Page:Letters, sentences and maxims.djvu/312

 ministers, when it is very necessary, de payer de sa personne, et d'être bien planté, with your feet not too near nor too distant from each other. More people stand and walk, than sit genteelly. Awkward, ill-bred people, being ashamed, commonly sit up bolt upright and stiff; others, too negligent and easy, se vautrent dans leur fauteuil, which is ungraceful and ill-bred, unless where the familiarity is extreme. [June 10, 1751.]

—I know a man, and so do you, who, without a grain of merit, knowledge, or talents, has raised himself millions of degrees above his level, simply by a good air and engaging manners; insomuch that the very prince, who raised him so high, calls him, mon aimable vaurien : but of this do not open your lips, pour cause. I give you this secret, as the strongest proof imaginable, of the efficacy of air, address, ''tournure, et tous ces petits riens''. [Same date.]

—Les bienséances are a most necessary part of the knowledge of the world. They consist in the relations of persons, things, time, and place; good-sense points them out, good company