Polite Quotes - Page 21

• The way to deal with superstition is not to be polite to it, but to tackle it with all arms, and so rout it, cripple it, and make it forever infamous and ridiculous. Is it, perchance, cherished by persons who should know better? Then their folly should be brought out into the light of day, and exhibited there in all its hideousness until they flee from it, hiding their heads in shame.

  H. L. Mencken

  Light, Forever, Criticism

  "Aftermath". Baltimore Evening Sun, September 14, 1925.

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• The path of Martial Arts begins and ends with courtesy. So be genuinely polite on every occasion.

  Mas Oyama

  Art, Path, Courtesy

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• So I had a choice between going to a jail or going to a bughouse like a nice young middle-class student. So I chose to go to a very polite mental hospital. When I left eight months later, they said, 'You were never psychotic. You were just an average neurotic.'

  Allen Ginsberg

  Nice, Jail, Eight

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• Charity, if you have the means, is a personal choice, but charity which is expected or compelled is simply a polite word for slavery.

  Terry Goodkind

  Mean, Choices, Charity

  Terry Goodkind (2015). “The Pillars Of Creation”, p.253, Head of Zeus

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• Trust me, it's paradise. This is where the hungry come to feed. For mine is a generation that circles the globe and searches for something we haven't tried before. So never refuse an invitation, never resist the unfamiliar, never fail to be polite and never outstay the welcome. Just keep your mind open and suck in the experience. And if it hurts, you know what? It's probably worth it.

  Alex Garland

  Beach, Hurt, Circles

  "The Beach". www.imdb.com. February 2, 2000.

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• Love thy enemies, it says in the scriptures. My foster mother always added, "At the very least, you will be polite to them.

  Patricia Briggs

  Mother, Enemy, Scripture

  Patricia Briggs (2011). “The Mercy Thompson Collection”, p.28, Penguin

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• I enjoyed my upbringing, my siblings did, we're polite, we're respectful, but at the end of the day we're young, we like to have fun. But now, more so than ever, the youth has been vilified to the point where it feels like you can't enjoy being young any more, you just have to sit it out and wait until you get old.

  Tinie Tempah

  Fun, Sibling, Waiting

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• If you intend to write as truthfully as you can, your days as a member of polite society are numbered.

  Stephen King

  Writing, Members, Ifs

  Stephen King (2000). “On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft”, p.175, Simon and Schuster

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• I can’t remember how many times I advised students to stop writing the sunny hours and write from where it hurts: No one wants to read polite. It puts them to sleep.

  Anne Bernays

  Hurt, Writing, Sleep

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• If some glorious angel suddenly descended through my living room ceiling and offered to take away the children I have and give me other, better children — more polite, funnier, nicer, smarter — I would cling to the children I have and pray away that atrocious spectacle.

  Andrew Solomon

  Children, Angel, Giving

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• An environment-based education movement--at all levels of education--will help students realize that school isn't supposed to be a polite form of incarceration, but a portal to the wider world.

  Richard Louv

  Nature, School, Parent

  Richard Louv (2013). “Last Child in the Woods: Saving our Children from Nature-Deficit Disorder”, p.176, Atlantic Books Ltd

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• It was always so hot, and everyone was so polite, and everything was all surface but underneath it was like a bomb waiting to go off. I always felt that way about the South, that beneath the smiles and southern hospitality and politeness were a lot of guns and liquor and secrets.

  James McBride

  Gun, Waiting, Southern

  James McBride (2006). “The Color of Water 10th Anniversary Edition”, p.70, Penguin

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• Etiquette is the ceremonial code of polite life, more voluminous and minute in each portion of society according to its rank.

  John Ramsay McCulloch

  Minutes, Etiquette, Portions

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• Chi-Os were ideal partners for all occasions. They were discrete, desirable, tactful, polite, and fun... Every mom dreamed of her son coming home with a Chi Omega, a woman's woman.

  David Letterman

  Mom, Fun, Home

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• I'm willing to show good taste, if I can, in somebody else's living room, but our reading life is too short for a writer to be in any way polite. Since his words enter into another's brain in silence and intimacy, he should be as honest and explicit as we are with ourselves.

  John Updike

  Reading, Life Is Too Short, Writing

  John Updike, James Plath (1994). “Conversations with John Updike”, p.113, Univ. Press of Mississippi

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• I think if anything I am perhaps more inclined than most people are to be polite and considerate because I am aware that human relationships are innately fragile and kind of dangerous.

  Alex Colville

  Thinking, People, Kind

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• People take it for granted that the physical world is both ordered and intelligible. The underlying order in nature - the laws of physics - are simply accepted as given, as brute facts. Nobody asks where they came from; at least not in polite company. However, even the most atheistic scientist accepts as an act of faith that the universe is not absurd, that there is a rational basis to physical existence manifested as law-like order in nature that is at least partly comprehensible to us. So science can proceed only if the scientist adopts an essentially theological worldview.

  Paul Davies

  Order, Law, People

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• Our society finds truth too strong a medicine to digest undiluted. In its purest form, truth is not a polite tap on the shoulder; it is a howling reproach.

  Ted Koppel

  Strong, Medicine, Our Society

  Ted Koppel's Commencement Address at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, www.crisismagazine.com. February 1, 1988.

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• People were always saying to Margaret, 'Well, Julia sings and Betsy writes. Now what is little Margaret going to do?' Margaret would smile politely, for she was very polite, but privately she stormed to Betsy with flashing eyes, 'I'm not going to do anything. I want to just live. Can't people just live?

  Maud Hart Lovelace

  Life, Writing, Eye

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• Discretion is the polite word for hypocrisy.

  Christine Keeler

  Hypocrisy, Discretion

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• The best advice that was given to me was that I had to be 10 times smarter, braver and more polite to be equal. So I did.

  Samuel L. Jackson

  Advice, Given, Equal

  "Samuel L Jackson: 'Now we got the movie stuff out of the way, let's talk about something serious'" by Sean O'Hagan, www.theguardian.com. December 6, 2008.

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• The nerves are a problem on trumpet, because when you mess up everyone can hear it. Just remember most people are too polite to say anything about it. That should calm your nerves.

  Wynton Marsalis

  People, Say Anything, Nerves

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• I wasn't entirely sure, but a polite John Pritkin might be a sign of the apocalypse.

  Karen Chance

  Might, Apocalypse

  Karen Chance (2008). “Embrace the Night”, p.31, Penguin

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• Tequila. Straight. There's a real polite drink. You keep drinking until you finally take one more and it just won't go down. Then you know you've reached your limit.

  Lee Marvin

  Real, Drinking, Limits

  "Biography / Personal Quotes". www.imdb.com.

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• We cannot become starched Christians, too polite, who speak of theology calmly over tea. We have to become courageous Christians and seek out those (who need help most).

  Pope Francis

  Christian, Tea, Needs

  "Pope Francis Insists Church Must Help Poor, Not ‘Speak Of Theology’" by Philip Pullella, www.huffingtonpost.com. May 18, 2013.

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