True humor springs not more from the head than from the heart. It is not contempt its essence is love. It issues not in laughter but in still smiles which lie far deeper.

A lot of people because of my contempt for the false consolations of religion think of me as a symbolic public opponent of that in extremis. And sometimes that makes me feel a bit alarmed to be the repository of other people's hope.

Contempt for happiness is usually contempt for other people's happiness and is an elegant disguise for hatred of the human race.

A little group of willful men representing no opinion but their own have rendered the great government of the United States helpless and contemptible.

Our government... teaches the whole people by its example. If the government becomes the lawbreaker it breeds contempt for law it invites every man to become a law unto himself it invites anarchy.

When bad men combine the good must associate else they will fall one by one an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle.

It were better to have no opinion of God at all than such a one as is unworthy of him for the one is only belief - the other contempt.

What contemptible scoundrel has stolen the cork to my lunch?

Therefore when I considered this carefully the contempt which I had to fear because of the novelty and apparent absurdity of my view nearly induced me to abandon utterly the work I had begun.

Comedy is defiance. It's a snort of contempt in the face of fear and anxiety. And it's the laughter that allows hope to creep back on the inhale.

Only the contemptible fear contempt.

America thinks of itself as a meritocracy so people have more respect for success and more contempt for failure.

There is small risk a general will be regarded with contempt by those he leads if whatever he may have to preach he shows himself best able to perform.

No man who worships education has got the best out of education... Without a gentle contempt for education no man's education is complete.

If you take the contempt some Americans have for yuppies and multiply it by 10 you might come close to understanding their attitude towards the City as they call it - London the people of the south.

Great art is the contempt of a great man for small art.

Anger and hate against one we love steels our hearts but contempt or pity leaves us silent and ashamed.