Life, Letters, and Epicurean Philosophy of Ninon de LEnclos, the Celebrated Beauty of the Seventee | Page 9

is not far
to seek. What is dominant in the minds always finds egress when a
favorable opportunity is presented, and the very thought of unchastity
as something to be avoided, leads to its contemplation, or its creation in

the form of temptation. The virtue of chastity was the one law, and its
observances and violations were studied from every point of view, and
its numberless permissible and forbidden limitations expatiated upon to
such a degree, that he who escaped them altogether could well attribute
the result to the interposition of some supernatural power, the
protection of some celestial guardian. One is reminded of the
expression of St. Paul: "I had not known lust had the law not said: thou
shalt not covet." Lord Beaconsfield's opinion was, that excessive piety
led to sexual disorders.
According to Ninon's philosophy, whatever tended to propagate
immoderation in the sexual relations was rigidly eliminated, and
chastity placed upon the same plane and in the same grade as other
moral precepts, to be wisely controlled, regulated, and managed. She
put all her morality upon the same plane, and thereby succeeded in
equalizing corporeal pleasure, so that the entire scale of human acts
produced a harmonious equality of temperament, whence goodness and
virtue necessarily followed, the pathway being unobstructed.
It is too much to be expected, or even to be hoped for, that there will
ever be any unanimity among moral reformers, or any uniformity in
their standards of moral excellence. The educated world of the present
day, reading between the lines of ancient history, and some that is not
so very ancient, see ambition for place and power as the moving cause,
the inspiration behind the great majority of revolutions, and they have
come to apply the same construction to the great majority of moral
agitations and movements for the reform of morals and the betterment
of humanity, with pecuniary reward or profit, however, added as the
sine qua non of maintaining them.
Cure the agitation by removing the occasion for it, and Othello's
occupation would be gone; hence, the agitation continues. As an
eminent theologian declared with a conviction that went home to a
multitude, at the Congress of Religions, when the Columbian
Exposition was in operation:
"If all the religions in the world are to be merged into one, who, or
what will support the clergy that will be deprived of their salaries by

the change in management?"
The Golden Calf and Aaron were there, but where was the angry
Moses?

CHAPTER V
Ninon and Count de Coligny
It was impossible for a maiden trained in the philosophy of Epicurus,
and surrounded by a brilliant society who assiduously followed its
precepts to avoid being caught in the meshes of the same net spread for
other women. Beloved and even idolized on all sides, as an object that
could be worshiped without incurring the displeasure of Richelieu, who
preferred his courtiers to amuse themselves with women and gallantries
rather than meddle with state affairs, and being disposed both through
inclination and training to accept the situation, Ninon felt the
sentiments of the tender passion, but philosophically waited for a
worthy object.
That object appeared in the person of the young Gaspard, Count de
Coligny, afterwards Duc de Chatillon, who paid her assiduous court.
The result was that Ninon conceived a violent passion for the Count,
which she could not resist, in fact did not care to resist, and she
therefore yielded to the young man of distinguished family, charming
manners, and a physically perfect specimen of manhood.
It is alleged by Voltaire and repeated by Cardinal de Retz, that the early
bloom of Ninon's charms was enjoyed by Richelieu, but if this be true,
it is more than likely that Ninon submitted through policy and not from
any affection for the great Cardinal. It is certain, however, that the great
statesman's attention had been called to her growing influence among
the French nobility, and that he desired to control her actions if not to
possess her charms. She was a tool that he imagined he could utilize to
keep his rebellious nobles in his leash. Abbé Raconis, Ninon's uncle,
and the Abbé Boisrobert, her friend, who stood close to the Cardinal,

had suggested to His Eminence that the charms of the new beauty could
be used to advantage in state affairs, and he accordingly sent for her at
first through curiosity, but when he had seen her he hoped to control
her for his personal benefit.
Although occupied in vast projects which his great genius and activity
always conducted to a happy issue, the great man had not renounced
the affections of his human nature, nor his intellectual gratifications. He
aimed at everything, and did not consider anything beneath his dignity.
Every day saw him engaged