Pietas Romana et Parisiensis, or, A faithful relation of the several sorts of charitable and pious works eminent in the cities of Rome and Paris the one taken out of the book written by Theodorus Amydenus ; the other out of that by Mr. Carr.

CHAP. IV. The Establishment of an Hospital in St. Lazar's Suburbs, for those Children found exposed in the Streets. And of the Dames and Sisters of the Charity in Paris, and elsewhere.

AS Mr. Vincent, and the pious Parisian La∣dies Charities had wrought, and were still working, wonders among the poor di∣stressed people abroad: so his and their pious care did not the while overlook Paris, nor was wanting at home. Here he considered the la∣mentable condition of so many poor abandon'd new-born Infants, whose bodies and souls are exposed to utter perdition, either by the un∣natural cruelty of naughty women, or by the extream poverty of necessitous parents, who covertly leave them in the streets to all adven∣tures;

of which kind of deserted Innocents it is observed, in this vast world of Paris, that scarce a year passes without three or four hun∣dred in the town and suburbs; and such a grow∣ing nursery, every one will judge, cannot be maintained with a little. He therefore by their charity procured an Hospital to be built in St. Lazar's suburbs, for the future recep∣tion of such children as were found so exposed; the annual maintenance whereof, amounts to no less than four thousand pistols, which is still growing up to more and more, for Charitas numquam excidit. And these poor souls are till this day nourished and brought up under the care and assistance of ten or twelve good Sisters of the Charity, with the help of a num∣ber of Nurses, who live in the said Hospital, together with a many more in the Country, who receive a monthly pay. When they are once weaned they are delivered back to the Sisters of the Charity; who in teaching them to speak, teach them also to pray, to know God, to love and serve him. As they grow up in years they are taught some little works to keep them out of idleness, till providence sort them with some fit occasion for their fu∣ture being.

The same Father also by his powerful ex∣hortations, and for the advancing them in the fear, of God, and of their poor neighbours, as also for the more plentiful relief of the ne∣cessitous, prevailed with the Princesses and Dutchesses, and other Ladies of the prime

Nobility of Paris, to the number of two hun∣dred and above, to devest themselves of the rich and sumptuous robes suitable to their illustrious conditions, and to present them∣selves in the Hospitals in the modest attire of simple gentlewomen, with aprons before them, to serve and comfort the most despicable crea∣tures alive; as common Beggars, Porters, and wounded Soldiers, most nasty and gastly to behold. And this they make their business, and go seriously about it, as if it were a thing belonging to them of duty, without discover∣ing any niceness of or disdainfulness thereat. Nor do they go thither for fashion sake, and by way of divertisement: but as their hearts are full of compassion upon the beholding of such sad ob∣jects, so are their mouths full of consolation and instruction, and their hands no less replenished with charitable presents agreeable to the infir∣mities of those, otherwise contemptible, crea∣tures (if they did not eye our Saviour Christ in them); which relief the poverty of the Hospi∣tals could not ordinarily afford to so vast num∣bers. Whereas those good Ladies made plen∣tiful provision thereof in every kind, in a Chamber near adjoining which they hired to that purpose. And every day by turns four of them performed that pious ministery of going from bed to bed to make the distribu∣tion, with an humble meekness well suited to so Christian a work. By these familiar and plea∣sing corporal assistances the good Ladies gain∣ed the hearts of those poor people, and in

consequence their Souls: for it was observed, that in the space of one year, they induced seven hundred and sixty of those infirm and maimed persons to abjure their Heresy, and imbrace the Catholick Faith. To say nothing of multitudes of others, who were moved by their vertuous examples and wholsome advice to make general confessions, and to resolve of a more Christian life than formerly they had led. Nor did this superlative example of chri∣stianity keep within the compass of what these noble Ladies performed in their own persons: but as the nature of good is to be communicative, it spread it self not only all over Paris, but even extended to many remote Villages and Diocesses, to the extream solace and relief of poor honest families, who were as little accustomed to beg their bread, as otherwise little able to gain it by their daily labours.

The Institution of the Charity in the most of, or even all, the Parishes of Paris.

The blessed example of these good Ladies served as the primum mobile under God to in∣cite other Ladies of an inferiour rank, toge∣ther with many honest and vertuous Burgesses of the best sort, to emulate them in so blessed a practice; and it had so powerful an influence upon them, that the most, or even all, the parishes of Paris have meetings at least every month (being all associated together in a holy

confraternity) to discover and confer upon the necessities of their respective parishes at the Curate's house, and accordingly, by col∣lections among themselves, to provide relief for them. The distribution of their charita∣ble collections was at first performed by the good Ladies own hands, who took the pains to go and visit the poor and the sick of the parish, and take a more particular assurance of each ones necessity; but in a small time they were taught by experience, that some o∣ther course was to be taken to carry on so pious a work effectually: for they found that part∣ly the care of their family could scarce dispense with their absence, partly their husbands had no great satisfaction in their conversation with such infirm and nasty poor people; but espe∣cially they saw that their small strength and skill in that kind came not home to the ne∣cessities of the sick: wherefore they advised of some better way. And Mr. Vincent, who ne∣ver was at a loss to invent means to promote charity, found out, and setled a constant and effectual way to continue the work, and it was this. M. Le Gras, sometime wife to Mr. Le Gras, Secretary to Queen Margaret, now Widow, whose maiden name was Marilac, of the family of the most vertuous and famous Chancellor of that name, who had the most eloquent and pious Camus Bishop of Bellay for her spiritual Director, till he delivered her up into Mr. Vincent's hands, where she was like to lose nothing in point of her propension

to serve the poor: this vertuous Lady, I say, was the person pitched upon by her present Director, as the prime instrument for the de∣signed settlement. And certainly divine pro∣vidence was as much in this choice, as her un∣dertakings were blessed with admirable success. For she being wholly addicted to the service of the sick, he trained her up in that way, to fit her for some greater work for the future, and made her make her first Essaies in the Vil∣lages of divers Diocesses, where there was o∣therwise no Hospitals to succour the poor and sick, as in that of Beavais, Sanlys, Soisson, Meaux, Chaalons and Charters. In all which with in∣credible pains, being onely accompanied with some other gentlewomen and a Maid, she set∣led Confraternities, which last till this day. But while he and she had no other design but this lowly way in the Villages, God had a greater design upon them to bring it into the great town of Paris, where she is made the mo∣ther of a company of course Country Maids, which he devised for certain aids to the ver∣tuous Dame of Paris, to the effect intimated as above.

They are called Maids, or Sisters of the Cha∣rity, and were instituted by Mr. Vincent to serve the poor, especially those that are sick, as he had already instituted Missions of men to preach to the poor. Mrs. Le Gras was the woman who was put to instruct them in vertue, and to breed them up, and fashion them to the end for which they are gathered together, viz.

to assist the Dames of Paris to serve the sick in their parishes, in the Hospitals, or where else they may be called. As they are brought up by that good mother in humility, patience, and painful labours, agreeable to their end, so they are suted to it in their attire; which is, a plain course gray coat, without welt or gard, made close to their body, with a close plain kerchief to their head; and their imploy∣ment is to carry the Pottage-pot between two of them, upon a staff all up and down the pa∣rish (which they keep as bright as the Hol∣lander doth his Andirons); and to distribute broth and meat, with other necessaries, to the needy according to the exigency of their seve∣ral wants. This Pot is prepared by turns in the Burgesses house of the Confraternity, who are to afford fire and seasoning, the rest being supplyed by the mutual collections of the pa∣rish. Mr. Vincent's prudence and piety regu∣lated also all those proceedings by constitu∣tions which he gave to the congregation or company of the said Maids of the Charity, ser∣vants of the poor: which by his credit he got to be approved by the Arch-Bishop of Paris in the year 1642. and to be authorized and confirmed by the Kings Letter Patents veri∣fied in the Parliament.