These ceremonious details of power were repugnant to her mind, which fed on philosophy, truth, liberty, and the virtue of the olden time.

The obscure names, the humble attire, of the relatives who took her to see all this, only procured for her mere passing looks and a few words, which meant more protection than favour.
The feeling that her youth, beauty, and merit, were unperceived by this crowd, who only adored favour or etiquette, oppressed her mind.

The philosophy, natural pride, imagination, and fixedness of her soul were all wounded during this sojourn.

"I preferred," she says, "the statues in the gardens to the personages of the palace." And her mother inquiring if she were pleased with her visit--"Yes," was her reply, "if it be soon ended; for else, in a few more days I shall so much detest all the persons I see, that I should not know what to do with my hatred." "What harm have they done you ?" inquired her mother.

"To make me feel injustice, and look upon absurdity." As she contemplated these splendours of the despotism of Louis XIV., which were drooping into corruption, she thought of Athens, but forgot the death of Socrates, the exile of Aristides, the condemnation of Phocion.