I have always forgotten to tell you that I noticed several days ago, in hearing you explain the Gospel, that you seem to me to embrace too many topics; children want but few. You also talk too much; I think you had better make the children talk more, so as to see if they have listened and understood. I likewise think that you are too eloquent. For example, you said to them that they must make an eternal divorce from sin; that is true, and well said, but I doubt if there are three girls in your class who know what a divorce is. Be simple, and think only of making yourself intelligible. I think, my dear daughter, that you will consider it right that I should give you my opinion from time to time on what I see you do. Inspire your children, I conjure you, with the practices of piety, with a horror of sin, a sense of God's presence, and a docility in being led by you. I beg you also to guide them according to the spirit of the Church; as for this, I have written a little compendium which you must follow. Adieu, my dear daughter. _To Mme. de Montalembert_ [head mistress of the Blues]. October 19, 1703. Your arrangements are all that could be wished, my dear daughter; we cannot thank God enough for what He does for you by means of your saintly and able confessor. I tell you again, my joy would be perfect if I could see you walking as straight without that great support; but I will have confidence in God and believe that the provision of strength you are making now will nourish you for the future. The affection you feel for your girls will never harm you if you love them all equally; preferences would be ruinous to the class and to yourself; you must have none, except for the very best girls, and such preferences ought not to offend the others. Why do you not ask of your class all that you know I should ask of them? My greatest honour at Saint-Cyr is that Saint-Cyr can do without me; what I should now do would be nothing; what there was of good in me has passed to you, my dear children, and will ever remain in the Institution. I desire with all my heart that it may be a school of virtue, and that you may live there as angels while corruption increases daily in the world. What would I not give to have you all see as I do how long and wearisome our days are here at Court; I do not mean only for those persons who have outlived the follies of youth, but for youth itself, which is dying of ennui because it wants to amuse itself continually and finds nothing to content that insatiable desire for pleasure. I toil at the oar to amuse Mme. la Duchesse de Bourgogne. It would not be thus if they sought only to please God, to work and sing His praises, as with you; the peace which that kind of life puts into the heart is a solid and lasting joy. Adieu; this subject would lead me far. I write to none but you to-day; assure the dear sisters that the healths about which they inquire are very good.