_Fontanges_. Oh, no, no! but I wanted to see whether they were in
earnest, or told me fibs; for, if they told me fibs, I would never
trust them again.

_Bossuet_. Do you hate the world, mademoiselle?

_Fontanges_. A good deal of it: all Picardy, for example, and all
Sologne; nothing is uglier--and, oh my life! what frightful men and
women!

_Bossuet_. I would say, in plain language, do you hate the flesh and
the devil?

_Fontanges_. Who does not hate the devil? If you will hold my hand the
while, I will tell him so.--I hate you, beast! There now. As for flesh,
I never could bear a fat man. Such people can neither dance nor hunt,
nor do anything that I know of.

_Bossuet_. Mademoiselle Marie-Angelique de Scoraille de Rousille,
Duchess de Fontanges! do you hate titles and dignities and yourself?

_Fontanges_. Myself! does anyone hate me? Why should I be the first?
Hatred is the worst thing in the world: it makes one so very ugly.

_Bossuet_. To love God, we must hate ourselves. We must detest our
bodies, if we would save our souls.

_Fontanges_. That is hard: how can I do it? I see nothing so detestable
in mine. Do you? To love is easier. I love God whenever I think of him,
he has been so very good to me; but I cannot hate myself, if I would.
As God hath not hated me, why should I? Beside, it was he who made the
King to love me; for I heard you say in a sermon that the hearts of
kings are in his rule and governance. As for titles and dignities, I do
not care much about them while His Majesty loves me, and calls me his
Angelique. They make people more civil about us; and therefore it must
be a simpleton who hates or disregards them, and a hypocrite who
pretends it. I am glad to be a duchess. Manon and Lizette have never
tied my garter so as to hurt me since, nor has the mischievous old La
Grange said anything cross or bold; on the contrary, she told me what a
fine colour and what a plumpness it gave me. Would not you rather be a
duchess than a waiting-maid or a nun, if the King gave you your choice?

_Bossuet_. Pardon me, mademoiselle, I am confounded at the levity of
your question.

_Fontanges_. I am in earnest, as you see.

_Bossuet_. Flattery will come before you in other and more dangerous
forms: you will be commended for excellences which do not belong to
you; and this you will find as injurious to your repose as to your
virtue. An ingenuous mind feels in unmerited praise the bitterest
reproof. If yo