FOOTNOTES:
[128] Rollin, Traité des études, Tome IV. p. 335.
[129] I am in doubt whether M. Compayré intends to sanction this doctrine or not. This is an anticipation of one of Jacotot’s paradoxes: “All human beings are equally capable of learning.” The verdict of actual teachers is undoubtedly to the effect that there are manifold differences in the ability of pupils to know, comprehend, and judge. (P.)
[130] Is not the antagonism pointed out by Malebranche more serious than M. Compayré seems to think? If the current of mental activity sets strongly towards the feelings, emotions, or senses, it is thereby diverted from the purely intellectual processes, such as reflection and judgment. The mind of the savage is an example of what comes from “following the order of nature” in an extreme training of the senses. On the nature and extent of this antagonism, the following authorities may be consulted: Hamilton, Metaphysics, p. 336; Mansel, Metaphysics, pp. 68, 70, 77; Bain, The Senses and the Intellect, pp. 392-394; Bain, Education as a Science, pp. 17, 29, 37; Spencer, Principles of Psychology, pp. 98-99. (P.)
[131] John Locke. His Life and his Work. Paris, 1878.
[132] Thoughts, translation by G. Compayré, p. 57.
[133] Demogeot et Montucci, de l’Enseignement secondaire en Angleterre, p. 41.
[134] On the question of corporal punishment in school, is not M. Compayré too absolute in his assumptions? On what principle does he base his absolute condemnation of the rod? What is to be done in those cases of revolt against order and decency that occur from time to time in most schools? There is no doubt that the very best teachers can govern without resorting to this hateful expedient; but what shall be done in extreme cases by the multitude who are not, and never can be, teachers of this ideal type? Nor does this question stand alone. Below, it is related to family discipline; and above, to civil administration. If corporal punishment is interdicted in the school, should it not be interdicted in the State? (P.)
[135] It is usually said that a pupil’s distaste for a study indicates one of two things, either the mode of presenting the subject is bad, or it is presented at an unseasonable period of mental development; but this distaste is quite as likely to be due to the fact that a certain mode of mental activity has not yet been established; for until fairly established, its exercise cannot be pleasurable. The assumption that intellectual appetites already exist and are waiting to be gratified, or that they will invariably appear at certain periods of mental development, is by no means a general law of the mental life. In many cases, these appetites must be created, and it may often be that the studies employed for this purpose may not at first be relished. And there are cases where, under the best of skill, this relish may never come; and still, the knowledge or the discipline is so necessary that the studies may be enforced contrary to the pupil’s pleasure. (P.)
[136] Thoughts, edited by R. H. Quick (Cambridge, 1880), pp. 153-4.
[137] Thoughts, p. 177.
[CHAPTER X.]
THE EDUCATION OF WOMEN IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY.—JACQUELINE PASCAL AND MADAME DE MAINTENON.
THE EDUCATION OF WOMEN IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY; MADAME DE SÉVIGNÉ; THE ABBÉ FLEURY; EDUCATION IN CONVENTS; PORT ROYAL AND THE REGULATIONS OF JACQUELINE PASCAL; GENERAL IMPRESSION; SEVERITY AND AFFECTION; GENERAL CHARACTER OF SAINT CYR; TWO PERIODS IN THE INSTITUTION OF SAINT CYR; DRAMATIC REPRESENTATIONS; THE REFORM OF 1692; THE PART PLAYED BY MADAME DE MAINTENON; HER PEDAGOGICAL WRITINGS; INTERIOR ORGANIZATION OF SAINT CYR; DISTRUST OF READING; THE STUDY OF HISTORY NEGLECTED; INSTRUCTION INSUFFICIENT; MANUAL LABOR; MORAL EDUCATION; DISCREET DEVOTION; SIMPLICITY IN ALL THINGS; FÉNELON AND SAINT CYR; GENERAL JUDGMENT; ANALYTICAL SUMMARY.
224. The Education of Women in the Seventeenth Century.—The Education of Girls of Fénelon has shown us how far the spirit of the seventeenth century was able to go in what concerns the education of women, as exhibited in the most liberal theories on the subject; but in practice, save in brilliant exceptions, even the modest and imperfect ideal of Fénelon was far from being attained.
Chrysale was not alone of this opinion, when he said in the Learned Ladies:—
“It is not very proper, and for several reasons, that a woman should study and know so many things. To train the minds of her children in good morals and manners, to superintend her household, by keeping an eye on her servants, and to control the expenditures with economy, ought to be her study and philosophy.”[138] It is true that Molière himself did not sympathize with the prejudices whose expression he put in the mouth of his comic character, and that he concludes that a woman “may be enlightened on every subject” (“Je consens qu’une femme ait des clartés de tout”). But in real fact and in practice, it is the opinion of Chrysale that prevailed. Even in the higher classes, woman held herself aloof from instruction, and from things intellectual. Madame Racine had never seen played, and had probably never read, the tragedies of her husband.
225. Madame de Sévigné.—However, the seventeenth century was not wanting in women of talent or genius, who might have made an eloquent plea in behalf of their sex; but they were content to give personal examples of a high order, without any anxiety to be imitated. Madame de Lafayette made beautiful translations from Latin; Madame Dacier was a humanist of the first order; and Madame de Sévigné knew the modern languages as well as the ancient. No one has better described the advantage of reading. She recommends the reading of romances in the following terms:—
“I found that a young man became generous and brave in seeing my heroes, and that a girl became genteel and wise in reading Cleopatra. There are occasionally some who take things somewhat amiss, but they would perhaps do scarcely any better if they could not read.”[139]
Madame de Sévigné had her daughter read Descartes, and her granddaughter Pauline, the tragedies of Corneille.
“For my part,” she said, “if I were to bring up my granddaughter, I would have her read what is good, but not too simple. I would reason with her.”[140]
226. The Abbé Fleury.—But Madame de Sévigné and Madame de Grignan were but brilliant exceptions. If one were to doubt the ignorance of the women of this period, it would suffice to read this striking passage from the Abbé Fleury, the assistant of Fénelon in the education of the Duke of Bourgogne:—
“This, doubtless, will be a great paradox, that women ought to learn anything else than their catechism, sewing, and different little pieces of work, singing, dancing, and dressing in the fashion, and to make a fine courtesy. As things now go, this constitutes all their education.”[141]
Fleury desires something else for woman. He demands that she learn to write correctly in French, and that she study logic and arithmetic. But we need not fear lest the liberalism of a thinker of the seventeenth century carry him too far. Fleury admits, for example, that history is absolutely useless to women.
227. Education in the Convents.—It is almost exclusively in convents that young girls then received what passed for an education. The religious congregations that devoted themselves to female education were numberless; we note, for example, among the most celebrated, the Ursulines, founded in 1537; the Association of the Angelics, established in Italy in 1536; and the Order of Saint Elizabeth. But, notwithstanding the diversity of names, all the convents for girls resemble one another. In all of them woman was educated for heaven, or for a life of devotion. Spiritual exercises formed the only occupation of the pupils, and study was scarcely taken into account.
228. Port Royal and the Regulations of Jacqueline Pascal.—The best means of penetrating into the inner life of the convents of the seventeenth century is to read the Regulations for Children, written towards 1657 by Jacqueline Pascal, Sister Saint Euphemia. The education of girls interested the Jansenists not less than the education of men; but in this respect, Port Royal is far from deserving the same encomiums in both cases.
229. General Impression.—There is nothing so sombre and sad as the interior of their institution for girls, and nothing so austere as the rules of Jacqueline Pascal.
“A strange emotion, even at the distance of centuries, is caused by the sight of those children keeping silent or speaking in a whisper from rising till retiring, never walking except between two nuns, one in front and the other behind, in order to make it impossible, by slackening their pace on the pretext of some indisposition, for them to hold any communication; working in such a way as never to be in companies of two or three; passing from meditation to prayer, and from prayer to instruction; learning, besides the catechism, nothing but reading and writing; and, on Sunday, ‘a little arithmetic, the older from one to two o’clock, and the younger from two to half past two’; the hands always busy to prevent the mind from wandering; but without being able to become attached to their work, which would please God as much the more as it pleased themselves the less; opposing all their natural inclinations, and despising the attentions due the body ‘destined to serve as food for worms’; doing nothing, in a word, except in the spirit of mortification. Imagine those days of fourteen and sixteen hours, slowly succeeding one another, and weighing down on the heads of those poor little sisters, for six or eight years in that dreary solitude, where there was nothing to bring in the stir of life, save the sound of the bell announcing a change of exercise or of penance, and you will comprehend Fénelon’s feeling of sadness when he speaks of the shadows of that deep cavern in which was imprisoned and, as it were, buried the youth of girls.”[142]
230. Severity and Love.—The severity of the Regulations is such that the editor, M. de Pontchartrain, also a Jansenist, allows that it will be impossible to obtain from all children “so complete a silence and so formal a life”; and requires that the mistresses shall try to gain their affections. Love must be united with severity. Jacqueline Pascal does not seem to be entirely of this opinion, since she declares that only God must be loved. However, notwithstanding her habitual severity, human tenderness sometimes asserts its rights in the rules which she established. We feel that she loves more than she confesses, those young girls whom she calls “little doves.” On the one hand, the Regulations incite the pupils to eat of what is placed before them indifferently, and to begin with what they like the least, through a spirit of penitence; but, on the other hand, Jacqueline writes: “They must be exhorted to take sufficient nourishment so as not to allow themselves to become weakened, and this is why care is taken that they have eaten enough.” And so there is a touching solicitude that is almost maternal in this remark: “As soon as they have retired, each particular bed must be visited, to see whether all proprieties have been observed, and whether the children are well covered in winter.” The mystic sister of the ascetic Pascal has moments of tenderness. “Nevertheless, we must not cease to feel pity for them, and to accommodate ourselves to them in every way that we can, but without letting them know that we have thus condescended.” However, the dominant conception ever reappearing, is the idea that human nature is evil; that we have to do with rebellious spirits which must be conquered, and that they deserve no commiseration.
There is a deal of anxiety to make study agreeable! Jacqueline directs her pupils to work at the very things that are most repulsive, because the work that will please God the most is that which will please them the least. The exterior manifestations of friendship are forbidden, and possibly friendship itself. “Our pupils shall shun every sort of familiarity one towards another.”
Instruction is reduced to the catechism, to the application of the Christian virtues, to reading, and to writing. Arithmetic is not taught save on holidays. It seems that memory is the only faculty that Jacqueline wishes to have developed. “This opens their minds, gives them occupation, and keeps them from evil thoughts.” Have we not reason to say that at Port Royal women have less value than men! What a distance between the solid instruction of Lancelot’s and Nicole’s pupils and the ignorance of Jacqueline Pascal’s! Even when the men of Port Royal speak of the education of women, they have more liberal ideas than those which are applied at their side. Nicole declares that books are necessary even in convents for girls, because it is necessary “to sustain prayer by reading.”
231. General Character of Saint Cyr.—In leaving Port Royal for Saint Cyr, we seem, on coming out of a profound night, to perceive a ray of light. Without doubt, Madame de Maintenon has not yet, as a teacher, all that breadth of view that could be desired. Her work is far from being faultless, but the founding of Saint Cyr (1686) was none the less a considerable innovation. “Saint Cyr,” it has been said, “is not a convent. It is a great establishment devoted to the lay education of young women of noble birth; it is a bold and intelligent secularization of the education of women.” There is some excess of praise in this statement, and the lay character of Saint Cyr is very questionable. Lavallée, an admirer, could write: “The instructions of Madame de Maintenon are doubtless too religious, too monastic.” Let us grant, however, that Madame de Maintenon, who, after having founded Saint Cyr, was the director of it, extra muros, and even taught there, at stated times, is personally the first lay teacher of France. Let us grant, also, that at least in the beginning, and up to 1692, the women entrusted with the work of instruction were not nuns in the absolute sense of the term. They were not bound by solemn and absolute vows.
But this character relatively laic, and this rupture with monastic traditions, were not maintained during the whole life of the institution.
232. Two Periods in the History of Saint Cyr.—Saint Cyr, in fact, passed, within a few years, through two very different periods, and Madame de Maintenon followed in succession two almost opposite currents. For the first years, from 1686 to 1692, the spirit of the institution is broad and liberal; the education is brilliant, perhaps too much so; literary exercises and dramatic representations have an honored place. Saint Cyr is an institution inclining to worldliness, better fitted to train women of intellect than good economists and housewives. Madame de Maintenon quickly saw that she had taken a false route, and, from 1692, she reacted, not without excess, against the tendencies which she had at first obeyed. She conceived an extreme distrust of literary studies, and cut off all she could from the instruction, in order to give her entire thought to the moral and practical qualities of her pupils. Saint Cyr became a convent, with a little more liberty, doubtless, than there was in the other monasteries of the time, but it was a convent still.
233. Dramatic Representations.—It was the notorious success of the performance of Andromaque and Esther that caused the overthrow of the original intentions of Madame de Maintenon. Esther, in particular, was the great event of the first years of Saint Cyr. Racine distributed the parts; Boileau conducted the training in elocution; and the entire Court, the king at the head, came to applaud and entertain the pretty actresses, who left nothing undone to please their spectators. Heads were a little turned by all this; dissipation crept into the school. The pupils were no longer willing to sing in church, for fear of spoiling their voices. Evidently the route was now over a dangerous declivity. The institution had been turned from its purpose. Matters were in a way to establish, under another form, another Hôtel de Rambouillet.[143]
234. Reform of 1692.—At the first, as we have seen, the ladies of Saint Louis, charged with the direction of Saint Cyr, did not found a monastic order properly so-called; but, when Madame de Maintenon resolved to reform the general spirit of the house, she thought it necessary to transform Saint Cyr into a monastery, and she founded the Order of Saint Augustine.
But what she changed in particular was the moral discipline, and the programme of studies.
Madame de Maintenon has herself recited, in a memorable letter,[144] the reasons of that reform which modified so profoundly the character of Saint Cyr:—
“The sorrow I feel for the girls of Saint Cyr,” she said, “can be cured only by time and by an entire change in the education that we have given them up to this hour. It is very just that I should suffer for this, since I have contributed to it more than any one else.... The whole establishment has been the object of my pride, and the ground for this feeling has been so real that it has gone to extremes that I never intended. God knows that I wished to establish virtue at Saint Cyr, but I have built upon the sand. Not having, what alone can make a solid foundation, I wished the girls to be witty, high-spirited, and trained to think; I have succeeded in this purpose. They have wit, and they use it against us. They are high-spirited, and are more heady and haughty than would be becoming in a royal princess. Speaking after the manner of the world, we have trained their reason, and have made them talkative, presumptuous, inquisitive, bold ... witty,—such characters as even we who have trained them cannot abide.... Let us seek a remedy, for we must not be discouraged.... As many little things form pride, many little things will destroy it. Our girls have been treated with too much consideration, have been petted too much, treated too gently. We must now leave them more to themselves in their class-rooms, make them observe the daily regulations, and speak to them of scarcely anything else.... Pray to God, and ask Him to change their hearts; and that He may give to all of them humility. There should not be much conversation with them on the subject. Everything at Saint Cyr is made a matter of discourse. We often speak of simplicity, and try to define it correctly ... and yet, in practice, the girls make merry in saying: ‘Through simplicity I take the best place; through simplicity I am going to commend myself.’ Our girls must be cured of that jesting turn of mind which I have given them.... We have wished to shun the pettiness of certain convents, and God has punished us for this haughty spirit. There is no house in the world that has more need of humility within and without than our own. Its situation near the Court; the air of favor that pervades it; the favors of a great king; the offices of a person of consideration,—all these snares, so full of danger, should lead us to take measures directly contrary to those we have really taken....”
235. The Part played by Madame de Maintenon.—Whatever may be the opinion respecting the tone of the educational work at Saint Cyr, there cannot be the least doubt as to the admirable zeal of Madame de Maintenon, and her indefatigable devotion to the success of her favorite undertaking. The vocation of the teacher was evidently hers. For more than thirty years, from 1686 to 1717, she did not cease to visit Saint Cyr every day, sometimes at six in the morning. She wrote for the directresses and for the pupils counsels and regulations that fill several volumes. Nothing which concerns “her children” is a matter of indifference to her. She devotes her attention to their meals, their sleep, their toilet, as well as to their character and their instruction:—
“The affairs we discuss at Court are bagatelles; those at Saint Cyr are the more important....” “May that establishment last as long as France, and France as long as the world. Nothing is dearer to me than my children of Saint Cyr.”
It is not tenderness, it is well known, that characterizes the soul of Madame de Maintenon; but, at Saint Cyr, from being formal and cold, which is her usual state, she becomes loving and tender:—
“Forget nothing that may save the souls of our young girls, that may fortify their health and preserve their form.”
One day, as she had come to the school, as her custom was, to consult with the nuns, a company of girls passed by raising a cloud of dust. The nuns, fearing that Madame de Maintenon was annoyed by it, requested them to withdraw. “Pray, let the dear girls be,” replied Madame de Maintenon; “I love them even to the dust they raise.” Conversely, as it were, the pupils of Pestalozzi, consulted on the question of knowing whether they were willing always to be beaten and clawed by their old master, replied affirmatively: they loved him even to his claws!
236. Her Pedagogical Writings.—It is only in our day that the works of Madame de Maintenon have been published in the integrity of their text, thanks to the labors of Théophile Lavallée. For the most part, these long and interesting letters are devoted to education and to Saint Cyr. These are, first, the Letters and Conversations on the Education of Girls.[145] These letters were written from day to day, and are addressed, sometimes to the ladies of Saint Cyr, and sometimes to the pupils themselves. “We find in them,” says Lavallée, “for all circumstances and for all times, the most solid teaching, masterpieces of good sense, of naturalness, and of truth, and, finally, instructions relative to education that approach perfection. The Conversations originated in the consultations that Madame de Maintenon had during the recreations or the recitations, either with the ladies or with the young women, who themselves collected and edited the words of their governess.”
After the Letters and Conversations comes the Counsels to Young Women who enter Society,[146] which contain general advice, conversations or dialogues, and, finally, proverbs, that is, short dramatic compositions, designed at once to instruct and amuse the young ladies of Saint Cyr. These essays are not admirable in all respects; most often they are lacking in imagination; and Madame de Maintenon, though an imitation of Fénelon, makes a misuse of indirect instruction, of artifice, and of amusement, in order to teach some moral commonplaces by insinuation. Here are the titles of some of these proverbs: The occasion makes the rogue; Women make and unmake the home; There is no situation more embarrassing than that of holding the handle of the frying-pan.
Finally, let us note the third collection, the Historical and Instructive Letters addressed to the Ladies of Saint Cyr.[147]
It is to be regretted that, out of these numerous volumes, where repetitions abound, there have not been extracted, in a methodical manner, a few hundred pages which should contain the substance of Madame de Maintenon’s thinking on educational questions.
237. Interior Organization.—The purpose of the founding of Saint Cyr was to assure to the two hundred and fifty daughters of the poor nobility, and to the children of officers dead or disabled, an educational retreat where they would be suitably educated so as to be prepared for becoming either nuns, if this was their vocation, or, the more often, good mothers. As M. Gréard has justly observed, “the very conception of an establishment of this kind, the idea of making France pay the debt of France, educating the children of those who had given her their blood, proceeds from a feeling up to that time unknown.”[148]
Consequently, children of the tenderest years, from six or seven, were received at Saint Cyr, there to be cared for till the age of marriage, till eighteen and twenty.
The young girls were divided into four classes,—the reds, the greens, the yellows, and the blues. The blues were the largest, and they wore the royal colors. Each class was divided into five or six bands or families, of eight or ten pupils each.
The ladies of Saint Cyr were ordinarily taken from the pupils of the school. They were forty in number,—the superior, the assistant who supplied the place of the superior, the mistress of the novices, the general mistress of the classes, the mistresses of the classes, etc.
The capital defect of Saint Cyr is, that, as in the colleges of the Jesuits, the residence is absolute and the sequestration complete. From her fifth to her twentieth year the young girl belongs entirely to Saint Cyr. She scarcely knows her parents. It will be said, perhaps, that in many cases she has lost them, and that in some cases she could expect only bad examples from them. But no matter; the general rule, which interrupted family intercourse to the extent of almost abolishing it, cannot obtain our approbation. The girl was permitted to see her parents only three or four times a year, and even then these interviews would last only for a half an hour each time, and in the presence of a mistress. There was permission to write family letters from time to time; but as though she mistrusted the natural impulses of the heart, and the free outpouring of filial affection, Madame de Maintenon had taken care to compose some models of these letters. With more of reason than of feeling, Madame de Maintenon is not exempt from a certain coldness of heart. It seems that she would impose on her pupils the extraordinary habits of her own family. She recollected having been kissed only twice by her mother, on her forehead, and then only after a long separation.
238. Distrust of Reading.—After the reforms of 1692, the instruction at Saint Cyr became a matter of secondary importance. Reading, writing, and counting were taught, but scarcely anything besides. Reading, in general, was viewed with distrust: “Teach girls to be very sparing as to reading, and always to prefer manual labor instead.” Books of a secular nature were interdicted; only works of piety were put in the hands of pupils, such as the Introduction to a Devout Life, by Saint François de Salles, and the Confessions of Saint Augustine. “Renounce intellectual culture” is the perpetual injunction of Madame de Maintenon.
“We must educate citizens for citizenship. It is not the question of giving them intellectual culture. We must preach family duties to them, obedience to husband, and care for children.... Reading does more harm than good to young girls.... Books make witlings and excite an insatiable curiosity.”
239. The Study of History Neglected.—To judge of the spirit of Saint Cyr, from the point of view of intellectual education, it suffices to note the little importance that was there given to history. This went so far as to raise the question whether it were not best to prohibit the study of French history entirely. Madame de Maintenon consents to have it taught, but only just enough so that “pupils may not confuse the succession of our kings with the princes of other countries, and not take a Roman emperor for an emperor of China or Japan, a king of Spain or of England for a king of Persia or of Siam.” As to the history of antiquity, it must be held in mistrust for the very reason—who would believe it?—of the beautiful examples of virtue that it contains. “I should fear that those grand examples of generosity and heroism would give our young girls too much elevation of spirit, and make them vain and pretentious.” Have we not some right to feel surprised that Madame de Maintenon is alarmed at the thought of raising the intelligence of woman? It is true that she doubtless thought of the romantic exaggerations produced by the reading of the Cyrus the Great and other writings of Mlle. de Scudéry. Let us add, besides, to excuse the shortcomings of the programme of Saint Cyr in the matter of history, that even for boys in the colleges of the University, the order that introduced the teaching of history into the classes dates only from 1695.
240. Insufficient Instruction.—“Our day,” says Lavallée, “would not accept that education in which instruction properly so-called was but a secondary matter, and entirely sacrificed to the manner of training the heart, the reason, and the character; and an education, too, that, as a whole and in its details, was wholly religious.” The error of Madame de Maintenon consists essentially in the wish to develop the moral virtues in souls scarcely instructed, scarcely enlightened. There was much moral discoursing at Saint Cyr. If it did not always bear fruit, it was because the seed fell into intelligences that were but little cultivated.
“Our young women are not to be made scholarly. Women never know except by halves, and the little that they know usually makes them conceited, disdainful, chatty, and disgusted with serious things.”
241. Manual Labor.—If intellectual education was neglected at Saint Cyr, by way of compensation great attention was paid to manual education. The girls were there taught to sew, to embroider, to knit, and to make tapestry; and there was also made there all the linen for the house, the infirmary, and the chapel, and the dresses and clothing of the ladies and the pupils:—
“But no exquisite productions,” says Madame de Maintenon, “nor of very elaborate design; none of those flimsy edgings in embroidery or tapestry, which are of no use.”
With what good grace Madame de Maintenon ever preaches the gospel of labor, of which she herself gave the example! In the coaches of the king, she always had some work in hand. At Saint Cyr, the young women swept the dormitories, put in order the refectory, and dusted the class-rooms. “They must be put at every kind of service, and made to work at what is burdensome, in order to make them robust, healthy, and intelligent.”
“Manual labor is a moral safeguard, a protection against sin.”
“Work calms the passions, occupies the mind, and does not leave it time to think of evil.”
242. Moral Education.—“The Institute,” said Madame de Maintenon, “is intended, not for prayer, but for action.” What she wished, above all else, was to prepare young women for home and family life. She devoted her thought to the training of wives and mothers. “What I lack most,” she said, “is sons-in-law!” Hence she was incessantly preoccupied with moral qualities. One might make a fine and valuable book of selections out of all the practical maxims of Madame de Maintenon; as her reflections on talkativeness: “There is always sin in a multitude of words;” on indolence: “What can be done in the family of an indolent and fastidious woman?” on politeness, “which consists, above all else, in giving one’s thought to others;” on lack of energy, then too common among women of the world: “The only concern is to eat and to take one’s ease. Women spend the day in morning-gowns, reclining in easy-chairs, without any occupation, and without conversation; all is well, provided one be in a state of repose.”
243. Discreet Devotion.—We must not imagine that Saint Cyr was a house of prayer, a place of overdone devotion. Madame de Maintenon held to a reasonable Christianity. Piety, such as was recommended at Saint Cyr, is a piety that is steadfast, judicious, and simple; that is, conformed to the state in which one ought to live, and exempt from refinements.
“The young women are too much at church, considering their age,” she wrote to Madame de Brinon, the first director of the institution.... “Consider, I pray you, that this is not to be a cloister.”[149]
And later, after the reform had begun, this is what she wrote:—
“Let the piety with which our young girls shall be inspired be cheerful, gentle, and free. Let it consist rather in the innocence of their lives, and in the simplicity of their occupations, than in the austerities, the retirements, and the refinements of devotion.... When a girl comes from a convent, saying that nothing ought to interfere with vespers, she is laughed at; but when an educated woman shall say that vespers may be omitted for the sake of attending her sick husband, everybody will commend her.... When a girl shall say that a woman does better to educate her children and instruct her servants than to spend the forenoon in church, that religion will be heartily accepted, and will make itself loved and respected.”[150] Excellent advice, perhaps too little followed! Madame de Maintenon here speaks the language of good sense, and we are wholly surprised to hear it from the lips of a politic woman who, not without reason, and for her part in the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, has the reputation of being an intolerant fanatic.
244. Simplicity in All Things.—The simplicity which she recommended in religion, Madame de Maintenon demanded in everything,—in dress and in language: “Young girls,” she says, “must wear as few ribbons as possible.”
A class-teacher had given a fine lecture, in which she exhorted her pupils to make an “eternal divorce” with sin. “Very well said, doubtless,” remarked Madame de Maintenon; “but, pray, who among our young ladies knows what divorce is?”
245. Fénelon and Saint Cyr.—Michelet, speaking of Saint Cyr, which he does not love, said: “Its cold governess was much more a man than Fénelon.” The fact is, that the author of the Education of Girls gives a larger place to sensibility and intelligence. It is not Madame de Maintenon who said: “As much as possible, tenderness of heart must be excused in young girls.” It is not at Saint Cyr that these maxims were practised. “Pray let them have Greek and Roman histories. They will find in them prodigies of courage and disinterestedness. Let them not be ignorant of the history of France, which also has its beauty.... All this serves to give dignity to the mind, and to lift the soul to noble sentiments.” Nevertheless, Fénelon’s work was highly esteemed at Saint Cyr. It appeared in 1687, and Saint Cyr was founded in 1686. A great number of its precepts were there observed, such as the following: “Frequent leaves of absence should be avoided;” “Young girls should not be accustomed to talk much.”
246. General Judgment.—In a word, if the ideal proposed to the young women of Saint Cyr by Madame de Maintenon cannot satisfy those who, in our day, conceive “an education broader in its scheme and more liberal in its spirit,” at least we must do justice to an institution which was, as its foundress said, “a kind of college,” a first attempt at enfranchisement in the education of women. Without demanding of Madame de Maintenon what was not in her age to give, let us be inspired by her in what concerns the changeless education in moral virtues, and in the qualities of discretion, reserve, goodness, and submission. “However severe that education may appear,” says Lavallée, “I believe it will suggest better reflections to those who observe the way in which women are educated to-day, and the results of that education in luxury and pleasure, not only on the fireside, but still more on society and political life, and on the future of the men that it is preparing for France. I believe they will prefer that manly education, so to speak, which purified private morals and begot public virtues; and that they will esteem and regret that work of Madame de Maintenon, which for a century prevented the corruption of the Court from extending to the provinces, and maintained in the old country-seats, from which came the greater part of the nobility, the substantial virtues and the simple manners of the olden time.”
[247. Analytical Summary.—1. The education of women in the seventeenth century reflects the sentiment of the age as to their relative position in society, their rights, and their destiny. Woman was still regarded as the inferior of man, in the lower classes as a drudge, in the higher as an ornament; in her case, intellectual culture was regarded as either useless or dangerous; and the education that was given her was to fit her for a life of devotion or a life of seclusion from society.
2. The rules of Jacqueline Pascal exhibit the effects of an ascetic belief on education,—human nature is corrupt; all its likes are to be thwarted, and all its dislikes fostered under compulsion.
3. The education directed by Madame de Maintenon is the beginning of a rupture with tradition. It was a movement towards the secularization of woman’s education, and towards the recognition of her equality with man, with respect to her grade of intellectual endowments, her intellectual culture, and to her participation in the duties of real life.
4. The type of the higher education was still monastic, both for men and women. No one was able to conceive that both sexes might be educated together with mutual advantage.]