Parisian wit, which in some quarters is regarded as the very type and ideal of French wit, is in some respects no more than an epitome of its defects; among the working classes it consists in chaff, what they call _blague_; among the upper classes it consists in a superficial varnish, an inability to fix the mind on a logical succession of ideas. In the salon frivolity is a convention, it has positively attained the height of being good manners. My attention was attracted a minute ago by a fly buzzing about my window, its transparent wings described curve after curve on the luminous surface that arrested its flight. Its graceful and futile progress reminded me of the conversation of a lady to whom I had just been listening in the salon, and who for an hour had described a series of scarcely larger circles, upon the surfaces of everything, and beneath the surface of nothing. The whole world of Parisian frivolity was typefied by the shimmering flight of the fly on the window-pane, ignorant of the open air, playing with stray rays of the great sun toward which it was unable to mount. [Sidenote: True inwardness.] But must one be serious to the point of ennui? Certainly not, it is not necessary. It does not belong to our temperament. Let us recognize, however, that to be enduring of ennui is a great power; it is the secret of slow, patient, painstaking labour, which spares no detail, which guarantees solidity in the foundations and remote and hidden elements of knowledge; it is the secret of the superiority of men of northern race over men of southern. In the south, owing to an impatience of what is tedious, there is manifested an inability to stick to one thing, to follow one pursuit, to venture into the darkness beyond where the light stops. Tasks pursued with obstinacy in the certitude of an ultimate success, indefatigable labour at the desk, reading understood as the absolute appropriation of every word and thought between the covers of the book in hand, are unknown to those superficial intelligences which are quick to take a birds-eye view of a subject in its entirety, but are impatient of details and of course among others of essential details. There are races of men who are incapable of anything exacting more attention than “skimming”; they skim their books, they skim the world, they turn the leaves of life. Neither true art nor true science is within their reach. “Live inwardly,” says the “Imitation.” It is an ideal which Frenchmen, who are particularly inclined to lose themselves in external details, might well pursue. But true inwardness does not necessarily consist in sterile meditation on a dogma. “Live inwardly” should signify, be serious, be yourself, be original, independent, and free; bestir your own powers of thought, take a pleasure in developing them and yourself; bloom inwardly like certain plants which lock up within themselves their pollen, their perfume, their beauty; but give out your fruit. The