f an overtaxed people who had no political rights.
They were the glittering abodes of immorality. Again and again France
was governed by wicked women who became favorites of the king. The
Huguenots, who were the sincerely religious people of France, were
compelled to leave the nation. Think of it,--four hundred thousand
people going away from their native country at the unrestrained edict
of one bad man. Do you wonder the people of France desired a
Constitution for their protection? The nobler orders of the Catholic
Church, the Jansenists and Port Royalists as they were called, were
also suppressed. The Church became immoral, tyrannical, and almost
wholly corrupt, an enemy to the rights of the people. The reaction
against such a church, which violated all the precepts of the Gospel,
was infidelity.

[Illustration: FENELON AND THE DUKE OF BURGUNDY.]

"During the whole of the reign of Louis XV. the cloud of Revolution
was gathering. Louis saw it, but he was so given over to sensuality
that it little troubled him. 'These things will last as long as I
shall,' he said. '_Apres nous le deluge_' (after us the deluge). He
was wholly governed, and the nation ruled, by Madame de Pompadour, a
corrupt and worthless woman, who made and dismissed ministers of State
and cardinals, declared war and dictated terms of peace. She declared
that even her lap-dog was weary of the fawnings of nobles. Are you
surprised that Frenchmen should rise against such a state of things as
this?"

"Was not Louis XV. educated by Fenelon, who wrote _Telemaque_, the
French text-book we have been studying?" asked Frank.

"Yes, the most corrupt king of France was educated by the purest and
most lovable man of genius that the times produced. The king was a
wilful child, but it was thought that Fenelon had quite changed his
character by his religious influence. He was subject to what were
called 'mad fits.' I might tell you some pleasant stories of this
period of his life. One day, when Fenelon had reproved him for some
grave fault, he said,--

"'I know what I am, and I know also what you are.'

"Fenelon's prudent conduct quite won back the affection of the child.

"'I will leave the Duke of Burgundy [his title] behind the door when I
am with you,' he used to say, 'and I will be only little Louis.'

"Fenelon turned the boy's mind to piety, and for a time influenced him
by it. 'All his mad fits and spites,' he said of his pupil, 'yielded
to the name of