Life, Letters, and Epicurean Philosophy of Ninon de L'Enclos Part 5

Let no one be surprised, If she should be advised Of the virtue most renowned In Plato to be found: For, counting up her age, She lived, 'tis reason sound, With that great personage.

Ninon had no rancor in her heart toward any one, much less against an unsuccessful suitor, hence she only laughed at Chapelle's effusions and all Paris laughed with her. The truth is, la Rochefoucauld had impressed her mind with that famous saying of his: "Old age is the h.e.l.l of women," and not fearing any h.e.l.l, reference to her age neither alarmed her, nor caused the slightest flurry in her peaceful life. She was too philosophical to regret the loss of what she did not esteem of any value, and saw Chapelle slipping away from her with tranquillity of mind. It was only during moments of gayety when she abandoned herself to the play of an imagination always laughing and fertile, that she repeated the sacrilegious wish of the pious king of Aragon, who wished that he had been present at the moment of creation, when, among the suggestions he could have given Providence, he would have advised him to put the wrinkles of old age where the G.o.ds of Pagandom had located the feeble spot in Achilles.

If Ninon ever felt a pang on account of the ungenerous conduct of Chapelle, his disciple, the ill.u.s.trious Abbe de Chaulieu, the Anacreon of the age, who was called, when he made his entree into the world of letters "the poet of good fellowship," more than compensated her for the injury done by his pastor. The Abbe was the Prior of Fontenay, whither Ninon frequently accompanied Madame the d.u.c.h.ess de Bouillon and the Chevalier d'Orleans. The d.u.c.h.ess loved to joke at the expense of the Abbe, and twit him about his wasted talents, which were more adapted to love than to his present situation. It may be that the worthy Abbe, after thinking over seriously what was intended to be a mere pleasantry, concluded that Madame the d.u.c.h.ess was right, and that he possessed some talent in the direction of love. However that might, have been, it is certain that he had cast an observant and critical eye on Ninon, and he now openly paid her court, not unsuccessfully it should be known.

The Abbe Gedoyn was her last lover so far as there is any account of her amours. The story is related by Remond, surnamed "The Greek," and must be taken with a grain of salt as Ninon was at that time seventy-nine years of age. This Remond, notwithstanding her age, had made violent love to Ninon without meeting with any success. Perhaps he was trying an experiment, being a learned man, anxious to ascertain when the fire of pa.s.sion became extinct in the human breast. Ninon evidently suspected his ardent professions for she refused to listen to him and forbade his visits altogether.

"I was the dupe of his Greek erudition," she explained, "so I banished him from my school. He was always wrong in his philosophy of the world, and was unworthy of as sensible a society as mine." She often added to this: "After G.o.d had made man, he repented him; I feel the same about Remond."

But to return to the Abbe Gedoyn: he left the Jesuits with the Abbe Fraguier in 1694, that is to say, when Mademoiselle de l'Enclos was seventy-eight years of age. Both of them immediately made the acquaintance of Ninon and Madame de la Saliere, and, astonished at the profound merit they discovered, deemed it to their advantage to frequent their society for the purpose of adding to their talents something which the study of the cloister and experience in the king's cabinet itself had never offered them. Abbe Gedoyn became particularly attached to Mademoiselle de l'Enclos, whose good taste and intellectual lights he considered such sure and safe guides. His grat.i.tude soon received the additions of esteem and admiration, and the young disciple felt the growth of desires which it is difficult to believe were real, but which became so pressing, that they revived in a heart nearly extinct a feeble spark of that fire with which it had formerly burned. Mademoiselle de l'Enclos refused to accede to the desires of her lover until she was fully eighty years of age, a term which did not cool the ardor of the amorous Abbe, who waited impatiently and on her eightieth birthday compelled his benefactress to keep her word.

This incident recalls the testimony of a celebrated Countess of Salisbury, who was called to testify as an expert upon the subject of love in a celebrated criminal case that was tried over a hundred years ago in the English House of Lords. The woman correspondent was of an age when human pa.s.sion is supposed to be extinct, and her counsel was attempting to prove that fact to relieve her from the charge. The testimony of the aged Countess, who was herself over seventy-five years of age, was very unsatisfactory, and the court put this question to her demanding an explicit answer.

"Madame," he inquired, "at what age does the sentiment, pa.s.sion, or desire of love cease in the female heart?"

Her ladyship, who had lived long in high society and had been acquainted with all of the gallants and coquettes of the English court for nearly two generations, and who, herself, had sometimes been suspected of not having been averse to a little waywardness, looked down at her feet for a moment thoughtfully, then raising her eyes and locking squarely into those of the judge, answered:

"My Lord, you will have to ask a woman older than I."

CHAPTER XII

The Villarceaux Affair

Party politics raged around Ninon, her "Birds" being men of high rank and leaders with a large following. They were all her dearest friends, however, and no matter how strong personal pa.s.sion was beyond her immediate presence, her circle was a neutral ground which no one thought of violating. It required her utmost influence and tenderness, however, to prevent outbreaks, but her unvarying sweetness of temper and disposition to all won their hearts into a truce for her sake.

There were continual plots hatched against the stern rule of Richelieu, cabals and conspiracies without number were entered upon, but none of them resulted in anything. Richelieu knew very well what was going on, and he realized perfectly that Ninon's drawing-rooms were the center of every scheme concocted to drag him down and out of the dominant position he was holding against the combined n.o.bility of France. But he never took a step toward suppressing her little court as a hot-bed of restlessness, he rather encouraged her by his silence and his indifference. Complaints of her growing coterie of uneasy spirits brought nothing from him but: "As long as they find amus.e.m.e.nts they are not dangerous." It was the forerunner of Napoleon's idea along the same line: "We must amuse the people; then they will not meddle with our management of the government."

It is preposterous to think of this minister of peace, this restless prelate, half soldier, half pastor, meddling in all these cabals and seditious schemes organized for his own undoing, but nevertheless, he was really the fomenter of all of them. They were his devices for preventing the n.o.bility from combining against him. He set one cabal to watch another, and there was never a conspiracy entered into that he did not prepare a similar conspiracy through his numerous secret agents and thus split into harmless nothings and weak attempts what would have been fatal to a continuance of his power. His tricks were nothing but the ordinary everyday methods of the modern ward politician making the dear people believe he is doing one thing when he is doing another. The stern man pitted one antagonist against another until both sued for peace and pardon. The n.o.bility were honest in their likes and dislikes, but they did not understand double dealings and therefore the craft of Richelieu was not even suspected.

Soon he corrupted by his secret intrigues the fidelity of the n.o.bles and destroyed the integrity of the people. Then it was, as Cyrano says: "The world saw billows of sc.u.m vomited upon the royal purple and upon that of the church." Vile rhyming poets, without merit or virtue, sold their villainous productions to the enemies of the state to be used in goading the people to riot. Obscene and filthy vaudevilles, defamatory libels and infamous slanders were as common as bread, and were hurled back and forth as evidence of an internecine strife which was raging around the wearer of the Roman scarlet, who was thereby justified in continuing his ecclesiastical rule to prevent the wrecking of the throne.

Ninon had always been an ardent supporter of the throne, and on that account imagined herself to be the enemy of Richelieu. There were many others who believed the same thing. They did not know that should the great Cardinal withdraw his hand for a single moment there would not be any more throne. When the human hornets around him became annoying he was accustomed to pretend to withdraw his sustaining hand, then the throne would tremble and totter, but he always came to the rescue; indeed, there was no other man who could rescue it. Cabals, plots, and conspiracies became so thick around Ninon at one period that she was frightened. Scarron's house became a rendezvous for the factious and turbulent. Madame Scarron was aiming at the throne, that is, she was opening the way to capture the heart of the king. This was too much for Ninon, who was more modest in her ambitions, and she fled frightened.

The Marquis de Villarceaux received her with open arms at his chateau some distance from Paris, and that was her home for three years. There were loud protests at this desertion from her coterie of friends, and numerous dark threats were uttered against the gallant Marquis who had thus captured the queen of the "Birds," but Ninon explained her reason in such a plausible manner that their complaints subsided into good-natured growls. She hoped to prevent a political conflagration emanating from her social circle by scattering the firebrands, and she succeeded admirably. The Marquis was constantly with her, permitting n.o.body to intervene between them, and provided her with a perpetual round of amus.e.m.e.nts that made the time pa.s.s very quickly. Moreover, she was faithful to the Marquis, so wonderful a circ.u.mstance that her friend and admirer wrote an elegy upon that circ.u.mstance, in which he draws a picture of the pleasures of the ancients in ruralizing, but reproaches Ninon for indulging in a pa.s.sion for so long a period to the detriment of her other friends and admirers. But Ninon was happy in attaining the summit of her desire, which was to defeat Madame Scarron, her rival in the affections of the Marquis, keeping the latter by her side for three whole years as has already been said.

However delighted Ninon may have been with this arrangement, the Marquis, himself, did not repose upon a bed of roses. The jealousy of the "Birds" gave him no respite, he being obliged in honor to respond to their demands for an explanation of his conduct in carrying off their leader, generally insisting upon the so-called field of honor as the most appropriate place for giving a satisfactory answer. They even invaded his premises until they forced him to make them some concessions in the way of permission to see the object of their admiration, and to share in her society. The Marquis was proud of his conquest, the very idea of a three years' tete a tete with the most volatile heart in France being sufficient to justify him in boasting of his prowess, but whenever he ventured to do so a champion on the part of Ninon always stood ready to make him either eat his words or fight to maintain them.

Madame Scarron, whom he so basely deserted for the superior charms of her friend Ninon, often gave him a bad quarter of an hour. When she became the mistress of the king and, as Madame de Maintenon, really held the reins of power, visions of the Bastile thronged his brain. He knew perfectly well that he had scorned the charms of Madame Scarron, who believed them irresistible, and that he deserved whatever punishment she might inflict upon him. She might have procured a lettre de cachet, had him immured in a dungeon or his head removed from his shoulders as easily as order a dinner, but she did nothing to gratify a spirit of revenge, utterly ignoring his existence.

Added to these trifling circ.u.mstances, trifling in comparison with what follows, was the furious jealousy of his wife, Madame la Marquise. She was violently angry and did not conceal her hatred for the woman who had stolen her husband's affections. The Marquise was a trifle vulgar and common in her manner of manifesting her displeasure, but the Marquis, a very polite and affable gentleman, did not pay the slightest attention to his wife's daily recriminations, but continued to amuse himself with the charming Ninon.

Under such circ.u.mstances each was compelled to have a separate social circle, the Marquis entertaining his friends with the adorable Ninon as the center of attraction, and Madame la Marquise doing her best to offer counter attractions. Somehow, Ninon drew around her all the most desirable partis among the flower of the n.o.bility and wits, leaving the social circle managed by la Marquise to languish for want of stamina. It was a constant source of annoyance to the Marquise to see her rival's entertainments so much in repute and her own so poorly attended, and she was at her wits' end to devise something that would give them eclat. One of her methods, and an impromptu scene at one of her drawing-rooms, will serve to show the reason why Madame la Marquise was not in good repute and why she could not attract the elite of Paris to her entertainments.

La Marquise was a very vain, moreover, a very ignorant woman, a "nouvelle riche" in fact, or what might be termed in modern parlance "shoddy," without tact, sense, or savoir faire. One day at a grand reception, some of her guests desired to see her young son, of whom she was very proud, and of whose talents and virtues she was always boasting. He was sent for and came into the presence accompanied by his tutor, an Italian savant who never left his side. From praising his beauty of person, they pa.s.sed to his mental qualities. Madame la Marquise, enchanted at the caresses her son was receiving and aiming to create a sensation by showing off his learning, took it into her head to have his tutor put him through an examination in history.

"Interrogate my son upon some of his recent lessons in history," said she to the tutor, who was not at all loth to show his own attainments by the brilliancy of his pupil.

"Come, now, Monsieur le Marquis," said the tutor with alacrity, "Quem habuit successorem Belus rex a.s.siriorum?" (Whom did Belus, king of the a.s.syrians, have for successor?)

It so happened that the tutor had taught the boy to p.r.o.nounce the Latin language after the Italian fashion. Wherefore, when the lad answered "Ninum," who was really the successor of Belus, king of the a.s.syrians, he p.r.o.nounced the last two letters "um" like the French nasal "on," which gave the name of the a.s.syrian king the same sound as that of Ninon de l'Enclos, the terrible bete noir of the jealous Marquise. This was enough to set her off into a spasm of fury against the luckless tutor, who could not understand why he should be so berated over a simple question and its correct answer. The Marquise not understanding Latin, and guided only by the sound of the answer, which was similar to the name of her hated rival, jumped at the conclusion that he was answering some question about Ninon de l'Enclos.

"You are giving my son a fine education," she snapped out before all her guests, "by entertaining him with the follies of his father. From the answer of the young Marquis I judge of the impertinence of your question. Go, leave my sight, and never enter it again."

The unfortunate tutor vainly protested that he did not comprehend her anger, that he meant no affront, that there was no other answer to be made than "Ninum," unfortunately, again p.r.o.nouncing the word "Ninon,"

which nearly sent the lady into a fit of apoplexy with rage at hearing the tabooed name repeated in her presence. The incensed woman carried the scene to a ridiculous point, refusing to listen to reason or explanation.

"No, he said 'Ninon,' and Ninon it was."

The story spread all over Paris, and when it reached Ninon, she laughed immoderately, her friends dubbing her "The successor of Belus." Ninon told Moliere the ridiculous story and he turned it to profit in one of his comedies in the character of Countess d'Escarbagnas.

At the expiration of three years, peace had come to France after a fashion, the cabals were not so frequent and the rivalry between the factions not so bitter. Whatever differences there had been were patched up or smoothed over. Ninon's return to the house in the Rue des Tournelles was hailed with joy by her "Birds," who received her as one returned from the dead. Saint-Evremond composed an elegy beginning with these lines:

Chere Philis, qu'etes vous devenues?

Cet enchanteur qui vous a retenue Depuis trois ans par un charme nouveau Vous retient-il en quelque vieux chateau?

CHAPTER XIII

The Marquis de Sevigne

It has been attempted to cast odium upon the memory of Mademoiselle de l'Enclos because of her connection with the second Marquis de Sevigne, son of the celebrated Madame de Sevigne, whose letters have been read far and wide by those who fancy they can find something in them with reference to the morals and practices of the court of Versailles during her period.

The Marquis de Sevigne, by a vitiated taste quite natural in men of weak powers, had failed to discover in a handsome woman, spirited, perhaps of too jealous a nature or disposition to be esteemed, the proper sentiments, or sentiments strong enough to retain his affections. He implored Ninon to aid him in preserving her affections and to teach him how to secure her love. Ninon undertook to give him instructions in the art of captivating women's hearts, to show him the nature of love and its operations, and to give him an insight into the nature of women. The Marquis profited by these lessons to fall in love with Ninon, finding her a thousand times more charming than his actress or his princess. Madame de Sevigne's letter referring to the love of her son for Ninon testifies by telling him plainly "Ninon spoiled your father," that this pa.s.sion was not so much unknown to her as it was a matter of indifference.

The young Chevalier de Va.s.se often gave brilliant receptions in honor of Ninon at Saint Cloud, which the Marquis de Sevigne always attended as the mutual friend of both. De Va.s.se was well acquainted with Ninon's peculiarities and knew that the gallantry of such a man as de Sevigne was a feeble means of retaining the affections of a heart that was the slave of nothing but its own fugitive desires. But he was a man devoted to his friends and, being Epicurean in his philosophy, he did not attempt to interfere with the affection he perceived growing between Ninon and his friend. It never occurred to the Marquis that he was guilty of a betrayal of friendship by paying court to Ninon, and the latter took the Marquis' attentions as a matter of course without considering the ingrat.i.tude of her conduct. She rather flattered herself at having been sufficiently attractive to capture a man of de Seine's family distinction. She had captured the heart of de Soigne, the father, and had received so many animadversions upon her conduct from Madame de Sevigne, that it afforded her great pleasure to "spoil"

the son as she had the father.

But her satisfaction was short-lived, for she had the chagrin to learn soon after her conquest that de Sevigne had perished on the field of honor at the hands of Chevalier d'Albret. Her sorrow was real, of course, but the fire lighted by the senses is small and not enduring, and when the occasion arises regret is not eternalized, besides there were others waiting with impatience. His successful rival out of the way, de Va.s.se supposed he had a clear field, but he did not attain his expected happiness. He was no longer pleasing to Ninon and she did no: hesitate to make him understand that he could never hope to win her heart. According to her philosophy there is nothing so shameful in a tender friendship as the art of dissimulation.

As has been said, much odium has been cast upon Mademoiselle de l'Enclos in this de Sevigne matter. It all grew out of the dislike of Madame de Sevigne for a woman who attracted even her own husband and son from her side and heart, and for whom her dearest friends professed the most intimate attachment. Madame de Grignan, the proud, haughty daughter of the house of de Sevigne, did not scruple to array herself on the side of Mademoiselle de l'Enclos with Madame de Coulanges, another bright star among the n.o.ble and respectable families of France.

"Women have the privilege of being weak," says Madame de Sevigne, "and they make use of that privilege without scruple."

Women had never, before the time of Ninon, exercised their rights of weakness to such an unlimited extent. There was neither honor nor honesty to be found among them. They were common to every man who attracted their fancy without regard to fidelity to any one in particular. The seed sown by the infamous Catherine de Medici, the utter depravity of the court of Charles IX, and the profligacy of Henry IV, bore an astonishing supply of bitter fruit. The love of pleasure had, so to speak, carried every woman off her feet, and there was no limit to their abuses. Mademoiselle de l'Enclos, while devoting herself to a life of pleasure, followed certain philosophical rules and regulations which removed from the unrestrained freedom of the times the stigma of commonness and conferred something of respectability upon practices that nowadays would be considered horribly immoral, but which then were regarded as nothing uncommon, nay, were legitimate and proper. The cavaliers cut one another's throats for the love of G.o.d and in the cause of religion, and the women encouraged the arts, sciences, literature, and the drama, by conferring upon talent, wit, genius and merit favors which were deemed conducive as encouragements to the growth of intellect and spirituality.

Ninon was affected by the spirit of the times, and being a woman, it was impossible for her to resist desire when aided by philosophy and force of example. Her intimacy with de Sevigne grew out of her attempt to teach a young, vigorous, pa.s.sionate man how to gain the love of a cold-blooded, vain and conceited woman. Her letters will show the various stages of her desires as she went along vainly struggling to beat something like comprehension into the dull brain of a clod, who could not understand the simplest principle of love, or the smallest point in the female character. At last she resolved to use an argument that was convincing with the brightest minds with whom she had ever dealt, that is, the power of her own love, and if the Marquis had lived, perhaps he might have become an ornament to society and an honor to his family.

To do this, however, she violated her compact with de Va.s.se, betrayed his confidence and opened the way for the animadversions of Madame de Sevigne. At that time de Sevigne was in love with an actress, Mademoiselle Champmele, but desired to withdraw his affections, or rather transfer them to a higher object, a countess, or a princess, as the reader may infer from his mother's hints in one of her letters to be given hereafter. To Ninon, therefore, he went for instruction and advice as to the best course to pursue to get rid of one love and on with a new. Madame de Sevigne and Madame de La Fayette vainly implored him to avoid Ninon as he would the pest. The more they prayed and entreated, the closer he came to Ninon until she became his ideal.

Ninon, herself was captivated by his pleasant conversation, agreeable manners and seductive traits. She knew that he had had a love affair with Champmele, the actress, and when she began to obtain an ascendency over his mind, she wormed out of him all the letters he had ever received from the comedienne. Some say it was jealousy on Ninon's part, but any one who reads her letters to de Sevigne will see between the lines a disposition on his part to wander away after a new charmer. Others, however, say that she intended to send them to the Marquis de Tonnerre, whom the actress had betrayed for de Sevigne.

But Madame de Sevigne, to whom her son had confessed his folly in giving up the letters, perhaps fearing to be embroiled in a disgraceful duel over an actress, made him blush at his cruel sacrifice of a woman who loved him, and made him understand that even in dishonesty there were certain rules of honesty to be observed. She worked upon his mind until he felt that he had committed a dishonorable act, and when he had reached that point, it was easy to get the letters away from Ninon partly by artifice, partly by force.

Madame de Sevigne tells the story in a letter to her daughter, Madame de Grignan: