Chapter LXI: Letter L: THE ROCKS, Wednesday, November 6, 1675

What a delightful letter have you written to me, my dear child! What thanks do I not owe you for employing your hand, your eyes, your head, your time, in composing so agreeable a volume! I have read it over and over, and shall read it again with pleasure and attention. I can read nothing that is more interesting; you satisfy my curiosity in every thing I wish. I admire your care in giving me such punctual answers. This makes a conversation perfect, regular, and extremely entertaining. But I must beg you not to destroy yourself; this fear makes me renounce the pleasure of having frequently such entertainments. You can not doubt my generosity in sparing you the fatigue of immoderate writing.

I comprehend with pleasure the high esteem that is paid to M. de Grignan in Provence, after what I have seen of it. This is a pleasure you are scarcely sensible of; you are too much accustomed to be loved and honored in a province where you command. If you saw the horror, the detestation, the hatred, that the people have here for their governor, you would feel more than you do the pleasure of being adored every where. What affronts! what injuries! what menaces! what reproaches! the very stones fly round him. I do not believe M. de Grignan would accept this post upon such conditions.

You mention to me the paper you have signed so heroically in favor of M. de Grignan.[129] You say you had no doubt which way the honorable sentiments of Cardinal de Retz[130] inclined. I do not say any thing of mine; it was enough that you could discern what his counsels tended to. In certain delicate affairs, we do not presume directly to advise, but we represent the case; the common friends of both do what is proper, that there may be no jarring opposition in the interest of those they love. But with a soul so perfectly generous and good as yours, we consult only ourselves, and act precisely as you have done. Have you not seen how much you have been admired? Are you not pleased that you owe to none but yourself so noble a resolution? You would have done nothing blamable, if you had refused to sign--you would only have acted like the rest of the world; but by consenting to it, you have exceeded all the world. In a word, my child, enjoy the beauty of your own action, and do not think meanly of us for not having prompted you to it. On a similar occasion, we should perhaps have acted as you have done, and you would have advised as we did; it is all well, I am very much pleased that M. de Grignan is so good as to recompense this mark of your friendship and affection by a greater attention to his affairs. The prudence you commend him for, is the truest mark of his gratitude you could have wished.

[129] It appears that Madame de Grignan had entered into a bond
for her husband.

[130] Cardinal de Retz advised her not to sign.