Offensive

“ But whether their combinations be offensive or defensive, they are always abundantly heard of. In order to bring the point to a speedy decision, they have always recourse to the loudest clamour, and sometimes to the most shocking violence and outrage. ”

“ Instead of our 'one thing needful' justifying in us vulgarity, hideousness, ignorance, violence—our vulgarity, hideousness, ignorance, violence are really so many touchstones which try our one thing needful, and which prove that in the state, at any rate, in which we ourselves have it, it is not all we want. ”

“ Triumph over his malice by your manners and by your silence: you will heap living coals upon his head; you will gain the public on your side, you will leave nothing to your enemy but the infamy of his passion and of his impositions. ”

“ But no nicety of wording, no artifice of human language, will suffice to discriminate the hundredth part of the shades of meaning in which the most world-wide differences of thought on such subjects may be involved; or prevent the most gentle worded and apparently justifiable expression of regret, so embodied, from grating on the feelings of thousands of estimable and well-intentioned men with all the harshness of controversial hostility. ”

“ A RULE OF LIFE
‘If you want to annoy an opponent thoroughly, and even to harm him,’ said a crafty old knave to me, ‘you reproach him with the very defect or vice you are conscious of in yourself. Be indignant ... and reproach him!
‘To begin with, it will set others thinking you have not that vice.
‘In the second place, your indignation may well be sincere.... You can turn to account the pricks of your own conscience. ”

“ No one more sincerely regrets the insults offered his person, and the injury done to his property; but I cannot restrain my indignation, when I hear the public virtue, that so promptly recoils from undue violence, stigmatized as time-serving conwardice. ”

“ But consider that man is over [105] against his enemy, with a mind like unto a walled city filled with armed men. Consider how in life's conflicts, thoughts become the swords of anger, the clubs of envy, stings for hissing hatred. ”

“ The face of your enemy,—no matter what antipathy it may excite,—is not invariably hateful in itself: you must acknowledge, to yourself at least, having observed in it moments of an expression the reverse of unworthy. ”

“ Can you bear the thought of not only seeing us used with insult and barbarity,—of seeing your country bleed at every pore, but of being the occasion of these dreadful evils, in consequence of your mistaken opinions, and by suffering yourselves to be deceived, and cajoled, by foreign, ill designing wretches, who have only our, and your, ruin at heart. ”

“ What, if she could think how fearful is my interest in these outrages, that in all probability, if their authors are detected, there is one who will drag me into their ruin; that I am given over, bound and blinded, into the hands of another; and that other, a man steeled to mercy, and withheld from my destruction by a thread—a thread that a blow on himself would snap. ”

“ There is in some such a disposition to be talking, that an offence of the slightest kind, and such as would not raise any other resentment, yet raises, if I may so speak, the resentment of the tongue, puts it into a flame, into the most ungovernable motions. This outrage, when the person it respects is present, we distinguish in the lower rank of people by a peculiar term. ”

“ What do you propose to gain by it?—a man whose whole life is peace, you would provoke to outrage? Would there be triumph in this, or disgrace?—A man whom your uncle honours and loves, you would insult without cause—you would waylay—you would, after watching and creating your opportunity, entrap into defending himself. ”

“ Often the fierceness of his temper, the righteous indignation that swelled his bosom, impelled him to hurl defiance at his foes, and to use language, the possible consequences of which, caused the more timid and abject of his followers, to tremble with apprehension. ”

“ I want to say to all those men: 'You are brutes!' to all those women: 'You are vile creatures!' I want to shout your name, your sacred name, to that idiotic crowd, to grovel at your feet and bite the dust, calling down upon myself all the scorn, all the insults, all the shame! ”

“ No violent outbursts of indignation on your part, no abusive words, no insulting language are reported to me: which, while quite alien to culture and refinement, are specially unsuited to high power and place. For if your anger is implacable, it amounts to extreme harshness ”

“ If I wanted any further evidence of this, the moral atmosphere which words diffuse, I would ask you to observe how the first thing men do, when engaged in controversy with others, be it in the conflict of the tongue or the pen, or of weapons more wounding yet, if such there be, is ever to assume some honourable name to themselves, such as, if possible, shall beg the whole subject in dispute, and at the same time to affix on their adversaries a name which shall place them in a ridiculous or contemptible or odious light. ”

“ And if any hatred has been excited against, or any offence been given by us, we then apply ourselves to remove or diminish that, by denying or extenuating the cause, or by atoning for it, or by deprecating hostility. ”

“ We treat the men like dogs; we consider the women as harlots. We insult men's wives and their daughters, or do worse, and we kill the husbands and brothers, or fathers, if they show a regard for their own honour. Sometimes we get killed ourselves, it is true, and 'twere no pity if 'twas oftener, but for the thinning of the king's ranks, and there are few enough of us left, I can tell you. Then see, again, how we pillage and oppress the people? ”

“ Every one suspects me, but none dare reproach me. You on the contrary, are the butt against which every censure is levelled: they know, that your easy nature can pardon malignity, and the hand that insults you to-day will crave your kindness to-morrow. When you are offended, with puerile impotence and passionate violence, you exhibit the effects of your momentary rage ”

“ Nay, the fact of being of a different race, tongue, and creed, a variance of opinion, family rivalries, an unhappy love, a little spite or jealousy,—all was turned to account, all was of use to denounce one's enemy on a religious ground. ”

“ Thus was there even of old the treacherous speech of hate, that walketh with the subtleties of tales, intent on guile, slander that breedeth ill: so doth it violence on the thing that shineth, and uplifteth the rottenness of dim men's fame. ”

“ They take for their protection the shield of a false and tinsel wit, the answer of a sneer, the argument of a supercilious look, and try to gloze over everything, to themselves and others, with a contemptuous persiflage which confounds all right and wrong. ”

“ But the things which are in the habit of being said, for the sake of amplification, or in the way of digression, or when men are summing up, are introduced either to excite hatred, or pity, or to work on the feelings of the judges by means of those arguments which have been already given; provided that the importance of the facts, or the envy of men, or the dignity of the parties, will allow of it. ”

“ An enormous fortalice of prejudice, privileges, superstitions, falsehoods, exactions, abuses, violences, iniquities, and darknesses, is still standing on the earth with its towers of hatred, and it must be thrown down, and the monstrous mass crumble away. ”

“ Implacable hate, patient cunning, and a sleepless refinement of device to inflict the extremest anguish on an enemy, these things are evil; and, although venial in a slave are not to be forgiven in a tyrant ”

“ Every absorbing passion and every ignoble impulse—love of fame, religious zeal, national prejudice, desire of novelty, insatiable cupidity, private malice—attracted the roving, the licentious, and the unprincipled to the standard of the Cross. ”

“ And from the fusion of opinions and sympathies thus produced, a general sentiment is elicited, to which oppression of any kind, whether of one class by another, or of individuals by the tyranny of sectarian custom, seldom appeals in vain. ”

“ If the general good demands it, I am prepared to bear the unjustified slur which a deceived public opinion has put upon me, in the belief that the eternal justice of people will one day absolve me again. ”

“ Shall he who, unwittingly, totters blindfold on the edge of a precipice, deem it a rude or an uncharitable violence which would snatch him with a strong and a venturous hand, or even it may be with a painful grasp, from the fearful ruin over which he impends? ”

“ How long will it take an individual or a nation to conquer prejudices, by continuing to practice and excuse them;—substituting general acknowledgements of their guilt, for immediately and thoroughly repudiating them? ”

“ From the character of our adversaries, if we are able to bring them either into hatred, or into unpopularity, or into contempt. They will be brought into hatred, if any action of theirs can be adduced which has been lascivious, or arrogant, or cruel, or malignant. They will be made unpopular, if we can dilate upon their violent behaviour, their power, their riches, their numerous kinsmen, their wealth, and their arrogant and intolerable use of all these sources of influence; so that they may appear rather to trust to these circumstances than to the merits of their cause. ”

“ Reflect, in the second place, on the slights and outrages which your nation inflicts on you;—which hypocrites wickedly excite against you; think of the infamies and insults heaped upon you; in a word, support all things with joy and patience. ”

“ On hearing these noble sentiments fall from the lips of a person, once a slave, and in a manner most insinuating, with all the dignity of the most refined and cultivated person, and with an indignation expressive of the deepest abhorrence for the nefarious system of unmittigated, inhuman, chattelism. ”

“ When obstinate resistance and high-toned language irritates the passions of men, it may be thought by some an apology for the extreme rigor too frequently exercised by the illiberal mind toward a conquered enemy. ”

“ To be treated by your philosophy with rudeness and contempt, because you yield to [Pg 149] emotions which are as natural, and, therefore, in my judgment, as innocent as any, is, as if one were struck with violence by a friend or a parent, to whom you fled for protection or comfort. ”

“ If I fail to unmask you by any other means, I shall revert to the primeval way of deciding such differences as lie between you and me, the differences which make for hate. I can wield a horse-whip with the strongest man living, and I am in deadly earnest. ”

“ But the example is to be admitted to be equivocal. A more decisive argument is afforded by a consideration of the universal connexion of ferocity of manners, and a contempt of social ties, with the contempt of human life. ”

“ We are to trace evil and corrupt passions to their source. The dreadful outrages which shock us from time to time in the public prints are not instigated by an evil spirit, but are outbursts of the same savage nature which found more frequent expression years ago, and which are still present with the lower races of to-day. ”

“ The change in the poet's style prepares for another effect. While we are contemplating the exact details of the sufferings of the different classes of outraged citizens, the insult and cruelty and utter abomination of these scenes rouse our indignation against the perpetrators of the foulest crimes, and leave nothing but pity for their victims. ”

“ After all my experience of this world of envy and malice, I should have recognized the man even in the caricatures of his enemies. And you brought the best possible credentials—you are well hated. To be well hated by the human race and by the creatures mounted on its back is a distinction, sir. ”

“ Whatever their hostility is all about is a mystery to me, the innocent object of sundry scowls and angry gestures. One individual contemplates me for a minute with unconcealed aversion, and then breaks out into a torrent of angry words and excited gestures. ”

“ He could, when it suited him, appear to be literally insensible to the claims of humanity, when appealed to by the helpless against an aggressor, and he could himself commit outrages, deep, dark and nameless. ”

“ Cry out into the world your “wild and guilty fantasy” of property in man, and every echo responds with a cry of horror or contempt; every breeze, from whatever point of the compass it may come, brings you a verdict of condemnation. ”

“ When we leave the vulgar circle of our equals, is it to hear of generous actions, exalted sentiments, high-souled motives; or is it not to find every vice that stains the low pampered up into greater infamy amongst the noble? ”