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Very Young Lady on Her Marriage," he again stresses that "civility and good will . . . with the addition of some degree of sense, can make conversation or any amusement agreeable." But so as not to have anyone imagine that it is only the men who lay down rules for conversation, and possibly that, while seeming to encourage it, they slyly want to hedge it so about with their rules that the sex which is said to talk as naturally as champagne bubbles might have its talk methodized into a mere fizz, I quote the dean of women essayists, Miss Agnes Repplier. In her essay, "The Luxury of Conversation," she insists, "People equipped with reason, sentiment, and a vocabulary should have something to talk about." This strongly underwrites Johnson's insistence on knowledge, command of words, and imagination. However, in "A Question of Politeness," she would appear to make St. Paul's graciousness the keystone of good talk. She says, "For to be civilized is to be incapable of giving unnecessary offense." |
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