(28.) There are some women past their prime, who, on account of their constitution or bad disposition, are naturally the resource of young men not possessing sufficient wealth. I do not know who is more to be pitied, either a woman in years who needs a young man, or a young man who needs an old woman.[160] (29.) A man who is looked upon with contempt at court, is received amongst fashionable people[161] in the city, where he triumphs over a magistrate in all his finery,[162] as well as over a citizen wearing a sword; he beats them all out of the field and becomes master of the situation; he is treated with consideration and is beloved; there is no resisting for long a man wearing a gold-embroidered scarf[163] and white plumes; a man who talks to the king and visits the ministers. He kindles jealousy amongst men as well as amongst women; he is admired and envied; but in Versailles, four leagues from Paris, he is despised.[164] (30.) A citizen is to a woman who has never left her native province what a courtier is to a woman born and bred in town. (31.) A man who is vain, indiscreet, a great talker and a mischievous wag, who speaks arrogantly of himself and contemptuously of others, who is boisterous, haughty, forward, without morality, honesty, or common-sense, and who draws for facts on his imagination, wants nothing else, to be adored by many women, but handsome features and a good shape. (32.) Is it for the sake of secrecy, or from some eccentricity, that a certain lady loves her footman and Dorinna her physician?[165]