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There is hardly anybody good for everything, and there is scarcely anybody who is absolutely good for nothing.

Lord Chesterfield

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Lord Chesterfield
Anybody
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More quotes by Lord Chesterfield

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It is by vivacity and wit that man shines in company but trite jokes and loud laughter reduce him to a buffoon.
Lord Chesterfield
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I am provoked at the contempt which most historians show for humanity in general one would think by them, that the whole human species consisted but of about a hundred and fifty people, called and dignified (commonly very undeservedly too) by the titles of Emperors, Kings, Popes, Generals, and Ministers.
Lord Chesterfield
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Be your character what it will, it will be known, and nobody will take it upon your word.
Lord Chesterfield
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Merit and knowledge will not gain hearts, though they will secure them when gained.
Lord Chesterfield
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Instead of giving in to the greatest misfortune that can happen at my age, deafness, I busy myself in searching out all possible compensations, and I apply myself much more to all the amusements that are here within my grasp.
Lord Chesterfield
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Good manners are the settled medium of social, as specie is of commercial, life returns are equally expected for both.
Lord Chesterfield
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I always put these pert jackanapeses out of countenance by looking extremely grave when they expect that I should laugh at their pleasantries and by saying Well, and so?--as if they had not done, and that the sting were still to come. This disconcerts them, as they have no resources in themselves, and have but one set of jokes to live upon.
Lord Chesterfield
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Choose your pleasures for yourself, and do not let them be imposed upon you.
Lord Chesterfield
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Many new years you may see, but happy ones you cannot see without deserving them. These virtue, honor, and knowledge alone can merit, alone can produce.
Lord Chesterfield
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Love has been not unaptly compared to the small-pox, which most people have sooner or later.
Lord Chesterfield
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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
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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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Indifference is commonly the mother of discretion.
Lord Chesterfield
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I knew a gentleman who was so good a manager of his time that he would not even lose that small portion of it which the calls of nature obliged him to pass in the necessary-house but gradually went through all the Latin poets in those moments.
Lord Chesterfield
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In the mass of mankind, I fear, there is too great a majority of fools and knaves who, singly from their number, must to a certain degree be respected, though they are by no means respectable.
Lord Chesterfield
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Young men are as apt to think themselves wise enough, as drunken men are to think themselves sober enough. They look upon spirit to be a much better thing than experience which they call coldness. They are but half mistaken for though spirit without experience is dangerous, experience without spirit is languid and ineffective.
Lord Chesterfield
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Good humor is the health of the soul, sadness is its poison.
Lord Chesterfield
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It may be objected, that I am now recommending dissimulation to you I both own and justify it. It has been long said: Qui nescitdissimular nescit regnare: I go still farther, and say, that without some dissimulation, no business can be carried on at all.
Lord Chesterfield
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When a man is once in fashion, all he does is right.
Lord Chesterfield
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Assurance and intrepidity, under the white banner of seeming modesty, clear the way for merit, that would otherwise be discouraged by difficulties...
Lord Chesterfield