"the French common people, particularly in the major cities, are considered to have infinite wit. I question the epithet. Wit only exists when one is purified by a taste that the people cannot have, this taste itself being the result of certain vices of civilization which are not those of the people. So the people have no wit, from my point of view. They have more than that: they have poetry, they have genius. With them, form is nothing. They don't waste their minds hunting for it; they take it as it comes to them. But their thoughts are full of grandeur and power, because they rest on the principle of eternal justice, disregarded by societies and preserved in their hearts. When this principle sees the light of day, no matter how it is expressed, it startles and strikes like the lightning of divine truth. (chapter 11)"