Part 18

My astonishment greatly increased when I saw that I must give up what I had with so much trouble acquired. At my father's house we had to live with much refinement, learn to speak correctly. All I said was there applauded and made much of. Here I was not listened to, except to be contradicted and to be blamed. If I spoke well they said it was to read them a lesson. If any one came and a subject was under discussion, while my father used to make me speak, here, if I wished to express my opinion, they said it was to dispute, and they ignominiously silenced me, and from morning to night they chided me. They led my husband to do the same, and he was only too well disposed for it.

I should have a difficulty in writing these sort of things to you, which can not be done without wounding charity, if you had not forbidden me to omit anything, and if you had not thus absolutely commanded me to explain everything, and give all particulars. One thing I ask, before going further, which is, not to regard things from the side of the creature, for this would make persons appear more faulty than they were; for my mother-in-law was virtuous and my husband was religious and had no vice.

My mother-in-law conceived such a hostility to me that, in order to annoy me, she made me do the most humiliating things; for her temper was so extraordinary, from not having conquered it in her youth, that she could not live with any one. I was thus made the victim of her tempers.

Her whole occupation was continually to thwart me, and she inspired her son with the same sentiments.

They insisted that persons far beneath me should take precedence, in order to annoy me. My mother, who was very sensitive on the point of honor, could not endure this; and when she learned it from others--for I never said anything of it--she found fault with me, thinking I did it from not knowing how to maintain my rank, that I had no spirit, and a thousand other things of this kind.

I dared not tell how I was situated, but I was dying of vexation, and what increased it still more was the recollection of the persons who had sought me in marriage, the difference of their temper and their manner of acting, the love and esteem they had for me, and their gentleness and politeness: this was very hard for me to bear.

My mother-in-law incessantly spoke to me disparagingly of my father and my mother, and I never went to see them but I had to endure this disagreeable talk on my return. On the other hand, my mother complained of me that she did not see me often enough--she said I did not love her.

What increased still more my crosses was that my mother related to my mother-in-law the trouble I had given her in my childhood, so that the moment I spoke they reproached me with this, and told me I was a wicked character.

My husband wished me to remain all day in the room of my mother-in-law, without being allowed to go to my own apartment; I had not therefore a moment for seclusion or breathing a little.

She spoke disparagingly of me to every one, hoping thereby to diminish the esteem and affection each had for me, so that she put insults upon me in the presence of the best society. She discovered the secret of extinguishing the vivacity of my mind and making me become quite dull, so that I could no more be recognized. Those who had seen me before used to say: "What! is that the person who passed for being clever? She does not say two words. It is a pretty picture."

For crown of affliction I had a maid they had given me, who was quite in their interest. She kept me in sight like a duenna, and strangely ill-treated me.

When I went out, the valets had orders to give an account of all I did. It was then that I commenced to eat the bread of tears. If I was at table they did things to me that covered me with confusion.

I had no one with whom to share my grief. I wished to tell something of it to my mother, and that caused me so many new crosses that I resolved to have no other confidante of my vexations than myself. It was not through harshness that my husband treated me so, but from his hasty and violent temper; for he loved me even passionately. What my mother-in-law was continually telling him irritated him.

Such was my married life, rather that of a slave than of a free person. To increase my disgrace I discovered, four months after my marriage, that my husband was gouty. This disease caused me many real crosses both without and within. That year he twice had gout six weeks at a time, and it again seized him shortly after, much more severely. At last he became so indisposed that he did not leave his room, nor often even his bed, which he ordinarily kept many months.

I believe that, but for his mother and that maid of whom I have spoken, I should have been very happy with him; for as to hastiness, there is hardly a man who has not plenty of it, and it is the duty of a reasonable woman to put up with it quietly without increasing it by sharp answers. You made use of all these things, O my God, for my salvation.

I became pregnant with my first child. During this time I was greatly petted as far as the body went, and my crosses were in some degree less severe thereby.

I was so indisposed that I would have excited the compassion of the most indifferent. Moreover, they had such a great wish to have children, that they were very apprehensive lest I should miscarry.

Yet towards the end they were less considerate to me, and once, when my mother-in-law had treated me in a very shocking manner, I was so malicious as to feign a colic in order to alarm them in my turn; because so anxious were they to have children, for my husband was the only son, and my mother-in-law was rich, could have heirs through him alone.

* * * * *

This first confinement greatly improved my appearance, and in consequence made me more vain, for although I would not have been willing to add art to Nature, yet I was very complaisant to myself.

I was glad to be looked at, and, far from avoiding occasions for it, I went to promenades; rarely however, and when I was in the streets, I took off my mask from vanity, and my gloves to show my hands. Could there be greater silliness? When I had thus been carried away, which happened often enough, I wept inconsolably; but that did not correct me. I also sometimes went to a ball, where I displayed my vanity in dancing.

I did not curl my hair, or very little, I did not even put anything on my face, yet I was not the less vain of it; I very seldom looked in the looking-glass, in order not to encourage my vanity, and I made a practise of reading books of devotion, such as the "Imitation of Jesus Christ" and the works of Saint Francis de Sales, while my hair was being combed, so that as I read aloud the servants profited by it. Moreover, I let myself be dressed as they wished, remaining as they arranged me--a thing which saves trouble and material for vanity.

I do not know how things were, but people always admired me, and the feelings of my vanity reawakened in everything. If on certain days I wished to look to better advantage, I failed, and the more I neglected myself the better I looked. It was a great stone of stumbling for me. How many times, O my God, have I gone to churches less to pray to you than to be seen there! Other women who were jealous of me maintained that I painted, and said so to my confessor, who reproved me for it, although I assured him to the contrary.

I often spoke to my own advantage, and I exalted myself with pride while lowering others. I sometimes still told lies, though I used all my effort to free myself from this vice.

I never spoke to a man alone, and never took one to my carriage unless my husband was there. I never gave my hand without precaution, and I never went into the carriages of men. In short, there was no possible measure I did not observe to avoid any ground for my being talked of.

* * * * *

So much precaution had I, O my God! for a vain point of honor, and I had so little of true honor, which is not to displease you. I went so far in this, and my self-love was so great, that if I had failed in any rule of politeness, I could not sleep at night. Every one wished to contribute to my diversion, and the outside life was only too agreeable for me; but as to indoors, vexation had so depressed my husband that each day I had to put up with something new, and that very often.

Sometimes he threatened to throw the supper out of the window, and I told him it would be very unfair to me--I had a good appetite.

* * * * *

It will be seen, from these frank outpourings of the heart, that Madame Guyon was suffering from an overwrought sex-nature.

Steeped in superstition, hypersthenia, God to her was a man--her lover.

Her one thought was to do His will. God is her ideal of all that is strong, powerful and farseeing. In her imagination she continually communicates with this all-powerful man. She calls Him "My Love," and occasionally forgetting herself addresses him as "Sir." She evades her husband, and deceives that worthy gentleman into believing she is asleep when she is all the time secretly praying to God. She goes to confession in a kimono. She gets up at daylight to go to mass, and this mass to her heated imagination is a tryst, and the fact that she can go to mass and get back safely and find her husband still sleeping adds the sweets of secrecy to her passion. In love the illicit seems the normal.

Her children are nothing to her, compared to this love, the ratio of a woman's love for her children having a direct relationship to the mother's love for their father. Madame Guyon's regard for her husband is covered by the word "duty," but to deceive the man never occurs to her as a fault. She prides herself on being an honest wife.

[Illustration: MADAME GUYON]

Of course her children turn from her, because she has turned from them. She thinks their ingratitude is a trial and a cross sent to her by God, just as she regards her husband's gout as a calamity for herself, never seemingly thinking of how it affects the gentleman himself. Simple people might say the gout was his affair, not hers, but she does not view it so. In her perverted selfness, all things have relationship to her own ego, and so she is in continual trouble, like a girl whose love is being opposed by parents and kinsmen.

A woman in love is the most unreasonable of all created things--next to a man. Reason is actually beyond a lover's orbit. This woman has lost the focus of truth, and all things are out of perspective. Every object is twisted and distorted by the one thought that fills her life. Lovers are fools, but Nature makes them so.

Here is a woman whose elective affinity is a being of her own creation--an airy, fairy fiction of the mind. When a living man appears upon the scene who in degree approximates her ideal of gentleness, strength and truth, how long, think you, will the citadel of her heart withstand the siege? Or will it be necessary for him to lay siege to her heart at all? Will she not straightway throw the silken net of her personality over him--this personality she affects to despise--and take him captive hand and foot? We shall see:

It was after this, my husband, having some relief from his continual illness, wished to go to Orleans, and thence to Touraine. On this journey my vanity triumphed, to disappear forever.

I received many visits and much applause. My God, how clearly I can see the folly of men, who let themselves be caught by vain beauty! I hated passion, but, according to the external man, I could not hate that in me which called me into life, although, according to the interior man, I ardently desired to be delivered from it. O my God, you know how this continued combat of Nature and of Grace made me suffer. Nature was pleased at public approbation, and Grace made it feared. I felt myself torn asunder and as if separated from myself; for I very well felt the injury this universal esteem did me. What augmented it was the virtue they believed united with my youth and my appearance. O my God, they did not know that all the virtue was in you alone, and in your protection, and all the weakness in me.

I told the confessors of my trouble, because I had not my neck entirely covered, although I was much better than the other women of my age. They assured me that I was dressed very modestly, and that there was no harm. My internal director told me quite the contrary, but I had not the strength to follow him, and to dress myself, at my age, in a manner that would appear extraordinary.

Besides, the vanity I had, furnished me with pretexts which appeared to me the justest possible. Oh, if confessors knew the injury they cause women by these soft complaisances, and the evil it produces, they would show a greater severity; for if I had found a single confessor who had told me there was harm in being as I was, I would not have continued in it a single moment; but my vanity taking the part of the confessors, made me think they were right and my troubles were fanciful.

That maid of whom I spoke became every day more arrogant, and as the Devil stirred her up to torment me, when she saw that her outcries did not annoy me, she thought if she could hinder me from communicating she would cause me the greatest of all annoyances. She was quite right, O Divine Spouse of pure souls, since the only satisfaction of my life was to receive you and to honor you. I suffered a species of languor when I was some days without receiving you. When I was unable, I contented myself with keeping some hours near you, and, in order to have liberty for it, I applied myself to perpetual adoration.

This maid knew my affection for the Holy Sacrament, before which, when I could freely, I passed many hours on my knees.

She took care to watch every day she thought I communicated. She came to tell my mother-in-law and my husband, who wanted nothing more to get into a rage with me. There were reprimands which continued the whole day.

If any word of justification escaped me, or any vexation at what they said to me, it was ground enough for their saying that I committed sacrilege, and crying out against devotion.

If I answered nothing, that increased their bitterness. They said the most stinging things possible to me. If I fell ill, which happened often enough, they took the opportunity to come and wrangle with me in my bed, saying it was my communions and my prayers made me ill--as if to receive you, O true Source of all good, could cause any ill!

As it was with difficulty I ordinarily had any time for praying, in order not to disobey my husband, who was unwilling I should rise from bed before seven o'clock, I bethought me I had only to kneel upon my bed.

I could not go to mass without the permission of my husband, for we were very distant from all kind of churches; and as ordinarily he only allowed me on festivals and Sundays, I could not communicate but on those days, however desirous I might be for it; unless some priest came to a chapel, which was a quarter of a league from our house, and let us know of it. As the carriage could not be brought out from the courtyard without being heard, I could not elude him. I made an arrangement with the guardian of the Recolets, who was a very holy man.

He pretended to go to say mass for somebody else, and sent a monk to inform me. It had to be in the early morning, that my husband might not know of it, and, although I had trouble in walking, I went a quarter of a league on foot, because I dared not have the horses put to the carriage for fear of awaking my husband. O my God, what a desire did you not give me to receive you! and although my weariness was extreme, all that was nothing to me. You performed miracles, O my Lord, in order to further my desires; for besides that, ordinarily on the days I went to hear mass, my husband woke later, and thus I returned before his awaking: how many times have I set out from the house in such threatening weather that the maid I took with me said it would be out of the question for me to go on foot, I should be soaked with rain. I answered her with my usual confidence, "God will assist us"; and did I not arrive, O my Lord, without being wetted? No sooner was I in the chapel than the rain fell in torrents. The mass was no sooner finished than the rain ceased entirely, and gave me time to return to the house, where, immediately upon my arrival, it recommenced with greater violence.

* * * * *

The cross I felt most was to see my son revolt against me. I could not see him without dying in grief. When I was in my room with any of my friends, he was sent to listen to what I said; and as the child saw it pleased them, he invented a hundred things to go and tell them. What caused me the most pain was the loss of this child, with whom I had taken extreme trouble. If I surprised him in a lie, which often happened, I dared not reprove him. He told me, "My grandmother says you are a greater liar than I!"

* * * * *

It was eight or nine months after I had the smallpox that Father La Combe passed by the place of my residence. He came to the house, bringing me a letter from Father La Mothe, who asked me to see him, as he was a friend of his. I had much hesitation whether I should see him, because I feared new acquaintances. However, the fear of offending Father La Mothe led me to do it. This conversation, which was short, made him desire to see me once more. I felt the same wish on my side; for I believed he loved God, and I wished everybody to love Him. God had already made use of me to win three monks. The eagerness he had to see me again led him to come to our country-house, which was only a half-league from the town. Providence made use of a little accident that happened, to give me the means of speaking to him; for as my husband, who greatly enjoyed his cleverness, was conversing with him, he felt ill, and having gone into the garden, my husband told me go look for him lest anything might have occurred. I went there. This Father said that he had remarked a concentration and such an extraordinary presence of God on my countenance, that he said to himself, "I have never seen a woman like that"; and this was what made him desire to see me again. We conversed a little, and you permitted, O my God, that I said to him things which opened to him the way of the interior. God bestowed upon him so much grace, through this miserable channel, that he has since declared to me he went away changed into another man.

I preserved a root of esteem for him, for it appeared to me that he would be God's; but I was very far from foreseeing that I should ever go to a place where he would be.

* * * * *

Some time after my arrival at Gex, the Bishop of Geneva came to see us. I spoke to him with the impetuosity of the spirit that guided me. He was so convinced of the spirit of God in me that he could not refrain from saying so. He was even affected, and touched by it opened his heart to me about what God desired of him, and how he had been turned aside from fidelity and grace; for he is a good prelate, and it is the greatest pity in the world that he is so weak in allowing himself to be led by others. When I have spoken to him, he always entered into what I said, acknowledging that what I said had the character of truth; and this could not be otherwise, since it was the spirit of truth that made me speak to him, without which I was only a stupid creature; but as soon as the people who wished to rule him and could not endure any good that did not come from themselves, spoke to him, he allowed himself to be influenced against the truth.

It is this weakness, joined to some others, which has hindered him from doing all the good in his diocese that otherwise he would have done. After I had spoken to him, he told me that he had it in mind to give me as director Father La Combe; that he was a man enlightened of God, who understood well the ways of the spirit, and had a singular gift for calming souls--these are his own words--that he had even told him, the Bishop, many things regarding himself, which he knew to be very true, since he felt in himself what the Father said to him.

I had great joy that the Bishop of Geneva gave him to me as director, seeing that thereby the external authority was joined to the grace which seemed already to have given him to me by that union and effusion of supernatural grace.

As I was very weak, I could not raise myself in bed without falling into a faint; and I could not remain in bed. The Sisters neglected me utterly, particularly the one in charge of the housekeeping, who did not give me what was necessary for my life. I had not a shilling to provide for myself, for I had reserved nothing, and the Sisters received all the money which came to me from France--a very large sum. Thus I had the advantage of practising a little poverty, and being in want with those to whom I had given everything.