The House of Saint Cyr.--Petition of the Monks of Saint Denis to the
King, against the Plan of Madame de Maintenon.--Madame de Maintenon
Summons Them and Sends Them Away with Small Consolation.
At the time when I founded my little community of Saint Joseph, Madame de
Maintenon had already collected near her chateau at Rueil a certain
number of well-born but poor young persons, to whom she was giving a good
education, proportioned to their present condition and their birth. She
had charged herself with the maintenance of two former nuns, noble and
well educated, who, at the fall of their community, had been recommended,
or had procured a recommendation, to her. Mesdames de Brinon and du
Basque were these two vagrant nuns. Madame de Maintenon, instinctively
attracted to this sort of persons, welcomed and protected them.
The little pension or community of Rueil, having soon become known,
several families who had fallen into distress or difficulty solicited the
kindness of the directress towards their daughters, and Madame de
Maintenon admitted more inmates than the space allowed. A more roomy
habitation was bought nearer Versailles, which was still only temporary
and the King, having been taken into confidence with regard to these
little girls, who mostly belonged to his own impoverished officers,
judged that the moment had come to found a fine and large educational
establishment for the young ladies of his nobility.
He bought, at the entrance to the village of Saint Cyr, in close
proximity to Versailles, a large old chateau, belonging to M. Seguier;
and on the site of this chateau, which he pulled down, the royal house of
Saint Cyr was speedily erected. I will not go into the nature and aim of
a foundation which is known nowadays through the whole of Europe. I will
content myself with observing that if Madame de Maintenon conceived the
first idea of it, it is the great benefactions of the monarch and the
profound recognition of the nobility which have given stability and
renown to this house.
Madame de Maintenon received much praise and incense as the foundress of
this community. It has been quite easy for her to found so vast an
establishment with the treasures of France, since she herself had
remained poor, by her own confession, and had neither to sell nor
encumber Maintenon, her sole property.
In founding my community of Saint Joseph, I was neither seconded nor
aided by anybody. Saint Joseph springs entirely from myself, from good
intentions, without noise or display. Saint Joseph is one of my good
actions, and although it makes no great noise in the world, I would
rather have founded it than Saint Cyr, where the most exalted houses
procure admission for their children with false certificates of poverty.
The buildings of Saint Cyr, in spite of all the sums they have absorbed,
have no external nobility or grandeur. The foundress put upon it the
seal of her parsimony, or, rather, of her general timidity. She is like
Moliere's Harpagon, who would like to do great things for little money.
[Here Madame de Montespan forgets what she has just said, that Saint-Cyr
cost "immense sums,"--an ordinary effect of passion.--ED. NOTE]
The only beauty about the house is in the laundry and gardens. All the
rest reminds you of a convent of Capuchins. The chapel has not even
necessary and indispensable dignity; it is a long, narrow barn, without
arches, pillars, or decorations. The King, having wished to know
beforehand what revenue would be needed for a community of four hundred
persons, consulted M. de Louvois. That minister, accustomed to calculate
open-handedly, put in an estimate of five hundred thousand livres a year.
The foundress presented hers, which came to no more than twenty-five
thousand crowns. His Majesty adopted a middle course, and assigned a
revenue of three hundred thousand livres to his Royal House of Saint Cyr.
The foundress, foreseeing the financial embarrassments which have
supervened later, conceived the idea of making the clergy (who are
childless) support the education of these three hundred and fifty young
ladies. In consequence, she cast her eyes upon the rich abbey of Saint
Denis, then vacant, and suggested it to the King, as being almost
sufficient to provide for the new establishment.
This idea astonished the prince. He found it, at first, audacious, not
to say perilous; but, on further reflection, considering that the monks
of Saint Denis live under the rule of a prior, and never see their abbot,
who is almost always a great noble and a man of the world, his Majesty
consented to suppress the said abbey in order to provide for the
children.
The monks of Saint Denis, alarmed at such an innovation (which did not,
however, affect their own goods and revenues), composed a petition in the
form of the factum that our advocates draw up in a suit. They exclaimed
in this document "on the disrepute which this innovation would bring upon
their ancient, respectable, and illustrious community. In suppressing
the title of Abbot of Saint Denis," they said further, "your Majesty, in
reality, suppresses our abbey; and if our abbey is reduced to nothing,
our basilica, where the Kings, your ancestors, lie, will be no more than
a royal church, and will cease to be abbatial."
Further on, this petition said: "Sire, may it please your Majesty, whose
eyes can see so far, to appreciate this innovation in all its terrible
consequences. By striking to-day dissolution and death into the first
abbey of your kingdom, do you not fear to leave behind you a great and
sinister precedent? . . . What Louis the Great has looked upon as
possible will seem righteous and necessary to your successors; and it
will happen, maybe, before long, that the thirst for conquests and the
needs of the State (those constant and familiar pretexts of ministers)
will authorise some political Attila to extend your work, and wreak
destruction upon the tabernacle by depriving it of the splendour which is
its due, and which sustains it."
Madame de Maintenon, to whom this affair was entrusted, summoned the
administrative monks of Saint Denis to Versailles. She received them
with her agreeable and seductive courtesy, and, putting on her dulcet and
fluted voice, said to them that their alarm was without foundation; that
his Majesty did not suppress their abbey; that he simply took it from the
male sex to give it to the female, seeing that the Salic law never
included the dignities of the Church nor her revenues.
"The King leaves you," she added, "those immense and prodigious treasures
of Saint Denis, more ancient, perhaps, than the Oriflamme. That is your
finest property, your true and illustrious glory. In general, your
abbots have been, to this very day, unknown to you. Do you find,
gentlemen, that religion was more honoured and respected when men of
battle, covered with murders and other crimes, were called Abbots of
Saint Denis? Beneath the government of the King such nominations would
never have affected the Church; and after the present M. le Chevalier de
Lorraine, we shall hear no more of nominating an abbot-commandant on the
steps of the Opera.
"Our little girls are cherubim and seraphim, occupied unceasingly with
the praise of the Lord. I recommend them to your holy prayers, and you
can count on theirs."
With this compliment she dismissed the monks, and what she had resolved
on was carried out.
The King, who all his life had loved children greatly, did not take long
to contract an affection for this budding colony. He liked to assist
sometimes at their recreations and exercises, and, as though Versailles
had been at the other end of the world, he had a magnificent apartment
built at Saint Cyr. This fine armorial pavilion decorates the first long
court in the centre. The mere buildings announce a king; the royal crown
surmounts them.
At first the education of Saint Cyr had been entrusted to canonesses; but
a canoness only takes annual vows; that term expired, she is at liberty
to retire and marry. Several of these ladies having proved thus
irresolute as to their estate, and the house being afraid that a greater
number would follow, the Abbe de Fenelon, who cannot endure limited or
temporary devotion, thought fit to introduce fixed and perpetual vows
into Saint Cyr, and that willynilly.
This elegant abbe says all that he means, and resolutely means all that
he can say. By means of his lectures, a mixed and facile form of
eloquence, which is his glory, he easily proved to these poor canonesses
that streams and rivers flow ever since the world began, and never think
of suspending their current or abandoning their direction. He reminded
them that the sun, which is always in its place and always active, never
dreams of abandoning its functions, either from inconstancy or caprice.
He told them that wise kings are never seized with the idea or temptation
of abdicating their crown, and that God, who serves them as a model and
example, is ceaselessly occupied, with relation to the world, in
preserving, reanimating, and maintaining it. Starting from there, the
ingenious man made them confess that they ought to remain at their post
and bind themselves to it by a perpetual vow.
The first effect of this fine oration having been a little dissipated,
objections broke out. One young and lovely canoness dared to maintain
the rights of her freedom, even in the face of her most amiable enemy.
Madame de Maintenon rushed to the succour of the Abbe of Saint Sulpice,
and half by wheedling, half by tyranny, obtained the cloister and
perpetual vows.
I must render this justice to the King; he never would pronounce or
intervene in this pathetic struggle. His royal hand profited, no doubt,
by a submission which the Abbe de Fenelon imposed upon timidity,
credulity, and obedience. The House of Saint Cyr profited thereby; but
the King only regretted a new religious convent, for, as a rule, he liked
them not. How many times has he unburdened himself before me on the
subject.