- Sherlock Holmes: I've had to deal with fifty murderers in my career, but the worst of them never gave me this sense of revulsion I feel at this moment toward Mr Charles Augustus Milverton.
- Doctor Watson: [reading] "Man who preys upon weakness with a smiling face and a heart of marble."
- Sherlock Holmes: A master blackmailer.
- Doctor Watson: [about Milverton] I exchanged a word with him. A more calculatingly insincere smile I never hope to see.
- Sherlock Holmes: He wrings the nerves of his victims to add to his already swollen moneybags. He is the WORST man in London.
- Lady Diana Swinstead: On my knees, I beg you... I implore you to show mercy.
- Charles Augustus Milverton: I'm not in the business of mercy, madam.
- Doctor Watson: Don't you think that the Honorable Miss Miles might be more worth a visit since Dorking wrote to you?
- Sherlock Holmes: That is past, Watson. What we must do now is foist ourselves onto his next victim.
- Sherlock Holmes: [hearing Watson's plan to catch Milverton] But legally we can not move until some victim is prepared to sacrifice their reputation by going to the police.
- Sherlock Holmes: Watson, you'll be interested to hear that I'm engaged to be married.
- Doctor Watson: [absorbed in his newspaper] Hm, yeah? Jolly good.
- Sherlock Holmes: To the Milvertons' housemaid.
- Doctor Watson: Good heavens.
- Charles Augustus Milverton: And yet here I find you, Mr. Holmes - a man of sense - boggling at terms when the whole future and honor of your client is at stake. You surprise me. You do, really.
- Doctor Watson: Surely, it would be better for you to take the substantial sum we offer than to ruin this young woman's career, which can profit you in no way.
- Charles Augustus Milverton: There, you're mistaken. An exposure would profit me indirectly to a considerable degree. I have eight or ten similar cases maturing. Ah, if it is circulated that I have made a severe example of Lady Eva, I shall find the rest much more open to reason. Do you see my point?
- Sherlock Holmes: I'd prefer you to direct your energies towards the gossip columns - hm! - the grasslands... grasslands, Watson, through which our serpent glides.