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Courtesy is showing politeness and consideration for others

• Courtesy: The showing of politeness in one’s attitude and behaviour towards others.  Oxford Dictionary
• Courtesy: Polite behaviour that shows respect for other people. Merriam Webster
• Courteousness is consideration for others; politeness is the method used to deliver such considerations. Bryant McGill
• Politeness: Having or showing good manners or respect for other people. Merriam Webster
• Respect,  Consideration,  Rudeness,  Reverence,  Tact

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True courtesy and politeness shows consideration to everyone at all times

• Really big people are, above everything else, courteous, considerate and generous – not just to some people in some circumstances – but to everyone all the time. Thomas J. Watson, Sr.
• Be courteous to all, but intimate with few, and let those few be well tried before you give them your confidence. George Washington
• The measure of a truly great man is the courtesy with which he treats lesser men.
• Treat everyone with politeness, even those who are rude to you – not because they are nice, but because you are.
• Courtesy should be a continuous action, not something to be turned on and off like a faucet.
• To be humble to superiors is duty, to equals courtesy, to inferiors nobleness. Benjamin Franklin
• It is better to have too much courtesy than too little, provided you are not equally courteous to all, for that would be injustice. Baltasar Gracian
• As the sword of the best tempered metal is most flexible, so the truly generous are most pliant and courteous in their behaviour to their inferiors. Thomas Fuller

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Some say politeness is a poor man’s virtue

• If you have no money, be polite. Danish Proverb
• Now there’s a poor man’s virtue if ever there was one. What’s so admirable about inoffensiveness, I should like to know. After all, it’s easily achieved. One needs no particular talent to be polite. On the contrary, being nice is what’s left when you’ve failed at everything else. People with ambition don’t give a damn what other people think about them. Diane Setterfield
• Virtue,  Poverty

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Of course, being polite is not always a genuine sign of respect

• You can demand courtesy but you have to earn respect. Lawrence Goldstone
• Politeness is organized indifference. Paul Valéry
• There can be no defence like elaborate courtesy. V. Lucas
• A polite enemy is just as difficult to discredit, as a rude friend is to protect. Bryant McGill
• One of the greatest victories you can gain over someone is to beat him at politeness. Josh Billings
• Politeness is the most acceptable hypocrisy. Ambrose Bierce
• Politeness is half good manners and half good lying. Mary Wilson Little
• Courtesy is only a thin veneer on the general selfishness. Honoré De Balzac
• Respect

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However, the fact is that politeness and courtesy play a very important role in lubricating relationships…

• Moving parts in contact require lubrication to avoid excessive wear. Honorifics and formal politeness provide lubrication where people rub together. Often, the very young, the untraveled, the naive, the unsophisticated deplore these formalities as empty, meaningless, or dishonest, and scorn to use them. No matter how pure their motives, they thereby throw sand into the machinery that does not work too well at best. Robert A. Heinlein
• It’s a pity so many of us persist in regarding politeness as being merely a superficial social grace instead of what it really is, namely one of the necessities of life. Quite apart from politeness for its own sake, and as a matter of plain justice, it is invaluable as a sort of cushion or buffer to hold off the jolt that would otherwise disrupt the harmony of things. Zealandia
• Principles for healthy relationships

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… and practicing courtesy brings great benefits…

• Use a sweet tongue, courtesy, and gentleness, and thou mayest manage to guide an elephant by a hair. Sa’di
• Politeness is to human nature what warmth is to wax. Arthur Schopenhauer
• He who sows courtesy reaps friendship, and he who plants kindness gathers love. Basil
• The small courtesies sweeten life; the greater ennoble it. Christian Nevell Bovee
• There is a courtesy of the heart; it is allied to love. From its springs the purest courtesy in the outward behaviour. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
• Outcomes rarely turn on grand gestures or the art of the deal, but on whether you’ve sent someone a thank-you note. Bernie Brillstein
• When music and courtesy are better understood and appreciated, there will be no war. Confucius
• Men, like bullets, go farthest when they are smoothest. Jean Paul Richter
• A polite enemy is just as difficult to discredit, as a rude friend is to protect. Bryant McGill
• A good deed is never lost; he who sows courtesy reaps friendship, and he who plants kindness gathers love. Basil
• Politeness is an inexpensive way of making friends. William Feather
• Six essential qualities that are the key to success: Sincerity, personal integrity, humility, courtesy, wisdom, charity. William Menninger
• Civility costs nothing and buys everything. Mary Wortley Montague
• Friends and good manners will carry you where money won’t go. Margaret Walker
• To succeed in the world, it is not enough to be stupid, you must also be well-mannered. Voltaire
• Good manners and soft words have brought many a difficult thing to pass. Sir John Vanbrugh

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… for courtesy is a small act but packs a mighty wallop

• Nothing is ever lost by courtesy. It is the cheapest of the pleasures, costs nothing and conveys much. It pleases him who gives and him who receives, and thus, like mercy, it is twice blessed. Erastus Wiman
• Courtesy is a small act but it packs a mighty wallop. Lewis Carroll
• Courtesies of a small and trivial character are the ones which strike deepest in the grateful and appreciating heart. Henry Clay

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Usually, politeness simply makes sense and it is stupid to be wantonly rude

• It is a wise thing to be polite; consequently, it is a stupid thing to be rude. To make enemies by unnecessary and wilful incivility, is just as insane a proceeding as to set your house on fire. For politeness is like a counter–an avowedly false coin, with which it is foolish to be stingy. Arthur Schopenhauer
• Politeness is the result of good sense and good nature. Oliver Goldsmith

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Courtesy says much about you…

• If a man be gracious and courteous to strangers, it shows he is a citizen of the world, and that his heart is no island cut off from other lands, but a continent that joins to them. Francis Bacon, Sr.
• A real gentleman is as polite to a little girl as to a woman. Louisa May Alcott
• Character

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… and so does rudeness

• Rudeness is the weak man’s imitation of strength. Eric Hoffer
• Whoever one is, and wherever one is, one is always in the wrong if one is rude. Maurice Baring

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Courtesy can take different forms

• Gratitude is the most exquisite form of courtesy. Jacques Maritain
• Grant others the same rights as you claim for yourself. Robert G. Ingersoll
• The test of good manners is to be patient with bad ones. Gabirol
• Play fair. Don’t hit people. Say you’re sorry when you hurt somebody. Robert Fulghum
• People count up the faults of those who keep them waiting. French Proverb
• Visitors should behave in such a way that the host and hostess feel at home. S. Farynski

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Often, courtesy is simply showing politeness and being pleasant

• Politeness is the art of choosing among one’s real thoughts. Abel Stevens
• True politeness consists in being easy one’s self, and in making everyone about one as easy as one can. Alexander Pope
• Politeness is good nature regulated by good sense. Sydney Smith
• The spirit of politeness is a desire to bring about by our words and manners, that others may be pleased with us and with themselves. Montesquieu
• Politeness has been well defined as benevolence in small things. Thomas B. Macaulay

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Courtesy is having good manners and being aware of the feelings of others

• Manners are a sensitive awareness of the feelings of others. If you have that awareness, you have good manners, no matter which fork you use.  Emily Post
• Good manners are just a way of showing other people that we have respect for them. Bill Kelly

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Courtesy can also take the form of biting your own tongue

• The most difficult thing in the world is to know how to do a thing and silently watch someone else do it wrong. H. White
• If you have nothing nice to say about a person . . . don’t say it.
• To speak kindly does not hurt the tongue. Proverb

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To disagree, you don’t have to be disagreeable

• To disagree, one doesn’t have to be disagreeable. Barry M. Goldwater and Jack Casserly

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Often courtesy consists in having tact

• Tact is the knack of making a point without making an enemy. Howard W. Newton
• Tact is the great ability to see other people as they think you see them. Carl Zuckmayer
• Silence is not always tact, but it is tact that is golden, not silence. Samuel Butler
• The secret of man’s success resides in his insight into the moods of people, and his tact in dealing with them. Josiah Gilbert Holland
• Tact is after all a kind of mind reading. Sarah Orne Jewett
• Tact is the ability to describe others as they see themselves. Abraham Lincoln
• Tact is ability to see others as they wish to be seen.
• Be sure, when you think you are being extremely tactful, that you are not in reality running away from something you ought to face. Frank Medlicott
• Tact is the interpreter of all riddles, the surmounter of all difficulties, the remover of all obstacles. William Scargill
• A quick and sound judgment, good common sense, kind feeling, and an instinctive perception of character, in these are the elements of what is called tact, which has so much to do with acceptability and success in life. Charles Simmons
• Tact, the kind of tact you should cultivate, is not a form of deception or make-believe, but a cultivated taste which gives fine perception in seeing and doing what is best under all circumstances. There is nothing which will so readily bring you into favor, or disarm an opponent, as the right use of tact. Grenville Kleiser
• Tact

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Be courteous with friends, not just strangers

• Don’t flatter yourself that friendship authorizes you to say disagreeable things to your intimates. The nearer you come into relation with a person, the more necessary do tact and courtesy become. Oliver Wendell Holmes
• It is wise to apply the oil of refined politeness to the mechanism of friendship. Sidonie Gabrielle Colette

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Some say passion and courtesy are polar opposites, but surely you can be both polite and passionate?

• Politeness is okay, but it gets old and boring. You want to attack life with a passion, not a politeness, you want people to think about you and remember you and say, “she is so passionate” you don’t want people to think about you and remember you and say “she is so polite,” because, who cares about polite?” JoyBell C.
• Passion and courtesy are two polar opposite traits that serve to balance each other into a full-blooded whole. Without socialization, passion is a crude barbarian, and without passion, the elegant and polite are dead. Allow both passion and courtesy into your life in equal measure, and be complete. Vera Nazarian

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Thoughts on manners

• Good manners are appreciated as much as bad manners are abhorred. Bryant McGill
• Good manners are just a way of showing other people that we have respect for them. Bill Kelly
• Good manners are made up of petty sacrifices. Ralph Waldo Emerson
• Good manners can replace morals. It may be years before anyone knows if what you are doing is right.  But if what you are doing is nice, it will be immediately evident.  J. O’Rourke
• Manners are a sensitive awareness of the feelings of others. If you have that awareness, you have good manners, no matter which fork you use.  Emily Post
• Manners are a sensitive awareness of the feelings of others. If you have that awareness, you have good manners, no matter what fork you use. Emily Post
• A man’s manners are a mirror in which he shows his portrait. Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
• Good manners have much to do with the emotions. To make them ring true, one must feel them, not merely exhibit them. Amy Vanderbilt
• Manners are the ability to put someone else at their ease…by turning any answer into another question. Tina Brown
• Clothes and manners do not make the man; but, when he is made, they greatly improve his appearance. Henry Ward Beecher Quotes
• Good manners and soft words have brought many a difficult thing to pass. Sir John Vanbrugh
• When a man points a finger at someone else, he should remember that four of his fingers are pointing at himself. Louis Nizer
• Etiquette is behaving yourself a little better than is absolutely essential. Will Cuppy
• Friends and good manners will carry you where money won’t go. Margaret Walker
• A man’s own manner and character is what most becomes him. Cicero
• Manners easily and rapidly mature into morals. Horace Mann
• A man’s own good breeding is the best security against other people’s ill manners. Lord Chesterfield
• Savages we call them because their manners differ from ours. Benjamin Franklin
• Nowadays, manners are easy and life is hard. Benjamin Disraeli

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More thoughts on courtesy

• Life is short, but there is always time enough for courtesy. Ralph Waldo Emerson
• Courtesy is a silver lining around the dark clouds of civilization; it is the best part of refinement and in many ways, an art of heroic beauty in the vast gallery of man’s cruelty and baseness. Bryant McGill
• Courteous men learn courtesy from the discourteous. Persian Proverb
• Courtesy on one side can never last long. Proverb
• What you discover about people you try not to offend is that you can offend them without trying. Robert Brault
• We must be as courteous to a man as we are to a picture, which we are willing to give the advantage of a good light. Ralph Waldo Emerson
• No one is more insufferable than he who lacks basic courtesy. Bryant McGill
• Courtesies cannot be borrowed like snow shovels; you must have some of your own. John Wanamaker
• Courtesy is the one coin you can never have too much of or be stingy with. John Wanamaker
• Charm is an innate quality of mind and heart, and an expression of a beautiful attitude toward life. Courtesy can be cultivated, but charm is largely an unconscious possession. Grenville Kleiser
• Children are natural mimics who act like their parents despite every effort to teach them good manners.
• Grace is to the body, what good manners are to the mind. François de la Rochefoucauld
• Let not the emphasis of hospitality lie in bed and board; but let truth and love and honour and courtesy flow in all thy deeds. Ralph Waldo Emerson
• Propriety of manners and consideration for others are the two main characteristics of a gentleman. Benjamin Disraeli
• Saying Thank You is more than good manners, it’s good spirituality. Alfred-Pierre Joseph Agache

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More thoughts on politeness

• Politeness is closely linked to tolerance, the capacity to live alongside people whom one will never agree with, but at the same time, cannot avoid. Alain de Botton
• Politeness is the poison of collaboration. Edwin Land
• Be humble and polite, but don’t let anyone push you around. H. Jackson Brown, Jr.
• I place a high moral value on the way people behave. I find it repellent to have a lot, and to behave with anything other than courtesy in the old sense of the word — politeness of the heart, a gentleness of the spirit. Emma Thompson
• If you expect to succeed as a writer, rudeness should be the second-to-least of your concerns. The least of all should be polite society and what it expects. If you intend to write as truthfully as you can, your days as a member of polite society are numbered, anyway. Stephen King
• Those who honour are honoured. Politeness and a sense of honour have this advantage: we bestow them on others without losing a thing. Baltasar Gracián y Morales

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• A car is useless in New York, essential everywhere else; the same with good manners. Mignon McLaughlin
• Admiration: Our polite recognition of another’s resemblance to ourselves. Ambrose Bierce
• Always be nice to people to their face. Then when they turn around, berate the back of their head. Benson Bruno
• Apology: Politeness too late.
• At a dinner party one should eat wisely but not too well, and talk well but not too wisely. William Somerset Maugham
• Brat: A child who displays his pest manners.
• Canadians are more polite when they are being rude than Americans are when they are being friendly.
• Courtesy: Acceptable hypocrisy.
• Courtesy: The art of yawning with your mouth closed.
• E-mail has some magical ability to turn off the politeness gene in a human being. Jeff Bezos
• Good breeding consists in concealing how much we think of ourselves and how little we think of the other person. Mark Twain
• Good manners: The noise you don’t make when you’re eating soup.  Bennett Cerf
• He combines the manners of a Marquis with the morals of a Methodist. S. Gilbert
• He’s the pineapple of politeness.
• Hospitality is making your guests feel at home, even if you wish they were.
• How long is it polite to pretend to continue to listen to someone after they’ve revealed they’ve got a boyfriend? Russell Brand
• I don’t mind if you don’t like my manners. I don’t like them myself. They’re pretty bad. I grieve over them on long winter evenings. Humphrey Bogart
• I tried to be polite and hold the door open for a woman, but she kept screaming, “I’m peeing in here!”
• In some countries what I did would be considered polite especially Fartland. Jack Handey
• It’s the height of bad manners to sleep with somebody less than three times. Mark Boxer
• Its bad manners to talk with your mouth full, unless you’re praising your wife’s cooking.
• Manners: Noises you don’t make when eating soup.
• One of the greatest victories you can gain over someone is to beat him at politeness. Josh Billings
• Polite conversation is rarely either. Fran Lebowitz
• Politeness is a pleasing way to get nowhere with women.
• Politeness is half good manners and half good lying. Mary Wilson Little
• Politeness, n. The most acceptable hypocrisy.  Ambrose Bierce
• Some people are kind, polite, and sweet-spirited until you try to sit in their pews.
• The courtesy phone is temporarily out of service. For assistance please call 503-849 . Sign
• The Japanese have perfected good manners and made them indistinguishable from rudeness. Paul Theroux
• The only substitute for good manners is fast reflexes.
• To succeed in the world it is not enough to be stupid, you must also be well-mannered. Voltaire
• Twas a woman who drove me to drink and I never had the courtesy to thank her for it. C. Fields
• When wearing a bikini, women reveal 90 % of their body… men are so polite they only look at the covered parts.
• Which of Santa’s reindeers needs to mind his manners the most? “Rude”olph
• You can’t be truly rude until you understand good manners. Rita Mae Brown

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