Civility Quotes - Page 8

• Now the good of political life is a great political good. It is not a secular good specified by a comprehensive doctrine like those of Kant or Mill. You could characterize this political good as the good of free and equal citizens recognizing the duty of civility to one another: the duty to give citizens public reasons for one's political actions.

  John Rawls

  Giving, Political, Doctrine

  Interview with Bernard G. Prusak, www.commonwealmagazine.org. September 25, 1998.

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• There was no civility, there was no sophistication, there was nothing but raw resentment and anger on the part of the Hillary [Clinton] campaign staff.

  Rush Limbaugh

  Campaigns, Resentment, Clinton

  Source: www.rushlimbaugh.com

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• Divorce is not easy, but if you genuinely put your kids first, that dictates the civility you should show each other. What example are you otherwise?

  Dawn French

  Divorce, Kids, Firsts

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• In my entire time in Washington, I treated everyone with respect, with civility.

  Ted Cruz

  Treated

  Interview with Glenn Thrush, www.politico.com. July 18, 2016.

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• A classical liberal is someone who wants a society that maximizes peace, civility, tolerance, and well-being for everyone. One that opens opportunities for everyone to advance themselves.

  Charles Koch

  Opportunity, Tolerance, Want

  Source: freebeacon.com

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• The arrangements that couples make in order to maintain civility in the midst of their journey to divorce are often most elaborate when the professed top priority is to protect a child.

  John Irving

  Children, Couple, Divorce

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• I would rather die than be in the United States Senate. I would be bored to death. Could you imagine me, banging around that chamber with 99 other people, asking for a motion on the amendment in the subcommittee? Forget it...You'd watch me just walk out and walk right into the Potomac River and drown. That would be it.

  Chris Christie

  Leadership, Work, Reality

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• Such is the common process of marriage. A youth and maiden exchange meeting by chance, or brought together by artifice, exchange glances, reciprocate civilities, go home, and dream of one another. Having little to divert attention, or diversify thought, they find themselves uneasy when they are apart, and therefore conclude that they shall be happy together. They marry, and discover what nothing but voluntary blindness had before concealed; they wear out life in altercations, and charge nature with cruelty.

  Samuel Johnson

  Marriage, Dream, Home

  Samuel Johnson, Peter Martin (2009). “Samuel Johnson: Selected Writings”, p.310, Harvard University Press

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• There is a mighty gulf between those who love and those who do not love God To the one class we owe civility, courtesy, kindness, even tenderness. It is only those who love the Lord who should find in our hearts a home.

  Frederick William Robertson

  Kindness, Home, Heart

  Frederick William Robertson (1871). “Sermons Preached at Brighton”, p.766

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• Civility is a desire to receive civilities, and to be accounted well-bred.

  Francois de La Rochefoucauld

  Desire, Wells

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• Martha Stewart contributes more to our civility than the Baptist Church.

  Dave Hickey

  Church, Baptists

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• Civility, it is said, means obeying the unenforceable.

  Ellen Goodman

  Mean, Said, Obeying

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• The more you look back into English history, the more you are forced to the conclusion that alongside civility and the deeply held convictions about individual rights, the English have a natural taste for disorder.

  Anna Pavlova

  Rights, English History, Looks

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• I think the things that are more painful to me are not the intrusion of paparazzi, it's the lack of civility that I find more intimidating and far more painful an experience. It's the lack of critical thinking. It's the endless snarky, mean way we talk about each other, we approach each other. The anonymity of being cruel, the delight in tearing people down. The tabloid era that we find ourselves in is a cultural boneyard, and that is painful to me.

  Sarah Jessica Parker

  Mean, Thinking, People

  "Katie Couric to Interview Sarah Jessica Parker in First ABC News Appearance (Exclusive)" by Marisa Guthrie, www.hollywoodreporter.com. September 5, 2011.

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• It had long been established in the Civil Worlds that public business was to be transparent, and personal business opaque; but it was as well recognised that the two would always have a turbulent interface, and that the clique, the caucus, and the conspiracy were as ineradicable features of civility as the council or the committee.

  Ken MacLeod

  Two, Long, Opaque

  Ken MacLeod (2012). “Learning The World: A novel of first contact”, p.113, Hachette UK

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• No greater glory can be handed down than to conquer the barbarian, to recall the savage and the pagan to civility, to draw the ignorant within the orbit of reason, and to fill with reverence for divinity the godless and the ungodly.

  Richard Hakluyt

  History, Ignorant, Divinity

  Richard Hakluyt (1935). “The Original Writings & Correspondence of the Two Richard Hakluyts”

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• The civilities of the great are never thrown away.

  Samuel Johnson

  Political, Campaigns, Contests

  Samuel Johnson (1782). “The Beauties of Johnson: Consisting of Maxims and Observations, Moral, Critical, and Miscellaneous ... Second Edition, Enlarged and Corrected, Etc”, p.39

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• URBANITY, n. The kind of civility that urban observers ascribe to dwellers in all cities but New York. Its commonest expression is heard in the words, "I beg your pardon," and it is not consistent with disregard of the rights of others.

  Ambrose Bierce

  New York, Rights, Expression

  Ambrose Bierce (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Ambrose Bierce (Illustrated)”, p.2534, Delphi Classics

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• In religious matters a traveller loses nothing by civility.

  James Branch Cabell

  Religious, Matter, Traveller

  James Branch Cabell (2009). “The Silver Stallion”, p.100, Wildside Press LLC

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• Among friends one has the privilege of saying nothing; the civility consists in the assumption that one's silence will be civilly understood. I can imagine a small gathering of friends who say nothing all evening: they recoil from saying anything that the others don't want to hear; and their silence would be the subtlest courtesy.

  Allen Tate

  Friendship, Silence, Gathering

  Allen Tate (1967). “T. S. Eliot: The Man and His Work”, London : Chatto & Windus

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• You never see the old austerity That was the essence of civility; Young people hereabouts, unbridled, now Just want.

  Moliere

  Essence, People, Want

  Jean-Baptiste Moliere (2015). “Tartuffe and Other Plays”, p.44, Penguin

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• Comedy speaks for civilization; farce bears an ill-concealed, sometimes unconcealed animus against civilization. Often against civility too.

  Irving Howe

  Civilization, Bears, Farce

  Irving Howe (1995). “A Critic's Notebook”, Harvest Books

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• In solitude the mind gains strength, and learns to lean upon herself; in the world it seeks or accepts of a few treacherous supports--the feigned compassion of one, the flattery of a second, the civilities of a third, the friendship of a fourth--they all deceive, and bring the mind back to retirement, reflection, and books.

  Laurence Sterne

  Retirement, Book, Reflection

  Laurence Sterne (1811). “The Beauties of Sterne: With Some Account of His Life”, p.139

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• There are people who balk at small civilities on account of their manifest insincerity. ... It is better and more logical to accept all the polite phraseology which facilitates intercourse, and contributes to the sweetness of life. If we discarded the formal falsehoods which are the currency of conversation, we should not be one step nearer the vital things of truth.

  Agnes Repplier

  Sweetness Of Life, People, Steps

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• A winning wave, (deserving note.)
  In the tempestuous petticote,
  A careless shoe-string, in whose tye
  I see a wilde civility,--
  Doe more bewitch me than when art
  Is too precise in every part.

  Robert Herrick

  Art, Winning, Shoes

  Robert Herrick, “Delight In Disorder”

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