Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield - Man Quotes

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If ever a man and his wife, or a man and his mistress, who pass nights as well as days together, absolutely lay aside all good breeding, their intimacy will soon degenerate into a coarse familiarity, infallibly productive of contempt or disgust.

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield
For my own part, I would rather be in company with a dead man than with an absent one; for if the dead man gives me no pleasure, at least he shows me no contempt; whereas the absent one, silently indeed, but very plainly, tells me that he does not think me worth his attention.

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield
A man of sense only trifles with them, plays with them, humors and flatters them, as he does with a sprightly and forward child; but he neither consults them about, nor trusts them with, serious matters.

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield
I am convinced that a light supper, a good night's sleep, and a fine morning, have sometimes made a hero of the same man, who, by an indigestion, a restless night, and rainy morning, would have proved a coward.

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield
The only solid and lasting peace between a man and his wife is, doubtless, a separation.

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield
Wit is so shining a quality that everybody admires it; most people aim at it, all people fear it, and few love it unless in themselves. A man must have a good share of wit himself to endure a great share of it in another.

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield
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.

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield
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.

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield
The characteristic of a well-bred man is, to converse with his inferiors without insolence, and with his superiors with respect and with ease.

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield
I look upon indolence as a sort of suicide; for the man is effectually destroyed, though the appetites of the brute may survive.

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield
Putting moral virtues at the highest, and religion at the lowest, religion must still be allowed to be a collateral security, at least, to virtue; and every prudent man will sooner trust to two securities than to one.

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield
Every man is to be had one way or another and every woman almost anyway.

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield
Every man becomes, to a certain degree, what the people he generally converses with are.

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield
There are some occasions in which a man must tell half his secret, in order to conceal the rest; but there is seldom one in which a man should tell all. Great skill is necessary to know how far to go, and where to stop.

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield
An able man shows his spirit by gentle words and resolute actions.

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield