Humor is the politeness of despair.

“Men circle like bees around honey, buzzing to communicate their sexual despair.”

— Carla H Krueger

“Francis Bacon somewhere remarks that politeness veils vice just as dress masks wrinkles.”

— John Doran

“In England I am always madam; I arrived too late to ever be a miss. In New York I have only been madamed once,…

— Anna Quindlen

When I act tough they listen politely till the spasm passes. They know.

— Frank McCourt

“As the head of an expedition, you can't pussyfoot around being polite to everyone. You have to show your teeth once in a while;…

— Tahir Shah

“In general, poor is polite and rich is rude.”

— Amit Kalantri

Adrian's face was the picture of perfect politeness and restraint, meaning something disastrous was about to happen.

— Richelle Mead

To joke in the face of danger is the supreme politeness, a delicate refusal to cast oneself as a tragic hero.

— Edmond Rostand

With hat in hand, one gets on in the world.

— Berthold Auerbach

I still do find it very difficult in the West to connect to this politeness of smiling, not saying how you're thinking or not…

— Waris Dirie

Good-breeding is not confined to externals, much less to any particular dress or attitude of the body; it is the art of pleasing, or…

— Henry Fielding

There are few defects in our nature so glaring as not to be veiled from observation by politeness and good-breeding.

— Stanisław I Leszczyński

The highest perfection of politeness is only a beautiful edifice, built, from the base to the dome, of ungraceful and gilded forms of charitable…

— Mark Twain

“The closest she got to pretence was politeness.”

— Alan Bennett

The sight of the bare katana inspires everyone to a practically Nipponese level of politeness

— Neal Stephenson