The Life of the Venerable Mother Mary of the Incarnation

by Anonymous

The first house of French Ursulines was established at Avignon in 1594 by two ladies named De Bermond. This branch of the Society, known as the Congregation of Avignon, adopted the Rules of the Congregation of Milan, and quickly spread through other parts of Provence. A few years later, the Institute of St. Angela was introduced into Paris by Madame Acarie, now venerated as the saintly Carmelite, Blessed Mary of the Incarnation. Though not the second foundation in order of date, the Paris house occupies a prominent position in the annals of the Ursulines, as their first monastery. As we have already more than once observed, the Sisters were not originally cloistered, bound by vows or monastic observances, or even irrevocably consecrated to their manner of life, but the time was come when by the adoption of these essential obligations, the Society, as St. Angela herself had called it, would receive its full development by being converted into a regular monastic Order. This alteration in the form, changed nothing in the substance of the Saint's original institution. Whether a member of a simple confraternity, or of a religious order in the restricted meaning of the word, the Ursuline was at all times equally bound to devote her life to the instruction of the young, and to work out her own sanctification by the practice of the evangelical counsels. The instrument of the great work in question was Madame St. Beuve, a pious and wealthy widow, who at the request of her relative, Madame Acarie, consented to accept the title and responsibilities of Foundress of the house at Paris, on the express understanding that it should in due time be formed into a monastery. In this object she finally succeeded to her entire satisfaction. The reigning Pontiff, Paul V., approved the design, and on the 16th of June, 1612, issued a Bull converting the Congregation into a Monastery, under the patronage of St. Ursula and the rule of St. Augustine. His Holiness, moreover, ordained that for the greater stability of the order, the religious should add to the three ordinary solemn vows, a fourth of the instruction of the young. The Bull of Pope Paul V. was confirmed in 1626 by Urban VIII. The convent in Paris, so interesting to Ursulines from its associations, "le grand couvent de St. Jacques," as it was called from its locality, was among those destroyed in the first Revolution, but, by an inscrutable permission of Divine Providence, it is not among those restored. Still, even in its ruins, it not only lives in the hearts of Ursulines, but may be said actually to survive in its numerous foundations and their offshoots. Between its establishment in 1612, and the death of its venerated Foundress in 1630, eleven houses of the Congregation had sprung up in the north of France. Its subsequent diffusion was equally satisfactory.

Congregations of Ursulines were established at Bordeaux and Lyons, under the respective dates 1605 and 1611, and, within a few years after their foundation, were erected into Monastic Orders by Pope Paul V.; from these, numerous filiations have also sprung. There are other Congregations of Ursulines, but the three named are the most numerous. Although the spirit and the essential end of Ursulines are in all cases the same, the various Congregations differ more or less on certain points, and each retains the name which distinguishes it from the others.

Notwithstanding the suppression of numbers of its houses, the Order of St. Angela now registers about three hundred, the greater portion in Europe, some in Oceanica, and a large number in America. The history of the Mother of the Incarnation will shortly introduce us to the first in the New World. Of late years, the old tree seems to have renewed its vitality, so vigorously is it putting forth fresh branches. In Belgium alone, thirty houses have been founded by one priest in our own times; and although, unhappily, the work of suppression has been steady in Germany, the dispossessed communities have not perished, but only removed to other countries.

The increase of devotion to St. Angela keeps pace in our day with the extension of her Order. Pope Pius IX., of revered and cherished memory, gave a considerable impetus to this devotion, by raising the saint's festival to a higher ritual rank, permitting the universal celebration of her office, and proclaiming her the "Patroness of Christian mothers, and the Protectress of young girls." The establishment of the arch- confraternity which bears her name, has greatly contributed to the same end. It was commenced at Blois in 1863 by the Abbé Richaudeau, a zealous patron of the Order, and is widely spread wherever Ursulines are to be found. Its objects are the honour of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the triumph of the Church, the deliverance of the suffering souls in purgatory, and the extension of the work of St. Angela by word and example, or the apostolate of woman. It is enriched with indulgences, and the holy sacrifice of the Mass is offered on the first Tuesday of every month for the associates.

During the three and a half centuries of its existence, the Ursuline Order is calculated to have given to the Church more than one hundred thousand religious, by whom multitudes of young girls of every grade have been trained to piety. Only the angels have kept the record of the multitude of saints whom it has given to heaven, some bearing the palm branches of victorious martyrs, all clad in virgin robes, and swelling the celestial canticle which only the Spouses of the Lamb are privileged to sing.

SECOND PERIOD, 1631-1639.

HER RELIGIOUS LIFE IN FRANCE.

CHAPTER I.

SISTER MARY OF THE INCARNATION, AN URSULINE NOVICE.—VIRTUES AND TRIALS OF HER NOVITIATE.—THIRD VISION OF THE BLESSED TRINITY.—HER CLOTHING.

Marie Guyart was in her thirty-first year when she commenced her career as an Ursuline. Even without her own testimony, we could easily have understood, that after her long and severe probation. in the world, the novitiate of religion must have appeared to her like a very heaven of peace. She compared her entrance into the sanctuary to the opening of the gate of a terrestrial paradise, and dwelt with holy joy on the happiness of having exchanged a life of embarrassment, responsibility, and care, for the blessed condition of a simple novice, whose only affair is to sanctify her soul by the observance of her rule.