Quotes & Sayings About Rebuke

The greatness of God is the true rebuke to the littleness of men. The greatness of Christ is the true rebuke to the littleness of Christians. — Arthur Penrhyn Stanley

Violet Eden!" Steph said sternly, sucking me out of my trance. "We have your dad's Amex, a green light and no specified limit." Her mock rebuke morphed into a devious grin. "What more could a girl want as a birthday present? — Jessica Shirvington

New Zealand's nuclear free movement is a broad-based and popular movement. Our nuclear free status is a challenge to much that is accepted as orthodox in international relations. It was formally adopted in the cold war era as a form of resistance to the dismal doctrines of nuclear deterrence. It is still a rebuke to the unprincipled exercise of economic power and military might. — David Lange

What a mouse he is made by conversation,' " Ezri recited. " 'Scorns gods, dares battle, and flinches from a maid's rebuke! Merest laugh from merest girl is like a dagger felt, and like a dagger, makes a lodging of his breast. Turns blood to milkwater and courage to faint memory.' — Scott Lynch

[ ... ] endless action and reaction. Those beautifully rounded pebbles which you gather on the sand and which you hold in your hand and marvel at their exceeding smoothness, were chiseled into their varies and graceful forms by the ceaseless action of countless waves. Nature is herself a great worker and never tolerates, without certain rebuke, any contradiction to her wise example. Inaction is followed by stagnation. Stagnation is followed by pestilence and pestilence is followed by death. — Frederick Douglass

[T]he man who, in the concrete pressure of a struggle for national independence by a single people, had the coolness, forecast, and capacity to introduce into a merely revolutionary document, an abstract truth, applicable to all men and all times, and so to embalm it there, that to-day, and in all coming days, it shall be a rebuke and a stumbling-block to the very harbingers of reappearing tyranny and oppression. — Abraham Lincoln

The young man of leadership caliber will work while others waste time, study while others snooze, pray while others daydream. Slothful habits are overcome, whether in thought, deed, or dress. The emerging leader eats right, stands tall, and prepares himself to wage spiritual warfare. He will without reluctance undertake the unpleasant task that others avoid or the hidden duty that others evade because it wins no public applause. As the Spirit fills his life, he learns not to shrink from difficult situations or retreat from hard-edged people. He will kindly and courageously administer rebuke when that is called for, or he will exercise the necessary discipline when the interests of the Lord's work demand it. He will not procrastinate, but will prefer to dispatch with the hardest tasks first. — J. Oswald Sanders

The classical theorists resemble Euclidean geometers in a non-Euclidean world who, discovering that in experience straight lines apparently parallel often meet, rebuke the lines for not keeping straight as the only remedy for the unfortunate collisions which are occurring. Yet, in truth, there is no remedy except to throw over the axiom of parallels and to work out a non-Euclidean geometry. — John Maynard Keynes

Nowhere do the Scriptures tell us to seek results, nor do the Scriptures rebuke evangelists if the results are meager. — Billy Graham

Preach the word, be urgent in season and out of season, convince, rebuke, and exhort, be unfailing in patience and in teaching. — Paul The Apostle

Today, Aaron decided, he would begin to grieve in earnest. He would walk the lonely beach, mocked by gulls, uncaring, his every step a stately rebuke to the malign forces that had blighted his fate. His was the tragedy of a man who couldn't have his own way, and he intended to make known his anguish in the solemn solitude that only a stretch of sand, a suspiring sea, and a beetling cliff could provide. — Joseph Caldwell

Let them spend their time condemning every action of persons they do not like; by this let them revoke their own condemnation licenses: no one will take them seriously when it comes time to condemn something that really needs to be condemned, and thus hear, hear, despite the excess noise, the reasonable voices may prevail. — Criss Jami

We need to stop comparing ourselves to others, and stop patting ourselves on the back for attaining artificial measurements of spirituality. We need to take care that we do not think we are something we are not, or else we may deceive ourselves, setting ourselves up for rebuke in the future when we see Christ face to face — Dan Schilling

Accept corrections and you'll improve and increase. — Israelmore Ayivor

If we rebuke our heart by a calm, mild remonstrance, with more compassion for it than passion against it and encourage it to make amendment, then repentance conceived in this way will sink far deeper and penetrate more effectually than fretful, angry, stormy repentance. — Francis De Sales

One's rebuke engraves itself upon the mind more than one's praise. — Seth D.

Forgotten is the first duty of love: to speak the truth (Ephesians 4:15). Real love does not flatter or soothe when correction is needed but points out the error which is blinding and harming the loved one. Christ said, "As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten; be zealous, therefore, and repent" (Revelation 3:19). Instead, the idea is now current that love excludes rebuke, ignores the truth, and seeks unity at any price. Only disaster can result. — Dave Hunt

You surely remember your past
when you rebuke me in honesty. — Toba Beta

Cats are a standing rebuke to behavioral scientists wanting to know how the minds of animals work. The mind of a cat is an unscrutable mystery. — Lewis Thomas

As I do not live in an age when rustling black skirts billow about me, and I do not carry an ebony stick to strike the floor in sharp rebuke, as this is denied me, I rap out a sentence in my note book and feel better. If a grandmother wants to put her foot down, the only safe place to do it these days is in a note book. — Florida Scott-Maxwell

It is amazing but true that it is easy for any of us to rebuke someone else who is intending to do something evil and say, "Don't do that - that's a sin!" And yet it is difficult for us to say the same thing to ourselves. The reason is that saying it to ourselves requires a movement of the will, but saying it to someone else requires only a low level of thought based on things we have heard. — Emanuel Swedenborg

I believed, with morbid sincerity, that if I could make him my friend, we would together, in some small but consequential way, defy the wicked logic of hate and war, that we, together, would stand as a rebuke to the grotesque idea that our problem was without a solution. — Jeffrey Goldberg

Oh why rebuke you him that loves you so? / Lay breath so bitter on your bitter foe. — William Shakespeare

It is a severe rebuke upon us, that God makes us so many allowances, and we make so few to our neighbour. — William Penn

Jesus defeated satan in Gethsemane on the cross, not by directly confronting the devil, but by fulfilling the destiny to which He had been called. The greatest battle that was ever won was accomplished by the apparent death of the victor, without even a word of rebuke to His adversary! — Francis Frangipane

For a man must have intelligence of universals, and be able to proceed from the many particulars of sense to one conception of reason;
this is the recollection of those things which our soul once saw while following God
when regardless of that which we now call being she raised her head up towards the true being. And therefore the mind of the philosopher alone has wings; and this is just, for he is always, according to the measure of his abilities, clinging in recollection to those things in which God abides, and in beholding which He is what He is. And he who employs aright these memories is ever being initiated into perfect mysteries and alone becomes truly perfect. But, as he forgets earthly interests and is rapt in the divine, the vulgar deem him mad, and rebuke him; they do not see that he is inspired. — Plato

Kandinski looked up. 'Do you read science fiction?' he asked matter-of-factly.
'Not as a rule,' Ward admitted. When Kandinski said nothing he went on: 'Perhaps I'm too skeptical, but I can't take it too seriously.'
Kandinski pulled at a blister on his palm. 'No one suggests you should. What you mean is that you take it too seriously.'
Accepting the rebuke with a smile at himself, Ward pulled out one of the magazines and sat down at a table next to Kandinski. On the cover was a placid suburban setting of snugly eaved houses, yew trees, and children's bicycles. Spreading slowly across the roof-tops was an enormous pulpy nightmare, blocking out the sun behind it and throwing a weird phosphorescent glow over the roofs and lawns. 'You're probably right,' Ward said, showing the cover to Kandinski. 'I'd hate to want to take that seriously.'
("The Venus Hunters") — J.G. Ballard

Because of Jesus' finished work of the cross, He will never be angry with you nor rebuke you even when you fail. — Joseph Prince

The apostle Paul urges Christians everywhere in all ages to be nonconformists as far as the world system is concerned. We are not to conform. A true Christian, living an obedient life, is a constant rebuke to those who accept the
moral standards of this world. — Billy Graham

Never be afraid when God brings back your past. Let your memory have its way with you. It is a minister of God bringing its rebuke and sorrow to you. — Oswald Chambers

...according to God's Word, we should not give a singe drop of evangelical consolation to those who are still living in sin. ON THE OTHER HAND, we should not address the slightest threat or rebuke to the broken hearted--but only promises delivering consolation and grace, forgiveness of sin and righteousness. Life and salvation. — C.F.W. Walther

Trust me, I have not earned your dear rebuke,
I love, as you would have me, God the most;
Would lose not Him, but you, must one be lost,
Nor with Lot's wife cast back a faithless look
Unready to forego what I forsook;
This say I, having counted up the cost,
This, tho' I be the feeblest of God's host,
The sorriest sheep Christ shepherds with His crook.
Yet while I love my God the most, I deem
That I can never love you overmuch;
I love Him more, so let me love you too;
Yea, as I apprehend it, love is such
I cannot love you if I love not Him.
I cannot love Him if I love not you. — Christina Rossetti

We will go no place where we cannot take our Master with us. While others take their liberty to sin, We will not renounce our liberty to rebuke and confront them. — Charles Haddon Spurgeon

It was the cheapest kind of rebuke, to call a woman ugly, but one to which small boys and grown men seemed equally quick to stoop when feeling challenged. — Helen Simonson

One invited artists to social events, but only for the pleasure of their company. To invite singers or dancers to perform for their supper was inexpressively vulgar, and deserved a prompt and stinging rebuke. — Kerry Greenwood

The first requisite of a gentleman is to be true, brave and noble, and to be therefore a rebuke and scandal to venal and vulgar souls. — John Lancaster Spalding

grief. We do and say strange things - sometimes bizarre things - when we are swallowed up in grief. No one should be hard on us when we say thoughtless and selfish things when we are in grief. Both Mary and Martha accused Jesus of being the cause of their brother's death by not responding immediately to their request: "Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died" (John 11:21, 32). Jesus did not rebuke either of them. Instead, He wept with them (see John 11:35). So with all of us. He knows our frame; He remembers we are dust. — R.T. Kendall

Brain, v. [as in "to brain"]: To rebuke bluntly, but not pointedly; to dispel a source of error in an opponent. — Ambrose Bierce

Anything happening," she whispered.
"Aside from you blundering about like a lost elephant?" he asked, in the same low tone.
She nodded, accepting the rebuke. "Aside from that. — John Flanagan

The ecological crisis in the world had become so obviously serious that Pope John Paul II felt the need to rebuke the wealthy classes of the industrialized nations for creating that crisis: Today, the dramatic threat of ecological breakdown is teaching us the extent to which greed and selfishness, both individual and collective, are contrary to the order of creation. — Howard Zinn

Whoever rebukes his fellow man, whether concerning matters between the two of them or between him [the fellow man] and God, needs to rebuke him in private. He shall speak to him calmly and gently, and make known to him that he talks to him only for his own good, to bring him to the life of the world-to-come. If he accepts it from him, good; if not, he shall rebuke him a second and a third time. Thus he is always obliged to rebuke him until the sinner strikes him and says to him, "I will not listen." If he does not prevent everything he can possibly prevent, he is ensnared in the sin of all those he could have prevented from sinning. — Maimonides

If it is hard to accept a rebuke, even a private one, it is harder still to administer one in loving humility. — D. A. Carson

Don't punish people who repent; heal them. I don't believe that private sin requires public rebuke or removal from office if repentance is taking place. However, when no evidence of true repentance exists, then discipline is in order. — Ted Haggard

Everybody in the world ought to care for books, and if there are some who do not, why that is a perfectly convincing reason why books ought to be given to them, to be a rebuke to them and, perchance, to rescue them from the error of their ways. — Willis Johnson

A winner rebukes and forgives; a loser is too timid to rebuke and too petty to forgive. — Sydney J. Harris

it is extraordinary how few Christians make any concerted effort to keep the commandment of sabbath rest. We have somehow twisted Jesus' pithy rebuke of the Pharisees, "The sabbath was made for humankind, and not humankind for the sabbath" (Mark 2:27) from a warning against legalism into a license for neglect. We seem to forget that in the very next breath Jesus asserts, "so the Son of Man is lord even of the sabbath" (v. 28), thus asserting his lordship over - not exemption from or indifference to - this very good gift from God to his image bearers. — Andy Crouch

Rebuke them that violates the principles of kingdom of God — Sunday Adelaja

A story contained in the family lore of Brigham Young's descendants illustrates the submissive nature of humility. It recounts that in a public meeting the Prophet Joseph, possibly as a test, sternly rebuked Brigham Young for something he had done or something he was supposed to have done but hadn't - the detail is unclear. When Joseph finished the rebuke, everyone in the room waited for Brigham Young's response. This powerful man, later known as the Lion of the Lord, in a voice everyone could tell was sincere, said simply and humbly, "Joseph, what do you want me to do?" — Truman G. Madsen

Remembering is a necessary rebuke to those who say the Holocaust never happened or has been exaggerated. — Kofi Annan

You are sitting in my chair, my lord." She said the words very civilly, she thought. Although he quirked a brow and lowered his chin as if giving her one of those looks. Like really? In a way that wasn't a question. She was telling a fae king, a hawk fae king, and a guest of the dark fae, that he should be sitting in her seat? But she didn't stop there. "You may sit there if it pleases you." She pointed to Micala's seat since he was not at the meal. Her mother's mouth gaped and for once she didn't have an immediate rebuke ready for Ritasia. The king gave Ritasia such a sinister smile, she was afraid she might have gone a little too far with her first encounter with him. She quickly remembered her manners, curtseyed, though, because she wasn't wearing a gown, she thought she looked a little ridiculous, then looked back up at him. — Terry Spear

Expecting to receive a rebuke, her heart lifted when she read the words on the page, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee. — J.E.B. Spredemann

The rebuke came, keen-edged. 'Trusting the man is not the same thing as knowing what he's about. — Janny Wurts

Youngest Brother, swan's wing,
where one arm should be, yours the shirt
of nettles short a sleeve
and me with no time left to finish --
I didn't mend you all the way back into man
though I managed for your brothers;
they flit again from court to playing-courts
to courting, while you station yourself,
wing folded from sight, avian eye
to the outside, no rebuke meant but love's.
Was it better then, the living on the water,
the taking to air...?

("Ever After," from the book 'The Poets' Grimm') — Debora Greger

Shocked at this rebuke, Sarah took a step backward. "But I ... I am the daughter of a marquess. I cannot marry either - "
"You are new here, so I will explain. In this land, nobility comes not from one's fathers or a title or from the land one owns, but from one's actions." His voice was hard-edged, and his words seemed harsh to her. "The MacKinnon brothers are the highest nobility to those who live on the frontier - true warriors, men who know how to fight and survive, men who put the lives of others before their own. Your family's wealth, your title, your virtue - they mean nothing out here. They won't fill your belly, and they won't keep you alive. What matters most right now is your survival. — Pamela Clare

We were where we we had never been in our lives.
Visitors--visiting even ourselves.

The bats were part of the sun's machinery,
Connected to the machinery of the flowers
By the machinery of insects. The bats' meaning

Oiled the unfailing logic of the earth.
Cosmic requirement--on the wings of a goblin.
A rebuke to our flutter of half-participation...

Those bats had their eyes open. Unlike us,
They knew how, and when, to detach themselves
From the love that moves the sun and other stars. — Ted Hughes

A godly person - one who serves Christ and exhibits purity and integrity in his life - is not necessarily welcomed or admired by those who live differently. They may even react in scorn, or refuse to include a christian in their social gatherings because his very presence is a rebuke to them. — Billy Graham

She was quick of mind and swift of tongue, always ready to answer a set down with the kind of witty rebuke most of us can think of only long after the moment of insult has passed. — Geraldine Brooks

If, on a rare occasion, it is necessary to speak with some severity in order to make a grievous crime felt, we should always, at the conclusion of the rebuke, add some kind words. We must heal wounds, as the Samaritan did, with wine and oil. But as oil floats above all other liquors, so meekness should predominate in all our actions. — Alphonsus Liguori

When gentle persuasion [of children] falls on deaf ears, we resort to ridicule and rebuke. Then we return to threats and punishment. This is the modus operandi of a mutual frustration society. — Haim Ginott

Rebuke

Obstinate regression
bringing untold paths
of deep dark foreboding
depression... — Muse

Rust is nature's rebuke of our vanity that the things we build of iron and steel will last.

From "Tractor Bones and Rusted Trucks" - not yet published — Greg Seeley

It's in the difficult times that we're growing and you can't just rebuke everything hard. We've got to endure it and fight the good fight of faith and pass the test. — Joel Osteen

God is fully aware of and has authorized every rebuke and every correction that comes into the life of a believer. It is truly God who "worketh in [us] both to will and to do of his good pleasure" (Phil. 2:13), and even when others "thought evil against [us]; . . . God meant it unto good" (Gen. 50:20). — Jim Berg

So then, when I speak to you, I speak to myself. If I seem to warn or to rebuke you, it is not so much you, as myself, to whom the warning or the rebuke is addressed. — Joseph Barber Lightfoot

Have you ever had a difference with a dear friend? How his letters, written in the period of love and confidence, sicken and rebuke you! What a dreary mourning it is to dwell upon those vehement protests of dead affection! What lying epitaphs they make over the corpse of love! What dark, cruel comments upon Life and Vanities! Most of us have got or written drawers full of them. They are closet-skeletons which we keep and shun — William Makepeace Thackeray

Fools despise wisdom and instruction" (Prov. 1:7), but it is the nature of true godliness, maturity, and health in church members to accept the loving instruction and rebuke of others. — Thabiti M. Anyabwile

The actions of a leader are always criticised by scholars as well as common men. A scholar has no obligation to produce result, so he is free to rebuke leaders for not sticking to noble means. Common men envy leaders their position and power, thus feeling happy in vilifying them to pull them down to their own levels. — Awdhesh Singh

An extra pressure, a silent rebuke, an unseen praising, a firm correction: all these passed between us as through telegraph wires. — Christilot Hanson-Boylen

It is an easy thing for one whose foot is on the outside of calamity to give advice and to rebuke the sufferer. — Aeschylus

It may well have been, too, that the smiling moderation with which she faced and answered these blasphemies, that this tender and hypocritical rebuke appeared to her frank and generous nature as a particularly shameful and seductive form of that criminal attitude towards life which she was endeavouring to adopt. But she could not resist the attraction of being treated with affection by a woman who had just shewn herself so implacable towards the defenceless dead; she sprang on to the knees of her friend and held out a chaste brow to be kissed; ... — Marcel Proust

The little hand on time's clock trips away as though measuring seconds; but God knows how much time it is covering when it whisks round heedless of the divisions it passes over! So much is certain, that we have been up here for years. Our brains reel, surely this is an evil dream, though dreamed with nor hashish nor opium; a censor of morals would rebuke us for it. — Thomas Mann

Gregory's words remain a sharp and timely rebuke to the continuing temptation to practice theology as though we could separate the exercise of our mind from the development of our character. — Christopher A. Hall

I believe it is now the duty of the slaves of the South to rebuke their masters for their robbery, oppression and crime ... Nostation or character can destroy individual responsibility, in the matter of reproving sin. — Angelina Grimke

You wish, or rather, have decided, to remove a splinter from someone? Very well, but do not go after it with a stick instead of a lancet for you will only drive it deeper. Rough speech and harsh gestures are the stick, while even-tempered instruction and patient reprimand are the lancet. 'Reprove, rebuke, exhort,' says the Apostle (II Tim. 4:2), not 'batter'. — John Climacus

The Supreme Leader's voice was flat. "You have compassion for her." "No - never. Compassion? For an enemy of the Order?" "I perceive the problem," Snoke intoned. "It isn't her strength that is making you fail. It's your weakness." The rebuke hurt, but Ren didn't show it. — Alan Dean Foster

The name, Seventh-day Adventist, is a standing rebuke to the Protestant world. Here is the line of distinction between the worshipers of God, and those who worship the beast, and receive his mark. The great conflict is between the commandments of God and the requirements of the beast. — Ellen G. White

Abba Macarius said, 'If you rebuke someone and do it with anger, you have allowed a passion to control you. You have not saved anyone and have destroyed yourself'. — Tim Vivian

It behooves those who take the young to task to leave them room for excuse, lest they drive them to be hardened by too much rebuke. — Plato

History and literature rebuke our self-sufficiency; that's one reason why we ought to study them. It's not so much that people of olden times were the finest exemplars of higher humanity, for they too fell short of their ideals, as must all who aspire to higher things--that's what ideals are for. It's that we have abandoned those ideals once animating our civilization, refusing to learn them anew with each generation. We have assumed their transfer to be automatic. We have not indeed jettisoned the hope and drive that keep us working for a better world (that's the good news), but we have forgotten to cultivate ourselves as individuals. — Tracy Lee Simmons

If your prayer is selfish, the answer will be something that will rebuke your selfishness. You may not recognize it as having come at all, but it is sure to be there. — William Temple

Little boldness is needed to assail the opinions and practices of notoriously wicked men; but to rebuke great and good men for their conduct, and to impeach their discernment, is the highest effort of moral courage. — William Lloyd Garrison

The democracy of to-day hold the liberty of one man to be absolutely nothing when in conflict with another man's right of property...
This is a world of compensations; and he would -be- no slave must consent to -have- no slave. Those who deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves; and, under a just God, can not long retain it.
All honor to Jefferson - to the man who, in the concrete pressure of a struggle for national independence by a single people, had the coolness, forecast, and capacity to introduce into a merely revolutionary document, an abstract truth, applicable to all men and all times, and so embalm it there, that to-day, and in all coming days, it shall be a rebuke and a stumbling-block to the very harbingers of re-appearing tyranny and oppression. Your obedient Servant,
[Abraham Lincoln]
April 6, 1859, in a letter to MA State Rep Henry L. Pierce
Springfield, Ill. — Abraham Lincoln

Next to a sincere compliment, I think I like a well-deserved and honest rebuke. — William Feather

hard to create. One will very likely
be rejected with the rebuke that one should not spoil the fun! Pleasure as a motivator can apply to the development of commercially — Eric Von Hippel

[Christ's] goodness is still a rebuke to our badness; His purity still shows up our impurities; His sinlessness still reveals our sinfulness; and unless we allow [Jesus] to destroy the evil within us, the evil within us still wants to destroy Him. This is the conflict of the ages. — Billy Graham

Rebuke her/him who rejects the kingdom — Sunday Adelaja

Doubt is from the devil. You have to resist doubts and rebuke them. You have to get your mind on the answer - on God's Word. In order to receive answers to your prayers, you must eradicate every image, suggestion, vision, dream, impression, feeling, and all thoughts that do not contribute to your faith and that do not affirm that you have what you have asked God for. The word "eradicate" means to uproot or remove. Remember, Satan moves in the sense realm, in the natural realm, and he uses the tool of suggestion. — Kenneth E. Hagin

Generosity is to help a deserving person without his request, and if you help him after his
request, then it is either out of self-respect or to avoid rebuke. — Hazrat Ali Ibn Abu-Talib

If God spares us as a father does his son, let us imitate God. It is natural for children to imitate their parents. Let us imitate God in this one thing: As God spares us, and passes by many failures, so let us be sparing in our censures of others; let us look upon the weaknesses and indiscretions of our brethren with ... a more tender, compassionate eye. How much God bears with us! — Thomas Watson

The preacher who jests and jokes with his people all week will soon find that he cannot stand in his pulpit on Sunday with power to reprove, rebuke and exhort. He may be the life of the party but it will be the death of the prophet. — Vance Havner

Only let the North exert as much moral influence over the South, as the South has exerted demoralizing influence over the North, and slavery would die amid the flame of Christian remonstrance, and faithful rebuke, and holy indignation. — Angelina Grimke

One of the things that makes a Negro unpleasant to white folk is the fact that he suffers from their injustice. He is thus a standing rebuke to them. — H.L. Mencken

People who have a seeking heart still make mistakes. But their reaction to rebuke and correction shows the condition of that heart. It determines what God is able to do with them in the future. — Jim Cymbala

Combativeness was, I suppose, the dominant trait in my grandmother's nature. An aggressive churchgoer, she was quite without Christian feeling; the mercy of the Lord Jesus had never entered her heart. Her piety was an act of war against Protestant ascendancy ... The teachings of the Church did not interest her, except as they were a rebuke to others ... — Mary McCarthy

The usage seems first to have made its appearance on the floor of the Convention in the context of insults. In February the deputy Thomas used the familiar form to rebuke Marat for one of his outbursts: "Shut up, you imbecile! — Timothy Tackett

For all of us, the time is short and the span of life is brief On top of that, our real human problem, the Stoic philosopher Seneca said in a direct rebuke to the modern illusion, is not just that life is short but that we waste so much of it-so that life ceases for us "just when we are getting ready for it."35
But — Os Guinness

Come hither, all ye empty things,
Ye bubbles rais'd by breath of Kings;
Who float upon the tide of state,
Come hither, and behold your fate.
Let pride be taught by this rebuke,
How very mean a thing's a Duke;
From all his ill-got honours flung,
Turn'd to that dirt from whence he sprung. — Jonathan Swift

I rebuke societies that impart to their flowers their cold and rigid demeanour. Flowers should not stand with the stiffness of a soldier on parade but must carry themselves with the relaxedness of a dancer, their arms outstretched above a shaggy mane. Life reveals few sights as distressing as the look of flowers standing mournfully at attention unstirred by the kisses of a million bees. This infection of uncomely reserve is the handiwork of sombre gardeners bred in sombre societies who will not consider their work done till their flowers exude in aspect that stiffness they esteem. They forget that God intended that we mingle with flowers and not merely admire them from afar. But there is a look in a fastidiously manicured garden that makes me keep my distance, a look that draws my eyes but scorns my touch, and that is why I condemn them. — Agona Apell

For kind of sophisticated art I'm interested in, the larger structural rebuke has to be so subtle that it has to be distributed at an almost sub-atomic level. Otherwise, you fall into the kind of preachy, moralistic fable that I don't think makes for good literature. — Junot Diaz

The next minute he realized what had happened to him, but not before she'd caught him staring.
For a decade, I was fixated by her beauty. I wrote an entire article on the evolutionary significance of beauty as a rebuke to myself, that I, who understood the concepts so well, nevertheless could not escape the magnetic pull of one particular woman's beauty.
She knew. With surgical precision, she had peeled back his layers of defenses, until his heart lay bare before her, all its shame and yearning exposed.
He could have lived with this if only he'd kept his secret whole and buried. But she knew. She knew. — Sherry Thomas