Undoubtedly the most disgraceful act of this all-powerful woman was the maintaining of a house of pleasure for the king, to which establishment she allured some of the most beautiful girls of the nobility, as well as of the _bourgeoisie_. These young women supposed that they were being supported by a wealthy nobleman; their children were given a pension of from three thousand to twelve thousand livres, and the mother received one hundred thousand francs and was sent to the provinces to marry; a father and mother were easily bought for the child. Thus was this clandestine trade carried on by those two--the king satisfying his utter depravity, and Mme. de Pompadour making herself all the more secure against a possible rival.
All this time her active brain was ever planning for higher honors and greater power. She aspired to becoming _dame de palais_, but as an excommunicated soul, a woman living in flagrant violation of the laws of morality and separated from her husband, she could not receive absolution from the Church, in spite of her intriguing to that effect. She did succeed, however, in influencing the king to make her lady of honor to the queen; therefore, in gorgeous robes, she was ever afterward present at all court functions.
She began to patronize the great men of the day, to make of them her debtors, pension them, lodge them in the Palais d'Etat, secure them from prison, and to place them in the Academy. Voltaire became her favorite, and she made of him an Academician, historiographer of France, ordinary gentleman of the chamber, with permission to sell his charge and to retain the title and privileges. For these favors he thanked her in the following poem:
"Ainsi donc vous réunissez Tous les arts, tous les goûts, tous les talents de plaire; Pompadour vous embellissez La Cour, le Parnasse et Cythère, Charme de tous les coeurs, trésor d'un seul mortel, Qu'un sort si beau soit éternel!"
[Thus you unite all the arts, all the tastes, all the talents, of pleasing; Pompadour, you embellish the court, Parnassus, and Cythera. Charm of all hearts, treasure of one mortal, may a lot so beautiful be eternal!]
Voltaire dedicated his _Tancrède_ to her; in fact, his influence and favor were so great that he was about to receive an invitation to the _petits soupers_ of the king, when the nobility rose up in arms against him, and, as Louis XV. disliked him, the coveted honor was never attained. To Crébillon, who had given her elocution lessons in her early days and who was now in want, she gave a pension of a hundred louis and quarters at the Louvre. Buffon, Montesquieu, Marmontel, and many other men of note were taken under her protection.