Contempt

Contempt

Contempt is a secondary emotion (not among the original six emotions) and is a mix of the primary emotions disgust and anger. The word originated in 1393, from the Latin word contemptus meaning "scorn." It is the past participle of contemnere and from com- intens. prefix + temnere "to slight, scorn." The origin is uncertain. Contemptuous appeared in 1529.

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Famous quotes containing the word contempt:

    What harm cause not those huge draughts or pictures which wanton youth with chalk or coals draw in each passage, wall or stairs of our great houses, whence a cruel contempt of our natural store is bred in them?
    Michel de Montaigne (1533–1592)

    Science has done great things for us; it has also pushed us hopelessly back. For, not content with filling its own place, it has tried to supersede everything else. It has challenged the super-eminence of religion; it has turned all philosophy out of doors except that which clings to its skirts; it has thrown contempt on all learning that does not depend on it; and it has bribed the skeptics by giving us immense material comforts.
    Katharine Fullerton Gerould (1879–1944)

    If ever a man and his wife, or a man and his mistress, who pass nights as well as days together, absolutely lay aside all good breeding, their intimacy will soon degenerate into a coarse familiarity, infallibly productive of contempt or disgust.
    Philip Dormer Stanhope, 4th Earl Chesterfield (1694–1773)