Had it not been for the influence of Ninon de l'Enclos--there are many
who claim it as the truth--the sombre tinge, the veil of gloominess
and hypocritical austerity which surrounded Madame de Maintenon and
her court, would have wrecked the intellects of the most illustrious
and brightest men in France, in war, literature, science, and
statesmanship. Madame de Maintenon resisted that influence but the Rue
des Tournelles strove against Saint Cyr. The world fluctuated between
these two systems established by women, both of them--shall it be
said--courtesans? The legality and morality of our modern common law
marriages and the ease and frequency of trivial divorces forbid it.
Ninon prevailed, however, and not only governed hearts but souls. The
difference between the two courts was, the royal salon was thronged
with women of the most infamous character who had nothing but their
infamy to bestow, while the drawing rooms of Ninon de l'Enclos were
crowded with men almost exclusively, and men of wit and genius.

The moral that the majority of writers draw from the three courts that
occupied society at that time, the Rue des Tournelles, Madame de
Sévigné, and Versailles, is, that men demand human nature and will
have it in preference to abnormal goodness, and female debauchery.
Ninon never hesitated to declaim against the fictitious beauty that
pretended to inculcate virtue and morality while secretly engaged in
the most corrupt practices, but Molière came with his Précieuses
Ridicules and pulverized the enemies of human nature. Ninon did not
know Molière personally at that time but she was so loud in his praise
for covering her gross imitators with confusion, that Bachaumont and
Chapelle, two of her intimate friends, ventured to introduce the young
dramatist into her society. The father of this Bachaumont who was a
twin, said of him: "My son who is only half a man, wants to do as if
he were a whole one." Though only "half a man" and extremely feeble