“I persevered constantly in this moral and physical disposition until the moment when I was carried in a sedan chair into the church of the Carmelites. I was brought there at five o’clock in the morning. I heard mass, and communicated without quitting my chair. Towards the moment of elevation I felt severe pains throughout my whole frame, and seemed to myself to be in such a state of weakness that I then thought if I were to be communicated it would have been for the last time. A cold sweat spread itself at that time over my whole body. The priest who gave me the Holy Sacrament noticed that I was so weak that I could not hold the cloth upon my knees. He was so much afraid from the paleness of my countenance and the alteration he perceived in me, that in fear of some accident he put the sacred ciborium almost close to my lips.
“Finding me in this painful state, which announced rather a speedy dissolution than a cure, I formed acts of submission to the Will of God. I begged Him to accept the sacrifice of my life; I also thrice made the prayer of the blind man, ‘Son of David, have mercy on me;’ the while interiorly, having lost my power of articulation. I remained in that state till the end of the mass, and finding my strength recovering I called my nurse, and begged her to go and see if the chapel in which the precious remains of the Venerable Sister Marie de l’Incarnation were deposited was open, having the design to be carried there. But O bounty and mercy of the Lord! at the very moment the people were preparing I quitted the chair myself; my nurse came hastily upon me to stop me, imagining that this movement was a last effort of nature. I corrected her, saying that I thanked her, but that thanks be to God! I had no need of her help, and instantly after, on the steps of the altar, returned thanks after communion; for I did not as yet perceive the change that was made in me. I was not sensible of it till after having made my thanksgiving, which was near a quarter of an hour after. I then raised myself from the ground filled with joy and consolation, finding I had recovered the use of my limbs; my breast and stomach at ease and devoid of pain, enjoying tranquillity altogether wonderful. I first ascended the seven steps of the altar; and then went to the grate of the choir and thanked the community for the prayers that they had the goodness to offer up for me; requesting them to add still further their thanks to mine. I then turned towards the Blessed Sacrament, where I remained on my knees on the ground without any support during the period of three masses, which were said in succession. I afterwards heard high mass, and assisted at the entire Office of the Day, without the noise of chaunting, of the instruments, nor the great concourse of people, occasioning me the slightest inconvenience. Although I had to answer in the course of the day to more than four thousand persons attracted by the novelty of the circumstance to the church of the Carmelites, on the afternoon of the same day I went on foot to visit the Ursuline Dames.
“Done at Compiègne on the 12th of Feb. 1792.
(Signed) “Françoise-Geneviève-Philippe,
“Called in religion ‘Sr. Josephine of the Incarnation,’ Religious Carmelite of the Monastery of the City of Compiègne, in which I had the happiness to enter on the 20th of December, 1786, and to pronounce my holy and inviolable engagements on the 22nd of July, 1788.”
Another point bearing very directly on the subject of this chapter here suggests itself for some brief consideration:—
Deeds of benediction have been so universally recognized in history, that it may be credibly maintained that the custom originated in the earliest ages of the World’s existence, either by a direct revelation from Heaven or by the most elementary religious instinct of the immediate descendants of our first parents. The heads of tribes, after the Flood, blessed their children and followers. And, when the Patriarchal dispensation drew towards its close, the power of blessing was exercised by the leaders and chiefs of God’s chosen people. Proof of all this is on record in the Sacred Writings. He, therefore, who runs may read. And we may gather from the same source that a form of blessing was attached to the priest’s office;[47] and that such blessing was efficient. All this is of course taken for granted under the Christian dispensation; and it is evident that the various forms of sacerdotal benediction are true means of bestowing the Divine blessing and grace: and this, because of the salient principle that the Fall of man from original righteousness, having effected a loss of union with God Almighty, salvation is the renewal of that union by and through Jesus Christ and His Church. Now, a Blessing, in the Name of God, is bestowed by a superior upon an inferior.[48] Thus a bishop gives his benediction to a priest, deacon, or layman; a priest to a layman; a father or head of a family to a son or an inferior member of that same family; a patriarch or chieftain to his tribe, or to any member of it. The blessing of God is a great and mighty gift of grace, and has always been intimately conjoined with the offering of sacrifice, and so particularly and specifically with the offering of the Christian sacrifice, as also with and by a benediction, some of the most solemn services of Holy Church have been brought to an end.
Of course, if there be a power to bless, there is, as has already been pointed out, likewise a power to curse. Neither blessing nor curse may be absolute in their effect, and all acts and deeds are done under God, or with the permission of the Almighty. Of the results respectively of blessings or curses we know but little. But the glimpses which History, Revealed Religion, and Experience alike afford of those results are full of interest, and are subjects for contemplation and study. Here, as in the consideration of similar details, concerning the Supernatural, the Church Universal should be our guide. Where she leads we should go: where she directs we should follow.
As bearing on this subject, it may be suitably pointed out that Mr. Robert Southey in his “Common-Place Book” puts on record a very remarkable story of “citation” by a man unjustly and cruelly murdered:—
“The Philipsons of Colgarth coveted a field like Ahab, and had the possessor hung for an offence which he had not committed. The night before his execution the old man (for he was very old) read the 109th Psalm as his solemn and dying commination, verses 2, 3, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13, 14, 15, and 16.” The verses contain a prayer for vengeance upon “the wicked and deceitful, who have spoken with a lying tongue,” and whose days are to be few, and their children to be fatherless, their descendants continually vagabonds and beggars, and their posterity to be cut off. “The curse,” Southey adds, “was fully accomplished; the family were cut off, and the only daughter who remained sold laces and bobbins about the country.”