Nought have I else to do,
        I sing the whole day long,
      And He whom well I love to please
        Doth listen to my song. 
      He caught and bound my wandering wing,
      But still He bends to hear me sing.

      Thou hast an ear to hear,
        A heart to love and bless,
      And though my notes were e’er so rude. 
        Thou would’st not hear the less,
      Because Thou knowest, as they fall,
      That love, sweet love, inspires them all.

      My cage confines me round,
        Abroad I cannot fly;
      But though my wing is closely bound,
        My heart’s at liberty. 
      My prison walls cannot control
      The flight, the freedom of the soul.

      Oh, it is good to soar
        These bolts and bars above,
      To Him whose purpose I adore,
        Whose providence I love,
      And in Thy mighty will to find
      The joy, the freedom of the mind.”

Her liberation from this imprisonment came from a remarkable quarter.  Madame de Miramion, a pious lady, often visited the convent with charitable intent.  Having heard much about Madame Guyon, she asked to see her; and having seen her and conversed with her, she soon became her warm friend, and pleaded her cause with Madame de Maintenon, who was now at the height of her power and possessed supreme influence with the king, whose wife she had become, by a private marriage, in 1685.  Madame de Miramion, having in this way procured Madame Guyon’s release from her convent prison, took her to her own house.  It was a happy change for this much-tried woman.  She was once again among friends, and had the society of her daughter.  She went to St. Cyr—­a royal institution for the education of the daughters of the poorer aristocracy, in which Madame de Maintenon took interest—­to thank the great lady for her kindness.  The latter was charmed with the bright, saintly ex-prisoner, whose devout spirit shone out in her countenance and breathed in her fascinating speech.  She had many conversations with her, and begged her to give instruction to the girls of St. Cyr.

It was at this time that Madame Guyon first met the great Fenelon, who was a director of St. Cyr, as well as one of the most noted characters of the age.  She won his lasting regard.  He was cheered by the warmth of her piety and her unwavering faith, while his more logical and better disciplined mind would no doubt moderate and tone down her excess of introspection and rapt emotion.  She spent three happy years in Paris, consulted by many persons on religious matters, admired and honoured by several distinguished people, and sheltered from storm in the house of her daughter, now married to the Count de Vaux.  But the sunshine was not to last long.  Godet, Madame de Maintenon’s confessor and one of the directors of St. Cyr, was possessed with a jealous hatred of his co-director, Fenelon, and also