"Virtue itself," says Bishop Middleton, "offends, when coupled with a forbidding manner." Manner has a good deal to do with the estimation in which men are held by the world; and it has often more influence in the government of others than qualities of much greater depth and substance.

A manner at once gracious and cordial is among the greatest aids to success, and many there are who fail for want of it.

[181] For a great deal depends upon first impressions; and these are usually favourable or otherwise according to a man's courteousness and civility.
While rudeness and gruffness bar doors and shut hearts, kindness and propriety of behaviour, in which good manners consist, act as an "open sesame" everywhere.

Doors unbar before them, and they are a passport to the hearts of everybody, young and old.
There is a common saying that "Manners make the man;" but this is not so true as that "Man makes the manners." A man may be gruff, and even rude, and yet be good at heart and of sterling character; yet he would doubtless be a much more agreeable, and probably a much more useful man, were he to exhibit that suavity of disposition and courtesy of manner which always gives a finish to the true gentleman.
Mrs.Hutchinson, in the noble portraiture of her husband, to which we have already had occasion to refer, thus describes his manly courteousness and affability of disposition:--"I cannot say whether he were more truly magnanimous or less proud; he never disdained the meanest person, nor flattered the greatest; he had a loving and sweet courtesy to the poorest, and would often employ many spare hours with the commonest soldiers and poorest labourers; but still so ordering his familiarity, that it never raised them to a contempt, but entertained still at the same time a reverence and love of him." [182] A man's manner, to a certain extent, indicates his character.

It is the external exponent of his inner nature.