de Sevigne thought it better not to have the genius of a Pascal,
than to have so many ailments. "Mme. De La Fayette is always
languishing, M. de La Rochefoucauld always lame," she writes; "we
have conversations so sad that it seems as if there were nothing
more to do but to bury us; the garden of Mme. de La Fayette is
the prettiest spot in the world, everything blooming, everything
perfumed; we pass there many evenings, for the poor woman does not
dare go out in a carriage." "Her health is never good," she writes
again, "nevertheless she sends you word that she should not like
death better; AU CONTRAIRE." There are times when she can no
longer "think, or speak, or answer, or listen; she is tired of
saying good morning and good evening." Then she goes away to
Meudon for a few days, leaving La Rochefoucauld "incredibly sad."
She speaks for herself in a letter from the country house which
Gourville has placed at her disposal.

"I am at Saint Maur; I have left all my affairs and all my
husbands; I have my children and the fine weather; that suffices.
I take the waters of Forges; I look after my health, I see no
one. I do not mind at all the privation; every one seems to me
so attached to pleasures which depend entirely upon others, that
I find my disposition a gift of the fairies.

"I do not know but Mme de Coulanges has already sent you word of
our after-dinner conversations at Gourville's about people who
have taste above or below their intelligence. Mme. Scarron and
the Abbe Tetu were there; we lost ourselves in subtleties until
we no longer understood anything. If the air of Provence, which
subtilizes things still more, magnifies for you our visions, you
will be in the clouds. You have taste below your intelligence;