Finesse

“ Thus, at length, I got snug into port, where, in the bosom of virtue, I gather'd the only uncorrupt sweets: where, looking back on the course of vice, I had run, and comparing its infamous blandishments with the infinitely superior joys of innocence, I could not help pitying, even in point of taste, those who, immers'd in a gross sensuality, are insensible to the so delicate charms of Virtue, than which even Pleasure has not a greater friend, nor than Vice a greater enemy. ”

“ But she rejoined, ‘Tell me the truth of the case, that I may order my affair; and what wantest thou with the mug of water?’ ‘To give the broker a drink,’ answered he; whereupon she exclaimed, ‘There is no power and no virtue but in God the Most High, the Supreme!’ And repeated the following verses:
O thou that seekest parting, stay thy feet: Let clips and kisses not delude thy spright.
Softly, for fortune’s nature is deceit And parting is the end of love-delight. ”

“ Artificial manners, and such as spring from good taste and refinement, can never be mistaken, and differ as widely as gold and tinsel. How captivating is gentleness of manner derived from true humility, and how faint is every imitation! ”

“ The pleasure of a literature that is yours without being wholly your own, a literature that is like an exquisite mistress, in whom you find consolation for all the commonplaces of life! The comparison is perfect, for although I know these French folk better than all else in the world, they must ever remain my pleasure, and not my work in life. ”

“ A look, a gesture, an attitude, a tone of voice, all bear their parts in the great work of pleasing. The art of pleasing is more particularly necessary in your intended profession than perhaps in any other; it is, in truth, the first half of your business; for if you do not please the court you are sent to, you will be of very little use to the court you are sent from. Please the eyes and the ears, they will introduce you to the heart; and nine times in ten, the heart governs the understanding. ”

“ Every incident, my dears, may afford you some useful lesson, if you accustom yourselves to reflect seriously; and this afternoon has taught you by experience, that the benefit of a good education, the finery of dress, and the distinction of noble connections, are altogether insufficient to engage your love or respect; while the superior charms of good-nature and good sense have in the humble Fanny found means to win your regard. ”

“ The manner in laughter, in tears, in irony, in indignations and enthusiasms, in judgments--and even in love. The manner in which, as in the features and character of a human face, the inner truth is foreshadowed for those who know how to look at their kind. ”

“ Life is made up of trifles, and our greatest happiness often depends upon a word, the glance of an eye, the tone of the voice, or what is more expressive, but more indescribable still, the manner. What a boon, a pleasure, and a blessing are pleasant manners! ”

“ What from virtue floweth, yieldeth dear delight;
All else extern, is void of glory's light.
Only that pleasure which flows from domestic virtue is pleasure; all else is not pleasure, and it is without praise. ”

“ The beautiful simplicity and naïveté of the man’s character, the mean circumstances in which his life was cast, the fortitude, industry, and manliness with which he triumphed over his difficulties—these things explain much that seems at first sight futile in his art and colour even his worst failures with a glow of purely human sympathy. ”

“ If, in all those attentions and eagernesses with which we see you occupied, to manage either the interests of your worldly affairs, or the preservation of a vain beauty, there is not either as much forwardness as may amount to the crime of illegal ambition, or complaisance for yourself, and desire of pleasing, as may sully your heart with the guilt of sensuality? ”

“ As the judgment gains strength, so do the passions also; we have actions to weigh, and need that taste in conduct, that delicate sense of propriety, which gives grace to virtue. The highest branch of solitary amusement is reading ”

“ And excellence alone appears through the beautiful body, and blossoms out in the flesh, exhibiting the amiable comeliness of self-control, whenever the character like a beam of light gleams in the form. ”

“ In short, every tone and glance, not proved, but simply assumed, that virtue was nothing more than--the economus of the stomach, the refectorist of the senses, the officiating priestess and daughter of the body. Love fared like virtue. ”

“ To perfect manly beauty and the most noble air, he united that cheerful temper, that considerate familiarity, which subdues while it seems to flatter,—that attaching grace of manner, which conquers all hearts without an effort, by its mere natural charm. ”

“ When we recount the activity of his life, when we contemplate the dignity of his character and of his course, and how exceptional it has been, what an example it is for us! Should we not be tending upward too and continually so? ”

“ Perhaps no where does a more beautiful treatise of the kind exist. The good sense and wisdom of the thoughts, the delicacy of the feelings, and the charm of the style, are, throughout, equally conspicuous. ”

“ Of the differences of rank in pleasures of sense.differences of dignity may exist between different kinds of æsthetic or sensual pleasure, properly so called.
Now it is evident that the being common to brutes, or peculiar to man, can alone be no rational test of inferiority, or dignity in pleasures. We must not assume that man is the nobler animal, and then deduce the nobleness of his delights; but we must prove the nobleness of the delights, and thence the nobleness of the animal. ”

“ They hold up for imitation all those cardinal virtues of love and self-sacrifice,—which is the ultimate criterion of character,—of courage, loyalty, kindness, gentleness, fairness, pity, endurance, bravery, industry, perseverance, and thrift. ”

“ And in truth, in our common and more vulgar intercourse with life, we must have observed, that where external gentleness of bearing is accompanied by a repute for iron will, determined resolution, and a serious, profound, and all-inquiring intellect, it carries with it a majesty wholly distinct from that charm which is exercised by one whose mildness of nature corresponds with the outward humility ”

“ And hence we may conclude, if there be any dignity, any truth, any beauty, in virtue, there must be a real difference, superior and inferior characteristic power of pleasing in the exterior of the human form. ”

“ The dignity and objects of literature are distinctly brought to view, whether in the form of prose to persuade and instruct—in that of poetry, to please the fancy—or in that of the drama, to move the passions. ”

“ On such occasions I say from my heart, I rejoice, and give thee joy for thy infinite perfections, — that thou art who art, a God supremely powerful, wise, good, merciful, just, &c., the supreme good of the rational creature; that thou needest nothing, for thou art happy enough in thyself, and sufficient for thyself, while all our sufficiency is from thee. ”

“ And by what scale do you measure, so as to form a correct decision—is your standard of your own merit so accurately settled, that you can instantly perceive truth from flattery, appropriating just so much of a compliment as you deserve, and rejecting the rest. ”

“ Lovely indeed is that grace of manner, that perfect ease and refinement which 77 so many attempt to acquire, and for which it is to be feared so much too often is renounced—the native vigour of mind, the blush of indignant and offended integrity, the open candour of truth, and all the long list of modest unassuming virtues, known only to a new and unsullied heart. ”

“ Her devotion to grace, elegance, and physical beauty, had led her also to the adoration of moral beauty; for if the expression of a low and bad passion render uncomely the most beautiful countenances, those which are in themselves the most ugly are ennobled, on the contrary, by the expression of good feelings and generous sentiments. ”

“ Each school, in this dialogue, is allowed to plead its own cause. "Listen" (says the Epicurean) "to the voice of nature that bids you pursue pleasure, and do not be misled by that vulgar conception of pleasure as mere sensual enjoyment; our opponents misrepresent us when they say that we advocate this as the highest good; we hold, on the contrary, that men often obtain the greatest pleasure by neglecting this baser kind. ”

“ But the pleasures of Imagination, as they heighten and refine the very pleasures of Sense, so they are of larger extent, and longer duration. And if the most sensual Man will confess there is a Pleasure in Pleasing, He must likewise allow, there is Good to a Man's Self, in doing Good to others ”

“ He is even able, through some fine choice of words, to convey to us the precise degree and quality of pleasure which they yield him, and which he wins us to share, not by exhortations or reproaches, but gently, with alluring smiles, and hinted promises of reward. ”

“ When any quality, or character, has a tendency to the good of mankind, we are pleas'd with it, and approve of it; because it presents the lively idea of pleasure; which idea affects us by sympathy, and is itself a kind of pleasure. ”

“ Many of you have learnt, I feel sure of it, to feel during these your school days, the satisfaction of living here a true and worthy life; you have tasted of that pleasure which the careless, the indifferent, and the sinful hardly taste at all, the pleasure that dwells with the consciousness of earnest effort and sincere striving after the best things within us. ”

“ It is to be regretted that a character so admirable and amiable in all leading respects as his, so strongly fortified by the cardinal virtues of modesty, veracity, integrity and courage, and so sweetly flavored with all the finer charities of human benevolence and affection, should in some particulars have fallen short of proper standards of conduct. ”

“ In examining this view, we must first make clear the meaning of pleasure. In ordinary speech we talk of pleasures as if they were definite things. We say that a certain man is "a lover of pleasures rather than a lover of God," and we speak of the pleasures of the chase or the pleasures of love or the pleasures of reading. ”

“ Do you call essential qualities, worth, firmness of character, precision of judgment, extent of learning, prudence, discretion, how can I tell the number of virtues which often embarrass you more than they make you happy? ”

“ Moreover in the home circle, where the forms of courtesy are quite indispensable to prevent undue friction; to send the light of grace and poetry into a world of little cares; to fill the atmosphere of our daily surroundings as with the fragrance of a pervading perfume; they are yet most commonly neglected. The word manners has the same meaning as morals. When we shall have better morals, we shall have truer and sweeter manners. ”

“ But again, in order to see this point in its true light we must consider the peculiar rank which is held by the pleasures connected with the fine arts. These pleasures are addressed to the eye and to the ear, and hold a middle rank between the lower pleasures of sense on the one hand, and the higher enjoyments of the intellect and of the affections on the other ”

“ By one of these experiments we find, that an object produces pride merely by the interposition of pleasure; and that because the quality, by which it produces pride, is in reality nothing but the power of producing pleasure. ”

“ But if the hero, by a dexterous compliment, gallant yet not obtrusive, can, first, tell you about the eyes, secondly exhibit to you the effect the eyes are having on him, thirdly, get a step forward in his relations with the lady, and fourthly, aided by her reply to the compliment, show you how she is disposed to receive his advances—the result is that the author has done more and has done it better. ”

“ Those who rate the dignity of human action by other standards than the breadth and conspicuousness of its stage, will not mock us because we find some stuff of romance in the homely circumstance and not always epic passages of this modern episode of school. ”

“ If his muse of kindness halt a little behind the strong lines, in fashion in this excitement-craving age, his prose is the best of the sort in the world, and exhibits a faithful transcript of his own healthy natural mind, and cheerful innocent tone of conversation. ”

“ This superior prudence, when carried to the highest degree of perfection, necessarily supposes the art, the talent, and the habit or disposition of acting with the most perfect propriety in every possible circumstance and situation. ”

“ But always, when put to a mind not merely muddled, for an inevitable answer. 'Why don't you, cher monsieur, give us the drama of virtue?' 'Because, chère madame, the high privilege of virtue is precisely to avoid drama.' The adventures of the honest lady? ”

“ We have constantly to wonder how they analysed and defined the word Virtue, to which they so constantly appealed in letters, conversation, and books, as the sovereign object for our deepest and warmest adoration. ”

“ With equal assurance may one appeal to the universal instinct which is gratified by the adaptation [Pg 87] of ends to means; to the innate human sense of the rightness of what is fitting; the constant pleasure in order, in appropriateness, in harmony. It is this instinct, this sense, this pleasure, which underlies the sensitiveness of the mind to what we call Elegance in composition. ”

“ They bring with them an aptitude for what is highest—they derive the greatest pleasure from what is judicious and true; and if, with these powers of appreciation, they deign to be satisfied with inferior productions, still, if they have once tasted what is excellent, they will in the end insist on having it supplied to them. ”