Scornful Quotes & Sayings

He had not yet learned that the only safe male rebuke to a scornful female is to stay away from her - especially if that is what she desires. — Booth Tarkington

No one is more arrogant toward women, more aggressive or scornful, than the man who is anxious about his virility. — Simone De Beauvoir

Canada is one of the few places left where the small decencies are observed. If, as a young man, I was scornful of the country because we always seemed so far behind style-setting New York, I now thank God for the cultural lag. Ours, after all, is the good neighbourhood. A society well worth preserving. — Mordecai Richler

Today's Republican Party ... is an insurgent outlier. It has become ideologically extreme; contemptuous of the inherited social and economic policy regime; scornful of compromise; unpersuaded by conventional understanding of facts, evidence, and science; and dismissive of the legitimacy of its political opposition, all but declaring war on the government. The Democratic Party, while no paragon of civic virtue, is more ideologically centered and diverse, protective of the government's role as it developed over the course of the last century, open to incremental changes in policy fashioned through bargaining with the Republicans, and less disposed to or adept at take-no-prisoners conflict between the parties. This asymmetry between the parties, which journalists and scholars often brush aside or whitewash in a quest for "balance," constitutes a huge obstacle to effective governance. — Thomas E. Mann

Poems are not for explaining," she said, her tone as bored and faintly scornful as his. "They are for pretty girls to read aloud. Everyone knows that. — Emily Horner

Well, we never expected this!" they all say. "No one liked her. They all said she was pretentious, awkward, difficult to approach, prickly, too fond of her tales, haughty, prone to versifying, disdainful, cantankerous, and scornful. But when you meet her, she is strangely meek, a completely different person altogether!"
How embarrassing! Do they really look upon me as a dull thing, I wonder? But I am what I am. — Murasaki Shikibu

As a young man I was scornful about the supernatural but as I have got older, the sharp line that divided the credible from the incredible has tended to blur; I am aware that the whole world is slightly incredible — Colin Wilson

Leave this touching and clawing. Let him be to me a spirit. A message, a thought, a sincerity, a glance from him, I want, but not news nor pottage. I can get politics, and chat, and neighborly conveniences from cheaper companions. Should not the society of my friend be to me poetic, pure, universal, and great as nature itself? Ought I to feel that our tie is profane in comparison with yonder bar of cloud that sleeps on the horizon, or that clump of waving grass that divides the brook? Let us not vilify, bur raise it to that standard. That great, defying eye, that scornful beauty of his mien and action, do not pique yourself on reducing, but rather fortify and enhance. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

Baley tried to picture a world as a sphere being lit and unlit as it turned. He found it hard to do and felt scornful of the so-superior Spacers who let such an essential thing as time be dictated to them by the vagaries of planetary movements. — Isaac Asimov

Laughter almost ever cometh of things most disproportioned to ourselves and nature: delight hath a joy in it either permanent or present; laughter hath only a scornful tickling. — Philip Sidney

The hidden and awful Wisdom which apportions the destinies of mankind is pleased so to humiliate and cast down the tender, good, and wise; and to set up the selfish, the foolish, or the wicked. Oh, be humble, my brother, in your prosperity! Be gentle with those who are less lucky, if not more deserving. Think, what right have you to be scornful, whose virtue is a deficiency of temptation, whose success may be a chance, whose rank may be an ancestor's accident, whose prosperity is very likely a satire. — William Makepeace Thackeray

The soldiers in their full dress uniforms were already miserable, some from the heat, others from envy. "We've got the bloody ugliest uniforms in the Empire," one of the Rifles muttered, casting a glance at the infinitely more splendid dress of the nearby Hussars. "I hate this gloomy dark green."
"Pretty target you'd make, crawling forward of the front lines in bright red and gold," another Rifle replied in a scornful undertone. "You'd have your arse shot off."
"I don't care. Women like red coats."
"You'd choose a woman over not having your arse shot off?"
"Wouldn't you?"
The other man's silence conceded the point. — Lisa Kleypas

Travellers scowl at us, and countrymen give us scornful names. 'Strider' I am to one fat man who lives within a day's march of foes that would freeze his heart, or lay his little town in ruin, if he were not guarded ceaselessly. Yet we would not have it otherwise. If simple folk are free from care and fear, simple they will be, and we must be secret to keep them so. — J.R.R. Tolkien

Hey, senorita, want to throw back some margaritas with me?"

Maya gave him a scornful look as only Maya could. "Who the hell are you?"

"Your dream come true, sweetheart."

"I might puke." Maya shoved past him, her toolbox just missing his groin. "It's too early in the morning for assholes. — Allyson James

O, to be a ruler of life
not a slave, To meet life as a powerful conqueror, No fumes
no ennui
no more complaints or scornful criticisms. O me repellent and ugly, O to these proud laws of the air, the water and the ground, proving my interior Soul impregnable, And nothing exterior shall ever take command of me. — Walt Whitman

The 'good' mother, with her fixed smile, her rigidity, her goody-goody outlook, her obsession with unnecessary hygiene, is in fact a fool. It is the 'bad' mother, unafraid of a joke and a glass of wine, richly self-expressive, scornful of suburban values, who is, in reality, good. — Rachel Cusk

Aware of her uneasy gaze straying to his rampant arousal, Sebastian shot her a scornful glance.
"Pay it no mind," he said, climbing into bed with her. "From now on, I have every expectation that proximity to you will affect my private parts like a prolonged swim in a Siberian lake. — Lisa Kleypas

You do not overcome the old teaching through doing less, but through doing more. Every step closer to my soul excites the scornful laughter of my devils, those cowardly ear-whisperers and poison-mixers. It was easy for them to laugh, since I had to do strange things. — C. G. Jung

Note: - One can do a great deal with appropriate smiles. I must study the subject carefully. The friendly smile - the scornful smile - the detached smile - the entreating smile - the common or garden grin. — L.M. Montgomery

I hear very little from evangelicals about the impact of gun proliferation on violent crime, much less an issue like nuclear disarmament. I hear almost nothing about health care for the poor and protecting widows and orphans, both biblical mandates, and scant mention of the thirteen million children who die worldwide from malnutrition in a year. I hear scornful dismissal of concerns about global warming, an issue viewed seriously by the vast majority of scientists. I hear talk about family values, but when an administration proposed legislation to allow mothers to take unpaid leave after childbirth, conservative religious groups opposed it. — Philip Yancey

I knew by this time what Thea thought of these people and in fact of most people, with their faulty humanity. She couldn't stand them. And what her eccentricity amounted to was that she proposed a different kind of humanity altogether. I guess nothing restrains people from demanding ideal conditions. Very little restrains them from anything. Thea's standard was high, but she wasn't exactly to blame as having arbitrarily set it high. For when she talked to me about some particular person she'd be more frightened than scornful. People with whom she had to struggle scared her, and what I'd call average hypocrisy, just the incidental little whiffs of the social machine, was terribly hard on her. As for greediness or envy, fat self-smelling of appreciation, hates and destructions, fraud, gnawing, she had a very poor tolerance of them, and I'd see her go out in the eyes in a really dangerous way at a gathering. — Saul Bellow

Winnie did not believe in fairy tales. She had never longed for a magic wand, did not expect to marry a prince, and was scornful - most of the time - of her grandmother's elves. So now she sat, mouth open, wide-eyed, not knowing what to make of this extraordinary story. It couldn't - not a bit of it - be true. And yet: — Natalie Babbitt

Untroubled, scornful, outrageous - that is how wisdom wants us to be: she is a woman and never loves anyone but a warrior. — Friedrich Nietzsche

I believe that you are sincere and good at heart. If you do not attain happiness, always remember that you are on the right road, and try not to leave it. Above all, avoid falsehood, every kind of falsehood, especially falseness to yourself. Watch over your own deceitfulness and look into it every hour, every minute. Avoid being scornful, both to others and to yourself. What seems to you bad within you will grow purer from the very fact of your observing it in yourself. Avoid fear, too, though fear is only the consequence of every sort of falsehood. Never be frightened at your own faint-heartedness in attaining love. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Of all the grief's that harass the distressed; sure the most bitter is a scornful jest. — Samuel Johnson

Piglet," Bishop Wulfheard said in a scornful tone. I stared at him, then held up a hand to check Merewalh, who was about to leave the hall. "Maybe we don't need a piglet," I said slowly, as if an idea was just coming to me. "Why waste a baby pig when there's a bishop available?" Wulfheard fled. — Bernard Cornwell

Adultery is in most cases a theft in the dark. At such moments almost every woman betrays her husband's innermost secrets; becomes a Delilah who discloses to a stranger, discloses to her lover, the mysteries of her husband's strength or weakness. What seems to me treason is, not that women give themselves, but that a woman is prone, when she does so, to justify herself to herself by uncovering her husband's nakedness, exposing it to the inquisitive and scornful gaze of a stranger. — Stefan Zweig

I don't know what you mean by 'glory,'" Alice said.
Humpty Dumpty smiled contemptuously. "Of course you don't
till I tell you. I meant 'there's a nice knock-down argument for you!'"
"But glory' doesn't mean 'a nice knock-down argument,'" Alice objected.
"When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean
neither more nor less."
"The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean so many different things."
"The question is," said Humpty Dumpty, "Which is to be master
that's all."
Alive was too much puzzled to say anything, so after a minute Humpty Dumpty began again. "They've a temper, some of them
particularly, verbs, they're the proudest
adjectives you can do anything with, but not verbs
however, I can manage the whole lot! Impenetrability! That's what I say! — Lewis Carroll

Marriage?"
Amelia almost enjoyed the look on his face. "I suppose Merripen forgot to mention that minor detail. Yes, Cam has proposed to me. And he's rich, Leo. Rich rich, which means even if you decide to go jump in the lake and drown yourself, the girls and I would be taken care of. Nice, isn't it, that someone's concerned about our future?"
"I forbid it."
She gave him a scornful glance. "Forgive me if I'm less than impressed by your authority, Leo. Perhaps you should practice on someone else. — Lisa Kleypas

The lion snorted. 'You treat all as a game. That is why they sent for me - Malcador cannot trust you. No one can trust you. Your Legion is a rabble that would brawl among themselves if you were not there to smack their heads together.' 'If only they were more like yours,' said Russ, mockingly. 'Yes,' replied the Lion, exasperated. 'Yes. Is that so hard to imagine?'

Russ loosened his arms, letting Krakenmaw swing lazily before him. 'I know why you do this. I know why you conquer, world after world, driving your sons after every campaign Malcador finds for you. But our father won't do it, brother. He won't choose a favourite. And if He did, it wouldn't be you - it would be Sanguinius, or Rogal, or Horus. So you're wasting yourself, trying to be noticed. It doesn't work like that.'

The Lion let slip a scornful laugh. 'Not all of us are so without friends in the Palace, Leman, and you have no idea who our father favours. — Chris Wraight

The scornful nostril and the high head gather not the odors that lie on the track of truth. — George Eliot

The true Christians are the true citizens, lofty of purpose, resolute in endeavor, ready for a hero's deeds, but never looking down on their task because it is cast in the day of small things; scornful of baseness, awake to their own duties as well as to their rights, following the higher law with reverence, and in this world doing all that in their power lies, so that when death comes they may feel that humanity is in some degree better because they lived. — Theodore Roosevelt

Part of the writer's problem may be thee wrong kind of appreciation: hen he does work he knows to be less than he's capable of, his friends praise precisely those things he knows to be weak or meretricious. The writer who cannot write because nothing he writes is good enough, by his own standards, and because no one around him seems to share his standards, is in a special sort of bind:
the love of good fiction that gets him started in the first place makes him scornful of the flawed writing he does (nearly all first-draft writing is flawed) and his sense that nobody cares about truly good fiction robs him of motivation. — John Gardner

And we may ask the scornful themselves: If our hope is a dream, when will you build up your edifice and order things justly by your intellect alone, without Christ? If they declare that it is they who are advancing towards unity, only the most simple-hearted among them believe it, so that one may positively marvel at such simplicity. Of a truth, they have more fantastic dreams than we. They aim at justice, but, denying Christ, they will end by flooding the earth with blood, for blood cries out for blood, and he that taketh up the sword shall perish by the sword. And if it were not for Christ's covenant, they would slaughter one another down to the last two men on earth. And those two last men would not be able to restrain each other in their pride, and the one would slay the other and then himself. And that would come to pass, were it not for the promise of Christ that for the sake of the humble and meek the days shall be shortened. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the path of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scornful; 2)But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in His law he meditates day and night. — Anonymous

like most men skilled at their work they were scornful of any least suggestion of knowing anything not learned at first hand. — Cormac McCarthy

I do not call reason that brutal reason which crushes with its weight what is holy and sacred, that malignant reason which delights in the errors it succeeds in discovering, that unfeeling and scornful reason which insults credulity. — Joseph Joubert

Beyond each mountain pass is a different religious sect with thousands of scholars and fools who follow it, saying, "Only this is true; this will not deceive you." This self-authorization of one's own truth delights a group of similar beings: when told to a group that does not agree, they are scornful." Gendun Chopel "An Adornment for Nagarjuna's Thought — The Dolgyal Shugden Research Society

When the illiterate and perhaps scornful trader has earned by enterprise and industry his coveted leisure and independence, and is admitted to the circles of wealth and fashion, he turns inevitably at last to those still higher but yet inaccessible circles of intellect and genius, and is sensible only of the imperfection of his culture and the vanity and insufficiency of all his riches, and further proves his good sense by the pains which he takes to secure for his children that intellectual culture whose want he so keenly feels; and thus it is that he becomes the founder of a family. — Henry David Thoreau

There was something unfair about a system in which a little kid was brought into a courtroom and surrounded by lawyers arguing and sniping at each other under the scornful eye of a judge, the referee, and somehow in the midst of this barrage of laws and code sections and motions and legal talk the kid was supposed to know what was happening to him. It was hopelessly unfair. — John Grisham

Eliot was scornful of idle women readers who imagined themselves the heroines of French novels, and of self-regarding folk who saw themselves in the most admirable character in a novel, and she hoped for more nuanced engagement from her own readers. Even so, all readers make books over in their own image, and according to their own experience. — Rebecca Mead

Every step closer to my soul excites the scornful laughter of my devils, those cowardly ear-whisperers and poison-mixers. — C. G. Jung

We should not scorn those whose fear is greater than our own. — Warren Eyster

Frederick Douglass, former slave, extraordinary speaker and writer, wrote in his Rochester newspaper the North Star, January 21, 1848, of "the present disgraceful, cruel, and iniquitous war with our sister republic. Mexico seems a doomed victim to Anglo Saxon cupidity and love of dominion." Douglass was scornful of the unwillingness of opponents of the war to take real action (even the abolitionists kept paying their taxes): The determination of our slaveholding President to prosecute the war, and the probability of his success in wringing from the people men and money to carry it on, is made evident, rather than doubtful, by the puny opposition arrayed against him. No politician of any considerable distinction or eminence seems willing to hazard his popularity with his party . . . by an open and unqualified disapprobation of the war. None seem willing to take their stand for peace at all risks; and all seem willing that the war should be carried on, in some form or other. — Howard Zinn

No offense, doll, but that's not something I'm willing to share. I'd prefer to live a long and happy life if it's all the same to you."
"You can't just throw out vague allegations and then say nothing else!"
"See, that's the good thing about being a fugitive like me. I can do what the hell I like, and I'm not answerable to anyone." Stepping away from the bars, he stands with his legs stretched out wide. His stance matches his grin.
"Sure looks like that's working out well for you," I say, piercing him with a scornful look. — Siobhan Davis

[ ... ] they imagine that the life they are obliged to lead is not that for which they are really fitted, and they bring to their regular occupations either a fantastic indifference or a sustained and lofty application, scornful, bitter and conscientious. — Marcel Proust

Where there is contempt/scornful rejection and slander, there wealth will not remain. — Dada Bhagwan

I was taught by professors who had done their schooling in the 1930s. Most of them were scornful of, even hated, big business. — Stephen Ambrose

Remember, no human condition is ever permanent. Then you will not be overjoyed in good fortune nor too scornful in misfortune. — Socrates

1. Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful. 2. But his delight is in the law of the Lord; and in his law doth he meditate day and night. 3. And he shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of water, that bringeth forth his fruit in his season; his leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever he doeth shall prosper. — Anonymous

When I use a word," Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, "it means just what I choose it to mean - neither more nor less. — Therese Anne Fowler

The English have a scornful insular way Of calling the French light. — Elizabeth Barrett Browning

I don't know that you would ever like him, or think him agreeable, Margaret. He is not a lady's man.' Margaret wreathed her throat in a scornful curve. — Elizabeth Gaskell

Oh, don't look so morally offended. Don't forget that if you get up on your high horse it's a long way to fall." He looked at his watch. "Do you know how late it is? Time for your next class."

I lifted my chin. "You're right there," I said, trying to sound as icily scornful as possible. "My high horse and I must just go and find a toilet to throw up in first, because this conversation makes us sick to our stomachs. — Kerstin Gier

Ah yes.' Peter's tone was scornful. 'And they must always be paid before the poor tradesmen's bills, mustn't they?'
'They must indeed. They are debts of honour.'
'Oh, Mary.' He leant over and kissed me quickly. 'What a lot we'll have to argue about after we're married. — Jennifer Paynter

Mother' (with a short scornful laugh), 'you will make me confess. The only time I saw Miss Hale, she treated me with a haughty civility which had a strong flavour of contempt in it. She held herself aloof from me as if she had been a queen, and I her humble, unwashed vassal. Be easy, mother. — Elizabeth Gaskell

The spring without a leaf to toss, bare and bright like a virgin fierce in her chastity, scornful in her purity, was laid out on fields wide-eyed and watchful and entirely careless of what was done or thought by the beholders. — Virginia Woolf

When I was a kid, there was unhappiness in my family - was dealt with partly by escaping to television. And from a very early age, for whatever reason, I became scornful and resistant to and angry about that. And some other time in my life, I realized that there's a lot I loved in television. — Robert Pinsky

Not having time for a person, not being able to sit in silence together with somebody, that's the same as rejecting them, as being scornful about them. — Henning Mankell

It is an unimaginatively standardized background, a sluggishness, of speech and manners, a rigid ruling of the spirit by the desire to appear respectable. It is contentment ... the contentment of the quiet dead, who are scornful of the living for their restless walking. It is negation canonized as the one positive virtue. It is the prohibition of happiness. It is slavery self-sought and self-defended. It is dullness made God. A savorless people, gulping tasteless food, and sitting afterward, coatless and thoughtless, in rocking chairs prickly with inane decorations, listening to mechanical music, saying mechanical things about the excellence of Ford automobiles, and viewing themselves as the greatest race in the world. — Sinclair Lewis

Unlike Gatsby and Tom Buchanan I had no girl whose disembodied face floated along the dark cornices and blinding signs and so I drew up the girl beside me, tightening my arms. Her wan scornful mouth smiled and I drew her up again, closer, this time to my face. — F Scott Fitzgerald

The modern world is also fascinated by innovation but scornful to tradition. Like the Athenians in Paul's day, many people do nothing but get involved in the latest fads (Acts 17:21). People stand in line to purchase the latest gimmicks, and no sooner do they learn how to use them than the manufacturers declare the models obsolete. Innovation! Progress! — Warren W. Wiersbe

People are what you make them. A scornful look turns into a complete fool a man of average intelligence. A contemptuous indifference turns into an enemy a woman who, well treated, might have been an angel. — Andre Maurois

Tall, elegant, vital, scornful. A man like that could rock a woman to her very core. — Margaret Way

Psychopaths have a grandiose self-structure which demands a scornful and detached devaluation of others, in order to ward off their envy toward the good perceived in other people. He will choose you, disarm you with his words, and control you with his presence. He will delight you with his wit and his plans. He will show you a good time but you will always get the bill. He will smile and deceive you, and he will scare you with his eyes. And when he is through with you, and he will be through with you, he will desert you and take with him your innocence and your pride. — Robert D. Hare

Stop it," Chance says out loud, angryraw, scornful voice that she hardly recognizes, "Jesus, just fucking stop it," but she's crying again, and her eyes burn, and she's so goddamn sick of the sound, the smell and saltbland flavor of her own useless tears. — Caitlin R. Kiernan

Thomas Henri Huxley often preached tolerance, but in practice he could not wait to go after religion and religious people in the most scornful of terms.
[Curb your enthusiasm,2016] — Michael Ruse

Above all, avoid falsehood, every kind of falsehood, especially falseness to yourself. Watch over your own deceitfulness and look into it every hour, every minute. Avoid being scornful, both to others and to yourself. What seems to you bad within you will grow purer from the very fact of your observing it in yourself. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Publicity is the only thing some people fear. An aroused public opinion has been the cause of most reforms. Telling the truth is perhaps the pacifist's only weapon. Over and over again, even the suggestion that one may publish the facts has changed a scornful, bullying opponent into an almost subservient helper. But how dangerous it is! — Muriel Lester

I believe you owe me a token, my lady. Or do you wish me to extend credit?"
"What, and have you claim I owe you some further recompense?" she declined with a scornful laugh as she flipped him a wooden chip.
"Definitely not!"
Christopher sighed in exaggerated disappointment. "Too bad. I was looking forward to collecting."
"You always are," she murmured as he leaned forward to pick up the chip.
"You can hardly fault me there." His tone was equally soft as his eyes caressed her warmly. "You sorely test my restraints, my lady."
"Restraints?" She raised a delicate brow in disbelief. "I have seen no evidence of such."
"Madam, if you really knew, you'd think me a scoundrel."
"I already do."

-Christopher & Erienne — Kathleen E. Woodiwiss

She was scornful. "He talks to you personally?" "He talks to everyone personally. Most people just don't bother to listen. — Francine Rivers

We are so scornful when we are young! — Dinah Maria Murlock Craik

When will the white man ever become wise, and, instead of treating the Indian with scornful indifference, give him credit for his intelligence, his quick and remarkable instincts, his powers of reflection and organization, and his inveterate opposition to all innovation? — John Carey Cremony

We shouldn't have been so scornful; we should have had compassion. But compassion takes work, and we were young. — Margaret Atwood

It sometimes seems to me as if I do not belong to this world at all. I deplore music that engenders in people not love but madness: which rouses them to scornful laughter instead of lifting their thoughts to God. — Franz Schubert

There were none so scornful as those who had had to learn the hard way. — Elizabeth Bear

The scornful force of his tone turned the word into a curse — John Knowles

The gods! long since they hold us in contempt,
Scornful of gifts thus offered by the lost!
Why should we fawn and flinch away from doom? — Aeschylus

Many days passed before we could speak to the Golden One again. But then came the day when the sky turned white, as if the sun had burst and spread its flame in the air, and the fields lay still without breath, and the dust of the road was white in the glow. So the women of the field were weary, and they tarried over their work, and they were far from the road when we came. But the Golden One stood alone at the hedge, waiting. We stopped and we saw that their eyes, so hard and scornful to the world, were looking at us as if they would obey any word we might speak. — Ayn Rand

He had tenderness in his heart - 'a soft place,' as Nicholas Higgins called it; but he had some pride in concealing it; he kept it very sacred and safe, and was jealous of every circumstance that tried to gain admission. But if he dreaded exposure of his tenderness, he was equally desirous that all men should recognize his justice; and he felt that he had been unjust, in giving so scornful a hearing to anyone who had waited, with humble patience, for five hours, to speak to him. — Elizabeth Gaskell

One of life's mysteries is why two children growing up in the same home sometimes take radically different paths - one following Christ, the other rebellious and scornful. Yet it happens. — Billy Graham