42 - GRIGNAN Françoise-Marguerite de Sévigné, Countess of [, 1646 –, 1705], daughter of Madame de Sévigné.

GRIGNAN Françoise-Marguerite de Sévigné, Countess of [, 1646 –, 1705], daughter of Madame de Sévigné. Autograph manuscript. 8½ pages, small quarto. The daughter of the Marquise de Sévigné was deeply drawn to philosophy and metaphysics. Here she writes a truly remarkable study on the controversy between Fénelon and Bossuet regarding the doctrine of pure love. “Mr. de Cambray defends God’s interests very well; Mr. de Meaux even defends those of religion—he must win his case in Rome. The big question, then, is to determine the true definition of the five kinds of love according to Mr. de Cambray. ” After a very thorough analysis of Bossuet’s and Fénelon’s positions and propositions, she concludes: “It is this mixture of love for ourselves—more or less intense—that distinguishes Mr. de Cambray’s five kinds of love, and what a difficulty it is to grasp the degree of intensity once we understand that God, love, nothingness—these three names are known to us; the definitions of the first two have been established, but nothingness, which has no properties, has no definition.”