Reserve

(165 votes)   There is safety in reserve, but no attraction. One cannot love a reserved person.

Jane Austen
1775-1817, British Novelist

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(145 votes)   I would not unduly praise the virtue of restraint. It is often merely temperamental. But it is not always a sign of coldness. It may be pride. There can be nothing more humiliating than to see the shaft of one's emotion miss the mark of either laughter or tears. Nothing more humiliating! And this for the reason that should the mark be missed, should the open display of emotion fail to move, then it must perish unavoidably in disgust or contempt.

Joseph Conrad
1857-1924, Polish-born British Novelist

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