Civil

Famous quotes containing the word civil:

    Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer,
    And, without sneering, teach the rest to sneer;
    Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike,
    Just hint a fault, and hesitate dislike;
    Alike reserved to blame, or to commend,
    A timorous foe, and a suspicious friend;
    Dreading e’en fools, by flatterers besieged,
    And so obliging, that he ne’er obliged;
    Like Cato, give his little senate laws,
    And sit attentive to his own applause:
    Alexander Pope (1688–1744)

    Physical force has no value, where there is nothing else. Snow in snow-banks, fire in volcanoes and solfataras is cheap. The luxury of ice is in tropical countries, and midsummer days. The luxury of fire is, to have a little on our hearth; and of electricity, not the volleys of the charged cloud, but the manageable stream on the battery-wires. So of spirit, or energy; the rests or remains of it in the civil and moral man, are worth all the cannibals in the Pacific.
    Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)

    The Count is neither sad, nor sick, nor merry, nor well; but civil count, civil as an orange, and something of that jealous complexion.
    William Shakespeare (1564–1616)