Note 553 — XI. OF MANKIND.

This paragraph appeared for the first time in the eighth edition of the “Characters,” published in 1694, three years after the former favourite of Louis XIV., Madame de Montespan, had left the court, and about ten years after he had married Madame de Maintenon. Madame de Montespan had then become an imaginary invalid, and made frequent journeys to take the waters at different places, and chiefly to Bourbon-lʼArchambaud, where, it is said, a doctor made her a similar answer as recorded above. It is doubtful whether La Bruyère would have spoken of her corpulency, failing sight, and her growing old if Madame de Montespan had still remained a favourite; his former pupil, the Duke de Bourbon, had married, in 1685, Mademoiselle de Nantes, one of her daughters by Louis XIV.