Finding a Bible

Reflections on
the Life of
Madame Jeanne de la Mothe Guyon.

---

At ten years of age she was taken home again. After a short residence at home, she was placed at the Dominican Convent, probably the same of which De La Force gives so particular an account in his work, entitled Nouvelle Description De La France. It was founded in 1242.

She says:

I stayed, only a little while at home. The reason of my remaining so short a time was this: a nun of the Dominican Order, who belonged to a distinguished family, and was an intimate friend of my father, solicited him to place me in her Convent, of which she was Prioress. This lady had conceived a great affection for me; and she promised my father, that she would take care of me herself, and would make me lodge in her own chamber. But circumstances occurred, which prevented her from fulfilling her intentions. Various troubles arose in the Religious Community, of which she had the charge, which necessarily occupied her attention; so that she was not in a situation to take much care of me.

Her opportunities for intellectual improvement, during her residence in the Dominican Convent, where she continued during eight months, were interrupted in some degree by sickness. But with a mind of naturally enlarged capacity, and which seemed to have an instinct for knowledge, she could hardly fail to improve.

During her residence at this place, she was left more with herself than had been customary with her. But her solitary hours, secluded as she was in a great degree from objects that might have distracted her attention, were not unprofitable ones.

One circumstance which occurred at this time, is worthy of particular notice. The pupils of the Convent, although they received religious instruction in other ways, do not appear to have been put in possession of the Bible, and to have had the use of it in private. A Bible, however, had been providentially left, by whose instrumentality or from what motive is unknown, in the chamber which was assigned to Mademoiselle De La Mothe. Young as she was, she seems to have had a heart to appreciate, in some degree, the value of this heaven-sent gift. "I spent whole days," she says, "in reading it; giving no attention to other books or other subjects from morning to night. And having great powers of recollection, I committed to memory the historical parts entirely."  It is certainly not improbable that these solitary perusals of the Bible had an influence on her mind through life, not only in enlarging its sphere of thought and activity, but by teaching her to look to God alone for direction, and by laying deep and broad the foundations of that piety which she subsequently experienced.

She remained at the Convent of the Dominicans eight months, after which she returned home. 

— edited from The Life of Madam Guyon Volume 1, Chapter 2.

Meeting the "Queen of England"

Reflections on
the Life of
Madame Jeanne de la Mothe Guyon.

---

At this period of her life [around eight years of age] an incident occurred, which seems to require some explanation.

The period of which we are now speaking, was subsequent in time to the great Civil War in England, which resulted in the death of Charles First, the establishment of a new government, and the expulsion of the surviving members of the royal family. Charles had married Henrietta Maria, the daughter of Henry Fourth, and sister of Lewis Thirteenth of France. In consequence of the unfavorable turn of the Civil War, she fled from England to her own country in 1644; residing for the most part, in sorrow and in poverty, in the Convent of Chaillot, at that time a village in the neighborhood of Paris, but now making a part of the city itself. She died in 1669; and it is worthy of notice, that her death furnished occasion for one of the most celebrated of the Funeral Orations of Bossuet.

Some years after her flight from England to France, this distinguished person visited the city of Montargis. And when we recollect, that the family of M. De La Mothe held a high rank in that city, and especially when we consider that there were probably some common grounds of religious sympathy and attachment, it will not be surprising that Henrietta Maria should have honored them with a visit. This statement will help to explain an incident which we find in her early life.

It is related in her Auto-biography, that, while she was at the Seminary of the Ursulines, she was frequently sent for by her father, who was desirous of seeing her from time to time at home. On one of these occasions she says that she found at her father's house the Queen of England; a circumstance which would seem very improbable, except in connection with the historical facts which have just now been mentioned. This seems to have been in the year 1655, or about that time. She was then near eight years of age.

My father told the Queen's Confessor, that, if he wanted a little amusement, he might entertain himself with me, and propound some questions to me. He tried me with several very difficult ones, to which I returned such correct answers, that he carried me to the Queen, and said to her, 'Your Majesty must have some diversion with this child.' She also tried me, and was so well satisfied and pleased with my lively answers and my manners, that she not only requested my father to place me with her, but urged her proposition with no small importunity, assuring him that she would take particular care of me, and going so far as to intimate, that she would make me Maid of Honor to the princess, her daughter. Her desire for me was so great, that the refusal of my father evidently disobliged her. Doubtless it was God who caused this refusal, and who in doing so turned off the stroke, which might have probably intercepted my salvation. Weak as I then was, how could I have withstood the temptations and distractions, incidental to a connection with persons so high in rank?

After this interview with a person, signalized by her rank and her misfortunes, she went, back as usual to the Ursuline Seminary, where her paternal half-sister, to whose kindness her father had particularly entrusted her continued her affectionate care.

But her authority was limited; she could not control, in all respects, the conduct of the other girls who boarded there, with whom the younger sister, Jeanne Marie, was sometimes obliged to associate, and from whom she acknowledges, in the account she has given of her life, that she contracted some bad habits. She ceased to be entirely strict and scrupulous in the utterance of the truth; she became in some degree peevish in her temper, and careless and undevout in her religious feelings, passing whole days without thinking of God. But happily she did not remain long under the power of such vicious tendencies and habits. Her sister's unwearied watchfulness and assiduity were the means, with the divine blessing, of recovering her from this temporary declension. And she remained at the Seminary some time longer, always making rapid improvement when she was in the enjoyment of good health, and conciliating the esteem of her associates and instructors, by her regular and virtuous deportment, as well as by her proficiency in knowledge.

— edited from The Life of Madam Guyon Volume 1, Chapter 2.

Instruction from a Sister

Reflections on
the Life of
Madame Jeanne de la Mothe Guyon.

---

The parents of Mademoiselle De La Mothe had both sustained the marriage relation previously to their marriage with each other. And each of them had a daughter in their first marriage. These two daughters, acting on the principles and methods of personal consecration which are recognized in the Roman Catholic church, had devoted themselves to a religious life in the Ursuline Convent, and thus became associated in its system of instruction. After having been taken from the Benedictine Seminary, and spending some time at home in a manner not very profitable, Mademoiselle Jeanne Marie, their young half-sister, who had already spent a little time there in her early childhood, was once more placed at the Ursulines with them. She was now in the seventh year of her age. The father, who seems to have been sensible, from what had fallen under his own notice, that her education had hitherto failed to receive sufficient attention, commended her to the especial care of his own daughter, as the best qualified of the two half-sisters, by kindness of disposition as well as in other respects, to aid in the development of her mind and the formation of her manners.  In her after life, as she recalled with gratitude the dealings of God with her in her younger years, she spoke in affectionate terms of this sister, as a person characterized alike by good judgment and by religious sentiments, and as especially fitted to train up young girls.

She says:

This good sister employed her time in instructing me in piety, and in such branches of learning as were suitable to my age and capacity. She was possessed of good talents, which she improved well. She spent much time in prayer, and her faith seemed strong and pure. She denied herself of every other satisfaction, in order that she might be with me and give me instruction. So great was her affection for me, that she experienced, as she told me herself, more pleasure with me than anywhere else. Certain it is, that she thought herself well paid for her efforts in my behalf, whenever I made suitable answers on the studies in which I was engaged. Under her care I soon became mistress of most of those things which were suitable for me; so much so that many grown persons, of some rank and figure in the world, could not have exhibited such evidence of proficiency and knowledge as I did.

— edited from The Life of Madame Guyon Volume 1, Chapter 2.

The Millenial Day

"They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain: for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea." — Isa. 11. 9.

Upon God's Holy Mountain all is peace.
Of clanging arms and cries and wail, no sound
Goes up to mingle with the gentle breeze,
That bears its perfum'd whispers all around.
Beneath its trees that spread their blooming light,
The spotted leopard walks; the ox is there;
The yellow lion stands in conscious might,
Breathing the dewy and illumin'd air.
A little child doth take him by the mane,
And leads him forth, and plays beneath his breast.
Nought breaks the quiet of that blest domain,
Nought mars its harmony and heavenly rest:
Picture divine and emblem of that day,
When peace on earth and truth shall hold unbroken sway.

— The Religious Offering (1835) Scripture Sonnets XII.

God in the Darkness

He sometimes walks behind the cloud;
And threatening storms His presence shroud;
His light is there; but all unseen,
Because the storm-cloud comes between.

From that dark cloud the bolts descend
The skies to cleave, the earth to rend;
But trusting hearts need not despair;
God guides the bolt; our God is there.

Oh transitory man and blind!
This consolation ever find;
That God, though shut from human view,
Is always present, always true.

As kind and faithful in the night,
As in the day-beam's cheerful light;
As kind and true, when storm-clouds hide,
As when the clouds are swept aside.

— Christ in the Soul (1872) LXXIV.

Subjection to God

"See now that I, even I, am he, and there is no God with me; I kill and I make alive; I wound and I heal; neither is there any that  can deliver out of my hand." — Deut. 32. 39.

Sometimes doth my uplifted heart suggest
It is not good Jehovah's yoke to bear;
Forgive, oh God, the thought, and teach my breast,
There's safety in thine arm, and only there.
If God be not my master, where's my place?
If I his kingdom leave, where shall I go?
E'en frighted Chaos bows before his face,
And Hell's dark world doth his dominion know.
May my poor will, O God, be bowed to thine,
Each thought, each purpose, feeling, as thine own,
Ever harmonious with thy great design,
And humbly circling round the central throne,
In thee I live, with thee move joyous on,
Without thy power am lost, extinct, and gone.

— The Religious Offering (1835) Scripture Sonnets XI.

Faith Can Make a New Heart

I suppose, that there may be, and that there probably is a sort of faith, either so general and unspecific in its nature, or so weak in its degree, that it does not produce love. A man, for instance, may believe in Jesus Christ as a mere man, as an inhabitant of Judea in the time of Pontius Pilate, and as a very remarkable and good man. But this belief, which does not seem to differ from that which we have in Confucius and Socrates, never is, and never can be the source of such feelings, as those which naturally follow our belief in Christ as one sent from God, as the beloved son of the Father, as an authorized teacher, and as an atoning sacrifice. And then, again, our faith, even if it be right in other respects, may be so weak, so vacillating, so closely allied to actual skepticism, as to fail of being followed by that love, which purifies the heart; the only love which can be acceptable to God. The faith of the heart, therefore, is that faith, which makes a new heart; in other words, which inspires new affections; such affections, as are conformable to God’s law and will.