Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield: Trending quotes (page 3)

“Little minds mistake little objects for great ones, and lavish away upon the former that time and attention which only the latter deserve. To such mistakes we owe the numerous and frivolous tribe of insect-mongers, shell-mongers, and pursuers and driers of butterflies, etc. The strong mind distinguishes, not only between the useful and the useless, but likewise between the useful and the curious.”

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

6 December 1748
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman (1774)

Strong , Time

“The manner is often as important as the matter, sometimes more so.”

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

1751
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman (1774)

“An injury is much sooner forgotten than an insult.”

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

9 October 1746
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman (1774)

“Abject flattery and indiscriminate assentation degrade, as much as indiscriminate contradiction and noisy debate disgust. But a modest assertion of one’s own opinion, and a complaisant acquiescence in other people’s, preserve dignity.”

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

10 August 1749
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman (1774)

People

“The reputation of generosity is to be purchased pretty cheap; it does not depend so much upon a man’s general expense, as it does upon his giving handsomely where it is proper to give at all. A man, for instance, who should give a servant four shillings, would pass for covetous, while he who gave him a crown, would be reckoned generous; so that the difference of those two opposite characters, turns upon one shilling.”

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

15 January 1753
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman (1774)

Dependency

“He adorned whatever subject he either spoke or wrote upon, by the most splendid eloquence.”

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

Character of Bolingbroke; reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

“You had better refuse a favor gracefully, than to grant it clumsily. Manner is all, in everything: it is by manner only that you can please, and consequently rise. All your Greek will never advance you from secretary to envoy, or from envoy to ambassador; but your address, your manner, your air, if good, very probably may.”

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

18 March 1751
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman (1774)

“The nation looked upon him as a deserter, and he shrunk into insignificancy and an earldom.”

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

Character of Pulteney; reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)

“Take the tone of the company you are in.”

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

16 October 1747
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman (1774)

“I recommend to you, in my last, an innocent piece of art: that of flattering people behind their backs, in presence of those who, to make their own court, much more than for your sake, will not fail to repeat, and even amplify, the praise to the party concerned. This is of all flattery the most pleasing, and consequently the most effectual.”

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

22 May 1749
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman (1774)

People , Art

“Let this be one invariable rule of your conduct—never to show the least symptom of resentment, which you cannot, to a certain degree, gratify; but always to smile, where you cannot strike.”

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

26 March 1754
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman (1774)

Smile

“In short, let it be your maxim through life, to know all you can know, yourself; and never to trust implicitly to the informations of others.”

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

16 March 1759
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman (1774)

Life

“In my mind, there is nothing so illiberal and so ill-bred, as audible laughter.”

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

9 March 1748
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman (1774)

Laughter

“Let dull critics feed upon the carcasses of plays; give me the taste and the dressing.”

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

6 February 1752
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman (1774)

“Let blockheads read what blockheads wrote.”

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

1 November 1750
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman (1774)

Reading

“The young leading the young, is like the blind leading the blind; “they will both fall into the ditch.””

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

24 November 1747
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman (1774)

“Our conjectures pass upon us for truths; we will know what we do not know, and often, what we cannot know: so mortifying to our pride is the base suspicion of ignorance.”

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

14 December 1756
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman (1774)

Truth

“I really know nothing more criminal, more mean, and more ridiculous than lying. It is the production either of malice, cowardice, or vanity; and generally misses of its aim in every one of these views; for lies are always detected, sooner or later.”

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

21 September 1747
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman (1774)

Lying

“Do as you would be done by, is the surest method of pleasing.”

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

9 October 1747
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman (1774)

“I recommend you to take care of the minutes: for hours will take care of themselves.”

Philip Stanhope, 4th Earl of Chesterfield

1747
Letters to His Son on the Art of Becoming a Man of the World and a Gentleman (1774)
Variant: I recommend you to take care of the minutes: for hours will take care of themselves.