“Never speak disrespectfully of Society, Algernon. Only people who can’t get into it do that.”
Oscar Wilde The Importance of Being Earnest
Lady Bracknell, Act III
Source: The Importance of Being Earnest (1895)
Misattributed, Jackson's personal book of maxims
“Never speak disrespectfully of Society, Algernon. Only people who can’t get into it do that.”
Oscar Wilde The Importance of Being Earnest
Lady Bracknell, Act III
Source: The Importance of Being Earnest (1895)
Sydney Smith (1771–1845) English writer and clergyman
Vol. I, p. 17
Lady Holland's Memoir (1855), Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)
Robert E. Lee (1807–1870) Confederate general in the Civil War
After one of the faculty at Washington College in Virginia (now Washington & Lee University) had spoken insultingly of Ulysses S. Grant, as quoted in Lee the American (1912) by Gamaliel Bradford, p. 226
Ai Weiwei (1957) Chinese concept artist
2010-, Ai Weiwei Says Blind Dissident’s Escape Will Inspire Chinese, 2012
“I’ve never had anyone’s approval, so I’ve learned to live without it.”
Pat Conroy book The Great Santini
Source: The Great Santini
“I’d made a vow when I got over here never to speak to anyone I’d ever known before.”
Elaine Dundy (1921–2008) American journalist, actress
Part One, One
The Dud Avocado (1958)
Context: I’d made a vow when I got over here never to speak to anyone I’d ever known before. Yet here we were, two Americans who hadn’t really seen each other for years; here was someone from "home” who knew me when, if you like, and, instead of shambling back into the bushes like a startled rhino, I was absolutely thrilled at the whole idea.
"I like it here, don’t you?” said Larry, indicating the café with a turn of his head.
I had to admit I’d never been there before.
He smiled quizzically. "You should come more often,” he said. "It’s practically the only nontourist trap to survive on the Left Bank. It’s real” he added.
Real, I thought … whatever that meant.
Jonathan Edwards (1703–1758) Christian preacher, philosopher, and theologian
No. 16.
Seventy Resolutions (1722-1723)
José Maria Eça de Queiroz book Cartas de Inglaterra
Estranha gente, para quem é fora de dúvida que ninguém pode ser moral sem ler a Bíblia, ser forte sem jogar o críquete e ser gentleman sem ser inglês! E é isto que os torna detestados. Nunca se fundem, nunca se desinglesam.
"Os Ingleses no Egipto"; "The English in Egypt" pp. 159-60.
Cartas de Inglaterra (1879–82)