Note 94 — XI. THE GENTLEMEN OF PORT-ROYAL.[88]

Lemaître, a nephew of La Mère Angélique, was one of the most celebrated orators in France. In renouncing the world for Port-Royal, he retired from a splendid position at the Bar. Such men had qualifications out of the reach of ordinary schoolmasters. Dufossé, in after years, told how, when he was a boy, Lemaître called him often to his room and gave him solid instruction in learning and piety. “He read to me and made me read pieces from poets and orators, and saw that I noticed the beauties in them both in thought and diction. Moreover he taught me the right emphasis and articulation both in verse and prose, in which he himself was admirable, having the charm of a fine voice and all else that goes to make a great orator. He gave me also many rules for good translation and for making my progress in that art easy to me.” (Dufossé’s Mémoires, &c., quoted by Cadet, p. 9.) It was Lemaître who instructed Racine (born 1639, admitted at Les Granges, Port Royal des Champs, in 1655).