"Louis, Count of Flanders, of Nevers, and of Rethel, etc., etc., to all present and to come makes known, that Dame Jane, and Margaret, her sister of happy memory, who were successively Countesses of Flanders and of Hainault (as we are, [Footnote 100] by the grace of God), having remarked that in the Flemish territory there were a great number of women, who, from their condition in life and that of their parents, were unable to find a fitting match; observing that honorable persons, the daughters of nobles and burgesses, who desired to live in a state of chastity, could not all enter into convents of women, by reason of their too great number, or for want of means; remarking, moreover, that many young ladies of noble extraction and others had fallen into a state of decadence, so that they were reduced to mendicity, or to a painful existence, to the dishonor of their families, unless they could be provided for in a discreet and becoming manner; incited by God, and with the advice, knowledge, and consent of several bishops and other persons of probity, the aforesaid countesses founded, in several cities of Flanders, establishments with spacious dwellings and lands, called beguinages, where noble young ladies and children of good families were received, to live therein chastely in community, with or without vows, without humiliation to themselves or their families, and where they might, by applying themselves to reasonable labor, procure their food and clothing. They founded among others a beguinage in our city of Ghent, called the beguinage of Notre Dame du Pré, enclosed by the river Scheldt, and by walls. In the centre is a church, a cemetery, and a hospital for infirm or invalid beguines, the whole given by the before-mentioned princesses, etc."
[Footnote 100: This bull is in the original French: "Comteses de Flandre et de Hainault, comme nous aussi, par la grace de Dieu."]
Those young persons who desire to be admitted to the beguinage must first become postulants, and afterward make their noviciate in the convents or communities. They remain there even after their profession up to thirty years of age. Thus are they protected during the most stormy period of life by the watchfulness of their superior and their companions, by prayer and labor in common. Later they can enjoy without danger a larger measure of freedom. They then live two or three together in one of the hermitages, where they pass their time in exercises of prayer and labor, to which the early years of their cenobitical life have accustomed them.
"The great beguinage at Ghent," says M. Chantrel, "contains four hundred small houses, eighteen common halls, one large and one small church. There are sometimes as many as seven hundred beguines assembled in the church. The assembly of these pious women, in their ancient Flemish black dresses, and white bonnets, is very solemn and impressive. The novices are distinguished by their dress. Those who have recently taken the veil have their heads encircled by a crown.
"The beguines admit within their enclosure, as boarders, persons of the gentler sex, of every age and condition, who find in these establishments an asylum for the inexperience of youth, or a calm and peaceful sojourn where those who are tired of the world may pass their days without any other rule than that of a Christian life. In the great beguinage at Ghent there are nearly two hundred secular boarders, who live either privately or in community with the nuns."
Among the novices of the great beguinage at Ghent there lived, fifteen years ago, a Mlle, de Soubiran, the niece of a former vicar of Carcassonne. For twenty years this worthy ecclesiastic had communed with Almighty God, in incessant prayers, to obtain an [{516}] answer to this question: "Would it be a useful work to introduce, or rather to resuscitate, beguinages in France?"
Monseigneur de la Bouillerie, whose eloquence and zeal for good works have made him famous, interpreted in a favorable sense the signs furnished by a concurrence of providential circumstances; and a small establishment was opened twelve years ago, in a suburb of Castelnaudary, under the direction of the Abbé de Soubiran. Since 1856, it has had its postulants, novices, and professed sisters.
The buildings of the new beguinage were too small and poor. This defect was remedied by a great fire which consumed them, and compelled their reconstruction on a larger plan, and with better materials than the planks and bricks of the original buildings.
There is doubtless a vast distance between this feeble beginning and the extensive beguinage in Belgium, which so many centuries have enlarged and brought to perfection. But Mlle, de Soubiran and her first companions brought with them from Flanders the old traditions, with the spirit of fervor and of poverty and humble labor. The trials which they have undergone have only improved their work. They are happy in the blessing of their bishop, and his alms would not be wanting in case of need.
The Castelnaudary beguinage is already fruitful. A second establishment is forming at Toulouse, on the Calvary road. Those of our readers who are acquainted with the capital of Languedoc know the situation of that road, but all Christians have long since learnt that the road to Calvary is the way of salvation.