Everything can be borne except contempt.

If he dropped a pun or a platitude into the conversation, it was just as if he had dropped a plate-there would be a moment of frozen silence, then the talk would go on as before.

There is no fate that cannot be surmounted by scorn.

Men more quickly learn and more gladly recall what they deride than what they approve and esteem.

There is no being so poor and so contemptible, who does not think there is somebody still poorer, and still more contemptible.

Moral contempt is a far greater indignity and insult than any kind of crime.

The great despisers are the great reverers.

Who can refute a sneer?

Silence is the most perfect expression of scorn.