sorrow, and succeeded in finding so many imperfections, that a Confessor who did not know her mode of life, might be deceived and fancy there was evil where none in reality existed. I have dwelt at length upon this fault of Catharine in order to show to what a high degree of perfection grace had raised her.
Bonaventura who had succeeded in occupying her with her attire, had not inspired her with a wish to please the world, yet her fervor in prayer and meditation had abated. Our Lord would no longer permit that his chosen spouse should thus be separated from his heart, and he destroyed the obstacle that prevented this holy union. Bonaventura, who had led Catharine in the path of vanity, died in childbirth, and in the flower of her age — and her death caused Catharine to comprehend more deeply the vanity of earth, and she devoted herself with new ardor to the service of her divine spouse. At this epoch she dates her devotion to St. Magdalen, of whom she asked a contrition similar to hers; this devotion always increasing, our Lord and the Blessed Virgin gave her Mary Magdalen for mistress and mother, as we shall hereafter see.
The enemy of salvation, perceiving that his snares were overthrown, and that she whom he was desirous of destroying, had sought refuge with more love than ever in the bosom of her spouse, determined to excite obstacles in her house, and bind her to the world by the violence of his persecutions; he inspired her relatives with the determination of obliging her to marry so as to fill the void created in the family by the death of Bonaventura. Catharine, enlightened from above, only increased her vocal prayers — her meditations and austerities, — avoiding the society of men, and proving in every way the inflexibility
