"Let her be brought," said M.d'Argenson.

"His Majesty's orders are," he continued, "that you break up this assemblage, never to meet again.

It is your general dispersal that I announce to you; you are allowed but three hours to break up." "We are ready to obey, sir," said the mother-prioress; "half an hour is more than sufficient for us to say our last good by, and take with us a breviary, a Bible, and our regulations." And when he asked her whither she meant to go, "Sir, the moment our community is broken up and dispersed, it is indifferent to me in what place I may be personally, since I hope to find God wherever I shall be." They got into carriages, receiving one after another the farewell and blessing of the mother-prioress, who was the last to depart, remaining firm to the end there were two and twenty, the youngest fifty years old; they all died in the convents to which they were taken.

A seizure was at once made of all papers and books left in the cells; Cardinal Noailles did not interfere.
M.de St.Cyran had depicted him by anticipation, when he said that the weak were more to be feared than the wicked.

He was complaining one day of his differences with his bishops.