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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Life, Letters, and Epicurean Philosophy
+of Ninon de L'Enclos, the Celebrated Beauty of the Seventeenth Century,
+by Robinson [and] Overton, ed. and translation.
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Life, Letters, and Epicurean Philosophy of Ninon de L'Enclos,
+       the Celebrated Beauty of the Seventeenth Century
+
+Author: Robinson [and] Overton, ed. and translation.
+
+Release Date: January 10, 2004 [EBook #10665]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK NINON DE L'ENCLOS ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Rick Niles, Wilelmina Malliere and PG Distributed
+Proofreaders
+
+
+
+
+
+LIFE, LETTERS
+
+AND
+
+EPICUREAN PHILOSOPHY
+
+OF
+
+NINON
+
+DE L'ENCLOS
+
+The Celebrated Beauty of the Seventeenth Century
+
+
+
+ROBINSON--OVERTON
+
+
+
+
+1903
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+LIFE OF NINON DE L'ENCLOS
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos as a Standard
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+Considered as a Parallel
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+Youth of Ninon de l'Enclos
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+The Morals of the Period
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+Ninon and Count de Coligny
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+The "Birds" of the Tournelles
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+Effect of Her Mother's Death
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+Her Increasing Popularity
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+Ninon's Friendships
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+Some of Ninon's Lovers
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+Ninon's Lovers (Continued)
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+The Villarceaux Affair
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+The Marquis de Sévigné
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+A Family Tragedy
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+Ninon's Bohemian Environments
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+A Remarkable Old Age
+
+
+
+
+LETTERS TO THE MARQUIS DE SÉVIGNÉ
+
+
+INTRODUCTION TO LETTERS
+I--A Hazardous Undertaking
+II--Why Love Is Dangerous
+III--Why Love Grows Cold
+IV--The Spice of Love
+V--Love and Temper
+VI--Certain Maxims Concerning Love
+VII--Women Expect a Quid Pro Quo from Men
+VIII--The Necessity for Love and Its Primitive Cause
+IX--Love Is a Natural Inclination
+X--The Sensation of Love Forms a Large Part of a Woman's Nature
+XI--The Distinction Between Love and Friendship
+XII--A Man in Love Is an Amusing Spectacle
+XIII--Vanity Is a Fertile Soil for Love
+XIV--Worth and Merit Are Not Considered in Love
+XV--The Hidden Motives of Love
+XVI--How to Be Victorious in Love
+XVII--Women Understand the Difference Between Real Love and Flirtation
+XVIII--When a Woman Is Loved She Need Not Be Told of It
+XIX--Why a Lover's Vows Are Untrustworthy
+XX--The Half-way House to Love
+XXI--The Comedy of Contrariness
+XXII--Vanity and Self-Esteem Obstacles to Love
+XXIII--Two Irreconcilable Passions in Woman
+XXIV--An Abuse of Credulity Is Intolerable
+XXV--Why Virtue Is So Often Overcome
+XXVI--Love Demands Freedom of Action
+XXVII--The Heart Needs Constant Employment
+XXVIII--Mere Beauty Is Often of Trifling Importance
+XXIX--The Misfortune of Too Sudden an Avowal
+XXX--When Resistance is Only a Pretence
+XXXI--The Opinion and Advice of Monsieur de la Sablière
+XXXII--The Advantages of a Knowledge of the Heart
+XXXIII--A Heart Once Wounded No Longer Plays with Love
+XXXIV--Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder
+XXXV--The Heart Should Be Played Upon Like the Keys of a Piano
+XXXVI--Mistaken Impressions Common to All Women
+XXXVII--The Allurements of Stage Women
+XXXVIII--Varieties of Resistance Are Essential
+XXXIX--The True Value of Compliments Among Women
+XL--Oratory and Fine Phrases Do Not Breed Love
+XLI--Discretion Is Sometimes the Better Part of Valor
+XLII--Surface Indications in Women Are Not Always Guides
+XLIII--Women Demand Respect
+XLIV--Why Love Grows Weak--Marshal de Saint-Evremond's Opinion
+XLV--What Favors Men Consider Faults
+XLVI--Why Inconstancy Is Not Injustice
+XLVII--Cause of Quarrels Among Rivals
+XLVIII--Friendship Must Be Firm
+XLIX--Constancy Is a Virtue Among Narrow Minded
+L--Some Women Are Very Cunning
+LI--The Parts Men and Women Play
+LII--Love Is a Traitor with Sharp Claws
+LIII--Old Age Not a Preventive Against Attack
+LIV--A Shrewd But Not an Unusual Scheme
+LV--A Happy Ending
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN LORD SAINT-EVREMOND AND NINON DE L'ENCLOS
+
+I--Lovers and Gamblers Have Something in Common
+II--It Is Sweet to Remember Those We Have Loved
+III--Wrinkles Are a Mark of Wisdom
+IV--Near Hopes Are Worth as Much as Those Far Off
+V--On the Death of De Charleval
+VI--The Weariness of Monotony
+VII--After the Death of La Duchesse de Mazarin
+VIII--Love Banishes Old Age
+IX--Stomachs Demand More Attention Than Minds
+X--Why Does Love Diminish After Marriage?
+XI--Few People Resist Age
+XII--Age Has Some Consolations
+XIII--Some Good Taste Still Exists in France
+XIV--Superiority of the Pleasures of the Stomach
+XV--Let the Heart Speak Its Own Language
+XVI--The Memory of Youth
+XVII--I Should Have Hanged Myself
+XVIII--Life Is Joyous When It Is Without Sorrow
+Letter to the Modern Leontium
+
+
+
+
+NINON DE L'ENCLOS
+
+LIFE AND LETTERS
+
+
+INTRODUCTION
+
+
+The inner life of the most remarkable woman that ever lived is here
+presented to American readers for the first time. Ninon, or
+Mademoiselle de l'Enclos, as she was known, was the most beautiful
+woman of the seventeenth century. For seventy years she held
+undisputed sway over the hearts of the most distinguished men of
+France; queens, princes, noblemen, renowned warriors, statesmen,
+writers, and scientists bowing before her shrine and doing her homage,
+even Louis XIV, when she was eighty-five years of age, declaring that
+she was the marvel of his reign.
+
+How she preserved her extraordinary beauty to so great an age, and
+attracted to her side the greatest and most brilliant men of the
+century, is told in her biography, which has been entirely re-written,
+and new facts and incidents added that do not appear in the French
+compilations.
+
+Her celebrated "Letters to the Marquis de Sévigné," newly translated,
+and appearing for the first time in the United States, constitute the
+most remarkable pathology of the female heart, its motives, objects,
+and secret aspirations, ever penned. With unsparing hand she unmasks
+the human heart and unveils the most carefully hidden mysteries of
+femininity, and every one who reads these letters will see herself
+depicted as in a mirror.
+
+At an early age she perceived the inequalities between the sexes, and
+refused to submit to the injustice of an unfair distribution of human
+qualities. After due deliberation, she suddenly announced to her
+friends: "I notice that the most frivolous things are charged up to
+the account of women, and that men have reserved to themselves the
+right to all the essential qualities; from this moment I will be a
+man." From that time--she was twenty years of age--until her death,
+seventy years later, she maintained the character assumed by her,
+exercised all the rights and privileges claimed by the male sex, and
+created for herself, as the distinguished Abbé de Chateauneauf says,
+"a place in the ranks of illustrious men, while preserving all the
+grace of her own sex."
+
+
+
+
+LIFE OF NINON DE L'ENCLOS
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos as a Standard
+
+
+To write the biography of so remarkable a woman as Ninon de l'Enclos
+is to incur the animadversions of those who stand upon the dogma, that
+whoso violates one of the Ten Commandments is guilty of violating them
+all, particularly when one of the ten is conventionally selected as
+the essential precept and the most important to be observed. It is
+purely a matter of predilection or fancy, perhaps training and
+environment may have something to do with it, though judgment is
+wanting, but many will have it so, and hence, they arrive at the
+opinion that the end of the controversy has been reached.
+
+Fortunately for the common sense of mankind, there are others who
+repudiate this rigid rule and excuse for human conduct; who refuse to
+accept as a pattern of morality, the Sabbath breaker, tyrant,
+oppressor of the poor, the grasping money maker, or charity monger,
+even though his personal chastity may entitle him to canonization.
+These insist that although Ninon de l'Enclos may have persistently
+transgressed one of the precepts of the Decalogue, she is entitled to
+great consideration because of her faithful observance of the others,
+not only in their letter but in their spirit, and that her life
+contains much that is serviceable to humanity, in many more ways than
+if she had studiously preserved her personal purity to the sacrifice
+of other qualities, which are of as equal importance as virtues, and
+as essential to be observed.
+
+Another difficulty in the way of establishing her as a model of any
+kind, on account of her deliberate violations of the sixth precept of
+the Decalogue, is the fact that she was not of noble birth, held no
+official position in the government of France, either during the
+regency or under the reign of Louis XIII, but was a private person,
+retiring in her habits, faithful in her liaisons and friendships,
+delicate and refined in her manners and conversations, and eagerly
+sought for her wisdom, philosophy, and intellectual ability.
+
+Had she been a Semiramis, a Messalina, an Agrippina, a Catherine II,
+or even a Lady Hamilton, the glamor of her exalted political position
+might have covered up a multitude of gross, vulgar practices,
+cruelties, barbarities, oppressions, crimes, and acts of
+misgovernment, and have concealed her spiritual deformity beneath the
+grandeur of her splendid public vices and irregularities. The mantle
+of royalty and nobility, like dipsomania, excuses a multitude of sins,
+hypocrisy, and injustice, and inclines the world to overlook,
+disregard, or even condone, what in them is considered small vices,
+eccentricities of genius, but which in a private person are magnified
+into mountains of viciousness, and call forth an army of well meaning
+but inconsistent people to reform them by brute force.
+
+It is time to interpose an impasse to the further spread of this
+misapprehension of the nature and consequences of human acts, and to
+demonstrate the possibility, in humble walks of life, of virtues worth
+cultivating, and to erect models out of those who, while they may be
+derelict in their ethical duties, are still worthy of being imitated
+in other respects. Our standards and patterns of morality are so high
+as to be unattainable, not in the details of the practice of virtue,
+but in the personnel of the model. Royal and noble blood permeated
+with the odor of sanctity; virtuous statesmanship, or proud political
+position attained through the rigid observance of the ethical rules of
+personal purity, are nothing to the rank and file, the polloi, who can
+never hope to reach those elevations in this world; as well expatiate
+upon the virtues of Croesus to a man who will never go beyond his
+day's wages, or expect the homeless to become ecstatic over the
+magnificence of Nabuchodonosor's Babylonian palace. Such extremes
+possess no influence over the ordinary mind, they are the mere
+vanities of the conceited, the mistakes of moralists.
+
+The history of Ninon de l'Enclos stands out from the pages of history
+as a pre-eminent character, before which all others are stale,
+whatever their pretensions through position and grandeur,
+notwithstanding that one great quality so much admired in
+women--womanly purity--was entirely wanting in her conduct through
+life.
+
+While no apology can be effectual to relieve her memory from that one
+stigma, the other virtues connected with it, and which she possessed
+in superabundance, deserve a close study, inasmuch as the trend of
+modern society is in the direction of the philosophical principles and
+precepts, which justified her in pursuing the course of life she
+preferred to all others. She was an ardent disciple of the Epicurean
+philosophy, but in her adhesion to its precepts, she added that
+altruistic unselfishness so much insisted upon at the present day.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+Considered as a Parallel
+
+
+The birth of Ninon de l'Enclos was not heralded by salvoes of
+artillery, Te Deums, or such other demonstrations of joy as are
+attendant upon the arrival on earth of princes and offspring of great
+personages. Nevertheless, for the ninety years she occupied the stage
+of life, she accomplished more in the way of shaping great national
+policies, successful military movements and brilliant diplomatic
+successes, than any man or body of men in the seventeenth century.
+
+In addition to that, her genius left an impress upon music and the
+fine arts, an impress so profound that the high standard of excellence
+both have attained in our day is due to her efforts in establishing a
+solid foundation upon which it was possible to erect a substantial
+structure. Moreover, in her hands and under her auspices and guidance,
+languages, belles lettres, and rhetoric received an impetus toward
+perfection, and raised the French language and its literature,
+fiction, poetry and drama, to so high a standard, that its productions
+are the models of the twentieth century.
+
+It was Ninon de l'Enclos whose brilliant mentality and intellectual
+genius formed the minds, the souls, the genius, of such master minds
+as Saint-Evremond, La Rouchefoucauld, Molière, Scarron, La Fontaine,
+Fontenelle, and a host of others in literature and fine arts; the
+Great Condé, de Grammont, de Sévigné, and the flower of the chivalry
+of France, in war, politics, and diplomacy. Even Richelieu was not
+unaffected by her influence.
+
+Strange power exerted by one frail woman, a woman not of noble birth,
+with only beauty, sweetness of disposition, amiability, goodness, and
+brilliant accomplishments as her weapons! It was not a case of the
+moth and the flame, but the operation of a wise philosophy, the
+precepts of which were decently, moderately and carefully inculcated;
+a philosophy upon the very edge of which modern society is hanging,
+afraid to accept openly, through too much attachment to ancient
+doctrines which have drawn man away from happiness and comfort, and
+converted him into a bitter pessimism that often leads to despair.
+
+As has already been suggested, had Ninon de l'Enclos sat upon a
+throne, or commanded an army, the pages of history would teem with the
+renown of her exploits, and great victories be awarded to her instead
+of to those who would have met with defeat without her inspiration.
+
+Pompey, in his vanity, declared that he could raise an army by
+stamping his foot upon the ground, but the raising of Ninon de
+l'Enclos' finger could bring all the chivalry of Europe around a
+single standard, or at the same gentle signal, cause them to put aside
+their arms and forget everything but peace and amity. She dominated
+the intellectual geniuses of the long period during which she lived,
+and reigned over them as their absolute queen, through the sheer force
+of her personal charms, which she never hesitated to bestow upon those
+whom she found worthy, and who expressed a desire to possess them,
+studiously regulated, however, by the precepts and principles of the
+philosophy of Epicurus, which today is rapidly gaining ground in our
+social relations through its better understanding and appreciation.
+
+Her life bears a great resemblance to the histories in which we read
+about the most celebrated women of ancient times, who occupied a
+middle station between the condition of marriage and prostitution--a
+class of women whose Greek name is familiarized to our ears in
+translations of Aristophanes. Ninon de l'Enclos was of the order of
+the French "hetaerae," and, as by her beauty and her talents, she
+attained the first rank in the social class, her name has come down to
+posterity with those of Aspasia and Leontium, while the less
+distinguished favorites of less celebrated men have shared the common
+oblivion, which hides from the memory of men, every degree of
+mediocrity, whether of virtue or vice.
+
+A class of this kind, a status of this singular nature existing
+amongst accomplished women, who inspired distinguished men with lofty
+ideals, and developed the genius of men who, otherwise, would have
+remained in obscurity, can never be uninteresting or uninstructive;
+indeed, it must afford matter for serious study. They are prefigures,
+or prototypes of the influence that aims to sway mankind at the
+present day in government, politics, literature, and the fine arts.
+
+As a distinguished example of such a class, the most prominent in the
+world, in fact, apart from a throne, Ninon de l'Enclos will peculiarly
+engage the attention of all who, whether for knowledge or amusement,
+are observers of human nature under all its varieties and
+circumstances.
+
+It would be idle to enter upon a historical digression on the state of
+female manners in ancient Athens, or in Europe during the last three
+centuries. The reader should discard them from his mind when he
+peruses the life of Ninon de l'Enclos, and examine her character and
+environments from every point of view as a type toward which is
+trending modern social conditions.
+
+At first blush, and to a narrow intellect, an individual woman of the
+character of Ninon de l'Enclos would seem hopelessly lost to all
+virtue, abandoned by every sense of shame, and irreclaimable to any
+feeling of social or private duty. But only at first blush, and to the
+most circumscribed of narrow minds, who, fortunately, do not control
+the policy of mankind, although occasional disorders here and there
+indicate that they are endeavouring to do so.
+
+A large majority of mankind are of the settled opinion that every
+virtue is bound up in that of chastity. Our manners and customs, our
+laws, most of our various kinds of religions, our national sentiments
+and feelings--all our most serious opinions, as well as our dearest
+and best rooted prejudices, forbid the dissevering, in the minds of
+women of any class, the ideas of virtue and female honor. That is,
+our public opinion is along that line. To raise openly a doubt on this
+head, or to disturb, on a point considered so vital, the settled
+notions of society, is equally inconsistent with common prudence and
+the policy of common honesty; and as tending to such an end, we are
+apt to consider all discussion on the subject as at least officiously
+incurring danger, without an opportunity of inculcating good.
+
+But, however strongly we insist upon this opinion for such purposes,
+there are others in which it is not useless to relax that severity for
+a moment, and to view the question, not through the medium of
+sentiment, but with an eye of philosophic impartiality. We are
+gradually nearing the point, where it is conceded that in certain
+conditions of society, one failing is not wholly incompatible with a
+general practice of virtue--a remark to be met with in every homily
+since homilies were written, notwithstanding that rigid rule already
+alluded to in the previous chapter.
+
+It is surprising that it has never occurred to any moralist of the
+common order, who deals chiefly with such general reflections, to
+apply this particular maxim to this particular social status. We
+follow the wise precepts of honesty found in Cicero, although we know
+that he was, at the time he was writing them, plundering his fellow
+men at every opportunity. Our admiration for Bacon's philosophy and
+wisdom reaches adulation although he was the "meanest of men," and was
+guilty of the most flagrant crimes such as judicial bribery and
+political corruption. We read that Aspasia had some great and many
+amiable qualities; so too had Ninon de l'Enclos; and it is worthy of
+consideration, how far we judge candidly or wisely in condemning such
+characters in gross, and treating their virtues as Saint Austin was
+wont to deal with those of his heathen adversaries, as no better than
+"splendid vices," so unparalleled in their magnitude as to become
+virtues by the operation of the law of extremes. There was no law
+permitting a man to marry his sister, and there was no law forbidding
+King Cambyses to do as he liked.
+
+Another grave point to be considered is this: The world, as it now
+stands, its laws, systems of government, manners and customs, and
+social conditions, have been built up on these same "splendid vices,"
+and whenever they have been tamed into subjection to mediocrity--let
+us say to clerical, or ecclesiastical domination;--government, society
+and morals have retrograded. The social condition in France during
+Ninon de l'Enclos' time, and in England during the reign of Charles
+II, is startling evidence of this accusation. Moreover, it is fast
+becoming the condition to-day, a fact indicated by the almost
+universal demand for a revolution in social ethics, the foundation to
+which, for some reason, has become awry, threatening to topple down
+the structure erected upon it. Society can see nothing to originate,
+an incalculable number of attempts to better human conditions always
+proving failures, and worsening the human status. It is dawning upon
+the minds of the true lovers of humanity, that there is nothing else
+to be done, but to revert to the past to find the key to any possible
+reform, and to that past we are edging rapidly, though, it must be
+said unwillingly, in the hope and expectation that the old foundations
+are possessed of sufficient solidity to support a new or re-modeled
+structure.
+
+The life of Ninon de l'Enclos, upon this very point, furnishes food
+for profitable reflection, inasmuch as it gives an insight into the
+great results to be obtained by the following of the precepts of an
+ancient philosophy which seems to have survived the clash of ages of
+intellectual and moral warfare, and to have demonstrated its capacity
+to supply defects in segregated dogmatic systems wholly incapable of
+any syncretic tendencies.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+Youth of Ninon de l'Enclos
+
+
+Anne de l'Enclos, or "Ninon," as she has always been familiarly called
+by the world at large, was born at Paris in 1615. What her parents
+were, or what her family, is a matter of little consequence. To all
+persons who have attained celebrity over the route pursued by her,
+original rank and station are not of the least moment. By force of his
+genius in hewing for himself a niche in history, Napoleon was truly
+his own ancestor, as it is said he loved to remark pleasantly. So with
+Ninon de l'Enclos, the novelty of the career she laid out for herself
+to follow, and did follow until the end with unwavering constancy,
+justifies us in regarding her as the head of a new line, or dynasty.
+
+In the case of mighty conquerors, whose path was strewn with violence,
+even lust, no one thinks of an ignoble origin as in any manner
+derogatory to the eminence; on the contrary, it is considered rather
+as matter to be proud of; the idea that out of ignominy, surrounded by
+conditions devoid of all decency, justice, and piety, an individual
+can elevate himself up to the highest pinnacle of human power and
+glory, has always, and will always be regarded as an example to be
+followed, and the badge of success stretched to cover the means of
+its attainment. This is the universal custom where success has been
+attained, the failures being relegated to a well merited oblivion as
+unworthy of consideration either as lessons of warning or for any
+purpose. Our youth are very properly taught only the lessons of
+success.
+
+It is in evidence that Ninon's father was a gentleman of Touraine and
+connected, through his wife, with the family of Abra de Raconis, a
+race of no mean repute in the Orleanois, and that he was an
+accomplished gentleman occupying a high position in society. Voltaire,
+however, declares that Ninon had no claim to a parentage of such
+distinction; that the rank of her mother was too obscure to deserve
+any notice, and that her father's profession was of no higher dignity
+than that of a teacher of the lute. This account is not less likely,
+from the remarkable proficiency acquired by Ninon, at an early age, in
+the use of that instrument.
+
+It is equally certain, however, that Ninon's parents were not obscure,
+and that her father was a man of many accomplishments, one of which
+was his skill as a performer on the lute. A fact which may have
+induced Voltaire to mistake one of his talents for his regular
+profession.
+
+Ninon's parents were as opposite in sentiments and disposition as the
+Poles of the earth. Madame de l'Enclos was a prudent, pious Christian
+mother, who endeavored to inspire her daughter with the same pious
+sentiments which pervaded her own heart. The fact is that the mother
+attempted to prepare her daughter for a conventual life, a profession
+at that period of the highest honor, and one that led to preferment,
+not only in religious circles, but in the world of society. At that
+time, conventual and monastic dignitaries occupied a prominent place
+in the formation of public and private manners and customs, and if not
+regarded impeccable, their opinions were always considered valuable in
+state matters of the greatest moment, even the security of thrones,
+the welfare and peace of nations sometimes depending upon their
+wisdom, judgment, and decisions.
+
+With this laudable object in view, Madame de l'Enclos carefully
+trained her daughter in the holy exercises of her religion, to which
+she hoped to consecrate her entire life. But the fond mother met with
+an impasse, an insurmountable obstacle, in the budding Ninon herself,
+who, even in the temples of the Most High, when her parent imagined
+her to be absorbed in the contemplation of saintly things, and
+imbibing inspiration from her "Hours," the "Lives of the Saints," or
+"An Introduction to a Holy Life," a book very much in vogue at that
+period, the child would be devouring such profane books as Montaigne,
+Scarron's romances and Epicurus, as more in accordance with her trend
+of mind.
+
+Even at the early age of twelve years, she had mastered those authors,
+and had laid out a course of life, not in accord with her good
+mother's ideas, for it excluded the idea of religion as commonly
+understood, and crushed out the sentiment of maternity, that crowning
+glory to which nearly all young female children aspire, although in
+them, at a tender age, it is instinctive and not based upon knowledge
+of its meaning.
+
+This beginning of Ninon's departure from the beaten path should not be
+a matter of surprise, for all the young open their hearts to ideas
+that spring from the sentiments and passions, and anticipate in
+imagination the parts they are to play in the tragedy or comedy of
+life.
+
+It is this period of life which the moralist and educator justly
+contend should be carefully guarded. It is really a concession to
+environment, and a tacit argument against radical heredity as the
+foundation upon which rest the character and disposition of the adult,
+and which is the mainspring of his future moral conduct. It is
+impossible to philosophize ourselves out of this sensible position.
+
+In the case of Ninon, there was her mother, a woman of undoubted
+virtue and exemplary piety, following the usual path in the training
+of her only child and making a sad failure of it, or at least not
+making any impression on the object of her solicitude. This was,
+however, not due to the mother's intentions: her training was too weak
+to overcome that coming from another quarter. It has been said that
+Ninon's father and mother were as opposite as the Poles in character
+and disposition, and Ninon was suspended like a pendulum to swing
+between two extremes, one of which had to prevail, for there was no
+midway stopping place. It may be that the disciple of heredity, the
+opponent of environment will perceive in the result a strong argument
+in favor of his view of humanity. Be that as it may, Ninon swung away
+from the extreme of piety represented by her mother, and was caught at
+the other extreme by the less intellectually monotonous ideas of her
+father. There was no mental conflict in the young mind, nothing
+difficult; on the contrary, she accepted his ideas as pleasanter and
+less conducive to pain and discomfort. Too young to reason, she
+perceived a flowery pathway, followed it, and avoided the thorny one
+offered her by her mother.
+
+Monsieur de l'Enclos was an Epicurean of the most advanced type.
+According to him, the whole philosophy of life, the entire scheme of
+human ethics as evolved from Epicurus, could be reduced to the four
+following canons:
+
+First--That pleasure which produces no pain is to be embraced.
+
+Second--That pain which produces no pleasure is to be avoided.
+
+Third--That pleasure is to be avoided which prevents a greater
+pleasure, or produces a greater pain.
+
+Fourth--That pain is to be endured which averts a greater pain, or
+secures a greater pleasure.
+
+The last canon is the one that has always appealed to the religious
+sentiments, and it is the one which has enabled an army of martyrs to
+submit patiently to the most excruciating torments, to reach the
+happiness of Paradise, the pleasure contemplated as a reward for
+enduring the frightful pain. The reader can readily infer, however,
+from his daily experiences with the human family, that this
+construction is seldom put upon this canon, the world at large,
+viewing it from the Epicurean interpretation, which meant earthly
+pleasures, or the purely sensual enjoyments. It is certain that
+Ninon's father did not construe any of these canons according to the
+religious idea, but followed the commonly accepted version, and
+impressed them upon his young daughter's mind in all their various
+lights and shades.
+
+Imbibing such philosophy from her earliest infancy, the father taking
+good care to press them deep into her plastic mind, it is not
+astonishing that Ninon should discard the more distasteful fruits to
+be painfully harvested by following her mother's tuition, and accept
+the easily gathered luscious golden fruit offered her by her father.
+Like all children and many adults, the glitter and the tinsel of the
+present enjoyment were too powerful and seductive to be resisted, or
+to be postponed for a problematic pleasure.
+
+The very atmosphere which surrounded the young girl, and which she
+soon learned to breathe in deep, pleasurable draughts, was surcharged
+with the intoxicating oxygen of freedom of action, liberality, and
+unrestrained enjoyment. While still very young she was introduced into
+a select society of the choicest spirits of the age and speedily
+became their idol, a position she continued to occupy without
+diminution for over sixty years. No one of all these men of the world
+had ever seen so many personal graces united to so much
+intellectuality and good taste. Ninon's form was as symmetrical,
+elegant and yielding as a willow; her complexion of a dazzling white,
+with large sparkling eyes as black as midnight, and in which reigned
+modesty and love, and reason and voluptuousness. Her teeth were like
+pearls, her mouth mobile and her smile most captivating, resistless
+and adorable. She was the personification of majesty without pride or
+haughtiness, and possessed an open, tender and touching countenance
+upon which shone friendship and affection. Her voice was soft and
+silvery, her arms and hands superb models for a sculptor, and all her
+movements and gestures manifested an exquisite, natural grace which
+made her conspicuous in the most crowded drawing-room. As she was in
+her youth, so she continued to be until her death at the age of ninety
+years, an incredible fact but so well attested by the gravest and most
+reliable writers, who testify to the truth of it, that there is no
+room for doubt. Ninon attributed it not to any miracle, but to her
+philosophy, and declared that any one might exhibit the same
+peculiarities by following the same precepts. We have it on the most
+undoubted testimony of contemporaneous writers, who were intimate with
+him, that one of her dearest friends and followers, Saint-Evremond, at
+the age of eighty-nine years, inspired one of the famous beauties of
+the English Court with an ardent attachment.
+
+The beauties of her person were so far developed at the age of twelve
+years, that she was the object of the most immoderate admiration on
+the part of men of the greatest renown, and her beauty is embalmed in
+their works either as a model for the world, or she is enshrined in
+song, poetry, and romance as the heroine.
+
+In fact Ninon had as tutors the most distinguished men of the age, who
+vied with one another in embellishing her young mind with all the
+graces, learning and accomplishments possible for the human mind to
+contain. Her native brightness and active mind absorbed everything
+with an almost supernatural rapidity and tact, and it was not long
+before she became their peer, and her qualities of mind reached out so
+far beyond theirs in its insatiable longing, that she, in her turn,
+became their tutor, adviser and consoler, as well as their tender
+friend.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+The Morals of the Period
+
+
+Examples of the precocious talents displayed by Mademoiselle de
+l'Enclos are not uncommon in the twentieth century, but the
+application she made of them was remarkable and uncommon. Accomplished
+in music, learned and proficient in the languages, a philosopher of no
+small degree, and of a personal beauty sometimes called "beauté de
+diable," she appeared upon the social stage at a time when a new idol
+was an imperative necessity for the salvation of moral sanity, and the
+preservation of some remnants of personal decency in the sexual
+relations.
+
+Cardinal Richelieu had just succeeded in consolidating the usurpations
+of the royal prerogatives on the rights of the nobility and the
+people, which had been silently advancing during the preceding reigns,
+and was followed by the long period of unexampled misgovernment, which
+oppressed and impoverished as well as degraded every rank and every
+order of men in the French kingdom, ceasing only with the Revolution.
+
+The great Cardinal minister had built worse than he had intended, it
+is to be hoped; for his clerico-political system had practically
+destroyed French manhood, and left society without a guiding star to
+cement the rope of sand he had spun. Unable to subject the master
+minds among the nobility to its domination, ecclesiasticism had
+succeeded in destroying them by augmenting royal prerogatives which it
+could control with less difficulty. Public maxims of government,
+connected as they were with private morals, had debauched the nation,
+and plunged it into a depth of degradation out of which Richelieu and
+his whole entourage of clerical reformers could not extricate a single
+individual. It was a riot of theological morality.
+
+The whole body of the French nobility and the middle class of citizens
+were reduced to a servile attendance on the court, as the only means
+of advancement and reward. Every species of industry and merit in
+these classes was sedulously discouraged; and the motive of honorable
+competition for honorable things, being withdrawn, no pursuit or
+occupation was left them but the frivolous duties, or the degrading
+pleasures of the palace.
+
+Next to the king, the women naturally became the first objects of
+their effeminate devotion; and it is difficult to say which were
+soonest corrupted by courtiers consummate in the arts of adulation,
+and unwearied in their exercise. The sovereign rapidly degenerated
+into an accomplished despot, and the women into intriguers and
+coquettes. Richelieu had indeed succeeded in subjecting the State to
+the rule of the Church, but Ninon was destined to play an important
+part in modifying the evils which afflicted society, and at least
+elevate its tone. From the methods she employed to effect this
+change, it may be suspected that the remedy was equivalent to the
+Hanemannic maxim: "Similia similbus curantur," a strange application
+of a curative agent in a case of moral decrepitude, however valuable
+and effective it may be in physical ailments.
+
+The world of the twentieth century, bound up as it is in material
+progress, refuses to limit its objects and aims to the problematic
+enjoyment of the pleasures of Paradise in the great hereafter, or of
+suffering with stoicism the pains and misfortunes of this earth as a
+means of avoiding the problematic pains of Hell. Future rewards and
+punishments are no longer incentives to virtue or right living. The
+only drag upon human acts of every kind is now that great political
+maxim, the non-observance of which has often deluged the earth with
+blood; "Sic utere tuo ut alienum non laedas," which is to say: So use
+thine own as not to injure thy neighbor. It is a conventional
+principle, one of contract in reality, but it has become a great
+doctrine of equity and justice, and it is inculcated by our
+educational systems to the exclusion of the purely religious idea, and
+the elimination of religious dogma, which tends to oppressive
+restraints, is carefully fostered.
+
+There is another reason why men's minds are impelled away from the
+purely sentimental moral doctrines insisted upon by sectarianism,
+which is ecclesiasticism run riot, and the higher the education the
+deeper we delve into the secret motives of that class of mankind, the
+deceptive outward appearances of which dominate the pages of history,
+which is, that the greatest and most glorious systems of government,
+the wisest and most powerful of rulers, the greatest and most liberal
+statesmen, heroes, and conspicuous conquerors, originated in
+violations of the Decalogue, and those nations and kingdoms which have
+been founded upon strictly ecclesiastical ideas, have all sunk beneath
+the shifting sands of time, or have become so degenerate as to be
+bywords and objects of derision.
+
+From the same viewpoint, a strange phenomenon is observable in the
+world of literature, arts, and sciences. The brightest, greatest
+geniuses, whose works are pointed to with admiration; studied as
+models and standards, made the basis of youthful education, imitated,
+and even wept over by the sentimental, were, in their private lives,
+persons of the most depraved morals. Why this should be the case, it
+is impossible even to conjecture, the fact only remaining that it is
+so. Perhaps there are so many different standards of morality, that
+humanity, weary of the eternal bickering consequent upon the conflicts
+entered into for their enforcement, have made for themselves a new
+interpretation which they find less difficult to observe, and find
+more peace and pleasure in following.
+
+To take a further step in the same direction, it is curious that in
+the lives of the Saints, those who spent their whole earthly existence
+in abstinence, works of the severest penance, and mortifications of
+the flesh, the tendency of demoniac influence was never in the
+direction of Sabbath breaking, profanity, idolatry, robbery, murder
+and covetousness, but always exerted itself to the fullest extent of
+its power in attacks upon chastity. All other visions were absent in
+the hair-shirted, and self-scourgings brought out nothing but sexual
+idealities, sensual temptations. The reason for this peculiarity is
+not far to seek. What is dominant in the minds always finds egress
+when a favorable opportunity is presented, and the very thought of
+unchastity as something to be avoided, leads to its contemplation, or
+its creation in the form of temptation. The virtue of chastity was the
+one law, and its observances and violations were studied from every
+point of view, and its numberless permissible and forbidden
+limitations expatiated upon to such a degree, that he who escaped them
+altogether could well attribute the result to the interposition of
+some supernatural power, the protection of some celestial guardian.
+One is reminded of the expression of St. Paul: "I had not known lust
+had the law not said: thou shalt not covet." Lord Beaconsfield's
+opinion was, that excessive piety led to sexual disorders.
+
+According to Ninon's philosophy, whatever tended to propagate
+immoderation in the sexual relations was rigidly eliminated, and
+chastity placed upon the same plane and in the same grade as other
+moral precepts, to be wisely controlled, regulated, and managed. She
+put all her morality upon the same plane, and thereby succeeded in
+equalizing corporeal pleasure, so that the entire scale of human acts
+produced a harmonious equality of temperament, whence goodness and
+virtue necessarily followed, the pathway being unobstructed.
+
+It is too much to be expected, or even to be hoped for, that there
+will ever be any unanimity among moral reformers, or any uniformity in
+their standards of moral excellence. The educated world of the present
+day, reading between the lines of ancient history, and some that is
+not so very ancient, see ambition for place and power as the moving
+cause, the inspiration behind the great majority of revolutions, and
+they have come to apply the same construction to the great majority of
+moral agitations and movements for the reform of morals and the
+betterment of humanity, with pecuniary reward or profit, however,
+added as the sine qua non of maintaining them.
+
+Cure the agitation by removing the occasion for it, and Othello's
+occupation would be gone; hence, the agitation continues. As an
+eminent theologian declared with a conviction that went home to a
+multitude, at the Congress of Religions, when the Columbian Exposition
+was in operation:
+
+"If all the religions in the world are to be merged into one, who, or
+what will support the clergy that will be deprived of their salaries
+by the change in management?"
+
+The Golden Calf and Aaron were there, but where was the angry Moses?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+Ninon and Count de Coligny
+
+
+It was impossible for a maiden trained in the philosophy of Epicurus,
+and surrounded by a brilliant society who assiduously followed its
+precepts to avoid being caught in the meshes of the same net spread
+for other women. Beloved and even idolized on all sides, as an object
+that could be worshiped without incurring the displeasure of
+Richelieu, who preferred his courtiers to amuse themselves with women
+and gallantries rather than meddle with state affairs, and being
+disposed both through inclination and training to accept the
+situation, Ninon felt the sentiments of the tender passion, but
+philosophically waited for a worthy object.
+
+That object appeared in the person of the young Gaspard, Count de
+Coligny, afterwards Duc de Chatillon, who paid her assiduous court.
+The result was that Ninon conceived a violent passion for the Count,
+which she could not resist, in fact did not care to resist, and she
+therefore yielded to the young man of distinguished family, charming
+manners, and a physically perfect specimen of manhood.
+
+It is alleged by Voltaire and repeated by Cardinal de Retz, that the
+early bloom of Ninon's charms was enjoyed by Richelieu, but if this be
+true, it is more than likely that Ninon submitted through policy and
+not from any affection for the great Cardinal. It is certain, however,
+that the great statesman's attention had been called to her growing
+influence among the French nobility, and that he desired to control
+her actions if not to possess her charms. She was a tool that he
+imagined he could utilize to keep his rebellious nobles in his leash.
+Abbé Raconis, Ninon's uncle, and the Abbé Boisrobert, her friend, who
+stood close to the Cardinal, had suggested to His Eminence that the
+charms of the new beauty could be used to advantage in state affairs,
+and he accordingly sent for her at first through curiosity, but when
+he had seen her he hoped to control her for his personal benefit.
+
+Although occupied in vast projects which his great genius and activity
+always conducted to a happy issue, the great man had not renounced the
+affections of his human nature, nor his intellectual gratifications.
+He aimed at everything, and did not consider anything beneath his
+dignity. Every day saw him engaged in cultivating a taste for
+literature and art, and some moments of every day were set apart for
+social gallantries. When it came to the art of pleasing and attracting
+women, we have the word of Cardinal de Retz for it, that he was not
+always successful. Perhaps it is only inferior minds who possess the
+art and the genius of seduction.
+
+The intriguing Abbé, in order to bring Ninon under the influence of
+his master, and to charm her with the great honor done her by a man
+upon whom were fixed the eyes of all Europe, prepared a series of
+gorgeous fêtes, banquets and entertainments at the palace at Rueil.
+But Ninon was not in the least overwhelmed, and refused to hear the
+sighs of the great man. Hoping to inspire jealousy, he affected to
+love Marion de Lormes, a proceeding which gave Ninon great pleasure as
+it relieved her from the importunities of the Cardinal. The end of it
+was, that Richelieu gave up the chase and left Ninon in peace to
+follow her own devices in her own way.
+
+Whatever may have been the relations between Ninon and Cardinal
+Richelieu, it is certain that the Count de Coligny was her first
+sentimental attachment, and the two lovers, in the first intoxication
+of their love, swore eternal constancy, a process common to all new
+lovers and believed possible to maintain. It was not long, however,
+before Ninon perceived that the first immoderate transports of love
+gradually lost their activity, and by applying the precepts of her
+philosophy to explain the phenomenon, came to regard love by its
+effects, as a blind mechanical movement, which it was the policy of
+men to ennoble according to the conventional rules of decency and
+honor, to the exclusion of its original meaning.
+
+After coldly reasoning the matter out to its only legitimate
+conclusion, she tore off the mask covering a metaphysical love, which
+could not reach or satisfy the light of intelligence or the sentiments
+and emotions of the heart, and which appeared to her to possess as
+little reality as the enchanted castles, marvels of magic, and
+monsters depicted in poetry and romance. To her, love finally became a
+mere thirst, and a desire for pleasure to be gratified by indulgence
+like all other pleasure. The germ of philosophy already growing in her
+soul, found nothing in this discovery that was essentially unnatural;
+on the contrary, it was essentially natural. It was clear to her
+logical mind, that a passion like love produced among men different
+effects according to different dispositions, humors, temperament,
+education, interest, vanity, principles, or circumstances, without
+being, at the same time, founded upon anything more substantial than a
+disguised, though ardent desire of possession, the essential of its
+existence, after which it vanished as fire disappears through lack of
+fuel. Dryden, the celebrated English poetic and literary genius,
+reaches the same opinion in his Letters to Clarissa.
+
+Having reached this point in her reasoning, she advanced a step
+further, and considered the unequal division of qualities distributed
+between the two sexes. She perceived the injustice of it and refused
+to abide by it. "I perceive," she declared, "that women are charged
+with everything that is frivolous, and that men reserve to themselves
+the right to essential qualities. From this moment I shall be a man."
+
+All this growing out of the ardour of a first love, which is always
+followed by the lassitude of satiety, so far from causing Ninon any
+tears of regret, nerved her up to a philosophy different from that of
+other women, and makes it impossible to judge her by the same
+standard. She can not be considered a woman subject to a thousand
+fantasies and whims, a thousand trifling concealed proprieties of
+position and custom. Her morals became the same as those of the wisest
+and noblest men of the period in which she lived, and raised her to
+their rank instead of maintaining her in the category of the
+intriguing coquettes of her age.
+
+It is not improbable that her experience of the suffering attendant
+upon the decay of such attachments, a suffering alluded to by those
+who contemplate only the intercourse of the sexes through the medium
+of poetry and sentiment, had considerable influence in determining her
+future conduct. At an early age, following upon her liaison with Count
+Coligny, she adopted the determination she adhered to during the rest
+of her life, of retaining so much only of the female character as was
+forced upon her by nature and the insuperable laws of society. Acting
+on this principle, her society was chiefly composed of persons of her
+adopted sex, of whom the most celebrated of their time made her house
+a constant place of meeting.
+
+A curious incident in her relations with Count de Coligny was her
+success in persuading him to adjure the errors of the Huguenots and
+return to the Roman Catholic Church. She had no religious
+predilections, feeling herself spiritually secure in her philosophic
+principles, but sought only his welfare and advancement. His obstinacy
+was depriving him of the advantages due his birth and personal merit.
+Considering that Ninon was scarcely sixteen years of age, respiring
+nothing but love and pleasure, to effect by tenderness and the
+persuasive strength of her reasoning powers, such a change in a man
+so obstinate as the Count de Coligny, in an obstinate and excessively
+bigoted age, was something unique in the history of lovers of that
+period. Women then cared very little for religious principles, and
+rarely exerted themselves in advancing the cause of the dominant
+religion, much less thought of the spiritual needs of their favorites.
+The reverse is the rule in these modern times, when women are the most
+ardent and persistent proselytizers of the various sects, a custom
+which recalls the remark of a distinguished lawyer who failed to
+recover any assets from a notorious bankrupt he was pursuing for the
+defrauded creditors: "This man has everything in his wife's name--even
+his religion."
+
+Ninon's disinterested counsel prevailed, and the Count afterward
+abjured his errors, becoming the Duc de Chatillon, Marquis d'Andelot,
+and died a lieutenant general, bravely fighting for his country, at
+Charenton.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+The "Birds" of the Tournelles
+
+
+Having decided upon her career, Ninon converted her property into
+prudent and safe securities, and purchased a city house in the Rue des
+Tournelles au Marais, a locality at that time the center of
+fashionable society, and another for a summer residence at Picpusse,
+in the environs of Paris. A select society of wits and gallant
+chevaliers soon gathered around her, and it required influence as well
+as merit to gain an entrance into its ranks. Among this élite were
+Count de Grammont, Saint-Evremond, Chapelle, Molière, Fontenelle, and
+a host of other no less distinguished characters, most of them
+celebrated in literature, arts, sciences, and war. Ninon christened
+the society "Oiseaux des Tournelles," an appellation much coveted by
+the beaux and wits of Paris, and which distinguished the chosen
+company from the less favored gentlemen of the great metropolis.
+
+Among those who longed for entrance into this charming society of
+choice spirits was the Count de Charleval, a polite and accomplished
+chevalier, indeed, but of no particular standing as a literary
+character. Nothing would do, however, but a song of triumph as a test
+of his competency and he accomplished it after much labor and
+consumption of midnight oil. Scarron has preserved the first stanza
+in his literary works, the others being lost to the literary world,
+perhaps with small regret. The sentiments expressed in the first
+stanza rescued from oblivion will be sufficient to indicate the
+character of the others:
+
+"Je ne suis plus oiseau des champs,
+Mais de ces oiseaux des Tournelles
+Qui parlent d'amour en tout temps,
+Et qui plaignent les tourterelles
+De ne se baiser qu'au printemps."
+
+Which liberally translated into English will run substantially as
+follows:
+
+No more am I a wild bird on the wing,
+But one of the birds of the Towers, who
+The love in their hearts always sing,
+And pity the poor Turtle Doves that coo
+And never kiss only in spring.
+
+Scarron alludes to the delicacy of the Count's taste and the
+refinement of his wit, by saying of him: "The muses brought him up on
+blanc mange and chicken broth."
+
+How Ninon kept together this remarkable coterie can best be understood
+by an incident unparalleled in female annals. The Count de Fièsque,
+one of the most accomplished nobles of the French court, had it
+appears, grown tired of an attachment of long standing between Ninon
+and himself, before the passion of the former had subsided. A letter,
+containing an account of his change of sentiments, with reasons
+therefor, was presented his mistress, while employed at her toilette
+in adjusting her hair, which was remarkable for its beauty and
+luxuriance, and which she regarded as the apple of her eye. Afflicted
+by the unwelcome intelligence, she cut off half of her lovely tresses
+on the impulse of the moment, and sent them as her answer to the
+Count's letter. Struck by this unequivocal proof of the sincerity of
+her devotion to him, the Count returned to his allegiance to a
+mistress so devoted, and thenceforward retained it until she herself
+wearied of it and desired a change.
+
+As an illustration of her sterling honesty in money matters and her
+delicate manner of ending a liaison, the following anecdote will serve
+to demonstrate the hold she was able to maintain upon her admirers.
+
+M. de Gourville, an intimate friend of Ninon's, adhered in the wars of
+the Fronde to the party of the Prince of Condé, one of the "Birds of
+the Tournelles." Compelled to quit Paris, to avoid being hanged in
+person, as he was in effigy, he divided the care of a large sum of
+ready money between Ninon de l'Enclos and the Grand Pénitencier of
+Notre Dame. The money was deposited in two caskets. On his return from
+exile, he applied to the priest for the return of his money, but to
+his astonishment, all knowledge of the deposit was denied, and that if
+any such deposit had been made, it was destined for charitable
+purposes under the rules of the Pénitencier, and had most probably
+been distributed among the poor of Paris. De Gourville protested in
+vain, and when he threatened to resort to forcible means, the power
+of the church was invoked to compel him to abandon his attempt. So
+cruelly disappointed in a man whom all Paris deemed incorruptibly
+honest, de Gourville suspected nothing else from Mademoiselle de
+l'Enclos. It was absurd to hope for probity in a woman of
+reprehensible habits when that virtue was absent in a man who lived a
+life of such austerity as the Grand Pénitencier, hence he determined
+to abstain from visiting her altogether, lest he might hate the woman
+he had so fondly loved.
+
+Ninon, however, had other designs, and learning that he had returned,
+sent him a pressing invitation to call upon her.
+
+"Ah! Gourville," she exclaimed as soon as he appeared, "a great
+misfortune has happened me in consequence of your absence."
+
+That settled the matter in de Gourville's mind, his money was gone and
+he was a pauper. Plunged in mournful reflections, de Gourville dared
+not raise his eyes to those of his mistress. But she, mistaking his
+agitation, went on hastily:
+
+"I am sorry if you still love me, for I have lost my love for you, and
+though I have found another with whom I am happy, I have not forgotten
+you. Here," she continued, turning to her escritoire, "here are the
+twenty thousand crowns you intrusted to me when you departed. Take
+them, my friend, but do not ask anything from a heart which is no
+longer disposed in your favor. There is nothing left but the most
+sincere friendship."
+
+Astonished at the contrast between her conduct and that of her
+reverend co-depositary, and recognizing that he had no right to
+complain of the change in her heart because of his long absence, de
+Gourville related the story of the indignity heaped upon him by a man
+of so exalted a character and reputation.
+
+"You do not surprise me," said Ninon, with a winning smile, "but you
+should not have suspected me on that account. The prodigious
+difference in our reputations and conditions should have taught you
+that." Then adding with a twinkle in her eye: "Ne suis-je pas la
+gardeuse de la cassette?"
+
+Ninon was afterward called "La belle gardeuse de cassette," and
+Voltaire, whose vigilance no anecdote of this nature could escape, has
+made it, with some variations, the subject of a comedy, well known to
+every admirer of the French drama, under the name of "La Dépositaire."
+
+Ninon had her preferences, and when one of her admirers was not to her
+taste, neither prayers nor entreaties could move her. Hers was not a
+case of vendible charms, it was le bon appetit merely, an Epicurean
+virtue. The Grand Prior of Vendôme had reason to comprehend this trait
+in her character.
+
+The worthy Grand Prior was an impetuous wooer, and he saw with great
+sorrow that Ninon preferred the Counts de Miossens and de Palluan to
+his clerical attractions. He complained bitterly to Ninon, but instead
+of being softened by his reproaches, she listened to the voice of some
+new rival when the Grand Prior thought his turn came next. This put
+him in a great rage and he resolved to be revenged, and this is the
+way he fancied he could obtain it. One day shortly after he had left
+Ninon's house, she noticed on her dressing table a letter, which she
+opened to find the following effusion:
+
+"Indigne de mes feux, indigne de mes larmes,
+Je renonce sans peine à tes faibles appas;
+  Mon amour te prêtait des charmes,
+  Ingrate, que tu n'avais pas."
+
+Or, as might be said substantially in English:
+
+Unworthy my flame, unworthy a tear,
+I rejoice to renounce thy feeble allure;
+  My love lent thee charms that endear,
+  Which, ingrate, thou couldst not procure.
+
+Instead of being offended, Ninon took this mark of unreasonable spite
+good naturedly, and replied by another quatrain based upon the same
+rhyme as that of the disappointed suitor:
+
+"Insensible à tes feux, insensible à tes larmes,
+Je te vois renoncer à mes faibles appas;
+  Mais si l'amour prête des charmes,
+  Pourquoi n'en empruntais-tu pas."
+
+Which is as much as to say in English:
+
+Caring naught for thy flame, caring naught for thy tear,
+I see thee renounce my feeble allure;
+  But if love lends charms that endear,
+  By borrowing thou mightst some procure.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+Effect of Her Mother's Death
+
+
+It is not to be wondered at that a girl under such tutelage should
+abandon herself wholly, both mind and body, to a philosophy so
+contrary in its principles and practices to that which her mother had
+always endeavored to instill into her young mind. The father was
+absent fighting for Heaven alone knew which faction into which France
+was broken up, there were so many of them, and the mother and daughter
+lived apart, the disparity in their sentiments making it impossible
+for them to do otherwise. For this reason, Ninon was practically her
+own mistress, and not interfered with because the husband and wife
+could not agree upon any definite course of life for her to follow.
+Ninon's heart, however, had not lost any of its natural instincts, and
+she loved her mother sincerely, a trait in her which all Paris learned
+with astonishment when her mother was taken down with what proved to
+be a fatal illness.
+
+Madame de l'Enclos, separated from both her husband and daughter, and
+devoting her life to pious exercises, acquired against them the
+violent prejudices natural in one who makes such a sacrifice upon the
+altar of sentiment. The worldly life of her daughter gave birth in her
+mind to an opinion which she deemed the natural consequence of it.
+The love of pleasure, in her estimation, had destroyed every vestige
+of virtue in her daughter's soul and her neglect of her religious
+duties had converted her into an unnatural being.
+
+But she was agreeably diverted from her ill opinion when her malady
+approached a dangerous stage. Ninon flew to heir mother's side as soon
+as she heard of it, and without becoming an enemy of her philosophy of
+pleasure, she felt it incumbent upon her to suspend its practice.
+Friendship, liaisons, social duties, pleasure, everything ceased to
+amuse her or give her any satisfaction. The nursing of her sick mother
+engaged her entire attention, and her fervor in this dutiful
+occupation astonished Madame de l'Enclos and softened her heart to the
+extent of acknowledging her error and correcting her estimate of her
+daughter's character. She loved her daughter devotedly and was happy
+in the knowledge that she was as devotedly loved. But this was not the
+kind of happiness that could prolong her days.
+
+Notwithstanding all her philosophy, Ninon could not bear the spectacle
+presented by her dying parent. Her soul was rent with a grief which
+she did not conceal, unashamed that philosophy was impotent to
+restrain an exhibition of such a natural weakness. Moreover, her dying
+mother talked to her long and earnestly, and with her last breath gave
+her loving counsel that sank deep into her heart, already softened by
+an uncontrollable sorrow and weakened by long vigils.
+
+Scarcely had Madame de l'Enclos closed her eyes upon the things of
+earth, than Ninon conceived the project of withdrawing from the world
+and entering a convent. The absence of her father left her absolute
+mistress of her conduct, and the few friends who reached her, despite
+her express refusal to see any one, could not persuade her to alter
+her determination. Ninon, heart broken, distracted and desolate, threw
+herself bodily into an obscure convent in the suburbs of Paris,
+accepting it, in the throes of her sorrow, as her only refuge and home
+on earth.
+
+Saint-Evremond, in a letter to the Duke d'Olonne, speaks of the
+sentiment which is incentive to piety:
+
+"There are some whom misfortunes have rendered devout through a
+certain kind of pity for themselves, a secret piety, strong enough to
+dispose men to lead more religious lives."
+
+Scarron, one of Ninon's closest friends, in his Epistle to Sarrazin,
+thus alludes to this conventual escapade:
+
+"Puis j'aurais su * * *
+* * * * * * * * * *
+* * * * * * * * * *
+Ce que l'on dit du bel et saint exemple
+Que la Ninon donne à tous les mondains,
+En se logeant avecque les nonais,
+Combien de pleurs la pauvre jouvencelle
+A répandus quand sa mère, sans elle,
+Cierges brûlants et portant écussons,
+Prêtres chantant leurs funèbres chanson,
+Voulut aller de linge enveloppée
+Servir aux vers d'une franche lippée."
+
+Which, translated into reasonable English, is as much as saying:
+
+But I might have known * * *
+* * * * * * * * * *
+* * * * * * * * * *
+What they say of the example, so holy, so pure,
+That Ninon gives to worldlings all,
+By dwelling within a nunnery's wall.
+How many tears the poor lorn maid
+Shed, when her mother, alone, unafraid,
+Mid flaming tapers with coats of arms,
+Priests chanting their sad funereal alarms,
+Went down to the tomb in her winding sheet
+To serve for the worms a mouthful sweet.
+
+But the most poignant sorrow of the human heart is assuaged by time.
+Saint-Evremond and Marion de Lormes, Richelieu's "belle amie,"
+expected to profit by the calm which they knew would not be long in
+stealing over the heart of their friend. Marion, however, despaired of
+succeeding through her own personal influence, and enlisted the
+sympathies of Saint-Evremond, who knew Ninon's heart too well to
+imagine for a moment that the mournful, monotonous life she had
+embraced would satisfy her very long. It was something to be admitted
+to her presence and talk over matters, a privilege they were accorded
+after some demur. The first step toward ransoming their friend was
+followed by others until they finally made great strides through her
+resolution. They brought her back in triumph to the world she had
+quitted through a species of "frivolity," so they called it, of which
+she was never again guilty as long as she lived.
+
+This episode in Ninon's life is in direct contrast with one which
+occurred when the Queen Regent, Anne of Austria, listening to the
+complaints of her jealous maids of honor, attempted to dispose of
+Ninon's future by immuring her in a convent. Ninon's celebrity
+attained such a summit, and her drawing rooms became so popular among
+the élite of the French nobility and desirable youth, that sad inroads
+were made in the entourage of the Court, nothing but the culls of
+humanity being left for the ladies who patronized the royal functions.
+In addition to this, she excited the envy and jealousy of a certain
+class of women, whom Ninon called "Jansensists of love," because they
+practiced in public the puritanic virtues which they did not even have
+tact enough to render agreeable. It is conceivable that Ninon's
+brilliant attractions, not to say seductive charms, and her
+unparalleled power to attract to her society the brightest and best
+men of the nation, engendered the most violent jealousy and hatred of
+those whose feebler charms were ignored and relegated to the
+background. The most bitter complaints and accusations were made
+against her to the Queen Regent, who was beset on all sides by loud
+outcries against the conduct of a woman whom they were powerless to
+imitate, until, to quiet their clamors, she deemed it her duty to act.
+
+Anne of Austria accordingly sent Ninon, by special messenger, a
+peremptory order to withdraw to a convent, giving her the power of
+selection. At first Anne intended to send her to the convent of
+Repentant Girls (Filles Repenties), but the celebrated Bauton, one of
+the Oiseaux des Tournelles, who loved a good joke as well as he did
+Ninon, told her that such a course would excite ridicule because Ninon
+was neither a girl nor a repentant (ni fille, ni repentie), for which
+reason, the order was changed leaving Ninon to her own choice of a
+prison.
+
+Ninon knew the source of the order, and foresaw that her numerous
+distinguished admirers would not have any difficulty in protecting
+her, and persuading the Queen Regent to rescind her order, and
+therefore gave herself no concern, receiving the order as a
+pleasantry.
+
+"I am deeply sensible of the goodness of the court in providing for my
+welfare and in permitting me to select my place of retreat, and
+without hesitation, I decide in favor of the Grands Cordeliers."
+
+Now it so happened that the Grands Cordeliers was a monastery
+exclusively for men, and from which women were rigidly excluded.
+Moreover, the morals of the holy brotherhood was not of the best, as
+the writers of their history during that period unanimously testify.
+M. de Guitaut, the captain of the Queen's guard, who had been
+intrusted with the message, happened to be one of the "Birds," and he
+assured the Regent that it was nothing but a little pleasantry on the
+part of Ninon, who merited a thousand marks of approval and
+commendation for her sterling and brilliant qualities of mind and
+heart rather than punishment or even censure.
+
+The only comment made by the Queen Regent was: "Fie, the nasty
+thing!" accompanied by a fit of laughter. Others of the "Birds" came
+to the rescue, among them the Duc d'Enghien, who was known not to
+value his esteem for women lightly. The matter was finally dropped,
+Anne of Austria finding means to close the mouths of the envious.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+Her Increasing Popularity
+
+
+Ninon's return to the gayeties of her drawing rooms was hailed with
+loud acclamations from all quarters. The envy and jealousy of her
+female enemies, the attempt to immure her in a convent, and her
+selection of the Grands Cordeliers as her place of retreat, brought
+her new friends and admirers through the notoriety given her, and all
+Paris resounded with the fame of her spirit, her wit, and her
+philosophy.
+
+Ladies of high rank sought admission into her charming circle, many of
+them, it is to be imagined, because they possessed exaggerated ideas
+of her influence at court. Had she not braved the Queen Regent with
+impunity? Her drawing rooms soon became the center of attraction and
+were nightly crowded with the better part of the brilliant society of
+Paris. Ninon was the acknowledged guide and leader, and all submitted
+to her sway without the slightest envy or jealousy, and it may also be
+said, without the slightest compunctions or remorse of conscience.
+
+The affair with the Queen Regent had one good effect, it separated the
+desirable from the undesirable in the social scale, compelling the
+latter to set up an establishment of their own as a counter
+attraction, and as their only hope of having any society at all. They
+established a "little court" at the Hôtel Rambouillet, where
+foppishness was a badge of distinction, and where a few narrow minded,
+starched moralists, poisoned metaphysics and turned the sentiments of
+the heart into a burlesque by their affectation and their unrefined,
+even vulgar attempts at gallantry. They culled choice expressions and
+epigrams from the literature of the day, employing their memories to
+conceal their paucity of original wit, and practised upon their
+imaginations to obtain a salacious philosophy, which consisted of
+sodden ideas, flat in their expression, stale and unattractive in
+their adaptation.
+
+Ninon's coterie was the very opposite, consisting as it did of the
+very flower of the nobility and the choicest spirits of the age, who
+banished dry and sterile erudition, and sparkled with the liveliest
+wit and polite accomplishments. There were some who eluded the
+vigilance of Ninon's shrewd scrutiny, and made their way into her
+inner circle, but they were soon forced to abandon their pretensions
+by their inability to maintain any standing among a class of men who
+were so far beyond them in rank and attainments.
+
+Not long after her return to the pleasures of society, after the
+convent episode, Ninon was called upon to mourn the demise of her
+father. M. de l'Enclos was one of the fortunate men of the times who
+escaped the dangers attendant upon being on the wrong side in
+politics. For some inscrutable reason, he took sides with Cardinal de
+Retz, and on that account was practically banished from Paris and
+compelled to be satisfied with the rough annoyances of camp life
+instead of being able to put in practice the pleasant precepts of his
+philosophy. He was finally permitted to return to Paris with his head
+safe upon his shoulders, and flattered himself with the idea that he
+could now make up for lost time, promising himself to enjoy to the
+full the advantages offered by his daughter's establishment. He
+embraced his daughter with the liveliest pleasure imaginable, taking
+upon himself all the credit for her great reputation as due to his
+efforts and to his philosophical training. He was flattered at the
+success of his lessons and entered upon a life of joyous pleasure with
+as much zest as though in the bloom of his youth. It proved too much
+for a constitution weakened by the fatigues of years of arduous
+military campaigns and he succumbed, the flesh overpowered by the
+spirit, and took to his bed, where he soon reached a condition that
+left his friends no hope of his recuperation.
+
+Aware that the end was approaching, he sent for his daughter, who
+hastened to his side and shed torrents of tears. But he bade her
+remember the lessons she had learned from his philosophy, and wishing
+to give her one more lesson, said in an almost expiring voice:
+
+"Approach nearer, Ninon; you see nothing left me but a sad memory of
+the pleasures that are leaving me. Their possession was not of long
+duration, and that is the only complaint I have to make against
+nature. But, alas! my regrets are vain. You who must survive me,
+utilize precious time, and have no scruples about the quantity of your
+pleasures, but only of their quality."
+
+Saying which, he immediately expired. The philosophical security
+exhibited by her father in his very last moments, inspired Ninon with
+the same calmness of spirit, and she bore his loss with equanimity,
+disdaining to exhibit any immoderate grief lest she dishonor his
+memory and render herself an unworthy daughter and pupil.
+
+The fortune left her by her father was not so considerable as Ninon
+had expected. It had been very much diminished by extravagance and
+speculation, but as she had in mind de la Rochefoucauld's maxim:
+"There are some good marriages, but no delicious ones," and did not
+contemplate ever wearing the chains of matrimony, she deposited her
+fortune in the sinking funds, reserving an income of about eight
+thousand livres per annum as sufficient to maintain her beyond the
+reach of want. From this time on she abandoned herself to a life of
+pleasure, well regulated, it must be confessed, and in strict
+accordance with her Epicurean ideas. Her light heartedness increased
+with her love and devotion to pleasure, which is not astonishing, as
+there are privileged souls who do not lose their tender emotions by
+such a pursuit, though those souls are rare. Ninon's unrestrained
+freedom, and the privilege she claimed to enjoy all the rights which
+men assumed, did not give her the slightest uneasiness. It was her
+lovers who became anxious unless they regulated their love according
+to the rules she established for them to follow, rules which it can
+not be denied, were held in as much esteem then as nowadays. The
+following anecdote will serve as an illustration:
+
+The Marquis de la Châtre had been one of her lovers for an
+unconscionably long period, but never seemed to cool in his fidelity.
+Duty, however, called him away from Ninon's arms, but he was
+distressed with the thought that his absence would be to his
+disadvantage. He was afraid to leave her lest some rival should appear
+upon the scene and dispossess him in her affections. Ninon vainly
+endeavored to remove his suspicions.
+
+"No, cruel one," he said, "you will forget and betray me. I know your
+heart, it alarms me, crushes me. It is still faithful to my love, I
+know, and I believe you are not deceiving me at this moment. But that
+is because I am with you and can personally talk of my love. Who will
+recall it to you when I am gone? The love you inspire in others,
+Ninon, is very different from the love you feel. You will always be in
+my heart, and absence will be to me a new fire to consume me; but to
+you, absence is the end of affection. Every object I shall imagine I
+see around you will be odious to me, but to you they will be
+interesting."
+
+Ninon could not deny that there was truth in the Marquis' logic, but
+she was too tender to assassinate his heart which she knew to be so
+loving. Being a woman she understood perfectly the art of
+dissimulation, which is a necessary accomplishment, a thousand
+circumstances requiring its exercise for the sake of her security,
+peace, and comfort. Moreover, she did not at the moment dream of
+deceiving him; there was no present occasion, nobody else she had in
+mind. Ninon thought rapidly, but could not find any reason for
+betraying him, and therefore assured him of her fidelity and
+constancy.
+
+Nevertheless, the amorous Marquis, who might have relied upon the
+solemn promise of his mistress, had it not been for the intense fears
+which were ever present in his mind, and becoming more violent as the
+hour for his departure drew nearer, required something more
+substantial than words. But what could he exact? Ah! an idea, a novel
+expedient occurred to his mind, one which he imagined would restrain
+the most obstinate inconstancy.
+
+"Listen, Ninon, you are without contradiction a remarkable woman. If
+you once do a thing you will stand to it. What will tend to quiet my
+mind and remove my fears, ought to be your duty to accept, because my
+happiness is involved and that is more to you than love; it is your
+own philosophy, Ninon. Now, I wish you to put in writing that you will
+remain faithful to me, and maintain the most inviolable fidelity. I
+will dictate it in the strongest form and in the most sacred terms
+known to human promises. I will not leave you until I have obtained
+such a pledge of your constancy, which is necessary to relieve my
+anxiety, and essential to my repose."
+
+Ninon vainly argued that this would be something too strange and
+novel, foolish, in fact, the Marquis was obstinate and finally
+overcame her remonstrances. She wrote and signed a written pledge
+such as no woman had ever executed, and fortified with this pledge,
+the Marquis hastened to respond to the call of duty.
+
+Two days had scarcely elapsed before Ninon was besieged by one of the
+most dangerous men of her acquaintance. Skilled in the art of love, he
+had often pressed his suit, but Ninon had other engagements and would
+not listen to him. But now, his rival being out of the field, he
+resumed his entreaties and increased his ardor. He was a man to
+inspire love, but Ninon resisted, though his pleading touched her
+heart. Her eyes at last betrayed her love and she was vanquished
+before she realized the outcome of the struggle.
+
+What was the astonishment of the conqueror, who was enjoying the
+fruits of his victory, to hear Ninon exclaim in a breathless voice,
+repeating it three times: "Ah! Ah! le bon billet qu'a la Châtre!" (Oh,
+the fine bond that la Châtre has.)
+
+Pressed for an explanation of the enigma, Ninon told him the whole
+story, which was too good to keep secret, and soon the "billet de la
+Châtre" became, in the mouth of everybody, a saying applied to things
+upon which it is not wise to rely. Voltaire, to preserve so charming
+an incident, has embalmed it in his comedy of la Prude, act I, scene
+III. Ninon merely followed the rule established by Madame de Sévigné:
+"Les femmes ont permission d'être faibles, et elles se servent sans
+scrupule de ce privilège."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+Ninon's Friendships
+
+
+Mademoiselle de l'Enclos never forgot a friend in a lover, indeed, the
+trait that stands out clear and strong in her character, is her whole
+hearted friendship for the men she loved, and she bestowed it upon
+them as long as they lived, for she outlived nearly all of them, and
+cherished their memories afterward. As has been said, Ninon de
+l'Enclos was Epicurean in the strictest sense, and did not rest her
+entire happiness on love alone, but included a friendship which went
+to the extent of making sacrifices. The men with whom she came in
+contact from time to time during her long life, were nothing to her
+from a pecuniary point of view, for she possessed an income
+sufficiently large to satisfy her wants and to maintain the social
+establishment she never neglected.
+
+There was never, either directly or indirectly, any money
+consideration asked or expected in payment of her favors, and the man
+who would have dared offer her money as a consideration for anything,
+would have met with scorn and contempt and been expelled from her
+house and society without ever being permitted to regain either. The
+natural wants of her heart and mind, and what she was pleased to call
+the natural gratifications of physical wants, were her mentors, and to
+them she listened, never dreaming of holding them at a pecuniary
+value.
+
+One of her dearest friends was Scarron, once the husband of Madame de
+Maintenon, the pious leader of a debased court and the saintly
+mistress of the king of France. In his younger days, Scarron
+contributed largely to the pleasures of the Oiseaux des Tournelles,
+the ecclesiastical collar he then wore not being sufficient to prevent
+his enjoying worldly pleasures.
+
+In the course of time Scarron fell ill, and was reduced to a dreadful
+condition, no one coming to his succor but Ninon. Like a tender,
+compassionate friend, she sympathized deeply with him, when he was
+carried to the suburb Saint Germain to try the effects of the baths as
+an alleviation of his pains. Scarron did not complain, on the
+contrary, he was cheerful and always gay even when suffering tortures.
+There was little left of him, however, but an indomitable spirit
+burning in a crushed tenement of mortal clay. Not being able to come
+to her, Ninon went to him, and passed entire days at his side. Not
+only that, she brought her friends with her and established a small
+court around his bed, thus cheering him in his pain and doing him a
+world of good, which finally enabled his spirit to triumph over his
+mortal shell.
+
+Instances might be multiplied, enough to fill a volume, of her
+devotion to her friends, whom she never abandoned and whom she was
+always ready with purse and counsel to aid in their difficulties. A
+curious instance is that of Nicolas Vauquelin, sieur de Desyvetaux,
+whom she missed from her circle for several days. Aware that he had
+been having some family troubles, and that his fortune was menaced,
+she became alarmed, thinking that perhaps some misfortune had come
+upon him, for which reason she resolved to seek him and help him out
+of his difficulties. But Ninon was mistaken in supposing that so wise
+and gay an Epicurean could be crushed by any sorrow or trouble.
+Desyvetaux was enjoying himself in so singular a fashion that it is
+worth telling.
+
+This illustrious Epicurean, finding one night a young girl in a
+fainting condition at his door, brought her into his house to succor
+her, moved by an impulse of humanity. But as soon as she had recovered
+her senses, the philosopher's heart was touched by her beauty. To
+please her benefactor the girl played several selections on a harp and
+accompanied the instrument with a charming and seductive voice.
+
+Desyvetaux, who was a passionate admirer of music, was captivated by
+this accomplishment, and suddenly conceived the desire to spend the
+rest of his days in the company of this charming singer. It was not
+difficult for a girl who had been making it her business to frequent
+the wineshops of the suburbs with a brother, earning a precarious
+living by singing and playing on the harp, to accept such a
+proposition, and consent to bestow happiness upon an excessively
+amorous man, who offered to share with her a luxurious and tranquil
+life in one of the finest residences in the suburb Saint Germain.
+
+Although most of his life had been passed at court as the governor of
+M. de Vendôme, and tutor of Louis XIII, he had always desired to lead
+a life of peace and quiet in retirement. The pleasures of a sylvan
+life which he had so often described in his lectures, ended by leading
+his mind in that direction. The young girl he found on his doorstep
+had offered him his first opportunity to have a Phyllis to his Corydon
+and he eagerly embraced it. Both yielded to the fancy, she dressed in
+the garb of a shepherdess, he playing the rôle of Corydon at the age
+of seventy years.
+
+Sometimes stretched out on a carpet of verdure, he listened to the
+enchanting music she drew from her instrument, or drank in the sweet
+voice of his shepherdess singing melodious pastorals. A flock of
+birds, charmed with this harmony, left their cages to caress with
+their wings, Dupuis' harp, or intoxicated with joy, fluttered down
+into her bosom. This little gallantry in which they had been trained
+was a delicious spectacle to the shepherd philosopher and intoxicated
+his senses. He fancied he was guiding with his mistress innumerable
+bands of intermingled sheep; their conversation was in tender eclogues
+composed by them both extemporaneously, the attractive surroundings
+inspiring them with poetry.
+
+Ninon was amazed when she found her "bon homme," as she called him, in
+the startlingly original disguise of a shepherd, a crook in his hand,
+a wallet hanging by his side, and a great flapping straw hat, trimmed
+with rose colored silk on his head. Her first impression was that he
+had taken leave of his senses, and she was on the point of shedding
+tears over the wreck of a once brilliant mind, when Desyvetaux,
+suspending his antics long enough to look about him, perceived her and
+rushed to her side with the liveliest expressions of joy. He removed
+her suspicions of his sanity by explaining his metamorphosis in a
+philosophical fashion:
+
+"You know, my dear Ninon, there are certain tastes and pleasures which
+find their justification in a certain philosophy when they bear all
+the marks of moral innocence. Nothing can be said against them but
+their singularity. There are no amusements less dangerous than those
+which do not resemble those generally indulged in by the multitude."
+
+Ninon was pleased with the amiable companion of her old friend. Her
+figure, her mental attainments, and her talents enchanted her, and
+Desyvetaux, who appeared in a ridiculous light when she first saw him
+in his masquerade, now seemed to her to be on the road to happiness.
+She made no attempt to persuade him to return to his former mode of
+life, which she could not avoid at this moment, however, as
+considering more agreeable than the new one he had adopted. But what
+could she offer in the way of superior seductive pleasures to a pair
+who had tasted pure and natural enjoyments? The vain amusements and
+allurements of the world have no sympathy with anything but
+dissipation, in which, the mind, yielding to the fleeting seductions
+of art, leaves the heart empty as soon as the illusion disappears.
+
+The strange conduct of Desyvetaux gave birth to numerous reflections
+of this nature in Ninon's mind, but she did not cease to be his
+friend, on the contrary, she entered into the spirit of his simple
+life and visited him from time to time to enjoy the spectacle of such
+a tender masquerade which Desyvetaux continued up to the time of his
+death. It gave Mademoiselle Dupuis nearly as much celebrity as her
+lover attained, for when the end came, she obeyed his desire to play a
+favorite dance on her harp, to enable his soul to take flight in the
+midst of its delicious harmony. It should be mentioned, that
+Desyvetaux wore in his hat as long as he lived, a yellow ribbon, "out
+of love for the gentle Ninon who gave it to me."
+
+Socrates advises persons of means to imitate the swans, which,
+realizing the benefit of an approaching death, sing while in their
+death agony. The Abbé Brantôme relates an interesting story of the
+death of Mademoiselle de Lineul, the elder, one of the queen's
+daughters, which resembles that of Desyvetaux.
+
+"When the hour of her death had arrived," says Brantôme, "Mademoiselle
+sent for her valet, Julian, who could play the violin to perfection.
+'Julian,' quoth she, 'take your violin and play on it until you see me
+dead--for I am going--the Defeat of the Swiss, and play it as well as
+you know how; and when you shall reach the words "tout est perdu,"
+play it over four or five times as piteously as you can:' which the
+other did. And when he came to 'tout est perdu' she sang it over
+twice; then turning to the other side of the couch, she said to those
+who stood around: 'Tout est perdu à ce coup et à bon escient;' all is
+lost this time, sure.'"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+Some of Ninon's Lovers
+
+
+Notwithstanding her love of pleasure, and her admiration for the
+society of men, Ninon was never vulgar or common in the distribution
+of her favors, but selected those upon whom she decided to bestow
+them, with the greatest care and discrimination. As has been already
+said, she discovered in early life, that women were at a discount, and
+she resolved to pursue the methods of men in the acceptance or
+rejection of friendship, and in distributing her favors and
+influences. As she herself declared:
+
+"I soon saw that women were put off with the most frivolous and unreal
+privileges, while every solid advantage was retained by the stronger
+sex. From that moment I determined on abandoning my own sex and
+assuming that of the men."
+
+So well did she carry out this determination that she was regarded by
+her masculine intimates as one of themselves, and whatever pleasures
+they enjoyed in her society, were enjoyed upon the same principle as
+they would have delighted in a good dinner, an agreeable theatrical
+performance, or exquisite music.
+
+To her and to all her associates, love was a taste emanating from the
+senses, a blind sentiment which assumes no merit in the object which
+gives it birth, as is the case of hunger, thirst, and the like. In a
+word, it was merely a caprice the domination of which depends upon
+ourselves, and is subject to the discomforts and regrets attendant
+upon repletion or indulgence.
+
+After her first experience with de Coligny, which was an abandonment
+of her cold philosophy for a passionate attachment she thought would
+endure forever, Ninon cast aside all that element in love which is
+connected with passion and extravagant sentiment, and adhered to her
+philosophical understanding of it, and kept it in its proper place in
+the category of natural appetites. To illustrate her freedom from
+passionate attachments in the distribution of her favors, the case of
+her friend Scarron will give an insight into her philosophy. Scarron
+had received numerous favors from her, and being one of her select
+"Birds," who had always agreed with la Rochefoucauld that, "There are
+many good marriages but none that are delicious," she assumed that her
+friend would never entangle himself in the bonds of matrimony. But he
+did and to his sorrow.
+
+When Ninon had returned to Paris after a long sojourn with the Marquis
+de Villarceaux, she found to her astonishment that Scarron had married
+the amiable but ignoble Mademoiselle d'Aubigne. This young lady was in
+a situation which precluded all hope of her ever attaining social
+eminence, but aspiring to rise, notwithstanding her common origin, she
+married Scarron as the first step upon the social ladder. Without
+realizing that this woman was to become the celebrated Madame de
+Maintenon, mistress of the king and the real power behind the throne,
+Ninon took her in charge and they soon became the closest and most
+affectionate friends, always together even occupying the same bed.
+Ninon's tender friendship for the husband continued in spite of his
+grave violation of the principles of his accepted philosophy, and when
+he was deserted, sick and helpless, she went to him and brought him
+cheer and comfort.
+
+Ninon was so little imbued with jealousy that when she discovered a
+liaison between her own lover, Marquis de Villarceaux and her friend,
+Madame Scarron, she was not even angry. The two were carrying on their
+amour in secret, and as they supposed without Ninon's knowledge, whose
+presence, indeed, they deemed a restraint upon their freedom of
+action. The Marquis considered himself a traitor to Ninon, and Madame
+Scarron stood in fear of her reproaches for her betrayal. But Ninon,
+instead of taking either of them to task, as she would have been
+justified in doing, gently remonstrated with them for their secrecy,
+and by her kindness reassured both of them and relieved them from
+their embarrassment, making them understand that she desired nothing
+so much as their happiness. Both the Marquis and his mistress made
+Ninon their confidante, and thereafter lived in perfect amity until
+the lovers grew tired of each other, Madame Scarron aiming higher than
+an ordinary Marquis, now that she saw her way clear to mounting the
+social ladder.
+
+It was perhaps due to Ninon's kindness in the Villarceaux episode,
+that enabled her to retain the friendship of Madame de Maintenon when
+the latter had reached the steps of the throne. The mistress of
+royalty endeavored to persuade Ninon to appear at court but there was
+too great a difference in temper and constitution between the two
+celebrated women to admit of any close relations. Ninon made use of
+the passion of love for the purpose of pleasure only, while her more
+exalted rival made it subservient to her ambitious projects, and did
+not hesitate with that view to cloak her licentious habits beneath the
+mantle of religion, and add hypocrisy to frailty. The income of Ninon
+de l'Enclos was agreeably and judiciously spent in the society of men
+of wit and letters, but the revenues of the Marchioness de Maintenon
+were squandered on the useless decoration of her own person, or
+hoarded for the purpose of elevating into rank and notice an
+insignificant family, who had no other claim to such distinction than
+that derived from the easy honesty of a female relation, and the
+dissolute extravagance of a vain and licentious sovereign.
+
+While Ninon de l'Enclos was receiving and encouraging the attentions
+of the most distinguished men of her time, literati, nobles, warriors,
+statesmen, and sages, in her house in the Rue des Tournelles, the
+mistress of the sovereign, the dear friend who had betrayed her to the
+Marquis de Villarceaux, was swallowing, at Versailles, the adulations
+of degraded courtiers of every rank and profession. There were met
+together there the vain and the ambitious, the designing and the
+foolish, the humblest and the proudest of those who, whether proud or
+humble, or ambitious, or vain, or crafty, were alike the devoted
+servants of the monarch or the monarch's mistress--princes, cardinals,
+bishops, dukes and every kind of nobility, excisemen and priests,
+keepers of the royal conscience and necessary--all ministers of filth,
+each in his degree, from the secretaries of state to the lowest
+underlings in office--clerks of the ordnance, victualing, stamps,
+customs, colonies, and postoffice, farmers and receivers general,
+judges and cooks, confessors and every other caterer to the royal
+appetite. This was the order of things that Ninon de l'Enclos was
+contending against, and that she succeeded by methods that must be
+considered saintly compared with the others, stands recorded in the
+pages of history.
+
+After Ninon had suffered from the indiscretion of the lover who made
+public the story of the famous pledge given la Châtre, she lost her
+fancy for the recreant, and though friendly, refused any closer tie.
+He knew that he had done Ninon an injury and begged to be reinstated
+in her favor. He was of charming manners and fascinating in his
+pleading, but he made no impression on her heart. She agreed to pardon
+him for his folly and declined to consider the matter further. Nor
+would she return to the conversation, although he persisted in
+referring to the matter as one he deeply regretted. When he was
+departing after Ninon had assured him of her pardon, she ran after him
+and called out as he was descending the stairs: "At least, Marquis,
+we have not been reconciled."
+
+Her good qualities were embalmed in the literature of the day, very
+few venturing to lampoon her. Those who did so were greeted with so
+much derisive laughter that they were ashamed to appear in society
+until the storm had blown over.
+
+M. de Tourielle, a member of the French Academy, and a very learned
+man, became enamored of her and his love-making assumed a curious
+phase. To show her that he was worthy of her consideration, he deemed
+it incumbent upon him to read her long dissertations on scientific
+subjects, and bored her incessantly with a translation of the orations
+of Demosthenes, which he intended dedicating to her in an elaborate
+preface. This was more than Ninon could bear with equanimity--a lover
+with so much erudition, and his prosy essays, appealed more to her
+sense of humor than to her sentiments of love, and he was laughed out
+of her social circle. This angered the Academician and he thought to
+revenge himself by means of an epigram in which he charged Ninon with
+admiring figures of rhetoric more than a sensible academic discourse
+full of Greek and Latin quotations. It would have proved the ruin of
+the poor man had Ninon not come to his rescue, and explained to him
+the difference between learning and love. After which he became
+sensible and wrote some very good books.
+
+It should be understood that Ninon had no secrets in which her merry
+and wise "Birds" did not share. She confided to them all her love
+affairs, gave them the names of her suitors, in fact, every wooer was
+turned over to this critical, select society, as a committee of
+investigation into quality and merit both of mind and body. In this
+way she was protected from the unworthy, and when she made a
+selection, they respected her freedom of choice, carefully guarding
+her lover and making him one of themselves after the fitful fever was
+over. They were all graduates in her school, good fellows, and had
+accepted Ninon's philosophy without question.
+
+Her lovers were always men of rank and station or of high talents, but
+she was caught once by the dazzle of a famous dancer named Pécour, who
+pleased her exceedingly, and who became the fortunate rival of the Duc
+de Choiseul, afterward a marshal of France. It happened that Choiseul
+was more remarkable for his valor than for his probity and solid
+virtues, and could not inspire in Ninon's heart anything but the
+sterile sentiments of esteem and respect. He was certainly worthy of
+these, but he was too cold in his amorous desires to please Ninon.
+
+"He is a very worthy gentleman," said she, "but he never gives me a
+chance to love him."
+
+The frequent visits of Pécour excited the jealousy of the warrior, but
+he did not dare complain, not knowing whether things had reached a
+climax and fearing that if he should mention the matter he might help
+them along instead of stopping them. One day, however, he attempted to
+goad his unworthy rival into some admission, and received a response
+that was enough to settle his doubts.
+
+Pécour was in the habit of wearing a costume much resembling that of
+the military dandies of the period. Choiseul meeting him in this
+equivocal garb, proceeded to be funny at his expense by putting to him
+all sorts of ironical and embarrassing questions. But Pécour felt all
+the vanity of a successful rival and was good natured. Then the Duke
+began to make sneering remarks which roused the dancer's anger.
+
+"Pray, what flag are you fighting under, and what body do you
+command?" asked Monseigneur with a sarcastic smile.
+
+Quick as a flash came the answer which gave the Duke an inkling into
+the situation.
+
+"Je commande un corps où vous servez depuis longtemps," replied
+Pécour.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+Ninon's Lovers--Continued
+
+
+A counter attraction has been referred to in speaking of the Hôtel
+Rambouillet, where a fashionable court was established for the purpose
+of drawing away from Ninon the elite who flocked to her standard.
+Mademoiselle de Scudery gives a fine description of this little court
+at Rambouillet in her romance, entitled "Cyrus." There was not and
+could not be any rivalry between the court in the Rue des Tournelles
+and that at Rambouillet, for the reason that Ninon's coterie consisted
+of men exclusively, while that of Rambouillet was thronged with women.
+But this, quite naturally, occasioned much envy and jealousy among the
+ladies who devised all sorts of entertainments to attract masculine
+society. One of their performances was the famous "Julia Garland," so
+named in honor of Mademoiselle de Rambouillet, who was known by the
+name of "Julie d'Angennes." Each one selected a favorite flower, wrote
+a sonnet in its praise, and when all were ready, they stood around
+Mademoiselle de Rambouillet in a circle and alternately recited the
+poem, the reward for the best one being the favor of some fair lady.
+Among those who were drawn to the Hôtel Rambouillet by this pleasing
+entertainment was the Duke d'Enghien, afterward known as the "Great
+Condé," a prince of the highest renown as a victorious warrior. He
+was a great acquisition, and the Garland Play was repeated every night
+in the expectation that his pleasure would continue, and the constant
+attraction prove adequate to hold him. Once or twice, however, was
+sufficient for the Duke, its constant repetition becoming flat and
+tiresome. He did not scruple to express his dissatisfaction with a
+society that could not originate something new. He was a broad minded
+man, with a comprehensive knowledge, but had little taste for poetry
+and childish entertainments. But the good ladies of Rambouillet,
+unable to devise any other entertainment, persisted in their Garland
+Play, until the Duke's human nature rebelled at the monotony, and he
+begged his friends de Moissens and Saint-Evremond to suggest some
+relief. They immediately brought him in touch with the Birds of the
+Tournelles, with the result that he abandoned the Hôtel Rambouillet
+and found scope for his social desires at Ninon's house and in her
+more attractive society. The conquest of his heart followed that of
+his intelligence, the hero of Rocroi being unable to resist a
+tenderness which is the glory of a lover and the happiness of his
+mistress.
+
+It is a curious fact, known to some, that all the heroes of Bellona
+are not expert in the wars of Venus, the strongest and most valiant
+souls being weak in combats in which valor plays an unimportant part.
+The poet Chaulieu says upon this point:
+
+"Pour avoir la valeur d'Hercule,
+On n'est pas obligé d'en avoir la vigueur."
+
+(To have the valor of Hercules, one need not have his vigor.)
+
+The young Prince was born to attain immortal glory on the field of
+Mars. To that all his training had tended, but notwithstanding his
+robust physique, and the indicia of great strength with which nature
+had endowed him, he was a weakling in the field of Venus. He came
+within the category of a Latin proverb with which Ninon was familiar:
+"Pilosus aut fortis, aut libidinosus." (A hairy man is either strong
+or sensual.) Wherefore, one day when Ninon was enjoying his society,
+she looked at him narrowly and exclaimed: "Ah, Monseigneur, il faut
+que vous soyez bien fort!" (Ah, Monseigneur, you must be very strong.)
+
+Notwithstanding this, the two dwelt together for a long time in
+perfect harmony, the intellectual benefit the Duke derived from the
+close intimacy being no less than the pleasure he derived from her
+affection. Naturally inclined to deserve the merit and esteem as well
+as the love of her admirers, Ninon used all the influence she
+possessed to regulate their lives and to inspire them with the true
+desire to perform faithfully the duties of their rank and station.
+What power over her intimates does not possess a charming woman
+disembarrassed of conventional prudery, but vested with grace, high
+sentiments, and mental attainments! It was through the gentle exercise
+of this power that the famous Aspasia graved in the soul of Pericles
+the seductive art of eloquent language, and taught him the most solid
+maxims of politics, maxims of which he made so noble a use.
+
+The young Duke, penetrated with love and esteem for Ninon, passed at
+her side every moment he could steal away from the profound studies
+and occupations required by his rank and position. Although he
+afterward became the Prince de Condé, the Lion of his time, and the
+bulwark of France, he never ceased expressing for her the liveliest
+gratitude and friendship. Whenever he met her equipage in the streets
+of Paris, he never failed to descend from his own and go to pay her
+the most affectionate compliments.
+
+The Prince de Marsillac, afterward the Duke de la Rochefoucauld, less
+philosophical then than later in life, and who prided himself on his
+acquaintance with all the vices and follies of youth, could not long
+withhold his admiration for the solid and estimable qualities he
+perceived in Ninon, whom he often saw in the company of the Duke
+d'Enghein. The result of his admiration was that he formed a tender
+attachment which lasted as long as he lived. It was Ninon who
+continued the good work begun by Madame de La Fayette, who confessed
+that her social relations with la Rochefoucauld had been the means of
+embellishing her mind, and that in compensation for this great service
+she had reformed his heart. Whatever share Madame de La Fayette may
+have had in reforming the heart of this great man, it is certain that
+Ninon de l'Enclos had much to do with reforming his morals and
+elevating his mind up to the point it is evident he reached, to judge
+from his "Maxims," in which the human heart is bared as with a scalpel
+in the most skilfully devised epigrams that never cease to hold the
+interest of every reader.
+
+Chapelle, the most celebrated voluptuary in Paris, did everything in
+his power to overcome Ninon's repugnance, but without success. There
+was nothing lacking in his mental attainments, for he was a poet of
+very high order, inimitable in his style; moreover, he was presentable
+in his person. Yet he could not make the slightest impression on
+Ninon's heart. He openly declared his love, and, receiving constant
+rebuffs, resolved to have revenge and overcome her resistance by
+punishing her. This he attempted to do in a very singular manner
+without regard to consistency.
+
+All Paris knew his verses in which he did not conceal his ardent love
+for Ninon, and in which were expressed the highest admiration for her
+estimable qualities and the depth of her philosophy. He now proceeded
+to take back everything good he had said about her and made fun of her
+love, her friendship, and her attainments. He ridiculed her in every
+possible manner, even charging up against her beauty, her age. A verse
+or so will enable the reader to understand his methods:
+
+"Il ne faut pas qu'on s'étonne,
+Si souvent elle raisonne
+De la sublime vertu
+Dont Platon fut revêtu:
+Car à bien compter son âge,
+Elle peut avoir vécu
+Avec ce grand personnage."
+
+Or, substantially in the English language:
+
+Let no one be surprised,
+If she should be advised
+Of the virtue most renowned
+In Plato to be found:
+For, counting up her age,
+She lived, 'tis reason sound,
+With that great personage.
+
+Ninon had no rancor in her heart toward any one, much less against an
+unsuccessful suitor, hence she only laughed at Chapelle's effusions
+and all Paris laughed with her. The truth is, la Rochefoucauld had
+impressed her mind with that famous saying of his: "Old age is the
+hell of women," and not fearing any hell, reference to her age neither
+alarmed her, nor caused the slightest flurry in her peaceful life. She
+was too philosophical to regret the loss of what she did not esteem of
+any value, and saw Chapelle slipping away from her with tranquillity
+of mind. It was only during moments of gayety when she abandoned
+herself to the play of an imagination always laughing and fertile,
+that she repeated the sacrilegious wish of the pious king of Aragon,
+who wished that he had been present at the moment of creation, when,
+among the suggestions he could have given Providence, he would have
+advised him to put the wrinkles of old age where the gods of Pagandom
+had located the feeble spot in Achilles.
+
+If Ninon ever felt a pang on account of the ungenerous conduct of
+Chapelle, his disciple, the illustrious Abbé de Chaulieu, the Anacreon
+of the age, who was called, when he made his entrée into the world of
+letters "the poet of good fellowship," more than compensated her for
+the injury done by his pastor. The Abbé was the Prior of Fontenay,
+whither Ninon frequently accompanied Madame the Duchess de Bouillon
+and the Chevalier d'Orléans. The Duchess loved to joke at the expense
+of the Abbé, and twit him about his wasted talents, which were more
+adapted to love than to his present situation. It may be that the
+worthy Abbé, after thinking over seriously what was intended to be a
+mere pleasantry, concluded that Madame the Duchess was right, and that
+he possessed some talent in the direction of love. However that might,
+have been, it is certain that he had cast an observant and critical
+eye on Ninon, and he now openly paid her court, not unsuccessfully it
+should be known.
+
+The Abbé Gedoyn was her last lover so far as there is any account of
+her amours. The story is related by Remond, surnamed "The Greek," and
+must be taken with a grain of salt as Ninon was at that time
+seventy-nine years of age. This Remond, notwithstanding her age, had
+made violent love to Ninon without meeting with any success. Perhaps
+he was trying an experiment, being a learned man, anxious to ascertain
+when the fire of passion became extinct in the human breast. Ninon
+evidently suspected his ardent professions for she refused to listen
+to him and forbade his visits altogether.
+
+"I was the dupe of his Greek erudition," she explained, "so I banished
+him from my school. He was always wrong in his philosophy of the
+world, and was unworthy of as sensible a society as mine." She often
+added to this: "After God had made man, he repented him; I feel the
+same about Rémond."
+
+But to return to the Abbé Gedoyn: he left the Jesuits with the Abbé
+Fraguier in 1694, that is to say, when Mademoiselle de l'Enclos was
+seventy-eight years of age. Both of them immediately made the
+acquaintance of Ninon and Madame de la Salière, and, astonished at the
+profound merit they discovered, deemed it to their advantage to
+frequent their society for the purpose of adding to their talents
+something which the study of the cloister and experience in the king's
+cabinet itself had never offered them. Abbé Gedoyn became particularly
+attached to Mademoiselle de l'Enclos, whose good taste and
+intellectual lights he considered such sure and safe guides. His
+gratitude soon received the additions of esteem and admiration, and
+the young disciple felt the growth of desires which it is difficult to
+believe were real, but which became so pressing, that they revived in
+a heart nearly extinct a feeble spark of that fire with which it had
+formerly burned. Mademoiselle de l'Enclos refused to accede to the
+desires of her lover until she was fully eighty years of age, a term
+which did not cool the ardor of the amorous Abbé, who waited
+impatiently and on her eightieth birthday compelled his benefactress
+to keep her word.
+
+This incident recalls the testimony of a celebrated Countess of
+Salisbury, who was called to testify as an expert upon the subject of
+love in a celebrated criminal case that was tried over a hundred years
+ago in the English House of Lords. The woman correspondent was of an
+age when human passion is supposed to be extinct, and her counsel was
+attempting to prove that fact to relieve her from the charge. The
+testimony of the aged Countess, who was herself over seventy-five
+years of age, was very unsatisfactory, and the court put this question
+to her demanding an explicit answer.
+
+"Madame," he inquired, "at what age does the sentiment, passion, or
+desire of love cease in the female heart?"
+
+Her ladyship, who had lived long in high society and had been
+acquainted with all of the gallants and coquettes of the English court
+for nearly two generations, and who, herself, had sometimes been
+suspected of not having been averse to a little waywardness, looked
+down at her feet for a moment thoughtfully, then raising her eyes and
+locking squarely into those of the judge, answered:
+
+"My Lord, you will have to ask a woman older than I."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+The Villarceaux Affair
+
+
+Party politics raged around Ninon, her "Birds" being men of high rank
+and leaders with a large following. They were all her dearest friends,
+however, and no matter how strong personal passion was beyond her
+immediate presence, her circle was a neutral ground which no one
+thought of violating. It required her utmost influence and tenderness,
+however, to prevent outbreaks, but her unvarying sweetness of temper
+and disposition to all won their hearts into a truce for her sake.
+There were continual plots hatched against the stern rule of
+Richelieu, cabals and conspiracies without number were entered upon,
+but none of them resulted in anything. Richelieu knew very well what
+was going on, and he realized perfectly that Ninon's drawing-rooms
+were the center of every scheme concocted to drag him down and out of
+the dominant position he was holding against the combined nobility of
+France. But he never took a step toward suppressing her little court
+as a hot-bed of restlessness, he rather encouraged her by his silence
+and his indifference. Complaints of her growing coterie of uneasy
+spirits brought nothing from him but: "As long as they find amusements
+they are not dangerous." It was the forerunner of Napoleon's idea
+along the same line: "We must amuse the people; then they will not
+meddle with our management of the government."
+
+It is preposterous to think of this minister of peace, this restless
+prelate, half soldier, half pastor, meddling in all these cabals and
+seditious schemes organized for his own undoing, but nevertheless, he
+was really the fomenter of all of them. They were his devices for
+preventing the nobility from combining against him. He set one cabal
+to watch another, and there was never a conspiracy entered into that
+he did not prepare a similar conspiracy through his numerous secret
+agents and thus split into harmless nothings and weak attempts what
+would have been fatal to a continuance of his power. His tricks were
+nothing but the ordinary everyday methods of the modern ward
+politician making the dear people believe he is doing one thing when
+he is doing another. The stern man pitted one antagonist against
+another until both sued for peace and pardon. The nobility were honest
+in their likes and dislikes, but they did not understand double
+dealings and therefore the craft of Richelieu was not even suspected.
+
+Soon he corrupted by his secret intrigues the fidelity of the nobles
+and destroyed the integrity of the people. Then it was, as Cyrano
+says: "The world saw billows of scum vomited upon the royal purple and
+upon that of the church." Vile rhyming poets, without merit or virtue,
+sold their villainous productions to the enemies of the state to be
+used in goading the people to riot. Obscene and filthy vaudevilles,
+defamatory libels and infamous slanders were as common as bread, and
+were hurled back and forth as evidence of an internecine strife which
+was raging around the wearer of the Roman scarlet, who was thereby
+justified in continuing his ecclesiastical rule to prevent the
+wrecking of the throne.
+
+Ninon had always been an ardent supporter of the throne, and on that
+account imagined herself to be the enemy of Richelieu. There were many
+others who believed the same thing. They did not know that should the
+great Cardinal withdraw his hand for a single moment there would not
+be any more throne. When the human hornets around him became annoying
+he was accustomed to pretend to withdraw his sustaining hand, then the
+throne would tremble and totter, but he always came to the rescue;
+indeed, there was no other man who could rescue it. Cabals, plots, and
+conspiracies became so thick around Ninon at one period that she was
+frightened. Scarron's house became a rendezvous for the factious and
+turbulent. Madame Scarron was aiming at the throne, that is, she was
+opening the way to capture the heart of the king. This was too much
+for Ninon, who was more modest in her ambitions, and she fled
+frightened.
+
+The Marquis de Villarceaux received her with open arms at his château
+some distance from Paris, and that was her home for three years. There
+were loud protests at this desertion from her coterie of friends, and
+numerous dark threats were uttered against the gallant Marquis who had
+thus captured the queen of the "Birds," but Ninon explained her
+reason in such a plausible manner that their complaints subsided into
+good-natured growls. She hoped to prevent a political conflagration
+emanating from her social circle by scattering the firebrands, and she
+succeeded admirably. The Marquis was constantly with her, permitting
+nobody to intervene between them, and provided her with a perpetual
+round of amusements that made the time pass very quickly. Moreover,
+she was faithful to the Marquis, so wonderful a circumstance that her
+friend and admirer wrote an elegy upon that circumstance, in which he
+draws a picture of the pleasures of the ancients in ruralizing, but
+reproaches Ninon for indulging in a passion for so long a period to
+the detriment of her other friends and admirers. But Ninon was happy
+in attaining the summit of her desire, which was to defeat Madame
+Scarron, her rival in the affections of the Marquis, keeping the
+latter by her side for three whole years as has already been said.
+
+However delighted Ninon may have been with this arrangement, the
+Marquis, himself, did not repose upon a bed of roses. The jealousy of
+the "Birds" gave him no respite, he being obliged in honor to respond
+to their demands for an explanation of his conduct in carrying off
+their leader, generally insisting upon the so-called field of honor as
+the most appropriate place for giving a satisfactory answer. They even
+invaded his premises until they forced him to make them some
+concessions in the way of permission to see the object of their
+admiration, and to share in her society. The Marquis was proud of his
+conquest, the very idea of a three years' tête à tête with the most
+volatile heart in France being sufficient to justify him in boasting
+of his prowess, but whenever he ventured to do so a champion on the
+part of Ninon always stood ready to make him either eat his words or
+fight to maintain them.
+
+Madame Scarron, whom he so basely deserted for the superior charms of
+her friend Ninon, often gave him a bad quarter of an hour. When she
+became the mistress of the king and, as Madame de Maintenon, really
+held the reins of power, visions of the Bastile thronged his brain. He
+knew perfectly well that he had scorned the charms of Madame Scarron,
+who believed them irresistible, and that he deserved whatever
+punishment she might inflict upon him. She might have procured a
+lettre de cachet, had him immured in a dungeon or his head removed
+from his shoulders as easily as order a dinner, but she did nothing to
+gratify a spirit of revenge, utterly ignoring his existence.
+
+Added to these trifling circumstances, trifling in comparison with
+what follows, was the furious jealousy of his wife, Madame la
+Marquise. She was violently angry and did not conceal her hatred for
+the woman who had stolen her husband's affections. The Marquise was a
+trifle vulgar and common in her manner of manifesting her displeasure,
+but the Marquis, a very polite and affable gentleman, did not pay the
+slightest attention to his wife's daily recriminations, but continued
+to amuse himself with the charming Ninon.
+
+Under such circumstances each was compelled to have a separate social
+circle, the Marquis entertaining his friends with the adorable Ninon
+as the center of attraction, and Madame la Marquise doing her best to
+offer counter attractions. Somehow, Ninon drew around her all the most
+desirable partis among the flower of the nobility and wits, leaving
+the social circle managed by la Marquise to languish for want of
+stamina. It was a constant source of annoyance to the Marquise to see
+her rival's entertainments so much in repute and her own so poorly
+attended, and she was at her wits' end to devise something that would
+give them éclat. One of her methods, and an impromptu scene at one of
+her drawing-rooms, will serve to show the reason why Madame la
+Marquise was not in good repute and why she could not attract the
+élite of Paris to her entertainments.
+
+La Marquise was a very vain, moreover, a very ignorant woman, a
+"nouvelle riche" in fact, or what might be termed in modern parlance
+"shoddy," without tact, sense, or savoir faire. One day at a grand
+reception, some of her guests desired to see her young son, of whom
+she was very proud, and of whose talents and virtues she was always
+boasting. He was sent for and came into the presence accompanied by
+his tutor, an Italian savant who never left his side. From praising
+his beauty of person, they passed to his mental qualities. Madame la
+Marquise, enchanted at the caresses her son was receiving and aiming
+to create a sensation by showing off his learning, took it into her
+head to have his tutor put him through an examination in history.
+
+"Interrogate my son upon some of his recent lessons in history," said
+she to the tutor, who was not at all loth to show his own attainments
+by the brilliancy of his pupil.
+
+"Come, now, Monsieur le Marquis," said the tutor with alacrity, "Quem
+habuit successorem Belus rex Assiriorum?" (Whom did Belus, king of the
+Assyrians, have for successor?)
+
+It so happened that the tutor had taught the boy to pronounce the
+Latin language after the Italian fashion. Wherefore, when the lad
+answered "Ninum," who was really the successor of Belus, king of the
+Assyrians, he pronounced the last two letters "um" like the French
+nasal "on," which gave the name of the Assyrian king the same sound as
+that of Ninon de l'Enclos, the terrible bête noir of the jealous
+Marquise. This was enough to set her off into a spasm of fury against
+the luckless tutor, who could not understand why he should be so
+berated over a simple question and its correct answer. The Marquise
+not understanding Latin, and guided only by the sound of the answer,
+which was similar to the name of her hated rival, jumped at the
+conclusion that he was answering some question about Ninon de
+l'Enclos.
+
+"You are giving my son a fine education," she snapped out before all
+her guests, "by entertaining him with the follies of his father. From
+the answer of the young Marquis I judge of the impertinence of your
+question. Go, leave my sight, and never enter it again."
+
+The unfortunate tutor vainly protested that he did not comprehend her
+anger, that he meant no affront, that there was no other answer to be
+made than "Ninum," unfortunately, again pronouncing the word "Ninon,"
+which nearly sent the lady into a fit of apoplexy with rage at hearing
+the tabooed name repeated in her presence. The incensed woman carried
+the scene to a ridiculous point, refusing to listen to reason or
+explanation.
+
+"No, he said 'Ninon,' and Ninon it was."
+
+The story spread all over Paris, and when it reached Ninon, she
+laughed immoderately, her friends dubbing her "The successor of
+Belus." Ninon told Molière the ridiculous story and he turned it to
+profit in one of his comedies in the character of Countess
+d'Escarbagnas.
+
+At the expiration of three years, peace had come to France after a
+fashion, the cabals were not so frequent and the rivalry between the
+factions not so bitter. Whatever differences there had been were
+patched up or smoothed over. Ninon's return to the house in the Rue
+des Tournelles was hailed with joy by her "Birds," who received her as
+one returned from the dead. Saint-Evremond composed an elegy beginning
+with these lines:
+
+Chère Philis, qu'êtes vous devenues?
+Cet enchanteur qui vous a retenue
+Depuis trois ans par un charme nouveau
+Vous retient-il en quelque vieux château?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+The Marquis de Sévigné
+
+
+It has been attempted to cast odium upon the memory of Mademoiselle de
+l'Enclos because of her connection with the second Marquis de Sévigné,
+son of the celebrated Madame de Sévigné, whose letters have been read
+far and wide by those who fancy they can find something in them with
+reference to the morals and practices of the court of Versailles
+during her period.
+
+The Marquis de Sévigné, by a vitiated taste quite natural in men of
+weak powers, had failed to discover in a handsome woman, spirited,
+perhaps of too jealous a nature or disposition to be esteemed, the
+proper sentiments, or sentiments strong enough to retain his
+affections. He implored Ninon to aid him in preserving her affections
+and to teach him how to secure her love. Ninon undertook to give him
+instructions in the art of captivating women's hearts, to show him the
+nature of love and its operations, and to give him an insight into the
+nature of women. The Marquis profited by these lessons to fall in love
+with Ninon, finding her a thousand times more charming than his
+actress or his princess. Madame de Sévigné's letter referring to the
+love of her son for Ninon testifies by telling him plainly "Ninon
+spoiled your father," that this passion was not so much unknown to
+her as it was a matter of indifference.
+
+The young Chevalier de Vassé often gave brilliant receptions in honor
+of Ninon at Saint Cloud, which the Marquis de Sévigné always attended
+as the mutual friend of both. De Vassé was well acquainted with
+Ninon's peculiarities and knew that the gallantry of such a man as de
+Sévigné was a feeble means of retaining the affections of a heart that
+was the slave of nothing but its own fugitive desires. But he was a
+man devoted to his friends and, being Epicurean in his philosophy, he
+did not attempt to interfere with the affection he perceived growing
+between Ninon and his friend. It never occurred to the Marquis that he
+was guilty of a betrayal of friendship by paying court to Ninon, and
+the latter took the Marquis' attentions as a matter of course without
+considering the ingratitude of her conduct. She rather flattered
+herself at having been sufficiently attractive to capture a man of de
+Seine's family distinction. She had captured the heart of de Soigné,
+the father, and had received so many animadversions upon her conduct
+from Madame de Sévigné, that it afforded her great pleasure to "spoil"
+the son as she had the father.
+
+But her satisfaction was short-lived, for she had the chagrin to learn
+soon after her conquest that de Sévigné had perished on the field of
+honor at the hands of Chevalier d'Albret. Her sorrow was real, of
+course, but the fire lighted by the senses is small and not enduring,
+and when the occasion arises regret is not eternalized, besides there
+were others waiting with impatience. His successful rival out of the
+way, de Vassé supposed he had a clear field, but he did not attain his
+expected happiness. He was no longer pleasing to Ninon and she did no:
+hesitate to make him understand that he could never hope to win her
+heart. According to her philosophy there is nothing so shameful in a
+tender friendship as the art of dissimulation.
+
+As has been said, much odium has been cast upon Mademoiselle de
+l'Enclos in this de Sévigné matter. It all grew out of the dislike of
+Madame de Sévigné for a woman who attracted even her own husband and
+son from her side and heart, and for whom her dearest friends
+professed the most intimate attachment. Madame de Grignan, the proud,
+haughty daughter of the house of de Sévigné, did not scruple to array
+herself on the side of Mademoiselle de l'Enclos with Madame de
+Coulanges, another bright star among the noble and respectable
+families of France.
+
+"Women have the privilege of being weak," says Madame de Sévigné, "and
+they make use of that privilege without scruple."
+
+Women had never, before the time of Ninon, exercised their rights of
+weakness to such an unlimited extent. There was neither honor nor
+honesty to be found among them. They were common to every man who
+attracted their fancy without regard to fidelity to any one in
+particular. The seed sown by the infamous Catherine de Medici, the
+utter depravity of the court of Charles IX, and the profligacy of
+Henry IV, bore an astonishing supply of bitter fruit. The love of
+pleasure had, so to speak, carried every woman off her feet, and there
+was no limit to their abuses. Mademoiselle de l'Enclos, while devoting
+herself to a life of pleasure, followed certain philosophical rules
+and regulations which removed from the unrestrained freedom of the
+times the stigma of commonness and conferred something of
+respectability upon practices that nowadays would be considered
+horribly immoral, but which then were regarded as nothing uncommon,
+nay, were legitimate and proper. The cavaliers cut one another's
+throats for the love of God and in the cause of religion, and the
+women encouraged the arts, sciences, literature, and the drama, by
+conferring upon talent, wit, genius and merit favors which were deemed
+conducive as encouragements to the growth of intellect and
+spirituality.
+
+Ninon was affected by the spirit of the times, and being a woman, it
+was impossible for her to resist desire when aided by philosophy and
+force of example. Her intimacy with de Sévigné grew out of her attempt
+to teach a young, vigorous, passionate man how to gain the love of a
+cold-blooded, vain and conceited woman. Her letters will show the
+various stages of her desires as she went along vainly struggling to
+beat something like comprehension into the dull brain of a clod, who
+could not understand the simplest principle of love, or the smallest
+point in the female character. At last she resolved to use an argument
+that was convincing with the brightest minds with whom she had ever
+dealt, that is, the power of her own love, and if the Marquis had
+lived, perhaps he might have become an ornament to society and an
+honor to his family.
+
+To do this, however, she violated her compact with de Vassé, betrayed
+his confidence and opened the way for the animadversions of Madame de
+Sévigné. At that time de Sévigné was in love with an actress,
+Mademoiselle Champmêlé, but desired to withdraw his affections, or
+rather transfer them to a higher object, a countess, or a princess, as
+the reader may infer from his mother's hints in one of her letters to
+be given hereafter. To Ninon, therefore, he went for instruction and
+advice as to the best course to pursue to get rid of one love and on
+with a new. Madame de Sévigné and Madame de La Fayette vainly implored
+him to avoid Ninon as he would the pest. The more they prayed and
+entreated, the closer he came to Ninon until she became his ideal.
+Ninon, herself was captivated by his pleasant conversation, agreeable
+manners and seductive traits. She knew that he had had a love affair
+with Champmêlé, the actress, and when she began to obtain an
+ascendency over his mind, she wormed out of him all the letters he had
+ever received from the comedienne. Some say it was jealousy on Ninon's
+part, but any one who reads her letters to de Sévigné will see between
+the lines a disposition on his part to wander away after a new
+charmer. Others, however, say that she intended to send them to the
+Marquis de Tonnerre, whom the actress had betrayed for de Sévigné.
+
+But Madame de Sévigné, to whom her son had confessed his folly in
+giving up the letters, perhaps fearing to be embroiled in a
+disgraceful duel over an actress, made him blush at his cruel
+sacrifice of a woman who loved him, and made him understand that even
+in dishonesty there were certain rules of honesty to be observed. She
+worked upon his mind until he felt that he had committed a
+dishonorable act, and when he had reached that point, it was easy to
+get the letters away from Ninon partly by artifice, partly by force.
+Madame de Sévigné tells the story in a letter to her daughter, Madame
+de Grignan:
+
+"Elle (Ninon) voulut l'autre jour lui faire donner des lettres de la
+comedienne (Champmêlé); il les lui donna; elle en était jalouse; elle
+voulait les donner à un amant de la princesse, afin de lui faire
+donner quelque coups de baudrier. Il me le vint dire: je lui fis voir
+que c'était une infamie de couper ainsi la gorge à une petite créature
+pour l'avoir aimer; je representai qu'elle n'avait point sacrifié ses
+lettres, comme on voulait lui faire croire pour l'animer. Il entra
+dans mes raisons; il courut chez Ninon, et moitié par adresse, et
+moitié par force, il retira les lettres de cette pauvre diablesse."
+
+It was easy for a doting mother like Madame de Sévigné to credit
+everything her son manufactured for her delectation. The dramatic
+incident of de Sévigné taking letters from Ninon de l'Enclos partly by
+ingenuity and partly by force, resembled his tale that he had left
+Ninon and that he did not care for her while all the time they were
+inseparable. He was truly a lover of Penelope, the bow of Ulysses
+having betrayed his weakness.
+
+"The malady of his soul," says his mother, "afflicted his body. He
+thought himself like the good Esos; he would have himself boiled in a
+caldron with aromatic herbs to restore his vigor."
+
+But Ninon's opinion of him was somewhat different. She lamented his
+untimely end, but did not hesitate to express her views.
+
+"He was a man beyond definition," was her panegyric. "He possessed a
+soul of pulp, a body of wet paper, and a heart of pumpkin fricasseed
+in snow."
+
+She finally became ashamed of ever having loved him, and insisted that
+they were never more than brother and sister. She tried to make
+something out of him by exposing all the secrets of the female heart,
+and initiating him in the mysteries of human love, but as she said:
+"His heart was a pumpkin fricasseed in snow."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+A Family Tragedy
+
+
+Some of Ninon's engagements following upon one another in quick
+succession were the cause of an unusual disagreement, not to say
+quarrel, between two rivals in her affections. A Marshal of France,
+d'Estrées and the celebrated Abbé Deffiat disputed the right of
+parentage, the dispute waxing warm because both contended for the
+honor and could not see any way out of their difficulty, neither
+consenting to make the slightest concession. Ninon, however, calmed
+the tempest by suggesting a way out of the difficulty through the
+hazard of the dice. Luck or good fortune for the waif declared in
+favor of the warrior, who made a better guardian than the Abbé could
+possibly have done, and brought him greater happiness.
+
+Ninon surrendered all her maternal rights in the child to the worthy
+Marshal, who became in reality a tender and affectionate father to the
+waif, cared for him tenderly and raised him up to a good position in
+life. He placed him in the marine service, where, as the Chevalier de
+la Bossière, he reached the grade of captain of a vessel, and died at
+an advanced age respected by his brother officers and by all who knew
+him. He inherited some of the talents of his mother, particularly
+music, in which he was remarkably proficient. His apartments at
+Toulon, where he was stationed, were crowded with musical instruments
+and the works of the greatest masters. All the musicians traveling
+back and forth between Italy and France made his house their
+headquarters. The Chevalier accorded them a generous welcome on all
+occasions; the only return demanded was an exhibition of their
+proficiency in instrumental music.
+
+The happiness of this son solaced Ninon for his unfortunate birth, and
+it would have been happy for her had she never had a second. But her
+profound love for the Chevalier de Gersay overcame any scruples that
+might have arisen in her mind against again yielding to the maternal
+instinct, and another son came to her, one who was destined to meet a
+most horrible fate and cause her the most exquisite mental torture.
+
+This de Gersay, who was famous for the temerity of his passion for the
+queen, Anne of Austria, a fact he announced from the housetops of
+Paris in his delirium, was as happy as a king over the boy that came
+to him so unexpectedly, and lavished upon him the most extravagant
+affection. He took him to his heart and trained him up in all the
+accomplishments taught those of the highest rank and most noble blood.
+The boy grew up and received the name of Chevalier de Villiers,
+becoming a credit to his father.
+
+His mother was beyond sixty years of age when de Villiers began to
+enter society, and her beauty was still remarkable according to the
+chronicles of the times and the allusions made to it in the current
+literature. She was as attractive in her appearance, and as lovable as
+at twenty years of age, few, even among the younger habitués of her
+drawing-rooms being able to resist the charms of her person. Her house
+was thronged with the élite of French society, young men of noble
+families being designedly sent into her society to acquire taste,
+grace, and polish which they were unable to acquire elsewhere. Ninon
+possessed a singular genius for inspiring men with high and noble
+sentiments, and her schooling in the art of etiquette was marvelous in
+its details and perfection. Her power was practically a repetition of
+the history of the Empress Theodora, whose happy admirers and
+intimates could be distinguished from all others by their exquisite
+politeness, culture, finish and social polish. It was the same in
+Ninon's school, the graduates of which occupied the highest rank in
+letters, society, statesmanship, and military genius.
+
+De Gersay intending his son to fill a high position in society and
+public honors, sent him to this school, where he was received and put
+upon the same footing as other youth of high birth, and was duly
+trained with them in all the arts and accomplishments of refined
+society. The young man was not aware of his parentage, de Gersay
+having extracted a solemn promise from Mademoiselle de l'Enclos that
+she would never divulge the secret of the youth's birth without his
+father's express consent, a promise which resulted in the most
+disastrous consequences.
+
+Ninon, as mother of this handsome youth, admired him, and manifested a
+tenderness which he misunderstood for the emotion of love, Ninon,
+herself never contemplating such a fatality, and ended by becoming
+enamored of his own mother. Ninon thought nothing of his passion,
+believing that it would soon pass away, but it increased in intensity,
+becoming a violent flame which finally proved irresistible, forcing
+the youth to fall at his mother's feet and pour forth his passion in
+the most extravagant language.
+
+Alarmed at this condition of her son's heart, Ninon withdrew from his
+society, refusing to admit him to her presence. Although the Chevalier
+was an impetuous wooer, he was dismayed by the loss of his inamorata,
+and begged for the privilege of seeing her, promising solemnly never
+to repeat his declaration of love. Ninon was deceived by his
+professions and re-admitted him to her society. Insensibly, however,
+perhaps in despite of his struggle to overcome his amorous
+propensities, the Chevalier violated the conditions of the truce.
+Ninon, on the watch for a repetition of his former manifestations,
+quickly perceived the return of a love so abhorrent to nature. His
+sighs, glances, sadness when in her presence, were signs to her of a
+passion that she would be compelled to subdue with a strong, ruthless
+hand.
+
+"Raise your eyes to that clock," she said to him one day, "and mark
+the passing of time. Rash boy, it is sixty-five years since I came
+into the world. Does it become me to listen to a passion like love?
+Is it possible at my age to love or be loved? Enter within yourself,
+Chevalier, and see how ridiculous are your desires and those you would
+arouse in me."
+
+All Ninon's remonstrances, however, tended only to increase the
+desires which burned in the young man's breast. His mother's tears,
+which now began to flow, were regarded by the youth as trophies of
+success.
+
+"What, tears?" he exclaimed, "you shed tears for me? Are they wrung
+from your heart by pity, by tenderness? Ah, am I to be blessed?"
+
+"This is terrible," she replied, "it is insanity. Leave me, and do not
+poison the remainder of a life which I detest."
+
+"What language is this?" exclaimed the Chevalier. "What poison can the
+sweetness of making still another one happy instill into the loveliest
+life? Is this the tender and philosophic Ninon? Has she not raised
+between us that shadow of virtue that makes her sex adorable? What
+chimeras have changed your heart? Shall I tell you? You carry your
+cruelty to the extent of fighting against yourself, resisting your own
+desires. I have seen in your eyes a hundred times less resistance than
+you now set against me. And these tears which my condition has drawn
+from your eyes--tell me, are they shed through indifference or hate?
+Are you ashamed to avow a sensibility which honors humanity?"
+
+"Cease, Chevalier," said Ninon, raising her hand in protest, "the
+right to claim my liveliest friendship rested with you, I thought you
+worthy of it. That is the cause of the friendly looks which you have
+mistaken for others of greater meaning, and it is also the cause of
+the tears I shed. Do not flatter yourself that you have inspired me
+with the passion of love. I can see too plainly that your desires are
+the effect of a passing presumption. Come now, you shall know my
+heart, and it should destroy all hope for you. It will go so far as to
+hate you, if you repeat your protestations of blind tenderness. I do
+not care to understand you, leave me, to regret the favors you have so
+badly interpreted."
+
+When Ninon learned that her son was plunged into despair and fury on
+account of her rejection of his love, her heart was torn with sorrow
+and she regretted that she had not at first told him the secret of his
+birth, but her solemn promise to de Gersay had stood in her way. She
+determined now to remedy the evil and she therefore applied to de
+Gersay to relieve her from her promise. De Gersay advised her to
+communicate the truth to her son as soon as possible to prevent a
+catastrophe which he prophesied was liable to happen when least
+expected. She accordingly wrote the Chevalier that at a certain time
+she would be at her house in the Saint Antoine suburb and prayed him
+to meet her there. The impassioned Chevalier, expecting nothing less
+than the gratification of his desires, prepared himself with extreme
+care and flew to the assignation. He was disconcerted, however, by
+finding Ninon despondent and sad, instead of smiling and joyful with
+anticipation. However, he cast himself at her feet, seized her hand
+and covered it with tears and kisses.
+
+"Unfortunate," cried Ninon submitting to his embraces, "there are
+destinies beyond human prudence to direct. What have I not attempted
+to do to calm your agitated spirit? What mystery do you force me to
+unfold?"
+
+"Ah, you are about to deceive me again," interrupted the Chevalier, "I
+do not perceive in your eyes the love I had the right to expect. I
+recognize in your obscure language an injustice you are about to
+commit; you hope to cure me of my love, but disabuse yourself of that
+fancy; the cruel triumph you seek to win is beyond the united strength
+of both of us, above any imaginable skill, beyond the power of reason
+itself. It seems to listen to nothing but its own intoxication, and at
+the same time rush to the last extremity."
+
+"Stop," exclaimed Ninon, indignant at this unreasoning folly, "this
+horrible love shall not reach beyond the most sacred duties. Stop, I
+tell you, monster that you are, and shudder with dismay. Can love
+flourish where horror fills the soul? Do you know who you are and who
+I am? The lover you are pursuing--"
+
+"Well! That lover?" demanded the Chevalier.
+
+"Is your mother," replied Ninon; "you owe me your birth. It is my son
+who sighs at my feet, who talks to me of love. What sentiments do you
+think you have inspired me with? Monsieur de Gersay, your father,
+through an excess of affection for you, wished you to remain ignorant
+of your birth. Ah, my son, by what fatality have you compelled me to
+reveal this secret? You know to what degree of opprobrium the
+prejudiced have put one of your birth, wherefore it was necessary to
+conceal it from your delicacy of mind, but you would not have it so.
+Know me as your mother, oh, my son, and pardon me for having given you
+life."
+
+Ninon burst into a flood of tears and pressed her son to her heart,
+but he seemed to be crushed by the revelations he heard. Pale,
+trembling, nerveless, he dared not pronounce the sweet name of mother,
+for his soul was filled with horror at his inability to realize the
+relationship sufficiently to destroy the burning passion he felt for
+her person. He cast one long look into her eyes, bent them upon the
+ground, arose with a deep sigh and fled. A garden offered him a
+refuge, and there, in a thick clump of bushes, he drew his sword and
+without a moment's hesitation fell upon it, to sink down dying.
+
+Ninon had followed him dreading some awful calamity, and there, in the
+dim light of the stars, she found her son weltering in his blood, shed
+by his own hand for love of her. His dying eyes which he turned toward
+her still spoke ardent love, and he expired while endeavoring to utter
+words of endearment.
+
+Le Sage in the romance of Gil Blas has painted this horrible
+catastrophe of Ninon de l'Enclos in the characters of the old woman
+Inisilla de Cantarilla, and the youth Don Valerio de Luna. The
+incident is similar to that which happened to Oedipus, the Theban who
+tore out his eyes after discovering that in marrying Jocasta, the
+queen, he had married his own mother. Le Sage's hero, however, mourns
+because he had not been able to commit the crime, which gives the case
+of Ninon's son a similar tinge, his self-immolation being due, not to
+the horror of having indulged in criminal love for his own mother, but
+to the regret at not having been able to accomplish his purpose.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+Her Bohemian Environments
+
+
+The daily and nightly doings at Ninon's house in the Rue des
+Tournelles, if there is anything of a similar character in modern
+society that can be compared to them, might be faintly represented by
+our Bohemian circles, where good cheer, good fellowship, and freedom
+from restraint are supposed to reign. There are, indeed, numerous
+clubs at the present day styled "Bohemian," but except so far as the
+tendency to relaxation appears upon the surface, they possess very few
+of the characteristics of that society of "Birds" that assembled
+around Mademoiselle de l'Enclos. They put aside all conventional
+restraint, and the mental metal of those choice spirits clashed and
+evolved brilliant sparks, bright rays of light, the luster of which
+still glitters after a lapse of more than two centuries.
+
+Personally, Ninon was an enemy of pedantry in every form, demanding of
+her followers originality at all times on penalty of banishment from
+her circle. The great writer, Mynard, once related with tears in his
+eyes that his daughter, who afterward became the Countess de
+Feuquières, had no memory. Whereat Ninon laughed him out of his
+sorrow:
+
+"You are too happy in having a daughter who has no memory; she will
+not be able to make citations."
+
+That her society was sought by very good men is evidenced by the grave
+theologians who found her companionship pleasant, perhaps salutary. A
+celebrated Jesuit who did not scruple to find entertainment in her
+social circle, undertook to combat her philosophy and show her the
+truth from his point of view, but she came so near converting him to
+her tenets that he abandoned the contest remarking with a laugh:
+
+"Well, well, Mademoiselle, while waiting to be convinced that you are
+in error, offer up to God your unbelief." Rousseau has converted this
+incident into an epigram.
+
+The grave and learned clergy of Port Royal also undertook the labor of
+converting her, but their labor was in vain.
+
+"You know," she told Fontenelle, "what use I make of my body? Well,
+then, it would be easier for me to obtain a good price for my soul,
+for the Jansenists and Molinists are engaged in a competition of
+bidding for it."
+
+She was not bigoted in the least, as the following incident will show:
+One of her friends refused to send for a priest when in extremis, but
+Ninon brought one to his bedside, and as the clergyman, knowing the
+scepticism of the dying sinner, hesitated to exercise his functions,
+she encouraged him to do his duty:
+
+"Do your duty, sir," she said, "I assure you that although our friend
+can argue, he knows no more about the truth than you and I."
+
+The key to Mademoiselle de l'Enclos' character is to be found in her
+toleration and liberality. Utterly unselfish, she had no thoughts
+beyond the comfort and, happiness of her friends. For them she
+sacrificed her person, an astounding sacrifice in a woman, one for
+which a multitude have suffered martyrdom for refusing to make, and
+are cited as models of virtue to be followed. Yet, notwithstanding her
+strange misapplication or perversion of what the world calls "female
+honor," her world had nothing but the most profound respect and
+admiration for her. It requires an extremely delicate pencil to sketch
+such a character, and even then, a hundred trials might result in
+failing to seize upon its most vivid lights and shades and bring out
+its best points.
+
+Standing out clearly defined through her whole life was a noble soul
+that never stooped to anything common, low, debasing or vulgar.
+Brought up from infancy in the society of men, taught to consider them
+as her companions and equals, and treated by them as one of
+themselves, she acquired a grace and a polish that made her society
+desired by the proudest ladies of the court. There is no one in the
+annals of the nations of the earth that can be compared to her. The
+Aspasia of Pericles has been regarded by some as a sort of prototype,
+but Aspasia was a common woman of the town, her thoughts were devoted
+to the aggrandizement of one man, her love affairs were bestowed upon
+an open market. On the contrary, Mademoiselle de l'Enclos never
+bestowed her favors upon any but one she could ever after regard as an
+earnest, unselfish friend. Their friendship was a source of delight to
+her and she was Epicurean, in the enjoyment of everything that goes
+with friendship.
+
+Saint-Evremond likens her to Leontium, the Athenian woman, celebrated
+for her philosophy and for having dared to write a book against the
+great Theophrastus, a literary venture which may have been the reason
+why Saint-Evremond gave Ninon the title. Ninon's heart was weak, it is
+true, but she had early learned those philosophical principles which
+drew her senses away from that portion of her soul, and her
+environments were those most conducive to the cultivation of the
+senses which are so easily led away into seductive paths. But however
+far her love of pleasure may have led her, her philosophical ideas and
+practices did not succeed in destroying or even weakening any other
+virtue. "The smallest fault of gallant women," says de la
+Rochefoucauld, "is their gallantry."
+
+The distinguished Abbé Châteauneuf expresses a trait in her character
+which drew to her side the most distinguished men of the period.
+
+"She reserved all her esteem, all her confidence for friendship, which
+she always regarded as a respectable liaison," says the Abbé, "and to
+maintain that friendship she permitted no diminution or relaxation."
+
+In other words she was constant and true, without whims or caprice.
+The Comte de Segur, in his work on "Women, their Condition and
+Influence in Society," says: "While Ninon de l'Enclos was fostering
+and patronizing genius, and giving it opportunities to expand, Madame
+de Sévigné was at the head of a cabal in opposition to genius, unless
+it was measured upon her own standard. In her self-love she wrought
+against Racine and sought to diminish the literary luster of Flèchier.
+But with all her ability Madame de Sévigné possessed very little
+genius or tact, and her lack of discrimination is apparent in the fact
+that none of her protégés ever reached any distinction. Moreover, her
+virtues must have been of an appalling character since they were not
+strong enough to save her husband and son from falling into the
+clutches of "That horrid woman," referring to Ninon.
+
+Ninon certainly understood men; she divined them at the first glance
+and provided for their bodily and intellectual wants. If they were
+deemed worthy of her favors, she bestowed them freely, and out of one
+animal desire gratified, there were created a thousand intellectual
+aspirations. She understood clearly that man can not be all animal or
+all spiritual, and that the attempt to divert nature from its duality
+of being was to wreck humanity and make of man neither fish, flesh nor
+fowl. Her constant prayer in her younger days, for the truth of which
+Voltaire vouches, was:
+
+"Mon Dieu, faîtes de moi un honnête homme, et n'en faîtes jamais une
+honnête femme." (My God, make me an honest man, but never an honest
+woman).
+
+Count Segur, in his book already referred to, has this to say further
+concerning Ninon:
+
+"Ninon shone under the reign of Louis XIV like a graceful plant in its
+proper soil. Splendor seemed to be her element. That Ninon might
+appear in the sphere that became her, it was necessary that Turenne
+and Condé should sigh at her feet, that Voltaire should receive from
+her his first lessons, in a word, that in her illustrious cabinet,
+glory and genius should be seen sporting with love and the graces."
+
+Had it not been for the influence of Ninon de l'Enclos--there are many
+who claim it as the truth--the sombre tinge, the veil of gloominess
+and hypocritical austerity which surrounded Madame de Maintenon and
+her court, would have wrecked the intellects of the most illustrious
+and brightest men in France, in war, literature, science, and
+statesmanship. Madame de Maintenon resisted that influence but the Rue
+des Tournelles strove against Saint Cyr. The world fluctuated between
+these two systems established by women, both of them--shall it be
+said--courtesans? The legality and morality of our modern common law
+marriages and the ease and frequency of trivial divorces forbid it.
+Ninon prevailed, however, and not only governed hearts but souls. The
+difference between the two courts was, the royal salon was thronged
+with women of the most infamous character who had nothing but their
+infamy to bestow, while the drawing rooms of Ninon de l'Enclos were
+crowded with men almost exclusively, and men of wit and genius.
+
+The moral that the majority of writers draw from the three courts that
+occupied society at that time, the Rue des Tournelles, Madame de
+Sévigné, and Versailles, is, that men demand human nature and will
+have it in preference to abnormal goodness, and female debauchery.
+Ninon never hesitated to declaim against the fictitious beauty that
+pretended to inculcate virtue and morality while secretly engaged in
+the most corrupt practices, but Molière came with his Précieuses
+Ridicules and pulverized the enemies of human nature. Ninon did not
+know Molière personally at that time but she was so loud in his praise
+for covering her gross imitators with confusion, that Bachaumont and
+Chapelle, two of her intimate friends, ventured to introduce the young
+dramatist into her society. The father of this Bachaumont who was a
+twin, said of him: "My son who is only half a man, wants to do as if
+he were a whole one." Though only "half a man" and extremely feeble
+and delicate, he became a voluptuary according to the ideas of
+Chapelle, and by devoting himself to the doctrines of Epicurus, he
+managed to live until eighty years of age. Chapelle was a drunkard as
+has been intimated in a preceding chapter, and although he loved Ninon
+passionately, she steadily refused to favor him.
+
+Molière and Ninon were mutually attracted, each recognizing in the
+other not only a kindred spirit, but something not apparent on the
+surface. Nature had given them the same eyes, and they saw men and
+things from the same view point. Molière was destined to enlighten his
+age by his pen, and Ninon through her wise counsel and sage
+reflections. In speaking of Molière to Saint-Evremond, she declared
+with fervor:
+
+"I thank God every night for finding me a man of his spirit, and I
+pray Him every morning to preserve him from the follies of the heart."
+
+There was a great opposition to Molière's comedy "Tartuffe." It
+created a sensation in society, and neither Louis XIV, the prelates of
+the kingdom and the Roman legate, were strong enough to withstand the
+torrents of invectives that came from those who were unmasked in the
+play. They succeeded in having it interdicted, and the comedy was on
+the point of being suppressed altogether, when Molière took it to
+Ninon, read it over to her and asked her opinion as to what had better
+be done. With her keen sense of the ridiculous and her knowledge of
+character, Ninon went over the play with Molière to such good purpose
+that the edict of suppression was withdrawn, the opponents of the
+comedy finding themselves in a position where they could no longer
+take exceptions without confessing the truth of the inuendoes.
+
+When the comedy was nearly completed, Molière began trying to think of
+a name to give the main character in the play, who is an imposter. One
+day while at dinner with the Papal Nuncio, he noticed two
+ecclesiastics, whose air of pretended mortification fairly represented
+the character he had depicted in the play. While considering them
+closely, a peddler came along with truffles to sell. One of the pious
+ecclesiastics who knew very little Italian, pricked up his ears at the
+word truffles, which seemed to have a familiar sound. Suddenly coming
+out of his devout silence, he selected several of the finest of the
+truffles, and holding them out to the nuncio, exclaimed with a laugh:
+"Tartuffoli, Tartuffoli, signor Nuncio!" imagining that he was
+displaying his knowledge of the Italian language by calling out
+"Truffles, truffles, signor Nuncio," whereas, what he did say was
+"Hypocrites, hypocrites, Signor Nuncio." Molière who was always a
+close and keen observer of everything that transpired around him,
+seized upon the name "Tartuffe" as suitable to the hypocritical
+imposter in his comedy.
+
+Ninon's brilliancy was so animated, particularly at table, that she
+was said to be intoxicated at the soup, although she rarely drank
+anything but water. Her table was always surrounded by the wittiest of
+her friends and her own flashes kept their spirits up to the highest
+point. The charm of her conversation was equal to the draughts of
+Nepenthe which Helen lavished upon her guests, according to Homer to
+charm and enchant them.
+
+One story told about Ninon is not to her credit if true, and it is
+disputed. A great preacher arose in France, the "Eagle of the Pulpit,"
+as he was called, or "The great Pan," as Madame de Sévigné, loved to
+designate him. His renown for eloquence and piety reached Ninon's ears
+and she conceived a scheme, so it is said; to bring this great orator
+to her feet. She had held in her chains from time to time, all the
+heroes, and illustrious men of France, and she considered Père
+Bourdaloue worthy of a place on the list. She accordingly arrayed
+herself in her most fascinating costume, feigned illness and sent for
+him. But Père Bourdaloue was not a man to be captivated by any woman,
+and, moreover, he was a man too deeply versed in human perversity to
+be easily deceived. He came at her request, however, and to her
+question as to her condition he answered: "I perceive that your malady
+exists only in your heart and mind; as to your body, it appears to me
+to be in perfect health. I pray the great physician of souls that he
+will heal you." Saying which he left her without ceremony.
+
+The story is probably untrue and grew out of a song of the times, to
+ridicule the attempts of numerous preachers to convert Ninon from her
+way of living. They frequented her social receptions but those were
+always public, as she never trusted herself to any one without the
+knowledge and presence of some of her "Birds," taking that precaution
+for her own safety and to avoid any appearance of partiality. The song
+referred to, composed by some unknown scribe begins as follows:
+
+"Ninon passe les jours au jeu:
+Cours où l'amour te porte;
+Le prédicateur qui t'exhorte,
+S'il était au coin de ton feu,
+Te parlerait d'un autre sorte."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+A Remarkable Old Age
+
+
+When Ninon had reached the age of sixty-five years, there were those
+among the beauties of the royal court who thought she ought to retire
+from society and make way for them, but there appeared to be no
+diminution of her capacity for pleasure, no weakening of her powers of
+attraction. The legend of the Noctambule, or the little black man, who
+appeared to Ninon when she was at the age of twenty years, and
+promised her perpetual beauty and the conquest of all hearts, was
+revived, and there was enough probability in it to justify a strong
+belief in the story. Indeed, the Abbé Servien spread it about again
+when Ninon was seventy years of age, and even then there were few who
+disputed the mysterious gift as Ninon showed little change.
+
+As old age approached, Ninon ceased to be regarded with that
+familiarity shown her by her intimates in her younger days, and a
+respect and admiration took its place. She was no longer "Ninon," but
+"Mademoiselle de l'Enclos." Her social circle widened, and instead of
+being limited to men exclusively, ladies eagerly took advantage of the
+privilege accorded them to frequent the charming circle. That circle
+certainly became celebrated. The beautiful woman had lived the life of
+an earnest Epicurean in her own way, regardless of society's
+conventionalities, and had apparently demonstrated that her way was
+the best. She had certainly attained a long life, and what was more to
+the purpose she had preserved her beauty and the attractions of her
+person were as strong as when she was in her prime. Reason enough why
+the women of the age thronged her apartments to learn the secret of
+her life. Moreover, her long and intimate associations with the most
+remarkable men of the century had not failed to impart to her, in
+addition to her exquisite femininity, the wisdom of a sage and the
+polish of a man of the world.
+
+Madame de La Fayette, that "rich field so fertile in fruits," as Ninon
+said of her, and Madame de la Sablière, "a lovely garden enameled with
+eye-charming flowers," another of Ninon's descriptive metaphors,
+passed as many hours as they could in her society with the illustrious
+Duke de la Rochefoucauld, who, up to the time of his death honored
+Ninon with his constant friendship and his devoted esteem. Even Madame
+de Sévigné put aside her envy and jealousy and never wearied of the
+pleasure of listening to the conversation of this wise beauty, in
+company with her haughty daughter, Madame de Grignan, Madame de
+Coulanges, Madame de Torp, and, strange to say, the Duchess de
+Bouillon.
+
+Her friends watched over her health with the tenderest care and
+affection, and even her slightest indisposition brought them around
+her with expressions of the deepest solicitude. They dreaded losing
+her, for having had her so long among them they hoped to keep her
+always, and they did, practically, for she outlived the most of them.
+As proof of the anxiety of her friends and the delight they
+experienced at her recovery from the slightest ailment, one
+illustration will suffice.
+
+On one occasion she had withdrawn from her friends for a single
+evening, pleading indisposition. The next evening she reappeared and
+her return was celebrated by an original poem written by no less a
+personage than the Abbé Regnier-Desmarais, who read it to the friends
+assembled around her chair:
+
+"Clusine qui dans tous les temps
+  Eut de tous les honnêtes gens
+  L'amour et l'estime en partage:
+  Qui toujours pleine de bon sens
+  Sut de chaque saison de l'âge
+  Faire à propos un juste usage:
+Qui dans son entretien, dont on fut enchanté
+  Sut faire un aimable alliage
+  De l'agreable badinage,
+  Avec la politesse et la solidité,
+  Et que le ciel doua d'un esprit droit et sage,
+  Toujours d'intelligence avec la verité,
+Clusine est, grâce au ciel, en parfaite santé."
+
+Such a poem would not be accorded much praise nowadays, but the hearts
+of her friends regarded the sentiments more than the polish, as a
+substantial translation into English will serve to show appeared in
+the lines:
+
+Clusine who from our earliest ken
+  Had from all good and honest men
+  Love and esteem a generous share:
+  Who knew so well the season when
+  Her heritage of sense so rare
+  To use with justice and with care:
+Who in her discourse, friends enchanted all-around,
+  Could fashion out of playful ware
+  An alloy of enduring wear,
+  Good breeding and with solid ground,
+  A heavenly spirit wise and fair,
+  With truth and intellect profound,
+Clusine, thanks be to Heaven, her perfect health has found.
+
+Her salon was open to her friends in general from five o'clock in the
+evening until nine, at which hour she begged them to permit her to
+retire and gain strength for the morrow. In winter she occupied a
+large apartment decorated with portraits of her dearest male and
+female friends, and numerous paintings by celebrated artists. In
+summer, she occupied an apartment which overlooked the boulevard, its
+walls frescoed with magnificent sketches from the life of Psyche. In
+one or the other of these salons, she gave her friends four hours
+every evening, after that retiring to rest or amusing herself with a
+few intimates. Her friendship finds an apt illustration in the case of
+the Comte de Charleval. He was always delicate and in feeble health,
+and Ninon when he became her admirer in his youth, resolved to
+prolong his life through the application of the Epicurian philosophy.
+De Marville, speaking of the Count, whom no one imagined would survive
+to middle age, says: "Nature, which gave him so delicate a body in
+such perfect form, also gave him a delicate and perfect intelligence."
+This frail and delicate invalid, lived, however, until the age of
+eighty years, and was always grateful to Ninon for her tenderness. He
+never missed a reception and sang her praises on every occasion.
+Writing to Saint-Evremond to announce his death, Ninon, herself very
+aged, says: "His mind had retained all the charms of his youth, and
+his heart all the sweetness and tenderness of a true friend." She felt
+the loss of this common friend, for she again writes of him afterward:
+"His life and that I live had much in common. It is like dying oneself
+to meet with such a loss."
+
+It was at this period of her life that Ninon occupied her time more
+than ever in endearing herself to her friends. As says Saint-Evremond:
+"She contents herself with ease and rest, after having enjoyed the
+liveliest pleasures of life." Although she was never mistress of the
+invincible inclination toward the pleasures of the senses which nature
+had given her, it appears that Ninon made some efforts to control
+them. Referring to the ashes which are sprinkled on the heads of the
+penitent faithful on Ash Wednesday, she insisted that instead of the
+usual prayer of abnegation there should be substituted the words: "We
+must avoid the movements of love." What she wrote Saint-Evremond
+might give rise to the belief that she sometimes regretted her
+weakness: "Everybody tells me that I have less to complain of in my
+time than many another. However that may be, if any one had proposed
+to me such a life I would have hanged myself." One of her favorite
+maxims, however, was: "We must provide a stock of provisions and not
+of pleasures, they should be taken as they come."
+
+That her philosophical principles did not change, is certain from the
+fact that she retained all her friends and gained new ones who flocked
+to her reunions. Says Madame de Coulanges in one of her letters: "The
+women are running after Mademoiselle de l'Enclos now as much as the
+men used to do. How can any one hate old age after such an example."
+This reflection did not originate with Ninon, who regretted little her
+former pleasures, and besides, friendship with her had as many sacred
+rights as love. From what Madame de Coulanges says, one might suppose
+that the men had deserted Ninon in her old age, leaving women to take
+their place, but Madame de Sévigné was of a different opinion. She
+says: "Corbinelli asks me about the new marvels taking place at
+Mademoiselle de l'Enclos' house in the way of good company. She
+assembles around her in her old age, whatever Madame de Coulanges may
+say to the contrary, both men and women, but even if women did not
+flock to her side, she could console herself for having had men in her
+young days to please."
+
+The celebrated English geometrician, Huygens, visited Ninon during a
+sojourn at Paris in the capacity of ambassador. He was so charmed
+with the attractions of her person, and with her singing, that he fell
+into poetry to express his admiration. French verses from an
+Englishman who was a geometrician and not a poet, were as surprising
+to Ninon and her friends as they will be to the reader. They are not
+literature but express what was in the mind of the famous scientist:
+
+"Elle a cinq instruments dont je suis amoureux,
+Les deux premiers, ses mains, les deux autres, ses yeux;
+Pour le dernier de tous, et cinquième qui reste,
+Il faut être galant et leste."
+
+In the year 1696, when Ninon had reached eighty, she had several
+attacks of illness which worried her friends exceedingly. The Marquis
+de Coulanges writes: "Our amiable l'Enclos has a cold which does not
+please me." A short time afterward he again wrote: "Our poor l'Enclos
+has a low fever which redoubles in the evening, and a sore throat
+which worries her friends." These trifling ailments were nothing to
+Ninon, who, though growing feeble, maintained her philosophy, as she
+said: "I am contenting myself with what happens from day to day;
+forgetting to-day what occurred yesterday, and holding on to a used up
+body as one that has been very agreeable." She saw the term of her
+life coming to an end without any qualms or fear. "If I could only
+believe with Madame de Chevreuse, that by dying we can go and talk
+with all our friends in the other world, it would be a sweet thought."
+
+Madame de Maintenon, then in the height of her power and influence,
+had never forgotten the friend of her youth, and now, she offered her
+lodgings at Versailles. It is said that her intention was to enable
+the king to profit by an intimacy with a woman of eighty-five years
+who, in spite of bodily infirmities, possessed the same vivacity of
+mind and delicacy of taste which had contributed to her great renown,
+much more than her personal charms and frailties. But Ninon was born
+for liberty, and had never been willing to sacrifice her philosophical
+tranquility for the hope of greater fortune and position in the world.
+Accordingly, she thanked her old friend, and as the only concession
+she would grant, consented to stand in the chapel of Versailles where
+Louis the Great could pass and satisfy his curiosity to see once, at
+least, the astonishing marvel of his reign.
+
+During the latter years of her life, she took a fancy to young
+Voltaire, in whom she detected signs of future greatness. She
+fortified him with her counsel, which he prayed her to give him, and
+left him a thousand francs in her will to buy books. Voltaire
+attempted to earn the money by ridiculing the memory of his
+benefactress.
+
+At the age of ninety years, Mademoiselle de l'Enclos grew feebler
+every day, and felt that death would not be long coming. She performed
+all her social duties, however, until the very end, refusing to
+surrender until compelled. On the last night of her life, unable to
+sleep, she arose, and at her desk wrote the following verses:
+
+"Qu'un vain espoir ne vienne point s'offrir,
+Qui puisse ébranler mon courage;
+Je suis en age de mourir;
+Que ferais-je ici davantage?"
+
+(Let no vain hope now come and try,
+My courage strong to overthrow;
+My age demands that I shall die,
+What more can I do here below?)
+
+On the seventeenth of October, 1706, she expired as gently as one who
+falls asleep.
+
+
+
+
+LETTERS
+
+OF
+
+NINON de L'ENCLOS
+
+TO THE
+
+MARQUIS de SÉVIGNÉ.
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTION TO LETTERS
+
+
+The celebrated Abbé de Châteauneuf, in his "Dialogues on Ancient
+Music," refers to Mademoiselle de l'Enclos under the name of
+"Leontium," a name given her by le Maréchal de Saint-Evremond, and in
+his eulogy upon her character, lays great stress on the genius
+displayed in her epistolary style. After censuring the affectation to
+be found in the letters of Balzac and Voiture, the learned Abbé says:
+
+"The letters of Leontium, although novel in their form of expression,
+although replete with philosophy, and sparkling with wit and
+intelligence contain nothing stilted, or overdrawn.
+
+"Inasmuch as the moral to be drawn from them is always seasoned with
+sprightliness, and the spirit manifested in them, displays the
+characteristics of a liberal and natural imagination, they differ in
+nothing from personal conversation with her choice circle of friends.
+
+"The impression conveyed to the mind of their readers is, that she is
+actually conversing with them personally."
+
+Mademoiselle de l'Enclos writes about the heart, love, and women.
+Strange subjects, but no woman ever lived who was better able to do
+justice to them. In her frame of mind, she could not see men without
+studying their dispositions, and she knew them thoroughly, her
+experience extending over a period of seventy-five years of intimate
+association with men of every stamp, from the Royal prince to the
+Marquis de Sévigné, the latter wearying her to such an extent that she
+designated him as "a man beyond definition; with a soul of pulp, a
+body of wet paper, and a heart of pumpkin fricasseed in snow," his own
+mother, the renowned Madame de Sévigné, admitting that he was "a heart
+fool."
+
+Ninon took this weak Chevalier in charge and endeavored to make a man
+of him by exposing his frailties, and, entering into a long
+correspondence, to instruct him in the pathology of the female heart,
+with which he was disposed to tamper on the slightest provocation. Her
+letters will show that she succeeded finally in bringing him to
+reason, but that in doing so, she was compelled to betray her own sex
+by exposing the secret motives of women in their relations with men.
+
+That she knew women as well as men, can not be disputed, for,
+beginning with Madame de Maintenon and the Queen of Sweden, Christine,
+down along the line to the sweet Countess she guards so successfully
+against the evil designs of the Marquis de Sévigné, including Madame
+de La Fayette, Madame de Sévigné, Madame de La Sablière, and the most
+distinguished and prominent society women of France, they all were her
+particular friends, as well as intimates, and held her in high esteem
+as their confidante in all affairs of the heart.
+
+No other woman ever held so unique a position in the world of society
+as Mademoiselle de l'Enclos, and her letters to the Marquis de Sévigné
+may, therefore, be considered as standards of the epistolary art upon
+the subjects she treats; as containing the most profound insight into
+the female heart where love is concerned, and as forming a study of
+the greatest value in everything that pertains to the relations
+between the sexes.
+
+There is an entire absence of mawkish sentimentality, of effort to
+conceal the secret motives and desires of the heart beneath specious
+language and words of double meaning. On the contrary, they tear away
+from the heart the curtain of deceit, artifice and treachery, to
+expose the nature of the machinery behind the scenes.
+
+These letters must be read in the light of the opinions of the wisest
+philosophers of the seventeenth century upon her character.
+
+"Inasmuch as the first use she (Mademoiselle de l'Enclos) made of her
+reason, was to become enfranchised from vulgar errors, it is
+impossible to be further removed from the stupid mistake of those who,
+under the name of "passion," elevate the sentiment of love to the
+height of a virtue. Ninon understood love to be what it really is, a
+taste founded upon the senses, a blind sentiment, which admits of no
+merit in the object which gives it birth, and which promises no
+recompense; a caprice, the duration of which does not depend upon our
+volition, and which is subject to remorse and repentance."
+
+
+
+
+LETTERS OF NINON de L'ENCLOS
+
+TO THE
+
+MARQUIS de SÉVIGNÉ
+
+
+
+I.
+
+A Hazardous Undertaking.
+
+What, I, Marquis, take charge of your education, be your guide in the
+enterprise upon which you are about to enter? You exact too much of my
+friendship for you. You ought to be aware of the fact, that when a
+woman has lost the freshness of her first youth, and takes a special
+interest in a young man, everybody says she desires to "make a
+worldling of him." You know the malignity of this expression. I do not
+care to expose myself to its application. All the service I am willing
+to render you, is to become your confidante. You will tell me your
+troubles, and I will tell you what is in my mind, likewise aid you to
+know your own heart and that of women.
+
+It grieves me to say, that whatever pleasure I may expect to find in
+this correspondence, I can not conceal the difficulties I am liable to
+encounter. The human heart, which will be the subject of my letters,
+presents so many contrasts, that whoever lays it bare must fall into
+a flood of contradictions. You think you have something stable in your
+grasp, but find you have seized a shadow. It is indeed a chameleon,
+which, viewed from different aspects, presents a variety of opposite
+colors, and even they are constantly shifting. You may expect to read
+many strange things in what I shall say upon this subject. I will,
+however, give you my ideas, though they may often seem strange;
+however, that shall be for you to determine. I confess that I am not
+free from grave scruples of conscience, foreseeing that I can scarcely
+be sincere without slandering my own sex a little. But at least you
+will know my views on the subject of love, and particularly everything
+that relates to it, and I have sufficient courage to talk to you
+frankly upon the subject.
+
+I am to dine to-night with the Marquis de la Rochefoucauld. Madame de
+la Sablière and La Fontaine will also be guests. If it please you to
+be one of us, La Fontaine will regale you with two new stories, which,
+I am told, do not disparage his former ones. Come Marquis--But, again
+a scruple. Have I nothing to fear in the undertaking we contemplate?
+Love is so malicious and fickle! Still, when I examine my heart, I do
+not feel any apprehension for myself, it being occupied elsewhere, and
+the sentiments I possess toward you resemble love less than
+friendship. If the worst should happen and I lose my head some day, we
+shall know how to withdraw in the easiest possible manner.
+
+We are going to take a course of morals together. Yes, sir, MORALS!
+But do not be alarmed at the mere word, for there will be between us
+only the question of gallantry to discuss, and that, you know, sways
+morals to so high a degree that it deserves to be the subject of a
+special study. The very idea of such a project is to me infinitely
+risible. However, if I talk reason to you too often, will you not grow
+weary? This is my sole anxiety, for you well know that I am a pitiless
+reasoner when I wish to be. With any other heart than that which you
+misunderstand, I could be a philosopher such as the world never knew.
+
+Adieu, I await your good pleasure.
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+Why Love is Dangerous
+
+
+I assure you, Marquis, I shall keep my word, and on all occasions, I
+shall speak the truth, even though it be to my own detriment. I have
+more stability in my disposition than you imagine, and I fear
+exceedingly that the result of our intercourse may sometimes lead you
+to think that I carry this virtue into severity. But you must remember
+that I have only the external appearance of a woman, and that in mind
+and heart I am a man. Here is the method that I wish to follow with
+you. As I ask only to acquire information for myself before
+communicating to you my ideas, my intention is to propound them to the
+excellent man with whom we supped yesterday. It is true that he has
+none too good an opinion of poor humanity. He believes neither in
+virtue nor in spiritual things. But this inflexibility, mitigated by
+my indulgence for human frailties, will give you, I believe, the kind
+and the quantity of philosophy which is required in all intercourse
+with women. Let us come to the gist of your letter.
+
+Since your entrance into the world it has offered you nothing, you
+say, of what you had imagined you would find there. Disgust and
+weariness follow you everywhere. You seek solitude, and as soon as
+you are enjoying it, it wearies you. In a word, you do not know to
+what cause to attribute the restlessness which torments you. I am
+going to save you the trouble, I am, for my burden is to speak my
+thoughts on everything that may perplex you; and I do not know but you
+will often ask me questions as embarrassing for me to answer as they
+may have been for you to ask.
+
+The uneasiness which you experience is caused only by the void in your
+heart. Your heart is without love, and it is trying to make you
+comprehend its wants. You have really what one calls the "need of
+loving." Yes, Marquis, nature, in forming us, gave us an allowance of
+sentiments which must expend themselves upon some object. Your age is
+the proper period for the agitations of love; as long as this
+sentiment does not fill your heart, something will always be wanting;
+the restlessness of which you complain will never cease. In a word,
+love is the nourishment of the heart as food is of the body; to love
+is to fulfill the desire of nature, to satisfy a need. But if
+possible, manage it so that it will not become a passion. To protect
+you from this misfortune, I could almost be tempted to disprove the
+counsel given you, to prefer, to the company of women capable of
+inspiring esteem rather than love, the intercourse of those who pride
+themselves on being amusing rather than sedate and prim. At your age,
+being unable to think of entering into a serious engagement, it is not
+necessary to find a friend in a woman; one should seek to find only
+an amiable mistress.
+
+The intercourse with women of lofty principles, or those whom the
+ravages of time force into putting themselves forward only by virtue
+of great qualities, is excellent for a man who, like themselves, is on
+life's decline. For you, these women would be too good company, if I
+dare so express myself. Riches are necessary to us only in proportion
+to our wants; and what you would better do, I think, is to frequent
+the society of those who combine, with agreeable figure, gentleness in
+conversation, cheerfulness in disposition, a taste for the pleasures
+of society, and strong enough not to be frightened by one affair of
+the heart.
+
+In the eyes of a man of reason they appear too frivolous, you will
+say: but do you think they should be judged with so much severity? Be
+persuaded, Marquis, that if, unfortunately, they should acquire more
+firmness of character, they and you would lose much by it. You require
+in women stability of character! Well, do you not find it in a
+friend?--Shall I tell you what is in my mind? It is not our virtues
+you need; but our playfulness and our weakness. The love which you
+could feel for a woman who would be estimable in every respect, would
+become too dangerous for you. Until you can contemplate a contract of
+marriage, you should seek only to amuse yourself with those who are
+beautiful; a passing taste alone should attach you to one of them: be
+careful not to plunge in too deep with her; there can nothing result
+but a bad ending. If you did not reflect more profoundly than the
+greater part of young people, I should talk to you in an entirely
+different tone; but I perceive that you are ready to give to excess, a
+contrary meaning to their ridiculous frivolity. It is only necessary,
+then, to attach yourself to a woman who, like an agreeable child,
+might amuse you with pleasant follies, light caprices, and all those
+pretty faults which make the charm of a gallant intercourse.
+
+Do you wish me to tell you what makes love dangerous? It is the
+sublime view that one sometimes takes of it. But the exact truth is,
+it is only a blind instinct which one must know how to appreciate: an
+appetite which you have for one object in preference to another,
+without being able to give the reason for your taste. Considered as a
+friendly intimacy when reason presides, it is not a passion, it is no
+longer love, it is, in truth, a warm hearted esteem, but tranquil;
+incapable of drawing you away from any fixed position. If, walking in
+the footsteps of our ancient heroes of romance, you aim at great
+sentiments, you will see that this pretended heroism makes of love
+only a sad and sometimes fatal folly. It is a veritable fanaticism;
+but if you disengage it from all that opinion makes it, it will soon
+be your happiness and pleasure. Believe me, if it were reason or
+enthusiasm which formed affairs of the heart, love would become
+insipid, or a frenzy. The only means of avoiding these two extremes is
+to follow the path I have indicated. You need only to be amused, and
+you will find amusement only among the women I mention to you as
+capable of it. Your heart wishes occupation, they are made to fill it.
+Try my recipe and you will find it good--I made you a fair promise,
+and it seems to me I am keeping my word with you exactly. Adieu, I
+have just received a charming letter from M. de Saint-Evremond, and I
+must answer it. I wish at the same time to propose to him the ideas
+which I have communicated to you, and I shall be very much mistaken if
+he does not approve of them.
+
+To-morrow I shall have the Abbé de Châteauneuf, and perhaps Molière.
+We shall read again the Tartuffe, in which some changes should be
+made. Take notice, Marquis, that those who do not conform to all I
+have just told you, have a little of the qualities of that character.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+Why Love Grows Cold
+
+
+In despite of everything I may say to you, you still stick to your
+first sentiment. You wish a respectable person for a mistress, and one
+who can at the same time be your friend. These sentiments would
+undoubtedly merit commendation if in reality they could bring you the
+happiness you expect them to; but experience teaches you that all
+those great expectations are pure illusions. Are serious qualities the
+only question in pastimes of the heart? I might be tempted to believe
+that romances have impaired your mental powers. Poor Marquis! He has
+allowed himself to become fascinated by the sublime talk common in
+conversation. But, my dear child, what do you mean to do with these
+chimeras of reason? I willingly tell you, Marquis: it is very fine
+coin, but it is a pity that it can not enter into commercial
+transactions.
+
+When you wish to begin housekeeping, look for a reliable woman, full
+of virtue and lofty principles. All this is becoming to the dignity of
+the marriage tie; I intended to say, to its gravity. But at present,
+as you require nothing but a love affair, beware of being serious, and
+believe what I tell you; I know your wants better than you yourself
+know them. Men usually say that they seek essential qualities in those
+they love. Blind fools that they are! How they would complain could
+they find them! What would they gain by being deified? They need only
+amusement. A mistress as reasonable as you require would be a wife for
+whom you would have an infinite respect, I admit, but not a particle
+of ardor. A woman estimable in all respects is too subduing,
+humiliates you too much, for you to love her long. Forced to esteem
+her, and even sometimes to admire her, you can not excuse yourself for
+ceasing to love her. So many virtues are a reproach too discreet, too
+tiresome a critic of our eccentricities, not to arouse your pride at
+last, and when that is humbled, farewell to love. Make a thorough
+analysis of your sentiments, examine well your conscience, and you
+will see that I speak the truth. I have but a moment left to say
+adieu.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+The Spice of Love
+
+
+Do you know, Marquis, that you will end by putting me in a temper?
+Heavens, how very stupid you are sometimes! I see it in your letter;
+you have not understood me at all. Take heed; I did not say that you
+should take for a mistress a despicable object. That is not at all my
+idea. But I said that in reality you needed only a love affair, and
+that, to make it pleasant, you should not attach yourself exclusively
+to substantial qualities. I repeat it; when in love, men need only to
+be amused; and I believe on this subject I am an authority. Traces of
+temper and caprice, a senseless quarrel, all this has more effect upon
+women, and retains their affection more than all the reason
+imaginable, more than steadiness of character.
+
+Someone whom you esteem for the justice and strength of his ideas,
+said one day at my house, that caprice in women was too closely allied
+to beauty to be an antidote. I opposed this opinion with so much
+animation, that it could readily be seen that the contrary maxim was
+my sentiment, and I am, in truth, well persuaded that caprice is not
+close to beauty, except to animate its charms in order to make them
+more attractive, to serve as a goad, and to flavor them. There is no
+colder sentiment, and none which endures less than admiration. One
+easily becomes accustomed to see the same features, however regular
+they may be, and when a little malignity does not give them life or
+action, their very regularity soon destroys the sentiment they excite.
+A cloud of temper, even, can give to a beautiful countenance the
+necessary variety, to prevent the weariness of seeing it always in the
+same state. In a word, woe to the woman of too monotonous a
+temperament; her monotony satiates and disgusts. She is always the
+same statue, with her a man is always right. She is so good, so
+gentle, that she takes away from people the privilege of quarreling
+with her, and this is often such a great pleasure! Put in her place a
+vivacious woman, capricious, decided, to a certain limit, however, and
+things assume a different aspect. The lover will find in the same
+person the pleasure of variety. Temper is the salt, the quality which
+prevents it from becoming stale. Restlessness, jealousy, quarrels,
+making friends again, spitefulness, all are the food of love.
+Enchanting variety! which fills, which occupies a sensitive heart much
+more deliciously than the regularity of behavior, and the tiresome
+monotony which is called "good disposition."
+
+I know how you men must be governed. A caprice puts you in an
+uncertainty, which you have as much trouble and grief in dispelling as
+though it were a victory obtained over a new object. Roughness makes
+you hold your breath. You do not stop disputing, but neither do you
+cease to conquer and to be conquered. In vain does reason sigh. You
+can not comprehend how such an imp manages to subjugate you so
+tyrannically. Everything tells you that the idol of your heart is a
+collection of caprices and follies, but she is a spoiled child, whom
+you can not help but love. The efforts which reflection causes you to
+make to loosen them, serve only to forge still tighter your chains;
+for love is never so strong as when you believe it ready to break away
+in the heat of a quarrel. It loves, it storms; with it, everything is
+convulsive. Would you reduce it to rule? It languishes, it expires. In
+a word, this is what I wanted to say; do not take for a mistress a
+woman who has only reliable qualities; but one who is sometimes
+dominated by temper, and silences reason; otherwise I shall say that
+it is not a love affair you want, but to set up housekeeping.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+Love and Temper
+
+
+Oh, I agree with you, Marquis, a woman who has only temper and
+caprices is very thorny for an acquaintance and in the end only
+repels. I agree again that these irregularities must make of love a
+never ending quarrel, a continual storm. Therefore, it is not for a
+person of this character that I advise you to form an attachment. You
+always go beyond my ideas. I only depicted to you in my last letter an
+amiable woman, one who becomes still more so by a shade of diversity,
+and you speak only of an unpleasant woman, who has nothing but
+ungracious things to say. How we have drifted away from the point!
+
+When I spoke of temper I only meant the kind which gives a stronger
+relish, anxiety, and a little jealousy: that, in a word, which springs
+from love alone, and not from natural brutality, that roughness which
+one ordinarily calls "bad temper." When it is love which makes a woman
+rough, when that alone is the cause of her liveliness, what sort can
+the lover be who has so little delicacy as to complain of it? Do not
+these errors prove the violence of passion? For myself, I have always
+thought that he who knew how to keep himself within proper bounds,
+was moderately amorous. Can one be so, in effect, without allowing
+himself to be goaded by the fire of a devouring impetuosity, without
+experiencing all the revolutions which it necessarily occasions? No,
+undoubtedly. Well! who can see all these disturbances in a beloved
+object without a secret pleasure? While complaining of its injustice
+and its transports, one feels no less deliciously at heart that he is
+loved, and with passion, and that these same aggravations are most
+convincing proofs that it is voluntary.
+
+There, Marquis, is what constitutes the secret charm of the troubles
+which lovers sometimes suffer, of the tears they shed. But if you are
+going to believe that I wished to tell you that a woman of bad temper,
+capricious, can make you happy, undeceive yourself. I said, and I
+shall always persist in my idea, that diversity is necessary,
+caprices, bickerings, in a gallant intercourse, to drive away
+weariness, and to perpetuate the strength of it. But consider that
+these spices do not produce that effect except when love itself is the
+source. If temper is born of a natural brusqueness, or of a restless,
+envious, unjust disposition, I am the first one to say that such a
+woman will become hateful, she will be the cause of disheartening
+quarrels. A connection of the heart becomes then a veritable torment,
+from which it is desirable to free oneself as quickly as possible.
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+Certain Maxims Concerning Love
+
+
+You think, then, Marquis, that you have brought up an invincible
+argument, when you tell me that one is not the master of his own
+heart, in disposing of it where he wishes, and that consequently you
+are not at liberty to choose the object of your attachment? Morals of
+the opera! Abandon this commonplace to women who expect, in saying so,
+to justify their weaknesses. It is very necessary that they should
+have something to which to cling: like the gentleman of whom our
+friend Montaigne speaks who, when the gout attacked him, would have
+been very angry if he had not been able to say: "Cursed ham!" They say
+it is a sympathetic stroke. That is too strong for me. Is anyone
+master of his heart? He is no longer permitted to reply when such good
+reasons are given. They have even so well sanctioned these maxims that
+they wish to attract everyone to their arms in order to try to
+overcome them. But these same maxims find so much approbation only
+because everyone is interested in having them received. No one
+suspects that such excuses, far from justifying caprices, may be a
+confession that one does not wish to correct them.
+
+For myself, I take the liberty of being of a different opinion from
+the multitude. It is enough for me that it is not impossible to
+conquer one's inclination to condemn all those who are unreasonable or
+dishonorable. Dear me! Have we not seen women succeed in destroying in
+their hearts a weakness which has taken them by surprise, as soon as
+they have discovered that the object of their affections was unworthy
+of them? How often have they stifled the most tender affection, and
+sacrificed it to the conventionalities of an establishment? Rest,
+time, absence, are remedies which passion, however ardent one may have
+supposed it, can never resist; insensibly it weakens, and dies all at
+once. I know that to withdraw honorably from such a liaison requires
+all the strength of reason. I comprehend still more, that the
+difficulties you imagine stand in the way of maintaining a victory, do
+not leave you enough courage to undertake it; so that, although I may
+say that there are no invincible inclinations in the speculation, I
+will admit that there are few of them to be vanquished by practice;
+and it happens so, only because one does not like to attempt without
+success. However that may be, on the whole, I imagine that there being
+here only a question of gallantry, it would be folly to put you to the
+torture, in order to destroy the inclination which has seized upon you
+for a woman more or less amiable; but also, because you are not
+smitten with anyone, I persist in saying that I was right in
+describing to you the character which I believed would be the most
+capable of making you happy.
+
+It is without doubt to be desired, that delicate sentiments, real
+merit, should have more power over our hearts, and that they might be
+able to occupy them and find a permanent place there forever. But
+experience proves that this is not so. I do not reason from what you
+should be, but from what you really are. My intention is to give you a
+knowledge of the heart such as it is, and not what it ought to be. I
+am the first one to regret the depravity of your taste, however
+indulgent I may be to your caprices. But not being able to reform the
+vices of the heart, I would at least teach you to draw out of them
+whatever good you can. Not being able to render you wise, I try to
+make you happy. It is an old saying: to wish to destroy the passions
+would be to undertake our annihilation. It is only necessary to
+regulate them. They are in our hands like the poison in a pharmacy;
+compounded by a skillful chemist they become beneficent remedies.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+Women Expect a Quid Pro Quo From Men
+
+
+Oh, who doubts, Marquis, that it may be only by essential qualities
+that you can succeed in pleasing women? It is simply a question of
+knowing what meaning you attach to this expression. Do you call
+essential qualities, worth, firmness of character, precision of
+judgment, extent of learning, prudence, discretion, how can I tell the
+number of virtues which often embarrass you more than they make you
+happy? Our minds are not in accord upon this matter. Reserve all the
+qualities I have specified for the intercourse you are obliged to have
+with men, they are quite proper under such circumstances. But when it
+comes to gallantry, you will have to change all such virtues for an
+equal number of charming traits; those that captivate, it is the only
+coin that passes current in this country; it is the only merit, and
+you must be on your guard against calling it spurious money. It may be
+that true merit consists less in real perfection than in that which
+the world requires. It is far more advantageous to possess the
+qualities agreeable to those whom we desire to please, than to have
+those we believe to be estimable. In a word, we must imitate the
+morals and even the caprices of those with whom we associate, if we
+expect to live in peace with them.
+
+What is the destiny of women? What is their rôle on earth? It is to
+please. Now, a charming figure, personal graces, in a word, all the
+amiable and brilliant qualities are the only means of succeeding in
+that role. Women possess them to a superlative degree, and it is in
+these qualities that they wish men to resemble them. It will be vain
+for you to accuse them of frivolity, for they are playing the beauty
+rôle, since they are destined to make you happy. Is it not, indeed,
+due to the charm of our companionship, to the gentleness of our
+manners, that you owe your most satisfying pleasures, your social
+virtues, in fact, your whole happiness? Have some good faith in this
+matter. Is it possible for the sciences of themselves, the love of
+glory, valor, nay, even that friendship of which you boast so much, to
+make you perfectly happy? The pleasure you draw from any of them, can
+it be keen enough to make you feel happy? Certainly not. None of them
+have the power to relieve you from a wearisome monotony which crushes
+you and makes you an object of pity.
+
+It is women who have taken upon themselves to dissipate these mortal
+languors by the vivacious gayety they inject into their society; by
+the charms they know so well how to lavish where they will prove
+effectual. A reckless joy, an agreeable delirium, a delicious
+intoxication, are alone capable of awakening your attention, and
+making you understand that you are really happy, for, Marquis, there
+is a vast difference between merely enjoying happiness and relishing
+the sensation of enjoying it. The possession of necessary things does
+not make a man comfortable, it is the superfluous which makes him
+rich, and which makes him feel that he is rich.
+
+It is not because you possess superior qualities that you are a
+pleasant companion, it may be a real defect which is essential to you.
+To be received with open arms, you must be agreeable, amusing,
+necessary to the pleasure of others. I warn you that you can not
+succeed in any other manner, particularly with women. Tell me, what
+would you have me do with your learning, the geometry of your mind,
+with the precision of your memory, etc.? If you have only such
+advantages, Marquis, if you have no charming accomplishments to offset
+your crudity--I can vouch for their opinion--far from pleasing women,
+you will seem to them like a critic of whom they will be afraid, and
+you will place them under so much constraint, that the enjoyment they
+might have permitted themselves in your society will be banished. Why,
+indeed, try to be amiable toward a man who is a source of anxiety to
+you by his nonchalance, who does not unbosom himself? Women are not at
+their ease except with those who take chances with them, and enter
+into their spirit. In a word, too much circumspection gives others a
+chill like that felt by a man who goes out of a warm room into a cold
+wind. I intended to say that habitual reserve locks the doors of the
+hearts of those who associate with us; they have no room to expand.
+
+You must also bear this in mind, Marquis, that in cases of gallantry,
+your first advances must be made under the most favorable
+circumstances. You must have read somewhere, that one pleases more by
+agreeable faults than by essential qualities. Great virtues are like
+pieces of gold of which one makes less use than of ordinary currency.
+
+This idea calls to my mind those people who, in place of our kind of
+money, use shells as their medium of exchange. Well, do you imagine
+that these people are not so rich as we with all the treasures of the
+new world? We might, at first blush, take this sort of wealth as
+actual poverty, but we should be quickly undeceived upon reflection,
+for metals have no value except in opinion. Our gold would be false
+money to those people. Now, the qualities you call essential are not
+worth any more in cases of gallantry, where only pebbles are
+sufficient. What matters the conventional mark provided there is
+commerce?
+
+Now, this is my conclusion: If it be true, as you can not doubt, that
+you ought not to expect happiness except from an interchange of
+agreeable qualities in women, you may be sure that you will never
+please them unless you possess advantages similar to theirs. I stick
+to the point. You men are constantly boasting about your science, your
+firmness, etc., but tell me, how weary would you not be, how disgusted
+even, with life, if, always logical, you were condemned to be forever
+learned and sordid, to live only in the company of philosophers? I
+know you, you would soon become weary of admiration for your good
+qualities, and the way you are made, you would rather do without
+virtue than pleasure. Do not amuse yourself, then, by holding
+yourself out as a man with great qualities in the sense you consider
+them. True merit is that which is esteemed by those we aim to please.
+Gallantry has its own laws, and Marquis, amiable men are the sages of
+this world.
+
+
+
+
+VIII
+
+The Necessity for Love and Its Primitive Cause.
+
+
+This time, Marquis, you have not far to go, your hour has come. The
+diagnosis you give me of your condition tells me that you are in love.
+The young widow you mention is certainly capable of rousing an
+inspiration in your heart. The Chevalier de ---- has given me a very
+favorable portrait of her. But scarcely do you begin to feel a few
+scruples, than you turn into a crime the advice I have been giving
+you. The disorder which love brings to the soul, and the other evils
+which follow in its train, appear to you, so you say, more to be
+feared than the pleasures it gives are to be desired.
+
+It is true that some very good people are of the opinion that the
+sorrows of love are about equal to its pleasures, but without entering
+upon a tiresome discussion to ascertain whether they are right or
+wrong, if you would have my opinion, here it is: Love is a passion
+which is neither good nor bad of itself; it is only those who are
+affected by it that determine whether it is good or bad. All that I
+shall say in its favor is, that it gives us an advantage with which
+any of the discomforts of life can not enter into comparison. It drags
+us out of the rut, it stirs us up, and it is love which satisfies one
+of our most pressing wants. I think I have already told you that our
+hearts are made for emotion; to excite it therefore, is to satisfy a
+demand of nature. What would vigorous youth be without love? A long
+illness: it would not be existence, it would be vegetating. Love is to
+our hearts what winds are to the sea. They grow into tempests, true;
+they are sometimes even the cause of shipwrecks. But the winds render
+the sea navigable, their constant agitation of its surface is the
+cause of its preservation, and if they are often dangerous, it is for
+the pilot to know how to navigate in safety.
+
+But I have wandered from my text, and return to it. Though I shock
+your sensitive delicacy by my frank speaking, I shall add, that
+besides the need of having our emotions stirred, we have in connection
+with them a physical machinery, which is the primitive cause and
+necessity of love. Perhaps it is not too modest for a woman to use
+such language to you, but you will understand that I would not talk to
+every one so plainly. We are not engaged in what may be called "nice"
+conversation, we are philosophizing. If my discussions seem to you to
+be sometimes too analytical for a woman, remember what I told you in
+my last letter. From the time I was first able to reason, I made up my
+mind to investigate and ascertain which of the two sexes was the more
+favored. I saw that men were not at all stinted in the distribution of
+the roles to be played, and I therefore became a man.
+
+If I were you, I would not investigate whether it be a good or a bad
+thing to fall in love. I would prefer to have you ask whether it is
+good or bad to be thirsty; or, that it be forbidden to give one a
+drink because there are men who become intoxicated. Inasmuch as you
+are not at liberty to divest yourself of an appetite belonging to the
+mechanical part of your nature, as could our ancient romancers, do not
+ruin yourself by speculating and meditating on the greater or less
+advantages in loving. Take love as I have advised you to take it, only
+do not let it be to you a passion, only an amusement.
+
+I understand what you are going to say: you are going to overwhelm me
+again with your great principles, and tell me that a man has not
+sufficient control over his feelings to stop when he would. Pooh! I
+regard those who talk in that fashion in the same light as the man,
+who believes he is in honor bound to show great sorrow on the occasion
+of a loss or accident, which his friends consider great, but which is
+nothing to him. Such a man feels less than any one the need of
+consolation, but he finds pleasure in showing his tears. He rejoices
+to know that he possesses a heart capable of excessive emotion, and
+this softens it still more. He feeds it with sorrow, he makes an idol
+of it, and offers it incense so often that he acquires the habit. All
+such admirers of great and noble sentiments, spoiled by romances or by
+prudes, make it a point of honor to spiritualize their passion. By
+force of delicate treatment, they become all the more infatuated with
+it, as they deem it to be their own work, and they fear nothing so
+much as the shame of returning to common sense and resuming their
+manhood.
+
+Let us take good care, Marquis, not to make ourselves ridiculous in
+this way. This fashion of straining our intelligence is nothing more,
+in the age in which we are living, than playing the part of fools. In
+former times people took it into their heads that love should be
+something grave, they considered it a serious matter, and esteemed it
+only in proportion to its dignity. Imagine exacting dignity from a
+child! Away would go all its graces, and its youth would soon become
+converted into old age. How I pity our good ancestors! What with them
+was a mortal weariness, a melancholy frenzy, is with us a gay folly, a
+delicious delirium. Fools that they were, they preferred the horrors
+of deserts and rocks, to the pleasures of a garden strewn with
+flowers. What prejudices the habit of reflection has brought upon us!
+
+The proof that great sentiments are nothing but chimeras of pride and
+prejudice, is, that in our day, we no longer witness that taste for
+ancient mystic gallantry, no more of those old fashioned gigantic
+passions. Ridicule the most firmly established opinions, I will go
+further, deride the feelings that are believed to be the most natural
+and soon both will disappear, and men will stand amazed to see that
+ideas for which they possessed a sort of idolatry, are in reality
+nothing but trifles which pass away like the ever changing fashions.
+
+You will understand, then, Marquis, that it is not necessary to
+acquire the habit of deifying the fancy you entertain for the
+Countess. You will know, at last, that love to be worthy of the name,
+and to make us happy, far from being treated as a serious affair,
+should be fostered lightly, and above all with gayety. Nothing can
+make you understand more clearly the truth of what I am telling you,
+than the result of your adventure, for I believe the Countess to be
+the last woman in the world to harbor a sorrowful passion. You, with
+your high sentiments will give her the blues, mark what I tell you.
+
+My indisposition continues, and I would feel like telling you that I
+never go out during the day, but would not that be giving you a
+rendezvous? If, however, you should come and give me your opinion of
+the "Bajazet" of Racine, you would be very kind. They say that the
+Champmesle has surpassed herself.
+
+I have read over this letter, Marquis, and the lecture it contains
+puts me out of humor with you. I recognize the fact that truth is a
+contagious disease. Judge how much of it goes into love, since you
+bestow it even upon those who aim to undeceive you. It is quite
+strange, that in order to prove that love should be treated with
+levity, it was necessary to assume a serious tone.
+
+
+
+
+IX
+
+Love is a Natural Inclination
+
+
+So you have taken what I said about love in my last letter as a crime?
+I have blasphemed love; I have degraded it by calling it a
+"necessity?" You have such noble thoughts, Marquis. What is passing in
+your mind is proof of it. You can not realize, or imagine anything
+less than the pure and delicate sentiments which fill your heart. To
+see the Countess, hold sweet discourse with her, listen to the sound
+of her gentle voice, dance attendance upon her, that is the height of
+your desires, it is your supreme happiness. Far from you are those
+vulgar sentiments which I unworthily substitute for your sublime
+metaphysics; sentiments created for worldly souls occupied solely with
+sensual pleasures. What a mistake I made! Could I imagine that the
+Countess was a woman to be captured by motives so little worthy of
+her? To raise the suspicion in her mind that you possessed such views,
+would it not inevitably expose you to her hate, her scorn, etc.?
+
+Are not these the inconveniences which my morality leads you to
+apprehend? My poor Marquis! you are yourself deceived by your
+misunderstanding of the real cause of your sentiments. Give me all
+your attention: I wish to draw you away from error, but in a manner
+that will best accord with the importance of what I am about to say. I
+mount the tribune; I feel the presence of the god who inspires me. I
+rub my forehead with the air of a person who meditates on profound
+truths, and who is going to utter great thoughts. I am going to reason
+according to rule.
+
+Men, I know not by what caprice, have attached shame to the indulgence
+of that reciprocal inclination which nature has bestowed upon both
+sexes. They knew, however, that they could not entirely stifle its
+voice, so what did they do to relieve themselves of their
+embarrassment? They attempted to substitute the mere shell of an
+affection wholly spiritual for the humiliating necessity of appearing
+in good faith to satisfy a natural want. Insensibly, they have grown
+accustomed to meddle with a thousand little sublime nothings connected
+with it, and as if that were not enough, they have at last succeeded
+in establishing the belief that all these frivolous accessories, the
+work of a heated imagination, constitute the essence of the
+inclination. There you are; love erected into a fine virtue; at least
+they have given it the appearance of a virtue. But let us break
+through this prestige and cite an example.
+
+At the beginning of their intercourse, lovers fancy themselves
+inspired by the noblest and most delicate sentiments. They exhaust
+their ingenuity, exaggerations, the enthusiasm of the most exquisite
+metaphysics; they are intoxicated for a time with the idea that their
+love is a superior article. But let us follow them in their liaison:
+Nature quickly recovers her rights and re-assumes her sway; soon,
+vanity, gorged with the display of an exaggerated purpose, leaves the
+heart at liberty to feel and express its sentiments without restraint,
+and dissatisfied with the pleasures of love, the day comes when these
+people are very much surprised to find themselves, after having
+traveled around a long circuit, at the very point where a peasant,
+acting according to nature, would have begun. And thereby hangs a
+tale.
+
+A certain Honesta, to give her a fictitious name, in whose presence I
+was one day upholding the theory I have just been maintaining, became
+furious.
+
+"What!" she exclaimed in a transport of indignation, "do you pretend,
+Madame, that a virtuous person, one who possesses only honest
+intentions, such as marriage, is actuated by such vulgar motives? You
+would believe, in that case, that I, for instance, who 'par vertu,'
+have been married three times, and who, to subdue my husbands, have
+never wished to have a separate apartment, that I only acted thus to
+procure what you call pleasure? Truly you would be very much mistaken.
+Indeed, never have I refused to fulfill the duties of my state, but I
+assure you that the greater part of the time, I yielded to them only
+through complaisance, or as a distraction, always with regret at the
+importunities of men. We love men and marry them because they have
+certain qualities of mind and heart; and no woman, with the exception
+of those, perhaps, whom I do not care to name, even attaches any
+importance to other advantages----"
+
+I interrupted her, and more through malice than good taste, carried
+the argument to its logical conclusion. I made her see that what she
+said was a new proof of my contention:
+
+"The reasons you draw from the legitimate views of marriage," said I,
+"prove that those who hold them, fend to the same end as two ordinary
+lovers, perhaps, even in better faith, with this difference only, that
+they wish an extra ceremony attached to it."
+
+This shot roused the indignation of my adversary.
+
+"You join impiety to libertinage," said she, moving away from me.
+
+I took the liberty of making some investigations, and would you
+believe it, Marquis? This prude so refined, had such frequent
+'distractions' with her three husbands, who were all young and
+vigorous, that she buried them in a very short time.
+
+Come now, Marquis, retract your error; abandon your chimera, reserve
+delicacy of sentiment for friendship; accept love for what it is. The
+more dignity you give it, the more dangerous you make it; the more
+sublime the idea you form of it, the less correct it is. Believe de la
+Rochefoucauld, a man who knows the human heart well: "If you expect to
+love a woman for love of herself," says he, "you will be much
+mistaken."
+
+
+
+
+X
+
+The Sensation of Love Forms a Large Part of a Woman's Nature
+
+
+The commentaries the Countess has been making you about her virtue,
+and the refinement she expects in a lover, have certainly alarmed you.
+You think she will always be as severe as she now appears to you. All
+I have told you does not reassure you. You even esteem it a favor to
+me that you stop with doubting my principles. If you dared you would
+condemn them entirely. When you talk to me in that fashion, I feel at
+liberty to say that I believe you. It is not your fault if you do not
+see clearly into your own affair, but in proportion as you advance,
+the cloud will disappear, and you will perceive with surprise the
+truth of what I have been telling you.
+
+The more cold blooded you are, or at least, as long as passion has not
+yet reached that degree of boldness its progress will ultimately lead
+you to, the mere hope of the smallest favor is a crime; you tremble at
+the most innocent caress. At first you ask for nothing, or for so
+slight a favor, that a woman conscientiously believes herself obliged
+to grant it, delighted with you on account of your modesty. To obtain
+this slight favor, you protest never to ask another, and yet, even
+while making your protestations, you are preparing to exact more. She
+becomes accustomed to it and permits further trifling, which seems to
+be of so little importance that she would endure it from any other
+man, if she were on the slightest terms of intimacy with him. But, to
+judge from the result, what appears to be of so little consequence on
+one day when compared with the favor obtained the day before, becomes
+very considerable when compared with that obtained on the first day. A
+woman, re-assured by your discretion, does not perceive that her
+frailties are being graduated upon a certain scale. She is so much
+mistress of herself, and the little things which are at first exacted,
+appear to her to be so much within her power of refusal, that she
+expects to possess the same strength when something of a graver
+character is proposed to her. It is just this way: she flatters
+herself that her power of resistance will increase in the same
+proportion with the importance of the favors she will be called upon
+to grant. She relies so entirely upon her virtue, that she challenges
+danger by courting it. She experiments with her power of resistance;
+she wishes to see how far the granting of a few unimportant favors can
+lead her. Here is where she is imprudent, for by her very rashness she
+accustoms her imagination to contemplate suggestions which are the
+final cause of her seduction. She travels a long way on the road
+without perceiving that she has moved a single step. If upon looking
+back along the route, she is surprised at having yielded so much, her
+lover will be no less surprised at having obtained so much.
+
+But I go still further. I am persuaded that love is not always
+necessary to bring about the downfall of a woman. I knew a woman, who,
+although amiable in her manner with everybody, had never been
+suspected of any affair of the heart. Fifteen years of married life
+had not diminished her tenderness for her husband, and their happy
+union could be cited as an example to imitate.
+
+One day at her country place, her friends amused themselves so late
+that they were constrained to remain at her house all night. In the
+morning, her servants happening to be occupied with her guests, she
+was alone in her apartment engaged in making her toilet. A man whom
+she knew quite well, but who was without social position, dropped in
+for a short visit and to pass the compliments of the day. Some
+perplexity in her toilette, induced him to offer his services. The
+neglige dress she wore, naturally gave him an opportunity to
+compliment her upon her undiminished charms. Of course she protested,
+but laughingly, claiming they were unmerited. However, one thing
+followed another, they became a trifle sentimental, a few
+familiarities which they did not at first deem of any consequence,
+developed into something more decided, until, finally, unable to
+resist, they were both overcome, the woman being culpable, for she
+regarded his advances in the nature of a joke and let them run on.
+What was their embarrassment after such a slip? They have never since
+been able to understand how they could have ventured so far without
+having had the slightest intention of so doing.
+
+I am tempted to exclaim here: Oh, you mortals who place too much
+reliance upon your virtue, tremble at this example! Whatever may be
+your strength, there are, unfortunately, moments when the most
+virtuous is the most feeble. The reason for this strange phenomenon
+is, that nature is always on the watch; always aiming to attain her
+ends. The desire for love is, in a woman, a large part of her nature.
+Her virtue is nothing but a piece of patchwork.
+
+The homilies of your estimable Countess may be actually sincere,
+although in such cases, a woman always exaggerates, but she deludes
+herself if she expects to maintain to the end, sentiments so severe
+and so delicate. Fix this fact well in your mind, Marquis, that these
+female metaphysicians are not different in their nature from other
+women. Their exterior is more imposing, their morals more austere, but
+inquire into their acts, and you will discover that their heart
+affairs always finish the same as those of women less refined. They
+are a species of the "overnice," forming a class of their own, as I
+told Queen Christine of Sweden, one day: "They are the Jansenists of
+love." (Puritans.)
+
+You should be on your guard, Marquis, against everything women have to
+say on the chapter of gallantry. All the fine systems of which they
+make such a pompous display, are nothing but vain illusions, which
+they utilize to astonish those who are easily deceived. In the eyes of
+a clear sighted man, all this rubbish of stilted phrases is but a
+parade at which he mocks, and which does not prevent him from
+penetrating their real sentiments. The evil they speak of love, the
+resistance they oppose to it, the little taste they pretend for its
+pleasures, the measures they take against it, the fear they have of
+it, all that springs from love itself. Their very manner renders it
+homage, indicates that they harbor the thought of it. Love assumes a
+thousand different forms in their minds. Like pride, it lives and
+flourishes upon its own defeat; it is never overthrown that it does
+not spring up again with renewed force.
+
+What a letter, good heavens! To justify its length would be to
+lengthen it still more.
+
+
+
+
+XI
+
+The Distinction Between Love and Friendship
+
+
+I was delighted with your letter, Marquis. Do you know why? Because it
+gives me speaking proof of the truth of what I have been preaching to
+you these latter days. Ah! for once you have forgotten all your
+metaphysics. You picture to me the charms of the Countess with a
+complacency which demonstrates that your sentiments are not altogether
+so high flown as you would have me believe, and as you think down in
+your heart. Tell me frankly: if your love were not the work of the
+senses, would you take so much pleasure in considering that form,
+those eyes which enchant you, that mouth which you describe to me in
+such glowing colors? If the qualities of heart and mind alone seduce
+you, a woman of fifty is worth still more in that respect than the
+Countess. You see such a one every day, it is her mother; why not
+become enamored of her instead? Why neglect a hundred women of her
+age, of her plainness, and of her merit, who make advances to you, and
+who would enact the same role with you that you play with the
+Countess? Why do you desire with so much passion to be distinguished
+by her from other men? Why are you uneasy when she shows them the
+least courtesy? Does her esteem for them diminish that which she
+pretends for you? Are rivalries and jealousies recognized in
+metaphysics? I believe not I have friends and I do not observe such
+things in them; I feel none in my own heart when they love other
+women.
+
+Friendship is a sentiment which has nothing to do with the senses; the
+soul alone receives the impression of it, and the soul loses nothing
+of its value by giving itself up to several at the same time. Compare
+friendship with love, and you will perceive the difference between a
+desire which governs a friend, and that which offers itself to a
+lover. You will confess, that at heart, I am not so unreasonable as
+you at first thought, and that it might be very well if it should
+happen that in love, you might have a soul as worldly as that of a
+good many people, whom it pleases you to accuse of very little
+refinement.
+
+I do not wish, however, to bring men alone to trial. I am frank, and I
+am quite sure that if women would be honest, they would soon confess
+that they are not a bit more refined than men. Indeed, if they saw in
+love only the pleasures of the soul, if they hoped to please only by
+their mental accomplishments and their good character, honestly, now,
+would they apply themselves with such particular care to please by the
+charms of their person? What is a beautiful skin to the soul; an
+elegant figure; a well shaped arm? What contradictions between their
+real sentiments and those they exhibit on parade! Look at them, and
+you will be convinced that they have no intention of making themselves
+valued except by their sensual attractions, and that they count
+everything else as nothing. Listen to them: you will be tempted to
+believe that it is not worldly things which they consider the least. I
+think I deserve credit for trying to dispel your error in this
+respect, and ought I not to expect everything from the care they will
+take to undeceive you themselves? Perhaps they will succeed only too
+easily in expressing sentiments entirely contrary to those you have
+heard to-day from me.
+
+I am due at Mademoiselle de Raymond's this evening, to hear the two
+Camus and Ytier who are going to sing. Mesdames de la Sablière, de
+Salins, and de Monsoreau will also be there. Would you miss such a
+fine company?
+
+
+
+
+XII
+
+A Man in Love is an Amusing Spectacle
+
+
+You take things too much to heart, Marquis. Already two nights that
+you have not slept. Oh! it is true love, there is no mistaking that.
+You have made your eyes speak, you, yourself, have spoken quite
+plainly, and not the slightest notice has been taken of your
+condition. Such behavior calls for revenge. Is it possible that after
+eight whole days of devoted attention she has not given you the least
+hope? Such a thing can not be easily imagined. Such a long resistance
+begins to pass beyond probability. The Countess is a heroine of the
+last century. But if you are beginning to lose patience, you can
+imagine the length of time you would have had to suffer, if you had
+continued to proclaim grand and noble sentiments. You have already
+accomplished more in eight days than the late Celadon could in eight
+months. However, to speak seriously, are your complaints just? You
+call the Countess ungrateful, insensible, disdainful, etc. But by what
+right do you talk thus? Will you never believe what I have told you a
+hundred times? Love is a veritable caprice, involuntary, even in one
+who experiences its pangs. Why should, you say that the beloved object
+is bound to recompense a blind sentiment acquired without her
+connivance?
+
+You are very queer, you men. You consider yourselves offended because
+a woman does not respond with eagerness to the languishing looks you
+deign to cast upon her. Your revolted pride immediately accuses her of
+injustice, as if it were her fault that your head is turned; as if she
+were obliged, at a certain stage, to be seized with the same disease
+as you. Tell me this: is the Countess responsible if she is not
+afflicted with the same delirium as soon as you begin to rave? Cease,
+then, to accuse her and to complain, and to try to communicate your
+malady to her; I know you, you are seductive enough. Perhaps she will
+feel, too soon for her peace of mind, sentiments commensurate with
+your desires. I believe she has in her everything to subjugate you,
+and to inspire you with the taste I hope will be for your happiness,
+but so far, I do not think she is susceptible of a very serious
+attachment.
+
+Vivacious, inconsistent, positive, decided, she can not fail to give
+you plenty of exercise. An attentive and caressing woman would weary
+you; you must be handled in a military fashion, if you are to be
+amused and retained. As soon as the mistress assumes the rôle of
+lover, love begins to weaken; it does more, it rises like a tyrant,
+and ends in disdain which leads directly to disgust and inconstancy.
+Have you found, perchance, everything you required in the little
+mistress who is the cause of your dolorous martyrdom? Poor Marquis!
+What storms will blow over you. What quarrels I foresee! How many
+vexations, how many threats to leave her! But do not forget this: So
+much emotion will become your punishment, if you treat love after the
+manner of a hero of romance, and you will meet a fate entirely the
+contrary if you treat it like a reasonable man.
+
+But ought I to continue to write you? The moments you employ to read
+my letters will be so many stolen from love. Great Heavens! how I
+should like to be a witness of your situations! Indeed, for a
+sober-minded person, is there a spectacle more amusing than the
+contortions of a man in love?
+
+
+
+
+XIII
+
+Vanity Is a Fertile Soil for Love.
+
+
+You are not satisfied, then, Marquis, with what I so cavalierly said
+about your condition? You wish me by all means to consider your
+adventure as a serious thing, but I shall take good care not to do so.
+Do you not see that my way of treating you is consistent with my
+principles? I speak lightly of a thing I believe to be frivolous, or
+simply amusing. When it comes to an affair on which depends a lasting
+happiness, you will see me take on an appropriate tone. I do not want
+to pity you, because it depends upon yourself whether you are to be
+pitied or not. By a trick of your imagination, what now appears to be
+a pain to you may become a pleasure. To succeed, make use of my recipe
+and you will find it good. But to refer to the second paragraph of
+your letter:
+
+You say you are all the more surprised at the coldness of the Countess
+as you did not think it in earnest. According to what you say, your
+conjectures are based on the indiscretions of her friends. The good
+she spoke about you to them, was the main cause of your taking a fancy
+to her. I know men by this trait. The smallest word that escapes a
+woman's lips leads them into the belief that she has designs upon
+them. Everything has some reference to their merits; their vanity
+seizes upon everything, and they turn everything into profit. To
+examine them closely, nearly all of them love through gratitude, and
+on this point, women are not any more reasonable. So that gallantry is
+an intercourse in which we want the others to go along with us, always
+want to be their debtors. And you know pride is much more active in
+paying back than in giving. If two lovers would mutually explain,
+without reservation, the beginning and progress of their passion, what
+confidences would they not exchange?
+
+Elise, to whom Valère uttered a few general compliments, responded,
+perhaps without intending to, in a more affectionate manner than is
+usual in the case of such insipidities. It was enough. Valère is
+carried away with the idea that from a gallant he must become a lover.
+The fire is insensibly kindled on both sides; finally, it bursts
+forth, and there you are, a budding passion. If you should charge
+Elise with having made the first advances, nothing would appear more
+unjust to her, and yet nothing could be more true. I conclude from
+this that to take love for what it really is, it is less the work of
+what is called invincible sympathy, than that of our vanity. Notice
+the birth of all love affairs. They begin by the mutual praises we
+bestow upon each other. It has been said that it is folly which
+conducts love; I should say that it is flattery, and that it can not
+be introduced into the heart of a belle until after paying tribute to
+her vanity. Add to all this, the general desire and inclination we
+have to be loved, and we are bravely deceived. Like those enthusiasts
+who, by force of imagination, believe they can really see the images
+they conjure up in their minds, we fancy that we can see in others the
+sentiments we desire to find there.
+
+Be careful, then, Marquis, not to let yourself be blinded by a false
+notion. The Countess may have spoken well of you with the sole object
+of doing you justice, without carrying her intention any farther. And
+be sure you are wrong when you suspect her of insincerity in your
+regard. After all, why should you not prefer to have her dissemble her
+sentiments toward you, if you are the source of their inspiration? Are
+not women in the right to hide carefully their sentiments from you,
+and does not the bad use you make of the certainty of their love
+justify them in so doing?
+
+
+
+
+XIV
+
+Worth and Merit Are Not Considered in Love
+
+
+No, Marquis, the curiosity of Madame de Sévigné has not offended me.
+On the contrary, I am very glad that she wished to see the letters you
+receive from me. Without doubt, she thought that if it were a question
+of gallantry, it could only be to my profit; she now knows the
+contrary. She will also know that I am not so frivolous as she
+imagined, and I believe her just enough to form hereafter another idea
+of Ninon than the one she has heretofore had of her, for I am not
+ignorant of the fact that she does not speak of me much to my
+advantage. But her injustice will never influence my friendship for
+you. I am philosophic enough to console myself for not securing the
+commendation of people who judge me without knowing me. Whatever may
+happen, I shall continue to talk to you with my ordinary frankness,
+and I am sure that Madame de Sévigné, in spite of her refined mind,
+will, at heart, be more of my opinion than she cares to show. Now, I
+come to what relates to you.
+
+Well, Marquis, after infinite care and trouble, you think you have at
+last softened that stony heart? I am glad of it; but I laugh at your
+interpretation of the Countess' sentiments. You share with all men a
+common error which it is necessary to remove, however flattering it
+may be to you to foster it. You believe, every one of you, that it is
+your worth alone that kindles passion in the heart of women, and that
+qualities of heart and mind are the causes of the love they feel
+toward you. What a mistake! You only think so, it is true, because
+your pride finds satisfaction in the thought. But, if you can do so
+without prejudice, inquire into the motives that actuate you, and you
+will soon perceive that you are laboring under a delusion, and that we
+deceive you; that, everything well considered, you are the dupe of
+your vanity and of ours; that the worth of the person loved is only an
+excuse which gives an occasion for love, and is not the real cause.
+Finally, that all this sublime by-play, which is paraded on both
+sides, is a mere preliminary which enters into the desire to satisfy
+the need I first indicated to you as the prime exciting cause of this
+passion. I tell you this is a hard and humiliating truth, but it is
+none the less certain. We women enter the world with this necessity of
+loving undefined, and if we take one man in preference to another, let
+us say so honestly, we yield less to the knowledge of merit than to a
+mechanical instinct which is nearly always blind.
+
+For proof of this I need only refer to the foolish passions with which
+we sometimes become intoxicated for strangers, or at least for men
+with whom we are not sufficiently acquainted, to relieve our selection
+of them from the odium of imprudence from the beginning; in which case
+if there is a mutual response, well, it is pure chance. We are always
+forming attachments without sufficient circumspection, hence I am not
+wrong in comparing love to an appetite which one sometimes feels for
+one kind of food rather than for another, without being able to give
+the reason. I am very cruel to thus dissipate the phantoms of your
+self love, but I am telling you the truth. You are flattered by the
+love of a woman, because you believe it implies the worthiness of the
+object loved. You do her too much honor: let us say rather, that you
+have too good an opinion of yourself. Understand that it is not for
+yourself that we love you, to speak with sincerity, it is our own
+happiness we seek. Caprice, interest, vanity, disposition, the
+uneasiness that affects our hearts when they are unoccupied, these are
+the sources of the great sentiment we wish to deify! It is not great
+qualities that affect us; if they enter for anything into the reasons
+which determine us in your favor, it is not the heart which receives
+the impression, it is vanity; and the greater part of the things in
+you which please us, very often makes you ridiculous or contemptible.
+
+But, what will you have? We need an admirer who can entertain us with
+ideas of our perfections; we need an obliging person who will submit
+to our caprices; we need a man! Chance presents us with one rather
+than another; we accept him, but we do not choose him. In a word, you
+believe yourselves to be the objects of our disinterested affection. I
+repeat: You think women love you for yourselves. Poor dupes! You are
+only the instruments of their pleasures, the sport of their caprices.
+I must, however, do women justice; it is not that you are what I have
+just enumerated with their consent, for the sentiments which I develop
+here are not well defined in their minds, on the contrary, with the
+best faith in the world, women imagine themselves influenced and
+actuated only by the grand ideas which your vanity and theirs has
+nourished. It would be a crying injustice to accuse them of deceit in
+this respect; but, without being aware of it, they deceive themselves,
+and you are equally deceived.
+
+You see that I am revealing the secrets of the good goddess. Judge of
+my friendship, since, at the expense of my own sex, I labor to
+enlighten you. The better you know women, the fewer follies they will
+lead you to commit.
+
+
+
+
+XV
+
+The Hidden Motives of Love
+
+
+Really, Marquis, I do not understand how you can meekly submit to the
+serious language I sometimes write you. It seems as if I had no other
+aim in my letters than to sweep away your agreeable illusions and
+substitute mortifying truths. I must, however, get rid of my mania for
+saying deeply considered things. I know better than any one else that
+pleasant lies are more agreeable than the most reasonable
+conversation, but my disposition breaks through everything in spite of
+me. I feel a fit of philosophy upon me again to-day, and I must ask
+you to prepare to endure the broadside of morality I am making ready
+to give you. Hereafter, I promise you more gayety. So now to answer
+your letter.
+
+No, I will not take back anything. You may make war on me as much as
+it please you, because of the bad opinion of my sex I expressed in my
+last letter. Is it my fault if I am furnished with disagreeable truths
+to utter? Besides, do you not know, Marquis, that the being on earth
+who thinks the most evil of women, is a woman?
+
+I wish, however, very seriously, to justify the ideas, to my manner of
+expressing which you have taken an exception. I am neither envious nor
+unjust. Because I happened to mention my own sex rather than yours,
+you must not imagine that it is my intention to underrate women. I
+hoped to make you understand that, without being more culpable than
+men, they are more dangerous because they are accustomed more
+successfully to hide their sentiments. In effect, you will confess the
+object of your love sooner than they will acknowledge theirs. However,
+when they assure you that their affection for you has no other source
+than a knowledge of your merit and of your good qualities, I am
+persuaded that they are sincere. I do not even doubt that when they
+realize that their style of thought is becoming less refined, they do
+everything in their power to hide the fact from themselves. But the
+motives, about which I have been telling you, are in the bottom of
+their hearts just the same. They are none the less the true causes of
+the liking they have for you, and whatever efforts they may make to
+persuade themselves that the causes are wholly spiritual, their desire
+changes nothing in the nature of things. They hide this deformity with
+as much care as they would conceal teeth that might disfigure an
+otherwise perfect face. In such case, even when alone they would be
+afraid to open their mouth, and so, by force of habit in hiding this
+defect from others as well as from themselves, they succeed in
+forgetting all about it or in considering that it is not much of a
+defect.
+
+I agree with you that you would lose too much if men and women were to
+show themselves in their true colors. The world has agreed to play a
+comedy, and to show real, natural sentiments would not be acting, it
+would be substituting the real character for the one it has been
+agreed to feign. Let us then enjoy the enchantment without seeking to
+know the cause of the charm which amuses and seduces us. To anatomize
+love would be to enter upon its cure. Psyche lost it for having been
+too curious, and I am tempted to believe that this fable is a lesson
+for those who wish to analyze pleasure.
+
+I wish to make some corrections in what I have said to you: If I told
+you that men are wrong in priding themselves on their choice of a
+woman, and their sentiments for her; if I said that the motives which
+actuate them are nothing less than glorious for the men, I desire to
+add, that they are equally deceived if they imagine that the
+sentiments which they show with so much pompous display are always
+created by force of female charms, or by an abiding impression of
+their merits. How often does it happen that those men who make
+advances with such a respectful air, who display such delicate and
+refined sentiments, so flattering to vanity, who, in a word, seem to
+breathe only through them, only for them, and have no other desire
+than their happiness; how often, I repeat, are those men, who adorn
+themselves with such beautiful sentiments, influenced by reasons
+entirely the contrary? Study, penetrate these good souls, and you will
+see in the heart of this one, instead of a love so disinterested, only
+desire; in that one, it will be only a scheme to share your fortune,
+the glory of having obtained a woman of your rank; in a third you
+will discover motives still more humiliating to you; he will use you
+to rouse the jealousy of some woman he really loves, and he will
+cultivate your friendship merely to distinguish himself in her eyes by
+rejecting you. I can not tell you how many motives, there are so many.
+The human heart is an insolvable enigma. It is a whimsical combination
+of all the known contrarieties. We think we know its workings; we see
+their effects; we ignore the cause. If it expresses its sentiments
+sincerely, even that sincerity is not reassuring. Perhaps its
+movements spring from causes entirely contrary to those we imagine we
+feel to be the real ones. But, after all, people have adopted the best
+plan, that is, to explain everything to their advantage, and to
+compensate themselves in imagination for their real miseries, and
+accustom themselves, as I think I have already said, to deifying all
+their sentiments. Inasmuch as everybody finds in that the summit of
+his vanity, nobody has ever thought of reforming the custom, or of
+examining it to see whether it is a mistake.
+
+Adieu; if you desire to come this evening you will find me with those
+whose gayety will compensate you for this serious discourse.
+
+
+
+
+XVI
+
+How to Be Victorious in Love
+
+
+Is what you write me possible, Marquis, what, the Countess continues
+obdurate? The flippant manner in which she receives your attentions
+reveals an indifference which grieves you? I think I have guessed the
+secret of the riddle. I know you. You are gay, playful, conceited
+even, with women as long as they do not impress you. But with those
+who have made an impression upon your heart, I have noticed that you
+are timid. This quality might affect a bourgeoise, but you must attack
+the heart of a woman of the world with other weapons. The Countess
+knows the ways of the world. Believe me, and leave to the Celadons,
+such things as sublime talk, beautiful sentiments; let them spin out
+perfection. I tell you on behalf of women: there is not one of us who
+does not prefer a little rough handling to too much consideration. Men
+lose through blundering more hearts than virtue saves.
+
+The more timidity a lover shows with us the more it concerns our pride
+to goad him on; the more respect he has for our resistance, the more
+respect we demand of him. We would willingly say to you men: "Ah, in
+pity's name do not suppose us to be so very virtuous; you are forcing
+us to have too much of it. Do not put so high a price upon your
+conquest; do not treat our defeat as if it were something difficult.
+Accustom our imagination by degrees to seeing you doubt our
+indifference."
+
+When we see a lover, although he may be persuaded of our gratitude,
+treat us with the consideration demanded by our vanity, we shall
+conclude without being aware of it, that he will always be the same,
+although sure of our inclination for him. From that moment, what
+confidence will he not inspire? What flattering progress may he not
+make? But if he notifies us to be always on our guard, then it is not
+our hearts we shall defend; it will not be a battle to preserve our
+virtue, but our pride; and that is the worst enemy to be conquered in
+women. What more is there to tell you? We are continually struggling
+to hide the fact that we have permitted ourselves to be loved. Put a
+woman in a position to say that she has yielded only to a species of
+violence, or to surprise; persuade her that you do not undervalue her,
+and I will answer for her heart.
+
+You must manage the Countess as her character requires; she is lively,
+and playful, and by trifling follies you must lead her to love. Do not
+even let her see that she distinguishes you from other men, and be as
+playful as she is light hearted. Fix yourself in her heart without
+giving her any warning of your intention. She will love you without
+knowing it, and some day she will be very much astonished at having
+made so much headway without really suspecting it.
+
+
+
+
+XVII
+
+Women Understand the Difference Between Real Love and Flirtation
+
+
+Perhaps, Marquis, you will think me still more cruel than the
+Countess. She is the cause of your anxieties, it is true, but I am the
+cause of something worse; I feel a great desire to laugh at them. Oh,
+I enter into your troubles seriously enough, I can not do more, and
+your embarrassment appears great to me. Really, why risk a declaration
+of love to a woman who takes a wicked pleasure in avoiding it on every
+occasion? Now, she appears affected, and then again, she is the most
+unmindful woman in the world in spite of all you do to please her. She
+listens willingly and replies gaily to the gallant speeches and bold
+conversation of a certain Chevalier, a professional coxcomb, but to
+you she speaks seriously and with a preoccupied air. If you take on a
+tender and affectionate tone, she replies flippantly, or perhaps
+changes the subject. All this intimidates you, troubles you, and
+drives you to despair. Poor Marquis!--and I answer you, that all this
+is love, true and beautiful. The absence of mind which she affects
+with you, the nonchalance she puts on for a mask, ought to make you
+feel at heart that she is far from being indifferent. But your lack of
+boldness, the consequences which she feels must follow such a passion
+as yours, the interest which she already takes in your condition, all
+this intimidates the countess herself, and it is you who raise
+obstacles in her path. A little more boldness on your part would put
+you both at your ease. Do you remember what M. de la Rochefoucauld
+told you lately: "A reasonable man in love may act like a madman, but
+he should not and can not act like an idiot."
+
+Besides, when you compare your respect and esteem with the free and
+almost indecent manner of the Chevalier; when you draw from it the
+conclusion that she should prefer you to him, you do not know how
+incorrectly you argue. The Chevalier is nothing but a gallant, and
+what he says is not worth considering, or at least appears so.
+Frivolity alone, the habit of romancing to all the pretty women he
+finds in his way, makes him talk. Love counts for nothing, or at least
+for very little, in all his liaisons. Like the butterfly, he hovers
+only a moment over each flower. An amusing episode is his only object.
+So much frivolity is not capable of alarming a woman. She is delighted
+at the trifling danger she incurs in listening to such a man.
+
+The Countess knows very well how to appreciate the discourse of the
+Chevalier; and to say everything in a word, she knows him to be a man
+whose heart is worn out. Women, who, to hear them talk, go in more for
+metaphysics, know admirably how to tell the difference between a lover
+of his class and a man like you. But you will always be more
+formidable and more to be dreaded by your manner of making yourself
+felt.
+
+You boast to me of your respectful esteem, but I reply that it is
+nothing of the kind, and the Countess knows it well. Nothing ends with
+so little respect as a passion like yours. Quite different from the
+Chevalier, you require recognition, preference, acknowledgment, even
+sacrifices. The Countess sees all these pretensions at a glance, or at
+least, if in the cloud which still envelops them, she does not
+distinguish them clearly, nature gives her a presentiment of what the
+cost will be if she allows you the least opportunity to instruct her
+in a passion which she doubtless already shares. Women rarely inquire
+into the reasons which impel them to give themselves up or to resist;
+they do not even amuse themselves by trying to understand or explain
+them, but they have feelings, and sentiment with them is correct, it
+takes the place of intelligence and reflection. It is a sort of
+instinct which warns them in case of danger, and which leads them
+aright perhaps as surely as does the most enlightened reason. Your
+beautiful Adelaide wishes to enjoy an incognito as long as she can.
+This plan is very congenial to her real interests, and yet I am fully
+persuaded that it is not the work of reflection. She sees it only from
+the point of view of a passion, outwardly constrained, making stronger
+impressions and still greater progress inwardly. Let it have an
+opportunity to take deep root, and give to this fire she tries to
+hide, time to consume the heart in which you wish to confine it.
+
+You must also admit, Marquis, that you deceive yourself in two ways
+in your calculation. You thought you respected the Countess more than
+the Chevalier does, on the contrary you see that the gallant speeches
+of the Chevalier are without effect, while you begrudge them to the
+heart of your beauty. On the other hand, you figure that her
+preoccupied air, indifferent and inattentive manner are proofs or
+forewarnings of your unhappiness. Undeceive yourself. There is no more
+certain proof of a passion than the efforts made to hide it. In a
+word, when the Countess treats you kindly, whatever proofs you may
+give her of your affection, when she sees you without alarm on the
+point of confessing your love, I tell you that her heart is caught;
+she loves you, on my word.
+
+By the way, I forgot to reply to that part of your letter concerning
+myself. Yes, Marquis, I constantly follow the method which I
+prescribed at the commencement of our correspondence. There are few
+matters in my letters that I have not used as subjects of conversation
+in my social reunions. I rarely suggest ideas of any importance to
+you, without having taken the opinions of my friends on their verity.
+Sometimes it is Monsieur de la Bruyère, sometimes Monsieur de
+Saint-Evremond whom I consult; another time it will be Monsieur l'Abbé
+de Châteauneuf. You must admire my good faith, Marquis, for I might
+claim the credit of the good I write you, but I frankly avow that you
+owe it only to the people whom I receive at my house.
+
+Apropos of men of distinguished merit, M. de la Rochefoucauld has
+just sent me word that he would like to call on me. I fixed to-morrow,
+and you might do well to be present, but do not forget how much he
+loves you. Adieu.
+
+
+
+
+XVIII
+
+When a Woman Is Loved She Need Not Be Told of It
+
+
+I have been engaged in some new reflections on the condition you are
+in, Marquis, and on the embarrassment in which you continue. After
+all, why do you deem it necessary to make a formal declaration of
+love? Can it be because you have read about such things in our old
+romances, in which the proceedings in courtship were as solemn as
+those of the tribunals? That would be too technical. Believe me, let
+it alone; as I told you in my last letter, the fire lighted, will
+acquire greater force every day, and you will see, that without having
+said you love, you will be farther advanced than if you were
+frightened by avowals which our fathers insisted should worry the
+women. Avowals absolutely useless in themselves, and which always
+incumber a passion with several nebulous days. They retard its
+progress. Bear this well in mind, Marquis: A woman is much better
+persuaded that she is loved by what she guesses than by what she is
+told.
+
+Act as if you had made the declaration which is costing you so much
+anxiety; or imitate the Chevalier; take things easy. The way the
+Countess conducts herself with him in your presence seems to be a law
+in your estimation. With your circumspection and pretended respect,
+you present the appearance of a man who meditates an important design,
+of a man, in a word, who contemplates a wrong step. Your exterior is
+disquieting to a woman who knows the consequences of a passion such as
+yours. Remember that as long as you let it appear that you are making
+preparations for an attack, you will find her on the defensive. Have
+you ever heard of a skillful general, who intends to surprise a
+citadel, announce his design to the enemy upon whom the storm is to
+descend? In love as in war, does any one ever ask the victor whether
+he owes his success to force or skill? He has conquered, he receives
+the crown, his desires are gratified, he is happy. Follow his example
+and you will meet the same fate. Hide your progress; do not disclose
+the extent of your designs until it is no longer possible to oppose
+your success, until the combat is over, and the victory gained before
+you have declared war. In a word, imitate those warlike people whose
+designs are not known except by the ravaged country through which they
+have passed.
+
+
+
+
+XIX
+
+Why a Lover's Vows Are Untrustworthy
+
+
+At last, Marquis, you are listened to dispassionately when you protest
+your love, and swear by everything lovers hold sacred that you will
+always love. Will you believe my predictions another time? However,
+you would be better treated if you were more reasonable, so you are
+told, and limit your sentiments to simple friendship. The name of
+lover assumed by you is revolting to the Countess. You should never
+quarrel over quality when it is the same under any name, and follow
+the advice Madame de la Sablière gives you in the following madrigal:
+
+  Bélise ne veut point d'amant,
+  Mais voudrait un ami fidèle,
+Qui pour elle eût des soins et de l'empressement,
+  Et qui même la trouvât belle.
+  Amants, qui soupirez pour elle,
+  Sur ma parole tenez bon,
+Bélise de l'amour ne hait que le nom.
+
+  (Bélise for a lover sighed not,
+  But she wanted a faithful friend,
+Who would cuddle her up and care for her lot,
+  And even her beauty defend.
+  Oh, you lovers, whose sighs I commend,
+'Pon my word, hold fast to such game,
+What of love Bélise hates is only the name.)
+
+But you are grieved by the injurious doubts cast upon your sincerity
+and constancy. You are disbelieved because all men are false and
+perjured, and because they are inconstant, love is withheld. How
+fortunate you are! How little the Countess knows her own heart, if she
+expects to persuade you of her indifference in that fashion! Do you
+wish me to place a true value on the talk she is giving you? She is
+very much affected by the passion you exhibit for her, but the
+warnings and sorrows of her friends have convinced her that the
+protestations of men are generally false. I do not conceive any
+injustice in this, for I, who do not flatter men willingly, am
+persuaded that they are usually sincere on such occasions. They become
+amorous of a woman, that is they experience the desire of possession.
+The enchanting image of that possession bewitches them; they calculate
+that the delights connected with it will never end; they do not
+imagine that the fire which consumes them can ever weaken or die out;
+such a thing seems impossible to them. Hence they swear with the best
+faith in the world to love us always; and to cast a doubt upon their
+sincerity would be inflicting a mortal injury.
+
+But the poor fellows make more promises than they can keep. They do
+not perceive that their heart has not enough energy always to hold the
+same object. They cease to love without knowing why. They are good
+enough to be scrupulous over their growing coldness. Long after love
+has fled they continue to insist that they still love. They exert
+themselves to no purpose, and after having tormented themselves as
+long as they can bear it, they surrender to dissatisfaction, and
+become inconstant with as much good faith as they possessed when they
+protested that they would be forever constant. Nothing is simpler and
+easier to explain. The fermentation of a budding love, excited in
+their heart the charm that seduced them; by and by, the enchantment is
+dispelled, and nonchalance follows. With what can they be charged?
+They counted upon keeping their vows. Dear me, how many women are too
+happy with what is lacking, since men give them a free rein to their
+lightness!
+
+However this may be, the Countess has charged up to you the
+inconstancy of your equals; she apprehends that you are no better than
+all other lovers. Ready to yield to you, however little you may be
+able to reassure her, she is trying to find reasons for believing you
+sincere. The love you protest for her does not offend her. What am I
+saying? It enchants her. She is so much flattered by it, that her sole
+fear is that it may not be true. Dissipate her alarms, show her that
+the happiness you offer her and of which she knows the price, is not
+an imaginary happiness. Go farther; persuade her that she will enjoy
+it forever, and her resistance will disappear, her doubts will vanish,
+and she will seize upon everything that will destroy her suspicions
+and uncertainty. She would have already believed you; already she
+would have resolved to yield to the pleasure of being loved, if she
+had believed herself really loved, and that it would last forever.
+
+How maladroit women are if they imagine that by their fears and their
+doubts of the sincerity and constancy of men, they can make any one
+believe they are fleeing from love, or despise it! As soon as they
+fear they will be deceived in the enjoyment of its pleasures; when
+they fear they will not long enjoy it, they already know the charms of
+it, and the only source of anxiety then is, that they will be deprived
+of its enjoyment too soon. Forever haunted by this fear, and attacked
+by the powerful inclination toward pleasure, they hesitate, they
+tremble with the apprehension that they will not be permitted to enjoy
+it but just long enough to make the privation of it more painful.
+Hence, Marquis, you may very easily conjecture a woman who talks to
+you as does the Countess, using this language:
+
+"I can imagine all the delights of love. The idea I have formed of it
+is quite seductive. Do you think that deep in my heart I desire to
+enjoy its charms less than you? But the more its image is ravishing to
+my imagination, the more I fear it is not real, and I refuse to yield
+to it lest my happiness be too soon destroyed. Ah, if I could only
+hope that my happiness might endure, how feeble would be my
+resistance? But will you not abuse my credulity? Will you not some day
+punish me for having had too much confidence in you? At least is that
+day very far off? Ah, if I could hope to gather perpetually the
+fruits of the sacrifice I am making of my repose for your sake, I
+confess it frankly, we would soon be in accord."
+
+
+
+
+XX
+
+The Half-way House to Love
+
+
+The rival you have been given appears to me to be all the more
+redoubtable, as he is the sort of a man I have been advising you to
+be. I know the Chevalier; nobody is more competent than he to carry a
+seduction to a successful conclusion. I am willing to wager anything
+that his heart has never been touched. He makes advances to the
+Countess in cold blood. You are lost. A lover as passionate as you
+have appeared to be, makes a thousand blunders. The most favorable
+designs would perish under your management. He permits everybody to
+take the advantage of him on every occasion. Indeed, such is his
+misfortune that his precipitation and his timidity injure his
+prospects by turns.
+
+A man who makes love for the pleasure he finds in it, profits by the
+smallest advantage; he knows the feeble places and makes himself
+master of them. Everything leads his way, everything is combined for
+his purpose. Even his imprudences are often the result of wise
+reflection; they help him along the road to success; they finally
+acquire so superior a position that, from their beginning, so to
+speak, dates the hour of his triumph.
+
+You must be careful, Marquis, not to go to extremes; you must not show
+the Countess enough love to lead her to understand the excess of your
+passion. Give her something to be anxious about; compel her to take
+heed lest she lose you, by giving her opportunities to think that she
+may. There is no woman on earth who will treat you more cavalierly
+than one who is absolutely certain that your love will not fail her.
+Like a merchant for whose goods you have manifested too great an
+anxiety to acquire, she will overcharge you with as little regard to
+consequences. Moderate, therefore, your imprudent vivacity; manifest
+less passion and you will excite more in her heart. We do not
+appreciate the worth of a prize more than when we are on the point of
+losing it. Some regulation in matters of love are indispensable for
+the happiness of both parties. I think I am even justified in advising
+you on certain occasions to be a trifle unprincipled. On all other
+occasions, though, it is better to be a dupe than a knave; but in
+affairs of gallantry, it is only the fools who are the dupes, and
+knaves always have the laugh on their side. Adieu.
+
+I have not the conscience to leave you without a word of consolation.
+Do not be discouraged. However redoubtable may be the Chevalier, let
+your heart rest in peace. I suspect that the cunning Countess is
+making a play with him to worry you. I have no desire to flatter you,
+but it gives me pleasure to say, that you are worth more than he. You
+are young, you are making your debut in the world, and you are
+regarded as a man who has never yet had any love affairs. The
+Chevalier has lived; what woman will not appreciate these differences?
+
+
+
+
+XXI
+
+The Comedy of Contrariness
+
+
+Probity in love, Marquis? How can you think of such a thing? Ah, you
+are like a drowned man. I shall take good care not to show your letter
+to any one, it would dishonor you. You do not know how to undertake
+the manoeuvres I have advised you to make, you say? Your candor, your
+high sentiments made your fortune formerly! Well, love was then
+treated like an affair of honor, but nowadays, the corruption of the
+age has changed all that; love is now nothing more than a play of the
+humor and of vanity.
+
+Your inexperience still leaves your virtues in an inflexible condition
+that will inevitably cause your ruin, if you have not enough
+intelligence to bring them into accord with the morals of the times.
+One can not now wear his sentiments on his sleeve. Everything is show;
+payment is made in airs, demonstrations, signs. Everybody is playing a
+comedy, and men have had excellent reasons for keeping up the farce.
+They have discovered the fact that nobody can gain anything by telling
+the actual truth about women. There is a general agreement to
+substitute for this sincerity a collection of contrary phrases. And
+this custom has proved contagious in cases of gallantry.
+
+In spite of your high principles, you will agree with me, that unless
+that custom, called "politeness," is not pushed so far as irony or
+treason, it is a sociable virtue to follow, and of all the relations
+among men, the true meaning of gallantry has more need of being
+concealed than that of any other social affair. How many occasions do
+you not find where a lover gains more by dissimulating the excess of
+his passion, than another who pretends to have more than he really
+has?
+
+I think I understand the Countess; she is more skillful than you. I am
+certain she dissimulates her affection for you with greater care than
+you take to multiply proofs of yours for her. I repeat; the less you
+expose yourself, the better you will be treated. Let her worry in her
+turn; inspire her with the fear that she will lose you, and see her
+come around. It is the surest way of finding out the true position you
+occupy in her heart. Adieu.
+
+
+
+
+XXII
+
+Vanity and Self-Esteem Obstacles to Love
+
+
+A silence of ten days, Marquis. You begin to worry me in earnest. The
+application you made of my counsel has, then, been successful? I
+congratulate you. What I do not approve, however, is your
+dissatisfaction with her for refusing to make the confession you
+desired. The words: "I love you" seem to be something precious in your
+estimation. For fifteen days you have been trying to penetrate the
+sentiments of the Countess, and you have succeeded; you know her
+affection for you. What more can you possibly want? What further right
+over her heart would a confession give you? Truly, I consider you a
+strange character. You ought to know that nothing is more calculated
+to cause a reasonable woman to revolt, than the obstinacy with which
+ordinary men insist upon a declaration of their love. I fail to
+understand you. Ought not her refusal to be a thousand times more
+precious to a delicate minded lover than a positive declaration? Will
+you ever know your real interests? Instead of persecuting a woman on
+such a point, expend your energies in concealing from her the extent
+of her affection. Act so that she will love you before you call her
+attention to the fact, before compelling her to resort to the
+necessity of proclaiming it. Is it possible to experience a situation
+more delicious than that of seeing a heart interested in you without
+suspicion, growing toward you by degrees, finally becoming
+affectionate? What a pleasure to enjoy secretly all her movements, to
+direct her sentiments, augment them, hasten them, and glory in the
+victory even before she has suspected that you have essayed her
+defeat! That is what I call pleasure.
+
+Believe me, Marquis, your conduct toward the Countess must be as if
+the open avowal of her love for you had escaped her. Of a truth, she
+has not said in words: "I love you," but it is because she really
+loves you that she has refrained from saying it. Otherwise she has
+done everything to convince you of it.
+
+Women are under no ordinary embarrassment. They desire for the very
+least, as much to confess their affection as you are anxious to
+ascertain it, but what do you expect, Marquis? Women ingenious at
+raising obstacles, have attached a certain shame to any avowal of
+their passion, and whatever idea you men may have formed of our way of
+thinking, such an avowal always humiliates us, for however small may
+be our experience, we comprehend all the consequences. The words "I
+love you" are not criminal, that is true, but their sequel frightens
+us, hence we find means to dissimulate, and close our eyes to the
+liabilities they carry with them.
+
+Besides this, be on your guard; your persistence in requiring an open
+avowal from the Countess, is less the work of love than a persevering
+vanity. I defy you to find a mistake in the true motives behind your
+insistence. Nature has given woman a wonderful instinct; it enables
+her to discern without mistake whatever grows out of a passion in one
+who is a stranger to her. Always indulgent toward the effects produced
+by a love we have inspired, we will pardon you many imprudences, many
+transports; how can I enumerate them all? All the follies of which you
+lovers are capable, we pardon, but you will always find us intractable
+when our self-esteem meets your own. Who would believe it? You inspire
+us to revolt at things that have nothing to do with your happiness.
+Your vanity sticks at trifles, and prevents you from enjoying actual
+advantages. Will you believe me when I say it? You will drop your idle
+fancies, to delight in the certainty that you are beloved by an
+adorable woman; to taste the pleasure of hiding the extent of her love
+from herself, to rejoice in its security. Suppose by force of
+importunities you should extract an "I love you," what would you gain
+by it? Would your uncertainty reach an end? Would you know whether you
+owe the avowal to love or complaisance? I think I know women, I ought
+to. They can deceive you by a studied confession which the lips only
+pronounce, but you will never be the involuntary witness of a passion
+you force from them. The true, flattering avowals we make, are not
+those we utter, but those that escape us without our knowledge.
+
+
+
+
+XXIII
+
+Two Irreconcilable Passions in Women
+
+
+Will you pardon me, Marquis, for laughing at your afflictions? You
+take things too much to heart. Some imprudences, you say, have drawn
+upon you the anger of the Countess, and your anxiety is extreme. You
+kissed her hand with an ecstasy that attracted the attention of
+everybody present. She publicly reprimanded you for your indiscretion,
+and your marked preference for her, always offensive to other women,
+has exposed you to the railleries of the Marquise, her sister-in-law.
+Dear me, these are without contradiction terrible calamities! What,
+are you simple enough to believe that you are lost beyond salvation
+because of an outward manifestation of anger, and you do not even
+suspect that inwardly you are justified? You impose upon me the burden
+of convincing you of the fact, and in doing so I am forced to reveal
+some strange mysteries concerning women. But, I do not intend, in
+writing you, to be always apologizing for my sex. I owe you frankness,
+however, and having promised it I acquit myself of the promise.
+
+A woman is always balancing between two irreconcilable passions which
+continually agitate her mind: the desire to please, and the fear of
+dishonor. You can judge of our embarrassment. On the one hand, we are
+consumed with the desire to have an audience to notice the effect of
+our charms. Ever engaged in schemes to bring us into notoriety;
+ravished whenever we are fortunate enough to humiliate other women, we
+would make the whole world witness of the preferences we encounter,
+and the homage bestowed upon us. Do you know the measure of our
+satisfaction in such cases? The despair of our rivals, the
+indiscretions that betray the sentiments we inspire, this enchants us
+proportionately to the misery they suffer. Similar imprudences
+persuade us much more that we are loved, than that our charms are
+incapable of giving us a reputation.
+
+But what bitterness poisons such sweet pleasures! Beside so many
+advantages marches the malignity of rival competitors, and sometimes
+your disdain. A fatality which is mournful. The world makes no
+distinction between women who permit you to love them, and those whom
+you compensate for so doing. Uninfluenced, and sober-minded, a
+reasonable woman always prefers a good reputation to celebrity. Put
+her beside her rivals who contest with her the prize for beauty, and
+though she may lose that reputation of which she appears so jealous,
+though she compromise herself a thousand times, nothing is equal in
+her opinion to see herself preferred to others. By and by, she will
+recompense you by preferences; she will at first fancy that she grants
+them out of gratitude, but they will be proofs of her attachment. In
+her fear of appearing ungrateful, she becomes tender.
+
+Can you not draw from this that it is not your indiscretions which vex
+us? If they wound us, we must pay tribute to appearances, and you
+would be the first to censure an excessive indulgence.
+
+See that you do not misunderstand us. Not to vex us on such occasions
+would be really to offend. We recommend you to practice discretion and
+prudence, that is the rôle we enact, is it not? Is it necessary for me
+to tell you the part you are to play? I am often reminded that
+accepting the letter of the law, is to fail to understand it. You may
+be sure that you will be in accord with our intentions as soon as you
+are able to interpret them properly.
+
+
+
+
+XXIV
+
+An Abuse of Credulity Is Intolerable
+
+
+The Countess no longer retreats? You think she has no other object in
+view than to put your love to the proof? Whatever preference you have
+manifested for her; however little precaution you have taken to
+testify to your passion, she finds nothing in you but cause for
+scolding. The least excuse, however, and the reproaches die upon her
+lips, and her anger is so delightful that you do everything to deserve
+it. Permit me to share in your joy with all my heart. But although
+this behavior flatters you, if you consider that such acts are not
+intended to be of long duration, how badly reasonable women, who value
+their reputation, misunderstand their true interests by thus
+multiplying through an affected incredulity, occasions for slandering
+them. Do they not understand and feel that it is not always the moment
+when they are tender which gives a blow to their reputation? The doubt
+they cast upon the sincerity of the affection they have inspired, does
+them more harm in the eyes of the world than even their defeat. As
+long as they continue incredulous the slightest imprudence compromises
+them. They dispose of their reputation at retail.
+
+Whenever a lover finds a woman incredulous of the truth of his
+sentiments, he goes full lengths, every time he has an opportunity, to
+furnish proofs of his sincerity. The most indiscreet eagerness, the
+most marked preferences, the most assiduous attentions, seem to him
+the best means of succeeding. Can he make use of them without calling
+the attention of the whole world to the fact; without offending every
+other woman and giving them occasions to be revenged by their sharpest
+arrows?
+
+As soon as the preliminaries are settled, that is to say, as soon as
+we commence to believe ourselves sincerely loved, nothing appears on
+the surface, nothing happens; and if outsiders perceive our liaison,
+if they put a malicious construction upon it, it will only be by the
+recollection of what passed during a time when love was not in
+question.
+
+I would, for the good of everybody concerned, that as soon as a woman
+ceases to find any pleasure in the society of a man who wishes to
+please her, that she could tell him so clearly and dismiss him,
+without abusing his credulity, or giving him ground for vain hopes.
+But I would also, that as soon as a woman is persuaded that a man
+loves her, she could consent to it in good faith, reserving to
+herself, however, the right to be further entreated, to such a point
+as she may deem apropos, before making an avowal that she feels as
+tenderly disposed toward her lover, as he is toward her. For, a woman
+can not pretend to doubt without putting her lover to the necessity of
+dissipating her doubts, and he can not do that successfully without
+taking the whole world into his confidence by a too marked homage.
+
+I know very well that these ideas would not have been probable in
+times when the ignorance of men rendered so many women intractable,
+but, in these times when the audacity of our assailants leaves us so
+few resources, in these times, I say, when, since the invention of
+powder, there are few impregnable places, why undertake a prolonged
+formal siege, when it is certain that after much labor and many
+disasters it will be necessary to capitulate?
+
+Bring your amiable Countess to reason; show her the inconveniences of
+a prolonged disregard of your sentiments. You will convince her of
+your passion, you will compel her to believe you through regard for
+her reputation, and still better, perhaps, you will furnish her with
+an additional reason for giving you a confidence she doubtless now
+finds it difficult to withhold from you.
+
+
+
+
+XXV
+
+Why Virtue Is So Often Overcome
+
+
+My last letter has apparently scandalized you, Marquis. You insist
+that it is not impossible to find virtuous women in our age of the
+world. Well, have I ever said anything to the contrary? Comparing
+women to besieged castles, have I ever advanced the idea that there
+were some that had not been taken? How could I have said such a thing?
+There are some that have never been besieged, so you perceive that I
+am of your opinion. I will explain, however, so that there will be no
+more chicanery about the question.
+
+Here is my profession of faith in this matter: I firmly believe that
+there are good women who have never been attacked, or who have been
+wrongly attacked.
+
+I further firmly believe that there are good women who have been
+attacked and well attacked, when they have had neither disposition,
+violent passions, liberty, nor a hated husband.
+
+I have a mind at this point to put you in possession of a rather
+lively conversation on this particular point, while I was still very
+young, with a prude, whom an adventure of some brilliancy unmasked. I
+was inexperienced then, and I was in the habit of judging others with
+that severity which every one is disposed to manifest until some
+personal fault has made us more indulgent toward our neighbors. I had
+considered it proper to blame the conduct of this woman without mercy.
+She heard of it. I sometimes saw her at an aunt's, and made
+preparations to attack her morals. Before I had an opportunity she
+took the matter into her own hands, by taking me aside one day, and
+compelled me to submit to the following harangue, which I confess made
+a deep impression in my memory:
+
+"It is not for the purpose of reproaching you for the talk you have
+been making on my account, that I wish to converse with you in the
+absence of witnesses," she explained, "it is to give you some advice,
+the truth and solidity of which you will one day appreciate.
+
+"You have seen fit to censure my conduct with a severity, you have
+actually treated me with a disdain, which tells me how proud you are
+of the fact that you have never been taken advantage of. You believe
+in your own virtue and that it will never abandon you. This is a pure
+illusion of your amour propre, my dear child, and I feel impelled to
+enlighten your inexperience, and to make you understand, that far from
+being sure of that virtue which renders you so severe, you are not
+even sure that you have any at all. This prologue astonishes you, eh?
+Well, listen with attention, and you will soon be convinced of the
+truth whereof I speak.
+
+"Up to the present time, nobody has ever spoken to you of love. Your
+mirror alone has told you that you are beautiful. Your heart, I can
+see by the appearance of indifference that envelops you like a
+mantle, has not yet been developed. As long as you remain as you are,
+as long as you can be kept in sight as you are, I will be your
+guarantee. But when your heart has spoken, when your enchanting eyes
+shall have received life and expression from sentiment, when they
+shall speak the language of love, when an internal unrest shall
+agitate your breast, when, in fine, desire, half stifled by the
+scruples of a good education, shall have made you blush more than once
+in secret, then your sensibility, through the combats by which you
+will attempt to vanquish it, will diminish your severity toward
+others, and their faults will appear more excusable.
+
+"The knowledge of your weakness will no longer permit you to regard
+your virtue as infallible. Your astonishment will carry you still
+farther. The little help it will be to you against too impetuous
+inclinations, will make you doubt whether you ever had any virtue. Can
+you say a man is brave before he has ever fought? It is the same with
+us. The attacks made upon us are alone the parents of our virtue, as
+danger gives birth to valor. As long as one has not been in the
+presence of the enemy, it is impossible to say whether he is to be
+feared, and what degree of resistance it will be necessary to bear
+against him.
+
+"Hence to justify a woman in flattering herself that she is
+essentially virtuous and good by force of her own strength, she must
+be in a position where no danger, however great it may be, no motive
+no matter how pressing, no pretext whatever, shall be powerful enough
+to triumph over her. She must meet with the most favorable
+opportunities, the most tender love, the certainty of secrecy, the
+esteem and the most perfect confidence in him who attacks her. In a
+word, all these circumstances combined should not be able to make an
+impression upon her courage, so that to know whether a woman be
+virtuous in the true meaning of the word, one must imagine her as
+having escaped unscathed all these united dangers, for it would not be
+virtue but only resistance where there should be love without the
+disposition, or disposition without the occasion. Her virtue would
+always be uncertain, as long as she had never been attacked by all the
+weapons which might vanquish her. One might always say of her: if she
+had been possessed of a different constitution, she might not have
+resisted love, or, if a favorable occasion had presented itself, her
+virtue would have played the fool."
+
+"According to this," said I, "it would be impossible to find a single
+virtuous woman, for no one has ever had so many enemies to combat."
+
+"That may be," she replied, "but do you know the reason? Because it is
+not necessary to have so many to overcome us, one alone is sufficient
+to obtain the victory."
+
+But I stuck to my proposition: "You pretend then that our virtue does
+not depend upon ourselves, since you make it the puppet of occasion,
+and of other causes foreign to our own will?"
+
+"There is no doubt about it," she answered. "Answer me this: Can you
+give yourself a lively or sedate disposition? Are you free to defend
+yourself against a violent passion? Does it depend upon you to arrange
+all the circumstances of your life, so that you will never find
+yourself alone with a lover who adores you, who knows his advantages
+and how to profit by them? Does it depend upon you to prevent his
+pleadings, I assume them to be innocent at first, from making upon
+your senses the impression they must necessarily make? Certainly not;
+to insist upon such an anomaly would be to deny that the magnet is
+master of the needle. And you pretend that your virtue is your own
+work, that you can personally claim the glory of an advantage that is
+liable to be taken from you at any moment? Virtue in women, like all
+the other blessings we enjoy, is a gift from Heaven; it is a favor
+which Heaven may refuse to grant us. Reflect then how unreasonable you
+are in glorifying in your virtue: consider your injustice when you so
+cruelly abuse those who have had the misfortune to be born with an
+ungovernable inclination toward love, whom a sudden violent passion
+has surprised, or who have found themselves in the midst of
+circumstances out of which you would not have emerged with any greater
+glory.
+
+"Shall I give you another proof of the justice of my ideas? I will
+take it from your own conduct. Are you not dominated by that deep
+persuasion that every woman who wishes to preserve her virtue, need
+never allow herself to be caught, that she must watch over the
+smallest trifles, because they lead to things of greater importance?
+It is much easier for you to take from men the desire to make an
+attack upon your virtue by assuming a severe exterior, than to defend
+against their attacks. The proof of this is in the fact that we give
+young girls in their education as little liberty as is possible in
+order to restrain them. We do more: a prudent mother does not rely
+upon her fear of dishonor, nor upon the bad opinion she has of men,
+she keeps her daughter out of sight; she puts it out of her power to
+succumb to temptation. What is the excuse for so many precautions?
+Because the mother fears the frailty of her pupil, if she is exposed
+for an instant to danger.
+
+"In spite of all these obstacles with which she is curbed, how often
+does it not happen that love overcomes them all? A girl well trained,
+or better, well guarded, laughs at her virtue, because she imagines it
+is all her own, whereas, it is generally a slave rigorously chained
+down, who thinks everybody is satisfied with him as long as he does
+not run away. Let us inquire further into this: In what class do you
+find abandoned females? In that where they have not sufficient wealth
+or happiness constantly to provide themselves with the obstacles which
+have saved you; in that, where men have attacked their virtue with
+more audacity, more facility, more frequency, and more impunity, and
+consequently with more advantages of every sort; in that, where the
+impressions of education, of example, of pride, the desire of a
+satisfactory establishment could not sustain them. Two doors below,
+there is a woman whom you hate and despise. And in spite of the
+outside aid which sustains that virtue, of which you are so proud, in
+two days you might be more despicable than she, because you will have
+had greater helps to guarantee you against misfortune. I am not
+seeking to deprive you of the merit of your virtue, nor am I
+endeavoring to prevent you from attaching too much importance to it;
+by convincing you of its fragility, I wish to obtain from you only a
+trifle of indulgence for those whom a too impetuous inclination, or
+the misfortunes of circumstances have precipitated into a position so
+humiliating in their own eyes; my sole object is to make you
+understand that you ought to glorify yourself less in the possession
+of an advantage which you do not owe to yourself, and of which you may
+be deprived to-morrow."
+
+She was going to continue, but some one interrupted us. Soon
+afterward, I learned by my own experience that I should not have had
+so good an opinion of many virtues which had been formerly imposed
+upon me, beginning with my own.
+
+
+
+
+XXVI
+
+Love Demands Freedom of Action
+
+
+I have been of the same opinion as you, Marquis, although the ideas I
+communicated to you yesterday appeared to be true speculatively, that
+it would be dangerous if all women were to be guided by them. It is
+not by a knowledge of their frailty, that women will remain virtuous,
+but by the conviction that they are free and mistresses of themselves
+when it comes to yield or to resist. Is it by persuading a soldier
+that he will be vanquished that he is goaded into fighting with
+courage? Did you not notice that the woman who did the talking as I
+have related in my last letter, had a personal interest in maintaining
+her system? It is true, that when we examine her reasoning according
+to the rules of philosophy, it does seem to be a trifle specious, but
+it is to be feared that in permitting ourselves to reason in that
+fashion on what virtue is, we may succeed in converting into a
+problem, the rules we should receive and observe as a law, which it is
+a crime to construe. Moreover, to persuade women that it is not to
+themselves they are indebted for the virtue they possess, might it mot
+deprive them of the most powerful motive to induce them to preserve
+it? I mean by that, the persuasion that it is their own work they
+defend. The consequences of such morality would be discouraging, and
+tend to diminish, in the eyes of a guilty woman, the importance of her
+errors. But let us turn to matters of more interest to you.
+
+At last, after so many uncertainties, after so many revolutions in
+your imagination, you are sure you are loved? You have finally
+succeeded in exciting the Countess to divulge her secret during a
+moment of tenderness. The words you burned to hear have been
+pronounced. More, she has allowed to escape her, a thousand
+involuntary proofs of the passion you have inspired. Far from
+diminishing your love, the certainty that you are beloved in return
+has increased it; in a word, you are the happiest of men. If you knew
+with how much pleasure I share your happiness you would be still
+happier. The first sacrifice she desired to make was to refuse to
+receive the Chevalier: you were opposed to her making it, and you were
+quite right. It would have compromised the Countess for nothing, which
+calls to my mind the fact, that women generally lose more by
+imprudence than by actual faults. The confidence you so nobly
+manifested in her, ought to have greatly impressed her.
+
+Everything is now as it should be. However, shall I tell you
+something? The way this matter has turned out alarms me. We agreed, if
+you remember, that we were to treat the subject of love without
+gloves. You were not to have at the most but a light and fleeting
+taste of it, and not a regulated passion. Now I perceive that things
+become more serious every day. You are beginning to treat love with a
+dignity which worries me. The knowledge of true merits, solid
+qualities, and good character is creeping into the motives of your
+liaison, and combining with the personal charms which render you so
+blindly amorous. I do not like to have so much esteem mixed with an
+affair of pure gallantry. It leaves no freedom of action, it is work
+instead of amusement. I was afraid in the beginning that your
+relations would assume a grave and measured turn. But perhaps you will
+only too soon have new pretensions, and the Countess by new disputes
+will doubtless re-animate your liaison. Too constant a peace is
+productive of a deadly ennui. Uniformity kills love, for as soon as
+the spirit of method mingles in an affair of the heart, the passion
+disappears, languor supervenes, weariness begins to wear, and disgust
+ends the chapter.
+
+
+
+
+XXVII
+
+The Heart Needs Constant Employment
+
+
+Madame de Sévigné does not agree with me upon the causes of love as I
+give them. She pretends that many women know it only from its refined
+side, and that the senses never count for anything in their heart
+affairs. According to her, although what she calls my "system" should
+be well founded, it would always be unbecoming in the mouth of a
+woman, and might become a precedent in morals.
+
+These are assuredly very serious exceptions, Marquis, but are they
+well grounded? I do not think so. I see with pain that Madame de
+Sévigné has not read my letters in the spirit I wrote them. What, I
+the founder of systems? Truly, she does me too much honor, I have
+never been serious enough to devise any system. Besides, according to
+my notion, a system is nothing but a philosophic dream, and therefore
+does she consider all I have told you as a play of the imagination? In
+that case, we are very far out of our reckoning. I do not imagine, I
+depict real objects. I would have one truth acknowledged, and to
+accomplish that, my purpose is not to surprise the mind; I consult the
+sentiments. Perhaps she has been struck by the singularity of some of
+my propositions, which appeared to me so evident that I did not think
+it worth while to maintain them; but is it necessary to make use of a
+mariner's compass to develop the greater or less amount of truth in a
+maxim of gallantry?
+
+Moreover, I have such a horror of formal discussions, that I would
+prefer to agree to anything rather than engage in them. Madame de
+Sévigné, you say, is acquainted with a number of female
+metaphysicians--there! there! I will grant her these exceptions,
+provided she leaves me the general thesis. I will even admit, if you
+so desire, that there are certain souls usually styled "privileged,"
+for I have never heard anybody deny the virtues of temperament. So, I
+have nothing to say about women of that species. I do not criticise
+them, nor have I any reproaches to make them; neither do I believe it
+my duty to praise them, it is sufficient to congratulate them.
+However, if you investigate them you will discover the truth of what I
+have been saying since the commencement of our correspondence: the
+heart must be occupied with some object. If nature does not incline
+them in that direction, no one can lead them in the direction of
+gallantry, their affection merely changes its object. Such a one
+to-day appears to be insensible to the emotion of love, only because
+she has disposed of all that portion of the sentiment she had to give.
+The Count de Lude, it is said, was not always indifferent to Madame de
+Sévigné. Her extreme tenderness for Madame Grignan (her daughter),
+however, occupies her entire time at present. According to her, I am
+very much at fault concerning women? In all charity I should have
+disguised the defects which I have discovered in my sex, or, if you
+prefer to have it that way, which my sex have discovered in me.
+
+But, do you really believe, Marquis, that if everything I have said on
+this subject be made public, the women would be offended? Know them
+better, Marquis; all of them would find there what is their due.
+Indeed, to tell them that it is purely a mechanical instinct which
+inclines them to flirt, would not that put them at their ease? Does it
+not seem to be restoring to favor that fatality, those expressions of
+sympathy, which they are so delighted to give as excuses for their
+mistakes, and in which I have so little faith? Granting that love is
+the result of reflection, do you not see what a blow you are giving
+their vanity? You place upon their shoulders the responsibility far
+their good or bad choice.
+
+One more thrust, Marquis: I am not mistaken when I say that all women
+would be satisfied with my letters. The female metaphysicians, that
+is, those women whom Heaven has favored with a fortunate constitution,
+would take pleasure in recognizing in them their superiority over
+other women; they would not fail to congratulate themselves upon the
+delicacy of their own sentiments, and to consider them as works of
+their own creation. Those whom nature built of less refined material,
+would without doubt owe me some gratitude for revealing a secret which
+was weighing upon them. They have made it a duty to disguise their
+inclinations, and they are as anxious not to fail in this duty as they
+are careful not to lose anything on the pleasure side of the question.
+Their interest, therefore, is, to have their secret guessed without
+being compromised. Whoever shall develop their hearts, will not fail
+to render them an essential service. I am even fully convinced that
+those women, who at heart, profess sentiments more comformable to
+mine, would be the first to consider it an honor to dispute them.
+Hence, I would be paying my court to women in two fashions, which
+would be equally agreeable: In adopting the maxims which flatter their
+inclinations, and in furnishing them with an occasion to appear
+refined.
+
+After all, Marquis, do you think it would betray a deep knowledge of
+women, to believe that they could be offended with the malicious talk
+I have been giving you about them? Somebody said a long time ago, that
+women would rather have a little evil said of them than not be talked
+about at all You see therefore, that even supposing that I have
+written you in the intention with which I am charged, they would be
+very far from being able to reproach me in the slightest degree.
+
+Finally, Madame de Sévigné pretends that my "system" might become a
+precedent. Truly, Marquis, I do not understand how, with the justice
+for which she is noted, she was able to surrender to such an idea. In
+stripping love, as I have, of everything liable to seduce you, in
+making it out to be the effect of temperament, caprice, and vanity;
+in a word, in undeceiving you concerning the metaphysics that lend it
+grandeur and nobility, is it not evident that I have rendered it less
+dangerous? Would it not be more dangerous, if, as pretends Madame de
+Sévigné, it were to be transformed into a virtue? I would willingly
+compare my sentiments with those of the celebrated legislator of
+antiquity, who believed the best means of weakening the power of women
+over his fellow citizens was to expose their nakedness. But I wish to
+make one more effort in your favor. Since I am regarded as a woman
+with a system, it will be better for me to submit to whatever such a
+fine title exacts. Let us reason, therefore, for a moment upon
+gallantry according to the method which appertains only to serious
+matters.
+
+Is love not a passion? Do not very strict minded people pretend that
+the passions and vices mean the same things? Is vice ever more
+seductive than when it wears the cloak of virtue? Wherefore in order
+to corrupt virtuous souls it is sufficient for it to appear in a
+potential form. This is the form in which the Platonicians deified it.
+In all ages, in order to justify the passions, it was necessary to
+apotheosize them. What am I saying? Am I so bold as to play the
+iconoclast with an accredited superstition? What temerity! Do I not
+deserve to be persecuted by all women for attacking their favorite
+cult?
+
+I am sorry for them; it was so lovely, when they felt the movements of
+love, to be exempt from blushing, to be able even to congratulate
+themselves, and lay the blame upon the operations of a god. But what
+had poor humanity done to them? Why misunderstand it and seek for the
+cause of its weakness in the Heavens? Let us remain on earth, we shall
+find it there, and it is its proper home.
+
+In truth, I have never in my letters openly declaimed against love; I
+have never advised you not to take the blame of it. I was too well
+persuaded of the uselessness of such advice; but I told you what love
+is, and I therefore diminished the illusion it would not have failed
+to create in your mind; I weakened its power over you and experience
+will justify me.
+
+I am perfectly well aware that a very different use is made of it in
+the education of females. And what sort of profit is there in the
+methods employed? The very first step is to deceive them. Their
+teachers strive to inspire them with as much fear of love as of evil
+spirits. Men are depicted as monsters of infidelity and perfidy. Now
+suppose a gentleman appears who expresses delicate sentiments, whose
+bearing is modest and respectful? The young woman with whom he
+converses will believe she has been imposed upon; and as soon as she
+discovers how much exaggeration there has been, her advisers will lose
+all credit so far as she is concerned. Interrogate such a young woman,
+and if she is sincere, you will find that the sentiments the alleged
+monster has excited in her heart are far from being the sentiments of
+horror.
+
+They are deceived in another manner also, and the misery of it is, it
+is almost impossible to avoid it. Infinite care is taken to keep from
+them the knowledge, to prevent them from having even an idea that they
+are liable to be attacked by the senses, and that such attacks are the
+most dangerous of all for them. They are drilled in the idea that they
+are immaculate spirits, and what happens then? Inasmuch as they have
+never been forewarned of the species of attacks they must encounter,
+they are left without defense. They have never mistrusted that their
+most redoubtable enemy is the one that has never been mentioned: how
+then can they be on their guard against him? It is not men they should
+be taught to fear, but themselves? What could a lover do, if the woman
+he attacks were not seduced by her own desires?
+
+So, Marquis, when I say to women that the principal cause of their
+weaknesses is physical, I am far from advising them to follow their
+inclinations; on the contrary, it is for the purpose of putting them
+on their guard in that respect. It is saying to the Governor of the
+citadel, that he will not be attacked at the spot which up to then has
+been the best fortified; that the most redoubtable assault will not be
+made by the besiegers, but that he will be betrayed by his own.
+
+In a word, in reducing to their just value, the sentiments to which
+women attach such high and noble ideas; in enlightening them upon the
+real object of a lover who pretends to great delicacy and refinement,
+do you not see that I am interesting their vanity to draw less glory
+out of the fact of being loved, and their hearts to take less pleasure
+in loving? Depend upon it, that if it were possible to enlist their
+vanity in opposition to their inclination to gallantry, their virtue
+would most assuredly suffer very little.
+
+I have had lovers, but none of them deceived me by any illusions. I
+could penetrate their motives astonishingly well. I was always
+persuaded that if whatever was of value from the standpoint of
+intellect and character, was considered as anything among the reasons
+that led them to love me, it was only because those qualities
+stimulated their vanity. They were amorous of me, because I had a
+beautiful figure, and they possessed the desire. So it came about that
+they never obtained more than the second place in my heart. I have
+always conserved for friendship the deference, the constancy, and the
+respect even, which a sentiment so noble, so worthy deserves in an
+elevated soul. It has never been possible for me to overcome my
+distrust for hearts in which love was the principal actor. This
+weakness degraded them in my eyes; I considered them incompetent to
+raise their mind up to sentiments of true esteem for a woman for whom
+they have felt a desire.
+
+You see, therefore, Marquis, that the precedent I draw from my
+principles is far from being dangerous. All that enlightened minds can
+find with which to reproach me, will be, perhaps, because I have
+taken the trouble to demonstrate a truth which they do not consider
+problematic. But does not your inexperience and your curiosity justify
+whatever I have written so far, and whatever I may yet write you on
+this subject?
+
+
+
+
+XXVIII
+
+Mere Beauty Is Often of Trifling Importance
+
+
+You are not mistaken, Marquis, the taste and talent of the Countess
+for the clavecin (piano) will tend to increase your love and
+happiness. I have always said that women do not fully realize the
+advantages they might draw from their talents; indeed, there is not a
+moment when they are not of supreme utility; most women always
+calculating on the presence of a beloved object as the only thing to
+be feared. In such case they have two enemies to combat; their love
+and their lover. But when the lover departs, love remains; and
+although the progress it makes in solitude is not so rapid, it is no
+less dangerous. It is then that the execution of a sonata, the
+sketching of a flower, the reading of a good book, will distract the
+attention from a too seductive remembrance, and fix the mind on
+something useful. All occupations which employ the mind are so many
+thefts from love.
+
+Suppose his inclination brings a lover to our knees, what can he
+accomplish with a woman who is only tender and pretty? With what can
+he employ his time if he does not find in her society something
+agreeable, some variety? Love is an active sentiment, it is a
+consuming fire always demanding additional fuel, and if it can find
+only sensible objects upon which to feed, it will keep to that diet. I
+mean to say, that when the mind is not occupied the senses find
+something to do.
+
+There are too many gesticulations while talking, sometimes I think we
+shall be compelled to use sign language with a person we know to be
+unable to understand a more refined language. It is not in resisting
+advances, nor in taking offense at too bold a caress that a woman is
+enabled to maintain her virtue. When she is attacked in that fashion,
+even while defending herself, her senses are excited and the very
+agitation which impels her to resist, hastens her defeat. But it is by
+distracting the attention of the man to other objects, that the woman
+is relieved of the necessity of resisting his advances, or taking
+offense at his liberties to which she herself has opened the way, for
+there is one thing certain, which is, that a man will never disappoint
+a woman who is anxious for him.
+
+You will not find a single woman, unless you can suppose one
+absolutely ignorant, who is not able to gauge exactly the degree of
+familiarity she ought to permit. Those who complain that their lovers
+do not come up to the mark do not affect me in the least. Inquire into
+the reason, and you will perceive that their stupidities, their
+imprudences are the cause. It was their desire to be found wanting.
+
+Defect in culture may expose us to the same inconveniences, for with a
+woman without mind, and without talents what else is there to do but
+undertake her conquest? When in her company, the only way to kill
+time is to annoy her. There is nothing to talk about but her beauty,
+and of the impression she has made upon the senses, and sensual
+language is the only one that can be employed for that purpose. She
+herself is not convinced that you love her, and she does not respond,
+she does not recompense you but by the assistance of the senses, and
+exhibits an agitation equal to yours, or else, her decency gone, she
+has nothing but bad humor with which to oppose you. This is the last
+ditch of a woman without mind, and what a culmination! On the
+contrary, what are not the advantages of an intelligent, resourceful
+woman? A lively repartee, piquant raillery, a quarrel seasoned with a
+trifle of malice, a happy citation, a graceful recitation, are not
+these so many distractions for her, and the time thus employed, is it
+not so much gained for virtue?
+
+The great misfortune with women is, without doubt, the inability to
+find occupations worthy of their attention, and this is the reason why
+love with them is a more violent passion than with men, but they have
+a characteristic which, properly directed may serve as an antidote.
+All women, to say the least, are as vain as they are sensitive,
+whence, the cure for sensitiveness is vanity. While a woman is
+occupied in pleasing in other ways than by the beauty of her figure,
+she loses sight of the sentiment which inspires her to act. In truth,
+this sentiment will not cease to be the "determining motive" (you must
+permit me to use some technical term of art), but it will not be the
+actual object presented to her attention, and that is something
+gained. Wholly devoted to the care of becoming perfect in the species
+of glory to which she aspires, this same desire, of which love will be
+the source, will turn against love, by dividing the attention of the
+mind and the affections of the heart; in a word it will create a
+diversion.
+
+But perhaps you will tell me that there are women of spirit and
+talents beyond the reach of attack. Whence you infer that men who do
+not dislike freedom will avoid them, but that fools and men of
+intelligence cultivate them. That is true, but the fools take to them
+because they do not perceive the difficulty in their way, and men of
+intelligence do not avoid them, because they aspire to surmount it.
+
+Now, ought not you, who are a military man, to appreciate everything I
+say to you about talent? I will suppose a campaign upon which you have
+entered; you have been given charge of conducting the siege of a city.
+Would you be satisfied if the governor, persuaded that the city is not
+impregnable, should open to you the gates without having given you the
+least occasion to distinguish yourself? I venture to say not; he
+should resist, and the more he seeks to cover himself with glory, the
+more glory he gives you. Well, Marquis, in love as in war, the
+pleasure of obtaining a victory is measured according to the obstacles
+in the way of it. Shall I say it? I am tempted to push the parallel
+farther. See what it is to take a first step. The true glory of a
+woman consists less, perhaps, in yielding, than in putting in a good
+defense, so that she will merit the honors of war.
+
+I shall go still farther. Let a woman become feeble enough to be at
+the point of yielding, what is left her to retain a satisfactory
+lover, if her intelligence and talents do not come to her aid? I am
+well aware that they do not give themselves these advantages, but if
+we investigate the matter, we shall find that there are very few women
+who may not acquire a few accomplishments if they really set about it;
+the difference would only be the more, at least. But women are
+generally born too indolent to be able to make such an effort. They
+have discovered that there is nothing so convenient as being pretty.
+This manner of pleasing does not require any labor; they would be glad
+not to have any other. Blind that they are, they do not see that
+beauty and talents equally attract the attention of men, but, beauty
+merely exposes her who possesses it, whereas talents furnish her with
+the means of defending it.
+
+In a word, to appreciate it at its full value, beauty stores up
+regrets and a mortal weariness for the day when it shall cease to
+exist. Would you know the reason? It is because it drowns out all
+other resources. As long as beauty lasts, a woman is regarded as
+something, she is celebrated, a crowd sighs at her feet. She flatters
+herself that this will go on forever. What a desolate solitude when
+age comes to ravish her of the only merit she possesses? I would like,
+therefore (my expression is not elevated, but it interprets my
+thought), I would like that in a woman, beauty could be a sign of
+other advantages.
+
+Let us agree, Marquis, that in love, the mind is made more use of than
+the heart. A liaison of the heart is a drama in which the acts are the
+shortest and the between acts the longest; with what then, would you
+fill the interludes if not with accomplishments? Possession puts every
+woman on the same level, and exposes all of them equally to
+infidelity. The elegant and the beautiful, when they are nothing else,
+have not, in that respect, any advantage over her who is plain; the
+mind, in that case making all the difference. That alone can bestow
+upon the same person the variety necessary to prevent satiety.
+Moreover, it is only accomplishments that can fill the vacuum of a
+passion that has been satisfied, and we can always have them in any
+situation we may imagine, either to postpone defeat and render it more
+flattering, or to assure us of our conquests. Lovers themselves profit
+by them. How many things they cherish although they set their faces
+against them? Wherefore, let the Countess, while cultivating her
+decided talent for the clavecin, understand her interests and yours.
+
+I have read over my letter, my dear Marquis, and I tremble lest you
+find it a trifle serious. You see what happens when one is in bad
+company. I supped last night with M. de la Rochefoucauld, and I never
+see him that he does not spoil me in this fashion, at least for three
+or four days.
+
+
+
+
+XXIX
+
+The Misfortune of Too Sudden an Avowal
+
+
+I think as you do, Marquis, the Countess punishes you too severely for
+having surprised an avowal of her love. Is it your fault if her secret
+escaped? She has gone too far to retreat. A woman can experience a
+return to reason, but to go so far as to refuse to see you for three
+days; give out that she has gone into the country for a month; return
+your tender letters without opening them, is, in my opinion, a
+veritable caprice of virtue. After all, however, do not despair
+whatever may happen. If she were really indifferent she would be less
+severe.
+
+Do not make any mistake about this: There are occasions when a woman
+is less out of humor with you than with herself. She feels with
+vexation that her weakness is ready to betray her at any moment. She
+punishes you for it, and she punishes herself by being unkind to you.
+But you may be sure that one day of such caprice advances the progress
+of a lover more than a year of care and assiduity. A woman soon begins
+to regret her unkindness; she deems herself unjust; she desires to
+repair her fault, and she becomes benevolent.
+
+What surprises me the most is the marked passage in your letter which
+states that since the Countess has appeared to love you, her
+character has totally changed. I have no particular information on
+that point. All I know is, that she made her debut in society as a
+lady of elegance, and her debut was all the more marked because,
+during the life of her husband, her conduct was entirely the contrary.
+Do you not remember when you first made her acquaintance, that she was
+lively even to giddiness, heedless, bold, even coquettish, and
+appeared to be incapable of a reasonable attachment? However, to-day,
+you tell me, she has become a serious melancholic; pre-occupied,
+timid, affected; sentiment has taken the place of mincing airs; at
+least she appears to so fit in with the character she assumes to-day,
+that you imagine it to be her true one, and her former one, borrowed.
+All my philosophy would be at fault in such a case, if I did not
+recognize in this metamorphosis the effects of love. I am very much
+mistaken if the storm raging around you to-day, does not end in the
+most complete victory, and one all the more assured because she has
+done everything in her power to prevent it. But if you steadily pursue
+your object, carrying your pursuit even as far as importunity, follow
+her wherever she goes and where you can see her; if you take it upon
+yourself not to allude to your passion, and treat her with all the
+mannerism of an attentive follower, respectful, but impressed, what
+will happen? She will be unable to refuse you the courtesies due any
+indifferent acquaintance. Women possess an inexhaustible fund of
+kindness for those who love them. You know this well, you men, and it
+is what always reassures you when you are treated unkindly. You know
+that your presence, your attentions, the sorrow that affects you have
+their effect, and end by disarming our pride.
+
+You are persuaded that those whom our virtue keeps at a distance
+through pride, are precisely those whom it fears the most, and
+unfortunately, your guess is only too just, it keeps them off, indeed,
+because it is not sure of its ability to resist them. It does more
+sometimes, it goes to the length of braving an enemy whose attack it
+dares not anticipate. In a word, the courage of a reasonable woman is
+nearly always equal to a first effort, but rarely is that effort
+lasting. The very excess of its violence is the cause of its
+weakening. The soul has only one degree of force, and exhausted by the
+constraint that effort cost it, it abandons itself to lassitude. By
+and by, the knowledge of its weakness throws it into discouragement. A
+woman of that disposition bears the first shock of a redoubtable enemy
+with courage, but, the danger better understood, she fears a second
+attack. A woman, persuaded that she has done everything possible to
+defend herself against an inclination which is urging her on,
+satisfied with the combats in which she has been engaged, finally
+reaches the opinion that her resistance can not prevail against the
+power of love. If she still resist, it is not by her own strength; she
+derives no help except from the idea of the intrepidity she at first
+displayed to him who attacks, or from the timidity she inspired in
+him in the beginning of her resistance. Thus it is, that however
+reasonable she may be, she nearly always starts out with a fine
+defense, she only needs pride to resolve upon that; but unfortunately,
+you divine the means of overcoming her, you persevere in your attacks,
+she is not indefatigable, and you have so little delicacy that,
+provided you obtain her heart, it is of no consequence to you whether
+you have obtained it through your importunities or with her consent.
+
+Besides that, Marquis, the excess of precautions a woman takes against
+you, is strong evidence of how much you are feared. If you were an
+object of indifference, would a woman take the trouble to avoid you? I
+declare to you that she would not honor you by being afraid of you.
+But I know how unreasonable lovers are. Always ingenious in tormenting
+themselves, the habit of never having but one object in view is so
+powerful, that they prefer being pestered with one that is
+disagreeable than with none at all.
+
+However, I feel sorry for you. Smitten as you are, your situation can
+not fail to be a sad one. The poor Marquis, how badly he is treated!
+
+
+
+
+XXX
+
+When Resistance Is Only a Pretense
+
+
+I was delighted to learn before my departure for the country, that
+your mind was more at rest. I feel free to say, that if the Countess
+had persevered in treating you with the same severity, I should have
+suspected, not that she was insensible to your love, but that you had
+a fortunate rival. The resistance manifested by her would have been
+beyond her strength in a single combat. For you should be well
+advised, Marquis, that a woman is never more intractable than when she
+assumes a haughtiness toward all other men, for the sake of her
+favorite lover.
+
+I see in everything you have told me, proofs that you are loved, and
+that you are the only one. I will be able to give you constant news on
+that score, for I am going to investigate the Countess for myself.
+This will surprise you, no doubt. Your astonishment will cease,
+however, when you call to mind that Madame de la Sablière's house,
+where I am going to spend a week, adjoins the grounds of your amiable
+widow. You told me that she was at home, and, add to the neighborhood,
+the unmeasured longing I have to make her acquaintance, you will not
+be surprised at the promise I have just made you.
+
+I have not the time to finish this letter, nor the opportunity to
+send it. I must depart immediately, and my traveling companion is
+teasing me in a strange fashion, pretending that I am writing a love
+letter. I am letting her think what she pleases, and carry the letter
+with me to the country. Adieu. What! Madame de Grignan's illness will
+not permit you to visit us in our solitude?
+
+Du Château de---.
+
+I am writing you from the country house of the Countess, my dear
+Marquis, this is the third day I have been with her, which will enable
+you to understand that I am not in bad favor with the mistress of the
+house. She is an adorable woman, I am delighted with her. I sometimes
+doubt whether you deserve a heart like hers. Here I am her confidante.
+She has told me all she thinks about you, and I do not despair of
+discovering, before I return to the city, the reasons for the change
+in her character which you have remarked. I dare not write you more
+now, I may be interrupted, and I do not wish any one to know that I am
+writing you from this place. Adieu.
+
+
+
+
+XXXI
+
+The Opinion and Advice of Monsieur de la Sablière
+
+
+How many things I have to tell you, Marquis! I was preparing to keep
+my word with you, and had arranged to use strategy upon the Countess
+to worm her secret from her, when chance came to my aid.
+
+You are not ignorant of her confidence in Monsieur de la Sablière. She
+was with him just now in an arbor of the garden, and I was passing
+through a bushy path intending to join them, when the mention of your
+name arrested my steps. I was not noticed, and heard all the
+conversation, which I hasten to communicate to you word for word.
+
+"I have not been able to conceal from your penetration, my inclination
+for M. de Sévigné," said the Countess, "and you can not reconcile the
+serious nature of so decided a passion with the frivolity attributed
+to me in society. You will be still more astonished when I tell you
+that my exterior character is not my true one, that the seriousness
+you notice in me now, is a return to my former disposition; I was
+never giddy except through design. Perhaps you may have imagined that
+women can only conceal their faults, but they sometimes go much
+farther, sir, and I am an instance. They even disguise their virtues,
+and since the word has escaped me, I am tempted, at the risk of
+wearying you, to explain by what strange gradation I reached that
+point.
+
+"During my married life I lived retired from the world. You knew the
+Count and his taste for solitude. When I became a widow, there was the
+question of returning to society, and my embarrassment as to how I was
+to present myself was not small. I interrogated my own heart; in vain
+I sought to hide it from my own knowledge, I had a strong taste for
+the pleasures of society; but at the same time I was determined to add
+to it purity of morals. But how to reconcile all this? It seemed to me
+a difficult task to establish a system of conduct which, without
+compromising me, would not at the same time deprive me of the
+pleasures of life.
+
+"This is the way I reasoned: Destined to live among men, formed to
+please them, and to share in their happiness, we are obliged to suffer
+from their caprices, and above all fear their malignity. It seems that
+they have no other object in our education than that of fitting us for
+love, indeed, it is the only passion permitted us, and by a strange
+and cruel contrariety, they have left us only one glory to obtain,
+which is that of gaining a victory over the very inclination imposed
+upon us. I therefore endeavored to ascertain the best means of
+reconciling in use and custom, two such glaring extremes, and I found
+predicaments on all sides.
+
+"We are, I said to myself, simple enough when we enter society, to
+imagine that the greatest happiness of a woman should be to love and
+be loved. We then are under the impression that love is based on
+esteem, upheld by the knowledge of amiable qualities, purified by
+delicacy of sentiment, divested of all the insipidities which
+disfigure it, in a word, fostered by confidence and the effusions of
+the heart. But unfortunately, a sentiment so flattering for a woman
+without experience, is everything less than that in practice. She is
+always disabused when too late.
+
+"I was so good in the beginning as to be scandalized at two
+imperfections I perceived in men, their inconstancy and their
+untruthfulness. The reflections I made on the first of these defects,
+led me to the opinion that they were more unfortunate than guilty.
+From the manner in which the human heart is constituted, is it
+possible for it to be occupied with only one object? No, but does the
+treachery of men deserve the same indulgence? Most men attack a
+woman's virtue in cold blood, in the design to use her for their
+amusement, to sacrifice her to their vanity, to fill a void in an idle
+life, or to acquire a sort of reputation based upon the loss of ours.
+There is a large number of men in this class. How to distinguish true
+lovers? They all look alike on the surface, and the man who pretends
+to be amorous, is often more seductive than one who really is.
+
+"We are, moreover, dupes enough to make love a capital affair. You
+men, on the contrary, consider it merely a play; we rarely surrender
+to it without an inclination for the person of the lover; you are
+coarse enough to yield to it without taste. Constancy with us is a
+duty; you give way to the slightest distaste without scruple. You are
+scarcely decent in leaving a mistress, the possession of whom, six
+months before, was your glory and happiness. She may consider herself
+well off if she is not punished by the most cruel indiscretions.
+
+"Hence I regarded things from their tragical side, and said to myself:
+'If love draws with it so many misfortunes, a woman who cherishes her
+peace of mind and reputation, should never love.' However, everything
+tells me that we have a heart, that this heart is made for love, and
+that love is involuntary. Why, then, venture to destroy an inclination
+that is part of our being? Would it not be wiser to rectify it? Let us
+see how it will be possible to succeed in such an enterprise.
+
+"What is a dangerous love? I have observed that kind of love. It is a
+love which occupies the whole soul to the exclusion of every other
+sentiment, and which impels us to sacrifice everything to the object
+loved.
+
+"What characters are susceptible of such a sentiment? They are the
+most solid, those who show little on the outside, those who unite
+reason with an elevated nobility of character in their fashion of
+thinking.
+
+"Finally, who are the men the most reasonable for women of that kind?
+It is those who possess just sufficient brilliant qualities to fix a
+value on their essential merit. It must be confessed, though, that
+such men are not good companions for women who think. It is true,
+they are rare at present, and there has never been a period so
+favorable as this to guarantee us against great passions, but
+misfortune will have it that we meet one of them in the crowd.
+
+"The moralists pretend that every woman possesses a fund of
+sensibility destined to be applied to some object or another. A
+sensible woman is not affected by the thousand trifling advantages so
+agreeable to men in ordinary women. When she meets an object worthy of
+her attention, it is quite natural that she should estimate the value
+of it; her affection is measured according to her lights, she can not
+go half way. It is these characters that should not be imitated, and
+all acquaintance with the men of whom I have just been speaking,
+should be avoided if a woman values her peace of mind. Let us create a
+character which can procure for us two advantages at one and the same
+time: One to guard us from immoderate impressions; the other to ward
+off men who cause them. Let us give them an outside which will at
+least prevent them from displaying qualities they do not possess. Let
+us force them to please us by their frivolity, by their absurdities.
+However much they may practice affectation, their visible faults would
+furnish us with weapons against them. What happy state can a woman
+occupy to procure such safeguards? It is undoubtedly that of a
+professional society woman.
+
+"You are doubtless astonished at the strange conclusion to which my
+serious reasoning has led me. You will be still more astonished when
+you shall have heard the logic I employ to prove that I am right:
+listen to the end. I know the justice of your mind, and I am not
+lacking in it, however frivolous I may appear to be, and you will
+finish by being of my opinion.
+
+"Do you believe that the outward appearance of virtue guarantees the
+heart against the assaults of love? A poor resource. When a woman
+descends to a weakness, is not her humiliation proportionately as
+great as the esteem she hoped to secure? The brighter her virtue, the
+easier mark for malice.
+
+"What is the world's idea of a virtuous woman? Are not men so unjust
+as to believe that the wisest woman is she who best conceals her
+weakness; or who, by a forced retreat puts herself beyond the
+possibility of having any? Rather than accord us a single perfection,
+they carry wickedness to the point of attributing to us a perpetual
+state of violence, every time we undertake to resist their advances.
+One of our friends said: 'There is not an honest woman who is not
+tired of being so.' And what recompense do they offer us for the cruel
+torments to which they have condemned us? Do they raise up an altar to
+our heroism? No! The most honest woman, they say, is she who is not
+talked about, that is to say, a perfect indifference on the part of a
+woman, a general oblivion is the price of our virtue. Must women not
+have much of it to preserve it at such a price? Who would not be
+tempted to abandon it? But there are grave matters which can not be
+overlooked.
+
+"Dishonor closely follows upon weakness. Old age is dreadful in
+itself, what must it not be when it is passed in remorse? I feel the
+necessity of avoiding such a misfortune. I calculated at first that I
+could not succeed in, doing so, without condemning myself to a life of
+austerity, and I had not the courage to undertake it. But it gradually
+dawned upon me that the condition of a society woman was alone
+competent to reconcile virtue with pleasure. From the smile on your
+face, I suspect such an idea appears to be a paradox to you. But it is
+more reasonable than you imagine.
+
+"Tell me this: Is a society woman obliged to have an attachment? Is
+she not exempt from tenderness? It is sufficient for her to be amiable
+and courteous, everything on the surface. As soon as she becomes
+expert in the role she has undertaken, then, the only mistrust the
+world has of her is that she has no heart. A fine figure, haughty
+airs, caprices, fashionable jargon, fantasies, and fads, that is all
+that is required of her. She can be essentially virtuous with
+impunity. Does any one presume to make advances? If he meet with
+resistance he quickly gives over worrying her, he thinks her heart is
+already captured, and he patiently awaits his turn. His perseverance
+would be out of place, for she would notify a man who failed to pay
+her deference, that it was owing to arrangements made before he
+offered himself. In this way a woman is protected by the bad opinion
+had of her.
+
+"I read in your eyes that you are about to say to me: The state of a
+professional society woman may injure my reputation, and plunge me
+into difficulties I seek to avoid. Is not that your thought? But do
+you not know, Monsieur, that the most austere conduct does not guard a
+woman from the shafts of malice? The opinion men give of women's
+reputation, and the good and wrong ideas they acquire of us are always
+equally false. It is prejudice, it is a species of fatality which
+governs their judgment, so that our glory depends less upon a real
+virtue than upon auspicious circumstances. The hope of filling an
+honorable place in their imagination, ought not to be the sole
+incentive to the practice of virtue, it should be the desire to have a
+good opinion of ourselves, and to be able to say, whatever may be the
+opinion of the public: I have nothing with which to reproach myself.
+But, what matters it to what we owe our virtue, provided we have it?
+
+"I was therefore convinced that I could not do better, when I
+reappeared in the world, than to don the mask I deemed the most
+favorable to my peace of mind and to my glory. I became closely
+attached to the friend who aided me with her counsel. She is the
+Marquise de ----, a relative. Our sentiments were in perfect accord.
+We frequented the same society. Charity for our neighbors was truly
+not our favorite virtue. We made our appearance in a social circle as
+into a ball room, where we were the only masks. We indulged in all
+sorts of follies, we goaded the absurd into showing themselves in
+their true character. After having amused ourselves in this comedy,
+we had not yet reached the limit of our pleasure, it was renewed in
+private interviews. How absolutely idiotic the women appeared to us,
+and the men, how vacuous, fatuous, and impertinent! If we found any
+who could inspire fear in a woman's heart, that is, esteem, we broke
+their heart by our airs, by affecting utter indifference for them, and
+by the allurements we heaped upon those who deserved them the least.
+By force of our experience, we came near believing, that in order to
+be virtuous, it was necessary to frequent bad company.
+
+"This course of conduct guaranteed us for a long time against the
+snares of love, and saved us from the dreadful weariness a sad and
+more mournful virtue would have spread over our lives. Frivolous,
+imperious, bold, even coquettish if you will, in the presence of men,
+but solid, reasonable, and virtuous in our own eyes, we were happy in
+this character. We never met a man we were afraid of. Those who might
+have been redoubtable, were obliged to make themselves ridiculous
+before being permitted to enjoy our society.
+
+"But what finally led me to doubt the truth of my principles, is they
+did not always guard me from the dangers I wished to avoid. I have
+learned through my own experience, that love is a traitor with whom it
+will not do to trifle. I do not know by what fatality, the Marquis de
+Sévigné was able to render my projects futile. In spite of all my
+precautions he has found the way to my heart. However much I resisted
+him I was impelled to love him, and my reason is of no more use to me
+except to justify in my own eyes the inclination I feel for him. I
+would be happy if he never gave me an occasion to change my
+sentiments. I have been unable to hide from him my true thoughts, I
+was afraid at first that he might deem me actually as ridiculous as I
+seemed to be. And when my sincerity shall render me less amiable in
+his eyes (for I know that frivolity captures men more than real
+merit), I wish to show myself to him in my true colors. I should blush
+to owe nothing to his heart but a perpetual lie of my whole being."
+
+"I am still less surprised, Madame," said Monsieur de la Sablière, "at
+the novelty of your project, than at the skill with which you have
+succeeded in rendering such a singular idea plausible. Permit me to
+say, that it is not possible to go astray with more spirit. Have you
+experimented with everybody according to your system? Men go a long
+way around to avoid the beaten track, but they all fall over the same
+obstacles. To make use of the privilege you granted me to tell you
+plainly my thought, believe me, Countess, that the only way for you to
+preserve your peace of mind is to resume openly your position as a
+reasonable woman. There is nothing to be gained by compounding with
+virtue."
+
+When I heard the conversation taking that complexion, I knew it would
+soon finish, and I therefore promptly withdrew, and could not think of
+anything but satisfying your curiosity. I am tired of writing. In two
+days I shall return to Paris.
+
+
+
+
+XXXII
+
+The Advantages of a Knowledge of the Heart
+
+
+Well, Marquis, here I am back again, but the news I bring you may not
+be altogether to your liking. You have never had so fine an occasion
+to charge women with caprice. I wrote you the last time to tell you
+that you were loved, to-day I write just the contrary.
+
+A strange resolution has been taken against you; tremble, 'tis a thing
+settled; the Countess purposes loving you at her ease, and without its
+costing her any disturbance of her peace of mind. She has seen the
+consequences of a passion similar to yours, and she can not face it
+without dismay. She intends, therefore, to arrest its progress. Do not
+let the proofs she has given you reassure you. You men imagine that as
+soon as a woman has confessed her love she can never more break her
+chains; undeceive yourself. The Countess is much more reasonable on
+your account than I thought, and I do not hide from you the fact that
+a portion of her firmness is due to my advice. You need not rely any
+more on my letters, and you do not require any help from them to
+understand women.
+
+I sometimes regret that I have furnished you weapons against my sex,
+without them would you ever have been able to touch the heart of the
+Countess? I must avow that I have judged women with too much rigor,
+and you now see me ready to make them a reparation. I know it now,
+there are more stable and essentially virtuous women than I had
+thought.
+
+What a stock of reason! What a combination of all the estimable
+qualities in our friend! No, Marquis, I could no longer withhold from
+her the sentiment of my most tender esteem, and without consulting
+your interests, I have united with her against you. You will murmur at
+this, but the confidence she has given me, does it not demand this
+return on my part? I will not hide from you any of my wickedness; I
+have carried malice to the point of instructing her in the advantages
+you might draw from everything I have written you about women.
+
+"I feel," she said to me, "how redoubtable is a lover who combines
+with so much knowledge of the heart, the talent to express himself in
+such noble and delicate language. What advantages can he not have of
+women who reason? I have remarked it, it is by his powers of reasoning
+that he has overcome them. He possesses the art of employing the
+intelligence he finds in a woman to justify, in the eyes of his
+reason, the errors into which he draws her. Besides, a woman in love
+thinks she is obliged to proportion her sacrifices to the good
+qualities of the man she loves. To an ordinary man, a weakness is a
+weakness, he blushes at it; to a man of intelligence, it is a tribute
+paid to his merits, it is even a proof of our discernment; he
+eulogizes our good taste and takes the credit of it. It is thus by
+turning it to the profit of the vanity which he rescues from virtue,
+that this enchanter hides from our eyes the grades of our weakness."
+
+Such are at present, Marquis, the sentiments of the Countess, and I am
+not sure if they leave you much to hope for. I do not ignore the fact
+that it might have doubtless been better to carry out the project we
+have in view without giving you any information concerning it. That
+was our first intention; but could I in conscience secretly work
+against you? Would it not have been to betray you? Moreover, by taking
+that course, we should have appeared to be afraid of you, and hence we
+found courage to put you in possession of all we expect to do to
+resist you.
+
+Come, now, Marquis, our desire to see you really makes us impatient.
+Would you know the reason? It is because we expect you without fearing
+you. Remember that you have not now a weak loving woman to fight
+against, she would be too feeble an adversary, her courage might give
+out; it is I, now, it is a woman of cold blood, who fancies herself
+interested in saving the reason of her friend from being wrecked. Yes,
+I will penetrate to the bottom of your heart; I will read there your
+perverse designs; I will forestall them; I will render all the
+artifices of your malice innocuous.
+
+You may accuse me of treason as much as you please, but come to-night,
+and I will convince you that my conduct is conformable to the most
+exact equity. While your inexperience needed enlightenment,
+assistance, encouragement, my zeal in your cause urged me to sacrifice
+everything in your interests. Every advantage was then on the side of
+the Countess. But now there is a different face on things; all her
+pride to-day, is barely strong enough to resist you. Formerly, her
+indifference was in her favor, and, what was worth still more, your
+lack of skill; to-day you have the experience, and she has her reason
+the less.
+
+After that, to combine with you against her, to betray the confidence
+she reposes in me, to refuse her the succor she has the right to
+expect from me, if you are sincere, you will avow it yourself, would
+be a crying wrong. Henceforth, I purpose to repair the evil I have
+done in revealing our secrets, by initiating you into our mysteries. I
+do not know why, but the pleasure I feel in crossing you, appears to
+be working in my favor, and you know how far my rights oven you
+extend. My sentiments will always be the same, and, on your part
+without doubt, you are too equitable to diminish your esteem for me,
+because of anything I may have done in favor of a friend.
+
+By and by, then, at the Countess'.
+
+
+
+
+XXXIII
+
+A Heart Once Wounded No Longer Plays with Love
+
+
+What, Marquis, afraid of two women? You already despair of your
+affairs, because they oppose your success, and you are ready to
+abandon the game? Dear me, I thought you had more courage. It is true
+that the firmness of the Countess astonishes even me, but I do not
+understand how she could hold out against your ardor for an entire
+evening. I never saw you so seductive, and she has just confessed to
+me that you were never so redoubtable. Now I can respond for her,
+since her courage did not fail her on an occasion of so much peril. I
+saw still farther, and I judge from her well sustained ironical
+conversation, that she is only moderately smitten. A woman really
+wounded by the shaft of love would not have played with sentiment in
+such a flippant manner.
+
+This gives birth to a strange idea. It would be very delightful, if in
+a joking way, we should discover that your tender Adelaide does not
+love you up to a certain point. What a blow that would be to your
+vanity! But you would quickly seek revenge. You might certainly find
+beauties ready to console you for your loss. How often has vexation
+made you say: "What is a woman's heart? Can any one give me a
+definition of it?"
+
+However, do you know that I am tempted to find fault with you, and if
+you take this too much to heart, I do not know what I would not do to
+soften the situation. But I know you are strong minded. Your first
+feelings of displeasure past, you will soon see that the best thing
+you can do is to come down to the quality of friend, a position which
+we have so generously offered you. You ought to consider yourself very
+fortunate, your dismissal might be made absolute. But do not make this
+out to be much of a victory, you will be more harshly treated if we
+consider you more to be feared.
+
+Adieu, Marquis. The Countess, who is sitting at the head of my bed,
+sends you a thousand tender things. She is edified by the discretion
+with which you have treated us; not to insist when two ladies seem to
+be so contrary to you, that is the height of gallantry. So much
+modesty will certainly disarm them, and may some day move them to
+pity. Hope, that is permitted you.
+
+
+From the Countess.
+
+Although you may be inspired by the most flattering hopes, Marquis, I
+will add a few words to this letter. I have not read it, but I suspect
+that it refers to me. I wish, however, to write you with my own hand
+that we shall be alone here all day. I wish to tell you that I love
+you moderately well at present, but that I have the greatest desire
+in the world not to love you at all. However, if you deem it advisable
+to come and trouble our little party, it gives me pleasure to warn you
+that your heart will be exposed to the greatest danger. I am told that
+I am handsomer to-day than you have ever found me to be, and I never
+felt more in the humor to treat you badly.
+
+
+
+
+XXXIV
+
+Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder
+
+
+All this, Marquis, begins to pass the bounds of pleasantry. Explain
+yourself, I pray you. Did you pretend to speak seriously in your
+letter, in making it understood that I was acting on this occasion
+through jealousy, and that I was trying to separate you and the
+Countess to profit by it myself?
+
+You are either the wickedest of men or the most adroit; the wickedest
+if you ever could suspect me guilty of such baseness; the most adroit,
+if you have thrown out that idea to make my friend suspect me. I see
+very clearly in all this, that the alternative is equally injurious to
+me, since the Countess has taken the matter to heart. I find that my
+relations with her are very embarrassing. Criminal that you are, how
+well you know your ascendency over her heart! You could not better
+attack her than by the appearance of indifference you affect. Not
+deign to answer my last letter, not come to the rendezvous given you,
+remain away from us three days, and after all that, to write us the
+coldest letter possible, oh, I confess it frankly, that is to act like
+a perfect man; that is what I call a master stroke, and the most
+complete success has responded to your hope. The Countess has not
+been able to stand against so much coolness. The fear that this
+indifference may become real has caused her a mortal anxiety.
+
+Great Heavens! What is the most reasonable woman when love has turned
+her head? Why were you not the witness of the reproaches I have just
+heard? How is that? To hear the Countess to-day, gave me an injurious
+opinion of her virtue, a false idea of your pretensions, and I
+considered your designs criminal because you took so much pleasure in
+punishing her.
+
+I am hard, unjust, cruel, I can not remember all the epithets with
+which I was covered. What outbursts! Oh, I protest to you, this will
+be the last storm I will undergo for being mixed up in your affairs,
+and I very cordially renounce the confidence with which you have both
+honored me. Advisers do not play a very agreeable part in such cases,
+so it seems to me, always charged with what is disagreeable in
+quarrels, and the lovers only profit by a reconciliation.
+
+However, after due reflection, I think I should be very silly to take
+offence at this. You are two children whose follies will amuse me, I
+ought to look upon them with the eye of a philosopher, and finish by
+being the friend of both. Come then, at once, and assure me if that
+resolution will suit you. Now, do not play the petty cruel role any
+more. Come and make peace. These poor children; one of them has such
+innocent motives, the other is so sure of her virtue, that to stand in
+the way of their inclination, is surely to afflict them without
+reason.
+
+
+
+
+XXXV
+
+The Heart Should be Played Upon Like the Keys of a Piano
+
+
+I am beginning to understand, Marquis, that the only way to live with
+the most reasonable woman, is never to meddle with her heart affairs.
+I have, therefore, made up my mind. Henceforward I shall never mention
+your name to the Countess unless she insists upon my doing so; I do
+not like bickerings.
+
+But this resolution will change nothing of my sentiments for you, nor
+my friendship for her. And, although I still stand her friend, I shall
+not scruple to make use of my friendship, so far as you are concerned,
+as I have in the past I shall continue, since you so wish it, to give
+you my ideas on the situations in which you may become involved, on
+condition, however, that you permit me sometimes to laugh at your
+expense, a liberty I shall not take to-day, because if the Countess
+follows up the plan she has formed, that is, if she persists in
+refusing to see you alone, I do not see that your affairs will advance
+very rapidly. She remembers what I told her, she knows her heart, and
+has reason to fear it.
+
+It is only an imprudent woman who relies upon her own strength, and
+exposes herself without anxiety to the advances of the man she loves.
+The agitation which animates him, the fire with which his whole person
+appears to be burning, excites our senses, fires our imagination,
+appeals to our desires. I said to the Countess one day: "We resemble
+your clavecin; however well disposed it may be to respond to the hand
+which should play upon it, until it feels the impression of that hand,
+it remains silent; touch its keys, and sounds are heard." Finish the
+parallel, and draw your conclusions.
+
+But after all, why should you complain, Monsieur, the metaphysician?
+To see the Countess, hear the soft tones of her voice, render her
+little attentions, carry the delicacy of sentiment beyond the range of
+mortal vision, feel edified at her discourses on virtue, are not these
+supreme felicity for you? Leave for earthy souls the gross sentiments
+which are beginning to develop in you. To look at you to-day, it might
+be said that I was not so far out of the way when I declared love to
+be the work of the senses. Your own experience will compel you to avow
+that I had some good reason for saying so, for which I am not at all
+sorry. Consider yourself punished for your injustice. Adieu.
+
+Your old rival, the Chevalier, has revenged himself for the rigors of
+the Countess, by tying himself up with the Marquise, her relative.
+This choice is assuredly a eulogy on his good taste, they are made for
+each other. I shall be very much charmed to know whither their fine
+passion will lead them.
+
+
+
+
+XXXVI
+
+Mistaken Impressions Common to All Women
+
+
+Do you think, Marquis, that I have not felt all the sarcasm you have
+deigned to turn against me on account of my pretended reconciliation
+with the Countess? Know this, sir, that we have never been at outs.
+
+It is true, she begged me to forget her vivacity, which she claimed
+was due to her love, and she insisted that I should continue to give
+her good counsel. But Good Heavens! Of what use are my counsels except
+to provide you with an additional triumph? The best advice I can give
+her is to break off her relations with you, for whatever confidence
+she may have in her pride, her only preservative against you is
+flight. She believes, for example, that she used her reason with good
+effect in the conversation you have related to me. But every
+reasonable woman does not fail to use the same language as soon as a
+lover shows her some respectful pretensions.
+
+"I only want your heart," they say, "your sentiments, your esteem is
+all I desire. Alas! you will find only too many women with so little
+delicacy as to believe themselves very happy in accepting what I
+refuse. I will never envy them a happiness of that kind."
+
+Be on your guard, Marquis, and do not openly combat such fine
+sentiments; to doubt a woman's sincerity on such occasions, is to do
+more than offend them, it is to be maladroit. You must applaud their
+mistaken idea if you would profit by it. They wish to appear
+high-minded, and sensible only of the pleasures of the soul, it is
+their system, their esprit du corps. If some women are in good faith
+on this point, how many are there who treat it as an illusion and wish
+to impose it upon you?
+
+But whatever may be the reason which impels them to put you on a false
+scent, ought you not to be delighted that they are willing to take the
+trouble to deceive you? What obligations are you not under? They give
+in this manner, a high value to those who, without it, would be very
+undesirable. Admire our strategy when we feign indifference to what
+you call the pleasures of love, pretending even to be far removed from
+its sweetness, we augment the grandeur of the sacrifice we make for
+you, by it, we even inspire the gratitude of the authors of the very
+benefits we receive from them, you are satisfied with the good you do
+us.
+
+And since it was said that we make it a duty to deceive you, what
+obligation do you not owe us? We have chosen the most obliging way to
+do it. You are the first to gain by this deceit, for we can not
+multiply obstacles without enhancing the price of your victory.
+Troubles, cares, are not these the money with which lovers pay for
+their pleasures? What a satisfaction for your vanity to be able to
+say within yourselves: "This woman, so refined, so insensible to the
+impressions of the senses; this woman who fears disdain so much, comes
+to me, nevertheless, and sacrifices her repugnance, her fears, her
+pride? My own merit, the charms of my person, my skill, have
+surmounted invincible objects for something quite different. How
+satisfied I am with my prowess!"
+
+If women acted in good faith, if they were in as much haste to show
+you their desires as you are to penetrate them, you could not talk
+that way. How many pleasures lost! But you can not impute wrong to
+this artifice, it gives birth to so many advantages. Pretend to be
+deceived, and it will become a pleasure to you.
+
+If the Countess knew what I have written, how she would reproach me!
+
+
+
+
+XXXVII
+
+The Allurements of Stage Women
+
+
+I know too well that a man in your position, particularly a military
+man, is often exposed to bad company, consequently, he is attracted by
+the divinities you mention. In spite of that you are not deceived, and
+I would probably censure you, if I were not so sure, that, in the
+present state of your heart, the heroines of the theater are not
+dangerous to you. But the Countess is less indulgent, you say. Her
+jealousy does not astonish me, she confirms my ideas concerning female
+metaphysicians. I know how much credit is due their sincerity. Her
+complaints are very singular, for, what is she deprived of? The women
+in question are nothing but women of sentiment, and it is to sentiment
+that the Countess is attached.
+
+How little women are in accord! They pretend to despise women of the
+stage; they fear them too much to despise them. But after all, are
+they wrong to consider them rivals? Are you not more captivated with
+their free and easy style, than with that of a sensible woman who has
+nothing to offer but order, decency, and uniformity? With the former,
+men are at their ease, they appear to be in their element; with the
+latter, men are kept within bounds, obliged to stand on their
+dignity, and to be very circumspect. From the portrait of several of
+them, I should judge that there are some of them very capable of
+making many men unfaithful to the most beloved mistress. But with a
+sensible man, this infidelity, if it be one, can not be of long
+duration. These women may create a sudden, lively desire, but never a
+veritable passion.
+
+The fairies of the operatic stage would be too dangerous, if they had
+the wit or the humor always to amuse you as much as they do the first
+time you are thrown on their company. However little jargon, habits,
+and decency they have on the surface, it is possible that they may
+please you at first. You men have so little refinement sometimes! The
+freedom of their conversation, the vivacity of their sallies of
+alleged wit, their giddy ways, all this affords you a situation that
+charms; a lively and silly joy seizes upon you, the hours you pass
+with them seem to be only moments. But happily for you, they seldom
+possess sufficient resources to maintain a role so amusing. Inasmuch
+as they lack education and culture, they soon travel around the small
+circle of their accomplishments. They feed you with the same
+pleasantries, the same stories, the same antics, and it is seldom one
+laughs twice at the same thing when one has no esteem for the fun
+maker.
+
+The Countess need not worry, for I know you well enough to assure her
+that it is not that class of women she may apprehend, there are in the
+world, others more redoubtable, they are the "gallant women," those
+equivocal women in society. They occupy a middle position between good
+women and those I have been talking about; they associate with the
+former and are not different from the latter except on the surface.
+More voluptuous than tender, they seduce by lending to the least
+refined sentiments an air of passion which is mistaken for love. They
+understand how to convey an impression of tenderness to what is only a
+taste for pleasure. They make you believe that it is by choice, by a
+knowledge of your merit that they yield. If you do not know them to be
+gallant women, the shade of difference which distinguishes the true
+motives which actuates them, from the sensibility of the heart, is
+impossible to seize. You accept for excess of passion what is only an
+intoxication of the senses. You imagine you are loved because you are
+lovable, but it is only because you are a man.
+
+These are the women I should fear if I were in the place of the
+Countess. The financial woman who has lately appeared in society
+belongs to this class, but I have already warned the Countess.
+
+I call to mind, here, that in your preceding letter, you mentioned the
+allurements which the Countess thought proper to manifest? She was
+right in taking umbrage. Your passion for her is truly too great to
+prevent you from sacrificing everything, but I fear you will not
+always be so honest.
+
+Madame de ---- possesses bloom and cheerfulness; she is at an age when
+women assume charge of young men who desire to be fitted for society,
+and to learn their first lessons in gallantry. The interesting and
+affectionate disposition you find in her will have its effect, but be
+careful, it is I who warn you. Although I despise such women, it
+happens that they have the power to create attachments; they often
+find the secret of making you commit more follies than any of the
+other women.
+
+
+
+
+XXXVIII
+
+Varieties of Resistance are Essential
+
+
+I hasten to tell you, Marquis, that I have just maintained a thesis
+against Monsieur de la Bruyère. No doubt you admire my temerity?
+However it is true. He pretends that Corneille described men as they
+should be, and Racine as they are; I held the contrary. We had some
+illustrious spectators of the dispute, and I ought to be very proud of
+the suffrages in my favor.
+
+But all the details would be too long to write you, so come and we
+will talk them over. Every one has his own fashion of describing
+things, I have mine, I know. I represent women as they are, and I am
+very sorry not to be able to represent them as they should be. Now I
+shall reply to your letter.
+
+The species of languor which affects you does not surprise me. The
+malady which afflicts the Marquise has deprived you of the pleasure of
+seeing the Countess, and your heart remaining in the same condition
+for three days, it is not surprising that ennui should have gained
+upon it. Neither does your present indifference for the Countess alarm
+me. In the greatest passions there are always moments of lukewarmness,
+which astonish the hearts that feel the sensation. Whether the heart,
+constantly agitated by the same emotions, finally tires, or whether it
+is absolutely impossible for it to be always employed with the same
+object, there are moments of indifference, the cause of which can not
+be ascertained. The livelier the emotions of the heart, the more
+profound the calm that is sure to follow, and it is this calm that is
+always more fateful to the object loved than storm and agitation. Love
+is extinguished by a resistance too severe or constant. But an
+intelligent woman goes beyond that, she varies her manner of
+resisting; this is the sublimity of the art.
+
+Now, with the Countess, the duties of friendship are preferable to the
+claims of love, and that is another reason for your indifference
+toward her. Love is a jealous and tyrannical sentiment, which is never
+satiated until the object loved has sacrificed upon its altar all
+desires and passions. You do nothing for it unless you do everything.
+Whenever you prefer duty, friendship, etc., it claims the right to
+complain. It demands revenge. The small courtesies you deemed it
+necessary to show Madame de ---- are proofs of it. I would have much
+preferred, though, you had not carried them so far as accompanying her
+home. The length of time you passed in her company, the pleasure you
+experienced in conversing with her, the questions she put to you on
+the state of your heart, all goes to prove the truth of what I said in
+my last letter. It is vain for you to protest that you came away more
+amorous than ever of the Countess, your embarrassment when she
+inquired whether you had remained long with your "fermière générale,"
+the attempt you made to deceive her by an evasive answer, the extreme
+care you took to disarm her slightest suspicion, are indications to me
+that you are far more guilty than you pretend, or than you are aware
+of yourself.
+
+The Countess suffers the consequences of all that. Do you not see how
+she affects to rouse your jealousy by praising the Chevalier, your
+ancient rival? For once, I can assure you that you will not so soon be
+affected by the languors we mentioned a short time ago. Jealousy will
+give you something to think about. Do you count for nothing, the
+sufferings of the Marquise? You will soon see her, the ravages of the
+smallpox will not alone disfigure her face, for her disposition will
+be very different, as soon as she learns the extent of her misfortune.
+How I pity her; how I pity other women! With what cordiality she will
+hate them and tear them to tatters! The Countess is her best friend,
+will she be so very long? She is so handsome, her complexion casts the
+others in the shade. What storms I foresee!
+
+I had forgotten to quarrel with you about your treatment of me. You
+have been so indiscreet as to show my recent letters to M. de la
+Rochefoucauld. I will cease writing you if you continue to divulge my
+secret. I am willing to talk personally with him about my ideas, but I
+am far from flattering myself that I write well enough to withstand
+the criticism of a reader like him.
+
+
+
+
+XXXIX
+
+The True Value of Compliments Among Women
+
+
+The marks left by the smallpox on the Marquise's face have set her
+wild. Her resolution not to show herself for a long time does not
+surprise me. How could she appear in public in such a state? If the
+accident which humiliates her had not happened, how she would have
+made the poor Chevalier suffer! Does not this prove that female virtue
+depends upon circumstances, and diminishes with pride?
+
+How I fear a similar example in the case of the Countess! Nothing is
+more dangerous for a woman than the weaknesses of her friend; love,
+already too seductive in itself, becomes more so through the contagion
+of example, if I may so speak; it is not only in our heart that it
+gathers strength; it acquires new weapons against reason from its
+environment. A woman who has fallen under its ban, deems herself
+interested, for her own justification, in conducting her friend to the
+edge of the same precipice, and I am not, therefore, surprised at what
+the Marquise says in your favor. Up to the present moment they have
+been guided by the same principles; what a shame, then, for her, that
+the Countess could not have been guaranteed against the effects of it!
+Now, the Marquise has a strong reason the more for contributing to
+the defeat of her friend; she has become positively ugly, and
+consequently obliged to be more complaisant in retaining a lover. Will
+she suffer another woman to keep hers at a less cost? That would be to
+recognize too humiliating a superiority, and I can assure you that she
+will do the most singular things to bring her amiable widower up to
+the point.
+
+If she succeed, how much I fear everything will be changed! To have
+been as beautiful as another woman, and to be so no longer, although
+she embellishes herself every day, and to suffer her presence every
+day, is, I vow, an effort beyond the strength of the most reasonable
+woman, greater than the most determined philosophy. Among women
+friendship ceases where rivalry begins. By rivalry, I mean that of
+beauty only, it would be too much to add that of sentiment.
+
+I foresee this with regret, but it is my duty to forewarn you.
+Whatever precautions the Countess may take to control the amour propre
+of the Marquise, she will never make anything else out of her than an
+ingrate. I do not know by what fatality, everything a beautiful woman
+tells one who is no longer beautiful, assumes in the mouth, an
+impression of a commiseration which breaks down the most carefully
+devised management, and humiliates her whom it is thought to console.
+The more a woman strives to efface the superiority she possesses over
+an unfortunate sister woman, the more she makes that superiority
+apparent, until the latter reaches the opinion that it is only
+through generosity that she is permitted to occupy the subordinate
+position left her.
+
+You may depend upon it, Marquis, that women are never misled when it
+comes to mutual praise; they fully appreciate the eulogies
+interchanged among themselves; and as they speak without sincerity, so
+they listen with little gratitude. And although she who speaks, in
+praising the beauty of another, may do so in good faith, she who
+listens to the eulogy, considers less what the other says than her
+style of beauty. Is she ugly? We believe and love her, but if she be
+as handsome as we, we thank her coldly and disdain her; handsomer, we
+hate her more than before she spoke.
+
+You must understand this, Marquis, that as much as two beautiful women
+may have something between them to explain, it is impossible for them
+to form a solid friendship. Can two merchants who have the same goods
+to sell become good neighbors? Men do not penetrate the true cause of
+the lack of cordiality among women. Those who are the most intimate
+friends often quarrel over nothing, but do you suppose this "nothing"
+is the real occasion of their quarrel? It is only the pretext. We hide
+the motive of our actions when to reveal it would be a humiliation. We
+do not care to make public the fact that it is jealousy for the beauty
+of our friend that is the real cause, to give that as the reason for
+estrangement would be to charge us with envy, a pleasure one woman
+will not give another; she prefers injustice. Whenever it happens
+that two beautiful women are so happy as to find a pretext to get rid
+of each other, they seize upon it with vivacity, and hate each other
+with a cordiality which proves how much they loved each other before
+the rupture.
+
+Well, Marquis, am I talking to you with sufficient frankness? You see
+to what lengths my sincerity goes. I try to give you just ideas of
+everything, even at my own expense, for I am assuredly not more exempt
+than another woman from the faults I sometimes criticise. But as I am
+sure that what passes between us will be buried in oblivion, I do not
+fear embroiling myself in a quarrel with all my sex, they might,
+perhaps, claim the right to blame my ingenuity.
+
+But the Countess is above all such petty things, she agrees, however,
+with everything I have just said. Are there many women like her?
+
+
+
+
+XL
+
+Oratory and Fine Phrases do Not Breed Love
+
+
+The example of the Marquise has not yet had any effect on the heart of
+her friend. It appears, on the contrary, that she is more on guard
+against you, and that you have drawn upon yourself her reproaches
+through some slight favor you have deprived her of.
+
+I have been thinking that she would not fail on this occasion to
+recall to your recollection, the protestations of respect and
+disinterestedness you made when you declared your passion for her. It
+is customary in similar cases. But what seems strange about it is,
+that the same eagerness that a woman accepts as a proof of disrespect,
+before she is in perfect accord with her lover, becomes, in her
+imagination, a proof of love and esteem, as soon as they meet on a
+common ground.
+
+Listen to married women, and to all those who, being unmarried, permit
+the same prerogatives; hear them, I say, in their secret complaints
+against unfaithful husbands and cooling lovers. They are despised, and
+that is the sole reason they can imagine. But with us, what they
+consider a mark of esteem and sincerity, is it anything else than the
+contrary? I told you some time ago, that women themselves, when they
+are acting in good faith, go farther than men in making love consist
+in an effervescence of the blood. Study a lover at the commencement of
+her passion: with her, then, love is purely a metaphysical sentiment,
+with which the senses have not the least relation. Similar to those
+philosophers who, in the midst of grievous torments would not confess
+that they were suffering pain, she is a martyr to her own system; but,
+at last, while combatting this chimera, the poor thing becomes
+affected by a change; her lover vainly repeats that love is a divine,
+metaphysical sentiment, that it lives on fine phrases, on spiritual
+discourses, that it would be degrading to mingle with it anything
+material and human; he vainly, boasts of his respect and refinement. I
+tell you, Marquis, on the part of all women, that such an orator will
+never make his fortune. His respect will be taken as an insult, his
+refinement for derision, and his fine discourses for ridiculous
+pretexts. All the grace that will be accorded him, is that she will
+find a pretext to quarrel with him because he has been less refined
+with some other woman, and that he will be put to the sorrowful
+necessity of displaying his high flown sentiments to his titular
+mistress, and what is admirable about this is, that the excuse for it
+arises out of the same principle.
+
+P.S.--You have so much deference for my demands! You not only show my
+letters to M. de la Rochefoucauld, but you read them before the whole
+assembly of my friends. It is true that the indulgence with which my
+friends judge them, consoles me somewhat for your indiscretion, and I
+see very well that the best thing for me to do is to continue on in my
+own way as I have in the past. But, at least, be discreet when I
+mention matters relating to the glory of the Countess; otherwise, no
+letters.
+
+
+
+
+XLI
+
+Discretion Is Sometimes the Better Part of Valor
+
+
+No, Marquis, I can not pardon in you the species of fury with which
+you desire what you are pleased to call the "supreme happiness." How
+blind you are, not to know that when you are sure of a woman's heart,
+it is in your interests to enjoy her defeat a long time before it
+becomes entire. Will you never understand, that of all there is good
+on earth, it is the sweetness of love that must be used with the
+greatest economy?
+
+If I were a man and were so fortunate as to have captured the heart of
+a woman like the Countess, with what discretion I would use my
+advantages? How many gradations there would be in the law I should
+impose upon myself to overlook them successively and even leisurely?
+Of how many amiable pleasures, unknown to men, would not I be the
+creator? Like a miser, I would contemplate my treasure unceasingly,
+learn its precious value, feel that in it consisted all my felicity,
+base all my happiness upon the possession of it, reflect that it is
+all mine, that I may dispose of it and yet maintain my resolution not
+to deprive myself of its use.
+
+What a satisfaction to read in the eyes of an adorable woman the power
+you have over her; to see her slightest acts give birth to an
+impression of tenderness, whenever they relate to you; to hear her
+voice soften when it is to you or of you she speaks; to enjoy her
+confusion at your slightest eagerness, her anxiety at your most
+innocent caresses? Is there a more delicious condition than that of a
+lover who is sure of being loved, and can there be any sweeter than at
+such moments? What a charm for a lover to be expected with an
+impatience that is not concealed; to be received with an eagerness all
+the more flattering from the effort made to hide the half of it?
+
+She dresses in a fashion to please; she assumes the deportment, the
+style, the pose that may flatter her lover the most. In former times
+women dressed to please in general, now their entire toilette is to
+please men; for his sake she wears bangles, jewelry, ribbons,
+bracelets, rings. He is the object of it all, the woman is transformed
+into the man; it is he she loves in her own person. Can you find
+anything in love more enchanting than the resistance of a woman who
+implores you not to take advantage of her weakness? Is there anything,
+in a word, more seductive than a voice almost stifled with emotion,
+than a refusal for which she reproaches herself, and, the rigor of
+which she attempts to soften by tender looks, before a complaint is
+made? I can not conceive any.
+
+But it is certain that as soon as she yields to your eagerness, all
+these pleasures weaken in proportion to the facility met. You alone
+may prolong them, even increase them, by taking the time to know all
+the sweetness and its taste. However, you are not satisfied unless
+the possession, be entire, easy, and continuous. And after that, you
+are surprised to find indifference, coolness, and inconstancy in your
+heart. Have you not done everything to satiate your passion for the
+beloved object? I have always contended that love never dies from
+desire but often from indigestion, and I will sometime tell you in
+confidence my feelings for Count ----. You will understand from that
+how to manage a passion to render happiness enduring; you will see
+whether I know the human heart and true felicity; you will learn from
+my example that the economy of the sentiments is, in the question of
+love, the only reasonable metaphysics. In fine, you will know how
+little you understand your true interests in your conduct toward the
+Countess. To interfere with your projects, I shall be with her as
+often as it is possible. Now, do not be formal, and tell me that I am
+an advocate on both sides; for I am persuaded that I am acting for the
+good of the parties interested.
+
+
+
+
+XLII
+
+Surface Indications in Women are Not Always Guides
+
+
+What, I censure you, Marquis? I will take good care not to do so, I
+assure you. You have not been willing to follow my advice, and hence,
+I am not at all sorry for having ill-used you. You thought you had
+nothing to do but to treat the Countess roughly. Her easy fashion of
+treating love, her accessibility, her indulgence for your numerous
+faults, the freedom with which she mocks the Platonicians, all this
+encouraged you to hope that she was not very severe, but you have just
+discovered your mistake. All this outward show was nothing but
+deceitful and perfidious allurements. To take advantage thus of the
+good faith of any one--I must confess that it is a conduct which cries
+for vengeance; she deserves all the names you give her.
+
+But do you wish me to talk to you with my customary frankness? You
+have fallen into an error which is common among men. They judge women
+from the surface. They imagine that a woman whose virtue is not always
+on the qui vive, will be easier to overcome than a prude; even
+experience does not undeceive them. How often are they exposed to a
+severity all the keener that it was unexpected? Their custom then, is
+to accuse women of caprice and oddity; all of you use the same
+language, and say: Why such equivocal conduct? When a woman has
+decided to remain intractable, why surprise the credulity of a lover?
+Why not possess an exterior conformable to her sentiments? In a word,
+why permit a man to love her, when she does not care ever to see him
+again? Is this not being odd and false? Is it not trifling with
+sentiment?
+
+You are in error, gentlemen, you are imposing upon your vanity, it is
+in vain you try to put us on a false scent, that, of itself, is
+offensive, and you talk of sentiment as ennobling a thing that
+resembles it very little. Are not you, yourselves, to blame if we
+treat you thus? However little intelligence a woman may have, she
+knows that the strongest tie to bind you to her is anticipation,
+wherefore, you must let her lay the blame on you. If she were to arm
+herself from the first with a severity that would indicate that she is
+invincible, from that time, no lovers for her. What a solitude would
+be hers, what shame even? For a woman of the most pronounced virtue is
+no less sensible of the desire to please, she makes her glory consist
+in securing homage and adoration. But without ignoring the fact that
+those she expects attention from are induced to bestow them only for
+reasons that wound her pride; unable to reform this defect, the only
+part she can take is to use it to her advantage to keep them by her
+side; she knows how to keep them, and not destroy the very hopes
+which, however, she is determined never to gratify. With care and
+skill she succeeds. Hence, as soon as a woman understands her real
+interests she does not fail to say to herself what the Countess
+confessed to me at our last interview:
+
+"I can well appreciate the 'I love you' of the men; I do not disguise
+the fact that I know what it signifies at bottom, therefore upon me
+rests the burden of being offended at hearing them; but when women
+have penetrated their motives, they have need of their vanity to
+disconcert their designs. Our anger, when they have offended us, is
+not the best weapon to use in opposing them. Whoever must go outside
+herself and become angry to resist them, exposes her weakness. A fine
+irony, a piquant raillery, a humiliating coolness, these are what
+discourage them. Never a quarrel with them, consequently no
+reconciliation. What advantages does not this mode of procedure take
+from them!
+
+"The prude, it is true, follows a quite different method. If she is
+exposed to the least danger, she does not imagine herself to be
+reasonable but in proportion to the resentment she experiences; but
+upon whom does such conduct impose? Every man who knows the cards,
+says to himself: 'I am ill used because the opportunity is
+unfavorable. It is my awkwardness that is punished and not my
+temerity. Another time, that will be well received which is a crime
+to-day; this severity is a notice to redouble my effort, to merit more
+indulgence and disarm pride; she wishes to be appeased.' And the only
+means in such case to make her forget the offense is, that in making
+an apology to repeat it a second time. With my recipe, I am certain
+that a man will never reason that way.
+
+"The Marquis, for example, has sometimes permitted me to read in his
+eyes his respectful intentions. I never knew but one way to punish
+him; I have feigned not to understand him; insensibly, I have diverted
+his mind to other objects. And this recipe has worked well up to the
+moment I last saw him at my house. There was no way to dissimulate
+with him; he wished to honor me with some familiarities, and I stopped
+him immediately, but not in anger. I deemed it more prudent to arm
+myself with reason than with anger. I appeared to be more afflicted
+than irritated, and I am sure my grief touched his heart more than
+bitter reproaches which might have alarmed him. He went away very much
+dissatisfied; and just see what the heart is: at first, I was afraid I
+had driven him away forever, I was tempted to reproach myself for my
+cruelty, but, upon reflection, I felt reassured. Has severity ever
+produced inconstancy?"
+
+To go on: We talked until we were out of breath, and everything the
+Countess told me gave me to understand that she had made up her mind.
+It will be in vain for you to cry out against her injustice, consider
+her as odd and inhuman, she will not accept any of the sweetness of
+love unless it costs her pride nothing, and I observe that she is
+following that resolution with more firmness than I imagined her
+capable of. The loss of your heart would undoubtedly be a misfortune
+for which she could never be consoled. But, on the other hand, the
+conditions you place upon your perseverance appear too hard to be
+accepted; she is willing to compromise with you. She hopes to be able
+to hold you without betraying her duty, a project worthy of her
+courage, and I hope it will succeed better than the plan she had
+formed to guarantee her heart against love. Let us await the outcome.
+
+Shall we see you to-morrow at Madame la Presidente's? If you should
+desire to have an occasion to speak to her, I do not doubt that you
+will make your peace.
+
+
+
+
+XLIII
+
+Women Demand Respect
+
+
+I should never have expected it, Marquis. What! My zeal in your behalf
+has drawn your reproaches down upon me? I share with the Countess the
+bad humor her severity has caused! you. Do you know? If what you say
+were well founded, nothing could be more piquant for me than the
+ironical tone in which you laud my principles. But to render me
+responsible for your success, as you attempt, have you dared think for
+an instant that my object in writing you, was ever for the purpose of
+giving you lessons in seduction? Do you not perceive any difference in
+teaching you to please, and exciting you toward seduction? I have told
+you the motives which incline women to love, it is true, but have I
+ever said that they were easier to vanquish? Have I ever told you to
+attack them by sensuality, and that in attacking them to suppose them
+without delicacy? I do not believe it.
+
+When your inexperience and your timidity might cause you to play the
+role of a ridiculous personage among women, I explained the harm these
+defects might cause you in the world. I advised you to have more
+confidence, in order to lead you insensibly in the direction of that
+noble and respectful boldness you should have when with women. But as
+soon as I saw that your pretensions were going too far, and that they
+might wound the reputation of the Countess, I did not dissimulate, I
+took sides against you, and nothing was more reasonable, I had become
+her friend. You see, then, how unjust you are in my regard, and you
+are no less so in regard to her. You treat her as if she were an
+equivocal character. According to your idea, she has neither decided
+for nor against gallantry, and what you clearly see in her conduct is,
+that she is a more logical coquette than other women. What an opinion!
+
+But there is much to pardon in your situation. However, a man without
+prejudice, would see in the Countess only a lover as reasonable as she
+is tender; a woman who, without having an ostentatious virtue,
+nevertheless remains constantly attached to it; a woman, in a word,
+who seeks in good faith the proper means of reconciling love and duty.
+The difficulty in allying these two contraries is not slight, and it
+is the source of the inequalities that wound you. Figure to yourself
+the combats she must sustain, the revolutions she suffers, her
+embarrassment in endeavoring to preserve a lover whom too uniform a
+resistance might repel. If she were sure of keeping you by resisting
+your advances; but you carry your odd conduct to the extent of leaving
+her when her resistance is too prolonged. While praising our virtue,
+you abandon us, and then, what shame for us! But since in both cases
+it is not certain that her lover will be held, it is preferable to
+accept the inconvenient rather than cause you to lose her heart and
+her esteem.
+
+That is our advice, for the Countess and I think precisely alike on
+the subject. Be more equitable, Marquis; complain of her rather than
+criticise her. If her character were more decided, perhaps you would
+be better satisfied with her; but, even in that case would you be
+satisfied very long? I doubt it.
+
+Adieu. We count on seeing you this evening at Madame de La Fayette's,
+and that you will prove more reasonable. The Abbé Gedoyn will be
+presented me. The assembly will be brilliant, but you will doubtless
+be bored, for you will not see the only object that can attract you,
+and you will say of my apartment, what Malherbe so well says of the
+garden of the Louvre:
+
+"Mais quoi que vous ayez, vous n'avez point Caliste,
+Et moi je ne vois rien, quand je ne la vois pas."
+
+(Whatever you may have Caliste you have not got,
+And I, I can see nothing when I see her not.)
+
+
+
+
+XLIV
+
+Why Love Grows Weak--Marshal de Saint-Evremond's Opinion
+
+
+A calm has succeeded the storm, Marquis, and I see by your letter that
+you are more satisfied with the Countess and with yourself. How
+powerful logic is coming from the mouth of a woman we adore! You see
+how the conduct of our friend has produced an opposite effect from
+that of the Marquise; the severity of the former increasing your
+esteem and love for her and the kindness of the Marquise making an
+unfaithful lover out of the Chevalier. So it generally happens among
+men, ingratitude is commonly the price of benefits. This misfortune,
+however, is not always beyond the reach of remedies, and in this
+connection I wish to give you the contents of a letter I received from
+Monsieur de Saint-Evremond a few days ago. You are not ignorant of the
+intimate relations that have always existed between us.
+
+The young Count de ---- had just espoused Mademoiselle ----, of whom
+he was passionately amorous. He complained one day to me that hymen
+and the possession of the beloved object weakened every day, and often
+destroyed the most tender love. We discussed the subject for a long
+time, and as I happened to write to Saint-Evremond that day, I
+submitted the question to him. This is his reply:
+
+
+SAINT-EVREMOND TO MADEMOISELLE DE L'ENCLOS.
+
+My opinion is exactly in line with yours, Mademoiselle; it is not
+always, as some think, hymen or the possession of the loved object
+which, of itself, destroys love, the true source of the
+dissatisfaction that follows love is in the unintelligent manner of
+economizing the sentiments, a possession too easy, complete, and
+prolonged.
+
+When we have yielded to the transports of a passion without reserve,
+the tremendous shock to the soul can not fail quickly to leave it in a
+profound solitude. The heart finds itself in a void which alarms and
+chills it. We vainly seek outside of ourselves, the cause of the calm
+which follows our fits of passion; we do not perceive that an equal
+and more enduring happiness would have been the fruit of moderation.
+Make an exact analysis of what takes place within you when you desire
+anything. You will find that your desires are nothing but curiosity,
+and this curiosity, which is one of the forces of the heart,
+satisfied, our desires vanish. Whoever, therefore, would hold a spouse
+or a lover, should leave him something to be desired, something new
+should be expected every day for the morrow. Diversify his pleasures,
+procure for him the charm of variety in the same object, and I will
+vouch for his perseverance in fidelity.
+
+I confess, however, that hymen, or what you call your "defeat," is, in
+an ordinary woman, the grave of love. But then it is less upon the
+lover that the blame falls, than upon her who complains of the cooling
+of the passion; she casts upon the depravity of the heart what is due
+to her own unskillfulness, and her lack of economy. She has expended
+in a single day everything that might keep alive the inclination she
+had excited. She has nothing more to offer to the curiosity of her
+lover, she becomes always the same statue; no variety to be hoped for,
+and her lover knows it well.
+
+But in the woman I have in mind, it is the aurora of a lovelier day;
+it is the beginning of the most satisfying pleasures. I understand by
+effusions of the heart, those mutual confidences; those ingenuities,
+those unexpected avowals, and those transports which excite in us the
+certainty of creating an absolute happiness, and meriting all the
+esteem of the person we love. That day is, in a word, the epoch when a
+man of refinement discovers inexhaustible treasures which have always
+been hidden from him; the freedom a woman acquires who brings into
+play all the sentiments which constraint has held in reserve; her
+heart takes a lofty flight, but one well under control. Time, far from
+leading to loathing, will furnish new reasons for a greater love.
+
+But, to repeat; I assume sufficient intelligence in her to be able to
+control her inclination. For to hold a lover, it is not enough
+(perhaps it is too much) to love passionately, she must love with
+prudence, with restraint, and modesty is for that reason the most
+ingenious virtue refined persons have ever imagined. To yield to the
+impetuosity of an inclination; to be annihilated, so to speak, in the
+object loved, is the method of a woman without discernment. That is
+not love, it is a liking for a moment, it is to transform a lover into
+a spoiled child. I would have a woman behave with more reserve and
+economy. An excess of ardor is not justifiable in my opinion, the
+heart being always an impetuous charger which must be steadily curbed.
+If you do not use your strength with economy, your vivacity will be
+nothing but a passing transport. The same indifference you perceive in
+a lover, after those convulsive emotions, you, yourself, will
+experience, and soon, both of you will feel the necessity of
+separating.
+
+To sum up; there is more intelligence required to love than is
+generally supposed, and to be happy in loving. Up to the moment of the
+fatal "yes," or if you prefer, up to the time of her defeat, a woman
+does not need artifice to hold her lover. Curiosity excites him,
+desire sustains him, hope encourages him. But once he reaches the
+summit of his desires, it is for the woman to take as much care to
+retain him, as he exhibited in overcoming her; the desire to keep him
+should render her fertile in expedients; the heart is similar to a
+high position, easier to obtain than to keep. Charms are sufficient to
+make a man amorous; to render him constant, something more is
+necessary; skill is required, a little management, a great deal of
+intelligence, and even a touch of ill humor and fickleness.
+Unfortunately, however, as soon as women have yielded they become too
+tender, too complaisant. It would be better for the common good, if
+they were to resist less in the beginning and more afterward. I
+maintain that they never can forestall loathing without leaving the
+heart something to wish for, and the time to consider.
+
+I hear them continually complaining that our indifference is always
+the fruit of their complaisance for us. They are ever recalling the
+time when, goaded by love and sentiment, we spent whole days by their
+side. How blind they are! They do not perceive that it is still in
+their power to bring us back to an allegiance, the memory of which is
+so dear. If they forget what they have already done for us, they will
+not be tempted to do more; but if they make us forget, then we shall
+become more exacting. Let them awaken our hearts by opposing new
+difficulties, arousing our anxieties, in fine, forcing us to desire
+new proofs of an inclination, the certainty of which diminishes its
+value in our estimation. They will then find less cause of complaint
+in us, and will be better satisfied with themselves.
+
+Shall I frankly avow it? Things would indeed change, if women would
+remember at the right time that their role is always that of the party
+to be entreated, ours that of him who begs for new favors; that,
+created to grant, they should never offer. Reserved, even in an
+excess of passion, they should guard against surrendering at
+discretion; the lover should always have something to ask, and
+consequently, he would be always submissive so as to obtain it. Favors
+without limit degrade the most seductive charms, and are, in the end,
+revolting even to him who exacts them. Society puts all women on the
+same level; the handsome and the ugly, after their defeat, are
+indistinguishable except from their art to maintain their authority;
+but what commonly happens? A woman imagines she has nothing further to
+do than to be affectionate, caressing, sweet, of even temper and
+faithful. She is right in one sense, for these qualities should be the
+foundation of her character; they will not fail to draw esteem; but
+these qualities, however estimable they may be, if they are not offset
+by a shade of contrariety, will not fail to extinguish love, and bring
+on languor and weariness, mortal poisons for the best constituted
+heart.
+
+Do you know why lovers become nauseated so easily when enjoying
+prosperity? Why they are so little pleased after having had so much
+pleasure? It is because both parties interested have an identically
+erroneous opinion. One imagines there is nothing more to obtain, the
+other fancies she has nothing more to give. It follows as a necessary
+consequence that one slackens in his pursuit, and the other neglects
+to be worthy of further advances, or thinks she becomes so by the
+practice of solid qualities. Reason is substituted for love, and
+henceforward, no more seasoning in their relations; no more of those
+trifling quarrels so necessary to prevent dissatisfaction by
+forestalling it.
+
+But when I exact that evenness of temper should be animated by
+occasional storms, do not be under the impression that I pretend
+lovers should always be quarreling to preserve their happiness. I only
+desire to impress it upon you, that all their misunderstandings should
+emanate from love itself; that the woman should not forget (by a
+species of pusillanimous kindness) the respect and attentions due her;
+that by an excessive sensitiveness, she does not convert her love into
+a source of anxiety capable of poisoning every moment of her
+existence; that by a scrupulous fidelity, she may not render her lover
+too sure that he has nothing to fear on that score.
+
+Neither should a woman by a sweetness, an unalterable evenness of
+temper, be weak enough to pardon everything lacking in her lover.
+Experience demonstrates that women too often sacrifice the hearts of
+their spouses or their lovers by too many indulgences and facilities.
+What recklessness! They martyrize themselves by sacrificing
+everything; they spoil them and convert them into ungrateful lovers.
+So much generosity finally turns against themselves, and they soon
+become accustomed to demand as a right what is granted them as a
+favor.
+
+You see women every day (even among those we despise with so much
+reason), who reign with a scepter of iron, treat as slaves men who are
+attached to them, debase them by force of controlling them. Well,
+these are the women who are loved longer than the others. I am
+persuaded that a woman of refinement, well brought up, would never
+think of following such an example. That military manner is repugnant
+to gentleness and morals, and lacks that decency which constitutes the
+charm in things even remote from virtue. But let the reasonable woman
+soften the clouds a trifle, there will always remain precisely what is
+necessary to hold a lover.
+
+We are slaves, whom too much kindness often renders insolent; we often
+demand to be treated like those of the new world. But we have in the
+bottom of our hearts a comprehension of justice, which tells us that
+the governing hand bears down upon us sometimes for very good reasons,
+and we take kindly to it.
+
+Now, for my last word: In everything relating to the force and energy
+of love, women should be the sovereigns; it is from them we hope for
+happiness, and they will never fail to grant us that as soon as they
+can govern our hearts with intelligence, moderate their own
+inclinations, and maintain their own authority, without compromising
+it and without abusing it.
+
+
+
+
+XLV
+
+What Favors Men Consider Faults
+
+
+To explain in two words to your satisfaction, Marquis. This is what I
+think of the letter I sent you yesterday: For a woman to profit by the
+advice of Monsieur de Saint-Evremond it is requisite that she should
+be affected with only a mediocre fancy, and have excited the passion
+of love. However, we shall talk about that more at large whenever it
+may please you, now, I will take up what concerns you.
+
+The sacrifice the Countess has exacted of you is well worth the price
+you put upon it. To renounce for her sake, a woman whose exterior
+proclaimed her readiness to accord you whatever favor you might be
+willing to ask; to renounce her publicly, in the presence of her
+rival, and with so little regard for her vanity, is an effort which
+naturally will not pass without a proportionate recompense. The
+Countess could not have found a happier pretext for giving you her
+portrait.
+
+But to take a solemn day when the Marquise received at her home for
+the first time since her illness; to select a moment when the moneyed
+woman was taking up arms to make an assault of beauty upon a woman of
+rank; to speak to her merely in passing, to pretend to surrender
+yourself entirely to the pleasure of seeing her rival; to entertain
+the latter and become one of her party, is an outrage for which you
+will never be pardoned. Revenge will come quickly, and be as cruel as
+possible, you will see. It is I who guarantee it. Now for the second
+paragraph of your letter:
+
+You ask me whether the last favor, or rather the last fault we can
+commit, is a certain proof that a woman loves you. Yes and no.
+
+Yes, if you love the woman for whom you had your first passion, and
+she is refined and virtuous. But even in such a case, this proof will
+not be any more certain, or more flattering for you, than all the
+others she may have given you of her inclination. Whatever a woman may
+do when she loves, even things of the slightest essential nature in
+appearance are as much certain marks of her passion, as those greater
+things of which men are so proud. I will even add, that if this
+virtuous woman is of a certain disposition, the last favor will prove
+less than a thousand other small sacrifices you count for nothing, for
+then, on her own behalf less than on yours, she is too much interested
+in listening to you, for you to claim the glory of having persuaded
+her, although every one else would have been accorded the same favor.
+
+I know a woman who permitted herself to be vanquished two or three
+times by men she did not love, and the man she really loved never
+obtained a single favor. It may happen, then, that the last favor
+proves nothing to him to whom it is granted. Whereas, on the contrary,
+it may happen that he owes the granting of it to the little regard
+had for him. Women never respect themselves more than with those they
+esteem, and you may be quite sure that it requires a very imperious
+inclination to cause a reasonable woman to forget herself in the
+presence of one whose disdain she dreads. Your pretended triumph,
+therefore, may originate in causes which, so far from being glorious
+for you, would humiliate you if you were aware of them.
+
+We see, for example, a lover who may be repelled; the woman who loves
+him fears he will escape her to pay his addresses to another woman
+more accommodating; she does not wish to lose him, for it is always
+humiliating to be abandoned; she yields, because she is not aware of
+any other means of holding him. They say there is nothing to reproach
+in this. If he leaves her after that, at least he will be put in the
+wrong, for, since a woman becomes attached more by the favors she
+grants, she imagines the man will be forced into gratitude. What
+folly!
+
+Women are actuated by different motives in yielding. Curiosity impels
+some, they desire to know what love is. Another woman, with few
+advantages of person or figure, would hold her lover by the
+attractions of pleasure. One woman is determined to make a conquest
+flattering to her vanity. Still another one surrenders to pity,
+opportunity, importunities, to the pleasure of taking revenge on a
+rival, or an unfaithful lover. How can I enumerate them all? The heart
+is so very strange in its vagaries, and the reasons and causes which
+actuate it are so curious and varied, that it is impossible to
+discover all the hidden springs that set it in motion. But if we
+delude ourselves as to the means of holding you, how often do men
+deceive themselves as to the proofs of our love? If they possessed any
+delicacy of discernment, they would find a thousand signs that prove
+more than the most signal favor granted.
+
+Tell me, Marquis, what have I done to Monsieur de Coulanges? It is a
+month since he has set foot in my house. But I will not reproach him,
+I shall be very pleasant with him when he does come. He is one of the
+most amiable men I am acquainted with. I shall be very angry with you
+if you fail to bring him to me on my return from Versailles. I want
+him to sing me the last couplets he has composed, I am told they are
+charming.
+
+
+
+
+XLVI
+
+Why Inconstancy Is Not Injustice
+
+
+It was too kind of you, Marquis, to have noticed my absence. If I did
+not write you during my sojourn in the country, it was because I knew
+you were happy, and that tranquilized me. I felt too, that it was
+necessary for love to be accorded some rights, as its reign is usually
+very short, and besides that, friendship not having any quarrel with
+love, I waited patiently an interval in your pleasure which would
+enable you to read my letters.
+
+Do you know what I was doing while away? I amused myself by piecing
+out all the events liable to happen in the condition your society is
+now in. I foresaw the bickerings between the Countess and her rival,
+and I predicted they would end in an open rupture; I also guessed that
+the Marquise would not espouse the cause of the Countess, but would
+take up the other's quarrel. The moneyed woman is not quite so
+handsome as her rival, a decisive reason for declaring for her and
+backing her up without danger.
+
+What will be the upshot of all this quarreling among these women? How
+many revolutions, Good Heavens! in so short a time! Your happiness
+seems to be the only thing that has escaped. You discover new reasons
+every day for loving and esteeming this amiable Countess. You believe
+that a woman of so much real merit, and with so interesting a figure,
+will become known more and more. Let nothing weaken the esteem you
+have always had for her. You have, it is true, obtained an avowal of
+her love for you, but is she less estimable for that? On the contrary,
+ought not her heart to augment in price in your eyes, in proportion to
+the certainty you have acquired that you are its sole possessor? Even
+if you shall have obtained proofs of her inclination we spoke about
+recently, do you think that gives you any right to underrate her?
+
+I can not avoid saying it; men like you arouse my indignation every
+time they imagine they claim the right to lack in courtesy for my sex,
+and punish us for our weaknesses. Is it not the height of injustice
+and the depth of depravity to continue to insult the grief which is
+the cause of their changes? Can not women be inconstant without being
+unjust? Is their distaste always to be followed by some injurious act?
+If we are guilty, is it the right of him who has profited by our
+faults, who is the cause of them, to punish us?
+
+Always maintain for the Countess the sentiments you have expressed in
+her regard. Do not permit a false opinion to interfere with the
+progress which they can still make in your heart. It is not our defeat
+alone which should render us despicable in your eyes. The manner in
+which we have been defended, delivered, and guarded, ought to be the
+only measure of your disdain.
+
+So Madame de La Fayette is of the opinion that my last letter is based
+upon rather a liberal foundation? You see where your indiscretions
+lead me. But she does not consider that I am no more guilty than a
+demonstrator of anatomy. I analyse the metaphysical man as he dissects
+the physical one. Do you believe that out of regard to scruples he
+should omit in his operations those portions of his subject which
+might offer corrupted minds occasions to draw sallies out of an ill
+regulated imagination? It is not the essence of things that causes
+indecency; it is not the words, or even the ideas, it is the intent of
+him who utters them, and the depravity of him who listens. Madame de
+La Fayette was certainly the last woman in the world whom I would have
+suspected of reproaching me in that manner, and to-morrow, at the
+Countess', I will make her confess her injustice.
+
+
+
+
+XLVII
+
+Cause of Quarrels Among Rivals
+
+
+What, I, Marquis, astonished at the new bickerings of your moneyed
+woman? Do not doubt for an instant that she employs all the
+refinements of coquetry to take you away from the Countess. She may
+have a liking for you, but moderate your amour propre so far as that
+is concerned, for the most powerful motive of her conduct, is, without
+contradiction, the desire for revenge. Her vanity is interested in
+punishing her rival for having obtained the preference.
+
+Women never pardon such a thing as that, and if he who becomes the
+subject of the quarrel is not the first object of their anger, it is
+because they need him to display their resentment. You have
+encountered in the rival of the Countess precisely what you exacted
+from her to strengthen your attachment. You are offered in advance the
+price of the attentions you devote to her, and from which you will
+soon be dispensed, and I think you will have so little delicacy as to
+accept them. It is written across the heart of every man: "To the
+easiest."
+
+You should blush to deserve the least reproach from the Countess. What
+sort of a woman is it you seem to prefer to her? A woman without
+delicacy and without love; a woman who is guided only by the
+attractions of pleasure; more vain than sensible; more voluptuous than
+tender; more passionate than affectionate, she seeks, she cherishes in
+you nothing but your youth and all the advantages that accompany it.
+
+You know what her rival is worth; you know all your wrong doing with
+her; you agree that you are a monster of ingratitude, yet, you are
+unwilling to take it upon yourself to merit her pardon. Truly,
+Marquis, I do not understand you. I am beginning to believe that
+Madame de Sévigné was right when she said that her son knew his duty
+very well, and could reason like a philosopher on the subject, but
+that he was carried away by his passions, so that "he is not a head
+fool, but a heart fool" (ce n'est pas par la tête qu'il est fou, mais
+par le coeur).
+
+You recall in vain what I said to you long ago about making love in a
+free and easy manner. You will remember that I was then enjoying
+myself with some jocular reflections which were not intended to be
+formal advice. Do not forget, either, that the question then was about
+a mere passing fancy, and not of an ordinary mistress. But the case
+to-day is very different, you can not find among all the women of
+Paris, a single one who can be compared with her you are so cruelly
+abandoning. And for what reason? Because her resistance wounds your
+vanity. What resource is left us to hold you?
+
+I agree with you, nevertheless, that when a passion is extinguished it
+can not be relighted without difficulty. No one is more the master of
+loving than he is of not loving. I feel the truth of all these maxims;
+I do homage to them with regret, as soon as, with a knowledge of the
+cause, I consider that you reject what is excellent and accept the
+worse; you renounce a solid happiness, durable pleasures, and yield to
+depraved tastes and pure caprices; but I can see that all my
+reflections will not reform you. I am beginning to fear that I am
+wearying you with morals, and to tell you the truth, it is very
+ridiculous in me to preach constancy when it is certain that you do
+not love, and that you are a heart fool.
+
+I therefore abandon you to your destiny, without, however, giving up
+my desire to follow you into new follies. Why: should I be afflicted?
+Would it be of any moment to assume with you the tone of a pedagogue?
+Assuredly not, both of us would lose too much thereby. I should become
+weary and you would not be reformed.
+
+
+
+
+XLVIII
+
+Friendship Must Be Firm
+
+
+I do not conceal it, Marquis, your conduct in regard to the Countess
+had put me out of patience with you, and I was tempted to break off
+all my relations with so wicked a man as you. My good nature in
+yielding to your entreaties inclines me to the belief that my
+friendship for you borders on a weakness. You are right, though. To be
+your friend only so long as you follow my advice would not be true
+friendship. The more you are to be censured the stronger ought to be
+my hold on you, but you will understand that one is not master of his
+first thoughts. Whatever effort I may make to find you less guilty,
+the sympathy I have for the misfortune of my friend is of still
+greater importance to me. There were moments when I could not believe
+in your innocence, and they were when so charming a woman complained
+of you. Now that her situation is improving every day, I consider my
+harshness in my last letter almost as a crime.
+
+I shall, hereafter, content myself with pitying her without
+importuning you any longer about her. So let us resume our ordinary
+gait, if it please you. You need no longer fear my reproaches, I see
+they would be useless as well as out of place.
+
+
+
+
+XLIX
+
+Constancy Is a Virtue Among the Narrow Minded
+
+
+You did not then know, Marquis, that it is often more difficult to get
+rid of a mistress than to acquire one? You are learning by experience.
+Your disgust for the moneyed woman does not surprise me except that it
+did not happen sooner.
+
+What! knowing her character so well, you could imagine that the
+despair she pretended at the sight of your indifference increasing
+every day, could be the effect of a veritable passion? You could also
+be the dupe of her management! I admire, and I pity your blindness.
+
+But was it not also vanity which aided a trifle in fortifying your
+illusion? In truth it would be a strange sort of vanity, that of being
+loved by such a woman; but men are so vain, that they are flattered by
+the love of the most confirmed courtesan. In any case undeceive
+yourself. A woman who is deserted, when she is a woman like your
+beauty, has nothing in view in her sorrow but her own interest. She
+endeavors by her tears and her despair, to persuade you that your
+person and your merit are all she regrets; that the loss of your heart
+is the summit of misfortune; that she knows nobody who can indemnify
+her for the loss of it. All these sentiments are false. It is not an
+afflicted lover who speaks; it is a vain woman, desperate at being
+anticipated, exasperated at the lack of power in her charms, worrying
+over a plan to replace you promptly, anxious to give herself an
+appearance of sensibility, and to appear worthy of a better fate. She
+justifies this thought of Monsieur de la Rochefoucauld: "Women do not
+shed tears over the lovers they have had, so much because they loved
+them, as to appear more worthy of being loved." It is for D---- to
+enjoy the sentiment.
+
+She must indeed, have a very singular idea of you to hope that she can
+impose upon you. Do you wish to know what she is? The Chevalier is
+actually without an affair of the heart on hand, engage him to take
+your place. I have not received two letters from you that do not speak
+of the facility with which she will be consoled for having lost you. A
+woman of her age begins to fear that she will not recover what she has
+lost, and so she is obliged to degrade her charms by taking the first
+new comer. Perhaps her sorrow is true, but she deceives you as to the
+motives she gives for it. Break these chains without scruple. In
+priding yourself on your constancy and delicacy for such an object,
+you appear to me to be as ridiculous as you were when you lacked the
+same qualities on another occasion.
+
+Do you remember, Marquis, what Monsieur de Coulanges said to us one
+day? "Constancy is the virtue of people of limited merit. Have they
+profited by the caprice of an amiable woman to establish themselves in
+her heart? the sentiment of medicrioty fixes them there, it
+intimidates them, they dare not make an effort to please others. Too
+happy at having surprised her heart, they are afraid of abandoning a
+good which they may not find elsewhere, and, as an instant's attention
+to their little worth might undeceive this woman, what do they then
+do? They elevate constancy up among the virtues; they transform love
+into a superstition; they know how to interest reason in the
+preservation of a heart which they owe only to caprice, occasion, or
+surprise." Be on your guard against imitating these shallow
+personages. Hearts are the money of gallantry; amiable people are the
+assets of society, whose destiny is to circulate in it and make many
+happy. A constant man is therefore as guilty as a miser who impedes
+the circulation in commerce. He possesses a treasure which he does not
+utilize, and of which there are so many who would make good use of it.
+
+What sort of a mistress is that who is retained by force of reason?
+What languor reigns in her society, what violence must one not employ
+to say there is love when it has ceased to exist? It is seldom that
+passion ceases in both parties at the same time, and then constancy is
+a veritable tyrant; I compare it to the tyrant of antiquity who put
+people to death by tying them to dead bodies. Constancy condemns us to
+the same punishment. Discard such a baleful precedent to the liberty
+of association.
+
+Believe me, follow your tastes, for the court lady you mentioned; she
+may weary you at times, it is true, but at least she will not degrade
+you. If, as you say, she is as little intelligent as she is beautiful,
+her reign will soon be over. Your place in her heart will soon be
+vacant, and I do not doubt that another or even several other
+gallantries will follow yours. Perhaps you will not wait for the end,
+for I see by your letter that you are becoming a man of fashion. The
+new system you have adopted makes it certain, nothing can be better
+arranged. Never finish one affair without having commenced another;
+never withdraw from the first except in proportion as the second one
+progresses. Nothing can be better, but in spite of such wise
+precautions, you may find yourself destitute of any, as, for example,
+some event beyond the reach of human foresight may interfere with
+these arrangements, may have for principle always to finish with all
+the mistresses at once, before enabling you to find any one to keep
+you busy during the interregnum. I feel free to confess, Marquis, that
+such an arrangement is as prudent as can be imagined, and I do not
+doubt that you will be well pleased with a plan so wisely conceived.
+Adieu.
+
+I do not know where I obtain the courage to write you such long and
+foolish letters. I find a secret charm in entertaining you, which I
+should suspect if I did not know my heart so well. I have been
+reflecting that it is now without any affair, and I must henceforth be
+on my guard against you, for you have very often thought proper to say
+very tender things to me, and I might think proper to believe in their
+sincerity.
+
+
+
+
+L
+
+Some Women Are Very Cunning
+
+
+You may derive as much amusement out of it as you wish, Marquis, but I
+shall continue to tell you that you are not fascinated by Madame la
+Presidente. Believe me when I say that I see more clearly into your
+affairs than you do yourself. I have known a hundred good men who,
+like you, pretended with the best faith in the world that they were
+amorous, but who, in truth were not in any manner whatsoever.
+
+There are maladies of the heart as well as maladies of the body; some
+are real and some are imaginary. Not everything that attracts you
+toward a woman is love. The habit of being together, the convenience
+of seeing each other, to get away from one's self, the necessity for a
+little gallantry, the desire to please, in a word, a thousand other
+reasons which do not resemble a passion in the least; these are what
+you generally take to be love, and the women are the first to fortify
+this error. Always flattered by the homage rendered them, provided
+their vanity profits by it, they rarely inquire into the motives to
+which they owe it. But, after all, are they not right? They would
+nearly always lose by it.
+
+To all the motives of which I have just spoken, you can add still
+another, quite as capable of creating an illusion in the nature of
+your sentiments. Madame la Presidente is, without contradiction, the
+most beautiful woman of our time; she is newly married; she refused
+the homage of the most amiable man of our acquaintance. Perhaps
+nothing could be more flattering to your vanity than to make a
+conquest which would not fail to give you the kind of celebrity to
+which you aspire. That, my dear Marquis, is what you call love, and it
+will be difficult for you to disabuse yourself of the impression, for
+by force of persuading yourself that it is love, you will, in a short
+time firmly believe that the inclination is real. It will be a very
+singular thing some day, to see with what dignity you will speak of
+your pretended sentiments; with what good faith you will believe that
+they deserve recognition, and, what will be still more agreeable, will
+be the deference you will believe should be their due. But
+unfortunately, the result will undeceive you, and you will then be the
+first to laugh at the importance with which you treated so silly an
+affair.
+
+Shall I tell you how far injustice reaches? I am fully persuaded that
+you will not become more amorous. Henceforth, you will have nothing
+but a passing taste, frivolous relations, engagements, caprices; all
+the arrows of love will glance from you. It is true you will not
+experience its pangs, but will you enjoy, in the least, its sweetness?
+Can you hope ever to recover from the fantasies to which you surrender
+yourself, those moments of delight which were formerly your supreme
+felicity? I have no desire to flatter you, but I believe it my duty to
+do you this much justice: Your heart is intended for refined
+pleasures. It is not I who hold you responsible for the dissipation in
+which you are plunged, it is the young fools around you. They call
+enjoyment the abuse they make of pleasure; their example carries you
+away. But this intoxication will be dissipated sooner or later, and
+you will soon, see, at least I hope so, that you have been deceived in
+two ways in the state of your heart. You thought it was fascinated by
+Madame la Presidente, you will recognize your mistake; you thought she
+had ceased to have an inclination for--but I hold to the words I have
+uttered. Perhaps there will come a time when I shall be at liberty to
+express my thoughts more freely. Now, I reply to the remainder of your
+letter.
+
+Confess it, Marquis, that you had little else to do this morning when
+you re-read my letters. I add that you must have been in a bad humor
+to undertake their criticism. Some brilliant engagement, some
+flattering rendezvous was wanting. But I do not care to elude the
+difficulty. So I seem to contradict myself sometimes? If I were to
+admit that it might very well be; if I were to give you the same
+answer that Monsieur de la Bruyère gave his critics the other day: "It
+is not I who contradict myself, it is the heart upon which I reason,"
+could you reasonably conclude from it that everything I have said to
+you is false? I do not believe it.
+
+But how do I know, in effect, if, led away by the various situations
+in which you were placed, I may not have appeared to destroy what I
+had advanced on different occasions? How do I know, if, seeing you
+ready to yield to a whim, I may not have carried too far, truths,
+which, feebly uttered, would not, perhaps, have brought you back? How
+do I know, in a word, if, being interested in the happiness of a
+friend, the desire to serve her may not have sometimes diminished my
+sincerity? I think I am very good natured to reply seriously to the
+worries you have caused me. Ought I not first to take cognizance of
+the fact that there is more malice in your letter than criticism? This
+will be the last time you will have an opportunity to abuse my
+simplicity. I am going to console myself for your perfidy with some
+one who is assuredly not so wicked as you.
+
+What a pity it is that you are not a woman! It would give me so much
+pleasure to discuss the new coiffures with you! I never saw anything
+so extravagant as their height. At least, Marquis, remember that if
+Madame la Presidente does not wear one of them incessantly, you can no
+longer remain attached to her with decency.
+
+
+
+
+LI
+
+The Parts Men and Women Play
+
+
+So the affair has been decided! Whatever I may say of it, you are the
+master of Madame la Presidente; a beloved rival has been sacrificed
+for you and you triumph.
+
+How prompt your vanity is to make profit out of everything. I would
+laugh heartily if your pretended triumph should end by your receiving
+notice to quit some fine morning. For it may well be that this
+sacrifice of which you boast so much is nothing but a stratagem.
+
+Ever since you have been associated with women, have you not
+established as a principle that you must be on your guard against the
+sentiments they affect? If your beauty had accepted you merely for the
+purpose of re-awakening a languishing love in the heart of her
+Celadon; if you were only the instrument of jealousy on the part of
+one and artifice on the other, would that be a miracle?
+
+You say that Madame la Presidente is not very shrewd, and consequently
+incapable of such a ruse. My dear Marquis, love is a great tutor, and
+the most stupid women (in other respects) have often an acute
+discernment, more accurate and more certain than any other, when it
+comes to an affair of the heart. But let us leave this particular
+thesis, and examine men in general who are in the same situation as
+you.
+
+They all believe as you do, that the sacrifice of a rival supposes
+some superiority over him. But how often does it happen that this same
+sacrifice is only a by play? If it is sincere, the woman either loved
+the rival or she did not. If she loved him, then as soon as she leaves
+him, it is a sure proof that she loves him no longer, in which case
+what glory is there for you in such a preference? If she did not love
+him, what can you infer to your advantage from a pretended victory
+over a man who was indifferent to her?
+
+There is also another case where you may be preferred, without that
+preference being any more flattering. It is when the vanity of the
+woman you attack is stronger than her inclination for the disgraced
+lover. Your rank, your figure, your reputation, your fortune, may
+determine her in your favor. It is very rare (I say it to the shame of
+women, and men are no less ridiculous in that respect), it is rare, I
+repeat, that a lover, who has nothing but noble sentiments to offer,
+can long hold his own against a man distinguished for his rank, or his
+position, who has servants, a livery, an equipage, etc. When the most
+tender lover makes a woman blush for his appearance, when she dare not
+acknowledge him as her conqueror, when she does not even consider him
+as an object she can sacrifice with eclat, I predict that his reign
+will be short. Her reasons for getting rid of him will be to her an
+embarrassment of choice. Thus the defunct of la Presidente was a
+counsellor of state, without doubt as dull and as stiff as his wig.
+What a figure to set up against a courtier, against a warrior like
+you?
+
+Well, will you believe in my predictions another time? What did I tell
+you? Did the Chevalier find it difficult to persuade your Penelope?
+This desolate woman, ready to break her heart, gave you a successor in
+less than fifteen days, loves him, proves it, and is flouted. Is this
+losing too much time? What is your opinion?
+
+
+
+
+LII
+
+Love Is a Traitor With Sharp Claws
+
+
+Yes, indeed, Marquis, it is due to my friendship, it is due to my
+counsel that the Countess owes the tranquillity she begins to enjoy,
+and I can not conceive the chagrin which causes the indifference she
+manifests for you. I am very far, however, from desiring to complain
+of you; your grief springs from a wounded vanity.
+
+Men are very unjust, they expect a woman always to consider them as
+objects interesting to them, while they, in abandoning a woman, do not
+ordinarily omit anything that will express their disdain. Of what
+importance to you is the hatred or love of a person whom you do not
+love? Tell me that. Your jealousy of the little Duke is so
+unreasonable that I burst out laughing when I learned it. Is it not
+quite simple, altogether natural that a woman should console herself
+for your loss, by listening to a man who knows the value of her heart
+better than you? By what right, if you please, do you venture to take
+exceptions to it? You must admit that Madame de Sévigné was right: You
+have a foolish heart, my poor Marquis.
+
+In spite of all that, the part you wish me to play in the matter
+appears to me to be exceedingly agreeable. I can understand how nice
+it would be to aid you in your plan of vengeance against an
+unfaithful woman. Though it should be only through rancor or the
+oddity of the thing, we must love each other. But all such comedies
+turn out badly generally. Love is a traitor who scratches us when we
+play with him.
+
+So, Marquis, keep your heart, I am very scrupulous about interfering
+with so precious an association. Moreover, I am so disgusted with the
+staleness of men, that henceforth I desire them only as friends. There
+is always a bone to pick with a lover. I am beginning to understand
+the value of rest, and I wish to enjoy it. I will return to this,
+however. It would be very strange if you take the notion that you need
+consolation, and that my situation exacts the same succor because the
+Marquis de ---- has departed on his embassy. Undeceive yourself, my
+friends suffice me, and, if you wish to remain among their number, at
+least do not think of saying any more gallant things to me,
+otherwise--Adieu, Marquis.
+
+
+
+
+LIII
+
+Old Age Not a Preventive Against Attack
+
+
+Oh, I shall certainly abandon your interests if you persist in talking
+to me in such fashion. What demon inspired you with the idea of taking
+the place of the absent? Could any one tease another as you did me
+last evening? I do not know how you began it, but however much I
+desired to be angry with you, it was impossible for me to do so. I do
+not know how this will end. What is certain, however, is; it will be
+useless for you to go on, for I have decided not to love you, and what
+is worse, I shall never love you; yes, sir, never.
+
+Eh? truly, but this is a strange thing; to attempt to persuade a woman
+that she is afflicted, that she needs consolation, when she assures
+you that it is not the fact, and that she wants for nothing. This is
+driving things with a tight hand. I entreat you, reflect a little on
+the folly that has seized upon you. Would it be decent, tell me that,
+if I were to take the place of my friend? That a woman who has served
+you as a Mentor, who has played the role of mother to you, should
+aspire to that of lover? Unprincipled wretch that you are! If you so
+promptly abandon a young and lovely woman, what would you do with an
+old girl like me? Perhaps you wish to attempt my conquest to see
+whether love is for me the same in practice as in theory. Do not go to
+the trouble of attempting such a seduction, I will satisfy your
+curiosity on that point immediately.
+
+You know that whatever we are, women seldom follow any given
+principles. Well, that is what you would discover in any gallant
+association you aspire to form with me. All I have said about women
+and love, has not given you any information as to my line of conduct
+on such an occasion. There is a vast difference between feeling and
+thinking; between talking for one's own account and pleading the cause
+of another. You would, therefore, find in me many singularities that
+might strike you unfavorably. I do not feel as other women. You might
+know them all without knowing Ninon, and believe me, the novelties you
+would discover would not compensate you for the trouble you might take
+to please me.
+
+It is useless to exaggerate the value you put upon my conquest, that I
+tell you plainly; you are expending too much on hope, I am not able to
+respond. Remain where you are in a brilliant career. The court offers
+you a thousand beautiful women, with whom you do not risk, as you
+would with me, becoming weary of philosophy, of too much intelligence.
+
+I do not disguise the fact, however, that I would have been glad to
+see you to-day. My head was split all the afternoon over a dispute on
+the ancients and moderns. I am still out of humor on the subject, and
+feel tempted to agree with you that I am not so far along on the
+decline of life as to confine myself to science, and especially to the
+gentlemen of antiquity.
+
+If you could only restrain yourself and pay me fewer compliments it is
+not to be doubted that I would prefer to have you come and enliven my
+serious occupations rather than any one else. But you are such an
+unmanageable man, so wicked, that I am afraid to invite you to come
+and sup with me to-morrow. I am mistaken, for it is now two hours
+after midnight, and I recollect that my letter will not be handed you
+before noon. So it is to-day I shall expect you. Have you any fault to
+find? It is a formal rendezvous, to be sure, but let the fearlessness
+in appointing it be a proof that I am not very much afraid of you, and
+that I shall believe in as much of your soft talk as I deem proper.
+You understand that it will not be I who can be imposed upon by that.
+I know men so well----
+
+
+
+
+LIV
+
+A Shrewd But Not an Unusual Scheme
+
+
+This is not the time, Marquis, to hide from you the true sentiments of
+the Countess in your regard. However much I have been able to keep her
+secret without betraying her friendship, and I have always done so, if
+I conceal from you what I am going to communicate, you may one day
+justly reproach me.
+
+Whatever infidelities you may have been guilty of, whatever care I
+have been able to take to persuade her that you have been entirely
+forgotten, she has never ceased to love you tenderly. Although she has
+sought to punish you by an assumed indifference, she has never thought
+of depriving herself of the pleasure of seeing you, and it has been
+through the complaisance of the Countess that I have sometimes worried
+you; it was to goad you into visiting me more frequently. But all
+these schemes have not been able to satisfy a heart so deeply wounded,
+and she is on the point of executing a design I have all along been
+opposed to. You will learn all about it by reading the letter she
+wrote me yesterday, and which I inclose in this.
+
+
+
+
+FROM THE COUNTESS TO MADEMOISELLE DE L'ENCLOS.
+
+
+"If you wish to remain my friend, my dear Ninon, cease to combat my
+resolution; you know it is not the inspiration of the moment. It is
+not the fruit of a momentary mortification, an imprudent vexation, nor
+despair. I have never concealed it from you. The possession of the
+heart of the Marquis de Sévigné might have been my supreme felicity if
+I could have flattered myself with having it forever. I was certain of
+losing it if I had granted him the favors he exacted of me. His
+inconstancy has taught me that a different conduct would not be a sure
+means of retaining a lover. I must renounce love forever, since men
+are incapable of having a liaison with a woman, as tender, but as pure
+as that of simple friendship.
+
+"You, yourself, well know that I am not sufficiently cured to see the
+Marquis without always suffering. Flight is the only remedy for my
+malady, and that is what I am about to take. I do not fear, moreover,
+what the world may say about my withdrawal to the country. I have
+cautioned those who might be surprised. It is known that I have won in
+a considerable action against the heirs of my late husband. I have
+given out that I am going to take possession of the estate awarded me.
+I will thus deprive the public of the satisfaction of misinterpreting
+my taste for solitude, and the Marquis of all suspicion that he is in
+any manner to blame for it. I inclose his letters and his portrait.
+
+"Good Heaven! How weak I am! Why should it cost my heart so much to
+get rid of an evil so fatal to my repose? But it is done, and my
+determination can not be shaken. Pity me, however, and remember, my
+dear friend, the promise you gave me to make him understand that I
+have for him the most profound indifference. Whoever breaks off
+relations with a lover in too public a manner, suggests resentment and
+regret at being forced to do so; it is an honest way of saying that
+one would ask nothing better than to be appeased. As I have no desire
+to resume my relations with the Marquis, return him what I send, but
+in the manner agreed upon, and pray him to make a similar restitution.
+You may tell him that the management of my property obliges me to
+leave Paris for a time, but do not speak of me first.
+
+"I should be inconsolable at leaving you, my dear Ninon, if I did not
+hope that you would visit me in my solitude. You write willingly to
+your friends, if you judge them by the tenderness and esteem they have
+for you. In that case, you have none more worthy of that title than I.
+I rely, therefore, upon your letters until you come to share my
+retreat. You know my sentiments for you."
+
+I have no advice to give you, Marquis, on what you have just read, the
+sole favor I expect from you is never to compromise me for the
+indiscretion I commit, and that the Countess shall never have any
+reason for not forgiving me. All I can say to justify myself in my own
+eyes is, that you have loved the Countess too much for her resolution
+to be a matter of absolute indifference to you. Had I been just, I
+would have betrayed both by leaving you in ignorance of her design.
+
+
+
+
+LV
+
+A Happy Ending
+
+
+I am delighted with everything you have done, and you are charming. Do
+not doubt it, your behavior, my entreaties, and better than all, love
+will overcome the resistance of the Countess. Everything should
+conspire to determine her to accept the offer you have made of your
+hand. I could even, from this time on, assure you that pride alone
+will resist our efforts and her own inclination.
+
+This morning I pressed her earnestly to decide in your favor. Her last
+entrenchment was the fear of new infidelities on your part.
+
+"Reassure yourself," said I, "in proof that the Marquis will be
+faithful to you, is the fact that he has been undeceived about the
+other women, by comparing them with her he was leaving. Honest people
+permit themselves only a certain number of caprices, and the Marquis
+has had those which his age and position in society seemed to justify.
+He yielded to them at a time when they were pardonable. He paid
+tribute to the fashion by tasting of all the ridiculous things going.
+Henceforth, he can be reasonable with impunity. A man can not be
+expected to be amorous of his wife, but should he be, it will be
+pardoned him as soon as people see you. You risk nothing, therefore,
+Countess; you yourself have put on the airs of a society woman, but
+you were too sensible not to abandon such a role; you renounced it;
+the Marquis imitates you. Wherefore forget his mistakes. Could you
+bear the reproach of having caused the death of so amiable a man? It
+would be an act that would cry out for vengeance."
+
+In a word, I besought and pressed her, but she is still irresolute.
+Still, I do not doubt that you will finish by overcoming a resistance
+which she, herself, already deems very embarrassing.
+
+Well, Marquis, if the anxiety all this has caused you, gives you the
+time to review what I have been saying to you for several days past,
+might you not be tempted to believe that I have contradicted myself?
+At first I advised you to treat love lightly and to take only so much
+of it as might amuse you. You were to be nothing but a gallant, and
+have no relations with women except those in which you could easily
+break the ties. I then spoke to you in a general way, and relative to
+ordinary women. Could I imagine that you would be so fortunate as to
+meet a woman like the Countess, who would unite the charms of her sex
+to the qualities of honest men? What must be your felicity? You are
+going to possess in one and the same person, the most estimable friend
+and a most charming mistress. Deign to admit me to share a third
+portion of your friendship and my happiness will equal your own. Can
+one be happier than in sharing the happiness of friends?
+
+
+
+
+CORRESPONDENCE
+
+BETWEEN
+
+LORD SAINT-EVREMOND
+
+AND
+
+NINON DE L'ENCLOS
+
+WHEN OVER EIGHTY YEARS
+OF AGE
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTION
+
+
+Charles de Saint Denis, Lord of Saint-Evremond, Marshal of France, was
+one of the few distinguished Frenchmen, exiled by Louis XIV, whose
+distinguished abilities as a warrior and philosopher awarded him a
+last resting place in Westminster Abbey. His tomb, surmounted by a
+marble bust, is situated in the nave near the cloister, located among
+those of Barrow, Chaucer, Spenser, Cowley and other renowned
+Englishmen.
+
+His epitaph, written by the hand of a Briton, is singularly replete
+with the most eminent qualities, which the great men of his period
+recognized in him, though his life was extraordinarily long and
+stormy. He was moreover, a profound admirer of Ninon de l'Enclos
+during his long career, and he did much toward shaping her philosophy,
+and enabling her to understand the human heart in all its
+eccentricities, and how to regulate properly the passion of love.
+
+During his long exile in England, the two corresponded at times, and
+the letters here given are the fragments of a voluminous
+correspondence, the greater part of which has been lost. They are to
+be found in the untranslated collated works of Saint-Evremond, and are
+very curious, inasmuch as they were written when Ninon and
+Saint-Evremond were in their "eighties."
+
+Saint-Evremond always claimed, that his extremely long and vigorous
+life was due to the same causes which Ninon de l'Enclos attributed to
+her great age, that is, to an unflagging zeal in observing the
+doctrines of the Epicurean philosophy. These ideas appear in his
+letter to Mademoiselle de l'Enclos, written to her under the sobriquet
+of "Leontium," and which is translated and appended to this
+correspondence.
+
+As an evidence of Saint-Evremond's unimpaired faculties at a great
+age, the charms of his person attracted the attention of the Duchess
+of Sandwich, one of the beauties of the English Court, and she became
+so enamored of him, that a liaison was the result, which lasted until
+the time of Saint-Evremond's death. They were like two young lovers
+just beginning their career, instead of a youth over eighty years of
+age, and a maiden who had passed forty. Such attachments were not
+uncommon among persons who lived calm, philosophical lives, their very
+manner of living inspiring tender regard, as was the case of the great
+affection of the Marquis de Sévigné, who although quite young, and his
+rank an attraction to the great beauties of the Court, nevertheless
+aspired to capture the heart of Mademoiselle de l'Enclos, who was over
+sixty years of age. What Ninon thought about the matter, appears in
+her letters on the preceding pages.
+
+
+
+
+Correspondence Between Lord Saint-Evremond
+and Ninon de L'Enclos
+When Over Eighty Years
+of Age
+
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+Saint-Evremond to Ninon de l'Enclos
+
+Lovers and Gamblers have Something in Common
+
+
+I have been trying for more than a year to obtain news of you from
+everybody, but nobody can give me any. M. de la Bastille tells me that
+you are in good health, but adds, that if you have no more lovers, you
+are satisfied to have a greater number of friends.
+
+The falsity of the latter piece of news casts a doubt upon the verity
+of the former, because you are born to love as long as you live.
+Lovers and gamblers have something in common: Who has loved will love.
+If I had been told that you had become devout, I might have believed
+it, for that would be to pass from a human passion to the love of God,
+and give occupation to the soul. But not to love, is a species of
+void, which can not be consistent with your heart.
+
+Ce repos languissant ne fut jamais un bien;
+C'est trouver sans mouvoir l'êtat où l'on n'est rien.
+
+('Twas never a good this languishing rest;
+'Tis to find without search a state far from blest.)
+
+I want to know about your health, your occupations, your inclinations,
+and let it be in a long enough letter, with moralizing and plenty of
+affection for your old friend.
+
+The news here is that the Count de Grammont is dead, and it fills me
+with acute sorrow.
+
+If you know Barbin, ask him why he prints so many things that are not
+mine, over my name? I have been guilty of enough folly without
+assuming the burden of others. They have made me the author of a
+diatribe against Père Bouhours, which I never even imagined. There is
+no writer whom I hold in higher esteem. Our language owes more to him
+than to any other author.
+
+God grant that the rumor of Count de Grammont's death be false, and
+that of your health true. The Gazette de Hollande says the Count de
+Lauzun is to be married. If this were true he would have been summoned
+to Paris, besides, de Lauzun is a Duke, and the name "Count" does not
+fit him.
+
+Adieu. I am the truest of your servants, who would gain much if you
+had no more lovers, for I would be the first of your friends despite
+an absence which may be called eternal.
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+
+Ninon de L'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+It is sweet to remember those we have loved
+
+
+I was alone in my chamber, weary of reading, when some one exclaimed:
+"Here is a messenger from Saint-Evremond!" You can imagine how quickly
+my ennui disappeared--it left me in a moment.
+
+I have been speaking of you quite recently, and have learned many
+things which do not appear in your letters--about your perfect health
+and your occupation. The joy in my mind indicates its strength, and
+your letter assures me that England promises you forty years more of
+life, for I believe that it is only in England that they speak of men
+who have passed the fixed period of human life. I had hoped to pass
+the rest of my days with you, and if you had possessed the same
+desire, you would still be in France.
+
+It is, however, pleasant to remember those we have loved, and it is,
+perhaps, for the embellishment of my epitaph, that this bodily
+separation has occurred.
+
+I could have wished that the young ecclesiastic had found me in the
+midst of the glories of Nike, which could not change me, although you
+seem to think that I am more tenderly enchanted with him than
+philosophy permits.
+
+Madame the Duchess de Bouillon is like an eighteen-year old: the
+source of her charms is in the Mazarin blood.
+
+Now that our kings are so friendly, ought you not to pay us a visit?
+In my opinion it would be the greatest success derived from the peace.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+Wrinkles are a Mark of Wisdom
+
+
+I defy Dulcinea to feel with greater joy the remembrance of her
+Chevalier. Your letter was accorded the reception it deserved, and the
+sorrowful figure in it did not diminish the merit of its sentiments. I
+am very much affected by their strength and perseverance. Nurse them
+to the shame of those who presume to judge them. I am of your opinion,
+that wrinkles are a mark of wisdom. I am delighted that your surface
+virtues do not sadden you, I try to use them in the same way. You have
+a friend, a provincial Governor, who owes his fortune to his
+amiability. He is the only aged man who is not ridiculed at Court. M.
+de Turenne wished to live only to see him grow old, and desired to see
+him father of a family, rich and happy. He has told more jokes about
+his new dignity than others think.
+
+M. d'Ebène who gave you the name of "Curictator," has just died at the
+hospital. How trivial are the judgments of men! If M. d'Olonne were
+alive and could have read your letters to me, he would have continued
+to be of your quality with his philosophy. M. de Lauzun is my
+neighbor, and will accept your compliments. I send you very tenderly,
+those of M. de Charleval, and ask you to remember M. de Ruvigny, his
+friend of the Rue des Tournelles.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+Near Hopes are Worth as much as Those Far Off
+
+
+I sent a reply to your last letter to the correspondent of the Abbé
+Dubois, but as he was at Versailles, I fear it has not reached him.
+
+I should have been anxious about your health without the visit of
+Madame de Bouillon's little librarian, who filled my heart with joy by
+showing me a letter from one who thinks of me on your account.
+Whatever reason I may have had during my illness to praise the world
+and my friends, I never felt so lively a joy as at this mark of
+kindness. You may act upon this as you feel inclined since it was you
+who drew it upon me.
+
+I pray you to let me know, yourself, whether you have grasped that
+happiness one enjoys so much at certain times? The source will never
+run dry so long as you shall possess the friendship of the amiable
+friend who invigorates your life. (Lady Sandwich.) How I envy those
+who go to England, and how I long to dine with you once again! What a
+gross desire, that of dinner!
+
+The spirit has great advantages over the body, though the body
+supplies many little repeated pleasures, which solace the soul in its
+sorrowful moods. You have often laughed at my mournful reflections,
+but I have banished them all. It is useless to harbor them in the
+latter days of one's life, and one must be satisfied with the life of
+every day as it comes. Near hopes, whatever you, may say against them,
+are worth as much as those far off, they are more certain. This is
+excellent moralizing. Take good care of your health, it is to that
+everything should tend.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+Ninon de L'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+On the Death of de Charleval
+
+
+Now, M. de Charleval is dead, and I am so much affected that I am
+trying to console myself by thinking of the share you will take in my
+affliction. Up to the time of his death, I saw him every day. His
+spirit possessed all the charms of youth, and his heart all the
+goodness and tenderness so desirable among true friends. We often
+spoke of you and of all the old friends of our time. His life and the
+one I am leading now, had much in common, indeed, a similar loss is
+like dying one's self.
+
+Tell me the news about yourself. I am as much interested in your life
+in London as if you were here, and old friends possess charms which
+are not so well appreciated as when they are separated.
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+The Weariness of Monotony
+
+
+M. de Clerambault gave me pleasure by telling me that I am in your
+thoughts constantly. I am worthy of it on account of the affection I
+maintain for you. We shall certainly deserve the encomiums of
+posterity by the duration of our lives, and by that of your
+friendship. I believe I shall live as long as you, although I am
+sometimes weary of always doing the same things, and I envy the Swiss
+who casts himself into the river for that reason. My friends often
+reprehend me for such a sentiment, and assure me that life is worth
+living as long as one lives in peace and tranquillity with a healthy
+mind. However, the forces of the body lead to other thoughts, and
+those forces are preferred to strength of mind, but everything is
+useless when a change is impossible. It is equally as worth while to
+drive away sad reflections as to indulge in useless ones.
+
+Madame Sandwich has given me a thousand pleasures in making me so
+happy as to please her. I did not dream, in my declining years to be
+agreeable to a woman of her age. She has more spirit than all the
+women of France, and more true merit. She is on the point of leaving
+us, which is regretted by every one who knows her, by myself,
+particularly. Had you been here we should have prepared a banquet
+worthy of old times. Love me always.
+
+Madame de Coulanges accepted the commission to present your kind
+compliments to M. le Comte de Grammont, through Madame de Grammont. He
+is so young that I believe him fickle enough in time to dislike the
+infirm, and that he will love them as soon as they return to good
+health.
+
+Every one who returns from England speaks of the beauty of Madame la
+Duchesse de Mazarin, as they allude to the beauty of Mademoiselle de
+Bellefond, whose sun is rising. You have attached me to Madame de
+Mazarin, and I hear nothing but the good that is said of her.
+
+Adieu, my friend, why is it not "Good day?" We must not die without
+again seeing each other.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+After the Death of La Duchesse de Mazarin
+
+
+What a loss for you, my friend! If it were not for the fact that we,
+ourselves, will be considered a loss, we could not find consolation. I
+sympathize with you with all my heart. You have just lost an amiable
+companion who has been your mainstay in a foreign land. What can be
+done to make good such a misfortune? Those who live long are subject
+to see their friends die, after that, your philosophy, your mind, will
+serve to sustain you.
+
+I feel this death as much as if I had been acquainted with the
+Duchess. She thought of me in her last moments, and her goodness
+affected me more than I can express; what she was to you drew me to
+her. There is no longer a remedy, and there is none for whatever may
+happen our poor bodies, so preserve yours. Your friends love to see
+you so well and so wise, for I hold those to be wise who know how to
+be happy.
+
+I give you a thousand thanks for the tea you sent me, but the lively
+tone of your letter pleased me as much as your present.
+
+You will again see Madame Sandwich, whom we saw depart with regret. I
+could wish that her condition in life might serve to be of some
+consolation to you. I am ignorant of English customs, but she was
+quite French while here.
+
+A thousand adieux, my friend. If one could think as did Madame de
+Chevreuse, who believed when dying that she was going to converse with
+all her friends in the other world! It would be a sweet thought.
+
+
+
+
+VIII
+
+Saint-Evremond to Ninon de l'Enclos
+
+Love Banishes Old Age
+
+
+Your life, my well beloved, has been too illustrious not to be lived
+in the same manner until the end. Do not permit M. de la
+Rochefoucauld's "hell" to frighten you; it was a devised hell he
+desired to construct into a maxim. Pronounce the word "love" boldly,
+and that of "old age" will never pass your lips.
+
+There is so much spirit in your letters, that you do not leave me even
+to imagine a decline of life in you. What ingratitude to be ashamed to
+mention love, to which we owe all our merit, all our pleasures! For,
+my lovely keeper of the casket, the reputation of your probity is
+established particularly upon the fact that you have resisted lovers,
+who would willingly have made free with the money of their friends.
+
+Confess all your passions to make your virtues of greater worth;
+however, you do not expose but the one-half of your character; there
+is nothing better than what regards your friends, nothing more
+unsatisfactory than what you have bestowed upon your lovers.
+
+In a few verses, I will draw your entire character. Here they are,
+giving you the qualities you now have and those you have had:
+
+  Dans vos amours on vous trouvait legère,
+  En amitié toujours sûre et sincère;
+  Pour vos amants, les humeurs de Vénus,
+  Pour vos amis les solides vertus:
+  Quand les premiers vous nommaient infidèle,
+  Et qu'asservis encore à votre loi,
+  Ils reprochaient une flamme nouvelle,
+Les autres se louaient de votre bonne foi.
+  Tantôt c'était le naturel d'Hélène,
+  Ses appétits comme tous ses appas;
+  Tantôt c'était la probité romaine?
+C'était d'honneur la règle et le compas.
+  Dans un couvent en soeur dépositaire,
+  Vous auriez bien ménagé quelque affaire,
+  Et dans le monde à garder les dépôts,
+On vous eût justement préférée aux dévots.
+
+  (In your love affairs you were never severe,
+  But your friendship was always sure and sincere;
+  The humors of Venus for those who desired,
+  For your friends, in your heart, solid virtues conspired;
+When the first, infidelity laid at your door,
+  Though not yet exempt from the law of your will,
+  And every new flame never failed to deplore,
+The others rejoiced that you trusted them still.
+  Ingenuous Helen was sometimes your role,
+  With her appetites, charms, and all else beside;
+  Sometimes Roman probity wielded your soul,
+  In honor becoming your rule and your guide.
+  And though in a convent as guardian nun,
+You might have well managed some sprightly fun,
+  In the world, as a keeper of treasures untold,
+Preferred you would be to a lamb of the fold.)
+
+Here is a little variety, which I trust will not surprise you:
+
+L'indulgente et sage Nature
+A formé l'âme de Ninon
+De la volupté d'Epicure
+Et de la vertu de Caton.
+
+
+
+
+IX
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+Stomachs Demand More Attention than Minds
+
+
+The Abbé Dubois has just handed me your letter, and personally told me
+as much good news about your stomach as about your mind. There are
+times when we give more attention to our stomachs than to our minds,
+and I confess, to my sorrow, that I find you happier in the enjoyment
+of the one than of the other. I have always believed that your mind
+would last as long as yourself, but we are not so sure of the health
+of the body, without which nothing is left but sorrowful reflections.
+I insensibly begin making them on all occasions.
+
+Here is another chapter. It relates to a handsome youth, whose desire
+to see honest people in the different countries of the world, induced
+him to surreptitiously abandon an opulent home. Perhaps you will
+censure his curiosity, but the thing is done. He knows many things,
+but he is ignorant of others, which one of his age should ignore. I
+deemed him worthy of paying you a visit, to make him begin to feel
+that he has not lost his time by journeying to England. Treat him well
+for love of me.
+
+I begged his elder brother, who is my particular friend, to obtain
+news of Madame la Duchesse Mazarin and of Madame Harvey, both of whom
+wished to remember me.
+
+
+
+
+X
+
+Saint-Evremond to Ninon de l'Enclos
+
+Why does Love Diminish After Marriage?
+
+
+Translator's Note.--Two of Ninon's friends whom she idolized, were
+very much surprised to discover after their marriage, that the great
+passion they felt for each other before marriage, became feebler every
+day, and that even their affection was growing colder. It troubled
+them, and in their anxiety, they consulted Mademoiselle de l'Enclos,
+begging her to find some reason in her philosophy, why the possession
+of the object loved should weaken the strength of ante-nuptial
+passion, and even destroy the most ardent affection.
+
+The question was discussed by Ninon and her "Birds" for several days
+without reaching an opinion that was in any manner satisfactory. It
+was therefore resolved to consult Saint-Evremond, who was living in
+exile in England. After writing him all the particulars, and the
+discussions that had been held with opinions pro and con, he sent the
+following letter in reply, which is unanswerable upon the subject.
+Moreover, it contains lessons that should be carefully studied and
+well learned by all loving hearts, who desire to maintain their early
+affection for each other during life.
+
+The letter is a masterpiece of the philosophy of love, and it is
+remarkable, in that it develops traits in human nature upon the
+subject of love and marriage, which are overlooked in questions
+applicable to the relations between the sexes, and that are so often
+strained to the breaking point. Indeed, it gives clues to a remedy
+which can not fail to effect a cure.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+My opinion is exactly in line with yours, Mademoiselle; it is not
+always, as some think, hymen or the possession of the loved object
+which of itself destroys love; the true source of the dissatisfaction
+that follows exists in the unintelligent manner of economizing the
+sentiments, a too complete, too easy, and too prolonged possession.
+
+When we have yielded to the transports of a passion without reserve,
+the tremendous shock to the soul can not fail quickly to leave it in a
+profound solitude. The heart finds itself in a void which alarms and
+chills it. We vainly seek outside of ourselves, the cause of the calm
+which follows our fits of passion; we do not perceive that an equal
+and more enduring happiness would have been the fruit of moderation.
+Make an exact analysis of what takes place within you when you desire
+anything. You will find that your desires are nothing but curiosity,
+and this curiosity, which is one of the forces of the heart,
+satisfied, our desires vanish. Whoever, therefore, would hold a spouse
+or a lover should leave him something to be desired; something new
+should be expected every day for the morrow. Diversify his pleasures,
+procure for him the charm of variety in the same object, and I will
+vouch for his perseverance in fidelity.
+
+I confess, however, that hymen, or what you call your "defeat," is, in
+an ordinary woman, the grave of love. But then it is less upon the
+lover that the blame falls, than upon her who complains of the cooling
+of the passion; she casts upon the depravity of the heart what is due
+to her own unskillfulness, and her lack of economy. She has expended
+in a single day everything that might keep alive the inclination she
+had excited. She has nothing more to offer to the curiosity of her
+lover, she becomes always the same statue; no variety to be hoped for,
+and her lover knows it well.
+
+But in the woman I have in mind, it is the aurora of a lovelier day;
+it is the beginning of the most satisfying pleasures. I, understand by
+effusions of the heart, those mutual confidences; those ingenuities,
+those unexpected avowals, and those transports which excite in us the
+certainty of creating an absolute happiness, and meriting all the
+esteem of the person we love. That day is, in a word, the epoch when
+a man of refinement discovers inexhaustible treasures which have
+always been hidden from him; the freedom a woman acquires brings into
+play all the sentiments which constraint has held in reserve; her
+heart takes a lofty flight, but one well under control. Time, far from
+leading to loathing, will furnish new reasons for a greater love.
+
+But, to repeat; I assume sufficient intelligence in her to be able to
+control her inclination. For to hold a lover, it is not enough
+(perhaps it is too much) to love passionately, she must love with
+prudence, with restraint, and modesty is, for that reason, the most
+ingenious virtue refined persons have ever imagined. To yield to the
+impetuosity of an inclination; to be annihilated, so to speak, in the
+object loved, is the method of a woman without discernment. That is
+not love, it is a liking for a moment, it is to transform a lover into
+a spoiled child. I would have a woman behave with more reserve and
+economy. An excess of ardor is not justifiable in my opinion, the
+heart being always an impetuous charger which must be steadily curbed.
+If you do not use your strength with economy, your vivacity will be
+nothing but a passing transport. The same indifference you perceive in
+a lover, after those convulsive emotions, you, yourself, will
+experience, and soon, both of you will feel the necessity of
+separating.
+
+To sum up: There is more intelligence required to love than is
+generally supposed, and to be happy in loving. Up to the moment of the
+fatal "yes" or if you prefer, up to the time of her defeat, a woman
+does not need artifice to hold her lover. Curiosity excites him,
+desire sustains him, hope encourages him. But once he reaches the
+summit of his desires, it is for the woman to take as much care to
+retain him, as he exhibited to overcome her; the desire to keep him
+should render her fertile in expedients; the heart is similar to a
+high position, easier to obtain than to keep. Charms are sufficient
+to make a man amorous; to render him constant, something more is
+necessary; skill is required, a little management, a great deal of
+intelligence, and even a touch of ill humor and inequality.
+Unfortunately, however, as soon as women have yielded they become too
+tender, too complaisant. It would be better for the common good if
+they were to resist less in the beginning and more afterward. I
+maintain that they never can forestall loathing without leaving the
+heart something to wish for, and the time to consider.
+
+I hear them continually complaining that our indifference is always
+the fruit of their complaisance for us. They are ever recalling the
+time when, goaded by love and sentiment, we spent whole days by their
+side. How blind they are! They do not perceive that it is still in
+their power to bring us back to an allegiance, the memory of which is
+so dear. If they forget what they have already done for us, they will
+not be tempted to do more; but if they make us forget, then we shall
+become more exacting. Let them awaken our hearts by opposing new
+difficulties, arouse our anxieties, in fine, force us to desire new
+proofs of an inclination, the certainty of which diminishes the value
+in our estimation. They will then find less cause of complaint in us,
+and will be better satisfied with themselves.
+
+Shall I frankly avow it? Things would indeed change if women would
+remember at the right time, that their role is always that of the
+party to be entreated, ours that of him who begs for new favors;
+that, created to grant, they should never offer. Reserved, even in an
+excess of passion, they should guard against surrendering at
+discretion; the lover should always have something to ask, and
+consequently, he would be always submissive so as to obtain it. Favors
+without limit degrade the most seductive charms, and are, in the end,
+revolting even to him who exacts them. Society puts all women on the
+same level; the handsome and the ugly, after their defeat are
+indistinguishable except from their art to maintain their authority;
+but what commonly happens? A woman imagines she has nothing more to do
+than to be affectionate, caressing, sweet, of even temper, and
+faithful. She is right in one sense, for these qualities should be the
+foundation of her character; they will not fail to draw esteem; but
+these qualities, however estimable they may be, if they are not offset
+by a shade of contrariety, will not fail to extinguish love, and bring
+on languor and weariness, mortal poisons for the best constituted
+heart.
+
+Do you know why lovers become nauseated so easily when enjoying
+prosperity? Why they are so little pleased after having had so much
+pleasure? It is because both parties interested have an identically
+erroneous opinion. One imagines there is nothing more to obtain, the
+other fancies she has nothing more to give. It follows as a necessary
+consequence that one slackens in his pursuit, and the other neglects
+to be worthy of further advances, or thinks she becomes so by the
+practice of solid qualities. Reason is substituted for love, and
+hence-forward no more spicy seasoning in their relations, no more of
+those trifling quarrels so necessary to prevent dissatisfaction by
+forestalling it.
+
+But when I exact that evenness of temper should be animated by
+occasional storms, do not be under the impression that I pretend
+lovers should always be quarreling to preserve their happiness. I only
+desire to impress it upon you, that all their misunderstandings should
+emanate from love itself; that the woman should not forget (by a
+species of pusillanimous kindness) the respect and attentions due her;
+that by an excessive sensitiveness she does not convert her love into
+a source of anxiety capable of poisoning every moment of her
+existence; that by a scrupulous fidelity she may not render her lover
+too sure that he has nothing to fear on that score.
+
+Neither should a woman by a sweetness, an unalterable evenness of
+temper, be weak enough to pardon everything lacking in her lover.
+Experience demonstrates that women too often sacrifice the hearts of
+their spouses or their lovers, by too many indulgences and facilities.
+What recklessness! They martyrize themselves by sacrificing
+everything; they spoil them and convert them into ungrateful lovers.
+So much generosity finally turns against themselves, and they soon
+become accustomed to demand as a right what is granted them as a
+favor.
+
+You see women every day (even among those we despise with so much
+reason) who reign with a scepter of iron, treat as slaves men who are
+attached to them, debase them by force of controlling them. Well,
+these are the women who are loved longer than the others. I am
+persuaded that a woman of refinement, well brought up, would never
+think of following such an example. That military manner is repugnant
+to gentleness and morals, and lacks that decency which constitutes the
+charm in things even remote from virtue. But let the reasonable woman
+soften the clouds a trifle, there will always remain precisely what is
+necessary to hold a lover.
+
+We are slaves, whom too much kindness often renders insolent; we often
+demand to be treated like those of the new world. But we have in the
+bottom of our hearts a comprehension of justice, which tells us that
+the governing hand bears down upon us sometimes for very good reasons,
+and we take kindly to it.
+
+Now, for my last word. In everything relating to the force and energy
+of love, women should be the sovereigns; it is from them we hope for
+happiness, and they will never fail to grant us that as soon as they
+can govern our hearts with intelligence, moderate their own
+inclinations, and maintain their own authority, without compromising
+it and without abusing it.
+
+
+
+
+XI
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+Few People Resist Age
+
+
+A sprightly mind is dangerous to friendship. Your letter would have
+spoiled any one but me. I know your lively and astonishing
+imagination, and I have even wanted to remember that Lucian wrote in
+praise of the fly, to accustom myself to your style. Would to Heaven
+you could think of me what you write, I should dispense with the rest
+of the world; so it is with you that glory dwells.
+
+Your last letter is a masterpiece. It has been the subject of all the
+talks we have had in my chamber for the past month. You are
+rejuvenating; you do well to love. Philosophy agrees well with
+spiritual charms. It is not enough to be wise, one must please, and I
+perceive that you will always please as long as you think as you do.
+
+Few people resist age, but I believe I am not yet overcome by it. I
+could wish with you, that Madame Mazarin had looked upon life from her
+own viewpoint, without thinking of her beauty, which would always have
+been agreeable when common sense held the place of less brilliancy.
+Madame Sandwich will preserve her mental force after losing her
+youth, at least I think so.
+
+Adieu, my friend. When you see Madame Sandwich, remember me to her, I
+should be very sorry to have her forget me.
+
+
+
+
+XII
+
+Saint-Evremond to Ninon de l'Enclos
+
+Age Has Some Consolations
+
+
+It gives me a lively pleasure to see young people, handsome and
+expanding like flowers; fit to please, and able to sincerely affect an
+old heart like mine. As there has always been a strong similarity
+between your tastes, your inclinations, your sentiments, and mine, I
+think you will be pleased to receive a young Chevalier who is
+attractive to all our ladies. He is the Duke of Saint Albans, whom I
+have begged to pay you a visit, as much in his own interests as in
+yours.
+
+Is there any one of your friends like de Tallard, imbued with the
+spirit of our age, to whom I can be of any service? If so, command me.
+Give me some news of our old friend de Gourville. I presume he is
+prosperous in his affairs; if his health is poor I shall be very
+sorry.
+
+Doctor Morelli, my particular friend, accompanies the Countess of
+Sandwich, who goes to France for her health. The late Count Rochester,
+father of Madame Sandwich, had more spirit than any man in England,
+but Madame Sandwich has more than her father. She is generous and
+spirituelle, and as amiable as she is generous and spirituelle. These
+are a portion of her qualities. But, I have more to say about the
+physician than about the invalid.
+
+Seven cities, as you know, dispute among themselves, the birth place
+of Homer; seven great nations are quarrelling over Morelli: India,
+Egypt, Arabia, Persia, Turkey, Italy, and Spain. The cold countries,
+even the temperate ones, France, England and Germany, make no
+pretensions. He is acquainted with every language and speaks the most
+of them. His style, elevated, grand and figurative, leads me to
+believe that he is of Oriental origin, and that he has absorbed what
+he found good among the Europeans. He is passionately fond of music,
+wild over poetry, inquisitive about paintings, a connoisseur in
+everything--I cannot remember all. He has friends who know
+architecture, and though skilled in his own profession, he is an adept
+in others.
+
+I pray you to give him opportunities to become acquainted with all
+your illustrious friends. If you make him yours, I shall consider him
+fortunate, for you will never be able to make him acquainted with
+anybody possessing more merit than yourself.
+
+It seems to me that Epicurus included in his sovereign good the
+remembrance of past things. There is no sovereign good for a
+centenarian like me, but there are many consolations, that of thinking
+of you, and of all I have heard you say, is one of the greatest.
+
+I write of many things of no importance to you, because I never think
+that I may weary you. It is enough if they please me, it is
+impossible at my age, to hope they will please others. My merit
+consists in being contented, too happy in being able to write you.
+
+Remember to save some of M. de Gourville's wine for me. I am lodged
+with one of the relatives of M. de L'Hermitage, a very honest man, and
+an exile to England on account of his religion. I am very sorry that
+the Catholic conscience of France could not suffer him to live in
+Paris, and that the delicacy of his own compelled him to abandon his
+country. He certainly deserves the approbation of his cousin.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+Some Good Taste Still Exists in France
+
+
+My dear friend, is it possible for you to believe that the sight of a
+young man gives me pleasure? Your senses deceive you when it comes to
+others. I have forgotten all but my friends. If the name "doctor" had
+not reassured me, I should have replied by the Abbé de Hautefeuille,
+and your English would never have heard of me. They would have been
+told at my door that I was not at home, and I would have received your
+letter, which gave me more pleasure than anything else.
+
+What a fancy to want good wine, and how unfortunate that I can not say
+I was successful in getting it! M. de L'Hermitage will tell you as
+well as I, that de Gourville never leaves his room, is indifferent to
+taste of any kind, is always a good friend, but his friends do not
+trespass upon his friendship for fear of worrying him. After that, if,
+by any insinuation I can make, and which I do not now foresee, I can
+use my knowledge of wine to procure you some, do not doubt that I will
+avail myself of it.
+
+M. de Tallard was one of my former friends, but state affairs place
+great men above trifles. I am told that the Abbé Dubois will go to
+England with him. He is a slim little man who, I am sure, will please
+you.
+
+I have twenty letters of yours, and they are read with admiration by
+our little circle, which is proof that good taste still exists in
+France. I am charmed with a country where you do not fear ennui, and
+you will be wise if you think of nobody but yourself, not that the
+principle is false with you: that you can no longer please others.
+
+I have written to M. Morelli, and if I find in him the skill you say,
+I shall consider him a true physician.
+
+
+
+
+XIV
+
+Saint-Evremond to Ninon de l'Enclos
+
+Superiority of the Pleasures of the Stomach
+
+
+I have never read a letter which contained so much common sense as
+your last one. You eulogize the stomach so highly, that it would be
+shameful to possess an intelligent mind without also having a good
+stomach. I am indebted to the Abbé Dubois for having sounded my
+praises to you in this respect.
+
+At eighty-eight years of age, I can eat oysters every morning for
+breakfast. I dine well and sup fairly well. The world makes heroes of
+men with less merit than mine.
+
+Qu'on ait plus de bien, de crédit,
+Plus de vertu, plus de conduite,
+Je n'en aurai point de dépit,
+Qu'un autre me passe en mérite
+Sur le goût et sur l'appétit,
+C'est l'avantage qui m'irrite.
+L'estomac est le plus grand bien,
+Sans lui les autres ne sont rien.
+Un grand coeur veut tout entreprendre,
+Un grand esprit veut tout comprendre;
+Les droits de l'estomac sont de bien digérer;
+Et dans les sentiments que me donne mon âge,
+La beauté de l'esprit, la grandeur du courage,
+N'ont rien qu'à se vertu l'on puisse comparer.
+
+(Let others more riches and fame,
+More virtue and morals possess,
+'Twill kindle no envious flame;
+But to make my merit seem less
+In taste, appetite, is, I claim,
+An outrageous thing to profess.
+The stomach's the greatest of things,
+All else to us nothing brings.
+A great heart would all undertake,
+A great soul investigate,
+But the law of the stomach is good things to digest,
+And the glories which are at my age the delight,
+True beauty of mind, of courage the height,
+Are nothing unless by its virtue they're blest.)
+
+When I was young I admired intellect more than anything else, and was
+less considerate of the interests of the body than I should have been;
+to-day, I am remedying the error I then held, as much as possible,
+either by the use I am making of it, or by the esteem and friendship I
+have for it.
+
+You were of the same opinion. The body was something in your youth,
+now you are wholly concerned with the pleasures of the mind. I do not
+know whether you are right in placing so high an estimate upon it. We
+read little that is worth remembering, and we hear little advice that
+is worth following. However degenerate may be the senses of the age at
+which I am living, the impressions which agreeable objects make upon
+them appear to me to be so much more acute, that we are wrong to
+mortify them. Perhaps it is a jealousy of the mind which deems the
+part played by the senses better than its own.
+
+M. Bernier, the handsomest philosopher I have ever known (handsome
+philosopher is seldom used, but his figure, shape, manner,
+conversation and other traits have made him worthy of the epithet), M.
+Bernier, I say, in speaking of the senses, said to me one day:
+
+"I am going to impart a confidence that I would not give Madame de la
+Sablière, even to Mademoiselle de l'Enclos, whom I regard as a
+superior being. I tell you in confidence, that abstinence from
+pleasures appears to me to be a great sin."
+
+I was surprised at the novelty of the idea, and it did not fail to
+make an impression upon my mind. Had he extended his idea, he might
+have made me a convert to his doctrine.
+
+Continue your friendship which has never faltered, and which is
+something rare in relations that have existed as long as ours.
+
+
+
+
+XV
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+Let the Heart Speak Its Own Language
+
+
+I learn with pleasure that my soul is dearer to you than my body and
+that your common sense is always leading you upward to better things.
+The body, in fact, is little worthy of regard, and the soul has always
+some light which sustains it, and renders it sensible of the memory of
+a friend whose absence has not effaced his image.
+
+I often tell the old stories in which d'Elbène, de Charleval, and the
+Chevalier de Riviere cheer up the "moderns." You are brought in at the
+most interesting points, but as you are also a modern, I am on my
+guard against praising you too highly in the presence of the
+Academicians, who have declared in favor of the "ancients."
+
+I have been told of a musical prologue, which I would very much like
+to hear at the Paris theater. The "Beauty" who is its subject would
+strike with envy every woman who should hear it. All our Helens have
+no right to find a Homer, and always be goddesses of beauty. Here I am
+at the top, how am I to descend?
+
+My very dear friend, would it not be well to permit the heart to
+speak its own language? I assure you, I love you always. Do not change
+your ideas on that point, they have always been in my favor, and may
+this mental communication, which some philosophers believe to be
+supernatural, last forever.
+
+I have testified to M. Turretin, the joy I should feel to be of some
+service to him. He found me among my friends, many of whom deemed him
+worthy of the praise you have given him. If he desires to profit by
+what is left of our honest Abbés in the absence of the court, he will
+be treated like a man you esteem. I read him your letter with
+spectacles, of course, but they did me no harm, for I preserved my
+gravity all the time. If he is amorous of that merit which is called
+here "distinguished," perhaps your wish will be accomplished, for
+every day, I meet with this fine phrase as a consolation for my
+losses.
+
+I know that you would like to see La Fontaine in England, he is so
+little regarded in Paris, his head is so feeble. 'Tis the destiny of
+poets, of which Tasso and Lucretius are evidence. I doubt whether
+there is any love philter that could affect La Fontaine, he has never
+been a lover of women unless they were able to foot the bills.
+
+
+
+
+XVI
+
+Saint-Evremond to Ninon de l'Enclos
+
+The Memory of Youth
+
+
+I was handed in December, the letter you wrote me October 14. It is
+rather old, but good things are always acceptable, however late they
+may be in reaching us. You are serious, therefore, you please. You add
+a charm to Seneca, who does not usually possess any. You call yourself
+old when you possess all the graces, inclinations, and spirit of
+youth.
+
+I am troubled with a curiosity which you can satisfy: When you
+remember your past, does not the memory of your youth suggest certain
+ideas as far removed from languor and sloth as from the excitement of
+passion? Do you not feel in your soul a secret opposition to the
+tranquillity which you fancy your spirit has acquired?
+
+Mais aimer et vous voir aimée
+Est une douce liaison,
+Que dans notre coeur s'est formée
+De concert avec la raison.
+D'une amoureuse sympathie,
+Il faut pour arrêter le cours
+Arrêter celui de nos jours;
+Sa fin est celle de la vie.
+Puissent les destins complaisants,
+Vous donner encore trente ans
+D'amour et de philosophie.
+
+(To love and be loved
+Is a concert sweet,
+Which in your heart is formed
+Cemented with reason meet.
+Of a loving concord,
+To stop the course,
+Our days must end perforce,
+And death be the last record.
+May the kind fates give
+You thirty years to live,
+With wisdom and love in accord.)
+
+I wish you a happy New Year, a day on which those who have nothing
+else to give, make up the deficiency in wishes.
+
+
+
+
+XVII
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+"I Should Have Hanged Myself"
+
+
+Your letter filled with useless yearnings of which I thought myself
+incapable. "The days are passing," as said the good man of Yveteaux,
+"in ignorance and sloth; these days destroy us and take from us the
+things to which we are attached." You are cruelly made to prove this.
+
+You told me long ago that I should die of reflections. I try not to
+make any more, and to forget on the morrow the things I live through
+today. Everybody tells me that I have less to complain of at one time
+than at another. Be that as it may, had I been proposed such a life I
+should have hanged myself. We hold on to an ugly body, however, as
+something agreeable; we love to feel comfort and ease. Appetite is
+something I still enjoy. Would to Heaven I could try my stomach with
+yours, and talk of the old friends we have known, the memory of whom
+gives me more pleasure than the presence of many people I now meet.
+There is something good in all that, but to tell you the truth, there
+is no comparison.
+
+M. de Clerambault often asks me if he resembles his father in mental
+attainments. "No," I always answer him, but I hope from his
+presumption that he believes this "no" to be of advantage to him, and
+perhaps there are some who would have so considered it. What a
+comparison between the present epoch and that through which we have
+passed!
+
+You are going to write Madame Sandwich, but I believe she has gone to
+the country. She knows all about your sentiment for her. She will tell
+you more news about this country than I, having gauged and
+comprehended everything. She knows all my haunts and has found means
+of making herself perfectly at home.
+
+
+
+
+XVIII
+
+Saint-Evremond to Ninon de l'Enclos
+
+Life Is Joyous When It Is Without Sorrow
+
+
+The very last letter I receive from Mademoiselle de l'Enclos always
+seems to me to be better than the preceding ones. It is not because
+the sentiment of present pleasure dims the memory of the past, but the
+true reason is, your mind is becoming stronger and more fortified
+every day.
+
+If it were the same with the body as with the mind, I should badly
+sustain this stomach combat of which you speak. I wanted to make a
+trial of mine against that of Madame Sandwich, at a banquet given by
+Lord Jersey. I was not the vanquished.
+
+Everybody knows the spirit of Madame Sandwich; I see her good taste in
+the extraordinary esteem she has for you. I was not overcome by the
+praises she showered upon you, any more than I was by my appetite. You
+belong to every nation, esteemed alike in London as in Paris. You
+belong to every age of the world, and when I say that you are an honor
+to mine, youth will immediately name you to give luster to theirs.
+There you are, mistress of the present and of the past. May you have
+your share of the right to be so considered in the future! I have not
+reputation in view, for that is assured to all time, the one thing I
+regard as the most essential is life, of which eight days are worth
+more than centuries of post mortem glory.
+
+If any one had formerly proposed to you to live as you are now living,
+you would have hanged yourself! (The expression pleases me.) However,
+you are satisfied with ease and comfort after having enjoyed the
+liveliest emotions.
+
+L'esprit vous satisfait, ou du moins vous console:
+Mais on préférerait de vivre jeune et folle,
+Et laisser aux vieillards exempts de passions
+La triste gravité de leurs reflexions.
+
+(Mental joys satisfy you, at least they console,
+But a young jolly life we prefer on the whole,
+And to old chaps, exempt from passion's sharp stings,
+Leave the sad recollections of former good things.)
+
+Nobody can make more of youth than I, and as I am holding to it by
+memory, I am following your example, and fit in with the present as
+well as I know how.
+
+Would to Heaven, Madame Mazarin had been of your opinion! She would
+still be living, but she desired to die the beauty of the world.
+
+Madame Sandwich is leaving for the country, and departs admired in
+London as she is in Paris.
+
+Live, Ninon, life is joyous when it is without sorrow.
+
+I pray you to forward this note to M. l'Abbé de Hautefeuille, who is
+with Madame la Duchesse de Bouillon. I sometimes meet the friends of
+M. l'Abbé Dubois, who complain that they are forgotten. Assure him of
+my humble regards.
+
+Translator's Note--The above was the last letter Saint-Evremond ever
+wrote Mademoiselle de l'Enclos, and with the exception of one more
+letter to his friend, Count Magalotti, Councillor of State to His
+Royal Highness the Grand Duke of Tuscany, he never wrote any other,
+dying shortly afterward at the age of about ninety. His last letter
+ends with this peculiar Epicurean thought in poetry:
+
+Je vis éloigné de la France,
+Sans besoins et sans abondance,
+Content d'un vulgaire destin;
+J'aime la vertu sans rudesse,
+J'aime le plaisir sans mollesse,
+J'aime la vie, et n'en crains pas la fin.
+
+(I am living far away from France,
+No wants, indeed, no abundance,
+Content to dwell in humble sphere;
+Virtue I love without roughness,
+Pleasures I love without softness,
+Life, too, whose end I do not fear.)
+
+
+
+
+DOCTRINE OF EPICURUS
+
+EXPLAINED BY
+
+MARSHAL DE SAINT-EVREMOND
+
+IN A LETTER TO
+
+THE MODERN LEONTIUM
+
+(NINON DE L'ENCLOS)
+
+
+
+
+TO THE MODERN LEONTIUM
+
+(NINON DE L'ENCLOS)
+
+
+Being the moral doctrine of the philosopher Epicurus as applicable to
+modern times, it is an elucidation of the principles advocated by that
+philosopher, by Charles de Saint-Evremond, Maréchal of France, a great
+philosopher, scholar, poet, warrior, and profound admirer of
+Mademoiselle de l'Enclos. He died in exile in England, and his tomb
+may be found in Westminster Abbey, in a conspicuous part of the nave,
+where his remains were deposited by Englishmen, who regarded him as
+illustrious for his virtues, learning and philosophy.
+
+He gave the name "Leontium" to Mademoiselle de L'Enclos, and the
+letter was written to her under that sobriquet. The reasoning in it
+will enable the reader to understand the life and character of Ninon,
+inasmuch as it was the foundation of her education, and formed her
+character during an extraordinarily long career. It was intended to
+bring down to its date, the true philosophical principles of Epicurus,
+who appears to have been grossly misunderstood and his doctrines
+foully misinterpreted.
+
+Leontium was an Athenian woman who became celebrated for her taste for
+philosophy, particularly for that of Epicurus, and for her close
+intimacy with the great men of Athens. She lived during the third
+century before the Christian era, and her mode of life was similar to
+that of Mademoiselle de l'Enclos. She added to great personal beauty,
+intellectual brilliancy of the highest degree, and dared to write, a
+learned treatise against the eloquent Theophrastus, thereby incurring
+the dislike of Cicero, the distinguished orator, and Pliny, the
+philosopher, the latter intimating that it might be well for her "to
+select a tree upon which to hang herself." Pliny and other
+philosophers heaped abuse upon her for daring, as a woman, to do such
+an unheard of thing as to write a treatise on philosophy, and
+particularly for having the assurance to contradict Theophrastus.
+
+
+The Letter.
+
+You wish to know whether I have fully considered the doctrines of
+Epicurus which are attributed to me?
+
+I can claim the honor of having done so, but I do not care to claim a
+merit I do not possess, and which you will say, ingenuously, does not
+belong to me. I labor under a great disadvantage on account of the
+numerous spurious treatises which are printed in my name, as though I
+were the author of them. Some, though well written, I do not claim,
+because they are not of my writing, moreover, among the things I have
+written, there are many stupidities. I do not care to take the trouble
+of repudiating such things, for the reason that at my age, one hour of
+well regulated life, is of more interest and benefit to me than a
+mediocre reputation. How difficult it is, you see, to rid one's self
+of amour propre! I quit it as an author, and reassume it as a
+philosopher, feeling a secret pleasure in manipulating what others are
+anxious about.
+
+The word "pleasure" recalls to mind the name of Epicurus, and I
+confess, that of all the opinions of the philosophers concerning the
+supreme good, there are none which appear to me to be so reasonable as
+his.
+
+It would be useless to urge reasons, a hundred times repeated by the
+Epicureans, that the love of pleasure and the extinction of pain, are
+the first and most natural inclinations remarked in all men; that
+riches, power, honor, and virtue, contribute to our happiness, but
+that the enjoyment of pleasure, let us say, voluptuousness, to include
+everything in a word, is the veritable aim and end whither tend all
+human acts. This is very clear to me, in fact, self-evident, and I am
+fully persuaded of its truth.
+
+However, I do not know very well in what the pleasure, or
+voluptuousness of Epicurus consisted, for I never saw so many
+different opinions of any one as those of the morals of this
+philosopher. Philosophers, and even his own disciples, have condemned
+him as sensual and indolent; magistrates have regarded his doctrines
+as pernicious to the public; Cicero, so just and so wise in his
+opinions, Plutarch, so much esteemed for his fair judgments, were not
+favorable to him, and so far as Christianity is concerned, the Fathers
+have represented him to be the greatest and the most dangerous of all
+impious men. So much for his enemies; now for his partisans:
+
+Metrodorus, Hermachus, Meneceus, and numerous others, who
+philosophize according to his school, have as much veneration as
+friendship for him personally. Diogenes Laertes could not have written
+his life to better advantage for his reputation. Lucretius adored him.
+Seneca, as much of an enemy of the sect as he was, spoke of him in the
+highest terms. If some cities held him in horror, others erected
+statues in his honor, and if, among the Christians, the Fathers have
+condemned him, Gassendi and Bernier approve his principles.
+
+In view of all these contrary authorities, how can the question be
+decided? Shall I say that Epicurus was a corruptor of good morals, on
+the faith of a jealous philosopher, of a disgruntled disciple, who
+would have been delighted, in his resentment, to go to the length of
+inflicting a personal injury? Moreover, had Epicurus intended to
+destroy the idea of Providence and the immortality of the soul, is it
+not reasonable to suppose that the world would have revolted against
+so scandalous a doctrine, and that the life of the philosopher would
+have been attacked to discredit his opinions more easily?
+
+If, therefore, I find it difficult to believe what his enemies and the
+envious have published against him, I should also easily credit what
+his partisans have urged in his defence.
+
+I do not believe that Epicurus desired to broach a voluptuousness
+harsher than the virtue of the Stoics. Such a jealousy of austerity
+would appear to me extraordinary in a voluptuary philosopher, from
+whatever point of view that word may be considered. A fine secret
+that, to declaim against a virtue which destroys sentiment in a sage,
+and establishes one that admits of no operation.
+
+The sage, according to the Stoics, is a man of insensible virtue; that
+of the Epicureans, an immovable voluptuary. The former suffers pain
+without having any pain; the latter enjoys voluptuousness without
+being voluptuous--a pleasure without pleasure. With what object in
+view, could a philosopher who denied the immortality of the soul,
+mortify the senses? Why divorce the two parties composed of the same
+elements, whose sole advantage is in a concert of union for their
+mutual pleasure? I pardon our religious devotees, who diet on herbs,
+in the hope that they will obtain an eternal felicity, but that a
+philosopher, who knows no other good than that to be found in this
+world, that a doctor of voluptuousness should diet on bread and water,
+to reach sovereign happiness in this life, is something my
+intelligence refuses to contemplate.
+
+I am surprised that the voluptuousness of such an Epicurean is not
+founded upon the idea of death, for, considering the miseries of life,
+his sovereign good must be at the end of it. Believe me, if Horace and
+Petronius had viewed it as painted, they would never have accepted
+Epicurus as their master in the science of pleasure. The piety for the
+gods attributed to him, is no less ridiculous than the mortification
+of the senses. These slothful gods, of whom there was nothing to be
+hoped or feared; these impotent gods who did not deserve the labor and
+fatigue attendant upon their worship!
+
+Let no one say that worshipers went to the temple through fear of
+displeasing the magistrates, and of scandalizing the people, for they
+would have scandalized them less by refusing to assist in their
+worship, than shocked them by writings which destroyed the established
+gods, or at least ruined the confidence of the people in their
+protection.
+
+But you ask me: What is your opinion of Epicurus? You believe neither
+his friends nor his enemies, neither his adversaries nor his
+partisans. What is the judgment you have formed?
+
+I believe Epicurus was a very wise philosopher, who at times and on
+certain occasions loved the pleasure of repose or the pleasure of
+movement. From this difference in the grade of voluptuousness has
+sprung all the reputation accorded him. Timocrates and his other
+opponents, attacked him on account of his sensual pleasures; those who
+defended him, did not go beyond his spiritual voluptuousness. When the
+former denounced him for the expense he was at in his repasts, I am
+persuaded that the accusation was well founded. When the latter
+expatiated upon the small quantity of cheese he required to have
+better cheer than usual, I believe they did not lack reason. When they
+say he philosophized with Leontium, they say well; when they say that
+Epicurus diverted himself with her, they do not lie. According to
+Solomon, there is a time to laugh and a time to weep; according to
+Epicurus, there is a time to be sober and a time to be sensual. To go
+still further than that, is a man uniformly voluptuous all his life?
+
+Religiously speaking, the greatest libertine is sometimes the most
+devout; in the study of wisdom, the most indulgent in pleasures
+sometimes become the most austere. For my own part, I view Epicurus
+from a different standpoint in youth and health, than when old and
+infirm.
+
+Ease and tranquillity, these comforts of the infirm and slothful, can
+not be better expressed than in his writings. Sensual voluptuousness
+is not less well explained by Cicero. I know that nothing is omitted
+either to destroy or elude it, but can conjecture be compared with the
+testimony of Cicero, who was intimately acquainted with the Greek
+philosophers and their philosophy? It would be better to reject the
+inequality of mind as an inconstancy of human nature.
+
+Where exists the man so uniform of temperament, that he does not
+manifest contrarieties in his conversation and actions? Solomon merits
+the name of sage, as much as Epicure for less, and he belied himself
+equally in his sentiments and conduct. Montaigne, when still young,
+believed it necessary to always think of death in order to be always
+ready for it. Approaching old age, however, he recanted, so he says,
+being willing to permit nature to gently guide him, and teach him how
+to die.
+
+M. Bernier, the great partisan of Epicurus, avows to-day, that "After
+philosophizing for fifty years, I doubt things of which I was once
+most assured."
+
+All objects have different phases, and the mind which is in perpetual
+motion, views them from different aspects as they revolve before it.
+Hence, it may be said, that we see the same thing under different
+aspects, thinking at the same time that we have discovered something
+new. Moreover, age brings great changes in our inclinations, and with
+a change of inclination often comes a change of opinion. Add, that the
+pleasures of the senses sometimes give rise to contempt for mental
+gratifications as too dry and unproductive and that the delicate and
+refined pleasures of the mind, in their turn, scorn the voluptuousness
+of the senses as gross. So, no one should be surprised that in so
+great a diversity of aspects and movements, Epicurus, who wrote more
+than any other philosopher, should have treated the same subjects in a
+different manner according as he had perceived them from different
+points of view.
+
+What avails this general reasoning to show that he might have been
+sensible to all kinds of pleasure? Let him be considered according to
+his relations with the other sex, and nobody will believe that he
+spent so much time with Leontium and with Themista for the sole
+purpose of philosophizing. But if he loved the enjoyment of
+voluptuousness, he conducted himself like a wise man. Indulgent to the
+movements of nature, opposed to its struggles, never mistaking
+chastity for a virtue, always considering luxury as a vice, he
+insisted upon sobriety as an economy of the appetite, and that the
+repasts in which one indulged should never injure him who partook. His
+motto was: "Sic praesentibus voluptatibus utaris ut futuris non
+noceas."
+
+He disentangled pleasures from the anxieties which precede, and the
+disgust which follows them. When he became infirm and suffered pain,
+he placed the sovereign good in ease and rest, and wisely, to my
+notion, from the condition he was in, for the cessation of pain is the
+felicity of those who suffer it.
+
+As to tranquillity of mind, which constitutes another part of
+happiness, it is nothing but a simple exemption from anxiety or worry.
+But, whoso can not enjoy agreeable movements is happy in being
+guaranteed from the sensations of pain.
+
+After saying this much, I am of the opinion that ease and tranquillity
+constituted the sovereign good for Epicurus when he was infirm and
+feeble. For a man who is in a condition to enjoy pleasures, I believe
+that health makes itself felt by something more active than ease, or
+indolence, as a good disposition of the soul demands something more
+animated than will permit a state of tranquillity. We are all living
+in the midst of an infinity of good and evil things, with senses
+capable of being agreeably affected by the former and injured by the
+latter. Without so much philosophy, a little reason will enable us to
+enjoy the good as deliciously as possible and accommodate ourselves to
+the evil as patiently as we can.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Life, Letters, and Epicurean
+Philosophy of Ninon de L'Enclos, the Celebrated Beauty of the
+Seventeenth Century, by Robinson [and] Overton, ed. and translation.
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Life, Letters, and Epicurean Philosophy
+of Ninon de L'Enclos, the Celebrated Beauty of the Seventeenth Century,
+by Robinson [and] Overton, ed. and translation.
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+Title: Life, Letters, and Epicurean Philosophy of Ninon de L'Enclos,
+       the Celebrated Beauty of the Seventeenth Century
+
+Author: Robinson [and] Overton, ed. and translation.
+
+Release Date: January 10, 2004 [EBook #10665]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK NINON DE L'ENCLOS ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Rick Niles, Wilelmina Malliere and PG Distributed
+Proofreaders
+
+
+
+
+
+LIFE, LETTERS
+
+AND
+
+EPICUREAN PHILOSOPHY
+
+OF
+
+NINON
+
+DE L'ENCLOS
+
+The Celebrated Beauty of the Seventeenth Century
+
+
+
+ROBINSON--OVERTON
+
+
+
+
+1903
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+LIFE OF NINON DE L'ENCLOS
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos as a Standard
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+Considered as a Parallel
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+Youth of Ninon de l'Enclos
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+The Morals of the Period
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+Ninon and Count de Coligny
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+The "Birds" of the Tournelles
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+Effect of Her Mother's Death
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+Her Increasing Popularity
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+Ninon's Friendships
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+Some of Ninon's Lovers
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+Ninon's Lovers (Continued)
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+The Villarceaux Affair
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+The Marquis de Sevigne
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+A Family Tragedy
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+Ninon's Bohemian Environments
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+A Remarkable Old Age
+
+
+
+
+LETTERS TO THE MARQUIS DE SEVIGNE
+
+
+INTRODUCTION TO LETTERS
+I--A Hazardous Undertaking
+II--Why Love Is Dangerous
+III--Why Love Grows Cold
+IV--The Spice of Love
+V--Love and Temper
+VI--Certain Maxims Concerning Love
+VII--Women Expect a Quid Pro Quo from Men
+VIII--The Necessity for Love and Its Primitive Cause
+IX--Love Is a Natural Inclination
+X--The Sensation of Love Forms a Large Part of a Woman's Nature
+XI--The Distinction Between Love and Friendship
+XII--A Man in Love Is an Amusing Spectacle
+XIII--Vanity Is a Fertile Soil for Love
+XIV--Worth and Merit Are Not Considered in Love
+XV--The Hidden Motives of Love
+XVI--How to Be Victorious in Love
+XVII--Women Understand the Difference Between Real Love and Flirtation
+XVIII--When a Woman Is Loved She Need Not Be Told of It
+XIX--Why a Lover's Vows Are Untrustworthy
+XX--The Half-way House to Love
+XXI--The Comedy of Contrariness
+XXII--Vanity and Self-Esteem Obstacles to Love
+XXIII--Two Irreconcilable Passions in Woman
+XXIV--An Abuse of Credulity Is Intolerable
+XXV--Why Virtue Is So Often Overcome
+XXVI--Love Demands Freedom of Action
+XXVII--The Heart Needs Constant Employment
+XXVIII--Mere Beauty Is Often of Trifling Importance
+XXIX--The Misfortune of Too Sudden an Avowal
+XXX--When Resistance is Only a Pretence
+XXXI--The Opinion and Advice of Monsieur de la Sabliere
+XXXII--The Advantages of a Knowledge of the Heart
+XXXIII--A Heart Once Wounded No Longer Plays with Love
+XXXIV--Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder
+XXXV--The Heart Should Be Played Upon Like the Keys of a Piano
+XXXVI--Mistaken Impressions Common to All Women
+XXXVII--The Allurements of Stage Women
+XXXVIII--Varieties of Resistance Are Essential
+XXXIX--The True Value of Compliments Among Women
+XL--Oratory and Fine Phrases Do Not Breed Love
+XLI--Discretion Is Sometimes the Better Part of Valor
+XLII--Surface Indications in Women Are Not Always Guides
+XLIII--Women Demand Respect
+XLIV--Why Love Grows Weak--Marshal de Saint-Evremond's Opinion
+XLV--What Favors Men Consider Faults
+XLVI--Why Inconstancy Is Not Injustice
+XLVII--Cause of Quarrels Among Rivals
+XLVIII--Friendship Must Be Firm
+XLIX--Constancy Is a Virtue Among Narrow Minded
+L--Some Women Are Very Cunning
+LI--The Parts Men and Women Play
+LII--Love Is a Traitor with Sharp Claws
+LIII--Old Age Not a Preventive Against Attack
+LIV--A Shrewd But Not an Unusual Scheme
+LV--A Happy Ending
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN LORD SAINT-EVREMOND AND NINON DE L'ENCLOS
+
+I--Lovers and Gamblers Have Something in Common
+II--It Is Sweet to Remember Those We Have Loved
+III--Wrinkles Are a Mark of Wisdom
+IV--Near Hopes Are Worth as Much as Those Far Off
+V--On the Death of De Charleval
+VI--The Weariness of Monotony
+VII--After the Death of La Duchesse de Mazarin
+VIII--Love Banishes Old Age
+IX--Stomachs Demand More Attention Than Minds
+X--Why Does Love Diminish After Marriage?
+XI--Few People Resist Age
+XII--Age Has Some Consolations
+XIII--Some Good Taste Still Exists in France
+XIV--Superiority of the Pleasures of the Stomach
+XV--Let the Heart Speak Its Own Language
+XVI--The Memory of Youth
+XVII--I Should Have Hanged Myself
+XVIII--Life Is Joyous When It Is Without Sorrow
+Letter to the Modern Leontium
+
+
+
+
+NINON DE L'ENCLOS
+
+LIFE AND LETTERS
+
+
+INTRODUCTION
+
+
+The inner life of the most remarkable woman that ever lived is here
+presented to American readers for the first time. Ninon, or
+Mademoiselle de l'Enclos, as she was known, was the most beautiful
+woman of the seventeenth century. For seventy years she held
+undisputed sway over the hearts of the most distinguished men of
+France; queens, princes, noblemen, renowned warriors, statesmen,
+writers, and scientists bowing before her shrine and doing her homage,
+even Louis XIV, when she was eighty-five years of age, declaring that
+she was the marvel of his reign.
+
+How she preserved her extraordinary beauty to so great an age, and
+attracted to her side the greatest and most brilliant men of the
+century, is told in her biography, which has been entirely re-written,
+and new facts and incidents added that do not appear in the French
+compilations.
+
+Her celebrated "Letters to the Marquis de Sevigne," newly translated,
+and appearing for the first time in the United States, constitute the
+most remarkable pathology of the female heart, its motives, objects,
+and secret aspirations, ever penned. With unsparing hand she unmasks
+the human heart and unveils the most carefully hidden mysteries of
+femininity, and every one who reads these letters will see herself
+depicted as in a mirror.
+
+At an early age she perceived the inequalities between the sexes, and
+refused to submit to the injustice of an unfair distribution of human
+qualities. After due deliberation, she suddenly announced to her
+friends: "I notice that the most frivolous things are charged up to
+the account of women, and that men have reserved to themselves the
+right to all the essential qualities; from this moment I will be a
+man." From that time--she was twenty years of age--until her death,
+seventy years later, she maintained the character assumed by her,
+exercised all the rights and privileges claimed by the male sex, and
+created for herself, as the distinguished Abbe de Chateauneauf says,
+"a place in the ranks of illustrious men, while preserving all the
+grace of her own sex."
+
+
+
+
+LIFE OF NINON DE L'ENCLOS
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos as a Standard
+
+
+To write the biography of so remarkable a woman as Ninon de l'Enclos
+is to incur the animadversions of those who stand upon the dogma, that
+whoso violates one of the Ten Commandments is guilty of violating them
+all, particularly when one of the ten is conventionally selected as
+the essential precept and the most important to be observed. It is
+purely a matter of predilection or fancy, perhaps training and
+environment may have something to do with it, though judgment is
+wanting, but many will have it so, and hence, they arrive at the
+opinion that the end of the controversy has been reached.
+
+Fortunately for the common sense of mankind, there are others who
+repudiate this rigid rule and excuse for human conduct; who refuse to
+accept as a pattern of morality, the Sabbath breaker, tyrant,
+oppressor of the poor, the grasping money maker, or charity monger,
+even though his personal chastity may entitle him to canonization.
+These insist that although Ninon de l'Enclos may have persistently
+transgressed one of the precepts of the Decalogue, she is entitled to
+great consideration because of her faithful observance of the others,
+not only in their letter but in their spirit, and that her life
+contains much that is serviceable to humanity, in many more ways than
+if she had studiously preserved her personal purity to the sacrifice
+of other qualities, which are of as equal importance as virtues, and
+as essential to be observed.
+
+Another difficulty in the way of establishing her as a model of any
+kind, on account of her deliberate violations of the sixth precept of
+the Decalogue, is the fact that she was not of noble birth, held no
+official position in the government of France, either during the
+regency or under the reign of Louis XIII, but was a private person,
+retiring in her habits, faithful in her liaisons and friendships,
+delicate and refined in her manners and conversations, and eagerly
+sought for her wisdom, philosophy, and intellectual ability.
+
+Had she been a Semiramis, a Messalina, an Agrippina, a Catherine II,
+or even a Lady Hamilton, the glamor of her exalted political position
+might have covered up a multitude of gross, vulgar practices,
+cruelties, barbarities, oppressions, crimes, and acts of
+misgovernment, and have concealed her spiritual deformity beneath the
+grandeur of her splendid public vices and irregularities. The mantle
+of royalty and nobility, like dipsomania, excuses a multitude of sins,
+hypocrisy, and injustice, and inclines the world to overlook,
+disregard, or even condone, what in them is considered small vices,
+eccentricities of genius, but which in a private person are magnified
+into mountains of viciousness, and call forth an army of well meaning
+but inconsistent people to reform them by brute force.
+
+It is time to interpose an impasse to the further spread of this
+misapprehension of the nature and consequences of human acts, and to
+demonstrate the possibility, in humble walks of life, of virtues worth
+cultivating, and to erect models out of those who, while they may be
+derelict in their ethical duties, are still worthy of being imitated
+in other respects. Our standards and patterns of morality are so high
+as to be unattainable, not in the details of the practice of virtue,
+but in the personnel of the model. Royal and noble blood permeated
+with the odor of sanctity; virtuous statesmanship, or proud political
+position attained through the rigid observance of the ethical rules of
+personal purity, are nothing to the rank and file, the polloi, who can
+never hope to reach those elevations in this world; as well expatiate
+upon the virtues of Croesus to a man who will never go beyond his
+day's wages, or expect the homeless to become ecstatic over the
+magnificence of Nabuchodonosor's Babylonian palace. Such extremes
+possess no influence over the ordinary mind, they are the mere
+vanities of the conceited, the mistakes of moralists.
+
+The history of Ninon de l'Enclos stands out from the pages of history
+as a pre-eminent character, before which all others are stale,
+whatever their pretensions through position and grandeur,
+notwithstanding that one great quality so much admired in
+women--womanly purity--was entirely wanting in her conduct through
+life.
+
+While no apology can be effectual to relieve her memory from that one
+stigma, the other virtues connected with it, and which she possessed
+in superabundance, deserve a close study, inasmuch as the trend of
+modern society is in the direction of the philosophical principles and
+precepts, which justified her in pursuing the course of life she
+preferred to all others. She was an ardent disciple of the Epicurean
+philosophy, but in her adhesion to its precepts, she added that
+altruistic unselfishness so much insisted upon at the present day.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+Considered as a Parallel
+
+
+The birth of Ninon de l'Enclos was not heralded by salvoes of
+artillery, Te Deums, or such other demonstrations of joy as are
+attendant upon the arrival on earth of princes and offspring of great
+personages. Nevertheless, for the ninety years she occupied the stage
+of life, she accomplished more in the way of shaping great national
+policies, successful military movements and brilliant diplomatic
+successes, than any man or body of men in the seventeenth century.
+
+In addition to that, her genius left an impress upon music and the
+fine arts, an impress so profound that the high standard of excellence
+both have attained in our day is due to her efforts in establishing a
+solid foundation upon which it was possible to erect a substantial
+structure. Moreover, in her hands and under her auspices and guidance,
+languages, belles lettres, and rhetoric received an impetus toward
+perfection, and raised the French language and its literature,
+fiction, poetry and drama, to so high a standard, that its productions
+are the models of the twentieth century.
+
+It was Ninon de l'Enclos whose brilliant mentality and intellectual
+genius formed the minds, the souls, the genius, of such master minds
+as Saint-Evremond, La Rouchefoucauld, Moliere, Scarron, La Fontaine,
+Fontenelle, and a host of others in literature and fine arts; the
+Great Conde, de Grammont, de Sevigne, and the flower of the chivalry
+of France, in war, politics, and diplomacy. Even Richelieu was not
+unaffected by her influence.
+
+Strange power exerted by one frail woman, a woman not of noble birth,
+with only beauty, sweetness of disposition, amiability, goodness, and
+brilliant accomplishments as her weapons! It was not a case of the
+moth and the flame, but the operation of a wise philosophy, the
+precepts of which were decently, moderately and carefully inculcated;
+a philosophy upon the very edge of which modern society is hanging,
+afraid to accept openly, through too much attachment to ancient
+doctrines which have drawn man away from happiness and comfort, and
+converted him into a bitter pessimism that often leads to despair.
+
+As has already been suggested, had Ninon de l'Enclos sat upon a
+throne, or commanded an army, the pages of history would teem with the
+renown of her exploits, and great victories be awarded to her instead
+of to those who would have met with defeat without her inspiration.
+
+Pompey, in his vanity, declared that he could raise an army by
+stamping his foot upon the ground, but the raising of Ninon de
+l'Enclos' finger could bring all the chivalry of Europe around a
+single standard, or at the same gentle signal, cause them to put aside
+their arms and forget everything but peace and amity. She dominated
+the intellectual geniuses of the long period during which she lived,
+and reigned over them as their absolute queen, through the sheer force
+of her personal charms, which she never hesitated to bestow upon those
+whom she found worthy, and who expressed a desire to possess them,
+studiously regulated, however, by the precepts and principles of the
+philosophy of Epicurus, which today is rapidly gaining ground in our
+social relations through its better understanding and appreciation.
+
+Her life bears a great resemblance to the histories in which we read
+about the most celebrated women of ancient times, who occupied a
+middle station between the condition of marriage and prostitution--a
+class of women whose Greek name is familiarized to our ears in
+translations of Aristophanes. Ninon de l'Enclos was of the order of
+the French "hetaerae," and, as by her beauty and her talents, she
+attained the first rank in the social class, her name has come down to
+posterity with those of Aspasia and Leontium, while the less
+distinguished favorites of less celebrated men have shared the common
+oblivion, which hides from the memory of men, every degree of
+mediocrity, whether of virtue or vice.
+
+A class of this kind, a status of this singular nature existing
+amongst accomplished women, who inspired distinguished men with lofty
+ideals, and developed the genius of men who, otherwise, would have
+remained in obscurity, can never be uninteresting or uninstructive;
+indeed, it must afford matter for serious study. They are prefigures,
+or prototypes of the influence that aims to sway mankind at the
+present day in government, politics, literature, and the fine arts.
+
+As a distinguished example of such a class, the most prominent in the
+world, in fact, apart from a throne, Ninon de l'Enclos will peculiarly
+engage the attention of all who, whether for knowledge or amusement,
+are observers of human nature under all its varieties and
+circumstances.
+
+It would be idle to enter upon a historical digression on the state of
+female manners in ancient Athens, or in Europe during the last three
+centuries. The reader should discard them from his mind when he
+peruses the life of Ninon de l'Enclos, and examine her character and
+environments from every point of view as a type toward which is
+trending modern social conditions.
+
+At first blush, and to a narrow intellect, an individual woman of the
+character of Ninon de l'Enclos would seem hopelessly lost to all
+virtue, abandoned by every sense of shame, and irreclaimable to any
+feeling of social or private duty. But only at first blush, and to the
+most circumscribed of narrow minds, who, fortunately, do not control
+the policy of mankind, although occasional disorders here and there
+indicate that they are endeavouring to do so.
+
+A large majority of mankind are of the settled opinion that every
+virtue is bound up in that of chastity. Our manners and customs, our
+laws, most of our various kinds of religions, our national sentiments
+and feelings--all our most serious opinions, as well as our dearest
+and best rooted prejudices, forbid the dissevering, in the minds of
+women of any class, the ideas of virtue and female honor. That is,
+our public opinion is along that line. To raise openly a doubt on this
+head, or to disturb, on a point considered so vital, the settled
+notions of society, is equally inconsistent with common prudence and
+the policy of common honesty; and as tending to such an end, we are
+apt to consider all discussion on the subject as at least officiously
+incurring danger, without an opportunity of inculcating good.
+
+But, however strongly we insist upon this opinion for such purposes,
+there are others in which it is not useless to relax that severity for
+a moment, and to view the question, not through the medium of
+sentiment, but with an eye of philosophic impartiality. We are
+gradually nearing the point, where it is conceded that in certain
+conditions of society, one failing is not wholly incompatible with a
+general practice of virtue--a remark to be met with in every homily
+since homilies were written, notwithstanding that rigid rule already
+alluded to in the previous chapter.
+
+It is surprising that it has never occurred to any moralist of the
+common order, who deals chiefly with such general reflections, to
+apply this particular maxim to this particular social status. We
+follow the wise precepts of honesty found in Cicero, although we know
+that he was, at the time he was writing them, plundering his fellow
+men at every opportunity. Our admiration for Bacon's philosophy and
+wisdom reaches adulation although he was the "meanest of men," and was
+guilty of the most flagrant crimes such as judicial bribery and
+political corruption. We read that Aspasia had some great and many
+amiable qualities; so too had Ninon de l'Enclos; and it is worthy of
+consideration, how far we judge candidly or wisely in condemning such
+characters in gross, and treating their virtues as Saint Austin was
+wont to deal with those of his heathen adversaries, as no better than
+"splendid vices," so unparalleled in their magnitude as to become
+virtues by the operation of the law of extremes. There was no law
+permitting a man to marry his sister, and there was no law forbidding
+King Cambyses to do as he liked.
+
+Another grave point to be considered is this: The world, as it now
+stands, its laws, systems of government, manners and customs, and
+social conditions, have been built up on these same "splendid vices,"
+and whenever they have been tamed into subjection to mediocrity--let
+us say to clerical, or ecclesiastical domination;--government, society
+and morals have retrograded. The social condition in France during
+Ninon de l'Enclos' time, and in England during the reign of Charles
+II, is startling evidence of this accusation. Moreover, it is fast
+becoming the condition to-day, a fact indicated by the almost
+universal demand for a revolution in social ethics, the foundation to
+which, for some reason, has become awry, threatening to topple down
+the structure erected upon it. Society can see nothing to originate,
+an incalculable number of attempts to better human conditions always
+proving failures, and worsening the human status. It is dawning upon
+the minds of the true lovers of humanity, that there is nothing else
+to be done, but to revert to the past to find the key to any possible
+reform, and to that past we are edging rapidly, though, it must be
+said unwillingly, in the hope and expectation that the old foundations
+are possessed of sufficient solidity to support a new or re-modeled
+structure.
+
+The life of Ninon de l'Enclos, upon this very point, furnishes food
+for profitable reflection, inasmuch as it gives an insight into the
+great results to be obtained by the following of the precepts of an
+ancient philosophy which seems to have survived the clash of ages of
+intellectual and moral warfare, and to have demonstrated its capacity
+to supply defects in segregated dogmatic systems wholly incapable of
+any syncretic tendencies.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+Youth of Ninon de l'Enclos
+
+
+Anne de l'Enclos, or "Ninon," as she has always been familiarly called
+by the world at large, was born at Paris in 1615. What her parents
+were, or what her family, is a matter of little consequence. To all
+persons who have attained celebrity over the route pursued by her,
+original rank and station are not of the least moment. By force of his
+genius in hewing for himself a niche in history, Napoleon was truly
+his own ancestor, as it is said he loved to remark pleasantly. So with
+Ninon de l'Enclos, the novelty of the career she laid out for herself
+to follow, and did follow until the end with unwavering constancy,
+justifies us in regarding her as the head of a new line, or dynasty.
+
+In the case of mighty conquerors, whose path was strewn with violence,
+even lust, no one thinks of an ignoble origin as in any manner
+derogatory to the eminence; on the contrary, it is considered rather
+as matter to be proud of; the idea that out of ignominy, surrounded by
+conditions devoid of all decency, justice, and piety, an individual
+can elevate himself up to the highest pinnacle of human power and
+glory, has always, and will always be regarded as an example to be
+followed, and the badge of success stretched to cover the means of
+its attainment. This is the universal custom where success has been
+attained, the failures being relegated to a well merited oblivion as
+unworthy of consideration either as lessons of warning or for any
+purpose. Our youth are very properly taught only the lessons of
+success.
+
+It is in evidence that Ninon's father was a gentleman of Touraine and
+connected, through his wife, with the family of Abra de Raconis, a
+race of no mean repute in the Orleanois, and that he was an
+accomplished gentleman occupying a high position in society. Voltaire,
+however, declares that Ninon had no claim to a parentage of such
+distinction; that the rank of her mother was too obscure to deserve
+any notice, and that her father's profession was of no higher dignity
+than that of a teacher of the lute. This account is not less likely,
+from the remarkable proficiency acquired by Ninon, at an early age, in
+the use of that instrument.
+
+It is equally certain, however, that Ninon's parents were not obscure,
+and that her father was a man of many accomplishments, one of which
+was his skill as a performer on the lute. A fact which may have
+induced Voltaire to mistake one of his talents for his regular
+profession.
+
+Ninon's parents were as opposite in sentiments and disposition as the
+Poles of the earth. Madame de l'Enclos was a prudent, pious Christian
+mother, who endeavored to inspire her daughter with the same pious
+sentiments which pervaded her own heart. The fact is that the mother
+attempted to prepare her daughter for a conventual life, a profession
+at that period of the highest honor, and one that led to preferment,
+not only in religious circles, but in the world of society. At that
+time, conventual and monastic dignitaries occupied a prominent place
+in the formation of public and private manners and customs, and if not
+regarded impeccable, their opinions were always considered valuable in
+state matters of the greatest moment, even the security of thrones,
+the welfare and peace of nations sometimes depending upon their
+wisdom, judgment, and decisions.
+
+With this laudable object in view, Madame de l'Enclos carefully
+trained her daughter in the holy exercises of her religion, to which
+she hoped to consecrate her entire life. But the fond mother met with
+an impasse, an insurmountable obstacle, in the budding Ninon herself,
+who, even in the temples of the Most High, when her parent imagined
+her to be absorbed in the contemplation of saintly things, and
+imbibing inspiration from her "Hours," the "Lives of the Saints," or
+"An Introduction to a Holy Life," a book very much in vogue at that
+period, the child would be devouring such profane books as Montaigne,
+Scarron's romances and Epicurus, as more in accordance with her trend
+of mind.
+
+Even at the early age of twelve years, she had mastered those authors,
+and had laid out a course of life, not in accord with her good
+mother's ideas, for it excluded the idea of religion as commonly
+understood, and crushed out the sentiment of maternity, that crowning
+glory to which nearly all young female children aspire, although in
+them, at a tender age, it is instinctive and not based upon knowledge
+of its meaning.
+
+This beginning of Ninon's departure from the beaten path should not be
+a matter of surprise, for all the young open their hearts to ideas
+that spring from the sentiments and passions, and anticipate in
+imagination the parts they are to play in the tragedy or comedy of
+life.
+
+It is this period of life which the moralist and educator justly
+contend should be carefully guarded. It is really a concession to
+environment, and a tacit argument against radical heredity as the
+foundation upon which rest the character and disposition of the adult,
+and which is the mainspring of his future moral conduct. It is
+impossible to philosophize ourselves out of this sensible position.
+
+In the case of Ninon, there was her mother, a woman of undoubted
+virtue and exemplary piety, following the usual path in the training
+of her only child and making a sad failure of it, or at least not
+making any impression on the object of her solicitude. This was,
+however, not due to the mother's intentions: her training was too weak
+to overcome that coming from another quarter. It has been said that
+Ninon's father and mother were as opposite as the Poles in character
+and disposition, and Ninon was suspended like a pendulum to swing
+between two extremes, one of which had to prevail, for there was no
+midway stopping place. It may be that the disciple of heredity, the
+opponent of environment will perceive in the result a strong argument
+in favor of his view of humanity. Be that as it may, Ninon swung away
+from the extreme of piety represented by her mother, and was caught at
+the other extreme by the less intellectually monotonous ideas of her
+father. There was no mental conflict in the young mind, nothing
+difficult; on the contrary, she accepted his ideas as pleasanter and
+less conducive to pain and discomfort. Too young to reason, she
+perceived a flowery pathway, followed it, and avoided the thorny one
+offered her by her mother.
+
+Monsieur de l'Enclos was an Epicurean of the most advanced type.
+According to him, the whole philosophy of life, the entire scheme of
+human ethics as evolved from Epicurus, could be reduced to the four
+following canons:
+
+First--That pleasure which produces no pain is to be embraced.
+
+Second--That pain which produces no pleasure is to be avoided.
+
+Third--That pleasure is to be avoided which prevents a greater
+pleasure, or produces a greater pain.
+
+Fourth--That pain is to be endured which averts a greater pain, or
+secures a greater pleasure.
+
+The last canon is the one that has always appealed to the religious
+sentiments, and it is the one which has enabled an army of martyrs to
+submit patiently to the most excruciating torments, to reach the
+happiness of Paradise, the pleasure contemplated as a reward for
+enduring the frightful pain. The reader can readily infer, however,
+from his daily experiences with the human family, that this
+construction is seldom put upon this canon, the world at large,
+viewing it from the Epicurean interpretation, which meant earthly
+pleasures, or the purely sensual enjoyments. It is certain that
+Ninon's father did not construe any of these canons according to the
+religious idea, but followed the commonly accepted version, and
+impressed them upon his young daughter's mind in all their various
+lights and shades.
+
+Imbibing such philosophy from her earliest infancy, the father taking
+good care to press them deep into her plastic mind, it is not
+astonishing that Ninon should discard the more distasteful fruits to
+be painfully harvested by following her mother's tuition, and accept
+the easily gathered luscious golden fruit offered her by her father.
+Like all children and many adults, the glitter and the tinsel of the
+present enjoyment were too powerful and seductive to be resisted, or
+to be postponed for a problematic pleasure.
+
+The very atmosphere which surrounded the young girl, and which she
+soon learned to breathe in deep, pleasurable draughts, was surcharged
+with the intoxicating oxygen of freedom of action, liberality, and
+unrestrained enjoyment. While still very young she was introduced into
+a select society of the choicest spirits of the age and speedily
+became their idol, a position she continued to occupy without
+diminution for over sixty years. No one of all these men of the world
+had ever seen so many personal graces united to so much
+intellectuality and good taste. Ninon's form was as symmetrical,
+elegant and yielding as a willow; her complexion of a dazzling white,
+with large sparkling eyes as black as midnight, and in which reigned
+modesty and love, and reason and voluptuousness. Her teeth were like
+pearls, her mouth mobile and her smile most captivating, resistless
+and adorable. She was the personification of majesty without pride or
+haughtiness, and possessed an open, tender and touching countenance
+upon which shone friendship and affection. Her voice was soft and
+silvery, her arms and hands superb models for a sculptor, and all her
+movements and gestures manifested an exquisite, natural grace which
+made her conspicuous in the most crowded drawing-room. As she was in
+her youth, so she continued to be until her death at the age of ninety
+years, an incredible fact but so well attested by the gravest and most
+reliable writers, who testify to the truth of it, that there is no
+room for doubt. Ninon attributed it not to any miracle, but to her
+philosophy, and declared that any one might exhibit the same
+peculiarities by following the same precepts. We have it on the most
+undoubted testimony of contemporaneous writers, who were intimate with
+him, that one of her dearest friends and followers, Saint-Evremond, at
+the age of eighty-nine years, inspired one of the famous beauties of
+the English Court with an ardent attachment.
+
+The beauties of her person were so far developed at the age of twelve
+years, that she was the object of the most immoderate admiration on
+the part of men of the greatest renown, and her beauty is embalmed in
+their works either as a model for the world, or she is enshrined in
+song, poetry, and romance as the heroine.
+
+In fact Ninon had as tutors the most distinguished men of the age, who
+vied with one another in embellishing her young mind with all the
+graces, learning and accomplishments possible for the human mind to
+contain. Her native brightness and active mind absorbed everything
+with an almost supernatural rapidity and tact, and it was not long
+before she became their peer, and her qualities of mind reached out so
+far beyond theirs in its insatiable longing, that she, in her turn,
+became their tutor, adviser and consoler, as well as their tender
+friend.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+The Morals of the Period
+
+
+Examples of the precocious talents displayed by Mademoiselle de
+l'Enclos are not uncommon in the twentieth century, but the
+application she made of them was remarkable and uncommon. Accomplished
+in music, learned and proficient in the languages, a philosopher of no
+small degree, and of a personal beauty sometimes called "beaute de
+diable," she appeared upon the social stage at a time when a new idol
+was an imperative necessity for the salvation of moral sanity, and the
+preservation of some remnants of personal decency in the sexual
+relations.
+
+Cardinal Richelieu had just succeeded in consolidating the usurpations
+of the royal prerogatives on the rights of the nobility and the
+people, which had been silently advancing during the preceding reigns,
+and was followed by the long period of unexampled misgovernment, which
+oppressed and impoverished as well as degraded every rank and every
+order of men in the French kingdom, ceasing only with the Revolution.
+
+The great Cardinal minister had built worse than he had intended, it
+is to be hoped; for his clerico-political system had practically
+destroyed French manhood, and left society without a guiding star to
+cement the rope of sand he had spun. Unable to subject the master
+minds among the nobility to its domination, ecclesiasticism had
+succeeded in destroying them by augmenting royal prerogatives which it
+could control with less difficulty. Public maxims of government,
+connected as they were with private morals, had debauched the nation,
+and plunged it into a depth of degradation out of which Richelieu and
+his whole entourage of clerical reformers could not extricate a single
+individual. It was a riot of theological morality.
+
+The whole body of the French nobility and the middle class of citizens
+were reduced to a servile attendance on the court, as the only means
+of advancement and reward. Every species of industry and merit in
+these classes was sedulously discouraged; and the motive of honorable
+competition for honorable things, being withdrawn, no pursuit or
+occupation was left them but the frivolous duties, or the degrading
+pleasures of the palace.
+
+Next to the king, the women naturally became the first objects of
+their effeminate devotion; and it is difficult to say which were
+soonest corrupted by courtiers consummate in the arts of adulation,
+and unwearied in their exercise. The sovereign rapidly degenerated
+into an accomplished despot, and the women into intriguers and
+coquettes. Richelieu had indeed succeeded in subjecting the State to
+the rule of the Church, but Ninon was destined to play an important
+part in modifying the evils which afflicted society, and at least
+elevate its tone. From the methods she employed to effect this
+change, it may be suspected that the remedy was equivalent to the
+Hanemannic maxim: "Similia similbus curantur," a strange application
+of a curative agent in a case of moral decrepitude, however valuable
+and effective it may be in physical ailments.
+
+The world of the twentieth century, bound up as it is in material
+progress, refuses to limit its objects and aims to the problematic
+enjoyment of the pleasures of Paradise in the great hereafter, or of
+suffering with stoicism the pains and misfortunes of this earth as a
+means of avoiding the problematic pains of Hell. Future rewards and
+punishments are no longer incentives to virtue or right living. The
+only drag upon human acts of every kind is now that great political
+maxim, the non-observance of which has often deluged the earth with
+blood; "Sic utere tuo ut alienum non laedas," which is to say: So use
+thine own as not to injure thy neighbor. It is a conventional
+principle, one of contract in reality, but it has become a great
+doctrine of equity and justice, and it is inculcated by our
+educational systems to the exclusion of the purely religious idea, and
+the elimination of religious dogma, which tends to oppressive
+restraints, is carefully fostered.
+
+There is another reason why men's minds are impelled away from the
+purely sentimental moral doctrines insisted upon by sectarianism,
+which is ecclesiasticism run riot, and the higher the education the
+deeper we delve into the secret motives of that class of mankind, the
+deceptive outward appearances of which dominate the pages of history,
+which is, that the greatest and most glorious systems of government,
+the wisest and most powerful of rulers, the greatest and most liberal
+statesmen, heroes, and conspicuous conquerors, originated in
+violations of the Decalogue, and those nations and kingdoms which have
+been founded upon strictly ecclesiastical ideas, have all sunk beneath
+the shifting sands of time, or have become so degenerate as to be
+bywords and objects of derision.
+
+From the same viewpoint, a strange phenomenon is observable in the
+world of literature, arts, and sciences. The brightest, greatest
+geniuses, whose works are pointed to with admiration; studied as
+models and standards, made the basis of youthful education, imitated,
+and even wept over by the sentimental, were, in their private lives,
+persons of the most depraved morals. Why this should be the case, it
+is impossible even to conjecture, the fact only remaining that it is
+so. Perhaps there are so many different standards of morality, that
+humanity, weary of the eternal bickering consequent upon the conflicts
+entered into for their enforcement, have made for themselves a new
+interpretation which they find less difficult to observe, and find
+more peace and pleasure in following.
+
+To take a further step in the same direction, it is curious that in
+the lives of the Saints, those who spent their whole earthly existence
+in abstinence, works of the severest penance, and mortifications of
+the flesh, the tendency of demoniac influence was never in the
+direction of Sabbath breaking, profanity, idolatry, robbery, murder
+and covetousness, but always exerted itself to the fullest extent of
+its power in attacks upon chastity. All other visions were absent in
+the hair-shirted, and self-scourgings brought out nothing but sexual
+idealities, sensual temptations. The reason for this peculiarity is
+not far to seek. What is dominant in the minds always finds egress
+when a favorable opportunity is presented, and the very thought of
+unchastity as something to be avoided, leads to its contemplation, or
+its creation in the form of temptation. The virtue of chastity was the
+one law, and its observances and violations were studied from every
+point of view, and its numberless permissible and forbidden
+limitations expatiated upon to such a degree, that he who escaped them
+altogether could well attribute the result to the interposition of
+some supernatural power, the protection of some celestial guardian.
+One is reminded of the expression of St. Paul: "I had not known lust
+had the law not said: thou shalt not covet." Lord Beaconsfield's
+opinion was, that excessive piety led to sexual disorders.
+
+According to Ninon's philosophy, whatever tended to propagate
+immoderation in the sexual relations was rigidly eliminated, and
+chastity placed upon the same plane and in the same grade as other
+moral precepts, to be wisely controlled, regulated, and managed. She
+put all her morality upon the same plane, and thereby succeeded in
+equalizing corporeal pleasure, so that the entire scale of human acts
+produced a harmonious equality of temperament, whence goodness and
+virtue necessarily followed, the pathway being unobstructed.
+
+It is too much to be expected, or even to be hoped for, that there
+will ever be any unanimity among moral reformers, or any uniformity in
+their standards of moral excellence. The educated world of the present
+day, reading between the lines of ancient history, and some that is
+not so very ancient, see ambition for place and power as the moving
+cause, the inspiration behind the great majority of revolutions, and
+they have come to apply the same construction to the great majority of
+moral agitations and movements for the reform of morals and the
+betterment of humanity, with pecuniary reward or profit, however,
+added as the sine qua non of maintaining them.
+
+Cure the agitation by removing the occasion for it, and Othello's
+occupation would be gone; hence, the agitation continues. As an
+eminent theologian declared with a conviction that went home to a
+multitude, at the Congress of Religions, when the Columbian Exposition
+was in operation:
+
+"If all the religions in the world are to be merged into one, who, or
+what will support the clergy that will be deprived of their salaries
+by the change in management?"
+
+The Golden Calf and Aaron were there, but where was the angry Moses?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+Ninon and Count de Coligny
+
+
+It was impossible for a maiden trained in the philosophy of Epicurus,
+and surrounded by a brilliant society who assiduously followed its
+precepts to avoid being caught in the meshes of the same net spread
+for other women. Beloved and even idolized on all sides, as an object
+that could be worshiped without incurring the displeasure of
+Richelieu, who preferred his courtiers to amuse themselves with women
+and gallantries rather than meddle with state affairs, and being
+disposed both through inclination and training to accept the
+situation, Ninon felt the sentiments of the tender passion, but
+philosophically waited for a worthy object.
+
+That object appeared in the person of the young Gaspard, Count de
+Coligny, afterwards Duc de Chatillon, who paid her assiduous court.
+The result was that Ninon conceived a violent passion for the Count,
+which she could not resist, in fact did not care to resist, and she
+therefore yielded to the young man of distinguished family, charming
+manners, and a physically perfect specimen of manhood.
+
+It is alleged by Voltaire and repeated by Cardinal de Retz, that the
+early bloom of Ninon's charms was enjoyed by Richelieu, but if this be
+true, it is more than likely that Ninon submitted through policy and
+not from any affection for the great Cardinal. It is certain, however,
+that the great statesman's attention had been called to her growing
+influence among the French nobility, and that he desired to control
+her actions if not to possess her charms. She was a tool that he
+imagined he could utilize to keep his rebellious nobles in his leash.
+Abbe Raconis, Ninon's uncle, and the Abbe Boisrobert, her friend, who
+stood close to the Cardinal, had suggested to His Eminence that the
+charms of the new beauty could be used to advantage in state affairs,
+and he accordingly sent for her at first through curiosity, but when
+he had seen her he hoped to control her for his personal benefit.
+
+Although occupied in vast projects which his great genius and activity
+always conducted to a happy issue, the great man had not renounced the
+affections of his human nature, nor his intellectual gratifications.
+He aimed at everything, and did not consider anything beneath his
+dignity. Every day saw him engaged in cultivating a taste for
+literature and art, and some moments of every day were set apart for
+social gallantries. When it came to the art of pleasing and attracting
+women, we have the word of Cardinal de Retz for it, that he was not
+always successful. Perhaps it is only inferior minds who possess the
+art and the genius of seduction.
+
+The intriguing Abbe, in order to bring Ninon under the influence of
+his master, and to charm her with the great honor done her by a man
+upon whom were fixed the eyes of all Europe, prepared a series of
+gorgeous fetes, banquets and entertainments at the palace at Rueil.
+But Ninon was not in the least overwhelmed, and refused to hear the
+sighs of the great man. Hoping to inspire jealousy, he affected to
+love Marion de Lormes, a proceeding which gave Ninon great pleasure as
+it relieved her from the importunities of the Cardinal. The end of it
+was, that Richelieu gave up the chase and left Ninon in peace to
+follow her own devices in her own way.
+
+Whatever may have been the relations between Ninon and Cardinal
+Richelieu, it is certain that the Count de Coligny was her first
+sentimental attachment, and the two lovers, in the first intoxication
+of their love, swore eternal constancy, a process common to all new
+lovers and believed possible to maintain. It was not long, however,
+before Ninon perceived that the first immoderate transports of love
+gradually lost their activity, and by applying the precepts of her
+philosophy to explain the phenomenon, came to regard love by its
+effects, as a blind mechanical movement, which it was the policy of
+men to ennoble according to the conventional rules of decency and
+honor, to the exclusion of its original meaning.
+
+After coldly reasoning the matter out to its only legitimate
+conclusion, she tore off the mask covering a metaphysical love, which
+could not reach or satisfy the light of intelligence or the sentiments
+and emotions of the heart, and which appeared to her to possess as
+little reality as the enchanted castles, marvels of magic, and
+monsters depicted in poetry and romance. To her, love finally became a
+mere thirst, and a desire for pleasure to be gratified by indulgence
+like all other pleasure. The germ of philosophy already growing in her
+soul, found nothing in this discovery that was essentially unnatural;
+on the contrary, it was essentially natural. It was clear to her
+logical mind, that a passion like love produced among men different
+effects according to different dispositions, humors, temperament,
+education, interest, vanity, principles, or circumstances, without
+being, at the same time, founded upon anything more substantial than a
+disguised, though ardent desire of possession, the essential of its
+existence, after which it vanished as fire disappears through lack of
+fuel. Dryden, the celebrated English poetic and literary genius,
+reaches the same opinion in his Letters to Clarissa.
+
+Having reached this point in her reasoning, she advanced a step
+further, and considered the unequal division of qualities distributed
+between the two sexes. She perceived the injustice of it and refused
+to abide by it. "I perceive," she declared, "that women are charged
+with everything that is frivolous, and that men reserve to themselves
+the right to essential qualities. From this moment I shall be a man."
+
+All this growing out of the ardour of a first love, which is always
+followed by the lassitude of satiety, so far from causing Ninon any
+tears of regret, nerved her up to a philosophy different from that of
+other women, and makes it impossible to judge her by the same
+standard. She can not be considered a woman subject to a thousand
+fantasies and whims, a thousand trifling concealed proprieties of
+position and custom. Her morals became the same as those of the wisest
+and noblest men of the period in which she lived, and raised her to
+their rank instead of maintaining her in the category of the
+intriguing coquettes of her age.
+
+It is not improbable that her experience of the suffering attendant
+upon the decay of such attachments, a suffering alluded to by those
+who contemplate only the intercourse of the sexes through the medium
+of poetry and sentiment, had considerable influence in determining her
+future conduct. At an early age, following upon her liaison with Count
+Coligny, she adopted the determination she adhered to during the rest
+of her life, of retaining so much only of the female character as was
+forced upon her by nature and the insuperable laws of society. Acting
+on this principle, her society was chiefly composed of persons of her
+adopted sex, of whom the most celebrated of their time made her house
+a constant place of meeting.
+
+A curious incident in her relations with Count de Coligny was her
+success in persuading him to adjure the errors of the Huguenots and
+return to the Roman Catholic Church. She had no religious
+predilections, feeling herself spiritually secure in her philosophic
+principles, but sought only his welfare and advancement. His obstinacy
+was depriving him of the advantages due his birth and personal merit.
+Considering that Ninon was scarcely sixteen years of age, respiring
+nothing but love and pleasure, to effect by tenderness and the
+persuasive strength of her reasoning powers, such a change in a man
+so obstinate as the Count de Coligny, in an obstinate and excessively
+bigoted age, was something unique in the history of lovers of that
+period. Women then cared very little for religious principles, and
+rarely exerted themselves in advancing the cause of the dominant
+religion, much less thought of the spiritual needs of their favorites.
+The reverse is the rule in these modern times, when women are the most
+ardent and persistent proselytizers of the various sects, a custom
+which recalls the remark of a distinguished lawyer who failed to
+recover any assets from a notorious bankrupt he was pursuing for the
+defrauded creditors: "This man has everything in his wife's name--even
+his religion."
+
+Ninon's disinterested counsel prevailed, and the Count afterward
+abjured his errors, becoming the Duc de Chatillon, Marquis d'Andelot,
+and died a lieutenant general, bravely fighting for his country, at
+Charenton.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+The "Birds" of the Tournelles
+
+
+Having decided upon her career, Ninon converted her property into
+prudent and safe securities, and purchased a city house in the Rue des
+Tournelles au Marais, a locality at that time the center of
+fashionable society, and another for a summer residence at Picpusse,
+in the environs of Paris. A select society of wits and gallant
+chevaliers soon gathered around her, and it required influence as well
+as merit to gain an entrance into its ranks. Among this elite were
+Count de Grammont, Saint-Evremond, Chapelle, Moliere, Fontenelle, and
+a host of other no less distinguished characters, most of them
+celebrated in literature, arts, sciences, and war. Ninon christened
+the society "Oiseaux des Tournelles," an appellation much coveted by
+the beaux and wits of Paris, and which distinguished the chosen
+company from the less favored gentlemen of the great metropolis.
+
+Among those who longed for entrance into this charming society of
+choice spirits was the Count de Charleval, a polite and accomplished
+chevalier, indeed, but of no particular standing as a literary
+character. Nothing would do, however, but a song of triumph as a test
+of his competency and he accomplished it after much labor and
+consumption of midnight oil. Scarron has preserved the first stanza
+in his literary works, the others being lost to the literary world,
+perhaps with small regret. The sentiments expressed in the first
+stanza rescued from oblivion will be sufficient to indicate the
+character of the others:
+
+"Je ne suis plus oiseau des champs,
+Mais de ces oiseaux des Tournelles
+Qui parlent d'amour en tout temps,
+Et qui plaignent les tourterelles
+De ne se baiser qu'au printemps."
+
+Which liberally translated into English will run substantially as
+follows:
+
+No more am I a wild bird on the wing,
+But one of the birds of the Towers, who
+The love in their hearts always sing,
+And pity the poor Turtle Doves that coo
+And never kiss only in spring.
+
+Scarron alludes to the delicacy of the Count's taste and the
+refinement of his wit, by saying of him: "The muses brought him up on
+blanc mange and chicken broth."
+
+How Ninon kept together this remarkable coterie can best be understood
+by an incident unparalleled in female annals. The Count de Fiesque,
+one of the most accomplished nobles of the French court, had it
+appears, grown tired of an attachment of long standing between Ninon
+and himself, before the passion of the former had subsided. A letter,
+containing an account of his change of sentiments, with reasons
+therefor, was presented his mistress, while employed at her toilette
+in adjusting her hair, which was remarkable for its beauty and
+luxuriance, and which she regarded as the apple of her eye. Afflicted
+by the unwelcome intelligence, she cut off half of her lovely tresses
+on the impulse of the moment, and sent them as her answer to the
+Count's letter. Struck by this unequivocal proof of the sincerity of
+her devotion to him, the Count returned to his allegiance to a
+mistress so devoted, and thenceforward retained it until she herself
+wearied of it and desired a change.
+
+As an illustration of her sterling honesty in money matters and her
+delicate manner of ending a liaison, the following anecdote will serve
+to demonstrate the hold she was able to maintain upon her admirers.
+
+M. de Gourville, an intimate friend of Ninon's, adhered in the wars of
+the Fronde to the party of the Prince of Conde, one of the "Birds of
+the Tournelles." Compelled to quit Paris, to avoid being hanged in
+person, as he was in effigy, he divided the care of a large sum of
+ready money between Ninon de l'Enclos and the Grand Penitencier of
+Notre Dame. The money was deposited in two caskets. On his return from
+exile, he applied to the priest for the return of his money, but to
+his astonishment, all knowledge of the deposit was denied, and that if
+any such deposit had been made, it was destined for charitable
+purposes under the rules of the Penitencier, and had most probably
+been distributed among the poor of Paris. De Gourville protested in
+vain, and when he threatened to resort to forcible means, the power
+of the church was invoked to compel him to abandon his attempt. So
+cruelly disappointed in a man whom all Paris deemed incorruptibly
+honest, de Gourville suspected nothing else from Mademoiselle de
+l'Enclos. It was absurd to hope for probity in a woman of
+reprehensible habits when that virtue was absent in a man who lived a
+life of such austerity as the Grand Penitencier, hence he determined
+to abstain from visiting her altogether, lest he might hate the woman
+he had so fondly loved.
+
+Ninon, however, had other designs, and learning that he had returned,
+sent him a pressing invitation to call upon her.
+
+"Ah! Gourville," she exclaimed as soon as he appeared, "a great
+misfortune has happened me in consequence of your absence."
+
+That settled the matter in de Gourville's mind, his money was gone and
+he was a pauper. Plunged in mournful reflections, de Gourville dared
+not raise his eyes to those of his mistress. But she, mistaking his
+agitation, went on hastily:
+
+"I am sorry if you still love me, for I have lost my love for you, and
+though I have found another with whom I am happy, I have not forgotten
+you. Here," she continued, turning to her escritoire, "here are the
+twenty thousand crowns you intrusted to me when you departed. Take
+them, my friend, but do not ask anything from a heart which is no
+longer disposed in your favor. There is nothing left but the most
+sincere friendship."
+
+Astonished at the contrast between her conduct and that of her
+reverend co-depositary, and recognizing that he had no right to
+complain of the change in her heart because of his long absence, de
+Gourville related the story of the indignity heaped upon him by a man
+of so exalted a character and reputation.
+
+"You do not surprise me," said Ninon, with a winning smile, "but you
+should not have suspected me on that account. The prodigious
+difference in our reputations and conditions should have taught you
+that." Then adding with a twinkle in her eye: "Ne suis-je pas la
+gardeuse de la cassette?"
+
+Ninon was afterward called "La belle gardeuse de cassette," and
+Voltaire, whose vigilance no anecdote of this nature could escape, has
+made it, with some variations, the subject of a comedy, well known to
+every admirer of the French drama, under the name of "La Depositaire."
+
+Ninon had her preferences, and when one of her admirers was not to her
+taste, neither prayers nor entreaties could move her. Hers was not a
+case of vendible charms, it was le bon appetit merely, an Epicurean
+virtue. The Grand Prior of Vendome had reason to comprehend this trait
+in her character.
+
+The worthy Grand Prior was an impetuous wooer, and he saw with great
+sorrow that Ninon preferred the Counts de Miossens and de Palluan to
+his clerical attractions. He complained bitterly to Ninon, but instead
+of being softened by his reproaches, she listened to the voice of some
+new rival when the Grand Prior thought his turn came next. This put
+him in a great rage and he resolved to be revenged, and this is the
+way he fancied he could obtain it. One day shortly after he had left
+Ninon's house, she noticed on her dressing table a letter, which she
+opened to find the following effusion:
+
+"Indigne de mes feux, indigne de mes larmes,
+Je renonce sans peine a tes faibles appas;
+  Mon amour te pretait des charmes,
+  Ingrate, que tu n'avais pas."
+
+Or, as might be said substantially in English:
+
+Unworthy my flame, unworthy a tear,
+I rejoice to renounce thy feeble allure;
+  My love lent thee charms that endear,
+  Which, ingrate, thou couldst not procure.
+
+Instead of being offended, Ninon took this mark of unreasonable spite
+good naturedly, and replied by another quatrain based upon the same
+rhyme as that of the disappointed suitor:
+
+"Insensible a tes feux, insensible a tes larmes,
+Je te vois renoncer a mes faibles appas;
+  Mais si l'amour prete des charmes,
+  Pourquoi n'en empruntais-tu pas."
+
+Which is as much as to say in English:
+
+Caring naught for thy flame, caring naught for thy tear,
+I see thee renounce my feeble allure;
+  But if love lends charms that endear,
+  By borrowing thou mightst some procure.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+Effect of Her Mother's Death
+
+
+It is not to be wondered at that a girl under such tutelage should
+abandon herself wholly, both mind and body, to a philosophy so
+contrary in its principles and practices to that which her mother had
+always endeavored to instill into her young mind. The father was
+absent fighting for Heaven alone knew which faction into which France
+was broken up, there were so many of them, and the mother and daughter
+lived apart, the disparity in their sentiments making it impossible
+for them to do otherwise. For this reason, Ninon was practically her
+own mistress, and not interfered with because the husband and wife
+could not agree upon any definite course of life for her to follow.
+Ninon's heart, however, had not lost any of its natural instincts, and
+she loved her mother sincerely, a trait in her which all Paris learned
+with astonishment when her mother was taken down with what proved to
+be a fatal illness.
+
+Madame de l'Enclos, separated from both her husband and daughter, and
+devoting her life to pious exercises, acquired against them the
+violent prejudices natural in one who makes such a sacrifice upon the
+altar of sentiment. The worldly life of her daughter gave birth in her
+mind to an opinion which she deemed the natural consequence of it.
+The love of pleasure, in her estimation, had destroyed every vestige
+of virtue in her daughter's soul and her neglect of her religious
+duties had converted her into an unnatural being.
+
+But she was agreeably diverted from her ill opinion when her malady
+approached a dangerous stage. Ninon flew to heir mother's side as soon
+as she heard of it, and without becoming an enemy of her philosophy of
+pleasure, she felt it incumbent upon her to suspend its practice.
+Friendship, liaisons, social duties, pleasure, everything ceased to
+amuse her or give her any satisfaction. The nursing of her sick mother
+engaged her entire attention, and her fervor in this dutiful
+occupation astonished Madame de l'Enclos and softened her heart to the
+extent of acknowledging her error and correcting her estimate of her
+daughter's character. She loved her daughter devotedly and was happy
+in the knowledge that she was as devotedly loved. But this was not the
+kind of happiness that could prolong her days.
+
+Notwithstanding all her philosophy, Ninon could not bear the spectacle
+presented by her dying parent. Her soul was rent with a grief which
+she did not conceal, unashamed that philosophy was impotent to
+restrain an exhibition of such a natural weakness. Moreover, her dying
+mother talked to her long and earnestly, and with her last breath gave
+her loving counsel that sank deep into her heart, already softened by
+an uncontrollable sorrow and weakened by long vigils.
+
+Scarcely had Madame de l'Enclos closed her eyes upon the things of
+earth, than Ninon conceived the project of withdrawing from the world
+and entering a convent. The absence of her father left her absolute
+mistress of her conduct, and the few friends who reached her, despite
+her express refusal to see any one, could not persuade her to alter
+her determination. Ninon, heart broken, distracted and desolate, threw
+herself bodily into an obscure convent in the suburbs of Paris,
+accepting it, in the throes of her sorrow, as her only refuge and home
+on earth.
+
+Saint-Evremond, in a letter to the Duke d'Olonne, speaks of the
+sentiment which is incentive to piety:
+
+"There are some whom misfortunes have rendered devout through a
+certain kind of pity for themselves, a secret piety, strong enough to
+dispose men to lead more religious lives."
+
+Scarron, one of Ninon's closest friends, in his Epistle to Sarrazin,
+thus alludes to this conventual escapade:
+
+"Puis j'aurais su * * *
+* * * * * * * * * *
+* * * * * * * * * *
+Ce que l'on dit du bel et saint exemple
+Que la Ninon donne a tous les mondains,
+En se logeant avecque les nonais,
+Combien de pleurs la pauvre jouvencelle
+A repandus quand sa mere, sans elle,
+Cierges brulants et portant ecussons,
+Pretres chantant leurs funebres chanson,
+Voulut aller de linge enveloppee
+Servir aux vers d'une franche lippee."
+
+Which, translated into reasonable English, is as much as saying:
+
+But I might have known * * *
+* * * * * * * * * *
+* * * * * * * * * *
+What they say of the example, so holy, so pure,
+That Ninon gives to worldlings all,
+By dwelling within a nunnery's wall.
+How many tears the poor lorn maid
+Shed, when her mother, alone, unafraid,
+Mid flaming tapers with coats of arms,
+Priests chanting their sad funereal alarms,
+Went down to the tomb in her winding sheet
+To serve for the worms a mouthful sweet.
+
+But the most poignant sorrow of the human heart is assuaged by time.
+Saint-Evremond and Marion de Lormes, Richelieu's "belle amie,"
+expected to profit by the calm which they knew would not be long in
+stealing over the heart of their friend. Marion, however, despaired of
+succeeding through her own personal influence, and enlisted the
+sympathies of Saint-Evremond, who knew Ninon's heart too well to
+imagine for a moment that the mournful, monotonous life she had
+embraced would satisfy her very long. It was something to be admitted
+to her presence and talk over matters, a privilege they were accorded
+after some demur. The first step toward ransoming their friend was
+followed by others until they finally made great strides through her
+resolution. They brought her back in triumph to the world she had
+quitted through a species of "frivolity," so they called it, of which
+she was never again guilty as long as she lived.
+
+This episode in Ninon's life is in direct contrast with one which
+occurred when the Queen Regent, Anne of Austria, listening to the
+complaints of her jealous maids of honor, attempted to dispose of
+Ninon's future by immuring her in a convent. Ninon's celebrity
+attained such a summit, and her drawing rooms became so popular among
+the elite of the French nobility and desirable youth, that sad inroads
+were made in the entourage of the Court, nothing but the culls of
+humanity being left for the ladies who patronized the royal functions.
+In addition to this, she excited the envy and jealousy of a certain
+class of women, whom Ninon called "Jansensists of love," because they
+practiced in public the puritanic virtues which they did not even have
+tact enough to render agreeable. It is conceivable that Ninon's
+brilliant attractions, not to say seductive charms, and her
+unparalleled power to attract to her society the brightest and best
+men of the nation, engendered the most violent jealousy and hatred of
+those whose feebler charms were ignored and relegated to the
+background. The most bitter complaints and accusations were made
+against her to the Queen Regent, who was beset on all sides by loud
+outcries against the conduct of a woman whom they were powerless to
+imitate, until, to quiet their clamors, she deemed it her duty to act.
+
+Anne of Austria accordingly sent Ninon, by special messenger, a
+peremptory order to withdraw to a convent, giving her the power of
+selection. At first Anne intended to send her to the convent of
+Repentant Girls (Filles Repenties), but the celebrated Bauton, one of
+the Oiseaux des Tournelles, who loved a good joke as well as he did
+Ninon, told her that such a course would excite ridicule because Ninon
+was neither a girl nor a repentant (ni fille, ni repentie), for which
+reason, the order was changed leaving Ninon to her own choice of a
+prison.
+
+Ninon knew the source of the order, and foresaw that her numerous
+distinguished admirers would not have any difficulty in protecting
+her, and persuading the Queen Regent to rescind her order, and
+therefore gave herself no concern, receiving the order as a
+pleasantry.
+
+"I am deeply sensible of the goodness of the court in providing for my
+welfare and in permitting me to select my place of retreat, and
+without hesitation, I decide in favor of the Grands Cordeliers."
+
+Now it so happened that the Grands Cordeliers was a monastery
+exclusively for men, and from which women were rigidly excluded.
+Moreover, the morals of the holy brotherhood was not of the best, as
+the writers of their history during that period unanimously testify.
+M. de Guitaut, the captain of the Queen's guard, who had been
+intrusted with the message, happened to be one of the "Birds," and he
+assured the Regent that it was nothing but a little pleasantry on the
+part of Ninon, who merited a thousand marks of approval and
+commendation for her sterling and brilliant qualities of mind and
+heart rather than punishment or even censure.
+
+The only comment made by the Queen Regent was: "Fie, the nasty
+thing!" accompanied by a fit of laughter. Others of the "Birds" came
+to the rescue, among them the Duc d'Enghien, who was known not to
+value his esteem for women lightly. The matter was finally dropped,
+Anne of Austria finding means to close the mouths of the envious.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+Her Increasing Popularity
+
+
+Ninon's return to the gayeties of her drawing rooms was hailed with
+loud acclamations from all quarters. The envy and jealousy of her
+female enemies, the attempt to immure her in a convent, and her
+selection of the Grands Cordeliers as her place of retreat, brought
+her new friends and admirers through the notoriety given her, and all
+Paris resounded with the fame of her spirit, her wit, and her
+philosophy.
+
+Ladies of high rank sought admission into her charming circle, many of
+them, it is to be imagined, because they possessed exaggerated ideas
+of her influence at court. Had she not braved the Queen Regent with
+impunity? Her drawing rooms soon became the center of attraction and
+were nightly crowded with the better part of the brilliant society of
+Paris. Ninon was the acknowledged guide and leader, and all submitted
+to her sway without the slightest envy or jealousy, and it may also be
+said, without the slightest compunctions or remorse of conscience.
+
+The affair with the Queen Regent had one good effect, it separated the
+desirable from the undesirable in the social scale, compelling the
+latter to set up an establishment of their own as a counter
+attraction, and as their only hope of having any society at all. They
+established a "little court" at the Hotel Rambouillet, where
+foppishness was a badge of distinction, and where a few narrow minded,
+starched moralists, poisoned metaphysics and turned the sentiments of
+the heart into a burlesque by their affectation and their unrefined,
+even vulgar attempts at gallantry. They culled choice expressions and
+epigrams from the literature of the day, employing their memories to
+conceal their paucity of original wit, and practised upon their
+imaginations to obtain a salacious philosophy, which consisted of
+sodden ideas, flat in their expression, stale and unattractive in
+their adaptation.
+
+Ninon's coterie was the very opposite, consisting as it did of the
+very flower of the nobility and the choicest spirits of the age, who
+banished dry and sterile erudition, and sparkled with the liveliest
+wit and polite accomplishments. There were some who eluded the
+vigilance of Ninon's shrewd scrutiny, and made their way into her
+inner circle, but they were soon forced to abandon their pretensions
+by their inability to maintain any standing among a class of men who
+were so far beyond them in rank and attainments.
+
+Not long after her return to the pleasures of society, after the
+convent episode, Ninon was called upon to mourn the demise of her
+father. M. de l'Enclos was one of the fortunate men of the times who
+escaped the dangers attendant upon being on the wrong side in
+politics. For some inscrutable reason, he took sides with Cardinal de
+Retz, and on that account was practically banished from Paris and
+compelled to be satisfied with the rough annoyances of camp life
+instead of being able to put in practice the pleasant precepts of his
+philosophy. He was finally permitted to return to Paris with his head
+safe upon his shoulders, and flattered himself with the idea that he
+could now make up for lost time, promising himself to enjoy to the
+full the advantages offered by his daughter's establishment. He
+embraced his daughter with the liveliest pleasure imaginable, taking
+upon himself all the credit for her great reputation as due to his
+efforts and to his philosophical training. He was flattered at the
+success of his lessons and entered upon a life of joyous pleasure with
+as much zest as though in the bloom of his youth. It proved too much
+for a constitution weakened by the fatigues of years of arduous
+military campaigns and he succumbed, the flesh overpowered by the
+spirit, and took to his bed, where he soon reached a condition that
+left his friends no hope of his recuperation.
+
+Aware that the end was approaching, he sent for his daughter, who
+hastened to his side and shed torrents of tears. But he bade her
+remember the lessons she had learned from his philosophy, and wishing
+to give her one more lesson, said in an almost expiring voice:
+
+"Approach nearer, Ninon; you see nothing left me but a sad memory of
+the pleasures that are leaving me. Their possession was not of long
+duration, and that is the only complaint I have to make against
+nature. But, alas! my regrets are vain. You who must survive me,
+utilize precious time, and have no scruples about the quantity of your
+pleasures, but only of their quality."
+
+Saying which, he immediately expired. The philosophical security
+exhibited by her father in his very last moments, inspired Ninon with
+the same calmness of spirit, and she bore his loss with equanimity,
+disdaining to exhibit any immoderate grief lest she dishonor his
+memory and render herself an unworthy daughter and pupil.
+
+The fortune left her by her father was not so considerable as Ninon
+had expected. It had been very much diminished by extravagance and
+speculation, but as she had in mind de la Rochefoucauld's maxim:
+"There are some good marriages, but no delicious ones," and did not
+contemplate ever wearing the chains of matrimony, she deposited her
+fortune in the sinking funds, reserving an income of about eight
+thousand livres per annum as sufficient to maintain her beyond the
+reach of want. From this time on she abandoned herself to a life of
+pleasure, well regulated, it must be confessed, and in strict
+accordance with her Epicurean ideas. Her light heartedness increased
+with her love and devotion to pleasure, which is not astonishing, as
+there are privileged souls who do not lose their tender emotions by
+such a pursuit, though those souls are rare. Ninon's unrestrained
+freedom, and the privilege she claimed to enjoy all the rights which
+men assumed, did not give her the slightest uneasiness. It was her
+lovers who became anxious unless they regulated their love according
+to the rules she established for them to follow, rules which it can
+not be denied, were held in as much esteem then as nowadays. The
+following anecdote will serve as an illustration:
+
+The Marquis de la Chatre had been one of her lovers for an
+unconscionably long period, but never seemed to cool in his fidelity.
+Duty, however, called him away from Ninon's arms, but he was
+distressed with the thought that his absence would be to his
+disadvantage. He was afraid to leave her lest some rival should appear
+upon the scene and dispossess him in her affections. Ninon vainly
+endeavored to remove his suspicions.
+
+"No, cruel one," he said, "you will forget and betray me. I know your
+heart, it alarms me, crushes me. It is still faithful to my love, I
+know, and I believe you are not deceiving me at this moment. But that
+is because I am with you and can personally talk of my love. Who will
+recall it to you when I am gone? The love you inspire in others,
+Ninon, is very different from the love you feel. You will always be in
+my heart, and absence will be to me a new fire to consume me; but to
+you, absence is the end of affection. Every object I shall imagine I
+see around you will be odious to me, but to you they will be
+interesting."
+
+Ninon could not deny that there was truth in the Marquis' logic, but
+she was too tender to assassinate his heart which she knew to be so
+loving. Being a woman she understood perfectly the art of
+dissimulation, which is a necessary accomplishment, a thousand
+circumstances requiring its exercise for the sake of her security,
+peace, and comfort. Moreover, she did not at the moment dream of
+deceiving him; there was no present occasion, nobody else she had in
+mind. Ninon thought rapidly, but could not find any reason for
+betraying him, and therefore assured him of her fidelity and
+constancy.
+
+Nevertheless, the amorous Marquis, who might have relied upon the
+solemn promise of his mistress, had it not been for the intense fears
+which were ever present in his mind, and becoming more violent as the
+hour for his departure drew nearer, required something more
+substantial than words. But what could he exact? Ah! an idea, a novel
+expedient occurred to his mind, one which he imagined would restrain
+the most obstinate inconstancy.
+
+"Listen, Ninon, you are without contradiction a remarkable woman. If
+you once do a thing you will stand to it. What will tend to quiet my
+mind and remove my fears, ought to be your duty to accept, because my
+happiness is involved and that is more to you than love; it is your
+own philosophy, Ninon. Now, I wish you to put in writing that you will
+remain faithful to me, and maintain the most inviolable fidelity. I
+will dictate it in the strongest form and in the most sacred terms
+known to human promises. I will not leave you until I have obtained
+such a pledge of your constancy, which is necessary to relieve my
+anxiety, and essential to my repose."
+
+Ninon vainly argued that this would be something too strange and
+novel, foolish, in fact, the Marquis was obstinate and finally
+overcame her remonstrances. She wrote and signed a written pledge
+such as no woman had ever executed, and fortified with this pledge,
+the Marquis hastened to respond to the call of duty.
+
+Two days had scarcely elapsed before Ninon was besieged by one of the
+most dangerous men of her acquaintance. Skilled in the art of love, he
+had often pressed his suit, but Ninon had other engagements and would
+not listen to him. But now, his rival being out of the field, he
+resumed his entreaties and increased his ardor. He was a man to
+inspire love, but Ninon resisted, though his pleading touched her
+heart. Her eyes at last betrayed her love and she was vanquished
+before she realized the outcome of the struggle.
+
+What was the astonishment of the conqueror, who was enjoying the
+fruits of his victory, to hear Ninon exclaim in a breathless voice,
+repeating it three times: "Ah! Ah! le bon billet qu'a la Chatre!" (Oh,
+the fine bond that la Chatre has.)
+
+Pressed for an explanation of the enigma, Ninon told him the whole
+story, which was too good to keep secret, and soon the "billet de la
+Chatre" became, in the mouth of everybody, a saying applied to things
+upon which it is not wise to rely. Voltaire, to preserve so charming
+an incident, has embalmed it in his comedy of la Prude, act I, scene
+III. Ninon merely followed the rule established by Madame de Sevigne:
+"Les femmes ont permission d'etre faibles, et elles se servent sans
+scrupule de ce privilege."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+Ninon's Friendships
+
+
+Mademoiselle de l'Enclos never forgot a friend in a lover, indeed, the
+trait that stands out clear and strong in her character, is her whole
+hearted friendship for the men she loved, and she bestowed it upon
+them as long as they lived, for she outlived nearly all of them, and
+cherished their memories afterward. As has been said, Ninon de
+l'Enclos was Epicurean in the strictest sense, and did not rest her
+entire happiness on love alone, but included a friendship which went
+to the extent of making sacrifices. The men with whom she came in
+contact from time to time during her long life, were nothing to her
+from a pecuniary point of view, for she possessed an income
+sufficiently large to satisfy her wants and to maintain the social
+establishment she never neglected.
+
+There was never, either directly or indirectly, any money
+consideration asked or expected in payment of her favors, and the man
+who would have dared offer her money as a consideration for anything,
+would have met with scorn and contempt and been expelled from her
+house and society without ever being permitted to regain either. The
+natural wants of her heart and mind, and what she was pleased to call
+the natural gratifications of physical wants, were her mentors, and to
+them she listened, never dreaming of holding them at a pecuniary
+value.
+
+One of her dearest friends was Scarron, once the husband of Madame de
+Maintenon, the pious leader of a debased court and the saintly
+mistress of the king of France. In his younger days, Scarron
+contributed largely to the pleasures of the Oiseaux des Tournelles,
+the ecclesiastical collar he then wore not being sufficient to prevent
+his enjoying worldly pleasures.
+
+In the course of time Scarron fell ill, and was reduced to a dreadful
+condition, no one coming to his succor but Ninon. Like a tender,
+compassionate friend, she sympathized deeply with him, when he was
+carried to the suburb Saint Germain to try the effects of the baths as
+an alleviation of his pains. Scarron did not complain, on the
+contrary, he was cheerful and always gay even when suffering tortures.
+There was little left of him, however, but an indomitable spirit
+burning in a crushed tenement of mortal clay. Not being able to come
+to her, Ninon went to him, and passed entire days at his side. Not
+only that, she brought her friends with her and established a small
+court around his bed, thus cheering him in his pain and doing him a
+world of good, which finally enabled his spirit to triumph over his
+mortal shell.
+
+Instances might be multiplied, enough to fill a volume, of her
+devotion to her friends, whom she never abandoned and whom she was
+always ready with purse and counsel to aid in their difficulties. A
+curious instance is that of Nicolas Vauquelin, sieur de Desyvetaux,
+whom she missed from her circle for several days. Aware that he had
+been having some family troubles, and that his fortune was menaced,
+she became alarmed, thinking that perhaps some misfortune had come
+upon him, for which reason she resolved to seek him and help him out
+of his difficulties. But Ninon was mistaken in supposing that so wise
+and gay an Epicurean could be crushed by any sorrow or trouble.
+Desyvetaux was enjoying himself in so singular a fashion that it is
+worth telling.
+
+This illustrious Epicurean, finding one night a young girl in a
+fainting condition at his door, brought her into his house to succor
+her, moved by an impulse of humanity. But as soon as she had recovered
+her senses, the philosopher's heart was touched by her beauty. To
+please her benefactor the girl played several selections on a harp and
+accompanied the instrument with a charming and seductive voice.
+
+Desyvetaux, who was a passionate admirer of music, was captivated by
+this accomplishment, and suddenly conceived the desire to spend the
+rest of his days in the company of this charming singer. It was not
+difficult for a girl who had been making it her business to frequent
+the wineshops of the suburbs with a brother, earning a precarious
+living by singing and playing on the harp, to accept such a
+proposition, and consent to bestow happiness upon an excessively
+amorous man, who offered to share with her a luxurious and tranquil
+life in one of the finest residences in the suburb Saint Germain.
+
+Although most of his life had been passed at court as the governor of
+M. de Vendome, and tutor of Louis XIII, he had always desired to lead
+a life of peace and quiet in retirement. The pleasures of a sylvan
+life which he had so often described in his lectures, ended by leading
+his mind in that direction. The young girl he found on his doorstep
+had offered him his first opportunity to have a Phyllis to his Corydon
+and he eagerly embraced it. Both yielded to the fancy, she dressed in
+the garb of a shepherdess, he playing the role of Corydon at the age
+of seventy years.
+
+Sometimes stretched out on a carpet of verdure, he listened to the
+enchanting music she drew from her instrument, or drank in the sweet
+voice of his shepherdess singing melodious pastorals. A flock of
+birds, charmed with this harmony, left their cages to caress with
+their wings, Dupuis' harp, or intoxicated with joy, fluttered down
+into her bosom. This little gallantry in which they had been trained
+was a delicious spectacle to the shepherd philosopher and intoxicated
+his senses. He fancied he was guiding with his mistress innumerable
+bands of intermingled sheep; their conversation was in tender eclogues
+composed by them both extemporaneously, the attractive surroundings
+inspiring them with poetry.
+
+Ninon was amazed when she found her "bon homme," as she called him, in
+the startlingly original disguise of a shepherd, a crook in his hand,
+a wallet hanging by his side, and a great flapping straw hat, trimmed
+with rose colored silk on his head. Her first impression was that he
+had taken leave of his senses, and she was on the point of shedding
+tears over the wreck of a once brilliant mind, when Desyvetaux,
+suspending his antics long enough to look about him, perceived her and
+rushed to her side with the liveliest expressions of joy. He removed
+her suspicions of his sanity by explaining his metamorphosis in a
+philosophical fashion:
+
+"You know, my dear Ninon, there are certain tastes and pleasures which
+find their justification in a certain philosophy when they bear all
+the marks of moral innocence. Nothing can be said against them but
+their singularity. There are no amusements less dangerous than those
+which do not resemble those generally indulged in by the multitude."
+
+Ninon was pleased with the amiable companion of her old friend. Her
+figure, her mental attainments, and her talents enchanted her, and
+Desyvetaux, who appeared in a ridiculous light when she first saw him
+in his masquerade, now seemed to her to be on the road to happiness.
+She made no attempt to persuade him to return to his former mode of
+life, which she could not avoid at this moment, however, as
+considering more agreeable than the new one he had adopted. But what
+could she offer in the way of superior seductive pleasures to a pair
+who had tasted pure and natural enjoyments? The vain amusements and
+allurements of the world have no sympathy with anything but
+dissipation, in which, the mind, yielding to the fleeting seductions
+of art, leaves the heart empty as soon as the illusion disappears.
+
+The strange conduct of Desyvetaux gave birth to numerous reflections
+of this nature in Ninon's mind, but she did not cease to be his
+friend, on the contrary, she entered into the spirit of his simple
+life and visited him from time to time to enjoy the spectacle of such
+a tender masquerade which Desyvetaux continued up to the time of his
+death. It gave Mademoiselle Dupuis nearly as much celebrity as her
+lover attained, for when the end came, she obeyed his desire to play a
+favorite dance on her harp, to enable his soul to take flight in the
+midst of its delicious harmony. It should be mentioned, that
+Desyvetaux wore in his hat as long as he lived, a yellow ribbon, "out
+of love for the gentle Ninon who gave it to me."
+
+Socrates advises persons of means to imitate the swans, which,
+realizing the benefit of an approaching death, sing while in their
+death agony. The Abbe Brantome relates an interesting story of the
+death of Mademoiselle de Lineul, the elder, one of the queen's
+daughters, which resembles that of Desyvetaux.
+
+"When the hour of her death had arrived," says Brantome, "Mademoiselle
+sent for her valet, Julian, who could play the violin to perfection.
+'Julian,' quoth she, 'take your violin and play on it until you see me
+dead--for I am going--the Defeat of the Swiss, and play it as well as
+you know how; and when you shall reach the words "tout est perdu,"
+play it over four or five times as piteously as you can:' which the
+other did. And when he came to 'tout est perdu' she sang it over
+twice; then turning to the other side of the couch, she said to those
+who stood around: 'Tout est perdu a ce coup et a bon escient;' all is
+lost this time, sure.'"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+Some of Ninon's Lovers
+
+
+Notwithstanding her love of pleasure, and her admiration for the
+society of men, Ninon was never vulgar or common in the distribution
+of her favors, but selected those upon whom she decided to bestow
+them, with the greatest care and discrimination. As has been already
+said, she discovered in early life, that women were at a discount, and
+she resolved to pursue the methods of men in the acceptance or
+rejection of friendship, and in distributing her favors and
+influences. As she herself declared:
+
+"I soon saw that women were put off with the most frivolous and unreal
+privileges, while every solid advantage was retained by the stronger
+sex. From that moment I determined on abandoning my own sex and
+assuming that of the men."
+
+So well did she carry out this determination that she was regarded by
+her masculine intimates as one of themselves, and whatever pleasures
+they enjoyed in her society, were enjoyed upon the same principle as
+they would have delighted in a good dinner, an agreeable theatrical
+performance, or exquisite music.
+
+To her and to all her associates, love was a taste emanating from the
+senses, a blind sentiment which assumes no merit in the object which
+gives it birth, as is the case of hunger, thirst, and the like. In a
+word, it was merely a caprice the domination of which depends upon
+ourselves, and is subject to the discomforts and regrets attendant
+upon repletion or indulgence.
+
+After her first experience with de Coligny, which was an abandonment
+of her cold philosophy for a passionate attachment she thought would
+endure forever, Ninon cast aside all that element in love which is
+connected with passion and extravagant sentiment, and adhered to her
+philosophical understanding of it, and kept it in its proper place in
+the category of natural appetites. To illustrate her freedom from
+passionate attachments in the distribution of her favors, the case of
+her friend Scarron will give an insight into her philosophy. Scarron
+had received numerous favors from her, and being one of her select
+"Birds," who had always agreed with la Rochefoucauld that, "There are
+many good marriages but none that are delicious," she assumed that her
+friend would never entangle himself in the bonds of matrimony. But he
+did and to his sorrow.
+
+When Ninon had returned to Paris after a long sojourn with the Marquis
+de Villarceaux, she found to her astonishment that Scarron had married
+the amiable but ignoble Mademoiselle d'Aubigne. This young lady was in
+a situation which precluded all hope of her ever attaining social
+eminence, but aspiring to rise, notwithstanding her common origin, she
+married Scarron as the first step upon the social ladder. Without
+realizing that this woman was to become the celebrated Madame de
+Maintenon, mistress of the king and the real power behind the throne,
+Ninon took her in charge and they soon became the closest and most
+affectionate friends, always together even occupying the same bed.
+Ninon's tender friendship for the husband continued in spite of his
+grave violation of the principles of his accepted philosophy, and when
+he was deserted, sick and helpless, she went to him and brought him
+cheer and comfort.
+
+Ninon was so little imbued with jealousy that when she discovered a
+liaison between her own lover, Marquis de Villarceaux and her friend,
+Madame Scarron, she was not even angry. The two were carrying on their
+amour in secret, and as they supposed without Ninon's knowledge, whose
+presence, indeed, they deemed a restraint upon their freedom of
+action. The Marquis considered himself a traitor to Ninon, and Madame
+Scarron stood in fear of her reproaches for her betrayal. But Ninon,
+instead of taking either of them to task, as she would have been
+justified in doing, gently remonstrated with them for their secrecy,
+and by her kindness reassured both of them and relieved them from
+their embarrassment, making them understand that she desired nothing
+so much as their happiness. Both the Marquis and his mistress made
+Ninon their confidante, and thereafter lived in perfect amity until
+the lovers grew tired of each other, Madame Scarron aiming higher than
+an ordinary Marquis, now that she saw her way clear to mounting the
+social ladder.
+
+It was perhaps due to Ninon's kindness in the Villarceaux episode,
+that enabled her to retain the friendship of Madame de Maintenon when
+the latter had reached the steps of the throne. The mistress of
+royalty endeavored to persuade Ninon to appear at court but there was
+too great a difference in temper and constitution between the two
+celebrated women to admit of any close relations. Ninon made use of
+the passion of love for the purpose of pleasure only, while her more
+exalted rival made it subservient to her ambitious projects, and did
+not hesitate with that view to cloak her licentious habits beneath the
+mantle of religion, and add hypocrisy to frailty. The income of Ninon
+de l'Enclos was agreeably and judiciously spent in the society of men
+of wit and letters, but the revenues of the Marchioness de Maintenon
+were squandered on the useless decoration of her own person, or
+hoarded for the purpose of elevating into rank and notice an
+insignificant family, who had no other claim to such distinction than
+that derived from the easy honesty of a female relation, and the
+dissolute extravagance of a vain and licentious sovereign.
+
+While Ninon de l'Enclos was receiving and encouraging the attentions
+of the most distinguished men of her time, literati, nobles, warriors,
+statesmen, and sages, in her house in the Rue des Tournelles, the
+mistress of the sovereign, the dear friend who had betrayed her to the
+Marquis de Villarceaux, was swallowing, at Versailles, the adulations
+of degraded courtiers of every rank and profession. There were met
+together there the vain and the ambitious, the designing and the
+foolish, the humblest and the proudest of those who, whether proud or
+humble, or ambitious, or vain, or crafty, were alike the devoted
+servants of the monarch or the monarch's mistress--princes, cardinals,
+bishops, dukes and every kind of nobility, excisemen and priests,
+keepers of the royal conscience and necessary--all ministers of filth,
+each in his degree, from the secretaries of state to the lowest
+underlings in office--clerks of the ordnance, victualing, stamps,
+customs, colonies, and postoffice, farmers and receivers general,
+judges and cooks, confessors and every other caterer to the royal
+appetite. This was the order of things that Ninon de l'Enclos was
+contending against, and that she succeeded by methods that must be
+considered saintly compared with the others, stands recorded in the
+pages of history.
+
+After Ninon had suffered from the indiscretion of the lover who made
+public the story of the famous pledge given la Chatre, she lost her
+fancy for the recreant, and though friendly, refused any closer tie.
+He knew that he had done Ninon an injury and begged to be reinstated
+in her favor. He was of charming manners and fascinating in his
+pleading, but he made no impression on her heart. She agreed to pardon
+him for his folly and declined to consider the matter further. Nor
+would she return to the conversation, although he persisted in
+referring to the matter as one he deeply regretted. When he was
+departing after Ninon had assured him of her pardon, she ran after him
+and called out as he was descending the stairs: "At least, Marquis,
+we have not been reconciled."
+
+Her good qualities were embalmed in the literature of the day, very
+few venturing to lampoon her. Those who did so were greeted with so
+much derisive laughter that they were ashamed to appear in society
+until the storm had blown over.
+
+M. de Tourielle, a member of the French Academy, and a very learned
+man, became enamored of her and his love-making assumed a curious
+phase. To show her that he was worthy of her consideration, he deemed
+it incumbent upon him to read her long dissertations on scientific
+subjects, and bored her incessantly with a translation of the orations
+of Demosthenes, which he intended dedicating to her in an elaborate
+preface. This was more than Ninon could bear with equanimity--a lover
+with so much erudition, and his prosy essays, appealed more to her
+sense of humor than to her sentiments of love, and he was laughed out
+of her social circle. This angered the Academician and he thought to
+revenge himself by means of an epigram in which he charged Ninon with
+admiring figures of rhetoric more than a sensible academic discourse
+full of Greek and Latin quotations. It would have proved the ruin of
+the poor man had Ninon not come to his rescue, and explained to him
+the difference between learning and love. After which he became
+sensible and wrote some very good books.
+
+It should be understood that Ninon had no secrets in which her merry
+and wise "Birds" did not share. She confided to them all her love
+affairs, gave them the names of her suitors, in fact, every wooer was
+turned over to this critical, select society, as a committee of
+investigation into quality and merit both of mind and body. In this
+way she was protected from the unworthy, and when she made a
+selection, they respected her freedom of choice, carefully guarding
+her lover and making him one of themselves after the fitful fever was
+over. They were all graduates in her school, good fellows, and had
+accepted Ninon's philosophy without question.
+
+Her lovers were always men of rank and station or of high talents, but
+she was caught once by the dazzle of a famous dancer named Pecour, who
+pleased her exceedingly, and who became the fortunate rival of the Duc
+de Choiseul, afterward a marshal of France. It happened that Choiseul
+was more remarkable for his valor than for his probity and solid
+virtues, and could not inspire in Ninon's heart anything but the
+sterile sentiments of esteem and respect. He was certainly worthy of
+these, but he was too cold in his amorous desires to please Ninon.
+
+"He is a very worthy gentleman," said she, "but he never gives me a
+chance to love him."
+
+The frequent visits of Pecour excited the jealousy of the warrior, but
+he did not dare complain, not knowing whether things had reached a
+climax and fearing that if he should mention the matter he might help
+them along instead of stopping them. One day, however, he attempted to
+goad his unworthy rival into some admission, and received a response
+that was enough to settle his doubts.
+
+Pecour was in the habit of wearing a costume much resembling that of
+the military dandies of the period. Choiseul meeting him in this
+equivocal garb, proceeded to be funny at his expense by putting to him
+all sorts of ironical and embarrassing questions. But Pecour felt all
+the vanity of a successful rival and was good natured. Then the Duke
+began to make sneering remarks which roused the dancer's anger.
+
+"Pray, what flag are you fighting under, and what body do you
+command?" asked Monseigneur with a sarcastic smile.
+
+Quick as a flash came the answer which gave the Duke an inkling into
+the situation.
+
+"Je commande un corps ou vous servez depuis longtemps," replied
+Pecour.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+Ninon's Lovers--Continued
+
+
+A counter attraction has been referred to in speaking of the Hotel
+Rambouillet, where a fashionable court was established for the purpose
+of drawing away from Ninon the elite who flocked to her standard.
+Mademoiselle de Scudery gives a fine description of this little court
+at Rambouillet in her romance, entitled "Cyrus." There was not and
+could not be any rivalry between the court in the Rue des Tournelles
+and that at Rambouillet, for the reason that Ninon's coterie consisted
+of men exclusively, while that of Rambouillet was thronged with women.
+But this, quite naturally, occasioned much envy and jealousy among the
+ladies who devised all sorts of entertainments to attract masculine
+society. One of their performances was the famous "Julia Garland," so
+named in honor of Mademoiselle de Rambouillet, who was known by the
+name of "Julie d'Angennes." Each one selected a favorite flower, wrote
+a sonnet in its praise, and when all were ready, they stood around
+Mademoiselle de Rambouillet in a circle and alternately recited the
+poem, the reward for the best one being the favor of some fair lady.
+Among those who were drawn to the Hotel Rambouillet by this pleasing
+entertainment was the Duke d'Enghien, afterward known as the "Great
+Conde," a prince of the highest renown as a victorious warrior. He
+was a great acquisition, and the Garland Play was repeated every night
+in the expectation that his pleasure would continue, and the constant
+attraction prove adequate to hold him. Once or twice, however, was
+sufficient for the Duke, its constant repetition becoming flat and
+tiresome. He did not scruple to express his dissatisfaction with a
+society that could not originate something new. He was a broad minded
+man, with a comprehensive knowledge, but had little taste for poetry
+and childish entertainments. But the good ladies of Rambouillet,
+unable to devise any other entertainment, persisted in their Garland
+Play, until the Duke's human nature rebelled at the monotony, and he
+begged his friends de Moissens and Saint-Evremond to suggest some
+relief. They immediately brought him in touch with the Birds of the
+Tournelles, with the result that he abandoned the Hotel Rambouillet
+and found scope for his social desires at Ninon's house and in her
+more attractive society. The conquest of his heart followed that of
+his intelligence, the hero of Rocroi being unable to resist a
+tenderness which is the glory of a lover and the happiness of his
+mistress.
+
+It is a curious fact, known to some, that all the heroes of Bellona
+are not expert in the wars of Venus, the strongest and most valiant
+souls being weak in combats in which valor plays an unimportant part.
+The poet Chaulieu says upon this point:
+
+"Pour avoir la valeur d'Hercule,
+On n'est pas oblige d'en avoir la vigueur."
+
+(To have the valor of Hercules, one need not have his vigor.)
+
+The young Prince was born to attain immortal glory on the field of
+Mars. To that all his training had tended, but notwithstanding his
+robust physique, and the indicia of great strength with which nature
+had endowed him, he was a weakling in the field of Venus. He came
+within the category of a Latin proverb with which Ninon was familiar:
+"Pilosus aut fortis, aut libidinosus." (A hairy man is either strong
+or sensual.) Wherefore, one day when Ninon was enjoying his society,
+she looked at him narrowly and exclaimed: "Ah, Monseigneur, il faut
+que vous soyez bien fort!" (Ah, Monseigneur, you must be very strong.)
+
+Notwithstanding this, the two dwelt together for a long time in
+perfect harmony, the intellectual benefit the Duke derived from the
+close intimacy being no less than the pleasure he derived from her
+affection. Naturally inclined to deserve the merit and esteem as well
+as the love of her admirers, Ninon used all the influence she
+possessed to regulate their lives and to inspire them with the true
+desire to perform faithfully the duties of their rank and station.
+What power over her intimates does not possess a charming woman
+disembarrassed of conventional prudery, but vested with grace, high
+sentiments, and mental attainments! It was through the gentle exercise
+of this power that the famous Aspasia graved in the soul of Pericles
+the seductive art of eloquent language, and taught him the most solid
+maxims of politics, maxims of which he made so noble a use.
+
+The young Duke, penetrated with love and esteem for Ninon, passed at
+her side every moment he could steal away from the profound studies
+and occupations required by his rank and position. Although he
+afterward became the Prince de Conde, the Lion of his time, and the
+bulwark of France, he never ceased expressing for her the liveliest
+gratitude and friendship. Whenever he met her equipage in the streets
+of Paris, he never failed to descend from his own and go to pay her
+the most affectionate compliments.
+
+The Prince de Marsillac, afterward the Duke de la Rochefoucauld, less
+philosophical then than later in life, and who prided himself on his
+acquaintance with all the vices and follies of youth, could not long
+withhold his admiration for the solid and estimable qualities he
+perceived in Ninon, whom he often saw in the company of the Duke
+d'Enghein. The result of his admiration was that he formed a tender
+attachment which lasted as long as he lived. It was Ninon who
+continued the good work begun by Madame de La Fayette, who confessed
+that her social relations with la Rochefoucauld had been the means of
+embellishing her mind, and that in compensation for this great service
+she had reformed his heart. Whatever share Madame de La Fayette may
+have had in reforming the heart of this great man, it is certain that
+Ninon de l'Enclos had much to do with reforming his morals and
+elevating his mind up to the point it is evident he reached, to judge
+from his "Maxims," in which the human heart is bared as with a scalpel
+in the most skilfully devised epigrams that never cease to hold the
+interest of every reader.
+
+Chapelle, the most celebrated voluptuary in Paris, did everything in
+his power to overcome Ninon's repugnance, but without success. There
+was nothing lacking in his mental attainments, for he was a poet of
+very high order, inimitable in his style; moreover, he was presentable
+in his person. Yet he could not make the slightest impression on
+Ninon's heart. He openly declared his love, and, receiving constant
+rebuffs, resolved to have revenge and overcome her resistance by
+punishing her. This he attempted to do in a very singular manner
+without regard to consistency.
+
+All Paris knew his verses in which he did not conceal his ardent love
+for Ninon, and in which were expressed the highest admiration for her
+estimable qualities and the depth of her philosophy. He now proceeded
+to take back everything good he had said about her and made fun of her
+love, her friendship, and her attainments. He ridiculed her in every
+possible manner, even charging up against her beauty, her age. A verse
+or so will enable the reader to understand his methods:
+
+"Il ne faut pas qu'on s'etonne,
+Si souvent elle raisonne
+De la sublime vertu
+Dont Platon fut revetu:
+Car a bien compter son age,
+Elle peut avoir vecu
+Avec ce grand personnage."
+
+Or, substantially in the English language:
+
+Let no one be surprised,
+If she should be advised
+Of the virtue most renowned
+In Plato to be found:
+For, counting up her age,
+She lived, 'tis reason sound,
+With that great personage.
+
+Ninon had no rancor in her heart toward any one, much less against an
+unsuccessful suitor, hence she only laughed at Chapelle's effusions
+and all Paris laughed with her. The truth is, la Rochefoucauld had
+impressed her mind with that famous saying of his: "Old age is the
+hell of women," and not fearing any hell, reference to her age neither
+alarmed her, nor caused the slightest flurry in her peaceful life. She
+was too philosophical to regret the loss of what she did not esteem of
+any value, and saw Chapelle slipping away from her with tranquillity
+of mind. It was only during moments of gayety when she abandoned
+herself to the play of an imagination always laughing and fertile,
+that she repeated the sacrilegious wish of the pious king of Aragon,
+who wished that he had been present at the moment of creation, when,
+among the suggestions he could have given Providence, he would have
+advised him to put the wrinkles of old age where the gods of Pagandom
+had located the feeble spot in Achilles.
+
+If Ninon ever felt a pang on account of the ungenerous conduct of
+Chapelle, his disciple, the illustrious Abbe de Chaulieu, the Anacreon
+of the age, who was called, when he made his entree into the world of
+letters "the poet of good fellowship," more than compensated her for
+the injury done by his pastor. The Abbe was the Prior of Fontenay,
+whither Ninon frequently accompanied Madame the Duchess de Bouillon
+and the Chevalier d'Orleans. The Duchess loved to joke at the expense
+of the Abbe, and twit him about his wasted talents, which were more
+adapted to love than to his present situation. It may be that the
+worthy Abbe, after thinking over seriously what was intended to be a
+mere pleasantry, concluded that Madame the Duchess was right, and that
+he possessed some talent in the direction of love. However that might,
+have been, it is certain that he had cast an observant and critical
+eye on Ninon, and he now openly paid her court, not unsuccessfully it
+should be known.
+
+The Abbe Gedoyn was her last lover so far as there is any account of
+her amours. The story is related by Remond, surnamed "The Greek," and
+must be taken with a grain of salt as Ninon was at that time
+seventy-nine years of age. This Remond, notwithstanding her age, had
+made violent love to Ninon without meeting with any success. Perhaps
+he was trying an experiment, being a learned man, anxious to ascertain
+when the fire of passion became extinct in the human breast. Ninon
+evidently suspected his ardent professions for she refused to listen
+to him and forbade his visits altogether.
+
+"I was the dupe of his Greek erudition," she explained, "so I banished
+him from my school. He was always wrong in his philosophy of the
+world, and was unworthy of as sensible a society as mine." She often
+added to this: "After God had made man, he repented him; I feel the
+same about Remond."
+
+But to return to the Abbe Gedoyn: he left the Jesuits with the Abbe
+Fraguier in 1694, that is to say, when Mademoiselle de l'Enclos was
+seventy-eight years of age. Both of them immediately made the
+acquaintance of Ninon and Madame de la Saliere, and, astonished at the
+profound merit they discovered, deemed it to their advantage to
+frequent their society for the purpose of adding to their talents
+something which the study of the cloister and experience in the king's
+cabinet itself had never offered them. Abbe Gedoyn became particularly
+attached to Mademoiselle de l'Enclos, whose good taste and
+intellectual lights he considered such sure and safe guides. His
+gratitude soon received the additions of esteem and admiration, and
+the young disciple felt the growth of desires which it is difficult to
+believe were real, but which became so pressing, that they revived in
+a heart nearly extinct a feeble spark of that fire with which it had
+formerly burned. Mademoiselle de l'Enclos refused to accede to the
+desires of her lover until she was fully eighty years of age, a term
+which did not cool the ardor of the amorous Abbe, who waited
+impatiently and on her eightieth birthday compelled his benefactress
+to keep her word.
+
+This incident recalls the testimony of a celebrated Countess of
+Salisbury, who was called to testify as an expert upon the subject of
+love in a celebrated criminal case that was tried over a hundred years
+ago in the English House of Lords. The woman correspondent was of an
+age when human passion is supposed to be extinct, and her counsel was
+attempting to prove that fact to relieve her from the charge. The
+testimony of the aged Countess, who was herself over seventy-five
+years of age, was very unsatisfactory, and the court put this question
+to her demanding an explicit answer.
+
+"Madame," he inquired, "at what age does the sentiment, passion, or
+desire of love cease in the female heart?"
+
+Her ladyship, who had lived long in high society and had been
+acquainted with all of the gallants and coquettes of the English court
+for nearly two generations, and who, herself, had sometimes been
+suspected of not having been averse to a little waywardness, looked
+down at her feet for a moment thoughtfully, then raising her eyes and
+locking squarely into those of the judge, answered:
+
+"My Lord, you will have to ask a woman older than I."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+The Villarceaux Affair
+
+
+Party politics raged around Ninon, her "Birds" being men of high rank
+and leaders with a large following. They were all her dearest friends,
+however, and no matter how strong personal passion was beyond her
+immediate presence, her circle was a neutral ground which no one
+thought of violating. It required her utmost influence and tenderness,
+however, to prevent outbreaks, but her unvarying sweetness of temper
+and disposition to all won their hearts into a truce for her sake.
+There were continual plots hatched against the stern rule of
+Richelieu, cabals and conspiracies without number were entered upon,
+but none of them resulted in anything. Richelieu knew very well what
+was going on, and he realized perfectly that Ninon's drawing-rooms
+were the center of every scheme concocted to drag him down and out of
+the dominant position he was holding against the combined nobility of
+France. But he never took a step toward suppressing her little court
+as a hot-bed of restlessness, he rather encouraged her by his silence
+and his indifference. Complaints of her growing coterie of uneasy
+spirits brought nothing from him but: "As long as they find amusements
+they are not dangerous." It was the forerunner of Napoleon's idea
+along the same line: "We must amuse the people; then they will not
+meddle with our management of the government."
+
+It is preposterous to think of this minister of peace, this restless
+prelate, half soldier, half pastor, meddling in all these cabals and
+seditious schemes organized for his own undoing, but nevertheless, he
+was really the fomenter of all of them. They were his devices for
+preventing the nobility from combining against him. He set one cabal
+to watch another, and there was never a conspiracy entered into that
+he did not prepare a similar conspiracy through his numerous secret
+agents and thus split into harmless nothings and weak attempts what
+would have been fatal to a continuance of his power. His tricks were
+nothing but the ordinary everyday methods of the modern ward
+politician making the dear people believe he is doing one thing when
+he is doing another. The stern man pitted one antagonist against
+another until both sued for peace and pardon. The nobility were honest
+in their likes and dislikes, but they did not understand double
+dealings and therefore the craft of Richelieu was not even suspected.
+
+Soon he corrupted by his secret intrigues the fidelity of the nobles
+and destroyed the integrity of the people. Then it was, as Cyrano
+says: "The world saw billows of scum vomited upon the royal purple and
+upon that of the church." Vile rhyming poets, without merit or virtue,
+sold their villainous productions to the enemies of the state to be
+used in goading the people to riot. Obscene and filthy vaudevilles,
+defamatory libels and infamous slanders were as common as bread, and
+were hurled back and forth as evidence of an internecine strife which
+was raging around the wearer of the Roman scarlet, who was thereby
+justified in continuing his ecclesiastical rule to prevent the
+wrecking of the throne.
+
+Ninon had always been an ardent supporter of the throne, and on that
+account imagined herself to be the enemy of Richelieu. There were many
+others who believed the same thing. They did not know that should the
+great Cardinal withdraw his hand for a single moment there would not
+be any more throne. When the human hornets around him became annoying
+he was accustomed to pretend to withdraw his sustaining hand, then the
+throne would tremble and totter, but he always came to the rescue;
+indeed, there was no other man who could rescue it. Cabals, plots, and
+conspiracies became so thick around Ninon at one period that she was
+frightened. Scarron's house became a rendezvous for the factious and
+turbulent. Madame Scarron was aiming at the throne, that is, she was
+opening the way to capture the heart of the king. This was too much
+for Ninon, who was more modest in her ambitions, and she fled
+frightened.
+
+The Marquis de Villarceaux received her with open arms at his chateau
+some distance from Paris, and that was her home for three years. There
+were loud protests at this desertion from her coterie of friends, and
+numerous dark threats were uttered against the gallant Marquis who had
+thus captured the queen of the "Birds," but Ninon explained her
+reason in such a plausible manner that their complaints subsided into
+good-natured growls. She hoped to prevent a political conflagration
+emanating from her social circle by scattering the firebrands, and she
+succeeded admirably. The Marquis was constantly with her, permitting
+nobody to intervene between them, and provided her with a perpetual
+round of amusements that made the time pass very quickly. Moreover,
+she was faithful to the Marquis, so wonderful a circumstance that her
+friend and admirer wrote an elegy upon that circumstance, in which he
+draws a picture of the pleasures of the ancients in ruralizing, but
+reproaches Ninon for indulging in a passion for so long a period to
+the detriment of her other friends and admirers. But Ninon was happy
+in attaining the summit of her desire, which was to defeat Madame
+Scarron, her rival in the affections of the Marquis, keeping the
+latter by her side for three whole years as has already been said.
+
+However delighted Ninon may have been with this arrangement, the
+Marquis, himself, did not repose upon a bed of roses. The jealousy of
+the "Birds" gave him no respite, he being obliged in honor to respond
+to their demands for an explanation of his conduct in carrying off
+their leader, generally insisting upon the so-called field of honor as
+the most appropriate place for giving a satisfactory answer. They even
+invaded his premises until they forced him to make them some
+concessions in the way of permission to see the object of their
+admiration, and to share in her society. The Marquis was proud of his
+conquest, the very idea of a three years' tete a tete with the most
+volatile heart in France being sufficient to justify him in boasting
+of his prowess, but whenever he ventured to do so a champion on the
+part of Ninon always stood ready to make him either eat his words or
+fight to maintain them.
+
+Madame Scarron, whom he so basely deserted for the superior charms of
+her friend Ninon, often gave him a bad quarter of an hour. When she
+became the mistress of the king and, as Madame de Maintenon, really
+held the reins of power, visions of the Bastile thronged his brain. He
+knew perfectly well that he had scorned the charms of Madame Scarron,
+who believed them irresistible, and that he deserved whatever
+punishment she might inflict upon him. She might have procured a
+lettre de cachet, had him immured in a dungeon or his head removed
+from his shoulders as easily as order a dinner, but she did nothing to
+gratify a spirit of revenge, utterly ignoring his existence.
+
+Added to these trifling circumstances, trifling in comparison with
+what follows, was the furious jealousy of his wife, Madame la
+Marquise. She was violently angry and did not conceal her hatred for
+the woman who had stolen her husband's affections. The Marquise was a
+trifle vulgar and common in her manner of manifesting her displeasure,
+but the Marquis, a very polite and affable gentleman, did not pay the
+slightest attention to his wife's daily recriminations, but continued
+to amuse himself with the charming Ninon.
+
+Under such circumstances each was compelled to have a separate social
+circle, the Marquis entertaining his friends with the adorable Ninon
+as the center of attraction, and Madame la Marquise doing her best to
+offer counter attractions. Somehow, Ninon drew around her all the most
+desirable partis among the flower of the nobility and wits, leaving
+the social circle managed by la Marquise to languish for want of
+stamina. It was a constant source of annoyance to the Marquise to see
+her rival's entertainments so much in repute and her own so poorly
+attended, and she was at her wits' end to devise something that would
+give them eclat. One of her methods, and an impromptu scene at one of
+her drawing-rooms, will serve to show the reason why Madame la
+Marquise was not in good repute and why she could not attract the
+elite of Paris to her entertainments.
+
+La Marquise was a very vain, moreover, a very ignorant woman, a
+"nouvelle riche" in fact, or what might be termed in modern parlance
+"shoddy," without tact, sense, or savoir faire. One day at a grand
+reception, some of her guests desired to see her young son, of whom
+she was very proud, and of whose talents and virtues she was always
+boasting. He was sent for and came into the presence accompanied by
+his tutor, an Italian savant who never left his side. From praising
+his beauty of person, they passed to his mental qualities. Madame la
+Marquise, enchanted at the caresses her son was receiving and aiming
+to create a sensation by showing off his learning, took it into her
+head to have his tutor put him through an examination in history.
+
+"Interrogate my son upon some of his recent lessons in history," said
+she to the tutor, who was not at all loth to show his own attainments
+by the brilliancy of his pupil.
+
+"Come, now, Monsieur le Marquis," said the tutor with alacrity, "Quem
+habuit successorem Belus rex Assiriorum?" (Whom did Belus, king of the
+Assyrians, have for successor?)
+
+It so happened that the tutor had taught the boy to pronounce the
+Latin language after the Italian fashion. Wherefore, when the lad
+answered "Ninum," who was really the successor of Belus, king of the
+Assyrians, he pronounced the last two letters "um" like the French
+nasal "on," which gave the name of the Assyrian king the same sound as
+that of Ninon de l'Enclos, the terrible bete noir of the jealous
+Marquise. This was enough to set her off into a spasm of fury against
+the luckless tutor, who could not understand why he should be so
+berated over a simple question and its correct answer. The Marquise
+not understanding Latin, and guided only by the sound of the answer,
+which was similar to the name of her hated rival, jumped at the
+conclusion that he was answering some question about Ninon de
+l'Enclos.
+
+"You are giving my son a fine education," she snapped out before all
+her guests, "by entertaining him with the follies of his father. From
+the answer of the young Marquis I judge of the impertinence of your
+question. Go, leave my sight, and never enter it again."
+
+The unfortunate tutor vainly protested that he did not comprehend her
+anger, that he meant no affront, that there was no other answer to be
+made than "Ninum," unfortunately, again pronouncing the word "Ninon,"
+which nearly sent the lady into a fit of apoplexy with rage at hearing
+the tabooed name repeated in her presence. The incensed woman carried
+the scene to a ridiculous point, refusing to listen to reason or
+explanation.
+
+"No, he said 'Ninon,' and Ninon it was."
+
+The story spread all over Paris, and when it reached Ninon, she
+laughed immoderately, her friends dubbing her "The successor of
+Belus." Ninon told Moliere the ridiculous story and he turned it to
+profit in one of his comedies in the character of Countess
+d'Escarbagnas.
+
+At the expiration of three years, peace had come to France after a
+fashion, the cabals were not so frequent and the rivalry between the
+factions not so bitter. Whatever differences there had been were
+patched up or smoothed over. Ninon's return to the house in the Rue
+des Tournelles was hailed with joy by her "Birds," who received her as
+one returned from the dead. Saint-Evremond composed an elegy beginning
+with these lines:
+
+Chere Philis, qu'etes vous devenues?
+Cet enchanteur qui vous a retenue
+Depuis trois ans par un charme nouveau
+Vous retient-il en quelque vieux chateau?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+The Marquis de Sevigne
+
+
+It has been attempted to cast odium upon the memory of Mademoiselle de
+l'Enclos because of her connection with the second Marquis de Sevigne,
+son of the celebrated Madame de Sevigne, whose letters have been read
+far and wide by those who fancy they can find something in them with
+reference to the morals and practices of the court of Versailles
+during her period.
+
+The Marquis de Sevigne, by a vitiated taste quite natural in men of
+weak powers, had failed to discover in a handsome woman, spirited,
+perhaps of too jealous a nature or disposition to be esteemed, the
+proper sentiments, or sentiments strong enough to retain his
+affections. He implored Ninon to aid him in preserving her affections
+and to teach him how to secure her love. Ninon undertook to give him
+instructions in the art of captivating women's hearts, to show him the
+nature of love and its operations, and to give him an insight into the
+nature of women. The Marquis profited by these lessons to fall in love
+with Ninon, finding her a thousand times more charming than his
+actress or his princess. Madame de Sevigne's letter referring to the
+love of her son for Ninon testifies by telling him plainly "Ninon
+spoiled your father," that this passion was not so much unknown to
+her as it was a matter of indifference.
+
+The young Chevalier de Vasse often gave brilliant receptions in honor
+of Ninon at Saint Cloud, which the Marquis de Sevigne always attended
+as the mutual friend of both. De Vasse was well acquainted with
+Ninon's peculiarities and knew that the gallantry of such a man as de
+Sevigne was a feeble means of retaining the affections of a heart that
+was the slave of nothing but its own fugitive desires. But he was a
+man devoted to his friends and, being Epicurean in his philosophy, he
+did not attempt to interfere with the affection he perceived growing
+between Ninon and his friend. It never occurred to the Marquis that he
+was guilty of a betrayal of friendship by paying court to Ninon, and
+the latter took the Marquis' attentions as a matter of course without
+considering the ingratitude of her conduct. She rather flattered
+herself at having been sufficiently attractive to capture a man of de
+Seine's family distinction. She had captured the heart of de Soigne,
+the father, and had received so many animadversions upon her conduct
+from Madame de Sevigne, that it afforded her great pleasure to "spoil"
+the son as she had the father.
+
+But her satisfaction was short-lived, for she had the chagrin to learn
+soon after her conquest that de Sevigne had perished on the field of
+honor at the hands of Chevalier d'Albret. Her sorrow was real, of
+course, but the fire lighted by the senses is small and not enduring,
+and when the occasion arises regret is not eternalized, besides there
+were others waiting with impatience. His successful rival out of the
+way, de Vasse supposed he had a clear field, but he did not attain his
+expected happiness. He was no longer pleasing to Ninon and she did no:
+hesitate to make him understand that he could never hope to win her
+heart. According to her philosophy there is nothing so shameful in a
+tender friendship as the art of dissimulation.
+
+As has been said, much odium has been cast upon Mademoiselle de
+l'Enclos in this de Sevigne matter. It all grew out of the dislike of
+Madame de Sevigne for a woman who attracted even her own husband and
+son from her side and heart, and for whom her dearest friends
+professed the most intimate attachment. Madame de Grignan, the proud,
+haughty daughter of the house of de Sevigne, did not scruple to array
+herself on the side of Mademoiselle de l'Enclos with Madame de
+Coulanges, another bright star among the noble and respectable
+families of France.
+
+"Women have the privilege of being weak," says Madame de Sevigne, "and
+they make use of that privilege without scruple."
+
+Women had never, before the time of Ninon, exercised their rights of
+weakness to such an unlimited extent. There was neither honor nor
+honesty to be found among them. They were common to every man who
+attracted their fancy without regard to fidelity to any one in
+particular. The seed sown by the infamous Catherine de Medici, the
+utter depravity of the court of Charles IX, and the profligacy of
+Henry IV, bore an astonishing supply of bitter fruit. The love of
+pleasure had, so to speak, carried every woman off her feet, and there
+was no limit to their abuses. Mademoiselle de l'Enclos, while devoting
+herself to a life of pleasure, followed certain philosophical rules
+and regulations which removed from the unrestrained freedom of the
+times the stigma of commonness and conferred something of
+respectability upon practices that nowadays would be considered
+horribly immoral, but which then were regarded as nothing uncommon,
+nay, were legitimate and proper. The cavaliers cut one another's
+throats for the love of God and in the cause of religion, and the
+women encouraged the arts, sciences, literature, and the drama, by
+conferring upon talent, wit, genius and merit favors which were deemed
+conducive as encouragements to the growth of intellect and
+spirituality.
+
+Ninon was affected by the spirit of the times, and being a woman, it
+was impossible for her to resist desire when aided by philosophy and
+force of example. Her intimacy with de Sevigne grew out of her attempt
+to teach a young, vigorous, passionate man how to gain the love of a
+cold-blooded, vain and conceited woman. Her letters will show the
+various stages of her desires as she went along vainly struggling to
+beat something like comprehension into the dull brain of a clod, who
+could not understand the simplest principle of love, or the smallest
+point in the female character. At last she resolved to use an argument
+that was convincing with the brightest minds with whom she had ever
+dealt, that is, the power of her own love, and if the Marquis had
+lived, perhaps he might have become an ornament to society and an
+honor to his family.
+
+To do this, however, she violated her compact with de Vasse, betrayed
+his confidence and opened the way for the animadversions of Madame de
+Sevigne. At that time de Sevigne was in love with an actress,
+Mademoiselle Champmele, but desired to withdraw his affections, or
+rather transfer them to a higher object, a countess, or a princess, as
+the reader may infer from his mother's hints in one of her letters to
+be given hereafter. To Ninon, therefore, he went for instruction and
+advice as to the best course to pursue to get rid of one love and on
+with a new. Madame de Sevigne and Madame de La Fayette vainly implored
+him to avoid Ninon as he would the pest. The more they prayed and
+entreated, the closer he came to Ninon until she became his ideal.
+Ninon, herself was captivated by his pleasant conversation, agreeable
+manners and seductive traits. She knew that he had had a love affair
+with Champmele, the actress, and when she began to obtain an
+ascendency over his mind, she wormed out of him all the letters he had
+ever received from the comedienne. Some say it was jealousy on Ninon's
+part, but any one who reads her letters to de Sevigne will see between
+the lines a disposition on his part to wander away after a new
+charmer. Others, however, say that she intended to send them to the
+Marquis de Tonnerre, whom the actress had betrayed for de Sevigne.
+
+But Madame de Sevigne, to whom her son had confessed his folly in
+giving up the letters, perhaps fearing to be embroiled in a
+disgraceful duel over an actress, made him blush at his cruel
+sacrifice of a woman who loved him, and made him understand that even
+in dishonesty there were certain rules of honesty to be observed. She
+worked upon his mind until he felt that he had committed a
+dishonorable act, and when he had reached that point, it was easy to
+get the letters away from Ninon partly by artifice, partly by force.
+Madame de Sevigne tells the story in a letter to her daughter, Madame
+de Grignan:
+
+"Elle (Ninon) voulut l'autre jour lui faire donner des lettres de la
+comedienne (Champmele); il les lui donna; elle en etait jalouse; elle
+voulait les donner a un amant de la princesse, afin de lui faire
+donner quelque coups de baudrier. Il me le vint dire: je lui fis voir
+que c'etait une infamie de couper ainsi la gorge a une petite creature
+pour l'avoir aimer; je representai qu'elle n'avait point sacrifie ses
+lettres, comme on voulait lui faire croire pour l'animer. Il entra
+dans mes raisons; il courut chez Ninon, et moitie par adresse, et
+moitie par force, il retira les lettres de cette pauvre diablesse."
+
+It was easy for a doting mother like Madame de Sevigne to credit
+everything her son manufactured for her delectation. The dramatic
+incident of de Sevigne taking letters from Ninon de l'Enclos partly by
+ingenuity and partly by force, resembled his tale that he had left
+Ninon and that he did not care for her while all the time they were
+inseparable. He was truly a lover of Penelope, the bow of Ulysses
+having betrayed his weakness.
+
+"The malady of his soul," says his mother, "afflicted his body. He
+thought himself like the good Esos; he would have himself boiled in a
+caldron with aromatic herbs to restore his vigor."
+
+But Ninon's opinion of him was somewhat different. She lamented his
+untimely end, but did not hesitate to express her views.
+
+"He was a man beyond definition," was her panegyric. "He possessed a
+soul of pulp, a body of wet paper, and a heart of pumpkin fricasseed
+in snow."
+
+She finally became ashamed of ever having loved him, and insisted that
+they were never more than brother and sister. She tried to make
+something out of him by exposing all the secrets of the female heart,
+and initiating him in the mysteries of human love, but as she said:
+"His heart was a pumpkin fricasseed in snow."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+A Family Tragedy
+
+
+Some of Ninon's engagements following upon one another in quick
+succession were the cause of an unusual disagreement, not to say
+quarrel, between two rivals in her affections. A Marshal of France,
+d'Estrees and the celebrated Abbe Deffiat disputed the right of
+parentage, the dispute waxing warm because both contended for the
+honor and could not see any way out of their difficulty, neither
+consenting to make the slightest concession. Ninon, however, calmed
+the tempest by suggesting a way out of the difficulty through the
+hazard of the dice. Luck or good fortune for the waif declared in
+favor of the warrior, who made a better guardian than the Abbe could
+possibly have done, and brought him greater happiness.
+
+Ninon surrendered all her maternal rights in the child to the worthy
+Marshal, who became in reality a tender and affectionate father to the
+waif, cared for him tenderly and raised him up to a good position in
+life. He placed him in the marine service, where, as the Chevalier de
+la Bossiere, he reached the grade of captain of a vessel, and died at
+an advanced age respected by his brother officers and by all who knew
+him. He inherited some of the talents of his mother, particularly
+music, in which he was remarkably proficient. His apartments at
+Toulon, where he was stationed, were crowded with musical instruments
+and the works of the greatest masters. All the musicians traveling
+back and forth between Italy and France made his house their
+headquarters. The Chevalier accorded them a generous welcome on all
+occasions; the only return demanded was an exhibition of their
+proficiency in instrumental music.
+
+The happiness of this son solaced Ninon for his unfortunate birth, and
+it would have been happy for her had she never had a second. But her
+profound love for the Chevalier de Gersay overcame any scruples that
+might have arisen in her mind against again yielding to the maternal
+instinct, and another son came to her, one who was destined to meet a
+most horrible fate and cause her the most exquisite mental torture.
+
+This de Gersay, who was famous for the temerity of his passion for the
+queen, Anne of Austria, a fact he announced from the housetops of
+Paris in his delirium, was as happy as a king over the boy that came
+to him so unexpectedly, and lavished upon him the most extravagant
+affection. He took him to his heart and trained him up in all the
+accomplishments taught those of the highest rank and most noble blood.
+The boy grew up and received the name of Chevalier de Villiers,
+becoming a credit to his father.
+
+His mother was beyond sixty years of age when de Villiers began to
+enter society, and her beauty was still remarkable according to the
+chronicles of the times and the allusions made to it in the current
+literature. She was as attractive in her appearance, and as lovable as
+at twenty years of age, few, even among the younger habitues of her
+drawing-rooms being able to resist the charms of her person. Her house
+was thronged with the elite of French society, young men of noble
+families being designedly sent into her society to acquire taste,
+grace, and polish which they were unable to acquire elsewhere. Ninon
+possessed a singular genius for inspiring men with high and noble
+sentiments, and her schooling in the art of etiquette was marvelous in
+its details and perfection. Her power was practically a repetition of
+the history of the Empress Theodora, whose happy admirers and
+intimates could be distinguished from all others by their exquisite
+politeness, culture, finish and social polish. It was the same in
+Ninon's school, the graduates of which occupied the highest rank in
+letters, society, statesmanship, and military genius.
+
+De Gersay intending his son to fill a high position in society and
+public honors, sent him to this school, where he was received and put
+upon the same footing as other youth of high birth, and was duly
+trained with them in all the arts and accomplishments of refined
+society. The young man was not aware of his parentage, de Gersay
+having extracted a solemn promise from Mademoiselle de l'Enclos that
+she would never divulge the secret of the youth's birth without his
+father's express consent, a promise which resulted in the most
+disastrous consequences.
+
+Ninon, as mother of this handsome youth, admired him, and manifested a
+tenderness which he misunderstood for the emotion of love, Ninon,
+herself never contemplating such a fatality, and ended by becoming
+enamored of his own mother. Ninon thought nothing of his passion,
+believing that it would soon pass away, but it increased in intensity,
+becoming a violent flame which finally proved irresistible, forcing
+the youth to fall at his mother's feet and pour forth his passion in
+the most extravagant language.
+
+Alarmed at this condition of her son's heart, Ninon withdrew from his
+society, refusing to admit him to her presence. Although the Chevalier
+was an impetuous wooer, he was dismayed by the loss of his inamorata,
+and begged for the privilege of seeing her, promising solemnly never
+to repeat his declaration of love. Ninon was deceived by his
+professions and re-admitted him to her society. Insensibly, however,
+perhaps in despite of his struggle to overcome his amorous
+propensities, the Chevalier violated the conditions of the truce.
+Ninon, on the watch for a repetition of his former manifestations,
+quickly perceived the return of a love so abhorrent to nature. His
+sighs, glances, sadness when in her presence, were signs to her of a
+passion that she would be compelled to subdue with a strong, ruthless
+hand.
+
+"Raise your eyes to that clock," she said to him one day, "and mark
+the passing of time. Rash boy, it is sixty-five years since I came
+into the world. Does it become me to listen to a passion like love?
+Is it possible at my age to love or be loved? Enter within yourself,
+Chevalier, and see how ridiculous are your desires and those you would
+arouse in me."
+
+All Ninon's remonstrances, however, tended only to increase the
+desires which burned in the young man's breast. His mother's tears,
+which now began to flow, were regarded by the youth as trophies of
+success.
+
+"What, tears?" he exclaimed, "you shed tears for me? Are they wrung
+from your heart by pity, by tenderness? Ah, am I to be blessed?"
+
+"This is terrible," she replied, "it is insanity. Leave me, and do not
+poison the remainder of a life which I detest."
+
+"What language is this?" exclaimed the Chevalier. "What poison can the
+sweetness of making still another one happy instill into the loveliest
+life? Is this the tender and philosophic Ninon? Has she not raised
+between us that shadow of virtue that makes her sex adorable? What
+chimeras have changed your heart? Shall I tell you? You carry your
+cruelty to the extent of fighting against yourself, resisting your own
+desires. I have seen in your eyes a hundred times less resistance than
+you now set against me. And these tears which my condition has drawn
+from your eyes--tell me, are they shed through indifference or hate?
+Are you ashamed to avow a sensibility which honors humanity?"
+
+"Cease, Chevalier," said Ninon, raising her hand in protest, "the
+right to claim my liveliest friendship rested with you, I thought you
+worthy of it. That is the cause of the friendly looks which you have
+mistaken for others of greater meaning, and it is also the cause of
+the tears I shed. Do not flatter yourself that you have inspired me
+with the passion of love. I can see too plainly that your desires are
+the effect of a passing presumption. Come now, you shall know my
+heart, and it should destroy all hope for you. It will go so far as to
+hate you, if you repeat your protestations of blind tenderness. I do
+not care to understand you, leave me, to regret the favors you have so
+badly interpreted."
+
+When Ninon learned that her son was plunged into despair and fury on
+account of her rejection of his love, her heart was torn with sorrow
+and she regretted that she had not at first told him the secret of his
+birth, but her solemn promise to de Gersay had stood in her way. She
+determined now to remedy the evil and she therefore applied to de
+Gersay to relieve her from her promise. De Gersay advised her to
+communicate the truth to her son as soon as possible to prevent a
+catastrophe which he prophesied was liable to happen when least
+expected. She accordingly wrote the Chevalier that at a certain time
+she would be at her house in the Saint Antoine suburb and prayed him
+to meet her there. The impassioned Chevalier, expecting nothing less
+than the gratification of his desires, prepared himself with extreme
+care and flew to the assignation. He was disconcerted, however, by
+finding Ninon despondent and sad, instead of smiling and joyful with
+anticipation. However, he cast himself at her feet, seized her hand
+and covered it with tears and kisses.
+
+"Unfortunate," cried Ninon submitting to his embraces, "there are
+destinies beyond human prudence to direct. What have I not attempted
+to do to calm your agitated spirit? What mystery do you force me to
+unfold?"
+
+"Ah, you are about to deceive me again," interrupted the Chevalier, "I
+do not perceive in your eyes the love I had the right to expect. I
+recognize in your obscure language an injustice you are about to
+commit; you hope to cure me of my love, but disabuse yourself of that
+fancy; the cruel triumph you seek to win is beyond the united strength
+of both of us, above any imaginable skill, beyond the power of reason
+itself. It seems to listen to nothing but its own intoxication, and at
+the same time rush to the last extremity."
+
+"Stop," exclaimed Ninon, indignant at this unreasoning folly, "this
+horrible love shall not reach beyond the most sacred duties. Stop, I
+tell you, monster that you are, and shudder with dismay. Can love
+flourish where horror fills the soul? Do you know who you are and who
+I am? The lover you are pursuing--"
+
+"Well! That lover?" demanded the Chevalier.
+
+"Is your mother," replied Ninon; "you owe me your birth. It is my son
+who sighs at my feet, who talks to me of love. What sentiments do you
+think you have inspired me with? Monsieur de Gersay, your father,
+through an excess of affection for you, wished you to remain ignorant
+of your birth. Ah, my son, by what fatality have you compelled me to
+reveal this secret? You know to what degree of opprobrium the
+prejudiced have put one of your birth, wherefore it was necessary to
+conceal it from your delicacy of mind, but you would not have it so.
+Know me as your mother, oh, my son, and pardon me for having given you
+life."
+
+Ninon burst into a flood of tears and pressed her son to her heart,
+but he seemed to be crushed by the revelations he heard. Pale,
+trembling, nerveless, he dared not pronounce the sweet name of mother,
+for his soul was filled with horror at his inability to realize the
+relationship sufficiently to destroy the burning passion he felt for
+her person. He cast one long look into her eyes, bent them upon the
+ground, arose with a deep sigh and fled. A garden offered him a
+refuge, and there, in a thick clump of bushes, he drew his sword and
+without a moment's hesitation fell upon it, to sink down dying.
+
+Ninon had followed him dreading some awful calamity, and there, in the
+dim light of the stars, she found her son weltering in his blood, shed
+by his own hand for love of her. His dying eyes which he turned toward
+her still spoke ardent love, and he expired while endeavoring to utter
+words of endearment.
+
+Le Sage in the romance of Gil Blas has painted this horrible
+catastrophe of Ninon de l'Enclos in the characters of the old woman
+Inisilla de Cantarilla, and the youth Don Valerio de Luna. The
+incident is similar to that which happened to Oedipus, the Theban who
+tore out his eyes after discovering that in marrying Jocasta, the
+queen, he had married his own mother. Le Sage's hero, however, mourns
+because he had not been able to commit the crime, which gives the case
+of Ninon's son a similar tinge, his self-immolation being due, not to
+the horror of having indulged in criminal love for his own mother, but
+to the regret at not having been able to accomplish his purpose.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+
+Her Bohemian Environments
+
+
+The daily and nightly doings at Ninon's house in the Rue des
+Tournelles, if there is anything of a similar character in modern
+society that can be compared to them, might be faintly represented by
+our Bohemian circles, where good cheer, good fellowship, and freedom
+from restraint are supposed to reign. There are, indeed, numerous
+clubs at the present day styled "Bohemian," but except so far as the
+tendency to relaxation appears upon the surface, they possess very few
+of the characteristics of that society of "Birds" that assembled
+around Mademoiselle de l'Enclos. They put aside all conventional
+restraint, and the mental metal of those choice spirits clashed and
+evolved brilliant sparks, bright rays of light, the luster of which
+still glitters after a lapse of more than two centuries.
+
+Personally, Ninon was an enemy of pedantry in every form, demanding of
+her followers originality at all times on penalty of banishment from
+her circle. The great writer, Mynard, once related with tears in his
+eyes that his daughter, who afterward became the Countess de
+Feuquieres, had no memory. Whereat Ninon laughed him out of his
+sorrow:
+
+"You are too happy in having a daughter who has no memory; she will
+not be able to make citations."
+
+That her society was sought by very good men is evidenced by the grave
+theologians who found her companionship pleasant, perhaps salutary. A
+celebrated Jesuit who did not scruple to find entertainment in her
+social circle, undertook to combat her philosophy and show her the
+truth from his point of view, but she came so near converting him to
+her tenets that he abandoned the contest remarking with a laugh:
+
+"Well, well, Mademoiselle, while waiting to be convinced that you are
+in error, offer up to God your unbelief." Rousseau has converted this
+incident into an epigram.
+
+The grave and learned clergy of Port Royal also undertook the labor of
+converting her, but their labor was in vain.
+
+"You know," she told Fontenelle, "what use I make of my body? Well,
+then, it would be easier for me to obtain a good price for my soul,
+for the Jansenists and Molinists are engaged in a competition of
+bidding for it."
+
+She was not bigoted in the least, as the following incident will show:
+One of her friends refused to send for a priest when in extremis, but
+Ninon brought one to his bedside, and as the clergyman, knowing the
+scepticism of the dying sinner, hesitated to exercise his functions,
+she encouraged him to do his duty:
+
+"Do your duty, sir," she said, "I assure you that although our friend
+can argue, he knows no more about the truth than you and I."
+
+The key to Mademoiselle de l'Enclos' character is to be found in her
+toleration and liberality. Utterly unselfish, she had no thoughts
+beyond the comfort and, happiness of her friends. For them she
+sacrificed her person, an astounding sacrifice in a woman, one for
+which a multitude have suffered martyrdom for refusing to make, and
+are cited as models of virtue to be followed. Yet, notwithstanding her
+strange misapplication or perversion of what the world calls "female
+honor," her world had nothing but the most profound respect and
+admiration for her. It requires an extremely delicate pencil to sketch
+such a character, and even then, a hundred trials might result in
+failing to seize upon its most vivid lights and shades and bring out
+its best points.
+
+Standing out clearly defined through her whole life was a noble soul
+that never stooped to anything common, low, debasing or vulgar.
+Brought up from infancy in the society of men, taught to consider them
+as her companions and equals, and treated by them as one of
+themselves, she acquired a grace and a polish that made her society
+desired by the proudest ladies of the court. There is no one in the
+annals of the nations of the earth that can be compared to her. The
+Aspasia of Pericles has been regarded by some as a sort of prototype,
+but Aspasia was a common woman of the town, her thoughts were devoted
+to the aggrandizement of one man, her love affairs were bestowed upon
+an open market. On the contrary, Mademoiselle de l'Enclos never
+bestowed her favors upon any but one she could ever after regard as an
+earnest, unselfish friend. Their friendship was a source of delight to
+her and she was Epicurean, in the enjoyment of everything that goes
+with friendship.
+
+Saint-Evremond likens her to Leontium, the Athenian woman, celebrated
+for her philosophy and for having dared to write a book against the
+great Theophrastus, a literary venture which may have been the reason
+why Saint-Evremond gave Ninon the title. Ninon's heart was weak, it is
+true, but she had early learned those philosophical principles which
+drew her senses away from that portion of her soul, and her
+environments were those most conducive to the cultivation of the
+senses which are so easily led away into seductive paths. But however
+far her love of pleasure may have led her, her philosophical ideas and
+practices did not succeed in destroying or even weakening any other
+virtue. "The smallest fault of gallant women," says de la
+Rochefoucauld, "is their gallantry."
+
+The distinguished Abbe Chateauneuf expresses a trait in her character
+which drew to her side the most distinguished men of the period.
+
+"She reserved all her esteem, all her confidence for friendship, which
+she always regarded as a respectable liaison," says the Abbe, "and to
+maintain that friendship she permitted no diminution or relaxation."
+
+In other words she was constant and true, without whims or caprice.
+The Comte de Segur, in his work on "Women, their Condition and
+Influence in Society," says: "While Ninon de l'Enclos was fostering
+and patronizing genius, and giving it opportunities to expand, Madame
+de Sevigne was at the head of a cabal in opposition to genius, unless
+it was measured upon her own standard. In her self-love she wrought
+against Racine and sought to diminish the literary luster of Flechier.
+But with all her ability Madame de Sevigne possessed very little
+genius or tact, and her lack of discrimination is apparent in the fact
+that none of her proteges ever reached any distinction. Moreover, her
+virtues must have been of an appalling character since they were not
+strong enough to save her husband and son from falling into the
+clutches of "That horrid woman," referring to Ninon.
+
+Ninon certainly understood men; she divined them at the first glance
+and provided for their bodily and intellectual wants. If they were
+deemed worthy of her favors, she bestowed them freely, and out of one
+animal desire gratified, there were created a thousand intellectual
+aspirations. She understood clearly that man can not be all animal or
+all spiritual, and that the attempt to divert nature from its duality
+of being was to wreck humanity and make of man neither fish, flesh nor
+fowl. Her constant prayer in her younger days, for the truth of which
+Voltaire vouches, was:
+
+"Mon Dieu, faites de moi un honnete homme, et n'en faites jamais une
+honnete femme." (My God, make me an honest man, but never an honest
+woman).
+
+Count Segur, in his book already referred to, has this to say further
+concerning Ninon:
+
+"Ninon shone under the reign of Louis XIV like a graceful plant in its
+proper soil. Splendor seemed to be her element. That Ninon might
+appear in the sphere that became her, it was necessary that Turenne
+and Conde should sigh at her feet, that Voltaire should receive from
+her his first lessons, in a word, that in her illustrious cabinet,
+glory and genius should be seen sporting with love and the graces."
+
+Had it not been for the influence of Ninon de l'Enclos--there are many
+who claim it as the truth--the sombre tinge, the veil of gloominess
+and hypocritical austerity which surrounded Madame de Maintenon and
+her court, would have wrecked the intellects of the most illustrious
+and brightest men in France, in war, literature, science, and
+statesmanship. Madame de Maintenon resisted that influence but the Rue
+des Tournelles strove against Saint Cyr. The world fluctuated between
+these two systems established by women, both of them--shall it be
+said--courtesans? The legality and morality of our modern common law
+marriages and the ease and frequency of trivial divorces forbid it.
+Ninon prevailed, however, and not only governed hearts but souls. The
+difference between the two courts was, the royal salon was thronged
+with women of the most infamous character who had nothing but their
+infamy to bestow, while the drawing rooms of Ninon de l'Enclos were
+crowded with men almost exclusively, and men of wit and genius.
+
+The moral that the majority of writers draw from the three courts that
+occupied society at that time, the Rue des Tournelles, Madame de
+Sevigne, and Versailles, is, that men demand human nature and will
+have it in preference to abnormal goodness, and female debauchery.
+Ninon never hesitated to declaim against the fictitious beauty that
+pretended to inculcate virtue and morality while secretly engaged in
+the most corrupt practices, but Moliere came with his Precieuses
+Ridicules and pulverized the enemies of human nature. Ninon did not
+know Moliere personally at that time but she was so loud in his praise
+for covering her gross imitators with confusion, that Bachaumont and
+Chapelle, two of her intimate friends, ventured to introduce the young
+dramatist into her society. The father of this Bachaumont who was a
+twin, said of him: "My son who is only half a man, wants to do as if
+he were a whole one." Though only "half a man" and extremely feeble
+and delicate, he became a voluptuary according to the ideas of
+Chapelle, and by devoting himself to the doctrines of Epicurus, he
+managed to live until eighty years of age. Chapelle was a drunkard as
+has been intimated in a preceding chapter, and although he loved Ninon
+passionately, she steadily refused to favor him.
+
+Moliere and Ninon were mutually attracted, each recognizing in the
+other not only a kindred spirit, but something not apparent on the
+surface. Nature had given them the same eyes, and they saw men and
+things from the same view point. Moliere was destined to enlighten his
+age by his pen, and Ninon through her wise counsel and sage
+reflections. In speaking of Moliere to Saint-Evremond, she declared
+with fervor:
+
+"I thank God every night for finding me a man of his spirit, and I
+pray Him every morning to preserve him from the follies of the heart."
+
+There was a great opposition to Moliere's comedy "Tartuffe." It
+created a sensation in society, and neither Louis XIV, the prelates of
+the kingdom and the Roman legate, were strong enough to withstand the
+torrents of invectives that came from those who were unmasked in the
+play. They succeeded in having it interdicted, and the comedy was on
+the point of being suppressed altogether, when Moliere took it to
+Ninon, read it over to her and asked her opinion as to what had better
+be done. With her keen sense of the ridiculous and her knowledge of
+character, Ninon went over the play with Moliere to such good purpose
+that the edict of suppression was withdrawn, the opponents of the
+comedy finding themselves in a position where they could no longer
+take exceptions without confessing the truth of the inuendoes.
+
+When the comedy was nearly completed, Moliere began trying to think of
+a name to give the main character in the play, who is an imposter. One
+day while at dinner with the Papal Nuncio, he noticed two
+ecclesiastics, whose air of pretended mortification fairly represented
+the character he had depicted in the play. While considering them
+closely, a peddler came along with truffles to sell. One of the pious
+ecclesiastics who knew very little Italian, pricked up his ears at the
+word truffles, which seemed to have a familiar sound. Suddenly coming
+out of his devout silence, he selected several of the finest of the
+truffles, and holding them out to the nuncio, exclaimed with a laugh:
+"Tartuffoli, Tartuffoli, signor Nuncio!" imagining that he was
+displaying his knowledge of the Italian language by calling out
+"Truffles, truffles, signor Nuncio," whereas, what he did say was
+"Hypocrites, hypocrites, Signor Nuncio." Moliere who was always a
+close and keen observer of everything that transpired around him,
+seized upon the name "Tartuffe" as suitable to the hypocritical
+imposter in his comedy.
+
+Ninon's brilliancy was so animated, particularly at table, that she
+was said to be intoxicated at the soup, although she rarely drank
+anything but water. Her table was always surrounded by the wittiest of
+her friends and her own flashes kept their spirits up to the highest
+point. The charm of her conversation was equal to the draughts of
+Nepenthe which Helen lavished upon her guests, according to Homer to
+charm and enchant them.
+
+One story told about Ninon is not to her credit if true, and it is
+disputed. A great preacher arose in France, the "Eagle of the Pulpit,"
+as he was called, or "The great Pan," as Madame de Sevigne, loved to
+designate him. His renown for eloquence and piety reached Ninon's ears
+and she conceived a scheme, so it is said; to bring this great orator
+to her feet. She had held in her chains from time to time, all the
+heroes, and illustrious men of France, and she considered Pere
+Bourdaloue worthy of a place on the list. She accordingly arrayed
+herself in her most fascinating costume, feigned illness and sent for
+him. But Pere Bourdaloue was not a man to be captivated by any woman,
+and, moreover, he was a man too deeply versed in human perversity to
+be easily deceived. He came at her request, however, and to her
+question as to her condition he answered: "I perceive that your malady
+exists only in your heart and mind; as to your body, it appears to me
+to be in perfect health. I pray the great physician of souls that he
+will heal you." Saying which he left her without ceremony.
+
+The story is probably untrue and grew out of a song of the times, to
+ridicule the attempts of numerous preachers to convert Ninon from her
+way of living. They frequented her social receptions but those were
+always public, as she never trusted herself to any one without the
+knowledge and presence of some of her "Birds," taking that precaution
+for her own safety and to avoid any appearance of partiality. The song
+referred to, composed by some unknown scribe begins as follows:
+
+"Ninon passe les jours au jeu:
+Cours ou l'amour te porte;
+Le predicateur qui t'exhorte,
+S'il etait au coin de ton feu,
+Te parlerait d'un autre sorte."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+
+A Remarkable Old Age
+
+
+When Ninon had reached the age of sixty-five years, there were those
+among the beauties of the royal court who thought she ought to retire
+from society and make way for them, but there appeared to be no
+diminution of her capacity for pleasure, no weakening of her powers of
+attraction. The legend of the Noctambule, or the little black man, who
+appeared to Ninon when she was at the age of twenty years, and
+promised her perpetual beauty and the conquest of all hearts, was
+revived, and there was enough probability in it to justify a strong
+belief in the story. Indeed, the Abbe Servien spread it about again
+when Ninon was seventy years of age, and even then there were few who
+disputed the mysterious gift as Ninon showed little change.
+
+As old age approached, Ninon ceased to be regarded with that
+familiarity shown her by her intimates in her younger days, and a
+respect and admiration took its place. She was no longer "Ninon," but
+"Mademoiselle de l'Enclos." Her social circle widened, and instead of
+being limited to men exclusively, ladies eagerly took advantage of the
+privilege accorded them to frequent the charming circle. That circle
+certainly became celebrated. The beautiful woman had lived the life of
+an earnest Epicurean in her own way, regardless of society's
+conventionalities, and had apparently demonstrated that her way was
+the best. She had certainly attained a long life, and what was more to
+the purpose she had preserved her beauty and the attractions of her
+person were as strong as when she was in her prime. Reason enough why
+the women of the age thronged her apartments to learn the secret of
+her life. Moreover, her long and intimate associations with the most
+remarkable men of the century had not failed to impart to her, in
+addition to her exquisite femininity, the wisdom of a sage and the
+polish of a man of the world.
+
+Madame de La Fayette, that "rich field so fertile in fruits," as Ninon
+said of her, and Madame de la Sabliere, "a lovely garden enameled with
+eye-charming flowers," another of Ninon's descriptive metaphors,
+passed as many hours as they could in her society with the illustrious
+Duke de la Rochefoucauld, who, up to the time of his death honored
+Ninon with his constant friendship and his devoted esteem. Even Madame
+de Sevigne put aside her envy and jealousy and never wearied of the
+pleasure of listening to the conversation of this wise beauty, in
+company with her haughty daughter, Madame de Grignan, Madame de
+Coulanges, Madame de Torp, and, strange to say, the Duchess de
+Bouillon.
+
+Her friends watched over her health with the tenderest care and
+affection, and even her slightest indisposition brought them around
+her with expressions of the deepest solicitude. They dreaded losing
+her, for having had her so long among them they hoped to keep her
+always, and they did, practically, for she outlived the most of them.
+As proof of the anxiety of her friends and the delight they
+experienced at her recovery from the slightest ailment, one
+illustration will suffice.
+
+On one occasion she had withdrawn from her friends for a single
+evening, pleading indisposition. The next evening she reappeared and
+her return was celebrated by an original poem written by no less a
+personage than the Abbe Regnier-Desmarais, who read it to the friends
+assembled around her chair:
+
+"Clusine qui dans tous les temps
+  Eut de tous les honnetes gens
+  L'amour et l'estime en partage:
+  Qui toujours pleine de bon sens
+  Sut de chaque saison de l'age
+  Faire a propos un juste usage:
+Qui dans son entretien, dont on fut enchante
+  Sut faire un aimable alliage
+  De l'agreable badinage,
+  Avec la politesse et la solidite,
+  Et que le ciel doua d'un esprit droit et sage,
+  Toujours d'intelligence avec la verite,
+Clusine est, grace au ciel, en parfaite sante."
+
+Such a poem would not be accorded much praise nowadays, but the hearts
+of her friends regarded the sentiments more than the polish, as a
+substantial translation into English will serve to show appeared in
+the lines:
+
+Clusine who from our earliest ken
+  Had from all good and honest men
+  Love and esteem a generous share:
+  Who knew so well the season when
+  Her heritage of sense so rare
+  To use with justice and with care:
+Who in her discourse, friends enchanted all-around,
+  Could fashion out of playful ware
+  An alloy of enduring wear,
+  Good breeding and with solid ground,
+  A heavenly spirit wise and fair,
+  With truth and intellect profound,
+Clusine, thanks be to Heaven, her perfect health has found.
+
+Her salon was open to her friends in general from five o'clock in the
+evening until nine, at which hour she begged them to permit her to
+retire and gain strength for the morrow. In winter she occupied a
+large apartment decorated with portraits of her dearest male and
+female friends, and numerous paintings by celebrated artists. In
+summer, she occupied an apartment which overlooked the boulevard, its
+walls frescoed with magnificent sketches from the life of Psyche. In
+one or the other of these salons, she gave her friends four hours
+every evening, after that retiring to rest or amusing herself with a
+few intimates. Her friendship finds an apt illustration in the case of
+the Comte de Charleval. He was always delicate and in feeble health,
+and Ninon when he became her admirer in his youth, resolved to
+prolong his life through the application of the Epicurian philosophy.
+De Marville, speaking of the Count, whom no one imagined would survive
+to middle age, says: "Nature, which gave him so delicate a body in
+such perfect form, also gave him a delicate and perfect intelligence."
+This frail and delicate invalid, lived, however, until the age of
+eighty years, and was always grateful to Ninon for her tenderness. He
+never missed a reception and sang her praises on every occasion.
+Writing to Saint-Evremond to announce his death, Ninon, herself very
+aged, says: "His mind had retained all the charms of his youth, and
+his heart all the sweetness and tenderness of a true friend." She felt
+the loss of this common friend, for she again writes of him afterward:
+"His life and that I live had much in common. It is like dying oneself
+to meet with such a loss."
+
+It was at this period of her life that Ninon occupied her time more
+than ever in endearing herself to her friends. As says Saint-Evremond:
+"She contents herself with ease and rest, after having enjoyed the
+liveliest pleasures of life." Although she was never mistress of the
+invincible inclination toward the pleasures of the senses which nature
+had given her, it appears that Ninon made some efforts to control
+them. Referring to the ashes which are sprinkled on the heads of the
+penitent faithful on Ash Wednesday, she insisted that instead of the
+usual prayer of abnegation there should be substituted the words: "We
+must avoid the movements of love." What she wrote Saint-Evremond
+might give rise to the belief that she sometimes regretted her
+weakness: "Everybody tells me that I have less to complain of in my
+time than many another. However that may be, if any one had proposed
+to me such a life I would have hanged myself." One of her favorite
+maxims, however, was: "We must provide a stock of provisions and not
+of pleasures, they should be taken as they come."
+
+That her philosophical principles did not change, is certain from the
+fact that she retained all her friends and gained new ones who flocked
+to her reunions. Says Madame de Coulanges in one of her letters: "The
+women are running after Mademoiselle de l'Enclos now as much as the
+men used to do. How can any one hate old age after such an example."
+This reflection did not originate with Ninon, who regretted little her
+former pleasures, and besides, friendship with her had as many sacred
+rights as love. From what Madame de Coulanges says, one might suppose
+that the men had deserted Ninon in her old age, leaving women to take
+their place, but Madame de Sevigne was of a different opinion. She
+says: "Corbinelli asks me about the new marvels taking place at
+Mademoiselle de l'Enclos' house in the way of good company. She
+assembles around her in her old age, whatever Madame de Coulanges may
+say to the contrary, both men and women, but even if women did not
+flock to her side, she could console herself for having had men in her
+young days to please."
+
+The celebrated English geometrician, Huygens, visited Ninon during a
+sojourn at Paris in the capacity of ambassador. He was so charmed
+with the attractions of her person, and with her singing, that he fell
+into poetry to express his admiration. French verses from an
+Englishman who was a geometrician and not a poet, were as surprising
+to Ninon and her friends as they will be to the reader. They are not
+literature but express what was in the mind of the famous scientist:
+
+"Elle a cinq instruments dont je suis amoureux,
+Les deux premiers, ses mains, les deux autres, ses yeux;
+Pour le dernier de tous, et cinquieme qui reste,
+Il faut etre galant et leste."
+
+In the year 1696, when Ninon had reached eighty, she had several
+attacks of illness which worried her friends exceedingly. The Marquis
+de Coulanges writes: "Our amiable l'Enclos has a cold which does not
+please me." A short time afterward he again wrote: "Our poor l'Enclos
+has a low fever which redoubles in the evening, and a sore throat
+which worries her friends." These trifling ailments were nothing to
+Ninon, who, though growing feeble, maintained her philosophy, as she
+said: "I am contenting myself with what happens from day to day;
+forgetting to-day what occurred yesterday, and holding on to a used up
+body as one that has been very agreeable." She saw the term of her
+life coming to an end without any qualms or fear. "If I could only
+believe with Madame de Chevreuse, that by dying we can go and talk
+with all our friends in the other world, it would be a sweet thought."
+
+Madame de Maintenon, then in the height of her power and influence,
+had never forgotten the friend of her youth, and now, she offered her
+lodgings at Versailles. It is said that her intention was to enable
+the king to profit by an intimacy with a woman of eighty-five years
+who, in spite of bodily infirmities, possessed the same vivacity of
+mind and delicacy of taste which had contributed to her great renown,
+much more than her personal charms and frailties. But Ninon was born
+for liberty, and had never been willing to sacrifice her philosophical
+tranquility for the hope of greater fortune and position in the world.
+Accordingly, she thanked her old friend, and as the only concession
+she would grant, consented to stand in the chapel of Versailles where
+Louis the Great could pass and satisfy his curiosity to see once, at
+least, the astonishing marvel of his reign.
+
+During the latter years of her life, she took a fancy to young
+Voltaire, in whom she detected signs of future greatness. She
+fortified him with her counsel, which he prayed her to give him, and
+left him a thousand francs in her will to buy books. Voltaire
+attempted to earn the money by ridiculing the memory of his
+benefactress.
+
+At the age of ninety years, Mademoiselle de l'Enclos grew feebler
+every day, and felt that death would not be long coming. She performed
+all her social duties, however, until the very end, refusing to
+surrender until compelled. On the last night of her life, unable to
+sleep, she arose, and at her desk wrote the following verses:
+
+"Qu'un vain espoir ne vienne point s'offrir,
+Qui puisse ebranler mon courage;
+Je suis en age de mourir;
+Que ferais-je ici davantage?"
+
+(Let no vain hope now come and try,
+My courage strong to overthrow;
+My age demands that I shall die,
+What more can I do here below?)
+
+On the seventeenth of October, 1706, she expired as gently as one who
+falls asleep.
+
+
+
+
+LETTERS
+
+OF
+
+NINON de L'ENCLOS
+
+TO THE
+
+MARQUIS de SEVIGNE.
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTION TO LETTERS
+
+
+The celebrated Abbe de Chateauneuf, in his "Dialogues on Ancient
+Music," refers to Mademoiselle de l'Enclos under the name of
+"Leontium," a name given her by le Marechal de Saint-Evremond, and in
+his eulogy upon her character, lays great stress on the genius
+displayed in her epistolary style. After censuring the affectation to
+be found in the letters of Balzac and Voiture, the learned Abbe says:
+
+"The letters of Leontium, although novel in their form of expression,
+although replete with philosophy, and sparkling with wit and
+intelligence contain nothing stilted, or overdrawn.
+
+"Inasmuch as the moral to be drawn from them is always seasoned with
+sprightliness, and the spirit manifested in them, displays the
+characteristics of a liberal and natural imagination, they differ in
+nothing from personal conversation with her choice circle of friends.
+
+"The impression conveyed to the mind of their readers is, that she is
+actually conversing with them personally."
+
+Mademoiselle de l'Enclos writes about the heart, love, and women.
+Strange subjects, but no woman ever lived who was better able to do
+justice to them. In her frame of mind, she could not see men without
+studying their dispositions, and she knew them thoroughly, her
+experience extending over a period of seventy-five years of intimate
+association with men of every stamp, from the Royal prince to the
+Marquis de Sevigne, the latter wearying her to such an extent that she
+designated him as "a man beyond definition; with a soul of pulp, a
+body of wet paper, and a heart of pumpkin fricasseed in snow," his own
+mother, the renowned Madame de Sevigne, admitting that he was "a heart
+fool."
+
+Ninon took this weak Chevalier in charge and endeavored to make a man
+of him by exposing his frailties, and, entering into a long
+correspondence, to instruct him in the pathology of the female heart,
+with which he was disposed to tamper on the slightest provocation. Her
+letters will show that she succeeded finally in bringing him to
+reason, but that in doing so, she was compelled to betray her own sex
+by exposing the secret motives of women in their relations with men.
+
+That she knew women as well as men, can not be disputed, for,
+beginning with Madame de Maintenon and the Queen of Sweden, Christine,
+down along the line to the sweet Countess she guards so successfully
+against the evil designs of the Marquis de Sevigne, including Madame
+de La Fayette, Madame de Sevigne, Madame de La Sabliere, and the most
+distinguished and prominent society women of France, they all were her
+particular friends, as well as intimates, and held her in high esteem
+as their confidante in all affairs of the heart.
+
+No other woman ever held so unique a position in the world of society
+as Mademoiselle de l'Enclos, and her letters to the Marquis de Sevigne
+may, therefore, be considered as standards of the epistolary art upon
+the subjects she treats; as containing the most profound insight into
+the female heart where love is concerned, and as forming a study of
+the greatest value in everything that pertains to the relations
+between the sexes.
+
+There is an entire absence of mawkish sentimentality, of effort to
+conceal the secret motives and desires of the heart beneath specious
+language and words of double meaning. On the contrary, they tear away
+from the heart the curtain of deceit, artifice and treachery, to
+expose the nature of the machinery behind the scenes.
+
+These letters must be read in the light of the opinions of the wisest
+philosophers of the seventeenth century upon her character.
+
+"Inasmuch as the first use she (Mademoiselle de l'Enclos) made of her
+reason, was to become enfranchised from vulgar errors, it is
+impossible to be further removed from the stupid mistake of those who,
+under the name of "passion," elevate the sentiment of love to the
+height of a virtue. Ninon understood love to be what it really is, a
+taste founded upon the senses, a blind sentiment, which admits of no
+merit in the object which gives it birth, and which promises no
+recompense; a caprice, the duration of which does not depend upon our
+volition, and which is subject to remorse and repentance."
+
+
+
+
+LETTERS OF NINON de L'ENCLOS
+
+TO THE
+
+MARQUIS de SEVIGNE
+
+
+
+I.
+
+A Hazardous Undertaking.
+
+What, I, Marquis, take charge of your education, be your guide in the
+enterprise upon which you are about to enter? You exact too much of my
+friendship for you. You ought to be aware of the fact, that when a
+woman has lost the freshness of her first youth, and takes a special
+interest in a young man, everybody says she desires to "make a
+worldling of him." You know the malignity of this expression. I do not
+care to expose myself to its application. All the service I am willing
+to render you, is to become your confidante. You will tell me your
+troubles, and I will tell you what is in my mind, likewise aid you to
+know your own heart and that of women.
+
+It grieves me to say, that whatever pleasure I may expect to find in
+this correspondence, I can not conceal the difficulties I am liable to
+encounter. The human heart, which will be the subject of my letters,
+presents so many contrasts, that whoever lays it bare must fall into
+a flood of contradictions. You think you have something stable in your
+grasp, but find you have seized a shadow. It is indeed a chameleon,
+which, viewed from different aspects, presents a variety of opposite
+colors, and even they are constantly shifting. You may expect to read
+many strange things in what I shall say upon this subject. I will,
+however, give you my ideas, though they may often seem strange;
+however, that shall be for you to determine. I confess that I am not
+free from grave scruples of conscience, foreseeing that I can scarcely
+be sincere without slandering my own sex a little. But at least you
+will know my views on the subject of love, and particularly everything
+that relates to it, and I have sufficient courage to talk to you
+frankly upon the subject.
+
+I am to dine to-night with the Marquis de la Rochefoucauld. Madame de
+la Sabliere and La Fontaine will also be guests. If it please you to
+be one of us, La Fontaine will regale you with two new stories, which,
+I am told, do not disparage his former ones. Come Marquis--But, again
+a scruple. Have I nothing to fear in the undertaking we contemplate?
+Love is so malicious and fickle! Still, when I examine my heart, I do
+not feel any apprehension for myself, it being occupied elsewhere, and
+the sentiments I possess toward you resemble love less than
+friendship. If the worst should happen and I lose my head some day, we
+shall know how to withdraw in the easiest possible manner.
+
+We are going to take a course of morals together. Yes, sir, MORALS!
+But do not be alarmed at the mere word, for there will be between us
+only the question of gallantry to discuss, and that, you know, sways
+morals to so high a degree that it deserves to be the subject of a
+special study. The very idea of such a project is to me infinitely
+risible. However, if I talk reason to you too often, will you not grow
+weary? This is my sole anxiety, for you well know that I am a pitiless
+reasoner when I wish to be. With any other heart than that which you
+misunderstand, I could be a philosopher such as the world never knew.
+
+Adieu, I await your good pleasure.
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+Why Love is Dangerous
+
+
+I assure you, Marquis, I shall keep my word, and on all occasions, I
+shall speak the truth, even though it be to my own detriment. I have
+more stability in my disposition than you imagine, and I fear
+exceedingly that the result of our intercourse may sometimes lead you
+to think that I carry this virtue into severity. But you must remember
+that I have only the external appearance of a woman, and that in mind
+and heart I am a man. Here is the method that I wish to follow with
+you. As I ask only to acquire information for myself before
+communicating to you my ideas, my intention is to propound them to the
+excellent man with whom we supped yesterday. It is true that he has
+none too good an opinion of poor humanity. He believes neither in
+virtue nor in spiritual things. But this inflexibility, mitigated by
+my indulgence for human frailties, will give you, I believe, the kind
+and the quantity of philosophy which is required in all intercourse
+with women. Let us come to the gist of your letter.
+
+Since your entrance into the world it has offered you nothing, you
+say, of what you had imagined you would find there. Disgust and
+weariness follow you everywhere. You seek solitude, and as soon as
+you are enjoying it, it wearies you. In a word, you do not know to
+what cause to attribute the restlessness which torments you. I am
+going to save you the trouble, I am, for my burden is to speak my
+thoughts on everything that may perplex you; and I do not know but you
+will often ask me questions as embarrassing for me to answer as they
+may have been for you to ask.
+
+The uneasiness which you experience is caused only by the void in your
+heart. Your heart is without love, and it is trying to make you
+comprehend its wants. You have really what one calls the "need of
+loving." Yes, Marquis, nature, in forming us, gave us an allowance of
+sentiments which must expend themselves upon some object. Your age is
+the proper period for the agitations of love; as long as this
+sentiment does not fill your heart, something will always be wanting;
+the restlessness of which you complain will never cease. In a word,
+love is the nourishment of the heart as food is of the body; to love
+is to fulfill the desire of nature, to satisfy a need. But if
+possible, manage it so that it will not become a passion. To protect
+you from this misfortune, I could almost be tempted to disprove the
+counsel given you, to prefer, to the company of women capable of
+inspiring esteem rather than love, the intercourse of those who pride
+themselves on being amusing rather than sedate and prim. At your age,
+being unable to think of entering into a serious engagement, it is not
+necessary to find a friend in a woman; one should seek to find only
+an amiable mistress.
+
+The intercourse with women of lofty principles, or those whom the
+ravages of time force into putting themselves forward only by virtue
+of great qualities, is excellent for a man who, like themselves, is on
+life's decline. For you, these women would be too good company, if I
+dare so express myself. Riches are necessary to us only in proportion
+to our wants; and what you would better do, I think, is to frequent
+the society of those who combine, with agreeable figure, gentleness in
+conversation, cheerfulness in disposition, a taste for the pleasures
+of society, and strong enough not to be frightened by one affair of
+the heart.
+
+In the eyes of a man of reason they appear too frivolous, you will
+say: but do you think they should be judged with so much severity? Be
+persuaded, Marquis, that if, unfortunately, they should acquire more
+firmness of character, they and you would lose much by it. You require
+in women stability of character! Well, do you not find it in a
+friend?--Shall I tell you what is in my mind? It is not our virtues
+you need; but our playfulness and our weakness. The love which you
+could feel for a woman who would be estimable in every respect, would
+become too dangerous for you. Until you can contemplate a contract of
+marriage, you should seek only to amuse yourself with those who are
+beautiful; a passing taste alone should attach you to one of them: be
+careful not to plunge in too deep with her; there can nothing result
+but a bad ending. If you did not reflect more profoundly than the
+greater part of young people, I should talk to you in an entirely
+different tone; but I perceive that you are ready to give to excess, a
+contrary meaning to their ridiculous frivolity. It is only necessary,
+then, to attach yourself to a woman who, like an agreeable child,
+might amuse you with pleasant follies, light caprices, and all those
+pretty faults which make the charm of a gallant intercourse.
+
+Do you wish me to tell you what makes love dangerous? It is the
+sublime view that one sometimes takes of it. But the exact truth is,
+it is only a blind instinct which one must know how to appreciate: an
+appetite which you have for one object in preference to another,
+without being able to give the reason for your taste. Considered as a
+friendly intimacy when reason presides, it is not a passion, it is no
+longer love, it is, in truth, a warm hearted esteem, but tranquil;
+incapable of drawing you away from any fixed position. If, walking in
+the footsteps of our ancient heroes of romance, you aim at great
+sentiments, you will see that this pretended heroism makes of love
+only a sad and sometimes fatal folly. It is a veritable fanaticism;
+but if you disengage it from all that opinion makes it, it will soon
+be your happiness and pleasure. Believe me, if it were reason or
+enthusiasm which formed affairs of the heart, love would become
+insipid, or a frenzy. The only means of avoiding these two extremes is
+to follow the path I have indicated. You need only to be amused, and
+you will find amusement only among the women I mention to you as
+capable of it. Your heart wishes occupation, they are made to fill it.
+Try my recipe and you will find it good--I made you a fair promise,
+and it seems to me I am keeping my word with you exactly. Adieu, I
+have just received a charming letter from M. de Saint-Evremond, and I
+must answer it. I wish at the same time to propose to him the ideas
+which I have communicated to you, and I shall be very much mistaken if
+he does not approve of them.
+
+To-morrow I shall have the Abbe de Chateauneuf, and perhaps Moliere.
+We shall read again the Tartuffe, in which some changes should be
+made. Take notice, Marquis, that those who do not conform to all I
+have just told you, have a little of the qualities of that character.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+Why Love Grows Cold
+
+
+In despite of everything I may say to you, you still stick to your
+first sentiment. You wish a respectable person for a mistress, and one
+who can at the same time be your friend. These sentiments would
+undoubtedly merit commendation if in reality they could bring you the
+happiness you expect them to; but experience teaches you that all
+those great expectations are pure illusions. Are serious qualities the
+only question in pastimes of the heart? I might be tempted to believe
+that romances have impaired your mental powers. Poor Marquis! He has
+allowed himself to become fascinated by the sublime talk common in
+conversation. But, my dear child, what do you mean to do with these
+chimeras of reason? I willingly tell you, Marquis: it is very fine
+coin, but it is a pity that it can not enter into commercial
+transactions.
+
+When you wish to begin housekeeping, look for a reliable woman, full
+of virtue and lofty principles. All this is becoming to the dignity of
+the marriage tie; I intended to say, to its gravity. But at present,
+as you require nothing but a love affair, beware of being serious, and
+believe what I tell you; I know your wants better than you yourself
+know them. Men usually say that they seek essential qualities in those
+they love. Blind fools that they are! How they would complain could
+they find them! What would they gain by being deified? They need only
+amusement. A mistress as reasonable as you require would be a wife for
+whom you would have an infinite respect, I admit, but not a particle
+of ardor. A woman estimable in all respects is too subduing,
+humiliates you too much, for you to love her long. Forced to esteem
+her, and even sometimes to admire her, you can not excuse yourself for
+ceasing to love her. So many virtues are a reproach too discreet, too
+tiresome a critic of our eccentricities, not to arouse your pride at
+last, and when that is humbled, farewell to love. Make a thorough
+analysis of your sentiments, examine well your conscience, and you
+will see that I speak the truth. I have but a moment left to say
+adieu.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+The Spice of Love
+
+
+Do you know, Marquis, that you will end by putting me in a temper?
+Heavens, how very stupid you are sometimes! I see it in your letter;
+you have not understood me at all. Take heed; I did not say that you
+should take for a mistress a despicable object. That is not at all my
+idea. But I said that in reality you needed only a love affair, and
+that, to make it pleasant, you should not attach yourself exclusively
+to substantial qualities. I repeat it; when in love, men need only to
+be amused; and I believe on this subject I am an authority. Traces of
+temper and caprice, a senseless quarrel, all this has more effect upon
+women, and retains their affection more than all the reason
+imaginable, more than steadiness of character.
+
+Someone whom you esteem for the justice and strength of his ideas,
+said one day at my house, that caprice in women was too closely allied
+to beauty to be an antidote. I opposed this opinion with so much
+animation, that it could readily be seen that the contrary maxim was
+my sentiment, and I am, in truth, well persuaded that caprice is not
+close to beauty, except to animate its charms in order to make them
+more attractive, to serve as a goad, and to flavor them. There is no
+colder sentiment, and none which endures less than admiration. One
+easily becomes accustomed to see the same features, however regular
+they may be, and when a little malignity does not give them life or
+action, their very regularity soon destroys the sentiment they excite.
+A cloud of temper, even, can give to a beautiful countenance the
+necessary variety, to prevent the weariness of seeing it always in the
+same state. In a word, woe to the woman of too monotonous a
+temperament; her monotony satiates and disgusts. She is always the
+same statue, with her a man is always right. She is so good, so
+gentle, that she takes away from people the privilege of quarreling
+with her, and this is often such a great pleasure! Put in her place a
+vivacious woman, capricious, decided, to a certain limit, however, and
+things assume a different aspect. The lover will find in the same
+person the pleasure of variety. Temper is the salt, the quality which
+prevents it from becoming stale. Restlessness, jealousy, quarrels,
+making friends again, spitefulness, all are the food of love.
+Enchanting variety! which fills, which occupies a sensitive heart much
+more deliciously than the regularity of behavior, and the tiresome
+monotony which is called "good disposition."
+
+I know how you men must be governed. A caprice puts you in an
+uncertainty, which you have as much trouble and grief in dispelling as
+though it were a victory obtained over a new object. Roughness makes
+you hold your breath. You do not stop disputing, but neither do you
+cease to conquer and to be conquered. In vain does reason sigh. You
+can not comprehend how such an imp manages to subjugate you so
+tyrannically. Everything tells you that the idol of your heart is a
+collection of caprices and follies, but she is a spoiled child, whom
+you can not help but love. The efforts which reflection causes you to
+make to loosen them, serve only to forge still tighter your chains;
+for love is never so strong as when you believe it ready to break away
+in the heat of a quarrel. It loves, it storms; with it, everything is
+convulsive. Would you reduce it to rule? It languishes, it expires. In
+a word, this is what I wanted to say; do not take for a mistress a
+woman who has only reliable qualities; but one who is sometimes
+dominated by temper, and silences reason; otherwise I shall say that
+it is not a love affair you want, but to set up housekeeping.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+Love and Temper
+
+
+Oh, I agree with you, Marquis, a woman who has only temper and
+caprices is very thorny for an acquaintance and in the end only
+repels. I agree again that these irregularities must make of love a
+never ending quarrel, a continual storm. Therefore, it is not for a
+person of this character that I advise you to form an attachment. You
+always go beyond my ideas. I only depicted to you in my last letter an
+amiable woman, one who becomes still more so by a shade of diversity,
+and you speak only of an unpleasant woman, who has nothing but
+ungracious things to say. How we have drifted away from the point!
+
+When I spoke of temper I only meant the kind which gives a stronger
+relish, anxiety, and a little jealousy: that, in a word, which springs
+from love alone, and not from natural brutality, that roughness which
+one ordinarily calls "bad temper." When it is love which makes a woman
+rough, when that alone is the cause of her liveliness, what sort can
+the lover be who has so little delicacy as to complain of it? Do not
+these errors prove the violence of passion? For myself, I have always
+thought that he who knew how to keep himself within proper bounds,
+was moderately amorous. Can one be so, in effect, without allowing
+himself to be goaded by the fire of a devouring impetuosity, without
+experiencing all the revolutions which it necessarily occasions? No,
+undoubtedly. Well! who can see all these disturbances in a beloved
+object without a secret pleasure? While complaining of its injustice
+and its transports, one feels no less deliciously at heart that he is
+loved, and with passion, and that these same aggravations are most
+convincing proofs that it is voluntary.
+
+There, Marquis, is what constitutes the secret charm of the troubles
+which lovers sometimes suffer, of the tears they shed. But if you are
+going to believe that I wished to tell you that a woman of bad temper,
+capricious, can make you happy, undeceive yourself. I said, and I
+shall always persist in my idea, that diversity is necessary,
+caprices, bickerings, in a gallant intercourse, to drive away
+weariness, and to perpetuate the strength of it. But consider that
+these spices do not produce that effect except when love itself is the
+source. If temper is born of a natural brusqueness, or of a restless,
+envious, unjust disposition, I am the first one to say that such a
+woman will become hateful, she will be the cause of disheartening
+quarrels. A connection of the heart becomes then a veritable torment,
+from which it is desirable to free oneself as quickly as possible.
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+Certain Maxims Concerning Love
+
+
+You think, then, Marquis, that you have brought up an invincible
+argument, when you tell me that one is not the master of his own
+heart, in disposing of it where he wishes, and that consequently you
+are not at liberty to choose the object of your attachment? Morals of
+the opera! Abandon this commonplace to women who expect, in saying so,
+to justify their weaknesses. It is very necessary that they should
+have something to which to cling: like the gentleman of whom our
+friend Montaigne speaks who, when the gout attacked him, would have
+been very angry if he had not been able to say: "Cursed ham!" They say
+it is a sympathetic stroke. That is too strong for me. Is anyone
+master of his heart? He is no longer permitted to reply when such good
+reasons are given. They have even so well sanctioned these maxims that
+they wish to attract everyone to their arms in order to try to
+overcome them. But these same maxims find so much approbation only
+because everyone is interested in having them received. No one
+suspects that such excuses, far from justifying caprices, may be a
+confession that one does not wish to correct them.
+
+For myself, I take the liberty of being of a different opinion from
+the multitude. It is enough for me that it is not impossible to
+conquer one's inclination to condemn all those who are unreasonable or
+dishonorable. Dear me! Have we not seen women succeed in destroying in
+their hearts a weakness which has taken them by surprise, as soon as
+they have discovered that the object of their affections was unworthy
+of them? How often have they stifled the most tender affection, and
+sacrificed it to the conventionalities of an establishment? Rest,
+time, absence, are remedies which passion, however ardent one may have
+supposed it, can never resist; insensibly it weakens, and dies all at
+once. I know that to withdraw honorably from such a liaison requires
+all the strength of reason. I comprehend still more, that the
+difficulties you imagine stand in the way of maintaining a victory, do
+not leave you enough courage to undertake it; so that, although I may
+say that there are no invincible inclinations in the speculation, I
+will admit that there are few of them to be vanquished by practice;
+and it happens so, only because one does not like to attempt without
+success. However that may be, on the whole, I imagine that there being
+here only a question of gallantry, it would be folly to put you to the
+torture, in order to destroy the inclination which has seized upon you
+for a woman more or less amiable; but also, because you are not
+smitten with anyone, I persist in saying that I was right in
+describing to you the character which I believed would be the most
+capable of making you happy.
+
+It is without doubt to be desired, that delicate sentiments, real
+merit, should have more power over our hearts, and that they might be
+able to occupy them and find a permanent place there forever. But
+experience proves that this is not so. I do not reason from what you
+should be, but from what you really are. My intention is to give you a
+knowledge of the heart such as it is, and not what it ought to be. I
+am the first one to regret the depravity of your taste, however
+indulgent I may be to your caprices. But not being able to reform the
+vices of the heart, I would at least teach you to draw out of them
+whatever good you can. Not being able to render you wise, I try to
+make you happy. It is an old saying: to wish to destroy the passions
+would be to undertake our annihilation. It is only necessary to
+regulate them. They are in our hands like the poison in a pharmacy;
+compounded by a skillful chemist they become beneficent remedies.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+Women Expect a Quid Pro Quo From Men
+
+
+Oh, who doubts, Marquis, that it may be only by essential qualities
+that you can succeed in pleasing women? It is simply a question of
+knowing what meaning you attach to this expression. Do you call
+essential qualities, worth, firmness of character, precision of
+judgment, extent of learning, prudence, discretion, how can I tell the
+number of virtues which often embarrass you more than they make you
+happy? Our minds are not in accord upon this matter. Reserve all the
+qualities I have specified for the intercourse you are obliged to have
+with men, they are quite proper under such circumstances. But when it
+comes to gallantry, you will have to change all such virtues for an
+equal number of charming traits; those that captivate, it is the only
+coin that passes current in this country; it is the only merit, and
+you must be on your guard against calling it spurious money. It may be
+that true merit consists less in real perfection than in that which
+the world requires. It is far more advantageous to possess the
+qualities agreeable to those whom we desire to please, than to have
+those we believe to be estimable. In a word, we must imitate the
+morals and even the caprices of those with whom we associate, if we
+expect to live in peace with them.
+
+What is the destiny of women? What is their role on earth? It is to
+please. Now, a charming figure, personal graces, in a word, all the
+amiable and brilliant qualities are the only means of succeeding in
+that role. Women possess them to a superlative degree, and it is in
+these qualities that they wish men to resemble them. It will be vain
+for you to accuse them of frivolity, for they are playing the beauty
+role, since they are destined to make you happy. Is it not, indeed,
+due to the charm of our companionship, to the gentleness of our
+manners, that you owe your most satisfying pleasures, your social
+virtues, in fact, your whole happiness? Have some good faith in this
+matter. Is it possible for the sciences of themselves, the love of
+glory, valor, nay, even that friendship of which you boast so much, to
+make you perfectly happy? The pleasure you draw from any of them, can
+it be keen enough to make you feel happy? Certainly not. None of them
+have the power to relieve you from a wearisome monotony which crushes
+you and makes you an object of pity.
+
+It is women who have taken upon themselves to dissipate these mortal
+languors by the vivacious gayety they inject into their society; by
+the charms they know so well how to lavish where they will prove
+effectual. A reckless joy, an agreeable delirium, a delicious
+intoxication, are alone capable of awakening your attention, and
+making you understand that you are really happy, for, Marquis, there
+is a vast difference between merely enjoying happiness and relishing
+the sensation of enjoying it. The possession of necessary things does
+not make a man comfortable, it is the superfluous which makes him
+rich, and which makes him feel that he is rich.
+
+It is not because you possess superior qualities that you are a
+pleasant companion, it may be a real defect which is essential to you.
+To be received with open arms, you must be agreeable, amusing,
+necessary to the pleasure of others. I warn you that you can not
+succeed in any other manner, particularly with women. Tell me, what
+would you have me do with your learning, the geometry of your mind,
+with the precision of your memory, etc.? If you have only such
+advantages, Marquis, if you have no charming accomplishments to offset
+your crudity--I can vouch for their opinion--far from pleasing women,
+you will seem to them like a critic of whom they will be afraid, and
+you will place them under so much constraint, that the enjoyment they
+might have permitted themselves in your society will be banished. Why,
+indeed, try to be amiable toward a man who is a source of anxiety to
+you by his nonchalance, who does not unbosom himself? Women are not at
+their ease except with those who take chances with them, and enter
+into their spirit. In a word, too much circumspection gives others a
+chill like that felt by a man who goes out of a warm room into a cold
+wind. I intended to say that habitual reserve locks the doors of the
+hearts of those who associate with us; they have no room to expand.
+
+You must also bear this in mind, Marquis, that in cases of gallantry,
+your first advances must be made under the most favorable
+circumstances. You must have read somewhere, that one pleases more by
+agreeable faults than by essential qualities. Great virtues are like
+pieces of gold of which one makes less use than of ordinary currency.
+
+This idea calls to my mind those people who, in place of our kind of
+money, use shells as their medium of exchange. Well, do you imagine
+that these people are not so rich as we with all the treasures of the
+new world? We might, at first blush, take this sort of wealth as
+actual poverty, but we should be quickly undeceived upon reflection,
+for metals have no value except in opinion. Our gold would be false
+money to those people. Now, the qualities you call essential are not
+worth any more in cases of gallantry, where only pebbles are
+sufficient. What matters the conventional mark provided there is
+commerce?
+
+Now, this is my conclusion: If it be true, as you can not doubt, that
+you ought not to expect happiness except from an interchange of
+agreeable qualities in women, you may be sure that you will never
+please them unless you possess advantages similar to theirs. I stick
+to the point. You men are constantly boasting about your science, your
+firmness, etc., but tell me, how weary would you not be, how disgusted
+even, with life, if, always logical, you were condemned to be forever
+learned and sordid, to live only in the company of philosophers? I
+know you, you would soon become weary of admiration for your good
+qualities, and the way you are made, you would rather do without
+virtue than pleasure. Do not amuse yourself, then, by holding
+yourself out as a man with great qualities in the sense you consider
+them. True merit is that which is esteemed by those we aim to please.
+Gallantry has its own laws, and Marquis, amiable men are the sages of
+this world.
+
+
+
+
+VIII
+
+The Necessity for Love and Its Primitive Cause.
+
+
+This time, Marquis, you have not far to go, your hour has come. The
+diagnosis you give me of your condition tells me that you are in love.
+The young widow you mention is certainly capable of rousing an
+inspiration in your heart. The Chevalier de ---- has given me a very
+favorable portrait of her. But scarcely do you begin to feel a few
+scruples, than you turn into a crime the advice I have been giving
+you. The disorder which love brings to the soul, and the other evils
+which follow in its train, appear to you, so you say, more to be
+feared than the pleasures it gives are to be desired.
+
+It is true that some very good people are of the opinion that the
+sorrows of love are about equal to its pleasures, but without entering
+upon a tiresome discussion to ascertain whether they are right or
+wrong, if you would have my opinion, here it is: Love is a passion
+which is neither good nor bad of itself; it is only those who are
+affected by it that determine whether it is good or bad. All that I
+shall say in its favor is, that it gives us an advantage with which
+any of the discomforts of life can not enter into comparison. It drags
+us out of the rut, it stirs us up, and it is love which satisfies one
+of our most pressing wants. I think I have already told you that our
+hearts are made for emotion; to excite it therefore, is to satisfy a
+demand of nature. What would vigorous youth be without love? A long
+illness: it would not be existence, it would be vegetating. Love is to
+our hearts what winds are to the sea. They grow into tempests, true;
+they are sometimes even the cause of shipwrecks. But the winds render
+the sea navigable, their constant agitation of its surface is the
+cause of its preservation, and if they are often dangerous, it is for
+the pilot to know how to navigate in safety.
+
+But I have wandered from my text, and return to it. Though I shock
+your sensitive delicacy by my frank speaking, I shall add, that
+besides the need of having our emotions stirred, we have in connection
+with them a physical machinery, which is the primitive cause and
+necessity of love. Perhaps it is not too modest for a woman to use
+such language to you, but you will understand that I would not talk to
+every one so plainly. We are not engaged in what may be called "nice"
+conversation, we are philosophizing. If my discussions seem to you to
+be sometimes too analytical for a woman, remember what I told you in
+my last letter. From the time I was first able to reason, I made up my
+mind to investigate and ascertain which of the two sexes was the more
+favored. I saw that men were not at all stinted in the distribution of
+the roles to be played, and I therefore became a man.
+
+If I were you, I would not investigate whether it be a good or a bad
+thing to fall in love. I would prefer to have you ask whether it is
+good or bad to be thirsty; or, that it be forbidden to give one a
+drink because there are men who become intoxicated. Inasmuch as you
+are not at liberty to divest yourself of an appetite belonging to the
+mechanical part of your nature, as could our ancient romancers, do not
+ruin yourself by speculating and meditating on the greater or less
+advantages in loving. Take love as I have advised you to take it, only
+do not let it be to you a passion, only an amusement.
+
+I understand what you are going to say: you are going to overwhelm me
+again with your great principles, and tell me that a man has not
+sufficient control over his feelings to stop when he would. Pooh! I
+regard those who talk in that fashion in the same light as the man,
+who believes he is in honor bound to show great sorrow on the occasion
+of a loss or accident, which his friends consider great, but which is
+nothing to him. Such a man feels less than any one the need of
+consolation, but he finds pleasure in showing his tears. He rejoices
+to know that he possesses a heart capable of excessive emotion, and
+this softens it still more. He feeds it with sorrow, he makes an idol
+of it, and offers it incense so often that he acquires the habit. All
+such admirers of great and noble sentiments, spoiled by romances or by
+prudes, make it a point of honor to spiritualize their passion. By
+force of delicate treatment, they become all the more infatuated with
+it, as they deem it to be their own work, and they fear nothing so
+much as the shame of returning to common sense and resuming their
+manhood.
+
+Let us take good care, Marquis, not to make ourselves ridiculous in
+this way. This fashion of straining our intelligence is nothing more,
+in the age in which we are living, than playing the part of fools. In
+former times people took it into their heads that love should be
+something grave, they considered it a serious matter, and esteemed it
+only in proportion to its dignity. Imagine exacting dignity from a
+child! Away would go all its graces, and its youth would soon become
+converted into old age. How I pity our good ancestors! What with them
+was a mortal weariness, a melancholy frenzy, is with us a gay folly, a
+delicious delirium. Fools that they were, they preferred the horrors
+of deserts and rocks, to the pleasures of a garden strewn with
+flowers. What prejudices the habit of reflection has brought upon us!
+
+The proof that great sentiments are nothing but chimeras of pride and
+prejudice, is, that in our day, we no longer witness that taste for
+ancient mystic gallantry, no more of those old fashioned gigantic
+passions. Ridicule the most firmly established opinions, I will go
+further, deride the feelings that are believed to be the most natural
+and soon both will disappear, and men will stand amazed to see that
+ideas for which they possessed a sort of idolatry, are in reality
+nothing but trifles which pass away like the ever changing fashions.
+
+You will understand, then, Marquis, that it is not necessary to
+acquire the habit of deifying the fancy you entertain for the
+Countess. You will know, at last, that love to be worthy of the name,
+and to make us happy, far from being treated as a serious affair,
+should be fostered lightly, and above all with gayety. Nothing can
+make you understand more clearly the truth of what I am telling you,
+than the result of your adventure, for I believe the Countess to be
+the last woman in the world to harbor a sorrowful passion. You, with
+your high sentiments will give her the blues, mark what I tell you.
+
+My indisposition continues, and I would feel like telling you that I
+never go out during the day, but would not that be giving you a
+rendezvous? If, however, you should come and give me your opinion of
+the "Bajazet" of Racine, you would be very kind. They say that the
+Champmesle has surpassed herself.
+
+I have read over this letter, Marquis, and the lecture it contains
+puts me out of humor with you. I recognize the fact that truth is a
+contagious disease. Judge how much of it goes into love, since you
+bestow it even upon those who aim to undeceive you. It is quite
+strange, that in order to prove that love should be treated with
+levity, it was necessary to assume a serious tone.
+
+
+
+
+IX
+
+Love is a Natural Inclination
+
+
+So you have taken what I said about love in my last letter as a crime?
+I have blasphemed love; I have degraded it by calling it a
+"necessity?" You have such noble thoughts, Marquis. What is passing in
+your mind is proof of it. You can not realize, or imagine anything
+less than the pure and delicate sentiments which fill your heart. To
+see the Countess, hold sweet discourse with her, listen to the sound
+of her gentle voice, dance attendance upon her, that is the height of
+your desires, it is your supreme happiness. Far from you are those
+vulgar sentiments which I unworthily substitute for your sublime
+metaphysics; sentiments created for worldly souls occupied solely with
+sensual pleasures. What a mistake I made! Could I imagine that the
+Countess was a woman to be captured by motives so little worthy of
+her? To raise the suspicion in her mind that you possessed such views,
+would it not inevitably expose you to her hate, her scorn, etc.?
+
+Are not these the inconveniences which my morality leads you to
+apprehend? My poor Marquis! you are yourself deceived by your
+misunderstanding of the real cause of your sentiments. Give me all
+your attention: I wish to draw you away from error, but in a manner
+that will best accord with the importance of what I am about to say. I
+mount the tribune; I feel the presence of the god who inspires me. I
+rub my forehead with the air of a person who meditates on profound
+truths, and who is going to utter great thoughts. I am going to reason
+according to rule.
+
+Men, I know not by what caprice, have attached shame to the indulgence
+of that reciprocal inclination which nature has bestowed upon both
+sexes. They knew, however, that they could not entirely stifle its
+voice, so what did they do to relieve themselves of their
+embarrassment? They attempted to substitute the mere shell of an
+affection wholly spiritual for the humiliating necessity of appearing
+in good faith to satisfy a natural want. Insensibly, they have grown
+accustomed to meddle with a thousand little sublime nothings connected
+with it, and as if that were not enough, they have at last succeeded
+in establishing the belief that all these frivolous accessories, the
+work of a heated imagination, constitute the essence of the
+inclination. There you are; love erected into a fine virtue; at least
+they have given it the appearance of a virtue. But let us break
+through this prestige and cite an example.
+
+At the beginning of their intercourse, lovers fancy themselves
+inspired by the noblest and most delicate sentiments. They exhaust
+their ingenuity, exaggerations, the enthusiasm of the most exquisite
+metaphysics; they are intoxicated for a time with the idea that their
+love is a superior article. But let us follow them in their liaison:
+Nature quickly recovers her rights and re-assumes her sway; soon,
+vanity, gorged with the display of an exaggerated purpose, leaves the
+heart at liberty to feel and express its sentiments without restraint,
+and dissatisfied with the pleasures of love, the day comes when these
+people are very much surprised to find themselves, after having
+traveled around a long circuit, at the very point where a peasant,
+acting according to nature, would have begun. And thereby hangs a
+tale.
+
+A certain Honesta, to give her a fictitious name, in whose presence I
+was one day upholding the theory I have just been maintaining, became
+furious.
+
+"What!" she exclaimed in a transport of indignation, "do you pretend,
+Madame, that a virtuous person, one who possesses only honest
+intentions, such as marriage, is actuated by such vulgar motives? You
+would believe, in that case, that I, for instance, who 'par vertu,'
+have been married three times, and who, to subdue my husbands, have
+never wished to have a separate apartment, that I only acted thus to
+procure what you call pleasure? Truly you would be very much mistaken.
+Indeed, never have I refused to fulfill the duties of my state, but I
+assure you that the greater part of the time, I yielded to them only
+through complaisance, or as a distraction, always with regret at the
+importunities of men. We love men and marry them because they have
+certain qualities of mind and heart; and no woman, with the exception
+of those, perhaps, whom I do not care to name, even attaches any
+importance to other advantages----"
+
+I interrupted her, and more through malice than good taste, carried
+the argument to its logical conclusion. I made her see that what she
+said was a new proof of my contention:
+
+"The reasons you draw from the legitimate views of marriage," said I,
+"prove that those who hold them, fend to the same end as two ordinary
+lovers, perhaps, even in better faith, with this difference only, that
+they wish an extra ceremony attached to it."
+
+This shot roused the indignation of my adversary.
+
+"You join impiety to libertinage," said she, moving away from me.
+
+I took the liberty of making some investigations, and would you
+believe it, Marquis? This prude so refined, had such frequent
+'distractions' with her three husbands, who were all young and
+vigorous, that she buried them in a very short time.
+
+Come now, Marquis, retract your error; abandon your chimera, reserve
+delicacy of sentiment for friendship; accept love for what it is. The
+more dignity you give it, the more dangerous you make it; the more
+sublime the idea you form of it, the less correct it is. Believe de la
+Rochefoucauld, a man who knows the human heart well: "If you expect to
+love a woman for love of herself," says he, "you will be much
+mistaken."
+
+
+
+
+X
+
+The Sensation of Love Forms a Large Part of a Woman's Nature
+
+
+The commentaries the Countess has been making you about her virtue,
+and the refinement she expects in a lover, have certainly alarmed you.
+You think she will always be as severe as she now appears to you. All
+I have told you does not reassure you. You even esteem it a favor to
+me that you stop with doubting my principles. If you dared you would
+condemn them entirely. When you talk to me in that fashion, I feel at
+liberty to say that I believe you. It is not your fault if you do not
+see clearly into your own affair, but in proportion as you advance,
+the cloud will disappear, and you will perceive with surprise the
+truth of what I have been telling you.
+
+The more cold blooded you are, or at least, as long as passion has not
+yet reached that degree of boldness its progress will ultimately lead
+you to, the mere hope of the smallest favor is a crime; you tremble at
+the most innocent caress. At first you ask for nothing, or for so
+slight a favor, that a woman conscientiously believes herself obliged
+to grant it, delighted with you on account of your modesty. To obtain
+this slight favor, you protest never to ask another, and yet, even
+while making your protestations, you are preparing to exact more. She
+becomes accustomed to it and permits further trifling, which seems to
+be of so little importance that she would endure it from any other
+man, if she were on the slightest terms of intimacy with him. But, to
+judge from the result, what appears to be of so little consequence on
+one day when compared with the favor obtained the day before, becomes
+very considerable when compared with that obtained on the first day. A
+woman, re-assured by your discretion, does not perceive that her
+frailties are being graduated upon a certain scale. She is so much
+mistress of herself, and the little things which are at first exacted,
+appear to her to be so much within her power of refusal, that she
+expects to possess the same strength when something of a graver
+character is proposed to her. It is just this way: she flatters
+herself that her power of resistance will increase in the same
+proportion with the importance of the favors she will be called upon
+to grant. She relies so entirely upon her virtue, that she challenges
+danger by courting it. She experiments with her power of resistance;
+she wishes to see how far the granting of a few unimportant favors can
+lead her. Here is where she is imprudent, for by her very rashness she
+accustoms her imagination to contemplate suggestions which are the
+final cause of her seduction. She travels a long way on the road
+without perceiving that she has moved a single step. If upon looking
+back along the route, she is surprised at having yielded so much, her
+lover will be no less surprised at having obtained so much.
+
+But I go still further. I am persuaded that love is not always
+necessary to bring about the downfall of a woman. I knew a woman, who,
+although amiable in her manner with everybody, had never been
+suspected of any affair of the heart. Fifteen years of married life
+had not diminished her tenderness for her husband, and their happy
+union could be cited as an example to imitate.
+
+One day at her country place, her friends amused themselves so late
+that they were constrained to remain at her house all night. In the
+morning, her servants happening to be occupied with her guests, she
+was alone in her apartment engaged in making her toilet. A man whom
+she knew quite well, but who was without social position, dropped in
+for a short visit and to pass the compliments of the day. Some
+perplexity in her toilette, induced him to offer his services. The
+neglige dress she wore, naturally gave him an opportunity to
+compliment her upon her undiminished charms. Of course she protested,
+but laughingly, claiming they were unmerited. However, one thing
+followed another, they became a trifle sentimental, a few
+familiarities which they did not at first deem of any consequence,
+developed into something more decided, until, finally, unable to
+resist, they were both overcome, the woman being culpable, for she
+regarded his advances in the nature of a joke and let them run on.
+What was their embarrassment after such a slip? They have never since
+been able to understand how they could have ventured so far without
+having had the slightest intention of so doing.
+
+I am tempted to exclaim here: Oh, you mortals who place too much
+reliance upon your virtue, tremble at this example! Whatever may be
+your strength, there are, unfortunately, moments when the most
+virtuous is the most feeble. The reason for this strange phenomenon
+is, that nature is always on the watch; always aiming to attain her
+ends. The desire for love is, in a woman, a large part of her nature.
+Her virtue is nothing but a piece of patchwork.
+
+The homilies of your estimable Countess may be actually sincere,
+although in such cases, a woman always exaggerates, but she deludes
+herself if she expects to maintain to the end, sentiments so severe
+and so delicate. Fix this fact well in your mind, Marquis, that these
+female metaphysicians are not different in their nature from other
+women. Their exterior is more imposing, their morals more austere, but
+inquire into their acts, and you will discover that their heart
+affairs always finish the same as those of women less refined. They
+are a species of the "overnice," forming a class of their own, as I
+told Queen Christine of Sweden, one day: "They are the Jansenists of
+love." (Puritans.)
+
+You should be on your guard, Marquis, against everything women have to
+say on the chapter of gallantry. All the fine systems of which they
+make such a pompous display, are nothing but vain illusions, which
+they utilize to astonish those who are easily deceived. In the eyes of
+a clear sighted man, all this rubbish of stilted phrases is but a
+parade at which he mocks, and which does not prevent him from
+penetrating their real sentiments. The evil they speak of love, the
+resistance they oppose to it, the little taste they pretend for its
+pleasures, the measures they take against it, the fear they have of
+it, all that springs from love itself. Their very manner renders it
+homage, indicates that they harbor the thought of it. Love assumes a
+thousand different forms in their minds. Like pride, it lives and
+flourishes upon its own defeat; it is never overthrown that it does
+not spring up again with renewed force.
+
+What a letter, good heavens! To justify its length would be to
+lengthen it still more.
+
+
+
+
+XI
+
+The Distinction Between Love and Friendship
+
+
+I was delighted with your letter, Marquis. Do you know why? Because it
+gives me speaking proof of the truth of what I have been preaching to
+you these latter days. Ah! for once you have forgotten all your
+metaphysics. You picture to me the charms of the Countess with a
+complacency which demonstrates that your sentiments are not altogether
+so high flown as you would have me believe, and as you think down in
+your heart. Tell me frankly: if your love were not the work of the
+senses, would you take so much pleasure in considering that form,
+those eyes which enchant you, that mouth which you describe to me in
+such glowing colors? If the qualities of heart and mind alone seduce
+you, a woman of fifty is worth still more in that respect than the
+Countess. You see such a one every day, it is her mother; why not
+become enamored of her instead? Why neglect a hundred women of her
+age, of her plainness, and of her merit, who make advances to you, and
+who would enact the same role with you that you play with the
+Countess? Why do you desire with so much passion to be distinguished
+by her from other men? Why are you uneasy when she shows them the
+least courtesy? Does her esteem for them diminish that which she
+pretends for you? Are rivalries and jealousies recognized in
+metaphysics? I believe not I have friends and I do not observe such
+things in them; I feel none in my own heart when they love other
+women.
+
+Friendship is a sentiment which has nothing to do with the senses; the
+soul alone receives the impression of it, and the soul loses nothing
+of its value by giving itself up to several at the same time. Compare
+friendship with love, and you will perceive the difference between a
+desire which governs a friend, and that which offers itself to a
+lover. You will confess, that at heart, I am not so unreasonable as
+you at first thought, and that it might be very well if it should
+happen that in love, you might have a soul as worldly as that of a
+good many people, whom it pleases you to accuse of very little
+refinement.
+
+I do not wish, however, to bring men alone to trial. I am frank, and I
+am quite sure that if women would be honest, they would soon confess
+that they are not a bit more refined than men. Indeed, if they saw in
+love only the pleasures of the soul, if they hoped to please only by
+their mental accomplishments and their good character, honestly, now,
+would they apply themselves with such particular care to please by the
+charms of their person? What is a beautiful skin to the soul; an
+elegant figure; a well shaped arm? What contradictions between their
+real sentiments and those they exhibit on parade! Look at them, and
+you will be convinced that they have no intention of making themselves
+valued except by their sensual attractions, and that they count
+everything else as nothing. Listen to them: you will be tempted to
+believe that it is not worldly things which they consider the least. I
+think I deserve credit for trying to dispel your error in this
+respect, and ought I not to expect everything from the care they will
+take to undeceive you themselves? Perhaps they will succeed only too
+easily in expressing sentiments entirely contrary to those you have
+heard to-day from me.
+
+I am due at Mademoiselle de Raymond's this evening, to hear the two
+Camus and Ytier who are going to sing. Mesdames de la Sabliere, de
+Salins, and de Monsoreau will also be there. Would you miss such a
+fine company?
+
+
+
+
+XII
+
+A Man in Love is an Amusing Spectacle
+
+
+You take things too much to heart, Marquis. Already two nights that
+you have not slept. Oh! it is true love, there is no mistaking that.
+You have made your eyes speak, you, yourself, have spoken quite
+plainly, and not the slightest notice has been taken of your
+condition. Such behavior calls for revenge. Is it possible that after
+eight whole days of devoted attention she has not given you the least
+hope? Such a thing can not be easily imagined. Such a long resistance
+begins to pass beyond probability. The Countess is a heroine of the
+last century. But if you are beginning to lose patience, you can
+imagine the length of time you would have had to suffer, if you had
+continued to proclaim grand and noble sentiments. You have already
+accomplished more in eight days than the late Celadon could in eight
+months. However, to speak seriously, are your complaints just? You
+call the Countess ungrateful, insensible, disdainful, etc. But by what
+right do you talk thus? Will you never believe what I have told you a
+hundred times? Love is a veritable caprice, involuntary, even in one
+who experiences its pangs. Why should, you say that the beloved object
+is bound to recompense a blind sentiment acquired without her
+connivance?
+
+You are very queer, you men. You consider yourselves offended because
+a woman does not respond with eagerness to the languishing looks you
+deign to cast upon her. Your revolted pride immediately accuses her of
+injustice, as if it were her fault that your head is turned; as if she
+were obliged, at a certain stage, to be seized with the same disease
+as you. Tell me this: is the Countess responsible if she is not
+afflicted with the same delirium as soon as you begin to rave? Cease,
+then, to accuse her and to complain, and to try to communicate your
+malady to her; I know you, you are seductive enough. Perhaps she will
+feel, too soon for her peace of mind, sentiments commensurate with
+your desires. I believe she has in her everything to subjugate you,
+and to inspire you with the taste I hope will be for your happiness,
+but so far, I do not think she is susceptible of a very serious
+attachment.
+
+Vivacious, inconsistent, positive, decided, she can not fail to give
+you plenty of exercise. An attentive and caressing woman would weary
+you; you must be handled in a military fashion, if you are to be
+amused and retained. As soon as the mistress assumes the role of
+lover, love begins to weaken; it does more, it rises like a tyrant,
+and ends in disdain which leads directly to disgust and inconstancy.
+Have you found, perchance, everything you required in the little
+mistress who is the cause of your dolorous martyrdom? Poor Marquis!
+What storms will blow over you. What quarrels I foresee! How many
+vexations, how many threats to leave her! But do not forget this: So
+much emotion will become your punishment, if you treat love after the
+manner of a hero of romance, and you will meet a fate entirely the
+contrary if you treat it like a reasonable man.
+
+But ought I to continue to write you? The moments you employ to read
+my letters will be so many stolen from love. Great Heavens! how I
+should like to be a witness of your situations! Indeed, for a
+sober-minded person, is there a spectacle more amusing than the
+contortions of a man in love?
+
+
+
+
+XIII
+
+Vanity Is a Fertile Soil for Love.
+
+
+You are not satisfied, then, Marquis, with what I so cavalierly said
+about your condition? You wish me by all means to consider your
+adventure as a serious thing, but I shall take good care not to do so.
+Do you not see that my way of treating you is consistent with my
+principles? I speak lightly of a thing I believe to be frivolous, or
+simply amusing. When it comes to an affair on which depends a lasting
+happiness, you will see me take on an appropriate tone. I do not want
+to pity you, because it depends upon yourself whether you are to be
+pitied or not. By a trick of your imagination, what now appears to be
+a pain to you may become a pleasure. To succeed, make use of my recipe
+and you will find it good. But to refer to the second paragraph of
+your letter:
+
+You say you are all the more surprised at the coldness of the Countess
+as you did not think it in earnest. According to what you say, your
+conjectures are based on the indiscretions of her friends. The good
+she spoke about you to them, was the main cause of your taking a fancy
+to her. I know men by this trait. The smallest word that escapes a
+woman's lips leads them into the belief that she has designs upon
+them. Everything has some reference to their merits; their vanity
+seizes upon everything, and they turn everything into profit. To
+examine them closely, nearly all of them love through gratitude, and
+on this point, women are not any more reasonable. So that gallantry is
+an intercourse in which we want the others to go along with us, always
+want to be their debtors. And you know pride is much more active in
+paying back than in giving. If two lovers would mutually explain,
+without reservation, the beginning and progress of their passion, what
+confidences would they not exchange?
+
+Elise, to whom Valere uttered a few general compliments, responded,
+perhaps without intending to, in a more affectionate manner than is
+usual in the case of such insipidities. It was enough. Valere is
+carried away with the idea that from a gallant he must become a lover.
+The fire is insensibly kindled on both sides; finally, it bursts
+forth, and there you are, a budding passion. If you should charge
+Elise with having made the first advances, nothing would appear more
+unjust to her, and yet nothing could be more true. I conclude from
+this that to take love for what it really is, it is less the work of
+what is called invincible sympathy, than that of our vanity. Notice
+the birth of all love affairs. They begin by the mutual praises we
+bestow upon each other. It has been said that it is folly which
+conducts love; I should say that it is flattery, and that it can not
+be introduced into the heart of a belle until after paying tribute to
+her vanity. Add to all this, the general desire and inclination we
+have to be loved, and we are bravely deceived. Like those enthusiasts
+who, by force of imagination, believe they can really see the images
+they conjure up in their minds, we fancy that we can see in others the
+sentiments we desire to find there.
+
+Be careful, then, Marquis, not to let yourself be blinded by a false
+notion. The Countess may have spoken well of you with the sole object
+of doing you justice, without carrying her intention any farther. And
+be sure you are wrong when you suspect her of insincerity in your
+regard. After all, why should you not prefer to have her dissemble her
+sentiments toward you, if you are the source of their inspiration? Are
+not women in the right to hide carefully their sentiments from you,
+and does not the bad use you make of the certainty of their love
+justify them in so doing?
+
+
+
+
+XIV
+
+Worth and Merit Are Not Considered in Love
+
+
+No, Marquis, the curiosity of Madame de Sevigne has not offended me.
+On the contrary, I am very glad that she wished to see the letters you
+receive from me. Without doubt, she thought that if it were a question
+of gallantry, it could only be to my profit; she now knows the
+contrary. She will also know that I am not so frivolous as she
+imagined, and I believe her just enough to form hereafter another idea
+of Ninon than the one she has heretofore had of her, for I am not
+ignorant of the fact that she does not speak of me much to my
+advantage. But her injustice will never influence my friendship for
+you. I am philosophic enough to console myself for not securing the
+commendation of people who judge me without knowing me. Whatever may
+happen, I shall continue to talk to you with my ordinary frankness,
+and I am sure that Madame de Sevigne, in spite of her refined mind,
+will, at heart, be more of my opinion than she cares to show. Now, I
+come to what relates to you.
+
+Well, Marquis, after infinite care and trouble, you think you have at
+last softened that stony heart? I am glad of it; but I laugh at your
+interpretation of the Countess' sentiments. You share with all men a
+common error which it is necessary to remove, however flattering it
+may be to you to foster it. You believe, every one of you, that it is
+your worth alone that kindles passion in the heart of women, and that
+qualities of heart and mind are the causes of the love they feel
+toward you. What a mistake! You only think so, it is true, because
+your pride finds satisfaction in the thought. But, if you can do so
+without prejudice, inquire into the motives that actuate you, and you
+will soon perceive that you are laboring under a delusion, and that we
+deceive you; that, everything well considered, you are the dupe of
+your vanity and of ours; that the worth of the person loved is only an
+excuse which gives an occasion for love, and is not the real cause.
+Finally, that all this sublime by-play, which is paraded on both
+sides, is a mere preliminary which enters into the desire to satisfy
+the need I first indicated to you as the prime exciting cause of this
+passion. I tell you this is a hard and humiliating truth, but it is
+none the less certain. We women enter the world with this necessity of
+loving undefined, and if we take one man in preference to another, let
+us say so honestly, we yield less to the knowledge of merit than to a
+mechanical instinct which is nearly always blind.
+
+For proof of this I need only refer to the foolish passions with which
+we sometimes become intoxicated for strangers, or at least for men
+with whom we are not sufficiently acquainted, to relieve our selection
+of them from the odium of imprudence from the beginning; in which case
+if there is a mutual response, well, it is pure chance. We are always
+forming attachments without sufficient circumspection, hence I am not
+wrong in comparing love to an appetite which one sometimes feels for
+one kind of food rather than for another, without being able to give
+the reason. I am very cruel to thus dissipate the phantoms of your
+self love, but I am telling you the truth. You are flattered by the
+love of a woman, because you believe it implies the worthiness of the
+object loved. You do her too much honor: let us say rather, that you
+have too good an opinion of yourself. Understand that it is not for
+yourself that we love you, to speak with sincerity, it is our own
+happiness we seek. Caprice, interest, vanity, disposition, the
+uneasiness that affects our hearts when they are unoccupied, these are
+the sources of the great sentiment we wish to deify! It is not great
+qualities that affect us; if they enter for anything into the reasons
+which determine us in your favor, it is not the heart which receives
+the impression, it is vanity; and the greater part of the things in
+you which please us, very often makes you ridiculous or contemptible.
+
+But, what will you have? We need an admirer who can entertain us with
+ideas of our perfections; we need an obliging person who will submit
+to our caprices; we need a man! Chance presents us with one rather
+than another; we accept him, but we do not choose him. In a word, you
+believe yourselves to be the objects of our disinterested affection. I
+repeat: You think women love you for yourselves. Poor dupes! You are
+only the instruments of their pleasures, the sport of their caprices.
+I must, however, do women justice; it is not that you are what I have
+just enumerated with their consent, for the sentiments which I develop
+here are not well defined in their minds, on the contrary, with the
+best faith in the world, women imagine themselves influenced and
+actuated only by the grand ideas which your vanity and theirs has
+nourished. It would be a crying injustice to accuse them of deceit in
+this respect; but, without being aware of it, they deceive themselves,
+and you are equally deceived.
+
+You see that I am revealing the secrets of the good goddess. Judge of
+my friendship, since, at the expense of my own sex, I labor to
+enlighten you. The better you know women, the fewer follies they will
+lead you to commit.
+
+
+
+
+XV
+
+The Hidden Motives of Love
+
+
+Really, Marquis, I do not understand how you can meekly submit to the
+serious language I sometimes write you. It seems as if I had no other
+aim in my letters than to sweep away your agreeable illusions and
+substitute mortifying truths. I must, however, get rid of my mania for
+saying deeply considered things. I know better than any one else that
+pleasant lies are more agreeable than the most reasonable
+conversation, but my disposition breaks through everything in spite of
+me. I feel a fit of philosophy upon me again to-day, and I must ask
+you to prepare to endure the broadside of morality I am making ready
+to give you. Hereafter, I promise you more gayety. So now to answer
+your letter.
+
+No, I will not take back anything. You may make war on me as much as
+it please you, because of the bad opinion of my sex I expressed in my
+last letter. Is it my fault if I am furnished with disagreeable truths
+to utter? Besides, do you not know, Marquis, that the being on earth
+who thinks the most evil of women, is a woman?
+
+I wish, however, very seriously, to justify the ideas, to my manner of
+expressing which you have taken an exception. I am neither envious nor
+unjust. Because I happened to mention my own sex rather than yours,
+you must not imagine that it is my intention to underrate women. I
+hoped to make you understand that, without being more culpable than
+men, they are more dangerous because they are accustomed more
+successfully to hide their sentiments. In effect, you will confess the
+object of your love sooner than they will acknowledge theirs. However,
+when they assure you that their affection for you has no other source
+than a knowledge of your merit and of your good qualities, I am
+persuaded that they are sincere. I do not even doubt that when they
+realize that their style of thought is becoming less refined, they do
+everything in their power to hide the fact from themselves. But the
+motives, about which I have been telling you, are in the bottom of
+their hearts just the same. They are none the less the true causes of
+the liking they have for you, and whatever efforts they may make to
+persuade themselves that the causes are wholly spiritual, their desire
+changes nothing in the nature of things. They hide this deformity with
+as much care as they would conceal teeth that might disfigure an
+otherwise perfect face. In such case, even when alone they would be
+afraid to open their mouth, and so, by force of habit in hiding this
+defect from others as well as from themselves, they succeed in
+forgetting all about it or in considering that it is not much of a
+defect.
+
+I agree with you that you would lose too much if men and women were to
+show themselves in their true colors. The world has agreed to play a
+comedy, and to show real, natural sentiments would not be acting, it
+would be substituting the real character for the one it has been
+agreed to feign. Let us then enjoy the enchantment without seeking to
+know the cause of the charm which amuses and seduces us. To anatomize
+love would be to enter upon its cure. Psyche lost it for having been
+too curious, and I am tempted to believe that this fable is a lesson
+for those who wish to analyze pleasure.
+
+I wish to make some corrections in what I have said to you: If I told
+you that men are wrong in priding themselves on their choice of a
+woman, and their sentiments for her; if I said that the motives which
+actuate them are nothing less than glorious for the men, I desire to
+add, that they are equally deceived if they imagine that the
+sentiments which they show with so much pompous display are always
+created by force of female charms, or by an abiding impression of
+their merits. How often does it happen that those men who make
+advances with such a respectful air, who display such delicate and
+refined sentiments, so flattering to vanity, who, in a word, seem to
+breathe only through them, only for them, and have no other desire
+than their happiness; how often, I repeat, are those men, who adorn
+themselves with such beautiful sentiments, influenced by reasons
+entirely the contrary? Study, penetrate these good souls, and you will
+see in the heart of this one, instead of a love so disinterested, only
+desire; in that one, it will be only a scheme to share your fortune,
+the glory of having obtained a woman of your rank; in a third you
+will discover motives still more humiliating to you; he will use you
+to rouse the jealousy of some woman he really loves, and he will
+cultivate your friendship merely to distinguish himself in her eyes by
+rejecting you. I can not tell you how many motives, there are so many.
+The human heart is an insolvable enigma. It is a whimsical combination
+of all the known contrarieties. We think we know its workings; we see
+their effects; we ignore the cause. If it expresses its sentiments
+sincerely, even that sincerity is not reassuring. Perhaps its
+movements spring from causes entirely contrary to those we imagine we
+feel to be the real ones. But, after all, people have adopted the best
+plan, that is, to explain everything to their advantage, and to
+compensate themselves in imagination for their real miseries, and
+accustom themselves, as I think I have already said, to deifying all
+their sentiments. Inasmuch as everybody finds in that the summit of
+his vanity, nobody has ever thought of reforming the custom, or of
+examining it to see whether it is a mistake.
+
+Adieu; if you desire to come this evening you will find me with those
+whose gayety will compensate you for this serious discourse.
+
+
+
+
+XVI
+
+How to Be Victorious in Love
+
+
+Is what you write me possible, Marquis, what, the Countess continues
+obdurate? The flippant manner in which she receives your attentions
+reveals an indifference which grieves you? I think I have guessed the
+secret of the riddle. I know you. You are gay, playful, conceited
+even, with women as long as they do not impress you. But with those
+who have made an impression upon your heart, I have noticed that you
+are timid. This quality might affect a bourgeoise, but you must attack
+the heart of a woman of the world with other weapons. The Countess
+knows the ways of the world. Believe me, and leave to the Celadons,
+such things as sublime talk, beautiful sentiments; let them spin out
+perfection. I tell you on behalf of women: there is not one of us who
+does not prefer a little rough handling to too much consideration. Men
+lose through blundering more hearts than virtue saves.
+
+The more timidity a lover shows with us the more it concerns our pride
+to goad him on; the more respect he has for our resistance, the more
+respect we demand of him. We would willingly say to you men: "Ah, in
+pity's name do not suppose us to be so very virtuous; you are forcing
+us to have too much of it. Do not put so high a price upon your
+conquest; do not treat our defeat as if it were something difficult.
+Accustom our imagination by degrees to seeing you doubt our
+indifference."
+
+When we see a lover, although he may be persuaded of our gratitude,
+treat us with the consideration demanded by our vanity, we shall
+conclude without being aware of it, that he will always be the same,
+although sure of our inclination for him. From that moment, what
+confidence will he not inspire? What flattering progress may he not
+make? But if he notifies us to be always on our guard, then it is not
+our hearts we shall defend; it will not be a battle to preserve our
+virtue, but our pride; and that is the worst enemy to be conquered in
+women. What more is there to tell you? We are continually struggling
+to hide the fact that we have permitted ourselves to be loved. Put a
+woman in a position to say that she has yielded only to a species of
+violence, or to surprise; persuade her that you do not undervalue her,
+and I will answer for her heart.
+
+You must manage the Countess as her character requires; she is lively,
+and playful, and by trifling follies you must lead her to love. Do not
+even let her see that she distinguishes you from other men, and be as
+playful as she is light hearted. Fix yourself in her heart without
+giving her any warning of your intention. She will love you without
+knowing it, and some day she will be very much astonished at having
+made so much headway without really suspecting it.
+
+
+
+
+XVII
+
+Women Understand the Difference Between Real Love and Flirtation
+
+
+Perhaps, Marquis, you will think me still more cruel than the
+Countess. She is the cause of your anxieties, it is true, but I am the
+cause of something worse; I feel a great desire to laugh at them. Oh,
+I enter into your troubles seriously enough, I can not do more, and
+your embarrassment appears great to me. Really, why risk a declaration
+of love to a woman who takes a wicked pleasure in avoiding it on every
+occasion? Now, she appears affected, and then again, she is the most
+unmindful woman in the world in spite of all you do to please her. She
+listens willingly and replies gaily to the gallant speeches and bold
+conversation of a certain Chevalier, a professional coxcomb, but to
+you she speaks seriously and with a preoccupied air. If you take on a
+tender and affectionate tone, she replies flippantly, or perhaps
+changes the subject. All this intimidates you, troubles you, and
+drives you to despair. Poor Marquis!--and I answer you, that all this
+is love, true and beautiful. The absence of mind which she affects
+with you, the nonchalance she puts on for a mask, ought to make you
+feel at heart that she is far from being indifferent. But your lack of
+boldness, the consequences which she feels must follow such a passion
+as yours, the interest which she already takes in your condition, all
+this intimidates the countess herself, and it is you who raise
+obstacles in her path. A little more boldness on your part would put
+you both at your ease. Do you remember what M. de la Rochefoucauld
+told you lately: "A reasonable man in love may act like a madman, but
+he should not and can not act like an idiot."
+
+Besides, when you compare your respect and esteem with the free and
+almost indecent manner of the Chevalier; when you draw from it the
+conclusion that she should prefer you to him, you do not know how
+incorrectly you argue. The Chevalier is nothing but a gallant, and
+what he says is not worth considering, or at least appears so.
+Frivolity alone, the habit of romancing to all the pretty women he
+finds in his way, makes him talk. Love counts for nothing, or at least
+for very little, in all his liaisons. Like the butterfly, he hovers
+only a moment over each flower. An amusing episode is his only object.
+So much frivolity is not capable of alarming a woman. She is delighted
+at the trifling danger she incurs in listening to such a man.
+
+The Countess knows very well how to appreciate the discourse of the
+Chevalier; and to say everything in a word, she knows him to be a man
+whose heart is worn out. Women, who, to hear them talk, go in more for
+metaphysics, know admirably how to tell the difference between a lover
+of his class and a man like you. But you will always be more
+formidable and more to be dreaded by your manner of making yourself
+felt.
+
+You boast to me of your respectful esteem, but I reply that it is
+nothing of the kind, and the Countess knows it well. Nothing ends with
+so little respect as a passion like yours. Quite different from the
+Chevalier, you require recognition, preference, acknowledgment, even
+sacrifices. The Countess sees all these pretensions at a glance, or at
+least, if in the cloud which still envelops them, she does not
+distinguish them clearly, nature gives her a presentiment of what the
+cost will be if she allows you the least opportunity to instruct her
+in a passion which she doubtless already shares. Women rarely inquire
+into the reasons which impel them to give themselves up or to resist;
+they do not even amuse themselves by trying to understand or explain
+them, but they have feelings, and sentiment with them is correct, it
+takes the place of intelligence and reflection. It is a sort of
+instinct which warns them in case of danger, and which leads them
+aright perhaps as surely as does the most enlightened reason. Your
+beautiful Adelaide wishes to enjoy an incognito as long as she can.
+This plan is very congenial to her real interests, and yet I am fully
+persuaded that it is not the work of reflection. She sees it only from
+the point of view of a passion, outwardly constrained, making stronger
+impressions and still greater progress inwardly. Let it have an
+opportunity to take deep root, and give to this fire she tries to
+hide, time to consume the heart in which you wish to confine it.
+
+You must also admit, Marquis, that you deceive yourself in two ways
+in your calculation. You thought you respected the Countess more than
+the Chevalier does, on the contrary you see that the gallant speeches
+of the Chevalier are without effect, while you begrudge them to the
+heart of your beauty. On the other hand, you figure that her
+preoccupied air, indifferent and inattentive manner are proofs or
+forewarnings of your unhappiness. Undeceive yourself. There is no more
+certain proof of a passion than the efforts made to hide it. In a
+word, when the Countess treats you kindly, whatever proofs you may
+give her of your affection, when she sees you without alarm on the
+point of confessing your love, I tell you that her heart is caught;
+she loves you, on my word.
+
+By the way, I forgot to reply to that part of your letter concerning
+myself. Yes, Marquis, I constantly follow the method which I
+prescribed at the commencement of our correspondence. There are few
+matters in my letters that I have not used as subjects of conversation
+in my social reunions. I rarely suggest ideas of any importance to
+you, without having taken the opinions of my friends on their verity.
+Sometimes it is Monsieur de la Bruyere, sometimes Monsieur de
+Saint-Evremond whom I consult; another time it will be Monsieur l'Abbe
+de Chateauneuf. You must admire my good faith, Marquis, for I might
+claim the credit of the good I write you, but I frankly avow that you
+owe it only to the people whom I receive at my house.
+
+Apropos of men of distinguished merit, M. de la Rochefoucauld has
+just sent me word that he would like to call on me. I fixed to-morrow,
+and you might do well to be present, but do not forget how much he
+loves you. Adieu.
+
+
+
+
+XVIII
+
+When a Woman Is Loved She Need Not Be Told of It
+
+
+I have been engaged in some new reflections on the condition you are
+in, Marquis, and on the embarrassment in which you continue. After
+all, why do you deem it necessary to make a formal declaration of
+love? Can it be because you have read about such things in our old
+romances, in which the proceedings in courtship were as solemn as
+those of the tribunals? That would be too technical. Believe me, let
+it alone; as I told you in my last letter, the fire lighted, will
+acquire greater force every day, and you will see, that without having
+said you love, you will be farther advanced than if you were
+frightened by avowals which our fathers insisted should worry the
+women. Avowals absolutely useless in themselves, and which always
+incumber a passion with several nebulous days. They retard its
+progress. Bear this well in mind, Marquis: A woman is much better
+persuaded that she is loved by what she guesses than by what she is
+told.
+
+Act as if you had made the declaration which is costing you so much
+anxiety; or imitate the Chevalier; take things easy. The way the
+Countess conducts herself with him in your presence seems to be a law
+in your estimation. With your circumspection and pretended respect,
+you present the appearance of a man who meditates an important design,
+of a man, in a word, who contemplates a wrong step. Your exterior is
+disquieting to a woman who knows the consequences of a passion such as
+yours. Remember that as long as you let it appear that you are making
+preparations for an attack, you will find her on the defensive. Have
+you ever heard of a skillful general, who intends to surprise a
+citadel, announce his design to the enemy upon whom the storm is to
+descend? In love as in war, does any one ever ask the victor whether
+he owes his success to force or skill? He has conquered, he receives
+the crown, his desires are gratified, he is happy. Follow his example
+and you will meet the same fate. Hide your progress; do not disclose
+the extent of your designs until it is no longer possible to oppose
+your success, until the combat is over, and the victory gained before
+you have declared war. In a word, imitate those warlike people whose
+designs are not known except by the ravaged country through which they
+have passed.
+
+
+
+
+XIX
+
+Why a Lover's Vows Are Untrustworthy
+
+
+At last, Marquis, you are listened to dispassionately when you protest
+your love, and swear by everything lovers hold sacred that you will
+always love. Will you believe my predictions another time? However,
+you would be better treated if you were more reasonable, so you are
+told, and limit your sentiments to simple friendship. The name of
+lover assumed by you is revolting to the Countess. You should never
+quarrel over quality when it is the same under any name, and follow
+the advice Madame de la Sabliere gives you in the following madrigal:
+
+  Belise ne veut point d'amant,
+  Mais voudrait un ami fidele,
+Qui pour elle eut des soins et de l'empressement,
+  Et qui meme la trouvat belle.
+  Amants, qui soupirez pour elle,
+  Sur ma parole tenez bon,
+Belise de l'amour ne hait que le nom.
+
+  (Belise for a lover sighed not,
+  But she wanted a faithful friend,
+Who would cuddle her up and care for her lot,
+  And even her beauty defend.
+  Oh, you lovers, whose sighs I commend,
+'Pon my word, hold fast to such game,
+What of love Belise hates is only the name.)
+
+But you are grieved by the injurious doubts cast upon your sincerity
+and constancy. You are disbelieved because all men are false and
+perjured, and because they are inconstant, love is withheld. How
+fortunate you are! How little the Countess knows her own heart, if she
+expects to persuade you of her indifference in that fashion! Do you
+wish me to place a true value on the talk she is giving you? She is
+very much affected by the passion you exhibit for her, but the
+warnings and sorrows of her friends have convinced her that the
+protestations of men are generally false. I do not conceive any
+injustice in this, for I, who do not flatter men willingly, am
+persuaded that they are usually sincere on such occasions. They become
+amorous of a woman, that is they experience the desire of possession.
+The enchanting image of that possession bewitches them; they calculate
+that the delights connected with it will never end; they do not
+imagine that the fire which consumes them can ever weaken or die out;
+such a thing seems impossible to them. Hence they swear with the best
+faith in the world to love us always; and to cast a doubt upon their
+sincerity would be inflicting a mortal injury.
+
+But the poor fellows make more promises than they can keep. They do
+not perceive that their heart has not enough energy always to hold the
+same object. They cease to love without knowing why. They are good
+enough to be scrupulous over their growing coldness. Long after love
+has fled they continue to insist that they still love. They exert
+themselves to no purpose, and after having tormented themselves as
+long as they can bear it, they surrender to dissatisfaction, and
+become inconstant with as much good faith as they possessed when they
+protested that they would be forever constant. Nothing is simpler and
+easier to explain. The fermentation of a budding love, excited in
+their heart the charm that seduced them; by and by, the enchantment is
+dispelled, and nonchalance follows. With what can they be charged?
+They counted upon keeping their vows. Dear me, how many women are too
+happy with what is lacking, since men give them a free rein to their
+lightness!
+
+However this may be, the Countess has charged up to you the
+inconstancy of your equals; she apprehends that you are no better than
+all other lovers. Ready to yield to you, however little you may be
+able to reassure her, she is trying to find reasons for believing you
+sincere. The love you protest for her does not offend her. What am I
+saying? It enchants her. She is so much flattered by it, that her sole
+fear is that it may not be true. Dissipate her alarms, show her that
+the happiness you offer her and of which she knows the price, is not
+an imaginary happiness. Go farther; persuade her that she will enjoy
+it forever, and her resistance will disappear, her doubts will vanish,
+and she will seize upon everything that will destroy her suspicions
+and uncertainty. She would have already believed you; already she
+would have resolved to yield to the pleasure of being loved, if she
+had believed herself really loved, and that it would last forever.
+
+How maladroit women are if they imagine that by their fears and their
+doubts of the sincerity and constancy of men, they can make any one
+believe they are fleeing from love, or despise it! As soon as they
+fear they will be deceived in the enjoyment of its pleasures; when
+they fear they will not long enjoy it, they already know the charms of
+it, and the only source of anxiety then is, that they will be deprived
+of its enjoyment too soon. Forever haunted by this fear, and attacked
+by the powerful inclination toward pleasure, they hesitate, they
+tremble with the apprehension that they will not be permitted to enjoy
+it but just long enough to make the privation of it more painful.
+Hence, Marquis, you may very easily conjecture a woman who talks to
+you as does the Countess, using this language:
+
+"I can imagine all the delights of love. The idea I have formed of it
+is quite seductive. Do you think that deep in my heart I desire to
+enjoy its charms less than you? But the more its image is ravishing to
+my imagination, the more I fear it is not real, and I refuse to yield
+to it lest my happiness be too soon destroyed. Ah, if I could only
+hope that my happiness might endure, how feeble would be my
+resistance? But will you not abuse my credulity? Will you not some day
+punish me for having had too much confidence in you? At least is that
+day very far off? Ah, if I could hope to gather perpetually the
+fruits of the sacrifice I am making of my repose for your sake, I
+confess it frankly, we would soon be in accord."
+
+
+
+
+XX
+
+The Half-way House to Love
+
+
+The rival you have been given appears to me to be all the more
+redoubtable, as he is the sort of a man I have been advising you to
+be. I know the Chevalier; nobody is more competent than he to carry a
+seduction to a successful conclusion. I am willing to wager anything
+that his heart has never been touched. He makes advances to the
+Countess in cold blood. You are lost. A lover as passionate as you
+have appeared to be, makes a thousand blunders. The most favorable
+designs would perish under your management. He permits everybody to
+take the advantage of him on every occasion. Indeed, such is his
+misfortune that his precipitation and his timidity injure his
+prospects by turns.
+
+A man who makes love for the pleasure he finds in it, profits by the
+smallest advantage; he knows the feeble places and makes himself
+master of them. Everything leads his way, everything is combined for
+his purpose. Even his imprudences are often the result of wise
+reflection; they help him along the road to success; they finally
+acquire so superior a position that, from their beginning, so to
+speak, dates the hour of his triumph.
+
+You must be careful, Marquis, not to go to extremes; you must not show
+the Countess enough love to lead her to understand the excess of your
+passion. Give her something to be anxious about; compel her to take
+heed lest she lose you, by giving her opportunities to think that she
+may. There is no woman on earth who will treat you more cavalierly
+than one who is absolutely certain that your love will not fail her.
+Like a merchant for whose goods you have manifested too great an
+anxiety to acquire, she will overcharge you with as little regard to
+consequences. Moderate, therefore, your imprudent vivacity; manifest
+less passion and you will excite more in her heart. We do not
+appreciate the worth of a prize more than when we are on the point of
+losing it. Some regulation in matters of love are indispensable for
+the happiness of both parties. I think I am even justified in advising
+you on certain occasions to be a trifle unprincipled. On all other
+occasions, though, it is better to be a dupe than a knave; but in
+affairs of gallantry, it is only the fools who are the dupes, and
+knaves always have the laugh on their side. Adieu.
+
+I have not the conscience to leave you without a word of consolation.
+Do not be discouraged. However redoubtable may be the Chevalier, let
+your heart rest in peace. I suspect that the cunning Countess is
+making a play with him to worry you. I have no desire to flatter you,
+but it gives me pleasure to say, that you are worth more than he. You
+are young, you are making your debut in the world, and you are
+regarded as a man who has never yet had any love affairs. The
+Chevalier has lived; what woman will not appreciate these differences?
+
+
+
+
+XXI
+
+The Comedy of Contrariness
+
+
+Probity in love, Marquis? How can you think of such a thing? Ah, you
+are like a drowned man. I shall take good care not to show your letter
+to any one, it would dishonor you. You do not know how to undertake
+the manoeuvres I have advised you to make, you say? Your candor, your
+high sentiments made your fortune formerly! Well, love was then
+treated like an affair of honor, but nowadays, the corruption of the
+age has changed all that; love is now nothing more than a play of the
+humor and of vanity.
+
+Your inexperience still leaves your virtues in an inflexible condition
+that will inevitably cause your ruin, if you have not enough
+intelligence to bring them into accord with the morals of the times.
+One can not now wear his sentiments on his sleeve. Everything is show;
+payment is made in airs, demonstrations, signs. Everybody is playing a
+comedy, and men have had excellent reasons for keeping up the farce.
+They have discovered the fact that nobody can gain anything by telling
+the actual truth about women. There is a general agreement to
+substitute for this sincerity a collection of contrary phrases. And
+this custom has proved contagious in cases of gallantry.
+
+In spite of your high principles, you will agree with me, that unless
+that custom, called "politeness," is not pushed so far as irony or
+treason, it is a sociable virtue to follow, and of all the relations
+among men, the true meaning of gallantry has more need of being
+concealed than that of any other social affair. How many occasions do
+you not find where a lover gains more by dissimulating the excess of
+his passion, than another who pretends to have more than he really
+has?
+
+I think I understand the Countess; she is more skillful than you. I am
+certain she dissimulates her affection for you with greater care than
+you take to multiply proofs of yours for her. I repeat; the less you
+expose yourself, the better you will be treated. Let her worry in her
+turn; inspire her with the fear that she will lose you, and see her
+come around. It is the surest way of finding out the true position you
+occupy in her heart. Adieu.
+
+
+
+
+XXII
+
+Vanity and Self-Esteem Obstacles to Love
+
+
+A silence of ten days, Marquis. You begin to worry me in earnest. The
+application you made of my counsel has, then, been successful? I
+congratulate you. What I do not approve, however, is your
+dissatisfaction with her for refusing to make the confession you
+desired. The words: "I love you" seem to be something precious in your
+estimation. For fifteen days you have been trying to penetrate the
+sentiments of the Countess, and you have succeeded; you know her
+affection for you. What more can you possibly want? What further right
+over her heart would a confession give you? Truly, I consider you a
+strange character. You ought to know that nothing is more calculated
+to cause a reasonable woman to revolt, than the obstinacy with which
+ordinary men insist upon a declaration of their love. I fail to
+understand you. Ought not her refusal to be a thousand times more
+precious to a delicate minded lover than a positive declaration? Will
+you ever know your real interests? Instead of persecuting a woman on
+such a point, expend your energies in concealing from her the extent
+of her affection. Act so that she will love you before you call her
+attention to the fact, before compelling her to resort to the
+necessity of proclaiming it. Is it possible to experience a situation
+more delicious than that of seeing a heart interested in you without
+suspicion, growing toward you by degrees, finally becoming
+affectionate? What a pleasure to enjoy secretly all her movements, to
+direct her sentiments, augment them, hasten them, and glory in the
+victory even before she has suspected that you have essayed her
+defeat! That is what I call pleasure.
+
+Believe me, Marquis, your conduct toward the Countess must be as if
+the open avowal of her love for you had escaped her. Of a truth, she
+has not said in words: "I love you," but it is because she really
+loves you that she has refrained from saying it. Otherwise she has
+done everything to convince you of it.
+
+Women are under no ordinary embarrassment. They desire for the very
+least, as much to confess their affection as you are anxious to
+ascertain it, but what do you expect, Marquis? Women ingenious at
+raising obstacles, have attached a certain shame to any avowal of
+their passion, and whatever idea you men may have formed of our way of
+thinking, such an avowal always humiliates us, for however small may
+be our experience, we comprehend all the consequences. The words "I
+love you" are not criminal, that is true, but their sequel frightens
+us, hence we find means to dissimulate, and close our eyes to the
+liabilities they carry with them.
+
+Besides this, be on your guard; your persistence in requiring an open
+avowal from the Countess, is less the work of love than a persevering
+vanity. I defy you to find a mistake in the true motives behind your
+insistence. Nature has given woman a wonderful instinct; it enables
+her to discern without mistake whatever grows out of a passion in one
+who is a stranger to her. Always indulgent toward the effects produced
+by a love we have inspired, we will pardon you many imprudences, many
+transports; how can I enumerate them all? All the follies of which you
+lovers are capable, we pardon, but you will always find us intractable
+when our self-esteem meets your own. Who would believe it? You inspire
+us to revolt at things that have nothing to do with your happiness.
+Your vanity sticks at trifles, and prevents you from enjoying actual
+advantages. Will you believe me when I say it? You will drop your idle
+fancies, to delight in the certainty that you are beloved by an
+adorable woman; to taste the pleasure of hiding the extent of her love
+from herself, to rejoice in its security. Suppose by force of
+importunities you should extract an "I love you," what would you gain
+by it? Would your uncertainty reach an end? Would you know whether you
+owe the avowal to love or complaisance? I think I know women, I ought
+to. They can deceive you by a studied confession which the lips only
+pronounce, but you will never be the involuntary witness of a passion
+you force from them. The true, flattering avowals we make, are not
+those we utter, but those that escape us without our knowledge.
+
+
+
+
+XXIII
+
+Two Irreconcilable Passions in Women
+
+
+Will you pardon me, Marquis, for laughing at your afflictions? You
+take things too much to heart. Some imprudences, you say, have drawn
+upon you the anger of the Countess, and your anxiety is extreme. You
+kissed her hand with an ecstasy that attracted the attention of
+everybody present. She publicly reprimanded you for your indiscretion,
+and your marked preference for her, always offensive to other women,
+has exposed you to the railleries of the Marquise, her sister-in-law.
+Dear me, these are without contradiction terrible calamities! What,
+are you simple enough to believe that you are lost beyond salvation
+because of an outward manifestation of anger, and you do not even
+suspect that inwardly you are justified? You impose upon me the burden
+of convincing you of the fact, and in doing so I am forced to reveal
+some strange mysteries concerning women. But, I do not intend, in
+writing you, to be always apologizing for my sex. I owe you frankness,
+however, and having promised it I acquit myself of the promise.
+
+A woman is always balancing between two irreconcilable passions which
+continually agitate her mind: the desire to please, and the fear of
+dishonor. You can judge of our embarrassment. On the one hand, we are
+consumed with the desire to have an audience to notice the effect of
+our charms. Ever engaged in schemes to bring us into notoriety;
+ravished whenever we are fortunate enough to humiliate other women, we
+would make the whole world witness of the preferences we encounter,
+and the homage bestowed upon us. Do you know the measure of our
+satisfaction in such cases? The despair of our rivals, the
+indiscretions that betray the sentiments we inspire, this enchants us
+proportionately to the misery they suffer. Similar imprudences
+persuade us much more that we are loved, than that our charms are
+incapable of giving us a reputation.
+
+But what bitterness poisons such sweet pleasures! Beside so many
+advantages marches the malignity of rival competitors, and sometimes
+your disdain. A fatality which is mournful. The world makes no
+distinction between women who permit you to love them, and those whom
+you compensate for so doing. Uninfluenced, and sober-minded, a
+reasonable woman always prefers a good reputation to celebrity. Put
+her beside her rivals who contest with her the prize for beauty, and
+though she may lose that reputation of which she appears so jealous,
+though she compromise herself a thousand times, nothing is equal in
+her opinion to see herself preferred to others. By and by, she will
+recompense you by preferences; she will at first fancy that she grants
+them out of gratitude, but they will be proofs of her attachment. In
+her fear of appearing ungrateful, she becomes tender.
+
+Can you not draw from this that it is not your indiscretions which vex
+us? If they wound us, we must pay tribute to appearances, and you
+would be the first to censure an excessive indulgence.
+
+See that you do not misunderstand us. Not to vex us on such occasions
+would be really to offend. We recommend you to practice discretion and
+prudence, that is the role we enact, is it not? Is it necessary for me
+to tell you the part you are to play? I am often reminded that
+accepting the letter of the law, is to fail to understand it. You may
+be sure that you will be in accord with our intentions as soon as you
+are able to interpret them properly.
+
+
+
+
+XXIV
+
+An Abuse of Credulity Is Intolerable
+
+
+The Countess no longer retreats? You think she has no other object in
+view than to put your love to the proof? Whatever preference you have
+manifested for her; however little precaution you have taken to
+testify to your passion, she finds nothing in you but cause for
+scolding. The least excuse, however, and the reproaches die upon her
+lips, and her anger is so delightful that you do everything to deserve
+it. Permit me to share in your joy with all my heart. But although
+this behavior flatters you, if you consider that such acts are not
+intended to be of long duration, how badly reasonable women, who value
+their reputation, misunderstand their true interests by thus
+multiplying through an affected incredulity, occasions for slandering
+them. Do they not understand and feel that it is not always the moment
+when they are tender which gives a blow to their reputation? The doubt
+they cast upon the sincerity of the affection they have inspired, does
+them more harm in the eyes of the world than even their defeat. As
+long as they continue incredulous the slightest imprudence compromises
+them. They dispose of their reputation at retail.
+
+Whenever a lover finds a woman incredulous of the truth of his
+sentiments, he goes full lengths, every time he has an opportunity, to
+furnish proofs of his sincerity. The most indiscreet eagerness, the
+most marked preferences, the most assiduous attentions, seem to him
+the best means of succeeding. Can he make use of them without calling
+the attention of the whole world to the fact; without offending every
+other woman and giving them occasions to be revenged by their sharpest
+arrows?
+
+As soon as the preliminaries are settled, that is to say, as soon as
+we commence to believe ourselves sincerely loved, nothing appears on
+the surface, nothing happens; and if outsiders perceive our liaison,
+if they put a malicious construction upon it, it will only be by the
+recollection of what passed during a time when love was not in
+question.
+
+I would, for the good of everybody concerned, that as soon as a woman
+ceases to find any pleasure in the society of a man who wishes to
+please her, that she could tell him so clearly and dismiss him,
+without abusing his credulity, or giving him ground for vain hopes.
+But I would also, that as soon as a woman is persuaded that a man
+loves her, she could consent to it in good faith, reserving to
+herself, however, the right to be further entreated, to such a point
+as she may deem apropos, before making an avowal that she feels as
+tenderly disposed toward her lover, as he is toward her. For, a woman
+can not pretend to doubt without putting her lover to the necessity of
+dissipating her doubts, and he can not do that successfully without
+taking the whole world into his confidence by a too marked homage.
+
+I know very well that these ideas would not have been probable in
+times when the ignorance of men rendered so many women intractable,
+but, in these times when the audacity of our assailants leaves us so
+few resources, in these times, I say, when, since the invention of
+powder, there are few impregnable places, why undertake a prolonged
+formal siege, when it is certain that after much labor and many
+disasters it will be necessary to capitulate?
+
+Bring your amiable Countess to reason; show her the inconveniences of
+a prolonged disregard of your sentiments. You will convince her of
+your passion, you will compel her to believe you through regard for
+her reputation, and still better, perhaps, you will furnish her with
+an additional reason for giving you a confidence she doubtless now
+finds it difficult to withhold from you.
+
+
+
+
+XXV
+
+Why Virtue Is So Often Overcome
+
+
+My last letter has apparently scandalized you, Marquis. You insist
+that it is not impossible to find virtuous women in our age of the
+world. Well, have I ever said anything to the contrary? Comparing
+women to besieged castles, have I ever advanced the idea that there
+were some that had not been taken? How could I have said such a thing?
+There are some that have never been besieged, so you perceive that I
+am of your opinion. I will explain, however, so that there will be no
+more chicanery about the question.
+
+Here is my profession of faith in this matter: I firmly believe that
+there are good women who have never been attacked, or who have been
+wrongly attacked.
+
+I further firmly believe that there are good women who have been
+attacked and well attacked, when they have had neither disposition,
+violent passions, liberty, nor a hated husband.
+
+I have a mind at this point to put you in possession of a rather
+lively conversation on this particular point, while I was still very
+young, with a prude, whom an adventure of some brilliancy unmasked. I
+was inexperienced then, and I was in the habit of judging others with
+that severity which every one is disposed to manifest until some
+personal fault has made us more indulgent toward our neighbors. I had
+considered it proper to blame the conduct of this woman without mercy.
+She heard of it. I sometimes saw her at an aunt's, and made
+preparations to attack her morals. Before I had an opportunity she
+took the matter into her own hands, by taking me aside one day, and
+compelled me to submit to the following harangue, which I confess made
+a deep impression in my memory:
+
+"It is not for the purpose of reproaching you for the talk you have
+been making on my account, that I wish to converse with you in the
+absence of witnesses," she explained, "it is to give you some advice,
+the truth and solidity of which you will one day appreciate.
+
+"You have seen fit to censure my conduct with a severity, you have
+actually treated me with a disdain, which tells me how proud you are
+of the fact that you have never been taken advantage of. You believe
+in your own virtue and that it will never abandon you. This is a pure
+illusion of your amour propre, my dear child, and I feel impelled to
+enlighten your inexperience, and to make you understand, that far from
+being sure of that virtue which renders you so severe, you are not
+even sure that you have any at all. This prologue astonishes you, eh?
+Well, listen with attention, and you will soon be convinced of the
+truth whereof I speak.
+
+"Up to the present time, nobody has ever spoken to you of love. Your
+mirror alone has told you that you are beautiful. Your heart, I can
+see by the appearance of indifference that envelops you like a
+mantle, has not yet been developed. As long as you remain as you are,
+as long as you can be kept in sight as you are, I will be your
+guarantee. But when your heart has spoken, when your enchanting eyes
+shall have received life and expression from sentiment, when they
+shall speak the language of love, when an internal unrest shall
+agitate your breast, when, in fine, desire, half stifled by the
+scruples of a good education, shall have made you blush more than once
+in secret, then your sensibility, through the combats by which you
+will attempt to vanquish it, will diminish your severity toward
+others, and their faults will appear more excusable.
+
+"The knowledge of your weakness will no longer permit you to regard
+your virtue as infallible. Your astonishment will carry you still
+farther. The little help it will be to you against too impetuous
+inclinations, will make you doubt whether you ever had any virtue. Can
+you say a man is brave before he has ever fought? It is the same with
+us. The attacks made upon us are alone the parents of our virtue, as
+danger gives birth to valor. As long as one has not been in the
+presence of the enemy, it is impossible to say whether he is to be
+feared, and what degree of resistance it will be necessary to bear
+against him.
+
+"Hence to justify a woman in flattering herself that she is
+essentially virtuous and good by force of her own strength, she must
+be in a position where no danger, however great it may be, no motive
+no matter how pressing, no pretext whatever, shall be powerful enough
+to triumph over her. She must meet with the most favorable
+opportunities, the most tender love, the certainty of secrecy, the
+esteem and the most perfect confidence in him who attacks her. In a
+word, all these circumstances combined should not be able to make an
+impression upon her courage, so that to know whether a woman be
+virtuous in the true meaning of the word, one must imagine her as
+having escaped unscathed all these united dangers, for it would not be
+virtue but only resistance where there should be love without the
+disposition, or disposition without the occasion. Her virtue would
+always be uncertain, as long as she had never been attacked by all the
+weapons which might vanquish her. One might always say of her: if she
+had been possessed of a different constitution, she might not have
+resisted love, or, if a favorable occasion had presented itself, her
+virtue would have played the fool."
+
+"According to this," said I, "it would be impossible to find a single
+virtuous woman, for no one has ever had so many enemies to combat."
+
+"That may be," she replied, "but do you know the reason? Because it is
+not necessary to have so many to overcome us, one alone is sufficient
+to obtain the victory."
+
+But I stuck to my proposition: "You pretend then that our virtue does
+not depend upon ourselves, since you make it the puppet of occasion,
+and of other causes foreign to our own will?"
+
+"There is no doubt about it," she answered. "Answer me this: Can you
+give yourself a lively or sedate disposition? Are you free to defend
+yourself against a violent passion? Does it depend upon you to arrange
+all the circumstances of your life, so that you will never find
+yourself alone with a lover who adores you, who knows his advantages
+and how to profit by them? Does it depend upon you to prevent his
+pleadings, I assume them to be innocent at first, from making upon
+your senses the impression they must necessarily make? Certainly not;
+to insist upon such an anomaly would be to deny that the magnet is
+master of the needle. And you pretend that your virtue is your own
+work, that you can personally claim the glory of an advantage that is
+liable to be taken from you at any moment? Virtue in women, like all
+the other blessings we enjoy, is a gift from Heaven; it is a favor
+which Heaven may refuse to grant us. Reflect then how unreasonable you
+are in glorifying in your virtue: consider your injustice when you so
+cruelly abuse those who have had the misfortune to be born with an
+ungovernable inclination toward love, whom a sudden violent passion
+has surprised, or who have found themselves in the midst of
+circumstances out of which you would not have emerged with any greater
+glory.
+
+"Shall I give you another proof of the justice of my ideas? I will
+take it from your own conduct. Are you not dominated by that deep
+persuasion that every woman who wishes to preserve her virtue, need
+never allow herself to be caught, that she must watch over the
+smallest trifles, because they lead to things of greater importance?
+It is much easier for you to take from men the desire to make an
+attack upon your virtue by assuming a severe exterior, than to defend
+against their attacks. The proof of this is in the fact that we give
+young girls in their education as little liberty as is possible in
+order to restrain them. We do more: a prudent mother does not rely
+upon her fear of dishonor, nor upon the bad opinion she has of men,
+she keeps her daughter out of sight; she puts it out of her power to
+succumb to temptation. What is the excuse for so many precautions?
+Because the mother fears the frailty of her pupil, if she is exposed
+for an instant to danger.
+
+"In spite of all these obstacles with which she is curbed, how often
+does it not happen that love overcomes them all? A girl well trained,
+or better, well guarded, laughs at her virtue, because she imagines it
+is all her own, whereas, it is generally a slave rigorously chained
+down, who thinks everybody is satisfied with him as long as he does
+not run away. Let us inquire further into this: In what class do you
+find abandoned females? In that where they have not sufficient wealth
+or happiness constantly to provide themselves with the obstacles which
+have saved you; in that, where men have attacked their virtue with
+more audacity, more facility, more frequency, and more impunity, and
+consequently with more advantages of every sort; in that, where the
+impressions of education, of example, of pride, the desire of a
+satisfactory establishment could not sustain them. Two doors below,
+there is a woman whom you hate and despise. And in spite of the
+outside aid which sustains that virtue, of which you are so proud, in
+two days you might be more despicable than she, because you will have
+had greater helps to guarantee you against misfortune. I am not
+seeking to deprive you of the merit of your virtue, nor am I
+endeavoring to prevent you from attaching too much importance to it;
+by convincing you of its fragility, I wish to obtain from you only a
+trifle of indulgence for those whom a too impetuous inclination, or
+the misfortunes of circumstances have precipitated into a position so
+humiliating in their own eyes; my sole object is to make you
+understand that you ought to glorify yourself less in the possession
+of an advantage which you do not owe to yourself, and of which you may
+be deprived to-morrow."
+
+She was going to continue, but some one interrupted us. Soon
+afterward, I learned by my own experience that I should not have had
+so good an opinion of many virtues which had been formerly imposed
+upon me, beginning with my own.
+
+
+
+
+XXVI
+
+Love Demands Freedom of Action
+
+
+I have been of the same opinion as you, Marquis, although the ideas I
+communicated to you yesterday appeared to be true speculatively, that
+it would be dangerous if all women were to be guided by them. It is
+not by a knowledge of their frailty, that women will remain virtuous,
+but by the conviction that they are free and mistresses of themselves
+when it comes to yield or to resist. Is it by persuading a soldier
+that he will be vanquished that he is goaded into fighting with
+courage? Did you not notice that the woman who did the talking as I
+have related in my last letter, had a personal interest in maintaining
+her system? It is true, that when we examine her reasoning according
+to the rules of philosophy, it does seem to be a trifle specious, but
+it is to be feared that in permitting ourselves to reason in that
+fashion on what virtue is, we may succeed in converting into a
+problem, the rules we should receive and observe as a law, which it is
+a crime to construe. Moreover, to persuade women that it is not to
+themselves they are indebted for the virtue they possess, might it mot
+deprive them of the most powerful motive to induce them to preserve
+it? I mean by that, the persuasion that it is their own work they
+defend. The consequences of such morality would be discouraging, and
+tend to diminish, in the eyes of a guilty woman, the importance of her
+errors. But let us turn to matters of more interest to you.
+
+At last, after so many uncertainties, after so many revolutions in
+your imagination, you are sure you are loved? You have finally
+succeeded in exciting the Countess to divulge her secret during a
+moment of tenderness. The words you burned to hear have been
+pronounced. More, she has allowed to escape her, a thousand
+involuntary proofs of the passion you have inspired. Far from
+diminishing your love, the certainty that you are beloved in return
+has increased it; in a word, you are the happiest of men. If you knew
+with how much pleasure I share your happiness you would be still
+happier. The first sacrifice she desired to make was to refuse to
+receive the Chevalier: you were opposed to her making it, and you were
+quite right. It would have compromised the Countess for nothing, which
+calls to my mind the fact, that women generally lose more by
+imprudence than by actual faults. The confidence you so nobly
+manifested in her, ought to have greatly impressed her.
+
+Everything is now as it should be. However, shall I tell you
+something? The way this matter has turned out alarms me. We agreed, if
+you remember, that we were to treat the subject of love without
+gloves. You were not to have at the most but a light and fleeting
+taste of it, and not a regulated passion. Now I perceive that things
+become more serious every day. You are beginning to treat love with a
+dignity which worries me. The knowledge of true merits, solid
+qualities, and good character is creeping into the motives of your
+liaison, and combining with the personal charms which render you so
+blindly amorous. I do not like to have so much esteem mixed with an
+affair of pure gallantry. It leaves no freedom of action, it is work
+instead of amusement. I was afraid in the beginning that your
+relations would assume a grave and measured turn. But perhaps you will
+only too soon have new pretensions, and the Countess by new disputes
+will doubtless re-animate your liaison. Too constant a peace is
+productive of a deadly ennui. Uniformity kills love, for as soon as
+the spirit of method mingles in an affair of the heart, the passion
+disappears, languor supervenes, weariness begins to wear, and disgust
+ends the chapter.
+
+
+
+
+XXVII
+
+The Heart Needs Constant Employment
+
+
+Madame de Sevigne does not agree with me upon the causes of love as I
+give them. She pretends that many women know it only from its refined
+side, and that the senses never count for anything in their heart
+affairs. According to her, although what she calls my "system" should
+be well founded, it would always be unbecoming in the mouth of a
+woman, and might become a precedent in morals.
+
+These are assuredly very serious exceptions, Marquis, but are they
+well grounded? I do not think so. I see with pain that Madame de
+Sevigne has not read my letters in the spirit I wrote them. What, I
+the founder of systems? Truly, she does me too much honor, I have
+never been serious enough to devise any system. Besides, according to
+my notion, a system is nothing but a philosophic dream, and therefore
+does she consider all I have told you as a play of the imagination? In
+that case, we are very far out of our reckoning. I do not imagine, I
+depict real objects. I would have one truth acknowledged, and to
+accomplish that, my purpose is not to surprise the mind; I consult the
+sentiments. Perhaps she has been struck by the singularity of some of
+my propositions, which appeared to me so evident that I did not think
+it worth while to maintain them; but is it necessary to make use of a
+mariner's compass to develop the greater or less amount of truth in a
+maxim of gallantry?
+
+Moreover, I have such a horror of formal discussions, that I would
+prefer to agree to anything rather than engage in them. Madame de
+Sevigne, you say, is acquainted with a number of female
+metaphysicians--there! there! I will grant her these exceptions,
+provided she leaves me the general thesis. I will even admit, if you
+so desire, that there are certain souls usually styled "privileged,"
+for I have never heard anybody deny the virtues of temperament. So, I
+have nothing to say about women of that species. I do not criticise
+them, nor have I any reproaches to make them; neither do I believe it
+my duty to praise them, it is sufficient to congratulate them.
+However, if you investigate them you will discover the truth of what I
+have been saying since the commencement of our correspondence: the
+heart must be occupied with some object. If nature does not incline
+them in that direction, no one can lead them in the direction of
+gallantry, their affection merely changes its object. Such a one
+to-day appears to be insensible to the emotion of love, only because
+she has disposed of all that portion of the sentiment she had to give.
+The Count de Lude, it is said, was not always indifferent to Madame de
+Sevigne. Her extreme tenderness for Madame Grignan (her daughter),
+however, occupies her entire time at present. According to her, I am
+very much at fault concerning women? In all charity I should have
+disguised the defects which I have discovered in my sex, or, if you
+prefer to have it that way, which my sex have discovered in me.
+
+But, do you really believe, Marquis, that if everything I have said on
+this subject be made public, the women would be offended? Know them
+better, Marquis; all of them would find there what is their due.
+Indeed, to tell them that it is purely a mechanical instinct which
+inclines them to flirt, would not that put them at their ease? Does it
+not seem to be restoring to favor that fatality, those expressions of
+sympathy, which they are so delighted to give as excuses for their
+mistakes, and in which I have so little faith? Granting that love is
+the result of reflection, do you not see what a blow you are giving
+their vanity? You place upon their shoulders the responsibility far
+their good or bad choice.
+
+One more thrust, Marquis: I am not mistaken when I say that all women
+would be satisfied with my letters. The female metaphysicians, that
+is, those women whom Heaven has favored with a fortunate constitution,
+would take pleasure in recognizing in them their superiority over
+other women; they would not fail to congratulate themselves upon the
+delicacy of their own sentiments, and to consider them as works of
+their own creation. Those whom nature built of less refined material,
+would without doubt owe me some gratitude for revealing a secret which
+was weighing upon them. They have made it a duty to disguise their
+inclinations, and they are as anxious not to fail in this duty as they
+are careful not to lose anything on the pleasure side of the question.
+Their interest, therefore, is, to have their secret guessed without
+being compromised. Whoever shall develop their hearts, will not fail
+to render them an essential service. I am even fully convinced that
+those women, who at heart, profess sentiments more comformable to
+mine, would be the first to consider it an honor to dispute them.
+Hence, I would be paying my court to women in two fashions, which
+would be equally agreeable: In adopting the maxims which flatter their
+inclinations, and in furnishing them with an occasion to appear
+refined.
+
+After all, Marquis, do you think it would betray a deep knowledge of
+women, to believe that they could be offended with the malicious talk
+I have been giving you about them? Somebody said a long time ago, that
+women would rather have a little evil said of them than not be talked
+about at all You see therefore, that even supposing that I have
+written you in the intention with which I am charged, they would be
+very far from being able to reproach me in the slightest degree.
+
+Finally, Madame de Sevigne pretends that my "system" might become a
+precedent. Truly, Marquis, I do not understand how, with the justice
+for which she is noted, she was able to surrender to such an idea. In
+stripping love, as I have, of everything liable to seduce you, in
+making it out to be the effect of temperament, caprice, and vanity;
+in a word, in undeceiving you concerning the metaphysics that lend it
+grandeur and nobility, is it not evident that I have rendered it less
+dangerous? Would it not be more dangerous, if, as pretends Madame de
+Sevigne, it were to be transformed into a virtue? I would willingly
+compare my sentiments with those of the celebrated legislator of
+antiquity, who believed the best means of weakening the power of women
+over his fellow citizens was to expose their nakedness. But I wish to
+make one more effort in your favor. Since I am regarded as a woman
+with a system, it will be better for me to submit to whatever such a
+fine title exacts. Let us reason, therefore, for a moment upon
+gallantry according to the method which appertains only to serious
+matters.
+
+Is love not a passion? Do not very strict minded people pretend that
+the passions and vices mean the same things? Is vice ever more
+seductive than when it wears the cloak of virtue? Wherefore in order
+to corrupt virtuous souls it is sufficient for it to appear in a
+potential form. This is the form in which the Platonicians deified it.
+In all ages, in order to justify the passions, it was necessary to
+apotheosize them. What am I saying? Am I so bold as to play the
+iconoclast with an accredited superstition? What temerity! Do I not
+deserve to be persecuted by all women for attacking their favorite
+cult?
+
+I am sorry for them; it was so lovely, when they felt the movements of
+love, to be exempt from blushing, to be able even to congratulate
+themselves, and lay the blame upon the operations of a god. But what
+had poor humanity done to them? Why misunderstand it and seek for the
+cause of its weakness in the Heavens? Let us remain on earth, we shall
+find it there, and it is its proper home.
+
+In truth, I have never in my letters openly declaimed against love; I
+have never advised you not to take the blame of it. I was too well
+persuaded of the uselessness of such advice; but I told you what love
+is, and I therefore diminished the illusion it would not have failed
+to create in your mind; I weakened its power over you and experience
+will justify me.
+
+I am perfectly well aware that a very different use is made of it in
+the education of females. And what sort of profit is there in the
+methods employed? The very first step is to deceive them. Their
+teachers strive to inspire them with as much fear of love as of evil
+spirits. Men are depicted as monsters of infidelity and perfidy. Now
+suppose a gentleman appears who expresses delicate sentiments, whose
+bearing is modest and respectful? The young woman with whom he
+converses will believe she has been imposed upon; and as soon as she
+discovers how much exaggeration there has been, her advisers will lose
+all credit so far as she is concerned. Interrogate such a young woman,
+and if she is sincere, you will find that the sentiments the alleged
+monster has excited in her heart are far from being the sentiments of
+horror.
+
+They are deceived in another manner also, and the misery of it is, it
+is almost impossible to avoid it. Infinite care is taken to keep from
+them the knowledge, to prevent them from having even an idea that they
+are liable to be attacked by the senses, and that such attacks are the
+most dangerous of all for them. They are drilled in the idea that they
+are immaculate spirits, and what happens then? Inasmuch as they have
+never been forewarned of the species of attacks they must encounter,
+they are left without defense. They have never mistrusted that their
+most redoubtable enemy is the one that has never been mentioned: how
+then can they be on their guard against him? It is not men they should
+be taught to fear, but themselves? What could a lover do, if the woman
+he attacks were not seduced by her own desires?
+
+So, Marquis, when I say to women that the principal cause of their
+weaknesses is physical, I am far from advising them to follow their
+inclinations; on the contrary, it is for the purpose of putting them
+on their guard in that respect. It is saying to the Governor of the
+citadel, that he will not be attacked at the spot which up to then has
+been the best fortified; that the most redoubtable assault will not be
+made by the besiegers, but that he will be betrayed by his own.
+
+In a word, in reducing to their just value, the sentiments to which
+women attach such high and noble ideas; in enlightening them upon the
+real object of a lover who pretends to great delicacy and refinement,
+do you not see that I am interesting their vanity to draw less glory
+out of the fact of being loved, and their hearts to take less pleasure
+in loving? Depend upon it, that if it were possible to enlist their
+vanity in opposition to their inclination to gallantry, their virtue
+would most assuredly suffer very little.
+
+I have had lovers, but none of them deceived me by any illusions. I
+could penetrate their motives astonishingly well. I was always
+persuaded that if whatever was of value from the standpoint of
+intellect and character, was considered as anything among the reasons
+that led them to love me, it was only because those qualities
+stimulated their vanity. They were amorous of me, because I had a
+beautiful figure, and they possessed the desire. So it came about that
+they never obtained more than the second place in my heart. I have
+always conserved for friendship the deference, the constancy, and the
+respect even, which a sentiment so noble, so worthy deserves in an
+elevated soul. It has never been possible for me to overcome my
+distrust for hearts in which love was the principal actor. This
+weakness degraded them in my eyes; I considered them incompetent to
+raise their mind up to sentiments of true esteem for a woman for whom
+they have felt a desire.
+
+You see, therefore, Marquis, that the precedent I draw from my
+principles is far from being dangerous. All that enlightened minds can
+find with which to reproach me, will be, perhaps, because I have
+taken the trouble to demonstrate a truth which they do not consider
+problematic. But does not your inexperience and your curiosity justify
+whatever I have written so far, and whatever I may yet write you on
+this subject?
+
+
+
+
+XXVIII
+
+Mere Beauty Is Often of Trifling Importance
+
+
+You are not mistaken, Marquis, the taste and talent of the Countess
+for the clavecin (piano) will tend to increase your love and
+happiness. I have always said that women do not fully realize the
+advantages they might draw from their talents; indeed, there is not a
+moment when they are not of supreme utility; most women always
+calculating on the presence of a beloved object as the only thing to
+be feared. In such case they have two enemies to combat; their love
+and their lover. But when the lover departs, love remains; and
+although the progress it makes in solitude is not so rapid, it is no
+less dangerous. It is then that the execution of a sonata, the
+sketching of a flower, the reading of a good book, will distract the
+attention from a too seductive remembrance, and fix the mind on
+something useful. All occupations which employ the mind are so many
+thefts from love.
+
+Suppose his inclination brings a lover to our knees, what can he
+accomplish with a woman who is only tender and pretty? With what can
+he employ his time if he does not find in her society something
+agreeable, some variety? Love is an active sentiment, it is a
+consuming fire always demanding additional fuel, and if it can find
+only sensible objects upon which to feed, it will keep to that diet. I
+mean to say, that when the mind is not occupied the senses find
+something to do.
+
+There are too many gesticulations while talking, sometimes I think we
+shall be compelled to use sign language with a person we know to be
+unable to understand a more refined language. It is not in resisting
+advances, nor in taking offense at too bold a caress that a woman is
+enabled to maintain her virtue. When she is attacked in that fashion,
+even while defending herself, her senses are excited and the very
+agitation which impels her to resist, hastens her defeat. But it is by
+distracting the attention of the man to other objects, that the woman
+is relieved of the necessity of resisting his advances, or taking
+offense at his liberties to which she herself has opened the way, for
+there is one thing certain, which is, that a man will never disappoint
+a woman who is anxious for him.
+
+You will not find a single woman, unless you can suppose one
+absolutely ignorant, who is not able to gauge exactly the degree of
+familiarity she ought to permit. Those who complain that their lovers
+do not come up to the mark do not affect me in the least. Inquire into
+the reason, and you will perceive that their stupidities, their
+imprudences are the cause. It was their desire to be found wanting.
+
+Defect in culture may expose us to the same inconveniences, for with a
+woman without mind, and without talents what else is there to do but
+undertake her conquest? When in her company, the only way to kill
+time is to annoy her. There is nothing to talk about but her beauty,
+and of the impression she has made upon the senses, and sensual
+language is the only one that can be employed for that purpose. She
+herself is not convinced that you love her, and she does not respond,
+she does not recompense you but by the assistance of the senses, and
+exhibits an agitation equal to yours, or else, her decency gone, she
+has nothing but bad humor with which to oppose you. This is the last
+ditch of a woman without mind, and what a culmination! On the
+contrary, what are not the advantages of an intelligent, resourceful
+woman? A lively repartee, piquant raillery, a quarrel seasoned with a
+trifle of malice, a happy citation, a graceful recitation, are not
+these so many distractions for her, and the time thus employed, is it
+not so much gained for virtue?
+
+The great misfortune with women is, without doubt, the inability to
+find occupations worthy of their attention, and this is the reason why
+love with them is a more violent passion than with men, but they have
+a characteristic which, properly directed may serve as an antidote.
+All women, to say the least, are as vain as they are sensitive,
+whence, the cure for sensitiveness is vanity. While a woman is
+occupied in pleasing in other ways than by the beauty of her figure,
+she loses sight of the sentiment which inspires her to act. In truth,
+this sentiment will not cease to be the "determining motive" (you must
+permit me to use some technical term of art), but it will not be the
+actual object presented to her attention, and that is something
+gained. Wholly devoted to the care of becoming perfect in the species
+of glory to which she aspires, this same desire, of which love will be
+the source, will turn against love, by dividing the attention of the
+mind and the affections of the heart; in a word it will create a
+diversion.
+
+But perhaps you will tell me that there are women of spirit and
+talents beyond the reach of attack. Whence you infer that men who do
+not dislike freedom will avoid them, but that fools and men of
+intelligence cultivate them. That is true, but the fools take to them
+because they do not perceive the difficulty in their way, and men of
+intelligence do not avoid them, because they aspire to surmount it.
+
+Now, ought not you, who are a military man, to appreciate everything I
+say to you about talent? I will suppose a campaign upon which you have
+entered; you have been given charge of conducting the siege of a city.
+Would you be satisfied if the governor, persuaded that the city is not
+impregnable, should open to you the gates without having given you the
+least occasion to distinguish yourself? I venture to say not; he
+should resist, and the more he seeks to cover himself with glory, the
+more glory he gives you. Well, Marquis, in love as in war, the
+pleasure of obtaining a victory is measured according to the obstacles
+in the way of it. Shall I say it? I am tempted to push the parallel
+farther. See what it is to take a first step. The true glory of a
+woman consists less, perhaps, in yielding, than in putting in a good
+defense, so that she will merit the honors of war.
+
+I shall go still farther. Let a woman become feeble enough to be at
+the point of yielding, what is left her to retain a satisfactory
+lover, if her intelligence and talents do not come to her aid? I am
+well aware that they do not give themselves these advantages, but if
+we investigate the matter, we shall find that there are very few women
+who may not acquire a few accomplishments if they really set about it;
+the difference would only be the more, at least. But women are
+generally born too indolent to be able to make such an effort. They
+have discovered that there is nothing so convenient as being pretty.
+This manner of pleasing does not require any labor; they would be glad
+not to have any other. Blind that they are, they do not see that
+beauty and talents equally attract the attention of men, but, beauty
+merely exposes her who possesses it, whereas talents furnish her with
+the means of defending it.
+
+In a word, to appreciate it at its full value, beauty stores up
+regrets and a mortal weariness for the day when it shall cease to
+exist. Would you know the reason? It is because it drowns out all
+other resources. As long as beauty lasts, a woman is regarded as
+something, she is celebrated, a crowd sighs at her feet. She flatters
+herself that this will go on forever. What a desolate solitude when
+age comes to ravish her of the only merit she possesses? I would like,
+therefore (my expression is not elevated, but it interprets my
+thought), I would like that in a woman, beauty could be a sign of
+other advantages.
+
+Let us agree, Marquis, that in love, the mind is made more use of than
+the heart. A liaison of the heart is a drama in which the acts are the
+shortest and the between acts the longest; with what then, would you
+fill the interludes if not with accomplishments? Possession puts every
+woman on the same level, and exposes all of them equally to
+infidelity. The elegant and the beautiful, when they are nothing else,
+have not, in that respect, any advantage over her who is plain; the
+mind, in that case making all the difference. That alone can bestow
+upon the same person the variety necessary to prevent satiety.
+Moreover, it is only accomplishments that can fill the vacuum of a
+passion that has been satisfied, and we can always have them in any
+situation we may imagine, either to postpone defeat and render it more
+flattering, or to assure us of our conquests. Lovers themselves profit
+by them. How many things they cherish although they set their faces
+against them? Wherefore, let the Countess, while cultivating her
+decided talent for the clavecin, understand her interests and yours.
+
+I have read over my letter, my dear Marquis, and I tremble lest you
+find it a trifle serious. You see what happens when one is in bad
+company. I supped last night with M. de la Rochefoucauld, and I never
+see him that he does not spoil me in this fashion, at least for three
+or four days.
+
+
+
+
+XXIX
+
+The Misfortune of Too Sudden an Avowal
+
+
+I think as you do, Marquis, the Countess punishes you too severely for
+having surprised an avowal of her love. Is it your fault if her secret
+escaped? She has gone too far to retreat. A woman can experience a
+return to reason, but to go so far as to refuse to see you for three
+days; give out that she has gone into the country for a month; return
+your tender letters without opening them, is, in my opinion, a
+veritable caprice of virtue. After all, however, do not despair
+whatever may happen. If she were really indifferent she would be less
+severe.
+
+Do not make any mistake about this: There are occasions when a woman
+is less out of humor with you than with herself. She feels with
+vexation that her weakness is ready to betray her at any moment. She
+punishes you for it, and she punishes herself by being unkind to you.
+But you may be sure that one day of such caprice advances the progress
+of a lover more than a year of care and assiduity. A woman soon begins
+to regret her unkindness; she deems herself unjust; she desires to
+repair her fault, and she becomes benevolent.
+
+What surprises me the most is the marked passage in your letter which
+states that since the Countess has appeared to love you, her
+character has totally changed. I have no particular information on
+that point. All I know is, that she made her debut in society as a
+lady of elegance, and her debut was all the more marked because,
+during the life of her husband, her conduct was entirely the contrary.
+Do you not remember when you first made her acquaintance, that she was
+lively even to giddiness, heedless, bold, even coquettish, and
+appeared to be incapable of a reasonable attachment? However, to-day,
+you tell me, she has become a serious melancholic; pre-occupied,
+timid, affected; sentiment has taken the place of mincing airs; at
+least she appears to so fit in with the character she assumes to-day,
+that you imagine it to be her true one, and her former one, borrowed.
+All my philosophy would be at fault in such a case, if I did not
+recognize in this metamorphosis the effects of love. I am very much
+mistaken if the storm raging around you to-day, does not end in the
+most complete victory, and one all the more assured because she has
+done everything in her power to prevent it. But if you steadily pursue
+your object, carrying your pursuit even as far as importunity, follow
+her wherever she goes and where you can see her; if you take it upon
+yourself not to allude to your passion, and treat her with all the
+mannerism of an attentive follower, respectful, but impressed, what
+will happen? She will be unable to refuse you the courtesies due any
+indifferent acquaintance. Women possess an inexhaustible fund of
+kindness for those who love them. You know this well, you men, and it
+is what always reassures you when you are treated unkindly. You know
+that your presence, your attentions, the sorrow that affects you have
+their effect, and end by disarming our pride.
+
+You are persuaded that those whom our virtue keeps at a distance
+through pride, are precisely those whom it fears the most, and
+unfortunately, your guess is only too just, it keeps them off, indeed,
+because it is not sure of its ability to resist them. It does more
+sometimes, it goes to the length of braving an enemy whose attack it
+dares not anticipate. In a word, the courage of a reasonable woman is
+nearly always equal to a first effort, but rarely is that effort
+lasting. The very excess of its violence is the cause of its
+weakening. The soul has only one degree of force, and exhausted by the
+constraint that effort cost it, it abandons itself to lassitude. By
+and by, the knowledge of its weakness throws it into discouragement. A
+woman of that disposition bears the first shock of a redoubtable enemy
+with courage, but, the danger better understood, she fears a second
+attack. A woman, persuaded that she has done everything possible to
+defend herself against an inclination which is urging her on,
+satisfied with the combats in which she has been engaged, finally
+reaches the opinion that her resistance can not prevail against the
+power of love. If she still resist, it is not by her own strength; she
+derives no help except from the idea of the intrepidity she at first
+displayed to him who attacks, or from the timidity she inspired in
+him in the beginning of her resistance. Thus it is, that however
+reasonable she may be, she nearly always starts out with a fine
+defense, she only needs pride to resolve upon that; but unfortunately,
+you divine the means of overcoming her, you persevere in your attacks,
+she is not indefatigable, and you have so little delicacy that,
+provided you obtain her heart, it is of no consequence to you whether
+you have obtained it through your importunities or with her consent.
+
+Besides that, Marquis, the excess of precautions a woman takes against
+you, is strong evidence of how much you are feared. If you were an
+object of indifference, would a woman take the trouble to avoid you? I
+declare to you that she would not honor you by being afraid of you.
+But I know how unreasonable lovers are. Always ingenious in tormenting
+themselves, the habit of never having but one object in view is so
+powerful, that they prefer being pestered with one that is
+disagreeable than with none at all.
+
+However, I feel sorry for you. Smitten as you are, your situation can
+not fail to be a sad one. The poor Marquis, how badly he is treated!
+
+
+
+
+XXX
+
+When Resistance Is Only a Pretense
+
+
+I was delighted to learn before my departure for the country, that
+your mind was more at rest. I feel free to say, that if the Countess
+had persevered in treating you with the same severity, I should have
+suspected, not that she was insensible to your love, but that you had
+a fortunate rival. The resistance manifested by her would have been
+beyond her strength in a single combat. For you should be well
+advised, Marquis, that a woman is never more intractable than when she
+assumes a haughtiness toward all other men, for the sake of her
+favorite lover.
+
+I see in everything you have told me, proofs that you are loved, and
+that you are the only one. I will be able to give you constant news on
+that score, for I am going to investigate the Countess for myself.
+This will surprise you, no doubt. Your astonishment will cease,
+however, when you call to mind that Madame de la Sabliere's house,
+where I am going to spend a week, adjoins the grounds of your amiable
+widow. You told me that she was at home, and, add to the neighborhood,
+the unmeasured longing I have to make her acquaintance, you will not
+be surprised at the promise I have just made you.
+
+I have not the time to finish this letter, nor the opportunity to
+send it. I must depart immediately, and my traveling companion is
+teasing me in a strange fashion, pretending that I am writing a love
+letter. I am letting her think what she pleases, and carry the letter
+with me to the country. Adieu. What! Madame de Grignan's illness will
+not permit you to visit us in our solitude?
+
+Du Chateau de---.
+
+I am writing you from the country house of the Countess, my dear
+Marquis, this is the third day I have been with her, which will enable
+you to understand that I am not in bad favor with the mistress of the
+house. She is an adorable woman, I am delighted with her. I sometimes
+doubt whether you deserve a heart like hers. Here I am her confidante.
+She has told me all she thinks about you, and I do not despair of
+discovering, before I return to the city, the reasons for the change
+in her character which you have remarked. I dare not write you more
+now, I may be interrupted, and I do not wish any one to know that I am
+writing you from this place. Adieu.
+
+
+
+
+XXXI
+
+The Opinion and Advice of Monsieur de la Sabliere
+
+
+How many things I have to tell you, Marquis! I was preparing to keep
+my word with you, and had arranged to use strategy upon the Countess
+to worm her secret from her, when chance came to my aid.
+
+You are not ignorant of her confidence in Monsieur de la Sabliere. She
+was with him just now in an arbor of the garden, and I was passing
+through a bushy path intending to join them, when the mention of your
+name arrested my steps. I was not noticed, and heard all the
+conversation, which I hasten to communicate to you word for word.
+
+"I have not been able to conceal from your penetration, my inclination
+for M. de Sevigne," said the Countess, "and you can not reconcile the
+serious nature of so decided a passion with the frivolity attributed
+to me in society. You will be still more astonished when I tell you
+that my exterior character is not my true one, that the seriousness
+you notice in me now, is a return to my former disposition; I was
+never giddy except through design. Perhaps you may have imagined that
+women can only conceal their faults, but they sometimes go much
+farther, sir, and I am an instance. They even disguise their virtues,
+and since the word has escaped me, I am tempted, at the risk of
+wearying you, to explain by what strange gradation I reached that
+point.
+
+"During my married life I lived retired from the world. You knew the
+Count and his taste for solitude. When I became a widow, there was the
+question of returning to society, and my embarrassment as to how I was
+to present myself was not small. I interrogated my own heart; in vain
+I sought to hide it from my own knowledge, I had a strong taste for
+the pleasures of society; but at the same time I was determined to add
+to it purity of morals. But how to reconcile all this? It seemed to me
+a difficult task to establish a system of conduct which, without
+compromising me, would not at the same time deprive me of the
+pleasures of life.
+
+"This is the way I reasoned: Destined to live among men, formed to
+please them, and to share in their happiness, we are obliged to suffer
+from their caprices, and above all fear their malignity. It seems that
+they have no other object in our education than that of fitting us for
+love, indeed, it is the only passion permitted us, and by a strange
+and cruel contrariety, they have left us only one glory to obtain,
+which is that of gaining a victory over the very inclination imposed
+upon us. I therefore endeavored to ascertain the best means of
+reconciling in use and custom, two such glaring extremes, and I found
+predicaments on all sides.
+
+"We are, I said to myself, simple enough when we enter society, to
+imagine that the greatest happiness of a woman should be to love and
+be loved. We then are under the impression that love is based on
+esteem, upheld by the knowledge of amiable qualities, purified by
+delicacy of sentiment, divested of all the insipidities which
+disfigure it, in a word, fostered by confidence and the effusions of
+the heart. But unfortunately, a sentiment so flattering for a woman
+without experience, is everything less than that in practice. She is
+always disabused when too late.
+
+"I was so good in the beginning as to be scandalized at two
+imperfections I perceived in men, their inconstancy and their
+untruthfulness. The reflections I made on the first of these defects,
+led me to the opinion that they were more unfortunate than guilty.
+From the manner in which the human heart is constituted, is it
+possible for it to be occupied with only one object? No, but does the
+treachery of men deserve the same indulgence? Most men attack a
+woman's virtue in cold blood, in the design to use her for their
+amusement, to sacrifice her to their vanity, to fill a void in an idle
+life, or to acquire a sort of reputation based upon the loss of ours.
+There is a large number of men in this class. How to distinguish true
+lovers? They all look alike on the surface, and the man who pretends
+to be amorous, is often more seductive than one who really is.
+
+"We are, moreover, dupes enough to make love a capital affair. You
+men, on the contrary, consider it merely a play; we rarely surrender
+to it without an inclination for the person of the lover; you are
+coarse enough to yield to it without taste. Constancy with us is a
+duty; you give way to the slightest distaste without scruple. You are
+scarcely decent in leaving a mistress, the possession of whom, six
+months before, was your glory and happiness. She may consider herself
+well off if she is not punished by the most cruel indiscretions.
+
+"Hence I regarded things from their tragical side, and said to myself:
+'If love draws with it so many misfortunes, a woman who cherishes her
+peace of mind and reputation, should never love.' However, everything
+tells me that we have a heart, that this heart is made for love, and
+that love is involuntary. Why, then, venture to destroy an inclination
+that is part of our being? Would it not be wiser to rectify it? Let us
+see how it will be possible to succeed in such an enterprise.
+
+"What is a dangerous love? I have observed that kind of love. It is a
+love which occupies the whole soul to the exclusion of every other
+sentiment, and which impels us to sacrifice everything to the object
+loved.
+
+"What characters are susceptible of such a sentiment? They are the
+most solid, those who show little on the outside, those who unite
+reason with an elevated nobility of character in their fashion of
+thinking.
+
+"Finally, who are the men the most reasonable for women of that kind?
+It is those who possess just sufficient brilliant qualities to fix a
+value on their essential merit. It must be confessed, though, that
+such men are not good companions for women who think. It is true,
+they are rare at present, and there has never been a period so
+favorable as this to guarantee us against great passions, but
+misfortune will have it that we meet one of them in the crowd.
+
+"The moralists pretend that every woman possesses a fund of
+sensibility destined to be applied to some object or another. A
+sensible woman is not affected by the thousand trifling advantages so
+agreeable to men in ordinary women. When she meets an object worthy of
+her attention, it is quite natural that she should estimate the value
+of it; her affection is measured according to her lights, she can not
+go half way. It is these characters that should not be imitated, and
+all acquaintance with the men of whom I have just been speaking,
+should be avoided if a woman values her peace of mind. Let us create a
+character which can procure for us two advantages at one and the same
+time: One to guard us from immoderate impressions; the other to ward
+off men who cause them. Let us give them an outside which will at
+least prevent them from displaying qualities they do not possess. Let
+us force them to please us by their frivolity, by their absurdities.
+However much they may practice affectation, their visible faults would
+furnish us with weapons against them. What happy state can a woman
+occupy to procure such safeguards? It is undoubtedly that of a
+professional society woman.
+
+"You are doubtless astonished at the strange conclusion to which my
+serious reasoning has led me. You will be still more astonished when
+you shall have heard the logic I employ to prove that I am right:
+listen to the end. I know the justice of your mind, and I am not
+lacking in it, however frivolous I may appear to be, and you will
+finish by being of my opinion.
+
+"Do you believe that the outward appearance of virtue guarantees the
+heart against the assaults of love? A poor resource. When a woman
+descends to a weakness, is not her humiliation proportionately as
+great as the esteem she hoped to secure? The brighter her virtue, the
+easier mark for malice.
+
+"What is the world's idea of a virtuous woman? Are not men so unjust
+as to believe that the wisest woman is she who best conceals her
+weakness; or who, by a forced retreat puts herself beyond the
+possibility of having any? Rather than accord us a single perfection,
+they carry wickedness to the point of attributing to us a perpetual
+state of violence, every time we undertake to resist their advances.
+One of our friends said: 'There is not an honest woman who is not
+tired of being so.' And what recompense do they offer us for the cruel
+torments to which they have condemned us? Do they raise up an altar to
+our heroism? No! The most honest woman, they say, is she who is not
+talked about, that is to say, a perfect indifference on the part of a
+woman, a general oblivion is the price of our virtue. Must women not
+have much of it to preserve it at such a price? Who would not be
+tempted to abandon it? But there are grave matters which can not be
+overlooked.
+
+"Dishonor closely follows upon weakness. Old age is dreadful in
+itself, what must it not be when it is passed in remorse? I feel the
+necessity of avoiding such a misfortune. I calculated at first that I
+could not succeed in, doing so, without condemning myself to a life of
+austerity, and I had not the courage to undertake it. But it gradually
+dawned upon me that the condition of a society woman was alone
+competent to reconcile virtue with pleasure. From the smile on your
+face, I suspect such an idea appears to be a paradox to you. But it is
+more reasonable than you imagine.
+
+"Tell me this: Is a society woman obliged to have an attachment? Is
+she not exempt from tenderness? It is sufficient for her to be amiable
+and courteous, everything on the surface. As soon as she becomes
+expert in the role she has undertaken, then, the only mistrust the
+world has of her is that she has no heart. A fine figure, haughty
+airs, caprices, fashionable jargon, fantasies, and fads, that is all
+that is required of her. She can be essentially virtuous with
+impunity. Does any one presume to make advances? If he meet with
+resistance he quickly gives over worrying her, he thinks her heart is
+already captured, and he patiently awaits his turn. His perseverance
+would be out of place, for she would notify a man who failed to pay
+her deference, that it was owing to arrangements made before he
+offered himself. In this way a woman is protected by the bad opinion
+had of her.
+
+"I read in your eyes that you are about to say to me: The state of a
+professional society woman may injure my reputation, and plunge me
+into difficulties I seek to avoid. Is not that your thought? But do
+you not know, Monsieur, that the most austere conduct does not guard a
+woman from the shafts of malice? The opinion men give of women's
+reputation, and the good and wrong ideas they acquire of us are always
+equally false. It is prejudice, it is a species of fatality which
+governs their judgment, so that our glory depends less upon a real
+virtue than upon auspicious circumstances. The hope of filling an
+honorable place in their imagination, ought not to be the sole
+incentive to the practice of virtue, it should be the desire to have a
+good opinion of ourselves, and to be able to say, whatever may be the
+opinion of the public: I have nothing with which to reproach myself.
+But, what matters it to what we owe our virtue, provided we have it?
+
+"I was therefore convinced that I could not do better, when I
+reappeared in the world, than to don the mask I deemed the most
+favorable to my peace of mind and to my glory. I became closely
+attached to the friend who aided me with her counsel. She is the
+Marquise de ----, a relative. Our sentiments were in perfect accord.
+We frequented the same society. Charity for our neighbors was truly
+not our favorite virtue. We made our appearance in a social circle as
+into a ball room, where we were the only masks. We indulged in all
+sorts of follies, we goaded the absurd into showing themselves in
+their true character. After having amused ourselves in this comedy,
+we had not yet reached the limit of our pleasure, it was renewed in
+private interviews. How absolutely idiotic the women appeared to us,
+and the men, how vacuous, fatuous, and impertinent! If we found any
+who could inspire fear in a woman's heart, that is, esteem, we broke
+their heart by our airs, by affecting utter indifference for them, and
+by the allurements we heaped upon those who deserved them the least.
+By force of our experience, we came near believing, that in order to
+be virtuous, it was necessary to frequent bad company.
+
+"This course of conduct guaranteed us for a long time against the
+snares of love, and saved us from the dreadful weariness a sad and
+more mournful virtue would have spread over our lives. Frivolous,
+imperious, bold, even coquettish if you will, in the presence of men,
+but solid, reasonable, and virtuous in our own eyes, we were happy in
+this character. We never met a man we were afraid of. Those who might
+have been redoubtable, were obliged to make themselves ridiculous
+before being permitted to enjoy our society.
+
+"But what finally led me to doubt the truth of my principles, is they
+did not always guard me from the dangers I wished to avoid. I have
+learned through my own experience, that love is a traitor with whom it
+will not do to trifle. I do not know by what fatality, the Marquis de
+Sevigne was able to render my projects futile. In spite of all my
+precautions he has found the way to my heart. However much I resisted
+him I was impelled to love him, and my reason is of no more use to me
+except to justify in my own eyes the inclination I feel for him. I
+would be happy if he never gave me an occasion to change my
+sentiments. I have been unable to hide from him my true thoughts, I
+was afraid at first that he might deem me actually as ridiculous as I
+seemed to be. And when my sincerity shall render me less amiable in
+his eyes (for I know that frivolity captures men more than real
+merit), I wish to show myself to him in my true colors. I should blush
+to owe nothing to his heart but a perpetual lie of my whole being."
+
+"I am still less surprised, Madame," said Monsieur de la Sabliere, "at
+the novelty of your project, than at the skill with which you have
+succeeded in rendering such a singular idea plausible. Permit me to
+say, that it is not possible to go astray with more spirit. Have you
+experimented with everybody according to your system? Men go a long
+way around to avoid the beaten track, but they all fall over the same
+obstacles. To make use of the privilege you granted me to tell you
+plainly my thought, believe me, Countess, that the only way for you to
+preserve your peace of mind is to resume openly your position as a
+reasonable woman. There is nothing to be gained by compounding with
+virtue."
+
+When I heard the conversation taking that complexion, I knew it would
+soon finish, and I therefore promptly withdrew, and could not think of
+anything but satisfying your curiosity. I am tired of writing. In two
+days I shall return to Paris.
+
+
+
+
+XXXII
+
+The Advantages of a Knowledge of the Heart
+
+
+Well, Marquis, here I am back again, but the news I bring you may not
+be altogether to your liking. You have never had so fine an occasion
+to charge women with caprice. I wrote you the last time to tell you
+that you were loved, to-day I write just the contrary.
+
+A strange resolution has been taken against you; tremble, 'tis a thing
+settled; the Countess purposes loving you at her ease, and without its
+costing her any disturbance of her peace of mind. She has seen the
+consequences of a passion similar to yours, and she can not face it
+without dismay. She intends, therefore, to arrest its progress. Do not
+let the proofs she has given you reassure you. You men imagine that as
+soon as a woman has confessed her love she can never more break her
+chains; undeceive yourself. The Countess is much more reasonable on
+your account than I thought, and I do not hide from you the fact that
+a portion of her firmness is due to my advice. You need not rely any
+more on my letters, and you do not require any help from them to
+understand women.
+
+I sometimes regret that I have furnished you weapons against my sex,
+without them would you ever have been able to touch the heart of the
+Countess? I must avow that I have judged women with too much rigor,
+and you now see me ready to make them a reparation. I know it now,
+there are more stable and essentially virtuous women than I had
+thought.
+
+What a stock of reason! What a combination of all the estimable
+qualities in our friend! No, Marquis, I could no longer withhold from
+her the sentiment of my most tender esteem, and without consulting
+your interests, I have united with her against you. You will murmur at
+this, but the confidence she has given me, does it not demand this
+return on my part? I will not hide from you any of my wickedness; I
+have carried malice to the point of instructing her in the advantages
+you might draw from everything I have written you about women.
+
+"I feel," she said to me, "how redoubtable is a lover who combines
+with so much knowledge of the heart, the talent to express himself in
+such noble and delicate language. What advantages can he not have of
+women who reason? I have remarked it, it is by his powers of reasoning
+that he has overcome them. He possesses the art of employing the
+intelligence he finds in a woman to justify, in the eyes of his
+reason, the errors into which he draws her. Besides, a woman in love
+thinks she is obliged to proportion her sacrifices to the good
+qualities of the man she loves. To an ordinary man, a weakness is a
+weakness, he blushes at it; to a man of intelligence, it is a tribute
+paid to his merits, it is even a proof of our discernment; he
+eulogizes our good taste and takes the credit of it. It is thus by
+turning it to the profit of the vanity which he rescues from virtue,
+that this enchanter hides from our eyes the grades of our weakness."
+
+Such are at present, Marquis, the sentiments of the Countess, and I am
+not sure if they leave you much to hope for. I do not ignore the fact
+that it might have doubtless been better to carry out the project we
+have in view without giving you any information concerning it. That
+was our first intention; but could I in conscience secretly work
+against you? Would it not have been to betray you? Moreover, by taking
+that course, we should have appeared to be afraid of you, and hence we
+found courage to put you in possession of all we expect to do to
+resist you.
+
+Come, now, Marquis, our desire to see you really makes us impatient.
+Would you know the reason? It is because we expect you without fearing
+you. Remember that you have not now a weak loving woman to fight
+against, she would be too feeble an adversary, her courage might give
+out; it is I, now, it is a woman of cold blood, who fancies herself
+interested in saving the reason of her friend from being wrecked. Yes,
+I will penetrate to the bottom of your heart; I will read there your
+perverse designs; I will forestall them; I will render all the
+artifices of your malice innocuous.
+
+You may accuse me of treason as much as you please, but come to-night,
+and I will convince you that my conduct is conformable to the most
+exact equity. While your inexperience needed enlightenment,
+assistance, encouragement, my zeal in your cause urged me to sacrifice
+everything in your interests. Every advantage was then on the side of
+the Countess. But now there is a different face on things; all her
+pride to-day, is barely strong enough to resist you. Formerly, her
+indifference was in her favor, and, what was worth still more, your
+lack of skill; to-day you have the experience, and she has her reason
+the less.
+
+After that, to combine with you against her, to betray the confidence
+she reposes in me, to refuse her the succor she has the right to
+expect from me, if you are sincere, you will avow it yourself, would
+be a crying wrong. Henceforth, I purpose to repair the evil I have
+done in revealing our secrets, by initiating you into our mysteries. I
+do not know why, but the pleasure I feel in crossing you, appears to
+be working in my favor, and you know how far my rights oven you
+extend. My sentiments will always be the same, and, on your part
+without doubt, you are too equitable to diminish your esteem for me,
+because of anything I may have done in favor of a friend.
+
+By and by, then, at the Countess'.
+
+
+
+
+XXXIII
+
+A Heart Once Wounded No Longer Plays with Love
+
+
+What, Marquis, afraid of two women? You already despair of your
+affairs, because they oppose your success, and you are ready to
+abandon the game? Dear me, I thought you had more courage. It is true
+that the firmness of the Countess astonishes even me, but I do not
+understand how she could hold out against your ardor for an entire
+evening. I never saw you so seductive, and she has just confessed to
+me that you were never so redoubtable. Now I can respond for her,
+since her courage did not fail her on an occasion of so much peril. I
+saw still farther, and I judge from her well sustained ironical
+conversation, that she is only moderately smitten. A woman really
+wounded by the shaft of love would not have played with sentiment in
+such a flippant manner.
+
+This gives birth to a strange idea. It would be very delightful, if in
+a joking way, we should discover that your tender Adelaide does not
+love you up to a certain point. What a blow that would be to your
+vanity! But you would quickly seek revenge. You might certainly find
+beauties ready to console you for your loss. How often has vexation
+made you say: "What is a woman's heart? Can any one give me a
+definition of it?"
+
+However, do you know that I am tempted to find fault with you, and if
+you take this too much to heart, I do not know what I would not do to
+soften the situation. But I know you are strong minded. Your first
+feelings of displeasure past, you will soon see that the best thing
+you can do is to come down to the quality of friend, a position which
+we have so generously offered you. You ought to consider yourself very
+fortunate, your dismissal might be made absolute. But do not make this
+out to be much of a victory, you will be more harshly treated if we
+consider you more to be feared.
+
+Adieu, Marquis. The Countess, who is sitting at the head of my bed,
+sends you a thousand tender things. She is edified by the discretion
+with which you have treated us; not to insist when two ladies seem to
+be so contrary to you, that is the height of gallantry. So much
+modesty will certainly disarm them, and may some day move them to
+pity. Hope, that is permitted you.
+
+
+From the Countess.
+
+Although you may be inspired by the most flattering hopes, Marquis, I
+will add a few words to this letter. I have not read it, but I suspect
+that it refers to me. I wish, however, to write you with my own hand
+that we shall be alone here all day. I wish to tell you that I love
+you moderately well at present, but that I have the greatest desire
+in the world not to love you at all. However, if you deem it advisable
+to come and trouble our little party, it gives me pleasure to warn you
+that your heart will be exposed to the greatest danger. I am told that
+I am handsomer to-day than you have ever found me to be, and I never
+felt more in the humor to treat you badly.
+
+
+
+
+XXXIV
+
+Absence Makes the Heart Grow Fonder
+
+
+All this, Marquis, begins to pass the bounds of pleasantry. Explain
+yourself, I pray you. Did you pretend to speak seriously in your
+letter, in making it understood that I was acting on this occasion
+through jealousy, and that I was trying to separate you and the
+Countess to profit by it myself?
+
+You are either the wickedest of men or the most adroit; the wickedest
+if you ever could suspect me guilty of such baseness; the most adroit,
+if you have thrown out that idea to make my friend suspect me. I see
+very clearly in all this, that the alternative is equally injurious to
+me, since the Countess has taken the matter to heart. I find that my
+relations with her are very embarrassing. Criminal that you are, how
+well you know your ascendency over her heart! You could not better
+attack her than by the appearance of indifference you affect. Not
+deign to answer my last letter, not come to the rendezvous given you,
+remain away from us three days, and after all that, to write us the
+coldest letter possible, oh, I confess it frankly, that is to act like
+a perfect man; that is what I call a master stroke, and the most
+complete success has responded to your hope. The Countess has not
+been able to stand against so much coolness. The fear that this
+indifference may become real has caused her a mortal anxiety.
+
+Great Heavens! What is the most reasonable woman when love has turned
+her head? Why were you not the witness of the reproaches I have just
+heard? How is that? To hear the Countess to-day, gave me an injurious
+opinion of her virtue, a false idea of your pretensions, and I
+considered your designs criminal because you took so much pleasure in
+punishing her.
+
+I am hard, unjust, cruel, I can not remember all the epithets with
+which I was covered. What outbursts! Oh, I protest to you, this will
+be the last storm I will undergo for being mixed up in your affairs,
+and I very cordially renounce the confidence with which you have both
+honored me. Advisers do not play a very agreeable part in such cases,
+so it seems to me, always charged with what is disagreeable in
+quarrels, and the lovers only profit by a reconciliation.
+
+However, after due reflection, I think I should be very silly to take
+offence at this. You are two children whose follies will amuse me, I
+ought to look upon them with the eye of a philosopher, and finish by
+being the friend of both. Come then, at once, and assure me if that
+resolution will suit you. Now, do not play the petty cruel role any
+more. Come and make peace. These poor children; one of them has such
+innocent motives, the other is so sure of her virtue, that to stand in
+the way of their inclination, is surely to afflict them without
+reason.
+
+
+
+
+XXXV
+
+The Heart Should be Played Upon Like the Keys of a Piano
+
+
+I am beginning to understand, Marquis, that the only way to live with
+the most reasonable woman, is never to meddle with her heart affairs.
+I have, therefore, made up my mind. Henceforward I shall never mention
+your name to the Countess unless she insists upon my doing so; I do
+not like bickerings.
+
+But this resolution will change nothing of my sentiments for you, nor
+my friendship for her. And, although I still stand her friend, I shall
+not scruple to make use of my friendship, so far as you are concerned,
+as I have in the past I shall continue, since you so wish it, to give
+you my ideas on the situations in which you may become involved, on
+condition, however, that you permit me sometimes to laugh at your
+expense, a liberty I shall not take to-day, because if the Countess
+follows up the plan she has formed, that is, if she persists in
+refusing to see you alone, I do not see that your affairs will advance
+very rapidly. She remembers what I told her, she knows her heart, and
+has reason to fear it.
+
+It is only an imprudent woman who relies upon her own strength, and
+exposes herself without anxiety to the advances of the man she loves.
+The agitation which animates him, the fire with which his whole person
+appears to be burning, excites our senses, fires our imagination,
+appeals to our desires. I said to the Countess one day: "We resemble
+your clavecin; however well disposed it may be to respond to the hand
+which should play upon it, until it feels the impression of that hand,
+it remains silent; touch its keys, and sounds are heard." Finish the
+parallel, and draw your conclusions.
+
+But after all, why should you complain, Monsieur, the metaphysician?
+To see the Countess, hear the soft tones of her voice, render her
+little attentions, carry the delicacy of sentiment beyond the range of
+mortal vision, feel edified at her discourses on virtue, are not these
+supreme felicity for you? Leave for earthy souls the gross sentiments
+which are beginning to develop in you. To look at you to-day, it might
+be said that I was not so far out of the way when I declared love to
+be the work of the senses. Your own experience will compel you to avow
+that I had some good reason for saying so, for which I am not at all
+sorry. Consider yourself punished for your injustice. Adieu.
+
+Your old rival, the Chevalier, has revenged himself for the rigors of
+the Countess, by tying himself up with the Marquise, her relative.
+This choice is assuredly a eulogy on his good taste, they are made for
+each other. I shall be very much charmed to know whither their fine
+passion will lead them.
+
+
+
+
+XXXVI
+
+Mistaken Impressions Common to All Women
+
+
+Do you think, Marquis, that I have not felt all the sarcasm you have
+deigned to turn against me on account of my pretended reconciliation
+with the Countess? Know this, sir, that we have never been at outs.
+
+It is true, she begged me to forget her vivacity, which she claimed
+was due to her love, and she insisted that I should continue to give
+her good counsel. But Good Heavens! Of what use are my counsels except
+to provide you with an additional triumph? The best advice I can give
+her is to break off her relations with you, for whatever confidence
+she may have in her pride, her only preservative against you is
+flight. She believes, for example, that she used her reason with good
+effect in the conversation you have related to me. But every
+reasonable woman does not fail to use the same language as soon as a
+lover shows her some respectful pretensions.
+
+"I only want your heart," they say, "your sentiments, your esteem is
+all I desire. Alas! you will find only too many women with so little
+delicacy as to believe themselves very happy in accepting what I
+refuse. I will never envy them a happiness of that kind."
+
+Be on your guard, Marquis, and do not openly combat such fine
+sentiments; to doubt a woman's sincerity on such occasions, is to do
+more than offend them, it is to be maladroit. You must applaud their
+mistaken idea if you would profit by it. They wish to appear
+high-minded, and sensible only of the pleasures of the soul, it is
+their system, their esprit du corps. If some women are in good faith
+on this point, how many are there who treat it as an illusion and wish
+to impose it upon you?
+
+But whatever may be the reason which impels them to put you on a false
+scent, ought you not to be delighted that they are willing to take the
+trouble to deceive you? What obligations are you not under? They give
+in this manner, a high value to those who, without it, would be very
+undesirable. Admire our strategy when we feign indifference to what
+you call the pleasures of love, pretending even to be far removed from
+its sweetness, we augment the grandeur of the sacrifice we make for
+you, by it, we even inspire the gratitude of the authors of the very
+benefits we receive from them, you are satisfied with the good you do
+us.
+
+And since it was said that we make it a duty to deceive you, what
+obligation do you not owe us? We have chosen the most obliging way to
+do it. You are the first to gain by this deceit, for we can not
+multiply obstacles without enhancing the price of your victory.
+Troubles, cares, are not these the money with which lovers pay for
+their pleasures? What a satisfaction for your vanity to be able to
+say within yourselves: "This woman, so refined, so insensible to the
+impressions of the senses; this woman who fears disdain so much, comes
+to me, nevertheless, and sacrifices her repugnance, her fears, her
+pride? My own merit, the charms of my person, my skill, have
+surmounted invincible objects for something quite different. How
+satisfied I am with my prowess!"
+
+If women acted in good faith, if they were in as much haste to show
+you their desires as you are to penetrate them, you could not talk
+that way. How many pleasures lost! But you can not impute wrong to
+this artifice, it gives birth to so many advantages. Pretend to be
+deceived, and it will become a pleasure to you.
+
+If the Countess knew what I have written, how she would reproach me!
+
+
+
+
+XXXVII
+
+The Allurements of Stage Women
+
+
+I know too well that a man in your position, particularly a military
+man, is often exposed to bad company, consequently, he is attracted by
+the divinities you mention. In spite of that you are not deceived, and
+I would probably censure you, if I were not so sure, that, in the
+present state of your heart, the heroines of the theater are not
+dangerous to you. But the Countess is less indulgent, you say. Her
+jealousy does not astonish me, she confirms my ideas concerning female
+metaphysicians. I know how much credit is due their sincerity. Her
+complaints are very singular, for, what is she deprived of? The women
+in question are nothing but women of sentiment, and it is to sentiment
+that the Countess is attached.
+
+How little women are in accord! They pretend to despise women of the
+stage; they fear them too much to despise them. But after all, are
+they wrong to consider them rivals? Are you not more captivated with
+their free and easy style, than with that of a sensible woman who has
+nothing to offer but order, decency, and uniformity? With the former,
+men are at their ease, they appear to be in their element; with the
+latter, men are kept within bounds, obliged to stand on their
+dignity, and to be very circumspect. From the portrait of several of
+them, I should judge that there are some of them very capable of
+making many men unfaithful to the most beloved mistress. But with a
+sensible man, this infidelity, if it be one, can not be of long
+duration. These women may create a sudden, lively desire, but never a
+veritable passion.
+
+The fairies of the operatic stage would be too dangerous, if they had
+the wit or the humor always to amuse you as much as they do the first
+time you are thrown on their company. However little jargon, habits,
+and decency they have on the surface, it is possible that they may
+please you at first. You men have so little refinement sometimes! The
+freedom of their conversation, the vivacity of their sallies of
+alleged wit, their giddy ways, all this affords you a situation that
+charms; a lively and silly joy seizes upon you, the hours you pass
+with them seem to be only moments. But happily for you, they seldom
+possess sufficient resources to maintain a role so amusing. Inasmuch
+as they lack education and culture, they soon travel around the small
+circle of their accomplishments. They feed you with the same
+pleasantries, the same stories, the same antics, and it is seldom one
+laughs twice at the same thing when one has no esteem for the fun
+maker.
+
+The Countess need not worry, for I know you well enough to assure her
+that it is not that class of women she may apprehend, there are in the
+world, others more redoubtable, they are the "gallant women," those
+equivocal women in society. They occupy a middle position between good
+women and those I have been talking about; they associate with the
+former and are not different from the latter except on the surface.
+More voluptuous than tender, they seduce by lending to the least
+refined sentiments an air of passion which is mistaken for love. They
+understand how to convey an impression of tenderness to what is only a
+taste for pleasure. They make you believe that it is by choice, by a
+knowledge of your merit that they yield. If you do not know them to be
+gallant women, the shade of difference which distinguishes the true
+motives which actuates them, from the sensibility of the heart, is
+impossible to seize. You accept for excess of passion what is only an
+intoxication of the senses. You imagine you are loved because you are
+lovable, but it is only because you are a man.
+
+These are the women I should fear if I were in the place of the
+Countess. The financial woman who has lately appeared in society
+belongs to this class, but I have already warned the Countess.
+
+I call to mind, here, that in your preceding letter, you mentioned the
+allurements which the Countess thought proper to manifest? She was
+right in taking umbrage. Your passion for her is truly too great to
+prevent you from sacrificing everything, but I fear you will not
+always be so honest.
+
+Madame de ---- possesses bloom and cheerfulness; she is at an age when
+women assume charge of young men who desire to be fitted for society,
+and to learn their first lessons in gallantry. The interesting and
+affectionate disposition you find in her will have its effect, but be
+careful, it is I who warn you. Although I despise such women, it
+happens that they have the power to create attachments; they often
+find the secret of making you commit more follies than any of the
+other women.
+
+
+
+
+XXXVIII
+
+Varieties of Resistance are Essential
+
+
+I hasten to tell you, Marquis, that I have just maintained a thesis
+against Monsieur de la Bruyere. No doubt you admire my temerity?
+However it is true. He pretends that Corneille described men as they
+should be, and Racine as they are; I held the contrary. We had some
+illustrious spectators of the dispute, and I ought to be very proud of
+the suffrages in my favor.
+
+But all the details would be too long to write you, so come and we
+will talk them over. Every one has his own fashion of describing
+things, I have mine, I know. I represent women as they are, and I am
+very sorry not to be able to represent them as they should be. Now I
+shall reply to your letter.
+
+The species of languor which affects you does not surprise me. The
+malady which afflicts the Marquise has deprived you of the pleasure of
+seeing the Countess, and your heart remaining in the same condition
+for three days, it is not surprising that ennui should have gained
+upon it. Neither does your present indifference for the Countess alarm
+me. In the greatest passions there are always moments of lukewarmness,
+which astonish the hearts that feel the sensation. Whether the heart,
+constantly agitated by the same emotions, finally tires, or whether it
+is absolutely impossible for it to be always employed with the same
+object, there are moments of indifference, the cause of which can not
+be ascertained. The livelier the emotions of the heart, the more
+profound the calm that is sure to follow, and it is this calm that is
+always more fateful to the object loved than storm and agitation. Love
+is extinguished by a resistance too severe or constant. But an
+intelligent woman goes beyond that, she varies her manner of
+resisting; this is the sublimity of the art.
+
+Now, with the Countess, the duties of friendship are preferable to the
+claims of love, and that is another reason for your indifference
+toward her. Love is a jealous and tyrannical sentiment, which is never
+satiated until the object loved has sacrificed upon its altar all
+desires and passions. You do nothing for it unless you do everything.
+Whenever you prefer duty, friendship, etc., it claims the right to
+complain. It demands revenge. The small courtesies you deemed it
+necessary to show Madame de ---- are proofs of it. I would have much
+preferred, though, you had not carried them so far as accompanying her
+home. The length of time you passed in her company, the pleasure you
+experienced in conversing with her, the questions she put to you on
+the state of your heart, all goes to prove the truth of what I said in
+my last letter. It is vain for you to protest that you came away more
+amorous than ever of the Countess, your embarrassment when she
+inquired whether you had remained long with your "fermiere generale,"
+the attempt you made to deceive her by an evasive answer, the extreme
+care you took to disarm her slightest suspicion, are indications to me
+that you are far more guilty than you pretend, or than you are aware
+of yourself.
+
+The Countess suffers the consequences of all that. Do you not see how
+she affects to rouse your jealousy by praising the Chevalier, your
+ancient rival? For once, I can assure you that you will not so soon be
+affected by the languors we mentioned a short time ago. Jealousy will
+give you something to think about. Do you count for nothing, the
+sufferings of the Marquise? You will soon see her, the ravages of the
+smallpox will not alone disfigure her face, for her disposition will
+be very different, as soon as she learns the extent of her misfortune.
+How I pity her; how I pity other women! With what cordiality she will
+hate them and tear them to tatters! The Countess is her best friend,
+will she be so very long? She is so handsome, her complexion casts the
+others in the shade. What storms I foresee!
+
+I had forgotten to quarrel with you about your treatment of me. You
+have been so indiscreet as to show my recent letters to M. de la
+Rochefoucauld. I will cease writing you if you continue to divulge my
+secret. I am willing to talk personally with him about my ideas, but I
+am far from flattering myself that I write well enough to withstand
+the criticism of a reader like him.
+
+
+
+
+XXXIX
+
+The True Value of Compliments Among Women
+
+
+The marks left by the smallpox on the Marquise's face have set her
+wild. Her resolution not to show herself for a long time does not
+surprise me. How could she appear in public in such a state? If the
+accident which humiliates her had not happened, how she would have
+made the poor Chevalier suffer! Does not this prove that female virtue
+depends upon circumstances, and diminishes with pride?
+
+How I fear a similar example in the case of the Countess! Nothing is
+more dangerous for a woman than the weaknesses of her friend; love,
+already too seductive in itself, becomes more so through the contagion
+of example, if I may so speak; it is not only in our heart that it
+gathers strength; it acquires new weapons against reason from its
+environment. A woman who has fallen under its ban, deems herself
+interested, for her own justification, in conducting her friend to the
+edge of the same precipice, and I am not, therefore, surprised at what
+the Marquise says in your favor. Up to the present moment they have
+been guided by the same principles; what a shame, then, for her, that
+the Countess could not have been guaranteed against the effects of it!
+Now, the Marquise has a strong reason the more for contributing to
+the defeat of her friend; she has become positively ugly, and
+consequently obliged to be more complaisant in retaining a lover. Will
+she suffer another woman to keep hers at a less cost? That would be to
+recognize too humiliating a superiority, and I can assure you that she
+will do the most singular things to bring her amiable widower up to
+the point.
+
+If she succeed, how much I fear everything will be changed! To have
+been as beautiful as another woman, and to be so no longer, although
+she embellishes herself every day, and to suffer her presence every
+day, is, I vow, an effort beyond the strength of the most reasonable
+woman, greater than the most determined philosophy. Among women
+friendship ceases where rivalry begins. By rivalry, I mean that of
+beauty only, it would be too much to add that of sentiment.
+
+I foresee this with regret, but it is my duty to forewarn you.
+Whatever precautions the Countess may take to control the amour propre
+of the Marquise, she will never make anything else out of her than an
+ingrate. I do not know by what fatality, everything a beautiful woman
+tells one who is no longer beautiful, assumes in the mouth, an
+impression of a commiseration which breaks down the most carefully
+devised management, and humiliates her whom it is thought to console.
+The more a woman strives to efface the superiority she possesses over
+an unfortunate sister woman, the more she makes that superiority
+apparent, until the latter reaches the opinion that it is only
+through generosity that she is permitted to occupy the subordinate
+position left her.
+
+You may depend upon it, Marquis, that women are never misled when it
+comes to mutual praise; they fully appreciate the eulogies
+interchanged among themselves; and as they speak without sincerity, so
+they listen with little gratitude. And although she who speaks, in
+praising the beauty of another, may do so in good faith, she who
+listens to the eulogy, considers less what the other says than her
+style of beauty. Is she ugly? We believe and love her, but if she be
+as handsome as we, we thank her coldly and disdain her; handsomer, we
+hate her more than before she spoke.
+
+You must understand this, Marquis, that as much as two beautiful women
+may have something between them to explain, it is impossible for them
+to form a solid friendship. Can two merchants who have the same goods
+to sell become good neighbors? Men do not penetrate the true cause of
+the lack of cordiality among women. Those who are the most intimate
+friends often quarrel over nothing, but do you suppose this "nothing"
+is the real occasion of their quarrel? It is only the pretext. We hide
+the motive of our actions when to reveal it would be a humiliation. We
+do not care to make public the fact that it is jealousy for the beauty
+of our friend that is the real cause, to give that as the reason for
+estrangement would be to charge us with envy, a pleasure one woman
+will not give another; she prefers injustice. Whenever it happens
+that two beautiful women are so happy as to find a pretext to get rid
+of each other, they seize upon it with vivacity, and hate each other
+with a cordiality which proves how much they loved each other before
+the rupture.
+
+Well, Marquis, am I talking to you with sufficient frankness? You see
+to what lengths my sincerity goes. I try to give you just ideas of
+everything, even at my own expense, for I am assuredly not more exempt
+than another woman from the faults I sometimes criticise. But as I am
+sure that what passes between us will be buried in oblivion, I do not
+fear embroiling myself in a quarrel with all my sex, they might,
+perhaps, claim the right to blame my ingenuity.
+
+But the Countess is above all such petty things, she agrees, however,
+with everything I have just said. Are there many women like her?
+
+
+
+
+XL
+
+Oratory and Fine Phrases do Not Breed Love
+
+
+The example of the Marquise has not yet had any effect on the heart of
+her friend. It appears, on the contrary, that she is more on guard
+against you, and that you have drawn upon yourself her reproaches
+through some slight favor you have deprived her of.
+
+I have been thinking that she would not fail on this occasion to
+recall to your recollection, the protestations of respect and
+disinterestedness you made when you declared your passion for her. It
+is customary in similar cases. But what seems strange about it is,
+that the same eagerness that a woman accepts as a proof of disrespect,
+before she is in perfect accord with her lover, becomes, in her
+imagination, a proof of love and esteem, as soon as they meet on a
+common ground.
+
+Listen to married women, and to all those who, being unmarried, permit
+the same prerogatives; hear them, I say, in their secret complaints
+against unfaithful husbands and cooling lovers. They are despised, and
+that is the sole reason they can imagine. But with us, what they
+consider a mark of esteem and sincerity, is it anything else than the
+contrary? I told you some time ago, that women themselves, when they
+are acting in good faith, go farther than men in making love consist
+in an effervescence of the blood. Study a lover at the commencement of
+her passion: with her, then, love is purely a metaphysical sentiment,
+with which the senses have not the least relation. Similar to those
+philosophers who, in the midst of grievous torments would not confess
+that they were suffering pain, she is a martyr to her own system; but,
+at last, while combatting this chimera, the poor thing becomes
+affected by a change; her lover vainly repeats that love is a divine,
+metaphysical sentiment, that it lives on fine phrases, on spiritual
+discourses, that it would be degrading to mingle with it anything
+material and human; he vainly, boasts of his respect and refinement. I
+tell you, Marquis, on the part of all women, that such an orator will
+never make his fortune. His respect will be taken as an insult, his
+refinement for derision, and his fine discourses for ridiculous
+pretexts. All the grace that will be accorded him, is that she will
+find a pretext to quarrel with him because he has been less refined
+with some other woman, and that he will be put to the sorrowful
+necessity of displaying his high flown sentiments to his titular
+mistress, and what is admirable about this is, that the excuse for it
+arises out of the same principle.
+
+P.S.--You have so much deference for my demands! You not only show my
+letters to M. de la Rochefoucauld, but you read them before the whole
+assembly of my friends. It is true that the indulgence with which my
+friends judge them, consoles me somewhat for your indiscretion, and I
+see very well that the best thing for me to do is to continue on in my
+own way as I have in the past. But, at least, be discreet when I
+mention matters relating to the glory of the Countess; otherwise, no
+letters.
+
+
+
+
+XLI
+
+Discretion Is Sometimes the Better Part of Valor
+
+
+No, Marquis, I can not pardon in you the species of fury with which
+you desire what you are pleased to call the "supreme happiness." How
+blind you are, not to know that when you are sure of a woman's heart,
+it is in your interests to enjoy her defeat a long time before it
+becomes entire. Will you never understand, that of all there is good
+on earth, it is the sweetness of love that must be used with the
+greatest economy?
+
+If I were a man and were so fortunate as to have captured the heart of
+a woman like the Countess, with what discretion I would use my
+advantages? How many gradations there would be in the law I should
+impose upon myself to overlook them successively and even leisurely?
+Of how many amiable pleasures, unknown to men, would not I be the
+creator? Like a miser, I would contemplate my treasure unceasingly,
+learn its precious value, feel that in it consisted all my felicity,
+base all my happiness upon the possession of it, reflect that it is
+all mine, that I may dispose of it and yet maintain my resolution not
+to deprive myself of its use.
+
+What a satisfaction to read in the eyes of an adorable woman the power
+you have over her; to see her slightest acts give birth to an
+impression of tenderness, whenever they relate to you; to hear her
+voice soften when it is to you or of you she speaks; to enjoy her
+confusion at your slightest eagerness, her anxiety at your most
+innocent caresses? Is there a more delicious condition than that of a
+lover who is sure of being loved, and can there be any sweeter than at
+such moments? What a charm for a lover to be expected with an
+impatience that is not concealed; to be received with an eagerness all
+the more flattering from the effort made to hide the half of it?
+
+She dresses in a fashion to please; she assumes the deportment, the
+style, the pose that may flatter her lover the most. In former times
+women dressed to please in general, now their entire toilette is to
+please men; for his sake she wears bangles, jewelry, ribbons,
+bracelets, rings. He is the object of it all, the woman is transformed
+into the man; it is he she loves in her own person. Can you find
+anything in love more enchanting than the resistance of a woman who
+implores you not to take advantage of her weakness? Is there anything,
+in a word, more seductive than a voice almost stifled with emotion,
+than a refusal for which she reproaches herself, and, the rigor of
+which she attempts to soften by tender looks, before a complaint is
+made? I can not conceive any.
+
+But it is certain that as soon as she yields to your eagerness, all
+these pleasures weaken in proportion to the facility met. You alone
+may prolong them, even increase them, by taking the time to know all
+the sweetness and its taste. However, you are not satisfied unless
+the possession, be entire, easy, and continuous. And after that, you
+are surprised to find indifference, coolness, and inconstancy in your
+heart. Have you not done everything to satiate your passion for the
+beloved object? I have always contended that love never dies from
+desire but often from indigestion, and I will sometime tell you in
+confidence my feelings for Count ----. You will understand from that
+how to manage a passion to render happiness enduring; you will see
+whether I know the human heart and true felicity; you will learn from
+my example that the economy of the sentiments is, in the question of
+love, the only reasonable metaphysics. In fine, you will know how
+little you understand your true interests in your conduct toward the
+Countess. To interfere with your projects, I shall be with her as
+often as it is possible. Now, do not be formal, and tell me that I am
+an advocate on both sides; for I am persuaded that I am acting for the
+good of the parties interested.
+
+
+
+
+XLII
+
+Surface Indications in Women are Not Always Guides
+
+
+What, I censure you, Marquis? I will take good care not to do so, I
+assure you. You have not been willing to follow my advice, and hence,
+I am not at all sorry for having ill-used you. You thought you had
+nothing to do but to treat the Countess roughly. Her easy fashion of
+treating love, her accessibility, her indulgence for your numerous
+faults, the freedom with which she mocks the Platonicians, all this
+encouraged you to hope that she was not very severe, but you have just
+discovered your mistake. All this outward show was nothing but
+deceitful and perfidious allurements. To take advantage thus of the
+good faith of any one--I must confess that it is a conduct which cries
+for vengeance; she deserves all the names you give her.
+
+But do you wish me to talk to you with my customary frankness? You
+have fallen into an error which is common among men. They judge women
+from the surface. They imagine that a woman whose virtue is not always
+on the qui vive, will be easier to overcome than a prude; even
+experience does not undeceive them. How often are they exposed to a
+severity all the keener that it was unexpected? Their custom then, is
+to accuse women of caprice and oddity; all of you use the same
+language, and say: Why such equivocal conduct? When a woman has
+decided to remain intractable, why surprise the credulity of a lover?
+Why not possess an exterior conformable to her sentiments? In a word,
+why permit a man to love her, when she does not care ever to see him
+again? Is this not being odd and false? Is it not trifling with
+sentiment?
+
+You are in error, gentlemen, you are imposing upon your vanity, it is
+in vain you try to put us on a false scent, that, of itself, is
+offensive, and you talk of sentiment as ennobling a thing that
+resembles it very little. Are not you, yourselves, to blame if we
+treat you thus? However little intelligence a woman may have, she
+knows that the strongest tie to bind you to her is anticipation,
+wherefore, you must let her lay the blame on you. If she were to arm
+herself from the first with a severity that would indicate that she is
+invincible, from that time, no lovers for her. What a solitude would
+be hers, what shame even? For a woman of the most pronounced virtue is
+no less sensible of the desire to please, she makes her glory consist
+in securing homage and adoration. But without ignoring the fact that
+those she expects attention from are induced to bestow them only for
+reasons that wound her pride; unable to reform this defect, the only
+part she can take is to use it to her advantage to keep them by her
+side; she knows how to keep them, and not destroy the very hopes
+which, however, she is determined never to gratify. With care and
+skill she succeeds. Hence, as soon as a woman understands her real
+interests she does not fail to say to herself what the Countess
+confessed to me at our last interview:
+
+"I can well appreciate the 'I love you' of the men; I do not disguise
+the fact that I know what it signifies at bottom, therefore upon me
+rests the burden of being offended at hearing them; but when women
+have penetrated their motives, they have need of their vanity to
+disconcert their designs. Our anger, when they have offended us, is
+not the best weapon to use in opposing them. Whoever must go outside
+herself and become angry to resist them, exposes her weakness. A fine
+irony, a piquant raillery, a humiliating coolness, these are what
+discourage them. Never a quarrel with them, consequently no
+reconciliation. What advantages does not this mode of procedure take
+from them!
+
+"The prude, it is true, follows a quite different method. If she is
+exposed to the least danger, she does not imagine herself to be
+reasonable but in proportion to the resentment she experiences; but
+upon whom does such conduct impose? Every man who knows the cards,
+says to himself: 'I am ill used because the opportunity is
+unfavorable. It is my awkwardness that is punished and not my
+temerity. Another time, that will be well received which is a crime
+to-day; this severity is a notice to redouble my effort, to merit more
+indulgence and disarm pride; she wishes to be appeased.' And the only
+means in such case to make her forget the offense is, that in making
+an apology to repeat it a second time. With my recipe, I am certain
+that a man will never reason that way.
+
+"The Marquis, for example, has sometimes permitted me to read in his
+eyes his respectful intentions. I never knew but one way to punish
+him; I have feigned not to understand him; insensibly, I have diverted
+his mind to other objects. And this recipe has worked well up to the
+moment I last saw him at my house. There was no way to dissimulate
+with him; he wished to honor me with some familiarities, and I stopped
+him immediately, but not in anger. I deemed it more prudent to arm
+myself with reason than with anger. I appeared to be more afflicted
+than irritated, and I am sure my grief touched his heart more than
+bitter reproaches which might have alarmed him. He went away very much
+dissatisfied; and just see what the heart is: at first, I was afraid I
+had driven him away forever, I was tempted to reproach myself for my
+cruelty, but, upon reflection, I felt reassured. Has severity ever
+produced inconstancy?"
+
+To go on: We talked until we were out of breath, and everything the
+Countess told me gave me to understand that she had made up her mind.
+It will be in vain for you to cry out against her injustice, consider
+her as odd and inhuman, she will not accept any of the sweetness of
+love unless it costs her pride nothing, and I observe that she is
+following that resolution with more firmness than I imagined her
+capable of. The loss of your heart would undoubtedly be a misfortune
+for which she could never be consoled. But, on the other hand, the
+conditions you place upon your perseverance appear too hard to be
+accepted; she is willing to compromise with you. She hopes to be able
+to hold you without betraying her duty, a project worthy of her
+courage, and I hope it will succeed better than the plan she had
+formed to guarantee her heart against love. Let us await the outcome.
+
+Shall we see you to-morrow at Madame la Presidente's? If you should
+desire to have an occasion to speak to her, I do not doubt that you
+will make your peace.
+
+
+
+
+XLIII
+
+Women Demand Respect
+
+
+I should never have expected it, Marquis. What! My zeal in your behalf
+has drawn your reproaches down upon me? I share with the Countess the
+bad humor her severity has caused! you. Do you know? If what you say
+were well founded, nothing could be more piquant for me than the
+ironical tone in which you laud my principles. But to render me
+responsible for your success, as you attempt, have you dared think for
+an instant that my object in writing you, was ever for the purpose of
+giving you lessons in seduction? Do you not perceive any difference in
+teaching you to please, and exciting you toward seduction? I have told
+you the motives which incline women to love, it is true, but have I
+ever said that they were easier to vanquish? Have I ever told you to
+attack them by sensuality, and that in attacking them to suppose them
+without delicacy? I do not believe it.
+
+When your inexperience and your timidity might cause you to play the
+role of a ridiculous personage among women, I explained the harm these
+defects might cause you in the world. I advised you to have more
+confidence, in order to lead you insensibly in the direction of that
+noble and respectful boldness you should have when with women. But as
+soon as I saw that your pretensions were going too far, and that they
+might wound the reputation of the Countess, I did not dissimulate, I
+took sides against you, and nothing was more reasonable, I had become
+her friend. You see, then, how unjust you are in my regard, and you
+are no less so in regard to her. You treat her as if she were an
+equivocal character. According to your idea, she has neither decided
+for nor against gallantry, and what you clearly see in her conduct is,
+that she is a more logical coquette than other women. What an opinion!
+
+But there is much to pardon in your situation. However, a man without
+prejudice, would see in the Countess only a lover as reasonable as she
+is tender; a woman who, without having an ostentatious virtue,
+nevertheless remains constantly attached to it; a woman, in a word,
+who seeks in good faith the proper means of reconciling love and duty.
+The difficulty in allying these two contraries is not slight, and it
+is the source of the inequalities that wound you. Figure to yourself
+the combats she must sustain, the revolutions she suffers, her
+embarrassment in endeavoring to preserve a lover whom too uniform a
+resistance might repel. If she were sure of keeping you by resisting
+your advances; but you carry your odd conduct to the extent of leaving
+her when her resistance is too prolonged. While praising our virtue,
+you abandon us, and then, what shame for us! But since in both cases
+it is not certain that her lover will be held, it is preferable to
+accept the inconvenient rather than cause you to lose her heart and
+her esteem.
+
+That is our advice, for the Countess and I think precisely alike on
+the subject. Be more equitable, Marquis; complain of her rather than
+criticise her. If her character were more decided, perhaps you would
+be better satisfied with her; but, even in that case would you be
+satisfied very long? I doubt it.
+
+Adieu. We count on seeing you this evening at Madame de La Fayette's,
+and that you will prove more reasonable. The Abbe Gedoyn will be
+presented me. The assembly will be brilliant, but you will doubtless
+be bored, for you will not see the only object that can attract you,
+and you will say of my apartment, what Malherbe so well says of the
+garden of the Louvre:
+
+"Mais quoi que vous ayez, vous n'avez point Caliste,
+Et moi je ne vois rien, quand je ne la vois pas."
+
+(Whatever you may have Caliste you have not got,
+And I, I can see nothing when I see her not.)
+
+
+
+
+XLIV
+
+Why Love Grows Weak--Marshal de Saint-Evremond's Opinion
+
+
+A calm has succeeded the storm, Marquis, and I see by your letter that
+you are more satisfied with the Countess and with yourself. How
+powerful logic is coming from the mouth of a woman we adore! You see
+how the conduct of our friend has produced an opposite effect from
+that of the Marquise; the severity of the former increasing your
+esteem and love for her and the kindness of the Marquise making an
+unfaithful lover out of the Chevalier. So it generally happens among
+men, ingratitude is commonly the price of benefits. This misfortune,
+however, is not always beyond the reach of remedies, and in this
+connection I wish to give you the contents of a letter I received from
+Monsieur de Saint-Evremond a few days ago. You are not ignorant of the
+intimate relations that have always existed between us.
+
+The young Count de ---- had just espoused Mademoiselle ----, of whom
+he was passionately amorous. He complained one day to me that hymen
+and the possession of the beloved object weakened every day, and often
+destroyed the most tender love. We discussed the subject for a long
+time, and as I happened to write to Saint-Evremond that day, I
+submitted the question to him. This is his reply:
+
+
+SAINT-EVREMOND TO MADEMOISELLE DE L'ENCLOS.
+
+My opinion is exactly in line with yours, Mademoiselle; it is not
+always, as some think, hymen or the possession of the loved object
+which, of itself, destroys love, the true source of the
+dissatisfaction that follows love is in the unintelligent manner of
+economizing the sentiments, a possession too easy, complete, and
+prolonged.
+
+When we have yielded to the transports of a passion without reserve,
+the tremendous shock to the soul can not fail quickly to leave it in a
+profound solitude. The heart finds itself in a void which alarms and
+chills it. We vainly seek outside of ourselves, the cause of the calm
+which follows our fits of passion; we do not perceive that an equal
+and more enduring happiness would have been the fruit of moderation.
+Make an exact analysis of what takes place within you when you desire
+anything. You will find that your desires are nothing but curiosity,
+and this curiosity, which is one of the forces of the heart,
+satisfied, our desires vanish. Whoever, therefore, would hold a spouse
+or a lover, should leave him something to be desired, something new
+should be expected every day for the morrow. Diversify his pleasures,
+procure for him the charm of variety in the same object, and I will
+vouch for his perseverance in fidelity.
+
+I confess, however, that hymen, or what you call your "defeat," is, in
+an ordinary woman, the grave of love. But then it is less upon the
+lover that the blame falls, than upon her who complains of the cooling
+of the passion; she casts upon the depravity of the heart what is due
+to her own unskillfulness, and her lack of economy. She has expended
+in a single day everything that might keep alive the inclination she
+had excited. She has nothing more to offer to the curiosity of her
+lover, she becomes always the same statue; no variety to be hoped for,
+and her lover knows it well.
+
+But in the woman I have in mind, it is the aurora of a lovelier day;
+it is the beginning of the most satisfying pleasures. I understand by
+effusions of the heart, those mutual confidences; those ingenuities,
+those unexpected avowals, and those transports which excite in us the
+certainty of creating an absolute happiness, and meriting all the
+esteem of the person we love. That day is, in a word, the epoch when a
+man of refinement discovers inexhaustible treasures which have always
+been hidden from him; the freedom a woman acquires who brings into
+play all the sentiments which constraint has held in reserve; her
+heart takes a lofty flight, but one well under control. Time, far from
+leading to loathing, will furnish new reasons for a greater love.
+
+But, to repeat; I assume sufficient intelligence in her to be able to
+control her inclination. For to hold a lover, it is not enough
+(perhaps it is too much) to love passionately, she must love with
+prudence, with restraint, and modesty is for that reason the most
+ingenious virtue refined persons have ever imagined. To yield to the
+impetuosity of an inclination; to be annihilated, so to speak, in the
+object loved, is the method of a woman without discernment. That is
+not love, it is a liking for a moment, it is to transform a lover into
+a spoiled child. I would have a woman behave with more reserve and
+economy. An excess of ardor is not justifiable in my opinion, the
+heart being always an impetuous charger which must be steadily curbed.
+If you do not use your strength with economy, your vivacity will be
+nothing but a passing transport. The same indifference you perceive in
+a lover, after those convulsive emotions, you, yourself, will
+experience, and soon, both of you will feel the necessity of
+separating.
+
+To sum up; there is more intelligence required to love than is
+generally supposed, and to be happy in loving. Up to the moment of the
+fatal "yes," or if you prefer, up to the time of her defeat, a woman
+does not need artifice to hold her lover. Curiosity excites him,
+desire sustains him, hope encourages him. But once he reaches the
+summit of his desires, it is for the woman to take as much care to
+retain him, as he exhibited in overcoming her; the desire to keep him
+should render her fertile in expedients; the heart is similar to a
+high position, easier to obtain than to keep. Charms are sufficient to
+make a man amorous; to render him constant, something more is
+necessary; skill is required, a little management, a great deal of
+intelligence, and even a touch of ill humor and fickleness.
+Unfortunately, however, as soon as women have yielded they become too
+tender, too complaisant. It would be better for the common good, if
+they were to resist less in the beginning and more afterward. I
+maintain that they never can forestall loathing without leaving the
+heart something to wish for, and the time to consider.
+
+I hear them continually complaining that our indifference is always
+the fruit of their complaisance for us. They are ever recalling the
+time when, goaded by love and sentiment, we spent whole days by their
+side. How blind they are! They do not perceive that it is still in
+their power to bring us back to an allegiance, the memory of which is
+so dear. If they forget what they have already done for us, they will
+not be tempted to do more; but if they make us forget, then we shall
+become more exacting. Let them awaken our hearts by opposing new
+difficulties, arousing our anxieties, in fine, forcing us to desire
+new proofs of an inclination, the certainty of which diminishes its
+value in our estimation. They will then find less cause of complaint
+in us, and will be better satisfied with themselves.
+
+Shall I frankly avow it? Things would indeed change, if women would
+remember at the right time that their role is always that of the party
+to be entreated, ours that of him who begs for new favors; that,
+created to grant, they should never offer. Reserved, even in an
+excess of passion, they should guard against surrendering at
+discretion; the lover should always have something to ask, and
+consequently, he would be always submissive so as to obtain it. Favors
+without limit degrade the most seductive charms, and are, in the end,
+revolting even to him who exacts them. Society puts all women on the
+same level; the handsome and the ugly, after their defeat, are
+indistinguishable except from their art to maintain their authority;
+but what commonly happens? A woman imagines she has nothing further to
+do than to be affectionate, caressing, sweet, of even temper and
+faithful. She is right in one sense, for these qualities should be the
+foundation of her character; they will not fail to draw esteem; but
+these qualities, however estimable they may be, if they are not offset
+by a shade of contrariety, will not fail to extinguish love, and bring
+on languor and weariness, mortal poisons for the best constituted
+heart.
+
+Do you know why lovers become nauseated so easily when enjoying
+prosperity? Why they are so little pleased after having had so much
+pleasure? It is because both parties interested have an identically
+erroneous opinion. One imagines there is nothing more to obtain, the
+other fancies she has nothing more to give. It follows as a necessary
+consequence that one slackens in his pursuit, and the other neglects
+to be worthy of further advances, or thinks she becomes so by the
+practice of solid qualities. Reason is substituted for love, and
+henceforward, no more seasoning in their relations; no more of those
+trifling quarrels so necessary to prevent dissatisfaction by
+forestalling it.
+
+But when I exact that evenness of temper should be animated by
+occasional storms, do not be under the impression that I pretend
+lovers should always be quarreling to preserve their happiness. I only
+desire to impress it upon you, that all their misunderstandings should
+emanate from love itself; that the woman should not forget (by a
+species of pusillanimous kindness) the respect and attentions due her;
+that by an excessive sensitiveness, she does not convert her love into
+a source of anxiety capable of poisoning every moment of her
+existence; that by a scrupulous fidelity, she may not render her lover
+too sure that he has nothing to fear on that score.
+
+Neither should a woman by a sweetness, an unalterable evenness of
+temper, be weak enough to pardon everything lacking in her lover.
+Experience demonstrates that women too often sacrifice the hearts of
+their spouses or their lovers by too many indulgences and facilities.
+What recklessness! They martyrize themselves by sacrificing
+everything; they spoil them and convert them into ungrateful lovers.
+So much generosity finally turns against themselves, and they soon
+become accustomed to demand as a right what is granted them as a
+favor.
+
+You see women every day (even among those we despise with so much
+reason), who reign with a scepter of iron, treat as slaves men who are
+attached to them, debase them by force of controlling them. Well,
+these are the women who are loved longer than the others. I am
+persuaded that a woman of refinement, well brought up, would never
+think of following such an example. That military manner is repugnant
+to gentleness and morals, and lacks that decency which constitutes the
+charm in things even remote from virtue. But let the reasonable woman
+soften the clouds a trifle, there will always remain precisely what is
+necessary to hold a lover.
+
+We are slaves, whom too much kindness often renders insolent; we often
+demand to be treated like those of the new world. But we have in the
+bottom of our hearts a comprehension of justice, which tells us that
+the governing hand bears down upon us sometimes for very good reasons,
+and we take kindly to it.
+
+Now, for my last word: In everything relating to the force and energy
+of love, women should be the sovereigns; it is from them we hope for
+happiness, and they will never fail to grant us that as soon as they
+can govern our hearts with intelligence, moderate their own
+inclinations, and maintain their own authority, without compromising
+it and without abusing it.
+
+
+
+
+XLV
+
+What Favors Men Consider Faults
+
+
+To explain in two words to your satisfaction, Marquis. This is what I
+think of the letter I sent you yesterday: For a woman to profit by the
+advice of Monsieur de Saint-Evremond it is requisite that she should
+be affected with only a mediocre fancy, and have excited the passion
+of love. However, we shall talk about that more at large whenever it
+may please you, now, I will take up what concerns you.
+
+The sacrifice the Countess has exacted of you is well worth the price
+you put upon it. To renounce for her sake, a woman whose exterior
+proclaimed her readiness to accord you whatever favor you might be
+willing to ask; to renounce her publicly, in the presence of her
+rival, and with so little regard for her vanity, is an effort which
+naturally will not pass without a proportionate recompense. The
+Countess could not have found a happier pretext for giving you her
+portrait.
+
+But to take a solemn day when the Marquise received at her home for
+the first time since her illness; to select a moment when the moneyed
+woman was taking up arms to make an assault of beauty upon a woman of
+rank; to speak to her merely in passing, to pretend to surrender
+yourself entirely to the pleasure of seeing her rival; to entertain
+the latter and become one of her party, is an outrage for which you
+will never be pardoned. Revenge will come quickly, and be as cruel as
+possible, you will see. It is I who guarantee it. Now for the second
+paragraph of your letter:
+
+You ask me whether the last favor, or rather the last fault we can
+commit, is a certain proof that a woman loves you. Yes and no.
+
+Yes, if you love the woman for whom you had your first passion, and
+she is refined and virtuous. But even in such a case, this proof will
+not be any more certain, or more flattering for you, than all the
+others she may have given you of her inclination. Whatever a woman may
+do when she loves, even things of the slightest essential nature in
+appearance are as much certain marks of her passion, as those greater
+things of which men are so proud. I will even add, that if this
+virtuous woman is of a certain disposition, the last favor will prove
+less than a thousand other small sacrifices you count for nothing, for
+then, on her own behalf less than on yours, she is too much interested
+in listening to you, for you to claim the glory of having persuaded
+her, although every one else would have been accorded the same favor.
+
+I know a woman who permitted herself to be vanquished two or three
+times by men she did not love, and the man she really loved never
+obtained a single favor. It may happen, then, that the last favor
+proves nothing to him to whom it is granted. Whereas, on the contrary,
+it may happen that he owes the granting of it to the little regard
+had for him. Women never respect themselves more than with those they
+esteem, and you may be quite sure that it requires a very imperious
+inclination to cause a reasonable woman to forget herself in the
+presence of one whose disdain she dreads. Your pretended triumph,
+therefore, may originate in causes which, so far from being glorious
+for you, would humiliate you if you were aware of them.
+
+We see, for example, a lover who may be repelled; the woman who loves
+him fears he will escape her to pay his addresses to another woman
+more accommodating; she does not wish to lose him, for it is always
+humiliating to be abandoned; she yields, because she is not aware of
+any other means of holding him. They say there is nothing to reproach
+in this. If he leaves her after that, at least he will be put in the
+wrong, for, since a woman becomes attached more by the favors she
+grants, she imagines the man will be forced into gratitude. What
+folly!
+
+Women are actuated by different motives in yielding. Curiosity impels
+some, they desire to know what love is. Another woman, with few
+advantages of person or figure, would hold her lover by the
+attractions of pleasure. One woman is determined to make a conquest
+flattering to her vanity. Still another one surrenders to pity,
+opportunity, importunities, to the pleasure of taking revenge on a
+rival, or an unfaithful lover. How can I enumerate them all? The heart
+is so very strange in its vagaries, and the reasons and causes which
+actuate it are so curious and varied, that it is impossible to
+discover all the hidden springs that set it in motion. But if we
+delude ourselves as to the means of holding you, how often do men
+deceive themselves as to the proofs of our love? If they possessed any
+delicacy of discernment, they would find a thousand signs that prove
+more than the most signal favor granted.
+
+Tell me, Marquis, what have I done to Monsieur de Coulanges? It is a
+month since he has set foot in my house. But I will not reproach him,
+I shall be very pleasant with him when he does come. He is one of the
+most amiable men I am acquainted with. I shall be very angry with you
+if you fail to bring him to me on my return from Versailles. I want
+him to sing me the last couplets he has composed, I am told they are
+charming.
+
+
+
+
+XLVI
+
+Why Inconstancy Is Not Injustice
+
+
+It was too kind of you, Marquis, to have noticed my absence. If I did
+not write you during my sojourn in the country, it was because I knew
+you were happy, and that tranquilized me. I felt too, that it was
+necessary for love to be accorded some rights, as its reign is usually
+very short, and besides that, friendship not having any quarrel with
+love, I waited patiently an interval in your pleasure which would
+enable you to read my letters.
+
+Do you know what I was doing while away? I amused myself by piecing
+out all the events liable to happen in the condition your society is
+now in. I foresaw the bickerings between the Countess and her rival,
+and I predicted they would end in an open rupture; I also guessed that
+the Marquise would not espouse the cause of the Countess, but would
+take up the other's quarrel. The moneyed woman is not quite so
+handsome as her rival, a decisive reason for declaring for her and
+backing her up without danger.
+
+What will be the upshot of all this quarreling among these women? How
+many revolutions, Good Heavens! in so short a time! Your happiness
+seems to be the only thing that has escaped. You discover new reasons
+every day for loving and esteeming this amiable Countess. You believe
+that a woman of so much real merit, and with so interesting a figure,
+will become known more and more. Let nothing weaken the esteem you
+have always had for her. You have, it is true, obtained an avowal of
+her love for you, but is she less estimable for that? On the contrary,
+ought not her heart to augment in price in your eyes, in proportion to
+the certainty you have acquired that you are its sole possessor? Even
+if you shall have obtained proofs of her inclination we spoke about
+recently, do you think that gives you any right to underrate her?
+
+I can not avoid saying it; men like you arouse my indignation every
+time they imagine they claim the right to lack in courtesy for my sex,
+and punish us for our weaknesses. Is it not the height of injustice
+and the depth of depravity to continue to insult the grief which is
+the cause of their changes? Can not women be inconstant without being
+unjust? Is their distaste always to be followed by some injurious act?
+If we are guilty, is it the right of him who has profited by our
+faults, who is the cause of them, to punish us?
+
+Always maintain for the Countess the sentiments you have expressed in
+her regard. Do not permit a false opinion to interfere with the
+progress which they can still make in your heart. It is not our defeat
+alone which should render us despicable in your eyes. The manner in
+which we have been defended, delivered, and guarded, ought to be the
+only measure of your disdain.
+
+So Madame de La Fayette is of the opinion that my last letter is based
+upon rather a liberal foundation? You see where your indiscretions
+lead me. But she does not consider that I am no more guilty than a
+demonstrator of anatomy. I analyse the metaphysical man as he dissects
+the physical one. Do you believe that out of regard to scruples he
+should omit in his operations those portions of his subject which
+might offer corrupted minds occasions to draw sallies out of an ill
+regulated imagination? It is not the essence of things that causes
+indecency; it is not the words, or even the ideas, it is the intent of
+him who utters them, and the depravity of him who listens. Madame de
+La Fayette was certainly the last woman in the world whom I would have
+suspected of reproaching me in that manner, and to-morrow, at the
+Countess', I will make her confess her injustice.
+
+
+
+
+XLVII
+
+Cause of Quarrels Among Rivals
+
+
+What, I, Marquis, astonished at the new bickerings of your moneyed
+woman? Do not doubt for an instant that she employs all the
+refinements of coquetry to take you away from the Countess. She may
+have a liking for you, but moderate your amour propre so far as that
+is concerned, for the most powerful motive of her conduct, is, without
+contradiction, the desire for revenge. Her vanity is interested in
+punishing her rival for having obtained the preference.
+
+Women never pardon such a thing as that, and if he who becomes the
+subject of the quarrel is not the first object of their anger, it is
+because they need him to display their resentment. You have
+encountered in the rival of the Countess precisely what you exacted
+from her to strengthen your attachment. You are offered in advance the
+price of the attentions you devote to her, and from which you will
+soon be dispensed, and I think you will have so little delicacy as to
+accept them. It is written across the heart of every man: "To the
+easiest."
+
+You should blush to deserve the least reproach from the Countess. What
+sort of a woman is it you seem to prefer to her? A woman without
+delicacy and without love; a woman who is guided only by the
+attractions of pleasure; more vain than sensible; more voluptuous than
+tender; more passionate than affectionate, she seeks, she cherishes in
+you nothing but your youth and all the advantages that accompany it.
+
+You know what her rival is worth; you know all your wrong doing with
+her; you agree that you are a monster of ingratitude, yet, you are
+unwilling to take it upon yourself to merit her pardon. Truly,
+Marquis, I do not understand you. I am beginning to believe that
+Madame de Sevigne was right when she said that her son knew his duty
+very well, and could reason like a philosopher on the subject, but
+that he was carried away by his passions, so that "he is not a head
+fool, but a heart fool" (ce n'est pas par la tete qu'il est fou, mais
+par le coeur).
+
+You recall in vain what I said to you long ago about making love in a
+free and easy manner. You will remember that I was then enjoying
+myself with some jocular reflections which were not intended to be
+formal advice. Do not forget, either, that the question then was about
+a mere passing fancy, and not of an ordinary mistress. But the case
+to-day is very different, you can not find among all the women of
+Paris, a single one who can be compared with her you are so cruelly
+abandoning. And for what reason? Because her resistance wounds your
+vanity. What resource is left us to hold you?
+
+I agree with you, nevertheless, that when a passion is extinguished it
+can not be relighted without difficulty. No one is more the master of
+loving than he is of not loving. I feel the truth of all these maxims;
+I do homage to them with regret, as soon as, with a knowledge of the
+cause, I consider that you reject what is excellent and accept the
+worse; you renounce a solid happiness, durable pleasures, and yield to
+depraved tastes and pure caprices; but I can see that all my
+reflections will not reform you. I am beginning to fear that I am
+wearying you with morals, and to tell you the truth, it is very
+ridiculous in me to preach constancy when it is certain that you do
+not love, and that you are a heart fool.
+
+I therefore abandon you to your destiny, without, however, giving up
+my desire to follow you into new follies. Why: should I be afflicted?
+Would it be of any moment to assume with you the tone of a pedagogue?
+Assuredly not, both of us would lose too much thereby. I should become
+weary and you would not be reformed.
+
+
+
+
+XLVIII
+
+Friendship Must Be Firm
+
+
+I do not conceal it, Marquis, your conduct in regard to the Countess
+had put me out of patience with you, and I was tempted to break off
+all my relations with so wicked a man as you. My good nature in
+yielding to your entreaties inclines me to the belief that my
+friendship for you borders on a weakness. You are right, though. To be
+your friend only so long as you follow my advice would not be true
+friendship. The more you are to be censured the stronger ought to be
+my hold on you, but you will understand that one is not master of his
+first thoughts. Whatever effort I may make to find you less guilty,
+the sympathy I have for the misfortune of my friend is of still
+greater importance to me. There were moments when I could not believe
+in your innocence, and they were when so charming a woman complained
+of you. Now that her situation is improving every day, I consider my
+harshness in my last letter almost as a crime.
+
+I shall, hereafter, content myself with pitying her without
+importuning you any longer about her. So let us resume our ordinary
+gait, if it please you. You need no longer fear my reproaches, I see
+they would be useless as well as out of place.
+
+
+
+
+XLIX
+
+Constancy Is a Virtue Among the Narrow Minded
+
+
+You did not then know, Marquis, that it is often more difficult to get
+rid of a mistress than to acquire one? You are learning by experience.
+Your disgust for the moneyed woman does not surprise me except that it
+did not happen sooner.
+
+What! knowing her character so well, you could imagine that the
+despair she pretended at the sight of your indifference increasing
+every day, could be the effect of a veritable passion? You could also
+be the dupe of her management! I admire, and I pity your blindness.
+
+But was it not also vanity which aided a trifle in fortifying your
+illusion? In truth it would be a strange sort of vanity, that of being
+loved by such a woman; but men are so vain, that they are flattered by
+the love of the most confirmed courtesan. In any case undeceive
+yourself. A woman who is deserted, when she is a woman like your
+beauty, has nothing in view in her sorrow but her own interest. She
+endeavors by her tears and her despair, to persuade you that your
+person and your merit are all she regrets; that the loss of your heart
+is the summit of misfortune; that she knows nobody who can indemnify
+her for the loss of it. All these sentiments are false. It is not an
+afflicted lover who speaks; it is a vain woman, desperate at being
+anticipated, exasperated at the lack of power in her charms, worrying
+over a plan to replace you promptly, anxious to give herself an
+appearance of sensibility, and to appear worthy of a better fate. She
+justifies this thought of Monsieur de la Rochefoucauld: "Women do not
+shed tears over the lovers they have had, so much because they loved
+them, as to appear more worthy of being loved." It is for D---- to
+enjoy the sentiment.
+
+She must indeed, have a very singular idea of you to hope that she can
+impose upon you. Do you wish to know what she is? The Chevalier is
+actually without an affair of the heart on hand, engage him to take
+your place. I have not received two letters from you that do not speak
+of the facility with which she will be consoled for having lost you. A
+woman of her age begins to fear that she will not recover what she has
+lost, and so she is obliged to degrade her charms by taking the first
+new comer. Perhaps her sorrow is true, but she deceives you as to the
+motives she gives for it. Break these chains without scruple. In
+priding yourself on your constancy and delicacy for such an object,
+you appear to me to be as ridiculous as you were when you lacked the
+same qualities on another occasion.
+
+Do you remember, Marquis, what Monsieur de Coulanges said to us one
+day? "Constancy is the virtue of people of limited merit. Have they
+profited by the caprice of an amiable woman to establish themselves in
+her heart? the sentiment of medicrioty fixes them there, it
+intimidates them, they dare not make an effort to please others. Too
+happy at having surprised her heart, they are afraid of abandoning a
+good which they may not find elsewhere, and, as an instant's attention
+to their little worth might undeceive this woman, what do they then
+do? They elevate constancy up among the virtues; they transform love
+into a superstition; they know how to interest reason in the
+preservation of a heart which they owe only to caprice, occasion, or
+surprise." Be on your guard against imitating these shallow
+personages. Hearts are the money of gallantry; amiable people are the
+assets of society, whose destiny is to circulate in it and make many
+happy. A constant man is therefore as guilty as a miser who impedes
+the circulation in commerce. He possesses a treasure which he does not
+utilize, and of which there are so many who would make good use of it.
+
+What sort of a mistress is that who is retained by force of reason?
+What languor reigns in her society, what violence must one not employ
+to say there is love when it has ceased to exist? It is seldom that
+passion ceases in both parties at the same time, and then constancy is
+a veritable tyrant; I compare it to the tyrant of antiquity who put
+people to death by tying them to dead bodies. Constancy condemns us to
+the same punishment. Discard such a baleful precedent to the liberty
+of association.
+
+Believe me, follow your tastes, for the court lady you mentioned; she
+may weary you at times, it is true, but at least she will not degrade
+you. If, as you say, she is as little intelligent as she is beautiful,
+her reign will soon be over. Your place in her heart will soon be
+vacant, and I do not doubt that another or even several other
+gallantries will follow yours. Perhaps you will not wait for the end,
+for I see by your letter that you are becoming a man of fashion. The
+new system you have adopted makes it certain, nothing can be better
+arranged. Never finish one affair without having commenced another;
+never withdraw from the first except in proportion as the second one
+progresses. Nothing can be better, but in spite of such wise
+precautions, you may find yourself destitute of any, as, for example,
+some event beyond the reach of human foresight may interfere with
+these arrangements, may have for principle always to finish with all
+the mistresses at once, before enabling you to find any one to keep
+you busy during the interregnum. I feel free to confess, Marquis, that
+such an arrangement is as prudent as can be imagined, and I do not
+doubt that you will be well pleased with a plan so wisely conceived.
+Adieu.
+
+I do not know where I obtain the courage to write you such long and
+foolish letters. I find a secret charm in entertaining you, which I
+should suspect if I did not know my heart so well. I have been
+reflecting that it is now without any affair, and I must henceforth be
+on my guard against you, for you have very often thought proper to say
+very tender things to me, and I might think proper to believe in their
+sincerity.
+
+
+
+
+L
+
+Some Women Are Very Cunning
+
+
+You may derive as much amusement out of it as you wish, Marquis, but I
+shall continue to tell you that you are not fascinated by Madame la
+Presidente. Believe me when I say that I see more clearly into your
+affairs than you do yourself. I have known a hundred good men who,
+like you, pretended with the best faith in the world that they were
+amorous, but who, in truth were not in any manner whatsoever.
+
+There are maladies of the heart as well as maladies of the body; some
+are real and some are imaginary. Not everything that attracts you
+toward a woman is love. The habit of being together, the convenience
+of seeing each other, to get away from one's self, the necessity for a
+little gallantry, the desire to please, in a word, a thousand other
+reasons which do not resemble a passion in the least; these are what
+you generally take to be love, and the women are the first to fortify
+this error. Always flattered by the homage rendered them, provided
+their vanity profits by it, they rarely inquire into the motives to
+which they owe it. But, after all, are they not right? They would
+nearly always lose by it.
+
+To all the motives of which I have just spoken, you can add still
+another, quite as capable of creating an illusion in the nature of
+your sentiments. Madame la Presidente is, without contradiction, the
+most beautiful woman of our time; she is newly married; she refused
+the homage of the most amiable man of our acquaintance. Perhaps
+nothing could be more flattering to your vanity than to make a
+conquest which would not fail to give you the kind of celebrity to
+which you aspire. That, my dear Marquis, is what you call love, and it
+will be difficult for you to disabuse yourself of the impression, for
+by force of persuading yourself that it is love, you will, in a short
+time firmly believe that the inclination is real. It will be a very
+singular thing some day, to see with what dignity you will speak of
+your pretended sentiments; with what good faith you will believe that
+they deserve recognition, and, what will be still more agreeable, will
+be the deference you will believe should be their due. But
+unfortunately, the result will undeceive you, and you will then be the
+first to laugh at the importance with which you treated so silly an
+affair.
+
+Shall I tell you how far injustice reaches? I am fully persuaded that
+you will not become more amorous. Henceforth, you will have nothing
+but a passing taste, frivolous relations, engagements, caprices; all
+the arrows of love will glance from you. It is true you will not
+experience its pangs, but will you enjoy, in the least, its sweetness?
+Can you hope ever to recover from the fantasies to which you surrender
+yourself, those moments of delight which were formerly your supreme
+felicity? I have no desire to flatter you, but I believe it my duty to
+do you this much justice: Your heart is intended for refined
+pleasures. It is not I who hold you responsible for the dissipation in
+which you are plunged, it is the young fools around you. They call
+enjoyment the abuse they make of pleasure; their example carries you
+away. But this intoxication will be dissipated sooner or later, and
+you will soon, see, at least I hope so, that you have been deceived in
+two ways in the state of your heart. You thought it was fascinated by
+Madame la Presidente, you will recognize your mistake; you thought she
+had ceased to have an inclination for--but I hold to the words I have
+uttered. Perhaps there will come a time when I shall be at liberty to
+express my thoughts more freely. Now, I reply to the remainder of your
+letter.
+
+Confess it, Marquis, that you had little else to do this morning when
+you re-read my letters. I add that you must have been in a bad humor
+to undertake their criticism. Some brilliant engagement, some
+flattering rendezvous was wanting. But I do not care to elude the
+difficulty. So I seem to contradict myself sometimes? If I were to
+admit that it might very well be; if I were to give you the same
+answer that Monsieur de la Bruyere gave his critics the other day: "It
+is not I who contradict myself, it is the heart upon which I reason,"
+could you reasonably conclude from it that everything I have said to
+you is false? I do not believe it.
+
+But how do I know, in effect, if, led away by the various situations
+in which you were placed, I may not have appeared to destroy what I
+had advanced on different occasions? How do I know, if, seeing you
+ready to yield to a whim, I may not have carried too far, truths,
+which, feebly uttered, would not, perhaps, have brought you back? How
+do I know, in a word, if, being interested in the happiness of a
+friend, the desire to serve her may not have sometimes diminished my
+sincerity? I think I am very good natured to reply seriously to the
+worries you have caused me. Ought I not first to take cognizance of
+the fact that there is more malice in your letter than criticism? This
+will be the last time you will have an opportunity to abuse my
+simplicity. I am going to console myself for your perfidy with some
+one who is assuredly not so wicked as you.
+
+What a pity it is that you are not a woman! It would give me so much
+pleasure to discuss the new coiffures with you! I never saw anything
+so extravagant as their height. At least, Marquis, remember that if
+Madame la Presidente does not wear one of them incessantly, you can no
+longer remain attached to her with decency.
+
+
+
+
+LI
+
+The Parts Men and Women Play
+
+
+So the affair has been decided! Whatever I may say of it, you are the
+master of Madame la Presidente; a beloved rival has been sacrificed
+for you and you triumph.
+
+How prompt your vanity is to make profit out of everything. I would
+laugh heartily if your pretended triumph should end by your receiving
+notice to quit some fine morning. For it may well be that this
+sacrifice of which you boast so much is nothing but a stratagem.
+
+Ever since you have been associated with women, have you not
+established as a principle that you must be on your guard against the
+sentiments they affect? If your beauty had accepted you merely for the
+purpose of re-awakening a languishing love in the heart of her
+Celadon; if you were only the instrument of jealousy on the part of
+one and artifice on the other, would that be a miracle?
+
+You say that Madame la Presidente is not very shrewd, and consequently
+incapable of such a ruse. My dear Marquis, love is a great tutor, and
+the most stupid women (in other respects) have often an acute
+discernment, more accurate and more certain than any other, when it
+comes to an affair of the heart. But let us leave this particular
+thesis, and examine men in general who are in the same situation as
+you.
+
+They all believe as you do, that the sacrifice of a rival supposes
+some superiority over him. But how often does it happen that this same
+sacrifice is only a by play? If it is sincere, the woman either loved
+the rival or she did not. If she loved him, then as soon as she leaves
+him, it is a sure proof that she loves him no longer, in which case
+what glory is there for you in such a preference? If she did not love
+him, what can you infer to your advantage from a pretended victory
+over a man who was indifferent to her?
+
+There is also another case where you may be preferred, without that
+preference being any more flattering. It is when the vanity of the
+woman you attack is stronger than her inclination for the disgraced
+lover. Your rank, your figure, your reputation, your fortune, may
+determine her in your favor. It is very rare (I say it to the shame of
+women, and men are no less ridiculous in that respect), it is rare, I
+repeat, that a lover, who has nothing but noble sentiments to offer,
+can long hold his own against a man distinguished for his rank, or his
+position, who has servants, a livery, an equipage, etc. When the most
+tender lover makes a woman blush for his appearance, when she dare not
+acknowledge him as her conqueror, when she does not even consider him
+as an object she can sacrifice with eclat, I predict that his reign
+will be short. Her reasons for getting rid of him will be to her an
+embarrassment of choice. Thus the defunct of la Presidente was a
+counsellor of state, without doubt as dull and as stiff as his wig.
+What a figure to set up against a courtier, against a warrior like
+you?
+
+Well, will you believe in my predictions another time? What did I tell
+you? Did the Chevalier find it difficult to persuade your Penelope?
+This desolate woman, ready to break her heart, gave you a successor in
+less than fifteen days, loves him, proves it, and is flouted. Is this
+losing too much time? What is your opinion?
+
+
+
+
+LII
+
+Love Is a Traitor With Sharp Claws
+
+
+Yes, indeed, Marquis, it is due to my friendship, it is due to my
+counsel that the Countess owes the tranquillity she begins to enjoy,
+and I can not conceive the chagrin which causes the indifference she
+manifests for you. I am very far, however, from desiring to complain
+of you; your grief springs from a wounded vanity.
+
+Men are very unjust, they expect a woman always to consider them as
+objects interesting to them, while they, in abandoning a woman, do not
+ordinarily omit anything that will express their disdain. Of what
+importance to you is the hatred or love of a person whom you do not
+love? Tell me that. Your jealousy of the little Duke is so
+unreasonable that I burst out laughing when I learned it. Is it not
+quite simple, altogether natural that a woman should console herself
+for your loss, by listening to a man who knows the value of her heart
+better than you? By what right, if you please, do you venture to take
+exceptions to it? You must admit that Madame de Sevigne was right: You
+have a foolish heart, my poor Marquis.
+
+In spite of all that, the part you wish me to play in the matter
+appears to me to be exceedingly agreeable. I can understand how nice
+it would be to aid you in your plan of vengeance against an
+unfaithful woman. Though it should be only through rancor or the
+oddity of the thing, we must love each other. But all such comedies
+turn out badly generally. Love is a traitor who scratches us when we
+play with him.
+
+So, Marquis, keep your heart, I am very scrupulous about interfering
+with so precious an association. Moreover, I am so disgusted with the
+staleness of men, that henceforth I desire them only as friends. There
+is always a bone to pick with a lover. I am beginning to understand
+the value of rest, and I wish to enjoy it. I will return to this,
+however. It would be very strange if you take the notion that you need
+consolation, and that my situation exacts the same succor because the
+Marquis de ---- has departed on his embassy. Undeceive yourself, my
+friends suffice me, and, if you wish to remain among their number, at
+least do not think of saying any more gallant things to me,
+otherwise--Adieu, Marquis.
+
+
+
+
+LIII
+
+Old Age Not a Preventive Against Attack
+
+
+Oh, I shall certainly abandon your interests if you persist in talking
+to me in such fashion. What demon inspired you with the idea of taking
+the place of the absent? Could any one tease another as you did me
+last evening? I do not know how you began it, but however much I
+desired to be angry with you, it was impossible for me to do so. I do
+not know how this will end. What is certain, however, is; it will be
+useless for you to go on, for I have decided not to love you, and what
+is worse, I shall never love you; yes, sir, never.
+
+Eh? truly, but this is a strange thing; to attempt to persuade a woman
+that she is afflicted, that she needs consolation, when she assures
+you that it is not the fact, and that she wants for nothing. This is
+driving things with a tight hand. I entreat you, reflect a little on
+the folly that has seized upon you. Would it be decent, tell me that,
+if I were to take the place of my friend? That a woman who has served
+you as a Mentor, who has played the role of mother to you, should
+aspire to that of lover? Unprincipled wretch that you are! If you so
+promptly abandon a young and lovely woman, what would you do with an
+old girl like me? Perhaps you wish to attempt my conquest to see
+whether love is for me the same in practice as in theory. Do not go to
+the trouble of attempting such a seduction, I will satisfy your
+curiosity on that point immediately.
+
+You know that whatever we are, women seldom follow any given
+principles. Well, that is what you would discover in any gallant
+association you aspire to form with me. All I have said about women
+and love, has not given you any information as to my line of conduct
+on such an occasion. There is a vast difference between feeling and
+thinking; between talking for one's own account and pleading the cause
+of another. You would, therefore, find in me many singularities that
+might strike you unfavorably. I do not feel as other women. You might
+know them all without knowing Ninon, and believe me, the novelties you
+would discover would not compensate you for the trouble you might take
+to please me.
+
+It is useless to exaggerate the value you put upon my conquest, that I
+tell you plainly; you are expending too much on hope, I am not able to
+respond. Remain where you are in a brilliant career. The court offers
+you a thousand beautiful women, with whom you do not risk, as you
+would with me, becoming weary of philosophy, of too much intelligence.
+
+I do not disguise the fact, however, that I would have been glad to
+see you to-day. My head was split all the afternoon over a dispute on
+the ancients and moderns. I am still out of humor on the subject, and
+feel tempted to agree with you that I am not so far along on the
+decline of life as to confine myself to science, and especially to the
+gentlemen of antiquity.
+
+If you could only restrain yourself and pay me fewer compliments it is
+not to be doubted that I would prefer to have you come and enliven my
+serious occupations rather than any one else. But you are such an
+unmanageable man, so wicked, that I am afraid to invite you to come
+and sup with me to-morrow. I am mistaken, for it is now two hours
+after midnight, and I recollect that my letter will not be handed you
+before noon. So it is to-day I shall expect you. Have you any fault to
+find? It is a formal rendezvous, to be sure, but let the fearlessness
+in appointing it be a proof that I am not very much afraid of you, and
+that I shall believe in as much of your soft talk as I deem proper.
+You understand that it will not be I who can be imposed upon by that.
+I know men so well----
+
+
+
+
+LIV
+
+A Shrewd But Not an Unusual Scheme
+
+
+This is not the time, Marquis, to hide from you the true sentiments of
+the Countess in your regard. However much I have been able to keep her
+secret without betraying her friendship, and I have always done so, if
+I conceal from you what I am going to communicate, you may one day
+justly reproach me.
+
+Whatever infidelities you may have been guilty of, whatever care I
+have been able to take to persuade her that you have been entirely
+forgotten, she has never ceased to love you tenderly. Although she has
+sought to punish you by an assumed indifference, she has never thought
+of depriving herself of the pleasure of seeing you, and it has been
+through the complaisance of the Countess that I have sometimes worried
+you; it was to goad you into visiting me more frequently. But all
+these schemes have not been able to satisfy a heart so deeply wounded,
+and she is on the point of executing a design I have all along been
+opposed to. You will learn all about it by reading the letter she
+wrote me yesterday, and which I inclose in this.
+
+
+
+
+FROM THE COUNTESS TO MADEMOISELLE DE L'ENCLOS.
+
+
+"If you wish to remain my friend, my dear Ninon, cease to combat my
+resolution; you know it is not the inspiration of the moment. It is
+not the fruit of a momentary mortification, an imprudent vexation, nor
+despair. I have never concealed it from you. The possession of the
+heart of the Marquis de Sevigne might have been my supreme felicity if
+I could have flattered myself with having it forever. I was certain of
+losing it if I had granted him the favors he exacted of me. His
+inconstancy has taught me that a different conduct would not be a sure
+means of retaining a lover. I must renounce love forever, since men
+are incapable of having a liaison with a woman, as tender, but as pure
+as that of simple friendship.
+
+"You, yourself, well know that I am not sufficiently cured to see the
+Marquis without always suffering. Flight is the only remedy for my
+malady, and that is what I am about to take. I do not fear, moreover,
+what the world may say about my withdrawal to the country. I have
+cautioned those who might be surprised. It is known that I have won in
+a considerable action against the heirs of my late husband. I have
+given out that I am going to take possession of the estate awarded me.
+I will thus deprive the public of the satisfaction of misinterpreting
+my taste for solitude, and the Marquis of all suspicion that he is in
+any manner to blame for it. I inclose his letters and his portrait.
+
+"Good Heaven! How weak I am! Why should it cost my heart so much to
+get rid of an evil so fatal to my repose? But it is done, and my
+determination can not be shaken. Pity me, however, and remember, my
+dear friend, the promise you gave me to make him understand that I
+have for him the most profound indifference. Whoever breaks off
+relations with a lover in too public a manner, suggests resentment and
+regret at being forced to do so; it is an honest way of saying that
+one would ask nothing better than to be appeased. As I have no desire
+to resume my relations with the Marquis, return him what I send, but
+in the manner agreed upon, and pray him to make a similar restitution.
+You may tell him that the management of my property obliges me to
+leave Paris for a time, but do not speak of me first.
+
+"I should be inconsolable at leaving you, my dear Ninon, if I did not
+hope that you would visit me in my solitude. You write willingly to
+your friends, if you judge them by the tenderness and esteem they have
+for you. In that case, you have none more worthy of that title than I.
+I rely, therefore, upon your letters until you come to share my
+retreat. You know my sentiments for you."
+
+I have no advice to give you, Marquis, on what you have just read, the
+sole favor I expect from you is never to compromise me for the
+indiscretion I commit, and that the Countess shall never have any
+reason for not forgiving me. All I can say to justify myself in my own
+eyes is, that you have loved the Countess too much for her resolution
+to be a matter of absolute indifference to you. Had I been just, I
+would have betrayed both by leaving you in ignorance of her design.
+
+
+
+
+LV
+
+A Happy Ending
+
+
+I am delighted with everything you have done, and you are charming. Do
+not doubt it, your behavior, my entreaties, and better than all, love
+will overcome the resistance of the Countess. Everything should
+conspire to determine her to accept the offer you have made of your
+hand. I could even, from this time on, assure you that pride alone
+will resist our efforts and her own inclination.
+
+This morning I pressed her earnestly to decide in your favor. Her last
+entrenchment was the fear of new infidelities on your part.
+
+"Reassure yourself," said I, "in proof that the Marquis will be
+faithful to you, is the fact that he has been undeceived about the
+other women, by comparing them with her he was leaving. Honest people
+permit themselves only a certain number of caprices, and the Marquis
+has had those which his age and position in society seemed to justify.
+He yielded to them at a time when they were pardonable. He paid
+tribute to the fashion by tasting of all the ridiculous things going.
+Henceforth, he can be reasonable with impunity. A man can not be
+expected to be amorous of his wife, but should he be, it will be
+pardoned him as soon as people see you. You risk nothing, therefore,
+Countess; you yourself have put on the airs of a society woman, but
+you were too sensible not to abandon such a role; you renounced it;
+the Marquis imitates you. Wherefore forget his mistakes. Could you
+bear the reproach of having caused the death of so amiable a man? It
+would be an act that would cry out for vengeance."
+
+In a word, I besought and pressed her, but she is still irresolute.
+Still, I do not doubt that you will finish by overcoming a resistance
+which she, herself, already deems very embarrassing.
+
+Well, Marquis, if the anxiety all this has caused you, gives you the
+time to review what I have been saying to you for several days past,
+might you not be tempted to believe that I have contradicted myself?
+At first I advised you to treat love lightly and to take only so much
+of it as might amuse you. You were to be nothing but a gallant, and
+have no relations with women except those in which you could easily
+break the ties. I then spoke to you in a general way, and relative to
+ordinary women. Could I imagine that you would be so fortunate as to
+meet a woman like the Countess, who would unite the charms of her sex
+to the qualities of honest men? What must be your felicity? You are
+going to possess in one and the same person, the most estimable friend
+and a most charming mistress. Deign to admit me to share a third
+portion of your friendship and my happiness will equal your own. Can
+one be happier than in sharing the happiness of friends?
+
+
+
+
+CORRESPONDENCE
+
+BETWEEN
+
+LORD SAINT-EVREMOND
+
+AND
+
+NINON DE L'ENCLOS
+
+WHEN OVER EIGHTY YEARS
+OF AGE
+
+
+
+
+INTRODUCTION
+
+
+Charles de Saint Denis, Lord of Saint-Evremond, Marshal of France, was
+one of the few distinguished Frenchmen, exiled by Louis XIV, whose
+distinguished abilities as a warrior and philosopher awarded him a
+last resting place in Westminster Abbey. His tomb, surmounted by a
+marble bust, is situated in the nave near the cloister, located among
+those of Barrow, Chaucer, Spenser, Cowley and other renowned
+Englishmen.
+
+His epitaph, written by the hand of a Briton, is singularly replete
+with the most eminent qualities, which the great men of his period
+recognized in him, though his life was extraordinarily long and
+stormy. He was moreover, a profound admirer of Ninon de l'Enclos
+during his long career, and he did much toward shaping her philosophy,
+and enabling her to understand the human heart in all its
+eccentricities, and how to regulate properly the passion of love.
+
+During his long exile in England, the two corresponded at times, and
+the letters here given are the fragments of a voluminous
+correspondence, the greater part of which has been lost. They are to
+be found in the untranslated collated works of Saint-Evremond, and are
+very curious, inasmuch as they were written when Ninon and
+Saint-Evremond were in their "eighties."
+
+Saint-Evremond always claimed, that his extremely long and vigorous
+life was due to the same causes which Ninon de l'Enclos attributed to
+her great age, that is, to an unflagging zeal in observing the
+doctrines of the Epicurean philosophy. These ideas appear in his
+letter to Mademoiselle de l'Enclos, written to her under the sobriquet
+of "Leontium," and which is translated and appended to this
+correspondence.
+
+As an evidence of Saint-Evremond's unimpaired faculties at a great
+age, the charms of his person attracted the attention of the Duchess
+of Sandwich, one of the beauties of the English Court, and she became
+so enamored of him, that a liaison was the result, which lasted until
+the time of Saint-Evremond's death. They were like two young lovers
+just beginning their career, instead of a youth over eighty years of
+age, and a maiden who had passed forty. Such attachments were not
+uncommon among persons who lived calm, philosophical lives, their very
+manner of living inspiring tender regard, as was the case of the great
+affection of the Marquis de Sevigne, who although quite young, and his
+rank an attraction to the great beauties of the Court, nevertheless
+aspired to capture the heart of Mademoiselle de l'Enclos, who was over
+sixty years of age. What Ninon thought about the matter, appears in
+her letters on the preceding pages.
+
+
+
+
+Correspondence Between Lord Saint-Evremond
+and Ninon de L'Enclos
+When Over Eighty Years
+of Age
+
+
+
+
+
+I
+
+Saint-Evremond to Ninon de l'Enclos
+
+Lovers and Gamblers have Something in Common
+
+
+I have been trying for more than a year to obtain news of you from
+everybody, but nobody can give me any. M. de la Bastille tells me that
+you are in good health, but adds, that if you have no more lovers, you
+are satisfied to have a greater number of friends.
+
+The falsity of the latter piece of news casts a doubt upon the verity
+of the former, because you are born to love as long as you live.
+Lovers and gamblers have something in common: Who has loved will love.
+If I had been told that you had become devout, I might have believed
+it, for that would be to pass from a human passion to the love of God,
+and give occupation to the soul. But not to love, is a species of
+void, which can not be consistent with your heart.
+
+Ce repos languissant ne fut jamais un bien;
+C'est trouver sans mouvoir l'etat ou l'on n'est rien.
+
+('Twas never a good this languishing rest;
+'Tis to find without search a state far from blest.)
+
+I want to know about your health, your occupations, your inclinations,
+and let it be in a long enough letter, with moralizing and plenty of
+affection for your old friend.
+
+The news here is that the Count de Grammont is dead, and it fills me
+with acute sorrow.
+
+If you know Barbin, ask him why he prints so many things that are not
+mine, over my name? I have been guilty of enough folly without
+assuming the burden of others. They have made me the author of a
+diatribe against Pere Bouhours, which I never even imagined. There is
+no writer whom I hold in higher esteem. Our language owes more to him
+than to any other author.
+
+God grant that the rumor of Count de Grammont's death be false, and
+that of your health true. The Gazette de Hollande says the Count de
+Lauzun is to be married. If this were true he would have been summoned
+to Paris, besides, de Lauzun is a Duke, and the name "Count" does not
+fit him.
+
+Adieu. I am the truest of your servants, who would gain much if you
+had no more lovers, for I would be the first of your friends despite
+an absence which may be called eternal.
+
+
+
+
+II
+
+
+Ninon de L'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+It is sweet to remember those we have loved
+
+
+I was alone in my chamber, weary of reading, when some one exclaimed:
+"Here is a messenger from Saint-Evremond!" You can imagine how quickly
+my ennui disappeared--it left me in a moment.
+
+I have been speaking of you quite recently, and have learned many
+things which do not appear in your letters--about your perfect health
+and your occupation. The joy in my mind indicates its strength, and
+your letter assures me that England promises you forty years more of
+life, for I believe that it is only in England that they speak of men
+who have passed the fixed period of human life. I had hoped to pass
+the rest of my days with you, and if you had possessed the same
+desire, you would still be in France.
+
+It is, however, pleasant to remember those we have loved, and it is,
+perhaps, for the embellishment of my epitaph, that this bodily
+separation has occurred.
+
+I could have wished that the young ecclesiastic had found me in the
+midst of the glories of Nike, which could not change me, although you
+seem to think that I am more tenderly enchanted with him than
+philosophy permits.
+
+Madame the Duchess de Bouillon is like an eighteen-year old: the
+source of her charms is in the Mazarin blood.
+
+Now that our kings are so friendly, ought you not to pay us a visit?
+In my opinion it would be the greatest success derived from the peace.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+Wrinkles are a Mark of Wisdom
+
+
+I defy Dulcinea to feel with greater joy the remembrance of her
+Chevalier. Your letter was accorded the reception it deserved, and the
+sorrowful figure in it did not diminish the merit of its sentiments. I
+am very much affected by their strength and perseverance. Nurse them
+to the shame of those who presume to judge them. I am of your opinion,
+that wrinkles are a mark of wisdom. I am delighted that your surface
+virtues do not sadden you, I try to use them in the same way. You have
+a friend, a provincial Governor, who owes his fortune to his
+amiability. He is the only aged man who is not ridiculed at Court. M.
+de Turenne wished to live only to see him grow old, and desired to see
+him father of a family, rich and happy. He has told more jokes about
+his new dignity than others think.
+
+M. d'Ebene who gave you the name of "Curictator," has just died at the
+hospital. How trivial are the judgments of men! If M. d'Olonne were
+alive and could have read your letters to me, he would have continued
+to be of your quality with his philosophy. M. de Lauzun is my
+neighbor, and will accept your compliments. I send you very tenderly,
+those of M. de Charleval, and ask you to remember M. de Ruvigny, his
+friend of the Rue des Tournelles.
+
+
+
+
+IV
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+Near Hopes are Worth as much as Those Far Off
+
+
+I sent a reply to your last letter to the correspondent of the Abbe
+Dubois, but as he was at Versailles, I fear it has not reached him.
+
+I should have been anxious about your health without the visit of
+Madame de Bouillon's little librarian, who filled my heart with joy by
+showing me a letter from one who thinks of me on your account.
+Whatever reason I may have had during my illness to praise the world
+and my friends, I never felt so lively a joy as at this mark of
+kindness. You may act upon this as you feel inclined since it was you
+who drew it upon me.
+
+I pray you to let me know, yourself, whether you have grasped that
+happiness one enjoys so much at certain times? The source will never
+run dry so long as you shall possess the friendship of the amiable
+friend who invigorates your life. (Lady Sandwich.) How I envy those
+who go to England, and how I long to dine with you once again! What a
+gross desire, that of dinner!
+
+The spirit has great advantages over the body, though the body
+supplies many little repeated pleasures, which solace the soul in its
+sorrowful moods. You have often laughed at my mournful reflections,
+but I have banished them all. It is useless to harbor them in the
+latter days of one's life, and one must be satisfied with the life of
+every day as it comes. Near hopes, whatever you, may say against them,
+are worth as much as those far off, they are more certain. This is
+excellent moralizing. Take good care of your health, it is to that
+everything should tend.
+
+
+
+
+V
+
+Ninon de L'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+On the Death of de Charleval
+
+
+Now, M. de Charleval is dead, and I am so much affected that I am
+trying to console myself by thinking of the share you will take in my
+affliction. Up to the time of his death, I saw him every day. His
+spirit possessed all the charms of youth, and his heart all the
+goodness and tenderness so desirable among true friends. We often
+spoke of you and of all the old friends of our time. His life and the
+one I am leading now, had much in common, indeed, a similar loss is
+like dying one's self.
+
+Tell me the news about yourself. I am as much interested in your life
+in London as if you were here, and old friends possess charms which
+are not so well appreciated as when they are separated.
+
+
+
+
+VI
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+The Weariness of Monotony
+
+
+M. de Clerambault gave me pleasure by telling me that I am in your
+thoughts constantly. I am worthy of it on account of the affection I
+maintain for you. We shall certainly deserve the encomiums of
+posterity by the duration of our lives, and by that of your
+friendship. I believe I shall live as long as you, although I am
+sometimes weary of always doing the same things, and I envy the Swiss
+who casts himself into the river for that reason. My friends often
+reprehend me for such a sentiment, and assure me that life is worth
+living as long as one lives in peace and tranquillity with a healthy
+mind. However, the forces of the body lead to other thoughts, and
+those forces are preferred to strength of mind, but everything is
+useless when a change is impossible. It is equally as worth while to
+drive away sad reflections as to indulge in useless ones.
+
+Madame Sandwich has given me a thousand pleasures in making me so
+happy as to please her. I did not dream, in my declining years to be
+agreeable to a woman of her age. She has more spirit than all the
+women of France, and more true merit. She is on the point of leaving
+us, which is regretted by every one who knows her, by myself,
+particularly. Had you been here we should have prepared a banquet
+worthy of old times. Love me always.
+
+Madame de Coulanges accepted the commission to present your kind
+compliments to M. le Comte de Grammont, through Madame de Grammont. He
+is so young that I believe him fickle enough in time to dislike the
+infirm, and that he will love them as soon as they return to good
+health.
+
+Every one who returns from England speaks of the beauty of Madame la
+Duchesse de Mazarin, as they allude to the beauty of Mademoiselle de
+Bellefond, whose sun is rising. You have attached me to Madame de
+Mazarin, and I hear nothing but the good that is said of her.
+
+Adieu, my friend, why is it not "Good day?" We must not die without
+again seeing each other.
+
+
+
+
+VII
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+After the Death of La Duchesse de Mazarin
+
+
+What a loss for you, my friend! If it were not for the fact that we,
+ourselves, will be considered a loss, we could not find consolation. I
+sympathize with you with all my heart. You have just lost an amiable
+companion who has been your mainstay in a foreign land. What can be
+done to make good such a misfortune? Those who live long are subject
+to see their friends die, after that, your philosophy, your mind, will
+serve to sustain you.
+
+I feel this death as much as if I had been acquainted with the
+Duchess. She thought of me in her last moments, and her goodness
+affected me more than I can express; what she was to you drew me to
+her. There is no longer a remedy, and there is none for whatever may
+happen our poor bodies, so preserve yours. Your friends love to see
+you so well and so wise, for I hold those to be wise who know how to
+be happy.
+
+I give you a thousand thanks for the tea you sent me, but the lively
+tone of your letter pleased me as much as your present.
+
+You will again see Madame Sandwich, whom we saw depart with regret. I
+could wish that her condition in life might serve to be of some
+consolation to you. I am ignorant of English customs, but she was
+quite French while here.
+
+A thousand adieux, my friend. If one could think as did Madame de
+Chevreuse, who believed when dying that she was going to converse with
+all her friends in the other world! It would be a sweet thought.
+
+
+
+
+VIII
+
+Saint-Evremond to Ninon de l'Enclos
+
+Love Banishes Old Age
+
+
+Your life, my well beloved, has been too illustrious not to be lived
+in the same manner until the end. Do not permit M. de la
+Rochefoucauld's "hell" to frighten you; it was a devised hell he
+desired to construct into a maxim. Pronounce the word "love" boldly,
+and that of "old age" will never pass your lips.
+
+There is so much spirit in your letters, that you do not leave me even
+to imagine a decline of life in you. What ingratitude to be ashamed to
+mention love, to which we owe all our merit, all our pleasures! For,
+my lovely keeper of the casket, the reputation of your probity is
+established particularly upon the fact that you have resisted lovers,
+who would willingly have made free with the money of their friends.
+
+Confess all your passions to make your virtues of greater worth;
+however, you do not expose but the one-half of your character; there
+is nothing better than what regards your friends, nothing more
+unsatisfactory than what you have bestowed upon your lovers.
+
+In a few verses, I will draw your entire character. Here they are,
+giving you the qualities you now have and those you have had:
+
+  Dans vos amours on vous trouvait legere,
+  En amitie toujours sure et sincere;
+  Pour vos amants, les humeurs de Venus,
+  Pour vos amis les solides vertus:
+  Quand les premiers vous nommaient infidele,
+  Et qu'asservis encore a votre loi,
+  Ils reprochaient une flamme nouvelle,
+Les autres se louaient de votre bonne foi.
+  Tantot c'etait le naturel d'Helene,
+  Ses appetits comme tous ses appas;
+  Tantot c'etait la probite romaine?
+C'etait d'honneur la regle et le compas.
+  Dans un couvent en soeur depositaire,
+  Vous auriez bien menage quelque affaire,
+  Et dans le monde a garder les depots,
+On vous eut justement preferee aux devots.
+
+  (In your love affairs you were never severe,
+  But your friendship was always sure and sincere;
+  The humors of Venus for those who desired,
+  For your friends, in your heart, solid virtues conspired;
+When the first, infidelity laid at your door,
+  Though not yet exempt from the law of your will,
+  And every new flame never failed to deplore,
+The others rejoiced that you trusted them still.
+  Ingenuous Helen was sometimes your role,
+  With her appetites, charms, and all else beside;
+  Sometimes Roman probity wielded your soul,
+  In honor becoming your rule and your guide.
+  And though in a convent as guardian nun,
+You might have well managed some sprightly fun,
+  In the world, as a keeper of treasures untold,
+Preferred you would be to a lamb of the fold.)
+
+Here is a little variety, which I trust will not surprise you:
+
+L'indulgente et sage Nature
+A forme l'ame de Ninon
+De la volupte d'Epicure
+Et de la vertu de Caton.
+
+
+
+
+IX
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+Stomachs Demand More Attention than Minds
+
+
+The Abbe Dubois has just handed me your letter, and personally told me
+as much good news about your stomach as about your mind. There are
+times when we give more attention to our stomachs than to our minds,
+and I confess, to my sorrow, that I find you happier in the enjoyment
+of the one than of the other. I have always believed that your mind
+would last as long as yourself, but we are not so sure of the health
+of the body, without which nothing is left but sorrowful reflections.
+I insensibly begin making them on all occasions.
+
+Here is another chapter. It relates to a handsome youth, whose desire
+to see honest people in the different countries of the world, induced
+him to surreptitiously abandon an opulent home. Perhaps you will
+censure his curiosity, but the thing is done. He knows many things,
+but he is ignorant of others, which one of his age should ignore. I
+deemed him worthy of paying you a visit, to make him begin to feel
+that he has not lost his time by journeying to England. Treat him well
+for love of me.
+
+I begged his elder brother, who is my particular friend, to obtain
+news of Madame la Duchesse Mazarin and of Madame Harvey, both of whom
+wished to remember me.
+
+
+
+
+X
+
+Saint-Evremond to Ninon de l'Enclos
+
+Why does Love Diminish After Marriage?
+
+
+Translator's Note.--Two of Ninon's friends whom she idolized, were
+very much surprised to discover after their marriage, that the great
+passion they felt for each other before marriage, became feebler every
+day, and that even their affection was growing colder. It troubled
+them, and in their anxiety, they consulted Mademoiselle de l'Enclos,
+begging her to find some reason in her philosophy, why the possession
+of the object loved should weaken the strength of ante-nuptial
+passion, and even destroy the most ardent affection.
+
+The question was discussed by Ninon and her "Birds" for several days
+without reaching an opinion that was in any manner satisfactory. It
+was therefore resolved to consult Saint-Evremond, who was living in
+exile in England. After writing him all the particulars, and the
+discussions that had been held with opinions pro and con, he sent the
+following letter in reply, which is unanswerable upon the subject.
+Moreover, it contains lessons that should be carefully studied and
+well learned by all loving hearts, who desire to maintain their early
+affection for each other during life.
+
+The letter is a masterpiece of the philosophy of love, and it is
+remarkable, in that it develops traits in human nature upon the
+subject of love and marriage, which are overlooked in questions
+applicable to the relations between the sexes, and that are so often
+strained to the breaking point. Indeed, it gives clues to a remedy
+which can not fail to effect a cure.
+
+       *       *       *       *       *
+
+My opinion is exactly in line with yours, Mademoiselle; it is not
+always, as some think, hymen or the possession of the loved object
+which of itself destroys love; the true source of the dissatisfaction
+that follows exists in the unintelligent manner of economizing the
+sentiments, a too complete, too easy, and too prolonged possession.
+
+When we have yielded to the transports of a passion without reserve,
+the tremendous shock to the soul can not fail quickly to leave it in a
+profound solitude. The heart finds itself in a void which alarms and
+chills it. We vainly seek outside of ourselves, the cause of the calm
+which follows our fits of passion; we do not perceive that an equal
+and more enduring happiness would have been the fruit of moderation.
+Make an exact analysis of what takes place within you when you desire
+anything. You will find that your desires are nothing but curiosity,
+and this curiosity, which is one of the forces of the heart,
+satisfied, our desires vanish. Whoever, therefore, would hold a spouse
+or a lover should leave him something to be desired; something new
+should be expected every day for the morrow. Diversify his pleasures,
+procure for him the charm of variety in the same object, and I will
+vouch for his perseverance in fidelity.
+
+I confess, however, that hymen, or what you call your "defeat," is, in
+an ordinary woman, the grave of love. But then it is less upon the
+lover that the blame falls, than upon her who complains of the cooling
+of the passion; she casts upon the depravity of the heart what is due
+to her own unskillfulness, and her lack of economy. She has expended
+in a single day everything that might keep alive the inclination she
+had excited. She has nothing more to offer to the curiosity of her
+lover, she becomes always the same statue; no variety to be hoped for,
+and her lover knows it well.
+
+But in the woman I have in mind, it is the aurora of a lovelier day;
+it is the beginning of the most satisfying pleasures. I, understand by
+effusions of the heart, those mutual confidences; those ingenuities,
+those unexpected avowals, and those transports which excite in us the
+certainty of creating an absolute happiness, and meriting all the
+esteem of the person we love. That day is, in a word, the epoch when
+a man of refinement discovers inexhaustible treasures which have
+always been hidden from him; the freedom a woman acquires brings into
+play all the sentiments which constraint has held in reserve; her
+heart takes a lofty flight, but one well under control. Time, far from
+leading to loathing, will furnish new reasons for a greater love.
+
+But, to repeat; I assume sufficient intelligence in her to be able to
+control her inclination. For to hold a lover, it is not enough
+(perhaps it is too much) to love passionately, she must love with
+prudence, with restraint, and modesty is, for that reason, the most
+ingenious virtue refined persons have ever imagined. To yield to the
+impetuosity of an inclination; to be annihilated, so to speak, in the
+object loved, is the method of a woman without discernment. That is
+not love, it is a liking for a moment, it is to transform a lover into
+a spoiled child. I would have a woman behave with more reserve and
+economy. An excess of ardor is not justifiable in my opinion, the
+heart being always an impetuous charger which must be steadily curbed.
+If you do not use your strength with economy, your vivacity will be
+nothing but a passing transport. The same indifference you perceive in
+a lover, after those convulsive emotions, you, yourself, will
+experience, and soon, both of you will feel the necessity of
+separating.
+
+To sum up: There is more intelligence required to love than is
+generally supposed, and to be happy in loving. Up to the moment of the
+fatal "yes" or if you prefer, up to the time of her defeat, a woman
+does not need artifice to hold her lover. Curiosity excites him,
+desire sustains him, hope encourages him. But once he reaches the
+summit of his desires, it is for the woman to take as much care to
+retain him, as he exhibited to overcome her; the desire to keep him
+should render her fertile in expedients; the heart is similar to a
+high position, easier to obtain than to keep. Charms are sufficient
+to make a man amorous; to render him constant, something more is
+necessary; skill is required, a little management, a great deal of
+intelligence, and even a touch of ill humor and inequality.
+Unfortunately, however, as soon as women have yielded they become too
+tender, too complaisant. It would be better for the common good if
+they were to resist less in the beginning and more afterward. I
+maintain that they never can forestall loathing without leaving the
+heart something to wish for, and the time to consider.
+
+I hear them continually complaining that our indifference is always
+the fruit of their complaisance for us. They are ever recalling the
+time when, goaded by love and sentiment, we spent whole days by their
+side. How blind they are! They do not perceive that it is still in
+their power to bring us back to an allegiance, the memory of which is
+so dear. If they forget what they have already done for us, they will
+not be tempted to do more; but if they make us forget, then we shall
+become more exacting. Let them awaken our hearts by opposing new
+difficulties, arouse our anxieties, in fine, force us to desire new
+proofs of an inclination, the certainty of which diminishes the value
+in our estimation. They will then find less cause of complaint in us,
+and will be better satisfied with themselves.
+
+Shall I frankly avow it? Things would indeed change if women would
+remember at the right time, that their role is always that of the
+party to be entreated, ours that of him who begs for new favors;
+that, created to grant, they should never offer. Reserved, even in an
+excess of passion, they should guard against surrendering at
+discretion; the lover should always have something to ask, and
+consequently, he would be always submissive so as to obtain it. Favors
+without limit degrade the most seductive charms, and are, in the end,
+revolting even to him who exacts them. Society puts all women on the
+same level; the handsome and the ugly, after their defeat are
+indistinguishable except from their art to maintain their authority;
+but what commonly happens? A woman imagines she has nothing more to do
+than to be affectionate, caressing, sweet, of even temper, and
+faithful. She is right in one sense, for these qualities should be the
+foundation of her character; they will not fail to draw esteem; but
+these qualities, however estimable they may be, if they are not offset
+by a shade of contrariety, will not fail to extinguish love, and bring
+on languor and weariness, mortal poisons for the best constituted
+heart.
+
+Do you know why lovers become nauseated so easily when enjoying
+prosperity? Why they are so little pleased after having had so much
+pleasure? It is because both parties interested have an identically
+erroneous opinion. One imagines there is nothing more to obtain, the
+other fancies she has nothing more to give. It follows as a necessary
+consequence that one slackens in his pursuit, and the other neglects
+to be worthy of further advances, or thinks she becomes so by the
+practice of solid qualities. Reason is substituted for love, and
+hence-forward no more spicy seasoning in their relations, no more of
+those trifling quarrels so necessary to prevent dissatisfaction by
+forestalling it.
+
+But when I exact that evenness of temper should be animated by
+occasional storms, do not be under the impression that I pretend
+lovers should always be quarreling to preserve their happiness. I only
+desire to impress it upon you, that all their misunderstandings should
+emanate from love itself; that the woman should not forget (by a
+species of pusillanimous kindness) the respect and attentions due her;
+that by an excessive sensitiveness she does not convert her love into
+a source of anxiety capable of poisoning every moment of her
+existence; that by a scrupulous fidelity she may not render her lover
+too sure that he has nothing to fear on that score.
+
+Neither should a woman by a sweetness, an unalterable evenness of
+temper, be weak enough to pardon everything lacking in her lover.
+Experience demonstrates that women too often sacrifice the hearts of
+their spouses or their lovers, by too many indulgences and facilities.
+What recklessness! They martyrize themselves by sacrificing
+everything; they spoil them and convert them into ungrateful lovers.
+So much generosity finally turns against themselves, and they soon
+become accustomed to demand as a right what is granted them as a
+favor.
+
+You see women every day (even among those we despise with so much
+reason) who reign with a scepter of iron, treat as slaves men who are
+attached to them, debase them by force of controlling them. Well,
+these are the women who are loved longer than the others. I am
+persuaded that a woman of refinement, well brought up, would never
+think of following such an example. That military manner is repugnant
+to gentleness and morals, and lacks that decency which constitutes the
+charm in things even remote from virtue. But let the reasonable woman
+soften the clouds a trifle, there will always remain precisely what is
+necessary to hold a lover.
+
+We are slaves, whom too much kindness often renders insolent; we often
+demand to be treated like those of the new world. But we have in the
+bottom of our hearts a comprehension of justice, which tells us that
+the governing hand bears down upon us sometimes for very good reasons,
+and we take kindly to it.
+
+Now, for my last word. In everything relating to the force and energy
+of love, women should be the sovereigns; it is from them we hope for
+happiness, and they will never fail to grant us that as soon as they
+can govern our hearts with intelligence, moderate their own
+inclinations, and maintain their own authority, without compromising
+it and without abusing it.
+
+
+
+
+XI
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+Few People Resist Age
+
+
+A sprightly mind is dangerous to friendship. Your letter would have
+spoiled any one but me. I know your lively and astonishing
+imagination, and I have even wanted to remember that Lucian wrote in
+praise of the fly, to accustom myself to your style. Would to Heaven
+you could think of me what you write, I should dispense with the rest
+of the world; so it is with you that glory dwells.
+
+Your last letter is a masterpiece. It has been the subject of all the
+talks we have had in my chamber for the past month. You are
+rejuvenating; you do well to love. Philosophy agrees well with
+spiritual charms. It is not enough to be wise, one must please, and I
+perceive that you will always please as long as you think as you do.
+
+Few people resist age, but I believe I am not yet overcome by it. I
+could wish with you, that Madame Mazarin had looked upon life from her
+own viewpoint, without thinking of her beauty, which would always have
+been agreeable when common sense held the place of less brilliancy.
+Madame Sandwich will preserve her mental force after losing her
+youth, at least I think so.
+
+Adieu, my friend. When you see Madame Sandwich, remember me to her, I
+should be very sorry to have her forget me.
+
+
+
+
+XII
+
+Saint-Evremond to Ninon de l'Enclos
+
+Age Has Some Consolations
+
+
+It gives me a lively pleasure to see young people, handsome and
+expanding like flowers; fit to please, and able to sincerely affect an
+old heart like mine. As there has always been a strong similarity
+between your tastes, your inclinations, your sentiments, and mine, I
+think you will be pleased to receive a young Chevalier who is
+attractive to all our ladies. He is the Duke of Saint Albans, whom I
+have begged to pay you a visit, as much in his own interests as in
+yours.
+
+Is there any one of your friends like de Tallard, imbued with the
+spirit of our age, to whom I can be of any service? If so, command me.
+Give me some news of our old friend de Gourville. I presume he is
+prosperous in his affairs; if his health is poor I shall be very
+sorry.
+
+Doctor Morelli, my particular friend, accompanies the Countess of
+Sandwich, who goes to France for her health. The late Count Rochester,
+father of Madame Sandwich, had more spirit than any man in England,
+but Madame Sandwich has more than her father. She is generous and
+spirituelle, and as amiable as she is generous and spirituelle. These
+are a portion of her qualities. But, I have more to say about the
+physician than about the invalid.
+
+Seven cities, as you know, dispute among themselves, the birth place
+of Homer; seven great nations are quarrelling over Morelli: India,
+Egypt, Arabia, Persia, Turkey, Italy, and Spain. The cold countries,
+even the temperate ones, France, England and Germany, make no
+pretensions. He is acquainted with every language and speaks the most
+of them. His style, elevated, grand and figurative, leads me to
+believe that he is of Oriental origin, and that he has absorbed what
+he found good among the Europeans. He is passionately fond of music,
+wild over poetry, inquisitive about paintings, a connoisseur in
+everything--I cannot remember all. He has friends who know
+architecture, and though skilled in his own profession, he is an adept
+in others.
+
+I pray you to give him opportunities to become acquainted with all
+your illustrious friends. If you make him yours, I shall consider him
+fortunate, for you will never be able to make him acquainted with
+anybody possessing more merit than yourself.
+
+It seems to me that Epicurus included in his sovereign good the
+remembrance of past things. There is no sovereign good for a
+centenarian like me, but there are many consolations, that of thinking
+of you, and of all I have heard you say, is one of the greatest.
+
+I write of many things of no importance to you, because I never think
+that I may weary you. It is enough if they please me, it is
+impossible at my age, to hope they will please others. My merit
+consists in being contented, too happy in being able to write you.
+
+Remember to save some of M. de Gourville's wine for me. I am lodged
+with one of the relatives of M. de L'Hermitage, a very honest man, and
+an exile to England on account of his religion. I am very sorry that
+the Catholic conscience of France could not suffer him to live in
+Paris, and that the delicacy of his own compelled him to abandon his
+country. He certainly deserves the approbation of his cousin.
+
+
+
+
+III
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+Some Good Taste Still Exists in France
+
+
+My dear friend, is it possible for you to believe that the sight of a
+young man gives me pleasure? Your senses deceive you when it comes to
+others. I have forgotten all but my friends. If the name "doctor" had
+not reassured me, I should have replied by the Abbe de Hautefeuille,
+and your English would never have heard of me. They would have been
+told at my door that I was not at home, and I would have received your
+letter, which gave me more pleasure than anything else.
+
+What a fancy to want good wine, and how unfortunate that I can not say
+I was successful in getting it! M. de L'Hermitage will tell you as
+well as I, that de Gourville never leaves his room, is indifferent to
+taste of any kind, is always a good friend, but his friends do not
+trespass upon his friendship for fear of worrying him. After that, if,
+by any insinuation I can make, and which I do not now foresee, I can
+use my knowledge of wine to procure you some, do not doubt that I will
+avail myself of it.
+
+M. de Tallard was one of my former friends, but state affairs place
+great men above trifles. I am told that the Abbe Dubois will go to
+England with him. He is a slim little man who, I am sure, will please
+you.
+
+I have twenty letters of yours, and they are read with admiration by
+our little circle, which is proof that good taste still exists in
+France. I am charmed with a country where you do not fear ennui, and
+you will be wise if you think of nobody but yourself, not that the
+principle is false with you: that you can no longer please others.
+
+I have written to M. Morelli, and if I find in him the skill you say,
+I shall consider him a true physician.
+
+
+
+
+XIV
+
+Saint-Evremond to Ninon de l'Enclos
+
+Superiority of the Pleasures of the Stomach
+
+
+I have never read a letter which contained so much common sense as
+your last one. You eulogize the stomach so highly, that it would be
+shameful to possess an intelligent mind without also having a good
+stomach. I am indebted to the Abbe Dubois for having sounded my
+praises to you in this respect.
+
+At eighty-eight years of age, I can eat oysters every morning for
+breakfast. I dine well and sup fairly well. The world makes heroes of
+men with less merit than mine.
+
+Qu'on ait plus de bien, de credit,
+Plus de vertu, plus de conduite,
+Je n'en aurai point de depit,
+Qu'un autre me passe en merite
+Sur le gout et sur l'appetit,
+C'est l'avantage qui m'irrite.
+L'estomac est le plus grand bien,
+Sans lui les autres ne sont rien.
+Un grand coeur veut tout entreprendre,
+Un grand esprit veut tout comprendre;
+Les droits de l'estomac sont de bien digerer;
+Et dans les sentiments que me donne mon age,
+La beaute de l'esprit, la grandeur du courage,
+N'ont rien qu'a se vertu l'on puisse comparer.
+
+(Let others more riches and fame,
+More virtue and morals possess,
+'Twill kindle no envious flame;
+But to make my merit seem less
+In taste, appetite, is, I claim,
+An outrageous thing to profess.
+The stomach's the greatest of things,
+All else to us nothing brings.
+A great heart would all undertake,
+A great soul investigate,
+But the law of the stomach is good things to digest,
+And the glories which are at my age the delight,
+True beauty of mind, of courage the height,
+Are nothing unless by its virtue they're blest.)
+
+When I was young I admired intellect more than anything else, and was
+less considerate of the interests of the body than I should have been;
+to-day, I am remedying the error I then held, as much as possible,
+either by the use I am making of it, or by the esteem and friendship I
+have for it.
+
+You were of the same opinion. The body was something in your youth,
+now you are wholly concerned with the pleasures of the mind. I do not
+know whether you are right in placing so high an estimate upon it. We
+read little that is worth remembering, and we hear little advice that
+is worth following. However degenerate may be the senses of the age at
+which I am living, the impressions which agreeable objects make upon
+them appear to me to be so much more acute, that we are wrong to
+mortify them. Perhaps it is a jealousy of the mind which deems the
+part played by the senses better than its own.
+
+M. Bernier, the handsomest philosopher I have ever known (handsome
+philosopher is seldom used, but his figure, shape, manner,
+conversation and other traits have made him worthy of the epithet), M.
+Bernier, I say, in speaking of the senses, said to me one day:
+
+"I am going to impart a confidence that I would not give Madame de la
+Sabliere, even to Mademoiselle de l'Enclos, whom I regard as a
+superior being. I tell you in confidence, that abstinence from
+pleasures appears to me to be a great sin."
+
+I was surprised at the novelty of the idea, and it did not fail to
+make an impression upon my mind. Had he extended his idea, he might
+have made me a convert to his doctrine.
+
+Continue your friendship which has never faltered, and which is
+something rare in relations that have existed as long as ours.
+
+
+
+
+XV
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+Let the Heart Speak Its Own Language
+
+
+I learn with pleasure that my soul is dearer to you than my body and
+that your common sense is always leading you upward to better things.
+The body, in fact, is little worthy of regard, and the soul has always
+some light which sustains it, and renders it sensible of the memory of
+a friend whose absence has not effaced his image.
+
+I often tell the old stories in which d'Elbene, de Charleval, and the
+Chevalier de Riviere cheer up the "moderns." You are brought in at the
+most interesting points, but as you are also a modern, I am on my
+guard against praising you too highly in the presence of the
+Academicians, who have declared in favor of the "ancients."
+
+I have been told of a musical prologue, which I would very much like
+to hear at the Paris theater. The "Beauty" who is its subject would
+strike with envy every woman who should hear it. All our Helens have
+no right to find a Homer, and always be goddesses of beauty. Here I am
+at the top, how am I to descend?
+
+My very dear friend, would it not be well to permit the heart to
+speak its own language? I assure you, I love you always. Do not change
+your ideas on that point, they have always been in my favor, and may
+this mental communication, which some philosophers believe to be
+supernatural, last forever.
+
+I have testified to M. Turretin, the joy I should feel to be of some
+service to him. He found me among my friends, many of whom deemed him
+worthy of the praise you have given him. If he desires to profit by
+what is left of our honest Abbes in the absence of the court, he will
+be treated like a man you esteem. I read him your letter with
+spectacles, of course, but they did me no harm, for I preserved my
+gravity all the time. If he is amorous of that merit which is called
+here "distinguished," perhaps your wish will be accomplished, for
+every day, I meet with this fine phrase as a consolation for my
+losses.
+
+I know that you would like to see La Fontaine in England, he is so
+little regarded in Paris, his head is so feeble. 'Tis the destiny of
+poets, of which Tasso and Lucretius are evidence. I doubt whether
+there is any love philter that could affect La Fontaine, he has never
+been a lover of women unless they were able to foot the bills.
+
+
+
+
+XVI
+
+Saint-Evremond to Ninon de l'Enclos
+
+The Memory of Youth
+
+
+I was handed in December, the letter you wrote me October 14. It is
+rather old, but good things are always acceptable, however late they
+may be in reaching us. You are serious, therefore, you please. You add
+a charm to Seneca, who does not usually possess any. You call yourself
+old when you possess all the graces, inclinations, and spirit of
+youth.
+
+I am troubled with a curiosity which you can satisfy: When you
+remember your past, does not the memory of your youth suggest certain
+ideas as far removed from languor and sloth as from the excitement of
+passion? Do you not feel in your soul a secret opposition to the
+tranquillity which you fancy your spirit has acquired?
+
+Mais aimer et vous voir aimee
+Est une douce liaison,
+Que dans notre coeur s'est formee
+De concert avec la raison.
+D'une amoureuse sympathie,
+Il faut pour arreter le cours
+Arreter celui de nos jours;
+Sa fin est celle de la vie.
+Puissent les destins complaisants,
+Vous donner encore trente ans
+D'amour et de philosophie.
+
+(To love and be loved
+Is a concert sweet,
+Which in your heart is formed
+Cemented with reason meet.
+Of a loving concord,
+To stop the course,
+Our days must end perforce,
+And death be the last record.
+May the kind fates give
+You thirty years to live,
+With wisdom and love in accord.)
+
+I wish you a happy New Year, a day on which those who have nothing
+else to give, make up the deficiency in wishes.
+
+
+
+
+XVII
+
+Ninon de l'Enclos to Saint-Evremond
+
+"I Should Have Hanged Myself"
+
+
+Your letter filled with useless yearnings of which I thought myself
+incapable. "The days are passing," as said the good man of Yveteaux,
+"in ignorance and sloth; these days destroy us and take from us the
+things to which we are attached." You are cruelly made to prove this.
+
+You told me long ago that I should die of reflections. I try not to
+make any more, and to forget on the morrow the things I live through
+today. Everybody tells me that I have less to complain of at one time
+than at another. Be that as it may, had I been proposed such a life I
+should have hanged myself. We hold on to an ugly body, however, as
+something agreeable; we love to feel comfort and ease. Appetite is
+something I still enjoy. Would to Heaven I could try my stomach with
+yours, and talk of the old friends we have known, the memory of whom
+gives me more pleasure than the presence of many people I now meet.
+There is something good in all that, but to tell you the truth, there
+is no comparison.
+
+M. de Clerambault often asks me if he resembles his father in mental
+attainments. "No," I always answer him, but I hope from his
+presumption that he believes this "no" to be of advantage to him, and
+perhaps there are some who would have so considered it. What a
+comparison between the present epoch and that through which we have
+passed!
+
+You are going to write Madame Sandwich, but I believe she has gone to
+the country. She knows all about your sentiment for her. She will tell
+you more news about this country than I, having gauged and
+comprehended everything. She knows all my haunts and has found means
+of making herself perfectly at home.
+
+
+
+
+XVIII
+
+Saint-Evremond to Ninon de l'Enclos
+
+Life Is Joyous When It Is Without Sorrow
+
+
+The very last letter I receive from Mademoiselle de l'Enclos always
+seems to me to be better than the preceding ones. It is not because
+the sentiment of present pleasure dims the memory of the past, but the
+true reason is, your mind is becoming stronger and more fortified
+every day.
+
+If it were the same with the body as with the mind, I should badly
+sustain this stomach combat of which you speak. I wanted to make a
+trial of mine against that of Madame Sandwich, at a banquet given by
+Lord Jersey. I was not the vanquished.
+
+Everybody knows the spirit of Madame Sandwich; I see her good taste in
+the extraordinary esteem she has for you. I was not overcome by the
+praises she showered upon you, any more than I was by my appetite. You
+belong to every nation, esteemed alike in London as in Paris. You
+belong to every age of the world, and when I say that you are an honor
+to mine, youth will immediately name you to give luster to theirs.
+There you are, mistress of the present and of the past. May you have
+your share of the right to be so considered in the future! I have not
+reputation in view, for that is assured to all time, the one thing I
+regard as the most essential is life, of which eight days are worth
+more than centuries of post mortem glory.
+
+If any one had formerly proposed to you to live as you are now living,
+you would have hanged yourself! (The expression pleases me.) However,
+you are satisfied with ease and comfort after having enjoyed the
+liveliest emotions.
+
+L'esprit vous satisfait, ou du moins vous console:
+Mais on prefererait de vivre jeune et folle,
+Et laisser aux vieillards exempts de passions
+La triste gravite de leurs reflexions.
+
+(Mental joys satisfy you, at least they console,
+But a young jolly life we prefer on the whole,
+And to old chaps, exempt from passion's sharp stings,
+Leave the sad recollections of former good things.)
+
+Nobody can make more of youth than I, and as I am holding to it by
+memory, I am following your example, and fit in with the present as
+well as I know how.
+
+Would to Heaven, Madame Mazarin had been of your opinion! She would
+still be living, but she desired to die the beauty of the world.
+
+Madame Sandwich is leaving for the country, and departs admired in
+London as she is in Paris.
+
+Live, Ninon, life is joyous when it is without sorrow.
+
+I pray you to forward this note to M. l'Abbe de Hautefeuille, who is
+with Madame la Duchesse de Bouillon. I sometimes meet the friends of
+M. l'Abbe Dubois, who complain that they are forgotten. Assure him of
+my humble regards.
+
+Translator's Note--The above was the last letter Saint-Evremond ever
+wrote Mademoiselle de l'Enclos, and with the exception of one more
+letter to his friend, Count Magalotti, Councillor of State to His
+Royal Highness the Grand Duke of Tuscany, he never wrote any other,
+dying shortly afterward at the age of about ninety. His last letter
+ends with this peculiar Epicurean thought in poetry:
+
+Je vis eloigne de la France,
+Sans besoins et sans abondance,
+Content d'un vulgaire destin;
+J'aime la vertu sans rudesse,
+J'aime le plaisir sans mollesse,
+J'aime la vie, et n'en crains pas la fin.
+
+(I am living far away from France,
+No wants, indeed, no abundance,
+Content to dwell in humble sphere;
+Virtue I love without roughness,
+Pleasures I love without softness,
+Life, too, whose end I do not fear.)
+
+
+
+
+DOCTRINE OF EPICURUS
+
+EXPLAINED BY
+
+MARSHAL DE SAINT-EVREMOND
+
+IN A LETTER TO
+
+THE MODERN LEONTIUM
+
+(NINON DE L'ENCLOS)
+
+
+
+
+TO THE MODERN LEONTIUM
+
+(NINON DE L'ENCLOS)
+
+
+Being the moral doctrine of the philosopher Epicurus as applicable to
+modern times, it is an elucidation of the principles advocated by that
+philosopher, by Charles de Saint-Evremond, Marechal of France, a great
+philosopher, scholar, poet, warrior, and profound admirer of
+Mademoiselle de l'Enclos. He died in exile in England, and his tomb
+may be found in Westminster Abbey, in a conspicuous part of the nave,
+where his remains were deposited by Englishmen, who regarded him as
+illustrious for his virtues, learning and philosophy.
+
+He gave the name "Leontium" to Mademoiselle de L'Enclos, and the
+letter was written to her under that sobriquet. The reasoning in it
+will enable the reader to understand the life and character of Ninon,
+inasmuch as it was the foundation of her education, and formed her
+character during an extraordinarily long career. It was intended to
+bring down to its date, the true philosophical principles of Epicurus,
+who appears to have been grossly misunderstood and his doctrines
+foully misinterpreted.
+
+Leontium was an Athenian woman who became celebrated for her taste for
+philosophy, particularly for that of Epicurus, and for her close
+intimacy with the great men of Athens. She lived during the third
+century before the Christian era, and her mode of life was similar to
+that of Mademoiselle de l'Enclos. She added to great personal beauty,
+intellectual brilliancy of the highest degree, and dared to write, a
+learned treatise against the eloquent Theophrastus, thereby incurring
+the dislike of Cicero, the distinguished orator, and Pliny, the
+philosopher, the latter intimating that it might be well for her "to
+select a tree upon which to hang herself." Pliny and other
+philosophers heaped abuse upon her for daring, as a woman, to do such
+an unheard of thing as to write a treatise on philosophy, and
+particularly for having the assurance to contradict Theophrastus.
+
+
+The Letter.
+
+You wish to know whether I have fully considered the doctrines of
+Epicurus which are attributed to me?
+
+I can claim the honor of having done so, but I do not care to claim a
+merit I do not possess, and which you will say, ingenuously, does not
+belong to me. I labor under a great disadvantage on account of the
+numerous spurious treatises which are printed in my name, as though I
+were the author of them. Some, though well written, I do not claim,
+because they are not of my writing, moreover, among the things I have
+written, there are many stupidities. I do not care to take the trouble
+of repudiating such things, for the reason that at my age, one hour of
+well regulated life, is of more interest and benefit to me than a
+mediocre reputation. How difficult it is, you see, to rid one's self
+of amour propre! I quit it as an author, and reassume it as a
+philosopher, feeling a secret pleasure in manipulating what others are
+anxious about.
+
+The word "pleasure" recalls to mind the name of Epicurus, and I
+confess, that of all the opinions of the philosophers concerning the
+supreme good, there are none which appear to me to be so reasonable as
+his.
+
+It would be useless to urge reasons, a hundred times repeated by the
+Epicureans, that the love of pleasure and the extinction of pain, are
+the first and most natural inclinations remarked in all men; that
+riches, power, honor, and virtue, contribute to our happiness, but
+that the enjoyment of pleasure, let us say, voluptuousness, to include
+everything in a word, is the veritable aim and end whither tend all
+human acts. This is very clear to me, in fact, self-evident, and I am
+fully persuaded of its truth.
+
+However, I do not know very well in what the pleasure, or
+voluptuousness of Epicurus consisted, for I never saw so many
+different opinions of any one as those of the morals of this
+philosopher. Philosophers, and even his own disciples, have condemned
+him as sensual and indolent; magistrates have regarded his doctrines
+as pernicious to the public; Cicero, so just and so wise in his
+opinions, Plutarch, so much esteemed for his fair judgments, were not
+favorable to him, and so far as Christianity is concerned, the Fathers
+have represented him to be the greatest and the most dangerous of all
+impious men. So much for his enemies; now for his partisans:
+
+Metrodorus, Hermachus, Meneceus, and numerous others, who
+philosophize according to his school, have as much veneration as
+friendship for him personally. Diogenes Laertes could not have written
+his life to better advantage for his reputation. Lucretius adored him.
+Seneca, as much of an enemy of the sect as he was, spoke of him in the
+highest terms. If some cities held him in horror, others erected
+statues in his honor, and if, among the Christians, the Fathers have
+condemned him, Gassendi and Bernier approve his principles.
+
+In view of all these contrary authorities, how can the question be
+decided? Shall I say that Epicurus was a corruptor of good morals, on
+the faith of a jealous philosopher, of a disgruntled disciple, who
+would have been delighted, in his resentment, to go to the length of
+inflicting a personal injury? Moreover, had Epicurus intended to
+destroy the idea of Providence and the immortality of the soul, is it
+not reasonable to suppose that the world would have revolted against
+so scandalous a doctrine, and that the life of the philosopher would
+have been attacked to discredit his opinions more easily?
+
+If, therefore, I find it difficult to believe what his enemies and the
+envious have published against him, I should also easily credit what
+his partisans have urged in his defence.
+
+I do not believe that Epicurus desired to broach a voluptuousness
+harsher than the virtue of the Stoics. Such a jealousy of austerity
+would appear to me extraordinary in a voluptuary philosopher, from
+whatever point of view that word may be considered. A fine secret
+that, to declaim against a virtue which destroys sentiment in a sage,
+and establishes one that admits of no operation.
+
+The sage, according to the Stoics, is a man of insensible virtue; that
+of the Epicureans, an immovable voluptuary. The former suffers pain
+without having any pain; the latter enjoys voluptuousness without
+being voluptuous--a pleasure without pleasure. With what object in
+view, could a philosopher who denied the immortality of the soul,
+mortify the senses? Why divorce the two parties composed of the same
+elements, whose sole advantage is in a concert of union for their
+mutual pleasure? I pardon our religious devotees, who diet on herbs,
+in the hope that they will obtain an eternal felicity, but that a
+philosopher, who knows no other good than that to be found in this
+world, that a doctor of voluptuousness should diet on bread and water,
+to reach sovereign happiness in this life, is something my
+intelligence refuses to contemplate.
+
+I am surprised that the voluptuousness of such an Epicurean is not
+founded upon the idea of death, for, considering the miseries of life,
+his sovereign good must be at the end of it. Believe me, if Horace and
+Petronius had viewed it as painted, they would never have accepted
+Epicurus as their master in the science of pleasure. The piety for the
+gods attributed to him, is no less ridiculous than the mortification
+of the senses. These slothful gods, of whom there was nothing to be
+hoped or feared; these impotent gods who did not deserve the labor and
+fatigue attendant upon their worship!
+
+Let no one say that worshipers went to the temple through fear of
+displeasing the magistrates, and of scandalizing the people, for they
+would have scandalized them less by refusing to assist in their
+worship, than shocked them by writings which destroyed the established
+gods, or at least ruined the confidence of the people in their
+protection.
+
+But you ask me: What is your opinion of Epicurus? You believe neither
+his friends nor his enemies, neither his adversaries nor his
+partisans. What is the judgment you have formed?
+
+I believe Epicurus was a very wise philosopher, who at times and on
+certain occasions loved the pleasure of repose or the pleasure of
+movement. From this difference in the grade of voluptuousness has
+sprung all the reputation accorded him. Timocrates and his other
+opponents, attacked him on account of his sensual pleasures; those who
+defended him, did not go beyond his spiritual voluptuousness. When the
+former denounced him for the expense he was at in his repasts, I am
+persuaded that the accusation was well founded. When the latter
+expatiated upon the small quantity of cheese he required to have
+better cheer than usual, I believe they did not lack reason. When they
+say he philosophized with Leontium, they say well; when they say that
+Epicurus diverted himself with her, they do not lie. According to
+Solomon, there is a time to laugh and a time to weep; according to
+Epicurus, there is a time to be sober and a time to be sensual. To go
+still further than that, is a man uniformly voluptuous all his life?
+
+Religiously speaking, the greatest libertine is sometimes the most
+devout; in the study of wisdom, the most indulgent in pleasures
+sometimes become the most austere. For my own part, I view Epicurus
+from a different standpoint in youth and health, than when old and
+infirm.
+
+Ease and tranquillity, these comforts of the infirm and slothful, can
+not be better expressed than in his writings. Sensual voluptuousness
+is not less well explained by Cicero. I know that nothing is omitted
+either to destroy or elude it, but can conjecture be compared with the
+testimony of Cicero, who was intimately acquainted with the Greek
+philosophers and their philosophy? It would be better to reject the
+inequality of mind as an inconstancy of human nature.
+
+Where exists the man so uniform of temperament, that he does not
+manifest contrarieties in his conversation and actions? Solomon merits
+the name of sage, as much as Epicure for less, and he belied himself
+equally in his sentiments and conduct. Montaigne, when still young,
+believed it necessary to always think of death in order to be always
+ready for it. Approaching old age, however, he recanted, so he says,
+being willing to permit nature to gently guide him, and teach him how
+to die.
+
+M. Bernier, the great partisan of Epicurus, avows to-day, that "After
+philosophizing for fifty years, I doubt things of which I was once
+most assured."
+
+All objects have different phases, and the mind which is in perpetual
+motion, views them from different aspects as they revolve before it.
+Hence, it may be said, that we see the same thing under different
+aspects, thinking at the same time that we have discovered something
+new. Moreover, age brings great changes in our inclinations, and with
+a change of inclination often comes a change of opinion. Add, that the
+pleasures of the senses sometimes give rise to contempt for mental
+gratifications as too dry and unproductive and that the delicate and
+refined pleasures of the mind, in their turn, scorn the voluptuousness
+of the senses as gross. So, no one should be surprised that in so
+great a diversity of aspects and movements, Epicurus, who wrote more
+than any other philosopher, should have treated the same subjects in a
+different manner according as he had perceived them from different
+points of view.
+
+What avails this general reasoning to show that he might have been
+sensible to all kinds of pleasure? Let him be considered according to
+his relations with the other sex, and nobody will believe that he
+spent so much time with Leontium and with Themista for the sole
+purpose of philosophizing. But if he loved the enjoyment of
+voluptuousness, he conducted himself like a wise man. Indulgent to the
+movements of nature, opposed to its struggles, never mistaking
+chastity for a virtue, always considering luxury as a vice, he
+insisted upon sobriety as an economy of the appetite, and that the
+repasts in which one indulged should never injure him who partook. His
+motto was: "Sic praesentibus voluptatibus utaris ut futuris non
+noceas."
+
+He disentangled pleasures from the anxieties which precede, and the
+disgust which follows them. When he became infirm and suffered pain,
+he placed the sovereign good in ease and rest, and wisely, to my
+notion, from the condition he was in, for the cessation of pain is the
+felicity of those who suffer it.
+
+As to tranquillity of mind, which constitutes another part of
+happiness, it is nothing but a simple exemption from anxiety or worry.
+But, whoso can not enjoy agreeable movements is happy in being
+guaranteed from the sensations of pain.
+
+After saying this much, I am of the opinion that ease and tranquillity
+constituted the sovereign good for Epicurus when he was infirm and
+feeble. For a man who is in a condition to enjoy pleasures, I believe
+that health makes itself felt by something more active than ease, or
+indolence, as a good disposition of the soul demands something more
+animated than will permit a state of tranquillity. We are all living
+in the midst of an infinity of good and evil things, with senses
+capable of being agreeably affected by the former and injured by the
+latter. Without so much philosophy, a little reason will enable us to
+enjoy the good as deliciously as possible and accommodate ourselves to
+the evil as patiently as we can.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Life, Letters, and Epicurean
+Philosophy of Ninon de L'Enclos, the Celebrated Beauty of the
+Seventeenth Century, by Robinson [and] Overton, ed. and translation.
+
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