Obedience, poverty, chastity, perseverance in their seclusion,—these are their vows, which the rule greatly aggravates.
The prioress is elected for three years by the mothers, who are called meres vocales because they have a voice in the chapter.
A prioress can only be re-elected twice, which fixes the longest possible reign of a prioress at nine years.
They never see the officiating priest, who is always hidden from them by a serge curtain nine feet in height.
During the sermon, when the preacher is in the chapel, they drop their veils over their faces.
They must always speak low, walk with their eyes on the ground and their heads bowed.
One man only is allowed to enter the convent,—the archbishop of the diocese.
There is really one other,—the gardener. But he is always an old man, and, in order that he may always be alone in the garden, and that the nuns may be warned to avoid him, a bell is attached to his knee.
Their submission to the prioress is absolute and passive.
It is the canonical subjection in the full force of its abnegation.
As at the voice of Christ, ut voci Christi, at a gesture, at the first sign, ad nutum, ad primum signum, immediately, with cheerfulness, with perseverance, with a certain blind obedience, prompte, hilariter, perseveranter et c?ca quadam obedientia, as the file in the hand of the workman, quasi limam in manibus fabri, without power to read or to write without express permission, legere vel scribere non addiscerit sine expressa superioris licentia.
Each one of them in turn makes what they call reparation.
The reparation is the prayer for all the sins, for all the faults, for all the dissensions, for all the violations, for all the iniquities, for all the crimes committed on earth.
For the space of twelve consecutive hours, from four o’clock in the afternoon till four o’clock in the morning, or from four o’clock in the morning until four o’clock in the afternoon, the sister who is making reparation remains on her knees on the stone before the Holy Sacrament, with hands clasped, a rope around her neck.
When her fatigue becomes unendurable, she prostrates herself flat on her face against the earth, with her arms outstretched in the form of a cross; this is her only relief.
In this attitude she prays for all the guilty in the universe.
This is great to sublimity.
As this act is performed in front of a post on which burns a candle, it is called without distinction, to make reparation or to be at the post.
The nuns even prefer, out of humility, this last expression, which contains an idea of torture and abasement.
To make reparation is a function in which the whole soul is absorbed.
The sister at the post would not turn round were a thunderbolt to fall directly behind her.
Besides this, there is always a sister kneeling before the Holy Sacrament.
This station lasts an hour.
They relieve each other like soldiers on guard.
This is the Perpetual Adoration.
The prioresses and the mothers almost always bear names stamped with peculiar solemnity, recalling, not the saints and martyrs, but moments in the life of Jesus Christ: as Mother Nativity, Mother Conception, Mother Presentation, Mother Passion.
But the names of saints are not interdicted.
When one sees them, one never sees anything but their mouths.
All their teeth are yellow.
No tooth-brush ever entered that convent.
Brushing one’s teeth is at the top of a ladder at whose bottom is the loss of one’s soul.
They never say my.
They possess nothing of their own, and they must not attach themselves to anything.
They call everything our; thus: our veil, our chaplet; if they were speaking of their chemise, they would say our chemise.
Sometimes they grow attached to some petty object,—to a book of hours, a relic, a medal that has been blessed.
As soon as they become aware that they are growing attached to this object, they must give it up.
They recall the words of Saint Therese, to whom a great lady said, as she was on the point of entering her order,
“Permit me, mother, to send for a Bible to which I am greatly attached.”
“Ah, you are attached to something!
In that case, do not enter our order!”
Every person whatever is forbidden to shut herself up, to have a place of her own, a chamber.
They live with their cells open.
When they meet, one says,
“Blessed and adored be the most Holy Sacrament of the altar!”
The other responds,
“Forever.”
The same ceremony when one taps at the other’s door.
Hardly has she touched the door when a soft voice on the other side is heard to say hastily,
“Forever!”
Like all practices, this becomes mechanical by force of habit; and one sometimes says forever before the other has had time to say the rather long sentence, “Praised and adored be the most Holy Sacrament of the altar.”