She thinks mostly of herself, and intense selfishness is apparent even in her humility. The tragedy of her life lay in that she had a surplus of time and a plethora of money, and these paved the way for introspection and fatty enlargement of the ego. Let her tell her own story:
My God: Since you wish me to write a life so worthless and extraordinary as mine, and the omissions I made in the former have appeared to you too considerable to leave it in that state, I wish with all my heart, in order to obey you, to do what you desire of me.
I was born, according to some accounts, on Easter Even, Thirteenth of April—although my baptism was not until the Twenty-fourth of May—in the year Sixteen Hundred Forty-eight, of a father and mother who made profession of very great piety, particularly my father, who had inherited it from his ancestors; for one might count, from a very long time, almost as many saints in his family as there were persons who composed it.
I was born, then, not at the full time, for my mother had such a terrible fright that she brought me into the world in the eighth month, when it is said to be almost impossible to live.
I no sooner received life than I was on the point of losing it, and dying without baptism.
My life was only a tissue of ills. At two and a half years, I was placed at the Ursulines, where I remained some time. Afterwards they took me away. My mother, who did not much love girls, neglected me and abandoned me too much to the care of women who neglected me also: yet you, O my God, protected me, for accidents were incessantly happening to me, occasioned by my extreme vivacity; I fell. A number of accidents happened to me which I omit for brevity.
I was then four years old, when Madame the Duchess of Montbason came to the Benedictines. As she had much friendship for my father, she asked him to place me in that House when she would be there, because I was a great diversion to her. I was always with her, for she much loved the exterior God had given me. I do not remember to have committed any considerable faults in that house. I saw there only good examples, and as my natural disposition was toward good, I followed it when I found nobody to turn me aside from it. I loved to hear talk about God, to be at church, and to be dressed as a nun. One day I imagined that the terror they put me into of Hell was only to intimidate me because I was very bright, and I had a little archness to which they gave the name of cleverness.
I wished to go to confession without saying anything to any one, but as I was very small, the mistress of the boarders carried me to confession and remained with me. They listened to me. She was astonished to hear that I first accused myself of having thoughts against the faith, and the confessor beginning to laugh, asked me what they were. I told him that I had up to now been in doubt about Hell: that I had imagined my mistress spoke to me of it only to make me good, but I no longer doubted. After my confession I felt an indescribable fervor, and even one time I experienced a desire to endure martyrdom.
I can not help here noting the fault mothers commit who, under pretext of devotion or occupation, neglect to keep their daughters with them; for it is not credible that my mother, so virtuous as she was, would have thus left me, if she had thought there was any harm in it.
I must also condemn those unjust preferences that they show for one child over another, which produce division and the ruin of families, while equality unites the hearts and entertains charity. Why can not fathers and mothers understand, and all persons who wish to guide youth, the evil they do, when they neglect the guidance of the children, when they lose sight of them for a long time and do not employ them?