A Quote by Mark Twain

I think a compliment ought always to precede a complaint, where one is possible, because it softens resentment and insures for the complaint a courteous and gentle reception.

Mark Twain

Quote Topics

Always Because Complaint Compliment Courteous Gentle Ought Possible Reception Resentment Think

Quote Author

Mark Twain
American - Writer
November 30, 1835 - April 21, 1910

The Culture of Complaint... We live in a culture of complaint because everyone is always looking for things to complain about. It's all tied in with the desire to blame others for misfortunes and to get some form of compensation into the bargain.

Alexander McCall Smith

Opening a complaint for investigation in no way implies that the Office for Civil Rights (OCR) has made a determination about the merits of the complaint.

Betsy DeVos

In a typical whistleblower scenario where the inspector general determines a complaint to be credible and urgent, there would be no colorable legal basis for the complaint to not reach Congress.

Asha Rangappa

It takes the same energy to complain as it does to compliment. When there is a short circuit, there is a complaint, and when the energy is flowing, there is a compliment.

Harbhajan Singh Yogi

I have for myself no conceivable complaint to make, and yet for American literature in general, and its standing in a country where industrialism and finance and science flourish and the only arts that are vital and respected are architecture and the film, I have a considerable complaint.

Sinclair Lewis

Everybody knows how to utter a complaint, but few can express a graceful compliment.

William Feather

Too often, complaint is not about principled objection on moral grounds, but opportunistic objection on grounds of self-interest. To rectify this, we need to work on mastering the art of complaint.

Julian Baggini

I say, then, that viewed from that standpoint, there is but one single subject of complaint which Virginia has to make against the government under which we live; a complaint made by the whole South, and that is on the subject of African slavery.

John Brown Baldwin

But, sir, the great cause of complaint now is the slavery question, and the questions growing out of it. If there is any other cause of complaint which has been influential in any quarter, to bring about the crisis which is now upon us; if any State or any people have made the troubles growing out of this question, a pretext for agitation instead of a cause of honest complaint, Virginia can have no sympathy whatever, in any such feeling, in any such policy, in any such attempt. It is the slavery question. Is it not so?

John Brown Baldwin

For 'wellness', naturally, is no cause for complaint - people relish it, they enjoy it, they are at the furthest pole from complaint. People complain of feeling ill - not well ... Thus, though a patient will scarcely complain of being 'very well', they may become suspicious if they feel 'too well'.

Oliver Sacks

I don't think boxing needs to be regulated. I think boxing needs to have a complaint board. And I think the complaint board should be able to look into boxing situations - as far as if you're getting what you should be getting, whether you're being managed, not being managed, etc.

Larry Holmes

It is often said of me - some intend it as a compliment, others as a complaint - that I write about a single subject: the Holocaust. I have no quarrel with that. Why shouldn't I accept, with certain qualifications, the place assigned to me on the shelves of libraries?

Imre Kertesz

Gratitude as a discipline involves a conscious choice. I can choose to be grateful even when my emotions and feelings are still steeped in hurt and resentment. It is amazing how many occasions present themselves in which I can choose gratitude instead of a complaint.

Henri Nouwen

Complaining is never powerful because at the root of a complaint is powerlessness

Dennis Prager

I think the satirist is always basically optimistic. The satirist's complaint about society is always that it doesn't measure up to a fairly high ideal he has. I think that even the bitterest satirist, even a man like Swift, was probably rather an optimist at heart.