Calumny Quotes - Page 3

Calumny ever pursues the great, even as the winds hurl themselves on high places.

Ovid

Wind, Slander, Pursue

Ovid (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Ovid (Illustrated)”, p.358, Delphi Classics

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Calumny is the offspring of Envy.

Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington

Calumny Is, Envy, Gossip

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Contempt is the only way to triumph over calumny.

Francoise d'Aubigne, Marquise de Maintenon

Disrespect, Triumph, Way

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His (Deschamps') complaint of court life was the same as is made of government at the top in any age: it was composed of hypocrisy, flattery, lying, paying and betraying; it was where calumny and cupidity reigned, common sense lacked, truth dared not appear, and where to survive one had to be deaf, blind, and dumb.

Barbara Tuchman

Lying, Government, Common Sense

Barbara Tuchman (2017). “A Distant Mirror: The Calamitous 14th Century”, p.539, Penguin UK

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Society is a republic. When an individual endeavors to lift himself above his fellows, he is dragged down by the mass, either by means of ridicule or of calumny. No one shall be more virtuous or more intellectually gifted than others. Whoever, by the irresistable force of genius, rises above the common herd is certain to be ostracized by society, which will pursue him with such merciless derision and detraction that at last he will be compelled to retreat into the solitude of his thoughts.

Heinrich Heine

Mean, Solitude, Individuality

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If our credit be so well built, so firm, that it is not easy to be shaken by calumny or insinuation, envy then commends us, and extols us beyond reason to those upon whom we depend, till they grow jealous, and so blow us up when they cannot throw us down.

Edward Hyde, 1st Earl of Clarendon

Jealous, Blow, Envy

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Nothing will ever equal that moment of joyous excitement which filled my whole being when I felt myself flying away from the earth. It was not mere pleasure; it was perfect bliss. Escaped from the frightful torments of persecution and of calumny, I felt that I was answering all in rising above all.

Jacques Charles

Airplane, Calumny Is, Perfect

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A man's reputation is not in his own keeping, but lies at the mercy of the profligacy of others. Calumny requires no proof.

William Hazlitt

Lying, Men, Reputation

William Hazlitt (1871). “The Round Table. A collection of Essays ... By W. H. and Leigh Hunt”, p.487

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Christ taught us truth; the Devil teaches us falsehood, and strives in every way to contradict every truth; devising various calumnies against it.

John of Kronstadt

Taught Us, Devil, Way

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The generation that followed did not have the same concerns; none of its members attempted to follow the example of the past generation. There was no longer anyone with the noble determination to get to know the great men of the world, or if there were some individuals consumed with this curiosity, they were few in number. From then on, there remained only vulgar minds given over to hatred, envy and discord, who took an interest only in things which did not concern them, gossip, slander, calumny of one's neighbors, all those things which are the source of the worst of our troubles.

Cheikh Anta Diop

Determination, Past, Men

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Calumny spreads like an oil-spot: we endeavor to cleanse it, but the mark remains.

Jeanne Julie Eleonore de Lespinasse

Oil, Gossip, Spots

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Then I celebrated my Wall of Books. I counted the volumes on my twenty-foot-long modernist bookshelf to make sure none had been misplaced or used as kindling by my subtenant. “You’re my sacred ones,” I told the books. “No one but me still cares about you. But I’m going to keep you with me forever. And one day I’ll make you important again.” I thought about that terrible calumny of the new generation: that books smell.

Gary Shteyngart

Wall, Book, Smell

Gary Shteyngart (2010). “Super Sad True Love Story”, p.45, Granta Books

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Alas, we are the victims of advertisement. Those who taste the joys and sorrows of fame when they have passed forty, know how to look after themselves. They know what is concealed beneath the flowers, and what the gossip, the calumnies, and the praise are worth. But as for those who win fame when they are twenty, they know nothing, and are caught up in the whirlpool.

Sarah Bernhardt

Flower, Winning, Gossip

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Pessimism like calumny is easy to do, and attracts immediate attention. The gossiper and the writer may find this out soon enough, and a little encouragement from the current mood will procure them successes that bring endless imitators in their trail. On the other hand saying good things about life in general and individuals in particular and making it interesting is a serious task which few can achieve with credit.

Bernard Berenson

Encouragement, Hands, Calumny Is

Bernard Berenson (1963). “Sunset and Twilight: From the Diaries of 1947-1958”, New York : Harcourt, Brace & World

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So long as he was personally present, [Alcibiades] had the perfect mastery of his political adversaries; calumny only succeeded in his absence.

Plutarch

Long, Perfect, Political

Plutarch (2015). “Lives of the noble Grecians and Romans: Top Biography”, p.324, 谷月社

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Yet the people, and even the clergy, incapable of forming any rational judgment of the business of peace and war, presumed to arraign the policy of Stilicho, who so often vanquished, so often surrounded, and so often dismissed the implacable enemy of the republic. The first moment of the public safety is devoted to gratitude and joy; but the second is diligently occupied by envy and calumny.

Edward Gibbon

Gratitude, War, People

Edward Gibbon (2009). “The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Edited and Abridged): Abridged Edition”, p.552, Modern Library

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After upwards of two thousand years Epicurus has been exonerated from the reproach that the doctrines of his philosophy recommended the pleasures of sensuality and voluptuousness as the chief good. Calumny may rest on genius a considerable part of a world's duration; what then is the value of fame?

William Benton Clulow

Philosophy, Years, Two

William Benton Clulow (1843). “Aphorisms and Reflections: A Miscellany of Thought and Opinion”, p.413

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No age is wanting in able men; it is the duty of wise masters to find them out, win them over, and get work done by means of them, without listening to the calumnies of selfish men against them.

Aurangzeb

Wise, Selfish, Mean

"Later Mughals : Volume II : 1719-1739". Book by William Irvine, "Ruqat-i-Alamgiri", 1922.

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As long as there are readers to be delighted with calumny, there will be found reviewers to calumniate.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Long, Found, Reader

Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1834). “Biographia Literaria: Or, Biographical Sketches of My Literary Life and Opinions”, p.41

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Calumny is like counterfeit money; many people who would not coin it circulate it without qualms.

Diane de Poitiers

Calumny Is, People, Coins

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It is in the habits of lawyers that every accusation appears insufficient if they do not exaggerate it even to calumny; it is thus that justice itself loses its sanctity and its respect amongst men.

Alphonse de Lamartine

Men, Justice, Lawyer

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In these days the invention of printing, and the diffusion of knowledge, render historical calumnies a little less dangerous: truth will always prevail in the long run, but how slow its progress!

Napoleon Bonaparte

Running, Long, Historical

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Nothing can be more notorious than the calumnies and invectives with which the wisest measures and most virtuous characters of The United States have been pursued and traduced [By American Newspapers]

Thurgood Marshall

Character, United States, Notorious

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And so the blasts of calumny, howl they ever so fiercely over the good man's head, contribute to his juster appreciation and to his wider fame. Preserve only a good conscience toward God, and a loving purpose toward your fellow men, and you need not wince nor tremble, though the pack of the spaniel-hearted hounds snarl at your heels.

William Morley Punshon

Appreciation, Men, Good Man

William Morley Punshon (1873). “Lectures and Sermons”, p.31, Adam, Stevenson

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As my object was not myself, I set out with the determination, and happily with the disposition, of not being moved by praise or censure, friendship or calumny, nor of being drawn from my purpose by any personal altercation; and the man who cannot do this, is not fit for a public character.

Thomas Paine

Determination, Character, Men

Thomas Paine (2016). “THE RIGHTS OF MAN: The French Revolution – Ideals, Arguments & Motives (Political Classic): Being an Answer to Mr. Burke's Attack on the French Revolution”, p.214, e-artnow

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