"Souvent, quoique léger, je lasse qui me porte.Un mot de ma façon vaut un ample discours.J'ai sous Louis le Grand commencé d'avoir cours,Mince, long, plat, étroit, d'une étoffe peu forte."Les doigts les moins savants me taillent de la sorte;Sous mille noms divers je parais tous les jours;Aux valets étourdis je suis d'un grand secours.Le Louvre ne voit point ma figure à sa porte."Une grossière main vient la plupart du tempsMe prendre de la main des plus honnêtes gens.Civil, officieux, je suis né pour la ville."Dans le plus rude hiver j'ai le dos toujours nu:Et, quoique fort commode, à peine m'a-t-on vu,Qu'ausitôt négligé, je deviens inutile."
"Souvent, quoique léger, je lasse qui me porte.Un mot de ma façon vaut un ample discours.J'ai sous Louis le Grand commencé d'avoir cours,Mince, long, plat, étroit, d'une étoffe peu forte.
"Souvent, quoique léger, je lasse qui me porte.
Un mot de ma façon vaut un ample discours.
J'ai sous Louis le Grand commencé d'avoir cours,
Mince, long, plat, étroit, d'une étoffe peu forte.
"Les doigts les moins savants me taillent de la sorte;Sous mille noms divers je parais tous les jours;Aux valets étourdis je suis d'un grand secours.Le Louvre ne voit point ma figure à sa porte.
"Les doigts les moins savants me taillent de la sorte;
Sous mille noms divers je parais tous les jours;
Aux valets étourdis je suis d'un grand secours.
Le Louvre ne voit point ma figure à sa porte.
"Une grossière main vient la plupart du tempsMe prendre de la main des plus honnêtes gens.Civil, officieux, je suis né pour la ville.
"Une grossière main vient la plupart du temps
Me prendre de la main des plus honnêtes gens.
Civil, officieux, je suis né pour la ville.
"Dans le plus rude hiver j'ai le dos toujours nu:Et, quoique fort commode, à peine m'a-t-on vu,Qu'ausitôt négligé, je deviens inutile."
"Dans le plus rude hiver j'ai le dos toujours nu:
Et, quoique fort commode, à peine m'a-t-on vu,
Qu'ausitôt négligé, je deviens inutile."
[Often, although light, I weary the person who carries me. A word in my manner is worth a whole discourse. I began under Louis the Great to be in vogue,—slight, long, flat, narrow, of a very slight material.
The most unskilled fingers cut me in their way; under a thousand different forms I appear every day; I am a great aid to the astonished valets. The Louvre does not see my face at its door.
A coarse hand most of the time receives me from the hand of the nicest people. Civil, officious, I am born for the city.
In the coldest weather, my back is always bare; and, although quite convenient, scarcely have they seen me, when I am neglected and useless.—Visiting card.]
A more interesting one and one that caused no little amusement is the following:
"Je suis niais et fin, honnête et malhonnête,Moins sincère à la cour qu'en un simple taudis.Je fais d'un air plaisant trembler les plus hardis,Le fort me laisse aller, le sage m'arrête."A personne sans moi l'on ne fait jamais fête:J'embellis quelquefois, quelquefois, j'enlaidis.Je dédaigne tantôt, tantôt j'applaudis;Pour m'avoir en partage, il faut n'être pas bête."Plus mon trône est petit, plus il a de beauté.Je l'agrandis pourtant d'un et d'autre côté,Faisant voir bien souvent des défauts dont on jase."Je quitte mon éclat quand je suis sans témoins,Et je me puis vanter enfin d'être la choseQui contente le plus et qui coûte le moins."
"Je suis niais et fin, honnête et malhonnête,Moins sincère à la cour qu'en un simple taudis.Je fais d'un air plaisant trembler les plus hardis,Le fort me laisse aller, le sage m'arrête.
"Je suis niais et fin, honnête et malhonnête,
Moins sincère à la cour qu'en un simple taudis.
Je fais d'un air plaisant trembler les plus hardis,
Le fort me laisse aller, le sage m'arrête.
"A personne sans moi l'on ne fait jamais fête:J'embellis quelquefois, quelquefois, j'enlaidis.Je dédaigne tantôt, tantôt j'applaudis;Pour m'avoir en partage, il faut n'être pas bête.
"A personne sans moi l'on ne fait jamais fête:
J'embellis quelquefois, quelquefois, j'enlaidis.
Je dédaigne tantôt, tantôt j'applaudis;
Pour m'avoir en partage, il faut n'être pas bête.
"Plus mon trône est petit, plus il a de beauté.Je l'agrandis pourtant d'un et d'autre côté,Faisant voir bien souvent des défauts dont on jase.
"Plus mon trône est petit, plus il a de beauté.
Je l'agrandis pourtant d'un et d'autre côté,
Faisant voir bien souvent des défauts dont on jase.
"Je quitte mon éclat quand je suis sans témoins,Et je me puis vanter enfin d'être la choseQui contente le plus et qui coûte le moins."
"Je quitte mon éclat quand je suis sans témoins,
Et je me puis vanter enfin d'être la chose
Qui contente le plus et qui coûte le moins."
[I am both stupid and bright, honest and dishonest; less sincere at court than in a simple hovel; with a pleasant air, I make the boldest tremble, the strong let me pass, the wise stop me.
There is no joy to anyone without me; I embellish at times, at times I distort; I disdain and I applaud; to share me, one must not be stupid.
The smaller my throne, the greater my beauty; I enlarge it, however, on both sides, often showing defects which are made sport of.
I leave my brilliancy when I am without witness, and I can boast of being the thing which contents the most and costs the least.—A smile.]
Critics often reproach Mlle. de Scudéry for having portrayed herself—as Sapho—in a flattering light in her novelCyrus; but it must be remembered that at that time this was a common custom, women of the highest quality indulging in such pastimes, there even being a prominent salon where verbal portraiture was the sole occupation. No one has written more or better on the condition of woman, for she, above all, had the experience upon which to base her writings. The idea of woman's education and aim, which was generally entertained by the intelligent and modest women of the seventeenth century, is well expressed by Mlle. de Scudéry in the following:
"The difficulty of knowing something with seemliness does not come to a woman so much from what she knows as from what others do not know; and it is, without doubt, singularity that makes it difficult to be as others are not, without being exposed to blame. Seriously, is not the ordinary idea of the education of women a peculiar one? They are not to be coquettes nor gallants, and yet they are carefully taught all that is peculiar to gallantry without being permitted to know anything that can strengthen their virtue or occupy their minds. Don't imagine, however, that I do not wish woman to be elegant, to dance or to sing; but I should like to see as much care devoted to her mind as to her body, and between being ignorant andsavanteI should like to see a road taken which would prevent annoyance from an impertinent sufficiency or from a tiresome stupidity. I should like very much to be able to say of anyone of my sex that she knows a hundred things of which she does not boast, that she has a well-balanced mind, that she speaks well, writes correctly, and knows the world; but I do not wish it to be said of her that she is afemme savante. The best women of the world when they are together in a large number rarely say anything that is worth anything and are more ennuyé than if they were alone; on the contrary, there is something that I cannot express, which makes it possible for men to enliven and divert a company of ladies more than the most amiable woman on earth could do."
Mlle. de Scudéry considered marriage a long slavery and preferred virtuous celibacy enlivened by platonic gallantry. When youth and adorers had passed away, she found consolation in interchanges of wit, congenial conversation, and the cultivation of the mind by study. Making of love a doctrine, a manual of morals orsavoir-vivre, has had a refining effect upon civilization; but the process has rendered the emotion itself too subtle, select, narrow, enervating, and exhausting; it has resulted in the production of splendid books with heroes and heroines of the higher type, and has purified the atmosphere of social life; this phase of its influence, however, is felt by only a set of the élite, and its adherents are scattered through every age and every country. Mlle. de Scudéry was a perfect representative of that type, but healthy and normal rather than morbidly æsthetic.
An opposition party soon arose, formed by those, especially, who entertained different ideas of the sphere and duties of woman. Just as the type of the salon of Mme. de Rambouillet degenerated among the aristocracy into thoseof the Hôtel de Condé, Mme. de Sablé, and Mlle. de Luxembourg, so the type of the salon of Mlle. de Scudéry gave rise to a number of literary salons among thebourgeoisie. The aim of the latter institutions was to imitate her example in endeavoring to spread the taste for courtesy, elegant manners and the higher forms of learning; all these aspirations, however, drifted into mere affectation, while the requisites of welcome at the original salon were simplicity, freedom from affectation, delicacy, amiability, and dignity.
As a writer, Mlle. de Scudéry occupies no mean position in the history of French literature of the seventeenth century. Her descriptions and anecdotes possess a wonderful charm and display unusual power of analysis; in them, Victor Cousin recognizes a truly virile spirit. In the history of the French novel, she forms a transition period, her productions having both a psychological interest and a historical value of a very high degree. Through her finesse and marvellous feminine penetration, her truthful, delicate and fine portraitures, which were widely imitated later, she has exerted an extensive influence.
With Mlle. de Scudéry "we have substance, real character painting, true psychological penetration, and realism in observation," while previously the novel, under such men as Gomberville and La Calprenède, was imaginative and full of fancy. Her talent, then, in that field, lay in the analysis and development of sentiments, in delineation of character, in the creation and reproduction of refined and ingenious conversations, and in her reflections on subjects pertaining to morality and literature—in all of which she displayed justness and entire liberty and independence of thought. Her poetry, delicate compliment or innocent gallantries, was a mere bagatelle of the salon.
Charming as well as accomplished, Mlle. de Scudéry was as intelligent, witty, and intellectual a woman ascould be found in the seventeenth century; and in the history of that period she retains an undisputed position as one of its great leaders of thought and progress. Her salon, inasmuch as the salon of Mme. de Lambert was not opened until 1710, and therefore the discussion of it belongs properly to the beginning of the eighteenth century, really closes the literary progress of the seventeenth century.
The influence of the seventeenth century salon was of a threefold nature—literary, moral, and social. According to the salon conception, artistic, literary, or musical pleasure being derived from form and mode of expression, it possessed a special and unique interest in proportion to the efforts made and the difficulties surmounted in attaining that form and expression: thus, woman introduced a new standard of excellence.
Préciositétreated language not as a work of art, but as a medium for the display of individual linguistic dexterity; giving no thing its proper name, it delighted in paraphrase, allusion, word play, unexpected comparisons and abundance of metaphors, and revelled in the elusive, delicate, subtle, and complex. Hence conversation turned constantly to love and gallantry; thus woman developed to a wonderful degree, unattainable to but few, the art of conversation, politeness and courtesy of manners, and social relations, at the same time purifying language and enriching it.
French women of the seventeenth century are condemned for having treated serious things too lightly; and it is said that "in confining the French mind to the observation of society and its attractions, she has restricted and retarded a more realistic and larger activity." In answer to this it may be asserted that the French mind was not prepared for a broader field until it had passed through theprocess of expurgating, refining, drilling, and disciplining. Ifpréciositéinfluenced politics, it was by developing diplomacy, for, from the time that this spirit began to spread, French diplomacy became world-renowned.
The social influence of the movement may be better appreciated by considering the condition of woman in earlier periods. Having practically no position except that of housewife or mother, she was merely a source of pleasure for man, for whom she had little or no respect. Theprécieuses, on the contrary, exacted respect, honor, and a place beside man, as rights that belonged to them.
As the outcome of their desire to think, feel, and act with greater delicacy, women introduced propriety in expression, finesse in analysis, keenness ofesprit, psychological subtleness: qualities that surely tended to higher standards of morality, purer social relations, finer and more subtle diplomacy, more elegance and precision in literature. Therefore,préciositéin France had a wholesome influence, which was possible because woman had won for herself her rightful position, and her aspirations were toward social and moral elevation.
In general, the women of France have always been conscious of their duty, their importance, and their limitations, appreciating their power and cultivating the characteristics that attract man and retain his respect and attention: sociability, morality,esprit, artistic appreciation, sensitiveness, tact. These qualities became manifest to a remarkable degree in French women of the seventeenth century, and created in every writer, great or unimportant, the desire to win their favor. Thus, Corneille strove to write dramas with which he might establish the reign of decency on a stage the liberties of which had previously made the theatre inaccessible to woman; hence, his characters of humanity (Cid) and politeness (Menteur).
The purpose of the French Academy itself was not different from that of theprécieuses. Richelieu, realizing that every great talent accepted the discipline of these women, sought to use this power for his own ends by interesting the world of letters in the accomplishment of his plans for a general political unity. Thus, when the first period ofpréciositéhad reached its highest point and was beginning to decline, and other smaller and envious social groups were forming about Paris and causing a conflict of ideas, Richelieu conceived the scheme of joining all in a union, with strong ideals and with a language as dignified as the Latin and the Greek. The result was the formation of the French Academy. From this time begins the decline of the authority of woman; for while she still exerted a powerful influence, it was no longer absolute. After the decline of the Hôtel de Rambouillet, feminine influence became more general, expending itself in petty rivalries, gossip, intrigues, and partaking of the nature of that court life which was filled by the young king with parties, feasts, collations, walks, carousals, boating, concerts, ballets, and masquerades—a mode of living that gave rise to a new standard of politeness, which was freer and looser than that ofpréciosité.
As the power of the young king became stronger, his favor became the goal of all men of letters. Although woman still to some extent controlled the destinies of those who were struggling for recognition and reputation, her influence was of a secondary nature, that of the king being supreme. Woman seemed to be overcoming the influence of woman—Mme. de Montespan replaced Mlle. de La Vallière, and she was in turn replaced by Mme. de Maintenon.
The degeneration of the king was accompanied by that of literature, society, and morals. The characteristic inclination of the day was eagerly to seek and grasp thatwhich was new, and the noble, forceful, and dignified style of language of the previous period was replaced by one of much lighter description; many female writers directed their efforts entirely toward amusing, pleasing, and gaining applause.
In the beginning of the eighteenth century, with Mme. de Lambert as its leader, there was a renascence of thepréciositéof the Hôtel de Rambouillet, women protesting against the prevalent grossness and indecency of manners. The salon of Mme. de Lambert was the great antechamber to the Academy, election to which was generally gained through her. A new aristocracy was forming, a new society arose; from about 1720 to 1750, libertinism and atheism, licentiousness and intrigue, crept into the salons.
The new aristocracy was of doubtful and impure source, cynical in manner, unbridled in habits, over-fastidious in taste, and politically powerful. In this society woman began to be felt as a political force. M. Brunetière said: "Mme. de Lambert made Academicians; the Marquise de Prie made a queen of France; Mme. de Tencin made cardinals and ambassadors." Montesquieu wrote: "There is not a person who has any employment at the court in Paris or in the provinces, who has not the influence (and sometimes the injustices which she can cause) of a woman through whom all favors pass;" and M. Brunetière added: "This woman is not his wife." The popular spirit in literature was one of subtleness, irony, superficial observations on manners and customs. From the beginning of the eighteenth century up to the eve of the Revolution, woman's influence continued to increase, but that influence was mainly in the direction of politics. Thus, in every period in French history, a group of women effectively moulds French thought and language, and directs intellectual activity in general.
After the death of Louis XIV., society passed under the rule of the regent, the Duke of Orléans—the personification of gallantry and affability, of depravity which was a mania, and of licentiousness which was a disease. From this atmosphere the salon of Mme. de Lambert became a refuge to those who still cherished the ideals of the good old times of Mme. de Rambouillet; it was distinguished by its refined sentiment and polished manners, which were like those of the seventeenth century at its best.
Mme. de Lambert believed that the demands of the time were just the opposite of those of the seventeenth century: "What a multitude of tastes nowadays—the table, play, theatre! When money and luxury are supreme, true honor loses its power. Persons seek only those houses where shameful luxury reigns." In her own salon, none might enter who were not of the small number of the elect.
Very little is known of the life of Mme. de Lambert. She was born in 1647, and, in spite of the unfavorable surroundings of her youth and of a dissolute, extravagant, and unrefined mother, the observance of decorum and honor became the actuating principle of her life. Until her marriage (in 1666) to Henri de Lambert, Marquis de Bris en Auxerrois, she was in the midst of the grossest licentiousness and freedom of manners; when married, she entered a family the very opposite of her own.
She was a woman who believed in the power of ambitious energy. To her son she once said: "Nothing is less becoming to a young man than a certain modesty that makes him believe that he is not capable of great things. This modesty is a languor of the soul, which prevents it from soaring and rapidly carrying itself to glory."
At first she lived in the Hôtel de Lambert (in the Ile Saint-Louis), renowned for its splendidly sculptureddecorations, painted ceilings, panels, and staircases. Her famous Salon des Muses and Cabinet d'Amours were filled with the finest works of art and the most exquisite paintings. There the élite of all classes were entertained until the death of her husband (1686), when the hôtel was closed; it was not reopened until 1710.
Though left with immense wealth, her affairs were in a very complicated state. While actively employed in untangling her difficulties, she at the same time superintended the education of her son and daughter. After long and trying lawsuits, she managed to put her fortune in order and established herself at Paris, where the Duc de Nevers ceded to her, for life, a large portion of the magnificently furnished Palais Mazarin, now the National Library. On the completion of her work in remodelling this palace and furnishing it with the most costly and beautiful panel paintings by Watteau and other artists, she inaugurated her Tuesday and Wednesday dinner parties.
One remarkable characteristic of her company was the age of her intimate associates—the Marquis de Saint-Aulaire, Fontenelle, Mme. Dacier, and her husband, Louis de Sacy, all of whom, as well as Mme. de Lambert herself, had passed threescore and more; but they still kept alive the cherished memories of the brilliant society of their youth. Mme. de Lambert did not personally know Mme. de Rambouillet, but she visited the latter's daughter, Julie d'Angennes, from whom she learned the customs and etiquette in vogue at the Hôtel de Rambouillet.
The Wednesday dinners of Mme. de Lambert were to her intimate friends, while every Tuesday afternoon she received a general circle which indulged in general conversation and read and discussed books which were about to be published; gambling, which seemed to be the principal means of entertaining in those days, had no placethere. Fontenelle says: "It was, with very few exceptions, the only house which had been preserved from the epidemic of gambling—the only house where persons congregated simply for the sake of talking sensibly and withesprit. Those who had their reasons for considering it bad taste that conversation was still carried on in any place, cast mean reflections, whenever they could, against the house of Mme. de Lambert." In the evening, she received only a few select friends with whom she talked seriously. Her salon soon became the envy of those who were not admitted (and they were numerous), and was the object of many calumnies and attacks.
During this time she found leisure to write two treatises of practical morality,Avis d'une mère à son fils, andAvis d'une mère à sa fille, which appeared without her permission. The manuscripts, lent to friends, fell into the hands of a publisher; and although the authoress endeavored to prevent the distribution of the works by buying up the entire editions, they were published outside of France. The two works written to her children form an important contribution to the educational literature of the time; in them the religion of the eighteenth century is first defined.
"Above all these duties—civil and human (says the mother to her son)—is the duty you owe to the Supreme Being. Religion is a commerce established between God and man through the grace of God to man and through the duty of man to God. Elevated souls have for their God sentiments and a cult apart, which do not resemble at all those of the people; everything issues from the heart and goes to God."
In these works, she attacked also the fad of free-thinking in vogue among the young men of the time. She was one of the few women of that age who could not separate themselves from reason and thought, even in religion; thelatter was a matter for the reason and the intellect to decide, and was thus an elevated product of the mind rather than an instinct coming from the heart, or a positive revelation as it was in the seventeenth century. In this view, Madame de Lambert indicated the beginning of the later eighteenth-century spirit.
Mme. de Lambert taught her children to be satisfied with nothing but the highest attainable object. She advised her son to choose his friends from among men above him, in order to accustom himself to respectful and polite demeanor; "with his equals he might cultivate negligence and his mind might become dull." She desired her children to think differently from the people—"Those who think lowly and commonly, and the court is filled with such." To their servants they were to be good and kind, for humanity and Christianity make all equal. She was the first to use those words, "humanity" and "equality," which later became the bywords of everyone, and the first to teach that conscience is the best guide. "Conscience is defined as that interior sentiment of a delicate honor which assures you that you have nothing with which to reproach yourself."
Possibly the most important and lasting effect of Mme. de Lambert's influence resulted from the expression of her ideas on the education of young women who "are destined to please, and are given lessons only in methods of delighting and pleasing." She was convinced that in order to resist temptation and be normal, women must be educated, must learn to think. Her counsels to her daughter are remarkable for an unusual insight into the temperament of her sex and for an extreme fear that makes her call to her aid all precautions and resources. She thus advises her daughter:
"Try to find resources within yourself—this is a revenue of certain pleasures. Do not believe that your onlyvirtue is modesty; there are many women who know no other virtue, and who imagine that it relieves them of all duties toward society; they believe they are right in lacking all others and think themselves privileged to be proud and slanderous with impunity. You must have a gentle modesty; a good woman may have the advantages of a man's friendship without abandoning honesty and faithfulness to her duties. Nothing is so difficult as to please without the use of what seems like coquettishness. It is more often by their defects than by their good qualities that women please men; men seek to profit by the weaknesses of good and kind women, for whose virtues they care nothing, and they prefer to be amused by persons not very estimable than to be forced merely to admire virtuous persons."
This is a most faithful description of the society of her time, and it was because her treatises struck home that they were severely criticised; but, nothing daunted, she carried out her plans in her own way, resorting neither to intrigue nor artifice. Many of her sayings became household maxims, such as—"It is not always faults that undo us; it is the manner of conducting ourselves after having committed them."
Her reflections on women might be called the great plea, at the end of the seventeenth century, for woman's right to use her reason. After the severe and cruel satire of Molière, attacking women for their innocent amusements, they gave themselves up entirely to pleasure. "Mme. de Lambert now wrote to avenge her sex and demand for it the honest and strong use of the mind; and this was done in the midst of the wild orgies of the Regency."
Mme. de Lambert was not a rare beauty, but she possessed recompensing charms. M. Colombey asserts that she became convinced of two things, about which shebecame highly enthusiastic: first, that woman was more reasonable than man; secondly, that M. Fontenelle, who presided over or filled the functions of president of her salon, was always in the right. He was indeed in harmony with the tone of the salon, being considered the most polished, brilliant, and distinguished member of the intellectual society of Paris, as well as one of the most talented drawing room philosophers. He made the salon of Mme. de Lambert the most sought for and celebrated, the most intellectual and moral of the period.
Mme. de Lambert has, possibly, exercised more influence upon men—and especially upon the Forty Immortals of her time—than did any woman before or after her. The Marquis d'Argenson states that "a person was seldom received at the Academy unless first presented at her salon. It is certain that she made at least half of our actual Academicians."
Her salon was called abureau d'esprit, which was due to the fact that it was about the only social gathering point where culture and morality were the primary requisites. As she advanced in years, she became even more influential. After her death in 1733, her salon ceased to exist, but others, patterned after hers, soon sprang up; to those, her friends attached themselves—Fontenelle frequented several, Hénault became the leader of that of Mme. du Deffand.
The finest résumé that can be given of Mme. de Lambert, is found in the letters of the Marquis d'Argenson: "Her works contain a complete course in the most perfect morals for the use of the world and the present time. Some affectation of thepréciositéis found; but, what beautiful thoughts, what delicate sentiments! How well she speaks of the duties of women, of friendship, of old age, of the difference between actual character and reputation!"
The salon of Mme. de Lambert forms a period of transition from the seventeenth century type in which elegance, politeness, courtesy, and morality were the first requisites, to the eighteenth century salon in whichespritand wit were the essentials demanded. It retained the dignity, discipline, refinement, and sentiments of morality of the Hôtel de Rambouillet; it showed, also, the first signs of pure intellectuality. The salons to follow, will exhibit decidedly different characteristics.
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 heavilyfor 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 andcandid; 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 householdsand 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'sfavor, 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 havehopes 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; throughher 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, todo 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 avenueto 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."