He woke to a juster and higher appreciation of human nature, and of woman's nature in especial.

He had found honesty and truth where he might least have expected it--in a woman of a court--in a woman surrounded by vicious and frivolous circles--in a woman who had nothing in the opinion of her friends, her country, her own husband, the social system in which she moved, to keep her from the concessions of frailty--in a woman of the world--a woman of Paris!--yes, it was his very disappointment that drove away the fogs and vapours that, arising from the marshes of the great world, had gradually settled round his soul.

Valerie de Ventadour had taught him not to despise her sex, not to judge by appearances, not to sicken of a low and a hypocritical world.

He looked in his heart for the love of Valerie, and he found there the love of virtue.

Thus, as he turned his eyes inward, did he gradually awaken to a sense of the true impressions engraved there.