by George Hogarth.
Originally published in Bentley's Miscellany (Richard Bentley) vol.3 (1838).
The influence of the fair sex in society is accounted, and very reasonably, a test of the progress of civilization; and the French mean to imply their superiority to all the rest of the world in this respect by the use of their favourite proverbial phrase, "La belle France est le paradis des femmes." There can be no doubt that the ladies of France, in modern times at least, have exercised a greater degree of influence, not only over the habits, manners, and character of the male part of the creation, but over their most important affairs and avocations, public as well as private, than they have done in any other country whatever. The Salique Law, notwithstanding its long prevalence in France, may be said to have been little more than a dead letter; for where was the use of providing against a female succession to the crown, when the nation never ceased to be virtually under petticoat government? What did it matter that the throne could not be occupied by a female sovereign, when the whole power of the state was wielded by some female or other, who wanted nothing of sovereignty but the name? What, after all, was the much-boasted Louis le Grand but a crowned and sceptred puppet, while the real monarch of France, for the time, was Maintenon, or La Valliere, or Montespan? What was his successor but the slave of a Du Barry and a Pompadour? And what was the best and most virtuous of the race,—the unhappy Louis the Sixteenth, but an instrument in the hands of his Austrian consort, whose imperious temper, and reckless interference with affairs of state, which she had neither knowledge to comprehend nor wisdom to conduct, precipitated the catastrophe which swept her family from the earth, and levelled in the dust the ancient monarchy of France? Seldom, however, has a French king been under so legitimate a sovereignty as that of his consort. The picture of the Grand Monarque holding his council in the boudoir of Madame de Maintenon, while the lady sat at her little table, with her work-basket before her, listening to the deliberations of grave statesmen, and quietly putting in her all-powerful word, represents, in fact, the machinery of the government of France for a century, at least, before the Revolution.
It was the same influence which, more than anything else, gave the French society of those days its singular grace, elegance, and refinement. Other things, no doubt, contributed to produce that most remarkable state of manners: that constitutional gaiety and liveliness which makes a French man or woman, of whatever rank or station, an eminently social animal, must no doubt come in for its share. In the aristocratic society of the metropolis its exclusiveness had a similar tendency. No degree of wealth, or merely personal distinction, unaccompanied by rank, could admit any one within its pale. If men of letters and votaries of the arts were received into its circles, it was as literati and artists, whose position was perfectly understood on all hands. They had no pretensions which could interfere with those of the class with whom they were allowed to mingle; the toe of the poet could not gall the kibe of the courtier. They did not require to be kept down by any assumption of superiority; and hence their social intercourse with the great was on a footing of apparent equality and freedom from restraint.[1] Something, too, must be ascribed to the very insignificance of the French aristocracy as a political body. They had no political power, no political functions, no political interests, no political cares: they had nothing to do but to hunt on their estates, or pursue the pleasures of the capital. The French noblesse of the seventeenth century accordingly were a degraded race; ignorant and vicious, coarse in their habits, and brutal in their amusements. From this debasement female influence contributed greatly to raise them. The crowd of men of genius, whose simultaneous appearance shed lustre over the age of Louis the Fourteenth, found, among the ladies of his brilliant court, their greatest admirers and patrons. It was through the influence of the fair sex that literature became the fashion, and that its professors came to be looked upon as the ornaments of polite society.
Nothing can be more captivating than the accounts, contained in the numerous French biographies and memoirs of the last age, of these social circles, of which the elements were rank, beauty, learning, and genius. It had, however, its dark, as well as its light side. There was none of the restraint arising from the jealousy of rank and station, and the necessity of repelling the pretensions of inferiors: but the distinction acquired by wit and brilliancy of conversation introduced pretensions of another kind; and these noctes cœnæque Deûm, were apt to become scenes of jealousy, rivalry, and laborious efforts of the company to outshine each other. "I soon perceived," says Marmontel, speaking of his first admission into this society, "that each guest arrived ready to play his part, and that the desire of exhibiting frequently prevented the conversation from following its easy and natural course. It was who should seize most quickly the passing moment, to bring out his epigram, his tale, his anecdote, his maxim, or his light and pointed satire; and very unnatural round-abouts were taken, in order to obtain a fit opportunity." There were, besides, other evils of a more serious nature. The moral tone of these elegant côteries was anything but pure; there was little warmth of heart or elevation of sentiment, and a total absence of religious feeling or principle. Their prevailing spirit seems to have been a selfish indifference to everything beyond the pursuit or amusement of the hour. We suspect, after all, that their extreme polish arose from the hardness of the materials.
Many distinguished women figure in the French literary annals in the last century, as occupying prominent places in the society we have been endeavouring to characterise. But a few notices of some of them will give a better notion of it than can be conveyed by any general description. We shall take, for the present, three of the most remarkable among them,—Madame Geoffrin, the Marquise Du Deffant, and her protegée and rival, Mademoiselle L'Espinasse, all contemporaries, and connected with each other.
Madame Geoffrin was born in 1699. Her father was a man of family, and had a place in the household of the Dauphin. At fifteen she was married to M. Geoffrin, an eminent glass-manufacturer. Her talents and accomplishments early attracted notice, and during her husband's life, as well as after his death, her house became the rendezvous of the best society in Paris. He left her a considerable fortune, which she greatly augmented by prudence and economy, and which she employed in acts of benevolence and charity. Her generosity was extensive and noble, yet free from any profusion which could impair her means of doing good. "I perceive with satisfaction," she said to D'Alembert, (as he informs us,) "that as I grow older I grow more benevolent, I dare not say better, because my benevolence, like the malignity of some people, may be the effect of weakness of mind. I have profited by what was often said to me by the good Abbé de St. Pierre, that the charity of a worthy man should not be confined to the support and relief of the unfortunate, but that it should extend to the indulgence which their faults so often stand in need of; and, in imitation of him, I have taken for my motto two words, donner et pardonner." Such became her celebrity as a leader in the literary society of Paris, that no traveller of any note thought he had seen that capital till he was introduced to Madame Geoffrin. She had received no regular education, her mind having acquired its cultivation from her intercourse with the world. She confessed she could not even spell; but nothing could exceed the ease and grace of her style: and though she had never studied painting or music, she was an excellent judge and munificent patron of both these arts.
Marmontel gives some pleasing pictures of the social meetings at this lady's house. "After having dined," he says, "at Madame Geoffrin's with men of letters or artists, I was again with her in the evening in a more intimate society, for she had also granted me the favour of admitting me to her little suppers. The entertainment was very moderate,—generally a chicken, some spinach, and an omelet, The company were not numerous; they consisted at most of five or six of her particular friends, or three or four gentlemen and ladies of the first fashion, selected to suit each other's tastes, and happy to be together.
"You may easily conceive that at these little suppers my self-love prompted all the means I possessed of being amusing and agreeable. The new tales I was then writing, and of which these ladies had the first offering, were read for their entertainment before or after supper. They made regular appointments to hear them, and when the little supper was prevented by any accident, they assembled at dinner at Madame de Brionne's. I confess that no success ever flattered me so much as that which I obtained by these readings in that little circle, where wit, taste, and beauty were my judges, or rather my eulogists. There was not a single trait, either in my colouring or dialogue, however minutely delicate and subtle, that was not felt at once; and the pleasure I gave had the air of enchantment. I was enraptured to see the finest eyes in the world swimming in tears at the little touching scenes in which I had made love or nature weep. But, notwithstanding the indulgence of extreme politeness, I could well perceive, too, the cold and feeble passages which were passed over in silence, as well as those in which I had mistaken the tone of nature or the just shade of truth; and these passages I kept in mind, that I might correct them at leisure."
Madame Geoffrin's husband, like the husbands of many other distinguished blues, was a thoroughly insignificant personage,—a perfect cipher in his own house. Grimm tells some amusing stories of him. He was in the habit of borrowing books of a friend, who, by way of joke, lent him the same book several times over. It happened to be a volume of Father Labat's Travels. Monsieur Geoffrin, with the most perfect simplicity, read it over every time it was lent him. "Well, sir!" said his friend, "how do you like the travels?" "Oh, very good—very good indeed; but I think the author a little given to repetition." A literary foreigner, who had frequently dined at Madame Geoffrin's without knowing her husband, asked her one day, after a long absence from Paris, what had become of the poor gentleman he used to meet there, and who always sat without opening his lips. "Oh!" said the lady, "that was my husband—he is dead."
She was celebrated for her bon-mots, of which many are preserved by Grimm and other writers of the day. The Count de Coigny was one day at her table, telling, as was his wont, interminable stories. Some dish being set before him, he took a little clasp-knife from his pocket, and began to help himself, prosing away all the while. "M. le Comte," said Madame Geoffrin at last, out of patience, "at dinner we should have large knives and little stories." One of her literary friends, M. de Rulhiere, having threatened to publish some very imprudent remarks on the conduct of the court of Russia, from the sale of which he expected to make a large profit, she offered him a handsome sum to put his manuscript in the fire, from a good-natured wish to keep him from getting himself into trouble. The author began to talk in a high tone about honour and independence, and the baseness of taking money as a bribe for suppressing the truth. "Well, well," said she with a quiet smile, "say yourself how much more you must have."
As may be supposed, she partook of the infidelity which prevailed among the society in which she lived, though her good disposition, and, we may add, good taste, prevented her from adopting the offensive style of conversation then fashionable on the subject of religion. In her long last illness she began to think seriously on this topic, and gave up the society of the philosophers. Having had a stroke of apoplexy, her daughter, the Marquise de la Ferte-Imbert, took the opportunity of shutting her door against D'Alembert, Marmontel, and her other old friends of this description.
"Everybody expected," says Grimm, "that as soon as Madame Geoffrin came to herself', she would disavow her daughter's proceedings; but the world was mistaken. After having scolded a little, she forgave her daughter, and confessed that, after all, the viaticum and the philosophers would not do very well together. She said her daughter had been silly, but gave her credit for her zeal. "My daughter," she said with a smile, "is like Godfrey of Bouillon,—she wanted to defend my tomb against the infidels." This plaisanterie savours a little of levity; but her pious impressions appear to have been strengthened by the chastening hand of affliction. She persisted in her determination to see her infidel friends no more, and died, as we are informed by the Biographie Universelle, professing her belief in the truths of religion. She died in 1777, at the age of seventy-eight, leaving behind her a brilliant reputation, and a memory ennobled by many great and good qualities, and unstained by the vices and follies of her time.
The character of the Marquise du Deffant reflects more faithfully the manners of the age, with which that of Madame Geoffrin, in many respects, stood in remarkable contrast. This celebrated lady had all the wit, all the talent, all the heartlessness, and all the immorality which entered so largely into the composition of the most polished society the world ever saw. She was born in 1699, of a noble family, and married, at an early age, to the Marquis du Deffant, a man much older than herself. The union was unhappy; they parted, and the lady consoled herself with a lover. This did not prevent a reconciliation from being patched up between the married pair by the intervention of friends. But the lover complained so loudly of the injury the lady had done him by taking back her husband, that, finding it necessary to choose between them, she gave her inamorato the preference, and once more contrived to get rid of the marquis.
After this she seems to have had a succession, or rather a plurality of admirers, and to have given herself little trouble about preserving even the appearance of decorum. She is said to have had an intrigue with that inimitable roué the Regent Duke of Orleans; but her earliest known lover seems to have been Pont de Vesle, a man of literary eminence, and of as cold and heartless a character as herself. Her subsequent preference of others did not prevent her from remaining on terms of the most intimate friendship with him, as it was called, for more than forty years. On the very evening of his death, La Harpe tells us, she came to sup with a large party at Madame de Marchais'. On her arrival, somebody began to condole with her on her loss. "Alas!" she said, "he died this evening at six o'clock; had it not been so early I could not have been here." So saying, she sat down to supper, made, as usual, an excellent meal, and was the liveliest of the company. From a colloquy between her and this ancient friend, we may have some notion of the strength of her friendship. "Pont de Vesle," she said to him one day, "we have been friends these forty years, and I don't think we have had a single quarrel or difference all the time."—"No, madam."—*Don't you think the reason is, that we do not care a great deal for one another?"—"Why, madam, it is very likely."—Well might La Harpe say of her, "Qu'il était difficile d'avoir moins de sensibilité et plus d'égoïsme."
Besides Pont de Vesle, she had another lover, the President Hénault, the historian. There is an amusing anecdote of their liaison, which has the advantage, too, of being authentic. They were both complaining one day of the continual interruptions they met with from the society in which they lived.
'What a pleasant thing it would be," said Madame du Deffant, "to have a whole day to ourselves!"
The lover eagerly caught at the idea, and it was determined to put it in execution. They found a small apartment in the Tuilleries, belonging to a friend, which was unoccupied; and there they resolved, like Seyed, the Emperor of Ethiopia, to spend a happy day. They arrived accordingly, in separate carriages, about eleven in the forenoon; ordered their carriages to return at twelve at night; and bespoke dinner from a traiteur.
The morning was spent entirely to the satisfaction of both parties, in the usual conversation of lovers.
"Well!" they could not help saying every now and then, "were every day like this, life would really be too short!"
Dinner came, was heartily partaken of, and sentiment gave way to wit and gaiety. About six the Marquise looked at her watch.
"Athalie is to be played to-night, and the new actress is to make her appearance."
"I must own," said the President, "that were I not here I should regret not seeing her."
"Take care, President; what you say is an expression of regret. Were you as happy as you profess to be, you never would have thought of the possibility of going to see the new actress!"
The President defended himself, and in turn became the accuser.
"Is it for you to complain of me, when you were the first to look at your watch, and to remark that Athalie was to be acted to-night? There ought to be no watches for people who are happy."
The dispute went on. The loving pair got more and more out of humour with each other; and by seven o'clock would both of them have been very glad to separate. But that was impossible.
"Ah!" cried the Marquise, "I can never stay here till twelve o'clock,—five hours longer,—what a penance!"
The Marquise went and sat down behind a screen, leaving the rest of the room to the President. Piqued at this, the gentleman seizes a pen, writes a note full of reproaches, and throws it over the screen. The lady picks it up, goes in search of pen, ink, and paper, and writes an answer in the sharpest terms. At last the happy hour of twelve struck; and each hurried off separately, resolved never again to try such an experiment.
Henault lived to the age of ninety; and with him, as with Pont de Vesle, Madame du Deffant kept up an intimacy to the last. He fell into a state of dotage before his death: and one day, when he was in that state, she having taken it into her head to ask him whether he liked her or another lady the best, he, quite unaware of the person he was speaking to, not only declared his preference of the absent lady, but went on to justify it by an enumeration of the faults and vices of his hearer, on which topic he became so animated and eloquent that it was impossible either to stop him or to prevent every body in the room from having the benefit of his strictures.
For many years Madame du Detffant's côterie was the most brilliant in Paris. Noblemen of the highest rank, ministers of state, the most distinguished foreigners, men of genius of every description, the most elegant and accomplished women, all thought it a high honour and privilege to be admitted into her circle, of which she herself, from her wit and various talents, was the greatest ornament. At fifty she was seized with a disorder in her eyes, which terminated in blindness. When threatened with loss of sight, she took Mademoiselle l'Espinasse, then a poor friendless girl, employed as a governess in a convent, to be her humble companion and lectrice. But the men of letters who frequented the house were more attracted by the protegée than the patroness; and their increasing attentions to Mademoiselle l'Espinasse gave rise to constant jealousies and heartburnings, which ended in her withdrawing herself, or being dismissed, from Madame du Deffant's house. Her secession was attended with that of D'Alembert, and others of the old lady's literary friends, who preferred the society of the young one; a circumstance which produced an irreconcilable feud between Madame du Deffant and the philosophers, and seems to have embittered the remainder of her life.
After this time she became acquainted with Horace Walpole; and their long and intimate friendship gave occasion to the admirable correspondence between them which has been published. The letters to Walpole are models in this species of composition. Equal in ease, grace, and purity of style, to those of Madame de Sevigné, though without her gentle and womanly feeling, they embrace many more topics of interest and entertainment to a reader of the present day. They contain shrewd and pointed remarks on public occurrences, spirited sketches of character and manners, discussions on serious subjects, the scandal of the hour, and amusing anecdotes, all mingled together in an easy and felicitous confusion. The following little story, which we extract from one of them, is not only exquisitely laughable, but speaks volumes as to the character of Louis the Fifteenth and his courtiers. The Duke de Choiseul was then Prime Minister, and the Bishop of Orleans held an office in the government.
"About eight days ago, the king after supper went to Madame Victoire's apartments, called a servant, and gave him a letter, saying to him, 'Jacques, take that letter to the Duke de Choiseul, and tell him to deliver it immediately to the Bishop of Orleans.' Jacques goes to the Duke's, and is told that he is at M. de Penthievre's. He follows him there, and gives him the letter. Monsieur de Choiseul sends Cadet, one of the Duchess's valets, to seek the Bishop, and tell him where he is. In a couple of hours Cadet returns, and tells the Duke that he had been to the Bishop's, had knocked at the door with all his might, and, finding that nobody answered, had been all over the town in search of him without success. The Duke had nothing for it but to go himself to the Bishop's apartments, climbed a hundred and twenty-eight steps, and knocked so furiously at the door that a couple of servants came running in their shirts to open it.
"'Where is the Bishop?'
"'In bed since ten o'clock.'
"'Open his door, and let me into his bed-room.'
"The Duke enters the bed-room, and rouses the Bishop from his slumber.
"'What's the matter?'
"''Tis I.—I have got a letter for you from the King.'
"'A letter from the King! Good God! What is it o'clock?'
"'About two.'
"The Bishop takes the letter, and opens it.
"'I can't read without my spectacles.'
"'Where are they?'
"'In my breeches' pocket.'
"The minister goes to find them; and meanwhile they are puzzling themselves with conjectures.—'What can the letter contain? Can the Archbishop of Paris have died suddenly? Which of the bishops can have hanged himself?' At the same time they were both uneasy enough, as it might perchance contain something of a less agreeable nature.
"The Bishop begins the letter, but cannot see to get through it. He hands it to the minister, who reads as follows;
"'My Lord Bishop of Orleans, my daughters have a great desire to have some quince marmalade. They want it in very small pots. Send some; and if you have not got any, I beg—' In this part of the letter there was a scrawl in the form of a sedan chair, and underneath it the letter went on, 'you will immediately send to your episcopal city for some, and let it be in very small pots. And so, my Lord Bishop of Orleans, may God have you in his holy keeping, Louis.'
"Then there was a postscript:—'The sedan-chair does not mean anything; my daughters had drawn it on this sheet of paper, which was the first I laid my hand on.'
"'Judge of the amazement of the two ministers. A courier was instantly despatched for the marmalade, which arrived next day, but nobody cared any more about it."
These letters, however, with all their wit and liveliness, present the picture of a miserable mind. The writer constantly describes herself as devoured by ennui, weary of life, and indifferent to everything but the affection of her correspondent, whom she often addresses in terms of passionate attachment, which are not easily comprehensible as proceeding from an old blind woman, and applied to a man past the meridian of life, whom, too, she had never seen. No wonder she was wretched, with nothing at the close of a long life to look to for comfort; when the past was without self-approval, the present without enjoyment, and the future without hope!
Her death was characteristic of herself and her society. "Her dearest friends," says Grimm, "Madame de Luxembourg, Madame de Choiseul, and Madame de Cambise, were constantly with her in her last illness. Through an extraordinary excess of attachment these ladies played at loo every evening in her bed-room till she had drawn her last breath (jusqu'à son dernier soupir inclusivement). Another writer says that her visitors happened in the middle of their game to discover that she was dead, but sat still, and played it out with great composure.
Voltaire, her letters to whom have also been published, used, in allusion to her acuteness and penetration, to call her, "L'aveugle clairvoyante." With her character and powers of conversation, she could not fail to be celebrated for her witticisms. She said of L'Esprit des Lois, that it was "De Vesprit sur les lois." Hearing two persons disputing about the famous miracle of Saint Denis, the one maintaining that the saint had only carried his head in his hands for a few minutes, and the other that he had carried it all the way from Montmartre to St. Denis, she put an end to the argument by observing that, "in such cases, il n'y a que le premier pas qui coûte." In regard to her utter heartlessness (notwithstanding the apparently solitary exception of her anomalous attachment to Walpole), all who speak of her are agreed. When the celebrated Marquise du Chatelet died, she showed her grief for the loss of her oldest and most intimate friend by circulating all over Paris the very next morning a malignant and scurrilous attack on her character: a single fact, which is perfectly conclusive.
Mademoiselle l'Espinasse was born at Lyons in 1732. Her mother was a woman of rank, who had been long before this time separated from her husband. She brought up her daughter with great care and tenderness, and it was not till her death that the poor girl, at the age of fifteen, was aware of the illegitimacy of her birth, and her forlorn and destitute situation. She found an asylum in a convent in the capacity of a governess; and she had been four years in that situation when she attracted the notice of Madame du Deffant, with whom she lived for ten years. At the end of that time, after having supplanted the old lady in the attentions of a large portion of her literary circle, she left her house, as has been already mentioned.
With the remains of what her mother had left her, and a pension granted by the King through the interest of the friends she had made in Madame du Deffant's côterie, she found herself in a condition to live independently. D'Alembert, who had become strongly attached to her, took up his abode under her roof; and others of the literati, who had frequented Madame du Deffant's house, forsook the poor old lady, and betook themselves to the society of her more attractive rival. Mademoiselle l'Espinasse was then above thirty, and far from handsome, her face being strongly marked with small-pox; but her countenance was full of intelligence and animation, and her manners and conversation quite captivating. Good-humoured and witty, possessed of information, judgment, and taste, she was the life and soul of the brilliant circle of which her house was the centre. "I cannot mention the Graces," says Marmontel, "without speaking of one who possessed them in mind and language. It was the friend of D'Alembert, Mademoiselle l'Espinasse; a wonderful combination of correctness, judgment, and prudence, with the liveliest fancy, the most ardent soul, and the most fiery imaginations that have existed since the days of Sappho. The constant object of attention, whether she spoke (and no one spoke better) or listened; without coquetry she inspired us with the innocent desire of pleasing her; without prudery she made freedom feel how far it might venture without disturbing modesty, or hurting decorum. Nowhere was conversation more lively, brilliant, or better regulated than in her society. That degree of temperate and ever-equal warmth in which she knew how to sustain it, now by restraining, and now by animating it, was a rare phenomenon; and be it observed that the heads she then moved at her will were neither weak nor light. The Condillacs and the Turgots were of the number. D'Alembert, by her side, was like a simple and docile child." "Of this society," says the same writer in another place, "the gayest, the most animated, the most amusing in his gaiety, was D'Alembert. After having passed his mornings in algebraic calculations, and solving the problems of mechanics or astronomy, he came from his study like a boy just let loose from school, seeking only to enjoy himself; and, by the lively and pleasant turn which his luminous, solid, and profound mind then assumed, he soon made us forget the philosopher and the man of science to admire in him every delightful and engaging quality. The source of this natural gaiety was a pure mind, free from passion, satisfied with itself, and in the daily enjoyment of some newly-discovered truth which rewarded and crowned his labours; a privilege which the mathematical sciences exclusively possess, and which no other kind of study can completely attain."
This illustrious philosopher, raised far above the level of the society in which he lived, by the singular simplicity and sincerity of his character, as well as his high intellectual powers, was the victim of a strong and unrequited attachment to Mademoiselle l'Espinasse. She was unquestionably an adventuress, and a female fortune-hunter; but her own passions were too strong to enable her to play the part successfully. She appears to have had an affection for D'Alembert and to have been fond of his society; but she was too ambitious and aspiring to marry a man without family or fortune. She calculated on the effect of her powers of pleasing, and imagined she could captivate some distinguished member of her coterie, so much as to induce him to offer her his hand. She succeeded in inspiring the Marquis de Mora, a young Spanish nobleman who had visited Paris in his travels, with so violent a passion for her, that his family, apprehensive of the consequences, recalled him home. "Mademoiselle l'Espinasse," says Marmontel, "was no longer the same with D'Alembert; and he not only had to endure her coldness and caprice, but often the bitterness of her wounded temper. He bore his sorrows patiently, and complained only to me. Unhappy man! such were his devotion and obedience to her, that in the absence of M. de Mora, it was he who used to go early in a morning to ask for his letters at the post-office, and bring them to her when she woke." Absence did not abate the young Spaniard's passion. He continued his correspondence with the object of it; and at last, while his family were seeking to terminate the connexion by means of a suitable match for him, he fell into a dangerous illness. This produced an extraordinary step on the part of Mademoiselle l'Espinasse. She contrived to obtain an opinion from a physician at Paris, that the climate of Spain would be mortal to her lover, and that if his friends wished to save him they ought to send him to breathe the air of France. This opinion, dictated by Mademoiselle |'Espinasse, was obtained by D'Alembert from his intimate friend M. Lorry, one of the most celebrated physicians in Paris. It was transmitted to Madrid, and the authority of Lorry, supported by the wishes of the patient, produced its effect. The young Marquis was permitted to return to France, and eagerly set out on his journey; but he could not bear the effort, and died on the road.
In the mean time D'Alembert's unhappy attachment preyed deeply on his mind. He neglected all his studies and pursuits, devoting himself entirely to the society of Mademoiselle l'Espinasse, though it was productive to him of nothing but misery. In this extremity, Madame Geoffrin, with her usual active friendship, determined to save him, if possible, from the fatal consequences of such a way of life. Though unacquainted with Mademoiselle l'Espinasse, she went to visit her, and represented to her so strongly the irreparable injury she was doing to D'Alembert, without the hope, or even the object, of any advantage to herself, that she prevailed on Mademoiselle l'Espinasse to give up all the letters she had received from him, and obtained her solemn promise to see him no more. As a recompense for this compliance, Madame Geoffrin settled on Mademoiselle l'Espinasse a pension, which she received during the remainder of her life.
Whatever may have been her original motive for endeavouring to captivate the young Spanish nobleman, there can be no doubt that her passion for him was not only real, but as violent as his own. From the time that she was separated from him by the interference of his family, her health gave way, and her mind was so deeply affected, that she became an object of commiseration to her friends; and his death was a blow from which she never recovered. But the most extraordinary part of her life yet remains to be noticed. While she was passionately attached to the Marquis de Mora during his life, and dying with grief for his death, she was at the same time violently in love with another. This was the Comte de Guibert, the celebrated writer on military tactics. This strange circumstance seems to have been little known or noticed, till it was brought to light by the publication of her letters to Guibert, about five-and-twenty years ago. Guibert, a handsome and fashionable young man, distinguished for spirit and talents, had recommended himself to her by the tender interest he took in her affliction caused by her separation from her lover. The correspondence between them began in 1773, soon after Mora's recall, and continued till within a few weeks of her death in 1776.
These letters disclose a state of mind that seems inexplicable on the common principles of human nature. That the feelings they express are fictitious, or even exaggerated, is out of the question, for they glow with the eloquence of truth; and the reader cannot but feel that the passions to which they give vent are not the less real for being inconsistent and conflicting. Long before Mora's death we find expressions of the utmost attachment to Guibert. Even in the same letter Guibert is addressed in terms of passionate adoration, and then made the confidant of her unspeakable love for Mora. After his death the same mixture of feelings continues, At one time she pours out the sorrow of a widowed and desolate heart, and next moment burns with passion for a living object. None of Guibert's letters have appeared; but she constantly complains of his coldness and indifference. All the while she seems never to have hoped or desired from him anything more than the happiness derived from reciprocity of affection. She appears never to have expected his hand; on the contrary, she advises him to marry, and, when he does so, the correspondence is continued in the same strain as before.
We extract a few passages from these singular letters, from which our female readers may see that there has been actually such a thing as a lady loving two gentlemen at once. We are dissatisfied with our translation of these fragments; feeling that we have been unable to transfer to another language, those "thoughts that breathe, and words that burn;" which (notwithstanding all the faults of the unhappy writer's character) render her effusions so interesting and impressive. These passages are from letters written after the death of Mora, and during the last year of her own life.
"I felt a dreadful reluctance to open your letter. Had it not been for the fear of offending you, I should have sent it back unopened. Something told me it would increase my sufferings, and I wished to spare myself. My constant bodily pains wear out my mind: I have again been in a fever, and unable to close my eyes; I am quite exhausted. For pity's sake, torment no longer a life which is closing, and every moment of which is given to sorrow and regret. I do not accuse you—I ask nothing of you—you owe me nothing: for, indeed, I have not a feeling or a sentiment to which I have voluntarily yielded. When I have been so unhappy as to give way to them, I have always detested their strength, and my own weakness. So you see that you owe me no gratitude, and that I have no right to reproach you with anything. Be free, then—leave me to my sorrow; let me, without interruption, occupy my mind with the only object I have adored, and whose memory is dearer to me than all that remains under the sun. O, my God! I ought not to weep for him—I ought to follow him: it is you who make me live, and who yet are the torment of a creature consumed by grief, and exerting the last remains of her strength in praying that death may relieve her. I told you truly a week ago—you make me captious and exacting: in giving all, one looks for some return. But, once more, I forgive you, and hate you not: though it is not from generosity that I forgive you; it is not from kind feeling that I do not hate you. It is simply because my very soul is weary even unto death. Ah! my friend, let me alone—do not talk any longer about loving me; it is a balm that turns to poison. Oh! how cruelly you hurt me—how heavily I feel the burden of life! How I love you notwithstanding, and how wretched should I be to make you unhappy!"
* * * * *
"How often might I have complained; how often have I hid from you my tears! Ah! I see it too well: it is impossible either to keep or bring back a heart drawn away by another attachment. This I repeat to myself without ceasing, and sometimes think myself cured; but you come, and I find that all my efforts have been vain. Reflections, resolutions, sufferings,—all become powerless the moment you utter a word, I see no refuge but death, and never has poor wretch prayed for it more earnestly. Ah! if you only knew—if you only read, what happiness was once derived, by a strong and impassioned soul, from the pleasure of being loved by me! He used to compare the love once felt for him, with that felt for him still; and he said to me again and again; 'My countrywomen are not worthy to be your scholars: your soul has been warmed by the sun of Lima, they seem to have been born amid the snows of Lapland;' and it was from Madrid that he told me this. My dear friend, he never praised me; he felt his happiness: nor do I think I praise myself when I tell you that, in loving you to distraction, I only bestow upon you what I have no power to withhold."
* * * * *
"My frame is no longer strong enough for my soul—it is killing me. You can do nothing to me but make me suffer; do not then make any further attempts to comfort me; don't try to make me the victim of your morality, after having made me the victim of your fickleness. You have not seen me, because there are but twelve hours in the day, and you have had the means of filling them up with interests and pleasures which must touch you more nearly than my unhappiness. I claim nothing—I exact nothing; but I never cease to tell myself that the source of happiness and pleasure is lost to me for ever."
* * * * *
"Oh, how you oppress my heart, when you wish to prove to me that it ought to be satisfied with yours! I would never complain, but you force me sometimes to cry out, so deeply and painfully do you hurt me! My friend, I have been loved—I am so still—and I die with grief that it is not by you. In vain I say to myself that I have never merited the happiness I regret. My heart tells me that, were I ever to be loved, it was by him who had charms sufficient in my eyes to withdraw me from M. de M --, and to reconcile me to life when I had lost him. I have done nothing but languish since your departure. I have not had an hour free from suffering; my mental disease affects my frame. Every day I have a fever, and my physician, though not one of the ablest of men, tells me incessantly that I am consumed by some hidden grief, and always takes his leave saying; 'we have no remedy for the mind. For me there is, indeed, no remedy: but cure is not what I desire. I wish for nothing but a little calm—for a few moments' repose, before obtaining that final rest which nature will soon grant me."
This highly-gifted and most unhappy woman died in 1776, in her forty-third year, the victim of violent passions acting on an ill-regulated mind. Though wasted with painful and hopeless disease, she continued to go the accustomed round of gaiety; and her salon was filled with company down to the day of her death.
1. Professors of literature, mingling in the society of the noble and the wealthy upon sufferance, held a rank scarcely higher than that of musicians or actors, from among whom individuals have often, by their talents and character, become members of the best society, while the castes to which such individuals belong remain in general exposed to the most humiliating contempt. The lady of quality, who smiled on the man of letters, and the man of rank who admitted him to his intimacy, still retained their consciousness that he was not, like themselves, formed out of "the porcelain clay of the earth:" and even while receiving their bounties, or participating in their pleasures, the favourite savant must often have been disturbed by the reflection that he was only considered as a creature of sufferance, whom the caprice of fashion, or a sudden reaction of the ancient etiquette, might fling out of the society where he was at present tolerated. Under this disheartening and even degrading inferiority, the man of letters might be tempted invidiously to compare the luxurious style of living at which he sat a permitted guest with his own paltry hired apartment, and scanty and uncertain chance of support. And even those of a nobler mood, when they had conceded to their benefactors all the gratitude they could justly demand, must sometimes have regretted their own situation—
"Condemn'd as needy supplicants to wait,
While ladies interpose and slaves debate."
Sir Walter Scott's Life of Napoleon, vol. i.