"One can see well that he is high-born," wrote the indulgent Madame de Motteville. "His restlessness and his grimaces show it." But Madame de Motteville was not his only chronicler. Others relished his manners less. A gentleman who had lived in his (Monsieur's) house when Monsieur was very young, saw him again under Mazarin, and finding that despite his age and size he was the same peculiar being that he had been in infancy, the old gentleman turned and ran away. "Well, upon my word," he cried, "if he is not the same deuced scamp as in the days of Richelieu! I shall not salute him."
Monsieur's portraits are not calculated to contradict the impression given by his contemporaries. He is a handsome boy. The long oval face is delicately fine. The eyes are spiritual; and despite its look of self-sufficiency the whole face is infinitely charming. One of the portraits shows a certain shade of sly keenness, but as a whole the face is always indescribably attractive,--and yet as we gaze upon it we are seized by an impulse to follow the example of the old marquis, and run away without saluting. In the portrait the base soul looks out of the handsome face just as it did in life, manifesting its deplorable reality through its mask of natural beauty and intelligence. No one could say that Monsieur was a fool. Retz declared: "M. le Duc d'Orléans had a fine and enlightened mind." It was the general impression that his conversation was admirable; judged by his talk he was a being of a superior order. His manners and his voice were engaging. He was an artist, very fond of pictures and rare and handsome trifles. He was skilful in engraving on metals; he loved literature; he loved to read; he was interested in new ideas and in the march of thought. He knew many curious sciences. He was a cheerful companion, easy-mannered, sprightly, easy of approach, fond of raillery, and full of his jests, but his jests were never ill-natured. Even his enemies were forced to own that he had a good disposition, and that he was naturally kind; and this was the general opinion of the strange being who was a Judas to so many of his most devoted friends.
Had Monsieur possessed but one grain of moral consciousness, and had he been free from an almost inconceivable degree of weakness and of cowardice, he would have made a fine Prince Charming. But his poltroonery and his moral debility stained the whole fabric of his life and made him a lugubrious example of spiritual infirmity. He engaged in all sorts of intrigues because he was too weak to say No, and owing to the same weakness he never honestly fulfilled an engagement.