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Modest Quotes

Browse 622 quotes about Modest.

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Modest Quotes

“He was the meekest of his sex, the mildest of little men. He sidled in and out of a room, to take up the less space. He walked as softly as the Ghost in Hamlet, and more slowly. He carried his head on one side, partly in modest depreciation of himself, partly in modest propitiation of everybody else.”

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Book:The Personal History of David Copperfield ... With Frontispiece by H. K. Browne
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“A modest ring at the bell at length allayed her fears, and Miss Benton, hurrying into her own room and shutting herself up, in order that she might preserve that appearance of being taken by surprise which is so essential to the polite reception of visitors, awaited their coming with a smiling countenance.”

MightFunnyOrderRoomsTakenMissingEssentialsHumorousSurpriseAppearanceRingsPreservesLengthBellsModestPoliteVisitorsCountenanceReceptionHurrying
Book:THE MYSTERY OF EDWIN DROOD, MASTER HUMPHREY'S CLOCK, AND SKETCHES BY
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“Seeking the Cave is part travelogue, part literary history, and part spiritual journey. James Lenfestey is a lively and entertaining tour guide. Modest, funny, curious, and wide open to the world, he gives us perceptive glimpses of Chinese culture, ancient to contemporary, and into what it means to be a poet, both now and twelve centuries ago. The account of his quest to find Han Shan's cave is a delight from beginning to end.”

WorldGivingMeanEndsSpiritualCultureJourneyCenturyPoetAccountsAncientDelightSeekingWideGuidesContemporaryCuriousChineseTwelveEntertainingQuestsModestGlimpseCavesLivelySpiritual JourneyChinese CultureTour Guides
Author:Chase Twichell
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“American gentlemen are a cross between English and French men, and yet really altogether like neither. They are more refined and modest than Frenchmen, and less manly, shy, and rough, than Englishmen. Their brains are finer and flimsier, their bodies less robust and vigorous than ours. We are the finer animals, and they the subtler spirits. Their intellectual tendency is to excitement and insanity, and ours to stagnation and stupidity.”

MenBodySpiritAnimalBrainIntellectualCrossesStupidityTendenciesInsanityExcitementGentlemanShyRoughModestEnglishmenVigorousRefinedManlyRobustStagnationFrenchmenGentility
Book:Further Records, 1848-1883: A Series of Letters
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“... goodness is of a modest nature, easily discouraged, and when much elbowed in early life by unabashed vices, is apt to retire into extreme privacy, so that it is more easily believed in by those who construct a selfish old gentleman theoretically, than by those who form the narrower judgments based on his personal acquaintance.”

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Book:Middlemarch: A Study of Provincial Life. By George Eliot ....
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“I became a little alarmed at the number of my readers who took the meme more positively as a theory of human culture in its own right - either to criticize it (unfairly, given my original modest intention) or to carry it far beyond the limits of what I then thought justified. This was why I may have seemed to backtrack.”

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Book:A Devil's Chaplain
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“If Heaven a draught of heavenly pleasure spare, One cordial in this melancholy vale, 'T is when a youthful, loving, modest pair In other's arms breathe out the tender tale”

IfsHeavenPleasureArmsBreatheTalesHeavenlyPairsMelancholyModestSparesDraught
Book:The Poetical Works of Robert Burns. To which are Now Added, Notes Illustrating Historical, Personal, and Local Allusions. [The Editor's Preface Signed: R. C., I.e. Robert Chambers.]
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“I would be the last to deny that the greatest scientific pioneers belonged to an aristocracy of the spirit and were exceptionally intelligent, something that we as modest investigators will never attain, no matter how much we exert ourselves. Nevertheless ... I continue to believe that there is always room for anyone with average intelligence ... to utilize his energy and ... any man could, if he were so inclined, be the sculptor of his own brain, and that even the least gifted may, like the poorest land that has been well-cultivated and fertilized, produce an abundant harvest.”

IfsMenBelieveWellsMayHas BeensMatterWould BeLastsSpiritBeliefEnergyRoomsBrainLandProduceIntelligentAverageIntelligenceDenyNeverthelessGiftedModestHarvestExceptionalAttainmentPioneersPoorestAristocracySculptorsExertionInvestigators
Author:Santiago Ramon y Cajal
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“And I want women to be modest in their appearance. They should wear decent and appropriate clothing and not draw attention to themselves by the way they fix their hair or by wearing gold or pearls or expensive clothes. For women who claim to be devoted to God should make themselves attractive by the good things they do.”

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Author:Paul the Apostle
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“I am very fond of the modest manner of life of those solitary owners of remote villages, who in Little Russia are commonly called "old-fashioned," who are like tumbledown picturesque little houses, delightful in their simplicity and complete unlikeness to the new smooth buildings whose walls have not yet been discolored by the rain, whose roofs are not yet covered with green lichen, and whose porch does not display its bricks through the peeling stucco.”

LittlesDoeHouseBuildingWallRainGreenSimplicityRussiaOwnersVillageCoveredDisplaySolitaryRoofSmoothModestDelightfulOld FashionedBricksPorchPeelingPicturesque
Book:The Complete Tales of Nikolai Gogol
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“...how little our side of the industry did to move its business to the more ethical firms and to make a fuss about conflicted or unethical behavior. Had a number of us moved our business, we might have slowed or even stopped the 30-year slide in conflicted, unethical behavior that we have experienced. I, for one, regret the modest nature of our moves. We all could have done more. We have tolerated a pretty nasty decline in standards. Shame on us.”

YearsLittlesDoneMightMovingSidesNumbersRegretIndustryBehaviorStandardsShameMovedFirmEthicalDeclineNastyModestSlidesUnethical
Author:Jeremy Grantham
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“The social or economic structure of the ideal state is of little concern to me. My desires are modest. Portraits of the head of the government should not exceed a postage stamp in size. No torture and no executions. No music, except coming through earphones, or played in theaters. Freedom of speech, freedom of thought, freedom of art.”

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Author:Vladimir Nabokov
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“The idea that the profits of capital are really the rewards of a just society for the foresight and thrift of those who sacrificed the immediate pleasures of spending in order that society might have productive capital, had a certain validity in the early days of capitalism, when productive enterprise was frequently initiated through capital saved out of modest incomes.”

IdeasMightCertainOrderPleasureCapitalismRewardsProfitSpendingSavedIncomeEnterpriseProductiveConsumerismModestForesightValidityOverconsumptionThrift
Book:Moral Man and Immoral Society: A Study in Ethics and Politics
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“Think that you are part of a big construction called science and you are not just a chemist but you are scientist. Be modest but proud. Modest because you know you will not be able to solve other problems because your life is too short. But be proud because you are contributing to it. Some people will bring a small stone to the building and some people will bring a big one but nevertheless no one can take that stone away from you.”

PeopleThinkingKnowsProblemBigsAbleLife IsBuildingProudStonesScientistSolveConstructionNeverthelessModestBe ProudToo ShortLife Is Too ShortContributingAway From YouChemist
Author:Jean-Marie Lehn
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