Samuel Johnson Quotes

You can't be truly rude until you understand good manners.

The Japanese have perfected good manners and made them indistinguishable from rudeness.

Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split.

There is not a single outward mark of courtesy that does not have a deep moral basis.

I don't mean to be rude—" he began, in a tone that threatened rudeness in every syllable. "Yet, sadly, accidental rudeness occurs alarmingly often," Dumbledore finished the sentence gravely.

Rudeness luxuriates in the absence of self-respect.

I think the thing I miss most in our age is our manners. It sounds so old-fashioned in a way. But even bad people had good manners in the old days, and manners hold a community together, and manners hold a family together; in a way, they hold the world together.

In life, if you have an enthusiasm for what they call 'good manners,' sometimes people don't quite believe you. I've had that once or twice before, where they assume you can't be for real.

Charm, I think, is education, really, no? I was educated to be nice to everybody. If you want to be rude and mean, I'm sure your life isn't that nice.

Etiquette is all human social behavior. If you're a hermit on a mountain, you don't have to worry about etiquette; if somebody comes up the mountain, then you've got a problem. It matters because we want to live in reasonably harmonious communities.

For me, politeness is a sine qua non of civilization.

I'm a gentleman, if nothing else. It's taken me years to become one, but finally I have a sense of propriety.

Callousness and insolence bring to bare unanimous social condemnation, while the simple efforts of politeness are admired; even in those who are otherwise despised.

Tipping your hat to a lady is good form. If you're at a dinner table, you'd most certainly take your hat off - cowboy hat, baseball hat, or otherwise.

My mom would still be mad if I didn't say 'please' and 'thank you.'

Go to any bookstore, and you'll see thousands of books on etiquette, which suggests there's a lot of self-help going on. There is hope.

In the contemporary world, we think of politeness as surface behavior, like frosting - it's sweet and attractive and finishes off the cake. But 19th century nobility and the enlightened thinkers and stoics before them viewed manners in a very different way. To them, manners are an outward expression of an inward struggle.

The underlying principles of manners- respect, fairness, and congeniality.

There is reason in the distinction of civil and uncivil. The manners are sometimes so rough a rind that we doubt whether they cover any core or sap-wood at all.

Me and polite have never been on close terms.

Like language, a code of manners can be used with more or less skill, for laudable or for evil purposes, to express a great variety of ideas and emotions. In itself, it carries no moral value, but ignorance in use of this tool is not a sign of virtue.

Politeness is the chief sign of culture.

Our manners, our civilization, and all the good things connected with manners and civilization, have, in this European world of ours, depended for ages upon two principles: I mean the spirit of a gentleman, and the spirit of religion.

They [the English] have a special word, "civil," for what is elsewhere merely ordinary politeness.

There is no excuse for bad manners, except fast reflexes.