ABSTRACT
French revolutionary politician, philosopher, and mathematician Marquis de Condorcet unhesitatingly used the humanness/rights-connection to defend the political rights of everyone despite their religion, color, and sex. The author begins with an analysis of the world of the nunnery and continue by considering questions of humanness, political agency, and the aesthetics of the tableau. The author's overall ambition is to present the workings and implications of the happy community presented onstage. Marie-Joseph Chenier's play opens with an exhibition of a social world gone astray. The small world of the Cambrai convent should be a peaceful sequestered space for religious benevolence but is actually a prison whose false promises hide the truth of moral depravity and inhumanity. In Fenelon the veiled conception of reality is one in which characters are blinded by the influence of pride and religious prejudice whereas unveiled characters see through falsity and immediately recognize kinship and friendship.
