Amelia Gere Mason

“ It is not possible within the limits of a brief chapter to touch even lightly upon the various phases of a character so complex and talents so versatile. One can only gather a few scattered traits and indicate a few salient points in a life of which the details are already familiar. As woman, novelist, philosopher, litterateur, and conversationist, she has marked, if not equal, claims upon our attention. To speak of her as simply the leader of a salon is to merge the greater talent into the less, but her brilliant social qualities in a measure brought out and illuminated all the others. ”

“ We fall under the glamour of the luminous but factitious atmosphere that surrounded them. We are dazzled by the subtlety and clearness of their intellect, the brilliancy of their wit. Their faults are veiled by the smoke of the incense we burn before them, or lost in the dim perspective. It is fortunate, perhaps, for many of our illusions, that the golden age, which is always receding, is seen at such long range that only the softly colored outlines are visible. Men and women are transfigured in the rosy light that rests on historic heights as on far-off mountain tops. ”

“ When misfortunes came, the blows that fell upon her husband struck with double force into her own heart. She was destined to share with him the chill of censure and neglect, the bitter sting of ingratitude, the lonely isolation of one fallen from a high place, whose friendship and whose favors count no more.
In the solitude of Coppet, where she died at fifty-seven, during the last and darkest days of the Revolution, perhaps she realized in the tireless devotion of her husband and the loving care of Mme. de Stael the repose of heart which the brilliant world of Paris never gave her. ”

“ The salon had become a vast engine of power, an organ of public opinion, like the modern press. Clever and ambitious women had found their instrument and their opportunity. They had long since learned that the homage paid to weakness is illusory; that the power of beauty is short-lived. With none of the devotion which had made the convent the time-honored refuge of tender and exalted souls, finding little solace in the domestic affections which played so small a role in their lives, they turned the whole force of their clear and flexible minds to this new species of sovereignty. ”

“ The Greek poets give us types of tragic passions, of heroic virtues, of motherly and wifely devotion, but woman is not recognized as a profound spiritual force. This masculine literature, so perfect in form and plastic beauty, so vigorous, so statuesque, so calm, and withal so cold, shines across the centuries side by side with the feminine Christian ideal—twin lights which have met in the world of today. It may be that from the blending of the two, the crowning of a man's vigor with a woman's finer insight, will spring the perfected flower of human thought. ”

“ The days of chivalry were not so far distant, and the subtle blending of exalted sentiment with thoughtful companionship, which revived their spirit in a new form, was too marked a feature of the time to be overlooked. These friendships, half intellectual, half poetic, and quite platonic, were mostly formed in mature life, on a basis of mental sympathy. "There is a taste in pure friendship which those who are born mediocre do not reach," said La Gruyere. Mme. de Lambert speaks of it as "the product of a perfect social culture, and, of all affections, that which has most charm." ”

“ Nowhere do we find a character so clearly self-revealed. Others have professed to unveil their innermost lives, but there is always a suspicion of posing in deliberate revelations. Mme. De Sevigne has portrayed herself unconsciously. It is the experience of yesterday, the thought of today, the hope of tomorrow, the love that is at once the joy and sorrow of all the days, that are woven into a thousand varying but living forms. One naturally seeks in the character of the daughter a key to the absorbing sentiment which is the inspiration and soul of these letters; but one does not find it there. ”

“ We catch the changeful tints of her mind that readily takes the complexion of those about her, while retaining its independence; we are made familiar with her small joys and sorrows, we laugh with her at her own harmless weaknesses, we feel the inspiration of her sympathy, we hear the innermost throbbings of her heart. No one was ever less consciously a woman of letters. No one would have been more surprised than herself at her own fame. One is instinctively sure that she would never have seated herself deliberately to write a book of any sort whatever. ”

“ It has been a labor of love with many distinguished Frenchmen to recall the memories of the women who have made their society so illustrious, and to retouch with sympathetic insight the features which time was beginning to dim. One naturally hesitates to enter a field that has been gleaned so carefully, and with such brilliant results, by men like Cousin, Sainte-Beuve, Goncourt, and others of lesser note. But the social life of the two centuries in which women played so important a role in France is always full of human interest from whatever point of view one may regard it. ”

“ One may call Mlle. de Scudery the muse of our age and the prodigy of her sex. It is not only her goodness and her sweetness, but her intellect shines with so much modesty, her sentiments are expressed with so much reserve, she speaks with so much discretion, and all that she says is so fit and reasonable, that one cannot help both admiring and loving her. Comparing what one sees of her, and what one owes to her personally, with what she writes, one prefers, without hesitation, her conversation to her works. Although she has a wonderful mind, her heart outweighs it. ”

“ Her exquisite tact, her brilliant intellect, her conversational gifts, her personal charm made her the idol of the world in which she lived. Her influence was courted, her salon was the resort of the most distinguished men of the century, and while she loved to discuss the great social problems which her friends were trying to solve, she forgot none of the graces. With the intellectual strength and grasp of a man, she preserved always the taste, the delicacy, the tenderness of a woman. ”

“ She had tact, grace, intelligence, appreciation, and the gift of inspiring others. The cleverest men and women of the age were to be met in her drawing room. One found there genius, beauty, esprit, elegance, courtesy, and the brilliant conversation which is the Gallic heritage. But not even her surpassing fascination added to all these attractions could revive the old power of the salon. Her coterie was charming, as a choice circle gathered about a beautiful, refined, accomplished woman, and illuminated by the wit and intelligence of thoughtful men, will always be ”

“ It gave color and force to her rich and versatile character. It animated all she did and gave point to all she wrote. It found expression in the eloquence of her conversation, in the exaltation and passionate intensity of her affections, in the fervor of her patriotism, in the self-forgetful generosity that brought her very near the verge of the scaffold. Here was the source of that indefinable quality we call genius—not genius of the sort which Buffon has defined as patience, but the divine flame that crowns with life the dead materials which patience has gathered. ”

“ A shaft of wit silences the most complacent of monologues. "What tiresome book are you reading?" she said one day to a friend who talked too earnestly and too long—saving herself from the charge of rudeness by an easy refuge in her blindness.
Her criticisms are always severe. "There are only two pleasures for me in the world—society and reading," she writes. "What society does one find? Imbeciles, who utter only commonplaces, who know nothing, feel nothing, think nothing; a few people of talent, full of themselves, jealous, envious, wicked, whom one must hate or scorn." ”

“ But the most interesting thing we read in her letters is the life and nature of the woman herself. She has a taste for society and for seclusion, for gaiety and for thought, for friendship and for books. For the moment each one seems dominant. "I am always of the opinion of the one heard last," she says, laughing at her own impressibility. It is an amiable admission, but she has very fine and rational ideas of her own, notwithstanding. In books, for which she had always a passion, she found unfailing consolation. Corneille and La Fontaine were her favorite traveling companions. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Devouring herself in solitude, she despises the society she cannot do without. "Men and women appear to me puppets who go, come, talk, laugh, without thinking, without reflecting, without feeling," she writes. She confesses that she has a thousand troubles in assembling a choice company of people who bore her to death. "One sees only masks, one hears only lies," is her constant refrain. She does not want to live, but is afraid to die; she says she is not made for this world, but does not know that there is any other. She tries devotion, but has no taste for it. ”

“ But the art of so blending a choice society that her own vivid personality was a pervading note of harmony she had to an eminent degree. She could easily have made a mark upon her time through her intellectual gifts without the factitious aid of the men with whom her name is associated. But society was her passion society animated by intellect, sparkling with wit, and expressing in all its forms the art instincts of her race. She never aspired to authorship, but she has left a voluminous correspondence in which one reads the varying phases of a singularly capricious character. ”

“ But who cares to dwell upon the shadows that scarcely dim the brilliancy of a genius so rare and so commanding? They are but spots on the sun that are only discovered by looking through a glass that veils its radiance. It is just to weigh her by the standards of her own age. Born at its highest level, she soared far above her generation. She carried within herself the vision of a statesman, the penetration of a critic, the insight of a philosopher, the soul of a poet, and the heart of a woman. ”

“ Your mind so adorns and embellishes your person, that there is no one in the world so fascinating when you are animated by a conversation from which constraint is banished. All that you say has such a charm, and becomes you so well, that the words attract the Smiles and the Graces around you; the brilliancy of your intellect gives such luster to your complexion and your eyes, that although it seems that wit should touch only the ears, yours dazzles the sight. ”

“ It was this excess of vivacity and her abounding sensibility that constituted at once her fascination and her misfortune. Her beliefs were enthusiasms. Her friendships were passions. "No one has carried the religion of friendship so far as myself," she said. To love, to be loved was the supreme need of her soul; but her love was a flame that irradiated her intellect and added brilliancy to the life it consumed. She paints in "Corinne" the passions, the struggles, the penalties, and the sorrows of a woman of genius. ”

“ It was here that Mme. de Rambouillet held her court for nearly thirty years, her salon reaching the height of its power under Richelieu, and practically closing with the Fronde. She sought to gather all that was most distinguished, whether for wit, beauty, talent, or birth, into an atmosphere of refinement and simple elegance, which should tone down all discordant elements and raise life to the level of a fine art. ”

“ The Gallic genius is eminently a social one, but it is, of all others, the most difficult to reproduce. The subtle grace of manner, the magic of spoken words, are gone with the moment. The conversations of two centuries ago are today like champagne which has lost its sparkle. We may recall their tangible forms—the facts, the accessories, the thoughts, even the words, but the flavor is not there. It is the volatile essence of gaiety and wit that especially characterizes French society. ”

“ One has a thousand tyrants in place of one." She had no breadth of sympathy, and her interests were largely personal; but in matters of style and form her taste was unerring. Pitiless in her criticisms, she held firmly to her ideals of clear, elegant, and concise expression, both in literature and in conversation. She tolerated no latitudes, no pretension, and left behind her the traditions of a society that blended, more perfectly, perhaps, than any other of her time, the best intellectual life with courtly manners and a strict observance of les convenances. ”

“ Your soul is great and elevated. You are sensitive to glory and to ambition, and not less so to pleasures; you were born for them and they seem to have been made for you... In a word, joy is the true state of your soul, and grief is as contrary to it as possible. You are naturally tender and impassioned; there was never a heart so generous, so noble, so faithful... You are the most courteous and amiable person that ever lived, and the sweet, frank air which is seen in all your actions makes the simplest compliments of politeness seem from your lips protestations of friendship. ”

“ Her nature unveils itself, her emotions chase one another in quick succession, her thoughts crystallize with wonderful brilliancy, and the world is reflected in a thousand varying colors. The sparkling wit, the swift judgment, the subtle insight, the lightness of touch, the indefinable charm of style—these belong to her temperament and her genius. But the clearness, the justness of expression, the precision, the simplicity that was never banal—such qualities nature does not bestow. One must find their source in careful training, in wise criticism, in early familiarity with good models. ”

“ The end came to her in the one spot where she would most have wished it. She died while on a visit to her daughter in Provence. Strength and resignation came with the moment, and she faced with calmness and courage the final mystery. To the last she retained her wit, her vivacity, and that eternal youth of the spirit which is one of the rarest of God's gifts to man. "There are no more friends left to me," said Mme. de Coulanges; and later she wrote to Mme. de Grignan, "The grief of seeing her no longer is always fresh to me. ”