SEVIGNE (Marie de Rabutin, Marquise de), a French lady, celebrated for her wit and her fine sense, was born in 1626, and was not above a year old when her father was killed at the descent of the English upon the Isle of Rhee. In 1644, she married the mar-
quis of Sevigne, who was killed in a duel in 1651. She had by him a son and a daughter; to the care of whose education she afterwards most religiously devoted herself: they became accordingly most accomplished persons, as it was reasonable to expect. This illustrious lady was acquainted with all the wits and learned of her time. It is said she decided the famous dispute between Perrault and Boileau, concerning the preference of the ancients to the moderns, thus: "The ancients are the finest, and we are the 'prettiest.'" She died in 1696, and left us a most valuable collection of letters; the best edition of which is that of Paris 1754, in eight volumes 12mo. "These letters," says Voltaire, "filled with anecdotes, written with freedom, and in a natural and animated style, are an excellent criticism upon studied letters of wit, and still more upon those fictitious letters which aim to imitate the epistolary style, by a recital of false sentiments and feigned adventures to imaginary correspondents." A Sevigniana was published at Paris in 1756; which is nothing more than a collection of literary and historical anecdotes, fine sentiments, and moral aphorisms, scattered throughout these letters.