In a troubled state, we must do as in foul weather upon a river, not
think to cut directly through, for the boat may be filled with water;
but rise and fall as the waves do, and give way as much as we
conveniently can.--_Seldon._
To manage men one ought to have a sharp mind in a velvet
sheath.--_George Eliot._
~Politeness.~--Politeness is fictitious benevolence. It supplies the place
of it among those who see each other only in public, or but little.
Depend upon it, the want of it never fails to produce something
disagreeable to one or other. I have always applied to good breeding
what Addison, in his "Cato," says of honor: "Honor's a sacred tie: the
law of kings; the noble mind's distinguishing perfection; that aids and
strengthens Virtue where it meets her, and imitates her actions where
she is not."--_Johnson._