"That is a cousin of my mother's, who would not have appeared here if it had not been a family assembly. She is a Jansenist. Thirty years ago she was a famous beauty, and a very fashionable woman. Now all that is over." "What is a Jansenist, Philip?" "Ah! there you puzzle me. I thought you would want to know that. You had better ask my Cousin Charlotte--she can tell you much better than I can." "I do not like to speak to any one," said Celia, timidly. "Can you not tell me something about them?" "Well, this much I can tell you--they are very bad people, who lead uncommonly holy lives--ergo, holiness does not make a saint." "Philip, you are laughing at me." "No, my dear; I am laughing at the Catholic Church, not at you. The Jansenists are a sort of heretic-Catholics, whom all real Catholics agree to call very wicked. They hold all manner of wrong doctrines, according to the Bishops and my Lady-Mother; and they lead lives of such austerity and purity as to put half the saints in the calendar to shame. Now this very Cousin Charlotte of mine, who sits there looking so quiet and saintly, with her blue eyes cast down, and her hands folded on that sombre black gown,--when my mother was a girl, she was the gayest of the gay. About fifteen years since she became a Jansenist. From that day she has been a very saint. She practices all kinds of austerities, and is behaved to almost as if she were a professed nun. Of course, in the eyes of all true Catholics, her Jansenism is her worst and wickedest action. I don't quite see myself how anything can be so very wrong which makes such saints of such sinners. But you see I am a complete _extern_, as the religious call it." "I should like to know something more about these people, Philip. What doctrines do they hold?" "Now, what a remarkable attraction anything wrong and perilous has for a woman!" observed Mr. Philip Ingram, with the air of a philosopher. "Well, my dear, I have only heard one; but I believe they have a sort of confession or creed, indicating the points whereon they differ from the Church. That one is, that there is no such thing as grace of congruity, and that men are saved by the favor of God only, and by no merit of their own." "But, Philip, that is the Gospel!" exclaimed Celia, turning round to look at him. "That is what we Protestants believe." "Is it, my dear? Well, I have no objection. (Now, return to your condition of a statue, or you will have a lecture on awkwardness and want of repose in your manners. Oh! I know all about that. Do you think I was born such a finished courtier as you see me?) As to merit, I have lived long enough to find out one thing, and that is, that people who are always talking of merit are generally least particular about acquiring it, while those who believe that their good deeds are worth nothing, have the largest stock of them." "That is natural," said Celia, thoughtfully.