QuoteProject
Politeness is to human nature what warmth is to wax.
Arthur Schopenhauer
ShareWTF𝕏

Interpretation

What this quote means

Politeness enhances human interactions just as warmth changes the nature of wax.

This quote by Arthur Schopenhauer illustrates the vital role that politeness plays in human relations. Just as warmth can soften and alter the physical properties of wax, politeness can influence and improve the dynamic of human interactions, fostering goodwill and understanding among individuals.

Themes

PolitenessHuman NatureInteractionWarmthKindness

In practice

Example use cases

During a speech about effective communication in the workplace.

More from Arthur Schopenhauer

We can come to look upon the deaths of our enemies with as much regret as we feel for those of our friends, namely, when we miss their existence as witnesses to our success.
Arthur SchopenhauerRead
To be shocked at how deeply rejection hurts is to ignore what acceptance involves. We must never allow our suffering to be compounded by suggestions that there is something odd in suffering so deeply. There would be something amiss if we didn't.
Arthur SchopenhauerRead
Almost all of our sorrows spring out of our relations with other people.
Arthur SchopenhauerRead
Life is full of troubles and vexations, that one must either rise above it by means of corrected thoughts, or leave it.
Arthur SchopenhauerRead
Our religions will never at any time take root; the ancient wisdom of the human race will not be supplanted by the events in Galilee. On the contrary, Indian wisdom flows back to Europe, and will produce a fundamental change in our knowledge and thought.
Arthur SchopenhauerRead
We will gradually become indifferent to what goes on in the minds of other people when we acquire a knowledge of the superficial nature of their thoughts, the narrowness of their views and of the number of their errors. Whoever attaches a lot of value to the opinions of others pays them too much honor.
Arthur SchopenhauerRead

Similar quotes

I don't do formal debates, because formal debates where you have two people up on a stage in equal status, and each of them is given 20 minutes to give their point of view, and then 10 minutes for a rebuttal, or whatever, that creates the illusion that you really do have here two equal points of view of equal scientific standing.
Richard DawkinsRead
There is neither happiness nor misery in the world; there is only the comparison of one state with another, nothing more. He who has felt the deepest grief is best able to experience supreme happiness.
Alexandre DumasRead
It is insufficient to say that my experience as a bully haunts me. Rather, my experience as a bully has been fundamental to the creation of my conscience, because it is what prevents me from making the basic human claim that I am a good person.
Tom JunodRead
Little islands are all large prisons: one cannot look at the sea without wishing for the wings of a swallow.
Richard BurtonRead
Property is surely a right of mankind as real as liberty.
John AdamsRead
We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable. So did the divine right of kings.
Ursula K. Le GuinRead

A little wisdom, now and then

Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.