Shall we then
be able to refuse our particular veneration to those characters of high
rank here, who add the charm of a cultivated mind to that situation
which, united even with ignorance, would ensure them respect? When
scholarship is found among the great in Italy, it has the additional
merit of having grown up in their own bosoms, without encouragement from
emulation, or the least interested motive. His companions do not think
much the more of him--for _that_ kind of superiority. I suppose, says a
friend of his, he must be fond of study; for _chi pensa di una maniera,
chi pensa d' un altra, per me sono stato sempre ignorantissimo_[I].
[Footnote I: One man is of one mind, another of another: I was always a
sheer dunce for my own part.]
These voluntary confessions of many a quality, which, whether possessed
or not by English people, would certainly never be avowed, spring from
that native sincerity I have been praising--for though family
connections are prized so highly here, no man seems ashamed that he has
no family to boast: all feigning would indeed be useless and
impracticable; yet it struck me with astonishment too, to hear a
well-bred clergyman who visits at many genteel houses, say gravely to
his friend, no longer ago than yesterday--that friend a man too eminent
both for talents and fortune--"Yes, there is a grand invitation at such
a place to-night, but I don't go, because _I am not a gentleman--perche
non sono cavaliere_; and the master desired I would let you know that
_it was for no other reason_ that you had not a card too, my good
friend; for it is an invitation of none but _people of fashion you
see_.
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