ABSTRACT

Maurice Daumas insists that in the seventeenth century, “[M]arriage was synonymous with stability.”1 According to the Chevalier de Jaucourt, it was basic to “a civil society, established by nature. This society is the most natural & the most ancient of all. It serves as the foundation of national society, for a people or a nation is nothing but a composition of a number of families.”2 While deep affection was not forbidden, it was of so little importance that when love was mentioned, it usually meant friendship, tenderness, and, in all cases, obligation to the community, whether family, church, or state. Most significantly, marriage was primarily subject to the needs of family, in short, to duty.