Essays in Portraiture Defended (1)

POLYSTRATUS This is the lady’s reply: “Lycinus, I have discerned, to be sure, from what you have written that your friendliness and esteem for me is great, for nobody would bestow such high praise if he were not writing in a friendly spirit. But my own attitude, please understand, is this. In general, I do not care for people whose disposition inclines to flattery, but consider such persons deceivers and not at all generous in their natures. Above all, in the matter of compliments, when anyone in praising me employs vulgar and immoderate extravagances I blush and almost stop my ears, and the thing seems to me more like abuse than praise.