There is an interesting chapel in St. Merri's Church, dedicated to St. Mary of Egypt, which is beautifully frescoed by Chasserian, depicting the touching old legend, with its deep moral significance, of
"That Egyptian penitent whose tears
Fretted the rock, and moistened round her cave
The thirsty desert."
The poet tells of a miraculous drop which fell in Egypt on St. John's day, and was supposed to have the effect of stopping the plague. Such a drop fell on the soul of this renowned penitent.
"There's a drop, says the Peri, that down from the moon
Falls through the withering airs of June
Upon Egypt's land, of so healing a power,
So balmy a virtue, that even in the hour
That drop descends, contagion dies,
And health reanimates earth and skies!
Oh! is it not thus, thou man of sin,
The precious tears of repentance fall.
Though foul the fiery plagues within,
One heavenly drop hath dispelled them all!"
St. Mary of Egypt is one of a long line of penitents who, after the example of Magdalen, have given proofs of their repentance in proportion to their sins and to the depth of their sorrow, and thus rendered the very scars on their souls so many rays of light.
Le Brun painted one whose frailties are "linked to fame" as Magdalen, and at her own request. The universal interest felt in her story, and the sympathy it always excites, induced me to visit a place that cannot be disconnected from her memory—the chapel of the Carmelites in the Rue d'Enfer, where she took the veil. I refer to Madame de la Vallière, whom Madame de Sevigné calls "la petite violette qui se cachait sous l'herbe."
A priest was just commencing mass when I entered the chapel. I knelt down by the tomb of the Cardinal de Bérulle, who used to come here to pray in the chapel of St. Magdalen, having a great devotion to that saint. It was difficult to resist the distractions that were inevitable in such a spot, but in which I would not indulge till the holy sacrifice was over. The choir of nuns was separated from the chancel by a grating which was closely curtained. There is always a certain charm in everything that savors of mystery. Whatever is hidden excites our curiosity and interest. That forbidding grate, that curtain of appalling blackness, were tantalizing. They concealed a world in which we had no part. Behind them were hearts which had aims and aspirations and holy ambitions, perhaps, we know not of. They led a life which is almost inexplicable to the world—hidden indeed in God. The chapel was so still, save the murmur of the officiating priest, that you might have supposed no one else there. But after the Agnus Dei, came out from that mysterious recess a murmur from unseen lips like a voice from another world. It was that of the nuns all saying the Confiteor together before going to holy communion. That murmur of mea culpâ, mea culpâ, seemed like the voice of penitence from La Sainte Beaume, or the voice of past times repeating the accents of the repentant La Vallière. There she lived and prayed and did penance for thirty-six years, longer than Magdalen in her cave, "son coeur ne respirant que du côté du ciel," thus displaying a remarkable strength of volition, and therefore of character; for "What is character but a perfectly formed will?" says Novalis. Before that altar she used to come two hours before the rest of the community to pray, and in cold weather she, that had been brought up in luxury, was often found senseless on the pavement of the choir when the rest of the nuns came to the chapel.
We read that the tears of Eve falling into the water brought forth pearls, and we cannot doubt that the tears through which our penitent viewed her past life helped obtain for her the pearl of great price. One instance of her austerity is well known. One Good-Friday, meditating in the refectory, during the meagre repast of the day, on the vinegar and gall given to the dying Saviour when he was athirst, she recalled the pleasures of her past life and particularly of the time when, returning with the court from the chase, being thirsty, she drank with pleasure of some delicious beverage which was brought her. This immortification, so in contrast with the vinegar and gall of the Saviour, filled her with lively sentiments of repentance and humiliation, and she resolved never to drink again. For three weeks she did not taste even a drop of water, and for three years she only drank half a glass day. This severe penance, which was unsuspected, brought on a fit of illness and caused violent spasms in the stomach, which reduced her to a state of great feebleness. Besides that, she suffered greatly from rheumatism, but she never ceased to share in the labors in the community. She died in 1710, aged nearly sixty-six years, having passed thirty-six years in the convent. Her life here was one long Miserere which was surely heard in heaven. Her soul had to pass through the deep waters; but she took fast hold of that "last plank after shipwreck"—repentance. Everything went to feed the stream of her sorrow. Every new grace gave her a new conception of the guilt of sin and awoke new regrets for lost glory. So she shut herself up in the garden of myrrh. She sheltered herself in the creux du rocher from the waves of memory that swept over her soul. In that dark night of her soul she looked tremblingly out over the wide sea of her sorrows with a heart like the double-faced Janus, looking into the past and toward the future, memory and hope struggling in her heart. Over that dark sea rose the moonlight of Mary's face—our Lady of Mount Carmel—a narrow crescent at first, but growing larger and brighter every day. And the great luminous starry saints with their different degrees of glory studded the heavens that opened to her view. And so the morning came when the voice of Jesus spoke: Many sins are forgiven her because she hath loved much.
There is an accent of sincerity, with no savor of cant, in the well-known reply of Soeur Louise de la Misericorde when asked if she was happy in the convent: "I am not happy, but I am satisfied." How few in the world can even say with sincerity that they are satisfied. Dr. Johnson said, "No one is happy," but satisfaction is certainly reasonable happiness. Carlyle says, "There is in man a higher than love of happiness. He can do without happiness, and instead thereof find blessedness." That happiness alone is real which does not depend on contingencies. It is reasonably satisfied with the present, and has a constantly increasing hope in the future. Such was the happiness Madame de la Vallière found among the pale-eyed votaries of the cloister, a satisfaction of the soul which became perfect happiness when death came to her after so many years of dying.