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Disdain   Listen
verb
Disdain  v. t.  (past & past part. disdained; pres. part. disdaining)  
1.
To think unworthy; to deem unsuitable or unbecoming; as, to disdain to do a mean act. "Disdaining... that any should bear the armor of the best knight living."
2.
To reject as unworthy of one's self, or as not deserving one's notice; to look with scorn upon; to scorn, as base acts, character, etc. "When the Philistine... saw David, he disdained him; for he was but a youth." "'T is great, 't is manly to disdain disguise."
Synonyms: To contemn; despise; scorn. See Contemn.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Disdain" Quotes from Famous Books



... refuse the triumphal chariot which had been prepared for his return to Milan, on the ground that such things were monarchial superstitions. Alfonso the Great, on his entrance into Naples (1443), declined the wreath of laurel, which Napoleon did not disdain to wear at his coronation in Notre-Dame. For the rest, Alfonso's procession, which passed by a breach in the wall through the city to the cathedral, was a strange mixture of antique, allegorical, and purely comic elements. The car, drawn by four white horses, on which he sat enthroned, ...
— The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy • Jacob Burckhardt

... he had fathomed the prince's sentiments thoroughly, had discovered all the avenues to his confidence, and imperceptibly stolen himself into his favor. All those arts which a noble pride, and a natural elevation of character, had taught the minister to disdain, were brought into play by the Italian, who scrupled not to avail himself of the most despicable means for attaining his object. Well aware that man never stands so much in need of a guide and assistant as in the paths of vice, and that nothing gives a stronger title ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... teasing procession for the eye and the thought. The cabs shoot by, caracoling through the orderly lines of traffic; zigzags of yellow, green, blue, lavender, black and white snorting along with a fine disdain. They speak of destinations reminiscent of the postern gate and the latticed window; of the waiting ...
— A Thousand and One Afternoons in Chicago • Ben Hecht

... with great disdain at the other; "do you imagine for an instant that such a shabby imitation of a horse as you are can run ...
— Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz • L. Frank Baum.

... to accept the simple but expressive token of their gratitude and admiration. Suffer their leader to place upon your veteran brow the only crown it would not disdain to wear, the blended emblems of civic worth and martial prowess. It will not pain you, General, to perceive some scattered sprigs of melancholy cypress intermingled with the blended leaves of laurel ...
— Memoirs of General Lafayette • Lafayette

... their doubts. At the latest experiments the cylindro-conical shots of Barbicane had no more effect than pins upon Nicholl's armour-plate. That day the forger of Philadelphia believed himself victorious, and henceforth had nothing but disdain for his rival. But when, later on, Barbicane substituted simple howitzers of 600 lbs. for conical shots, the captain was obliged to go down in his own estimation. It fact, these projectiles, though of mediocre velocity, drilled with holes and broke to ...
— The Moon-Voyage • Jules Verne

... set the aviary on flame. "To-morrow comes the Prince," it said, "to choose A bird of gifts will grace the royal bower." O then began a fluttering and a fume— A judging each of all! Pert airs and speech Flew thick as moulted feathers. Little heads Were tossed in lofty pride, or in disdain Were turned aside. For each bird deemed his own The merits that would charm. One only sang To-day his daily song, nor joined the crowd In envious exultation. To him spoke Another of his kind. "Vain one, refrain That everlasting pipe, fit for a ...
— Laura Secord, the heroine of 1812. - A Drama. And Other Poems. • Sarah Anne Curzon

... such a magnificent tone of disdain that Joe was rather amused at the fellow. In his red shirt and coarse breeches, and brown, not overclean skin, he certainly didn't look much like a gentleman in the conventional sense of ...
— Joe's Luck - Always Wide Awake • Horatio Alger, Jr.

... spoke. Fearing another access she began, as a resource, to lecture Clarice upon the impropriety of making appointments with young gentlemen at other people's houses. The lecture, however, was received with disdain. ...
— The Philanderers • A.E.W. Mason

... her haue I forgone My Country, Caesar vnto warre prouok'd (For iust reuenge of Sisters wrong my wife, Who mou'de my Queene (ay me!) to iealousie) For loue of her, in her allurements caught Abandon'd life, I honor haue despisde, Disdain'd my freends, and of the statelye Rome Despoilde the Empire of her best attire, Contemn'd that power that made me so much fear'd, A slaue become vnto her feeble face. O cruell, traitres, woman most vnkinde, Thou dost, forsworne, my loue and life betraie: ...
— A Discourse of Life and Death, by Mornay; and Antonius by Garnier • Philippe de Mornay

... merely beat them at his piety, he beats them at their own irreverence. In all their little books of verse you will not find a finer defiance of God than Satan's. Nor will you find the grandeur of paganism felt as that fiery Christian felt it who described Faranata lifting his head as in disdain of hell. And the reason is very obvious. Blasphemy is an artistic effect, because blasphemy depends upon a philosophical conviction. Blasphemy depends upon belief and is fading with it. If any one doubts this, let him sit down seriously and try to think ...
— Heretics • Gilbert K. Chesterton

... you, Mr. Cosmo Comyne Bradwardine of Bradwardine and Tully-Veolan," retorted the other, in huge disdain, "that I will make a muir cock of the man that refuses my toast, whether he be a crop-eared English Whig wi' a black ribband at his lug, or ane wha deserts his friends to claw favour wi' the rats ...
— Red Cap Tales - Stolen from the Treasure Chest of the Wizard of the North • Samuel Rutherford Crockett

... collectivistic tendencies, they teach forbearance, and patience, and the will to face the facts—tout comprendre, c'est tout pardonner. And they are modern: treating problems of character and milieu, they disdain the adventitious aids of eloquence and theatrical splendor, and speak to us with the directness, often with the bluntness, of nature herself. Hebbel was no naturalist, in the sense of one who seeks but to reproduce phenomena in all their details, sordid, ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IX - Friedrich Hebbel and Otto Ludwig • Various

... minutes' silence she felt her chin lifted until her eyes met the gaze of the merriest brown ones, from which all trace of disdain or impatience was gone. ...
— Mr. Pat's Little Girl - A Story of the Arden Foresters • Mary F. Leonard

... said I, "what a book it is in your power to make, whenever so disposed. 'Translations from the crockery literature of China.' Such a book would be sure to take; even glorious John himself would not disdain to publish it." ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow

... generally has a small brother who refuses to go to bed at night, or to stop making the piazza chairs into a train of cars, or to use the public halls as a skating rink. When he is not making a noise, he is eating. And his "elegant" sister looks upon him with disdain. ...
— Etiquette • Emily Post

... Of this damsel's disdain, Why thus in despair do you fret? For months you may try, Yet, believe me, a sigh [i] Will never ...
— Byron's Poetical Works, Vol. 1 • Byron

... proceedings of the fermiers, stewards and other men of business."[1308] An Englishwoman, who observes them in Provence just after the Revolution, says that, detested at Aix, they are much beloved on their estates. "Whilst they pass the first citizens with their heads erect and an air of disdain, they salute peasants with extreme courtesy and affability." One of them distributes among the women, children and the aged on his domain wool and flax to spin during the bad season, and, at the end ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1 (of 6) - The Ancient Regime • Hippolyte A. Taine

... exiled from the dear-loved scene, In proud Vienna he beguiled the pain Of sad remembrance: and the empress-queen, That great Teresa, she did not disdain In gracious mood sometimes to entertain Discourse with him both pleasurable and sage; And sure a willing ear she well might deign To one whose tales may equally engage The wondering mind of youth, ...
— Specimens of the Table Talk of S.T.Coleridge • Coleridge

... Plutocracy, the profound feeling of sorrow and admiration elicited by the death of Queen Victoria is an encouraging sign. It shows that the vulgar ideals, the false moral measurements, the feverish social ambitions, the love of the ostentatious and the factitious, and the disdain for simple habits, pleasures, and characters so apparent in certain conspicuous sections of society, have not yet blunted the moral sense or perverted the moral perceptions of the great masses on either side of the Atlantic. To this type, ...
— Historical and Political Essays • William Edward Hartpole Lecky

... often it is gathered on Mount Sinai," said Wayland, after looking at the drug offered him with great disdain, "but I will wager my sword and buckler against your gaberdine, that this trash you offer me, instead of what I asked for, may be had for gathering any day of the week in ...
— Kenilworth • Sir Walter Scott

... In Beauty's finest mould was framed; But thy disdain Rome's haughty lord inflamed. How lovely wast thou, in thy youth's sweet prime, When the rough dagger of thy sire Thy snowy breast did smite, And thou, a willing victim, didst descend Into realms of night! "May old age ...
— The Poems of Giacomo Leopardi • Giacomo Leopardi

... and her dainty rose-leaf lips curled in pretty disdain. 'For the future let those who come to play with me have no hearts,' she cried, and she ran ...
— A House of Pomegranates • Oscar Wilde

... circumstances—thrown on their own resources in London with plenty of money to spend—would have lost no time in "going wrong," but Phil's temperament preserved him from those temptations which so many young well-born men find irresistible. He had a disdain for the stage, he did not care for chorus girls, he disliked horse-racing, and he ...
— The Hand in the Dark • Arthur J. Rees

... intellectual shrewdness evident in the best men of his time. The English domestic life of the period was certainly far from blameless, and anything but refined; but if we have gained in some ways, we are hardly entitled to look with unqualified disdain upon the rough vigour of our ...
— Hours in a Library - New Edition, with Additions. Vol. II (of 3) • Leslie Stephen

... appearance it had presented three months before. Inside the walls a new spirit prevailed, the courage of the bold commander reanimating his troops, while the sentinels on the ramparts shouted messages of disdain to the ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 12 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris

... White, began to be sure of Adams on the first ballot; Adams the indifferent, who had sailed away for Europe, observing that he was not a candidate for the nomination and otherwise intimating his disdain of us and it. ...
— Marse Henry, Complete - An Autobiography • Henry Watterson

... ways of peace and justice the footsteps of those who looked towards them. He did more: he caused the lives of those his servants whom he sanctified and almost glorified in this world, to be recorded by their followers; and his own Spirit did not disdain to inspire the men who executed a work so salutary to mankind. From Adam to Noe, from Noe to Abraham, from Abraham to the days of Christ, what period is not marked by the life of some eminent saint; and what portion of the Old Testament has always been ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler

... but," she continued, with a breaking utterance, and passing tenderly to the familiar form of address, "I cannot part so with thee. Thou hast been too like a son to me, too like a brother to my poor Clarice. Maybe thou no longer lovest us, yet I think thou wilt not disdain this gift for thy wife. Take it, Tonelli, if not for our sake, perhaps then for the sake of sorrows that in times past we have shared together in this ...
— A Fearful Responsibility and Other Stories • William D. Howells

... Roughbrown. The hoptoad lived in the stone-wall several yards away; but every morning and evening he made a journey to the rose-tree, and there he would sit for hours gazing with tender longings at the beautiful rose, and murmuring impassioned avowals. The rose's disdain did not chill the hoptoad's ardor. "See what I have brought you, fair rose," he would say. "A beautiful brown beetle with golden wings and green eyes! Surely there is not in all the world a more delicious morsel than a brown beetle! Or, ...
— The Holy Cross and Other Tales • Eugene Field

... of the unerring bow,[527] The God of Life, and Poesy, and Light— The Sun in human limbs arrayed, and brow All radiant from his triumph in the fight; The shaft hath just been shot—the arrow bright With an Immortal's vengeance—in his eye And nostril beautiful Disdain, and Might And Majesty, flash their full lightnings by, Developing in ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 2 • George Gordon Byron

... before the many sorrowed Mother of the Crucified and pray. Only my knee and my tongue worship death—my heart remains true to life. But do not look so sourly," continued the Spaniard, as he saw what little gratification his words seemed to give the Rabbi. "Do not look at me with disdain. My nose is not a renegade. When once by chance I came into this street at dinner time, and the well-known savory odors of the Jewish kitchen rose to my nose, I was seized with the same yearning which our fathers felt for the fleshpots ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VI. • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke

... moment in the life of Tadeusz Kosciuszko had now arrived. His fiery and enthusiastic soul leapt to its call; but with none of the headlong precipitance that would have been its ruin. Kosciuszko was too great a patriot to disdain wariness and cool calculation. He never stirred without seeing each step clearly mapped out before him. He took his counsels with Potocki and his other Polish intimates in Saxony; then formulated his plan of the Rising. Each district of Poland and Lithuania was to be under the command of ...
— Kosciuszko - A Biography • Monica Mary Gardner

... orator. Speaking, in the course of the same trial, of the way in which the governor had made "requisitions" of all the most valuable works of art throughout the island, "the broom", said he, "swept clean". He did not disdain the comic element in poetry more than in prose; for we find in Quinitilian [2] a quotation from a punning epigram in some collection of such trifles which in his time bore Cicero's name. Tiro is said to have collected and ...
— Cicero - Ancient Classics for English Readers • Rev. W. Lucas Collins

... hard fortune, I some ease should find, Did your disdain extend to all mankind. But give me leave to grieve, and to complain, That you give others what I beg ...
— The Works Of John Dryden, Volume 4 (of 18) - Almanzor And Almahide, Marriage-a-la-Mode, The Assignation • John Dryden

... was not the only one to whom the afternoon had brought trials. Chris had not been without his share of troubles. The Seminoles treated him with marked disdain and would not even permit him ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely

... anyone becometh thy foe, thou shouldst, if desirous of prosperity, slay him without scruples. By curses and incantations, by gift of wealth, by poison, or by deception, the foe should be slain. He should never be neglected from disdain. If both the parties be equal and success uncertain, then he that acteth with diligence groweth in prosperity. If the spiritual preceptor himself be vain, ignorant of what should be done and what left undone, and vicious in his ways, even he should be chastised. If ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa - Translated into English Prose - Adi Parva (First Parva, or First Book) • Kisari Mohan Ganguli (Translator)

... if there are no springs from which we can construct aqueducts, it is necessary to dig wells. Now in the digging of wells we must not disdain reflection, but must devote much acuteness and skill to the consideration of the natural principles of things, because the earth contains many various substances in itself; for like everything else, ...
— Ten Books on Architecture • Vitruvius

... imported the voice from Havre, left behind by mistake? What more could be asked than to inspire a town with enthusiasm, so that the dullest should feel the contagion? They were triumphs such as women have seldom achieved. If you disdain them, recollect that human nature is still the same, and all that I have done is under the inspiration of a voice that broke on me in Duesseldorf, and opened heaven. And people find some ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 13, No. 77, March, 1864 • Various

... these!" she repeated, looking on her finery with disdain. "No, Robin, young as I am, I have learned better things. The linnet would look ill tricked out in parrot's feathers. Not but I think the bravery becoming, though, perhaps, not to me;—surely no, ...
— The Buccaneer - A Tale • Mrs. S. C. Hall

... the heart of the proud and patriotic little aristocrat, true daughter of a nation great enough to disdain small economies, and not accustomed to do without any luxury to which it is attached, that appealed to Mr. Price, pleasing the pride of race with which we contemplate any evidence of strength in our fellow-creatures, whether it be strength of purpose or strength of passion, more than it shocked ...
— The Heavenly Twins • Madame Sarah Grand

... sister runs in a flutter of dismay, with torn face and smitten bosom, and darts through them all, and calls the dying woman by her name. 'Was it this, mine own? Was my summons a snare? Was it this thy pyre, ah me, this thine altar fires meant? How shall I begin my desolate moan? Didst thou disdain a sister's company in death? Thou shouldst have called me to share thy doom; in the self-same hour, the self-same pang of steel had been our portion. Did these very hands build it, did my voice call on our father's gods, that with thee lying thus I should ...
— The Aeneid of Virgil • Virgil

... I get back, I want to paint a picture of the fleet assembled at Quebec. The grays and greens looked really beautiful. Quebec, the city of history and the scene of many big battles, views with disdain the Canadian patriotism in the present crisis, and we had no send-off, no flags and ...
— "Crumps", The Plain Story of a Canadian Who Went • Louis Keene

... pastoral of a dozen sentences, the strictest orders on my clergy to desist from all politics, all fighting; to disdain any cry, any struggle; to accept from Dissent any rebuff, persecution, spoliation—while steadily ignoring it. In every parish my Church's attitude should be this: 'You may deny me, hate me, persecute me, strip me: but you are a Christian ...
— Brother Copas • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... There is more hidden in your secret heart to-night than finds utterance upon the lips. You have the soft speech of a diplomat, full of guile and cunning. Come, I bid you tell me the whole truth. Do you think me an untutored savage, that you deny me in such disdain?" ...
— Prisoners of Chance - The Story of What Befell Geoffrey Benteen, Borderman, - through His Love for a Lady of France • Randall Parrish

... denounces, launches forth, Against all systems built on abstract rights, Keen ridicule; the majesty proclaims Of institutes and laws hallowed by time; Declares the vital power of social ties Endeared by custom; and with high disdain, Exploding upstart theory, insists Upon the allegiance to which men are born. .... Could a youth, and one In ancient story versed, whose breast hath heaved Under the weight of classic eloquence, Sit, see, and hear, ...
— Among My Books • James Russell Lowell

... but as a fiction of envy, and was soon after exploded by the priest's own confession. But that which most exasperated the Queen and gave advantage to his enemies was, as Sir Walter Raleigh takes into observation, words of disdain, for the Queen, by sharp and reprehensive letters, had nettled him; and thereupon, sending others of approbation, commending his service, and intimating an invasion from Spain; which was no sooner proposed but he said publicly, in the great chamber at Dublin: —"Lo, now she is ...
— Travels in England and Fragmenta Regalia • Paul Hentzner and Sir Robert Naunton

... sharpened now, I could see that not by my young companions alone, but by every one of the four teachers, I was looked upon as a harmless little girl whose mother knew nothing about the fashionable world. I do not think that anything in my manner showed either my pique or my disdain; I believe I went out of doors just as usual; but these things were often in my thoughts, and taking by degrees more ...
— Daisy • Elizabeth Wetherell

... he dragged the back of a hand impatiently across his vision. His persistent indifference, the inhibition that held him in a contemptuous isolation, again possessed him, Howat, a black Penny. A last trace of his emotion, caught in the flood of his paramount disdain, vanished like a breath of warm mist. He entered the house and mounted to his room; the stairs creaked but that was the only sound audible within. His candles burned without their protecting glasses in smooth, unwavering flames. When ...
— The Three Black Pennys - A Novel • Joseph Hergesheimer

... came the campaign of Russia and ended all that. To-day, Poland is remembered in France only by a proverb, 'Saoul comme un Polonais,' 'Drunk as a Pole.' It is so we think of them, when we think of them at all, which is not often. This disdain, this forgetfulness, has been carefully fostered by Germany and Russia. No one thinks it worth while to interfere. Besides, Poland's lot is that of every conquered country. In Alsace-Lorraine it ...
— The Destroyer - A Tale of International Intrigue • Burton Egbert Stevenson

... question impossible for him to answer, he turned to other thoughts and fretted himself for a while with memories of Amabel's disdain and Frederick's careless acceptance of a sacrifice he could never know the cost of, mixed strangely with relief at being free of it all and on the verge of another life. As the dark settled, his head fell farther ...
— Agatha Webb • Anna Katharine Green

... enemy. But the suddenness of Thy relief from holy poverty and evil care, has so shaken his heart and brain, or rather, perhaps, has made him think so keenly of his lack of faith in his Father in heaven, that he fears Thou hast thrown him the gift in disdain, as to a dog under the table, though never didst Thou disdain a dog, and not given it as to a child, from Thy hand into his. Father, let Thy spirit come with the gift, or take it again, and make him poor and able to pray."—Here came an amen, groaned out as from the bottom of a dungeon.—"Pardon ...
— Paul Faber, Surgeon • George MacDonald

... was turned homeward, paced along the ghost-strip of roadway in long free strides. Even when a jackal, or it might have been a honey-badger, slipped across the road in front, a drifting shadow, the Turcoman only rattled the snaffle-bit in his teeth, cocked his ears, and then blew a breath of disdain from his ...
— Caste • W. A. Fraser

... like them half so well myself," says Sylvia, with feminine disdain of reasons. "They always had so many soldiers, though the others were ...
— For the Term of His Natural Life • Marcus Clarke

... ungenerous thought recall: Shall proud Polydamas* before the gate Proclaim, his counsels are obeyed too late, Which timely follow'd but the former night What numbers had been saved by Hector's flight? That wise advice rejected with disdain, I feel my folly in my people slain. Methinks my suffering country's voice I hear, But most her worthless sons insult my ear, On my rash courage charge the chance of war, And blame those virtues which they cannot share. No—if I e'er return, return I must ...
— Journeys Through Bookland - Volume Four • Charles H. Sylvester

... Matron of the fields, I sing to you; And all the fondest love that summer yields I bring to you; Yet there you squat, immense in your disdain, Heedless of all the tears of streaming rain My eyes drip over you—your breathless ...
— A Prisoner in Fairyland • Algernon Blackwood

... It was the alarum. First of all I was chased by a bull, and then—" Mr. Fogo told his story incoherently. The angry red left Tamsin's cheek, and a look of disdain succeeded. ...
— The Astonishing History of Troy Town • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... only have been inherited from his father. The fourth boy, Hal, is the most up-to-date of all. His mother and father were both divorced and both remarried and both have new families, for which his only feeling is mild resentment and disdain. ...
— Heart and Soul • Victor Mapes (AKA Maveric Post)

... other hand, vows have been made, but persons have contrived to rid themselves of the inconveniences without breaking them, reminding us of Benedick, who finding the charms of his "Dear Lady Disdain" too much for his celibate resolves, gets out of his difficulty by declaring that "When I said I would die a bachelor, I did not think I should live till I were married." Equally ludicrous, also, is the story told of a certain man, who, greatly terrified in a storm, vowed ...
— Strange Pages from Family Papers • T. F. Thiselton Dyer

... look straightly at her my own gaze will speak, and she, who is so shrewd of wit and has seen such worship in men's faces, will read and understand, and disdain me, or—disdain me not. God knows ...
— His Grace of Osmonde • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... each in turn, without troubling ourselves whether they agree.' When we remember the inadequateness of human language, the infirmities of our vision, and all the imperfections of mental apparatus, the wise men will not disdain even partial glimpses of a scene too vast and intricate to be comprehended in a single map. To complain that Emerson is no systematic reasoner is to miss the secret of most of those who have given ...
— Critical Miscellanies, Vol. 1, Essay 5, Emerson • John Morley

... contempt which I believed I saw upon it. Probably it was my own feeling of inward self-contempt which made me believe I saw that expression there. His face had for me a miserable, basilisk-like attraction. When I was there he was there, I must look at him and endure the silent, smiling disdain which I at least believed he bestowed upon me. How did he contrive to do it? How often our eyes met, and every time it happened he looked me full in the face, and never would give me the faintest gleam of recognition! It was as though ...
— The First Violin - A Novel • Jessie Fothergill

... it is by a not unnatural progress I pass from speaking of dinners and diners to the kindred subject of the present chapter, and I trust the reader will not disdain the lowly-minded muse that sings this mild domestic lay. I was resolved in writing this book to tell what I had found most books of travel very slow to tell,—as much as possible of the everyday life of a people whose habits are so different from our own; endeavoring to develop ...
— Venetian Life • W. D. Howells

... prophecies. Henry V consulted the hermit of Sainte-Claude, Jean de Gand, who foretold the King's approaching death; and on his death-bed he again had the stern prophet summoned.[642] It was the custom of saints to speak to kings and of kings to listen to them. How could a pious prince disdain so miraculous a source of counsel? Had he done so he would have incurred ...
— The Life of Joan of Arc, Vol. 1 and 2 (of 2) • Anatole France

... how useful, avails him nothing. If they discover at the distance of fourteen[G] or of forty years[H] an action for which the law ordains that his life shall be the forfeit, though the interval should have been spent with the purity of a saint and the devotedness of a patriot, they disdain to enquire into it. What then can I do? Am I not compelled to go on in ...
— Caleb Williams - Things As They Are • William Godwin

... is sometimes the ruin and death of the lover, but often kills Love itself, because Love comes to be so much under its influence that it is impelled to despise the object, and in fact becomes alienated from it, especially when it engenders disdain. ...
— The Heroic Enthusiasts,(1 of 2) (Gli Eroici Furori) - An Ethical Poem • Giordano Bruno

... that unaffected carelessness, even defiance of opinion and criticism, which I had seen here for the first time, so beautifully embodied. I was quite sure she both thought and felt, and could talk, too, if she chose it. What tremendous self-reliance and disdain must form the basis of a female character, which accepted misapprehension and depreciation with an indifference so genuine as to scorn even the trifling exertion ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu

... educated in the enjoyment of ease and luxury, discovered how little is requisite to supply the demands of nature, and lavished their unavailing treasures of gold and silver to obtain the coarse and scanty sustenance which they would formerly have rejected with disdain. The food the most repugnant to sense or imagination, the aliments the most unwholesome and pernicious to the constitution, were eagerly devoured, and fiercely disputed, by the rage of hunger. A dark suspicion was entertained that some desperate wretches fed on the bodies of their ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 4 • Various

... was suddenly filled with disdain. His anger returned. He felt how utterly out of accord he was with every one else. "Don't you think there is anything else required besides being 'smart' and 'good'?" He himself would have blushed at the tone in which he said this, ...
— The Uncalled - A Novel • Paul Laurence Dunbar

... round with gentleness. She tried to fill the little man's soul with jealousy and alarms, but it was stockaded with insolent confidence. He left Dinah, when he went to Paris, with all the conviction of Medor in Angelique's fidelity. When she affected cold disdain, to nettle this changeling by the scorn a courtesan sometimes shows to her "protector," and which acts on him with the certainty of the screw of a winepress, Monsieur de la Baudraye gazed at his wife with fixed eyes, like those of ...
— The Muse of the Department • Honore de Balzac

... Luther came off the undisputed conqueror. The legates of the pope, exasperated at his triumph, intreated the emperor to arrest him, in defiance of his word of honor pledged for his safety. Charles rejected the infamous proposal with disdain. Still he was greatly annoyed at so serious a schism in the Church, which threatened to alienate from him the patronage of the pope. It was evident that Luther was too strongly intrenched in the hearts of the Germans, for the youthful emperor, ...
— The Empire of Austria; Its Rise and Present Power • John S. C. Abbott

... with a sense of superiority, which was in itself somewhat ludicrous; but as nobody is clear-sighted in their own concerns, he was quite unconscious of this. His laugh nettled Lady Randolph still more. She said, with a certain disdain in her tone,— ...
— Sir Tom • Mrs. Oliphant

... easy matter at any time, even for the Arabs, to find the way in a direct line across the boundless Desert; and when clouds obscure the stars, it is almost impossible without a compass. The old recluse, on seeing white strangers, cast a look of disgust and disdain at us, expressing his surprise that any true believers should allow infidel Nazarenes to remain in their company. But our leader only laughed, and answered that, as we had not eaten pork for a year, we had become almost as clean as Arabs. Considering ...
— Saved from the Sea - The Loss of the Viper, and her Crew's Saharan Adventures • W.H.G. Kingston

... familiar use of language. I entreat the reader to reflect with himself, and see if it doth not often happen, either in hearing or reading a discourse, that the passions of fear, love, hatred, admiration, disdain, and the like, arise immediately in his mind upon the perception of certain words, without any ideas coming between. At first, indeed, the words might have occasioned ideas that were fitting to produce those emotions; but, if I mistake not, it will be found that, when language is once grown familiar, ...
— A Treatise Concerning the Principles of Human Knowledge • George Berkeley

... granite. A few gray locks on either side of his head fell straight to the collar of his greasy coat, which was buttoned to the chin. He resembled both Voltaire and Don Quixote; he was, apparently, scoffing but melancholy, full of disdain and philosophy, but half-crazy. He seemed to have no shirt. His beard was long. A rusty black cravat, much worn and ragged, exposed a protuberant neck deeply furrowed, with veins as thick as cords. A large brown circle like a bruise was strongly marked beneath his eyes, ...
— Ferragus • Honore de Balzac

... one arm the lusty courser's rein Under her other was the tender boy, 32 Who blush'd and pouted in a dull disdain, With leaden appetite, unapt to toy; She red and hot as coals of glowing fire He red for shame, but ...
— Venus and Adonis • William Shakespeare

... furs and a marvelous necklace of diamonds, she sat with superior mien in an opera box. Now and again, with an air of infinite ennui and disdain, she glanced coolly aloft through her lorgnette at the eager poor in the steep, high ...
— A Book Without A Title • George Jean Nathan

... the joy his artist-soul took in the stately Hebrew woman. He forgot the mission that urged him to the temple and, permitting the shifting, restless crowd to surround him, he lingered, thinking. This proud disdain must mark his goddess of stone in the Arabian hills, this majesty and power; but there must be youth and fire in the place of ...
— The Yoke - A Romance of the Days when the Lord Redeemed the Children - of Israel from the Bondage of Egypt • Elizabeth Miller

... doctrine, which are respectively presented by the Athanasian Creed and the Nicene. My criticisms were to the effect that some of the verses of the former Creed were unnecessarily scientific. This is a specimen of a certain disdain for Antiquity which had been growing on me now for several years. It showed itself in some flippant language against the Fathers in the Encyclopaedia Metropolitana, about whom I knew little at the time, except what I had learnt as ...
— Apologia Pro Vita Sua • John Henry Cardinal Newman

... is especially true in the early stages of adolescence. The boy or girl is becoming conscious of himself as a person, and resents being treated as a child; the only way he knows of asserting his personality is by affecting an air of disdain toward those who presume to treat him as a child. This swagger is more likely to be put on when there is a third person present. It is therefore always safer to reserve your discussions and corrections to the time when you are alone with your girl or boy, and can place your conversation ...
— Your Child: Today and Tomorrow • Sidonie Matzner Gruenberg

... except by a couple of brutal cobblers, who, without any cause, took offence at the generous creature, and once or twice attempted to wound his proboscis with their awls. The noble animal, who knew it was beneath him to crush them, did not disdain to chastise them by other means. He filled his large trunk with a considerable quantity of water, not of the cleanest quality, and advancing to them as usual, covered them at once with a dirty flood. The fools were laughed at, and the ...
— A Hundred Anecdotes of Animals • Percy J. Billinghurst

... hero,—how can they be ruled by persons of the opposite sex? It seems to me that Vrihaspati and other great thinkers, O slayer of foes, evolved the science of policy from observation of the understandings of women. Whether treated by men with respect or with disdain, women are seen to turn the heads and agitate the hearts of men.[272] Living creatures, O thou of mighty arms, are virtuous. Even this is what has been heard by us. (How then, can this be consistent with fact)? ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli

... same moment Ruyler became subtly aware that Mrs. Thornton was looking at his wife and Doremus, and as his eyes focused he saw her long, thin, mobile mouth curl and her eyes fill with open disdain. The mist in his brain fled as abruptly as an inland fog out in the bay before one of the sudden winds of the Pacific. In any case, his mind hardly could have remained in a state of confusion for long; but that his young wife was being openly contemned ...
— The Avalanche • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton

... arrival in Britain, gained admittance and a courteous welcome from Imogen, as a friend of her husband; but when he began to make professions of love to her she repulsed him with disdain, and he soon found that he could have no hope of succeeding ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles and Mary Lamb

... memorial tablets to the fallen not only the names of Britishers, but also the names of German Rhodes Scholars, who died fighting for their country against the men who were once their friends. Generosity, justice, disdain of animosity-these virtues were learnt on the playing-fields and race-courses. England knows their value; she treats war as a sport because so she will fight better. For her that ...
— Out To Win - The Story of America in France • Coningsby Dawson

... from Lilian and Mrs. Dane treated her with a sort of tolerant sympathy. She roamed about the deserted library and chose some books, a few girls waylaid her in the school room. Miss Nevins made an importunate appeal, quite forgetting her past disdain. ...
— The Girls at Mount Morris • Amanda Minnie Douglas

... presence seemed to absorb such dreamy glimmers as float in limpid night-airs: a faint glory, a twilight of its own, clothed it. King of the daylit-world, it became queen of the dimmer realms of night, and like a woman-queen it did not disdain to stoop and study its loveliness in the polished lake, and stooping thus it overhung the earth, a shadowy creature of gleam and ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 62, December, 1862 • Various

... that has seized thee. By this aged breast, long harassed by many cares, from which thou didst take thy first nutriment, I humbly beseech thee to have the courage to aid thyself, to have a concern for thine own honor, and not to disdain my warnings. Bethink thee that the very desire to be healed is itself often ...
— La Fiammetta • Giovanni Boccaccio

... which I refer, a hundred years ago, they took a personal part in the higher branches of cookery, as well as in the concoction of home-made wines, and distilling of herbs for domestic medicines, which are nearly allied to the same art. Ladies did not disdain to spin the thread of which the household linen was woven. Some ladies liked to wash with their own hands their choice china after breakfast or tea. In one of my earliest child's books, a little girl, the daughter of a gentleman, is taught by her mother to ...
— Memoir of Jane Austen • James Edward Austen-Leigh

... on the subject soon after the Germans had signed the Treaty remarked: "The Big Three are superlatively unsympathetic to most of the envoys from the lesser belligerent states. And it would be a wonder if it were otherwise, for they make no effort to hide their disdain for us. In fact, it is downright contempt. They never consult us. When we approach them they shove us aside as importunate intruders. They come to decisions unknown to us, and carry them out in secrecy, as though we were enemies or spies. If we protest ...
— The Inside Story Of The Peace Conference • Emile Joseph Dillon

... extorted no truth from him; but he would have died enjoying the doubts of his enemies, and the confusion that must necessarily attend those doubts. A stratagem is therefore thought of to discover what force and terror could not, and the stratagem such as no king or minister would disdain, to get at an important discovery. If you call that stratagem a TRICK, you vilify it, and make it comical; but call that trick a STRATAGEM, or a MEASURE, and you dignify it up to tragedy: so frequently do ridicule or dignity turn upon one single word. ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield

... and a mind thus instructed, will bring the art to a higher degree of excellence than, perhaps, it has hitherto attained in this country. Such a student will disdain the humbler walks of painting, which, however profitable, can never assure him a permanent reputation. He will leave the meaner artist servilely to suppose that those are the best pictures which are most likely to deceive the spectator. He will ...
— Seven Discourses on Art • Joshua Reynolds

... to it!" cried Dolly, in disdain. "Well, I like that! Why, your old fudge party is FOR me! I'm the heroine of the hour! Who went on your desperate and dangerous errand, I'd like to know! Who got permission to invite your old Coriell man to tea? Come, now, declare the ...
— Two Little Women on a Holiday • Carolyn Wells

... jeer. Great men in the Senate sate, Sage and hero, side by side, Building for their sons the State, Which they shall rule with pride. They forbore to break the chain Which bound the dusky tribe, Checked by the owners' fierce disdain, Lured by "Union" as the bribe. Destiny sat by, and said, "Pang for pang your seed shall pay, Hide in false peace your coward head, I ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 72, October, 1863 • Various

... Thompson washed up his dishes in a fashion to make the lips of a careful housekeeper pucker in disdain, clapped on his broken-rimmed ...
— Burned Bridges • Bertrand W. Sinclair

... one of the plagues of modern times," replied the capitan with the disdain and indignation of a Roman senator. "The ancients knew about it but never abused it. While the addiction to classical studies lasted—mark this well, young men—opium was used solely as a medicine; and besides, tell me who smoke it the most?—Chinamen, ...
— The Reign of Greed - Complete English Version of 'El Filibusterismo' • Jose Rizal

... and, on the other, will be put on the same footing as teaching, nursing or secretarial work. That we are beginning to move in this direction is evidenced by the coming into existence of schools of domestic economy, to which "ladies" do not disdain to resort for training. This will undoubtedly result in domestic labour becoming a much higher-priced commodity than it is now, the housewife will have to pay at least as much for three hours help per day as she now does for nine hours, but the fact that the help will be skilled, ...
— The Healthy Life, Vol. V, Nos. 24-28 - The Independent Health Magazine • Various

... the hut; the painter creates not the landscape but the beauty of it; the musician creates not the musical tones, but by means of a harmony of tones he creates an emotional experience. The impulse to art rises out of the earliest springs of consciousness and vibrates through all life. Art does not disdain to manifest itself in the little acts of expression of simple daily living; with all its splendid past and vital present it is ever seeking new and greater forms whose end is not yet. I spoke of the work of the traveler through the wilderness as art; the term was applied also to railroad-building ...
— The Gate of Appreciation - Studies in the Relation of Art to Life • Carleton Noyes

... spirit, drooped his homely, ungainly head in a dejected manner. To him, Mary was only one more burden, one more wriggling, gasping infliction, to be jogged slowly about for her first ride. He snorted in disdain. Mary jumped. Why didn't she use her own feet? "Dolly" didn't want to be bothered. Finally he rolled an eye back ...
— The 1926 Tatler • Various

... every shred of the carcase that could claim acquaintance with the fire had been eaten, and all were clamoring for more. Fully three-parts of the carcase remained, indeed, but it was all raw flesh. A-ya looked down upon it with disdain. ...
— In the Morning of Time • Charles G. D. Roberts

... about such things it made her rather sorry. But she bore up for Barty's sake, and the resigned, half-humorous courtesy with which she assented to these fables was really more humiliating to a sensitive, haughty soul than any mere supercilious disdain; not that she ever wished to humiliate, but she was easily bored, and thought that kind of conversation vulgar, futile, and ...
— The Martian • George Du Maurier

... hated her for a swell, as much as a young man can hate a pretty woman, when he saw her walking up and down the platform at Hatboro'. He looked about the rich man's library with a scornful recognition of its luxury. His disdain, which was purely dramatic, and had no personal direction, began to scare Louise; she wanted to go away, but even if she could get to her shoes without his noticing, she could not get them on without making a scraping noise on the hard-wood ...
— The Quality of Mercy • W. D. Howells

... women as he professed to be. He was averse to being ruled by them, but he was far from being insensible to their charms. Opposition exasperated him; all his caprices found many obsequious allies ready to further his suit, and more than one woman made a deep, if brief, impression upon him. His disdain of woman has, we are sure, been much exaggerated. At Saint Helena he declaimed against women, but his remarks were mere paradoxes, not meant ...
— The Court of the Empress Josephine • Imbert de Saint-Amand

... one would not be willing to regard such a library as a real library. I would regard it as only a cheap edition of a library. There would be something about it that would arouse in me a certain benevolent disdain, even though every volume was well printed on good paper and inoffensively bound. Why? Well, although it is my profession in life to say what I feel in plain words, I do not know that in this connection I can say what I feel in plain words. I have to rely on a sympathetic comprehension ...
— Mental Efficiency - And Other Hints to Men and Women • Arnold Bennett

... can give, read every play from the first scene to the last, with utter negligence of all his commentators. When his fancy is once on the wing, let it not stoop at correction or explanation. When his attention is strongly engaged, let it disdain alike to turn aside to the name of Theobald and Pope. Let him read on through brightness and obscurity, through integrity and corruption; let him preserve his comprehension of the dialogue and his interest in the fable. And when the pleasures of novelty have ceased, ...
— Preface to Shakespeare • Samuel Johnson

... unarmed; and it is not reasonable that he who is armed should yield obedience willingly to him who is unarmed, or that the unarmed man should be secure among armed servants. Because, there being in the one disdain and in the other suspicion, it is not possible for them to work well together. And therefore a prince who does not understand the art of war, over and above the other misfortunes already mentioned, cannot be respected by his soldiers, nor can he rely on them. He ought never, therefore, ...
— The Prince • Niccolo Machiavelli

... personality he had put on had nerves curiously associated with his own nerves, and that, though he might say to himself a hundred times with respect to the attitudes of other people, "Pah! they don't mean me," that formula was no charm against disdain. ...
— The Man Who Lost Himself • H. De Vere Stacpoole

... no art too rough or primitive, or even too vulgar, for the Church to disdain, if it offers the only medium of conveying her truth to certain minds. Though custom has made it classical, her liturgical language, whether Latin or Greek, when first assumed, was that of the mob—about as elegant ...
— The Faith of the Millions (2nd series) • George Tyrrell

... chosen, the Duke and Duchess, under Captains Rogers and Courtenay, were carefully equipped, and stocked with everything necessary for so long a voyage, the famous Dampier, who had acquired a great reputation by his daring adventures and piracies, did not disdain to accept the title of chief pilot, and although this trip was richer in material results than in geographical discoveries, the account of it contains a few curious particulars worthy ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part 2. The Great Navigators of the Eighteenth Century • Jules Verne

... a vexed glance at De Launay, who did not in the least comprehend his distress, went to the girl, who during their brief conversation had stood quietly looking from one to the other with an expression of half-amused disdain on ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli

... begins to fancy that the borrowed money is his own. This noble loyalty becomes the daily bread of the soul, and an infidelity is as tempting as a dainty. The woman who is scornful, and yet more the woman who is reputed dangerous, excites curiosity, as spices add flavor to good food. Indeed, the disdain so cleverly acted by Valerie was a novelty to Wenceslas, after three years of too easy enjoyment. Hortense was a wife; ...
— Cousin Betty • Honore de Balzac

... quarters. The water and all upon it was in active motion, dancing and buoyant and bubbling up; while the old grey Tower and piles of building on the shore, with many a church-spire shooting up between, looked coldly on, and seemed to disdain their chafing, ...
— The Old Curiosity Shop • Charles Dickens

... means he should be as happy as before. Unfortunately, however, the lady he chanced to fix upon was the proudest and most haughty woman ever known; she was always out of humour with every one; nobody could please her, and she returned the civilities of those about her with the most affronting disdain. She had two daughters by a former husband, whom she brought up to be proud and idle: indeed, in temper and behaviour they perfectly resembled their mother; they did not love their books, and would not learn to work; in short, they were disliked by everybody. The gentleman on his side, too, had a ...
— Children's Rhymes, Children's Games, Children's Songs, Children's Stories - A Book for Bairns and Big Folk • Robert Ford

... came a few weeks after, and remained some days with the countess. They were ceremonious and polite until they had a moment to retire from before people, when the countess changed her cold disdain to ...
— Varney the Vampire - Or the Feast of Blood • Thomas Preskett Prest

... ... 'Why who is this? ... who's out of England?' Which is an extreme case of course; but you will see what I mean ... and often I have observed how some of the very most beautiful of your lyrics have suffered just from your disdain of the usual tactics of writers in ...
— The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, Vol. 1 (of 2) 1845-1846 • Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett

... wished to marry Linda Tressel, because she was young, and was acknowledged to be a pretty girl; and he still wished to marry her, if not now for these reasons, still for others which were quite as potent. He wanted to be her master, to get the better of her, to punish her for her disdain of him, and to bring her to his feet. But he was not a man so carried away by anger or by a spirit of revenge as to be altogether indifferent to his own future happiness. There had already been some ...
— Linda Tressel • Anthony Trollope

... surrendered every pecuniary privilege; under severe trials, their courage, heightened by polished manners, adds even to their heroism, elegance, tact and gaiety. The most corrupt, a Duke of Orleans, the most frivolous and the most blase, a Duc de Biron, meet death with stoical coolness and disdain.[4154] Delicate women who complain of a draught in their drawing-rooms, make no complaint of a straw mattress in a damp, gloomy dungeon, where they sleep in their clothes so that they may not wake up stiffened, and they come down into the court of the Conciergerie with their accustomed cheerfulness. ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 4 (of 6) - The French Revolution, Volume 3 (of 3) • Hippolyte A. Taine

... and the singer was selling printed sheets of poesy. The old tune was fairly correct, but the words were strange and sad. "When Britain first at Hell's command Prepared to cross the Irish main, Thus spake a prophet in our land, 'Mid traitors' scoff and fools' disdain, 'If Britannia cross the waves, Irish ever shall be slaves.' In vain the warning patriot spoke, In treach'rous guise Britannia came—Divided, bent us to her yoke, Till Ireland rose, in Freedom's name, ...
— Ireland as It Is - And as It Would be Under Home Rule • Robert John Buckley (AKA R.J.B.)

... which they never before knew. Japanese patriotism has only in this generation come to self-consciousness. This leads it to many a strange freak. It is vociferous and imperious, and often very impractical and Chauvinistic. It frequently takes the form of uncompromising disdain for the foreigner, and the most absolute loyalty to the Emperor of Japan; it demands the utmost respect of expression in regard to him and the form of government he has graciously granted the nation. The slightest hint or indirect suggestion ...
— Evolution Of The Japanese, Social And Psychic • Sidney L. Gulick

... the other side of it, may make it turn forward and backward, to the admiration of the multitude of spectators, who know, by the motion of the image, whether the offerings which they make, and lay upon the altar, be acceptable or not; if one gives a small offering, the image turns away from it in disdain of it; if it be a fat offering, it turns towards it in token of acceptance; and though they tell these stories themselves, yet still they retain these images and trumperies among them. This church is of a good length and breadth, ...
— A Journal of the Swedish Embassy in the Years 1653 and 1654, Vol II. • Bulstrode Whitelocke

... his gratitude and admiration suggested, he concluded with pressing him to accept the half of his fortune, and to settle in Venice for the remainder of his life. This offer Hamet refused with the greatest respect, but with a generous disdain; and told his friend that, in what he had done, he had only discharged a debt of gratitude and friendship. 'You were,' said he, 'my generous benefactor; you had a claim upon my life by the benefit you had already conferred; that life would have been ...
— The History of Sandford and Merton • Thomas Day

... paradox of the love of the world—"Somehow one must love the world without being worldly." Again, "Courage is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a strong desire to live taking the form of a readiness to die." The martyr differs from the suicide in that he cherishes a disdain of death, while the motive of the suicide is a disdain of life. Charity, too, is a paradox, for it means "one of two things—pardoning unpardonable acts, or loving unlovable people." Similarly Christian humility has a background of unheard-of arrogance, and Christian liberty is possible only ...
— Among Famous Books • John Kelman

... said he, turning to Lenore, "already been with your family trapper as far as the distillery and back, and I have brought what always serves me on my travels for breakfast and dinner." He took out a few tablets of chocolate. "We will concoct something like a beverage with this, if you do not disdain to lend us your aid. I propose that we try to mix this with water as well as we can. It would be charming of you to vouchsafe an opinion as to how we ...
— Debit and Credit - Translated from the German of Gustav Freytag • Gustav Freytag

... Brave Virginian soldier whose lady-love enacts "My Lady Disdain" until news is brought her that he has fallen in battle. Then she grieves for him as a widow for her husband, and when she dies, she is buried by him.—Thomas Nelson Page, In ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer

... threaten it; it has shone brightly in thicker darkness than that in which men are laboring so hard to enshroud it. It is not going to be extinguished, be very sure, before the affected indifference of a few wits of our day, and the haughty disdain of ...
— The Heavenly Father - Lectures on Modern Atheism • Ernest Naville

... holds by Thee hath Heaven in fee To gild his dross thereby, And knowledge sure that he endure A child until he die— For to make plain that man's disdain Is but new Beauty's birth— For to possess, in loneliness, The ...
— The Seven Seas • Rudyard Kipling

... voyage to the regions about Bojador, bringing with him the first gold. Presently a company was formed for the purpose of carrying on the gold-trade between Portugal and Africa. Its leading men were the navigators Lanzarote and Gilianez, and Prince Henry 'the Navigator' did not disdain to become a member. In 1471 Joao de Santarem and Pedro Escobar reached a place on the Gold Coast to which, from the abundance of gold found there, they gave the name of 'Sao Jorje da Mina,' the present Elmina. After this a flood of gold poured into the lap of Europe; and at last, cupidity ...
— To the Gold Coast for Gold - A Personal Narrative in Two Volumes.—Vol. I • Richard F. Burton

... they have discovered ideas, universalities, separated forms, first matters, quiddities, haecceities, formalities, and the like stuff; things so thin and bodiless that I believe even Lynceus himself was not able to perceive them. But then chiefly do they disdain the unhallowed crowd as often as with their triangles, quadrangles, circles, and the like mathematical devices, more confounded than a labyrinth, and letters disposed one against the other, as it were in battle array, they cast a mist before the eyes ...
— The Praise of Folly • Desiderius Erasmus

... look me in the face, Mr. Schmidt?" she broke in. He looked up at once prepared to meet a look of disdain. To his surprise, she was smiling. "I have talked it all over with Mrs. Gaston, and she advised me to forgive you if you were in the least penitent and—honest. Well, you have made an honest confession, I am satisfied. ...
— The Prince of Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon

... exclaimed, in disdain. "I don't like the word. Them birds is about useful as a hip pocket in an undershirt. Why, missionaries don't do no real, lasting good outside of Indian villages! Us sure-thing guys are the best missionaries ...
— The Winds of Chance • Rex Beach

... which took so long to wane, He saw sad sufferers relieving pain, And daughters of iniquity and scorn Performing deeds which God will not disdain. ...
— Robert F. Murray - his poems with a memoir by Andrew Lang • Robert F. Murray

... that he is a person well acquainted with the habits of the upper classes. Be this as it may, I am afraid he is no gentleman; and moreover, that no training could make him such. {190} Many a poor man, born and bred to labour, would disdain that ...
— Charlotte Bronte and Her Circle • Clement K. Shorter

... The turn might be expected. Modest greatness Wears willingly the mask of what is shocking To scare off admiration: but, altho' She may disdain the tribute, admiration, Is there no other tribute she can bear with? Knight, were you here not foreign, not a captive I would not ask so freely. Speak, command, In what can I ...
— Nathan the Wise • Gotthold Ephraim Lessing

... who fluttered in on the breeze of the footman's announcement. They immediately fell into raptures over his lordship, who was forced in self-defence to tug and twist at his mustache and toy with his monocle. At this last Dolores flung herself out of the room in ill- concealed disdain. ...
— Out of the Primitive • Robert Ames Bennet

... gain, perhaps, nor the rest you had planned, 'Neath the horrible countless eyes that you could not withstand? Or was it God looked from his throne in a moment's disdain, And you shrieked for a trial once more in the ...
— The Fairy Changeling and Other Poems • Dora Sigerson

... that the liquor was sour, and emptied, with much spluttering and grimaces, the remainder of the beer into the fire. This process so offended the parson of the parish (who in those good old times did not disdain to take the post of honour in the chimney-nook), that he left his corner, looking wrathfully at the offender; who without any more ado instantly occupied it. It was a fine thing to hear the jingling of the twenty pieces in his pocket, the oaths which he distributed between the ...
— Catherine: A Story • William Makepeace Thackeray

... a fair price, a suggestion which he only receives with a smile of slight pity, and, I fancy, a little disdain. A woman joins him, and also holds up this and that gold-skinned ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... my soul, arise! The husks of time disdain, And wing thee to the skies, Where there is lasting gain; Where moth nor rust can mock thy toil, Nor subtle ...
— Hymns from the East - Being Centos and Suggestions from the Office Books of the - Holy Eastern Church • John Brownlie

... warrant for it first, Mr. Sheriff," replied the former, turning to Patterson with cool disdain. "I have nothing to do with you, sir; but I hold this horse till the outrage I have just received is atoned for, or at ...
— The Rangers - [Subtitle: The Tory's Daughter] • D. P. Thompson

... looked at him, and told him he was young, and that his Uncle's circumstances were not good, there had been an expression of disdain in his face; a contemptuous and disparaging assumption that he would be quite content to live idly on a reduced old man, which stung the boy's generous soul. Determined to assure Mr Dombey, in so far as it was possible to give him the assurance without ...
— Dombey and Son • Charles Dickens

... found a young Irish recollet, in his way from Rome to his own country. He complained, that he was almost starved by the inhospitable disposition of the French people; and that the regular clergy, in particular, had treated him with the most cruel disdain. I relieved his necessities, and gave him a letter to a gentleman of ...
— Travels Through France and Italy • Tobias Smollett

... the rest of the world admires are only worthy of contempt, and, though your health would have allowed of it, you yet were unwilling to come, then I rejoice at both facts—that you were free from bodily pain, and that you had the sound sense to disdain what others causelessly admire. Only I hope that some fruit of your leisure may be forthcoming, a leisure, indeed, which you had a splendid opportunity of enjoying to the full, seeing that you were left almost alone in your lovely country. For I doubt not that ...
— The Letters of Cicero, Volume 1 - The Whole Extant Correspodence in Chronological Order • Marcus Tullius Cicero

... they have seen. It was bad enough when the latest witness had before him the actual pictures on which the first description had been based; even then crooked noses became straight, large mouths small, disdain was turned to affability and ingenuousness to guile; but where this guide was lacking the ...
— An Adventure With A Genius • Alleyne Ireland

... to be,—we must appear so: Great souls disdain the shadow of offence, Nor must their whiteness ...
— Percy - A Tragedy • Hannah More

... silence, and went through the steps of the quadrille without so much as a look at the talker, Ratman was sober enough to be annoyed at this chilly disdain. ...
— Roger Ingleton, Minor • Talbot Baines Reed

... of the Captain, he dreaded that other dancers, seeing his prize, would try to capture her; but there was a certain tempered disdain in the poise of his little partner's head, an ability to put up a quick and effective defense against intrusion, ...
— Quin • Alice Hegan Rice

... while the evenings begin to grow long, it is not unusual to see a number of the younger men at play at cricket in the meadow with the more active of the farmers. Most populous villages have their cricket club, which even the richest farmers do not disdain to join, and their ...
— The Toilers of the Field • Richard Jefferies

... as well as our own encouragement, we desire you to take notice of the gracious answer of the God that heareth prayer, unto your fervent cryes. For beside our own particular addresses and secret vows to our God to be faithful (with disdain of all baits of avarice and ambition) it hath pleased the Divine Providence so to direct both the honourable Houses of Parliament, to take care of preventing all obliquitie in our proceedings, and to stop the mouthes of all that ...
— The Acts Of The General Assemblies of the Church of Scotland

... And nostril beautiful disdain, and might And majesty, flash their full lightnings by, Developing in that one ...
— Letters of Horace Walpole, V4 • Horace Walpole

... before him, and Sturk looked at the back of the volume with a leisurely disdain, but finding no title there, returned to the recipe. They both stared on his face, without breathing, while he conned it over. When he came about half-way, he whistled; and when he arrived at the end, he frowned hard; and squeezed his lips ...
— The House by the Church-Yard • J. Sheridan Le Fanu

... with slaves, nor reign O'er those who cower to take a tyrant's yoke; She left the down-trod nations in disdain, And flew to Greece, when Liberty awoke, New-born, amid those glorious vales, and broke Sceptre and chain with her fair youthful hands: As rocks are shivered in the thunder-stroke. And lo! in full-grown strength, an empire stands Of leagued and rival ...
— Poetical Works of William Cullen Bryant - Household Edition • William Cullen Bryant

... on the same spot, in a sort of extraordinary fashion which bore no relation whatever either to form or rhythm. At last I stopped altogether. Every-one was looking at me—some with curiosity, some with astonishment, some with disdain, and some with compassion, Grandmamma alone ...
— Childhood • Leo Tolstoy

... sudden light touch of disdain, which she could not forego. "The smallest sketch of a head painted by him will fetch a lot ...
— December Love • Robert Hichens

... extremely. Her mother will then wait upon me, respectfully kiss my hands, and say to me, Sir, (for she will not dare to call me her son-in-law, for fear of provoking me by such familiarity), I pray you not to disdain my daughter, by refusing to approach her: I assure you that her chief study is to please you; and that she loves you with all her heart. But my mother-in-law might as well hold her peace; I will not make her the least answer, but keep my gravity. Then she will prostrate herself ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Volume 1 • Anonymous

... fifteen years ago, fifteen years, when she returned, clandestinely, at a fall of night similar to this one. In the first days of this return, dumb and haughty to her former companions from fear of their disdain, she would go out only to go to church, her black cloth mantilla lowered on her eyes. Then, at length, when curiosity was appeased, she had returned to her habits, so valiantly and so irreproachably that all ...
— Ramuntcho • Pierre Loti

... on her part was also eyeing him askance. He was a handsome gallant surely! Her heart longed for the canty fellow. Yet if he showed the least sign of disdain he ...
— Border Ghost Stories • Howard Pease

... intimacy will always be largely dependent on community of tastes, interests, occupations, and early associations. But these facts afford no reason why one set of men should look down with superciliousness and disdain on another set of men who have not enjoyed the same early advantages or are not at present endowed with the same gifts or accomplishments as themselves, or why they should hold aloof from them when there is any opportunity of common action or social intercourse. The pride ...
— Progressive Morality - An Essay in Ethics • Thomas Fowler

... were now massing together at one side of the square; saw the Turk with a knife in his hand; saw Trail edging away from the group before the overseer's cabin—and sprang forward, his powerful figure instinct with determination, the set calm of the face with which he had met Havisham's quiet disdain and the imprecations of the other conspirators, broken up into fire and passion, high and resolved. Blood was upon it still, and upon his arms and half naked breast; his eyes burned; and as he threw up his arm in a gesture of command, ...
— Prisoners of Hope - A Tale of Colonial Virginia • Mary Johnston

... down, side by side, and talked long. I did not go away the whole day. With a high disdain of convention, she made me stay. Her mother sent word that she would not be able to come to dinner, and we were alone together at table, in an image of what our united lives might be. We spent the evening in that happy interchange of trivial ...
— Through the Eye of the Needle - A Romance • W. D. Howells

... to disdain riches, and more yet, worldly honors. One day when his disciples were disputing who should have the highest rank in heaven, he said, "He that is greatest among you shall be your servant." "Whosoever exalteth himself shall be abased, ...
— History Of Ancient Civilization • Charles Seignobos

... stood behind me. I seemed to feel his breath penetrate my skull; and yet I was forced to answer a whispered question of Brother John's with a smooth face. I saw Edouard suddenly reach for the milk glass in front of his plate, and hand it back to Abonus with the disdain of a duchess. He said, in ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 6 • Various

... On recovering from his first stupefaction, he bestirred himself to shout, to the four personages on the stage, "Go on! What the devil!—go on!"—without even deigning to cast a glance of disdain upon the two interrupters. ...
— Notre-Dame de Paris - The Hunchback of Notre Dame • Victor Hugo

... down this land wherever I have gone, and praise for the great national effort which I have seen in so many places and felt everywhere." Mr. MASEFIELD however soon abandoned this manner and made the rest of his way in a good solid pedestrian style. But he did not disdain to go so far in flattery of the Americans, his audience, as to use the word "gotten" for the past tense of the ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 156, March 12, 1919 • Various

... will rest upon me." Then a voice out of the high heavens rang out and said: "The Shekinah shall not rest upon these high mountains that are so proud, for it is not God's will that the Shekinah should rest upon high mountains that quarrel among themselves and look upon one another with disdain. He prefers the low mountains, and Sinai among these, because it is the smallest and most insignificant of all. Upon it will He let the Shekinah rest." [183] The other mountains hereupon said to ...
— THE LEGENDS OF THE JEWS VOLUME III BIBLE TIMES AND CHARACTERS - FROM THE EXODUS TO THE DEATH OF MOSES • BY LOUIS GINZBERG

... hearken to other and more melodious voices—to Shelley and Keats, to Wordsworth and Coleridge and the 'faultless and fervent melodies of Tennyson.' In course of time Byron was forgotten, or only remembered with disdain; and when Thackeray, the representative Briton, the artist Philistine, the foe of all that is excessive or abnormal or rebellious, took it upon himself to flout the author of Don Juan openly and to lift up his heavy hand ...
— Views and Reviews - Essays in appreciation • William Ernest Henley



Words linked to "Disdain" :   turn down, pooh-pooh, contemn, detest, depreciation, despite, repel, hate, derogation, scorn, pass up, despise, decline, snub, spurn, contempt, condescension, freeze off, look down on, rebuff, patronage, dislike, refuse, reject, disparagement, turn away



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