Royal, once the
refuge of serious faith and strict morals, was destroyed. The bull
_Unigenitus_ expelled the spiritual element from French Christianity,
reduced the clergy to a state of intellectual impotence, and made
a lasting breach between them and the better part of the laity.
Meanwhile the scientific movement had been proving its power. Science
had come to fill the place left void by religion. The period of the
Regency (1715-23) is one of transition from the past to the newer
age, shameless in morals, degraded in art; the period of Voltaire
followed, when intellect sapped and mined the old beliefs; with
Rousseau came the explosion of sentiment and an effort towards
reconstruction. A great political and social revolution closed the
century.

The life of the time is seen in many memoirs, and in the correspondence
of many distinguished persons, both men and women. Among the former
the _Memoires_ of Mdlle. Delaunay, afterwards Mme. de Staal
(1684-1750) are remarkable for the vein of melancholy, subdued by
irony, underlying a style which is formed for fine and clear exactness.
The Duchesse du Maine's lady-in-waiting, daughter of a poor painter,
but educated with care, drew delicately in her literary art with an
etcher's tool, and her hand was controlled by a spirit which had in
it something of the Stoic. The _Souvenirs_ of Mme. de Caylus
(1673-1729), niece of Mme. de Maintenon--"jamais de creature plus
seduisante," says Saint-Simon--give pictures of the court, charming
in their naivete, grace, and mirth. Mme. d'Epinay, designing to tell
the story of her own life, disguised as a piece of fiction, became
in her _Memoires_ the chronicler of the manners of her time. The
society of the _salons_ and the men of letters is depicted in the
Memoirs of Marmontel. These are but examples from an abundant
literature constantly augmented to the days of Mme. de Campan and
Mme. Roland. The general aspect of the social world in the mid-century
is presented by the historian Duclos (1704-1772) in his
_Considerations sur les Moeurs de ce Siecle_, and with reparation
for his previous neglect of the part played in society by women in
his _Memoires pour servir a l'Histoire du XVIIIe Siecle_.

As much or more may be learnt from the letter-writers as from the
writers of memoirs. If Voltaire did not take the first place by his
correspondence, so vast, so luminous, so comprehensive, it might
justly be assigned to his friend Mme. du Deffand (16