Dangerous Liaisons Religion

In Choderlos de Laclos epistolary novel, Dangerous Liaisons, there are several prominent themes that reoccur throughout the novel, two being seduction and manipulation. While those themes play a large role, one theme that has significant influence in character development is religion. The relationship between the Vicomte de Valmont and the Présidente de Tourvel develops throughout the novel based upon the evolving importance that religion and faith have in the decision making of the two characters.

One of the main plot lines in this novel is based upon a bet between the Vicomte de Valmont and the Marquise de Merteuil; in short, Valmont wagers that if he is able to seduce the very religious woman, Tourvel, Merteuil will agree to be with him again when he visits Paris. Valmont being both a womanizer and promiscuous takes on this bet and begins his manipulation of Tourvel. At this initial stage, it is important to take into account the values of both

Valmont and Tourvel. Valmont can be seen as one who does not truly believe in love and is in it for that game, as well as having no religious convictions at all. On the other hand, Tourvel is a very conservative and religious woman whose sole focus is on her faith and duty to God. She is often praying and her own letters are full of religious imagery.
In the first exchange of letters between the two (22-26), Valmont frightens Tourvel with his sudden expression of “love” for her. She immediately goes to pray, “[…] and I beheld this adorable woman bathed in tears, on her knees, praying most fervently. What deity dared she invoke? Is there one so powerful as the god of love?” (Letter XXIII). Valmont highlights the fact that he does not believe in either God or love; this makes him seem pretentious because he thinks that there is nothing that can stop him from his ultimate goal of seducing Tourvel. Later, he goes on to apologize to her for his sudden and inappropriate proclamation of love for her. Valmont is a very intelligent and manipulative man though, so when he writes to Tourvel, he states exactly what she would want to hear if she were to forgive him: “I will not deceive you; it will be impossible for you to conquer my love, but you may teach me how to regulate it: by guiding my steps, by prescribing to me my conversation […]” (Letter XXIV). This implies that he is willing to take a step back and respect her wishes and even be willing to learn more about her faith, which Valmont realizes is the only way that he may have any chance to win her heart. He uses a religious tone of argument to convince Tourvel that she should not brush him off to the side, and this is enough to let herself continue to be seduced by him.
In letters forty-one and forty-two, the reader can detect an important tone that is being set by Valmont in his pursuit to seduce Tourvel. The voice that he portrays when writing her in this letter will cause her to be convicted by how she responds to him. Again, Valmont is only writing exactly what she wants to hear from him, so this far, Tourvel is the only one who has begun to have any change in character because she is the one being manipulated. In this particular exchange of letters, Valmont plays the victim by accusing Tourvel of not listening to his prayers or dismissing him because of his wrongdoings: “You banish me on the same principle that people turn their eyes from the miserable wretches they do not choose to relieve” (Letter XLII). By doing this, Tourvel may begin to think of herself as a less Godly woman, which is exactly what Valmont is aiming to do in order to get inside of her head. In response to Valmont’s guilt filled letter, Tourvel does exactly as he predicted: she tries to disprove the accusations thus making them valid to begin with, thus falling into his trap.
The next series of letters show to be a lull in Valmont’s advances as Tourvel promised that she would no longer respond to his letters.

She emphasizes her happiness in her current life and she does not want to mess it up for an uncertain love-affair. Tourvel writes, “Beloved and esteemed by a husband, who I love and respect, my duty and pleasure are united in the same object; I am happy; I ought be so. If there are more lively pleasures existing, I wish them not; I will not be acquainted with them” (Letter LVI). In this letter, Tourvel seems to have realized Valmont’s true intentions, and chooses her faith and husband at this specific time over Valmont. It seems that Tourvel has not strayed as far from her religion as Valmont had wished and Valmont has not yet proven his change of heart and commitment to religion in a manner that Tourvel believes that he is truly trying to grow in his “faith.” Valmont responds to her silence by stating that he cannot transfer his love for her to friendship as she implied in her

letter.
Though not directed at each other, the reader learns that Valmont’s persistence in writing Tourvel has not been in vain, she writes to another character that she needed to leave the house she was staying at because she was falling in love with Valmont and it wasn’t fair for her husband for her to stay and either emotionally or physically be unfaithful to him. She states, “[…] I was flattered with the hope that absence would increase my strength and resolution. How fatally am I deceived! […] I am ashamed of my sentiments, but not of him who caused them” (Letter CVIII). This confirms two things: one being that she has begun to stray from her faith and devotion to both God and her husband to the point where she questions her own ability to resist Valmont’s charm, and two, Valmont has somehow made Tourvel believe that he has been changing his heart and trying to become religious for her and that he is not in it just because he sees love as being a game to be won.
With the pressure rising from Merteuil to seduce Tourvel, Valmont reaches out to Father Anselme in a last ditch effort to win over Tourvel by asking the priest to tell Tourvel that he has recently confessed and renounced all of his sins. His letter states, “Therefore I request, Sir, you will be so good to inform her of my new resolves, and ask in my name, a particular interview, where I may in some measure repair the injuries I have been guilty of by my apologies […]” (Letter CXX). Along with this letter, and the ones included in it for Tourvel, Valmont comes up with a plan to make her consent to his “love” or she will be convicted of condemning him to either death or eternal damnation. This is the ultimate trail of her faith, in which high stakes are on the line. She must decide whether it is more important to save herself from the sinful act of adultery or sacrifice her beliefs to save Valmont from suicide. In this confusing time for Tourvel, she too easily confuses her Christian virtues and duties to God with what she owes the man who as been perusing her so diligently. These letters provide some of the pivotal moments where the importance of religious conviction switches from Tourvel to Valmont. Valmont is drawn towards religion in order to pursue her while Tourvel strays from religion as Valmont leads her closer to a sinful act.
Valmont finally gets what he was so determined to gain: the right of entry into Tourvel house through the use of the priest, which is ironic in its own way, and seducing her. Even after convincing her that he is a changed man by confessing to the priest, it is evident that that is entirely false when he goes on to express his victory to Merteuil shortly after it occurred, “At last this haughty woman is conquered, who dared think she could resist me. –She is mine–totally mine. –She has nothing left to grant since yesterday” (Letter CXXV). The importance of religion to Tourvel has evolved much more drastically than with Valmont, in which she went from being a strictly religious woman to falling into temptation and committing adultery. She is now entirely at the will of Valmont and expresses that he now rules her life because of her love for him and his ability to play her like a puppet. Her acceptance of no longer being a Godly woman and she is both disappointed in her own behavior but also utterly happy because she is in love with the man who led her to sin.
The importance that these two character place on religion changes throughout the novel and is most significantly seen in Tourvel. Valmont only placed importance on religion and confessed to the priest on the surface, while deep down he was just being the same manipulative womanizer that he was at the beginning of the novel and his success with seducing Tourvel was seen as another trophy to stash away in his collection. Tourvel, on the other hand, was manipulated and blindly led into Valmont’s trap. She is seen as being a highly religious and faithful woman to attempting to separate herself from the situation to finally completely straying away from everything that she believed in and placing more emphasis on her duty to Valmont than her duty to God. She expresses her grief in a letter to a close friend after she realizes that she was played by Valmont and that he was never truly in love with her, “I am dying because I did not believe you” (Letter CXLVII). In the end, Valmont was hardly affected by the fact that destroyed a woman’s life with his lies and deception. Tourvel’s complete loss of faith and religion and the weight of her sins makes her no longer want to live.