It is curious to see La Rochefoucauld’s nervous anxiety about presenting himself before the public as an author; far from rushing into print, he stole into it, and felt his way by asking private opinions. Through Madame de Sablé he sent manuscript copies to various persons of taste and talent, both men and women, and many of the written opinions which she received in reply are still in existence. The women generally find the maxims distasteful, but the men write approvingly. These men, however, are for the most part ecclesiastics who decry human nature that they may exalt divine grace. The coincidence between Augustinianism or Calvinism, with its doctrine of human corruption, and the hard cynicism of the maxims, presents itself in quite a piquant form in some of the laudatory opinions of La Rochefoucauld. One writer says: – ‘On ne pourroit faire une instruction plus propre à un catéchumène pour convertir à Dieu son esprit et sa volonté … Quand il n’y auroit que cet escrit au monde et l’Evangile je voudrois être chrétien. L’un m’apprendroit à connoistre mes misères, et l’autre à implorer mon libérateur.’ Madame de Maintenon sends word to La Rochefoucauld, after the publication of his work, that the Book of Job and the Maximes are her only reading!