ticism and Quietism had begun to
spread abroad; but Fenelon, who had acquired already a very high
celebrity for eloquence, had not yet written on the subject. We may
well suppose that Bossuet was among the earliest assailants of a
system which he afterward attacked so vehemently.

[2] Bossuet was in his fifty-fourth year; Mademoiselle de Fontanges
died in child-bed the year following: he survived her twenty-three
years.

[3] Though Bossuet was capable of uttering and even of feeling such a
sentiment, his conduct towards Fenelon, the fairest apparition that
Christianity ever presented, was ungenerous and unjust.

While the diocese of Cambray was ravaged by Louis, it was spared by
Marlborough; who said to the archbishop that, if he was sorry he had
not taken Cambray, it was chiefly because he lost for a time the
pleasure of visiting so great a man. Peterborough, the next of our
generals in glory, paid his respects to him some years afterward.

JOHN OF GAUNT AND JOANNA OF KENT

Joanna, called the Fair Maid of Kent, was cousin of
the Black Prince, whom she married. John of Gaunt was
suspected of aiming at the crown in the beginning of
Richard's minority, which, increasing the hatred of
the people against him for favouring the sect of
Wickliffe, excited them to demolish his house and to
demand his impeachment.

_Joanna._ How is this, my cousin, that you are besieged in your own
house by the citizens of London? I thought you were their idol.

_Gaunt._ If their idol, madam, I am one which they may tread on as
they list when down; but which, by my soul and knighthood! the ten
best battle-axes among them shall find it hard work to unshrine.

Pardon me: I have no right, perhaps, to take or touch this hand; yet,
my sister, bricks and stones and arrows are not presents fit for you.
Let me conduct you some paces hence.

_Joanna._ I will speak to those below in the street. Quit my hand:
they shall obey me.

_Gaunt._ If you intend to order my death, madam, your guards who have
entered my court, and whose spurs and halberts I hear upon the
staircase, may overpower my domestics; and, seeing no such escape as
becomes my dignity, I submit to you. Behold my sword and gauntlet at
your feet! Some formalities, I trust, will be used in the proceedings
against me. Entitle me, in my attainder, not John of Gaunt, not Duke
of Lancaster, not King of Castile; nor commemorate my father, t