Page 389 - swanns-way

ral refinement which prevented Swann from associating
himself with the criticisms (too obviously false to be worth
his notice) that Mme. Verdurin levelled at people whom he
knew. As for the vulgar and affected tirades in which the
painter sometimes indulged, the bag-man’s pleasantries
which Cottard used to hazard,—whereas Swann, who liked
both men sincerely, could easily find excuses for these with-
out having either the courage or the hypocrisy to applaud
them, Forcheville, on the other hand, was on an intellectual
level which permitted him to be stupified, amazed by the
invective (without in the least understanding what it all was
about), and to be frankly delighted by the wit. And the very
first dinner at the Verdurins’ at which Forcheville was pres-
ent threw a glaring light upon all the differences between
them, made his qualities start into prominence and precipi-
tated the disgrace of Swann.
There was, at this dinner, besides the usual party, a pro-
fessor from the Sorbonne, one Brichot, who had met M. and
Mme. Verdurin at a watering-place somewhere, and, if his
duties at the university and his other works of scholarship
had not left him with very little time to spare, would gladly
have come to them more often. For he had that curiosity,
that superstitious outlook on life, which, combined with a
certain amount of scepticism with regard to the object of
their studies, earn for men of intelligence, whatever their
profession, for doctors who do not believe in medicine, for
schoolmasters who do not believe in Latin exercises, the
reputation of having broad, brilliant, and indeed superior
minds. He affected, when at Mme. Verdurin’s, to choose his

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