Do any of us ever think that the spirit of penance—corporal penance—is dying out amongst us? There are instruments of self-mortification in this “Martyrs’ Room” that will convince us to the contrary.

It is not a miracle—unless the world and life be all a miracle—if, when men die wondrous deaths, wonderful things should follow upon those deaths; and when we see a marble tablet in this “Martyrs’ Room” telling how, not eighteen months ago, at Mass-time, when the priest invoked the saints whose relics lay beneath the altars in the church, a child was healed of a grievous disease, we must not be surprised.

“Ecce ego vobiscum sum omnibus diebus usque ad consummationem sœculi.”[192]

The beds from La Roquette are here—pieces of sacking, stretched out by a contrivance something similar to that made use of in the formation of camp-stools.

Here are the little silver cases in which the fathers concealed the Blessed Sacrament, to be at last, as each anticipated, his viaticum.

But enough....

The church, as I before stated, is situated on the north side of the quadrangle. It is Gothic, and of fair proportions, consisting of a choir and two aisles. The only side chapel worthy of note is that where repose the bodies of the PP. Olivaint, Ducoudray, Clerc, Caubert, and De Beugy, murdered on the 24th and 26th of May, 1871, by the Communists of Paris. The walls, the floor, the whole chapel, in fact, is literally covered with wreaths of blood-red immortelles; while in front of what, in the event of their canonization, will be the “Martyrs’ Altar,” are five white marble slabs, bearing upon them the names of the five victims, together with the incidents and date of their deaths.

My kind guide—the priest whom I have elsewhere described as being “my particular father”—having now shown me all that was necessary of the house and chapel, returned with me to his cell, and, in some very interesting conversations then and on my succeeding visits, soon gave me an idea of the important works undertaken by his society in Paris.

“We are,” said he, “quite a military order. Fighting is as much our business as it is the soldier’s; and I will even go so far as to say that he is no true Jesuit who does not fight. Of enemies, as you may imagine, there is no lack whatever; but, undoubtedly, here our bête noire is socialism; for you know in Paris, as indeed elsewhere, it has ever been our aim to undertake, if possible, the education of the male portion of society. And this, unfortunately, happens to be the favorite work of the socialists also; for, however faulty their code of moral philosophy may be in other respects, they have at least grasped the fact that to educate the affluent youth of a country is to form the intellect of a rising generation. However,” concluded my instructor laughingly, “we have never been very popular in European society.”

“No,” I answered abstractedly; for I was thinking just then of the sacred name which the order bears—of him who was “Virum dolorum et scientem infirmitatem”;[193] and my thoughts reverted to the martyr shrine that I had so lately seen in the chapel. “But perhaps you, who have in such a special manner enrolled yourselves under the banner of the sacred name of Jesus, have received of him a greater share than others of the shame of the cross.”