Juana Inés was buried the same day she died. The memory of the episcopal process conducted in secret and against the Hieronymite nun was still fresh in her memory. It was whispered in her cloister that having been condemned to hand over her estate and her extensive library to the archbishop, to abjure her “mistakes” and not publish any more of her, she would take her life. her.
The sun grew so dark, his desk so empty, and his words so useless that he wanted nothing more. Juana Inés stopped going to the locutory and began the silence. No one said a word about the publication of the second volume of her works and only her confessor appeared for the ratification of her votes. From her previous fame, nothing. Only murmurs pitying or celebrating her punishment. Only one or another piece of news circulated: it was learned that she had bought her cell for three hundred pesos and requested, of her own free will, a judicial petition; that is to say, the opportunity to appear before the Divine Court and the ecclesiastical justice to imprecate pardon. Also installed in the mute, the world continued its course and Juana Inés remained changed from herself.
For some time, nothing more serious than the heat and the fat rains that fell from the sky, affected the life of the Hieronymite nuns. Until the plague came. That new disease, which had nothing to do with the smallpox that the city had recently suffered. This punishment from God was different. The sisters caught it quickly, and the convent spent three months putting up with foul odors, digging out stagnant water, and testing treatments. Doctors, nurses, and apothecaries applied balms of vinegar, nitro, and camphor, dispensed black cherry syrup, or prepared gallons of camphorated water. But it was useless and everything was over. The nuns woke up crying at seven o’clock mass for that disease they did not understand and that, despite penances, prayers and remedies, went through everything.
It was obvious that Juana Inés’ mood had changed. The fire in her eyes, previously full of arrogance, was barely a spark and all her rebellion had melted into silence. From her handwriting, only the additions and subtractions of the remedies that she administered appeared and they were running out. And she did not even try to change the alchemy of stews to restore health to the sick.
Exhausting hours of work and contact with the infected weakened her since the beginning of April. Still no one knew how to cure that plague and nine out of ten patients died. She endured without complaint until the pain began to take over her body. The fever restored her speech for a few moments and made her scream madly. She then prayed with verses, called Santa Paula and swore never to ask God in vain again. Finally, the bleeding from her nose reassured her to death and on April 17, 1695, at four in the morning, in one of the cells of the convent of San Jerónimo, Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz undertook the last trip of she.
In the convent’s Book of Professions, Juana Inés had written months earlier: “I beg, for the love of God and of his Most Pure Mother, my beloved sisters, the religious that they are and those who will later be, entrust me to God, that I have been and am the worst there has been. I apologize to all for the love of God and his Mother. I, the worst in the world.”
It is certain that Juana Inés did not have a public funeral to honor her memory because in an epidemic, both in the past and now, the survivors rushed to bury the victims. The only ceremonies that could be celebrated in such cases were, as required by the spirit of the time, acts of atonement and reparation, in case it was necessary to appease some divine wrath or ask for God’s justice. At her funeral, in the lower choir of the San Jerónimo temple, only 85 nuns could attend. To do so, the undertaker located the oldest tomb, opened it, removed the bones that were there, placed them in the ossuary and left the hole ready where the body of Juana Inés would rest.
The death of that illustrious woman, the nun, the poetess, the rebel, the punished daughter of God, soon spread like all bad news. It was told in the Cathedral Chapter that some had wanted to attend her funeral and that Canon Francisco de Aguilar regretted not having done the funeral. Rumors also spread that Carlos de Sigüenza y Góngora, a faithful friend of Juana Inés, had written a Funeral Oration, but no one heard it or could find it.
When she died, Juana Inés only had a little over a hundred books. She had drawn up her will and she inherited nothing but a God child, some shell paintings and a bundle of papers. The religious images that she kept of her were left to the archbishop and her talents to whoever wanted to read, understand and remember her.