#modest

Mrs Forrester ... sat in state, pretending not to know what cakes were sent up, though she knew, and we knew, and she knew that we knew, and we knew that she knew that we knew, she had been busy all the morning making tea-bread and sponge-cakes. ↗

— Elizabeth Gaskell

#cakes #humor #modesty #pretense #tea-parties

Love, forgiveness, modesty, humility and gratitude are most important virtues in life. ↗

— P. Remes

#gratitude #humility #love #modesty #forgiveness

Victorian rigidities were such that ladies were not even allowed to blow out candles in mixed company, as that required them to pucker their lips suggestively. They could not say that they were going "to bed"--that planted too stimulating an image--but merely that they were "retiring." It became effectively impossible to discuss clothing in even a clinical sense without resort to euphemisms. Trousers became "nether integuments" or simply "inexpressibles" and underwear was "linen." Women could refer among themselves to petticoats or, in hushed tones, stockings, but could mention almost nothing else that brushed bare flesh. ↗

— Bill Bryson

#modesty #underwear #victorian-era #home

My value as a woman is not measured by the size of my waist or the number of men who like me. My worth as a human being is measured on a higher scale: a scale of righteousness and piety. And my purpose in life-despite what fashion magazines say-is something more sublime than just looking good for men. ↗

— Yasmin Mogahed

#modesty #purpose #women #men

A great man is always willing to be little. ↗

— Ralph Waldo Emerson

#greatness #humbleness #humility #modesty #size

Modesty is only arrogance by stealth. ↗

— Terry Pratchett

#modesty #arrogance

Modesty, tis a virtue not often found among poets, for almost every one of them thinks himself the greatest in the world. ↗

— Miguel de Cervantes

#among #every #found #greatest #himself

A superior man is modest in his speech, but exceeds in his actions. ↗