Quotes about compliment

A collection of quotes on the topic of compliment, doing, likeness, people.

Quotes about compliment

Meryl Streep photo

“I no longer have patience for certain things, not because I’ve become arrogant, but simply because I reached a point in my life where I do not want to waste more time with what displeases me or hurts me. I have no patience for cynicism, excessive criticism and demands of any nature. I lost the will to please those who do not like me, to love those who do not love me and to smile at those who do not want to smile at me. I no longer spend a single minute on those who lie or want to manipulate. I decided not to coexist anymore with pretense, hypocrisy, dishonesty and cheap praise. I do not tolerate selective erudition nor academic arrogance. I do not adjust either to popular gossiping. I hate conflict and comparisons. I believe in a world of opposites and that’s why I avoid people with rigid and inflexible personalities. In friendship I dislike the lack of loyalty and betrayal. I do not get along with those who do not know how to give a compliment or a word of encouragement. Exaggerations bore me and I have difficulty accepting those who do not like animals. And on top of everything I have no patience for anyone who does not deserve my patience.”

Meryl Streep (1949) American actress

Misattributed to Meryl Streep (and widely disseminated on the Internet as of August/September 2014), this quote is allegedly a translation of a text by the author José Micard Teixeira, the original of which begins (in Portuguese): "Já não tenho paciência para algumas coisas, não porque me tenha tornado arrogante..."
Misattributed

Babur photo
Jimmy Carter photo
Michael Jackson photo

“I have no problem with them imitating [me]. It's a compliment. Everybody has to start out looking up to someone. For me it was James Brown, Sammy Davis Jr., Jackie Wilson, Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly.”

Michael Jackson (1958–2009) American singer, songwriter and dancer

On pop groups like N'Sync, as quoted in interview in TV Guide (1 November 2001)

Manly P. Hall photo

“What nobler relationship than that of friend? What nobler compliment can man bestow than friendship?”

Manly P. Hall (1901–1990) Canadian writer and mystic

The Lost Keys Of Freemasonry (1923)
Context: What nobler relationship than that of friend? What nobler compliment can man bestow than friendship? The bonds and ties of the life we know break easily, but through eternity one bond remains — the bond of fellowship — the fellowship of atoms, of star dust in its endless flight, of suns and worlds, of gods and men. The clasped hands of comradeship unite in a bond eternal — the fellowship of spirit.

Mark Twain photo

“I have been complimented many times and they always embarrass me; I always feel that they have not said enough.”

Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist

Speech (23 September 1907)

Oscar Wilde photo
Oscar Wilde photo
Mark Twain photo

“I can last two months on a good compliment.”

Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist
Diego Rivera photo

“you have to trust a TRUE compliment as muc as a critique.”

Diego Rivera (1886–1957) Mexican painter, muralist, Communist
Rick Riordan photo
Oscar Wilde photo
Antonin Sertillanges photo
Oscar Wilde photo
Abraham Lincoln photo
George Savile, 1st Marquess of Halifax photo
Julie Newmar photo
Mark Twain photo

“Compliments make me vain: & when I am vain, I am insolent & overbearing. It is a pity, too, because I love compliments. I love them even when they are not so. My child, I can live on a good compliment two weeks with nothing else to eat.”

Mark Twain (1835–1910) American author and humorist

Letter to Gertrude Natkin, 2 March 1906 http://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/53b4cf90-7739-0132-f12c-58d385a7b928

Bertrand Russell photo

“I feel like that intellectual but plain-looking lady who was warmly complimented on her beauty.”

Bertrand Russell (1872–1970) logician, one of the first analytic philosophers and political activist

In accepting his Nobel Prize, in December 1950; Russell denied that he had contributed anything in particular to literature. Quoted in LIFE, Editorials: "A great mind is still annoying and adorning our age", 26 May 1952
1950s

Christopher Walken photo

“I think it's sort of a compliment. Jay Mohr does it in front of me all the time. I've got another friend who does me on his answering machine. When I call him, I hear myself.”

Christopher Walken (1943) American actor

On individuals' impressions of Walken, interview in Randy Cordova (December 22, 2002) "Workaholic Walken Is Marvelous 'Catch'", The Arizona Republic, p. E3.

Mark Twain photo
Benjamin Franklin photo
Lewis Carroll photo

“Yet still to choose a brat like you,
To haunt a man of forty-two,
Was no great compliment!”

Lewis Carroll (1832–1898) English writer, logician, Anglican deacon and photographer

Canto 1
Phantasmagoria (1869)

Sukirti Kandpal photo

“Being a part of the show, is nothing less than a compliment. This show has taken us all to a new height; we will miss each other a lot and hope to work with each other in the future as well. The show is going off air but something new will definitely come up for our fans.”

Sukirti Kandpal (1987) Indian actress

Message to fans on the ending of Pyaar Kii Ye Ek Kahaani http://www.tellychakkar.com/tv/tv-news/pyaar-kii-actors-get-nostalgic-about-the-show/
On her shows

Golda Meir photo
Henry Miller photo
Marquis de Sade photo
Rick Riordan photo
Jane Austen photo
Gabrielle Zevin photo

“Every word the right one and exactly where it should be. That's basically the highest compliment I can give.”

Gabrielle Zevin (1977) American writer

Source: The Storied Life of A.J. Fikry

Augusten Burroughs photo
Steven Pressfield photo
Richard Dawkins photo
Victor Hugo photo
Jane Austen photo
Neil Strauss photo
Ned Vizzini photo
Bill Maher photo

“Saying someone is religious is heard in most of America as a compliment, a reassuring affirmation that someone will be moral, ethical, and after a few glasses of wine, a freak in the bedroom.”

Bill Maher (1956) American stand-up comedian

Source: When You Ride Alone You Ride With Bin Laden: What the Government Should Be Telling Us to Help Fight the War on Terrorism

Clarence Darrow photo

“I do not consider it an insult, but rather a compliment to be called an agnostic. I do not pretend to know where many ignorant men are sure — that is all that agnosticism means.”

Clarence Darrow (1857–1938) American lawyer and leading member of the American Civil Liberties Union

Scopes Trial, Dayton, Tennessee (13 July 1925)

Samuel Taylor Coleridge photo
Leo Buscaglia photo

“Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around.”

Leo Buscaglia (1924–1998) Motivational speaker, writer

LOVE (1972)
Variant: Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest accomplishment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around.

Chi­ma­man­da Ngo­zi Adi­chie photo
Christopher Moore photo

“Compliment but do not covet.”

Christopher Moore (1957) American writer of comic fantasy
Gillian Flynn photo

“I like to be admired from afar, and then complimented up close.”

Gena Showalter (1975) American writer

Source: The Darkest Seduction

Henry David Thoreau photo

“The greatest compliment that was ever paid me was when one asked me what I thought, and attended to my answer.”

Life Without Principle (1863)
Context: The greatest compliment that was ever paid me was when one asked me what I thought, and attended to my answer. I am surprised, as well as delighted, when this happens, it is such a rare use he would make of me, as if he were acquainted with the tool.

Wilkie Collins photo
Alan Hollinghurst photo
George MacDonald photo

“To be trusted is a greater compliment than to be loved.”

George MacDonald (1824–1905) Scottish journalist, novelist

The Marquis of Lossie (1877)

Meg Cabot photo
Laurell K. Hamilton photo
Teresa of Ávila photo
Rick Riordan photo
Joyce Meyer photo
Margaret Atwood photo
Chris Rock photo

“Women need food, water, and compliments
That's right.
And an occasional pair of shoes.”

Chris Rock (1965) American comedian, actor, screenwriter, television producer, film producer, and director
Thomas Francis Meagher photo

“In this assembly, every political school has its teachers — every creed has its adherents — and I may safely say, that this banquet is the tribute of United Ireland to the representative of American benevolence. Being such, I am at once reminded of the dinner which took place after the battle of Saratoga, at which Gates and Burgoyne — the rival soldiers — sat together. Strange scene! Ireland, the beaten and the bankrupt, entertains America, the victorious and the prosperous! Stranger still! The flag of the Victor decorates this hail — decorates our harbour — not, indeed, in triumph, but in sympathy — not to commemorate the defeat, but to predict the resurrection, of a fallen people! One thing is certain — we are sincere upon this occasion. There is truth in this compliment. For the first time in her career, Ireland has reason to be grateful to a foreign power. Foreign power, sir! Why should I designate that country a "foreign power," which has proved itself our sister country? England, they sometimes say, is our sister country. We deny the relationship — we discard it. We claim America as our sister, and claiming her as such, we have assembled here this night. Should a stranger, viewing this brilliant scene inquire of me, why it is that, amid the desolation of this day — whilst famine is in the land — whilst the hearse-plumes darken the summer scenery of the island, whilst death sows his harvest, and the earth teems not with the seeds of life, but with the seeds of corruption — should he inquire of me, why it is, that, amid this desolation, we hold high festival, hang out our banners, and thus carouse — I should reply, "Sir, the citizens of Dublin have met to pay a compliment to a plain citizen of America, which they would not pay — 'no, not for all the gold in Venice'”

Thomas Francis Meagher (1823–1867) Irish nationalist & American politician

to the minister of England."
Ireland and America (1846)

Iain Banks photo

“The news team, and Hamin, seemed well pleased. “You should have been an actor, Jernau Gurgeh,” Hamin told him.
Gurgeh assumed this was intended as a compliment.”

Source: Culture series, The Player of Games (1988), Chapter 3 “Machina Ex Machina” (p. 306).

Erik Naggum photo

“Well, I think comparing Common Lisp to Scheme is prima facie evidence of ill will, even if Common Lisp wins. It is somewhat like a supposed compliment like "man, you are even smarter than George W. Bush."”

Erik Naggum (1965–2009) Norwegian computer programmer

Re: Setting a property in a symbol http://groups.google.com/group/comp.lang.lisp/msg/80bdf64552957f61 (Usenet article).
Usenet articles, Lisp

George Marshall photo
Revilo P. Oliver photo
Maria Mitchell photo

“I know I shall be called heterodox, and that unseen lightning flashes and unheard thunderbolts will be playing around my head, when I say that women will never be profound students in any other department except music while they give four hours a day to the practice of music. I should by all means encourage every woman who is born with musical gifts to study music; but study it as a science and an art, and not as an accomplishment; and to every woman who is not musical, I should say, 'Don't study it at all;' you cannot afford four hours a day, out of some years of your life, just to be agreeable in company upon possible occasions. If for four hours a day you studied, year after year, the science of language, for instance, do you suppose you would not be a linguist? Do you put the mere pleasing of some social party, and the reception of a few compliments, against the mental development of four hours a day of study of something for which you were born? When I see that girls who are required by their parents to go through with the irksome practising really become respectable performers, I wonder what four hours a day at something which they loved, and for which God designed them, would do for them. I should think that to a real scientist in music there would be something mortifying in this rush of all women into music; as there would be to me if I saw every girl learning the constellations, and then thinking she was an astronomer!”

Maria Mitchell (1818–1889) American astronomer

Maria Mitchell: Life, Letters and Journals (illustrated) by Maria Mitchell, 1896, p. 189.

F. E. Smith, 1st Earl of Birkenhead photo
Oscar Levant photo
Winston S. Churchill photo
John Wesley photo

“It is true, likewise, that the English in general, and indeed most of the men of learning in Europe, have given up all accounts of witches and apparitions, as mere old wives' fables. I am sorry for it; and I willingly take this opportunity of entering my solemn protest against this violent compliment which so many that believe the Bible pay to those who do not believe it. I owe them no such service. I take knowledge these are at the bottom of the outcry which has been raised, and with such insolence spread throughout the nation, in direct opposition not only to the Bible, but to the suffrage of the wisest and best of men in all ages and nations. They well know (whether Christians know it or not), that the giving up witchcraft is, in effect, giving up the Bible; and they know, on the other hand, that if but one account of the intercourse of men with separate spirits be admitted, their whole castle in the air (Deism, Atheism, Materialism) falls to the ground. I know no reason, therefore, why we should suffer even this weapon to be wrested out of our hands. Indeed there are numerous arguments besides, which abundantly confute their vain imaginations. But we need not be hooted out of one; neither reason nor religion require this.”

John Wesley (1703–1791) Christian theologian

Nehemiah Curnock, ed., 'The Journal of the Rev. John Wesley, A.M.', London, Charles H. Kelly, vol. 5, p. 265 https://archive.org/stream/a613690405wesluoft#page/265/mode/1up (entry of 25 May 1768)
General sources

Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury photo
Giacomo Casanova photo
Paul Scholes photo

“I don't like compliments. No. I prefer criticisms; prefer to prove them wrong”

Paul Scholes (1974) English footballer

During an interview in the latter years of his career http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-YOti0icEbw

“I am not interested in illustrating my time. A man’s 'time' limits him; it does not truly liberate him. Our age – it is of science – of mechanism – of power and death. I see no point in adding to its mammoth arrogance the compliment of graphic homage.”

Clyfford Still (1904–1980) American artist

Clyfford Still in an interview with Ti Grace Sharpless, 1963; as quoted in Abstract Expressionism Creators and Critics, edited by Clifford Ross, Abrams Publishers New York 1990, p. 201
1960s

W. S. Gilbert photo
Henry David Thoreau photo
Helen Keller photo

“"You think you're so smart" is never a compliment; the only thing worse than being smart is thinking that you are.”

Laura Penny (1975) Canadian journalist

Source: More Money than Brains (2010), Chapter One, Don't Need No Edjumacation, p. 4

Tim Shadbolt photo
Gordon B. Hinckley photo
Arsène Wenger photo
MS Dhoni photo
Harry Emerson Fosdick photo
Henry Fielding photo
Philip Schaff photo
Jane Austen photo
Richard Rorty photo
Robert Denning photo

“Having people be impressed with a house is not a compliment. You don't want them to say, 'What a place!' You want them to sit down and enjoy it.”

Robert Denning (1927–2005) American interior designer

Suzanne Stephens, "Florida Renaissance — Italianate Splendors Enrich A Villa in Naples", Architectural Digest, October 2000, v. 57 #10, pp. 284-298.

“Compliments have lost their lure by the time a man does not have to fish for them.”

Henry S. Haskins (1875–1957)

Source: Meditations in Wall Street (1940), p. 100