Smooth-polished and rounded. [ Horace ]
Her polished limbs,
Veiled in a simple robe, their best attire,
Beyond the pomp of dress; for loveliness
Needs not the foreign aid of ornament,
But is, when unadorned, adorned the most. [ Thomson ]
Society is now one polished horde
Formed of two mighty tribes, the Bores and Bored. [ Byron ]
A rough diamond is better than the polished paste. [ Tupper ]
A diamond polished was first a diamond in the rough. [ G. W. Doane ]
Polished brass will pass upon more people than rough gold. [ Chesterfield ]
Innocence is like polished armor; it adorns and it defends. [ South ]
Chaucer, I confess, is a rough diamond, and must be polished ere he shine. [ Dryden ]
The chaste mind, like a polished plane, may admit foul thoughts, without receiving their tincture. [ Sterne ]
The style of letters should not be too highly polished. It ought to be neat and correct, but no more. [ Blair ]
O, polished perturbation! golden care that keepest the ports of slumber open wide to many a watchful night! [ William Shakespeare ]
Nobody contents himself with rough diamonds, or wears them so. When polished and set, then they give a lustre. [ Locke ]
The brightest crowns that are worn in heaven have been tried and smelted and polished and glorified through the furnace of tribulation. [ Chapin ]
Mere intelligence without corresponding energy of the will is a polished sword in its scabbard, contemptible, if it is never drawn forth. [ Lindner ]
The most civilised are as near to barbarism as the most polished steel to rust. Nations, like metals, have only a superficial brilliancy. [ Rivarol ]
Polished steel will not shine in the dark; no more can reason, however refined, shine efficaciously, but as it reflects the light of Divine truth, shed from heaven. [ Foster ]
Ages of ignorance and simplicity are thought to be ages of purity. But the direct contrary I believe to be the case. Rude periods have that grossness of manners, which is as unfriendly to virtue as luxury itself. Men are less ashamed as they are less polished. [ Warton ]
Fetch a spray from the wood and place it on your mantel-shelf, and your household ornaments will seem plebeian beside its nobler fashion and bearing. It will wave superior there, as if used to a more refined and polished circle. It has a salute and response to all your enthusiasm and heroism. [ Thoreau ]
If the eye were so acute as to rival the finest microscope, and to discern the smallest hair upon the leg of a gnat, it would be a curse, and not a blessing to us; it would make all things appear rugged and deformed; the most finely polished crystal would be uneven and rough; the sight of our own selves would affright us; the smoothest skin would be beset all over with rugged scales and bristly hair. [ Bentley ]