conscience, Bossuet felt his weakness; he saw the apostolic severance
from the world, the apostolic zeal and fervor required for the holy
crusade he had undertaken. "Your Majesty has given your promise to God
and the world," he wrote to Louis XIV. in, ignorance of the secret
correspondence still kept up between the king and Madame de Montespan.
"I have been to see her," added the prelate. "I find her pretty calm;
she occupies herself a great deal in good works. I spoke to her as well
as to you the words in which God commands us to give Him our whole heart;
they caused her to shed many tears; may it please God to fix these truths
in the bottom of both your hearts, and accomplish His work, in order that
so many tears, so much violence, so many strains that you have put upon
yourselves, may not be fruitless."

The king was on the road back to Versailles; Madame de Montespan was to
return thither also, her duties required her to do so, it was said;
Bossuet heard of it; he did not for a single instant delude himself as to
the emptiness of the king's promises and of his own hopes. He
determined, however, to visit the king at Luzarches. Louis XIV. gave him
no time to speak.

"Do not say a word to me, sir," said he, not without blushing, do not say
a word; I have given my orders, they will have to be executed." Bossuet
held his tongue. "He had tried every thrust; had acted like a pontiff of
the earliest times, with a freedom worthy of the earliest ages and the
earliest bishops of the Church," says St. Simon. He saw the inutility of
his efforts; henceforth, prudence and courtly behavior put a seal upon
his lips. It was the time of the great king's omnipotence and highest
splendor, the time when nobody withstood his wishes. The great
Mademoiselle had just attempted to show her independence: tired of not
being married, with a curse on the greatness which kept her astrand, she