"That from my province you withdraw all armed men--all sign of compulsion
of every sort!"

Fenelon was of noble blood, but his sympathies were ever with the people.
The lowly, the weak, the oppressed, the persecuted--these were ever the
objects of his solicitude--these were first in his mind.

It was in prison that Fenelon first met Madame Guyon. Fenelon was
thirty-seven, she was forty. He occasionally preached at Montargis, and
while there had heard of her goodness, her piety, her fervor, her
resignation. He had small sympathy for many of her peculiar views, but now
she was sick and in prison and he went to her and admonished her to hold
fast and to be of good-cheer.

Twelve years before this Madame Guyon had been left a widow. She was the
mother of five children--two were dead. The others were placed under the
care of kind kinsmen; and Madame Guyon went forth to give her days to
study and to teaching. This action of placing her children partly in the
care of others has been harshly criticized. But there is one phase of the
subject that I have never seen commented upon--and that is that a mother's
love for her offspring bears a certain ratio to the love she bore their
father. Had Madame Guyon ever carried in her arms a love-child, I can not
conceive of her allowing this child to be cared for by others--no matter
how competent.

The favor that had greeted Madame Guyon wherever she went was very great.
Her animation and devout enthusiasm won her entrance into the homes of
the great and noble everywhere. She organized societies of women that met
for prayer and conversation on exalted themes. The burden of her