LIFE OF FENELON, ARCHBISHOP OF CAMBRAY. BY CHARLES BUTLER, Esq. Quare quis tandem me reprehendat, si quantum cæteris ad festos ludorum Charge of Study Jails to shore me D'Agüesseau. BALTIMORE: PUBLISHED BY PHILIP H. NICKLIN & CO. ALSO BY A. FINLEY, PHILADELPHIA; E. SARGEANT, NEW MARIETTA (OHIO); AND D. MALLORY & CO. BOSTON. 1811. THE LIFE OF FENELON. CHAP 1. PRINCIPAL WRITERS OF THE LIFE OF FENELON. WITH the name of Fenelon, the most pleasing ideas are associated. To singular elevation both of genius and sentiment, he united extreme modesty and simplicity; unconquerably firm in every thing which he considered a duty, he displayed, both on great and ordinary occasions, a meekness, which nothing could discompose. In the midst of a voluptuous court he practised the virtues of an anchorite equally humble and elegant, severe to himself B and indulgent to others, a mysterious holiness hangs on his character and attracts our veneration, while his misfortunes shed over him a tinge of distress, which excites our tenderest sympathy. Not long after his decease, a short account of his life was published by the chevalier Ramsay, who had been the preceptor of Prince Charles, the son of our James the second. The chevalier Ramsay passed several years in the strictest intimacy with Fenelon, and, after Fenelon's decease, was entrusted by his family, with his papers. In 1734, a great nephew of Fenelon published memoirs of him, which are short, but contain some curious details. A third account of the life of Fenelon was published in 1787, by father Querbeuf, an ex-jesuit. In 1808, a life of Fenelon was published in three volumes octavo, by M. de Bausset, bishop of Alais at the beginning of the French Revolution, and afterwards member of the imperial chapter of the church of St. Denis at Paris. He |