Simon Legree Quotes

He remembered deciding then that the world was full of Simon Legrees, and that you had to be an animal, as tough as the gorillas who worked with him at the warehouse, or starve.

It is better to have a Law Degree than to be a Simon Legree.

The Yankees refused to live up to the Federal law requiring the return of fugitive slaves; they closed their eyes to the beneficent aspects of slavery; they made heroes of such fantasies as Uncle Tom, and chose to look upon Christian slaveholders as Simon Legrees; they tolerated monsters like William Lloyd Garrison; they contributed money and support to John Brown, whose avowed purpose was the wholesale murder of Southern women and children, and when he was legally executed for his crimes they crowned his vile head with martyrdom. Yankees, moreover, were considered a race of hypocrites: While they were vilifying Southerners for enslaving blacks, they were keeping millions of white factory workers in a condition far worse than slavery; while denouncing Southern wickedness, they were advocating free love and all sorts of radical isms. All in all, Yankee society was a godless and grasping thing.

Great, now I’m a moron,” Vince grumbled, and nodded at me. “You see how smart you are with Simone Legree halfway up your ass.

His Plot to Overthrow Christmas was pure delight: first heard Dec. 25, 1938, on Words Without Music, it told of a scheme by the demons of Hell to assassinate Santa Claus. “Did you hear about the plot to overthrow Christmas?” the narrator began: “Well, gather ye now from Maine to the Isthmus/Of Panama, and listen to the story/Of the utter inglory/Of some gory goings-on in Hell.” In Hell, the listener met as motley a crew of villains as history and literature had yet devised: Ivan the Terrible, Haman, Caligula, Medusa, Simon Legree, and Circe (Mercy!). Nero was fiddling, as was his wont, while Borgia thought of the North Pole jaunt: “Just think how it would tickle us/To liquidate St. Nicholas!” But the plot failed as Nero, sent to do the deed, turned into mush at Santa’s feet. House Jameson starred as Santa, with Will Geer as the Devil and Eric Burroughs as Nero.