The Life of the Venerable Mother Mary of the IncarnationAnonymous
Religion
The Life of the Venerable Mother Mary of the Incarnation
Anonymous
Canada -- History -- To 1763 (New France); Indians of North America; Marie de l'Incarnation, mère, 1599-1672
Ever active and indefatigable, she might be seen, now teaching and
tending her dear Indian children, now directing the building of the new
convent, now superintending the domestic details of the monastery, and
all the time fulfilling to the least particular the duties of her
responsible office as Superior. She was the last to retire to rest at
night, the first to appear in the morning, and ever to be found either in
communion with God, or engaged in the active occupations of her charge.
It was at this period that she commenced correspondence with several
religious communities, and numerous pious seculars in France, in order to
engage their interest for the Indians. The number of her letters is
something wonderful, especially during her first twelve years in Canada,
and the alms which she thus procured, supplied the most pressing wants of
the institution. "This is but my second letter," she says in one place,
"since the arrival of the ships; they leave in a fortnight, and I have to
answer two hundred." In another, she remarks, "My hand is so tired that I
can scarcely hold the pen, but so it is that we must pass our time, while
waiting for the eternity which will never pass." The words, "Short
labour, eternal rest," formed her ordinary motto. Besides her letters on
business to persons of all conditions, she maintained a constant
correspondence with her son and her niece from the time of their joining,
the one the Benedictine, and the other the Ursuline Order. These last,
like all her spiritual letters, are replete with solid maxims of
practical piety, and manifest a knowledge of the secrets of the interior
life which could have been acquired only in her close and habitual
communications with God. While going through this almost incredible
amount of work, she never lost her calm self-possession and firm control
over natural feeling. More than twenty times in one morning, it has
happened her to be interrupted at an occupation, and never by look or
word was she known to betray annoyance or impatience.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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