Letter 1219. To Mother Mane Aimée de Blonay

My dearest Daughter,—You know the spirit of Moulins. As sister has given you her confidence, I should be very glad to send the letters open to you; but I thought if I did not give the messenger the packet apart for Moulins, possibly he might not pass it on to you.

The sooner, it seems to me, that you send your sisters the better; you need not wait for the community to ask for them, and it would drag it out too long, unless you can obtain leave from the Cardinal to go yourself, or you saw any sign of the Mother of Moulins asking for it, as the permission would be granted to her. Whatever diffidence you may feel about yourself, your presence would do great good there, and your journey be a very useful one for that poor house,?

as you will report honestly and truly, and with the gentleness of your spirit and vocation, how matters are going on there: for amidst all the things that are repeated I cannot tell what is true. But if there is no likelihood of obtaining this permission, M. Brun should take your sisters there and speak to the Mother and to all the community, to know what is really taking place, and particularly if this journey were made with all the circumstances that are mentioned in the letters I have sent you—for that is the root of the affair. As to what sisters you ought to send: Sister [M. Marguerite] de Saint Colombe, though very good and virtuous, has not judgment enough for a matter of this kind, so you ought to give her a companion who would supply this want, and, as you desire to have my opinion, I think Sister [M. Isabeau] de Ravachot, or rather, Sister M. Aimée [Coultin], who was your assistant when we were at Lyons, would be more useful. Do not let them leave you without a strong recommendation to diffuse in that house, by their example, the good odour of virtue. And then on the return of M. Brun the truth of the affair will be made known to us. As to your thought that she asks for your sisters in order to be able the more easily to come to your monastery: she has no such idea, for she speaks of making a foundation at Angers. But if what they write to me about this journey is true, the Bishop of Autun ought to give her a good correction, and she should repair in some way the bad example the houses have received from her, or, at least, let her serve as an example for the future, so that no evil consequences may result. This, my very dear daughter, is all that I can say to you for the present. You know how entirely I am yours, etc.

P.S.—A thousand salutations to all our sisters. May God make them all holy!

the introduction of customs contrary to religious simplicity, such as the use of perfumes, of trailing habits, etc. The holy Foundress, always on the watch to suppress anything that savoured of the spirit of the world, hastened to remedy these innovations, and begged Mother de Blonay to go herself to Moulins or send some of her daughters, so as to bring there the power and encouragement of example and to learn the truth of things —for which truth see note to Letter 1320 on page 234.¹

Footnotes

1. As this and some other letters give an impression of grave faults at the monastery of Moulins, a few words ofexplanation aredesirable. Mother M. Angélique de Bigny, Superior of this monastery, made a journey to Annecy, and later to Paris, both for perfectly legitimate causes. However, several superiors of the Order took alarm at these absences from enclosure and appealed to the Saint to interfere. They also accused Mother de Bigny of not being sufficiently vigilant of her community and of allowing ↩