Inspirational Quotations

Inspirational Quotations on Insults

There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all argument and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance. This principle is contempt prior to examination.
Herbert Spencer (1820–1903) English Polymath, Philosopher, Sociologist, Political Theorist

I love Wagner, but the music I prefer is that of a cat hung up by its tail outside a window and trying to stick to the panes of glass with its claws.
Charles Baudelaire (1821–67) French Poet, Art Critic, Essayist, Translator

Just the omission of Jane Austen’s books alone would make a fairly good library out of a library that hadn’t a book in it.
Mark Twain (1835–1910) American Humorist

Slander cannot destroy the man … when the flood recedes, the rock is there.
Chinese Proverb

If a man could say nothing against a character but what he can prove, history could not be written.
Samuel Johnson (1709–84) British Essayist

Calumny is only the noise of madmen.
Diogenes Laertius (f.3rd Century CE) Biographer of the Greek Philosophers

I have no right, by anything I do or say, to demean a human being in his own eyes. What matters is not what I think of him; it is what he thinks of himself. To undermine a man’s self-respect is a sin.
Antoine de Saint-Exupery (1900–44) French Novelist, Aviator

There is nothing that people bear more impatiently, or forgive less, than contempt: and an injury is much sooner forgotten than an insult.
Earl of Chesterfield (1694–1773) English Statesman, Man of Letters

Obscenity is whatever happens to shock some elderly and ignorant magistrate.
Bertrand A. Russell (1872–1970) British Philosopher, Mathematician, Social Critic

Reject your sense of injury and the injury itself disappears.
Marcus Aurelius (121–180) Emperor of Rome, Stoic Philosopher

It is a strange desire, to seek power and lose liberty, or to seek power over others and to lose power over a man’s self. The rising unto place is laborious, and by pains men come to greater pains, and it is sometimes base; and by indignities men come to dignities. The standing is slippery, and the regress is either a downfall or at least an eclipse, which is a melancholy thing.
Francis Bacon (1561–1626) English Philosopher

Write your injuries in dust, your benefits in marble.
Benjamin Franklin (1706–90) American Political Leader, Inventor, Diplomat

You will find that silence or very gentle words are the most exquisite revenge for insult.
Indian Proverb

He who puts up with insult invites injury.
Yiddish Proverb

A slander is like a hornet; if you can’t kill it dead the first time, better not strike at it.
Josh Billings (Henry Wheeler Shaw) (1818–85) American Humorist, Author, Lecturer

She looked as if she had been poured into her clothes and had forgotten to say ‘when.’
P. G. Wodehouse (1881–1975) British Novelist, Short-story Writer, Playwright

Insults should be well avenged or well endured.
Scottish Proverb

Our disputants put me in mind of the cuttlefish that, when he is unable to extricate himself, blackens the water about him till he becomes invisible.
Joseph Addison (1672–1719) English Essayist, Poet, Playwright, Politician

To vilify a great man is the readiest way in which a little man can himself attain greatness.
Edgar Allan Poe (1809–49) American Poet

When any one has offended me, I try to raise my soul so high that the offense cannot reach it.
Rene Descartes (1596–1650) French Mathematician, Philosopher

Backbite: To “speak of a man as you find him” when he can’t find you.
Ambrose Bierce (1842–1913) American Short-story Writer, Journalist

Oppression is more easily borne than insult.
Junius Unidentified English Writer

The habit of sneering marks the egotist, the fool, or the knave, or all three.
Johann Kaspar Lavater (1741–1801) Swiss Theologian, Poet

Insults are the arguments employed by those who are in the wrong.
Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712–78) Swiss-born French Philosopher

It is a weakness of your human nature to hate those whom you have wronged.
Tacitus (56–117) Roman Orator, Historian

He who does not shield himself from vilification receives it.
Arabic Proverb

It is often better not to see an insult than to avenge it.
Seneca the Younger (Lucius Annaeus Seneca) (c.4 BCE–65 CE) Roman Stoic Philosopher, Statesman, Tragedian

What is said of a man is nothing. The point is, who says it.
Oscar Wilde (1854–1900) Irish Poet, Playwright

Be thou chaste as ice, and pure as snow, thou shalt not escape calumny.
William Shakespeare (1564–1616) British Playwright

Man is much more sensitive to the contempt of others than to self-contempt.
Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900) German Philosopher, Scholar, Writer

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