Quotes & Sayings About Villainy

What is it about this book - essentially a military history of the first month of the First World War - which gives it its stamp and has created its enormous reputation? Four qualities stand out: a wealth of vivid detail which keeps the reader immersed in events, almost as an eyewitness; a prose style which is transparently clear, intelligent, controlled and witty; a cool detachment of moral judgment - Mrs. Tuchman is never preachy or reproachful; she draws on skepticism, not cynicism, leaving the reader not so much outraged by human villainy as amused and saddened by human folly. These first three qualities are present in all of Barbara Tuchman's work, but in The Guns of August there is a fourth which makes the book, once taken up, almost impossible to set aside. Remarkably, she persuades the reader to suspend any foreknowledge of what is about to happen. — Barbara W. Tuchman

To enlist the support of the people and of parliament, you only have to propose a profitable villainy. — Franz Grillparzer

A successful villain should have all these things at his or her villainous fingertips, or else give up villainy altogether and try to lead a life of decency, integrity, and kindness, which is much more challenging and noble, if not always quite as exciting. — Lemony Snicket

I'm interested in villainy. — Jonathan Frid

Wherein cunning, but in craft? Wherein crafty, but in villainy? Wherein villainous, but in all things? Wherein worthy, but in nothing? — William Shakespeare

It's this same habit that confirms some of us, who are capable of better things, in Lucifer's own pride and stubbornness - that confirms and deepens others of us in villainy - more of us in indifference - that hardens us from day to day, according to the temper of our clay, like images, and leaves us as susceptible as images to new impressions and convictions. — Charles Dickens

Men whose wit has been mother of villainy once have learned from it to be evil in all things. — Sophocles

For the villainy of the world is great, and a man has to run his legs off to keep them from being stolen out fom underneath him. — Bertolt Brecht

We [Americans] move about the world arrogantly, calling wars when we want, overthrowing governments when we want. There is a price to be paid for it
look at 9/11. [That] wasn't just bin Laden. Bin Laden didn't come from the abstract. He came from somewhere, and if you look where ... you'll see America's hand of villainy. — Harry Belafonte

Evil turned out not to be a grand thing. Not sneering Emperors with their world-conquering designs. Not cackling demons plotting in the darkness beyond the world. It was small men with their small acts and their small reasons. It was selfishness and carelessness and waste. It was bad luck, incompetence, and stupidity. It was violence divorced from conscience or consequence. It was high ideals, even, and low methods. — Joe Abercrombie

The world is filled with heroes and wannabes, so let me just play the villain. — Ahmed Mostafa

And I take this opportunity to declare, that ... I will to my dying day oppose, with all the powers and faculties God has given me, all such instruments of slavery on the one hand, and villainy on the other, as this writ of assistance is. It appears to me ... the worst instrument of arbitrary power, the most destructive of English liberty, and the fundamental principles of the constitution, that ever was found in an English law-book. — James Otis

Villainy can win against one library, but not against an organization of readers. — Lemony Snicket

Sin aims always at the utmost; every time it rises up to tempt or entice, might it have its own course, it would go out to the utmost sin in that kind. Every unclean thought or glance would be adultery if it could; every covetous desire would be oppression, every thought of unbelief would be atheism, might it grow to its head. Men may come to that, that sin may not be heard speaking a scandalous word in their hearts - that is, provoking to any great sin with scandal in its mouth; but yet every rise of lust, might it have its course, would come to the height of villainy: it is like the grave that is never satisfied. — John Owen

Were the life of man prolonged, he would become such a proficient in villainy, that it would become necessary again to drown or to burn the world. Earth would become an hell; for future rewards when put off to a great distance, would cease to encourage, and future punishments to alarm. — Charles Caleb Colton

Wholly given up to villainy and debauchery, and ride the steed of perfidy and presumption, and dive into the sea of error and impiety, and are united under the banner of Satan. — Bernard Lewis

In the world of so-called villains, what we need is not another hero. What we need is to stop the influx of people who dress themselves as menaces and proceed to harm others. — Vironika Tugaleva

The government of my country snubs honest simplicity but fondles artistic villainy, and I think I might have developed into a very capable pickpocket if I had remained in the public service a year or two. — Mark Twain

Heaven knows insanity was disreputable enough, long ago; but now that the lawyers have got to cutting every gallows rope and picking every prison lock with it, it is become a sneaking villainy that ought to hang and keep on hanging its sudden possessors until evil-doers should conclude that the safest plan was to never claim to have it until they came by it legitimately. The very calibre of the people the lawyers most frequently try to save by the insanity subterfuge ought to laugh the plea out of the courts, one would think. — Mark Twain

The very rich, having fundamentally missed the point of urban living, have long been frustrated by the fact that it's impossible to squeeze the amenities of a country mansion - car showroom, swimming pool, cinema, servants quarters etc. - into the floor space of your average London terrace. Those without access to trans-dimensional engineering, a key Time Lord discovery, have had to resort to extending their houses into the ground. Thus proving that all that stands between your average rich person and a career in Bond villainy is access to an extinct volcano. They — Ben Aaronovitch

O, Men's vows are women's traitors! All good seeming, By thy revolt, O husband, shall be thought Put on for villainy, not born where't grows, But worn a bait for ladies. — William Shakespeare

It does happen sometimes that a person commits a villainy and praises himself for it, elevating his villainy to the level of a principle, and claiming that l'ordre and the light of civilization are precisely expressed in that abomination; the unfortunate one ends by believing this sincerely, blindly and honestly. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

As a member of a zippier generation, with sparkle in its eyes and a snap in its stride, let me tell you what kept us as high as kites a lot of the time: hatred. All my life I've had people to hate - from Hitler to Nixon, not that those two are at all comparable in their villainy. It is a tragedy, perhaps, that human beings can get so much energy and enthusiasm from hate. If you want to feel ten feet tall and as though you could run a hundred miles without stopping, hate beats pure cocaine any day. Hitler resurrected a beaten, bankrupt, half-starved nation with hatred and nothing more. Imagine — Kurt Vonnegut

Suddenly, however, the dastardly department of my personality presented two plans, one of which involved dynamite, mustache wax, some rope, and train tracks ... which I rejected due to financial investment. — Laurie Notaro

I've never really been serious about my villainy. I don't have a master plan. I suppose my philosophy is: Every villain has a mother. For every cold-blooded killer on your screen, there's a little old lady somewhere who calls him 'sonny.' — Anthony Zerbe

And thus I clothe my naked villainy
With odd old ends stol'n out of holy writ;
And seem a saint, when most I play the devil. — William Shakespeare

The villains were always ugly in books and movies. Necessarily so, it seemed. Because if they were attractive - if their looks matched their charm and their cunning - they wouldn't only be dangerous.
They would be irresistible. — Nenia Campbell

Sarah Palin is a symbol of everything that is wrong with the modern United States. As a representative of our political system, she's a new low in reptilian villainy, the ultimate cynical masterwork of puppeteers like Karl Rove. — Matt Taibbi

For those whose wit becomes the mother of villainy, those it educates to be evil in all things. — Sophocles

Affectation is to be always distinguished from hypocrisy as being the art of counterfeiting those qualities, which we might with innocence and safety, be known to want. Hypocrisy is the necessary burden of villainy; affectation part of the chosen trappings of folly. — Samuel Johnson

You have attributed conditions to villainy that simply result from stupidity. — Robert A. Heinlein

As with any great literature, there are probably as many ways to read William Faulkner's writing as there are readers. There are hundreds of books devoted to interpretations of his novels, numerous biographies, and every year high school teachers and college professors guide their students through one or more of the novels. But after all is said and done, there are the books themselves, and the pleasure of reading them can be deep and lasting. The language Faulkner uses ranges from the poetically beautiful, nearly biblical to the coarse sounds of rough dialect. His characters linger in the mind, whether for their heroism or villainy, their stoicism or self-indulgence, their honesty or deceitfulness or self-deception, their wisdom or stupidity, their gentleness or cruelty. In short, like Shakespeare, William Faulkner understood what it means to be human. — William Faulkner

I was dressed like Darth Vader. Vader was my man, even with the villainy. He wore all black and had a deep voice; he reminded me of my uncle. I had a cheap mask-cape combo, the kind available at any pharmacy during October. — Victor LaValle

Lorsen shook his head in amazement. 'You truly are disgusting.'
'I would be the last to disagree, but you fail to see that you are worse. No man capable of greater evil than the one who thinks himself in the right. No purpose more evil than the higher purpose. I freely admit I am a villain. That's why you hired me. But I am no hypocrite. — Joe Abercrombie

Psychological complexity, character development, the killer line to end a scene, villains blotched with virtue, heroic characters speckled with villainy, foreshadow and backflash, artful misdirection. — David Mitchell

Isn't every hero aware of all the terrible reason they did those good deeds? Aware of every mistake they ever made and how good people got hurt because of their decisions? Don't they recall the moments they weren't heroic at all? The moments where their heroism led to more deaths than deliberate villainy ever could? — Holly Black

I am ... troubled and grieved when men argue that many women want to be raped and that it does not bother them at all to be raped by men even when they verbally protest. It would be hard to believe that such great villainy is actually pleasant for them. — Christine De Pizan

Nevertheless, let no one boast. Just as every man, though he be the greatest genius, has very definite limitations in some one sphere of knowledge, and thus attests his common origin with the essentially perverse and stupid mass of mankind, so also has every man something in his nature which is positively evil. Even the best, nay the noblest, character will sometimes surprise us by isolated traits of depravity; as though it were to acknowledge his kinship with the human race, in which villainy
nay, cruelty
is to be found in that degree. — Arthur Schopenhauer

Never has there been a more wretched hive of scum and villainy,' — Steve McHugh

The Wit of Cheats, the Courage of a Whore,
Are what ten thousand envy and adore:
All, all look up, with reverential Awe,
At crimes that 'scape, or triumph o'er the Law:
While Truth, Worth, Wisdom, daily they decry-'
'Nothing is sacred now but Villainy'

- Epilogue to the Satires, Dialogue I — Alexander Pope

Today is a day of celebration. We have triumphed over villainy and oppression and have given our Alliance - and the galaxy beyond it - a chance to breathe and cheer for the progress in reclaiming our freedom from an Empire that robbed us of it. We have reports from Commander Skywalker that Emperor Palpatine is dead, and his enforcer, Darth Vader, with him. But — Chuck Wendig

The opportunity for evil in itself does not suffice; people need a rationale as well. Consider how unpleasant, how awkward it must be when your neighbor, catching his breath (and that can happen anytime), screams, 'Why?' - or, 'Aren't you ashamed?!' It's embarrassing to stand there without a ready answer. A crowbar makes a poor rebuttal, everybody senses that. The whole trick lies in having the proper grounds to brush aside such aggravating objections. Contemptuously. Everyone wants to commit a villainy without having to feel like a villain. — Stanislaw Lem

The best years are the forties; after fifty a man begins to deteriorate, but in the forties he is at the maximum of his villainy. — H.L. Mencken

But see you, we should travel by night. Dark times for dark business, as they says. No sun to bother Valeriana or you, Kaylana's surely no' disadvantaged, and I know I work better in darkness. Anybody looking for us will have a harder time of it. Besides, marching in daylight is for the heroes. If we're going to do this, we may as well go all out. — Eve Forward

Despite its protests to the contrary, modern Christianity has become willy-nilly the religion of the state and the economic status quo. Because it has been so exclusively dedicated to incanting anemic souls into Heaven, it has been made the tool of much earthly villainy. It has, for the most part, stood silently by while a predatory economy has ravaged the world, destroyed its natural beauty and health, divided and plundered its human communities and households. — Wendell Berry

In the end, I suspect, being female will do nothing for Sheba, except deny her the grandeur of genuine villainy. — Zoe Heller

These minor, natural flaws did not explain why hers was but the deceptive beauty of the poisoned apple. It was not merely that she was shallow, a creature of simple malice: within her tiny skull a storm raged, hectic, vicious and vengeful. The depths of her character were murky and she herself, had she made the attempt, would struggle to rationalise her behaviour. In morals she was well-versed, for they had been imparted to her through fables as a young child, yet she could find no trace of villainy in her own actions. In her skewed world-view she was set apart. — R.D. Shanks

Villainy wears many masks; none so dangerous as the mask of virtue. — Washington Irving

Just because a person is attractive/beautiful, this does not mean it is okay to villainize them. We always say that we cannot judge a person from the outside (doesn't matter if they have a handicap, are ugly, have a deformity, etc.). But this must go both ways. It also does not matter if someone is beautiful, attractive and happy. That also does not make it okay to judge them, to villainize them. There is a double standard when it comes to whom people choose to be good to, and this double standard is wrong. The outward appearance, both the grotesque and the beautiful, must not be basis for kindness and for cruelty. — C. JoyBell C.

I have a childlike conviction that the sufferings will be healed and smoothed over, that the whole offensive comedy of human contradiction will disappear like a pitiful mirage, a vile concoction of man's Euclidean mind, feeble and puny as an atom, and that ultimately, at the world's finale, in that moment of eternal harmony, there will occur and be revealed something so precious that it will suffice for all hearts, to allay all indignation, to redeem all human villainy, all bloodshed; it will suffice not only to make forgiveness possible, but also to justify everything that has happened with men
let this, let off of this, come true and be revealed. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Jeth had an unnatural talent for nuclear physics. Should that be a crime? He didn't like governments. Who did? How smart do you have to be before cynicism counts as villainy? And oh, God forbid you become independently wealthy enough to buy an island. Suddenly it's the Island of Dr. X, and the press can't refer to you without using the word "lair. — Tom Francis

Villainy was not simply the red raging glory of inflicting well-deserved pain; it was also the curdling knowledge of having inflicted injustice. A villain simply did not care. Only the victims did. — Meredith Duran

For me, one of the most beautiful and rewarding aspects of serial reality TV is that characters can move freely along a spectrum of heroism and villainy. — Andrea Seigel

I find it hard to believe that a lady like...' Pertellis hesitated, and coughed. 'There is something elevated in the female spirit that will always hold a woman back from the coldest and most vicious forms of villainy.'

'No, there isn't,' Miss Kitely said kindly but firmly, as she set a dish in his hand. 'Drink your chocolate, Mr Pertellis. — Frances Hardinge

Thou slave, thou wretch, thou coward!
Thou little valiant, great in villainy!
Thou ever strong upon the stronger side!
Thou Fortune's champion, that dost never fight
But where her humorous ladyship is by
To teach thee safety. — William Shakespeare

Dick Elpinoy and I didn't get along. He was too hoity-toity for my tastes; I didn't follow rules well enough for his. But now we were united in villainy. Or something. — Lia Habel

Villains are a lot of fun. My villains have a lot of tongue-in-cheek. They are sometimes conscious of and a little bit gleeful of their villainy. — John Rhys-Davies

Barring that natural expression of villainy which we all have, the man looked honest enough. — Mark Twain

The most interesting heroes have a bit of villainy to them, and the most interesting villains have a certain bit of heroism in them, ... I think (Alan Shore) intends to do the right thing, but his view of the world is very different so, to get to the right place, he sometimes takes a path that goes through a very dark forest. — James Spader

The inhabitants of Coventry, for example, continued to imagine that their sufferings were due to the innate villainy of Adolf Hitler without a suspicion that a decision, splendid or otherwise, of the British War Cabinet, was the decisive factor in the case. — Martin Caidin

Villainy that is vigilant will be an overmatch for virtue, if she slumber at her post. — Charles Caleb Colton

Mos Eisley spaceport. You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be cautious. — George Lucas

You know, my boy, he said, it's impossible to love men such as they are. And yet we must. So try to do good to men by doing violence to your feelings, holding your nose, and shutting your eyes, especially shutting your eyes. Endure their villainy without anger, as much as possible; try to remember that you're a man too. For, if you're even a little above average intelligence, you'll have the propensity to judge people severely. Men are vile by nature and they'd rather love out of fear. Don't give in to such love: despise it always. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

I will to my dying day oppose, with all the powers and faculties God has given me, all such instruments of slavery on the one hand and villainy on the other, as this Writ of Assistance is. — James Otis

It turns out that one can perpetrate all manner of heinous villainy under a cloak of courtesy and good cheer ... a man will forfeit all sensible self-interest if he finds you affable enough to share your company over a flagon of ale. — Christopher Moore

If I must consort with rogues [ ... ] I own I like them to be in the grand manner. — Georgette Heyer

If there is one thing I've learned from the years in the criminal enterprises, it's that anyone can do almost anything to anybody else for any reason, and villainy and treachery doesn't have a thing to do with race, sex, species, or creed. — Tim Pratt

He who profits by villainy, has perpetrated it. — Iain Pears

The most stormy ebullitions of passion, from blasphemy to murder, are less terrific than one single act of cool villainy. — Johann Kaspar Lavater

It means, your worships' excellencies, that - you - can't come to it! This chicken won't fight. It means that the fat's in the fire, and the cat's out of the bag! It means confusion! Distraction! Perdition! And a tearing off of our wigs! It means the game's up, the play's over, villainy is about to be hanged and virtue about to be married, and the curtain is going to drop and the principal performer - that's I - is going to be called out amid the applause of the audience! — E.D.E.N. Southworth

Nothing routs us but the villainy of our fears. — William Shakespeare

We weren't wealthy but we definitely weren't poor. We were incredibly rich because there was a wonderful community in Shepherd's Bush, where I grew up. All my friends were into villainy and crime. — Roger Daltrey

Villainy, when detected, never gives up, but boldly adds impudence to imposture. — Oliver Goldsmith

Varys appeared not long after Lord Jacelyn had left. "Men are such faithless creatures," he said by way of greeting. Tyrion sighed. "Who's the traitor today?" The eunuch handed him a scroll. "So much villainy, it sings a sad song for our age. Did honor die with your fathers? — George R R Martin

Nobody can be forced to commit an act of villainy. You can't push anybody into the mud; people always step into it themselves. — Sergei Lukyanenko

I don't play villainy. I wouldn't even know how to play it. — Kevin Spacey

Remove justice, and what are kingdoms but gangs of criminals on a large scale? ... A gang is a group of men ... in which the plunder is divided according to an agreed convention. If this villainy ... acquires territory, establishes a base, captures cities and subdues people, it then openly arrogates to itself the title of kingdom. — Saint Augustine

And through our actions these guys may see the error of their ways, give up their lives of villainy, and return to the side of the angels?"
"You really believe that?" asked Cara.
"No, not in the slightest. I personally hope my father ends up in a very deep, dark dungeon for the rest of his life." - Ian — Sarwat Chadda

Hypocrisy is the necessary burden of villainy, affectation part of the chosen trappings of folly; the one completes a villain, the other only finishes a fop. — Samuel Johnson

Every great character, Iz, be it on page or screen, is multidimensional. The good guys aren't all good, the bad guys aren't all bad, and any character wholly one or the other shouldn't exist at all. Remember this when I describe the antics that follow, for though I am not a villain, I am not immune to villainy. — David Arnold

[The Universe] does not care, and even with all our science there are some disasters that we can not avert. All evil and good is petty before nature. Personally, we take comfort from this, that there is a universe to admire that can not be twisted to villainy or good, but which simply is. — Vernor Vinge

No visor does become black villainy so well as soft and tender flattery. — William Shakespeare

I think it's too easy often to find a villain out of the headlines and to then repeat that villainy again and again and again. You know, traditionally, America has always looked to scapegoat someone as the boogie man. — Edward Zwick

The real source of her villainy came from those qualities that supposedly make men great leaders- a thirst for power, relentless drive paired with massive ego, and a total lack of emotions. — Mike Madrid

When one rises above the individual villainy displayed, one can only pity them all, just as we shall be pitied some day. — Arthur Miller

Host: For those of you just tuning in, our guests tonight are the amazing Murder Magician, and his lovely minion, The Assistant ...
Assistant: Charmed, I'm sure
Host: Who recently killed The Rumor. And you were awarded the Oppenheimer prize for villainy at last week's annual summit for dastardly deeds
what are you going to do with all that money?
Murder Magician: Well, I'm so glad you asked that
because I spent all the money on this giant MURDERBOT, and I've been dying to show it off!
Assistant: It's true ... every penny.
Host: Wow! That's impressive! So what does it do?
Murder Magician: Well, Mr. Clark ... it murders people.
Laughter.
Murder Magician: I'm serious.
Assistant: He is. — Gerard Way

There are no crimes and no criminals in these days. What is the use of having brains in our profession? I know well that I have it in me to make my name famous. No man lives or has ever lived who has brought the same amount of study and of natural talent to the detection of crime which I have done. And what is the result? There is no crime to detect, or, at most, some bungling villainy with a motive so transparent that even a Scotland Yard official can see through it. — Arthur Conan Doyle

We want the happiness of the Philippines, but we want to obtain it through noble and just means. If I have to commit villainy to make her happy, I would refuse to do so, because I am sure that what is built on sand sooner or later would tumble down. — Jose Rizal

There is such a thing as the poetry of a mistake, and when you say, "Mistakes were made," you deprive an action of its poetry, and you sound like a weasel. — Charles Baxter

Believe you have struck upon the problems of conspiracies. There are men who wish to keep you from uncovering the truth about this particular matter, but there are others who are only privately villainous and have their own little truths to hide. When you confront a conspiracy it becomes monstrous hard to distinguish between wretched villainy and ordinary, common lies. — David Liss

Nixon's shifty eyes and perpetual 5 o'clock shadow made him a natural fit for caricatured villainy. — Richard Corliss