Hatred is the worst thing in the world: it makes one so very ugly.

_Bossuet._ To love God, we must hate ourselves. We must detest our
bodies, if we would save our souls.

_Fontanges._ That is hard: how can I do it? I see nothing so
detestable in mine. Do you? To love is easier. I love God whenever I
think of Him, He has been so very good to me; but I cannot hate
myself, if I would. As God hath not hated me, why should I? Beside, it
was He who made the king to love me; for I heard you say in a sermon
that the hearts of kings are in His rule and governance. As for titles
and dignities, I do not care much about them while his Majesty loves
me, and calls me his Angelique. They make people more civil about us;
and therefore it must be a simpleton who hates or disregards them, and
a hypocrite who pretends it. I am glad to be a duchess. Manon and
Lisette have never tied my garter so as to hurt me since, nor has the
mischievous old La Grange said anything cross or bold: on the
contrary, she told me what a fine colour and what a plumpness it gave
me. Would not you rather be a duchess than a waiting-maid or a nun, if
the king gave you your choice?

_Bossuet._ Pardon me, mademoiselle, I am confounded at the levity of
your question.

_Fontanges._ I am in earnest, as you see.

_Bossuet._ Flattery will come before you in other and more dangerous
forms: you will be commended for excellences which do not belong to
you; and this you will find as injurious to your repose as to your
virtue. An ingenuous mind feels in unmerited praise the bitterest
reproof. If you reject it, you are unhappy; if you accept it, you are
undone. The compliments of a king are of themselves sufficient to
pervert your intellect.

_Fontanges._ There you are mistaken twice over. It is not my person
that pleases him so greatly: it is my spirit, my wit, my talents, my
genius, and that very thing which you have mentioned--what was it? my
intellect. He never complimented me the least upon my beauty. Others
have said that I am the most beautiful young creature under heaven; a
blossom of Paradise, a nymph, an angel; worth (let me whisper it in
your ear--do I lean too hard?) a thousand Montespans. But his Majesty
never said more on the occasion than that I was _imparagonable!_ (what
is that?) and that he adored me; holding my hand and sitting quite
still, when he might have romped with me and kissed me.

_Bossuet._ I would aspire to the glory of converting you.