Note 143 — Chapter X · THE EDUCATION OF WOMEN IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY.—JACQUELINE PASCAL AND MADAME DE MAINTENON.

“The name generally given to a social circle, which for more than half a century gathered around Catherine de Vivonne, marquise de Rambouillet, and her daughter, Julie d’Angennes, duchess de Montausier, and which exercised a very conspicuous influence on French language, literature, and civilization.... Her house soon became the place where all who had genius, wit, learning, talent, or taste, assembled, and from these reunions originated the French Academy, the highest authority of French literature, and the salons, the most prominent feature of French civilization.”—Johnson’s Cyclopædia.