ed up with those who in all ages are considered as the
scum of the people.

"Politeness, in monarchies, is naturalized at court. One man excessively
great renders everybody else little. Hence that regard which is paid to
our fellow-subjects; hence that politeness, equally pleasing to those by
whom, as to those toward whom, it is practiced; because it gives people
to understand that a person actually belongs, or at least deserves to
belong, to the court.

"A court air consists in quitting a real for a borrowed greatness. The
latter pleases the courtier more than the former. It inspires him with a
certain disdainful modesty, which shows itself externally, but whose
pride insensibly diminishes in proportion to his distance from the source
of this greatness.

"At court we find a delicacy of taste in everything; a delicacy arising
from the constant use of the superfluities of life; from the variety, and
especially the satiety of pleasures; from the multiplicity and even
confusion of fancies, which, if they are not agreeable, are sure of being
well received.

"These are the things which properly fall within the province of
education, in order to form what we call a man of honor, a man possessed
of all the qualities and virtues requisite in this kind of government.

"Here it is that honor interferes with everything, mixing even with
people's manner of thinking, and directing their very principles.

"To this whimsical honor it is owing that the virtues are only just what
it pleases; it adds rules of its own invention to everything prescribed
to us; it extends or limits our duties according to its own fancy,
whether they proceed from religion, politics, or morality.

"There is nothing so strongly inculcated in monarchies, by the laws, by
religion, and honor, as submission to the Prince's will, but this very
honor tells us, that the Prince never ought to command a dishonorable
action, because this would render us incapable of serving him.

"Crillon refused to assassinate the Duke of Guise, but offered to fight
him. After the massacre of St. Bartholomew, Charles IX., having sent
orders to the governors in the several provinces for the Huguenots to be
murdered, Viscount Dorte, who commanded at Bayonne, wrote thus to the
King: 'Sire, Among the inhabitants of this town, and your Majesty's
troops, I could not find so much as one executioner; they are honest
citizens and brave soldiers. We jointly, therefore, beseech your Majes