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Contempt   Listen
noun
Contempt  n.  
1.
The act of contemning or despising; the feeling with which one regards that which is esteemed mean, vile, or worthless; disdain; scorn. "Criminal contempt of public feeling." "Nothing, says Longinus, can be great, the contempt of which is great."
2.
The state of being despised; disgrace; shame. "Contempt and begarry hangs upon thy back."
3.
An act or expression denoting contempt. "Little insults and contempts." "The contempt and anger of his lip."
4.
(Law) Disobedience of the rules, orders, or process of a court of justice, or of rules or orders of a legislative body; disorderly, contemptuous, or insolent language or behavior in presence of a court, tending to disturb its proceedings, or impair the respect due to its authority. Note: Contempt is in some jurisdictions extended so as to include publications reflecting injuriously on a court of justice, or commenting unfairly on pending proceedings; in other jurisdictions the courts are prohibited by statute or by the constitution from thus exercising this process.
Synonyms: Disdain; scorn; derision; mockery; contumely; neglect; disregard; slight.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Contempt" Quotes from Famous Books



... snappy, and in cadence. "Like a clock-work," muttered Pickle in despair. And it is a crime to drop a rifle. Its first commission roused our lieutenant from his languor. "Who dropped that piece?" he thundered. Then he outpoured contempt. "There'll be glue on little Willie's fingers ...
— At Plattsburg • Allen French

... more—presumption. You know quite well, Charlie, that warning voice in your heart was placed there by God to teach and guide you; yet you would not listen; you turned a deaf ear; you knew better than the great God who made you; you put your own will before His, and treated His Holy Spirit with contempt. It is a most solemn and awful thought that God's Holy Spirit will not ...
— Charlie Scott - or, There's Time Enough • Unknown

... touch of merry contempt for all the vain controversies and conflicts of humanity in the grateful ejaculation with which the old doctor greeted that ...
— Fisherman's Luck • Henry van Dyke

... for, on hearing Basil's voice, Ulric had come forward from the shelter of the curtains. He was not red, but pale,—very pale, with a look of such intense misery in his eyes, that Basil's momentary feeling of contempt entirely faded into one ...
— A Christmas Posy • Mary Louisa Stewart Molesworth

... and in fact until 1866, when he conquered Austria, Bismarck was very unpopular; and as he rose in power he became the most bitterly hated man in Prussia,—which hatred he returned with arrogant contempt. He consistently opposed all reforms, even the emancipation of the Jews, which won him the favor ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume X • John Lord

... before my eyes; there's something great about a monster like that, there's something to loathe. His assistant is only little—mean—despicable!" Loud and hurried in its wrath, low and deliberate in its contempt, all this was uttered with a furious and abnormal eloquence, which would have struck me, loving her, to the ground. On Rattray it had a different effect. His head lifted as she heaped abuse upon it, until he met ...
— Dead Men Tell No Tales • E. W. Hornung

... appeared with their melancholy consequences— universal languor, jealousies, rivalries of States, decline of navigation and commerce, discouragement of necessary manufactures, universal fall in the value of lands and their produce, contempt of public and private faith, loss of consideration and credit with foreign nations; and, at length, in discontents, animosities, combinations, partial conventions, and insurrection, threatening some great ...
— The World's Best Orations, Vol. 1 (of 10) • Various

... superior nautical knowledge, "the dark night suits them best, by reason that at high tide they can come in close to Down End. Oh, you needn't try to think you can hurt me by your sneers at them," she said, inwardly smarting under the contempt she knew Reuben felt. "I feel hurt at your wanting to say such things, but not at all at what you say. That ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 26, August, 1880 - of Popular Literature and Science • Various

... was! Then came envy; then detraction; then calumny; then hate; then persecution. Then derision, which is the beginning of the end. And last of all came pity, which is the funeral of fame. Oh, the bitterness and misery of renown! target for mud in its prime, for contempt ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... bluish, freshly shaven cheeks and chin. His hair was black and long and curling. The thin lips, set and unsmiling, were nevertheless drawn up slightly at one corner of the mouth in what appeared to be a permanent stamp of superiority and disdain,—or even contempt. Altogether, a most striking face, thought Gwynne,—and the man himself a person of importance. The very manner in which he jerked his head to his companion was proof enough ...
— Viola Gwyn • George Barr McCutcheon

... of pleasure at meeting Flamel; but it was not in this case curtailed by the reaction of contempt that habitually succeeded it. Probably even the few men who had known Flamel since his youth could have given no good reason for the vague mistrust that he inspired. Some people are judged by their actions, others ...
— The Touchstone • Edith Wharton

... conscience has been doing to have passed Browning is something difficult to imagine. But the peculiarity of this occasional coarseness in his work is this—that it is always used to express a certain wholesome fury and contempt for things sickly, or ungenerous, or unmanly. The poet seems to feel that there are some things so contemptible that you can only speak of them in pothouse words. It would be idle, and perhaps undesirable, to give examples; but ...
— Robert Browning • G. K. Chesterton

... took on a fine expression of contempt. "Suppose white man no got money?" he asked. "Eh! suppose he no got money—him dam fool!" And Napoleon glared upon us, his passengers, as though he wondered if either of us would venture to ...
— Northern California, Oregon, and the Sandwich Islands • Charles Nordhoff

... prisoner," he said, sadly, after a thoughtful pause. "It doesn't matter much what I think or say. But, somehow or other, I wish I had never seen her," he continued, meditatively. "Now she will think of me only with contempt, just as her father will. Of course she will; ...
— The Boy Broker - Among the Kings of Wall Street • Frank A. Munsey

... in accents of ineffable contempt; "not much, there isn't. No, it is something infinitely better than that. It is this, my son, that when we leave this island we do so as a little bunch of bloated ...
— Turned Adrift • Harry Collingwood

... perseverance in anything. That a man of twenty-six should be looking for his first situation was incomprehensible to him. He made no effort to conceal his prejudice, because the class to which the young man had belonged enjoyed his hearty contempt. ...
— The Blazed Trail • Stewart Edward White

... These ladies never approached me, and yet they might have known that I would naturally know more about the state of the Camp than anyone else. The Superintendent led them about—where he chose, I suppose. They were regarded with universal contempt by the people. Their report I have not yet seen, but I know this: that the Superintendent was not immediately dismissed as he should have been. (This was only done in December.) Perhaps the subsequent ...
— Woman's Endurance • A.D.L.

... perpetuate such a combination—that is the Greek conception of well-being; and it is because labour with the hands or at the desk distorts or impairs the body, and the petty cares of a calling pursued for bread pervert the soul, that so strong a contempt was felt by the Greeks for manual labour and trade. "The arts that are called mechanical," says Xenophon, "are also, and naturally enough, held in bad repute in our cities. For they spoil the bodies of ...
— The Greek View of Life • Goldsworthy Lowes Dickinson

... see and converse with him; because having lived so long in Persia, I felt myself, in some measure, identified with its natives, and now in a country where both nations were treated with the same degree of contempt, my fellow-feeling for them ...
— The Adventures of Hajji Baba of Ispahan • James Morier

... in every manifestation of impatience lest they should temporarily gain the upper hand, and lay waste the fair fields of civilization; and to be kept under for the safety of society, if not for their own safety, by social burdens and the depressing influences of disregard and contempt. ...
— Conversion of a High Priest into a Christian Worker • Meletios Golden

... What contempt we have for a man who robs another, who picks his pocket, or knocks him down in some lonely place and strips him of whatever articles of value he may have. But the man who cheats is a thief, just as truly as the pickpocket and ...
— The True Citizen, How To Become One • W. F. Markwick, D. D. and W. A. Smith, A. B.

... ribs to-morrow," said Shaw, looking with contempt at the venison steaks which Delorier placed before us. Our meal finished, we lay down under a temporary awning to sleep. A shout from Henry Chatillon aroused us, and we saw him standing on the cart-wheel, ...
— Journeys Through Bookland, Vol. 7 • Charles H. Sylvester

... outset Dyer had listened to George's speech in open-mouthed amazement, and some little contempt for what he regarded as the young man's ignorance; but even his dense intellect could not at last fail to grasp the inward meaning and intention of the speaker; a lightning flash of intelligence revealed to him that ...
— The Cruise of the Nonsuch Buccaneer • Harry Collingwood

... coolly, recovering that contempt for the understandings of the dying which marks the ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 104, June, 1866 • Various

... from doing a certain act. They generally direct it under pain of a specified pecuniary forfeiture; but whether they do so or not, disobedience is punishable also by arrest and imprisonment, being treated as a contempt of court. The need of an injunction is often immediate. It would be worthless unless promptly granted. When, therefore, no court having power to issue one is in actual session, there would be a ...
— The American Judiciary • Simeon E. Baldwin, LLD

... had been left unpainted, and shone as though her plates had been of burnished silver. Altogether he was well pleased with this invasion of a solitude which, in spite of its great beauty and his professed contempt for the world in general, had for the last few months been getting a good deal more tedious than he ...
— The Angel of the Revolution - A Tale of the Coming Terror • George Griffith

... enough, less pliable. She did full justice to Pesca's excellent qualities of heart; but she could not accept him implicitly, as my mother accepted him, for my sake. Her insular notions of propriety rose in perpetual revolt against Pesca's constitutional contempt for appearances; and she was always more or less undisguisedly astonished at her mother's familiarity with the eccentric little foreigner. I have observed, not only in my sister's case, but in the instances of others, that we of the young generation are nothing like so hearty and so ...
— The Woman in White • Wilkie Collins

... to ask?" she said, with cold contempt. "Are you indeed so blind where this woman is concerned? Why, my son's wife is the talk of the town, and my son sits here and asks me ...
— The Baronet's Bride • May Agnes Fleming

... of improving one's mind; moderation in desires; decorum in all actions; a wise reserve in unessential wants; indulgence, toleration, humanity, good will towards all men; love of the public good and of all that is necessary to our fellows; contempt for weakness; a kind of severity towards one's self which preserves us from that multitude of artificial wants enslaving those who give up to them; resignation and, if possible, moral impassibility in suffering reverses, injustices, oppression, and losses; respect for order, for public ...
— Lamarck, the Founder of Evolution - His Life and Work • Alpheus Spring Packard

... before them. A noble person, engaged in the same commission, and sent to learn his commercial rudiments in New York, (then under the operation of an act for the universal prohibition of trade,) was soon after put at the head of that board. This contempt from the present ministers of all the pretended functions of that board, and their manner of breathing into its very soul, of inspiring it with its animating and presiding principle, puts an end to all dispute ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. II. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... these radicals should go on denouncing the cause which Peter had espoused. They all thought of Peter as a comrade, they were most friendly to him; but Peter had the knowledge of how they would regard him when they knew the real truth, and this imagined contempt burned him like an acid. Sometimes there would be talk about spies and informers, and then these people would exhaust their vocabulary of abuse, and Peter, of course, would apply every word of it to himself and become wild with anger. He would long to answer back; he was waiting for the day ...
— 100%: The Story of a Patriot • Upton Sinclair

... say that the Belgians were so ignorant as to think they were being butchered when they weren't, we only wonder whether you are so ignorant as to think you are being believed when you aren't. Thus, for instance, when you brag about burning Venice to express your contempt for "tourists," we cannot think much of the culture, as culture, which supposes St. Mark's to be a thing for tourists instead of historians. This, however, would be the least part of our unfavourable judgment. That judgment is complete ...
— The Crimes of England • G.K. Chesterton

... with a coterie of lawbreakers in a secluded village, and perpetrate an act which would be resented by thousands of business men and tens of thousands of the travelling public in our Dominion, and attach a stain to the name of the Company which would challenge contempt for years future. The facilities afforded by other competing lines at so many points in our Dominion for such as would resent an act of this character are too great to permit a Company that is hungering ...
— The Story of a Dark Plot - or Tyranny on the Frontier • A.L.O. C. and W.W. Smith

... shamefaced, some reckless, some sullen. A few white convicts among them seemed doubly ashamed—both of their condition and of their company; they kept together as much as they were permitted, and looked with contempt at their black companions in misfortune. Fetters's man and Haines, armed with whips, and with pistols in their belts, were present to oversee the unloading, and the colonel could see them point him out to the State officers who had come in charge of the convicts, and see them look ...
— The Colonel's Dream • Charles W. Chesnutt

... other seed and stock. The region of Louisiana alone, destined a generation later to be included within the boundaries of the great republic, retained organized communities of French descent and language; but, living as they were in utter unbelief and contempt of religion and morality, it would be an unjust reproach on Catholicism to call them Catholic. The work of the gospel had got to be begun from the foundation. Nevertheless it is not to be doubted that remote memories or lingering traditions of a better age survived to aid the work of those who ...
— A History of American Christianity • Leonard Woolsey Bacon

... that is his place, when considered as an author. It may safely be affirmed, that the mediocrity of James's talents in literature, joined to the great change in national taste, is one cause of that contempt under which his memory labors, and which is often carried by party writers to a great extreme. It is remarkable, how different from ours were the sentiments of the ancients with regard to learning. Of the first twenty Roman emperors, counting from Caesar to Severus, above the half were authors; ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part D. - From Elizabeth to James I. • David Hume

... the quack drew together, and the eyes peered out sharply through half-closed lids. "There's plenty of wanting and not much getting in this world," he rejoined, with a leer of contempt, and spat on the floor, while yet the furtive watchfulness of the eyes indicated a ...
— Northern Lights • Gilbert Parker

... his mind keep going back to that little cottage in St. Mary street? What good reason was there? Would they thank him for his solicitude? Indeed! He almost smiled his contempt of the supposition. Why, when on one or two occasions he had betrayed a least little bit of kindly interest,—what? Up had gone their youthful vivacity like an umbrella. Oh, yes!—like all young folks—their affairs were intensely private. Once or twice ...
— Dr. Sevier • George W. Cable

... Sunday, on which day, at an early hour, they attended mass at the church of the Shaddock Grove, which you see yonder. That church was more distant from their homes than Port Louis; but they seldom visited the town, lest they should be treated with contempt on account of their dress, which consisted simply of the coarse blue linen of Bengal, usually worn by slaves. But is there, in that external deference which fortune commands, a compensation for domestic ...
— Paul and Virginia • Bernardin de Saint Pierre

... hell you be'n?" asked one, "we be'n here sence noon." Purdy eyed the speaker with contempt: "Who wants to know?" he asked and receiving no answer, continued, "where I be'n is my business. Why don't you ask Cass where he's be'n, sometime? If you fellers are goin' to follow my lead, I'll be boss—an' where I've be'n ...
— Prairie Flowers • James B. Hendryx

... to Ray, eyeing him with such a look of contempt and scorn that it smarted like a whiplash in spite of the protecting mantel of his new-found triumph. "Oh, you depraved dogs!" he told them quietly and distinctly. ...
— The Sky Line of Spruce • Edison Marshall

... on every side, wondering where was the hot water, and what had become of the whiskey bottle, and above all, why the company were so extremely dull and ungenial. At length, with a half-shake, he roused up a little, and giving a look of unequivocal contempt on every side, called out, 'Upon my soul, you're pleasant companions; but I'll give you a chant to enliven you!' So saying, he cleared his throat with a couple of short coughs, and struck up, with the voice of a Stentor, the following ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 1 (of 2) • Charles Lever

... except Marryatt's novels and Tom Cringle's Log. But of matters connected with the shore Mr. Brewster is as ignorant as a child unborn. He holds all landsmen but ship-builders, owners, and riggers, in supreme contempt, and can hardly conceive of the existence of happiness, in places so far inland that the sea breeze does not blow. A severe and exacting officer is he, but yet a favorite with the men—for he is always ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 3. March 1848 • Various

... mouth of Shif'less Sol swung wide, and again he uttered that fearful yell of defiance, abuse, contempt and loathing, a yell so powerful that it came back in repeated echoes without any loss of character. The Indians on the bank, stung by it, uttered a fierce shout and fired another volley, but the bullets fell further short than ever. Shif'less ...
— The Border Watch - A Story of the Great Chief's Last Stand • Joseph A. Altsheler

... a lot of tyrants instead of loyal Confederate soldiers," said Mrs. Le Dell, while the sisters gazed at the young hero with contempt pictured ...
— Frank on a Gun-Boat • Harry Castlemon

... abilities. She was a very clever teacher, who liked to push on quick pupils, but was a little ruthless towards stupid girls. She knew how to make the dullest subject entertaining, and expected a high average of work, having no toleration for laziness, and a contempt for incompetence. No girl ever dreamt of whispering or idling during Miss Harper's classes. As a rule, a word or even a look was sufficient to maintain order. She rarely if ever inflicted a punishment for a breach of discipline; to do so, she considered, would be an acknowledgment of her lack ...
— The Nicest Girl in the School - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil

... wild cry Fred Hatfield crumpled down upon the ice and burst into a tempest of sobbing. He beat his ungloved hands upon the ice, and although Ruth could not help feeling contempt for a boy who would so give way to weakness she could not help but pity ...
— Ruth Fielding at Snow Camp • Alice Emerson

... temper will certainly not read this work of ours, or, if they do read it, it will be with contempt or pity. I do not think it necessary to refute those paradoxes here; the Bishop of Senez has done it with his usual erudition and zeal, in a long letter printed at Utrecht in 1736. I do not deny that the sacred writers may sometimes have spoken ...
— The Phantom World - or, The philosophy of spirits, apparitions, &c, &c. • Augustin Calmet

... vanishing halfbreed, his method of reaching the top was merely foolishly exhausting; but several weeks of acquaintance had taught them to accept his silent peculiarities with nothing more than casual wonder, though they disliked him for his unsociability, for the cold contempt that twisted his lips, and for the stifled volcano that smouldered within his squinting eyes. They hated him more than ever now, with a hatred that could be liquidated only in blood. Their own criminal schemes that had taken the lives of two of their companions they did not consider, but ...
— The Return of Blue Pete • Luke Allan

... too well to have a contempt for her; otherwise he held her calculating powers in such very slight estimation that he must have fallen upon that conclusion. Somehow or other, he had become possessed by an idea that there was something in this girl which could hardly be set forth in ...
— Hard Times • Charles Dickens*

... toil! glorious ancestry! you have fought the foes of your native land with sword and pen; but I,—I have to contend with unmerited shame and mockery, without a hope of ultimate triumph or glory; my weary soul sinks under its burden, and the world has nothing in store for me but scorn and contempt! And, yet, have I ever stained your noble escutcheon? All that I have done is generous and honest in the sight of God;—nay, the very fountain-head of my wo is love and compassion! Yes, yes!—fix your glittering eyes on me; contemplate me in the abyss of poverty where ...
— The Poor Gentleman • Hendrik Conscience

... unfledged heroes from the lower wards, who had broke away from their mammas, and run to electioneer with a slice of bread and butter in their hands." Irving's patriotism was not found wanting when the time came, but he had a life-long contempt for the petty trickery of party politics. That year he made another of his leisurely jaunts, nominally on business, this time to Virginia. His letters record the usual round of social gallantries, and ...
— Washington Irving • Henry W. Boynton

... obviously capable of taking care of herself. That was how I had come across her. She had smiled at the gabble of the cathedral guide as he showed the obsessed troop, of which we had formed units, the place of martyrdom of Blessed Thomas, and her smile had had just that quality of superseder's contempt. It had pleased me then; but, now that she smiled thus past me—it was not quite at me—in the crooked highways of the town, I was irritated. After all, I was somebody; I was not a cathedral verger. I had a fancy for myself in those days—a fancy that solitude and brooding ...
— The Inheritors • Joseph Conrad

... company men swore. Most humans, cognizant of the principles of safety first, are respectful of the rear quarters of a mule. We watched one disrespecter of these principles invite what might have been called "mulecide" with utter contempt for the consequences. He deliberately stood in the dangerous immediate rear of one particularly onery mule, and kicked ...
— "And they thought we wouldn't fight" • Floyd Gibbons

... to me, but to the country I represented. How I made some of them dance! Not for vanity's sake; rather the inborn patriotism of my race. I had only to think of my father, his honorable scars, his contempt for little things, his courage, his steadfastness, his love for his country, which has so honored him with its trust. Oh! I am a patriot; and I shall never, never marry a man whose love for his country does not equal my own." She caught up her father's mutilated hand and kissed it. "And even ...
— The Man on the Box • Harold MacGrath

... distinguished public men of the country, and with many of them brought into direct acquaintance by the easy intercourse of hotel life, destroyed any reverence I might have acquired for official station. Familiarity may not always breed contempt, but it is a veritable eye opener. To me no divinity hedged the brow of a senator. I knew the White House too well to be impressed by its architectural grandeur without ...
— Marse Henry, Complete - An Autobiography • Henry Watterson

... unexpected issue of that contest, will long be remembered by every man who was educated at Dr. Swishtail's famous school. The latter youth (who used to be called Heigh-ho Dobbin, Gee-ho Dobbin, Figs, and by many other names indicative of puerile contempt) was the quietest, the clumsiest, and, as it seemed, the dullest of all Dr. Swishtail's young gentlemen. His parent was a grocer in the city: and it was bruited abroad that he was admitted into Dr. Swishtails academy upon what are called "mutual ...
— Boys and girls from Thackeray • Kate Dickinson Sweetser

... with A. Somerville by Craigleith. Conversing on missions. If I am to go to the heathen to speak of the unsearchable riches of Christ, this one thing must be given me, to be out of the reach of the baneful influence of esteem or contempt. If worldly motives go with me, I shall never convert a soul, and shall lose my own ...
— The Biography of Robert Murray M'Cheyne • Andrew A. Bonar

... only because it violates some great natural right of humanity, personal liberty, property, or the right to common law. When constitutions go into details which are not substantially connected with these cardinal rights, they bring themselves into contempt, and justify the growing prejudice of our labor leaders against them. The people should believe, as I think they do believe under the Federal Constitution and under the older ones of the States, that when a law is declared no law by a ...
— Popular Law-making • Frederic Jesup Stimson

... the ensuing year.(1718) His daughter, much against her father's will, married Lord Compton. To thwart the matrimonial designs of a nobleman was in those days a perilous task, and Alderman Spencer was committed to the Fleet "for a contempt" in endeavouring to conceal his daughter. "Our Sir John Spencer, of London"—writes John Chamberlain(1719) to Dudley Carleton (15 March, 1599)—"was the last weeke committed to the Fleet for a contempt and hiding away his daughter, who, they say, is contracted ...
— London and the Kingdom - Volume I • Reginald R. Sharpe

... sounded strange in the ears of the Southern nobles. The Duke of Newcastle having demanded to know with what kind of shot the guard which Porteous commanded had loaded their muskets, was answered, naively, "Ow, just sic as ane shoots dukes and fools with." This reply was considered as a contempt of the House of Lords, and the Provost would have suffered accordingly, but that the Duke of Argyle explained, that the expression, properly rendered into ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott

... their own word for their god—all else had been in his own tongue, and so, fortunately, they did not understand. But the contempt in his action they did recognize—and a dead, a fearful silence fell upon them all. Lugur's eyes blazed, little sparks of crimson in their green. The priestess reached up, caught at O'Keefe. He seized the soft hand; caressed it; his gaze grew ...
— The Moon Pool • A. Merritt

... something gentle that had leant upon him, mingled with a strong intermittent feeling of unutterable relief. Perhaps his keenest regret was that, after all, it had not been love! He had offered himself up to a girl's just contempt, but he had no recompense in the shape of a great addition to knowledge, to experience. Save for a few doubtful moments at the beginning, when he had all but surprised himself in something more poignant, what ...
— Robert Elsmere • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... on the subject of the Russian armament alone that opposition sought to bring ministers into contempt, and to overthrow their administration. In their plan of campaign they had determined to attack them on the subject of the Indian war, and accord-ingly, on the 9th of February, Major Maitland moved for all papers necessary to throw ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan

... for their cruel treatment of their own people, robbing widows and selling children into slavery. Family life as well as public affairs seems to have become unsettled. The contempt and the violation of the laws of domestic duties are a sad symptom ...
— The Woman's Bible. • Elizabeth Cady Stanton

... an equal appetite for every dish. One has an elegant horror of a roasted pig; another holds a curry or a devil in utter abomination; a third cannot tolerate the ancient flavor of venison and wild-fowl; and a fourth, of truly masculine stomach, looks with sovereign contempt on those knick-knacks here and there dished up for the ladies. Thus each article is in condemned in its turn, and yet amidst this variety of appetites seldom does a dish go away from the table without being tasted and relished ...
— The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. • Washington Irving

... exploded a keg of powder on the sidewalk there could not have been a greater change in the outlaw's manner. He stared at Bucks with contempt enough to pierce the feelings of the wooden Indian beside ...
— The Mountain Divide • Frank H. Spearman

... young man to whom Sir Thomas Mostyn's title will go, if he does not marry, but whose property, being much encumbered, made him no match for Cecy and her forty thousand pounds; and we were censured for not taking better care, and suffering her to wed a Welsh gentleman,—object of ineffable contempt to the daughters of Mr. Thrale, with whom she always held correspondence while living with us, who indulged her in every expense and every folly,—although allowed only one hundred and forty pounds per ann. on ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 7, No. 43, May, 1861 • Various

... To suppress any publication which incites to hatred and contempt of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy and the general tendency of which is ...
— The Evidence in the Case • James M. Beck

... a grim, stern, hard-looking, middle-aged man, and his garb and breastplate were of the commonest and plainest description. He seemed to glance with something like contempt at the elegantly fluted and embossed armour the boy was wearing, and, above all, at the gay sash Lady Royland's loving hands had fastened across his breast. But his attention was keen as he scanned the soldierly bearing of Ben and the corporal, and a feeling of envy filled ...
— The Young Castellan - A Tale of the English Civil War • George Manville Fenn

... gravely and turned on his heel. In his heart he was inclined to a kind of contempt for the monarch's humours. When there was a chance of hanging a man, it seemed to him a waste of time to play the fool in this fashion. The cat and mouse policy was never Tristan's way. He was ever for the dog's ...
— If I Were King • Justin Huntly McCarthy

... society considers that in certain instances it has a right to expect the thinker will martyrise himself on its account, while it stands serenely by and heaps faggots on the pile, with every mark of contempt and loathing. But society is mistaken. No man is bound to martyrise himself; in a great many cases a man is bound to do the exact opposite. He has given hostages to Fortune, and his first duty is to the hostages. "We ask you for bread," his children may well say, "and you give us a noble moral ...
— Post-Prandial Philosophy • Grant Allen

... a handsome, swaggering soldier, a good-looking, wealthy man, who had a great reputation for gallantry, and something worse. Perhaps the fellow guessed how things lay, for he never troubled to conceal his dislike and contempt for me. It is no fault of mine that I am extremely sensitive as to my personal appearance, but Von Gulden played upon it until he drove me nearly mad. He challenged me sneeringly to certain sports wherein he knew I could not shine; he challenged ...
— The Crimson Blind • Fred M. White

... and Cornelia, in her rising contempt, would have spurned him with her foot. There were more feet on the stairway. Glaring torches were tossing over gold inlaid armour. A man of unusual height and physique strode at the head of the oncomers, clutching and dragging by the wrist ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis

... enough, but there was so much anger under his contempt that I thought it was wise to change the conversation. I expressed my wonder how, with the Highlands covered with troops, and guarded like a city in a siege, a man in his situation could come and go ...
— Kidnapped • Robert Louis Stevenson

... together all his power, made expedition against them, and when he had marched his army up to Babylon he began to besiege them; but they cared nothing about the siege, for the Babylonians used to go up to the battlements of the wall and show contempt of Dareios and of his army by gestures and by words; and one of them uttered this saying: "Why, O Persians, do ye remain sitting here, and not depart? For then only shall ye capture us, when mules shall bring forth young." This was said by one of the Babylonians, not supposing ...
— The History Of Herodotus - Volume 1(of 2) • Herodotus

... perpetrated in one of the districts where St. Patrick was baptizing, roused his keenest indignation, and he wrote a letter, which he sent by one of his companions, calling upon Coroticus to restore the captives, many of whom had been baptized. But his request being treated with contempt and scorn, he composed another circular epistle, in which he inveighed in the strongest terms against the cruelty of the marauding tribe and its chief. He contrasted his conduct with that of the Christians of the Continent, who were in ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 3 of 8 • Various

... down the inherent evil of matter, Manicheanism is latent in their system. They did not explicitly identify matter with the spirit of evil, but they had the spiritual man's suspicion of matter and his contempt for the body of the flesh. Abstinence, mortification of the flesh, and all ascetic practices flourished in their communion. Art and culture were suspect; they had no eye for natural beauty. Some of their hymn-writers possessed considerable poetic taste; ...
— Monophysitism Past and Present - A Study in Christology • A. A. Luce

... ever talk with a man of the world, who did not speak with levity or contempt of the ...
— Characteristics of Women - Moral, Poetical, and Historical • Anna Jameson

... their new existence under the most unfavourable conditions. In the first place, they are totally ignorant of everything connected with household management, and what is far worse, they have almost a contempt for it. What the result is, in too many cases, I have already dwelt upon,— either the husband and the family suffer from the effects of bad Cookery, and unhappiness and ill-health follow, or else the bread-winner flies to alcohol in order to ...
— The Art of Living in Australia • Philip E. Muskett (?-1909)

... to the master's plea he gave The vast contempt his manhood felt, He saw a brother in the slave,— With man as equal man ...
— The Complete Works of Whittier - The Standard Library Edition with a linked Index • John Greenleaf Whittier

... mysterious country, however, seemed to regard our natives with supercilious disdain. Probably their contempt had been engendered by the fact that certain tribes had on several occasions attempted an invasion, and they had from their formidable heights simply swept them out of existence as easily as a fly may be crushed ...
— The Great White Queen - A Tale of Treasure and Treason • William Le Queux

... a jerk upon the big kitchen, where before the Christmas turkeys toasting on the spit, Aunt Rhody was striding to and fro like an Amazon in charcoal. From the beginning of the covered way they had been guided by the tones of penetrant contempt, with which she lashed the circle of house servants who had gathered to her assistance. "You des lemme alont now," was the advice she royally offered. "Ef you gwine ax me w'at you'd better do, I des tell you right now, you'd better lemme alont. ...
— The Battle Ground • Ellen Glasgow

... contrast in education, external appearance and outlook, Philip II and Joseph II had certain points in common. They were both conscientious workers, over-anxious to control every act of their representatives, and they had both the greatest contempt for the feelings of the people they governed. Having come to certain conclusions, they applied them mechanically, scornful of all resistance. They held the secret of their people's happiness or salvation in their hands and they were resolved to enforce this happiness and this salvation on ...
— Belgium - From the Roman Invasion to the Present Day • Emile Cammaerts

... of language the case is clearly shown. The adjectives and derivatives based on woman's distinctions are alien and derogatory when applied to human affairs; "effeminate"—too female, connotes contempt, but has no masculine analogue; whereas "emasculate"—not enough male, is a term of reproach, and has no feminine analogue. "Virile"—manly, we oppose to "puerile"—childish, and the very word "virtue" ...
— The Forerunner, Volume 1 (1909-1910) • Charlotte Perkins Gilman

... we quit the church, we see dead or sick folk carried about, or we see those, who for their crimes were of late condemned to exile by the outraged majesty of the public laws, but who now, in contempt of those laws, well knowing that their ministers are a prey to death or disease, have returned, and traverse the city in packs, making it hideous with their riotous antics; or else we see the refuse of ...
— The Decameron, Volume I • Giovanni Boccaccio

... "No." There was profound contempt in the little word. "He give up 'is business to go away to fight to save you, while you stay be'ind to rob 'im. Is ...
— The Bad Man • Charles Hanson Towne

... infernal traitor Bonaparty, and the war; until the Irish maid-servant came with a plate and a bottle of wine, from which the old gentleman insisted upon helping the valet. He gave him a half-guinea too, which the servant pocketed with a mixture of wonder and contempt. "To the health of your master and mistress, Trotter," Mr. Sedley said, "and here's something to drink your health ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray

... There are several varieties of them, and it seems difficult to distinguish exactly between them. Some appear to be themselves afraid of the snakes they exhibit, while others handle them with a remarkable contempt of danger. Some pull out the snake's poison fangs so that they may always be safe, while others leave them in, and then everything depends on the charmer's skill and dexterity and the quickness with which he avoids the bite of the snake. It frequently ...
— From Pole to Pole - A Book for Young People • Sven Anders Hedin

... inferiority of the former. Conservatism, in the sense we have been using the term, defies any recognition and acknowledgment of this sort; therefore it defies imitation. In other words, a man does not imitate what he dislikes or scorns, and since conservatism is aversion to, or contempt for, say a new political institution, the imitative trait has no part to play, while that aversion or contempt continues. Evidently, then, the imitative power of the Japanese was not the force which served ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 22, September, 1891 • Various

... he tried to believe her worthy of all scorn and contempt, his heart was still very tender of her. He kissed the sweet face of the picture he had worn so long in his bosom, before he locked it away from his sight, and dropped some tears, that were no dishonor to his manhood, over the half dozen elegant little ...
— The Fatal Glove • Clara Augusta Jones Trask

... of Biological Science, besides Physiology proper, whose practical influence, though less obvious, is not, as I believe, less certain. I have heard educated men speak with an ill-disguised contempt of the studies of the naturalist, and ask, not without a shrug, "What is the use of knowing all about these miserable animals—what bearing has it ...
— Lay Sermons, Addresses and Reviews • Thomas Henry Huxley

... it must be valued in dollars, so that the reward may not be held in contempt by the public, who know my liberality when I pay, with splendid generosity, sea voyages, river and land journeys for myself and for my emissaries, or when I distribute with abundant profusion pecuniary and material recompenses to buy over the wills of ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman

... him! I hate the sight of that sharp-pointed snout of his, which he wants to be ever poking into my affairs. He and Addington have been boggling about the debts again. Why, look ye, Charlie, if Pitt held me in contempt he could ...
— Rodney Stone • Arthur Conan Doyle

... which only he may obtain who promises ostensibly to keep to the beaten track? Let us remember how the Academy of Sciences of France repudiated Darwin, how the Academy of St. Petersburg treated Mendeleeff with contempt, and how the Royal Society of London refused to publish Joule's paper, in which he determined the mechanical equivalent of heat, finding ...
— The Conquest of Bread • Peter Kropotkin

... to his feet in no gentle manner, and then he discovered that his arms had been bound. Sitting on her pony was Hallie Croffut, pale but calm, regarding the scene with an expression of contempt. ...
— Ted Strong in Montana - With Lariat and Spur • Edward C. Taylor

... I fear Achilles, and on no account should dare Defraud him, lest some evil find me next. But thee I would with pleasure hence conduct 550 Even to glorious Argos, over sea Or over land, nor any, through contempt Of such a guard, should dare to do thee wrong. So Mercury, and to the chariot seat Upspringing, seized at once the lash and reins, 555 And with fresh vigor mules and steeds inspired. Arriving at the foss and towers, they found The guard preparing now their ...
— The Iliad of Homer - Translated into English Blank Verse • Homer

... sloth and luxury to great and successful exertion, yet neither this success, the imbecility of Shah Tamasp, nor a reliance upon his own fame and strength could induce him to take the last step of usurpation, until he had, by his arts, excited in the minds of his countrymen that complete contempt for the reigning sovereign, and that pride in his glory, which were likely to make his elevation appear more the accomplishment of their wishes than of ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, v. 13 • Various

... by removals. Such a change in the civil and subordinate offices of the Government had never before been made, and Washington society, which always takes a hearty interest in the offices, was not slow to manifest its contempt for "the man of the people" and his "hungry" followers. But there was still another trouble. Secretary Eaton had married the daughter of a tavern-keeper; her reputation was unsavory and notorious. She now proposed to enter Washington social life as a leader, ...
— Expansion and Conflict • William E. Dodd

... shape of linen. If you were to want to have your clothes washed every week, as you do in England, you would be put down as a person who only has just enough to last that length of time, and would be an object of general contempt." ...
— Elizabeth and her German Garden • "Elizabeth", AKA Marie Annette Beauchamp

... sort of despair. Here again, her affairs were being managed for her. Would she ever be able to maintain her independence? She had said all she could say, and now she hoped that La Fleur would treat the proposition with contempt. ...
— The Girl at Cobhurst • Frank Richard Stockton

... Moreover, the Chinese servants in the employ of foreigners habitually insult and oppress the natives, presuming on immunity as retainers of the privileged stranger. As the Japanese hold the Celestials in supreme contempt, and as that feeling is fully reciprocated, collisions are the consequence, and it is pretty certain that the 'servants' of the legation who were ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. 4, No 3, September 1863 - Devoted to Literature and National Policy • Various

... Achitophel, l. 179. Hawkins (Life, p. 506) says that 'to party opposition Johnson ever expressed great aversion, and of the pretences of patriots always spoke with indignation and contempt.' He had, Hawkins adds, 'partaken of the short-lived joy that infatuated the public' when Walpole fell; but a few days convinced him that the patriotism of the opposition had been either hatred or ambition. For patriots, ...
— Life Of Johnson, Vol. 2 • Boswell

... Alexander Grant and Principal of the University of Edinburgh, was a delightful companion. He had always something new in his mind, and discussed with many flashes of wit and satire. He possessed an aristocratic contempt for anything commonplace, or self-evident, so that one had to be careful in conversing with him. But he was generous, and his laugh reconciled one to some of his sharp sallies. How little one anticipates the future greatness of one's friends. They ...
— My Autobiography - A Fragment • F. Max Mueller

... "Familiarity breeds contempt, I suppose," he replied. "But as it happened, none of those agents was employed. The very menace that I sought to avoid reached me somehow. It would almost seem that Dr. Fu-Manchu deliberately accepted the challenge of those ...
— The Devil Doctor • Sax Rohmer

... as he was, the mate made no answer, and Warner, with a snort of contempt at him, went below. In a minute or two he reappeared with his pipe and a large plug of ...
— Edward Barry - South Sea Pearler • Louis Becke

... nature, inexperienced by habit, awaking suddenly to the truth, conceived desperate resistance. But without his making a gesture this was instinctively felt by the others; the muzzle of the gun turned spontaneously on him, and he was vaguely conscious of a certain contempt and impatience of him in ...
— Snow-Bound at Eagle's • Bret Harte

... Ephraim!" she cried indignantly. "Me ask him! No, my dears, 'tain't likely as I shall ask him to tea in my kitchen, so he needn't expect it," and she bustled away, sniffing and snorting in a perfect fury of disgust apparently. Why she should show such scorn and contempt of poor Ephraim no one could ever understand; but some very wise, sharp-eyed people had been known to say that she over-acted her contempt for all men, and Ephraim in particular, and that really—well, they even went so far ...
— The Carroll Girls • Mabel Quiller-Couch

... him, 'Ho, boy, up and stop yonder antelope, for it escapeth me!' The youth raised his head and replied, 'O ignorant of the worth of the worthy,[FN125] thou lookest on me with disdain and speakest to me with contempt; thy speech is that of a tyrant and thy conduct that of an ass.' 'Out on thee,' cried Hisham. 'Dost thou not know me?' 'Verily,' rejoined the youth, 'thine unmannerliness hath made thee known to me, in that ...
— The Book Of The Thousand Nights And One Night, Volume III • Anonymous

... ruse after another which he employed to beguile the British leaders is very remarkable. Even more remarkable, perhaps, is the manner in which these plain-minded, business-like British seamen, for whose mental powers Napoleon cherished the deepest contempt, fathomed his ...
— Deeds that Won the Empire - Historic Battle Scenes • W. H. Fitchett

... diabolical talent and ingenuity of a Sand, the most subversive and anti-social doctrines. His works are not befouled with filth and obscenity, such as that impure old reprobate Paul de Kock delights and wallows in—or disgraced by the irreligion, and contempt of things holy, found in the writings of scores of French authors whom we could name, were they worth the naming. It is undeniable that the ingenious plots of his very entertaining books turn, for the most part, on matters difficult to touch upon with propriety, and which English writers usually ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 61, No. 379, May, 1847 • Various

... arithmetic than composition. He says that he can make a composer in three weeks, and a singer in six months; but we have not yet seen any proof of this. He despises the greatest masters. To myself he spoke with contempt of Bach [Johann Christian, J. Sebastian's youngest son, called the London Bach], who wrote two operas here, the first of which pleased more than the second, Lucio Silla. As I had composed the same opera in Milan, I was anxious to see it, ...
— The Letters of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, V.1. • Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

... sent to smoke him from his home. He came, was duly usher'd in, And, knowing where Sir Wolf had been, Said, "Sire, abused your royal ear Has been by rumours insincere; To wit, that I've been self-exempt From coming here, through sheer contempt. But, sire, your royal health to aid, I vow'd to make a pilgrimage, And, on my way, met doctors sage, In skill the wonder of the age, Whom carefully I did consult About that great debility Term'd in the books senility, Of which you fear, with reason, ...
— A Hundred Fables of La Fontaine • Jean de La Fontaine

... the benefits of friends, but the drudgery of slaves, and, therefore, could scarcely refrain from insults while they employed us, at least when they no longer wanted our immediate assistance. They renewed their contempt and cruelty, their robberies and oppressions; they prescribed laws to our navigation, and laid ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 10. - Parlimentary Debates I. • Samuel Johnson

... exhibition attracted Pounce's notice, pointed out the man to an assistant. The assistant, Jacob Gimblett, advanced and desired the prisoner to surrender the pipe. The man plunged his hands into his pockets, and, with a gesture of the most profound contempt, walked away to that part of the mess-shed ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke

... for his originalities, and more contempt for his vices among the farmers of Summerfield. The opinion of the town at that time may be given in the language of Uncle Walter, who declared he was "hollow and foul as ...
— Summerfield - or, Life on a Farm • Day Kellogg Lee

... and viewed my empty glasses with ill-disguised contempt. "We'll have to get you to stay in town long enough to overcome those notions of yours," said he. "Look around you. I'll wager there's not another ...
— A Court of Inquiry • Grace S. Richmond

... (1755) was commanded by General Braddock, Washington acting as aide-de-camp. The general was a regular British officer, proud and conceited. Washington warned him of the dangers of savage warfare, but his suggestions were received with contempt. ...
— A Brief History of the United States • Barnes & Co.

... said Philip. "It has shown me my age. I declare I am trembling; I, whose nerves were iron. But I have a particular contempt for servants. Mercenary wretches! I think Heaven inspired me to talk to them. After all, who knows? perhaps we might find a way to their hearts, if we did not eternally shock their vanity, and forget that it is, and must be, far greater than our own. The women gave me their tears, and the men ...
— A Simpleton • Charles Reade

... authorities, had sent him home. During that leave he married Gratian. He had known the Piersons some time; and, made conscious of the instability of life, had resolved to marry her at the first chance he got. For his father-in-law he had respect and liking, ever mixed with what was not quite contempt and not quite pity. The blend of authority with humility, cleric with dreamer, monk with artist, mystic with man of action, in Pierson, excited in him an interested, but often irritated, wonder. He saw things so differently ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... has advanced enough to prevent poverty, it may have the right to prevent charity too," she answered him, with a contempt that showed thought on the theme was not new to her. "Perhaps charity—I dislike the word—may do no good; but friendship from the rich to the poor must do good; it ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida

... common men emigrate. It's a confession of failure. . . . And so we've continued to swell the ranks of the most pitiful class in the country—the gentleman and his family with the small fixed income. The working man regards him with suspicion because he wears a black coat—or, with contempt because he doesn't strike; the Government completely ignores him because they know he's too much a slave to convention to do anything but vote along so-called gentlemanly lines. What do you suppose would be the result if the enormous ...
— Mufti • H. C. (Herman Cyril) McNeile

... idea how she despises concealments and deceits; and I have had to plot and contrive, almost to tell lies, all through this wretched time. She would never get over it. Even if she said she forgave me, I should always read a sort of contempt in her eyes whenever she looked at me. Oh, mamma, mamma! And I love her ...
— A Little Country Girl • Susan Coolidge

... is supremely interested in origins. Not until we have traced the genesis and earliest unfolding of an institution or an idea or a literature do we feel that we really understand and appreciate it. Familiarity with that which is noble breeds not contempt but reverence, and intelligent devotion. Acquaintance with the origin and history of a book is essential to its true interpretation. Therefore it is fortunate that modern discovery and research have thrown so much light upon the ...
— The Origin & Permanent Value of the Old Testament • Charles Foster Kent

... church, or the matter be carried to a class or synod). Now the magistrate withstandeth the ecclesiastic discipline, either by prohibitions and unjust laws, or, by his evil example, stirring up and inciting others to the contempt thereof, or to the trampling ...
— The Works of Mr. George Gillespie (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Gillespie

... Wednesday I came to town and went on to Oatlands. Madame de Lieven was there. This woman is excessively clever, and when she chooses brilliantly agreeable. She is beyond all people fastidious. She is equally conscious of her own superiority and the inferiority of other people, and the contempt she has for the understandings of the generality of her acquaintance has made her indifferent to please and incapable of taking any delight in general society. Her manners are very dignified and graceful, and she is extremely accomplished. She ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William - IV, Volume 1 (of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville

... your people—I don't mean to say that it is so with you, far from it—but don't you find sometimes that both men and women fancy themselves channels for God's Spirit, and are quite mistaken, so that they set about a work for which they are unfit and bring holy things into contempt?" ...
— Adam Bede • George Eliot

... and when she attempted them they were often so apparent as to be comically pathetic. And yet she did attempt them. There was nothing bold and unmaidenly in her manner, and as I look back upon those days I thank God that I was never so graceless and brutal as to show or feel anything like contempt for her gentle, childlike preference. Very possibly also my own unfortunate experience made me more considerate, and it was my policy to treat her with the same frank, undisguised affection that I manifested toward Zillah, ...
— A Day Of Fate • E. P. Roe

... scheme of government the waste of public money is a crime against the citizen, and the contempt of our people for economy and frugality in their personal affairs deplorably saps the strength and sturdiness of ...
— Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Volume 8, Section 2 (of 2): Grover Cleveland • Grover Cleveland

... Age is Honourable, we only mean, When Gravity and Wisdom are its marks, And not gray hairs, and froward peevishness, As ten for one, are known by to be Old, And though we see this true, yet we would all Prolong our time to that decrepid state, When nothing but contempt can wait upon us; How strangely sin dastards our very Reason, Making that guide us to desire known ills Rather then Joys, that promis'd we deserve not; For the best Men through sense of guilt do fear To change for unseen Joys ...
— The Fatal Jealousie (1673) • Henry Nevil Payne

... this is not a case for romance. The fact is, I can endure all I have to suffer: sadness, sickness of mind, ruin, the loss of my wife, and my lonely, broken old age, but I cannot, I will not, endure the contempt I have for myself! I am nearly killed by shame when I think that a strong, healthy man like myself has become—oh, heaven only knows what—by no means a Manfred or a Hamlet! There are some unfortunates who feel flattered when people call them Hamlets ...
— Ivanoff - A Play • Anton Checkov

... purpose then? My shafts, if rebels court their fate, Shall lay Ayodhya desolate. Then shall her streets with blood be dyed Of those who stand on Bharat's side: None shall my slaughtering hand exempt, For gentle patience earns contempt. If, by Kaikeyi's counsel changed, Our father's heart be thus estranged, No mercy must our arm restrain, But let the foe be slain, be slain. For should the guide, respected long, No more discerning right and wrong, Turn in forbidden paths to stray, 'Tis meet that force ...
— The Ramayana • VALMIKI

... dispatch, Sir John French writes: 'I have once more to remark upon the devotion to duty, courage and contempt of danger which has characterized the work of the chaplains throughout this campaign.' The padre's work is not to fight; indeed, he is not armed (anyhow, he is not allowed to be by the authorities); and certainly one of the difficulties experienced is to withhold oneself as one sees the brave ...
— With The Immortal Seventh Division • E. J. Kennedy and the Lord Bishop of Winchester

... a plea for fairness and for justice; but it showed the working of a heart that would be true to itself, in some measure at least, in spite of its shyness and shrinking, and in spite of the peril of the hour. The question at first excited anger and contempt against Nicodemus himself; but it checked the gathering tides of violence, probably ...
— Personal Friendships of Jesus • J. R. Miller

... stood looking about him indifferently, waiting to be made to do something silly. He danced listlessly, carelessly, sullenly, and one could see from his movements, his tail and his ears, that he had a profound contempt for the crowd, the bright light, his master and himself. When he had performed his allotted task, he gave ...
— The Cook's Wedding and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov

... military resistance to national authority, were not at all realized at the North, except by a few. Nine-tenths of the people of the free States look'd upon the rebellion, as started in South Carolina, from a feeling one-half of contempt, and the other half composed of anger and incredulity. It was not thought it would be join'd in by Virginia, North Carolina, or Georgia. A great and cautious national official predicted that it would ...
— Complete Prose Works - Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy • Walt Whitman

... between Mr. Cabell and the popular romancers who in all ages clutter the scene and for whom he has nothing but amused contempt is that they are unconscious dupes of the demiurge whereas he, aware of its ways and its devices, employs it almost as if it were some hippogriff bridled by him in Elysian pastures and respectfully entertained in a snug Virginian ...
— Contemporary American Novelists (1900-1920) • Carl Van Doren

... collate manuscripts:—but to dive into the depths of dungeons; to plunge into the infection of hospitals; to survey the mansions of sorrow and pain; to take the gauge and dimensions of misery, depression, and contempt; to remember the forgotten, to attend to the neglected, to visit the forsaken, and to compare and collate the distresses of all men in all countries. His plan is original; and is as full of genius as it is of humanity. It was a voyage of discovery; a circumnavigation ...
— Selections from the Speeches and Writings of Edmund Burke. • Edmund Burke

... body on the other side of the road. The watchman took him in custody, as a witness before the coroner; but, when brought before the coroner, he refused to take an oath, and was, consequently, committed to prison for contempt. The Hindoo being a respectable person, and never having taken an oath, refused to take any nourishment in the prison. In this state he continued a day and a half, my father being then at Serampore; but upon his coming ...
— The Life of William Carey • George Smith

... man, and sanctioned all that was evil. He perceived how it had kept the nation in a condition of barbarity; how it had made it the prey of the civilized nations around it; how it had made the Hebrew nations the contempt of civilization; and yet the Church that calls itself the Church of Christ has not yet had the courage to offer humanity anything but that impossible task—the amalgamation of the law that came by Moses and the grace and truth that came by ...
— Phyllis of Philistia • Frank Frankfort Moore

... uncle!" "You know your grandfather!" and you began to sell out bites at three pins for a lady-bite and six pins for a hog-bite, and a boy bought a lady-bite and then took a hog-bite, he was held in contempt, and could by no means pass it off for a good joke on you; it was ...
— A Boy's Town • W. D. Howells

... glance of contempt at Tom and me, put the bundle tenderly down on the coarse brown ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... I know she had other reasons for her contempt—that the words she wrote were in rebuke to the brother rather than to the man, I feel my guilt and deplore my anger. I cannot say more. I should but insult your grief by any lengthy ...
— Initials Only • Anna Katharine Green

... Hitch, "this is why the jealousy of Congress has been aroused against us! Why have the soldiers of the Union invaded the soil of Utah? Why has Brigham Young, our chief, been imprisoned, in contempt of all justice? Shall we yield to force? Never! Driven from Vermont, driven from Illinois, driven from Ohio, driven from Missouri, driven from Utah, we shall yet find some independent territory on which to plant our tents. And you, my brother," continued the Elder, fixing ...
— Around the World in 80 Days • Jules Verne

... said in a tone of such crushing contempt, that a slap on the face would have been less cruel. All the blood in M. Costeclar's ...
— Other People's Money • Emile Gaboriau

... Wall Street it was indubitably petty. To the merchant it was unprofitable, and yet they were quite content with it, and looked out upon the bustling throngs of fashion and the hustling world of business with equal word of good-natured contempt. ...
— The Tyranny of the Dark • Hamlin Garland

... justice. This persistent agitation, the war of the executioners and martyrs, lasted nearly three centuries, ending in the conversion of the world. Idolatry was destroyed, slavery abolished, dissolution made room for a more austere morality, and the contempt for wealth was ...
— What is Property? - An Inquiry into the Principle of Right and of Government • P. J. Proudhon

... happy holidays, boating and fishing, alone, or in company of some man chum. Sherston had never thought to bring a woman there, for the morrow's bridegroom, for some six to seven years past, had had an impatient contempt for, as well ...
— Defenders of Democracy • Militia of Mercy

... songs represent the gay, reckless loyalty of the Cavaliers to the cause of King Charles I and their contempt for his Puritan opposers. The Puritans wore closely cropped hair; hence the Parliament which came together in 1640 and was controlled by the opponents of the King, is dubbed "crop-headed." John Pym and John Hampden were leaders in the struggle ...
— Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning • Robert Browning

... cleverness in arriving at this conclusion, which they deduced from the princess contempt ...
— Jewish Fairy Tales and Legends • Gertrude Landa

... you are there!" he cried, with a volley of blasphemy. And he signed to those about Count Hannibal to stand away from him. "You are there, are you? And you are not afraid to show your face? I tell you, it's you and such as you bring us into contempt! so that it is said everywhere Guise does all and serves God, and we follow because we must! It's you, and such as you, are stumbling-blocks to our good folk of Paris! Are you traitor, sirrah?" he continued with passion, "or are you of our brother Alencon's opinions, that ...
— Count Hannibal - A Romance of the Court of France • Stanley J. Weyman

... my sort of conscience," answered Constance, laughing to conceal her intense hatred and contempt of him. ...
— Five Thousand an Hour - How Johnny Gamble Won the Heiress • George Randolph Chester

... its head and looked the rubicund man full in the eyes. Never in the face of any man or woman have I seen such an expression of sublime pity and contempt.... ...
— The Wonder • J. D. Beresford

... with contempt; and this is all that was said of the Painted Lady then. It is the first mention of her in ...
— Sentimental Tommy - The Story of His Boyhood • J. M. Barrie

... put you on another track," he said slowly, and stopped, as if suddenly choked by an unholy emotion of intense eagerness combined with fear of failure. Ricardo waited, attentive, yet not without a certain contempt. ...
— Victory • Joseph Conrad

... was ordinarily very adventurous and was wont to hesitate at nothing; and he had that lofty contempt for the populace which army officers usually profess. He took a hundred and fifty men and attempted to go out by the Pont du Louvre, but there he met Rochefort and his fifty horsemen, attended by more than five hundred men. The marshal made no attempt ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere

... one whose pavement was a model to all the neighbours; indeed, it was rumoured that the Mayor passing down our street, had stopped and admired the working of his civic spirit, while the result of my efforts was passed by with evident contempt. I did not care. I hugged Froissart to my heart. Who would condescend to wield a broom and a wooden shovel, even for the reward of ten cents in cash, when he could throw javelins and break lances ...
— Confessions of a Book-Lover • Maurice Francis Egan

... plump leg over the horn of his saddle and sat sidewise. One of his tribunes looked at the other with a flickering smile that was not entirely free of contempt. But his fellow returned a stare that for immobility would have ...
— The City of Delight - A Love Drama of the Siege and Fall of Jerusalem • Elizabeth Miller

... something better than pure element. He fed with more display of appetite, and drank with more appearance of satisfaction, than the Saracen judged it becoming to show in the performance of a mere bodily function; and, doubtless, the secret contempt which each entertained for the other, as the follower of a false religion, was considerably increased by the marked difference of their diet and manners. But each had found the weight of his opponent's arm, and the mutual respect which the bold struggle had ...
— The Talisman • Sir Walter Scott

... you give to what is good—for the courtly tenderness with which you touch on my defects. I begin to grow old; I have given my top note, I fancy;—and I have written too many books. The world begins to be weary of the old booth; and if not weary, familiar with the familiarity that breeds contempt. I do not know that I am sensitive to criticism, if it be hostile; I am sensitive indeed, when it is friendly; and when I read such criticism as yours, I am emboldened to go on and ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 25 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... you would think me very bold—that you would regard me with contempt," Violet sighed, tremulously. "After my letter had gone, and I tried to think over what I had written more calmly, and to wonder how you would regard it, I was almost sorry that I had ...
— His Heart's Queen • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon

... be attach'd, And bring him safe to suffer punishment. Prevent it not, nor seeke not to delude The Officers to whom this charge is given; For if thou doe, as sure as God doth live, Thy selfe shall satisfie the lawes contempt. Therefore forward ...
— A Collection Of Old English Plays, Vol. IV. • Editor: A.H. Bullen

... dreadful apprehensions I looked back on the life I had led with the utmost contempt and abhorrence. I blushed, and wondered at myself how I could act thus, how I could divest myself of modesty and honour, and prostitute myself for gain; and I thought, if ever it should please God to spare me this one time from death, ...
— The Fortunate Mistress (Parts 1 and 2) • Daniel Defoe



Words linked to "Contempt" :   despite, sneer, discourtesy, contemptuous, dislike, disobedience, civil contempt, criminal contempt, rudeness, fleer, disrespect, scorn, contempt of Congress, contempt of court, leer, jurisprudence, disdain, law, noncompliance



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