Shame

“ I now perceive the folly of this compassion and these hopes. I need not be assiduous to spare you the shame and mortification of hearing the truth. Shame is as much a stranger to your heart as remorse. Say what I will, disclose what I will, your conduct will be just the same. A show of much reluctance and humility will, no doubt, be made, and the tongue will be busy in imploring favour which the heart disdains. ”

“ With fire of hell shall shame consume him shameless,
And dying, all the night darken his death.
The years are as thy garments, the world's ages
As sandals bound and loosed from thy swift feet;
Time serves before thee, as one that hath for wages
Praise or shame only, bitter words or sweet. ”

“ I have found thee, and thee alone, punish my valour sharpliest. But I forbear all vengeance, and am satisfied with the shame within thy heart—if, after all, any shame visits the thankless—as expiation for this wrongdoing towards me. I have a right to surmise that thou art worse than all demons in fury, and all beasts in cruelty, if, after escaping the snares of all these monsters, I have failed to be safe from thine. ”

“ Shame makes me vile, and anger makes me brave, Reason in me is cautious, but my heart Doth, rich in vices and in virtues, rave; Sad for the most, and oft alone, apart; Incredulous alike of hope and fear, Death shall bring rest and honor to my bier. ”

“ I shuddered, too, when I contemplated the shame which awaited me, should some future event, yet hidden in the lap of time, reveal to the world the secret villainy of the man who had borne himself so proudly among his fellows. Yet even these regrets, even the apprehension of fresh difficulties in the concealment of my crime, were insufficient to deter me from the prosecution of my original intention; and blinded by the intemperance of misguided affection, heedless of the shame and misery into which I was about to plunge the woman I adored, I sought and obtained your hand. ”

“ You have endeavoured to put a brand of shame upon a man who never, consciously, was guilty of a dishonourable action in his life."
"Well, and how do you feel?"
"Feel! God forgive me, but I feel as though I should like to kill you." ”

“ What cause has lit so fierce a flame
They know not: but the pangs of shame
From great love wronged, and what despair
Can make a baffled woman dare—
All this they know, and knowing tread
The paths of presage, vague and dread. ”

“ His daily bounties fall,
Still comes the sun with cheerful smile
Dispensing good to all.
The way of wickedness is hard,
Its bitter fruits we know,
Shame in this world is its reward,
And in the future, woe. ”

“ Alas! we so dearly love to be lamented in our misfortunes: indifference alone irritates and wounds us: here not only shall all hearts be shut to our misfortunes, but all beholders shall insult our shame, and the only portion left to the sinner shall be his confusion, his despair, and his crimes. ”

“ No, your shame is known to all men, and the shame of all who belong to you. Again, what think you of the woman who, because it is the fashion, goes out to balls indecently and improperly dressed—who is not covered as becomes a Christian matron or maiden, but is so clad as to bring the blush of lust to the face of the brazen, and of shame to that of the pure in heart; or of those who go to all sort of plays and spectacles, who encourage the most questionable of dances and ballets, and bring up their children in the same spirit? Is their modesty known to all men? ”

“ Oh, the ineffable misery of an exposed shame! the terrible sense that we are to meet abroad and before the world the stern condemnation our conscience has already pronounced, and that henceforth we are to be shunned and avoided! There is not left to us any longer one mood of mind that can bring repose. If we are depressed, it is in the mourning of our guilt we seem to be dressed; if for a moment we assume the air of light-heartedness, it is to shock the world by the want of feeling for our shame! It is written that we are to be outcasts and live apart!
“May I come in, Loo?” ”

“ In the abyss of evil into which I am plunged, I feel the blows reach me, without perceiving the hand by which they are directed or the means it employs. Shame and misfortune seem of themselves to fall upon me. ”

“ And yet each whispering wind has blown
Abroad the story of my shame.
I dread to see men shrink away
With startled looks of scorn or fear,
When in life’s crowded marts some day,
That name falls on their ear. ”

“ I said it; martyrdom or shame! It is shame which awaits me.
So spoke the Curé, when Marianne had taken away her young mistress, and his conscience exaggerated the gravity and the consequences of his imprudent rapture.
—Yes, it is shame, it is shame.
—Do not despair in this way, said a jeering voice.
Marcel turned round, terror-struck.
His servant was behind him.
She had approached, noiselessly, and was looking at him with her strange, green eyes.
—Shame lies in scandal, she added sententiously. Reassure yourself; that pretty young lady will hold her tongue. ”

“ Such in fact is the state of mind that shame gives expression to; the soul is stung as it were at the result; its remorse for its ill-considered attempt is a whip that makes it feel to the quick, and it would bring in oblivion to its aid against its tormentor. ”

“ You have brought shame upon your parents and shame upon your son, and that shame you can never wipe out. If you had in you a spark of human feeling, if you were not worthless and heartless you would blush to look me in the face or your child in the face. ”

“ You begin with shame and regret. But the sight of your lover’s agonies, his indignation, his anger, madden you and you get the lust of cruelty. You become insane. You make new wounds. You tear open old ones. ”

“ The fear of shame moves me; and I am moved by the desire to give instruction which others truly are unable to give. I fear shame for having followed passion so ardently, as he may conceive who reads the afore-named Songs, and sees how greatly I was ruled by it; which shame ceases entirely by the present speech of myself, which proves that not passion but virtue may have been the moving cause. ”

“ Dressed in loveliness and laughter, there is mortal decay at thy heart: sorrow, sin, and shame have mingled thy cup of misery. Strange rulers have bruised thee, and laughed thee to scorn, and they have made all thy sweetness bitter. ”

“ Thou art the shame of human nature: [438] thou representest man in the likeness of a beast, and worse; as if he were made but instead of a barrel or a sink: look on a drunkard filthing and spewing, and reeling and bawling, and see if he be not uglier than a brute! Thou art a shame to thy own reason, when thou showest the world, that it cannot so much as shut thy mouth, nor prevail with thee in so small a thing. ”

“ We live in an atmosphere of shame. We are ashamed of everything that is real about us; ashamed of ourselves, of our relatives, of our incomes, of our accents, of our opinions, of our experience, just as we are ashamed of our naked skins. ”

“ You put a shame upon him, hiding who his father and his father’s people were, and you put a shame upon her that lies in the graveyard—as sweet a lass, as good, as ever lived on earth. Ay, a shame and a scandal! For your eyes were shut always to the sidelong looks, your ears never heard the things people said—‘A good-for-nothing ship-captain, a scamp and a ne’er-do-weel, one that had a lass at every port, and, maybe, wives too; one that none knew or ever had seen—a pirate maybe, or a slave-dealer, or a jail-bird, for all they knew! ”

“ And let thy princes and the court give ear!
’Tis time all heard how Vashti feels her shame.
Ahasueras
Shame is no word to couple with thy name!
Shame and a spotless woman may not meet,
Even in a sentence. Choose another word. ”

“ Forgetting shame’s pure blush and honour’s wrack.
Hot, faint, and weary, with her hard embracing,
Like a wild bird being tam’d with too much handling,
Or as the fleet-foot roe that’s tir’d with chasing, 561
Or like the froward infant still’d with dandling:
He now obeys, and now no more resisteth,
While she takes all she can, not all she listeth. ”

“ The expense of spirit in a waste of shame
Is lust in action: and till action, lust
Is perjur'd, murderous, bloody, full of blame,
Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust;
Enjoy'd no sooner but despised straight;
Past reason hunted; and no sooner had,
Past reason hated, as a swallow'd bait,
On purpose laid to make the taker mad:
Mad in pursuit and in possession so;
Had, having, and in quest, to have extreme;
A bliss in proof,-- and prov'd, a very woe;
Before, a joy propos'd; behind a dream.
All this the world well knows; yet none knows well
To shun the heaven that leads men to this hell. ”

“ Can there be aught of shame in true love? Or is it that my ass's ears do shame thee, my cock's-comb and garments pied shame the worship of this foolish heart, and I, a Fool, worshipping thee, shame thee by such worship? Then—on, cock's-comb! Ring out, silly bells! Fool's love doth end in folly! Off love—on folly—a Fool can but love and die. ”

“ Shame, which is fear: the deep organic shame, the old, old physical fear which crouches in the bodily roots of us, and can only be chased away by the sensual fire, at last it was roused up and routed by the phallic hunt of the man, and she came to the very heart of the jungle of herself. ”

“ Dandinus, &c.
SUBSECT. VI.—Shame and Disgrace, Causes.
Shame and disgrace cause most violent passions and bitter pangs. Ob pudorem et dedecus publicum, ob errorum commissum saepe moventur generosi animi (Felix Plater, lib. 3. de alienat mentis.) Generous minds are often moved with shame, to despair for some public disgrace. And he, saith Philo, lib. 2. de provid. dei, [1673] “that subjects himself to fear, grief, ambition, shame, is not happy, but altogether miserable, tortured with continual labour, care, and misery.” ”

“ Worse than savage encounters and fiercer than fire and than thunder-—
He who in frenzy blind covers his kindred with shame.
O ye years of the past that as night are lying around me,
O my country, thou art image of glory and shame ”

“ The gnawing misery of being fastened like two dogs in a leash to one who 'causes shame' is vividly portrayed by that strong figure, that she is like 'rottenness in his bones,' eating away strength, and inflicting disfigurement and torture. ”

“ I will take shame from no man, and no lie from any living throat. If there should be dark days, let them come; I will not let you go from me—no, for here life is, nor can there be sin or shame in that which God has given. ”

“ And now, if a man would be so mad as to be ashamed, for fear of the rebuke that he should have of such rebukeful beasts, to confess the faith of Christ, then, with fleeing from a shadow of shame, he would fall into a true shame—and a deadly painful shame indeed! ”

“ O Lord, let me not be put to shame by those who insult me, for that I have called upon Thee. “Let the ungodly be ashamed, and be brought down to hell.” Let them rather who call upon stones be ashamed, and made to dwell with darkness. ”

“ Bowed down by shame and remorse, the unhappy man slunk back to his hermitage, miserable and degraded, bitterly lamenting his folly and infatuation, but resolved to atone for it by deep repentance and severe penance. ”

“ Or could this man, so vex’d in early time, By this strong feeling for his father’s crime; Who to the parent’s sin was barely just, And mix’d with filial fear the man’s disgust— Could he, without some strong delusion, quit 410 The path of duty, and to shame submit? Cast off the virtue he so highly prized, ‘And be the very creature he despised?’ [Pg 331] “A tenant’s wife, half forward, half afraid, Features, it seem’d, of powerful cast displayed, That bore down faith and duty; common fame Speaks of a contract that augments the shame. ”

“ Who can tell how many proud, graceful and gallant thoughts and emotions have been killed by shame—the shame which the egalitarians and the humble have heaped upon them? And how much Art, therefore, has lost? Certainly, in the minds of children there are many brave, generous and noble thoughts which are never permitted to come to maturity. ”

“ We only represent to you the higher, the adequate objects of those very faculties and affections. Let the man of ambition go on still to consider disgrace as the greatest evil, honour as his chief good. But disgrace in whose estimation? Honour in whose judgment? This is the only question. If shame, and delight in esteem, be spoken of as real, as any settled ground of pain or pleasure, both these must be in proportion to the supposed wisdom, and worth of him by whom we are contemned or esteemed. ”

“ Shame indeed there is when each makes known his sins, but that shame, as it were, ploughs his land, removes the ever-recurring brambles, prunes the thorns, and gives life to the fruits which he believed were dead. ”

“ First, to define the passion of shame, I think it may be called a sorrowful reflection on our own unworthiness, proceeding from an apprehension that others either do, or might, if they knew all, deservedly despise us. ”

“ The blush of shame, which is an excess of sensation, and the glow of anger, which is an excess of volition, continue some time, though the affected person finds, that those emotions were caused by mistaken facts, and endeavours to extinguish their appearance. ”

“ Finally, if there occurs to us some former humiliating incident, we shrink together, would like to sink out of sight, blush with shame, and often try forcibly to distract and divert our thoughts by some loud exclamation, as if to scare some evil spirit. ”

“ This blur to youth, this sorrow to the sage,
This dying virtue, this surviving shame,
Whose crime will bear an ever-during blame?
'O, what excuse can my invention make,
When thou shalt charge me with so black a deed?
Will not my tongue be mute, my frail joints shake,
Mine eyes forego their light, my false heart bleed?
The guilt being great, the fear doth still exceed;
And extreme fear can neither fight nor fly,
But coward-like with trembling terror die. ”