No one can consider himself a gentleman who engages in the vice of lyi — Gentlemen

"And thus he bore without abuse The grand old name of gentleman, Defamed by every charlatan And soiled with all ignoble use."

"Rousseauist and Baconian, though often superficially at odds with one another, have co-operated in undermining, not merely religious tradition, but another tradition which in the Occident goes back finally, not to Judea, but to ancient Greece. This older tradition may be defined as humanistic. The goal of the humanist is poised and proportionate living. This he hopes to accomplish by observing the law of measure. ... Decorum is supreme for the humanist even as humility takes precedence over all other virtues in the eyes of the Christian. Traditionally the idea of decorum has been associated, often with a considerable admixture of mere formalism, with the idea of the gentleman."

"He is a gentleman; I am a gentlemans daughter; so far we are equal."

"When you leave the little world of Hampden-Sydney, you will still have much to learn of the diversity of the greater world, of the customs and manners of the many cultures you will encounter and interact with as you make your life and living in a global economy. I hope that your recognition of the value of the traditional social customs as they are practiced in our small community will make you keenly aware of the importance of the traditional social customs of other communities- whether ethnic neighborhoods or nations. I end this epilogue as I have ended others before. You are a Hampden-Sydney Gentleman, and as Cardinal Newman wrote, "It is almost the definition of a gentleman to say he is one who never inflicts pain."

"In whatever society he might find himself, the humblest citizen should therefore so order his behaviour that when he left the table men would say "A gentleman was here."

"To be a gentleman does not depend upon the tailor, or the toilet.… Good clothes are not good habits.… A gentleman is just a gentle-man; no more, no less: a diamond polished, that was first a diamond in the rough."