Court, it is always the place where the sovereign lives; it is composed of princes, princesses, ministers, grandees and principal officers. It is therefore not surprising that it should be the centre of a nation's good breeding. Good breeding exists there because of the equality that the extreme grandeur of one person imposes on those who surround him, and taste is refined there by continuous use of the superfluities of wealth. Among these superfluities, there are necessarily found artificial products of the rarest perfection. Knowledge of this perfection is applied to other, much more important, concerns: it passes into the language, judgements, sentiments, deportment, manners, tone, pleasantries, works of wit, gallantry, accessories and, even, into the customs. I would almost dare to assert that there is no other place where delicacy is better known in all undertakings, more rigorously observed by gentlefolk and more precisely affected by courtiers. The author of the Spirit of the Laws defines the courtly air as the exchange of natural greatness for borrowed greatness. Whatever about this definition, this air, according to him, is the seductive veneer which hides ambition in laziness, baseness in pride, the desire to become wealthy without work, an aversion to truth, flattery, betrayal, perfidy, the failure to keep promises, disdain for the duties of a citizen, fear of virtue in the prince, hope in his weaknesses, and so on, in a word, dishonesty with all its attendants, under an appearance of the truest honesty; the reality of vice always behind the phantom of virtue. Only in the absence of success are actions called by their true name in this country; so that only ineptitude brings remorse. See, Courtier.