A Quote by Daphne du Maurier

...but I should say that kindliness, and sincerity, and if I may say so--modesty--are worth far more to a man, to a husband, than all the wit and beauty in the world.

Daphne du Maurier

Quote Topics

Beauty Far Husband Kindliness Man May Modesty More Say Should Sincerity Than Wit World Worth

Quote Author

Daphne du Maurier
English - Novelist
May 13, 1907 - April 19, 1989

When custom has made familiar the charms that are most attractive, when youthful freshness has died away, and with the brightness of domestic life more and more shadows have mingled, then ... and not till then, can the wife say of the husband, "He is worthy of love;" then, first, the husband say of the wife, "She blooms in imperishable beauty.

Timothy Shay Arthur

The more sincerity is developed, the greater share of truth you will have. And however much sincerity a person may have, there is always a gap to fill, for we live in the midst of falsehood, and we are always apt to be carried away by this world of falsehood. Therefore we must never think we are sincere enough, and we must always be on our guard against influences which may carry us away from that sincerity which is the bridge between ourselves and our ideal. No study, no meditation is more helpful than sincerity itself.

Hazrat Inayat Khan

I should say sincerity, a deep, great, genuine sincerity, is the first characteristic of all men in any way heroic.

Thomas Carlyle

Consider the sunlight. You may say that it is near, yet if you pursue it from world to world you will never catch it. You may say it is far, yet it is right before your eyes. Chase it and it always eludes you; run from it and it is always there. From this example you can understand how it is with the true nature of things.

Huangbo Xiyun

This, more than anything else, is what I have never understood about your people. You can roll dice, and understand that the whole game may hinge on one turn of a die. You deal out cards, and say that all a man's fortune for the night may turn upon one hand. But a man's whole life, you sniff at, and say, what, this naught of a human, this fisherman, this carpenter, this thief, this cook, why, what can they do in the great wide world? And so you putter and sputter your lives away, like candles burning in a draft.

Robin Hobb

There's nothing like being in fashion. A man that has once got his character up for a wit is always sure of a laugh, say what he may. He may utter as much nonsense as he pleases, and all will pass current. No one stops to question the coin of a rich man; but a poor devil cannot pass off either a joke or a guinea without its being examined on both sides. Wit and coin are always doubted with a threadbare coat.

Washington Irving

It may be unpopular and out-of-date to say-but I do not think that a scientific result which gives us a better understanding of the world and makes it more harmonious in our eyes should be held in lower esteem than, say, an invention which reduces the cost of paving roads, or improves household plumbing.

Alfred Tarski

I find it more credible, since it is anterior information, that one man should know heaven, as the Chinese say, than that so many men should know the world.

Ralph Waldo Emerson

The Great Man's sincerity is of the kind he cannot speak of, is not conscious of: nay, I suppose, he is conscious rather of insincerity; for what man can walk accurately by the law of truth for one day? No, the Great Man does not boast himself sincere, far from that; perhaps does not ask himself if he is so: I would say rather, his sincerity does not depend on himself; he cannot help being sincere!

Thomas Carlyle

A wit should no more be sincere, than a woman constant; one argues a decay of parts, as to other of beauty.

William Congreve

It is more important that we should remember God than that we should breathe: indeed, if one may say so, we should do nothing else besides.

Gregory of Nazianzus

Doth perfect beauty stand in need of praise at all? Nay; no more than law, no more than truth, no more than loving kindness, nor than modesty.

Marcus Aurelius

To say less of yourself than is true is stupidity, not modesty. To pay yourself less than you are worth is cowardice and pusillanimity.

Michel de Montaigne

I don't think there's any intrinsic difference between a lover and a husband. ... If I were cynical, I would say that a woman should have both a good husband and a lover. But I'm not cynical so I'll just say that a woman should have a lover who's a good husband and a husband who's a good lover, perhaps both.

Francoise Sagan

The very essence of gravity was design, and, consequently, deceit; it was a taught trick to gain credit of the world for more sense end knowledge than a man was worth; and that with all its pretensions it was no better, but often worse, than what a French wit had long ago defined it--a mysterious carriage of the body to cover the defects of the mind.