Page:Path of Vision; pocket essays of East and West.djvu/189

 intellectual attainments and her brilliancy of mind, were not devoid of a certain quality of respect, secret or expressed. And that is because he was, though obviously incurious, unquestionably sincere. The Parisian, on the other hand, though his curiosity was engaging, animating,—though he delighted in the banquet she spread before him of her intellectual charms and was lavish in his adulation,—could not but betray the insincerity that wore for its secret purpose the mask of culture. Even with the occidentals, curiosity may be complex in its origin and significance. It is the instigator of all shades of moods and manners. For whether direct or artful, it may be innate or acquired or assumed. And it may be actuated by self-interest, by pride, and sometimes by snobbery. In the first, one wishes to know and to profit by the knowledge; in the second, one seeks knowledge only to know what others ignore; while in the third, the curious one is but the slave of fashion. There is still another phase to this