ty--this low rogue, this glutton who eats as
much as six, this red-eared villain--how did he grow bold so suddenly
and aspire so high? A declaration of love from such a man to such a
lady, from an intended son-in-law to his future mother-in-law, still
astonishes when we read it. On the stage, perhaps, we countenance it
more easily.

Elmira, when the holy man makes this surprising avowal to her face is
by no means prepared to listen to him. A real Tartuffe would have
acted in a very different manner: he would have quietly sat down,
humble and patient, and waited for the favourable moment. If, for
instance, Elmira had experienced the indiscretions and fickleness of
those worldly lovers whom Tartuffe mentions, then, indeed, when she was
worn out by these trials, and become weak, weary, and dispirited, he
might have accosted her; then perhaps she would have allowed him to
say, in the smooth quietist jargon, many things that she cannot listen
to at the moment when Moliere presents her before us.

Mademoiselle Bourignon, in her curious _Life_, which well deserves
another edition, relates what danger she was in through a saint of this
species. I shall let her speak for herself. But first you must know
that the pious damsel, who had just become an heiress, was thinking
about laying out her wealth in endowing convents, and in other similar
acts of piety.

"Being, one day, in the streets of Lille, I met a man whom I did not
know, who said to me as he passed, 'You will not do what you wish; you
will do what you do not wish.' Two days after, the same man came to my
house and said, 'What did you think of me?' 'That you were either a
fool or a prophet,' replied I. 'Neither,' said he; 'I am a poor fellow
from a village near Douai, and my name is Jean de St. Saulieu; I have
no other thought but that of charity. I lived first of all with a
hermit, but now I have my cure, Mr. Roussel, for a director. I teach
poor children to read. The sweetest--the most charitable act you could
do would be to collect all the little female orphans; they have become
so numerous since the wars! The convents are rich enough.' He spoke
for three hours together with much unction.

"I inquired about him of the cure, his director, who assured me that he
was a person of a truly apostolical zeal. (We should observe that the
cure had tried at first to catch this rich heiress for his own nephew;
the nephew not succeeding, he employed one of his ow