Precept & Practice – MAY 19 – Rules for Deportment

He told us it was childish to lay down rules for deportment, – but he could not help laying down a few.

Thus, – Nothing so vulgar as to be in a hurry. – True, but hard of application.   People with short legs step quickly, because legs are pendulums, and swing more times in a minute the shorter they are.   Generally a natural rhythm runs through the whole organisation:  quick pulse, fast breathing, hasty speech, rapid trains of thought, excitable temper.

Stillness of person and steadiness of features are signal marks of good-breeding.   Vulgar persons can’t sit still, or, at least, they must work their limbs or features.

Talking of one’s own ails and grievances. – Bad enough, but not so bad as insulting the person you talk with by remarking on his ill-looks, or appearing to notice any of his personal peculiarities.

Apologising. – A very desperate habit, – one that is rarely cured.   Apology is only egotism wrong side out.  Nine times out of ten, the first thing a man’s companion knows of his shortcoming is from his apology.   It is mighty presumptuous on your part to suppose your small failures of so much consequence that you must make a talk about them.

Oliver Wendell Holmes (The Professor at the Breakfast Table)

Not frequently nor without necessity to say to any one, or to write in a letter, that I have no leisure;  nor continually to excuse the neglect of duties required by our relation to those with whom we live, by alleging urgent occupation.

Marcus Aurelius

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From the Introduction to Precept and Practice

The kindly welcome given to my other little books, ‘Being and Doing’ and ‘Character and Conduct,’ must be my excuse for adding another collection of extracts to the number now in circulation.

The quotations are gathered from the books of many earnest thinkers, and deal with Life in all its length and breadth, with ourselves, our characters, our plain unvarnished faults and weaknesses, our often untoward circumstances, and with all that drags us down;-  with our purposes, our religion, our love and friendships, and with all that uplifts us;-  with our relation to others, our influence and responsibilities, and finally with those stages of our journey which bring us to the Road’s Last Turn and to the Silent Land.

CONSTANCE  M. WHISHAW