Sainte Beuve says that the cynical book and that young life were the only fruits of the war of the Fronde. Madame de Sevigne, who was with him when he heard the news of the death of so much that was dear to him, says, "I saw his heart laid bare on that cruel occasion, and his courage, his merit, his tenderness, and good sense surpassed all I ever met with. I hold his wit and accomplishments as nothing in comparison." The combined effect of his wounds and the gout caused the last years of Rochefoucauld's life to be spent in great pain. Madame de Sevigne, who was {with} him continually during his last illness, speaks of the fortitude with which he bore his sufferings as something to be admired. Writing to her daughter, she says, "Believe me, it is not for nothing he has moralised all his life; he has thought so often on his last moments that they are nothing new or unfamiliar to him." In his last illness, the great moralist was attended by the great divine, Bossuet. Whether that matchless eloquence or his own philosophic calm had, in spite of his writings, brought him into the state Madame de Sevigne describes, we know not; but one, or both, contributed to his passing away in a manner that did not disgrace a French noble or a French philosopher. On the 11th March, 1680, he ended his stormy life in peace after so much strife, a loyal subject after so much treason. One of his friends, Madame Deshoulieres, shortly before he died sent him an ode on death, which aptly describes his state-- "Oui, soyez alors plus ferme, Que ces vulgaires humains Qui, pres de leur dernier terme, De vaines terreurs sont pleins. En sage que rien n'offense, Livrez-vous sans resistance A d'inevitables traits; Et, d'une demarche egale, Passez cette onde fatal Qu'on ne repasse jamais." Rochefoucauld left behind him only two works, the one, Memoirs of his own time, the other the Maxims. The first described the scenes in which his youth had been spent, and though written in a lively style, and giving faithful pictures of the intrigues and the scandals of the court during Louis XIV.'s minority, yet, except to the historian, has ceased at the present day to be of much interest. It forms, perhaps, the true key to understand the special as opposed to general application of the maxims.