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Updated: June 9, 2025
So many and such long audiences with the King, followed by so much serenity, had a great effect upon the world, and the crowd that flocked to see Madame des Ursins was greater than ever; but under various pretences she shut herself up and would see only a few intimate friends, foremost among which were Madame de Saint-Simon and myself.
Saint-Simon notes that "Patriote comme il l'était, il avait toute sa vie été touché de la misère du peuple et de toutes les vexations qu'il souffrait." La Bruyère was the first effective moralist who realized what a monstrous disproportion existed between the fortune of the rich and of the poor.
As may be believed, his orders were punctually obeyed. Madame de Saint-Simon could not refuse to remain and sleep in the Palais Royal, where the apartment of the queen-mother was given to her. All the while the party was shut up there was a good deal of gaming in order to console M. le Duc de Berry for his confinement.
Marechal, first surgeon of the King, and possessed of his confidence, related once to me and Madame de Saint-Simon, a very important anecdote referring to this time. He said that the King, talking to him privately of the Pere La Chaise, and praising him for his attachment, related one of the great proofs he had given of it.
There was no means, therefore, of being wise among so many fools. Several dresses were necessary. Those for Madame Saint-Simon and myself cost us twenty thousand francs. Workmen were wanting to make up so many rich habits. Madame la Duchesse actually sent her people to take some by force who were working at the Duc de Rohan's!
They pick up fallen great men like Vico, Saint-Simon, and Fourier. I am much afraid that they will turn poor Joseph Bridau's head among them." "Bianchon, my old schoolfellow, gives me the cold shoulder now," said Lousteau; "it is all their doing " "Do they give lectures on orthopedy and intellectual gymnastics?" asked Merlin.
The government had anticipated by ten years its revenues from the towns. Still, this pale corpse of France must needs be bled anew to gratify the inexorable Jesuits, who had again made themselves complete masters of Louis XIV's mind. He would have frightened anyone, says Saint-Simon, who met him at the corner of a wood.
On Thursday morning, the 18th of February, I learned that the Dauphin, who had waited for midnight with impatience, had heard mass immediately after the communion, had passed two hours in devout communication with God, and that his reason then became embarrassed. Madame de Saint-Simon told me afterwards that he had received extreme unction: in fine, that he died at half-past eight.
With Madame de Maintenon and a small suite, he had just taken up his abode in Meudon, when Madame de Saint-Simon sent me the letter of which I have just made mention. I will continue to speak of myself with the same truthfulness I speak of others, and with as much exactness as possible.
At the end of my illness I was bled and purged once, after which I lived as usual, but in a species of solitude. During the long interval in which this illness shut me out from all intercourse with the world, the Abbe de Saint-Simon corresponded for me with Cardinal Dubois, Grimaldo, Sartine, and some others.
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