I do not know whether it ought to be so, but certainly silly things do cease to be silly if they are done by sensible people in an impudent way.  Wickedness is always wickedness, but folly is not always folly.

“A general silence prevailed--A silence, which was by nothing interrupted but by…”

“You are a good girl, and I have great pleasure in thinking you will be so happi…”

“I am going to take a heroine whom no one but myself will much like”

“—There will be nothing singular in his case; and it is singularity which often …”