ceforth, he can be reasonable with impunity. A man can not be
expected to be amorous of his wife, but should he be, it will be
pardoned him as soon as people see you. You risk nothing, therefore,
Countess; you yourself have put on the airs of a society woman, but
you were too sensible not to abandon such a role; you renounced it;
the Marquis imitates you. Wherefore forget his mistakes. Could you
bear the reproach of having caused the death of so amiable a man? It
would be an act that would cry out for vengeance."

In a word, I besought and pressed her, but she is still irresolute.
Still, I do not doubt that you will finish by overcoming a resistance
which she, herself, already deems very embarrassing.

Well, Marquis, if the anxiety all this has caused you, gives you the
time to review what I have been saying to you for several days past,
might you not be tempted to believe that I have contradicted myself?
At first I advised you to treat love lightly and to take only so much
of it as might amuse you. You were to be nothing but a gallant, and
have no relations with women except those in which you could easily
break the ties. I then spoke to you in a general way, and relative to
ordinary women. Could I imagine that you would be so fortunate as to
meet a woman like the Countess, who would unite the charms of her sex
to the qualities of honest men? What must be your felicity? You are
going to possess in one and the same person, the most estimable friend
and a most charming mistress. Deign to admit me to share a third
portion of your friendship and my happiness will equal your own. Can
one be happier than in sharing the happiness of friends?

CORRESPONDENCE

BETWEEN

LORD SAINT-EVREMOND

AND

NINON DE L'ENCLOS

WHEN OVER EIGHTY YEARS
OF AGE

INTRODUCTION

Charles de Saint Denis, Lord of Saint-Evremond, Marshal of France, was
one of the few distinguished Frenchmen, exiled by Louis XIV, whose
distinguished abilities as a warrior and philosopher awarded him a
last resting place in Westminster Abbey. His tomb, surmounted by a
marble bust, is situated in the nave near the cloister, located among
those of Barrow, Chaucer, Spenser, Cowley and other renowned
Englishmen.

His epitaph, written by the hand of a Briton, is singularly replete
with the most eminent qualities, which the great men of his period
recognized in him, though his life was extraordinarily long and
stormy. He was moreover, a profound a