The story of the wives and mistresses of Louis XIV., embraces that which is most dramatic morally (or immorally dramatic) in the history of French women. The record of the eighteenth century heroines is essentially a tragic one, while that of those of the previous century is essentially dramatic in its sadness, remorse, and repentance.
The mistress, as a rule, was unhappy; there were few months during the period of her glory, in which she was entirely free from anxiety or in which her conscience was at rest. Mme. de Montespan "was for so many years the sick nurse of a soul worn out with pride, passion, and glory." Mme. de Maintenon wrote to one of her friends: "Why cannot I give you my experience? Why cannot I make you comprehend the ennui which devours the great, and the troubles that fill their days? Do you not see that I am dying of sadness, in a fortune the vastness of which could not be easily imagined? I have been young and pretty; I have enjoyed pleasures; I have spent years in intellectual intercourse; I have attained favor; and I protest to you, my dear child, that all such conditions leave a frightful void." She said, also, to her brother, Count d'Aubigné: "I can hold out no longer; I would like to be dead." It was she too, who, after her successes, made her confession thus: "One atones heavily for the pleasures and intoxications of youth. I find, in looking back at my life, that since the age of twenty-two--which was the beginning of my fortune--I have not had a moment free from sufferings which have constantly increased."
M. Saint-Amand gives a description of the women of Louis XV. which well applies to those of his predecessor: "These pretended mistresses, who, in reality, are only slaves, seem to present themselves, one after the other, like humble penitents who come to make their apologies to history, and, like the primitive Christians, to reveal publicly the miseries, vexations, and remorses of their souls. They tell us to what their doleful successes amounted: even while their triumphal chariot made its way through a crowd of flatterers, their consciences hissed cruel accusations into their ears; like actresses before a whimsical and variable public, they were always afraid that the applause might change into an uproar, and it was with terror underlying their apparent coolness that they continued to play their sorry part.... If among these mistresses of the king there were a single one who had enjoyed her shameful triumphs in peace, who had called herself happy in the midst of her dearly bought luxury and splendor, one might have concluded that, from a merely human point of view, it is possible to find happiness in vice. But, no--there is not even one!" Massillon, the great preacher of truth and morality, said: "The worm of conscience is not dead; it is only benumbed. The alienated reason presently returns, bringing with it bitter troubles, gloomy thoughts, and cruel anxieties"--a true picture of every mistress.
The remarkable power and influence of these women, the love and adoration accorded them, ceased with their death; the memory of them did not survive overnight. When, during a terrible storm, the remains of the glorious Mme. de Pompadour were being taken to Paris, the king, seeing the funeral cortége from his window, remarked: "The Marquise will not have fine weather for her journey."
Each one of these powerful mistresses represents a complete epoch of society, morals, and customs. Mme. de Montespan--that woman whose very look meant fortune or disfavor--with all her wit and wealth, her magnificence and pomp and superb beauty--she, in all her splendor, is a type of the triumphant France, haughty, dictatorial, scornful and proud, licentious and decayed at the core. Voluptuousness and haughtiness were replaced by religiosity and repentance in Mme. de Maintenon, with her temperate character, consistency, and propriety.
The Regency was a period of scandal and wantonness, personified in the Duchess of Berry. The licentious and extravagant, yet brilliant and exquisite, frivolous but charming, intriguing and diplomatic, was represented by the talented and politically influential Mme. de Pompadour. Complete degeneracy, vice with all manner of disguise thrown off, adultery of the lowest order, were personified in the common Mme. du Barry, who might be classed with Louise of Savoy of the sixteenth century, while Mme. de Pompadour might be compared with Diana of Poitiers.
In this period the queens of France were of little importance, being too timid and modest to assert their rights--a disposition which was due sometimes to their restricted youth, spent in Catholic countries, sometimes to a naturally unassuming and sensitive nature. To this rule Maria Theresa, the wife of Louis XIV., was no exception. She inherited her sweetness of disposition and her Christian character from her mother, Isabella of France, the daughter of Henry IV. and Marie de' Medici. She was pure and candid; a type of irreproachable piety and goodness, of conjugal tenderness and maternal love; and recompensed outraged morality for all the false pride, selfish ambition, depravity, and scandals of court. She is conspicuous as a model wife, one that loved her husband, her family, and her children.
Around Maria Theresa may be grouped the noble and virtuous women of the court of Louis XIV., for she was to that age what Claude of France was under Francis I., Elizabeth of Austria under Charles V., Louise de Vaudemont under Henry III. However, in extolling these women, it must be remembered that they had not, as queens, the opportunity to participate in debauchery, licentiousness, and intrigue, as had the mistresses of their husbands; they had no power, were not consulted on state or social affairs, and had granted to them only those favors to the conferring of which the mistresses did not object.
Maria Theresa was a perfect example of the self-sacrificing mother and devoted wife. Her feelings toward the king are best expressed by the Princesse Palatine: "She had such an affection for the king that she tried to read in his eyes whatever would give him pleasure; providing he looked kindly at her, she was happy all day." Mme. de Caylus wrote: "That poor princess had such a dread of the king and such great natural timidity that she dared neither to speak to him nor to run the risk of a tête-à-tête with him. One day, I heard Mme. de Maintenon say that the king having sent for the queen, the latter requested her to go with her so that she might not appear alone in his presence: but that she (Mme. de Maintenon) conducted her only to the door of the room and there took the liberty of pushing her so as to make her enter, and that she observed such a great trembling in her whole person that her very hands shook with fright."
From about 1680, especially after the death of Mlle. de Fontanges, his last mistress, Louis XIV. began to look with disfavor upon the women of doubtful morality and to advance those who were noted for their conjugal fidelity. He became more attentive to the queen--a change of attitude which was due partly to the influence of Mme. de Maintenon and partly to the fact that he was satiated with the excesses of his debauches, by which his physical system had been almost wrecked. He would not have dared to legitimatize his bastard children, had he not been so thoroughly idolized by his greatest heroes and most powerful ministers. As an illustration, it may be remarked that the Great Condé proposed the marriage of his son to the king's daughter by Mlle. de La Vallière.
The queen became so religious that she derived more enjoyment from praying at the convents or visiting hospitals than from remaining at her magnificent apartments. She waited upon the sick with her own hands and carried food to them; she never meddled in political affairs or took much interest in social functions.
Timidity, an instinctive shrinking from the slanders, calumnies, and intrigues of the court, appeared to be the most pronounced characteristic of queens who seemed to believe themselves too inferior to their husbands to dare to offer any political counsel. While none of them were superior intellectually, they possessed dignity, good sense, and tact, "a reverential feeling for the sanctity of religion and the majesty of the throne," an admirable resignation, a painful docility and submission--qualities which might have been turned to the advantage of their owners and the state, had the former been more self-assertive.
The infidelities of their husbands caused the queen-consorts constant torture; they were forced to behold the kings' favorites becoming part of their own households and were compelled to endure the presence, as ladies in waiting, of those who, as their rivals, caused them to suffer all possible torments of jealousy and outraged conjugal love.
First among the mistresses of Louis XIV. was Mlle. de La Vallière, whom Sainte-Beuve mentions as the personification of the ideal of a lover, combining disinterestedness, fidelity, unique and delicate tenderness with a touching and sincere kindness. When, at the age of seventeen, she was presented at court, the king immediately selected her as one of his victims. Her beauty was so striking, of such an exquisitely tender type, that no woman actually rivalled her as queen of beauty. Distinguished by blond hair, dark blue eyes, a most sympathetic voice, and a complexion of rare whiteness mingled with red, she was guileless, animated, gentle, modest, graceful, unaffected, and ingenuous; although slightly lame, she was, by everyone, considered charming.
Mlle. de La Vallière was the mother of several children of whom Louis XIV. was the father. On realizing that she had rivals in the favor of the sovereign, she fled several times from the Tuileries to the convent; on her second return, the king, about to go to battle, recognized his daughter by her, whom he made a duchess. Remorse overcame the mistress so deeply that she, for the third and final time, left court. Especially on the rise to power of Mme. de Montespan was she painfully humiliated, suffering the most intense pangs of conscience. The evening before her final departure to the convent, she dined with Mme. de Montespan, to drink "the cup to the dregs and to enjoy the rejection of the world even to the last remains of its bitterness."
Guizot describes this period most vividly: "When Mme. de Montespan began to supplant her in the king's favor, the grief of Mlle. de La Vallière was so great that she thought she would die of it. Then she turned to God, penitent and in despair; twice she sought refuge in a convent at Chaillot. On leaving, she sent word to the king: 'After having lost the honor of your good graces I would have left the court sooner, if I could have prevailed upon myself never to see you again; but that weakness was so strong in me that hardly now am I capable of sacrificing it to God. After having given you all my youth, the remainder of my life is not too much for the care of my salvation.'" The king still clung to her. "He sent M. Colbert to beg her earnestly to come to Versailles that he might speak with her. M. Colbert escorted her thither and the king conversed for an hour with her and wept bitterly. Mme. de Montespan was there to meet her, with open arms and tears in her eyes." "It is all incomprehensible," adds Mme. de Sévigné; "some say that she will remain at Versailles and at court, others that she will return to Chaillot; we shall see."
Mlle. de La Vallière remained three years at court, "half penitent," she said, humbly, detained by the king's express wish, in consequence of the tempers and jealousies of Mme. de Montespan who felt herself judged and condemned by her rival's repentance. Attempts were made to turn Mlle. de La Vallière from her inclination for the Carmelites': "Madame," said Mme. Scarron to her, one day, "here are you one blaze of gold; have you really considered that, before long, at the Carmelites' you will have to wear serge?" She, however, was not to be dissuaded from her determination and was already practising, in secret, the austerities of the convent. "God has laid in this heart the foundation of great things," said Bossuet, who supported her in her conflict; "the world puts great hindrances in her way, and God great mercies; I have hopes that God will prevail; the uprightness of her heart will carry everything before it."
"When I am in trouble at the Carmelites'," said Mlle. de La Vallière, as for the last time she quitted the court, "I shall think of what those people have made me suffer." "The world itself makes us sick of the world," said Bossuet in the sermon which he preached on the day she took the veil; "its attractions have enough of illusion, its favors enough of inconstancy, its rebuffs enough of bitterness. There is enough of bitterness, enough of injustice and perfidy in the dealings of men, enough of inconsistency and capriciousness in their intractable and contradictory humors--there is enough of it all, to disgust us."
When, in 1675, she took the final vows, she cut off her beautiful hair and devoted herself to the church and to charity, receiving the veil from the queen, whose forgiveness she sought before entering the convent. The king showed himself to be such a jealous lover, that when Mlle. de La Vallière entirely abandoned him for God, he forgot her absolutely, never going to the convent to see her.
She was by far the most interesting and pathetic of the three mistresses of Louis XIV.; her heart was superior to that of either of her successors, though her mind was inferior; she belonged to a different atmosphere--such kindness, charity, penitence, resignation, and absolute abandonment to God were rare among the conspicuous French women. Sainte-Beuve says: "She loved for love, without haughtiness, coquetry, arrogance, ambitious designs, self-interest, or vanity; she suffered and sacrificed everything, humiliated herself to expiate her wrong-doing, and finally surrendered herself to God, seeking in prayer the treasures of energy and tenderness; through her heart, her mental powers attained their complete development."
The fate of Mlle. de La Vallière was the same as that of nearly all royal mistresses; abandoned and absolutely forgotten by her lover, she sought refuge and consolation in religion and God's mercy. "She was dead to me the day she entered the Carmelites'," said the king, thirty-five years later, when the modest and fervent nun at last expired, in 1710, without having ever relaxed the severities of her penance.
Of an entirely different type from Mlle. de La Vallière was that haughtiest and most supercilious of all French mistresses, Mme. de Montespan. The picture drawn by M. Saint-Amand does her full justice: "A haughty and opulent beauty, a forest of hair, flashing blue eyes, a complexion of splendid carnation and dazzling whiteness, one of those alluring and radiant countenances which shed brightness around them wherever they appear, an incisive, caustic wit, an unquenchable thirst for riches and pleasure, luxury and power, the manners of a goddess audaciously usurping the place of Juno on Olympus, passion without love, pride without true dignity, splendor without harmony--that was Mme. de Montespan." And these qualities were the secret of her success as well as of her fall.
From this description it can easily be divined of what nature was her influence and how she gained and held her power over the king. She won Louis XIV. entirely by her sensual charms, provoked him by her imperious exactions, her ungovernable fits of temper, and her daring sarcasm; always extravagant and unreasonable, she talked constantly of balls and fêtes, the glories of court and its scandals. Most exacting, yet never satisfied, she had no regard for the interests or honor of the weak king, to whose lower nature only she appealed.
Mme. de Montespan was of noble birth, being the youngest daughter of Rochechouart, first Duke of Mortemart. She was born in 1641, at the grand old château of Tonnay-Charente, and was educated at the convent of Sainte-Marie. Brought up religiously, she at first evinced a much greater tendency toward religion than toward worldly ambition and vanity. Mme. de Caylus, in herSouvenirs, wrote that "far from being born depraved, the future favorite had a nature inherently disinclined to gallantry and tending to virtue. She was flattered at being mistress, not solely for her own pleasure, but on account of the passion of the king; she believed that she could always make him desire what she had resolved never to grant him. She was in despair at her first pregnancy, consoled herself for the second one, and in all the others carried impudence as far as it could go."
She was known first as Mlle. Tonnay-Charente, and was maid of honor to the Duchess of Orléans. When, at the age of twenty-two, she married the Marquis de Montespan and became lady in waiting to the queen, her beauty, wit, and brilliant conversational powers at once made her the centre of attraction; for several years, however, the king scarcely noticed her. Upon secretly becoming his mistress in 1668 and openly being declared as such two years later, her husband attempted to interfere, and was unceremoniously banished to his estates; in 1676 he was legally separated from her. She persuaded the king to legitimatize their children, who were confided to Mme. Scarron,--afterward Mme. de Maintenon,--who later influenced the king to abandon his mistress.
Mme. de Montespan's power, lasting fourteen years, was almost unlimited, and was the epoch of courtiers intoxicated with passion and consumed by vice, infatuated with the king and his mistress, whose title asmaîtresse-en-titrewas considered an official one, conferring the same privileges and demanding the same ceremonies and etiquette as did a high court position. The only opposition incurred was from the clergy, who eventually, by uniting their forces with the influence of Mme. de Maintenon, brought about the disgrace of the mistress.
When, in 1675, she desired to perform her Easter duties publicly at Versailles, the priest refused to grant absolution until she should discontinue her wanton, adulterous life. She appealed to the king, and he referred the decision of the matter to Bossuet, who decided that it was an imperative duty to deny absolution to public sinners of notorious lives who refused to abandon them. This was immediately before her legal separation from her husband.
Influenced by the preaching of men like Bourdaloue and Bossuet, the king resolved to abandon his powerful mistress; in 1686 she was finally separated from Louis XIV., but did not leave Versailles until 1691, when, becoming reconciled to her fate, she decided to retire to a convent. Bossuet became her spiritual adviser, and described her habits in the following letter to the king:
"I find Mme. de Montespan sufficiently tranquil. She occupies herself greatly in good works. I see her much affected by the verities I propose to her, which are the same I uttered to your majesty. To her--as to you--I have offered the words by which God commands us to yield our whole hearts to him; they have caused her to shed many tears. May God establish these verities in the depths of the hearts of both of you, in order that so many tears, so much suffering, so many efforts as you have made to subdue yourselves, may not be in vain."
The king did not wholly abandon his mistress; from a material point of view, she was more powerful than ever, for Louis XIV. gave orders to his minister, Colbert, to do for Mme. de Montespan whatever she wished, and her wishes caused a heavy drain upon the treasury. The king continued to pay court to other favorites, such as the Princesse de Soubèse and Mlle. de Fontanges; the latter was his third mistress, but her career was of short duration, as one of the last acts of Mme. de Montespan was, it is said, the poisoning of Mlle. de Fontanges; this, however, is not generally accepted as true, although the Princesse Palatine wrote the following which throws suspicion upon the former favorite: "Mme. de Montespan was a fiend incarnate, but the Fontanges was good and simple. The latter is dead--because, they say, the former put poison in her milk. I do not know whether or not this is true, but what I do know well is that two of the Fontanges's people died, saying publicly that they had been poisoned." With the increasing influence of Mme. de Maintenon, the king completely forgot his former mistress.
Mme. de Montespan was possibly the most arrogant and despotic of all French mistresses and she was, also, the most humiliated. She had inspired no confidence, friendship, love, or respect in Louis XIV., who eventually looked with shame and remorse upon his relations with her. It took her sixteen years to overcome her terrible passion and to give up the court forever. Not until 1691 did she become reconciled to departure from Versailles; thenceforth, penitence conquered immoral desires. M. Saint-Amand says she not only "arrived at remorse, but at macerations, fasts, and haircloths. She limited herself to the coarsest underlinen and wore a belt and garters studded with iron points. She came at last to give all she had to the poor;" she also founded a hospital in which she nursed the sick.
While at the convent, she tried, in vain, to effect a reconciliation with her husband; not until every avenue to a social life was cut off from her, did she entirely surrender herself to charity and the service of God. In her latest years, she was so tormented by the horrors of death that she employed several women whose only occupation was to watch with her at night. She died in 1707, forgotten by the king and all her former associates; Louis XIV. formally prohibited her children, the Duke of Maine, the Comte de Toulouse, the Comte de Vexin, and Mlles. de Nantes, de Blois, and de Tours, from wearing mourning for her.
A striking contrast to Mme. de Montespan in character, disposition, morality, and birth was Mme. de Maintenon, one of the greatest and most important women in French history. What is known of her is so enveloped in calumny and falsehood and made so uncertain by dispute, that to disentangle the actual facts is almost an impossibility, despite the glowing tribute paid to her in the immense work published recently by the Comte d'Haussonville and M. Gabriel Hanotaux.
It would seem that the more the history of Mme. de Maintenon is studied, the more one is led away from a first impression--which usually proves to be an erroneous one. Thus, M. Lavallée, in his first work,Histoire des Français, wrote that she "was of the most complete aridity of heart, narrow in the scope of her affections, and meanly intriguing. She suggested fatal enterprises and inappropriate appointments; she forced mediocre and servile persons upon the king; she had, in fine, the major share in the errors and disasters of the reign of Louis XIV." A few years later he wrote, in hisHistoire de la maison royale de Saint-Cyr: "Mme. de Maintenon gave Louis XIV. none but salutary and disinterested counsels which were useful to the state and instrumental in making less heavy the burdens of the people."
Opinion in general, especially French opinion, has been very bitter toward her. History has even reproached her with having been a usurper, a tyrant, and a selfish master. The great preacher, Fénelon, wrote to her:
"They say you take too little part in affairs. Your mind is more capable than you think. You are, perhaps, a little too distrustful of yourself, or, rather, you are too much afraid to enter into discussions contrary to the inclination you have for a tranquil and meditative life."
Is this picture, left by Emile Chasles and accepted by M. Saint-Amand, truthful? "This intelligent woman, far from being too much heeded, was not enough so. There was in her a veritable love for the public welfare, a true sorrow in the midst of our misfortunes. To-day, it is necessary to retrench much from the grandeur of her worldly power and add a great deal to that of her soul." M. Saint-Amand believes her sincere when she wrote to Mme. des Ursins:
"In whatever way matters turn, I conjure you, madame, to regard me as a person incapable of directing affairs, who heard them talked too late to be skilful in them, and who hates them more than she ignores them.... My interference in them is not desired and I do not desire to interfere. They are not concealed from me, but I know nothing consecutively and am often badly informed."
The opinions of her contemporaries are not always flattering, but such are possibly due to envy and jealousy or to some purely personal prejudice. Thus, when the Duchess of Orléans, the Princesse Palatine, calls her "that nasty old thing, that wicked devil, that shrivelled-up, filthy old Maintenon, that concubine of the king," and casts upon her other gross aspersions that are unfit to be repeated, one must remember that the calumniator was a German, the daughter of the Elector Palatine Charles-Louis, a woman honest in her morals, but shameless in her speech, who loved the beauties of nature more than those of the palaces; more shocked at hypocrites than at religion or irreligion, she took Mme. de Maintenon to be a type of the impostors whom she detested. It was her son who became regent, and it was her son who married one of the illegitimate daughters of Louis XIV.--an alliance of which his mother had a horror.
The memoirs of Saint-Simon are interesting, but the odious picture he has drawn of Mme. de Maintenon is hardly in accord with later appreciations. M. Saint-Amand sums up the two classes of critics thus:
"The revolutionary school which likes to drag the memory of the great king through the mire, naturally detests the eminent woman who was that king's companion, his friend and consoler. Writers of this school would like to make of her a type not only odious and fatal, but ungraceful and unsympathetic, without radiance, charm or any sort of fascination. She is too frequently called to mind under the aspect of a worn old woman, stiff and severe, with tearless eyes and a face without a smile. We forget that in her youth she was one of the prettiest women of her time, that her beauty was wonderfully preserved, and that in her old age she retained that superiority of style and language, that distinction of manner and exquisite tact, that gentle firmness of character, that charm and elevation of mind, which, at every period of her life, gained her so much praise and so many friends."
Mme. de Maintenon was born in prison. Her maiden name was Françoise d'Aubigné. She was the granddaughter of Agrippa d'Aubigné, the historian. Her father had planned to settle in the Carolinas, and his correspondence with the English government, to that effect, was treated as treason; he was thrown into prison, where his wife voluntarily shared his fate and where the future Mme. de Maintenon was born. After the death of her father, she was confided to her aunt, Mme. de Villette, a Calvinist, who trained her in the principles of Protestantism. Because of the refusal of her daughter to attend mass, her mother put her in charge of the Countess of Neuillant who, with great difficulty, converted Françoise back to Catholicism.
At the home of the Countess of Neuillant, she often met Scarron, the comic poet--a paralytic and cripple--who offered her money with which to pay for admission to a convent, a proposition which she refused; subsequently, however, the countess sent her to the Ursulines to be educated. When, after two years, she lost her mother and was thus left without home, fortune, or future prospects, she consented, at the age of seventeen, to marry the poet. Thus, born in a prison, without even a dowry, harshly reared by a mother who was under few obligations to life, more harshly treated in the convent, introduced as a poor relation into the society of her aunt and to the friends of her godmother, the Countess of Neuillant, she early learned to distrust life and suspect man, and to restrain her ambitions.
Exceedingly beautiful, graceful, and witty, she soon won her way to the brilliant and fashionable society of the crippled wit, buffoon, and poet, who was coarse, profane, ungodly, and physically an unsightly wreck. In this society, which the burlesque poet amused by his inexhaustible wit and fancy, and his frank, Gallic gayety, she showed an infinite amount of tact and soon made his salon the most prominent social centre of Paris. There, Scarron, never tolerated a stupid person, no matter of what blood or rank.
When asked what settlement he proposed to make upon his wife, he replied: "Immortality." At another time, he remarked: "I shall not make her commit any follies, but I shall teach her a great many." On his deathbed he said: "My only regret is that I cannot leave anything to my wife with whom I have every imaginable reason to be content." In this free-and-easy salon, a young noble said, soon after the marriage of Scarron: "If it were a question of taking liberties with the queen or Mme. Scarron, I would not deliberate; I would sooner take them with the queen."
The reputation made by the young Mme. Scarron gained her many influential friends, especially among court people. At the death of her husband, in 1660, to avoid trouble with his family, she renounced the marriage dowry of twenty-four thousand livres. Her friends procured her a pension of two thousand livres from the queen. Thus freed from care, she lived according to her inclination, which tended toward pleasing and doing good; taking good cheer and her services voluntarily and unaffectedly to all families, she gradually made herself a necessity among them--thus she laid the foundation of her future greatness. She was received by the best families, grew in favor everywhere, and even won over all her enemies. Modest, complaisant, promptly and readily rendering a favor, prudent, practical and virtuous, her one desire was to make friends, not so much for the purpose of using them, but because she realized that a person in humble circumstances cannot have too many friends.
Her portrait as a widow is admirably drawn by M. Saint-Amand: "Mme. Scarron seeks esteem, not love. To please while remaining virtuous, to endure, if need be, privations and even poverty, but to win the reputation of a strong character, to deserve the sympathy and approbation of honest persons--such is the direction of all her efforts. Well dressed, though very simply; discreet and modest, intelligent anddistingué, with that patrician elegance which luxury cannot create, but which is inborn and comes by nature only; pious, with a sincere and gentle piety; less occupied with herself than with others; talking well and--what is much rarer--knowing how to listen; taking an interest in the joys and sorrows of her friends, and skilful in amusing and consoling them--she is justly regarded as one of the most amiable as well as one of the superior women in Paris. Economical and simple in her tastes, she makes her accounts balance perfectly, thanks to an annual pension of two thousand livres granted her by Queen Anne of Austria."
When Mme. Scarron was about to leave Paris because of lack of funds and the loss of her pension, after the death of Queen Anne, her friend Mme. de Montespan, the king's mistress, interfered in her behalf and had the pension renewed, thus inadvertently paving the way for her own downfall. Three years later Mme. Scarron was established in an isolated house near Paris, where she received the natural children of Louis XIV. and Mme. de Montespan, as they arrived, in quick succession, in 1669, 1670, 1672, 1673, and 1674. There, acting as governess, she hid them from the world. This is the only blemish upon the fair record of her life. It is maintained by her detractors that a virtuous woman would not have undertaken the education of the doubly adulterous children of Louis XIV. (thus, in a way, encouraging adultery), and that she would have given up her charge upon the first proposals of love.
However deep this stain may be considered, one must remember that the standard of honor at the court of Louis XIV. did not encourage delicacy in matters of love, and Mme. Scarron knew only the standard of society; her morality was no more extraordinary than was her intelligence, and it was to her credit that she preserved intact her honor and her virtue. At first the king looked with much dissatisfaction upon her appointment, not admiring the extreme gravity and reserve of the young widow; however, the unusual order of her talents and wisdom soon attracted his attention, and her entrance at court was speedily followed by quarrels between the mistress and Louis XIV. In 1674 the king, wishing to acknowledge his recognition of her merits, purchased the estate of Maintenon for her and made her Marquise de Maintenon.
Her primary object became the gaining of the favor of Mme. de Montespan; for this purpose she taught herself humility, while toward the king she directed the forces of her dignity, reserve, and intellectual attainments. Being the very opposite of the mistress who won and retained him by sensuous charms (in which the king was fast losing pleasure and satisfaction), she soon effected a change by entertaining her master with the solid attainments of her mind--religion, art, literature.
Mme. de Maintenon was always amiable and sympathetic, kind and thoughtful, never irritating, crossing, or censuring the king; wonderfully judicious, modest, self-possessed, and calm, she was irreproachable in conduct and morals, tolerating no improper advances. Although the characteristics and general deportment of Mme. de Montespan were entirely different from those of Mme. de Maintenon, the latter entertained true friendship for her benefactress, displaying astonishing tact, shrewdness, and self-control.
If Mme. de Maintenon were not, at first, loved by the king, it was because she appeared to him too ideal, sublime, spirituelle, too severely sensible. Then came the turning point; at forty years of age she was "a beautiful and stately woman with brilliant dark eyes, clear complexion, beautiful white teeth, and graceful manners;" sedate, self-possessed, and astonished at nothing, she had learned the art of waiting, and studied the king--showing him those qualities he desired to see.
Her aim became to take the king from his mistress and lead him back to the queen. After gaining his confidence by her sincerity and trustworthiness, and making herself indispensable to him, she succeeded in bringing about the desired separation, through the medium of the dauphiness, whom she won over to her cause. Thus, without perfidy, hypocrisy, intrigue, or manoeuvring, by simply being herself, she replaced the haughty and beautiful Mme. de Montespan.
When, after the queen's death, and after having lived about the king for fifteen years, "she had succeeded in making the devotee take precedence of the lover, when piety had overcome passion, when religion had effected its change, then Louis the Great offered his hand in marriage to her who had only veneration, gratitude, and devotion for him, but no passion or love." Reasons of state demanded the secrecy of the marriage; for had he raised her to the throne, political complications would have arisen and disturbed his subsequent career; Mme. de Maintenon fully appreciated the intricacies of the situation, and was therefore content to remain what she was.
She came to the king when he was beginning to feel the effects of his former mode of life; he needed fidelity and friendship, and he saw these in her. His feelings for her are well described in the following extract by M. Saint-Amand:
"To sum up: the king's sentiment for her was of the most complex nature. There was in it a mingling of religion and of physical love, a calculation of reason and an impulse of the heart, an aspiration after the mild joys of family life and a romantic inclination--a sort of compact between French good sense, subjugated by the wit, tact, and wisdom of an eminent woman, and Spanish imagination allured by the fancy of having extricated this elect woman from poverty in order to make her almost a queen. Finally, it must be noted that Louis XIV., always religiously inclined, was convinced that Mme. de Maintenon had been sent to him by Heaven for his salvation, and that the pious counsels of this saintly woman, who knew how to render devotion so agreeable and attractive, seemed to him to be so many inspirations from on High."
It must not be inferred, however, that the feeling for Mme. de Maintenon was purely ideal. "He was unwilling to remarry," says the Abbé de Choisy, "because of tenderness for his people. He had, already, three grandsons, and wisely judged that the princes of a second marriage might, in course of time, cause civil wars. On the other hand, he could not dispense with a wife and Mme. de Maintenon pleased him greatly. Her gentle and scintillating wit promised him an agreeable intercourse which would refresh him after the cares of royalty. Her person was still engaging and her age prevented her from having children."
As his wife, Mme. de Maintenon took more interest in the king and his family than she did in the affairs of the kingdom. To be the wife of the hearth and home, to educate the princes, to rear the young Duchess of Bourgogne, granddaughter of Louis XIV., to calm and ease the old age of the king and to distract and amuse him, became her sole objects in life. Her power, thus directed, became almost unbounded; she was the dispenser of favors and the real ruler, sitting in the cabinet of the king; and her counsels were so wise that they soon became invaluable.
At court, she opposed all foolish extravagance, such as the endless fêtes and amusements of all kinds which had become so popular under Mme. de Montespan--a procedure which caused her the greatest difficulties and provoked revolts and quarrels in the royal family. By her prudence, tact, wisdom, and the loyalty of her friendship, she won and retained the respect and favor--if not the love--of everyone. Her reputation was never tarnished by scandal. "When one reflects that Louis XIV. was only forty-seven years old and in the prime of life and Mme. de Montespan in the full blaze of her marvellous beauty, that this woman of humble birth, in her youth a Protestant, poor, a governess, the widow of a low, comic poet, should win so proud a man as Louis XIV., seems incredible."
When one considers that throughout life her one aspiration was an irreproachable conduct, that her manner of action was always defensive, never offensive, that her chief aim was to restore the king to the queen (who died in her arms) and not to replace his mistress, one cannot withhold admiration and esteem from this truly great woman who accomplished all those honorable designs.
The obstacles to be conquered before reaching her goal were indeed numerous, but she managed them all. There were so many persons hostile to her,--mistresses and intriguers, bishops and priests, courtesans and valets, princes and members of the royal family,--to overcome whom she had to be on her guard, make use of every opportunity, show a rare knowledge of society and court, a profound skill and address, resolution and will; and she was equal to all occasions.
Her greatest defect was the narrowness of her religious views. Entirely in the hands of her spiritual advisers, obeying them faithfully and blindly, she was not inclined to theological investigation, but was sincerely devout. More interested in the various persons than in doctrines, she showed a passion for making bishops, abbots, and priests, as well as for negotiating compromises, reconcilingamours propresand doing away with all religious hatred. Lacking, above all else, clearness of conception, promptness and firmness of decision, she was finally persuaded to encourage the bigotry of Louis XIV. and his intolerance toward those who differed from him. Hence, in 1685, she permitted that fearfully destructive persecution of the Protestants, which caused over three hundred thousand of France's most solid people to leave the country; and by her fanaticism and false zeal, she caused the king to be a party to that awful catastrophe.
"This one act of hers counterbalances nearly all her virtues, and we remember her more as the murderess of thousands of innocents than as the calm and virtuous governess. But we must remember the nature of her advisers and the eternal policy of the Catholic Church, which are ever identical with absolutism. To uphold the institutions and opinions already established, was the one sentiment of the age; innovation, progress, were destructive--Mme. de Maintenon became the watchful guardian of royalty and the Church." Such is the verdict of English opinion. M. Saint-Amand judges the affair differently:
"A woman as pious and reasonable as she was, animated always by the noblest intentions, loving her country and always showing sympathy for the poor people--not merely in words but in deeds as well--detesting war and loving justice and peace, always moderate and irreproachable in her conduct--such a woman cannot be the mischievous, crafty, malicious, and vindictive bigot imagined by many writers; she did not encourage such an act, nor would her nature permit to do so.... The prayer she uttered every morning, best portrays the woman and her rôle: 'Lord, grant me to gladden the king, to console him, to sadden him when it must be for Thy glory. Cause me to hide from him nothing which he ought to know through me, and which no one else would have courage to tell him.' ... To Madame de Glapion she said: 'I would like to die before the king; I would go to God; I would cast myself at the foot of His throne; I would offer Him the desires of a soul that He would have purified; I would pray Him to grant the king greater enlightenment, more love for his people, more knowledge of the state of the provinces, more aversion for the perfidy of the countries, more horror of the ways in which his authority is abused: and God would hear my prayers.'"
This pious woman was weary of life before her marriage, and but changed the nature of her misery upon reaching the highest goal open to a woman. Marly, Versailles, Fontainebleau were only different names for the same servitude. When she had attained her desire, she thought her repose assured; instead, her ennui, her disgust of life and the world, only increased; realizing this, she began to direct her thoughts entirely toward God and her aspirations toward things not of this earth--hence the almost complete absence of her influence in politics.
She was never happy, and that her life was a disappointment to her may be gathered from the following words from her pen: "Flee from men as from your mortal enemies; never be alone with them. Take no pleasure in hearing that you are pretty, amiable, that you have a fine voice. The world is a malicious deceiver which never means what it says; and the majority of men who say such things to young girls, do it hoping to find some means of ruining them."
Her most intense desire seemed to be to please, and be esteemed--to receive thehonneur du monde, which appeared to be her sole motive for living. When in power, she did not use her influence as the intriguing women of the epoch would have done, because she did not possess their qualities--taste, breadth of vision, and selfish ambitions. Her objects in life were the reform of a wicked court, the extirpation of heresy, the elevation of men of genius, and the improvement of the society and religion of France. After the death of the king (in 1715), she retired to Saint-Cyr, and spent the remainder of her life in acts of charity and devotional exercises.
After the king's death she dismissed all her servants and disposed of her carriages as well, "unable to reconcile herself to feeding horses while so many young girls were in need," as she said. For almost four years she peacefully and happily lived in a very modest apartment. She seldom went out and then only to the village to visit the sick and the poor. On June 10, 1717, when she was eighty-one years old, Peter the Great went to Saint-Cyr for the purpose of seeing and talking to the greatest woman of France. He found her confined to her bed; the chamber being but dimly lighted, he thrust aside the curtain in order to examine the features of the woman who had ruled the destinies of France for so many years. The Czar talked to her for some time, and when he asked Madame de Maintenon from what she was suffering, she replied: "From great old age." She died on August 15, 1719, and was buried in the choir of the church of Saint-Cyr, where a modest slab of marble indicated the spot where her body reposed until, in 1794, when the church was being transformed into hospital wards, "the workmen opened the vault, and took out the body and dragged it into the court with dreadful yells and threw it, stripped and mutilated, into a hole in the cemetery."
The greatest work of Mme. de Maintenon was the founding of the Seminary of Saint-Cyr, which the king granted to her about the time of their marriage and of his illness; it was probably intended as the penance of a sick man who wished to make reparation for the wrongs inflicted upon some of the young girls of the nobility, and as a wedding gift to Mme. de Maintenon. There, aided by nuns, she cared for and educated two hundred and fifty pupils, dowerless daughters of impoverished nobles. It was "the veritable offspring of her who was never a daughter, a wife, nor a mother." There she was happy and content; there she recalled her own youth when she was poor and forsaken; there she found respite from the turmoils and agitations of Versailles; there she was supreme; there she governed absolutely and was truly loved.
For thirty years she was queen at Saint-Cyr, visiting it every other day and teaching the young girls for whom it was a protection against the world. Since childhood, she had been so accustomed to serve herself, to wait upon others and to care for the smallest details of the management of the household, that she introduced this spirit into society and at Saint-Cyr, where she managed every detail, from the linen to the provisions; this showed a reasonable and well-balanced mind, but not any high order of intelligence.
Of the young girls in her charge, she desired to make model women, characterized by simplicity and piety; they were to be free from morbid curiosity of mind, were to practise absolute self-denial and to devote their lives to a practical labor. Her advice was: "Be reasonable or you will be unhappy; if you are haughty, you will be reminded of your misery, but if you are humble, people will recall your birth.... Commence by making yourself loved, without which you will never succeed. Is it not true that, had you not loved me or had you had an aversion for me, you would not have accepted, with such good grace, the counsels that I have given you? This is absolutely certain--the most beautiful things when taught by persons who displease us, do not impress but rather harden us."
A counsel that strikes home forcibly to-day, one which strongly attacks the modern fad of neglecting home for church, is expressed well in one of her letters: "Your piety will not be right if, when married, you abandon your husband, your children and your servants, to go to the churches at times when you are not obliged to go there. When a young girl says that a woman would do better properly to raise her children and instruct her servants, than to spend her morning in church, one can accommodate one's self to such religion, which she will cause to be loved and respected."
At the hour of leisure, she gave the girls those familiar talks which were anticipated by them with so much pleasure, and extracts from which are still cherished by the young women of France. She believed that the aim of instruction for young girls should be to educate them to be Christian women with well-balanced and logical minds. With her varied experience of the ups and downs of life, she gradually came to the conclusion that, after all, there is nothing in the world so good as sound common sense, but one that is not enamored of itself, which obeys established laws and knows its own limits. Her sex is intended to obey, thus her reason was a Christian reason.
"You can be truly reasonable only in proportion as you are subservient to God.... Never tell children fantastic stories, nor permit them to believe them; give them things for what they are worth. Never tell them stories of which, when they grow to independent reasoning, you must disillusion them. You must talk to a girl of seven as seriously and with as much reason as to a young lady of twenty. You must take part in the pleasures of children, but never accommodate them with a childish language or with foolish or puerile ways. You can never be too reasonable or too sane. Religion, reason, and truth are always good."
To appreciate the importance of Mme. de Maintenon's position and the revolutionary effect which her attitude produced upon the customs of the time, one must remember with what she had to contend. Hers was a period of passion and adventure--a period which was followed by sorrow and disaster. The novels of Mlle. de Scudéry, which were at the height of their popularity, had over-refined the sentiments; thechevaleresqueheroes and picturesque heroines turned the heads of young girls, who dreamed of an ideal and perfect love; their one longing was for the romantic--for the enchantments and delights of life. In this stilted and amorous atmosphere, Mme. de Maintenon preserved her poise and fought vigorously against the fads of the day. The young girls under her care were taught to love just as they were taught to do other things--with reason. Also, she guarded against the weaknesses of nature and the flesh. "Than Mme. de Maintenon, no one ever better knew the evils of the world without having fallen prey to them," says Sainte-Beuve; "and no one ever satisfied and disgusted the world more, while charming it at the same time."
Mme. de Maintenon's ideal methods of education were not immediately effective; there were many periods of hardship, apprehension, and doubt. Thus, when Racine'sEsther(written at the request of Mme. de Maintenon, to be presented by the pupils at Saint-Cyr) was performed, there sprang up a taste for poetry, writing, and literature of all kinds. The acting turned the girls' thoughts into other channels and threatened to counteract the teachings of simplicity and reason; no one ever showed more genuine good sense, wholesomeness of mind, and breadth of view, than were displayed by Mme. de Maintenon in dealing with these disheartening drawbacks.
In endeavoring to impress upon those young minds the correct use of language and the proper style of writing, she wrote for them models of letters which showed simplicity, precision, truth, facility, and wonderful clearness; and these were imitated by them in their replies to her.
She wished, above all, to make them realize that her experience with that social and court life, for which they longed, was one of disappointment: that was a world apart, in which amusing and being amused was the one occupation. She had passed wearily through that period of life, and sought repose, truth, tranquillity, and religious resignation; to make those young spirits feel the fallacy of such a mode of existence was her earnest desire, and her efforts in that direction were characterized by a zeal, energy, and persistence which were productive of wonderful results. That was one phase of her greatness and influence.
But Mme. de Maintenon was somewhat too severe, too narrow, too strict,--one might say, too ascetic,--in her teaching. There was too little of that which, in this world, cheers, invigorates, and enlivens. Her instruction was all reason, without relieving features; it lacked what Sainte-Beuve calls thedon des larmes(gift of tears). Hers was a noble, just, courageous, and delicate judgment; but it was without the softening qualities of the truly feminine, which calls for tears and affection, tenderness and sympathy.
She remains in educational affairs the greatest woman of the seventeenth century, if not of all her countrywomen. M. Faguet says: "This widow of Scarron, who was nearly Queen of France, was born minister of public instruction." She powerfully upheld the cause of morality, was a liberal patroness of education and learning, and all aspiring geniuses were encouraged and financially aided by her. It was she who impressed upon Louis XIV. the truth of the existence of a God to whom he was accountable for his acts--a teaching which contributed no little to the general purification of morals at court.
The writings of Mme. de Maintenon occupy a very high place in the history of French literature; in fact, her letters have often been compared with those of Mme. de Sévigné, although, unlike the latter, she never wrote merely to please, but to instruct, to convert, and to console. In her works there was no pretension to literary style; they were sermons on morals, characterized by discretion and simplicity, dignity and persuasiveness, seriousness and earnestness; Napoleon placed her letters above those of Mme. de Sévigné. M. Saint-Amand says of her writings: "More reflection than vivacity, more wisdom than passion, more gravity than charm, more authority than grace, more solidity than brilliancy--such are the characteristics of a correspondence which might justify the expression, the style is the woman."
He gives, also, the following discriminating comparison between the two writers: "Enjoyment, Gallic animation, good-tempered gayety, fall to the lot of Mme. de Sévigné; what marks Mme. de Maintenon is experience, reason, profundity. The one laughs from ear to ear--the other barely smiles. The one has pleasant illusions about everything, admiration which borders onnaïveté, ecstasies when in the presence of the royal sun: the other never permits herself to be fascinated by either the king or the court, by men, women, or things. She has seen human grandeur too close at hand not to understand its nothingness, and her conclusions bear the imprint of a profound sadness. At times Mme. de Sévigné, also, has attacks of melancholy, but the cloud passes quickly and she is again in the sunshine. Gayety--frank, communicative, radiant gayety--is the basis of the character of this woman who is more witty, seductive, and amusing than is any other. Mme. de Sévigné shines by imagination--Mme. de Maintenon by judgment. The one permits herself to be dazzled, intoxicated--the other always preserves her indifference. The one exaggerates the splendors of the court--the other sees them as they are. The one is more of a woman--the other more of a saint."
Mme. de Maintenon may be called "a woman of fate," She was never daughter, mother, or wife; as a child, she was not loved by her mother, and her father was worthless; married to two men, both aged beyond their years, she was, indeed, but an instrument of fate. Truthful, candid, and discreet she was entirely free from all morbid tendencies, and was modest and chaste from inclination as well as from principle. Though outwardly cold, proud, and reserved, yet in her deportment toward those who were fortunate enough to possess her esteem, she was kind--even loving. While not intelligent to a remarkable degree, she was prudent, circumspect, and shrewd, never losing her self-control. When once interested, and convinced as to the proper course, she displayed marvellous strength of will, sagacity, and personal force. Beautiful and witty, she easily adapted herself to any position in which she might be placed; though intolerant and narrow in her religious views, she was otherwise gentle, charitable, and unselfish. Therefore, it is evident that she possessed, to a greater degree than did any other woman of her time, unusual as well as desirable qualities--qualities that made her powerful and incomparable.