quotations about manners
Bad manners are the fruits of a coarse nature and unwise training.
CLARA JESSUP MOORE
Sensible Etiquette of the Best Society
Many a worthy man sacrifices his peace to formalities of compliments and good manners.
L'ESTRANGE
attributed, Day's Collacon
You only had to choose which me to talk to, for, you know, we all change our manners, depending on who has come to chat.
CATHERYNNE M. VALENTE
The Girl Who Fell Beneath Fairyland and Led the Revels There
Good manners do more for a man that good looks.
EDGAR WATSON HOWE
Country Town Sayings
Suit your manner to the man.
TERENCE
Adelphi
Call a jack a jack. Call a spade a spade. But always call a whore a lady. Their lives are hard enough, and it never hurts to be polite.
PATRICK ROTHFUSS
The Name of the Wind
A robot could be programmed to show good manners. A pleasant demeanor can disguise evil, courtesy can be a window of opportunism, gracious conduct may conceal disdain.
JASON W. BROWN
Process and the Authentic Life
Manners are tell-tales of men.
THEODORE TILTON
Sanctum Sanctorum
Perhaps instead of teaching manners, parents should teach the statistical probability that the person you are speaking to is just as good as you are.
BERTRAND RUSSELL
Mortals and Others
Lack of manners is the sign of a hero.
JEAN COCTEAU
Opium
All Politeness is owing to Liberty. We polish one another, and rub off our Corners and rough Sides by a sort of amicable Collision. To restrain this, is inevitably to bring a Rust upon Mens Understandings.
ANTHONY ASHLEY-COOPER
"Sensus Communis", Characteristicks of Men, Manners, Opinions, Times
A man's own manner and character is what best becomes him.
CICERO
attributed, Day's Collacon
Fine manners are the mantle of fair minds.
AMOS BRONSON ALCOTT
Tablets
Good men ought to let the world see that their manners are more firm than an oath.
SOCRATES
attributed, Day's Collacon
What once were vices, are now the manners of the day.
SENECA THE YOUNGER
Epistolae Ad Lucilium
Nothing, except what flows from the heart, can render even external manners truly pleasing.
HUGH BLAIR
Sermons
And now, gentlemen, like your manners, I must leave you.
DYLAN THOMAS
Rebecca's Daughters
Good manners are made up of petty sacrifices.
RALPH WALDO EMERSON
Letters and Social Aims
Good manners is the art of making those people easy with whom we converse; whoever makes the fewest persons uneasy is the best bred man in company.
JONATHAN SWIFT
A Treatise on Good Manners and Good Breeding
Manners are primarily codes by which we express relationships, particularly status, and are thus contingent upon power. There is nothing absolute about manners: doing or not doing something does not mean it is good or bad manners, but depends upon the people and the context.
DAVID TRIPP
Critical Incidents in Teaching: Developing Professional Judgement