Dinah Maria Mulock Quotes

The English are polite by telling lies. The Americans are polite by telling the truth.

Nothing is so great an example of bad manners as flattery. If you flatter all the company, you please none; If you flatter only one or two, you offend the rest.

People generally despise where they flatter, and cringe to those they would gladly overtop; so that truth and ceremony are two things.

Don't flatter the rich, or appear to willing before the great.

All men have a feeling, that they would rather you told them a civil lie than give them a point blank refusal.... If you make a promise, the thing is still uncertain, depends on a future day, and concerns but few people; but if you refuse you alienate people to a certainty and at once, and many people too.

I probably not as likely to say what's on my mind, and I think most people aren't. It's not something I would want to always be doing. So that's why I'm not a politician.

I believe in absolute honesty and sensible social lies.

The basic rule of human nature is that powerful people speak slowly and subservient people quickly - because if they don't speak fast enough, nobody will listen to them.

There would not be any absolute necessity for reserve if the world were honest; yet even then it would prove expedient. For, in order to attain any degree of deference, it seems necessary that people should imagine you have more accomplishments than you discover.

Truth or tact? You have to choose. Most times they're not compatible. It's so hard to draw the line.

Men resort to talking only when they haven't the power to enforce their convictions upon others.

In real life, I try to be honest but not overshare. There are people that turn every conversation into a therapy session and you want to start charging them.

The whole art of life is knowing the right time to say things.

...William wondered why he always disliked people who said 'no offense meant.' Maybe it was because they found it easier to to say 'no offense meant' than actually to refrain from giving offense.

Yet, sadly, accidental rudeness occurs alarmingly often. Best to say nothing at all, my dear man.

And if candor strikes to forcefully, step back, draw careful breath, and consider the angle your words must take before you open your mouth, let them leak out. Because once you tilt the truth, it becomes a lie.

The people at the very top could fall by and grace you with their presence and give you a little largesse, and you'd be "Oh, I'm so beloved." In a way, it was kind of like flattery. The middle managers didn't quite have that cachet, but at the same time, they had to seem like they were of that caliber. So there's a little bit of loneliness at the heart of those with a little bit of power.

Though it be honest, it is never good to bring bad news.

There's nothing wrong with most men's egos that the kowtowing of a headwaiter can't cure.

Diplomacy is the art of telling people to go to hell in such a way that they ask for directions.

You don't always have to chop with the sword of truth. You can point with it too.

Because there can be consequences for saying the first thing that pops into our heads, it is prudent to exercise tact.

A truth is to be known always, to be uttered sometimes.

Nice customs curtsy to great kings.

...but I guess it's better for people to shut up rather than rather than say something nasty. -ONE NIGHT @ THE CALL CENTER Chapter 1 page 22