But the martyrdom of Joan of Arc is an additional confirmation of the truth that it is only by self-sacrifice that great deliverances have been effected.  Nothing in the moral government of God is more mysterious than the fate which usually falls to the lot of great benefactors.  To us it seems sad and unjust; and nothing can reconcile us to the same but the rewards of a future and higher life.  And yet amid the flames there arise the voices which save nations.  Joan of Arc bequeathed to her country, especially to the common people, some great lessons; namely, not to despair amid great national calamities; to believe in God as the true deliverer from impending miseries, who, however, works through natural causes, demanding personal heroism as well as faith.  There was great grandeur in that peasant girl,—­in her exalted faith at Domremy, in her heroism at Orleans, in her triumph at Rheims, in her trial and martyrdom at Rouen.  But unless she had suffered, nothing would have remained of this grandeur in the eyes of posterity.  The injustice and meanness with which she was treated have created a lasting sympathy for her in the hearts of her nation.  She was great because she died for her country, serene and uncomplaining amid injustice, cruelty, and ingratitude,—­the injustice of an ecclesiastical court presided over by a learned bishop; the cruelty of the English generals and nobles; the ingratitude of her own sovereign, who made no effort to redeem her.  She was sold by one potentate to another as if she were merchandise,—­as if she were a slave.  And those graces and illuminations which under other circumstances would have exalted her into a catholic saint, like an Elizabeth of Hungary or a Catherine of Sienna, were turned against her, by diabolical executioners, as a proof of heresy and sorcery.  We repeat again, never was enacted on this earth a greater injustice.  Never did a martyr perish with more triumphant trust in the God whose aid she had so uniformly invoked.  And it was this triumphant Christian faith as she ascended the funeral pyre which has consecrated the visions and the voices under whose inspiration the Maid led a despairing nation to victory and a glorious future.

AUTHORITIES.

Monstrelets’ Chronicles; Cousinot’s Chronique de la Pucelle; Histoire et
Discours du Siege, published by the city of Orleans in 1576; Sismondi’s
Histoire des Francais; De Barante’s Histoire des Dues de Bourgogne;
Michelet and Henri Martin’s Histories of France; Vallet de Viriville’s
Histoire de Charles VII.; Henri Wallon; Janet Tuckey’s Life of Joan of
Arc, published by Putnam, 1880.

SAINT THERESA.

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A. D. 1515-1582.

RELIGIOUS ENTHUSIASM.