If the guests want to wrest the check away from the host, because the host is also the guest of honor, then the guest who volunteers has to cover the whole thing. A guest can't volunteer -all- of the guests to pay for the host/honoree.
It is equally bad when one speeds on the guest unwilling to go, and when he holds back one who is hastening. Rather one should befriend the guest who is there, but speed him when he wishes.
It is good to dress in fair clothes to dine with friends. It honors your host, if you are a guest; and your guest if you are a host. And both adorn the feast, and so celebrate the gifts of the world.
The truly essential bargain between host and guest requires the guest only to respond promptly, show up on time, socialize with other guests, thank the host, write additional thanks and reciprocate. You needn't bring anything.
My father and I were never intimate in the sense of my coming to him with confidences or seeking advice. Our relationship was rather that of host and guest. Perhaps host and guest is really the happiest relation for father and son.
Hospitality is always an act that benefits the host even more than the guest. The concept of hospitality arose in ancient times when the reciprocity was easier to see: in nomadic cultures, the food and shelter one gave to a stranger yesterday is the food and shelter one hopes to receive from a stranger tomorrow. By offering hospitality, one participates in the endless reweaving of a social fabric on which all can depend-thus the gift of sustenance for the guest becomes a gift of hope for the host.
A guest is really good or bad because of the host or hostess who makes being a guest an easy or a difficult task.
I'm a much worse guest than I am a host, and I'm not an awfully good host either. I really like being alone.
The French are always reticent to surrender to the wishes of their friends and always more than willing to surrender to the wishes of their enemies.
THE soul should always stand ajar, That if the heaven inquire, He will not be obliged to wait, Or shy of troubling her. Depart, before the host has slid The bolt upon the door, To seek for the accomplished guest, -- Her visitor no more.
It is equally wrong to speed a guest who does not want to go, and to keep one back who is eager. You ought to make welcome the present guest, and send forth the one who wishes to go.
I'm a generous host, but I'm a difficult and interfering guest. When I go around to other people's houses and they're cooking, I'm always telling them what to do.
A guest should be permitted to graze, as it were, in the pastures of his host's kindness, left even to his own devices, like a rational being, and handsomely neglected.
A free-loader is a confirmed guest. He is the man who is always willing to come to dinner.
Pleasantest of all ties is the tie of host and guest.
People are always willing to follow advice when it accords with their own wishes.