propriety Quotes

“Like a kiss or caress in a Hindi movie, a husband’s name is something intimate and therefore unspoken, cleverly patched over.”

“She was a young lady whom a gentleman need no longer be at pains to respect.”

″‘I think you had better not go out in a boat, mademoiselle,’ Eugenio declared. Winterbourne wished to Heaven this pretty girl were not so familiar with her courier; but he said nothing. ‘I suppose you don’t think it’s proper!’ Daisy exclaimed. ‘Eugenio doesn’t think anything’s proper.‘”

“Between ourselves, Jo, some of the girls I know really do go on at such a rate I’m ashamed of them. They don’t mean any harm, I’m sure, but if they knew how we fellows talked about them afterward, they’d mend their ways, I fancy.”

In reality, those who in Vronsky’s opinion had the “proper” view had no sort of view at all, but behaved in general as well-bred persons do behave in regard to all the complex and insoluble problems with which life is encompassed on all sides; they behaved with propriety, avoiding allusions and unpleasant questions. They assumed an air of fully comprehending the import and force of the situation, of accepting and even approving of it, but of considering it superfluous and uncalled for to put all this into words.