Quotation from: Villette

Written by: Charlotte Bronte

"Puritaine! I doubt it not. Yet see how my Jesuit's system works. You
know the St. Pierre?"

"Partially."

He laughed. "You say right--_'partially'_; whereas _I_ know
her _thoroughly_; there is the difference. She played before me
the amiable; offered me patte de velours; caressed, flattered, fawned
on me. Now, I am accessible to a woman's flattery--accessible against
my reason. Though never pretty, she was--when I first knew her--young,
or knew how to look young. Like all her countrywomen, she had the art
of dressing--she had a certain cool, easy, social assurance, which
spared me the pain of embarrassment--"