Etiquette requires the presumption of good until the contrary is proved.
Emily PostRead
Courtesy demands that you, when you are a guest, shall show neither annoyance nor disappointment--no matter what happens.
Interpretation
As a guest, you should remain polite and composed regardless of your feelings about the situation.
This quote by Emily Post emphasizes the importance of etiquette in social situations, particularly when you are a guest. It suggests that good manners require you to hide any negative emotions like annoyance or disappointment, thereby maintaining a pleasant atmosphere for both yourself and your host. By adhering to this guideline, you show respect and understanding, fostering positive relationships and social harmony.
In practice
During a formal dinner party, when the food is not to your taste, remember to keep a smile and be gracious.
Etiquette requires the presumption of good until the contrary is proved.
If you are hurt, whether in mind or body, don't nurse your bruises. Get up, and light-heartedly, courageously, good-temperedly, get ready for the next encounter.
To make a pleasant and friendly impression is not alone good manners, but equally good business.
An overdose of praise is like 10 lumps of sugar in coffee; only a very few people can swallow it.
Any child can be taught to be beautifully behaved with no effort greater than quiet patience and perseverance, whereas to break bad habits once they are acquired is a Herculean task.
Manners are a sensitive awareness of the feelings of others. If you have that awareness, you have good manners, no matter what fork you use.
Repeal that [welfare] law, and you will soon see a change in their manners. ... Six days shalt thou labor, though one of the old commandments long treated as out of date, will again be looked upon as a respectable precept; industry will increase, and with it plenty among the lower people; their circumstances will mend, and more will be done for their happiness by inuring them to provide for themselves, than could be done by dividing all your estates among them.
Oh Tigger, where are your manners?" "I donβt know, but I bet theyβre having more fun than I am.
They didn't know why these things were funny. Sometimes you laugh because you've got no more room for crying. Sometimes you laugh because table manners on a beach are funny. And sometimes you laugh because you're alive, when you really shouldn't be.
No guest is so welcome in a friend's house that he will not become a nuisance after three days.
There are two qualities that make fiction. One is the sense of mystery and the other is the sense of manners. You get the manners from the texture of existence that surrounds you. The great advantage of being a Southern writer is that we don't have to go anywhere to look for manners; bad or good, we've got them in abundance. We in the South live in a society that is rich in contradiction, rich in irony, rich in contrast, and particularly rich in its speech
Now, a corpse, poor thing, is an untouchable and the process of decay is, of all pieces of bad manners, the vulgarest imaginable. For a corpse is, by definition, a person absolutely devoid of savoir vivre.
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