced 
 him to stint the allowance and equipage of the young 
 monarch, who slept upon worn and ragged sheets 
 and had a most unbecoming and insufficient ward- 
 robe," 
 
 Certainly this gives little prophecy of his brilliant 
 reign — " the Augustan age of France." But we are 
 to remember that Louis Fourteenth's reign was bril- 
 liant, not from the mind and character of the king, 
 but from those of his gifted subjects. The cruelty, des- 
 potism, and fearful grossness of morals during this 
 reign, are facts with which everybody is familiar. 
 "And yet," say Buckle in his " History of Civiliza- 
 tion," " there are still found men who hold up for ad- 
 miration the age of Louis Fourteenth. They are 
 willing to forgive every injury inflicted by a prince 
 during whose life there were produced the letters of 
 Pascal, the orations of Bossuet, the comedies of 
 Moliere, and the tragedies of Racine." 
 
 This is wandering a little from Cardinal Mazarin, 
 but we will come back to say that, one day in 1648 — 
 that summer after M. Pascal had joined Blaise and 
 Jacqueline in the city — Paris awaked to find itself in
 
 Waiting. 169 
 
 the hands of the mob. The cardinal had caused the 
 arrest of two men who had resisted the taxes, and 
 this was the result. The Swiss guards, stationed at 
 the Tuilleries, were dispersed, barricades were erected 
 in all the streets adjoining the palace, and the court, 
 thus hemned in and defenseless, was obliged to repeal 
 for the moment the obnoxious taxes. 
 
 This was the beginning of " the wars of the Fronde," 
 so called from the epithet frondciirs (slingers) applied 
 to the insurgents. 
 
 These wars soon became a mere series of intrigues 
 between the nobility and the cardinal, and are far too 
 intricate for us to follow. It is worth our while, 
 however, to notice that that beautiful and accom- 
 plished woman, the Duchess of Longueville, at first 
 took the lead of the party opposed to the court and 
 cardinal, and thus placed herself in opposition to her 
 brother, the great Prince Conde. A few years later 
 she became a very different woman, and gladly left 
 the tumult of the world for the cloisters of Port 
 Royal. 
 
 During all the remaining years with which our little 
 history has to do, these commotions or others similar 
 to them were raging. 
 
 Paris was besieged by Conde in 1649, and all the 
 surrounding country was involved in the distress of 
 the city. The Mere Angelique writes from Port 
 Royal dcs Champs : " We are all occupied in contriv-
 
 170 Sister and Saint. 
 
 ing soups and pottage for the poor. This is, indeed, 
 an awful time. Our gentlemen, as they were taking 
 their rounds yesterday, found two persons starved to 
 death, and met with a young woman on the very 
 point of killing her child because she had no food for it. 
 
 "All is pillaged around ; corn-fields are trampled 
 over by the cavalry in presence of the starving own- 
 ers ; despair has seized all whose confidence is not in 
 God ; no one will any longer plow or dig ; there 
 are no horses left, indeed, for plowing, nor, if there 
 were, is any person certain of reaping what he sows ; 
 everything is stolen. 
 
 " Perhaps I shall not be able to send you a letter 
 to-morrow, for all our horses and asses are dead with 
 hunger. Oh, how little do princes knov/ of the de- 
 tailed horrors of war ! All the provender of the 
 beasts we were obliged to divide between the starving 
 poor and ourselves. We have concealed, in our con- 
 vent, as many of the peasants and their cattle as we 
 could, to save them from being murdered and losing 
 all their substance. Our dormitory and the chapter- 
 house are full of horses. We are almost stifled from 
 being pent up. with these beasts. But we could not re- 
 sist the piercing lamentations of the starving and 
 heart-broken people. In the cellar are concealed 
 forty cows. Our court-yards and outhouses are packed 
 full of fowls, turkeys, ducks, geese, and asses. The 
 church is piled up to the ceiling with corn, oats, beans,
 
 Waiting. 171 
 
 and pease, and with caldrons, kettles, and other things 
 belonging to the cottagers. Every time we enter the 
 chapel we are obliged to scramble over sacks of flour 
 and all sorts of rubbish. The floor of the choir is com- 
 pletely covered with the libraries of our gentlemen. 
 
 " Thirty or forty nuns, from other convents, have 
 also fled here for refuge. Our laundry is thronged 
 by the aged, th^ blind, the maimed, the halt, and in- 
 fants. The infirmary is full of sick and wounded. 
 We have torn up all our linen clothes, and used all 
 our rags, to dress their sores. We have no more, and 
 are now at our wits' end. The cold is excessive, and 
 all our fire-wood is consumed. We dare not go into 
 the fields for any more, for they are full of marauding 
 parties. We hear that the Abbey of St. Cyran has 
 been burnt and pillaged. Our own is threatened with 
 an attack every day. The cold weather alone pre- 
 serves us from pestilence. We are so closely crowded 
 that deaths take place continually. God, however, is 
 with us, and we are in peace. I did not intend to tell 
 you all this, but my heart is so full that I have written 
 on without knowing it." 
 
 While she waited for the fulfillment of her vows and 
 of her hopes, Jacqueline Pascal's mind was not stag- 
 nating, nor was her pen altogether idle, though she 
 appears to have spent more time in copying and 
 paraphrasing the writings of others than in original 
 composition.
 
 1^2 Sister and Saint. 
 
 Of course the character of her productions is very 
 different from that of carHer days. Her thoughts 
 were deeper, higher, and undoubtedly the excellent 
 models she so faithfully studied had their natural ef- 
 fect on her style, so that we find in her compositions 
 after this time a certain elevation and dignity added 
 to the gracefulness of her youth. " Her prose," says 
 Cousin, " is always of the best quality, healthy, natural, 
 ingenious, agreeable." Some of her " reflections " 
 were considered so fine that it was once proposed to 
 incorporate them with an edition of her brother's 
 *' Pensees," but this plan was given up, and they were 
 added to the " Conferences of the Rev. Mere Marie 
 Angelique Arnauld." 
 
 Jacqueline Pascal never attained the keen, clear 
 thought and transparent style of her brother, but she 
 belongs, as some one has said, to the nobl6 order of the 
 '■'■sisters of genius," capable of appreciating the high- 
 est and best in another, and by her enthusiasm and 
 her nobility of character, of inspiring that other to his 
 greatest successes. Such a power is to most women 
 a more useful and a more welcome gift than genius 
 itself. 
 
 There are three papers written by Jacqueline, be- 
 tween the years 1648 and 1652, which are worth our 
 attention. The first in time is a letter to her father, 
 written soon after his refusal to her request, and be- 
 fore she had entered upon the strictly solitary life hei
 
 IVaiiing. 1 73 
 
 sister has described to us. It is ver}' long, taking up 
 seven pages of Cousin's volume, and we can make 
 but a few extracts from it. Her object in writing is 
 to beg her father's permission to make a " retreat " of 
 a fortnight at Port Royal, and very skillfully she 
 makes her plea. She begins thus : 
 
 " Monsieur MON Pere : — As ingratitude is the 
 blackest of vices, all that approaches it is so horrible 
 that it can scarcely be thought of by one who has any 
 love whatever for virtue. Forgetfulness of benefits 
 received from another, above all when those benefits 
 have been great and long continued, is ordinarily an 
 effect of ingratitude, and want of confidence in this 
 same person must be the effect of this forgetfulness. 
 Therefore, I should believe it to be a crin*^ to fail to 
 have great confidence in you on this occasion, although, 
 at the same time, I very much wish what I ask, and, 
 ordinarily, those who wish fear also. 
 
 " First of all, I beg you, my father, not to be sur- 
 prised at this request of mine, for it does not militate 
 in the least against your will in regard to me as you 
 have testified it. I also beg you, by all that is most 
 holy, to remeviber the prompt obedience I have ren- 
 dered you in that thing which touches me nearest of 
 anything in the world,, and the accomplishment of 
 which I wish so ardently. Doubtless }'ou have not 
 forgotten this exact submission. You appeared too ^ 
 well satisfied with it to let it so soon pass out of your
 
 1 74 Sister and Saint. 
 
 mind. God is my witness that I believe I have done 
 my duty in acting thus, and I only remind you of it 
 that you may understand that all my principles lead 
 me to undertake nothing important without your 
 consent. After that, my father, I have no more 
 doubt that you will do me the honor to believe me 
 and to grant my request." 
 
 And now she fears she has gone too far and injured 
 her cause by making too much of it. She changes 
 her tactics : 
 
 "After all this preparation you will think it is some 
 great request. // really is 7iot that at all ; indeed, it 
 is so little that I believe I might have done it without 
 offending you in the least, if I had said nothing about 
 it!" ... . 
 
 '' Know then, my father, if you please (and, indeed, 
 I think you already are aware of the fact), that it is 
 a frequent thing among persons of all conditions, 
 whether living in the world or not, to make at certain 
 times, as their spiritual director may advise, two or 
 three weeks of retreat in some religious house, where 
 they enter into perfect seclusion, by permission of the 
 superior, and hold converse only with God and those 
 who are His. Those who are most careful of their 
 salvation place themselves when they can in the best 
 regulated house they know of. I think you see my 
 design, and I am sure you think with me that I can 
 not do better than choose Port Royal de Paris, nor
 
 Waiting. 175 
 
 take a better time than that of your absence when I 
 can render you no service. Neither am I needed by 
 any one else in the house, for since you went away I 
 have not written a single word for my brother, and 
 that is the thing for which he needs me most. But 
 he can do very well with some one else ; indeed, I 
 see no way in which I can possibly be needed until 
 your return from Rouen, certainly if you compare 
 such usefulness with the necessity which there is for 
 my making this retreat." 
 
 And then, presently, she thinks of another good 
 argument to urge : " For since God has shown me 
 the grace to increase daily within me the effect of 
 that vocation He has pleased to give me, and you 
 have^ permitted me to keep, and which it is my de- 
 sire to accomplish as soon as He shall make known to 
 me His will by yours — since, I say, this desire aug- 
 ments every day, and I see no power on earth that 
 can prevent my accomplishing it if you will and per- 
 mit it — tJiis retreat would serve to prove whether it is 
 there that God would have me. I could then listen to 
 Him alone {seul a seul), and perhaps I sJiall find that 
 I am not born for that sort of place ; and, if it is thus, 
 I will ask you frankly not to think of it any longer, 
 or pay any more attention to what I have said to 
 you 
 
 " Behold, M. mon pere, the very humble prayer I 
 make you. I doubt not you will grant it If I
 
 176 Sister and Samt. 
 
 have ever been so happy as to satisfy you in anything, 
 I beg you grant me promptly what I ask. The ab- 
 besses, on their part, have accorded me the privilege. 
 M. Perier, my brother, and via fidcle (Gilberte), ap- 
 prove my plan and are quite willing, provided I can 
 gain your consent 
 
 " If there were any other consideration stronger 
 than the love of God, which will urge you for His 
 sake to accord me this slight request, I would employ 
 it. In the name of that sacred love which He gives 
 to us, and which we owe to Him, grant this request, 
 either to my iveakness or to my arguments 
 
 " You may be certain that your commandments are 
 laws to me, and that where your satisfaction is con- 
 cerned, even at the prejudice of my whole life's re- 
 pose, I promptly hasten to obey. It is gratitude and 
 affection rather than duty that leads me to do this, 
 and when I accord to you what you demand of me, it 
 is from pure love to your service next to that of God. 
 This service is the reason you have given for keeping 
 me with you. I hope in God you will some day 
 know how much better I could serve you by being 
 with Him than by being with you. But while wait- 
 ing for this time, I pray Him to keep me in the same 
 sentiments I have always had, to await patiently your 
 will after I have sought to discover His. 
 
 " On the subject of my little retreat I await your 
 answer with impatience such as you can imagine, but
 
 Wat ting. 177 
 
 with entire submission, altJioiigh I have the greatest 
 desire for it. Whatever your answer may be, it will 
 not in the least change the passion it will find in me 
 — a passion which will never leave me — of proving to 
 you how much more I am by the affection of the 
 heart than by the necessity of nature, M. my father, 
 your very humble and very obedient daughter and 
 servant, JACQUELINE Pascal. 
 
 " M. Perier, my brother, and ma fide le, humbly kiss 
 your hands." 
 
 A better specimen of a woman's logic — compounded 
 of tenderness, obedience, defiance, pleading, argu- 
 ment, and religion — it would be diflficult to find. It 
 is easy to recognize in the writer the little girl who 
 sat on Richelieu's knee, and through tears and ca- 
 resses, backed by genuine determination and a fine 
 talent for sticking closely to the point, obtained her 
 father's pardon. 
 
 We are not told whether this letter brought the 
 desired permission, but it certainly deserved to do so. 
 
 While Jacqueline was at Clermont, living in the 
 little cold room partitioned off for her, making " coats 
 and garments " and taking them to the hospital, she 
 became acquainted with a certain good Father of the 
 Oratory, who seems to have been much interested in 
 the earnest young disciple. Madame Perier says : 
 
 " The good man often came to see my sister, and 
 8*
 
 1 78 Sister and Saint. 
 
 liis edifying conversation gave her pleasure. He one 
 day said to her that, since her talents had formerly 
 been employed on worldly themes, it was but reason- 
 able that she should now use them in some attempt 
 at honoring God ; that he had heard of her as writing 
 poetry, and had thought of furnishing her with an 
 opportunity of thus glorifying God by translating for 
 her some of the Church hymns from Latin into 
 French prose, which she might afterward versify. 
 She replied promptly that she was quite willing. He 
 brought her first the Ascension hymn, Jcsu, nostra 
 redeviptio, which is chanted every day at the Ora- 
 tory, and she put it into rhyme." 
 
 This hymn is supposed to have been written by St. 
 Ambrose in the year 390. It is given us in some of 
 our church collections as follows : 
 
 " O Christ ! our Hope, our heart's desire. 
 Redemption's only spring ; 
 Creator of the world art Thou, 
 Its Saviour and its King. 
 
 " How vast the mercy and the love 
 Which laid our sins on Thee ; 
 And led Thee to a cruel death 
 To set Thy people free ! 
 
 " But now the bonds of death are burst. 
 The ransom has been paid ; 
 And Thou art on Thy Father's throne. 
 In glorious robes arrayed. 
 
 *' O Christ ! be Thou our present joy. 
 
 Our future great Reward ! *
 
 Waiting. 1 79 
 
 Our only glory may it be 
 To glory in the Lord ! " 
 
 It may be interesting to some readers to see it in 
 Jacqueline Pascal's French version: 
 
 "Jesus, digue rangon de rhomme rachete. 
 
 Amour de notre coeur et desir de notre ame, 
 Seul Createur de tout, Dieu dans I'eternite, 
 
 Homme a la fin des temps naissant d'une femme. 
 
 " Quel exces de clemence a su ta surmonter, 
 
 Que, portant les peches de son peuple rebelle, 
 Tu souffris une mort horrible d, reconter. 
 Pour garantir les tiens de la mort eternelle ? 
 
 "Que la meme bonte t' oblige maintenant, 
 
 A surmonter les maux dont ton peuple est coupable ; 
 Remplis ses justes voeux en les lui pardonnant, 
 Et qu'il jouisse'en paix de tu vue ineffable. 
 
 " Sois notre unique joie, O J6sus, notre Roi, 
 
 Qui seras pour toujours notre unique salaire ; 
 Que toute notre gloire a jamais soit on toi, 
 Dans le jour ^ternel o\\. ta splendeur eclaire ! " 
 
 "The good father thought this so fine," continues 
 Madame Perier, " that he urged her to proceed, but 
 her scruples were aroused by the reflection that she 
 had undertaken the work without due consultation." 
 
 She wrote to Port Royal to ask advice, and re- 
 ceived an answer, Sainte-Beuve says from Agnes, 
 Cousin says from Angelique, and where such doctors 
 disagree we would not undertake to settle the point.
 
 i8o Sister and Saint. 
 
 At any rate, the letter probably expresses the opin- 
 ions of both sisters on the subject, and they had forti- 
 fied their own by that of M. Singlin. " I have ob- 
 tained M. Singlin's opinion on the questions you ask," 
 the letter runs. " To the first " (which seems to have 
 been an inquiry into the propriety of some employ- 
 ment), " he says that nuns must not work for vanity, 
 and it would be better for you to work on it a little 
 at a time by way of occupation. As to the second, it 
 is better for you to hide your talents of that nature, 
 instead of making them known. God will not re- 
 quire an account of them, and they must be buried, for 
 the lot of women is humility and silence." 
 
 Again, '' I am glad that you have yourself antici- 
 pated this decision. You ought to hate your genius, 
 and all the other traits in your character which, per- 
 haps, cause the world to retain you, for where it has 
 sown it would fain gather the harvest. Our Saviour 
 will do the same in His own good time. He will call 
 for the fruit of that divine seed which He has set in 
 your heart, and which, with patience, will become 
 abundantly multiplied. This is all He now asks 
 of us." 
 
 " When Jacqueline received this letter," says her 
 sister, " she showed it to me, and, without giving any 
 reason, begged the good father to excuse her from 
 proceeding farther." This was, then, with one nota- 
 ble exception, Jacqueline Pascal's last poetic effort.
 
 Waiting. 1 8 1 
 
 The third noteworthy production of her pen during 
 these years was a series of fifty-one " pensees edifian- 
 tes" on the mystery of the death of our Lord Jesus 
 Christ. 
 
 It was the custom at Port Royal to decide by lot 
 every month on a motto, or subject of meditation, 
 for each member of the sisterhood. The M6re Agnes 
 often included Jacqueline in this drawing of lots, and 
 in May, 165 1, she sent her the subject given above 
 with this kind little note : " I have drawn for you the 
 Mystery of Jesus Christ's Death, and the same subject 
 has also fallen to my lot. I have thereby been led 
 to think that .... none of those holy desires, emo- 
 tions, and actions which God inspires in us can reach 
 their full perfection, nor aid us in the attainment of 
 Christian holiness, until our self-will is entirely dead 
 and happily swallowed up in God's will. When this 
 is done, we can not fail of experiencing that resurrec- 
 tion which gives eternal life. Let us therefore try, 
 my dear sister, to realize that it is the privilege of our 
 heavenly calling to die daily, and let us not shrink 
 from crucifying our own inclinations, if we may there- 
 by honor Him whose death has procured for us eter- 
 nal life." 
 
 These reflections of Jacqueline Pascal's on the death 
 of Christ would be rather heavy reading, to say noth- 
 ing of writing, for most young ladies of the present 
 day, however religiously inclined. We are to notice
 
 1 82 Sister and Saint. 
 
 / 
 
 that they are thoughts — not feelings — and that each 
 one has a practical bearing. If any girl will make the 
 experiment of writing out fifty-one distinct thoughts 
 on any one single fact, she will get an impression of 
 the quality of Jacqueline Pascal's mind. 
 
 We give a few extracts, choosing them on the prin- 
 ciple of brevity chiefly : 
 
 III. 
 
 Jesus died in reality, and not figuratively, or in de- 
 sire only. 
 
 This teaches me that I ought to die to the world 
 effectively, and not to be content with imaginations 
 and beautiful speculations about it. 
 
 IV. 
 
 The death of Jesus has nothing extraordinary about 
 it ; that is to say. His body "was deprived of life, as 
 all other bodies are, and death took possession of Him 
 in the posture and in the manner natural to that 
 condition. 
 
 This teaches me that although I ought to destroy 
 within me the flesh and all its desires, there should 
 nevertheless be nothing extraordinary nor singular in 
 my actions ; but I should do simply those things 
 which are suitable to my present condition.
 
 Waiting. 183 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Jesus did not wait to die of old age, but antici- 
 pated death in the strength of His youth. 
 
 This teaches me not to wait till the decadence of 
 my life before dying to the world, but to anticipate 
 the actual by the mystic death. 
 
 X. 
 
 Jesus died on the cross, raised above all the world, 
 having ever}^'thing under His feet, even His blessed 
 mother. 
 
 I learn from this that my heart should be above all 
 the things of this world, and that by this elevation of 
 spirit, which is not proud, but heavenly, I should rci 
 gard as beneath me everything, even that which is 
 most grand and most amiable. 
 
 XV. 
 
 Jesus died publicly, before the eyes of all who chose 
 to gaze. 
 
 I learn from this that although my condition may 
 expose me to the eyes of the world, nevertheless I 
 should die to it. 
 
 XXVIII. 
 
 I see Jesus dead in three different places : on the 
 cross in view of the whole world ; descended from the
 
 184 Sister and Saint. 
 
 cross in the midst of His friends ; and in the tomb in 
 
 entire solitude ; and in these three places He is equally- 
 dead. 
 
 This teaches me that in whatever state I may find 
 myself, in conversation or in solitude, I should equally 
 be dead to the world. 
 
 XXX. 
 
 Jesus was clothed after His death with the garments 
 suitable to the dead. 
 
 I learn from this to show by my dress that I am 
 dead to the world. 
 
 XXXII. 
 
 Even the cloth in which the body of Jesus was 
 wrapped did not belong to Him. 
 
 I learn from this not to be attached to the things 
 which are about me, even those which are most useful. 
 
 XLVII. 
 
 Jesus did not enter triumphant into heaven as soon 
 as He died to the earth, but He waited patiently sev- 
 eral days. 
 
 This teaches me to suffer in patience the privation 
 of celestial consolations.
 
 Waiting. 185 
 
 XLVIII. 
 
 Jesus died, but in dying He did not leave His own 
 comfortless. He sent to them His Holy Spirit, 
 which is His Divine Love, to dwell with them 
 (though invisible), even to the end of the world. 
 
 I learn from this that in whatever manner I may 
 be separated from my own, I ought, nevertheless, 
 always to dwell with them by an affection which is 
 born of God, and always assist them with my prayers. 
 
 It ^vas by the death of the natural body of Jesus 
 that He gave life to His mystical body, which is the 
 Church. 
 
 This teaches me that my death to the world should 
 be the principle of my life in God,
 
 THE LORD OPENS THE WAY,
 
 XIII. 
 
 THE LORD OPENS THE WAY. 
 
 THUS the months and the years had passed 
 away till Septemoer, 165 1. "At that time," 
 says Madame Perier, ''my father was seized 
 with the illness of which he died, and my sister de- 
 voted herself to attendance upon him by day and 
 night, with the utmost zeal and assiduity. She may 
 be said to have done nothing else, for when her 
 presence was not needed in his room, she withdrew 
 to her own apartment, where, as she herself told me, 
 she prostrated herself and prayed for him incessantly 
 with tears. But God, notwithstanding, did accord- 
 ing to His own will, and my father died, September 
 24th. We were at once informed of it (being then at 
 Clermont), but my state of health prevented us irom 
 reaching Paris before the last of November." This 
 was the time when, as we may remember, Madame 
 Perier " preferred to incur the expense and trouble " 
 of taking her little girls with her rather than run the 
 
 (iSg)
 
 190 Sister and Saint, 
 
 risk of possible ribbons and laces bestowed by their 
 indulgent grandmother. 
 
 While Blaise and Jacqueline waited together these 
 few weeks in the house of mourning, there seems to 
 have been a renewal of the old, beautiful, tender in- 
 timacy between them. 
 
 " My brother was much comforted in his deep afflic- 
 tion by her society," says Madame Perier. And, 
 doubtless, Jacqueline was as much comforted by her 
 brother. Notwithstanding the opposition of her 
 opinion to that of her father, her love for him was 
 deep and her mourning most sincere. Touched by a 
 common sorrow, the hearts of brother and sister crept 
 naturally close together. Once more Jacqueline be 
 comes her brother's scribe, and they write together s 
 long, beautiful letter of mingled grief and consolation 
 to their sister. 
 
 " Let us view death," they say, " in Jesus Christ, 
 
 and not without Him In Christ all things are 
 
 pleasant, and work together for our good. Death is 
 no exception. Christ suffered and died that He 
 might sanctify death and sorrow. 
 
 " It is not right for us to be without grief, even as 
 the angels who are unconscious of sorrow. Neither 
 ought we to refuse comfort, as do the heathen in 
 
 their ignorance of grace It is our duty to let 
 
 the comforts of grace overcome natural sorrow, and to 
 say with the apostle, * Being afflicted, We give thanks.'
 
 The Lord Opens the Way. 191 
 
 "A holy man once told me that one of the most 
 advantageous ways of showing our love for departed 
 friends is ^ do as they would advise us, were they 
 still living, to follow their counsels, and to endeavor 
 to attain that state of holiness in which they would 
 delight to see us." 
 
 And then Blaise cries out in his own name (though 
 the handwriting throughout the letter is Jacqueline's), 
 " His loss is greater to me than to the others. Had 
 I lost him six years ago I had been ruined, and 
 though my need of him is not quite so absolute at 
 the present time, it seems as if he were necessary to 
 me for the next ten years, and his presence would 
 have been useful through my whole life." 
 
 Undoubtedly, during the three years just past, 
 father and son had been much thrown upon each 
 other for companionship, and the separation was the 
 more keenly felt on that account. Perhaps, also, 
 there was another reason for his feeling the need of a 
 father's restraining and inspiring presence. 
 
 As we have seen, his path and Jacqueline's have 
 been all this time diverging. Not only was he not 
 ready to follow her up to her cold, calm heights, but 
 his feet had, actually, for a time, turned in another 
 (and in Jacqueline's austere judgment), an opposite 
 direction. 
 
 That he had not lost his faith is abundantly 
 proved by the letter from which we have quoted.
 
 T92 Sister and Saint. 
 
 But cut off from all study, either secular or religious; 
 deprived of the old home enjoyments by the absence 
 of one sister and the still greater inaccessibility of the 
 present one ; denied, both by ill-health a»d by his 
 easy circumstances, the invigorating effect of manual 
 labor, it would have been a marvel if the young man's 
 life had not acquired a taint of aimlessness. At first, 
 when the physicians had ordered him to " abandon 
 every sort of mental occupation, and seek, as much as 
 he could, opportunities of amusing himself," he was 
 very reluctant to take their advice, " because " (keen, 
 clear, honest logician that he was !) " he saw its danger T 
 
 "At length, however, he yielded, thinking it his 
 duty to do all he could to restore his health, and 
 believing that trivial amusements could not harm 
 him." And so, to use the severe expression of Jan- 
 senism, Pascal had " set himself on the world." 
 
 Margaret Perier, his niece, relieves the picture by 
 a few slight details : 
 
 " In consequence of my uncle's miserable state of 
 health," she s^ys, " the physicians had to interdict all 
 mental effort ; but a disposition so lively and energetic 
 as his could not long remain idle. When he was no 
 longer busied in scientific pursuits, or in religious 
 studies requiring close application, he felt the need of 
 amusement, and this drove him into company where 
 he played cards and joined in other diversions. At 
 first he did so in moderation ; but by degrees his
 
 The Lord Opens the Way. 193 
 
 taste for society increased, and though his life was 
 never in the least vicious or irregular, it gradually be- 
 came gay, frivolous, and useless At length he 
 
 made up his mind to follow the common routine, 
 purchase some office, and marry." 
 
 And this is the worst that, in all the Port Royal 
 and the family annals, can be found set down against 
 those few deeply-regretted years. 
 
 But now his father's death recalls Blaise Pascal from 
 whatever worldly pleasures he may have been enjoy- 
 ing, and the loss of that father's affectionate presence 
 throws him back upon his sisters for the love he so 
 much needs both to give and to receive. 
 
 How beautifully the strong, natural affection blazes 
 up at this opportunity — that affection so soon to be 
 resolutely smothered, though never extinguished ! 
 "May God continue in my heart," he says, "that 
 love for you and my sister which seems to me greater 
 at this moment than it ever was before. I feel as if 
 the love we used to lavish on my father ought not to 
 be lost, but to be gathered up and concentrated oji each 
 other. The legacy of love he left us should be in- 
 vested in a deeper fraternal affection, if that were 
 possible." 
 
 With such feelings in his heart, with Jacqueline by 
 
 his side, writing for him and ministering to him in 
 
 her old sisterly way, it is not strange that he should 
 
 have been " much comforted," nor that he should 
 
 9
 
 194 Sister and Saint. 
 
 have " imagined that kindness would induce her to 
 stay with him at least a year, to help him in recover- 
 ing from this great calamity." 
 
 But Jacqueline's purpose was exactly what it had 
 been for three years. The Lord had now removed 
 the only obstacle in the way of her fulfilling it. There 
 was, then, in her view, but one thing for her to do. 
 She would take the portion of goods that fell to her 
 and go to Port Royal. Till her sister could come, 
 and the property could be divided, she would stay 
 with her brother. And while' she stayed she would 
 be his loving, sympathizing, and tender sister. She 
 would not add to his grief if it were possible to help 
 it. She would make the wrench as gentle as possi- 
 ble. " She concealed her intentions till we arrived," 
 says her sister. " She then told me that she meant 
 to take the veil as soon as the estate was divided, and 
 that she should spare my brother's feelings by letting 
 him suppose she was only going to make a retreat at 
 Port Royal." 
 
 A month passed after Madame Perier's arrival at 
 Paris before the estate was settled. During this time 
 Jacqueline "disposed of everything" in preparation 
 for retirement from the world. On the last day of 
 December the division of property was made, and 
 the last papers signed. Jacqueline had a part of her 
 own share transferred to her brother, but she kept a 
 considerable sum — her fdowry for her " divine be- 
 trothal " — about which more hereafter.
 
 The Lord Opens the Way. . 195 
 
 _ « 
 
 Three days after the settlement she left her home 
 forever. This is her sister's simple story : 
 
 " On the evening before, she begged me to say 
 something to my brother, that he might not be taken 
 by surprise. I did so, with all the precaution I 
 could ; but though I hinted something about ' a re- 
 treat,' he did not fail to be deeply moved. He with- 
 drew very sad to his own chamber, without seeing 
 my sister, who was then in a small cabinet where she 
 was accustomed to retire for prayer. She did not 
 come out till my brother had left, as she feared his 
 look would go to her heart. 
 
 " I told her for him what words of tenderness he 
 had spoken, and after that we both retired. Though 
 I consented with all «ny heart to what my sister was 
 doing, because I thought it was for her highest good, 
 the greatness of her resolution astonished and occu- 
 pied my mind so much that I could not sleep all 
 night. 
 
 "At seven o'clock the next morning, when I saw 
 that my sister was not up, I concluded that she was 
 no longer sleeping, and feared she might be ill. 
 Accordingly, I went to her bed, where I found her 
 still fast asleep. The noise I made awoke her ; she 
 asked me what time it was. I told her ; and having 
 inquired ho-\\^ she was and if she had slept well, she 
 said she was very well and had slept excellently. 
 
 " So she rose, dressed, and went away, doing this, as
 
 ig6 Sister and Saint. 
 
 everything else, with a tranquilHty and equanimity 
 inconceivable. 
 
 " We said no adieu for fear of breaking dozvn. I 
 only turned aside when I saw her ready to go. 
 
 " In this manner she quitted the world on the 4th 
 of January, 1652, being then exactly twenty-six years 
 and three months old." 
 
 Thus ends Madame Periei's sketch of the sister's 
 life, from which we have quoted so often. 
 
 How touching in their simplicity are these last 
 words ! How full of suppressed, unselfish love ! 
 
 " What a picture," says Principal Tulloch, " does 
 this extract give us of this remarkable family ! — the 
 elder sister's wakeful anxiety— the younger's calm 
 determination — the brother's half-suppressed yet 
 deeply-moved tenderness- the proud and sensitive 
 reserve of all the three ! " 
 
 To our mind, the elder sister, acting as medium 
 between Blaise and Jacqueline, who dared not trust 
 themselves to meet — quite forgetting herself in 
 tender concern for each of them — shielding and 
 soothing the wounded brother, yet rising to full 
 sympathy with Jacqueline in her high resolve — al- 
 ways unselfish, always "la fidele,'' forms the noblest 
 figure of the group. Yet there is dignity in the 
 silent Blaise, sitting " very sad," but unremonstrating, 
 uncomplai^ning in his chamber. And there is a won- 
 derful calm brightness about the noble girl sleeping
 
 The Lord Opens the Way. 197 
 
 " excellently " on the eve of so great and solemn a 
 change. Was this from want of love and tenderness ? 
 Gilberte knew belter than that ! " She feared his look 
 would go to her hearth *' We said no adieu for fear 
 of breaking dozun." 
 
 Port Royal opened joyous gates to the dear sister 
 who had so long waited for admittance. Jacqueline 
 was assigned at first to the Paris house, and entered 
 at once upon the active duties of the convent as pos- 
 tulant or candidate. 
 
 It was, undoubtedly, a pleasant and a healthful 
 change from the life of solitude and introversion she 
 had been leading. At the same time there were in- 
 conveniences and hardships attendant on convent 
 life which might have severely shocked the delicate, 
 high-bred girl had she not wisely made some prepa- 
 ration for them. The abbesses Angolique and Agnes 
 allowed no luxuries to themselves or to their nuns, 
 except the luxury of charity. The utmost poverty 
 and bareness prevailed throughout the whole build- 
 ing, and the nuns' cell's — the only thing in the world 
 which they could call their own — were no exception 
 to the rule. The story is told of one of the Arnaulds, 
 that, on going to her cell for the first time, at night, 
 she covered the one bare little table with a white 
 cloth and made such few simple preparations for her 
 toilet as circumstances admitted. The abbess — her own 
 sister Angelique — noticed it in her nightly round, and
 
 198 Sister and Saint. 
 
 " laaghed in her heart." However, she said nothing that 
 night, but the next day the simple little appointments 
 — cloth and all — were removed. When the young sistei 
 came to her cell the second night and found it bare 
 again, she thought there had been some mistake and 
 again spread a clean white handkerchief over the table. 
 But once more it was removed, and so it went on till 
 she had thoroughly learned the lesson and cheerfully 
 submitted to it. It was a part of the great lesson of 
 "the mystery of the poverty of Christ." 
 
 Jacqueline Pascal had been humbly trying to learn 
 that lesson in her own cheerless chamber at home, 
 and probably she found little difficulty in suiting her- 
 self to a new lack of comforts. Her dress, too — the 
 ugly and harassing combination described by Gil- 
 berte — must have been willingly exchanged for the 
 novice's costume — a " loose, gray robe, cut on the 
 cross, fastened round the throat and hanging to the 
 feet." The beauty of this dress, according to Angel- 
 ique, was that "all kinds of work could be done in 
 it," and all kinds of work were done by candidates, 
 novices, and sisters of all degrees, from cleaning the 
 hen-house and scouring the saucepans tcr the most 
 exquisite darning and the reverent care of the altar 
 furniture. 
 
 " We used to go into the kitchen by turns for a 
 week together," says Anne Arnauld. " We liked hard 
 work of all kinds, and I was particularly fond of
 
 The Lord Opens the Way. 199 
 
 sweeping the floors, remembering that St. Theresa 
 took great pleasure in it. In the summer mornings 
 we used to go into the garden and dig in silence with 
 great zeal. We rose at two to say matins and did not 
 go to bed again after that time. In winter the church 
 was very cold, but no one complained of it, and our 
 clothing was not much warmer in winter than it was 
 in summer." 
 
 The " Constitutions of Port Royal," drawn up by 
 the Mere Agnes, give us a similar view of humility 
 and* activity. " The novices," says this authority, 
 " are not to be fed with milk and honey, by being 
 humored and treated gently, but with the strong 
 
 meat of self-denial and humiliations Industry 
 
 is a positive duty, each sister being expected to 
 perform a certain amount of work daily, the more 
 humiliating the better, and to love her task, because 
 the Saviour stooped to practice a lowly trade, and so 
 did His apostles. They make their own habits and 
 shoes, as well as linen, wafers, and wax candles. Book- 
 binding is also one of our occupations, and we make 
 lanterns, candlesticks, and other useful articles of tin." 
 .... (Embroideries and artificial flowers were never 
 introduced at Port Royal). "When at work, the 
 
 sisters are to be silent and meditative Strict 
 
 silence is enjoined for some hours of each day, except 
 in case of absolute necessity, and even then the use 
 of sifjns is recommended Those possessing
 
 200 Sister and Samt. 
 
 good voices are carefully trained to sing in the choir, 
 under the direction of a leader, who must strain every 
 nerve to prevent the possibility of a mistake or fail- 
 ure in the worship of the sanctuary ; yet the leader is 
 not to assume undue authority, ox permit her voice to 
 be heard above the others ! " 
 
 One of the sweetest duties of the convent to Jac- 
 queline was, doubtless, what was called " the perpetual 
 adoration of the Holy Sacrament." This expression 
 is a little startling to Protestant ears, but it only signi- 
 fied " that every nun was to spend a portion of each 
 day in silent prayer before the altar, and to wait there 
 till relieved by one of her companions." They had 
 no set form of prayer for the occasion, but were to 
 invoke the special aid of the Holy Spirit to bring 
 their wishes into accordance with God's will, ^^ and 
 not dwelling on their own persoiial tvants or sins, were 
 to forget self and plead earnestly for the good of 
 the Church universal and the extension of Christ s 
 kingdom. They were taught to hope' that by thus 
 trying to imitate the blessed ones who "■ rest not day 
 nor night " in their worship, and " expelling as far as 
 possible all earthly interests from the heart, Christ 
 would fill it with the precious balm of His grace, 
 and perfume their poor prayers with the incense of 
 His own merits. The remembrance of this hallowed 
 hour was also to accompany them through the rest 
 of the day. Their motto was to be, ' I sleep, but my
 
 The Lord Opens the Way. 201 
 
 heart worketh,' meaning that no occupation ought to 
 distract their minds from continued prayer and com- 
 munion with Jesus." 
 
 Of course, in addition to this daily worship in the 
 church, and fixed hours for each one in her own cell, 
 the sisterhood observed the ordinary Church routine 
 of lasts and festivals. The Bible was, moreover, daily 
 read aloud — not a common custom in a convent at 
 that time, if it is at present. The nuns were urged 
 to learn portions of it by heart. " Let them try to 
 fill the treasury of their minds with God's word," say 
 the Constitutions. " It is more desirable than gold 
 or precious stones." 
 
 One hour of every day was allowed the sisters " in 
 which to make confession of losses, accidents, or 
 slight failures in duty." There was another " hour of 
 conference," in summer, spent in the garden, where 
 each one was permitted to speak freely, '' provided 
 she did so with discretion and grave politeness, as 
 well as care not to interrupt others, or put herself un- 
 duly forward." 
 
 Such was the daily course of Jacqueline Pascal's 
 
 life during these first months at Port Royal. We are 
 
 obliged to learn of it from the convent rules and not 
 
 from herself, for at first she wrote very little, even to 
 
 her faithful Gilberte. Indeed, the " Constitutions " 
 
 require that letters should be rarely written. They 
 
 were never sent without inspection, nor were they 
 ft*
 
 202 Sister and Saint. 
 
 ever to be very affectionate. " The best way of ex- 
 pressing love is in prayer for its object." 
 
 Without doubt, Jacqueline was happy. But one 
 great burden lay on her heart — one great longing 
 took possession of her soul. It was the longing for 
 her brother's full sympathy. As the time drew near 
 for her to take the veil the burden weighed heavier, 
 the longing grew more intense. Her few letters at 
 this time are grave and repressed. It is not till later, 
 when actual trial and persecution are staring her in 
 the face, but when her heart is lightened of this great 
 weight, that we catch once more an occasional gleam 
 of her youthful playfulness.
 
 FRESH TRIALS.
 
 XIV. 
 
 FRESH TRIALS. 
 
 THE usual period of probation at Port Royal 
 was a year, but Jacqueline had in effect 
 been on probation before she entered the 
 convent, and, in her case, the time was shortened to 
 four months. 
 
 It was arranged that she should take the veil as a 
 novice in May. And looking forward to that joyful 
 occasion, there is but one thing lacking to render her 
 happiness complete. 
 
 Early in March she wrote a long letter to her 
 brother — a letter as remarkable as the one she wrote 
 her father when begging for a " retreat " at Port 
 Royal. 
 
 " This letter reveals," says Cousin, " both the 
 woman and the saint, the mingled passion and ob- 
 stinacy which distinguish the whole family, and withal 
 a charming sweetness — a blending of humble entreat- 
 ies with the accent of command." She signs herself 
 
 C205)
 
 2o6 Sister and Saint. 
 
 already " sceur de Sainte-Euphemie," the " new 
 name" which she is to receive on the day of the 
 coming ceremony. (Strange that while cutting them- 
 selves away from all natural relationships, and break- 
 ing the most sacred bonds, these monks and nuns 
 must yet borrow the names of human ties to express 
 their ideal of their place in God's world ! Father — 
 mother — brother — sister — they can find no more sa- 
 cred titles by which to show what they believe to be 
 the highest and holiest estate for man or woman !) 
 
 Through the greater part of this letter Jacqueline 
 addresses her brother with the grave and formal 
 " you," but now and then she forgets herself and re- 
 lapses into the old familiar " thou." She begs him 
 by all their former intimacy to give her " his kindly 
 greeting" in this solemn act, and yet she reminds 
 him that she is now her own mistress, and can do as 
 she pleases without his consent ! In short, the whole 
 eight pages are just as illogical, just as affectionate, 
 just as proud, as noble, and as thoroughly feminine 
 as was that long letter to her father three years be- 
 fore. 
 
 See how skillfully she touches upon every motive 
 which" can possibly have weight in her brother's 
 mind : 
 
 " Do you remember the time," she says, " when I 
 loved the world, and when my knowledge and love of 
 God increased my guilt, because my heart was so un-
 
 Fresh Trials, 207 
 
 equally divided between two masters? Do you re- 
 member that it 'Wd.syou who first tried to convince me 
 that I could not unite two things so opposed as the 
 spirit of religion and the spirit of the world?" 
 
 " You ought, in some measure, to judge of my affec- 
 tion by your own, and to consider that, even if I am 
 strong enough to persevere, despite your resistance, I 
 may not be able to bear up against the grief it will 
 cause me." As if she would say, " I am human still, 
 though you may not believe it ; I have a heart and you 
 can make it ache." 
 
 " You have the power of troubling my peace," she 
 goes on, " but you can not restore it if, through your 
 fault, I should once lose it. Do not take that away 
 which you can not give." 
 
 " Do not hinder those who do well ; and do well 
 yourself ; at least, if you have not the strength to fol- 
 low me, do not hold me back." 
 
 " How strange that you should have such scruples ! 
 You would not try to prevent my marrying a prince, 
 nor think, if I did so, it were not my duty to follow 
 him, even to a place very far removed from you." 
 
 " I await this proof of your affection," she con- 
 cludes (his presence at the ceremony). ..." Of course 
 my invitation is a mere form, for / do not imagine you 
 wonld dream of siayiiig dzvay .^ .... I have written 
 to my sister. I ask you to console her, if necessary, 
 and to encourage her. I tell her that if she wishes to
 
 2o8 Sister and Saint. 
 
 come, it will delight me to see her, but that if she 
 
 comes in the hope of making me change my mind, 
 her pains will be. thrown away. I say the same to 
 you. Now, do with a good grace what you must do 
 any way ; I mean, do it in a spirit of kindness, and 
 do not make me unhappy. Farewell, my very dear 
 brother." 
 
 This letter brought Blaise at once to his sister's 
 side. He came the day after receiving it, and saw 
 her for the first time, perhaps, since she left him, in 
 the convent parlor through the grated window. 
 
 " He was nearly wild with a terrible headache," 
 Jacqueline writes to Madame Perier — " the result of 
 my letter. Yet he was much softened ; for instead of 
 the two years' delay he had asked before, he only 
 wanted me to wait till All Saints' Day" — the last of 
 October. " But seeing me determined not to put it 
 off long, and yet complaisant enough to allow him a 
 little more time to get accustomed to the thought, he 
 gave up entirely, and even expressed pity for me that 
 I had been obliged to delay so long that which I had 
 set my heart upon. Nevertheless, he did not return 
 at the appointed hour to settle the exact time, but 
 M. d'Andilly, by my request, was good enough to 
 send for him Saturday, and to argue with him so skill- 
 fully and yet cordially that he agreed to everything 
 we- wished." 
 
 Thus far Jacqueline had gained her point, but pain-
 
 Fresh Trials. 209 
 
 ful difficulties were yet to come — difficulties of a kind 
 quite unthought of by her. She had no idea of enter- 
 ing Port Royal empty-handed, and took it as a matter 
 of course that her portion of her father's property was 
 to go to endow the convent. But to her great sur- 
 prise, her brother and her sister — yes, even her faith- 
 ful Gilberte — were not inclined to agree with her in 
 this view. If she had chosen the spiritual riches, 
 they seemed to think it but right and natural that 
 they should have the earthly. They viewed the 
 case, as poor Jacqueline says, *' in an entirely secular 
 manner." The mixture of grief, vexation, and morti- 
 fication in her heart at this unexpected contretemps is 
 curious to witness. For the proud and high-spirited 
 daughter of M. Pascal to come to Port Royal portion- 
 less, is, indeed, a bitter thing. But she humbles her- 
 self even to this, and "begs earnestly" for admission 
 as a "lay-sister." " If my reception must be a gratu- 
 itous one, I thought tha<(j!lout of gratitude to the sis- 
 terhood, for the double favor of welcoming me with- 
 out a dowry, I could do no less than serve them as a 
 
 menial for the rest of my life But God, the 
 
 Searcher of hearts, knew me to be unworthy of an 
 office so honorable in His sight, and that my past and 
 present pride needed a punishment instead of a re- 
 ward. He therefore restrained Father Singlin from 
 giving his consent." 
 
 In a '' Relation," which takes up fifty pages of
 
 2IO Sister and Saint. 
 
 Cousin's volume, Jacqueline gives the detaih; of this 
 whole affair. The paper was written not in her own 
 interest, but as part of the " Memoirs of Port Royal," 
 and notwithstanding its length, it is worthy the read- 
 ing of any one who is interested in the study of char- 
 acter. It shows that the infirmities of human nature, 
 in convents and out of them, were much the same in 
 the seventeenth century as now. Yet at the same 
 time it shows how far love and right feeling and re- 
 ligion can go toward conquering those infirmities. 
 
 At first Jacqueline has nothing but indignation and 
 a fine scorn to bestow on her brother and sister. Her 
 years of mortification had not placed her beyond the 
 possibility of genuine anger and vexation. " My res- 
 olution," she says, " which they thought so unkind, 
 gave my friends a fine chance of moralizing over the 
 instability of human affections ! " 
 
 . Both Blaise and Gilberte wrote, giving as reasons 
 for their refusal, the entagtfeinent of her share of the 
 property with their own, and various technical difificul- 
 ties. If she tvoiildzvait four years, till all claims on the 
 estate had been settled, they would think of it. " Dis- 
 ingenuous arguments ! " she exclaims, " which, had 
 they been less irritated, they would never have named ! 
 Not that these reasons were actually untrue," she 
 goes on to say, " but they were not S2ich as zve had 
 been acejcstomed to tise zvith one anotlier ! Just thinlc, 
 my dear mother, how these letters made me feel ! —
 
 Fresh Trials. 2 1 1 
 
 written in a style so changed ! . . . . my grief became 
 so violent that it seems wonderful I lived through it." 
 
 '' This strong expression," says Sainte-Beuve, " is 
 no exaggeration. She does nearly die of it. Her 
 intense, enthusiastic nature, frustrated on the point 
 of the triumphant fulfillment of her vow, and that, 
 too, by a thrust from those whom she loves, is almost 
 overpowered. And we recognize here the same ten- 
 der, conscientious, womanly heart that a few years 
 later falls a victim to its own scruples and reproaches." 
 
 The dear Mother Agnes sees Jacqueline's heavy 
 grief and sends for her — her " fille cherie " — for a long 
 private talk. With the greatest tact and wisdom she 
 deals with the wounded heart. " Only eternal things 
 are worth such emotion as this," she says. " Tempo- 
 ral matters ought never to call forth these tears — only 
 the real evils, sins, deserve those." And then, trying 
 the effect of a little gayety, she declares that she is 
 *' really astonished ! that it is almost incredible that 
 she, a novice — a novice of Port Royal! — ready to 
 make her profession — is capable of being afflicted by 
 anything, least of all by such a bagatelle as a little 
 money! " 
 
 But though the novice's heart is lightened for a 
 time, Agnes sees that she has not effected a cure. So, 
 in the kindness of her heart, she sets out for Dcs 
 Champs to tell Angclique all about it, and Father 
 Singlin, too, who happens to be there for a few days
 
 212 Sister and Saint. 
 
 The Mdre Angelique's advice is characteristic. 
 "Tell her to relinquish it all t'o her relatives, and not 
 to mix herself up in the matter any further. And let 
 her give her whole mind to her approaching profes- 
 sion." 
 
 Dowry or no dowry, lay-sister or lady-boarder — the 
 profession was the main thing in Angelique's mind. 
 That was a matter of course. When was Port Royal 
 — since sJie had anything to do with it, certainly — 
 known to delay a profession on the score of poverty ? 
 
 But good Father Singlin has the guidance not only 
 of Jacqueline's conscience, but of the Reverend Moth- 
 er's as well, and by this time he has gained a good 
 deal of facility in reading souls. " He did not en- 
 tirely agree with our Mother," says the Relation, " for 
 he feared there might be too much generosity and 
 too little humility in the advice ! " 
 
 And he " improved " the occasion (perhaps on the 
 way back to Paris, whither they both returned the 
 next day), by a few short remarks. " When we have 
 overcome the avarice of wealth," he said, "we ought 
 to beware of falling into the opposite extreme and 
 .becoming greedy of praise, and ostentatious of our 
 generosity, while we despise those who still cling to 
 their property." 
 
 After some further conference, however, he advised 
 Jacqueline to adopt the M^re Angelique's plan, but 
 he chose to dictate her letter to her brother himself,
 
 Fresh Trials, 213 
 
 "lest my owit words should be too warm," says Jac- 
 queline, frankly. "This letter," she continues, "could 
 not be short, and it kept me busy till evening so that 
 I did not see our Mother. But, on the next day, 
 as was her custom after returning from the coun- 
 try, she sent for all the novices, and when my turn 
 came to salute her, I could not help saying that I was 
 the only sorrowful one among the sisters, who were 
 all delighted at her return. ' What ? ' said she, ' is it 
 possible, my daughter, that you are still sad ? Were 
 you not prepared for trials ?'.... And then she 
 talked to me a long time on the emptiness of all human 
 affection J keeping her arm around me tvitJi much teti' 
 derness I ' — dear, inconsistent Angelique ! 
 
 " The next day, also, ' having noticed that my looks 
 were unusually sad,' she left the choir before Mass 
 began, and sending for me, did her best to give 
 me comfort. Not content with this brief effort of 
 kindness, as soon as Mass was over, she signed to me 
 to follow her, and then supported my head on her 
 bosom for a full hour, caressing me all the time with 
 a mother's tenderness. I can truly say that she 
 omitted nothing in her power that could charm away 
 my distress." 
 
 '[ I told her," says Jacqueline, naively, " that it was 
 the injustice done to the establishment that troubled 
 me, and that personally I was neither hurt nor angry, 
 but simply indifferent. 'You are mistaken, my
 
 214 Sister and Saint. 
 
 daughter,' said she. ' Nothing is more painful or hard 
 to bear than wounded affection. I know you feel 
 deeply the injustice done to the House, but your own 
 share in this gives you a keener pang, for self-love 
 mingles in everything we do, and is the mainspring of 
 this mighty sorrow ! ' 
 
 " She was then so good as to give me the details of 
 several similar cases, without mentioning names. I 
 suppose this was done as much for the sake of afford- 
 ing me that species of comfort derivable from com- 
 panionship in misery, as to convince me that we never 
 take the interests of justice so much to heart as when 
 they concern ourselves." 
 
 " Now forget all that is past," says the good Moth- 
 er, at the end of this long talk, " and speak and write 
 to your friends as if nothing had occurred, merely 
 telling them that you confirm your resignation (of 
 the property) in their favor. And you must do this in 
 all sincerity^ avoiding a spirit of pride, as if you had 
 been more generous than they, and avoiding, also, a 
 wish to coax them into obliging you. If our actions 
 do not arise from genuine love they are worthless." 
 
 Pascal, it seems, was at this time absent from the 
 city for a few days, but when he came home and 
 found Jacqueline's letters awaiting him, he at once 
 presented himself again in the convent parlor. Port 
 Royal's nobility had challenged his, and he was not 
 found wanting ! He undertook " a Pinstant" to
 
 Fresh Trials. 215 
 
 manage the whole affair, and without waiting to free 
 his sister's portion from its entanglement with the 
 rest of the estate, to make a gift in his own name to 
 the convent, " taking upon himself all risks and 
 charges." Thus. suddenly and simply was the diffi- 
 culty removed. 
 
 As to Pascal's first position in the matter, Reuch- 
 lin explains it thus: "In the case of twins it is fre- 
 quently observable that the death of one is soon fol- 
 lowed by that of the other. Blaise Pascal and Jac- 
 queline Pascal were twins in soul, and when the 
 former strove to prevent his sister's complete identifi- 
 cation with Port Royal, he was in reality struggling 
 for the right of his own independence — fighting for 
 his own life. Another pretext for delay presented 
 itself in this difficulty about the property, and he 
 eagerly seized it." But as soon as he saw that it was 
 useless, that Jacqueline's determination remained un- 
 shaken in spite of the worst he could do, he gave up 
 without another word. Gilberte, for her part, seems 
 to have acted only out of sympathy for her brother, 
 and from the natural "secular" view of the matter. 
 But she yields in the end as gratefully as does her 
 brother. 
 
 And so, at last, the eve of the solemn day had 
 actually com.e — the day so long delayed, so ardently 
 desired ! Is Jacqueline as happy as she expected to 
 be? A few days before, she wrote 'to her sister-.
 
 2i6 Sister and Saint. 
 
 " There is nothing but sorrow everywhere " (referring 
 to the war), "yet I am full of joy, for I am to take the 
 veil on the glorious feast of Trinity. After so much 
 opposition, it seems like a dream to find myself so 
 near it. I shall fear that it is only an illusion till the 
 ceremony is really over. But I will not waste time 
 in expatiating on my happiness, for you can not 
 doubt it." Did ever expectant bride write a happier 
 letter on the eve of her wedding-day? 
 
 The nuns went rather early to their cells that May 
 evening, for to-morrow was to be a great day for them. 
 Perhaps Jacqueline Pascal lingered, like St. Agnes, a 
 little while at her window looking at the solemn stars. 
 
 The airs from the garden were soft and sweet, and 
 the pink horsechestnut blossoms were dropping now 
 and then through the stillness, as they drop now on 
 May evenings in the gardens of Paris. That " noble 
 house " in the Faubourg St. Jacques, was very full 
 that night, for many of the sisters had come in from 
 Port Royal dcs CJLajnps to see the ceremony. The 
 next day's dinner had been prepared overnight, so 
 that lay-sisters and all might have an opportunity to 
 be present at the services. 
 
 But scarcely had quiet settled down on the house 
 when voices and quick steps were heard about the 
 gates, and the frightened women were soon out of 
 their beds. It was war-time, and they were living in 
 constant expectation of danger. They found, how-
 
 Fresh Trials. 217 
 
 ever, that it was not a troop of soldiers who had 
 taken possession of the house. It was only a band of 
 nuns who had been driven out of their convent at 
 Etampes and h^d walked all the way to Paris. 
 
 " These poor sisters reached the Faubourg St. Jac- 
 ques about nine o'clock," says the story. " Some of 
 them had friends in the city, but knew not where to 
 find them ; others were friendless. It was quite dark, 
 they had no guide, no guard, and did not know what 
 to do. As they passed the gates of Port Royal one 
 of them recognized the convent. She bade her com- 
 panions be of good cheer. Madame de Port Royal" 
 ■ — Madame dii cceiir Royal, as she was often called — 
 "would take them in." 
 
 They were not disappointed. It was against the 
 rules for an abbess to receive members of another 
 community without the permission of the archbishop. 
 " But Angelique said, ' Charity is above law,' and 
 opened her gates." And now was made evident the 
 good Providence which had led them to cook to-mor- 
 row's dinner overnight ! These sisters must be fed 
 first of all. Then came the more difficult task of 
 finding beds for them. " We began to gather up all 
 that we could," says one of the nuns. " There was 
 nothing to be met in the passages and on the stairs 
 but sisters dragging their beds, pillows, coverlets, 
 mattresses, and doing it all with the heartiest good- 
 will." 
 
 10
 
 2 1 8 Sister and SamL 
 
 The next day, with all these unexpected guests and 
 with the two communities of Port Royal to witness 
 her profession, Jacqueline Pascal took the veil as 
 novice. We do not know whether "iier brother and 
 sister were present. No details of the ceremony have 
 been preserved. It was probably conducted according 
 to the "Constitutions" of the convent, with great 
 simplicity. Few guests from '' the world " were per- 
 mitted; all attempts to excite public interest by dis- 
 play were prohibited. The dress of the candidate 
 must be plain and inexpensive. Pearls and other 
 ornaments were forbidden ; and instead of the usual 
 entire severance of the hair, the abbess only cut off a 
 little from the ends. " If the candidate should after- 
 ward repent of her consecration she was not to be 
 deterred from re-entering society by the loss of that 
 feminine adornment." 
 
 ^-<^TTm^
 
 A BUNDLE OF LETTERS WHICH 
 TELL THEIR OWN STORY.
 
 ^.'-i--=?> 
 
 T^^^^ 
 
 
 XV. 
 
 \ BUNDLE OF LETTERS WHICH TELL THEIR OWN 
 STORY. 
 
 O M. Perier", during an alarming illness of his 
 
 wife : 
 
 " Jufy 31, 1653. 
 
 "My dear Sister and Brother: — I write to 
 you both, if God permit this. letter to find you both 
 in a state to read it. which, after your note of the 
 24th, I scarcely dare to hope. You can imagine the 
 state of my own feelings ; I do not pretend to express 
 them. But I think it my duty in this extremity to 
 render all the assistance I can, both to my sister and 
 yourself. I pray for you as often as possible, and our 
 mothers have frequently reminded the sisterhood to 
 
 commend her case to God We can not have a 
 
 better opportunity of testing whether we possess real 
 faith * 
 
 ■" If it please Him to grant my sister the happiness of 
 
 seeing His face in preference to ourselves, why should 
 
 (221)
 
 222 Sister and Saint. 
 
 we oppose her blessedness? I see no blessedness to 
 be found in this world except in giving up all things 
 for God ; but even this is not to be compared with 
 the full possession of Him and the certainty of never 
 
 losing that felicity 
 
 " God knows that I love my sister more than I did 
 when we were both in the world, and yet it seemed 
 to me then that nothing could increase my affection ; 
 but whereas at that time my chief wishes and anxieties 
 were for her life (which always has been, and still is, 
 dearer to me than my own), they now relate to her 
 eternal life. Therefore, violent as my grief is, and 
 though I am continually in dread of hearing the fatal 
 news, trembling so that I can scarcely stand if any one 
 looks as if he iv ere going to speak to me, yet, when I 
 take into account the misery and dangers of this pres- 
 ent life, especially for a person immersed in worldly 
 occupations, I can not but accuse myself of selfishly 
 desiring my own benefit rather than hers. And so 
 my most earnest prayers to God are that the infant 
 may be an heir of grace and that the mother's illness 
 
 may be sanctified Tell her to remember the 
 
 beautiful saying of M. de St. Cyran, that ' the sick 
 should look upon their bed as an altar whereon they 
 continually offer up the sacrifice of their life for God 
 to t^ke at His pleasure ' ; and this other : ' The pains 
 and various inconveniences of illness are sounds that 
 serve to warn the virgins of the Bridegroom's ap-
 
 A Bundle of Letters. 223 
 
 proach.' Let her hope to go in with Him to that 
 blessed marriage. 
 
 " SCEUR DE SaINTE EUPHEMIE, 
 
 " {Religiciise Indigne)!' 
 
 Under the same date JacqueHne urges her brother- 
 in-law, in case of her sister's recovery, to testify his 
 gratitude by leaving his wife and family and becopiing 
 a recluse. Happily, he did not follow this advice, 
 but we are told that, after this time, he wore a girdle 
 lined with iron points, though his humility kept this 
 fact a secret till after his death. He used also to 
 have a plank in his bed, and made his bed himself in 
 order to prevent discovery. 
 
 To Madame Perier, bearing joyful tidings : 
 
 "Dec. 8, 1654. 
 
 " It is not right that you should longer be ignorant 
 of what God has wrought in the heart of one so dear 
 to us ; but I wish you to learn it from himself, in 
 order that your every doubt may be done away. All 
 that I now have time to tell you is that God has gra- 
 ciously given him a great wish to be entirely devoted 
 to his service, though in what mode of life is not yet 
 determined. For more than a year he has felt a 
 thorough contempt for the world, and an almost in- 
 supportable disgust for its votaries ; and yet, though 
 his excitable temperament would naturally lead him
 
 2 24 Sister and Saint. 
 
 to extremes, he behaves with a moderation that 
 encourages me to hope for good. He has put him- 
 self entirely under P^re Singlin's direction. 
 
 '' Thoug-h his health is worse than it has been for a 
 long time, it does not in the least affect his resolu- 
 tion, which shows that the reasons he formerly urged 
 were only a pretense. 
 
 " I perceive in him a humility and submission, 
 even toward myself, which astonishes me. I have 
 now no more to add, except that it is evident another 
 spirit than his own is at work within him. Farewell ; 
 let all this be kept secret, even from him. 
 " I am yours entirely, 
 
 " Sister Euphiemie." 
 
 To Madame Perier, giving further particulars of 
 the good work : 
 
 "Port Royal, January 2^, 1655. 
 
 " My very dear Sister : — I wonder if your im- 
 patience to receive intelligence has been greater than 
 mine to communicate it ; yet, as I had no time to 
 waste, I was afraid to write too soon, lest I might 
 have to unsay what I had prematurely said. But 
 now things are at a po'nt where you ought to know 
 of them, let the resull be, by God's good pleasure, 
 what it may. 
 
 " It would be doing you injustice not to relate the 
 whole story from the beginning.
 
 A Bn7idle of Letters. 225 
 
 " He came to see me toward tRe close of last Sep- 
 tember, and during the visit, opened his heart to me 
 in such a way that I felt a deep pity for him. He 
 acknowledged that in the midst of his occupations, 
 which were numerous and of a nature to excite in 
 him a love for the world, he still often felt a desire to 
 leave it altogether. That, by reason of his aversion 
 for the follies and amusements of society, and by 
 reason of the constant reproaches of conscience, he 
 found himself more detached from the world than ho 
 had ever been before ; but that, on the other hand, 
 God'seemed to have foesaken him, and he experience i 
 no longings after Him 
 
 " This confession gave me great surprise and de 
 light, and from that time I began to hope for him as 
 I had not done before. If I were to recount all his 
 other visits in detail, it would fill a volume, for they 
 were afterward so frequent and so long that I seemed 
 to myself to have no other work to do than to follow 
 him and watch his progress. I did not attempt to 
 hurry him in the least, but I saw him growing in 
 such a way that I scarcely knew him for the same 
 person. You will see it also, if God carries on the 
 work, and particularly in his humility, submission, 
 self-distrust, even to the point of scorn of self and 
 desire to become as nothing in the esteem and mem- 
 ory of man. This is what he is- now; only God 
 knows what he will become.
 
 2 26 Sister and Saint. 
 
 " There were many visits and much conflict on the 
 subject of choosing a spiritual guide. He saw the 
 necessity of having one ; but, although the person 
 best suited to him was already found and he could 
 not bear to think of any one else, yet his self-distrust 
 made him afraid of being guided by partiality. / 
 saw clearly enough that this hesitation only arose 
 from the independence yet remaining in his soul, and 
 catching at any excuse for avoiding the complete sub- 
 jection to which he was tending. But I would not 
 influence him. I merely said that I thought it was 
 our duty to select the best physicians we could find, 
 
 both for the soul and for the body At length 
 
 his mifid was made up. But our task was not over 
 yet,- for M. Singlin hesitated to undertake the charge, 
 chiefly on account of a long-continued infirmity which 
 prevents his speaking without great pain. 
 
 " Meanwhile many things occurred, too long and 
 unimportant to be repeated here ; the principal event 
 being that our young convert came of his own accord 
 to the conclusion that a temporary withdrawal from 
 home would be serviceable to him. M. Singlin was 
 then at Port Royal des Cliavips for the benefit of his 
 health ; and therefore Blaise (although he was ter- 
 ribly afraid of having it known that he held com- 
 munication with the convent)' resolved to go thither 
 under pretext that business called him into the coun- 
 try. By changing his name, leaving his r^.rvants in
 
 A Bundle of Letters, 227 
 
 some neighboring village, and proceeding on foot to 
 M. Singlin, he hoped that no one would recognize 
 him or discover his object, and that, in this way, he 
 might effect a temporary retreat. 
 
 " I advised him not to take such a step without 
 consulting M. Singlin ; and M. Singlin, on his part, 
 forbade it altogether. M. Singlin wrote him a beau- 
 tiful letter, and in it he constituted 7ne as my brother's 
 
 directress until God made his own duty plain 
 
 When M. Singlin at length returned, I entreated him 
 to release me from my dignity, and said so much that 
 I obtained my desire. They then both thought it 
 would be best for Blaise to make a trip into the coun- 
 try for the sake of being more alone than he could 
 be in town. His particular friend (the Due de 
 Roannez) had returned, and took up nearly all his 
 time. 
 
 He, accordingly, made the Duke his confidant 
 (receiving his consent, which was not given without 
 
 tears), and set out the day after Epiphany 
 
 He has procured a room, or rather a cell, among the 
 recluses of Port Royal, and thence he writes me that 
 he finds himself extremely happy, being lodged and 
 treated like a prince — a prince of St. Bernard's 
 stamp, dwelling in a lonely spot, where the pro- 
 fession of poverty is carried out as far as discretion 
 will allow. 
 
 " He is present at every service from Prime to
 
 2 28 S/s/cr and Samt. 
 
 Complines, and docs not find the least inconvenience 
 in rising at five o'clock. 
 
 " It seems to Ue God's will, also, that he shall fast 
 as well as watch, though, in doing so, he must defy 
 all medical rules which forbid him to do either. But 
 he finds that his supper begins to give him pain in 
 the chest, and I think he will omit it. 
 
 " He will not miss his directress, for M. Singlin has 
 provided him with a confessor, M. de Saci, with 
 whom he was not before acquainted, a man who is 
 beyond praise, and who has completely charmed him 
 already." 
 
 (M. de Saci was one of Madame le Maitre's sons, 
 an elegant writer, translator of the Bible, and one of 
 the brightest lights of Port Royal). 
 
 *' He told only two persons where he was going 
 when he set out. However, it was suspected. Some 
 say he has turned monk ; others hermit ; others, 
 again, that he is at Port Royal ; and he knows all 
 this, but does not care for it 
 
 " I have not been able to finish this letter till to- 
 day, Feb. 8. 
 
 " Business just now detains Blaise at home, but, as 
 
 soon as he can, he will go back to his solitude 
 
 He is anxious to do something for our little cousin, 
 the daughter of Pascal the overseer ; and as this con- 
 vent is very charitable, we hoped to get her received 
 here as a boarder. But I doubt whether either
 
 A Btcndle of Letters. 229 
 
 mother or child would be willing. Write me about 
 it, please, as soon as you can and say how wc had 
 better manage it. I am very antxious she should 
 come, for I look upon her as a sister and can not think 
 of her situation, either bodily or spiritually, without 
 a shudder. Besides, she is my father's niece, and I 
 can understand how he would have felt for her from 
 my own feelings toward your children. 
 
 " Sister Euphemie." 
 
 To M. Pascal during his retreat at Les Granges 
 
 (Port Royal des Champs^ : 
 
 " January 19, 1655. 
 
 " My very dear Brother : — It gives me as much 
 delight to find you cheerful in solitude as it used to 
 give me pain, when I saw you immersed in the gay- 
 eties of the world. I hardly know, however, how M. 
 de Saci gets along with a penitent so full of happi- 
 ness. Instead of expiating worldly pleasures by un- 
 ceasing tears, you are only relinquishing them for 
 more reasonable joys and a more allowable play of 
 fancy. 
 
 " For my part, I think your penance very moderate 
 indeed, and there are few people who would not envy 
 you it ! " 
 
 A few more playful, but rather obscure allusions 
 follow : " And now," says the writer, " I_ hereby put 
 an end to the willful nonsense of this letter. Your
 
 230 Sister and Saint. 
 
 eager desire to renounce every semblance of worldly 
 
 distinction is very praiseworthy The same must 
 
 be said of your Wooden spoon and earthen platter 
 about which you wrote me. These are the gold and 
 precious stones of Christianity. None but princes 
 should have them on their tables. We must be truly 
 poor in spirit if we would deserve such an honor, 
 which, according to the Marquis de Renti,' should be 
 denied to common people. My only comfort is that, 
 this kind of kingship not being hereditary, it may be 
 
 acquired 
 
 " I was before you in the discovery that health de- 
 pends more on Jesus Christ than on the maxims of 
 Hippocrates. Spiritual rcgivten often cures bodiQ' ail- 
 ments. Unless, indeed, God sees fit to strengthen us 
 by means of sickness. Certainly it is a great privi- 
 lege to have sufificient strength of body to do what 
 is enjoined for the cure of our souls ; but it is none 
 the less a privilege to take chastisement from Him. 
 In either case we are well, if we are in Him. We 
 are not told, ' if any man will come after Me let him 
 perform works requiring great strength,' but, ' let him 
 deny himself.' And sometimes a sick jj^rson may do 
 this better than one in health." 
 
 To the same ; — a fragment : 
 
 "December i, 1655. 
 
 " I have been congratulated on the great fervor of 
 
 devotion which has lifted you so far above all ordi-
 
 A Bundle of Letters. 231 
 
 nary customs, that you consider a broom a superflu- 
 ous piece of furniture I think that, for some 
 
 months at least, you should try being as clean as you 
 now are dirty, in order that you may show that you 
 can succeed in humble and vigilant care of the body 
 (which is your servant), as well as you have succeed- 
 ed in humble lugligence of it. After that, if you 
 again find it glorious and edifying to others to be 
 dirty, you can do so ; especially if it be a means of 
 holiness, which I very much doubt. St. Bernard did 
 not think it was." 
 
 To Madame Perier in answer to inquiries as to 
 Jacqueline's promotion in the convent : 
 
 " June 23, 1655. 
 
 " I had thought of answering this part of your let- 
 ter in the same style in which you wrote, buf I can 
 not do it. All my gayety leaves me when I approach 
 the topic. And I therefore entreat you to believe 
 every word of what I shall now tell you, for I am 
 perfectly serious. 
 
 " I dare say my employment here has been repre- 
 sented to you as much greater than it in fact is. 
 After all, it is a mere nothing, and I do not suppose 
 that any one but myself would consider it of conse- 
 quence. 
 
 " But it is quite a responsibility for me, who would 
 much rather keep in the background, and d.\Vi fit for
 
 232 Sister and Saint. 
 
 nothing but to bustle about in a tiny cell, or to sweep 
 the house ; for this last is an accomplishment I have 
 become quite expert in, as well as in washing dishes 
 and spinning. You see I have learned to be very- 
 handy. 
 
 '' The employment assigned me, then, is to remain 
 with the novices and keep an eye on the newly- 
 arrived candidates, in order to prevent such little 
 mistakes as they are likely to make at first. I also 
 look after their 'little external wants, and see that 
 they are provided with shoes, stockings, pins, thread, 
 
 etc And that you may have no more cause to 
 
 complain of my reserve, I will tell you that it is also 
 my duty to advise them in regard to their behavior. 
 
 Now, you know just what I have, to do My 
 
 sister Madeleine is always on the spot to correct me 
 
 if I do wrong But for all that, I can not help 
 
 trembling when I think that I hold the destiny,, so to 
 speak, of five or six girls in my hands, and that they 
 are in a measure dependent on one so imperfect 
 
 " I must acknowledge that, when you were here, I 
 often felt that it was scarcely right to keep this a 
 secret from you, to whom my heart has always been 
 so open, especially when you frequently asked me 
 what it was that kept me so busy. I had even made 
 a memorandum to ask our Mother Agnes whether 
 this confidence were not due you, but God permitted 
 me always to forget it, and, since you left, it has
 
 A Bundle of Letters. 233 
 
 never occurred to me. Neither have I mentioned it 
 to my brother, and if he knows it, some one else has 
 told him. 
 
 " There is a great advantage in having to teach 
 others the ways of God ; . . . . but it is very difficult 
 to speak of God in a godly manner, and there is great 
 danger of feeding others from our own penury instead 
 of from His abundance. Pray for me that my two 
 mites may be as acceptable to Him as the large alms 
 of the wealthier. Farewell, dear sister. Yours ever 
 in the Lord, 
 
 "Sister Euphemie, 
 
 '■^ An unworthy nun^ 
 
 To the same, in answer to inquiries as to the best 
 method of educating her children : 
 
 "Port Roy ki., August 15, 1655. 
 
 "My very dear Sister: — I take a large sheet 
 of paper, because it is my resolution, by God's help, 
 to send you a long letter. When I first read the one 
 you forwarded by my brother I did not intend to 
 answer it at all. It seemed to me that I was very far 
 from having the requisite ability for such a task, and, 
 besides that, I ought not to undertake it. For there 
 is nothing, in my opinion, so provoking as to see a 
 little novice, whose eyes have scarcely begun to dis- 
 cern the true light, taking it upon herself to enlighten
 
 Sister and Saint. 
 
 others, and to become their torch-bearer. It is really 
 unendurable ! 
 
 " But since, on account of the humility of our 
 mothers and the illness of Pere Singlin, I am totally 
 unable elsewhere to procure the aid you are seeking, 
 I do not know that there is any harm in saying to you 
 what I have said to myself, for I feel as if you and I 
 had but one heart and one soul in Christ Jesus. 
 
 "When I had written thus far, it occurred to me 
 that M. de Rebours (one of the confessors) might, 
 perhaps, be able to give some advice. I broke off, 
 therefore, in order to consult him, and now write 
 what he says : * * * * 
 
 " To M. Pascal, making inquiries in regard to his 
 new method of teaching children to read : 
 
 "' October 26, 1655. 
 
 " * Obedience and chanty lead me to break silence 
 before you do, my very dear brother, and when I 
 least expected it ; I tell you this, lest you should be 
 scandalized at my writing.' (She alludes, probably, 
 to some mutual vow of silence for a certain time). 
 
 " 'Our mothers have commanded me to ask all the 
 particulars of your method of learning to read with- 
 out learning the names of the letters. I can see very 
 well how a child can be taught to pronounce some 
 words in that way, but how do you manage with 
 silent consonants following a vowel? — for instance,
 
 A Btmdle of Letters. 235 
 
 such a word as ^« ? .... I see difficulties in the sys- 
 tem, but then, I am sure, you have also foreseen them 
 and provided for them. 
 
 " ' So much for obedience ; now for the charity.' 
 (She then begs a favor of him in behalf of a poor 
 young girl of their acquaintance.) ' I will not apolo- 
 gize for giving you the trouble. Charity is its own 
 recompense. 
 
 "'Did you think of me on the loth? That is the 
 day of my baptism, you know. Remember me also 
 to-day. The 26th of every month is dear to me since 
 God gave me grace on that day to cast off forever the 
 habiliments of the world. May you and all who be- 
 long to you be ever the Lord's. I belong to you not 
 less by grace than by nature. Properly, indeed, I 
 consider myself your daughter ; I shall never forget it.' 
 "Sister Euphemie, 
 
 "y^;^ imworthy muiy 
 
 The system of teaching here spoken of was intro- 
 duced by Pascal into the Port Royal schools, and 
 through their text-books* adopted afterward through- 
 out France. It is now used in many English schools, 
 and has been introduced somewhat in the United 
 States. Cousin ' says : " A method of orthography 
 certainly adds little to the glory of the great mathe- 
 matician, the great scientist, and the great rhetorician, 
 yet it serves to bring into relief that exactness and
 
 236 
 
 Sister and Saint. 
 
 clearness — the special attribute of Pascal's genius — 
 which he carried into the smallest as well as into the 
 greatest things." 
 
 Pascal's system of logic, set forth in his little 
 treatise, " De I'art de Persuader," was about this time 
 also adopted at Port Royal. 
 
 I
 
 TEACHING THE CONVENT SCHOOL.
 
 XVI. 
 
 TEACHING THE CONVENT SCHOOL. 
 
 THE letters we have just read tell us better 
 than any other words could do, the story of 
 Jacqueline Pascal's life between 1652 and 
 1655. They show us the increasing honor in which 
 she is held by that household of noble women among 
 whom she has found her home. They show the great 
 confidence reposed in her by her superiors, evidenced 
 by her appointment as Sub-Mistress of the Novices 
 before she had herself passed her novitiate. And 
 still stronger proof of confidence and high esteem is 
 the fact that careful, conscientious Abbe Singlin 
 placed in her hands the infinitely momentous and 
 delicate task of guiding her brother's newly-stirred 
 conscience. 
 
 They very touchingly show that brother's trust in 
 her as he makes visit after visit and unburdens his 
 troubled heart before her; anJ they show her elder 
 sister's exaggerated reverence when she asks of the 
 
 (239)
 
 240 Sister and Saint. 
 
 inexperienced novice how she shall best bring up her 
 family. 
 
 But, above all, these letters give us a hint of the 
 inner life — a glimpse at that "secret greenness" which 
 "only One" can fully see. 
 
 We perceive a rapid growth of character. We see 
 a great increase of sweetness — of love and of joy — in 
 her heart. The beauty of holiness is beginning to be 
 apparent. Instead of the chilling virtues of those 
 first years of devotion to God there is a pleasant 
 warmth and light. She is not afraid now to tell her 
 brother and sister how much she loves them. " It 
 seems to me we are but one heart and one soul in 
 Jesus Christ," she writes to Gilberte. " Did you 
 think of me on the loth?" she asks Blaise, showing 
 how completely the old freedom and sympathy is 
 established between them and how sweet it is to her. 
 
 In every way, indeed, there 4S an increasing natu- 
 ralness and healthfulness in her religion, as there 
 must be in all spiritual life, the nearer it approaches 
 to Him who is the Life. 
 
 Not that faults are wanting. As long as we know 
 Jacqueline Pascal we shall see those, yet more and 
 more, from this time, they seem to be the faults of 
 her century, her education, her Church, rather than 
 faults of character. 
 
 Undoubtedly, Jacqueline's great joy in her broth- 
 er's conversion hastened her spiritual grov.'th. Joy is
 
 Teaching the Cotivent School, 241 
 
 good for souls. Whatev^er may be said and may be 
 true of the blessed effects of sorrow, those who have 
 had great sorrows and great joys know that joy is the 
 natural atmosphere of the soul. He who has swung 
 open the doors of heaven to His children knows this 
 well. 
 
 And so, when the desire of this sweet woman's 
 heart is granted, when her cup runs over — we see her 
 coming back to the naturalness and freedom of her 
 early days. Her heart comes again as the heart of a 
 little child. She does from joyful enthusiasm, not 
 from forcing duty, what her hand finds to do. 
 
 It was a gre^at year for the Port Royalists — this 
 year of Pascal's definite identification with them and 
 farewell to the world. In their histories it forms a 
 distinct era, and other events are dated from it, as 
 one dates from the accession of a sovereign. 
 
 In the family annals the change is known as his 
 " second conversion." Many striking and minute ac- 
 counts of it are given. We will content ourselves 
 with Jacqueline's story as we have read it in that long 
 letter to their sister. It can not fail to be a faithful 
 picture, though less sharp in its outlines than most 
 of the Jansenist writers have made it. 
 
 There can be no doubt that, during those years 
 when mental activity was denied him, Blaise Pascal 
 made a thorough trial of material pleasures, yet the 
 
 Btraitest of the Jansenists — those who most bitterly 
 II
 
 242 Sister and Saint. 
 
 deplore those years of defection — are careful to 
 say that no hint of vice ever attached to his hfe. 
 " His feet, indeed, trod the mire," says one, "but his 
 divine wings remained forever unsoiled." 
 
 During these years, a young nobleman — the Due 
 de Roannez — was Pascal's most intimate friend. 
 There is a suspicion of an attachment on Pascal's 
 part for the duke's sister, a ^irl of sixteen — an un- 
 spoken love, however, if it existed at all, and hope- 
 less, probably, in the lover's mind, on account of the 
 great difference in rank and fortune. 
 
 A treatise on " Love," probably written about this 
 time, goes toward establishing the theor}^ But stu- 
 dents of Pascal's life differ in their opinions, and it is 
 one of those questions which can never be settled. 
 Sainte-Beuve believes that " Pascal never passionately 
 loved any being but his Lord and Saviour." 
 
 Mdlle. de Roannez became for a time a novice at 
 Port Royal, but was urged by her friends into a mar- 
 riage which proved most unfortunate. Pascal corre- 
 sponded with her at intervals throughout his life. 
 Her brother, the duke, became warmly interested in 
 the Port Royal party, and was one of the editors of 
 the first edition of Pascal's " Thoughts." 
 
 When such a young man as we know Blaise Pascal 
 to be " came and sold all that he had " and followed 
 Jesus, we should expect great ardor and enthu- 
 siasm from him, and we find it showing itself
 
 Teaching the Convent School. 243 
 
 sometimes in painful forms. Even the nun Jac- 
 queline, as we see, is obliged to reprove him for 
 his neglect of the body, while he revels in his new- 
 found spiritual joy. Ill-health, doubtless, deepened 
 the naturally somewhat ascetic tone of Pascal's 
 mind, and we see through all the remainder of his 
 life a relentless crushing out of much that is beautiful 
 and noble in human nature. 
 
 He was a most ingenious self-tormentor and did not 
 always remember that those who loved him were, of 
 necessity, included in the torment. While Jacqueline's 
 character is budding anew into fragrance and bloom, 
 his seems to be growing hard and dry, like some 
 brown lily-bulb which gives no hint of the glory and 
 sweetness within. Both bud and bulb will burst into 
 spotless beauty when the full summer comes ! 
 
 But at his harshest and his driest, Jacqueline, his 
 twin soul, understands him. 
 
 " I felt astonished and discouraged by his coldness 
 and occasional rebuffs," writes Madame Perier, speak- 
 ing of a time when he was ill at her house, " I did 
 not then know that he thought it wrong to testify 
 affection. I wrote about it to my sister and com- 
 plained that my brother was unkind and did not love 
 me, and that I really seemed to displease him even 
 when I rendered him the m.ost affectionate services. 
 My sister wrote me that I was mistaken, that she 
 knew the contrary. He loved me dearly, — as well as
 
 244 Sister and Saint. 
 
 I could desire, — and if opportunity offered for him 
 to help me in any way, he would prove by deeds 
 what he thought it wrong to express in words. And, 
 indeed, I afterward found it so." 
 
 We have mentioned her brother's conversion as 
 one reason for Jacquehne's happiness. Another 
 reason was her busy hfe. " I am never able to write 
 above two dozen lines," she says, "often not more 
 than five or six without being interrupted by some 
 question." For, in addition to her other duties, Jac- 
 queline was soon appointed to teach in the convent 
 school of Port Royal de Paris. It was a large and 
 popular boarding and day-school — as popular, proba- 
 bly, as any young ladies' school in Paris is to-day. Mrs. 
 Schimmelpenninck says, " It would be easy to cite a 
 prodigious number of young ladies educated in these 
 schools " (that at Port Royal dcs Champs and the one 
 in the city), " who have since edified the world, the 
 court, or the cloister by their wisdom, piety, and tal- 
 ent. It is well known with what sentiments of admi- 
 ration, gratitude, and reverence they always spoke of 
 the education they received at Port Royal." 
 
 Anne Arnauld had been for some years the Princi- 
 pal of the Paris school. The pupils were very fond 
 of her, especially the younger ones. No wonder ! for 
 we are told : "It was so pleasant to her to gratify 
 them that she could not help giving them sweet 
 meats." However, being a nun — a Jansenist — a con<
 
 Teaching the Co7ivcnt School. 245 
 
 scientious and truly loving as well as an indulgent 
 woman — " she always prayed before giving them that 
 the children might not like them very much ! " 
 
 "One day," the story goes, "the children were 
 naughty, and Sister Anne left the school-room saying 
 she should not return, for it grieved her too much to 
 see how little love they had either for God or for 
 their duty." The children, on their part, spent the 
 morning in tears, " entreating the other teachers to 
 go and fetch Sister Anne and tell her how sorry they 
 were. At length some one went, and she relented 
 immediately and came to them. They flocked around 
 her, and she said it was a great consolation to her 
 that they were sorry for their faults, because God for- 
 gave those who repented, and it was, therefore, quite 
 right that she should forgive them also. With this, 
 she drew a bag full of sugar-plums from under her 
 mantle and distributed them, saying that when St. 
 Louis wept as he thought of the Passion of our Lord 
 he found the tears which fell upon his lips were sweet 
 as honey ; and she gave them the sugar-plums in 
 order that they might remember that when we weep 
 for our faults our tears are sweet." 
 
 Sometimes Sister Anne would bear the burden of 
 the children's faults and do penance for them herself, 
 for she could not pass over the sins, nor could she 
 bear to punish the children. " She had not learned," 
 says Frances Martin, " that the tenderness of their
 
 246 Sister and Saint. 
 
 Father in heaven was as great as her own, and 
 thought that she must appease Him by her own suf- 
 ferings." 
 
 And now to this deHghtful Sister Anne and to one 
 or two others of the talented Arnauld sisters, is add- 
 ed JacqueHne Pascal with her clear, well-trained in- 
 tellect, her talent, her noble, womanly character. 
 
 Fortunate school-girls ! Justly do the " Memoires " 
 say : " The education they here received under the 
 sisters of Pascal and of Arnauld, was far different 
 from that elsewhere afforded to ladies." 
 
 The new teacher was never so demonstrative as 
 Anne Arnauld. She proved her love in a very differ- 
 ent and certainly a far less beautiful manner. 
 
 In the opinions of her superiors she was clearly a 
 successful teacher, for, after two or three years' ex- 
 perience, she was directed by Father Singlin to draw 
 up a code of " Reglem.ents pour les Enfants," ac- 
 cording to the Port Royal plan. This was added to 
 the " Constitutions," though with the^caution that in 
 other places it might not be easy or even advisable 
 to carry them out fully. Some children might not 
 be able to endure so strict a discipline, neither could 
 all teachers enforce it, without losing the love and 
 confidence of their charge, " which is all-important." 
 
 No one who loves children can read these rules 
 without shivering. "Yet," says Vinet, " where must 
 be the eyes of those who can read them and not dis-
 
 Teaching the Conv.ent School. 247 
 
 cover them to be full of the most considerate tender- 
 ness ? " 
 
 And we must remember that the chilliness and 
 harshness which so offends us is not to be charged to 
 the writer so much as to the whole of the false, un- 
 natural system of which she was one of the few re- 
 deeming features. 
 
 These poor little Port Royal girls are to rise at 
 half-past four or five, according to their size and 
 strength. " They must rise promptly, not allowing 
 themselves time to get thoroughly awake, for fear of 
 yielding to idleness." 
 
 Prayer, both silent and audible, is the first duty, 
 and then the elder ones comb each other's hair " in 
 perfect silence." This " deep, morning silence," is 
 strongly insisted on and lasts, so far as we can see, 
 through the greater part of the day. For, after 
 Prime, at half-past six, the beds are made by the 
 girls in couples, still in silence. Next, hands are 
 washed and mouths rinsed with wine and water, 
 and breakfast follows, during which " one of them 
 reads the Marty rology for the day." 
 
 At half-past seven, all withdraw to the work-room, 
 " where they must diligently improve their time and 
 keep a strict silence. If it is necessary to speak they 
 must do so softly, so as not to interrupt those who 
 are old enough, to hold communion with God. Even 
 the little ones are taught not to speak, though they
 
 248 Sister and Saint. 
 
 are allowed to play when their work has been well 
 and silently done, but each must play by herself so 
 that there may be no noise." And here is the first 
 glimpse of the tenderness of which Vinet speaks, as 
 the writer adds, in her own simple, kindly way, " I 
 have found that this solitude does not trouble the 
 children, for when they are used to it, they seem 
 to amuse themselves veiy merrily." We have a 
 second view of her tenderness, and, at the same time, 
 a specimen of shrewdness and good management in 
 this remark : " We teach them that they ought to 
 perform disagreeable tasks with more industry and 
 good nature than pleasant ones. But, nevertheless, 
 zve do really Jnwior them in their tasks as far as we 
 can, without allowi^ig them to perceive itT 
 
 At eight o'clock, the governess reads till half-past 
 eight, when all go to church. 
 
 Then comes a writing lesson (silent), before which 
 each offers a short prayer that God would help her 
 to perform that duty aright. " We try to impress 
 their minds gently with a holy habit of never begin- 
 ning an action of any importance without prayer." 
 
 At eleven, they all examine themselves and after- 
 ward repeat the Confiteor. 
 
 At length, " the dinner bell rings." Can they be 
 girls now and run down, waiting with bright faces 
 around the table till their teacher joins them ? " On 
 entering the dining-hall, they curtsey in pairs and do
 
 Teaching the Co7tvent School. 249 
 
 the same in passing any of the sisters. They stand 
 modestly in their places till grace is said, their sleeves 
 
 falling over their hands They must keep their 
 
 eyes, always down, not looking on either hand, but 
 quietly listening to what is read." 
 
 On leaving the dining-hall, they have a recess. 
 And now for a little natural life ! 
 
 " The little ones are kept apart from the elder ones 
 in order that the latter may converse more quietly 
 and discreetly." "If the recess is held in a room, 
 the elder ones gather in a circle round the mistress 
 and talk modestly and sociably, according to their 
 ability." " They may be allowed to play at innocent 
 games, such as battledore and shuttlecock. Not that 
 our girls avail themselves of this permission, for all 
 of them, except the very youngest, are so fond of 
 work that, as I have said, a holiday is irksome to 
 them." " The children are to avoid every kind of 
 personal familiarity, and never to caj'css, to kiss, or 
 even touch one miother on any pretext. Neither must 
 the elder ones pet the little children. 
 
 "The recess closes with prayers asking for grace to 
 enable them to pass holily the remainder of the day." 
 
 It would be wearisome to follow these school-girls 
 through the whole day, till the evening bell calls them 
 from their walk in the garden to undress " with silence 
 and dispatch," and go each to her separate bed. We 
 will simply make a- few more extracts from the rules :
 
 250 Sister and Saint. 
 
 " We avoid talking much to the children, feeling 
 that instruction does more good if they are not 
 wearied with it." 
 
 " We do not seek to render them too spiritually- 
 minded, unless God himself has made them so, be- 
 cause either they might set too close a watch upon 
 themselves and so weary the mind and fancy, instead 
 of communing with God, or, on the other hand, might 
 feel too much discouraged at finding it impossible to 
 attain the perfection demanded of them." 
 
 " I find it a good way of forming a habit of indus- 
 try to allow them to do at recess some work which 
 they like and can not do at any other time. I taught 
 them, for instance, to make worsted gloves, and as 
 they can only do this during their recess, they are 
 very eager after it." 
 
 *' We are careful to make them speak politely, hold 
 themselves uprightly and gracefully, and curtsey 
 when they enter or leave the room." 
 
 " They must not speak of the singing of the sister- 
 hood, remarking that one sister sings better than 
 another, etc." 
 
 " Uncharitable conversation is specially prohibited, 
 and they are taught never to say anything that might 
 be unpleasant to one of their number, though in it- 
 self harmless, because it is enough to know that any 
 one present would prefer some other topic of dis- 
 course."
 
 Teaching the Convetit School. 251 
 
 " We try' to make them yield precedence to one an- 
 other from that holy politeness which charity alone 
 produces. 
 
 " I think that really to do children any good we 
 ought never to speak or act for their benefit without 
 first looking to God and asking His holy aid." 
 
 " We ought to be very kind and tender toward 
 them, never neglecting either their internal or exter- 
 nal wants, and showing them that we grudge nothing 
 to serve them." 
 
 " Example is the most effective method of teach- 
 ing. For the devil helps them to remember our 
 slightest failures, and hinders them from remembering 
 tlie little good we do." 
 
 " As to their trivial defects, I think it best seldom 
 to notice these, because they otherwise gradually get 
 accustomed to be found fault with." 
 
 " They ought to be treated politely, spoken to with 
 respect, and yielded to where it is possible." 
 
 " We ought to consider them as sacred deposits 
 placed by God in our hands, for which we must ren- 
 der an account to Him. Therefore it is best to say 
 little to the children, and much to God on their be- 
 half." 
 
 More and more, as we proceed, does the hidden 
 love and wisdom become manifest, and as we read the 
 final word we are ready to say with Mrs. Schimmel- 
 penninck, " although many treatises on education have
 
 252 Sister and Saint. 
 
 appeared in modern times, and many which have 
 been distinguished for the splendid talents of the 
 writers, perhaps not many among them surpass in 
 true wisdom, in a deep knowledge of the human 
 heart, or reality of experience, these * Reglements' of 
 Jacqueline Pascal." " Nor is it to be forgotten, that 
 whilst the press teems with numberless theories, this 
 little, but inestimable work details a system which 
 was tried, and that with unexampled success, for 
 above sixty years ; and which, at the end of a hundred 
 and fifty years, still entitles its author to the rever- 
 ence due to transcendent piety and the admiration 
 due to super-eminent talent."
 
 THE MASTERPIECE AND THE 
 MIRACLE.
 
 XVII. 
 
 THE MASTERPIECE AND THE MIRACLE. 
 
 T. CYRAN and Jansen were both in ihelf 
 graves, but the truth they loved lived after 
 them. Its enemies, 'too, were active still. The 
 hatred of the Jesuits was the rightful inheritance of 
 the second generation of Port Royalists who are now 
 on the stage. 
 
 In order to understand that hatred and the climax 
 it now reached, it will be well at this point to recall 
 some facts in regard to both Jesuits and Jansenists. 
 
 In the first place the Jesuits had an old grudge 
 against' the father of the Arnaulds, on account of a 
 remarkably forcible and eloquent charge he had made 
 against them when he was a rising young advocate. 
 This success, Pascal wittily said, was the " original 
 sin" of Jansenism. And some of the later sins had 
 been of the same sort. Such were those flourishing 
 and popular schools and the widely-circulated school- 
 books. And such were the irtcreasing num.bers of tal- 
 
 (255)
 
 256 - Sister and Saint. 
 
 ented and influential men and women constantly 
 joining the Port Royal ranks. We remember, too, 
 that there was an old quarrel with Pascal in the mat- 
 ter of his atmospherical experiments. Father Noel 
 and his confreres could not be expected to love the 
 Jansenists any better after Pascal became one of their 
 number. 
 
 More than this, the strict morals and ascetic habits 
 of these people were a constant though silent reproach 
 of the lax principles and " casuistic morality " of Jes- 
 uitism. The ideal of true Christian living was plainly 
 more nearly approached at Port Royal than in the 
 Jesuit colleges. 
 
 " A little church born of the Spirit, within the visi- 
 ble and regnant church," the Jansenist body has been 
 fitly called. Disowned, indeed, they were by the 
 Romish communion, but '' they obstinately refused 
 to accept that disavowal." It was " grievous " to 
 them, as Pascal said, " to find themselves in a strait 
 betwixt God and the Pope." But they did their best 
 for many years to stand in that difficult and danger- 
 6us position. 
 
 We must remember, now, in addition to all this, 
 that the Jesuits had great influence with the Govern- 
 ment. "They especially coveted," we are told, " to 
 guide the consciences of men in power." "There 
 were very few princes on the throne, nobles in the 
 realm, dignitaries in the Church, or religious houses
 
 The Masterpiece and the Miracle. 257 
 
 belonging to any order, which were not, either 
 directly or remotely, under their influence." The 
 young king, whatever else had been lacking in his 
 education, had been well indoctrinated by his Jesuit 
 confessor, Father Annat, with hatred of the Jansenists. 
 And it was an easy matter to persuade Anne of Aus- 
 tria and Cardinal Mazarin that the Port Royal schools 
 were ** hot-beds of heresy" and must be abolished. 
 
 Early in 1656, the year to which Jacqueline Pascal's 
 letters have brought us, the matter seemed to have 
 reached its crisis. Over the heads of the Port Royal- 
 ists hung the censure of the Sorbonne (the University 
 of France) on a book of Arnauld's, " De la frequente 
 Communion," and, worse than that, the author's con- 
 demnation by the Pope. And after bewildering and 
 almost interminable disputations, lasting from July of 
 one year to May of the next, the Holy See had con- 
 demned the celebrated " Five Propositions." 
 
 These propositions were referred to in the chapter 
 on Jansen, but we must look at them more closely 
 here. They were five statements, which Father Cor- 
 net, a Jesuist priest, had with marvelous subtlety and 
 art framed out of Jansen's " Augustinus." " They 
 were worded, ' Mrs. Schimmelpenninck tells us, "with 
 the most artful ambiguity. The phrases were so con- 
 trived as to be capable of two constructions, widely 
 differing from, each other." In some cases it was only 
 the question of a comma's position in the sentence.
 
 258 Sister and Saint. 
 
 , ic . 
 
 Now, there was not one of these propositions which 
 the Jansenists would not have condemned, if bearing 
 the meaning the Jesuits imputed to them. But they 
 denied that they were to be found in any such sense 
 in the " Augustinus." 
 
 Hence, when a " formulary" was drawn up for them 
 to sign, condemning these propositions, they signed 
 without any ado, but, one and all, added a line stating 
 that the propositions were not to be iound in Jan- 
 sen's book, and pointing out wherein they differed. 
 
 This was disappointing. Simple, straightforward 
 truth had cut the twisted knot ! But the Jesuits 
 were equal to the emergency, as we shall see. 
 
 They began their work of vengeance by getting an 
 order from Government for the breaking up of the 
 Port Royal schools — the schools for boys. " The offi- 
 cers of the police, accompanied by a troop of archers, 
 were sent to Port Royal des Champs, where they 
 made a list of the schools. They then proceeded to 
 each, and immediately turned out all the masters and 
 scholars." Racine, the poet, was a pupil in one of 
 the schools at the time of the dispersion, and has 
 given an account of it in his " Histoire de Port Roy- 
 al." The recluses were also driven away from Lcs 
 Granges on pain of imprisonment. Pascal took lodg- 
 ings in Paris, where he soon had plenty of work to do 
 for his cause. 
 
 " Immediately after, an order of council was signed
 
 The Masterpiece ajtd the Miracle. 259 
 
 against the nuns. It was resolved that, every scholar, 
 postulant, and novice should be turned out of both 
 houses of Port Royal." The decree had been given 
 and was on the point of execution when two remark- 
 able events occurred which had the effect of delaying 
 the persecution for five years. One of these events 
 was the publication of Pascal's most famous work, 
 the " Provincial Letters " ; the other was a so-called 
 miracle, effecting a wonderful cure on the person of 
 Margaret Perier, Jacqueline's niece, who was a novice 
 of Port Royal. 
 
 The stoiy of the " Provincial Letters " is an inter- 
 esting one : 
 
 There was a good old nobleman, the Due de Lian- 
 court, living in Paris, who went one day to his church 
 in the parish of St. Sulpice to confess. The duke had 
 once made a retreat at Lcs Granges and he had a little 
 granddaughter in the boarding-school at Port Royal. 
 
 When he had finished his confession that day the 
 priest said, " I can not give you absolution. You are 
 guilty of two sins which you have not confessed : you 
 have a relative who is a pensionnaire at Port Royal 
 and you have dealings with those heretics — ^the gen- 
 tlemen recluses of Lcs Granges^ 
 
 The aged duke admitted the facts, but was not 
 willing to confess them as sins, and quietly went 
 away without absolution. But the affair made a great 
 deal of talk.
 
 26o Sister and Saint. 
 
 Arnauld ("the great Arnauld," Angelique's young- 
 est brother,) had been trying to keep still after his 
 last condemnation. But he was a born controversialist 
 and he could hold his peace no longer. 
 
 He came out in a series of letters on the subject, 
 and that was the signal for a wordy tournament, two 
 months long, between himself single-handed and the 
 doctors of the Sorbonne. Arnauld produced ream 
 after ream of solid argument (in Latin), and was 
 written down or talked down by the Jesuits, with 
 Pere Annat, Louis Fourteenth's confessor, prominent 
 among them. 
 
 The Due de Liancourt and his affair were very soon 
 left behind, as the combatants rushed once more into 
 the labyrinth of the " Five Propositions." Eighteen 
 or twenty sessions of the theological faculty were 
 spent on the question "du fait " — that is, whether 
 the propositions were, in fact, in the " Augustinus " ; 
 the remainder of the time on the question du droit — 
 that is, whether the propositions were orthodox if 
 they were there. 
 
 On the 14th of January — a few days before the dis- 
 persion of the recluses — Arnauld was censured on the 
 question oi fact, and the doctors went on to take up 
 the question of right, with the prospect of another 
 censure on that. 
 
 The great leader returned to his friends at Port 
 Royal, we may well believe a little dispirited. "The
 
 The Masterpiece and the Miracle. 261 
 
 gentlemen there," Sainte-Beuve tells us, " all begged 
 him to write something in his defense — something 
 addressed to the public." His " labored, geometric 
 apologies," in Latin, addressed to the Sorbonne, did 
 not come anywhere near the people, and they, seeing 
 all this array of ecclesiastical and scholarly authority 
 against him, could only suppose th/it the very founda- 
 tions of the faith were in danger. "Address yourself 
 to the public," urged his friends. " It is time the 
 people should be undeceived. Are you going to let 
 yourself be condemned like a child that has nothing 
 to say for itself ? " 
 
 " He wrote, therefore," says Margaret Perier in her 
 Memoirs, " and read his production to them all. But 
 no one gave it any praise. M. Arnauld understood 
 their silence, and as he did not covet applause, he 
 said, ' I see very clearly you think this a poor perform- 
 ance, and you are right,' and turning to M. Pascal, he 
 added: 'You — you are young, — you might do some- 
 thing.' " 
 
 *' M. Pascal wrote the first Provincial, and read it 
 to them. M. Arnauld cried, ' That is excellent ; every 
 one will like that; it must be printed.'" 
 
 "This was done," adds Pascal's niece simply. 
 ** The success it had is well known, and the work 
 went on." 
 
 "The success it had," — it and its seventeen succes- 
 sors — was imminse. Perhaps no literary success was
 
 262 Sister anU Saint, 
 
 ever more im-nediate — and probably no series of 
 eighteen letters ever more completely reversed the 
 public sentiment of a nation. Jansenism and Jes- 
 uitism, as they had been known in these interminable 
 theological debates, for so many years, were matters 
 of indifference to a large proportion of the population. 
 But these letters ! — everybody wanted to read them. 
 The court ladies laughed over their satires. The keen, 
 clear-headed French middle classes enjoyed their sharp, 
 unerring truthfulness. Thinking people were con- 
 vinced by their arguments. Unthinking people were 
 carried away by their eloquence. " By his inimitable 
 pleasantry, Pascal succeeded in making even the dullest 
 matters of scholastic theology and Jesuitical casuistry 
 as attractive to the people as a comedy ; and, by his 
 little volume, did more to render this formidable So- 
 ciety the contempt of Europe than was ever done by 
 all its other enemies put together."* 
 
 "They killed the Jesuits," says Sainte-Beuve. "I 
 say killed deliberately. I know the Jesuits still live, 
 and, in some respects, prosper. But I maintain that 
 they are slain in the sense that they are forever fallen 
 from the center of action which they occupied, and 
 have lost the access to the government of the world." 
 " It was a shaft from a bow doubly strung," says an- 
 
 ' Henry Rogers, ay hor of " The Eclipse of Faith."
 
 The Masterpiece arid the Miracle. 263 
 
 other writer,* — "strung with genius and piety, and 
 his enemies could not recover." 
 
 The Chancellor of the Jesuit College was so en- 
 raged at the effect of the letters that his physicians 
 ordered him to be bled seven times. And far off in 
 the provinces ecclesiastical councils which had met 
 to censure Arnauld changed their minds and censured 
 the Jesuits instead. 
 
 Margaret Perier gives us a glimpse of her uncle's 
 life while he was writing these immortal letters : 
 
 " He went to an inn, where he was not known, and 
 remained there at work under the name of M. de 
 Mons." (The old home at Clermont and the Piiy du 
 Dome were not forgotten). " M. Perier, his brother- 
 in-law, took lodgings in the same inn as a stranger 
 from the country, not letting the relationship be 
 known." 
 
 One day they were very near discovery. Father 
 Defretal, a Jesuit, a friend and relative of M. Perier's, 
 
 o 
 
 called on the latter to give him a friendly warning. 
 " He said that the Society of Jesuits were firmly 
 persuaded that M. Pascal, his brother-in-law, was the 
 author of those * little letters ' which were having such 
 a run in Paris, and that M. Perier would do well to 
 warn him and advise him to stop writing them or he 
 might find himself in trouble." 
 
 * Essay in the North British Peview,
 
 264 Sister afkl Saint. 
 
 After a long call, " the Jesuit went away, repeating 
 that M. Pascal ought to be warned and to beware. 
 M. Perier was greatly relieved at his departure, foi 
 at that very moment there were spread out upon his 
 bed to dry a score of copies of the seventh or eighth 
 letter. A Jesuit brother, who had accompanied 
 Father Defretal, sat very near the bed, but luckily 
 the curtains were drawn and the papers were not dis- 
 covered. M. Perier at once ran up-stairs to tell M 
 Pascal, whose room was overhead, though the Jesuits 
 had no idea of his being so near them." 
 
 Neither had the Jesuits any idea where these let- 
 ters were printed, though they tried hard to find out, 
 for, with equal boldness and sagacity, Pascal had them 
 printed under the very shadow of the Jesuit college. 
 
 Some of the Port Royal gentlemen, who, though 
 scattered, were in frequent communication, had doubts 
 as to the propriety of using these carnal weapons of 
 ivit and satire in defense of the truth. Good Abb6 
 Singlin, in particular, thought that " merriment was 
 out of place when applied to religious subjects." 
 
 As for Pascah himself, ascetic and sufferer that he 
 was, it was probable the sure instinct of genius 
 rather than any personal delight in mirth that led 
 n.'m to unsheathe this shining blade. " When we 
 regard his life, so afflicted, sad, and short," says Vil- 
 lemain, " we can scarcely understand that super- 
 abundance of humor with which this man floods the
 
 The Masterpiece and the Miracle. 265 
 
 arid fields of scholasticism." Yet we can not help 
 thinking that he must have thoroughly and heartily- 
 enjoyed himself for once, as he gave free play to all 
 those varied powers he had been trying so long to 
 cramp and kill. 
 
 He defends himself for the use of satire and for his 
 entire mode of attack, in this passage of the sixteenth 
 letter : 
 
 " I was asked if I repented having written ' Les 
 Provinciales.' I reply that, far from having repented, 
 if I had to write them now, I would write even more 
 strongly. I was asked why I have given the names 
 of the authors from whom I have taken all the abon; 
 inable propositions I have cited. I answer, that if 1 
 lived in a city where there were a dozen fountains, 
 and if I certainly knew that one of them was poisoned, 
 I should be obliged to warn everybody to draw no 
 water from that fountain ; and, as they might think 
 it pure imagination on my part, I should be obliged 
 to name him who had poisoned it, rather than ex- 
 pose all the city to the danger of being poisoned by 
 it. I was asked why I had employed a pleasant, 
 jocose, and diverting style. I reply that if I had 
 written in a dogmatical style, it would have been 
 only the learned who would have read, and they 
 would have had no necessity to do it, being, art: least, 
 as well acquainted with the subject as myself : thus, 
 
 I thought it a duty to write so as to be comprehended 
 12
 
 266 Sister and Saint. 
 
 by women and men of the world, that they might 
 know the danger of those maxims and propositions 
 which were then universally propagated, and of which 
 they allowed themselves to be so easily persuaded. 
 
 " I was asked, lastly, if I had myself read all the 
 books I have cited. I answer. No ; for in that case 
 it would have been necessary to have passed my life 
 in reading very bad books ; but I have read through 
 the whole of ' Escobar '* twice, and, for the others, 
 I caused them to be read by my friends. But I have 
 never used a single passage without having myself 
 read it in the book cited, or without having examined 
 the subject on which it is adduced, or without having 
 read both what precedes and what follows it, in order 
 that I might not run the risk of quoting what was, in 
 fact, an objection to a reply to it, which would have 
 been censurable and unjust." 
 
 One of the strongest proofs of the genius of these 
 letters is the fact that, notwithstanding the difference 
 in time, in country, in belief, in habits of thought, 
 they are interesting reading to us to-day, 
 
 M. Louis de Montalte, the supposed writer (again 
 we have a hint of Clermont in the nom de plume), is 
 an honest provincial gentleman, of much ignorance 
 and great naivete, who sets out for Paris to gain infor- 
 mation in regard to the theological disputes of the 
 age, and particularly the doctrines of the Jesuits. 
 
 * A celebrated Spanish Jesuit authority.
 
 The Masterpiece and the Miracle. 267 
 
 He addresses himself to a worthy Jesuit father, 
 who, in his boundless admiration for his own order, 
 and in the hope of gaining a convert, details without 
 hesitation — indeed, with triumph — all the arts of 
 casuistry. 
 
 " The arch simplicity with which the provincial 
 involves the worthy father in the most perplexing 
 dilemmas — the expressions of unsophisticated aston- 
 ishment wjiich but prompt his stolid guide eagerly 
 to make good every assertion by a proper array of 
 authorities — a device which, as Pascal has used it, 
 converts what would have been in other hands only 
 a dull catalogue of citations, into a source of perpetual 
 amusement — the droll consequences which, with in- 
 finite affectation of simplicity, he draws from the 
 Jesuit's doctrines — the logical exigencies into which 
 the latter is thrown in the attempt to obviate them, — 
 all these things, managed as only Pascal could have 
 managed them, render the book as entertaining as 
 any novel. The form of letters enables him at the 
 same time to intersperse the most eloquent and glow- 
 ing invectives against the doctrines he exposes."* 
 
 This book of Pascal's is an acknowledged French 
 classic. Voltaire declared it to be the first work of 
 genius in French prose. Before Pascal the language 
 had been heavy, involved. Latinized. Pascal " threw 
 
 * Kenry Rogers, author of " Eclipse of Faith."
 
 268 Sister a7id Sai7it, 
 
 off the yoke " of Latinism, '' and formed the clear, 
 exact French." "As Corneille is the father and 
 founder of French poetry, so is Pascal of French 
 prose," says Cousin. And Voltaire again remarks 
 that " Moliere does not excel these letters in wit, 
 nor Bossuet in sublimity." 
 
 A wonderful transparency is the chief character- 
 istic of Pascal's style. " We see," says Faugere, 
 " Thought herself arrayed in her own chaste nudity 
 like an antique statue." 
 
 His wit is as delicate as it is keen. " Probably no 
 one ever knew so well when to stay his hand."* 
 
 " The remarkable simplicity which characterizes 
 Pascal's style is owing to the great labor he bestowed 
 on his writings."! Nicole says that he often spent 
 twenty days on a single letter, and some of them 
 were written seven times over before they satisfied 
 him. " This letter is a very long one," he once 
 apologizes, " simply because I had not time to make 
 it shorter." 
 
 The second remarkable event which delayed the 
 persecution was the wonderful cure ascribed to the 
 agency of the Holy Thorn. 
 
 Margaret Perier, from whose " Memoirs " of her 
 uncle and aunt we have more than once quoted, was 
 at this time a child of ten years, a member of the 
 
 * Rogers. f Villemain.
 
 The Masterpiece and t'he Miracle. 269 
 
 school of Port Royal de Paris. She had been af- 
 flicted for three years and a half with what was sup- 
 posed to be fistula lacJirynialis of the left eye. The 
 bones of the nose were said to be diseased, and the 
 whole case was a most malignant one, distressing 
 even to read about. The physicians had made up 
 their minds to cautery as a last resort, and M. Perier, 
 who had been absent in Auvergne for a time, was 
 hastening back to be present at the operation. 
 
 Jacqueline tells the story of the cure in a letter to 
 Madame Perier, dated March 29, 1656: 
 
 " Last Friday, M. de la Potherie " (an assiduous 
 collector of relics) " sent hither a very handsome 
 reliquary to our Mothers, having within it a splinter 
 from the sacred crown of thorns, set in a little sun of 
 gilded silver, in order that the whole community 
 might enjoy the sight. Before returning it, they had 
 it placed on a little altar in the choir, and when an 
 anthem had been chanted in its honor, each sister 
 went up and kissed it on her knees, and so did the 
 children, one by one. 
 
 " Sister Flavie, their governess, made a sign to Mar- 
 garet as she drew near, to touch her eye with the 
 relic, and herself took it up and laid it on the spot, 
 hardly thinking what she was doing. When all had 
 retired, it was sent back to M. de la Potherie. 
 
 " That same evening. Sister Flavie, who had forgot- 
 ten the circumstance, heard Margaret say to one of
 
 270 Sister and Saint. 
 
 the little girls, ' My eye is cured ; it does not pain me 
 at all now.' Not a little surprised, she went to the 
 child, and found that the swelling in the corner of 
 her eye, which in the morning was as thick as her 
 fing-er-tip, and very long arid hard, had quite gone 
 down, and the eye itself appeared as healthy as the 
 other, and looked precisely like it." 
 
 The sisterhood proceeded with their usual calm- 
 ness and good sense in the matter. Mother Agnes 
 (Angelique was at des Champs) was informed at once, 
 and the next day she told Jacqueline Pascal. 
 
 They then waited a week, saying nothing about it, 
 and at the end of that time Jacqueline wrote to the 
 child's mother; ** It really needs far more faith for any 
 one who did not see her in her former state to be- 
 lieve that the eye was diseased than it does for those 
 who did see her to believe the cure was produced by 
 a miracle." 
 
 The doctor came to see her now, and the child was 
 brought to him without a word being said. He began 
 to press, and probe, and examine. " Don't you re- 
 member what a bad eye I had?" said the little girl. 
 
 " That is just what I am trying to find," said the 
 doctor, " but I see no traces of it." 
 
 Thereupon Sister Flavie told him what had hap- 
 pened. He asked if the cure was instantaneous. 
 The child confirmed her statement that it. was, upon 
 which he said he was wilh'ng to declare upon oath
 
 The Masterpiece and the Miracle. 271 
 
 that such a cure could not have taken place without 
 a miracle. 
 
 Waiting two weeks longer, seven physicians and 
 surgeons examined the case and made a report to the 
 same effect. 
 
 M. Perier, in his great joy, spoke freely about the 
 matter, and all Paris was soon ringing with the story. 
 Anne of Austria was at first skeptical, but after send- 
 ing M. Felix, the king's first surgeon, to make an 
 examination, she was obliged to accept the universal 
 verdict. Then the Grand Vicar of the Archbishop of 
 Paris inquires, approves, and verifies, and the miracle 
 is publicly sanctioned by the Church, 
 
 The Provincial letters had convinced one class of 
 minds. The miracle convinced another class. Port 
 Royal all at once became fashionable again. The 
 church was so crowded at the weekly Friday services 
 that seats had to be secured months beforehand. The 
 ladies of the court begged the privilege of making re- 
 treats at both convents. There were almost daily 
 conversions to Jansenism. The Queen of Poland, the 
 Princess Guemenee, the Marquis de Sevigne, and a 
 long list of dukes and duchesses were among those 
 who frequently sought retirement in the cloisters, 
 and, according to Mrs. Schimmelpenninck, " edified 
 the world by an upright and godly conversation." 
 
 The most remarkable conversion was that of the 
 Duchesse de Longueville, sister of the great Conde.
 
 272 Sister and Saint. 
 
 She seems to have become, indeed, a changed wom- 
 an, and the same is true of her brother and sister, the 
 Prince and Princess of Conti. " Their houses, reti- 
 nue, and equipage became marked with strict econ- 
 omy. Their princely revenues were poured into the 
 bosom of those whose fortune had been injured by 
 the late civil war. They did not refuse to make the 
 most humiliating and public acknowledgments of 
 their guilt. Nor did they ever afterward spend more 
 than was absolutely necessary on themselves ; till, 
 after a lapse of many years, all the provinces injured 
 by the war had been fully indemnified by their 
 princely donations." 
 
 It is quite beyond the scope of this little book to 
 discuss the miracle of the " Holy Thorn." Indeed, 
 we think with Sir James Stephen that " time must 
 be at some discount with any one who should em- 
 ploy it in adjusting the balance of improbabilities " in 
 this case. 
 
 We know that, as Sainte-Beuve says, " it would have 
 been impossible for either Blaise or Jacqueline Pascal 
 to lend themselves to anything like deception," and 
 it is evident from their letters that they were both 
 humble believers in the miracle. 
 
 Neither could any of the Arnaulds have been 
 parties to the deception, if deception there were. 
 It was much against Angelique's taste to have the 
 matter talked about, and she said that if she had
 
 The Masterpiece and the Miracle. 273 
 
 prayed for a miracle she should have asked that one 
 might be performed upon the soul rather than upon 
 the body. 
 
 After this great event, the bann of silence was re- 
 moved from Jacqueline Pascal's muse, and by order 
 of her superiors, she wrote a long poem in honor of 
 the miracle. Cousin tries to find in it some echo of 
 Corneille, but we are inclined to agree with Sainte- 
 Beuve in thinking it " parfaitement detestable." In 
 the awakening of nobler powers that little gift of 
 versifying had been lost.
 
 SORROWFUL DAYS
 
 XVIII. 
 
 SORROWFUL DAYS. 
 
 ]T is pleasant to think of the next three or four 
 years — years of peace and plenty — when the 
 nuns returned to their unmolested worship, when 
 the recluses gathered again at their beloved farm- 
 house, and this whole little community of the Lord's 
 faithful ones rejoiced in what seemed to them His 
 visible smile and blessing. 
 
 These were busy years for Jacqueline. She was 
 promoted to the post of Sub-Prioress of Port Royal 
 des Champs, and left Paris never to return. Her let- 
 ters are few and brief, but cheerful. Whatever her 
 attainments in self-mortification, it is impossible that 
 she should not have felt a noble pleasure in her 
 brother's great success. The nuns were not allowed 
 secular reading, but, for once, they had access to the 
 choicest that French literature could give them, in 
 chese " Provincial letters." Jacqueline refers to them 
 once or twice, always in that tone of unsurprised and 
 
 (277)
 
 giyS Sister and Saint. 
 
 assured calm which is so beautiful to see in the " sis- 
 ters of genius." The world, to be sure, may be going 
 mad over this remarkable performance, but the> ? — 
 they are not astonished — they have known all the 
 time that their hearts' beloved could do this thing ! 
 
 Whatever complacency the author himself may 
 have felt in his work so splendidly done, he was care- 
 ful to check it at once, as he did every feeling of 
 pleasure. Madame Perier tells us : '' He wore an 
 iron girdle lined with points, next his naked flesh, 
 and whenever there came to him any feeling of satis- 
 faction in having assisted or advised another, or when 
 he took pleasure in the place where he was, or in any 
 circumstance whatever, he gave himself a blow with 
 his elbow, to redouble the violence of the co'.i5-tant 
 pain and make him remember his duty. Thir, prac- 
 tice appeared to him so useful that he continued it 
 through his increasing feebleness till the close of his 
 
 life His great maxim was to renounce all 
 
 pleasure and all superfluity, and he labored without 
 ceasing for mortification." 
 
 In February, 1660, Jacqueline writes a letter to her 
 nieces, Margaret and Jacqueline Perier, who are both 
 now at Port Royal de Paris. This is the only speci- 
 men of her handwriting now extant — a "beautiful 
 handwriting and orthography," Cousin tells us. 
 
 " My very dear nieces," she begins, " yov have so 
 much reason to complain of me that I cSii not find
 
 Sorrowful Days. 279 
 
 any excuse for myself. It will, therefore, be a shorter 
 way to ask the forgiveness which I doubt not you 
 will grant ; for if I were to bring forward some excuse 
 that is not exactly true I should both injure myself 
 
 and set you a very bad example I can assure 
 
 you, my dear sisters, it seems to me as if I could for- 
 get myself ere I forget you, and the less I testify my 
 love, the more I feel it." 
 
 We may judge of the busy life of the Sub-Prioress 
 by this letter to her brother, of November, 1660: 
 
 " Good-morning, and a happy New Year to you, 
 my dearest brother. You will not doubt my having 
 wished you this most cordially when the year began, 
 though I could not tell you so till its close. I dare 
 say you wonder at my mentioning it at all, but it is 
 right you should know that my complete dedication 
 of this year to God has not robbed you of anything 
 you had reason to expect from me, for I have prayed 
 for you continually. Oh, when I think how peace- 
 fully this season of separation, which we naturally 
 expected would prove so painful, has passed away, 
 and how swiftly this year has fled, time seems of such 
 small importance that I can not help longing for 
 eternity. But I am not going on with so extensive a 
 train of thought, which, indeed, I began unintention- 
 ally." .... After various salutations to friends, she 
 concludes : '' To yourself I say nothing ; you can 
 judge of my love by your own, and you kiow that I
 
 28o Sister and Saint. 
 
 am entirely yours in Him who has united us more 
 closely in the bonds of grace than in those of nature." 
 
 Early in the year i66i, troubles once more thick- 
 ened about Port Royal. 
 
 Mazarin died, and what little influence Anne of 
 Austria had, died with him. Louis XIV. had "placed 
 his conscience in the hands of the Jesuits," and they, 
 at once, saw their opportunity and seized it. The 
 "Five Propositions" were once more marshalled out, 
 — "those celebrated propositions which are in the 
 'Augustinus' but nobody has ever seen," as Pascal 
 said, and which, according to another gentleman who 
 read the whole book carefully through to find them, 
 " were there incognito if they were there at all." A 
 "New Formulary" was drawn up, running (in part) 
 as follows : 
 
 " I condemn, from my heart and with my mouth, 
 the doctrine of the five propositions of Cornelius 
 Jansenius, which are cojitaincd in the book entitled 
 ' Augustinus,' which both Pope Innocent X. and 
 Pope Alexander VII. have condemned." 
 
 Not only ecclesiastics, but all the nuns and school- 
 masters were required, under very severe penalties, to 
 sign this paper. No exception was made in favor of 
 those who had never seen the "Augustinus" or who 
 could not read Latin ! 
 
 It was, of course, impossible for the Port Royalists 
 to sign such a paper.
 
 Sorroiufnl Days. 281 
 
 "Persecution," says Tregelles, *'now began in 
 earnest. The dungeons of the Bastile were crowded 
 with those v.'ho refused to violate their consciences by 
 subscribing what they did not beheve. The very 
 passages of the prison were occupied with prisoners. 
 
 " M. de Saci, the nephew of the Mere Angelique, 
 carried on during his imprisonment his well-known 
 version of the Holy Scriptures. Henri Arnauld, 
 Bishop of Anjou, and three other bishops, refused to 
 accept the formulary, let the consequences be what 
 they might. But it was upon Port Royal itself that 
 the principal fury of the tempest discharged itself." 
 
 In April, 1661, there came an order that all the 
 pupils in the two convents should be sent back to 
 their homes within three days. And the spring and 
 summer following are crowded full of sorrow. 
 
 The Mere Angelique was now old and suffering 
 from the disease of which she soon died. But the 
 day before that fixed upon for the dispersion, she said 
 good-bye forever to her beloved valley of Chevreuse, 
 and was carried on a litter to the Paris house. 
 
 " On her arrival she found the street thronged by 
 an immense concourse of people, the gates of the 
 convent closely guarded by sentinels, and the courts 
 full of armed police ; she was carried into the house 
 between files of archers. She found the whole com- 
 munity in tears and lamentations." There were 
 thirty-three boarders in the Paris house, not including,
 
 282 Sister and Saint. 
 
 of course, the. novices, candidates, and nuns. Many 
 of these young pupils were orphans, and knew no 
 other home than the convent, and when the time 
 came for them to go, their sobs and cries resounded 
 through the house. It was equally hard for the nuns 
 to know that they were to see these children no more, 
 " for they were tenderly attached to them." 
 
 " The mournful scene was prolonged eight days, 
 for some of the parents lived in the country and could 
 not reach Paris sooner." The children Avould throw 
 themselves in a crowd upon the nun who had charge 
 of them, " weeping and holding fast by her dress." 
 Some of them entreated to be received at once as 
 novices that they might stay, and others begged to 
 be made lay-sisters, as the servants were not ordered 
 away. But in a few days there came another order 
 to expel every candidate and novice. Many touching 
 and thrilling scenes are given us in the '' Memoires." 
 
 Angelique and Agnes were true mothers to their 
 whole flock in these days of trial. They inspired, 
 comforted, advised, wept and prayed with their chil- 
 dren, as it is given to mothers to do at such times. 
 Agnes wrote a very beautiful letter to the King in 
 regard to certain novices, whose cases we need not 
 detail here. '' The king praised the letter," we are 
 told, but paid no heed to its humble request. 
 
 Angelique, from her bed of death, also wrote an 
 appeal to Anne of Austria, But all was useless. In
 
 Sorrowful Days. 283 
 
 the course of a few days seventy-five young girls were 
 removed from Port Royal de Paris, and nearly as 
 many about the same time left the other house. Jac- 
 queline's two nieces, the Periers, were sent home to 
 their mother, who was then living in Paris. Their 
 aunt wrote to them in June — a letter full of consola- 
 tion and of warning. She advises them to retire as 
 much as possible from society. " I do not mean you 
 to be discourteous," she explains, '' nor to seclude 
 yourselves entirely, but to seek retirement when not 
 actually obliged to mingle with society, and when you 
 are to snatch a few moments frequently for lifting 
 your hearts to Godl' 
 
 The scholars, novices, and candidates were gone 
 from both houses. The large, plain rooms were empty 
 and desolate, and the busy Sub-Prioress, doubtless, 
 had time now to sit down quietly to write and think. 
 And now comes the Grand Vicar of the Archbishop 
 of Paris, to go through both convents and question 
 each nun in turn as to her belief. Jacqueline's ac- 
 count of her own examination is published in the 
 " History of the Persecutions of the Port Royalist 
 Nuns." She is very modest and humble — a true 
 daughter of the Church — yet we catch an inkling now 
 and then of the same quick wit and clear reason which, 
 in lier brother's brain, involved the worthy Father of 
 the "Letters" in so many "logical exigencies." 
 
 " I am not accustomed to dive into matters uncon-
 
 284 SzJer and Saint, 
 
 nected with duty," she answers to one question, but 
 when pressed for her opinion, she gave it simply and 
 clearly. 
 
 At another ready answer, " he smiled a little." Once 
 he asked her, " How comes it that so many persons 
 are lost eternally?" *' I confess to you, sir," she re- 
 plies, " this thought often troubles me when I am 
 praying, and I can not help saying sometimes, * O my 
 Lord ! how can it be, after all Thou hast done for us, 
 that so many souls should perish miserably?' But 
 when these thoughts come, I repress them, not daring 
 to pry into the secrets of God, and I find satisfaction 
 in praying for sinners." 
 
 The Grand Vicar answered, "That is quite right, 
 my daughter." 
 
 When he asked if she had taught the novices cer- 
 tain doctrines, she said : "As I avoid puzzling myself 
 with these topics, it is not likely that I should seek 
 to puzzle them. On the contrary, I have tried to 
 have them as simple-minded as possible." 
 
 At the end of the conference the examiner said : 
 " You are right, and God be praised for it. I believe 
 you are speaking to me in all sincerity. Send me 
 another sister." 
 
 And yet, after all these things, the nuns would not 
 sign that little formulary. " Pure as angels and proud 
 as devils ! " exclaimed the angry archbishop. They 
 would* not sign !
 
 Sorrowful Days, 285 
 
 How could they? How could they declare that 
 certain things were contained in a book they never 
 had read and never could read ? They did not believe 
 them to be there. They loved the truth, and "they 
 clung desperately" and heroically to "the one shred 
 and particle o truth they had discovered." That one 
 particle of truth was enough to make them free — free 
 from blind obedience to a corrupt Church, and free 
 from fear of their adversaries. 
 
 As the Grand Vicar completed his examination at 
 Port Royal de Paris (in July), he passed through the 
 room where the M^re Angelique lay very near her 
 end. "How do you feel, Reverend Mother?" asked 
 the ecclesiastic. 
 
 " Like a person who is dying," she answered, tran- 
 quilly. 
 
 " Do you speak of death so calmly ? " said he. " Does 
 death not alarm you ? " 
 
 " No," answered she. " I am incomparably more 
 alarmed at what I now see taking place in this house." 
 Then, rousing herself and speaking with all her old 
 energy, she added : " Oh, sir, sir, this is man's day ; 
 but the day of the Lord is coming, and that will ex- 
 plain all, and avenge all ! " 
 
 A few weeks later, in the midst of the storm of per- 
 secution, the good mother passed quietly to her rest. 
 Many were her expressions of love to her dear daugh- 
 ters during those last days, but " Jesus — Jesus, my
 
 286 Sistei^ and Saint. 
 
 Lord, my righteousness, my strength, my all ! " were 
 the last words upon her lips. 
 
 And still the nuns would not sign ! The court- 
 yard of the Paris house was full of mounted police 
 and archers, and masons and carpenters were busy 
 walling up the very gates of the monastery, and thus 
 rendering their home their prison. Pere Singlin, 
 de Saci, and all their confessors were in concealment, 
 and both houses were deprived of all religious guides, 
 except the Jesuits. Still, they would not sign ! 
 
 In this extremity some of their best friends be- 
 thought themselves of a compromise. A treaty with 
 the archbishop was opened, for the purpose of obtain- 
 ing a modified declaration {maiidemcjit), to which 
 these women might be willing to subscribe their 
 names. The scattered leaders met, with much risk 
 and difficulty, in Pascal's room to talk the matter 
 over. Some of the meetings were rather stormy. 
 Arnauld and Nicole were in favor of a signature of 
 this modified formula. Pascal was confined to his bed 
 with the illness from which he never rallied, but his 
 mind roused itself to its full strength to consider this 
 question which came so near him. He was in favor 
 of " standing by God's truth at all hazards, even if it 
 involved disobedience to the pope." Arnauld ably 
 argued the wisdom of trying to make duty to the 
 Ghurch consistent with the truth, and skillfully rep- 
 resented the helpless condition of these nuns.
 
 Sorrowful Days. 287 
 
 Pascal was stubborn " in his unconscious Protest- 
 antism." Duty to the Church could not, in this case, 
 be made consistent with the truth. " No, no," again 
 and again he cried, "you can never save Port Royal, 
 but you can be traitors to the truth ! " 
 
 At the last conference the majority of those pres- 
 ent, yielding to Arnauld and Nicole, voted for the 
 compromise. " Seeing which, M. Pascal, who loved 
 truth more than anything else, and who, in spite of 
 his weakness, had spoken with great earnestness in 
 order to impress his convictions upon the others, was 
 so overcome with grief that he fainted, entirely losing 
 voice and consciousness." When he had recovered 
 himself, and all had gone away except the Duke of 
 Roannez. and another intimate friend, " Madame 
 Perier asked him what had occasioned the swoon. 
 He replied, ' When I beheld so many persons to whom 
 God has made known His truth, and \v^o ought to 
 be its defenders, thus giving way, I could not bear 
 it.' " 
 
 And how was it with Jacqueline ? How was that 
 twin-soul of Blaise Pascal's settling this question ? 
 
 In the quiet of Port Royal dcs Champs, beneath 
 the solemn hills, with no knowledge of what was 
 passing in her brother's room in Paris, she thought 
 the problem out and came to her own conclusion. 
 " Strange to say," says Cousin, " though not aware of 
 the meetings at Paris, Jacqueline used the same
 
 288 Sister and Saint, 
 
 arguments and even, in some cases, the very same 
 words that Pascal had done." She could not under- 
 stand, any more than he, how men claiming to be the 
 defenders of the truth, could even seem to abandon 
 it on any consideration of expediency. " Brought 
 face to face with danger, her intrepid heart broke 
 forth in proud yet pathetic strains, reminding us of 
 some of the finest passages of the ' Provincial Let- 
 ters.' " 
 
 The advice of the leaders was formally signified to 
 the nuns. It was that they should sign this modified 
 document, " with a distinct exception in favor of 
 Jansen's meaning." Not only did Arnauld urge this 
 step, but Father Singlin, from his place of conceal- 
 ment, wrote them a letter advising the same. It is 
 doubtful whether Jacqueline ever knew her brother's 
 position in the matter. 
 
 But before she would yield, this heroic woman 
 made one more effort. Cousin says : " We ask of 
 all who yet retain any sympathy with energy of charac- 
 ter and with the beauty of an unselfish love for truth, 
 if they have ever met with many pages of greater 
 sublimity and strength than are found in Jacqueline 
 Pascal's ' Letter on signing the formulary ' ? " 
 
 This letter is worthy, in every way, of Pascal's sis- 
 ter. "It is an echo of his own manly and heart- 
 stirring tone." 
 
 " I am convinced," she boldly declares, " that in
 
 Sorro'wf7il Days. 289 
 
 this course there is safety neither for body nor soul. 
 Truth is the only real Liberator." 
 
 "What are we afraid of?" again she cries. " Ban- 
 ishment and dispersion, the seizure of property, 
 prison, death, if you will — but are not these things 
 our glory? Let us either give up the Gospel or carry 
 out its principles and be happy in suffering for the 
 truth." 
 
 Satire does not fail her. " I admire the ingenuity 
 of the human mind, as displayed in the perfection 
 with which the "■ Mandemeiit' is drawn up." 
 
 " I know very well that the defense of the truth is 
 not women's business. But perhaps when bishops 
 have the cowardice of women, women ought to have 
 the boldness of bishops." 
 
 And, at last, in the note to Arnauld in which she 
 incloses the letter, the whole noble, womanly heart 
 comes out as she concludes : " Forgive me, my dear 
 Father, and do not imagine that though I seem cour- 
 ageous, nature does not dread the consequences. 
 But I trust that grace will support me." 
 
 The Prioress of Port Royal des Champs, a much 
 older woman than Jacqueline, shared the scruples of 
 her subordinate, and did not hesitate to tell Arnauld 
 that she did so. " And that great man," says Cousin, 
 " instead of being irritated, did his best to answer 
 their objections in a long letter, which unfortunately 
 has been lost." 
 13
 
 290 Sister and Saint. 
 
 At length, a last communication from Arnauld — 
 Jacqueline calls it " a note of command " — was sent 
 to them, and, one sad day, the nuns in solemn proces- 
 sion signed the modified formulary. Trained to obe- 
 dience, influenced most of all by the direction of 
 their own spiritual Father, Singlin, they put their 
 names to the hated paper. 
 
 All of them made the "distinct exceptions" sug- 
 gested by Arnauld. Jacqueline and her sympathiz- 
 ing friend, the prioress, added to these " a strong 
 protest in order to clear their consciences in some 
 degree." Yet, notwithstanding this, remorse and 
 grief so overcame these noble women that, the next 
 day, both of them were taken seriously ill. For 
 nearly three months they lingered. Doubtless the 
 autumn chill and dampness of the valley had some- 
 thing to do with their condition. But Jacqueline 
 said of herself that she was " a victim of the formu- 
 lary." " I speak in the agony of a grief which I feel 
 certaiii will kill me,'' she had said in her " Letter on 
 the Formulary," and the clear-headed, conscience- 
 searching nun was not given to exaggeration. " It 
 was the woman, not the Christian which sank," says 
 Vinet, "overwhelmed by the weight of her own 
 courage." 
 
 The prioress, with much difficulty was restored to 
 health. Jacqueline never rallied. On her birthday — 
 October 4, 1661, just thirty-three years old — she died.
 
 Sorrowful Days. 291 
 
 We have no details of her last days. We only- 
 know that neither brother nor sister were with her, 
 that the Mere Angelique was dead and Agnes very 
 feeble and imprisoned at Paris, that she was denied 
 the presence of her beloved Father Singlin. But the 
 Lord remembereth His own, and, doubtless, she was 
 ministered unto according to her need. 
 
 " Her life," says Vinet, " is the life of an energetic 
 woman ; her death — that of a woman. She died of 
 grief, because, under the guidance of the great 
 Arnauld, and of the distinguished leaders of Port 
 Royal, she had consented to a transaction deemed 
 proper by them all, but in which the exquisite deli- 
 cacy of her moral sense detected a slight evasion."
 
 THOSE LEFT BEHIND.
 
 XIX. 
 
 THOSE LEFT BEHIND. 
 
 THERE was fresh sorrow in the convent now, 
 for " Sceur de Sainte-Euphemie " was greatly 
 beloved. A touching and beautiful letter was 
 written by the abbess to Pascal, informing him of 
 their common loss. 
 
 D'Andilly's daughter, Angelique de St. Jean, a 
 very lovely and talented woman, just Jacqueline 
 Pascal's age, wrote to Madame Perier. Her letter is 
 rather an outcry of sisterly grief than an attempt at 
 consolation. 
 
 Good, quiet, unpretending M. Perier came from 
 Paris, hoping to find his sister-in-law still alive. " He 
 seems so grieved," writes Angelique. " I pity him 
 for the sad news I have not yet dared communicate. 
 The Duke of Roannez is also here. I am very glad 
 of that ; yet earthly consolation is little worth. Alas ! 
 how much I had hoped for, in all our present and 
 
 (295)
 
 296 Sister and Saint. 
 
 future trials, from her whom God has taken away, 
 lest we should lean on her too much." 
 
 Father Singlin wrote a tender epistle to his daugh- 
 ters in the Lord, holding up for their imitation the 
 virtues of their beloved sister. In the annals of the 
 convent, Jacqueline is spoken of as, in all respects, 
 " a perfect nun — one whose eminent piety equaled 
 the nobility of her intellect." 
 
 The brother and sister were, in death, not long 
 divided. In August, 1662, Blaise Pascal died. His 
 last months were an accumulation of sufferings — dis- 
 ease, penances, and griefs. 
 
 His only remark on hearing of Jacqueline's death 
 was, " God give us grace to die as well." " Yet," 
 says Madame Perier simply, " she was assuredly the 
 person whom he loved best in all the world." He 
 endured all trials with a beautiful patience. He was 
 ashamed, he said, of having so much kindness and at- 
 tention lavished upon him, while so many of Christ's 
 poor had not where to lay their heads. 
 
 While the body wore away, the active mind was 
 reaching farther and farther out into its own bound- 
 less realm. 
 
 In these last years were written those " Pens6es " 
 which will live even longer than the "Provincial 
 Letters." They were jotted down on bits of paper 
 and pinned together without classification. "Frag- 
 mentary, but grand — they are like some temple
 
 Those Left Behind, 297 
 
 portico in the sands of Egypt, ruined before finished, 
 but whose glory will never pass away. "* They were 
 intended as parts of a great work on the evidences of 
 the Christian religion, the general plan of which he 
 once sketched in conversation with the Duke of 
 Roannez and other friends. 
 
 Once Pascal returned, for a brief season, to mathe- 
 matical studies. In the course of a few sleepless 
 nights, caused by the agony of tooth-ache, he thought 
 out, merely for the sake of distraction from the pain, 
 a system which came within one step of being the 
 " Differential and Integral Calculus." Tulloch says 
 that if he had pursued this train of thought " it may . 
 confidently be presumed that he would have antici- 
 pated Leibnitz and Newton in the glory of their great 
 invention." As it was, Pascal's discovery brought 
 him great honors from all the mathematical circles of 
 Europe. 
 
 And who first thought of the dray, the wheel- 
 barrow, the omnibus ? — who but this " miracle of 
 universal genius " ? Sainte-Beuve says : " It seems as 
 if eveiy object he looked at gave him a new idea, 
 often a very practical one." 
 
 It is almost a relief to have the intimation of a fault 
 in the midst of the many virtues all Pascal's biogra- 
 phers have presented to us. His sister says : " The 
 
 * Villemain. 
 
 13^
 
 298 
 
 extreme vivacity of his mind made him sometimes so 
 impatient that it was hard to satisfy him ; yet as soon 
 as he perceived that he had grieved any one by his 
 impatience, he made up for it at once ijncontijicni) by 
 behavior so sweet and by so many kindnesses that he 
 never lost the love of any one by this fault." We 
 may be sure every word of this is true. The beauty 
 of Madame Perier's "Memoirs" is their moderate 
 tone. -Their repressions are more eloquent than any 
 panegyrics. This very fault of impatience brings out 
 an offsetting virtue — humility. " I have always ad- 
 mired the many great points of this man," said an 
 ecclesiastic who visited him shortly before his death, 
 "but I never knew before the grandness of his sim- 
 plicity. He is a childr 
 
 When the end was near, Pascal insisted on leaving 
 his own house to die at his sister's, because he had 
 taken into his own house a family, one of whom was 
 ill of varioloid, and he would not expose his sister to 
 the risk of coming there.* " He was almost incon- 
 solable" that they would not let him go to a hospital 
 "to die among the poor," and he begged his sister to 
 take into her house some poor sick person who should 
 receive the same attentions as himself. This would 
 
 * Mi'dame Perier's residence at that time was No. S Rue Neuve 
 Saiiit-Etienne. Entering tlie court, at the right of the/^r/<? cochere, 
 you find a little isolated pavilion. There, in a room which has two 
 grated windows opening on the street, Pascal died.
 
 Those Left Behmd. 299 
 
 have been done if they had succeeded in finding a 
 patient in condition to be moved. 
 
 He continued his austerities to the last, and "re- 
 strained, even in his dying hours, expressions of ten- 
 derness toward those whom he loved." 
 
 " Mistaken — misled by a pernicious asceticism." 
 Most truly so, we think. Yet, some men's mistakes 
 are better than other men's wisdom. 
 
 That patient elder sister, Gilberte, had, indeed, 
 many griefs to bear. Ten years after her brother, her 
 husband died, and she was then plunged into a sea of 
 pecuniary troubles. Two of her sons died not long 
 afterward. In 1687, at the age of sixty-eight, she 
 herself went to her rest. She was buried in the 
 church of Saint-Etienne du Mont, by her brother's 
 side. Both tombstones may be seen there to-day. 
 
 Margaret Perier, the heroine of the miracle, lived 
 to be eighty-seven years old. She did the world good 
 service by collecting the papers of her celebrated 
 uncle and aunt and writing the memoirs of her family. 
 " All my relatives and brethren have died in God's 
 service and in the love of His truth," she says at the 
 close of those " Memoirs." " I am left alone. God 
 forbid that I should ever thir^k of renouncing either! " 
 That she did not renounce either is shown by the fol- 
 lowing memoranda made by some friend after her 
 death : 
 
 "Mad^"= Perier made, at different times, long
 
 300 Sister and Saint. 
 
 sojourns in Paris, where she was the admiration of 
 literary and the consolation of religious people. She 
 had many acquaintances and a great number of 
 
 friends of both sexes She left Paris altogether 
 
 in 1695, after the death of her sister, and went to live 
 with her brother, then dean of St. Peter's (at Cler- 
 mont). At first she remained at Bienassis, which is 
 the most beautiful country-seat in the environs of 
 Clermont, but she would never allow the smallest 
 party of pleasure to assemble there. 
 
 "She had a carriage in which to ride in and out of 
 town, but, after a while, gave up both house and 
 equipage, and finding that the Great Hospital was in 
 want of a superintendent, offered her own services to 
 the directors. They were accepted, and she separated 
 herself from her brother in order to live at the hospi- 
 tal, where, however, her health, which was much im- 
 paired, did not permit her to make a long stay. Her 
 brother was now canon of the cathedral. They 
 bought a house in its neighborhood, and they lived 
 there in a very simple manner. She remained there 
 after his death. 
 
 " Mad^''^ Perier was always dressed in blaclc;, of the 
 commonest material. Her furniture was perfectly 
 plain. Her only domestics were a valet, who took 
 care of the country property, and two or three maids, 
 who, like their mistress, lived a religious life. They 
 did not wear veils, but little white hoods. One of
 
 Those Left Behind. 301 
 
 them, who survived her, had been in her service fifty 
 years. 
 
 " Some years before her death, Mad^"^ Perier lost 
 the use of her hmbs, and this compelled her to re- 
 main within doors except on festival days and Sun- 
 days, when she was carried to the cathedral in a chair. 
 She passed most of her days on a couch, and occu- 
 pied herself with prayer and reading. Her visitors 
 were always charmed with her conversation. Her 
 mind and memory, which was excellent, endured to 
 the very last. By her will she made the poor, in the 
 General Hospital of Clermont, her legatees." 
 
 You do not wish to lay down the book till we have 
 taken a final glance at Port Royal ? 
 
 Pascal was right. No compromises would avail. 
 TJicy could not save Port Royal. It was not the sign- 
 ing of a paper that the Jesuits wanted. It was the 
 giving up of a principle, and these women would not 
 give that up. " You refuse to yield your consciences 
 to youn superiors. What signifies it that you are 
 holy and virtuous ? " said the archbishop when he 
 came " in full pontificals, with a terrible countenance," 
 to inspect Port Royal de Paris. " He forbade them 
 to approach the altar as wholly unworthy, contuma- 
 cious, and mutinous," and he warned them to expect 
 his return at an early day, " to denounce a signal pun- 
 ishment which should make them tremble." 
 
 He kept his promise. A rumor (all too true)
 
 302 Sister and Saint. 
 
 reached them one night that the abbess and "all the 
 principal officers and nuns" were to be imprisoned in 
 separate prisons or in Jesuit convents. 
 
 The next morning " the great gates of the monas- 
 tery being opened, the archbishop's state-coach, with 
 others containing his officers, silver-cross bearers, and 
 ecclesiastics, and cigJit empty coaches, with twenty con- 
 stables with staves, and eighty soldiers fully armed, 
 entered and arranged themselves around the court, 
 with loaded fire-arms and fixed bayonets." 
 
 " Oh, ma Mere,'' whispered one of the nuns to 
 Mother Agnes, " is it possible that we, such unworthy 
 disciples, should be sent for with a * band of men with 
 swords, and staves, and chief priests,' just like the 
 Lord himself ? " 
 
 " Guards were placed at the doors ; and the arch- 
 bishop alighted from his coach in full state, with his 
 great silver gilt cross borne before him, his mitre on 
 his head, and his train borne by numerous ecclesias- 
 tics. 
 
 "As he alighted, M. d'Andilly, bareheaded, his hair 
 white as silver, threw himself at the archbishop's feet. 
 He had in that monastery six daughters and had had 
 as many sisters, two of whom yet lived. And in the 
 grave-yard of that monastery were the remains of his 
 mother and his grandmother, both of whom had died 
 exemplary nuns of Port Royal, and one of whom had 
 bestowed on it that vciy. house. He uttered not a
 
 Those Left Behind, 303 
 
 word, but tears betrayed what he felt on seeing the 
 hour come when they were, for their constancy in the 
 truth, to be torn from that very house their munifi- 
 cence had bestowed ; and to be immured separately 
 in prisons, destitute of everything." 
 
 The threat was fully carried out. The M^re Agnes 
 was imprisoned, the last sacraments were refused 
 her when she was believed to be dying, and she 
 was threatened that her dead body should be thrown 
 out unburied. " But she recovered, and, after ten 
 months, was sent back to Port Royal dcs Chainps, 
 where she died at the age of seventy-eight. 
 
 Very thrilling are many of the stories of these 
 days given us in the "Lives of the Nuns of Port 
 Royal." Gertrude de Valois is one of the noblest 
 instances of patient suffering for righteousness' sake. 
 Wealth and honor she gladly left behind, and chose 
 imprisonment, torture, want, even to the verge of 
 starvation, for her earthly portion. She was threat- 
 ened with burial in unconsecrated ground if she re- 
 fused, to the last, compliance with the demands of 
 her persecutors. "Sire," she answered undauntedly 
 to the archbishop, " I do not think you can bury me 
 in a spot where my Lord can not find me and raise 
 me up again at the last day." 
 
 Port Royal dcs Champs was deprived, like its sister 
 community, of its officers and principal nuns, and, 
 after going through a few brief attempts at " pacifica-
 
 304 Sister and Saint. 
 
 tion," through the influence of the Duchesse de Lon- 
 gucville, was left, apparently, to die out. Various 
 schemes were proposed by friends of the nuns. At 
 one time the Duke of Roannez offered to buy an 
 island in the St. Lawrence for them and bear the ex- 
 pense of their removal to America. Should we ever 
 have known or guessed their virtues if they had come 
 thus to our doors? 
 
 Fifty years after Angelique's death, we are told, 
 there were still twenty-two nuns left at Port Royal 
 dcs Champs. " They were old and feeble women ; 
 bedridden, paralytic, dying." They had lived many 
 years shut up in the convent, without confessor, with- 
 out priest, without sacraments. 
 
 Madame de Maintenon made sport of these old 
 women, and urged by her and his Jesuit priests, te 
 grand 7iionarquc, Louis Fourteenth, decided to dis- 
 perse them, and forever blot out Port Royal. 
 
 In 1709, an officer with three hundred soldiers ap- 
 peared in the quiet, almost deserted • valley. He 
 seated himself on the throne of the abbess and ordered 
 the trembling, but stout-hearted old ladies to be ready 
 within ten minutes to leave their home. They were 
 to be exiled one by one to different convents. The 
 prioress, with respectful dignity, asked if they might 
 not be allowed to go two by two, as many of them 
 were too infirm to be without attendants. This was 
 refused. Most of them were between seventy and
 
 Those Left Behind. 305 
 
 eighty years old; the eldest was eighty-six, the 
 youngest over fifty. " Some died on their journey ; 
 others as soon as they reached their destination." 
 They were imprisoned in cells without light or fire ; 
 they were deprived of sacraments, arid, in some cases, 
 their dying hands were guided to sign that hated, un- 
 modified " Formulary," which no persecution had 
 been able to make them sign. 
 
 Was not this enough ? No. The convent itself, 
 the farm-house of the recluses, the church, and the 
 grave-yard must suffer. The buildings were razed, 
 one after another, to their foundations. Then " a 
 band of workmen, prepared for their task by drink, 
 broke open the graves of recluses and nuns, tore the 
 bodies from the graves, threw them together in heaps, 
 and allowed the dogs to feed on them. The remains 
 were heaped up in carts and conveyed to a large pit, 
 into V, hich they were cast." 
 
 Thus was this heresy crushed out ! Thus ended, to 
 human view, the lives and efforts of some of the most 
 gifted as well as the holiest children of the Catholic 
 Church of the seventeenth century. Thus did this 
 diseased and weakening body cut off its healthiest 
 member ! 
 
 But exiled from that church's altars, denied the 
 consolations of her sacraments, condemned to die in 
 that spiritual penury which was to them so much 
 worse than any other want, these fainting souls found.
 
 3o6 Sister and Saint. 
 
 we believe, at last, that righteousness for which they 
 hungered. They found it in no earthly temples, but 
 in that Church above where creeds are lost in Truth. 
 They sowed in tears ; they doubtless reap in joy. 
 Nor can such seed be without a harvest for us in 
 these ends of the world. Such lives can not have 
 been lived in vain. Such characters are an immortal 
 force for good. Jacqueline Pascal, from her far-off, 
 dishonored grave, still speaks to us a lesson of cour- 
 age, fidelity, and faith.
 
 FRAGMENTS GATHERED UP.
 
 XX. 
 
 FRAGMENTS GATHERED UP. 
 
 THERE may be readers who will like to sup- 
 plement our story with a few further illustra- 
 tions of its characters. 
 For such, these fragments have been gathered, and 
 let them feel assured that there is much more of 
 equal interest in the great mass from which these are 
 taken. 
 
 I. 
 
 In the history of certain races there may occur an 
 illustrious moment, a unique moment, in which the 
 type of that race, after long elaboration, attains its 
 distinct degree of energy and perfection, sets its dis- 
 tinct and deep imprint on two or three medals, and 
 then is broken forever. It was so in the case of Blaise 
 and Jacqueline Pascal — two precious vases, shattered 
 by the mighty workings of truth, genius, and feeling 
 within them. — Vi?iet. 
 
 (309)
 
 310 Sister and Saint, 
 
 II. 
 We experience a feeling of more thorough and re- 
 spectful admiration for her than for him. We doubt 
 whether we have ever met with a character, male or 
 even female, which surpassed Jacqueline's. Had she 
 been a woman endowed with one of those peaceful 
 and innately submissive natures to which the convic- 
 tion of submission brings repose, we should not say 
 this. But the history of Pascal's sister displays a 
 struggle and a victory of the most arduous kind, and 
 yet complete in its results. — Vinet. 
 
 III. 
 
 The life of Pascal is worth a hundred sermons, and 
 his acts of humility and self-abasement will do more 
 toward checking the libertinism of the age than doz- 
 ens of missionaries. — Bayle. 
 
 IV. 
 
 pascal's confession of faith. 
 (Found in his handwriting after his death). 
 I love poverty because Jesus Christ loved it. I love 
 property because it affords the means of assisting the 
 wretched. I keep faith with all. I do not render evil 
 to those who injure me ; but I wish t^iem a condition 
 like mine, in which neither evil nor good is received 
 on the part of man. I try to be just, true, sincere, 
 and faithful to all men ; and I have a tenderness of
 
 Fragments Gathered Up. 311 
 
 heart for those with whom God has closely united 
 me ; and whether I am alone or in the sight of man, 
 I perform all my actions as in the sight of God, who 
 is to judge them and to whom I have devoted them 
 all. 
 
 These are my convictions ; and I bless every day 
 of my life my Redeemer who has inspired me with 
 them, and who of a man full of weakness, wretched- 
 ness, concupiscence, pride, and ambition has made 
 a man exempt from these evils by the force of His 
 grace, to which all the glory is due, for in myself are 
 only wretchedness and error. 
 
 V. 
 
 (On the evidences of Christianity). 
 There is light enough for those whose sincere wish 
 is to see, and darkness enough to confound those of 
 an opposite disposition. — TJioiigJits. 
 
 VI. 
 
 I lay it down as a fact, that if all men knew what 
 
 they say of one another, there would not be four 
 
 friends in the world. This appears by the quarrels 
 
 which are sometimes caused by indiscreet reports. — 
 
 Thoughts. 
 
 vir. 
 
 Certain authors, speaking of their works, say, " My 
 book, my commentary, my history." It were better
 
 312 Sister and Saint. 
 
 to say, " Our book, our history, our commentary ; " 
 for generally there is more in it belonging to others 
 than to themselves. — ThoiiziUs. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Curiosity is but vanity. Often we wish to know 
 more, only that we may talk about it. People would 
 never traverse the sea if they were never to speak of 
 it ; for the mere pleasure of seeing, without the hope 
 of ever telling what they have seen. — Thoughts. 
 
 IX. 
 
 What advantage is it to us to hear a man saying 
 that he has thrown off the yoke ; that he does not 
 think there is any God who watches over his actions ; 
 that he considers himself as the sole judge of his con- 
 duct, and that he is accountable to none but himself ? 
 Does he imagine that we shall hereafter repose special 
 confidence in him, and expect from him consolation, 
 advice, succor, in the exigencies of life ? Do such 
 men imagine that it is any matter of delight to us to 
 hear that they hold the soul to be but a little vapor 
 or smoke, and that they can tell us this in an assured 
 and self-sufficient tone of voice ? Is this, then, a 
 thing to be said with gayety ? Is it not rather a 
 thing to be said with tears, as the saddest thing in 
 the world ? — Thoughts.
 
 Frag7ne7its Gathered Up. 313 
 
 X. 
 
 The style of the Gospels is admirable in many re- 
 spects, and, amongst others, in this — that there is not 
 a single invective against the murderers and enemies 
 of Jesus Christ. — Thoughts. 
 
 XI, 
 
 The heart has its reasons, which reason can not 
 
 understand It is the heart which is sensible 
 
 of God and not the reason. This, then, is faith : God 
 sensible to the heart. — Thoughts. 
 
 XII. 
 Discontent is caused by the knowledge of the 
 vanity of present pleasures and the ignorance of the 
 vanity of absent pleasures. — Thoughts. 
 
 XIII. 
 
 " Devotion made Easy." From the ninth Provincial 
 Letter. 
 
 {Louis de Montallc, the supposed writer, meets the 
 worthy Jesuit father). 
 
 The moment he perceived me, he came forward 
 with his eyes fixed on a book which he held in his 
 hand, and accosted me thus : 
 
 " ' Would you not be infinitely obliged to any one 
 who should open to you the gates of Paradise ? 
 14
 
 314 Sister an'd Saint. 
 
 Would you not give millions of gold to have a key 
 by A^hich you might gain admittance whenever you 
 thought proper? You need not be at such expense. 
 Here is one — here are a hundred for much less 
 money.' " 
 
 At first I was at a loss to know whether the good 
 father was reading or talking to me ; but he soon put 
 the matter beyond doubt by adding : 
 
 " These, sir, are the opening words of a fine book 
 written by Father Barry of our Society." 
 
 " What book is it ? " asked I. 
 
 " Here is its title," he replied : " ' Paradise opened 
 to Philagio in a Hundred Devotions to the Mother 
 of God, easily practiced.' " 
 
 " Indeed, father ! And is each of these easy devo- 
 tions a sufficient passport to heaven ?" 
 
 " It is," returned he. " Listen to what follows : 
 
 * The devotions which you will find in this book are 
 so many celestial keys which will open to you the 
 gatQS o£ Paradise if you will practice them.' " 
 
 " Pray, then, father, do teach me one of the easiest 
 of them." 
 
 *' They are all easy," he replied ; ■" for example, 
 
 * Saluting her when you meet her image — fervently 
 pronouncing the name of Mary — commissioning the 
 angels to bow to her for us — . . . . the last pos- 
 sessing the additional virtue of securing us the heart 
 of the Virgin.' " ,
 
 Fragments Gathered Up. 315 
 
 " But, father," said I, " only provided we give het 
 our own in return, I presume ? " 
 
 " That," he repHed, " is not absolutely necessary, 
 when a person is extremely attached to the world." 
 
 " Why, this is extremely easy work," said I ; " and 
 I should really think that nobody will be damned 
 after that." 
 
 " Alas ! " said the monk, " I see you have no idea 
 of the hardness of some people's hearts. There are 
 some who would never engage to repeat every day 
 
 even these simple words And accordingly it 
 
 became necessary for Father Barry to provide them 
 with expedients still easier, such as wearing a chaplet 
 night and day on the arm, in the form of a bracelet, 
 or carrying about one's person a rosary, or an image 
 of the Virgin." .... 
 
 " My dear sir," I observed, " I am fully aware that 
 devotions to the Virgin are a powerful means of sal- 
 vation, 'and that the least of them, if flowing from 
 the exercise of faith and charity, as in the case of 
 the saints who have practiced them, are of great 
 merit ; but to make persons believe that by practic- 
 ing these without reforming their wicked lives, they 
 will be converted by them at the hour of death, 
 does appear calculated rather to keep sinners going 
 on in their evil courses, by deluding them with false
 
 o 
 
 1 6 Sister and Saint. 
 
 peace and foolhardy confidence, than to draw them 
 off from sin by genuine conversion." 
 
 " What does it matter," replied the monk, " by 
 what road we enter Paradise, provided we do enter 
 it?" (He quotes another Jesuit writer to the same 
 effect). 
 
 " Granted," said I ; " but the great question is if 
 we will get there at all." 
 
 " The Virgin will be answerable for that," returned 
 he. " So says Father Barry." .... 
 
 " But, father, it might be possible to puzzle you, 
 were one disposed to push the question a little farther. 
 Who, for example, has assured us that the Virgin 
 will be answerable in this case ? " 
 
 " Father Barry will be answerable for her," he re- 
 plied (quoting). 
 
 " But, father, who is to be answerable for Father 
 Barr>'?" 
 
 " How ! " cried the monk ; " for Father Barry ? 
 Is he not a member of our Society ? " 
 
 XIV. 
 
 (In defense of the nuns of Port Royal. Sixteenth 
 Provincial Letter.) 
 
 Cruel, cowardly persecutors ! Can, then, the most 
 retired cloisters afford no retreat from your calumnies? 
 You publicly cut off from the Church these conse-
 
 Fragments Gaikercd Up. 317 
 
 crated virgins, while they are praj'-ing in secret foi 
 you and for the whole Church. You calumniate 
 those who have no ears to hear you, no mouth to 
 reply to you. But Jesus Christ, in whom they are 
 now hidden, not to appear till one day together with 
 Him, hears you and answers for them. 
 
 XV. 
 
 Violence and Verity. Twelfth Provincial Letter.) 
 
 It is a strange and tedious war when violence at- 
 tempts to vanquish truth. All the efforts of violence 
 can not weaken truth, and only serve to give it fresh 
 vigor. All the lights of truth can not arrest violence, 
 and only serve to exasperate it. When force meets 
 force, the weaker must succumb to the stronger. 
 When argument is opposed to argument, the solid 
 and the convincing triumphs over the empty and the 
 false. But violence and verity can make no impres- 
 sion on each other. 
 
 Let none suppose, however, that the two are there- 
 fore equal to each other ; for there is this vast differ- 
 ence between them, that violence has only a certain 
 course to run, limited by the appointment of heaven, 
 which overrules its effects to the glory of the truth 
 which it assails ; whereas verity endures forever, and 
 eventually triumphs over its enemies, being eternal 
 and almighty as God himself.
 
 3i8 Sister and Saint. 
 
 XVI. 
 JacqiLclijie s Letter on the Formulary . 
 
 (She had deemed it her especial duty to mortify 
 her noble intellect, but she was unable to destroy it ; 
 it still clung to her ; and though everything which 
 she achieved or wrote bears the stamp of mental 
 superiority, there is nothing comparable in this re- 
 spect to the Letter on the Formulary, Closeness, 
 sagacity, vigor of argument, energy of language, every 
 ingredient of eloquence is there, and stands out in 
 fine relief from an admirable background of humility. 
 — Vinet.) 
 
 The letter is addressed to Angelique de St. Jean, 
 d'Andilly's daughter. We here give it in full : 
 
 " My very dear Sister : — The little notice that 
 has been taken of our scruples in the matter of the 
 signature would prevent my recapitulating them at 
 this time, did the case admit of delay. As it is, I 
 think I ought to tell you that the difficulties I men- 
 tioned in writing to our Mother (Agnes), referred to 
 the modified formulary, the proposed mandement, a 
 copy of which had, by a singular chance, fallen into 
 our hands. 
 
 " We understand very well the pretense that our 
 signature only binds us to submission to the Church 
 (that is to say, to silence in matters of fact and be-
 
 Fragments Gathe7'ed Up. 319 
 
 lief in matters of faith). Most of us wish, with all our 
 hearts, that the requirement were something worse, 
 for then we could reject it with entire liberty, but 
 now some will feel constrained to accept it, and false 
 prudence or real cowardice will induce others to ac- 
 cept it as an easy means of procuring safety for the 
 conscience and for the person as well. 
 
 " For my part, I am persuaded that there is safety 
 neither for body nor for soul in such a course. Truth 
 is the only real liberator, and she makes none free 
 but those who will themselves strike off their fitters 
 ■ — those who confess her so faithfully that she can in 
 turn confess them as the true children of God. 
 
 " I can not dissimulate the pain which pierces to 
 the very bottom of my heart when I see those per- 
 sons to whom God has confided His truth unfaithful 
 to it, and, if I may dare to say so, wanting in the 
 courage to endure sufTering, and perhaps death, for 
 truth's sake. 
 
 " I know the reverence that is due to the high 
 authorities of the Church ; I would willingly die to 
 preserve that reverence inviolate, just as I am ready, 
 by God's help, to die for the confession of my faith. 
 But it seems to me nothing is easier than to unite 
 the two. What is to prevent us — what is to prevent 
 every ecclesiastic, who knows the truth, from answer- 
 ing, when the formulary is presented for signature : 
 * I know what respect I owe to their lordships the
 
 320 Sister and Saint. 
 
 bishops ; but my conscience will not permit me to 
 declare that a certain thing is in a book which I have 
 never found there ' ? And, after that, we may pa- 
 tiently await the result. 
 
 "What are we afraid of? Banishment, dispersion, 
 the seizure of property, prison and death, if you will ! 
 But is not that our glory, and ought it not to be our 
 joy? Either let us give up the Gospel or follow its 
 principles and esteem ourselves happy in suffering 
 for righteousness' sake. 
 
 " But perhaps we may be cast out from the Church ! 
 True ; and yet who does not know that no one can be 
 really cast out of the Church except by his own will ? 
 The spirit of Jesus Christ being the only thing which 
 unites His members to Himself and to each other, 
 we may, indeed, be deprived of the badge of that 
 membership, but we can not be deprived of the mem- 
 bership itself, so long as we preserve the spirit of 
 love, without which no one is a living member of His 
 holy body. Is it not plain, therefore, that so long as 
 we do not erect altar against altar (that is, form or 
 join a schismatic Church), while we continue within 
 the limits of simple remonstrance and meek endur- 
 ance of persecution, charity will of necessity unite us 
 to the Church by inviolable bonds. It is our enemies 
 alone who will have excommunicated themselves by 
 the divisions they are trying to produce ! 
 
 "Alas! my dear sister, what joy we ought to feel
 
 Fragments Gathered Up. 321 
 
 if we are permitted to endure some special reproach 
 for Christ's sake ! But there is too much pains taken 
 to prevent this, when truth is so disguised that she 
 can scarcely be recognized. 
 
 "I admire the ingenuity of the human mind as dis- 
 played in the perfection with which this mandcment 
 is drawn up. It is worthy of a heretic ; but for the 
 faithful — for those who know and should sustain the 
 truth — for members of the Catholic Church to stoop 
 to such disguises ! I can not believe that such things 
 were ever known in the past ages of the Church, and 
 I pray God that we may all die now rather than be 
 the means of introducing such proceedings into the 
 Church. I find it difficult, indeed, my dear sister, to 
 believe that such wisdom as this comes down from 
 the Father of lights ; rather it seems to me a revela- 
 tion of flesh and blood. 
 
 " Forgive me, my dear sister, I beg. I speak %i the 
 agony of a grief which I feel certain will kill me, if I 
 have not the consolation of seeing that there are 
 some persons willing to suffer for the truth, and to 
 protest against the weakness of others. 
 
 " You know very well that the condemnation of a 
 holy bishop (Jansen) is by no means the only ques- 
 tion in debate. His condemnation includes that of 
 the doctrine of our Saviour's grace. If our times 
 are so unfortunate that no one can be found to 
 
 die for a righteous man, yet let it not be said that 
 14*
 
 32 2 Sister aiid Samt, 
 
 there is no one willing to die for righteousness 
 itself ! 
 
 " Perhaps you will say to me that this does not 
 concern us, because of our own particular formulary 
 which our friends have drawn up for us ; I answer 
 two things to that. First, that St. Bernard teaches 
 us that the most insignificant member of the Church 
 not only may, but ouglit to cry aloud and spare not 
 when he sees the bishops and pastors in such a state 
 as we see them now. 'Who,' says he, ' can blame me 
 for calling out, though I am but a feeble sheep, if I 
 try to awaken my shepherd when I see him asleep 
 and on the point of being devoured by a wild beast ? 
 Even were I so ungrateful as not to do this out of 
 love and gratitude, ought not a sense of my own 
 peril to prompt my utmost efforts to arouse him? 
 For who is to defend me if my shepherd is devoured? ' 
 Thi^ as you know, does not refer to our own pastors 
 and friends, for they have as great a horror of dis- 
 guises as I have ; but I speak of the leaders of the 
 Church in general. 
 
 " The other thing which I answer, and which I con- 
 fess to you, my dear sister, is that I have not been 
 able thus far to entirely approve our formulary, even 
 as it now is. I could wish changes in several par- 
 ticulars. 
 
 " The first is at the beginning ; for it seems hard 
 for persons like us to offer so freely to give an ac-
 
 Fragments Gathered Up, 323 
 
 count of our faith. I would give it, however, but 
 with a little preamble which should take away the 
 apparent presumption of such a declaration. The 
 second point is toward the close, where I would not 
 mention the decisions of the Holy See. It is true we 
 do submit to those decisions in matters of faith, but 
 the vulgar do not discriminate, and it would be 
 thought that we assented to the condemnation of 
 Jansen. 
 
 " I know very well that the defense of the truth is 
 not women's business. But when bishops have the 
 cowardice of women, women should, perhaps, have 
 the courage of bishops. And, if it is not for us to 
 defend the truth, we can, at least, suffer for it. 
 
 " A comparison occurs to me, illustrating my idea 
 on the decisions of the Holy See. Everybody knows 
 that the doctrine of the Trinity is one of the princi- 
 pal points of our faith, and Saint Augustine (for in- 
 stance) would, without doubt, willingly confess and 
 sanction it ; yet, supposing his native country hap- 
 pened to be in possession of a pagan prince who 
 wished to have the unity of God denied, and a plu- 
 rality of deities acknowledged, and supposing a cer- 
 tain formulary had been drawn up to this effect, ' I 
 believe that there are several persons to whom we 
 may give the name of God and address our prayers,' 
 do you believe St. Augustine would sign such a 
 formulary ? I do not believe he would, and what is
 
 324 Sister mid SamL 
 
 more, ' I do not believe he ought to if he would. 
 Now what I say of St. Augustine I say also of you 
 and of me, and of the most insignificant persons in 
 the Church. The feebletiess of our influence does not 
 lessen our guilt if we use that influence against the 
 truth. 
 
 " M. de St. Cyran often says that the least truth of 
 religion ought to be defended as jealously as Christ 
 himself. Where is the Christian who would not 
 abhor himself if he had been present in Pilate's coun- 
 cil, and when the question of Christ's condemnation 
 arose, had been contented with giving an ambiguous 
 answer? Is not the sin of St. Peter trivial in com- 
 parison with such a sin, and yet how St. Peter 
 mourned all his life long over his. sin! Follow this 
 comparison to its last results, I beg you. My letter 
 is only too long already. 
 
 " This, dear sister, is what I think about the 
 Formulary : I wish it to be clear in all that it con- 
 tains, and these words or something like them, might, 
 I think, be placed at its head : Ignorant as we are, 
 all that can be expected of us in this signature is a 
 testimony to the sincerity of our faith, and of- sub- 
 mission to the Church, to the Pope as its supreme 
 head, and to the Archbishop of Paris, our superior ; 
 although we do not think it right that we should be 
 called upon to give an account of our faith as we 
 have never given any occasion for that faith to be
 
 Fragments Gathered Up. 325 
 
 called in question ; nevertheless, to avoid the sus- 
 picions our refusal might occasion, we testify in this 
 public manner that, esteeming nothing so precious as 
 the treasure of a pure faith, we wish to preserve ours 
 at the expense of our lives, if need be ; we desire to 
 live and to die humble daughters of the Catholic 
 Church, believing all that she believes, and ready at 
 any time to die for the least of her truths. 
 
 '' Let us pray God, my dear sister, that He will 
 strengthen us and make us Jiumble, for liinnility with- 
 out strength, and strength without humility ^ are equally 
 dajigerous. This, more than ever before, is the time 
 for us to remember that the fearfid have their place 
 with the unbelieving and the abominable. 
 
 " If they are contented with the statement I have 
 sketched, well and good. For myself, if the matter 
 is left in my own hands I shall never sign anything 
 stronger. Then let what will come. Poverty, dis- 
 persion, prison, death — all these seem to me nothing 
 in comparison with the anguish of my whole future 
 life, if I should be wretched enough to make a league 
 with death instead of profiting by such an opportu- 
 nity of paying #iy vows to God. 
 
 " It is indifferent to me what words are used, pro- 
 vided we give no reason to think that we condemn 
 either the doctrine of the grace of Jesus Christ, or 
 him who has so ably expounded it. 
 
 " That is why, in saying ' believe all that the
 
 326 
 
 Sister and Saint. 
 
 Church believes,' I have omitted the words ' and 
 condemn all that it condemns.' I believe that this 
 is not the tvne to say that, lest the condemnation of 
 the Church should be confounded with the present 
 decision. Even as our beloved M. de St. Cyran says, 
 * Pagans having placed an idol on the spot where a 
 cross once stood, Christians should not go there to 
 worship, lest it should seem as if they were worship- 
 ing the idol.' "
 
 INDEX. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 d' AlGUiLLON, Duchesse 34, 84 
 
 d'Alibrai, M 105 
 
 d'Andilly 71,135 
 
 " and St. Cyran 75,89,90 
 
 d' Andilly's daughter 71, 295 
 
 Angers 137 
 
 Annat, Father 257,260 
 
 Anne of Austria 87, 156, 257, 280 
 
 " " examines the mir- 
 acle 271 
 
 " " Jacqueline's poems 
 
 dedicated to. . . . 20 
 
 " " peculiarities 10 
 
 " " receives appeal from 
 
 Angelique 282 
 
 " " Regent 85, 166 
 
 Anjou, Bishop of 281 
 
 Archbishop of Paris 271, 283 
 
 " " angry 285 
 
 " " answer of Ger- 
 
 trude de Va- 
 
 lois to 303 
 
 Arrnand 35 
 
 Arnaulds 135, 138, 197 
 
 " father of. 255 
 
 Arnauld, Agnes 68, 109, 136, 232, 270 
 
 " *' characteristics. . .157-159 
 " " childish characteris- 
 tics 137 
 
 " " comforts Jacqueline. 211 
 
 " " imprisoned at Paris. 291 
 
 " " last days , 303 
 
 " " portrait of 134 
 
 " " " by Philip 
 " " de Champagne... 158 
 " " writes to Jacque- 
 line 124, 158, 181 
 
 " " writes letter to the 
 
 King 282 
 
 " " writings of. 158,199 
 
 Arnauld, Angelique. ... 68, log, 123, iSo 
 ^vice in matter 
 
 of dowry 212 
 
 childish charac- 
 teristics. . 136, 137 
 comforts Jacque- 
 line 214 
 
 contrasted with 
 Agnes. .. 156, 157 
 
 death 285, 286 
 
 leaves Valley of 
 Chevreuse.. . . 281 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Arnauld, Angelique, letter to Anne 
 
 of Austria... 283 
 " " sketch of. .. 134-147 
 " " takes in benight- 
 ed nuns 217 
 
 " " view of miracle. 272 
 " " writes to Jac- 
 queline 124 
 
 Arnauld, Anne 137, 197, 246 
 
 " " as teacher 244-246 
 
 Arnauld, Antoine (the Great Ar- 
 nauld) 83, 138 
 
 and the Sorbonne 
 
 257, 260, 261 
 answers objections. 
 
 289 
 in favor of signing 
 
 Formulary. 286, 287 
 Jacqueline's note 
 
 to 289 
 
 "note of com- 
 mand '' 290 
 
 Arnauld, Henri 137, 281 
 
 " Madame 152 
 
 " Madeleine 138, 233 
 
 " Mane Claire 69, 137 
 
 " Simon 138 
 
 Augustinus, The 54 
 
 " " contains the Five 
 
 Propositions. 257, 280 
 
 " " finished 58, 59 
 
 " "What it was 61 
 
 Auvergne 3, 4, 31, 269 
 
 Bastille 31, 281 
 
 Battledore and Shuttlecock 58, 249 
 
 Bayonne 56, 57 
 
 " Bishopric offered to St. 
 
 Cyran . . 67 
 
 Beau Soleil, Baron and Baroness de. 88 
 
 Bellay, M., confirms Jacqueline 82 
 
 Bernard, St 227, 231 
 
 Bible, French translation of. . . . 22S, 281 
 
 Bienassis 125 
 
 Body, Pascal's neglect of. 229-231 
 
 Bossuet 168,268 
 
 Calculus, Differential and Integral. 297 
 
 Calvinism or Calvinist 42, 61, 138 
 
 Capuchin friar, preaches at Port 
 
 Royal 139 
 
 Cid, The 45 
 
 (327)
 
 ,2S 
 
 Index. 
 
 PACK 
 
 Codex claromontanus 6 
 
 Conde. Prince of 121, 169, 270 
 
 Conti, Prince and Princess of 272 
 
 Corneille 44,45,268,273 
 
 Cornet. Father. . 257 
 
 Champagne, Philip de, painting by. 158 
 
 Chapelet Secret, Le 158 
 
 Charles I. of England I'l 67 
 
 Chevreuse, valley of 133, 134, 150 
 
 " " Angelique leaves 
 
 281 
 " " dampners of. 152, 153 
 
 Clermont 3,4,263,266 
 
 " Fastings and vigils at. 161-164 
 
 " Hospital 300,301 
 
 " Jacqueline visits 128 
 
 Cliiny, Hotel 123 
 
 Defretal, Father 263 
 
 De la Bouteillerie 81 
 
 Descartes 25 , 99, 100 
 
 " meets Pascal in Paris 104 
 
 Deslandes 81 
 
 De Wert, John 8q 
 
 Director of Consciences 66 
 
 Directress, Jacqueline appointed her 
 
 brother's 227,239 
 
 Du Droit,— question 260 
 
 Du Fait, — question 260 
 
 Elvira, Countess of Toulouse 5 
 
 Escobar 266 
 
 Examination of Jacqueline before 
 Grand Vicar 284 
 
 Felix, M . . . . _ 271 
 
 Five Propositions, The 62, 257 
 
 " " again marshalled 
 
 out 2S0 
 
 " " discussed by Ar- 
 
 nauld and the 
 Doctors of the 
 Sorbonne .. . 260 
 
 Flavie, Sister 269, 270 
 
 Fontaine 73 
 
 Formulary ... 258 
 
 " Dying nuns made to sign. 305 
 " Jacqueline'sletteron sign- 
 ing the 288,318-326 
 
 " Modified 286 
 
 " New 280,281 
 
 Fronde, Wars of the 169 
 
 " Fruit Wnit " 156 
 
 Galileo 99 
 
 Gassion 42 
 
 Grand Vicar 271, 2S3, 284 
 
 Granges, Les 155,229,259 
 
 Guemene, Princess 86, S7, 271 
 
 Guillebert, Pastor. ... 79i 80, 81 
 
 " '• training under. .. . 113 
 
 Hamilton, Sir William (estimate of 
 Pascal) 29 
 
 Hauranne, Jean du Verger de (St. 
 Cyran) 56 
 
 paqe 
 
 Hautefort, Madame de. 19 
 
 Henrietta of Kngland 67 
 
 Henry Fourth (of France) ... 139 
 
 Hippocrates 230 
 
 Holy Sacrament, adoratio'n of.. 200. 201 
 
 Holy Thorn, miracle of 268-273 
 
 Huguenots 48-50 
 
 " Angelique's aunts 139 
 
 " Grandfather of the Ar- 
 
 naulds .. 138 
 
 " resemblance of Jansen- 
 
 ists to . . ... 61 
 Hymn translated by Jacqueline 178 
 
 J.^NSEN, CoRNFLifS, sketch of life. 54-62 
 
 '■ portrait of 134 
 
 Jansen's great work(.r<r? Augustinus). 
 Jansenism or Jansenist .. 241,255,257 
 
 " characterized 256 
 
 Jesuits and New Formulary 2S0 
 
 " and Pascal's experiments. .. . loi 
 " and Provincial letters 262, 263 
 " and the Five Propositions. 
 
 257. 258 
 
 Jesuits' hatred of St. Cyran 72 
 
 '• influence with government. 
 
 255-257 
 
 Jesuits punish Port Royal.. 286, 301-306 
 
 " Schools 72 
 
 Lancelot. 73 
 
 Latin Quarter 123 
 
 Laud, Archbishop 11 
 
 Letters of Jacqueline Pascal... . 35, 124, 
 173, 190, 205, 215, 221, 223. 224, 229, 
 230, 231, 234, 269, 270, 278, 279, 283, 288 
 
 Letter on Formulary 318-326 
 
 Letters, Provincial, (j^^ Pascal, Blaise). 
 
 Liancourt, Due de 259 
 
 Longueville, Duchessc de.. 169, 271, 301 
 
 Louis XI .. 7 
 
 Louis Xni 10, 85 
 
 Louis XIV 86 
 
 " " conscience of. 280 
 
 " " disperses the nuns 304 
 
 " " education of. 167 
 
 Louvain 56,58 
 
 Maintenon, Madame de 304 
 
 Maitre, Le 138 
 
 " Madame Le 135,136,228 
 
 Mandement (modified formula). 286, 289 
 
 ISIarion, M 136 
 
 Maternite, La (Hospital) 123 
 
 Mazarin, Cardinal. 85, 137, 156, 166, 169, 
 257, 280 
 
 !Medici, Cosmo di 99 
 
 Mersenne, Father 100 
 
 Moliere 268 
 
 Mons, M. de (assumed name of Pas- 
 cal) 263 
 
 Montalte, Louis de (Pascal's noui de 
 
 flu »ie) 266 
 
 Montpensier, Mad'selle de 18 
 
 Morangis, M. and Madame de 18
 
 ■ Index. 
 
 329 
 
 Nicole 286 
 
 Novice, Jacqueline as 205 
 
 Novices, Duties as sub-mistress of. 
 
 231, 232 
 
 " reception of 218 
 
 " Sub-mistress of 239 
 
 Pailleur 25 
 
 Palais Royal lo 
 
 Pascal, Blaise 8 
 
 " " atmospherical experi- 
 ments 98-101 
 
 " " austerities of.... 242,244, 
 
 278, 298, 299 
 
 " " calculating machine. 42, 98 
 
 " " confession of faith. .. . 310 
 
 " " conversion of. 83-85 
 
 " " death of. 298,299 
 
 " " difficulties in regard to 
 
 dowTy 208-2H 
 
 " " settlement of difficul- 
 
 ties in regard to 
 
 dowry 214, 215 
 
 " " dray invented by. ... 297 
 " " encourages Jacque- 
 line's project 117 
 
 " " experiments on sound. 22 
 " " fault mentioned by sis- 
 ter _. 297, 298 
 
 " " Geometrical investiga- 
 tions 23-25 
 
 " " ill-health.. 96, 97, 102, 103 
 
 " " Jacqueline's letter on 
 
 taking the vow.. 206-208 
 " " later mathematical stud- 
 ies 297 
 
 " " love for Jacqueline.. . . 296 
 
 " " mental struggles.. 115, 116 
 
 " " omnibus invented by.. 297 
 
 " " opinion on signing 
 
 Formulary 280, 287 
 
 " " Pensiies 297 
 
 " " " extracts from. 
 
 311-313 
 " " Provincial letters. 2^9-268 
 " " Provincial letters, ex- 
 tracts from .. 313-317 
 " " Provincial letters, ori- 
 gin of 260, 261 
 
 " " remark on Jacqueline's 
 
 death 396 
 
 " " " Second conversion". 
 
 223-229, 241 
 
 " " simplicity of. 298 
 
 " " statue in Tour St. 
 
 Jacques 107 
 
 " " system of learning to 
 
 read 234-2 36 
 
 " " system of logic 236 
 
 " " theories of education 
 
 73- 236 
 " " wheelbarrow invented 
 
 by 397 
 
 " " woildliness. 192, 193, 241, 
 
 242 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Pascal, Etienne 7, 16, 20 
 
 " " answers Father Noel. loi 
 " " conducts his son's ed- 
 ucation 16,23-25 
 
 " " Councillor of State... 116 
 
 " " death of . 189 
 
 " " flight from Paris 31 
 
 " " Intendant of Nor- 
 
 mandv 4^1 
 
 " " Jacqueline's letter to. 
 
 1^3-177 
 " ■' opposes Jacqueline's 
 
 project 122 
 
 " " slips on ice 81 
 
 " " special love for Jac- 
 
 queline ... 31.97,123 
 Pensees (sec Pascal, Blaise). 
 
 " edifiantes, by Jacqueline 
 
 182-185 
 
 Pericr, Florin 43 
 
 '' ■' a-ssists in Pascal's ex- 
 periments 107 
 
 " " at Jacqueline's death. 295 
 
 " " austerities 223 
 
 ". " builds country-seat 125 
 
 " " conversion of and wife. 85 
 
 " " helps with Provincial 
 
 letters 263 
 
 " " joy in miracle 271 
 
 " " letter from Jacqueline. 
 
 221, 222 
 
 Perier, Margaret 46,113,263 
 
 '• " miraculous cure of. 
 
 268- 27V 
 " " sketch of after-life. 
 
 299-30T 
 
 Perier, Madame, marriage of 43 
 
 •' lays aside orna- 
 ments 114 
 
 " " position in regard 
 to Jacqueline's 
 dowrj'. . . 209, 210 
 " " sorrows and death. 299 
 Poem on miracle, Jacqueline's (esti- 
 mate of) ■ 293 
 
 Poems of Jacqueline (published)... 20 
 
 Pope Alexander VII 280 
 
 Pope Innocent X 2S0 
 
 Pope Urban H 4, 5 
 
 Poitiers (St. Cyran, Bishop ofl . 64 
 
 Port Royal ■ ■ 73- 108, 116, 123 
 
 " " Constitutions of. ... 199,201 
 
 " " distress at 169-171 
 
 " " endowing 208-211 
 
 " " final scenes at des 
 
 Champs 304-306 
 
 " " final scenes at Paris. 301-303 
 
 " " fruit of 156 
 
 " " Jacqueline enters. .. 215-218 
 " " Jacqueline leaves home 
 
 for .». .. 19s 
 
 " " Jacqueline's reception 
 
 at 197, 198 
 
 " " life at 133-156 
 
 " " popularity of 86,277
 
 Z^o 
 
 hidex. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Port Royal, probation at 205 
 
 " " receiving a novice at 218 
 
 " " schools for boys 72,73 
 
 " " schools for girls 244-246 
 
 " " troubles at. 259,280,281-283 
 
 Pntherie, M. de la 270 
 
 Prince Henry of Bourbon. ... 76 
 
 Prize at Rouen 45 
 
 Provincial Letters (see Pascal, Blaise) 
 
 Puritans 12 
 
 Piiy de Dome, atmospherical experi- 
 ments on 6,108 
 
 Puy de Dome, finding of Codex clar- 
 omontanus 6 
 
 Queen of Poland 271 
 
 Racine 73i 168 
 
 Raymond of Toulouse 5 
 
 Recluses 72,152-154 
 
 Reflections — Jacqueline's on death 
 
 of Christ 172,182-185 
 
 Renti, Marquis de 230 
 
 Richelieu — and St. Cyran 66-68 
 
 '• death of 85 
 
 " imprisons St. Cyran... 74-76 
 
 " pardons Pascal, P&re.. .. 38 
 
 " play acted before. . . . 33-37 
 
 " receives Pascal children 20 
 
 " speculations 16,30 
 
 " wars against Huguenots. 10 
 
 Roannez, Due de 242,295,304 
 
 " Mdelle de 242 
 
 Roberval 25, 105 
 
 Rochelle 139 
 
 Rocroy 121 
 
 Rouen 39,43,44,79,80 
 
 Rouville 79 
 
 Ruel, play-acting at 35 
 
 Rules, Jacqueline Pascal's, for gov- 
 ernment of children 246-252 
 
 Saci, de 73, 228, 230, 281 
 
 Saintot, Madame dc 17, 37 
 
 Serenade, by Jacqueline 47 
 
 S6ricourt, de .. 71 
 
 Sevign6, Madame de 133 
 
 " Marquis de 271 
 
 Singlin, P^re . 
 
 " '■ advice as to signature 
 
 of Formulary 2S8 
 
 " " does not approve of 
 
 Pascal's mirth 264 
 
 " " course in matter of 
 
 dowry 212 
 
 " " guidance of Pascal. 
 
 224-228 
 " " judgment of Jacque- 
 
 line's "vocation ".. 117 
 
 PAGB 
 
 Singlin, Pfere, letter after Jacque- 
 line's death 296 
 
 " " opinion on writing 
 
 poetry r8o 
 
 Skepticism does not attack Pascal.. 84 
 Small-pox, Jacqueline suffers from. 
 
 31-33 
 
 " lines on recovery 32 
 
 Sonnet, Devotional 47 
 
 Sorbonne 103, 123, 257 
 
 " Spiritual regimen " 230 
 
 Stanzas thanking God for gift of 
 
 verse 21 
 
 Stanzas on recovery from small-pox. 32 
 
 St. Ange, Madame de 87 
 
 St. Augustine, studied by the two 
 
 friends 57, 58 
 
 St. Augustine, St. Cyran reading... 74 
 St. Augustine, " mystic tower ",.... 125 
 
 St. Cyr, Convent of 135, T56 
 
 St. Cyran, Abbe de 65-76 
 
 " anecdotes of 69-72 
 
 " illness and death 90,91 
 
 " in prison 87-89 
 
 " intimacy with Jansen. 56-60 
 
 " portrait of 134 
 
 " released 85 
 
 " sayings of.. 221,222 
 
 St. Etienne du Mont, tomb of Pas- 
 cal and sister 209 
 
 St. Francis de Sales 138, 144, 162 
 
 St. Jacques, Tour de 107, 108 
 
 " Faubourg de 152,217 
 
 St. Lawrence, river 304 
 
 St. Germain, verse-making at 18-20 
 
 St. Sulpice, Due de Liancourt con- 
 fesses at 259 
 
 System of learning to read, Pas- 
 cal's 234, 235 
 
 System of logic, Pascal's 235 
 
 TiSCHENDORF 6 
 
 Torricelli 99, 100 
 
 Tuilleries 169 
 
 Vacuum, theory of 98 
 
 Valois, Gertrude de (answer to Arch- 
 bishop) 303 
 
 Versailles 134 
 
 Verses recited to Richelieu 35, 
 
 Verses of Jacqueline... 4, 21, 32, 47, 48, 
 119, 179 
 
 Verses written for the Queen 18,19 
 
 Vincennes 74, 79 
 
 Voltaire 269 
 
 Ypres, Jansen Bishop of 58
 
 bR1725 P3^4x 
 
 k'^eitzel, Sophie ^^inthrop 
 
 Sister and saint;