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Should you be unfortunate enough to have vices, you may, to a certain degree, even dignify them by a strict observance of decorumat least they will lose something of their natural turpitude.

Lord Chesterfield

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Lord Chesterfield
Certain
Unfortunate
May
Vices
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Degree
Even
Degrees
Something
Lose
Dignify
Loses
Decorum
Least
Observance
Natural
Strict

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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.
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Dispatch is the soul of business, and nothing contributes more to dispatch than method.
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Always make the best of the best, and never make bad worse.
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One of the greatest difficulties in civil war is, that more art is required to know what should be concealed from our friends, than what ought to be done against our enemies.
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Not to care for philosophy is to be a true philospher.
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Do as you would be done by, is the surest method of pleasing.
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Give Dayrolles a chair.
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Never seem wiser, nor more learned, than the people you are with. Wear your learning, like your watch, in a private pocket: and do not merely pull it out and strike it merely to show that you have one.
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Sincerity w the most compendious wisdom, an excellent instrument for the speedy despatch of business. It creates confidence in those we have to deal with, saves the labor of many inquiries, and brings things to an issue in few words.
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Young men are apt to think themselves wise enough, as drunken men are apt to think themselves sober enough.
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Arbitrary power has seldom... been introduced in any country at once. It must be introduced by slow degrees, and as it were step by step.
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Indifference is commonly the mother of discretion.
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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.
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People hate who makes you feel one's inferiority.
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Whenever a man seeks your advice he generally seeks your praise.
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The herd of mankind can hardly be said to think their notions are almost all adoptive and, in general, I believe it is better that it should be so as such common prejudices contribute more to order and quiet, than their own separate reasonings would do, uncultivated and unimproved as they are.
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Compliments of congratulation are always kindly taken, and cost nothing but pen, ink and paper. I consider them as draughts upon good breeding, where the exchange is always greatly in favor of the drawer.
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Our own self-love draws a thick veil between us and our faults.
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Men have various subjects in which they may excel, or at least would be thought to excel, and though they love to hear justice done to them where they know they excel, yet they are most and best flattered upon those points where they wish to excel and yet are doubtful whether they do or not.
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The New Year is the season in which custom seems more particularly to authorize civil and harmless lies, under the name of compliments. People reciprocally profess wishes which they seldom form and concern which they seldom feel.
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