specimen.”  A man of heart or of talent, D’Argenson, for example, bore a surname of “simpleton,” because his originality transcended the conventional standard.  “That has no name, there is nothing like it!” embodies the strongest censure.  In conduct as in literature, whatever departs from a certain type is rejected.  The quantity of authorized actions is as great as the number of authorized words.  The same super-refined taste impoverishes the initiatory act as well as the initiatory expression, people acting as they write, according to acquired formulas and within a circumscribed circle.  Under no consideration can the eccentric, the unforeseen, the spontaneous, vivid inspiration be accepted.  Among twenty instances I select the least striking since it merely relates to a simple gesture, and is a measure of other things.  Mademoiselle de — obtains, through family influence, a pension for Marcel, a famous dancing-master, and runs off, delighted, to his domicile to convey him the patent.  Marcel receives it and at once flings it on the floor:  “Mademoiselle, did I teach you to offer an object in that manner?  Pick up that paper and hand it to me as you ought to.”  She picks up the patent and presents it to him with all suitable grace.  “That’s very well, Mademoiselle, I accept it, although your elbow was not quite sufficiently rounded, and I thank you."[3] So many graces end in becoming tiresome; after having eaten rich food for years, a little milk and dry bread becomes welcome.

Among all these social flavorings one is especially abused; one which, unremittingly employed, communicates to all dishes its frigid and piquant relish, I mean insincerity (badinage).  Society does not tolerate passion, and in this it exercises its right.  One does not enter company to be either vehement or somber; a strained air or one of concentration would appear inconsistent.  The mistress of a house is always right in reminding a man that his emotional constraint brings on silence.  “Monsieur Such-a-one, you are not amiable to day.”  To be always amiable is, accordingly, an obligation, and, through this training, a sensibility that is diffused through innumerable little channels never produces a broad current.  “One has a hundred friends, and out of these hundred friends two or three may have some chagrin every day; but one could not award them sympathy for any length of time as, in that event, one would be wanting in consideration for the remaining ninety-seven;"[4] one might sigh for an instant with some one of the ninety-seven, and that would be all.  Madame du Deffant, having lost her oldest friend, the President Hénault, that very day goes to sup in a large assemblage:  “Alas,” she exclaimed, “he died at six o’clock this evening; otherwise you would not see me here.”  Under this constant régime of distractions and diversions there are no longer any profound sentiments; we have nothing but an epidermic exterior; love itself is reduced to “the exchange of two fantasies.”