Quote

Observe it, the vulgar often laugh, but never smile, whereas well-bred people often smile, and seldom or never laugh. A witty thing never excited laughter, it pleases only the mind and never distorts the countenance.

Lord Chesterfield

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Lord Chesterfield
Mind
Smile
Countenance
Never
Laugh
Vulgar
People
Laughing
Observe
Please
Seldom
Often
Whereas
Wells
Witty
Distorts
Well
Excited
Bred
Thing
Laughter
Pleases

More quotes by Lord Chesterfield

Image
Politicians neither love nor hate. Interest, not sentiment, directs them.
Lord Chesterfield
Image
Deserve a great deal, and you shall have a great deal deserve little, and you shall have but a little and be good for nothing atall, and I assure you, you shall have nothing at all.
Lord Chesterfield
Image
It is by vivacity and wit that man shines in company but trite jokes and loud laughter reduce him to a buffoon.
Lord Chesterfield
Image
I really think next to the consciousness of doing a good action, that of doing a civil one is the most pleasing and the epithet which I should covet the most next to that of Aristides, would be that of well-bred.
Lord Chesterfield
Image
The only solid and lasting peace between a man and his wife is, doubtless, a separation.
Lord Chesterfield
Image
Nothing convinces persons of a weak understanding so effectually, as what they do not comprehend.
Lord Chesterfield
Image
There is hardly anybody good for everything, and there is scarcely anybody who is absolutely good for nothing.
Lord Chesterfield
Image
People hate who makes you feel one's inferiority.
Lord Chesterfield
Image
Horse-play, romping, frequent and loud fits of laughter, jokes, and indiscriminate familiarity, will sink both merit and knowledge into a degree of contempt. They compose at most a merry fellow and a merry fellow was never yet a respectable man.
Lord Chesterfield
Image
A man of sense soon discovers, because he carefully observes, where and how long he is welcome and takes care to leave the company at least as soon as he is wished out of it. Fools never perceive whether they are ill timed or ill placed.
Lord Chesterfield
Image
Everything is worth seeing once, and the more one sees the less one either wonders or admires.
Lord Chesterfield
Image
Indifference is commonly the mother of discretion.
Lord Chesterfield
Image
Lady ---- is safely delivered of a son, to the great joy of that noble family. The expression, of a woman's having brought her husband a son, seems to be a proper and cautious one for it is never said, from whence.
Lord Chesterfield
Image
Dispatch is the soul of business, and nothing contributes more to dispatch than method.
Lord Chesterfield
Image
The manner of a vulgar man has freedom without ease, and the manner of a gentleman has ease without freedom.
Lord Chesterfield
Image
It must be owned, that the Graces do not seem to be natives of Great Britain and I doubt, the best of us here have more of rough than polished diamond.
Lord Chesterfield
Image
If originally it was not good for a man to be alone, it is much worse for a sick man to be so he thinks too much of his distemper, and magnifies it.
Lord Chesterfield
Image
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
Image
Remember that the wit, humour, and jokes of most mixed companies are local. They thrive in that particular soil, but will not often bear transplanting.
Lord Chesterfield
Image
It is to be presumed, that a man of common sense, who does not desire to please, desires nothing at all since he must know that he cannot obtain anything without it.
Lord Chesterfield