Pity

Pity

Pity originally means feeling for others, particularly feelings of sadness or sorrow, and was once used in a comparable sense to the more modern words "sympathy" and "empathy". Through insincere usage, it now has more unsympathetic connotations of feelings of superiority or condescension.

Read more about Pity.

Famous quotes containing the word pity:

    Men must learn now with pity to dispense,
    For policy sits above conscience.
    William Shakespeare (1564–1616)

    With the single exception of Homer, there is no eminent writer, not even Sir Walter Scott, whom I can despise so entirely as I despise Shakespear when I measure my mind against his.... But I am bound to add that I pity the man who cannot enjoy Shakespear. He has outlasted thousands of abler thinkers, and will outlast a thousand more.
    George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)

    So you, O nameless Duchess who die young,
    Meet death somewhat lovingly
    And I am filled with a pity of beholding skulls.
    There was no pride like yours.
    Allen Tate (1899–1979)