irreligion, and what was still worse, of the unpardonable crime of being
connected with me. These were the grievances, on account of which he was
determined to break with his mother, and adopt the manner of life of
which I have just spoken, all to play the part of the young Emilius.
Alarmed at his petulance, I immediately wrote to him, endeavoring to make
him change his resolution, and my exhortations were as strong as I could
make them. They had their effect. He returned to his duty, to his
mother, and took back the resignation he had given the colonel, who had
been prudent enough to make no use of it, that the young man might have
time to reflect upon what he had done. St. Brisson, cured of these
follies, was guilty of another less alarming, but, to me, not less
disagreeable than the rest: he became an author. He successively
published two or three pamphlets which announced a man not devoid of
talents, but I have not to reproach myself with having encouraged him by
my praises to continue to write.

Some time afterwards he came to see me, and we made together a pilgrimage
to the island of St. Pierre. During this journey I found him different
from what I saw of him at Montmorency. He had, in his manner, something
affected, which at first did not much disgust me, although I have since
thought of it to his disadvantage. He once visited me at the hotel de
St. Simon, as I passed through Paris on my way to England. I learned
there what he had not told me, that he lived in the great world, and
often visited Madam de Luxembourg. Whilst I was at Trie, I never heard
from him, nor did he so much as make inquiry after me, by means of his
relation Mademoiselle Seguier, my neighbor. This lady never seemed
favorably disposed towards me. In a word, the infatuation of M. de St.
Brisson ended suddenly, like the connection of M. de Feins: but this man
owed me nothing, and the former was under obligations to me, unless the
follies I prevented him from committing were nothing more than