The aim is something like Castiglione’s ideal of casual poise, but it is not done mainly with the intention of showing off one’s own cool. The aim is, rather, to make life nicer for others. It is a method for not separating oneself from the world, like those awkward Sorbonne teachers or bad-tempered monks. It means knowing how to put companions at ease and to take your place in a generally pleasant society, living with humanity in every sense. It even makes you human. “Manners maketh man,” as the motto of Winchester College and New College, Oxford, still maintains—a line dating from a couple
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