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  ...word _servant_--_Diener_--because, of course, it is not true!) However, to carry politeness to such an extent as to damage your prospects, is like giving money where only counters are expected.
Wax, a substance naturally hard and brittle, can be made soft by the application of a little warmth, so that it will take any shape you please. In the same way, by being polite and friendly, you can make people pliable and obliging, even though they are apt to be crabbed and malevolent. Hence Politeness is to human nature what warmth is to wax.  
Of course, it is no easy matter to be polite; in so far, I mean, as it requires us to show great respect for everybody, whereas most people deserve none at all; and again in so far as it demands that we should feign the most lively interest in people, when we must be very glad that we have nothing to do with them. To combine politeness with pride is a masterpiece of wisdom.
We should be much less ready to lose our temper over an insult,--which, in the strict sense of the word, means...   Schopenhauer, Arthur

Excerpt from The Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer; Counsels and Maxims · This quote is about politeness · Search on Google Books to find all references and sources for this quotation.

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