Having read a French edition of the Life of Venerable Sister Bourgeois,
published in 1818, the translator of the present work was so charmed by
its perusal that she resolved on rendering it into English for the
spiritual edification of others.

Many years ago the work of translation was commenced, but from some
preventing cause or other, was as often laid aside. Yet the idea of
presenting it to the public remained, as no _English_ Version of Sister
Bourgeois' life exists, at least in the United States.

Therefore determining at last to obey an impulse of long standing, the
scattered translation sheets have been prepared for publication, with
the humble hope that the reader may derive as much benefit from their
perusal as did the writer.

In this age of miscellaneous and corrupt literature, when people of
every condition of life are literally devouring irreligious magazines
and serials, it surely cannot be amiss to add another volume to the
already rich store of our libraries in order to help roll back the
torrent of universal depravity that threatens the rain of our beloved
country, and also to place before the minds of the young, the glorious
example of one of God's heroines.

The _Second Centennial_ of Sister Bourgeois' advent to America is
already past, and more than a hundred years before the _Declaration of
Independence_, was she laboring in the cause of humanity for the glory
of God in the New World.

If reading the lives of such women as Mrs. Seton--a Protestant American