Cousin says that the whole literature of maxims and reflections issued directly from the salon of a kind and good woman who had retired to a convent with no other desire than to live over her life, to recall her past and what she had seen and felt therein; and upon her society, that woman impressed her own tastes, elegance, and seriousness. Her great act of benevolence was her protection of Port-Royal. When, after the death in 1661 of Mother Angélique Arnauld, that institution became the object of persecution and its tenants were either imprisoned or compelled to seek refuge in the various families of Paris, Mme. de Sablé remained faithful to its principles; she lived with her friends, Mme. de Longueville and Mme. de Montausier, until 1669, when, with the coöperation of Mme. de Longueville, who exerted all her influence for Port-Royal, she finally succeeded in bringing about its reopening. At least, Cousin ascribes this result to Mme. de Sablé, but he may have somewhat exaggerated her influence in this respect. From her retreat at Port-Royal, she kept up a constant correspondence with her friends all over France; she lived there until 1678, with but one intimate friend, Mme. de Longueville. Mme. de Sablé had remarkable gifts; her mission in politics, religion, and literature seems to have been to excite to action, to stimulate and to bring out to its fullest value, the talents and genius of others. In her modest salon, she inspired the great and illustrious work which will keep her memory alive as long as the _Maxims_ and _Pensées_ are read. Her name will be connected with that of Mme. de Longueville, because of their ideal friendship, and with that of Port-Royal because of her ardent and self-sacrificing support of it in the time of its direst persecution, when any exhibition of sympathy was dangerous in the extreme; and finally, her name will always be connected with that small circle of French society of the seventeenth century, which was noble, moral, and elevating to an unusual degree. Somewhat later in the century a different movement was started by a woman, which involved many of the highest in rank at court. This took the form of a kind of mystical enthusiasm, running into a theory of pure love, and was instigated by Mme. Guyon, a widow, still young, and gifted with a lofty and subtile mind. After losing her husband, whom she had converted to her religious views, she went, in 1680, to Paris to educate her children. Becoming interested in religion, she went to Geneva, where she became very intimate with a priest who was her spiritual director, and whom she soon wholly subjected to her influence. On account of their views on sanctification, they were ordered to leave.