The Art of Conversing: Written for the Instruction of Youth in the Polite Manners and Language of the Drawing-room

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James French, 1846 - 96 pagine

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Pagina 87 - There are a sort of men whose visages Do cream and mantle like a standing pond...
Pagina 84 - I would establish but one great general rule to be observed in all conversation, which is this, "that men should not talk to please themselves, but those that hear them." This would make them consider, whether what they speak be worth hearing; whether there be either wit or sense in what they are about to say; and, whether it be adapted to the time when, the place where, and the person to whom, it is spoken.
Pagina 86 - There is speaking well, speaking easily, speaking justly and speaking seasonably : It is offending against the last, to speak of entertainments before the indigent; of sound limbs and health before the infirm ; of houses and lands before one who has not so much as a dwelling; in a word, to speak of your prosperity before the miserable ; this conversation is cruel, and the comparison which naturally arises in them betwixt their condition and yours is excruciating.
Pagina 86 - IT is a hard and nice subject for a man to speak of himself,' says Cowley ; ' it grates his own heart to say any thing of disparagement, and the reader's ears to hear any thing of praise from him.' Let the tenor of his discourse be what it will upon this subject, it generally proceeds from vanity. An ostentatious man will rather relate a blunder or an absurdity he has committed, than be debarred of talking of his own dear person.
Pagina 87 - And surely one of the best rules in conversation is, never to say a thing which any of the company can reasonably wish we had rather left unsaid; nor can there anything be well more contrary to the ends for which people meet together, than to part unsatisfied with each other or themselves.
Pagina 82 - GOOD manners is the art of making those people easy with whom we converse. Whoever makes the fewest persons uneasy is the best bred in the company.
Pagina 85 - The best is to take words as they are most commonly spoken and meant, like coin, as it most currently passes, without raising scruples upon the weight of the allay, unless the cheat or the defect be gross and evident.
Pagina 83 - THERE is nothing, (says Plato,) so delightful, as the hearing or the speaking of truth.' For this reason there is no conversation so agreeable as that of the man of integrity, who hears without any intention to betray, and speaks without any intention to deceive.
Pagina 3 - Who wickedly is wise, or madly brave, Is but the more a fool, the more a knave. Who noble ends by noble means obtains, Or failing, smiles in exile or in chains, Like good Aurelius let him reign, or bleed Like Socrates, that man is great indeed. What's fame? a fancied life in others' breath, A thing beyond us, ev'n before our death.
Pagina 83 - From social intercourse are derived some of the highest enjoyments of life ; where there in a free interchange of sentiments the mind acquires new ideas, and by a frequent exercise of its powers, the understanding gains fresh vigor.— Acidison.

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