Chapter IV: Part 4

"A wise man will turn adverse criticism and malicious attacks to good account. He will consider carefully whether there is not in him some weakness or fault which, although he never discovered, was plain to the eye of his enemy. Many men profit more by the assaults of foes than by the kindness of friends."

* * * * *

"Politeness is like an air cushion: there may be nothing in it, but it eases our jolts wonderfully."

* * * * *

Don't flatter yourself that friendship authorizes you to say disagreeable things to your intimates. On the contrary, the nearer you come into relation with a person the more necessary do tact and courtesy become. Except in cases of necessity, which are rare, leave your friend to learn unpleasant truths from his enemies: they are ready enough to tell them. Good breeding never forgets that _amour-propre_ is universal.

O. W. HOLMES.

* * * * *

Whatever our disbeliefs, most of us profoundly believe in goodness; and we incline to believe that a man who has practically learned the secret of noble living has somehow got near the truth of things.

GEO. S. MERRIAM.

* * * * *

"A man's bad temper sometimes does more toward spoiling a dinner than a woman's bad cooking."

* * * * *

_Her voice was ever soft,
Gentle and low; an excellent thing in
Woman._

SHAKESPEARE.

* * * * *

True politeness is perfect ease and freedom. It simply consists in treating others just as you love to be treated yourself.

CHESTERFIELD.

* * * * *

A man has no more right to say an uncivil thing than to act one, no more right to say a rude thing to another than to knock him down.

JOHNSON.

* * * * *

How sweet and gracious, even in common speech,
Is that fine sense which men call courtesy!
Wholesome as air and genial as the light,
Welcome in every clime as breath of flowers,----
It transmutes aliens into trusting friends,
And gives its owner passport round the globe.

J. T. FIELDS.

THE END.

TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES

1. Passages in italics are surrounded by _underscores_.

2. Punctuation errors have been corrected without note.

3. The following misprints have been corrected:
"repuation" corrected to "reputation" (page 2)
"sympatheic" corrected to "sympathetic" (page 38)
"Stael" corrected to "Stael" (page 59)

4. Other than the corrections listed above, printer's inconsistencies in spelling and hyphenation have been retained.

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