le enough to those
who observed the rule of Helvetius, and expected nothing from him. She
not only assisted him, as we have seen, in getting criticisms, and
carrying out the improvements suggested by them, but when the book was
actually published she prepared a notice of it for the only journal then
existing--the _Journal des Savants_. This notice was originally a brief
statement of the nature of the work, and the opinions which had been
formed for and against it, with a moderate eulogy, in conclusion, on its
good sense, wit, and insight into human nature. But when she submitted
it to La Rochefoucauld he objected to the paragraph which stated the
adverse opinion, and requested her to alter it. She, however, was either
unable or unwilling to modify her notice, and returned it with the
following note:

"Je vous envoie ce que j'ai pu tirer de ma teste pour mettre dans le
_Journal des Savants_. J'y ai mis cet endroit qui vous est le plus
sensible, afin que cela vous fasse surmonter la mauvaise honte qui
vous fit mettre la preface sans y rien retrancher, et je n'ai pas
craint dele mettre, parce que je suis assuree que vous ne le ferez
pas imprimer, quand meme le reste vous plairoit. Je vous assure
aussi que je vous serai pins obligee, si vous en usez comme d'une
chose qui servit a vous pour le corriger on pour le jeter au feu.
Nous autres grands auteurs, nous sommes trop riches pour craindre de
rien perdre de nos productions. Mandez-moi ce qu'il vous semble de
ce dictum."

La Rochefoucauld availed himself of this permission, and "edited" the
notice, touching up the style, and leaving out the blame. In this
revised form it appeared in the _Journal des Savants_. In some points,
we see, the youth of journalism was not without promise of its future.

While Madame de Sable was thus playing the literary confidante to La
Rochefoucauld, and was the soul of a society whose chief interest was the
_belles-lettres_, she was equally active in graver matters. She was in
constant intercourse or correspondence with the devout women of Port
Royal, and of the neighboring convent of the Carmelites, many of whom had
once been the ornaments of the court; and there is a proof that she was
conscious of being highly valued by them in the fact that when the
Princess Marie-Madeline, of the Carmelites, was dangerously ill, not
being able or not daring to visit her, she sent her youthful portrait