Mercenary Quotes - Page 3

• The gigantic challenge is the magnitude of the individual differences in the optimal set point for "good stress." For one person, it's doing something risky with your bishop in a chess game; for someone else, it's becoming a mercenary in Yemen.

  Robert M. Sapolsky

  Stress, Individual Differences, Games

  Source: www.psychologytoday.com

  8 Copy quote

  Show source

• That public virtue which among the ancients was denominated patriotism, is derived from a strong sense of our own interest in the preservation and prosperity of the free government of which we are members. Such a sentiment, which had rendered the legions of the republic almost invincible, could make but a very feeble impression on the mercenary servants of a despotic prince; and it became necessary to supply that defect by other motives, of a different, but not less forcible nature; honour and religion.

  Edward Gibbon

  Strong, Government, History

  Edward Gibbon (2009). “The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Edited and Abridged): Abridged Edition”, p.15, Modern Library

  9 Copy quote

  Show source

• I do not say that all lawyers are bad, but I do maintain that the general tendency is bad: standing up in a court for whichever side has paid you, affecting warmth and conviction, and doing everything you can to win the case, whatever your private opinion may be, will soon dull any fine sense of honour. The mercenary soldier is not a valued creature, but at least he risks his life, whereas these men merely risk their next fee.

  Patrick O'Brian

  Men, Winning, Risk

  Patrick O'Brian (2004). “The Complete Aubrey/Maturin Novels”, W. W. Norton & Company

  19 Copy quote

  Show source

• "A child!" said Edith, looking at her. "When was I a child? What childhood did you ever leave to me? I was a woman - artful, designing, mercenary, laying snares for men - before I knew myself, or you, or even understood the base and wretched aim of every new display I learnt. You gave birth to a woman. Look upon her. She is in her pride tonight."

  Charles Dickens

  Children, Character, Pride

  Charles Dickens (1867). “Charles Dickens's works. Charles Dickens ed. [18 vols. of a 21 vol. set. Wanting A child's history of England; Christmas stories; The mystery of Edwin Drood].”, p.245

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• Many men who do creditable things refuse to let it be known. This is a mistake. While we all admire modesty, nevertheless there is a great national need to do everything possible to bring home to the rank and file of the people that all employers and all wealthy men are not grinding, mercenary, selfish skinflints, but that many of them take delight in doing helpful things for others ... Shortcomings of employers are constantly paraded. Why not let the public become acquainted with the better side which most present-day employers possess?

  B. C. Forbes

  Selfish, Mistake, Home

  4 Copy quote

• If there are atheists, who is to be blamed if not the mercenary tyrants of souls who, in revolting us against their swindles, compel some feeble spirits to deny the God whom these monsters dishonour?

  Voltaire

  Atheist, Tyrants, Soul

  11 Copy quote

• My character is called The Hunter. He's the main antagonist in the movie. In a nutshell, he's a slightly deranged natural born killer who's weirdly determined to succeed at his job, whatever his employment is. He's a mercenary and there's a high body count for him in this film [Never Go Back].

  Patrick Heusinger

  Jobs, Character, Determined To Succeed

  "'Jack Reacher' Villain Patrick Heusinger on Playing Opposite Tom Cruise". Interview with Harper's Bazaar, www.harpersbazaar.com. October 24, 2016.

  5 Copy quote

  Show source

• Pure mathematics offers no mercenary inducements to its followers, who is attracted to it by the importance and beauty of the truths in contains; and the complete absence of any material advantage to be gained by means of it, adds perhaps another charm to its study.

  James Whitbread Lee Glaisher

  Mean, Add, Followers

  6 Copy quote

• When I said "the pocket of the banks," it is not necessarily a mercenary relationship. It is a mindset.

  Joseph Stiglitz

  Pockets, Mindset, Said

  Interview with Amitabh Pal, www.sharedhost.progressive.org. May 27, 2011.

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• For all the gold and silver stolen and shipped to Spain did not make the Spanish people richer. It gave their kings an edge in the balance of power for a time, a chance to hire more mercenary soldiers for their wars. They ended up losing those wars anyway, and all that was left was a deadly inflation, a starving population, the rich richer, the poor poorer, and a ruined peasant class

  Hans Koning

  Kings, War, Class

  Hans Koning (1992). “Columbus: His Enterprise: Exploding the Myth”, p.118, NYU Press

  6 Copy quote

  Show source

• Three classes inhabited the city (Alexandria in Egypt): first the Aegyptian or native stock of people, who were quick-tempered and not inclined to civil life; and secondly the mercenary class, who were severe and numerous and intractable...; and, third, the tribe of the Alexandrians, who also were not distinctly inclined to civil life, and for the same reasons, but still they were better than those others, for even though they were a mixed people, still they were Greeks by origin and mindful of the customs common to the Greeks.

  Strabo

  Cities, Egypt, Class

  14 Copy quote

• South Africa, with US support, after the fall of the Portuguese empire, invaded Angola and Mozambique to establish their own puppet regime there. They were trying to protect Namibia, to protect apartheid, and nobody did much about it; but the Cubans sent forces, and furthermore they sent black soldiers and they defeated a white mercenary army, which not only rescued Angola but it sent a shock throughout the continent-it was a psychic shock-white mercenaries were purported to be invincible, and a black army defeated them and sent them back fleeing into South Africa.

  Noam Chomsky

  Fall, Army, Psychics

  "Chomsky on Haiti". Interview with Keane Bhatt, www.counterpunch.org. March 9, 2010.

  13 Copy quote

  Show source

• A love that is based on the goodness of those whom you love is a mercenary affair.

  Mahatma Gandhi

  Love, Affair, Goodness

  Mahatma Gandhi (2012). “The Essential Gandhi: An Anthology of His Writings on His Life, Work, and Ideas”, p.165, Vintage

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• Your lawyer is your true mercenary. Under his code honor consists in making the best possible fight in exchange for the biggest possible fee. He is frankly for sale to the highest bidder.

  David Graham Phillips

  Fighting, Honor, Lawyer

  David Graham Phillips (1905). “The Deluge”

  25 Copy quote

  Show source

• It was a distortion, a mercenary decision to create this parallel history in order to drive the movie for an American audience, Both my grandparents were officers in World War Two, and I would be personally offended if somebody distorted their achieve.

  David Ayer

  War, Order, Two

  Biography/Personal Quotes, www.imdb.com.

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• As for myself, my course is clear. A British subject I was born - a British subject I will die. With my utmost effort, with my latest breath, will I oppose the 'veiled treason' which attempts by sordid means and mercenary proffers to lure our people from their allegiance.

  John A. Macdonald

  Mean, People, Effort

  30 Copy quote

• You really turning mercenary on your favorite older brother? (Dev) No. I would never do that to Alain. (Aimee) Ouch! Bearswan got ‘tude. (Dev)

  Sherrilyn Kenyon

  Brother, Ouch, Your Favorite

  4 Copy quote

• She could and had faced an armed laser in the hands of a mad mutant mercenary with less fear than she faced such unswerving emotion.

  Nora Roberts

  Fear, Hands, Mad

  J. D. Robb, Nora Roberts (2011). “J. D. Robb In Death Collection”, p.447, Penguin

  4 Copy quote

  Show source

• As for my family, my father was Danel; he died as a mercenary in the southern wars," Han went on. "My mother's name was Sarah, called Sali, and my sister was Mari. They died last summer. But then, you already knew that. Every time you forget, I'll remind you. That's the blood sacrifice I made to be here, and that's enough.

  Cinda Williams Chima

  Summer, Mother, Father

  4 Copy quote

• Most of the things I do brand wise are both missionary and mercenary in their position, and that's really important to me; that's one of the first things I look at when I say, 'does it make sense to do a deal?'

  Mike Rowe

  Wise, Important, Missionary

  20 Copy quote

• Servile, and base, and mercenary, is the notion of Christian practice among the bulk of nominal Christians. They give no more than they dare not with-hold; they abstain from nothing but what they must not practise.

  William Wilberforce

  Christian, Practice, Giving

  William Wilberforce (1871). “A practical view of the prevailing religious system of professed Christians, in the higher and middle classes in this country, contrasted with real Christianity. Complete ed”, p.349

  6 Copy quote

  Show source

• The passions seldom give good advice but to the interested and mercenary. Resentment generally suggests bad measures. Second thoughts and good nature will rarely, very rarely, approve the first hints of anger.

  Horace Walpole

  Anger, Passion, Giving

  4 Copy quote

• New York is the city of privilege. Here is the seat of the Invisible Power represented by the allied forces of finance and industry. This Invisible Government is reactionary, sinister, unscrupulous, mercenary, and sordid. It is wanting in national ideals and devoid of conscience... This kind of government must be scourged and destroyed.

  William Jennings Bryan

  New York, Cities, Government

  13 Copy quote

• Bourgeois patriotism, as I view it, is only a very shabby, very narrow, very mercenary, and deeply antihuman passion, having for its object the preservation and maintenance of the power of the national state-that is, the mainstay of all the priveleges of the exploiters throughout the nation.

  Mikhail Bakunin

  War, Passion, Views

  18 Copy quote

• We are afraid that Heaven is a bribe, and that if we make it our goal we shall no longer be disinterested. It is not so. Heaven offers nothing that the mercenary soul can desire. It is safe to tell the pure in heart that they shall see God, for only the pure in heart want to. There are rewards that do not sully motives. A man's love for a woman is not mercenary because he wants to marry her, nor his love for poetry mercenary because he wants to read it, nor his love of exercise less disinterested because he wants to run and leap and walk. Love, by definition, seeks to enjoy its object.

  C. S. Lewis

  Running, Heart, Exercise

  4 Copy quote