The abbey underwent the usual history of such institutions. Distinguished at first by the strictness of its discipline and the piety of its inmates, it became gradually corrupted with increasing wealth, till, in the end of the sixteenth century, it had grown notorious for gross and scandalous abuses. The revenues were squandered in luxury; the nuns did what they liked; and the extravagances and dissipations of the world were repeated amidst the solitudes which had been consecrated to devotion. But at length its revival arose out of one of the most obvious abuses connected with it. The patronage of the institution, like that of others, had been distributed without any regard to the fitness of the occupants, even to girls of immature age. In this manner the abbey of Port Royal accidentally fell to the lot of one who was destined by her ardent piety to breathe a new life into it, and by her indomitable and lofty genius to give it an undying reputation.
Jacqueline Marie Arnauld—better known by her official name, La Mère Angélique—was appointed abbess of Port Royal when she was only eight years of age. She was descended from a distinguished family belonging originally to the old _noblesse_ of Provence, but which had migrated to Auvergne and settled there. Of vigorous healthiness, both mental and physical, the Arnaulds had already acquired a merited position and name in the annals of France. In the beginning of the sixteenth century it found its way to Paris in the person of Antoine Arnauld, Seigneur de la Mothe, the grandfather of the heroine of Port Royal. M. de la Mothe, as he was commonly called, was endowed with the energetic will, and with more than the usual talents, of his family. He was specially known as Procureur-général to Catherine de Médicis; but, as he himself said, he wore “a soldier’s coat as well as a lawyer’s robe.” He was a Huguenot, and nearly perished in the Bartholomew massacre. He had eight sons, every one of whom more or less achieved distinction in the service of their country; but his second son and namesake peculiarly inherited his father’s legal talents, and became his successor in the office of Procureur-général. He more than rivalled his father’s forensic success; and many traditions survive of his great eloquence, and of the pre-eminent ability with which he pleaded on behalf of the University of Paris for the expulsion of the Jesuits from France, under suspicion of having instigated an attempt on the life of Henri IV. in 1593. This great effort has been called the “original sin” of the Arnauld family against the Jesuit order, which was never forgiven. His eloquence produced such an impression, that it is said the judges rose in their seats to listen to his speech, while crowds assembled at the closed doors of the Court to catch its partial echoes. And yet, like some other great speeches, it cannot now be read without weariness.