 Βολ Bu, 16 ΟΚΜΑΟΝΟΛΗΤΗΝΚΜΑΔΑΜ ΚΙΟΝ Τα είναι τα ΛΑΔΕΑ's σημή, πάρε τα όλοι όλοι οι ΛΑΔΕΑλ αυτός είναι στη κομμάτι Του κράτα, για να βίνει με την ευρωπαϊκή πιο 것을 ευχαριστώ για να βάλει σας μ 이거 λιμπρε Βολ Βόκς ε τα όρα! Η φυσικής πρωσης που είχα μπροδşaνη Teach was disposed to lay open his heart to me, ο Θεός του έδωσε τον Θεό, ό,τι ήταν πρέπει για τον Θεό, γιατί ο Θεός έδωσε τον σπίτι του ζωή, αλλά για το σπίτι του θεού και του θεού. Δεν είχε τίποτα ανάπτυξη στον Θεό. Είχε τη δικαίωση να πρένει σε εμένα κάποιους του συμφωνιούς, που είχαν σπίτις και ο Θεός έδωσε όλους τους όλους. Είχα το ίδιο ίδιο time που οι άλλοι του ίδιου έδωσε όλους τους ραβίγες, που έχω μιλήθει, και ανάπτυξη με όλα τα πράγματα, το σπίτι του Θεού. Δεν μπορώ να δούμε να δούμε πώς ο Θεός was pleased to make amends for former damages pouring out his spirit in abundance on these men, while the others were laboring vehemently against it, doing all they could to destroy its dominion and efficacy in their fellow mortals. But those good souls, instead of being staggered by persecutions, grew the stronger by it. The superior and the master of the novices of the house, in which this doctor was declared against me without knowing me. They were grievously shakrin that a woman, as they said, should be so much flocked to and so much sought after. Looking at things as they were in themselves and not as they were in the Lord, who does whatever pleases him, they had condemned for the gift which was lodged in, so mean an instrument, instead of esteeming the Lord and His grace. Yet this good brother at length got the superior to come to see me and thank me for the good which he said I had done. Our Lord saw order that he found something in my conversation which reached and took hold of him. At length he was completely brought over. He, it was, who sometime after being visitor, dispersed such a number of those books, brought at their own charge, which the others had tried utterly to destroy. Oh, how wonderful thou, my God, in all thy ways, how wise, in all thy conduct, how full of love. How well thou canst prostrate all the false wisdom of men and triumph over their vain pretensions. There are where in this novitiate many novices. The eldest of them grew so very uneasy under his vocation that he knew not what to do. So great was his trouble that he could neither read, study, pray, nor do scarcely any of his duties. His companion brought him to me. We spoke a while together and the Lord discovered to me both the cause of his disorder and its remedy. I told it to him and he began to practice prayer, even that of the heart. He was on a sudden, wonderfully changed and the Lord highly favored him. As I spoke to him, Grace wrote in his heart and his soul trung it in. As the parched ground does the gentle rain. He felt himself relieved of his pain before he left the room. He then readily, joyfully and perfectly performed all his exercises, which before were done with reluctance and disgust. He now both studied and prayed easily and discharged all his duties in such a manner that he was cursed known to himself or to others. What astonished him most was a remarkable gift of prayer. He saw that there was readily given him what he could never have before, whatever pains he took for it. This enlivening gift was the principle which made him act, gave him grace for his employments and an inward fruition of the grace of God, which brought all good with it. He gradually brought me all the novices, all of whom partook of the effects of grace, though differently according to their different emberaments. There never was there a more flourishing novitiate. The master and superior could not forbear admiring so great a change in the novices, though they did not know the cause of it. One day, as they were speaking of it to the collector, for they esteemed him highly on account of his virtue, and said, My fathers, if you will permit me, I will tell you the reason of it. It is the lady against whom you have exclaimed so much, without knowing her, whom God has made use of for all of this. They were very surprised and both the master, though advanced in age and the superior, submitted humbly to practice prayer after the manner taught by a little book, which the Lord inspired me to write, and of which I shall say more hereafter. They reaped such benefit from it that the superior said to me, I am become quite a new man. I could not practice prayer before because my reasoning faculty was grown down and exhausted, and now I do it as often as I will with ease, with much fruit, and a quite different sensation of the presence of God, and the master said, I have been a friar these forty years and can truly say that I never knew how to pray, nor have I ever known or tasted of God, as I have done since I read that little book. Many others were again to God whom I looked on to be my children. He gave me three famous friars of an order by which I have been and still am very much persecuted. He made him also of service to a great number of nuns of virtuous women and even men of the world. Among the rest, a young man of quality who had quitted the order of the knights of Malta to take that of the priesthood. He was the relation of a bishop near him who had other designs of preferment for him. He has been much favored of the Lord and is constant in prayer. I could not describe the great number of souls which were then given me as well-maids, as wives, priests and friars. But there were three curts, one canon and one grand figure who were more particularly given me. There was one priest for whom I suffered much through his not being willing to die to himself and loving himself too much. With a sad regret, I saw him decaying, falling away. As for the others, there are some of them who had continued steadfast and immovable and some whom the tempest had shaken a little but not torn away. Those these start aside, yet they still return. But those who are snatched quite away return no more. There was one true daughter given me whom our Lord made use of to gain many others to him. She was in a strange state of death when I first saw her and by me he gave her life and peace. She afterwards fell extremely ill. The doctor said she would die but I had an assurance of the contrary and that God would make use of her to gain souls as she has done. There was in a monastery a young woman confined in a state of destruction. I saw her, knew her case and that it was not what they thought it was. As soon as I had spoken to her, she recovered but the priors did not like that I should tell her my thoughts of it because the person who had brought you Thether was her friend. They plagued her more than before and threw her back again into her destruction. A sister of another monastery had been for eight years in a deep melancholy unreleaved by anyone. Her director increased it by practicing remedies contrary to her disorder. I had never been in that monastery for I did not go into such places unless I was sent for as I did not think it right to intrude but left myself to be conducted of providence. I was very much surprised that at eight o'clock at night one came for me from the priors. It was in the long days of summer and being near I went. I met with a sister who told me her case. She had gone to such excess that seeing no remedy for it she had taken a knife to kill herself. The knife fell out of her hand and a person coming to see her had advised her to speak to me. Our lord made me know at first what the matter was and that he required her to resign herself to him instead of resisting him as they had made her do for eight years. I was instrumental to draw her into such a resignation that she ended at once into a piece of paradise. All her pains and troubles were instantly punished and never returned again. She was the greatest capacity of any in the house. She was presently so changed as to be the admiration of the whole community. Our lord gave her a very great gift of prayer and his continual presence with the faculty and readiness for everything. A domestic also, who had troubled her for 22 years past was delivered from her troubles that produced a close tie of friendship between the priors and me as the wonderful change and the peace of this sister surprised here she having so often seen her in her terrible sorrow. I also contracted others such ties in the monastery where there are souls under the lord's special regard whom he drew to himself by the means he had been pleased to make choice. I was specially moved to read the holy scriptures. When I began I was in bell to write the passage and instantly its explication was given me which I also wrote going on with inconceivable expulsion light being pour in upon me in such a manner that I found I had in myself latent treasures of wisdom and knowledge which I had not yet known of. Before I wrote I knew not what I was going to write and after I had written I remember nothing of what I had penned nor could I make use of any part of it for the help of souls. The lord gave me at the time I spoke to them without any study or reflection of mine all that was necessary for them. That's the lord made me go on with an explanation of the holy internal sense of the scripture. I had no other book but the bible nor ever made use of any but that and without even seeking for any. When in writing on the old testament I made use of passages of the new to support what I had said. It was without seeking them they were given me along with the explication and in writing on the new testament there in making use of passages of the old they were given me in like manner without my seeking anything. I had scarce any time for writing but in the night allowing only one or two hours to sleep. The lord made me write with so much purity that I was obliged to live off or be keen again as he was pleased to order. When I wrote by day often suddenly interrupted I left the word unfinished and he afterward gave me what he pleased. If I gave way to reflection I was punished for it and could not proceed. Yet sometimes I was not duly attentive to the divine spirit thinking I did well to continue when I had time even without feeling his immediate impulse or enlightening influence from hence it is easy to see some places clear and consistent and others which have neither taste nor action such is the difference of the spirit of God from the human and natural spirit. Although they are left just as I wrote them yet I am ready if order to adjust them according to my present light. This thou not, oh my God, tell me a hundred ways to prove whether I was without any reserve through every kind of trial or whether I had not yet some little interest for myself. My soul became hereby readily too pliable to every discovery of the divine will and whatever kind of humiliations attempted me to counterbalance my Lord's favours till everything high or low was rendered alike to me. Me thinks the Lord acts with his dearest friends as the sea with its waves. Sometimes it pushes them against the rocks where they break in pieces. Sometimes it rolls them on the sand or dashes them on the mire then instantly it retakes them into the depths of its own bosom where they are absorbed with the same repetity that they were first ejected. Even among the good the far greater part are souls only of mercy surely that is well but do I pertain to divine justice or how rare and yet how great? Mercy is all distributive in favour of the creature but justice destroys everything of the creature without sparing anything. The lady who was my particular friend began to conceive some jealousy on the applause given me God saw permitting it for the father purification of your soul through this weakness and the pain it caused here. Also some confessors began to be uneasy saying that it was none of my business to invade the province and to mantle in the help of souls. But there were some of the penitents which had a great affection for me. It was easy for me to observe the difference between those confessors who in their conducting of souls seek nothing but God and those who seek themselves therein. The first came to see me and rejoiced greatly at the grace of God bestown on their penitents without fixing their attention on the instrument. The others on the contrary try underhand to stir up the town against me. I saw that they would be in the right to oppose me if I had intruded of myself but I could do nothing but what the Lord made me do. At times there came some to dispute and oppose me. Two friars came one of them a man of profound learning and a great preacher. They came separately after having studied a number of difficult things to propose to me. Though they were matters far out of my reach the Lord made me answer as justly as if I had studied them all my life after which I spoke to them as he inspired me. They went away not only convinced and satisfied but affected with the love of God. I still continued writing with the prodigious swiftness for the hand could scarcely follow fast enough the spirit which dictated. Through the whole progress of so long a work I never altered my manner no made use of any other book than the Bible itself. The trustcriber whatever diligence he used could not copy in five days what I wrote in one night. Whatever is good in it comes from God only. Whatever is otherwise comes from myself. I mean from the mixture which I have made without Julie attending to it of my own impurity with his pure and chaste doctrine. In the day had scarcely time to eat by reason of the vast numbers of people which came thronning to me. I wrote the canticles in a day and a half and received several visits besides. Here I may add to what I have said about my writings that a considerable part of the Book of Judges happened by some means to be lost. Being desired to render that book complete I wrote again the places lost. Afterward, when the people were about living the house they were found. My former and latter explanations on Combarison were found to be perfectly conformable to each other which greatly surprised persons of knowledge and merit who attested the truth of it. There came to see me a counselor of the parliament a servant of God who finding on my table a tract on prayer which I had written long before desired me to lend it. Having read it and liked it much he lent it to some friends to whom he thought it might be of service. Everyone wanted copies of it. He resolved therefore to have it printed. The impression was begun and proper applications given to it. They requested me to write a preface which I did and that was that little book printed. This counselor was one of my intimate friends and a pattern of piety. The book has already passed through five or six editions and our Lord has given a very great benediction to it. Those good friars took fifteen hundred of them. The devil became so enraged against me on account of the conquest which got made by me that I was assured he was going to stir up against me a violent persecution. All that gave me no trouble. Let him stir up against me ever so strange persecutions. I know they will all serve to the glory of my God. End of Chapter 16 Athens, Greece May of 2009 The autobiography of Madame Keon This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org The autobiography of Madame Keon by Jean Keon Volume 2 Chapter 17 A poor girl of very great simplicity who earned her livelihood by her labor and was inwardly favored of the Lord came all sorrowful to me and said On my mother what strange things have I seen? I asked what they were. Alas, said she, I have seen you like a lamb in the midst of a vast troupe of eurious wolves. I have seen a frightful multitude of people of all ranks and robes, of all ages, sexes and conditions, priests, friars, married men, mates and wives, with bikes, harpards and drone swords, all eager for your instant destruction. You let them alone without staring or being surprised and without offering any way to defend yourself. I looked on all sides to see whether anyone would come to assist and defend you, but I saw not one. Some days after, those who threw envy were raising private batteries against me broke forth. Libals began to spread. Envious people wrote against me without knowing me. They said that I was a sorceress, that it was by a magic power I attracted souls that everything in me was diabolical, that if I did charities, it was because I coined and put off false money with many other cross accusations, equally false, groundless and absurd. As the tempest increased every day, some of my friends advised me to withdraw, but before I mentioned my living green noble, I must say something further of my state while here. It seemed to me that all our Lord made me do for souls would be in union with Jesus Christ. In this divine union my words had wonderfully effect even the formation of Jesus Christ in the souls of others. I was in a wise able of myself to say the things I said. He conducted me, made me say what he pleased and as long as he pleased. To some I was not permitted to speak a word and to others they are flowed forth as it were a deluge of grace. Yet this pure love admitted not of any superfluity or a means of empty amusement. When questions were asked to which an answer was useless, it was not given me. It was the same in regard to such as our Lord was pleased to conduct through death to themselves and who came to seek for human consolation. I had nothing for them, but what was purely necessary and could proceed no farther. I could at least only speak of indifferent things in such liberty as God allows in order to suit everyone and not to be unsociable or disagreeable to any. But for his own word he himself is the dispenser of it. Oh, if preachers were duly careful to speak only in that spirit what fruit would they bring forth in the lives of the hearers? With my true children I could communicate best in silence in the spiritual language of the Divine Word. I had the consolation some time before to hear one read in Sage Augustine a conversation he had with his mother. He complains of the necessity of returning from that heavenly language to words. I sometimes said Oh my love give me hearts large enough to receive and contain the fullness bestowed on me. After this manner when the Holy Virgin approached Elizabeth a wonderful commerce was maintained between Jesus Christ and Saint John the Baptist who after this manifested no eagerness to come to see Christ but was drawn to retire into the desert to receive the light communications with the greatest plenitude. When he came forth to preach repentance he said not that he was the Word but only a voice which was sent to make way or open a passage into the hearts of the people for Christ the Word. He baptized only with water for that was his function for as the water in running off leaves nothing so does the voice when it is passed. But the Word baptized with the Holy Ghost because he imprinted himself on souls and communicated with them by that Holy Spirit. It is not observed that Jesus Christ said anything during the whole obscure part of his life though it is true that not any of his words shall be lost. Oh love If all thou hast said and operated in silence were to be written I think the whole Word could not contain the books that should be written John 21 25. All that I experienced was shown in me in the Holy Scripture. I saw with admiration that there passed nothing within my soul which was not in Jesus Christ and in the Holy Scriptures. I must pass over many things in silence because they cannot be expressed. If they were expressed they could not be understood or comprehended. I often felt much for Father Lacombe who was not yet fixed in his state of interior death but often rose and fell into alternatives. I was made sensible that Father Lacombe was a vessel of election whom God had chosen to carry his name among the Gentiles and that he would show him how much he must suffer for that name. A corner wall judges carnally them and imputes to human attachment what is from the purest grades. If this union by any deviation be broken the more pure and perfect it is the more painfully will it be felt. The separation of the soul from God by sin being worse than that from the body of death. For myself I may say I had a continual dependence on God in every state. My soul was ever willing to obey every motion of his spirit. I thought there could not be anything in the world which he could require from me to which I would not give myself up readily and with pleasure. I had no interest at all for myself. When God requires anything from this wretched nothing I find no resistance left in me to do his will. However rigorous it may appear. If there is a heart in the world of which thou art the soul an absolute master mine seems to be one of that sort. Thy will however rigorous is its life and its pleasure. To resume the threat of my story the bishop of Greenville's Almoner persuaded me to go for some time to Marcel to let the storm pass over. He told me that I would be well received there it's being his native soil and that many people of merit were there. I wrote to Father Lacombe for his consent. He readily gave it. I might have gone to Versile for the bishop of Versile had written me very obliging letters earnestly pressing me to come. But a human respect and fear of affording a handle to my enemies gave me an extreme aversion there too. Beside the above the Martians of Prune who since my departure from her had been more enlightened by her own experience having met with the part of the things which I thought would befall her had conceived for me a very strong friendship an intimate union of spirit in such a manner that not two sisters could be more united than we. She was extremely desirous that I would return to her as I had formally promised her. But I could not resolve upon this lest it should be thought that I was gone after Father Lacombe. There had been no room given to anybody to accuse me of any indirect attachment to him or when it depended on myself not to continue with him I did not do it. The bishop Geneva had not failed to write against me to Grenoble as he had done to other places. His nephew had gone from house to house to cry me down. All this was indifferent to me and I did not cease to do to his diocese all the good in my power. I even wrote to him in a respectful manner but his heart was too much close to yield to anything. Before I left Grenoble that good girl I have spoken of came to me weeping and told me that I was going and that I hid it from her because I would have nobody know it but that the devil will be before me in all the places I should go to that I was going to a town where I would scarce be arrived before he would steer up the whole town against me and would do me all the harm he possibly could. What had obliged me to conceal my departure was my fear of being loaded with visits and testimonies of friendship from a number of good persons who had a very great affection for me. I embarked then upon the phone with my mate and a young woman of Grenoble whom the Lord had highly favored through my eminence. The bishop of Grenoble's Almorne also accompanied me with another very worthy ecclesiastic. We met with many alarming accidents and wonderful preservations but those instant dangers which affrighted others far from alarming me augmented my peace. The bishop of Grenoble's Almorne was much astonished. He was in a desperate fright when the boat struck against a rock and opened at the stroke. In his emotion looking attentively at me he observed that I did not change my accountants or move my eyebrows. Retaining all my tranquility I did not so much as feel the first emotions of surprise which are natural to everybody on those occasions as they depend not on ourselves. What caused my peace in such dangers as terrify others was my resignation to God and death is much more agreeable to me than life if such were His will to which I desire to be ever patiently submissive. A man of quality, a servant of God and one of my intimate friends had given me a letter for a knight of Malta who was very devout and whom I have esteemed since I have known him as a man whom our Lord designed to serve the order of Malta greatly and to be its ornament and support by his holy life. I had told him that I thought he should go thither and that God would assuredly make use of him to diffuse the spirit of piety into many of the knights. He was actually gone to Malta where the first places were soon given him. This man of quality sent him my little book of prayer printed at Grenoble. He had a chaplain very adverse to the spiritual path. He took this book and, condemning it at once, went to stare up a part of the town and among the rest a set of men who called themselves the 22 disciples of Saint Cyrano. I arrived at Marseille at 10 o'clock in the morning that very afternoon all was in a noise against me. Some went to speak to the bishop telling him that on account of that book it was necessary to punish me from the city. They gave him the book which he examined with one of his prepents. He liked it well He sent for Manchure Malaval and the father Recollect who he knew had come to see me a little after my arrival to inquire of them from hence that great tumult had its rise which indeed had no other effect on me than to make me smile seeing so soon accomplished what that young woman had foretold. Manchure Malaval and that good father told the bishop what they thought of me after which he testified much uneasiness at the insult given me. I was obliged to go to see him. He received me with extraordinary respect and begged my excuse for what had happened. Desire me to stay at Marseille and assure me that he will protect me. Even asked where I lodged that he might come to see me. Next day the bishop of Greenville's Almuner went to see him with that other priest who had come with us. The bishop of Marseilles again testified to them his sorrow for the insults given me without any cause and told them that it was usual with those persons to insult all such as were not of their couple that they had even insulted himself. They were not content with that. They wrote to me the most offensive letters possible though at the same time they did not know me. I apprehended that our lord was beginning in earnest to take from me every place of a boat and those words were renewed in my mind. The foxes have holes and the birds of the air have nests but the son of man had nowhere to lay his head. In the short time of my stay at Marseilles I was instrumental in supporting some good souls and among others an ecclesiastic who till then was unacquainted with me. After having finished his Thanksgiving in the church seeing me go out he followed me into the house in which I lodged. Then he told me that the lord had inspired him to address me and to open his inward state to me. He did it with as much simplicity as humility and the lord gave him through me all that was necessary for him from hence he was filled with joy and thankful acknowledgments to God. Although there were many spiritual persons there and even of his intimate friends he never had been moved to open his mind to any of them. He was a servant of God and favored by him with a singular gift of prayer. During the eight days I was at Marseilles I saw many good souls there. Through all my persecutions our lord always struck some good stroke of his own right hand and that good ecclesiastic was delivered from an anxiety of mind which had much afflicted him for some years. After I had left Green Noble those who hated me without knowing me spread libel against me a woman for whom I had great love and whom I had even extricated from an engagement which she had continued in for several years and contributed to her discarding the person to whom she had been attached suffered her mind to resume its fondness for that pernicious engagement. She became violently enraged against me for having broken it off although I had freely been at some expense to procure her freedom still she went to the bishop of Green Noble to tell him that I had cancelled her to do an act of injustice. She then went from confessor to confessor repeating the same story to animate them against me. As they were too susceptible of the prejudices infused the fire was soon kindled in all quarters. There were none but those who knew me and who loved God that took my part. They became more closely united to me in sympathy through my persecution. It would have been very easy for me to destroy the colony as well with the bishop of Green Noble. I need only to tell who the person was and show the fruits of her disorder. I could not declare the guilty person without making known at the same time the other who had been her accomplice who now being touched of God was very penitent so I thought it best for me to suffer and be silent. There was a very pious man who knew all her history from the beginning to the end of it who wrote to her that if she did not retract her lies he would publish the account of her wicked life to make known both her cross-iniquity and my innocence. She continued sometime in her malleys writing that I was a sorceress with many other falsehoods. Sometime after she had such a cruel remorse of conscience on this account that she wrote both to the bishop and others to retract what she had said. She induced one to write to me to inform me that she was in despair for what she had done that God had punished her. After these recommendations the outright abated. The bishop disabused and since that time he has testified a great regard for me. This creature had among other things said that I caused myself to be worshiped also other unparalleled follies. From my sail I knew not how or whether I should turn next. I saw no likelihood either of staying or of returning to Greenville where I had left my daughter in a convent. Παδελακόμ had written to me that he did not think I owed to go to Paris. I even felt a strong repartence to the idea of going which made me think it was not yet the time for it. One morning I felt myself inwardly pressed to go somewhere. I took conveyance to go to see the machinettes of Brunei which was I thought the most honorable refuge for me in my present condition. I thought I might pass through Nice on my way to her habitation as some had assured me I might. But when I arrived at Nice I was greatly surprised to learn that the conveyance could not pass the mountain. I knew not what to do nor which way to turn alone, forsaken of everybody and not knowing what God required of me. My confusion and crosses seemed to engrease. I saw myself without refuge or retreat wandering as a vagabond. All the tradesmen who my saw in their shops appeared to me happy in having a dwelling of their own in which to retire. Nothing in the world seemed harder than this wandering life to me who naturally loved propriety and decorum as I was in this uncertainty not knowing what course to take. One came to tell me that next day a slope would set off which used to go in one day to general and that if I chose it they would land me at Savona. From my hands I might get myself carried to the machinettes of Brunei's house. To that I consented as I could not be supplied with any other way. I had some joy at embarking on the sea. I sat in myself. If I am the drakes of the earth, the scorn and offscarring of nature I am now going to embark on the element which above all others is the most treacherous. If it be the Lord's pleasure to plunge me in the waves it shall be mine to perish in them. There came a tempest in a place dangerous for a small boat and the mariners were some of the wickedness. The irritation of the waves gave a satisfaction to my mind. I pleased myself in thinking that those mutinous billows might probably supply me with a grave. Perhaps I carried the point too far in the pleasure I took at seeing myself beaten and bounded by the waves. Those who were with me took notice of my interpivity but you're not the cause of it. I asked some little hole of a rock to be placed in there to live separate from all creatures. I figured to myself that some uninhabited island would have terminated all my disgrace and put me in a condition on infallibly doing my will. Thou designed me a prison far different from that of the rock and quite another punishment than that of the uninhabited island. Thou reserved me to be battered by billows more irritated than those of the sea. Calamans proved to be the unrelenting waves to which I was to be exposed in order to be lashed and tossed by them without mercy. By the tempest we were kept back and instead of a short-dazed passage to Genoa we were 11 days making it. How peaceable was my heart in so violent an agitation. We could not land at Savona. We were obliged to go onto Genoa. We arrived there in the beginning of the week before Easter. While I was there I was obliged to bear the insults of the inhabitants caused by the resentment they had against the French because of the havoc of a late bombardment. The doge was newly gone out of the city and had carried off with him all the coaches. I could not get one and I was obliged to stay several days at excessive expenses. The people there demanded of us exorbitant sums and as much for every single person as they would have asked for a company at the best eating place in Paris. I had little money left but my store in Providence could not be exhausted. I begged with the greatest earnestness for a carriage at any price to pass the feast of Easter at the Martianess of Prune's house. It was then within three days of Easter. I could scarce any way get myself to be understood. By the force of intrity they brought me at length a sorry coach with lame news and told me that they would take me readily to Versil which was only two days' journey but demanded an enormous sum. They would not engage to take me to the Martianess of Prune's house as they knew not where her estate lay. This was to me a strong mortification for I was very willing to go to Versil. Nevertheless, the proximity of Easter and want of money in a country where they used every kind of extortion and tyranny left me no choice. I was under an absolute necessity of submitting to be that's convey to Versil. That's Providence led me whether I could not. Our mûliteer was one of the most brutal men and for an increase of my affliction I had sent a way to Versil the ecclesiastic who accompanied us to prevent their surprise at seeing me there after I had protested against going. That the ecclesiastic was very coarsely treated on the road through the hatred they brought to the French. They made him go part of the way on foot so that though he set off the day before me he arrived there only a few hours sooner than I did. As for the fellow who conducted us seeing he had only women under his care he treated us in the most insolent and boorish manner. We passed through a wooden infested with robbers. The mûliteer was afraid and told us that if we met any of them on the road we should be murdered. They spared nobody. Scursly had he uttered these words when there appeared four men well armed. They immediately stopped us. The man was exceedingly frightened. I made a light bow of my head with a smile for I had no fear and was so entirely resigned to providence that it was all one to die this way or any other in the sea or by the hands of robbers. Where the dangers were most manifest then was my faith the strongest as well as my interpity being unable to wish for anything else than what should fall out whether to be dashed against the rocks drone or killed in any other way everything in the will of God being equal to me. The people who used to convey or attend me said that they had never seen a courage like mine for the most alarming dangers and the time when death appeared the most certain were those which seemed to please me the most. Was it not thy pleasure of my God which guarded me in every imminent danger and held me back from rolling down the precipice on the instant of sliding over its dizzy brow. The most easy I was about life which I bore only because thou wast pleased to bury it the more care thou tookest to preserve it. There seemed a mutual emulation between us on my part to resign and on thine to maintain it. The ropers then advanced to the coach but they had no sooner saluted them than God made them change their design. Having pushed off one another as it were to hinder each of them from doing any harm they respectfully saluted me and with an air of compassion unusual to such sorts of persons retire. I was immediately struck to the heart with a full and clear conviction that it was the stroke of thy right hand who had other designs over me than to suffer me to die by the hands of robers. It is thy suffering power which takes away their all from thy devoted lovers and destroys their lives with all that is of self without pity or sparing anything. The mnuleteer seeing me attended only with two young women though he might treat me as he would perhaps expecting to draw money from me. Instead of taking me to the inn he brought me to a mill in which there was a woman. There was but one single room with several beds in it in which the millers and mnuleteers lay together. In that chamber they forced me to stay. I told the mnuleteer I was not a person to lie in such a place and wanted to oblige him to take me to the inn. Nothing available he do. I was constrained to go out on foot at ten o'clock at night carrying a part of my clothes and to go a good way more than a quarter of a leak in the dark in a strange place not knowing the way crossing one end of the wood infested with robbers to endeavor to get to the inn. That fellow seeing us go off from the place where he had wanted to make me lodge put it after us in a very abusive manner. I bore my humiliation cheerfully but not without feeling it but the will of God and my resignation to it render it everything easy to me. We were well received at the inn and the good people there did the best in their power for our recovery from the fatigue we had undergone. They assure us the place we had left was very dangerous. Next morning we were obliged to return on foot to the carriage for that man would not bring it to us. On the contrary he gave us a shower of fresh insults. To consummate his base behavior he sold me to the post whereby I was forced to go the rest of the way in a post shez instead of a carriage. In this equipage I arrived at Alexandria a frontier town subject to Spain on the side of the Melanies. Our driver took us according to their custom to the post house. I was exceedingly astonished when I saw the landlady coming out not to receive him but to oppose his entrance. She had heard there were women in the shez and taking us for a different sort of women from what we were she protested against our coming in. On the other hand the driver was determined to force his entrance in spite of her. Their dispute rose to such a high that a great number of the officers of the garrison with the mob gathered at the noise who were surprised at the odd humour of the woman in refusing to lodge us. With earnestness I entreated the post to take us to some other house but he would not. So obstinately was he bent on carrying his point. He assured the landlady we were persons of honour and piety too. The marks were off he had seen. At last by force of pressing in dritties he obliged her to come to see us. As soon as she had looked at us she acted as the ropers had done. She relented at once and admitted us. No sooner had I alighted from the shez than she said Go, shut yourselves up in that chamber heard by and do not stare that my son may not know you are here as soon as he knows it he will kill you. She said it was so much force as did also the servant maid that if death had not so many charms for me I should have been ready to die with fear. The two poor girls with me were under frightful apprehensions. When they stared or came to open the door they thought they were coming to kill them. In short they continued in a dreadful suspense between life and death till next day when we learned that the young man had sworn to kill any woman who lodged at the house. A few days before an event had fallen out which had liked to have ruined him. A woman of a bad life having there privately murdered a man in some steam that had caused the house the heavy fine and he was afraid of any more such persons coming not without reason. End of chapter 17 Athens May of 2009 The Autobiography of Madame Keon by G. Keon Vol. 2, Chapter 18 This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org After these adventures and others which it will be tissues to recite I arrived at Versil. I went to the inn where I was badly received. I sent for Father Lacombe whom I thought had been already apprised of my coming by the ecclesiastic whom I had sent before and who would be of so much service to me. This ecclesiastic was only a little while arrived. How much better on the road should I have been fed if I had him with me? For in that country they look upon ladies accompanied with ecclesiastics with veneration as persons of honour and piety. Father Lacombe came in a strange fret at my arrival God saw permitting it. He said that everyone would think I was come after him and that would injure his reputation which in that country was very high. I had no less pain to go. It was necessity only which had obliged me to submit to such disagreeable task. The Father received me with coolness and in such a manner has let me sufficiently see his sentiments and indeed redoubled my pain. I asked him if he required me to return acting if he did I will go off that moment. However oppressed and spent both with fatigues and fastings. He said that he did not know how the bishop overseas would take my arrival after he had given over all his expectations of it. And after I had so long and so obstinately refused the obliging offers he had made me since which he no longer expressed any desire to see me. It seemed to me then as if I were rejected from the face of the earth. Without being able to find any refuge and as if all creatures were combined to crush me I passed that night without sleep not knowing what course I should be obliged to take being persecuted by my enemies and a subject of disgrace to my friends. When it was known at the inn that I was one of Father Lacombe's acquaintances they treated me with greatest respect and kindness. They esteemed him as a saint. The father knew not how to tell the bishop of my arrival and I felt his pain more than my own. As soon as that prelate knew that I was arrived he sent his knees who took me in her coach and carry me to her house. These things were only done out of ceremony and the bishop not having seen me yet knew not what to think of a journey so very unexpected after I had thrice refused though he sent expresses on purpose to bring me to him. He was out of humor with me nevertheless as he was informed that my design was not to stay at Brazil but to go to the mushrooms of Prune's house he gave orders for me to be well treated. He could not see me till Easter Sunday was over. He officiated all day and all that day. After it was over he came in shifts to his nicest house to see me. Though he understood French hardly any better than I did Italian he was very well satisfied with the conversation he had with me. He appeared to have as much favor for me as he had indifference before. He conceived a stronger friendship for me as if I had been his sister and his only pleasure. A meet his continual occupations was to come and pass half an hour with me in speaking of God. He wrote to the bishop of Marseilles to thank him for having protected me in the persecutions there. He wrote to the bishop of Grenoble and he omitted nothing to manifest his regard for me. He now seemed to think alone of finding out means to detain me in his diocese. He will not hear of my going to see the Marchioness of Prune on the contrary he wrote to her to come and settle with me in his diocese. He sent Father Lacombe to her on purpose to exhort him to come assuring her that he will unite us all to make a congregation. The Marchioness entered into it readily and so did her daughter. They would have come with Father Lacombe but the Marchioness was sick. The bishop was active and earnest in collecting and establishing a society of us and found several pious persons and some very devoted young ladies who were all ready to come to join us. But it was not the will of God to fix me that but to crucify me yet more. The fatigue of traveling made me sick. The girl also whom I brought from Grenoble fell sick. Her relations with were covetous took it in the heads that if she should die in my service I would get her to make a will in my favor. They were much mistaken. Far from desiring the property of others I had given up my own. Her brother, full of this apprehension came with old speed. The first thing he spoke to her about although he found her recovered was to make a will. That made a great noise in Versile. He wanted her to return with him but she refused. I advised her to do what her brother desired. He conducted a friendship with some of the officers of the garrison to whom he told ridiculous stories as that I wanted to use his sister badly. He pretended she was a person of quality. They gave out what I was still afraid of that I was come after Father Lacombe. They even persecuted him on my account. The big shop was much trouble but could not remedy it. The friendship he had for me increased every day because as he loved God saw he did all those whom he thought desired to love God. As he saw me so much indisposed he came to see me with assituity and charity when and leisure from his occupations. He made me little presents of fruits and other things. His relations were jealous. They said that I was come to ruin him to carry off his money into France which was father's from my thoughts. The big shop patient reborn this affronts hoping still to keep me in his diocese when I should be recovered. Father Lacombe was the bishop's prepent and his confessor. The bishop esteemed him highly. God made use of him to convert several of the offices and soldiers who from being men of scandalous lives became patrons of piety. In that place everything was mixed with crosses but souls were gained to God. There were some of the friars who after his example were advancing toward perfection. Though I neither understood their language nor they mine the Lord made us understand each other in what concerned his service. The erector of Jesuits took his time when father Lacombe was gone out of town to prove me as he said he had studied theological matters which I did not understand. He propounded several questions. The Lord inspired me to answer him in such a manner that he went away both surprised and satisfied. He could not forbear speaking of it. The banner bites of Paris or father Lamanth took it in head to try to draw father Lacombe to go and preach at Paris. He wrote to the father general about it because they had no one at Paris to support the house that their church was deserted that it was a pity to live such a man as father Lacombe in a place where he only corrupted his language. It was necessary to make his fine talents appear at Paris where he himself could not bear the burden of the house if they did not give him an assistant of such qualifications and experience who would not have thought of this to be sincere. The bishop of Versile who was very much a friend of father general having advised their off opposite an answer that it will be doing him the greatest injury to take from him a man who was so exceedingly useful to him and at a time when he had the greatest need of him the father general of the banner bites could not agree to the request of father Lamanth for fear of offending the bishop of Versile as to me my disposition increased. The air which is there extremely bad caused me a continual cough with frequent returns of favor. I grew so much worse that it was thought I could not get over it. The bishop was afflicted to see it but having consulted the physicians they assure him that the air of that place was mortal to me whereupon he said to me I had rather have you live though distant from me than see you die here. He gave up his design of establishing his congregation for my friend will not settle there without me. The genoise lady could not easily live her own city where she was respected. The genoise besought her to set up there what the bishop of Versile had wanted her to set up. It was a congregation almost like that of Madame D. Miraminen. When the bishop had first proposed this however agreeable it appeared I had a pre-sentiment that it will not succeed that it was not what our law required of me though I submissively yield to the good proposal worried only to acknowledge the many special favors of this prelat. I was assured that the lord would know well how to prevent what he should now require of me. As this good prelat so he must resign himself to let me go he said to me you were willing to be in the diocese of Geneva and there they persecuted and reject you. I who will gladly have you cannot keep you. He wrote to Father Lamant that I should go in the spring as soon as the weather would permit. He was sorry to be obliged to let me go but he still hoped to have kept Father Lacombe which probably might have been had not the death of the father general given it another turn. Here it was that I wrote upon the apocalypse and that there was given me a greater certainty of all the persecutions of the most faithful servants of God. Here also I was strongly moved to write to Madame DJ. I did it with great simplicity and what I wrote was like the first foundation of what the law required of her having been pleased to make use of me to help to bring her into his ways being one to whom I am much united and by her to others. The bishop of Vercil's friend the father general of the Barnabites departed this life. As soon as he was dead Father Lamant wrote to the vicar general who now held his place till another should be elected renewing his request to Father Lacombe as an assistant. The father hearing that I was obliged on account of my indisposition to return into France sent an order to Father Lacombe to return to Paris and to accompany me in my journey as he is doing that will exempt the house at Paris already pulled from the expenses of so long journey. Father Lacombe who did not penetrate the poison under this fair outside consented there too. Knowing it was my custom to have some ecclesiastic with me in traveling Father Lacombe went off 12 days before me in order to transcend some business and to wait for me at the passage over the mountains as the place where I had most need of an escort. I set off in land the weather then being fine. It was the sorrowful parting to the bishop I pitied him. He was so much affected at losing both Father Lacombe and me he caused me to be attended at his own expense as far as Turin giving me a gentleman and one of his ecclesiastics to accompany me. As soon as the resolution was taken that Father Lacombe should accompany me Father Lamant reported everywhere that he had been obliged to do it to make him return into France. He expatiated on the attachment I had Father Lacombe pretending to pity me. Upon this everyone said that I ought to put myself under the direction of Father Lamant. In the meantime he decidedfully palliated the malignity of his heart writing letters full of a steam to Father Lacombe and some to me of tenderness desiring him to bring his dear sister and to serve her in her infirmities and in the hardships of so long a journey that he should be sensibly obliged to him for his care with many other things of the like nature. I could not resolve to depart without going to see my good friend the martialness of Prune not withstanding the difficulty of the roads. I caused myself to be carried it been scarcely possible to go otherwise on account of the mountains. She was extremely joyful at seeing me arrive. Nothing could be more courteous than what passed between us. It was then that she acknowledged that all I had told her had come to pass. A good ecclesiastic who lives with her told me the same. We made ointments and plasters together and I gave her the secret of my remedies. I encouraged her so did Father Lacombe to establish a hospital in that place which was done while we were there. I contributed my mind to it which has ever been blessed to all the hospitals which had ever been established in reliance on Providence. I believed I had forgotten to tell that the law had made use of me to establish one near Greenville which subsists without any other fund than the supplies of Providence. My enemies made use of that afterward to slander me saying that I had wasted my children's substance in establishing hospitals. Though, far from spending any of their substance I had even given them my own. All those hospitals have been established only on the fund of Divine Providence which is inexhaustible. But so it has been ordered for my good that all our Lord has made me to do His glory has ever been turned into crosses for me. As soon as it was determined that I should come into France the Lord made known to me that it was to have greater crosses than I ever had. Father Lacombe had the like sense. He encouraged me to resign myself to the Divine Will to become a victim offered freely to new sacrifices. He also wrote to me Would it not be a thing very glorious to God if he should make a serve in that great city for a spectacle to angels and to men? I set off then with a spirit of sacrifice to offer myself up to new kinds of punishments if pleasing to my dear Lord. All along the road something within me repeated the very words of Saint Paul. I go bound in the spirit onto Jerusalem not knowing the things should befall me there save that the Holy Ghost witness saying that bonds and afflictions abide me but none of these things move me Neither count I my life dear unto myself so that I might finish my course with joy Acts 20 verse 22, 23 and 24 I could not forbear to testify to it to my intimate friends who try hard to prevail on me to stop and not to proceed. They were all willing to contribute a share of what they have for my settlement there and to prevent my coming to Paris but I found it my duty to hold on my way and to sacrifice myself for him who first sacrificed himself for me. In January we saw Father Lamont who was going to the election of the Father General Though he affected an appearance of friendship it was not difficult to discover that his thoughts were different from his words and that he had conceived dark designs against us. I speak not of his intentions but to obey the command given me to omit nothing. I shall necessarily be obliged often to speak of him. I could wish with all my heart it were in my power to suppress what I have to say of him. If what he has done respected only myself I would willingly bury all but I think I owe it to the truth and to the innocence of Father Lacombe so cruelly oppressed and grievously crushed so long by wicked calamities by an imprisonment of several years which in all probability would last as long as life. Though Father Lamont may appear heavily charged in what I say of him I protest solemnly and in the presence of God that I pass over in silence many of his bad actions. End of Chapter 18 Athens, Greece, June of 2009 The autobiography of Madame Keon by Jean Keon Chapter 19 This is a LibriVox recording. For more information or to volunteer visit LibriVox.org Skerslihat I arrived at Paris when I readily discovered the black designs entertained against both Father Lacombe and me. Father Lamont who conducted the whole tragedy artfully dissembled according to his custom flattering me to my face while he was aiming the keenest wounds behind my back. He and his confederates wanted for their own interests to persuade me to go to Montorgies my native place hoping thereby to get the guardianship of my children and to dispose of both my person and effects. All the persecutions from Father Lamont and my family have been attended on their part with views of interest. Those against Father Lacombe have sprung from rage and revenge because he, as my director, did not oblige me to do what they wanted as well as out of jealousy. I may enter into a long detail on this sufficient to convince all the world but I suppress to avoid prolixity. I shall only say that they threatened to deprive me of what little I had reserved to myself to this I only applied that I will not go to law that if they were resolved to take from me what little I had left little indeed in comparison of what I had given up I will surrender it indirectly to them being quite free and willing not only to be poor but to be even in the very externity of want in imitation of our Lord Jesus Christ. I arrived at Paris on Magdalene's E 1686 exactly five years after my departure from that city. After Father Lacombe arrived he was soon followed and much applauded. I perceived some jealousy in Father Lamont hereupon but did not think that matters would be carried as far as they have been. The greater part of the Barnabites of Paris and its neighborhood join against Father Lacombe induced from several causes that particularly related to the order but all the colonies and evil attempts were overthrown by the unaffected piety he manifested and the good which multitudes reaped from his labels. I had deposited a little sum of money in his hand with the consent of his superior to serve for the entrance of a nun. I thought myself obliged in conscience to do it. She had, through my means, quit the new Catholics. It was that young woman whom I mentioned before whom the priest of Ghex wanted to win over as she is beautiful, though very prudent. There are always continuous echoes of fear when such a nun is exposed in the world. Lamont wanted to have that money and signify to Father Lacombe that if he did not make me giving it to him for a wall which he had to rebuild in his convent he would make him suffer for it. But the latter, who is always upright, answered that he could not in conscience advise me to do anything else but what I had already resolved in favor of that young woman. Hence Lamont and the Provincian ardently longed to satisfy their desire of revenge. They employed all their thoughts on the means of affecting it. A very wicked man who was employed for that purpose wrote defamatory labels declaring that the propositions of Molinos which had been current for two years past in France were the sentiments of Father Lacombe. These labels were spread about in the community. Father Lamont and the Provincial acting as persons well affected to the church carried them to the official or judge of the ecclesiastical court who joined in the dark design. They show them to the archbishop saying it was out of the zeal that they were exceedingly sorry that one of the fraternity was a heretic and as such execrable. They also brought mean but more moderately saying Father Lacombe was almost always at my house which was false. I could scarcely see him at all except at the confessional and then for a very short time. Several other things equally false they liberally gave out concerning both of us. They thought themselves of one thing Father likely to favor their scheme. They knew I had been at Marseille and thought they had a good foundation for a fresh colony. They account-fated a letter from a person at Marseille's I heard it was from the bishop addressed to the archbishop of Paris or to his official in which they wrote the most abominable scandal. Father Lamant came to try to draw me into his snare to make me say in the presence of the people whom he had brought that I had been at Marseille's with Father Lacombe. There are, said he, shocking accounts against you sent by the bishop of Marseille's. You have there fallen into great scandal with Father Lacombe. There are good witnesses of it. I replied with a smile. The colony is well devised but it would have been proper to know first whether Father Lacombe had been at Marseille or I do not believe he was ever there in his life. While I was there Father Lacombe was laboring at Marseille. He was confounded and went off saying there are witnesses of it being true. He went immediately to ask Father Lacombe if he had not been at Marseille. He assured him he never had been there. They were struck with disappointment. They then gave out that it was not Marseille's but Cicela's. Now this Cicela is a place I have never been at and there is no bishop there. Every imaginable device was used to terrify me by threats, forged letters and by memorials drawn up against me accusing me of teaching aronias, doctrines and of living a bad life and urging me to flee the country to escape the consequences of exposure. Failing in all this at length Lamant took off the mask and said to me in the church Before Lacombe it is now, my sister that you must think of fleeing. You are charged with crimes of a deep die. I was not moved in the list but replied with my usual tranquility. If I am guilty of such crimes I cannot be too severely punished Wherefore I will not flee or go out of the way. I have made an open profession of dedicating myself to God entirely. If I have done things offensive to him whom I would wish both to love and to cause to be loved by the whole world even at the expense of my life I owed by my punishment to be made an example to the world. But if I am innocent for me to flee is not the way for my innocence to be believed. Similar attempts were made to ruin Father Lacombe. He was grossly misrepresented to the king and in order procured for his arrest an imprisonment in the Bastille. Although on his trial he appeared quite innocent and they could not find anything whereupon to ground a condemnation yet they made the king believe he was a dangerous man in the article of religion. He was then shut up in a certain fortness of Bastille for life. But as his enemies heard that the captain in that fortness esteemed him and treated him kindly they had him removed into a much worse place. God, who beholds everything will reward every man according to his works. I know by an interior communication that he is very well content and fully designed to God. La month now endeavor or more than ever to induce me to flee assuring me that if I went to Montrequiz I should be out of trouble. But that if I did not I should pay for it. He insisted on my taking him for my director to which I could not agree. He decried me wherever he went and wrote to his brethren to do the same. They sent me very abusive letters assuring me that if I did not put myself under his direction I was undone. I have the letters by me still. One father desired me in this case to make a virtue of necessity. Nay, some advised me to pretend to put myself under his direction and to deceive him. He abhorred the thought of deceit. I bore everything with the greatest tranquility without taking any care to justify or defend myself. Living it, indirely to God to order as he should please about me. Hearing he was graciously pleased to ingress the peace of my soul while everyone seemed to cry against me and to look on me as an infamous creature. Except those few who knew me well by a near union of spirit. At church I heard people behind me exclaim against me and even some priests say it was necessary to cast me out of the church. I left myself to God without reserve being quite ready to endure the most rigorous pains and tortures if such were his will. I never made any solicitation either for Father Lacombe or myself though charged with that among other things. Willing to owe everything to God I have no dependence on any creature. I will not have it said that any but God had made Abraham Genesis 14-23. To lose all for him is my best gain and to gain all without him would be my worst loss. Although at this time so general an outcry was raised against me God did not fail to make use of me to gain many souls to himself. The more persecution raged against me the more children were given me on whom the Lord conferred great favors through his handmaid. One must not judge of the servants of God by what the enemies say of them nor by their being oppressed under calmness without any resource. Jesus Christ expired under pangs. God uses the like conduct towards his dearest servants to render them conformable to his Son in whom he is always well pleased but few plays that conformity were it owed to be. It is not involuntary pains or austerities but in those which are suffered in a submission ever equal to the will of God. In a renunciation of our whole selves to the end that God may be our all in all conducting us according to his views and not our own which are generally opposite to his. All perfection consists in this entire conformity with Jesus Christ not in shining things which men esteem. It will only be seen in eternity who are the true friends of God. Nothing pleases him but Jesus Christ and that which bears his mark or character. They were continually pressing me to flee though the archbishop had spoken to me and beaten me not to leave Paris but they wanted to give the appearance of criminality both to me and to Father Lacombe by my flight. They knew not how to make me fall into the hands of the official. If they accused me of crimes it must be before other judges. Any other judge would have seen my innocence. The false witness would have run the risk of suffering for it. They continually spread stories of horrible crimes but the official assured me that he had heard no mention of any. He was afraid lest I should retire out of his jurisdiction. They then made the king believe that I was a heretic that I carry on a literary correspondence with Molinos. I, who never knew there was a Molinos in the world till the Gazette had told me of it. That I had written a dangerous book and that on those accounts it would be necessary to issue an order to put me in a convent that they might examine me. I was a dangerous person. It would be proper for me to be locked up to be allowed no commerce with anyone since I continually held assemblies which was very false. To support this calamity my handwriting was counterfeited and a letter was forged as from me import that I had great designs but fear that they would prove unbortive through the imprisonment of Father Lacombe. For which reason I had left off halting assemblies at my house being too closely watched but that I would hold them at the houses of other persons. This forged letter they showed the king and upon it an order was given for my imprisonment. This order would have been put in execution two months sooner than it was had I not fallen very sick. I had inconceivable pains and fever. Some thought that I had a gathering in my head. The pain I suffered for five weeks made me delirious. I had also a pain in my breast and a violent cough. Twice I received the holy sacrament as I was thought to be expiring. One of my friends had acquinted Father Lacombe not knowing him to have had any hand in Father Lacombe's imprisonment that she had sent me a certificate from the inquisition in Father Lacombe's favor having heard that his own was lost. This answered a very good purpose for they had made the king believe that he had run away from the inquisition but these show the contrary. Father Lamant then came to me when I was in excessive pain counterfeiting all the affection and tenderness in his power and telling me that the affair of Father Lacombe was going on very well that he was just ready to come out of prison with honor that he was very glad of it. If he had only this certificate he would soon be delivered. Give me it then said he and he will be immediately released. At first I made a difficulty of doing it. What said he? Would you be the cause of ruining Poor Father Lacombe having it in your power to save him and cause us that affliction for want of what you have in your hands? I yielded ordering it to be brought and given him but he suppressed it and gave out that it was lost. It never could be got from him again. The ambassador from the court of Turin sent a messenger to me for this certificate designing the proper use of it to serve Father Lacombe. I refer him to Father Lacombe. The messenger went to him and asked him for it. He denied I had given it to him saying her brain is disorder which makes her imagine it. The man came back to me and told me his answer. The persons in my chamber bore witness that I had given it to him. Yet all signified nothing. It could not be got out of his hands but on the contrary he insulted me and caused others also to do it though I was so weak that I seemed to be at the very gates of death. They told me they only waited for my recovery to cast me into prison. He made his brethren believe that I had treated him ill. They wrote to me that it was for my crimes that I suffer and that I should put myself under the control of Father Lacombe otherwise I should repent it. That I was mud and owed to be bound and was a monster of pride since I will not suffer myself to be conducted by Father Lamant. Such was my daily feast in the externity of my pain deserted of my friends and oppressed by my enemies. The former being ashamed of me through the calamities which were forged and industriously spread. The latter let loose to persecute me under all which I kept silence living myself to the Lord. There I was not any kind of infamy, error, sorcery or sacrilege of which they did not accuse me as soon as I was able to be carried to the church in a chair. I was told I must speak to the prepent. It was a snare converted between Father Lamant and the canon at whose house I lodged. I spoke to him with much simplicity and he approved of what I said. Yet, two days after they gave out that I had uttered many things and accused many persons and from hence they procured the punishment of sundry persons with whom they were displeased, persons whom I had never seen or of whom I never heard. They were men of honor. One of them was punished because he said my little book is a good one. It is remarkable that they say nothing to those who prefixed the appropriations and that far for condemning the book it has been reprinted since I have been in prison and advertisements of it have been posted up at the Archbishop's Palace and all over Paris. In regard to others when they find faults in their books they condemn the books and leave the person at liberty. But as for me my book is approved, sold and spread while I am kept a prisoner for it. The same day that those gentlemen were punished I received a letter de Cachette or seal order to repair to the convent of the visitation of Saint Mary in a suburb of Saint-Adouin. I received it with a tranquility which surprised the bearer exitingly. He could not for bear expressing it having seen the extreme sorrow of those who were only punished. He was so touched with it as to shed tears. No though his order was to carry me off directly he was not afraid to trust me but left me all the day desiring me to repair to Saint Mary's in the evening. On that day many of my friends came to see me and found me very cheerful which surprised such of them as knew my case. I could not stand I was so weak having the fever every night it being only a fortnight since I was thought to be expiring I imagine they would leave me my daughter and mate to serve me. End of Chapter 19 Athens, Greece July of 2009