The Women of the French Salons [57]
to preserve the tradition of household virtues. Every one seems to have accepted the philosophy of the irrepressible Ninon, who "returned thanks to God every evening for her esprit, and prayed him every morning to be preserved from follies of the heart." If a young wife was modest or shy, she was the object of unflattering persiflage. If she betrayed her innocent love for her husband, she was not of the charmed circle of wit and good tone which frowned upon so vulgar a weakness, and laughed at inconvenient scruples.
"Indeed," says a typical husband of the period, "I cannot conceive how, in the barbarous ages, one had the courage to wed. The ties of marriage were a chain. Today you see kindness, liberty, peace reign in the bosom of families. If husband and wife love each other, very well; they live together; they are happy. If they cease to love, they say so honestly, and return to each other the promise of fidelity. They cease to be lovers; they are friends. That is what I call social manners, gentle manners." This reign of the senses is aptly illustrated by the epitaph which the gay, voluptuous, and spirtuelle Marquise de Boufflers wrote for herself:
Ci-git dans une paix profonde Cette Dame de Volupte Qui, pour plus grande surete, Fit son paradis de ce monde.
"Courte et bonne," said the favorite daughter of the Regent, in the same spirit.
It is against such a background that the women who figure so prominently in the salons are outlined. Such was the air they breathed, the spirit they imbibed. That it was fatal to the finer graces of character goes without saying. Doubtless, in quiet and secluded nooks, there were many human wild flowers that had not lost their primitive freshness and delicacy, but they did not flourish in the withering atmosphere of the great world. The type in vogue savored of the hothouse. With its striking beauty of form and tropical richness of color, it had no sweetness, no fragrance. Many of these women we can only consider on the worldly and intellectual side. Sydney Smith has aptly characterized them as "women who violated the common duties of life, and gave very pleasant little suppers." But standing on the level of a time in which their faults were mildly censured, if at all, their characteristic gifts shine out with marvelous splendor. It is from this standpoint alone that we can present them, drawing the friendly mantle of silence over grave weaknesses and fatal errors.
In this century, in which women have so much wider scope, when they may paint, carve, act, sing, write, enter professional life, or do whatever talent and inclination dictate, without loss of dignity or prestige, unless they do it ill,--and perhaps even this exception is a trifle superfluous,--it is difficult to understand fully, or estimate correctly, a society in which the best feminine intellect was centered upon the art of entertaining and of wielding an indirect power through the minds of men. These Frenchwomen had all the vanity that lies at the bottom of the Gallic character, but when the triumphs of youth were over, the only legitimate path to individual distinction was that of social influence. This was attained through personal charm, supplemented by more or less cleverness, or through the gift of creating a society that cast about them an illusion of talent of which they were often only the reflection. To these two classes belong the queens of the salons. But the most famous of them only carried to the point of genius a talent that was universal.
In its best estate a brilliant social life is essentially an external one. Its charm lies largely in the superficial graces, in the facile and winning manners, the ready tact, the quick intelligence, the rare and perishable gifts of conversation--in the nameless trifles which are elusive as shadows and potent as light. It is the way of putting things that tells, rather than the value of the things themselves. This world of draperies and amenities, of dinners and conversaziones, of epigrams, coquetries, and sparkling trivialities
"Indeed," says a typical husband of the period, "I cannot conceive how, in the barbarous ages, one had the courage to wed. The ties of marriage were a chain. Today you see kindness, liberty, peace reign in the bosom of families. If husband and wife love each other, very well; they live together; they are happy. If they cease to love, they say so honestly, and return to each other the promise of fidelity. They cease to be lovers; they are friends. That is what I call social manners, gentle manners." This reign of the senses is aptly illustrated by the epitaph which the gay, voluptuous, and spirtuelle Marquise de Boufflers wrote for herself:
Ci-git dans une paix profonde Cette Dame de Volupte Qui, pour plus grande surete, Fit son paradis de ce monde.
"Courte et bonne," said the favorite daughter of the Regent, in the same spirit.
It is against such a background that the women who figure so prominently in the salons are outlined. Such was the air they breathed, the spirit they imbibed. That it was fatal to the finer graces of character goes without saying. Doubtless, in quiet and secluded nooks, there were many human wild flowers that had not lost their primitive freshness and delicacy, but they did not flourish in the withering atmosphere of the great world. The type in vogue savored of the hothouse. With its striking beauty of form and tropical richness of color, it had no sweetness, no fragrance. Many of these women we can only consider on the worldly and intellectual side. Sydney Smith has aptly characterized them as "women who violated the common duties of life, and gave very pleasant little suppers." But standing on the level of a time in which their faults were mildly censured, if at all, their characteristic gifts shine out with marvelous splendor. It is from this standpoint alone that we can present them, drawing the friendly mantle of silence over grave weaknesses and fatal errors.
In this century, in which women have so much wider scope, when they may paint, carve, act, sing, write, enter professional life, or do whatever talent and inclination dictate, without loss of dignity or prestige, unless they do it ill,--and perhaps even this exception is a trifle superfluous,--it is difficult to understand fully, or estimate correctly, a society in which the best feminine intellect was centered upon the art of entertaining and of wielding an indirect power through the minds of men. These Frenchwomen had all the vanity that lies at the bottom of the Gallic character, but when the triumphs of youth were over, the only legitimate path to individual distinction was that of social influence. This was attained through personal charm, supplemented by more or less cleverness, or through the gift of creating a society that cast about them an illusion of talent of which they were often only the reflection. To these two classes belong the queens of the salons. But the most famous of them only carried to the point of genius a talent that was universal.
In its best estate a brilliant social life is essentially an external one. Its charm lies largely in the superficial graces, in the facile and winning manners, the ready tact, the quick intelligence, the rare and perishable gifts of conversation--in the nameless trifles which are elusive as shadows and potent as light. It is the way of putting things that tells, rather than the value of the things themselves. This world of draperies and amenities, of dinners and conversaziones, of epigrams, coquetries, and sparkling trivialities