To his clergy he was a father and brother in God, gathering them about him as constantly as possible for instruction and inspiration, moving among them with the utmost wisdom, correcting, advising, assisting. One of his first cares was the improvement of the seminary for completing the education of those who were preparing for the Church. It had been at Valenciennes, but he removed it to Cambrai, that it might be under his own eye. It was his great desire to reconstruct it on the lines of the seminary at St. Sulpice, where he himself had been so profited, and to intrust the supervision of the students to priests who were members of that congregation; but he found insuperable obstacles to this scheme in the fear of M. Tronson lest any direct connection between St. Sulpice and Cambrai might draw down upon the former the king’s displeasure. So Fénelon appointed to the head of it his intimate friend, the Abbé de Chanterac, formerly his agent at Rome, saying, “He has the wit, the piety, and the wisdom to govern it peacefully.” But Fénelon devoted great personal care to the students, examining them himself, and endeavoring to estimate their individual capacities. Besides the instruction he gave them during periods of retreat, and at the chief festivals, he conducted conferences once a week, listening with infinite patience to their difficulties and replying with the kindness of a father. No priest proceeded to ordination until he had been five times examined by Fénelon himself. In short, no pains were spared to make the priests of this diocese an example to their degenerate colleagues.