(33.) It is the business of a newsmonger to inform us when any book is published; if it is printed by Cramoisy,[67] and with what type; if it is well bound, and on what paper, and at what price it is sold; he ought even to know what the booksellerʼs sign is; but it is foolish in him to pretend to criticise it. The highest point a newsmonger can reach is to reason in a vague manner on politics. A newsmonger lies down at night quietly, after having received some information, but it is spoiled overnight, and he is obliged to throw it away when he wakes in the morning.[68] (34.) A philosopher[69] wastes his life in observing men, and wears himself out in exposing vice and folly. If he shapes his thoughts into words, it is not so much from his vanity as an author as to place entirely in its proper light some truth he has discovered, that it may make the desired impression. Yet some readers think they repay him with interest if they say, with a magisterial air, “that they have read his book, and that there is some sense in it;” but he does not mind their praise, for he has not laboured and passed many sleepless nights to obtain it: he has higher aims, and acts from nobler motives: he demands from mankind greater and more uncommon results than empty praise, and even than rewards; he expects them to lead better lives. (35.) A fool reads a book and does not understand it; a man of ordinary mind reads it and fancies he perfectly understands it; a man of intelligence sometimes does not wholly understand it; he perceives what is really obscure and what is really clear, whilst witlings[70] imagine those passages obscure which are not so, and think they do not understand what is really intelligible. (36.) In vain an author endeavours to obtain admiration by his works. A fool may sometimes admire him, but then he is only a fool; an intelligent man has within him the germs of all truth and of all sentiments; nothing is new to him; he admires few things, but he finds that many things deserve some praise.