Chapter III (8)

Eighteen months later I passed through Paris on my way home from Switzerland, but so dolorous was the impression that I had fain leave it in a couple of days. Ruin, desolation stared one in the face at every step, and the smell of petroleum seemed to haunt one at every turn. The blackened shells of the historic Tuileries, of the beautiful Hôtel de Ville, the Conseil d’Etat, the Ministry of Finance, the Gobelin tapestry manufactory with its art treasures accumulated there during the last three hundred years, the blank in the Place Vendôme caused by the destruction of its splendid column, the felled trees in the Bois de Boulogne, and the complete annihilation of St. Cloud, town and palace, were sights which deprived us of all happiness during the day and of peaceful rest at night. Not less melancholy was the effect of the sad countenances of the inhabitants. The elasticity and cheerfulness which had formerly seemed to be a component part of Paris air was gone, and in its place one only heard tales of their sufferings in those days of anarchy, of the Pétroleuses seen gliding stealthily through the streets, of the petroleum strewn round St. Roch and the chairs piled up in the nave of Notre Dame, so that both churches might be set on fire, when the troops providentially entered just in time to prevent this and many other wicked designs being carried out. Instead of the brightness one remembered of yore, people seemed to have a suspicious dread of their neighbors, and veiled communism undoubtedly still lurked even in the best _quartiers_. One notable instance of the kind will never be effaced from my memory, and even now, though mayhap unjustly, makes me view Parisian cabmen with anything but affection.

My friend and I, feeling dejected and oppressed by sad thoughts, one morning determined to indulge our feelings by a kind of pilgrimage to the scene of the massacres, especially as we had known and revered the sainted archbishop at the time of the Vatican Council in Rome. Calling a cab, therefore, on the Boulevard des Capucines, we quietly desired the grinning coachman to drive us to the Rue Haxo. In an instant his expression changed to one of sturdy anger. He knew no such street; had never heard of it before; could not possibly take us there. Perceiving at once the spirit we had to deal with, and that he had divined our object, no other cab, moreover, being within view, we insisted no further on the point, but tranquilly told him to drive instead to La Roquette—the prison where the unfortunate victims had been confined. Knowledge of so large a place we knew he could not deny, and, trusting to our own general idea of its position, we felt satisfied when he apparently started in that direction. However, on and on we went, in and out of lane and street, without seeming to approach the object of our search, but as we proceeded soon found ourselves amongst a most forbidding population, men and women looking stern and sulky as we passed, and exchanging glances with our driver, who appeared known to many, while on more than one window were the ominous words, “Ici on vend le pétrole!” An involuntary shudder seized us, not diminished on reaching an open height whence we beheld La Roquette in a distant part of the town, and our horse’s head turned exactly the opposite way. The truth suddenly flashed upon us. Our Communist driver, possibly one of the undetected incendiaries or murderers himself, calculating on our ignorance, while unable to plead such on his own part, had cunningly outwitted us by driving in and out toward a different point, whither doubtless he would have gone on indefinitely but for our unexpected discovery. It was too dangerous a neighborhood in which to quarrel with him, even though but mid-day; therefore, merely telling him that we had altered our intentions, we tranquilly desired him to return to our original starting-point on the Boulevard des Capucines. Most curious was it then to note the same instantaneous change of countenance as before, but this time to an exultant expression as undisguised as the sulky mood of the previous hour. And how could we wonder at it? For had he not succeeded in defeating the object we had in view, and, moreover, inspired us with so much fear that we sighed to get away from such a population and never breathed freely again until safely back in the more civilized quarters? Our courage, however, then revived, and, determined not to be altogether conquered, we bade him turn aside and stop at the _ci-devant_ Hôtel de Ville. Incredible as it now sounds, again he feigned ignorance, then pretended to have lost his way, and at length, when we forced him to “land” us there, the scowl and growl he honored us with made us realize, more than any description ever could, what such a being might be if uncontrolled, above all if multiplied indefinitely.

* * * * *

To-day, the 22d of May, 1878, as I stand in the new building on the Trocadéro and behold the scene before me, thinking of this recent past, I am tempted to doubt my own identity. Paris—the same Paris that was in flames on this day seven short years since—now lies, like a vision of beauty, outstretched around; the pretty Seine winds beneath its beautiful bridges, the countless boulevards are thick in shade and perfumed blossoms, the then unfinished streets finished, the scars and wounds well-nigh (though not completely) removed, all faces bright and people civil, and the whole city still hung with the thousand flags spontaneously hoisted on the opening day of the Exhibition, when England and America were everywhere given the posts of honor beside the tricolor. Opposite, the huge main building of this same Exhibition, standing on the Champ de Mars, is crowded with its fifty and sixty thousand daily visitors;[126] the gardens between it and this Trocadéro, connected by the bridge of Jéna, are covered with a moving mass of all nationalities, while the Spanish restaurant, Turkish kiosk, Chinese “summer palace,” English buffet, Hungarian cafe, dotted with others around the grounds, tell of peace, and of a national revival unparalleled for its rapidity in the history of the world.

And what subjects for deep thought, what food for philosophic meditation, as one gazes at this glorious landscape, and from the hidden recesses of one’s memory spring forth recollections of the past few years!

My own acquaintance with this Champ de Mars dates from 1865, when in the August of that year I here witnessed a review of fifty thousand men in honor of Don François d’Assise, King Consort of Spain. On this last 1st of May, 1878, the same royal personage, long since classed amongst the _ex’s_ residing in this capital, walked beside the Marshal-President, MacMahon, and the Prince of Wales in the procession which opened the Exhibition, and it were but natural to presume that thoughts of his previous visit must now and then have flitted across his royal brain. On that former occasion military of all arms lined the sides of the then arid square, while the imperial party advanced from the Porte de Jéna up its centre to a tribune in the Ecole Militaire. First came the empress, beautiful and popular, loudly cheered as, in her open carriage, she passed along the lines; next appeared the little Prince Imperial, not more than nine years old, riding far in front quite alone on his tiny pony, followed by his father, the emperor, and his royal guest, Don François d’Assise, escorted by an apparently brilliant gathering of distinguished military men. No prophetic eye was there to point out those who in brief time were to court the national defeat, or whose names would soon become bywords for corruption and incapacity.

Nor in the large mass of soldiery who required two hours and a half to march past, albeit in quick time, could any one discern the possibility of coming gigantic disasters. Alas! alas! what reputations have since then been blown into thin air, what calculations dashed to the ground, what history “acted out,” fearful suffering endured, theories exploded! Such thoughts are overpowering—sufficient to make the giddiest spirits ponder. And such, in truth, has been their effect of recent years in France; for, side by side with the marvellous material resurrection of this energetic nation, its religious revival has grown to astounding proportions. Not that we ever can admit with many passing observers that the French people were so completely devoid of religion as it has been somewhat the fashion to affirm—and on this point we thoroughly agree with the article by an eloquent Protestant writer in the _Blackwood_ of last December—but the terrible events of 1871 have made the most frivolous more sober-minded, forced many an indolent mind to reflect, and from thoughts have made them now proceed to acts, to good works and alms-deeds. Above all they seem to have learnt the necessity of expiation and of prayer, and the whole Catholic portion of the French community since then have fallen upon their knees and endeavored to pray. Their pride, it is true, has been humbled, but they have taken the lesson properly to heart, and appear to have realized the truth that in all things, human as well as divine, “in order to live we first must die,” and that without supernatural aid even humility itself cannot be acquired.

And here it must be noted that mortifying as the defeat by the Prussians has been to French pride, it never could have produced the permanent effect on their characters which has been achieved by the frantic outbreak of the Commune. This it is which has so thoroughly sobered the entire nation and made them feel that every one must combine as against a common enemy. The republic, too, whether destined to last or not, has been productive of one incalculable service in depriving all its citizens of the possibility of shirking individual responsibility by throwing the blame, as heretofore, of every failure on some supposed or real despot; so that, while they have arisen from this death-struggle wiser and better men, Frenchmen now see the necessity, almost for the first time in their history, of taking an active part in public affairs and putting their own shoulders to the wheel.

But leaving these reflections, let us turn to the Champs Elysées and take a seat beneath its trees. What a contrast between the May of ’71 and this one of ’78! That all terror and woe, this one all joy and contentment. French mothers with their _bonnes_ and babies are in groups around far and near, mingled with foreigners of all sorts and nationalities. Faultless carriages pass by, drawn by magnificent, high-stepping horses, of a size and breed formerly unknown in France, and which make many an Englishman exclaim with wrath: “This is the way in which all our horses are taken out of our country!” Doubtless he is right, though only to a certain degree; for the perfection to which horses now attain in France is said to be mainly due to the climate, which has been found to suit equine nature in a way undreamt of some few years since. Thus the breed, when once imported, is improved on French soil, and easily accounts for the multitude of fine horses at present met with all over Paris. This fact, however—together with the taste for horses, driving, and every other thing connected with the existing Anglomania, so foreign to the Parisian natures of forty years ago—owes its discovery to the late emperor, little as any Frenchman now likes to admit its possibility. Before his day no one ever thought of holding the reins, and almost as little of riding, not only in France but on the Continent, leaving such matters to grooms, as Easterns leave dancing to hired performers. But if these tastes were fostered by him before the war, the extraordinary development they have since acquired is one of the remarkable changes in modern Paris, and denotes both greater wealth—despite the Prussian indemnity—and more manly habits than in the “good old days long, long ago.” Louis Napoleon no doubt laid the foundation, but during the republic the edifice has been raised. He it was who inspired the tastes, prepared the ways and means, laid out the roads and drives—the marshal-president and his “subjects” who now profit by them. Perhaps one of the prettiest and most interesting sights nowadays in this beautiful city is the daily Parisian overflow of riders to the Bois de Boulogne between the hours of eight and ten, not only of men but of ladies, whose wildest dreams in former times never aspired to such an expensive pleasure. On a fine May morning “Rotten Row” has here a formidable rival both in numbers and in the steeds, with the difference, too, that instead of riding up and down a monotonous, straight road, the happy-looking parties of equestrians in Paris, almost invariably numbering many ladies, turn off into the fifteen small and large roads that surround the lake in the Bois, and there for a couple of hours enjoy a genuine country canter or a walk beneath pleasant shade. And mingled with these are pony-phaetons well driven by ladies, returning later laden with ferns, wild flowers, and greenery of various kinds. There is true enjoyment in sitting on a bench in the Avenue de Boulogne (once de _l’Impératrice_) and watching the well-shaped horses, their healthy looks and glossy coats, which would awake the envy of many a London groom, and are not more striking than the good seats of the fair riders and the vast improvement in those of the younger men. Of the number in the early morn the soldier-like President may here be seen, accompanied more than once during this month of May by the Prince of Wales or some other royal visitor.

But this is the afternoon, and, though our thoughts have flown back to the morning, we are sitting in the Champs Elysées and the hour for driving has arrived. Here comes a four-in-hand, driven, though somewhat badly, by the young Marquis de Château Grand—strictly _à l’Anglaise_, as he fondly hopes—closely pursued by the Duc de Grignon in his pretty dog-cart, attended by his English groom. “Victorias” with duchesses and countesses—the bluest blood of the blue faubourgs—follow in countless numbers. But whose is this open landau with its four black horses and gay postilions, containing two ladies in close converse as they pass along? The stout one is Isabella, ex-Queen of Spain—what memories her name evokes!—the younger “La Reine Marguerite,” as her intimates love to call her; in other words, the wife of Don Carlos, now the inseparable companion of Isabella, with that remarkable disregard to conventionality, considering the remonstrances of her son’s government, which has always been as strong an element in her character as the _bonhomie_ that has led her into this intimacy, and also makes her love her present Parisian life almost as much as she ever did her throne. A few seconds later a handsome man rides slowly by, attended only by his groom, his sad, pensive countenance amidst this gay throng telling a tale of care and inward sorrow. It is Amadeus, son of Victor Emmanuel, but unlike him in most respects, now Duke of Aosta, once too “King of Spain,” and still grieving for his lost wife. Then, turning round to look again at the mass of children, _voué_ to the Blessed Virgin, driving up and down in their blue and white perambulators, and which thus silently bear witness to wide-spread French devotion amid all the seeming worldliness, the eye falls on General de Charette as he walks by with some old friend, and whom we last saw commanding the Papal Zouaves in Rome during that eventful winter of 1870. Since then he has seen fire and fought valiantly for his own native land, he and his corps, as in the ages of faith, first making a public act of consecration to the Sacred Heart, the scapular being emblazoned on their regimental colors. Trial and suffering, however, have rather improved than injured him, for he has grown in size and freshness, mayhap owing somewhat to present happiness and the fair American who has lately brought him both wealth and beauty. Looking towards the road again, the Crown Prince and Princess of Denmark are seen driving past, but only to make us miss the sweet, smiling face of the Princess of Wales and the pleasant manners of the Prince, seen here on their road to the Exhibition every afternoon until last week, but now returned to England, not, however, until they had become such universal favorites and so completely won French hearts that if this were 1880 and not 1878, universal suffrage, it is said, if Paris were a criterion, would be very likely to offer Queen Victoria’s heir the doubtful honor of MacMahon’s place.

Nor does this in any way complete the list of royal representatives during this month of May in Paris. Archdukes of Austria, princes of Belgium and Holland, with Orleans princes and princesses, old and young, and, neither last nor least, the blind King of Hanover, Bismarck’s victim, and now permanently settled in the gay capital, may be here discerned by those who care to penetrate their _incognito_.

And not only during the day but at night is the city gay and full of life, for balls and _fêtes_ are going forward, where twelve and fourteen royalties may often be seen at a time; nay more, unlike as in imperial days, _the_ faubourg has come forth from its retreat, and legitimacy has opened its doors with hospitality, oftentimes with regal splendor.

Where, then, are the signs of poverty and depression which the enormous indemnity paid to Prussia and the sad events of recent years might lead a foreigner to expect? Naught but wealth and comfort is apparent; money and money’s worth; the rich showing every outward mark of luxury, the people well clad and housed; that squalor which makes itself so painfully visible by the side of London riches here entirely absent, life bright and cheerful as far as casual observers can perceive.

But beneath all this enjoyment, the flutter of flags on the “opening day,” the gathering of foreign princes as in the palmiest period of imperialism, and the evident revival of trade, in no other country is there so great a dread of impending evil, such a vague, undefined fear, baseless it may possibly be, but which it were folly to ignore. 1880 and the termination of the Septennate are ever before French minds, and the dreaded lack of durability, of a firm basis to their edifice, and the possible renewal of the Commune horrors seem nowadays always uppermost in their thoughts. Despite the outward symptoms of brightness, perhaps even frivolity, no change is more impressive to any one formerly acquainted with France than the grave and sobered character of the nation; the reflection which misfortune seems to have evoked, and the subdued tone their crushing defeat has stamped upon the entire people. The old crowing of the Gallic cock, so Napoleonic and offensive to strangers of yore, has, at least for the present, entirely disappeared and been exchanged for a tranquil manner, a greater civility in answering questions, and a total absence of the “swagger” so universal in the ante-war period. Hence, too, springs a sudden awakening to the possibility of other nations having special merits unnoticed formerly, with a studying of their minds and habits as compared with their own both in the press and private circles, which unconsciously betrays how terrible an ordeal the French have been passing through and how little they count upon its being as yet fully past.

Nothing, therefore, is so interesting and at the same time touching to any one who has not been in Paris since 1867 as to note the signs of change in these respects which meet us at every turn. One time it is the eloquent tribute of the _Figaro_ to the reign and subjects of Queen Victoria on the birthday of that constitutional monarch; at another, the strict neutrality, so foreign to their natures, which this excitable people are maintaining in the present turmoil of the Eastern question; yesterday I noticed it at a dinner, when a heedless remark about the ruined Conseil d’Etat caused all the party to shudder and to exclaim, one after the other, that hard as it had been to eat horses—nay, dogs, and even _cats_, as many of them had had to do during the siege—the suffering was as naught compared to the terror of those fearful Commune days. One who had lived near the Palais Royal had seen the Tuileries burning from the end of her own street, another had been roused from her work by a shell throwing the opposite chimney down into her court-yard—and now that it is rebuilt an inscription records the fact—while a third had slept for the two worst nights, if sleep it could be called, in the cellar of her house, amongst the odds and ends of a band-box maker’s stock, who occupied the place. But the most singular experience of all, perhaps, was that of a family who then lived at their villa twelve miles outside of Paris, and became aware of the Conseil d’Etat being in flames from a shower of burnt paper falling on their lawn on that May evening of the 22d, 1871, of which some scraps showed the government stamp and belonged to documents of the state. And, perhaps, of all the Commune misdeeds the burning of this building and the Hôtel de Ville was the most malicious, for in both places marriage contracts and family deeds were kept or registered, and the loss and confusion which have hence ensued in families can never properly be estimated.

But it is especially in the churches, just where passing travellers have neither the time nor opportunity for observation, that the strides in religious fervor become most apparent. Above all in the Faubourg St. Germain is one at once conscious of breathing a different atmosphere. There the bells, as in old Catholic Swiss and German towns, wake one at five or half-past five o’clock of a summer morning, and keep up a constant call to Mass thenceforward until a late hour. There, too, should one turn in to a church on coming home from the Exhibition, he is certain to find devout women, and men also, lost in meditation before the Blessed Sacrament. “Kneeling-work” (as a late writer names this _œuvre_) and “reparation” are the practice of the day in the orthodox quarter. But especially before the Grotto of Lourdes in the Jesuits’ Church, Rue de Sèvres, is the crowd of ardent petitioners never ceasing and intensely fervent. I have watched them with admiration the many times I have been there myself, and the thousand ex-votos, many from military men, prove that their prayers have not been made in vain. The faubourg is also like a network of “Mother Honors,” second only to Rome itself in their number and variety. Sisters of Charity especially flit about it in every direction, and are even to be met with in the omnibuses or shopping with the utmost simplicity amidst the vast crowds of the Bon Marché. The devotions of the “Mois de Marie,” moreover, lend the district at this moment an additional source of ardor.

May, too, has ever been the month of First Communions, and those who know French life understand what this implies. The whole winter, nay, for many previous years, the catechism has been leading up to this point, and now since Easter Sunday the examinations have been constant and severe. Each parish has a day set apart in May for this great event, preceded by a short retreat, attended many times a day by all the children. Then on the happy morning the whole church is given up to the ceremony. All is arranged most systematically: the nave set apart for the two hundred or three hundred young communicants—rich and poor mixed together—the boys in front with white rosettes in their new jackets, the girls in rows behind enveloped in long white veils. Beautiful hymns are sung by the whole congregation, led by one of the priests; a touching sermon is preached by the curé; the parents are in the aisles, and many follow their children to the holy table. In the afternoon the little ones again meet to renew their baptismal vows in presence of the Blessed Sacrament, and the day closes by Vespers and Benediction. On that day week, before they lose their first fervor, in the same church the same children receive confirmation. These have been _fête_ days for the whole family, nay, parish; and as parishes and churches are numberless in Paris, tiny brides and white-rosetted boys are met in all quarters during the whole of this beautiful month. If any of these children have the misfortune in after-years to lose their faith, their parents and the clergy at least have faithfully and zealously fulfilled their share of duty, while, on the other hand, it is a certain fact that in most cases this care lays the foundation of the solid virtues and tender piety, of that religious element in French life so well described by Mme. Craven and others, and which, side by side with the frivolity, is now making such sure and steady progress in every part of France.

The month of May, too, is here, as in England, the period of charitable bazaars, annual meetings, and rendering of accounts. Amongst others, two societies, the immediate offspring of the Commune, are now attracting much attention. One is that of St. Michael, to whom devotion as ancient patron of France has revived with marvellous ardor, and under whose protection has been placed the society for the distribution of good books; the other, “Les Cercles Catholiques,”[127] or Working-men’s clubs, more deeply interesting than any other of the present day.

At this present moment Paris counts its eighty different “Cercles,” while the provinces possess not less than two thousand. The third Sunday after Easter, the Patronage of St. Joseph, is their annual feast, and on that day, while gay Paris was attending the races in the Bois de Boulogne, we were present at the afternoon service in the Cathedral of Notre Dame. A more imposing sight, with greater promise for the future, it were impossible to conceive; for six thousand members, but only that portion which consists of the schools and apprentices—many from the Belleville quarters—had marched thither, each headed by their own chaplain and carrying handsome banners, unfolded as they entered the church. For them the nave was set apart, all others being in the aisles, while the meek, venerable Cardinal-Archbishop of Paris sat opposite the pulpit during the sermon, the blind Monseigneur de Ségur at his side, the Comte de Mun and other gentlemen of the society directing the general arrangements.

The now celebrated hymn of the Sacred Heart composed by the blind old bishop was first sung; and if the sensation of the Derby Day in May, 1871, had cut deeply into my soul, it was now all but effaced by the sublime, thrilling emotion caused by this vast multitude answering each verse chanted by the choir by the famous, heart-stirring chorus of

Dieu de Clemence,
Dieu Vainqueur,
Sauvez, sauvez la France
Par votre sacré Cœur.

The effect at any time would have been marvellous, but with the knowledge that these six thousand youths had almost all been to Holy Communion that very morning, with such a past in one’s memory, and a congregation composed of such elements before one, it became simply overpowering. Moreover, we all knew that at the same hour, nay, at the same moment, the same prayer was being offered up in two thousand other churches in France; for, the provincial branches had made arrangements that their ceremonies should thus coincide with those of Paris. A procession, rendered picturesque as well as impressive by the six thousand lighted tapers winding in and out of the nave and aisles of this grand, historic cathedral and headed by the cardinal-archbishop, followed the short sermon, when a public act of consecration, with Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament, brought this most heart-stirring and encouraging celebration to a close.

And now, on the 30th May, since writing the above lines, another impressive ceremony has taken place in the same cathedral, but strikingly illustrative, too, of the increasing influence the religious element is obtaining in France—namely, a public act of reparation for the intended celebration of Voltaire’s centenary and in memory of Joan of Arc. Good principles have certainly made more progress than was supposed, for public opinion and the protests of the religious portion of the nation have forced the government to forbid the demonstration in honor of the enemy of Christianity. But, to show even-handed justice, they equally forbade all homage to Joan of Arc, even that of depositing wreaths around her statue in the Rue de Rivoli—erected, by the way, on the spot where she was wounded when attacking Paris for the king.[128] No authorities, however, could or would interfere inside a church. Hence at three o’clock precisely the act of reparation commenced, every spot in the vast cathedral being occupied by a crowd, composed in greater part, too, of men, though the ladies, especially the “Enfants de Marie,” distinguished by their lighted tapers, mustered strong under their president, the Duchesse de Chevreuse. Amongst the number, in her Spanish mantilla, I recognized “La Reine Marguerite,” with many another high-born dame of far-sounding title. It was purely a work of devotion—vespers and benediction, the _Miserere_ chanted by this enormous congregation, constituting the “reparation,” followed by a “Regina Cœli” which in beauty nothing could surpass. But the countenances of all present were a perfect study in themselves, showing the depth of their emotion and how different such ceremonies are in a country like this, where every one attends them for a solemn and public purpose, far more than for private, individual motives. It lends a sublimity to such acts that raises the spirit high above ordinary moments. Who, for instance, could behold the vast multitude beneath the roof of this lofty nave, which goes back to the ancient days of France, without remembering that Providence had saved it seven short years since from destruction by its own sons, and that the chairs whereon they were kneeling had been piled up in that same spot, in the hope of putting an end to all ceremonies or worship of this kind? As one listened to the “Regina Cœli,” and gazed on the beautiful statue of the Virgin Mother presenting to us the Divine Infant, and which stands amidst the lights and flowers over the altar outside the choir, courage and hope revived, and all left the sacred edifice with renewed grace to encounter their struggles in the cause of right. Most surely prayer and expiation are the strength and the duty of modern France, and with such reward as has been already vouchsafed to them her sons and daughters need no longer despair.

Footnote 126:

The largest number at the Exhibition was on a Sunday, when upwards of
111,000 entered the building.

Footnote 127:

For a full description of these excellent associations see THE
CATHOLIC WORLD, January, 1878, “Catholic Circles for Working-men in
France.”

Footnote 128:

The Place des Pyramides in the Rue de Rivoli is on the site of the
ancient ditch of the fortification in the Faubourg St. Honoré, and is
known to be the spot where Joan of Arc was wounded.

THE CREATED WISDOM.[129]
BY AUBREY DE VERE.
II.

Behold! I sought in all things rest:
My Maker called me: I obeyed:
On me he laid His great behest,
In me His tabernacle made.

The world’s Creator thus bespake:
“My Salem be thy heritage:
Thy rest within mine Israel make:
In Sion root thee, age on age.”

Within the City well-beloved
Thenceforth I rose from flower to fruit:
And in an ancient race approved
Behold thenceforth I struck my root.

Like Carmel’s cedar, or the palm
That gladdens ’mid Engaddi’s dew,
Or plane-tree set by waters calm,
I stood; my fragrance round I threw.

Behold! I live where dwells not sin:
I breathe in climes no foulness taints:
I reign in God’s fair court, and in
The full assembly of His saints.

Footnote 129:

Ecclesiasticus xxiv.

THE VENERABLE MOTHER MARY OF THE INCARNATION.

A decree of the late Holy Pontiff permitted the introduction of the cause of the canonization of Mary Guyard Martin, known in religion as Mother Mary of the Incarnation, foundress of the Ursuline Convent at Quebec. There is in this much to console and encourage us. Up to this step no servant of God who lived or labored even transiently in any part of our continent lying north of the Rio Grande had ever been proposed for that exceptional public honor which the church permits by a decree of canonization.

To any servant of God whose life, stamped with the impress of sanctity, seems to justify a belief on our part that he is now reigning with Christ in glory, we may address our prayers to obtain those more abundant temporal and spiritual graces which we crave as a means to our ultimate end, salvation; but this devotion is for our own closet. The church permits no public honors till she has examined with the closest scrutiny the life, writings, virtues, and miraculous gifts of the one whom thousands are honoring in private.

Exalted sanctity was developed in the mission life in our northern wilds, in the first rude cloisters, in laborious ministry, in patient suffering; but there were no monarchs or wealthy communities to undertake the long and often expensive investigations and evidence demanded at Rome, where, as the saying is, it almost requires a miracle to prove a miracle.

Spanish America under the Catholic kings was differently situated, and that part of the western world numbers not a few canonized or beatified, as well as many whose process of canonization, begun long since, has been laid aside amid the changes in the political world, which in this century show us the government in almost all Spanish-speaking countries the enemy of religion.

Mexico and Peru were the two great centres of Spanish power, originally rich, prosperous, semi-civilized states. In and between these two states flourished nearly all those whose canonization was undertaken or completed. It would be an error, however, to suppose that the Spanish colonies were all that the church desired, or that they were models for a Christian state. The popular picture of them is dark enough, and the untempered zeal and vivid imagination of Las Casas gave to the enemies of Catholicity and Spain an authority for the most fearful charges. Calm Spanish accounts, however, reveal facts which show that, in the mad rush for wealth aroused by the opening of these golden realms, an immigration poured into our shores which made light of the salutary teachings of Catholicity, and even of humanity or the natural law. The sudden wealth did not tend to chasten or spiritualize these natures in which pride, avarice, and lust held such sway. Yet it was with adventurers of this kind that the church began her mission to bring the Indian to the Gospel, the Spaniard back to the spirit of the Gospel. There was opposition alike from Indian and Spaniard. If missionaries fell, slain by the Indians whom they sought to enrich with blessings beyond all price, a bishop died like St. Thomas of Canterbury, slain by his own Christian countrymen. Shining sanctity, however, exerted its influence and ultimately prevailed.

In Mexico the humble Franciscan brother Sebastian de la Aparicion filled Puebla with the odor of his virtues, and the process of his canonization attested his sanctity so clearly that he was beatified by Pope Pius VI. The causes of the Venerable Gregory Lopez and of the Venerable John Palafox, Bishop of Puebla and Viceroy of New Spain, were also introduced, while missionaries either born in Mexico, like St. Philip of Jesus, or laborers for a time in that field, won in Japan the crown of martyrdom, recognized by the beatification of the church.

St. Louis Bertrand for several years illumined by his holy life and gospel eloquence the coast of South America from Panama to Santa Marta and Carthagena, laboring among the Spaniards and the conquered Indians, and endeavoring, as did all his order, to save the latter from misery here and hereafter, as well as to bring his own countrymen to the practice of the religion which they professed. As though one saint prepared the way for another, Blessed Peter Claver came in the next century to devote his life on that same coast to a still more degraded race, the enslaved African. New Granada thus has her saints, but Peru is the favored spot in our whole continent—Peru, where religion seems at so low an ebb, where governments of a day, put up for sale by prætorian guards, agree only in one point: hostility to the church of God and to the well-being of the people. Peru was above all other parts blessed by the example of exalted sanctity. St. Toribius Mogrobejo, called from among the laity to the archiepiscopal see of Lima, illustrated his stewardship by untiring zeal—reviving religion in the clergy and people, extending the missions, erecting institutions of learning and charity—and by the wise decrees of synods and councils confirming his holy work. Among those who labored in his diocese was the holy Franciscan St. Francis Solano, whose zeal has made his memory hallowed from Tucuman, in the Argentine Republic, to Panama, but who is honored especially at Lima, long the scene of his apostolic ministry. His heroic virtues, the miraculous gifts with which God endowed him, gave a force to his words that no human eloquence could equal and the most hardened sinners could not resist.

While Lima, the City of the Kings, had these two brilliant examples before her, a child of benediction was born of a father Spanish in origin and an Indian mother. Little Isabel Flores y Oliva was, however, known from her cradle as Rose, and the church, in canonizing her, adopted this name, which St. Toribius, too, gave her when he conferred the sacrament of confirmation. Her wonderful life of austerity and zeal, of intense love of God and her neighbor, has made the name of the Lima virgin known throughout the world; and even before her canonization she was declared protectress and principal patron of all the churches of the New World.

She is one of the glories of the Order of St. Dominic, and in her day two humble lay brothers, in convents of the same order in Lima, were conspicuous for sanctity. Blessed Martin Porras, a mulatto, holy, zealous, full of love for the sick, the poor, and the afflicted, was looked upon by all as a saint and an angel of mercy. His labors and his fame were shared by the Spanish lay brother Blessed John Massias. What a privilege it must have been to have lived at that time in Lima!

Coeval with the last of these flourished in Quito the secular virgin Mariana de Paredes y Flores, whose life so resembles that of St. Rose that she has been called the Lily of Quito. Her beatification by the late Pope Pius IX. gave us another patroness for the western world.

The canonized and beatified in Spanish America thus represent all states and ages: the episcopate, the priesthood, the religious state, and secular life.

Spanish America, in the wild rush of the restless and adventurous to its rich and luxuriant soil, resembled California and Australia as we have seen them in our days, could we imagine the tide of emigration Catholic, with some of the knightly graces of chivalry still powerful, and devoted clergy and religious striving manfully to recall the wild horde from their temporary forgetfulness of religion, morality, and civilization.

When we turn from this picture to that of Canada, we find a contrast as striking as the difference of the climes. In Canada labor, hardship, the deepest religious feeling prevailed from the outset and left their impress on the colony. The world has rarely witnessed a community so completely guided by religion and morality as the first Canadian settlers, and so deeply imbued with them as to elevate to its own standard the repeated emigrations of more than half a century. The austere virtue of Canada was gay and cheerful; it had none of the ferocious Puritanism of New England, which enforced religious tyranny, and pursued with unrelenting hate alike dissenting whites and unbelieving natives. While New England, narrow and restrictive in character and territory, hugged the bleak coast of the Atlantic, Canada, under the broader, higher impulse of Catholicity, won the friendship of countless native tribes and pushed her conquest thousands of miles into the heart of the continent. “Peaceful, benign, beneficent were the weapons of this conquest. France aimed to subdue not by the sword but by the cross; not to overwhelm and crush the nations she invaded, but to convert, to civilize, and to embrace them among her children,” is the testimony of one to whom Catholic piety seems only a wild dream.

Time has shown on what a solid foundation they built who laid the corner-stones of the Canadian colony. At a critical moment, when the court of France, yielding to the spirit of licentiousness and infidelity which had leperized the higher classes, was forging a rod of iron wherewith in the hands of the neglected and demoralized masses to chastise the monarchy and the aristocracy, God in his providence saved Canada by what seemed a death-blow, by allowing it to pass under the sway of England, the bitter enemy of Catholicity and France. But though the French spirit in the colony died out, her teeming population is intensely Catholic, well trained, well guided, holding their own against Protestant and infidel influence.

With such results we may look to the founders of the Canadian commonwealth for examples of high and exemplary virtue. The history of the Canadian Church has not been written even in French, and does not exist in English; it has seemed scarcely necessary to write separately the history of a church when the history of the colony is so imbued with the religious element that, deprived of it, her annals would be almost a blank.

In every history of Canada we trace the life of the church; we see governors whose lives were models of Christian piety, of strict administration, of skill and courage; priests and missionaries whose austerity, zeal, and piety shrank from no hardship, no peril, no torture; religious devoting their lives to education and works of mercy; colonists, the whole tenor of whose career recalls us to the days of the primitive church, influenced by the highest motives of faith.

Among all the founders of Canada the eye rests especially on her martyred missionaries; on Mother Mary of the Incarnation, foundress of the Ursuline Convent, Quebec; on Margaret Bourgeoys; on Bishop Laval; on Catharine Tehgahkwita, the Mohawk maiden, who rose to such sanctity. To them devotion has been constant though private, fervent, and not unrewarded.

The time has come when the Head of the church has been solicited to sanction and confirm the devotion so long entertained for one of these heroic souls—Mary Guyard Martin, known in religion as Mother Mary of the Incarnation.

She was born at Tours, in one of the loveliest provinces of France—one that gave that kingdom some of its master-minds and American colonization some of its most energetic and manly pioneers. Her father, Florence Guyard, was a wealthy silk manufacturer, and her mother belonged to the noble house of Babou de la Bourdaisiere, one of her ancestors having been deputed by Louis XI. to escort St. Francis of Paula to his states. The hereditary piety of the family was marked by a special devotion to this servant of God.

Mary was born on the 18th day of October, in the year 1599, and showed from her cradle marks of God’s predilection. Her childish soul had no greater passion than a lively charity and most tender compassion for the poor and the sick, viewing in them the beloved of Jesus and Mary, whose names were the first she learned from a pious mother’s lips. On one of her little errands of mercy she was caught by the shaft of a cart and thrown so violently to the ground that bystanders rushed to raise the child, whom they supposed terribly injured, only to find that she had escaped unharmed, protected, as she always believed, by the influence of the prayers of the poor and afflicted.

When only seven she had a vision, in which our Saviour called her in an especial manner to be his alone. Her docile heart responded to the divine vocation, and from the age of nine or ten she sought the most retired places and least-frequented churches, in order to spend a considerable part of the day in communion with our Lord. She watched the devout persons at prayer, and imitated their humble and pious attitude, and, ignorant of meditation or mental prayer, made her spontaneous acts of virtue, repeated the prayers she knew or ejaculations prompted by her own innocent heart.

As she grew and began to study, the influence of her girlish companions could not wean her from her love of spiritual things. In pious books she found her greatest and most unwearied delight, and her piety only grew more solid as her mind was enabled to understand the mysteries of faith and the immensity of God’s love and mercy. Her whole soul tended to the consecration of herself to our Lord in some religious retreat, and she expressed to her mother her desire to enter the Benedictine convent at Tours, then the only one in the city; but as her pious mother, after advising her that she was yet too young to take such a step, heard no further allusion, she supposed it a mere passing thought and not a solid vocation. The child had not the advantage of a wise and prudent director at this moment, and her future was apparently to lie in secular life; yet Providence was but guiding her surely to her real vocation.

At the age of seventeen her parents proposed that she should accept the hand of a young man of good character who solicited her as his wife. She evinced the greatest repugnance to enter a state so incompatible with the recollection and prayer which were her great desire. But as her parents had accepted the offer she durst not resist. “Mother,” she exclaimed, “as the whole thing is determined and my father insists on it, I feel obliged to obey his will and yours; but if God does me the grace to give me a son, I here promise to consecrate my son to his service; and if he restores me the liberty I am now about to lose, I promise to consecrate myself to him.”

The young wife accepted her new life courageously. Her husband, Mr. Martin, was a silk manufacturer, employing many operatives, and she had a certain supervision over a number of them who lived on the place. But these new duties did not cause any relaxation in her pious practices; she heard Mass every day, and gave a considerable time to meditation and pious reading. Affection founded on the purest motives united her and her husband, who soon learned to revere the holy wife whom God had granted him. Yet her life was not free from bitter trials. Even greater were in store. She had passed but two years in the marriage state, and had been but six months a mother, when her husband was almost suddenly taken from her. The widow of nineteen, with her helpless child, saw her property swept away, law-suits encircle her in their deadly meshes, and a lot of almost absolute destitution await her. She soon returned to her father’s house, and in a garret room led the life of a recluse.

God now began to favor her by interior lights, and placed her under the guidance of experienced directors. She consecrated herself to his divine service, but the future was not made clear to her, and a further period of trial was to purify her virtue. A sister, also married, urged her to come and aid her in the business that devolved upon her. Mme. Martin reluctantly yielded, but was ungratefully made the drudge of the house, and then burdened with the superintendence of her brother-in-law’s extensive forwarding business. Amid all this distracting toil, apparently so incompatible with high spirituality, the servant of God maintained an almost uninterrupted union with God. Amid all the din and bustle of business life she was raised to the highest contemplation. In all this she subsequently beheld God’s providence. Writing at a later date from Quebec, she said: “I see now that all the states, all the trials and labors through which I passed, were a preparation to form me for the work of Canada. This was my novitiate, from which I issued far from being perfect, but yet, by the grace of God, in a state to bear the difficulties and hardships of New France.”

Heaven was fitting her alike for the external work in founding a religious community in a scarcely-organized colony, and for conducting its members with the experience of the highest mystical knowledge.

As the ties which bound her to the world fell away her longing for the religious life increased. Her director, however, deemed it her duty to remain in the world in order to superintend the education of her son; but he ultimately allowed her to make vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience, the last referring to her director, and in temporal affairs to her sister and brother-in-law.

Her austerities at this time were constant and severe. She slept on a bare board, wore hair-cloth, mingled wormwood in her scanty food, and by frequent disciplines—even with nettles—and fastings mortified a body already over-burdened with daily toil. For this privileged soul, raised to the highest contemplation, and prepared by the heavenly Bridegroom for the most sublime union, mortifying the body with austerities that rivalled the anchorets of Thebais, was not even in a religious cloister, but immersed from morning to night in those business cares and details which seem so incompatible with a spirit of prayer and of recollectedness. She not only gave so much of her time to God and made all her labor one prayer, but in her great heart was always solicitous for her neighbor. Over the working-people under her direction she exercised the greatest influence, giving them from time to time clear and persuasive instructions suited to their understanding, and by counsel and mild reproof guarding them from offending God or recalling them from danger. But it was especially in the hour of sickness that they found her a true mother, rendering them all the service and care that the best of mothers could lavish on them.

It was not to be wondered at that she came to be regarded as a saint; but God, to purify her and preserve her from any self-esteem, permitted her suddenly to fall into the greatest aridity. Her fidelity when all sensible consolation was withdrawn was rewarded by extraordinary favors—visions in which the most profound mysteries of faith seemed laid open to her gaze.

The period at last arrived when she could place her son in a suitable institution and follow the inclination which had so long been to her as a vocation. Yet she was far from beholding to what order she was called. Her first inclination had been towards the Ursulines, while the contemplative order of Mount Carmel seemed most in unison with her whole spiritual life. Her director was a father of the order of Feuillants, and the general, desirous of securing for a convent of nuns of his rule a soul so privileged and so highly advanced in the ways of perfection, offered to assume the education of her son. While she remained thus undecided the Ursulines founded their first house at Tours. She felt at once that Providence wished her among them. A knowledge of their rule and of their profession of serving their neighbor confirmed this impression, and she felt convinced that she was not called to a purely contemplative life. A pious bishop, about to found a Visitation monastery at his see, heard on his way through Tours of the pious widow, and called upon her. He pressed her earnestly to join the community he projected, but all confirmed her in believing that the Ursuline was the order into which she must enter.