Stop, on the other hand, if tall and commanding, before cultivating a creeping, crushed demeanor, unless you are a colporteur or dog-stealer.
Stop on the brink of wholly disregarding the prevailing fashions. Knee-breeches, shoe-buckles, a powdered wig, and a swallow-tailed coat, with the waist-buttons between the shoulder-blades, would stamp you as an eccentric at the present day.
Stop before despising the requirements of the seasons. A straw-hat in a snow-storm, for instance, would excite remark.
Stop when vanity counsels an excess of ornament. To exhibit a jewel or two with judgment is one thing, to groan under a clanking avoirdupois of gauds and trinkets another.
Stop at the claims of both a cadaverous gravity and a causeless facetiousness of demeanor. Neither the belfry owl nor the proverbial basket of chips should be your model in this regard.
Stop on the verge of unnecessary violence in word and deed. Resent, if you must, without preliminary roaring. The deadly submarine torpedo is terrible in its explosion, but less noisy than the harmless bursting of an inflated paper-bag.
Stop before criticising what you do not understand. The bore indulging in this species of idiocy is deserving of an enforced association with numerous mothers-in-law in a whisper-gallery.
Stop, indeed, snap your jaws to like a spring-trap, at the very suggestion of an oath or low expression. “Profanity,” says Lacon, “never yet dignified wrath nor emphasized a great purpose.”
Stop before indulging in covert sneers. Indeed, “a good, mouth-filling oath” is preferable, because less hypocritical, but an ungarnished assertion is better than either.
Stop before meanly insinuating what should be plainly spoken. Even if a man owes you money, which you think he ought to pay, tell him so, or ask for an explanation, instead of conveying your meaning through an allusion to his current expense or new clothes. This is the course of a sneak and a coward.