Letter V. To the Same

lie encourages her, by his example, patiently to suffer, that her gentleness, in domestic contradictions, should he put down to dissimulation.

Holy Saturday, i/.th April, 1607.

O, my dearest Child, here we are at the end of the holy Lent and at the glorious resurrection! Ah! how I desire that we should be raised up again with our Lord! I am now going to beg this of him, as I do daily; for I never applied my communions so earnestly to your soul as I have done this Lent, and with a particular sentiment of trust in this immense goodness, that it will be favourable to us.

Yes; my dear child, we must have good courage. It is no harm for your patience in bearing domestic contradiction to be attributed to dissimulation. And do you think that I am exempt from such attacks? But it is the truth, I only laugh about them when I remember them, which is but rarely. O God! indeed am I not insensible to other accidents and evil insinuations; how sensitive, am I to the injurious and bad opinions which may be held about me! It is true that they are neither stinging nor in great number; but still I believe that if there were many more of them, I should not fail to bear them, by the assistance of the Holy Spirit. Oh! courage, my very dear and well-beloved child. What is needful for us is, that our little portion of ointment should offend the nostrils of the world.

To God, my dearest child; to God let us belong, in time and in eternity! Let us ever unite our little crosses to his great one!

Yesterday (for I must say one more word to you) after the sermon in the town at which I assisted, I preached a sermon on the Passion before our religious of Sainte-Claire. They had begged this very hard of me. When it came to the part in which I was contemplating how the cross was laid on the shoulders of our Lord, and how he embraced it, and when I said that in his cross and with it he acknowledged and took to himself all our little crosses, and kissed them all to sanctify them: — and when I came to say in particular that he kissed our drynesses, our contradictions, our bitternesses, I assure you, my dear child, that I was much consoled, and had difficulty to contain my tears.

For what reason do I say this? I know not, except that I could not help saying it to you. I had much consolation in this little sermon, at which twenty-five or thirty devout souls of the town assisted, besides those of the monastery: so that I had every opportunity to give the rein to my poor little affections on a worthy subject. May the good and gentle Jesus be for ever the king of our hearts! Amen.

I love our Celse-Benigne and the little Francon.* May God be for ever their God; and the angel who has guarded their mother bless them for ever! Yes, my child, for it has been a great angel who has given you your good desires. So may he give you the execution of them and perseverance. Vive Jesus, who has made me and keeps me for ever all yours. Amen.

• Children of Madame de Chantal.