Lord Chesterfield Quotes

The heart never grows better by age; I fear rather worse, always harder. A young liar will be an old one, and a young knave will only be a greater knave as he grows older.

Women, then, are only children of a larger growth

Knowledge may give weight, but accomplishments give luster, and many more people see than weigh.

A proper secrecy is the only mystery of able men; mystery is the only secrecy of weak and cunning ones.

To take a wife merely as an agreeable and rational companion, will commonly be found to be a grand mistake.

I recommend to you to take care of the minutes; for hours will take care of themselves. I am very sure, that many people lose two or three hours every day, by not taking care of the minutes.

Inferiority is what you enjoy in your best friends.

The world is a country which nobody ever yet knew by description; one must travel through it one's self to be acquainted with it.

Knowledge of the world in only to be acquired in the world, and not in a closet.

People hate those who make them feel their own inferiority.

Whoever is in a hurry shows that the thing he is about is too big for him.

Few people do business well, who do nothing else.

Polished brass will pass upon more people than rough gold.

Politicians neither love nor hate. Interest, not sentiment, directs them.

Pocket all your knowledge with your watch, and never pull it out in company unless desired.

Good breeding is the result of good sense, some good nature, and a little self-denial for the sake of others.

People will no more advance their civility to a bear, than their money to a bankrupt.

Idleness is only the refuge of weak minds.

Take the tone of the company you are in...

I look upon indolence as a sort of suicide.

No man tastes pleasures truly, who does not earn them by previous business; and few people do business well, who do nothing else.

In business be as able as you can, but do not be cunning; cunning is the dark sanctuary of incapacity.

Common sense (which, in truth, is very uncommon) is the best sense I know of: abide by it; it will counsel you best.

Physical ills are the taxes laid upon this wretched life; some are taxed higher, and some lower, but all pay something.

The manner of your speaking is full as important as the matter, as more people have ears to be tickled than understandings to judge.

Manners must adorn knowledge and smooth its way through the world.

A man must have a good share of wit himself to endure a great share in another.

Whenever I go to an opera, I leave my sense and reason at the door with my half-guinea, and deliver myself up to my eyes and my ears.

In my mind, there is nothing so illiberal, and so ill-bred, as audible laughter.

Never hold anyone by the button or the hand in order to be heard out; for if people are unwilling to hear you, you had better hold your tongue than them.

The difference between a man of sense and a fop is that the fop values himself upon his dress; and the man of sense laughs at it, at the same time he knows he must not neglect it.

Nature has hardly formed a woman ugly enough to be insensible to flattery upon her person.

I sometimes give myself admirable advice, but I am incapable of taking it.

Choose the company of your superiors whenever you can have it.

The rich are always advising the poor, but the poor seldom return the compliment.

Mankind is made up of inconsistencies, and no man acts invariably up to his predominant character. The wisest man sometimes acts weakly, and the weakest sometimes wisely.

Seek always for the best words and the happiest expression you can find.

If you would convince others, seem open to conviction yourself.

The young leading the young, is like the blind leading the blind; "they will both fall into the ditch.

In matters of religion and matrimony I never give any advice; because I will not have anybody's torments in this world or the next laid to my charge.

Second-rate knowledge, and middling talents, carry a man farther at courts, and in the busy part of the world, than superior knowledge and shining parts.

Choose your pleasures for yourself, and do not let them be imposed upon you.

May you live as long as you are fit to live, but no longer, or, may you rather die before you cease to be fit to live than after!

The less one has to do, the less time one finds to do it in.

History is but a confused heap of facts.

Prepare yourself for the world, as athletes used to do for their exercises; oil your mind and your manners, to give them the necessary suppleness and flexibility; strength alone will not do.

He makes people pleased with him by making them first pleased with themselves.

Without some dissimulation no business can be carried on at all.

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.

I am very sure that any man of common understanding may, by culture, care, attention, and labor, make himself what- ever he pleases, except a great poet.