PARIS, Friday, January 8, 1681.
I should be very sorry, sir, if our correspondence were to end with
the temple of Montpellier; and all you say to this effect, in doing
the honors of your letters, by supposing the assurance of their
continuance to contain a threat to me, is so ungenerous that I should
be disposed to scold you; nor would the pretty turn you have given to
this guarantee you from my reproaches, were it not that the letter
you have written to my son makes me eager to tell you how much it has
delighted me. The neatness of the beginning has reminded me of our
merry stories, and the beauty of the verses has made me regret that you
have not continued them in good earnest. If you have done so, let us
share the pleasure of reading them. The two Latin verses you explain
are very just. In short, we esteem your verse, your prose, and all
your productions. My son is still your adorer; my daughter admires and
esteems you in the highest degree. I presume you know my own sentiments
for you, and that you see plainly there is not a family in the world
who so justly appreciates your merit. You do the same in regard to
M. de Carcassonne, by praising him as you do. The poor chevalier
has been here for these six weeks, laid up with the rheumatism. He
receives visits from persons almost as lame as himself. Those who are
left-handed show at least that their taste is right. You have returned
M. de Noailles to us in a very ill state of health. He has so violent
a diarrhœa that it seems as if he had eaten to his own share all that
he has expended at Montpellier; in short, he has been obliged to resign
the staff, the staff that was the object of his love, the staff he
went so far to assume, the staff which was the reward of all his other
services. It is natural to suppose that he must be very ill, when he
gives it himself to M. de Luxembourg. You say much in his favor when
you speak of the distinction and expansion of heart he showed you. I
wish his generosity had gone so far as to have induced him to return
our mortified friend’s visit.[302] Have I not heard you say that we
ought to respect the unfortunate? It can not be doubted that this
has increased the mortification. I pity him for having suffered this
feeling to take possession of him, and to have surmounted even his
Christian philosophy; but I pity him still more if your heart be yet
closed against him. A friend like you would be a true consolation in
all his afflictions. Our _friend_ (Corbinelli) is entirely occupied
here with his affairs. He does wonders. He is become the best lawyer
in Paris; and this qualification came to him unexpectedly along with
his peruke and brandenbourg, so that we should much sooner have taken
him for a captain of cavalry than a man of business. It is thus the
exterior often deceives us. If M. de Vardes had not thrown him into
this employment, his gratitude and inclination would lead him straight
to you. His heart is still perfect in all the moral virtues. They will
become Christian virtues when it shall please Providence, whom we still
adore, and who seems to treat you well, by the sentiments it inspires
you with. Adieu, my dear sir. We should have many things to say to
each other if we met. Who knows that some day or other we may not? Our
friend writes to you separately; so much the worse for him: he will not
know that I have the pleasure of assuring you here of my sincere and
faithful friendship.
[302] Anne Jules, Duke de Noailles, had been nominated to the
command in Languedoc, of which the Duke du Maine, then too young
to take it upon himself, had just been appointed governor.
Preparations were making for the destruction of Calvinism.
In conjunction with the intendant d’Aguesseau, father of the
celebrated chancellor, Noailles endeavored for a long time
to engage the court to employ mild measures; and even in the
execution of the most rigorous he at first showed some humanity;
but he afterward became one of the most violent persecutors, and
his dispatches, concerted with Louvois, did not fail to excite
the king to rigors of which he too late repented.
It appears that he thought he could not, with propriety, in the
situation he held, return the visit of M. de Vardes, then an
exile, and whom Madame de Sévigné designates by the title of the
mortified friend.