A man is never more serious than when he praise himself.
Criticism of others is thus an oblique form of self-commendation. We think we make the picture hang straight on our wall by telling our neighbors that all his pictures are crooked.
The lizard that jumped from a high Iroko tree to the ground said he would praise himself if no-one else did.
Criticism is an indirect form of self-boasting.
Prosperity inebriates men, so that they take delights in their own merits.
Xenophon says that there is no sound more pleasing than one's own praises.
Don't wrench your shoulder out of its socket trying to pat yourself on the back," Beldin said sourly.
All censure of a man's self is oblique praise.
Therefore it is most expedient for the wise, if Don Worm (his conscience) find no impediment to the contrary, to be the trumpet of his own virtues, as I am to myself.
Every other enjoyment malice may destroy; every other panegyric envy may withhold; but no human power can deprive the boaster of his own encomiums.
The only thing that ever consoles man for the stupid things he does is the praise he always gives himself for doing them.
