A database of quotes
Discourtesy does not spring merely from one bad quality, but from several - from foolish vanity, from ignorance of what is due to others, from indolence, from stupidity, from the distraction of thought, from contempt of others, from jealousy.
Character | Contempt | Ignorance | Indolence | Jealousy | Stupidity | Thought |
Charles Alexander Eastman, first named Ohiyesa
It was our belief that the love of possessions is a weakness to be overcome. Its appeal is to the material part, and if allowed its way, it will in time disturb one’s spiritual balance. Therefore, children must early learn the beauty of generosity. They are taught to give what they prize most, that they may taste the happiness of giving. If a child is inclined to be grasping, or to cling to any of his or her little possessions, legends are related about the contempt and disgrace falling upon the ungenerous and mean person... The Indians in their simplicity literally give away all that they have - to relatives, to guests of other tribes or clans, but above all to the poor and the aged, from whom they can hope for no return.
Balance | Beauty | Belief | Character | Children | Contempt | Disgrace | Generosity | Giving | Guests | Hope | Legends | Little | Love | Possessions | Simplicity | Taste | Time | Weakness | Will | Beauty | Child | Happiness | Learn |
Everyone suffers. But many do not take it to heart that the suffering comes as a punishment for transgressions, rather they consider it accidental. The proper attitude is that suffering is an atonement. With this realization a person appreciates that suffering in this world saves him suffering in the next.
Character | Heart | Punishment | Suffering | World |
The effects of our actions may be postponed but they are never lost. There is an inevitable reward for good deeds and an inescapable punishment for bad. Meditate upon this truth, and seek always to earn good wages from Destiny.
Character | Deeds | Destiny | Good | Inevitable | Punishment | Reward | Truth | Deeds |
François Fénelon, fully Francois de Salignac de la Mothe-Fénelon
There is no real elevation of mind in a contempt of little things; it is, on the contrary, from too narrow views that we consider those things of little importance which have in fact such extensive consequences.
Character | Consequences | Contempt | Little | Mind |
What is called affluence - the consequence of the type of rapid economic development which occurred from about the middle of the nineteenth century - is in a real sense an abundance not just of serious problems which machines cannot solve, but of hopeless poverty: the physical insecurity, personal unhappiness, the intensified morality, the sense of being dwarfed by vast and uncontrollable physical, mechanical and corporate structures, the hatred and contempt of other peoples, the lack of opportunity for contemplation, the loss of community life.
Abundance | Character | Contemplation | Contempt | Insecurity | Life | Life | Machines | Morality | Opportunity | Poverty | Problems | Sense | Unhappiness | Loss |
Guilt always looks for punishment, and punishment creates pain.
To forgive sin is not an act of injustice, though the punishment have been threatened. Even amongst men, though the promise of good bind the promiser; yet threats, that is to say, promises of evil, bind them not; much less shall they bind God, who is infinitely more merciful than men.
Character | Evil | God | Good | Injustice | Injustice | Men | Promise | Punishment | Sin | Forgive |
E. W. Howe, fully Edgar Watson Howe
No man ever knows the few joys of living without some sort of success to his credit. Of all the games worth a candle, success is first. The greatest punishment is to be despised by your neighbors, the world and members of your family.
Character | Credit | Family | Man | Punishment | Success | World | Worth |
Søren Kierkegaard, fully Søren Aabye Kierkegaard
Each age has its own characteristic depravity. Ours is perhaps not pleasure or indulgence or sensuality, but rather a dissolute pantheistic contempt for the individual man.
Age | Character | Contempt | Individual | Indulgence | Man | Pleasure | Sensuality |
The only effect of public punishment is to show the rabble how bravely it can be borne.
Character | Public | Punishment |