The man had intellect, great spirituality, and moreover was a great actor, which latter fact need not be stated to his discredit—he used his personality to press home the truth he wished to impart.
The powers at Rome, realizing Father La Combe's ability as a preacher, refused to allow him a regular parish, but employed him in moving about from place to place conducting retreats. We would now call him a traveling evangelist. Monasteries and nunneries are very human institutions, and quibble, strife, jealousy, bickering, faction and feud play an important part in their daily routine.
To keep down the cliques and prevent disintegration, the close inspection of visiting prelates is necessary. Father La Combe, by his gentle, saintly manner, his golden speech, was everywhere a power for good.
Madame Guyon came under the sway of Father La Combe's eloquence. She felt the deep, abiding strength of his character. He was the first genuine man she had ever met, and in degree he filled her ideal. She sought him in confession, and the quality of her confession must surely have made an impression on him. Spirituality and sex are closely akin. Oratory and a well-sexed nature go together.
Father La Combe was a man. Madame Guyon was a woman.
Both were persons of high intellect, great purity of purpose, and sincerity of intent. But neither knew that piety is a by-product of sex.
They met to discuss religious themes: she wished to advise with him as to her spiritual estate. He treated her as a daughter—kissed her forehead when they parted, blessed her with laying on of hands.
Their relationship became mystic, symbolic, solemn, and filled with a deep religious awe; she had dreams where Father La Combe appeared to her—afterward she could not tell whether the dream was a vision or a reality. When they met in reality, she construed it into a dream. God was leading them, they said. They lived in God—and in each other.
Father La Combe went his way, bidding her a tender farewell—parting forever. In a few weeks Madame would appear at one of his retreats with a written consent from the Bishop.
She followed him to his home in Gex, and then to Geneva. She entered a convent and worked as a menial so as to be near him. The Bishop made Father La Combe her official adviser, so as to lend authority to their relationship.