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CONSCIENCE
CONSEQUENCES --- CONSERVATION
CONSERVATIVES --- CONSIDERATE
CONSISTENCY --- CONSTITUTION (THE)
CONSUMERS --- CONTEMPT --- CONTENTED

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CONSCIENCE

see: "CONFESSION"
see: "CONVICTION"
see: "ETHICS"
see: "GUILT"
see: "MORALITY"
see: "REGRET"
see: "RESPONSIBILITY"
see: "SCRUPLES"
see: "SHAME"
see: "CHARACTER" for other related links
see "THE MIND" for other related links


Conscience is a cudgel which all men pick up in order
to thwack their neighbors instead of applying it to their
own shoulders.
--Honorι de Balzac (1799—1850)
French journalist and writer.

Reason often makes mistakes, but conscience never does.
--Josh Billings [Henry Wheeler Shaw] (1818—1885)
American humorist.
In Dorothy Sarnoff
_Speech Can Change Your Life_, p. 288 [1970].

What we call conscience, in many instances,
is only a wholesome fear of the constable.
--Christian Nestell Bovee (1820—1904)
American writer.
In James Wood _Dictionary of Quotations from Ancient
and Modern, English and Foreign Sources_, p. 639 [1899].

To say that we have a clear conscience is to utter a
solecism; had we never sinned we should have had
no conscience. Were defeat unknown, neither would
victory be celebrated by songs of triumph.
--Thomas Carlyle (1795—1881)
Scottish historian and political philosopher.

The guilty think all talk is of themselves.
--Geoffrey Chaucer (c. 1343—1400)
English poet.
_The Canterbury Tales_ [c. 1387]
"The Canon's Yeoman's Prologue"

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The only guide to a man is his conscience, the only
shield to his memory is the rectitude and the sincerity
of his actions. It is very imprudent to walk through
life without this shield, because we are so often
mocked by the failure of our hopes and the
upsetting of our calculations; but with this shield,
however the fates may play, we march always in
the ranks of honour.
--Part of Winston Churchill's eulogy for
Neville Chamberlain, (1869—1940)
_Their Finest Hour_, Page 486


The only wise and safe course is to act from
day to day in accordance with what one's own
conscience seems to decree.
--Winston Churchill (1874—1965)
British Conservative statesman and
Prime Minister [1940—1945, 1951—1955].
_The Second World War: The Gathering Storm_ 1.12 [1948]

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There is not pillow so soft as a clear conscience.
--French Proverb

A guilty conscience is like a whirlpool, drawing
in all to itself which would otherwise pass by.
--Thomas Fuller (1608—1661)
English churchman and historian.

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In matters of conscience, the law
of the majority has no place.
--Mohandas K. Gandhii (1869—1948)
Indian statesman and leader of the nationalistic
movement against British rule.
In "Young India" [4 August 1920].


I should love to satisfy all, if I possibly
can; but in trying to satisfy all, I may be
able to satisfy none. I have, therefore,
arrived at the conclusion that the best course
is to satisfy one's own conscience and leave
the world to form its own judgment, favorable
or otherwise.
--Mohandas K. Gandhii (1869—1948)
Indian statesman and leader of the nationalistic
movement against British rule.
In Chandrashanker Shukla _Gandhi's View of Life_ [1952].

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The first and indispensable requisite of
happiness is a clear conscience.
--Edward Gibbon (1737—1794)
English historian.
_Memoirs of My Life and Writings_ [1796]
Alex Murray edition [1869]

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I have to live with myself, and so,
I want to be fit for myself to know;
I want to be able as days go by,
Always to look myself straight in the eye;
I don't want to stand with the setting sun
And hate myself for the things I've done.

I don't want to keep on a closet shelf
A lot of secrets about myself,
And fool myself as I come and go
Into thinking that nobody else will know
The kind of man I really am;
I don't want to dress myself up in sham.

I want to go out with my head erect,
I want to deserve all men's respect;
But here in this struggle for fame and pelf,
I want to be able to like myself.
I don't want to think as I come and go
That I'm bluster and bluff and empty show.

I never can hide myself from me,
I see what others may never see,
I know what others may never know,
I never can fool myself— and so,
Whatever happens, I want to be
Self-respecting and conscience free.

--Edgar Guest (1881—1959)
American poet.
"Myself"

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In matters of conscience first thoughts are best;
in matters of prudence last thoughts are best.
--Robert Hall (1764—1831)
English minister and orator.

I cannot and will not cut my conscience to
fit this year's fashions.
--Lillian Hellman (1905—1984)
American dramatist.
Letter to Committee on Un-American Activities of
House of Repsentatives, [19 May 1952].

Any attempt to replace the personal conscience
by a collective conscience does violence to
the individual and is the first step toward
totalitarianism.
--Hermann Hesse (1877—1962)
German novelist, poet, and winner of the
Nobel Prize for Literature in 1946.
_Reflections_ [ed. Volker Michels 1974], #32

Courage without conscience is a wild beast.
--Robert Green Ingersoll (1833—1899)
American politician and orator know as "the great agnostic."
[1882 Decoration Day Address]

People who have tried it, tell me that a clear
conscience makes you feel very happy and
contented; but a full stomach does the business
quite as well, and is cheaper, and more easily
obtained.
--Jerome K Jerome (1859—1927)
English novelist and playwright.

On some positions, cowardice asks the question, 'Is it safe?'
Expediency asks the question, 'Is it politic?' And vanity comes
along and asks the question, 'Is it popular?' But conscience
asks the question, 'Is it right?' and there comes a time when
one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor
popular, but he must do it because conscience tells him it is
right.
--Martin Luther King, Jr. (1929—1968)
American civil rights leader.
1967 speech at Riverside Church, New York City.

A lot of people mistake a short memory for a clear conscience.
--Doug Larson (1902—1981)
English racer.

Unless I am convicted by scripture and plain
reason — I do not accept the authority of the
popes and councils, for they have contradicted
each other — my conscience is captive to the
Word of God. I cannot and I will not recant
anything for to go against conscience is
neither right nor safe. God help me. Amen.
--Martin Luther (1483—1546)
German Protestant theologian.
At the Imperial Diet at Worms [18 April 1521].

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Conscience: the inner voice which warns
you that someone may be looking.
--H.L. (Henry Louis) Mencken (1880—1956)
American journalist and literary critic.
_A Little Book in C Major_ [1916]


Conscience is a mother-in-law whose visit never ends.
--H.L. (Henry Louis) Mencken (1880—1956)
American journalist and literary critic.
Attributed in "Saturday Review", Volume 50 [1967].

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I will not do that which my conscience tells
me is wrong to gain the huzzahs of thousands,
or the daily praise of all the papers which
come from the press; I will not avoid doing
what I think is right, though it should draw
on me the whole artillery that falsehood and
malice can invent, or the credulity a deluded
population can swallow.
--William Murray (Lord Mansfield) (1705—1793)
Scottish barrister and judge.
_Credo for Judges_

There is only one way to achieve happiness on
this terrestrial ball, and that is to have
either a clear conscience or none at all.
--Ogden Nash (1902—1971)
American writer of humorous poetry.

He had a mania for washing and disinfecting himself . . .
For him the only danger came from the microbes that
attacked the body. He had not studied the microbe
of conscience which eats into the soul.
--Anaοs Nin (1903—1977)
French-born American writer.

The plain fact of the matter is that any group will
remain inevitably potentially conscienceless and
evil until such time as each and every individual
holds himself or herself directly responsible for
the behavior of the whole group—the organism
—of which he or she is a part.
--Scott Peck (1936—2005)
American author.
_People of the Lie_ [1983]

Money dishonestly acquired is never worth its cost,
while a good conscience never costs as much as it
is worth.
--Jean-Antoine Petit-Senn (1792—1870)
French-Swiss lyric poet.
Quoted in A.N. Coleman _Proverbial Wisdom: Proverbs,
Maxims and Ethical Sentences_ p. 100 [3rd ed. 1903].

A bad conscience embitters the sweetest comforts;
a good conscience sweetens the bitterest crosses.
--Wendell Phillips (1811—1884)
American abolitionist and reformer.

Consult your conscience, rather than popular opinion.
--Publilius Syrus (85—43 B.C.)
Latin writer of mimes who was originally a slave.,
_Moral Sayings_, 146

Rules of society are nothing, one's conscience is the umpire.
--George Sand [pseudonym of Amandine-Aurore-Lucile Dupin] (1804—1876)
French author.

Nothing shall I ever do for the sake of
[public] opinion, everything for the sake
of my conscience.
--Lucius Annaeus Seneca (4 BC—65 A.D.)
Roman philosopher and poet.
"On the Happy Life", _Moral Essays_

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A peace above all earthly dignities,
A still and quiet conscience.
--William Shakespeare (1564—1616)
English dramatist.
_Henry VIII_ [1613]


They whose guilt within their bosom lies,
imagine every eye beholds their blame.
--William Shakespeare (1564—1616)
English dramatist.
_The Rape of Lucrece_, l. 1342 [1594]

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Most people sell their souls, and live with
a good conscience on the proceeds.
--Logan Pearsall Smith (1865—1946)
American-born man of letters.
_Afterthoughts_ [1931], "Other People"

A person may sometimes have a clear conscience
simply because his head is empty.
--Ralph Washington Sockman (1889—1970)
American pastor of the United Methodist Christ Church
in New York City and radio personality [1928—1962].
_How to Believe_ [1953]

The voice of conscience is so delicate that it
is easy to stifle it; but it is also so clear
that it is impossible to mistake it.
--Germaine de Staλl (1766—1817)
French writer.

Conscience warns us as a friend before
it punishes us as a judge.
--Stanislaw I [Stanislaw Leszczynski]
(1677—1766) King of Poland.

Trust that man in nothing who has
not a Conscience in everything.
--Laurence Sterne (1713—1768)
English novelist.
_Tristram Shandy_ [1760], bk. II, ch. XVII

Let not your peace rest in the utterances of men,
for whether they put a good or bad construction
on your conduct does not make you other than
you are.
--Thomas a' Kempis (1380—1471)
German ascetical writer.

No man has ever stood the lower in my estimation
for having a patch in his cloths; yet I am sure
that there is greater anxiety, commonly, to have
fashionable, or at least clean and unpatched
clothes, than to have a sound conscience.
--Henry David Thoreau (1817—1862)
American essayist, poet, and practical philosopher.
_Walden_, or _Life in the Woods_

Some good must come by clinging to the right.
Conscience is a man's compass, and though
the needle sometimes deviates, though one
perceives irregularities in directing one's
course by it, still one must try to follow its
direction.
--Vincent van Gogh (1853—1890)
Dutch painter.

He that loses his conscience has nothing left that is
worth keeping. Therefore be sure you look to that,
and in the next place look to your health; and if you
have it praise God and value it next to a good
conscience.
--Izaak Walton (1593—1683)
English writer.
In Robert Chambers
_Chamber's Cyclopζdia of English Literature_, p.617 [1902].

If a dog will not come to you after having looked you
in the face, you should go home and examine your
conscience.
--attributed to Woodrow Wilson (1856—1924)
American Democratic statesman and President [1913—1921].

Things said or done long years ago,
Or things I did not do or say
But thought that I might say or do,
Weigh me down, and not a day
But something is recalled,
My conscience or my vanity appalled.
--William Butler Yeats (1865—1939)
Irish poet and dramatist who received the
Nobel Prize for Literature in 1923.
"Vacillation" in _The Winding Stair and Other Poems_ [1933]

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Conscience is what hurts when everything
else feels so good.
--anon

If your conscience is troubled, beware the knock
on your door, Fear the earth as it trembles, the
sky when it roars. Beware of the dweller within,
not the man that comes to greet you.
--anon

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compunction [kuhm-PUHNK-shuhn], noun:
1. Anxiety or deep unease proceeding from a sense
of guilt or consciousness of causing pain.
2. A sting of conscience or a twinge of uneasiness;
a qualm; a scruple.

subliminal (adjective) [sκb-'li-mκ-nκl]
Operating below the threshold of consciousness.



CONSEQUENCES

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see: "CAUSES & CONSEQUENCES
see: "ENDINGS"
see "ACTIONS" for other related links


People who treat other people as less than human must not be
surprised when the bread they have cast on the waters comes
floating back to them, poisoned.
--James Baldwin (1924—1987)
American author and playwright.
_No Name in the Street_ [1972]

As the dimensions of the tree are not always regulated by the
size of the seed, so the consequences of things are not always
proportionate to the apparent magnitude of those events that
have produced them.
--C.C. Colton (1780—1832)
English clergyman and writer.

Consequences are unpitying. Our deeds carry their terrible
consequences, quite apart from any fluctuations that went
before — consequences that are hardly ever confined to
ourselves.
--George Eliot [Mary Ann Evans] (1819—1880)
English novelist.
_Adam Bede_ [1859]

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You remember the Permanent Record. In school,
you were constantly being told that if you screwed
up, the news would be sent to the principal and
placed in your Permanent Record. Nothing more
needed to be said.

No one had ever seen a Permanent Record. That
didn't matter. We knew it was there. We imagined
a steel filing cabinet crammed full of Permanent
Records — one for each kid in the school. I think
we always assumed that our Permanent Record
was sent on to college with us and later to our
employer, probably with a duplicate to the U.S.
government.

I have a terrible feeling that mine was the last
generation to know what a Permanent Record
was — and that it has disappeared as a concept
in society.

There was a time when people really stopped before
they did something they knew was deceitful, immoral
or unethical. They didn't stop because they were
such holy folks. They stopped because they had a
nagging fear that if they did the foul deed, it
would end up on their Permanent Record.

At some point in the last few decades, I'm afraid,
people wised up to something that amazed them:
there is no Permanent Record. They discovered
that regardless of how badly you fouled up your
life or the lives of others, there was nothing
about it on your record. You would always be
forgiven, no matter what.

So pretty soon men and women — instead of fearing
the Permanent Record — started laughing at it.
The things that they used to be ashamed of, that
once made them cringe when they thought about
them, now became "interesting" aspects of their
personalities.

If the details were weird enough, the kinds of
things that would have really jazzed up the
Permanent Record, people sometimes wrote books
confessing them, and the books became best-sellers.
They found out that other people — far from scorning
them — would line up in bookstores to get their
autographs. Talk-show hosts would say, "Thank you
for being so honest with us. I'm sure our audience
understands how much guts it takes for you to tell
us these things." Permanent Records were being
opened up for the whole world to see — and the sky
did not fall in.

As Americans began to realize that there probably
never had been a Permanent Record, they deduced
that any kind of behavior was permissible. All
you had to do was say, "That was a real crazy
period in my life." All would be okay.

And that is where we are today. We have accepted
the notion that no one is keeping track. No one is
even allowed to keep track. I doubt you could scare
a school kid nowadays by telling him that the
principal was going to inscribe something on his
Permanent Record; the kid would probably file a suit
under the Freedom of Information Act and expect to
obtain his Permanent Record by recess. Either that,
or call it up on his or her computer and delete it.

As for us adults, it has been so long since we
believed in the Permanent Record that the very
mention of it now brings a nostalgic smile to
our faces. We feel naive for ever having
believed there was such a thing.

But who really knows? On some distant day when
we check out of this earthly world and approach
the gates of our new eternal home, our smiles
may freeze. We just might be greeted by a heavenly
presence sitting there, casually leafing through a
dusty, battered volume of our Permanent Record,
as we come jauntily into view.

--Bob Greene (1947— )
American journalist.
_Cheeseburgers: The Best of Bob Greene_ [1985]

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As you must make your bed, so you must lie on it.
--Gabriel Harvey (c. 1545—1630)
English writer, lecturer, and critic.
"Marginalia" [c. 1590]

The fat is in the fire.
--John Heywood (1497—1580)
English playwright.
_Proverbs_ [1546]

The sins of youth are paid for in old age.
--Latin proverb

Freedom is not empowerment. Empowerment is what
the Serbs have in Bosnia. Anybody can grab a gun
and be empowered. It's not entitlement. An
entitlement is what people on welfare get, and how
free are they? It's not an endlessly expanding list
of rights — the 'right' to education, the 'right'
to health care, the 'right' to food and housing.
That's not freedom, that's dependency. Those aren't
rights, those are the rations of slavery — hay and
a barn for human cattle. There's only one basic human
right, the right to do as you damn well please. And
with it comes the only basic human duty, the duty
to take the consequences.
--P.J. O'Rourke (1947— )
American political satirist.

The game of life is a game of boomerangs.
Our thoughts, deeds and words return to us
sooner or later, with astounding accuracy.
--Florence Scovel Shinn (1871—1940)
American author.

Everybody, soon or late, sits down to a
banquet of consequences.
--Robert Louis Stevenson (1850—1894)
Scottish essayist, poet, and novelist.

But with every deed you are sowing a seed,
Though the harvest you may never see.
--Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850—1919)
American author and poet.
"You Never Can Tell"
In _Custer And Other Poems_ [1896]

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condign (adj.)
Well-deserved or fitting, esp. of punishment or
reprimand. Example: a condign demotion.
Related: apposite, rightful, due.
Derived: condignly, adv.

redound (verb) [ree-'dawnd]
To recoil or return, hence
to have a consequence.



CONSERVATION

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see: "WASTE"
see "NATURE" for other related links


I am I plus my surroundings, and if I do not
preserve the latter, I do not preserve myself.
--Josι Ortega y Gasset (1883—1955)
Spanish philosopher.
_Meditations of Quixote_ [1911]

At the beginning of the cask and the end take thy fill but
be saving in the middle; for at the bottom the savings
comes too late.
--Hesiod (c. 700 B.C.)
Greek poet.

The nation behaves well if it treats the natural resources
as assets which it must turn over to the next generation
increased, and not impaired, in value.
--Theodore Roosevelt (1858—1919)
American Republican statesman and President [1901—1909].



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CONSERVATIVES

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see "POLITICS" for related links


If you're not a liberal at twenty, you have no
heart, and if you're not a conservative at
forty, you have no head.
--attributed to Winston Churchill (1874—1965)

[A neoconservative is] a liberal who has
been mugged by reality.
--Irving Kristol (1920—2009)
American founder of the neoconservative movement.
Quoted in _N.Y. Times_ [6 December 1981].

The word 'conservative' is used by the BBC as a
portmanteau word of abuse for anyone whose views
differ from the insufferable, smug, sanctimonious,
naοve, guilt-ridden, wet, pink orthodoxy of that
sunset home of the third-rate minds of that third-
rate decade, the nineteen-sixties.
--Norman Tebbit (1931— )
British Conservative politician.
In _Independent_ [24 February 1990].

A liberal is a conservative who has been arrested.
--Tom Wolfe (b. 1931)
American journalist and novelist.
_The Bonfires of the Vanities_, ch. 24 [1987]



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CONSIDERATE

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see "KINDNESS" for related links


The Americans are a good-natured people,
kindly, helpful to one another, disposed to
take a charitable view even of wrongdoers ...
Even a mob lynching a horse thief in the West
has consideration for the criminal, and will
give him a good drink of whiskey before he
is strung up.
--James Bryce (1838—1922)
British politician, diplomat, and historian;
ambassador to the U.S. [1907—1913].
_The American Commonwealth_ [1888]

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Blow me a kiss across the room
Say I look nice when I'm not
Touch my hair as you pass my chair
Little things mean a lot

Give me your arm as we cross the street
Call me at six on the dot
A line a day when you're far away
Little things mean a lot

Don't have to buy me diamonds or pearls
Champagne, sables or such
I never cared much for diamonds and pearls
'Cause honestly, honey, they just cost money

Give me your hand when I've lost my way
Give me your shoulder to cry on
Whether the day is bright or gray
Give me your heart to rely on

Send me the warmth of a secret smile
To show me you haven't forgot
For always and ever, now and forever
Little things mean a lot [. . . ]

--"Little Things Mean A Lot"
{Words and music by Edith Lindeman and Carl Stutz;
lyrics as recorded by Kitty Kallen in a 1962 re-recording of
her 1954 record}

-

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My parents died when I was so young, my mother when I
was eight, my father when I was ten, that I know little
of them but from hearsay. . . He was forty when he married
my mother, who was more than twenty years younger.
She was a very beautiful woman and he was a very ugly
man.

. . . One of her great friends was Lady Anglesey, an
American woman who died at an advanced age not very
long ago, and she told me that she had once said to my
mother; 'You're so beautiful and there are so many people
in love with you, why are you faithful to that ugly little man
you've married?' And my mother answered: 'He never hurts
my feelings.'

--W. Somerset Maugham (1874—1965)
English novelist, playwright, and short-story writer.
_The Summing Up_, ch. 7 [1938]

-

Manners are a sensitive awareness of the feelings
of others. If you have that awareness, you have
good manners — no matter what fork you use.
--Emily Post (1873—1960)
American authority on social behavior.
In Ruth Cullen _The Little Pink Book of Etiquette_, p. 33 [2005].



CONSISTENCY

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see "CHANGE"
see: "DOUBT"
see "OPINION"


Of right and wrong he taught
Truths as refined as ever Athens heard;
And (strange to tell) he practis'd what he preach'd.
--John Armstrong (1709—1779)
Scottish poet.
_The Art of Preserving Health_, bk. IV, l. 301 [1744]

Consistency requires you to be as ignorant
today as you were a year ago.
--Bernard Berenson (1865—1959)
American art critic and writer.
Quoted in Connie Robertson
_Book of Humorous Quotations_, p. 24 [1998].

No well-informed person has declared a
change of opinion to be inconstancy.
--Marcus Tullius Cicero (106—43 BC)
Roman orator and statesman.

A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little
minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers
and divines. With consistency a great soul has simply
nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with
his shadow on the wall. Speak what you think now
in hard words, and to-morrow speak what to-morrow
thinks in hard words again, though it contradict
every thing you said to-day.... let me record day
by day my honest thought without prospect or retrospect,
and, I cannot doubt, it will be found symmetrical,
though I mean it not, and see it not.
--Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803—1882)
American philosopher and poet.
_Essays_ [1841] "Self-Reliance"

Consistency is contrary to nature, contrary to life.
The only completely consistent people are the dead.
--Aldous Huxley (1894—1963)
English novelist (grandson of T.H. Huxley.)
_Do What You Will_ [1929]



CONSTITUTION (THE)

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see "FREEDOM" for related links


Our constitution was made only for a moral and religious people.
It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.
--John Adams (1735—1826)
First VP and second President of the United States.
To the Officers of the First Brigade of the 3rd Division of the
Massachusetts Militia [11 October 1798].

The makers of our Constitution conferred, as against
the Government, the right to be let alone — the most
comprehensive of rights and the right most valued
by civilized men.
--Louis Brandeis (1856—1941)
American lawyer and associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court [1916—1939].
"Olmstead v. United States" [1928]

[H]e who takes the oath today to preserve, protect, and defend the
Constitution of the United States only assumes the solemn obligation
which every patriotic citizen — on the farm, in the workshop, in the
busy marts of trade, and everywhere — should share with him. The
Constitution which prescribes his oath, my countrymen, is yours;
the government you have chosen him to administer for a time is
yours.
--Grover Cleveland (1837—1908)
22nd [1885-1889] and 24th [1893—1897] President of the U.S..
In his first inaugural address [4 March 1885].

[The ratification of the Constitution] was a close thing in some states,
Virginia, for instance, voted 89 for, 79 against. George Mason and
Patrick Henry voted against.
--Alistair Cooke [Alfred Cooke] (1908—2004)
British-born American broadcater and journalist.
_America_ [1973]

The strength of the Constitution lies entirely in the determination
of each citizen to defend it. Only if every single citizen feels duty
bound to do his share in this defense are the constitutional rights
secure.
--Albert Einstein (1879—1955)
German-American physicist who developed the special and general theories of relativity.

Our Constitution is the will of the Fuehrer.
--Hans Frank (1900—1946)
German politician and lawyer who served as govenor-general of Poland during WWII.
[20 May 1936]

Our new Constitution is now established, and has
an appearance that promises permanency; but in
this world nothing can be said to be certain, except
death and taxes.
--Benjamin Franklin (1706—1790)
American politician, inventor, and scientist.
Letter to Jean-Baptiste Le Roy [13 November 1789].

As the British Constitution is the most subtle organism
which has proceeded from progressive history, so the
American Constitution is the most wonderful work ever
struck off at a given time by the brain and purpose of
man.
--William Gladstone (1809—1898)
British Liberal statesman, Prime Minister [1868—1874, 1880—1885, 1892—1894].
"Kin Beyond the Sea" in _North American Review_ [September 1878].

If the Constitution is to be construed to mean what
the majority at any given period in history wish the
Constitution to mean, why a written Constitution?
--Frank J. Hogan,
President, American Bar Assn. [1939]

Some men look at constitutions with sanctimonious reverence,
and deem them like the ark of the covenant, too sacred to be
touched. . . . Laws and institutions must go hand in hand with
the progress of the human mind. . . . We might as well require
a man to wear still the same coat which fitted him when a boy,
as civilized society to remain ever under the regimen of their
barbarous ancestors.
--Thomas Jefferson (1743—1826)
American statesman and president [1801—1809].
Letter to Samuel Kercheval [12 July 1810].

Either some Caesar or Napoleon will seize the
reins of government with a strong hand, or your
republic will be as fearfully plundered and laid waste
by barbarians in the twentieth century as the Roman
Empire was in the fifth; with this difference, that
the Huns and Vandals who ravaged the Roman
Empire came from without and that your Huns and
Vandals will have been engendered within your own
country by your own institutions ... Your constitution
is all sail and no anchor.
--Thomas Babington Macaulay (1800—1859)
English politician and historian.
To Henry Stephens Randall (American politician) [23 May 1857], in Thomas
Pinney (ed.) _The Letters of Thomas Babington Macauley_ [1981] v. 6, p. 96.

I hope your committee will not permit doubts as to constitutionality,
however reasonable, to block the suggested legislation [the Bituminous
Coal Conservation Act of 1935].
--Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882—1945)
American Democratic statesman and President [1933—1945].
Letter to Samuel B. Hill (Chairman of House committee) [6 July 1935]

For most Americans, the Constitution had become
a hazy document, cited like the Bible on ceremonial
occasions, but forgotten in the daily transactions of
life.
--Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. (1917—2007)
American historian.
_The Imperial Presidency_ [1973]

Next to the right of liberty, the right of property is the most important
individual right guaranteed by the Constitution and the one which,
united with that of personal liberty, has contributed more to the
growth of civilization than any other institution established by the
human race.
--William Howard Taft (1857—1930)
27th President of the United States [1909—1913]
and Chief Justice of the Supreme Court [1921—1930].
_Popular Government_ [1913], ch. 3

I prefer a man who will burn the flag and then wrap
himself in the Constitution to a man who will burn
the Constitution and then wrap himself in the flag.
--Craig Washington (1941— )
American politician.

-

We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.
--Preamble

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting
the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the
right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a
redress of grievances.
--Amendment I

A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state,
the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.
--Amendment II

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects,
against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants
shall issue, but upon probable cause...
--Amendment IV



CONSUMERS

.
.

see "CAPITALISM" for related links


In a consumer society there are inevitably
two kinds of slaves: the prisoners of
addiction and the prisoners of envy.
--Ivan Illich (1926—2002)
Austrian philosopher.
_Tools for Conviviality_, ch. 3 [1973]

Expenditure rises to meet income.
--C. Northcote Parkinson (1909—1993)
English writer.
_The Law and the Profits_, ch. I [1960]



CONTEMPT

.
.

see: "HURTING SOMEONE" for related links


Contempt putteth an edge upon anger
more than the hurt itself.
--Francis Bacon (1561—1626)
English philosopher and essayist.

Contempt is not a thing to be despised. It may be borne with
a calm and equal mind, but no man, by lifting his head high,
can pretend that he does not perceive the scorns that are
poured down on him from above.
--Edmund Burke (1729—1797)
Irish-born Whig politician and man of letters.

Speak with contempt of no man. Every one hath a tender
sense of reputation. And every man hath a sting, which he
may, if provoked too far, dart out at one time or other.
--Robert Burton (1577—1640)
English scholar, cleric, and author.

-

It is often more necessary to conceal contempt than
resentment; the former is never forgiven, but the later
is sometimes forgotten.
--Lord Chesterfield [Philip Dormer Stanhope] (1694—1773)
British writer and politician.


Men are much more unwilling to have their weaknesses
and their imperfections known than their crimes; and if
you hint to a man that you think him silly, ignorant, or
even ill-bred or awkward, he will hate you more and
longer than if you tell him plainly that you think him a
rogue.
--Lord Chesterfield [Philip Dormer Stanhope] (1694—1773)
British writer and politician.

-

If the Secret Service considered Richard Nixon the strangest modern
president, Jimmy Carter was known as the least likeable. If the true
measure of a man is how he treats the little people, Carter flunked the
test. Inside the White House, Carter treated with contempt the little
people who helped and protected him.
--Ronald Kessler
Jounalist and author of non-fiction.
_In the President's Secret Service_, p. 70 [2009]

Among other evils caused by being disarmed, it renders you contemptible.
--Niccolς Machiavelli (1469—1527)
Florentine statesman and political philosopher.
_The Prince_ [written 1513], chapter 14

Nothing so contemptible as habitual contempt.
--Elias L. Magoon (1810—1886)
American clergyman.

Contempt is the only way to triumph over calumny.
--Franηoise d'Aubignι, marquise de Maintenon (1635—1719)
Second wife and untitled queen of King Louis XIV of France.
Quoted in Andrew Steinmetz
_Gems of Genius; or, Words of the Wise_, p. 172 [1838].

There is nothing more contemptible than a
bald man who pretends to have hair.
--Martial [Marcus Valerius Martialis] (38/41—103)
Roman poet.
_Epigrams_ [86-98], bk. X, ep. 83.

To show pity is felt as a sign of contempt because one has
clearly ceased to be an object of fear as soon as one is pitied.
--Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche (1844—1900)
German classical scholar, philosopher, and critic of culture.
_The Wanderer and His Shadow_ [1880]

If a man sets out to hate all the miserable creatures he
meets, he will not have much energy left for anything
else; whereas he can despise them, one and all, with
the greatest ease.
--Arthur Schopenhauer (1788—1860)
German philosopher.

-----

contemn [kuhn-TEM], transitive verb:
To regard or treat with disdain or contempt; to scorn; to despise.
Ex.: The spectrum of difference exhibited at these shows
suggests varying relationships with the West: some artists
identify with or at least acknowledge the Western tradition,
some contemn it.
--Thomas McEvilley, "Arrivederci Venice",
ArtForum, November 1993

flout [FLOWT], transitive verb:
1. To treat with contempt and disregard; to show contempt for.
2. To mock, to scoff.
3. Mockery, scoffing.




CONTENTED

.
.

see "HAPPINESS" for related links


Show me a thoroughly contented person,
and I will show you a useless one.
--Josh Billings [Henry Wheeler Shaw] (1818—1885)
American humorist.

One who is contented with what he has done will never
become famous for what he will do. He has lain down
to die. The grass is already growing over him.
--Christian Nestell Bovee (1820—1904)
American writer.

To be content with what we possess is
the greatest and most secure of riches.
--Marcus Tullius Cicero (106—43 BC)
Roman orator and statesman.

Enjoy your own life without comparing it with that of another.
--Marie-Jean-Antoine-Nicolas de Caritat, marquis de Condorcet (1743—1794)
French philosopher.

Cheerfulness and contentment are great beautifiers
and are famous preservers of youthful looks.
--Charles Dickens (1812—1870)
English novelist.
In Willard Scott _The Older the Fiddle, the Better the Tune:
The Joys of Reaching a Certain Age_, p. 194 [2002].

To be content with little is difficult; to
be content with much is impossible.
--Marie von Ebner-Eschenbach (1830—1916)
Austrian writer.

Nothing can bring you peace but yourself.
--Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803—1882)
American philosopher and poet.
_Essays_, First Series [1841], "Self-Reliance"

Do not spoil what you have by desiring what you have not;
remember that what you now have was once among the
things only hoped for.
--Epicurus (341—270 B.C.)
Greek philosopher.
Attributed in William Safire _Good Advice_ [1982]

Better is half a loaf than no bread.
--John Heywood (1497—1580)
English playwright.
_Dialogue of Proverbs_ [1546]

This is my motto: Contented with little,
yet wishing for more.
--Charles Lamb (1775—1834)
English essayist.

It is right to be contented with what we have,
but never with what we are.
--Sir James Mackintosh (1765—1832)
Scottish historian and statesman.

I would be most content if my children grew up to be the kind of
people who think decorating consists mostly of building enough
bookshelves.
--Anna Quindlen (1952— )
American writer.
_Enough Bookshelves_, "New York Times" [7 August 1991]

To act with common sense according to the
moment, is the best wisdom I know; and the
best philosophy is to do one's duties, take
the world as it comes, submit respectfully
to one's lot; bless the goodness that has
given us so much happiness with it,
whatever it is; and despise affectation.
--Horace Walpole (1717—1797)
English writer and connoisseur.

That happy state of mind, so rarely possessed, in which
we can say, "I have enough," is the highest attainment
of philosophy.
--Johann Georg Zimmermann (1728—1795)
Swiss philosophical writer and physician.


end page



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