Memoirs
The memoirs of a French duke who lived at the court of Louis XIV. They are cited for his account of the destruction of the convent of Port-Royal des Champs in 1709, which he tells as an enemy of the Jesuits and of the bull Unigenitus.
Saint-Simon writes of the court as one who was there, and with strong likes and dislikes. The introduction to the edition used calls his memoirs the chief authority for the years 1694 to 1723. In the chapter cited he calls Jansenism a heresy “invented by the Jesuits” and blames the king’s Jesuit confessor for the fate of Port-Royal; elsewhere he calls Unigenitus an “infamous bull”.
He is cited for the event he reports, the removal of the nuns on the night of 28 to 29 October and the razing of the buildings, and his judgements are given as his.
Cited in
- 1653 to 1713, firm date