Letter 536. To M. Michel Favre

Confessor of the Religious of the Visitation of Annecy.

(Chambéry, 1624.] Vive > Jésus!

My most good and dear Father,—I beg of you to answer our good sisters of Lyons, who ask for an explanation of the article on Correction. You will have told them that

LETTER 536 I2I they were to send for a copy of the two letters I had written to our sister, their Superior, on this subject; for I cannot, nor does it seem to me that I ought to, give any other interpretation than that given by our Blessed Father in the Conferences. I think it is in the one on ‘ Aversions.’ Not indeed but that I know full well he highly approved of the sisters making no reserves with me. Yet he used to say that there were very few superiors capable of this absolute confidence, but that there was no need of advising the sisters to make distinctions between the capacities of superiors, otherwise they would be always questioning them. It was better, he said, to leave the Rules just as they were, without gloss, save when necessary, and let them be practised in good faith by those who are led by a truly humble and simple spirit.

Do not, please, speak of my visit, as I have no authority for it. When I can be of any use to our monasteries and they desire it, and that my ecclesiastical superiors so employ me, I am only too glad to serve them, and that with great devotion. Truly, my dear Father, I feel immense compassion for our poor sisters of Marseilles, for I see that they are upset, and I should greatly like to be able to help them, but, as for my presence there, it would be of nouse. Ihave written to the Bishop so that we may arrange the return of Sister Claude Catherine [de Vallon], and I have told our poor Sister Superior what will happen. May it please God to draw profit for them out of it all. . . . Sister Marie Aimée is determined to come to Nessy. O my God! how I wish for her own sake that the little Mother of Nevers? could or would come with her. Try to entice her: but you know, my dear Father, how tactfully it must be done. She has not written to me from Moulins, soI am afraid that she is annoyed, though without reason, because we have not gone there.;¹

Footnotes

1. Mother Paule Jéronyme de Monthoux. ↩