Deference Quotes

To be humble to superiors is duty, to equals courtesy, to inferiors nobleness.

It's an unwritten rule that you respect people who've given you breaks. You see somebody's body of work before you take a tone with them. I will talk differently to someone with 18 years of experience and someone with 18 months.

Bin Laden was intelligent, well-informed, and low key. The people around him treated him with great deference, calling him 'sheikh,' a term of respect.

In my day you didn't speak until spoken to.

I don't mean being famous is a perk, because one knows that it's not necessarily a perk, but there are certain perks to being well-known and respected in one's field. Public perks. Like, I don't know, general friendliness and willingness to please, just to point out two.

Always respect your superiors, if you have any.

Must! Is must a word to be addressed to princes? Little man, little man! Thy father, if he had been alive, durst not have used that word.

Words change over time. 'Condescending,' for instance, was once a good thing to be. It meant that a person was willing to interact politely with people of lower social ranks. In Jane Austen's world, a lady praised for her condescension was receiving a sincere compliment.

I don't curtsy to Frank Sinatra and I'm not going to curtsy to a fucking king.

Hats off, gentlemen — if he were still alive we should not be here.

Nobody is strong-minded around a President…

Truth cannot be sacrificed at the altar of pretended tolerance. Real tolerance is deference to all ideas, not indifference to the truth.

Curtsey while you're thinking what to say. It saves time.

Since the 1960s, when America finally became fully accountable for its past, deference toward all groups with any claim to past or present victimization became mandatory. The Great Society and the War on Poverty were some of the first truly deferential policies.

The feeling of right or wrong is the beginning of wisdom.

Presidents have a right to certain prerogatives, including the expectation of a certain deference. He's the president; this is history. But we seem to have come a long way since Ronald Reagan was regularly barked at by Sam Donaldson, almost literally, and the president shrugged it off.

Once in a while there's wisdom in recognizing that the Boss is.

The English, the plain English, of the politest address of a gentleman to a lady is, I am now, dear Madam, your humble servant: Pray be so good as to let me be your Lord and Master.

We submit to the majority because we have to. But we are not compelled to call our attitude of subjection a posture of respect.

Humility forms the basis of honor, just as the low ground forms the foundation of a high elevation.

When people complain of the decay of manners they have in mind not the impudent abbreviations of the crowd, but the decline in bowing and scraping and in speaking of one's employer as "the master." What the rich mean by the good manners of the poor is usually not civility, but servility.

People in power, they're so used to people kind of playing up to them.

My one thing is respect. I don't care about anything else. You should respect everyone around you - the people who work for you, peers. Be classy.

When I came to Britain I was in awe of the British press, afraid of them. But they're not as ferocious as people think. In some instances they are, but when it comes to taking on power they're really deferential.

I had a hard time calling Laurence Oliver 'Larry.'