Page:Montesquieu - The spirit of laws.djvu/34

xxx in respect to each other, there is nothing so timid; this arises from a pride which durst not discover its secret motion, and which from the respect it has for others, lets go its hold in order to recover it again. Christianity gives us the habit of subduing this pride; the world gives us the habit of concealing it. With the few virtues we have what would become of us, if the whole soul was set at liberty, and if we were not attentive to the least words, the least signs, and the least gestures? Now when persons of a respectable character discover passions which the men of the world durst not suffer to appear, these begin to believe themselves better than they really are. This is an evil of very great consequence.

"We men of the world are so frail that we deserve to be treated with the extremest circumspection and address: for when they let us see all the exterior marks of violent passions, what would they have us think of their minds? Can they hope that we, with our ordinary rash way of judging, shall not be tempted to judge? Rh