Quote

To be always thinking about your manners is not the way to make them good the very perfection of manners is not to think about yourself.

Richard Whately

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Richard Whately
Age: 76 †
Born: 1787
Born: February 1
Died: 1863
Died: October 8
Economist
Philosopher
Priest
Theologian
London
England
Think
Thinking
Manners
Perfection
Way
Make
Good
Always

More quotes by Richard Whately

Image
When a man says he wants to work, what he means is that he wants wages.
Richard Whately
Image
There is no right faith in believing what is true, unless we believe it because it is true.
Richard Whately
Image
It is folly to expect men to do all that they may reasonably be expected to do.
Richard Whately
Image
Happiness is no laughing matter.
Richard Whately
Image
Everyone wishes to have truth on his side, but not everyone wishes to be on the side of truth.
Richard Whately
Image
It is also important to guard against mistaking for good-nature what is properly good-humor,--a cheerful flow of spirits and easy temper not readily annoyed, which is compatible with great selfishness.
Richard Whately
Image
Honesty is the best policy but he who is governed by that maxim is not an honest man.
Richard Whately
Image
A man is called selfish not for pursuing his own good, but for neglecting his neighbor's.
Richard Whately
Image
In our judgment of human transactions, the law of optics is reversed, we see most dimly the objects which are close around us.
Richard Whately
Image
Controversy, though always an evil in itself, is sometimes a necessary evil.
Richard Whately
Image
Of metaphors, those generally conduce most to energy or vivacity of style which illustrate an intellectual by a sensible object.
Richard Whately
Image
No one complains of the rules of Grammar as fettering Language because it is understood that correct use is not founded on Grammar, but Grammar on correct use. A just system of Logic or of Rhetoric is analogous, in this respect, to Grammar.
Richard Whately
Image
The happiest lot for a man, as far as birth is concerned, is that it should be such as to give him but little occasion to think much about it.
Richard Whately
Image
To know your ruling passion, examine your castles in the air.
Richard Whately
Image
Manners are one of the greatest engines of influence ever given to man.
Richard Whately
Image
It is the neglect of timely repair that makes rebuilding necessary.
Richard Whately
Image
Even supposing there were some spiritual advantage in celibacy, it ought to be completely voluntary.
Richard Whately
Image
One way in which fools succeed where wise men fail is that through ignorance of the danger they sometimes go coolly about a hazardous business.
Richard Whately
Image
An instinct is a blind tendency to some mode of action, independent of any consideration, on the part of the agent, of the end to which the action leads.
Richard Whately
Image
It is a remarkable circumstance in reference to cunning persons that they are often deficient not only in comprehensive, far-sighted wisdom, but even in prudent, cautious circumspection.
Richard Whately