Chapter 12 - Page 2

means we must use."

"They call me Lady Abbess, or Mother at the least, who address me,"
said Dame Bridget, drawing herself up, as if offended at her friend's
authoritative manner--"the Lady of Heathergill forgets that she speaks
to the Abbess of Saint Catherine."

"When I was what you call me," said Magdalen, "you indeed were the
Abbess of Saint Catherine, but both names are now gone, with all the
rank that the world and that the church gave to them; and we are now,
to the eye of human judgment, two poor, despised, oppressed women,
dragging our dishonoured old age to a humble grave. But what are we in
the eye of Heaven?--Ministers, sent forth to work his will,--in whose
weakness the strength of the church shall be manifested-before whom
shall be humbled the wisdom of Murray, and the dark strength of
Morton,--And to such wouldst thou apply the narrow rules of thy
cloistered seclusion?--or, hast thou forgotten the order which I
showed thee from thy Superior, subjecting thee to me in these
matters?"

"On thy head, then, be the scandal and the sin," said the Abbess,
sullenly.

"On mine be they both," said Magdalen. "I say, embrace each other,
my children."

But Catherine, aware, perhaps, how the dispute was likely to
terminate, had escaped from the apartment, and so disappointed the
grandson, at least as much as the old matron.

"She is gone," said the Abbess, "to provide some little refreshment.
But it will have little savour to those who dwell in the world; for I,
at least, cannot dispense with the rules to which I am vowed, because
it is the will of wicked men to break down the sanctuary in which they
wont to be observed."

"It is well, my sister," replied Magdalen, "to pay each even the
smallest tithes of mint and cummin which the church demands, and I
blame not thy scrupulous observance of the rules of thine order. But
they were established by the church, and for the church's benefit; and
reason it is that they should give way when the salvation of the
church herself is at stake."

The Abbess made no reply.

One more acquainted with human nature than the inexperienced page,
might have found amusement in comparing the different kinds of
fanaticisms which these two females exhibited. The Abbess, timid,
narrowminded, and discontented, clung to ancient usages and
pretensions which were ended by the Reformation; and was in adversity,
as she had been in prosperity, scrupulous, weak-spirited, and bigoted.
While the fiery and more lofty spirit of her companion suggested a
wider field of effort, and would not be limited by ordinary rules in
the