Respectable Man Quotes

• I don't know what a scoundrel is like, but I know what a respectable man is like, and it's enough to make one's flesh creep.

  Joseph de Maistre

  Respect, Men, Flesh

  73 Copy quote

• I have no pretensions whatever to that kind of elegance which consists in tormenting a respectable man.

  Jane Austen

  Men, Prejudice, Kind

  Jane Austen (1853). “Pride and Prejudice”, p.97

  56 Copy quote

  Show source

• I do assure you, Sir, that I have no pretension whatever of that kind of elegance which consists in tormenting a respectable man. I would rather be paid the compliment of being believed sincere. I thank you again and again for the honour you have done me in your proposals, but to accept them is absolutely impossible. My feelings in every respect forbid it. Can I speak plainer? Do not consider me now as an elegant female intending to plague you, but as a rational creature speaking the truth from her heart.

  Jane Austen

  Heart, Men, Honour You

  Jane Austen (1853). “Pride and Prejudice”, p.97

  52 Copy quote

  Show source

• A mere literary man is a dull man; a man who is solely a man of business is a selfish man; but when literature and commerce are united, they make a respectable man.

  Samuel Johnson

  Respect, Selfish, Men

  Samuel Johnson (1836). “Johnsoniana: Or, Supplement to Boswell: Being Anecdotes and Sayings of Dr. Johnson”, p.416

  54 Copy quote

  Show source

• Horse-play, romping, frequent and loud fits of laughter, jokes, and indiscriminate familiarity, will sink both merit and knowledge into a degree of contempt. They compose at most a merry fellow; and a merry fellow was never yet a respectable man.

  Lord Chesterfield

  Horse, Laughter, Fun

  Lord Chesterfield, David Roberts (2008). “Lord Chesterfield's Letters”, p.140, Oxford University Press

  52 Copy quote

  Show source

• Time, which alone makes the reputation of men, ends by making their defects respectable.

  Voltaire

  Character, Men, Reputation

  8 Copy quote

• Unless you give yourself to some great cause you haven't even begun to live.

  William P. Merrill

  Giving, Causes, Easy Living

  15 Copy quote

• Men are respectable only as they respect.

  Ralph Waldo Emerson

  Respect, Army, Men

  Ralph Waldo Emerson (1954). “Basic Selections from Emerson: Essays, Poems & Apothegms”

  26 Copy quote

  Show source

• A respectable man may love madly, but not foolishly.

  Francois de La Rochefoucauld

  Love, Men, May

  4 Copy quote

• For the greatest fool and rascal in creation there is yet a worse condition; and that is, not to know it, but to think himself a respectable man.

  George MacDonald

  Men, Thinking, Fool

  George MacDonald (2015). “THOMAS WINGFOLD, CURATE + PAUL FABER, SURGEON + THERE AND BACK - The Complete Series: The Curate's Awakening, The Lady's Confession & The Baron's Apprenticeship”, p.230, e-artnow

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• An honest, sensible, humane man, . . . laboring to do good rather than be rich, to be useful rather than make a show, living in modest simplicity . . . is really the most respectable man in society, [and] makes himself and all about him most happy.

  John Adams

  Money, Men, Simplicity

  9 Copy quote

• Respectable men and women content with the good and easy living are missing some of the most important things in life. Unless you give yourself to some great cause you haven't even begun to live.

  William P. Merrill

  Life, Men, Giving

  46 Copy quote

• If we desire respect for the law, we must first make the law respectable.

  Louis D. Brandeis

  Respect, Law, Desire

  "A Treasury of Jewish Quotations". Book by Joseph L. Baron, 1996.

  70 Copy quote

  Show source

• I'm not concerned with your liking or disliking me... All I ask is that you respect me as a human being.

  Jackie Robinson

  Motivational, Change, Baseball

  "The Impact and Legacy Years, 1941, 1947, 1968". p. 100. Book by Fred Pulis, 2000.

  248 Copy quote

  Show source

• Do not consider me now as an elegant female intending to plague you, but as a rational creature speaking the truth from her heart.

  Jane Austen

  Honesty, Heart, Female

  Jane Austen (2007). “The Complete Novels of Jane Austen”, p.302, Wordsworth Editions

  10 Copy quote

  Show source

• The more things a man is ashamed of, the more respectable he is.

  George Bernard Shaw

  Respect, Integrity, Character

  Man and Superman (1903) act 1

  26 Copy quote

  Show source

• Reviewing the day's lessons. Isn't it joyful? Friends come from far. Isn't it delightful? One has never been angry at other's misunderstanding. Isn't he a respectable man?

  Confucius

  Men, Lessons, Joyful

  6 Copy quote

• The most dangerous lechers and creeps are not drunks wearing rags on the street, but respectable men wearing hairspray, pinstripes, and wedding rings who lurk in the halls of power.

  Michelle Malkin

  Men, Rags, Hairspray

  5 Copy quote

• The people who kill and torture and tell lies in the name of their sacred causes, these are never the publicans and the sinners. No, they're the virtuous, respectable men, who have the finest feelings, the best brains, the noblest ideals.

  Aldous Huxley

  Lying, Men, Names

  Aldous Huxley (1993). “After Many a Summer Dies the Swan: A Novel”, p.133, Ivan R. Dee

  21 Copy quote

  Show source

• I think you'll have to marry me, Miss Fielding." "To save your reputation?" Derek grinned, bending to kiss the flash of pale throat revealed by the robe. "Someone has to make a respectable man of me.

  Lisa Kleypas

  Kissing, Men, Thinking

  4 Copy quote

• I find that the respectable man, so called, has immediately drifted from his position, and despairs of his country, when his country has more reason to despair of him. He forthwith adopts one of the candidatesas the only available one, thus proving that he is himself available for any purposes of the demagogue. His vote is of no more worth than that of any unprincipled foreigner or hireling native, who may have been bought.

  Henry David Thoreau

  Country, Men, Voting

  4 Copy quote