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Ridicule is the best test of truth.

Lord Chesterfield

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Lord Chesterfield
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More quotes by Lord Chesterfield

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One should always think of what one is about when one is learning, one should not think of play and when one is at play, one should not think of learning.
Lord Chesterfield
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Without some dissimulation no business can be carried on at all.
Lord Chesterfield
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Nothing sharpens the arrow of sarcasm so keenly as the courtesy that polishes it no reproach is like that we clothe with a smile and present with a bow.
Lord Chesterfield
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If you have wit, use it to please and not to hurt: you may shine like the sun in the temperate zones without scorching.
Lord Chesterfield
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The heart never grows better by age I fear rather worse, always harder. A young liar will be an old one, and a young knave will only be a greater knave as he grows older.
Lord Chesterfield
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Little secrets are commonly told again, but great ones generally kept.
Lord Chesterfield
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Good breeding and good nature do incline us rather to help and raise people up to ourselves, than to mortify and depress them, and, in truth, our own private interest concurs in it, as it is making ourselves so many friends, instead of so many enemies.
Lord Chesterfield
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A wise man will live as much within his wit as within his income.
Lord Chesterfield
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Women are much more like each other than men: they have, in truth, but two passions, vanity and love these are their universal characteristics.
Lord Chesterfield
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Never write down your speeches beforehand if you do, you may perhaps be a good declaimer, but will never be a debater.
Lord Chesterfield
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Distrust those who love you extremely upon a slight acquaintance, and without any visible reason.
Lord Chesterfield
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Knowledge may give weight, but accomplishments give luster, and many more people see than weigh.
Lord Chesterfield
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A man who owes a little can clear it off in a very little time, and, if he is a prudent man, will whereas a man, who by long negligence, owes a great deal, despairs of ever being able to pay, and therefore never looks into his accounts at all.
Lord Chesterfield
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Wit is so shining a quality that everybody admires it most people aim at it, all people fear it, and few love it unless in themselves. A man must have a good share of wit himself to endure a great share of it in another.
Lord Chesterfield
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You must labour to acquire that great and uncommon talent of hating with good breeding, and loving with prudence to make no quarrel irreconcilable by silly and unnecessary indications of anger and no friendship dangerous, in care it breaks, by a wanton, indiscreet, and unreserved confidence.
Lord Chesterfield
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How often should a woman be pregnant? Continually, or hardly ever? Or must there be a certain number of pregnancy anniversaries established by fashion? What do you, at the age of forty-three, have to say on the subject? Is it a fact that the laws of nature, or of the country, or of propriety, have ordained this time of life for sterility?
Lord Chesterfield
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A certain degree of ceremony is a necessary outwork of manners, as well as of religion it keeps the forward and petulant at a proper distance, and is a very small restraint to the sensible and to the well-bred part of the world.
Lord Chesterfield
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To know a little of anything gives neither satisfaction nor credit, but often brings disgrace or ridicule.
Lord Chesterfield
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In matters of religion and matrimony I never give any advice because I will not have anybody's torments in this world or the next laid to my charge.
Lord Chesterfield
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Not to perceive the little weaknesses and the idle but innocent affectations of the company may be allowable as a sort of polite duty. The company will be pleased with you if you do, and most probably will not be reformed by you if you do not.
Lord Chesterfield