Graciousness Quotes

I needn't have worried about our welcome. As soon as Diana spotted me, she cried out happily, "Mrs. Robertson, I'm so glad you're here!" and gave me a huge, spontaneous hug.
I assured her, "We wouldn't have missed this for the world!" I was touched by her genuine warmth and by her evident surprise that we'd traveled so far to share in her triumph.
She turned quickly to exclaim, "Oh Charles, look! it's Patrick's parents from America!" and formally introduced us to the Prince of Wales. Pat bowed and I curtsied and murmured "Your Royal Highness" just to be on the safe side. Prince Charles radiated tremendous charm and graciousness. His eyes twinkled as he smiled at us. His voice was deep, warm, and resonant, as he said, "How very nice of you to have traveled so far." I loved his voice! He seemed genuinely pleased to meet us. I thought he was absolutely terrific. I was so excited for Diana, about to marry this perfect prince. ~ Mary Robertson

Decency is the essence of morality, It spreads out like the scent of a rose and shows to world your elegance and graciousness. ~ Nighat Hafiz

We have less reason to be surprised or offended when we find others differ from us in opinions because we very often differ from ourselves. ~ Samuel Johnson

Like families, competitors can bring out the worst as well as the best in each other. Like romance, competition has many faces, some of them ugly. In addition to showing me my grace and graciousness, the mirror of sports has reflected back to me my jealousy, pettiness, and arrogance. ~ Mariah Nelson

The wings of the dove are as soft as they are swift. Gentleness is a sure result of the Sacred Dove's transforming power: hearts touched by His benign influence are meek and lowly henceforth and for ever. ~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon

Graciousness, courtesy, compassion-this is hesed. Hesed is a quality that extends even to the animals and the land. The sabbath rest principle of Hebrew law included the needs of the livestock (Exod. 23:12). After seven years of planting and harvesting, the land itself needed "a year of complete rest" (Lev. 25:5). Even the soil of the vineyards was not to be overtaxed by planting other crops between the rows (Deut. 22:9). The oxen that trod out the grain were not to be muzzled so that they could eat while they worked (Deut. 25:4). And so on. ~ Richard J. Foster

He may have confused honor with with with ruthlessness. ~ T. J. Stiles

When you learn to embrace your self with a sense of appreciation and affection, you begin to glimpse the goodness and light that is in you and gradually you will realize that you are worthy of respect from yourself. When you recognize your limits, but still embrace your life with affection and graciousness, the sense of inner dignity begins to grow. You become freer and less dependent on the affirmation of outer voices and less troubled by the negativity of others. ~ John O'Donohue

If you happened to be born on third base, you didn't rub it in the face of the guy who wasn't even born in the stadium. Self-interest was generally checked at the door with your coat and hat. ~ Ron Suskind

The desire to lift, the willingness to help, and the graciousness to give come from a heart filled with love. The poet wrote, 'Love is the most noble attribute of the human soul.' And William Shakespeare cautioned, 'They do not love who do not show their love' (Two Gentlemen of Verona, act 1, sc. 2, line 31). ~ Thomas S. Monson

Being gracious,' Rabbi Scott added, 'is allowing other people to be or appear graceful.'

In other words, graciousness - your willingness to be easily pleased - is a gift; you are giving others the spotlight and then applauding like mad and tossing roses. The gracious person creates ease with his approval, rather than judgment. ~ Sarah L. Kaufman

We are to be generous not just in the results of our work, but also IN our work. ~ Matt Perman

I too once belived in the heavier gauge string as a superior tone source. However, thanks to the graciousness of B.B. King I learned that a lighter-gauge string offers superior playing comfort ... try it, you may like it ... ~ Billy Gibbons

Looking back on his adolescence from the vantage point of his mid-eighties, George H.W. Bush candidly admitted, "I might have been obsessed with bodies – boobs they are now called. But what seventeen-year-old kid was not? Guilty am I. ~ H.W. Brands

Can we disagree graciously
I am tired of people

not knowing the volume
of their power. ~ Raymond Antrobus

There is really no good English translation for adab. It means behaving well or good etiquette. It is acting with heedfulness, beauty, refinement, graciousness, and respect for others. The Koran teaches us the importance of acting beautifully. "Do what is beautiful. God loves those who do what is beautiful." (2:195) ~ Robert Frager

If you happen to find it hard to have sustained conversations, try keeping your voice up at the end of the sentence. There is a charming graciousness in doing so, for it seems to say that you do not think your remarks are the last words to be said on the subject. It prevents you from seeming opinionated. How men dislike an opinionated woman! No one really likes her! To keep your voice up sounds as though you are interested in other people's ideas. The subject is still open! ~ Margery Wilson

It's striking how many of the world's biggest problems, and many of the small ones too. are eliminated by the simplest of solutions – having women around. ~ Geoff Dyer

He loved his family, his friends, his writing, his painting; he knew their flaws, but they neither surprised nor embittered him. ~ Philip Zaleski

My prophetic task would be twofold: to stand up to him, and to stand by him. To awaken his conscience, and to salve the pain this would cause him. ~ Erik Larson

Civilization depends on, and civility often requires, the willingness to say, "What you are doing is none of my business" and "What I am doing is none of your business. ~ George F. Will

The joyful heart sees and reads the world with a sense of freedom and graciousness. ~ John O'Donohue

Characters carrying the playwright's disapproval is a un-Shakespearian burden. ~ Harold Bloom

I would recommend a free commerce both of matter and mind. I would let men enter their own churches with the same freedom as their own houses; and I would do it without a homily or graciousness or favor, for tyranny itself is to me a word less odious than toleration. ~ Walter Savage Landor

This is the homely heart of Incarnation, this meeting of God in man with men and women, this simple face of divine graciousness in ordinary life rather than in the hymns of church fathers or in the dry elaborations of theologians. ~ Eugene Kennedy

By some special graciousness of fate I am deposited - as all good photographers like to be - in the right place at the right time. Go into it as young as possible. Bring all the asset you have and play to win. ~ Margaret Bourke-White

The author perceptively outlines what might be an underrated aspect of his subject and of many others whose public achievements are of note – a "gift for friendship". McCullough says Adams, despite his towering intellect and curmudgeonly demeanor, had a soft heart for other people and a genuine interest in their particulars. ~ David McCullough

Our girls have need of such an example of graciousness, elegance, refinement, and spirituality. ~ Maria Young Dougall

They ask me things like: what is the right way to address a duke? An' once again I have to point out that it is a matter of fine details, such as, if there's a gate needs holdin' open and it looks like half a dollar might be forthcoming, it's 'G'day, your graciousness,' whereas if you've just set fire to his ancestral piles and the mob is breakin' the windows it is more suitable to address him as 'you bloated lying blutocat!' It is all a matter of finesse ~ Terry Pratchett

Then it is settled. You will be my guest," said Skanda.
"What about me?" muttered Kamala in my ear.
"And my horse?"
"And the horse," said Skanda, with such false graciousness, I almost considered letting Kamala eat him. ~ Roshani Chokshi

He wants to be known deep down, abysmally deep down, before he is capable of being loved at all; he dares to let himself be fathomed. He feels that his beloved is fully in his possession only when she no longer deceives herself about him, when she loves him just as much for his devilry and hidden insatiability as for his graciousness, patience, and spirituality. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

The author perceives nuances of Abigail Adams' character in the occasional errors she makes in readily quoting John Milton. Rather than giving the observer a reason to quibble, they are evidence that she had absorbed Milton's works enough to feel comfortable quoting them from memory. ~ David McCullough

HOW SHOULD THE SOUL not take wings
when from the Glory of God

It hears a sweet, kindly call:
"Why are you here, soul? Arise!"

How should a fish not leap fast
into the sea from dry land

When from the ocean so cool
the sound of the waves reaches its

How should the falcon not fly
back to his king from the hunt

When from the falconer's drum
it hears to call: "Oh, come back"?

Why should not every Sufi
begin to dance atom-like

Around the Sun of duration
that saves from impermanence?

What graciousness and what beauty?
What life-bestowing! What grace!

If anyone does without that, woe-
what err, what suffering!

Oh fly , of fly, O my soul-bird,
fly to your primordial home!

You have escaped from the cage now-
your wings are spread in the air.

Oh travel from brackish water
now to the fountain of life!

Return from the place of the sandals
now to the high seat of souls!

Go on! Go on! we are going,
and we are coming, O soul,

From this world of separation
to union, a world beyond worlds!

How long shall we here in the dust-world
like children fill our skirts

With earth and with stones without value,
with broken shards without worth?


Let's take our hand from the dust gr ~ Rumi

Love: understanding, honesty, humility, forgiveness, acceptance, patience, reverence, gratitude, graciousness, benevolence, compassion and integrity. Be Love. ~ Maximus Freeman

It's sloppy theology to think that all suffering is good for us, or that it's a result of sin. All suffering can be used for good, over time, after mourning and healing, by God's graciousness. But sometimes it's just plain loss, not because you needed to grow, not because life or God or anything is teaching you any kind of lesson. The trick is knowing the difference between the two. ~ Shauna Niequist

The weak mind is irritated at a little: the strong mind bears it like a rock which moveth not, though a thousand breakers dash upon it, and cast their pitiful malice in spray upon its summit. ~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon

Humility is the earmark of God's genuine servant. ~ Beth Moore

The Internet has given us the illusion of intimacy. We read someone's books, articles, sermons, or watch their videos online, and we feel we know them, so why not share what we think is wrong? But that illusion of intimacy is just that – an illusion. It distracts us from the important principle of reaching out to them personally first, and making the sometimes difficult effort of keeping it private and saving the relationship. ~ Phil Cooke

Hospitality can be an expression of doctrine beyond the pulpit. Hospitality is the means by which the Church, from the ground level, models the gospel to others. ~ Matt Chandler

We are not to look to what men in themselves deserve but to attend to the image of God which exists in all and to which we owe all honor and love. ~ John Calvin

A thousand little civilities create tenderness in time. ~ E. M. Forster

Never have I witnessed such sincere hospitality and
the overwhelming spirit of true brotherhood as is practiced
by people of all colours and races here in this ancient Holy Land,
the home of Abraham, Muhammad, and all the other prophets
of the Holy Scriptures. For the past week, I have been utterly
speechless and spellbound by the graciousness I see displayed
all around me by people of all colours. ~ Malcolm X

No low-trust society will ever produce sustained innovation. ~ Thomas L. Friedman

Just keep playing, mastering as you do the step Into disorder this one meant. Don't you see It's all we can do? Meanwhile, great fires Arise, as of haystacks aflame. The dial has been set And that's ominous, but all your graciousness in living Conspires with it, now that this is our home: A place to be from, and have people ask about. ~ John Ashbery

Soft power is quiet persistence. ~ Susan Cain

God's graciousness is not totally removed from any individual during this lifetime. In hell, it is. ~ R.C. Sproul

We need to forgive the adolescent versions of ourselves, if only because we need the practice to forgive those who are maturing awkwardly in our lives. ~ Madam Secretary

Parasitism is the only practice of the church; with its ideal of anaemia, its holiness, draining all blood, all love, all hope for life; the beyond as the will to negate every reality; the cross as the mark of recognition for the most subterranean conspiracy that ever existed-against health, beauty, whatever has turned out well, courage, spirit, graciousness of the soul, against life itself. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

After American titan and presidential father Joseph P. Kennedy suffered a stroke that impacted one side of his body, guests pretended not to notice the impact. Jackie Kennedy, however, held the impacted hand and kissed the affected side of his face, facing his disability and giving him the courage to do so. ~ Sally Bedell Smith

He was a generous but subtly demanding boss. ~ H.W. Brands

She was never satisfied with anything less than perfection, but she was no grind. She was too interested in people. ~ Doris Kearns Goodwin

We are enjoined whenever we behold the gifts of God in others so to reverence and respect the gifts as also to honor those in whom they reside. ~ John Calvin

All that we know theologically must be "accessed" by our heart with all the joy, peace, self-control, love, durability, patience, and graciousness that it should produce in a human being. ~ Timothy Keller

We see a first generation going through adolescence knowing their every misstep, all the awkward gestures of their youth, are being frozen in a computer's memory. ~ Sherry Turkle

We're all in this human experience together, so let's try to be kind, gracious, and compassionate to each other." - Kailin Gow in Interview ~ Kailin Gow

He says this episode will be about grief. About helping other people to mourn. He says that my family's involvement could really help other people in similar situations. All those viewers who thought they lost a family member to a famous serial killer, then are told 36 years later that DNA from the crime scene matches both that of a retired nurse and a man who was four years old at the time and grew up to murder his mother, I think.
With less graciousness than I'd hoped to display, I ask if there's a reason why stories about the bizarre, violent deaths of young, good-looking, middle- to upper-class white girls help people mourn better than other stories. ~ Maggie Nelson

[Sandra Day O'Connor] is a justice whose graciousness and sense of duty fuels her continued service, even agreeing to serve more than six months after her retirement date. ~ Patrick Leahy

If you think the most courageous and difficult thing you can do is stubbornly stand your ground, try graciously giving in. ~ Richelle E. Goodrich

Too many people are too angry about language too much of the time. This time could be better spent listening, learning, and enjoying the vast variety of human language around them. ~ Robert Lane Greene

I've learned that in many cases, change is not a function of life's cruelty but instead a function of God's graciousness. ~ Shauna Niequist

I most definitely knows God is strong. If he were weak he would not have been able to hold me when I'm tired, and he dose. His graciousness is wonderful, when we get annoyed at him he says "I Forgive You" always. God can be trusted, and we, or at least I, have found that not trusting God to keep me safe through all this cancer stuff would drive me crazy. ~ Esther Earl

Truthfulness takes you a mile. Graciousness takes you around the world. ~ Matshona Dhliwayo

It may be that until now there has been no more potent means for beautifying man himself than piety: it can turn man into so much art, surface, play of colors, graciousness that his sight no longer makes one suffer.
~ Friedrich Nietzsche

When strangers meet, great allowances should be made for differences in custom and training. ~ Frank Herbert

Be civilized. Grudges are for Neanderthals. – Hubert Humphrey ~ David Pietrusza

The classic Old Testament example of these two ways to run from God is right here in the book of Jonah. Jonah takes turns acting as both the "younger brother" and the "older brother." In the first two chapters of the book, Jonah disobeys and runs away from the Lord and yet ultimately repents and asks for God's grace, just as the younger brother leaves home but returns repentant. In the last two chapters, however, Jonah obeys God's command to go and preach to Nineveh. In both cases, however, he's trying to get control of the agenda.11 When God accepts the repentance of the Ninevites, just like the older brother in Luke 15, Jonah bristles with self-righteous anger at God's graciousness and mercy to sinners.12 And that is the problem facing Jonah, namely, the mystery of God's mercy. It is a theological problem, but it is at the same time a heart problem. Unless Jonah can see his own sin, and see himself as living wholly by the mercy of God, he will never understand how God can be merciful to evil people and still be just and faithful. The story of Jonah, with all its twists and turns, is about how God takes Jonah, sometimes by the hand, other times by the scruff of the neck, to show him these things. ~ Timothy J. Keller

He showed me the lowest. I had to surmise the highest. ~ John Howard Griffin

Cynicism is intelectual dandyism, but graciousness in speech is an aphrodisiac. (Andy Spade) ~ Kate Spade

The life I've lived
What more can one ask for
Apart from a grand exit
Slit of the wrist
Total bliss ~ Nomzamo Nhlumayo

The truth must dazzle gradually or every man be blind. Emily Dickinson ~ Eugene H. Peterson

We need to discover all over again that worship is natural to the Christian, as it was to the godly Israelites who wrote the psalms, and that the habit of celebrating the greatness and graciousness of God yields an endless flow of thankfulness, joy, and zeal. ~ J.I. Packer

The trout fisher, like the landscape painter, haunts the loveliest places of the earth, and haunts them alone. Solitude and his own thoughts - he must be on the best terms with all of these; and he who can take kindly the largest allowance of these is likely to be the kindliest and truest with his fellow men. ~ Thomas Hughes

Happy the soul to whom it is given to attain this life with Christ, to cleave with all one's heart to him whose beauty all the heavenly hosts behold forever, whose love inflames our love, the contemplation of whom is our refreshment, whose graciousness is our delight, whose gentleness fills us to overflowing, whose remembrance makes us glow with happiness, whose fragrance revives the dead, the glorious vision of whom will be the happiness of all the citizens of the heavenly Jerusalem. For he is the brightness of eternal glory, the splendour of eternal light, the mirror without spot. ~ St. Clare Of Assisi

Just consider a child who, absorbed in play, forgets himself - this is the moment to take a snapshot; when you wait until he notices that you are taking a picture, his face congeals and freezes, showing his unnatural self-consciousness rather than his natural graciousness. Why do most people have that stereotyped expression on their faces whenever they are photographed? This expression stems from their concern with the impression they are going to leave on the onlooker. It is "cheese" that makes them so ugly. Forgetting themselves, the photographer, and the future onlooker would make them beautiful. ~ Viktor E. Frankl

The hard truth is, the life thing moments happen. They are the details, the surprises, the every now and again "dang it" moments that are necessary for you to be able to appreciate good times and accomplish greater things. ~ Jaha Knight

Graciousness in serving and being served marks the lives of leaders who have made the largest impact on my life. ~ Sue Mallory

She was an experimental child but compassionate with it. ~ Joe Cawley

Jonathan Sacks; "One way is just to think, for instance, of biodiversity. The extraordinary thing we now know, thanks to Crick and Watson's discovery of DNA and the decoding of the human and other genomes, is that all life, everything, all the three million species of life and plant life - all have the same source. We all come from a single source. Everything that lives has its genetic code written in the same alphabet. Unity creates diversity. So don't think of one God, one truth, one way. Think of one God creating this extraordinary number of ways, the 6,800 languages that are actually spoken. Don't think there's only one language within which we can speak to God. The Bible is saying to us the whole time: Don't think that God is as simple as you are. He's in places you would never expect him to be. And you know, we lose a bit of that in English translation. When Moses at the burning bush says to God, "Who are you?" God says to him three words: "Hayah asher hayah."Those words are mistranslated in English as "I am that which I am." But in Hebrew, it means "I will be who or how or where I will be," meaning, Don't think you can predict me. I am a God who is going to surprise you. One of the ways God surprises us is by letting a Jew or a Christian discover the trace of God's presence in a Buddhist monk or a Sikh tradition of hospitality or the graciousness of Hindu life. Don't think we can confine God into our categories. God is bigger than religion. ~ Krista Tippett

Dinner is a cacophonous exercise of holy sanctification. ~ Jen Pollock Michel

I'm annoyed by those who love mankind but are discourteous to people. ~ John Howard Griffin

Southern women are unique; there is no disputing that. We are women born of conflict, our pasts littered with battles and chaos, self-preservation, and protection. We've run plantations during wars, served Union soldiers tea before watching them burn our homes, hidden slaves from prosecution, and endured centuries of watching and learning from our men's mistakes. It is not easy to survive life in the South. It is even more difficult to do it with a smile on your face. We have held these states together, held our dignity and graciousness, held our head high when it was smeared with blood and soot. We are strong. We are Southern. We have secrets and lives you will never imagine. ~ Alessandra Torre

Indeed, the key to all diplomacy was knowing when they were serious about their threats and when they were posturing. Nations were like individuals, requiring cultivation and the paying of respect. ~ H.W. Brands

Art itself is female - it is full of graciousness, cadence, color, rhythm. It's full of love and grace. ~ Juan Gabriel

My own personality, which was molded by the furnace of time and circumstances ... strengthened by the touchstone of varied experiences, has changed a bit due to the benevolence and graciousness of people around me but I have never felt trapped in the nets of influence. ~ Balroop Singh

Homes should mean something to us humans. They are a basic instinct. A home, with a life that centers only on food and sleep, is not really a home, it's a house. Beauty and graciousness, joy of living, being used in every part, these are the things that make a house a home. (chapter header quote from Popular Home Decorations, 1940) ~ Ellen Baker

He is as full of valor as of kindness. Princely in both. ~ William Shakespeare

Almost alone among successful politicians, he took slights personally. ~ Rick Perlstein

There is graciousness and a kind of urbanity in beginning with men by esteem and confidence. It proves, at least, that we have long lived in good company with others and with our selves. ~ Joseph Joubert

I will not believe that thou hast tasted of the honey of the gospel if thou canst eat it all thyself. True grace puts an end to all spiritual monopoly. ~ Charles Haddon Spurgeon

Men raised in a culture of blood revenge do not change in a day. ~ Geraldine Brooks

This was my first real lesson in politics ... If you are cast on a desert island with only a screwdriver, hatchet, and the chisel to make a boat with, why, go and make the best one you can. It would be better if you had a saw, but you haven't, so with men. ~ Theodore Roosevelt

My wife has been my greatest earthly inspiration. She excels in eloquence, the poetry of words, empathy and graciousness. ~ George W. Romney

To identify a person as a Southerner suggests not only that her history is inescapable and formative but that it is also impossibly present. Southerners live uneasily at the nexus between myth and reality, watching the mishmash amalgam of sorrow, humility, honor, graciousness, and renegade defiance play out against a backdrop of profligate physical beauty. ~ Sally Mann

You don't notice the dead leaving when they really choose to leave you. You're not meant to. At most you feel them as a whisper or the wave of a whisper undulating down. I would compare it to a woman in the back of a lecture hall or theater whom no one notices until she slips out.Then only those near the door themselves, like Grandma Lynn, notice; to the rest it is like an unexplained breeze in a closed room.
Grandma Lynn died several years later, but I have yet to see her here. I imagine her tying it on in her heaven, drinking mint juleps with Tennessee Williams and Dean Martin. She'll be here in her own sweet time, I'm sure.
If I'm to be honest with you, I still sneak away to watch my family sometimes. I can't help it, and sometimes they still think of me. They can't help it....
It was a suprise to everyone when Lindsey found out she was pregnant...My father dreamed that one day he might teach another child to love ships in bottles. He knew there would be both sadness and joy in it; that it would always hold an echo of me.
I would like to tell you that it is beautiful here, that I am, and you will one day be, forever safe. But this heaven is not about safety just as, in its graciousness, it isn't about gritty reality. We have fun.
We do things that leave humans stumped and grateful, like Buckley's garden coming up one year, all of its crazy jumble of plants blooming all at once. I did that for my mother who, having stayed, found herself facing the ~ Alice Sebold

A love for his child was so profound, it spilled over to all humanity. ~ John Howard Griffin

Thank you to Giulia Fani, Joan Spence and my sister for the rooms and desks they loaned me. ~ Moez Surani

Manners matter, asserts the professor. What provokes rebellion, he asserts, is not as often a theory out allowing for arbitrary power but be excessive, brusque use of it by a particular individual. ~ Robert J. Allison

Self-slaughter is an extravagant enactment of feeling sorry for oneself. Suicide is stingy act, because no matter how wretched our life may currently be, a person can always rise tomorrow and perform some small act of kindness for other people, care for a pet, or perform some other caring act that works towards preserving nature's graciousness. To die of their own hand is to cheat other people and shortchange Mother Nature; it is taking without giving back in kind. What combats suicide is a sense of gratitude, a willingness to give to other people, and to cease living life as a taker. Without a profound appreciation for all that is living and devoid of a sincere willingness to contribute to the flourishing of all life forms, one can callously write off the value of their own life. ~ Kilroy J. Oldster

We need to care about beauty and not just the utility of our products because people are not only rational but also emotional. We need to treat people as whole people. This means caring about purity and the emotional side of human nature, not just utility. ~ Matt Perman

He did something he rarely did. He decided not to see things from the other guy's point of view. ~ H.W. Brands