I met with more courage in dealing with the king.

Young and virtuous, he could and would hear all.

The queen, too, lent me a favorable ear, but, all around their Majesties, in court and city, to how much enmity and hatred did I not expose myself?
There were all kinds of influence and power which I had to oppose with firmness; there were all sorts of interested factions with which I had to fight in this perpetual struggle." "Alas!" Madame Necker would say, "my heart and my regrets are ever yearning for a world in which beneficence should be the first of virtues.
What reflections do I not make on our own particular case! I thought to see a golden age under so pure an administration; I see only an age of iron.

All resolves itself into doing as little harm as possible." 0 the grievous bitterness of past illusions! Madame Necker consoled herself for the enmity of the court and for the impotence of that beneficence which had been her dream by undertaking on her own account a difficult reform, that of the hospitals of Paris, scenes, as yet, of an almost savage disorderliness.

The sight of sick, dead, and dying huddled together in the same bed had excited the horror and the pity of Madame Necker.