St. Therese of the Child Jesus.

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He was not the man to read about the fortitude of others without practising it to a heroic degree in his own life.

    Providence listened benignly to the supplications of these pious parents. By the sweet alchemy of prayer, the two patients were kissed back to "out-of-danger" condition within the space of only a few months. Therese’s recovery must, in some measure, be attributed to the healthy atmosphere which she breathed constantly in her rural surroundings. "When the farmer’s wife was going to the fields, she placed Therese on some straw in the bottom of her barrow and thus wheeled her along the grassy paths through the clover and flowers to the spot where her husband was working. When milking-time came she carried the little one with her in her apron, so that Therese lived constantly in the open air amidst the fragrance of the fresh hay and the scent of ripe corn. In this way she became ‘browned by the sun,’ and grew daily more robust from inhaling the chemicals given, out by the harvest-bearing fields."

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V.

CHILDHOOD TRAITS

EVERY MOTHER LOVES to record the trifling incidents which make up the early days of her child’s infancy. The cradle days of Little Therese might be chronicled in much the same way as the early days of any other child, with this exception, that at an unusually early date there seemed to be very pronounced manifestations of the presence of the Holy Spirit in her soul. On November 30, 1873, when the Little Flower was only 11 months old, her mother wrote the following words to Pauline who was then at the Visitation Convent:

    "I expect that she will be able to walk unaided in five or six more weeks. You have only to put her standing beside a chair, and she remains quite steady—never falls. She takes her own little precautions to accomplish this and appears very intelligent. She is continually smiling; she has the expression of one who is predestined."

    The first words uttered by this chosen child were addressed to the "good Jesus." She was only twenty-two months old, when God saw fit to loosen that tongue which was to preach to the world the fascinating doctrine of the "little way" to Heaven.

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   Unexpectedly this infant of scarcely two years gave expression to some very surprising wishes of her heart. On one occasion, she threw her arms around her mother and told her that she wished her to die. "Oh, how I wish you would die, my poor little mother." When the mother inquired concerning the reason for such an unheard of wish, the tiny Saint answered: "It is that you may go to Heaven, since you say that we must die to go there."

    On earth Therese found her Heaven in church. She loved to watch the sacred functions, to listen to the inspiring chant, to breathe forth her simple prayers together with the slowly dying candles that burned beside the little home of Jesus in the tabernacle. She was drawn to Jesus as by a magnet, so much so, that she would often run away to church amid torrents of rain.

    It would be wrong for us to suppose that there was not a trace of childish mischief in the early days of the Little Flower. The following letter written by Mme. Martin to Pauline, who was studying at the Visitation Convent at Le Mans, tells us something of the roguish disposition of the Therese of three years:

    "She (Therese) is extraordinarily outspoken, and it is charming to see her run after me to confess her childish faults: ‘Mamma, I gave Celine a push; I slapped her once; but I will not do it again.’ The moment she has done anything mischievous, everyone must know. Yesterday, without meaning to do so, she tore off a small piece of wall paper; you would have been sorry for her —she wanted to tell her father immediately.

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   When he came home four hours later and everyone else had forgotten about it, she ran at once to Marie, saying: ‘Tell Papa that I tore the paper,’ and she waited like a criminal for the sentence. There is an idea in her little head, that if she accuses herself she will be the more readily forgiven."

    Tersely and tenderly, Therese in her Autobiography tells us of the affection she entertained at that early age for her saintly sisters.

    "I listened attentively while she (Marie) taught Celine, and I was very good and obedient so as to obtain the privilege of remaining in the room during lessons. Marie loaded me with little presents which, trifling though they were, afforded me endless pleasure." This passage reveals to us the innate thirst of the Little Flower for the dew of instruction in religious matters.

    "When I was just learning to talk, Mamma would ask me: ‘What are you thinking about?’ and the invariable answer was ‘Pauline.’ " It was Pauline’s example that inspired her tiny sister with the hope of one day becoming a nun. From the moment that wish took possession of her little heart it never more departed.

    "Dear Leonie also had a warm place in my heart and my great love for her was fully returned. In the evening, when she came from school, she used to take care of me while everyone else went for a walk, and it seems as though I can still hear the sweet songs she sang to lull me to sleep. I remember perfectly the day of her First Communion, and I remember her companion, the poor child whom Mamma dressed, according to the touching custom of the well-to-do families in Alencon.

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    This child did not leave Leonie throughout all that happy day, and at the grand dinner in the evening she sat in the place of honor. I was too small to stay up for the feast, but, thanks to Papa’s goodness, I had my share in it, for when the dessert came around, he himself brought his little Queen a piece of the First Communion cake." The nun’s hand that wrote these lines, was fully conscious of the fact that things and persons of bygone years grow brighter as the years gild them.

    Almost in the same breath with her praises of Marie, Pauline and Leonie, the Little Flower pays noblest tribute to Celine, the companion of her childhood. "My memories of her are so abundant that I do not know how to choose. We understood each other perfectly, though I was much the more forward and lively, and by far the less simple of the two." To have been called the companion of a saint—what an honored title and who could bear it more deservedly than Celine! She used every opportunity that presented itself to form the heart of her sister-playmate according to the desires of the Sacred Heart of the Child Jesus.

    To Therese, childhood was a land of toys, a land of fairies, a realm of play, as it is to every other normal youngster. The visitor at Lisieux today may see the very objects which were used by the Little Flower during that simple though sacred state of her early girlhood. Her checker-board, her miniature set of dishes, her tiny doll bed—these and others are carefully preserved behind a large glass window in the reliquary of the convent where she maintained her simplicity and her innocence to her very dying breath.

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    From these cursory glimpses into the babyhood days of the Saint, we can see that there was a distinctly human touch about everything that she did and said. Falsifiers of the truth would have us believe that saints keep their heads forever turned toward the stars. It is true that the very first word which Little Therese learned to read unaided was "cieux" which means "heaven." She loved to converse with the Saints and particularly with Mary, the Queen of Saints.

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Nevertheless, she was practical enough, even at her tender age, to realize that the eternal cornpanionship of the inhabitants of Heaven could only be gained by charitable dealing with those souls on earth into whose sphere it has pleased God to place us. It is interesting to know that her Catechism, which is carefully preserved at Lisieux, is most pronouncedly thumbed and ragged at the page on which is found this question: "What does it mean to love your neighbor as yourself?" The answer to that question reads: "To love your neighbor as yourself means to do unto others as you would have others do unto you." It would appear that this was the Little Flower’s favorite page in that book, which played such an important part in her religious training.

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VI.

    THE KEY to Therese’s disposition at the age of three might be found in her own beautiful words: "Truly everything on earth smiled on me; I found flowers strewn at each step, and my naturally happy disposition helped ‘to make life bright. But a new era was about to dawn. I was to be the spouse of Our Lord at so tender an age that it was necessary I should suffer from childhood."

   The first and possibly one of the most piercing thorns that penetrated the heart of the Little Flower, was the death of her darling mother. In her early years, Mme. Martin had injured herself seriously against the corner of a table. The result was a lasting swelling in her breast. It was not characteristic of this noble lady to complain. She concealed the little pain which attended the swelling in the beginning. In the course of time, however, the malady developed into a fibrous tumor which gave the mother of this large family considerable concern. For more than sixteen years she succeeded in hiding her condition from her family. With a smile on her face and a prayer of resignation in her heart, she went about the manifold duties of wife, mother and lace-maker.

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Gradually, however, the dread disease made itself evident upon the features and the frame of this saintly mother. When once her failing condition was detected, the members of her family prevailed upon her to be examined by a doctor. The physician wrote out a prescription and handed it to the patient. Receiving it into her hands, she queried: "Of what use will it be?" The doctor answered in a low voice, "It is useless; I give it to patients to please them."

    Thus, the condition of Mme. Martin was officially declared hopeless as far as earthly remedies were concerned.

    As is to be expected, the stricken mother had to give up her lace industry. Throughout the length and breadth of the land she had become reputed as one of the most skillful manufacturers of Point ‘d Alencon lace, but she had woven a finer fabric in Heaven. No earthly piece of lace-work could begin to compare with the rich and lasting masterpiece which she had carefully, slowly and surely fitted together out of a million motherly sacrifices, firmly stitched together by prayers and works of mercy. She would soon be at the end of her weaving.

   As a final token of tribute to the powerful Queen of Heaven, Mme. Martin decided to undertake a pilgrimage to Lourdes to implore the Lady of the Grotto to restore her to health, if that were the will of God. On June 18, 1877, she started out with Marie, Pauline and Leonie for the sacred spot where the Blessed Mother appeared to Little Bernadette. With prayers and tears, her three daughters stormed Heaven during that pilgrimage for the cure of their beloved mother.

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Shall we say that their prayers were in vain? Worldlings, who understand not the nature of prayer, might say so. For reasons hidden from this world, Almighty God permitted the patient’s condition to become worse so that when she returned to Alencon, a marked decline was noticed.

   During the long and painful days that followed, the Little Flower’s mother placed herself fully under the charge of the Blessed Mother of God. In a letter to her brother, she wrote: "My strength is at an end.. . . If the Holy Virgin does not cure me, then my term of life is over; God wills that I find a resting-place elsewhere than on this earth."

    Ten days after she wrote this letter, Mme. Martin received the Last Sacraments, and two days later, August 28, 1877, half an hour past midnight, her merit-laden soul winged its way heavenward to receive the reward of an exemplary mother.

   It was the first time that Therese was confronted with a corpse or a coffin. Years later, in reminiscing on this event, she wrote: "Once I found myself alone in front of the coffin, which had been placed upright in the passage, and for a long time I stood there lost in contemplation. I had never seen one before, but I knew quite well what it meant. I was so small that I had to lift up my head to see its whole length, and it seemed a huge and melancholy thing."

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