a religious sect or party gathered within its fold such an array of
great minds, such a number of fearless and determined heroines and
_esprits d'elite_. A short account of this famous convent must precede
any story of its members.

The original convent, Port-Royal des Champs, near Versailles, was
founded as early as 1204, by Mathieu of Montmorency and his wife, for
the Cistercian nuns who had the privileges of electing their abbess
and of receiving into their community ladies who, tired of the social
world, wished to retire to a religious asylum, without, however, being
bound by any religious vows. Later on, the sisters were permitted to
receive, also, young ladies of the nobility.

These privileges were used to such advantage that the institution
acquired great wealth; and through its boarders, some of whom belonged
to the most important families of France, it became influential to an
almost incalculable degree. For four centuries this convent had been
developing liberal tendencies and gradually falling away from its
primitive austerity, when, in 1605, Sister Angelique Arnauld became
abbess and undertook a thorough reform. So great was her success in
this direction that, after having effected similar changes at the
Convent of Maubuisson and then returned to Port-Royal des Champs, the
latter became so crowded that new and more commodious quarters had to
be obtained.

The immense and beautiful Hotel de Cluny, at Paris, was procured, and
a portion of the community moved thither, establishing an institution
which became the best known and most popular of those French convents
which were patronized by women of distinction. The old abbey buildings
near Versailles were later occupied by a community of learned and
pious men who were, for the most part, pupils of the celebrated Abbe
of Saint-Cyran, who, with Jansenius, was living at Paris at the time
that Mere Angelique was perfecting her reforms; she, attracted by the
ascetic life led by the abbe, fell under his influence, and the whole
Arnauld family, numbering about thirty, followed her example.

Soon "the nuns at Paris, with their numerous and powerful connections,
and the recluses at Port-Royal des Champs, together with their pupils
and the noble or wealthy families to which the latter belonged, were
imbued with the new doctrines of which they became apostles." The
primary aim was to live up to a common ideal of Christian perfection,
and to react against the general