Letter 202. To the Reverend Mother M. de la Tnnité,?
My very good and very dear Mother,—May the peace of our divine Saviour be always in the midst of your heart! It is an immense consolation to me to receive news of you and to know that you retain a pleasant remembrance of the holy friendship in which our Saviour and Master unites our hearts. Verily it is most true that nothing can sever what God has united. If some day I have the pleasure of seeing you, I will make you realise my love and the absolute trust I have always placed in you. My soul would, I think, be overcome with holy suavity had I the happiness of conversing heart to heart with you of the sweetness of the love of our Lord Jesus. But oh! my Mother, I see little chance of it, for on leaving here they talk of sending us to Italy. May the holy will of our great God be accomplished in everything! Provided I serve Him with the profound humility and fidelity that is His due, all places are indifferent to me. Yet, my dearest Mother, this is just what I do not. My service of Him is immortified, indiscreet, and cowardly. Pray, I beg of you, for my needs, and get your dear daughters to pray. Double your prayers, for I have a twofold necessity —one greater than I could express.
Is it not a wonderful thing, my very dear Mother, to see so unworthy and incapable a creature employed in such noble and important service?
But it has always been our good God’s way to make use of those who are vilest and most abject, so as to erect the throne of His mercy upon that of our misery. What incomparable goodness! I should like to write at length to you, but the bearer of your letter has not time to await my doing so, nor have I leisure at this moment to write more; but I shall not fail to give you an account of my actions before I leave these parts. I have already been making inquiries about you, and as no one could tell me anything for certain, I sent to the good Mother here to get news of you. I think I know the young lady about whom you write to me,! but I have a difficulty in remembering names. Both the Bishop of Geneva and we, I assure you, my dearest Mother, greatly desire to console her; however, our duty to this house will not allow of our going against those to whom the Cardinal of has entrusted the affair, and they have declared that her reception here would be, for several reasons which they have stated in their decision, greatly to the detriment of this house, so we can do nothing more. We offered her a retreat in one of our other houses, but she has not accepted it. For your sake what is there we would
Footnotes
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The Saint here alludes to the Sisters de Rajat, novices of a relaxed order, who asked to be admitted to the Visitation. ↩
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The Rev. Mother Marie dela Trinité d’Hanivel was the first professed of Carmel in France. While still a secular, St. Jane Frances de Chantal honoured this holy religious as a great servant of God. She died in the odour of sanctity at Troyes, 1647. ↩
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Probably Madame du Tertre. not do, my dearest Mother? but you see it is impossible, and so I am sure you will give up the idea. I must conclude in haste. Good-bye, my Mother, etc. ↩
Chapter 22 of 252