The misanthrope of Shakespeare and Molière is a passionate savage; the misanthrope who has just kissed his hand to you is a polished gentleman. No disgust of humanity will ever make _him_ fly the world. From his club-window in St James’s his smile falls on all passers-by with equal suavity and equal scorn. It may be said by verbal critics that I employ the word misanthrope incorrectly—that, according to strict interpretation, a misanthrope means not a despiser but a hater of men, and that this elegant gentleman is not, by my own showing, warmblooded enough for hate. True, but contempt so serene and immovable is the philosophy of hate—the intellectual consummation of misanthropy. My hero would have listened with approving nod to all that Timon or Alceste could have thundered forth in detestation of his kind, and blandly rejoined, “Your truisms, _mon cher_, are as evident as that two and two make four. But you can calculate on the principle that two and two make four without shouting forth, as if you proclaimed a notable discovery, what every one you meet knows as well as yourself. Men are scoundrels—two and two make four—reckon accordingly, and don’t lose your temper in keeping your accounts.” My misanthrope _à la mode_ never rails at vice; he takes it for granted as the elementary principle in the commerce of life. As for virtue, he regards it as a professor of science regards witchcraft. No doubt there are many plausible stories, very creditably attested, that vouch for its existence, but the thing is not in nature. Easier to believe in a cunning imposture than an impossible fact. It is the depth and completeness of his contempt for the world that makes him take the world so pleasantly. He is deemed the man of the world _par excellence_, and the World caresses and admires its Man. The finest gentleman of my young day, who never said to you an unkind thing nor of you a kind one—whose slightest smile was a seductive fascination—whose loudest tone was a flute-like melody—had the sweetest way possible of insinuating his scorn of the human race. The urbanity of his manners made him a pleasant acquaintance—the extent of his reading an accomplished companion. No one was more versed in those classes of literature in which Mephistopheles might have sought polite authorities in favour of his demoniacal views of philosophy. He was at home in the correspondence between cardinals and debauchees in the time of Leo X. He might have taken high honours in an examination on the memoirs illustrating the life of French _salons_ in the _ancien régime_. He knew the age of Louis Quinze so well that to hear him you might suppose he was just fresh from a _petit souper_ in the _Parc aux Cerfs_.