460 On Learning and the Arts. 
embrace her in sincerity; the designing and bad 
have no access but in her name, and their hy7 
pocrisy is so ‘far from being to her dishonour, 
that itis the homage which even. vice finds itself 
obliged to render to her excellence and worth,— 
But to quit the poetic stile, which is not natural 
to me, the truth assuredly is, that politeness has 
not in her contemplation to furnish a language 
for the insincere and dishonest ; her intention is 
in the less important and ordinary intercourses 
of human beings, which singly seem of small 
worth, but altogether make up the sum and mass 
of social enjoyment, to intermix those little 
sweet courtesies, which give a grace, a charm, an 
acceptableness to every thing. She is therefore 
of the family of good-will and benevolence, and 
he who cannot separate her genuine character 
and spirit, from the abuses which have attached 
themselves to her, deserves not the name of a 
philosopher, and hardly the name of a man. These 
abuses however, like most incidental evils, have 
provided their own correction, The ordinary 
forms and language of politeness have their ap- 
preciated value; they pass for no more than they 
are worth; while the higher value of the heart, 
of which politeness was designed to be the agrees 
able expression, is estimated by more accurate 
and certain tests. 
I may add to what I have already observed in 
