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41,128. I can live for two months on a good compliment. Mark Twain
98,556. Blanch: I was fishing for a compliment.
Stanley: I don’t go in for that stuff. Tennessee Williams, A Streetcar Named Desire
41,129. Everybody likes a good compliment. Abraham Lincoln
95,944. All the attributes of a perfect man. Thomas Edison, of Robert Ingersoll
82,658. This man’s rhetoric and ability to organise are unique. There was no situation he couldn’t deal with. The party members followed him with great love. The Stormtroopers would have let themselves be hewn to pieces for him. Goebbels, that was like Hitler himself. Goebbels, well that was our Goebbels. (Nazi & Compliment) Horst Wessel, 1920s
2,080. Marx discovered the law of development of human history: the simple fact, hitherto concealed by an overgrowth of ideology, that mankind must first of all eat and drink, have shelter and clothing, before it can pursue politics, science, religion and art; and that therefore the production of the immediate material means of life and consequently the degree of economic development ... form the foundation upon which the forms of government, the legal conceptions, the art and even the religious ideas of the people concerned have been evolved ... instead of vice versa as had hitherto been the case. (Life’s Like That & Eulogy & Compliment) Frederick Engels, graveside tribute to Karl Marx
42,387. For Marx was, before all else, a revolutionary. His real mission in life was to contribute in one way or another to the overthrow of capitalist society and of the forms of government which it had brought into being, to contribute to the liberation of the present day proletariat. (Capitalism & Marxism & Revolution & Working Class & Communism & Compliment) ibid.
2,591. During the 1950s, the first great age of molecular biology, the English Schools of Oxford and particularly of Cambridge produced more than a score of graduates of quite outstanding ability – much more brilliant, inventive, articulate and dialectically skilful than most young scientists; right up in the Watson class. But Watson had one towering advantage over all of them: in addition to being extremely clever he had something important to be clever about. (Science & Biology & Universities & Compliments) Peter Medawar
3,487. When he shall die,
Take him and cut him out in little stars,
And he will make the face of heaven so fine
That all the world will be in love with night
And pay no worship to the garish sun. (Star & Death & Heaven & World & Love & Worship & Sun & Compliment) William Shakespeare, Romeo and Juliet III ii @21
41,118. Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow world
Like a Colossus. William Shakespeare, Julius Caesar I ii 136-137
41,119. He reads much,
He is a great observer, and he looks
Quite through the deeds of men. ibid. I ii 202-204, Caesar to Anthony et al
41,120. Yet he’s gentle; never schooled, and yet learned; full of noble device; of all sorts enchantingly beloved; and indeed so much in the heart of the world, and especially of my own people, who best know him, that i am altogether misprized. William Shakespeare, As You Like It I i 156-160, Oliver
41,121. O, what a noble mind is here o’erthrown!
The courtier’s, soldier’s, scholar’s eye, tongue, sword,
The expectancy and rose of the fair state.
The glass of fashion and the mould of form,
Th’ observed of all observers – quite, quite down! William Shakespeare, Hamlet III i 149-153
41,122. He sits ’mongst men like a descended god. William Shakespeare, Cymbeline I vi 170, Giacomo
4,588. Muhammad Ali was the greatest man to ever box. He was the greatest man to do an interview. He was the greatest man to do about anything that’s ever been done. (Man & Boxing & Great & Compliment & Cool) George Foreman
4,811. And you’d find women – articulate, intelligent and impassioned. And among those women the most striking of all was Mary Wollstonecraft. She was the Spirit of the Times. Mary Wollstonecraft was a one-woman revolution. (Woman & Feminism & Suffragette & Compliment & Great Britain & England) Simon Schama, A History of Britain: Forces of Nature
8,828. Her joyousness and animal spirits radiated from her whole countenance and rendered every movement elastic and full of life and vigour. It was delightful and cheerful to behold her. Her dear face now rises. (Children & Compliment & Charles Darwin) Charles Darwin of Annie, personal notebook
10,132. Bernini: as architect, as sculpture, as painter, the man could do everything. (Art & Art: Bernini & Architecture & Sculpture & Painting & Compliment) Waldemar Januszczak, Baroque! – From St Peter’s to St Paul’s I, BBC 2013
10,481. Sometimes in a supernatural fashion a single body [da Vinci] is lavishly supplied with such beauty, grace and ability that ... each of his actions is so divine that he leaves behind all other men ... a genius endowed by God. Men saw this in Leonardo da Vinci. (Art & Talent & Compliment) Giogio Vasari
20,463. It was never about the money for Charlie. It was about the power and what went with it ... His fucking bed made itself in the mornings. That’s how cool he was ... As I said, he walked on fucking water. (GBH Films & Compliment) The Business 2005 starring Danny Dyer & Tamer Hassan & Geoff Bell & Georgina Chapman & Linda Henry & Roland Manookian & Camille Coduri & Andy Parfitt et al, director Nick Love
20,767. Raymond Shaw is the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful human being I have ever known in my life. (GBH Films & Brainwashing & Mind Control & Compliments) The Manchurian Candidate 1962 starring Frank Sinatra & Angela Lansbury & Janet Leigh & Laurence Harvey & Henry Silva & James Gregory & Leslie Parris & John McGiver et al, director John Frankenheimer, Sinatra
24,077. I see Captain James Kirk – a man of morality, decency, handsome and strong. (Star Trek & Compliment) Star Trek: The Deadly Years s2e12, Doctor Janet Wallace
27,450. I have listened to the boss. It was a kind of awakening. I listened to this voice and I knew that the messiah was in front of me. (Nazi: Hitler & Compliment) Joseph Goebbels, diary entry November 1925
27,451. Those big blues eyes like stars ... This man has all the qualities of a king. (Nazi: Hitler & Compliment) Joseph Goebbels, diary entry
28,106. He was this very intelligent, intense young lawyer, and she was an au pair. But she had a very good brain. Serge opened up Beate’s eyes to what happened during the war. And their life since then has been one long very very hardly fought campaign against injustice. (Nazi & Compliment & Injustice) Guy Walters, of Beate and Serge Klarsfeld
41,074. This was the end, Echekrates, of our friend; a man of whom we may say that of all whom we met at that time he was the wisest and justest and best. Plato, Phaedo