pt a religious life, which would have put her
into his power, he tries to strengthen her in her duties of mother and
daughter towards her children and the two old men who required also her
maternal care. He discourses with her of her duties, business, and
obligations. As to her doubts, she must neither reflect nor reason
about them. She must occasionally read good books; and he points out
to her, as such, some paltry mystic treatises. If the _she-ass_ should
kick (it is thus he designates the flesh and sensuality), he must quiet
her by some blows of discipline.

He appears at this time to have been very sensible that an intimacy
between two persons so united by affection was not without
inconvenience. He answers with prudence to the entreaties of Madame de
Chantal: "I am bound here hand and foot; and as for you, my dear
sister, does not the inconvenience of the last journey alarm you?"

This was written in October on the eve of a season rude enough among
the Alps and at Jura: "We shall see between this and Easter."

She went at this period to see him at the house of his mother; then,
finding herself all alone at Dijon, she fell very ill. Occupied with
the controversy of this time, he seemed to be neglecting her. He wrote
to her less and less; feeling, doubtless, the necessity of making all
haste in this rapid journey. All this year (1605) was passed, on her
part, in a violent struggle between temptations and doubts; at last she
scarcely knew how to make up her mind, whether to bury herself with the
Carmelites, or marry again.

A great religious movement was then taking place in France: this
movement, far from being spontaneous, was well devised, very
artificial, but, nevertheless, immense in its results. The rich and
powerful families of the Bar had, by their zeal and vanity, impelled it
forward. At the side of the oratory founded by Cardinal de Berulle,
Madame Acarie, a woman singularly active and zealous, a saint engaged
in all the devout intrigues (known also as the blessed Mary of the
incarnation), established the Carmelites in France, and the Ursulines
in Paris. The impassioned austerity of Madame de Chantal urged her
towards the Carmelites; she consulted occasionally one of their
superiors, a doctor of the Sorbonne.[1] St. Francois de Sales
perceived the danger, and he no longer endeavoured to contend against
her. He accepted Madame de Chantal from that very moment. In a
charming letter he gives