Quote

The more skillful the performance of false cheer, the more pleasing the effect is upon one's public and on that private audience to whom one owes even more.

Judith Martin

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Judith Martin
Age: 86
Born: 1938
Born: September 13
Economist
Journalist
Washington
District of Columbia
Upon
Performance
Even
False
Performances
Effect
Owes
Private
Skillful
Effects
Pleasing
Public
Deception
Audience
Cheer

More quotes by Judith Martin

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Honesty has come to mean the privilege of insulting you to your face without expecting redress.
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I have always believed that the key to a happy marriage was the ability to say with a straight face, 'Why, I don't know what you're worrying about. I thought you were very funny last night and I'm sure everybody else did, too.
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Washington knows that it is not safe to kick people who are down until you find out what their next stop will be.
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Hypocrisy is not generally a social sin, but a virtue.
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It's far more impressive when others discover your good qualities without your help.
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The pejorative term political correctness was adapted to express disapproval of the enlargement of etiquette to cover all people, in spite of this being a principle to which all Americans claim to subscribe.
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Meanwhile, the empty forms of social behavior survive inappropriately in business situations. We all know that when a business sends its customers 'friendly reminders,' it really means business.
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The way one was brought up isn't an excuse for rude behavior.
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Parents should conduct their arguments in quiet, respectful tones, but in a foreign language. You'd be surprised what an inducement that is to the education of children.
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Nowadays people consider it a disgrace to admit that they are not stressed.
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Allowing an unimportant mistake to pass without comment is a wonderful social grace.
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Being listened to should be sufficiently gratifying in itself, whether or not the advice is followed.
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It doesn't matter whether the bride or the bridegroom writes the letters of thanks for wedding presents provided that these go out immediately after the arrival of each present and are not in the handwriting of the bride's mother.
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Dishonesty is not the only alternative to honesty. There is also the highly underrated virtue of shutting up.
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The etiquette business has its emergencies, heaven knows, but it is in the nature of etiquette emergencies that once one realizes what one has done, it is too late. One might as well get a good night's sleep and send flowers with an apology in the morning.
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people, in forming their opinions of others, are usually lazy enough to go by whatever is most obvious or whatever chance remark they happen to hear. So the best policy is to dictate to others the opinion you want them to have of you.
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You do not have to do everything disagreeable that you have a right to do
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What we have come to, through a combination of popular psychology and expanding technology, is a presumption that all our thoughts and feelings are worth uttering.
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Most people who work at home find they do not have the benefit of receptionists who serve as personal guards
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It is one of Miss Manners's great discoveries that one needn't contradict others in order to set them straight.
Judith Martin