Another dangerous consequence of inoccupation is that thirst for amusement which is the leading motive in female society. It creates egoists, bent upon indulging every wanton caprice. This, coupled with physical weakness, makes women resort to cunning and dissimulation as a means of attaining their end, to the detriment of their moral characters.
Vanity, which is another inherent portion of the female character, is responsible for that inordinate desire to please which in leading to an all-absorbing passion for clothes and fashion threatens to ruin domestic life and to deprave the female morals.
Fénelon had no patience with the "précieuses" of the decline, who tried to appear "savantes" without being even "instruites". To him, the value of knowledge depends entirely on its practical use as a means of edifying the mind and soul. Woman was not meant for science, and what Fénelon has seen of the "femme savante" is not calculated to make him enthusiastic. Girls should feel "une pudeur sur la science presque aussi délicate que celle qu'inspire l'horreur du vice." His programme of subjects of female study is correspondingly small. Reading and writing, spelling, arithmetic and grammar are the principal. In addition, music, painting, history, Latin and literature are conditionally recommended, for the individual talents have to be taken into consideration.
Fénelon's picture of contemporary womanhood is far from alluring. Its chief interest lies in the circumstance that it is the first instance in French literature of a systematic estimate of female manners based upon the feminine psychology, anticipating the current opinion among the writers of the next century regarding the foibles of the sex. Fénelon was among the first to realise—what Mary Wollstonecraft a century later stated with that characteristic frankness which almost entirely robbed her of female sympathy—that the worst enemy of female emancipation is, and always has been, woman herself. As long as the majority of women make considerations of sex the foundation of all their actions, it will prove impossible for the champions of equality to accomplish their full aims. Although a churchman and a moralist, Fénelon was in open revolt against the spirit of monasticism which regarded only eternity and failed to see its relation to everyday life, with its many exigencies. The best preparation for eternity, according to him, is a daily attention to the nearest duties of life. Not science, but the domestic circle was the proper domain of woman. More necessary than theoretical knowledge was that practical instruction in the little household ways which turn a young woman into a good housekeeper. What Fénelon did not sufficiently realise, was the indispensable connection between a moral and an intellectual education. The theory that perfect virtue arises out of the intellect and derives its chief value from a rational source, was a further step in the same direction which it was left to his successors to take. But he was instrumental in preparing the enfranchisement of the female education from the narrow principles of that church to which he belonged heart and soul.
His precepts were almost immediately put in practice. Making some allowance for personal inclinations and circumstances which forbade their full application, we may call Madame de Maintenon the foremost pupil of Fénelon's school. This remarkable woman's educational views present two entirely different aspects. She was a pietist of the Roman Catholic faith, but with certain leanings towards liberalism which smacked of heresy, the origin of which may be found in the influence of the philosophical creeds with which her early career as a précieuse had brought her into contact. On the other hand, her experience of society—after her marriage to the poet Scarron she had for some years kept a salon in Paris—had given her a taste for literature and made her a believer in "l'art de dire et d'écrire" as one of the necessary elements of female education. She thus combined in her person two of the principal tendencies of the century: a strong religious spirit and an intense interest in literature, and both became important factors in her educational system, in which she aimed at reconciling the exigencies of the world with the demands of piety in forming society women who were devout Christians. She was a woman of practical common sense, actuated by the most unselfish motives, and devoted to the exercise of that Reason which she held ought to be the constant regulator of Piety and the governing motive of all human actions. Nothing could be more directly opposed to the monastic spirit. Her principles therefore stamped her as a reactionary of Fénelon's school, save for the fact that "the world was too much with her", which made her always keep in view that polite society whose morals she had set out to improve, and the allurements of which constantly clashed with the rigidity of her religious devotion. At the same time the charms of domesticity appealed to her as strongly as to Fénelon. Reason, she argued, forbids the education of women to any station except that for which Providence originally intended them, and Providence never meant them to pass their lives in a convent, but rather in the domestic circle as devoted wives and loving mothers. She felt the monastic education to be a violation of the destination of womanhood, and her educational writings were a plea for emancipation from the compulsion of conventional religiosity with its disregard of practical life.
The equality-claim has no place in her programme. The very spirit of Christianity condemns it. "Dieu a soumis notre sexe au moment qu'il l'a créé, la faiblesse de notre esprit et de notre corps a besoin d'être conduite, soutenue et protégée; notre ignorance nous rend incapable de décision, et nous ne pouvons dans l'ordre de Dieu, gouverner que dépendamment des hommes." No further steps towards intellectual, social or political enfranchisement are to be expected from Madame de Maintenon.
Although woman can only "govern dependently", yet her rule of the home—and here again she fully agrees with Fénelon—is of the utmost importance, not only to her own small circle, but to society, or rather to that portion of it which alone had her full regard and affection: the kingdom of France. Woman was meant for marriage and her education should be relative to her position in society. Plutarch's line of thought, which we had almost lost sight of, re-enters the stage with the appearance of Fénelon and Madame de Maintenon. No motives of false delicacy should withhold from young women such information as may be useful to them in their struggle against the temptations of the outside world. The right place to prepare them for their natural place in society is not the convent, but the college, where the educational taste is entrusted to capable teachers, of whom it may be said that "le monde n'est étranger qu'à leur coeur". The optimistic faith in the capability of her sex of being perfected, which links her to Helvétius and the other Encyclopedians gave her the necessary courage to attempt an experiment which she confidently trusted might lead to a general reform in female morals. The words of Racine's Esther:
Ici, loin du tumulte, aux devoirs les plus saints
Tout un peuple naissant est formé par mes mains,
are a faithful reflection of her hope for the future. And so Madame de Maintenon declared war against convention and tradition and went the way she had marked out for herself. Her influence with the king enabled her to carry out her scheme to the minutest details and became the means of placing the vast establishment of St. Cyr at her disposal. The time had come to realise her dream of education. Two hundred and fifty girls of aristocratic families whom the endless wars had ruined, were entrusted to the care of a headmistress, Mme de Brinon, and her staff, under Madame de Maintenon's personal superintendance. It was her wish that they should constitute a large family and that the relation between teacher and pupil should be as nearly as possible that of mother to child, so as to make the reality differ as little as possible from what Fénelon's theory had considered the ideal form. The secular character of the establishment—on which the king had also insisted, holding that there were already more nuns than was strictly compatible with the interests of his kingdom—appeared from the fact that the teachers—"les dames de Saint Louis"—were called "madame" instead of "soeur" and wore dresses which, although simple, were different from those worn in the convent. They were not at first expected to take the vow for life, but their patroness expressed a distinct wish that they should always regard their pupils' interests before their own and show the greatest possible devotion to this task. In respect of this insistence upon the most absolute self-abnegation—involving a most unyielding sternness in taking what seemed the right moral course and a most complete subjection on the part of the pupil—Mme de Maintenon's ideas came dangerously near those of the Jansenists against whose severe methods she professed to be in revolt. The rules of discipline at St. Cyr were in some respects as strict as those practised at Port Royal and in both the motive was to shield the pupil against contamination. Realising the danger of influence from abroad at an age when the character was not sufficiently formed, and apt to take impressions too easily, Mme de Maintenon determined that all parental authority should cease. The girls were kept in the establishment until they were well out of their teens, and supposed to be morally strong enough to resist temptation and to exercise influence on their surroundings instead of undergoing it. There were no holidays and the "demoiselles" were allowed to see their parents only four times a year for half an hour or so under the watchful eye of one of the mistresses. Even their correspondence with them was limited, and the tone of the letters had to be strictly formal, in fact they were mere exercises of style. Apart from these restrictions, the girls were treated with great kindness, if with little outward show of affection. Mme de Maintenon was too much devoted to Reason to approve of such demonstrations, and wished the emotions to be kept under strict control. On the other hand, punishments were few, the teacher took a liberal share in all recreations and amusements, and the necessary instruction was made as attractive and imparted in as unobtrusive a manner as possible, in accordance with Fénelon's precepts.