OF FRENCH SOCIETY. 63 out regret ; yet meet they must- they were necessary to each other, not for comfort, for theyknew neither the name nor the thing ; but 'society being an article of the first necessity for the sup- port of existence, it must be -had with companions hating, and hated by, each other. Under such circumstances, the fondness for society seems not so much a taste, as a raging appetite. It is, however, a cheerless, heartless association, where persons of talents and breeding meet,. not so much to enjoy each other, as to get rid of themselves. Intimacy without confidence, and inter- course without esteem, add little to the genuine delights of social life. Compe- tition, while it inflames vanity, is no im- prover ofkindness. In a city like Paris, where men were wits and authors by profession, and ladies judges and critics by courtesy, nothing was considered as an exclusion from these societies but want of talents to amuse, or taste to decide. The poet
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