In Teresa's land and day a Religious House was the
understood and universal refuge for any young woman who was in earnest
about her duty to God and to her own soul. In those Houses such young
women secluded themselves from all society and gave themselves up to the
care of the poor and the young. In the more strict and enclosed of those
retreats the inmates never came out of doors at all, but wholly
sequestered themselves up to a secret life of austerity and prayer. This
was the ideal life led in those Houses for religious women. But Teresa
soon found out the tremendous mistake she had made in leaving her
father's family-fireside for a so-called Religious House. No sooner had
she entered it than she was plunged headlong into those very same
'pestilent amusements,' the mere approach of which had made her flee to
this supposed asylum. Though she is composing her Autobiography under
the sharp eyes of her confessors, and while she is writing with a
submissiveness and, indeed, a servility that is her only weakness, Teresa
at the same time is bold enough and honest enough to tell us her own
experiences of monastic life in language of startling strength and
outspokenness.
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