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More "Commiserate" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... in the attempt. The unfortunate generally meet with more blame than pity; for as the latter is a painful emotion, people endeavour to exonerate themselves from its indulgence, by trying to discover some error which may have led to the misfortune they are too selfish to commiserate. Alas! there are but few friends who, like ivy, cling to ruin, and —— is ...
— The Idler in France • Marguerite Gardiner
... or self-commendations. When, therefore, you pride yourselves on your superiority and civilisation the whole is a delusion; and when we hear you set forth these absurd pretensions, we are compelled to commiserate our common race, and to exclaim, Alas, poor human nature!" This is the 241 verbatim reply that a very intelligent but irritated Muselman made to my animadversions on the absurdity of burying treasure. This gentleman's father had been ambassador from the Emperor of ...
— An Account of Timbuctoo and Housa Territories in the Interior of Africa • Abd Salam Shabeeny
... to the savage state; and vice versa. Men in all states seem to have much the same proportion of happiness. We judge others with eyes accustomed to dwell on our own circumstances. I have seen the slave, whom we commiserate, enjoy his holiday with a rapture unknown to the grave freeman. I have seen that slave made free, and enriched by the benevolence of his master; and he has been gay no more. The masses of men in all countries are much the same. If there are greater comforts in the hardy ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... bourgeois pomposity that he can act to the life. Which things, my dear boy, ought to prove to you how much we care for our friends in adversity. Florine, whom I have had the weakness to forgive, begs you to send us an article on Nathan's hat. Fare thee well, my son. I can only commiserate you on finding yourself back in the same box from which you emerged when you discovered ...
— Lost Illusions • Honore De Balzac
... way to some very sincere and touching regrets that a piece of marvellous good fortune should have been so near her, and she actually obliged to decline it. In this natural emotion every properly regulated mind will certainly share. What good mother is there that would not commiserate a penniless spinster, who might have been my lady, and have shared four thousand a year? What well-bred young person is there in all Vanity Fair, who will not feel for a hard-working, ingenious, meritorious girl, who gets such an honourable, advantageous, provoking offer, just at the ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray
... herself as soon as the respect she owed the Count and Countess De Villefort would permit. The dejection of his friend soon alarmed the anxiety of the Count, to whom Du Pont, at length, confided the secret of his hopeless affection, which, however, the former could only commiserate, though he secretly determined to befriend his suit, if an opportunity of doing so should ever occur. Considering the dangerous situation of Du Pont, he but feebly opposed his intention of leaving Chateau-le-Blanc, on the following day, but drew from him a promise ...
— The Mysteries of Udolpho • Ann Radcliffe
... that she used these pretexts to conceal the true cause of her grief. 'Madam,' said I, 'so far from blaming, I assure you I heartily commiserate your sorrow. I should feel surprise if you were insensible to such heavy calamities: weep on; your tears are so many proofs of your tenderness; but I hope that time and ...
— The Arabian Nights - Their Best-known Tales • Unknown
... those which are driven before the gale. The Worst of it—another poem of the failures of love—reverses the conventional attitude of the wronged husband; he ought, according to all recognised authorities of drama and novel, rage against his faithless wife, and commiserate his virtuous self; here he endeavours, though vainly, to transfer every stain and shame to himself from her; his anguish is all on her behalf, or if on his own chiefly because he cannot restore her purity or save her from her wrong done against herself. It is a poem of moral stress and strain, ...
— Robert Browning • Edward Dowden
... affecting indolence or effeminacy or any other behavior that is not genuine. Many persons, fearing that on account of some such possession they may incur jealousy or danger, do much that is unworthy of themselves, expecting by such behavior to live in greater security. As a consequence they commiserate themselves, believing themselves wronged in this very particular, that they are not allowed to appear to live aright. Their ruler also suffers a loss because he is deprived of the services of good men, and suffers ill repute for the censure ...
— Dio's Rome, Vol. 4 • Cassius Dio
... more real than what he has held to be realities to learn from the sudden snapping off of life and activity. I find myself filled with an immense pity for him; and yet if my faith were a little stronger and purer, I should congratulate rather than commiserate him. And yet the thought of him in his bewilderment helps me too, for I see my own life as in a mirror. I have received a message of truth, the message that the accomplishment of our plans and cherished designs is not the best thing that can befall us. How easy to see that in ...
— The Altar Fire • Arthur Christopher Benson
... 740; charity, ruth, long- suffering. melting mood; argumentum ad misericordiam [Lat.], quarter, grace, locus paenitentiae [Lat.]. sympathizer; advocate, friend, partisan, patron, wellwisher. V. pity; have pity, show pity, take pity &c n.; commiserate, compassionate; condole &c 915; sympathize; feel for, be sorry for, yearn for; weep, melt, thaw, enter into the feelings of. forbear, relent, relax, give quarter, wipe the tears, parcere subjectis [Lat.], give a coup de grace, put out of one's misery. raise ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget
... Chinese on horseback, very well dressed, and who had the air and appearance of a gentleman, came down to the shore, and, as far as could be understood by his signs, seemed to censure the conduct of his countrymen, and to commiserate the officer, being wonderfully officious to assist in getting him on board the boat: But notwithstanding this behaviour, it was shrewdly suspected that he was an accomplice in the theft, and time fully evinced ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr
... land,—without great emotion. During a peregrination of more than five hundred miles, exposed to the burning rays of a tropical sun, these poor slaves, amidst their own infinitely greater sufferings, would commiserate mine, and frequently, of their own accord, bring water to quench my thirst, and at night collect branches and leaves to prepare me a bed in the wilderness. We parted with mutual regret and blessings. My good wishes and prayers were all I could bestow upon them, ...
— An Appeal in Favor of that Class of Americans Called Africans • Lydia Maria Child
... lingering and more terrible fate at the last. All night long those melancholy sounds continued, and though they might have been heard by my companions, they did not appear to disturb their repose. I scarcely knew whether to envy or commiserate their apathy. ...
— Manco, the Peruvian Chief - An Englishman's Adventures in the Country of the Incas • W.H.G. Kingston
... vessel in company, which, upon signal, saved their lives, and took the boat up: or that the boat might be driven into the main ocean, where these poor creatures might be in the most miserable condition. But as all these conjectures were very uncertain, I could do no more than commiserate there distress, and thank God for delivering me, in particular, when so many perished ...
— The Life and Most Surprising Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of - York, Mariner (1801) • Daniel Defoe
... spread about the city, a great press of curious onlookers came crowding before the Palace. Some said, "Lo! a good deed well done!" Others, and these the more part, at sight of so lamentable a spectacle, were filled with ruth. Yet durst they not openly commiserate the Prince's victims, for fear of evil handling by his armed dependents, which were set to guard the bodies. Young men gazed at the Princess's corse, for to discover the traces of that beauty which had been her undoing, while the little children would be expounding one to the other the meaning ...
— The Well of Saint Clare • Anatole France
... flattery or wheedling or playing on the man's weaknesses; whereas in America the husband's duty and desire is to gratify the wife, and render to her those services which the English tyrant exacts from his consort. One may often hear an American matron commiserate a friend who has married in Europe, while the daughters declare in chorus that they will never follow the example. Laughable as all this may seem to English women, it is perfectly true that the theory as well as the practice of conjugal life is not the ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 6 • Various
... the steps supporting the tall steel gate, through which, in former days, I had seen many a poor devil pass; it was now others' turn to commiserate, or to jeer, the poor devil that was myself. There was no delay—we seemed to be awaited; and in the next minute I had felt what it is to be locked into a prison. I was behind bars, and could not get out at my own will—nor at any one else's, for that matter; only at the impersonal ...
— The Subterranean Brotherhood • Julian Hawthorne
... a corner, with half its feathers out," she said, with a tenderness in her voice that seemed to commiserate the sufferings of humanity while resting assured in the capacity of Ralph Denham to alleviate them, so that Mrs. Hilbery could ...
— Night and Day • Virginia Woolf
... Points tempted like us; so that as he himself has suffer'd, being tempted, he knows how more compassionately to succour those that are under the like Trials[a]. Now this must surely intimate, that it is not in human Nature, even in its most perfect State, so tenderly to commiserate any Sorrows, as those which our own Hearts have felt: As we cannot form a perfect Idea of any bitter Kind of Draught, by the most exact Description, till we have ourselves tasted it. It is probably for this Reason, ...
— Submission to Divine Providence in the Death of Children • Phillip Doddridge
... he, who is genuinely compassionate, rather there were nothing for him to grieve for. For if good will be ill willed (which can never be), then may he, who truly and sincerely commiserates, wish there might be some miserable, that he might commiserate. Some sorrow may then be allowed, none loved. For thus dost Thou, O Lord God, who lovest souls far more purely than we, and hast more incorruptibly pity on them, yet are wounded with no sorrowfulness. And who ...
— The Confessions of Saint Augustine • Saint Augustine
... instructed me diplomatically to boast of the attentions which I had received from the Touaricks, for observed the Consul, "If you say the Touaricks did not treat you well in every respect, the Bashaw will commiserate you before your face, but laugh at you behind your back, and tell his people how happy he is (and I'm sure he will be happy) you have been well fleeced by the Touaricks, of whom the Turks here are jealous in the extreme." Mr. Gagliuffi also volunteered a diplomatic ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson
... condition if that movement could exist and there could be at the same time a retrograde movement as to the rights of women.... I have grown philosophical with reference to the temporary defeats that we suffer. The thing to do is to commiserate those who bring about the defeats. I look at the black disgrace with which they will live in history who said they would die for their own rights and yet were tyrants enough to deny the rights of others.... The hour is quickly coming ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume V • Ida Husted Harper
... because she is penniless. I say nothing against him for doing so, for it was an indisputable right of his, but when we view the brutality of the act—when we think of the hardness of the heart that could not commiserate with the situation of Mrs. Wentworth—that was deaf to the appeals of a mother—blind to the illness of her child—the soul sickens with horror at the knowledge that a mortal so debased—so utterly devoid of the instincts of humanity which govern a brute—should exist on the ...
— The Trials of the Soldier's Wife - A Tale of the Second American Revolution • Alex St. Clair Abrams
... the same holy father, which is, that the same Jesus Christ, whom we refuse to nourish in the persons of the poor, feeds our souls with his precious body and blood. If such considerations move not our hearts to commiserate and assist the indigent, what share of mercy and relief can we hope for in the hour of need? Oh, incomprehensible blindness! we perhaps prepare for ourselves an eternal abyss, by those very means which, properly applied, would secure as the conquest of ...
— The Lives of the Fathers, Martyrs, and Principal Saints - January, February, March • Alban Butler
... it was so; but the fact was clear enough to the few persons who used to visit them at Angleford. Her friend, Clara Graham, for instance, the wife of a London journalist, who came down now and then to spend a holiday in her native village, would attempt to commiserate Lettice on the hardness of her lot; but Lettice would not listen to anything of the kind. She was too loyal to permit a word to be spoken in her presence which might seem to reflect upon her ...
— Name and Fame - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant
... carried off their whole booty unmolested. No sooner were they gone, than a Chinese on horseback, very well dressed, and who had the air and appearance of a gentleman, came down to the shore, and, as far as could be understood by his signs, seemed to censure the conduct of his countrymen, and to commiserate the officer, being wonderfully officious to assist in getting him on board the boat: But notwithstanding this behaviour, it was shrewdly suspected that he was an accomplice in the theft, and time fully evinced the justice of ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr
... Gay, and in their correspondence there are many allusions to him. "Mr. Gay," wrote Swift to Pope, "is a scandal to all lusty young fellows with healthy countenances; and, I think, he is not intemperate in a physical sense. I am told he has an asthma, which is a disease I commiserate more than deafness, because it will not leave a man quiet either ...
— Life And Letters Of John Gay (1685-1732) • Lewis Melville
... the day, and I regret for your sake that you have to return here. I know that the powerful interest of your life is gone. But I am glad that you have had five, six, seven, or eight hours of passionate pleasure"? Not a bit! His wife's face says to him: "I commiserate with you on all that you have been through. It is a great shame that you should be compelled to toil thus painfully. But I will try to make it up to you. I will soothe you. I will humour you. Forget anxiety and fatigue in my smiles." She does not fetch ...
— The Plain Man and His Wife • Arnold Bennett
... if she had been alone with her tribe in the bush; but she took advantage of my presence, and escaped with nearly one-third of the incisions deficient. At this ceremony many other natives of both sexes, and of all ages were standing looking on; but so little did they commiserate the poor creature's sufferings, that the degree of her pain only seemed to be the measure of ...
— Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central • Edward John Eyre
... wonderfully contriv'd to influence the Reader with Pity and Compassion towards them. Tho Adam involves the whole Species in Misery, his Crime proceeds from a Weakness which every Man is inclined to pardon and commiserate, as it seems rather the Frailty of Human Nature, than of the Person who offended. Every one is apt to excuse a Fault which he himself might have fallen into. It was the Excess of Love for Eve, that ruin'd Adam, and his Posterity. I need not add, that the Author is justify'd ...
— The Spectator, Volume 2. • Addison and Steele
... him adieu with malicious suspicion. What was he doing hanging around there? In search of his usual lucky adventure? . . . And their smiles were rather grave, the smiles of older folk who know the true significance of life and commiserate the deluded ones still seeking diversion ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... a free course to my tears! Eliza was my friend. Reader, whosoe'er thou art, forgive me this involuntary motion;—let my mind dwell upon Eliza. If I have sometimes moved thee to compassionate the calamities of the human race, let me now prevail upon thee to commiserate my own misfortune. I was thy friend without knowing thee; be for a moment mine. Thy gentle pity ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, No. 486 - Vol. 17, No. 486., Saturday, April 23, 1831 • Various
... of a personable body, and an ingenious aspect howsoever both were clouded under a rustick habit, began somewhat to commiserate his estate, and knocking for a servant had him take in that fellow and give him such victuals as the house for the present afforded, and at his return he would have further conference with him. The servant did as he was commanded ...
— The History of Sir Richard Whittington • T. H.
... contrast with the magnificence and dash of his attire, for he was dressed, regardless of expense, as a Hungarian magnate of the first water, and he rejected with sombre scorn all attempts made by friends to commiserate him. His nearer acquaintances knew for a certainty that he would thus remain seated on top of an empty wine cask until the very close of the ball. For whenever the black devils of drink cast their spell over him in this fashion it required from four ...
— A Little Garrison - A Realistic Novel of German Army Life of To-day • Fritz von der Kyrburg
... listen, without even acted displeasure, to the talk of the youth's blind passion; she allowed his soft pity to soothe her. Several times she had been moved to tears as she listened to Calyste's promises; and she suffered him to commiserate her for being bound to an evil genius, a man as false as Conti. More than once she related to him the misery and anguish she had gone through in Italy, when she first became aware that she was not alone in Conti's heart. On this subject Camille had fully informed Calyste and given ...
— Beatrix • Honore de Balzac
... landlady, a commiserate landlord, a warm potation, and the promise of excellent beds, all appeared to our squire to make ample amends for the intelligence that the inn was not licensed to let post-horses; and mine host having promised forthwith to send two stout ...
— Paul Clifford, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... such a matter was natural to him. He conceived that it behoved a woman to be weak, irascible, affectionate, irrational, and soft-hearted. When Julia would be loud in condemnation of her cousin, and would pretend to commiserate the woes of the poor wife who had been left in Australia, though he knew the source of these feelings, he could not be in the least angry with her. But that was not at all the state of his mind in reference to his son-in-law Augustus Smirkie. Sometimes, as he had heard ...
— John Caldigate • Anthony Trollope
... committee may commiserate with the degraded condition of the negro, and feel for his fate, yet they can never consent to open the doors of our beautiful State and invite him to settle our lands. The policy of other States would drive the whole black population of the Union upon us. The ballot box would fall into their hands ...
— History of the Constitutions of Iowa • Benjamin F. Shambaugh
... They commiserate also my accidents and chances:—but MY word saith: "Suffer the chance to come unto me: innocent is it as a ...
— Thus Spake Zarathustra - A Book for All and None • Friedrich Nietzsche
... qualification an organized massacre perpetrated unblushingly under its very eyes. As for the distinguished man who lent himself to be the mouthpiece of adulation worse than slavish, we are less inclined to commiserate the difficulty of his position than to pity the ingenuous historian who strives to touch leniently upon a fault of his father which he can neither conceal nor palliate.[1061] We may credit his assertion that his ...
— History of the Rise of the Huguenots - Volume 2 • Henry Baird
... wretchedness: and if they were merely human and not brutal, Nature did grievous wrong to human bodies, to curse them with souls so cruel as to strive to add to a wretchedness already intolerable. When a Mason hears of any man that hath fallen into public disgrace, he should have a mind to commiserate his mishap, and not to make him more disconsolate. To envenom a name by libels, that already is openly tainted, is to add stripes with an iron rod to one that is flayed with whipping; and to every well-tempered mind will seem most inhuman ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike
... person, but failed in the attempt. The unfortunate generally meet with more blame than pity; for as the latter is a painful emotion, people endeavour to exonerate themselves from its indulgence, by trying to discover some error which may have led to the misfortune they are too selfish to commiserate. Alas! there are but few friends who, like ivy, cling to ruin, and —— ...
— The Idler in France • Marguerite Gardiner
... distinguishable from the admittedly insane. And this way of thinking of illusion and its subjects is strengthened by one of the characteristic sentiments of our age. The nineteenth century intelligence plumes itself on having got at the bottom of mediaeval visions and church miracles, and it is wont to commiserate the feeble minds that are still subject to ...
— Illusions - A Psychological Study • James Sully
... an heiress;—like her, you are fatherless, though not like her friendless! If she is awaited by the temptations of adversity, you, also, are surrounded by the corruptions of prosperity. Your fall is most probable, her's most excusable;—commiserate her therefore now,—by and by she may ...
— Cecilia Volume 1 • Frances Burney
... iniquitous in itself, would be, above all, unworthy and ungraceful in you; with you rests the origin of the war now appertaining to all Greece. Insufferable, indeed, if the Athenians, once the authors of liberty to many, were now the authors of the servitude of Greece. We commiserate your melancholy condition —your privation for two years of the fruits of your soil, your homes destroyed, and your fortunes ruined. We, the Spartans, and the other allies, will receive your women and all who ...
— Athens: Its Rise and Fall, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... an address at the Town Hall recruiting-depot, go to a theatre, and then as there seemed nothing else to be done, would return to the hospital. Such was my programme for ninety days. Sometimes I varied it by visiting the Zoo to commiserate with the ...
— "Over There" with the Australians • R. Hugh Knyvett
... town than to the overthrow of his own heirship. At least so he manifestly and honestly believed, and knowing it to be one of those faiths that make themselves facts, the Kirkaldys did not disturb him in it, nor commiserate him for a loss which they thought the best thing possible ...
— Nuttie's Father • Charlotte M. Yonge
... that would ruin his influence with Richard; still he wanted some present credit for his discernment and devotion. The boys got away from dinner, and, after deep consultation, agreed upon a course of conduct, which was to commiserate with Farmer Blaize loudly, and make themselves look as much like the public as it was possible for two young malefactors to look, one of whom already felt Adrian's enormous A devouring his back with the fierceness of the Promethean eagle, and isolating him forever ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... she used these pretexts to conceal the true cause of her grief. 'Madam,' said I, 'so far from blaming, I assure you I heartily commiserate your sorrow. I should feel surprise if you were insensible to such heavy calamities: weep on; your tears are so many proofs of your tenderness; but I hope that time and reflection will ...
— The Arabian Nights - Their Best-known Tales • Unknown
... in a foreign land,—without great emotion. During a peregrination of more than five hundred miles, exposed to the burning rays of a tropical sun, these poor slaves, amidst their own infinitely greater sufferings, would commiserate mine, and frequently, of their own accord, bring water to quench my thirst, and at night collect branches and leaves to prepare me a bed in the wilderness. We parted with mutual regret and blessings. My good wishes and prayers were all I could bestow upon them, and it afforded ...
— An Appeal in Favor of that Class of Americans Called Africans • Lydia Maria Child
... without exception, celebrate it as a sublime sacrifice of all temporal interests to religious principle. The best instructed foreigners, in like manner, however they may condemn the details of its execution, or commiserate the sufferings of the Jews, commend the act, as evincing the most lively and laudable zeal ...
— The History of the Reign of Ferdinand and Isabella The Catholic, V2 • William H. Prescott
... one need commiserate with her. Instead of any terror at her situation a wild joy sprang up within her. Relief and freedom clapped their ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume IX (of X) • Various
... Above the portal, in the stonework, are two false windows, in which two figures, a man and a woman, apparently household servants, are represented, in sculpture, as looking down into the street. The effect is homely, yet grotesque, and the figures are sufficiently living to make one commiserate them for having been condemned, in so dull a town, to spend several centuries at the window. They appear to be watching for the return of their master, who left his beautiful house one ...
— A Little Tour in France • Henry James
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