A Quote by Baron de Montesquieu

The English are busy; they don't have time to be polite.

Baron de Montesquieu

Quote Topics

Busy English Polite Time

Quote Author

Baron de Montesquieu
French - Author
January 18, 1689 - February 10, 1755

The English are busy folk; they have no time in which to be polite.

Baron de Montesquieu

The English are polite by telling lies. The Americans are polite by telling the truth.

Malcolm Bradbury

What I see as specially English is the charm - everyone is so polite. Being restrained is part of the charm. And I love the sense of humour - it takes me back to Australia. The English are great at making fun of themselves. They're so self-effacing.

Danielle de Niese

Before, if your phone was busy, your phone was busy. You had no cell phone. Now people work 24/7, their BlackBerry keeps them busy, and e-mail - and when do they have time for other pursuits? When do they have time to be politically active?

Paula Patton

Being English, we're polite and reserved, we don't express our opinions; we're very private people.

Steven Wilson

Not long time ago there was a striking example of the extent to which English has diverged: a television company put out a programme filmed in the English city of Newcastle, where the local variety of English is famously divergent and difficult, and the televised version was accompanied by English subtitles!

Larry Trask

I told her tea bags were just a convenience for people with busy lives and she said no one is so busy they can't take time to make a decent cup of tea and if you are that busy you don't deserve a decent cup of tea for what is it all about anyway? Are we put into this world to be busy or to chat over a nice cup of tea?

Frank McCourt

I will be busy playing, getting in shape, and learning English, and being in a smaller town will help me do that. And I want the challenge of trying to get Bolton into Europe for the first time in their history.

Rivaldo

Are you too busy for improvement? Frequently, I am rebuffed by people who say they are too busy and have no time for such activities. I make it a point to respond by telling people, look, you’ll stop being busy either when you die or when the company goes bankrupt.

Shigeo Shingo

I'm English and I'm used to coming from a world of period dramas, where there's a very polite restraint to everything. Everybody's sort of sitting in drawing rooms.

Clive Owen

In that intensely busy time of children and work, soup became my stalwart friend and I learned its true value. Anyone who's been there knows. You're busy, too much to do, time vanishes, the kids are relentless, and everyone is hungry all the time. Something as comforting, delicious, and practical as soup is like gold.

Anna Thomas

I think that timing is everything. At first, it was too soon. And then, the time was right, but I was busy with other things, and the cast was busy with other things. By the time we sat down to work on the movie, enough time had passed that suddenly a different story emerged.