the faculties
which go to make up moral equilibrium.

"This quality," said the philosopher, "is obscure and intangible, like
the air we breathe.

"Like the air we breathe, it is necessary to our existence, it surrounds
us, envelops us, and is indispensable to the harmony of our mental life.

"To acquire this precious gift, many conditions are obligatory, the
principle ones being:

"Sincerity of perception.

"Art of the situation.

"Attention.

"Approximation.

"Experience.

"Comparison.

"Analysis.

"Synthesis.

"Destination.

"Direction.

"And lastly the putting of the question.

"It is very clear that without exactness of perception we could not
pretend to judge justly; it would then be impossible for us to hear the
voice of common sense, if we did not strive to develop it.

"Perception is usually combined with what they call in philosophical
language adaptation.

"Otherwise it is difficult, when recognizing a sensation, not to
attribute it at once to the sentiment which animated it at the time of
its manifestation.

"The first condition, then, in the acquiring of common sense is to
maintain perfection in all its pristine exactness, by abstracting the
contingencies which could influence us.

"If we do not endeavor to separate from our true selves the suggestions
of sense-consciousness, we shall reach the point where perception is
transformed into conception, that is to say, we shall no longer obtain
reality alone, but a modified reality.

"With regard to perception, if we understand its truthfulness; it will be
a question for reawakening it, of placing ourselves mentally in the
environment where it was produced, and of awakening the memory, so as to
be able to distinguish, without mistake, the limits within which it is
narrowly confined.

"The art of situation consists in reproducing, mentally, past facts,
allowing for the influence of the surroundings at that time, as compared
with the present environment.

"One must not fail to think about the influences to which one has been
subjected since this time.

"It is possible that life during its development in the aspirant to
common sense may have changed the direction of his first conceptions
either by conversation or by reading or by the reproduction of divers
narrations.

"It would then be a lack of common sense to base an exact recollection of
former incidents on the recent state of being of the soul, without
seeking to reproduce