There is an entire absence of mawkish sentimentality, of effort to conceal the secret motives and desires of the heart beneath specious language and words of double meaning.  On the contrary, they tear away from the heart the curtain of deceit, artifice and treachery, to expose the nature of the machinery behind the scenes.

These letters must be read in the light of the opinions of the wisest philosophers of the seventeenth century upon her character.

“Inasmuch as the first use she (Mademoiselle de l’Enclos) made of her reason, was to become enfranchised from vulgar errors, it is impossible to be further removed from the stupid mistake of those who, under the name of “passion,” elevate the sentiment of love to the height of a virtue.  Ninon understood love to be what it really is, a taste founded upon the senses, a blind sentiment, which admits of no merit in the object which gives it birth, and which promises no recompense; a caprice, the duration of which does not depend upon our volition, and which is subject to remorse and repentance.”

LETTERS OF NINON de L’ENCLOS

TO THE

Marquis de Sevigne

I.

A Hazardous Undertaking.

What, I, Marquis, take charge of your education, be your guide in the enterprise upon which you are about to enter?  You exact too much of my friendship for you.  You ought to be aware of the fact, that when a woman has lost the freshness of her first youth, and takes a special interest in a young man, everybody says she desires to “make a worldling of him.”  You know the malignity of this expression.  I do not care to expose myself to its application.  All the service I am willing to render you, is to become your confidante.  You will tell me your troubles, and I will tell you what is in my mind, likewise aid you to know your own heart and that of women.

It grieves me to say, that whatever pleasure I may expect to find in this correspondence, I can not conceal the difficulties I am liable to encounter.  The human heart, which will be the subject of my letters, presents so many contrasts, that whoever lays it bare must fall into a flood of contradictions.  You think you have something stable in your grasp, but find you have seized a shadow.  It is indeed a chameleon, which, viewed from different aspects, presents a variety of opposite colors, and even they are constantly shifting.  You may expect to read many strange things in what I shall say upon this subject.  I will, however, give you my ideas, though they may often seem strange; however, that shall be for you to determine.  I confess that I am not free from grave scruples of conscience, foreseeing that I can scarcely be sincere without slandering my own sex a little.  But at least you will know my views on the subject of love, and particularly everything that relates to it, and I have sufficient courage to talk to you frankly upon the subject.