Page:A Biographical Dictionary of the Celebrated Women of Every Age and Country (1804).djvu/482

468 appears to have been inimitable for the charms of her person and manners; Her mind was highly polished; yet with powers of reasoning to make her respected by the sage; she knew how to blend refinement with gaiety, candour and sensibility with acknowledged looseness of principle and life. During a long life, she was the admiration of the world around her, and amidst all the changes of fashion and time maintained her influence. The distinguished, whether for birth or talents, sought her society for the gratification it afforded them; the young and aspiring, in hopes of being thereby polished and instructed.

Voltaire says, that her father was a player upon the lute, and that cardinal Richelieu was her first admirer, and settled on her a pension of 2000 livres, no small sum at that time. Others say, it was the young Coligny, duke de Chatillon, who was a Calvinist, and with whom Ninon would argue for hours to detach him from that faith, which most likely she thought prejudicial to his interest. He abjured Calvinism accordingly in 1694. They had at first sworn eternal fidelity; but finding the sentiment die in her heart, Ninon for the future determined that in friendship only it was necessary to be faithful.

As she was not rich, she permitted her guests to bring with them their separate dishes to her suppers, which were frequented by the first wits of the age. This was not an unusual custom in France. Amongst the wits who obtained this privilege was St. Evremond, who wrote a verse under her picture, signifying, that wise and indulgent nature had formed her heart with the principles of Epicurus, and the virtue of Cato.

She was called the modern Leontium, from her philosophical knowledge, which received additional charms from