The hey-day of youth having passed, he was beginning to be anxious about his soul.

She artfully pricked his conscience, and de Montespan was sent away, but de Maintenon remained.
She next convinced him that the only fitting atonement for his sins was to drive heresy out of his kingdom, and re-establish the true faith.
At her bidding he undid the glorious work of Henry IV., signed the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes, and brutally stamped out Protestantism.
During the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries the stake in the great game played in Europe was the headship, the pre-eminent position held by the house of Hapsburg.

The entire reign of Louis XIV.

had had this for its ultimate object.

He seemed many times near it; but was never to reach the goal.