Letter 174
 
My very dear son,

Jesus be our love and our all for time and eternity. I got all your letters, last years that were in the packet, addressed to our mothers in Tours and those you have written this year. I am not answering you for the present. The ships are going too soon. This in only word to tell you the consolation every year that your letters bring and the desire you have of giving yourself and belonging entirely to Jesus Christ and His Holy Mother in the ways of true holiness. That’s what I ask from God several times a day particularly in these times when so much darnel is mixed with the good grains and lies under a deceptive mantle that passes for truth. May God send you and me a most horrific death rather than allow us to fall into this trap. I don’t know where this will reach you so I am addressing it to my niece, Marie of the Incarnation. This good sister tells me how much she is obliged to you for the great care you took of anything that might save the eye she was in danger of losing. She is a soul who is trying to go to God and her illness has helped greatly to detach her from creatures and herself. God knows His time to sanctify His elect.

As for me, a few months ago I ceased to be Superior. This is a great consolation being naturally more inclined to obey and to depend, than to command. However my new office is very distracting especially in Canada, it is care of the temporalities but I find rest in the midst of the coming and going because God is everywhere and there is no place nor business that need keep us from loving Him.

When we got our letters from France, I was ill within inches of death. In the height of my fever a fear came into my mind about the affair I spoke to you about last year and which you answered. I worried greatly and wasn’t able to shake it off by reasoning or otherwise. My mind was so taken up with it that I could not make a deliberate act though all the time my heart was in a state of submission to God for you and for me, whatever He should ordain. I said it all by a look at His Divine Goodness in the depths of my soul where He is always present to me. I must admit that to love the salvation of a soul is to have a powerful stimulus in the heart. Love my salvation I beg you and take care of it when at the altar. The extremity I was at during my illness has made me see more than ever that we have to work for God and practise virtue while we are in good health and especially to keep our conscience clear and be humble. Through the Mercy of God I have great peace of soul, apart from what was bothering me during my illness. If I were troubled by a scruple or otherwise I would have been badly off because on the two occasions I wanted to receive the Sacraments I wasn’t able to make my Confession but just to receive a general absolution. Finally our Good Jesus gave me back my health so that I can attend to the observances and to the duties of my office. My other letters will answer yours, in the meantime continue to pray for me and let us force ourselves to love our one and only God. This is our most important duty. That is to love Him perfectly as He is loved by His true friends on whom He has poured His Holy Spirit. That is my desire for you and for me who am,

From Quebec. 27 July 1657.
Pages 224-225.