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More "Flatter" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... her very name away as a faded flower, she will be praying, hoping, fearing for you; though all men deny you, yet will not she. Yes, Mr. Burr, if ever your popularity and prosperity should leave you and those who now flatter should despise and curse you, she will always be interceding with her own heart and with God for you, and making a thousand excuses where she cannot deny; and if you die, as I fear you have lived, unreconciled to the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 4, No. 25, November, 1859 • Various
... had been her lover, he had never told her how beautiful she was. She might have understood his meaning. Those whom we flatter we no ...
— Debts of Honor • Maurus Jokai
... The country now becomes flatter, particularly on the left bank, where extend the immense plains of Wallachia, and the eye finds no object on which it can rest. On the right hand rise terrace-like rows of hills and mountains, and the background is bounded by the sharply-defined lines of the ...
— A Visit to the Holy Land • Ida Pfeiffer
... in the approaching battle. The measure that he had referred to was one to which the Romans were not accustomed to resort except in emergencies of the most extreme and dangerous character, and Pyrrhus ought not to flatter himself with the idea that the Romans regarded his invasion as of sufficient consequence to require them to have recourse to any unusual means of defense. They were fully convinced of their ability to meet and conquer him by ordinary modes of warfare. To prove that they ...
— Pyrrhus - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... essential. Few artists, not barring some of the greatest, play with perfect intonation. Its control depends first of all on the ear. And a sensitive ear finds differences and shading; it bids the violinist play a trifle sharper, a trifle flatter, according to the general harmonic color of the accompaniment; it leads him to observe a difference, when the harmonic atmosphere demands it, between a C sharp in the key of E major and a D flat in the ...
— Violin Mastery - Talks with Master Violinists and Teachers • Frederick H. Martens
... Sophy," said he, addressing himself to her companion, "give me leave to implore your intercession with your cousin. I am sure you have humanity enough to espouse my cause, did you but know the justice of it; and I flatter myself that by your kind interposition I may be able to rectify that fatal misunderstanding which hath made me wretched."—"Sir," said Sophy, "you appear like a gentleman, and I doubt not but your behaviour has been always ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... green and red jasper, and quartz-crystal flakes, arrowheads, cores, and saw-blades. Chert and limestone rough hoe-blades (easily mistaken for palaeolithic implements; they are, however, much flatter); polished serpentine or jasper celts; lentoid (lentil-shaped), amygdaloid (almond-shaped), and discoid beads of cornelian, crystal, obsidian, &c., unpolished; nails of translucent quartz and obsidian (obviously imitations of metal ...
— How to Observe in Archaeology • Various
... said. "Flatter me. Make me get swelled head. Don't think of the consequences. Ladle it out. Tell me I look ...
— Coquette • Frank Swinnerton
... liquidating the claims for indemnity for slaves carried away after the close of the war has been sitting, with doubtful prospects of success. Propositions of compromise have, however, passed between the two Governments, the result of which we flatter ourselves may yet prove unsatisfactory. Our own dispositions and purposes toward Great Britain are all friendly and conciliatory; nor can we abandon but with strong reluctance the belief that they ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... with an assumption of ignorance, Luna's broad hints of guilty complicity; but his sagacity failed utterly to comprehend Pierre's more cunning silence. Pierre was actively acquainted with Morrison's weak points, and while he ceased not to flatter them he never neglected to gather rewards for his labour. If the fabled crow had had the wit to swallow his cheese before he began to sing he would at least have had a full stomach to console himself for being duped. ...
— Blue Goose • Frank Lewis Nason
... am at all a joodge of pheesogs, and a flatter meself a am," said a raw-boned Scotch Captain of Grenadiers, measuring six feet two in his stockings, "yon geerl has a bit of the deevil in her ee, therefor, me lads, tak heed that nane o' ye lose yer ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson
... censures, and even of annihilation; but no real punishment seemed to fall upon him. It may be doubted whether, when the whole arrangement was settled for him, and when he heard that Camilla had yielded to the decrees of Fate, he did not rather flatter himself on being a successful man of intrigue,—whether he did not take some glory to himself for his good fortune with women, and pride himself amidst his self-reproaches for the devotion which had been displayed for him by the fair sex in general. It is quite ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope
... Richard replied. "I have been shaping out in my mind a little speech which I flatter myself will cover the points. They have brought this thing upon themselves, and we are about to have the clearest of understandings. I ...
— The Stillwater Tragedy • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... came home, and the empress sat down near him, and began to coax and flatter him into a good humour, and at last ...
— The Violet Fairy Book • Various
... me at the coast yonder but would go with you very, very gladly, for they love France, these brave gentlemen, and they think that I can serve her better than most other men. That is very flattering, is it not? But all the world conspires to flatter me, mademoiselle. Your good brother, by example, prizes my company so highly that he would infallibly hang the gentleman who rode back with you. So, you conceive, I cannot avail myself of their services. But with me it is different, hein? ...
— The Line of Love - Dizain des Mariages • James Branch Cabell
... presence of her injured friends. She was not studying how to conceal or palliate her offence, but how she could best tell the whole truth. She gave herself no credit for any good deed she had done during her absence; she did not flatter herself that she had been benevolent and kind in using the stolen money as she had used it; she did not believe that her tender vigil at the bedside of the dying ...
— Hope and Have - or, Fanny Grant Among the Indians, A Story for Young People • Oliver Optic
... Canada, he would have laid low till he'd made his investments. So my theory is that he's got all the money he took with him except his living expenses. I believe I can find Northwick, and I am not going to come home without trying hard. I am going to have a detective's legal outfit, and I flatter myself I can get Northwick over the frontier somehow, and restore him to the arms of his anxious friends of the Ponkwasset Company. I don't know yet just how I shall do it, but I guess I shall do it. I shall have Mrs. Pinney's advice and counsel, and she's a team; but I shall have to leave her ...
— The Quality of Mercy • W. D. Howells
... men flatter themselves with their great actions, they are not so often the result of great design as ...
— Familiar Quotations • John Bartlett
... done, he refused to give me one dollar for, and it was with great difficulty that I got my money back. I had to put it into another man's hands, as his property, to recover it. This man, probably, had two objects in view when he went to Waterbury to flatter me away. He did not want me to be there with my name on the movements and cases, and therefore he made me a first-rate offer. I had been broken up in all my business, and felt very anxious to be doing something again. I was a little afraid when he made the ...
— History of the American Clock Business for the Past Sixty Years, - and Life of Chauncey Jerome • Chauncey Jerome
... "You flatter yourself," he retorted. "You'd not be known. Old Jumel will give you the pick of the larder for a kiss," he roared in my sullen face, and added, relenting: "Well, then, I will send one of the lackeys up with a salver. The lazy beggars have ...
— Helmet of Navarre • Bertha Runkle
... but one. I do the cooking'; and the Countess, ever disposed to flatter and be suave, even when stung by a ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... of wealth, &c., always produce the same effect, although already somewhat worn by use. But the candidate who hits on a new formula as devoid as possible of precise meaning, and apt in consequence to flatter the most varied aspirations, infallibly obtains a success. The sanguinary Spanish revolution of 1873 was brought about by one of these magical phrases of complex meaning on which everybody can put his own interpretation. A contemporary writer has described the launching ...
— The Crowd • Gustave le Bon
... faith in general are attacked by the servants of Satan, and the one concerning the Trinity is in particular beginning to be derided confidently by some skeptics and Epicureans. These are ably assisted not only by those Italian grammarians [Humanists] and orators, which they flatter themselves to be, but also by some Italico-German vipers and others, or, as you are accustomed to call them, viper-aspides, who sow their seed here and there in their discourses and writings, and, as Paul says [2 Tim. ...
— Historical Introductions to the Symbolical Books of the Evangelical Lutheran Church • Friedrich Bente
... give me but a sorry proof of your love; this, 'Ah! have you returned so soon?' is scarcely the language a heart really inflamed with love would use on such an occasion as this. I dared to flatter myself I had remained away from you too long. The expectation of an ardently longed for return makes each moment seem of great length; the absence of what we love, however brief it may be, is always ...
— Amphitryon • Moliere
... of that. The bachelors here they'd see their sweethearts carry the roof into next parish on their backs, like a snail, and never put out a hand; 't is not the custom hereaway. But, as I was saying, Paul and our Mercy kept company, after a manner: he never had the wit to flatter her as should he, nor the stomach to bid her name the day and he'd buy the ring; but he talked to her about his sick beasts more than he did to any other girl in the parish, and she'd have ended by going to Church with him; only you came and put ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 104, June, 1866 • Various
... life in trifles and die without a memorial, many flatter themselves with high opinion of their own importance and imagine that they are every day adding some improvement to human life."—"Some turn the wheel of electricity, some suspend rings to a loadstone, and find ...
— The Poet at the Breakfast Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... thou canst do all things. But behold, I will go with thee to the land of Middoni; for the king of the land of Middoni, whose name is Antiomno, is a friend unto me; therefore I go to the land of Middoni, that I may flatter the king of the land, and he will cast thy brethren out of prison. Now Lamoni said unto him: Who told thee that thy brethren ...
— The Book Of Mormon - An Account Written By The Hand Of Mormon Upon Plates Taken - From The Plates Of Nephi • Anonymous
... and most comfortable appearance. The veranda may appear more ornamental than the plain character of the house requires; but any superfluous work upon it may be omitted, and the style of finish conformed to the other. The veranda roof is flatter than that of the house, but it may be made perfectly tight by closer shingling, and paint; while the deck or platform in the centre may be roofed with zinc, or tin, and a coat of sanded paint laid upon it. The front chimney is plain, yet in keeping with the general style of the house, ...
— Rural Architecture - Being a Complete Description of Farm Houses, Cottages, and Out Buildings • Lewis Falley Allen
... of the earth is free? My youth is still like a blue and cloudless sky. If I set myself to obtain wealth or power, does it mean that I must make up my mind to lie, and fawn, and cringe, and swagger, and flatter, and dissemble? To consent to be the servant of others who have likewise fawned, and lied, and flattered? Must I cringe to them before I can hope to be their accomplice? Well, then, I decline. I mean to work nobly and with a single ...
— Father Goriot • Honore de Balzac
... show that the question is one requiring calm consideration; though I must, at the same time, admit that they prove a strong necessity of some settlement for the preservation of that good understanding which, I trust, we may flatter ourselves that our joint labors have now ...
— The Great Speeches and Orations of Daniel Webster • Daniel Webster
... Circumstances induced me to flatter myself, that a Work of this Kind would be agreeable to Your MAJESTY; and should this Attempt towards pointing out the Means of alleviating those Miseries, which necessarily attend a Military Life in the Time of Service, be ...
— An Account of the Diseases which were most frequent in the British military hospitals in Germany • Donald Monro
... Steve. "I'll lie a little flatter, because the sun and the wetting has made my head ache. ...
— The Long Roll • Mary Johnston
... Isabella; but failing hopelessly in both instances. You have seen him, when he realized the failure of an attempt which had made Rome too dangerous for him and compelled him to remain in exile, suddenly veering round to fawn and flatter and win the friendship of one whom his ...
— The Life of Cesare Borgia • Raphael Sabatini
... be damned," said the stranger, "as I flatter myself he will be, if he does not look more to his own sins and less to those of his neighbors. Look yonder, and see ...
— The Great English Short-Story Writers, Vol. 1 • Various
... among them, people in this country now attach a rational importance only to their quarrels, which formerly attracted universal attention. The revolution has been so great an event; it has overthrown such great interests; that no one here can any longer flatter himself with exciting a personal interest, except by performing ...
— Paris As It Was and As It Is • Francis W. Blagdon
... that white-veiled witch stares at me with her golden eyes?" said Nick. "Wish I could flatter myself she ...
— The Port of Adventure • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... vast, the unknown; any presentiment, any extravagance of faith, the Spiritualist adopts it as most in nature. The Oriental mind has always tended to this largeness. Buddhism is an expression of it. The Buddhist, who thanks no man, who says, 'Do not flatter your benefactors,' but who in his conviction that every good deed can by no possibility escape its reward, will not deceive the benefactor by pretending that he has done more than he should, ...
— Ralph Waldo Emerson • Oliver Wendell Holmes
... In truth, it simply told him of the completion of the cattle-shed, of her father's health, and of the milk which the little cow gave; but she signed herself his affectionate cousin, and the letter was very gratifying to him. There were two lines of a postscript, which could not but flatter him: 'Papa is so anxious for Christmas, that you may be here again and so, indeed, am I also.' Of course it will be understood that this was written before Clara's visit to Perivale, and before Mrs Winterfield's death. Indeed, much happened in Clara's history ...
— The Belton Estate • Anthony Trollope
... 1635, in which he tells him she died almost without pain, and with a deep sense of religion. "My wife and I, says he, bear this misfortune like people accustomed to adversity: besides, why should we call her death a misfortune? has not God a right to take back what he gave? and ought not we to flatter ourselves that she is arrived at that happy state, which the young ought to long after as much as the old? We are delivered from the care of procuring a husband for her: perhaps we should have had much difficulty to find one that would have been agreeable to her and to all her family: ...
— The Life of the Truly Eminent and Learned Hugo Grotius • Jean Levesque de Burigny
... female dog, that mass of carneying affectations, shines equally in either sphere; rules her rough posse of attendant swains with unwearying tact and gusto; and with her master and mistress pushes the arts of insinuation to their crowning point. The attention of man and the regard of other dogs flatter (it would thus appear) the same sensibility; but perhaps, if we could read the canine heart, they would be found to flatter it in very different degrees. Dogs live with man as courtiers round a monarch, steeped in the flattery of his notice and enriched with sinecures. To push ...
— Memories and Portraits • Robert Louis Stevenson
... bliss With one fraternal kiss." The Cock replied, "Upon my word, A better thing I never heard; And doubly I rejoice To hear it from your voice; There really must be something in it, For yonder come two greyhounds, which I flatter Myself are couriers on this very matter. They come so fast, they'll be here in a minute. I'll down, and all of us will seal the blessing With general kissing and caressing." "Adieu," said Fox; "my errand's pressing; I'll hurry on my way, And we'll rejoice some ...
— The Talking Beasts • Various
... from every prince, zealous co-operation from every stadtholder; not merely a description of the present posture of affairs, or conjectures as to what might take place were events suffered to hold on their course without interruption. To contemplate a mighty evil, to flatter oneself with hope, to trust to time, to strike a blow, like the clown in a play, so as to make a noise and appear to do something, when in fact one would fain do nothing; is not such conduct calculated to awaken a suspicion that those who act thus ...
— Egmont - A Tragedy In Five Acts • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
... limousine and consequently employs a chauffeur. To meet and make this chauffeur mine took me just two days. I don't know how I did it. I never know how I do it," he added with a sheepish smile as Mr. Gryce gave utterance to his old-fashioned "Umph!" "I don't flatter and I don't bring out my pocketbook or offer drinks or even cigars, but I get 'em, as you know, and get 'em strong, perhaps because I don't ...
— The Mystery of the Hasty Arrow • Anna Katharine Green
... maintained against desperate odds; of lives dearly sold when resistance could be maintained no more; of signal deliverance, and of unsparing revenge. Whatever gave a stronger air of reality to a narrative so well calculated to inflame the passions and to flatter national pride, was ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson
... queer accent of politeness in the voice of the speaker. He did not seem to have uttered these words in order to flatter his listener, but to express his real sentiment. ...
— Mohun, or, The Last Days of Lee • John Esten Cooke
... is a part of our being; therefore when you are behaving yourself like a true man, do not flatter yourself that you are doing any superhuman feat. And do not, as some do, have a sort of stupid contempt for people who respect truth, honesty, and purity, people who work hard at school, never insult their masters, and try to get on in the world without soiling their fingers and draggling their ...
— The Story of Baden-Powell - 'The Wolf That Never Sleeps' • Harold Begbie
... to me. Money for writing verses! One dollar would be as ridiculous as a thousand. I should as soon have thought of being paid for thinking! My mother, fortunately, was sensible enough never to flatter me or let me be flattered about my scribbling. It never was allowed to hinder any work I had to do. I crept away into a corner to write what came into my head, just as I ran away to play; and I looked upon it only as my most ...
— A New England Girlhood • Lucy Larcom
... him. I was much agitated, and recollecting his prejudice against the Scotch, of which I had heard much, I said to Davies, "Don't tell where I came from." "From Scotland," cried Davies, roguishly. "Mr. Johnson" (said I), "I do indeed come from Scotland, but I can not help it." I am willing to flatter myself that I meant this as light pleasantry to soothe and conciliate him, and not as an humiliating abasement at the expense of my country. But however that might be, this speech was somewhat unlucky; ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Vol. V (of X) - Great Britain and Ireland III • Various
... stayed. The mere presence of a young man had altered her disposition curiously, and filled her with a desire for a scene which should end in an emotional forgiveness. She would have given much to clasp both nephew and niece in her arms. But she could not flatter herself that any hope ...
— Night and Day • Virginia Woolf
... the strongest and the one most to be feared," continued Alvarez musingly, "I am not saying it to flatter you, but because it is a matter that I have weighed well for reasons pertaining to statecraft. There sentiment or personal liking cannot count. I have plans, large plans, in regard to this country. I suppose that every ambitious man ...
— The Free Rangers - A Story of the Early Days Along the Mississippi • Joseph A. Altsheler
... Roger, with whom by and by I discoursed largely, and in short he gives me good counsel, but tells me plainly that it is my best way to study a composition with my uncle Thomas, for that law will not help us, and that it is but a folly to flatter ourselves, with which, though much to my trouble, yet I was well satisfied, because it told me what I am to trust to, ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys
... mixture of novelty and vanity is the usual prop, no wonder if it fall with the slender stay. The fop in the play paid a greater compliment than he was aware of when he said to a person, whom he meant to flatter, "I like you almost as well as a new acquaintance." Why am I talking of friendship, after which I have had such a wild-goose chase. I thought only of telling you that the crows, as well as wild-geese, are here ...
— Letters written during a short residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark • Mary Wollstonecraft
... pledge. It did not appear that evening that she succeeded; but as he was rising to take his leave she passed suddenly, as she was very apt to do, from the tone of unsparing persiflage to that of almost tremulous sympathy. "Speaking seriously," she said, "I believe in you, Mr. Newman. You flatter my patriotism." ...
— The American • Henry James
... sole throne of Italy? Do you expect to govern at Rome when I cease to reign at Milan? No, Holy Father! the pontiff who placed the crown on my head, should it be shaken, will fall to rise no more." If what Cardinal Caprara said can be depended upon, Bonaparte frequently used to intimidate or flatter the Pope in ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... other person's words for the sake of small criticism and fault-finding. Mr. Mann replied that Webster was wrong in his Latin, and the words Captatores Verborum meant toad- eaters, or men who hang on the words of great men to praise and flatter them, of which he found some conspicuous modern examples among Webster's supporters. Professor Felton, the Greek professor, who was a staunch friend of Webster, attacked Mann and charged him with ...
— Autobiography of Seventy Years, Vol. 1-2 • George Hoar
... Hardy make, when, by this wicked woman's contrivances, he thinks himself disinherited of his whole fortune, ill-treated, and neglected by a father, he never had in thought offended! He could give an opportunity to a sincere friend, who would not flatter him, ...
— The Governess - The Little Female Academy • Sarah Fielding
... go, Madame, to engage, to-morrow morning, his Majesty's ship, Drake, of twenty guns, now lying at Carrickfergus. I should meet the enemy with more than wonted resolution, could I flatter myself that, through this unhandsome conduct on the part of my officers, I lie not under the disesteem of the sweet lady of the Isle of St. Mary's. But unconquerable as Mars should I be, could but dare to dream, that in some green retreat of her charming domain, the ...
— Israel Potter • Herman Melville
... is just another way of beginning a flirtation. It made me very angry when I heard that; but now that I have asked you, I am quite satisfied, for it seems impossible to mix the two things together. You can't flatter a person when you have agreed to tell him his faults; you can't feign a sentiment which is real. I knew I was right, though I could not argue it out; but for the future I sha'n't mind a bit when you say nasty things to me, for I shall feel they are a proof of friendship; and I shall ...
— A Houseful of Girls • Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
... against him). Say, shall I give an answer? If so, I'll do 't to flatter thee. If not, 'Twill be to show thee that my happiness Requireth ...
— The German Classics, v. 20 - Masterpieces of German Literature • Various
... the veteran with the eyes of affection; and she had determined within herself to remove certain delicate objections which had long embarrassed her peculiar situation, as respected the corps, by making the sergeant the successor of her late husband. For some time past the trooper had seemed to flatter this preference; and Betty, conceiving that her violence might have mortified her suitor, was determined to make him all the amends in her power. Besides, rough and uncouth as she was, the washerwoman had still enough of her sex to know that the moments of reconciliation were the moments ...
— The Spy • James Fenimore Cooper
... I cannot flatter you with any change in your designation. If your respected parent had survived he might have become the Honourable Charles, but only by special grant from Her Majesty. It was so in the case of the ...
— That Stick • Charlotte M. Yonge
... pleasure. The talents and accomplishments, which charmed a far different circle, are here out of place. I am rude in the arts of palaces, and can ill bear comparison with those whose calling, from their youth up, has been to flatter and to sue. Have I, then, two lives, that, after I have wasted one in the service of others, there may yet remain to me a second, which I may live ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... envy, nor strike any onesoever in any manner, because it is needful to be as strong as an oak, which kills the plants at its feet, to crush envious heads, and even then would one succumb, since human oaks are especially rare and that no Tournebouche should flatter himself that he is one, granting that he be a Tournebouche. Thirdly, never to spend more than one quarter of one's income, conceal one's wealth, hide one's goods and chattels, to undertake no office, to go to church like other people, ...
— Droll Stories, Complete - Collected From The Abbeys Of Touraine • Honore de Balzac
... feelings, so far as it bears witness to the impression which my son's amiableness and steadiness have made on you. He is indeed a most exemplary lad: fathers are partial, and their word about their children is commonly not to be taken; but I flatter myself that the present case is an exception to the rule; for, if ever there was a well-conducted youth, it is my dear son. He is certainly very clever; and a closer student, and, for his age, of more extensive reading and sounder judgment, ...
— The Idea of a University Defined and Illustrated: In Nine - Discourses Delivered to the Catholics of Dublin • John Henry Newman
... allegiance, and sailed to Britain with numberless ships. But the king of that island, perceiving that he was unequal in force (for the ships seemed to cover the sea), went to Frode, affecting to surrender, and not only began to flatter his greatness, but also promised to the Danes, the conquerors of nations, the submission of himself and of his country; proffering taxes, assessment, tribute, what they would. Finally, he gave them a hospitable ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")
... all right,' said her aunt, rushing up to her with warm congratulations, ready to flatter her, prone to admire her. It would be something to have a niece married to Adrian Urmand, the successful young merchant of Basle. Marie Bromar was already in her aunt's eyes something ...
— The Golden Lion of Granpere • Anthony Trollope
... Long live the Queen! The prologue was written in honour of his most Catholic Majesty James II. and his consort, Marie Beatrice of Modena, but the opening lines are admirably adapted to flatter Anne, and so they are retained, even though what follows ...
— The Palmy Days of Nance Oldfield • Edward Robins
... daily bestows! To read and hear how the World merrily goes; To laugh, sing and prattle of This, That, and T' other; And be flatter'd and ogl'd and kiss'd ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers
... or say anything about them that should seem to smack of irreverence; but I do believe that (with one or two exceptions I have in my mind) the system they have introduced among us is the Greatest Humbug in the universe. In the meantime poor Paterfamilias (who is the last man, they flatter themselves, to find this out) stands with his hands (and very little else) in his pockets, regarding his clever offspring, and wondering what he shall do with him. He remembers to have read about a man on his deathbed, who calls his children about him and thanks God, though ...
— Some Private Views • James Payn
... her countenance with guileless simplicity, but earnest affection; "How could I be sorry that a ray of the sun came across the gloom of a cheerless day—that light has broken in upon darkness, though it remained so short a time? I do not flatter myself with being able to march quite so light-hearted as I once used to could, or to sleep as sound, for some time to come; but I shall always remember how near I was to being undeservedly happy, I shall. So far from blaming you, Mabel, I only blame myself for being so vain as to think it ...
— The Pathfinder - The Inland Sea • James Fenimore Cooper
... conservative. "I don't want him to flatter himself over having run the whole fiesta, no! Let me speak! ...
— The Social Cancer - A Complete English Version of Noli Me Tangere • Jose Rizal
... Bonds resolved upon a plan to flatter George Acton, beg his pardon for their seeming disrespect, and invite him to a celebration in honor of his return. As they were still devising how best to carry out the plot, George Acton entered. They jumped to their feet, hastened to greet him and assure him that his return gave them the ...
— After Long Years and Other Stories • Translated from the German by Sophie A. Miller and Agnes M. Dunne
... of prolongation of life or name Restoring what has been lent us, wit usury and accession Revenge more wounds our children than it heals us Revenge, which afterwards produces a series of new cruelties Reverse of truth has a hundred thousand forms Rhetoric: an art to flatter and deceive Rhetoric: to govern a disorderly and tumultuous rabble Richer than we think we are; but we are taught to borrow Ridiculous desire of riches when we have lost the use of them Right of command appertains to the beautiful-Aristotle ...
— Quotes and Images From The Works of Michel De Montaigne • Michel De Montaigne
... to tell "the author" of the instruction I received from every chapter of his work, and of the delight with which I rose from the perusal of the whole, I might seem to flatter rather than to speak the language of sober criticism; but I should only give utterance to my honest sentiments. His work has already taken, and will long maintain a distinguished place in the philosophic literature of ...
— The Coming of Evolution - The Story of a Great Revolution in Science • John W. (John Wesley) Judd
... establishment, but I am not addicted to hunting or shooting. I hate all field sports, though a few years since I was a tolerable adept in the polite arts of Foxhunting, Hawking, Boxing, etc., etc. My Library is rather extensive, (and as you perhaps know) I am a mighty Scribbler; I flatter myself I have made some improvements in Newstead, and, as I am independent, I am happy, as far as any person unfortunate enough to be born into this world, can be ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Letters and Journals, Vol. 1 • Lord Byron, Edited by Rowland E. Prothero
... Cavendish gave me some tea, and her few quiet remarks heightened my first impression of her as a thoroughly fascinating woman. An appreciative listener is always stimulating, and I described, in a humorous manner, certain incidents of my Convalescent Home, in a way which, I flatter myself, greatly amused my hostess. John, of course, good fellow though he is, could hardly ...
— The Mysterious Affair at Styles • Agatha Christie
... semivir amens, is the expression of Sidonius, (Panegyr. Avit. 359.) The poet knew the world, and was not inclined to flatter a minister who had injured or disgraced Avitus and Majorian, the successive heroes ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 3 • Edward Gibbon
... discovered an inclination to have the like presented to himself. But now the Jewish nation is by their law a stranger to all such things, and accustomed to prefer righteousness to glory; for which reason that nation was not agreeable to him, because it was out of their power to flatter the king's ambition with statues or temples, or any other such performances; And this seems to me to have been at once the occasion of Herod's crimes as to his own courtiers and counselors, and of his benefactions as to foreigners and those that had ...
— The Antiquities of the Jews • Flavius Josephus
... of that," said the Dog, overhearing the lament. "There's a difference, certainly, between your whelps and mine, but I venture to flatter myself that it is not due altogether to the mothers. You and I ...
— Fantastic Fables • Ambrose Bierce
... several sides and angles, technically termed facets, of a well-polished diamond. It is now intended to be fashioned into a brilliant; that is, to have the form of two flattened pyramids joined at the base, the upper pyramid much flatter than the lower one. In England, the art of diamond-cutting has ceased to exist, but in Holland it still maintains its ancient pre-eminence; and from thence the cutters of the Koh-i-noor have been brought to perform an operation, which, taking into consideration the size of the stone, ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 456 - Volume 18, New Series, September 25, 1852 • Various
... Harry is come to town, he shall write to you; others should write to you if I could make them, but I am afraid those wishes are more of a courtier than a friend. I should be sorry and ashamed, by endeavouring to flatter your inclination, if I lost your good opinion, which ...
— George Selwyn: His Letters and His Life • E. S. Roscoe and Helen Clergue
... himself clerk to a merchant, and, by some mercantile adventures in which he had successfully engaged, began to flatter himself with being able, in no long time, to support a family. Meanwhile, a tender and constant correspondence was maintained between him and his beloved Susan. This girl was a soft enthusiast, in whose bosom devotion ...
— Arthur Mervyn - Or, Memoirs of the Year 1793 • Charles Brockden Brown
... Servilian Law, as Lysippus said he had done by studying the famous [Footnote: Doryphorus. A Spear- man.] statue of Polycletus. What you have said on this occasion I consider as an absolute Irony: but I shall not inform you why I think so, lest you should imagine I design to flatter you. I shall therefore pass over the many fine encomiums you have bestowed upon these; and what you have said of Cotta and Sulpicius, and but very lately of your pupil Caelius. I acknowledge, however, that we may call them Orators: but as to the nature and extent of ...
— Cicero's Brutus or History of Famous Orators; also His Orator, or Accomplished Speaker. • Marcus Tullius Cicero
... their own countrymen, and still less of their countrywomen, in their mother tongue. I take some liberty in venturing to offer these wholly unauthorized remarks on a subject of some delicacy; and only wish I could flatter myself they have any chance of reaching influential quarters, and not being forgotten. Mr. Craig's position, respected and esteemed as he long has been, is eligible in many respects; but it ...
— Rambles in the Islands of Corsica and Sardinia - with Notices of their History, Antiquities, and Present Condition. • Thomas Forester
... myself. "You think yourself very clever, Ivan Andreievitch. Yes, you think you're watching all of us and studying all our characters. And I suppose there'll be a book one day, another of those books by Englishmen about poor Russians—and you'll flatter yourself that now at last one true picture has been given ... but let me tell you that you'll never know anything really about us so long ...
— The Dark Forest • Hugh Walpole
... once in a while to myself. I do not dare, I do not care, to be so to everybody. But with my own self, I can feel that it is strictly a family affair. If I hurt my feelings, I can grieve over it until I apologize. If I flatter myself, I am only doing what every other woman in the world is doing in her innermost consciousness, and flattery as honest as flattery from one's own self naturally would be could not fail to please me. Besides, it would have the ...
— The Love Affairs of an Old Maid • Lilian Bell
... man who mindeth the minstrelsy; Since still, in sandy, glittering pleasances, Cold, stony fruits, gem-like but quite in- Edible, flatter and wholly ...
— New Poems • Robert Louis Stevenson
... is very important to yourself, Mr. Travers, and as to my daughter's well-being, I have looked to that for quite a number of years past, and I flatter myself I shall be able to look out for it in ...
— That Mother-in-Law of Mine • Anonymous
... the little caitiff, briskly. "It is true you played a joke or two on me, but I flatter myself, on the whole, I paid you beforehand; and for the present the account ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 1 January 1848 • Various
... which captivates and controuls the inchanted spirit at least, he appears to me to have this defect; but if he had all the engaging qualifications which a man can possess, they would be excited in vain against that constancy, which, I flatter myself, is the characteristic of my nature. No, my dear Willis, I may be involved in fresh troubles, and I believe I shall, from the importunities of this gentleman and the violence of my relations; but my heart ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett
... a moment try to uncover his teeth in a natural smile, but it died away. 'Cripplestraw, you flatter me; or do you mean it? Well, there's truth in it. I am more gallant in going to her than in marching to the shore. But we cannot be too careful about our good names, we soldiers. I must not be seen. ...
— The Trumpet-Major • Thomas Hardy
... kept their husbands out of the bankruptcy court. When young Trexham, the son of the Lord Lieutenant of the county, married a minor light of musical comedy at a registrar's office, I was the first person in the place to be told; and I flatter myself that I was instrumental in inducing a pig-headed old idiot to receive an exceedingly charming daughter-in-law. I loved to look upon Wellingsford as an open book. Can you blame me for my resentment at coming across, so ...
— The Red Planet • William J. Locke
... by reason of the physical difference, or accompanying that physical difference, woman is the superior of man in mental and moral qualities. In proof of this see the report of the minority and all the eulogiums of woman pronounced by those who, like the serpent of old, would flatter her vanity that they may continue ...
— Debate On Woman Suffrage In The Senate Of The United States, - 2d Session, 49th Congress, December 8, 1886, And January 25, 1887 • Henry W. Blair, J.E. Brown, J.N. Dolph, G.G. Vest, Geo. F. Hoar.
... "You—you flatter me! What am I, pray, a marquis or a duke?" chaffed the other, but the trembling dial belied his gayety, and even from the side Coquenil could see that the man's face was as tense and pallid ...
— Through the Wall • Cleveland Moffett
... am only a woman and must fight in a woman's way," she interrupted bitterly. "Yes! I intreat, I implore, I wheedle, I flatter, I fawn, I lie! I creep where you stand upright, and pass through doors to which you would not bow. You wear your blazon of honor on your shoulder; I hide mine in a slave's gown. And yet I have worked and striven and suffered! ...
— Clarence • Bret Harte
... was very dear to his father, who in his own silent way almost admired and certainly liked the openness and guileless freedom of a character which was very opposite to his own. The father, though he had never said a word to flatter the son, did in truth give his offspring credit for greater talent than he possessed, and, even when appearing to scorn them, would listen to the young man's diatribes almost with satisfaction. And Everett was very dear also to a sister, who ...
— The Prime Minister • Anthony Trollope
... has become an important port; superior to Bristol, or Hull; and some day we shall be equal to London, we flatter ourselves." ...
— Dick Cheveley - His Adventures and Misadventures • W. H. G. Kingston
... expressing his fraternal opinion that she was "the sauciest little turn-out he ever saw," and then wet-blanketed the remarks by adding, "Of course you don't call it a disguise, do you? and don't flatter yourself that you won't be known; for Dolly Ward is as plainly written in every curl, bow, and gimcrack, as if you wore a label on ...
— On Picket Duty and Other Tales • Louisa May Alcott
... tongue— a fellow whom I consider beneath all men of the very lowest grade: for when you can bring yourself to flatter that fellow (pointing at THRASO), I do believe you could pick your victuals out of ...
— The Comedies of Terence - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Notes • Publius Terentius Afer, (AKA) Terence
... Doctor. 'But do not suppose me so unwary as to adopt him out of hand. I am, I flatter myself, a finished man of the world; I have had all possibilities in view; my plan is contrived to meet them all. I take the lad as stable boy. If he pilfer, if he grumble, if he desire to change, I shall see I was mistaken; I shall recognise him for no son of mine, ...
— The Merry Men - and Other Tales and Fables • Robert Louis Stevenson
... face, and went on. "Second"—he folded back his middle finger—"you are injuring your own father, also in two ways: you are bringing his lawful property into danger, and you are giving his political enemies the most effective sort of a weapon to swing in his coming campaign. And do not flatter yourself they will not make the best of it. It happens that your father has stood strongly with the Conservation members in the late fight in Congress. This would be a pretty scandal. Third," said Oldham, touching ...
— The Rules of the Game • Stewart Edward White
... faithlessness here means not a gradual conversion dependent on enlarged knowledge, but a yielding to seductive circumstance; not a conviction that the original choice was a mistake, but a subjection to incidents that flatter a growing desire. In this sort of love it is the forsaker who has the melancholy lot; for an abandoned belief may be more effectively vengeful than Dido. The child of a wandering tribe, caught young and trained ...
— George Eliot; A Critical Study of Her Life, Writings & Philosophy • George Willis Cooke
... picture of delicate beauty, ingenuous and sparkling, deserved to be a duchess. Rigou knew nothing of the love affair between her and Jean-Louis Tonsard, which proves that he had let himself be fooled by the girl,—the only one of his many servants whose ambition had taught her to flatter the lynx as the only ...
— Sons of the Soil • Honore de Balzac
... afterward named by Captain Sabine, CAPE FELLFOOT, which appeared to form the termination of this coast; and as the haze, which still prevailed to the south, prevented our seeing any land in that quarter, and the sea was literally as free from ice as any part of the Atlantic, we began to flatter ourselves that we had fairly entered the Polar Sea, and some of the most sanguine among us had even calculated the bearing and distance of Icy Cape, as a matter of no very difficult or improbable accomplishment. This pleasing prospect was rendered the ...
— Three Voyages for the Discovery of a Northwest Passage from the • Sir William Edward Parry
... and dry, yet if the Corks are not new and found, the Drink is still liable to be damaged; for if the Air can get into the Bottles, the Drink will grow flat, and will never rise. I have known many who have flatter'd themselves that they knew how to be saving, and have used old Corks on this occasion, that have spoiled as much Liquor as has stood them in four or five Pounds, only for want of laying out three or four Shillings. If Bottles are cork'd as they ...
— The Country Housewife and Lady's Director - In the Management of a House, and the Delights and Profits of a Farm • Richard Bradley
... spent a sad and sleepless night? When my disgust admitted of thought I could not help reflecting how very happy some vulgar people can be with a very little sense, and how very unhappy other people who flatter themselves they are very clever and superior can at ...
— The Adventures of a Three-Guinea Watch • Talbot Baines Reed
... is no more. The person of the last anointed is no more also; and I flatter myself I am not alone, even in this kingdom, when I wish that it may please the Almighty neither by the hands of His priests nor His nobles (I allude to a striking passage of Racine) to raise his posterity ...
— The Prose Works of William Wordsworth • William Wordsworth
... ornaments, the gilding and stucco-work, the sunshine and sunny prospects, will come with the superstructure." But the building, alas! was never destined to be completed, and the architect had his own misgivings about the attractions even of the completed edifice. "I dare not flatter myself that any endeavours of mine, compatible with the duty I owe to the truth and the hope of permanent utility, will render the Friend agreeable to the majority of what is called the reading public. I never expected it. How indeed could I when, etc." Yet, in spite of these professions, ...
— English Men of Letters: Coleridge • H. D. Traill
... beautiful Princess Hippodamia, and it is customary on these occasions to make the bride a present of some far-fetched and elegant curiosity. I have been a little perplexed, I must honestly confess, where to obtain anything likely to please a princess of her exquisite taste. But this morning, I flatter myself, I have ...
— Myths and Legends of All Nations • Various
... in that his politest tone, "I think it certainly as well that I came down, and I flatter myself that last botte was a successful one. I tell you how I came to think of it. Three years ago my kind friend Lady Ferrybridge sent for me in the greatest state of alarm about her son Gretna, whose affair ...
— The History of Pendennis • William Makepeace Thackeray
... tributaries, which, rushing down from the gorges of the Alps on the west and the north, are skillfully conducted so as to refresh and fertilize the whole plain, and, finding their way ultimately to the Po, are thence drawn again by new canals to render like beneficence to the lower, flatter intervals of Venezia and the Northern Papal States. Nowhere can be found a region capable of supporting a larger population to the square mile ...
— Glances at Europe - In a Series of Letters from Great Britain, France, Italy, - Switzerland, &c. During the Summer of 1851. • Horace Greeley
... constantly reiterated the great and wise lesson, 'Doubt everything and mistrust everything, even what you see.' He who will make his fortune at court, must first of all mistrust everybody, and consider everybody his enemy, whom he is to flatter, because he can do him harm, and whom he is to hug and kiss, until in some happy embrace he can either plunge a dagger into his breast wholly unobserved, or pour poison into his mouth. Trust neither ...
— Henry VIII And His Court • Louise Muhlbach
... at the Temple for almost nothing. Thus, you see, I have a nice merino dress that I bought for fifteen francs, which perhaps cost sixty; it has hardly been put on and is beautifully fine. I altered it to fit me, and I flatter myself ...
— The Mysteries of Paris V2 • Eugene Sue
... trying to flatter her vanity, unable to realize that her mind was not worldly. She replied, negligently, that it might be a pleasant trip. Then he praised the mountains, the ancient cities, the bazaars, ...
— The Red Lily, Complete • Anatole France
... to flatter, had not the boldness yet to refuse him directly; they only warned him that before he could reach the Forum the people would tear him to pieces, and declared that if he did not mount his horse immediately, they too ...
— Quo Vadis - A Narrative of the Time of Nero • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... 'You flatter my ability, I fear,' said the doctor. 'I will do my best, of course: but I ought to warn you that I am ...
— Corporal Sam and Other Stories • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... of love are like the wind, And none knows whence or why they rise: I ne'er before felt heart and mind So much affected through mine eyes. How cognate with the flatter'd air, How form'd for earth's familiar zone, She moved; how feeling and how fair For others' pleasure and her own! And, ah, the heaven of her face! How, when she laugh'd, I seem'd to see The gladness of the primal grace, And how, when grave, its dignity! Of all she was, the least not less ...
— The Angel in the House • Coventry Patmore
... he replied enthusiastically. "I'll sit for you as a study in Disappointment, Flat-busted, or Return from the Races. The title doesn't matter, because I'll be such an excellent study for any sort of man whose hopes have all been knocked flatter than a pancake." ...
— Mixed Faces • Roy Norton
... he flatter himself that the task of betterment is an easy one, or that the end is in sight. It is not a world where wishes, even good wishes, are fulfilled without effort. There are inexorable laws not of our making. The whims of good people are ...
— Humanly Speaking • Samuel McChord Crothers
... same time I do not wish, in paying my homage to the other sex, and in glorifying its possible power over ours, to be confounded with those thoughtless and trivial rhetoricians who flatter woman with a false lip worship; and, like Lord Byron's buccaneers, hold out to them a picture of their own empire, built only upon sensual or upon shadowy excellences. We find continually a false enthusiasm, a mere bacchanalian inebriation, on behalf of woman, put forth ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey
... did not annoy his keeper; never led a single step towards virtue, or guarded by a single precept against vice. And from what I heard, Joseph contributed much to his deterioration, by a narrow-minded partiality which prompted him to flatter and pet him, as a boy, because he was the head of the old family. And as he had been in the habit of accusing Catherine Earnshaw and Heathcliff, when children, of putting the master past his patience, and compelling him to seek solace in drink by what he termed their 'offald ...
— Wuthering Heights • Emily Bronte
... always on the move, telephonic communication with everywhere, and my telegraphic address of "Panjimcracks," comfortably installed in a third-floor flat in commanding premises, within a stone's throw of the Stock Exchange, I flatter myself that, at least in all the surroundings of my position, I am, acting under your instructions, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 98, May 3, 1890. • Various
... friends from that moment, for I knew that she told Kitty Sage,— And she wasn't a girl that would flatter—"that she thought I was tall for my age." And I gave her four apples that evening, and took her to ride on my sled, And— "What am I telling you this for?" Why, Papa, ...
— Complete Poetical Works of Bret Harte • Bret Harte
... not flatter me, Alfred Stevens, do not deceive me. I am too willing to believe you, for it is so dear a feeling to think that I too am a poet. Yet, at the first, I had not the smallest notion of this kind: I neither knew what poetry was, nor felt the desire to be a poet. Yet I yearned with strange feelings, ...
— Charlemont • W. Gilmore Simms
... cried he, "but I flatter myself this right hand, mutilated though it be, can lay on the lash ...
— Elsie's Motherhood • Martha Finley
... you believe it, my friend, that I have visited as many as fifteen sick people in a day, and what will surprise you still more, I have lost only one patient, an Irishman, who would drink a little. I do not flatter myself that I have cured one single person, but you will think with me that in my quality of Philadelphia physician I have been very moderate, and that not one of my confreres ...
— Great Fortunes, and How They Were Made • James D. McCabe, Jr.
... any art is not a one-sided accomplishment. It is beneficial in many ways, and aids distinctly in character building. No one, for example, can acquire the art of tactful flattery and retain a sour or mean disposition. To flatter efficiently you must seem delighted, and the delight must express itself in smiles and kindly words. These habits will impress themselves upon your inner consciousness, and before you know it, the habit will be a constituent part ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Vol. 3 (of 4) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague
... something to eat," continued the other, reprovingly. "It is not a good example to the young, sister. The carnal appetite, it is a sin, my sister, to flatter it!" ...
— Mlle. Fouchette - A Novel of French Life • Charles Theodore Murray
... sparkling lustre derived from the scientific disposition of the several sides and angles, technically termed facets, of a well-polished diamond. It is now intended to be fashioned into a brilliant; that is, to have the form of two flattened pyramids joined at the base, the upper pyramid much flatter than the lower one. In England, the art of diamond-cutting has ceased to exist, but in Holland it still maintains its ancient pre-eminence; and from thence the cutters of the Koh-i-noor have been ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 456 - Volume 18, New Series, September 25, 1852 • Various
... I'm sick of it," said Mary angrily. Then she checked herself and added—"I don't mean you, papa; but at Manor Cross they all flatter me now, because that poor man is dying. If you were me you ...
— Is He Popenjoy? • Anthony Trollope
... remarks, "produces, in its primitive condition, much wild rye, which is not known as a cultivated plant in Syria, and much wild barley and oats. These cereals precisely resemble the corresponding cultivated plants in leaf, ear, size, and height of straw, but their grains are sensibly flatter and poorer in flour."—Reisebericht uber Hauran und die Trachenen, ...
— The Earth as Modified by Human Action • George P. Marsh
... sake of small criticism and fault-finding. Mr. Mann replied that Webster was wrong in his Latin, and the words Captatores Verborum meant toad- eaters, or men who hang on the words of great men to praise and flatter them, of which he found some conspicuous modern examples among Webster's supporters. Professor Felton, the Greek professor, who was a staunch friend of Webster, attacked Mann and charged him with ignorance of Latin. But Dr. Beck came to the rescue, ...
— Autobiography of Seventy Years, Vol. 1-2 • George Hoar
... There was, I flatter myself, some little skill in the introduction of the foregoing chapter, which has played the part of chorus during the time that the Bombay Castle has proceeded on to Canton, has taken in her cargo, and is on her passage home, in company with fifteen ...
— Newton Forster • Frederick Marryat
... and became very rich. His portraits of men were not equal to those of women. When Cromwell gave him a commission to paint his portrait, he said: "Mr. Lely, I desire you will use all your skill to paint my picture truly like me, and not flatter me at all; but remark all these roughnesses, pimples, warts, and everything as you see me, otherwise I will never pay you a farthing for it." Sir Peter Lely was buried in Covent Garden, where there is a monument to his memory with a ...
— A History of Art for Beginners and Students: Painting, Sculpture, Architecture - Painting • Clara Erskine Clement
... grille through which they show like beauteous wraiths or frescoes in the flat. That screen is emblematic of their real exclusion from the higher government which their social participation in parliamentary elections, and the men's habit of talking politics with them, flatter them into a delusive sense of sharing. A woman may be the queen of England, but she may not be one of its legislators. That must be because women like being queens and do not ...
— London Films • W.D. Howells
... Families may give additional Lustre to their Nobility, by forming themselves by the Model here presented to them; and those of lower Extraction, attain Qualities to attone for what they want in Birth:—So that we flatter ourselves this Undertaking will not fail of receiving the Approbation of all who wish well to a Reformation of Manners, and more especially those who have Youth under their Care.—As for such who may take it up merely as an Amusement, it is possible they will find ...
— The Fortunate Foundlings • Eliza Fowler Haywood
... impartial man, Irishman or Englishman—for whom Mr. Trench wrote his "book," is it strange or wonderful that the Catholic people, so treated, would rejoice—would have bonfires on the hill tops at their deliverance from such conduct? I flatter myself that you, my lord—that the learned reading public—that the English people would sympathise with any people so treated for conscience' sake; and having pronounced the sentence of condemnation against Mr. Trench for not having noticed these facts, that you will ...
— The Land-War In Ireland (1870) - A History For The Times • James Godkin
... we have here perhaps a truer explanation of Frank's failures. Had he met Mr. Sheriff Scott he could have turned a neater compliment, because Mr. Scott would have been a friend worth making. Dand, on the other hand, he did not value sixpence, and he showed it even while he tried to flatter. Condescension is an excellent thing, but it is strange how one-sided the pleasure of it is! He who goes fishing among the Scots peasantry with condescension for a bait will have an empty ...
— Weir of Hermiston • Robert Louis Stevenson
... ludicrous pretence of education is banishing every form of native simplicity. In the large towns, the populace sink deeper and deeper into a vicious vulgarity, and every rural district is being affected by the spread of contagion. To flatter the proletariat is to fight against all the good that still characterises educated England—against reverence for the beautiful, against magnanimity, against enthusiasm of ...
— Born in Exile • George Gissing
... This letter will, I hope, find you settled to your serious studies, and your necessary exercises at Turin, after the hurry and the dissipation of the Carnival at Venice. I mean that your stay at Turin should, and I flatter myself that it will, be an useful and ornamental period of your education; but at the same time I must tell you, that all my affection for you has never yet given me so much anxiety, as that which I now feel. While you are in danger, I shall be in fear; ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield
... things as gets lost easily. It's only on the stage that folks ever have any particular use for other people's children. I've known some bad characters in my time, but I'd have trusted the worst of 'em with a wagon- load of other people's kids. Don't you flatter yourself you're going to lose it! Whoever's got it, you take it from me, his idea is to do the honest thing, and never rest till he's succeeded in returning it to ...
— The Observations of Henry • Jerome K. Jerome
... medial line. The basal end of the carina is, likewise, slightly curved laterally, and always turns towards the more convex valve. This inequality, as Mr. Gray pointed out to me, depends on the position of the specimens; the flatter side lying close to the carapace of the crab. Terga, flat, oblong, nearly rectangular; occludent margin straight; basal angle, truncated, almost parallel to the occludent margin; in width, three or four times as wide as the carina. Carina, (fig. 1, a) short, narrow, slightly curved, ...
— A Monograph on the Sub-class Cirripedia (Volume 1 of 2) - The Lepadidae; or, Pedunculated Cirripedes • Charles Darwin
... more fully and clearly, than any prince in Christendom; and to justify to the world the people of England, whose love of their just and natural rights, with their resolution to preserve them, saved the nation when it was on the very brink of slavery and ruin. If these papers have that evidence, I flatter myself is to be found in them, there will be no great miss of those which are lost, and my reader may be satisfied without them: for I imagine, I shall have neither the time, nor inclination to repeat my pains, and fill up the wanting part of my answer, by tracing Sir Robert ...
— Two Treatises of Government • John Locke
... in these happy days was paid to the general's wife—how busy were even the most fanatical republicans, the dreaded ones of the Mountain, to flatter her, to give expression to their enthusiastic praises of the general who was preparing for the arms of the ...
— The Empress Josephine • Louise Muhlbach
... KINDS OF STITCHES (fig. 873).—The straight lines of this border are all worked in old German knotted stitch in ecru thread, forming a thick round cord which stands out from the surface in high relief; the flatter outlining of the outside figures is done in basket stitch in soft blue knitting cotton. The little oblong figures within the two inner lines of the border are worked in Gobelin stitch, in red embroidery cotton, and the filling ...
— Encyclopedia of Needlework • Therese de Dillmont
... had at all times a lofty idea of his own dignity as an artist, and never would stoop either to flatter a patron or to conciliate a rival. Julius II., though now seventy-four, was as impatient of contradiction as fiery in temper, as full of magnificent and ambitious projects as if he had been in the prime of life; in his service was the famous architect, Bramante, ...
— Great Men and Famous Women, Vol. 8 (of 8) • Various
... goin' to take me up to the clubroom so's I can see that picture of Major Hardee that he presented the club with? Everybody says it's just lovely. Sarah T. says it's perfectly elegant, only not quite so handsome as the Major reelly is. She says it don't flatter ...
— The Depot Master • Joseph C. Lincoln
... nor sought to shun the death design'd; "And comest thou then, young veteran in deceit, To make thy work of perfidy complete, To earn by Vasa's death one title more, And revel in another patriot's gore?— And think'st thou still to flatter and deceive, By fables madness only can believe?— Thy wealth is useless now—this ruined state Has long in vain required her traitor's fate; She bids me, when I can, avenge her woes, And wreak her wrongs where'er I meet her foes! Brave Stenon quits the mansions of ...
— Gustavus Vasa - and other poems • W. S. Walker
... that what your sister meant?" said Christine, as if a sudden light dawned on her. "Tell me, Nancy darling, do you really think I hit the horse on purpose, so as to have an uninterrupted evening with Mr. Riatt? How you do flatter men! It's a great art. I'm afraid I ...
— Ladies Must Live • Alice Duer Miller
... But relations of this sort, even when they are of long standing, are always liable to change. I can easily conceive that you might act in a way to loosen the tie she feels towards you—it must be remembered that she is only conditionally bound to you—and that in that case, another man, who may flatter himself that he has a hold on her regard, might succeed in winning that firm place in her love as well as respect which you had let slip. I can easily conceive such a result," repeated Mr. Farebrother, emphatically. "There ...
— Middlemarch • George Eliot
... the anchor dropped, and in a few minutes after small boats crowded alongside to take us ashore. Until you are rowed in a sampan in style, never flatter yourself you have known the grotesque in the way of transportation. Fancy a large, wide canoe, with a small cabin in the stern, the deck in front lower than the sides, and on this four creatures, resembling nothing ...
— Round the World • Andrew Carnegie
... flattery. They know that the reader has forgotten every detail of it, and that nothing of the tremendous event is left in his mind but a vague and formless luminous smudge. Aside from the desire to flatter the reader, they have another reason for making the remark-two reasons, indeed. They do not remember the details themselves, and do not want the trouble of hunting them up and copying them out; also, they are afraid that if they search ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... —There—I flatter myself that in the way of description it would not be easy to beat the above. I just throw it off as my friend Tit-marsh, poor fellow, once said, to show what I could do if I tried. I have decided not to put punctuation marks ...
— The Dodge Club - or, Italy in 1859 • James De Mille
... of politeness in the voice of the speaker. He did not seem to have uttered these words in order to flatter his listener, but to express his real sentiment. He was ...
— Mohun, or, The Last Days of Lee • John Esten Cooke
... on the identical roan jennet. In the background of the picture are seen two or three suspicious-looking figures, as if watching the success of some plot. These may have been put in by the painter, to flatter the King, by making it be supposed that he had actually escaped, or successfully combated, some serious plot. The King is attended by a numerous band of courtiers and attendants, all of whom seem moving forward to arrest the defaulter. The painting ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... and dropped as though he had been a stone. Before Arthur could fire again, the passengers astride the dead tree dived into the stream. Slowly the log swung around and was sucked into the current. Here and there a feathered head bobbed up. The boy fired at them from a sense of duty, but he did not flatter himself that ...
— Oh, You Tex! • William Macleod Raine
... humble friends the treatise on The Duties of Man, in which he told them that he loved them too well to flatter them. Another work that occupied him and consoled him was the rescue and moral improvement of the children employed by organ-grinders, and he was the first to call attention to the white slavery to which many of them were subjected. He opened a school in Hatton Garden, ...
— The Liberation of Italy • Countess Evelyn Martinengo-Cesaresco
... wound than his body, could not, for that reason, bear to hear of an engagement. But still, continued Sempronius, is it just to let the whole army droop and languish with him? What could Scipio expect more? Did he flatter himself with the hopes that a third consul, and a new army, would come to his assistance? Such were the expressions he employed both among the soldiers, and even about Scipio's tent. The time for the election of new generals drawing ...
— The Ancient History of the Egyptians, Carthaginians, Assyrians, • Charles Rollin
... read that 'the princes of Judah came and made obeisance to him.' They take him on his weak side, and I dare say Jehoiada had been too true and too noble to do that, and though we are not told what means they took to flatter and coax him, we see very plainly what they were conspiring to do, for we read that 'they left the house of the Lord their God, the God of their fathers, and served groves and idols,' the groves here mentioned being symbols of Ashtaroth ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... of luxury cover his table, the voice of harmony lulls him in his bowers; he breathes the fragrance of the groves of Java, and sleeps upon the down of the cygnets of Ganges. He speaks, and his mandate is obeyed; he wishes, and his wish is gratified; all whom he sees obey him, and all whom he hears flatter him. How different, Ortogrul, is thy condition, who art doomed to the perpetual torments of unsatisfied desire, and who hast no amusement in thy power that can withhold thee from thy own reflections! They tell thee that thou art wise; but ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume IV: The Adventurer; The Idler • Samuel Johnson
... are sweet With smell of ripening fruit. Through the sere grass, in shy retreat, Flatter, at coming feet, The robins ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 30, April, 1860 • Various
... 'Ah, don't flatter yourself! There is a thing I have not got courage to face—without necessity, and that's Janet's triumphant pity. Mr. Dutton lives rather too near your uncle, but he is a man, and he ...
— Nuttie's Father • Charlotte M. Yonge
... we can invest her whom we admire with all the attributes of loveliness, and though time may steal the roses from her cheek, and the lustre from her eye, still the original beau ideal remains, filling the mind and intoxicating the soul with the overpowering presence of loveliness. I flatter myself that my Leila, Zuleika, Gulnare, Medora, and Haidee will always vouch for my taste in beauty: these are the bright creations of my fancy, with rounded forms, and delicacy of limbs, nearly so incompatible as to be rarely if ever united; for where, with some rare exceptions, ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, - Issue 572, October 20, 1832 • Various
... my looks In an eternall brake, or practise jugling, To keep my face still fast, my heart still loose; Or beare (like dames schoolmistresses their riddles) Two tongues, and be good only for a shift; 90 Flatter great lords, to put them still in minde Why they were made lords; or please humorous ladies With a good carriage, tell them idle tales, To make their physick work; spend a man's life In sights and visitations, that will make 95 His eyes as hollow as his ...
— Bussy D'Ambois and The Revenge of Bussy D'Ambois • George Chapman
... "I flatter myself that you would be very sorry if I went away; you would have no one to tease, at all events," replied Alfred, "and that would be a ...
— The Settlers in Canada • Frederick Marryat
... "Don't flatter yourself," replied Craig. "He wanted me, too. There wasn't any light in the laboratory last night. There was a light in our apartment. What more natural than to think that we were both there? You were caught in the trap intended ...
— The Gold of the Gods • Arthur B. Reeve
... a kind of silence and more jabbering, and in he came, Bible in hand, after the manner of them—a little sandy chap in specks and a pith helmet. I flatter myself that me sitting there in the shadows, with my copper head and my big goggles, struck him a bit of a heap at first. 'Well,' I says, 'how's the trade in scissors?' for I ...
— The Country of the Blind, And Other Stories • H. G. Wells
... comprehend it not, In those unfathomable orbs Every function he absorbs; Doth eat, and drink, and fish, and shoot, And write, and reason, and compute, And ride, and run, and have, and hold, And whine, and flatter, and regret, And kiss, and couple, and beget, By those roving ...
— Poems - Household Edition • Ralph Waldo Emerson
... to rise. "Oh, I wasn't so terribly disappointed. You needn't flatter yourself. I simply don't like to ...
— The Iron Woman • Margaret Deland
... congratulating myself that I took the resolution to confine myself entirely to Herbals. Before, I had a vast but untrustworthy knowledge of titles and editions which a bad memory did not assist. Now, thank goodness, I have forgotten all that, but I flatter myself that I really ...
— The Book-Hunter at Home • P. B. M. Allan
... stoned cur. Abner took a sudden dive into Hints and Helps, and came up with, "You flatter us, Miss Claiborne," whereat Ross snickered out like a human boy. They ...
— The Best American Humorous Short Stories • Various
... flatter falsely, Hope? The day hath scarcely passed that saw thy birth, Yet thy white wings are plumed to all their scope, And hour by hour thine eyes have gathered light, And grown so large and bright, That my whole future life unfolds ...
— Poems of Henry Timrod • Henry Timrod
... that repose has fled For ever the course of the river of Time. That cities will crowd to its edge In a blacker, incessanter line; That the din will be more on its banks, Denser the trade on its stream, Flatter the plain where it flows, Fiercer the sun overhead. That never will those on its breast See an ennobling sight, Drink of the feeling ...
— Poetical Works of Matthew Arnold • Matthew Arnold
... chief of our escort jumped off his horse, and presented me his hand to dismount also. A door was open, and the staircase lighted by a lamp. 'Madame,' said the man to me, 'you are now at home. At this door finishes the mission I received; may I flatter myself I have fulfilled it according to your wishes?' 'Yes, monsieur,' said I, 'I have only thanks to give you. Offer them in my name to all your men; I would wish to reward them in a better manner, but I possess nothing.' 'Do not be ...
— Chicot the Jester - [An abridged translation of "La dame de Monsoreau"] • Alexandre Dumas
... but it's so becoming to me—at least, I flatter myself it is," and she glanced in the direction of Mr. Towne, who as usual was attired "to the limit," ...
— The Moving Picture Girls Under the Palms - Or Lost in the Wilds of Florida • Laura Lee Hope
... acquaint you, that I was very well made, and reckoned a bright polite Gentleman. I was the Confident and Darling of all the Fair; and if the Old and Ugly spoke ill of me, all the World knew it was because I scorned to flatter them. No Ball, no Assembly was attended till I had been consulted. Flavia colour'd her Hair before me, Celia shew'd me her Teeth, Panthea heaved her Bosom, Cleora brandished her Diamonds; I have seen Cloe's Foot, and tied artificially ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... which is the result of marital relations. In consequence motherhood without the consent of the State or the benefit of the clergy is just as logically condemned. And they who thus sit in judgment, flatter themselves to be the prophets of an advanced and enlightened era,—ingrafting their personal feelings and rights on the religious and lawful order of the universe. Or, in common parlance, and as our introduction ...
— Mother Earth, Vol. 1 No. 4, June 1906 - Monthly Magazine Devoted to Social Science and Literature • Various
... majestic as a Jupiter, whose hand was so steady and whose eye so true, that he was never known to miss, and who, in this accomplishment at least, was so absolute in his excellence, that, as we are assured by a writer not disposed to flatter him, the very foremost of the Parthian archers and of the Mauritanian lancers [Parthyaion oi toxichaes hachribentes, chai Mauresion oi hachontixein harizoi] were not able to contend with him. Juvenal, in a well known passage upon the disproportionate endings of illustrious careers, ...
— The Caesars • Thomas de Quincey
... cut down his tail a little, dust him all over so as to make his glossy black plumage look grey and shabby, ruffle his feathers, apply a little pomade hongroise to the feathers on the back of his head, and make some of them stick out to look like a dilapidated crest, and you may flatter yourself that you have produced a very fair imitation of a black bulbul as it appears when flitting about from one tree summit to another. Closer inspection of the bird reveals the fact that "black" is scarcely the right adjective to apply to it. Dark grey is the prevailing hue of its plumage, ...
— Birds of the Indian Hills • Douglas Dewar
... it here and there across the vast white background of canvas, drawing great meaningless lines in distant expanses of the texture, then, always consulting her with his keen, impersonal gaze, he pushed back his ladder, mounted, wiped the big brushes, selected others smaller and flatter, considering her in penetrating silence ...
— The Common Law • Robert W. Chambers
... McDonald of Kingsborough to be Major, and Captain Alexd. McLeod of the Marines now on half pay to be first Captain, who besides being men of great worth, and good character, have most extensive influence over the Highlanders here, great part of which are of their own names and familys, and I should flatter myself that His Majesty would be graciously pleased to permit me to nominate some of the Subalterns of such a Battalion, not for pecuniary consideration, but for encouragement to some active and deserving young Highland Gentlemen who might be usefully employed in the ...
— An Historical Account of the Settlements of Scotch Highlanders in America • J. P. MacLean
... people, in height, shape, and limb, very much resemble the Europeans, there is yet this difference, that their bodies are rather broader and flatter, and their limbs, though as long and well shaped, are seldom as thick as ours. And this I observed generally in all I saw of them during a long time among them afterwards; but their skin, for beauty and fairness, ...
— Life And Adventures Of Peter Wilkins, Vol. I. (of II.) • Robert Paltock
... away the front wall." And I outlined the history of that canine clairvoyant, Willy Woolly. "The Mordaunt Estate is sensitive about his tenants, anyway. He rents, not on profits, but on prejudice. Perhaps it would be well for you to flatter him a little; admire his style ...
— From a Bench in Our Square • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... upon a summer sea, (in a boat, of course,) 'mid crocuses and lilies, while the air is filled with the melodious sounds from a bass-drum and that sort of thing, and is redolent with the perfume of a thousand flowers, will find solace here. (I flatter myself that period ...
— Punchinello, Vol. 1, No. 14, July 2, 1870 • Various
... getting into his chair, and taking up a paper-weight to help him in talk. "The fact is, I find that I have been working too hard. I have undertaken to manage the editorial department of the Events in addition to looking after its business, and the care has been too great. It has told upon me. I flatter myself that I have not allowed either ...
— A Modern Instance • William Dean Howells
... go-off. But we could get around that. For example, 'Dear Mrs. Blank: Replying to your application for membership in the Post-Graduate School of W. B., would say that your case is so peculiar'—that would flatter her immensely—'your case is so peculiar that the ordinary text-books cover it very inadequately. Therefore, with your approval, and for a small additional tuition fee of $2 the term, we shall place you in a special class to be instructed by electrographed lectures ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume IX (of X) • Various
... the exertions of their ally, and of the merit of the officers he employs. The confidence inspired by the first, and the esteem excited by the last, form new bands of union between nations, whom reciprocal interests had before connected. In this view I flatter myself the enclosed acts of Congress will be agreeable to you, and that you will with pleasure communicate to his Most Christian Majesty their desire, with his permission, to present to the Count de Grasse two pieces of field ordnance, taken from the enemy at York, with inscriptions calculated ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. XI • Various
... because 'tis buying of Protection, and acknowledging of Power. To give little gifts, is to Dishonour; because it is but Almes, and signifies an opinion of the need of small helps. To be sedulous in promoting anothers good; also to flatter, is to Honour; as a signe we seek his protection or ayde. To ...
— Leviathan • Thomas Hobbes
... tell him that each new overseer is expected to treat the others to brandy or wine, and all plan to go to the tavern after supper. Freneli is surprised that he is going with them, and cautions him to be on his guard. At the tavern all begin to flatter him at once, but Uli is mindful of what he heard at church and of Freneli's caution. One by one the others all leave, except one man; he offers to take Uli a-courting. Uli half yields, and is led into a dark alley where the others set upon him. He ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. VIII • Various
... his rise in society, till at last he came in touch with members of the upper classes, and rubbed shoulders with the men who sat in the high places. Then came his disillusionment, and this disillusionment he described in terms that did not flatter his audience. He was surprised at the commonness of the clay. Life proved not to be fine and gracious. He was appalled by the selfishness he encountered, and what had surprised him even more than that ...
— The Iron Heel • Jack London
... way; some politicians in the free States countenance it from similar motives, and because less cautious measures might occasion a loss of Southern votes and influence; the time-serving class—so numerous in every community,—who are always ready to flatter existing prejudices, and sail smoothly along the current of popular favor, join it, of course; but I am willing to believe that the largest proportion belong to it, because they have compassionate hearts, are fearful ...
— An Appeal in Favor of that Class of Americans Called Africans • Lydia Maria Child
... Mr. Isidore, during this time, the least part of our Chaplain's trial. Mr. Julius might flatter, proclaiming him a born organiser: but this was small consolation when Mr. Isidore (an artist by temperament) stamped and swore ...
— Brother Copas • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... open our chambers to receive him. How shall we receive him if, avoiding judgment, we hold this or that daub of authority or tradition hanging upon our walls to be the real likeness of our Lord? Is it not possible at least that, judging unrighteous judgment by such while we flatter ourselves that we are refusing to judge, we may close our doors against the Master himself as an impostor, not finding him like the picture that hangs in our oratory. And if we do not judge—humbly and lovingly—who is to judge for us? Better to refuse even the truth for a time, ...
— Unspoken Sermons - Series I., II., and II. • George MacDonald
... to be always continued by those, who, being able to add nothing to truth, hope for eminence from the heresies of paradox; or those, who, being forced by disappointment upon consolatory expedients, are willing to hope from posterity what the present age refuses, and flatter themselves that the regard which is yet denied by envy, will be ...
— Preface to Shakespeare • Samuel Johnson
... excuse of natural incapacity and unfitness, and yet thou still remainest voluntarily below the mark? or art thou compelled through being defectively furnished by nature to murmur, and to be stingy, and to flatter, and to find fault with thy poor body, and to try to please men, and to make great display, and to be so restless in thy mind? No, by the gods; but thou mightest have been delivered from these things long ago. Only if ...
— Thoughts of Marcus Aurelius Antoninus • Marcus Aurelius Antoninus
... and marriage, and of those whose value may be unexpectedly increased by a legacy, or a sister or brother's decease. Particular attention will be paid to rich widows.—The first part of this truly useful work is nearly ready for the press; and we flatter ourselves that its arrangement and execution will excite universal applause. The particulars concerning each lady will be distributed under four heads; the first will be devoted to her fortune and expectations; the second to a description of her person; the third ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 12, Issue 327, August 16, 1828 • Various
... and a bon-vivant, he could hit the humor of the roystering cavaliers who surrounded the 'merry monarch;' a man of gallantry and polite accomplishments, he was acceptable to women of society. The same tongue that bullied from the bench, when witnesses were perverse or counsel unruly, could flatter with such melodious affectation of sincerity, that he was known as a most delightful companion. As a musical connoisseur he spoke with authority; as a teller of good stories he had no equal in town. ...
— A Book About Lawyers • John Cordy Jeaffreson
... of self-reconcilement, of inward peace and strength, continue! May you still be lenient with, be just to, yourself! I will not praise nor flatter you, I should hate to pay those enervating compliments which tend to check the exertions of a mind that aspires after excellence; but I must permit myself to remark that if you had not something good ...
— Charlotte Bronte and Her Circle • Clement K. Shorter
... their faces thitherward. Now the devil has lost a sinner; there is a captive has broke prison, and one run away from his master. Now hell seems to be awakened from sleep, the devils are come out. They roar, and roaring they seek to recover their runaway. Now tempt him, threaten him, flatter him, stigmatize him, throw dust into his eyes, poison him with error, spoil him while he is upon the potter's wheel, anything to keep him from coming to Christ.'[83] 'What, my true servant,' quoth he, 'my old servant, wilt thou forsake me now? Having so often sold thyself to ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... since it lives and lets me live; The posts are set, the booth of boards completed. And each awaits the banquet I shall give. Already there, with curious eyebrows raised, They sit sedate, and hope to be amazed. I know how one the People's taste may flatter, Yet here a huge embarrassment I feel: What they're accustomed to, is no great matter, But then, alas! they've read an awful deal. How shall we plan, that all be fresh and new,— Important matter, yet attractive too? For ...
— Faust • Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe
... Psalm, while he went out to beat up the wanderers to attend public worship; how he once interrupted a preacher who was congratulating the Haworth people on the advantages they enjoyed under a Gospel ministry, by crying out in a loud voice, 'No, no, sir, don't flatter them; they are most of them going to Hell with their eyes open;' these and many other such stories might be told at full length.[802] But it is more profitable to dwell upon the noble, disinterested work which he did, quite unrecognised ...
— The English Church in the Eighteenth Century • Charles J. Abbey and John H. Overton
... interview; "nor am I prepared to admit your claim to the position you assume. But if my daughter is your wife, she left you of her own free will, under no coercion of mine; and she must return to you in the same manner, or you must put the machinery of the law in force to compel her. And that, I flatter myself, in a free country like America, will ...
— Fenton's Quest • M. E. Braddon
... the flap of the saddle; and it will be more inconvenient to alter the length of the leather, when the lady is mounted, than if the buckle or hook was low down. The hook (Fig. 14) is better than a buckle, because it lies flatter and ...
— The Horsewoman - A Practical Guide to Side-Saddle Riding, 2nd. Ed. • Alice M. Hayes
... no particular desire to talk to him now; he had already told him everything he intended to tell him, and he had no intention of allowing the case to be boomed as a sensation; quite the reverse indeed: in his opinion, the flatter the case fell, the better it would be for his interests, though no doubt Maitre Barberoux would not be of ...
— Fantomas • Pierre Souvestre
... handed Madame Raquin, who could only walk with difficulty, the small articles she required. Then he seated himself and chatted. He had acquired the gentle penetrating voice of an actor which he employed to flatter the ears and heart of the good old lady. In a friendly way, he seemed particularly anxious about the health of Therese, like a tender-hearted man who feels for the sufferings of others. On repeated occasions, he took Madame Raquin to one side, and terrified her by ...
— Therese Raquin • Emile Zola
... situation did not in the least depress her. Rather was she somewhat proud of her own part in it. "It's really painful, my dear boy," said she, "but I flatter myself that I've been quite a Sherlock Holmes. I suppose you haven't even discovered, yet, that the ...
— The Old Flute-Player - A Romance of To-day • Edward Marshall and Charles T. Dazey
... "I think I follow you. It is quite proper that you should marry. It is quite proper that a man who has done so much for England should leave descendants to perpetuate his name, and with perhaps some portion of his ability—no, Jean, I do not flatter,—serve the England which is to his heart so dear. As a Frenchman I cannot but deplore that our next generation may have to face another Ormskirk; as your friend who loves you I say that this marriage will appropriately round ...
— Gallantry - Dizain des Fetes Galantes • James Branch Cabell
... it is not necessary for the writer to be in love," she said quietly but positively. "I flatter myself that my love scenes are rather real, and I have not found it ...
— The Two-Gun Man • Charles Alden Seltzer
... many persons angry in my life, Polly. I cannot even flatter myself that this is the first time I have offended you. However, I feel compelled to speak the truth." Miss ...
— The Campfire Girls on the Field of Honor • Margaret Vandercook
... donations into the sacred treasury, so that they yield to their request, whilst they denounce those who refuse to comply with their importunities as foes to Christ and His holy Gospel. They contrive to obtain testamentary devices to the injury (in many cases) of widows and orphans; they condescend to flatter the female sex until they have begged all that they are able to bestow. Thus by the instrumentality of those clerical beggars, and by the cause of Christ being made a pander, the Church becomes wealthy; and wealth creates power, and power, tyranny and ...
— American Lutheranism - Volume 1: Early History of American Lutheranism and The Tennessee Synod • Friedrich Bente
... resenting this curious mental dictatorship, his auditors never seem to weary. They hang upon his words, praise him, flatter him, repeat his judgments all over London the next day, and return in the evening hungry for more. Whenever the conversation begins to flag, Boswell is like a woman with a parrot, or like a man with a dancing bear. He must excite ...
— English Literature - Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English Speaking World • William J. Long
... the programme of discussion is concluded, (34) please remember, we must obtain a verdict on the point of beauty. Judgment shall be given—not at the bar of Alexander, son of Priam—but of these (35) who, as you flatter yourself, have such ...
— The Symposium • Xenophon
... she said, "Blessed! but not as happier children blessed"— That this should be Even she.... God, how with time and change Thou makest thy footsteps strange! Ah, now I know They play upon me, and it is not so. Why, 't is a girl I never saw before, A little thing to flatter and make weep, To tease until her heart is sore, Then kiss and clear the score; A gypsy run-the-fields, A little liberal daughter of the earth, Good for what hour of truancy and mirth The careless season yields Hither-side the flood o' the year ...
— Gloucester Moors and Other Poems • William Vaughn Moody
... I say, sometimes (as I think) they may; but they being naturally ignorant, understand not that such convictions tend to their good; and therefore they do desperately seek to stifle them, and presumptuously continue to flatter themselves in the way of their ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... I began noticing changes in our surroundings that indicated we were drawing nearer to our goal, namely, the trees lessening in proportions, the terrain becoming flatter, and the air growing moister and more vibrant. Still, the trees continued to spring up from the ground like great earthen tentacles, for while their size diminished, it was not by enough to change their demeanor, the trees anywhere on Daem ...
— The Revolutions of Time • Jonathan Dunn
... her hard, domestic grace Illusions scatter; But sometimes when the stars are full, While at my season'd pipe I pull, I'll see my little love once more, With brilliant lovers by the score, Whose tributes flatter. And, thinking of the light gone by, Murmur with philosophic sigh, "It ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 104, January 14, 1893 • Various
... not become a nun through jealousy of her sister, but from the fear of being tormented by her mother and sister, whom she loves very much, and in this she is right. She and her sister are not fond of their mother's favourites, and cannot endure to flatter them. They have no very reverent notions, either, of their mother's brother, and this is the cause of dissensions. I never saw my granddaughter in better spirits than on Sunday last; she was with her sister, on horseback, ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... an hour's time you will be in a glow all over; ride on horseback, the same effect will scarcely be perceived by four hours' round trotting; but if you loll in a carriage, such as you have mentioned, you may travel all day, and gladly enter the last inn to warm your feet by a fire. Flatter yourself then no longer that half an hour's airing in your carriage deserves the name of exercise. Providence has appointed few to roll in carriages, while he has given to all a pair of legs, which are machines infinitely more commodious and serviceable. Be grateful, then, and ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. IX (of X) - America - I • Various
... For the lady was sad: And a terrible night o't the poor lady had, While Mr. McNair wondered what was the matter, And endeavored to coax, to console and to flatter. Many tears she shed That night while in bed For she had such a terrible pain in her head! "My dear little pet, where's the camphor?" he said; "I'll go for the doctor—you'll have to be bled; I declare, my dear wife, you are ...
— The Feast of the Virgins and Other Poems • H. L. Gordon
... mountainous waves and deep gorges of a short time previous had probably swallowed up many an unlucky ship that morning; but its temper was expended, and all it could do now was to sulk in long, even billows which every moment became flatter and flatter. ...
— Around the World in Ten Days • Chelsea Curtis Fraser
... this night let's harbour here in York; And when the morning sun shall raise his car Above the border of this horizon We'll forward towards Warwick and his mates, For well I wot that Henry is no soldier.— Ah, froward Clarence! how evil it beseems thee To flatter Henry and forsake thy brother! Yet, as we may, we'll meet both thee and Warwick.— Come on, brave soldiers; doubt not of the day, And, that once gotten, doubt not ...
— King Henry VI, Third Part • William Shakespeare [Rolfe edition]
... "Not flatter vice. We curse vice only behind its back, and that's like making a long nose at it round a corner. I am a zoologist or a sociologist, which is the same thing; you are a doctor; society believes in us; we ought to point out the terrible harm which threatens it and the next ...
— The Duel and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... of Shakspeare he has cited, is somewhat startling, it was not to be summarily rejected without due examination; and yet, from a tolerably extensive acquaintance with old English phraseology, I fear I cannot flatter him with the expectation of having it confirmed by instances ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 43, Saturday, August 24, 1850 • Various
... man can live with that constraint Upon his soul, to bear, much less to flatter, A court like this! Can I sooth tyranny? Seem pleased to see my royal master murdered, His crown usurped, a distaff in the throne, A council made of such as dare not speak, And could not, if they durst; ...
— The Works of John Dryden, Vol. 6 (of 18) - Limberham; Oedipus; Troilus and Cressida; The Spanish Friar • John Dryden
... always on the worst of terms with Mr. and Mrs. Mumbray, and therefore glad to encourage Serena against them) had made her an heiress of no slight consideration. Young men of Polterham regarded her as the greatest prize within view, though none could flatter himself that he stood in any sensible degree of favour with her. There seemed no reason why Miss Mumbray should not marry, but it was certain that as yet she behaved disdainfully to all who approached her with the show of intention. ...
— Denzil Quarrier • George Gissing
... wondered whatever could have made him take to such a life. Unknown to father, too, he gave us good advice, warned us that what we were in was the road to imprisonment or death in due course, and not to flatter ourselves that any ...
— Robbery Under Arms • Thomas Alexander Browne, AKA Rolf Boldrewood
... you call straining a man's throat until he's hoarse, hailing, I believe I did. I flatter myself, there is not a man north of Hatteras that can make himself heard further in gale of wind than a certain gentleman who is to be found within a foot of the spot where I stand. Yet, sir, I've been hailing the Swash these five minutes, ...
— Jack Tier or The Florida Reef • James Fenimore Cooper
... went through all kinds of instruments of torment, that they might be forced either to blaspheme their legislator, or to eat what was forbidden them, yet could they not be made to do either of them, no, nor once to flatter their tormentors, or to shed a tear; but they smiled in their very pains, and laughed those to scorn who inflicted the torments upon them, and resigned up their souls with great alacrity, as ...
— The Wars of the Jews or History of the Destruction of Jerusalem • Flavius Josephus
... to her, if he may, that the English priesthood is older than that of Rome. He is minded to convince her if he may, or, if he may not, he plans to make submission to her, to commend her learning and in all things to flatter her—for she is very approachable by these channels, more than by ...
— Privy Seal - His Last Venture • Ford Madox Ford
... emphasis of the name? She repeated, with added emphasis, "Mr. Brute MacNair, since you have deemed it worth your while to furnish me with evidence? You told me once, I believe, that you cared nothing for my opinion. Is it possible that you hope at this late day to flatter ...
— The Gun-Brand • James B. Hendryx
... "We flatter ourselves we do look pretty fine," Burns admitted, eying his wife with satisfaction. "That gauzy gray thing Ellen has on strikes me as the bulliest yet. If I could just get her to wear a pink rose in ...
— Mrs. Red Pepper • Grace S. Richmond
... right, you are right, Wilton," replied the Earl. "But leave it to me: I myself will write to the Duke upon the subject, and doubt not shall find means to satisfy him, though I cannot flatter you, Wilton—and I tell you so at once—I cannot flatter you with the idea of any unexpected wealth. Your blood is your only possession; but that is enough. I will write myself in a ...
— The King's Highway • G. P. R. James
... It must have been galling to the great philosopher to yield the palm to lesser men; but such has ever been the destiny of genius, except in crises of public danger. Of all things that politicians hate is the domination of a man who will not stoop to flatter, who cannot be bribed, and who will be certain to expose vices and wrongs. The world will not bear rebukes. The fate of prophets is to be stoned. A stern moral greatness is repulsive to the weak and wicked. Parties reward mediocre men, ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume IX • John Lord
... sin. Balak is the devil who would ruin the people of God; by Balaam we can understand the nobles, the prelates, the preachers, the learned, who are held captive by their arrogance. The two servants are those who follow the proud, serve them, and flatter them, especially the lazy clergy and monks, who so far as outward show goes live a virtuous life, but who live for ceremonies and take care not to speak the truth. To these belong many citizens who live ...
— The World's Great Sermons, Volume I - Basil to Calvin • Various
... more brutish. Much flatter cranium. Long, tearing canine teeth. Carnivorous. I'll call them just 'guardians' until we find out ...
— The Galaxy Primes • Edward Elmer Smith
... can quit your imagination of love and greatness, and leave your hopes of preferment and bridal raptures to try once more the fortune of literature and industry, the way through France is now open. We flatter ourselves that we shall cultivate with great diligence the arts of peace; and every man will be welcome among us who can teach us anything we do not know. For your part, you will find all your old friends ...
— Selected English Letters (XV - XIX Centuries) • Various
... had been heard quarreling. She had the temper of a hyena, and soon the place she ran was a witch's caldron. There were some of the girls who were of her own sort, who were willing to toady to her and flatter her; and these would carry tales about the rest, and so the furies were unchained in the place. Worse than this, the woman lived in a bawdyhouse downtown, with a coarse, red-faced Irishman named Connor, ...
— The Jungle • Upton Sinclair
... the more desirous of offering a few remarks upon this subject, from having occasionally heard observations indicating some disapprobation relative to our theatrical arrangements. Such impressions, we flatter ourselves, a little more information upon the subject, and a candid reconsideration will do away. From a knowledge of the state of the theatres in other parts of the continent, we feel ourselves perfectly ...
— The Mirror of Taste, and Dramatic Censor - Vol I, No. 2, February 1810 • Samuel James Arnold
... regimenting them. Christianity has supported for ages monastic institutions, institutions the most counter to the passions of men, solely by its strong appeal to the individual conscience. St Simonian institutions, or delightful phalansteres, will in vain flatter every passion and indulge every sense; if they leave the conscience inert, if nothing is built on the sense of duty, they will no sooner rise but they will crumble back ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 349, November, 1844 • Various
... are constantly apologizing to foreigners for America, for its institutions, for its social life, and for themselves as belonging to it, is a fact which no one ever thinks of disputing. In this faculty for disparaging our own country we may flatter ourselves that we have no equals. The Chinese may come near us in their obsequious assurances as to the utter unworthiness of everything pertaining to them, but with the difference that they, probably, are inwardly profoundly convinced of ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. 26, October, 1880 • Various
... finished, pushing back her bonnet and pulling off her gloves, "I'll just write my opinion of you to Mr. Craven, and I'll wait till you direct the envelope, and I'll go with you to the post, and I'll see you put the letter in the box. If you and your fine Colonel Morris think you can frighten or flatter me, you are both much mistaken, I ...
— The Uninhabited House • Mrs. J. H. Riddell
... speaking of the "profane herd of those vulgar and mechanical politicians" (p. 126) to arouse righteous anger against a certain class, to flatter his audience, or did he have some ...
— Teachers' Outlines for Studies in English - Based on the Requirements for Admission to College • Gilbert Sykes Blakely
... "Do not attempt to flatter me. I have no fancy for handling befouled spider webs. Besides, if I had—if such elusive filaments fascinated me—how could I, well-known in person and name, enter upon such a scene without prejudice to our ...
— The Golden Slipper • Anna Katharine Green
... of Kildare to be put up at the young club, at White's. If little Harry is come to town, he shall write to you; others should write to you if I could make them, but I am afraid those wishes are more of a courtier than a friend. I should be sorry and ashamed, by endeavouring to flatter your inclination, if I lost your good opinion, which without flattery I ...
— George Selwyn: His Letters and His Life • E. S. Roscoe and Helen Clergue
... wives and sisters of scholars and literary men; were they the wives and sisters of inspectors or of dentists, they would speak with the same zeal of fires or teeth. To allow them to speak of science, which is foreign to them, and to listen to them, is to flatter their ignorance. ...
— Note-Book of Anton Chekhov • Anton Pavlovich Chekhov
... household truly happy, for here the positions are reversed and the wife rules because the husband is weak. But the normal instinct of woman is to rule over the heart of man, not over his intelligence or on his will. Ruling in these last domains may flatter a woman's vanity and render it dominating, but it never satisfies her heart, and this is why the woman who rules is so often unfaithful to her husband, if not in deed, at least ...
— The Sexual Question - A Scientific, psychological, hygienic and sociological study • August Forel
... an Accurate Description of the New World, etc. Collected and Translated by John Ogilby. London, 1670, Book II, Ch. II, p. 155.] says: "Hubbub is five small Bones in a small Tray; the Bones be like a Die, but something flatter, black on the one side and white on the other, which they place on the Ground, against which violently thumping the Platter, the Bones mount, changing Colour with the windy whisking of their Hands to and fro; which action in that sport they much use, smiting themselves on ...
— Indian Games • Andrew McFarland Davis
... still fresh in the remembrance of your fellow citizens. Could it be possible for men who have served and fought under you, to be now forgetful of that general, by whose prudent conduct their lives have been saved and their families preserved from being plundered by a rapacious enemy? We mean not to flatter you. At this time it is impossible for you to suspect it. Our present language is the language of free men expressing only sentiments of gratitude. Your achievements may not have sufficiently swelled the historic page. They were performed by those who could better wield the sword ...
— A Sketch of the Life of Brig. Gen. Francis Marion • William Dobein James
... contempt he'd have to modify. I sing alone sometimes, But singing isn't easy! Tra la, la, tra, la la! Still it isn't voice that I lack, I think, Tra la la, tra la la, No, 'tis the method. Of course one can't have everything. I sing pretty badly, But dance agreeably, And I do not flatter myself; Dancing shows off my advantages. 'Tis my one great attraction, But dancing isn't easy. Tra la la, tra ...
— The Tales of Hoffmann - Les contes d'Hoffmann • Book By Jules Barbier; Music By J. Offenbach
... accession to the throne in 1498, resolved to cross the Alps in his turn, and on his solemn entry into Paris after his coronation an elaborate machine was contrived to delicately flatter his pretensions to Genoa and Milan, and appear in the royal procession. This consisted of an apparatus mounted on wheels, in the form of a terrace, on which was seen a porcupine, moving all his quills at once, and a young ...
— Paris from the Earliest Period to the Present Day; Volume 1 • William Walton
... will seldom trouble himself to inquire into the veracity of the tale bearer, lest he should be reduced to the necessity of defending himself on his weakest side. For a similar reason, when Miss Abigail had a mind to flatter any person (which she frequently would, to answer the purposes of her malice) she always commended him for those particular good qualities, or accomplishments which she knew he most valued himself for, or chiefly wished to have the credit of; because she was sensible that by this ...
— Vice in its Proper Shape • Anonymous
... therefore the little he did understand of it was too much. But he had begun to be afraid of his daughter: her still dignity had begun to tell upon him in his humiliation. He laid the letter aside, said nothing, and waited, inwardly angry and contemptuous. After a while he began to flatter himself with the hope that perhaps it was but a sort of impertinent valentine, the writer of which was unknown to Ginevra. From the moment of its arrival, however, he kept a stricter watch upon her, and ...
— Sir Gibbie • George MacDonald
... is pretty well known, I flatter myself," said the visitor, complacently. "To be brief—I heard you sing last evening, and was much pleased with your rendition of the ...
— Facing the World • Horatio Alger
... felt in her, whom he had known as he had known no other, something unknown, the coming of another woman, belonging to another life, the life of the opera and the multitude, which would again flatter and intoxicate her. The summer had passed without a doubt, and now, all at once, something new came to him, indefinable, colored with the vague terror of the night, the fear of other men who would come thronging ...
— Murder in Any Degree • Owen Johnson
... insult him at this moment, and if this priest wished it, in an hour you would be without a crown? Come, then, on another occasion you can be firm and strong; but to-day is not the proper time; to-day, flatter and caress, or you are only ...
— Twenty Years After • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... the little while we were alone she was at a good deal of pains to flatter me; always cleverly, always with the appearance of a banter, still calling me Saxpence, but with such a turn that should rather uplift me in my own opinion. When Catriona returned, the design became if possible more obvious; ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 11 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... established as in England now, the alternatives for trust are either to hold aloof in despair awaiting the debacle, to resist to the bitter end with a result like that which Stephenson said would occur if a cow attempted to stop his locomotive, or to try humbug and flattery. You do not flatter those you trust. We are not speaking of that delightful flattery practised by Irishmen out of exuberant spirits or to create a genial atmosphere, but which is so easily succeeded by equally picturesque and imaginative ...
— Rebuilding Britain - A Survey Of Problems Of Reconstruction After The World War • Alfred Hopkinson
... under suspicion. 'More than once in an emergency at sea,' says Dr. Grenfell, the hero of Labrador, 'I have swiftly decided upon a certain line of action. If I had waited to hem my reason into a corner before adopting that course, I should not be here to tell the tale.' We often flatter ourselves that we base our conclusions upon our reasons. In reality, we do nothing of the kind. The mind works so rapidly that it tricks us. It is another case of legerdemain. Once more, it is the machine that ...
— Mushrooms on the Moor • Frank Boreham
... are found. If any one were to say to them "A lofty spirituality is beyond all comparison with the honesty and respectability of a merely moral man"—it would make them furious, I shall take care not to say so. I would rather flatter them with my theory that lofty spirituality itself exists only as the ultimate product of moral qualities, that it is a synthesis of all qualities attributed to the "merely moral" man, after they have been acquired ...
— Beyond Good and Evil • Friedrich Nietzsche
... the [124] right moment, brought a beam of effectual day-light to a whole magazine of observation, fancy, desire, stored up from the first impressions of childhood. To bring Apollo with his lyre to Germany! It was precisely that he, Carl, desired to do—was, as he might flatter himself, actually doing. ...
— Imaginary Portraits • Walter Horatio Pater
... called Dennis. "We're level with the gun," and, trying to squeeze themselves flatter, if such a performance had been humanly possible, they heard the rhythmical tac-tac abreast of them and the weird whistle of the deadly stream of bullets a few feet ...
— With Haig on the Somme • D. H. Parry
... and the support of the missionaries. He then took measures to have the same thing done in the other towns of his fief, and he seconded the preachers of the Gospel so well in everything else that he could flatter himself that he soon would not have one single idolater in his states." This fanatical "Prince Andrew" survived his baptism by two years only, but during that time twenty thousand converts were made in Arima. His successor, however, was a believer ...
— A History of the Japanese People - From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era • Frank Brinkley and Dairoku Kikuchi
... sensations. It was something like that with me, and my life was almost as good as a play. I could say and do dreadfully naughty things, which would have been outrageous for a grown-up young lady of nearly seventeen. And didn't I do them all? I never missed a single chance, and I flatter myself that I ...
— My Friend the Chauffeur • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... I'm just where I started. I've been going round in a circle. That's banking! Do you think for a holy minute that if I was young again I'd give myself another twenty-five-year sentence? Great Heaven! what wouldn't I give to be back at your age? You may flatter yourself with the notion that you're going to have something nice handed to you some day. Well, you'll get it handed to you, all right, but not in a silver salver. You'll get it where the chicken got the a-x-e; you'll get it with the bank guillotine. You're now doing ...
— A Canadian Bankclerk • J. P. Buschlen
... flattery; you could take it as spite, fear, or homage, according to the manner in which it was pronounced, naturally always behind the General's back, for it went very hard indeed with the man who ventured to pick a quarrel with him, and still harder, if possible, with anybody who tried to flatter him. ...
— The Day of Wrath • Maurus Jokai
... was often a little rough, and that the members were a little ashamed of it; for when Mark Lemon introduced there Mr. Catling, the editor of "Lloyd's Weekly Newspaper," he picturesquely warned his guest to be prepared for "an awful set of blackguards." On the night in question, however, the fun was flatter, and Kenny Meadows, the Father ...
— The History of "Punch" • M. H. Spielmann
... Savior, in all His glory, to appear in the midst of the temple; and that you are only assembled here to wait His coming; like trembling criminals on whom the sentence is to be pronounced, either of life eternal or of everlasting death; for it is vain to flatter yourselves that you shall die more innocent than you are at this hour. All those desires of change with which you are amused will continue to amuse you till death arrives, the experience of all ages proves it; the only difference you have to expect will most likely be a ...
— Successful Methods of Public Speaking • Grenville Kleiser
... think of it. The old she-wolf is always moving; she never tires; she tramps along all the hollows in the Black Forest. We must not flatter ourselves with vain hopes. If, perhaps, she has stopped on her journey, so much the better for us; and if she still keeps going, we won't let that discourage us. ...
— The Man-Wolf and Other Tales • Emile Erckmann and Alexandre Chatrian
... cheery smile, that reached nearly to the tips of his mustache and almost sufficed to give them a faint curl, spread itself over his face as he turned from Wall Street into Broadway. He caressed the check with his fingers and softly observed, "H'm, I flatter myself that was well done. I have the money, and Thwicket has an abiding confidence in my wealth,—but oh, ye gods! what would I give to be able to put my fine Italian hand into ...
— Tin-Types Taken in the Streets of New York • Lemuel Ely Quigg
... condescension that a woman has for the most stupendous, most shameful deceits, as long as they flatter her. ...
— Woman Triumphant - (La Maja Desnuda) • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... must be cut; these are to be bent, and have both ends stuck in the ground, in such a way as to form the framework of the required boat, bottom upwards, much like half a walnut-shell in shape, but flatter. Where these wands cross, they should be lashed; and sticks should be wattled in, to fill up gaps. A raw hide is then thrown over the framework, sewn in place, and left to dry. Finally, the projecting ends of the osiers have to be cut off. Should this boat, by any chance, prove ...
— The Art of Travel - Shifts and Contrivances Available in Wild Countries • Francis Galton
... entertains The court with annual birthday strains, Whence Gay was banished in disgrace, Where Pope will never show his face, Where Young must torture his invention To flatter knaves, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 11, September, 1858 • Various
... opportunities of conversing with any of their own countrymen, and still less of their countrywomen, in their mother tongue. I take some liberty in venturing to offer these wholly unauthorized remarks on a subject of some delicacy; and only wish I could flatter myself they have any chance of reaching influential quarters, and not being forgotten. Mr. Craig's position, respected and esteemed as he long has been, is eligible in many respects; but ...
— Rambles in the Islands of Corsica and Sardinia - with Notices of their History, Antiquities, and Present Condition. • Thomas Forester
... "I have read and pondered much on what this book contains. It seems to me, that, if it teaches anything, it clearly teaches, that, no matter how we flatter ourselves that we are doing as we choose, and carrying out our own designs and wishes, we are all the time only fulfilling purposes that have been fixed from all eternity. Since, then, we are the subjects of an Inexorable Will, which no ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 3, Issue 15, January, 1859 • Various
... eyes of the Malays, and not without reason, seeing that, in an Independent Native State, many a man has come by his death for carelessness in their observance. A wrongly given salute may raise the ire of a Raja, which is no pleasant thing to encounter; or if it flatter him by giving him more than his due, the fact may be whispered in the ears of his superiors, who will not be slow to resent the usurpation and to ...
— In Court and Kampong - Being Tales and Sketches of Native Life in the Malay Peninsula • Hugh Clifford
... one-night stands with a theatrical company, which mirthful experience has just been ours. We went along in the very lowly capacity of co-author, which placed us somewhat beneath the stage hands as far as dignity was concerned; and we flatter ourself that we have learned our station and observe it with due humility. The first task of the director who stages a play is to let the author know where he gets off. This was accomplished in our case by an argument ...
— Pipefuls • Christopher Morley
... brought many things to a close. Before ending it we will leap over three months, to the termination of the career of the pope who has been so far our companion. Not any more was the distracted Clement to twist his handkerchief, or weep, or flatter, or wildly wave his arms in angry impotence; he was to lie down in his long rest, and vex the world no more. He had lived to set England free—an exploit which, in the face of so persevering an anxiety to escape a separation, required a rare ...
— The Reign of Henry the Eighth, Volume 1 (of 3) • James Anthony Froude
... been nourished for the lack of true doctrine, your majesty will find the liberty of my tongue nothing offensive. Without the preaching-place, Madam, I am not master of myself, for I must obey Him who commands me to speak plain, and flatter no flesh upon the face ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor
... are with me, you must conform to my wishes. Mr. Keith is not responsible for you. Mr. Keith is like other men—ready to flatter a ...
— Gordon Keith • Thomas Nelson Page
... sleep will come. This belief may be reenforced to strong autosuggestion which may then overcome other factors that hinder sleep. For instance, I have repeatedly received letters from strangers containing expressions of gratitude with news which under other circumstances would at least not flatter an author. They wrote to me that immediately after reading one or another essay of mine on hypnotism, they fell into deep sleep. Yet as they were always patients who had suffered from insomnia, I was pleased with this unintended effect ...
— Psychotherapy • Hugo Muensterberg
... especially as it was, "in its progress, encountering trials of a new sort in the formation of new parties attaching adverse constructions to it." The latter reason seems to be one of those happy after-thoughts which public men not unfrequently flatter themselves will anticipate a question they would prefer should not be asked. Mr. Madison was a member of the First Congress from the first day it met, before the new Constitution had encountered new trials from new parties by any ...
— James Madison • Sydney Howard Gay
... she said, "they're very wise. They know they've only got to flatter your vanity, and you press up to them like a dog that ...
— Sons and Lovers • David Herbert Lawrence
... nothing to truth, hope for eminence from the heresies of paradox; or those, who, being forced by disappointment upon consolatory expedients, are willing to hope from posterity what the present age refuses, and flatter themselves that the regard which is yet denied by envy, will be ...
— Preface to Shakespeare • Samuel Johnson
... complimentary! I flatter myself that our Dick is a gentleman. I do, indeed. And, as he is yet perfectly in his senses, you might ...
— The Bow of Orange Ribbon - A Romance of New York • Amelia E. Barr
... and therefore buy and sell. Has the Conference or the League the right or power to dictate to them the persons or the people with whom alone they may have dealings? Can it narrow the field of Russia's political activities? Some people flatter themselves that it can. In this case the League of Nations must transform itself into an alliance for the suppression of the ...
— The Inside Story Of The Peace Conference • Emile Joseph Dillon
... perfectly discreet—if he thinks discretion desirable. He is the only available friend we have close enough to ask at once. And things of this kind are, I suppose, if anybody's concern, his. It's certain to leak out. Everybody will hear of it. Don't flatter yourself you are going to hush up a thing like this for long. You can't keep living skeletons in a cupboard. You think only of yourself, only of your own misfortune. But who's to know, pray, that you really are my husband—if you are? The sooner ...
— The Return • Walter de la Mare
... same locust-tree, I hope you will not refuse to try a mug of my home-brewed beer, which I made out of its beans this very day, while you were wandering about my grounds and through the valley. It is, perhaps, not equal to Barclay and Perkins'; but I flatter myself that, under the circumstances, you will not ...
— The Desert Home - The Adventures of a Lost Family in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid
... kept the former within reach of his hand, consigning the one he most valued to the keeping of their allies. The arrangement was understood to be merely temporary, and was made as much with a view to flatter his neighbors as in obedience to the invariable ...
— The Last of the Mohicans • James Fenimore Cooper
... together, the sound of voices was heard in the distance. Our castaways at once sank flatter into the grass, and ...
— The Battery and the Boiler - Adventures in Laying of Submarine Electric Cables • R.M. Ballantyne
... Levant, cooled in snow. The worthy Consul was smoking his chibouque, and his daughter, as she rose to greet their guest, let her guitar fall upon the turf. The original of the portrait proved that the painter had no need to flatter; and the dignified, yet cordial manner, the radiant smile, and the sweet and thrilling voice with which she welcomed her countryman would have completed the spell, had, indeed, the wanderer been one prepared, or capable of being enchanted. As it was, Mr. Ferrers, while he returned his ...
— Sketches • Benjamin Disraeli
... admiral; nor could I have supposed it possible. My greatest comfort under God is, that I have been supported by the officers, seamen, and marines of this ship, for which, with a heart overflowing with gratitude, I request you to accept my sincere thanks. I flatter myself much good may result from your example, by bringing those deluded people to a sense of the duty which they owe, not only to their king ...
— The King's Own • Captain Frederick Marryat
... would have run after you—you needn't flatter yourself; and besides, I think I was really trying to protect you as well as to gain protection, else why should I have cast myself on you like a catamount, or a catacomb, or whatever the ...
— A Cathedral Courtship • Kate Douglas Wiggin
... portions of lean flesh, usually a little flattened and somewhat rounded at their edges, and terminating at one end—often at both—in a harder, flatter, white substance, called tendon, which is fastened to ...
— The Young Woman's Guide • William A. Alcott
... would be bound to know all about it. I am quite sure that Thackeray believed every word that he said in the lectures, and that he intended to put in the good and the bad, honestly, as they might come to his hand. We may be quite sure that he did not intend to flatter the royal family;—equally sure that he would not calumniate. There were, however, so many difficulties to be encountered that I cannot but think that the subject was ill-chosen. In making them so amusing as he did and so little offensive ...
— Thackeray • Anthony Trollope
... "may be said to have doubled his mental resources." No man is wise enough to be his own counselor, for he inclineth too much to leniency toward himself. "It is a well-known rule that flattery is food for the fool." Therefore no man should be his own counselor since no one is so apt to flatter another as he is himself. A wise man never flatters himself, neither does a friend flatter. As a wise man sees his own faults and seeks to correct them, so a true friend sees the faults of his friend and labors faithfully to banish them. The one who flatters ...
— Questionable Amusements and Worthy Substitutes • J. M. Judy
... went on. "Second"—he folded back his middle finger—"you are injuring your own father, also in two ways: you are bringing his lawful property into danger, and you are giving his political enemies the most effective sort of a weapon to swing in his coming campaign. And do not flatter yourself they will not make the best of it. It happens that your father has stood strongly with the Conservation members in the late fight in Congress. This would be a pretty scandal. Third," said Oldham, touching his ring finger, "you are injuring yourself. You are throwing away an opportunity ...
— The Rules of the Game • Stewart Edward White
... replied the Doctor. "But do not suppose me so unwary as to adopt him out of hand. I am, I flatter myself, a finished man of the world; I have had all possibilities in view; my plan is contrived to meet them all. I take the lad as stable-boy. If he pilfer, if he grumble, if he desire to change, I shall see I was mistaken; I shall recognise him for ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 6 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... single celebrated picture. There was a subdued lustre in the scene and an air as of the shining trains of dresses tumbled over the carpet. At the furthest end of the room sat Mrs. Capadose, rather isolated; she was on a small sofa, with an empty place beside her. Lyon could not flatter himself she had been keeping it for him; her failure to respond to his recognition at table contradicted that, but he felt an extreme desire to go and occupy it. Moreover he had her husband's sanction; so he ...
— A London Life; The Patagonia; The Liar; Mrs. Temperly • Henry James
... advanced and said, 'It is here.' The chief of our escort jumped off his horse, and presented me his hand to dismount also. A door was open, and the staircase lighted by a lamp. 'Madame,' said the man to me, 'you are now at home. At this door finishes the mission I received; may I flatter myself I have fulfilled it according to your wishes?' 'Yes, monsieur,' said I, 'I have only thanks to give you. Offer them in my name to all your men; I would wish to reward them in a better manner, but I possess nothing.' 'Do not be uneasy about that, madame,' ...
— Chicot the Jester - [An abridged translation of "La dame de Monsoreau"] • Alexandre Dumas
... I am, I flatter myself, completely a citizen of the world. In my travels through Holland, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Corsica, France, I never felt myself from home; and I sincerely love 'every kindred and tongue ...
— The Journal of a Tour to the Hebrides with Samuel Johnson, LL.D. • James Boswell
... a less favored child, and he will so far dote on the corporal and physical object of his devotion as to forget there is a soul within. He will account all things good that flatter his conceit, and all things evil that disturb the voluptuousness of his attachment. He owns that child, and he is going to make it the object of his eternal delights, God's rights and the child's own interests to the contrary notwithstanding. This fellow ...
— Explanation of Catholic Morals - A Concise, Reasoned, and Popular Exposition of Catholic Morals • John H. Stapleton
... village girl—she is nothing more! And they talk about his being so clever. Well, he always liked ladies' society; that is his failing, and now he has burnt his fingers. They all do sooner or later, especially these clever men. The women flatter them, that's it. Of course the girl is trying to get hold of him, and she might do worse, but so surely as my name is Honoria Bingham I will put a spoke in her wheel before she has done. Bah! and they laugh ...
— Beatrice • H. Rider Haggard
... my spectral and shifting visitant, again shifting spectrally. "Why, I'm thinking of writing, for the Nineteenth Century, an article on 'Political Lightning Conductors,' which, I rather flatter myself, will comprehend everything, convince everybody, and conciliate even Professor TYNDALL. If you like I will read, from the advance-sheets, ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 93, September 24, 1887 • Various
... of life doth flatter me With hope of yet more years on earth to stay, Death none the less draws nearer day by day, Who to sad souls alone comes lingeringly. Yet why desire long life and jollity, If in our griefs alone ...
— Sonnets • Michael Angelo Buonarroti & Tommaso Campanella
... I don't mean to flatter you, but we've got nothing in this league that can touch you. Come, now! As a personal favor ...
— Jim Spurling, Fisherman - or Making Good • Albert Walter Tolman
... intimation from mamma that it would be as well to put my books and music in the bottom, and my dresses in the top of my trunk. I am somewhat of a novice in packing, for during the preparations for our eight ocean voyages that duty never once fell to my lot; however I flatter myself that such very ...
— The Story of a Summer - Or, Journal Leaves from Chappaqua • Cecilia Cleveland
... tribute, which the wond'ring Court Pays your fair eyes, prevail with you to scorn The answer and consent to that report Which, echo-like, the country does return: Mirrors are taught to flatter, but our springs Present ...
— Poetical Works of Edmund Waller and Sir John Denham • Edmund Waller; John Denham
... have remained in ignorance," she repeated, calmly. "Don't flatter yourself, Sir Leslie, that a woman ever has any real gratitude in her heart for the person who, out of friendship, or some other motive, destroys her ideals. I should have married Lawrence Mannering ...
— A Lost Leader • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... Nothing could be more splendid than the general effect of this noble building, brilliantly illuminated and filled with a well-dressed crowd. The president and corps diplomatique were in full uniform, and the display of diamonds was extraordinary. We ladies of the corps diplomatique tried to flatter ourselves that we made up in elegance what we wanted in magnificence! for in jewels no foreign ladies could attempt to compete with those of the country. The daughter of Countess ——-, just arrived ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon De La Barca
... support it; but as a mixture of novelty and vanity is the usual prop, no wonder if it fall with the slender stay. The fop in the play paid a greater compliment than he was aware of when he said to a person, whom he meant to flatter, "I like you almost as well as a new acquaintance." Why am I talking of friendship, after which I have had such a wild-goose chase. I thought only of telling you that the crows, as well as wild-geese, are here birds ...
— Letters written during a short residence in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark • Mary Wollstonecraft
... there in the forefront of this company, there was nothing in his refined and comely exterior to indicate that his real function was to pander to and flatter them; to invest with an air of respectability and rectitude the abominably selfish lives of the gang of swindlers, slave-drivers and petty tyrants who formed the majority of the congregation of ...
— The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists • Robert Tressell
... he resented the manner in which Grandfather Iden treated him, giving away half-crowns, crown-pieces, shillings, and fourpenny bits to anyone who would flatter his peculiarities, leaving his own descendants to struggle daily ...
— Amaryllis at the Fair • Richard Jefferies
... an example. I flattered myself a little while ago that a man cared a great deal about me—a man I cared a great deal for myself. And all the while he didn't; or, at least, I am afraid he didn't. And yet, you know, I can't help hoping that perhaps I didn't only flatter myself, after all; that perhaps he will come back some day and ...
— The Wharf by the Docks - A Novel • Florence Warden
... is, Sybil! Bosh! who cares for such double-dealing wretches, who flatter us before our faces and abuse us behind our backs?" exclaimed Beatrix, as she quickly finished her Puritan ...
— Cruel As The Grave • Mrs. Emma D. E. N. Southworth
... study-room; while, of course, he never expected to see Heady there, and didn't much care, of course, whether he came or not, still, a fellow never can tell, you know); on the same floor were B.J. and Jumbo. Jumbo did not stoop to flatter B.J. by pretending that he would not have preferred Sawed-Off for his room-mate; but Sawed-Off was working his way through, and the principal of the Academy had offered to help him out, not only ...
— The Dozen from Lakerim • Rupert Hughes
... he said, "how the growth of one's feet bears no proportion to that of his head. Observe those pedals. One of my ancestors must have found a wife in China. They have gained no increase after all these pilgrimages—and I flatter myself that they are in some sort graceful—ay? Now remark my head. What does Hamlet, or somebody, say about the front of Jove? This trip to Italy has actually enlarged the diameter of my head ...
— Bohemian Days - Three American Tales • Geo. Alfred Townsend
... her virginity sold to a dandy; you may pay for it my boy, and not find out you have been done." I pondered much over this, and the next night returned to the subject. His opinion was that an old stager like him was not to be done; but that any randy young beggar would go up the girl, and flatter himself he had had a virgin, if the girl was cunning. "When you see the tight covered hole with your eye, find it tight to your little finger, and then tight to your cock, my boy; when you have satisfied your eye, your finger, and your ...
— My Secret Life, Volumes I. to III. - 1888 Edition • Anonymous
... is left alone without the strong arm to guide him and keep him right, and we read that 'the princes of Judah came and made obeisance to him.' They take him on his weak side, and I dare say Jehoiada had been too true and too noble to do that, and though we are not told what means they took to flatter and coax him, we see very plainly what they were conspiring to do, for we read that 'they left the house of the Lord their God, the God of their fathers, and served groves and idols,' the groves here mentioned being symbols of Ashtaroth ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... squandering men's fortunes, is Correggio in a hay-loft, is genius starving in a garret. Lais, in Paris, must first and foremost find a rich man mad enough to pay her price. She must keep up a very elegant style, for this is her shop-sign; she must be sufficiently well bred to flatter the vanity of her lovers; she must have the brilliant wit of a Sophie Arnould, which diverts the apathy of rich men; finally, she must arouse the passions of libertines by appearing to be mistress to one man only who is envied ...
— Cousin Betty • Honore de Balzac
... bonfires light. But, first, let's seal the bliss With one fraternal kiss.' 'Good friend,' the cock replied, 'upon my word, A better thing I never heard; And doubly I rejoice To hear it from your voice; And, really there must be something in it, For yonder come two greyhounds, which I flatter Myself are couriers on this very matter. They come so fast, they'll be here in a minute. I'll down, and all of us will seal the blessing With general kissing and caressing.' 'Adieu,' said fox; 'my errand's ...
— The Fables of La Fontaine - A New Edition, With Notes • Jean de La Fontaine
... was followed by Aunt Huldah, and Matthew and Julia were heartily shaken, questioned and kissed, and led into the house, and served to hospitalities, that would flatter and refresh ...
— Summerfield - or, Life on a Farm • Day Kellogg Lee
... fell ill and died, on the 10th of Marchesvan, or October. The empire was divided between his two sons. Assur-bani-pal had already been named as his successor, and now took Assyria, while Saul-sum-yukin became king of Babylonia, subject, however, to his brother at Nineveh. It was an attempt to flatter the Babylonians by giving them a king of their own, while at the same time keeping the supreme power in ...
— Early Israel and the Surrounding Nations • Archibald Sayce
... d'Epernon found themselves once more the principal personages of the Court, but their triumph was nevertheless greatly moderated by the jealousy of Concini, who began to apprehend that their ceaseless efforts to gratify the wishes of the Queen, and to flatter her love of splendour and dissipation, might ultimately tend to weaken his own influence; while the ministers, on their side, aware that the negotiations then pending with Spain for the marriage of the King could not be readily concluded without their aid and concurrence, however they might ...
— The Life of Marie de Medicis, Vol. 2 (of 3) • Julia Pardoe
... friendship exceedingly precarious. He had indeed many qualities which, on a first acquaintance, were captivating. His conversation was lively; his manners, to those whom he desired to please, were even caressing. No man could flatter with more delicacy. No man succeeded more completely in inspiring those who approached him with vague hopes of some great advantage from his kindness. But under this fair exterior he was a tyrant, suspicious, disdainful, and malevolent. He had one taste ...
— Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... pursue the step-daughter of the emperor with boundless fury, for this very fury proved their royalism, and to hate and calumniate Bonaparte and his family was to love and flatter the Bourbons. ...
— Queen Hortense - A Life Picture of the Napoleonic Era • L. Muhlbach
... Jardine. "By now I flatter myself that I am so accustomed to you that you will have to ...
— A Daughter of the Land • Gene Stratton-Porter
... fell into a passion, and said, with an oath, "Madame, an honest man cannot flatter you when things are come to such an extremity. If you do not set Broussel at liberty this very day, there will not be left one stone upon another in ...
— The Memoirs of Cardinal de Retz, Complete • Jean Francois Paul de Gondi, Cardinal de Retz
... this as a compliment, though she knew that it had not been his intention to flatter her. His general attitude since she had met him scarcely suggested such, a lack of good taste. She was becoming mildly interested in the stranger, but she possessed several essentially English characteristics, ...
— Masters of the Wheat-Lands • Harold Bindloss
... you," he said,—"you know that very well; but you mustn't quarrel with me, if I talk honestly with you; it isn't everybody that will take the trouble. You flatter yourself that you will make a good many enemies by leaving your old communion. Not so many as you think. This is the way the common sort of people will talk:—'You have got your ticket to the feast of life, as ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... and taking care that you may have her ready for your use, so long as you continue my Pensioner: But as for her own Terms, I leave that to your self and her—But, said he, may I not see the Person first, that I may be satisfied the Painter has not flatter'd her? Yes, Sir, said I, provided that you don't spend too much time before you come to a Conclusion.—Leave that to me, said he, for you shall be no Looser: Whereupon I slipt out of the Room, and call'd one Mrs. Gertrude (which was the Person he desir'd) who came in immediately; and going ...
— The London-Bawd: With Her Character and Life - Discovering the Various and Subtle Intrigues of Lewd Women • Anonymous
... and his rewards, the tragedy of his soaring aspiration, the worse tragedy of his dumb questioning? Granting the existence of God, a house dedicated to Him naturally follows. He is all-important; it is fit that man should take some notice of Him. But why praise and flatter Him for His unspeakable cruelties? Why forget so supinely His failures to remedy the easily remediable? Why, indeed, devote the churches exclusively to worship? Why not give them over, now and then, ...
— Damn! - A Book of Calumny • Henry Louis Mencken
... the next bed; "and you have never taught me; neither shall you, if I can help it. A pretty instructor you would be, who think it ridiculous to be red! I suppose you can't grow red yourself, and so abuse the colour out of spite. Now I flatter myself I am red inside as well as out, so I suppose I am more ridiculous than your friend who contrives to keep himself white within, according to his own account; but I doubt the fact. There, there! it is a folly to be angry; so I say no more, except this: get red as fast as you can. You live in ...
— The Junior Classics Volume 8 - Animal and Nature Stories • Selected and arranged by William Patten
... this as a beginning?—it is to be a stately, pompous plunge into the subject, after the Milverton fashion:—"Friendship and the Phoenix, taking into due account the fire-office of that name, have been found upon the earth in not unsimilar abundance." I flatter myself that "not unsimilar ...
— Chambers' Edinburgh Journal - Volume XVII., No 423, New Series. February 7th, 1852 • Various
... unexpectedly increased by a legacy, or a sister or brother's decease. Particular attention will be paid to rich widows.—The first part of this truly useful work is nearly ready for the press; and we flatter ourselves that its arrangement and execution will excite universal applause. The particulars concerning each lady will be distributed under four heads; the first will be devoted to her fortune and expectations; the second to a description of her person; the third to non-essentials; and under the ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. 12, Issue 327, August 16, 1828 • Various
... in an alley off Washington Avenue, and they got the last twenty bones off'n me, and I was flatter 'n a pancake. So I says 'ish kabibble,' and I sneaks onto the blind baggage, and bums my way West. You'd 'a' died laughing to seen me throwing my feet for grub. Oh, I'm some panhandler! There was one Frau ...
— Free Air • Sinclair Lewis
... with a short rope in his hand. The mule eyed him with a gleam of malice. Its ears became, if possible, flatter. Dick made a loop on the rope, and leaning over the breast-high barricade between him and his adversary made a cast after the manner of South Americans, but the mule jerked his head aside, and the lasso missed him. While Dick was preparing for another cast, Tom came up behind him with a sly ...
— Six Months at the Cape • R.M. Ballantyne
... looked upon as a witch. This was not very agreeable news, but we tried to make the best of it. Our house was near the river-side, and we were surrounded by the families of those who followed the sea, and we endeavored to flatter ourselves with the idea, that idle tales of marvelous things are very common among that class of population; and that the stories we heard were mere gossip, as we whispered to ourselves, for fear of being overheard through the thin partition which divided us from the ...
— Old New England Traits • Anonymous
... reason of your not rising, whatever your apology be, I heartily accept of it. Being drawn hither by your complaints, and affected by your grief, I came to offer you my help; would to God that it lay in my power to ease you of your trouble; I would do my utmost to effect it. I flatter myself that you would willingly tell me the history of your misfortunes; but pray tell me first the meaning of the pond near the palace, where the fishes are of four colours? what this castle is? how you came to be here? and ...
— The Arabian Nights Entertainments Volume 1 • Anonymous
... Jew, though not with Judaical Absurdity, a faithful Adherer to my Expectation. Nor did the Consequence fail of answering, a War was apparent, and soon after proclaim'd. Thus waiting for an Opportunity, which I flatter'd my self would soon present, the little Diversions of Dublin, and the moderate Conversation of that People, were not of Temptation enough to make my Stay in England ...
— Military Memoirs of Capt. George Carleton • Daniel Defoe
... dedicarse, to devote oneself dirigirse, to address oneself escribirse, to write to each other, to one another escuchar, to listen to exacto, exact, accurate firmeza, firmness industria azucarera, sugar industry los informes, information lisonjearse, to flatter oneself llamarse, to be called el montaje, the erection of machinery, etc. *moverse, to be moved, driven (machinery) operadores, dealers (on 'Change) partida, lot (of goods) perfeccionar, to perfect, improve (machinery) *reconocer, to acknowledge ...
— Pitman's Commercial Spanish Grammar (2nd ed.) • C. A. Toledano
... not the course indicated by Lord Carlisle, viz., advancing upon a new line of intellectual communication with the laboring classes, be the surest mode of retrieving their affections, as most likely to flatter their self-esteem in ...
— Theological Essays and Other Papers v2 • Thomas de Quincey
... these Circumstances induced me to flatter myself, that a Work of this Kind would be agreeable to Your MAJESTY; and should this Attempt towards pointing out the Means of alleviating those Miseries, which necessarily attend a Military Life in the Time of Service, be ...
— An Account of the Diseases which were most frequent in the British military hospitals in Germany • Donald Monro
... concealed, because he is conscious they are really true; he will seldom trouble himself to inquire into the veracity of the tale bearer, lest he should be reduced to the necessity of defending himself on his weakest side. For a similar reason, when Miss Abigail had a mind to flatter any person (which she frequently would, to answer the purposes of her malice) she always commended him for those particular good qualities, or accomplishments which she knew he most valued himself for, or chiefly wished to have the credit of; because ...
— Vice in its Proper Shape • Anonymous
... and Speroni's revolting and frigid declamation of butchery and lust. Nor did the debt pass unnoticed. In 1585 Guarini, who had long since parted with the sinking ship of the younger poet's friendship, was ready to flatter Speroni with the declaration 'che tanto di leggiadria e sempre paruto a me, che abbia nell' Aminta suo conseguito Torquato Tasso, quant' egli fu imitatore ...
— Pastoral Poetry and Pastoral Drama - A Literary Inquiry, with Special Reference to the Pre-Restoration - Stage in England • Walter W. Greg
... vanity every one with his neighbour: they do but flatter with their lips, and dissemble in ...
— The Book of Common Prayer - and The Scottish Liturgy • Church of England
... followed he made excellent progress in the affections of the officers of L'Heureuse. He had a face full of bonhomie, an engaging knack of seeming to flatter his companions while he merely listened to their talk, a fund of anecdote, and (as we know) a voice for singing that conciliated all who had an ear for music. All these advantages he used. For the next few days ...
— The Blue Pavilions • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... your expert comes in; and though I am democrat enough to insist that he must first convince a representative body of amateurs that his way is the right way and Mrs Squeers's way the wrong way, yet I very strongly object to any tendency to flatter Mrs Squeers into the belief that her way is in the least likely to be the right way, or that any other test is to be applied to it except the test of its ...
— Getting Married • George Bernard Shaw
... While over and over in the dark she said, "Blessed! but not as happier children blessed" — That this should be Even she . . . God, how with time and change Thou makest thy footsteps strange! Ah, now I know They play upon me, and it is not so. Why, 't is a girl I never saw before, A little thing to flatter and make weep, To tease until her heart is sore, Then kiss and clear the score; A gypsy run-the-fields, A little liberal daughter of the earth, Good for what hour of truancy and mirth The careless season yields Hither-side the flood of the year and yonder of the neap; Then thank you, thanks ...
— The Little Book of Modern Verse • Jessie B. Rittenhouse
... judges. Even so far back as the Directory days, when Bernadotte was insulted at Vienna, he summed up the Austrian character in the following terms:—"When the Austrians think of making war, they do not insult; they cajole and flatter the enemy, so that they may have a better chance to stick a knife into him." He told the Directory they did not understand the Cabinet of Vienna; "it is the meanest and most perfidious to be found." "It will not make war with you ...
— The Tragedy of St. Helena • Walter Runciman
... probable that they will ever voluntarily submit to us; and we ought to consider, that the blood which must be shed in forcing them to do so, is, every drop of it, the blood either of those who are, or of those whom we wish to have for our fellow citizens. They are very weak who flatter themselves that, in the state to which things have come, our colonies will be easily conquered by force alone. The persons who now govern the resolutions of what they call their continental congress, feel in themselves at this moment a degree of importance which, perhaps, the greatest ...
— An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations • Adam Smith
... for there breathes no flattery in it—only the serious observations of an old man bent on getting knowledge by personal experience. "A man may flatter himself as he pleases," says Sir Richard Steele, "but he will find that the women have more understanding in their own affairs than we have." Man suffers in his loves for woman. She often casts him on the rocks like an angry unfeeling sea, but when, at last she has smiled ...
— The Golden Censer - The duties of to-day, the hopes of the future • John McGovern
... looked at Peter sharply. Perhaps he read the truth in Peter's eyes. "Chug-a-rum!" said he. "Be honest, Peter. Be honest. Don't try to flatter, because it is a bad habit to get into. I know how I look. I look old and tired. Now ...
— Mother West Wind "How" Stories • Thornton W. Burgess
... carry the roof into next parish on their backs, like a snail, and never put out a hand; 't is not the custom hereaway. But, as I was saying, Paul and our Mercy kept company, after a manner: he never had the wit to flatter her as should he, nor the stomach to bid her name the day and he'd buy the ring; but he talked to her about his sick beasts more than he did to any other girl in the parish, and she'd have ended by going to Church ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 104, June, 1866 • Various
... congratulated him on his promotion, and yet more on the high deserts that had drawn it upon him, L'Isle's manner implied that the commissary's good opinion gave him greater confidence in himself. How could L'Isle do this? Simply because the proudest and best of us can tolerate, and even flatter, those we despise, when we have urgent occasion to ...
— The Actress in High Life - An Episode in Winter Quarters • Sue Petigru Bowen
... cordage cracks; rather the Sun comes but to kiss the Fruit in wealthy Autumn, when all falls blasted; if you needs must love (forc'd by ill fate) take to your maiden bosoms two dead cold aspicks, and of them make Lovers, they cannot flatter nor forswear; one kiss makes a long peace for all; but man, Oh that beast man! Come lets be sad my Girles; That down cast of thine eye, Olympias, Shews a fine sorrow; mark Antiphila, Just such another was the Nymph Oenone, When Paris brought home Helen: now a tear, And then thou art a ...
— The Maids Tragedy • Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher
... distillers to use it the more confidently, as a long experience has proved to me its utility. In describing the art of converting Whiskey into Gin, according to the process of the Holland Distillers, I flatter myself, that I give a greater value to a national production usually neglected througout [TR: throughout] the continent, and which will be the principle of a considerable produce. Henceforth the Gin of the United States will be an important article ...
— The Art of Making Whiskey • Anthony Boucherie
... finely shred, and a nutmeg grated, a little salt, some currants, and then beat some eggs in a little sack, and some sugar, and mix all together, and knead it as stiff as for manchet, and make it up in the form and size of a turkey-egg, but a little flatter; then take a pound of butter, and put it in a dish, and set the dish over a clear fire in a chafing-dish, and rub your butter about the dish till 'tis melted; put your puddings in, and cover the dish, but often turn your puddings, until ...
— Old Cookery Books and Ancient Cuisine • William Carew Hazlitt
... athirst for flattery, a man who would pay a kingdom in exchange for adulation, must have outlived all that is best and strongest in human nature. He comes upon the stage as a wreck. His vanity has eaten up his sagacity, so that she, Goneril or Regan, who can flatter most, can lie most, and can play the devil best, shall fare most lavishly at his hands. Is it not well partly to excuse these excesses of self-valuation by such mitigations as can be found in the infirmity of old age? Even in an elderly man they would have been treated with ...
— The Idler, Volume III., Issue XIII., February 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly. Edited By Jerome K. Jerome & Robert Barr • Various
... inclined (so far as they think about the matter at all) to flatter themselves that the ill-feeling which blazed so suddenly into flame twelve years ago was more or less effectually quenched by Great Britain's assistance to the United States at the time of the Spanish War. Those Englishmen who watched the course of opinion in America at the time of the Boer ...
— The Twentieth Century American - Being a Comparative Study of the Peoples of the Two Great - Anglo-Saxon Nations • H. Perry Robinson
... face I resolved to honour and renown ye (Ford) Sing we and chant it (Morley) Sister, awake! close not your eyes (Bateson) Sleep, angry beauty, sleep and fear not me (Campion) So light is love, in matchless beauty shining (Wilbye) Some can flatter, some can feign (Corkine) Sweet, come again (Campion and Rosseter) Sweet Cupid, ripen her desire (Corkine) Sweet heart, arise! why do you sleep (Weelkes) Sweet Kate (Jones) Sweet Love, if thou wilt gain ...
— Lyrics from the Song-Books of the Elizabethan Age • Various
... preferred to be crowned on the Capitol by the senator of Rome. This honor was long the highest object of ambition, and so it seemed to Jacobus Pizinga, an illustrious Sicilian magistrate. Then came the Italian journey of Charles IV, whom it amused to flatter the vanity of ambitious men, and impress the ignorant multitude by means of gorgeous ceremonies. Starting from the fiction that the coronation of poets was a prerogative of the old Roman emperors, and consequently was no less ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... many a man who is no less elated by his position, or by some good fortune that falls to him, than this ass. The man of wealth holds up his head and expects every one to bow to him; he thinks a great deal of himself, and he finds that a great many persons cringe to him and flatter him. "Man! the honour is given, not to you, but to the gold you carry." It may be the same with office, or title; respect is given to the magistrate, or the nobleman, or the general, or the captain, or the poor-law officer, or the policeman, and he thinks much of himself accordingly. ...
— The Village Pulpit, Volume II. Trinity to Advent • S. Baring-Gould
... leaf patterns (Nos. 6 and 7, p. 169[f093]) consist simply of the repetition and reversal of a single element. An emphatic effect is obtained by bringing the leaves out black upon a white ground (as in No. 6), while a flatter and softer effect is the result of throwing them upon a plane of half-tint expressed by horizontal lines, with a similar effect of relief to that which would be given by the warp, if ...
— Line and Form (1900) • Walter Crane
... clattered to the floor. Not for an instant could a single inmate of the apartment, armed or unarmed, flatter himself that his slightest motion was unobserved. They were like tigers on the crouch, ready to spring the moment the man's guard lowered. It did not lower. The huddled figure on the floor reminded them of what might happen. ...
— Blazed Trail Stories - and Stories of the Wild Life • Stewart Edward White
... the bushranger continued, smiling mischievously at his cigar, "occur on the stations I have occasion to visit from time to time. On one a good lady played and sang Pinafore and The Pirates of Penzance to me from dewy eve to dawn. I'm bound to say I sang some of it at sight myself; and I flatter myself it helped to pass an embarrassing night rather pleasantly for all concerned. We had all hands on the place for our audience, and when I left I was formally presented with both scores; for I had simply called for horses, and horses were all I took. Only the other day I had ...
— Stingaree • E. W. (Ernest William) Hornung
... shall return? My commission expires next spring, and if not renewed, I shall return then. If renewed, I shall stay somewhat longer; how much, will not depend on me altogether. So far as it does, I cannot fix the epoch of my return, though I always flatter myself it is not very distant. My habits are formed to those of my own country. I am past the time of changing them, and am, therefore, less happy anywhere else ...
— The Writings of Thomas Jefferson - Library Edition - Vol. 6 (of 20) • Thomas Jefferson
... No; I can't flatter you that health or sanity were in fault there. Nor is it delirium now; the rambling is only in sleep. ...
— Hopes and Fears - scenes from the life of a spinster • Charlotte M. Yonge
... almost too well known to need description, and there is little difference between the Asiatic and African animal. It may, however, be generally described as being distinguished from other Cats by its uniform tawny colour, flatter skull, which gives it a more dog-like appearance, the shaggy mane of the male, and by the ...
— Natural History of the Mammalia of India and Ceylon • Robert A. Sterndale
... me lies, I bear your words in mind, and pray to the gods continually that they may show us favour and vouchsafe to counsel us. I remember," he went on, "how once I heard you say that, as with men, so with the gods, it was but natural if the prayer of him should prevail who did not turn to flatter them only in time of need, but was mindful of them above all in the heyday of his happiness. It was thus indeed, you said, that we ought to deal with our earthly friends." [4] "True, my son," said his father, "and because ...
— Cyropaedia - The Education Of Cyrus • Xenophon
... the time of Charlemagne, is by no means deficient in occasional passages of considerable poetic merit. There is a flow, and a tender enthusiasm in the following lines (at the conclusion of Chapter V.), which even in the translation will not, I flatter myself, fail to interest the reader. Ottfried is describing the circumstances immediately following the birth of our Lord."—'Biog. ...
— Literary Remains (1) • Coleridge
... historically]: yea, we come at that which Christ hath done for us with God, by what He hath done for us within us. . . . With God there cannot be reconciliation without our becoming God-like. . . . They deceeve and flatter themselves extreamly; who think of reconciliation with God by means of a Saviour acting upon God in their behalfe and not also working in or upon them to make them God-like," and he says that he added in the spoken sermon, what was not in his notes, that a theology which taught a salvation without ...
— Spiritual Reformers in the 16th & 17th Centuries • Rufus M. Jones
... triumph, Octavius should, according to the precedents of the Republic, have given up the title of IMPERATOR; but he allowed the Senate, which was only too glad to flatter him, to give him that name for ten years,—a period which was repeatedly renewed. In this way he became permanent commander of the national forces. Next the Imperator (Emperor) caused himself to be invested with the authority of Censor. This ...
— History of Rome from the Earliest times down to 476 AD • Robert F. Pennell
... has told me some things in your favor that you have omitted. I cannot flatter myself now that my love is stronger than yours, but you are stronger, you are braver. What is the secret of your strength? Your religion seems to do you more good than ...
— A Face Illumined • E. P. Roe
... found enveloped in a body of metallic hardness, at the same time there are souls of bronze enveloped in bodies so supple and capricious that their grace attracts the friendship of others, and their beauty calls for a caress. But if you flatter the exterior man with your hand, the Homo duplex, the interior man, to use an expression of Buffon, immediately rouses himself and rends you with his keen ...
— The Physiology of Marriage, Part III. • Honore de Balzac
... have been impossible to make any impression on that meat with aught less forcible than an axe. Thus, with reluctance, his portion, albeit paid for in advance, was relinquished, to be again paid for probably and again to flatter and deceive some other passing and hungry stranger. The remainder of the journey proved agreeable, thanks to the companionship of a young officer who, invalided home from the Lomboh war, was en route to Buitenzorg, where he lived. ...
— From Jungle to Java - The Trivial Impressions of a Short Excursion to Netherlands India • Arthur Keyser
... profoundly, "you flatter me! Say rather that I am a French soldier and as such never shrink from my duty no matter in what shape ...
— Monte-Cristo's Daughter • Edmund Flagg
... method, the sentiment of the priest's dignity is exalted. What is the priest?"He is, between God who is in heaven and the man who tries to find him on earth, a being, God and man, who brings these nearer by his symbolizing both.[5281].. I do not flatter you with pious hyperboles in calling you gods; this is not a rhetorical falsehood.... You are creators similar to Mary in her cooperation in the Incarnation.... You are creators like God in time.... ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 6 (of 6) - The Modern Regime, Volume 2 (of 2) • Hippolyte A. Taine
... go to Mr. Sewell or your grand'ther either; 'cause you see these 'ere wild chaps they'll take things from me they wouldn't from a church-member or a minister. Folks mustn't pull 'em up with too short a rein,—they must kind o' flatter 'em off. But that ar Atkinson's too rediculous for anything; and if he don't mind, I'll serve him out. I know a thing or two about him that I shall shake over his head if he don't behave. Now I don't think so much of smugglin' as some folks," said the Captain, lowering ...
— The Pearl of Orr's Island - A Story of the Coast of Maine • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... left for us but to try to pass the Surgeons as desperately sick, and we expended our energies in simulating this condition. Rheumatism was our forte, and I flatter myself we got up two cases that were apparently bad enough to serve as illustrations for a patent medicine advertisement. But it would not do. Bad as we made our condition appear, there were so many more who were infinitely ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy
... that? What woman in London would not call for such a one as Peter Brome in her trouble? Well, you must ask her, and that soon, if you can find the words. Take a lesson from that Spanish don, and scrape and bow and flatter and tell stories of the war and turn verses to her eyes and hair. Oh, Peter! are you a fool, that I at my age should have to teach you how ...
— Fair Margaret • H. Rider Haggard
... am sure. I have spent on your education money which I should be very glad of now. When people flatter you, Therese (as they will do; for there is not a negress in all the island to compare with you),—remember who made you a lady. You will promise me that much, Therese, ...
— The Hour and the Man - An Historical Romance • Harriet Martineau
... if it takes me where I've always longed to be! Or, if not, I flatter myself I'm accountant enough to be an agent ...
— The Young Step-Mother • Charlotte M. Yonge
... a Jesuit!" said Joachim; "he strove after an unrestrained despotism, and laid violent hands on the Charter. The expedition against Algiers was only a glittering fire-work arranged to flatter the national pride—all glitter and falseness! Like Peirronnet, through an embrace he ...
— O. T. - A Danish Romance • Hans Christian Andersen
... married in the same year as his brother of Kent, and to him also a little daughter was born, who, had she lived, would have finally succeeded to the throne instead of Victoria. But the poor little Princess stayed but a little while to flatter or disappoint royal hopes. She looked timidly out upon life, with all its regal possibilities, and went away untempted. Still the Duchess of Clarence (afterwards Queen Adelaide) might yet be the happy mother of a Prince, or Princess ...
— Queen Victoria, her girlhood and womanhood • Grace Greenwood
... Polyxena's fate agony less than mine? I have not that thing which is left to all mortals, hope, nor may I flatter my mind heart with any good to come, though it is sweet to ...
— Authors of Greece • T. W. Lumb
... which in the past had always brought him to heel. It all rested on the fortuity of her getting five minutes alone with him. Granted this, she would have a chance. There are ways given to women whereby men of his type can be placated. She would have to flatter him by abasing herself, by throwing herself upon his mercy. But since this must be done, she was prepared to pay ...
— The Highgrader • William MacLeod Raine
... her pocket, and began to crack nuts and eat them. But Dan could not keep away from the subject. "Gad!" he ejaculated, "I thought they'd get hold of you, that lot, and flatter you, and make a convenience of you—that's what they do! I know them! They think you're clever—how easy it is to be mistaken! But you'll see for yourself in time, and then you'll believe me—when ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
... Norbanus said warmly, "though for you the promotion is perilous. To be Nero's friend is to be condemned beforehand to death, though for a time he may shower favours upon you. He is fickle and inconstant, and you have not learned to cringe and flatter, and are as likely as not to anger him by ...
— Beric the Briton - A Story of the Roman Invasion • G. A. Henty
... might conclude, not only that every man is an egoist, but also that every man is at all times a prudent and calculating egoist— which seems to flatter grossly the drunkard and the excited man laying about him in blind fury. But one may hold that egoism is inevitable without going so far. [Footnote: Psychological Hedonism, the doctrine that "volition is always determined ...
— A Handbook of Ethical Theory • George Stuart Fullerton
... verily flatter the vanity of a man, Querini, to forget that I am but two days returned with my cargoes ...
— The Royal Pawn of Venice - A Romance of Cyprus • Mrs. Lawrence Turnbull
... good Drink are spoiled: but if the Bottles are clean and dry, yet if the Corks are not new and found, the Drink is still liable to be damaged; for if the Air can get into the Bottles, the Drink will grow flat, and will never rise. I have known many who have flatter'd themselves that they knew how to be saving, and have used old Corks on this occasion, that have spoiled as much Liquor as has stood them in four or five Pounds, only for want of laying out three or four Shillings. ...
— The Country Housewife and Lady's Director - In the Management of a House, and the Delights and Profits of a Farm • Richard Bradley
... you trying to say? I remember, in the spring You pretended you could sing; But your voice is now still queerer, And as yet you've come no nearer To a song. In fact, to sum the matter, I never heard a flatter Failure than your doleful clatter. Don't you think it's wrong? It was sweet to hear your note, I'll not deny, When April set pale clouds afloat O'er the blue tides of sky, And 'mid the wind's triumphant drums You, in your white and azure coat, A ...
— Dreams and Days: Poems • George Parsons Lathrop
... he? He is deeper than I thought would not risk your fortune. Why, Mary, I did not think a girl of your sense could be so taken in! It is transparent, I tell you. They get you there, flatter you up with their attentions, but when they find you too wise for them the first time, off goes this youth to Miss Conway, finds her a bad speculation, no heiress at all, and disposes of her to his cousin. I wonder ...
— Dynevor Terrace (Vol. II) • Charlotte M. Yonge
... your satisfaction. I feel now that I can sit down and roughly sketch my whole scenario again. I must confess that in two places in this 'Plain Mary' this man Pike has really improved on my idea. But as a whole his manuscript does not flatter my ...
— Ruth Fielding Down East - Or, The Hermit of Beach Plum Point • Alice B. Emerson
... 'I flatter myself that I have discovered an argument which, if just, will, with the wise and learned, be an everlasting check to all kinds of superstitious delusions, and consequently will be useful as long as the ...
— The Making of Religion • Andrew Lang
... their will that I should sail in the opposite direction, and take the boy to Egypt to sell him for a slave. I was confounded and said, 'Let some one else pilot the ship;' withdrawing myself from any further agency in their wickedness. They cursed me, and one of them exclaiming, 'Don't flatter yourself that we depend on you for our safety,' took my place as pilot, and ...
— TITLE • AUTHOR
... steep and you could not reach the flowers. I gathered them for you, and, in sending my bouquet, I could not resist the temptation of adding a word. 'Before doing penance,' I said to myself, 'let me commit this one folly; it shall be the last.' We always flatter ourselves that each folly will be our last. The unfortunate note had scarcely gone, when I regretted having sent it; I would have given much to have had it back; I felt all its impropriety; I have dealt justly by it in tearing it to pieces. My only excuse was my firm resolution ...
— Samuel Brohl & Company • Victor Cherbuliez
... I have been searching everywhere for you, catching glimpses of you now and then, only to lose you, as, alas, has been my fate on more serious occasion. May I flatter myself with the ...
— Jennie Baxter, Journalist • Robert Barr
... during progress had, when dry, to be torn or washed off. The modern, simplest and best way is to have ready a soft wood mould with a square or flat back for the under or circular part of the neck, and a similar but flatter one to fit above on the fingerboard. These can be easily adjusted, and the requisite pressure obtained by several screw cramps along its extent (diagrams 6 and 7). It is not very often that the nut or small block over which the strings pass on to ...
— The Repairing & Restoration of Violins - 'The Strad' Library, No. XII. • Horace Petherick
... he said cheerfully, rising and handing the guitar to the abashed Annabel. "And you are really quite recovered? C'est bien! Business is dull, and we are amusing each other, you see. How do you like the rooms? I flatter myself—" ...
— A Philanthropist • Josephine Daskam
... and his coadjutors could hardly flatter themselves that as yet they had made any impression on the steadfast defence which the British force was maintaining in the Sherpur cantonment. The Afghan leader had tried force in vain; he knew the history of that strange period in the winter of 1841 during which Afghan truculence ...
— The Afghan Wars 1839-42 and 1878-80 • Archibald Forbes
... are three friends that help us, and three that do us harm. The friends that help us are a straight friend, an outspoken friend, and a friend that has heard much. The friends that harm us are plausible friends, friends that like to flatter, and friends with ...
— The Sayings Of Confucius • Confucius
... possible that this man believed in the necessity of the gentry as a virtuous example? Or did he merely view the fact that the aristocracy were there in actual possession, and as they could not be evicted, why then the next best thing was to cajole, flatter and discreetly advise them? Who shall ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 5 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard
... briskly. "It is true you played a joke or two on me, but I flatter myself, on the whole, I paid you beforehand; and for the present the account is pretty ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII No. 1 January 1848 • Various
... to Mrs. Fraser,[25] Perhaps you think I mean to praise her— And were I vain enough to think My praise was worth this drop of ink, A line—or two—were no hard matter, As here, indeed, I need not flatter: But she must be content to shine In better praises than in mine, 40 With lively air, and open heart, And fashion's ease, without its art; Her hours can gaily glide along. Nor ask the aid of ...
— The Works Of Lord Byron, Vol. 3 (of 7) • Lord Byron
... Salisbury, that he gave an excellent one to a clergyman, who preached and published it in his own name on some public occasion. But the Bishop has not as yet told me the name, and seems unwilling to do it. Yet I flatter myself I shall get at it."' —Nichols's ...
— Life of Johnson, Volume 6 (of 6) • James Boswell
... became unbearable. She longed for the world of men and women, hungered to hear laughter and the sound of voices—anything to distract her from her thoughts. That evening she went to Court, beautiful, reckless, heartless to all seeming, ready to be flattered and to flatter—a dangerous mood for such a ...
— Princess Maritza • Percy Brebner
... shoo is, peepin' off th' side, An' aw see 'at shoo's all on a grin; To chait her aw've monny a time tried, But I think it's nah time to give in, A chap may be deep as a well, But a woman's his maister when done; He may chuckle and flatter hissel, But he'll wakken to find at shoo's won. It's a rayther unpleasant affair, Yet it's better it's happened noa daat; Aw'st be fain to come in for a share O' that paand at th' wife ...
— Yorkshire Lyrics • John Hartley
... there sounded once more the ripping crack of a rifle, the singing of a bullet past them, and with it the flatter, louder noise of the shot-gun was repeated. Her eye in the act of turning to her task, caught the silhouette of old Gideon Himes's uncouth figure relieved against the noonday sky, as he sprang high, both arms flung up, the hands empty and clutching, and pitched headlong ...
— The Power and the Glory • Grace MacGowan Cooke
... attributes are terms coined by people of their own damaging class, people with low motives, with even brutish morals. It is time that this age of ours, so rich in theoretic if impracticable humanitarianisms, forebore to flatter the spirits which work against it in its efforts toward higher and wiser achievement. The anarchists hanged in Chicago were men of mistaken purpose and fatuous belief. But at least they were conceivably sincere, however dangerous ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 24, November, 1891 • Various
... I have a new conception of the character of Orlando and I flatter myself the Romeo is yet to be played. I shall attempt it next winter. Now, Elizabeth, all the summer is before us. If you will not ask us to Burrell Court, then do in sisterly kindness send us to some quiet sea-side place to study. We could, ...
— A Singer from the Sea • Amelia Edith Huddleston Barr
... Epistle, which lets us into the true Author of the Letter to Mrs. Margaret Clark, part of which I did myself the Honour to publish in a former Paper. I must confess I do not naturally affect critical Learning; but finding my self not so much regarded as I am apt to flatter my self I may deserve from some professed Patrons of Learning, I could not but do my self the Justice to shew I am not a Stranger to such Erudition as they smile upon, if I were duly encouraged. However this only to let the World ...
— The Spectator, Volume 2. • Addison and Steele
... Cibber entertains The court with annual birthday strains, Whence Gay was banished in disgrace, Where Pope will never show his face, Where Young must torture his invention To flatter knaves, ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Issue 11, September, 1858 • Various
... temptation of those who may or do feed thee, and prompt thee to evil, the most excellent and prevalent remedy will be, to apply thyself to that light of Christ which shineth in thy conscience, and which neither can, nor will flatter thee, nor suffer thee to be at ease in thy ...
— Common Sense • Thomas Paine
... petitioners are that this inhuman system meets with the general execration of mankind, they flatter themselves the day is not far distant when it will be universally abolished. And they most ardently hope to see a British parliament, by the extinction of that sanguinary traffic, extend the blessings of liberty to millions beyond this realm, held up ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson
... agreeable if Lieutenant John Ross, who served last year on board the Swedish Admiral's ship, would be permitted to resume the same employment on board of this. He is so well acquainted with the Swedish language and customs, that I flatter myself he would have no objection ...
— Memoirs and Correspondence of Admiral Lord de Saumarez. Vol II • Sir John Ross
... got into fairy land, long ere we have reached the last steps of our theory; and there we have no reason to trust our common methods of argument, or to think that our usual analogies and probabilities have any authority. Our line is too short to fathom such immense abysses. And however we may flatter ourselves that we are guided, in every step which we take, by a kind of verisimilitude and experience, we may be assured that this fancied experience has no authority when we thus apply it to subjects that lie entirely ...
— An Enquiry Concerning Human Understanding • David Hume et al
... same, but the curve would rise more sharply. Similarly, the measurements at the beginning are not correct, as they are calculated according to gage heights measured from the stone crest of the dam. Therefore, a true flood curve at this point would be much flatter at the beginning and rise sharply at a period coincident with the carrying away ...
— The Passaic Flood of 1903 • Marshall Ora Leighton
... prettiest black-eyed lass in Mexico, and, by the same token, so is our friend Chaves, who just gave us the guns a little while ago. But Valdez is a man from the heel of him to the head. Miss Carmencita has her nose in the air because Juan doesn't snuggle up to ould Megales and flatter him the same way young Chaves does. So the lad is persona non grata at court with the lady, and that tin soldier who gave up the guns without a blow gets the lady's smiles. But it's my opinion that, for all her haughty ways, miss would rather have our honest fighting ...
— Bucky O'Connor • William MacLeod Raine
... race. It is no doubt from following this standard of beauty that even the Aztec people, who never disfigured the heads of their children, have represented their heroes and principal divinities with heads much flatter than any of the Caribs I saw on the Lower Orinoco."—Humboldt's Researches on the ...
— The Conquest of Canada (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Warburton
... like it. Flatter the peasant and you will be almost sure to move him. Say, 'Ah, what a time that was when you had the old wine in your cellars!' He will say, 'Nest-ce pas, monsieur?' and brighten up at the thought of it. Then you will continue: 'Yes, indeed, that ...
— Two Summers in Guyenne • Edward Harrison Barker
... Do not flatter yourself that there is anything personal or romantic on my side. I ...
— The Lure of the Mask • Harold MacGrath
... calmness and self-possession with which she received her uncle and himself, to believe that she had not visited the Water-Witch at all; but when the gay and reckless being who governed the movements of that extraordinary vessel, appeared, he could no longer flatter himself with this hope. He now believed that her choice for life had been made; and while he deplored the infatuation which could induce so gifted a woman to forget her station and character, he was himself too frank not to see that the individual ...
— The Water-Witch or, The Skimmer of the Seas • James Fenimore Cooper
... officer in the artillery, monsieur. Well, he stayed two months at the house, two months of the summer. I thought nothing about it when he began to look at me, and then flatter me, and make love to me all day long. And I let myself be taken in, monsieur. He kept saying to me that I was a handsome girl, that I was good company, that I just suited him—and I, I liked him well enough. What could I do? One listens to these things ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... long shell, having one sheave over the other, and the lower smaller than the upper (see LONG-TACKLES), in contradistinction to double blocks, which also have two sheaves, but one abreast of the other. They lie flatter and more snugly to the yards, and are ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth
... was not the case, and that I felt my kindly reception to be the more flattering since Miss Mordaunt was not accustomed to flatter. ...
— Major Frank • A. L. G. Bosboom-Toussaint
... conversation for the rest of the day. He will discourse on California scenery, climate, crops, athletes, women, art-sense, etc., ad libitum, ad infinitum and ad nauseum. He is a walking compendium of those Who's Whosers who were born in California. He can reel off statistics which flatter California, not by the yard, but by the mile. And although he is proud enough of the ease and abundance with which things grow in California, he is even more proud of the size to which they attain. Gibes do not stop the Californiac, nor jeers give him pause. ...
— The Californiacs • Inez Haynes Irwin
... together in a garret in Bucharest? How you fought in the streets of Warsaw against the Cossacks? How they tracked you through the snow-covered forest by the trail of blood you left behind you? Oh, I recollected it all, and I flatter myself that I related it with just that proud, sombre, subdued melancholy with which you used to speak of ...
— The Worlds Greatest Books - Vol. II: Fiction • Arthur Mee, J. A. Hammerton, Eds.
... particular," said Blake complacently, "that I shall differ from them." He turned to Ruth, eager to engage her in the conversation, to flatter her by including her in the secret. Knowing the loyalist principles she entertained, he had no reason to fear that his plans could other than meet her approval. "What do you say, Mistress Ruth?" Presuming upon his friendship with her brother, he had taken to calling ...
— Mistress Wilding • Rafael Sabatini
... the Devil do I ask—Yes, you are still the same; one of those hoiting Ladies, that love nothing like Fool and Fiddle; Crouds of Fops; had rather be publickly, though dully, flatter'd, than privately ador'd: you love to pass for the Wit of the Company, by talking all ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. III • Aphra Behn
... other children, you will in time make up your mind to let me keep Johnnie entirely as mine. It puts a new value into life,—this chance of having an immortal intelligence placed in my hands to train. It will be a real delight to do so, and I flatter myself the result ...
— Nine Little Goslings • Susan Coolidge
... ride on horseback, the same effect will scarcely be perceived by four hours' round trotting; but if you loll in a carriage, such as you have mentioned, you may travel all day, and gladly enter the last inn to warm your feet by a fire. Flatter yourself then no longer that half an hour's airing in your carriage deserves the name of exercise. Providence has appointed few to roll in carriages, while he has given to all a pair of legs, which are machines infinitely more commodious ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. IX (of X) - America - I • Various
... OF STITCHES (fig. 873).—The straight lines of this border are all worked in old German knotted stitch in ecru thread, forming a thick round cord which stands out from the surface in high relief; the flatter outlining of the outside figures is done in basket stitch in soft blue knitting cotton. The little oblong figures within the two inner lines of the border are worked in Gobelin stitch, in red embroidery cotton, and the filling of the figures, outlined in basket stitch, in one ...
— Encyclopedia of Needlework • Therese de Dillmont
... heard of this philosopher, and waited for him when he came to fetch his food, and returned with him hither, though greatly did I fear to tread the gulf. Then did I beguile him with my beauty and my wit, and flatter him with my tongue, so that he led me down and showed me the Fire, and told me the secrets of the Fire, but he would not suffer me to step therein, and, fearing lest he should slay me, I refrained, knowing that the man was very old, and soon would die. And I returned, having learned ...
— She • H. Rider Haggard
... you by my own experience. I have sometimes been in that security that I felt not dolour for sin, neither yet displeasure against myself for any iniquity in that I did offend. But rather my vain heart did thus flatter myself, (I write the truth to my own confusion, and to the glory of my heavenly Father, through Jesus Christ), 'Thou hast suffered great trouble for professing of Christ's truth; God has done great things for thee.'... ...
— John Knox • A. Taylor Innes
... and to justify to the world the people of England, whose love of their just and natural rights, with their resolution to preserve them, saved the nation when it was on the very brink of slavery and ruin. If these papers have that evidence, I flatter myself is to be found in them, there will be no great miss of those which are lost, and my reader may be satisfied without them: for I imagine, I shall have neither the time, nor inclination to repeat my pains, and fill up the wanting part of my answer, by tracing Sir Robert again, ...
— Two Treatises of Government • John Locke
... she was flattered. Of all flattery praise is the coarsest and least efficacious. When you would flatter a man, talk to him about himself, and criticise him, pulling him to pieces by comparison of some small present fault with his past conduct;—and the rule holds the same with a woman. To tell her that she looks ...
— Sir Harry Hotspur of Humblethwaite • Anthony Trollope
... to forgive you," he went on, more gravely, "for several reasons. I don't flatter, as you know. It's because you carried out the thing so perfectly that I am led to think you have a gift that may be cultivated, Paret. You wrote that theme in the way Peters would have written it if he had not been—what shall ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... edition of Karamsin's History of the Russian Empire. It will be completed in ten volumes; the first is already published. This is regarded as the best history of Russia extant, though it notoriously misstates many facts in order to flatter the imperial house and sustain its absolute authority. It has previously passed through five editions, and it is estimated that twenty-four thousand copies of it are in Russian public libraries and the hands of ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 5, No. 3, March, 1852 • Various
... longer than in the European. It is well known that the foot is less well formed in the Negro than in the European. The arch of the instep, the perfect conformation of which is essential to steadiness and ease of gait, is less elevated in the former than in the latter. The foot is thereby rendered flatter as well as longer, more nearly resembling the monkey's, between which and the European there is a marked difference in this particular."—From "A Treatise on the Human Skeleton" by Dr. Humphry, Lecturer on Surgery and Anatomy in the Cambridge ...
— The Antiquity of Man • Charles Lyell
... you are going to flatter me! Give me a cigarette from my case, please, and strike a match, and if you don't mind struggling with this wind and the darkness, we will have our walk. There!" she added, as they stood in the ...
— The Cinema Murder • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... ridge becomes flatter, the forest spreads out and the road, now freer, winds among the trees, runs from one slope to the other, avoids the big roots, passes round the inequalities of the ground and, at times, disappears from sight under ...
— The Frontier • Maurice LeBlanc
... desperate odds; of lives dearly sold when resistance could be maintained no more; of signal deliverance, and of unsparing revenge. Whatever gave a stronger air of reality to a narrative so well calculated to inflame the passions and to flatter national pride, was ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson
... 'll just be ae bar to my pleasures, A bar that 's aft fill'd me wi' fear, He 's sic a hard near-be-gawn miser, He likes his saul less than his gear. But though I now flatter his failin', An' swear nought wi' gowd can compare, Gude sooth! it shall soon get a scailin', His bags sall be mouldie ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel , Volume I. - The Songs of Scotland of the past half century • Various
... it doesn't need improvement. A lot of third-rate fellows have tried that tack with me, as if they'd flatter me into giving them a job. The fools never seemed to realise that when they said the paper didn't need improvement they were giving the best reason that could be given why they shouldn't be employed on it. If you weren't a plain-spoken ...
— The Foolish Lovers • St. John G. Ervine
... on the first day, October 11, 1468. On the second a council was held which sat late into the night. A minority of the council, the enemies of Louis, or those who were only anxious to flatter the passions of their master, advised him to use to the full the opportunity which chance and the foolhardiness and duplicity of his adversary had placed in his hands. They urged him to keep the King in secure confinement ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 8 - The Later Renaissance: From Gutenberg To The Reformation • Editor-in-Chief: Rossiter Johnson
... benevolent William Allen, of the Society of Friends, wrote to Sir Patrick Ross, the Governor of the Colony, with whom he was on terms of friendship, soliciting him to use his influence in persuading Mr. Wood to consent: and I confess I was sanguine enough to flatter myself that we should thus at length prevail. The result proved, however, that I had not yet fully appreciated the character of the man we ...
— The History of Mary Prince - A West Indian Slave • Mary Prince
... Souvenance, or Soveraigne, or Seneschallus, or whatever else ingenuity or fancy may suggest, this is the question,—a question which it is scarcely possible to settle authoritatively without the testimony of some unequivocal contemporary statement. But I flatter myself that I have now clearly shown that the esses were neither the links of a chain nor yet (as suggested in a former paper) identical with the gormetti fremales, or horse-bridles, which are said to have formed the livery collar ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 52, October 26, 1850 • Various
... dearly. But I have heard mother say that the worst part of losing dear friends is that we have to blame ourselves, more or less, for our behaviour to them,—even to those we loved the very most. So I will not flatter you, dear: though I don't at all wonder at your being tired of hearing Geordie cry that day. I will not say whether you were right or wrong; but only put you in mind that we may always ask for pardon. Remember, too, that you may meet Geordie again; and ...
— The Settlers at Home • Harriet Martineau
... powers of intense realisation, exhibited in the best parts of Robinson Crusoe, we get a fine counterpart amid the outcasts in Mumper's Lane. Bound up with the truthfulness and originality of the Author is that strange absence of sycophancy, which we may flatter ourselves is no exceptional thing, but which is in reality a ...
— Isopel Berners - The History of certain doings in a Staffordshire Dingle, July, 1825 • George Borrow
... day and stare in delight. To tell you the truth, I think it's rather a remarkable bit of painting. I didn't quite know I could turn out anything so chic. I shouldn't be surprised if I make a specialty of women's portraits. How many men can flatter, and still keep a good likeness? That's what I've done. But wait till ...
— Will Warburton • George Gissing
... not wish to flatter you" said Mrs. Gary, one evening "but that child has very elegant manners! Really, I think they are very nearly perfect. I don't believe there is an English court beauty who ...
— Melbourne House • Elizabeth Wetherell
... cream; now it seemed to mean kicks, blows, flapping dish-cloths, wash-leathers and dusters, pokers, carpet brooms, and every instrument of torture with which a poor cat could be chased from garret to cellar. I am pretty nimble, and though I never felt less disposed for violent exercise, I flatter myself I led them a good dance before, by a sudden impulse of affectionate trustfulness, I sprang straight into my ...
— Brothers of Pity and Other Tales of Beasts and Men • Juliana Horatia Gatty Ewing
... exalted; has set it upon the throne, and so made it a king, and given it authority to reign; and thou goest by and nearest thereof, but wilt not submit thyself thereto, neither thy soul, nor thy life. Why, what is this more than to flatter God with thy lips, and than to lie unto him with thy tongue? What is this but to count him less wise than thyself, while he seeks glory by that by which thou wilt not glorify him—-while he displays his grace before ...
— The Riches of Bunyan • Jeremiah Rev. Chaplin
... store-cupboard, and now, owing to the necessity of getting her aid in stopping that mischievous rumour, which she herself had been so careful to set on foot, regarding the cause of the duel, Miss Mapp had been positively obliged to flatter and to "Susan" her. And if Diva's awful surmise proved to be well-founded, Susan would be in a position to patronize them all, and talk about counts and countesses with the same air of unconcern as Mr. Wyse. She would be bidden to the Villa Faraglione, she ...
— Miss Mapp • Edward Frederic Benson
... in love with you already," she said, "from those snapshots in the Looking Glass. They make you both look such darlings—though they don't flatter either of you. All the people we know will be clamouring to meet you, so you must hurry and find a nice house, in the right part of town, before some other sensation comes up and you're forgotten. How would it be if you took our house for a couple of months, while you're looking round? ...
— The Second Latchkey • Charles Norris Williamson and Alice Muriel Williamson
... as they think about the matter at all) to flatter themselves that the ill-feeling which blazed so suddenly into flame twelve years ago was more or less effectually quenched by Great Britain's assistance to the United States at the time of the Spanish War. Those Englishmen who watched the course of opinion in America ...
— The Twentieth Century American - Being a Comparative Study of the Peoples of the Two Great - Anglo-Saxon Nations • H. Perry Robinson
... the Bar such a long time ago! But I flatter myself that I've learnt now to know All the ropes pretty well, yet completely at sea I confess that I ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 104, May 20, 1893 • Various
... of the year, as the emperor was mounting the steps of the temple of the Genius, one of the priests, the eldest of all, fell without any one striking him and suddenly expired; an event which the bystanders, either out of ignorance or a desire to flatter, affirmed was an omen affecting Sallustius, as the elder consul; but it was soon seen that the death it portended was not to the elder man, but to ...
— The Roman History of Ammianus Marcellinus • Ammianus Marcellinus
... whose friendship he can confide, and to suffer no temptations of the idle and the dissolute to seduce him from the quiet scenes of his youth (scenes so congenial to his taste) to the hollow and heartless society of cities, to the haunts of men who would court and flatter him while his name was new, and who, when they had contributed to distract his attention and impair his health, would cast him off unceremoniously to seek some other novelty. Of his again encountering the difficulties and privations he lately experienced there is no danger. Report speaks of honourable ...
— Life and Remains of John Clare - "The Northamptonshire Peasant Poet" • J. L. Cherry
... Tongue never spoke, my Eyes said a thousand Things, and my Hopes flatter'd me hers answer'd 'em. If I'm lucky—if not, 'tis but a hundred Guineas thrown away. (Miranda and ...
— The Busie Body • Susanna Centlivre
... Miss Effingham, after the elaborate soirees of the literary circles in Paris, you will find our reunions of the same sort, a little dull; and yet I flatter myself with having assembled most of the talents of New-York on this memorable occasion, to do honour to your friend. Are you acquainted with many ...
— Home as Found • James Fenimore Cooper
... said Peg bluntly, "that he's in love with one of us." She looked at Faith with sharp eyes. "A man never spends heaps of money on a woman for nothing. And as there's nothing to be got out of us, he's in love with one of us, and I don't flatter myself that ...
— The Beggar Man • Ruby Mildred Ayres
... the Racket Court. They were the first to laugh at it, so as to leave others at liberty to do so too; a privilege that was largely made use of without pressing. I received and I paid numberless visits; and as it is easy to flatter one's self, I fancied I might flatter myself ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, Complete • Duc de Saint-Simon
... which not will, But misery, hath wrested from me. Where 470 Easily canst thou find one miserable, And not inforced oft-times to part from truth, If it may stand him more in stead to lie, Say and unsay, feign, flatter, or abjure? But thou art placed above me; thou art Lord; From thee I can, and must, submiss, endure Cheek or reproof, and glad to scape so quit. Hard are the ways of truth, and rough to walk, Smooth on the tongue discoursed, pleasing to the ear, And tunable as sylvan pipe ...
— Paradise Regained • John Milton
... Don't flatter it by noticing. How odd to find, meeting in this way, that we are both searching for the ...
— Captivating Mary Carstairs • Henry Sydnor Harrison
... to let tender expressions soften or sink into her heart. The ball, the show, are not the dangerous places: no, it is the private friend, the kind consoler, the companion of the easy, vacant hour, whose compliance with her opinions can flatter her vanity, and whose conversation can just soothe, without ever stretching her mind, that is the lover to be feared. He who buzzes in her ear at court or at the opera must be contented to buzz in vain." These notions Dr. Johnson carried so very far, that I have heard ...
— Anecdotes of the late Samuel Johnson, LL.D. - during the last twenty years of his life • Hester Lynch Piozzi
... have written above have its due weight with you, my dear; and then, as warm imaginations are not without a mixture of enthusiasm, your Anna Howe, who, on reperusal of it, imagines it to be in a style superior to her usual style, will be ready to flatter herself that she has been in a manner inspired with the hints that have comforted and raised the dejected heart of her suffering friend; who, from such hard trials, in a bloom so tender, may find at times her spirits sunk too ...
— Clarissa, Volume 4 (of 9) - History Of A Young Lady • Samuel Richardson
... a house there, but I altered it considerably after my own idea, and not a bad idea, I flatter myself. I spent a good deal of money in laying out the grounds, putting up ...
— Spring Days • George Moore
... mahogany furniture stood round the room, a reproach against the discovery of America, covered with sanguinary cloth stamped in black with subjects taken from Fontaine's fables. When I say subjects I basely flatter the sumptuous taste of Madame Taverneau; it was the same subject indefinitely repeated—the Fox and the Stork. How luxurious it was to sit upon a stork's beak! In front of each chair was spread a piece of carpet, to protect the splendor of the floor, so that the guests when seated ...
— The Cross of Berny • Emile de Girardin
... now seemed more distant and a little to my right. I was beginning to flatter myself with the belief that I had reached the point where the picket-line ...
— Who Goes There? • Blackwood Ketcham Benson
... of my antagonist's cause. For I am now busy on the subject, and shall in a very few weeks go to press with a volume on the prose writings of Hall, Milton, and Taylor; and shall immediately follow it up with an essay on the writings of Dr. Johnson and Gibbon, and in these two volumes I flatter myself I shall present a fair history of English Prose. If my life and health remain, and I do but write half as much, and as regularly as I have done during the last six weeks, this will be finished by January next; and I shall then put together my memorandum-book on the subject of Poetry. ...
— Biographia Epistolaris, Volume 1. • Coleridge, ed. Turnbull
... was a Jesuit!" said Joachim; "he strove after an unrestrained despotism, and laid violent hands on the Charter. The expedition against Algiers was only a glittering fire-work arranged to flatter the national pride—all glitter and falseness! Like Peirronnet, through an embrace he ...
— O. T. - A Danish Romance • Hans Christian Andersen
... the way we do. You would say you were more Greek than I am, but when one thinks of it, you are just going around liking the things the Greeks liked 3000 years ago, and I am around liking the things a Greek would like now, that is, as well as I can. I don't flatter myself I begin to enjoy the wireless telegraph to-day the way Plato would if he had the chance, and Alcibiades in an automobile would get a great deal more out of it, I suspect, than anyone I have seen in one, so ...
— The Voice of the Machines - An Introduction to the Twentieth Century • Gerald Stanley Lee
... spirit” in her writings. An evening is described as being “attic”; but even Pope, we may remark, calls a nightingale an “attic warbler.” It is true, however, he was writing poetry, not prose. Though a Bluestocking, her praise was usually generously bestowed; she knew well how to flatter. She, though unacquainted with Latin, paraphrased Horace; and she admitted her ignorance of French. She loved all animals, notably cats and dogs, and, believing in a future existence for the dumb creation, wrote a poem, entitled “On the Future ...
— Anna Seward - and Classic Lichfield • Stapleton Martin
... nothing!" she retorted with sudden vivacity. And she made a face at him, laughing under his nose. "I do that when I mean nothing, Monsieur! Do you see? But you are Gascon, and given, I fear, to flatter yourself." ...
— Count Hannibal - A Romance of the Court of France • Stanley J. Weyman
... always making me gifts; she is one who remembers her old mother! Figure to yourselves that last year, in midwinter, she sent me no less than three gowns, all wool! What can I do with them? C'est pour me flatter, c'est sa maniere de me dire qu'il faut vivre pour longtemps! Ah, la chere folle! But she spoils ...
— In and Out of Three Normady Inns • Anna Bowman Dodd
... shape, had their longer axes parallel to the planes of stratification (see Figure 54). From this he inferred that such strata must, at first, have been horizontal, each oval pebble having settled at the bottom of the water, with its flatter side parallel to the horizon, for the same reason that an egg will not stand on either end if unsupported. Some few, indeed, of the rounded stones in a conglomerate occasionally afford an exception to the above rule, for the ...
— The Student's Elements of Geology • Sir Charles Lyell
... something more important to do than to get himself killed for his country. It was not only in art that Cezanne gave proof of a surprisingly sure sense of values. Some fulsome journalist, wishing to flatter the old man after he had become famous, represented him hugging a tree and, with tears in his eyes, crying: "Comme je voudrais, celui-la, le transporter sur ma toile!" For a moment Cezanne contemplated the picture in terrified amazement, then exclaimed: "Dites, monsieur Vollard, c'est effrayant, ...
— Since Cezanne • Clive Bell
... the curious passages between her and Admiral Seymour, contained in Haynes, render her chastity very much to be suspected. Her self-conceit with regard to beauty, we know from other undoubted authority to have been extravagant. Even when she was a very old woman, she allowed her courtiers to flatter her with regard to her "excellent beauties." Birch, vol. ii. p. 442, 443. Her passionate temper may also be proved from many lively instances; and it was not unusual with her to beat her maids of honor. See the ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part D. - From Elizabeth to James I. • David Hume
... off the Tiergarten, not far from the Esplanade, and I found my way there without much difficulty. I flatter myself that both Monica and I played our parts well, and I am sure nothing could have been more professional than the way I helped her to alight. It was an apartment house and she had the key of the front ...
— The Man with the Clubfoot • Valentine Williams
... that the peasants drank only a glass each and no more, and it was awkward for him to drink alone. But he could not refrain from taking a second glass, all the same, then a third, and he ate all the sausage. He brought himself to flatter the peasants, that they might accept him as one of the party instead of holding ...
— The Horse-Stealers and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov
... death prevailed against him and he passed; his countenance was changed, and he was sent away.' 10. I flatter myself that the preceding paragraphs contain a more correct narrative of the principal incidents in the life of Confucius than has yet been given in any European language. They might easily have been expanded into a volume, ...
— THE CHINESE CLASSICS (PROLEGOMENA) • James Legge
... not your friend," continued Diggle, "I might say that your attitude is one of sheer obstinacy. Why not trust us? You see we trust you. I stand pledged for you with Angria; but I flatter myself I know a man when I see one: si fractus illabitur orbis—you have already shown your mettle. Of course I understand your scruples; I was young myself once; I know the generous impulses that rule the hearts of youth. But this is a matter that must be decided, ...
— In Clive's Command - A Story of the Fight for India • Herbert Strang
... mounted his horse and took the rounds to see his patients, and everywhere he was greeted with a welcome that could not but flatter him. ...
— Buffalo Bill's Spy Trailer - The Stranger in Camp • Colonel Prentiss Ingraham
... indeed travelled far.' answered he. Then the old woman began to flatter him, and to praise his cleverness; and when she thought she had got him into a good temper, she said: 'I have wondered so often where you get your strength from; I do wish you would tell me. I would stoop and kiss ...
— The Crimson Fairy Book • Various
... his upper vest, His painted buckler, and his plumy crest. Thus Ripheus, Dymas, all the Trojan train, Lay down their own attire, and strip the slain. Mix'd with the Greeks, we go with ill presage, Flatter'd with hopes to glut our greedy rage; Unknown, assaulting whom we blindly meet, And strew with Grecian carcasses the street. Thus while their straggling parties we defeat, Some to the shore and safer ships retreat; And some, oppress'd with more ignoble fear, Remount ...
— The Aeneid • Virgil
... frescoes in the flat. That screen is emblematic of their real exclusion from the higher government which their social participation in parliamentary elections, and the men's habit of talking politics with them, flatter them into a delusive sense of sharing. A woman may be the queen of England, but she may not be one of its legislators. That must be because women like being queens and do not really care ...
— London Films • W.D. Howells
... had what I flatter myself is an inspiration for everyone concerned. I've got a big commission for part of the decorations of the new State House in Montana, and I need a very large studio. It occurred to me the other day that instead of building I'd save time by buying the old church ...
— Hillsboro People • Dorothy Canfield
... been said about the balance of straight lines and curves applies equally well to tones, if for straight lines you substitute flat tones, and for curved lines gradated tones. The deeper, more permanent things find expression in the wider, flatter tones, while an excess of gradations makes for prettiness, if not for the gross roundnesses ...
— The Practice and Science Of Drawing • Harold Speed
... in sedimentary rocks, such as sandstones, clays and slates, from which they may be separated by washing away the lighter constituents of the powdered rock. Crystals of the second type have numerous pyramidal faces developed, and they are usually flatter or sometimes prismatic in habit (fig. 2); the colour is ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia
... smuggled is not even yet wholly dead. Who has not met the hoary waterside ruffian, who, whispering low,—or at least as low as a throat rendered husky by much gin can whisper,—intimates that he can put the "Captain" (he'd promote you to be "Admiral" on the spot if he thought that thereby he might flatter you into buying) on to the "lay" of some cigars—"smuggled," he breathes from behind a black and horny paw, whose condition alone would taint the finest Havanna that ever graced the lips of king or duke—the like ...
— Stories of the Border Marches • John Lang and Jean Lang
... are the outcome of superstition, slavery to custom, and an unhealthy climate. Among them is a lack of moral courage, a tendency to lean on stronger natures, and to flatter a superior by feigning to agree with him. The standard of truth and honesty is that of all races which have been ground under heel for ages: deceit is the weapon of weaklings and slaves. Perjury has become a fine art, because our legal system fosters the ...
— Tales of Bengal • S. B. Banerjea
... "generalship," their "Napoleonic" attributes are terms coined by people of their own damaging class, people with low motives, with even brutish morals. It is time that this age of ours, so rich in theoretic if impracticable humanitarianisms, forebore to flatter the spirits which work against it in its efforts toward higher and wiser achievement. The anarchists hanged in Chicago were men of mistaken purpose and fatuous belief. But at least they were conceivably sincere, however dangerous to peace and order. These czars ...
— The Arena - Volume 4, No. 24, November, 1891 • Various
... thought it nonsense, yet it flattered her; and though she appeared half offended by flattery so gross, as to seem almost an insult upon her understanding, yet her vanity was secretly gratified, even by feeling that she had dependents who were thus obliged to flatter; and though she despised Captain Lightbody for the meanness, yet he made his court to her successfully, by persisting in all the audacity of adulation. She knew Sir John Hunter too well to believe that he was liable ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. V - Tales of a Fashionable Life • Maria Edgeworth
... opponents, too, is colder and flatter than it has ever been; rumours—I know not how true—of the Duke of Rutland hesitating on the question, and daily talk of other unexpected votes. Perhaps these rumours are exaggerated; but still they add to the general tide and current of opinion as to the probable success, and that ...
— Memoirs of the Court of George IV. 1820-1830 (Vol 1) - From the Original Family Documents • Duke of Buckingham and Chandos
... dear, I am sure. I have spent on your education money which I should be very glad of now. When people flatter you, Therese (as they will do; for there is not a negress in all the island to compare with you),—remember who made you a lady. You will promise me that ...
— The Hour and the Man - An Historical Romance • Harriet Martineau
... a favourite at the court of Lorenzo the Magnificent as Filippino Lippi and Botticelli were. Lorenzo liked those who would flatter him and do as they were bid, while Leonardo took his own way in everything and never said what he did ...
— Knights of Art - Stories of the Italian Painters • Amy Steedman
... Sir," he continued, stalking past his brother practitioner, and making a bow with a battered hat to the major, "I come, I presume, on your summons, to attend to the injured boy; and such skill as I possess—and I flatter myself it's considerable—is at your service. May I ask what is ...
— Paddy Finn • W. H. G. Kingston
... happy days was paid to the general's wife—how busy were even the most fanatical republicans, the dreaded ones of the Mountain, to flatter her, to give expression to their enthusiastic praises of the general who was preparing for the arms of the republic so glorious ...
— The Empress Josephine • Louise Muhlbach
... the pistols clattered to the floor. Not for an instant could a single inmate of the apartment, armed or unarmed, flatter himself that his slightest motion was unobserved. They were like tigers on the crouch, ready to spring the moment the man's guard lowered. It did not lower. The huddled figure on the floor reminded them of what might happen. ...
— Blazed Trail Stories - and Stories of the Wild Life • Stewart Edward White
... always made them quarrelsome. So they broke and paid, but their generosities were almost invariably followed by a scuffle. No one could surpass Julio in the quick slap and the ready card. His father heard with a heavy heart the news brought him by some friends thinking to flatter his vanity—his son was always victorious in these gentlemanly encounters; he it was who always scratched the enemy's skin. The painter knew more about fencing than art. He was a champion with various weapons; he could box, and was even skilled in the favorite blows ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... towns fly to the country, while the inhabitant of the isolated chateau takes refuge in the neighbouring town. Flocks of both aristocrates and patriots are trembling and fluttering at the foreboding storm, yet prefer to abide its fury, rather than seek shelter and defence together. I, however, flatter myself, that the new government will not justify this fear; and as I am certain my friends will not return to England at this season, I shall not endeavour to intimidate or discourage them from their present arrangement. ...
— A Residence in France During the Years 1792, 1793, 1794 and 1795, • An English Lady
... rejoined, briskly; "I have been to see the librarian himself, and I flatter myself I made a favorable impression. In fact, the old ...
— The Bread-winners - A Social Study • John Hay
... to retire from active business. Besides, every man has his ambition, and I have mine. I wish to emigrate to the glorious West, settle, marry, turn my attention to politics, be elected to Congress, then to the Senate, then to the Cabinet, then to the White House—for success in which career, I flatter myself nature and education have especially fitted me. Ten thousand dollars will give me a fair start! Many a successful politician, your honor knows, has started on less character ...
— Hidden Hand • Emma Dorothy Eliza Nevitte Southworth
... bored by her own bad temper, and was nearer to making him the 'only exception' than she had often been of late. She said to herself that he always amused her, but in her heart she was conscious that he was the only man in the world who knew how to flatter her back into a good temper, and would take the trouble to do so. It was better than nothing to look forward to a pleasant evening, and she went back to her novel and her cup of tea already ...
— The Primadonna • F. Marion Crawford
... it would,' she said, nodding confidently at him. 'You must not flatter yourself, because Mr. Wentworth told me everything about it, that you wouldn't have done just the same, if I had had to find it out from you. All men are pretty much alike where ...
— A Woman Intervenes • Robert Barr
... now, Lady Dorothy, why wilt thou be at the pains o' such a clamoring? Sure thou hast heard that old tale o'er a hundred times; and thou too, my lord? Fie, then! Wouldst seek to flatter thy old nurse with this seeming eagerness? Go to! I say thou canst not in truth want to hear me drone o'er that ancient narrative. Well, then, an I must, I must. Soft! Hold my fan betwixt thy dainty cheeks ...
— A Brother To Dragons and Other Old-time Tales • Amelie Rives
... legs are short, and it is wide across the breast and sholders in propotion to it's size, appears strongly formed in that part; the head is also bony muscular and stout, reather more blontly terminated wider and flatter than the common squirrel. the upper lip is split or divided to the nose. the ears are short and lie close to the head, having the appearance of being cut off, in this particular they resemble the guinea pig. the teeth are like those of the squrrel rat &c. they have a false jaw or pocket between ...
— The Journals of Lewis and Clark • Meriwether Lewis et al
... darkened by the awful shadow of woman's debasement. While man has admired and loved her, he has degraded her. Savage and civilized man are not very dissimilar in this respect. They both woo, cajole, and flatter woman to oppress and degrade her. They both load her with honeyed titles and flattering compliments, as though to sweeten with sugar-plum nonsense her bitter pressure of wrongs. It is the consent of all historians that woman has been elevated in proportion ...
— Aims and Aids for Girls and Young Women • George Sumner Weaver
... as I did bear the friar's style In me, God wot, was many wrink and wile, In me was falseness every wight to flatter, Which might be banished by no holy water; I was aye ready ...
— English Literature For Boys And Girls • H.E. Marshall
... a letter last night in some passion. I begin to fear again; I own myself a coward.—You made no reply to one part of my letter concerning my fortune. I am afraid you flatter yourself that my F. [father] may be at length reconciled and brought to reasonable terms. I am convinced, by what I have often heard him say, speaking of other cases like this, he never will. The fortune he has engaged to give with me, was settled on my B. [brother's] ...
— A Letter Book - Selected with an Introduction on the History and Art of Letter-Writing • George Saintsbury
... the Science of Language are enormous. There is no sphere of intellectual activity which has not felt more or less the influence of this new science. Nor is this to be wondered at. Language is the organ of all knowledge, and though we flatter ourselves that we are the lords of language, that we use it as a useful tool, and no more, believe me there are but few who can maintain their complete independence with respect to language, few who can ...
— Chips from a German Workshop - Volume IV - Essays chiefly on the Science of Language • Max Muller
... has been spread, may be call'd by so slight a term as accident. It is this approbation which makes it unnecessary for me to make any apology but to the author: as he cannot but feel some satisfaction in having pleas'd so many readers already, I flatter myself he will forgive my communicating that pleasure ...
— Notes & Queries, No. 50. Saturday, October 12, 1850 • Various
... while I am forced to see it glide away, to let it vanish, disappear forever! And alas! that is not all. If I have deceived an inexperienced heart by words spoken or deeds done in a moment of weakness or temptation, can I flatter myself that I have acted like an ...
— Jacqueline, Complete • (Mme. Blanc) Th. Bentzon
... up your mind to let me keep Johnnie entirely as mine. It puts a new value into life,—this chance of having an immortal intelligence placed in my hands to train. It will be a real delight to do so, and I flatter myself the result ...
— Nine Little Goslings • Susan Coolidge
... "Do not flatter yourself too far," replied the Hermit, "with the hope that I will positively yield to the frailty of pity. Why should I snatch a dupe, so well fitted to endure the miseries of life as you are, from the wretchedness which his own visions, ...
— The Black Dwarf • Sir Walter Scott
... countries we compare And estimate the blessings which they share, Though patriots flatter, yet shall wisdom find An equal ...
— The Philippine Islands • John Foreman
... just as painters heighten the effect of their pictures by the combination of light and shade, so by censure abuse detraction and ridicule of the opposite virtues secretly praise and foment the actual vices of those they flatter. Thus they censure modesty as merely rustic behaviour in the company of profligates, and greedy people, and villains, and such as have got rich by evil and dishonourable courses; and contentment and uprightness they call having no spirit or energy in action; and when they associate ...
— Plutarch's Morals • Plutarch
... I was trying to flatter, will you, but I was going to say, and too clever for that ...
— A Prince of Sinners • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... larger population than the 2,000,000 black men on the Southern plantation. It takes in all the foreigners daily landing in our eastern cities, the Chinese crowding our western shores, the inhabitants of Alaska, and all those western isles that will soon be ours. American statesmen may flatter themselves that by superior intelligence and political sagacity the higher orders of men will always govern, but when the ignorant foreign vote already holds the balance of power in all the large cities by sheer force of numbers, it is simply a question ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage
... theatres, balls, and parties, and other penalties of a similar nature, which form the criminal code of the confessional tribunal; and here it is easy to imagine what a latitude this faculty offers to gratify hatred, show revenge, flatter the powerful, and make things pleasant to those who have the power of conferring favours. The act concludes with the words of absolution, which is a formula consisting of a ...
— Roman Catholicism in Spain • Anonymous
... fringe being a soft lemon-yellow colour. The pedicels are slender and distant, causing the flower spikes, which are composed of four to eight flowers, to have a lax appearance. The leaves are few, 4in. to 6in. long, lance-shaped, concave, but flatter near the apex, of good substance and a dark ...
— Hardy Perennials and Old Fashioned Flowers - Describing the Most Desirable Plants, for Borders, - Rockeries, and Shrubberies. • John Wood
... cried he, "half so precious as your smallest satisfaction? do you suppose I can flatter myself with a possibility of contributing to it, and yet have the resolution to refuse myself so much pleasure? no, no, the heroic times are over, and self-denial ...
— Cecilia vol. 2 - Memoirs of an Heiress • Frances (Fanny) Burney (Madame d'Arblay)
... epitaphs that are but meant to flatter, But never are was sae profane, an' that's nae laughin' matter. Yet, gin he gies his siller all awa, mon, he's a dandy, An' we'll admit his right to it, for ...
— Autobiography of Andrew Carnegie • Andrew Carnegie
... Brentwood's about three o'clock in the afternoon. I flatter myself that I made a very successful approach, and created rather a sensation among the fourteen or fifteen people who were sitting in the verandah. They took me for a distinguished stranger. But when they saw who it was they all ...
— The Recollections of Geoffrey Hamlyn • Henry Kingsley
... tell me that you never take the trouble to flatter the inferior male. That's conflicting evidence, you know. Are you a man-hater, ...
— The Knave of Diamonds • Ethel May Dell
... a present of some far-fetched and elegant curiosity. I have been a little perplexed, I must honestly confess, where to obtain anything likely to please a princess of her exquisite taste. But this morning, I flatter myself, I have thought of precisely ...
— Myths and Legends of All Nations • Various
... Luxemburg, where the former means to wait for succours. There are not fifteen thousand troops in the provinces, and there are above forty thousand of the patriots already armed, and the whole country with them. They collect the revenues of the country, on which they maintain their army. They flatter themselves that, allowing for the necessary requisitions for passage, &c., no effectual force can be brought to act against them till the spring; and the style of the Emperor's concessions, as well as the mode of making them, looks as if he was of ...
— Memoirs of the Court and Cabinets of George the Third, Volume 2 (of 2) - From the Original Family Documents • The Duke of Buckingham
... whose manner suggested a charming frankness and innocence, took Peter by the arm. "Which of the three Graces do you mean to devote yourself to this afternoon, Peter? You shall not flatter us all ...
— The Automobile Girls At Washington • Laura Dent Crane
... day and country. A ludicrous pretence of education is banishing every form of native simplicity. In the large towns, the populace sink deeper and deeper into a vicious vulgarity, and every rural district is being affected by the spread of contagion. To flatter the proletariat is to fight against all the good that still characterises educated England—against reverence for the beautiful, against magnanimity, against enthusiasm ...
— Born in Exile • George Gissing
... senator of Rome. This honor was long the highest object of ambition, and so it seemed to Jacobus Pizinga, an illustrious Sicilian magistrate. Then came the Italian journey of Charles IV, whom it amused to flatter the vanity of ambitious men, and impress the ignorant multitude by means of gorgeous ceremonies. Starting from the fiction that the coronation of poets was a prerogative of the old Roman emperors, and consequently was no less his own, he crowned, May 15, 1355, the Florentine scholar Zanobi ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... about flowers to an agricultural bureau scientific, and about the chemistry of something to a savant or savan, or a word like that, of the Smithsonian Institution. I tell you, sisters, it was sharp work; but I flatter myself you were not ...
— Phemie Frost's Experiences • Ann S. Stephens
... not flattery at all. You know the truth too well. I am not ingenious enough to flatter you, Madame. Perfection is not flattered when it ...
— Don Orsino • F. Marion Crawford
... knowing what gentlemen like Jerry will do. To call them scoundrels is to flatter them: they are brigands, and the knifing, lounging rascals of Sicily and Calabria are mere children in villany compared with their English imitators. Places like The Chequers are the hunting-grounds of creatures like Jerry, and the bait of drink draws the victims ...
— The Chequers - Being the Natural History of a Public-House, Set Forth in - a Loafer's Diary • James Runciman
... to look at the table. One is not always looking. The other has that astonishment. Something has changed. That is what would be the defence if any one saw that she was flatter. She had the smile and it was not lightening all her evenings. They were not always too hot. They closed ...
— Matisse Picasso and Gertrude Stein - With Two Shorter Stories • Gertrude Stein
... as what he has been making himself, and in all probability never to be much more than he is at present. But, oh! my dear Honora! it is for thy sake only I wish for wealth.—You say she was somewhat better at the time you wrote last. I must flatter myself that she will soon be without any remains ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 6, No. 38, December, 1860 • Various
... you were, and after you told me that you had no resentment—I acknowledge that it is indelicate, if you choose to look at it in that light, but a man like me can't afford to let delicacy stand in his way. I don't want to flatter you, or get you to do this thing for me on false pretences. But I thought that if you went to Mrs. Hasketh for me, she would remember that you had overlooked something, and she would be ...
— A Pair of Patient Lovers • William Dean Howells
... ears. I am myself a poor creature, and yet complain of others! this you will, however, forgive, with the kindly heart that looks out from your eyes, and with the intelligence that dwells in your ears—at least, your ears know how to flatter when they listen. Mine, alas! are a barrier through which I can have hardly any friendly intercourse with mankind, else, perhaps, I might have acquired a still more entire confidence in you. As it ...
— Sketch of Handel and Beethoven • Thomas Hanly Ball
... his brother, and to flatter Cais with expressions of admiration all the way, until in the evening they arrived at the tribe of Fazarah. Hadifah, who at the moment was surrounded by many powerful chiefs, upon whose aid he depended in the hour of need, had changed his mind since his brother Haml's departure, ...
— Oriental Literature - The Literature of Arabia • Anonymous
... I do not flatter you in saying, that on no man in Upper Canada does the peace of our Church and of the Province so much depend, as on yourself. May all your powers be employed for good! Guard against the fascination of political fame. It will do no more for you on a dying bed ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... she looks as I did at her age," thought the candid lady; "but they must flatter me. My nose was never so straight as that: her nose is Belding all over. I wonder whom she will care about here? Mr. Furrey is a nice young man, but she is hardly polite to ...
— The Bread-winners - A Social Study • John Hay
... on the return to the village. On the road Bakahenzie sought to flatter MYalu by pretending to take him into his confidence, adjuring him to secrecy and informing him that he would cause it to be known that MYalu, the son of MBusa, would bring back the Bride of the Banana. MYalu ...
— Witch-Doctors • Charles Beadle
... he said, "it is seldom in my life that I have had to have recourse to physical violence, but I flatter myself that there is no man who would do me any harm. We will meet, then, at my house. You will bring the ...
— The Black Box • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... go back in that way? We have agreed that that should be regarded as done and gone. He has been very unhappy, and now we see what remedy he proposes to himself for his misery. Do I flatter myself if I allow myself to look at ...
— The Last Chronicle of Barset • Anthony Trollope
... sensed the satire. "We'll meet and vote the money and then we can sit back and take comfort in thinkin' that there's just the right man at the head of town affairs to economize us back onto Easy Street." He was eager to flatter. "This town understands what kind of a man it wants to keep in office. I take back all I ever said about ...
— The Skipper and the Skipped - Being the Shore Log of Cap'n Aaron Sproul • Holman Day
... to the following Comedy, which, though an unfinished one, is, I flatter myself, as complete a Mystery as any of ...
— Memoir of Jane Austen • James Edward Austen-Leigh
... go no further," Sandy broke in, with a laugh. "You flatter yourself! You think," he continued; "you've been incapable of thought for nearly two weeks. Neither of us would give a boddle for your opinion on any subject save one. I'll wager," he said, coming over ...
— Nancy Stair - A Novel • Elinor Macartney Lane
... Colonel Dodd, trying to make the state chairman hear him, for the roar that rocked the great hall was deafening. "A boomerang has come back and mowed us flatter than an oven door ...
— The Landloper - The Romance Of A Man On Foot • Holman Day
... the vast number of followers he feeds and clothes, and his singular disposition to pay hugely for small services. He is a most kind and indulgent master, and, provided his servants humor his peculiarities, flatter his vanity a little now and then, and do not peculate grossly on him before his face they may manage him to perfection. Everything that lives on him seems to thrive and grow fat. His house-servants ...
— The Sketch Book of Geoffrey Crayon, Gent. • Washington Irving
... duty to see that they are nourished and protected. To my mind there is more 'sympathy' in this than in railing at the rich and rendering the poor discontented, weaning them from their habitual attachments and respects, and teaching them that the political quacks and adventurers who flatter and cajole them ...
— The Greville Memoirs (Second Part) - A Journal of the Reign of Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1852 - (Volume 1 of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville
... impute the lowest motives may say if they will, that Daniel and the later Isaiah found it politic to worship the rising sun, and flatter the Persian conquerors: and that Cyrus and Darius in turn were glad to see Jerusalem rebuilt, as an impregnable frontier fortress between them and Egypt. Be it so; I, who wish to talk of things noble, pure, lovely and of good report, would rather point you once more to the magnificent poetry ...
— Lectures Delivered in America in 1874 • Charles Kingsley
... his communications on the subject of the tomb of Julius, saying that Michelangelo must not expect to satisfy the Duke without executing the work, in part at least, himself. "There is no one but yourself that harms you: I mean, your eminent fame and the greatness of your works. I do not say this to flatter you. Therefore, I am of opinion that, without some shadow of yourself, we shall never induce those parties to do what we want. It seems to me that you might easily make designs and models, and afterwards assign the completion to any master whom you ...
— The Life of Michelangelo Buonarroti • John Addington Symonds
... during the week, the market has been somewhat flatter in goods suited for the Eastern markets, in consequence of merchants being anxious to receive their advices by the Indian Mail before extending their transactions materially at present prices. In the Yorkshire woollen markets a fair trade continues to be done; and in Bradford a very active ...
— The Economist - Volume 1, No. 3 • Various
... only the continuous bump! bump! intermingled, just by way of variety, with divers side plunges and compound shakes; and they begin to flatter themselves that they are not so badly off, after all. At last, with a square plunge, which puts all on to their feet and then down into their seats with incredible quickness, the carriage stops,—and, after much outside commotion, Cudjoe appears at ...
— Uncle Tom's Cabin • Harriet Beecher Stowe
... orchard aisles are sweet With smell of ripening fruit. Through the sere grass, in shy retreat, Flatter, at coming feet, The robins ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 5, No. 30, April, 1860 • Various
... never, as yet, done full justice to the advantages of your own actual position in this respect. You have overlooked the great work immediately before you. We have no magic talisman to offer you in carrying out that work. We shall not flatter you with the promise of unlimited success; we shall not attempt to gratify any personal ambition of public honors. We have no novel theories or brilliant illusions with which ...
— Female Suffrage • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... better than women," said the stranger; "he doesn't flatter people, but of course his pictures are ...
— Orpheus in Mayfair and Other Stories and Sketches • Maurice Baring
... essentially heavy fare; a little goes a long way; I respect Bancroft, but I do not love him; he has moments when he feels himself inspired to open up his improvisations upon universal history and the designs of God; but I flatter myself I am more nearly acquainted with the latter than Mr. Bancroft. A man, in the words of my Plymouth Brother, "who knows the Lord," must needs, from time to time, write less emphatically. It is a fetter ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 23 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... give good words to ye will flatter Beneath abhorring. What would you have, you curs, That like not peace nor war? The one affrights you, The other makes you proud. He that trusts to you, Where he would find you lions, finds you hares; Where foxes, geese; you are ...
— Tolstoy on Shakespeare - A Critical Essay on Shakespeare • Leo Tolstoy
... fed from mysterious sources. Go to any suburban race meeting (I don't care which you pick) and you will fancy that Hell's tatterdemalions have got holiday. Whatsoever things are vile, whatsoever things are roguish, bestial, abominable, belong to the racecourse loafers. To call them thieves is to flatter them, for their impudent knavery transcends mere thieving; they have not a virtue; they are more than dangerous, and, if ever there comes a great social convulsion, they will let us know of their presence in an ...
— The Ethics of Drink and Other Social Questions - Joints In Our Social Armour • James Runciman
... amicably settled, of which circumstance I was unacquainted when I left England. I am now compleating my water, and have taken on board full 3 months wine for my compliment, with some fruit and vegetables, and purpose and flatter myself that I shall be able to sail from hence this evening. Inclosed I send the state and condition of His Majesty's Ship Pandora for their Lordships' information, and I ...
— Voyage of H.M.S. Pandora - Despatched to Arrest the Mutineers of the 'Bounty' in the - South Seas, 1790-1791 • Edward Edwards
... squeeze; and he returned to his place with a swelling heart, ready for Nick Grylls and any like him. But he would not allow himself to depart from the course he had laid out. In the past he had been compelled to conciliate, to flatter, to mould such men as Grylls for the advantage of the Leader; and he could certainly do it once more for the sake of Natalie. Nick faced him with a venomous eye, but was unable to make ...
— Two on the Trail - A Story of the Far Northwest • Hulbert Footner
... woman whose eyes, as she spoke, were upon the artist, answered, "You are pleased to flatter me, Mrs. Taine." ...
— The Eyes of the World • Harold Bell Wright
... in her pocket, and began to crack nuts and eat them. But Dan could not keep away from the subject. "Gad!" he ejaculated, "I thought they'd get hold of you, that lot, and flatter you, and make a convenience of you—that's what they do! I know them! They think you're clever—how easy it is to be mistaken! But you'll see for yourself in time, and then you'll believe me—when it's too late. For then you'll have got your name mixed up with them, and you'll not get over that, ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
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