war of diplomacy and of pamphlets, in which Fenelon displayed
the utmost skill and energy as tactician and dialectician, he received
a temperate condemnation from Rome, and submitted. The death of the
Dauphin (1711), which left his former pupil heir to the throne,
revived Fenelon's hopes of political influence, but in the next year
these hopes disappeared with the decease of the young Duc de Bourgogne.
At Cambrai, where he discharged his episcopal duties like a saint
and a _grand seigneur_, Fenelon died six months before Louis XIV.,
in 1715.

"The most original intellect--if we set Pascal aside--of the
seventeenth century"--so Fenelon is described by one excellent
critic. "Antique and modern," writes his biographer, M. Paul Janet,
"Christian and profane, mystical and diplomatic, familiar and noble,
gentle and headstrong, natural and subtle, fascinating the
eighteenth century as he had fascinated the seventeenth, believing
like a child, and daring as Spinoza, Fenelon is one of the most
original figures which the Catholic Church has produced." His first
publication was the treatise _De l'Education des Filles_ (written
1681, published 1687), composed at the request of his friends the
Duc and Duchesse de Beauvilliers. It is based on a recognition of
the dignity of woman and the duty of a serious effort to form her
mind. It honours the reason, opposes severity, would make instruction,
as far as possible, a delight, and would exhibit goodness in a gracious
aspect; commends object-lessons in addition to book-learning,
indicates characteristic feminine failings (yet liveliness of
disposition is not regarded as one of these), exhorts to a dignified
simplicity in dress. The range of studies recommended is narrow, but
for Fenelon's time it was liberal; the book marks an epoch in the
history of female education.

For his pupil the Duc de Bourgogne, Fenelon wrote his graceful prose
_Fables_ (which also include under that title short tales, allegories,
and fairy stories), the _Dialogues des Morts_, aiming at the
application of moral principles to politics, and his _Telemaque_,
named in the first (incomplete) edition _Suite du IVe Livre de
l'Odyssee_ (1699). In this, for long the most popular of tales for
the young, Fenelon's imaginative devotion to antiquity finds ample
expression; it narrates the wanderings of Telemachus in search of
his father Ulysses, under the warning guidance and guardianship of
Minerva disguised as Mentor. I