A Quote by Joseph Addison

The talent of turning men into ridicule, and exposing to laughter those one converses with, is the qualification of little ungenerous tempers.

Joseph Addison

Quote Topics

Converses Exposing Laughter Little Men Qualification Ridicule Talent Those Turning

Quote Author

Joseph Addison
English - Writer
May 1, 1672 - June 17, 1719

Ridicule may be the evidence of with or bitterness and may gratify a little mind, or an ungenerous temper, but it is no test of reason or truth.

Tryon Edwards

Inject laughter into tense situations to save the day; laughter calms tempers and soothes jangled nerves.

Wilferd Peterson

The left wants to transform America away from founding ideals, and this is it. And they know it. And they're doing everything they, and they've got the media helping them and so forth. I think one of the ways of exposing 'em is to ridicule 'em. I mean, laughter is the simplest way to humiliate somebody. Laugh at them, it shrinks them.

Rush Limbaugh

Laughter is the great antidote for self-pity, maybe a specific for the malady, yet probably it does tend to dry one's feelings out a little, as if by exposing them to a vigorous wind.

Mary McCarthy

We believe that if men have the talent to invent new machines that put men out of work, they have the talent to put those men back to work.

John F. Kennedy

We must be on our guard against giving interpretations which are hazardous or opposed to science, and so exposing the word of God to the ridicule of unbelievers.

Saint Augustine

Do you recall the laughter of the Philistines at the helpless Sampson? You can hear the echo of that laughter to-day, as the church, shorn of her strength by her own sin, is an object of ridicule to the world, who cry in derision, "Where is your boasted triumph and your Millennial glory?

Abbott Eliot Kittredge

I think it is not very difficult to discern by the duties and converses of Christians, what frames their spirits are under. Take a Christian in a good frame, and how serious, heavenly, and profitable, will his converses and duties be! what a lovely companion is he during the continuance of it!

John Flavel

For me it is really important to have a story with blood in the veins, there are bad tempers and good tempers.

Patrick Ness

There is no talent so useful toward rising in the world, or which puts men more out of the reach of fortune, than that quality generally possessed by the dullest sort of men, and in common speech called discretion; a species of lower prudence, by the assistance of which, people of the meanest intellectuals, without any other qualification, pass through the world in great tranquillity, and with universal good treatment, neither giving nor taking offence.

Jonathan Swift

A lot of sexism is just very silly... and the best response is laughter and ridicule.

Mary Beard

Those who love music are gentle and honest in their tempers. I always loved music, and would not, for a great matter, be without the little skill which I possess in the art.

Martin Luther

I am quite sure that a little man who braves ridicule to improve the lot of his fellow men, and is thanked by their jibes, is an interesting character.

Preston Sturges

Feminine traits are called weaknesses. People joke about them; fools ridicule them; but reasonable persons see very well that those traits are just the tools for the management of men, and for the use of men for female designs.