I cannot think of the results of your labors without shame at the little we do.

That's what our Rules engage us to do, to help poor persons, our lords and masters.

I know well, Monsieur, how much you have to endure in your present duty, and I ask Our Lord to strengthen you in your difficulties. It is in such circumstances that we acquire virtue; where there is no suffering, there is little merit. My wish is that God may grant us great indifference with regard to duties. O Monsieur, how sure we would then be of doing His Holy Will, which is our sole aspiration, and how much peace and contentment we would enjoy, or so it seems to me!

If we want to find the manna hidden in our vocation, let us restrict and confine all our desires within it.

I cannot think of the results of your labors without shame at the little we do.

Ultimately, Monsieur, we must go to God per infamiam et bonam famam [whether spoken of well or ill], and His Divine Goodness is merciful to us when it pleases Him to allow us to encounter blame and public contempt. I am sure you have borne patiently the embarrassment you experienced because of what has happened. If the glory of the world is nothing but smoke, the contrary is a solid good, when it is accepted in the right way. I hope that great good will come to us from this humiliation.

Who will excuse us before God for the loss of such a great number of people, who could be saved by the slight assistance we could give them?