In order to be able to pursue her political schemes she filled her salon on different days of the week with people of various occupations and interests; keeping philosophers and académiciens, politicians and ecclesiastics carefully separated, making herself their confidante, and possessing herself of their secrets, managing them all so cleverly that they became her tools without being aware of it, secretly despising her "bêtes" while openly flattering them. The visitors to her two weekly dinners were nearly all men, Bolingbroke and Matthew Prior being among her "habitués". Apart from Mme Geoffrin, who became her successor, and of whom she said that "she only came to see if there was anything among her inventory that she might have a use for", there were hardly any women, for Mme de Tencin would brook no possible rivals. Such was her degradation that she wrote a most indecent "Chronique scandaleuse" for the special delectation of the Regent. As Mme de Lambert's salon represents eighteenth century society at its best, so Mme de Tencin's foreshadowed some of the worst instances of female intriguing that were to follow.
A totally different salon was that kept by Mme Geoffrin. Mme de Tencin—whose own birth was not above suspicion—had all the pride of class, and looked down upon the Third Estate; Mme Geoffrin on the contrary was the daughter of a court-valet and consequently remained all her life a "bourgeoise", without any pretence to "préciosité" or anything but a kind and warm heart, a most remarkable wit, sound common sense and a natural delicacy which made her an ideal hostess. For Mme de Tencin's lofty disdain she substituted an almost maternal solicitude for the welfare of her "children", who, with the exception of Mlle de Lespinasse, were of the male sex. Besides d'Alembert, Diderot, Morellet and Grimm there were the ubiquitous Horace Walpole, David Hume the philosopher and Wraxall; the first-named of whom in his correspondence declared her to be "a most extraordinary woman with more common sense than he had ever encountered in one of her sex."
The principles of the salon in the Rue St. Honoré were much the same as at Mme de Tencin's, but a milder spirit prevailed, and the demon of intrigue was absent. Mme Geoffrin kept fixed reception-days, her Mondays being devoted to artists, and her Wednesdays to men-of-letters and philosophers, while her intimates were made welcome on both days. The hostess presided over the assemblies without in any way obtruding her personal opinions or bringing her private interests into play, exercising an absolute authority which never became tyranny, and keeping peace among the more excitable of her guests[12]. She was much appreciated by them all, not least by the future king of Poland, Stanislas Augustus, her devoted "son", causing Walpole to refer to her as "the queen-mother of Poland". Her apotheosis came when in her sixty-eighth year she visited Warsaw, where she met with a royal reception. After her return her mental powers declined rapidly, and her daughter—fearing the influence of scepticism upon her mother—kept her favourite philosophers at a distance, eliciting from her the remark that she was, like Godfrey of Bouillon, "protecting her tomb against the infidels."
The third of the "Muses of the philosophical Decameron", whose salon was much in vogue, was Julie de Lespinasse, whose attractive personality and brilliant conversational and epistolary powers account for her success. She combined the warmth of heart of Mme Geoffrin with the ardent temperament of Mme de Tencin, but without the latter's brazen-facedness. She possessed a degree of sensibility which made her succumb to different lovers "for each of whom she cherished a passion which it was beyond her power to resist." Her youth had been fed with Richardson, "Clarissa Harlowe" being her favourite. She had entered the employ of the famous marquise du Deffand, herself a prominent hostess, in the capacity of reader. Her wit and the natural buoyancy of her character soon made her more popular than her mistress, whose guests took to visiting her in her room, while her mistress was still asleep. Mme du Deffand in her jealousy accused her of "skimming off the cream of her visitors' conversation"; a breach followed, and Julie was enabled by some supporters to set up a small salon in the rue St. Dominique, which flourished from 1764 till the year of her death in 1776. She could not afford sumptuous dinners, but her guests were sure of a warm welcome and of some interesting conversation, which she conducted so tactfully, effacing herself completely and making her guests feel at home by always appearing interested, that her lack of personal beauty was quite forgotten in the charm of her manner. Politics were a frequent topic, and Mlle de Lespinasse was among the professed admirers of the British Constitution. D'Alembert, Condorcet, Turgot and also Mme Geoffrin belonged to her circle, and that Walpole knew her also, appears from the correspondence between him and Mme du Deffand, who at Julie's death complained that the rupture with her had robbed her of the friendship of d'Alembert.
While the women of society were celebrating their triumphs in the salons, philosophy was trying to do something for the female multitude. We have seen that it was Fénelon who caused education to be included among the subjects of moral philosophy, but it was the diffusive power of Rousseau's writings that made it one of the most frequently discussed themes of the century. His "Emile, ou de l'Education", which appeared in 1762—curiously enough, the year of the suppression of Jesuitism in France—marked a new era in the history of education, if not in that of feminism. Of Rousseau it might have been reasonably expected as the champion of liberty and equality to carry to their full extent the philosophical venturings of Fénelon and thus to usher in a new era of female emancipation. However, with an inconsistency which is one of his chief characteristics, Rousseau not only deliberately left the female half of mankind out of his scheme for political enfranchisement, but ranged himself among the anti-feminists by the great emphasis he laid on the consideration of a sexual character, which he construed into evidence of female inferiority, by arguing that it makes the subjection of woman a natural law, which is to be respected according to the theory that "whatever is in Nature, must be right." Owing to the contradictory nature of his views, however, while directly opposing the movement, he indirectly furthered it in two ways. In the first place, his social theories were adopted without reserve and without restrictions by some of his followers, who thus repaired the omission which had left Woman out of the scheme; and secondly it was Rousseau who once for all broke the back of the monastic system of education by continuing the campaign which Fénelon in theory, and Mme de Maintenon in practice, had entered upon before him, and bringing it to a happy conclusion. The reduction and ultimate abolition of the education of religion, which was one of the great victories of the philosophical school, became manifest in the latter half of the century. It was a signal success, achieved over an unwilling government and crowned by the expulsion of the Jesuits, who had formed one of the chief bulwarks against the growing revolutionary spirit.
The Cartesian principles, which had been a beacon-light to seventeenth century philosophy, were supplemented in the next by a new element: that of utility. In John Locke's "Treatises of Government" and also in "Some Thoughts concerning Education", he let himself be guided chiefly by considerations of usefulness, thus becoming the founder of that doctrine of Utilitarianism which, after influencing the French Encyclopedians, was to return to England a century later and to find a fervent champion in William Godwin. In deciding upon a course of action, the inevitable question was: "What is the use?" and this guiding principle became paramount also in matters of education. To Locke, who was a man of practical sense and not a mere theorist, the problem was how to make people understand their real interests, and to make them act in accordance with them, which must necessarily lead to happiness. His educational system, therefore, is based upon the communication of such useful knowledge as will most contribute to the total amount of happiness to be found on this globe[13]. Locke insisted on the necessity for a physical education which increases the mental and moral capacity by rendering the body less subject to fatigue. Simplicity and effectiveness in dress and food, and plenty of outdoor exercise are recommended, and in this important matter, as indeed in a great many others, Locke may be said to have struck the keynote of the philosophical tendencies of the eighteenth century, anticipating the famous Nature-theory of Rousseau. Many important questions were mooted by him. He introduced the ethical problem of reward and punishment, and discussed the advisability of reasoning with a child and of making him learn a trade, which became a part of the educational programme of the next generations.
The French philosophers became Locke's immediate heirs, and afterwards repaid their debt to England with interest. Where Locke gave his "young gentleman" a tutor, his views were adopted by the opponents of the monastic education. It could hardly be expected of Locke, who lived in a time when the female fortunes in his own country were at a very low ebb, to have paid much attention to the possibility of making women share in the obvious advantages of the new system. However, if he did little or nothing for British women, his theories were turned to account for the benefit of their French sisters, whose position in the lower walks of life was not very much better than theirs. His French disciples, carrying the theory of utility to its fullest extent, included the female sex in their reflections. The first in point of time was the Abbé de St. Pierre, of whom Rousseau contemptuously said that he was "a man of great schemes and narrow views". Seen from a feminist standpoint this judgment is cruelly unjust. For, even granting that the Abbé's schemes were too Utopian to be capable of full realisation—a circumstance he himself sadly recognised—the fact remains that he was responsible for the first project of female education on a national basis, making wholesale education a state-concern and thus wanting to extend the benefit of instruction to many who would otherwise be deprived of it. He stands at the beginning of the lane that leads via Bernardin de St. Pierre and Talleyrand to the great Condorcet.
The Abbé de St. Pierre was willing to grant women as a class that equality which the better-class women had actually attained, and he believed in their instruction, holding that on the instruction given to the young, whether male or female, depended the happiness of the coming race. But he believed still more in the necessity for a moral education, for his utilitarianism is not of this earth, but of eternity. With him the ever recurring question is: "What will it profit the soul?", and the fear of punishment in Hell is rather stronger with him than the sense of moral duty. He thus laid himself open to attack from the notorious Mme de Puysieux, who believed in reputation and the preservation of appearances, informing him that it was silly to let the fear of Hell withhold people from seeking happiness by cultivating the good opinion of others, whether deserved or not! The final clause sums up what moralists found most objectionable in the inclinations of a depraved age.
The real aim of women, according to the Abbé, should be to please God, and not men, so as to gain eternal life. He has no ambition for women beyond that of making them devout Christians and good housekeepers, and his educational efforts are accordingly directed towards these two accomplishments. Girls are to dress simply, to eschew cards—that curse of the age—and to learn useful needlework, the keeping of accounts and in general such things as will be of the greatest use to them in the performance of their domestic duties. But he very unaccountably refuses their youth the advantages and innocent enjoyments of home-life, wishing them to be brought up in colleges, in which they are to be kept immured until such time as their education will be completed, when they will be ready for matrimony! At college girls may learn to be good citizenesses, but they will scarcely gain the necessary experience for managing a home of their own. The comprehensiveness of his scheme, however, and his recognition of the female equality entitles him to a place in the history of feminism above Rousseau.
The latter's attitude towards the feminist movement is so complicated as to demand careful analysis. Where women were concerned the strong individuality of the female genius would not allow him to side fully either with "those who wished to condemn them to a life of household-drudgery, making of them a sort of superior slaves, or those who, not satisfied to vindicate woman's rights, made her usurp those of the stronger sex", for the former have too low a notion of the duties of womanhood, whilst the latter overlook the considerations of a sexual character by which, according to Rousseau, the relations between the sexes are exclusively determined. Rousseau's opinion of the depth to which women had sunk appears from his "Lettre à d'Alembert sur les Spectacles," which contains a fierce onslaught upon their moral perversity, which has caused the drama, too feeble to rise to worthier themes, to fall back upon erotics of a most despicable kind. Rousseau judged women capable of becoming something better than what eighteenth century society had made of them, but in his demands for them and in his schemes for perfecting their moral education he was extremely modest. Next to the salons he held the education of the convents, "ces véritables écoles de coquetterie", to be chiefly responsible for the degradation of the female character. The young women who, on leaving them, enter society, carry into instant practice the lessons of vanity and coquetry which the convents have supplied. For convent and salon Rousseau wanted to substitute the blessings of true domesticity—painted in glowing colours in the pages of the "Nouvelle Héloise." His sympathies went out, not to that college-life of which the Abbé de St. Pierre had such sanguine expectations, but to the intimacies of the family-circle, presided over by loving parents, an ideal which he reintroduced in the fifth book of his treatise on education, where, circumstances rendering it advisable to provide the finished male product with a suitable partner for life, the principles of Sophie's education are elaborately described[14].