CHRISTINE DE PISAN 



Pensee" her fame went forth, and princes 

 sought, by tempting offers, to attach her to 

 their courts, but without success. Of these, 

 Henry the Fourth of England, already acquainted 

 with her poems, and Gian Galleazo Visconti, 

 Duke of Milan, were the most importunate, and 

 particularly the former, who was unaccustomed 

 to rebuff and failure. But Christine, with 

 repeated gracious thanks and guarded refusals, 

 remained firm. No reason for her decision is 

 recorded, but it may well be believed that her 

 patriotism would not allow her, even with the 

 certainty of ease and emolument, to quit France 

 at that critical time, or to serve the enemy of 

 her adopted country. 



Although Christine's reading was very varied 

 and extensive, there were two subjects the 

 amelioration of her war-distraught country, then 

 in the throes of the Hundred Years' War, and 

 the championship of the cause of womankind 

 which specially appealed to her as a patriot 

 and a woman, and for which she strove with 

 unceasing ardour. In all her writings she so 

 interweaves these two causes that it is only by 

 approaching them in the same way that we can 

 understand her view of their psychological unity. 

 To Christine these interests were essentially 

 identical, for she recognised how paramount is 

 woman's influence in the making or marring of 

 the world how, in truth, in woman's hand lies 

 a key which can unlock a Heaven or a Hell. 



There was sore need of a patriot, and in 



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