Corneille was old, and Paris looked to Racine to supply his place, yet
he left the theatrical world for ever. Racine had been brought up with
deep religious convictions; they could not, however, preserve him from a
mad, unlawful attachment. He loved the actress Champmesle: but
repentance came. He resolved not only to write no more plays, but to do
penance for those already given to the world. He was on the eve of
becoming, in his penitence, a Carthusian friar, when his religious
director advised marriage instead. He humbly did as he was told, and
united himself to the daughter of a treasurer for France, of Amiens, by
whom he had seven children. It was only at the request of Madame de
Maintenon that he wrote 'Esther' for the convent of St. Cyr, where it
was first acted.
His death was the result of his benevolent, sensitive nature. Having
drawn up an excellent paper on the miseries of the people, he gave it to
Madame de Maintenon to read it to the king. Louis, in a transport of
ill-humour, said, 'What! does he suppose because he is a poet that he
ought to be minister of state?' Racine is said to have been so wounded
by this speech that he was attacked by a fever and died.
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