Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield Quotes

In my younger years my dedication may have expressed itself egotistically.

Clearly I've got an ego.

Egotism: The art of seeing in yourself what others cannot see.

A dwarf who brings a standard along with him to measure his own size, take my word, is a dwarf in more articles than one.

I'm hardly disinterested totally in my appearance.

I don't want to be too proud, but I have a good personal style.

I know I am not the worst-dressed person.

I have no business carrying myself like some diva.

My ego and my vanities have nothing to do with comedy.

I may be a vain person, but I'm not a vain performer.

People write memoirs - this is my take, anyway - out of a great sense of self-importance.

I don't choose to be humble.

I'm a proud person. I'm not vain. I look at it like it is. If you've got the money and you're going to be out there, you owe it to people not to look like a dog if you can help it.

Vanity does not refer to the opinion a man entertains of himself, but to that which he wishes others to entertain of him.

The boor covers himself, the rich man or the fool adorns himself, and the elegant man gets dressed.

The common foible of women who have been handsome is to forget that they are no longer so.

There is this paradox in pride - it makes some men ridiculous, but prevents others from becoming so.

Every man has just as much vanity as he wants understanding.

There are no grades of vanity; there are only grades of ability in concealing it.

To this principle of vanity, which philosophers call a mean one, and which I do not, I owe a great part of the figure which I have made in life.

What is the vanity of the vainest man compared with the vanity which the most modest possesses when, in the midst of nature and the world, he feels himself to be man!

A man . . . must have a very good opinion of himself when he asks people to leave their own fireside, and encounter such a day as this, for the sake of coming to see him. He must think himself a most agreeable fellow.

Is there any vanity greater than the vanity of those who believe themselves without it?

Pride is a vice, which pride itself inclines every man to find in others, and to overlook in himself