Added to this heresy, was her notion of prayer, which she made consist, not in the preferment of our requests to God, such as Jesus Christ taught, but in a state of mind embued with the sense of God's presence, and an assimilation of the soul with God's perfection. Her health suffered from the constant excitement of her mind. It was considered that the climate of the province where she resided was injurious, and she visited Paris to recover. She became acquainted with the dukes de Beauvilliers and Chevreuse; her doctrines became known and discussed in Paris; madame de Maintenon was struck and attracted; Fénélon, his own heart full of love, became almost a convert; madame Guyon herself was full of talent, enthusiasm, and goodness; Fénélon became her friend, and denied the odious conclusions which her enemies drew from her doctrines. As the doctrine gained ground, it met opposition. Des Marais, the bishop of Chartres, in whose diocese was Saint Cyr, the scene of these impassioned mysteries, became alarmed at its progress; and, with the deceit which a priest sometimes thinks he is justified in using in what he deems a righteous cause, he made use of two ladies of great repute for piety, as spies, and from their accounts of what passed in the society of Quietists, found sufficient cause of objection to the sect. Madame de Maintenon listened to his censures, and withdrew her favour. Fénélon saw the danger that threatened madame Guyon, and, steady in his attachment to one whom he considered worthy his friendship, he assisted her by his counsel. Following his advice, and secure in her own virtue, she applied to Bossuet. His manly and serious mind, strengthened by age, rejected at once her mysticism, while her personal merits won his esteem and condescension. It is a singular circumstance, and shows her candour, that she confided her thoughts and her writings far more unreservedly to Bossuet than to Fénélon. Bossuet saw her, explained his objections; and she acquiescing in every thing he suggested, he administered the sacrament to her; a token at once of her submission and his good opinion.