But Anne would not listen. She said to herself that they were but temptations of the enemy, such as had beset all eminent saints, and were to be banished by the proper means. So she fasted and scourged herself, and lay on the bare floor, and repeated ten times more prayers than ever. She had been fed upon "Lives of the Saints" from the time she could read, and for years, her cherished ambition had been to become a saint, on the model of Elizabeth of Hungary, or St. Bridget: to be looked up to as a pattern of holiness and austerity; to found a new order of nuns, more self-denying even than the "poor Clares," more contemplative than the Carmelites; to rule them while she lived, to be made a saint, and have miracles worked at her grave, when she was dead and buried. Father Barnaby had cultivated these notions, seeing in the girl material which might encouraged her to believe made useful, and had believe that in the course of a few years she might be placed at the head of a sisterhood of her own founding. Anne had plenty of imagination, and hundreds of times she had gone over the whole matter in her own mind, arranging the rules and services of her house, and the very dress of the sisters. She fancied herself like St. Hilda, giving counsel and advice to abbots and priests, even to bishops and heads of the Church; as helping to stay the tide of heresy by her prayers and writings; as educating girls to perpetuate the doctrines and ways of her new order. And was all this to be given up? Was she to abandon all her cherished ambitions and be content with the life of a daughter at home or a mere commonplace mother of a family? Or, still worse, was she to run the risk of open shame and disgrace and punishment, of being despised and held up as a warning, instead of an example, by those over whom she had hoped and expected to rule? Was she to confess that all her righteousness, her prayers and penances and sufferings, were worse than worthless in God's sight, and receive the gift of salvation as a free, wholly undeserved alms? Was her only title to heaven to consist in the fact, not that she was a saint, but a sinner? It could not be true—it should not be true! It was a work of the devil tempting her to abandon her vocation and all the great things she had planned. And then came the thought—was it not her own fault after all? Had she not by weakly yielding to family affection—those fleshly ties from which she had been told again and again she must tear herself loose—had she not given the Tempter a handle against her? Ought she not to do all in her power to prevent the spread of heresy, and had she not, by yielding to her regard for her only brother, and concealing his fault, made herself a partaker therein? Would not her peace of mind return, if she were once to make the sacrifice? Would not that sacrifice be an additional and most precious jewel in the crown of martyrdom she coveted?