XXXIV. MADAME DE MIRAMIOK CHARITY is of no age, race, or country. Travelers among the most savage tribes find kind and com- passionate hearts, and some of the most excellent institu- tions of benevolence have been founded in times of the grossest corruption of manners and morals. In the worst periods there are always some who preserve their integrity, and assert by their conduct the dignity of human nature. Madame de Miramion, a French lady of rank and fortune, born in 1629, passed the whole of her life near the showy and licentious court of Louis XIV, and in the society of Paris, when that society was most devoted to pleasure. But from her childhood she was drawn irresistibly to a nobler life, and she spent the greater part of her existence in alleviating human anguish, and found- ing institutions which have continued the same beneficent office ever since. A beauty and an heiress, she turned away from the pleasures of her circle at the age when they are usually most, alluring. At nine years of age the death of her mother, a woman devoted to piety and good- works, saddened her life and made her for a while morbid in her feelings. In the midst of a gay and brilliant circle of relations and friends, the child was moody, sorrowful, and averse to society. " I think constantly of death," she said one day to her governess, " and ask myself, should I like to die ? should I like to die at this moment ? " The governess encouraged these feelings, and dissuaded (417)
