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 In 1818 Madame Philippine Duchesne led the first colony to America, establishing the houses which are still prospering in Missouri and Louisiana.

The astonishing growth of her work, and the veneration universally accorded to her own virtues, had on Mother Barat no other effect than to deepen her humility, and widen her charity. Effacing her own personality, she glorified the divine love which she perpetually proclaimed to be the vital principles of her order. Having attained the age of eighty-five, she lived to see her congregation widely extended and solidly established, without ever, in word or thought, attributing to herself the glory of seed, culture or harvest. The title of Foundress she rejected with something like indignation, and among the sisters holding herself to be the last and least, she sought, while serving all, to be forgotten. On the Feast of the Ascension, May 5, 1865, she passed to God, for whom her entire existence had been spent in toil and prayer. Her life, its labors and their crowning, can be summed up in this single line of the Magnificat: "He hath exalted the humble."

In the year 1900 the Society of the Sacred Heart possesses one hundred and forty-two convents, scattered over Europe, North and South America, Australia and Northern Africa. On the 21st of November it celebrated the hundredth anniversary of its foundation. There is, in the fact that the mode of commemoration was identical, in essentials, throughout all these establishments, a remarkable testimony to strength of organization, and a convincing proof that the order has just claims to its distinctive device: "Cor unam et anima una in Corde Jesu."



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