Nicolas Chamfort Quotes

Every man depends on the quantity of sense, wit, or good manners he brings into society for the reception he meets with in it.

I wasn't a cliquey person, and I think that's because I came from a large family. I got along with everybody, and I usually got along with the people that people didn't like.

I think if somebody knows how to play the game, he or she can play anywhere. You know how to fit in.

I feel I can hang out with any group of people and find common ground to talk with them.

Growing up, I went to many schools, and I had to fit in to many different types of environments with totally different social groups. It helps me out as I move from job to job.

Society is like a large piece of frozen water; and skating well is the great art of social life.

We're losing social skills, the human interaction skills, how to read a person's mood, to read their body language, how to be patient until the moment is right to make or press a point. Too much exclusive use of electronic information dehumanises what is a very, very important part of community life and living together.

I enjoy working with people. I understand that as a necessity. And clearly that's something that develops as you get older. And I've grown into that.

I get along with people quickly.

I don't know how to talk. Oh! talk to every woman as if you loved her, and to every man as if he bored you, and at the end of your first season you will have the reputation of possessing the most perfect social tact.

He who fails to please in his salutation and address is at once rejected, and never obtains an opportunity of showing his latest excellences or essential qualities.

We live one day at a time and scratch where it itches.

That's how I try to think of education - a school is a miniature society where children learn to function in a real world.

I think metaphysics is good if it improves everyday life; otherwise forget it.

Happiness requires changing yourself and changing your world. It requires pursuing your own goals and fitting in with others. Different people at different times in their lives will benefit from drawing more heavily on one approach or the other.

I wish to speak with all respect of persons, but sometimes I must pinch myself to keep awake, and preserve the due decorum. They melt so fast into each other, that they are like grass and trees, and it needs an effort to treat them as individuals.

School doesn't really teach you how to interact with people properly, you learn that outside of school.

I not only enjoy it, I think, how do you design things that are applicable to life - unless you live it?

The most welcome guest in society will ever be the one to whose mind everything is a suggestion, and whose words suggest something to everybody.

I know Mark,' I reply. 'And I don't like him.' 'But I do. And part of being social means being civil to someone you don't like.' 'That's stupid. It's a huge world. why not just get up and walk away?' 'Because that's rude,' Jess explains. 'I think it's rude to stick a smile on your face and pretend you like talking to someone when in reality you'd rather be sticking bamboo slivers under your fingernails.

You flirt with everything." She could tell that her eyes were popping-- her eyeballs actually felt cold around the edges. "You flirt with old people and babies and everybody in between.

You only had to choose which me to talk to, for, you know, we all change our manners, depending on who has come to chat. One doesn’t behave at all the same way to a grandfather as to a bosom friend, to a professor as to a curious niece.

There is hardly any personal defect... which an agreeable manner might not gradually reconcile one to.

If you are capable people are happy to play with you.

How could I fail to be a lone wolf, and an uncouth hermit, as I did not share one of its aims nor understand one of its pleasures?