Pity Quotes - Page 12

• Contempt mates well with pity.

  Gloria Naylor

  Disrespect, Mates, Contempt

  Gloria Naylor (2017). “Linden Hills: A Novel”, p.26, Open Road Media

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• Self-pity is, perhaps, the least becoming of all emotions, and we often indulge in it only beause we are too exhausted to resist.

  Ivy Baker Priest

  Self, Indulge In, Becoming

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• They love the country, and none else, who seek
  For their own sake its silence and its shade.
  Delights which who would leave, that has a heart
  Susceptible of pity, or a mind
  Cultured and capable of sober thought.

  William Cowper

  Country, Heart, Silence

  William Cowper, James Thomson (1832). “The Works of Cowper and Thompson: Including Many Letters and Poems Never Before Published in this Country. With a New and Interesting Memoir of the Life of Thomson”, p.73

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• Pity! Religion has so seldom found
  A skilful guide into poetic ground!
  The flowers would spring where'er she deign'd to stray
  And every muse attend her in her way.

  William Cowper

  Spring, Flower, Religion

  William Cowper (1855). “The Complete Poetical Works of William Cowper: With Life, and Critical Notice of His Writings. Eight Engravings on Steel”, p.14

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• Some men make gain a fountain, whence proceeds
  A stream of liberal and heroic deeds;
  The swell of pity, not to be confined
  Within the scanty limits of the mind.

  William Cowper

  Men, Heroic Deeds, Mind

  William Cowper (1845). “The Poetical Works of William Cowper”, p.98

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• If I freely may discover
  What should please me in my lover,
  I would have her fair and witty,
  Savouring more of court than city;
  A little proud, but full of pity;
  Light and humorous in her toying,
  Oft building hopes, and soon destroying,
  Long, but sweet in the enjoying;
  Neither too easy nor to hard;
  All extremes I would have barr'd.

  Ben Jonson

  Love, Sweet, Witty

  Ben Jonson (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Ben Jonson (Illustrated)”, p.690, Delphi Classics

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• Forbear, you things
  That stand upon the pinnacles of state,
  To boast your slippery height! when you do fall,
  You dash yourselves in pieces, ne'er to rise:
  And he that lends you pity, is not wise.

  Ben Jonson

  Wise, Fall, Pieces

  Ben Jonson (1990). “Sejanus His Fall”, p.261, Manchester University Press

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• Great vices are the proper objects of our detestation, smaller faults of our pity, but affectation appears to be the only true source of the ridiculous.

  Henry Fielding

  Vices, Faults, Ridiculous

  Henry Fielding (1821). “The novels of Henry Fielding ... complete in one volume. To which is prefixed, a memoir of the life of the author [by sir W. Scott].”, p.5

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• O vanity, how little is thy force acknowledged or thy operations discerned! How wantonly dost thou deceive mankind under different disguises! Sometimes thou dost wear the face of pity; sometimes of generosity; nay, thou hast the assurance to put on those glorious ornaments which belong only to heroic virtue.

  Henry Fielding

  Vanity, Generosity, Different

  Henry Fielding (1832). “The Adventures of Joseph Andrews”, p.52

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• Sacrificers ... are not the ones to pity. The ones to pity are those that they sacrifice. Oh, the sacrificers, they get it both ways. A person knows themselves that they're able to do without.

  Elizabeth Bowen

  Sacrifice, Able, Way

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• Friendship is made up of esteem and pleasure; pity is composed of sorrow and contempt: the mind may for some time fluctuate between them, but it can never entertain both at once.

  Oliver Goldsmith

  Friendship, Mind, Sorrow

  Oliver Goldsmith (1868). “The vicar of Wakefield, poems, and essays”, p.258

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• Blest be that spot, where cheerful guests retire
  To pause from toil, and trim their evening fire;
  Blest that abode, where want and pain repair,
  And every stranger finds a ready chair
  Blest be those feasts with simple plenty crown'd,
  Where all the ruddy family around
  Laugh at the jest or pranks, that never fail,
  Or sigh with pity at some mournful tale,
  Or press the bashful stranger to his food,
  And learn the luxury of doing good.

  Oliver Goldsmith

  Pain, Simple, Fire

  Oliver Goldsmith (1833). “Miscellaneous Works of Oliver Goldsmith: With a New Life of the Author”, p.81

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• It has been remarked that almost every character which has excited either attention or pity has owed part of its success to merit, and part to a happy concurrence of circumstances in its favor. Had Caesar or Cromwell exchanged countries, the one might have been a sergeant and the other an exciseman.

  Oliver Goldsmith

  Country, Character, Favors

  Oliver Goldsmith (1819). “Essays and poems, by Dr. Oliver Goldsmith. To which are prefixed, memoirs of the author”, p.3

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• Above all things I entreat you to preserve your faith in Christ. It is my wealth in poverty, my joy in sorrow, my peace amid tumult. For all the evil I have committed, my gracious pardon; and for every effort, my exceeding great reward. I have found it to be so. I can smile with pity at the infidel whose vanity makes him dream that I should barter such a blessing for the few subtleties from the school of the cold-blooded sophists.

  Samuel Taylor Coleridge

  Dream, School, Blessing

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• Heart-chilling superstition! thou canst glaze even Pity's eye with her own frozen tear.

  Samuel Taylor Coleridge

  Heart, Eye, Tears

  Samuel Taylor Coleridge, John Keats, Percy Bysshe Shelley (1829). “The Poetical Works of Coleridge, Shelley, and Keats. Complete in One Volume”, p.89

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• From whence comes it that a cripple in body does not irritate us, and that a crippled mind enrages us? It is because a cripple sees that we go right, and a distorted mind says that it is we who go astray. But for that we should have more pity and less rage.

  Blaise Pascal

  Should Have, Mind, Doe

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• O blessed bounty, giving ail content!
  The only fautress of all noble arts
  That lend'st success to every good intent.
  A grace that rests in the most godlike hearts,
  By heav'n to none but happy souls infus'd
  Pity it is, that e'er thou wast abus'd.

  Michael Drayton

  Art, Blessed, Giving

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• We pity or condemn the communist peoples of the world for being bound in the chains of doctrine. So are we. Our doctrine runs as follows: Our Way is the Only Way.

  Marya Mannes

  Running, Doctrine, World

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• When I die, people will say it is the best thing for me. It is because they know it is the worst. They want to avoid the feeling of pity. As though they were the people most concerned!

  Ivy Compton-Burnett

  Death, People, Feelings

  1961 The Mighty and Their Fall, ch.4.

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• Youth is the season of tragedy and despair. Youth is the time when one's whole life is entangled in a web of identity, in a perpetual maze of seeking and of finding, of passion and of disillusion, of vague longings and of nameless griefs, of pity that is a blade in the heart, and of 'all the little emptiness of love.

  Ellen Glasgow

  Grief, Passion, Heart

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• Pity is a corroding thing.

  Martha Graham

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• We pity people too often for the wrong reasons.

  Katherine Anne Porter

  People, Reason, Wrong Reasons

  Katherine Anne Porter (2008). “Katherine Anne Porter: Collected Stories & Other Writings”, p.591, Library of America

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• pity is an agreeable sentiment, uplifting like military music.

  Francoise Sagan

  Uplifting, Military, Sentiments

  FRANCOISE SAGAN (1955). “BONOUR TRISTESSE”

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• As there were no black Founding Fathers, there were no founding mothers - a great pity, on both counts.

  Shirley Chisholm

  Mother, Father, Black

  Shirley Chisholm's remarks for the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), August 10, 1970.

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• I think I love most people best when they are in adversity; for pity is one of my prevailing passions.

  Mary Wollstonecraft

  Passion, Adversity, Thinking

  Mary Wollstonecraft, Janet M. Todd (2003). “The collected letters of Mary Wollstonecraft”

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