Inspiration from Cardinal Newman via Sir Arthur

Here’s a quotation I spotted in chapter 7 of Arthur Quiller-Couch’s On the Art of Writing. It’s from Cardinal Newman’s description of a gentleman. For briefwriters, it’s something to print out and tape to their bathroom mirrors:

He is never mean or little in his disputes, never takes unfair advantage, never mistakes personalities or sharp sayings for arguments, or insinuates evil which he dare not say out… If he engages in controversy of any kind, his disciplined intellect preserves him from the blundering discourtesy of better perhaps, but less educated minds; who, like blunt weapons, tear and hack instead of cutting clean, who mistake the point in argument, waste their strength on trifles, misconceive their adversary, and leave the question more involved than they found it. He may be right or wrong in his opinion: but he is too clear-sighted to be unjust. He is simple as he is forcible, and as brief as he is decisive.