inspiration from Heaven. Even the name of Quinault Dufresne is not once
mentioned from one end of her narrative to the other.


On the twenty-fifth of April, seventeen hundred and twenty-two (writes
Mademoiselle Gautier), while I was still leading a life of
pleasure--according to the pernicious ideas of pleasure which pass
current in the world--I happen to awake, contrary to my usual custom,
between eight and nine o'clock in the morning. I remember that it is my
birthday; I ring for my people; and my maid answers the bell, alarmed by
the idea that I am ill. I tell her to dress me that I may go to mass.
I go to the Church of the Cordeliers, followed by my footman, and taking
with me a little orphan whom I had adopted. The first part of the mass
is celebrated without attracting my attention; but, at the second part
the accusing voice of my conscience suddenly begins to speak. "What
brings you here?" it says. "Do you come to reward God for making you
the attractive person that you are, by mortally transgressing His laws
every day of your life?" I hear that question, and I am unspeakably
overwhelmed by it. I quit the chair on which I have hitherto been
leaning carelessly, and I prostrate myself in an agony of remorse on the
pavement of the church.

The mass over, I send home the footman and the orphan, remaining behind
myself, plunged in inconceivable perplexity. At last I rouse myself on
a sudden; I go to the sacristy; I demand a mass for my own proper
advantage every day; I determine to attend it regularly; and, after
three hours of agitation, I return home, resolved to enter on the path
that leads to justification.

Six months passed. Every morning I went to my mass: every evening I