Finally, after many visits and struggles with himself, especially as to his choice of a spiritual guide, he became an inmate of Port Royal des Granges, under the guidance of M. de Saci. The questions betwixt him and his sister as to his selection of a confessor or director are very curious, revealing, as they do, the quiet self-possessed decision of the one, the scruples of the other, and the proud self-respect of both. As to one of Pascal’s difficulties, she says, without misgiving—“I saw clearly that this was only a remnant of independence hidden in the depth of his heart, which armed itself with every weapon to ward off a submission which yet in his state of feeling must be perfect.” M. Singlin was willing to assist the sister with his advice, but was reluctant himself, in his weak state of health, to assume full responsibilities towards the brother. Jacqueline herself appeared to him the best director her brother could have for the time; and there is a charming blending of humility and yet assumption in the manner in which she relates this, and speaks of “our new convert.” But finally there is found in M. de Saci a director “with whom he is delighted, for he comes of a good stock” (dont it est tout ravi, aussi est-il de bonne race).
Pascal first sought retirement in a residence of his own in the country. It is particularly mentioned amongst the reasons for his withdrawal from Paris, that the Duc de Roannez, “who engaged him almost entirely,” was about to return there. Unable to find everything to his wish, however, in his own house, “he obtained a chamber or little cell among the Solitaries of Port Royal,” from which he wrote to his sister with extreme joy that he was lodged and treated like a prince, “according to St Bernard’s judgment of what it was to be a prince.” It is still Jacqueline’s pen which reports all this to Madame Périer. She continues in the same letter:—
“He joins in every office of the Church from Prime to Compline, without feeling the slightest inconvenience in rising at five o’clock in the morning; and as if it was the will of God that he should join fasting to watching, in defiance of all the medical prescriptions which had forbidden him both the one and the other, he found that supper disagreed with him, and was about to give it up.” { 77}