“There is a place less commodious than another; she chooses it, saying with a sweet smile, How comfortable I am here!
“There is some work to be done, and she presents herself for it simply with the joyous manner of one who finds her happiness in so doing.
“It is an object of trifling value, of which she deprives herself to give to her who the evening before has manifested a desire to possess one like it.
“How many oversights repaired by this unknown hand!
“How many neglected things put in their places, without our ever seeing how they came there!
“How many little joys procured for another without his ever having mentioned to any one the happiness which they would give him!
“Who has known thus how to do good in secret? Who has known how to divine the secrets of the heart?
“Does a dispute arise? She knows how to settle it by a pleasant word which wounds no one, and falls upon the slight disturbance like a ray of sunlight upon a cloud.
“Should she hear of two hearts estranged, she has always new means of reuniting them without their being able to show her any gratitude, so sweet, simple, and natural is what she does.
“But who will tell the thorns which have torn her hands, the pain her heart has endured, the humiliations her charity has borne?