You can rob a person's dignity, but you can't spend it on yourself.
From Lonely in a Crowd, one of 296 sayings written by John Sarris over thirty years.
From Alfred’s journal
Outside the hardware store this afternoon a man in a good coat took a long slow look at the fellow sitting by the door with a cup, and then said something to his wife about people like that, loud enough to be heard, which was the point of saying it. The man with the cup went on looking at the sidewalk. What struck me was the face of the one in the coat afterward. He had gotten exactly what he came for and it had not fed him. For years I thought cruelty of that kind was a trade, that something passed from the one to the other, and that the taker went off heavier than he came. You can rob a person's dignity, but you can't spend it on yourself. I watched him all the way to his car and he never once looked lighter.
He reads what you tell him and writes a page of his journal back, with a few of these chosen for you. It costs nothing and asks for nothing.
Have it on something
More like it
- Waiting for someone else to change gives you a reason not to.
- The world is full of love and lonely people.
- Dogs possess a skill lacking in their masters, the ability to overlook human shortcomings.
- Dog is man's best friend, which says more for dog than man.
- Animals know when to sniff and when to bristle.
- Before you sharpen your tongue, remember that it spends most of its time in your mouth.